Latest / Pod Save America / Liz Cheney on the Cult of Trump

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Liz Cheney on the Cult of Trump · 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, Trump tries to tank a bipartisan immigration
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: deal because he wants to use the border crisis as
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: a campaign issue. Biden gets great economic news following a
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: big endorsement from the United Auto Workers. And later, I
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: talked to former Congresswoman Liz Cheney about the dangers of
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: a second Trump term and how she plans to stop
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: it from happening. Liz Cheney on Pod Save America. That's
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: where we're at, Dan. That's 2024.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: Chris Christie, Vivek Ramaswamy, Liz Cheney.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: You know what? Big tent. We're a big tent.
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: The left's answer to Fox News. Here you go.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: But first, Donald Trump and all the MAGA goons are
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: trying to push Nikki Haley out of the race. But
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: as of right now, she's not just sticking around. She's
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: actually showing some fight. She's running ads in South Carolina.
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: Her super PAC had its biggest day of fundraising this week.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: And here she is at a rally in her home
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: state having some fun with Trump's meltdown on Tuesday night.
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: So we got out there and we did our thing
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: and we said what we had to say. And then
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: Donald Trump got out there and just threw a temper tantrum.
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: He pitched a fit.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: He was insulting. He was doing what he does.
• 1:31
  Speaker 3: But I know that's what he does when he's insecure.
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: I know that's what he does when he is threatened.
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: And he should feel threatened, without a doubt. You look
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: at what's happening. And out of everything that he said
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: in his rant, he didn't.
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: Talk about the American people once. He talked about revenge. Well, Dan,
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: looks like she didn't follow the DeSantis path of dropping
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: out after a few days. Who would have guessed?
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: I want to say two things.
• 2:04
  Speaker 4: One.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: Yes, go ahead, please.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: Don't worry. I'll get to where you want me to
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: get to first. It's been less than 48 hours. It
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: took DeSantis longer than that to get out of the
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: race after Iowa. So that's one. But two, I will
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: acknowledge that perhaps I was overly negative about maybe put
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: off by sort of the fan boy vibes that you
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: would love it. We're putting out on my, on Tuesday
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: night and maybe she, maybe you are, you're going to
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: end up being correct. And she will be in this
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: through South Carolina and maybe beyond my analysis of what
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: her odds are into that has not changed, but I
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: will stipulate that she, she has shown more fight in
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: the 48 hours since they do have department that I expected,
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: which is a good thing for the process, for, Democrats
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: are going to beat Donald Trump, and for people who
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: have to do three podcasts a week. So, kudos.
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: And again, I share your analysis of what the final
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: outcome will be. Always have. And I will separate what
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: I want to happen and what I think will happen. Obviously,
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: what I want to happen is for Nikki Haley to
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: stay in this race as long as possible, because anything
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: that happens in this country or the world that even
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: has a chance of damaging... Donald Trump, politically, I am for,
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: which is why I really want her to stay in. Now,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: what I think will happen, I also think she'll stay
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: in through South Carolina for all the reasons that I
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: talked about on Tuesday night. And I just think, you know,
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: I think she's going to lose some donors. She's already
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: lost some donors. She's still down about 30 points in
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: South Carolina. She's got most of the Republican Party pressuring
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: her to drop out, including the ostensibly neutral RNC chair,
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: Ronna McDaniel. So she's got some challenges.
• 3:53
  Speaker 5: Yes.
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: The big one being Republicans have yet to vote for
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: her in any of these races. So that's a challenge.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: Well, I'm talking about challenges of like, does she stay
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: in through South Carolina? So I still think there's definitely,
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: I still think there's a chance she drops out before
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: South Carolina. But I think I'm more likely than not,
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: I think she at this point is going to stick
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: it out. Because I think even though she's losing some donors,
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: you know, she's still raising money. Some other donors are
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: staying in there, which is not totally surprising. When have
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: billionaires ever been known to make shrewd political decisions or
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: have good political analysis? And again, she's thinking to herself,
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: why not? She's been excommunicated from the party at this point.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: If she had dropped out after Iowa, maybe she could
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: have gotten herself back in Trump's good graces and the
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: party's good graces. She chose to compete in New Hampshire,
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: which is crossing the Rubicon. Now, Trump hates her. MAGA
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: hates her. She is persona non grata in the party.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: And at this point, it's like, what do you got
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: left to lose? Dignity. I mean, she was Trump's UN ambassador,
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: said he was bad, said he was good again, said
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: he was bad. She's lost that.
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: The reason why she would get out, if she were
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: to get out, which she very well may not, I
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: would like to stipulate for you, is losing your home
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: state by 30 points. That'd be personally painful for a
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: lot of people. Does she have a political future in
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: that state? Unlikely. Does she have a political future in
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: the Republican Party? Maybe, but potentially probably unlikely. If Donald
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: Trump loses in the general election, then maybe she does.
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: But people generally don't like to lose their home states
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: by a lot. Now, I will say, I went looking
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: through the quote-unquote polling that we have on South Carolina,
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: and we're all hinging this 30% number on one Emerson poll.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: that when you click on the link, it comes out
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: in an Excel spreadsheet, um, which is not to say
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: that it's not a good poll. It very well may be,
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: but I would like to see some, and that poll
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: was before Iowa. I like to see some more recent polling,
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: but you would, if that poll is correct, you would
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: have to just be very concerned with Nikki Haley because everyone,
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: the point she made, everyone knows you and they're currently
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: choosing the other guy.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: Um, Yeah.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: So, but let's see some other, we may get some
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: point that shows it in a two-person race closer, right?
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: Because there are, while most DeSantis voters are for Trump,
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: there are some of them who were Haley voters. There
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: were some, you know, there's a percent or two of
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: Ace Hutchinson voters or whatever. Some of the Tim Scott voters,
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: even if he endorsed Trump, probably end up in Haley's camp.
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: There are whatever the seven people in South Carolina probably
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: are going to vote for Chris Christie. They end up
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: in Haley's camp. She could get to a number that's
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: more respectable than down 30, which would give it some
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: juice and interest, even if She still has to find
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: a way to win a state, a very Republican state,
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: where in the 2016 Republican primary, 72% of primary voters
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: were evangelical Christians, a group she's getting clobbered with.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah. What's indisputable, whatever the polls show, is that not
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: only is the South Carolina electorate worse for her than
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: the New Hampshire electorate, it is worse by a magnitude.
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: It doesn't get much worse.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: It was 20% of New Hampshire voters were evangelical Christians.
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: It's tough. Now, look, Democrats and independents, of course, can
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: vote in the primary if they want. There's not a
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: ton of them in South Carolina either. And a lot
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: of Democrats will be voting in the Democratic primary that
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: comes first for Joe Biden. So although if I was
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: a voter in South Carolina, I might just to keep
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: the fun going, I might vote for Nikki Haley.
• 7:31
  Speaker 6: Sure.
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: Why not?
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Right? In the primary? Who cares?
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: Jon Favreau announces he would vote for Nikki Haley over
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: Joe Biden.
• 7:37
  Speaker 5: Cool, cool.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: I didn't say that. That's just fake news at the end.
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: I mean, you said you would vote for the Republican
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: primary for Nikki Haley.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: In the Democratic primary, I'm obviously going to write in
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: Dan Pfeiffer. If you were parachuted into Nikki Haley's campaign
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: as senior advisor, what do you do for the next
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: few weeks?
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: Well, first I would say, Nikki... You clearly have not
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: taken my advice to drop out right now that are
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: offered on Tuesday night. But since we are in it,
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: here's what you have to come to terms with. The
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: odds of victory are quite long. For you to win
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: would require an upset of a magnitude that has not
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: happened in modern political history. So there are two outcomes
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: to this campaign. One is you win. The other one
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: is that your time in politics is over. You leave
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: diminished results. You will never be invited to a Republican
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: Party function again. You will never run for office as
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: a Republican again. You will probably spend your days either
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: outside of politics or hosting a podcast with Liz Cheney
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: on the Crooked Media Network.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: That's not a bad future.
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: But, and so I would say to her, if you
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: have any interest in the former winning, you have to
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: be willing to accept the probability of the latter. And
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: that means you have to be all in, 100% in.
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: You have to make an argument against Trump every day
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: a brutally honest argument about how you truly feel about
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: him and how dangerously unfit he is, how Republicans who
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: nominate Donald Trump are putting this election, their party, and
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: the country at risk. You have to be willing to
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: say that the Republicans are about to nominate someone who
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: could be running for president from prison and go all in.
