Advisory Opinions - Democrats Go Virtual, Bannon Goes to Court

Episode Date: August 20, 2020

Former Trump advisor Steve Bannon was arrested Thursday—along with Brian Kolfage, Andrew Badolato, and Timothy Shea—after federal prosecutors discovered they defrauded donors involved with the “We Build the Wall” campaign, a GoFundMe that shored up $25 million in donations since its inception in 2018. The unsealed federal indictment is damning, and even shows evidence of the grifters’ amusement with scamming their donors and misappropriating the funds for personal use. The grift looks a lot like what happened recently with the NRA with Wayne LaPierre, and reminds us that scamming donors is an ever-present problem on the Right. As David says on today’s pod, “Right-wing institutions are bilking from angry grandpas and grandmas—their extra dollars—to fight for the people, when they’re really conning the people.” Catch the latest episode for some highlights (and lowlights) of the Democratic Convention, a primer on employment law in relation to the Goodyear diversity slideshow, Facebook’s strike against QAnon and Antifa, and an answer to a listener question from about the citizenship of a tv show character. Show Notes: -Trump embracing QAnon in front of reporters, Sarah’s “Mid Week Mop-Up With Mo Elleithee”, parody Orrin Hatch tweet, and the indictment against Steve Bannon, Brian Kolfage, Andrew Badolato, and Timothy Shea. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Welcome to the Advisory Opinions Podcast. Oh, it's good. the wall was crooked. It's shocking, isn't it? I am stunned. I'm shocked. I'm appalled. I'm amazed. Listeners, what we're talking about is just before we began recording this podcast, I got a press release from the United States Attorney's Office, Southern District of New York, and it said, leaders of We Build the Wall online fundraising campaign charged with defrauding hundreds of thousands of donors. And who was included among the leaders of the campaign? One, Steve Bannon, who Sarah allegedly diverted some of the $25 million raised privately to build the wall and stop the caravans,

diverted that to fund his lifestyle. What? Could that possibly have happened? I have questions about his lifestyle. I don't know if you saw that interview, but I don't think it's going to haircuts. No, it's true. It's true.

Okay, that's just a teaser. We're not going to actually start with the indictment of Steve Bannon, but that is some of the late-breaking news that came in right before we started recording. There of the late-breaking news that came in right before we started recording. There was other late-breaking news that we're going to get to. But here's what we're going to cover today. We've got a lot to cover. So we're going to talk about the Democratic National Convention. We're going to talk about Bannon. We're going to talk about some late-breaking

developments on Trump tax returns. We're going to have a really brief primer on employment law related to All Lives Matter and Black Lives Matter. We're going to talk about social media and Facebook's strike against QAnon and Antifa. By the way, Sarah, just all the more reason to listen to our podcast. Last week, we talked QAnon. And what happens this week the president united states talks q anon and says that uh the believers of the conspiracy are um love this country so we're on the front edge of the news curve aren't we always always and we're going to also answer the burning question um what is the legal immigration status of the children of Philip and Elizabeth Jennings? And if you don't know who they are, we'll fill you in later. But Sarah, let's get

started in your political wheelhouse. You have been doing yeoman's work watching the Democratic National Convention. Yeah. So, I mean, I'm i'm watching it i've actually i don't watch the democratic national convention every four years i don't watch the republican one either mind you um but i am always interested when there is something new in politics that has not been done before and uh you know this is not because they want to have done something that has never been done before. And, uh, you know, this is not because they want to have done something that has never been done before, but nevertheless, the democratic convention is entirely digital and the television networks covering it are having to cover something totally new. And the number, like how people are watching it has and consuming it has been really new as well.

So lots of things that get my little nerd brain, political brain going. It's been interesting. Some highlights, some lowlights, for sure. And the fact that the Republican convention goes second normally is a good thing for the Republican side. You get to sort of have more time, frankly, and learn a few like, oh, hey, don't let this screw up. But I think that this could be tough. I actually think the Democrats have pulled something off in terms of the newness of it and uniqueness of it, as well as some pretty big highlights. And the RNC is going to have to figure out a way to match that. Now, they've got Donald Trump, so they've literally got the Trump card on that.

But just technologically speaking, the DNC has not really had any screw-ups, for instance, and they've kept it sort of visually entertaining the best you can with, you know, to the extent sitcoms or other shows have tried to do their zoom episodes. Right. Very few have gone well with the exception of mythic quest, which I thought was fantastic, but there's only so many times you can do a joke about old people, not knowing how to use zoom and the DNC hasn't had that problem. Uh, now what do you think has

worked well? What, what have been the high points to you? What have been some of the low points? No question in terms of logistics, high point was the roll call. This is where each state has to go through and say how many of their delegates, you know, Michigan pledges seven delegates to Bernie Sanders and pledges 5,000 delegates to Joe Biden, our next president of the United States. That's a miserable part of most conventions because you're just panning to people on the floor that are surrounded by other people. It's loud and it's really, really boring. This was so much fun because it's people in, you know, it looks like each state got to decide what

their video should look like. And so they were all really different. The Northern Mariana Islands should have gotten more of a shout out because that looked beautiful. And they were wearing flowers and it was lovely. Ohio did something somewhat odd, but there was a guy really far away from the camera.

And then there was a guy you would pan to that was really close. Then, of course, there was the famous one, which is Rhode Island, who plugged their dish, calamari. And yeah, the calamari comeback state. And it looked delicious. It looked so delicious, David. I was so hungry. I love calamari.

I have to say, I love calamari. And I didn't know that was Rhode Island's contribution to the great American story. And so a big deal. But as someone on Twitter noted, perhaps there was some corruption involved of how the calamari got to be the state dish, you know, a squid pro quo. Oh, well, you know, there is a famous like sort of Rhode Island mafia world out there. They may be there, but we'll just pass on that. David likes my dad jokes. We'll just pass on that. David likes my dad jokes. So that was the highlight logistically. Highlight in terms of political highlight.

