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The Biden Bump (with AOC!) · 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, Joe Biden launches a new plan to
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: forgive student debt after the Supreme Court strikes down his
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: first attempt at Ron DeSantis attacks Donald Trump for being
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: too supportive of LGBTQ rights. And Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez joins
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: to talk about reforming the right-wing Supreme Court and lots more. Then,
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: in a special edition of Two Takes and a Fake,
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: we sniff out the made-up reaction from the right over
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: the revelation that lines were crossed and possibly bumped when
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: someone left their nose candy in the White House.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Did you write that yourself?
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: I got a lot more where those come from, Dan. Yeah,
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: of course I write it myself. Good, good.
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: That's impressive.
• 1:00
  Speaker 3: Good.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: But first, over the long weekend, you may have seen
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: an episode of our subscription show, Terminally Online, pop up
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: in your Pod Save America feed. Check it out. If
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: you haven't listened yet, you'll hear me, Dan, Elijah, and
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: What A Day's Priyanka Arabindi talk about everything from Ron
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: DeSantis and Roseanne to Barbenheimer. It's a hard one to say.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: I don't think that's all we talked about.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: What else did we talk about? Oh, we talked about
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Elijah going to the North Carolina Republican convention.
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: No, I think we talked about you not so subtly
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: floating your campaign for governor of California.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: Is that what happened?
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: So not subtle that you demanded, I'm told demanded, the
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: marketing department label that episode to title it Governor Jon Favreau.
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: You know what? There's a little behind the scenes for everyone.
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: There's a whole bit. It's a whole bit they're all doing.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: They've all ganged up on me. No one told me
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: what the title was going to be. It just popped
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: up in my feed. It was a question about when
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: we were all going to run for office and what
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: office it was going to be. We started with Dan
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: in Delaware, which now he has to wait in line
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: because he's just waiting around for Chris Coons to retire.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: But anyway. And then I attacked Sacramento.
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I actually wanted to talk to you about that
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: because I spent my 4th of July weekend in a
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: cabin at a lake with families who live in Sacramento,
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: including our friends who own a great wine bar called
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: Good News Wine in Sacramento. None of them thought you
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: were being helpful. They did appreciate me defending Sacramento, but
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: they're trying to build a small business with a delicious
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: wine bar and you're just attacking the entire city.
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: Well, you know what? Go to Sacramento for that wine bar.
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: I'll go for that wine bar.
• 2:45
  Speaker 4: Okay, perfect.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: I'll tell you what, it's not going to be on
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: the house for you. I'll tell you that right now.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Because for some reason, I did not have a tour
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: of Sacramento from someone who lives there. So I don't
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: know the city. That's what I need. I need, you know,
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: especially if I'm going to ultimately live there someday when
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: I am governor.
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: Yes, your future home, gov.gov.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: Anyway, if you want to listen to the nonsense we
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: do on Terminally Online every week, which you should, and
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: get regular access to a truly great subscription community on Discord,
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: which is just like a public Slack channel. We're trying
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: all kinds of social media apps these days. You know
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: what it is?
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: It is Twitter pre-Elon for Friends of the Pod.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: That's what it is. That's what it is.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: Put me in the marketing department.
• 3:29
  Speaker 4: I know.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: I know. Join Friends of the Pod at crooked.com slash friends.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get to the news. The Supreme Court's
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: right-wing majority celebrated America's birthday with a trio of six
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: to three rulings that banned affirmative action in higher education,
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: allowed a business to deny wedding services to LGBTQ couples,
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: and struck down President Biden's plan to forgive $ 10, 000 worth
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: of student debt for people earning less than $ 125, 000 a
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: year and $ 20, 000 worth of debt for low-income families, relief
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: that nearly 26 million borrowers have already applied for. Chief
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: Justice Roberts invoked the so-called major questions doctrine, which was
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: just made up by this court. And it basically says
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: that the president can't take executive actions regarding major political
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: and economic questions that aren't explicitly spelled out by Congress
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: in the legislation they've passed. The Biden administration was clearly
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: prepared for this outcome. which is why the president made
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: this announcement shortly after the ruling.
• 4:33
  Speaker 5: I believe the court's decision to strike down my student
• 4:35
  Speaker 5: debt relief program as a mistake was wrong. I'm not
• 4:39
  Speaker 5: going to stop fighting to deliver borrowers what they need.
• 4:43
  Speaker 5: I'm announcing today a new path consistent with today's ruling
• 4:47
  Speaker 5: to provide student debt relief to as many borrowers as possible,
• 4:50
  Speaker 5: as quickly as possible. We will ground this new approach
• 4:54
  Speaker 5: in a different law than my original plan, the so-called
• 4:57
  Speaker 5: Higher Education Act.
• 4:59
  Speaker 6: That will allow Secretary Cardona.
• 5:02
  Speaker 5: Who is with me today, to compromise, waive, or release
• 5:06
  Speaker 5: loans under certain circumstances.
• 5:08
  Speaker 6: This new path is legally sound.
• 5:10
  Speaker 5: It's going to take longer, but in my view, it's
• 5:12
  Speaker 5: the best path that remains to providing for as many
• 5:15
  Speaker 5: borrowers as possible. Second, we know what many borrowers will
• 5:19
  Speaker 5: need to make their hard choices, which their budgets are
• 5:24
  Speaker 5: being strained now when they start to repay their monthly
• 5:26
  Speaker 5: loan payments this fall. That's why we're creating a temporary 12-month,
• 5:32
  Speaker 5: what we're calling on-ramp repayment program. Monthly payments will be due.
• 5:37
  Speaker 5: Bills will not go out and interest will be accruing.
• 5:40
  Speaker 5: And during this period, if you can pay your monthly bills,
• 5:43
  Speaker 5: you should. But if you cannot, if you miss payments,
• 5:47
  Speaker 5: this on-ramp temporarily remove the threat of default or having
• 5:51
  Speaker 5: your credit harm, which can hurt borrowers for years to come.
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: So It seems to me that the challenge with this
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: new plan is that it's going to run up against
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: the same Supreme Court. But what do you think? What's
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: your strict scrutiny legal degree tell you?
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: Well, like any aspiring lawyer, I've been in the stacks today.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: I've been on LexisNexis, just reading briefs.
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: LexisNexis. Oh, there's a callback.
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: Do you think that still exists?
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: I don't know. Either way, I have been asking CHPT questions.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: I'm wondering what percentage of our audience knows what LexisNexis is.
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: I assume all the lawyers who are over 40. I
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: have no idea. In other words, I listened to all
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: the back episodes of scrutiny that came out at the
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: end of last week before the holiday weekend. Based on
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: what little I know, and I really want to emphasize little,
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: is it does seem like there are many people who
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: believe that the Higher Education Act would be a slightly
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: stronger ground on which to offer loan forgiveness. There is
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: a provision in the Higher Education Act that has been
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: used for loan forgiveness before. It's the foundation for the
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: public service loan forgiveness program, which allows people who do
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: public service to get some of their debt forgiven. It
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: was also used when the Biden administration settled a class
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: action lawsuit involving people who had been misled by for-profit universities.
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: So there's precedent there. But as you point out, The
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: major questions doctrine is this incredibly vague and intentionally vague
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: weapon to be used to strike down the executive actions
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: of Democratic presidents. So it's very likely you would end
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: up right back where you are because they can do
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: the exact same thing all over again.
• 7:27
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: I mean, as you heard Biden say there, the Higher
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: Education Act gives the Secretary of Education the authority to, quote, compromise,
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: waive or release any right title claim lien or demand.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: Roberts in the student loan decision that they just handed
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: down said that waive or modify could not be interpreted
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: as giving the secretary the power to cancel debt at
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: a massive scale. So I'm not sure exactly what the
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: difference is. White House aides, though, as you mentioned, have
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: pointed out that that, you know, Biden's taken other executive
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: actions around student loans that have not been challenged in court,
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: like increasing Pell grants and reducing monthly payments. So, you know,
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: even though this one was challenged successfully in court, they
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: point out that other student loan action executive actions from
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: the president have not been challenged in court. So that's
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: I think that's what they're hoping for here. It will
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: take a long time. It'll take maybe a year because
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: the Department of Education has to undertake a rulemaking process
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: around this that involves policy negotiations and a public comment period,
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: though some economists have argued that the administration should skip
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: the rulemaking process and see what the court does. think
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: we all know what the court will do. Some folks
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: on the left directed their very understandable frustration with the
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: decision towards President Biden and Democrats in Congress. Can you
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: think of anything they could have done differently to achieve
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: a better outcome here? I cannot, but I don't know
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: if I'm missing anything.
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: I don't think you are. Had Congress passed a law
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: forgiving student loan debt, the court cannot have used a
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: major questions doctrine to strike it down. There's one giant
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: flaw in that argument, which is in the two years
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: in which Democrats had control of the White House House
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: and the Senate, the filibuster was in place, which would
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: allow 10 Republicans to easily block any attempt to forgive
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: student debt. There was not a majority of Democrats to
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: eliminate the filibuster, and there was not a majority of
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: Democrats supporting broad-based student loan debt forgiveness. There was nothing
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: in the past that I can see. There was no
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: different way in which the Biden administration could have written
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: the rule. There is no strategy that I can see
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: whether they could have passed a law that would have
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: been immune from this specific court challenge. This is the
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: reality we have of the Congress we had with this court.
