Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 3/25/26: Ryan Smeared For Cuba Aid Trip, Newsom Flips On Israel Apartheid, Blackouts Imminent In US, Mortgage Rates Spike

Episode Date: March 25, 2026

Ryan and Emily discuss Ryan smeared for Cuba aid trip, Ryan cooks Newsmax host on Cuba, Newsom flips on Israel apartheid, blackouts imminent in US, mortgage rates spiral.   Christopher Rabb: https://www.chrisrabb.com/      To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show AD FREE, uncut and 1 hour early visit: www.breakingpoints.comMerch Store: https://shop.breakingpoints.com/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Well, our own Ryan Grimm recently returned from Havana, Cuba, where he was on a reporting trip as part of a delegation, a humanitarian delegation that went to deliver supplies to the people of Cuba in protest of the blockade and escalating U.S. efforts to squeeze the Cuban economy and the Cuban people into some type of deal. We'll see exactly what happens. Ryan's going to give us some updates on what could come. But boy, is Ryan Grimm getting a lot of criticism. The whole delegation is getting a lot of criticism.

And we have an incredible clip of Ryan from Newsmax that we're going to talk about in a bit. Let's just go through some of what's been leveled at you, at Hassan Piker, who you were on the trip with as well. You could tell us a little bit about who organized all of this, but basically the free press, we could put C4 up, among others. They wrote that you and Hassan were Cuba's useless idiots. I love the subhead here. Yes, viral content creators like Hassan Piker and Ryan Grimm were invited for a weekend in a blacked-out Cuba so they

could preach the glories of la revolution, which Hassan did. I don't know that you did that, Ryan. No, and how weird would that be to go to Cuba and a white guy preach to them about the glories of the revolution. Also, viral content creator, for what I know are explicitly political reasons, TikTok actually refuses to verify my account. So, TikTok, if you're listening, according to

the free press, I am a viral content creator. Listen up, bitches. They refuse to verify me, and as a result, all of these fake accounts keep popping up impersonating me and like stealing stuff and DMing people. So it wasn't just the free press. Here's the New York Times going after

Hassan Piker. Actually, I thought this was a pretty So the headline here is Hassan Piker, a celebrity left-wing streamer, defends Cuba aid mission. I thought they gave Hassan a lot of oxygen here to defend what happened over the weekend. And a more serious criticism, I would say, from a Cuban, actually. This is a quote from a Cuban politician who said, they say they've come to support the Cuban people, but they meet with the man who gave the combat order to repress those who took to the streets on hashtag 11J. which was the July 11th protest demanding freedom. So, Ryan Graham.

That might be my photo, actually. Did you take that? I might have. All right. So we didn't meet with him. He gave a speech. Tell us what, break this all down. What did you do?

Who organized it? And what is your response to your critics? Yeah. And so there are a couple of key criticism. First of all, it makes me embarrassing to be part of this media. ecosystem because it's so divorced from reality. Like we went there, we saw the starvation of the economy and of the Cuban people, which is being done deliberately to try to allow the U.S. to overthrow the regime. Like that's, like, we have been very explicit that we are blocking fuel

from getting in, designated them as terrorists and supporters of terrorism, not allowing them to use credit cards, etc. Everything we can to make it as miserable possible so that we accomplish our foreign policy objective of overthrowing the government. Unless you think that's not an American strategy, Henry Kissinger said it himself that we were going to, this was... Rubio said it himself a couple days ago. Right, but what was, we're going to make them scream, make the economy scream. This has been a Cold War policy for decades. Yeah. Instead, we're talking about this other silly stuff. But for people who are curious, so that, the, two, so the criticism is that, well, I guess there's two related criticisms, that the, that the

delegation stayed in a five-star hotel that kept its power on, despite there being major blackouts across the island. So two points on that. Yeah, it is bad if hotels keep power and hospitals lose power. I agree with that. Two things. Why did this? delegation stay at this quote unquote five-star hotel? First of all, five-star is quite relative. It's so much nicer than the conditions that the Cuban people are suffering under. No question about that. Also, nobody in the Bravo-Lebriety universe would go to that hotel and call it a five-star hotel. That is absolutely the case. But there is a U.S. law on the books that says if an American visits Cuba, there is a long list of places they cannot stay. Anything connected directly or

indirectly, really, for the most part, with the government. You can go read their FAQs. You can go read their rules about it. And they'll specifically list a bunch of hotels you cannot stay in on top of that. And so that leaves a very small number of hotels that you can stay in. And this was among them. This is a Spanish-operated hotel among them. Now, it's like five or six hundred people in the delegation. If you go just by yourself, you can try to find what's a Casa Particular, like a... An Airbnb. Not an Airbnb, obviously, because that... Right. But a version of it. Now, you can't book it online. You can't book it with a credit

card. The telephone, an internet service is very spotty. So good luck in 24 to 48 hours, you know, finding five or 600 of these for a giant delegation. It's not serious. The only thing you can do is stay in a hotel. Also, the Cubans want you to stay in these hotels to bring cash into the economy. Now, so there it is. Like, you don't like that that's where we stayed. Change the law so that we can stay in any hotel that we want and we'll stay in a cheaper hotel. Although, if you have the money, as an American, it's actually better that you stay in a more expensive hotel because you're then pumping more money into the economy. Their second complaint is about the act that hotels have generators that stay on. Now, the hospitals also have generators.

And the generator, and we can get into that. They are, the hospitals are deeply, deeply struggling. In February, the Trump administration introduced a new policy that said it is okay for private businesses on the island of Cuba to import oil. while it is not okay for anybody affiliated with the government. Famously, the hospitals are publicly run in Cuba, if you weren't familiar with that. And so it is okay according to the U.S. government. And that's not just from the U.S. that's from Mexico. That's from Russia, China.

We're trying to block oil from getting in to the hospitals from any country, not just us. but if you want to send it to a private business, that is okay with us. C-10, Reuters just reported, and I've been saying this, I'm telling you this, again, you guys never believe me. I'm telling you the truth. So Reuters reported this morning, actually, exclusive. U.S. ramps up fuel exports to Cuba's private sector. This is C-10. So if you read the article, there are as many thousands of barrels, not enough, but many thousands. thousands of barrels of and diesel in particular, which is what they use for the generators, that the U.S. is allowing to be sold to private businesses.

So I want people to sit with this for a second. The critique that the New York Times elevated, that the free press pushed, that a lot of these like right-wing Cuban defenders were pushing around, Cuba policy defenders were pushing, was that it is bad that the hospital had, I mean that the hospital did not have power, hospitals did not have power, and the hotel did. Okay, so that's the premise that the free press is operating under. I agree. I am now making the free press aware, because they apparently didn't read our reporting in February, and now Reuters is confirming what I'm reporting. Our American policy is that it's okay for the hotel to buy oil and diesel,

but it's not okay for the hospital to buy diesel. So if you spent the last three or four days yelling at me and Hassan Piker about the fact that the hotel has energy and the hospitals didn't, now that you know the truth, you have to be furious at the Trump administration. Because the Trump administration's explicit policy

is that hotels can buy. diesel, but hospitals cannot. Now, what they're really going to do is just ignore it and keep it moving because that is a morally indefensible policy. It is barbaric, it's uncivilized, it's cruel, it's disgusting. There's just no world in which anybody is going to take the other side of the argument that, no, actually I think it's good. It's good vetty hotels. get diesel, but the hospitals can't. It may have, that may have had a lot more cash with the American public in the early stages of nuclear weapon capacity when people were, like, you had school kids getting under their

desks preparing their potential nuclear lines. Cuba's going to have the Soviet bombs. Well, yeah, so C-7. Let's put C-7 up on the screen. If you want a little flashback that's very, very current, this is a report in the New York Times. Look at this headline, by the way. let's just let's just let this marinate in our race for a second. Yeah, no, it's incredible.

Russian oil shipment puts focus on Kremlin's post in Cuba. This is the New York Times headline. Then the lead is a Russian oil. Yeah, yeah, go for it. Let's just like sit with this headline for a second. It's such a window into our world. It's incredible stuff. Russian oil shipment.

So there's a Russian oil shipment that is headed to Cuba. It should be there in a few days that the U.S. is trying to stop. They're threatening it. apparently there's a naval escort that Russia is sending with it. So according to New York Times, what the Russian oil shipment puts in the, for the focus on, is not the fact that there's no fuel on the island and that the U.S. in an act of war and a crime against humanity is blocking the island from getting fuel. That's not what the Russian shipment puts the focus on. It puts the focus on a defunct spy base.

