Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 4/17/26: Iran OPENS STRAIT, Zohran Triggers Billionaire Crashout, College Grad Unemployment Apocalypse, AOC Flamed On Pelosi Replacement

Episode Date: April 17, 2026

The BP team looks at Iran opening the Strait of Hormuz in ceasefire agreement, Zohran triggering the rich in new Tax Video, and AOC giving a stumbling answer to a Drop Site reporter on who will replace Pelosi in California race. 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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Happy Friday, everybody. It is April 17th. How are we doing? We have an amazing show, don't we, folks? That's right. The effing straight is open apparently. F yeah. Crazy bastards. You crazy. Crazy bastards open the street. Praise me to Allah. Sensible bastards this weekend, or at least for now, the straight is open for the next 10 days or so during this Israel-Lebanon ceasefire. We also have a Zoran tax video that was released that became his most watch video of all time with a lot of haters that we're going to get into.

college grad unemployment prediction from Senator Mark Warner. He predicts it might hit 30% unemployment in the next two years. Look forward to that. There's a new vote that happened overnight with the War Powers Resolution. And we have a new clip of AOC who declines to endorse Shikot Chakrabati. That and more. Our former chief of staff is why that's particularly significant. Yes, exactly.

And we'll get into all of that and more on this Friday show. But Crystal, why don't you, let's open the straight together, Crystal. Why don't we start here? Let's do it. Let's do it. So you could go ahead and pull up the first element. So just to give everybody the backstory, not that people watching the show don't know, backstory already.

We're in the middle of this supposed ceasefire. And there are, I'd say two, I'm sure many more, but we'll just go with two. Very significant things that just happened. one, there appears to actually have been a ceasefire agreed to between Israel and Lebanon. I don't know if Trump put pressure or what happened there. I think it was more the pressure that was coming from Hezbollah and also from the Iranians refusing to open the strait so long as Israel continued to bombard Lebanon that ultimately helped to force some sort of a temporary deal there. So of course, Israel being Israel, even after the ceasefire went into effect, they continue to bomb and bombard

and murder and kill, but now it appears that there is some more quiet there. So in response to that, you have the foreign minister, Arachi here of Iran, tweeting out, in line with the ceasefire in Lebanon, the passage for all commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz is declared completely open for the remaining period of ceasefire on the coordinated route as already announced by ports and maritime organization of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Trump did respond to this, basically thanking them and expressing optimism about the outcome of some, you know, potential deal between the U.S. and Iran. Here he is. He says the Strait of Hormuz is completely open and ready for business and full passage, but the naval blockade from the U.S. side will remain in full force and effect as it

pertains to Iran only until such time as our transaction with Iran is 100% complete. This process should go very quickly in that most of the points are already negotiated. Thank you for your attention to this matter of President Donald J. Trump. So things are still a little bit murky, you know, is the toll being charged still? Don't know about that. There was, a drop site was, had some reporting, may have been based on another outlets reporting around that tanker tracker account that said Iran was actually able to get some of their oil in and out of the straits.

So, you know, the exact status a little bit unclear. But certainly, markets are loving this morning the fact that the Iranians are saying, okay, open for business. And Trump was saying, okay, open for business and expressing optimism about some deal. Now, I would say there should still be a lot of skepticism that we are truly coming to an end of this thing. And maybe Griffey could put up this, you know, alleged deal framework that is being floated here by the U.S., which effectively what they're proposing is a cash for uranium deal. U.S. considering a $20 billion cash for uranium deal with Iran as part. Details include the U.S. and Iran negotiating over a three-page plan to end the war, because that's

all Kushner, Wittkoff, and J.D. Vance can handle apparently. Number two, one element under discussion is that the U.S. would release $20 billion in frozen Iranian funds in return for Iran giving up its stockpile of enriched uranium. Number three, some of Iran's highly enriched uranium would be shipped to a third country, some would be downblended in Iran under international monitoring. And number four, Iran would be allowed to have nuclear research reactors for production of medical isotopes, but would pledge that all of its nuclear facilities would be above ground. Second round of U.S. Iran talks is expected in Pakistan on Sunday. So, Emily, important to keep in mind, this is what the U.S. is putting out there about what they're hoping the contours of a deal would look like.

we've had Iranians coming forward and saying some of the previous representations of their positions, including the idea that they agreed to give up their highly enriched uranium for some period of time, that this was completely false. So important to keep that in mind when we're evaluating exactly where we are in terms of the resolution of this conflict. Yeah, enormously important. The Wall Street Journal had a straight news report a couple of days ago, basically just outlining how the people who are remaining in the IRGC and have now been elevated because layers of power have been killed are just objectively hardliners in a way that is escalatory. And that's what we were saying all along.

So now these are the people who are in charge of the negotiations. And not just us, obviously everybody was saying that all along that that's a huge risk that comes with carrying out an operation like this. We've seen it happen however many times throughout like the last five decades of American history. It's something that often happens. And so those are the people who are now negotiating. Arakhi says right now, straight is open. So apparently you have Trump and Raqi on the same page today, but come Sunday.

You then have to wonder if they, I mean, listen, I want this thing to be done. I think that would be great. If we can come to a resolution, Iran now knows that it can. tank the global economy by just the straight, like doing exactly what it did over the last six, seven weeks. And that's leverage that maybe it will carry into the future, whatever deal is reached. If it's super tentative, I mean, I hate to say it, but the, it's obvious. We've all been covering what's happening in Gaza right now. And that ceasefire. So this is, if something has reached, I'm really, really happy about that.

But it's going to be very tenuous, I think, no matter what. Yeah. Well, and as part of what we should discuss, too, goes back to the logic after the 12-day war, where those of us who were opposed from this, you know, from any of these wars from the beginning, said, okay, great that this was wrapped up. But the logic that brought us to this place continues to persist. And an important part of that logic is Israel. It will be in no way acceptable to Israel if this war ends now.

In no way will that be acceptable to that. because their entire goal is to completely collapse the Iranian government. And instead, if you have a deal even along the lines of, you know, what's being contemplated here, we know that Iran maintains their ballistic missile capacity. We know that they maintain their drone capacity. We know that an even more hardline government is now in place. And we know that there's actually, you know, regardless of what paper is exchanged here, there's actually more logic to push them in the direction of,

building a nuclear weapon. And if they have sanctions relief, then suddenly they have more money to rebuild. And certainly they're going to pay a lot of attention to their defenses because they have been attacked multiple times, unprovoked, by us and Israel. So this is in no way a sustainable or acceptable situation to Netanyahu and to Israel. He will be politically attacked for it. There's already a lot of dissatisfaction in Israel with the idea that this could be coming to a close. Of course, he uses endless war anyway to forestall his own legal and corruption problems within society. So Israel will continue to do everything they can to play the role of a spoiler, especially since, you know, Netanyahu is as savvy an American political analyst as anyone else.

He can see the polls. He can see the fact that we're going to talk later in the show, 40 Democrats voted against sending bombs to Israel. And so you have a dramatic shift in terms of the political. landscape in the U.S., and he and others in that country feel that it is a now or never moment, they have to go for the whole enchilada here or else they're not going to potentially get the chance again in the future. That dynamic has not changed. Right. And so then this question of whether they're willing to accept cash for uranium brings up why a lot of Republicans oppose the JCPOA, many of them thought, these are, like, Iran is not going to abide by anything that you're negotiating right now.

So, interesting little question then for Republicans with whatever Donald Trump works out. Interesting for the Lindsay Graham's of the world, let us not forget that Netanyahu once stayed in Jared Kushner's childhood bedroom. This is like, these negotiators are being influenced, I mean, obviously being influenced by the most hawkish wing of the Republican Party. That's a question for them. Do you? I mean, are you so, is Donald Trump himself so desperate to get a deal that he ends up with a deal that Republicans would have decried as something with no enforceability if it had been negotiated by Democrats or by Obama? Because you now have a more hardline regime. And you have potentially shown them they should be racing towards enriching uranium to weapons grade levels because that's the only way to protect them. So, yeah, that's what I'm looking at those three points sounds like something just on its face that Republicans would have blanched at if Obama had been negotiating it because how do you enforce that without going into more conflict? And Crystal, speaking of Obama, I mean, giving 20 billion to Iran monitoring their nuclear sites. This is basically the JCPOA with extra steps, right? Like just with. the extra step of threatening the global economy.

Am I wrong or like, isn't it the exact same? Emily, remind me, because Republicans fixated on this much more than I ever did. What was the amount of money that they sell? Well, they, we delivered this cash in pallets to the Iranians. Oh, during the Biden administration. No, during the Obama administration with the JCPOA, it wasn't like $1.6 billion. And this is, you know, vastly more money. And I mean, not to mention.

Inflation. There was. Oh, 150. It was a, it was 1.6. seven billion here, according to Brookings. Yes. Oh, I was so close. 1.7 billion that, you know, Obama gave to the crazy mullahs.

