Pod Save America - “'Tis the season for virtual treason.”

Episode Date: June 17, 2019

Trump offers up a smorgasbord of delusional buffoonery over the weekend, his Administration saber-rattles with Iran, the Democratic debate lineup is set, and Elizabeth Warren surges to the top of the field. Then Senator Harry Reid talks to Jon F. about impeachment and the state of the Senate, and Congresswoman Ilhan Omar joins us for a game about student debt from our Minneapolis show on June 7th.

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Tommy... Did you just cough? I'm just kidding. I'm Tommy Vitor. We'll get to that later. Jon Lovett is on vacation. Well-deserved. Well-deserved vacation for Jon Lovett. Later in the pod, we'll have my conversation with former Senator Harry Reid joins us for the first time. I miss him. Me too. Me too. We're also going to share at the end of that interview the game we played with Congresswoman Ilhan Omar in Minneapolis about student debt.

It was a very funny game. Sadly, we didn't have time for it on Thursday's Marathon Pod, so you'll be hearing that today. But first, we've got a lot of news to talk about. We've got some warmongering with Iran. We've got cyber attacks on Russia. We've got more from Trump's batshit interview with George Stephanopoulos. It just keeps going. We got the Democratic debate lineups and Elizabeth Warren's climb to the top

of the Democratic field. Also, we got a brand new episode of This Land out today, Monday. Have you listened yet? I'm halfway through and then I get to work so I'd stop. It's excellent. It's about the opposition. It just keeps getting better and more interesting. It is, it's such a great

pod. I'm so happy with it. Download. Mash that subscribe button. Thislandpodcast.com. Is that right? That's right. Sure. And go buy some tickets to our LA show at the Greek Theater on August 17th. We'll be joined by Emmy Award winning journalist Jamel Hill. There'll be special performances by Amanda Seals,

Best Coast, and Jim James. And proceeds from the show will go to four organizations that are protecting your right to vote. Vote.org, Election Protection, the National Redistricting Foundation, and Think Social Impact. Great cause, great show. What are you waiting for? Go get your tickets. Crooked.com slash the Greek. Okay.

Tommy, I wanted to start by getting your thoughts on what's going on with Iran right now. On Sunday morning, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said, quote, there's no doubt that Iran was responsible for the attacks on two commercial tankers in the Strait of Hormuz last week. But in addition to Iran denying this, which you'd expect them to do, some of our allies have said they're not sure Iran was responsible either. And Pompeo has not offered any additional evidence beyond sort of the grainy video that was out there last week. The New York Times also reported that on Friday, there was a meeting in the White House over a proposal to send as many as 6,000 additional troops to the Gulf region, including warships

and fighter jets. What do you think about all this? Send them all, John. I mean, you know, on the credibility point, I mean, look, we don't have a great track record when it comes to intelligence assessments that lead to wars with countries that start with IRA, I guess. That was, when you said we don't have good credibility, I was thinking because the president lies about everything big and small all the time. But you're right. We don't have credibility from two administrations ago that took us to war. The Iraq war was bad. You know, also, but I mean, look, there's the broader problem that Trump lies all the time about everything. But Pompeo's case was strange.

I will admit that the video of what clearly looks like an Iranian fast boat, they have these little fast boats that tool around the Strait of Hormuz and cause problems. It looks like they are unattaching a limpet mine, which is like a magnet mine to the side of that same ship with the same markings in a similar area. It looks bad. It looks really bad. But Pompeo then went on this longer litany of things that he blamed Iran for, including the IED attack in Kabul that the

Taliban had taken credit for. So they're laying out this confusing case. I think they should find all the evidence. This is why you collect intelligence. This is the whole point. Release everything you have, take it to the UN Security Council, get your partner's buy-in. Don't leap to saying this was clearly Iran's fault within 24 hours of the incident occurring without any sort of credible amount of time to have an investigation. It's also the fact, you know, John Bolton shouldn't be your messenger here. That's probably why they have Pompeo out. But Bolton is a guy who is known for manipulating intelligence that helps get us into wars. So, you know, he's the wrong team, liar at the top, and a, you know, pretty delicate issue.

Let's talk about the politics here. It seems like we know why certain members of the Trump administration want war with Iran. You have sort of longtime Iran warmongers like John Bolton there sort of driving the process. process from Iran's point of view what are the politics within Tehran that may have led them to attack these boats carry out some of these attacks um in Iraq Etc why is Iran doing all this do they want more I don't think they want war I think that it's likely they feel like um they cut the JCPOA the Iran nuclear agreement right which was supposed to provide them sanctions relief in return for stopping certain enrichment activities. They have been denied that sanctions relief. In fact, the Trump administration has come down harder on them and not just tried to cut off

all their sales of oil and gas to the region, but also sanctioned their metal industry with the goal of crushing their economy and leading to regime change in the region. So they are lashing out in response. Trump also designated the IRGC as a foreign terrorist organization, which his own chairman of the Joint Chiefs anticipated and opposed because he thought it would lead them to lashing out in response, particularly in places like the Strait of Hormuz, where they know they can screw with global oil supplies. So I think they're probably trying to show that they're not going to just

take it from the Trump administration. And who knows? Who knows who's really calling the shots here? It's probably a more hardline faction. But we just don't know. I mean, it's not the best idea to speculate. How worried are you that this could lead to a wider conflict? I think we should all be pretty worried. We should be pretty worried. I mean, when you have the Trump administration road testing its argument that a vote in 2001 that was taken in response to the 9-11 attacks justifies them going to war in Iran, it feels like they're really thinking through this and trying to lay the groundwork for something bigger. And it would be a big deal. I don't think we'd have any international support. I don't think our allies would be with us.

It would potentially be disastrous. Yeah, I mean, what worries me about the whole thing is I was looking at polling on this, and I think the last time it was polled was basically a year ago this month. They said that only 23% of the public said they'd support the U.S. deciding to declare war on Iran. I'm wondering if, you know,

if you're Bolton or you're Pompeo and you want to set a gin up public support for, if not war, at least sort of further escalation of this conflict, do you constantly have these episodes where you're saying, look, Iran's a bad actor. They're attacking ships that could attack our troops. Like, do you think they're trying to build support for this?

They're definitely trying to build support. I mean, I think Pompeo told a bunch of members of Congress in a closed-door briefing that he thought the American people would support war with Iran. That leaked out in one of the many stories about the conversation of them trying to use the AUMF as the legal justification. But certainly they're trying to make a bigger case

that goes well beyond these tankers in the Gulf. They're pointing to this incident the Gulf. They're pointing to this incident in Kabul. They're, you know, they're pointing to every bad action that they could possibly credibly tie to Iran, including things that are happening in Yemen. So yeah, they're definitely trying to make the case. And it seems really like the only war-weary or war-skeptical person they need to convince is Donald Trump. It's so scary that we're, are we counting on Donald Trump here to rein in John Bolton? That's what freaks me out.

I mean, he said it on the record. He's like, I actually moderate John. That shouldn't make anyone feel good. And, you know, I think Dunford and, you know, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and that team, hopefully they're providing him appropriate military advice

and, you know, counseling caution about what this could lead to, how it could escalate, because the Iranians, it wouldn't just be a fight against the Iranian military. They have proxy forces and terrorist groups like Hezbollah that they can direct that could launch huge rocket attacks against the Israelis or go after our guys in Iraq or Afghanistan or various places. So this could escalate incredibly quickly. It is not well thought through. And it's also just a question of stepping back, like, what is the goal? That's what I was trying to ask earlier.

