Latest / Normally / Normally Podcast: The Sad Story of the FAKE USAID Employee

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Normally Podcast: The Sad Story of the FAKE USAID Employee · Normally

0:02
Speaker 1: Hey, yeah, as welcome back to normally the show with
0:05
Speaker 1: normalist takes for when the news gets weird. I am
0:08
Speaker 1: Mary Catherine Ham.
0:09
Speaker 2: And I'm Carol markoitz him. Mary Catherine, how's it going.
0:14
Speaker 1: It's all right. It's still freezing here. I know you
0:16
Speaker 1: don't have to deal with this, but I'm actually going
0:19
Speaker 1: to escape to Florida next week, so I will see you,
0:21
Speaker 1: I know, a brief time in person.
0:23
Speaker 2: We're excited about that. And I hope the weather. You know,
0:25
Speaker 2: it's like seventy one today. I hope it warms up
0:27
Speaker 2: for you, because this is clearly unacceptable, unacceptable.
0:31
Speaker 1: I'll be so cold when I get there, Oh my gosh. Yes,
0:34
Speaker 1: I'll survive.
0:36
Speaker 2: I hope. So I really do bring a sweater. In
0:39
Speaker 2: any case, I'm wearing a sweater for for those watching it.
0:43
Speaker 2: So you know, we talked about the sixty minutes episode
0:47
Speaker 2: last show, and yet there was more to say about
0:50
Speaker 2: that episode that we didn't cover that I think we
0:53
Speaker 2: need to get into. On this episode, they had on
0:58
Speaker 2: two people who aim to be USAID employees and the
1:03
Speaker 2: claim to be that's going to feature into this complaining
1:08
Speaker 2: about how Elon Musk is shutting down their their work
1:13
Speaker 2: and doing it really haphazardly. Apparently, according to them, let's
1:18
Speaker 2: roll the short clip.
1:19
Speaker 1: People are really scared.
1:21
Speaker 3: I think that you know, twelve days ago, people knew
1:24
Speaker 3: where their next paycheck was coming from. They knew how
1:26
Speaker 3: they were going to pay for their kids' takecare, their
1:29
Speaker 3: medical bills, and then all gone.
1:32
Speaker 4: Overnight, All gone overnight. For Christina Dry and Adam Dubard
1:38
Speaker 4: fired this month in the chaotic shutdown of foreign aid
1:43
Speaker 4: distributed by the US Agency for International Development USAID, more
1:49
Speaker 4: than eight thousand USAID employees were sent home by the administration.
1:56
Speaker 1: They're not looking for covenancy.
1:57
Speaker 4: They're not looking for if you're good at your job.
1:59
Speaker 4: They're looking for peer loyalty tests and if you don't
2:01
Speaker 4: give it you you will be punished.
2:04
Speaker 3: And they had to leave the building. And these are
2:07
Speaker 3: folks who had decades and decades of public service serving
2:11
Speaker 3: USAID across administrations from you know, George Bush to Obama
2:16
Speaker 3: to the first Trump administration. And they were never able
2:20
Speaker 3: to walk back in the building again.
2:21
Speaker 4: There was no process, No one explained to them why
2:24
Speaker 4: they were being relieved.
2:26
Speaker 3: To my knowledge, they received an email and then if
2:29
Speaker 3: they didn't leave the building, they were escorted out of
2:31
Speaker 3: the building.
2:33
Speaker 2: Interesting because it turns out that these two were not
2:38
Speaker 2: employees of USAID. They were consultants who were never actually employees.
2:44
Speaker 2: Therefore they could not be fired for their lack of loyalty.
2:48
Speaker 2: What do you think?
2:49
Speaker 1: So Christina Dry in particular, In particular, it turns out
2:52
Speaker 1: was a consultant and in the capacity largely as a
2:57
Speaker 1: close confidant and speech writer for Samantha Power. This is
3:01
Speaker 1: a political position, Okay, There's two different kinds of positions
3:05
Speaker 1: in the federal government. There are the civil service ones
3:08
Speaker 1: that are intended to be more neutral and to cross
3:11
Speaker 1: over several administrations, although in practice they end up being
3:13
Speaker 1: quite political, just only to.
3:15
Speaker 2: The left of course. Yeah.
3:17
Speaker 1: Then there are political appointees who every time there's a switch,
3:21
Speaker 1: they change out. That is the custom, that is the
3:24
Speaker 1: proper way to do things. So Christina Dry was going
3:27
Speaker 1: to lose that job regardless. And then she's painting herself
3:32
Speaker 1: as not only a USAID employee or implying that she
3:36
Speaker 1: is one, but also like a career civil servant, right,
3:40
Speaker 1: which is not the case. In sixty minutes, isn't telling
3:43
Speaker 1: you the truth about her? Yeah?