And so anyway, listen, I hope they all forget that and just pretend that they never were opposed to that. And Republicans have been happy to twist themselves into hypocrisy knots and pay no attention to past situations. And another part of this is obviously that there was a deal on the table.

According to the Omanis, there was a deal on the table that included more concessions than what the Obama administration was able to get under the GACPOA before we decided to launch this insane war. And so, you know, even like, let's say best case scenario, some sort of an agreement is hashed out over the weekend and there's some cash for uranium deal and there's some, they figure something out with the straight of hormones, which I don't think Iran is willing to, you know, totally give up control of because why would they at this point? It's already been shown that the U.S. cannot militarily retake it, because if they could, they would have already done it.

So I, you know, there's still a lot here that's, that's very question. But let's say they did. I mean, then what have you accomplished over the course of this war? Genuinely, what have you accomplished other than sort of demonstrate our own weakness, demonstrate Iranian strength, hand them more tools, harden their government. Their government was actually flailing. I mean, the protests, well, you know, well, sort of fueled by. the West, there is genuine anti-government sentiment within the country. The government has been,

in a lot of ways, really strengthened by this war. So what did you actually accomplish through all of that? But with that being said, I'll also say, I mean, I'm very skeptical because of some of the problems we've talked about before, because of Israel, because of the Strait of Hormuz, because I'm still not sure that the U.S. is ready to accept the amount of humiliation that it would take in order to actually come to some sort of an agreement here. And you have very, you know, you have elements within certainly the IRGC who think it'd be a grave mistake to, who thought it was a mistake to do the ceasefire to begin with. And then you also have lots of U.S. military assets, which continue to flood into the region.

And Pete Hex, the Secretary of War yesterday, saying we are reloading and getting ready to go back to combat. So I think you have to take all of those factors into account as well as we try to assess what exactly is going on here. Yeah, I mean, it's pretty hard to believe that the Iranians would agree to just give up all enriched uranium in the future and not do it with a plan to be enriching uranium underground or in ways that are just harder to prove for the United States or inspectors or whatever, which would put us back here. Because, again, just this is a Wall Street Journal, straight news report that I'm sure the administration was not happy about, but it just, outlines exactly who the people who are now in charge and are now negotiating are. So it's, I mean, it's really, like, the math isn't massing on how that would, like, actually make any sense in terms

of a deal. And the Trump administration, I think, is very desperate to, I mean, Donald Trump has been spinning this war as over and won for six, seven weeks now, basically since it started. Like, I think within, like, 72 hours. Yeah, he's been, he's been spinning it as a win. And so I actually don't, to your point, Crystal, the humiliation point, I don't know. I think Trump is just willing to get it to end and, you know, see that, like, I'm here in Illinois, the gas prices at the station I passed last night at 520, 519, 520. It's not sustainable. Yeah, it's crazy. So I think he just trusts his ability to brand something as a win, which might be good news for the cause of peace. But whatever he gets, if it's, if it's, if it's, I mean, I just don't trust, like you said, after midnight hammer, we all were saying there's a good likelihood we're back here in six months. And that was sadly proven correct. So let's see what happens, I guess. Yeah.

Griffin, should we hear from the man himself? That's absolutely. Where would we like to start here with the ceasefire extension question? Why don't we play that right here? Let's take a little listen to Trump being asked if there will be an extension on the ceasefire. with a very good conversation sending the ceasefire with Iran with who with Iran

with who happened before that I'm not sure it needs to be extended Hamas Iran wants to make a deal and we're dealing very nicely with them we've got to have no nuclear weapons that's a big factor and they're willing to do things today

that they weren't willing to do two months ago. Willing to do things they wouldn't have done two months ago or years ago with Obama. So, you know, the current two-week ceasefire ends early next week. The, you know, talks allegedly maybe are happening in Islamabad on Sunday. So that is the timeline. I mean, the, you know, the difference between these negotiations and the JCPOA negotiations are just crazy. I mean, all Americans had all, we had all these technical, experts involved for months and crafting all the details and getting in at all the nitty-gritty.

Here, it's very high level, let's just say, his very top line kind of, you know, approach. And this was apparently a problem in the first negotiations because the Iranians felt that the American side just genuinely didn't understand what was being offered and what they were trying to present to them. And that's part of what led to Trump launching this war. So now you have have J.D. Vance involved. You know, the other issue is that at the last, at the talks that already failed, where Trump and Secretary of State Margaret Rubio were at a UFC fight while the ceasefire negotiations were collapsing, J.D. Vance apparently didn't really have sufficient authority to broker some sort of a deal. He was constantly on the phone with Trump. If the Iranians are

to be believed, he was also on the phone with Netanyahu. So that is, you know, that is, you know, That is also a challenge year in terms of coming to some sort of a deal. So we'll see if the American side takes this more seriously than they took the first round of talks. Based on our conversation yesterday with Professor Mirandi, which I thought was very interesting to hear their perspective, they, according to what he's presenting, he and the Iranian side don't believe that the U.S. are serious about these talks. They say we didn't believe they were serious about the talks in the lead up to this war. We didn't believe they were serious in the talks leading up to the 12-day war. war. We do these negotiations to demonstrate that we'll operate in good faith, to demonstrate that we don't

want war, but we don't actually believe that we are going to come to some peaceful resolution. We believe that the U.S. is planning another attack. And so at least that's the message that the Iranian side is presenting to the world. And they see Israel as a major part of why that logic continues to persist and why it's very likely that, you know, they end up back in a hot war. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, Emily, you mentioned the math wasn't mathing. And speaking of math, why don't we look at the vote for the war powers resolution on this operation, Epic Fury, for just a second? Now, this vote, if I correct me, if I'm wrong, occurred last evening, late last evening. And their vote was failed 213 to 214.

And we pull this up on the screen. I believe there was a Democrat. One Democrat. Jared Golden, who's retired. And Crystal, tell me who is this Mr. Golden, who was the deciding vote here? Who is this Mr. Golden? Yeah, you know, he is a bit of a mysterious figure, to be honest with you. When he came into Congress, I was tracking his run.

He represents a district in Maine that's a swing district. So it's one that can be tough for Democrats to win. And he really came in positioning himself as this sort of heterodox populist, where he from at the beginning, I think it wasn't like a logger, he had this like blue collar background. And at the beginning, he supported Medicare for all, but then had some issues where he was sort of more conservative. And to me, that's a very interesting profile and obviously very different from almost anyone else in the House. He has over time transitioned to just being a conservative Democrat across the board. All those pieces where he was kind of more interesting

have fallen by the wayside. And now he's retiring. I'm not sure. sure, you know, exactly what the reasons for that are, if he feels out of step with the, where the Democratic Party base is or what. But, you know, it seems like these votes, people frequently notice these votes, usually, they're, they are so close, but we just can't quite get over the finish line. And it's very convenient for Golden to be the person who comes in and casts the vote in favor of continuing the war because he, it doesn't matter the political backlash against him since he's retiring. So we're going to talk more about

Shoycott, Chakabati, who was AOC's former chief of staff, is not running for Congress in a bit. But I believe it was him who laid out, like, listen, we all know the fact that there are a lot more Democrats than this that actually do support the war. And so it's not ridiculous to believe that

leadership basically figured out, okay, well, what can we do to make sure that this comes close and you guys protect your political futures by voting the way that the base wants? But that at the end of the day, the vote doesn't pass. And since Jared Golden is retiring and doesn't have to deal with that political backlash, he would be an ideal candidate to cast this unpopular vote and protect the rest of the Democrats from really showing their true feelings. And there's certainly sentiment against the war

within the Democratic caucus as well, probably majority sentiment. But there's no doubt that there's more than one Democrat that wants to keep this thing going for ideological reasons and also for cynical political reasons that they believe that this is hurting Donald Trump. Yeah, this vote was literally 214 to 213, and a couple of key Republican votes stayed on the sidelines, interestingly enough. So Thomas Massey crossed over, obviously, no surprise there. And this was specifically on Iran, obviously. So sometimes the war power votes are more broad, but this one was just on current operation in Iran. Warren Davidson, who has been with Massey on this while being supportive of the war.

He's a veteran, so he's been going and he's been holding firm to both of those positions saying, you know, you can, you can, two things can be true at once. You know, this can be an important congressional authority that we need to exercise and two that he supports the president's actions. He voted present. People who didn't vote. Lauren Bobert and Nancy Mace. Interesting.

Very interesting. What do you make of that, um? I don't think that Lauren Bobert wanted to be on the record on that vote. I think it's it's easy to just not vote. Yeah. And then, you know, they went to the mat on FISA at 2.30 in the morning. And honestly, I would say like heroically, like 20 Republicans crossed over with Democrats. Mike Johnson was whipping.

