Bulwark Takes - Joni Ernst’s “Apology” Video Is Deeply Unsettling

Episode Date: June 1, 2025

Tim Miller and Sam Stein break down a jaw-dropping series of statements from Senator Joni Ernst — including one from a cemetery, where she basically tells Iowans worried about Medicaid cuts to embrace death... and Jesus.

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This free virtual event brings together leaders like Senator Heidi Heitkamp, Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Governor Andy Beshear, and others for real talk and real solutions. Together we'll tackle the most urgent issues facing rural America. Register today or learn more at ruralprogress.com. Hey everybody, it's Tim Miller from The Bullwork

here with managing editor Sam Stein. There have been a series of statements from Iowa Senator Joni Ernst about how she doesn't really seem to care that people are going to die if the Republicans pass the big, beautiful bill so-called. And you usually kind of make an aside such as that as a politician where you're like, well, you know, everybody dies, so if our bill is going our bills gonna make people die whatever that's the kind of thing that in the past you'd clean up but for Joni Ernst no she doubled down she leaned in people are gonna die fucking deal with it and if you're worried about death let

me tell you you should just accept her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and be welcomed into his arms Sam I want to break down both videos with you, but do you have any big picture thoughts first? No, let's just get into it. So, we people are not, well we all are going to die. So, Sam, my take on this is like, it wasn't great, but it's kind of like one of those gaffes from when we were coming up, you know, a 1990s, 2000s gaffe. We're like, she was trying to make a point. She was trying to be, she was getting attacked.

She was being a little dismissive. I think she was just being dismissive. She was getting attacked, but she just like, you know, I think she was under pressure. And I guess my point was that I don't think that, I think it was the kind of thing that in this day and age, disappears. I don't know that,

me and you didn't do a video on it Right like it happened last week. There's a lot of I was hoping to do a video 2006 that would have been a gaffe that was like top of the line, you know, Bruce Okay, Todd Aiken, but yeah, maybe not Really what a callback. So it was top of the line in Iowa, but it was not. I mean, it was obviously, it went viral very quickly nationally, but I agree with you that it was going to flame out and we were going to move on to like 18 other, like, I think after that, like we got the, you know, Elon's taking ketamine and he's peeing all over the

place. So like there was other things going on, but I'm here. It's actually a bloody bladder. I've had several doctors message me after my comments that Elon's peeing all over the place. And I think that well, they're they're they're bladder doctors. And so they know about what kind of issues you get if you take too much ketamine. And it's not that you lose control of your pee and you're peeing your pants. But so when you do pee your pee blood. So again, that's not another, another not great sign about your drug intake.

It sounds like an assignment for Will Summer. Do the elan ketamine diet and see what happens. I might have to assign that. I was back to Joni Yates. So she says it and yeah, I mean like, again, it just seems so cold to me to be able to, your constituents like, constituents like, you know,

these cuts are gonna kill people and your response is, well, we're all going to die. It's like so, it's so cold. But yes, fine. It was going to go away. You know, and I think the other thing, just really quick before you go into this next video, I do think the other thing worth just sitting on for a second

is that like the Medicaid cuts in a place like Iowa, like this is really an issue that is gonna have some salience. And I think in fact she made the gas because at this town hall, you're getting bombarded. Right? Like you're getting bombarded on this.

And I think that this bill is one, though in Iowa it does have a massive farmer bailout. But for a lot of red states, it's gonna maybe be a little tougher for these guys politically than they realize. Also, look at it through. I mean, I don't wanna be so, you know, well, whatever. I'll play the role of like teary-eyed liberal here.

But like, if you're like a poor person who's scraping to get by and you're nervous about the economy to begin with, and then the Congress is gonna pass a bill that could affect your healthcare coverage and could throw you off the Medicaid rules and you have a kid, let's say, and you're beginning to start to freak out. Like you're legitimately forgetting these are not insincere emotions from these town hall attendees. And so when you have an elected official responding to your very valid concerns about your your future, saying, Well, you know

what, just, you know, embrace death. It's like, that's not, that's not what you want to hear. And so, you know, that's why I thought like it was bad for her. And then I was like, well, she's going to clean it up. Right. You know, it'd be like, you know, she'll say something, be like, you know, of course I, I want to make sure people are healthy and living longer.