3:44
Speaker 2: Also, she was on video the week before as she
3:49
Speaker 2: was being interviewed also outside of the USAID offices, saying
3:53
Speaker 2: that she removed a bunch of things from the office
3:57
Speaker 2: as Doge was coming in, like pride flags or books
4:00
Speaker 2: they may not like, or other things like that she
4:04
Speaker 2: said she took out of the building. Hmm. You know,
4:07
Speaker 2: I can't imagine why.
4:09
Speaker 1: I empathize with the fact that there are a lot
4:11
Speaker 1: of people whose lives and finances might be disrupted, yes,
4:15
Speaker 1: by Doje's actions. Right, what she's relating here is just
4:20
Speaker 1: what it looks like to get laid off any other place.
4:23
Speaker 3: Yep.
4:24
Speaker 1: This is what many Americans have experienced in the past.
4:27
Speaker 1: One day, you know exactly what's happening in your life,
4:30
Speaker 1: and the next day you don't. Sometimes, and it's not
4:32
Speaker 1: to say that I'm celebrating that for people, but this
4:37
Speaker 1: is a normal process that regular people go through. People
4:40
Speaker 1: in civil service do not have the same experience because
4:43
Speaker 1: they have extra protections, and the Trump administration is going
4:47
Speaker 1: to test those protections as we go through this process.
4:51
Speaker 1: By the way, did you see in the DC District
4:54
Speaker 1: Court that Judge shoot Can Who's like the best chance
4:59
Speaker 1: you're going to get a favorable decision for the civil
5:02
Speaker 1: servants and the people suing Doge decided against the state's
5:07
Speaker 1: sewing Doge yesterday. They wanted an emergency temporary restraining order,
5:14
Speaker 1: saying we will suffer irreparable harm, and shut Can was like,
5:19
Speaker 1: I can't give it to you because you haven't proved
5:22
Speaker 1: that this is irreparable harm and that it is eminent.
5:26
Speaker 1: What you've told me is that media is reporting that
5:29
Speaker 1: they're going to fire a lot of people, and I'm
5:31
Speaker 1: not allowed to use media reports and speculation as a
5:34
Speaker 1: way to temporarily enjoin the executive branch, which like, yeah,
5:39
Speaker 1: like kind of somebody said, imagine how bad their argument
5:43
Speaker 1: was if shot Can has to say no. She wanted
5:47
Speaker 1: to say yes, but in this battle no. There's an
5:51
Speaker 1: interesting line in here where she says the thing about
5:55
Speaker 1: sort of saying the quiet part out loud, like I
5:57
Speaker 1: know you're telling me the media's saying this is happened,
6:00
Speaker 1: but that's not a substitute for showing me that it's happening,
6:04
Speaker 1: which is a perfect example of how the left and
6:06
Speaker 1: the media work together to work against the will of
6:10
Speaker 1: the electorate. They're like, oh, we made a story, and
6:12
Speaker 1: therefore you should enjoin the executive branch.
6:15
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, that's a very interesting point. My friend Joel Engel,
6:19
Speaker 2: the writer posted on x the sixty thousand people who
6:24
Speaker 2: got cut loose when the Keystone Excel pipeline extension was
6:27
Speaker 2: canceled after Biden took office know the feeling, except they
6:30
Speaker 2: weren't bureaucrats. They were skilled construction workers and engineers. I mean,
6:35
Speaker 2: people get laid off, and that's what happens a lot
6:37
Speaker 2: of the time when new administrations take over. And so
6:41
Speaker 2: also Elon Musk has said that these people are getting
6:45
Speaker 2: eight months of pay and benefits, so it actually isn't
6:48
Speaker 2: true that they don't know where their next meal is
6:51
Speaker 2: coming from.
6:52
Speaker 1: Well, and to the extent that it's uncertain. One of
6:54
Speaker 1: the things that's happened is a federal judge has paused
6:58
Speaker 1: those agreements. Five thousand reportedly have taken the buyout agreement.
7:03
Speaker 1: But Judge, like I need to see more about this
7:05
Speaker 1: before we let them do it again. They have protections
7:09
Speaker 1: that private workers have no idea about, and so we're
7:12
Speaker 1: going to sort through those. And I'm also open to
7:16
Speaker 1: the idea that this is haphazard. I think many voters
7:20
Speaker 1: see this as the only way to make progress in
7:23
Speaker 1: understanding what's going on, so they're willing to go through that.