Even Democrats started whipping their own caucus to support Mike Johnson's reauthorization of FISA. Just insane, insane. David Sarod has been reporting on that, and Julian Over at Dropside has been reporting on that if people want to follow it. But Lauren Bobart was with Massey and was going against Johnson all night, raging at Johnson. They called this vote at 2.30 in the morning because they didn't think that they would be able to do this in the daylight and get it through. Well, they couldn't do it at night either because, you know, that's great. It would have been a five-year reauthorization of FISA 702 powers without.

significant reforms, which, again, Trump ran on kill FISA, all caps. Mike Johnson went on Glenn's show years ago and said, we have to get, like, we have to reform FISA. FISA is terrible. And now Mike Johnson is whipping his conference to support. It's all so ridiculous. So I don't, I think that's probably what's what's going on yesterday is that they're in this battle with leadership. And Bobert said, okay, I'll just not vote.

So I think it's, it's probably. falling into that big picture, but I agree. That's, I mean, mm-mm-mm. Get on the record. And Emily, didn't they ultimately pass like a two-week extension of Pfizer or something like that to the end of April? Is that what ultimately happened? They punted it. Yeah. I saw Roe posting a video of him like in the car on the way over to Congress, you know, blasting them for for what they're trying to do. So yeah, we're just get more hypocrisy and broken promises from Trump and the Republican. on that one, clearly. It's insane behavior.

Yeah, here's the tear sheet. They punted a procedural vote on it as the Hill is reporting here. There's two golden rules that any man should live by. Rule one, never mess with a country girl. You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes. And rule two, never mess with her friends either.

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I said, oh, hell no. I vowed. I will be his last target. He's going to get what he deserves. Listen to the Girlfriends. Trust me, babe. on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Nora Jones, and I love playing music with people so much that my podcast called Playing Along is back. I sit down with musicians from all musical styles to play songs together in an intimate setting.

Every episode's a little different, but it all involves music and conversation with some of my favorite musicians. Over the past two seasons, I've had special guests like Dave Grohl, Leve, Mavis Staples, Remy Wolf, Jeff Tweedy, really too many to name. And this season, I've sat down with Alessia Cara, Sarah McLaughlin, John Legend, and more. Check out my new episode with Josh Grobin. You related to the Phantom at that point. Yeah, I was definitely the Phantom in that. That's so funny.

Share each day with me each night, each morning. Say you love me. You know I... So come hang out with us in the studio and listen to playing along on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, everyone?

I'm Ago Wodam. My next guest, you know from Step Brothers Anchorman, Saturday Night Live, and the Big Money Players Network, it's Will Ferrell. Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. I went and had lunch with them one day,

and I was like, And dad, I think I want to really give this a shot. I don't know what that means, but I just know the groundlings. I'm working my way up through, and I know it's a place that come look for up and coming talent. He said, if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet. Yeah. He goes, but there's so much luck involved. And he's like, just give it a shot.

He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks, Dad, on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

Well, speaking of promises, there was a promise kept by Mayor Zohan Mamdani in New York City. Emily, what's going on with this? Why don't you take this one? I want, you know, you're the number one Z head on the show. He released a video, didn't he? He did. He released a very viral video. And, Griffin, you're going to put the element up on the screen.

Should we roll the video, actually? Yeah, we'll watch the video because it's good. So then they said that this was their most watch video ever, which is a high bar for them because they've had some viral bangers in the past. So I think that's pretty interesting. Emily, I'm surprised that you can watch this video. as well. Oh, no, I watched the video. Okay, let's do it.

I have thoughts on the video. That's why I was feeding you the segment. Let's do it. Zara, Mom Donnie. When I ran for mayor, I said I was going to tax the rich. Well, today, we're taxing the way. I'm thrilled to announce we've secured a pita tear tax, the first in New York's history. This is an annual fee on luxury properties worth $5 million whose owners who's owners do not live full-time in the city.

Like for this penthouse, which hedge fund CEO, Ken Griffin bought for $238 million. This beard to tear tax is specifically designed for the richest of the rich. Those who store their wealth in New York City real estate, but who don't actually live here. But even so, they're able to reap the huge financial rewards of owning property in, dare I say, the greatest city of the world. And most of the time, these units are sitting empty, since again, they don't actually live here. This is a fundamentally unfair system that hurts working New Yorkers. Now, it's coming to a debt.

This tax will raise at least $500 million directly for the city. It'll help fund things like free childcare, cleaner streets, and safer neighborhoods. As mayor, I believe everyone has a role to play in contributing to our city. And some, a little bit more than others. Happy Tax Day, New York. Wow. Complete with succession music. And let's check the view count currently.

It is at 42.4 million views on X.com. Pretty much like a typical breaking points club, basically more. us. Absolutely. A rounding era there. Now, before we get Emily's take on it, I wanted to hear from some of the other haters. Of course, we had Linda. Are you assuming Emily's a hater?

I'm assuming that Emily's going to find some middle ground here. I know she's a big Ken Griffin fan. Yeah, I love Ken. Linda Yakorino says this is actually one of the scariest things I have seen. It won't stop here. It's a nice life. then very few spooks for her. And this is a lady who worked with Elon Musk.

Yeah. And that wasn't scary. Come on, lady. Let's be real. Let's be real. And a few others I'll pull up here really quickly. But this is just part of that there was thousands of these on X.com, the website for people with expensive condos apparently.

How does Ken Griffin owning a $238 million condo, NYC? He only visits occasionally. harm New Yorkers exactly. He pays an extraordinary high property tax to the city for services he barely uses. Why ridicule him for this? And of course, we have Trump, who have finally had to say something about his BFF. Let's take a read here. Trump says, sadly, Mayor Mamdani is destroying New York.

It has no chance. The United States of America should not contribute to its failure. It will only get worse. The tax, tax, tax policies are so wrong. People are fleeing. They must change their ways and fast. History has proven this stuff, in quotations, just doesn't work. Thank you for your attention to this matter. So that's where we're at with the reactions here.

Emily, what do we make of this? Well, I think part of the reason the video has so many views is that the billioners freaked the F out over the video and drew so much attention to it. I mean, even just saying this is the scariest thing or one of the scariest things that she's ever seen. She was, yeah, the CEO of X. I don't know if she still is. But that's remarkable because, honestly, middle class taxes should probably be the scariest thing that you've ever seen. Like, even if you're, what, that's the scariest thing, the Piettaire. That's, like, I'm totally against our tax regime.

I'm a flat tax person. So that's like for the reasons that it would close all of the loopholes. And so don't get me wrong. But like that, even if you're in my camp, the scariest thing I've ever seen is like middle class tax hikes that are, there was just a poll the other day. Vast majority of Americans believe that they're overtaxed. And the people who believe that they're overtaxed also include billionaires, which is often hilarious because the assumption baked into that one post is that he's paying high property. taxes. We actually don't know that in the case of Ken Griffin. He could be using his real estate portfolio in various ways to take his tax bill down. He could be taking advantage of all kinds of

different breaks. And people were making this argument that by buying expensive real estate, buying piettares, that they don't use very often, they're paying taxes, they're paying staff. So they've created jobs. And that it's like only a net benefit. There's no, there's no, like, nothing is getting sucked out of the system or out of the city because they're there. Again, why then is it such a big deal for Ken Griffin to pay a little bit more? And I'm not even arguing for that. I'm arguing against the insane freak out that, like, why are you freaking out so much over the Piettaire tax? Like, are you serious?

Just making Mom Doni look more and more reasonable with your insane reactions to this. Yes. But Crystal, how is the city going to function if these billionaires can't use all of these apartments as like public storage units? I'm not really sure what they're doing with them. They will continue to have those apartments. They will continue to have those apartments. Yeah, where are they going to go? Miami? Come on.

But that's the thing. This is, they don't. even live in New York. Like that's why they had this second homes in New York that are sitting empty. So these are people who have already moved to Miami or whatever. I think Ken himself lives in Miami. So, you know, in a sense, if you're playing the game of like, it's going to chase them out of the city. Well, disincentivize them to move to the city. Then they can avoid this tax if they just actually lived in the apartments that we all know, like Emily was saying, that's, they're not going to do that. They're going to pay this and they will pay it without even noticing

because it's such a tiny, minuscule, pathetic, flee on the ass of their net worth, that it will not even, it will not even be noticeable to them. It would be like, you know, an average person buying a, not a Starbucks coffee, but like, you know, a coffee at the bodega that's actually inexpensive. Well, the coffee is probably gone up and it's probably expensive now no matter what.

Anyway, you get what I'm saying. So the free count I think that Emily points to is, kind of the genius of this little piece of film. You know, we should be realistic about $500 million, a lot of money is not going to close what I think is a $5 billion budget deficit in New York City. It's not going to fund all the proposals. It will help, right?

