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Transcript

Trump’s CNN Clown Hall · Pod Save America

0:20
Speaker 1: Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
0:22
Speaker 2: I'm Dan Pfeiffer.
0:22
Speaker 1: On today's show, Donald Trump paints a terrifying picture of
0:25
Speaker 1: a second term during a CNN town hall the day
0:28
Speaker 1: after a jury finds him liable for sexual assault and defamation.
0:32
Speaker 1: President Biden weighs negotiations and the 14th Amendment to deal
0:35
Speaker 1: with the debt limit. Tucker Carlson takes his racist variety
0:38
Speaker 1: hour to Twitter. And Anthony Devalder, a.k.a. Katara Ravash, a.k.a.
0:43
Speaker 1: George Santos, is indicted on multiple criminal charges. Then immigration
0:49
Speaker 1: expert Dara Lynn joins to talk about the end of
0:52
Speaker 1: Title 42 and what it means for the border. But first,
0:56
Speaker 1: exciting news. We're back on the road. We got a
0:59
Speaker 1: live show in New York at the Tribeca Film Festival
1:02
Speaker 1: on June 12th. Tickets are available at cricket.com slash events.
1:07
Speaker 1: Fantastic lineup planned. It's going to be great. Excited to
1:11
Speaker 1: go to New York. June, perfect.
1:14
Speaker 3: Right?
1:15
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, there's not a lot happening in the
1:17
Speaker 2: world these days, so....
1:19
Speaker 4: Yeah.
1:20
Speaker 1: Will we have breached the debt ceiling by then? Stay tuned.
1:22
Speaker 1: Stay tuned. Hide some extra money under the mattress for
1:26
Speaker 1: those Pod Save America tickets.
1:27
Speaker 2: It's possible that could be the night we default. Don't
1:30
Speaker 2: miss it. Get your tickets now.
1:31
Speaker 1: All right, let's get to the news. Last night, Donald
1:35
Speaker 1: Trump participated in a 70-minute town hall with 400 Republican
1:38
Speaker 1: primary voters in New Hampshire, hosted by CNN, moderated by
1:42
Speaker 1: Caitlin Collins. The twice-impeached criminal defendant frontrunner said that if elected...
1:47
Speaker 1: He'll pardon most of the January 6th rioters, consider a
1:51
Speaker 1: national abortion ban, and bring back family separation. He refused
1:55
Speaker 1: to say that Russia should lose the war they started
1:57
Speaker 1: in Ukraine and refused to commit to a peaceful transfer
2:00
Speaker 1: of power here in 2024. He told House Republicans to
2:04
Speaker 1: let the U.S. economy collapse if they don't get their
2:07
Speaker 1: way on the debt ceiling. He defamed the woman he
2:09
Speaker 1: was just held liable for defaming and sexually assaulting. And
2:12
Speaker 1: he called the moderator a nasty person when she fact-checked
2:15
Speaker 1: his many, many lies.
2:16
Speaker 3: When you look at what happened during that election, unless
2:19
Speaker 3: you're a very stupid person, you see what happened. Most
2:22
Speaker 3: people understand what happened. That was a rigged election.
2:26
Speaker 2: They are investigating your efforts to overturn the election results.
2:29
Speaker 1: In the state of Georgia. I did nothing wrong. It
2:31
Speaker 1: was a perfect phone call.
2:32
Speaker 2: Let me finish my question.
2:33
Speaker 1: At the center of that is that call that you
2:35
Speaker 1: had with the Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger.
2:38
Speaker 3: If this call was bad, I questioned the election. You
2:41
Speaker 3: asked him to find you votes. I didn't ask him
2:44
Speaker 3: to find anything.
2:45
Speaker 2: We've heard the audio tape, Mr.
2:46
Speaker 3: President.
2:47
Speaker 2: If this call was bad.
2:48
Speaker 3: I said you owe me votes because the election was rigged.
2:52
Speaker 3: That election was rigged.
2:54
Speaker 4: Are you ready?
2:55
Speaker 3: Can I talk?
2:55
Speaker 4: Yeah, what's the answer?
2:57
Speaker 3: Do you mind?
2:58
Speaker 2: I would like for you to answer the question.
2:59
Speaker 3: Okay, it's very simple to answer.
3:00
Speaker 1: That's why I asked it.
3:02
Speaker 3: It's very simple. You're a nasty person, I'll tell you.
3:07
Speaker 1: So as you heard there throughout the town hall, lots
3:09
Speaker 1: of applause and laughter from the crowd. Trump's team says
3:12
Speaker 1: they are very happy. CNN says they did their job.
3:15
Speaker 1: A lot of people say CNN did not do their job,
3:18
Speaker 1: including many Republicans. CNN reporters and employees who are going
3:23
Speaker 1: on background with all kinds of other reporters. What was
3:25
Speaker 1: your reaction to Donald Trump's first time facing questions from
3:29
Speaker 1: an actual journalist since 2020?
3:32
Speaker 2: That time is a flat circle. We have been doing
3:36
Speaker 2: this for eight years.
3:39
Speaker 1: Or a week. I can't tell. I've lost all sense
3:42
Speaker 1: of time.
3:43
Speaker 2: It has been eight years since he decided to start
3:45
Speaker 2: running for president. We have learned no lessons. When we
3:48
Speaker 2: learn the lessons, we probably forget them and we're right
3:50
Speaker 2: back where we were. This could have been a 2015
3:53
Speaker 2: town hall all over again.
3:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's just like there was a feeling
4:01
Speaker 1: watching it where it's we know he's running for president again.
4:05
Speaker 1: We've known it for some time. We know he's the
4:08
Speaker 1: Republican front runner. We know that we're going to go
4:10
Speaker 1: through this again. But last night, I think, was the
4:13
Speaker 1: first time because we haven't really seen him all that much.
4:16
Speaker 1: on normal television, not MAGA television, where you're like, oh yeah,
4:21
Speaker 1: we're really going to go through this again. This is
4:23
Speaker 1: really happening.
4:24
Speaker 2: He's been looming in the shadows since January 6th, 2021.
4:28
Speaker 2: And even you and I who consume political content for
4:32
Speaker 2: a living don't really hear him speak that often. Every
4:35
Speaker 2: once in a while, we're forced to watch a rally
4:36
Speaker 2: on a Saturday night. But for the vast majority of
4:39
Speaker 2: our listeners, the people who were on Twitter last night,
4:41
Speaker 2: this is the first time they've really seen him in
4:43
Speaker 2: a couple of years. And it's Deeply alarming. And for
4:48
Speaker 2: all we want to say, everything about last night, what
4:51
Speaker 2: Trump said, the fact how CNN covered him, the way
4:54
Speaker 2: the crowd cheered is just a reminder of the dramatic
4:58
Speaker 2: stakes in this election and why all that matters is
5:02
Speaker 2: that we do everything we possibly can to reelect Joe Biden.
5:04
Speaker 2: Because that man cannot be anywhere near the White House.
5:07
Speaker 1: I mean, here's my thought on the whole CNN thing.
5:10
Speaker 1: I really genuinely wish more than anything that half the
5:14
Speaker 1: electorate didn't vote for Donald Trump twice. I really wish
5:17
Speaker 1: that Republican voters didn't want him to be president again,
5:20
Speaker 1: but they do. And it's very likely at this point
5:24
Speaker 1: that he's going to be the nominee. And every result
5:26
Speaker 1: from the last four national elections tells us that a
5:29
Speaker 1: rerun of Donald Trump and Joe Biden is going to
5:32
Speaker 1: be extremely close. That is the reality of where we
5:35
Speaker 1: are today. It would be the reality if CNN never
5:39
Speaker 1: said the word Trump between now and Election Day 2024,
5:42
Speaker 1: particularly because each day CNN now averages about half the
5:46
Speaker 1: audience that an episode of this podcast gets. Last night,
5:50
Speaker 1: they got 3 million viewers, which is still only about
5:53
Speaker 1: 2% of the last electorate. And it's an audience of
5:57
Speaker 1: mostly news junkies, mostly partisans who have already made up
6:00
Speaker 1: their mind. So we can yell about CNN all we want. It's,
6:05
Speaker 1: you know, you can tweet about them, you can send letters,
6:07
Speaker 1: you can boycott them, whatever we want to do. I think, personally,
6:11
Speaker 1: a more productive use of our time would be to
6:14
Speaker 1: do what you just said and convince the persuadable voters
6:18
Speaker 1: who will decide the next election that Joe Biden is
6:20
Speaker 1: a better choice than Donald Trump. Those people, the persuadable voters,
6:24
Speaker 1: they know that Donald Trump lies a lot. That Washington
6:26
Speaker 1: Post poll where Trump was beating Joe Biden by seven points,
6:32
Speaker 1: 70% of the people in that poll said that Donald
6:34
Speaker 1: Trump's a liar. Only a third of the people polled
6:39
Speaker 1: say that he's honest. And yet, he was still leading
6:42
Speaker 1: Joe Biden by seven, which means there's a huge chunk
6:44
Speaker 1: of people who know that he's a liar, who thinks
6:47
Speaker 1: that everything that comes out of his mouth is a lie,
6:49
Speaker 1: and they still want to vote for him. And the
6:52
Speaker 1: reason that Donald Trump was defeated in 2020 is because
6:56
Speaker 1: enough people thought that he was too extreme and brought
7:00
Speaker 1: too much chaos to the presidency and to their lives,
7:03
Speaker 1: and so they voted for Joe Biden instead. And our
7:06
Speaker 1: job now is to make sure that everyone knows how
7:11
Speaker 1: extreme and chaotic a second Trump term would be. And
7:14
Speaker 1: to that end, he gave us plenty of material last night,
7:17
Speaker 1: which is why I started off the show talking about
7:19
Speaker 1: all the things he promised to do in a second term.
