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Trump Cancels Kimmel · Pod Save America

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  Speaker 1: That's Nutrafol.com. Promo code crooked. Welcome to Pod Save America.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: I'm Jon Favreau.
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
• 1:55
  Speaker 3: And I'm Alex Wagner.
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  Speaker 1: Alex, it's great to have you here in person. What
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: a thrill. And... Do we have a big announcement?
• 2:03
  Speaker 3: We sure do.
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  Speaker 1: Alex is joining the Pod Save America family and coming
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: back to the Crooked Network. What? I say back because
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: you did have a pod with us once. I did.
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: It was a limited edition. It was just a pop-up.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: Limited no longer. You're going to be a regular contributor
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: to this show.
• 2:20
  Speaker 4: What?
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America.
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: Nobody told me that.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: And hosting a new show for us starting in October.
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  Speaker 5: Yes.
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  Speaker 1: What can you tell us about the new pod?
• 2:29
  Speaker 3: The new pod, name TBD. We got some good front runners.
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  Speaker 3: We're going to drop that later on in the month.
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: I will be bringing you stories from the front line.
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: I mean, I think one of the things that's missing
• 2:39
  Speaker 3: in all of this news is we got a lot
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: of analysis, but we don't have a lot of storytelling
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: about how these policies and how these, you know, how
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: the politics themselves are playing out at the human level.
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: And so We will be talking to people who are
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: at the center of the headlines, whether they are red
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: state farmers or anti-vaxxers in Texas or undocumented migrants caught
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: in dragnets. I mean, you're going to really get a visceral,
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: emotional perspective on what's playing out in our national dialogue.
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: And then we're pairing that with some really smart contextualizing
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: from the The brightest minds I know. I'm sure you
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: guys will be drafted in when we can't book those people.
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: I'm just kidding. You are those people.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: I was going to make that joke myself.
• 3:22
  Speaker 3: But I'm really excited. I'm someone that has a real
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: passion for talking to people who are outside of the studio.
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: And I think this will complement what is out there
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: and the suite of incredible programming you have here at Crooked.
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: So I'm super thrilled. And let's just be honest. The
• 3:38
  Speaker 3: snacks here are A +.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's high praise.
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's our X-Bars, people. What's not to love?
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: We are so excited about this. And I'm especially excited
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: you're doing that show because you are so good at
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: going out into the world and talking to folks. And
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: I've watched you do it for many years. Um, love
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: talking to you about politics, always on and off mic,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: on and off screen. And so we feel very, very
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: lucky to have you. I'm super excited. Super excited.
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: Dan's here in person.
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  Speaker 1: Like just for the day.
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: It's unbelievable. I feel so, I almost, I like, I
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: almost started crying.
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: It was weird. You requested that in your negotiations. I'd
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: be here on your first day, but I was willing
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: to do it.
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: Contractual obligation. But thank you for taking one for the team, Dan.
• 4:21
  Speaker 3: It's great to see you in person.
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: Well, What a first day. Whoa. What a first day.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: We have a lot of awfulness to cover just for you.
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: Thanks.
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  Speaker 1: We got government crackdowns. We got political purges, anti-vax, kooks
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: causing mayhem, and Kamala Harris spilling the tea about 2024.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: But let's start with Donald Trump using the power of
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: the state to cancel a late night show that made
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: fun of him. I just want to quickly go through
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: the chain of events that led Disney to pull Jimmy
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: Kimmel off the air because there seems to be some confusion.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: willful or not, over how this went down. So here's
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: Trump's reaction back in July to CBS canceling Stephen Colbert's show,
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: which took place as the media company needed Trump's FCC
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: to approve its merger. He said, quote, I absolutely love
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: that Colbert got fired. I hear Jimmy Kimmel is next. Now,
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: here's Jimmy Kimmel's initial reaction to Charlie Kirk's assassination. I
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: think this was the night after it happened. Let's listen.
• 5:23
  Speaker 6: We're like the rest of the country. We're still trying
• 5:25
  Speaker 6: to wrap our heads around the senseless murder of the
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  Speaker 6: popular podcaster and conservative activist Charlie Kirk yesterday, whose death
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  Speaker 6: has amplified our anger, our differences. And I've seen a
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  Speaker 6: lot of extraordinarily vile responses to this from both sides
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  Speaker 6: of the political spectrum. Some people are cheering this, which
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  Speaker 6: is something I won't ever understand.
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  Speaker 1: Jimmy also posted on social media, like hours after the assassination, quote,
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  Speaker 1: Instead of the angry finger pointing, can we just for
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  Speaker 1: one day agree that it is horrible and monstrous to
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  Speaker 1: shoot another human? On behalf of my family, we send
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: love to the Kirks and to all the children, parents,
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: and innocents who fall victim to senseless gun violence. So
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  Speaker 1: then on Monday, earlier this week, Kimmel again talked about
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  Speaker 1: the assassination. And this was the night before the press
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  Speaker 1: conference where law enforcement confirmed for the first time reports
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  Speaker 1: that the killer had left-leaning political views. We had heard
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  Speaker 1: that it was probably the case from Governor Spencer Cox
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  Speaker 1: on some of the Sunday shows, but this is the
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  Speaker 1: first we heard from law enforcement at the press conference
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  Speaker 1: where they actually laid out the charges against the killer.
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  Speaker 1: So let's listen to the clip that got Kimmel in
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  Speaker 1: all this trouble.
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  Speaker 6: We had some new lows over the weekend with the
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  Speaker 6: MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered
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  Speaker 6: Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and
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  Speaker 6: doing everything they can to score political points from it.
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  Speaker 1: In response to that, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr went on
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  Speaker 1: Benny Johnson's podcast, as one does, and said the following.
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  Speaker 5: When you look at the conduct that has taken place
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  Speaker 5: by Jimmy Kimmel, it appears to be some of the
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  Speaker 5: sickest conduct possible. Frankly, when you see stuff like this,
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  Speaker 5: I mean, look, we can do this the easy way
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  Speaker 5: or the hard way. These companies can find ways to
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  Speaker 5: change conduct, to take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there's
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  Speaker 5: going to be additional work for the FCC ahead. I
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  Speaker 5: think that it's really sort of past time that a
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  Speaker 5: lot of these licensed broadcasters themselves push back on Comcast
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  Speaker 5: and Disney and say, listen, we are going to preempt.
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  Speaker 5: We are not going to run Kimmel anymore. And so
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  Speaker 5: you straighten this out because we, we licensed broadcaster, are
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  Speaker 5: running the possibility of fines or license revocation from the
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  Speaker 5: FCC if we continue to run content that ends up
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  Speaker 5: being a pattern of news distortion.
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  Speaker 1: Hours later, one of those licensed broadcasters that he was
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  Speaker 1: talking about, the media conglomerate Nexstar, which runs a lot
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: of local ABC affiliates and also, just by coincidence, needs
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: Trump's FCC to approve its merger with another broadcaster. they
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  Speaker 1: announced that they would pull Kimmel's show from all of
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: their local affiliates. Right after that, Disney ABC made the
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: decision to suspend the show indefinitely, which is where we
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: are as of this recording on Thursday afternoon. And in
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: case there's still any confusion about the government's role in
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  Speaker 1: all this, Donald Trump and his FCC chairman celebrated the
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: news on social media by congratulating ABC. And then the
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  Speaker 1: president said this on his flight home from the.
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  Speaker 4: U.K., Kimmel had, look, he was fired, he had no talent.
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  Speaker 4: He's a whack job. I read someplace that the networks
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  Speaker 4: were 97% against me. I got 97% negative, and yet
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  Speaker 4: I won it easily. I won all seven spring states, popular,
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: but won everything. And they're 97% against. They give me
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  Speaker 4: holy bed publicity for press. I mean, they're getting a license,
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  Speaker 4: I would think. Maybe their license should be taken away.
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  Speaker 4: It will be up to Brendan Carr. I think Brendan
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  Speaker 4: Carr is outstanding.
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  Speaker 1: Of course you do. So we got Trump influencers out
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  Speaker 1: there saying, this isn't a government crackdown on free speech.
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  Speaker 1: It was a private business deciding to take action against
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  Speaker 1: a host who made comments that they found inaccurate and inappropriate. Thoughts, Alex?
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  Speaker 3: Just correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the statement,
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  Speaker 3: we can do this the easy way or we can
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  Speaker 3: do this the hard way, what mob hitmen say right
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  Speaker 3: before they take someone out. I mean, the lack of
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  Speaker 3: subtlety here is staggering. The idea, first of all, if
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  Speaker 3: we get into the comments themselves from Jimmy, he's actually
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  Speaker 3: not even talking about Charlie Kirk. He's talking about the MAGA, right?
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  Speaker 3: And if you're looking, I mean, there's going to be
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  Speaker 3: a lot of parsing about how much was known and
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  Speaker 3: how much wasn't known. But at the end of the day,
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  Speaker 3: this wasn't actually a statement about Charlie Kirk or his legacy.
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  Speaker 3: It was about the behavior of the MAGA, right? And
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  Speaker 3: you can take issue with that. You can not like
• 10:12
  Speaker 3: the characterization, but is it reason to end someone's television show?
• 10:17
  Speaker 3: I mean, I don't think it's even close. And if
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  Speaker 3: you compare that to what happens elsewhere, and especially on
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: the other side of the aisle, and not that Jimmy
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  Speaker 3: Kimmel is a leftist propagandist, it's terrifying. And I will
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: say it's not the end, right? What we are learning,
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: and I think it's very meaningful, that ABC is also
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: the network that opened the door to settling with Trump
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: and normalized it. after George Stephanopoulos made comments that Trump
• 10:45
  Speaker 3: didn't like and they settled for $ 15 million. And I think,
• 10:49
  Speaker 3: you know, there's a thinking that appease Trump once and
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: he'll go easier on you the second time. And the
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: reality is the only people that bend the knee further
• 10:59
  Speaker 3: are the people that bent it the first time. What
• 11:01
  Speaker 3: does that metaphor mean?