Like, they're going forward with the public-owned grocery stores. I think those are supposed to cost about $30 million a piece. So, okay, we're funding those. That's fantastic. But the free count is kind of the point. You know, it's a very Trumpian place. in a sense where Zoran knows, look, if you pull, I don't care, Democrat, In Penna, Republican, New York, Kansas, Oklahoma, wherever you are. If you pull, should we tax billionaires a tiny bit more? The response is going to be overwhelmingly, yes, absolutely.

Let's do it now. Let's do it today. So he picks the fight on his terms where he knows he's got, especially in the city of New York, It's like an, you know, would be like an 80-20 issue at worst, at worst for him. The predicted meltdown ensues, which is why he personalizes it because he knows that will also trigger the right-wingers here. And he comes off looking like an absolute political genius and populist hero. He also comes out really being able to advertise the fact that he was able to deliver on a core promise. He says, I said I was going to tax the rich, and now I'm taxing the rich. Now, he's not doing the particular tax that he said, you know, that was the original plan. But the fact that he was able to get Kathy Hokel to go along with this and work with her is in and of itself a significant political achievement and something that people did not think he would be able to achieve.

She has been very smart in recognizing that Zoran has a real base and is a real force to reckon with politically. and so she has had to bend a bit and come towards him. And he is very clever in spinning this as a complete and total victory, when in reality it's more symbolic and more of a political win than anything else. Yeah. And I just, like, I want to contrast this with the California billionaire tax, which I know we all disagree on. I'm sure you two disagree with me on that.

I think there's really good evidence that people actually will leave California, like 30% of the base has already actually left. That's according to a Hoover Institute study, obviously conservative. But there are plenty, I mean, we all have seen there are plenty of billionaires and centa millionaires who have left California. All that is to say, this is not that. They are right now defending higher taxes on fifth homes. That's what they're saying. It's one of the scariest things I've ever seen.

Good luck. Go ahead. Good luck. What scary is the political numbers in favor of defending billionaire, billionaire, billionaire fifth homes. in New York City. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, and that's, again, like, this is so different. So the California tax, which is something that Rose very supportive of, he sees it as an anti-revolutionary tax. I actually agree with him on that point that there, it probably is something like that. But I think it sets, it's a one-time thing. I'd hate the precedent that it sets in terms of just

like wealth confiscation from the government. We don't have to have that debate to just say that It's completely different from what this is. And the freak out is almost at the same level. They're not going to leave New York because the reason that they have their pietta tears is that they have meetings in New York once a month, once every three months, and they want a place to go. So that's not going to change. They want a place to entertain and have like Epstein-style dinners.

That's what they want to do. And so they're not going to get rid of them because they have to pay a little bit more. you might see like one or two dramatically being like, okay, well, I'm going to be a renter in New York now, or I'm going to go to Connecticut and have my dinners there. Enjoy that. But in large part, you're not going to see people like giving up their New York City. Piettares. It's not going to happen.

Yeah. Well, and I would just. Go ahead, Griff. Go ahead. I was just say, for people who live in New York City, like, speaking of an 80-20 issue, people hate these billionaire row buildings that get built in like Hudson Yards or ones that cover Central Park and are just completely empty and all they do is create like a shadow on the park. And they're basically just like pieces of like metal garbage that get put up in the city and where

no one's even living in them. So yeah, I mean, soccer has talked about that and the way that, you know, it hollows out these cities and makes them so that they're, they're not real. They're just like, yeah, they're a stopping, stomping grounds or a resting place for the global lead as they happen to pass through. And you see that certainly most of all. in Manhattan. So, and I mean, obviously, Zagra's conservative, like, conservative populace, but I don't think that that is a totally unique view. So it's really a proposal that I feel like it's very hard to oppose because even if, okay,

let's say Ken Griffin gets mad and he's like, I'm going to sell my $278 million condo. I'm moving out for a tiny little tax that he wouldn't even know. Okay, fine. Like, you don't live here to begin with. And now you have, you know, more housing stock that is available. Now, of course, you're not going to have working class. moving in, but if you actually did reduce the demand for these like super, super luxury buildings, then developers would have more of an incentive to build things that ordinary

people would be able to afford because I'm far less concerned about Ken Griffin moving out of the city and far more concerned about all of the working class people who cannot afford to live in New York City. They're the ones who have actually fled and are unable to, you know, sustain a life there even if they would like to. So one last note, you know, Trump is deciding that he has to, you know, really play a hardball now with Mom Dani and talk about how Mom Dani, he talks to him all the time, but he's ruining New York is now what is Trump is saying out loud. But it is funny because Zorn has gotten yet another thing from Trump. This is in the New York Times. In a reversal, the Trump administration agrees to release nearly six.

$60 million in funding for New York City's 2nd Avenue Subway. So he just can't say no to this guy. Griffin, what did you think of the cinematic elements of the Tax the Rich video? I think that the freeze frame. Well, I think that close up freeze frame is going to, yes, be in a museum one day. It's already being memed. Yes. I think something about that really struck home.

to people. And, you know, we talk a lot about taxing the billionaires, but looking down the barrel, tapping, tapping the lens, that's something like, we're coming for you. So I appreciated the cinematic quality of it and the directness of it. And yeah, calling out something by name, he had a similar dust up. Didn't make a video for it, but there is a city council member in New York that's been getting his way named Julie Menon. She is very, very, very, very I believe she owns like a lot of real estate. She might be one of those multi-home owners as well. And seems like now she is bending to Zoron's will, at least on a few city council votes.

So it does really seem like you said earlier, Crystal, like there is a base that people are aware of, afraid of, and the online billionaire rich people is not a real base because they live in, they have five homes all over the place. They don't have a constituency. And Zoron is actually. And they have no loyalty. They have no loyalty to a city. They have no loyalty to a country. They have a lot of class loyalty to one another,

as we saw demonstrated in the Epstein files. But, you know, they play us all like fools. Like, oh, you know, I'm going to take my toys and go home. But, you know, with regards to Zoran, I still think it's such a shame he can't run for president because I do think he has both the talent, the right message. and truly understands how to do politics today.

Villains, villains, which the Democratic Party refuses to do and people like the abundance as recline people refuse to do, which is name villains and identify them, which is how people can focus politics. And to intentionally provoke, you know, and he's able to do it in a way where, you know, unlike Trump who's, like, angry and outrageous and whatever, Zoran will just say a thing in his cheerful, you know, big smile, very polished way.

And he knows how to press buttons to cause the free count that he wants. And I think he expected that from this. And the other one that I think it's funny that there was such a free gown over is the grocery stores, which is like, we're talking about five grocery stores in a massive city. it's the most insignificant part of his agenda. Now, I think it's a great pilot. I think it's good ideologically to demonstrate, like, here's a thing government could do.

But it almost seemed like in the campaign outside of the Zionist piece, that was what the biggest freakout was about from, you know, it was, oh, my God, breadlines and communism and this is Soviet, blah, blah, blah. It's like, it's literally like literally the federal government runs grocery stores and basically every military base here and around the world. This is not that crazy of an idea. So everybody relaxed, it's going to be fine. And when he got asked about like, well, what if it doesn't work?

He's like, then it didn't work. But we try something else. No big deal, right? Yeah, and that's why I actually think that people really need to pay way more attention to Roe describing the California piece as anti-revolutionary, because the more that you treat these things like the Pietater attacks as total, like, scariest thing you've ever seen. or, you know, like the end of America, grocery stores, like the end of America, what they're really saying, the reason the right goes into hysterics over these things and the kind of business center goes into hysterics over these things is because they're correctly sensing that the country is saying the system is broken.

If you have an alternative that I feel like is going to work better for me, I do not care if it is called socialism or democratic socialism. do it, do it. And people are going in that direction. So the billionaires and the centrist business people are correct to sense that that's happening. What they're doing is freaking out and saying, you're a horrible person if you support this. You are Stalin. You are Mao. You are taking America down that path instead of realizing. And there are all kinds of quotes from the Gilded Age to the first Gilded Age about this where people like Carnegie were realized, that the way the system had been set up

was sending people into like Bolshevism and that the enemies of capitalism were the capitalists. The capitalists were starting to make capitalism unsustainable

because it wasn't working for everyone. And what they should be doing instead of freaking out at anybody who's like, hey, a city-round grocery store might be nice.

I can't afford the price of milk and eggs right now. They're treating that like it's it's Bolshebism. instead of offering alternatives that are viable and making the case for their alternatives. They're just making the case against socialism.

But they're also like inflating it to this cartoonish, like, they're inflating the five grocery stores and a pieter tax into this cartoonish version of what it is. But they're not wrong about what it is, which is evidence that people want a new system and they're willing to accept, you know, more government intervention in the market. Yep. And if the door on grocery stores don't work, well, we can just go back to the polymarket grocery stores that are popping up all over the place. That's the alternative. There are alternatives being offered. There are alternatives offered by billionaires. They're doing the work. Emily, you said, speaking of untenable, I think that leads us nicely to a warning from Senator

Mark Warner who predicts that college graduate unemployment, is going to reach 30% in the next two years. Let's take a listen. But we all kind of describe how we make jobs, AI adjacent. I've yet to see that they're there on that. And again, I think there will be productivity. I think there'll be job.