7:23
Speaker 1: And focusing on that, I think is going to be
7:25
Speaker 1: a lot more productive than having a whole conversation today
7:28
Speaker 1: about CNN, because the conversation about CNN, that doesn't hurt
7:32
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. That doesn't like prevent him from becoming president.
7:35
Speaker 1: But having a conversation about the fact that he wants
7:37
Speaker 1: to It sounds like he wants a national abortion ban,
7:39
Speaker 1: sounds like he wants to bring back family separation, would
7:42
Speaker 1: pardon insurrectionists that stormed the Capitol. I want people to
7:46
Speaker 1: have that information, right? And this is not to say that, oh,
7:50
Speaker 1: you know, he gave us so much material last night,
7:53
Speaker 1: it's fine, he's not going to win. No, no, it's
7:55
Speaker 1: quite the opposite. He very much could win. And because
7:58
Speaker 1: of that, we need to be focused on keeping the
8:01
Speaker 1: conversation around the bad things that Donald Trump will do
8:04
Speaker 1: in a second term.
8:05
Speaker 2: I think you are dramatically underselling the value of one
8:08
Speaker 2: more fact check.
8:10
Speaker 1: We are. I get it.
8:12
Speaker 2: Look, at one point, it's just a camel carrying straw.
8:17
Speaker 2: And then one more piece of straw and the camel
8:21
Speaker 2: goes down. And that's what you get. That's what we're
8:22
Speaker 2: looking for here.
8:25
Speaker 1: And I don't want to mock it too much because
8:27
Speaker 1: I get it. You watch him and he's lying. And
8:32
Speaker 1: Caitlin Collins, by the way, Even that short clip that
8:35
Speaker 1: we just heard called him out on his lies and
8:38
Speaker 1: fact checked him constantly. That's not what does it like.
8:42
Speaker 1: The only way like you have to take it up
8:45
Speaker 1: such a to such a high level. If you're interviewing Trump,
8:49
Speaker 1: you have to be willing to be combative, not just
8:51
Speaker 1: like I'm going to fact check you and Mr. President,
8:54
Speaker 1: let me finish and answer the question. You have to
8:56
Speaker 1: be willing to say like, you're a liar. We know
8:58
Speaker 1: you're a liar. Why are you lying right now? You
9:01
Speaker 1: just really have to take it up a notch. And
9:03
Speaker 1: I think that most journalists just aren't going to do that.
9:06
Speaker 1: And again, we've said this a million times, we are
9:08
Speaker 1: not going to be able to make them do that
9:11
Speaker 1: because they have different interests than us. We don't want
9:14
Speaker 1: Donald Trump to win again. Journalists, that is not their job.
9:17
Speaker 2: And I want to make one point on the CNN thing,
9:19
Speaker 2: which I know you say is not constructive, but I
9:20
Speaker 2: think it can be, think of it as something to
9:24
Speaker 2: prevent 100 million conversations about this over the next 17 months.
9:28
Speaker 1: Sure.
9:30
Speaker 2: CNN is filled with very good journalists who do great journalism.
9:33
Speaker 2: I think Caitlin Collins is, in my opinion, one of
9:35
Speaker 2: those people. And I think she did an admirable job
9:38
Speaker 2: last night in an impossible situation that her bosses put
9:40
Speaker 2: us in.
9:41
Speaker 1: But.
9:43
Speaker 2: hearing all the people on Twitter saying CNN abdicated its
9:45
Speaker 2: journalistic responsibility. What they did was bad for democracy. Here's
9:48
Speaker 2: what you need to know about CNN and every other
9:50
Speaker 2: major media entity. It is a line item in a
9:53
Speaker 2: major corporation's earnings statement. It is part of a large
9:58
Speaker 2: corporation that made enough money to buy CNN by running
10:02
Speaker 2: 90-day fiance seven days a week. This is not fucking
10:05
Speaker 2: Edward R. Murrow or Walter Cronkite. These are corporations. We
10:10
Speaker 2: don't expect corporations' job is to return value to its
10:13
Speaker 2: investors and to make money. We don't expect drug companies
10:17
Speaker 2: and tobacco companies and oil companies to save democracy. And
10:20
Speaker 2: we shouldn't expect large media companies to do it. At
10:23
Speaker 2: the end of the day, corporate media companies are going
10:26
Speaker 2: to do what's in their interest. And CNN had got
10:28
Speaker 2: more people to watch CNN last night than have watched
10:30
Speaker 2: CNN in a really, really long time. They're always going
10:34
Speaker 2: to make that choice.
10:34
Speaker 1: 3 million versus 400,000 a day is what they're averaging,
10:38
Speaker 1: which is just wow.
10:40
Speaker 2: And the thing to remember is that history shows that
10:43
Speaker 2: when fascism and authoritarianism come, the corporations are not the
10:48
Speaker 2: ones who try to stand in the way. They accommodate
10:51
Speaker 2: the regime. And so just this idea that we just
10:53
Speaker 2: have to take the blinders off when it comes to
10:56
Speaker 2: how major media companies are going to cover this race.
10:58
Speaker 2: It is not their job to save democracy. They don't
11:00
Speaker 2: think it's their job to save democracy. It is their
11:03
Speaker 2: job to make money. Even if the journalists doing the
11:05
Speaker 2: reporting are trying to do the right thing, the people
11:08
Speaker 2: who call the shots, the people who tell Caitlin Collins
11:10
Speaker 2: to hold this town hall are the people trying to
11:13
Speaker 2: make money for investors.
11:16
Speaker 1: And again, the reason this is that I keep harping
11:19
Speaker 1: on this is the positions he took last night, pardoning
11:23
Speaker 1: the rioters. I think you pointed this out in our
11:25
Speaker 1: discord chat that we were doing during the town hall.
11:30
Speaker 1: That's popular with, what, 20% of voters?
11:33
Speaker 2: All voters and a majority of Trump voters, 2020 Trump voters,
11:38
Speaker 2: oppose it.
11:39
Speaker 1: Right. Extremely unpopular position. We know a national abortion ban,
11:43
Speaker 1: very unpopular. We know that family separation, extremely unpopular. Do
11:47
Speaker 1: you know where those positions were in all the coverage today?
11:50
Speaker 1: In Playbook, it was like three-fourths of the way down.
11:53
Speaker 1: And most of the, because most of the coverage was
11:55
Speaker 1: about everyone yelling about CNN. And so all the things
11:58
Speaker 1: he said that are extremely unpopular that would lead people
12:01
Speaker 1: to not vote for him were buried by the complaining
12:04
Speaker 1: about CNN. And again, I get it. It was infuriating
12:08
Speaker 1: to watch, right?
12:09
Speaker 4: Right.
12:09
Speaker 1: Like we can have a debate about whether they should
12:11
Speaker 1: or should have not have done that. But like this,
12:13
Speaker 1: you know, it's, I know we're in election season again
12:16
Speaker 1: because I'm back to the serenity prayer. It's like, grant
12:19
Speaker 1: me the wisdom. Grant me the serenity to accept the
12:22
Speaker 1: things I cannot change, the change of things I can,
12:26
Speaker 1: and the wisdom to know the difference. I think it is.
12:28
Speaker 1: And if the.
12:29
Speaker 2: Crooked merch store doesn't start selling that piece of embroidery
12:31
Speaker 2: straight off someone's grandmother's wall.
12:33
Speaker 1: We're very religious here. CNN can't change it. What persuadable
12:37
Speaker 1: voters think about who they're going to elect president can
12:39
Speaker 1: definitely change that. So we should get to work. Go
12:41
Speaker 1: to votesaveamerica.com, sign up. Speaking of voters, do you think
12:44
Speaker 1: last night helped Trump with any wavering Republican voters who watched,
12:48
Speaker 1: if there were any? And then how do you think this,
12:51
Speaker 1: we kind of talked about this, but how do you
12:52
Speaker 1: think it landed with persuadable voters? I don't think it
12:54
Speaker 1: landed too well, but what do you think about Republican voters?
12:57
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm sure it was helpful. I mean, I think
13:00
Speaker 2: if there was one part of last night that was worthwhile,
13:03
Speaker 2: it was a reminder of who the Republican base is.
13:07
Speaker 2: To hear what they cheered about, what they laughed about,
13:10
Speaker 2: what they yelled about, how much they love Trump. Even
13:12
Speaker 2: voters who– Republican voters who are open to supporting some
13:15
Speaker 2: other person like Tiny D love Trump. And they believe
13:19
Speaker 2: what he says and they enjoy the spectacle. And that
13:23
Speaker 2: is a deeply scary thing for this country. But I
13:26
Speaker 2: think it reminds us in a very real way what
13:30
Speaker 2: Trump's real advantages are in this race in that he
13:32
Speaker 2: is much stronger– as a front runner for that race.
13:35
Speaker 2: And I think we, that I think a lot of
13:37
Speaker 2: people assumed just a few months ago.