Well, so I thought were you going with this? First paragraph. Well, yeah, the lead here is a Russian oil tanker possibly bound for Cuba is highlighting a key U.S. security concern. The communist silence ties to foreign adversaries who use Cuba to spy on the United States. That lead is just straight out of like 1962. Incredible. And to the point we were just getting at about whether it's worth making the Cuban economy scream, that was from like 73.

That was Allende when Kissinger said that to Nixon. That was, people were on a daily basis utterly terrified of, imminent nuclear annihilation. And listen, I still think that's a fear that we gloss over way more than we probably should. But it is not 1962 anymore. Cuba has, yes, turned to Russia and China. There is, I think, real evidence that Russia and China have bases, have outposts. Probably is a good way to put it. They have embassies too. Yeah. But they also, like, are they probably using, are they probably monitoring the United States, like launches in Florida, space launchers in Florida? Yeah, from Cuba. Yes, absolutely. Cuba has been pushed repeatedly into the arms of

Russia and Cuba, despite what we're always constantly told is that the Cuban people are freedom-loving. Many of them are, whatever that means. Many of them don't like the regime. They're people in jail, and I don't know if you had any reporting when you're on the ground about this, Ryan. As the politician who was arguing against you all was saying, there are artists, there are activists who have been in jail since the July 11th. What was that 2021? Yeah. There have been people who have been in jail, rotting in jail longer than that for practicing political speech or being artists who oppose the regime.

It's about a thousand at this point. Political prisoners is the number that I see. Mm-hmm. And, you know, it's the repeated insistence on this pattern over and over and over again. When you see that it drives a place like Cuba that could potentially be a partner further and further towards Russia and China. I thought where you were going with it is that Trump also, this is another New York Times headline,

removes sanctions on Russia to help oil flow amid Iran conflict. That's what I thought when we were talking about the first headline. You can buy and sell Iranian oil. You can buy and sell Russian oil. You just can't allow Russia to sell oil to Cuba. Just amidst an obvious, well, as Cuba continues to rely more on Russia, in China. If you think that's good for the United States, it makes no sense. Right. And so what does that look like on the ground? So we were there Friday through Monday.

On about a little more than a week ago, there was a complete nationwide blackout. Like used to be in a line in the recently 11 million people. It's now about 9 million because of the economic strangulation. And it's now, it's now, it's now legal for people to just leave Cuba if they can find somewhere that they can go. And so millions of people have gone to, the U.S., Mexico, Paraguay, Uruguay, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, et cetera. And so we're down to something like 9 million people. So 9 million people plunged in the darkness a little more than a week ago. Got the grid back up.

So then on Friday night when we were there, there were partial and very significant blackouts all over Havana. And let me tell you, walking through a city without lights is a truly surreal experience. To be able to look up in Havana and see the big dipper is it's a mind-bending experience. With buildings looming over you. It's still a very safe city. It's less safe than it was six months ago. But the social cohesion is strong. You took an amazing picture.

We can probably start rolling these, right? C-8. Yeah, we can roll, I think it's C-8. You took an amazing picture in the middle of Havana. Yeah, we can roll, yeah. Oh, my gosh. That's actually March and Hassan there. So that one is in a hospital.

That is a, that's urine from an 11-year-old's collected, but it's not in a urine bag. It's like a separate, it's like a different kind of bag. It's just, it's a recycled saline bag. The completely closed gas station there. This is a boy on a ventilator who we interviewed his mother, who you can see to the, to the left there. Luckily, his ventilator had a battery. So when the power went out,

his ventilator didn't shut down, but the monitor connected to it shut down. So they had to rush in and, you know, do a lot of kind of manual checking of vitals and otherwise make sure that he was getting the proper amount of ventilation. And so Friday night, there's a partial blackout. Most of Havana goes down, but the grid didn't completely collapse. And so, What the grid is designed to do is protect the healthcare system first and foremost. And so what was interesting is that the, and I was walking around with a Cuban journalist who was explaining this to me and pointing it out, the block of houses around every hospital compound had lights and the hospital had lights because they protect the hospitals foremost. Let's put second element up on the screen, VO. you can see the blackout here.

And I think this one is from Saturday night, which ended up being a complete blackout. But so what it's had this interesting effect of like, if you happen to live within a certain distance from a hospital, you're now super lucky because I don't know what hotel that is. That's not the one we were at. So because if your house is right next to the hospital, you keep your, keep your, keep your. power on. Now, Saturday, Saturday morning, because they have now plus 20 plus percent of their energy is coming from solar power, energy kick back on Saturday morning, then around 7.30 on Saturday night, complete and total nationwide blackout, not just the partial blackout. So when there's a total blackout, everything goes down. And then generators kick in. The little fuel that the Cuban government

has, they prioritize to the hospitals. And so all the hospitals have generators. But there is a gap between when the power goes out and when the generator kicks back in, just obviously. Like, anybody can understand that. That is fine. Like in a hotel, like we saw the power go in and out, you know, pretty frequently, actually, even in the hotel. But then it would kick back on. that's fine in a hotel. That's not fine in a hospital. And so we, on Sunday morning, I went with actually the Truonon guys

were there as well. Hassan had gone with us on Saturday of the hospital. He was gone by Sunday. Was the government organizing the tour of the hospital? Well, the government is... They run the hospital. The government runs the hospital. Belly of the Beast, which is a U.S.-based

nonprofit news organization that has reporters in Cuba, they set up the interviews with the hospital. They're really helpful. And they have to be approved. Everything has to be approved by the government. And the visas, I imagine, too. I know that there are a lot of Cubans who say, like, well, maybe exiles or the like who say, you know, we can't get into Cuba.

And so it wasn't arranged by the government, and the government was not there. There was no government minored. But the government had to approve going in. You can't just walk into hospital. In fact, you can't just walk into a hospital here in the United States. But you felt comfortable asking what you wanted to ask. Not only that, they showed us the place in total disrepair. Like I saw some people saying, oh, they only got showed the best parts of Cuba.

That's not at all what the government is doing right now. They are not pretending for a second that things are great. Maybe they were doing that 10 years ago. It's only showing you the good stuff. We were at William Solera on Sunday. We're at Williams-Solera, Pediatric Hospitals. one of the crown jewels, they were not at all sugar-coating it. Like, they were showing...

This is C-6. Yeah, how absolutely, you know, brutal things have got. Look at that. And so this is Dr. Alio Fernandez, who's one of the top pediatric doctors at this hospital. That is a baby named Eric who's on a ventilator. And what he's describing is this list, like, absolutely terrifying situation where when the power goes out he and the nurses

and that's Liz Olivia Hernandez from Fernandez from Bailey the Beast who was there with me what he was so the power goes out they turn on their flashlight immediately on their phone

and then sprint to the babies and the children who are on ventilators and crank it and just and hand crank it but and the doctor was telling me he's like I'm going to need the surgery for a heart attack as this keeps happening because you have you're you're very nervous that you're going to over pump because you can kill someone by you know pumping too hard that that is that happens

um you can kill them by not pumping enough and it takes anywhere from a minute to five six minutes for the generator to to kick on and after the generator kicks on then you know it doesn't just fire right up like you've got it has to these are 20 plus year old devices. Right. It's obviously not top of the line contemporary stuff. And then you have to monitor constantly while they're going. They did not lose anybody. They were very proud. They have not lost anybody as a result of the as a result of the blackouts at this hospital. They said that their patients, many of which

we met and their parents, they've definitely seen deterioration that they've moved, you know, downward in stages, and many of them are more critical now, but haven't died yet. There were rumors that people in other hospitals died in the gap between the power kicking off, the generator kicking on. I haven't been able to independently confirm that. We'll have more reports on this as we collect more of our video and continue to do interviews on it. But there's no question that it is extraordinarily dangerous to the children. And also, we also saw the way that the sanctions and block and embargo make it extremely difficult

to get supplies. We met one woman who had just had facial reconstruction of surgery where she had waited for a very, very long time for this $80 screw. And finally, a doctor that we interviewed was able to get a friend of his who, lives in the United States who was visiting to buy the screw and just bring it with him. And that's how that woman got her surgery. We met a boy, Carlos and his mother, who has cystic

fibrosis, which is eminently treatable for the most part. I think of the right kind of cystic fibrosis disease, but he couldn't, he can't get the medication. And he's going to die if he doesn't get that medication. Now, I'm hoping to have actually a really positive update on that kid. The people, I'll wait on that until it's confirmed. But this is how these folks are trying to survive. It's like just luck and like ingenuity and like, oh, I know somebody who knows somebody who knows somebody who can get this thing. And so the, I also interviewed Mitchell Valdez Sosa, who is the head of the Cuban Center for Neuroscience. And it was an hour long interview.