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  Speaker 4: I don't know.
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  Speaker 3: But I just, the fact that ABC did it.
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  Speaker 1: Both knees bent now.
• 11:05
  Speaker 3: I think it, well, they're on both knees. We're going
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: to let that metaphor lie. I just think it made
• 11:12
  Speaker 3: it easier for Bob Iger to say, we're going to
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: do this because they'd done it once. And that should
• 11:16
  Speaker 3: be chilling given the fact that there are other networks
• 11:19
  Speaker 3: that have also made settlements with Trump. And I'm sure
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: there are lawsuits to follow.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: Dan, what do you think?
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  Speaker 2: I mean, he explicitly threatens ABC first because he says
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: it's easier with a hard bike. And then if it's
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: the hard way, the FCC is going to have more
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: work to do, meaning they're going to open an investigation.
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: And just go beyond what your point about Nexstar is.
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: So Nexstar has a bunch of local television affiliates. They
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: are trying to buy another conglomerate. They don't just need
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: FCC approval for the deal. They need the FCC to
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: lift what is called the 39% cap because by FCC rule,
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: no single entity can own TV stations that reach more
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: than 40% of the public. So they have everything riding
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: on this. And this is why, in a very obvious
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: and nefarious way, Brendan Carr mentioned the local affiliates, because
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: that's where the leverage is. That's where you can put
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: pressure on. And they did it. And this is not
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: ABC or just a company making a decision. This is
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: not consequences. This is a government censorship. This is a
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: government threatening a private business with regulation, or in the
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: case of these local affiliates, potential financial collapse, if they
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: do not do what the government wants. In this case,
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: what the government wanted was to end the show of
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: a late night comedy host over one comment made.
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: Can I also just say, if the FCC does rewrite
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: the rules for Nextar, they'll have access to 80% of
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: American television screens at home. I mean, that's a huge
• 12:45
  Speaker 3: sphere of influence.
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: You know who else jumped up to poke their head
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: out to talk about this? It's Sinclair Broadcasting. It was like, yeah, absolutely.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: We're going to pull Jimmy Kimmel, too. And also, we
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: should go for, and we're going to do, I think
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: Sinclair promised that they're going to devote a couple hours
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: to Charlie Kirk either the funeral, either the memorial service
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: or just like maybe.
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: They're going to air a memorial documentary during the Jimmy
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: Kimmel hour.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: Right, that's what's interesting.
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: They were originally going to preempt Jimmy Kimmel with this.
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: And they want Jimmy Kimmel to make a donation. They
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: don't think him being taken off the air is sufficient.
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: I believe they want a formal apology and a donation
• 13:23
  Speaker 3: to Charlie Kirk's family.
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: I thought it was the Turning Point USA.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: I mean, who.
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: Perhaps it's Turning Point USA, his political family.
• 13:30
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: If Jimmy Kimmel had said, If the joke was around, like,
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: you know, and we think now it could be a
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: MAGA person who did this. Like, that is going further
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: than he did. That would still not be a reason
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: to take him off the air, right? That is a
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: factual inaccuracy that then he could come on the next
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: day and be like, oh, I'm going to correct it.
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: Which he was planning to do before they took a
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: show off the air.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: What he said just then wasn't even technically inaccurate if
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: you were actually going to go parse the fucking statement,
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: which I hate doing because that's not the point.
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: But, like, he's saying that over the weekend, MAGA was
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: trying to point it anywhere but themselves. And, of course,
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: they were doing that. It just turned out to be
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: someone who was left-leaning. And if you didn't watch the
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: Sunday shows and saw that Spencer Cox said, oh, we
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: think now it's left-wing ideology— you wouldn't have known because
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: the only other people that were saying it's radical left
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: was Donald Trump and the administration offering no evidence for that. Exactly.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: And as soon as I heard the actual district attorney
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: get up at a press conference on Tuesday and say,
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: here are the text messages, then I was like, oh yeah,
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: of course. After that, no one should pretend, I think,
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: it's a MAGA person or it's anyone but what he's
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: saying is in the text. And I complained about this earlier.
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: Some people are like, maybe the texts are doctored. And
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: it's like, no, the texts are not doctored.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: We are where we are.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: The district attorney does not, this is evidence in a trial,
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: you know?
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: Well, I will also say Brendan Carr has done a
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: lot of media since this happened. And his, even his
• 15:04
  Speaker 3: indignation shapeshifts, right? Sometimes it's directed at, you know, what
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: Kimmel said. And sometimes it's about the ideology that Kimmel represented.
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: And it's just very clear that this wasn't, it was
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: no crisis should go wasted or every crisis is an opportunity.
• 15:19
  Speaker 3: And It's clear that he saw, as many Trump lackeys do,
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: an opportunity to get in good with the big boss, right?
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: We know that Donald Trump wants Jimmy Kimmel to be next,
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: so let's find a way to get Jimmy Kimmel off
• 15:32
  Speaker 3: the air.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: I mean, I get the affiliates. What is Disney ABC doing?
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: Well, Disney has big business, right? I mean, all of
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: these companies have big business. They have a deal with
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: the NFL, which is critical to the future of ESPN.
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: Sports are a huge part of the survival of linear
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: television and cable. And Bob Iger understands that. And some
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: of that business may come before the FCC. And look,
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: Trump has made no secret of punishing his enemies and
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: rewarding his allies. And they'd rather stay in his good
• 16:02
  Speaker 3: graces when they have millions of dollars on the line.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: And this is ultimately the problem with CBS in the
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: Paramount settlement is The news and quasi-news functions at these
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: large corporations that own media companies are meaningless in the
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: bottom line. We don't know that Kimmel's losing money, but
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: if you look at all the other shows, it probably is.
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: They're certainly not making a ton of money. And so
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: Disney already went through this with Florida and DeSantis when
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: they were going to take away the tax exemption around
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: the theme parks. And so they were very worried. And
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: they're making these business decisions, the same ones The Washington
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: Post is making. It's the same ones Paramount is making
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: all across the board. And it says something about the
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: leaders of these companies. Because if they're not going to
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: stand up for the First Amendment, if the people who
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: own media companies aren't, fair question, who is going to
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: stand up for it? And it says something just about
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: the ultimate failure of the corporate media model in this moment.
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: Iger knows the stakes here. And that's why it's like,
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: I think this was, also the blowback he's going to
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: get in this town is going to be intense.
• 17:01
  Speaker 7: Intense.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: Because people, I mean, it's just been a day and
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: You know, my phone's been blowing up. I'm sure everyone,
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: like people are fucking outraged. Outraged. There's people protesting outside
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: of Disney today.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: And Kimmel is different than Colbert in that Kimmel, he's
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: like the mascot for Disney. He hosts the upfronts every
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: year for them. Mayor of Hollywood.
• 17:20
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah, he's a Hollywood guy. I mean, Stephen's on the
• 17:23
  Speaker 3: East Coast, and as a fellow East Coaster, I know
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: you guys don't pay that much attention to what happens
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: to us. But now.
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: Of course we do. The whole world has to. It's
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: happening in New York. It's happening everywhere.
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: Oh, another hurricane coming up the East Coast.
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: I sense a little ego bruising.
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: Look, I'm an East Coast native, so I can say
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: that now.
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: But yeah, I mean, I think, and Kimmel has an
• 17:45
  Speaker 3: extraordinary amount of goodwill, right? I mean, and this is
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: so transparent. Unlike, first of all, I think it informs
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: what happened at CBS with Colbert because there was a
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: lot of kind of, well, maybe it wasn't about this
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: and it was just about revenue and I never bought
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: any of that. Just for the record, this makes it
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: quite clear that the corporate overlords bowed.
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: So in his post on Monday night, Trump also called
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: on NBC to finish the job by firing Seth Meyers
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: and Jimmy Fallon. You heard him in that clip. musing
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: about pulling broadcast licenses when he was talking on Air
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: Force One. Carr, FCC chairman, has done the same thing.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: He's been doing the same thing. None of these people
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: are at all cowed by this or trying to be
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: subtle anymore. Where do you guys think this goes next?
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: Well, Brendan Carr was on, I can't remember how to
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: say this, but was on Scott Jennings' radio show today.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: Thank you.
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: The thing they got into, which I think is the
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: next step here, is under the equal opportunity provision where
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: basically you have to give both sides opportunity on broadcast television.
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: There is a carve-out for what are called bona fide
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: news programs. So basically the idea is if every news
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: show had to give every candidate equal time, you couldn't
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: really run the news. So news programs don't have to
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: do it. If CBS interview, or 60 Minutes interviews Kamala Harris,
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: they don't have to, by law, interview Donald Trump too,
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: especially if Donald Trump's going to quit in the middle
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: of the interview. But they've also carved out late night
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: comedy shows, daytime talk shows, basically anyone that is in
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: the news entertainment space has been carved out. This was
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: specifically mentioned as a way in which the FCC could
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: go after the view. And so I think this is
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: the next place they're going to, they want to put as,
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: they understand.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they've been mentioning, yeah, so Carr talked about the view.
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they understand, Carr understands, Trump understands that these media
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: entities are at their weakest point since the invention of
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: the printing press, right? The economics of the old media
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: model are falling apart. out the bottom rapidly. And so
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: they can put tremendous pressure on them and they will
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: give in part because the only way that a lot
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: of these companies can save themselves is through mergers. They
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: are trying to get bought.
• 19:50
  Speaker 6: Right?
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: It's why Warner Brothers Discovery is spinning out their cable
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: entities like CNN. It's why NBC, Comcast did the same
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: thing with MSNBC because they want to get bought. If
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: you're going to get bought, you need either FCC or
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: if you're a cable network, FTC approval. And so Trump
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: has all the leverage here.