What outcome do we want out of this? Because sanctions in and of themselves are not a strategy. Crushing another country's economy is not a strategy. If your goal is to prevent them from getting a nuclear weapon, well, we kind of had that one under control. If your goal is to prevent them from getting a nuclear weapon, well, we kind of had that one. Yeah, we had a whole deal. Under control. And now I feel like I'm in a fucking time machine because we're having the same conversation about Iran doing the same things it's not allowed to do. Like now they're going to enrich up to 20% enrichment, which makes it easier for them to get to a bomb quickly.

And they'll say it's for medical research. And we'll say you're a liar. And it's like, I did this. We did this in 2011 and 12 and 13. We had this conversation. We had managed it in the Trump administration against all the advice from their top national security team at the time, Mattis, H.R. McMaster, Rex Tillerson. They all told him to stay on the deal and he pulled out. And now we're relitigating the same shit and we're no safer. In fact, we're clearly less safe because the Iranians possibly are going, are targeting commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, which was always the, the, one of the nightmare scenarios in terms of preventing or, or allowing the free transport of oil in the region.

Like that was what always freaked people out. Yeah. I saw in the New York Times story, there's an analysis piece about this, I think David Sanger wrote, that within Iran, sort of the so-called moderates in Iran are basically trying to argue to the hardliners, well, maybe we can just wait out the United States and bet on change in 2020. And if there's another administration that comes in, then they'll maybe take us back into the deal, the Iran deal, and lift the sanctions and stuff like that, which is, it's a good political calculation from them. Hopefully people in our country do the same thing. What a depressing conversation. We used to have conversations in the U.S. that, well, maybe if we can get past Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Leader,

we might have a different set of actors. I mean, look, the Iran deal was made because Iran potentially having a nuclear weapon was seen as an existential threat to the U.S., to Israel, and it would create an arms race in the region, which is why we carved it out and Obama negotiated on its own. But certainly there was a hope that if you cut one deal, then you can think about some of the other things we need to talk about with them and increase diplomatic engagement. And maybe that work and the sanctions relief that would come from the Iran deal would empower the more moderate forces in Iran, like Rouhani, who is not a moderate in a term we would use here in the United States, but compared to like Qasem Soleimani and the IRGC Quds Force guys who literally sponsored terror, that we would want the

more moderate factions to win out. We don't know exactly how things are going to play out in Iran right now, but they have real politics. And I imagine that the team of moderates who cut the deal with the U.S., who said this would benefit the people, are facing a raft of shit because it has not. And that is likely to empower the people who said, we need to fight the Americans everywhere we can because they will always try to take us down. And Trump is making their case for them. Trump is making their case and Bolton's making their case and Pompeo's making their case. we should blow up Iranian ships in response, which is setting a precedent that the U.S. military will respond to an attack

on a foreign commercial vessel by blowing up another ship, which is a troubling precedent. Great. The cotton doctrine. The cotton doctrine. Okay, there's one more crazy national security story I want to ask you about before we move on. David Sanger wrote a New York Times piece this weekend about how the United States is escalating digital attacks on Russia's power grid. The most striking part of the story, however,

was that officials said that Trump hasn't been briefed in detail about the attacks because of, quote, concern over his reaction and the possibility that he might countermand it or discuss it with foreign officials as he did in 2017 when he mentioned a sensitive operation in Syria to the Russian foreign minister. Always forget about that one. The president tweeted that the Times piece wasn't true and was a, quote, virtual act of treason. The Times responded that Trump's National Security Council, when shown the article, said they had no national security concerns about the reporting. What do you think about this story?

And how unusual is it for DOD or whoever's doing these cyber attacks to not loop in the president of the United States? So yeah, three things jumped out at me in the piece. It sounds like Trump has deferred a lot of authority for what to do and how to do it when it comes to cyber warfare to the cyber command, which is surprising and interesting to me it when it comes to cyber warfare to the cyber command, which is surprising and interesting to me because this stuff's kind of the wild, wild west. I mean, it's relatively new, but it's made it incredibly significant, and you'd think that White House would want to tightly control it. Two, the fact that the NSC didn't express any concern about the leak when the New York Times approached them says to me maybe they wanted this known.

Maybe this was a shot across the bow to the Russians. Pompeo has been talking about these things in broad strokes so i don't know but um the fact that they're three that the fact that they won't brief trump on it was troubling to me in a couple ways like one we should be able to trust the president united states with sensitive information but two it's not acceptable for the pentagon or any agency to just kind of run shit on its own and not tell the democratically elected president of the united states where we have civilian control of the military about offensive cyber capabilities like none of this should make anybody feel good it's all weird now i had that same concern it's like yeah none of us like trump all of us think he's

fucking crazy shouldn't have his finger on the nuclear button. But how would we be feeling if there was a Democratic president in there or even some more moderate Republican president? And just because the folks in the Pentagon or in the CIA or whoever it may be didn't like them, they just kind of ran missions on their own? If some four star walked into the Oval Office and was like, oh, President Obama, I forgot to tell you, we planted some malware in a Moscow security grid so we can take them down in a future day. My bad. His ass would be fired right away. I mean, this is the future of warfare. This is not an insignificant thing. The Russians turned the lights off in Western Ukraine back in 2015 for hundreds of thousands of people before they took Crimea. So we should care about precedent and rules of the road and what's happening. And I would think you would want the White House to tightly control these things, but it seems like there does not.

I also it's just seems like we skipped over the fact that the president accused the New York Times of treason, which is a word he now uses all the time. Virtual treason. Virtual treason. You know, he's talked about now former Obama administration officials committing treason because they, you know, tried to stage some coup against him with the Mueller investigation. Now he's talking about the press like this because he has to step up from enemy of the people to something else now. So now he's calling it treason. Sort of something we all just move on from on a monday

here i guess it's all bad um all right let's talk about trump's interview with george stefanopoulos which was uh aired in full for the first time last night on abc it was a real tour de force what a journey of delusional buffoonery real smorgasbord yes um according to cnn's daniel dale the president told at least a dozen easily provable lies the president also said that quote abraham lincoln was treated supposedly very badly it was treated supposedly very badly some might argue that abraham lincoln was treated badly he said he said but quote dumbest example he could have used. But nobody, nobody has been treated badly like me. Okay. And then this happened, which you just have to hear for yourself.

I think we have the clip here. At some point, I hope they get it because it's a fantastic financial statement. It's a fantastic financial statement. And let's do that over. He's coughing in the middle of my answer. Yeah, okay. I don't like that, you know? You're chief of staff.

If you're going to cough, please leave the room. I'll get a shot and I'll come over here. You just can't. Just to change the shot? Sorry. Okay, do you want to do that a little differently then? Yeah, we just changed the angle. It's like, it's crazy for a couple of reasons.

First of all, he's a weird germaphobe and whatever. People are like that. But second, moments like that shows you that he views the whole presidency as a performance. I know. That to me was bigger than just the, oh, he's coughing and he doesn't like coughers. Like, whatever. It's weird. He's weird.