We'll put up the whole thing at some point. But I do want to play one little clip where he describes their efforts to buy an MRI machine and keep it operating amid sanctions. And he added that since fuel shipments have been cut off, Helium has not been able to get in either. Now, Qatar, a bunch of their helium production has been taken offline. So what they're suffering, a lot of the world is going to suffer. MRI machines require cold helium.

But let's roll a little bit of Mitchell Vadososa, who actually, interestingly, is an American citizen because he was born in Chicago in the 50s, but he's been in Cuba since the early 1960s. early 1960s. So this is a couple minutes with Valdez Sosa. You were telling me earlier before we started talking about an MRI machine. Yeah. So how is that working in coordination with the lack of electricity? Yeah, yeah. And how did you get it? What we're thinking of, first, MRI systems are very expensive, but they're really very useful. So we had an interesting opportunity. There was this bank,

that gave us a soft credit line. You know, something we can pay over the years with a long period of payment and very low interest. And so we took advantage of that in our organization. We bought equipment for different centers, and we bought an MRI system from Germany that had to wait about seven months after the manufacturer, so they received certification that it didn't have 10%. More than 10% of American components. But we managed to get the system to cube.

But the problem is that MRI systems, which are really necessary, imagine a kid with meddle bostoma, this is a kind of cancer, the spinal card. Surgeon has to know if it's present, the size, has metastases. This is all part of the, it's life or death for the kid. And so many other disorders. So the only thing we needed is to fill up with helium, which is used to liquid helium to cool, because MRI systems work at very low temperatures. The magnets are called superconductors, which means they're cooled, and when they're cool, very,

very low temperatures, there's practically no resistance, no friction for the electrons in circulating that creates a very strong magnet. The problem is we've bought the helium and ships are afraid to come to Cube. This was after President Trump said that he would block oil. And we're trying to get one of these ships that's bringing donations, humanitarian donations, the Cuban would bring it because most of the MRI systems in Cuba are old. It's very difficult getting spare parts. And we know that our system, once we set it up, which is brand new,

We'll probably be doing a lot of heavy lifting for all the hospitals around us. The Children's Hospital in Marianau, the big hospital for blindness and other disorders of vision, Pando Ferret, which is also in Marianas, and polyclinics and we had a previous system, and the story is very funny, because we received a donation from the University of Maastricht.

Why? They got money to buy these new scanners. And in an international conference, my twin brother, who's also a neuroscientist, was giving some talks at the conference and he talked with this professor from a master's university saying, we don't know what we're going to do with the old sister. Give it to us. And we got some money from a charity. And we brought this system, it was very old. but we kept it working almost eight years.

We saw thousands of patients. But it was impossible because once a system is too old, it breaks down. You have to put helium, which costs a lot in every few months. And we got this opportunity. We bought the new system. So we're bringing it to, the heat up to Cuba, we're finding how. We don't know how. Humanitarian convoy.

Let's see. But then the problem is you can't. We can't have an MRI scanner without electricity. So now we're launching a campaign to receive donations similar to what we did with the ventilators in COVID. And we're going to have some friends that are trying to collect money and we want to buy a generator and we want to buy oil tech. Meanwhile, Nick Turs over at the Intercept is reporting that the Pentagon has revealed the attacks in Latin America are just beginning with, quote, Operation Total extermination and Trump's threats against Cuba, expect more U.S. military strikes in the region.

TERS report. So you go read that full report over at the Intercept. Now, Operation Total Extermination looks technically like it's referring to the Naboa operation in Ecuador. But if you look at the testimony in the House Armed Services document that TERS links to, it says the joint effort named, quote, Operation Total Extermination, referring to what happened in Ecuador, is the start of a military offensive by Ecuador against transnational criminal organizations with the support of the U.S.,

setting the pace for regional deterrence-focused operations against cartel infrastructure throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. So whether or not they're going to apply, quote, Operation Total Extermination just to cartels in Ecuador, or it'll be more broadly interpreted as, you know, even including Cuba as part of Latin America,

we will see, but certainly escalating. by the day. And did you see the New York Times report, by the way, this one here? Yes, I did. So the New York Times sent reporters out to go to them for them, give them their flowers when they deserve it, to the site of a U.S. bombing in Ecuador that they had said was a drug cartel training camp or something. Turns out it was a dairy farm. Total extermination. Yes. And so remember this when they're telling you that their intelligence on boats is 100% rock solid. If they can't

nail down their intelligence on an immobile dairy farm, like why are we so sure that they're exactly right about all of these boats that are moving around? Separately, Naboa? Just Google Daniel Naboa drug trafficker. His family, he's the sign of this banana export business, their boats are constantly getting found

to be stashed with cocaine. Yeah. This is the president of Ecuador who we are allegedly teaming up with to do a drug eradication campaign. I'm starting a team.

It's going to be Juan Orlando Hernandez, Daniel Naboa, and Buckele. Drug war. Yeah. Yes. Canadian women are looking for more. More to themselves, their businesses,

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As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Ladies and gentlemen, breaking news at Americopa County as Laura Owens has been indicted on fraud charges. This isn't over until justice is served in Arizona. Listen to Love Trapped Podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Ryan, you went on Newsmax just last night on Rob Schmidt's show,

and he asked you basically to defend this trip we've been discussing. So Juan David Rojas pointed out, He posted a really, I thought that he put it really well. He reports for Compact and other news outlets from all over Latin America. You probably remember him having been on the show several times. He says, Earth to anti-imperialist fundamentalists. This is the most honest and effective way of advocating for the Cuban people. Ryan doesn't talk about, quote, participatory democracy or the regime's righteousness.

He talks about the real world consequences and double standards of our despicable policies. Better yet, he asks how any of this benefits Americans. method is so effective, the interviewer concedes multiple times. One David adds, the difference between Ryan and Piker or Ben Norton is his first, second, and third priorities are Normy Cubans, not the PCC oligarchy staying in power. Ryan, I do feel as though you, maybe it's your reporter background, are very careful in how you cover Cuba. And I thought that came out in this conversation with Rob Schmidt, where nowhere do you ever,

or did you and your reporting from Cuba defend the regime, which is a very easy. thing not to do. I will defend the quote-unquote regime in the sense of when I think they're being unfairly criticized. The media is getting a story wrong. Yeah, right, exactly. But if you consider that to be like a defense of imprisoning a thousand political prisoners, that's not the same. Right. And also, it's important to just understand the reality of who is actually causing the suffering. It is the sanctions, it's the embargo blockade, the state sponsor of terror designation. In this interview, we didn't get into kind of the details of it.

But as you saw from the last segment, like Cuba is, you know, blocked from, you know, purchasing MRI machines for the most part. Or getting helium to keep their MRI machines running. They can't buy anything that has a minimum of 10% of U.S. parts in it. even when they end up buying, they bought a 3D printer to try to get around this so that they could produce medical supplies, these unique medical supplies that people needed. It broke down. The German company said they can't send a tech out because of the U.S. sanctions.

And they said, actually, that's not true. Like, there's an EU law that says, and Michel Valde Sosa relayed this story to me. He was on the phone with the vice president. He said, there's an EU law that says you're not allowed to follow U.S. sanctions. Yeah. Because it's EU sovereignty means that you have to make your own decisions. You cannot be driven by U.S. sanctions. And the guy told him, yeah, I know that law is on the books.

We do a lot of business with the United States. We don't do much business with Cuba. I'm sorry that you bought a million dollar 3D printer from us. We're not going to be able to fix it. And so it's just sitting there collecting dust. So we didn't get into a lot of those details about the way that the sanctions and the embargo play a, play a primary driver of the emiseration of the island.

