Pod Save America - Indictment (Georgia's Version)

Episode Date: August 15, 2023

Donald Trump gets indicted for the fourth time for racketeering and other felonies in Georgia. Republican presidential candidates descend on the Iowa State Fair. Merrick Garland gives special counsel status to the U.S. Attorney investigating Hunter Biden. RFK Jr. floats a national abortion ban. And later, Representative Ruben Gallego stops by to talk about extreme heat in Arizona, and his campaign to unseat Kyrsten Sinema.

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm unindicted co-conspirator Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Detour. On today's show, Republican presidential candidates descend on the Iowa State Fair, Merrick Garland gives special counsel status to the U.S. attorney investigating Hunter Biden, RFK Jr. floats a national abortion ban, and later, Representative Ruben Gallego stops by to talk about extreme heat in Arizona and his campaign to unseat Kyrsten Sinema.

But first... Donald Trump has been indicted for the fourth time. A Fulton County grand jury has voted to charge Trump and 18 other defendants with 41 counts, starting with the violation of the Georgia RICO Act, which stands for Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations. Some of the other notable defendants charged as part of Trump's criminal enterprise include Rudy Giuliani, Mark Meadows, Sidney Powell, John Eastman, Jeff Clark, Jenna Ellis, Ken Cheesebro, and former

Georgia Republican Chair David Schaefer. Fulton County District Attorney Fannie Willis's indictment says that Trump and his crew, quote, constituted a criminal organization whose members and associates engaged in various related criminal activities, including but not limited to false statements and writings, impersonating a public officer, forgery, filing false documents, influencing witnesses, computer theft, computer trespass, computer invasion of privacy, conspiracy to defraud the state, acts involving theft, and perjury. And here's the DA at a press conference. I make decisions in this office based on the facts and the law. The law is completely nonpartisan.

That's how decisions are made in every case. To date, this office has indicted, since I've been sitting as a district attorney, over 12,000 cases. This is the 11th RICO indictment. We followed the same process. We look at the facts, we look at the law, and we bring charges. All right, and with us to walk through this indictment is Strict Scrutiny's Melissa Murray. Welcome.

Thanks for doing this. Thanks for having me. Up late. Up very late. So now that we're all RICO experts now, because there's been a couple hours perusing Twitter, because there's been a couple hours perusing Twitter. Can you tell us what the RICO law is and sort of how Fannie Willis sort of combined all of these charges

and all of these offenses under the RICO law? Well, let me preface this with I'm not a RICO expert. Much of what I know about RICO comes from my obsessive watching of The Sopranos for much of the early 2000s. But RICO, as you said, is a racketeering statute. So it's meant to sort of get at questions of organized criminal syndicates. And there's one at the federal level. There's a federal RICO statute, which if you watch The Sopranos, Tony Soprano was always very concerned about federal RICO charges.

But there are also state level RICO charges, and Georgia has its own RICO statute. And what's so interesting about Fannie Willis's use of the RICO statute here is that, one, she's used it before. There was a very high-profile Atlanta teacher's cheating scandal a few years ago that was prosecuted under the Georgia RICO statute, and she was involved in that prosecution, so she has some experience with it. The second thing that's notable about the Georgia RICO statute is that it carries a five year minimum sentence. And the third thing that's notable about the RICO statute in the context of this particular indictment is that there are apparently 19 people in this criminal syndicate, Donald Trump and 18 others. And so the fact that there is a

five-year minimum sentence for these RICO charges and 18 other defendants, that means there's a lot of opportunity here for people to flip and to cooperate and to provide information. And that's not even related to the 30 other unindicted co-conspirators that are identified but not named in this indictment. So it's a sweeping indictment. The RICO statute allows her to sort of lay out a case with a narrative that is broad in scope and explains exactly what was happening here and why there was essentially a criminal syndicate with a former president at the head of it.

The other important point, I think, is that these are state charges, and they can't be pardoned by Trump if he wins the election. So to your point about all the people who could flip on Trump were they to face real jail time, he can't make them any promises. Right. And I should also correct this because I misstated this on MSNBC last week. Georgia is one of the states where the governor doesn't actually have direct clemency privileges, which is to say the governor does not grant pardons in Georgia. There's actually, since the

1940s, a state board of pardons and paroles that makes recommendations as to pardons. So it's not even like someone could call up Brian Kemp and say like, okay, you got to do our guy a solid here. It actually has to go through the state board and then be processed in order for a state pardon to happen. And again, not the same as a federal pardon. This is not going to change if Donald Trump somehow becomes president or if someone close to him becomes president. Donald Trump somehow becomes president or if someone close to him becomes president. Were you surprised? Just in reading it, I've never seen an indictment document of a former president of trying to overturn an election in Georgia before. So this is the first time I've read one like this. In Georgia was the critical point there. But were you surprised by how sweeping the acts defining the criminal enterprise were, that how far field from Fulton County Fonny Willis is going?

Yeah, I mean, there are a lot of other jurisdictions involved here, some that are not necessarily even in the state of Georgia. So Coffey County, which is in Georgia, as mentioned, but also outside of Georgia. And she was asked during her press conference whether or not that was going to be an issue. And she spoke to this question. And again, because they connect back to the effort to overturn the election in Georgia, they are properly, in her view, within the scope of this Georgia RICO charge. And so you can bet there's probably going to be some wrangling going forward from Donald Trump's lawyers about whether or not those additional kinds of charges that take place out of the jurisdiction are proper under this particular indictment. But she seems to have an answer for

that. But I'm not surprised by how sweeping this is. I mean, this was a case that has been building for some time. She's indicated that it was going to be broad in scope and in substance. And she kind of nailed the landing on this one, at least in terms of the indictment. This is the kind of indictment that has the kind of fireworks I think we were expecting in some of the other indictments that didn't quite cash out. But this one is really meaty, lots to say. And again, this idea, this ideal of Donald Trump sitting on the top of this, like Tony Soprano at Satriali's pork shop. Was there anything just skimming through the indictment that surprised you? And what do you think of the strength of the overall case just from perusing the indictment. I was definitely surprised that Rudolph Giuliani has two middle names, like was not expecting that.

Yeah, I didn't know that either. Also appreciated how at her press conference, she identified every defendant by their full names, like very, very big schoolmarm energy. That was great. Again, I love the part in the indictment. And again, it does read like a narrative where she talked about the fraud on the people of Georgia.

And she mentioned Ruby Moss and her daughter, Shay, and how their lives were essentially upended by Donald Trump and the way in which he implicated them as perpetrating this massive fraud in Georgia that really wasn't the case. And a point that she made in the press conference that I think underlies much of this indictment is that she is part of law enforcement. She spent a lot of time at the press conference thanking law enforcement, the sheriff's officers for keeping them safe in the courthouse, the police officers in Atlanta. But she too is a law enforcement officer. And she made very clear both in this indictment and her prepared remarks

that she was doing no more than upholding the law, doing her job and doing right by the people of Georgia. One other piece of it, just to your point about sort of the impact on people in Georgia is the lengths they were going to try to intimidate Ruby Freeman. Like a lot of detail about like going to the neighbor's house saying, we're going to help you. Hey, we're here to help you. Hey, you need to be. I mean, it just sounds so much like mom shit. Like, hey, it'd be a shame if something would have happened to you, if something nasty would have come your way if you don't cooperate with us. It feels like it does feel like gangster shit. Well, and some of the charges sort of have that kind of gangster shit feeling to it, too, like forgery, impersonating an officer.

I mean, it's not like everything here is like a high-minded criminal conspiracy. Some of it just seems like really petty criminal mind stuff that you would see like corner boys doing. And that's sort of like, you know, like corner boys doing. And that's sort of like the level of it. This was like brass knuckles tactics to try and overturn an election. It wasn't just simply sort of concocting with John Eastman these schemes about constitutional law. It was like, you know, bare knuckles. Let's forge these documents. Let's intimidate witnesses. Let's tell someone that we're police officers and invite them here to do this. Like, I mean, it's some of it's just kind of really shady, shady stuff. She got asked at the press conference if she's going to try all 19 defendants together. And she

said, yes. What's the significance of that? And is that going to be is that normal? Like, how does that usually work? It can be normal. I mean, often in some of these big cases, the most common analog I can think of from my own experience was a large multi-defendant drug trial where all of the defendants were on trial at the same time. So it's not unusual. It's not unorthodox. It is unwieldy, though. I mean, that's 19 different defendants, 19 different lawyers. Then you have to add in like Donald Trump's lawyers are probably going to change five or six times. So like add in an additional five or six lawyers who will be going in and out.

