Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 9/23/25: Trump Links Tylenol To Autism, Homan Denies Cash Bribe, Electricity Prices Skyrocket

Episode Date: September 23, 2025

Ryan and Saagar discuss Trump links Tylenol to autism, Homan denies 50k cash bribe, electricity prices skyrocket.   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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Good morning, everybody. Happy Tuesday. Have an amazing show for everybody today. Bro show, Ryan. People live for the pound. It's been a while here, my man. It's good to see you. How you doing?

I'm good. I was complaining to you about how sleep deprived I am these days. Four months sleep progression. No joke, no joke. We will delve into many tough topics today. Number one is autism, a new claim from the Trump administration, from President Trump himself, advising American pregnant women, do not take Tylenol. Unless you have a fever, he said.

To your baby. No, he said, he said, just grin and bear it, unless it's the worst circumstances ever. We'll get into it. We'll get into it. I've pulled all the data that we can all go through. Ryan and I can go off. We're going to talk about Homan, Tom Homan. That's not a story that we were able to cover yesterday, allegedly accepting a 50,000,

dollar bribe in a bag of cash from Kava, which again, you know, we got to defend Kava at all cost, by far the best fast food. We're going to give you all of the details. He can kind of issued a non-denial denial yesterday on Fox News. Says a lot of interesting stuff, not just about Tom Homan, but actually about bribery laws, which is something not enough people paid attention to when a Supreme Court case happened last year. We're also going to talk about the economy. Ryan actually pulled some excellent stuff. A retiring GOP congressman worrying about tariffs and loss of jobs, as well, some other troubling data, including the Trump administration delaying an inflation report. We're talking about H-1B's absolute chaos and interesting new order from

the Trump administration. At first, thinking that there would be a $100,000 annual fee for H-1B visa holders retracting that. People were literally on planes considering getting off the plane. It's a total craziness, but there's, you know, some there are there. And we've talked about H-1Bs, I think, in a nuanced way on the show before. We're also going to talk about Venezuela. These two next ones are Ryan specials. We're going to talk about Venezuela. Trump saying he has caught Venezuelan militias training for domestic terrorism purposes, potentially flashing red light there on a potential regime change operation.

And then finally, Ryan, speaking of regime change, there is a new leader in Syria. He is, of course, the former leader of al-Qaeda and had ties to ISIS. And in probably one of the most insane and extraordinary things, Ryan, I have ever seen, David Petraeus, the former commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, glazed this man to his face despite being on opposite sides of the Civil War some 20 years ago. It is a perfect distillation of U.S. policy. It is shocking. It makes me question why I wasted years of my life covering the war on Al-Qaeda and all this. The former CIA director just worrying about whether this Al-Qaeda guy is getting enough sleep. It's crazy.

And usually when a CIA handler and his asset meet, it's in a... It's not in public. It's private. This was at the UN on stage. Great call. One piece of news that we're not going to get the cover. But one of those prominent activists from the Arab Spring, the Egyptian author and activist al-Aid al-Fata, was released yesterday, pardoned by Cece. This is absolutely huge news in Egypt and for everybody following that.

His mother was on this, who was in London, was on like a 10-month-old. month, a hunger strike, and was on the brink of death. So a tiny sliver of good news. And sort of like the end of an era. Yeah, that is interesting, actually. I think about, you know, social media and the hope of the Arab Spring turned out to not have a little bit of hope. And they're so comfortable. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, we'll save it for Syria. And the last thing before we get into all of that, Jimmy Kimmel, we just want to make this a news. Disney announced Jimmy Kimmel will be returning to his show tomorrow or, sorry, today. on Tuesday, Tuesday evening. Emily and Crystal will cover that extensively tomorrow. Thank you, by the way, to everybody who's been supporting the show. We really appreciate it, breakingpoints.com. If you are able, as part of our premium benefits, you sometimes get early episodes. And today I'll actually be recording an episode with Tucker Carlson about his new

9-11 documentary that will drop exclusively for our premium subscribers tonight and will be made available at some point tomorrow for everybody else. If you can't afford it, no worries. Just please hit subscribe on our YouTube channel. And if you're listening to this as a podcast, send the show to a friend. But breakingpoints.com if you want early access to episodes like that or our AMA yesterday as well as the full show and all of that jazz. So breakingpoints.com if you can support us as well as get early access to that Tucker Carlson interview. So let's go ahead and get to autism. Some extraordinary remarks here from President Trump in a press conference late yesterday at the White House about Tylenol joining with Dr. J. Bhattacharya, Dr. McHickr,

Dr. RFK Jr., the Secretary of Health and Human Services, as well as some other medical professionals making a grand pronouncement that they believe that Tylenol, while, Tylenol used while pregnant, can lead to autism. Here's what they had to say. Be very careful with what he says, and he should, but I'm not so careful with what I say. But you have certain groups. The Amish, as an example, they have essentially no autism. First, effective immediately, the FDA will be notifying physicians at the use of

Ascentia, well, let's see how we say that. Acetaminopin, acetaminophin, is that okay? Which is basically commonly known as Tylenol during pregnancy can be associated with a very increased risk of autism. Don't do it. Break up your visits to the doctors. Break them up. Do it in five if you can. Now it's inconvenient. It's inconvenient. Oh, you've got to have to go back another year later. You're going to go back each year for four years, five years, three years. Just break it up. Break it up because it's too much liquid. Too many different things are going into that baby. At too big a number, the size of this thing.

When you look at it, it's like 80 different vaccines and beyond vaccines. And 80, then you give that to a little kid. This country is going through what parts of the world are going through. And I will say there are parts of the world that don't take Tylenol. I mean, there's a rumor, and I don't know if it's so or not, that Cuba, they don't have Tylenol because they don't have the money for Tylenol, and they have virtually no autism. Okay? Tell me about that one.

And there are other parts of the world where they don't have Tylenol, where they don't have autism. That tells you a lot. So that's a small flavor of the Trump press conference. There's a lot more than that. Yeah, there was a hell of a lot more, though. We just did our best to kind of distill it down. I guess I'll try to focus on the seriousness of it because while it is Trump being Trump, it's also, you know, a major pronouncement from his administration. The administration released a new fact sheet, basically requiring.

a new warning label on Tylenol, which is currently the only pain reliever, which doctors recommend to pregnant women for pain relief. This has been the center of not controversy per se, but of study now for quite some time, Ryan. We have pulled all the data that we can get into, but do you have anything you want to say before we play RFK Jr.? No, let's go to RFK. Yeah, okay. All right, well, let's play RFK Jr. Again, I want to lay out the administration's case, and then I'll present you the other side. Let's take a list to RFK. HHS wants, therefore, to encourage clinicians to exercise their best judgment and the use of acetametamine for fevers and pain and pregnancy

by prescribing the lowest effective dose for the shortest necessary duration and only when treatment is required. Furthermore, thanks to also to the politicization of science, the safety of acetamapentin against the risk of neurodevelopmental diso orders in young children has never been validated. Prudent medicine, therefore, suggests caution in a set of metafin use by young children especially since strong evidence also has associated it with liver toxicity. Some studies have also found that use of acetaminin and children can potentially prolong

viral illnesses. FDA will drive new research to safeguard mothers, children, and families. In addition to a possible set of benefit connection to autism for pregnant women, infants, and toddlers, our research has revealed that folate deficiency in a child's brain can lead to autism. We have also identified an exciting therapy that may benefit larger numbers of children who suffer from autism. Beer-reviewed literature has documented that up to 60% of folate deficient children with ASD can have improved verbal communication. communications if given lucavoren. For those who are just listening, ASD, you're not familiar with the term is autism spectrum disorder.