Increases, I think there'll be innovation. But boy, oh, boy, this short-term next couple of years. You know, the stat I use, recent college grad, grad unemployment is about 9%. I believe it'll go to 30% within the next two years. And that will have a dual effect of not only making that age cohort appropriately

a concern, but an awful lot of parents and grandparents who help finance that education, pretty pissed off. So how we get this right and what I've been trying to implore, we need the tech community, the hypers

to both help us through the transition and also help pay for it. So 30% is a big number. I know those you're restricting yourself to recent college grads there, but that's still really, really high. How did you get to that number? I got that number simply because I think most CEOs are not being, what they say to me privately about the amount of job elimination

that they're looking at is not what they're saying publicly. I think they're hesitant to literally, you know, say the full truth because they think they're afraid it's going to freak people out. And, you know, I think it will come less in the form of we're going to go out and fire X number. I think it's just the incoming, I don't know, a single firm where their incoming class of new hires is not a half or a third of what it was even a few years back. I like the way that lady is lounging. She's so comfy doing that interview. I need to take a lesson from that. She already has a job.

Crystal, you just brought your daughter to college tours. So how does this make you feel in your own family's futures? By the way, we have to just acknowledge, I mean, Crystal, you look incredible for having college college college. Who is touring? They're like, are you on tour? Yeah. Stop. Anyway, yeah, I feel seen.

I mean, I'll tell you, like, my advice to my daughter going to school is like, I don't know what the job landscape will look like. I have no idea. And no one does. No one can tell you. So I think the best thing you can do is pursue studies that deepen your humanity. I mean, it kind of in a way is like a return to like the traditional liberal arts approach. because I don't know what else to advise.

I feel really, really bad for the people who were sold the like learn to code, you know, people who graduated with their computer science degree thinking they had their golden ticket like three years ago. And I mean, that path, that was, that's the first to go. That's already gone, right? If you're graduating with that degree now, good luck because that's already been, you know, Claude is going to handle it. Sorry, we don't need your services anymore.

So look, is he right? Who knows? But this is someone who was a, you know, himself. He's a billionaire. He's a CEO. I think he's a billionaire. Very wealthy. CEO. And certainly in tight with all of these guys. So if that's what they're telling him, I believe him because I don't see any reason why he would lie. Now, I would say as a senator and a politician who is rather senior and has, you know, fair amount of power and sway. What solutions are you offering, Mark Warner? Because I don't see that side of your politics whatsoever. If you truly believe college grad unemployment is going to 30% in a matter of years, that necessitates a much more radical approach to changing the social contract than what I have ever seen from Mark Warner. And this is kind of what drives me crazy, you know, not only from him, but from all these tech CEOs, has come out and like, well, we're going to get rid of human labor. So, you know, you guys should get ready for that.

It's like, okay, well, you're announcing your intent to just completely rip up the social contract with no democratic input whatsoever. In fact, the democratic input you're getting is saying stop and people are starting to throw Molotov cocktails at Sam Altman's house. And yet I have heard none of them offer anything that approaches, including Dario Amadeh, who's, you know, anthropic supposed to be the most thoughtful one, that comes anywhere close to approaching what would need to be done. the truth of the matter is what would need to be done is some sort of public ownership, public accountability, public benefit. And of course, the, you know, guys who own and control this, no, they want to be the oligarch king who comes out on top. And that's what they're all racing to become. So I want to put some stuff up on the screen here. This is from the New York Fed. You can see this is the unemployment rates for recent college graduates versus other groups. So if you look

all the way over here, where we are right now. So this ends in December 25. Yep. So you have the blue line is recent college graduates. Look, it's been rising steadily since these LLMs were rolled out. And economists say some of what's going on right now is not all attributable to LLMs. It's on top of a really shaky. economy. Part of that is because you have like the mag seven propping up like what 30% of the Dow or the

S&P. I mean, it's just like insane levels, maybe even more than that. But on top of that tariffs and now you could add war into the mix. But look at where this, this is recession levels, creeping up into recession levels here. We're comparing this with around 2009, 2010 for recent college graduates. This is COVID. This is where it shoots up during COVID. But yes, it's going up really high. Now let me share this one. This is a headline from Fortune. Gen Z. Men with college degrees now have the same unemployment rate as non-grads. So remember, that comes with a lot of debt for the average college graduate as well, some around $40,000 on average of debt. So speaking of anti-revolutionary taxes, imagine, you know, many of you are actually probably don't

have to imagine it because you're in those shoes. You're a 24-year-old college grad with $35,000 in debt. And if you had gone into, like if you had done a welding apprenticeship five years ago, you would be making more right now. But instead you did what the system was designed to make you do. And you trusted the authorities who told you this is the right path for you. And now you're saddled with debt and making less money than you could have been. And maybe even a more been miserable and a fragile job, then you'd want to be in anyway. So it's really, really bleak. Yeah, the new tech, like, sales pitch is so bizarre to me because, like, the old tech pitches, the Steve Jobs, the original Silicon Valley people, their pitch was that technology will

improve your life, that you're going to be able to access more, like live a more full life. And now the pitch is life is over. Like, like, they're, they're will. be no more life and get used to that. And if all of our AI CEO predictions about the future are right, well, then you will have no life. And if they're wrong, we are going to crash the economy. So the pitch is needs some work, need some massaging. And it's also a weird period where like these CEOs, like Crystal said, are so bad at making

people feel good about their products or optimistic or not feel doom. But they seem to like the celebrity of it. So they keep putting themselves out there. Like Sam Altman is not a soothing figure. He's not someone that makes you feel calming or better. Like they could hire comms people to do this. But they somehow, they suddenly like like the celebrity of being in all these interviews, talking about the future and doing a terrible job at painting a future that anybody wants. I guess we should be grateful for that. right? I guess we should be grateful for that. Yeah, because it's very, it's very off-putting, but it's also, you know, helps people to understand the reality of how dystopian it is. Yeah. I don't know. I didn't get through the whole Rowan and Farrow piece about Sam Altman, but I mean, I did basically the TLGR's he's a psychopath who lies all the time. So that's the guy who's, you know, one of whom could come out on top of this, you know, race to AGI and have more power than any human being has ever had in the history.

of humanity. So that's something we can look forward to. And speaking of social contract, now, there has been a tech leader that has started to speak about a new social contract. I, of course, I'm talking about Elon Musk, who over the last two days has been talking about universal basic income through artificial intelligence. No, no. Universal high income. Oh, sorry, universal high income. Really, yeah. So, like, you know, what do people need? Like, 500 bucks a month every two months. We'll see. Let's take a listen.

How much could a banana cost, Michael? It would be sort of complacent. We do need to be careful because the future is a range of possible outcomes. And they're not all great. But at this point, I do agree with you that it's likely to be great. It's probably 80% likely, maybe more likely to be great. And I do think we'll have universal income. We're basically just issue money to people, you know, and the really just, because the output of goods and services will so far exceed the money supply that, you know, that effectively you have deflation.

It's just the ratio of the outputs of goods and services to the money supply. So that's, so if the rate of growth of goods and services far exceeds the rate of growth of the goods and services, far exceeds the rate of both of the money. money supply, which I predict will happen, then you will have deflation. So what do we think about that brave new world? That's communism, just to be clear. Whoa. I mean, it actually, well, it isn't because he's talking about these. I mean, he would still be the owner if Grock is the first to achieve, you know, get to

the mountain top. He still would be the owner of the technology. And so we would be completely dependent on the good graces of Elon. Musk, who, you know, I think is pretty clearly eugenicist and has all sorts of other problems besides to then distribute this income as he sees to be adequate. And that's why, to me, the core issue really is ownership. Because let's say that Elon or Sam Altman or Mark Zuckerberg or one of these other characters, Mark Hendrickson is appointed that to Peter T. Whoever, right? Right.

Did you say that they. The head? Mark Anderson's appointed the head. Yeah. Exactly. Yes, exactly. The dome. We'll just leave it there. The dome.

He's at the top of the dome. Let's say that they, you know, the deflation happens, which is one of the potential promises of AI, you know, if it's able to deliver on all of the like utopian vision. And let's say that they decide that they want to keep us around, even though they really don't need us anymore, which is totally something that I think, you know, billionaires love having human beings and your average working class person around. So let's assume all of that and that they provide reasonable, let's say even high income. It still doesn't answer all the questions of what is this technology going to be used for? How is it going to be deployed? And so if we do believe the hype, and I don't know if we believe the hype, I think that's still an open question. But if we do believe the hype, there has to be.

a focus on who owns and who controls and who drives these technologies. And if, you know, I can already hear Emily saying, like, I also don't want it in the hands of just like the president of the United States, which I agree with. Like, God forbid, Donald Trump is the one who's deciding how this all goes, which is basically what's happening right now. There needs to be true small D democratic check where people have input and there is collaboration. there's an ability to control our own futures. And we are not just all hoping that Elon Musk is benevolent enough and smart enough to figure this all out.

