Pod Save America - “Crisis actor in the White House.”

Episode Date: January 22, 2019

Trump offers the Democrats a deal they can’t accept, Buzzfeed defends its story about Trump suborning perjury, and Kamala Harris announces her candidacy for president. Then Senator Kirsten Gillibrand talks to Jon Favreau about why she’s running for president, and what she’ll do if she wins. Also – Pod Save America is going on tour! Get your tickets now: crooked.com/events.

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor. Later in the pod, my interview with Democratic presidential candidate Kirsten Gillibrand, who stopped by Cricket headquarters earlier this morning. Had a little chat. First candidate, first declared candidate to come into the headquarters. To darken these doorways.

Hopefully not the last. But first, we've got a lot of news to get through, including Trump's proposal to end the longest government shutdown in history, the fallout from BuzzFeed's story about Trump and Michael Cohen, and Kamala Harris's entry into the presidential race. Tommy, tell us what's in store for PSTW this week. Well, Ben and I are going to talk to a member of parliament named David Lammy about Brexit, Theresa May's future, and what the hell our good friends across the pond are going to do

because this is an ongoing disaster. Yikes. Love it. I hear your big return to the stage happens this Friday. Love it or leave it is back. Finally. This Saturday a new show comes out. We'll be at the 24th at the Improv.

And then, you know, there'll be show week after, like you're used to. And we're going back out on the road. You sure are. Come see us on tour. Pod Save America has dates coming up in February in Charleston, New Orleans, and Durham. Love It or Leave It is coming to D.C., Chicago, Madison,

Milwaukee, and more. DeRay and the Pod Save the People crew are heading to Philly, Brooklyn, Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, and L.A. Buy your tickets. Tickets are going. Tickets are going, but you can still get some at cricket.com slash events. Go get them.

Don't be the one who couldn't get them. Go get them. I think DC Love It or Leave It is sold out. Okay, well then don't. Don't pitch that one. I'm just saying. All the ones to pitch. I'm just saying.

That's just sort of a warning to you if you live in a different city. Shot across the bow. Alright, the news. We are now 31 days into the Trump shutdown, which has become the longest government shutdown in the history of the United States. Over the weekend, Trump threw out a new offer that he had negotiated with Mitch McConnell, Mike Pence, and Jared Kushner.

Tough negotiating partners. That's... Okay, well, that's not how it works. You drive a hard bargain, Jared. Yeah. So here's the deal. If Democrats agree to $5.7 billion in steel slats, Trump will temporarily agree not to deport 700,000 immigrants

who are protected by DACA and the hundreds of thousands of immigrants with temporary protected status, but only for three years. Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer immediately rejected the offer, but Mitch McConnell is holding a vote on it anyway. Guys, what do you think about the deal? You know, I was in a contemplative mood this weekend.

As I watched... Watch out, everyone. I watched all of Twitter take an ugly interaction on Capitol Hill as a symbol for everything that's gone wrong in this country as Republicans put forward a completely bad faith proposal and then pundits eat it up because that's their job and they live under the like luxurious protection of a system they always assume will work just fine. You forgot then the third thing the the media just self-flagellating over what is the future of media if BuzzFeed possibly maybe got one story wrong.

There was a lot of garbage this weekend. And I just sort of at some point just put my phone down and I now can't find it. I'm unreachable. So what do you think about the deal, Tommy? I mean, it's a ridiculous offer, right? So, I mean, the carrot they're offering to Democrats is, remember that Trump canceled the DACA program. So he's the one who screwed over all the dreamers from this country for no fault of their own. They came here as kids.

And he also canceled TPS protections for a bunch of people coming from countries that were suffering from natural disasters or wars or horrible situations. He called them shithole countries, famously. Shithouse countries. He took these things away, and now they're offering to give it back. So essentially what Donald Trump did, so he took Chuck and Nancy out to lunch. They went to Wendy's, and they got a burger, and they got some chicken tenders and some fries and a drink. And he grabbed their tenders and their fries, and he said, if you give me half your burger, I'll give these back to you. And that's his deal.

No. Well, that's almost that. He said, I'll give the chicken tender back to you, but then after you have a bite, I'm going to take it back again. That's right. Because it's only three years. Right.

It's a temporary chicken tender Passover. And listen, if you look the other way, I'm going to kick this brown person the fucking nuts. That's also what he made as part of his deal. Also, you owe me $5.7 billion. The deeper you dig into the deal, the worse it gets.

Originally, you know, they said it was like this thing called the Bridges Act that was introduced in Congress, but it's not like that

because Stephen Miller got in there and originally the plan was to protect anyone, all Dreamers who were eligible for DACA, which is like 1.5 million people, and then Miller said, no, no, no, no.

We're only doing the 700,000 who actually are protected by DACA right now. So he already took it down. And then they have this crazy asylum policy in there that says that Central American minors, children from Central America, can only apply for asylum from their home country. So they have to send in an application, which is also not how it works, by the way. They slotted in a paragraph that would just radically change the way the asylum process works. The point of asylum is you have to leave where you are because you are at risk.

And they're saying, no, no, no, just chill and apply in your home country. It doesn't work that way. And the other thing we should point out is the reason that Trump has not successfully eliminated DACA and the TPS protections is because people sued. This is now held up in court. The Supreme Court has so far decided not to take up the DACA case, which means that all those protections, by the way, for people who are protected by TPS and DACA are still there. So he's basically extending the status quo for the short term right now. extending the status quo for the short term right now.

It's also just worth remembering because, you know, there's been, you know, editorials calling on Democrats to make this deal. And there's been pundits on television looking for an opportunity to hit both sides. And it's what's always accepted in this is like, well, what's the leverage here? Why is it that the government being shut down is leverage for Republicans and not for Democrats? It was also the same thing during the Obama years when they would threaten to default on the national debt. Why is it that Democrats, it is understood and accepted by our political culture that one party simply accepts and is comfortable with vastly more cruelty and chaos, and that is their leverage point? Why is that an

acceptable way to govern? And why do pundits who think Democrats should accept this kind of a deal want to embrace that kind of governance? Why is it that they think right now, at a time in which we have this unhinged person who shut the government down in a fit of pique, why is it that the way they think we should govern is Republicans put forward a Republican proposal and Democrats accept it because Democrats are the only people who care about the federal workers. That's just an accepted part of this debate. One other thing is that I've seen it all over and over again. They said, woo, Republicans have added $12 billion in sweeteners for disaster relief, sweeteners. Like, just think about like, you know, those, you know, those Democrats, the only people who care about disaster victims.

Oh, wow, what a sweetener that is for us. A sweetener. Fuck you. Sweetener. Especially when 56% of voters blame Trump and the Republicans. I mean, the data makes clear that they have no leverage. And they don't want a wall. And it's an unpopular piece of legislation.

And they don't want a wall. Policy. And they don't want a wall. And it's an unpopular piece of legislation. And they don't want a wall. And the only Republican member of Congress in a border district, Will Hurd, has been talking about how a wall is useless. Because he calls it basically a glorified speed bump. Because a wall only works if it can temporarily slow people down and then you send out human beings to get them. But the response time for the Border Patrol is hours to days. So a wall is not going to do much for you. And, Lovett, to your question, I mean, I thought that Eric Levitz at New York Magazine put this very well, which is, the president has made a decision to deliberately inflict suffering

on the American people as a means of coercing a co-equal branch of government into doing his bidding. That is what's happening here. And that is how you have to cover what's happening right like if as a pundit you want to say you know what uh democrats should still do his bidding and be forced into doing whatever the person in a co-equal branch of government says to do and that's more important than uh you know than doing that and risking the incentives that gives trump to shut down the government the future is still better than the suffering that's being inflicted on people right now in this country.

You can say that, but at least set out that that's what's happening here. Well, right. That's what's happening. Yeah, it's like, you know, I come back to this because it really was what I... One of the reasons we're okay in the sense that the country has not totally ground down to a halt is that a lot of federal workers are showing up and working without pay. And they're showing up and working without pay because they think it's the right thing to do, because they want to keep their jobs when the government comes back. They want to earn their

back pay. They're not sure what's right or what's wrong. They're not sure what's legal or what's not. They're being told to show up. There's a lot of reasons. A lot of people can't, right? Because they can't afford childcare. They can't afford the gas, what have you. But we are coasting. We are coasting on the credit that our institutions will work, that government will generally function. Yeah, they'll pass a CR and yeah, they'll go back and pay the employees. And yeah, this is just a rocky spot in the road. But if we give into this kind of governing, this is the future. This is it. This is how it will look. There will be no normal times. Normal times will be over. And all these pundits, a lot of them wealthy, a lot of them disconnected generally, just assume, assume that normalcy is

something that happens by accident. It doesn't. It doesn't. It could be like this all the time forever. And if we don't draw a line, if we don't draw a line and fight for just basic decency in how we govern and push back against this, we will get that kind of government. And I will be very surprised if these pundits then turn around and realize it's their fault. and then turn around and realize it's their fault. Yeah, I mean, look, so the Washington Post editorial board ran a piece called Make a Deal, Save the Dreamers that tells Democrats, quote, to refuse to even talk until the government reopens does no favors to sideline federal workers and contractors. Yeah, I mean, unbelievable. I feel like the press often defaults to this both sides criticism because it's so easy.

It's easy to say it takes two to tango because you don't have to dig into the details of the policies or the proposals or the history of the context. But in this case, the analysis is quite simple. President Trump said he would gladly shut down the government to get Democrats to bend to his will. And that is not, in this case, an acceptable way to government. I mean, our position is we're happy to debate border security funding, but let's open the government first. Here's six bills that would do exactly that. And by the way, guess whose position that was over and over again said every single day last year when there was a shutdown over DACA? Mitch McConnell.

