No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen - George Santos sinks the GOP with horrific lies

Episode Date: January 1, 2023

Brian is joined by FOX LA's Elex Michael to discuss George Santos and his raft of lies, the impending Trump-DeSantis feud heading into the next general election, and some best-of memories from 2022.Donate to the "Don't Be A Mitch" fund: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/dontbeamitchShop merch: https://briantylercohen.com/shopYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/briantylercohenTwitter: https://twitter.com/briantylercohenFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/briantylercohenInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/briantylercohenPatreon: https://www.patreon.com/briantylercohenNewsletter: https://www.briantylercohen.com/sign-upWritten by Brian Tyler CohenProduced by Sam GraberRecorded in Los Angeles, CA See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey, everybody. So we are neck deep in the holidays right now. Not a lot has happened politically this past week. And so I thought we would do something a little bit different this week. And I'll be co-hosting this episode with my good friend Alex Michelson. Alex is the anchor for Fox L.A. and the host of California's statewide political show, The Issue is. Alex, thanks for joining. Brian is good to be with you. Some behind-the-scenes things for people that may be watching this on video. Brian told me this was going to be an audio-only thing. And then about five minutes ago, said that it wasn't. So I'm on vacation this week. I haven't shaved in days. I look like a mountain man, but out of respect to Brian, I tried to throw on a suit, but then wearing sweatpants underneath. So I'm kind of a mess. I hope you like the new look. I'll be back to the other look the next time we talk, but it's a different version as we wrap up the year. Yeah, well, join the club when it comes to suit on the top, sweatpants on the bottom. So let's start here with kind of a crazy one, and that is George Santos, this Republican who's been caught lying about everything. Everything. Do you realize how much you have to lie for people to notice in 2022 after four years

of Donald Trump? So I guess the question here is, do you think he'll be seated? And why is your answer, yes? Because so much of what happens today is about power. I mean, I think if the Republicans had a 50-seat margin, you know, they could afford to dump him and, you know, chalk it up and whatever. But when the margin is this close and Kevin McCarthy needs every vote and all the rest of it, they're going to try to hold on to it for the same reason that there were people in Georgia that were admitting that Herschel Walker was not particularly be a great senator or especially well-qualified, but they just wanted the power and they wanted the R. So I think in our tribal political world, that probably means more than being a complete liar

and fraud in just about every aspect of your life. Yeah. You know, there are a few Republicans who've come out and I guess kind of not necessarily called for him not to be seated, but just kind of expressed their disdain for him. And my take on it is that they're not actually mad he lied. They're just mad that he got caught. They're mad that George Santos is such an obvious. caricature of all the things that they're accused of being in the Republican Party, which is,

you know, liars, cheats, thieves, kind of sociopathic. And so, like, he's not an aberration within that party. He's the rule, and they don't like that he makes it so easy for the rest of us to kind of see exactly who they are. And he's taking a lot of attention away from what should be a triumphant moment for Republicans who have wanted to win back the House, obviously, for a while and worked hard for it. Obviously, they wanted to have much bigger margins than they did, but still taking over the House is a big deal, and this is an unnecessary distraction

from a really ugly leadership fight for Kevin McCarthy, which is another distraction from Republicans taking over the House. But one point that I think is important on the George Santos thing, and this is me as a journalist, I think it's a reminder how important it is to support local journalism. And for viewers that are like, well, why didn't we know about this earlier or what more could we have done or things like that, it's important to support not only the New York Times, but the local papers on the ground that are looking into this sort of thing. And by supporting, we don't only mean clicking on an article, but subscribing because journalism, investigative journalism especially is expensive and resource intensive. And if there aren't people that are willing to help fund that, a lot of these sort of George Santos situations will repeat themselves over and over again when people aren't looking that closely.

So let's switch over into what I think is going to be the biggest story of 2023, and that is, do you think that the special counsel will indict Donald Trump? That's the question I'm asked more than any other question. I'm assuming that you've been asked the same question, one or two times yourself. So what do you think on this? I don't know. What do you think? What's your answer to the question? Well, my answer to the question is yes.

I do. I don't think that he has the political cover that he's had in the past by virtue of being president. I think that the evidence against him is so aggressively overwhelming that it would be difficult for him not to be. I don't even see how there is an out. I don't see how he has any plausible deniability on anything.