7:28
Speaker 1: I don't want to lose experienced people who are good,
7:30
Speaker 1: but frankly, a lot of the experienced people in like say, oh,
7:33
Speaker 1: I don't know public health over the last five years,
7:37
Speaker 1: have not proved to be knowledgeable or trustworthy or good
7:41
Speaker 1: at their jobs. And that's a lot of people's experience
7:44
Speaker 1: of the federal workforce.
7:46
Speaker 2: That's right. And Dog just posting a lot of the
7:49
Speaker 2: money that they're canceling on their X account, and it's
7:53
Speaker 2: stuff like ten million for Mozambique voluntary medical mail circumcision
7:59
Speaker 2: nine points and for u C. Berkeley to develop a
8:01
Speaker 2: cohort of Cambodian youth with enterprise driven skills. I mean,
8:06
Speaker 2: some of it, I'm sure isn't awful, but I just
8:09
Speaker 2: don't know why we need to be doing biodiversity conversations
8:14
Speaker 2: in Nepal or social cohesion in Mali or any of
8:18
Speaker 2: this stuff that sort of just sounds ridiculous. And a
8:21
Speaker 2: lot of people are realizing that I had a tweet
8:24
Speaker 2: that I had more se retweeted into my timeline of
8:28
Speaker 2: minim the d's account. He says, count me as one
8:31
Speaker 2: of the supporters, much to my surprise. I think a
8:34
Speaker 2: lot of people recognize that the government needs pruning and
8:37
Speaker 2: are willing to overlook the occasional errand snip because the
8:40
Speaker 2: bush is so out of control.
8:42
Speaker 1: I think that's going to be a lot of people's
8:44
Speaker 1: take on this, to the point about how they're covering this.
8:49
Speaker 1: Of course, the media in the District of Columbia area,
8:54
Speaker 1: certainly everyone who works in media works very closely with
8:58
Speaker 1: federal employees, right, civil servants in particular, who have been
9:02
Speaker 1: there for a long time and are arguably deep state
9:06
Speaker 1: ish and leak all their stuff to the media. Right,
9:10
Speaker 1: So the media thinks that these are the perfect sympathetic victims.
9:14
Speaker 1: I think they're misreading, and that doesn't mean that there
9:16
Speaker 1: aren't victims among them. But I do notice that, for instance,
9:20
Speaker 1: the Washington Post has like Johnny on the Spot, a
9:23
Speaker 1: reporter at every town hall for a Virginia politician where
9:27
Speaker 1: he's getting asked questions about these federal jobs. Because in
9:30
Speaker 1: Virginia this will make a large difference. The federal workforce
9:33
Speaker 1: has grown. As it has Virginia has gotten bluer and bluer.
9:37
Speaker 1: Despite the blip welcome with Youngkin, which may have some
9:41
Speaker 1: staying power. But Washington Post reporters, they're live tweeting a
9:45
Speaker 1: local town hall with Representative Vinman so that people can
9:51
Speaker 1: hear all these sad stories. Not so many national reporters
9:55
Speaker 1: like in western North Carolina. You know, those victims not
10:00
Speaker 1: as special as these things.
10:01
Speaker 3: Yepes.
10:02
Speaker 2: They didn't really tell a lot of stories from the
10:04
Speaker 2: Keystone pipeline people being laid off. I didn't really read
10:07
Speaker 2: a lot of those.
10:08
Speaker 1: By the way, I think the AP estimates there are
10:10
Speaker 1: two point four million federal workers, twenty percent of them
10:13
Speaker 1: are in the DC area, so it does make a
10:15
Speaker 1: big economic impact here. Like I said, seventy five k
10:19
Speaker 1: have accepted the buyout. Reportedly, the VA may have lost
10:24
Speaker 1: a thousand people, Energy three hundred and fifty HHS and
10:28
Speaker 1: CDC a couple thousand, but as we note the total
10:33
Speaker 1: numbers two point four million. Yeah, and a lot of
10:36
Speaker 1: these jobs. Although they are certainly very important to the
10:42
Speaker 1: agencies themselves, because the agencies themselves are invested in perpetuating themselves,
10:48
Speaker 1: it remains to me seeing how important they are to voters, right.
10:52
Speaker 2: That is what remains to be seen. We'll see how
10:54
Speaker 2: much voters care about this. And that's the thing. A
10:57
Speaker 2: lot of people I've seen kind of people in the
10:59
Speaker 2: life tweet like alwos you know the voters will feel
11:02
Speaker 2: this soon, but like will they will they feel this?
