Pod Save America - "Too Much Crime On Their Hands."

Episode Date: June 16, 2022

The January 6th committee makes the case that Donald Trump broke the law, election results in South Carolina and Texas offer hints about November, committee member Elaine Luria joins to talk about Thursday's big hearing, and later, we close out with a round of Take Appreciator. For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast.

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Dan Pfeiffer. On today's show, the January 6th committee makes the case that Donald Trump broke the law. Election results in South Carolina and Texas offer hints about November. Committee member Elaine Luria joins to talk about Thursday's big hearing. And later, we close things out with a quick round of Take Appreciator. of Take Appreciator. But first, Strict Scrutiny just dropped a special episode in honor of Pride Month. Leah, Kate, and Melissa

are joined by Joshua Matz and Chase Strangio to highlight some of the developments in ongoing litigation related to LGBTQ rights. They'll also be updating us throughout the month as SCOTUS decisions drop.

So check it out. Also, check out our brand new line of Pride merch now at the Crooked store. As always, a portion of every order from our Pride collection is going to the Crooked Pride or Else Fund, which supports three incredible organizations that provide community building, gender affirming, and life-saving resources to the queer and transgender community. Shop for all Crooked merch at crooked.com slash store.

All right, Dan, let's get to the news uh we are recording this segment before thursday's january 6th hearing but in our next segment dan will get representative luria's reaction after the hearing ends uh of course the committee postponed wednesday's hearing because apparently their video team doesn't work as hard as the video team here at Crooked. See, I got some laughs from Phoebe there. But despite all that, they've already given us at least three big pieces of news to cover since our last pod. First, the Washington Post reported on an episode that was supposed to be the focus of the postponed hearing. Shortly after the 2020 election, Jeffrey Clark, a mid-level Justice Department official,

almost convinced Donald Trump to appoint him attorney general so that he could announce that the DOJ had, quote, identified significant concerns about voter fraud and urged swing states to send their own slates of Trump electors to Congress. Second, the committee released surveillance video of a group who'd been given a tour of the Capitol complex by Republican Congressman Barry Loudermilk of Georgia on January 5th. It shows people taking pictures of hallways, stairways, and security checkpoints that, as the committee said, aren't typically of interest to tourists. A day later, on January 6th,

several of the people in that tour showed up at the Stop the Steal rally, and one man was filmed saying, quote, We're coming in like white on rice for Pelosi, Nadler, Schumer, and even you, AOC. We're coming to take you out and pull you out by your hairs. Next to him was a man carrying a flagpole with a sharpened end who said it was for a, quote, certain person. And finally, the committee released a video featuring Liz Cheney where she talks about the focus of today's hearing, Thursday's hearing, which is Trump's efforts to pressure Mike Pence to overturn the election. Here's a clip. As a federal judge has indicated, this likely violated two federal criminal statutes. President Trump had no factual basis for what he was doing, and he had been told it was illegal. Despite this, President Trump

plotted with a lawyer named John Eastman and others to overturn the outcome of the election on January 6th. To give you a sense of the gravity of these issues, here is a clip of one of President Trump's own White House lawyers, Eric Hirschman, who talked to Mr. Eastman the day after January 6th. He started to ask me about something dealing with Georgia and preserving something potentially for appeal. I said to him, are you out of your effing mind? Now I'm going to give you the best free legal advice you're ever getting in your life. Get a great effing criminal defense lawyer. You're going to need it. And then I hung up on him.

So Dan, I want to get your reaction to all three pieces of news here. Let's start with mid-level mouth breather Jeffrey, trying to get himself appointed attorney general so he can overturn the election. What'd you think about that one? I mean, shoot your shot, insurrectionist. I mean, it's the chutzpah and lack of self-awareness it takes to be a mid-level environmental attorney in the Department of Justice to get not one, not two, but three meetings with the president to convince him to fire all of your superiors, appoint you to be a member of the cabinet in the line of presidential succession, and promising you could overturn an election the president clearly lost. I mean, it is just, God bless that guy. That is unbelievable.