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: And I don't think I understand why people are angry.
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: That anger should be directed at Republicans, at the court,
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: and channeled into trying to regain the House and expand
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: our Senate majority so that we can eliminate the filibuster
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: and ensure that we have 50 Senate Democrats who are
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: willing to support forgiving student debt.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I realize we sound like a broken record and
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: have been for the past several years about the filibuster,
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: and it's not exactly like a new and exciting explanation
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: for things. And it is frustrating. But again, that's where
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: we're at, right? Like, unless we have 50 senators, plus
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: Kamala Harris is the tiebreaker, who are willing to get
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: rid of the filibuster, we can't do anything. And Joe
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: Biden yelling about whatever and other Democrats yelling about whatever
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: are not going to change Joe Manchin's mind on this
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: or Kyrsten Sinema's mind on this. And that's been pretty
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: clear since... you know, Joe Biden became president since long
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: before Joe Biden became president. Like they are immune to
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: pressure on this issue. So that's what we have to
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: do is focus on, like you said, electing a Senate
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: majority that is willing to get rid of the filibuster
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: for a host of reasons. There's also been a lot
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: of pressure on Biden and Democrats to support more aggressive
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: judicial reforms, particularly around expanding the court. Here's what the
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: president had to say about that during an interview on
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: Friday with MSNBC's Nicole Wallace.
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: Do you worry that without court reform, this conservative majority
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: is too young and too conservative, that they might do
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: too much harm?
• 11:22
  Speaker 6: Well, I think they may do too much harm.
• 11:25
  Speaker 5: But I think if we start the process of trying
• 11:29
  Speaker 5: to expand the court, we're going to politicize it maybe
• 11:33
  Speaker 5: forever in a way that is not healthy.
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: So Biden also put together a bipartisan commission on court
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: reform a few years ago that issued fairly moderate recommendations
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: around transparency and ethics. They did not suggest expanding the court,
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: but they did suggest some ethics reform code of conduct.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: But we heard from White House communications director Ben LeBolt
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: on last week's episode that Biden has not yet endorsed
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: any specific ethics reforms either. What do you think's going
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: on there?
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: Let's take these in reverse order. Let's start with ethics reform.
• 12:06
  Speaker 4: Great.
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: When we were listening to Ben give that answer, I
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: had two thoughts. The first is Joe Biden is naturally
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: more reticent on sort of aggressive political reforms than you
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: and I are, probably a lot of people who listen
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: to this podcast are. It took him a long time
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: on the filibuster. He's in the Senate for decades. He
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: was the chair of the Judiciary Committee. He has real
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: concerns that I don't want to necessarily agree with, but
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: about delegitimizing the court. And so That may be one
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: reason why he's hesitant. And I think that's why he's
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: hesitant or opposed on bigger issues like expansion and term limits.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: On ethics reform, I have a suspicion that the White
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: House did not want to come out with a position
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: on ethics reform while the court, this right-wing court, was
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: making decisions on these huge cases that matter a lot
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: to them. The one about discrimination against the LGBTQ community,
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: the one about student loans, and the one about the
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: independent state legislature theory. You'll remember this, that when the
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: Supreme Court was making a decision on Obamacare in Obama's
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: first term, it was seen that Judge Anthony Kennedy was
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: the deciding vote. Obama, because he likes being funny, was
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: on the stump in interviews making a joke about how
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: he would mow Anthony Kennedy's lawn and offer to do
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: his laundry. One day, the White House counsel came down
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: and told us that They had heard from people who
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: know Kennedy that Kennedy probably doesn't like that joke. So
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: you should stop making it while access to affordable health
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: care for millions of people is at stake. And we
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: immediately shut up. So I can definitely see the White House.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: Counsel saying– And to apologize, Obama did send him a
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: giant fruit basket, which he did not like.
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: Fruit– you mean an edible arrangement?
• 13:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's correct.
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: And so I can definitely see whatever policy process is
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: in place to make a decision about this ethics reform,
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: that would definitely take place after the Supreme Court term
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: was over. So we'll see what happens, but I think
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: that may be what's happening there.
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: Also, maybe they wanted to save it for the heat
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: of the campaign. Yeah, maybe. And also the Senate is
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: now starting a process where they're coming up with ethics
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: reform legislation. So I'm guessing that- the White House might
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: want to let that play out for a little bit
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: and help shape it as well so that they can
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: be on the same page as the Senate Democrats in
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: whatever they propose. Or there's an off chance that it
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: could be bipartisan as well because you have people like
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: Susan Collins and Murkowski that might be interested in the
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: ethics reform side of it as well. So on that,
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: I think it is definitely a wait and see. On
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: the adding justices to the court, you're right. I don't
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: It's Biden, right? And it took him a long time
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: in the filibuster. The flip side of that is he
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: did change his mind on the filibuster. And I think
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: this White House has shown that they do care about
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: public opinion, that their minds can be changed, that President
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: Biden's mind can be changed on issues like the filibuster.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: The guy is a creature of the Senate for decades
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: and an institutionalist. And so, of course, he was going
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: to support the filibuster for a long time. And the
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: fact that, you know, at this age... As president, he
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: changed his mind is, I think, a good sign. And
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: it tells you to keep up the pressure on him
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: for that. But I will also say, if Biden came
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: out tomorrow in favor of adding justices to the Supreme Court,
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: do you think it would change the political dynamic in
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: any way?
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: Not in the short term. We're not going to automatically
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: get justices on the court, just say it, and then
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: all of a sudden we get two new justices. That's
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: not how that happens.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: We should tell people, well, the way it happens is,
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: there's a law that has to be passed by Congress, which, again,
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: could be blocked by a filibuster. So again, we do
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: not have the votes. Even if every Senate Democrat was
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: on board with adding justices to the court, which they
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: are not, we would not be able to pass legislation
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: adding justices to the court while the filibuster is in place.
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: And we don't have the House.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: And we don't have the House. Forgot about that. Forgot
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: about the fact that we don't have the House, yeah.
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: Now, I still think... I understand politically– and we'll talk
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: about the polling in a second– why Joe Biden– I
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: think he sincerely does not believe in the idea. I
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: do not think this is– he like secretly is a
• 16:17
  Speaker 2: big court expansionist and is just keeping back because the
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: pollsters have told him not to do it. I don't
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: think that's the case. But just because it's not going
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: to happen now is not an argument for not supporting–
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: aggressive policies are going to take time. If you want
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: to build support for it, you got to come out
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: for it. And so nothing is going to change in
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: the short term. Yeah, nothing is going to happen in
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: the short term. I wish Biden was for expansion because
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: I don't think expansion is going to happen in his
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: first term, certainly, maybe not even a second term. But
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: if we actually want to solve this problem, and I
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: believe pass real court reform, it's going to require prominent
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: Democrats to support it. But that's not where Joe Biden
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: is now. And as you say, if he were to
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: change his mind tomorrow, he's not going to expand the court.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: We still don't have the power to do it. And
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: It's not going to forgive anyone's student debt. Simply saying it,
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: it does not change where we are in the short term.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: In the long term, it could have an impact.
• 17:04
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: I saw a quote from Brian Fallon, who works with
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: Demand Justice, which is they support court reform and expanding
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: the court. And he acknowledged in an interview that Joe
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: Biden is probably the last domino to fall among Democrats
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: on this issue. Now, if he came out tomorrow and
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: supported court reform, You might get a few Senate Democrats
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: who were already supportive of court reform privately to come
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: out publicly and, you know, start building momentum. So, yeah,
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: I think that could help. But it's also possible that
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: you build support by, you know, starting to ask Senate
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: Democrats how they feel about it, starting to ask people
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: who are running for the Senate, like, you know, Ruben
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: Gallego is trying to, you know, run against Kyrsten Sinema
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: and whoever the Republican is in Arizona. And, you know,
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: so people like you start you start building support that way.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: And I do think that's that's good to do. But
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: I don't think that Joe Biden coming out for court
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: reform tomorrow or had he come out for court reform
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: a year ago, two years ago, would have led to
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: a different outcome.
• 18:06
  Speaker 7: Correct.
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: Well, what do we know about how voters feel about
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: court reform?
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: When we generally talk about court reform, we are talking
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: about three things, a code of conduct and a process
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: for accountability for the Supreme Court. Term limits of some,
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: shape or form, and expansion. The first two are quite popular.