And so what they cite is largely a couple of studies, including one that just came out from Harvard University, in which they said that there may be a link. I do think it's important. I spent a lot of time, actually, on this very question when my wife was pregnant and we both went through all of the data. The single best data set that exists is actually this one. We can go ahead and put this up here on the screen. This is from a study of some two and a half million children. What they looked at was acetaminopin use during pregnancy and a children's risk of autism, ADHD, and intellectual disability.

Their end result that they ultimately found was, quote, to address, unobserved, confounding, matched full sibling pairs were also analyzed, sibling control analyses, found no evidence that acetaminein use during pregnancy was associated with autism. So let me just reiterate what that said. it said that in this population-based study, models without sibling control, identified marginally increased risk of autism and ADHD associated with acetaminopin use during pregnancy. However, analyses of matched full sibling pairs then found no evidence of increased risk of autism with a hazard ratio, ADHD, or intellectual disability. So basically, to break that down from doctor speak, and I've spoken with a couple of doctors in preparation for this segment is that if you look at it without sibling control, you could see it.

If you don't look at it with sibling control, you could see it. If you do look at it with sibling control, then it largely disappears. And so I do think that's important. There is also a chart here that we should put up here up on the screen. This is one specifically about Tylenol use. Does it increase the risk of various newer developmental conditions? Same thing. Results on base 2.4 million Swedish children born between 95.

in 2019, and you can actually see the chart there and the flat use of no use, low dose, medium deuce, and high dose if you're just looking for the association. And they say, the only problem, according to the person who put this chart together is, quote, the only problem with doing that is that we have strong causal evidence. A Tylenol does not cause autism. Exposed siblings are no more likely to be autistic than the unexposed. I do think this is medically a very important thing because, Ryan, as you know, your wife has been through way more pregnancies in fine. But, I mean, one of the things that they do tell you is don't use, you know, ensades, like things like ibuprofen or other over-the-counter pain relievers.

And one of the messages that the president kept hammering home was just grin and bear it, which, you know, look, I mean, it's kind of barbaric, if you ask me, because one of the things here, and I'm not an expert on Tylenol, I'm willing to believe, I do, I will say this, this is my own personal bias based on some emerging evidence. around acetaminophen, NSAIDS, and all these other things, is people pop these things like candy and you just really have no idea what's going on.

Like, you take them all the time. There are people who take two ibuprofen or Advil or whatever in the morning and they don't think about the effect on the gut microbiome or all these other things. And I'm just not willing to believe it's costless. I don't believe that for any medication. So I would say in general, you know,

my personal view was, you know, use it as little as possible. But to say, don't use it. at all. I don't know. I don't see the current evidence for that that's in the data. And by the way, they didn't release any new data. They're pointing very specifically the studies I laid out. Right. Point to this study. They also point to that new Harvard University study, as I said. However, the doctors and the researchers who I spoke to told me that that did not have as many good controls in it for its research. But, you know, I'm going to present the case for it for

what it is. Just broadly, though, it seems very simplistic to what is. obviously a multifactorial rise in autism. Yeah, and one fear I have out of this is that people will see all of this coverage of the dangers of Tylenol when it comes to autism or other intellectual disabilities for pregnant women. And then they will move to aspirin, you know, or Advil. But even as, as Trump himself said at the press conference yesterday, he said, we know for sure those are dangerous.

So he said, don't take those. And he's right about that. Yeah. So don't forget that Now we're talking When we get into the Ronald Talanol He's saying well we don't really know But you might want to be cautious

I'm Saugers You know probably right We don't we don't know And so just popping them constantly Like no one can say it's totally safe right It's like and even that question of totally safe Is not really a perfect way of talking about it I mean it's like that Thomas Sol quote

It's everything is tradeoffs right Like everything is a tradeoff of something If you're in a lot of pain You have a lot of fever well, taking is going to make you feel better. One of the things... Yeah, go ahead. Not just feel better.

Yeah. We do know for a fact that a fever has risks for... Right, exactly. For a fetus, right? You have inflammation risk. I think brain swelling is... It's particularly a high fever, right? And then, you know, in general...

I don't know. This is one where, look, my broad takeaway from this thing is... You shouldn't trust RFK Jr. You definitely should not just Donald Trump for his personal medical advice. What I actually thought was fascinating from his press conference is he kept being like, this is just me saying this. It may not be the people behind them. Because actually, if you read the text of the FDA order, they basically cite what we just said.

They're like, yeah, it may. You should be careful. Consult with your doctor. But Trump straight up was like, don't take Tylenol. He said it over and over and over again. He's like, do not take Tylenol. He also talked about spreading out the number of vaccine doses. That's another different.

We can return to that. This is a whole other conversation. But let's stick with Tylenol specifically and autism, because this is an interesting question. It's one Kristen and I actually touched on in our AMA yesterday. The prevailing theories, and they actually kind of fall into different ideological camps. Number one, the most prevalent is diagnostic, as in we just diagnose a hell of a lot more people have expanded the definition of autism, whereas 20, 30 years ago, you'd be like, yeah, they're a little off, right? You know, something like that.

And now, yeah, exactly. You know, and now, actually, one of the moms who spoke at the press conferences even said, I don't like this spectrum. She's like, you're either fully autistic or you're just not, right? And I know that, again, I'm not in an autistic family or whatever. Like, I'm not going to sit here in police the terms. I'm just like, we're dealing with reality. The point is that diagnostics is one of the prevailing theories of the medical community.

Now, Maha and RFK Jr. have long attacked diagnostics, because what they're saying is that diagnostics itself absolves environmental and pharmaceutical potential causes of autism. What I find very frustrating about both of those is that they're deeply simplistic. It's obviously multifactorial. It could be diagnostic. It's obvious potentially, some level of that. Some level of diagnostic. The other is going to be changes in maternal and paternal age, right? So, for example, you know, you have 40, 50, 60, 70, 80-year-olds in the U.S. having children. I mean, come on. Like, it's a man. The men in particular. Yeah, men in particular, right. You don't need to be a doctor to say, yeah, it's a little weird. It obviously has never

happened before. That's probably going to change something. Same with maternal age, right? So the average birthing age in the U.S. now is like much higher than it was, let's say, in the 1950s. Again, you know, geriatric pregnancy, is not a term that should be used to put anybody down. I want to make that very, very clear, but it is a medical term that is used for specific purposes, right? Let's leave that on the side. Then there is also, again, this is where Maha really focuses on

pharmaceutical and environmental. So what I mean by that is largely vaccines, pain relievers, environmental. There's all kinds of different theories, microplastics, like you said, herbicide, et cetera, processed food. what I always find frustrating is we never talk about obesity. I mean, one of the things that's happened in this country has been massively and morbidly obese, pre-diabetic and or diabetic of the population. And I mentioned this in our AMA yesterday, but a woman I really respect, Dr. Rhonda Patrick, had done, she put out some initial research on obesity and then how that affects both the mother for fertility, but also for the genetic expression. I'm getting into, like, stuff, which, again, none of this is proven. And also take everything I say medically with a grain of salt, too.