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: And then tactically, we have to begin looking beyond South Carolina.
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: And that includes looking at states like Virginia, which You're
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: not going to believe this, but you know who won
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: Virginia in 2016?
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: Marco Rubio.
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: Marco Rubio, right? But it's a state like Michigan, a
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: place where the independents go. They wrote this in their
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: memo that we talked about on Monday. You have to
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: be willing to go all the way to the convention
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: because if you are in, you're in through the Jack
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: Smith trial. You're in through countless hamburgers. You're all the
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: way in and be ready to take it to convention
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: and say that. And there's a small chance you could
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: possibly win. It's going to require a tremendous amount of luck,
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: some exogenous events. But you got to be all the
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: way in. There was no pulling your punches for how
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: dangerous this guy is. And you'll still probably lose. But
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: if you really believe he's this dangerous, the right thing
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: to do is to make that case to the country.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: Dan, that advice is, it's music to my ears.
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: I thought it would be.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: I want her to go out in a blaze of glory. Look,
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: she's already, she's not there yet. Who knows if she'll
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: ever get there. But I do think he didn't talk
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: about the American people. He's only talking about revenge. She's
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: tiptoeing closer to the Chris Christie message that Donald Trump
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: is about Donald Trump. He's about himself. He only cares
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: about himself. He doesn't care about anyone else, which I
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: think is To me, the most effective message, I think
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: it's great for Biden. I think it's great for Democrats.
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: It just happens to be true. It's true. The best
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: messages are also true, which is that Donald Trump is
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: a fucking narcissist who only gives a shit about himself,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: his election, whether he wins. Like, there is no such
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: thing as loyalty. There's no one he cares about except himself.
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: He is running for president to punish his enemies, enrich himself,
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: and reward his politically connected friends.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: And so she should just, you know, go all out.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: What do you get? This is it. What do you
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: get to lose? You're like your career in Republican politics
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: is already over. So, right. You get the cricket podcast.
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: Maybe you get an MSNBC slot. You're you go to
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: you're going to Davos. You're given lots of speeches. She'll
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: be you'll be you'll be on boards. It's fine. She'll
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: be fine. She'll be embarrassed among Republicans. But like, that's
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: already the case.
• 11:24
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: The embarrassing thing is being a Republican right now.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: Also, we know that you really. thinks that Trump is
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: unfit for it. Like, she has told us this several
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: times before she's changed her position for political expediency. So
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: it's like, we know that she can do it. She's
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: done it before. Now she's just got to stay there.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: And look, I mean, again, what do you get to lose?
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: What do you get to lose? Clearly, Donald Trump isn't
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: happy about any of this. He took a quick break
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: from attacking the woman a jury has held him liable
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: for raping. 37 posts about E. Jean Carroll in just
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: 20 minutes the other day. He also, by the way, testified.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: We're recording this Thursday. He testified for three minutes at
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: the defamation trial today in New York before the judge
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: shut him up because he was trying to say that
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: he didn't do it, which the judge said, we already
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: adjudicated this at another trial. So just stop. And they
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: went off the stand. So that was Donald Trump testifying.
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: So he took a break from attacking E. Jean Carroll
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: and he started attacking the woman still running against him. Quote,
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: I knew Nikki well. She was average at best. Anybody
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: that makes a contribution to Birdbrain from this moment forth
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: will be permanently barred from the MAGA camp. What do
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: you think that means? Does that mean that Haley's supporters
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: won't be invited to Mar-a-Lago to help Donald Trump cover
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: up more crimes? Does it mean they're not going to
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: be able to take part in the next insurrection? What's
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: MAGA camp?
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: I don't think we want to know, John. I really don't.
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: I know that we're going to be in the other camp.
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: That's not the MAGA camp.
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the other camp is the one you
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: really don't want to be in if Donald Trump wins.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: We're going to see Nikki Haley, Chris Christie, Mike Pence.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: They're all going to be in the other camp.
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: The re-education camp run by Greg Gutfeld and Jesse Waters
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: that we'll be staying in. Yeah, that one.
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's it. That's our camp.
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: I mean, look, this is a message clue designed for
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: about 30 rich people in America. And these rich people,
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: they don't love Donald Trump. Obviously, they... do have not
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: read the demographic, they have the delegate rules or the
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: demographic makeup of South Carolina and are putting money in
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: Nikki Haley's campaign, but they also like being in the mix.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: And so what he's really saying is, if you back
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: Nikki Haley after today, you're not coming to the inauguration,
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: you're not coming to the White House, you're not getting
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: invited to Mar-a-Lago, you got some special favors you need
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: from a junior EPA official who's handing out waivers on pollution,
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: you're not getting those You're not going to be part
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: of the mix. And that's why all these people who–
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: we saw this in 2016. All these Republicans stayed off
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: the sidelines because they were sure Trump was– all these
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: Republican billionaires did not get involved in the general election
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: because they assumed Trump would lose. As soon as he won,
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: they all wrote gigantic checks to the inaugural so that
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: they could be part of it and get invited to
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: all this stuff. And so that's essentially the message he's
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: giving to those people.
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: He's a mob boss. That's what it is.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: That's how he thinks.
• 14:15
  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's just the Republican National Committee. The dispatch
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: broke the story today. The Republican National Committee is reviewing
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: a draft resolution from David Bossie of Citizens United slash
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: Trump campaign fame that declares Trump declares Trump the nominee
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: before the 48 other states have voted. They just they
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: are so Republicans are so afraid of people voting. They're
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: even afraid of their own voters voting. that they want
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: to just declare that the primary is over, the nomination over,
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: and that Trump has won. Now, the rules say that
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: Trump would still have to win the delegates, but if
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: they pass this resolution, the RNC can start working with him, which,
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: you know, I mean, Ronna McDaniel was on TV basically
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: sounding like she was going to do that anyway.
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: This is just more evidence that Donald Trump is essentially
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: an incumbent president running for re-election. The DNC is working
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: with Joe Biden because he's the incumbent president and he
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: is in charge of the DNC. All the people working
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: for the RNC, including Rana Romney McDaniel, were appointed by him.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: They exist. They're there because of him. That piece of paper,
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: as you point out, in terms of the delegate math,
• 15:23
  Speaker 2: means nothing. It could be a tweet for all of
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: its value. But it's another way to go around to
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: donors and others and the small handful of endorsers that
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: Nikki Haley has and say, this thing is over. get
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: on board. It's time to go beat Joe Biden, which
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: is what their message is. And that's usually what presumptive
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: nominees do when they think they have this thing locked up.
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: It's where we were when Obama had to develop an
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: insurmountable delegate lead over Hillary Clinton in 2008. It's the
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: argument that Hillary Clinton tried to make to Bernie Sanders
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: in 2016. So that part is unusual. The RNC doing
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: the bidding of the leading candidate is unusual, but it
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: doesn't really matter that much.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: Trump has also been taunting Haley about how he already
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: won Nevada, where there's a primary on February 6th and
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: a caucus on February 8th. You want to tell people
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: what that's all about?
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, this is pretty interesting and kind of stupid all
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: at the same time. So in the past, Nevada has
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: had caucuses to decide as part of being one of
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: the early states. In the 2020 Democratic caucus, there was
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: a lot of chaos about how the reporting was done.
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: Wasn't really sure... who got what votes, where they came from.
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: A couple of campaigns sued. There was also the disaster
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: in the Democratic caucus in Iowa, a real blowback against
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: caucuses generally. So just as a refresher, caucuses are run
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: by parties. Primaries are run by state, secretary of states
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: and election offices. So Nevada passed a law. Nevada liked
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: being early in the process and they liked the attention.
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: So the Nevada state legislator passed a law that said,
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: we're going to have a presidential primary on February 6th.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: The idea would be candidates in both parties would compete
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: in it. The Nevada Republican Party is run by Trump loyalists,
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: so much so that the chair of the party, even
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: though they are hosting this early caucus in primary, has
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: already endorsed Trump, which is definitely not sketchy at all.