And I don't think tonight will change this, but President Obama's speech started out good. This is his format. They had President Clinton the night before. Clinton is the master at retail politics. He thrives with an audience. So having a digital format for him was tough. There was no audience for him to feed off of. So while his speech was fine, it didn't build to his strengths. On the flip side, President Obama is not known for being a particularly good retail politician. And this format, he just thrived.

It was a good speech at the beginning. I thought maybe it dipped a little when he was talking about Joe Biden, not because that was necessarily bad, but it was really nice when he was trying to, in fact, make the case against Donald Trump. And so it just didn't fit tone-wise for me. But then, after he gets done talking about joe biden i mean you got the righteous fury of barack obama and and his fury was not necessarily directed at trump his fury was more directed at the people who were apathetic, if that makes sense. And the people who were maybe just too online for the last six months about George Floyd or other things, instead of wanting to make a real substantive difference, they think the difference is, you know, capitalization rules or whatever else, like that's going to end racism. Right. And, you know, the most powerful moment for me is when he's

talking about the things that, in his words, our ancestors went through to make it a more perfect union and the discrimination they faced and not voting and all of these things that were wrong with America that they fought against and fought through and fought for. And so if you think that it's rough right now for you, like shove it and do what you need to do and get out and vote. Um, and democracy is at stake. Uh, now agree or disagree with his message. It was, it was well written. It was well delivered. I think it will go down as Barack Obama's best speech ever. Really? Okay. Yeah, I do. So what didn't work? What didn't work? A lot didn't work. But this is true for all conventions, right? A lot didn't

work just because it's going to be not a great medium for people. Not everyone has a brilliant speech writer to help them. It is hard to watch video after video of people who, because they're reading, always read in a sing-songy voice. Right.

We all do that to some extent. It is hard to read in your authentic talking voice. But that was tough. And, you know, I talked to Mo Alethi, who was the DNC comms director when I was at the RNC, and he pointed out something relevant to me, which was like, look, for the, like the real people, the real Americans that we heard from, uh, you know, it is better than when they stand in front of this, you know, thousands and tens of thousands of people in these convention halls and they're nervous and it's jilted. In that sense, we saw

them in their home habitats, as he put it, and it was great. One thing also that worked really well from last night was the video story. And this took a lot of production. It was not just someone talking to the camera, but the video story told from the perspective, I think she's 11 years old, but I might get that wrong. The 11 year old girl whose mother was deported. It's the father is served in the U S military. The mother was an illegal alien.

She had two daughters in the country, has two daughters in the country, and she was deported. And to hear from an 11 year old girl about, you know, her mother's her best friend and she doesn't understand. Right. Um, that was, that was well done on the flip side of like, that may have been overproduced for some people. I doubt it. I think everyone thought that was pretty good, but on other times, Joe Biden was nominated by the woman who had met him in the elevator, which was super cool. It was this viral video moment where she's like, oh my God, I love you.

Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. He stays in the elevator and talks to her. And so she was the one who nominated him. And she was giving just a very written to the camera speech. I wanted more authenticity in that moment because what made that video viral was how authentic it was. Yeah. So it was still good, but maybe a missed opportunity. One more missed opportunity. AOC. I thought it was a wildly, oddly missed opportunity for someone who actually should have thrived in this medium.

She was given one minute to second the nomination of Bernie Sanders. Now, for everyone who's criticizing her that she didn't endorse Joe Biden, I do think it's relevant that her role was to second the nomination of Bernie Sanders. Fine. And she had one minute to do it. AOC can build mountains out of one minute online. Yeah. Cathedrals in the sky. out of one minute online. Yeah. Cathedrals in the sky. And instead, it was a very plain speech that didn't even make the case,

particularly for progressives in my mind. You know, she's like, we're for racial justice and social justice and economic justice. Like, no joke, but those are like just kind of cliche words at this point. Yeah, yeah. You know, I mentioned this to,

um, to Mo, but you know, if I were advising her, I think there were a number of things they could have done that would have been a little bit show stealing, you know, find a poet, a progressive poet and read one minute of poetry and with no commentary and have everyone Googling what that was or, um, anything like any visual something. And it just, it, that to me for someone who is so talented in my view, uh,

I mean a swing and a miss on every front. She didn't talk about Joe Biden. So she got criticized for that and she didn't make any splash. And I don't think that she picked up the baton from Bernie. That didn't happen to me either. Okay. So I have a, I have an AOC theory. Love it. I love your theories.

Okay, here's my AOC theory. I think that she is seriously on the outs with the Democratic establishment, in part because, not just because of her as a person, but also because the team that she had when she came in and their efforts to primary some leading lights in the Democratic Party. And that sort of, she has a lot of natural talent. There is no question about that. She has a ton of natural talent. But this convention has been mainly about not featuring,

here's the next generation of progressives. It's been a lot more about, we're totally normal bridge-building people who are, you know, we're the complete opposite of the Fox primetime caricature that you have of the far left in control and the squad in control. And I think she's seriously on the outs and a lot of her cultural relevance,

honestly, is kind of maintained by the right right now because they hype everything that she does. And if the Democrats had their way, she would not have nearly the same cultural relevance in part because she came in with her team and tried to unseat an awful lot of people who had an awful lot of power and it didn't go well. It didn't endear her. My thought about AOC for some time is that her

star is being kept lit mainly by right-wing opposition to her. She does have talent, no question, but she's not what the right thinks she is in the left. I think that all of that is accurate.