But what they pointed to was that there was some, like, limited evidence here about genetic expression. And it makes sense if you are obese and you smoke marijuana, THC, and you drink alcohol, and you have very low testosterone because you don't sleep a lot, and you don't work out, you don't lift any weights, of course your sperm count is going to be dramatically, diminished. And, you know, the DNA and all the, if you think about it's like almost like radiate, it's, again, not one to one. What I'm saying, though, is that bad lifestyle choices, which, let's be honest, the vast majority of Americans currently practice, if you're using all of these substances and you are, you know, a part, in a not in a healthy lifestyle or eating a healthy diet,

that also could have a major impact. I mean, they talk about folate there, right? And that's one and interesting where almost all of that could be cured by diet. Like I, you know, I was looking into that, again, I spent so much time on this when my wife was pregnant. And this is part of the reason why prenatal vitamins are really important, right, for folic acid, because in the very early days of fetal development, that's when they need the folic acid the most for, I think it's their brain stem for the fetus. But there's also, you know, iron levels and other things where if you're not eating in a very, very balanced diet and eating like wild caught Alaskan fish, and, you know, like making, which, you know, when you're in your first trimester,

you're living off salting crackers and puking your guts out, not easy. So my point is just that I find the lack of nuance here from the government, like, frankly, appalling. Because I think it just pushes more of the burden on mothers who, it's hard, man. I watched her go through it. It's fucking hard. I mean, you know, especially the way our society is currently structured when they're working in the first and second trimet, even in the third trimester, and they're having difficulty walking. And, you know, people, other people who are childless in the office, they don't care.

And they're asking, you know, have no consideration for any of this. Or taking the subway or the metro and walking 10,000. Try doing that whenever your belly is, you know, all the way out over here. So I just, I find, like, this honestly kind of appalling from the government. I'm Jorge Ramos. And I'm Paola Ramos. Together we're launching The Moment, a new podcast about what it means to live through a time, as uncertain as this.

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Listen to there are no girls on the internet on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. They tried to work a little. little nuance into the press statements that they put out. It looks like you can almost see if you squint the tug of war going on, and we can maybe add this in post. So the first paragraph of their press statement seems like it was written by RFK, second one by some of the lower level doctors. They say, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration today initiated the process for a label

change for acetaminophen, Tylenol, and similar products to reflect evidence suggesting that the use of acetaminephine by pregnant women may be associated with an increased risk of neurological conditions such as autism and ADHD in children's. That's the first paragraph. The second paragraph then goes, it is important to note that while an association between acedomenefin and neurological conditions has been described in many studies, notice that language, a causal relationship has not been established and there are contrary studies in the scientific literature. It is also noted that acetaminophen is the only over-the-counter drug approved for use to treat fevers during pregnancy, and high fevers in pregnant women can pose a risk to their children. Additionally,

aspirin and ibuprofen have well-documented adverse impacts on the fetus. Very much screams like the science were like, all right, if you're going to do this, let us write the second paragraph. Yeah, and actually, the only person who kind of made any sense during that, in my opinion, was Marty and J. Batacharya. So we can go ahead and play some of what they said because they pointed to a potential, you know, new drug for potential treatment of autism. And I did check with a couple of doctors. And there's relatively mixed evidence, but the new FDA approval and all of that, especially with coverage under chips and Medicaid seems like, you know, listen, try something if it has decent enough evidence behind it. But second from Jay Baticharya was like, we're

going to throw a lot of money at these studies. That was the solution the whole time, right? At least, again, to me, because relying on observational Swedish study or this Harvard, it's like these are not run currently massive data sets other than the Swedish one, which didn't find the link, and it also was not controlled properly or funded by the government. Like, if you just cut all these MRNA, which fine, you should at least try and channel it into these same things to find some scientific evidence and then see where the data takes you. But it seemed to me like they started off with conclusion. that they were under kind of intense pressure on the autism question,

they didn't want to go fully down the road of pulling the MMR vaccine, or at least for now. You know, that's still kind of up in the air. Again, separate question, which we could spend hours on here if we wanted to. But broadly, it just seemed to me like they were under the gun. They needed to come up with something. They needed a big press conference, you know, maybe to distract from certain other things that are going on here.

And this was like their big banner to start a conversation. So with that, let me play this A6. Let's take a listen. Today, the FDA is filing a federal register notice to change the label on an exciting treatment called Prescription Luke of Orrin so that it can be available to children with autism. You know, autism may also be due to a autoimmune reaction to a folate receptor on the brain, not allowing that important vitamin to get into the brain cells. It's a fairly established mature pathway.

Again, we have a duty to let doctors and the public know. We are going to change the label to make it available. Hundreds of thousands of kids, in my opinion, will benefit. One study found that with kids with autism and chronic folate deficiency, two-thirds of kids with autism symptoms had improvement and some market improvement. All right. So that's the new drug that they are touting here. A7, we can go ahead and put it up there on the screen.

I apologize if I butcher this. I'm not good with drug names, but it's Lucavoren inside the drug, giving new hope there to, quote, autism parents. They're saying that it's, quote, an answer to autism, and it's a form of vitamin B9, also known as folate, that's been prescribed to protect healthy cells from the toxic side effects of previously used in chemotherapy and to enhance chemo and to treat cerebral folate deficiency.

Folate, as Dr. Macri is saying there, is needed for brain development, and they have found that some children with neurodevelopmental disorders show signs of cerebral folate deficiency, a shortage of B9 in the brain. Again, I am not a doctor. Do not take medical advice from me. I wouldn't take medical advice from them either.

That's part of the difficulty, I think, of this entire kind of conversation. I mean, that's what ChatGPT is for, right? Well, okay, let's talk about that. And this is one of the, I hope, maybe potential benefits of COVID. Now, a lot of the doctors and all these people are upset. I read everything for myself now at this point, and I'll take their consideration. I will not dismiss it out of hand. I probably, you know, more biased earlier, let's say, two years ago, really in the heights of the COVID mania, I would have been like, I don't believe a word that you people say. But, you know, presented with this, I'm like, well, I don't know. That's the counter argument. I'm like, well. Yeah, right. So it's like, maybe I'm going to do my own research. And by doing my own research and all that, and you read the data and the trials and stuff for themselves, actually, the Swedish study is a good reminder to people. Something I tried to do was, I'd stop looking at America because the

The question is always about corruption, either ideological or pharma. So I would look to countries where they have universal health care. They largely are not woke. So I'm mainly shouting out Japan here. And then I would look at their health outcomes, right? And I would compare U.S. advisory sushi is a great one, right? You know, no sushi or any of that. I'm like, well, you know, the Japanese are pretty smart and they eat a lot of sushi and raw fish.

So what's going on over there? And they're like, you're an idiot. If, you know, everyone here eat sushi, right? But again, don't take medical advice from me. Read the book and read the guidance and all of that for yourself. But on their vaccine schedule, you can compare the U.S. It's easy, actually with chat GPT or any of these. Compare the U.S. vaccine schedule to the Japanese vaccine schedule.

You can make up your mind for yourself. You can also go and take a look at various other European countries. Keep in mind, a lot of these pharma companies are European-based, so there's still some potential for corruption. But by and large, some of their data is better than ours, or they publish more population-wide stuff. and they have less ideological, you know, kind of influence going on there. So that's part of the difficulty for me personally, Ryan. Like I saw the American College of Obstetricians come out and be like, this is dangerous and all of that.

