Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 6/26/25: McConnell Says Get Over Medicaid Cuts, Bernie And Rogan Rip AIPAC, Liver King Arrested

Episode Date: June 26, 2025

Krystal and Saagar discuss Mitch McConnell says Americans will get over Medicaid cuts, Bernie and Rogan go off on AIPAC, Liver King arrested.   Scott Horton: https://x.com/scotthortonshow    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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We need your help to build the future of independent news media, and we hope to see you at breakingpoints.com. Let's turn now to the one big, beautiful bill that's the major tax legislation being pushed by Republicans through the House and the Senate. There's been some pretty big developments there, but really it's the political development of the future of Medicaid, which is the one that is just hanging like a noose around the

Republican's neck. You've got two sides really. You've got President Trump and you've got Josh Hawley and a few other Republicans who are saying, we're not going to cut Medicaid. We're not going to touch it. And then you've got others like Senator Mitch McConnell who are like, yeah, people will get over it. And if you think I'm making it up, let's put this up there on the screen.

This is leaked from a direct meeting of the Senate Republicans. Senator Tom Tillis warned GOP senators during a closed door meeting that Senate reconciliation bill would prompt major electoral losses similar to Obamacare. Tillis aired concerns with Senate's Medicaid provider tax framework. The majority leader, John Thune, defended it, saying it's key component for their spending cuts. Separately, Mitch McConnell said,

"'Failure isn't an option.' "'I know a lot of us are hearing from people "'back home about Medicaid, but they'll get over it. They'll get over it. Okay, good luck. Yeah, I don't think so, actually. And just to show that it's not just crazy people like Josh Hawley or whatever that are worried about this,

let's put this up there on the screen from Politico. Even the speaker, Mike Johnson, who is not somewhat liberal, is saying that Medicaid backlash could be a serious problem for a lot of the House Republicans and their majority next year. A lot of this just comes down to the fact that because they're not willing to cut the Pentagon

and because discretionary spending is just not that big, like in terms of Doge or wherever, I think it's probably less than 7% of the federal budget, you've got to hit an entitlement program somewhere. You can't touch Medicare, can't touch Social Security, so they're going after quote unquote reforms within Medicaid. But no matter how, which way you slice it, it would lead to less services and that's of course where the spending cuts are coming from.

And that is one of the most tangible ways, which particularly lower middle class Americans and more interact with the federal government for spending. It would just be such a massive own goal, especially in the realm of war with Iran and a trillion dollar Pentagon budget, to show what the priorities are, not to mention the fact that it extends many of those tax cuts

from the TCJA which had lowered the taxes for the wealthiest income brackets. There's also the salt provision which continues to be battled out within there but Medicaid is like the number one thing and actually outside of Iran I think this one is breaking through. This is one of those where it's like the Social Security thing it's a service that people use. By the way, my social security card for my daughter took forever to come. Thank you, Elon.

Oh yeah, it's like a tangible thing. I was like, where is the damn card? I needed to sign up for health insurance. But just goes to show you, you know, these are things people actually need to use, all segments of society. And so that really, especially combined with the tax cut, it's just a brutal headline for the Republicans, brutal.

Even Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer can figure out how to message this one. Yeah, that's right. You know, a giant tax cut. You are losing your healthcare so that rich people can get a tax cut. That's the promise of this bill. And that's why some Republicans are wise enough

to realize this could be a political problem. I mean I think a lot of them realize that but remember the vast majority of the Republican caucus are incredibly safe seats so they're not worried about it. You have you know the number of swing states has like shrunken shrunken shrunk so you have a comparatively small number and then they're terrified of just getting crosswise from Trump with Trump because you know they see what he's doing to Thomas Massey right now the way he's aggressively going after we didn't even get a chance to cover this He set up an entire pack to spend money against Thomas Massey to try to defeat him because of his you know Defiance over a number of issues, but including the you know illegal strikes on Iran illegal war waged against Iran

So you know they know what happens when you get crosswise with Trump, and so they're fearful, even the ones who are in districts that are potentially winnable by a Democrat. Yeah, that's right. And so let's go to the next one, please, and just on the screen, just to underscore a lot of this, this is D3, and it shows all of the polling. So this is from Fox News, by the way,

and that's why we picked it. So can you understand what's in the bill? 60% say, yeah, that's actually a lot. I'm pretty shocked that people are paying attention that much. But here's the most devastating one. Your opinion, 60% say they oppose, 38% say that they favor.