But the point I did make to him is if you think that's not true and the system is so flawed and unable to succeed, right. Let it try. And make inroads with them so they don't turn to Russia and China. And there you go, yeah. And it's a, yeah,

we don't have to keep doing it. Also, yeah, I haven't seen Schmidt calling for regime change in Saudi Arabia over. Like, the human rights abuses and the lack of democracy in Saudi Arabia make Cuba look like Switzerland. Well, this is a great back and forth. I think it draws out some important contrast. So without further ado, Ryan on newsbags. Dropside news reporter Ryan Grimm also traveled to Cuba as well, reporting on all this.

He's seen in this photo here. And Ryan joins us tonight. And it's good to have you back on the show. The Trump administration is trying to end a 70-year regime. It looks like these guys, along with you there, are trying to help it survive. Am I missing? something? Wait, there's trying to do what? Trying to help this regime survive. Who is? Piker, most of the people there. I'm wondering if yourself along with them are included in that. Yeah, the group that went along brought about 50 tons worth of medical supplies and solar panels. That's right. Medical supplies and solar panels. And a lot of sympathies for the regime that controls the country, I imagine. So let me try to help out your viewers a little bit here.

How do you feel about the fact that when Americans travel to a foreign country, in this case, Cuba, they are told specifically a list of hotels that they are allowed to stay in in another country? I went through it because when I went and stayed there, it was the same I stayed in an Airbnb. I think if you have a, if our country is trying to squeeze, what do you think of that? I think our country is trying to end a regime that's been torturing people for very long time and they don't want to fund it. They don't want us funding it by paying money to a communist-owned entity like a hotel. So if their system of government is so awful, why not just let it fail on its own? Why do we have to blockade them? Because they won't leave.

They don't have elections. They won't leave power. How do you think the United States economy would do if we cut off fuel for three straight months? No fuel has basically gotten into Cuba since the Venezuela operation. Yeah, but I was there in 2019. Ryan, and it was still a horribly impoverished country. But we're cutting off fuel to try and get this leadership out. Get them the hell out of there because they won't leave.

They won't have an election. They won't leave. Why do you want to, why do you, why do you care about, like, who's, who's in charge in Cuba? Who, like, who elected you to do that? It's such a bizarre, like, there aren't enough problems of the United States here for you to worry about. That's, that's another side of it.

Like, I can't even get my mind to a place where I would think it's my call. Like, who runs Cuba, who runs Haiti, who runs Mexico, who runs Mexico, who runs. who runs Iraq, who runs Iran, like, who runs Israel? That's a fair criticism. That's a fair criticism. But do you think it's better for it? Do you want this regime to continue to run this country against the wishes of the people that are all impoverished? It's not up to me.

I live in Washington, D.C. I vote in Washington, D.C. elections, and I vote in federal elections. Where do you live? You live in Hawaii? That's fair. Where do you live? I live in New York. Why should you vote? Why should you, look, what do you have to do with Cuba? Well, I think the prosperity of that country that's only 90 miles away from our border can't be a bad thing.

And I'm just saying, what I'm asking you is, okay, then why not let them import oil? It's fine. It's not, it's not America first. Let's put it there. But do you think that that regime should be running the country? Why does it bother you if Mexico sells oil to Cuba? You live in New York. In what world is it a New Yorker's responsibility to stop Mexico from selling oil to Cuba? That's, okay, fair criticism right there. My question of you is, why did you travel there? If you don't care, why did you travel there to try and support the regime? I'm a journalist and the United States is literally killing people.

Like, we are killing people. I toured two hospitals. One was a pediatric hospital. Yep. We implemented a new rule in February that says that if you're a private business, you can import oil. You can import fuel. So the hotel where we were required to stay is allowed.

by the United States government to have fuel. Hospitals, because they have a publicly run health care system, are not allowed to have fuel. I heard a lot of people complaining that the hotel still had power, but the hospitals did you not understanding, apparently, that it is a U.S. rule that blocks the hospitals from getting fuel. I tore at the pediatric hospital. You know what the nurses and doctors there told me?

They said, when the power goes out, they immediately turn on their phone lights. and race to the babies on ventilators. Let me ask you this. Because there's a gap between the time. Hold on. I understand. There's a gap between when the power goes out and when the generator kicks in,

that can be up to like five or six, seven minutes. A baby can die in that time on a ventilator. So they have to take their phone, turn the light on, race and hand pump the ventilator. All because the United States has decided that Mexico can't sell oil and fuel to Cuba. What does that have to do with the United States? That's fine. If you want to say it's not American first, that's fine. But let me ask you this.

How many tens of thousands of people have died over the last 30, 40 years as this country has lived in extreme poverty? 88% of the people live in extreme poverty, the government will not allow any kind of capitalism in to bring these people up, to bring the quality of life up. How many thousands and thousands of their own people has that government killed? We're trying to strangle out a government here. And yes, there's going to be ancillary, there's going to be some negative impact. of that like you just described, that's fair. But you've, I mean, how many people have died

because of the government in power? I interviewed the number three guy in Cuba. I will let you have the interview. You can air the entire thing. He said Cuban nationals, Americans are welcome to invest in Cuba. He said they are open to in a holistic negotiation, compensating Americans for property that was seized during the revolution. What they want is... Right. What they want... No, they offered that in the 1960s.

The United States refused it because we thought we were going to do regime change. So why take a deal if we're just going to do regime change? Well, let me... We didn't overthrow the government. We failed over and over and over. We tried to assassinate Fidel Castro, like a dozen plus times.

We tried an invasion Bay of Pigs. It didn't work. Every other country, Italy, France, Spain. They all took compensation for what was nationalized. So they're saying you can invest here. We will compensate you for what was nationalized. All we're asking is that you lift the sanctions and leave us alone. Leave the regime alone.

Leave Cuba alone. Leave the regime alone and let the people continue to suffer. I mean, did you see the people there? The misery of the people that live in that country under these A-holes? It's horrific. The misery is like unspeakable. Unspeakable. It's unspeakable.

It's unspeakable. Been that way for a long time. It's a lot worse. The people who were there in December and people who obviously live there telling me, like, it's noticeably worse. You know how you have people, like starvation and homelessness

wasn't really a thing. Like there was poverty. It wasn't like a rich country. Yeah. But, you know, even a few months ago, 90% of the people live under $2 a day. I mean, that's nobody in America lives under $2 a day. Not a single person.

I got to leave it there. I really do. You're a good sport for coming on. Ryan Graham from Dropside News. You got it. Good to see you. Ryan, my favorite part of that clip is the picture of you guys outside the hospital where Newsmax circled your faces like it was a true crime documentary.

Incredible. It was like your face and Hassan's face. You can almost hear the music that would be playing in the true crime documentary there. That was good stuff. Good stuff. I agree with one. So I'm glad that Rob Sprint had you on. Sure.

This is a fun conversation. Always happy to go on Newsmax. Yes. Well, I'm sure they'll have me back, right? That was kind of a good TV for them. I thought it was great TV. All right, let's talk about A-PAC. Canadian women are looking for more.

More to themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world are out of them. And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast. I'm Jennifer Stewart. And I'm Catherine Clark. And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women. Entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers, all at different stages of their journey. So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us. Listen to the Honest Talk Podcasts on I Heart Radio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

I became a millionaire overnight but lost everything that actually mattered. Wait a minute, Sophia. Did you just say he lost everything? That's right. It's inheriting too much drama week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, I just inherited a fortune after losing my mom, and now my girlfriend's entire family is coming out of nowhere with their hands out. One sibling wants me to fund their whole lifestyle. Another vanished for four years and suddenly reappeared. And my girlfriend is already giving my money away. Hold on, Sophia. So the girl he wants to marry is already sending money out the door.

And that's just the beginning. He makes a plan, sets up a trust, and finally thinks he has everything under control. Okay, so things work out then? Let's just say the people he trusted the most are the ones who ended up shocking him the most. So does the money end up being worth going through all that? To find out, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. guess. In 2023, former bachelor star Clayton Eckerd found himself at the center of a paternity scandal. The family court hearings that followed revealed glaring inconsistencies in her story. This began a years-long court battle to prove the truth. You doctored this particular test twice in

someone's, correct? I doctored the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to crack the case. I wanted people to be able to see what their tax dollars were being used for. Some like, the greatest disinfected. They would uncover a disturbing pattern. Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg Alespian and Michael Marantini. My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young.