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: And they believed, correctly in my view, that a caucus
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: would be much better for Trump than a primary, especially
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: one that had same-day registration, where people could walk in
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: and register and vote. And so what the party said was, sure,
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: you can hold any primary you want, but it's not
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: going to be worth anything, much like the New Hampshire
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: primary had no delegates for Democrats. So we're just going
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: to hold our caucus, and that's where all the delegates
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: are going to go. Everyone believed that that was rigged
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: for Donald Trump, as it clearly is. So Haley and
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: DeSantis and the others didn't participate in it. They didn't
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: want to turn it into this contest where Trump would
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: just win by a lot, and it would seem like
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: a huge victory. It would be easier to not compete
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: because there's only a small handful of delegates compared to
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: the 1,215 you need for the nomination. But what is
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: interesting is the reason Trump is not on the primary
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: ballot is at Trump's urging, the Nevada Republican Party said,
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: in order to participate in the caucus and be able
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: to win those delegates, you cannot be on the primary ballot.
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: This is the example of something that Nikki Haley will
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: face if she stays in this race is Donald Trump's
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: campaign has very strategically and cleverly rigged the rules, used
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: party loyalists all across the country to rig the delegate
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: rules in his favor. And this is one very resonating example,
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: which is why He's on the ballot. Nikki Haley isn't.
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: He gets all those delegates just for no reason. He
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: doesn't do anything and he gets free delegates.
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: It's almost as if Trump and his supporters have a
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: problem with people deciding things because they think that whatever
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: they decide, everyone else should have to live with. And
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: so therefore, they want to take away people's right to
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: choose for themselves.
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: Yes, that seems to be a theme that is running
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: through a lot here. And if the voters do something
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: that we don't like, then we will just... Again. Violence, right?
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: That's right.
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: Do what we want or violence is essentially the MAGA ethos.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: Well, it also bleeds over to Congress, even though Trump
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: is not an elected official right now. He is dictating
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: the Republican Party's legislative strategy. Punchbowl reported that during a
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: closed-door meeting on Wednesday, Mitch McConnell told Republicans that Trump
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: doesn't want a deal on immigration that would address the
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: border crisis because Trump wants to use the problem as
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: a campaign issue against Joe Biden. And McConnell reportedly said, quote,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: we don't want to undermine Trump because he's going to
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: be the Republican nominee. This led to a lot of
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: grumbling among Republican senators who were close to a deal
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: with Democrats, including Mitt Romney. Let's listen.
• 19:49
  Speaker 4: I think the border is a very important issue for
• 19:52
  Speaker 4: Donald Trump. And the fact that he would communicate to
• 19:58
  Speaker 4: Republican senators and congresspeople that he doesn't want us to
• 20:01
  Speaker 4: solve the border problem because he wants to blame Biden
• 20:05
  Speaker 4: for it is really appalling.
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: So McConnell doesn't like Trump. He really wants to pass
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: Ukraine funding, which won't get done if there's no immigration deal.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: Why do you think he seems to be giving up?
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: It seems like there's conflicting reports about the meeting itself.
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: And some Republicans are now saying McConnell wasn't saying we
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: should defer to Trump, but he was just sort of
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: bowing to the reality that this is what Trump wants.
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: And therefore, they're not going to have the Republican votes
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: to help pass the deal.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: I think it is McConnell bowing to two realities. The
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: first is that his caucus was pretty divided on this.
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: There was a crunchable report from the day before earlier
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: this week that detailed how the Senate caucus lunch, Senate
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: Republican caucus lunch got very heated with like the Josh
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: Hawleys and Ted Cruz's of the world being, Ron Johnson's
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: being very upset about this immigration deal and being very aggressive.
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: And the fact that they don't know what's in the deal.
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: And then the other reality here is the House is
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: not going to pass it. So if you're from McConnell's perspective,
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: you're going to anger your caucus. You're going to anger
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: your party nominee, who you now need to raise money
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: and campaign for your Senate candidates to win in these
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: red states where they're trying to do it like Montana
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: and Ohio, for a bill that is very unlikely to
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: become law because Mike Johnson, who is in the thrall
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: of Trump in a way McConnell isn't all the time,
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: has already said we're not going to pass it. We
• 21:29
  Speaker 2: want H.R. 2 or whatever it is, their border bill,
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: which has no chance of passing the Senate or being
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: signed by the president. So it's like, why take on
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: all that water for no reason?
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: Tom Tillis, who's been negotiating the deal, is also pretty mad.
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: In addition to what Romney said, Tillis said, it's all
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: about politics and not having the courage. He's talking about
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: his fellow senators. He said, it's all about politics and
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: not having the courage to respectfully disagree with President Trump.
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: I didn't come here to have a president as a
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: boss or a candidate as a boss. Tough news for you, Tom.
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: Most of your colleagues very much enjoy having Donald Trump
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: as a boss and see him as their boss, even
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: though he is not.
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: I mean, it is just worth noting that all of
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: these Republicans say the border is the biggest national security
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: threat to the country. There was fentanyl coming across the border.
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: They make up these apocryphal stories about Hamas terrorists coming
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: across the border. and given the opportunity to do something
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: about it now, and something that would be pretty Republican-friendly.
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: It's kind of a once-in-a-generation opportunity for them to do
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: border security without comprehensive immigration reform. On their terms, with
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: a lot of leverage, they walk away from that in
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: order to help Donald Trump win an election. When we
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: know that if Trump were to win They're not going
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: to get that deal because, and Mitch McConnell has said that,
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: that there's no way with unified Republican government without the
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: leverage of the Ukraine bill, they're going to get such
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: a deal. So they are simply, they say this is
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: the biggest problem in the world. They talk about it
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: every single day. They foam in about it. It dominates
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: Fox News. And given that they would rather not solve
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: it in order to win election, people will lose their lives.
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: Dangerous things will happen because of that choice. And it's like,
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: you just have to hammer on the dangerous cynicism of
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: what happens when Donald Trump's in charge of the Republican party.
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, look, I know this might sound surprising
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: to you, but it doesn't seem like the political genius
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: who controls the Republican Party made a very strategic move
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: here on this immigration bill. Like, I know he wants
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: to run on the issue, but he's sort of, by
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: being so open about it, Trump has given, I think,
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: Nikki Haley, if she wants it, and certainly Joe Biden
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: and the Democratic Party, a huge opening to just hit
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: him over the head with this from now until November.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: that every time that Republicans talk about the border, now
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: Biden can say, we were willing to meet you halfway,
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: work with Republicans, get something done, and you wanted to
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: campaign on it. You wanted to campaign on it. So
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: now he can throw it in Trump's lap, even though
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: Trump's not the incumbent.
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, the best thing for President Biden, subsequently politically,
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: I think, would be to get a deal, presuming the
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: details of the deal are things that are acceptable to
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: him and his party, and get the aid done. That
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: would be a bipartisan accomplishment. If your choice is stand
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: on stage at this possible debate that may or may
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: not happen and Trump attacks the border and say, well,
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: I actually did this bipartisan thing that did X, Y,
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: and Z, is a better argument than you torpedoed the deal.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: But you torpedoed the deal is still a pretty good argument.
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: And it's one that Biden and Democrats up and down
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: the ballot, I think, should hammer relentlessly.
• 24:39
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: And by the way, Nikki Haley should do it in
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: South Carolina. She should say, this is exactly what I'm
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: talking about. He didn't fix the border when he was president.
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: He doesn't care about fixing the border now. He doesn't
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: care about the American people. He only cares about himself.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: He only cares about winning. Biden should say the same
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: thing if this ends up not happening. Donald Trump killed
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: the border deal, not because it wasn't good enough for
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: the country, because it wasn't good for him. You know,
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: I mean, you just say this all day long.
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: I have a very prescriptive message box coming out about
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: how to talk about this tomorrow morning. It's in the
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: editing process now, John, just to bring you behind the curtain.
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: Meaning it's probably out right now. We're taking those on Thursday.
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: People are going to hear this Friday morning.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: Depending on how early you wake up East Coast time,
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: you could have already read the message box by the
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: time you listen to this. But one point I want
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: to make is there will be this tendency among some
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: Democrats to use this as a way to say, see,
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump's the one who's soft on the border. Remember
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: when Democrats went around saying that Republicans are the ones
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: who defunded the police because they cut funding for local police? Barnes,
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: which is actually a substantively true statement. It is substantively
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: true that there was a chance to make the border
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: more secure. Donald Trump opposed it. Therefore, he is soft
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: on the border. But the attack has to be believable.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: And voters are not going to believe that Donald Trump,
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: who is known for the wall and for cruel anti-immigrant
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: rhetoric and policies, you have to make it about Donald
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: Trump putting himself and his interests over what's the best
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: for the country. They will not believe he's soft on
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: the border, but they will believe that he is a
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: self-interested narcissist. And that is the way to make this,
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: that he is putting politics, he's putting his own interests
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: above the country's. And that is the core of what
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: I think that argument should be.