He sounds like a director. He's like, do you have coverage on all the angles? Like, do you want to get another shot of that and he repeats it in the same in the same it also shows that he repeats his statement was stupid in the first place yes right and it's not like he's losing his train of thought when he says these sort of things he's purposely saying things this fucked up you know like i have the best financial statements you where do you see my financial statements he's's talking, by the way, about his tax returns. Right. Which once again, he's saying, you know, he won't say whether he'll provide them or not.

He's saying that the lawyers are holding them up. That's not true. George didn't really press him on that, but he just sort of yada yada his way through the fucking question about his tax returns. Yeah. I mean, George pressed him on some things pretty hard. Not everything. Yeah. I mean, George pressed him on some things pretty hard, not everything. Clearly, he was trying to preserve all 30 hours of that access, knowing that if you just kind of stick around, the guy is going to make news on something bizarre. I mean, it's also a reminder that we only

see him in his Fox News safe space or friendly interviews. And even when he does like the press conferences or two and twos with foreign leaders he starts with fox or oann or some like right-wing network and he never gets real follow-up questions i mean he kind of unravels pretty quickly if anyone asks him deliberate repeated follow-ups yeah i thought it was an interesting strategy from george because you could tell he went into that interview you're right he's spending however long he spent. Three days? 30 hours.

30 hours. 30 hours. That sounds awful. Over the course of a couple days. Yeah, that's fucking miserable. That's probably why Melania's not there that often. And so he's spending all this time with him, so he doesn't want to scare him off right away.

But it was interesting comparing that with Jonathan Swan's interview of Jared Kushner on Axios. but it was interesting comparing that with like Jonathan Swan's interview of Jared Kushner on Axios like Swan decided he was going to go at Kushner on birtherism and when Kushner dissembled he was just going to go back to him five or six times in this time in this interview when George wouldn't get an answer from Trump and Trump started getting angry at George you know and started getting a little pissy um you know George did one follow-up and then he just sort of moved on because I feel like he thought, well, I have a bunch of other topics to get to. I think he pushed

him pretty hard on obstruction and that was when Trump got the most pissed and accused him of being a wise guy. But yeah, I mean, I think a lot of these guys view it as an opportunity to give him enough rope to hang himself and he certainly did that many times. I mean, he had to do a 50 5-0 minute interview on Fox

and Friends on Friday to try to clean up his suggestion that, yeah, it's totally cool to take intelligence from a foreign adversary. Which is another thing. We're just sort of, I guess we've just moved on from that last week. Yeah, and his cleanup was basically he tried to explain how hearing works. He was like, first you hear the words, and then you know if they're bad, and then FBI. Yeah, which is not really. I forgot the part about Russia being in the email to his son pitching the meeting. Were there any other notable moments from the Stephanopoulos interview that stuck out at you?

I think a couple things. I mean, it looks worse than it reads. So if people have only read the transcript, give the whole thing a shot. read the transcript. Give the whole thing a shot. It was funny that he's so inside his own head about Mueller that Stephanopoulos was like, what's your pitch to a swing voter? He starts with the economy, and

within two sentences, he's complaining about Mueller. I thought that... He asked him how his son Barron was doing, and within two seconds Trump's like, no collusion! He is just... It's shocking. You flag this on Twitter. He is just serving up health care to the Democrats for the 2020 elections. I thought this was the

most politically significant comment to come from last night's interview, aside from the portions that were released last week about foreign election interference. The new portions from last night that were most damning to Trump, I think, were his reiterated promise to repeal the Affordable Care Act if Republicans win in November of 2020, and his promise, again, to come up with a replacement plan very soon. Yeah, that's bad. Two other quick things. One, I'm getting really sick of reporters teeing up Trump to blame Obama for spying on him. Yeah. And then not following up. It's an annoying headline grab. It's like the fourth time it's happened. Either get

some fucking evidence or don't ask the question that way. But you know he's going to concede that Obama was part of it because he can't back down from a claim once he's made it. I will say, I mean, it was an interesting interview in that, you know, George really wanted to get Trump to lay out what the reelect strategy is. And it's basically just grievance over the Mueller report. The economy's the best ever. The military has been rebuilt. Our veterans are doing great. And when pressed on something, he might be more defensive about health care.

Oh, don't worry. I have a great replacement, which is basically what he's been saying since he started running for president in 2015. And there has been no replacement. I think I mean, I said this on Twitter, like every Democratic candidate for president should be out today talking about this, because I can tell you, I don't think many House and Senate Republican candidates are going to want to be running on Donald Trump's secret plan to repeal Obamacare. No, just a hunch. And in fact, magically, it showed up afterwards. There are some stories in the New York Times or the Washington Post about how Congress is eager for him to let the subject drop.

What was his exact line about the vets? Did he say, like, I solved vets? I solved vets. Vets have a choice now. I solved vets. Vets have a choice now. I fixed vets. He fixed vets.

He clearly thinks that the tweaks he made to the way VA health care is delivered to veterans is one of his signature accomplishments. And the total lack of fluency with which he discusses the issue is baffling. He's like, I gave vets choice. He just can't speak about it. He can't. No, because he doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about. All right, let's talk about 2020. The first Democratic presidential debate will take place in Miami just nine days from now, on June 26th and 27th.

The candidates have been sorted into two groups that were announced on Friday. The group debating joocks and nerds. Very NCAA tournament here. The first group debating on the opening night includes Elizabeth Warren, Beto O'Rourke, Cory Booker, Amy Klobuchar, and a bunch of candidates polling at 1% or lower. The second night will feature Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg, Kamala Harris, and a bunch of candidates polling at 1% or lower.

The 20 candidates who qualified were split into groups of 10. Three other declared candidates, Steve Bullock, Wayne Messam, and Seth Moulton, failed to meet the criteria and will not be debating. First of all, before we get into the lineups, how big of a deal is it for the candidates who didn't qualify? I think it's a fairly big deal. I think it's going to be hard to claim. It's just going to be hard to get the spotlight. It's going to be hard to show that you're credible or raise money. It's a problem.

Yeah. Do you think they should have qualified? Do you think the DNC should have made exceptions? I don't know. I think it's hard to say. I mean, and I like some of these candidates. I think it's hard to say that we need more than 20 people on the stage over those two nights. I also think, you know, you could look at it and say, oh, just three didn't qualify, but they had to set the rules before the race started,

and what if it was five or six more or seven or eight more? Like, this is an imperfect process, and I don't think that even Tom Perez would argue that their rules are perfect, but I think they probably made the best of a really tough situation, you know? There was a lot of predictable criticism on Twitter and in news reports after this happened, and, you know? There was a lot of predictable criticism on Twitter and news

reports after this happened. And, you know, when you have 20 different candidates who have a different self-interest, of course, people are going to take shots of it. But I think the primary is a bit of a mess. The debate process is going to be a bit of a mess. I don't know how you fix that. The only thing that I thought was weird was NBC just kind of arbitrarily deciding the order of the two debates based on what would get them the most ratings? Like, how did we not have that process set up ahead of time? Yeah. I'm okay with NBC saying they're the ones who are going to decide,

but if they were going to decide, they should have let the campaigns know and the DNC know that they were going to be the deciders on that. The DNC protested in the room, apparently. Yeah. I mean, you can—now, from the media perspective, you can see why they went with the one, the decision they made. Because the more exciting debate is probably going to be the second night because that's got the more front runners. Now, about that, we should just let everyone know how this was, how these groups were divided up. What the DNC did is they decided that they're going to put all the candidates who were polling above 2% into a hat and then divide them evenly.