And then all of the different motions for each of these defendants. And you can predict right now that Donald Trump is going to do everything to slow this down. Because part of the delay tactic here will not just be delaying getting to a trial. It will also be intended to keep all of these 18 co-defendants in line so that none of them defects and flips and cooperates. So it's just going to be unwieldy for her. But I mean, again, it makes sense to do it all together. I think we all remember when district attorney Harvey Dent indicted the Falcone crime syndicate and the impact that

had on the city and the way it did help stem the tide of that enterprise. Yeah. There's a lot of talk. Thank you for that. There's a lot of talk that Donald Trump might try to get Fannie Willis removed from this case. Is that something you's a lot of talk that Donald Trump might try to get Fannie Willis removed from this case. Is that something you anticipate as part of the just sort of general like mucking up the gears process? And she said she wants a trial within six months. She does want a trial very quickly. That, again, I think is consistent with criminal trials. The whole idea of a speedy trial is that, you know, the government doesn't get to keep you like, on a rotisserie spit indefinitely. Like they have to, if they make these charges against you, they have

to either prove them or you're free and you're innocent. So that's not a surprise. I do think that there's a lot of pressure here for the Georgia GOP to keep her in place because I think the optics of taking her out would be really poor. And, you know, these are the same Georgia Republicans who, you know, they're Republicans for sure, but they're also the ones that kind of stood up to Trump, like thinking of Raffensperger, who was like, you know, no, I can't find you those votes. Like they've been pretty principled on the things that have counted. And this is something that I think really counts. I don't

think they can bend to his will and remove her on the view that she's somehow targeting him. She's been pretty much above board with this. And she was very clear in her statement. I'm not prosecuting him out of spite. I'm prosecuting him because this is where the facts are. And it's an indictment. It's just a set of allegations. It's now my duty to prove these charges beyond a reasonable doubt. And if I don't, these people are innocent. And they are innocent now until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. And I'm sure one of the first moves from Trump's legal team will be to try to get this case moved from state court to federal court.

Do you think that's likely to succeed or what would you put the chances of that? I mean, again, generally the standard for federal court removal really requires the presence of significant federal questions or significant overlap. And there is some overlap with Jack Smith's case, but there's also a lot that's quite distinct. And that is very specific to Georgia and Georgia's own body of laws. And so I think that might give a federal judge pause in hearing a request to remove this to federal court. To be clear, even if it were removed to federal court, there's a lot here that I think is

really meaty for a jury to get into, whether it's a state jury or a federal jury. But I think at most, and most pressingly for Donald Trump, and any effort to remove this to federal court is nothing more than a delay tactic, first and foremost, to slow this down. If they were to try to move this to federal court, would that make it a federal RICO case? Is that how that would work? Because then can't they take his stuff? I think that's one of the reasons why there's so much Georgia specific stuff here. Like the Georgia RICO statute is different from the federal RICO statute. And it's not clear that it's easily translatable. So when I say like, I think there's enough here that

is very specific to Georgia that would like require it to be heard in a Georgia tribunal as opposed to a federal tribunal. That's what I'm talking about. But I don't think that they would translate as easily to a federal RICO. So I don't think it's like, you know, you move to federal court and now it's a federal RICO case. If you were coordinating the global defense for Donald Trump of all these cases, is there one that you would be most worried about now having seen all of them like in terms of all of these indictments yeah i mean like on the mar-a-lago documents cases like we have photos of fucking top secret documents sitting next to the toilet and he's you know

deleting footage from the tapes or at least attempting to so it seems like he's dead to rights there this case is this state-based case that's this broad sweeping recall i'm just wondering if if at first blushed as one of these you think is the most concerning for him, legally speaking. So if I were running the Four Seasons legal team, the elite strike force, what would I be most concerned about? The fact that you're indicted in this document. The fact that we have an indictment for every year of this guy's presidency is notable. And I mean, I think you have to, if you're thinking globally,

like that's a lot to sort of keep in the air. It's a lot of balls to juggle. Like most criminal defense lawyers are dealing with one major criminal prosecution and not four and not while you're also trying to minister to a client who is famously irascible, famously unmotivated to listen, and also campaigning for president at the same time. So I would be worried about this Georgia prosecution for sure, just because of all of the different ways in which it has really

broad legal liability in terms of the exposure of all of the participants and the fact that so many people could defect at any time. And the fact that there are these 30 other unindicted co-conspirators who, like zombies, I guess, could be revivified and brought into this. And so that's a real concern. But the Jack Smith prosecution, the Mar-a-Lago documents, and the January 6th prosecution, I mean, those are not to be laughed at either. And then you have Alvin Bragg in Manhattan. There's the civil liability with Tish James in New York and the Trump organization,

the next E. Jean Carroll defamation suit. I mean, that's a lot of balls to keep in the air. I don't envy his lawyers at all. I mean, no one should envy his lawyers. It's the worst job in the world. And it usually means that you're on your way to getting your own attorney at some point. But this is a bad, bad situation, I think, in terms of just case management and trying to keep all of this, all of these ducks in a row. A real crime buffet. Yeah. Speaking of lawyers, many of them are indicted in this

document. You have Rudy's all over this thing. John Eastman's here. Sidney Powell is not just reference for her involvement in a few of the different schemes, but also for lying about it. I think she's one of the people mentioned directly for doing some perjury in here. Light perjury. Some light perjury. What do you take from this that so many of his lawyers are included? The people that were actively representing him at the time are included in this indictment. I mean, it's not a great day for the profession.

Every time one of these indictments drops, I think we say on Strict Stutiny, it's been a pretty bad day for the profession. It's not a great look for lawyers. So many people have lawyer jokes, like the whole idea of lawyers as sharks being unprincipled, unethical. This just feeds that perception. And I don't know that it is an accurate perception. Most of the lawyers I know are decent, are committed to doing the right thing. This really does feel anomalous. But what really strikes me is these are people so enthralled in the cult of Donald Trump that they're not only willing to put their professional reputations on the line in service of him, they're now in a position where they're likely putting their liberty at risk. I mean, I didn't even like this guy in The

Apprentice. I couldn't even imagine putting my license on the line for him, much less my liberty. I mean, so obviously, when you get really close to him, he's really appealing. But I just don't understand the appeal at all. And I don't know why you would do this for this guy. Melissa Murray, thank you as always for hopping on Pod Save America, especially so late and walking us through this indictment. All right. Thanks for having me. Well, that was worth the wait. We'll tell you all what happened here. We recorded the pod on Monday afternoon, like we usually do. We thought that maybe the indictment would drop right afterwards,

and we'd come back in, record the A Block, and here it is, 9 p.m. Pacific time. Yeah, so we wanted to wait, out of respect for you, our dear listener, to not say, oh, yeah, we'll give you an indictment bonus. We wanted to get into it. We thought, all right, we'll give it an hour for this thing. I don't know how long it takes them to PDF down there in Georgia, but fucking two and a half hours? Just get the thing uploaded. that's quite a long time i thought the

judge was going to read some names but the judge did not read the names he just me he just had a look on his face though it was like oh everybody leaves there's a former president on here look at that wait i'm sorry this can't be right uh what do you guys think do you think we got them anything stick out at you in the indictment i know we've been uh we've been reading through these things as fast as possible here. Well, one thing I just one thing that Fannie Wells has said is that she likes Rico. She's a fan of Rico. I'm a fan of Rico. I've told people that. And the reason that I am a fan of Rico is I think jurors are very, very intelligent, but they want to know the whole story. They want to know what happened. They want to make an accurate decision about someone's life.

They want to know what happened. They want to make an accurate decision about someone's life. And so RICO is a tool that allows a prosecutor's office and law enforcement to tell the whole story. We love RICO. We love RICO, don't we, folks? Don't we love RICO? We love beautiful, fabulous RICO. But she talks about the fact that she likes it in part because it gives her the ability that when you have a jury, they want to understand the whole story.

They want to understand the whole story of what the crime was, not just the very specifics, but the larger narrative of what people were up to. And that Rico gives her the ability to do that. And it's just so, it's still jarring to see just in an indictment, the connection between the public statements and the private planning, and then the criminal acts that took place later, seeing it all weaved together, not just in Georgia, from state to state to state, and to see it said so plainly that when Trump was going on television and saying that the election was stolen, that we should look what's happening in Georgia, that the dead people were voting in Michigan, whatever he was saying, that those statements themselves might not have been a crime, but they were in furtherance of a conspiracy to overturn the election and part of a criminal enterprise. Yeah. Yeah. Pretty bad. To one point that Melissa made, and she talked about how some of these were just like,

they weren't all like high-minded crimes, right? Like when you read the D.C. indictment for overturning the election, the Jack Smith case, a lot of it is, you know, it's violation of the Constitution and, you know, conspiracy. I was struck by some of the acts here, you know, in Georgia, members of the enterprise stole data, including ballot images, voting equipment, software, and personal voter information. Like, to talk about this, we can put the legal stuff personal voter information like to talk about this we can put the legal stuff aside but just to talk about this from a political standpoint in you know persuading people that yeah donald trump breaks the law and is part of a criminal enterprise like stuff like that like hacking into voting machines stealing data stealing data it'll

be complicated because they're going to say this election official gave us a letter and invited us, blah, blah, blah. But I agree with you. That is sort of an easy to understand. Also soliciting, this is a high-minded one, soliciting the vice president to violate the constitution. It's like, yeah, we've seen that one before. But creating fake documents, harassing election officials, creating and distributing false electoral college documents, the way they phrase it as part of this broader RICO case, which is a criminal enterprise with Donald Trump at the helm, it does make it all make more sense and feel more salient. And also just it puts it in a like it takes it out of the political context, too, and puts it in a like a law and order TV fucking crime context of these were forgeries. These were catch me if you can, fake fucking electors. And then you might end up

with like Ruby Freeman on the stand saying, my family was terrified. They came to my house. She did with her daughter during the January 6th hearings. Very powerful. And she's gonna be back on the stand

telling that story is really powerful to see, not in like a congressional hearing, not like with politicians around, but on the witness stand in a trial. Well, and you say powerful to see that's the other big thing here in terms of the politics, which is if this case does stay in a state court, if it's not moved to federal court, this judge has already ruled that there will be cameras in

the courtroom. And this will be the trial of Donald Trump that we see like every day on television, which is going to be much different than getting reports about it when it's like the Jack Smith case. No puppet show system. Yeah, Elijah said, when Elijah heard that the thing was going to be televised, he shouted, let's go. Like he hit a half court three,