For your family, the big, beautiful bill will quote, make no difference, 26%, 23% help, 49% say it will hurt. It's not exactly true, just because outside of Medicaid, it's mostly extending tax cuts that were already passed. That's why it's kind of funny seeing the Republican messaging. They're like, if we don't do this,

it will be a massive tax hike. I'm like, well, no, it'll revert back to the original tax bill of 2016. But what, most people don't actually pay that much attention to taxes. It's really about services that broadly is one of the ones that we're watching. So for example, let's put guys D4 up on the screen.

This is about the process that has happened inside of the Senate, and that's broadly where these Medicaid stuff has come into play because a lot of the spending cuts are coming from the program. President Trump actually spoke with a reporter today saying he was against that, but then on top of that, and I know this sounds like very in the weeds,

but it really matters, is that just this morning, the Senate parliamentarian has, quote, struck up a whole bunch of critical health provisions from the bill, including the provider tax framework. Effectively, what that means is it screws with many of the ways they were going to pay and fund their tax or their tax extension and their spending cuts. And so what that would mean is would increase the deficit score. Now if it increases the deficit score outside of the Senate bill, that will

then move to the House where already you had a lot of freedom caucus Republicans bucking at the fact that the deficit was going to increase as a result of this. So you got two kind of opposing forces at work. And most importantly is that President Trump has said he does not want Congress, we can put that D5 please on the screen. President Trump has said nobody's leaving Washington until the mega tax bill is done. He wants it passed by July 4th. This makes that a hell of a lot more difficult because they just lost a lot of their payfors. They're going to be in parliamentary hell for the next week now basically.

And what that means is that they're going to have to scramble and find some other stuff to do that's going to run up against the House Republicans and the Freedom Caucus. And of course, it just makes it not only is it more chaotic, but it's more likely they're gonna have to cut even deeper from some other type of social program and find some other way just to pay for a tax cut, which people at home are all paying attention to. A couple other provisions that the parliamentarian has said cannot be included in this reconciliation bill that are noteworthy. Number one, we had mentioned before

and covered before the fact that in the House version, there was effectively a provision that is meant to make it difficult or impossible for federal courts to enforce contempt charges against the federal government. The parliamentarian has said, you can't do that. The Senate had a slightly modified version. It would have required plaintiffs to post potentially enormous bonds when asking courts

to issue preliminary injunctions or impose temporary restraining orders against the federal government. The House version had to do with contempt orders. In any case, she said, none of this can go in this bill. So that is probably being stripped down. Another couple that are really noteworthy, there was a provision that would reduce the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, that's basically the Anti-Scam Bureau funding to zero, that also was deemed to not qualify for reconciliation.

And there was another proposal that would put the public company accounting oversight board, which is the US audit watchdog, into the SEC, that again was deemed not eligible for the reconciliation process. So these are some of these provisions. The court one is actually quite significant and the CFPB one also very significant. So the fact they won't make it into reconciliation matters a lot. But also to Sagar's point, you know, as they go through all these things, there was also a piece they were trying to sell off all the US Postal Service's new electric vehicle fleet

and charging infrastructure, which I can't imagine they were gonna make like that much money on it, but that was another one of their pay-fors. I'll buy it. That also got taken out of the bill, so I'm sorry, you won't be able to purchase one of the USPS electric trucks.

I'll take it for pennies on the dollar, that sounds pretty fun actually, roll around in an electric post office. I mean, one of the weirdest things is I actually love, not even just electric vehicles, but resto mod stuff, like stuff that's electric, like a golf cart. You know, and things like that. They're just fun to drive, like let's be honest.

At this point, a check for the relationship with golf carts. I don't blame you, I don't blame you. But I enjoy them, I enjoy seeing them around. I know a lot of cops, and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes, but there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country cops called this Taser the revolution. But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that Taser told them.

From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley comes a story about what happened when a multibillion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser, Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad. May 21st and episodes four, five and six on June 4th. Ad free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple podcasts. Over the past six years of making my true crime podcast, Hell and Gone, I've learned one thing.

No town is too small for murder. I'm Catherine Townsend. I've received hundreds of messages from people across the country, begging for help with unsolved murders. I was calling about the murder of my husband. It's a cold case. I've never found her, and it haunts me to this day. The murderer is still out there.

Every week on Hell and Gone Murder Line, I dig into a new case, bringing the skills I've learned as a journalist and private investigator to ask the questions no one else is asking. Police really didn't care to even try. She was still somebody's mother. She was still somebody's daughter. and private investigator to ask the questions no one else is asking. If you have a case you'd like me to look into, call the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. Listen to Hell and Gone Murder Line on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The summer of 1993 was one of the best of my life.

I'm journalist Jeff Perlman, and this is Rick Jervis. We were interns at the Nashville Tennessean, but the most unforgettable part, our roommate, Reggie Payne, from Oakley, sports editor and aspiring rapper. And his stage name? Sexy Sweat. In 2020, I had a simple idea. Let's find Reggie.