And then all the candidates below 2% went into a hat and were divided evenly. Actually, they went into two gold boxes. Two gold boxes? Yeah. Oh, my God. So, yeah, there was some complaining, too, like, oh, Elizabeth Warren got screwed or this person got screwed or whatever else. It's like, no, it was just people put in a hat and picked out. And I don't know that we know that.

Right. You know what I mean? Why are we gaming out how this is going to go before we know? I mean, we can certainly speculate. Who do you think got lucky and unlucky in these groupings? I don't think we know yet. I think that Biden probably got unlucky because he's got a lot of people who are going to be coming after him in this debate. I think that probably would have been in either.

I don't know what Biden's like ideal stage would have looked like. Honestly, maybe he's lucky that he's not on with Warren because she has been formulating probably the best message against him. I mean, there's an argument that Warren got screwed because she's not on the stage with the other front runners. I also think there's an argument that she could just own the night and and really stand out. And everyone will watch both debates and decide that, well, if she'd been on stage the second night, she would have won that debate anyway. So it's impossible to know. Yeah, I sort of I went back and forth on this, too. Like, I mean, my first reaction was, yeah, you know, she's climbing in the polls and Elizabeth Warren probably wants a shot at Bernie and Biden or maybe one or both, whether it's whether she takes an explicit shot at them or whether it's more of an implicit shot.

Right. But then the more I thought about it elizabeth warren especially in fact actually a lot of these candidates uh on that second night that are above two percent both warren betto booker and klobuchar they've all sort of staked their candidacies not necessarily in opposition to another candidate like a a Biden or a Bernie. Like Elizabeth Warren, she goes out there. She doesn't even talk about Trump that much. She knows what her story is, what she's saying. Like she doesn't necessarily need to have one of those other candidates there

to take shots at to do really well. I don't think you want to take big shots at any of your opponents this early. I don't think so either. Iowa voters hate that. You want to make a case for yourself. Now, that said. I don't think so either. Iowa voters hate that. You want to make a case for yourself. Now, that said, I don't think you should go up there and be boring and repeat the same talking points and attack Trump. I think the press is looking for a good story to come out of this. So say or do something interesting. Like, don't repeat yourself. Be funny. Tell a moving story. Make a contrast in a deft way. Show that you could debate Trump well.

You know, it's like there's a lot of ways to stand out on the debate stage. You just have to have a strategy and try. That said, I think two candidates who are probably happy with where they ended up are Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg. Sanders because, you know, he slipped in the polls a little bit because, you know, Warren's gaining in the polls. And he has staked a lot of his candidacy on, you know, he's been doing this no middle ground, hashtag no middle ground thing, which is basically about Joe Biden. And so I think Bernie sort of wants the contrast with Biden. And you saw, you know, his campaign manager, Fad Shakir, said on the record, you know, we couldn't be happier with this debate stage pairing because now we can talk about what's really at stake in the primary. Like, it seems like Bernie could be the one that goes right

after Biden. That's right. And Mayor Pete's whole case is generational change. And the visual of being with Bernie and Biden certainly will make that case because he's a lot younger. And the other person who gets that opportunity, I think,ala harris because um hers her case is both generational change and that she can build this um multi-racial coalition and her being on stage come you know as sort of one of the front runners one of the top five or six um on stage contrasted with bernie and biden probably helps her i think the thing is funny he's like yes they've divided the debate night equally but that doesn't mean everyone on stage is going to get equal time. There's a lot of discretion here that will go to the moderator. If a candidate is attacked, he or she will get to respond in kind.

So there could be some candidates who just get lost. I do think this first debate night is going to be fascinating, and you don't want to bet on anything, but my hunch is that there's probably going to be less conflict among that crowd. Because I think the other candidates who probably did well here in the drawing on anything, but my hunch is that there's probably going to be less conflict among that crowd. I mean, because I think the other candidates who probably did well here in the drawing were Beto and Klobuchar and Booker, because now those three who sort of been, I don't know whether you call them second tier or third tier, you know, they're all kind of stuck between two and five percent in the polls. Now they get to be on stage without Biden, Bernie, who the moderators might try to make go at

each other, or even Buttigieg or people like that who've been getting a lot more attention. And maybe they have a chance in that first debate to sort of stand out. But it doesn't seem like any of them are going to stand out by going after Warren or each other. No. And my guess is the moderators on the first night still try to bait those candidates into criticizing Biden because he's perceived as a frontrunner. And Beto has been hammering away at Biden by name on a whole bunch of issues recently. So we'll see if he keeps doing that. And I can't really imagine anyone on that first night going after Warren.

Can you? No. And on what grounds? That's what I'm saying. No one has sort of like prepped the territory for this, which I thought is interesting. How do candidates prepare for a debate like this? We talked about this a little bit. I mean, so the one argument for saying

maybe your time is better spent not on the debate stage is that you're not spending two or three days locked down with your advisors at a debate camp, preparing lines, going through research, preparing responses, literally practicing, having your staffers play candidates who you're up against. I mean, I imagine that these guys, these candidates went down for two or three days and are holed up somewhere in a conference room, just practicing nonstop. Yeah. And look, I've been in debates, preps and debate preps, both for

with Obama when he's been prepping for a general election debate and a primary debate, general election debates are a completely different ball game, right? You actually have time to make your case. So you're practicing different lines of attack and all this bullshit. The primary debate preps are just like, okay,

you're going to have five, six, seven minutes, probably with this, these crowds at most. What do you want to say? What's your story? And I thought, you know,

Peter Hamby wrote a story in Vanity Fair about the debates and there was advice from David Kochel, who was a Republican who prepped both Romney and Jeb Bush. I thought this was such

a fantastic piece of advice. I just want to read it. Whoever can tell the best, most compelling story in the three minutes they have will be the one who helps themselves the most. Issue laundry lists are useless. Most of these candidates support the same things with a few

distinctions biography is fine but i think a story from the trail from their experience from their public service that puts their candidacy in context is the best approach can lines from consultants sharp attacks on other candidates or even a clever attack on trump will get lost in the shuffle i think yeah that's couldn't be said any better. Totally. And look, I think you hear that. And I think Elizabeth Warren will talk about her plans a lot and her issues. But again, she doesn't just list off her policy position. She talks about them within the larger context of her story. From the very first event I watched Warren do in Iowa, she was doing a town hall meeting. She was talking about her policies and her plans, but she was linking it to her upbringing in Oklahoma. And I just felt from the beginning that it was a better way to deliver a message and

it was going to play well in Iowa. And I think it's benefited over time. But she's also really interesting because Warren in particular doesn't go on the campaign trail to deliver a message. She really does seem to absorb what she gets back. And you hear her repeat a lot of stories from people she met in Keokuk, Iowa or wherever she might have been. Beto does that too. And I think that if you can incorporate the things you've learned in the past six, seven months, however long it's been that they've

been running, that's a beneficial way to, I don't know, just tell a story. Yeah, it shows that you're listening and also shows your growth as a candidate. So speaking of Warren, it's a good segue. It appears as though she has now climbed to the top of the Democratic field along with Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders. Polls are obviously just a snapshot in time. We will say this a million times between now and the election. But when you look at the polling averages in the early states and nationally, Warren is now a solid third and has actually overtaken Bernie in a few recent polls, including a few state polls. She's also caught the attention of Trump's team, whose pollster told Politico, quote,