How many times did he say to Democrats, open the government, we'll negotiate? Paul Ryan said, open the government, we'll negotiate. We'll negotiate. And now, like, the idea that you would negotiate before he opens the government, all that means, like you said, Levitt, is next time Donald Trump's going to say, oh, well, this worked last time. So this time I'm going to say, let's gut Medicare. Yeah, let's gut Medicare. And if you guys don't gut Medicare in this budget, I'm shutting down the government. Let's get rid of Obamacare. And then I'm going to have you negotiate with me.

So maybe we won't gut all of Medicareare but we'll make huge cuts to it and i'll wring that concession out of you because i know the democrats eventually will fold because they care about people getting fucked over and i don't so i know that i have now that i propose food stamps are only for white people i'm going to shut down the government right until i get it in a normal in normal negotiation with a normal group of people in a normal president you would would find a way to meet in the middle. But we know, thanks to the New York Times, that when Mick Mulvaney, the chief of staff, tried to find a middle ground between what the Democrats proposed and what he proposed, Trump screamed

at him and told him he fucked it all up in front of a giant group of people. So of course they have no faith in a traditional negotiation. Also, just two other things. One, this is a... Donald Trump has been president for over two years or exactly. We're at the halfway point of the first term. Hump day, everybody.

It's hump day. But, and he had Republican control of both houses of Congress, right? This was a fight he could have had at any moment. He chose to have it now. That's one. That's number two. Democrats did come to the table and we actually offer $25 billion as long as there would be permanent protections for DREAMers with none of the restrictions in legal immigration that Stephen Miller wanted. The reason that that deal didn't happen is because again and again, when we get close to a deal to protect DREAMers and give him border security, which, by the way, Democrats have been doing for a decade or more, more than a decade, giving into border security demands.

Right when you get close to a deal, the Ann Coulters of the world and the Rush Limbaugh's of the world and the Stephen Millers of the world throw a fit and insist on drastic reductions in legal immigration and all kinds of poison pills to scuttle the deal. This is the fight they want. They do not want the government open and they do not want to win. So the Washington Post reported that this latest deal was sort of made in consultation with Mitch McConnell. And so you could tell there's some kind of dark evil strategy there from McConnell because that's what he does. It seems as though what McConnell wants to do now is put this not really compromise on the floor and vote and then be able to say, OK, look, Republicans are trying to open the government, too.

Now, I don't think that McConnell has anywhere near the votes he needs to pass this because he needs 60, which means he'd need seven Democrats to cross over, which I don't think he has. I don't know if he has any right now. Joe Manchin said he was undecided. So what is the what is the strategy? What's McConnell up to here? Well, look, I don't think we know. I think one thing is clear. They were in a really, really bad situation, right?

This does make their situation slightly better, because now they can say, all right, there was a House bill that passed, there was a Senate bill that passed. It looks like governing. It looks like... Let's just get into it. They just want to pull Democrats into a negotiation like let's just get into it they just want to pull democrats into a negotiation let's get him into the negotiation on something and then then they can be against a specific policy as opposed to being against the government being shut down

over trump's fucking demands right and the democratic position yeah has been and continues to be open the government and then we'll talk and we're open to any discussions after that, which is the right thing to do. So what should Democrats next move be? I mean, on the substance, they cannot accept this proposal. So this thing is dead on arrival. And I think we need to just maintain our position. I mean, I guess they can go back to Trump and say, offer something else, something different. But his stupid Saturday speech didn't work. It didn't move anyone. His Oval Office address didn't work. It didn't move anyone.

Workers are about to miss another paycheck on Friday. I mean, I think that we should be, we the citizens of this country who are worried about the government being closed, should be putting as much pressure as humanly possible on the White House and on McConnell to move. Yeah. I also think it's, look, it's not hard to, right now, it's not hard to say what Democrats should do when the options are, when there's this bad faith proposal that isn't a compromise, that violates our basic principles of what we believe government should do. And it's part of this evil habit of governing by crisis and shutting down the government and using human beings as leverage. My question would be like, well, what what would have happened if out of that tense negotiation between a narcissist, his dumb son in law and a dead eyed zealot named Mike Pence came out with a true compromise? Something Democrats actually believed in? What would our position be? Because I have a feeling, actually, that suddenly all of our protestations

about how this is no way to govern would kind of diminish in the face of a legitimate option. I think you still have to say, hold a vote to open the government, fund all the other departments, don't fund DHS, fund everything else, and then we pledge to hold a vote on, or at least to hold a debate,

maybe not a vote, hold a floor debate on this compromise that you talked about. I mean, that's the only way this can go. I think that's right. I think that's right because I think we have to mean it. When we say we are not going to see to this kind of governing, we really have to mean it. It's important because, because, you know, what I, the response to the Washington Post, the response to these pundits has to be, our goal is not just to end this shutdown. Our goal is to stop governing by shutdown. It has to stop. I just think the fear is that Trump historically in business and in politics has

taken fights like this to such an extreme that he's willing to harm himself in the long run to win in the short term against fucking Merv Griffin or whoever, whatever weird person he was competing for a casino for. There's a New York Times story about this the other day. Read it. So that's scary. That should be scary to Mitch McConnell because Trump is very willing to drive the bus full of Republicans off the cliff and just destroy the party. And it looks like from their approval ratings that is starting to happen.

Well, I think you're right. I think that's where the pressure needs to be on Mitch McConnell. And everyone's like, oh, that's silly. Mitch McConnell would never go against Trump. OK, well, maybe he wouldn't, but he's got vulnerable senators and he wants to be Majority Leader Mitch McConnell after 2020.

All he cares about is power. Mitch McConnell hates Donald Trump's guts. He despises Donald Trump. This smarmy, turtle looking, power hungry nut has built up an entire career by being smart and savvy and this grifting asshole comes along and takes the presidency.

It's gotta drive him crazy. And Mitch McConnell does not get to be majority leader if he doesn't have Susan Collins and Cory Gardner and Jody Ernst and Tom Tillis there, and whatever other fucking Republicans are up in 2020. So, I think that's where the...

Now, I saw that there are protests planned by federal and labor unions on Wednesday. I do think, we've been saying this, like, I think the pressure has to get ratcheted up here. You know, David Leonard wrote a piece for the New York Times where he talked about, like, this is, this

shutdown is basically showing the limits of the resistance movement, and that, and we said this before, too, you know muslim ban the women's march the rally for you know uh family separations there's this groundswell yeah and now there's 800 000 people without paychecks millions more who are hurting this the new york times is talking about it's hitting the poor homeless people um we've talked about native americans who aren't getting government services over this i mean there's a lot of people barely fucking hanging on right now and people in this country if you care about this like people need to start

get out into the streets and start protesting especially in dc the capital should be swarmed all the time yeah it's also i think one of the problems is that it's um there was no clear moment at which this became something that required like national national protests. I would say that we're about to hit the second paycheck paycheck miss. Yeah. And to me like that is a big moment, a huge moment because you know what, there are there are a lot of people, there's a lot of people that couldn't go without one paycheck, but there's many, many more that can't miss a second. And the ripple effects of that, you know, not only places that need child care, but there are people who rely on places that provide child care that require kids from federal workers to show up to pay for the child care. There are going to be huge long-term consequences for this. And I think the second pay period should be the moment where everybody just erupts. Yeah. The New York Times story on all the HUD programs that are not, the people who can't get money to like purchase a house that would allow their special needs kids to feel safe. I mean, homeless veterans, elderly people. This thing is getting really bad for a

lot of people. It's acute pain. And, you know, by the way, good for the New York Times. They did a story on Trump voters. Yes. But this time it was Trump voters who are fed up with Trump because of the shutdown. And they finally, they finally ended up, they went into some of those coffee shops, but finally with some of those diners, they found some people who don't like them. That's true. Can I read you guys some quick breaking news?

Sure. Mark Warner introduced the Stop Stupidity Act. some quick breaking news. Sure. Mark Warner introduced the Stop Stupidity Act. Stupidity stands for shutdowns transferring unnecessary pain

and inflicting damage in the coming years. Well done, Senate staffer. Which would fund all the government except the White House and Congress to stop further shutdowns.

Are we one great acronym away from solving this thing? As we know from all having worked in the Senate, it's a real art. There's certain staffers

who just spend their time coming up with the acronyms for these bills. Get a whiteboard. So someone said something to me, which was so smart, which is that, see, you think the smart move is to come up with an acronym, but actually, the smart move is to not come up with an acronym, because if the bill name is boring, it gets called by the names of the senators who introduced it. Which is why, like, if Dodd-Frank had a clever name,

we wouldn't call it Dodd-Frank, but we'd call it Dodd-Frank. So Dodd and Frank get their name all over it. So now Chris Dodd can just sit around there and talk to Barney Frank and they're like, I'm Dodd-Frank Sarbanes-Oxley. What is it? You don't know, but their names are etched in stone. One last note. Indivisible is leading a national coordinated day of action

tomorrow, Wednesday, January 23rd. Excellent. With a national coordinated day of action tomorrow, Wednesday, January 23rd. Excellent. With a national call day, you can join by calling 844-236-2373. Tell your senators to pressure Mitch McConnell to end the shutdown. Excellent. All right. Let's talk about the Mueller investigation. Just hours after we finished recording our Friday bonus episode

on the BuzzFeed piece about Trump's suborning perjury... BuzzFeed had a bonus of their own. Robert Mueller's spokesperson, Peter Carr, issued an extremely rare statement about the story in which he said, quote, which he said, quote, BuzzFeed's description of specific statements to the special counsel's office and characterization of documents and testimony obtained by this office regarding Michael Cohen's congressional testimony are not accurate. BuzzFeed, however, has said that their sources are telling them to stand their ground, that

their reporting is going to be borne out to be accurate, and that they're saying that their sources are not wrong. Brian Stelter asked Anthony Cormier directly, what if your sources are wrong? They are not wrong, he said. Guys, what's going on here? Because I have to say, this is a real mystery to me. I have no fucking idea. It's fascinating.

