No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen - Republicans lose their minds over prosecutor's announcement

Episode Date: February 11, 2024

The media loses its mind over what one rightwing prosecutor said about Joe Biden. Brian interviews Senator Chris Murphy, who helped author the border bill, about whether that bill is now dead, if we’re still going to see any Ukraine aid, and whether there exists any incentive for even good faith Republicans to seek any compromise with Democrats. And the Governor of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, joins to discuss his thoughts on Republicans’ unwillingness to actually do anything, and some major progressive priorities in PA, like legal weed and raising the minimum wage.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, CASee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Today we're going to talk about the media losing its mind over what one right-wing prosecutor said about Joe Biden. And I have two interviews this week. I'm joined by Senator Chris Murphy, who helped author the border bill, who discusses whether that bill is now dead, if we're going to see any Ukraine aid, and whether there exists any incentive for even good faith Republicans to seek any compromise with Democrats. And I'm joined by the governor of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, to discuss his thoughts on Republicans' unwillingness to actually do anything and some major progressive priorities in Pennsylvania,

like legal weed and raising the minimum wage. I'm Brian Tyler Cohen, and you're listening to No Lie. As you may or may not know, Joe Biden was being investigated by a special prosecutor named Robert Herr for his own mishandling of classified documents during his time as vice president. Now, we've covered this extensively, but for those who would like nothing more than to equate Donald Trump and Joe Biden, the issue wasn't so much that they both retain classified documents as it was Trump's unwillingness to give those documents back. Remember, Trump was asked by the National Archives and refused, then he was subpoenaed,

and he refused, and finally a federal magistrate approved a search warrant, which led to that warrant being executed at Maralago. Biden, on the other hand, just complied. But still, in fairness, Merrick Arland named Robert Hur as a special prosecutor to investigate Joe Biden and to determine whether to press charges. This week, Her opted not to charge Biden, stating that there wouldn't be enough evidence to convict him in front of a jury, but not before also adding that Joe Biden presented as a, quote, elderly old man with a poor memory. And so even though Biden, was not charged, her found a way to make the report just as damaging to him, if not legally than politically. Here's what another prosecutor, now the vice president, had to say.

So the way that the president's demeanor in that report was characterized, could not be more wrong on the facts and clearly politically motivated, gratuitous. And so I will say that when it comes to the role in responsibility of a prosecutor in a situation like that, we should expect that there would be a higher level of integrity than what we saw. Obama administration attorney general Eric Holder echoed those sentiments, saying special counsel, her report on Biden classified documents issues, contains way too many gratuitous remarks and is flatly inconsistent with longstanding DOJ traditions. Had this report been subject to a normal DOJ review, these marks would undoubtedly have been

excised. So I want to be clear, first of all, about who this guy is. Robert Herr is a Trump-appointed Republican prosecutor. He clerked for a staunch conservative Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist. He clerked for another far-right judge who wrote in support of Trump's Muslim ban. He's donated to at least three Republican political campaigns. And so the notion that Merrick Garland would find an avowed Republican to handle investigation into a Democratic president during an election year just defies logic. Here's the Democrats' problem. We are under the impression that we are going to win over Republicans with displays of goodwill,

like right here, putting a right-winger in charge of an investigation into Joe Biden. Democrats gain nothing from empowering partisan Republicans. Because on the off chance that a Republican sides

with the Democrats, then those Republicans are just instantly written off as rhinos or even Democrats, and on the very likely occasion that the Republican doesn't side with the Democrats, then it's immediately weaponized.

We need to get off this obsession with seeking acceptance by Republicans. Merrick Garland is so desperate to not be viewed is political, that he is empowering people who are more than happy to be political. He dropped the ball on prosecuting Trump because he was too afraid of the optics. He dropped the ball on prosecuting Mark Meadows and Dan Scavino because, again, he was too afraid of the optics.

And now he allowed a Republican prosecutor to investigate the Democratic president. And lo and behold, that guy used his role to launch a political hit job on him during an election year. It is weakness personified. And Democrats need to learn that you get no points for these useless gestures of goodwill that, A, don't get reciprocated. B, don't get you any points, and C, backfire on you over and over again. The Democrats and Republicans are playing two different games.