• 20:09
  Speaker 3: I just got back from Hungary a couple months ago,
• 20:12
  Speaker 3: and I remember thinking, is this premature, really looking to
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: Hungary as a roadmap for what's going to happen to America?
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: And it turns out no, because what Orban did, which
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: is exactly what's happening here, although perhaps even less artfully,
• 20:25
  Speaker 3: is he effectively either shut down major news outlets, newspapers,
• 20:28
  Speaker 3: or he got his oligarch friends to buy them, and
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: then they became mouthpieces for the state. And what you
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: are seeing right now is a consolidation. You're seeing, you know...
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: whether the marketplace does it or whether it's the FCC,
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: you are seeing companies that are either not going to
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: survive or they're going to get bought out by people
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: who are allies of Trump or explicitly have told the
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: White House they will be allies of Trump. And as
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: a result, you know, in Hungary, I believe it's like
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: 80% of the free press is effectively state media. And
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: so what's left are a hodgepodge of really essential... actual
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: news groups. Some of them are digital. Some of them
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: are podcasting. It's basically left to sort of the grassroots
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: to be the place for information and analysis and, you know,
• 21:16
  Speaker 3: real facts. And that's terrifying. But I don't, I mean,
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: I think that that's our future.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: I don't say this to be self-serving. I wish we
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: didn't have to say it, but like, yeah, we don't,
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: he's not coming after podcasts.
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: You don't have a deal with the NFL?
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: No, we don't have a deal with the NFL.
• 21:30
  Speaker 4: Not yet.
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: I mean, they'll find ways to come after anyone, I'm sure,
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: but there's no FCC relationship.
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: Yes, but don't open the door. Don't pay attention to
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: what's happening here.
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: But it is a good time to support independent media.
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: And to come subscribe to Cricket and come hang with
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: us because we have lots. I will say that it also,
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: they don't have to carry through on all the threats
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: to the point about The View. The View today did
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: not mention Kimmel.
• 21:55
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: Did not mention it.
• 21:57
  Speaker 4: Yeah, right.
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: Part of it is just the chilling effect.
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: And now, it could be because of the chilling effect.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: I'm also wondering, though, because I saw Dylan Byers at
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: Puck reported last night briefly that Disney leadership said that
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: they are trying to work something out to get Jimmy
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: back on the air eventually. Do you think that there's
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: a chance that... Work something out?
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: They just have to say, put him back on the air.
• 22:19
  Speaker 8: Right.
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: And that's... You're like, what is the.
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: What is the... Like, are we settling with Brendan Carr
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: over this? Like, what the fuck are we doing? You're
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: in charge. It's your company. It's It's a free country.
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: Well, but will Jimmy want to go back? I mean,
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: that's the question. Like, if you can't say what he said,
• 22:32
  Speaker 3: you're a comedian. The whole point is you can speak
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: without using four-letter words. You're speaking uncensored to make, you know,
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: light of parody or otherwise stick it to people in power.
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: And if he can't do that, and if he feels
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: like he's under a microscope, I don't know how you
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: do the same show.
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: No, in fact, if he came back, he would have to,
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: in the most factual way possible, kick the shit out
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: of Donald Trump.
• 22:55
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: And show people that he's not afraid. That's like the
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: only way you can come back at this point. Um,
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: thoughts on the best way for, uh, for Democrats, maybe
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: in Congress, elected Democrats, and really all free speech lovers, uh,
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: to respond to this. I know that, um, Democrats are
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: going to subpoena Carr, um, and, uh, and then launch
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: an investigation. I think Eric Swalwell said, you know, we're
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: going to get the house back in a year. And
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: so I would tell everyone at the FCC and Brendan
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: Carr to keep all your documents and get ready to
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: So I like his optimism. I like Eric Swalwell's optimism.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: But what do you think? Is that all we can do?
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: We have limited actual power here. The Senate Dems sent
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: a letter demanding all documents, but it is not even
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: worth the paper it's printed on. We've seen the Trump
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: administration simply ignore subpoenas before. It's not going to ignore that.
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: The idea that we're going to pass legislation in a
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: world where we don't have the House or the Senate
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: is also impossible. What we have to do is speak out.
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: And, and it isn't, we're gonna talk about this later
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: in the pod too, but right here, you have big
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: government colluding with big business to try to stifle dissent
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: in this country, right. To take away the freedom of
• 24:02
  Speaker 2: speech of people. And you should call that out. That
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: is the exact kind of corruption that drives people insane.
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: And we should be willing to say that we should
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: say it clearly, we should say it compellingly and we
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: should do that. And then ultimately, I think, you know,
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: you mentioned supporting, um, independent media. we also shouldn't be
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: looking to our elected leaders.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: To do this, right?
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: Like this is, we all have the capacity. We have our,
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: our attention is our most valuable asset in this media environment.
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: And we should use that and direct it to places
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: that are actually going to hold Trump accountable. And if
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: entities are not going to do that, then they shouldn't
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: get our support. They shouldn't get our, our dollars and
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: they shouldn't get our eyeballs.
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: I I've learned something from the Jeffrey Epstein, uh, saga,
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: which is an overall say that, um, I think what
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: really resonates with this White House is when you can
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: pull at least a couple of people over from the
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: manosphere or wherever who still see the import of all this,
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: whether it's Joe Rogan or Megyn Kelly. But I think
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: it's not about bipartisanship, but it's about exacting some kind
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: of cost among people that this administration cares about. And
• 25:11
  Speaker 3: I do think somewhere out there are people who are
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: on the hard right, who are in the conservative movement
• 25:17
  Speaker 3: who are free speech defenders who understand, who see this
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: for what it is. And also, by the way, like
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: maybe there's a Democrat in power one day. You don't
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: want that Democratic president pulling what Trump is pulling. I mean,
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: you just have to paint a scenario that is compelling
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: enough to get I mean, the hope is a few
• 25:34
  Speaker 3: people that matter aligned on this, and maybe that makes
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: a difference next time they try and do something like this.
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: But I do think, you know, the reason the Epstein
• 25:43
  Speaker 3: thing was so potent was because Trump felt like it
• 25:45
  Speaker 3: was costing him. And until it feels like it costs
• 25:48
  Speaker 3: them with people who matter, they'll just keep doing it
• 25:50
  Speaker 3: with impunity.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: Speaking of Epstein, did you guys, there is one fire
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: tweet from a Democrat in power that came across my
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: screen just before we started recording.
• 26:02
  Speaker 4: Mr.
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: Chuck Schumer. All caps. Are you ready for it? Is
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: Epstein the real reason Trump had Kimmel canceled? Exclamation question mark.
• 26:11
  Speaker 3: Hitting him where it hurts.
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: I'm glad that Alex hadn't seen it, so I get
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: your first reaction. I had to read the tweet three
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: times and look at the account to make sure it
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: wasn't a parody. So that's what we're working with. I
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: think your point is well taken.
• 26:26
  Speaker 3: Bringing it back home, Chuck.
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: I saw Mike Birbiglia comedian who is a friend of
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: the show.
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: Been on the show, yes.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: Been on the show many times. One of the funnier
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: comedians I've ever known. You know, he posted last night.
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: He was like, I have stood up for a lot
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: of other comedians in public and in private who people
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: were saying should be canceled or told a joke that
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: people found offensive. He's like, and now I want to
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: see all those comedians and everyone else standing up for
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: free speech. And sure enough today, I've seen a lot
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: of comedians like Andrew Schultz, The Flagrant Podcast, Tim Dillon.
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: A lot of these guys came out and were like,
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: all right, we're going to complain about this. I also think,
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: I don't know, the entertainment industry, they have some power here.
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: The people, the actors, artists, the staff. Also, it's not
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: just Jimmy Kimmel potentially losing his job here. Jimmy Kimmel
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: will probably be fine. But there's a lot of people
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: on that show. A lot of staff on that show.
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: People work on that show. And you do that plus
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: the Colbert show, you do that plus any other kind
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: of show that they're targeting. Like, I think that, you know,
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: I'm interested to see what happens in Hollywood and Los
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: Angeles and this town where the entertainment industry is such
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: a critical part of the economy. Like, I could see,
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: I've already heard rumblings of this. Artists, actors, celebrities, like, saying,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: you know, we're gonna, I mean, Damon Lindelof already posted,
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: and he's a writer, director in Hollywood.
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: You may remember from Lost.
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: From Lost, exactly. Said that he will not be working
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: with abc or disney until they bring back jimmy or
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: do something and i i would love to see other
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: uh entertainers do the same thing.
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: It has to be talent driven because it's not going
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: to come from it's not going to come from the
• 28:05
  Speaker 3: the production company it's not going to come from the
• 28:07
  Speaker 3: the networks themselves it has to be from the people
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: they rely on to make great content hundred.
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: Percent hundred percent.
• 28:19
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• 29:56
  Speaker 1: Incredibly, Kimmel was not Trump's only attempt to silence the
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: media this week. He's also suing the New York Times
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: for a cool $ 15 billion because I guess they didn't
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: adequately praise his business acumen. And the editorial board endorsed
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris. Those were just two of the many complaints.
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: I don't know if you've read the whole lawsuit. I
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: did not. I kind of skimmed it.
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: No, I read the highlights.
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: You read the highlights? It seems like he knows this
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: is frivolous, but he's just enjoying it. What do you
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: guys think? What's the purpose of this?
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: I mean, the best part of it is that one
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: of the central arguments is that in a book written
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: by New York Times employees, they say that Mark Burnett
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: discovered Trump. And Trump's argument, which is then laid out
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: with a lot of facts and footnotes, is that he
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: was actually a celebrity before Mark Burnett discovered him. So
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: because he was a celebrity, he could not be discovered. Ergo,
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: you owe me $ 15 million.