It is fascinating. It's really hard to understand what's going on. I think it's hard to understand for a few reasons. One, a lot of the sources involved with all these stories are famous liars, right? We are talking about people like Michael Cohen and others who have made their careers lying. Their lawyers are liars. Their lawyers' lawyers are liars. So that makes it hard for the journalist to suss out what's going on.

Second thing is that the Mueller investigation itself has been so tight-lipped and so hard to get information out of. Third thing, we don't really fully understand the equities involved and why they felt the need to put the statement out. Right? So, like, we're starting to get some, you know, that Rosenstein was involved and why they felt they needed to do it. Potentially Giuliani and Trump or someone from the White House might have called. Yes. And then finally, the last piece is we don't actually know precisely what they're disputing. Right?

So all of those things make this really tricky to suss out what's happening. Tommy, what was your reaction watching this unfold over the weekend? Well, it was so funny because I took a few days off. So I saw the Thursday pod come out and then I read the story and then I saw the bonus come out.

And before I had time to listen to the bonus episode, they disavowed, they pre-butted your bonus. So I was like, oh man, what a day in Crooked Media HQ. The one day we finally acceded to everyone and be like,

bonus, do a bonus, do a bonus. You guys aren't going back until Tuesday. And they were like, okay, okay. Boom, news. Three hours after the bonus. Then I saw the demands for

bonus, bonus. Marcy Wheeler, who has been on the show before, you can read her stuff at emptywheel.net, has a smart theory. I mean, basically, she, bonus. Marcy Wheeler, who has been on the show before, you can read her stuff to EmptyWheel.net, has a smart theory. I mean, basically, she thinks that BuzzFeed's sources are the Southern District of New York because parts of this case are getting spun off to other folks. And she thinks that BuzzFeed's sources are there. And she thinks that the Southern District of New York was sort of more aggressive in framing Trump's role in the various cover ups, specifically the hush money to Stormy Daniels and other.

She thinks that that Mueller's folks are not going to be as aggressive in talking about the way Cohen was directed by Trump in terms of the cover-up in this case, because Cohen is cooperating witness for them, and they need to be able to back up with other sources anything they have Cohen saying. So long story short, and I probably just confused you, she thinks that Mueller's folks wanted to make clear that they were not the source for this story, A, and that when Cohen told Congress that he was not directed by Trump to specifically lie about the Trump Tower deal, but that he was just trying to match Trump's own rhetoric, she doesn't want them, they don't want something out there that makes it sound like he was unreliable in that testimony. Yeah, so the key here is Cohen's sentencing memo, not the one that Mueller filed, but

the one that Cohen filed, Cohen's lawyers filed. Cohen's sentencing memo, not the one that Mueller filed, but the one that Cohen filed, Cohen's lawyers filed. In that memo, they admit that Cohen lied to Congress, quote, in accordance with or, quote, to support and advance Trump's agenda. And then here's the actual quote from Cohen. I made these statements to be consistent with individual one's political messaging and out of loyalty to individual one. and out of loyalty to individual one. That is notably different from what Cohen said in the hush money case, where he said, I was directed by individual one to make these payments, to do whatever. In fact, here's an audio of a call where we're talking about it. Right, yeah.

So it's very interesting that, and Marcy makes this point, Mueller doesn't want to get out ahead of, Mueller needs Cohen to be as reliable as possible on the issues where he's focused on, right? So he said, Marcy was saying, Mueller doesn't need to prove that Trump had a role in Cohen's lies. He needs to prove that Cohen kept Trump and Don Jr. in the loop on the Moscow deal itself. And to do that, he can't have Cohen's testimony looks like it was, or sentencing memo looked like it was false or people doubt the fact that that uh trump actually directed cohen to lie now but you'd think that like so that portion that

i just read peter carr apparently according to the washington post sent that portion to buzzfeed at one point as an fyi and buzzfeed was like oh we thought that was just an fyi we didn't think that was disputing anything. But it is interesting, like if you read that that's what Cohen said and you're the reporters at BuzzFeed, you must think to yourself like, okay, why would Cohen not say

that he was directed to lie in this case, but did say he was directed to lie in the SDNY case? Well, so, I think two things. One, I think this, this again comes back to this problem which is michael cohen uh i think it's hard to deny has been very far in over his head for quite some time it's always hard to suss out why he's lying or if he's lying right so i think that's the first thing and the second thing is i also think a lot of this comes down to like what does it actually mean to be directed by someone to do something? What does that actually semantically mean?

Like if it was, if it was a game, a telephone, if it was implied. So to me, like a lot of this comes down to a matter of degree that I think we'll maybe understand. Ideally we'll understand in,

in, in due time, like what exactly Buzzfeed sources were defining being directed as. Yeah. Right. Because like there's a lot of versions of that. Right. If, you know, if there's some email where it's between Don Jr. and Michael Cohen, where

it's clear that Donald Trump knew about something, is that being directed by Donald Trump? While some would say yes, some would say no. I just, I think a lot of this is ultimately going to be reduced to semantics and we just don't have the underlying documents yet. Yeah, and just something to know, and we mentioned this before about these BuzzFeed reporters, Jason Leopold and Anthony Cormier, not only were they part of a Pulitzer Prize-winning team at BuzzFeed for reporting in the past,

they're the ones who broke open the Trump Tower Moscow deal story in the first place. They broke that story. A lot of people said, what is this story? It's not corroborated by other outlets. And then sure enough, it was corroborated by Robert Mueller in the filings that he, in the Cohen sentencing memo, right? So their reporting was 100% borne out in the Moscow Tower story, right? But notably in that story, their sources were two FBI agents who are familiar with the matter.

In this story, in the latest story about him directing to lie, it was two federal agents. It was two federal law enforcement agents part of the investigation. So it very well may be the same. So one of the reasons they might be trusting their sources right now, it may be the same two FBI agents who were part of SDNY who gave them the Trump Tower Moscow story. Yeah. I mean, now we're way deep down to speculation rabbit hole, but sure. I mean, they've done a great job. Also, like stepping even further back, BuzzFeed posted the dossier when everyone told Ben Smith and the team there that they were the worst people in the world for, you know, giving credence to Steele. And boy, it turns out that that was the right decision.

to steal, and boy, it turns out that that was the right decision. Right. So I think these guys are certainly, they feel like their body of reporting stands for itself. Yeah. That said, you know, like, I do think it's, there was some process fouls in the process of trying to get comment from Carr and the special counsel's office on this, that they probably could have tightened up to avoid this disaster, but here we are. I wonder if they knew they were getting that statement

if they would have run the story anyway. Isn't that interesting? Because they stand by it, you know? Yeah. Maybe they would have. That's a good question. I mean, look, one other thing that also must be just weighing on BuzzFeed

is that Rudy Giuliani has just gone out there like a fucking shark and just, with all credibility, absolutely destroyed them. I mean, I've never seen such a sharp legal mind at work. It's like, take notes, Harvard Law students. A master is before you. On Sunday, Rudy told CNN's Jake Tapper that the president was involved in discussions about a potential Trump Tower project in Moscow up through the end of the 2016 election. The timetable that contradicted what Trump's team has previously acknowledged,

though Rudy had said something similar to that to George Stephanopoulos like a month ago. Giuliani has since backtracked, issuing a statement on Monday that his comments to CNN were merely hypothetical and not based on conversations I had with the president. This was after he told CNN last week that he, quote, never said there was no collusion

between Trump's campaign and the Russians, only that there was never any collusion between the Russians and the president. Comments he also walked back in a follow up statement. Guys, some people say that Rudy purposely says crazy shit on TV to soften the ground for some bad news that he knows is going to break. But isn't it possible that he just says crazy shit on TV? I actually I am one of those people. I do believe that amidst inside this word fog that he unleashes, there is some

desire to get certain bits of it out there. I just believe that. That's been true all along. It's true with Stormy Daniels, for sure. That said, I do think he just is a very confused man. I don't know anymore that there's a method to the madness. The look on his face, the quotes he's like, I mean, he does a follow-up interview with New York Magazine where he's like, I reviewed all the tapes.

The reporter's like, I'm sorry, what tapes? Oh, I shouldn't have said that. No tapes. It is wild the things he's just vomiting up. Next thing you know, you're going to be telling me that that body buried behind Trump Tower is important. What body? No body behind Trump Tower. Who said Trump Tower?

He was asked at the end of that interview what he thinks about his legacy. And everyone should read this. Rudy Giuliani said, I'm afraid it will be on my gravestone. Rudy Giuliani, he lied for Trump. Somehow I don't think it will be. But if it is, so what do I care? I'll be dead. I figure I can explain it to St. Peter.

I have some bad news. I have some bad news for you. I do not believe St. Peter is going have some bad news. I have some bad news for you. I do not believe St. Peter is going to have time in his schedule. I mean, lost in the weeds of all of this

is just how much the story has changed on the Trump Tower issue alone. I mean, at first, at first they tried to say that there were no real negotiations

over a Trump Tower, that Trump was barely involved. It was over before the Republican primaries. And then we learned that they went to the middle of 2016. We got all these emails from Felix Sater about how our boy can become president of the USA and we can engineer it.

We know he was reaching out to Russian military intelligence officials. We know that Michael Cohen was cold emailing Dmitry Peskov, Putin's press secretary. Then he actually got a call back and talked to somebody. Putin's press secretary, then you actually got to call back and talk to somebody. So, you know, look, Cohen, Michael Cohen was going to go to Moscow until June 14th, 2016. And that day he killed the trip because the Washington Post reported that the Russians hacked the DNC. So everything about this is fishy. Buzzfeed or no buzzfeed, it doesn't matter.