I will also add, you know, our cliche, bad facts make bad law. There's a political equivalent to that in my view, which is winning campaigns didn't do everything right and losing campaigns didn't do everything wrong. And I do think that AOC fell trap a little bit too. I won my campaign and therefore everything I did and everything I stood for is the way. And in fact, sometimes a good candidate with a good campaign can hit a moment and it's like a double bounce. You don't have to be perfect. You don't even have to be great in order to hit that double bounce. And so I do think there was some of that, especially when she first came in. I think she has been humbled a little bit by the situation. She has replaced her team by and

large. Her team was having a lot of trouble playing in the sandbox. Yes. Yeah. I mean, when they started to go, the sort of the broader movement that she was a part of started to try to pick off some leaders of the Congressional Black Caucus. leaders of the congressional black caucus not a great way to introduce yourself to the congress yeah yeah so um and you know it's interesting because if there's been a lot of discontent i've seen on the online left the very online left about this convention. To such an extent, it's like falling to people like Matt Iglesias to sort of say, hey, y'all, one of the things we're trying to do is reach out. a John Kasich, when you take some of these other, you know, not super prominent, well, more prominent in the past Republicans, and you put them front and center more than you put your progressive wing front and center. Yep. That strikes me as a very, very, very intentional strategy that is designed to completely undermine the radicals are coming for you message of the Trump campaign.

Well, let's talk for a second about who this is reaching and who it's intended to reach. Right. Because if you're a television producer right now, this has been bad for you, I would put it, or really easy for you. But back when we had conventions in person, there was so much downtime that you'd have these pundits in the sky booth throwing it back to you, George. And the pundits would sit there and talk and talk until something else even remotely interesting happened.

That is not happening. Basically, the DNC has been given two hours of airtime each night to just put on what amounts to a sort of telethon style situation. It's, you know, there's a host last night, it was Kerry Washington and they throw it back and forth to these pre-recorded sometimes live videos. Yeah. There's performances in the middle, Billie Eilish last night, which I loved or in hatch. There's a picture of him on a Eilish last night, which I loved. Orrin Hatch,

there's a picture of him on a cell phone, like a flip phone. And it says, calling a young person to figure out what Billie Eilish is. I loved it. So there is no real interruption. There's no punditry, which is fascinating. And for me, someone who is a pundit, this may surprise people, but actually I love that because I like sort of punditing in my own head at home. That's just fine for me. But in terms of viewership, viewership on television is way, way down. In 2016 2016 it was roughly uh 26 million it's about 18 million this time but online viewership is way up here's the problem david i mean this isn't surprising right like yeah tv viewership overall is going to have been down in general it goes down

every four years for the conventions but But in particular, during coronavirus, there's the NBA finals on, finally, if you will. So that doesn't surprise me. But it's a problem for both parties. and you're just flipping through, you may land on the Democratic Convention or you may flip over just for the Obama speech if you're watching the finals, the NBA finals or something like that. But if you're watching online, you're much more likely to be someone who is making the intentional choice to watch and who, how to put this, right? It's like part of the great sort. You're not a persuadable if you're watching online, most likely. Yeah. And so it's interesting

because the Democratic Convention feels like it's geared towards persuadables. Yep. You know, Republicans who are fed up with Trump, suburban people of all shapes and sizes,

a little trying to gin up young people to actually register to vote and try to go vote, although I'm going to call that almost, they're still persuadables in the sense that you people to actually register to vote and try to go vote. Although I'm going to call that almost, they're still persuadables in the sense that you're persuading them to vote, not who to vote for. But that's really lost if people are just online watching, because we've talked about voter scores. If you're online, the likelihood is your voter

score is a high Biden score and probably even a pretty high vote score. Yeah, yeah, that's interesting. So before we move on from the conventions, Sarah, I'm going to ask you to do something you're not accustomed to doing. I hate it already. What? I hate it already.

You hate it. Put on the MAGA cap and advise the Trump campaign about how to counter-program the DNC. If you are advising the Trump campaign, what are you telling them to do when their convention kicks off? Well, let me tell you something I am stunned that they haven't done. Like, stunned. And I can't figure out why.

So there is this gentleman's agreement that you don't counter program the other sides convention. I am stunned that the Trump campaign has kept that gentleman's agreement. They've kept no other such agreements at any point at any time. He has counter tweeted it. He has counter-tweeted it. He has counter-tweeted it. But like all caps tweeting that didn't make news. The thing with Trump, whether it's intentional and strategic or simply preternatural and instinctual, it doesn't matter. He is very, very good at stealing the spotlight back when it's taken from him. And I think it was taken from him on the first night by Michelle Obama. I'm stunned that we didn't see something the next day to steal it back.

It was 100% like all conversations were about Barack Obama yesterday and today, nothing. I mean, I could come up with things for him to do to counter program that. I'm not going to say them here, but you, you know, say or do something outrageous. Now, instead, what they've done is traveled to a couple of these, um, swing States, which no question that will dominate local news in those States, but local news, as we've said before, it is the most trusted source of news, but it is also declining in terms of people getting their news from local news. So, um, and it's, that felt so traditional to me, have the president give a rally speech in a state during the other side's convention, uh, you know, 1996 called and it wants it's very normal strategy

back. Um, so, so counter-programming I'm stunned that we haven't seen it and now it's largely too late i'm i'm reading that they plan to do something tonight in scranton at biden's you know birthplace hometown whatever um to counter-program his speech tonight but to some extent too late too little too late uh so we'll see okay so that's the counter-programming i'm shocked for next week you know i think the part of the reason we haven't seen counter-programming is because trump is sitting there like yes he's doing some all caps tweeting but i bet there's far more all caps messages going to his staff of do we have this this? Have you thought of this? What about this idea? And, you know, I think that he is, if nothing else, a television producer.