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: There's a poll that was conducted by N Citizens United,
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: which is a pro-court reform group, and they found that
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: two-thirds of voters, including a significant majority of independents, support
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: a code of conduct for the Supreme Court. That seems
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: pretty obvious, particularly given everything that's been happening with Alito
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: and Thomas and everyone else. Term limits... while constitutionally and
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: legally complicated, is also quite popular. We've seen polls that
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: show north of 60% of voters supporting that, which makes
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: complete sense. It would probably in fact be the most
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: important– if you could get it to be constitutionally acceptable,
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: which is tough because the Supreme Court is the one
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: who would make that choice, would be a complete game
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: changer both in terms of the balance of the court,
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: I think it would mean that each and every one
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: of these appointments would not be this cataclysmic apocalyptic battle
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: where you have to find the youngest, healthiest person possible
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: to conserve the longest. I think it would just be
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: better across the board for the court. Expansion is much
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: less popular. How you word the question matters a lot,
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: but in general, it is far below 50% right now
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: in support for it. When you package them all together–
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: I've seen it do better, but expansion is by far
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: the least popular part. Only 60% of Democrats support it
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: in a bunch of polls. Now, to the Biden point,
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: if Biden were to come out for it, that number
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: would go up. not to 100% of Democrats, but would
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: go up, but it would not get it to majority
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: support in this country. Republicans obviously don't like it. Independents
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: are particularly skeptical of it thus far, but also no
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: one is making the case for it either.
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: I think that the polls I've seen, expansion has become
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: more popular over the last several years, particularly since Dobbs.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: You're right, though, it's still under 50. Data for Progress
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: had a poll in April of 2023. That's the latest
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: poll that I've seen on this. 47% support expansion, 42% oppose.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: This would be expanding the court to 13 justices, which
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: is legislation that some Democrats have introduced. And you're right,
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: it's underwater with independents, 42-46. And then Republicans, it's 28-62.
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: No surprise there. So it's getting more popular, but you're right.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: It's not majority support yet. It's plurality in some polls.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: In some polls, it's different. You're right that the ethics
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: reform is by far the most popular. I also would
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: argue that it will be the least effective of the options.
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: It solves a different problem.
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: It solves a different problem. I think it's a connected problem,
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: but I think that if you had a very stringent
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: code of conduct and really significant ethics reforms— you would
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: still have a bunch of ideological zealots on the court who,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: even if they weren't flying on private planes with Harlan
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: Crow and getting their mom's house paid for like Clarence Thomas,
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: would still make horrible decisions just because they like to
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: make horrible decisions based on their right-wing ideology. But I
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: think it's still important. We should still do it. I
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: do think term limits is probably the the one that
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: is both popular and would be effective that Democrats should
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: feel more confident running on, including Joe Biden. Because I
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: think that you're right. Like you actually start limiting the
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: amount of time the justices sit on the bench, then
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: that's going to have a real effect. And it is
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: quite popular. And then I think, and then in the meantime,
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: you try to get court reform and expansion more popular
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: by actually advocating for it. So that's what I would do.
• 22:02
  Speaker 7: All right.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about the knuckleheads trying to replace Joe Biden.
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: Most of the Republican candidates spent the weekend on the
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: trail at Fourth of July parades and barbecues. Donald Trump
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: held a rally in South Carolina where he was introduced
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: by Lindsey Graham, who was loudly and repeatedly booed throughout
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: the event. That's fun. Mike Pence marched in an Iowa
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: parade where the crowd started chanting Trump, Trump, Trump, which
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: I guess is an improvement over hang Mike Pence. Just,
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: you know, you take the wins where you can get them.
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: And Ron DeSantis' campaign released a video to mark the
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: end of Pride Month that begins by attacking Donald Trump
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: for pledging to protect LGBTQ Americans during his 2016 convention speech,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: then shows a series of headlines that say DeSantis signed
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: the most, quote, extreme anti-trans law ever and is, quote, evil,
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: all while flashing pictures of shirtless dudes and Patrick Bateman,
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: the serial killer from American Psycho. The video managed to
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: be both... homophobic and homoerotic, was widely condemned by Democrats
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: and Republicans, including some DeSantis-curious pundits. But the best response
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: was from Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
• 23:15
  Speaker 8: What's your reaction to that video?
• 23:21
  Speaker 7: You know, I'm going to choose my words carefully, partly
• 23:24
  Speaker 7: because I'm appearing as secretary, so I can't talk about campaigns.
• 23:27
  Speaker 4: Mm-hmm.
• 23:28
  Speaker 7: And I'm going to leave aside the strangeness of trying
• 23:31
  Speaker 7: to prove your manhood by putting up a video that
• 23:34
  Speaker 7: splices images of you in between oiled up shirtless bodybuilders
• 23:39
  Speaker 7: and just get to the bigger issue that is on
• 23:43
  Speaker 7: my mind whenever I see this stuff in the policy space,
• 23:46
  Speaker 7: which is, again, who are you trying to help? Who
• 23:50
  Speaker 7: are you trying to make better off? And what public
• 23:53
  Speaker 7: policy problems do you get up in the morning thinking
• 23:56
  Speaker 7: about how to solve?
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: So first question, obviously there is a constituency for homophobia
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: in the Republican Party, but do you really think there's
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: a bunch of Republican voters who will vote for Ron
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: DeSantis because they've somehow been persuaded that he's a bigger
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: homophobe than Donald Trump?
• 24:14
  Speaker 4: No.
• 24:15
  Speaker 2: And I have come to the conclusion now that Ron
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: DeSantis' campaign team was in a coma from the period
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: of 2015 to 2017 when.
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump was running for election for the first time
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: because they are running the exact same ass backward, doomed
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: to fail, stupid strategy that these other candidates ran in 2016.
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: Remember all the ads with footage of Donald Trump saying
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: he was pro-choice or at a wedding with the Clintons
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: or playing golf with Clinton? Republican voters understand that Donald
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: Trump was full of shit. They don't care. They're not
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: in it for the sincerity. They're in it for the strength.
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: And it's not going to work. It has never worked
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: in the past. It's not going to work now. you're
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: not going to convince people that Donald Trump is insufficiently MAGA.
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: You might be able to convince people that he is
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: ineffective at the MAGA agenda, but it's not like everyone's
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: running around thinking Donald Trump is an honest, sincere human being.
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: And if you only were to show this footage to
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: show that he is not as bigoted and homophobic as
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: his speeches would suggest, they're all going to suddenly going
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: to leave him. There is no evidence for that to work,
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: and it's particularly stupid, like much of what Ron DeSantis'
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: campaign does.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: I mean... point taken about the way he campaigned in
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: 2015 and 2016 but even beyond that voters just lived
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: through republican voters just lived through four years of his
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: presidency and judging by his approval ratings among those same
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: republican voters and even evangelical voters they don't think he
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: governed in a way that was too supportive of lgbtq
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: rights or if they do they don't care They just
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: got four years of it, and they're all in. So now,
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: instead of hitting him for what he did or didn't
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: do during his presidency, you're going to go back before
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: the presidency to when he was running Miss Universe pageants
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: and complaining that he let transgender Americans compete in the
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: beauty pageants, or that he said that he didn't care
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: where Caitlyn Jenner went the bathroom, which those two bits
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: were also in the DeSantis video. I mean, it is
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: so nuts. And so stupid. And it wasn't... I had
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: to check, by the way, because I think in the
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: outline you said it was from the Never Back Down pack. No, no, no, no.
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: The video was made by someone else.
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: They posted it.
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: By some other group.
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: They posted it.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: They also posted it. But DeSantis' campaign posted it. Not
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: the pack. The campaign also posted it. And then Ron
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: DeSantis was asked in an interview about the video and
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: he defended it. He said, I think identifying Donald Trump
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: as really being a pioneer in injecting gender ideology into
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: the mainstream where he was having men compete against women,
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: I think that's totally fair game. It's so stupid. It's
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: so stupid. So I guess that brings us to the
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: second question. Why is Ron DeSantis' campaign so fucking weird?
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: Because the fish rots from the head, John.
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: No campaign in history has needed to go touch grass
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: more than Ron DeSantis' campaign. They are the most online
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: campaign I think I have ever seen. Like, you have
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: to have a fucking degree in 4chan to understand what
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: was going on in that video. The music, the images, like,
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: you know, people have, like, dissected it who know this stuff.
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: But it is wild that they would put that up.
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: I mean.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: It all comes back to the fact that Ron DeSantis
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: announced his campaign in a Twitter Spaces conversation moderated by
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: Elon Musk and the former HR director at PayPal.
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: I also think, by the way, that the way that
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: Trump is handling these issues is with a bit of
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: a wink and a nod to how ridiculous and concocted
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: these culture war issues are. So like, we didn't talk
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: about this, but there was a couple of weeks ago,
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: he had an event where he did his like, I'll
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: keep men out of women's sports. I'll cut federal funding
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: for any school pushing transgender insanity was his quotes. The
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: crowd went wild. And then after the crowd goes wild,
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: Trump stops and he says, it's amazing how strong people
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: feel about that. I talk about cutting taxes and you
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: all go like this. And then he, And then he goes,
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: I talk about transgender. Everyone goes crazy. Five years ago,
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: you didn't even know what the hell it was, which
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: is just a completely true statement from Donald Trump and
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: a very sharp bit of political analysis and an honest
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: bit of political analysis.
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: He winks and he nods at the people who want
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: to see the wink and the nod. And the other
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: people know that even though he's winking and nodding, he's
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: still going to do what they want.
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: Yes, that's right. Same thing on abortion.
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: Trump is a vibe for these people.
• 29:01
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: So DeSantis is attacking Trump for supposedly being too far
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: left on issues like gay rights and abortion. Trump is
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: attacking DeSantis for being too far right on issues like
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: wanting to privatize and cut Medicare and Social Security. How
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: much does it worry you that this may make Trump
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: seem more moderate and thus electable to a general electorate
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: if he's the nominee?