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: Billion.
• 30:47
  Speaker 4: Oh, billion.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: Excuse me.
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: Excuse me.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: I was trying to settle.
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: It's billion with a B.
• 30:51
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: It seems like that's not going to, although they did
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: file it in Tampa.
• 30:55
  Speaker 3: I mean, hoping for Aileen.
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: They're hoping for Aileen.
• 30:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly.
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: Is that what they're hoping?
• 30:58
  Speaker 3: Come on, Aileen.
• 30:59
  Speaker 8: I just, the peevishness, the like, the juvenile, it's just
• 31:04
  Speaker 8: the ego stroking is so, I'm waiting for him to
• 31:07
  Speaker 8: appear in the street in an invisible cloak that everybody
• 31:10
  Speaker 8: has to praise.
• 31:11
  Speaker 5: You know?
• 31:11
  Speaker 3: Like, it's so pathetic.
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 31:17
  Speaker 3: And it's such a waste of time. But I guess
• 31:19
  Speaker 3: it makes him happy to throw these numbers around. He's
• 31:22
  Speaker 3: not going to win. I do worry about the fact that,
• 31:25
  Speaker 3: you know, this is all so onerous. And it's– all
• 31:30
  Speaker 3: these newspapers, when they publish these accounts or books, as
• 31:33
  Speaker 3: Suzanne Craig did, lucky loser. Go buy it.
• 31:36
  Speaker 8: Mm-hmm.
• 31:37
  Speaker 3: They fact-checked the shit out of it. They have a
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: lot of legal. They have the receipts. They're ready. This
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: is just going to make more work on that back end,
• 31:44
  Speaker 3: and it makes it harder to do deep investigative reporting.
• 31:46
  Speaker 3: And that, I think, is the most meaningful effect of
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: all of this because you know you're going to get sued,
• 31:50
  Speaker 3: and then you have to, you know, just make sure
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: everything is watertight because it's the era of Trump.
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: I mean, sued the Wall Street Journal over the Epstein
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: birthday letter, book. Then they produced the book, produced the
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: letter with his signature, and they're like, no, still fake.
• 32:08
  Speaker 3: Not his signature.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: I mean, he did sue the Des Moines Register because
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: of a poll that had him winning Iowa insufficiently.
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: Just fucking real. Well, we talked about maybe the digital
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: platforms will save us. President's also moving to exert more
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: control over those. When Trump and Scott Besant said earlier
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: in the week that they'd reach a deal to transfer
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: ownership of TikTok to an American company, we had a
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: hunch that the lucky winners would be Trump friends. And
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: sure enough, Looks like a consortium of investors led by
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: Trump allies, donors Larry Ellison and Marc Andreessen will be
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: getting an 80% stake. Trump was asked on Thursday morning
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: who would control the algorithm and he didn't answer. I'm
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: guessing because the answer is still China.
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: Or he doesn't know what an algorithm is, which I
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: think is highly likely.
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: That is a very good point. Very good point.
• 32:57
  Speaker 3: Or he doesn't actually know what the deal is. I mean,
• 32:58
  Speaker 3: he just doesn't know.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: Any of it. He's not in the weeds on this
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: kind of stuff. Thoughts about the TikTok of it all?
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: So I think this is a gigantic deal. Based on
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: the reporting that we've seen, they may not know who's
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: going to control the algorithm. But if China controls the algorithm,
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: then it entirely defeats the purpose of the original legislation,
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: which was that they were very concerned about China, a
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: company with ties to the Chinese government, putting their thumb
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: on the scale about what content Americans get.
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: Well, remember, there's two concerns. There's one that's a data
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: privacy concern.
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: And you can solve that problem without the algorithm. The
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: algorithm is a bigger problem.
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: It's a much more mass problem for everyone to deal with.
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: And so if you, so let's assume that they're either
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: going to license it to the U S and the
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: U S consortium is going to have some control over it.
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: There is almost nothing more powerful that someone could have
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: in media in the world today than control the TikTok algorithm, right?
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: It is a, what a world.
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: It is a leading source. It is a rapidly growing
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: source of news for all Americans, particularly younger Americans. It
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: is incredibly addictive. It is incredibly powerful. It doesn't just
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: set news, but it sets culture in this country in
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: a very powerful way. And if you want to know
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: how dangerous it is to get an algorithm in the
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: wrong person's hands, look at what Elon Musk did to
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: Twitter when he got control of the algorithm. So we're
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: living in a world, and I'm sure they'll say this
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: would never happen, but where a bunch of pro-Trump billionaires,
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: including Marc Andreessen, who is very avowedly pro-MAGA, can put
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: their thumb on the scale to make TikTok be as
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: pro-MAGA as Elon has made Twitter? And that is a very,
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: very dangerous thing because that is the, you know, you
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: now have pro-Trump billionaires controlling if this deal goes through. TikTok, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp.
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: Maybe we are depending on LinkedIn. LinkedIn and Pinterest are
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: going to save us. Well, Pinterest will save us. That
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: is the distribution pipes of news and information in this country.
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: The vast majority of them.
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: Oh, you forgot blue sky.
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: I forgot blue sky. I mean, the one outstanding one.
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: I just get myself in trouble. You do. I was
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: just going to say, you're awesome.
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: I mean, the one, obviously the biggest platform, most powerful
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: one is YouTube, which is owned by Google, not controlled
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: by a pro-Trump billionaire. Also, if you've been on YouTube recently,
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: not exactly a fountain of progressive pro-democracy thought.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: Subscribe to us on YouTube.
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: There you go.
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: We did that.
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: Because Elijah's in the office.
• 35:27
  Speaker 5: Today.
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: But I think it's a huge, huge deal.
• 35:30
  Speaker 3: And I think it's also happening. I mean, these are
• 35:34
  Speaker 3: profound seismic changes in terms of the way we get information.
• 35:37
  Speaker 3: And I do think it's happening largely because it's a
• 35:41
  Speaker 3: business concern. And, you know, camel getting canceled is very
• 35:45
  Speaker 3: clear to the American public. Okay, that looks like censorship.
• 35:48
  Speaker 3: That looks like a curbing of free speech. That looks
• 35:50
  Speaker 3: like a First Amendment concern. This feels like, okay, it
• 35:53
  Speaker 3: can happen and it could be ultimately much more influential.
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: The impact of it could be much more impactful, and
• 36:02
  Speaker 3: there is not the same level of awareness or outcry
• 36:04
  Speaker 3: about what's going on here. And that seems insanely dangerous.
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: Especially because the impact is one that a lot of
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: people just won't recognize.
• 36:11
  Speaker 3: Right, exactly.
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: This has been our problem with social media the whole time, right?
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: It's like, I'm just looking at my TikTok. It's great.
• 36:15
  Speaker 3: Right, exactly.
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: No one's like, oh, I'm being brainwashed. Okay, so the
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: government's crackdown on free expression is unfortunately reaching well beyond
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: media outlets. The White House is planning to launch investigations
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: and take other actions against a broad network of left-leaning
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: nonprofits and other organizations. Details are still unclear. They said
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: it could take a while, but Trump and other officials
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: have talked about racketeering charges using the RICO law and
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: taking away tax-exempt status from nonprofits, which would effectively bankrupt
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: many of those organizations. They've mentioned George Soros' Open Society
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: Foundation and the Ford Foundation, among others, and they are
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: trying to argue that it's not about censoring speech, but
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: punishing groups that fund or incite violence especially, quote, foreign
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: malign actors. On Wednesday night, Trump announced that he's designating
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: Antifa as a major terrorist organization, a move he tried
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: to take during the George Floyd protests in 2020, somewhat
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: complicated by the fact that Antifa isn't actually an organization
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: and there isn't actually a law that allows the president
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: to designate domestic groups as terrorists. Other than that, good
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: to go. Here's what he had to say to Fox's
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Martha McCallum about all this during a UK sit-down. early
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: on Thursday.
• 37:30
  Speaker 10: Do you believe that there is a vast terrorist movement
• 37:35
  Speaker 10: in the United States that people need to be aware of?
• 37:37
  Speaker 10: And is it responsible for Charlie Kirk's killing, for the
• 37:40
  Speaker 10: attempts on your life, for these CEOs that we saw
• 37:43
  Speaker 10: in New York City? Is there something people need to understand?
• 37:47
  Speaker 4: You never know.
• 37:48
  Speaker 10: And we'll find out maybe.
• 37:49
  Speaker 4: But in the meantime, we're going to do a big
• 37:53
  Speaker 4: thing with respect to Antifa. It's a sick group, a very,
• 37:56
  Speaker 4: very sick group.
• 37:57
  Speaker 11: We have a lot of things.
• 37:58
  Speaker 3: They love burning the American flag.
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: I think it's terrible that they burn the American flag.
• 38:01
  Speaker 10: Who's behind it?
• 38:02
  Speaker 12: Do you have a gut feeling? You know, you hear Soros.
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: I don't know.
• 38:05
  Speaker 5: We're going to find out if he's behind it.
• 38:07
  Speaker 10: Do you have concerns about, you know, some people look
• 38:10
  Speaker 10: at this and your critics will say, well, this crackdown
• 38:14
  Speaker 10: is a crackdown on free speech.
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: It's interesting.
• 38:17
  Speaker 4: I watch your show and I watch others and I
• 38:19
  Speaker 4: see people saying things. They're crazy. These people are crazed lunatics,
• 38:23
  Speaker 4: even the way they'll answer. You know, it's like you'll
• 38:25
  Speaker 4: see them and The things they say are really bad,
• 38:29
  Speaker 4: but they look crazy.
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: Didn't really answer the question about is it a crackdown
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: on free speech.
• 38:36
  Speaker 3: Also, Antifa HQ must be, the switchboards must be lighting
• 38:39
  Speaker 3: up over there.