We searched everywhere, but Reggie was gone. In February, 2020, Reggie was having a diabetic episode. His mom called 911. Police cuffed him face down. He slipped into a coma and died. Reggie was having a diabetic episode. His mom called 911. Police cuffed him face down. He slipped into a coma and died. I'm like thanking you. But then I see my son's not moving.

No headlines, no outrage, just silence. So we started digging and uncovered city officials bent on protecting their own. Listen to Finding Sexy Sweat on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Let's move on to Bernie, shall we? Yeah, so Bernie Sanders went back on with Joe Rogan. I did actually, I sort of skimmed through the whole conversation and there was a long stretch

that was interesting, but kind of went on for a long time about AI and what do we do about this and how do people find meaning. So that was a lot of it. Also, Bernie just doing his normal Bernie thing, talking about healthcare and the millionaires, the billionaires was also a good part of it. But there are a couple pieces that I found pretty interesting.

One of them where Bernie is talking about Carson Massey and some of the attitude he's taken towards the Iran war in particular, and you get Joe's response to that. So let's go ahead and take a listen to that. I mentioned there's a guy named, I don't know his first name, Mr. Massey, is that the name? Thomas Massey. Thomas from Kentucky. And this guy, as I am, is opposed to this war in Iran. Just yesterday, Trump gave a long post about how they're going to primary this guy. What bothers me is you would hope that there would be respect enough for members of Congress that you can vote your own conscience, you could represent your constituency.

Every district is different than America. But right now, anybody stands up and say, well, you know, I disagree with President Trump, bam, you are finished. We're going to primary you. We got all kinds of money. You're out of there. That happened to Massey yesterday. So I thought that was pretty interesting, that coming up and, you know, Trump's attempt to punish Thomas Massey, which we were just talking about, and Thomas Massey has been

speaking out a lot about AIPAC. And I think it's been really important. He's also raised about a million five in the last week, so Massie's crushing it right now. Yeah, I mean, I think that his speaking out on AIPAC in particular coming from a Republican who has a lot of credibility, you know, he's an ideological libertarian,

but he has a lot of credibility with a pretty significant swath of the Republican party, and for him to be talking about the influence of this lobby and the way that it works, I think has been really significant broken through to people like Joe Rogan and others where, you know, I mean, the left were always talking about money and politics, Bernie's always talking about money and politics. It really does land a lot when you have someone from the right who is making that kind of a critique.

Yeah. There was another moment here that I thought was interesting that I wanted to get your reaction to, Sagar saga where Joe is talking About how he sees the divisions within MAGA right now again about war in Iran. Let's go ahead and take a listen that part I think the whole MAGA thing right now is very divided Particularly because one of the things that they voted for was no war Well now it seems like we're in a war, right? So and it's quick.

We're six months in and that's already popped off. And then people are very concerned with now what happens to our troops overseas that are in these bases that are in vulnerable positions and what happens with, I mean, they're supposedly documented terror cells that got in through the open border over the last four years. So what happens now in America? What happens on American soil? No, I mean, I agree with those.

When a guy like Thomas Massey steps up and says something, he's going to have a lot more support as well. The answer is yes. And my only point is he has a right. Yes. You know somebody else says hey I think the war is a great idea. Fine that's you. You got to go back. But what bothers me is that if anybody stands up the next day we're gonna prime him. You're out of here man. And that's the Republicans. Let me talk about the Democrats for a moment. Okay. And I don't even know your views on this so you may disagree with me.

You know, Israel was attacked by Hamas, and Hamas is a terrible terrorist organization. They killed 1,200 people, which in a small country like Israel is a lot of people. Terrible, terrible attack. It's a war crime. Israel had a right, in 52,000 people in Gaza, wound over well over a hundred thousand and right now as we speak Joe, children are starving to death because of Israel's blockades. Yeah.

Yeah. Starving to death. And I brought forth two resolutions which which basically were very simple, and said, no more U.S. military aid to Israel under these conditions. One vote got 15 votes in the Senate, the other one got 16. Do you think that members of the Senate do not know what's going on in Gaza? The kids are starving to death, the innocent people are being shot down right and left. They know it.

Why do you think I couldn't get more votes? They wouldn't vote against Israel. Right. It's political suicide. Now you're talking. Right. All right. So in the Republican side, you have money insurers saying, you speak up against Trump,

you're out of here. In the Democratic side, you speak up against Netanyahu government, you're out of here as well. And they have been successful. You have super PACs like AIPAC spending a fortune. And they have already knocked off a number of good members of Congress, and they will do it again. So all I'm saying is you've got a corrupt campaign finance system on both sides.