But considering how we've seen them previously talk about the COVID vaccine or, I mean, Chris only got into a nice big debate yesterday on trans, but like considering some of the stuff that, let's say, the American Academy of Pediatrics has said there, too, I'm like, yeah, I don't trust you at all, right? So, like, I really think a lot of parents, they need more information. And the government, it did not do that today or yesterday in their announcement. They did not give people, in my opinion, more information.

They didn't say they were going to study. They made a declarative statement. And as you said, maybe the doctors wrote it a little bit differently. But the president's straight up said, don't take Tylenol. Yeah. The headline is clear. Yeah. Like, he said don't take it.

Which, by the way, their stock is now plunged. Let's put 85 up here on the screen. Tylenol maker Kenvue has plunged on reports that the White House has planned to link the drug to autism. The news spurred in 8% sell-off in shares yesterday for Kenvue. Their shares, I believe, are not yet open while we were recording this. So keep you guys updated. The company is now a year-to-date loss of 21%. So I don't know.

By the way, it does remind me there was a great documentary called The Tylenol Killer, which was super interesting, on Netflix. So that's the last thing. Anything you want to say more on Tylenol, autism, any of that? No, I think that pretty much covers it. Yeah. Yeah. It's, I think it's a sad state because one of the things that they cite that RFK sided in particular was like the grief of a lot of these parents. And I think, I think, first of all, I think the medical establishment has done a lot of these people a disservice by saying, like, not lying to them, but like kind of lecturing them being like, it is what it is, you know, get over it, right?

And no parent, especially as a new parent, is going to quote, get over it. to want answers. That doesn't mean that you have to give them what they want to hear or a easy explanation. That's kind of what I think the government did here. And I also think that they should have considered that for people, for women who are pregnant in America today, it's really not easy, especially people who are working. And so for them, I do really fear, like you said, Ryan, this will kind of spur a level of hopelessness of, I can't take Tylenol. You know, the last thing you want when you're pregnant is stress, right? And now it's about Tylenol, Advil, diet, prenatal.

There's already so much pressure on these people. And what I would say is make it easier, you know, at a system-wide level. And let's not put all the blame on the mothers or all of the responsibility necessarily on them. I think it should be on all of us as a society, medical system, et cetera. Okay, so Yeah, go ahead. Rachel Boudard has an interesting point on here, which is, I'm curious for your take on this,

that both Trump and RFK Jr. were kind of boxed in by their very early declarations that they were going to basically get to the bottom of this. Yes. And had to come up with... I know exactly what you're talking about. I read it this morning. Yeah, had to come up with something,

and it would have been much more damaging if they just concocted some vaccine link, which is far, even more spurious. then well what it would do is they would have to prove it right is that for this they didn't even really prove it they just said may and by the way i mean look Tylenol use i do think you know could be important especially if you're suffering you know from a lot of pain so talk to your doctor think of this as like uh harm reduction right that's kind of what i was like that's that was from getting over your skis that if what they really wanted to do and what the you know the maha people

desperately want is they want the mmr vaccine to straight up just be pulled and trump even basically said he's like i think the mmr should be split up I think it has problems. Get your M. Get your M. Get your arm. Whatever. Yeah, exactly. I mean, let's put his comments to the side, like an actual guidance from the CDC, the FDA, and the U.S. government from HHS telling doctors and all that pull the MMR vaccine.

That is actually like just a whole other level because not only would you have to prove it, but then you would have any potential consequences on your hands. Epidemics all over the place. Right. And look, I'm not an expert on MMR. I have read all the anti-Vax books. I also read all the ProVax books. books. I recommend that you do that too, so you can actually, frankly, I'll both have some

horrible argumentation and really do address a lot of each other's points. One thing I think is critical on this again is that more information and more data, one of the things RFK pledged was about more data. But the thing is, is that making macro decisions for the entire nation without any new data, that seems a big problem for me. So they threw Tylenol under the bus. First is Tylenol. We'll see. I mean, listen, I mean, they laid the ground pretty hard. on MMR and on the rest of them. And so my response would be the same one that they give to the vaccine companies,

which is true, prove it, right? Prove it. So there you go. That's what I think the standard of evidence should be there in science. I'm Jorge Ramos. And I'm Paola Ramos.

Together we're launching The Moment, a new podcast about what it means to live through a time as uncertain as this one. We sit down with politicians. I would be the first immigrant mayor in generations, but 40% of New Yorkers were born outside of this country.

Artists and activists, I mean, do you ever feel demoralized? I might personally lose hope. This individual might lose the faith, but there's an institution that doesn't lose faith. And that's what I believe in. To bring you death and analysis from a unique Latino perspective. There's not a single day that Paola and I don't call or text each other, sharing news and thoughts about what's happening in the country.

This new podcast will be a way to make that ongoing intergenerational. conversation, public. Listen to The Moment with Jorge Ramos and Paola Ramos as part of the MyCultura Podcast Network on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

My name is Ed. Everyone say, hello, Ed? From a very rural background myself, my dad is a farmer, and my mom is a cousin, so, like, it's not... What do you get when a true crime producer walks into a comedy club? I know it sounds like the start of a bad joke, but that really was my reality nine years ago.

I just normally do straight stand-up, but this is a bit different. On stage stood a comedian with a story that no one expected to hear. The 22nd of July 2015, a 23-year-old man had killed his family. And then he came to my house. So what do you get when a true crime producer

walks into a comedy club? a new podcast called Wisecrack, where stand-up comedy and murder takes center stage. Available now. Listen to Wisecrack on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The internet is something we make, not just something that happens to us.

I'm Bridget Todd, host of the Tech and Culture Podcast, There Are No Girls on the Internet. There Are No Grows on the Internet is not just about tech. It's about culture and policy and art and expression, and how we as humans exist and fit with one another. In our new season, I'm talking to people like Emile Dash, an OG entrepreneur and writer who refuses to be cynical about the Internet. I love tech.

You know, I've been a nerd my whole life, but it does have to be for something. Like, it's not just for its own sake. It's a fascinating exploration about the power of the Internet for both good and bad. They use WhatsApp to get the price of rice at the market that is often 12 hours away. They're not going to be like,

we don't like the terms of service, therefore we're not trading rice. season. It's an inspiring story that focuses on people as the core building blocks of the internet. Platforms exist because of the regular people on them and I think that's a real important story to keep repeating. I created there are

no girls on the internet because the future belongs to all of us. New episodes every Tuesday and Friday. Listen to there are no girls on the internet on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. All right, let's get to Holman. Shelby. This is pretty crazy.