I mean, so many of these cases are just so beyond. airtight. I mean, with the Marlago documents case, there were classified documents in Marlago. We know that nobody, that he said the GSA packed them. We know that they didn't pack them. We know that he tried to, that he had his lawyers on counsel for himself sign that there were no documents there when there were. I mean, just every element of this case just makes it so airtight. And on the January 6th stuff, I mean, we had the January 6th committee, which was composed not just of Democrats and Republicans, but the interview guests were

almost entirely Republicans who just reigned down an avalanche of evidence against Donald Trump, irrefutable evidence against Donald Trump, that he knew what was happening, that he knew the truth about there being no fraud in the election, and that he pushed all of this bullshit anyway, that he knew that his supporters were armed and that he pushed for them to be able to come into his speech and march down to the Capitol anyway. So, you know, and just issue after issue bolstered by so many of these Republican claims, I just don't see how there's a world in which he can get out of it. Granted, it's Donald Trump.

He's gotten out of it before, but he doesn't have, you know, the political protection that he's had in the past. So I do think he'll be indicted. Now the question becomes, what's going to happen once he's indicted? Will it be a slap on the wrist? I mean, is the guy going to get hauled off to federal prison? That I'm less likely of. So I do think that he'll be indicted in terms of the punishment.

I don't know that we'll be satisfied with what we do see in this scenario that I've made up, but that remains to be seen. So now what do you think? If we were filming a TV segment, that rant would have been the entire segment. So I appreciate the depth there. I think that, look, I think one thing Democrats should have learned from the Mueller experience

when everybody was like, it's Mueller time and expecting everything to go and that he was gonna be this superhero that was gonna come down and it was all gonna blow up for Trump is to maybe lower your expectations when it comes to DOJ. some of what happens there. And so I think we don't know. Now, here's the thing to me on the Trump front is that it's not just one case, right? I mean, he's being hit from all different angles.

You got the situation in Georgia. You got the situation with January 6th. You've got the stealing of classified documents. You've got the financial situation in New York on top of something else we may not even know about, right? That's happened. And so the chances that one of those four or five, which all seem pretty bad for him. One of them results in some sort of indictment to me seems pretty high. Will that make people that like Donald Trump like him less? It might make them like him more because his whole strategy is spinning there against you when they're against me, which is brilliant, the way that he's been able to do that. But there does seem to be a growing movement of Republicans who don't want Donald Trump to be the nominee because they want

themselves to be the nominee, who are increasingly tired of that. And he seems to get a little bit less leeway there. But the big question to me of 2023 is, will any of those people effectively become the anti-Trump so that they get the best of Trumpism? They get, get the base of Donald Trump, but then they don't get the baggage. There's a lot of hope that that's gonna be Ron DeSantis. That's what a lot of people think Ron DeSantis is gonna do. He hasn't done it yet.

And he hasn't really even taken a swing at that yet. Right. And unless somebody can effectively do that, Donald Trump will be the nominee again. But there is an opening now in a way that there wasn't a few years ago and some space for somebody to do that. Which, Alex, is the perfect segue into the last question that I have here, which is,

who do you think are going to be the 2024 presidential nominees for each party? I mean, look. This is prediction time right here, so we're going to play this back at some point. I learned that predictions are stupid years ago, so I don't like to make prediction. I will say the odds at this point, at this point, are that the nominees will be Joe Biden and Donald Trump. they have the easiest path to their respective nominations. Joe Biden, if he runs, and by all indications from what I hear from my reporting is that

he is, will probably not be challenged by anybody who is a serious contender, and he will most likely win the nomination. And Donald Trump, for all the reasons I just laid out, still has the best chance because of the way that Republicans nominate. Remember, Republican system is winner-take-all, not proportional representation. I think we talked about this the last time I was on the podcast, but if somebody wasn't listening to that, basically, when the Democrats have a primary, say in our state of California, and if Bernie Sanders wins 47 percent and Hillary Clinton wins 42 percent, Bernie Sanders gets