13:41
Speaker 1: Yeah. The one thing I noticed, at least at the
13:43
Speaker 1: beginning with him too, is he clearly has advisors who,
13:48
Speaker 1: you know, workshopped answers with him on some of these
13:52
Speaker 1: trickier questions. Like why'd you do a coup? And he
13:55
Speaker 1: was reciting some of the talking points and pivoting away
13:59
Speaker 1: at times that he did show some discipline at the beginning,
14:03
Speaker 1: Discipline in a scary way, because he was probably on
14:06
Speaker 1: the message they wanted. He, you know, Caitlyn kept pushing
14:09
Speaker 1: him and pushing him. And then when he sort of
14:10
Speaker 1: lost it towards the end and started saying she was
14:12
Speaker 1: nasty and yelling about other stuff, I think he became
14:16
Speaker 1: his old Trump self. But he did show a little
14:18
Speaker 1: bit of discipline at the beginning that makes me think
14:20
Speaker 1: just only strengthens him in the Republican primary.
14:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, he, that was the, and this is, I do
14:25
Speaker 2: not want to say that this is the lowest bar
14:28
Speaker 2: humanly possible. It's a bar so low it is underground.
14:30
Speaker 2: But that is the most prepared he's been for an
14:32
Speaker 2: immediate appearance since he started running for president. He brought notes.
14:37
Speaker 2: He had a timeline. He was definitely avoiding going to
14:40
Speaker 2: jail on January 6th. He lost it when we got
14:44
Speaker 2: to the Carroll verdict. But being strategic and being more
14:48
Speaker 2: strategic than he was in the past are not the
14:49
Speaker 2: exact same thing. But there is a plan and there
14:53
Speaker 2: are people he is listening to, at least right now,
14:54
Speaker 2: which did not happen through either of his two races.
14:57
Speaker 1: DeSantis' super PAC hit Trump on Twitter after the town
15:00
Speaker 1: hall on January 6th pardons, the big lie investigations he's
15:04
Speaker 1: involved in, the E. Jean Carroll case. They just, you know,
15:08
Speaker 1: backed up the truck, dumped it out. All the research.
15:11
Speaker 1: But do you think Pudding Fingers will take the hint?
15:12
Speaker 2: No, I think he would watch what happened last night
15:14
Speaker 2: and reconsider his decision to run. I mean, serious. You
15:17
Speaker 2: look at that all, like, we sit here and we
15:19
Speaker 2: say all the time, like, make this case, call him
15:22
Speaker 2: a loser, show the chaos, and people fucking lapped it up.
15:26
Speaker 2: They lapped it up, every bit of it.
15:28
Speaker 1: The E.G.
15:28
Speaker 2: And Carol thing, in the conception of that within the
15:32
Speaker 2: Republican base, Trump is not the perpetrator. He's the victim.
15:37
Speaker 4: Yeah.
15:37
Speaker 1: Well, that was what– it's funny you said he should
15:39
Speaker 1: reconsider because my thought was, I'm like, this guy is
15:42
Speaker 1: about to go through an entire presidential campaign, potentially just
15:48
Speaker 1: torch his reputation among Republican voters forever, and he's not
15:51
Speaker 1: even going to try to win?
15:52
Speaker 2: Yeah.
15:54
Speaker 1: Either try to win and just start going after him,
15:57
Speaker 1: or don't fucking do it, man. What are you doing?
15:59
Speaker 2: I mean, if he runs, he seems to be making
16:03
Speaker 2: the same mistake that every previous Republican makes, is get
16:05
Speaker 2: in the race and hope Trump falls under his own weight.
16:09
Speaker 2: And maybe he will. Maybe he'll get killed.
16:11
Speaker 1: I think literally, unless he dies. I guess they're just
16:14
Speaker 1: hoping he dies. Maybe between now and then, that's it.
16:18
Speaker 1: That's the only hope they have.
16:19
Speaker 2: He could legitimately go to prison, and it's a coin
16:21
Speaker 2: flip as to whether he is still the Republican nominee.
16:25
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, I would say it's still pretty likely.
16:29
Speaker 1: And not even a coin flip. All right, let's talk
16:30
Speaker 1: more about the verdict in the E. Jean Carroll case,
16:33
Speaker 1: where a jury ordered Trump to pay the famous advice
16:36
Speaker 1: columnist $ 5 million in damages for sexually assaulting, then defaming her.
16:41
Speaker 1: Here's what Trump said when he was asked about it
16:42
Speaker 1: at the town hall.
16:43
Speaker 3: This woman, I don't know her. I never met her.
16:46
Speaker 3: I have no idea who she is. I had a
16:48
Speaker 3: picture taken years ago with her and her husband, nice guy,
16:51
Speaker 3: John Johnson. He was a newscaster, very nice man. What
16:55
Speaker 3: kind of a woman meets somebody and brings them up
16:58
Speaker 3: and within minutes you're playing hanky-panky in a dressing.
17:01
Speaker 2: Room, okay? I have no idea who the hell.
17:04
Speaker 3: She's a whack job.
17:05
Speaker 4: Mr.
17:05
Speaker 1: President, you did not... Let's put aside for a moment
17:09
Speaker 1: whether this verdict will damage Trump politically. Sure seems like
17:12
Speaker 1: a big deal that the Republican frontrunner for president will
17:15
Speaker 1: finally face some measure of accountability after being accused of
17:18
Speaker 1: sexual misconduct by 26 women, no?
17:22
Speaker 2: The entire... episode last night was just so disgusting, right?
17:28
Speaker 2: The way he talked about it, the way the crowd
17:31
Speaker 2: reacted to it, just the amount of like cruelty and misogyny,
17:36
Speaker 2: like running through the entire event through him. And, and
17:40
Speaker 2: it is when you watch it, it's like, this is
17:42
Speaker 2: why so many victims do not come forward because that
17:45
Speaker 2: is a huge part of society. That, that audience represents
17:48
Speaker 2: a significant swath of Americans and the embodiment of that
17:52
Speaker 2: cruelty and misogyny is their chosen leader. the man who
17:54
Speaker 2: was president of the United States and could very well
17:56
Speaker 2: be president again. And that– I mean it was a
17:58
Speaker 2: truly– one of the more horrifying things I've ever seen
18:03
Speaker 2: in a political like media event like that. Just absolutely
18:07
Speaker 2: disturbing and offensive and horrifying and I'm sure triggering for
18:10
Speaker 2: so many people. We were watching it with a bunch
18:13
Speaker 2: of people online. I mean just– I mean horrifying. Absolutely horrifying,
18:17
Speaker 2: disgusting experience from a disgusting human being.
18:21
Speaker 1: Yeah, and look, I– After the verdict came, one of
18:26
Speaker 1: my thoughts was like, it's so difficult for so many
18:30
Speaker 1: survivors to come forward. Perhaps E. Jean Carroll finding some
18:34
Speaker 1: measure of justice and some measure of accountability for Donald Trump,
18:38
Speaker 1: small as it may be, this will help other people
18:40
Speaker 1: come forward. Then you see the spectacle at the town
18:43
Speaker 1: hall and exactly what you said, you realize, oh, this
18:45
Speaker 1: is why people don't come forward. I think about the verdict,
18:48
Speaker 1: like the facts and the testimony were incredibly damning, but
18:52
Speaker 1: I think none more so than Trump's videotaped deposition where
18:57
Speaker 1: the jury, six men, three women, could see for themselves
19:01
Speaker 1: that Trump, and this was back to our earlier conversation,
19:04
Speaker 1: Trump wasn't just a liar, but a monster. He said
19:07
Speaker 1: under oath that when you're a star, women let you
19:10
Speaker 1: sexually assault them, unfortunately or fortunately, which he then said
19:13
Speaker 1: again at the, he stood by those remarks at the
19:16
Speaker 1: town hall. He said that he wouldn't rape the victim
19:19
Speaker 1: or the victim's lawyer because they're not his type. He
19:23
Speaker 1: said he didn't recognize a picture of his own ex-wife.
19:26
Speaker 1: And the jury heard all this and they were like, yeah,
19:30
Speaker 1: that guy's an asshole. It's bullshit. And he's liable. So,
19:34
Speaker 1: you know, even back to the, oh, Trump lies. He
19:37
Speaker 1: gets away with it. He didn't really get away with it.
19:39
Speaker 1: There was a jury, a jury of his peers. They
19:42
Speaker 1: heard him. They heard his deposition. And they were like,
19:44
Speaker 1: you know what? That's bullshit. So so he doesn't you
19:48
Speaker 1: know the idea that trump's words are magic and he
19:52
Speaker 1: says them and everyone's under a spell and then believes
19:54
Speaker 1: him like it's not you know it's not always true
19:57
Speaker 1: it wasn't true in 2020 so none of the republicans
20:00
Speaker 1: trying to beat donald trump in the primary have criticized
20:03
Speaker 1: him for the verdict except for chris christie and asa
20:05
Speaker 1: hutchinson what is wrong with these people.
20:09
Speaker 2: I mean, they are appealing to a Republican Party base
20:13
Speaker 2: that is fine with it.
20:16
Speaker 4: Yeah.
20:17
Speaker 1: I mean, most of them have been in the women
20:19
Speaker 1: are usually liars camp since Kavanaugh. So that's one reason.