I can't do a sports joke. Like he did a sports thing. Last thing on this that's interesting is everyone's been wondering, where's Mark Meadows? Where's Mark Meadows? Mark Meadows is in this document. He's got the counts of the RICO statute,

and he's charged with soliciting a solicitation of violation of oath by public officers. It's going to be, and cameras allowed in the courtroom. The sheriff has already said that he will be getting a mugshot of Donald Trump. They won't be doing anything different than for anyone else. Otherwise, how will we know who it is? If he escapes, we have to put something out gonna get ourselves a mug shot we also by the way we don't know individuals one through 30 we don't know if any of those people have already cooperated yeah i know there's some we just you know we're recording a couple minutes after this broke but um there was someone's some speculation that uh someone

someone high up has probably flipped uh who's one of the unindicted co-conspirators that was part of the oval meeting where they were talking about accessing voter data. You know, Mark Meadows on the phone with his lawyer being like, you tell them I will say whatever they need to say. Get me the fuck out of this. You get me out of this tomorrow. I will tell them whatever they want. Six months, she said. That brings us to February, March. That is like, March is the Alvin Bragg case.

Jack Smith wants early January. This could be February or March. Who knows what Cannon's going to do with the documents case. But that is a, that's quite a kickoff to 2024 for donald look we're not legal experts no way this happens in six months though yeah no way it's gonna be so it sounds so complicated with this many people night yeah i think that is the that is the drawback with 19 defendants because they're all if you if you don't and i guess think a judge can step in and sever the case if they want but she definitely wants to try them all they have to they have till

august was it august 25th to surrender? August 25th, the surrender. I like that phrasing. All right. In other news, Trump and the Republicans ostensibly trying to beat him for the nomination spent the weekend at the Iowaowa state fair there was plenty of stumping grilling trolling heckling and even rapping which we'll get into shortly god please don't uh before we do uh tommy you're a state fair veteran thanks uh what's the deal with this event why do candidates feel the need to go and uh what are these campaigns trying to get out of it? So it's a couple parts. It's like tradition. It's fun. And it's a chance to talk to voters directly. The traditions are you go to the pork tent to flip pork chops on the grill and, you know, seem like a regular guy. You go check out the butter cow, 600 pound cow made of butter.

You check out the giant steer that's sitting in some ag tent. And then the Des Moines Register has something called the Soapbox, which gives you a chance to speak directly to voters and take some questions. And then the Republican governor, Kim Reynolds, has been hosting what she calls fair side chats. I hate that. It has a terrible- Do you get it? I know. It took me a couple of minutes though, and I was like, fire. Oh, oh, fair side. It hurts your ears.

It hurts your ears. It's a trunk. It's not great. It's a trunk. It's a trunk. Fair side chats. Basically, she lobs softball questions at candidates in front of an audience. And so, look, you know, like part of your job is have a good time.

You go eat some deep fried Twinkies. Barack Obama went on the bumper cars with Sasha back in 2007. They went on some other rides and stuff. You see Meatball did that too? Yeah. You know, he played some of the like kind of rigged games you play where you shoot water into a thing until you get a prize. Hey, we're not rigged.

I think I've been twice and the fried stuff is the best. Delicious. Like success is, did you get some press coverage? Did you talk to some voters? Did you come off looking like a normal human being who actually has fun at things like a fair yes okay you did the fair right and so in 2007 i think normies saw clips of obama like riding on the bumper cars and and chilling with his daughters and thought oh that's a normal guy i like him i like his family actually i think

desantis kind of succeeded in the same way for for locals here like he walked around with one of his daughters on his shoulders, seemed like a normal guy, went to the bumper cars. Gave her the $20 he promised and they went home. On his shoulders? Look, I think, you know, some of these people,

the voters are like, oh, that's a cute family. If you've got a better way to come up with how we pick who's in charge of Medicare, I'd like to hear it. I don't think we've covered this enough. It's deep fried Snickers,

deep fried Oreos. Pickles. Deep fried pickles, deep deep fried Oreos. Pickles. Deep fried pickles, deep fried Twinkies. Love it. Have you had? Butter. Butter? Deep fried butter.

Oh, I didn't know that. That's tough. Look, I love, as you know, I love fair food. It's something that, and people don't realize this, you don't need to be at the state fair to eat like you're at the state fair, which is something I, that's what I put that on my tombstone. I was not there for this, but in 2004, I guess it would have been 2003, John Kerry went to the Iowa State Fair and ordered a strawberry smoothie.

That did not go well. And so David Wade or someone immediately tried to get him a corndog. Get a corndog in his hand. What do you think this is, John Kerry? You think this is Abs and Ass Day in Hollywood? You're in the other state fair. Oh, man. That's a reference.

Oh, boy. That's right. Six berries instructors get that one. I like the human weird interactions. Someone handed Mike Pence a toothbrush and said, keep smiling. That's not ever going to happen in six months because he won't be a candidate. So Trump's visit was pretty quick. He didn't grill.

he won't be a candidate but so uh trump's visit was pretty quick he didn't grill he didn't sit down for the uh fair side chat with uh kim reynolds probably because he's been attacking her for a month he rolled in with a bunch of florida politicians presumably to troll ron desantis and he was gone by 2 p.m on saturday but not before a quick speech where he was introduced by matt gates and then he was uh shouted some questions that he answered. Let's listen. We are having a great time at the fair. We love standing with you. But we know that only through force do we make any change in a corrupt town like Washington, D.C. President Trump, did you intend to overturn the 2020 election? Yes, the answer is yes. Sure did. what do you think he meant by that because i sometimes i can't tell if he's you know he goes through phases where he's proud he's like yes i did try

to overturn the election because the election was rigged sometimes he sometimes he admits it i think he's saying you know my answer that question is the the election was stolen and i was trying to get the right person who you know he's just and you heard gates you got to make change through force that's what they were doing on january 6th personalities that's what they were doing outside the capital in the same way that he's now claiming that if you come after me i'm coming after you was actually about political action committees yeah right it was a yeah he's he doesn't like pax um so the desantis people are accusing trump of snubbing iowa they said he's acting like he's entitled to the nomination how much do you think any of this matters to trump, Tommy? I think it can matter on the margins.

Like, the Iowa caucus goers are a little bit pampered. They're used to being catered to, and I think if they feel snubbed, maybe that'll be effective. I think the bigger problem is that Trump is just kind of half-assing it in Iowa.

Right? I mean, you mentioned he didn't flip pork. He had his surrogates. The Florida congressman flipped the pork for him. What's up with that? Also, he's in his suit

and his cufflinks and everything. The man's a star. You think he's going to do a cattle call? He is a star. I think you're right. And it's tough. Also, these people will caucus for him if he's sitting in jail. They're probably not going to be upset that he missed the butter cow.

There's something. First of all, I think it is tough. I think it's tough to make the argument that Trump is snubbing Iowa while he's in Iowa. He was in Iowa at the time. And yeah, he's in iowa uh he was in iowa at the time and yeah he's not doing these events these cattle call events like he did he didn't do the one where you know tucker carlson rip pence anyone the lincoln didn't do this one and do joni earntz yeah he didn't do joni one and it's like i couldn't remember what it was called you know he just seems bigger than all these people sitting down for these things so they end up his entire visit was designed to troll Ron DeSantis and step on his coverage.

I don't think that's like you're bigger. Well, I just think that like he doesn't he does his own events. He doesn't go and sit down the same seat that Pence sat in the same seat that Vivek Ramaswamy sits in. He doesn't do that shit anymore. I would argue that his attempt to troll Pence was probably more important than his visit. Because like I think this whole primary like Trump is it's a it's a unique circumstance. Trump is this known quantity. The vast majority of Republican voters, they know Donald Trump.

They like Donald Trump. They think he did a great job as president. And they are at least considering supporting him again. So the question then becomes, is there any other candidate out there who can present a credible alternative to Donald Trump? And so it's more important for them than it is for him. And he probably knows that. He's like, they all know me. I can do whatever I want. Yeah, that's probably right.

I just think like, if you're going to fly your ass to Iowa, you might as well stay for more than two hours and do some of this stuff. Like routinely, continually snubbing the very popular Republican governor of Iowa is just stupid. Well, I think that's different.

That is, I think, that's a case of just like, even now, his own campaign advisors are saying that it was stupid to go this hard after Kim Reynolds. But I mean, that's sort of the context that this was asked of Ron DeSantis. And yeah, Trump's campaign advisor said the two biggest mistakes he's made are snubbing Kim Reynolds and, uh, having dinner with Nick Fuentes, the neo-Nazi with Kanye West.