And I expect them to do well next week and to counter program, if you will, through their own convention, where the Democrats, where this all digital, you know, videos produced, and it's just two hour telethon to the Republicans raucous, you don't know what's going to happen next. It's all live. Um, you know, these people are afraid and sitting in their basements and we're out there. You want to go back to school. Here's how we're going to go back to school. We're all going to have these rallies.

And I think that that does, I think that will be a contrast, maybe more so than we've ever had two conventions actually contrast each other and how they plan to lead the country. Right, right. I think that's going to be, I think there's going to be a, we're fearlessly reopening,

they're fearfully in the basement. And there's also going to be a, we already know from some of the guests that are going to be there, there's going to be a they're coming for you vibe as well. Yeah. So you're going to have the,

what the St. Louis couple, you know, that was famously caught on their front porch brandishing weapons at Black Lives Matter protesters. They're going to be there.ishing weapons at black lives matter protesters they're going to be there that's a sort of a classic they're coming for you uh guest then you're i believe you're going to have um nick sandman the the 15 year old um kid who was caught in the middle of the covington catholic maelstrom and was treated awfully just terribly, in that whole thing. He's going to be there.

So I think you're going to have... This is where I'm going to get my old man voice going, Sarah. Back when I was a mere 23-year-old, I watched a certain convention speech by Patrick Buchanan in 1992. And it's the famous culture war convention speech. This was the aftermath of the LA riots. This was sort of the populist,

you know, pitchfork brigade. I feel like we're going to get a, a good dose of Pat Buchanan, 90, 1992 style culture war ism. I could be wrong. I could be wrong,

but I sense that that's coming. Probably right. I think that the, from a political standpoint, the more interesting part will be the surprises. There weren't really surprises in the Democratic Convention.

We knew who was speaking. They tried to sort of gin up, you know, that there would be Republicans, but John Kasich and Susan Molinari, eh. Colin Powell was a big surprise, but they didn't actually, I thought, deliver the surprise, if you will. Right. It was just like, oh, and now Colin Powell's speaking? What? They could have, I thought, actually done a bigger reveal for that and didn't. Well, and the very sight of John Kasich brought up a lot of rage

thoughts for me. David, it's not possible for you to have more rage thoughts than me, but whatever. No, true. I step back. I recede from this conversation. Oh, yeah.

We don't need to get into that. We don't need to get into that. Well, I think one day there might need to be maybe like a late night with a glass of bourbon advisory opinions where you tell all of your rage thoughts from 2016. Just all of the rage thoughts. I mean, it's interesting. I think the way that I accuse some people… Caleb is nodding at that, by the way. I think the way some people... Sorry. I accuse some people of their dislike for Hillary Clinton being based on sexism because it's just visceral. They can't really explain it because there's other people who have the same problems as Hillary Clinton, but they don't feel that rage towards them. You can accuse me of Kasichism. The rage that I feel toward John Kasich, plenty of other people have those qualities, but for some reason, my rage is reserved for John

Kasich. No, believe me. Okay, listeners, one day, one day, we will have the special advisory opinions venting episode. My dad was such a John Kasich fan in 2016, and I just would verbally throw plates against the wall. What is it that your generation says, Sarah? I'm all out of can't evens. Oh, I love it when the old folks try. I'd like to take a moment and thank our sponsor, Bills.com. Oh, I love it when the old folks try. to bills.com. If you're losing sleep over maxed out credit cards or stressed out thinking about your mortgage payments or student loans, bills.com can help you take back control of your life. The first step to lowering your monthly payments and becoming debt-free is to get a free debt assessment. It only takes a few minutes and could save you hundreds or even thousands of dollars

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pronouncing it in my head. All right. It's an all cat that as indictment style, the names are in all caps. So I'll read the names dramatically. Brian Colfage, Stephen Bannon, Andrew Bottle Lotto, and Timothy Shea. The defendants, by the way, not the same Timothy Shea, who was the DC US attorney for a while there. Not the same guy. Thank you for the clarification. Although I had no idea there was a DC US attorney for a while there. Not the same guy. Thank you for the clarification. Although I had no idea there was a DC US attorney named Timothy Shea.

Well, my apologies, Timothy, if you're listening. Timothy Shea was the one who originally filed the Flynn stuff and the Stone stuff. So he made headlines there back in January, pre-coronavirus. So now we don't remember it, but. Yes. Okay.

Okay. It's all coming back to me now. All coming back. All coming back to me now. Keep going. All right. The defendants and others orchestrated a scheme to defraud hundreds of thousands

of donors, including donors in the Southern District of New York. And that would be surprising if you had build the wall donors in Manhattan. But anyway, in connection with an online crowdfunding campaign, ultimately known as We Build the Wall, that raised more than $25 million to build a wall along the southern border

of the United States to induce donors to donate to the campaign, Colfage and Bannon, each of whom, as detailed herein, exerted significant control over Build the Wall, repeatedly and falsely assured the public that Colfage would not take a penny in salary and compensation and that 100% of the funds raised will be used in the execution of our mission and purpose because, as Bannon publicly stated, we're a volunteer organization. These representations were false. In truth, they diverted, Sarah allegedly diverted, a lot of money to personal use. This is a classic fraud case. It's a classic fraud case. And there's not that much legally interesting about it. In my view, it's more politically interesting than legally interesting.

control of. About 350,000 of that went to Colfage, who was sort of the public-facing part of this. You know, you're right. It's very, very traditional fraud. You tell people one thing, you're doing something else with the money. You know, there was one paragraph 26 of the indictment. This is about their, after they learn that there's a criminal investigation into what they're doing, what they did... You always got to love the cover-up, David. Yes. And I just love, like, if you think they're investigating you,

they're watching you now. So what you're doing isn't working. So what they did, they started using encrypted messaging apps on their phones, and they changed the website. Like the FBI wasn't going to notice that you took off the incriminating statements from your website that said you weren't taking any money. Right. They then added a line to the website that said that Colfage would be paid a salary starting in January 2020, which is particularly laughable

because you know they're investigating you because they know you've already been paying him. Why be so specific? Colfage also stopped receiving secret salary payments after this date. I mean, okay, that's actually the smartest thing that they did. Stop the illegal behavior from the moment you think that you're being

investigated for illegal behavior it will not fix what you've already done as they have now seen with this indictment but the idea every time right criminals find out that the fbi is watching them and then do extra criminal stuff why why yeah that's a that's a good rule of thumb. If you find out, heaven forbid any listeners find out they're under FBI investigation, trust me, you're the last one to know.