This is Love Trap. Laura, Scottsdale Police. As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Ladies and gentlemen, breaking news at Americopa County as Laura Owens has been indicted on fraud charges. This isn't over until justice has served in Arizona. Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your

podcasts. So if you want to know where the center of the Democratic Party is, it's always useful to study Gavin Newsom. And he has gotten himself into a very interesting pickle when it comes to his posture towards APEC and to Israel. You might remember when a friend of the show, Van Lathen had him on, he was like, you're going to take AAC money. He just kept saying, that's an interesting question.

Interesting that you would ask it. thought about that before. Interesting, interesting. He's now saying he won't take A-PAC money. He recently said that Israel is an apartheid state. And we should have had a timer up, counting down the days or minutes until he walked that back. We can end that timer at his lunch with Jonathan Martin of Politico. So Jonathan Martin asks him straight up about this, and this is Newsom's response. Do you consider yourself a Zionist? Do I consider myself Zionists? I believe, I revere the state of Israel.

I'm proud to support the state of Israel. I deeply, deeply oppose B.B.N. Netanyahu's leadership, his opposition to the two-state solution, and deeply oppose how he is indulging the far right as it relates to what's going on in the West Bank. You were using the word apartheid to describe it. I used it. I do in this context that I said it and I referenced why I used it, a Tom Friedman, a hard. article in that same sentence where Tom used it in the context of the direction that BB is going. Not the current state.

Correct. Okay. And that is a legitimate concern I have that I share with Tom that that direction, if that vision and that direction of the far right that B.B. is indulging. That if they see the full annexation of the West Bank, then that's not something. That's a word you may hear others use. So, Emily, the reason I say that this is an interesting pickle is because it's a real test of whether an obviously very talented politician can play both sides on this question.

I think the answer is going to be no and that even the most talented gymnast, you know, can't stretch this far. Because the question of apartheid itself is like, is interesting. It's like, if you are a Palestinian born in the West Bank, you have, there's certain laws about whether or not you can vote, you can't, who you can marry, where you can move if you get married, what what your travel is, where you can work. If you are arrested, you go to military courts. If you are Jewish, an Israeli citizen born in the West Bank, you have civilian courts, you can marry and move, you can, you have free travel restrictions, like you can drive on different roads. Like, it's apartheid. The only way that they get around saying it's not

apartheid is, well, they don't have legal control of the West Bank. They're just, they're occupied. it and they have basically they exercise sovereignty over it, but we don't recognize that the West Bank is part of Israel yet. So therefore, it's not part of the state. So therefore, technically, it's like, good luck trying, but more to the point. Well, also, and if you're Jewish, you do have privileges about whether you can be a resident and come and move to Israel and the like. Right. Exactly. Sure. Yeah. Which is, I mean, I think there are important distinctions because usually when people here apartheid, it's used to invoke South Africa. And there's a distinction, of course, being that there are Palestinian members of the Knesset, Muslim members of the Knesset. There are, there's,

it's not exactly South Africa, but there are also distinctions where you see people being treated differently on the basis of religion and ethnicity. And the big problem for Gavin Newsom, correct me you think I'm wrong here, is that people don't think he believes anything. Now, I think, people, a lot of Democrats who believe that, are still willing to support him if they think that his new positions that he's claiming to believe are something that he'll fight for. You know what I mean? They're beyond caring even if, like, he has a soul or if he believes in these things. But just show me that you'll fight for whatever you're claiming you believe in now. And he's going to be forced to waffle back and forth on this through the entire campaign if he's, you know, he's going to be forced to waffle back and forth on this

through the entire campaign if he is unwilling to make a stand. And so this thing of like, oh yeah, it's apartheid, but it's not. I regret saying that. Is just going to make him look like a 1990s-era politician who just doesn't believe in anything. And I think it's going to be a major problem for him.

Yeah, because when you imagine this out in the campaign trail, Iowa, South Carolina, New Hampshire, you're talking to people at fairs and at pancake breakfasts, and you are going to be in a Democratic primary in 2028 every single day in and out, but rated with this question. Does it backfire and some, you know,

normie voters get sick of it? Maybe, but you need the party's grassroots. You need the base and to show up for you in a small state like New Hampshire or Iowa. So he's gonna have to, I mean, this is his best answer right now. You can see it how he kind of repeats the question. Right, he's like, he's ready to launch. Yeah.

Yeah, he's like, he's preparing his launch. And it's, this answer is clearly, like, well thought out from their campaign perspective or their strategic perspective. And even then, it's not going to cut muster when you're getting constantly hounded by people over and over again. And the smartphone videos are pinging around the internet. And Jennifer Welch has kind of driven a lot of this because these candidates, these mainstream candidates, keep coming on her program and getting pressed on this exact question. And let's jump to D4, where she had Corey Booker on. And you might remember this viral moment from the fall of 2025. And there's a reason we're showing you this.

So here's Welch and Booker. I'm one of a handful of people that don't take corporate PAC money. What about APAC money? You take APAC money, don't you? That's a minuscule percentage of my resources come from. I raise like 800,000. Yeah, but that's a lifetime number. When you did your 25-hour speech,

I was like, go, Corey. I love this. That is amazing. And then there's a photo shoot with you with Benjamin Netanyahu. And I was just like, what in the actual fuck? Like, how can he do that? It was heartbreaking. I felt betrayed.

I felt like it diminished your 25 hours. That's how it felt to me. Do you think he's a war criminal? Benjamin Netanyahu, do you think he's a war criminal? Again, these are questions that a lot of people think are the important litmus tests that are loaded and hot. My urgency is to be an effective. leader in bringing an end to this crisis. And I get these questions all the time that to me undermine my urgency. I think the thing that Democrats get so frustrated with, where we are right now,

where you see like the Zoron Mondanis and the grand platoners rise up, because they can go on podcast and you can say, do you think Benjamin Netanyahu's a war criminal? And they just say, yes. I love what a delightful collection of words that is coming out of us now. Yes. These questions undermine my urgency. I think he said underline. Oh, they underline? I think you say they underline his... It doesn't matter because the words aren't supposed to mean anything. They're just supposed to fill space. Yeah, don't worry about it.

You saw him backing away slightly from this. You put up D2, this hilarious picture that's circulated of when Cory Booker went to... There is. Cory Booker hiding behind a bunch of senators when he's meeting with Netanyahu. We did to him what they did to you on Newsbacks outside the Cuban Hospital. But this is a little bit fair because he actually does seem to be hiding back there. Yes. But now we can roll D2.

You, Cory Booker, guess what? Just like Gavin Newsom, he went from getting embarrassed in an interview to saying, you know what? Okay, I'm not taking A-PAC money. Now, what he smartly did is he rolled it out with this pledge that he's not going to take any PAC money, including APAC money. Smart. Now, when you're running for president, here's what people don't quite, you know, corporate PAC money is capped at, what, $5,000? $1. It's not much. If you're a House member,

for them, corporate pack money is helpful because you can rack up half a million of it very easily with a couple dinners in Washington, D.C. You get 100 corporations around, and they each give you five grand, boom, that adds up fast.

That's not enough for a presidential campaign. For that, you need billionaires or regular people. Cory Bookers, you know, needs billionaires, who are going to drop massive checks. So he can say no to corporate pack money running for president, and it's not actually going to hurt him that much.

And so what he's doing then is smuggling in. I'm also not going to take APEC money. Cory Booker is one of the lead champions of APEC's agenda in Congress over the years. For him to understand that it's too toxic to take is a watershed moment for APEC. I will say that. Now, let's put D5 up on the screen. Ryan, can you take us through this, the NBC News report here, APEC, Super PAC-funded Illinois group. We went through all of this after the results last week,

but there's a quote here. UDP was happy to support these local committees, along with Chicago donors, to make sure pro-Israel voices would have their voices heard, according to Patrick Dorton, to NBC News on Friday. What does that mean? And so UDP is United Democracy Project. That's Apex, Super PAC. You're like, what does that name mean, by the way? Because, according to them, Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East, and we are here, United States. We're a democracy. We are united democracies. And so that's where their super PAC name comes from. Just wanted to highlight this because in case there's anybody out there doesn't believe me, we've been reporting for many weeks that it was APAC money that was funneling through these,

what they call local committees. And those quote unquote local committees were, they're called elect Chicago women, affordable Chicago now and one other progressive something, something. There were fake pop-up packs that would then be funneled, that would then be funded by UDP, A-PAC super PAC, plus a bunch of A-PAC donors. And then you don't learn that officially until after the campaign is over. So ridiculous. And when we report, based on our sourcing and our just doing journalism about what's going on in Chicago, when we report,

Oh, no, this is actually APAC money. You get people saying that's bigoted and you're trafficking in tropes. And then after the campaign, they're like, oh, yeah, that was us. And with one of the races, they won the race with this candidate, Donna Miller. APEC put out a tweet saying,

big win for APEC. They had not endorsed her or admitted that they were even spending on her behalf. And still publicly then took credit for winning the race, which I feel like that, you can't do that. Like, okay, you won, we'll acknowledge it, but you don't get to claim, like, publicly,

you don't get to do with a victory lap. No, you would think. You would think. Now, speaking of victory laps, quite a scene down in the, I think it's the town of Palm Beach is included in this district. There's West Palm Beach.