Although our own early published polls and internal polls discounted Elizabeth Warren, her recent momentum in May and June in national and early caucuses and primary states into a strong second place to a flat Joe Biden is now a cause for our campaign's attention. What do you think is driving Warren's increased support? I mean, I think she's a good campaigner. I think she invested early in field staff on the ground in Iowa. And that's one of the places you saw her make a big bump. I think that the narrative around her went from people aren't covering Warren's plans to, oh, she's the one with all the plans, right? I mean, that's like a good thing to be known as. You're the person who has big policies and who's rolling out big ideas. And I think that there's been always

a discussion about electability, whatever the hell that means. But clearly, people are deciding that they like the things that she would do and that she stands for, and they want to see her as president. So I've been really impressed. Also, she made a decision not to do these big fundraising events. So I think she really needed some momentum early to be able to continue to raise money through the fall. You're reading reports about the various candidates that Wall Street is choosing as their favorites. She's not going to have that cash. I would not be happy to be a candidate in that story. I would not either. And a deft campaign or a campaign ad by Warren or Bernie Sanders would use that headline against the

candidates who are mopping up wall street money to show why they're different i wouldn't be surprised if she talked about that during the debate not as an attack on people because i don't think she does that but but just touting her own decision not to take that money and to spend time and it matters um there's there's a fantastic uh profile of el of Elizabeth Warren in, uh, the New Yorker right now. I think the headline is can Elizabeth Warren win it all? And it really tells you everything you need to know, I think about, um, her rise in the polls. I mean, we said this from the day she announced her candidacy, right? Like the most important thing when you're running for president is to have a biography that links up with your career,

that links up with your policy choices, that links up with your theory of the case and your value, why you can beat the opposition, whether it's in the primary or the general election, and how you see the country and where it's going. And, you know, there is an argument that Elizabeth Warren's entire life and career led her to this moment. And when you talk to her, all she talks about is inequality and the wealth gap and how, you know, corporations have gamed the system. Like everyone can tell you Elizabeth Warren's rationale who pays any attention to politics. And there's not too many candidates running where you can say that right off the bat like that.

Yeah, she leaves you with the impression that she's running against something bigger than Trump or any of her primary opponents, that she's running against a broken system, against corruption, against money in politics. And certainly her career before she was in politics leads you to believe that she holds those views sincerely and actually wants to do it. And we know this from being in campaigns and in politics for a long time, hammering, hammering, hammering economic issues. And I think there was a long discussion after the 2016 race. There was a long discussion after the 2016 race. We made a lot of fun of economic anxiety and stuff like that because it is very true that a lot of the vote for Trump was driven by racial resentment among non-college educated whites.

This is a fact. This is true. And yet there is this feeling of economic angst in this country. It is a feeling held by non-college educated white voters, black voters, Latino voters, young people, all across the spectrum, that the economy is not working for them. And Elizabeth Warren in this profile actually said, she goes, as a Democratic candidate, you just have to make sure that you are talking to the economic concerns of Americans all the time. She's like, I read a line from Steve Bannon, of all people, in 2017, who said, if the Democrats keep talking about the economic concerns of working people and actually focused on that,

I'd be worried because then they'd win. She goes, and I read that line from that asshole and basically thought to myself, like, yeah, that's the ticket. And I do think for all these cases, like she said on that message. Now, the question that raises is, so Bernie Sanders would say, yeah, I also have that message. Why do we think she's eating away at support from Bernie Sanders? Well, look, it's hard when you are Bernie and you come in with a floor at sort of 30%, right? When you start stronger, it is much easier for it to look like you are losing support.

When you start low, it looks like you're gaining momentum. So Bernie was always going to lose some votes. You know, it's not possible to jump in a race with 20-some-odd other people and not have supporters come and go. You know, I think he's fighting against his own expectations. I mean, the same expectations game that benefited him in 2016.

Right. Yeah. I mean, and we said this at the beginning of the primary, too. How much of the Bernie vote in 2016 was a vote for Bernie and how much of it was a vote against Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary? And I think we're finding out that a good chunk of that vote was against Hillary Clinton. I also think Bernie is a victim of his own success. He has moved the debate in the Democratic field to the left, to a more

progressive direction. He has won that debate. But he is not the new shiny object. And the way that the media is right now, the media focuses on a new story. And it's been, you know, Elizabeth Warren has been putting out these plans left and right.

Bernie Sanders is probably sitting there like, yeah, I've had a lot of these plans for my whole life. But it doesn't feel as new to people. I do remember thinking that Bernie was pretty good in the debates in 2016. You know, he's relentless. He's someone to watch. Yeah, he's relentlessly on message.

And he, you know, the I don't care about your damn emails moment yeah maybe it wasn't the smartest strategy when you're trying to attack an opponent but it made him seem like genteel and i don't know it made me like him that is a that is an excellent point because something i was just about to say i remember watching those debates and i didn't know much about bernie sanders at the time or think much about bernie sanders and when he said that i was like oh i like this guy he's talking about the issues that matter to me and I like him. And from that moment on, even when it got, you know, even though I was for Hillary Clinton, I never got the Bernie hate. I

never really hated Bernie. But I think what I wonder about in this campaign and I wonder how he'll deal with this on stage is sometimes it seems like Bernie's campaign, his supporters enjoy being at war with the Democratic establishment. They feel like that's a useful villain. And Bernie himself doesn't do that too much, but sometimes he does. Elizabeth Warren has all the progressive positions that Bernie Sanders has,

and she'll attack the Democratic establishment on specific issues, right? She gave the Obama administration some tough time on things, right? When it seemed like they were, you know, picking some corporate stooge for this or that. But she doesn't run her campaign against the Democratic establishment. Sometimes Bernie supporters, they seem like they don't want you on their team.

Yeah, it's an argument against a broken system. It's not a grievance-based argument. You know, I think that Bernie's done a lot of really smart things. I was a little confused by the speech ostensibly defending democratic socialism that was really more about FDR and the New Deal. I mean, it was sort of like a forgettable, not, it wasn't like a really compelling speech. I didn't think the language was all that interesting or kind of long.

But it wasn't, it also didn't really live up to what I thought it was framed to be, which was a robust defense of socialism. But it's likely to tee up that question from the moderator to Bernie and then to all these other candidates, which will highlight a distinction that I'm not sure is necessarily beneficial or at least is a little more esoteric than the actual concerns of working people. And I think he's incredibly good at speaking to those concerns. Right. If you're Bernie Sanders, would you rather hang a lantern on the fact that your label is a democratic socialist

and get into a debate over democratic socialism? Or would you rather talk about the economic issues that are sort of driving the debate within the Democratic Party, of which you've been at the forefront on for a long time? I mean, some of Bernie's videos, when they come out and they have someone, you know, in the middle of the country who's going through a job loss, something like that,

they're fantastic videos. They almost make you want to cry, you know? Why have a debate about democratic socialism? I don't know. I feel like AOC's approach was sort of like, I don't really give a shit about the labels. I just want to get things done. Right.