But it almost worked. So Trump is thinking about doing it. and the only reason trump doesn't do it is because there's this emergency meeting where uh the attorney general the deputy attorney general everyone else comes in to the oval office with clark and they're like look you do this we are going to resign en masse all the justice department officials are going to resign at once and trump's probably thinking to himself well you know he probably didn't care about that but what will that mean for a possible impeachment right and so there's also a great scene where one of the i think it was the deputy ag turns to clark and he's like yeah you're an environmental lawyer go back to your office and we'll call you when there's an oil spill which i thought was pretty funny but anyway i mean what here's what would happen if if trump

said yes and and appointed this guy ag like you would have had knowing these state legislatures in some of these competitive states because since they were all republican and a lot of them mega republicans would have sent dueling slates of electors would have sent trump electors to congress then we would have had to hope that the Republican Senate at the time rejected those electors and or it could have ended up in the Supreme Court if they were or the they could have thrown out the electors from the states altogether, which means that the election gets thrown to the House. And we know that if it got thrown to the House, there were enough the way that the House works. There were enough Republicans in the House that they would have thrown the election to Trump. I mean, we were really close if this Jeffrey Clark thing had worked. And there's one part of this story that I think

is worth focusing on because it's easy to get distracted at what a nut Clark is and all the drama and the threatens to fire and the guy and the, you know, the deputy general in his muddy jeans showing up, all that is like great color. But at one point in the meeting, some of the attendees say, we can't just flip a switch and give you the election. And Trump says, according to notes in the meeting, I don't expect you to do that. Just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressman. And that explains everything. I think that is the Rosetta Stone of the entire scandal. This suggests that Trump knew what he was saying about the election being stolen was a lie. He just needed some putative fig leaf so that he could implement his plan and bring along Congress and state legislators to steal the election. That's what it was. Just say it was

corrupt and I will figure it out. And that, I think that that will be, I believe probably the core of the criminal case against Trump if we are so lucky as to have one. What about the Republican congressman from Georgia who gave a lovely Capitol tour to a gang of insurrectionists? Seems sketchy. I don't know. I mean, it's like, you probably ought to have asked some questions. They're like, do you want to see the rotunda? Do you want to see the house chamber? Do you want to see the oil paintings of the, or the sculptures of the leaders and the presidents? No, I would like to see the fire exits. Seems like you should ask yourself some questions and it's worth asking

why did Barry Loudermilk, who is actually a real person, I had to Google this a few months ago, Barry Loudermilk, lie about it. He said he did not give this tour. He did not give a tour on January 5th. What is he trying to hide? That is very much worth getting to the bottom of just because it gets at a couple of things. One, did members of Congress, and this has been an allegation for over a year now, did some Republican members of Congress give the insurrectionists, whether it was the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, other attendees, tours for the specific purpose of scouting out the Capitol for when they took over? It also gets at just the close relationships and cooperation around this day and more broadly between certain members of Congress and the most extreme members

of right-wing militias and white supremacist groups. That is, I think, another symptom of this is that the same person who would be saying these things about these members and threatening violence was someone who was getting a tour in the Capitol from the congressperson themselves. I think that's the key point because the you know, the Capitol Police released a letter and the letter said, look, you know, we did not think this tour was a specific threat. You know, we take everything seriously and we weren't too worried about this. And obviously that tour, where they were in the Capitol complex was not ultimately where the rioters entered um where the insurrectionists

entered and so they said you know and so of course laudermilk's like we're vindicated but the point remains like at a time when they weren't giving tours because of the pandemic laudermilk gave a special tour to a bunch of people who the next day were carrying uh sharpened flagpoles and threatening the lives of Democratic members of Congress. Not a good thing. Whether they were on a reconnaissance tour or not, they were part of the insurrectionists that stormed the Capitol and they got a private tour the day before from a Republican congressman. So that's bad enough as it is. Do you know who gives tours typically? 22-year-old staff assistants. Right, exactly.

The fact that this is the member of Congress, I don't know whether it suggests what knowledge they have of what was to come, but it certainly suggests a relationship between this member of Congress and these extreme elements. Yep. So maybe the most consequential piece of news, what did you make of Liz Cheney's video and that Trump lawyer's legal advice for John Eastman to get a great effing criminal defense lawyer? We don't use that word on this pod.