47 percent of the delegates, Hillary Clinton gets 42 percent. In California and all the states, Republicans do winner take all primaries, which means if Bernie, if Donald Trump gets 47% and Rhonda Sanis gets 42%. Donald Trump gets 100% of the delegates, which makes it much harder for there to be a contested convention. So even if he's winning, you know, the most among a small group, if there's a bunch of people splitting it up, Donald Trump still wins. So the rules right now are advantageous. for Donald Trump. Yeah. That being said, the honest answer is we have no idea. We have never gone into a year with this much uncertainty on who the nominees are going to be, ever. And that's what makes our jobs really exciting and it means that people got to tune in every

week to your show to figure, to watch this whole thing play out. That's it. Who do you think? I agree. I mean, I've said it before. I think that at this point, all of the possible Democratic nominees have basically lined up behind Joe Biden, which is, by the way, the smart thing to do, he's got the power of the incumbency, he's already shown that he can win, and he's got a successful first two years

under his belt, successful by any measure. As far as Donald Trump is concerned, I think that, and I've said this to you as well, but there's a lot of granting Ron DeSantis the air appearance on the right, but Ron DeSantis himself doesn't seem to have any appetite to actually take a swing at Donald Trump. And until he does, because we all know that Trump is going to go full scorched earth and leave no stone unturned and just try to completely destroy whoever goes up against him. Until DeSantis does do that, I have no reason to believe that it'll be anybody else. I mean, Donald Trump's the one who's going to fight until the bitter end. And if nobody is showing any appetite right now to fight at all, then I have to assume, at least with

the information that we have in front of us, that it's going to be Donald Trump. And that's not to say that things can change, especially as these investigations and potential indictments continue to bear down on him. But for right now, just looking at the tea leaves, it looks like it's going to be Biden Trump in 2024. That being said, the Republican strategists have not exactly been impressed by the first few weeks of the Trump 20204 campaign with a campaign launch announcement with people literally being locked inside because they're trying to walk out the door because they're so bored. After that, no announcements since, has not done a single rally since then. And then he does a campaign ad for buying Trump NFTs where he imposed his body on superheroes to make himself

look thinner. So, I mean, that's not exactly the typical campaign that you see that shows momentum. You don't remember, you know, back in the day, the Abraham Lincoln, NFT. So we'll see how all that plays or people care about that. But I think there were a lot of people, even Republicans that like Trump that were like, you know, when they saw that was not exactly a sign of strength. Yeah, I don't know that I would call that a healthy, the sign of a healthy campaign when your first major announcement after announcing your candidacy is to buy $99 pictures of him standing on the moon. So with that said, Alex, last year we started where I think will be a really cool tradition,

and that is for me to give the reins over to you and just kind of talk about some personal stuff and some career stuff that we've experienced the last year and what we're looking forward to next year. So you're an interviewer on your show, so I'll give the reins up to you here. Well, we'll do a couple of generic things, and then we can get more into the show. But who do you think was the biggest political winner of 2022? I would say the biggest political winner has to be Joe Biden. He's, and this isn't just me like as a Democrat.

This is, you know, this is somebody who has not only defied the opposite, to beat Donald Trump to get into office in the first place. But if you look at the number of judges he's gotten confirmed, if you look at the legislation that he's been able to pass, objectively by any measure, one of the most successful Congresses and presidencies as far as legislation is concerned in modern American history, from the American Rescue Plan to the Chips Act, the Pact Act, the gun safety legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act, eliminating student loan debt, which is right now being contested by Republicans in court.

But on issue after issue after issue, Joe Biden's been able to move his agenda forward to advance his agenda that he ran on. There are a few notable exceptions. We have no Voting Rights Act, and we weren't able to eliminate the filibuster to get there. But by and large, he's been able to pass everything that he ran on passing. And even the big crutches that he was contending with, which were inflation and high gas prices. Gas is down to, you know, the most common gas price in the United States is $2.99 right now. Inflation is down to, I believe the most recent inflation numbers were 0.2% for

the last month, which was, I think, November. So that annualized, that's barely any inflation at all. So both of those troubling numbers have gone down, aren't really an issue for him to contend with. And what we would normally think is a referendum on an unpopular president contending with high inflation, high gas prices, and a low approval rating, instead turned into this major victory for the party in power. And Joe Biden's atop that party. All right. If we're turning this into my show, we're going to be more concise.