11:05
Speaker 2: I don't know.
11:07
Speaker 1: I think it's possible you have a phenomenon where voters
11:10
Speaker 1: feel it in Virginia and Maryland. Although Maryland ain't getting
11:14
Speaker 1: any bluer like that, one's not going to change. Virginia
11:18
Speaker 1: could be a place where you see backlash. But again,
11:21
Speaker 1: it just once again sort of emphasizes that the economic
11:25
Speaker 1: effects of this are so centralized at the capitol hunger
11:30
Speaker 1: game style that maybe the regular folks will not be
11:34
Speaker 1: affected by it.
11:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, it remains to be seen.
11:39
Speaker 1: But one more thing, and I'm just going to repeat this.
11:41
Speaker 1: I know I keep repeating it. This idea that they
11:44
Speaker 1: have no legal authority is false, right DOJE is the
11:49
Speaker 1: US Digital Service, which was authorized by Obama. The people
11:53
Speaker 1: who lead the US Digital Service have been appointed by
11:56
Speaker 1: the president. I do not believe they were sentate confirmed either.
12:00
Speaker 1: This idea that a special government employee cannot do anything
12:04
Speaker 1: is wild, and even shut can is like, actually they
12:08
Speaker 1: can look at records inside these agencies, right, just as
12:12
Speaker 1: they've been doing since the Obama administration. Now, letting people
12:16
Speaker 1: go is the question. And I do think that one
12:18
Speaker 1: might be a bigger legal question.
12:19
Speaker 2: And I think you want to talk about voters hearing
12:22
Speaker 2: that you can't fire government employees. I feel like that's
12:25
Speaker 2: going to be something that they don't realize is going
12:27
Speaker 2: to affect.
12:28
Speaker 1: People every Yeah, yeah, that's the thing they say. And
12:33
Speaker 1: again I'm sort of sympathetic to the argument, like, oh,
12:35
Speaker 1: go at this with a scalpel. Okay, we'd love to,
12:37
Speaker 1: but you've never let us do it with a scalpel either.
12:41
Speaker 1: The admonition is always be careful with the bureaucracy. Be
12:44
Speaker 1: careful with the bureaucracy. Is the bureaucracy ever careful with me?
12:47
Speaker 3: Never?
12:48
Speaker 1: Or my money? I would love for them to be.
12:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, they want to know how you spent every penny
12:54
Speaker 2: last year. They don't want to tell you how they
12:58
Speaker 2: spent their money new We're going to take a short
13:02
Speaker 2: break and come right back with normally. So, speaking of
13:08
Speaker 2: new voters and voting habits shifting, the Atlantic had a
13:13
Speaker 2: piece about how it could be that the COVID lockdowns
13:19
Speaker 2: made the young people more right leaning.
13:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, The Atlantic reports you know, for decades, America's young
13:26
Speaker 1: voters have been deeply and famously progressive. In two thousand
13:29
Speaker 1: and eight, a youthquake sent Barack Obama to the White House.
13:31
Speaker 1: In twenty sixteen, voters eighteen to twenty nine broke for
13:34
Speaker 1: Hillary Clinton by eighteen points. In twenty twenty, they voted
13:37
Speaker 1: for Joe Biden by twenty four points. In twenty twenty four,
13:40
Speaker 1: Donald Trump closed most of the gap, losing voters under
13:43
Speaker 1: thirty by a fifty one to forty seven margin. That
13:46
Speaker 1: is a five alarm fire startling for Democrats.
13:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, and it's interesting, is it was it
13:54
Speaker 2: Kamala Harris or is this a permanent shift? Which is
13:58
Speaker 2: really the question. You know, there was an interesting part
14:01
Speaker 2: of that Atlantic piece. I really like this that people,
14:05
Speaker 2: once they change, they really don't change back. They write.
14:10
Speaker 2: Most famously, so called depression babies who grew up in
14:13
Speaker 2: the nineteen thirties saved more as adults. And there are
14:16
Speaker 2: some evidence that corporate managers born in the thirties were
14:19
Speaker 2: unusually disciplined to take on loans. Perhaps the eighteen to
14:23
Speaker 2: twenty five Cohort, whose youths were thrown into a people
14:27
Speaker 2: by COVID will adopt a set of socio political assumptions
14:30
Speaker 2: that form a new sort of ideology that doesn't quite
14:33
Speaker 2: have a name yet. Maybe or maybe they're just never
14:37
Speaker 2: going to trust the government, which is I don't know.