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: I don't want to overstate the case because in times
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: of high polarization like the one we live in, very
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: little changed people's opinion. And that's particularly true of Trump,
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: whose approval rating, other than a couple of moments, stayed
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: basically the same for eight years. It's in a narrow band,
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: whether he is getting indicted, getting impeached, committing crimes, talking
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: about Nazis, about the same. So there's not a lot
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: that's moving people. But the presidential electorate is much larger
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: than the general election. You're going to have a lot
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: of people in there who are paying zero attention in
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: this primary. They're just kind of like surfing the news.
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: They're seeing the headlines. And there is a chance that
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: some of them watching this coverage will get the impression,
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: particularly how Ron DeSantis is running his campaign, that Donald
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: Trump is more economically populist than the rest of his
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: party and slightly more moderate on some cultural issues than
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: the furthest extremes of his party. And that could be
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: decisive on the margins. And as we know, this presidential
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: election is likely to be decided on the margins. The
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: way I've been trying to explain how close this is
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: going to be is that if it's anything like 16
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: and 20, the election will be decided by fewer people
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: than attended the most recent Taylor Swift concert.
• 30:33
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: That's like, so it does take a lot of people
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: to get that impression to do it. Cause it's not
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: like you're people who are like lifelong Democrats are going
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: to all of a sudden change their mind or Republicans
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: are going to, it's, they're going to people who voted
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: for Trump in 16 Biden in 20 and might possibly
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: be available to Trump again in 24. And those are
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: sort of people who could get that impression, right? People
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: who voted people, maybe people who voted Trump in 20,
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: but then voted for a Democrat for Congress in 2022
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: because they thought these other Republicans were such MAGA lunatic
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: extremists that they might see Trump as slightly different if
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: he's out there protecting Social Security and Medicare and getting
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: hammered by a bunch of his opponents for being not
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: insufficiently extreme on abortion and LGBTQ rights.
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: And like you said, the challenge is a lot of
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: voters go on vibes, especially when it comes to Trump,
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: especially low information voters who are not paying close attention
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: to politics. We have Trump's record for the last, you know,
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: when he was president for four years. He put out
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: budgets that would have decimated Social Security and Medicare. He
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: put the justices on the court that have given us
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: all of these rulings that are horrible on abortion and
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: gay rights. So, you know, I do think that it's
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: probably smart of Democrats to start reminding people of that
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: to kind of counter what DeSantis is doing here. But...
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: you could see DeSantis running, if DeSantis' campaign actually picks up,
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: if DeSantis is still around in the fall and the winter.
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: Open question.
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: Open question, right. And it becomes like Ron DeSantis' culture
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: warrior who also has a little Paul Ryan in him too,
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: which is electorally the worst possible fucking position to be in.
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: But if it's him versus Donald Trump, then yeah, you
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: could see it have an effect on people's perceptions of
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: Trump in general. And it would be the wrong perception,
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: but it's something that Democrats should think about now.
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: There was a sense in 2020 among some people that
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: because Donald Trump, he doesn't go to church, he's a
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: thrice-divorced New York City playboy, that he is not really
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: even a natural culture warrior like a bunch of these
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: other Republicans. And that helped him. And now many people
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: were quite surprised we turned out to govern like that,
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: but that you could get some element of that dynamic
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: could happen again in 2024. Thank you, Ron DeSantis, for
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: running a terrible campaign.
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: It's fucking awful.
• 33:02
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: Awful.
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: One more thing we should mention about the Republican primary.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: The RNC has demanded that every candidate sign a loyalty
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: pledge where they have to promise to support the eventual
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: nominee or else they don't get to participate in the debates.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: Most of the candidates, including Trump, have not signed it yet.
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: So what happens if they don't?
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: Well, as you know that Ronna McDaniel, a woman of
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: such steadfast principles that she gave up using her given
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: name in order to become the RNC chair, will probably
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: fight this to the end. No, I assume they're just
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: going to quietly somehow abandon it and do whatever Trump
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: wants to do. Trump will either sign it and say
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: he's going to lie and then everyone's going to have
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: to do the same thing or he's not going to
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: sign it and they're not going to hold the debates
• 33:41
  Speaker 2: without Trump. So there you go. I don't think it's–
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: I think whatever it takes to get Trump on that stage,
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: the RNC will do.
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: And I don't know that the loyalty pledge or even
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: getting rid of the loyalty pledge will get Trump.
• 33:53
  Speaker 4: It changes.
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah. There's, there's two things. Those first couple of debates,
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: no matter what.
• 33:59
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: The question will be on the first debate that he
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: may be, may feel compelled to do for whatever reason. What,
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: when's it going to matter there?
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: I really wonder if he skips the first two, if
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: he ever shows up. I know that like, you know,
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: Chris Christie made a somewhat compelling case on his, during
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: a CNN town hall about this, that like Donald Trump's
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: ego won't let him skip all the debates. But I
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: don't know. Like if it turns out that all these
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: jokers are still like 30 points behind him, why the
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: fuck would you participate in those debates and just like
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: risk getting your ass kicked?
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: Chris Christie's, we thought the same thing around the presidential
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: base in 2020 as Donald Trump needs the attention. And
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: ultimately that's what I think will matter. But, you know,
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: we'll see.
• 34:43
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: I think the general is a little different.
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure.
• 34:47
  Speaker 4: For sure.
• 34:47
  Speaker 8: For sure.
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: But but I could. Yeah, we'll see. OK, when we
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: come back, I talk to Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Joining us
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: today to talk about the Supreme Court and much more,
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Congresswoman, welcome back to the pod.
• 35:14
  Speaker 4: Thanks for having me.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: So I want to get into a broader discussion about
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: the court. But first, on student loans, I would love
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: nothing more than for the president's new debt relief plan
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: to succeed. My concern is that it'll end up at
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: the same Supreme Court. You've urged the president to also
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: consider shortening the time frame on when it goes into
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: effect and suspending interest on loans, especially over the next year.
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: Have you heard from anyone in the administration on those suggestions?
• 35:43
  Speaker 4: You know, I think we've been, our staff and our
• 35:47
  Speaker 4: team has been in contact with the White House. I
• 35:49
  Speaker 4: think we are continuing our advocacy. I anticipate that there's
• 35:53
  Speaker 4: going to be more discussions of movement when Congress reconvenes
• 35:58
  Speaker 4: and is back in session next week. So I think
• 36:02
  Speaker 4: right now there's kind of like a little bit of
• 36:04
  Speaker 4: a long period as the administration first starts to pick
• 36:07
  Speaker 4: up what it's already committed to doing. And then I
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: think we can, you know, follow up with conversations about
• 36:13
  Speaker 4: how to potentially make improvements on it.
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: It seems like a no-brainer idea to me. I know
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: that the timeframe, like there's all kinds of, around figuring
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: out a process with the Department of Education and there's
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: the public comment period and all that. On the suspending interest,
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: it seems like a no-brainer. What would the argument against
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: that be?
• 36:35
  Speaker 4: You know, and I really don't see a huge argument
• 36:40
  Speaker 4: against it. I think it's just the political backlash about
• 36:44
  Speaker 4: there has been this handshake agreement with the debt limit
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: deal about ending the suspension, ending the payment suspension in September.
• 36:54
  Speaker 4: I don't know if people would basically say, oh, this
• 36:58
  Speaker 4: is kind of breaking your end of the bargain. I
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: don't really think so. I think suspending interest is totally
• 37:05
  Speaker 4: fair game. And remember, we are proceeding with an alternative
• 37:10
  Speaker 4: plan here, which means there are millions of people out
• 37:13
  Speaker 4: there that would potentially be paying interest on loan balances
• 37:17
  Speaker 4: that are going to get forgiven if all goes according
• 37:21
  Speaker 4: to plan. And so I really do believe that suspending
• 37:24
  Speaker 4: interest is important. you know, the move to make right now,
• 37:27
  Speaker 4: especially as people start to, you know, get acclimated. A
• 37:31
  Speaker 4: lot of people don't even know who their student loan
• 37:33
  Speaker 4: servicers are anymore because there were a lot of consolidations
• 37:36
  Speaker 4: during the pandemic.
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: On what to do about the court, I see a
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: two-track approach here. There can be hearings and investigations into
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: ethics and potentially legal violations and hopefully some kind of
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: ethics legislation. And then there are broad structural reforms like
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: Court expansion and term limits that can help rebalance the
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: extreme right turn the court has taken. In terms of
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: the ethics investigations, who makes the decision on whether Senate
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: Democrats issue subpoenas, which has only been tried under justice
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: once in the past? Is that Durbin? Is it Schumer?
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: Is it like a majority on the judiciary? What's the
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: process there?
• 38:14
  Speaker 4: I mean, I would say that it's a combination of
• 38:18
  Speaker 4: both Leader Schumer, of course, Democratic Party and any chamber's
• 38:22
  Speaker 4: party leadership would be part of that conversation. But of course,
• 38:26
  Speaker 4: it would go to the chair of the judiciary. The
• 38:28
  Speaker 4: Senate Judiciary Committee would have enormous sway over that decision.