I was so surprised he edited himself in this. I think just for the purposes of drama, it would have been better if he had said the word. And then Liz Cheney had beeped it, that would have been even better. I said the word and then that would have been my edit to that if i was uh yeah the more talented hardworking crooked team would have just beeped it anyway even though he said effing just put the beep in there okay in all seriousness this is i think really critical point because just as we were just having this conversation about barry louder milk and these and how people got in the Capitol and all of that, the conversation continues to be pulled towards what happened on January 6th, which is obviously a dark day in America. A deep tragedy happened there. People died. There was damage. People's lives were threatened. But even – and this is what is implied in Liz Cheney's opening,

and then what this Trump attorney says, is that even if the mob had never made it inside the Capitol, if the Capitol Police or the National Guard, somebody would be able to stop them from breaching the building and doing damage and stop the violence that led to the deaths, this would still be a crime. The crime was the plot to overturn the election. The riot at the Capitol, the assault at the Capitol was a consequence of that conspiracy failing. And we cannot lose sight of that. Because I think it's going to be, we don't really know, maybe we'll know more in these hearings, if the centerpiece of what we interpret to be the crime is what happened on January 6th, it's going to probably be pretty challenging to connect Donald Trump to specifically to the elements that entered the Capitol or a specific plan to enter the Capitol. And it's unlikely you'll be able to have a single piece of evidence that beyond a reasonable doubt will connect Donald Trump to a specific plan to assault the Capitol. And it's unlikely you'll be able to have a single piece of evidence that,

beyond a reasonable doubt, will connect Donald Trump to a specific plan to assault the Capitol. But the crime was happening. And what bothers me, I think, and this is why I think these hearings are important and what Liz Cheney does here is important, is we have become sort of numb to the nonviolent parts of the plot to overturn the election in the last year and a half. It's been sort of normalized, particularly as the Republican Party has embraced it going forward. We think of that as that's almost become treated as within the normal course of business. Look, Democrats want to run on a $15 minimum wage. Republicans want to have the power to overturn the election. Who's to say which is right or wrong? And so continuing to center the fact that what they were doing was a crime,

the alternate states of electors were crimes, lying about it and trying to conspire to stop the counting of the votes was a crime. And saying laser focus on that. And the most important part here is you don't have to believe me. You don't have to believe Liz Cheney. Here's Donald Trump's own attorney saying it's a crime. Liz Cheney. Here's Donald Trump's own attorney saying it's a crime. Well, and more than that, you know, testifying today will be J. Michael Luddig as a former George W. Bush judge who was a runner up for both the Alito and the Roberts nominations. This is a pretty conservative guy, Republican, and he's going to be testifying today about how he told his friend, John Eastman, who is the subject of who's the one who wrote all these memos to Donald Trump saying like,

yeah, Mike Pence can probably overturn the election. And I think the key is at the time you were just saying, like, why are we numb to this? At the time, the thinking was, oh, Donald Trump is dumb. And he thinks that Mike Pence has the power to overturn the election. And obviously he doesn't. And I think what they're going to prove in today's hearing is Donald Trump knew that John Eastman's plan was illegal. He was told it was illegal. He knew it was illegal and he went along with it anyway. And then when Mike Pence refused to go along with the plan, Donald Trump inflamed the mob that threatened Mike Pence's life.

And then Donald Trump didn't care. That connection right there is the clearest you're going to get. to go along with the plan donald trump inflamed the mob that threatened mike pence's life and then donald trump didn't care that connection right there is the clearest you're gonna get between trump the illegality of the plot to overturn the election and then his decision to incite the mob to cause violence and potentially kill his own vice president i mean it's fucking it's not great it's it's it's so let's take a step back for a minute and talk about where all this is headed. On one hand, the committee is now clearly making the case that Donald Trump and others committed crimes in trying to overturn the election. On the other, they've been a bit more circumspect on whether they will make a criminal referral to the Department of Justice. The committee's chairman, Benny Thompson, said that they wouldn't.

And then basically everyone else on the committee, including the staff, walked back those comments shortly after saying they haven't decided yet. That's basically as far as they went. What do you think is going on here?

Like, why wouldn't they make a criminal referral if they're very clearly and publicly making the case that Trump committed a crime? There is no reason not to make a criminal referral. It doesn't make – I think there was a sense when – there was a version of this debate happening a few months ago sort of through anonymous sources.