Democrats treat Republicans like equal partners in democracy, while Republicans deny the rights of Democrats to exist. But we refuse to see it even when they are banging us over the head with it. For example, just recently how Republicans demanded a conservative border bill because they said that's the only way they would pass foreign aid. And then the moment that Democrats played ball, the Republicans balked because they didn't want to lose a potent issue ahead of November. Do you not see the inequity?

Democrats want to govern and Republicans want to seize power, which is not to say that Democrats shouldn't govern. It's just to say that we also have to recognize that they're not operating in good faith and to treat them like they're not operating in good faith and to message like they're not operating in good faith because every free pass they get is an invitation for them to do it again and again and again.

The Biden report here is an unforced error by Merrick-Arland, something that we should have expected and a weapon we should never have handed to Republicans. With that said, one final. point on this. And this is a point that I've made before and a point that I'll continue to make as often as I need to. If you are wondering whether Joe Biden's memory would stop him from being an effective president, all you have to do is look at the job that he is literally already doing as president. The guys presided over the addition of almost 15 million jobs and 800,000

manufacturing jobs, 23 straight months of sub 4% unemployment, surging consumer sentiment, wages outpacing inflation, the American Rescue Plan, the Inflation Reduction Act, the Chips Act, the Pact the infrastructure law, the gun safety law, the Violence Against Women Act, codified marriage equality, lower health care costs. He canceled $136 billion in student loan debt for three and a half million borrowers. He bolstered NATO and he's presided over electoral wins in 2020, 2020, and 2023. It is hard to claim that Joe Biden might not be up for a job that he is currently excelling at. And it's probably worth noting that notwithstanding Biden's stellar performance,

his likely opponent, Donald Trump, just blamed Nikki Haley for January 6th, and claim that World War II hasn't happened yet and just learned that the U.S. for United States also spells the word us. Like, I'm no expert on senility, but I think the story here is pretty clear. Next up are my interviews with Chris Murphy and Josh Shapiro. Now I've got the U.S. Senator from Connecticut,

Chris Murphy, thanks so much for coming back on. Yeah, awesome. Thanks for having me. So you were the lead negotiator for the border bill for the Democrats working with Senators Lankford and cinema. So first things first here, is this bill dead or what can we expect from here? I think this bill is dead. We worked for four months on a fixed to the broken immigration system and the border, which on many days is just not manageable by this president. It was a true compromise, right? It had some very tough conservative measures to try to get the border under

control, including allowing the president to temporarily suspend taking asylum applications on days where too many people are crossing, but also had some good things for, you know, progressives and immigrants, including earlier work permits when you cross and more visas to allow people into the country faster. But Republicans ran for the hills. Ultimately, within hours of the bill's introduction, the 20 to 25 Republicans that we thought would vote for it all declared that they hated the bill. And for one reason only, Donald Trump told them they hate the bill because the party wants to maintain chaos at the border. They don't want to fix the problem.

They just want to use immigration and the border as a political wedge issue in the next election. And I wish that weren't the reality. I wish they wanted to fix the problem, but they don't. Well, to that exact point, Republicans have now rejected bipartisan border bills in 2006, 2014, 2018, and now in 2024. Is this just going to continue to persist? Are they going to continue to do everything they can to just preserve this as an issue? even if it's nakedly apparent to the, to the whole world?

Well, that's the wild thing is that everybody sees what happened here, right? This was a bipartisan bill that Republicans demanded. Last fall, Republicans said, we will not vote for Ukraine, aid, unless you come up with a bipartisan border bill. And we're going to tell you who to negotiate the bill with James Lankford, very conservative Republican from Oklahoma. He's going to drive a hard bargain. He did drive a hard bargain.

Mitch McConnell came to the room. He was part of the negotiation. So we announced last weekend a bipartisan border bill that was negotiated by James Langford, hardline conservative Republican, and Mitch McConnell, and no Republican would support it. Everybody knows what's happening here. Donald Trump came out against the bill. Donald Trump said, I can't imagine winning this election if the border isn't a mess. And so keep the border a mess because it helps me.

