No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen - Trump gets buried in legal trouble in the courts

Episode Date: February 20, 2022

Donald Trump gets gut punched by three separate legal decisions and announcements in a week full of bad news. Brian interviews the governor of New York, Kathy Hochul, about the huge role that New York played in redistricting, some significant moves on mask mandates, and what’s being done to make sure that the environment that Andrew Cuomo created doesn’t return. And the hosts of The Climate Pod, Brock and Ty Benefiel, join to discuss whether Biden is doing enough for climate, where Joe Manchin and the Build Back Better Act stand right now, and how all of this is factoring into the upcoming midterm elections.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 a week's worth of bad news for Donald Trump, where he got gut-punched by three separate legal decisions and announcements. I interview the governor of New York, Kathy Hochel, about the huge role that New York played in redistricting, some major moves on mask mandates, and what's being done to make sure that the environment that Andrew Cuomo created doesn't return. And I'm joined by hosts of the climate pod, Brock and Ty Benefiel, to discuss whether Biden's doing enough for climate, where Joe Manchin and the Billback Better Act stand right now, and how all of this is factoring into the upcoming midterm elections.

I'm Brian Tyler Cohen, and you're listening to No Lie. So not often we focus on Trump, and that's very much on purpose, but I think enough has happened this week on the Donald Trump front that it warrants some attention. And I'm not coming out and saying that Trump is done for, that the walls are finally closing in. You've got some Robert Mueller flashbacks there, but I will say that he has had a really bad week, and it doesn't exactly pretend anything positive.

for him. First, a judge ruled that Trump, Ivanka, and Don Jr. would have to sit for questioning under oath as part of the New York Attorney General's investigation into the Trump org's business practices, specifically that he had used bogus financial statements to inflate the value of his assets, and that was to secure better loans. Now, the Trump team had tried to claim that the Attorney General Latisha James was too politically biased against him to allow the interview to go forward, which the judge basically laughed out of the courtroom. He said that, James had uncovered, quote, copious evidence of possible financial fraud. And granted, that's not to say that Trump and his kids can't just show up and plead the fifth.

They can and they likely will. But, uh, well, here's a clip that I'll play for no reason at all. Here's people take in the Fifth Amendment. Four people plus the guy who illegally did the server. You know, he put it in the illegal server. So there are five people taking the Fifth Amendment, like you see on the mob, right? You see, the mob takes a fifth. If you're innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?

Yeah, I have a feeling that clip is going to pop up again. And by the way, just remember what Jamie Raskin said a few weeks ago during an interview on this very podcast exactly on the issue of Trump testifying. He will either get up there and tell the truth and completely convict himself of being at the center of this attack on American democracy, this attempt to overthrow the 2020 election, and coerce Mike Pence into unilaterally rejecting electoral college votes or he'll lie, he'll commit perjury.

So if you're looking for a reason why Trump will likely plead the fifth, it's probably because, on one hand, if he talks, he'll be incapable of not lying, and if by some miracle he doesn't lie, well, the truth isn't exactly going to help him either. Like, turns out there's not a ton of great options when your only move is to commit crimes.

Next, a federal judge in Wisconsin ruled that three civil suits against Trump regarding January 6 could move forward. The lawsuits were brought forward by members of Congress and Capitol police officers who'd served on January 6th, and those suits focused on the role that Trump played in instigating the insurrection. Now, Trump's lawyers had been arguing that he couldn't be sued because he was acting in his official capacity as president when he addressed the crowd before the insurrection

took place, which the judge rightly shot down because, you know, turns out that inciting a mob to storm the capital doesn't actually fall into the umbrella of a president's official responsibilities. And of course, if Trump's ultimately found liable in any of these cases, he could be on the hook to pay financial damages. And finally, the kicker here, the National Archives confirmed that Trump took classified documents with him to Mar-a-Lago. That's right, Donald Trump, who couched his entire campaign on how much of a crook Hillary Clinton was because of how her mishandling of classified information put all of our lives at risk, that guy boxed up a bunch of classified national security information and took it with him to his golf course and

Florida. Like, like, the RNC issued a resolution condemning Hillary Clinton for violating regulations on protecting sensitive material and encourage the DOJ and the State Department to investigate her. And, and not just the RNC, I mean, seriously, if I were to list out all of the officials on the right who castigated Hillary Clinton for doing the thing that Trump just got caught doing, I'd just name every Republican. This would be the longest episode I ever recorded. So, you know, I'll spare you the laundry list. But I will say, that if they thought mishandling classified information was bad enough that they should open a criminal investigation

into Hillary Clinton, then surely, surely they abide by the same precedent now. Surely they wouldn't want us thinking that the attacks on Hillary weren't actually because of her actions, but rather just because she was a potent target for them, surely. And look, clearly the right is radio silence on this because it was never really about the crime, it was always just about attacking Hillary.