And it does tell us a lot about the country where we are today, because it's not just Tom Homan here, who, by the way, allegedly, because he denies it. But one of the things, he kind of denies it. It strikes to the heart of bribery laws in this country and how basically bribery is legal after the Supreme Court ruled in 2024. Let's go and put this up here on the screen. You had a new report from NBC News. They say Tom Homan was investigated for accepting $50,000 from undercover FBI, agents, Trump's DOJ shut it down. The FBI, justice officials, closed the investigation of calling it a deep state probe in early 2025. The details are as such. Quote, in an undercover operation

last year, the FBI recorded Tom Homan, now the White House borders are, accepting $50,000 in cash after indicating he could, quote, help the agents who were posing as business executives win government contracts in a second Trump administration. FBI and Justice Department planned to wait to see whether Homan would deliver on his alleged promise once he became the nation's top immigration official. But the case indefinitely stalled after Trump became president in January. In recent weeks, Trump appointees have officially closed the investigation. It's unclear what reasons FBI and DOJ gave for shutting down, but a Trump Justice Department appointee called the case a, quote, Deep State probe. The investigation was launched in West Texas in the summer of 2024 after a

separate investigation claimed that Homan was soliciting payments in exchange for awarding contracts for Trump should he win the presidential election. The U.S. Attorney's Office in the Western District of Texas, working with the FBI, asked the DOJ to join its ongoing probe into the border czar and former, the former acting director of immigration and ICE, Tom Homan, based on the evidence of payment from the FBI undercover agents. What they said is that Homan, who was served as the acting director of ICE early in Trump's first term, was openly claimed during the the 2024 campaign, he would play a prominent role. Thus, during the investigation, they allegedly on September 20th, with hidden cameras recording the scene at a meeting spot in Texas, caught him

accepting some $50,000 in bills, according to this internal summary. They then took the matter no further in the final months of 2024. Now, one of the reasons why I think that is important is that it was obviously in September in the lead up to the presidential election, but that the quid pro quo, if you will, had to be proven. because of the way that the bribery laws are written, simply accepting cash does not in and of itself mean that it's bribery because you actually have to deliver, okay, because we've changed the way the bribery works in this country. Tom Homan did address this last night on Fox News. Here's what you had to say. I want to give you a chance to address this article that came out over the weekend

and it was on our always reliable MSNBC and they said that you took, It took $50,000 in cash in a bag from an undercover FBI agent to help them win government contracts in Trump's second term. The DOJ said they concluded there was no criminal wrongdoing, but nevertheless, that story is out there, and I imagine you want to respond to that. Absolutely. Look, I did nothing criminal. I did nothing illegal. And it's hit piece after hit piece after hit piece. And I'm glad the FBI and DOJ came out and said, And, you know, it said that nothing illegal happened, nothing, you know, no criminal activity. You're talking about a guy spent 34 years enforcing the law. I mean, I left a very successful business that I ran to come back and work for a government again.

I'm back on a government paycheck. Not only did I sacrifice my family sacrifices. I make sacrifices every day. I got more debt threats than anybody. I got a security around me, but guess what? My kids don't, my wife don't. I mean, I haven't lived to my wife in months because I don't want her to be here. right now with all the threats. So after all the sacrifices, after serving my nation

all these years, they want to come on and dirty me up. And it's not going to end. There's a hip piece on me every two weeks. But keep coming because you know what? Tom Holman isn't going anywhere. Tom Homer isn't shutting up. And Tom Homer's going to keep doing what he's doing because we're going to President Trump's the greatest honor in my life. We're making this country safer again every day. We're going to keep doing it. Kind of a non-denial denial there because what he didn't say is I never took the money. What he said is, I did nothing criminal. I did nothing illegal, which, I mean, technically true, right? So far.

So far, yeah. It does raise the question, though, about those tapes and whether they exist, honestly, or not. So, you know, if you're in the FBI, it's time to put up or shut up, you should release it. If not, I mean, according to them, they've got it on camera and they've got it on tape. Now, maybe the FBI, listen, you know, you wouldn't put it past this FBI to delete it. But the reason why it is important is that Homan has always stressed his impartiality and his government service and that he would.

never accept any quid pro quo or anything in service of his potential service in government. Here's what we previously said on Bill Marshow. If you want to send the messages to the whole world, cross the border illegally, it's a crime, it's okay. Had due process, the order removed by an immigration, just don't leave, it's okay. Just don't commit another crime, you're good to go. If that's the message we send to the whole world, people are going to keep coming. And let me tell you something, there's a whole illegal immigration is not a victim

crime. But that's why you have to show those consequences. Because if you send a message, there's no consequence, and you want to reward illegal behavior, that dot going to stop. So that's the question there about rewarding behavior if you don't show any consequences. And then finally, the White House itself also issued a flat denial that it never took place ever, a little bit, again, different than what Tom Homan said. Take a listen to Caroline Levitt. Did the president ask the Justice Department to close the case, and does Homer have to return the $50,000?

Well, Mr. Homan never took the $50,000 that you're referring to, so you should get your facts straight, number one. Number two, this was another example of the weaponization of the Biden Department of Justice against one of President Trump's strongest and most vocal supporters in the midst of a presidential campaign. You had FBI agents going undercover to try and trap one of the president's top allies and supporters, someone who they knew very well would be taking a government position months later. Mr. Homan did absolutely nothing wrong. And even the president's Department of Justice, even Cash Patel's FBI looked into this just to make sure they had a number of different prosecutors and FBI agents who looked into this. They found zero evidence of illegal activity or criminal wrongdoing in the White House and the

president stand by Tom Homan 100 percent because he did absolutely nothing wrong. And he is a brave public servant who has done a phenomenal job in helping the president shut down the border. They say, Mr. Homan never took the $50,000. So, Ryan, that seems to be the crux of the question. So I think there was a string on the cash. And so when he wasn't looking, they kind of reeled it back in. I do want to talk about the bribery laws.

But first, my spidey sense is up on this story for a couple of reasons here. Did you notice who broke the story? Ken Denland. No. Oh, sorry. He's the second byline. Carol Lennon, who for 25 years. She watched the Washington Post.

was the Washington Post star investigative reporter with three Pulitzer Prizes under her belt. Now she, so she leaves the Washington Post after this long-storied career. And then within a month has published this massive story about Tom Homan. Obviously, she did not leave the Washington Post

and then have some source say, I was just waiting for you to go to MSNBC to give you this incredible tip. and then she writes it with Ken Delanian. No, she clearly had the story. For some reason, she did not write it at the Washington Post. There is obviously a story there. That's a good flag.

Why did she not write it at the Washington Post? You should investigate that. Separately, in the original reporting, it said that Holman was caught accidentally. He was kind of swept up in a broader FBI investigation. And so this happens in September 2024. even though it's, you know, they don't have, let's say they don't have the crime or the indictment yet, they can still leak it. It's September of the election year. This is just a big problem for Trump.

Right. They decided not do that. So they didn't leak it. And he was swept up kind of accidentally by chance in this investigation. That means whoever they were actually, whatever or whatever they were actually going after was much bigger than Tom Homan. Oh, interesting. And Tom Homan. Tom Homan's a big fish.

Yeah, he is big. So what kind of fish is bigger than Tom Homan? And if Lennon had this for a significant amount of time, chances are not just there's a story within the Washington Post, but she too was probably hunting, like, what's the bigger story here? Bigger than, like, this is a good story. See, for people who are listening or watching, that is very important for the inside to kind of TikTok of how this stuff happened. Because this happened a year ago, right, at this point.