She's a very smart politician. Very utilitarian perspective on politics. And he's also done a lot of smart things on foreign policy. So there's a lot of ways Bernie can go. I mean, this Iran news could tee up an anti-war message for him that becomes incredibly helpful. Who knows? But yeah, that speech was actually weird.

Okay, when we come back, my interview with Senator Harry Reid and the game we played in Minnesota with Congresswoman Ilhan Omar and Annamarie Cox about student debt. She hates student debt. Doesn't like it. Was against it. On the pod today, we have the former Democratic leader of the United States Senate, Harry Reid.

Welcome, Senator. Very good to be with you. It's good to hear your voice. First and most important question, you said a few months ago that your cancer is in remission. How are you feeling? How's your health? I'm feeling quite well. Everything's good. My mobility is not as good as I'd like it to be, but it's getting better. I had chemo, five of my vertebrae, so I had a couple back surgeries, but I'm doing okay. Well, you've always been a fighter, so it's really good to hear that you're better. Thank you.

So earlier this month, you told USA Today that your thinking had evolved on whether the House should move forward with impeachment hearings against President Trump. You said that, quote, it's not the right thing to do nothing. What do you think the costs are of doing nothing? Well, I think it would be really wrong to do nothing. I think it would be wrong to jump into impeachment right now. I think the way forward should be one that is deliberate. I think it should be an inquiry into the Mueller report and inquiry as to whether or not there should be impeachment. I think that would give the American people, in their own way, an ability to understand what was in the Mueller report. I think it would help lawmakers understand what Trump has done that deserves a real close look. So you think that next step should be the House Judiciary Committee

voting to begin an impeachment inquiry? Would that be your recommended step? I believe there should be an inquiry started forthwith. You also said in that USA Today interview that you were going to reach out to Nancy Pelosi on this issue. Can you talk about what kind of advice you gave her about dealing with this? Well, the speaker has done such a remarkably good job. I served as the leader when she was the speaker the first time. I've never served with anyone that is better than she. She is someone who is very smart. She's courageous and determined. And so she knows what my position your caucus still not on board with impeachment and you had, you know, I think it's now 60 Democrats who were in favor of it.

How would how would you be handling such a situation where you're sort of torn between two sides of the caucus? I think the way that should be handled is the way that she's handling it. I think it's appropriate that she make sure that at a very, very large conference that she has, understands what the efforts being made by others, and that includes the press. I think that when I was the leader, I had a very small number of people compared to hers. She's got 230 plus people in her conference alone. So she can't jump into anything. So I think she's doing just fine.

I've expressed my opinion. I think there should be an inquiry. But she'll determine what she thinks is best. Now, you were Senate minority leader when Bill Clinton was impeached. What lessons should today's Democrats take from that experience, in your view? to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. And in my mind, I can see impeachment and how very, very difficult it is. And we have to understand, at that time,

there were Democrats and Republicans who worked together in the Senate. The way things are now, you know, not the case. Impeachment is a very serious thing. I think it's really too bad that we don't have members of the Senate. We've only got one Republican member of the House who has talked about a need for moving forward on impeachment. And I think that's unfortunate because the Speaker has also the problem involved that the Republicans in the Senate are kowtowing to everything that Trump wants. Yeah. I want to talk about the Senate as an institution a little bit since there's few

people who know it better than you. Do you see any truth in Joe Biden's recent statement that with Trump gone, we're going to begin to see things change in the Senate because, quote, these Republicans know better? Do you think that with Trump gone, anything would, the Republicans would change their behavior in the Senate? I sure hope that's right. Here's the problem we have, though. I sure hope that's right. Here's the problem we have, though. The Republicans now for 10 years have done everything they can to do away with the Senate that we all loved.

What do I mean by that? What I mean by that is that Senate Republicans have created a program now where if you want to get anything done in the Senate, you have to have 60 votes. That's not the way it used to be. Filibusters were used very sparingly. And I was responsible for my staff person, Bill Douster, to write a law review article for the New York University Law School Law Review, where in that article we talked about the fact that unless the Senate changed quickly, the Senate was going to wind up turning out to be just like the House of Representatives because you can't go on the way it is. Now, that would be not the way the Senate used to be, and that's too bad.

However, if you had the Senate was like another House of Representatives, it wouldn't be the end of the world. You still have a bicameral legislature. You have senators with six-year terms, House members with two-year terms. So having a democracy wouldn't be all that bad. The simple majority would win. However, I hope, I hope Vice President Biden is right. I hope that things go back to the way they used to be. But as we talked about in that Laura V. article, things are not headed in that direction. Yeah, I mean, you know Mitch McConnell very well, probably better than most, you know, and he's right now bragging about how the Senate is a legislative graveyard and he's

the Grim Reaper and all that kind of stuff. I mean, what does the next Democratic president do about the problem of Mitch McConnell in this crop of Senate Republicans? in this crop of Senate Republicans? Well, if you understand, and it's easy to understand what I've just said, for a Democratic president, which I think we're going to have, I think would be just fine, you know, because the majority would rule in the Senate. So you would be for getting rid of the legislative filibuster if the next Democratic president runs into the same kind of obstruction like Barack Obama? I'm in favor of recognizing reality. And the reality is Republicans have made the Senate something that is no longer the way it used to be. That is really too bad because it's not a question of simply wanting it to happen.

It's just accepting reality. Yeah. I mean, in about 20 years, something like 70% of Americans will be represented by just 30 senators. Obviously, the Senate has always been weighted towards smaller rural states, but now that those states are mostly Republican and deeply Republican, what options do the Democrats have? Obviously, we just spoke about the filibuster. Is there any other sort of strategy that you have in mind for the Democratic Party? history when the Constitution was accepted and approved, Delaware was the smallest state population-wise. They had about seven times less, more power than the state of Virginia, which was the most populous. But now the situation has gotten so out of hand that the state of The situation has gotten so out of hand that the state of Wyoming is 70% more powerful than California. So that's something to be concerned about. I don't see any change in taking away the way the founding fathers set up the Constitution,

where each state has two senators. I don't think anything's going to change in that very quickly. But when you start talking about that, you start talking about a lot of issues, issues such as how presidents are elected. You know, we in recent years, we look and we find that presidents are being elected with less than a majority. Right. There's a rolling number as to how many votes Trump lost by, but it's a minimum of 3 million. It could have been more votes than that. So there are a lot of issues that we have to work on. And nothing's going to happen very quickly

because these are all constitutional-based issues. Are you in favor of the National Popular Vote Compact, which sort of gets around some of the constitutional issues, but would still sort of effectively eliminate the electoral college? Well, it's something that needs to be talked about more. The state of Nevada, for example, benefits from what we have right now. And that's why Governor Sisolak vetoed the majority vote issue this past election. So, you know, it's an issue that we have. What they were trying to come up

with is a compact where states would agree in this compact or contract that they would cast their votes with the person running for president who got the most votes. That would eliminate the electoral college as we now have it.

But that's not going to happen real soon because a lot of states are just like Nevada. That's an issue that's been going on for generations. Right. So I know you've served with a lot of the Democratic candidates for president and you aren't endorsing. But which candidates running have impressed you so far in this race? I've been impressed with, of course, you know, Joe Biden is somebody that I served with for three and a half decades in Congress. A personal friend. He's such a wonderful human being. I like him a great deal.