So that's why this is all so disturbing, so dystopian and why even the proposals that they offer that sound like, okay, universal high income, I guess that sounds good. They preserve the key point of power for Elon and the other oligarchs. And I include, you know, Dario Amman. in the solutions that he's offered as well. Yeah, and the reason I was kind of joking about the communism point is that he already wants GROC. I mean, what GROC has contracts with XAI, I should say, has contracts with the Pentagon. Like, he's a major defense contractor, actually even bigger than that.

He's a major government contractor. And so what you have then is crony capitalism doing like universal. So like it's, you know, the communist definition is it's not like exact and it's not exactly capitalism either. It's this, like, awful combination of both where you have someone who's not really democratically accountable either to the market or to voters because they're just this, like, version of Lockheed on steroids in this fantasy utopian future that Elon Musk has sketched out. So I agree that it's, like, wildly, it's not even Republican, lower case are Republican. It's not Democratic. It's not Republican. It's just cronyism. And the thing that's

crazy about, first of all, I mean, we could go into the entire conversation about how patronizing it is and how undignified it is for you to have to pay for your bread because of the benevolence, just based on the benevolence of Elon Musk and whomever is president and is giving Elon Musk this power, whatever, that's just disgusting. And nobody should have to live that way. Gross. And so, Secondly, they have so much money right now. It's hilarious to me that they think AI growth will be what creates universal high income. You know what they could do right now if they took pay cuts? They could probably do some version of universal high income right now, not high income, but they could do UBI right now.

They just want to wait until everything explodes so they can be even richer. and then it costs them less percentage-wise of their wealth to distribute universal high income. So that's a reason that you shouldn't trust that they ever actually will do universal high income because parting with their cash, no matter how much they have, is historically very, very difficult. And so if you think that they get more and suddenly decide, oh, here's a great way to do the system, good luck with that. Yeah, and it's the same type of cast of characters that's freaking out about some miniscule tax on their piettaire to fund, like, you know, a minor expansion of daycare in the city of New York. So, yeah, I don't think anyone should really trust their motives or intentions here.

You know what Linda Yakorino cutting the checks? Okay. Well, I'm more of a Bill Ackman person myself. That's true. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you're an Ackman head. Do you guys remember when he paid to be in that tennis in like, what was the U.S. Open? He like played in the U.S. Open.

That was amazing. Glenn was so mad about that. Glenn Greenwald was so mad about that. Emily, that was communism. Okay? That was communist. But I will say if you're relying on a government contractor for your like regular income, we're getting pretty close. So thanks you all.

The great anti-communism. this warrior. There's two golden rules that any man should live by. Rule one, never mess with a country girl. You play stupid games, you get stupid prizes. And rule two, never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends. I'm Anna Sinfield, and in this new season of the girlfriends,

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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.

Facts, very true. Well, speaking of evil commies, let's go to AOC. We've got AOC here in a clip where she was asked by Julian Andrione from DropSight News. Shout out to Julian. Yep, friend of the show, Julian, drop site Capitol Hill reporter. And she was asked about the race between. Shikot Chakrabati and Scott Wiener in California. Shoycott, obviously, your chief of staff, former chief of staff is running in San

Francisco. That primary is in June, obviously. You're not going to have a reporter tell you to endorse, but like is that something you're, are you at least monitoring the race looking at it? I mean, what's your stance on Shoycott? I mean, yeah, I think for me overall, it's more about, I'm trying to think about the role that I am trying to play more broadly in these things, you know, it's, we've got 435 seats in Congress, right? And there is this kind of moment where it's like when, and not just

with this race, with any race, once you go in, then it's like, what about this? What about this? What about this one? And I'm one person with, you know, a pretty amazing crack, but also lean team. And so we're thinking about kind of like how much of myself I'm pouring into this and how much of myself we want to make sure that we're, you know, pouring into the task at hand. Like, you know, what we've got going on here. But I think that what I will say is that I think that the primary environment that we're seeing is really great. I think that progressives have already notched some really impressive victories this early into the primary season. And we've got another, what, six or seven months of it to go. And I'm looking forward to having a lot of new colleagues here in November that we can, you know,

it's been a lonely, really lonely road for the first eight years. And I'm really hoping that it'll be a little less lonely in November. Emily, your face. Well, so for context, Julian's like six foot five. He's literally giant. So that's why it is important context for audio only listeners, yes. Yes, but I mean, you guys can cook on this. I'll let you guys go off.

But that's a little bit of cope. So, Crystal, they were like former allies, right? He was her chief of staff. I mean, he was with her during her upset campaign where, you know, almost no one thought she would win. And then Ryan has done the reporting. I don't think anyone, clearly, like, listen, I'm reading into this, she's got some sort of a,

personal issue with him. Because otherwise, this is your former chief of staff. There is another progressive in the race, but he is the one that, according to the polls, has the actual chance to win. He is part of your ideological project and movement. He's up against the state senator, Scott Wiener, who is generally progressive except Palestine. He's tried to position, reposition himself recognizing where the base of the party is, but it's very clear, Shoyot is the left-wing candidate with the best shot to win. And not only does she not. endorse him. She doesn't say a single thing about him. No kind words. No, I think he's a great progressive, but I'm just a vet. No. So she clearly has some sort of a personal beef and is allowing that

to cloud her commitment to a broader movement. So she says in that, like, I'm trying to figure out what kind of role I'm going to play. It's like, lady, I thought you were trying to play the role of a progressive leader. So, you know, if you're trying to do that, then whatever your hurt feelings are, whatever happened in the past, You put that aside because you're supposed to be helping to get these candidates in so you're not so lonely in Congress anymore. I mean, the whole thing, everything about it is cope and nonsense too because she also does this thing. Oh, our staff is so lean, blah, blah, blah. There's plenty of other people out there who managed to make endorsements and, you know, serve in Congress and it's not that hard.

And you yourself have made other endorsements. So it's not like you're waiting to rip the Band-Aid off, you know? So I don't know. I just look at this. And it's very, it's not honest. Number one, it's not direct. None of it makes sense. This does not appear to me, someone who is comfortable or truly desires to be in a leadership role.

And so it's just very, honestly, just very sad to me because she has so much potential to be such an important force right now at a time when the political project that she has helped been a very important part of is taking flight. does have this momentum. Annalia Mejia won overwhelmingly in New Jersey last night. That's awesome. By the way, AOC endorsed her, managed to endorse her without a problem, without it stretching her too thin or whatever. But in any case, right at the moment when she could really be pushing the ball forward, she's so reticent.

And, you know, I feel like, and not to over-psychologize her, but she's taken so much criticism from the right. She's taking criticism from the left, from myself included, because I do hold her to a higher standard as someone who wants to position herself as the vanguard of the left. You know, I expect her to be occupying that space and there have been instances where she has not. And in response to that criticism, rather than going out there and making her case and kind of doing battle, she's withdrawn. You, she doesn't go on shows like ours and not just ours. She doesn't go on, you know, she'll occasionally go on with Hassan. maybe she's gone on a majority of it once.

But she'll go on Hassan for like, she'll go on Hassan for like four minutes, right? Like these aren't even like long, long sit downs. And that is four hours. That is kind of the interesting thing about, I guess, AOC's theory of media,

which is to do Instagram videos, to have like complete control, right? Do your stories, do your Instagram lives, and have complete control of your media message, do a quick snippet to a news camera outside the Capitol or whatever, and sort of, have a full control there.

You know, we came out of 2024, which was the podcast election, or that's how people referred to it. It was really like four guys. It was like Schultz, Theovan, Rogan, Tim Dillon. Maybe that. Alex has kind of disappeared a little bit. This is, um, this is milk boys erasure. I'm so sorry.

Yeah, it's the milk boys. We add them. But those were like the four horsemen of the podcast election. Maybe, maybe 2028, maybe they aren't the four horsemen. Maybe they actually don't have as much sway in 2028, like, who's to say there? But I do think it's clear that, like, can you imagine AOC doing a two-hour podcast anywhere right now? I do think it's like a weakness for her. Yeah.

But I guess her theory of the case is like maybe she doesn't have to do them. Maybe she can just stay on Instagram, stay on these places, not have to sit down for a long time with anyone. Like, didn't we already learn that that's not the case with Compt? Harris. Like, didn't we already find this out? And even if, let's say that that general media theory is correct, that she can do her own media and she's a big enough star that people will come to her and see what she has to offer. Number one, I think Zoron's content is vastly like more polished and effective than hers. I haven't seen anything she's put out that is like hit anywhere close to like what his, you know, billionaire tax video or even his like halal cart video or any of those, right?