So what do you think of that exchange? Well, that's what makes Bernie good at this, right? Is that he's talking both about those sides and he also gets Joe to kind of agree with him. I mean, you know, it's funny, this is where the analysis just always, and I understand why people do this, but the MAGA base is an actual thing.

It's not just like something you talk about. I'm talking about people who love Donald Trump and say that he is more important to them than the Republican party. That is not really the podcast audience really at all. Most of those people are boomers, rural working class voters, who mostly just like don't vote for anything else

and they just love Trump. Now outside of that is more what I would say is the ma-ha base, and this would probably be a more accurate way of talking about it, who are a lot more podcast aligned and who are a lot more libertarian. Those are the people, I put Dave Smith in that category,

maybe Candace Owens, probably Joe himself, who were attracted to Trump for more of those elements, Tulsi Gabbard as well. That, if anybody's quote, been betrayed, I would say it's that segment of that audience. Now I'm not gonna sit here and claim that that's a meaningful 50 or 60% or whatever of the Republican electorate.

But it is a new part and it's also, look, when you win the popular vote, you do so with a coalition. MAGA was, they're never gonna go anywhere. That's not the point. MAGA's not ever gonna go anywhere. The Boomer Republicans are gonna vote Republican no matter what.

The way you win the popular vote are with some really interesting coalitional groups, Ma'a people, and also some of these more anti-war voters. We were gonna do a segment before the Iran War ended, whatever, at least paused, at least for now, about polling, but these anti-war Muslims in Dearborn, it was not nothing that put them over the edge. That's how you win X amount of electoral votes.

And so I think we need to be more accurate in terms of the type of voter who is out there. Again, I would never claim that this is a huge percentage, but it can be your margin of victory. And I think we should start thinking about it in those terms. To me, the way I've been talking about it is the MAGA base versus independence.

Yeah, there you go, perfect. It's independence who swung to Trump and that's what gives him this victory and gives him the popular vote margin, etc. And I think they're the ones who are up for grabs. And you know, independence overall, if you look at the polling, people who don't identify as Republicans don't identify as Democrats, they are not happy about the strikes. You know, the numbers are significantly underwater. They're overwhelmingly underwater among Democrats.

They are significantly underwater among independents. Among Republicans, they all basically support him. CBS did a, to your point about parsing the MAGA base, CBS did a poll separating out all self-described Republicans from self-described MAGA Republicans. And among all Republicans, the strikes were supported 85 to 15, so still quite overwhelming.

Among MAGA Republicans, actually the support is even higher. 94% of the MAGA Republican base supported these strikes. So the accuracy in the language is something that's been bugging me too, because if you say the MAGA base is divided, like they're not. The MAGA base is 94% in favor of these airstrikes. They shifted. Before Trump did it, there was a little bit more dissent, a little bit more concern. Once he did it, they were all on board. And that is what we've seen. There is not a core ideology here. The core commitment is to Donald Trump.

And what he does, what he says defines where MAGA is gonna be. And that is just reality that we've seen time and time and time and time again. This is not the first time that Donald Trump has claimed he was gonna go in one direction and then ultimately gone in the other direction. And we've seen the MAGA base every single time

find a way to justify it because Trump did it, ergo it must ultimately be good. That's right. Probably the most heated exchange over the course of the interview came towards the end when Bernie seeks to bring up some of Trump's authoritarian tactics, and Joe starts to get a little,

a little, you know, it gets a little more contentious here, where Bernie is specifically talking about some of the lawsuits and the attacks on free speech by Trump, some of the lawsuits that he has waged against various media companies. Let's go ahead and take a listen. This went on for a little while, but let's go ahead and take a listen to a section of this. And what I worry about Trump is, you're right. You know, I read, it is astounding back in the 1780s when these guys wrote the Constitution,

how perceptive they were. Amazing. Yeah. I mean, they said... Their understanding of human desires and the power and all the corruption. Exactly. Pretty amazing. And they wrote that having just fought a war and won a war against the most powerful despot

on earth, the King of England, right? And I think in the back of their minds was saying, all right, we just beat the King of England, absolute power. How do you create a new country which has checks and balance so that nobody ever has that power again? And I got to say, I mean, one of the things, and there's a lot of arguments about Trump that worries me very, very much is this movement toward authoritarianism and going after media, suing media, taking away the authority that Congress has.

When you say suing media, are you talking about the CBS lawsuit? Among other things. But don't you think there's a real issue with what they did? No. You don't think that there's a real issue in editing conversations to give someone an answer that's different than what they really answered? Joe, I've been on eight zillion shows in my life. Now should I sue you if you ask me some stupid question that I don't like, right?