20:23
Speaker 1: There's an additional reason than just loyalty to Donald Trump
20:25
Speaker 1: on this one. It was interesting that some Republican senators,
20:28
Speaker 1: when asked, said that this was a problem. Not Marco Rubio.
20:32
Speaker 1: Marco Rubio said that the jury is a joke. So
20:35
Speaker 1: Marco Rubio... thinks that our justice system in which a
20:38
Speaker 1: jury of your peers hears a case, he doesn't know
20:41
Speaker 1: who the jury is. The jury is anonymous. They have
20:43
Speaker 1: to be anonymous because they could get death threats for
20:45
Speaker 1: rendering justice. But, you know, Marco Rubio, he just thinks
20:49
Speaker 1: they're a joke. Thinks juries are a joke. Doesn't matter
20:51
Speaker 1: who they are. He doesn't know who they are. He's
20:53
Speaker 1: just going to say they're a joke.
20:55
Speaker 2: I mean, you just have to say he's a fucking joke.
20:58
Speaker 1: It's just unbelievable. It's unbelievable. So anyway, so that's what
21:04
Speaker 1: we've got for the next 500 and something days. Donald Trump.
21:07
Speaker 1: Donald Trump is back. Let's talk about the debt ceiling.
21:23
Speaker 1: A cheerier subject.
21:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's pivot to something positive.
21:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, which Donald Trump thinks we should forget about the
21:29
Speaker 1: debt ceiling, trigger default, economic catastrophe, who cares? Big White
21:34
Speaker 1: House meeting on Tuesday between Biden and congressional leaders. Still
21:36
Speaker 1: no deal. Doesn't seem like there was too much progress.
21:39
Speaker 1: Few somewhat positive signs. Mitch McConnell joined Biden and the
21:43
Speaker 1: Democrats in saying that default is not an option. Aides
21:46
Speaker 1: in both parties are starting to meet and negotiate over
21:48
Speaker 1: the budget. And Biden said he's willing to look at
21:50
Speaker 1: Republican priorities like cutting unspent COVID funds and permitting reform.
21:55
Speaker 1: The Democrats are making it clear that these are budget negotiations,
21:58
Speaker 1: not debt ceiling negotiations. Semantics. Who knows? And the president
22:03
Speaker 1: said for the first time he's considering declaring the debt
22:05
Speaker 1: ceiling unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment, that we also talked
22:09
Speaker 1: about all the legal challenges involved, and the White House
22:12
Speaker 1: later said that this path is still unlikely. What do
22:15
Speaker 1: you think, Dan? How are you feeling after this week
22:17
Speaker 1: of debt ceiling negotiations?
22:19
Speaker 2: Not great, John. I wrote about this a little bit
22:24
Speaker 2: in MessageBox earlier this week, but I think All the participants,
22:29
Speaker 2: the media, the markets are dramatically under-appreciating how likelihood default
22:34
Speaker 2: might be. Because you worked in the White House for
22:37
Speaker 2: one of these. I worked in the White House for
22:38
Speaker 2: both of these debt ceiling fights. And the conditions that
22:44
Speaker 2: prevented default in 2011, 2013 are not the same now.
22:49
Speaker 2: Kevin McCarthy is not John Boehner. And John Boehner is
22:51
Speaker 2: not Nancy Pelosi. So that's saying a lot. Mitch McConnell,
22:56
Speaker 2: who was... Integral to having last-minute solutions both times is
23:01
Speaker 2: much weaker than he was before, and his caucus is
23:03
Speaker 2: much more unruly. Back in those days, it was really
23:05
Speaker 2: only Ted Cruz and Rand Paul who were sort of
23:09
Speaker 2: the trolls who would try to upend everything. But now
23:10
Speaker 2: he's got those guys. He's got Tommy Tuberville, Josh Hawley,
23:15
Speaker 2: Tom Cotton, J.D.
23:16
Speaker 4: Vance.
23:16
Speaker 2: There's a whole bunch of people who make it much
23:18
Speaker 2: harder for him to cut a last-minute deal that's acceptable
23:21
Speaker 2: to all sides. A lot of goobers. A lot of goobers.
23:25
Speaker 2: And so this is– This is worrisome. And I think
23:28
Speaker 2: what Donald Trump said last night makes it much, much
23:31
Speaker 2: more dangerous because he has now given permission to the
23:35
Speaker 2: House Republicans to default.
23:38
Speaker 1: It certainly feels like we are headed for the two-track
23:42
Speaker 1: strategy where Democrats negotiate a budget deal in exchange for
23:45
Speaker 1: Republicans lifting the debt ceiling, which lets Democrats say they
23:48
Speaker 1: negotiated over the budget, not the debt ceiling. And Republicans
23:50
Speaker 1: say that they use the debt ceiling to extract policy concessions.
23:55
Speaker 1: I think the challenge is what concessions Unspent COVID funds
23:59
Speaker 1: and permitting reform aren't going to be enough for Republicans.
24:02
Speaker 1: Big cuts are off the table for Democrats. So where
24:06
Speaker 1: does that leave us in the negotiation? Again, negotiating with McCarthy,
24:12
Speaker 1: you could get a plan or you could get a
24:14
Speaker 1: deal that maybe does some cuts. And then he goes
24:17
Speaker 1: back to his caucus and they're like, well, that's not enough.
24:20
Speaker 1: And then we're fucked.
24:21
Speaker 2: Back in the Obama years, the Venn diagram of things
24:24
Speaker 2: that could pass the Republican House and were acceptable to
24:26
Speaker 2: a Democratic president and a largely Democratic Senate, there was
24:29
Speaker 2: a very narrow area of overlap there. I'm not sure
24:32
Speaker 2: those circles touch anymore, that there is something that would
24:35
Speaker 2: be acceptable, especially for McCarthy, who has made it his
24:39
Speaker 2: strategy to empower the far right. Boehner had the opposite strategy. Now,
24:43
Speaker 2: he had more margin of error, but he would appeal
24:47
Speaker 2: to the middle and In the middle, that's a term
24:50
Speaker 2: of art in this case because they weren't really moderates.
24:52
Speaker 1: They're all relative.
24:53
Speaker 2: Everyone to the closer to the middle than the Freedom Caucus.
24:56
Speaker 2: And McCarthy knows that he's one angry Freedom Caucus member
25:00
Speaker 2: away from losing his job. And so unless you can
25:04
Speaker 2: jam a deal down their throats, I find it really
25:06
Speaker 2: hard to imagine. I can see a world in which
25:08
Speaker 2: McConnell and Biden cut some deal with Schumer. that then
25:13
Speaker 2: they force onto McCarthy and McCarthy's going to have to
25:16
Speaker 2: either have to do it. Either they use a discharge
25:18
Speaker 2: petition or it goes through with some sort of overwhelming
25:23
Speaker 2: majority of Democrats that happened in non-debt ceiling fiscal negotiations
25:26
Speaker 2: in the past. But I found it hard to imagine
25:28
Speaker 2: that there's a real deal there between Biden and McCarthy
25:31
Speaker 2: if McCarthy is the chief negotiator for the Republicans.
25:35
Speaker 1: Yeah. The only thing I can see is if there's
25:37
Speaker 1: some kind of deal that gets most Republicans on board,
25:40
Speaker 1: in the House, which again, like you said, with this
25:42
Speaker 1: caucus is still a pretty bad deal or they're going
25:45
Speaker 1: to want pretty steep cuts. And that somehow the Freedom
25:48
Speaker 1: Caucus is like, we're not going to vote for it,
25:50
Speaker 1: but we're not going to fire you from your job,
25:53
Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy, if you bring this to the floor. And
25:55
Speaker 1: then he gets some Democrats on board. That's the only
25:57
Speaker 1: thing I can think of. And like you said, the
25:59
Speaker 1: Venn diagram of what would be acceptable in that deal
26:00
Speaker 1: is I don't fucking know. Why do you think Biden
26:03
Speaker 1: floated the 14th Amendment as a real, if unlikely, possibility?
26:09
Speaker 2: I think it's been reported that they were doing it.
26:12
Speaker 2: People in the administration are clearly telling reporters that they're
26:14
Speaker 2: looking at it. Of course they're looking at it. You
26:15
Speaker 2: have to look at it. You would be insane not
26:17
Speaker 2: to look at it because you very well could default
26:22
Speaker 2: and then you might have to invoke it. And so
26:24
Speaker 2: I think he does answer the question truthfully. I don't–
26:27
Speaker 2: just because it seems weird to– what else was he
26:30
Speaker 2: going to say? I'm not going to tell you what
26:31
Speaker 2: I'm thinking or– I think I have a lot of
26:34
Speaker 2: questions about the merits of floating it right now because–
26:39
Speaker 2: On one side, you can see the Republicans saying at
26:42
Speaker 2: the end of this, well, Biden says he has the power.
26:44
Speaker 2: Let's see if he can do it, right, as a
26:46
Speaker 2: way– it gives them an out. On the other hand,
26:50
Speaker 2: particularly in 2011, we avoided default, but we did significant
26:54
Speaker 2: damage– the Republicans did significant damage to the economy in
26:57
Speaker 2: the run-up to that near default where zero jobs were
27:02
Speaker 2: created the month of the fiscal– of the debt ceiling fight.
27:06
Speaker 2: The market lost– trillions or billions, I don't know, a
27:09
Speaker 2: ton of money, right? Like a lot of bad stuff happened.