I actually think this flips the politics of the border. I think this probably was going to be a tough issue for Democrats. I think it's a much less tough issue now because we have a bipartisan bill that would have controlled the border. Republicans are against it only because they actually don't want to fix the problem and they kind of admitted it in front of everybody. Does it kind of hurt them doubly in the sense that because these are the same people who have said that this issue is so urgent, the border.

is so dangerous. There's drugs and rapists and fentanyl and everything coming across. And so this is the number one issue we should focus on the fact that they're now preserving the status quo. I mean, to your exact point, is that what you and Democrats intend to harp on moving toward November? Yeah. All of a sudden, Democrats are the party that are serious about fixing the border, right? We came up with a bill to give the president tough new authority to be able to temporarily slow down the number of people who cross. We came up, with a bill to shorten the asylum approval process from 10 years, which is way too long

to get an asylum claim processed and allows a lot of people to game the system down to six months. Democrats are the party that want to fix the border. Republicans of the party that reject those ideas and are very happy with the border staying open. So I'm counseling my Democratic colleagues, those that are on the ballot, including the president,

to go on offense on the issue, of the border and immigration. Of course, we're a pro-immigration party. We still believe that you need to keep legal pathways open to come to this country. But we also believe that there should be law and order on the border. We're the only party that seems to be willing

to vote for a bill that does that. You know, Tim Scott came forward and scoffed the very notion that we would ever link foreign aid and a border bill. And the irony of that is that it was Republicans' idea to do exactly that in the beginning. That's why you spent the last four months,

working on this bill in the first place. But now the Senate has already advanced just recently a foreign aid only bill, and they opened that up for debate. So what's happening here? Are we ending up at the same exact bill that was initially a non-starter for Republicans and now going back to the initial Democratic priority of a foreign aid only bill? So I used to defend Senate Republicans back in my state in Connecticut. I'd say, listen, the House Republicans are just a dumpster fire. They're a disaster under the thumb of Trump. Senate Republicans, I disagree with them on a lot of things, but, you know, they're a little bit more normal, a little bit more regular, more functional. Not true anymore. Not true anymore. The

Senate Republicans are just as big a disaster as the House Republicans, and this whole episode is evidence of that. So yes, this played out exactly as you just said. In the fall, we wanted to pass aid for Ukraine. We want to make sure that Vladimir Putin doesn't win this war. Republicans said, well, we support that, but we're not going to vote for what we support unless you come up with a bipartisan border bill and put the two together. And we're going to tell you who to negotiate with. We did that. We negotiated the bill. We released the text. And literally within the day of releasing the text, they were like, it's a terrible idea to tie border security and Ukraine together. We want to straight vote on Ukraine, which we just gave them. It just passed with 14 Republican votes. We're

moving towards final passage. And it looks like we are going to approve through the Senate, a clean bill providing aid to Ukraine, something we could have done back in the fall if they hadn't made us go through this exercise. And Brian, this is the last thing I'll say about this. It's such a weird political decision for them because the outcome is the same that we would have gotten last fall. We are going to approve in the Senate money for Ukraine. But now the whole country knows that they are frauds on the issue of immigration. And so they have just law. the issue of immigration as as pungent political issues they thought it was going to be in the November elections. Right. I mean, all they did was delink the border, which is the issue that,

again, to my earlier point, was apparently so important that nothing could move forward without so important that HR2, their top priority in the House was getting some legislation for the border. And now everything is going to move forward except the one thing that they claims was that urgent. Yeah. And again, it's just, it's evidence that it's actually not that urgent for them that for the Republican Party, they can't live in a world in which the border or the immigration system is better. I mean, they just, like, what would they do on the weekend, right? If they couldn't run down to the border with reporters and put on pretend camouflage and act like their border patrol agents. Like, that's like what they do with their free time. If the border wasn't a mess, they, you know,

literally would you know sit in the couch all day right well i think i think the issue of abortion are also kind of uh didn't redown to their benefits to the extent that now they're seeing what happens when the dog catches the car and so you know they loved to have the issue of abortion to fearmonger and and and rile up their base to get them to go vote abortion was overturned it all of a sudden turned out not to be such a great issue for uh for the republicans at the ballot box and they're like you know what we have to preserve this issue because when when we actually get what we want, it doesn't really end up working out too well for us. Yeah. And it was, it's always amazing to me how many issues Republicans are on the deeply

unpopular side, whether it be abortion or guns or taxes, Republicans occupy the position that has the support of the minority of Americans. Arguably on the border, they held a position get tough that was more popular than Democrats' position, which was, which for Democrats, was often to defend probably too reflexively the current situation of the border. They've lost that advantage because now after this bill that was supported by 90% of Democrats were the party that is saying, hey, listen, time to get tough on the border, time to clean this mess up. And Republicans are the ones that are saying, man, it's not that important. We'd rather just keep it the way it is. So even on this one issue where they might have been