So that's number one. I don't even think that she's doing a particularly good job if that's the theory. But number two, remember when she went to that, what was the Munich Security Conference? And she kind of fell flat on her face. Even people who want to defend her had to admit that it wasn't exactly a polished presentation. And I personally had some issues with the ideological content of the answers as well. Well, that doesn't come out of nowhere. That's because she's not putting in reps.

If you're not facing hostile questioning, if you're not having a deal with the questions that people have, you're not going to be good at it. No matter, I don't care how talented you are. It was like Tim Walls. It requires practice. It was like Tim Walls.

You know, like J.D. was going on all of the shows. J.D. was getting his reps in. And then you go to the VP debate. Tim Walls, all Tim Walls was doing was eating corn dogs at the county fair and like hiding from reporters. And then you go to the VP debate and he gets wallop by Vance, who like, Vance started out, Vance started out not that great on camera.

We interviewed Vance before he was the nominee, and he was far less talented back then. I mean, you can say what you want about him right now if you don't feel he's talented currently, but he did put in reps. He got better. So the Orr Walls would go on, like, really, really gentle, like dad podcasts and that type of thing.

That's actually a really good point about the media. When you're in an environment, you can study all you want, but when it actually is like you're at the Munich Security Conference and people are asking you about Taiwan, you can tell that she sort of freezes because she's trying to like bring up the points that she's studied for, which sort of all politicians do. But that's very interesting. And it also, the thing that stuck with me from what you guys have been talking about, because from the outside, I disagree a little bit. And again, I'm observing this from the outside. I think she's actually been, I think there's a chance that we look at this 10 years from

now and we're like, she played it pretty cleverly. I think her relationship with Nancy Pelosi, which I wonder if that's involved in the Scott Wiener situation. Probably. I think she was fairly clever about that because when I look back at the trajectory of the left since she won and galvanized candidates around the country and the broader movement, it's been on the up. The question is, I think the point that you guys are both raising, is she up to be a leader of that movement. She obviously wants to be a leader of that movement, but when you look at this answer to Julian, that is not the statement of a leader. When you look at the performance at Munich, that is not the performance of a leader, somebody with the capacity to really take the helm

of the movement from Bernie, who clearly wants to appoint AOC the heir. Their fighting Oggar Kitor was a massive runaway success. Could she have done that on her own or with another person that she chooses in the future to go on a sort of tour with, is she exhibiting like really the capacity to be a leader? I think that is the point that you guys are hitting on that really resonates. That's very, very interesting. Yeah. And Emily, to your point, I've been thinking about this lately, you know, the disappointments of the left in the squad, which really, you know, kind of AOC's seen as the leader of. And she comes in with all this fanfare and knocks off this Joe Crowley who, you know, came out of nowhere. and there's all this post-2016 excitement.

The reality is the left is very weak, right? No institutional backing. Public still very much in love with the Democratic establishment leadership, in love with MSNBC in terms of the Democratic base, et cetera. And so it was perhaps it was. Perhaps it was a savvy calculator. I still don't totally agree, but I can see why the calculation was made. Look, we just don't have the institutional support to do this renegade thing right now.

So I need to get what I can from leadership. right? We're in a different moment now. The base of the parties with us. They're not with Nancy Pelosi. They're certainly not with Chuck Schumer. They're certainly not with Hakeem Jeffries. It's a different moment now. And the power, the institutional power needs to be built. She could be an important part of building that. As far as I can tell, she is not doing that. And she's very reluctant to do that. And so to see her there saying, I don't really know what my role is. It's like, okay, well, then, you know, don't pretend like we should all defer to you as some leader of the progressive movement or take seriously a presidential bid if you don't even know yourself if that's the role that you want to fill. And I just look at, you know, I look at we've had huge energy and outrage on the left over ice. We've had, you know, a massive national conversation about the Epstein class and Epstein files. We're at war with Iran right now. And on all of these things, she will, she will take the correct positions, right? She'll vote the right way. But is she the one leading the charge?

Post the fight oligartigator, I have not seen it. I have not seen it. And so, you know, when she says, I'm not sure what role, I think that's actually very revealing that she is not secure in the role that she wants to fill. And, you know, if you want to be, that person who is out front, you really do need to go into some spaces that are going to be uncomfortable and be unafraid of making your case and be unafraid of, look, yeah, of course, if you're going to be a very visible leader, you are going to take incoming. That is the nature of the deal. And it may not always be fair.

And that has certainly been the case for her and, you know, the way she's been sexualist. All of that stuff is disgusting. But you have to be prepared that you're going to take incoming. And then you can, you know, play it like Zoran does and provoke the fights you want to provoke and help guide and take the incoming you want to take so that you're driving the narrative. But instead, I feel like she turtles and has just become increasingly insular. And that's, you know, it's not going to serve anyone. So anyway, I find this whole thing very frustrating and just so lame, just so lame.

Like, it's just so dishonest, too. Like, if you've got, you know, at least have the respect to say, listen, we had some issues in office, I'm not sure. You know, like, okay, at least I can deal with that. But to pretend, did I even say his name? To pretend like, oh, this is about some other higher-minded principle. It's like, this is just all total spin and nonsense and everyone can see through it. It definitely felt Kamala-e, where it's like, you know you're going to get these questions.

Like, you should have something to say, even if it's something that we disagree with. But she is, you know, the last thing I'll say positively for AOC is, I do think she would be the only 2028 candidate to actually unite liberals in the left. Whereas I feel like every other candidate, there would be a lot of schisms between, but I do

think most leftists would probably like come over to her. I don't think that they're as critical as potentially we are on this show of her. I do think there's still a lot of good feelings for AOC, and I do also feel like liberals would trust her. Do you disagree, Emily? No, I mean, I just am thinking

about like how Glenn has covered AOC, which is, I think, appropriately critical and how we've covered her, which I think has been totally fair. And I wonder how that trickles into like the average kind of leftist based Democratic voter in a primary. So I don't know. It's an interesting point. I think, you know, it depends on who you're running against because if you're running against Kamala Harris, then it's easy to consolidate people in support of AOC. I mean, I would just say, I think you're right about that, Griffin. I think she is, broadly popular, right? I think she's broadly one of the most popular figures in the Democratic Party right now. I don't think there's any doubt about that. Can you imagine are holding up on a debate stage?

I mean, I can't, you know? And so, look, Kamala Harris came into the 2020 primary with a head of steam and with that same position and people thought, okay, she's for Medicare for all and maybe she can bridge these divides and she's got this incredible resume, blah, blah, blah. And then she really, she had one great debate poor performance, the like, you know, what was it, her tagline? Like, that little girl was me. That, I mean, it really did in the moment. Like, her polls went up and people were responded to it, blah, blah, blah. And then after that, she just kind of crumbled. And people as they watch her under that scrutiny were like, I can't really see it. And so it's hard for me to imagine. I'm sorry, I hate to be so brutal, but it is hard for me to imagine. AOC because she hasn't

put in the time in the reps really holding up under that scrutiny. And the few glimpses we've gotten of her under pressure have not been great. So it makes me very skeptical of, of her chances and even really her desire to put herself into that role. I mean, I think that's a part of what else is going on here. She may herself be kind of reluctant. And you've got a staff around. You say, oh, you've got this favor bill. You've got this name recognition and your Bernie's there and blah, blah, blah. And so she's being pulled in this direction. But I'm not sure that she's entirely comfortable with it at this point, maybe part of what we're getting as well. Okay, so I know that I'll end the AOC discussion.

I know Crystal's going to jump in a sec. Let's hit some AMA questions. Let's see if we can get one out of Crystal before she's got to run. Let's see. From Trevor Scott, what does everyone thoughts on the coalition between Ro Khanna and MTG? Is this a dangerous move or smart politics in order to leverage their followers to put pressure against the war or both? I think it's a little bit dangerous, actually. I agree.

I think Roe working with Thomas Massey on War Powers resolutions, on Epstein files, Roe working with MTG when she was in Congress on these things. That is completely, that makes a lot of sense. And I have no problem with him, you know, doing a CNN interview exploring where they have overlap, exploring where they have differences, et cetera. But I do think there is a danger in filling yourself too much with her because some of her views have been really awful. And, you know, and some of her contribution politics has been truly terrible. And I'm not sure that we've really seen, okay, what is the transformation that occurred here?

Who are you today? What do you actually believe at this point? So that's why I think there is a bit of a risk here of him being a bit over-eager to sort of affiliate with someone, especially if you are thinking in terms of a Democratic primary base, much of whom are still going to have a lot of antipathy towards Marjorie Taylor Green. Is Griffin? Is Griffin here? I think he is... What happened in Griffin? Dropped off for a second.