• 38:33
  Speaker 4: But a lot of that conversation does tend to be
• 38:36
  Speaker 4: a caucus-wide decision. You know, we dealt with a lot
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: of subpoenas during impeachment, sitting on House oversight. we took
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: issuing of subpoenas very, very seriously. And they were often
• 38:47
  Speaker 4: a combination of consultation within our rural caucus, conversation as
• 38:53
  Speaker 4: a committee. But, you know, much of that at the
• 38:56
  Speaker 4: time was a lot of that decision weighed very heavily
• 39:00
  Speaker 4: on then Chairman of Oversight, Elijah Cummings, as well as
• 39:04
  Speaker 4: discussions with House leadership. And so I would expect that
• 39:07
  Speaker 4: there would kind of be a mirror dynamic Senate side.
• 39:10
  Speaker 4: So that would mean that Senator Durbin would have an
• 39:13
  Speaker 4: enormous amount of input on that, as well as other
• 39:20
  Speaker 4: major figures as well. Sheldon Whitehouse has been doing an
• 39:23
  Speaker 4: enormous amount of work regarding this issue. And of course,
• 39:27
  Speaker 4: a Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer.
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: So Durbin said today that they're going to move forward
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: on ethics legislation. More broadly, what would your ideal outcome
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: be from a series of ethics investigations and hearings?
• 39:44
  Speaker 4: You know, I think ethics legislation is necessary and it's important,
• 39:49
  Speaker 4: but my concern is that this isn't quite covering the
• 39:53
  Speaker 4: harm that has already been done to the court. I
• 39:57
  Speaker 4: do not believe that we should leave it to ProPublica alone,
• 40:02
  Speaker 4: God bless them, to bring all of this information to light.
• 40:08
  Speaker 4: What we are seeing is really an unprecedented and frankly,
• 40:13
  Speaker 4: catastrophic amount of revelations of financial entanglement coming out of
• 40:21
  Speaker 4: the Supreme Court. And it does leave open a question of,
• 40:26
  Speaker 4: in addition to what we already know, have there been
• 40:29
  Speaker 4: even other kind of developments out there that we don't
• 40:33
  Speaker 4: know about that have potentially swayed or had significant impact
• 40:38
  Speaker 4: on decisions that may have already occurred? And is there
• 40:43
  Speaker 4: a righting of a wrong on that? I think that
• 40:48
  Speaker 4: ultimately is what this is about, is that You know,
• 40:52
  Speaker 4: as much as these justices, of course, conveniently want to say, oh,
• 40:56
  Speaker 4: this has nothing to do with this. They have far
• 41:00
  Speaker 4: surpassed even what members of Congress are allowed to do.
• 41:03
  Speaker 4: And Congress regulates itself. And people have seen what members
• 41:09
  Speaker 4: of Congress have gotten away with, frankly. And what the
• 41:13
  Speaker 4: Supreme Court has done, what certain members of the court
• 41:16
  Speaker 4: have done, has even put that to shame. And so...
• 41:19
  Speaker 4: I really do believe that what we need is not
• 41:22
  Speaker 4: just ethics reform, which is very necessary, but we do
• 41:26
  Speaker 4: need a thorough accounting and investigation of what the court
• 41:32
  Speaker 4: has frankly been withholding. We cannot allow this lack of disclosure,
• 41:38
  Speaker 4: just like a convenient, you know, people like Clarence Thomas
• 41:41
  Speaker 4: or Samuel Alito, just conveniently leaving off lavish gifts and
• 41:46
  Speaker 4: vacations from billionaires that have interests before the court and
• 41:52
  Speaker 4: just say, oh, that's a mulligan. That, I think, is
• 41:58
  Speaker 4: profoundly disturbing. And these are the kinds of conflicts of
• 42:03
  Speaker 4: interest that even the most basic, low-level, entry-level judges would
• 42:09
  Speaker 4: know that this is a no-no. Even basic government employees
• 42:14
  Speaker 4: are not allowed to receive this kind of favoring. And
• 42:19
  Speaker 4: that needs to be taken seriously. And I do think
• 42:21
  Speaker 4: that there needs to be an account on what has
• 42:26
  Speaker 4: fully occurred.
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: On court reform, you've supported expanding the Supreme Court. Biden's
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: not there yet. If he came out for expansion tomorrow,
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: we still have a Senate majority that can't eliminate the
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: filibuster or that won't in the case of Joe Manchin
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: and Kyrsten Sinema. What do you see as the best
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: strategy for achieving some kind of structural court reform?
• 42:49
  Speaker 4: Well, I mean, I do think that it does come
• 42:52
  Speaker 4: in with oversight and investigation. If we do not have
• 42:55
  Speaker 4: court expansion, if we do not have a Senate that
• 42:58
  Speaker 4: is capable of eliminating the filibuster, I think there's a
• 43:02
  Speaker 4: couple of things that we need to do. We need
• 43:04
  Speaker 4: to engage in a check on the Supreme Court's power,
• 43:07
  Speaker 4: which means I think that we need to bring judicial
• 43:10
  Speaker 4: review into question, which basically means is saying what the
• 43:15
  Speaker 4: Supreme Court is allowed to touch, what they aren't, the
• 43:20
  Speaker 4: extent of their power, the extent of what they're able
• 43:24
  Speaker 4: and capable of overturning or not. All of that falls
• 43:27
  Speaker 4: under a category known as judicial review. And when the
• 43:33
  Speaker 4: court begins to expand and abuse its power far beyond
• 43:38
  Speaker 4: what it has, that is them expanding their judicial review.
• 43:42
  Speaker 4: As we saw, even with Elena Kagan's, um, dissent, she
• 43:45
  Speaker 4: is saying this court, you know, the call is coming
• 43:49
  Speaker 4: from inside the house in her dissent. She's saying this
• 43:52
  Speaker 4: court is getting out of control. They are assuming the
• 43:56
  Speaker 4: power of a legislature. This is, we are going far
• 44:00
  Speaker 4: beyond our jurisdiction and, um, And we are seeing members
• 44:04
  Speaker 4: of the court themselves really allude to this. And so
• 44:08
  Speaker 4: I believe that in our system of checks and balances,
• 44:10
  Speaker 4: it is up to Congress, it is also up to
• 44:13
  Speaker 4: the president to begin to push back on the scope
• 44:17
  Speaker 4: of the Supreme Court's judicial review. They are calling into
• 44:22
  Speaker 4: question laws and rights that have been established for 50
• 44:28
  Speaker 4: plus years in this country in their overturning of Dobbs.
• 44:31
  Speaker 4: in their overturning of basic protections and equality protections for
• 44:38
  Speaker 4: LGBTQ Americans, even in their Supreme Court decision around student loans,
• 44:45
  Speaker 4: them just basically saying, the president doesn't have the authority
• 44:49
  Speaker 4: to do something this big, but we won't say how big.
• 44:54
  Speaker 4: And they're really calling in an enormous amount of power
• 45:02
  Speaker 4: into themselves that, frankly, they don't have and that the
• 45:04
  Speaker 4: Constitution does not give them. And so, you know, I
• 45:07
  Speaker 4: do believe that really honing in on the court's judicial
• 45:11
  Speaker 4: review and the scope of that is important. And again,
• 45:14
  Speaker 4: I do believe that. Listen, I mean, some folks may
• 45:17
  Speaker 4: disagree with me, but I believe that the Supreme Court
• 45:20
  Speaker 4: is fully politicized. I think this is a group of
• 45:22
  Speaker 4: political actors and they respond to political pressure. And maybe
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: that's not the eye in the sky way we'd like
• 45:31
  Speaker 4: to think of our court. Maybe that's not what the
• 45:33
  Speaker 4: court is supposed to be, but that's the court that
• 45:35
  Speaker 4: we're working with today. And I think that proper oversight,
• 45:41
  Speaker 4: I do believe that investigations and subpoenas and potentially law-breaking behavior,
• 45:46
  Speaker 4: we have a Supreme Court justice that refused to recuse
• 45:49
  Speaker 4: himself from a case in which his wife was directly implicated.
• 45:52
  Speaker 4: That was Clarence Thomas, and his wife's involvement on January 6th.
• 45:56
  Speaker 4: And not only that, but he was the only judge,
• 46:00
  Speaker 4: if not one of the only two, to vote against
• 46:04
  Speaker 4: allowing full disclosure of materials with respect to that. And
• 46:08
  Speaker 4: so I do believe that investigations, subpoenas, if Chief Justice
• 46:15
  Speaker 4: Roberts will not comply with Senate investigations, as he has
• 46:21
  Speaker 4: refused to come before Congress around this issue. And the
• 46:25
  Speaker 4: Supreme Court does not have that luxury. They are not
• 46:28
  Speaker 4: above investigation. They are human and they are just as
• 46:33
  Speaker 4: susceptible to corruption as any other government entity. And we
• 46:38
  Speaker 4: have a responsibility to conduct the strongest oversight for them
• 46:42
  Speaker 4: because at least with the legislature, the presidency, we have
• 46:46
  Speaker 4: elections and the people can always hold us accountable by
• 46:50
  Speaker 4: not voting for us again. And that is one of
• 46:53
  Speaker 4: many layers. But the Supreme Court, these are lifetime appointments,
• 46:58
  Speaker 4: at least they are for now. And that means that
• 47:01
  Speaker 4: the responsibility for oversight on them is that much greater.