Almost a year ago. Wow, it's a year ago. It's September 23rd that we're recording right now. So how long has she sat on it, right? You would think if you get caught on camera and I'm Biden, I'm leaking that tomorrow. Yeah. You know, before they, so yeah, what's going on with that, right? I mean, I'm not saying that's a just thing. It shouldn't work that way, but let's be honest. In the lead up to the election. I mean, Trump would leak it. Right. Of course he would. Yeah, I mean, you kind of would be an idiot not to. In fact, they are idiots not. Yeah. So you, yeah, wow. So, yeah, what were they chasing? that was bigger. Also, did you note the jurisdiction, West Texas? That's weird, right? And the reason why that's weird to me is like that is deep red country. That's like R plus 55 country. So even the U.S. attorney, and I get it. They're political, probably Democrats, et cetera. But, you know, even there that's like some sensitivity in the FBI agents and the jurisdiction and all of that. So, yeah, I have to try and put it together. If I had to, yeah, they must have been

running Buck Wild in West Texas, assuming. Which is classic for West Texas. Exactly. Culturally appropriate. Just assuming, like, that they're on a landman and, like, there are no laws. They're just going to bring the National Guard out to fire. There are no laws out there, Ryan, because there's no lawmen, all right? That's the main lesson of landman. And so somehow some lawmen got out there and were like, whoa, this is still the United States of America. And then somebody was like, actually, no, it's not.

Right. This is West Texas. Well, listen, let's track it. My response is, release the tapes, man. You know, now we've got some more tapes. If you did nothing wrong, release it. Let's see it. Let's see what happened.

Your interaction with the FBI agents and all that. People have a right to know whether the people in charge are corrupt. But plot twist, they are. But, you know, look, also, it's cartoonish. Anybody who is dumb enough to accept $50,000 in cash in a cabba bag, like, you have no reasonable, you shouldn't even be close to power, okay? Right, because one argument would be, well, it's a consulting contract. Yeah, in cash?

In cash in a cabba bag? In a cava bag? Yeah, right. The only thing I want my combo bag are my horissa chips. Real cova heads know the shout-off. They're so good. They're so good.

They're so good. All right, let's talk about bribery laws. I want you specifically to explain some of this down to me. Let's put this up here on the screen from Scotus blog. This is June 2024. We covered this heavy at the time, actually. The Supreme Court has now limited scope of anti-bribery law. So what they ruled is that the federal anti-bribery law

does not make it a crime for state and local officials to, quote, accept a gratuity for acts that they have already taken. They wrote for a six justice majority that the state and local government's officials already have to regulate gifts to officials. So the federal law does not supplement those state and local laws by subjecting some 19 million state local officials up to 10 years in federal prison for accepting even commonplace gratuity. But this builds on other Supreme Court decisions, including that Virginia governor case about what was it, Bob McDonald, right, where it eventually was overturned because the standards

now are, it's kind of like defamation for media. Like, you have to prove that not only were they accepting the money, they were doing so for an explicit quid pro quo, that that quid pro quo was real, it was promised, and it was deliverable. And all of this is being caught on audio, on video, where they're like, I am accepting this so that you will get X, Y, and Z. It's no longer even, like the original Menendez case where it's obviously corrupt to be flying around on private jets. And then help a guy out. And help a guy out. Yeah, it's, I mean, come on. Like, you would know that for anybody, but that didn't rise to the level. Yeah, or, yeah, well, that, that case, I think they were found guilty because it was a little different. And in the McDonnell case,

they also redefined what a quote, official act is, if you remember. So important. Um, what McDonnell did, he, like, made phone calls for the guy. He had, uh, he had, like, a meeting at the governor's mansion for him. This is basically a supplement maker. Yeah. gave him like 175 grand worth of gifts and in exchange McDonald and also arranged meetings with lawmakers that he that he wanted so McDonald calls up and says hey like my guy's got a problem can you meet with him and you know fix this problem and what the Supreme Court and they did it and he paid for that what the Supreme Court says don't none of those are official acts it's like what the governor right arranging a meeting with the lawman the scope of the

definition in all of these cases makes it so impossible. You have to have a contract. I was talking with Crystal about this, and her theory was that one of the reasons Biden and them didn't bring the case was the same thing. He's like, well, he didn't deliver the quid. Well, we're not going to win, right? What official act? He's not even a governor of official. Right, exactly. He's not even official. It's, I don't know. It's sick, honestly, the way that we've basically legalized corruption here, but whatever. So that's the story. You can track it for what it is. Maybe it's a deep state hit job or not easy way to prove it, just release the tape. You know, just tell us what's in the tape. If you're caught on camera, except in the $50,000 cash in Kava bag, you're corrupt

in my eyes. That's just maybe not in the eyes of the law. And I think that, you know, public officials should, of course, be held to the highest standard. If a media official did that and it ever leaked from projects Veritas or whatever, we'd be like, hey, come on, what's going on? Can't do this? Yeah, we can't do this. You're bringing people with news. And it's like 10,000 times less important than actually running the government. I'm Jorge Ramos. And I'm Paola Ramos. Together we're launching The Moment, a new podcast about what it means to live through a time, as uncertain as this one.

We sit down with politicians. I would be the first immigrant mayor in generations, but 40% of New Yorkers were born outside of this country. Artists and activists, I mean, do you ever feel demoralized? I might personally lose hope. This individual might live. lose the faith. But there's an institution that doesn't lose faith. And that's what I believe in. To bring you depth and analysis from a unique Latino perspective. There's not a single day that

Paola and I don't call or text each other sharing news and thoughts about what's happening in the country. This new podcast will be a way to make that ongoing intergenerational conversation public. Listen to The Moment with Jorge Ramos and Paola Ramos as part of the MyCultura podcast network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Ed. Everyone say, hello, Ed. Hello, Ed. I'm from a very rural background myself.

My dad is a farmer, and my mom is a cousin. So, like, it's not, like... What do you get when a true crime producer walks into a comedy club? I know it sounds like the start of a bad joke, but that really was my reality nine years ago. I just normally do straight stand-up, but this is a bit different. On stage stood a comedian with a story that. that no one expected to hear. The 22nd of July 2015,

a 23-year-old man had killed his family. And then he came to my house. So what do you get when a true crime producer walks into a comedy club? A new podcast called Wisecrack, where stand-up comedy and murder takes center stage. Available now.

Listen to Wisecrack, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Internet is something we make, not just something that happens to us. I'm Bridget Todd, host of the Tech and Culture Podcast, There Are No Girls on the Internet. There Are No Gros on the Internet is not just about tech. It's about culture and policy and art and expression and how we as humans exist and fit with one another. In our new season, I'm talking to people like Emile Dash, an OG entrepreneur and writer who refuses to be cynical about the Internet.

I love tech. You know, I've been a nerd my whole life. But it does have to be for something. Like, it's not just for its own sake. It's a fascinating exploration about the power of the Internet for both good and bad. They use WhatsApp to get the price of rice at the market that is often 12 hours away. They're not going to be like, we don't like the terms of service. Therefore, we're not trading rice this season.

It's an inspiring story that focuses on people as the core building blocks of the Internet. Platforms exist because of the regular people on them. And I think that's a real important story to keep repeating. I created there are no girls on the internet because the future belongs to all of us. New episodes every Tuesday and Friday. Listen to there are no girls on the internet on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. All right, let's get over to the economy. We're going to start here with the story that Ryan flagged.

Representative Don Bacon from Nebraska, sounding the alarm on tariffs, potentially showing some other broader problems in the economy. Let's take a listen. Most people will tell you this is not emergency powers what he's doing. And is it hurting your constituents? Yes, right? We heard just yesterday, we have a company that makes combines. They're moving all of their manufacturing that makes combines for Canada to Europe. Because of the tariffs from going to U.S. to Canada are too high.