Everyone freaked out about it. It was a Twitter moment saying – and I think the argument back then among some of the people who did not want to do a criminal referral was if Merrick Garland were to decide under the advice of career prosecutors to charge Trump, that it would make it more political if it was a referral from a largely Democratic committee in a house controlled by Democrats. That is optics brain. That makes no sense. No one – that's not really how it's going to work.

optics brain. That makes no sense. That's not really how it's going to work. And now we have certainly crossed the Rubicon now that you have members of Congress, including famed liberals like Dick Cheney's daughter, making the case that crimes were committed. So I don't think there's no reason not to do it. I think for everyone who has melted down about what Congressman Thompson said or the possibility that they won't. It's all, it's just, it's worth noting. It is a piece of paper with the same value as the next tweet Jon Favreau sends. Like that's all it is, right? So it's very valuable. Yes, exactly. I'm saying it is. So they really need to make that referral. It is digital parchment, right? It is very important. No, it doesn't mean anything. It doesn't impact what Garland does or does not do

in this situation. It matters when they make a criminal referral about a crime committed against contempt of Congress, right? Where someone is refusing to cooperate with congressional subpoenas, then that isn't decisive, as we know from the fact that Mark Meadows is still walking free in America. But it has influence. Here, this is just a general recommendation of no force. And so I still think they should do it. If you say it's a crime, you should take all the steps to make the case that it is a crime. This would be one of those steps. But it does not materially impact, as I understand it, what Merrick Garland and his team may or may not do here. lunch yeah since since the beginning of the hearing so it's not like certainly not like she's afraid of saying it um you know we haven't heard as much from some of the other members but they all it is it's it's it's a bit of a silly debate for the reasons that you cite which is

like it's silly that they wouldn't just send the referral but it's also silly to think that if they don't send the referral somehow the justice department is going to be like maybe they don't want to maybe they don't think he committed a crime because they clearly think he committed a crime. Anyway, Democrats on the committee and all of us have no control over what Merrick Garland ultimately decides. We all do have some control over the message coming out of these hearings, especially which parts are emphasized and amplified. We have some exclusive new navigator polling out today that shows a couple things. have some exclusive new navigator polling out today that shows a couple things. 70% of Americans support the committee's investigation. 60% have heard a lot or some about the hearings. 54% would support the Justice Department filing criminal charges against Trump for his role in

January 6th. And the top descriptors of Republicans in Congress who support Trump and his attempted Dan, given these numbers and the revelations we've talked about so far, what do you think the most important messages are to be amplifying about these hearings? That this was a crime. hearings. That this was a crime. It was a criminal conspiracy from the top of the Republican Party to overturn the election, to put in place a radical right-wing agenda that was rejected by the majority of Americans. And I think we have to say it's a crime because of what I mentioned earlier about this fear that we're normalizing insurrection as a political strategy. So I want people to say crime so often that if we were playing a drinking game with the word crime, I would want it to end up so that we were all Rudy Giuliani. Like, let's just focus on crime because there is this tendency towards normalization

in our political debate that keeps moving the Overton window of acceptable political conduct in very dangerous ways. So crime, crime, crime, crime, crime. Second point, forward-looking. This is an ongoing threat that is happening right now. And last time, as we know from all these stories, this was a plot engineered by some of the dumbest and drunkest people in America. This time around, it's a much different situation. It involves the RNC is on board. They're recruiting people to be part of this plan. It's a much different situation it involves the the rnc is on board they're recruiting people to be part of this plan it's being funded by people this is not just the maga wing or donald trump sowing grievances it's a very real threat yeah you know i was kind of hoping

that benny thompson would have opened the entire hearing, the first hearing, with, like, we meet here tonight as democracy is under attack. Like, forget about the history. You know, like, they really do have to, and this is a job for all of us, bring it forward. And there is rightly a focus on Donald Trump because he was the one who tried to overturn the election. He was the president who tried to stay in power. He was the one who tried to do the election. He was the president who tried to stay in power. He was the one who tried to do the attempted coup. But we should also focus on all of the MAGA Republicans around him who not only tried to help with the coup, but are still in power today and are running for office in these midterms. Just as an example, the Democratic Secretary of State in New Mexico just this week asked the state Supreme Court to order a MAGA-filled election commission in a rural county in New Mexico to certify the primary results after they refused.