Trump could literally have run a child, sex trafficking ring in the basement of a pizza place, and still the Republican Party wouldn't utter a word about it. But the point is that they did make a big stink about it with Hillary, and she did get investigated. And so, look, that is exactly what the DOJ should do here. You don't get to just get away with crimes because you do a lot of them, or you do them in broad daylight. So open investigation, because it is bad enough that Republicans and conservative media

somehow convinced the entire country that Hillary using a private email server was the greatest national security scandal in the history of this country, but even worse than that would be not investigating an actual crime that Republicans have already set the precedent for investigating. That would be ridiculous. If there is one thing that Republicans have shoved down our throats as being prosecutable, it is this. So, okay, prosecute it then. The simple fact is that if the government wants to restore any semblance of trust in our institutions, then they have to show that those institutions aren't incapable of actually delivering some modicum of accountability. They can't only work against the powerless.

In fact, there's no better way to undermine trust in our institutions than having a system that does bring the hammer down on regular people while letting the rich and powerful, the people like Donald Trump, skate by. Like, we love to call ourselves a nation of laws. Okay, well, it's now or never to show whether those laws actually apply to everyone. Next step is my interview with Governor Hockel. Today we have the governor of the state of New York. Kathy Hokel, thanks so much for coming on.

Thanks for having. We're looking forward to a conversation about the Democratic Party in our future. So speaking of, the New York Democratic Convention just took place in your state. You're the first female governor in New York State's history to be nominated. What does that mean for you, for New York, for the Democratic Party? You know, it was a significant milestone. It's a lot of energy. And I really pushed all the delegates and people in the convention and all the labor unions.

and so that people all walks on to really take one message to heart, that the greatest fear that Republicans have is the United Democratic Party. So we have to go forth and get to our primaries. We have a few of those to deal with. But when we are done, we have to be united, joined at the hip, or else the Republicans really will think they have an advantage. It's a mid-year election. There's some waves and tides and everything else they're going to talk about.

But I don't subscribe to that fear at all. So I was very proud to be historic, but I'm not about making history, about making a difference. And what this did and being introduced by Hillary Clinton, another grass, glass ceiling shatterer, was just extorty or a lot of energy in the room. Both of us talked about the need to propel Democrats forward because we are the ones who actually care. We have heart. We want to lift people up from their circumstances. And so I felt really fired up leaving that convention and being historic is great, but it also, all I wanted to make sure that the doors that were shut for so long in our state

are wide open to all young women throughout New York. And so it was a great day. Now, I want to move over to a topic that I focus on, especially on my show, on my videos in this podcast, and that is redistricting. Now, New York's played a huge part in redistricting, especially in a cycle where Republicans have been shameless and aggressive in trying to ensure. their own power. And so now the people who gerrymandered redmaps to within an inch of their lives have turned around and criticized New York for how it's handled its own redistricting among other states.

What's your response to that? Well, that's very disingenuous, but I expect no less. And what we did here in the state of New York was look at the population trends, which you do every decade. I know quite a bit about this. I was a member of Congress 10 years ago. And redistricting made my most Republican district and state, even more Republican. They've had no trouble with the lines in their states and Florida and Texas and elsewhere. But here in New York, we're playing by the rules, we're looking at our population chips, and yes, we have far more Democrats and Republicans, and our congressional seats simply reflect that. So, you know, we believe that we're going to get through this without any problem

and we'll deal with any challenges. But at the end of day, you know, what it really calls for is a federal solution to this, instead of being it up to individual states and just having the same playbook, the same map that we all follow in terms of just the guidelines we're looking for. And also make sure that we're allowing communities of color to have access and representation. It's not just access to the ballot box, which I believe in. We have to do so much more the Voting Rights Act, but how about more access to empowerment because you have a district that reflects the community that it serves? And so I believe in this. We're going to keep fighting for this in the state of New York.