27:12
Speaker 2: And so having the out of the 14th Amendment out
27:14
Speaker 2: there could theoretically prevent, give people the market some reason
27:18
Speaker 2: to not panic, at least until the last minute here,
27:21
Speaker 2: and maybe do less economic damage.
27:23
Speaker 3: I don't know.
27:24
Speaker 2: I think he probably does answer the question because that's
27:25
Speaker 2: what was happening. It was being truthful. How that plays,
27:28
Speaker 2: I don't know. We talked about the real challenges of
27:31
Speaker 2: getting people to buy bonds of questionable legal authority.
27:36
Speaker 1: Yeah.
27:37
Speaker 2: Um, in that situation.
27:38
Speaker 1: And I think, and Biden basically said this is that it's, I,
27:43
Speaker 1: I was wondering if you could do it now somehow
27:47
Speaker 1: and have the courts decide on the issue by the
27:50
Speaker 1: time we're about to hit default. Biden basically said, Oh,
27:54
Speaker 1: I'll look at it for next time. Like, like we're
27:56
Speaker 1: looking at it down the road kind of thing, uh,
27:58
Speaker 1: when pressed on it and the white house sort of
28:00
Speaker 1: backed that up as well. So it doesn't seem it's
28:03
Speaker 1: if he, if he wanted to try to invoke the
28:06
Speaker 1: 14th amendment. It doesn't seem like you can do it
28:08
Speaker 1: once we default because, um, then the mark, like we've said,
28:12
Speaker 1: the markets will go crazy anyway, and the cost of
28:13
Speaker 1: borrowing will skyrocket. So what's his next move? What's Biden's
28:18
Speaker 1: next move?
28:19
Speaker 2: I mean, there are, I think there's a meeting with
28:22
Speaker 2: leadership staff and white house staff either later this week
28:25
Speaker 2: or early next week. I mean, I think what they're
28:27
Speaker 2: going to try to do, as you said, is try
28:30
Speaker 2: to cut the deal. They were going to have to
28:32
Speaker 2: cut in September anyway, around government funding. and then claim
28:36
Speaker 2: to add a clean debt ceiling to it. And that
28:38
Speaker 2: could work as long as you get it. You're not at,
28:41
Speaker 2: you know, you're not the clock ticking to the X date,
28:43
Speaker 2: which is the date when you run out of cash, uh,
28:46
Speaker 2: as you're cutting that deal, because you just, that's not
28:48
Speaker 2: a situation in which a good faith negotiation can happen
28:51
Speaker 2: when the Republicans hold the trigger to blow up the
28:54
Speaker 2: economy and you're, and you're trying to fight for education funding.
28:56
Speaker 2: Like that's not, that's not a real negotiation. And so
28:59
Speaker 2: that we'll see what happens. We'll know soon how much
29:02
Speaker 2: time they have because the may, uh, tax results, or
29:07
Speaker 2: this are the may, may tax receipts could buy us
29:10
Speaker 2: a little more time or give us less time. And
29:12
Speaker 2: that could get us to the June 15th quarterly tax payments,
29:15
Speaker 2: which could get us back closer to that September deadline.
29:17
Speaker 2: So we'll, this is either a few weeks or a
29:19
Speaker 2: few months and we're not, we'll know, uh, in the
29:21
Speaker 2: not too distant future.
29:23
Speaker 1: So here's a match made in hell, uh, Tucker Carlson
29:26
Speaker 1: and Elon Musk, uh, the fired talk show host who
29:29
Speaker 1: was even too racist and sexist for Fox news announced
29:32
Speaker 1: that he's taking his talents to Twitter and, where he
29:34
Speaker 1: will host a version of the Tucker Carlson Show on
29:36
Speaker 1: the Buggy platform that users and advertisers are... fleeing in droves.
29:41
Speaker 1: So Tucker's lawyers also accused Fox of fraud so that
29:44
Speaker 1: he can get out of his $ 25 million contract and
29:47
Speaker 1: do this new show. Do you think that was a
29:49
Speaker 1: wise move? Is there any way you see this show
29:52
Speaker 1: working as well as his last one?
29:55
Speaker 2: Can you... imagine being so narcissistic, so desperate to have
30:00
Speaker 2: people hear your voice that you would spend $ 20 million
30:03
Speaker 2: for the opportunity to do so. That's essentially what he's doing.
30:08
Speaker 1: My also thought is like, he's gotta be pretty fucking rich.
30:10
Speaker 4: Yeah.
30:11
Speaker 2: I don't care how rich you're at the stage.
30:13
Speaker 1: You're giving up $ 25 million. Uh, you got, you got
30:16
Speaker 1: enough money to throw around.
30:17
Speaker 2: I think he's got plenty of money, but I still
30:19
Speaker 2: think $ 20 million is a lot of money. Even Tucker Carlson.
30:21
Speaker 1: And it's wild.
30:24
Speaker 2: You know, whether this will have any influence, uh, There
30:27
Speaker 2: is a test case here. Glenn Beck left Fox News
30:29
Speaker 2: and did a bunch of digital stuff for The Blaze,
30:32
Speaker 2: and we didn't really hear that much of Glenn Beck
30:34
Speaker 2: for a very long time. Certainly, I think Tucker Carlson
30:37
Speaker 2: will continue to have a real influence on the MAGA
30:42
Speaker 2: base because Steve Bannon is not on Fox News, and
30:46
Speaker 2: he's got real influence on the MAGA base through his
30:47
Speaker 2: media stuff. But in terms of affecting the larger culture
30:51
Speaker 2: to the way that people were– bumping into Tucker Carlson's
30:56
Speaker 2: content because they were someplace where Fox News is on
30:59
Speaker 2: or they're flipping channels. That's not going to happen. You're
31:01
Speaker 2: going to have to really seek him out. And I
31:04
Speaker 2: can't remember where I read this, but Ben Smith, who
31:06
Speaker 2: was the editor of BuzzFeed News and at Semaphore has
31:09
Speaker 2: been on.
31:09
Speaker 1: The- Offline guest this week.
31:11
Speaker 2: Oh, exciting. I want to just listen to that on Sunday.
31:13
Speaker 1: Tune in Sunday. Tune in Sunday.
31:15
Speaker 2: But he talked a little bit about, in some interview
31:16
Speaker 2: he had done recently about, at BuzzFeed, they had a
31:21
Speaker 2: Twitter-only- Show, morning show called AM to DM. I was
31:26
Speaker 2: a guest on it once.
31:27
Speaker 1: In fact, he talked about this on Offline.
31:28
Speaker 2: Did he?
31:29
Speaker 1: I sat down with Ben 10 minutes after the Tucker
31:31
Speaker 1: Carlson news broke. Yeah, they had a show called AM
31:33
Speaker 1: DM on Twitter and it did not work.
31:36
Speaker 2: And tell them why it didn't work.
31:37
Speaker 1: Because people on Twitter, they just keep scrolling. They don't
31:41
Speaker 1: stop and watch a video for a long time. The
31:45
Speaker 1: whole thing is built for scrolling fast.
31:47
Speaker 2: So I think that that's going to have an impact
31:48
Speaker 2: on its influence.
31:50
Speaker 1: I mean, a good chunk of Tucker's audience has clearly
31:53
Speaker 1: left Fox, according to the ratings. His hour is now
31:57
Speaker 1: third behind MSNBC and CNN, which takes some doing when
32:02
Speaker 1: you know CNN's rating.
32:04
Speaker 2: Seriously.
32:05
Speaker 1: The question is, where did they go? Are these mostly
32:09
Speaker 1: old people? Are they going to Newsmax or OAN for
32:12
Speaker 1: their fix, for their racist authoritarian fix? Or are they
32:17
Speaker 1: going to sign up for something called a Twitter account? Yeah,
32:21
Speaker 1: and stream Tucker's show there. I mean, it's about who
32:23
Speaker 1: his audience is, too. Like, does he really think that
32:25
Speaker 1: his audience was, like, in the demo? Like, I know
32:28
Speaker 1: he was winning in the key demo, but I don't
32:31
Speaker 1: think that was the bulk of his audience. I don't
32:32
Speaker 1: think that a Fox News host was getting a bunch
32:35
Speaker 1: of Twitter users in his audience. I mean, we'll find out. But, like,
32:41
Speaker 1: I mean, and then how do you, how do they
32:43
Speaker 1: make money from this? A bunch of old people going
32:45
Speaker 1: to give Elon Musk their credit card information to get
32:47
Speaker 1: Tucker's show? Like, how does this work?
32:49
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, that's the problem is that you would
32:52
Speaker 2: use advertising. That's how you would do it. And Tucker
32:54
Speaker 2: was struggling to get advertising on Fox News.
32:56
Speaker 1: You know who else is struggling for advertisers?
32:58
Speaker 2: Twitter.
32:59
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. And now they thought that advertisers were uncomfortable before.
33:03
Speaker 1: Just wait until their ads are shown next to the
33:05
Speaker 1: guy that Fox fired because he said he was rooting
33:09
Speaker 1: for a mob to kill a kid because that's not
33:11
Speaker 1: how white men should fight. That's where you get to
33:14
Speaker 1: put your ad, right next to that guy.
33:17
Speaker 2: Cool. Good stuff here.
33:19
Speaker 1: You know what? I hope the two of them are
33:20
Speaker 1: very happy together.