There's the town of Palm Beach. There's Palm Beach itself. Last element here, headline from NBC News. Democrat flips Republican-held Florida a statehouse district that includes Trump's Mar-a-Lago. Emily Gregory, according

to NBC, quote, narrowly won the special election for the district Tuesday night, according to AP projections. Trump carried this district in 2024. Gregory got 51% of the vote to 49% for the Trump-endorsed candidate in that race.

I was just watching this come in on X last night. It had a lot of Dems feeling pretty good, Ryan. I think it's fun for them to just win Mar-a-Lago. Because Trump had won it by 11 points. Now they're going to do a ticky-tackey like municipal stuff. Run Mar-a-Lago to mess with them. Well, they can't. I mean, it would

have to go through the House. And another one, it's now official. It wasn't official last night, but it's in a Senate, a Republican Senate District 14. I don't know where that is. You know look it up. Democrats flipped that one, too. Guy Brian Nathan beat Josie Tom Cow

a Republican. So that had been, so They flipped, Democrats flipped two seats in Florida that had been Republican held before. I think the Republicans had won Trump's Mar-Lago seat by 11 points before. So, you know, if you're a republic, it's another sign of this roughly, you know, that's a 13-point swing that we've been seeing somewhere between 10 and 20 points in all these special elections. If that holds this Texas gerrymander where they put people, put Republicans in districts, where they kind of won by like eight, nine points, may go down as one of the funniest own goals ever, because what they've done is they redrew all these Texas districts

to actually now put them within reach for Democrats. Oops. Insane. All right, well, quickly, Ryan, let's go to AI Blackouts. We've got a guest coming in in just one moment. Some breaking news on this, by the way. According to Brian Metzger, as of just this morning,

Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasso-Cortez are planning to introduce the, quote, AI Data Center Moratorium Act at a 4 p.m. press conference over on Capitol Hill. So expect that to come down later today. But why might they be pursuing this? Well, one reason for Stellman, we can toss up on the screen here per Tom Winter over at NBC News. Electrical Grid, this is according to his NBC News report, quote, electrical grid at increasing risk of blackouts due to who's surging demand. And he asked, could there be blackouts in NYC? How serious is the threat nationwide? The fact that that that question is even being asked, Ryan, is all the evidence you need for why populists on the left might be considering introducing a moratorium on the data centers? And I'll look forward to people asking their phones. Grock, is it true that I'm in a

blackout caused by you? That is so dark. That is so dark. Let's take a look actually at this video from an interview that was done in Kentucky. Really recently, it was making the rounds. This is a Kentucky family being interviewed. I think this was the local news about a data center. Let's roll it. It's my way. I'll stay and hold and feed an Asian.

26 million doesn't mean anything. Some people might find it hard to understand how Delcia Bear can turn away a $26 million offer to buy some of her land until you spend a little time. with her walking the dirt road she grew up on and in the house her daddy built. My grandfather and great-grandfather and a whole bunch of family has all lived here for years, paid taxes on it, fed a nation off of it. So what do you say to the people who are in town that say, hey, this is going to bring jobs, this is going to bring economic prosperity? I say there are a liar and the truth ain't in them, is what I say. It's a scam. For Delcia,

scam or not, she says she's connected to her home like Scarlett O'Hara was in Gone with the Wind. As long as she was attached to that land, her spirit never would die. That's the exact same thing for me right here. As long as I'm on this land, as long as it's feeding me, as long as it's taken care of me, there's nothing that can destroy me if I've got this land. I actually just watched Gone with the Win again a couple of weeks ago. I'm not sure Scarlett O'Hara is the complete. comparison she wants to make in this case, but you see how deeply fell.

You know what, we'll allow it. Brian will allow it. In the interest of whatever, we'll allow it. Meanwhile, this is another one of these AI updates that just casually pops into the discourse, and it's so massive, you can't even do it justice through coverage. Because again, like, it's casual things that AI guys are saying. This is Jensen Wang of Navidio over with Lex Friedman. He says we've achieved AGI.

We could roll the clip. I think it's now. I think we've achieved AGI. You think you can't have a company run by an AI system like this? Possible. And the reason for that is you said a billion, and you didn't say forever. And so, for example,

it is not out of the question that a claw was able to create a web service, some interesting little app, that all of a sudden, you know, a few billion people used for 50 cents. The robots are now on our level, casual little. Now, he has his own motivations for saying that. Right, because he's the only guy making any money here because he's selling all these chips.

Everybody else is losing money. That's the new definition of AGI that you can make an app, like that an agent can make an app that people might like. Okay, I thought we were, I thought AGI was, supposed to mean something a lot deeper and more profound than that. But whatever. Yeah. Now, finally, about where this is going and again to the point about why Bernie and AOC are teaming up on this moratorium, which by the way, I get the thrust of the moratorium policy. I'm not necessarily advocating that that's the right thing or the wrong thing. I have to think

about it more, but you can see the politics of it from a country mile, why it's important for them to be on this side of the issue. And we can put the New York Times tar sheet up on the screen here. Young graduates face the grimmest job market in years. I don't know if they invoke grim and dendently, but listen to this. Copyright. The unemployment rate for college graduates, ages 22 to 27,

soared to 5.6% at the end of last year. That is, we are going back to, the New York Times has a chart included in this article. We're going back to roughly great recession levels. of unemployment for people with college degrees. And this is the spring, a lot of people right now looking for jobs, finding that they're probably hitting an impasse, hitting a wall.

In those searches, the Times article says that this is not necessarily, they say, although AI may be replacing some entry-level jobs on the margins, there's little evidence, it's the main culprit yet, but some of it is from this quote, low-hire, low-fire dynamics in the labor market, or most of it is what the Times report says

economists are convinced. On that note, what this is, tells us is next year, year after, what we can be looking at is low hire, low fire dynamics, and an AI, potentially an AI bloodbath of entry-level position. So what that actually is telling us is the worst may be yet to come. Right. And people expect that we're heading into very uncertain territory. And so as a result, they're not hiring. So that's, which it becomes a self-fulfilling thing. It's bleak. It's bleak. Even in China, by the way, I was looking at it up, They're seeing an increase too in unemployment among people in their 20s.

And so this is a trend that isn't unique to us. Yeah. Maybe they should do a little moratorium over there too. They don't have the same energy problems, though. They can fire away. On a similar note, let's break down some economic indicators. Canadian women are looking for more. More to themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world are at them.

And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the eating. Honest Talk podcast. I'm Jennifer Stewart. And I'm Catherine Clark. And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women. Entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers, all at different stages of their journey. So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us. Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on IHartRadio or wherever you listen to your podcasts. I became a millionaire overnight, but lost everything that actually mattered. Wait a minute, Sophia. Did you just say he lost everything? That's right. It's inheriting too much drama week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, I just inherited a fortune after losing my mom, and now my girlfriend's

entire family is coming out of nowhere with their hands out. One sibling wants me to fund their whole lifestyle. Another vanished for four years and suddenly reappeared. And my girlfriend is already giving my money away. Hold on, Sophia. So the girl he wants to marry is already sending money out the door. And that's just the beginning. He makes a plan, sets up a trust, and finally thinks he has everything under control.