And on the sort of the right side of public opinion, they've lost that advantage. Right. You know, going back to Ukraine aid, I think it's framed very frequently as a Democratic priority, but it's actually a small D Democratic priority because, I mean, think about what would happen if down the line, if Russia were to beat Ukraine and then attack a NATO country and then drag the U.S. into war. I mean, this is kind of protecting us for what could happen in the future. So now that debate has begun on the issue of a foreign aid only bill, do you think that

there's a realistic possibility that this could actually pass the Senate? I think it's going to pass the Senate this weekend. We've begun debate. We got 14 Republicans, which are enough to break a filibuster to begin debate. I expect that enough of those Republicans will join us when it's time to end debate. I agree with you that we've got to do a better job of explaining to people. what the consequences are of Russia winning the war in Ukraine. We've kind of gotten used to this post-World War II world

in which big countries don't expand their boundaries by invading smaller countries, but anybody who remembers their high school history knows that this is how the world worked all the time. And the United States got dragged into two world wars in order to defend our friends from foreign invasions. That will start again. will recommence because it's not just Russia that wants to keep moving, China wants to expand

their boundaries as well. So if you don't stand up for a little country like Ukraine, or I guess it's not that little, but for a friend like Ukraine right now, you will be sooner than later at war with another big power, and it will be thousands of American young men and women who are dying. This is just a smart, relatively small investment in global security and ultimately in American security. And by the way, even if the moral incentive isn't strong enough here, there's also a really strong economic incentive because people may think it's expensive to help Ukraine now,

but imagine how expensive it would be if the world is engrossed in another war, not just in terms of how much we would have to spend just on the war effort, but just what would happen to the global economy if another war broke out? Well, and already, you know, you've seen the impact of this war,

part of the story of inflation is the story of, you know, a big part of the world's food supply chain being interrupted in Ukraine and in Russia. So listen, I'm not saying it's certain that if Putin wins the war in Ukraine, that he will move on to a NATO country. But I think it is certainly inside the Overton window. It is possible. And, man, we do not want to be in our lifetime's first ever direct confrontation between two nuclear powers. Now, going back to just the way the Senate is working right now, honestly, what is the incentive to try and pass legislation in the Senate? Because Langford was condemned by his own state party. He was vilified on right-wing media.

Like, how does another senator see that and voluntarily be the next guy to want to stick their neck out only to get beat up over it? Listen, I mean, Langford, you know, was heroic right into the end. I mean, he and I disagree on a lot of big issues, but, you know, he only had four Republicans voting for the compromise that they asked him to write. And he's still up into the end, defended the thing, voted for it. No, I think between now and the election, it is going to be very hard to get Republicans to agree to any compromise because they are, they're, they've been folded into the Trump political operation at this point. And so I think we have to accept that, you know, with very, very limited exceptions, it's going to be hard to get Republicans to break away from Trump from here to the election, which sucks.

I mean, I hate that the election lasts this long. I hate that Trump has so much influence over the party, but it is the reality. And so at this point, I mean, we've already seen historically unproductive Congress. Is it just going to pretty much be the status quo from here knowing that any effort to move toward compromise on anything at this point is basically viewed as a capitulation to Democrats or a win for Joe Biden as far as the Republicans are concerned. Well, and even if we had remained functional in the Senate, the House is obviously non-functional. At the same day that we were losing Republican support for the bipartisan border bill,

the House was failing in its efforts to impeach Mayorkas. It couldn't get votes for, Speaker Johnson's priority bill to fund Israel. So it almost doesn't matter what happens here in the Senate because the place where everything, every policy issue is going to go die is the House of Representatives. And like we've kind of become a little normalized to the House being this out of control. Like never before an American history, with a possible exception of the lead up to the civil war,

has the House been this out of control? And I hope that that is part of the calculation that voters are going to make. Like, this is an embarrassment, regardless of whether you're a Republican or Democrat, the way the House is operating today is just a particular embarrassment to the whole country. Well, let's finish off with this, and this is to that exact point, do you believe that at least this foreign aid package that's making its way through the Senate right now that you just said that you believe is going to pass the Senate? Do you have any idea of how its prospects would fare in the House?