I just think like, I can't believe he admitted that weakness. Like, you look, you know, the New York times poll was 44 Trump, 20 DeSantis. And then about half of Trump supporters said they would consider other candidates. So is his strategy is snubbing iowa gonna hurt him i kind of doubt it but like he's not running hard to gain more support um so we'll see i don't know so desantis did spend the weekend getting mocked by the trump campaign uh they interrupted his interview with kim reynolds by flying a plane overhead with a banner that read be likable ron that's funny man i love you know what every so often a campaign that's like that you have an opponent and you just you got their number you know and it just becomes really fun it was

like us and romney and 12 it was like federman and oz i mean you just you the trump people they are in his head they've got his number be likable it's such a funny command. Be likable. And this is the response that DeSantis got from the crowd while he was flipping pork chops. That's got to suck. We want Trump and we love Trump. There was a mix of both of those. But you know, it's not like when, when, when, when like someone shouts something like this at Pence or a, or at DeSantis, they have some funny, charming quip to come back at them with. They're just like,

they just sort of like glumly. He's not funny or charming. Yeah. Well, that's the, I would say that's, I think a deeper issue. The thing I want to know is like this,

this trolling certainly influenced the Twitter conversation and a lot of the national coverage. I would love to know what was on like WKCCI, the local TV. I bet you it was a lot of B-roll of Ron DeSantis and all these candidates having fun and talking from the soapbox and carrying their kids around. Well, so on that note, DeSantis' team told, has been telling reporters, they told Political Playbook this, that they think he's in a, despite all the shenanigans from the weekend, they think he's in a better position than Trump to win Iowa. They said he is further ahead than Ted Cruz was at this point in 2016,

when Cruz beat Trump, that he's in the middle of visiting all 99 counties. He's already got 10,000 caucus commitments. What do you think of their argument, Tommy? Is it just spin, or do they have a point here? I mean, 10,000 supporter cards at this point is not nothing. But Ted Cruz won Iowa with 51,000 votes. So he has a long way to go. It is interesting that the guy running DeSantis' super PAC is named Jeff Rowe, and he was also Ted Cruz's consigliere back in the day. The things DeSantis has going for him, he's buds with Kim Reynolds, the governor. They're clearly investing in fields. He's gotten some endorsements and he's doing all these bus tours and like putting real time into

the state. The questions I have are, how does a super PAC run your field program? That just seems confusing to me and weird. The super PAC is setting up his events on these bus tours. I just kind of don't get it. And DeSantis really does have votes that may piss off farmers on the margins, like ethanol, ag subsidies, etc. He also has a terrible personality. So we'll see how that wears. Not like Ted Cruz is winning any Miss Congeniality Awards. But yeah, I do wonder, too, it's like every four years this gets worse. Like the race being more national, people already having a sense of DeSantis.

people already having a sense of DeSantis, you know, Cruz kind of coming from behind to win Iowa at the time was, it was a lot about Trump too. The kind of the fact that like things were coalescing around Trump and a lot of people were really unsure about that, especially like the evangelical right and the more conservative right. I just, I just wonder if it's like, you know, you're going, look, he's not doing as bad as Cruz was and Cruz won but a lot has changed I mean Tommy I feel like that was a theme of your the limited series you did uh in 2020 when you went out to Iowa that like the changing nature of sort of the nationalized race versus local like what did you how where do you think we are right now in that um it's I think that the race is incredibly nationalized I mean we talked about Tucker Carlson was asking questions at a big Iowa Republican fundraiser that's about as nationalized as it gets. I think like I heard from a bunch of reporters this weekend that the sort of DeSantis disaster narrative maybe had bottomed out and that he was starting to do better than you would expect. That wouldn't surprise me. You also, by the way, get better at campaigning as you go. Barack Obama sucked for a while, and then he got better and better and better and

started to hit his stride. So the broader question I have is, what is your strategy? Because the cliche about Iowa is you don't have to win Iowa, you have to exceed expectations, and there's multiple tickets out of Iowa. What does that look like for Ron DeSantis? Because if Donald Trump wins Iowa, he didn't in 2016, what do we think is going to slow him down going into South Carolina a couple weeks later, where I think the last poll had him with 50%? You know, I think this is a little harder than it would be traditionally for a DeSantis. Like, how are you going to put together enough votes from Trump, you siphon away, consolidate all the never Trump folks, or the

sort of, you know know trump curious folks who seem movable i just like we haven't seen any evidence that he's done that because you can you can maybe if you stretch see a scenario where trump wins iowa desantis gets a close second and then new hampshire does what new hampshire does and rejects iowa's choice and desantis wins new hampshire somehow and then but then you're right. You get to South Carolina, and it's an extremely conservative electorate where Donald Trump is way out in the lead. So our friend Tim Miller was in Iowa for the state fair, and I was listening to him on The Next Level, his Bulwark podcast,

and he said that DeSantis super PAC people were telling him that they have started to think about a strategy. And they told him it was OK to say this publicly, that they are starting to think about a strategy and plan for a possibility where DeSantis gets second in Iowa. DeSantis keeps getting seconds and thirds and just piles up delegates, does not get a majority. They don't even think he gets a majority of delegates. And what happens is they get closer to the convention because DeSantis has the second most delegates after Trump. Jack Smith and Fannie Willis do their jobs and suddenly Trump's in a big legal mess. And there's a brokered convention and they try to take it away from Trump.

I mean, the DeSantis people are saying this. That's the same exact. That is. That is. That's also what Chris Christie has been telling had telling people about his sort of like what he thinks could potentially happen. That is, that is also, that's also what Chris Christie has been telling, had telling people about his sort of like what he thinks could potentially happen. This is madness. What in the Mueller time fan fiction are you people talking about?

Pretty straightforward from here. Brokered convention where everybody gets behind their favorite person, Ron DeSantis. Also there, there will be a couple of contests and then the pressure Trump will put on everyone else to drop out will be so intense. That'll be his whole message. Drop out. We need to work together and beat Joe Biden. Which also Trump's electability argument then is going to be, if it's not me, I'm going to burn down the whole fucking parties.

So good luck. Good luck beating Joe Biden without me and my supporters who you're going to piss off and you're going to take it away from me even though I'm in jail or whatever he is. I mean, it seems to be a few missing steps there. But the whole point of it is, it does sound like fan fiction, but it is a little alarming if you're a DeSantis supporter that people in a super PAC are laying out that possibility now. Yes, if your strategy is to lose but hang around, probably says something about the state of your hopes and dreams.

So here's a Politico headline from the weekend. Pence is having a moment. He qualified for the debate. You know what? I thought he might not qualify for the debate. He did. He leaned into his criticism of Trump's attempted coup at the state fair.

In the Iowans he met, responded by saying things like, I appreciate what you did. Keep smiling. And this. I'm glad we didn't hang you. I'm glad we didn't hang you. For emphasis. I'm glad we didn't hang you. I'm glad we didn't hang you. Come on.

For emphasis, I'm glad they didn't hang you. So, so. I'm glad they didn't hang you. I want to, so the person who said, I appreciate what you did, this is how this person is described. A man in cutoff t-shirt, shorts, and hiking boots told him. And I think it is a real disservice by that reporter to not let us know if that's country style or gay style. Right. Like, what am I picturing? I picturing. Is there a beer?

What are we what are what are we what am I looking at with this cutoff? Because like that guy that's the context for your visualization, because it's like, is this a person? Is this a like is this a person of the Iowa State Fair? Is it a Republican or just some gay dude who's yelling at Mike Pence in a way that I think is great? Or like that guy that said- What do you think? Yeah. Let's take an educated guess.

I'm not going to sit here and guess based on a cutoff. A lot of people wear cutoffs. I don't know. I can't picture the cutoffs. But a lot of people wear cutoffs and then talk to Mike Pence. The guy that yelled,

I'm glad they didn't hang yet, he was in an Iowa City Yacht Club t-shirt, which made me laugh because how could there be a yacht club it's iowa there's no water it's famously landlocked and so then it's a it's a it's a music venue okay uh and i was like i think that i don't know if that guy's a i don't know that guy's a pro pence republican i think he might be uh one of us what do you think tommy do you think he's mike pence is having a moment are we asking about the cutoffs i don't think i don't i don't know if he's gay either um here's an actual pence line

from one of his speeches that day somebody did tell me the other day they said i get the feeling you've got a little bias for states that start with an i and end with an a no one laughs that may well be true yeah indiana iowa that's his that was one of his big applause lines holy shit he is negative charisma negative like i it's okay politico i know you have a lot of i mean i guess he's having a moment in that websites to feed but come on good for him for like going out there and leaning into the criticism of donald trump stuff like it's not going to win him the republican nomination because those people like what happened. If he could have one-on-one conversations with every voter, he might be able to explain his constitutional duties on January 6th.

But I don't know that he's got the time. I don't think he'd make it through all the voters because one of them would hang him. Yeah. The Titanic is having a moment. I want to read you as. Just after the iceberg. Yeah. Just like, look, everyone's talking about the Titanic.