This is a massive story. And it has to be a huge part of Mueller's investigation too. We know. I mean, it's one of the reasons that probably they spoke up. Like, the idea that Donald Trump and Michael Cohen and all the rest of the fucking goobers were talking directly to the Russian government about

a deal that would involve sanctioned banks and GRU officers right up until the election. The election. A presidential candidate who ultimately won was talking about doing a deal with a hostile foreign power that he knew because he got a briefing from our own intelligence agencies that Russia was attacking our democracy.

He knew that and he was still doing a deal with them. It's also not clear that the election is the end date because at one point Rudy said November. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he was like, November? You can't just throw november out there vaguely a big fucking thing happens in the middle of november and as these talks were ongoing they were changing the republican platform to make it more favorable to russia they were they were talking shit about nato uh they were talking about getting rid of sanctions his campaign manager was forwarding their internal polling to some

russian intel asset so the whole, the collusion is right there. It's right there. And I realize like suborning perjury is like an easier crime for everyone to understand and it puts like a neat little bow on it. But it seems like there's bigger things at stake here actually. Yeah, that's actually worth remembering too. Like the BuzzFeed story, I think people latched onto it rightly because it was such a clear cut case of, uh,

of a, of a crime and the kind of crime presidents have been impeached for in the past. But in a way that's like a meta crime, you know, it's a meta crime. And like, but the, but what is not in dispute right now are all the underlying,

uh, causes for the need to lie to Congress, which Michael Cohen has been giving them copious information about. Right. All right. Let's talk 2020. Oh, good. Just skipping from big topic to big topic. Right around the corner to this problem. On Martin Luther King Day, Senator Kamala Harris of California declared her candidacy for the

Democratic presidential nomination in 2020. She made the announcement on Good Morning America and released a video on social media. She'll be visiting South Carolina in the coming days, as well as hosting a kickoff event in her hometown of Oakland, California. Harris joined the Senate two years ago after serving as both California's Attorney General and the District Attorney in San Francisco. Her campaign platform includes proposals for Medicare for All and bail reform. It also includes a $2.8 trillion tax cut designed to help middle and working class families and tax credit for low income renters

guys uh what did you think of her announcement and uh what are her strengths as a candidate I love everybody kind of scrambling the timing you know like the the the symbolism was cool doing it on Martin Luther King Day and then 47 years ago Monday Shirley chisholm became the first woman to seek the Democratic Party nomination for president so there's a lot of – it was a weighty date to choose. I would have liked a little bit longer of a video, not to get too far into the weeds, but, like, you're going to put out a video. Make it two minutes. Tell me a little more about yourself and your bio. Yeah.

That's cool. I'm interested that she's going to South Carolina first. I think it speaks to the fact that her team thinks that she might have a path to the nomination that doesn't necessarily include heavy investment in Iowa and New Hampshire, and that they can benefit from the California primaries getting moved up in the process. So talks about how things could be scrambled this time. I think she'll be formidable. You know, she put a a very progressive platform there's already people raising questions about her work as a prosecutor so she'll have to handle that

but um you know she's going to be a good candidate yeah anybody watching those hearings knows that she's i wouldn't want to debate senator harris no i think i think kamala harris in those hearings when she is questioning someone is that is when she is in her element. That is when she seems like this is who she is. This is what she has been doing her most of her life. She's comfortable. She's sharp. She's powerful in her questioning like that.

That that's a strength. Jeff Sessions folded like a cheap suit in those hearings when she asked him two questions in a row. Yeah. like a cheap suit in those hearings when she asked him two questions in a row yeah she also by the way she you know she is an african she's a black woman running in the democratic primary who has embraced um quite a few most uh progressive policy positions and that right there puts her in a very good position to win the democratic primary in 2020 just everything what is on paper right now you know what she has done, what she has proposed. And as Tommy's mentioned, I think she also has, she has a good calendar, right?

Like if she can get through Iowa and New Hampshire, whether win either one or whether she plays as well, you go to South Carolina, heavily African-American population in South Carolina, that's where Obama really started pulling away from Hillary. And then you're right. You've got California, her home state in March, and you've got a couple other states with heavy African-American populations on that day, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas. Yeah. I mean, I guess, you know what I was struck by just sort of because there was the Gillibrand announcement who you talked to and we said to hear the interview and the Harris announcement.

What is striking, I think, right now is what makes these announcements similar. Right. There's a lot there's a kind of threshold of progressive policy that we're seeing the kind of top tier candidates embrace. And all of them are feeling their way through. Like, how do I how does how does Trump factor into this? How do I talk about myself? How do I demonstrate that I understand the kind of anger and the desire for kind of big answers that are coming from the base? And I think we see Warren also kind of trying to prove, you know, her bona fides on that. Same thing for Gillibrand, same thing for Harris. Same thing for Castro and others. And I think what I'm interested in now is, okay, you know, everybody's putting out their best foot forward.

Like this is how I'm going to present myself at first. This is how I'm starting this journey. And I'm just genuinely interested in what happens next. Like how do they start to differentiate themselves from each other? Like, how do they start to differentiate themselves from each other? And not in just a kind of branding and messaging way, but like starting to really get a feel for what they care about, like what their priorities will be, what their staff represents, what proposals look like, the thing they're going to be pumped about and interested in talking about at every stop. Like, what drives them? What genuinely is driving their interest in being president beyond just the desire to be president? And how you deal with adversity when the first horrible story pops up or the first bad interaction

with a voter who doesn't like you. Yeah, because that's inevitable. And by the way, just one other thing to that too, to Tommy's point, like the first thing that cracks, that cracks open, that gets through this built apparatus, right? That kind of tears it apart and like reveals people, because I think that is the one the one truth that still that still applies, which is that for all their faults, like campaigns in their exhaustion and their relentlessness, get the truth out of people and what makes them tick. And that is so important right now for the primaries, because we we only get to send one person to the general. I will say, too, and, you know, I've noticed this every time we've seen her speak or talked to her,

she really does speak the language of activism. I mean, her parents were activists, and when you hear her talk about the civil rights movement, when you hear her talk about activism, she talks about justice a lot. I mean, she's very well-versed in that language, and that makes her, I think, her public comments, her speeches better. We mentioned adversity. So she'll also face challenges, particularly around her past as a prosecutor. Harris calls herself a progressive prosecutor and talks about her work combating implicit police bias,

keeping first-time offenders out of jail, prosecuting sexual assault victims, and banks who screwed over homeowners hurt by the foreclosure crisis. But a recent New York Times op-ed by law professor Lara Bazelon, who DeRay recently interviewed on Pod Save the People, said that Harris wasn't that progressive as a prosecutor and argued that she's fought to keep people facing wrongful convictions in jail, didn't fully support certain sentencing reforms, defended the death penalty even though she's personally against it. And, you know, Kamala Harris's people pushed back and said, you know, that's not true. It didn't provide the right context. So there's been arguments on both sides of this. There's been some activists who defend her in the criminal justice world, and there have been some who have criticized her.

How much of an issue is this, and how does she deal with this? Well, the good news is I think it's a real issue, right? I mean, the good news for the movement of the country on the issue of crime. Is that we're talking about the understanding that mass incarceration is actually a bigger problem than, say, being as hard as we possibly can on criminals. I mean, interestingly, just this weekend, I think Biden apologized for the 1994 crime bill, something that he used to champion his role in because it had draconian sentencing for crack convictions. So I think that this will be a big piece of the conversation this cycle. She's also out talking about reforming the cash bail system. So that's also going to be a piece of this. I mean, I don't know how well she'll handle it. I don't know all the details of the criticism or the response, but I think it's going to be something we hear about throughout the primary and that's a good thing. Yeah, I mean, I guess I got, I think it's

a, you know, it's a serious challenge to her ability to win over progressives. It's already gaining traction. It's an important story to me. You know, I think there's several candidates in this race that are going to face questions about previous positions that either because they represented more conservative areas when they were first running or because the progressive movement has pulled the center of the party to the left are going to have to answer for. And to me, there's sort of two there's two there's two versions of that conversation. One of them is this is what I used to believe. And I've come to believe something else. I used to believe that being tough in this way was really important. And I've come to learn

that there were harms that I didn't fully appreciate, whatever it is, depending on the issue. But I think one of the challenges will be, how do you make that case when what's also true is I took these positions when they were politically more popular or in some way politically necessary to my success as a candidate in some race or into some job. And now that I'm in a Democratic primary in which those positions are anathema to huge portions of the base, I have a different point of view. And I think being able to deal with that political reality is really, really challenging. My advice to every candidate who does this is just be honest. Be honest about the past positions. Don't apologize if you are truly sorry and truly believe something different now.

Right. Kirsten Gillibrand, who you'll hear from. I mean, I didn't even ask her this because it's the only thing she's been asked for the last week since she announced, which is like, you know, she used to be further to the right on immigration, on guns. She has said she's sorry. She said she's embarrassed by these positions. She's ashamed of these positions. Right. And if that's what she genuinely believes, then that is the right answer. If you are not embarrassed, if you are not ashamed, if you don't, if you still believe that what you did was right back then, you should say that,

by the way. You know, like I don't, I think the key is to stay away from anything that even is a whiff of political opportunism either way. Right. So yesterday, Harris responded to some of these criticisms. She said there are cases where there were folks that made a decision in my office and they had not consulted me. And I wish they had. The bottom line, though, is the buck stops with me and I take full responsibility for what my office did. So in some cases, she's saying maybe I should have done this. And I think as she goes on, she's going to have to explain every one of these decisions that she made.

And some she can say, maybe she'll say, that was someone else in my office, but still, that's my responsibility. Another she might say, look, this is why I did what I did, and I stand by it. Another she might say,

you know what? If I had done that again today, I wouldn't do the same thing because I believe something differently now. But I think the key is, you have to be honest about why you made the decisions you did, even if it is politically uncomfortable. Well, except I agree. But what if the answer in some cases is I was from a conservative district and this was the only way I could win?