That's right. And that the best that the cover-up is at this point essentially futile. The best thing you can do is the one one thing, is to stop the criminal behavior. That's right. All, honestly, paragraph 26, they would be so much better off if it only read, Colfage stopped receiving secret salary payments after this date.

The problem is, though, it shows consciousness of guilt. Yes, right, right. In this case. So, Sarah, can I vent for a little bit? Love it. Okay. I am continually a combination of dispirited and outraged at the extent to which much of what you would,

I don't even want to use the term conservative, much of the right wing fundraising movement is a giant grift and con. Like this is $25 million, Sarah. That is a lot of money that was conned from Americans. We haven't even talked about the NRA scandal, which I think we've maybe referenced it a little bit, where I think I may have said, if I didn't, this is good relationship advice. I think I said this in a previous podcast. But listeners, find someone who loves you as much as the NRA board loves Wayne LaPierre. I think that's sound relationship advice. But the giant grift and con that is going on where right-wing institutions are bilking from angry grandpas and grandmas their extra dollars to fight for the people when they're really conning the people.

I mean, we're talking on the scale of millions and millions and millions of dollars, and we haven't even gotten into the scam packs. These political action committees that exist mainly to raise salary money for their founders. And it is a real problem on the right. I'm sure there are cons on the left as well. I'm not as familiar with them, but it is a real problem on the right. Can I tell you what my rage comes from on this? Okay, please. comes from on this. Okay, please. Paragraph 19 of the indictment. As they're creating these pass-through payments,

they create a nonprofit and funnel the money to the nonprofit, which they then realize they're going to have to disclose on tax forms. Right. And Badalato replies, via text, I take it, better Lato replies by a text. I take it better than you or me. Lol.

So here's what really pisses me off about that. Mm. They intentionally gin people up through political rhetoric about building the wall. Then they take their money and they, for reasons that aren't that interesting, they had to re-raise the money. And so they had to reach out to people who had already given them money. And, you know, some of these people are like, I don't really have a lot of money. And they're like, yeah, but this is really important. So this is worth you, you know, not having food, give us that $25 again.

you not having food, give us that $25 again. And they know what they're doing to the point that they're, to me, that lull is acknowledging that they are making fools of these people intentionally, that they think they're idiots. Yep. And that they have convinced them of the problem and told them the solution to the problem, and then taken their money. Lol.

These dum-dums. And that's really upsetting to me because there are many millions of people who actually believe in the Make America Again movement. America Again movement. And that the leaders of that movement are mocking and defrauding their followers just fills me with rage. They have contempt. They have contempt for the people that they are bilking. I mean, and it's worth going back to a little bit of the context here. You know, this is a whole thing. There's a right-wing rage machine that is also a right-wing con machine. Because if you remember, this thing came about in the context of the panic over the caravan and these caravans approaching, which was wall-to-wall coverage in parts of conservative

media that there was this caravan that was going to flood the border. And this capitalized, this was capitalized on this panicky, panicky coverage about this caravan. And it's, you know, so you, you draw eyeballs by panicking people about a caravan that was never a threat. It was never really a threat. And then you raise money off the false panic. And the whole time these people they're texting, as you said in, in, um, you know, paragraph 19, lol, you know, it is, it is infuriating. It is really infuriating. And it is constant. And I have to say, I don't know, Sarah, are you still getting some of the Trump campaign text messages? I have unsubscribed. I have finally blocked them all. But they're hysterical as well. And they're also manipulative.

Donald Trump is waiting to hear from you. And a lot of this stuff is aimed at people who are not terribly sophisticated in politics. They're not terribly sophisticated in tech. And it's a giant there's it's a giant scam and it is so infuriating and the nra here's here's and i'll and i'll stop this rant in a minute um so the nra is has diverted millions and millions and millions of dollars into the pockets of some of its key leaders and key members of the board and Wayne LaPierre. And the problem I have is that should be the story, but the New York Attorney General has sought to dissolve the NRA, sort of really reached as far as she possibly could to take on the NRA. And what that did is it turned, it has allowed a lot of people on the right to turn the grifter into the victim. And so, you know, we talked about anti-anti-Trump. So now we sort of have anti-anti-NRA.

When there should be a white hot spotlight on what has the NRA done with these millions of dollars of dues that have been raised from ordinary, everyday, average Americans who merely are seeking to have their Second Amendment rights protected. That should be the white hot spotlight. But there was this overreach, and this overreach becomes the news. That's a good way to put a period on this ranty segment. Okay. Should we move on to a very brief discussion of employment law? Let's. Okay. So this is an interesting, just a little micro issue. Yesterday, there was a brief mini-controversy as Trump tweeted that people should boycott Goodyear,

a great American company, Goodyear, which I believe has Ohio manufacturing plants. So why would the president ask Americans, do boycott a good American manufacturing company? Well, because they indicated in, there were some employee training materials that indicated that they were going to ban all political messaging, including MAGA messaging in like on the workroom floors. But they would not ban pro-LGBT messages or Black Lives Matter messages. And that Goodyear explicitly bans White Lives Matter but allows Black Lives

Matter. And a guy at the Daily Wire named Matt Walsh tweeted out that audio shows that Goodyear also explicitly bans White Lives Matter while allowing Black Lives Matter. This is clearly racial discrimination and cannot possibly be legal. Sarah, your thoughts. Well, so I thought that this was pretty bad PR on Goodyear's part. Goodyear immediately came out with a statement distancing themselves from this slide. The slide itself was bad.