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: Which is, by the way, the narrative of almost all
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: the news we've talked about today and a message that
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: is available to Nikki Haley and Democrats.
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And the Biden folks have been doing a lot
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: of this. We haven't seen them talk about the border yet,
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: but yeah.
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, not with the border because it hasn't come up yet,
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: but for a whole bunch of other stuff, they've been
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: doing this. So I'd say that Joe Biden is having
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: a pretty good week. He won 64% of the vote
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: in the New Hampshire primary, despite not even appearing on
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: the ballot. We learned on Thursday that even though a
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: lot of economists predicted a recession, the economy grew at
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: a healthy 3.1% clip last year, which is higher growth
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: than any year under Donald Trump, even before the pandemic.
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: Biden also won the endorsement of the United Auto Workers,
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: one of the biggest unions in the country. And he
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: joined UAW President Sean Fain in an event this week.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump is a scab. Donald Trump is a billionaire
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: and that's who he represents.
• 27:14
  Speaker 6: In fact, when Donald Trump was in office, six auto
• 27:17
  Speaker 6: factories closed around the country. Tens of thousands of auto
• 27:21
  Speaker 6: jobs were lost nationwide during Trump's presidency. During my presidency,
• 27:25
  Speaker 6: we've opened 20 auto factories and.
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: More to come.
• 27:31
  Speaker 6: We've traded more than 250,000 auto jobs all across America.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: So not entirely unexpected endorsement, but still a pretty big deal.
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: What do you think?
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: A huge deal and very important. And I think Biden
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: should campaign with Sean Fain as often as possible in
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: this lecture. I think Sean Fain is an incredible messenger.
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: I think what Biden has done for unions, he is
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: the most pro-union president in modern history. He has, through
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: his administration, and we're existing in a time of resurgent
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: union power with the organizing efforts happening at Starbucks and Amazon,
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: all these other places across the country. He should make
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: that part of his story because it is Ultimately, all
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: politics on the economy, message on the economy, is not
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: about what policy you implement. It's who you're fighting for.
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: And the labor stuff is about Biden fighting for working
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: people all across the country, big cities, small towns, white, black, Latino, everyone.
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: And so I think that's an important story that should
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: be told everywhere. And he should be with union members
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: all the time. Unions have never been more popular than
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: they are right now, at least in the last 30
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: or so years. And take advantage of that. Use that association.
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: to tell a story about the kind of president you
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: have been and will be if you get a second term.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: I also think Donald Trump has always screwed over working people.
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: This seems like a good message, especially when you've got
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: all these polls showing that most voters prefer Trump to
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: Biden on the economy right now. How do you think
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: the Biden campaign can break through with that message? Because
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: that's always the challenge.
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: That is the follow-up question to everything we say about
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: the messaging. One other interesting thing I want to say
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: there is When Biden said about the auto plants closing
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: under Trump, that is not just a throwaway line. There
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: was some internal polling done by Democratic groups that I
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: saw last year that showed that one of the better
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: message against Trump is that he said he was going
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: to keep all of these plants and factories open and
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: a whole bunch of them closed. And so that's not
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: an accident that he's doing that. And the Biden folks
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: ran an ad in Michigan back when Trump was going
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: to do that fake union rally that made this exact point.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: So I think we're going to see more of that.
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: And it's going to be– it's just there's not like
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: one thing you're going to do that's going to break through.
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: Get in the UAW endorsement, some attention. There's going to
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: have to be a bunch of ads about this. You're
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: going to have to directly go at Donald Trump. You're
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: going to have to do it all the time, every day.
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: And some of this will be the visuals you have, right?
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: Being with these union members, which is why Biden going
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: to the picket line was such a big moment because
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: it was a moment that broke through. So you're gonna
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: have to find some of those moments as well. But
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: you're just gonna have to do it all day, every
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: day with the president, with ads, with surrogates to drive
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: that message home. And you have to go right at
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: Donald Trump on this. It can't be subtle.
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: Well, I was gonna say, I think it requires an
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: evolution of the Biden message around the economy. which is
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: like so far, every time there's good economic news, the
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: Biden folks sort of trumpet the good economic news. If
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: the media doesn't cover it, they criticize the media for
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: not covering it. And I get why they do all that.
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: But now that we're in the general election against Trump,
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: I think you get this great economic news today about
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: the economy growing. By the way, Joe Biden's been fighting
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: for that. He's going to continue to fight for a
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: good economy. If Donald Trump gets in office again, he
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: has already said he can't wait to give another huge
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: tax cut to CEOs. And for everyone else, he's going
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: to increase the cost of your prescription drugs, increase the
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: cost of your health care. And by the way, he's
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: going to slap a 10 percent tax on every single
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: good that's imported because this is he wants to bring back.
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: He wants to do these tariffs, which has not been
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: getting a lot of attention. But talk about inflation and
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: the cost of living. Imagine if Anything that had any
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: parts that weren't made in America at a 10% tax
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: on it, what that would do to consumers and small
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: businesses across the country? I mean, it's crazy.
• 31:25
  Speaker 2: I think there is a big strategic question that I
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: do not know the answer to and do not have
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: the data to give that answer, but that I think
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: is at the core of what we're talking about here
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: is in order to make that case effectively that you
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: are better than Trump, how much do you have to
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: convince people about what you have done and how it's worked?
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: And I think the Biden people– I'm just guessing this
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: based on– they're not up on the air right now.
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: So other than this abortion ad that you guys talked
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: about the other day on the podcast, other than that
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: abortion ad, they're not up on the air. So we're
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: not seeing their tested messages about the economy. We see
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: a bunch of tweets and some throwaway stuff that's happening
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: on social media. But that stuff suggests they think it's
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: very important to trumpet every bit of good economic news.
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: Like a single economist goes on Fox News and says
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: something positive about the Biden economy, they're trying to get
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: that to as many people as possible. Now, is that
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: audience their own voters, right, to be tribunes of that
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: good news? I don't know the answer to that. But ultimately,
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: do you need to invest that time and energy to
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: convince people what you did and that it mattered in
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: order to get people to believe that you are– to
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: get to that equal footing enough where you can battle
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: Trump on the economy? I just don't know.
• 32:41
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: One other piece of news from the Biden campaign, our
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: friends Jen O'Malley Dillon and Mike Donlan are leaving the
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: White House to help Julie Chavez Rodriguez run the campaign
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: in Wilmington full time. What's your take on that move?
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: Look, I think that people, if they have the opportunity
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: to move to Wilmington, Delaware, should do that.
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: I should have expected that take from you. I did not.
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: I did not.
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: I think that was something that was always going to happen.
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: I don't know whether this was the timing that was
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: always planned. Maybe if the Republican primary had extended longer.
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: Because the Biden people clearly think that it is over.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: They basically said that in their statement on Tuesday night.
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: But Jen and Mike are two of the smartest, most
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: accomplished operatives in the Democratic Party. The things they do
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: that they specialize in can't really be done from the
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: White House in the way some of the stuff that
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: you and I worked on can be done from the
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: White House. Jen is obviously an extremely experienced campaign manager,
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: ran his campaign in 2020, has run lots of other campaigns.
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: But what she thinks about is organizing voter contact, how
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: to use data to reach voters. That you can't really
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: do for the White House. And Mike Donilon is an admin.
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: He's a message guy and a speechwriter and all these
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: other things. You can do some of that for the
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: White House since you were a speechwriter who worked on
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: a campaign in your spare time for the White House.
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: What you can't do is make political ads for the
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: White House effectively and efficiently. And he oversaw the billion-dollar
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: paid media budget in 2020. I'm sure he's going to
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: do the same thing here. You've got to be in
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: the campaign to do it. So I think this was
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: always– inevitable. And I think it's a welcome sign that
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: they are quickly ramping up to be on general election footing.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah. It certainly feels this week like all my Nikki
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: Haley fantasies notwithstanding, the general election has begun and the
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: Biden people get that and they are ramping up as well.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: And everyone's starting to see a lot more of Trump.
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: So hopefully things start getting going from now on. All right,
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: two quick housekeeping notes before break. Love It or Leave
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: It is coming to Washington, D.C. on April 25th for
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: a big show at the Lincoln Theater. Tickets are on
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: sale now, so head to crooked.com slash events to grab
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: yours today. And check out the latest episode of Crooked's
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: daily news show, What a Day, where former New York
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: City Council head Christine Quinn joins to talk about why
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: she thinks Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Mayor Eric Adams
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: are using migrants as political pawns. Check it out in
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: the What a Day feed wherever you listen to podcasts.