And then she just like went completely in the other direction. Which takes us to the next video, which I do not use this word likely lightly, it is psychotic. It's totally crazy. It's totally crazy. I was like, it's not RFK bear style crazy, but it's got its own genre of nuttiness. And there's so many elements to this where I would just like sort of say to anybody, I'd be like, no, no, no. Is this a Ryan Coogler movie? Is this a Scrooge character from a horror? Well, you start out.

Should we just play and then analyze it? Because there's so many parts of it that I was like, what the fuck? All right, let's play. Here it is, Joan Ernst in a cemetery. Hello, everyone. I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely apologize for a statement that I made yesterday at my town hall.

See, I was in the process of answering a question that had been asked by an audience member when a woman who was extremely distraught screamed out from the back corner of the auditorium, people are going to die. And I made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that yes we are all going to perish from this earth. So I apologize. And I'm really, really glad

that I did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well. But for those that would like to see eternal and everlasting life, I encourage you to embrace my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. All right. Yes. Okay.

Learn it again. Yeah, go for it. Well, you start, yeah, I don't know about you, but when I started seeing, I was like, oh, okay, like she's just gonna be like, contrite about it. And that's, I'm glad. Wait a second. Is that a fucking cemetery? My first reaction is like, is that a tombstone? And then there's something a little bit off. I don't know if you picked up on it.

The camera, it was like oddly steady, but she was kind of moving on it. But like the camera stayed put and there was like a weird closeness. She was like very close to it. And the way she was talking was so creepy to me when she had that The camera stayed put and there was like a weird closeness. She was like very close to it. Yeah. And the way she was talking was so creepy to me when she had that pregnant pause. She was like, yes, we are all going to perish. I was like, oh my God.

Parish is just, I would like you to sit on the word perish for a second. That's like the darkest way to just the word you could possibly choose to describe death also. Yeah I don't I don't want to think about my harrassing. What is the camera? I want to also give the comment but now you mentioned what is she just holding the phone very close to her She there she's they're holding it or it's propped up on something. But if you watch it, it doesn't quite move It's her that's moving. So she's either got the steadiest selfie. Maybe she was doing a selfie stick thing.

I don't know. It was the whole thing was weird and the zoom on her face was very odd and it felt sort of like, I don't know. She was like the, the what's the, the patron of death or whatever it is. Like she was coming to kill you. Yeah. I've never seen her pores before. Maybe she was using camo. Yeah, she is so close. Portrait mode.

Yeah. I don't, yeah, that part is very strange and it's unsettling. I guess my point is it's unsettling. Totally. Yeah. That would be a very, it would be an unusual setup to be that close to the camera if you were talking something fun, but Cory Booker does this, right? And I'd also find that kind of unsettling. I've mentioned it to him, I think, during the interview. It's like he's just running. Or like you're AOC in your living room cooking like mac and cheese, but not in a fucking cemetery. But I also don't want your face like right there.

Okay. I guess it might be a little bit of a boomer selfie situation since Cory Booker also does it. Okay. So there's that. Uh, and then, you know, the, the thing for me also that is just so off putting immediately is just, she's like dripping with sarcasm. I know. In a way that again, like kind of goes against what I, I thought her brand was.

I'm like, maybe I didn't understand, no Joni Ernst that well. Like I thought that again, if you're going to be an Iowa, you know, an Iowa nice farm senator that's like a tough woman who served in the military. Castrates pigs. Yeah, castrate pigs. Like doing the kind of sarcastic 20 something from Bed-Stuy, you know, kind of vibe, like I, I, very condescending. No, you gotta save the, you gotta save the sarcasm to the Jews.

I mean, we don't have much. That's our thing. And she, you can't, you can't steal that from us. You really do. And the condescending non-apologetic, I was trying to think about the version of this where if you thought about like a liberal from New York or a Jewish or even like AOC, like talking about the Iowans, you know, talking about like these red state people, like they just, they're not as, you know, they're not as enlightened as me. And so I'm really upset about this climate change bill, but they're, but I, I'm going to fake apologize to them because they got their pearls clutch because they believe in their sky God. When I'm over here worried about climate and what's

happening here on earth. Like I, it would be, there would just be the chastising that would happen among the chattering class. She's so out of touch. You like touch. Yeah. And the whole thing, the other thing, like the tooth fairy where she's like, I didn't realize like you guys didn't believe you're going to die. Yeah. What's next? I'm going to have to educate you on the tooth fairy.