33:22
Speaker 2: Look, every shoe finds a match.
33:28
Speaker 1: Last but not least, in the least shocking news of
33:31
Speaker 1: the year, Nobel Prize-winning astrophysicist George Santos was finally charged
33:35
Speaker 1: with a host of federal crimes this week, including seven
33:38
Speaker 1: counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, one
33:41
Speaker 1: count of theft of public funds, and two counts of
33:44
Speaker 1: lying to the House of Representatives on financial forms. If convicted,
33:47
Speaker 1: he could face up to 20 years in prison. But
33:50
Speaker 1: for now, he's out on $ 500, 000 bail, serving in Congress,
33:54
Speaker 1: still telling reporters he plans to run for re-election. Republicans
33:57
Speaker 1: aren't yet doing a thing about it. What a country.
34:00
Speaker 1: What a country. Thoughts on what's next for George Santos
34:03
Speaker 1: and the people he represents?
34:05
Speaker 2: I would imagine one of two paths. Jail or another
34:09
Speaker 2: 15 months in Congress.
34:11
Speaker 1: You think he's going to win re-election?
34:13
Speaker 2: I don't think he's going to win re-election. I don't
34:14
Speaker 2: think he's going anywhere because George Santos sits in a
34:17
Speaker 2: district that Joe Biden won by four points. And given
34:20
Speaker 2: how Democrats have performed in special elections during the Trump era,
34:23
Speaker 2: there is not a chance Kevin McCarthy is forcing him
34:26
Speaker 2: out to have him be replaced by a Democrat, which
34:29
Speaker 2: is what would be, any Democrat would be a favorite,
34:31
Speaker 2: if not a heavy favorite in that special election. So
34:34
Speaker 2: he is going to stay in Congress. Kevin McCarthy is
34:36
Speaker 2: going to be totally fine with it. A bunch of
34:38
Speaker 2: Republicans are going to be totally fine with it. And
34:39
Speaker 2: the job of Democrats is to make the other Republicans,
34:42
Speaker 2: particularly the New York Republicans who represent the largest concentration
34:45
Speaker 2: of vulnerable Republican incumbents in the 2024 election pay a
34:48
Speaker 2: price for it.
34:50
Speaker 1: But it's a witch hunt. The whole thing's a witch hunt,
34:51
Speaker 1: just like all Donald Trump's investigations.
34:54
Speaker 4: No?
34:56
Speaker 1: Yeah. McCarthy said if the ethics committee determined Santos broke
35:00
Speaker 1: the law, he would call for him to resign. The
35:02
Speaker 1: ethics committee. There's also a legal system. That would perk
35:08
Speaker 1: up with that.
35:09
Speaker 2: No?
35:09
Speaker 1: No, doesn't sound that way. So that's George Santos, a
35:12
Speaker 1: fitting end, a fitting end. And it's not even the
35:15
Speaker 1: end yet.
35:15
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think we should thank George Santos for,
35:17
Speaker 2: in what was really an eventful, pretty scary week of politics,
35:20
Speaker 2: he allowed us to make the Nobel Prize winning astrophysicist
35:23
Speaker 2: joke one more time.
35:25
Speaker 1: Also, the fact that George Santos was indicted was the
35:28
Speaker 1: sixth story on the list today. It's been a real week, Dan.
35:32
Speaker 1: It's been a real week.
35:35
Speaker 2: Between the Trump town hall and the gusher of news
35:38
Speaker 2: this week, We are right back at it.
35:41
Speaker 1: We are. Yeah, no, I can feel it. I can
35:43
Speaker 1: feel it. Well, another big news from today, the end
35:46
Speaker 1: of Title 42. And when we come back, Daryl Lind
35:48
Speaker 1: will be here talking to Dan about what that means
35:51
Speaker 1: for immigration going forward.
36:05
Speaker 2: At 11.59 tonight, a Trump administration border policy called Title
36:08
Speaker 2: 42 will expire. More than 10,000 migrants have crossed the
36:12
Speaker 2: border each day this week. Here to break down the
36:14
Speaker 2: latest in Biden's immigration policies is American Immigration Council fellow
36:17
Speaker 2: and former longtime immigration reporter, Dara Lind. Dara, thanks so
36:22
Speaker 2: much for joining us and welcome back to the pod.
36:24
Speaker 4: Thank you. It's great to be back.
36:26
Speaker 2: This is a very complicated issue with a lot of
36:30
Speaker 2: very strong opinions. I just want to start with the
36:31
Speaker 2: very basics. Can you tell us what Title 42 is
36:35
Speaker 2: and why it's expiring today?
36:38
Speaker 1: Yes.
36:38
Speaker 4: So Title 42 is an extremely previously super obscure provision
36:43
Speaker 4: of a very old public health law that, as written,
36:47
Speaker 4: allows the government to prevent the introduction of people or
36:51
Speaker 4: things that could introduce infectious disease to the U.S., The
36:55
Speaker 4: Donald Trump administration very quickly after the introduction of the
36:59
Speaker 4: COVID-19 virus decided to use it as a way as
37:03
Speaker 4: a de facto immigration ban. Right. To, quote unquote, prevent
37:06
Speaker 4: the introduction of COVID-19, which was already circulating in the
37:09
Speaker 4: United States by making by by. You know, officially prohibiting
37:14
Speaker 4: the introduction of unauthorized migrants. Now, in practice, what that
37:17
Speaker 4: means is that instead of border agents apprehending somebody, putting
37:21
Speaker 4: them in deportation proceedings, and then if they requested asylum,
37:25
Speaker 4: being legally obligated to give them the chance to present
37:28
Speaker 4: an asylum case or at least be screened for asylum
37:31
Speaker 4: by an asylum officer. Border agents simply expelled people. If
37:36
Speaker 4: you asked for asylum, they said, sorry, can't get it.
37:39
Speaker 4: There were some very, very limited, and we don't even
37:42
Speaker 4: know how often they were used, exemptions for extreme trafficking cases.
37:46
Speaker 4: But on the flip side, they also weren't deported. They
37:48
Speaker 4: were simply, in many cases, pushed back to Mexico, even
37:52
Speaker 4: if they weren't Mexican. In other cases, expelled back to
37:55
Speaker 4: their home countries, but in a way that didn't have
37:57
Speaker 4: the lasting legal consequences that deportation carries in statutory immigration law.
38:03
Speaker 4: So what we've seen is, you.
38:05
Speaker 1: Know, a.
38:08
Speaker 4: At first, an increase in people just making repeat crossings,
38:12
Speaker 4: attempting to get through without being detected. And now, as
38:16
Speaker 4: it is, you know, because in theory, this was always
38:18
Speaker 4: supposed to be a temporary measure tied to the COVID-19 pandemic.
38:22
Speaker 4: And the Biden administration's first effort to end it a
38:25
Speaker 4: year ago was held up in court by Republicans saying
38:28
Speaker 4: you can't say there's still a public health emergency and
38:31
Speaker 4: not have this measure in place. It's become tied to
38:34
Speaker 4: the official HHS declaration of the end of the emergency measure.
38:37
Speaker 4: which happens at midnight tonight.
38:40
Speaker 2: So the administration has announced a host of new policies
38:43
Speaker 2: that will go into effect once Title 42 expires. I
38:47
Speaker 2: know this is very complicated. I know there's a lot
38:49
Speaker 2: of different policies here. Can you give us a quick
38:50
Speaker 2: summary of what those new immigration restrictions are and what
38:53
Speaker 2: they would mean for the 10,000 or so migrants who
38:55
Speaker 2: are coming to the border every day?
38:58
Speaker 4: Yes. So there's kind of the substance that's changing and
39:01
Speaker 4: then a whole lot of ways to implement that, right?
39:03
Speaker 4: The substance is that they just introduced a regulation or
39:08
Speaker 4: they just finalized a regulation yesterday that says if you A,
39:12
Speaker 4: are crossing between ports of entry and B, haven't already
39:16
Speaker 4: asked for asylum in another country and gotten denied, then
39:20
Speaker 4: you have a really, really high bar to clear like,
39:24
Speaker 4: tantamount to impossible to actually get asylum in the United States.
39:29
Speaker 4: It sets up like a bunch of like if then
39:32
Speaker 4: procedures and extra steps. But it's tantamount to saying we
39:36
Speaker 4: are holding you to a higher standard and we are
39:38
Speaker 4: forcing you to meet it. You know, at the beginning
39:41
Speaker 4: of the process. Now, the things they're doing to implement
39:43
Speaker 4: this include these. They're bringing back a Trump era policy
39:48
Speaker 4: of keeping people in Border Patrol custody for a little
39:52
Speaker 4: bit extra and having them screened for asylum and deported
39:55
Speaker 4: from Border Patrol custody, which essentially means they've built phone
39:59
Speaker 4: booths in Border Patrol facilities to use for asylum interviews.
40:02
Speaker 4: And that's being used for some single adults, as many
40:06
Speaker 4: as they can hold, presumably. And for families, a policy
40:11
Speaker 4: of ankle bracelets for members of the family with curfew
40:16
Speaker 4: and very rapid asylum interviews that if they fail them
40:21
Speaker 4: under this new standard... They're then promising to deport them.
40:23
Speaker 4: So there are, you know, they have a bunch of
40:25
Speaker 4: kind of extra resources, extra mechanisms in place to create
40:30
Speaker 4: what they call the consequences for people who are failing
40:33
Speaker 4: to meet this new elevated standard.