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: Well, because we were watching this interview in our office
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: and always have Fox on anyway because we love the five.
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: The way that they're debating it's on five is the
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: Democrats are saying that Antifa doesn't exist. Do you think
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: Antifa exists, Harold Ford?
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: Who said yes, he thought it existed.
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: Of course.
• 38:56
  Speaker 3: Where is their address? Where are they headquartered?
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: The point, of course, is there's not an organization with
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: a website and an address called Antifa.
• 39:07
  Speaker 3: There's an Antifa secretary. Is there someone that answers the phones?
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: They have not filed papers, right?
• 39:12
  Speaker 3: There's just a bunch of It's an ideology.
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and people run around and they say they're Antifa
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: or they're Black Bloc or whatever the fuck.
• 39:18
  Speaker 3: Surprise, surprise. The organization that's against centralized power doesn't have
• 39:23
  Speaker 3: a centralized fucking operation. So that's happening. What do you
• 39:27
  Speaker 3: make of.
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: These threats? The sort of like what they're trying to
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: do here? Because it's a little murky to me still.
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: How much of it is we're going to try to
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: scare everyone? How much of it is they can actually
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: do some of this stuff? What do you think?
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: Listen, I get that, right? Because it's like the levers
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: aren't immediately obvious. Revoke tax exempt status. harass threat whatever
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: but given the landscape that we're in like did you
• 39:55
  Speaker 3: ever think that brendan carr would be.
• 39:56
  Speaker 13: Like we can do this the hard way we can
• 39:59
  Speaker 13: do this the easy way you're out jimmy like all
• 40:02
  Speaker 13: bets are off i don't know i i think they
• 40:05
  Speaker 13: can make it difficult i think you know everything is
• 40:08
  Speaker 13: fungible in trump's universe like what does it mean to
• 40:11
  Speaker 13: be a bad actor what does it mean to i
• 40:12
  Speaker 13: mean i Their definition of what is threatening or malign
• 40:16
  Speaker 13: behavior or somehow terrorizing the American public could be a
• 40:20
  Speaker 13: completely divorced reality.
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: But I don't know. I mean, he's the president of
• 40:24
  Speaker 3: the United States, has the full force of the federal
• 40:27
  Speaker 3: government behind him, has the business community largely bending the knee.
• 40:30
  Speaker 3: I mean, I do worry about what that means. And
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: then you see self-designated, you know. truth-seekers and, like, patriot
• 40:37
  Speaker 3: keepers like Enrique Tarrio coming out and saying, I'll find
• 40:40
  Speaker 3: him on the internet. We'll figure out who the bad
• 40:42
  Speaker 3: actors are. And Stuart Rhodes is like, let's reconstitute the
• 40:45
  Speaker 3: Oath Keepers and protect this country. And, you know, this,
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: the Kirk assassination has been a catalytic moment. And I
• 40:52
  Speaker 3: don't think we know what comes next. And I think
• 40:55
  Speaker 3: that already the sort of iterations of, like, punishment are
• 41:00
  Speaker 3: beyond what I imagined a week after he was killed.
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 41:06
  Speaker 4: Dan?
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: I think these are very unserious people that we should
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: take deadly seriously. It's not. It's actually, yes, the Antifa
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: thing is fake. I almost feel like they gave Trump
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: a ball of yarn to play with here because it's
• 41:15
  Speaker 2: an entirely fake thing. But using the IRS to go
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: after the tax-exempt status of nonprofits is a very easy
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: thing to do.
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: It's not easy to take it away. No, but if
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: you start the process. Start the process. Harvard's in court
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: right now.
• 41:29
  Speaker 3: Exactly.
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: Even though Harvard clearly has the upper hand in this case. You,
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: we've all seen the reports about people inside Harvard being like,
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: we know we can win, but this is, this is bad.
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: And this is draining us of resources and all that
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: kind of shit.
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: You can, I mean, remember earlier this year, the FTC
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: sued media matters, right? Like you can go after these organizations,
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: many of which, like, obviously some of them have a
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: ton of money like Harvard and they would have the
• 41:51
  Speaker 2: capacity to fight back. Many don't. You can go after individuals, right?
• 41:54
  Speaker 2: You don't have like, there is a governmental equivalent of
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: what Trump is doing with these lawsuits, which is I
• 41:59
  Speaker 2: am suing. I'm going to make you spend money on attorneys.
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: And document collection and all of the above. And I'm
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: going to drain your resources. I'm going to make it
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: really hard. And what it does is, so yes, there's
• 42:09
  Speaker 2: some individual people, some individual organizations will absolutely be affected.
• 42:12
  Speaker 2: And that will be very bad. But the bigger effect
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: is it scares the shit out of everyone else. And
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: if you talk to anyone who's been out trying to
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: raise money for progressive pro-democracy causes right now, for many
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: of the people who have funded the anti-Trump resistance for
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: the last decade, many of them do not want to
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: stick their head up right now because the last thing
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: they want is to end up in Trump's crosshairs. Legally.
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: from a regulatory perspective, from a public perspective. And it
• 42:35
  Speaker 2: is draining. Democrats are struggling to raise money in part
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: because people are afraid of Trump.
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: The domestic terrorist thing that they just keep bringing up, Trump, Vance,
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: Stephen Miller, they have started to say, use that phrase,
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: foreign malign actors too, because there is no way that
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: a president can try to designate a domestic group as
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: a domestic terrorist organization. You can't prosecute someone for any
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: law that they're a domestic terrorist organization, right? You can
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: use like terrorism enhancement on a sentence if you're already
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: prosecuting something. But like it doesn't really exist what he's
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: trying to do, which is why when he did it
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: in 2020 with Antifa, it's not just because it's not
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: an organization because it wasn't really a thing. But you
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: can designate, of course, foreign organizations as terrorist groups. And
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: I think the foreign malign actors thing is they now
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: are going to try to look for potentially domestic organizations
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: that have some connection to foreign funding. Like it seems
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: like that's the nexus there.
• 43:27
  Speaker 3: Or have a foreign person working for them. I just
• 43:29
  Speaker 3: feel like they're going to stretch the bounds of whatever
• 43:31
  Speaker 3: the definition is.
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: For sure. Pam Bondi, who seems like she's just playing
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: Attorney General on TV, went into the lion's den this
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: week and sat through the usual confrontational grilling from former
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: White House senior advisor turned podcaster Katie Miller. Here she
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: is showing off her knowledge of the First Amendment.
• 43:52
  Speaker 12: There's free speech and then there's hate speech. And there
• 43:55
  Speaker 12: is no place, especially now, especially after what happened to Charlie,
• 44:00
  Speaker 12: in our society. We will absolutely target you, go after you,
• 44:06
  Speaker 12: if you are targeting anyone with hate speech, anything. And
• 44:10
  Speaker 12: that's across the aisle.
• 44:11
  Speaker 3: Well, that's reassuring.
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: Now, to their credit, conservatives like your Brit Humes, even
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: Brendan Carr himself, slapped this idea down. But I think
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: the most satisfying right-wing rebuttal came from none other than
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: Tucker Carlson. Let's listen.
• 44:29
  Speaker 11: This is the Attorney General of the United States, the
• 44:31
  Speaker 11: Chief Law Enforcement Officer of the United States, telling you
• 44:33
  Speaker 11: that there's this other category called hate speech. And of course,
• 44:36
  Speaker 11: the implication is that's a crime. There's no sentence that
• 44:39
  Speaker 11: Charlie Kirk would have objected to more than that. You
• 44:42
  Speaker 11: hope that a year from now, the turmoil we're seeing
• 44:45
  Speaker 11: in the aftermath of his murder won't be leveraged to
• 44:49
  Speaker 11: bring hate speech laws to this country. And trust me,
• 44:52
  Speaker 11: if it is... If that does happen, there is never
• 44:56
  Speaker 11: a more justified moment for civil disobedience than that, ever.
• 44:58
  Speaker 11: And there never will be.
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: Bondi dust up. Now the Kimmel move. They don't seem
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: to be sitting well with some mega media types and
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: right-leaning free speech enthusiasts, I'll call them. How much do
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: you guys think that matters?
• 45:14
  Speaker 3: I think it matters a lot. I mean, this is
• 45:16
  Speaker 3: what I'm saying. I think you have Tucker out there
• 45:18
  Speaker 3: who very much matters to this White House, calling them out.
• 45:22
  Speaker 3: I think that was recorded before the Kimmel firing?
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: I think so.
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: I think so, yes.
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: Because I think that was a reaction to the Bondi thing.
• 45:30
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 45:30
  Speaker 3: And so I'm eager to know what Tucker, the Wizard
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: of Oz, has to say about this one.
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: Tucker will save us.
• 45:37
  Speaker 3: I mean, my lord, if that's where we're at, stop
• 45:40
  Speaker 3: this train, I want to get off. But I mean,
• 45:43
  Speaker 3: the end of that clip actually, in the way that
• 45:46
  Speaker 3: only Tucker can, is him intoning, you're taking away man's
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: humanity if you take away his right to speech. But respect, right?
• 45:54
  Speaker 3: This is not insignificant. I am shocked, I will say,
• 45:59
  Speaker 3: at the level of vitriol directed at Pam Bondi. And
• 46:02
  Speaker 3: you heard some of that from Megyn Kelly. It's clear
• 46:05
  Speaker 3: that Pam Bondi is not beloved in certain conservative circles.
• 46:08
  Speaker 3: I am hoping, though, that that is not the catalyst
• 46:11
  Speaker 3: for these folks speaking out and that it legitimately is
• 46:13
  Speaker 3: a sort of revulsion from at the idea that the
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: conservative movement headed by Trump is now curbing free speech
• 46:22
  Speaker 3: and that this can, like, obviously this is Trump's new,
• 46:26
  Speaker 3: you know, his new raison d'etre is going after the
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: libs on speech and it should engender some passions on
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: the right because it's the thing they've been talking about
• 46:36
  Speaker 3: and outraged about for the last five years.