Okay. Rapid fire. Answer is Joe Biden. I would say the political winner of the year was Ron DeSantis, because Donald Trump is weakened, most definitely. He had a big win in Florida. He's grown into a big national base for. him. He looks like the night, you know, coming in on the horse to potentially save the

Republican Party. He's got a long way to go to actually be that, but he is best positioned of anybody in the Republican Party to take Donald Trump down, and it was undoubtedly a good year for him. Who do you think, Brian, was the biggest political loser of the year? I'm going to guess that we're both on the same page on this one and say that it's Donald Trump, not just because all of his slate of gubernatorial and Secretary of State came candidates lost in this midterm election following losses at, you know, at the hands of Donald Trump in 2018 and 2020, but also he's got a ton of legal issues bearing down on him right now. What do you think? Yeah, it was a, I was, Donald Trump is the obvious choice.

But as a subset of Donald Trump, one of his candidates who I think was the biggest loser of all was Dr. Mem and Oz, who came into a state that could have very easily won up against John Fetterman, who literally was having a hard time speaking, and he still lost big, and now he's back home in New Jersey. Who do you think? What do you think was the biggest political story of 2022? I think the biggest political story would have to be Roe being overturned. That's what I think had, I mean, that changed the entire momentum of this midterm cycle. I think that it not only caused all of these, you know, basically all of Americans to come out and be way more likely to vote in this election, but also took what would have, what history told us was going to be a

gimmee election for Republicans and swung it so far in the other direction that kind of, it became this, this complete anomaly that we have no historical precedent for. I would say the most important story of the year, big picture, when we look back upon it, will be democracy saving democracy, that voters, came out and said no to the extremism, to the lies, to the mistruths, and ended up sending a clear message that that is not the way forward, which is a really important thing for the entire system itself

to survive. What do you think? Better answer than my answer. Your answer was good too. Both were important. What would you say is the biggest, or your favorite moment. You've had this whole year,

this amazing moments on this show. What's the most memorable moment for you personally doing this show? I feel like this is an obvious one too, but at the end of February in 2022, I went to the White House and interviewed President Biden. So that was an easy one

for my most memorable moment. I mean, just to be able to go into the White House and sit down with him. And I remember the moment, I wouldn't even tell most people that I was doing it, because I just didn't think it was real. And until the moment he walked into that room

and sat down with me and like fist-bumped me because we were still in the middle of COVID, I still didn't think it was going to be real. So that's an easy one for me. What about you? Well, before we get to that, follow-up to that, recently, you know, your BFF, Joey B,

invited you back to the White House, right? You got to party together? Yeah, yeah, we did. He shot me a text and just, you know, checking on what I was doing this past week. He, the White House invited, invited me and, you know, a number of other people. They have parties at the White House. So I went to the Christmas party this past week at the White House, which was awesome.

And I've been invited for a few bill signings, but I live in Los Angeles, so it's difficult for me to, like, pop on over to the other side of the country. It's difficult for me to get out of the house, even just to go to the gym. So, you know, getting to Washington, D.C. is tough, but it's pretty amazing opportunity to see the White House at Christmas. So I brought my girlfriend there and, yeah, it was, it was really, really cool. You also were in, in D.C. for Christmas time. Yes, I did. I was invited by the vice president to a big California event that she did, which was really kind of extraordinary to see a lot of our congresspeople and a lot of people that we

interview on our show and got to spend some quality time with Doug Emhoff, who's like the coolest guy in Washington. And it was really, it was really fun. In terms of, for me, reporting, you know, there were two stories that, that, that, like were really meaningful for me that that I will remember. One was this this Gavin Newsom goes national story. I remember I'm sitting at a press conference right after the Roe draft opinion came out, the Dobbs draft opinion came out. And he's at Planned Parenthood. And he just went on this rant on where the hell is the Democratic Party. And she had never done before and started sort of

attacking the party infrastructure in a way that was really aggressive and interesting. and got a ton of attention. And I was with him a few weeks later and asked him about it. And then we took it another step further and got a tremendous amount of national attention. So much so that he went to the White House. And I went as the only reporter with him to the White House and was with him at the White House and on Capitol Hill and interviewed him there and to see him sort of test the waters, but also at the same time saying to them, I'm not running and delivering that message to

Jill Biden and to Ron Clayne. And that was a really fascinating story. And for me personally, the story I covered the most was the race for L.A. Mayor and got a chance to cover it very closely, covered both Rick Caruso and Karen Bass on their first day of the campaign, on the last day of the campaign, organized the first debate between the two of them in the spring and the first debate between them in the fall and was with Karen Bass right after her house was burgled and was with Rick Caruso when he got the Snoop Dog endorsement. Yeah. It was all these sort of random wild, did the first interview with their kids and was with Kamala Harris and Karen Bass together. I mean, it was like a wild ride to be on. And in the end, you know, Karen Bass won that race.