Okay, so things work out. Let's just say the people he trusted the most are the ones who ended up shocking him the most. So does the money end up being worth going through all that? To find out, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In 2023,

former bachelor star Clayton Eckerd found himself at the center of a paternity scandal. The family court hearings that followed revealed glaring inconsistencies in her story. This began a years-long court battle to prove the truth. You doctored this particular test twice in so-ins, correct? I doctored the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to crack the case.

I wanted people to be able to see what their tax dollars were being used for. Sunlight's the greatest disinfected. They would uncover a disturbing pattern. Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg, a lesbian, Michael Marantini. My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trap.

Laura, Scottsdale Police. As the season continues, news, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Ladies and gentlemen, breaking news at Americopa County as Laura Owens has been indicted on fraud charges. This isn't over until justice is served in Arizona. Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So the entire underpinning of the U.S.-run global economy is under threat by the Iran War. We put up this Reuters article talking about the, uh, the, uh, the radical of the foundations of the Gulf of Petro-Dolar, which would have extraordinary implications

for the U.S. economy and everybody else around the world. It's based significantly on a Deutsche Bank report that concluded, quote, the huge strategic importance of the Middle East to the dollar's role as the world's reserve currency should not be underestimated. The current conflict could test the foundations of the petro-dollar regime, unquote. Now, when Deutsche Bank had floated this as a risk of the looming conflict in Iran back in January, Treasury Secretary Scott Besson lashed out at them, basically saying, how dare you? Now that this is, now that the war has come to pass, we're seeing the Iranians allowing oil tankers to go through the Strait of Hormuz as long as they trade in Yuan. You're seeing, and you're seeing a lot of questioning of the value of the

relationship with the petrodollar effectively, Emily, you know, as you know, as you know, means the deal is these Middle Eastern countries, Saudi Arabia most particularly will sell its oil in dollars. We will offer them protection as a result of that. And with their dollars, they will invest that back in the United States and global economy in dollars, particularly buying U.S. Treasury bonds. So which allows us to keep our interest rates down and allows us to keep our debt load. at what it is. If that breaks down, you're looking at a completely different era for the U.S. and we put up F1, there had been some hope. Mortgage interest rates had been coming back down to Earth.

There was some hope that people who were locked into their mortgage would be able to start, would be able to sell, that people who have been waiting forever to buy a house would be able to buy. In the last couple weeks, we're now surging 7% again, you know, could be in sight if these trends continue, we're up over, back over 6%. And put up F2, people are not feeling so good about Donald Trump's handling of the economy. Man. If you're just listening to this, you're not getting to see the blood on this chart. It looks like Donald Trump's approval rating got hacked.

by Joe Biden. It's just straight down. And by Joe Biden. It shows his, Trump's approval of the economy finished in, at around 50%. Now, compare that to where he was in his first term. Look at that.

Yeah. Yeah, he used to be, people used to love him. Yeah. His handling of the economy, at least. Biden, it tanked under Biden, spiked at the beginning under Trump, and is now down to 29% of people approving

of the economy? I mean, this is a midterm year. This is a midterm year for Donald Trump. And he looks at the markets and he says, well, the markets are up. So that's the economy. What's wrong with voters, right? He keeps musing, what's wrong with the people?

What's wrong with the voters? And obviously, the American people are not feeling that the economy is good because the markets are good. So if you see it, the markets is the economy. That would be a very confusing figure. Right. Like, wait a minute, am I not messaging this right?

And, I mean, we can just go ahead and toss this element up on the screen. This is from the, well, actually, we'll save it. We talked about this earlier in the show, so we don't have to get back to it. But the New York Times new article that we talked about moments ago on the New York, on the college graduate situation. People are saying it's the uncertainty that's in the economy. It's not necessarily AI yet. Right. But Liberation Day, pedal to the medal on AI, this is just the first year.

Right. This is just the first year. Yeah, this is dark. And this is before the collapse, before the crash, that everybody knows is coming. Well, and remember when this was the Scott Bessent letter where he said, quote, Trump will pursue a weak dollar policy rather than implementing tariffs, weakening the dollar early in the second admin would make U.S. manufacturing competitive. A weak dollar in plentiful cheap energy could power a bull. boom. What? Are we, is this what we're witnessing? I don't know. I guess so. So to find out how

voters are thinking about this, let's bring in state representative, Chris Rob, who is running for Philadelphia's open congressional seat. Rob was recently endorsed by Justice Democrats, and so giving him a real shot in the arm in this kind of open race that has like, you know, 72 different people running for it. Because if you get elected to this Philadelphia seat, one of the most progressive probably bastions in the United States, you know, you're going to be, you know, people think if you get it, you're going to be in there.

It's going to be difficult to dislodge you. So State Representative Rob, thank you so much for joining us. My pleasure. And the election is in the middle of May. So this is coming pretty rapidly around the corner. in New York, Mayor Mom Dhani came up with this innovative idea, apparently, innovative in American politics, that he would actually talk about how difficult it is for people to live day to day and that people might respond to that.

It was kind of, people were like, that's crazy. You're going to talk about people's material concerns and you think they're going to respond to a politician. This is crazy. And now he's mayor. So since then, we've seen a lot of Democrats adopt his language around affordability, but not often connected to concrete ways that he's going to actually make your, that Democrats are going to make your life more affordable. So I'm curious, as this, as people have really come to the conclusion that this economy sucks,

what are you seeing on the campaign trail from people? And what is, what are you finding is resonating with this? them and what isn't? Well, sure. So I've been on the campaign trail for several months now. And it's a very unique moment for us in Philadelphia because it's the first time in 35 years that there's no incumbent on the ballot in this race, 35 years. So we literally have voters who are not born the last time there was no incumbent on the ballot.

It's also, like you said, the bluest congressional district nationwide of all 435 seats. It's number one. It is also an aggressively young district. So it's all within the city of Philadelphia. Over half of voters are millennials and younger. It is also a majority black district with a lot of ethnic diversity and a number of universities. So it is a unique space to be campaigning. And as someone who never takes corporate PAC money,

that's one of the first questions people ask, particularly folks who are on social media, because they see that there's a corrosive influence of money in politics, and they assume that any viable candidate, be they Democrat or Republican, is somehow mired in that system. And they are shocked and pleasantly surprised that I don't take corporate PAC money,

and that I've never taken it. And that also relates to how I message on issues that are of concern to people, because I have opponents who will not say, we should tax the ultra wealthy because they receive money from ultra wealthy insiders. They will not mention Gaza because they have support from folks who want the war in Iran.

And that's connected to the ongoing genocide in Palestine. There are folks who are not going to talk about Medicare for all in the most meaningful, meaningful ways because they're receiving money from folks who do not want universal health care in this country. And so people are finding that refreshing. It's Mondani put it on the map and did it masterfully. It also helped that there was ranked choice voting in New York, which I'm the prime sponsor of in Pennsylvania, and the Pennsylvania legislature, and also that there's public financing of elections, which is also huge,

which I think a lot of people appreciate because it reduces the influence of the way. wealthiest members of the donor class so that we can actually have races that are not pandering to folks closest to the Epstein class, essentially. So one of the, I think, questions that's always valuable to ask people who are out campaigning in the field is what are you hearing, I mean, this is a, as you mentioned, a very deep blue area. What are you hearing from voters and then how much do they care about the issues that you're hearing about? Because one of the big questions in a midterm cycle is how the coalition turns out on election day, how energized people are to go vote, whether it's the economy,

maybe for some people, it's Gaza, Iran. But what are you hearing about most and what is your sense about how deeply people are bothered by those issues? Yeah, so I think it's a twofold kind of view. One is, when I'm meeting folks for the first time, and they don't know anything about me, they want to kind of test how authentic I am. Right. So they'll say, do you take corporate PAC money? Assuming that I do because, you know, I'm viable. And it's like, no. And they're like, oh, all right. Where are you on a Palestine? I'm like, well, I believe there's an ongoing genocide in Palestine. And that needs to be addressed. And they're shocked that I even used the word. And then they'll say, well, what about ice? And I said, well, we should start with abolishing ice, but we should also dismantle the immigrant detention centers, which were born. out of bipartisan complicity. And that's when I pivot into talking about critiquing my own party, because I'm running in the Democratic primary. So while everyone likes to take shots at Trump, because it's so easy, unless and until we can hold our own party to account, it really doesn't

matter about anything else until we've done that. And so one of the things I do is I say, I am not an establishment Democrat. I've never been, even though I'm a five-term incumbent, I've never been endorsed by my own political party, even though I've received more votes than any state representative in Pennsylvania history because I'm an independent thinker who does not, I'm nobody's rubber stamp. And people seem to respond well to that in this moment because establishment politics is why we got here. Centrism is why we got here. And centrism is not going to be the solution for systemic issues that people are crying out

to be addressed in the most bold and humane ways. It's fascinating that they're going through these series of litmus tests to determine how anti-establishment you are, which is entirely fair. Right, it is because I think people are thinking, like, if you're not willing to say these basically obviously true things, then you're not going to fight on anything else. And in that respect, your race caught some national attention on the flip side when your lead opponent, Alas Stanford, made some extraordinarily, like, bizarre and eyebrow raising comments that went in the complete. opposite direction. We'll play it in a little clip here, which is actually from Sunrise Movement, Philadelphia, which has endorsed you. This is a climate group, but showing the kind of valence and the strength of the question of this genocide in Gaza for the sunrise movement, that seems to be a proxy as well for your willingness to fight on the climate. Because I think Tana Hussi