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: It seems to me like in this administration, you don't
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: criticize dear leader if you have a problem with something
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: that dear leader has said. you can criticize one of
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: your colleagues.
• 46:48
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: So it's happened to Pam Bondi. It's happened to Kash Patel.
• 46:52
  Speaker 3: It's happened to Alex Azar.
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's happened to RFK Jr., right? And so everyone's like, oh,
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: they try to keep Trump just like an arm's length
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: from all these decisions. I can't tell. Who's at fault here?
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: Who's going on? But it's like they're able to criticize.
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: The people in the larger movement are able to criticize
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: various cabinet officials that are there as lackeys, but they
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: just can't actually criticize Donald Trump.
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's performative independence.
• 47:13
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 47:14
  Speaker 3: Oh, he's so succinct. Why could you just shut up
• 47:17
  Speaker 3: and let Dan suffer? Performative.
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: I love that.
• 47:20
  Speaker 3: Performative independence.
• 47:27
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• 48:49
  Speaker 1: Democrats are trying their best to respond to all this.
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: We're back to the Democrats again. Members of Congress, governors,
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: even Barack Obama was talked about. He was tweeting out
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: this morning. Schumer put out a statement calling- Chuck? Chuck.
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: Epstein files. I guess Democrats are introducing the NOPE Act,
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: which is short for, can anyone?
• 49:11
  Speaker 2: No something.
• 49:14
  Speaker 3: Never mind.
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: Political Enemies?
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: No Political Enemies Act.
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: Oh, so it's- Let's see, that's tricky because.
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: sort of doing double duty there.
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: It can either be an acronym or not. It can't
• 49:24
  Speaker 2: be both.
• 49:26
  Speaker 5: Nope.
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: So I don't know. I'm assuming the legislation will sail
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: through Congress because obviously Republicans are also concerned with the
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: weaponization of government and and crack down on free speech.
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: They'll join with the Democrats on this legislation and pass it,
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: and then it'll get to the president's desk. And he
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: also set up a whole committee on the weaponization of government,
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: so I'm sure he'll sign it.
• 49:45
  Speaker 4: Nope.
• 49:46
  Speaker 3: This would be called performative... Performative.
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: Performative resistance.
• 49:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah, performative... I mean.
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: I don't want to give the Democrats too much shit.
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: They are, like, look, every Democrat we want to be
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: outraged is out there being outraged. Yes. I don't know
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: what I'd be telling them to do otherwise. I do think...
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: like we haven't, you know, we're going to talk about this,
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: but like heading for the government shutdown, I wouldn't be
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: funding this government that's cracking down on free speech.
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: And I think that's the thing. It's like, that's actually
• 50:16
  Speaker 3: where you have some power. So maybe it's time to
• 50:17
  Speaker 3: use it.
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: Which is a, it's a larger, more interesting debate about
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: how you wrap in this sort of stuff into the
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: argument around a shutdown.
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: They seem, you know, they're going to be saying like, oh,
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: the Democrats want to shut down the government over Jimmy
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: Kimmel and foreign aid.
• 50:31
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 50:31
  Speaker 2: And the, and the, from what we can tell as
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: of right now, and what I'm sure is a very
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: clear and long articulated plan, the Democrats seem to be
• 50:39
  Speaker 2: focusing on the subsidies for Obamacare as the primary reason
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: for the shutdown. Because I saw Schumer, a clip of
• 50:46
  Speaker 2: Schumer today doing an interview with Punchbowl, where he said
• 50:49
  Speaker 2: the two things, it seemed like what he was implying
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: is one, their process was entirely partisan, which has been
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: known to get people on the street before. But the
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: other one is making healthcare more expensive, which is actually
• 50:59
  Speaker 2: one of a very, very compelling argument. It feels, this
• 51:03
  Speaker 2: is one I've struggled with a lot in how we,
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: in how I think about the shutdown is that is
• 51:07
  Speaker 2: certainly a very real thing that matters to a lot
• 51:08
  Speaker 2: of people and does poll really well. It feels a
• 51:11
  Speaker 2: little removed from what's actually happening.
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: You think?
• 51:14
  Speaker 2: But maybe not to the people whose healthcare is going up.
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: So no, no, it's, it's again, it is the, if
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: we were just dealing in substance and rational world, it
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: is the absolutely right thing to fight for. Um, forget
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: about the polls just substantively. Like if you can stop
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: healthcare premiums from going up by like 75% on a
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: lot of people, which is going to happen, then yeah,
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: you go do that. But that's, none of the things
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: they're proposing are going to happen. I saw one Huss Democrat,
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: of course on background, so only get a, only get
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: half credit on this profile of courage and honesty, but
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: said like, look, we should shut this government down and
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: we may not win this and we don't have a
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: plan to get out of this and they might not
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: cave at all, but we should just do it anyway.
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, well, credit, credit to just do something.
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's why.
• 52:02
  Speaker 3: The alternative seems.
• 52:05
  Speaker 2: It's unsustainable.
• 52:06
  Speaker 3: How could you abide that, especially in this climate? Like,
• 52:09
  Speaker 3: how could you abide that? I mean, I don't actually
• 52:11
  Speaker 3: know if they could not shut down the government.
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: It gets, like, complicated in the sense that, like, the
• 52:18
  Speaker 2: matter before them is a, like, 45-day clean extension.
• 52:23
  Speaker 3: Right? So it is.
• 52:25
  Speaker 2: This is why these things are always hard, which is
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: you've got to draw the line somewhere. Otherwise, they can
• 52:28
  Speaker 2: just 45-day it until the end of time. And so
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: this goes to November 21st. So do you say, we
• 52:36
  Speaker 2: haven't really figured it out, so we're going to vote
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: for this and then fight on November 21st? But why
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: would anyone believe you that you'll fight on November 21st
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: if you won't fight on September 30th?
• 52:45
  Speaker 3: Also, get it away from the midterms as much as possible, maybe.
• 52:49
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: I was trying to think, too, about the partisanship thing.
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: So the Republicans have not reached out at all to
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: the Democrats to even try to fund the government on anything.
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: And I think if you want to make that argument,
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: just be like, look, they didn't ask us for our help,
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: so they're not getting our votes.
• 53:03
  Speaker 3: You run it.
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: And you run this government, and it is lawless, and
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: you are violating the Constitution, and you are cracking down
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: on people's speech, and you are raising their prices and
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: their costs, and we do not want anything to do
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: with this. And if you actually want partners in government,
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: then we can come to the table, but that's not
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: what you want, so you are not getting our votes.
• 53:24
  Speaker 2: Then you better give us a temporary means test extension
• 53:26
  Speaker 2: of the Affordable Care Act subsidies.
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: That's why you don't do it over. That's what I'm saying.
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: You don't ask for it now. You're just like, no,
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: fuck you. You don't get any votes.
• 53:35
  Speaker 3: But you've got to reiterate.
• 53:37
  Speaker 2: You do need, having been on the other side of
• 53:39
  Speaker 2: a couple of these, you do need an ask. You
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: need a specific thing.
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: And it's Kimmel back on the air.
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: We are not voting for this until Kimmel's on the air.
• 53:50
  Speaker 3: Uncensored.
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: And the view is safe.
• 53:52
  Speaker 2: I need a statement from Brendan Carr that.
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: The view is safe. I want Joy Behar. I want
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: to make sure she's okay. Whoopi, can you hear us?
• 53:59
  Speaker 3: Whoopi? Okay. Blink twice.
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: I think we got that handled. Let me cheer you
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: guys up with some updates on how the government is
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: making America healthy again.
• 54:05
  Speaker 3: Great.
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: Former CDC director Susan Monarez testified before the Senate Health
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: Committee on Wednesday about why she was abruptly fired just
• 54:13
  Speaker 1: weeks into the job. She told the committee that RFK Jr.
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: pushed her out for refusing to, quote, pre-approve... his preferred
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: vaccine guidance and for protecting career CDC scientists from being purged.
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: Let's listen.
• 54:25
  Speaker 7: He directed me to commit in advance to approving every
• 54:29
  Speaker 7: ACIP recommendation, regardless of the scientific evidence. He also directed
• 54:38
  Speaker 7: me to dismiss career officials responsible for vaccine policy without cause.
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: Did he cite any data or science that as relates
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: to the potential ACIP recommendations to persuade you to support them?
• 54:54
  Speaker 7: He did not have any data or science to point to.
• 54:58
  Speaker 7: Did he ever suggest that the president was, that he
• 55:00
  Speaker 7: was speaking for the president? In that morning meeting, he
• 55:04
  Speaker 7: did say that he had spoken to the president. He
• 55:06
  Speaker 7: spoke to the president every day about changing the childhood
• 55:09
  Speaker 7: vaccine schedule. I could have kept the office, the title,
• 55:12
  Speaker 7: but I would have lost the one thing that cannot
• 55:15
  Speaker 7: be replaced, my integrity.
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: So the ACIP panel is meeting as we record this
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: today and tomorrow, but there was just some breaking news
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: as we've been talking. The panel approved limiting the availability
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: of a combined shot for measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella,
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: which is the virus that causes chickenpox. The 12-member panel
• 55:39
  Speaker 1: also appeared poised to do away with the recommendation that
• 55:41
  Speaker 1: all newborns receive the hepatitis B vaccine... but delayed a
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: vote until Friday. That was from Axios.
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: What's the limit on the MMR?
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: The panel voted eight to three with one abstention to
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: recommend against giving the MMR vaccine to children before the
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: age of four.
• 55:58
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: Because now you get one right away and then just
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: a booster at four.
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: It makes sense to do this at a time when
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: measles is spreading rapidly across the country for the first
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: time in decades.
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: Right. Yeah.