So, you know, that's Joe Biden. And I don't think there's any doubt that he would be a good president. But as everyone knows, I'm not endorsing anyone because we have our caucus next February. But there are so many people that are impressive. Elizabeth Warren has certainly shined or shown, I don't know, a proper grammar. The last several months, people were recognizing her basic intelligence and understanding of our financial system. I think that people are accepting some of the things that Bernie talked about four years ago. You know, there's a real discussion going on about health care, with the Republicans having eliminated Obamacare in many instances. It's good that we're having a debate on that.

We're having a debate on education, how young men and women can get a college education. Right now, even in state institutions, it's really difficult. I'm glad we're having a discussion on that. So you have Buttigieg, who's been interesting and has created a lot of interest all over the country. And you go through the list of candidates and they're all really, really good. I am personally not at all disturbed by the fact that we have 23 candidates who've already said they want to run for president. We have, our debates are coming up next week

where we have two nights of debates, 10 candidates each night. I think that's good. I think that's very, very good. Yeah, I can remember when I served in Senator Obama's Senate office, and you were one of the people who encouraged him to run for president. I read that this time around, you actually encouraged Senator Warren to run. What made you encourage her to run? to run. What made you encourage her to run? Well, I had an issue that I needed some help on. We had statutorily set up a debt commission to find out what happened to Wall Street, why did it collapse? And I'd read one of her books dealing with poor people. I was impressed with her being a Harvard professor, and I knew about her background. And so I called her in my office.

She brought her daughter, and I put her on the debt commission, and she was a star. And as you will remember, it was her idea to come up with a consumer affairs department within the Dodd-Frank legislation. But she couldn't get approved and the republicans fought that tooth and nail as a result of that she didn't take that job in fact she ran for the senate and won very easily so they wish in hindsight but they wish they had done that so um i chose her because she's a very in-depth person. I think the world of her. But, you know, I served in the Senate with a number of people that are running for president. There are a lot of really good candidates, and I repeat,

Democrats should feel good about the fact that so many talented, well-reasoned people want to run for president. I think it's good. It shows our country is in the right direction. What qualities do you think are most important in a candidate when it comes to being able to beat Donald Trump? I think that every candidate is different, and the reason that I spotted President Obama is I just thought at that time that he was just what the country needed. And that's why he called in my office.

We had a nice visit. I just thought it was the right thing to do. I can remember when he was reelected, I was told, the president's going to call you as soon as he finishes his acceptance speech, and he did. He told me, thanks for helping me decide to run. So, you know, I think that you can't give every person the same brush of paint. Every candidate has different strengths and weaknesses, and you have to recognize those. and weaknesses. You have to recognize those. If you were a leader in the Senate right now,

if you're a minority leader right now, what would you be doing to maximize the chances that Democrats flip the Senate in 2020? Well, it would be really wrong for me to second judge Senator Schumer, and I'll tell you why. Senator Schumer helped make my career. I needed somebody to help me take the Senate back. And I called upon Senator Schumer. I put him in a leadership position. He served as chair of the DSCC twice, which was unheard of at the time. And he did a remarkably good job. And as you know, we took the Senate and we had a significant majority. I give a lot of credit to him. So he's now the Democratic leader. And I think that people don't understand, first of all, how hard he works. And number two, how smart he is. People do not understand Chuck Schumer got a perfect score on the SAT,

a perfect score on the law school aptitude exam. You know, people listening to this think I'm making this up, but it's true. You can't blame people. But that's happened very often. In fact, rarely. So I'm not going to second-judge what he is doing in the Senate. I, of course, am very, very concerned about the Republicans being lapdogs for Trump. I think that's really too bad. The Senate, as I know it, we had courageous Democrats and Republicans

who would stand up against the president of their own party. You don't see that happening with the lapdog treatment Trump's getting from the Republicans in the Senate. I mean, obviously, we have some great recruits for 2020. Senator Schumer's been doing a great job recruiting some candidates. Do you feel bullish on our chances, or how worried are you about flipping the Senate in 2020? How do you feel about that? I feel really good about the fact that we could retake the Senate.

The sad part about what's happened is that we have really a fine number of recruits. They're not all done yet. Dr. Senator Schumer recently, he's still working on it. But, you know, one of the things that the Republicans have done is created an atmosphere where people aren't as anxious to run for the Senate as they used to be because of the Republican shenanigans. Yeah. So last question for you. You came to Washington as a pretty moderate, even conservative on some issues, Democrat. You left as a progressive, having shifted on immigration, gun control, gay marriage, abortion. What what caused your thinking to evolve over the years? I laugh when I hear questions like this. The first time I ran statewide in Nevada for lieutenant governor,

I didn't have many credentials. So one of the things I did in high school, I played football. I was a left guard. And what we did is we changed it to right guard because I had the reputation of always being too progressive, even as a very young man running for lieutenant governor. So yes, I acknowledge that my positions on quite a few different issues developed over the years. But I can say without any equivocation,

if you find a senator who comes to the Senate and believes in certain things and never changes, you'll find a senator who didn't accomplish much in the Senate. I evolved, and I think I did it for the right reasons. It was good, I believe, for the state of Nevada. I believe it was good for the country, and I believe it was good for my Democratic caucus that the leader was somebody who was not locked in step, how he felt when he ran for lieutenant governor, or when I came to the Senate. Well, Senator Reid, I was privileged enough to have a front row seat watching you be leader for all those years during the Obama administration, and I can remember President Obama singing your praises and Speaker Pelosi's praises almost every day. He really loved working with both of you. And so thank you for all that

you did. Thank you for your service. And thank you for joining us on the pod. We really appreciate it. Thank you very much for asking. I'm very, very flattered. You guys want to play a game? Minneapolis. In 1885, a visiting reporter from New York City called the Twin Cities another Siberia unfit for human habitation. And like most comments from New Yorkers about the Midwest, it was accurate.

It wasn't. It's 100 degrees out today. It also wouldn't be the last time the coastal elite unfairly maligned the people of this fair city. But while a certain Manhattanite has been insulting a certain Minneapolis It's got a insulting a certain Minneapolis.

It's got a weird cadence, Minneapolis. Did I get it? Minneapolis. Did you say that? Minneapolis. What did we say? I googled it. Minneapolis.

What do you say then? What do you say? Minneapolis. Yeah. Okay. Are you lying? Why are they booing you? I'm sorry. How is there a census?

We're in the fucking city. What do you call this place? What are you calling? The president's on our stage right now. I'm going to go with whatever Ilhan says because I feel like I'm... Congresswoman Omar. How about we just do Minnesotans? There we go. There we go.

There we go. Spoken like a true Minnesotan. We're at the U, not at, you know. There's Minnesotans in this audience. There are. That all happened like halfway through a dependent clause. What am I supposed to do? But while a certain Manhattanite has been insulting a certain Minnesotan... Perfect.

That Minnesotan... Yeah, thank you. Thank you. I'm so sorry for them. Has been attacking the student debt crisis. So let's talk about Congresswoman Omar's proposal to deal with student debt in a game we're calling Hey, What If We Dismantled?