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: When you talk about judicial review, is there legislation that
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: you envision Congress potentially passing around judicial review that actually
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: scopes what kind of cases or decisions the Supreme Court
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: can make? And is there historical precedent for that?
• 47:24
  Speaker 4: You know, I do think that there is... Judicial review
• 47:27
  Speaker 4: and the history of judicial review has kind of been this...
• 47:31
  Speaker 4: I guess we can say it's been.
• 47:35
  Speaker 4: It's been like an amalgam of different factors that can
• 47:38
  Speaker 4: shape what judicial review does. Some of it, again, has
• 47:42
  Speaker 4: to do with political pressure. When we go back nearly
• 47:45
  Speaker 4: 100 years, when FDR started threatening expansion of the court
• 47:49
  Speaker 4: back then, it was the executive branch drawing a line
• 47:53
  Speaker 4: in the sand and saying, you all are going too far.
• 47:57
  Speaker 4: And in the past, there have been moments, even, for example,
• 48:02
  Speaker 4: with Abraham Lincoln in the case of Dred Scott and
• 48:05
  Speaker 4: the Supreme court ruled the way that it did and
• 48:08
  Speaker 4: Abraham and, you know, and Lincoln disregarded the outcome of
• 48:13
  Speaker 4: Dred Scott when he signed the emancipation proclamation. And they said,
• 48:17
  Speaker 4: there are certain things that are inalienable and, and citizenship
• 48:22
  Speaker 4: for black Americans. And the formerly enslaved was one of
• 48:27
  Speaker 4: those inalienable rights. And it is, I know it is
• 48:33
  Speaker 4: a third rail in politics to discuss this, but frankly,
• 48:39
  Speaker 4: this is where we are as a country. And it
• 48:41
  Speaker 4: is sad and it is scary, but the idea of
• 48:45
  Speaker 4: having a panel of unelected individuals who have demonstrated financial
• 48:53
  Speaker 4: entanglement and whose reasoning is increasingly straying from precedence There
• 49:02
  Speaker 4: has to be a line. And we have to ask
• 49:05
  Speaker 4: ourselves and prepare ourselves. We are seeing the Supreme Court,
• 49:09
  Speaker 4: they strict rights, basic inalienable rights, inalienable rights from women
• 49:14
  Speaker 4: and non-binary people last year with the overturning of jobs.
• 49:20
  Speaker 4: They are now stripping certain inalienable rights from LGBTQ Americans.
• 49:26
  Speaker 4: And we have to ask ourselves, what If they can
• 49:31
  Speaker 4: do this, what can't they do? What is the line
• 49:37
  Speaker 4: in terms of that pushback? And so I think when
• 49:40
  Speaker 4: it comes to legislation, there's a potential, there's a possibility
• 49:44
  Speaker 4: there that too could be challenged in court, but it
• 49:48
  Speaker 4: can also be done through other ways as well. And
• 49:53
  Speaker 4: I know that that makes folks uncomfortable, but there is
• 49:56
  Speaker 4: a history and a precedent for this in American history.
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: In general, how do you think President Biden has handled
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: his job over the last four years?
• 50:07
  Speaker 4: You know, I think he's done quite well, given the
• 50:12
  Speaker 4: limitations that we have. I do think that there are
• 50:17
  Speaker 4: ebbs and flows, as there are in any presidency. You know,
• 50:23
  Speaker 4: there are areas that I think were quite strong when
• 50:25
  Speaker 4: he came right out of the gate with the American
• 50:27
  Speaker 4: Rescue Plan. And of course, the Inflation Reduction Act was
• 50:34
  Speaker 4: a massive step in terms of our climate agenda. But,
• 50:38
  Speaker 4: you know, there are also areas that I think could
• 50:41
  Speaker 4: have gone better. The president and I think the Democratic
• 50:44
  Speaker 4: Party in general continues to struggle with immigration. We don't
• 50:49
  Speaker 4: want to own this issue. We talk a big game
• 50:52
  Speaker 4: when we're in the minority and when we're trying to
• 50:54
  Speaker 4: win an election, but I don't feel like we are
• 50:57
  Speaker 4: there when it comes to what we actually passed. The
• 51:01
  Speaker 4: DREAM Act is now over 20 years old and it's
• 51:06
  Speaker 4: still not passed. And a lot of, you know, there's
• 51:10
  Speaker 4: plenty of other issues as well, even with what is
• 51:13
  Speaker 4: happening with asylees. You know, the ability to grant people
• 51:17
  Speaker 4: basic work authorization so that they can work while they
• 51:22
  Speaker 4: are going through their legal processing, there is an enormous
• 51:26
  Speaker 4: amount of political resistance to that. And we want to
• 51:30
  Speaker 4: make sure that we are expanding that fight and working
• 51:34
  Speaker 4: for the coalition that elects this party. So, you know,
• 51:38
  Speaker 4: I do think, of course, there's so much more that
• 51:43
  Speaker 4: we could do, so much more that we should do.
• 51:47
  Speaker 4: We have major structural issues in this country, and I
• 51:50
  Speaker 4: think It starts with the United States Senate. And I
• 51:55
  Speaker 4: think that until we have senators that are willing to
• 52:00
  Speaker 4: stand up and stare the filibuster in the eye and
• 52:02
  Speaker 4: stare a lot of structural issues about the Senate in
• 52:05
  Speaker 4: the eye, the United States Senate will be what holds
• 52:09
  Speaker 4: back this country from an enormous amount of progress. And
• 52:13
  Speaker 4: I think that we need to have a real conversation
• 52:15
  Speaker 4: about that, not just in the structure, but also in
• 52:18
  Speaker 4: the culture. The culture of the United States Senate is
• 52:22
  Speaker 4: there is so much deference to this kind of like
• 52:28
  Speaker 4: polite society, but oftentimes that runs up against some people's
• 52:34
  Speaker 4: basic rights and we need to have that conversation.
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: So president's only primary opponents are Marianne Williamson, Robert F.
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: Kennedy Jr. Haven't been any rumors about anyone else even
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: thinking about jumping in. Will you be supporting Joe Biden
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: for reelection?
• 52:50
  Speaker 4: I believe given that field, yes. What do you.
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: Make of Cornel West's campaign?
• 52:54
  Speaker 4: You know, I think Dr. West has an incredible history
• 53:01
  Speaker 4: in this country. What he fights for, what he gives
• 53:03
  Speaker 4: voice to is incredibly important. And the ability for us
• 53:09
  Speaker 4: to talk about issues that, frankly, mainstream Democrats are often
• 53:13
  Speaker 4: too afraid to touch when we talk about American oligopoly,
• 53:19
  Speaker 4: when we talk about foreign policy, when we talk about
• 53:22
  Speaker 4: the United States, oftentimes our foreign policy's complicit nature in
• 53:29
  Speaker 4: human rights abuses abroad, whether that's in Palestine, in Africa,
• 53:33
  Speaker 4: or in other areas of the global South, these are
• 53:35
  Speaker 4: very important things for us to talk about. When we
• 53:38
  Speaker 4: talk about universal healthcare in the United States, and we
• 53:41
  Speaker 4: talk about Medicare for all, there are very real powers
• 53:47
  Speaker 4: and forces that prevent the Democratic Party from really advancing
• 53:52
  Speaker 4: in these issues. And I think that it's very healthy
• 53:55
  Speaker 4: for us to have those kinds of conversations and to
• 54:00
  Speaker 4: kind of zoom out into an overall critique of our
• 54:03
  Speaker 4: political system that doesn't, you know, that isn't obliged, uh,
• 54:12
  Speaker 4: in this logic of American exceptionalism. Um, so I think,
• 54:16
  Speaker 4: you know, I, I appreciate when there are people who
• 54:21
  Speaker 4: raise those voices and, um, have a history of that.
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: How much do third party candidacies, whether it's Dr. West's
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: or no labels or anyone like that, how much does
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: that concern you for the general election?
• 54:35
  Speaker 4: Well, you know, I think, um, not all third party
• 54:39
  Speaker 4: candidacies are created equal, you know, there are some third
• 54:44
  Speaker 4: party candidacies that, that really exists to send a message
• 54:51
  Speaker 4: and to really kind of discuss some of these issues
• 54:54
  Speaker 4: in real time. And I think that there's, there is
• 54:57
  Speaker 4: value to us having these conversations. But, you know, when
• 55:03
  Speaker 4: you look at, for example, what No Labels is doing with,
• 55:07
  Speaker 4: that is something to be concerned about because of the
• 55:10
  Speaker 4: sheer amount of money and bad faith actors that are involved.
• 55:15
  Speaker 4: And again, it's not just to say no labels, but
• 55:18
  Speaker 4: we have to be very concerned because the risk of
• 55:21
  Speaker 4: fascism in this country is here. It is real. And
• 55:27
  Speaker 4: we cannot risk it, especially in critical electoral college states
• 55:33
  Speaker 4: that are decided by tens of thousands of votes, we
• 55:36
  Speaker 4: need to be very, very careful, I believe, about that.