Well, I think people should say that. I'm asking. Well, I think that's one way to say it. You can also say the same thing as I was from a conservative district. Those are the people I was representing. And that's what I heard from my constituents. And I was elected to represent my constituents. I think it's also fair that in some instances, it will be that you were told a series of facts that were wrong. Like the Iraq war is a good analogy, I think, because all those senators and members of Congress were handed intelligence saying that it was a slam dunk case, that Saddam and Al Qaeda were linked, that Iraq had WMD. All that shit was wrong. They had to know somehow that the U.S. intelligence agencies were all lying to them. Right. So with respect to

criminal justice reform, they presented all this evidence that that crack was somehow worse. I mean, I'm not excusing them, but that was what Biden said as he was presented a set of facts that were just completely wrong. And I think it's going to be hard to explain that to people. It's a complicated argument. Because you're right. Like you can you can hear people, even as you're talking about Iraq, be like, oh, how can you excuse? I know I'm like I'm getting more cautious as the words come out of my mouth. I know the people are going to attack me.

I'm just trying to explain that like shit changes. Remember, we worked for the guy who was against the Iraq War. So we know that you can also look at that same intelligence and come to the other conclusion. But you're right. I guess the point I think you're trying to make is some of these issues are complicated. And you have to judge people within the context of the time they were in. Now, there may be other leaders who in that same context, in that same time period, were much bolder, were much more progressive, took the right position. And if they're running, then they should say that.

Right. That's part of it. That's a really good point, too, because I think one of the other lessons, too, is I think a lot of times candidates end up looking back and paying for politically older, politically expedient positions because there were very sincere arguments around Democrats being tough on crime in the 90s. But one of the reasons Democrats were tough on crime is they were trying to demonstrate something to voters. They were trying to prove that they weren't the caricature that Republicans under in the Reagan years had made Democrats out to be that that look, we're going to put cops on the street so you can trust us. We're law and order, too. And, you know, now it's all these years later and we've we've changed and come to see things differently and and it led them to me and that worry that political concern led them to make bad policy decisions and it is a lesson to people today do not let fucking consultants and pollsters and and washington in general let you make decisions out of political expediency do what you think is right and if. And if what's right is progressive, great. If it's more centrist, that's fine too, but it should be what you fucking believe.

You know? Yeah, I mean, look, those policies were wrong. They were racist. They needed to be walked back, and I'm glad that we're having a conversation about it. No, it's like what you said at the beginning of this conversation, which it is a credit to the activists on the ground who have made criminal justice reform an issue in this country because

they've raised awareness about it. That is the only reason we're talking about it right now. It's not politicians that brought it to the forefront. It's activists on the ground. And here's, I think the really good news is I do think that one thing that's making this primary already feel different is I don't, you feel, what you feel from a lot of these candidates is their desire to prove to Democratic voters that they get it, that they're on their side, they're not trimming their sails, they're not afraid of Republican voters, they're not out there trying to convince independents that they're centrists. They are trying to prove that they have heard loud and clear that we are going to be for bold, progressive, liberal policy answers to the challenges we face.

And we are willing to stake our chances on making that case rather than some mealy-mouthed center answer. What I'm more interested in is, okay, you've evolved or you've moved over the years and now you're proposing big, bold policy ideas. Are you going to stay there? Because the real test is, do you stay there in a general election when it's tougher to do that? And then the even tougher test is, do you stand there on that position and push those policies when you're president of the United States? You've got competing priorities. You've got a lot of political pressures. You've got a bunch of conservative Democrats still in Congress that aren't going to back. You've got Republicans who don't want to work with you on anything, right? Like, will you, which positions will you stand by? Which will you really fight for? And I think sussing that out from each candidate,

who's going to be real when they get there is going to be the challenge of the primary. Yeah, that's really important. That's really important too, because policy positions are one thing, but the reason Obamacare became Obamacare is because there was a person in that job who took the chance. And all the criticisms that get leveled against Obamacare now, getting that done was the accomplishment of a century. And there were many people around Barack Obama saying to go for something smaller. Pull the bill. When Scott Walker won, pull the bill. Go with the patient's bill of rights,

a small expansion of Medicaid. You will lose if you keep pushing this, is what he was told by advisers. Barack Obama said, I don't care if I'm a one-term president. This is more important. I'm going to push this. You should elect a president

who is going to do that when told by a bunch of advisers that something that we all care about is very unpopular. Which is why for all the branding and all the messaging and all the kind of videos we're going to see now, when push comes to shove, it does actually matter what these people say when they get the unexpected question, when they're on their heels, when they're exhausted, when they face a setback,

when they face a problem, because that's what presidents face every single day. Okay. And we'll be talking to one of these potential presidents right after the break. We'll be back with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. On the pod today, we have right here in studio, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. Hello. Presidential candidate. Yes. Thanks for coming by. I'm delighted to be here. Congrats on the announcement. Thank you. Congrats on a great first trip to Iowa. It was amazing. I had more fun than you can possibly imagine. Yes. Yeah.

So I'm always fascinated by the process of making a decision as momentous as running for president. When did you first seriously consider running? And why did you ultimately decide that this particular moment in history was the right moment for you to run? Well, I've been feeling very called at this moment to do what is necessary to right the ship. I really believe in right versus wrong. And up until the last election, wrong was winning. And I have been feeling that I need to fight for this country, for families, for children as hard as I would fight for my own children. And it's why I believe we have to fight for the causes that so many of us have been fighting for. Health care is a right, better public schools, making sure people can earn their way into the middle class and live the American dream.

But I think it's going to take a kind of conviction and a courage that understands we have to take on the status quo in a way that perhaps we never have, because Washington's run on corruption and special interests. Every legislation gets written in the dead of night, and someone's making sure that the corporate interests and the corporate greed is constantly protected. And that's what I feel I really have to challenge, because you're never going to get any of that stuff done if you're unwilling to. really have to challenge because you're never going to get any of that stuff done if you're unwilling to. And so over the last couple of months, I really wanted to spend time with my family to talk to them personally. Is this a sacrifice you're willing to make? Are we willing as a family to do everything we can to change what's happening in this country and restore,

in my mind, what's been lost? And we just need a time together to really think about it and understand. I mean, I have a 10-year-old. Henry's going to give a lot to this country in the next year or two. He's used to mommy making breakfast every morning, lunch, dinner every night, picking him up from school. How does he feel about the decision? Spending weekends together. I think he was a little concerned, but he also feels called to this moment in a way that I think any parent who's listening to this will understand. President Trump's created a lot of anxiety in the world and a lot of hate and division. And I think people are feeling that this is the moment they have to do whatever it takes. And even Henry, who's 10, feels, no, Mom, you might be the only one who can beat him.

You should do this. My 15-year-old saying, Mom, I think you should do it. He's terrible. He's doing all these terrible things around the country and the world, and you should do this. And so I just needed time with them. So over the last few months, I made the decision to actually do this. And I just feel like all of us have to just use whatever time, talent, courage, passion we have to change what's happening. So it's shaping up to be a very crowded field.

There's a lot of talent. There's a lot of diversity. There's a lot of experience. There's also a lot of consensus around sort of a very big, bold, progressive policy agenda. What makes you different? How do you stand out in the field of Democratic candidates? Well, we all have our own stories, of course, and I'm a mother with young kids. And what drives me to public service is that I do want to fight for other people's kids as hard as I fight for my own. And I have been working over the last 12 years in public service to bring people together to find solutions for really hard problems. And I do that by listening to all my constituents, whether they're in red parts or blue parts or purple parts of my state. I serve all of them.

And because I listen and then find common ground and build for there, I get a lot done. I passed the 9-11 health bill twice for first responders all across this country, people who ran up the towers on 9-11 when everybody else was coming down. And unfortunately, because they've been breathing in all these toxins for now, you know, decades, they're dying. And so I had to lift up their voices and carry their stories with the 9-11 responders knocking on doors with me, all those senators, and got it passed. I also was able to bring people together on Don't Ask, Don't Tell repeal. Even Democrats at the time and advocates at the time were saying, you can't do this. And this is not a convenient

time or this isn't the right strategy. And I just was very clear that when is civil rights convenient? You have to fight for it for the right reasons because you have to fight for it because it's necessary. These are men and women who will die for this country and they're being denied the ability to serve based on who they love. And then transparency and accountability. I passed the Stock Act telling members of Congress they can't engage in insider trading. Surprise, surprise. telling members of Congress they can't engage in insider trading. Surprise, surprise. And doing things about transparency and accountability, posting my schedule, went back when we had earmarks, my taxes online. So I get things done and I bring people together. And last, I fight.

I do not back down from a fight, especially if it's the right fight for the right reasons. And it doesn't matter if it's hard. I will fight, especially if it's hard right fight for the right reasons. And it doesn't matter if it's hard. I will fight, especially if it's hard. And I've shown that I could do that by taking on the generals in the Pentagon over sexual harassment in the military, being willing to take on special interests on all hosts of ideas, and making sure that we do the right thing even when it's hard and especially when it's hard. So one of the most difficult decisions that a president makes is how to prioritize keeping all the different campaign promises. Right. So you remember this. Obama comes into office and spends much of the first two years, aside from trying to fix the financial crisis, passing the Affordable Care Act.