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: When we come back, Liz Cheney. Joining us today, the
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: vice chair of the January 6th committee and author of
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: the new book, Oath and Honor, a memoir and a warning,
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: former Wyoming representative Liz Cheney. Welcome to Pod Save America.
• 35:22
  Speaker 5: Great to be with you, John. Thank you for having me.
• 35:24
  Speaker 5: I appreciate it.
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, so in 2004, I was working on
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: John Kerry's campaign while you were working on the Bush-Cheney reelect.
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: And if someone had told me then, the two of
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: us would be chatting about how to save American democracy
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: from the former host of The Apprentice, I'd have a
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: few questions.
• 35:42
  Speaker 5: Yeah, exactly, exactly.
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: But here we are.
• 35:45
  Speaker 5: That's right.
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: So it's the day after Donald Trump won the New
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: Hampshire primary. What do you make of Nikki Haley's decision
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: to stay in the race? And do you see a
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: path for her?
• 35:55
  Speaker 5: Yeah, look, I mean, I hope she stays in the
• 35:58
  Speaker 5: race as long as she has to. I think certainly
• 36:03
  Speaker 5: through Super Tuesday, I think that we're in a situation
• 36:07
  Speaker 5: where only two states have voted. And you had something
• 36:11
  Speaker 5: like over 35%, I believe, of the Republicans coming out
• 36:16
  Speaker 5: of the voting in New Hampshire said they would never
• 36:19
  Speaker 5: vote for Donald Trump. And so we're obviously looking at
• 36:25
  Speaker 5: a significant portion of the Republican Party that is supporting him.
• 36:32
  Speaker 5: But ultimately, this is gonna be about being able to
• 36:35
  Speaker 5: win independence. And in a general election, surely Nikki Haley
• 36:41
  Speaker 5: fares much better than Donald Trump does. And even more
• 36:46
  Speaker 5: important than that is where you began, which is the
• 36:49
  Speaker 5: threat that he poses what we watched him do in
• 36:52
  Speaker 5: the lead up to January 6th, uh, his attempt to
• 36:54
  Speaker 5: seize power, uh, presents an existential threat. And so we
• 36:58
  Speaker 5: need to make sure that we're, we're challenging him and
• 37:01
  Speaker 5: working to defeat him at every step of the way. Uh, and,
• 37:04
  Speaker 5: and right now Nikki Haley is, is in this fight and,
• 37:08
  Speaker 5: and I think she ought to stay in it.
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: Are you, uh, are you officially supporting Haley over Trump
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: now that it's just the two of them left or
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: do you not, might that hurt her?
• 37:16
  Speaker 5: I haven't, yeah, I mean, I haven't made any formal endorsements, um,
• 37:21
  Speaker 5: at this point, but certainly I would never support or
• 37:24
  Speaker 5: vote for Donald Trump again.
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: You said you're considering a third party run for president,
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: but that you won't do anything that would help Trump win.
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: Have you seen any data that suggests a run by
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: any independent candidate would help defeat Trump and not help
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: elect him?
• 37:43
  Speaker 5: I certainly think that there are people on both sides
• 37:49
  Speaker 5: of the aisle, there are Republicans and Democrats, and you've
• 37:52
  Speaker 5: seen all the polling that shows, you know, 70% of
• 37:54
  Speaker 5: the people are dissatisfied with having, you know, the choice
• 37:58
  Speaker 5: be Trump versus Biden. And so I think it matters
• 38:02
  Speaker 5: very much, you know, what the overall terrain looks like.
• 38:09
  Speaker 5: I think that we certainly are gonna have more than
• 38:11
  Speaker 5: two parties in this race. You've already got independents on
• 38:16
  Speaker 5: the left, And and I think we'll see what happens.
• 38:20
  Speaker 5: I again, you know, my my number one priority is
• 38:23
  Speaker 5: defeating him. And I think that's, you know, going to
• 38:27
  Speaker 5: guide whatever ultimately I decide I'm going to do.
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: Does that involve could you imagine telling Republicans and conservatives
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: like you to vote for the Democratic nominee if it
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: comes down to that?
• 38:38
  Speaker 5: I mean, look, what I have done, certainly beginning in
• 38:42
  Speaker 5: the 2022 midterms, is support people that I believe are
• 38:46
  Speaker 5: going to defend the Constitution. And I did that with
• 38:51
  Speaker 5: respect to Abigail Spanberger and Alyssa Slotkin, two Democrats, members
• 38:56
  Speaker 5: of the House that I know well and served with.
• 39:01
  Speaker 5: And my message to people all across this country has been, look,
• 39:04
  Speaker 5: this is not an election about partisan politics. This is
• 39:08
  Speaker 5: an election about whether or not we're going to stand
• 39:10
  Speaker 5: up for our democracy and for the Constitution. So I'm not, again,
• 39:13
  Speaker 5: I'm not an endorsing anybody. I'm not telling people whom
• 39:17
  Speaker 5: they should vote for, but certainly they should not ever
• 39:21
  Speaker 5: again entrust Donald Trump with the power that we watched
• 39:24
  Speaker 5: him abuse once and that he tells us every day
• 39:26
  Speaker 5: he will abuse again if he's ever entrusted with it.
• 39:30
  Speaker 1: I want to ask you about making the case against Trump.
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: I've heard of focus groups where Republican and independent voters
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: who supported Joe Biden last time say, you know, I
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: don't like Trump. I think he's a bad person, but
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: I'm much more worried about cost of living or the
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: southern border, or I just don't think Joe Biden can
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: handle the job for another four years. And, you know,
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: and I think Trump did a better job with the
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: economy and the country survived Trump's first term. So, you know,
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: maybe I'll just hold my nose and vote for him.
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: What do you say to that voter? And like more specifically,
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: how do you make the threat that Trump poses to
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: democracy real to voters who may not feel the urgency
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: that you and I do?
• 40:08
  Speaker 5: Yeah, it's a really important question. I think there are
• 40:11
  Speaker 5: a couple of pieces to it. One is, I would say,
• 40:14
  Speaker 5: you know, what's happening right now at the border is
• 40:17
  Speaker 5: absolutely indefensible. And, you know, I talked to my new
• 40:22
  Speaker 5: Democratic friends, and I can't understand why the Biden administration
• 40:28
  Speaker 5: doesn't take steps to secure the border. It makes no
• 40:30
  Speaker 5: sense to me, you know, the extent to which you've
• 40:34
  Speaker 5: got Democratic mayors of cities across the country pleading with
• 40:38
  Speaker 5: the president to secure the border. You know, it... that
• 40:43
  Speaker 5: is an issue that's a very real issue that understandably
• 40:47
  Speaker 5: drives voters. Now, I think that the overall message though
• 40:52
  Speaker 5: is the nation is at a moment here where hopefully
• 40:57
  Speaker 5: we'll have other choices, but the choice can never be
• 41:01
  Speaker 5: Donald Trump. And people have to understand that he's not
• 41:03
  Speaker 5: the lesser of two evils. If you look at some
• 41:06
  Speaker 5: of the opinion polling from last summer, and again, most
• 41:09
  Speaker 5: recently in the last couple of weeks, you see that
• 41:13
  Speaker 5: there are significant numbers of people who say they don't
• 41:17
  Speaker 5: know enough, they don't have enough information about what Donald
• 41:20
  Speaker 5: Trump did, for example, to make judgments about whether or
• 41:25
  Speaker 5: not some of the indictments against him are political or not.
• 41:29
  Speaker 5: And so I do think that there's a big task
• 41:31
  Speaker 5: in terms of helping educate people, helping make sure people
• 41:35
  Speaker 5: understand specifically the steps that he took, the plan that
• 41:40
  Speaker 5: he oversaw, to try to overturn an election. And I
• 41:44
  Speaker 5: think that that education piece is gonna be crucial. I
• 41:48
  Speaker 5: also think that ultimately this election is gonna be won
• 41:51
  Speaker 5: or lost as they always are in a handful of
• 41:54
  Speaker 5: swing states. And those happen to be the states where
• 41:59
  Speaker 5: Donald Trump attempted to nullify the votes of millions of
• 42:03
  Speaker 5: those voters in 2020. And so I think going into
• 42:06
  Speaker 5: those states, making sure people there understand This is the
• 42:09
  Speaker 5: guy that tried to seize power last time. And the
• 42:12
  Speaker 5: method that he used to do it, one of the
• 42:14
  Speaker 5: parts of his plan was to reject your votes, to
• 42:19
  Speaker 5: say that members of Congress can decide they're going to
• 42:23
  Speaker 5: reject your votes and instead install the person they want,
• 42:26
  Speaker 5: which was him. And he's going to have to go
• 42:29
  Speaker 5: into those states and make the case that those people
• 42:31
  Speaker 5: ought to entrust him with power and with defending and
• 42:35
  Speaker 5: protecting their vote. And I think that's going to be
• 42:38
  Speaker 5: challenging for him.