Or that you do something. Do I have a right? Should I sue you? Yeah, but that's not what he's getting. Well, he has sued ABC. He has sued Metta. He is suing the Des Moines Register because of a poll that came out during the campaign that he didn't like.

All right. He is suing CBS for this Kamala Harris interview. So do I think, how many, I cannot tell you the number of stories done about me that were based, that were not good stories, that were dishonest stories. That's what a free press is about. You don't like it, you got to live with it. So Bernie is sort of making the broader point about the authoritarian tactics and Joe is, I mean Joe's supposed to be a free speech guy,

but then he's down with these lawsuits. He has CVS, et cetera. The reason I understand is he's probably deeply fed up with a lot of these. In fact, I find this with a lot of rich guys who are like relatively well known as they get pissed about the media. And I actually understand, but the point is is that-

We get pissed about the media too. I get them too, right? Like is that... We can piss about the media too. I hate to piss about the media too, right? Like, I've literally had lies written about me multiple times, and it's like, well, you know, I think it's more useful to explain the principle, and I haven't listened fully to the interviews, I don't know if Bernie guessed to this, but the point of the way that the standard

is set currently is that you have to be able to prove as a public figure their willful knowledge, that they knew what they were saying was a lie at the time, and then you have to be able to show a damage. Now the reason why it's set that way is from a New York Times, what is it, New York Times versus Sullivan case at the Supreme Court back in the 1970s,

because we actually used to live in a much more censorious press, and the way that that current legal doctrine looks like is Britain and in Britain they actually have a much lower standard for the ability to sue over defamation and libel and in my opinion I don't think of nearly an adversarial culture enough you have much more of like the power veto of somebody coming in and saying no that's not gonna happen and the reason why I think that standard is important from a media person who works in this

is it preserves the ability to report things that are off the cuff, on the fly, first draft of history. Of course there are going to be errors as long as you have an editorial process in place and you can also demonstrate that what you're trying to do is not willfully lie about somebody, then it should be an extremely high standard to make sure that you can disseminate

that level of information. And if that didn't exist, you genuinely would have just a lot less of people, okay, let's go to the great example. This Iran intelligence story, right? The Trump administration is saying that they're trying to libel these pilots. You can see, that's bullshit.

That's not what's happening. They took facts and they reported it. They're not willfully trying to libel these pilots. You can see, that's bullshit. That's not what's happening. They took facts and they reported it. They're not willfully trying to libel or defame the pilots or taking information and they're putting it out into the public, but people should know that prior to that Sullivan decision and really to the Pentagon Papers, that story would never would have seen the light of day.

You and I would have no idea that that was actually the case. And I think we're better off knowing. Let's take that one step further because this gets to the next point, which is that what happened with ABC News and with CBS is because they didn't wanna get crosswise with the Trump administration, they didn't go forward and fight those suits.

They could have taken it to trial and they absolutely would have won. I'm telling you 100% they would have won. But they decided they would rather effectively pay a bribe to Trump. So that their business deals could go through, and Bernie does get to this point, their business deals can go through and they're not going to get messed with, et cetera. And so even though, when they're out there saying, oh, the New York Times or whoever

is libeling these pilots, even though that's obviously a bullshit and spurious claim, because of the track record of all of these media lawsuits. And the fact that these corporate entities are very willing to bend the knee and capitulate and pay the bribe rather than have their business messed with, it does act as an effective check on the press because they have that hanging over their head. We saw the way that 60 minutes, the fallout over there and their desire, the leadership's desire there for them not to go too far in terms of their Trump criticism so that they wouldn't, their larger business entity

wouldn't get crosswise with them. And so that's the point that Bernie is trying to make. And you know, on the specifics of like the CBS News I think was the one where there was an edit of Kamala Harris that like made Kamala look better. I mean, you can criticize the jury, as we did, but also, news outlets edit interviews all the time. All the time.

Not us, by the way. Fox News, I'm not gonna say we've never edited an interview. I actually, I'm not sure it's ever happened. I don't know if we have, but theoretically, you could imagine, okay, that question, we don't have time, whatever. But Fox News edited that interview with Trump where to make his Epstein answer look better,

like should Kamala sue Fox News over distorting the election because they hid from the audience the fact that Trump gave a really poor answer on Jeffrey Epstein that actually raised a lot of questions? No, she should complain about it. Fine. But the idea you should sue them or any other news outlet that edits an interview a way that you don't find to be advantageous for you or you find to be advantageous for your opponent,

that is ridiculous. I mean, it is completely absurd. But again, the broader piece here is part and parcel of this series of authoritarian tactics that are used to force media organizations to trim their sales, to not critique as much, to be afraid of these lawsuits, to pay tribute to the king. Goes with the university, the approach to universities, goes the approach to law firms, and is sort of like part and parcel of this project. And that is really the important point to make here versus getting even getting into