And that meant that some big ticket priorities like immigration reform, you know, voting rights reform sort of took a back seat. You've proposed quite a few very big, bold progressive policies, Medicare for All, universal family leave, publicly funded elections, a federal job guarantee. Which of those do you tackle first as president? Well, the thing that I hear most about, to be perfectly honest, no matter where I've traveled over the last year for the candidates, because I was working really hard to flip the house,

of course, and hold our Senate seats and the victories in Nevada and Arizona are amazing. I talk to voters everywhere. And the number one thing still on their minds is health care. And I can't explain to you how important this is, because if you don't have access to health care because you can't afford it or because you're being denied because of an insurer, you might not think you'll survive to be able to provide for your kids. You might think my child has a preexisting condition and he'll die if I can't get the treatment or the medicine that he needs. So this is an issue of life or death. So I would really like to bring people together and focus on healthcare as a right to not a privilege. I think Medicare for all is the right solution. I campaigned on Medicare for all in 2006 in my two to one Republican district. And I made it really simple for folks back then. They just said, our insurance charges too much too much money, copays are too high, deductibles are too high, keeps going up. I said,

well, how would you feel if you could just buy into Medicare at a percentage of your income, something like 5%? Would that be something you're interested in? And they said, of course, because they knew, number one, it creates competition because you're having a not-for-profit public option that will drive competition with the for-profit insurers. And number two, they knew Medicare is good. It covers most things, the things they want. And even after this last presidential election, I would talk to voters in upstate New York. And the thing I'd hear is, I'm angry that my neighbor earns $5,000 less than me, and he gets access to Medicaid, and I don't. And it's unfair. So folks want access to basic health care. So I would really focus on that. I would focus on

education, making sure our public schools aren't crumbling and people actually have a chance to get a good education and have a hope for a future. And I would focus on the economy, particularly jobs, making sure we can get anyone who wants to work full time, who wants to work hard, the training they need to get a job and get this country to full employment. Those are the kinds of common sense things. I think you can bring people together on those issues. So they feel like this is certainly about them and their community no matter where they live. So it's interesting in, in you referenced your 2006 campaign and you were for a Medicare buy-in there, and Medicare is a public option that lets you buy into Medicare. You've recently signed on to Bernie Sanders' Medicare for All bill, which is much more sweeping, right?

It's a transition out of private insurance altogether. What made you decide that Bernie's bill was a better bet than just a Medicare buy-in, which some other senators are offering as well. So the part of Senator Sanders' bill that I got to write was the transition, which is the part that I think is really important for people to understand. It's a four-year transition where anybody can buy in at 4% of their income to create competition in the market and let people begin to choose what works for you. I promise you, if you have a choice of paying your insurers and less amounts of money and not great coverage and actually buying into Medicare, people are going to choose that because it is affordable medicine, affordable healthcare, quality service. And I want people to look at this as something that is theirs, like an earned benefit. Because what we have with social security, it's really clear. You buy in across your lifetime at 6% of your income up to a certain amount. I would blow that cap, by the way, as a way to have more people invest into our social safety net through all incomes. And then

let people buy at 4%. So if you bought at a 4% and for your earned benefit of health care, people can understand that. If you're committing 10% of your income overall to make sure that you have access to health care as a right, not a privilege, to make sure that you will not die in poverty, that you will have a safety net when you're a senior. I think that's the kind of thing that makes sense to people. And so that's the part of the bill I wrote that I really like. And that's how you get to single payer. That's how you get to true Medicare for all, because you're letting people participate in a way that makes sense to them. Are you worried at all that even with the transition period, you know, there's going to be people who say, because we know there's a lot of people in this country who like the insurance they have, they like getting their employer-sponsored insurance.

I think you've got to try. It's the only way we're going to get there, because if you just keep fixing the current system, the current system's built on for-profit insurance industry. It's built on a for-profit industry that has obligations to their shareholders and they pay their CEOs millions of dollars. So if you're putting all that fat into another industry, it's not going directly to the doctors and the nurses and the hospitals

that are doing the work. And so I want our money, my money, your money to go for the things we want to buy, which is better healthcare. And so I don't want my money to go to an insurance company. You don't need to have insurance to have healthcare in this country. Let's just buy into healthcare. So it's an unnecessary layer of fat that I would like to remove. And that's why if you explain to the American people, this is going to be your earned benefit in the same way that social security is, I think they're going to vote for it. I think they're actually going to say this is something. And again,

when I ran in 2006 in a two to one Republican district, this was my solution for healthcare. People liked it. They felt comfortable with it. And they voted for me for those reasons. Yeah. No, I've talked to Obama Trump voters who like, I love Medicare for all. And you're like, you voted for Donald Trump. Well, he ran on, if you remember, we need universal healthcare that's cheaper and better. Well, that's Medicare for all. And it's not going to happen because he didn't mean it. He never meant it. Do you support a green new deal? I do. I think the platform, there's not a lot of details yet behind the Green New Deal, but the platform of it is really exciting because it recognizes, and the way I see a green economy is this.

I think we need a moonshot. We need to tell the American people we are going to have a green economy in the next 10 years, not because it's easy but because it's hard, because it's a measure of our innovation and effectiveness. Like that JFK moment where he says, this is what we're going to do in 10 years, not because it's easy, but because it is hard. And I think if you lay out a large agenda that really transforms the economy in a lot of places, and I'll explain the places where I've been working for a long time, which are very much part of that platform. So the simple thing, jobs.

You can create more economic growth if you invest in entrepreneurialism and innovation. If you actually invest in wind turbines, in solar panels, in geothermal, in hydropower, in biofuels, if you use our ability to innovate and invent, you will solve the problem of moving into a green energy economy. And by doing that, you're going to create a lot of jobs. You also can use the investment of investing in efficiencies. So there's a school in upstate New York where they teach green energy, and it's what they do. And so the kids learn how to build a home that's LED certified. They learn how to install solar panels and wind turbines. And they learned how to do energy efficient appliances, everything. And what I

was told when I toured that school, they said 98% of our graduating seniors have three or more job offers before graduation. Now, that's a true statistic. That's pretty amazing. But that's what the green economy can look like. You're just actually creating the vision for how to create a faster-growing economy. And we've made a mistake in the last 10 years because, you know, Congress always hems and haws and doesn't provide these tax benefits for innovation. We've let the tax credits elapse and expire. And so industries that would normally be investing over and over again chose not to. And you know what happened? All that innovation, all that manufacturing went to China.

So now China is in a better position to innovate than America is because they took on the goal of making green energy a real part of their economy. So make it a real part of the economy. Let me just do two more things. Yeah, no, no. Go ahead. The platform is so big. A lot of this stuff I've been working on for a long time.

And it's very complicated. So the other part of the this stuff I've been working on for a long time. And it's very complicated. So the other part of the platform that I've been working on for the last 10 years is clean air, clean water. Because clean air and clean water should be a right and not a privilege. It should be a right for every community. And so you take any part of this country. They have brownfield sites. They have dirty water from eras of pollution by different manufacturers. New York State, we have the largest superfund site

called the Hudson River because of PCBs. The county I live in, in Rensselaer County, has been polluted by companies that have been manufacturing with plastics. And so now we have PFOA in our water. So you need to focus on clean air and clean water as a major goal for addressing global climate change and for addressing a green economy. Because if you don't have it, communities can't thrive or survive. It's really important. I think you should put a price on carbon. If you really want to attack global climate change effectively, you should put a price on carbon because what you're doing is you're incentivizing good behavior. You're saying if you want to be a polluter, fair enough, but you're going to have to pay a lot more because you're harming the rest of us and we're going to have to pay all those hospital bills. That's going to come to the taxpayer eventually. So you don't get the benefit of being a big polluter unless you're going to pay for it. But if you're going to be the inventor and the innovator who's going to create the new energy efficient processes, you get the least. There was a referendum in Washington state

that Jay Inslee tried that a carbon tax didn't pass. Obviously, I think everyone agrees like on the polluter, the polluter should pay, but it sometimes goes down to... No, it doesn't. It doesn't have to be regressive. That's a different tax. That's like putting a price on gasoline. That's a different approach.

Putting a price on carbon is much more about incentivizing good behavior and disincentivizing bad behavior. It's all how you structure it, right? It's a market. Yes, it's a market. And it works. It's worked in other places. There's been places where it didn't work because of fraud and corruption.

But it is using market dynamics to help you. So I think it's a good thing that we should be talking about as well. And I just believe that global climate change is one of the greatest threats to humanity. It is a life or death threat that we have to face right now. And it's been a life or death threat for a long time across this country. I mean, we lost so many lives during Superstorm Sandy and Tropical Storm Irene and Lee. It really, I mean, I met parents who lost their babies because when a mom got out of a car to get her kids to safety, the water swelled to 10 feet and literally took them out

of her arms. People die and you cannot turn a blind eye. And anybody who does, I don't think should be in public service because it's not, they're not making the differences that need to be made. Do you think that a federal job guarantee should be part of a Green New Deal? It's in some of the drafts of the plan. And I know you've been for a federal job guarantee separately. So I believe in full employment and I think you should get to a full employment. And the way you do that, in my mind, is you make sure that anybody who wants to be working full time can get whatever job training it takes to get a full-time job. And we've been doing that in New York and a couple places effectively.

And the way I think you could do it is you partner with the community colleges and the state schools and the apprenticeship programs and the not-for-profits that do this today, do the really good hands-on job training to get the skills you need for the job that is available. In upstate New York, one of our local manufacturers, Bombardier, needed advanced welders. And so they said, we couldn't find anybody in 500-mile radius

of our manufacturing plant. So they went to the community college and said, will you offer this coursework? We'll hire everyone. It's a $70,000-a-year job. Sure enough, it works perfectly. So now they have all the welders they need. A great not-for-profit I just toured in the Bronx called Perscola. And it's a not-for-profit. It's fully funded. It's free training for anybody

who wants to learn something in cyber or in computer technology. So they've taught young adults how to code, how to build computers, how to fix computers, how to do cybersecurity.. They're already doing it. So amplify their work, investing in that directly. So you know if you're underemployed or unemployed and you want a better job or higher wages, you have someplace you can go and know that there's a path for you. But should government be an employer of last resort? Sure can be, particularly public service. And that's another idea I have. So I believe that public service is life-changing for people. I believe that if you give someone a chance to put others before themselves, it changes their hearts.