14:40
Speaker 2: I'm in for that. I'm in for them being skeptical
14:43
Speaker 2: of everything the government ever tells them.
14:45
Speaker 1: Well, that's the thing is that even Derek Thompson, who
14:49
Speaker 1: I think is better at reporting on this stuff than many.
14:52
Speaker 2: He's the one who wrote the Atlantic piece.
14:54
Speaker 1: He wrote the Atlantic piece, I do think there's an
14:56
Speaker 1: inability to recognize just how much government experts betrayed public trust. Yeah,
15:04
Speaker 1: Like they're just like, oh, the pandemic made them distrustful
15:07
Speaker 1: because of gestures, you know, generation right, It's like, well,
15:12
Speaker 1: it was real things that were happening that were making
15:15
Speaker 1: people say, I think you're full of it. Yeah, and
15:18
Speaker 1: young people were really damaged by having their milestones taken
15:23
Speaker 1: from them, and not just that this is what the
15:25
Speaker 1: left does. It's one step further, take all your stuff
15:29
Speaker 1: from you and then tell you you're the jerk for complaining
15:32
Speaker 1: about it.
15:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, you didn't do it good enough, you didn't miss
15:36
Speaker 2: your prom good enough for them.
15:38
Speaker 1: You didn't miss your graduation with correct stoicism, because you know,
15:42
Speaker 1: the left is so good at stoicism, and they got
15:45
Speaker 1: upset and they should have.
15:48
Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, my kids aren't old enough to vote yet,
15:51
Speaker 2: but they definitely the takeaway for them of the pandemic
15:55
Speaker 2: was adults don't know stuff like that was what they
15:58
Speaker 2: left the last few years thinking, like you know, they
16:01
Speaker 2: made them eat on the ground at their public schools
16:04
Speaker 2: in Brooklyn while old people who are at risk of
16:07
Speaker 2: COVID sat inside at restaurants. And my middle son would
16:12
Speaker 2: get in trouble all the time for his mask falling
16:14
Speaker 2: below his nose. But then he'd see politicians on TV
16:18
Speaker 2: not wearing masks at all, as.
16:19
Speaker 1: They had no conversations.
16:21
Speaker 2: They realized that a adults can lie to them, but
16:25
Speaker 2: be that adults don't know everything. And it's a realization
16:29
Speaker 2: that a lot of people come to. My kids just
16:30
Speaker 2: will get that realization a little bit earlier than others.
16:34
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think, you know, you see that that
16:36
Speaker 1: trend of people sticking with their twenty something politics in
16:40
Speaker 1: the millennial cohort, which I'm in, although I'm like the
16:42
Speaker 1: grandma of that court cohort, arguably a little gen X,
16:46
Speaker 1: but they were the Obama generation right, and gen X
16:51
Speaker 1: and gen Z on either side of them are more
16:53
Speaker 1: conservative than the millennials are. The millennials were like, oh,
16:57
Speaker 1: I'm inspired by Obama. Yes, and it's right. And then
17:00
Speaker 1: the concern was that every generation after that, and our
17:04
Speaker 1: friend Christen Soultus Anderson has written about this at length,
17:07
Speaker 1: that we wouldn't be able to move any future generations
17:10
Speaker 1: to the right because they're getting married later. Yeah, they're
17:13
Speaker 1: having kids later, the things that generally make you more conservative.
17:16
Speaker 1: But it turned out the government and the left just
17:18
Speaker 1: decided to make conservatives.
17:21
Speaker 2: They're like, here's what we have for you. Where's our program. Also,
17:29
Speaker 2: the effect of Donald Trump and this whole this election
17:33
Speaker 2: and the fact that he went on all these cool podcasts,
17:36
Speaker 2: the cool factor really can't be overlooked. It became uncool
17:40
Speaker 2: to be a Democrat for really the first time in
17:43
Speaker 2: my life, and I'm relax some firmly. Gen X and
17:48
Speaker 2: gen X also went major for Trump and this election,
17:52
Speaker 2: and it was the first time that it was not
17:56
Speaker 2: just acceptable but like preferable, Like people made fun of
18:00
Speaker 2: Kamala voters they did. That became a thing that happened
18:03
Speaker 2: and comedians would you know, mock them and and all
18:08
Speaker 2: of that, and yeah.