• 55:40
  Speaker 4: This is, you know, the United States has a winner-take-all system.
• 55:44
  Speaker 4: Whether we like that or not, we have to live
• 55:48
  Speaker 4: with that reality. And the risk of just a fascist erosion,
• 55:57
  Speaker 4: that is really quite there. It's real. And I think
• 56:04
  Speaker 4: every single one of us, no matter where you are
• 56:06
  Speaker 4: on the political spectrum, whether you consider yourself moderate or
• 56:11
  Speaker 4: whether you consider yourself as far left as can be,
• 56:15
  Speaker 4: we have to contend with a very real material risk
• 56:18
  Speaker 4: of people being harmed.
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: As you pointed out, it's not just about reelecting Joe Biden.
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: It's about expanding the Senate majority or at least having
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: a Senate majority willing to eliminate the filibuster. And also,
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: of course, we're going to take back the House. What
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: do you think the best case is for the Democratic
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: Party to make to voters for 2024?
• 56:39
  Speaker 4: Well, I think the best cases are actions. And that's
• 56:42
  Speaker 4: why I think it's so important that Joe Biden and
• 56:47
  Speaker 4: his administration go full steam ahead, for example, on student
• 56:51
  Speaker 4: loan relief. I think some of his critics on this
• 56:56
  Speaker 4: are saying, you know, they're just dragging this out, this
• 56:59
  Speaker 4: whole 12-month process until after an election. This is just cynical.
• 57:03
  Speaker 4: They have no intention of seeing this through. I think
• 57:05
  Speaker 4: it's very important for the administration to prove those critics wrong.
• 57:09
  Speaker 4: And that's why I think it's really important to accelerate
• 57:11
  Speaker 4: that timeline. But cutting interest is a material benefit that
• 57:19
  Speaker 4: people can experience now while we figure out and work
• 57:24
  Speaker 4: out the Higher Education Act path to student loan forgiveness.
• 57:30
  Speaker 4: And so I think material changes are the best case
• 57:35
  Speaker 4: that we can make, where we can say, look at
• 57:38
  Speaker 4: what we've done. We've brought insulin down. We've capped the
• 57:42
  Speaker 4: price of insulin to $ 35. We have invested and created
• 57:48
  Speaker 4: 9 million dignified, high-paying jobs to work on climate with
• 57:53
  Speaker 4: the Inflation Reduction Act alone. During COVID, we did have
• 57:59
  Speaker 4: that child tax credit that we were able to implement.
• 58:03
  Speaker 4: And if we get those seats back, then we can
• 58:06
  Speaker 4: see if we can extend it or make it permanent
• 58:08
  Speaker 4: and bring it back again. Really talking in the language
• 58:13
  Speaker 4: of what everyday people actually felt, you know, that child
• 58:16
  Speaker 4: tax credit, people felt that. Insulin caps, people feel that.
• 58:21
  Speaker 4: Not having to pay rent in a student loan payment,
• 58:25
  Speaker 4: people really feel that. And that, I think, is our
• 58:29
  Speaker 4: best case. I do think that, yeah, and I think
• 58:34
  Speaker 4: that that is the case that the president can make.
• 58:36
  Speaker 4: But I also think that There are some Senate Democrats
• 58:42
  Speaker 4: that should reflect on some of their positions on things
• 58:47
  Speaker 4: and see, you know, are they willing to be more
• 58:50
  Speaker 4: vocal on these issues? Are they willing to fight more
• 58:52
  Speaker 4: on these issues so that we can actually get some
• 58:55
  Speaker 4: of this stuff done? Because what I don't want to
• 58:58
  Speaker 4: happen is for people to say, oh, you know, the
• 59:02
  Speaker 4: Biden administration or certain, you know, or the Senate or
• 59:06
  Speaker 4: the House or whatever promise all of these things just
• 59:09
  Speaker 4: to get elected and then they don't deliver on them.
• 59:11
  Speaker 4: And so I think it's important to remind folks of
• 59:13
  Speaker 4: the material changes that we've made, but also really discuss
• 59:19
  Speaker 4: the felt reality of what people are seeing, hearing, breathing,
• 59:23
  Speaker 4: and paying for.
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: Makes sense. Makes sense.
• 59:26
  Speaker 7: Okay.
• 59:27
  Speaker 6: I'm jumping in.
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: I'm jumping in. Jump in.
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: We got a lightning round from Lovett.
• 59:31
  Speaker 2: Hi, hi, hi.
• 59:31
  Speaker 3: Good to see you. How you doing?
• 59:33
  Speaker 7: Good, good.
• 59:34
  Speaker 3: All right. It's time to focus on the questions that
• 59:36
  Speaker 3: matter the least. Are you ready?
• 59:37
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 59:38
  Speaker 3: All right. Barbie Oppenheimer.
• 59:41
  Speaker 4: Barbie, but I wouldn't mind doing a double head or whatever.
• 59:45
  Speaker 3: Double header. I think that's right because Barbie is going
• 59:48
  Speaker 3: to be really fun, but Oppenheimer is going to make us...
• 59:51
  Speaker 3: you know, question what it means to be a person
• 59:53
  Speaker 3: and the incredible chaos and evil we each have within
• 59:55
  Speaker 3: our hands, you know, and that that's worth something too,
• 59:57
  Speaker 3: isn't it?
• 59:58
  Speaker 4: Absolutely.
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 3: Two doors open. One is a billionaire's sub to the Titanic.
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 3: The other is a billionaire's rocket to Mars. You must
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 3: go in one. Which one are you getting in?
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 4: Damn, maybe Mars.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's right. I think that's right.
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: You know, Fool me once, you know?
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 3: Are you playing any video games right now at all?
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 4: I'm playing Zelda.
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 3: You're playing Zelda.
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 4: But I left my Switch in DC, so I've been
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 4: a little Zelda-less for a week or so.
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 3: Are you aware of how addictive Diablo 4 is, and
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 3: is there anything that you can do legislatively?
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 4: I've heard a lot about this, so I have intentionally
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 4: avoided going near that. because I have a job.
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 3: Is that supposed to stop you from doing it?
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 4: Yeah. I have to stay focused.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: Okay. Okay.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 3: All right. Someone out there went on a White House
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 3: tour or visit. They know it is their cocaine. They're scared.
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 3: They're embarrassed. It's just you and that person. What do
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 3: you tell them?
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 4: Listen, if it's just me and that person, I tell them,
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 4: you can tell me. If you want, but don't worry
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 4: about it. But, you know, listen, there's no shame. We
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 4: need to destigmatize drug use. It's a public health issue,
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 4: you know, like end the war on drugs.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 3: Okay. Okay. Wouldn't it be cool if the Biden administration
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 3: actually had coke energy? Isn't like that deep down what
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 3: we want? Like, let's cancel the debt and be legends.
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 3: Let's mint the coin and be legends.
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 4: 100%.
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 2: 100%.
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: Perfect.
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 3: Perfect.
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 2: Be legend.
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: Congresswoman, thank you so much for coming back on Pod
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: Save America. We really appreciate it. And we'll talk to
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: you soon. Good to see you.
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 4: Thank you. Good to see you.
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, we're back. Before we go, we want to play
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: a quick game about the discovery of cocaine in the
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: White House called Whose Line Is It Anyway? I was
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: excited about that. No, we're actually going to play two
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: takes and a fake with the skipped up reactions from
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: Republicans to the news that a dime-sized bag of cocaine
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: was found near the ground floor entrance to the West
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: Wing in a place where visitors are asked to leave
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: their cell phones before taking a tour. The cubbies can
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: also be used by staff who can't bring their phones
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: into a SCIF or sensitive compartmented information facility where classified
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: materials are handled. Dan, I remember those cubbies. I don't
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: remember visitors being required to leave their cell phones there
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: before taking a tour. Am I forgetting or do you
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: think that's a new policy?
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 2: That seems to be a new policy.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: Okay. I don't know if I was just giving all
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: the tours wrong and letting people walk around with phones.
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 3: No, you used to have to.
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: If you were going into a meeting in certain rooms,
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 2: White House staff would just leave theirs in the office.
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: But even in the Roosevelt Room, which is a meeting
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 2: room for use for a lot of things, non-White House
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 2: staff were leaving their phones. By the time I left,
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 2: in a cubby outside. There had been a lot. Between
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 2: when you left and when I left in the end
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: of the Obama presidency, a lot more sort of Anti-surveillance
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 2: measures about where you could take your phones were more
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 2: strictly enforced. But it seems now like anyone bringing their
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 2: phone in has to leave it there.
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: Which makes sense because they all probably have fucking TikTok
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: on their phones and the Chinese government is just spying.
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. And there are a lot of people come
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 2: through there all the time for not just tours, meetings, right?
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 2: It'll be like the... delegation of members of Congress or
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 2: a bunch of union people from Michigan or teachers, the
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: people coming through the West Wing all the time, not
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 2: just for tours, but for meetings. And so that suggests
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: that we may never know who brought their cocaine to
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 2: the White House.
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean, I think those teachers, teachers are always
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: bringing cocaine into the White House.
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 4: Yes.