This is from the iceberg. Yeah, just like, look, everyone's talking about the Titanic. This is from The Atlantic. So Pence is flipping burgers and a reporter heard someone crowd whisper the following. Look at him sweat, someone behind me said. He's a dweeb and so is DeSantis, a young man from Cedar Rapids

named Jacob, who declined to give his last name, told me, you just want to take their lunch money. It's instinct. This is why the Iowa State Fair

is fun. This shit happens all over the state fair. So Pence will have to contend with not only Trump and DeSantis, but first-time candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, a 38-year-old businessman who's vowed to spend $100 million of his own money on the race. Two new polls now show him edging out DeSantis for second place nationally. He's getting decent crowds in Iowa.

And that is despite doing this at the state fair. I just want you to know I hated hearing that. It hurts so much. It hurts. He's done it so many times. He loves it. What's going on with this guy? What's the appeal? What do you guys think the appeal is for Vivek?

I don't know what the fucking appeal is of this guy. I do. I think part of it, I think what I was, first of all, there was some look at like his polling success and some of it is based on like certain internet polls where he's sort of like doing a little bit better. And those are polls where they're kind of pre-selected to be part of this sample. So who knows? But it reminds me of just when Republicans were casting about, and there was this period of time where like Michelle Bachman was in the lead and like other random people kept popping up. And it wasn't, there were things that were doing that

were interesting to the people hearing it. But for the most part, it was more, less a story about the strength of that person and more about just the weakness of the field and people looking for an alternative. So someone just sent me an Onion headline that says, ah, pissing. I love to piss, says Rhonda Sandis, attempting to strike a conversation with a voter. Sorry. Yeah. And Vivek, I think, I think he's doing a better version of I've got Trump policies weird, like, kind of Ron Paul conspiracy crowd. Ben and I last week talked about a clip where he was sort of questioning the 9-11 attacks and the role of the Saudi intelligence with the hijackers. He's super anti-government.

While Ron DeSantis is talking about slitting throats, Vivek is saying he's going to fire 75% of the workforce. So, you know, look, I think this is, you see this happen early. Sometimes there's a candidate that kind of catches a little fire. They're not attacking anyone. No one's attacking them. I would like to see him take a punch. And then what happens? I bet he has a bunch of old statements that are getting dredged up by researchers as we speak. And the rapping is horrendous. Horrendous. it's funny you said that you think he's doing like the more optimistic or the the optimistic message better than tim scott i thought he's like

the version of ron desantis that the all-in podcast wanted like he's very because in that story that you're referencing a little bit about the polling you know the other theory there is that he's doing well with high information high interest republican voters college educated they are paying more attention to the millions and millions of dollars he's already spent on uh digital and tv ads they they just know about him because they're followed they're online they're terminally online right and he's charismatic like he's a charismatic and he and and it's he's appealing to some young republicans who like for them the anti-woke stuff is important he's got you know

he's got he goes out there on the stump and he's doing his 10 commandments number one god is real number two there are two genders number three reverse racism is racism and he gets like wild applause for this he's getting he's getting bigger crowds and better applause than ron de santos and i do think that there's a little bit of like, there's a reason that like, Elon has appealed to the right. There's a kind of like, it's actually the same reason

that Trump appealed to a lot of people, which is he has this business background. He talks about it. He has a kind of, he has that tech technocratic way of speaking that seems smart and feels modern. And less creepy Blake. Well, it's an outsider.

An outsider. An outsider. And especially inside of the Republican Party, which is how, you know, he is interesting and different in that he's talking about these policies, but doing it with this sort of like, you know, Silicon Valley spin. He's also, I think, unemployed. So he's putting a lot of time and effort in. He's been doing bus tours for weeks. I think over time, you know, it bears some fruit. Yeah. All right. Let's talk about the guy these Republicans are trying to replace. Joe Biden and his cabinet are barnstorming the country this week to celebrate the one year anniversary of the Inflation Reduction Act. Happy anniversary, guys. Thank you. But the president

got some annoying news on Friday when Attorney General Merrick Garland announced that he's giving U.S. Attorney David Weiss special counsel status for his investigation of Hunter Biden, whose plea deal with Weiss fell apart after the government refused to guarantee immunity for future charges. Republicans who had previously demanded that Weiss get special counsel status reacted by accusing Garland and Biden of doing this to somehow protect Hunter, which makes no sense whatsoever. But Politico reported that people inside the White House are worried that this will hang over Biden's reelection. What do you guys think? How worried are you? And how do you handle this if you're in the White House, the Biden campaign?

If you're a Democratic official, you know, I've seen a bunch of and heard a bunch of strategists on background saying like Biden and Democrats need to do more to distance themselves from Hunter. But I'm not sure what that would look like. Yeah, I don't know. I think one of the challenges is that like they've already done everything that you're supposed to do to keep it separate from the White House. They're saying all the things you're supposed to say, not saying really anything when they shouldn't be saying anything. Merrick Garland has, I think, always kind of, he really kind of takes in this idea that, like, you have to seem impartial and that if you're being accused of being politicized and you have to go even further to try to prove that you're not being politicized. And that's sort of been his MO for the entire time. No, it doesn't seem like it's what he did here because it does seem like the request came from Weiss. But it doesn't. But like, and I think it's telling that this move, which Republicans originally had said was necessary, is now a sign that it's even more corrupt than they ever could have possibly imagined. Because the reality is that nothing about this becoming a special counsel

makes the special counsel more independent. Because does anyone doubt that what Merrick Garland was saying wasn't true, which is that this person had the freedom to make their decisions however they saw fit? Yeah, I mean, just politically, I'm pretty worried about this. I think it's going to dog them for a while. I think reporters are going to feel pressure to cover Hunter's trial like it's a Trump trial because they don't want to be called biased. It'll be a huge distraction. And I think that so far, Republicans on the Hill, despite having nothing to work with, have just been straight up lying and saying that, oh, there's a connection to Joe Biden that he's somehow profiting off of whatever Hunter Biden was doing. And they're basically

pushing on an open door with an argument that is basically like all politicians are bad. You know, they all do it. They're all corrupt. And that's just I think that's something that's easy to convince people of. And so I also don't really know what it would mean for Democrats or Joe Biden to distance himself from Hunter. Like, I think most Democrats are saying if he did something wrong, prosecute him. And that's what I hear from most for Joe Biden. Again, like the idea that he should shun his own child, I think is fucking gross and only a DC argument you would hear. Again, he lost a wife, lost a 13 month old daughter and lost Bo, his older son. All of them have died. And if you read about if you I read Hunter's book, and it's a miracle that he is still alive. And the idea that Joe Biden is going to push his son away in this very difficult chapter for political reasons, I think, you know, that's not something Joe Biden is going to do. I do think if I were in that,

in the white house, I would say you have to stop getting so defensive when you're asked about this. Like Peter Doocy the other day was like asking about the Devin Archer testimony that had occurred and he, he's, you know, he just like criticized him. He said it was a stupid question or something like that. And it's like, no, it's not. You have to know this is serious, you know, be a dad, answer like a human being. But I don't think you can lash out at people for asking, I think, what will be perceived by almost every voter as a legitimate question. has taken or that his Department of Justice has taken are like over and above what you're supposed to do here, right? Like, again, Joe Biden and Merrick Garland allowed a Trump-appointed U.S. attorney who began this investigation under Donald Trump to continue his job and then allowed him to have whatever powers he needed.

And then he just said he wanted special counsel status and they gave him that. So now there is a special counsel who was appointed by Donald Trump trump who is free to investigate and charge hunter biden with whatever he wants and he is within the united states government in joe biden's administration and so like you're right like that he he's he's done all the right things so you're right that he he that he doesn't he shouldn't be so uh you know pissed about it yeah i Yeah, I'm sure he is. I think there's like, I think, so I think that's the sort of the like, the political legal argument, along with making clear that all of this is tied back to Hunter Biden, not to Joe Biden.

But then there, I think there's also this, like a human argument to what Tommy was saying, which is, I think that there's like, and this is not something that like Biden would be saying, but I do think it's something Democrats could be saying, which is, I think that there's like, and this is not something that like Biden would be saying, but I do think it's something Democrats could be saying, which is something like, I think a lot of Americans know what it's like to love someone in your family who's struggled with addiction, made terrible mistakes in their lives and struggled with how to make sure you show that person love while understanding that they've done the wrong thing. Right. And I

think that like that piece of it is something thing. Right. And I think that like that piece of it is something that I think people I think people have been a lot of people just find this whole story just hard to know what to say and not wanting to give into it and just wanting to go away. But I think you need that piece of it. And I think where Republicans are trying to go with this is not necessarily they know that that's coming. So I think what they're trying to do is you know the two irs agents that testified that were like well the department of justice slow walked this now the department of justice that their contention is the department of justice

slow walked it's starting in the trump administration so that doesn't really make all that much sense but that's out there you know ted cruz is out there being like he this is it was basically uh joe biden who was getting all this money because he was just selling, you know, selling Joe Biden's name. And and perhaps Hunter was selling Joe Biden's name. But what they're going to try to do is connect it to Joe Biden. Right. They want they they know now that to get Biden, they need Biden wrongdoing and they can't do the Hunter bank shot. Well, they've already done the Hunter bank shot, but they know it's not fruitful as as it's not as fruitful as if they can get by. but they know it's not fruitful as as it's not as fruitful as if they can get by it's not it's that the the right wing ecosystem joe biden is a criminal it is the biden crime family he is

complicit in his son's crime that's done they're trying to get it into the into the mainstream and they don't have the goods to get it well they want to subpoena like the whole family's bank records and all this yeah they don't have the goods i do think they've gotten into the mainstream a considerable amount considering how bullshit it is. I fundamentally agree, though. I think if this is a story about corruption and Joe Biden seems to be defensively defending his son, that's a loser for them. If this is a story about imperfect families and addiction and like, you know, loving your son through thick and thin, I think that's a very human thing that people can understand.