18:11
Speaker 1: I think I think that's I think that's part of
18:13
Speaker 1: the disorientation and unmoored feeling of democratic leadership right now,
18:19
Speaker 1: is that they have never had to argue in my
18:22
Speaker 1: lifetime from the position of being the uncool party. Perhaps
18:27
Speaker 1: maybe Ronald Reagan's second term, like that reelection, right, so
18:32
Speaker 1: maybe in that area, although I think that was still
18:34
Speaker 1: a time when just the mostly silent majority was like,
18:39
Speaker 1: we're a giant majority, We're going to handle this. But
18:42
Speaker 1: the cool people were still the lefty people in culture, right, right,
18:46
Speaker 1: So I think they're just they don't know what to
18:50
Speaker 1: do with that.
18:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's really interesting actually because we never hear about like, oh,
18:54
Speaker 2: the youths, you know, they came out for Reagan, Like,
18:56
Speaker 2: I still don't think that they did.
18:58
Speaker 1: I think I think it was actually back then the
19:01
Speaker 1: male the male female gap was the gender gap was smaller,
19:05
Speaker 1: and I think the age gaps were smaller. Certainly for
19:08
Speaker 1: Reagan's reelection, right, you know, he was very unifying.
19:12
Speaker 2: He was forty nine states and all that.
19:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just like a little it's wild, it's wild
19:19
Speaker 1: at the retelling, like in liberals' brains where they're like, oh, Reagan,
19:23
Speaker 1: very problematic, very unpopular, very nine states.
19:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, one New York, one, New Jersey, one, Massachusetts, Yeah problematic.
19:34
Speaker 2: May we have future problematic people?
19:37
Speaker 1: Yes, exactly.
19:38
Speaker 2: We'll be right back on normally.
19:44
Speaker 1: Shall we talk about Mayor Eric Adams? Oh?
19:46
Speaker 2: If we must, I guess you know. It's I'm so
19:49
Speaker 2: torn on him because there's a lot of corruption around him,
19:54
Speaker 2: and I've written about this in the past. I wrote
19:57
Speaker 2: about it in September where I wrote about all the
20:00
Speaker 2: people around him doing really weird, shady things and a
20:04
Speaker 2: lot of them getting indicted. I don't know that he
20:08
Speaker 2: is the corruption kind of whirlwind. I don't know that
20:12
Speaker 2: he's the one causing it necessarily. But it's not great.
20:16
Speaker 2: It's really not Having said that, if I lived in
20:20
Speaker 2: New York and I tweeted this before, but I would
20:23
Speaker 2: be holding on to him with my fingernails, right, So
20:27
Speaker 2: anybody that comes after is going to be so much worse.
20:31
Speaker 1: So this is this is a story in several parts, right,
20:34
Speaker 1: because Eric Adams fairly unpopular in New York City. But
20:40
Speaker 1: he did make a political turn, and I think in
20:44
Speaker 1: some policies towards saying like, hey, the things I've gotten
20:47
Speaker 1: a little out of hand here with the illegal immigration
20:49
Speaker 1: and some of the crime, perhaps we could do something
20:52
Speaker 1: about that for the people.
20:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're not exaggerating. That's literally how he did it
20:56
Speaker 2: in the most delicate, minor way possible. He wasn't like
21:01
Speaker 2: we should stop a legal immigration. He was like, can
21:04
Speaker 2: we get more funding for this, or you know, this
21:07
Speaker 2: seems like a problem.
21:08
Speaker 1: Perhaps, like let's just acknowledge that we do have many
21:11
Speaker 1: people coming into the city that.
21:12
Speaker 2: Were having well he wanted. Yeah.
21:15
Speaker 1: So shortly after that turn, and this is correlation, not causation.
21:20
Speaker 1: I'm just giving you the timeline, he was indicted on
21:23
Speaker 1: something that surely had been investigated for quite some time.
21:28
Speaker 1: But it and this is I thought this before any
21:30
Speaker 1: of this happened with Trump. The indictment was basically like
21:33
Speaker 1: he's been taking flight upgrades from Turkish airlines, right, which
21:38
Speaker 1: on the public corruption scale.
21:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, and yeah, so just to add to that, he
21:44
Speaker 2: was taking the upgrades on Turkish airlines. And also, by
21:47
Speaker 2: the way, like looking into like when he had to
21:49
Speaker 2: like fly to Texas, he was like, hey, does Turkish
21:52
Speaker 2: airlines fly there and have his emails asking that not
21:57
Speaker 2: so smart.
21:59
Speaker 1: He's all of it down right like, which is another
22:02
Speaker 1: thing that I think probably makes him and Trump find
22:06
Speaker 1: find commonality is they're like, oh, you know, we just
22:08
Speaker 1: say what we're doing.
22:09
Speaker 2: Right.
22:09
Speaker 1: Anyway, I thought the the the alleged crimes in this
22:12
Speaker 1: were like a little thin.