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: Whoever that person is, they have poor judgment.
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: Well, here's the thing.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 2: How did they forget it on the way out is
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: the question.
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: That's a very good point.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, because theoretically it was next to their cell phone.
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 6: Right.
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 1: Maybe they just took a bunch of shit out of
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: their pocket and cocaine was part of the stuff in
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: their pocket and they just stuffed it in the cubby.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: Or they panicked. You know, they're like going.
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: Oh, they panicked. Yeah, they're like, I don't want to
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 1: take it back.
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 2: It's like they took all their stuff. Because you have
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 2: to empty your pockets to go through security. So they
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 2: emptied their pockets.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 5: Oh.
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: Well, maybe they didn't. They probably didn't take the cocaine
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: out of the pockets.
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 4: Or out of the purse.
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: Because the Secret Service would have seen it go through
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: the metal detector, or not the metal detector, the whatever,
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: you put your stuff in a- X-ray machine. X-ray machine, yeah.
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: Thank you. They would have seen it then, so maybe
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: they just kept it in their pocket thinking that it
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: wouldn't set the scanner off because it was.
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 6: Metal, right?
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: Just imagine the feeling you would have is you're all
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 2: ready for your White House meeting, you're all dressed up,
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: you're excited, and you realize as you're about to go
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: through the gates that you have cocaine in your pocket
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 2: and you don't know what you're going to do about it.
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: No, what you're going to do about it then is
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: if you realize that is do the cocaine.
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: Is that not right? Washing down the toilet?
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 8: Is that not right?
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: But so people know what it's like. So it was
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: on the ground floor entrance. So that's usually for staff,
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: except at night when you give tours, that's where you
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: start the tour often. And the tours are given by
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: staffers like us at night to people that you know.
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: And so you're right, like a ton of people go
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: through that entrance. And they said, you know, they're going
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: to look at surveillance footage, but I don't know that
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: surveillance footage is going to show like who left what
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: and what cubby because no one has taken out the
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: cocaine and like waving it in front of the camera
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: and then putting it in the cubby.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 4: Right.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 1: So that's going to be, it's going to be hard
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: to look for the surveillance footage. And also they're doing
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: like DNA testing and fingerprint stuff, but like people's fingerprints
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: are like all over those cubbies. Cause all the people
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: are putting their phones in there. So I don't know
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: how that's going to work either.
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 2: I think that's, there are, it's on the bag of cocaine.
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 2: It's the fingerprint they're looking for. Right.
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: But then you, then that person has to have fingerprints
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: somewhere else. Right. Like, I mean, unless it's, you know,
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: if they're, if they have a clean, if they have
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: a clean record, there is.
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 2: One person in America right now who is hiding.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: Under their bed, not sleeping, not sleeping because of the cocaine,
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: but also because they're very nervous that they're going to
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 1: get caught. Anyway, I heard that we have a clip
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: that we're supposed to throw to that. Some kind of
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: a surprise here. I'm scared. Scared to find out what
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: this is.
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 6: John Fife Dog, it's Joe Biden. Look, I've got a
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 6: little problem and I could really use your help.
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 5: Last week, I invited my friend Mitch over to the
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 5: White House to watch the new season of Marvelous Miss Maisel.
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 5: That Rachel Brosnahan razzes our berries. And you guys know Mitch,
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 5: that prankster loves Gallagher and prop comedy. So he brings
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 5: this little beatnik baggie with him for a cheap yuck
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 5: because he's cocaine, Mitch. And now I got the cops
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 5: on my ass. It's a bunch of applesauce, man. So
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 5: here's the deal. Dan, you need to take the fall.
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 5: You look like you know your way around the booger sugar,
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 5: so these Fox News folks will believe it. Mitch says
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 5: he'll send some earmarks to Delaware if you do a masala.
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 6: Made in the shade, man. We got a deal, Danny boy.
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: That is the closest we'll ever get to having Joe
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: Biden on this podcast.
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 2: I mean, if people had not been making the cocaine
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 2: Mitch joke, it hadn't even occurred to me until now.
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: I know, I know, I know. You know, Olivia had
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: thought about it. She put it in the prep, but
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: I didn't. Of course, I'm glad I didn't say it
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: because I didn't want to ruin that surprise there.
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 2: I just want to stipulate for the record, just legally
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 2: and politically, that that is Tommy misusing artificial intelligence.
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: Which he has now done more than. Anyone else in politics,
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: I think.
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like the DeSantis people did that ad with
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 2: the Fauci hug and Tommy, the two corporates.
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: Tommy's the big culprit.
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 2: Tommy deepfake Vitor.
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: I will say, it really nails Joe Biden's voice. The
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: ha-ha was pretty funny. That was the only thing that
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: was a little off, is Joe Biden saying ha-ha.
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 2: I'm so uncomfortable right now.
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: I knew that Booger Sugar was getting in there as
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: soon as I heard the beginning. Yeah.
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 4: Okay.
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: Now we have a game. I think Elijah is going
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: to join us for this. Elijah, are you there?
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 3: I am.
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: Here he is.
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 8: I also don't know how I'm supposed to follow up
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 8: that clip. It's so funny. It's a bunch of applesauce.
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: Not so sleepy Joe, you know?
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 8: Yep. Welcome back to Two Takes and a Fake. It's
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 8: our take on the classic game, Two Truths and a Lie.
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 8: This is going to be a cocaine in the White
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 8: House edition.
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 2: Only one round.
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 8: Just a little bump. Here are three Republicans reactions to
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 8: the cocaine story. Two of them are real. One of
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 8: them is fake. John and Dan, are you ready?
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: So ready.
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 2: Born ready.
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 8: Here's take number one. I think a lot of us
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 8: have believed that the Biden administration's been blowing it on
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 8: a lot of fronts. But I guess this is a
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 8: little bit more literal than even I had thought. That
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 8: is number one.
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 8: Number two. Has deranged Jack Smith, the crazy Trump-hating special prosecutor,
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 8: been seen in the area of the cocaine? He looks
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 8: like a crackhead to me. That is reaction number two.
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 8: And here's reaction number three.
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 2: Well, well, well.
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 8: It looks like Joe Biden's crime wave has finally come
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 8: to his doorstep, and the White House is now less
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 8: secure than the southern borders. So guys, honestly, which is
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 8: the fake?
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: Honestly, great job with all three of those. Uh, I
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 1: will identify the fake and I will identify the people
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: who uttered the first two. The first one is from
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 1: Ron DeSantis. The second one is a truth from Donald Trump.
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: And the third one is either fake or you decided
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: to do, uh, all three that are real.
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 8: That one, the last one is a conglomeration of takes
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 8: submitted by the subscribers.
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 3: Thank you.
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 8: Go sign up at, uh, crooked.com slash friends.
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: But, The other two, I was correct.
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 4: Oh, yes.
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 8: The other two, you're correct. And I have the full
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 8: quotes here if you want them.
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: Oh, please, please, please. Yeah, we got to read the
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: whole Trump truth because it's special.
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 8: I have the Ron DeSantis one also, but I mean,
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 8: per usual, Trump just blows him out of the water.
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 8: Here it is. And I'm going to shout when Trump
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 8: uses all caps.
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: Thank you.
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 8: Does anybody really believe that the cocaine found in the
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 8: West Wing of the White House, very close to the
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 8: Oval Office, is for the use of anyone other than
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 8: Hunter and Joe Biden? But watch, the fake news media
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 8: will soon start saying that the amount found was, quote,
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 8: very small, and it wasn't really cocaine, but rather common
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 8: ground-up aspirin, and the story will vanish. Has deranged Jack Smith,
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 8: the crazy Trump-hating special prosecutor, been seen in the area
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 8: of the cocaine? He looks like a crackhead to me.
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: It certainly feels like Donald Trump has used or at
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: least been aware of the... It's just ground up aspirin excuse.
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 8: We were all thinking it.
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: Really, really reached for that, huh?
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 2: Just strange detour to go. There are a lot of
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 2: ways to go with cocaine being found in Joe Biden's
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 2: White House. Accusing Jack Smith of being a crackhead was
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 2: a swerve, I would say. Yeah, rent free.
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: It was a swerve. It was a swerve, though an
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 1: unsurprising one. You know, kudos to him. Well, there it is.
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 1: Two takes and a fake. We did it. blow we
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 1: did it blow we did it blow I'm.
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 2: So glad that because Tommy did that thing you and
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 2: I will never see those newly installed cell phone companies
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 2: because we will never be invited.
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: Back to the house again again it was all Tommy
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: thank you thank you to AOC for joining us today
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 1: sorry that you joined in the episode where we made
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: about 40 cocaine jokes everyone have a fantastic weekend And
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 1: we'll talk to you next week.
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 2: Bye, everyone.
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 1: Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: producer is Michael Martinez. Our producers are Andy Gardner Bernstein
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: and Olivia Martinez. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick.
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer with audio support from
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Thanks to Hallie Kiefer, Madeline Herringer,
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: Ari Schwartz, Andy Taft, and Justine Howe for production support.
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 1: And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Phoebe Bradford, Mia Kelman,
• 1:12:42
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• 1:12:45
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• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: community events. Find us at youtube.com slash at Pod Save America.