the nitty gritty. I mean, the details sure they matter, but getting into the nitty gritty of the lawsuits isn't really the point. It's that bigger picture that is what really matters. I don't disagree. But I also think that part of the problem, this is actually, I mean, I think Trump is, you know, what he does is he takes everything to the nth degree. But the truth is is that government has always used its leverage over these massive corporations

to influence media. And what we can see, like for example, let's take CBS. CBS is owned by Paramount, right? And Paramount is now being sold to Skydance. Well, Sherry Redstone, who was the head of Paramount, who is by the way, a massive pro-Zionist Jew, that's part of the reason she's interfering in CBS 60 Minutes, and also because she wants her merger

to go through, which is like Paramount Studios in Hollywood, and thus is trying to placate Trump over here. This, by the way, is, again, this is not just Trump, this is a tale as old as time. The Bush administration did this on Iraq coverage back in the mid 2000s. They've seen, we've seen significant pressure in the past. For example, I read a Jack Welch's book or a book about Jack Welch and he would never

sell CNBC because he was like, you don't understand CNBC cost me X amount of money, but it's value to General Electric as a company because of the ability to manipulate the stock market and to influence all policy discussion is immense. Bloomberg, same thing. Bloomberg Terminal owns Bloomberg News. So really I think it's also a story of corporate consolidation and control over media because of course the government and presidents in that

will use their leverage on those organizations. We've seen it threatened in the past. Nixon famously, as well would threaten their businesses and their permits and all these other things that won't be able to go through. It's part of the reason why, you know, with the internet and more independent models,

it actually, you genuinely can get a little bit more freedom, but yeah. It's such a big story that it is important for people to understand that. I just, I was, that's all accurate. I've never seen a president sue a media company over a poll they didn't like. No, but that's right.

I've never, yeah. What I'm saying is, Trump is like, Trump just goes all out, okay? I wanna say full something else, but I'll save it. But like, that's what he does. But I'm just, he's less subtle about it, I guess. I'm only just contextualizing it in that so that people should understand that, you know,

I mean, remember when Bernie, what did he say on the campaign trail? Oh, about Washington Post? Yeah, and he was like, who's that owned by? He said, who's that owned by? Something like that, and everyone freaked out at him. But it's just so obvious now, you know, the way that this all, and the way that they use

their media companies as tools for their broader empire. Bezos yesterday rolled out a new policy where sources who disagree with the way a story was framed are able to email in their comments about a story. Yeah, why do you think he did that? Okay, all right, let's wonder a little bit about why these things work. Well, here's what I would say is different

and then we can get to the liver king story, which also directly involves Joe Rogan and also involves us, potentially. Yes, that's right. What Trump has done differently with his administration, I did a long monologue about this previously, is there is no longer even the appearance or claim or pretense of neutrality.

Everyone knows if you get crosswise with Trump, he will get the DOJ after you, he will pull your funding, and whether it's Department of Education, whether it's your federal emergency, whatever it is, it is not, there is no pretext of neutrality. It's Versailles. You're completely accurate about that. So previously, remember in the Obama administration,

this big scandal that allegedly there were tax statuses being revoked by the IRS in a political manner. This was a giant scandal, okay? This would go unremarked upon. I don't even know there'd be a news article about it. This is what like it's, it's just- What was that woman's name? It's like-

Lois Lerner. Lois. Yeah, that's- It is so, that is what is, has truly been transformed about the government under Trump is everyone expects that every single aspect, every agency, every agency head, every lever that they can use against you, they will. And so that means that if Trump threatens to sue you,

that carries a lot of power. If they're going out, if they're a university that they're going after, if it's a state they're going after, it contains even more power. Not that it hasn't always been, you know, the federal government has always had a lot of power, but now there's not even a pretense of neutrality whatsoever. So they can go after you and it's barely even a scandal that they're

doing it in a politically motivated way. So that's what I think is, you know, has that's what the Rubicon Trump has truly crossed and you know a way in which he has truly changed the nature of the relationship that people expect from the federal government vis-a-vis the the citizens and civil societies. Yeah I don't I don't really disagree with any of that. I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time have you ever had to shoot your gun? And they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. Across the country, cops call this Taser the revolution.

But not everyone was convinced it was that simple. Cops believed everything that Taser told them. From Lava for Good and the team that brought you Bone Valley, comes a story about what happened when a multi-billion dollar company dedicated itself to one visionary mission. This is Absolute Season 1, Taser Inc. I get right back there and it's bad. It's really, really, really bad.