I mean, it's possible that it could pass the House. There's this tool that you have in the house called the discharge petition. You can take a bill that the speaker doesn't want to call it for a vote, and you can force a vote on it if you get the majority of members signing a petition. Now, Republicans have not used that tactic before, but there is a small rump group of pro-Ukraine anti-Russia Republicans. There's a handful of them left, and it's possible that they could take our bill, if it passes with a big bipartisan vote in the Senate and use that discharge position to force a vote

in the House. There's just no question that the votes would exist in the House to pass this. I mean, if Speaker Johnson took our bill, if it passes the Senate, I think it will. Put it on the floor of the Senate for a vote, floor of the House for a vote. It would pass. If he doesn't, that discharge petition might force his hand. Well, we'll leave it there. I think I speak for everybody in saying that even though it was a futile exercise, We appreciate the work that you've done for these last few months. If for nothing else, then to just expose the Republicans' hypocrisy on this issue. So with that said, Senator, thanks so much for taking the time.

Thanks, man. Now we've got the governor of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro. Thanks so much for coming back on. Great to be with you. Thanks for having me. Of course. Now, you've just delivered a major budget address outlining the top priorities for the state of Pennsylvania. But at the top, I want to get your thoughts on one national story here.

So we've watched for basically my entire adult life as Republicans have fear mongered about the border demanding legislation. Then the Democrats agreed and negotiated what is the most conservative border deal that they could have negotiated. And then the Republicans, having seen that, opted to balk. So can you speak on the idea of the Republicans preserving issues because they would rather run on them ahead of the election than actually solving them? Yeah, it's absolutely shameful. I think if you ask anybody, Democrat and Republican alike, we need comprehensive. We need a pathway to citizenship. We need to make sure our dreamers are protected. And we need a secure border. And we have to do all of this in a thoughtful, humane way. Now, I'm not familiar with

all the ins and outs of the bill, but what seemed obvious to me was that it had some kind of bipartisan support in Congress until Donald Trump decided to do what he always does, which is put himself first instead of the country and create more chaos for us. I mean, this really is indicative of how he goes about his daily grind, which is, let me figure out what's best for Donald Trump and screw everybody else in the process. And what is really scary, what should scare that hell out of most people, is that he's not got this legion of followers who are quite willing to vote against their own interest in support of him and creating more chaos in our country. And to take a serious issue, like immigration reform, which we need, which let's be real. Democrats and Republicans alike

have failed to get done over a lot of years. And the fact that we were at the one yard line. And then they wouldn't run the ball in because Donald Trump said no, tells you all you need to know about the modern day national Republican Party. It is scary. What we don't need is more chaos in our country. And that's exactly what Donald Trump is bringing. And this is a pattern, by the way. I mean, just a few days earlier than that, he also came out and said that he hopes the economy crashes before he takes office. So he constantly wants to see all of the priorities, the profess priorities of his own party, fail

because he thinks it would redound to his benefit, electorally speaking. Yeah, and let me give you a concrete example from Pennsylvania. He claims to be this great voice of the middle class. You know, I think his words, not mine, that he's their champion. One of the first things he says he wants to do, and look, for all of his BS, what we've learned is he got to take him in his word because he actually does try to do the things that he says, he's going to do. The first thing he wants to do is get rid of Obamacare. That would mean that

1.2 million Pennsylvanians, primarily middle class Pennsylvanians, would be thrown off health care coverage. Think about the chaos that would bring to their families. But you see, he wants the political issue for himself. He wants to inject more chaos into the conversation. And so screw all the people that get in his way. That is what he does every single day. It's incredibly dangerous. Yeah. Well, in fairness, though, he did promise a great health health care plan. I think it was two weeks. I think we'll get it in about two weeks from now. Let's move over to Pennsylvania here. There were two major progressive priorities outlined in your budget address. You've called for raising the minimum wage and also legalizing marijuana,

among other priorities that you outlined. What's the likelihood, given the legislature's make up that they would be receptive? Well, let me talk about each. I think on minimum wage, you have to understand. We're still at 7.25 an hour. 30 states have changed their minimum wage or up their minimum wage while we have stayed static. Every single state around us in Pennsylvania has raised their minimum wage. We have people leaving Pennsylvania to go work in Maryland or New York, just to name two examples, because they can make a higher wage, making our workforce challenges even greater. The bottom line is this is the time for us to be competitive, to do the right thing, and to raise

the minimum wage in the Commonwealth. I think the prospects are much better today than they were a couple years ago. The House of Representatives passed a bill to raise them in wage to $15 an hour, which is what I support. And the Senate, which is controlled by Republicans, have given some signals that they're open to a change here. This is one of the areas where I'm going to try and find bipartisan consensus. I think you know this.