You know, it said Blue Lives Matter, zero tolerance. Right. Which was also just a weird way to say it. It's one way to say, like, hey, here are the phrases that we've decided

are political, and here are the ones that aren't political, but zero tolerance for Blue Lives Matter struck me as a little tone deaf. And Goodyear thought so, too. A little, yep.

And Goodyear came out and said, we support the fight for racial justice and law enforcement. This slide was not approved by us. It's, it's not correct. Um, but the damage was well done by that point. And I thought Goodyear didn't really specify like, so wait, are you allowed to wear blue lives matter stuff or no? Right. Right. Um, they just said they support law enforcement, which is kind of different. So from a comms PR perspective, Goodyear was, uh, did one thing really well. They got out quickly

with a statement and then they did a bunch of stuff really badly, like being specific. Right. Right. Yeah. What, you know, the interesting thing is, so a lot of these corporations will have, and this is, this is, we'll go down a little bit of the diversity training rabbit hole. A lot of these corporations will bring in diversity trainers and these diversity trainers will quite honestly come in and they don't know much of anything about actual employment law. know much of anything about actual employment law. They're not really tuned into American public opinion. They're heavily steeped in sort of like the identity politics of the academy. And so they're going to wax eloquent about problems with whiteness. They're going to say a lot of things. And this was actually part of a big lawsuit against um google where you had google bringing in people who were just really blatant and just running down whiteness as a concept um and so they're going to be they're not thinking about employment law at all um they're thinking about sort of these academic theories of critical, you know, identity politics, critical race theory, etc. And not all of those things play well with employment law, quite frankly.

However, at the same time, it is not the case that if you say, if White Lives Matter is, and there is evidence that White Lives Matter is a white supremacist slogan, and there is evidence that white lives matter is a white supremacist slogan that you have to allow it on the shop floor if you allow black lives matter yeah just because they're parallels you know exactly that is not the case an employer can say there are some expressions that in some actions that we deem to be advancing either, say, white supremacy or overt discrimination against marginalized communities. And we can prohibit those things from being expressed in the workplace. You can do it even if you can find a parallel. But the fact of the matter is they're not parallel.

But the fact of the matter is they're not parallel. White Lives Matter is in general an expression of white supremacy. Black Lives Matter is not, as a general matter, an our culture and an employer can recognize that um that's not to say that an employer can run down whiteness or uh has carte blanche to run down whiteness or run down white people or to take formal job actions against white people those are not the same things but it can recognize in fact that two slogans do not have, they don't have mirror image meanings here. Well, let's break this down then in a harder context. Let's take Blue Lives Matter, All Lives Matter, and let's note that Black Lives Matter is both a rallying cry for a movement about George Floyd and about racial justice in the country, but also a specific organization

that has a political side. Correct. Okay, so given those grayer areas, what say you? Well, the Blue Lives Matter issue, so what is the employment law context here? So employment law prohibits discrimination on the basis of race. The employer is going to be able to get rid of Blue Lives Matter as an

act of political expression. Blue Lives are actually people involved. The status at issue in Blue Lives Matter is not skin color. The status at issue in Blue Lives matter is not skin color the status at issue in blue lives matter is is status as a member of law enforcement um so the employer can say that's a political statement and can get rid of that um now the interesting thing is i think the issue would be you could say um i think an employer can say um generic black lives Lives Matter expressions are going to be okay, but encompassing a ban on political statements, perhaps some of the specifically Black Lives Matter organization, that official all, you know, the capital BLM organizational material would be encompassed under their political ban. Not sure that they would have on a shop floor to shop floor basis, the kind of sophistication to tell the difference between the two, but I think they in theory could do that.

Interesting. So the president has Goodyear tires on the beast, which is the limo that he drives around in. He said that people should stop using Goodyear tires, but then when asked about the Goodyear tires on his car said, well, if we could find other tires that would work, we would do that. So it feels a little bit, I mean, the whole boycott thing in general, um, I thought the right was against, but now the rights for it. And in fairness to the president,

he did say like two can play at this game, sort of pointing out that like, if the left is going to keep boycotting things, we're going to keep boycotting things. I don't think this leads anywhere good though. No, no. My general view is I am overall anti-boycott. Now there are particular sets of facts

with a particular organization. There is a threshold of conduct that could be so egregious that would cause me to boycott. We could go through crazy hypotheticals, but my general default position is I don't want to boycott. And I think I've told this story before

about the time I spoke to Students for Life of America. I gave a keynote speech at the Students for Life for America convention. Great group of students. It was a really, really honored to do it. And you know how you finish your speech, and students will line up to talk to you. There's this sort of like really cool way in which the pattern of speeches, of speaking to students has emerged where instead of people gathering up in a gaggle, they form an orderly line to talk to you. So the line forms, and the first question I got was, why did you walk up to the podium with a Starbucks cup? question I got was, why did you walk up to the podium with a Starbucks cup? And because I had,

it was a late morning speech. I had a cup of coffee and I learned in that conversation that Starbucks had apparently supported Planned Parenthood in Seattle or something like that. And they said, there's another coffee shop down the street. You should have used that. And I said, well, what are the political beliefs of its owners? Do you know? Can you tell me? And they had no idea. And to some extent, the process of trying to discern the political beliefs of each and every vendor that you use is just, A, it's utterly exhausting. And B, it's ridiculously divisive. It's just contributing to this incredible polarization that we have in this country. And so my general view is, if you're bringing a product in the public square, I'm going to use your product if I like your product. That's my philosophy, sir. I think that's fair. Yeah. I'd like to take a moment and thank our sponsor, the Bradley Speaker Series from the Bradley Foundation. I think that's fair. Yeah. Visit BradleyFDN.org backslash Liberty to watch our most recent episode featuring Mitch Daniels, president of Purdue University. Daniels is a former governor of Indiana, a previous director