They can't compete. So they're going to move all the manufacturing for Canadian combines to Europe. That's hundreds of jobs right there. Iowa and Nebraska are really struggling right now with our farm economy. We're not growing markets for corn and soybeans. The president's making trade deals. but not a single country that I can see has bought more corned soybeans. And that's what we really need right now.

Tariffs aren't working, at least the coffee. I mean, I went to bought coffee, but I came back from my apartment. And it was up $4 to the bag that I buy, right? That's not a success right there. Would you make of that run? Don Bacon. I mean, let's contextualize him. He is, you know, to say Republican, it's like moderate.

Yeah. Not even, come on, not moderate. Like, massively pro, you reign. Liberal Republican? Yeah, there you go. No, but it's because it's not social. It's like pro-Ukraine, neocon, low taxes, all of that. So I just want to contextualize that for the audience. That said, any retiring Republican has a lot more ability to speak freely, asked Tom Tillis. So I'm finding it interesting some of the things that they're saying, potentially about, you know, blinking red lights, not just in the economy, in their district, and potentially for what that could mean for the midterms. So he's, and he also has his finger on the pulse of the economy back in Nebraska. Yeah, that's fair. And so I called a couple of Combine. There's not many Combine manufacturers out in Nebraska.

And I found the one because there haven't actually been any news reports. Yeah. And from the guy that I talked to on the phone, it seemed like they were like, ooh, Bacon kind of. Oh, he kind of let the cat out of the bag. We were just kind of letting him know. And now all the workers are finding out about it, you know, through him telling Montaguayu on CNN. But the company I can report here is called Klaus. Okay.

It's a German company that was founded in like 1913 that opened and Omaha, opened its Omaha plant in 1999, does have hundreds and hundreds of employees. They said they'd get me a, they're going to try to get me a statement. We'll see if it comes in by the end of this segment on the details of what's going on. And he said, you know, the impression that he left was that they're closing the entire plant. But if you listen very closely to what he said, the manufacturing that they're doing of combines for Canada, is being moved to Europe. So it's not the, so if you work in this plant and you, and you work on combines for the domestic market, then your job might be safe. But the plant itself is going to shrink significantly because if you are a manufacturer, you are trying to not just build for the American domestic economy. You're trying to export your products too. And think about it.

If you're an European company and you're making for the Canadian market, you want to open a plant up in Nebraska so that after you make the combine, you throw it on a truck. Not cheap to move a combine. Of course. Huge. Right. But if you're in Nebraska, it's a little bit better. And so for the last 26 years, it made sense for them to make combines for the Canadian market right there in Nebraska. right um and now they're saying because of the tariffs that doesn't make sense anymore

and they already have manufacturing capacity in europe they have a france they have from france production there's there are german companies they've got german plants so they're going to hire more european workers and then they'll pay a little extra on the shipping just to put them on a boat not that much get on the boat and get them over to and then you sell them to canada and we're out and and and those uh those nebraskans are then out of work at the same time, John Deere, Caterpillar, all these others have said that they are suffering because farmers can't sell. Farmers keep talking about how by this time of the year, they're starting to do soybean harvesting.

They have usually locked in contracts for two-thirds of-thirds. And that's a big Chinese market, just to explain to people. Like China eats something like two-thirds of soybeans in the world. And they buy a huge amount of that from the U.S. from Brazil. And this year, they have booked, and it shows how effectively China can control its commercial sector. They have booked zero contracts in the United States. And now all these American farmers are sitting there with these soybeans. So they are then not buying combines and tractors and other capital upgrades for their farms for the coming years.

just and actually we can get to i think the white house responded to that but we can go to c2 here speaking of the kind of economy kind of and and trump's management of it coming apart it seems like you know they recently he was frustrated by um he was ironically frustrated that the bLS data was showing a weaker economy than than he wanted and there were some revisions that were downward. I say ironically, because it was those downer revisions and the lower numbers that finally gave him the thing that he wanted, which was the Federal Reserve interest rate cut. But he was so outraged at the low numbers that he brings in a new, you know, BLS guy, absolutely just objectively unqualified for it. And now he's just out here postponing without explanation.

Yeah, the BLS said, here's what they said, the annual release of consumer data set for Tuesday will be rescheduled to a later date. We will update users when more information is available. Users. Then they said that the report was being delayed to a quote, data quality issue and will now be out October 30th. So the day before Halloween, so I guess it'll be a fun day to actually cover what's going on. As you said, Ryan, very, by the way, great job, very interesting. story there on the combine, kind of a microcosm of some of the ill-conceived way that this is all going down. On the spending level, we're also seeing some of this. Put C4, please up on the screen.

Low-income Americans are slashing spending, a worrying sign for the economy. We talked about this a little bit earlier, but just want to continue to hammer at home. Spending is softening in a fragmented way with wealthy Americans also scaling back in some ways. They say U.S. consumer spending is not just softening overall. It's doing so in a fragmented way. If the benefits and the pressures are not shared broadly, then we're not looking at a balanced or healthy state of the U.S. consumer base. Working class Americans already up against waning wage growth, rising house, and electricity costs are burned by any increase in grocery prices, tariff-fueled increase on household staples, apparel, and furniture increasingly dipping into savings,

racking up more debt, pulling back on discretionary spending. Meanwhile, those in the middle and upper income tiers are being more strategic about when to make big purchases, buying in bulk and shopping at cheaper retailers. Moody's retail analysts said that the Walmart Dollar Generals of the world have told investors they are picking up share among wealthier consumers who are themselves also looking for bargains and that the highest earners still are the only people holding up consumer spending and accounts for some 70% of gross domestic product. So it's a hour or base, the top 10% of earners making $250,000 or more annually account for some 49.2% of spending in the second quarter that is up from 45.8% during the same period

two years ago. So top 10% spending 50% of the money. That's a problem. And some of that's some of that change is going to be sticky. Those rich people get into Walmart, they're going be like, right? Yeah. This place pretty good. They'll stick around. They got a lot of stuff I wouldn't go. It's pretty good, but, you know, it does the job. Good isn't the work. Yeah. I love Walmart. But what's really punching people in the face, and we can put up this next element, I think this is C5, are people's electric bills. This is really a totally under-discussed thing. Nobody in mainstream media is talking about this. It's crazy. Yeah, it is totally crazy. If you look, and so 2022, you guys have been watching this program, you can probably figure out what

happened there. Russia invaded Ukraine. And that sent natural gas and broadly sent electricity prices. absolutely skyrocketing, they then level off. After that, you're looking at a confluence of things, data centers and the gobbling up of electricity by AI being a significant part of it. And as we warned about on this program, while Trump was and Republicans were working on the big, beautiful bill, they actively stripped away subsidies. for clean energy, over the last several years, clean energy has represented something like 70 to 80% of new energy brought on to the market. So if you're not bringing on that new energy and you're not actually ramping up, like, it's not as if people think, you know, Biden was

stopping them from drilling or whatever, no, they were drilling like crazy. You're not actually going to drill anymore. And ironically, in Saga, you'll like this, the way that, so we've cut off, you know, we're telling Europe and other places do not buy Russian natural gas, buy our natural gas. And as a result, we are paying more for natural gas. Yes, I highlighted this. Ryan, I talked about this until it was blue in the face at the time. I go, why are we exporting natural gas? We're the one, we make all the natural gas. Why don't we just use it for ourselves? And they're like, oh, well, that's not how the global commodity markets work. And I was like, okay. Okay, well, then tell this chart. That's not how to do it.

global commodities market. Well, no, they were like, well, you can't do that because it would disrupt the global commodities market, et cetera. And I was like, okay, well, then put a tariff or something on it and make them pay more for it, at least, right, to make sure that we have to pay a little bit. Nope, that's totally out of the question. Let's all just eat it so that the Dunbos region can be 5% more Ukrainian for a month. That's basically what the U.S. policy was. It still drives me nuts. It's not all Ukraine. It was largely back in 2022. But nowadays, it's data centers. We got to go and put C6 up here on the screen because this, again, is one of the most under-discussed issues, which is these data centers are popping up everywhere.