Coates said, you know, if you're not going to draw the line at genocide, how can I trust to fight for democracy? is true, I think, for everything else, climate included. So let's quickly, let's roll this sunrise clip here. If you're in Philly, you got to hear this. Aila Stanford, who's running to be our next congressperson, just compared using the word genocide to using the N-word. Acknowledging the fact that Israel has committed genocide against the Palestinians is not the same as using a slur that has been used to harm black people throughout this nation's history.

But I guess that's the kind of loyalty that over a million dollars, from pro-Israel groups can buy from you, huh? If you want the kind of candidate who has the courage to say, fuck APEC, well, then you'd be in good luck because the Sunrise Movement is supporting this dude, Chris Rab, who's running for Congress. And you can help us put him there by signing our Sunrise for Rab interest form or donating to his campaign. In order to get an uncompromised progressive leader in Congress, let's be APEC.

So has there been any fallout? For Stanford, for that comment saying, I don't want to describe what's going on in Gaza as the G word, because to me, that's for some people, that's too similar to the N-word. What has been the kind of reaction locally to that? I mean, it is such a bizarre and problematic statement. The response from Jewish people has been overwhelming. like, how dare you put, make us a monolith and conflate APAC with Judaism or Jewish identity? That's offensive to connect an actual genocide with a term used by white supremacists to dehumanize black people over centuries. Like, it is so deeply problematic.

But here's where it matters most. this super PAC 314 action on the surface is about empowering and supporting folks with the STEM background to run for Congress. Right. Right. But the reality is 314 action received millions of dollars from a United Democracy Project, which is a front group for APEC. But it's worse because the six Democratic physicians currently in Congress who are enduring, by the same Super PAC are not folks who are on the Medicare for All bill. They are not one of the over 110 co-sponsors of the Medicare for All Bill. And why does that matter? Because in this election,

in this campaign trail, rather, all of us claim to be for universal health care. But I'm the only one who says I would co-sponsor the Medicare for All bill, which is very different and it's very precise. And my opponent's not doing that. And if you have a super PAC that now has given over two and a half million dollars in support of her candidacy and their track record is only supporting Democrats, who are physicians who do not support Medicare for all, that's problematic. And that does not pass the smell test among folks who are outraged at this awful statement and also being funded by folks who are not human beings. Like, this should just, I only get money from human beings.

I'm old school that way. And I think that's important. People want to see that I'm not accountable to anyone but the people. And I remind people that my biggest donor is my mommy. And just to do a little back patting, 24, I did the reporting on this race in Oregon. Was it Oregon? No, Seattle, Washington. Seattle.

Where Maxine Dexter, who was now a member of Congress, was also a physician. was backed by this super PAC called 314 action, which backs doctors and scientists, or says they back doctors and scientists. I reported that, in fact, A PAC was using it as a shell to secretly funnel money in it because they opposed Susheila Jayapal, who was Pramilla Jayapal's sister. Primal JayaPaul had been critical of Israel. They didn't want her sister coming to Congress. They furiously denied it, called me all sorts of names, bigot, et cetera. and then after the election is over and she wins, they publicly have to now do their filing and it's,

oh, yep, it was A-PAC the entire time. And so now every time that 3-14 action jumps into these races in a significant way, people are asking, where did this money come from? And to me, because sometimes it's not A-PAC money with through 3-14 actions, sometimes it is, if they're putting in a huge amount, it's probably A-PAC money. Are they over a million for her at this point? Or what are they throw in?

I think it's over $2 million at this point. We're being inundated. And I can tell you from reporting on this group over the years, this is not a new group. 314's been around for a while. They're the kind of super PAC that usually comes in and spends low six figures in a race. Because while doctors and scientists are doing. doing well in the United States, they're the kind of people that will write five and ten thousand dollar checks. They're not, they don't own stadiums and baseball teams. And so they're

not the kind of people that can write multi-million dollar checks. So if they're spending two plus million dollars in this race, the chances that that's A-PAC money are very high because that it's outside of the pattern of what they've done over the years. Yeah. Anyway, were you going to say something? No, I just, I was kind of wondering in my own mind how Iran, the war in Iran has changed, if at all, the race. It seems like something that would shake things up. Good question, yeah.

It should. But only if you have, you show the nexus between what's happened in Palestine and the interest. Like, this is Netanyahu's war, right? This is Netanyahu's war. Trump is doing the bidding of Netanyahu. So if you support, if you have issues with Netanyahu, then you should have deep issues with what's happening in Iran. So everyone is against the war in Iran in this race, but they're not connecting the dots between the interests of folks who want to level Gaza and the folks who believe in regime change and do not believe in multilateral diplomacy, right? And that's a problem.

And that's what I'm trying to connect the dots for. The other thing is a lot of people are concerned about this, but they're also concerned about putting food on the table and, you know, filling up their gas tanks. And my job is to connect the dots to say every bomb we drop on civilians in Tehran is money that could go to free child care, you know, social housing, universal basic income, any number of these so-called radical ideas. that are adopted in other industrialized nations with far less financial wealth than what we have. And so that's how I connect the dots. And it's important. But there are opponents of mine who do not want those dots connected because they're going to be against the war in Iran, but therefore what Netanyahu is seeking to do in Palestine. And that is deeply problematic and hypocritical. Well, Chris Rab, thank you so much for joining us.

I appreciate we'll continue to follow this race. Thank you. I'm going to have to look at a little closer to see if we can nail down for certain whether this is APEC money going through 314. But appreciate you joining. My pleasure. That's going to do it for us on today's edition of Breaking Points. As a reminder, hit up breaking points.com for a premium subscription to support our independent

journalists to support journalists like Ryan Grimm going to Cuba. That ain't cheap. Actually, it was fairly cheap. $700 for three nights. Reasonable. That was like also the visa. You get breakfast. Whoa, you got breakfast.

The visa was $90. Oh, okay. That goes straight to Cuba. There you go. Well, please go to breaking points.com. Support the show. One of you, one breaking points premium sub pays for a visa. I was going to say, we were about to do the ASPCA.

Plus $10 left over. Yeah, we should zoom in on Ryan's face and have him like looking like a sad puppy. Buy me another visa. All right. Well, thanks so much. We'll see you on Friday for the Friday show, Premium Half the, the Friday show. Have a great afternoon, everyone. I became a millionaire overnight and lost everything that actually mattered.

Hold on, Sophia. Did you just say they lost everything after becoming a millionaire? That's right. And it gets worse. It's narrating too much drama week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This person writes, I just inherited a fortune after losing my mom, and now my girlfriend's entire family is coming out of nowhere with her hands out. And my girlfriend is already giving my money away. So the girl he wants to marry is already sending money out the door. Find out how it ends. Listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

In 2023, Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd was accused of fathering twins. But the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax. You doctored this particular test twice, Ms. Owens, correct? I doctored the test ones. It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern. Two more men who'd been through the same. thing. Greg, a lesbian, Michael Mancini.

My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. Laura, Scottsdale Police. As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey there, this is Josh from Stuff You Should Know with a message that could change your life. The Stuff You Should Know Think Spring podcast playlist is available now.

Whether spring has sprung in your neck of the woods yet or not, the stuff you should know, think spring playlist will make you want to get your overalls on, get outside, and get your hands in the dirt. You can get the stuff you should know think spring playlist on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.