A vast and cruel system that saddles the best and brightest young people in our country with student debt like a massive weight forever pressing down on the chest of a generation. Would someone out there like to play the game? Travis is over here. Travis, I really, I mean, something might happen over here. Hi, what's your name? I'm Dan.

Hi, Dan. Hi. Where are you from? I'm a Minnesotan. Have you heard the term Minneapolis? You know what, John? I'm a love it, so yes. You're right. You got it. Thank you, Dan.

Okay. All right. Let's begin. What is the current total in the United States of all student loan debt? Is it A, $156 million, slightly less expensive than the yacht Betsy DeVos enjoys when she needs a little time away from her bigger yacht? Or is it B, $15.6 billion, or how much Melania thought Trump was worth when she agreed to marry him,

and when he got down on one knee and handed her the NDA. Or is it C? It was very romantic. That's how it works for him. He gets down on one knee and he presents a nondisclosure agreement.

No comment. Or is it C? 1.56 trillion dollars or enough to buy the world a Coke. In fact, it's enough to buy every single person on earth 200 bottles of Coke each. Or is it D? I bid $1, John.

Doesn't make any sense. Or is it E? The student debt is so high that if you took that money and used it to buy kegs and slip and slides, you would have one killer spring break. My broseph. My broseph. My broseph. I told Travis to cut that one, and he told me that it was great. I think it worked, Travis.

Worked great. What do you think, Dan? C. You got it. Question two. How many Americans under the age of 30 currently have student loan debt is it a 1.6 million people are all the people who signed that petition to remake season eight of game of thrones or is it b 300 million or the number of people who have said listen you're incredible

to their significant other while dumping them. Or is it C? 32 million. Oh, I'm sorry. That's how many homes baby boomers own. Two out of every five homes in the country. Boo. I apologize

for giving you the clue where I mercilessly attack baby boomers on the stage. She needs their votes, man. Come on. We're going to talk about this later. Or is it D? Five million. Or the number of Harvard grads who wrote about saving the world in their college application but ended up working at McKinsey.

Tough Buttigieg hit there. All right. I didn't write this crap. Or is it E? 16.8 million people, or roughly the population of West Virginia, Idaho, Hawaii, Montana, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Delaware, South Dakota, North Dakota, Alaska, Washington, D.C., Vermont, and Wyoming combined. What Dan said. Yep, you got it. Question three.

Some people think that the federal government canceling student debt would cause the economy to explode. What would actually happen if we canceled student debt? Is it A? While canceling student debt might create financial instability in the short term, the damage would quickly be reversed by the free electricity radiating off of furious baby boomers shouting, Participation trophy, Edison bulb, fast casual motherfuckers, and a Tucker Carlson segment on their 72-inch Costco TVs with the motion smoothing turned on.

Listen. Wow. Baby boomers, we've had our differences. Ask your children to go into the settings and turn off the motion smoothing. Or is it B? The economy would, in fact, explode. Chernobyl style.

Get ready to bury some dogs. Who are you mad at? Who are you mad at? Or is it C? There has to be a disclaimer for this. Who are you mad at? Who are you mad at? Or is it C? There has to be a disclaimer for this. Yeah, no, everyone knows it's him. Okay, okay, okay, got it, got it.

Just want to be safe. There would be a boost in GDP by an average of 86 billion108 billion per year. The added cash in the pockets of millions of Americans would lead to roughly $1.2 million to $1.5 million new jobs per year. Sounds pretty good. Maybe you should take credit for that one, actually. That's pretty good. Or is it Dean? Those scammy credit score commercials would disappear,

freeing up ad time for more useful products like catheters, weight loss supplements, burritos with Doritos inside. Our society is fucked. Or is it A? Free to follow their dreams, more young people could become teachers, social workers, and sadly, magicians. The harm, therefore, vastly and sadly, magicians. The harm, therefore, vastly outweighing any benefit. So is a surplus of prestidigitators worth the candle, as they say, you know? Right, right. I think we're going to increase aggregate demand and go with C. You got it. Yeah. Look at that. C. You got it.

Look at that. Dan's wearing his Econ 101 t-shirt. Question four. Lightning round. There's no sound. We're going to read you facts about student debt and you have to say whether they're true or false. Are you ready? Yes.

We're going to go down the line probably twice. Is it A? Wait, no, that doesn't make sense. Yeah. John, kick us off. Unlike other forms of debt, it is virtually impossible to declare bankruptcy to escape it. True.

Got it. Next. After you hit $100,000 in student debt, they let you drive the Zamboni during the broomball game at your 10-year reunion. In some places it's true, but false. Yep, yep, yep. People with student debt are less likely to get married. I mean, yeah, true. Yeah.

People with student debt blame their debt for not getting married when really, how are you supposed to know if this is it, you know? It's like, no relationship is perfect. How do you know there's no manual? He's the one or she's the one. There's so many ones out there. There's no manual, Tommy. Is this a normal problem or is this a problem that means you should leave? How are you supposed to know? What if the next relationship is worse and you look back with regret? Or what if a better person is waiting on the other side of this relationship? True or false?

True. Got it. Collection agencies pursue student debt aggressively, including calling borrowers at all hours. True. Those with student debt are disproportionately young, which means receiving a phone call is a fate

worse than death. Correct. True. I'm not answering. I'm not answering when you call me. Honestly, text me. Email me. Even screening my call. I call my friends. Buckle up. You're friends with me. I call you. You know what that is?

That's a wannabe rumor. Tell me what you want first. It explains a lot, John. The movie It Follows was not actually a metaphor for sexual relationships. It was a metaphor for student debt following you around like a creep. True. No, that's false. It was about teen sex.

There's got to be a bonus, maybe. Half a point? Half a point? Half a point, half a point. Half a point, half a point. You're right, sorry. Yeah, okay. Can we get an air horn? That's leadership.

That's leadership. Changing the rules. Changing the rules. He's playing. Changing the rules to win. I like that a lot. $1.56 trillion sounds like a lot. sounds like a lot.

But it's actually the same amount the government committed to bailing out the banks during the financial crisis. True. False. Tommy, you're up. $1.56 trillion sounds like a lot, but it's only half the size of the bank bailout. True. False. Dan, you're up. 1.56 trillion sounds like a lot, but it's only half the size of the bank bailout. True.

False. Dan, you're up. 1.56 trillion sounds like a lot, but it's just a quarter the size of the bank bailout. Sure. Wrong, Dan. Shame on you. Get it. Get it.

John, you're up. I have something totally different. 1.56 trillion sounds like a lot, but it's just a tenth of the size of the bank bailout. True. You got it. Ding, ding, ding, ding. Rescuing students from debt would cost only about 10% of what the government committed to rescuing the banks during the financial crisis. How amazing is that?

Dan, that's why this is, yeah, yeah. What are you booing? You're booing an inequitable system we're trying to change. Dan, you've won the game. Thank you for playing. Hey, what if we dismantled a vast and cruel system that saddles the best and brightest young people in our country with student debt like a massive weight forever pressing down on the chest of an entire generation? Thank you, Congresswoman Omar, for playing and for

being here tonight. One more time for the congressman. Thank you guys all for coming. Have a great night. Thanks to Harry Reid for joining us today. Thanks to Congresswoman Omar for joining us in Minneapolis. And we'll talk to you later this week. Bye.