I'm the only governor in the entire nation with a divided legislature. I've got one chamber led by Democrats, one led by Republicans. So we've constantly got to find areas of compromise, and that's exactly what we're going to do here. On marijuana, I'll let you know, this is something I've had to really evolve on. I've grown on this issue. Years ago, I was against legalization. And I sort of viewed it through dual prisms. One, as a dad, I'm the father of four children.

And two, as the former chief law enforcement officer of the Commonwealth, I was the Attorney General. And I worried about it from both perspectives. But as I studied the issue, as I learned more, as I tried to stop listening to the noise and look at the actual data, what became very clear to me is that we need to use law enforcement resources for the things that actually matter that are going to keep people safe. We've got a history here where the criminalization of marijuana has negatively impacted certain communities, particularly communities of color, and we needed to write that wrong. And in states that have legalized, if you regulate it effectively, you can keep it out of the hand. of kids and others who shouldn't have it and then do away with the black market, which is

far more difficult to sort of monitor when it comes to keeping it away from kids. And if we tax it responsibly, and we can be more competitive, this is another area where our neighbors across around Pennsylvania, Ohio being the most recent, have legalized. I think we should be next. And that's why I pushed forward in my budget. I just wanted to share with you and your viewers and listeners. This wasn't something that, you know, I've sort of always been there on. I want to be very honest. This is something I've evolved on.

I've changed on, and I'm glad I did because I think we're in the right place. Yeah, I agree. And I think it's worth noting, too, that I don't know that the left necessarily has a monopoly on marijuana legalization. To your point, recreational marijuana use was approved in states like Ohio and also Missouri and Montana. So these aren't exactly liberal bastions here. No, it's not a partisan issue.

I mean, Ohio, again, I'm focusing kind of on our neighbors, right? So I've got Maryland, New York, New Jersey, legalized. Ohio went a different path. They actually had a referendum. And 57% of their voting public voted to legalize. And so that tells you not just where the politicians are, but that tells you where the public is there. Now, while Republican states are passing laws to strip women of reproductive health care, you've called for Pennsylvania to actually invest in it, can you go over some of the changes

that you would like to see on that front? Look, let me just say for a long time, about 30 years, here in Pennsylvania, we funded something called Crisis Pregnancy Centers, or these, it was called Real Alternatives. This is one of those places that tried to trick women into not understanding their full range of reproductive rights. This is something I feel very, very strongly about, that women deserve the right to make decisions over their own bodies. They deserve a full range of reproductive health care.

as governor, in my first year, after three decades of this, I ended funding for crisis pregnancy centers. And now we're making sure that a full range of reproductive health care options are available to women across Pennsylvania. I'm always going to trust women to make decisions over their own bodies. We're now trying to go steps further to deal with women's health in general and the health of girls. You know, my wife, Lori, our first lady, has spent a lot of time talking to young girls and women across her. girls and young women across Pennsylvania, one of the things they talked to her about was the lack of period products in their schools or in their rec centers or other areas where they go, you know, girls and young women explaining to her that they might have to miss

a day of school or leave early because they got their period and there was nothing available for them. And so I called for $3 million in funding for feminine hygiene products to be directly distributed in our schools. It's something I think is critically important to protect the interests of young women and girls. And I couldn't be more proud of Lori, my wife, our first lady, for taking such a leadership role here. You know, as we head toward this November, do you still believe that reproductive rights and abortion are as potent an issue in Pennsylvania as that issue has been since Stops was handed down? I think freedom's always an important issue. And I think reproductive freedom is chief among them, along with being able to marry the person that you

love, have your kids read the books that you want, not that some politician decided for them. And then, of course, have your vote be counted for the person that you cast your ballot for. All of our freedoms are at risk if Donald Trump is returned to the White House. And these are going to be central issues I know on voters' minds, including reproductive freedom. Well, now, there is also a mental health crisis happening among young Americans. You've called for that issue to be confronted as well. Can you speak on that? I think it is critically important that we recognize what goes on between your ears is just as important as what goes on throughout your whole body.