• 56:08
  Speaker 2: I mean, no one has a strong immune system than
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: children age zero to four.
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: Especially as we head into the winter.
• 56:14
  Speaker 3: Can I just say the polling on this is like,
• 56:16
  Speaker 3: I don't get this at all. It's like, I think 70,
• 56:19
  Speaker 3: 73% of Trump voters think vaccines save lives. And then
• 56:24
  Speaker 3: you break down vaccines by MMR, shingles, hepatitis B, and
• 56:27
  Speaker 3: it's like 70% of Trump voters.
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: Until you get to COVID.
• 56:31
  Speaker 3: Right. COVID opened the door. But I mean, this is
• 56:33
  Speaker 3: not a political winner for them at all. And oh,
• 56:36
  Speaker 3: by the way, it's going to kill children. and adults.
• 56:40
  Speaker 3: I mean, it is, as someone who has young children
• 56:44
  Speaker 3: who just, I mean, all of us, right? Like, I
• 56:48
  Speaker 3: remember getting them after the, first of all, they hate
• 56:51
  Speaker 3: taking the shots. I mean, they fucking hate the shots.
• 56:54
  Speaker 3: But I always felt like, thank God.
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: Me too.
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: Good.
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: We're good.
• 56:57
  Speaker 3: We're good for a little, you know, the terrifying thing
• 57:01
  Speaker 3: in all of this, and this is something we can't,
• 57:03
  Speaker 3: I think, wrap our heads around living in largely places
• 57:06
  Speaker 3: where vaccinations are still you know, the order of the
• 57:09
  Speaker 3: day and where we have governors who are working in
• 57:11
  Speaker 3: concert with other, you know, parts of the region to
• 57:14
  Speaker 3: make sure that people have access to vaccines, is the
• 57:16
  Speaker 3: way in which this anti-vax culture is now on the upswing.
• 57:21
  Speaker 3: Like in Texas, there's an article in the New York
• 57:23
  Speaker 3: Times talking about families that finally feel like they're being heard.
• 57:26
  Speaker 3: The communities around them are growing. There are churches that,
• 57:30
  Speaker 3: you know, support the anti-vax lifestyle. There are networks of people.
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: I mean, it is metastasizing. That is dangerous shit. This
• 57:37
  Speaker 3: is not just sort of the fringe having its moment.
• 57:40
  Speaker 3: This is how you poison entire communities and then societies.
• 57:44
  Speaker 3: The idea that we are eroding not just Americans' belief
• 57:47
  Speaker 3: in the efficacy and the safety of the COVID-19 vaccine,
• 57:50
  Speaker 3: but shingles, chicken pox, measles, mumps, rubella, I mean, hepatitis B,
• 57:57
  Speaker 3: that will reshape public health in a really meaningful way
• 58:01
  Speaker 3: in a not long period of time. Terrifying.
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: These are long settled questions. There is no, I mean,
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: these people are introducing doubt where doubt did not exist.
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: And there were liaisons that they had at the panel
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: to try to argue otherwise. Amy Middleman is the liaison
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: for the Society of Adolescent Health and Medicine. And she
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: said to the panel, what problem exists in the current
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: schedule that has prompted this entire discussion? We all know,
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: I think, there are always some risks and benefits and
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: we vet those risks and benefits and compare them. We
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: have an immunization schedule for hepatitis B that's been incredibly successful.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: I'm trying to figure out what the question was that
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: really prompted this. Obviously, we all know. It's from fucking
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: kook RFK Jr.
• 58:44
  Speaker 3: The crank. What's the point of a confirmation process? What's
• 58:47
  Speaker 3: the point of, like, asking people questions? I mean, he
• 58:49
  Speaker 3: said literally he would not change the vaccine schedules. I mean,
• 58:53
  Speaker 3: from Supreme Court justices to cabinet officials, they just go
• 58:55
  Speaker 3: and lie.
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: I mean, some good news is that we've said this
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: once before. California... And a coalition of West Coast states
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: announced that they would issue their own vaccine recommendations, as
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: did New York and a coalition of states in the Northeast,
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: even health insurers have stepped in. AHIP, which is the
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: major health insurance trade group, announced that their member plans,
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: which include Aetna, Humana, Kaiser Permanente, and a dozen blue plans,
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: would continue to cover flu and COVID-19 vaccines through the
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: end of 2026, even if the CDC changes their recommendations.
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: We should also note that the CDC has to, the CDC,
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: the organization, has to vote on recommendations from the CDC panel,
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: the kooks in the panel, but it's not like there's
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: anyone running the CDC right now either.
• 59:36
  Speaker 3: Can I say one thing? And this was comforting, I guess,
• 59:40
  Speaker 3: because I live in one of those states that has
• 59:41
  Speaker 3: one of these, but there's a network of doctors and
• 59:44
  Speaker 3: clinicians and sort of people in science who have been
• 59:47
  Speaker 3: corresponding and communicating for decades now and are now sort
• 59:51
  Speaker 3: of the Cracker Jack Avengers team that are responsible for
• 59:54
  Speaker 3: helping these states figure out what their policies are. So
• 59:56
  Speaker 3: There does exist a network. The problem is that it's
• 59:58
  Speaker 3: isolated to, I don't know, blue states in large part
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 3: or coastal states. And what you can't have in the
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 3: name of public health is a patchwork of solutions because
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 3: we're all in it together, newsflash.
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: This is one where, like, people need to organize groups
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: of parents and kids and doctors and, like, go to
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: Washington and sit in Congress and sit outside the White House. And, like,
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: if there was ever a time for peaceful protest, you know, like,
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump can target Jimmy Kimmel. And he can try
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: to target NGOs here and there. How about kids who
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: want vaccines? Parents who wants their kid to have vaccines.
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 3: Want to be safe in school.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 3: You'll be hearing from some of them on my forthcoming podcast,
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 3: I'm sure.
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: Look at that.
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 3: Stories from the ground.
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: Love that. I do think that, like, I don't know.
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: I'm not trying to be optimistic here, believe me.
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: You can be. It's a safe space.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: I would say this is a lot to sustain for
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: the Trump administration. Between the Kimmel stuff and the larger
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: crackdown on free speech and now the vaccines. health insurance
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: premiums are going to go up for people, and we're
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: looking down at a government shutdown, and we didn't even
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: talk about Lisa Cook, who gets to keep her seat
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: for now, but then Trump just asked the Supreme Court
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: to try to kick her off. We got one rate cut,
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: but he wants more. We don't know what's happening with
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: the economy, right?
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 3: The Vax stuff and the money stuff really hits home.
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 2: And I think the Kimmel stuff does, too. For a
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: couple reasons. I think that Trump is now at risk
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 2: of being optimistic. How dare we do that in this period?
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: We're going to have something.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: But Trump is at, this is classic overreach in a
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 2: lot of ways, right? Trump was elected for two reasons, right?
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: And he was elected by people who don't really like Trump.
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 2: They just thought he would probably do a better job
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 2: of lowering their costs and securing the border and put
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 2: the border aside. But on immigration, he's gone further than
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 2: most people want. And he has not lowered their costs.
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 2: He's raised them. And instead he's spending his time on
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: a lot of things that are not solving that particular,
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: the economic problem. And some of those things like we
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 2: obsess about, we think about all the time we talk about,
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 2: but they don't break through to real people. The vaccine
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 2: stuff breaks through to real people. It absolutely does. It
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 2: is something that blows up parent group chats for school
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: and WhatsApp groups. It's happening as people are going back
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 2: to school and filling out the vaccine certification so their
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 2: kids can go to school. It is happening as everyone
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: is now making decisions about flu vaccines. And this is
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: the period of time for our fourth year where we
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 2: would be getting our COVID vaccine. And the Kimmel-Charlie Kirk stuff,
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 2: I think, really does break through. The Charlie Kirk assassination
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 2: has broken through almost nothing else this year, even more
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: than the Epstein files. I track this on the What's
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 2: Resonating sub stack, where they go through all the social
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: traffic and internet traffic and stuff. The Kirk stuff blows
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 2: everything out of the water. And Kimmel is attached to that.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 2: And that gets through to people. I just can't tell
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 2: you how many non-political people in my life have asked
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 2: me about the Charlie Kirk stuff. And so on two
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 2: big things that break through to real people, He is
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 2: focused on things that are not what they elected him
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 2: to do. And that is where when you get in
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 2: trouble as a president, particularly as you head into a midterm.
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 2: So there's some optimism.
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: And I would say that's true for any president. White
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: houses tend to be insular and you're in a foxhole.
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: And so it's hard to get a good handle on
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: public opinion beyond just the polls. I think in authoritarian regimes,
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: that is a particular problem. because they have completely shut
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: out the rest of public opinion, and Trump is just
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: surrounded by people telling him, you are doing the best job,
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: you're the greatest person that we've ever had in this job,
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: and we're so excited, and blah, blah, blah. And then
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: he turns on the TV, and all the people on
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: Fox are singing his praises, and everyone's wonderful. So to
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: the extent that there's going to be a backlash against
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: him in the country, he's not going to really detect it.
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: Now, and the people around him won't either. This is
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: the fundamental shift in the Trump era from when we
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: were in Washington, is when we were in Washington, everyone watched,
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: all the Republicans watched Fox. But they also watched everything else.
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: And they kind of winked and nodded at Fox that
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 2: it was sort of a ridiculous thing. They were kind
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 2: of in on the joke. But they also watched all
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: the regular news. They watched CNN. They read the newspapers.
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 2: Now everyone in the MAGA movement has self-selected into a
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 2: right-wing media bubble. And so they are not exposed to
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 2: dissenting opinions in any way. And I really think they
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 2: turn on that TV when Fox is on. And they
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: think it's a window into the world when it's really
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 2: just a mirror. And so that's why the policies are addressing.