Listen to new episodes of Absolute Season One, Taser Incorporated on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Binge episodes one, two, and three on May 21st, and episodes four, five, and six on June 4th. Add free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Add free at Lava for Good Plus on Apple podcasts. Over the past six years of making my true crime podcast hell and gone, I've learned one thing.

No town is too small for murder. I'm Katherine Townsend. I've received hundreds of messages from people across the country begging for help with unsolved murders. I was calling about the murder of my husband at the cold case. I have never found her, and it haunts me to this day. The murderer is still out there. Every week on Hell and Gone Murder Line, I dig into a new case,

bringing the skills I've learned as a journalist and private investigator to ask the questions no one else is asking. Police really didn't care to even try. She was still somebody's mother, she was still somebody's daughter, she was still somebody's sister. asking. If you have a case you'd like me to look into, call the Helen Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. Listen to Helen Gone Murder Line on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The summer of 1993 was one of the best of my life. I'm journalist Jeff Perlman and this is Rick Jervis. We were interns at the Nashville Tennessean, but the most

unforgettable part? Our roommate, Reggie Payne from Oakley, sports editor and aspiring rapper. And his stage name? Sexy Sweat. In 2020, I had a simple idea. Let's find Reggie. We searched everywhere, but Reggie was gone. In February 2020, Reggie was having a diabetic episode. His mom called 911. Police cuffed him face down.

He slipped into a coma and died. I'm like thanking you, but then I see my son's not moving. No headlines, no outrage, just silence. So we started digging and uncovered city officials bent on protecting their own. Listen to Finding Sexy Sweat on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Let's get over to Liver King, shall we? Yes, again, just to bring it full circle, because we were in the Liver King documentary,

and this also involves Joe Rogan, and it's a fun story to end on after an insane couple of weeks. Liver King has found himself under arrest in the city of Austin. Let's go ahead and put some of that video up there on the screen after issuing quote, terroristic threats against Joe Rogan.

I mean, Liver King, his real name is Brian Johnson as revealed in the documentary, and as he often would talk about on his social media platform. I mean, let's be honest, this guy has totally lost it. He appears, he looks terrible. Who knows exactly what's going on with him, whether he's on something,

or whether he's withdrawing from the steroids that he admitted to taking after lying to everybody about not taking steroids. But the point actually, as a sociological phenomenon, is important to see because look, I mean, Liver King is a bullshit artist. I mean, this is a guy who again lied about taking steroids, sold, I think it was like $100 million or something

like that in supplements. He pulled off a bunch of stunts to popularize the carnivore diet, fine, but really it was like selling a vision and lifestyle centered around a body which just fundamentally he was lying about and everybody and lifestyle centered around the body, which just fundamentally he was lying about. And everybody kind of knew he was lying, but the proof eventually being released by my friend Derek

over at More Plates More Dates just really revealed him to be a total fraud and he tried to have his whole redemption arc. But I mean, what this just like demonstrates is also, you know, so many people were looking up to Liver King at that time. It's important to remember, you know, that a huge part of his audience was like teenage males who weren't really able to discern a lot of this.

And so, you know, in the hopes of being able to show people what the downside of, frankly, unhinged, you know, lying personality of somebody who's willing to perpetrate, you know, first of all, like, this massive attention grab and all this ridiculous shit that he was doing. But also, look at the downside of this, you know? Like, he's literally melting down on his Instagram page, now being arrested by the police,

and is obviously unhinged, like, he looks terrible. I genuinely hope he gets the help that he needs. He needs to be committed. His wife and his kids, like, you guys need to step up here, man, because this is a crash out of epic proportions. Like, yeah, take control, because this is not good. You know, whatever it is.

Well, I'll tell you, I watched the documentary last night about him, that Saga's monologue builds to a crescendo and it wraps up with Saga's monologue. Also, my voice is briefly in it as well, from our last, our Joe Rogan appearance. I forgot that we talked about this. I forgot about it too. And Joe's like, yeah, I knew he was a fraud.

And I'm like, oh, just based on how he looks. So in any case, we've been following it. He was obviously not on my readers, but I wasn't really the key demographic that they were going after. But what jumps out in the documentary is, first of all, you feel terrible for these boys. I do, I do.

Terrible. Those children are used as props to basically sell a lifestyle. And all this weird shit he has them do, I mean, I feel bad for those kids. I think we need to get like, child, like parents using kids as influencers, there needs to be laws and regulation around this because it is sickening.