And those are just shared democratic values. And I think it's especially ironic that the same people complaining about redistricting in blue states are the same people who turned around and blocked federal laws that would actually ban partisan gerrymandering across the country. You know, I think what Republicans would like to see is unilateral disarmament by the Democrats. That's not happening. We know how to fight. We fight fair, but we will fight to the bitter end.

So don't expect any you later disarm. We don't go into these situations without being willing to take it to the math because this is what it's so important. I want to make sure that our communities of color here in the state of New York have the representation they deserve. The lines are drawn within the guidelines of law using all the resources we have to get it right. We've done that successfully in New York. And if that means a few more democratic seats, well, that's how it plays out. We have more Democrats in our state, but we're doing it the right way. And I'm proud of what we did here in New York State, and I'm sure they'll be held in court.

New York was one of a number of states that's recently lifted mask band-aids that happened in this past week. What's the rationale for doing so? Why is this time different that we can go ahead and take these steps? We have seen tremendous progress in our state and bailing this pandemic. First of all, because New Yorkers took this seriously. This was ground zero two years ago of the pandemic. eyes were on New York City. We saw how hard hit our communities were disproportionately impacting communities of color, high infection rates, high death rates. Everyone knows the images that are

seared in our minds of how our hospitals were overflowing with people. So New Yorkers, when the opportunity came to have a vaccine, we have 95% of New Yorkers had at least one dose and even higher, as well as getting our young people vaccine. So they took this seriously. They wore masks when we talked about having mask warning schools since the beginning of the school year because as I thought it would not be controversial, but clearly it was, protecting our kids in schools was a way to get them back in schools because remote learning was such a colossal failure. It was the best we could do. Our teachers put their heart and soul in it.

The parents struggled. But at the end of the day, the kids were not learning properly. So I wanted them back in school. We have a mask mandate in place for kids. But what I saw for the rest of the economy, and I said this was number one, number one job I had just since taking office six months ago. Protect the health of New Yorkers, but also protect the healthy economy. Our small businesses could not take another shutdown. We have Broadway and tourists and attractions in New York City that people are not coming to.

We could not see those collapse because that is part of our identity. So the masks allowed us to get through Delta, get through Omicrod, driving our numbers down. And as a result, we now have in New York City a 1.5% infection rate, 2.5% for the rest of the state. So that is what we looked at, as well as hospitalizations. My main concern was always when we ever see a repeat of those scenes from two years ago when we did not have enough hospital space. So we really worked hard to manage this. Once I knew, we had enough hospital capacity and our numbers were going down.

It was the right time. We'll keep them on in school a little longer. watch the numbers, but all based on science and data, vaccinations, smart masking policies, and that's how you get out of a pandemic. Now, if the trends continue as they are right now, when do you expect the school mask mandates to be lifted? Well, what I've said is that right now we're looking at a winter break for children. They'll be back to school after a break on February 28th throughout most of the state. And I'll look at the numbers. What we're doing is really smart. We're sending home test kits with every single child in their backpack before that break,

as we did before the winter break in December, have parents test the children that Monday morning, March 4th, three days later, test them again. If they're negative and I keep an eye on the numbers by that Friday, we should have a good idea on how they look. And then we'll look at hospitalization still down. That's good. Vectual rates still down. No spike yet to the case.

I'll tell you one more thing I'm looking at. I'm looking at global trends because back in November, early November, we were starting to say, well, Delta started to move B. We're doing better. You know, we would make some changes. And then November 26, Omocrine hit was first identified, first case in New York, December 2nd. And by two weeks later, we had to have mass mandates in place because it was just spiraling out of control. Like, wow. So I'm going to also not be ignorant to what could be happening. in some other part of the world.

I don't expect that, but I want everybody know how thoughtful we are, our Department of Health and my team, we're not doing this randomly. So we anticipate that there'll be time in a very short order that children won't need masks either. Now, we've watched as the Supreme Court has cleared the way for states like Texas

to strip women of their reproductive rights and they're using a bounty law system. We've heard from Governor Newsom out here in California, where I am, that if Republicans want to outsource to some vigilante style system, that basically two can play at that game, right? So does New York intend on doing anything to counteract these bounty laws

to show Republicans the danger of these vigilante-style systems of justice? Well, independent of what's happening there, we have already said that we want people to feel welcome to come to our state to let them know that this is where you can receive all the health care you need. We'll protect you, will protect your rights,

and to make sure that we have a system that is well known across the state, across the nation is the place where we protect women's rights. So we'll talk about those other options, but everyone here in the state of New York knows that I will defend those rights to the bitter end. And no matter what the Supreme Court does, no matter what anybody else does, those rights are enshrine in our state. So speaking of Texas, we just recently watched as another cold front swept through that state, and that left 70,000 Texans without power. And this was after last year's Cold Front where five million Texans were left without power and 700 people were left dead. And yet in the special sessions that the Texas governor called, it wasn't to pass any meaningful power grid reforms. Their reforms included some loophole where the natural gas companies could just opt out.