Actually, here, where we live, Ryan, this is data in the capital of the world because of the government. And Amazon and all these people have all these contracts. The government has the largest data centers in the world on top of the big tech companies like Meta and Google, everybody in the AI race, Nvidia. Yeah, we have the NSA and all of that. But I'm talking about, it's not just a Northern Virginia problem or a Maryland problem now. It's like American. It's down in Texas, which has its own grid that's separate from everybody else. But what we know is that increasing numbers of states are under major pressure from households and from normal businesses who are saying, hey, these people are buying all the power and our rates are going up like crazy. And these

data centers actually strategically often pick low tax, more rural areas, which I wouldn't you? Yeah, right, if you're for business purposes, but that puts a huge strain on the, like Texas specifically, right? Like, look, Texas, the grid situation down there, it's a disaster. We can fight about that all day long, whether we should go nuclear, renewable, whatever. The point is we need more power, all right? And what is interesting about it is that it's starting to become a ground up campaign of just normal people looking at their electric bills and they're like, hey, this is out of control. Yeah. This is totally crazy.

And it's California, Texas, Wyoming, you know, I mean, places out in the middle of flyover country, which often will have a data center park there. And then two to three years later, they're just watching the spike go up. And actually, they have all kinds of other problems, too, with data centers that are nearby. And it's the tradeoff where, of course, it's great for Silicon Valley. It's great for Envidia's stock price. But maybe it's not so great for the rest of us. And, you know, maybe if you're going to be buying or if you're going to be building these data centers

and supposedly pumping all this money into the local economy, it's like, well, maybe, should be required to invest a little bit into power and all this other stuff. But we would never think of that, would we rhyme? No. And also, like, the way that a lot of these counties work, it's legal for some of these county commissioners to be consultants. Yeah, you're right. At the same time. And state lawmakers, like in Florida, for instance, are literally able to draw a salary as a state lawmaker and also be lobbyists for some data center company or whatever. And so then you, you know, you only have to, if you are building a data center somewhere in Wyoming, you'll give three county commissioners 100 grand each for a consulting fee. Yeah. What do they do for the

consulting fee? They vote yes on your data center. And then the company writes the rules so that they get access, they get privileged access to cheap energy, but also reliable energy. Like, if, I just said if, but you know what, it's when. It's when we don't have the power. to feed both the residential homes and the normal businesses in that area and the data center. The data center will keep running, and y'all will get a rolling blackout. Yeah, one of the highlighted stats here, which is just to put this in perspective, some of these data centers require more electricity than cities the size of Pittsburgh, Cleveland, or New Orleans make huge factories look tiny by comparison, pushing policymakers to rethink a system

that has spread transmission costs among classes of consumers proportional to electricity use. Yeah. And then they rethink and they're like, let me look at that contract and they're like, oh, this contract is not good for us. And time for my daily China does it a better way. I follow these AI researchers and others that go to China and they kind of report back for the U.S. financial industry, just check back. And they're like, hey, what's China doing? And they ask, because they presume that everybody else has our problems. They're like, what are you guys going to do about power? They're like, what do you mean? We have plenty of power. They're like, we're not worried about power.

They said, quote, electricity here is a solved problem. Now, it's dirty. All right? I mean, not all of it's nice. Some of it's solar, which is filthy to create. Some of its hydro, some of its coal. They don't give a shit, whether it's coal, nuclear or anything. They don't have any of the sunrise people campaigning against nuclear power plants or any of that stuff. But the point is, is that that's possible in elsewhere in the world. They don't think about power. They think it's cheap, plentiful. And the reason why that's important is that if you want to build a future on top of something, that's what infrastructure matters for. That's what the original grid system of the United States of America was kind of laid out after the post-New Deal era,

is like the backbone of which all of us can build better lives on top of, not to be kind of, you know, commoditize and bought entirely by some data center and then spread the costs, you know, to the rest of us. And the big beautiful bill actively, aggressively targeted renewable energy projects for destruction. That's true. Like it's said, and it was loosened up a tiny bit at the very end, but it basically said, if your project is not operational, like producing energy within like 60 days of the passage of this bill, right? You're done. For forget it. Which is none of them. Like that you don't just, you know, people are trying to figure out ways to fake it. Like, okay, well, we'll plug in like a car battery to a solar panel and

say we're producing energy. But that's based on some, but most companies are like, all right, well, America's not a place that supports the development of new energy projects. So we're going to go somewhere else. I mean, it's con. I mean, the big beautiful bill thing, I don't disagree with you. I think there was a very stupid way to decide it. I was also funded AI out the, I was just say it's not all like it also it's my issue more with it is that they go all in on solar and wind I've done endless number of segments here why solar and wind I think alone are not the answer I think nuclear is obvious answer by the way the Trump administration hey make big promises on nuclear still haven't seen a damn thing happen on it just so everybody knows so it's like like they are

delivering by the net effect is basically a gift to the oil and gas industry which look I'm not ideologically opposed to the oil and gas industry I just don't think it's nearly as efficient as a lot of other different types of power. And they don't need subsidies. And yeah, right, exactly. It's just like everyone I think should compete on its own and we can make the most efficient type of power. It seems to me the nuclear is obviously the answer.

And yet, you know, we have all kinds of ideological reasons for why that doesn't happen. But that's kind of the issue is if you just take away and you don't add, then prices are just going to go off. That's the key thing. That's my problem. The bill tilted the playing field against clean energy. It wasn't that it said, okay, we're all going to compete on a level playing field.

It's like, no, we're going to make it easier for fossil fuels. and subsidize them, we're going to make it harder for this. It's like, why are you making harder for any energy when... Right, yeah, we just need more power, period. Yeah, exactly. So we're getting rolling blackouts and we're just going to have to deal with it. I don't know if we're going to get rolling blackouts, but we will get rolling, what was the, what happened before the rolling blackouts in California?

It was like sky high bills, right? You know, people were paying like $400 in like 2002 money, which is like $2,000 today for their electric bills. Man, I don't even know. I'm Jorge Ramos. Together we're launching The Moment, a new podcast about what it means to live through a time as uncertain as this one. We sit down with politicians, artists and activists, to bring you death and analysis

from a unique Latino perspective. The moment is a space for the conversations we've been having us father and daughter for years. Listen to The Moment with Jorge Ramos and Paola Ramos on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I just normally do straight stand-up, but this is a bit different.

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