It really, it's a huge industry and it's grotesque. And so first and foremost, you feel bad for these kids. Secondly, you are wondering what is the, like the wife is just going along with all of this? Like what is happening? And then third was, it was so disturbing to me that this is someone who so many young men looked up to as a role model

when this person is the polar opposite of who a role model should be. I mean, now he's had the full mental break, but this was not a well person. And obviously, his whole thing is built on a lie. He is a con artist. It is complete fraud. I mean, I think a lot of his orajoint in story too

is probably a fraud, which involved his kids, by the way. Nobody knows. Like, you can't take any of this for granted now because his big selling point was, I look like this because of these nine ancestral principles or whatever. Tenants. Yeah, nine ancestral tenants.

And that was all total and complete bullshit. And it wasn't like he just didn't answer the question. Multiple podcasts he'd go on and they'd say, are you on? Absolutely not. No, I know people can't believe it. I love when I get this question, but no, it's all natural and you need to stop

limiting yourself and believing that this isn't possible for you too, blah, blah, blah. So this is a con artist, a charlatan, a fraud, someone who is clearly deeply insecure and in some sort of mental anxiety, anguish, et cetera, and becomes an icon and a role model for millions of, I mean, it does bring you back to the point of like, we have to do some self-reflection

about what state young men are in, that this would be appealing to them, and so many people would gravitate to such an obvious charlatan. So that was the piece for me. And then, you know, I've watched a bunch of videos of him just like hunting Joe Rogan throughout Austin. And I think effectively, like he has in his mental collapse

fixated like a stalker on Rogan as the source of his downfall because Joe had said, you know, several things about him. He was the most prominent person to be like, that guy's a liar. Before it even officially came out. And then he had Derek on the podcast to go through all of the total evidence,

like the leaked emails and everything that just proved that he absolutely was a fraud and a liar. And so it seems like this guy is completely fixated on Joe, he's hunting him, he shows up in Austin, he's making these direct threats, and he's carrying around this briefcase that has Joe's, like the Joe Rogan Experience logo, which includes his face, of course, on it.

And at one point, he opens it briefly, and if you do a freeze frame of what's inside of it, there's at least one gun in there. Yeah. And he's saying he wants to fight him and he's coming after him and all of these sorts of things. So I think that's what probably led to them feeling like, okay, we've got enough that we've got to arrest this guy.

But yeah, he needs to get high. No, I'm actually glad that they arrested him because you can't just be rolling around threatening people with guns on social media. I mean, look, we have some video of this. I'm gonna play it for you You guys this guy's lost it. Okay, let's let's let's watch Because Joe Rogan we don't have to make videos to pretend anymore All of this is happening. We're coming to you. I've challenged you man-to-man to a fight All of this is happening. We're coming to you. I've challenged you man to man to a fight

Honorable and we don't have to pretend or make any videos the world is watching they'll make the videos for us and You don't have to hold a camera You can hold the hand of somebody that you love because what happens next to you? You're gonna need to remember that feeling you're gonna need something more than what you did To give you something to fight for because I have my family to fight for you're gonna need to remember that feeling. You're gonna need something more than what you did to give you something to fight for, because I have my family to fight for. It's what warriors do. You and Andrew Tate are good warriors. But you're actually better than that real tension we have.

Comedy that you do is good and true. Yeah, it's creepy, man. I mean, it's beyond creepy. It's terrifying, honestly. So I'm glad that they press charges because this type of behavior is just ridiculous. And yeah, honestly, we all hope Brian, not the liver king, gets the help that he deserves.

Yeah, I mean, look at those pupils. One is like triple the size of the other. There's a lot going on there. And yeah, he needs mental help. That's very clear. And frankly, like the kids are one thing, like I don't know what age they are at this point, but this is their dad, et cetera.

But shame on his wife and his handlers and whoever's getting paid by him, whatever, for letting it get to this point. Letting it get to this point is just absolutely. It's sad. All right, maybe they can play this in the follow-up documentary. This is gonna be involving the to the Liver King Downfall,

shall we? All right, it's been a great week. Thank you all so much. There'll be a great Friday show for everybody tomorrow, but otherwise, we will see you all next week. ["The Living Deadly Sins"] to the BIN News This Hour podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

I know a lot of cops and they get asked all the time, have you ever had to shoot your gun? Sometimes the answer is yes. But there's a company dedicated to a future where the answer will always be no. This is Absolute Season One, Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season One, Taser Incorporated on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. The OGs of uncensored motherhood are back and batter than ever. I'm Erica and I'm Mila and we're the hosts of the Good Moms Bad Choices podcast brought to you by the Black Effect Podcast Network every Wednesday.

Yeah we're moms but not your mommy. Historically men talk too much. And women have quietly listened. And all that stops here. If you like witty women, then this is your tribe. Listen to the Good Moms, Bad Choices podcast. Every Wednesday. On the Black Effect Podcast Network.

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