Yeah. Finally, we got yet another weird story about RFK Jr., the anti-vax conspiracy theorist who is for some reason attempting to run in the Democratic primary. At the Iowa State Fair, he said he would support a national abortion ban after the first three months of pregnancy. Was asked multiple times by Ali Vitale at NBC News about this, like gave him an opportunity to clarify. He kept saying, yes, no, this is what I want. And then later his campaign said he misunderstood the question. What do you guys think happened here?

You think he misunderstood the question? I've read the transcript. Doesn't seem like it to me. I'll tell you what I thought when I saw the transcript, which is he sounds like some rich Malibu whack job asshole who sits at some dinner party and is just like this abortion thing. It's actually solvable. I actually have the answer. And I just don't understand why people don't get how simple this is. That's what I, it's just like a kind of just like a political imbecile who thinks he's so

brilliant and so smart that he's like, has all these answers. Yeah, I look, I think the question initially was phrased a little bit confusingly. But Kennedy then specifically says, I believe that a decision to abort a child should be up to the woman during the first three months. And then he says that states have the right to limit abortion access once a child is viable outside of the room. So he wasn't saying yes or no to a confusing question. He was affirmatively stating his views in his own words. And he also gets offensive about it. He says, look, I'm a medical freedom guy. I care about medical freedom. However, I'm going to swerve and tell pregnant women what to do with their bodies. And so I think, you know, look, it's like the 3000th data point that this guy's not really running for the Democratic nomination.

Right. You know, if you're running for the Democratic nomination, you know, look, it's like the 3000th data point that this guy's not really running for the Democratic nomination, right? You know, if you're running for the Democratic nomination, you know, your position on abortion, you don't seem like you're thinking about it for the first time in the ag tent at the Iowa State Fair. What he has figured out is that when you pretend to be running for president, you get tons of press coverage, and you spread your crazy anti vaccine conspiratorial views, and he's just hacking the system. And I hope that moments like this will lead the media to reevaluate whether or not or how often to cover him. Because he's full of shit. He's not really running. And he's a liar.

That statement is a lie. You told us what you think. That was my first reaction because you've been saying this, Tommy, that he's not just a conspiracy theorist. He's a liar. And this is a perfect example of his campaign just lying straight out lying before we get to tommy's interview with ruben gallego a few quick housekeeping notes uh if you want to chat about the republican debate in a place that isn't the platform formerly known as twitter you can join friends of the pod to chat with us and your fellow listeners on discord so

we can suffer through the debates together subscribe to Friends of the Pod now at cricket.com slash friends. One more thing. You've probably heard about the devastating fires in Maui. The death toll and the damage is truly horrific, and they really need our help. We briefly spoke to Senator Brian Schatz, and he said that the best place to donate is hawaiicommunityfoundation.org. They have a Maui Strong Fund

where 100% of the money will be distributed to the community. That is hawaiicommunityfoundation.org. They have a Maui strong fund where 100% of the money will be distributed to the community. That is hawaiicommunityfoundation.org. All right, when we come back, Tommy talks to Representative Ruben Gallego about his race to unseat Kyrsten Sinema. Congressman Ruben Gallego represents Arizona's third congressional district, and he's running for the United States Senate. Congressman, good to see you here. Thanks for having me, Tony. Thanks for being in LA. First thing, most important question. You just had a little baby girl. Is she traveling with you, or did you actually get sleep last night? She's traveling with me. She's at my mother-in-law's with my wife in Orange County.

And I was feeding her last night and then went to sleep and woke up, got in a car at 5 a.m. and made my way up here. So that's like, that's a good night's sleep. It's a good night's sleep. Five hours straight. Absolutely. Yeah, that's nice. I saw you release a statement announcing you were taking paternity leave. Obviously, that makes sense to do because your constituents in the press is going to say, like, why is he missing votes?

They want to know where you're at and stuff. But it did read a little bit like you felt like you needed to defend the decision. Do you think there's still a stigma around men taking paternity leave? Oh, absolutely. I mean, you hear it all the time. You saw Secretary Buttigieg got a lot of bad remarks, especially from conservatives, that he was taking paternity leave. I think that it is important that we take it. Number one, it's good for the child, for them to actually bond with the father, with the parent, which is good for your spouse. They need the support. It is extremely difficult, obviously, in the first month, as you know, in terms of the sleep you know in terms of sleep cycle in terms of hopefully your baby's in colicky you know there's a lot of appointments all these

kind of things and um it's important for you to be there physically and emotionally there and i think it's very difficult to do that when you're also working at the same time yeah and you're not getting a ton of feedback i mean like i have an eight month old and the first first three months it's sort of like you feed them you change them right you you burp them. That's about all you're getting. But yeah, but you're trying to figure out also, like, read the tea list. What are they feeling? What's going on? Do you need to poop? Are you gassy? What's going on here?

It's all these, like, you know, guessing games and you're trying to figure out with your partner and your spouse like, what the heck is going on with the baby at this point? Yeah, yeah. It's also just fun to be around. It's a meaningful time. Speaking of our kids in the future that we're going to hand over to them, Phoenix just endured a month of temperatures, I think at 110 degrees or hotter. I read about people getting third degree burns from the sidewalk. I guess the pavement got so hot. ago, included all these investments in clean energy that over the long term will help us transition from fossil fuels to clean energy and EVs, et cetera. But that's going to take a long time to have the impact we need.

What more do you think the White House should be doing now? And this is a long-term problem, but it needs short-term mitigation. And the problem when it comes to this type of extreme heat is it affects poor people the most and what does that mean like if you are in arizona the way you could do with heat is you turn down your air conditioning well you do that you're gonna your your electricity bill is gonna go up that's fine if you're making a good salary but if you're living you know working hourly you're just you know right now are probably cutting into your savings right

people that have to work outside, for example. You know, I used to do carpentry when I was growing up. I also worked outside a lot in the Marine Corps. Working in the heat, it's not great. It's not easy. And the people that do that tend to be your working class people. So having rules about water breaks, about making sure that they have like shade, they have some cooling is really important.

You know, one of the things that I've been pushing the White House on in FEMA is to allow places to actually declare heat emergencies. And it sounds crazy, but it can get so bad like we saw right now. We had more than 160 people already die because of heat that a lot of these localities can't afford to actually mitigate. So how do you deal with extreme heat? You put up cooling centers for poor people. You put up water stations for people to have hydration. That all comes out of a very small tax base. But we can't ask FEMA for money.

If you're in Boston where you're originally from and Massachusetts has a horrible blizzard, even though they get snow all the time, Massachusetts, Boston can ask for FEMA support to help pay for paving for getting rid of the snow or for heating centers. If you deal with water in the Northwest or in the Midwest, too much rain or flooding, you could always ask for FEMA. But if you ever have to deal with extreme heat, no matter what part you are in the country, FEMA will not be able to help you. Wow, really? That makes no sense. And we've been pushing the FEMA. They've been non-committal they have the right to do it they

won't do it uh but it's not just an arizona thing so we're used to 105 degree weather now it's bad because it's 110 and above and doesn't cool down at night but if you go example up to seattle if they get to 100 they're not acclimated for that. They don't have the buildings are made for that. They don't have the air conditioning for that. And should something happen in Seattle with that type of extreme weather, they can't ask for help from FEMA. So this is just a very simple thing that deals with the reality of what's happening now. We know that climate change is here now. Let's give the tools for these localities and municipalities to deal with this. And hopefully in the long run, we could, you know, start turning the corner when it comes to climate change.

Yeah, and just so people know, I mean, the impact isn't like people are uncomfortable, it's death. Death, absolutely. I saw a stat that the 2022 heat wave in Europe killed led to like 60,000 excess mortalities. And it's our most vulnerable people. Yeah. You know, it's your elderly, it's your people in poverty, it's your people that are unfortunately addicted to drugs. It's your unhoused people. It's your elderly. It's your people in poverty. It's your people that are unfortunately

addicted to drugs. It's your unhoused people. All those people tend to be the first ones that go, that die, unfortunately. And many of them don't really have a strong constituency or they don't have an interest group that supports them. So this is why members of Congress need to step up and really demand this. Yeah. You mentioned earlier you served in the Marine Corps. Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville is single-handedly blocking every single military promotion in the armed forces because he's mad that the Pentagon provides support to- Because he's a shithead, yeah. Because he's a terrible person. Yeah. And because he's upset the Pentagon provides support to women and families in need of abortion services.