22:14
Speaker 2: Let me just add sorry I meant to add. But
22:16
Speaker 2: the reason that they were giving him the upgrades was
22:19
Speaker 2: the Turkish embassy was being built in New York and
22:22
Speaker 2: there was a long waiting list for the FD and
22:26
Speaker 2: Y it this is.
22:28
Speaker 1: Such a New York store certification.
22:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, they needed the FD and WY to sign off
22:32
Speaker 2: on it. They failed their first inspection and they wanted
22:36
Speaker 2: to be moved to the front of the list for
22:37
Speaker 2: the second one. Now how common was this in New York?
22:40
Speaker 2: How common? The Blasio administration that preceded Adams handed the
22:46
Speaker 2: Adams administration a binder of people and agencies and corporations
22:50
Speaker 2: and they were like, these people get moved to the
22:52
Speaker 2: front of the list. God, and so Adams added somebody
22:57
Speaker 2: to that binder. That's what he did. This is the
22:59
Speaker 2: this is the an extent of his you know, alleged crimes.
23:03
Speaker 1: Okay, so it seemed a little thin to me. The
23:06
Speaker 1: Southern District of New York says, there's more to come.
23:08
Speaker 1: We were investigating him. We're going to put this in
23:11
Speaker 1: the you know, in the case as we move forward.
23:14
Speaker 1: In the meantime, Trump's administration instructs the Southern District of
23:19
Speaker 1: New York and the lawyers therein to drop these charges,
23:23
Speaker 1: which on one hand could be a legit like, hey,
23:26
Speaker 1: we have prosecutorial discretion in the DJ we don't think
23:31
Speaker 1: this really passes muster for these reasons, and go forth
23:35
Speaker 1: and tell the judge that this is the reason we're
23:38
Speaker 1: doing this.
23:38
Speaker 2: Yeah.
23:39
Speaker 1: Well, two of the folks involved in this case, one
23:42
Speaker 1: of whom at least is verified as like a federalist society,
23:46
Speaker 1: yeah right, yeah, yeah, and like a like a personally
23:50
Speaker 1: conservative person in the in the legal world, says no, no, no, no, no.
23:56
Speaker 1: I can't go to a judge and do that. You
23:58
Speaker 1: didn't give me legal res that were doing this. You
24:01
Speaker 1: didn't give me a rationale for this, and as such,
24:05
Speaker 1: I am concerned that your rationale is that Eric Adams
24:08
Speaker 1: is working with you on immigration and therefore you're gonna
24:11
Speaker 1: let him off the hook for this, In which case
24:13
Speaker 1: you should pardon him, not do it this way?
24:15
Speaker 2: Right, and she ends up resigning.
24:17
Speaker 1: Yes, which is the right thing to do if you
24:19
Speaker 1: do not want to do something asked of you in
24:21
Speaker 1: your job.
24:22
Speaker 2: I agree absolutely. And a lot of conservatives are saying,
24:28
Speaker 2: why do we need Eric Adams so badly? Like why
24:31
Speaker 2: sacrifice these people for Eric Adams? And I understand that.
24:36
Speaker 2: And again, having said all that, if I were a
24:39
Speaker 2: conservative in New York, I'd be like, these save Eric Adams,
24:42
Speaker 2: we need him.
24:44
Speaker 1: Saltines look great to a starving person. Yeah, it's like
24:47
Speaker 1: exactly right.
24:48
Speaker 2: Because if Governor Kathy Hokeel removes Mayor Eric Adams, which
24:53
Speaker 2: may happen, it's public Advocate Jamaine Williams who becomes the mayor.
25:00
Speaker 2: Let me tell you, New York City, if you're a
25:01
Speaker 2: wild ride with him.
25:03
Speaker 1: Well, and that's that's the second part of this story, right,
25:06
Speaker 1: is where I go, this looks shady. Why are you
25:09
Speaker 1: doing this? And by the way, Trump, who's supposed to
25:12
Speaker 1: be a great negotiator, why are we trading away prosecutorial
25:15
Speaker 1: credibility for other things you want to do for a
25:18
Speaker 1: mortally wounded democrat mayor of New York City. And my friend,
25:23
Speaker 1: my friend Guy Benson has made the point, Well, it
25:25
Speaker 1: just he really kind of likes a corrupt democrat like there, like.
25:31
Speaker 2: Likes who he likes. And if you if you're on
25:33
Speaker 2: the like side, he's going to do things for you,
25:36
Speaker 2: and if you're not on the like side, he's not.