His priority was voter suppression bills. So what is your message to these other Republican governors like Greg Abbott who are using these legislative sessions and these bills to entrench their own power while the citizens? of their state are left out literally in the cold? I mean, that's shameful. They have to understand that as governors, we have a responsibility to protect the health and welfare of our residents. We've had ice storms. We've had major storms.

We've had hurricanes. When those hit, I convene our lives together. I talk to them. I get the resources out to the people who need the help the most. And that is our job as governors. And to take advantage of a session that's back because it's just to be dealing with a really a real humanitarian crisis when your people are cold and the left without power and to abuse that for other purposes. It's just simply wrong. Well said. Now, what reforms have

you made since your predecessor, Andrew Cuomo, left to ensure that the environment that he created doesn't come about again in the state of New York? Well, from day one, I said, we are changing the environment. The culture is changing. I'm literally by walking the door, removing people, bringing in a whole new team of individuals who looked at the whole culture and made sure that there was training in place, not just remote training or people kind of clicked through that they've been trained on sexual harassment or all the training that's required, but in-person training to make sure that there's accountability. Also, the way it was set up before, if someone had a complaint by someone, as we call the executive chamber, whether it's a governor or a staffer, they had

to go to that same entity to make the complaint. So we set up an outreach. law firm, the first time ever, an outside law firm, independent of us, is set up to hear any harassing complaints in the workplace. That's a game changer as well. So we have focused very hard on transparency, accountability, because my job, number one, is to restore people's confidence in their government. That's what was so shattered. And the more we can do that as Democrats, whether it's in Washington or at the state level

or the local level, let people know we know who we're fighting for, and we're making sure that all women feel that their workplace, whether it's in government or in the private sector, is a safe place, free from harassment, free from discrimination, free from pay disparities, because as the first governor in the state of New York, this is personal to me. I've been underpaid in my jobs. I know what it's like to struggle and make those decisions about family and career. So I've lived that experience in child care and all the hassles that women have to deal with just to get their families taken care. So that's the advantage I bring to this position. those issues, those young women, they could be me when I was younger, that could be my daughter

today. And that's why I'm going to fight to make sure that they feel that the whole culture and the environment has been transformed. And we've already started accomplishing that. Great. Well, I have one last question here. And I know that you're running short on time, so I'll make it a quick one. And then is that Democrats are facing the obvious headwinds in 2022. Obviously, one major impediment to Democratic victories this year is that we're unable to get a lot done through Congress because of our razor-thin margins and, you know, a Republican caucus that's basically united in their desire to ensure that nothing gets done. That's not the case in New York, thanks to Democratic supermajorities, meaning that New York can be a case study

for what's happening when there isn't Republican obstructionism. So how are you and Democrats delivering for New Yorkers? What do you want your lasting legacy to be? Well, we have a legacy that attacks every major social problem, every environmental problem, and also using the infrastructure dollars that have been freed up. Let me talk a couple things. One is, as a Democratic leader, I truly believe in the concept of shared success. I am making sure that every time I do a press conference and talk about infrastructure dollars to repair potholes or to fix a bridge or to have a new transit system,

a connection between two boroughs that have been isolated for so long, I say, well, we're gathered here today. First of all, we thank President Joe Biden for having the courage. to bring this idea forward that we could have a bipartisan, at least a partisan infrastructure bill that gets over the finish line because of Democrats. And Senator Schumer, our majority leader from the statement, and I mentioned the members of Congress.

And I talked about our state legislators, our selling members, our Senate. I am able to, instead of taking all that credit as governor, as has happened in the past, I make sure that everyone knows that Democrats are responsible for this. So that's one part of what we do. The other part is to be very bold. My first month on the job was Climate Week, the United Nations gathered in New York, and everyone talks about the climate.