And it's going to be a huge challenge for her. One of the stories I'm going to be following most closely is can she do what she promised, which is to build a coalition and to tackle this huge issue of homelessness, which not only L.A. is dealing with, but most of the big cities around the country are dealing with as well. And can they all work together to sort of of have models that might be able to be replicated around the country, I think is something that a lot of your viewers and listeners probably are focused on as well. Yeah, that's going to be probably the biggest story out of California in the next two years. So you'll be the guy to go to on that stuff.

Yeah, we'll see. And finally, any personal notes that you want to share as we wrap up the year? Yeah. You know, I've been thinking a lot about, like, what my goals are as we move into 2023, like, you know, in terms of advice I would give to other people or just goals that I would follow for myself. I think it's important to pay attention to this stuff. Like, my job is desperately trying to make sure that people are paying attention. But not to feel like you have to shoulder everything all the time. Like, it's not my job to tell people

how to live. And I'm not going to pretend that I have a wealth of life experience. that everyone listening and watching doesn't, but right now I'm in New Jersey. I'm in New Jersey longer than I thought I would be because my grandpa passed away and so if I could like very humbly offer some advice, it's to take some time for yourself and your family and your health and to have some fun. I think that fighting for a better world is a virtuous fight to have, but don't forget that this is our only shot here. We're only on this planet for a short amount of time, so don't spend too much time on Twitter and YouTube. And I say that as someone who makes a living from YouTube. So if you feel like you're being constantly consumed by this

stuff, it's okay to step away. This is, this is a marathon. And so, uh, and so I would just offer to make sure that you're not treating it like a sprint because, uh, you know, we've got a long fight ahead of us, but to make sure that we're also saving some time to pay attention to what's important, uh, beyond the political stuff. Can you tell us a little bit about your grandfather and what made him so great? Yeah. He, he was, um, he was, um, he was probably the kindest person I know. He was gentle and never raised his voice ever, which I couldn't do for a single day.

He's basically the pinnacle of what I could aspire to be. He is kind. He made time for his family all the time. And he was everyone's rock. He was just he's just one of those people that are just good. We've talked a lot about how much I love animals and how they show unconditional love

and everybody loves their dogs because it's just love that you get from them and nothing is ever... You don't have any bad memories associated with our animals and that's how it is for me with my grandpa. I have not a single memory where he's not smiling or making jokes or just in good spirits. And that was his whole life.

And everybody in my family has the exact same story when it comes to him in terms of that stuff. So just someone who only brings positivity. I say that as someone who traffics in a lot of toxicity on a daily basis. So having someone like that in my life was always amazing. And so, yeah, I appreciate you asking that. Well, on behalf of your viewers and listeners and fans and friends, you know, we're all thinking about you and praying for you,

if that's your thing or sending you love virtually or in person or whatever and know that you are supported by a vast network of people all around the world who care about you and also how proud we all know that your grandfather must have been of you and what you've done with this platform what an incredible year you've had how you've grown this thing is really extraordinary and And as this episode and the episodes in the future can be a tribute to him and his legacy and he lives on in you. Well, thank you. I really appreciate that.

Okay, well, we'll leave it there. Elex, thank you for taking the reins on this one and for being such a good friend and such a frequent guest on this show. I know that my viewers, listeners, love hearing from you. So happy 2023 and we'll talk to you soon. Thank you. And if any of them want to follow me on YouTube, YouTube.com slash Elex. Michelson, that's Alex with an E.

You can search for the issue is as a podcast as well and all the social platforms would love to hear from you and love to hear if you listen to this episode, that would be especially cool. Thank you very much, Brian. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. You've been listening to No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen,

produced by Sam Graber, music by Wellesie, interviews captured and edited for YouTube and Facebook by Nicholas Nicotera and recorded in Los Angeles, California. If you enjoyed this episode, Please subscribe on your preferred podcast app. Feel free to leave a five-star rating and a review, and check out briantylercoen.com for links to all of my other channels.