And we're trying to eliminate the stigma here in Pennsylvania by speaking openly about mental health issues and then actually funding tangible things that help folks from our 988 crisis hotline and more funding for adult mental health. But the thing that I have focused so much attention on is getting mental health counselors and resources and online services available to, students in their schools so that they can have this help that they need. In my first budget that I passed with bipartisan support, we created the first ever $100 million line item in our schools for mental health. I'm trying to double down on that now in my next budget and hopefully we'll again be able to get bipartisan support in that area. And this would be a good opportunity too for all those Republicans who do gun apologia by blaming mental health for everything, you know, to give them the opportunity to actually walk the walk and allocate funding to mental health.

Yeah, look, I mean, there is no question we need to do more on mental health. We need to both eliminate the stigma and fund real resources. I'm obviously, I've been focused my comments to you today on children, but there's a lot of work that needs to be done for adults as well. And this is a wise investment here in Pennsylvania. We're making it. We're going to continue to. I also saw that Pennsylvania is making up to the median income will pay no more than $1,000

in tuition and fees per semester for college, which would have been wonderful when I went to Lehigh because tuition was not $1,000 at Lehigh. It was not. But look, I really believe that we got to create the opportunity economy here in Pennsylvania, which means starting off with a great K-12 education, and then being in a position where you can choose your path to success and opportunity. You want to go in the workforce, then we're going to fund more apprentices and get you out into union halls and get you out into the workforce there.

There's real value and respect in that work. You want to be a welder? Great. We want to help you be a welder. If you want to choose the path of going to college, we need to make that more affordable. We are 49th in the nation in higher education investment here in Pennsylvania. And it's holding us back.

And so one of the things we need to do is both reform our higher ed system and invest in it. And by investing in it, that's going to allow tuition to be held down. And so I made a commitment that if you pass my budget, we will be able to say to every family median income or below, you will, or student median income or below, you will not have to pay more than $1,000 a semester in order to attend a state college university. This is an important time to invest in higher ed and all kinds of pathways to success and opportunity. That's what I'm trying to do here is governor of Pennsylvania. Now, either among the stuff we just spoke about or something that we didn't cover, was there any one priority that's a. especially important for you to see pass? Look, I just think creating a sense of hope and opportunity here in Pennsylvania. For too long, Republicans who dominated this building have held us back by

failing to make the kind of commitments we need on education, on workforce development, on public safety, on health care options, and now we're in a position where we can make those investments. We've got a $14 billion surplus. I want to invest some of the money. that still maintain a surplus but invest some of that the good people of pennsylvania create an opportunity economy lift up communities that have historically been shut out and left behind i believe we can do that together here i got my work cut out for me of course because i'm the only governor in the nation with the divided legislature but we're going to be able to work together to get it done i'm confident of that and finally let's finish off with this i mean just going by the priorities

that you laid out and that your party is advocating for can you kind of talk about the difference both at PA, you know, at the PA level and also the national level in terms of what Democrats are advocating for when they're in power versus what Republicans are pushing for evidenced by even what they're doing from the minority and the national level. Well, maybe I can answer that question by going back to your first question. I believe Democrats of the party of getting shit done, which is my motto here is governor of Pennsylvania. We live by three letters, GSD. We try and put points on the board every day, whether it's on infrastructure, education, economic opportunity. I think the other side led by Donald Trump is the party of chaos that doesn't want to get anything

done. Back to your first question, when we were on the one yard line and had the opportunity to do something meaningful in immigration reform, again, I don't, not familiar with all the details here or there, but it was clear that there was bipartisan support to get that done. One yard line to get that done after more than a decade of trying, they said no, because they're the party of not getting stuff done. The reality is what people want, more than they want, you know, to agree with you on 100% of the issues, they just want to know your work and your butt off for them. That's what I'm trying to do in Pennsylvania.

Clear contrast with what Donald Trump is trying to do across this country. We'll leave it there perfectly put. Governor Shapiro, thanks for taking the time. Thanks. Thanks again to the senator and the governor. That's over this episode. Talk to you next week. 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 Brian Tyler Cohen.com for links to all of my other channels.