We put forth the most ambitious, aggressive climate protection plan that our nation has ever seen. We're proud of that, as well as a $4 billion bond deck. We want to get through with the voters this November to give us the money for clean water initiatives and making sure that we have resiliency for storms. We get better with hurricanes in New York. city now. My first week on the job, we had two hurricanes. So we're ready for that, but also a legacy of a company, not just building infrastructure, not just protecting the environment, but also taking care of people. We saw that this pandemic brought our health care system to its needs. We have health care workers who've been put through some lights. They're underpaid.

We are doing everything we can to bolster that whole ecosystem, $10 billion on the table to address that, as well as making sure we address child care issues and home health care aids and so many other areas where we realized people have been on the margins for so long and no one really looked at their issues and talked about them. So our legacy will be one of great accomplished for individuals, but also to support our business communities, so they get back on their feet, small businesses in particular, as well as supporting great initiatives for job training and our jails to jobs programs. So people who are incarcerated see that they're there's a place that they can go and they return to society so they feel welcome.

They've paid their debt and how do we make sure that they don't end up on that same cycle back in the jails again? So our plan, my first state of the state had 220 plans. We had only been on the job a few months. We got it done. I'm working on a budget right now, a very vicious budget. I feel confident with the Democratic majorities that you referenced will get us through. Now, our own party is different opinions on, you know, different roads to take. but ultimately we get to the same outcome

and then as lifting up people and making their outcomes better in life. And that's the dear to us and Republicans and I'll make sure everybody knows that we're getting to our next couple of elections. So I'm excited. Well said. We'll leave it there. Governor Hockel, thank you so much

for taking the time to talk. I appreciate it. All right. Thank you very much. Bye-bye. Thanks again to Governor Hockel. Now we've got Brock and Ty Benefiel, host of the climate pod. Thank you guys for coming on. Brian, thank you so much for having us, talk about the climate pod.

So can you speak on the Biden administration's climate initiatives, and do you think that they go far enough? Yeah, it's been an interesting first year for the Biden administration. You know, obviously the Biden administration has called this a climate crisis. They've centered this in environmental justice issues, and they've taken this extremely seriously, especially we would go from a president who was a full-blown climate denier to President Biden. it was extremely refreshing. And all day one, the Biden administration got to work, right? We rejoined the Paris Agreement. They immediately started signing executive orders to reverse all those horrible environmental rollbacks by the Trump administration that made our air dirtier, the water

worse, and we're increasing, you know, greenhouse gas emissions. You know, for many activists and I think even members of the Democratic Party, they'd like to see the Biden administration not give out so many new oil and gas leases, as well as cancel more federal pipeline permits. This obviously happened with Keystone XL. I think people would like to see the Biden administration go further. But build back better and the climate initiatives in build back better, that is the ball game. I mean, that is what will make huge dense in greenhouse gas emissions, which is critical to the president's goals. Now, speaking of that exact bill, you know, I know that Joe Manchin took a machete to a lot of the original climate provisions that were included in Build Back Better.

And it was left with a more carrots versus sticks approach. So more tax credits for good environmental behavior, but not too many punishments for bad behavior. Did that castrate the bill, or do you still feel like if it passed, if the iteration, if the version that we were dealing with most recently, if that passed that it would still be a good bill? Look, I mean, losing the clean energy performance plan, which is what you're talking about as far as the sticks, side of the equation, that hurts a lot. That really makes the transition harder, but there are enough carrots still left in this bill to make it possible. I mean, this bill, as passed in the house, still has, what, $550 billion worth of spending for climate. That's $320 billion of tax credits.

So this is going to make it cheaper for people to install solar on their rooftops. There's 12,000 $500 of credits for electric vehicles. It's going to make it easier and more affordable for people to buy EVs. A ton of money going into the research and development of new technologies, both for like, you know, the kind of the hard to decarbonize sectors, like, you know, like agriculture and, you know, long distance shipping and transportation. So, I mean, there's a ton of money still in this bill, about 40% of that money is going to go to front-line communities, to communities that I've already felt the brunt of environmental injustice. The money is there. This bill really invest that money where it's needed most, where it's going to have the biggest impact for our country

and for our planet. And I do believe that some iteration of bill by better will pass. I think that Democrats understand that without some type of a hallmark legislation, that it's going to be that much more difficult for them to succeed in midterm. So I think that everybody has really vested interest in making sure that something passes. With that said, of course, do you have any insight into what's happening now in negotiations with Senator Manchin? So we just had Representative Rokane on the show a couple weeks ago. He says he still, you know, he still communicates with Senator Manchin frequently. And Representative Kana, who you know, you know, he caucuses with the progressives. He said he, even he, is willing to kind of take cuts to a lot of what was in,