You call this a selfish political stunt. You said it hurts military readiness. It endangers national security. Can you explain to listeners what you mean by when you say military readiness is endangered? Well, very simple. Women that need abortion care, and if they're in a state that doesn't provide that, are now not going to be able to take paid time off, which is we are giving them paid time off that they've earned to travel to a state to receive that abortion care for whatever reason it is. Tommy and his, you know, probably getting knocked too many times around the head has decided to block, you know, a lot of the promotions of

some of our top leaders. Some of our top leadership positions, for example, the head of the Marine Corps is now acting. Why does that matter? So the acting commandant can't give directives and orders to Marines. Wow. Could only give guidelines. So if he needs to change anything with the Marine Corps, it has no force of law. And that's happening in many of the other services too. Number two, readiness.

If you're a woman right now, a young woman, do you want to join a military that's not going to give you the freedom to travel should you need an abortion for whatever reason possible? You know, being in the military, you already give up a certain amount of liberty. And you understand that. You understand to give up your liberty, some amount of liberty for your country. But to say to a young woman, you come join the military, but we will take away your right to control your body, by the way, but we expect you to protect everyone else's rights is absolutely ridiculous. And someone like Tommy is doing this for a political stunt, but it has real, real world ramifications. Yeah. What do you think these, you know, not just Tommy Tuberville, it's, you know,

Ron DeSantis is always whining about the woke military, you know, just like constantly running down the military and all these ridiculous crowds. What do you think that kind of language means for recruiting and people's desire to join an organization that's constantly getting attacked or has become, you know, the NDAA, the defense authorization bill got loaded up on the house side with all these crazy culture war bills. Like, what does that tell people that might want to join? Well, I think it's tough to recruit. I think, first of all, the Rwandans and all these people think the military, the people you recruit in the military are entirely different than it actually is. The military right now has to be diverse because the population of the country is diverse,

right? The young population that you want to recruit is not 80% white and Southern. It is very, very multicultural. not 80% white and Southern. It is very, very multicultural. It's Latino, African-American, Asian, immigrants, gay women, and making it accepting and welcoming is going to be important for you to recruit them, right? If you make it to seem that this is like a good old boys network, you're less likely to get some of these people in that you need and qualified. Lastly, I i think is funny is like these guys the sanders of the world the cruises of the world their example of like the uh archetype like strong man anti-woke is russia yeah russia's getting their asses kicked by a woke ukrainian army that is open to everybody right the you know

russia is not even the second strongest army know, Russia is not even the second strongest army in Europe. It's not even the second strongest army in Ukraine right now. And it's getting kicked, you know, it's ass kicked by people, you know, wearing, you know, having earrings and talking about their partners. So this idea that, you know, we don't have the strongest military is bullshit. We have the strongest military, most professional military in the world. military is bullshit. We have the strongest military, most professional military in the world. And like these, you know, countries like Russia, even like China would kill to have the men and women that we have on the family that they could actually execute on. Tommy Tummerville just

doesn't understand that. You know, he's just a guy that, you know, snorts up the Fox News information and just like tries to spit it out and doesn't really understand the real nuances of the military. Yeah. People like Ted Cruz love to retweet these Russian propaganda videos and criticize the military. Yeah, half the guys in those Russian propaganda videos are dead already. Right, right.

Probably taken out by some, you know, millennial, like hitting a button on a high Mars and laughing the whole time. But yeah, yeah, exactly. I'm just sticking with the issue of abortion. I mean, Democrats have been running and winning on restoring abortion access ever since Roe versus Wade was struck down. You recently tweeted, I'm running for U.S. Senate to codify Roe. Can you explain what that means and how we can accomplish it and how you think the issue is going to factor into your campaign generally? It's something you're hearing about a lot. Well, number one, it factors in because Arizona is a pro-choice state. You know, Planned Parenthood Arizona was started by Peggy Goldwater, one of the famous Goldwater families. It's still somewhat of a libertarian state, and they want people to keep their hands off our bodies and to make sure that women have liberty and autonomy over their bodies. So number one, I think that is a salient campaign issue that people are going to vote on, especially women, especially young Latinos and Latinas. It's going to be on the ballot. We're going to run a Michigan-like initiative

to codify it. And number three, I do think that now that the Supreme Court has struck down a row, we should pass a national protection to the right to an abortion. We will not be able to do that with certain senators right now that won't overturn a filibuster to do it, but I will. It is a right for a woman to have that opportunity and have that choice. And the fact that some senators don't recognize the need for that, I think is a very sad statement. When you talk about the need to modify the filibuster, do you mean getting rid of it in instances like codifying Roe? Is that something you're talking about? Yeah, like I would say at a minimum in terms of instances of codifying rights, right? To have a very illiberal means of governance that's not found in the Constitution

of the United States to stop the rights of individuals with the Voiding Rights Act, for example, is another one. You know, ENDA is another one, as well as, you know, abortion rights, I think, is another one. We should at minimum have the ability to reform the filibuster for that at a minimum. And worse, if we're not getting to the point where things happen, then we do get rid of it. Got it. Another issue that is likely to dominate the campaign going forward is Donald Trump's various crimes in court cases. We're sitting here waiting for something to happen in Georgia. You know, it hasn't yet.

There's a lot of debate about how much Democrats should or should not talk about these criminal trials in the upcoming campaign. Is this something you're hearing about on the trail? And do you think it's going to be something you talk about? I'm not hearing about it on the trail, to be honest. I mean, look, it's a sad situation we're in. The fact that a president of the United States has put himself in this situation and he did it on his own. But it's still sad that the country has to go through this.

The most important thing is for us to have the rule of law and to execute on that no matter who you are. And nobody's above that. execute on that, no matter who you are. And nobody's above that. But what I do think is, since I don't hear about it on the campaign trail, we shouldn't avoid it, but it shouldn't be our campaign slogan and our logo. Because people really do care about what is going to happen to their everyday lives. What does the future look like? And while I think a lot of people are worried about the illegal activities that the president may have conducted, and that's why there's a court case taking place, maybe they may not be ready to vote on that. Now, I think there's other places for us to have conversations about.

We should be talking about the fact that this president is a threat to democracy. He certainly acted illegally, in my opinion, on January 6th. I think that's something we should be talking about. I think people understand that. You saw that in 2022, people coming out to vote to protect democracy. understand that. You saw that in 2022, people came coming out to vote to protect democracy. And I think when we kind of couch that in that way, that's a better approach, because then they actually understand what that means to them. They actually see the effect of potentially putting something like that in power again.

Yeah. I mean, sometimes we talk about the need to protect democracy and it seems sort of obvious, but kind of ill-defined, you know, is this like an anxiety that you hear and come up when you're talking to voters? I do. And it's enough, you know, it's not an everyday conversation, but enough that people, you know, people care about. And I remember in 2022, I actually, I was running a political organization, we polled on it. And the pollster came back and said, like, it's not an issue you should run on. And I said, I just don't, I think you're wrong. I just, in my gut, knew that that was wrong. And, you know, I talked to a lot of the candidates I was helping out. I told them, like, this is something you should be talking about. And then they went and mocked Biden when he said, in the Biden campaign, at that point,

when they were talking about the need to defend democracy, it ends up that they were right and I was right. I think at the end of the day, there are some true universal American values and the idea of safeguarding democracy for not just us, but our future is something that is very sacred and it does cross a certain amount of party lines and certainly did in 2022. Yeah. Another issue that I'm almost certain will be a big part of your campaign and the presidential is immigration. The situation, the border, you know, the sort of narrative around it was crisis levels, right? At the end of last year. Then there was a big anxiety about the repeal of title 42, which was this Trump era policy that allowed the government basically to kick out everybody seeking asylum under health

reasons. But surprisingly, there hasn't been a surge. The Biden administration put in place a bunch of ad hoc asylum policies based on specific countries. Those policies were controversial, but they seem to have drastically reduced the number of unlawful border crossings. What's your view of the situation on the border and Biden's handling of it at this point? Look, I think it police efforts, humanitarian efforts. So we should be giving money, support to these local communities because really at the end of the day, it's our broken immigration system that they're dealing with this situation. It's not their fault and it's not the fault of the local taxpayers. So helping them at least in that regard, is important. The one thing that we saw by the regulations that the president has put in terms of where you can ask for asylum and has reduced the amount of asylum seekers coming to the border shows us that it's a really good example. What happens when you give people legal pathways to ask for asylum and or to ask to get into this country legally? They will take it, right? So I believe that what we should do is really build on that. We should give people an opportunity to ask for

asylum in their home country or another home country, give them a fair hearing, or, and that's just for asylum seekers, or for other people that want to come to this country, give them the visa that if they earned it and if it's needed for them to come and work and do it legally. Nobody wants to pay a coyote $20,000 when they could have a legal way to come to the United States, or whether it's asylum seeker or whether it's someone looking to just work here temporarily. From my personal experience, I was born in Chicago but lived in a border state called Chihuahua, Mexico. My family used to cross the border all the time to come back and forth and work. It was very easy.