They refused to certify the results of a primary election, a Republican primary, in this rural county in New Mexico because they believe in some batshit crazy conspiracy about Dominion voting machines. They didn't have any allegations of fraud. They didn't think anything had gone wrong. But just because Dominion voting machines were used in their primary, they refused to certify the election. And one of the commission members is a Cowboys for Trump founder who was convicted of illegally entering the Capitol grounds on January 6th. This threat is ongoing. There are people, there are MAGA Republican politicians running for Secretary of State, for County Commission, for Governor, for Attorney General, for Congress, all over this country. And they have basically told us that if they take power and it's a close election,

they will throw our votes away. They will throw our votes away to make sure that Republicans win because they tried to do it in 2020 and they failed, but they want to do it again. And I think that is the most important message coming out of it because, you know, Americans are busy. They're worried about a lot of things. They're worried about inflation. They're worried about all kinds of stuff. And it's easy to see these hearings and think, oh, this is about the past. This is something bad that happened. I believe Trump was responsible. I don't think the Republicans should have gone along with it, blah, blah, blah.

But it's in the past. We've got to look forward. Well, looking forward means realizing that the threat to our democracy exists right now in many of the MAGA Republicans who are running for office. And I think that we can't lose that point. Yeah, the difference, there is this sense, and all these primaries where it's like big lie candidate wins, big lie candidate, you know, big lie opponent loses, all of that.

It's treated as this battle within the party between like an insurrectionist wing and everyone else. That's not, the difference in the Republican Party is not between insurrectionists and non-insurrectionists. It's just in terms of how public you are about your coming insurrection, right? It is – these big lie candidates are being supported by the party establishment. Herschel Walker is a big lie candidate who has talked about the election conspiracy theories. He is endorsed by Mitch McConnell. I promise you that if the recent poll in Pennsylvania, which showed Doug Mastroianno only four points behind Josh Shapiro, if the polls look like that in a month or two from now, the Republican Governors Association and the RNC will be supporting Doug Mastroianno's campaign.

This is a party-wide conspiracy. It is much bigger than Trump. He is actually just sort of an ancillary part of what's happening. It is now being engineered by much smarter, more dangerous people. And I know you're exactly right about Benny Thompson's missed opportunity. I think in his mind, it was important for him to start with that very long story about his hometown. But then he could have gotten to the democracy thing. Yeah. So on that note about some of these Republican primaries that are happening across

the country, we did have a few notable results from this week's elections. South Carolina Republican Tom Rice was one of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump for his attempted coup. But on Tuesday, he lost his primary to Trump endorsed state representative Russell Frye by 51 to 25 percent. But South Carolina Republican Congresswoman Nancy Mace, who voted against impeachment, even as she really pissed off Trump by just criticizing him, won her primary against Trump endorsed state representative Katie Arrington, 53 to 45%. Any lessons from these two South Carolina primaries about Trump and the Republican Party dynamics right now? We'll know more about this as the rest of the primaries,

but it seems thus far that criticizing Trump is a venal political sin within this Republican Party and voting to impeach him is a mortal political sin. And so there was, Nancy Mace was very critical of him after January 6th. After that moment, she has worked very hard to not necessarily be in his good graces, because he's obviously very against her, but to be very positive towards Trump. She has made finishing the wall a big part of her primary campaign. There was also a... She filmed a video, just an embarrassing video outside of Trump Tower, where she talked about how wonderful Trump is and all the accomplishments that his administration did. It was just so sad.

You don't need Trump to be pro-you, but you have to be pro-Trump. And Tom Rice could not be... Like Brian Kemp. Yes, exactly. Brian Kemp is the exact example of how this works. It is worth noting that these are two very different districts. Nancy Mace is in a district that is pretty Republican. It's plus 17 Republican, but Tom Rice's district is nine points more Republican and more conservative because a version of Nancy Mace's district had elected, you know, was won by a Democrat in 2018. Yeah. I mean, no one who truly opposes Donald Trump, who says openly and honestly that what he did was an illegal attempted coup in the Republican Party is going to have a big future

in that party. Liz Cheney is down like 30 points to her primary challenger right now. Adam Kinzinger is not running again. You know, out of the 10 Republicans who impeached Donald Trump in the House, I think now five, six aren't coming back to Congress. So one more notable primary on the Democratic side, a special election in South Texas that was held after Congressman Philemon Vela retired in the middle of his term to become a lobbyist.