of the Office of Management and Budget, and a 2013 winner of the Bradley Prize. In this episode, you'll learn more about why Purdue was one of the first universities to announce its intentions to reopen, and hear some encouraging news about students' response to returning. He also addresses the loneliness crisis among younger people and offers guidance to federal and state leaders on managing the COVID-19 pandemic. That's Bradley with an L-E-Y at the end, fdn.org slash liberty to watch the video. New episodes will debut weekly, so come back often and subscribe to their YouTube channel

to be notified whenever a new one is posted. All right, move on? Yeah. Okay. Miles to go before we sleep. Miles and miles. So, social media. Facebook has taken action against QAnon,

is the headline, but the headline is not exactly telling the whole story. So Facebook has announced that it has removed 790 QAnon groups. It has taken down about 440 pages and more than 10,000 Instagram accounts related to the right-wing conspiracy theory reading from the New York Times. Now, what's interesting is that was the top-line story. This is targeted at QAnon, targeted at QAnon. But you had to scroll all the way down the story to find out that they had also taken action against hundreds of Antifa groups as well,

which seems to me to be, if you're going to take action against QAnon, taking action against Antifa groups. It said Facebook said it will also remove 980 groups such as those related to far-left Antifa movement as well as others related to far-left Antifa movement as well as others related to militia movements or other protests. Before I get into the law of this and before I get into why I think I might have been kind of wrong about something, not legally related but

policy related, Sarah, what are your thoughts? Yeah, I always think these are tricky. On the one hand, by banning folks, you do take care of the problem, right? Problem, you know, ripped up, done. On the other hand, it gives them a platform to, you know, say, hey, they don't want you to see this. It's sort of like telling a kid not to touch the hot stove. You've told them they shouldn't touch the hot stove anymore, but now the kid really wants to touch the hot stove. You've told them they shouldn't touch the hot stove anymore, but now the kid really wants to touch the hot stove. And I mean, we've seen the result, right? Then the president gets asked about QAnon. It just, it has raised their profile.

Facebook is not the sole reason that their profile was raised. Obviously, a nominee for Congress also raised the profile, but everything adds to it. And so that's a bummer aspect of it. But what else is Facebook? Are they supposed to just leave them there and not raise their profile once they have sort of hit a tipping point? We saw this also with a lawsuit about the anti-vax folks. Right. They've left them on there a long time, but at some point when

they're, when they are spreading so far and having so many eyeballs on them, uh, you know, Facebook decides this isn't worth it. This isn't so fringe anymore. And we're part of the reason that it's not fringe. Yeah. I, you know, one of the things I think, and you raise a really good point. Yeah. You know, one of the things I think, and you raise a really good point, you have a lot of people attacking Facebook and Twitter and others as if they have an easy solution to this.

Right. As if these questions are, the answers to these questions are easy. They are not easy. It is very hard to ban an idea. It's very hard. And in fact, the growth of QAnon, I i mean q anon began on 4chan we talked about this before it's this really obscure message board it went it began on this obscure hyper obscene

hyper racist message board that probably the number of people who listen to this podcast this podcast listener group of podcast listeners is probably on the power curve of aware of what's going on in politics. Probably a lot of folks who listen to this podcast didn't know what 4chan was. It then moved on to 8chan and then went and moved on to 8kun, which are various other platforms that after, you know, 4chan's, you know, that as efforts were made to get the domain owners, etc., of these groups to get rid of these conspiracy theorists and the alt-right fringe, etc., etc., they bounced from place to place. So this is a conspiracy theory that began in some of the darkest, worst corners of the internet and then spread. And so it's not as if you can just sort of say,

we can get rid of this idea by, you know, blanket bans on social media. At the same time, at the same time, there is this point at which, and it's a hard point to discern, at which the social media becomes, the spread of an idea on social media becomes actively dangerous to the body politic. And this is something that Facebook has dealt with overseas more than it has here, where you have a conspiracy theory that begins to trigger real world violence and social facebook is a private institution is able to say you know what this platform that we

built they can legally say this platform that we don't we built cannot be used to foster violence in the real world now at the same time it's too simple to say that Facebook, by stifling ideas on its platform, can then end violence in the real world. That's way too simplistic. And so there is this really tough line to draw about when does stifling speech stifling speech actually create actually sort of spread the conspiracy theory

through victim victimizing it versus when the stifling speech actually limit the damage of the conspiracy theory that's not an easy line to draw it's just not do you know what is an easy line to draw what

this lawsuit filed by Robert Kennedy against Facebook. Yeah. In which he claimed, creative, I'll give them creative. He claimed a Bivens action, which involves federal officers and First Amendment, which obviously has to involve government speech, in a suit against Facebook. And what was his theory for the government action, David? Please tell me. That congressmen had reached out to Facebook and shared their opinion of what Facebook should do.

Yeah. Yeah, this is... Sarah, I think the legal challenges against social media have been, they're almost like a bad legal idea generator. Do you remember the Saturday Night Live commercial, Bad Idea Jeans? Or is that before your time? I remember the Mom Jeans one with Tina Fey. No, you got to look it up. Bad Idea Jeans. It's a great commercial. But it's almost like every lawyer

who files suit against social media companies on speech grounds is just put on a pair of Bad Idea Jeans. The bad legal theories. Rico, Bivens, First Amendment, genes um the the bad legal theories um rico um bivins first amendment uh and and one of the interesting that and this is something that's been filed against google and youtube this idea that essentially google or youtube functions like a company town um that in other words that it has such a control over public speech that it functions in much the same way that company towns did around the turn of the century where if you were say a coal miner and you worked for a coal company you would live in a company

town and a company handled fire um you know the fire department, the local security was the police department, delivery of mail, etc., etc. And there is a line of Supreme Court authority that says, if you are taking over all of the functions of the state, then you're going to have the same legal obligations of the state. And they've tried to use that authority to bring the First Amendment to YouTube and Google, and it's been soundly rejected by the courts.