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: Before we move on, you mentioned the border issue. And,
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: you know, there's been these negotiations. Biden and Senate Democrats
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: have moved towards Republicans on this issue. They say they
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: want to do something about the border. I thought they
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: were close to a deal. And then, you know, just
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: as we were talking, apparently Mitch McConnell said, well, Trump
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: wants to run the border, so they don't want us
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: to do anything about that. And that's what Mike Johnson's
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: kind of been saying, too. So this is it seems
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: like that's part of the issue is that, even when
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: Democrats want to work constructively with Republicans, Republicans then want
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: to block it and then blame the Democrats for not
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: fixing anything.
• 43:17
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, this case in particular just strikes me as,
• 43:21
  Speaker 5: you know, really disgusting. You know, if it's true that
• 43:29
  Speaker 5: McConnell said, you know, basically, you know, we thought we
• 43:32
  Speaker 5: had a deal, but now it looks like, you know,
• 43:35
  Speaker 5: Trump's going to be the nominee and he wants to
• 43:37
  Speaker 5: run on this. I mean, that is so cynical and
• 43:43
  Speaker 5: irresponsible and surprising, frankly. We all know how dangerous the
• 43:51
  Speaker 5: situation is at the border. I think, as I said,
• 43:54
  Speaker 5: the Biden administration deserves real criticism for the fact that
• 43:59
  Speaker 5: they haven't secured the border. But now for the Republicans...
• 44:03
  Speaker 5: the Republican leader to be saying, well, we're not going
• 44:07
  Speaker 5: to take any action because Trump doesn't want us to.
• 44:10
  Speaker 5: You know, that just, I think, confirms what everybody's frustrations
• 44:14
  Speaker 5: are about politics today and is just really, really cynical
• 44:19
  Speaker 5: and sad that that's the position they're taking.
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: I'm sure you heard that Senator Romney was saying like, oh,
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: Biden needs a new argument because the democracy thing is old.
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: And I've heard a lot of people say it's just
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: it's hard to make it tangible for people when their
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: concerns might be more immediate. Do you have thoughts on
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: sort of how to make the threat of a Trump
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: second term real to people?
• 44:43
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I think that, you know, I have huge respect
• 44:46
  Speaker 5: for Senator Romney, but I disagree with him on this.
• 44:50
  Speaker 5: And I think, you know, part of this is making
• 44:53
  Speaker 5: sure people understand what Trump did already. And I think
• 44:58
  Speaker 5: making sure, you know, if you look at, The extent
• 45:01
  Speaker 5: to which, for example, he's working so hard to delay
• 45:05
  Speaker 5: his January 6th trial and reminding people that the reason
• 45:10
  Speaker 5: he's doing that is because he wants to suppress that evidence.
• 45:14
  Speaker 5: The witnesses in that trial aren't going to be his
• 45:16
  Speaker 5: political opponents. The people that have testified about his attempt
• 45:23
  Speaker 5: to corruptly pressure the Department of Justice to corruptly pressure
• 45:27
  Speaker 5: the vice president to get him to do things that
• 45:29
  Speaker 5: were illegal and unconstitutional. The people who are gonna testify
• 45:34
  Speaker 5: to the January 6th committee about Trump's refusal for hours
• 45:40
  Speaker 5: to tell the mob to leave the Capitol, those people
• 45:44
  Speaker 5: are the ones who know Trump best. And of course
• 45:47
  Speaker 5: he doesn't want that information out there before the election,
• 45:51
  Speaker 5: but I think it's fundamentally important that people understand why
• 45:54
  Speaker 5: he's trying to delay that And I think the more
• 45:57
  Speaker 5: that we can make sure we have in front of
• 45:59
  Speaker 5: people what those individuals have said, what his White House
• 46:04
  Speaker 5: counsel said, what his attorney general said, what the head
• 46:09
  Speaker 5: of his last campaign said, those aren't Democrats. Those are
• 46:15
  Speaker 5: people Trump hired, what members of his family said about
• 46:19
  Speaker 5: the depravity of his unwillingness while he watched on television
• 46:26
  Speaker 5: that violent attack, his unwillingness to tell people to stop.
• 46:29
  Speaker 5: You know, that gets to sort of a fundamental human
• 46:32
  Speaker 5: question about what kind of a man is this. And
• 46:36
  Speaker 5: I think that, you know, people will recognize and understand
• 46:38
  Speaker 5: the threat that he poses.
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: You're a lawyer and probably know more about the election
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: subversion charges against Trump than anyone but Jack Smith and
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: his team. If you were them, what would be keeping
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: you up at night?
• 46:52
  Speaker 5: Look, I think if you look at the work that
• 46:55
  Speaker 5: the Select Committee did and the criminal referrals that we made, certainly, obviously,
• 47:04
  Speaker 5: Jack Smith has secured his own testimony and witnesses have
• 47:10
  Speaker 5: come in and testified in front of his grand jury.
• 47:12
  Speaker 5: And it's that process on which the charges are based.
• 47:15
  Speaker 5: But they track very closely with what the Select Committee did.
• 47:21
  Speaker 5: was able to learn during our investigation. And I think
• 47:26
  Speaker 5: that one of the things that we have seen to
• 47:29
  Speaker 5: date that's been so important has been the extent to
• 47:33
  Speaker 5: which our courts have played the role that they're supposed
• 47:38
  Speaker 5: to play in terms of all the institutions of our government.
• 47:42
  Speaker 5: With a couple of exceptions, we've seen judges be very
• 47:47
  Speaker 5: responsible and even-handed approach this with the gravity that it deserves.
• 47:54
  Speaker 5: I think that what we're watching, what anybody who cares
• 47:58
  Speaker 5: about the rule of law has to be deeply concerned
• 48:02
  Speaker 5: about is Donald Trump's efforts really on a daily basis
• 48:07
  Speaker 5: to tear it down, to use threats of violence, to
• 48:11
  Speaker 5: attack fundamental, the individuals who are involved in these cases,
• 48:16
  Speaker 5: as well as the institutions themselves. And I think that
• 48:20
  Speaker 5: that should cause grave concern, the fact that you've got
• 48:23
  Speaker 5: somebody who's willing to do that, who's so close, again,
• 48:27
  Speaker 5: to being the nominee of one of the two major
• 48:29
  Speaker 5: political parties.
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: Do you have any concern that the Supreme Court will
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: decide that the charge of corruptly obstructing an official proceeding
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: somehow doesn't apply to Donald Trump's attempt to overturn the election?
• 48:41
  Speaker 5: Well, my view on that is very clear. And I think,
• 48:44
  Speaker 5: in fact, the question has been, one interpretation of that
• 48:50
  Speaker 5: statute that would basically hold that it only applies in
• 48:57
  Speaker 5: an instance where there was an attempt to destroy documents
• 49:02
  Speaker 5: or an attempt to falsify documents that was very focused
• 49:05
  Speaker 5: on this concept of documents. And of course, we know
• 49:10
  Speaker 5: that what Donald Trump was doing included things like ensuring
• 49:15
  Speaker 5: that there were fake fraudulent electors submitted to the Congress.
• 49:20
  Speaker 5: submitted to the Vice President. So even in a very
• 49:24
  Speaker 5: narrow reading of 1512C2, I think it's pretty clear, as
• 49:30
  Speaker 5: the Select Committee pointed out, that that reading would cover
• 49:34
  Speaker 5: Donald Trump's actions in this case. And I think it's
• 49:38
  Speaker 5: also important to understand that You know, the case that's
• 49:41
  Speaker 5: in front of the Supreme Court on that issue is
• 49:43
  Speaker 5: not a case that involves Trump. It's a case that
• 49:45
  Speaker 5: involves one of the rioters. And so, you know, no
• 49:49
  Speaker 5: matter how they hold in that case, Donald Trump's connection to,
• 49:55
  Speaker 5: in particular, the effort to falsify electors and ensure that
• 49:59
  Speaker 5: those are presented to Congress clearly fits within the plain
• 50:03
  Speaker 5: meaning and the intent of that statute.