In an over 80%, yeah it's you know gotta leave congress it's a you know nothing much is going on in the country uh everything's going swimmingly things are cool it's a great time to just like skip out in the middle of your term and go be a lobbyist super cool super cool so in an over 80 percent% Latino district that voted for Joe Biden by a little more than four points in 2020, Republican Mayra Flores beat Democrat Dan Sanchez 51 to 43%, making the hardline immigration candidate the first woman born in Mexico to serve as a Republican in Congress and the first time since Reconstruction that a Republican will represent the Rio Grande Valley. But there's a catch. Because of redistricting, in November, Flores will face Democratic Congressman Vicente

Gonzalez in a seat that Biden would have won by 16 points. So the new seat, the new district is a Biden plus 16. The one that just that the special election was held in was a Biden plus four. And this is the main reason that Democrats invested almost no money in this special election was held in as a Biden plus four. And this is the main reason that Democrats invested almost no money in this special election. So Dan, obviously, this result has triggered another round of stories about Democratic weakness with Latino voters. Is it warranted? Is it just another unique circumstance? Is it a little bit of both? This falls under the category of something we haven't said in a long time on this podcast, which is worry about everything, panic about nothing. Like, yes, all the caveats that you put in place are right there.

The Democrats did not invest any money in this seat or did not invest as much money in this seat. It's complicated. We will hopefully, maybe even probably get this seat back in the fall. But I hope so. Biden 16. Hope so. But we should be winning Biden plus four districts. If we are not winning Biden plus four districts, we are in a lot of trouble.

That is worth, I mean, that is just as a point of, a data point about the current state of the political environment. But of course, we have to be concerned about what looks like a shift. It's not a gigantic shift, but it is a shift among some segments of non-white voters, Latino voters in parts of the country, Black voters in parts of the country, Asian American voters in parts of the country. We have to be concerned about that because if the Republicans go from being a nearly entirely white working class political party to a just mostly white working class political party, Democrats are locked out of power. There is no math where we can win the Senate or Electoral College if we suffer any sort of real dip in our margins among core parts of the Democratic base.

So we – like I don't know why you wouldn't worry about it. Like what would be the downside? Like I would rather worry, spend some time trying to figure it out, and maybe it turned out to be totally fine than to just be like totally don't worry about it. Like what would be the upside of that? So yeah, I think we should pay real close attention to what happened here and try to figure out – and there have been some really – some good people, our friends at Eckes Research and others looking at the challenges here, try to figure out. And there have been some really, you know, some good people, our friends at Eckes Research and others looking at the challenges here,

trying to find solutions. But we should be like, this is another data point. And for reasons why Democrats should be concerned and focused on shoring up the parts of our party that have ensured that we've been elected, that helped win us the 2020 election. Because of the Senate, because of the Electoral College, it is extremely difficult for Democrats to win without getting some portion of non-college educated white voters. It is impossible, impossible to win if we also can't get non-college educated Latino voters and increasingly some non-college educated black males. I mean, it is just, it's impossible. The math doesn't add up. You can't go find a bunch of college educated progressives who are just hiding out in their homes. It's just,

it's not going to happen. Look, of course, the Democrats didn't invest at all in this race. So that is, that is ridiculous. That is a big explanation for why Dan Sanchez did so poorly. And he's obviously also not the candidate that's going to be running in the fall, right? So that's a weird, we have a sitting congressman in Vicente Gonzalez who's running in the fall, who's an incumbent. So that's going to help a lot too. So you're absolutely right. There's all these extenuating circumstances. But just to dig into the results a little bit, Cameron County in this district, which is right on the border. It is on the border of Mexico in the Rio Grande Valley. Flores wins that county by a point in this race. Obama beat Romney in that county by 30 points. 30 points. Willisee County, which is just north of Cameron County, Flores wins that by two.

Obama won it by 40 points. These aren't like, oh, we just didn't invest a little bit more money and we could have done some more door knocking and there could have been some ads from the DCCC. Like that's a couple points here and there. That gets you a couple points in there. That's not a difference between a point, two points and 30 and 40 points. That's a big, big, big difference. And look, Myra Flores also isn't some like, she's not like a Will Hurd Republican on the other side of Texas. She's not like some moderate Republican or even a mainstream conservative Republican. She was running around talking about a militarized border. She was like tweeting stuff with QAnon hashtags in her tweets as of a year or two ago. A couple

days after the January 6th insurrection, she said, it's time for us all to go buy more guns. She is a pretty extreme Republican. And if Democrats don't start figuring out how to treat Latino voters not as base voters, that they just have to activate around the midterm, around during election, but actually persuasion targets where you have to go and talk to them and figure out what their issues are. And by the way, their issues just aren't immigration, which is a patronizing way to treat Latino voters, I think.