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 2: There is this circular logic where Fox runs something. The,
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 2: they see the white house uses a problem. They try
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: to solve it. It's how you end up with the
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: national guard in DC, right? Like it's, that's why even
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: though crime is down all in lots of places around
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 2: the country that they've made their central focus be urban crime,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 2: because that urban crime has been one of Fox's favorite
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 2: stories for very obvious racially coded reasons for decades now.
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 2: And so they're solving problems that Fox news producers or
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 2: other right-wing media people think gets engagement from other MAGA
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 2: media consumers.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 3: Can I say one thing on the vaccines, though? I'm
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 3: glad that you played that moment between Menard and Cassidy,
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 3: because she says that RFK is talking daily with Trump
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 3: about changing the vaccine schedule. You know, it is really hard.
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 3: First of all, I think Ivanka and Don Jr. and
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 3: Eric probably all got their MMR vaccines. You know, like,
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 3: this does not seem like the hill that Trump wants
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 3: to die on.
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 2: Trump got his COVID vaccine.
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 3: But I mean, I just think the concern about, you know,
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 3: this is all, these are confections created by Robert F.
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 3: Kennedy Jr. And so I do wonder whether there's more
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 3: hope that he will move away from this insanity before
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 3: he is forced to just because it's not his thing. Like,
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 3: this is not his thing. And if he starts paying
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 3: a price.
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 2: And he knows that.
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 3: And he knows that. Like, it's very hard for me
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 3: to imagine that RFK is going into the Oval Office
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 3: and being like, we're finally changing the head B schedule.
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 3: And Trump is like, well, thank God. You know, like,
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 3: it's kind of like, do whatever you're going to do.
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 3: I know this is your bailiwick. Do this. But the
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 3: minute it starts costing him... I wonder whether he can
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 3: be moved to go back to reality and safety.
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: He did get that question the other week in The
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: Oval about the attempt in Florida to do away with
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: the vaccine mandates for kids. And he was like, vaccines work.
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: Vaccines work.
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 2: But it's like, did he say that because he's pro-vaccine
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 2: or because he's anti-DeSantis? Like, I couldn't really figure that out.
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: That's a good question. Well, however we can get it done.
• 1:06:11
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• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: All right. With all this End of the Republic stuff happening,
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: we haven't gotten the chance yet to talk about Kamala
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: Harris's new book, 107 Days. It's out Tuesday. More excerpts
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: are making the rounds, including one where the New York
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: Times has both a book review and a piece that
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: sort of gives some of the highlights, some of the
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: excerpt highlights. And we can just get into some of
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: the fun ones. Here's one that I think we all–
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: this is the one we all gravitated to here in
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: the office– This is from the New York Times. Minutes
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: before she was to step on stage at a presidential
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: debate in September of 2024, she received a call from Mr.
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 4: Biden.
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: He relayed that his brother told him that Kamala Harris
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: was bad-mouthing him and that several, quote, power brokers in
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: Philadelphia were threatening not to support her because of it.
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 4: Mr.
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: Biden went on to insist that his own disastrous debate
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: performance had not hurt him with voters and that he
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: had actually beaten Mr. Trump. And then this is what
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: Harris writes, quote, I just couldn't understand why he would
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: call me right now and make it all about himself,
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: distracting me with worry about hostile power brokers in the
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: biggest city of the most important swing state, right before
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: she was about to go on stage for a debate
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: with Donald Trump.
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 3: Dad, I cannot talk to you about this right now.
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 3: I do not have the time. I mean... What?
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 4: What?
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 5: Man.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 3: Wait, but just so many things.
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 6: I know.
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 3: Like what's what's the worst part that first of all,
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 3: dude is insisting that he won the debate.
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 1: I mean, it tells you everything.
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 10: Right.
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 3: Or I mean, I guess obviously it's that he's calling her.
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 3: right before these incredibly important debates on 107 days, you
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 3: don't have a lot of time to go and do that.
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 3: To me, that honestly speaks more to senility than cruelty or,
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 3: you know, trying to undermine her. It's like it makes
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 3: no sense. No part of it makes sense.
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: Honestly, I don't think you have to choose.
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 2: Well, that's... Yeah, I'm trying to like, how does that happen?
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 2: I guess because the president doesn't dial a phone himself.
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 2: Someone, he picks up the phone and says, put me
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 2: through to Kamala Harris. And so I assume the person
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 2: who connected the call was like, obviously he's calling to
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 2: wish her good luck. And maybe that was the original
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: intent of the call. And it just went off the rails.
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 2: I don't know. It's not great.
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: Her fraught relationship with Biden forms the undercurrent of the book, quote,
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: my feelings for him are grounded in warmth and loyalty,
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: but they had become complicated over time with hurt and disappointment.
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: And that is basically the sort of the theme of
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: the book. I will just say, And I got an
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: advanced copy of the book. I'm not going to break
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 1: any embargo, but I read it as well. And the
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: Biden defenders out there, the people who are still out there,
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: still fighting the fight, just telling you guys, I don't know,
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: put those swords down.
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 3: Lay down your arms.
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: Because you know what? You can go after Jake Tapper
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: and Alex Thompson and everyone on Twitter and all the
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: pundits that you don't like. This was the nominee of
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: the party. She was there. She's got phone calls everywhere.
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 1: that she's written stuff down. Like it is, Joe Biden
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: was not in the right here.
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 3: Do you think it changes? I mean, she, Tim Alberta
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 3: was making this point. I mean, she was the vice
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 3: president of the United States. It's not like she was
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 3: some random, like, you know, assistant to an assistant. Do
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 3: you think it changes the way administrations work in terms
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 3: of like decision-making? Because here it's like, I understand it
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 3: was incredibly challenging to say, wait a second, don't do this.
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 3: But look, I mean, look, look what fucking happened. And
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 3: now everyone's coming out and you see this sort of
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 3: how fraught it was, how wrenching it all was. And
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 3: I just wonder if it makes people feel differently the
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 3: next time there's something very questionable that's happening inside or whether,
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 3: I mean, I guess I wonder what is the end
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 3: game of a book like this coming out? Like what
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 3: is the net net? What effect does this actually have?
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 2: I think it's very unique to the president themselves.
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 5: Right?
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 2: Like, just based on, I don't think this is necessarily
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 2: true of when he was vice president, we worked with him,
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 2: but based on the accounts, I have not read this book,
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 2: but in some of the other accounts that we've read
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 2: about Biden, he was the opposite of Obama, right? Obama
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 2: would seek out contrary opinions at all time, and contrary
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 2: opinions were not welcome in a lot of Biden's meetings,
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 2: either by the president or his senior advisors.
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: Particularly as it got towards the end.
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 2: Particularly as it got towards the end. You know, you
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 2: could look, like, Every administration, like look at the Bush administration,
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 2: you just have the vice president like running the country
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 2: just by getting the president to sign memos during their
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 2: weekly lunch that he wasn't sure what was in them.
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 2: So I think there are all kinds of challenges. Like
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 2: look at the current administration where the president has delegated
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 2: Twitter and podcasts to the vice president. This is primary
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 2: spiritual responsibility.
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 1: I also think that the portrait you get out of
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: this book, along with Jake and Alex's book, along with
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 1: all the other reporting that's happened and everything that we've
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: experienced ourselves, is... It would be easier to figure this
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: all out if it had been some grand conspiracy where
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: everyone was like, he's got dementia and we've got to
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: cover it up.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: And that was clearly not what happened. What happened was
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: it was, um, it was a collective action problem where
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 1: a lot of people were like, Ooh, I had a
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: weird interaction with him, but then other people told me
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: he's fine and he has good days and bad days
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 1: and maybe this is okay. And I saw, and he
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 1: was really smart in that meeting and he made a
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: great decision. And I don't think he should run, but, like, really?
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 1: Who else is going to run? And no one else
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 1: is stepping up?
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 3: So much equivocation.
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: Exactly. Inertia. It's an unsatisfying truth, and it seems like
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: that is the truth.
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 3: It feels like that holds true today.
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 3: We see bad shit happening, and everyone's like, ugh.
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: Which, by the way, the reason I sometimes keep harping
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: on this is there is a lesson, even though that
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: is a very specific circumstance that happened in 2024, there
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: is a lesson going forward, which is, like, don't just
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: expect that someone else is going to take care of
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: it and that it's going to be fine and that
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: someone in charge is going to be, you know, like,
• 1:13:37
  Speaker 1: if you see something, say something.
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 3: It's Kitty Genovese. It's Kitty Genovese. Go do something if
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 3: you hear a scream.
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 11: Yep.
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 1: And if you're in these organizations, right, and if you're
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: in this stuff, because I think there's a lot of
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: people who, and to be completely fair, there's a lot
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: of people who just weren't around Biden a lot, so
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: they didn't know they were working for him. But, like,
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 1: you know, if you have doubts... The thing to do
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: is not just put your head down and just tough
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: it through and think everything's going to be fine.
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 3: Not just a backpack on the floor of the subway.
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: That is right.
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 3: If you see something, say something. That's an East Coast
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 3: reference for you West Coasters.
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: Remember that in Boston?
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 2: We're all native East Coasters.
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 3: So much defense. The T.
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: El Chicago.
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 3: Whatever.
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: Anyway.
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 3: Second city.
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: So that was fun. Thanks for joining us, Alex.
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 8: Oh, my God.
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 3: Thank you so much.
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: And welcome. Welcome to the family.
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 3: Thank you. I'm going to go eat some more RX bars.
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: Love that.
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 3: Love seeing you in person, Dan. Let's make a habit
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 3: of it.
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 11: All right.
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 2: I'll come down more often now.
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 3: Don't lie.
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 1: Have a good weekend, everyone. We'll be back in your
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: feeds on Sunday with a special Sunday Pod Save America.
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 2: Bye, everyone.
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 3: Bye.
• 1:14:40
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• 1:14:58
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