40:36
Speaker 2: And why a curfew? I understand, theoretically, at least the
40:40
Speaker 2: logic behind ankle bracelets or things like that to track
40:43
Speaker 2: people who you have not yet granted asylum to, but
40:45
Speaker 2: why a curfew?
40:47
Speaker 4: Think about it the other way in terms of in
40:49
Speaker 4: terms of why they're doing this. They can't detain. They
40:51
Speaker 4: don't they don't want to detain families. There are limits
40:54
Speaker 4: on how long you can detain families. And they while
40:58
Speaker 4: there were reports that they were considering reopening some of
41:01
Speaker 4: the family detention centers, they have that seems to be
41:05
Speaker 4: one policy that they have at least for the moment
41:06
Speaker 4: taken off the table. So, if the alternative was to
41:11
Speaker 4: detain people 24 hours a day, then at least having
41:14
Speaker 4: a place that they can check in, you know, that
41:16
Speaker 4: you know that they will be for, you know, five
41:18
Speaker 4: or six hours a day is, you know, is in
41:22
Speaker 4: theory preferable. Now, the question is going to be, There
41:25
Speaker 4: have been shifts over the last few years in how
41:27
Speaker 4: many people even have a home waiting for them after
41:31
Speaker 4: they cross, how many of them know people in the US,
41:33
Speaker 4: how many of them have support networks, or even know
41:35
Speaker 4: what city they want to go to. So this pilot
41:39
Speaker 4: program is being rolled out in only a few cities,
41:41
Speaker 4: but it's going to be interesting to see how many
41:45
Speaker 4: people would even be in stable enough conditions that guaranteeing
41:51
Speaker 4: they will be in the same place overnight and that
41:53
Speaker 4: they know exactly where that is and can tell ICE
41:56
Speaker 4: before they're released from custody is even feasible.
41:59
Speaker 2: A lot of people have said that these new Biden
42:04
Speaker 2: policies are actually harsher than the ones that Trump was
42:07
Speaker 2: using under Title 42. Is that an accurate assessment?
42:11
Speaker 4: Insofar as deportation is harsher than expulsion, yes. Insofar as
42:19
Speaker 4: there is any access to asylum, then the question becomes
42:25
Speaker 4: how accessible is humanitarian protection for people right now, really?
42:32
Speaker 4: And the other argument that the Biden administration brings is
42:35
Speaker 4: that They're, you know, unlike the Trump administration, they've tried
42:38
Speaker 4: to expand access to legal pathways for people. They've created
42:43
Speaker 4: this parole program for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans that
42:47
Speaker 4: allows 30,000 people a month to come into the U.S.
42:51
Speaker 4: who have support networks in the U.S. and can afford
42:54
Speaker 4: airfare to come into the U.S. work legally for two
42:56
Speaker 4: years and then leave, question mark.
43:00
Speaker 1: They are.
43:02
Speaker 4: Attempting to expand refugee resettlement from the Western hemisphere, which
43:06
Speaker 4: frankly is something that state has never been, has never
43:09
Speaker 4: really invested in, in the same way that it's invested
43:13
Speaker 4: in resettling refugees from other parts of the world. And
43:16
Speaker 4: it's opening these new regional processing centers, the details of
43:19
Speaker 4: which are still pretty unclear, but that in theory are
43:23
Speaker 4: going to connect people who have some access to legal,
43:27
Speaker 4: who have like some theory of the case about that
43:29
Speaker 4: they could get a legal immigrant or non-immigrant visa to
43:33
Speaker 4: the United States or to Canada or Spain to be
43:37
Speaker 4: able to figure that out before they leave their home country.
43:40
Speaker 4: So the argument is we're doing so much before you
43:45
Speaker 4: even get to the border that you shouldn't try to
43:47
Speaker 4: come to the border and cross illegally. That's just going
43:49
Speaker 4: to create more problems for us and therefore it's going
43:51
Speaker 4: to create more problems for you. Now, you know, the
43:54
Speaker 4: question is always how many people are like, how are
43:57
Speaker 4: the solution? Are the alternatives you're proposing really accessible to people,
44:01
Speaker 4: especially people who are already waiting across the border in Mexico,
44:04
Speaker 4: people who are already on their way through the dairy
44:06
Speaker 4: and gap and to people who find themselves needing to
44:09
Speaker 4: flee without necessarily having the luxury of months to wait.
44:13
Speaker 2: I mean, assuming as I do that, the vast majority
44:17
Speaker 2: of these people have, they are fleeing violence, right? They
44:20
Speaker 2: are coming to, here for a reason. They don't feel
44:23
Speaker 2: like they can be safe at home. The Biden administration
44:26
Speaker 2: is making it very clear that the numbers that are
44:27
Speaker 2: coming drastically exceed our capacity to handle them. What is
44:32
Speaker 2: the way, historically at least, to find the balance between
44:35
Speaker 2: the people who have what is potentially a legitimate claim
44:39
Speaker 2: for asylum and our capacity to house them here in
44:41
Speaker 2: the United States or to have them come here. Because
44:44
Speaker 2: there seems to be– the Biden administration wants to both say,
44:48
Speaker 2: you know, we are going to take legitimate claims seriously,
44:52
Speaker 2: but also all the messaging, both in the policies and
44:54
Speaker 2: the rhetoric is don't come, right? Stay, you know, that
44:58
Speaker 2: you can't just show up here. And they're trying to
45:01
Speaker 2: stem the flow because they can't handle 10,000 migrants a day, correct?
45:05
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, you mentioned like, what is the capacity
45:08
Speaker 4: been historically? And I think it's worth underlining that we
45:14
Speaker 4: are in unprecedented times in terms of How many people
45:18
Speaker 4: are displaced around the world, how many of those displaced
45:21
Speaker 4: people are displaced in the Western Hemisphere, and how easy
45:23
Speaker 4: it is to travel. The phenomenon of people being able
45:27
Speaker 4: to fly from Africa to South America and then take
45:30
Speaker 4: an overland journey up, you know, most of the American,
45:34
Speaker 4: like the American continent. dual continent is really, that is
45:38
Speaker 4: a new phenomenon. And it means that people who are desperate,
45:42
Speaker 4: who are fleeing, and this is where it gets really
45:44
Speaker 4: tricky under existing law, not just violence, but say, you know,
45:48
Speaker 4: when the, when consecutive Guatemalan coffee harvests failed and people
45:53
Speaker 4: in the Highlands found themselves absolutely unable to feed their families, when,
45:58
Speaker 4: you know, when, when you have situations like the one
46:01
Speaker 4: in Venezuela, where, They're not fleeing immediate violence, but the
46:04
Speaker 4: state has been failed for a decade, and they're not
46:07
Speaker 4: finding that the other countries in the hemisphere that have
46:11
Speaker 4: more displaced people that they're housing than the U.S. does
46:14
Speaker 4: because they're closer are not doing enough to give them
46:18
Speaker 4: solid footing, to give them a way to make a living,
46:20
Speaker 4: to integrate them into society. You know, these are all
46:23
Speaker 4: very hard problems that mean that, frankly, the U.S. is
46:29
Speaker 4: isn't dealing with them as acutely as Colombia is, for example,
46:34
Speaker 4: and is instead finding itself in the position where it
46:37
Speaker 4: has to deal with more than it would like. But
46:39
Speaker 4: as far as not having the capacity, I've increasingly become
46:45
Speaker 4: convinced that thinking about border management as something that we
46:50
Speaker 4: should be building capacity towards is the right way to
46:53
Speaker 4: go forward. We can't stop 10,000 people from coming. We
46:58
Speaker 4: can acknowledge that this is neither the first nor the
47:00
Speaker 4: last time that more people it's like there have been
47:03
Speaker 4: so many times over the last decade that there have
47:05
Speaker 4: been more people, many of whom are claiming are trying
47:08
Speaker 4: to claim asylum coming. Then the government can have the
47:11
Speaker 4: capacity to process. Why hasn't there been sustained investment in
47:15
Speaker 4: actually increasing that processing capacity so that more people, So
47:19
Speaker 4: that you don't have to choose between keeping people in
47:21
Speaker 4: Border Patrol custody for several days and just releasing them
47:25
Speaker 4: onto the streets with, you know, hoping that they'll get
47:28
Speaker 4: a bus ticket out of town. Those are the when
47:30
Speaker 4: you the more effort you put into ever stricter solutions
47:35
Speaker 4: for some people, the more you allow other people to
47:38
Speaker 4: fall through the cracks and that. Doesn't doesn't accomplish a
47:41
Speaker 4: deterrent method. It doesn't provide a support network for for
47:44
Speaker 4: asylum seekers who don't already have them, even if they
47:47
Speaker 4: do have legitimate, even and especially if they have legitimate
47:49
Speaker 4: asylum claims. And it means that we end up spending
47:53
Speaker 4: tremendous amounts of money every few years in congressional border
47:56
Speaker 4: supplementals instead of actually building the infrastructure that we can
48:00
Speaker 4: use the next time something comes around.
48:03
Speaker 2: The attempts to build infrastructure, are they falling victim to
48:07
Speaker 2: the same reason that a lot of very popular common sense,
48:10
Speaker 2: larger immigration reform initiatives fall victim to, which is politics?