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: What scares you most about a second Trump term?
• 50:09
  Speaker 5: The extent to which we know that as president, he
• 50:13
  Speaker 5: will refuse to enforce the rulings of our courts. And
• 50:17
  Speaker 5: I think it's really important for people to understand what
• 50:20
  Speaker 5: that means. We're only a nation of laws if the
• 50:25
  Speaker 5: president enforces the rulings of the courts. And to have
• 50:30
  Speaker 5: someone like Donald Trump, who we know won't do that,
• 50:34
  Speaker 5: who we've already seen, we've watched the extent to which
• 50:37
  Speaker 5: he's talked about a president deserving complete and absolute immunity.
• 50:42
  Speaker 5: The people that he would have around him, if you
• 50:45
  Speaker 5: look at the story of January 6th and the days
• 50:48
  Speaker 5: and weeks leading up to it, he was stopped from
• 50:52
  Speaker 5: doing even worse things because of some of the people
• 50:56
  Speaker 5: around him. And those people won't be around him again.
• 50:59
  Speaker 5: I also, you know, if you look at the people
• 51:02
  Speaker 5: that he's likely to put in place, people like Mike Flynn,
• 51:06
  Speaker 5: you know, those are the very people that, we're suggesting
• 51:08
  Speaker 5: he ought to deploy the military in order to seize
• 51:11
  Speaker 5: voting machines and rerun the election in swing states. So
• 51:15
  Speaker 5: he presents an existential threat. There's no question. I mean,
• 51:20
  Speaker 5: the list goes on. If you look at, for example,
• 51:24
  Speaker 5: what he says every day about praising Xi, praising Orban,
• 51:30
  Speaker 5: praising Putin, the threats that we're gonna withdraw from NATO,
• 51:36
  Speaker 5: for example, you know, you very quickly get into a
• 51:40
  Speaker 5: whole series of very serious national security threats as well.
• 51:44
  Speaker 5: But it's clear that, you know, the fundamental threat to
• 51:47
  Speaker 5: the rule of law, to the republic itself, you know,
• 51:52
  Speaker 5: it really is an existential one.
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I've heard you talk about that. And I hadn't
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: really thought about it myself, is that, you know, a
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: lot of people are concerned, like, oh, will the court
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: do this or that? It's a more conservative court. But
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: It's very possible that the court could just issue rulings
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: and Trump ignores them. The court doesn't have any way
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: to enforce those rulings. He can appoint whoever he'd like. Obviously,
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: there's Senate confirmed positions, but he can get around Senate
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: confirmed positions by just putting people temporarily in place like
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: Mike Flynn, put them in place at the Defense Department,
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: you know, and so that does seem like a real,
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: real concern.
• 52:27
  Speaker 5: Well, and sometimes you hear conservatives, the Wall Street Journal
• 52:30
  Speaker 5: editorial page, for example, repeatedly says, well, you know, we
• 52:34
  Speaker 5: have the balance of power. We have these checks and balances.
• 52:37
  Speaker 5: We don't have to worry about it. But, you know,
• 52:39
  Speaker 5: people really need to think about which Republicans exactly in
• 52:42
  Speaker 5: the House and Senate are going to stand up and
• 52:44
  Speaker 5: stop him. You know, it's hard for me to think
• 52:46
  Speaker 5: of any who will. And so I think, you know,
• 52:51
  Speaker 5: it's another reason why I think, you know, what we're
• 52:55
  Speaker 5: seeing go on today, specifically, for example, with, you know,
• 52:59
  Speaker 5: Ronna McDaniel, the chair of the RNC, suggesting that, you know,
• 53:04
  Speaker 5: she's determined that this race is over. You know, that's
• 53:09
  Speaker 5: inappropriate to say the least for the chairperson of the
• 53:14
  Speaker 5: RNC to be asserting that, you know, the primary is
• 53:17
  Speaker 5: over when it's not over. And for her to be
• 53:20
  Speaker 5: doing it when, you know, we know she was personally
• 53:24
  Speaker 5: involved in the fraudulent electors scheme. Recently, you know, we've
• 53:29
  Speaker 5: learned that she was also involved in a reportedly Trump's
• 53:34
  Speaker 5: phone call to the officials in Michigan to try to
• 53:36
  Speaker 5: get them to reverse their certification. So this is, you know,
• 53:42
  Speaker 5: this is activities and behavior that really are un-American and undemocratic. And,
• 53:49
  Speaker 5: you know, I think it's important that we ensure that,
• 53:54
  Speaker 5: you know, that the system play out, but first and foremost,
• 53:58
  Speaker 5: that Donald Trump be defeated.
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: You're out there speaking out against Trump. You hear Romney
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: do this, Adam Kinzinger. There's a lot more Republican politicians
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: and former Trump officials who've criticized Trump in the past.
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: Do you expect them to be out there more now
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: that we're in 2024 speaking out against Trump? Do you
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: think that would make a difference?
• 54:21
  Speaker 5: I do. I think it will make a difference. I
• 54:23
  Speaker 5: think that it's going to be very important that we
• 54:26
  Speaker 5: have in an organized way and also people doing it
• 54:29
  Speaker 5: on their own, individuals who have seen him up close,
• 54:34
  Speaker 5: who've worked with him up close, and who know the
• 54:36
  Speaker 5: danger that he poses. And again, it's an unprecedented moment. Normally,
• 54:41
  Speaker 5: particularly people who are retired military officers, as you know,
• 54:45
  Speaker 5: would not be engaged in speaking out. But it's really
• 54:51
  Speaker 5: important for people to understand the facts and the truth.
• 54:55
  Speaker 5: And in some cases, you've seen, for confirmed some of
• 55:00
  Speaker 5: the most horrible things that Donald Trump did and said
• 55:05
  Speaker 5: about our men and women in uniform. And those voices really,
• 55:09
  Speaker 5: really matter. That credibility is really important.
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: You mentioned your former colleagues in the House. Are there
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: any House Republicans you think are doing a good job
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: right now that you would vote for?
• 55:22
  Speaker 6: Sure.
• 55:23
  Speaker 5: I think that, you know, it's a big conference and
• 55:28
  Speaker 5: there are good people. There are, you know, good Republicans
• 55:31
  Speaker 5: certainly in office. And I think that the Republican conference
• 55:37
  Speaker 5: as a whole right now has allowed the most extreme
• 55:41
  Speaker 5: voices control. And, you know, I'm not a fan of
• 55:47
  Speaker 5: Mike Johnson, the current Speaker of the House. You know,
• 55:49
  Speaker 5: I've watched him conduct himself in a way that he
• 55:52
  Speaker 5: was doing things he knew to be wrong with respect
• 55:55
  Speaker 5: to the efforts to overturn the election. So I think
• 55:58
  Speaker 5: you've got a real problem with the way that the
• 56:01
  Speaker 5: conference is led. And with, you know, you've got over
• 56:05
  Speaker 5: half now the Republicans in the House have endorsed Trump.
• 56:10
  Speaker 5: And so I think that clearly there are some significant problems,
• 56:14
  Speaker 5: but there are also some really good people who are
• 56:17
  Speaker 5: doing a good job and representing their constituents well and
• 56:20
  Speaker 5: who I hope will help come together once we get
• 56:23
  Speaker 5: past 24 and help to rebuild the Republican Party or
• 56:28
  Speaker 5: build a new party, frankly, that can really be focused
• 56:31
  Speaker 5: on the substance of these issues.
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: You recently called Elise Stefanik a total crackpot. No disagreement
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: from you there. In your book, you write about how
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: she underwent this dramatic transition from being a reasonable and
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: thoughtful lawmaker to a Trump sycophant. Can you talk more
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: about what it was like to watch that evolution? Because
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: I'm sure there are many other Republican politicians who have
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: taken that same path.
• 56:55
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, it never ceases to amaze me. I mean,
• 57:00
  Speaker 5: we saw it again last night, for example, with Tim Scott.