But in fact, in 2020, the top issue for most Latino voters was the economy. Democrats don't figure out how to talk to Latino voters, who's a huge and growing percentage of the electorate every single year. We're fucked. We're fucked. So, like, I know that we can comfort ourselves with all kinds of like this is an extenuating circumstance excuse. And there are plenty of extenuating circumstances here that made this race unique. And like you said, I would expect that in a Biden plus 16 district, we'll get this back in the fall. But there are some shifts going on in the Rio Grande Valley.

And first, when it was shifts in Miami-Dade and it was OK, you'd say, OK, it was shifts going on in the Rio Grande Valley. And first, when it was shifts in Miami-Dade, and it was, okay, you'd say, okay, it was the Cuban vote in Miami-Dade. Then you go to the Rio Grande Valley and there's shifts there. You're like, okay, now there's shifts there. Now, look, a lot of strategists will point out that in counties across the country where there's a high percentage of college-educated Latinos, Democrats are doing fine and there's no attrition. Of course, because college-educated voters, we're doing great, whether they're white, black, or Latino or Asian, we're doing really great about college educated voters. But we are there is a problem with non college educated voters in the Democratic Party that is now becoming a problem across races. And we have to figure that out.

The demographic shifts in the country means that certain parts of the what were safe Democratic states and safe Democratic states in the Electoral College are becoming more and more Republican. It's Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio, which Obama won twice, Iowa, which Obama won twice, have moved very quickly in the Republican direction. And the hope is that heavily Latino states like Texas continue to become more diverse, therefore become blue. There is no world in which Texas becomes a blue state if Democrats are losing the Rio Grande Valley. And if this trend, there's going to be a real test for this trend in 2022 in Nevada, which is a very high percentage of non-college educated Latino voters. We can't win Texas. We lose Nevada.

Arizona stays hard. We're in huge trouble as a party. And so we have to figure this out. We have to do better across the board, right? We obviously, I believe there is a potential to improve our margins among non-college educated white voters. We have a case to make there. We have to do that. We have to improve our margins and our turnout in every part of the party in order to win, because the math is getting harder, particularly when it comes to the Senate. Yeah. And in Nevada, you have all the things we talked about this episode coming together because there was a primary there this week as well.

And Catherine Cortez Masto, who's the Democratic senator from Nevada, who's up, who's going to be in one of the tougher races. We absolutely have to keep her seat in order to hold the Senate. She's now going to be running against Adam Laxalt, who is another election denier, strong Trump supporter. He won that primary. in Nevada now, who's a Republican there, is the Republican secretary of state candidate in Nevada who won that primary is another election denier who could overturn future elections. And he just won as well. So Nevada, if we don't win Nevada in 2022, we could have a bunch of MAGA Republicans there who might want to overturn future elections. So it's incredibly important. Everyone go to votesaveamerica.com slash midterm, sign up for midterm madness, pick a region, whether you want to do West, South, Midwest, East, we really need people to sign up

because look, all of this can sound scary. I know there's a lot of focus on like, what will Margaret Garland do? And yeah, for sure. But we have the power to go out there and organize and make sure that these MAGA Republicans, these election deniers do not win these seats in these competitive districts and these competitive states. We can do it. So everyone sign up and we've got a lot of work to do. Okay. When we come back, Dan, we'll talk to Representative Elaine Luria of Virginia, who was on the 1-6 committee. Joining us now is one of the members of the January 6th Committee in our Congresswoman of Virginia, Elaine Luria. Welcome to the pod. Thank you. I wanted to start with this hearing, which felt different in a lot of ways from the previous two. It was obviously much more

kind of in the weeds about specific provisions of the 12th Amendment, Electoral Council Act. What was the committee trying to communicate with this hearing? Well, I think we were trying to get across that, you know, we have examined every aspect of the law, every claim that was made by, for example, John Eastman and other people who had this crazy theory of a way that the vice president could just unilaterally overthrow the results of the voters in the election. And we really examined that with both a renowned former conservative federal judge, as well as the legal advisor to the former vice president. And they unequivocally said across all of their testimony that there was no merit to this legal theory. And they went into depth about kind of all the different iterations of it. Was it essentially to delay? Was it to,

you know, choose a different slate of fake electors? Kind of all the different scenarios that have been laid out there. They just, the purpose was to go through them methodically and debunk them because they had no legal merit. It also felt like in the questioning, Congressman Aguilar and your counsel tried to get really at the point that both Eastman and President Trump knew that there was no legal merit to these claims and made them anyway. Why was this so important to establish that they pushed them while knowing that these claims are untrue or unfounded? Yeah, that really stood out to me too in the line of questioning, because they talked about this meeting on January 4th.