It changes who they are. It changes what they care about. And I think if you told every young person in America, if you do a year of public service, we're going to give you two years of community college free. If you do two years of public service, we'll give you four years free for community college or state schools or any not-for-profit training program. And so I would combine that with your full employment goal so that young people can also get good training. And then encouraging them in those public service jobs, go into healthcare for a year. We used to have candy stripers in upstate New York. I don't know if you ever had them where you are, but you could

go work in a hospital just as an intern to just help. You could create a not-for-profit training for people in healthcare. Because our baby boomers are retiring, we're going to have an onslaught of Alzheimer's like you've never seen before. We don't have enough home health aides to meet that need. And so really giving young people, go into health care, go into first responders. You know, if you want to be a firefighter, a police officer, military, education, amplify what we're already doing in Teach for America, extend that. One of the things that Ted Kennedy did right when I was first part of the Senate was trying to create more slots for public service. I remember that. I was very excited about that bill.

I think it was still only maybe $50,000. But imagine if any kid could say, I'm going to dedicate at least a year or two of my life to public service before they decide what they want to be. I think it would change everything. So I'd combine those things together to get to full employment. So at best, you as president would have a Democratic majority in the House and a narrow Senate majority, certainly not 60 votes, right, after this election. So there are no Senate Republicans in favor of Medicare for All, probably very few in favor of a big program like Green New Deal or something like that. As president, would you push, hopefully, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to get rid of the filibuster so you can pass something like Medicare for All or Green New Deal?

Well, the filibuster is mostly gone now. So it barely exists. No, I think... Well, yeah, that's why I'm sort gone now. So it barely exists. Well, yeah, that's why I'm sort of thinking like... It barely exists. It barely exists. There's pretty much a 51 vote threshold now for everything. The only part we had left in place was for art for your listeners, it just means that you're done with debate. And so you will urge people to have at least 60 votes to say we're done with debate. That's not an unreasonable goal because if people don't feel like you're done with debate and that they haven't been heard enough, maybe you should debate a little

more. And I think government only works when people who care deeply stand up and fight for what they believe in and know how important their voices are. And so if you're not able to get 60 votes on something, it just means you haven't worked hard enough talking to enough people and trying to listen to their concerns and then coming up with a solution that they can support. So I'm not afraid of it one way or the other. But you'd be open to getting rid of it

for something big like Medicare for All? I don't think we should have gotten rid of it for the Supreme Court justices because they're lifetime appointments. And I do think you should be able to earn at least 60 votes. But I'll think about it. I believe I can work well under either system because if you don't have 60 votes yet, it just means you haven't done enough advocacy and you need to work a lot harder. impediment to your agenda would be a fairly conservative, fairly partisan Supreme Court. Some folks on the left are saying, you know what, after what McConnell did to Garland, after ramming through Kavanaugh, who was openly partisan at his hearings, the next Democratic president needs to consider reforming the Supreme Court, potentially adding seats, potentially instituting term limits. What do you think of those ideas?

Either of those appealing to you? Well, they're interesting ideas that I would need to think more about. But I do think what President Trump has done with the judiciary is shocking and is so destructive. I thought both Kavanaugh and Gorsuch were disqualified in my mind because of their records, because of their previous statements, because their belief that money is speech and that corporations have same free speech rights as you and I. I think that's outrageous. I think we need to get money out of politics. I think that the special interests, the moneyed interests, the levers of power that exist in Washington are so powerful, they don't need more power, they need far less. And we need to restore direct democracy,

we need to actually put the power of this country back in the hands of the people. And so you need to undermine those special interests. And these two justices, they just want to glorify those special interests. So do you think the Supreme Court needs reform? It does. Well, I can give you one example that I desperately believe. The fact that a Supreme Court justice can be wined and dined by a special interest, have junkets paid for, where they can be lobbied incessantly by special interests, by the wealthy special interests, I think we have to make that illegal. I think it is absolutely essential that we take away the ability for them to be wined and dined. We need transparency and

accountability. It's something I've been working on since I was first elected in 2006. We need to make sure that the public knows what's happening and how it's happening. And I don't think we should have a system where legislation is written in the dead of night by the most powerful people in the land. We really have to restore that to the people. So I'd be very interested in looking at a very significant transparency agenda for the Supreme Court, because I do not think they are held accountable. And I think, you know, way back when we used to say, oh, they're above the partisanship. Well, I have not believed that since Bush v. Gore, when I saw extreme partisanship come out of our justices. And certainly with Judge Kavanaugh, or now Justice Kavanaugh, and the way he spoke in his last hearing, creating a screed saying this was some conspiracy of the Clintons and a screed against Democrats. And it was so inappropriate for a justice of the Supreme Court that I do believe we need a full transparency agenda put in place for them because they are no longer public servants in the way that we have always imagined them to be.

Let's talk about immigration, which is seemingly Trump's only political issue, and one that where your thinking has evolved over the years. Oh, but I will just say one thing. That stuff that I just talked about is why we're not taking corporate PAC monies in my campaign. It's also why we're not taking federal lobbyist money. It's also why I don't think individuals should have super PACs because you have to start somewhere. And if you are unwilling to take on the special interests in a way that shows I value your voice as an individual more than a corporate interest or a billionaire's interest or people who can manipulate politics with their money, you will never get to health care as a right, not a privilege. Because you need to take on the insurance companies and the drug manufacturers. You will never get to any of the issues.

You will never end gun violence if you won't take on the NRA. So this is the stuff that's necessary in this moment we're in. You really need a direct democracy and you need to restore of a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. You've talked about splitting ICE, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, into two agencies, one that handles crime and terrorism, one that handles immigration. What would enforcement look like under a Gillibrand presidency? What would you do about immigrants who come across the border or overstay their visas? Right. So let me answer the first part of your question first and the second part second. So Democrats believe in border security. Democrats believe in national security. And the initial mission of ICE was to do anti-terrorism. That

was founded in 2003 to do anti-terrorism. So we need to fund anti-terrorism. And unfortunately, under this president, he's taken a lot of the money that would normally go for anti-terrorism. So we need to fund anti-terrorism. And unfortunately, under this president, he's taken a lot of the money that would normally go for anti-human trafficking, anti-drug trafficking, anti-gun trafficking, and cross-border terrorism, and taken all that to put moms and babies in for-profit prisons and pay for those for-profit prisons. So it gets me so angry. So I believe that we should be funding the anti-terrorism work, keeping our country safe, making sure people know that law enforcement have the tools they need and the support they need to do hard work of arresting criminals and finding terrorists and arresting terrorists. That has to continue. Immigration in our country has always been a strength.

We thrive on our diversity. Our diversity has always been a strength. It helps to increase the economy. It helps to create entrepreneurialism and innovation. It's the American story. The Statue of Liberty stands in New York Harbor with a beacon of light and hope saying to the world, come, we will help you. You know, for anyone, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free, we are here, that beacon of light. We've never been afraid of refugees. We've never been afraid of immigration. We've always seen it as something that is part of our story.

And so we need to build that, and it should be under the Department of Justice. It should be part of a humanitarian issue, certainly for asylum seekers, that has a humanitarian issue. humanitarian issue, certainly for asylum seekers, that has a humanitarian issue. And immigration is an issue of families, making sure families who desperately want to be reunited can be reunited, and those communities can be strong and economic, and making sure that we ultimately right-size immigration. And so that's why you need a comprehensive immigration approach, and you're going to do all of it. So you're not going to sacrifice national security and anti-terrorism work that needs to be fully funded as part of homeland security. But immigration is about so much more. It's not a criminal issue.

It's not a national security issue. It's about who we are as a nation and what makes us strong. And immigration is going to be part of that. And so you've got to make it work. You have to have a pathway to citizenship for the 11 or 12 million folks that are here. You have to let people who are here start buying into Social Security and buying into paying their taxes and making sure they're investing in our schools. So you have to create a pathway for that to happen. And then you have to look at asylum very differently, because we have a lot of reasons why asylum seekers are coming here. You've got things happening in South America and Central America that, frankly, we're turning a blind eye to that we should be actually addressing, working with the international community with political solutions and diplomatic solutions to try to end the gun violence, gang violence and terrorism that's happening in these communities that are making mothers send their young boys to travel by themselves to America so they just don't get recruited into a gang. Think about the problem that these people are facing. How many women are

seeking refuge because of gang violence and rape and being just treated so horribly that they can't survive. So if you don't start with the human story about what's actually happening in these families, you're not going to create the right solution. I promise you, locking them up in a for-profit prison or sticking lots of young boys in a Walmart with no windows is not the solution to the horror their lives are facing or our immigration challenges.

And so I would do comprehensive and I would try to solve each problem based on what is the actual problem and get at it from the root. I guess, yeah, I guess my question is, so say, say we do comprehensive, right? And we provide a path to citizenship for all the undocumented immigrants who are here. And then we, you know, Democrats beef up border security, not like, not like not with the wall, but maybe the border security we have. You're still going to have people who come across the border. You're still going to have after that people who overstay.

Yeah, but you can then deal with them humanely. You have visa overstays, which happens all the time. And those folks are coming from countries that we have visas with. These are people we have coming as tourist visas. So I think you just have to have a more humane system created so people know there's a real process. So they don't feel like they have to go around the law because the law is fair and just. They can feel like they can work with the law. And that is possible. We've done that for many decades in this country, had a proper immigration process that worked for people.

It's when it lacks compassion and when it lacks empathy and when it lacks justice that people feel they can't trust the system. So let's build a system that they can trust and do it in the way that's healthy for our economy, our country, our families, and our communities, with the recognition that this only makes us stronger. So you spent your career as a senator working to reduce sexual assault in the workplace, in the military, in Congress. You've been called to the political face of the Me Too movement. You tweeted about how the future is female and intersectional. I saw that tweet and I thought, that is a brave thing to tweet.