48:14
Speaker 2: Is it just it's hard to find a bipartisan consensus
48:16
Speaker 2: around these things because they're so polarizing? Or has there
48:19
Speaker 2: been some sort of failure of leadership from administrations of
48:22
Speaker 2: both parties here?
48:23
Speaker 4: I mean, I think it's. The logic of deterrence is
48:28
Speaker 4: so compelling, right?
48:29
Speaker 1: It's so seductive.
48:30
Speaker 4: It really, it's so, like, it's so much easier to
48:34
Speaker 4: believe that if you just hit the right, like, ABAB
48:38
Speaker 4: combo of policies and messages, that people will suddenly get
48:43
Speaker 4: the message that they shouldn't come to the U.S. And, like,
48:47
Speaker 4: the fact that, you know, the argument will always be
48:50
Speaker 4: that true deterrence has never been tried because we haven't
48:52
Speaker 4: been harsh enough. The reason we haven't been harsh enough
48:54
Speaker 4: is because we have, like, legal commitments, humanitarian commitments, things
48:58
Speaker 4: that put a pretty solid floor on what you can do.
49:01
Speaker 4: And so the effort to try to creep ever closer
49:04
Speaker 4: to that line is it's it's really it is tempting.
49:07
Speaker 4: And it means that you will also like see some
49:09
Speaker 4: kind of the the logic of of the four countries
49:13
Speaker 4: for the parole program is that those were the four
49:14
Speaker 4: countries where apprehensions were going up.
49:16
Speaker 1: In the fall.
49:17
Speaker 4: So, you know, you can do some things to engineer
49:20
Speaker 4: particular populations, but you can't then prevent the next wave
49:24
Speaker 4: of people from being, you know, people of different nationalities
49:28
Speaker 4: who now have the opportunity because smuggling capacity has been
49:31
Speaker 4: built there because conditions have deteriorated enough in their home countries.
49:36
Speaker 4: So it requires a certain amount of like put on
49:40
Speaker 4: your big boy pants, not just from politicians, but from
49:43
Speaker 4: the public because it's If incumbent politicians say, oh, we
49:48
Speaker 4: don't have a silver bullet solution, they're extremely vulnerable to
49:51
Speaker 4: challengers saying, why don't you have a silver bullet solution? I,
49:54
Speaker 4: from my couch, have a silver bullet solution. So I
49:58
Speaker 4: don't know how to get the public to accept that
50:06
Speaker 4: if we keep insisting that the problem gets solved tomorrow,
50:08
Speaker 4: we're creating a situation where the problem won't be solved
50:10
Speaker 4: a decade from now, but that's really where I am personally.
50:13
Speaker 2: It also just seems somewhat naive or far-fetched to think
50:17
Speaker 2: that messaging from the U.S. federal government officials at the
50:21
Speaker 2: DHS or wherever else is going to reach the people
50:23
Speaker 2: most likely to seek asylum in the United States, especially
50:26
Speaker 2: when you have an entire industry that is making– an
50:30
Speaker 2: underground industry making money to try to get them north, right?
50:33
Speaker 2: Or from wherever. It seems– it's like Ali Marourkis. God
50:38
Speaker 2: bless him. He can say everything he wants. But you
50:40
Speaker 2: can't even get people in the United States to hear that,
50:42
Speaker 2: let alone people in Honduras or somewhere else.
50:45
Speaker 4: Right, exactly. I mean, the question of the information ecosystem
50:48
Speaker 4: surrounding would-be migrants is like, it's a really, really, really
50:52
Speaker 4: complicated question that, you know.
50:55
Speaker 1: In.
50:57
Speaker 4: My perfect world, there would be an embedded sociologist asking
51:01
Speaker 4: people who got released what they knew. But it's also
51:05
Speaker 4: something that, you know, because smugglers can take advantage of,
51:08
Speaker 4: for example, like opposition politicians saying the border is open.
51:12
Speaker 4: They can take advantage of hawkish policies to say you'd
51:15
Speaker 4: better come fast. Like this happened under Trump all the time. Right.
51:18
Speaker 4: The smugglers message was you better come fast. Donald Trump
51:20
Speaker 4: says he's about to close the border. So because of
51:23
Speaker 4: all of that, it's very, very hard to ensure any
51:28
Speaker 4: kind of messaging gets through. There is an argument that
51:32
Speaker 4: word of mouth through actual success or failure does work.
51:36
Speaker 4: And this is the argument the immigration hawks will use,
51:39
Speaker 4: that you have to have a system where People say,
51:42
Speaker 4: I tried and it didn't work. I'm in detention. I
51:46
Speaker 4: got deported. I wasn't able to get a work permit.
51:50
Speaker 4: I couldn't work in the United States. It didn't work.
51:53
Speaker 4: The problem is that that has to be a consistent message.
51:56
Speaker 4: The minute that anybody gets through, we saw a lot
51:59
Speaker 4: of this with Cubans in 2019, the minute that any
52:03
Speaker 4: Cuban managed to get through to get an exception to
52:07
Speaker 4: remain in Mexico. Every other every Cuban stuck on the
52:09
Speaker 4: Mexican side of the border was pinging their lawyers like,
52:11
Speaker 4: why can't you get that for me? So, you know,
52:15
Speaker 4: it's there. And that's just because there is a really
52:17
Speaker 4: well established like cross diaspora social network there. So, you know,
52:21
Speaker 4: you see similar things, similar kind of network effects with
52:25
Speaker 4: other groups as well. So unless you're going to actually,
52:29
Speaker 4: you know, just not not just repeal federal asylum law,
52:34
Speaker 4: but like prevent literally everyone from getting through undetected, then
52:39
Speaker 4: your word of mouth is going to be somewhat muddied.
52:42
Speaker 4: And the more exemptions you build in, the more you
52:44
Speaker 4: treat families differently, the more you treat unaccompanied children differently,
52:47
Speaker 4: the more you, in other words, accede to common sense
52:51
Speaker 4: and humanitarian needs that some people should be treated differently
52:55
Speaker 4: from others, the more complicated that word of mouth situation gets.
52:59
Speaker 2: So last question, as Title 42 expires and things take
53:05
Speaker 2: place over the next few days, what are you going
53:06
Speaker 2: to be watching for to see how this is going?
53:08
Speaker 4: It's a great question. The way I think about it
53:11
Speaker 4: is there are problems that are going to be very, very,
53:14
Speaker 4: very visible, such as large group releases of people in
53:18
Speaker 4: cities that haven't been briefed or prepared, don't have the funding,
53:22
Speaker 4: don't have the shelter capacity. That's going to be, if
53:26
Speaker 4: that happens and when that happens, you're going to know
53:28
Speaker 4: about it because there's going to be cable B-roll. What
53:31
Speaker 4: I'm concerned about that is a failure that's not going
53:34
Speaker 4: to be visible is, are people's due process rights being respected?
53:38
Speaker 4: And if they have asylum claims, are they getting the
53:41
Speaker 4: opportunity to make them? What standard are they being held to?
53:46
Speaker 4: The difference between Border Patrol custody and ICE custody, well,
53:49
Speaker 4: among other things, is that lawyers can't get into Border
53:52
Speaker 4: Patrol custody. The public can't get into Border Patrol custody. Like,
53:55
Speaker 4: electeds can't. So it's a total black box. And I.
54:02
Speaker 4: I am personally hoping that what we don't see is
54:05
Speaker 4: what happened under the Trump iteration of this policy and
54:08
Speaker 4: also under Remain in Mexico, where because it was hard
54:11
Speaker 4: to find people who had experienced this because they were
54:13
Speaker 4: getting deported quickly, they weren't in the U.S., they certainly
54:16
Speaker 4: weren't in government custody anymore, or they certainly weren't in
54:19
Speaker 4: the U.S. out of government custody, rather, that we just
54:22
Speaker 4: don't know.
54:22
Speaker 1: Like, it.
54:23
Speaker 4: The combination of the the size of the policy change
54:27
Speaker 4: and the fact that they're just surging people to kind
54:31
Speaker 4: of they're detailing a bunch of people to do border
54:34
Speaker 4: asylum screenings who have been trained in this but aren't
54:36
Speaker 4: full time asylum officers and the opacity. All of that
54:40
Speaker 4: says to me that it's like it's to me a
54:42
Speaker 4: recipe for like. You get a really scathing inspector general
54:45
Speaker 4: report three years from now saying, actually, this was a
54:47
Speaker 4: disaster and a bunch of people got deported who shouldn't
54:49
Speaker 4: have been. And that's what I I'm I'm really hoping
54:52
Speaker 4: that we get information soon enough that that that we
54:55
Speaker 4: can prevent that from.
54:56
Speaker 1: Being the case.
54:57
Speaker 2: Dara, thank you so much for joining us. It's always
54:59
Speaker 2: great to talk to you.
55:00
Speaker 4: Thank you.
55:07
Speaker 1: Thanks to Daryl for joining us today. Everyone have a
55:09
Speaker 1: great weekend. Hopefully we'll have some happier news next week.
55:12
Speaker 2: Bye, everyone.
55:14
Speaker 1: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive
55:18
Speaker 1: producer is Michael Martinez. Our producers are Andy Gardner-Bernstein and
55:22
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Speaker 1: Cantor is our sound engineer, with audio support from Kyle
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Speaker 1: Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Thanks to Hallie Kiefer, Madeline Herringer,
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