initially in, build back better in order to get the climate legislation passed. I mean, he sees this. Every, you know, every congressperson that's been on our show says, this is our best shot, right? This is our best shot to get climate legislation done. So we got to do everything we can to do that. Not, you know, of course, there's so many reasons for this, but one of which is, you know, the Democratic Party, really the fate of Democratic Party relies on that significant climate legislation getting passed before the midterms, right? That is, we know that is such a motivating factor for young voters. It was a huge factor for voters in 2018 midterms. It was a gigantic factor for voters in the 2020 election, and we've got to have those young voters come out in 2022 for

the midterms if we're going to, if the Democrats are going to kind of keep the House and potentially keep the Senate and get something, you know, get real legislation, get some of the other things and build back better pass potentially next term. So given the importance of this legislation to the party, to the country, really to the entire planet, I don't see how something doesn't get past before the midterms. Yeah, well, from your lips to God's ears. So, you know, we tend to think of climate as a whole separate issue onto itself, when in reality, climate is actually the most intersectional issue there is.

Climate touches everything, all sectors. What would a climate bill mean for jobs, health care, the economy, and more? Well, I can tell you, it's going to create a ton of new jobs, right? All this money is going to go to investments here in America. You've got the civilian climate core. That alone is going to create 300,000 jobs in the clean energy industry. I talked about those, you know, those tax credits for electric vehicles. That's $12,500.

You get that if you buy an American-made, union-made, with union jobs, electric vehicle right here in the United States, right? Those kinds of things. We are going to invest that money in communities that need it the most. There's something like over 100,000, and this is actually already passed, but there's something like 100,000 holes that need to be plugged still in America, right? These are natural gas and extraction holes, and this money is going to be used to put former fossil fuel workers back to work, doing the things that they know how best to do

and doing it so that it protects their community and gets so much, so much that stuff done. So it's going to create a ton of jobs, and it's going to make our air cleaner, our water, you know, cleaner. Everyone loves that stuff. So that's what's going to, you know, that's what's so important to this, to the passing of this bill. You know, when you burn fossil fuels, as Ty mentioned, it doesn't just cause climate change. It makes our air so much dirtier. If you look at the cost to transition to renewable energy, ignoring all the benefits, two jobs to the economy, to living on a. in the habit of planet, the benefits, the health benefits just alone more than pay for the transition

itself every single year. Yeah, I think that's perfectly put. Now, moving over to the politics aspect of this, how did climate motivate voters in 2020? How much of an impact did this issue have on turnout? How many people viewed this as a primary issue when they went to vote? We know that 81% of voters say that the federal government is responsible for climate change. And as I mentioned earlier, this is a huge. This is one of the top issues for young voters who showed up in 2018, showed up in 2020. And this was a top issue for them. And we're just not going to have, we're not going to have a successful election for anyone that cares about progressive politics if we don't have a record turnout again for young voters like we did in 2020 and have that massive skew toward the Democratic Party, which we saw for young voters. Right. Let's finish up with this. I'm especially interested in what solutions we can actually use to solve some of this stuff, even if it's not from the federal level, what we can do from the private sector? What emergent technologies do you believe will be game changers for climate? I know that there's carbon capture, for example, but we've always heard that it's just too expensive to deploy. Yeah, I mean, direct air carbon capture is crazy expensive. It just doesn't make sense financially for anyone to do that right now. What does make sense, honestly, Brian, is the stuff that we already have.

I mean, we've got wind, we've got solar, we have all the technology that we need today to decarbonize. We've got, you know, battery technology has improved drastically. There was a report a couple of years ago called a 2035 report that said that we could get to 90% of our electricity grid could be completely, you know, it could be carbon free by 2035. using the technologies that we have today. This climate change is not a technological problem. It's a problem of political will. We just have to deploy the technologies that we already have. It's that simple.

No need to reinvent the wheel here, right? Well, Brock and Ty, thank you so much for coming on. Again, anybody listening, check them out on the climate pod. Great show, obviously super important, and I appreciate you guys taking the time. Brian, thank you for all the amazing work that you do. Thanks again to Ty and Brock. That's it for this episode. Talk to you next week. You've been listening to No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen.

Produced by Sam Graber, music by Wellsey, 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. Thank you.