It's like, no, fuck you. Come on. People are scared. Yeah. Also, the tooth fairy is fake. Oh, that doesn't even make any sense. The tooth fairy's fake. Outside doesn't even make any sense. The tooth fairy's fake. We're going to die. Yeah, good point. Yeah, it doesn't make sense.

It doesn't make sense at all. It's not an apt comparison. She's trying to say that people who, oh no, she's saying believe in eternal life is the same as believing in the tooth fairy. Embrace death. Yeah, embrace death unless you go through Jesus Christ. Or I guess you get the childlike view to not accept that you're going to die.

I don't know. I know a lot of kids that think they're right. The whole thing. The whole thing. But do you think that, because there was an edit cut obviously in the middle. Um, do you think that they had planned to do the Jesus Christ part or they're at the end being like, you know what, you know what this video needs is like us to, you know, convert some people.

I think that it is obviously strategic, which is why it's kind of gross, right? Which is like, Oh wait, hold on. You think it was that, but that's the thing. It's like the strategy that went into it. It's like, let's do a video, but let's make fun of these people for getting all reactive to our original video and let's shoot it in a cemetery. Let's shoot a cemetery. But then we're going to bait people at the end. So it's like, okay, so if so, we know that that Jew Sam Stoving and that homosexual Tim Miller are going to make fun of us about this. All right. And so we're going to have the Trump card. We're

going to be able to say to the islands, like, they're just upset that we like Jesus and they don't like, not liking Jesus, liking Jesus and wanting to tend to the poor and sick, actually those things working together, okay, those things are not at odds. Like believing in heaven and being a Christian and also wanting to make sure that poor people get health care. Those things combine together, right? It's not like, at my understanding, having gone to Catholic school, having an everyday Catholic church attending mother, is that Christians don't just say, okay, well, because we have heaven, then we can do whatever the fuck we want on earth. And who cares if people suffer?

Because they're going to get, they're're gonna be in the arms of the God They'll be in the bosom of God at the end in heaven so they can suffer here on earth And I don't have to deal with it the bosom exactly. Yeah You missed the the canon of Jesus's selfie videos walking through Nazareth He made fun of people for thinking that they could get eternal life like he could Why do we think? I don't know, guys. The cemetery is such a weird touch.

I like what the fuck that's does she normally walk in cemeteries? That's weird. I don't know. I mean, we're very cemetery oriented people. Um, who's we? Uh, here in Louisiana, cemetery people do go to cemeteries and hang out you know. Really? I find that a little bit. There's cemetery tours here. Historical cemeteries sure but I wouldn't hang out at cemeteries. Just like a random one?

No. Not on my Saturday and Sunday to-do list to be honest with you. We really did need the angel of death character from Family Guy to be kind of like walking behind her. We need a cartoon version of this. I'm sure someone's going to do it. Yeah. All right. Any other final takeaways? I guess here's my final one.

Just really quick, pure politics. Jodie only won by 6% last time. I mean, Iowa used to be a swing state. It is not now. I called one of my buddies who's an Iowa consultant. They're like, I don't, that's just not, it's over. Like, I don't think this is really on the board anymore. Um, do you think?

Yeah, well, I don't know. Like, no, probably not, but we have a piece coming up tonight. Um, just to tease it from Lauren Egan about sort of what the strategy is for states like Iowa for Democrats. And I mean, it's, it's like a fucking triple bank shot, right? Like they got a, you know, get a national climate that works in their favor. They got to find a candidate that's really dynamic and authentic and it may not be a Democrat because the brand is so tarnished. Like,

and even then it might not work. And so it's like these, this is to, to your point, this map is pretty brutal for Democrats. That's what peace tonight. I check out on the board.com Rob Sanchez run for governor of Iowa. I think governor's race is a little different than Senate races. So nationalized. I think Rob has legit, legit shot and we're gonna be talking about in the coming months introducing Augusta him. Okay, Sam Stein, that's it. Stay out of the cemeteries on this Sunday.

My next activity. The Sabbath for you. I'm going to stay out of the cemetery myself and we'll be seeing you guys later. Subscribe to the feed. Peace.