Just from a political perspective, someone's going to run for president saying that. I could also hear some, you know, cynical D.C. consultant, probably a guy in my head saying, okay, that's a great thing to tweet for a presidential primary, democratic primary. How do you, how do you deliver that message? Can you deliver that message in some of these redder states that Trump won that we know we need to win back? I definitely can. And I have been because in my state, most people look at New York and say, oh, it's a blue state and it's New York City. But what they don't realize is upstate New York is a lot of red. It's a rural area. There's a lot of agriculture. There's a lot of manufacturing.

There is a lot of the rural challenges we have in other parts of the country. The manufacturing tradition is a lot like Michigan. It's a lot like Ohio. It's a lot like Wisconsin. Agriculture is a lot like Wisconsin and Michigan too. So there's just a lot of similarities with the rest of the country. Our suburbs in Westchester and in Long Island are purple. It's a lot of those white middle-class moms who didn't vote with Democrats last time. They are in my state. And I do well with all of them talking about what I believe in. And not everybody necessarily knows what the tweet meant, but I certainly can explain it to them. How would you explain it to people who don't know? So when you say the future's female, I'm not saying the future's only female. I'm saying,

please include the ladies in the future because we have a lot to offer, which is why I created Off the Sidelines. It was a political action committee I created seven years ago, a call to action asking America's women to vote, to become advocates, to participate, to run, to find a woman candidate to support, because we want 51% of women at the table. Why would you exclude half of our U.S. population from the decision-making table? And that's going to resonate in any community, because they know that their mom or their sister or their aunt or their daughter have important things to say that they listen to in their own families. And so when you elevate men and women at the same table, you're going to have a diversity of opinion about what are the biggest problems, but also what are the best solutions.

And the diversity of that really works. And I'll give you one example. So when I first got elected in 2006, I was put on the Armed Services Committee. And I'm sitting next to Gabby Giffords and a bunch of new freshman women. And we were having a hearing on military readiness. And a lot of the men were talking about equipment. They wanted to know how many guns, how many ships, how many aircraft. It was all about the function of military readiness from an equipment perspective, from what are we going to buy and what are we going to build. But the women just instinctively were looking at other data and saying,

well, why is the divorce rate as high as it is right now? Why is the suicide rate as high as it is? Domestic violence rate as high as it is? And we realized that military readiness also has to do with the troops and the service members. To say each one of these service members, they're being pulled to the thinnest. They're not having rotations at home. Their deployment times are longer than they've been in other conflicts. And there's no rest time

and no dwell time, and they're struggling. And so the military readiness that we're talking about is both equipment and personnel. And so for America, that was a better answer for them, because the combination of our voices was strong. And so when I, that was a better answer for them because the combination of our voices was strong. And so when I say the future's female, I'm talking about the fact that 120 women just ran for Congress and won. And what allowed them to win was all these women who came out and were activists and voted and have been marching since President Trump got elected to say, we don't agree with you. We don't agree with your vision for this country. We don't agree with how you talk about people. We don't agree with the hatred.

And we see a different future. And so it's a call to action saying we want to all be part of this discussion. And so back to- What about intersectionality? Let me finish this one and then I'll go to your- It's a longer question. So I've been talking about this for seven years in New York State, about why I want more women's voices at the table.

I have the highest vote margin in the history of the state, a 72% vote margin. And the reason why I have the highest vote margin in the history of the state, against anyone who's ever run statewide, including the presidentials, outperforming President Obama, outperforming Secretary Clinton, because when I'm talking to folks in red and purple places, I have time to tell them what I'm for and why, and they can see my heart and they understand it. And they also know how important women in leadership is. So that's all it takes. You just have to talk to people about their lives and what they care about and tell them why you care and why you want more women, more female leadership. So I've never hid that.

And I talk about it all the time. And people are okay with that. And they know when I'm trying to get rid of sexual harassment and sexual assault on a college campus or in the military or in Congress itself, I bring people together on those issues. My co-sponsor in working on sexual harassment in Congress was Ted Cruz. My co-sponsor in ending sexual harassment or sexual assault in the military was Rand Paul and Ted Cruz. Marco Rubio worked with me on sexual assault on college campuses.

So you can cross party lines. You can talk to people from red and purple places. If you just care about, if you talk about what you care about and why, and I've done it. So I know that I can talk to people in all parts of the country about what they care about because I listen first,

I find where the common ground is, and then I build from there. And that's how I bring people together. It's how I pass laws. It's how I get things done. And it's how New Yorkers see me. So I'd like to introduce that to everyone. So intersectionality, what that means to me is that if you are discriminated against in more than one way, it's intersectional.

And, for example, if you are a woman, you're going to be discriminated against because of gender bias and sexism. If you're a black woman, you might be discriminated against because of racism. And the burden on that black woman is so much harder because she has to deal with racism and sexism at the very same time. And if you explain that to someone who might not know what that word means, they're going to say that's right, that is right. And then you give them a few facts like, well, you know, if you're a black woman in New York City and you went to go have a baby, you are 12 times more likely to die in childbirth because of institutional racism.

Yeah. If you explain to someone law enforcement really isn't that fair. And if you are a black or brown man in my in my city of New York City and in the country, you are 10 times more likely to be arrested than a white man in New York City and four times more likely in the rest of the country for marijuana possession. So that's why I'm for decriminalization because how people are treated is unacceptable. And when someone's been arrested and put in jail for possession of marijuana, you know how their lives change? They might have missed work that day. They might be fired. They might have just lost the one job it took them a really long time to get. If their mom lives in one of the housing authorities in New York City and they want to go visit her on Thanksgiving, they can't. If that somehow gets

in their record and they go for a job interview and this employer says, you ever been arrested? And he has to say, well, yeah, when I was 18, the job interview is over. And so criminal justice has to be important. And in the economy, you'll see one of the issues you guys have talked about is postal banking. 30% of our country doesn't have access to a savings account. Do you know what? It's very expensive to be poor in this country.

It means that if you have to wire some money to your mother who's in Puerto Rico, they're going to charge you maybe 20% of what you just sent her. Or if you want to buy a couch for your house, well, your only option is layaway. And the predatory lending aspect of that, you're going to pay $500 for a couch that was $200 because you had to, you couldn't pay it all in one go. So I think as a white woman, it is my responsibility to take on these, these issues of institutional racism, um, as if they were my own, because that's my job. And it is not, should not be left as a burden for black and brown people to fight these their own on their own. It should be me who can lift up their voices, can make sure their voices are heard,

and so that we can end it. And so those are my responsibilities as a woman who seeks to serve. And so I will talk about that in red, purple, and blue places. And I promise you, if I told any mom in America that if you're a black lady and you go to have a baby, you're going to more likely die, they're going to be as mad as I am because it's not OK. It's not it's not OK. So you just have to take time. Well, somewhat related to that. I mean, you know, you've talked about last question. You talked about working with Republicans and you obviously have this record in the Senate where you were able to reach out to the other side and get stuff done. You talk about bringing people together. You know, there's some people on the left who

often say, like, it's naive to think we're going to go after those Trump voters. It's a waste of our time and energy. We should be only going after non-voters because, you know, these Trump voters, even if they themselves aren't racist, they have supported, right, this man that, you know, you yourself have called a racist, a misogynist. Are they wrong? Are those Democrats wrong? Yes, I do. I think you should ask everyone for their vote. And I think you should ask Americans to put this country first and our values first.

We, despite all our flaws, have always believed in a more perfect union. We have fought as a nation to end discrimination over and over again, whether we're trying to abolish slavery or fighting for suffrage or fighting for basic civil rights for black Americans or fighting for LGBTQ equality or clean air and clean water so that if you're poor, you're not being poisoned to death. These are issues that we have chosen as a country to bring people together towards a more perfect union despite all our flaws. And we do it because we believe that we should care about one another.

This country believes in the golden rule that we should treat others the way we want to be treated. We should protect and fight for the least among us. We have to remind America. That's who we are. We have to heal this division and this hatred and this darkness that president Trump has created. I believe that only light can defeat darkness.

We just had MLK Day. We're reminded of his amazing statements and amazing preaching and everything he's ever said. We celebrate his legacy once a year for that reason. And he's not wrong. So only light can drive out darkness. And that is what I'm called to do, to be able to bring and fight for what's right, what's good against what's bad and what's harmful in all forms. And so I want to inspire all voters and not enough. You know, last election we lost for a lot of reasons, but you need to inspire all voters. You need to inspire folks in red places, blue places and purple places. And you're only going to do that if your vision actually reaches the people who you intend to serve and you should intend to serve everyone.

And you'll bring them with you. It doesn't mean you're going to, I don't think triangulating and running as a conservative is the way to go. Run as the person you are, run on the values that you want. You will bring people along. When I started running my two to one Republican district in upstate, I ran on getting out of Iraq, which would have been perceived by some as a very liberal issue. But I explained to folks, listen, we need to defeat terrorism. And we are not going to do that effectively with troops in Iraq if the Iraqis themselves won't push out terrorists. There's not enough military might in the world to defeat terrorism in a country that won't fight for it for themselves. I said we should redeploy out. We should invest in other anti-terrorism methods. But being in Iraq is the wrong way to

keep us safe. By election day, from 30%, it went to 70% were for getting out of Iraq. So I would just urge Democrats, speak your truth, speak your values, be for what you're for. If everyone doesn't agree with you on day one, you can bring them along. We don't have to accept the racism and division and the hatred that President Trump has created. I believe you can call on people to be better than that, to actually care about one another and speak to their better angels, not their worst demons. Kirsten Gillibrand, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. And come back again and good luck on the campaign.

Thank you. Thanks. Thanks to Senator Kirsten Gillibrand for joining us today. I'm sold. I haven't heard yet. And we will talk to you guys again on Thursday. Bye. Bye.