25:38
Speaker 2: And you know, and the thing is the only difference
25:41
Speaker 2: between Trump and other politicians is that he's very open
25:45
Speaker 2: about this act like super politicians do this. It's just
25:48
Speaker 2: he's like, I like this guy, I'm going to help him.
25:51
Speaker 1: I don't like this guy.
25:52
Speaker 2: I'm not going to help him.
25:53
Speaker 1: So then so Eric Adams goes on this like publicity
25:56
Speaker 1: tour with Homan on the morning shows to say, I'm
25:58
Speaker 1: going to help out. I'm gonna give him Franks Island,
26:00
Speaker 1: which fine. I think you would have helped out regardless.
26:03
Speaker 1: I don't think you need to do this. And one
26:05
Speaker 1: of the allegations is that the reason they didn't get
26:08
Speaker 1: him pardoned is because they still have leverage over him
26:11
Speaker 1: when he's in this position. So I'm like, oh, that's bad,
26:15
Speaker 1: y'all shouldn't do that. This seems like a very bad idea.
26:18
Speaker 1: And then Kathy Hokele, Governor of New York, comes along
26:22
Speaker 1: to say I'm gonna unmayor the mayor, and I'm like, okay,
26:27
Speaker 1: so now you've outdone him. I think you've outdone him.
26:31
Speaker 4: Yeah.
26:31
Speaker 1: So apparently the New York w York State Constitution does
26:35
Speaker 1: give her some authority in this way. Although it's used right,
26:39
Speaker 1: it's never been used successfully. I think Fdr Famous respector
26:42
Speaker 1: of limits Arms. Yeah, he did it. He attempted it
26:47
Speaker 1: one time. But the state constitution says the mayor. A
26:51
Speaker 1: mayor may be removed by the governor after giving to
26:54
Speaker 1: such officer a copy of the charges against him and
26:57
Speaker 1: an opportunity to be heard in his defense. It is
27:00
Speaker 1: very unclear what that due process looks like, but as usual,
27:04
Speaker 1: as long as it's a left of center person, New
27:07
Speaker 1: York Times is like, yeah, this is fascinating, right, it's
27:11
Speaker 1: fascinating that she could remove him. How's she going to
27:13
Speaker 1: do it?
27:14
Speaker 2: How is she going to do it? So one of
27:16
Speaker 2: the hows of how she's going to do it, she
27:18
Speaker 2: brought in Al Sharpton yesterday to basically be like, Hey,
27:22
Speaker 2: I know, I'm a white lady going to get rid
27:24
Speaker 2: of a black man who is the mayor of New
27:26
Speaker 2: York City. How do you feel about that, And so
27:30
Speaker 2: if Al Sharpton gave her his blessing, it might be
27:33
Speaker 2: a go. We don't know yet, but this is where
27:37
Speaker 2: we are. And again New Yorkers are just in a bad,
27:41
Speaker 2: bad spot here, and I really hope for that for
27:45
Speaker 2: their sake, it all works out in their favor. But
27:49
Speaker 2: Jamaine Williams as the possible next mayor, he, by the way,
27:52
Speaker 2: is the guy who was for defund the police. But
27:55
Speaker 2: he lives on a secure army base and he's cool. Yeah,
27:59
Speaker 2: he's against real ID, but he has to show his
28:02
Speaker 2: real ID to get on that army base. Really great guy.
28:06
Speaker 1: I mean, So this is a dynamic we're going to
28:09
Speaker 1: see throughout the Trump presidency. As you and I have said,
28:12
Speaker 1: there will be good, and there will bad and be bad,
28:14
Speaker 1: and there will be ugly. And I think the Eric
28:17
Speaker 1: Adams thing is bad. And then the response of his
28:20
Speaker 1: opponents is always almost always equally.
28:24
Speaker 2: Bad, if not worse, right, Yeah, I mean, because can
28:29
Speaker 2: Trump get rid of Kathy Hoko.
28:32
Speaker 1: Here we go, and then Elon Musk will get rid
28:37
Speaker 1: of Donald Trump, and then you know it.
28:38
Speaker 2: All comes and then we really are good to go.
28:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, then we're good we're good.
28:45
Speaker 2: That was an abnormal ending, but okay, thank you for
28:50
Speaker 2: it's fine. It's fine. Thanks for joining us on normally.
28:53
Speaker 2: Normally airs Tuesdays and Thursdays, and you can subscribe anywhere
28:57
Speaker 2: you get your podcasts to get in touch with us
28:59
Speaker 2: at normally the pod at gmail dot com. Thanks for listening,
29:02
Speaker 2: and when things get weird back normally why not