Bad idea genes again. But creative. I'm all for creative. I forgot about the RICO part of the Robert Kennedy lawsuit. RICO, man, well done. Yeah. I think the bottom line is, and what Americans have to get and should really begin to understand is, one, there is legal freedom of these social media companies to make these decisions. They have the legal freedom to make

these decisions about banning groups and moderating content. They have it. They have it under Section 230. Even if Congress were to wipe away Section 230, there would be a very strong constitutional argument that the First Amendment would give these companies 230-like protections. So they're going to have the freedom to do it. And number two, these decisions are not as easy as partisans would tell you they are. And regardless, Adam Schiff introducing legislation is not enough to give rise to government officer action for Bivens First Amendment claims. The right. Shall we move on to, um, Paige Jennings? Yes. Paige Jennings. Uh, this came from a listener and it turns out that someone actually emailed both David and I separately.

We think it's two different people. Uh, she said, I was recently listening to your podcast where you talked about Kamala Harris's citizenship and all the ways people are citizens by statute. My husband and I are watching The Americans. That's an FX show about a couple that is conducting espionage for Russia while pretending to be fully American, suburban, housewife, working dad in the 80s. And we had a citizenship question about Henry and Paige, the kids of Elizabeth and Philip, the spies. Yes. Obviously, Elizabeth and Philip are here illegally and acting against the interests of the United States. So they are criminal non-citizens. Since Henry and Paige were born here, are they citizens even though their parents meet none of the statutory criteria you outlined? So I reached out to an immigration

expert. Oh, I love it. You actually reached out to an expert. I did. Yes, of course. I love it. And I had some questions like to me, this is like issue spotting an exam, mostly because I didn't want to sound like a total idiot to our immigration expert friend of the pod. And so I said, I asked whether there would be a fraud exception, even though the fraud was perpetrated by the parents and not the kids. Like, so a third party in this case. And what about the diplomatic exception? Because the parents were reporting to the embassy. So they were sort of, in fact, acting as foreign government agents like a diplomat. And if you are a diplomat here in the country and have kids, your kids do not get automatic citizenship. That is a statutory exception and one probably contemplated in the

14th Amendment if you go back and look at some of the history of that. Will it matter that the kids are still minors at the time that it is discovered? And he writes back and basically is like, no, everything that you've asked is incorrect on every front. So basically there's very specific things to being a diplomat. So the exceptions, being born to a foreign diplomat, being the child of a hostile occupying force, or being the child of a tribe where the tribe is refusing admission into the union. Although he notes all tribes through treaty have accepted admission for citizenship purposes at this point, but theoretically they could revoke the treaty

in the future. I love that he included that, by the way. Perhaps there is an argument that Henry and Page are born to a hostile occupying force, but I think that's a hard sell. Would make it for a great case, though, he says. Unfortunately, there are precisely zero cases regarding the foreign occupation exception after the ratification of the 14th Amendment, because luckily the United States has not faced an occupying force since then where children were born here. The Japanese invasion of Pearl Harbor and the Mexican-American War did not produce any children born here by foreign nations. I mean, how great and nerdy is this? I love it so much. It's amazing. It's amazing. So the bottom line, Sarah,

is that are Henry and Paige anchor babies for Soviet spies? Absolutely. So basically their parents, because they committed visa fraud, actually not visa fraud, they faked birth certificates and social security cards,

but fraudulent documents. They are here, same as any other illegal alien through fraud. They faked birth certificates and social security cards, but fraudulent documents. They are here, same as any other illegal alien through fraud. So their children are birthright citizens through the 14th Amendment constitutionally. And that's the end of that. Fascinating. Well, I'll say in my, i got a very similar email i responded um i didn't do the right thing sarah so the right thing is what you did the right thing is you reached out to an immigration expert okay here's what i did i just came up with an answer off the top of my head um in fairness that's what you and i do to most emails that we get. Right.

I risked malpractice. Yes. In case, you know, the person who was contacting me was, you know, maybe a, the person who was contacting me was maybe a Soviet spy asking about,

or a Russian spy. There is no Soviet Union now. A Russian spy asking about their own kids in a disguised way. Anyway, short answer. Henry and Paige,

children of Soviet spies, are American citizens. And that's the way the law is. And for those, by the way, who want to look up the diplomatic exceptions, they are found, according to our expert, in 8 U.S.C. 1101, sections A11 and A15A. But regardless, you have to, the parents would have to have held a non-immigrant visa bearing that title and issued to a non-immigrant

in accordance with such regulations as the Secretary of State may prescribe, which obviously Elizabeth and her husband did not have.

Well, we'll end on a note of warning. Thank you for sharing that citation. I would urge our listeners to not all go to the website at once to look up that statute

or that portion of the code or you might crash the website. That's right. We don't want to crash it. Just pause a beat before you look up the law. Anything else, Sarah? No.

I'm excited to continue Nerd Mondays. We have two more Mondays left. That's right. So undisclosed nerdery coming on Monday. So we look forward to that. But we might, just to sort of tease this, we might have nerdery at a level that you cannot possibly fathom.

And I mean that, not possibly fathom coming up. So stay tuned. And again, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts. Please rate us on Apple Podcasts. And we appreciate you listening and we will be back on Monday. Bye.