What are your thoughts, Emily? You probably disagree with me on this one. No, I mean, I see what you're saying. I think I have seen MTG like apologize for the way she did politics years ago, but I think part of the reason it's good is that I think she is actually trying to figure out what she believes right now. Like, I feel like she's felt like she's had the rug pulled out from under her by MAGA,

by Trump, by the Republican Party, that she felt like she was at the hell. of, like, briefly. And that leaves her questioning a lot of like, and Roe can probably help nud her in good directions or better directions. So I just, my skepticism of it is like, how much does it really matter? Like, is it really going to do much? Like, I don't think it's, I don't think it's revolutionary or anything of that sort. There's a line he can walk that's like projecting, okay, this is what a broad majority could look like. And as long as she's coming to him, on his issue positions, then he's in the position of strength. I think the danger is if there's any, you know,

sort of like when Gavin Newsom would host like Benchapiro or Charlie Kirk or whatever, and he's going to their positions. That reads as weakness. That reads as capitulation. If you're drawing like a magnet people to your positions, then you're in a position of strength. Yeah, but also it's like MTG got bullied and quit. Like, I just don't see what, like, does she even have a political future?

Like, is she going to quit again? when someone's mean to her again. Like, I'm sorry, but it was kind of pathetic how she, like, took a stand and then quit. She could be voting on these war powers resolutions. She could be voting on all these things. So it's like, okay, now we're aligning with, what is she on, like a gym? Like, what is it?

I don't know what her future is. And I do feel like it's almost, it's kind of like, it's weird because it is kind of the premise of our show, right? That there are these like shared interests between the left and right, like populists or whatever. But it is also kind of like a nerdy online take, isn't it? Like, you know, like maybe like liberals won't like that he's cozy with all these people. I hope he's running a dem primary.

Like maybe that would work against him. All in all, though, I respect it because at the end of the day, for the last six weeks, we've been trying to stop the Israeli nuclear holocaust, right? So like, it doesn't matter who you align with right now. Like, we're glad that everyone, like, we're glad that Megan Kelly is saying what she's saying on the war. We're glad that Tucker is saying what he's saying on the war, you know. So I get in that moment and I respect it. But yeah, I'm not sure about the future there.

And Crystal, do you got to run? It's tough. I do. I need to jump. I've got a meeting I'll have to get to. But appreciate you guys. Yeah. Bye.

Okay, Emily, from Space Bartender. Emily, what's your sense of the net impact of Trump's fight with the Pope? Repleted slash repeated claims of divinity. Is it losing him support in a significant way? Is there some meaningful number that like it because he's smashing, norms. There's a few more questions here. Oh, yeah. And is Heg-Seth's aggressive religiosity a plus or a minus for administration? Like for the, I guess that the politics, I guess if those are the same questions like the

politics of the Heg-Seth thing, I'll get to that in a second. With Trump, I don't know, it's always hard to tell what's a media scandal for Trump. Like we hear over and over again for the last 10 years, he's losing it. This time, he's really losing. losing it. This time he's like, he's finally gone crazy 25th Amendment. It's like it happens. It comes in waves. And well, like my perspective on it was like, this is exactly what I expect for Donald Trump. It's exactly what I expect from Donald Trump and has been one I've expected from Donald Trump since 2015 in politics. Like this is, he posted, he photoshopped himself into the pope's like outfit last year at a very sensitive time for the Catholic perfects.

He says all kinds of, like he says he hates his enemies. He says, you know, I used to get my little wine and my little cracker. It's just like, so I can't tell, but I have heard just anecdotally, people being somewhat horrified by it. And Catholic voters are real. And there are some independent-leaning Catholic voters, like the types of people that voted Obama and then Trump, Rust Belt types. So I could see it being kind of a final straw. building on top of like a lot of just total, you know, disillusionment and fatigue, exhaustion with Trump and Trumpism. Hegseth, the politics of Hegseth constantly invoking religion at his war briefings, I think are incontrovertibly bad. You know, Christians want their leaders to be, like, to believe Everything is in being done with having prayed for the correct sense of direction and to make decisions that are in accordance with the will of God.

So that's, I don't have a problem with that. But I do think, first of all, most Americans don't think that way. And it sounds creepy and weird when you're doing it in war briefings. So the politics of it, I think, are a disaster. It's weird. It comes across as very weird. Well, you said weird, so let's end on a weird one to send everyone off to the weekend. From Michael Corleone, please include a detailed breakdown of Raccoon Gate on the Friday show.

Thank you for your attention to this matter. The penis. Yes, the raccoon. So let's look at it real quick to send everyone off. From the New York Post, RFK Jr. once chopped off a dead raccoon's penis to study later, a family road trip. The bizarre account by the nation's top civilian health official was unearthed in a new book, RFK Jr., the Fall and Rise.

Quote, I was standing in front of my parked car on I-684, cutting the penis out of a road-killed raccoon, thinking about how weird some of my family members have turned out to be. Reads a surreal passage in which the Health and Human Services had, 72 was reportedly lamenting his rocky relationships with his family. My kids waited patiently in the car, he noted. Collected him, he collected the raccoon's genitals so he could study them later. I thought this was from the new podcast.

Emily, he's also started a new podcast. Yeah, yeah. Have you seen the new podcast? Well, have you seen the set? Because it's given me some ideas about our own set. His set has many ducks. And I'm wondering why we don't have a single duck on the breaking point set. Hmm, yeah, we should get into...

Well, there's a lot of opportunities for taxidermy this year, you know? I might be building some home studios for some remote sessions. So, yeah, maybe we could... Why don't you just start picking up whatever you find off the street? I mean, is there any roadkill you see in D.C.? Choping off those, right? That's right, yeah, chopping off dead animal dicks and bringing them into the studio. The best part of that passage is that he wrote,

he was doing this while thinking about how weird the rest of his family was. And that is an incredible psychological insight. He's like, man, I wish they could just be normal like me. So it also feels like Maha with his pivot to like doing this podcast or whatever. Like is he just kind of giving up on all the maha stuff? Like do you have any sense of that? We don't really cover it a ton of the show because it's hard to cover without. like having like a very informed almost like doctor level perspective on the proceedings,

but it seems like he's just going back to podcasting, which was like his first and true love. No, funny. Well, I think actually what we're going to see is going forward, bureaucrats, like heads of these agencies are the ones that are more like media friendly. Like they've done a lot of interviews in the career, whatever. They're all going to have podcasts. So I think it's kind of just the new normal. It's basically the equivalent of having somebody who sends press releases.

You're going to have somebody who's sending out your podcasts. And you do the podcast to convey the same thing as that was in the press release. So that's my sense of, I don't think it has any, like, substantive bearing. But lots of ducks. And it's always hard to, I mean, yeah, we should do more Maha coverage. We should find, like, who is our, who is our Professor Pate for Maha? That's what we need. Yeah, that's a good question.

That's a really good question. Sager's got some guys. Are there any questions for you, Chris? You know, there are, but I usually skip them because it's like... I know, but I know you do that on purpose, but that's what I'm trying to... No, that was, the Raccoon Gate one, that was for me this week, okay? That was for me. Spiritually, that was for you.

It was for me. It's nice to know all the, all of the wildlife animals that RFK engages with over his life. So looking forward to the next raccoon, otter, seal, whatever he finds next. Looking forward to that story. And thank you all for watching. That was today's Friday show. Check out Emily on After Party. How's After Party going?

Everyone should subscribe. We had Dave Smith on this week. So need more subscribers. Come on. Help us out. Yeah, Dave was. And Dave wanted to fight. Dave came in.

He got me. He sucked me into a debate. which I hate doing, but about the U.S. being, we were quibbling over the definition of terrorism. He says U.S. biggest supporter of terrorism around the world. I said violence and terrorism are not the same thing. It was heated. It was fun. But also we do have an actual debate that I'm moderating coming up on the after party channel

between Ryan and Scott Jennings. Oh, my God. So, yeah. That's Thursday. That's a full court event. Thursday night. Well, everyone go subscribe to After Party to get ready for that one. I'm sure we'll send out a link to that so everyone can get a little Ryan Grimm for Scott Jennings.

Oh my God. What a match. Why did Scott agree with it? On immigration. That's why Scott agreed to it. Okay. It's in his Q zone. And then what's Ryan going to say just like, oh, tear down the wall?

Well, you know, it's kind of interesting because Ryan is basically a full open borders guy. So I feel like it's actually the right contrast as opposed to like some. centrist, um, dem loser who's like, well, it'll be good. Incredible. Well, everybody look forward to that. And if there's any other breaking news around this ceasefire, we'll see you with some breaking news. And if not, we'll see you Monday. Take care. Bye. Bye. When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands. I vowed. I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with

this. He's going to get what he deserve. We always say that trust your girlfriends. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. What's up, everyone? I'm Ego Wood. My next guest, it's Will Ferrell.

My dad gave me the best advice ever. He goes, just give it a shot. But if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore. It's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat, just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right. It wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Yeah. Listen to thanks dad 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

to be a hoax. You doctored this particular test twice, Ms. Owens, correct? I doctored the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern. Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg Gillespie and Michael Marencheony. 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. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.