• 57:03
  Speaker 5: I mean, you've got members who used to be responsible
• 57:10
  Speaker 5: and thoughtful and honorable. And now, for some reason, they
• 57:16
  Speaker 5: feel that they They can sort of jettison all of
• 57:18
  Speaker 5: that in the name of loyalty to Trump. And I
• 57:23
  Speaker 5: think there are a number of reasons why it goes on,
• 57:26
  Speaker 5: but one of the episodes that I talk about in
• 57:31
  Speaker 5: the book has to do with what we were hearing
• 57:36
  Speaker 5: after the election, but before January 6th, when members would
• 57:40
  Speaker 5: sometimes say, well, let's just do this one more thing
• 57:42
  Speaker 5: for him. If we just do this one more thing,
• 57:46
  Speaker 5: you know, then that'll be it. And, you know, then
• 57:49
  Speaker 5: he'll concede or, you know, we can all move on. But,
• 57:53
  Speaker 5: you know, that one more thing becomes a slippery slope. And,
• 57:56
  Speaker 5: you know, once you've done just one more thing and
• 57:59
  Speaker 5: then you do just one more thing, you know, people
• 58:03
  Speaker 5: begin to rationalize and you get to a point where
• 58:06
  Speaker 5: you've sort of, you've crossed the Rubicon. And if you
• 58:09
  Speaker 5: rationalize defending him after he tried to seize power and
• 58:15
  Speaker 5: overturn an election, it's pretty hard to walk back from that.
• 58:20
  Speaker 5: And so, you know, but what I would say is
• 58:24
  Speaker 5: all of the individuals who are doing that, you know,
• 58:27
  Speaker 5: history teaches us that when autocrats come to power, they
• 58:31
  Speaker 5: have to have people who are willing to support them
• 58:35
  Speaker 5: and enable them and collaborate with them. And history will,
• 58:40
  Speaker 5: you know, judge them, you know, in my view, as
• 58:44
  Speaker 5: harshly as it will judge Trump, because he can't do
• 58:48
  Speaker 5: what he's doing without them.
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: I know a lot of never-Trump Republicans whose politics and
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: even policy views have changed as a result of Trump.
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: Some of them are basically Democrats now, some are independents.
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: I know you're a proud conservative. You and your family
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: have been in Republican politics your whole lives. But I've
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: even noticed that your rhetoric about your policy and political
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: differences with Democrats has softened over the last few years.
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: Has the Trump threat and the transformation of the Republican
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: Party into a Trump party caused you to rethink any
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: of your policy positions or political approach?
• 59:26
  Speaker 5: My policy views haven't changed. But living through the last
• 59:35
  Speaker 5: three years and living through this moment in our politics
• 59:39
  Speaker 5: has certainly caused me to think again and more carefully
• 59:46
  Speaker 5: about how I engage in politics. And I think you
• 59:52
  Speaker 5: started talking about the 2004 race. We've been involved in
• 59:56
  Speaker 5: many campaigns many partisan and ideological battles. And I'm not
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 5: opposed to, you know, our nation needs partisan debate. We
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 5: need to be able to do that. But I think
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 5: the reflexive sort of, you know, well, if the Democrats
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 5: are proposing this, let me pull my talking points out
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 5: to find the harshest way I can attack that. And
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 5: the Democrats do the same thing to Republicans. And I
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 5: think that that kind of reflexive attack And the kind
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 5: of toxicity that we've seen really is something we all
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 5: have to turn away from. And I think the best
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 5: debates and, you know, the reason, for example, why I
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 5: supported people like Abigail and Alyssa is not because I
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 5: agree with them on everything, but I know, like, look,
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 5: if I'm going to be in a debate with Abigail Spanberger,
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 5: I better be prepared because she's going to be prepared.
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 5: And And I hope we'll both learn something. And you
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 5: want to be engaged with people. You can sit down
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 5: and say, listen, tell me why you believe that. Because
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 5: I believe this. And here's why I believe this. But
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 5: I think the country needs a lot more of that.
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 5: And I think we have to really walk back from
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 5: the edge of the toxic nature of our politics. And
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 5: the extreme of that is what Donald Trump has done
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 5: with respect to bringing violence back into our politics in
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 5: a way it hasn't been in the modern era.
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: Do you think that's possible to do at this point,
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: even if Trump is defeated in 2024? I heard you
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: talk about building possibly a new party after 2024. What
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: would that look like? And what's made you hopeful that
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: there is a critical mass of conservatives or Republicans like
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: you who'd actually join that party, just looking at the
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: results of what Republican voters have been choosing over the
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: last several years?
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 5: Yeah, what makes me hopeful is as I travel around
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 5: the country and I talk to lots of people and,
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 5: you know, the vast majority of Americans, whether they're Republicans
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 5: or Democrats, they want their kids to grow up in
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 5: a country that's free. They think America ought to have
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 5: the peaceful transfer of power. They want their elected officials
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 5: to conduct themselves in a way that isn't embarrassing. You know,
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 5: one of the things I think is really important is
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 5: for us to get more people to run for office, because,
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 5: you know, if you, and I used to talk a
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 5: lot about this, actually, the Republican impeachers, you know, if
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 5: you look at the the challenges we're facing and the
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 5: complexity of those challenges, both internationally and domestically. And then
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 5: you look at the caliber of the people that are
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 5: getting elected today, and the gap is huge. And we're
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 5: like taking people that are not competent, putting them in office,
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 5: and then saying, now here, could you figure out these
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 5: really complicated strategic issues and think through this in a
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 5: thoughtful manner? And that's going to lead to disaster. So
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 5: We need people to have better choices. We need more
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 5: people to run. I think we need to look at
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 5: things like rank choice voting. We need to look at
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 5: how we conduct our primaries. I think we need to
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 5: look at term limits. I think there are some constitutional
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 5: problems with term limits, and I have not been supportive
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 5: of term limits in the past, but I think that
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 5: if elected officials in order to get them to do
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 5: the right thing, need to not be focused on the
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 5: next race, then it may be time for us to
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 5: take another look at term limits.
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: Last question. What's it been like to become an unlikely
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: resistance hero? Disorienting?
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 5: Yeah, it is. I mean, look, it's definitely weird in
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 5: some ways. But look... It also, it's one of the
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 5: things that does give me hope is how many people
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 5: have sort of said like, you know, and especially young people,
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 5: like they don't relate, they don't think about, well, am
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 5: I a Republican or a Democrat? You know, they're saying,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 5: you know, are we gonna live in a country that's
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 5: governed by the constitution? And I think that kind of
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 5: unity and understanding and desire to work on these issues Um,
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 5: that gives me a lot of hope and, and I,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 5: I really do in a lot of ways, you know,
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 5: I look forward very much to the day when, you know,
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 5: when I can come on your show and we can
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 5: have an argument and, you know, then we'll know like, okay,
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 5: we got past this really huge threat. And so now
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 5: we can talk about, you know, what our national security
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 5: policy ought to look like. Um, and I, I think that's, that'll,
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 5: that'll be how we know that, that we've succeeded here.
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, look, I've often over the last couple years,
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: I've done a thought experiment with myself, which is, okay,
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: say there was a president, who's a democratic president, and
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: they're very progressive. And you know, we could get and
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: there's a progressive Supreme Court and a progressive majority in
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: the House and Senate, we could get everything we wanted
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: policy wise as progressives. But that president is doing what
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: Trump did and not respecting the rule of law and
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: trying to overturn elections and trying to stay in power.
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: And I really hope that not only in me, but
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: like everyone else who I know who are Democrats would
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: stand up and speak out like you did. So I
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: know it wasn't easy. I know it probably hasn't been easy,
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: both professionally and personally. So I respect what you've done
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 1: these last couple of years.
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 5: Well, I appreciate your saying that. And I think there
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 5: are a lot more people out there who understand and
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 5: will ensure by voting against him that we don't end
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 5: up with Donald Trump in the White House again. But
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 5: we're going to all have to work together to do that.
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: Yes. Liz Cheney, thanks for coming on Pod Save America.
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: And I hope next time that you're on, we can
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: argue about policy.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 5: I know. Me too. I look forward to it.
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: Take care.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 2: Thanks.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 5: Bye-bye.
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: Thanks to Liz Cheney for joining us today. Everyone have
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: a great weekend and we'll talk to you next week.
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 2: Thanks to Liz Cheney. Something I never thought I would
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 2: hear on our podcast.
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: But you know what?
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: Legitimately, thank you to Liz Cheney.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure.
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 2: Bye, everyone.
• 1:06:41
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• 1:06:44
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• 1:06:47
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• 1:06:50
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• 1:07:00
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• 1:07:03
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• 1:07:06
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• 1:07:10
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• 1:07:13
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• 1:07:23
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• 1:07:26
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• 1:07:29
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