They would come over, and I'm assuming a lot of them did it with visas. I think some of them may have not done it, but they crossed over, worked for six months, whatever they were, whether it was in the fields or in the factories or in the construction business, and then they would come back to Mexico to spend the rest of the time with their family. If we give people that option,

I think they're going to take it, and then you can have Border Patrol really focus on the bad guys, the guys that are really the human traffickers, the bones that are really the cartel, not just people coming over to come work at your local factory, farm or taqueria. The Republican conversation on the 2024 primary about immigration has gotten so extreme. You got Trump saying we should, you know, like shoot border crossers in the knees. You got Ron DeSantis saying he'll take direct lethal action, maybe even drone strikes against drug traffickers. Now, he doesn't explain how you will differentiate a drug trafficker from a pregnant woman with a backpack full of her baby's stuff.

Right. You know, he says, oh, we figured out Iraq. We'll figure it out here. We did not figure it out in Iraq. Yes. Like there are some real challenges there yeah um what do you make of where this debate has gone and do you think are those arguments working in a place like Arizona that is like on the front lines no I mean those arguments work more in you know the Midwest than they do in Arizona I mean we're used to the border right you know we have cross borders all the time you know Arizonans go to Mexico all the time a lot of us own condos I don't right you know we have cross borders all the time you know arizonans go to mexico all the time a lot of us own condos i don't because you know just don't make that type of

money own condos in rocky point right right we have to watch the traffic report going south during uh you know the holidays because there's so many teenagers and college students that go to mexico right this the war zone crossing the border that one talks about. The largest migration of humans legally happens in the United States happens every day at the Yuma border when about 6,000 Mexican nationals cross every morning to go pick our crops. As a matter of fact, we are so dependent on that cross-border traffic, legal cross-border traffic, that during COVID, we had to give an exception to the border in Yuma in order for us to get bodies to cross over and take out the crops from the fields or else they're going to rot.

If you go down to the border, there are Starbucks. There's literally a Starbucks right almost in front of the border wall. You could literally look out that Starbucks and see the border wall. One of the busiest Walmarts is in Santa Cruz County. When you talk to the you know the commissioners there their biggest complaint is that that walmart is so busy it backs up traffic right so the idea and i bring this up because the border is not a war zone the border is a real place the border is part of america the people that are there are americans and these politicians

are using them and trying to make them non-American, trying to make them as not part of America. These idiots are wearing flak jackets while they're walking around the border. I've worn a flak jacket. I wore a flak jacket for seven months. I know when to wear a flak jacket and when to not wear a flak jacket. There's no place in the United States where I need to be wearing a flak jacket. And certainly it's not at the border.

You're not Ted Cruz with a Fox News camera crew. Yeah. But to your point, like every election, right, there's a new car's not at the border. Yeah, not Ted Cruz with a Fox News camera crew. Yeah. But to your point, like every election, right, there's a new caravan that's come in. Absolutely, yeah. And this year,

everyone has Ebola and this year it's full of ISIS members. You're saying like those arguments don't really fly. They don't fly as hard, they don't hit as hard

in Arizona as they do in some places. Now, it doesn't mean it's not an issue as in the fact that we should deal with this, but deal with it in a realistic

and mature manner, right? Let's try to figure out how to make this a more predictable way for people to come to the united states transparent way let's try to figure out how to weed out the good guys from the bad guys let's try to rectify the situation that we've you know de facto allowed 10 million people to live here uh and now they're living in the shadows let's get them out of the shadows pay their taxes. Those that have criminal, you know, have done, condemned themselves in a criminal manner need to leave. Those that have not need to pay a fine and stay and get, you know, go through the process, become legal permanent residents. But this scare attack that keeps happening every cycle, nothing ever happens when the solution is for us to have a very sane comprehensive immigration

reform that allows us to really focus on the bad guys and allow the good guys in. Yeah. So there are reports, back to your Senate race, some reports out now that failed gubernatorial candidate and bona fide lunatic, I would say, Carrie Lake is gearing up to now she'll be running for Senate in 2024. That means the race could be you running as a Democrat, Kyrsten Sinema as an independent, and then Kerry Lake as a Republican. How worried should we all be that Kyrsten Sinema could be the spoiler who sends Kerry Lake to the U.S. Senate?

So all the polling that we have seen, all the polling that we have conducted ourselves and outside people shows us the opposite. Kyrsten Sinema takes more from the Republicans. If you want more information, go to our website, www.gallego4arizona.com. Also a great place to donate, just throwing that out there. And it will tell you, will show you exactly what's happening. Every poll shows that she pulls more from Republicans. And why is that? Kirsten and really Carrie Lake just aren't matching up with the values of Arizonans, right? You know, Kerry Lake is so focused on 2020 and 2022 that, you

know, Arizonans are worried about 2030, 2030, they're worried about anything but the past election. And, you know, I think the values that Kirsten has shown just don't match voters anymore. And so when you go and you ask voters consistently who they're going to vote for, it's always the same outcome. Either I'm in first place in a three-way race, I'm in first place in a two-way race. Now you have to run a race no matter what. Arizona is a swing state. You never know what's going to happen. But if we raise the money we need to, we hit the doors we need to, we work with the volunteers that we have, we're going to win this election. Do you expect the party to get behind you,

the DSCC and others, and put money into the race? I think at the end of the day, if you look at the fundamentals of this and you see who is the strongest candidate, who can hold the seat for Democrats, there's no way that you don't end up supporting this race. There's a reason why we have more than 100,000 individual donations. We have 100,000 people that have given, on average, $28 through our website, gallego4arizona.com, consistently. And we are out-raising them. We have the money and the excitement to really go the long way

and raise what we need to do to win this. There is no other candidate that can do that. There's no candidate that can put the coalition together to win this race in Arizona, Democrat or independent. I think a lot of people just look at Kyrsten Sinema and are just like, what is going through her head? Like, I would love to intern on a vineyard too someday, but not when I'm a United States senator. Like, that's a weird thing to do when you're a senator is i head off to a vineyard to be an intern like she went from green party member to voting to protect hedge funds and pharma like i don't know i don't and you're not obviously not a shrink but like what the hell's going on there what do you what do people think happened

to her well i don't know but first of all like i grew up working on a ranch i'm not going to get interned to that that's like a slide back for me, right? It's just like, it's like doing like, you know, charity for labor. It's just doesn't, that's not a thing. I don't know. And it doesn't really matter in the end. What I know right now is that when I'm out there talking to voters and we have town halls all the time throughout the state, and we're not shying away from red places, you know, whether it's outside of Maricopa, rural areas. We're going to visit our Native American brothers and sisters. What we are hearing is, number one, they want responsive leadership.

They want someone to actually talk to them, you know, doesn't treat them as if they're, you know, not – doesn't treat them as if they're not deserving of attention and or explanation. Because I don't think I'm ever going to be 100% in alignment with my constituents. But I do think that I will always be 100% accountable to my constituents. I'll be there to talk to them. I'll answer to them. I think a lot of them want someone that actually cares about them and doesn't care about, you know, this last, you know, two election cycles that, you know, what you're hearing from from Carrie Lake. And, you know, that's all we can really focus on. We do our job. We go out there. We make ourselves accessible.

We talk to the voters. At the end of the day, we're going to be able to beat the Carrie Lakes of the world or the Kyrsten Sinema of the world. So, I mean, you mentioned Carrie Lake and the kind of madness of 2020. I mean, obviously, Joe Biden won, but it turned into this circus afterwards of cyber ninjas and people trying to dispute the election results. Yeah, it sounds terrible. How are you feeling about Biden's chances in Arizona going into 2024 and what else do you think they need to do to sure it up? Okay, I think Biden has a really good chance in Arizona. I think we need to focus on our successes. You know, Arizona is a booming state because a lot of the actions that the Democrats

have taken. And, you know, what are we looking at? For example, the infrastructure law has been great. You know, we're building highways, you know, putting that laying down broadband to our rural areas, to Native American areas. You areas. We're doing massive growth in technology and manufacturing when it comes to chips. I mean, this is the first time, and I think this is not just like a good Arizona story. It's a great America story. Manufacturing is coming back to the United States, high-end manufacturing. When I was growing up, the conversation was that it was all going over to Asia and other parts of the world. And now we have the biggest chip manufacturing plant in the world being built in Phoenix and all the other kind of businesses that are aligned with

that. The fact that we've turned around more than three decades slide in manufacturing in less than two years is a credit to Democrats. The fact that seniors are paying way less now in pharmaceuticals and don't have to travel to Mexico to get, or Canada, depending on what closest border you have to get cheap pharmaceuticals is a big, big deal. We need to be talking about this stuff every day because I don't see the other side talking about successes. I don't see the other side talking actually about anything that looks for the future. The other side wants to talk about kind of grievance politics about who you should be who you should hate and who you should be scared of yeah i don't think americans want to live that way i don't think

americans love want to vote for someone else because they're telling you who to hate and who you who you should be afraid of they want to vote for ideas they want to vote for like a positive bright future and whatever is coming from this other side, whether it is Trump, whether it is Kerry Lake, it's just not going to sell, especially not in Arizona. In Arizona, it's a very aspirational state. People are moving there to start their lives. They're not going to want to invest their political energy in someone who's going to tell them what is behind them instead of what's going forward. Yeah. Well, I'm a donor to your campaign. I think we all wish you the best of luck. We want to see you

win, and good luck out there. Thanks for coming in. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me back. Thanks to Ruben Gallego for joining, and we'll talk to you Thursday. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our producers are Andy Gardner-Bernstein and Olivia Martinez.

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