And the president, the vice president, Mark Short, the vice president's chief of staff, others were there. And during that conversation, Eastman indicated that he didn't think there was really a legal merit to this plan or idea that he had, this scheme. But he kind of said, but the Electoral Count Act, I think that's unconstitutional. So he's just going to a law that's been on the book since 1887, his own personal opinion that he doesn't like it. He thinks it's unconstitutional. And so therefore, the Electoral Count Act, let's just violate it. And then he turns right back

around on January 5th, another meeting with Mark Short, the legal advisor to the vice president, and tries to pressure him again, goes through all these different schemes. And then again, this was really the most shocking to me on January 6th, after there's been a riot, after the vice president's life has been in danger, he's been evacuated to a secure location in the basement of the Capitol, and they come back for the certification. location in the basement of the Capitol, and they come back for the certification, he essentially says, well, now the Electoral Count Act, we've determined that it's not so sacrosanct because you took more than two hours to debate of this particular state in the midst of a riot and insurrection, of course. And just file it one more time. I wrote this down, like, I implore you to consider one more relatively minor violation. This is the advice being provided. Essentially, they're urging the vice president to take this action. In stark contrast to this crazy theory, someone who's trying to essentially encourage

others to break the law. The former vice president, he was steadfast. We had just witness after witness after witness say that there was never any doubt in his mind that this was illegal, that he wasn't going to do this. And, you know, I've said a lot throughout the evaluation and course of this investigation that, you know, there were a few people, the right people who did the right thing at the right place at the right time. And the former vice president, he was steadfast in his adherence to the law, his adherence to the Constitution. And I think that clearly saved the day while his life was in danger. And there was also time spent in the hearing on this statement that President Trump put out prior to January 6th, saying that he and Mike Pence were on the same page. January 6th, saying that he and Mike Pence were on the same page. Why was it so significant that Trump was dishonest, not just about what was legally possible, what about the vice president actually believed? Well, so the topic of this was the pressure on the vice president. So this was

just one of those means of pressure on him. If the president puts out a false statement, essentially telling the world that the vice out a false statement, essentially telling the world that the vice president agrees with me, you know, it puts the former vice president in this position where, you know, he has to clearly and unambiguously come back and, you know, state that he does not agree with this legal opinion, which he does prior to convening the session on January 6th. But it is a method of this pressure campaign on the former vice president. And, you know, that stood out a lot in the hearing today as well. And there also seemed to be a specific effort to connect the pressure campaign on the vice

president, the dishonest assertions from the president and John Eastman about the power of the vice president to the actual violence that happened on January 6th. What was the committee thinking in trying to draw that connection? Is the belief that absent that effort, the creation of the expectation that vice president had the power to do something was going to do that and then not doing it is a precipitating event that led to the violence. Is that what you're getting at? I think that's true. And I think, you know, when you look at this 224 tweet, the one where the president comes out and says,

Mike Pence didn't have the courage to do what he needed to do. And then you immediately switch to, you know, a video clip of multiple of the rioters and people who ultimately stormed the Capitol, you know, yelling and screaming, bring out Pence, hang Mike Pence. He didn't have the courage to act. He didn't have the courage to do the right thing. There's clearly a connection because these people are anticipating and waiting. And they think that like Pence is the pivotal figure because of this

pressure campaign, because of these statements, essentially the one you mentioned where Trump said that Pence agreed with him. When we know that's not true, then Pence puts out a statement saying, you know, this legal theory is BS. I'm not going to do this. I'm going to do what the Constitution tells me to do, the 12th Amendment. I'm just going to open the envelopes and they're going to be counted, not be changed from what the voters, you know, sent and the real electoral slates that came to Congress. There has been some confusion and ambiguity about whether the committee would make a criminal referral to the Department of Justice. You helped clear some of that confusion up in a tweet this morning where you said this was something the committee had to vote on. It was your belief

that the committee had a responsibility that if criminal activity was found, that such a referral should be made. You've obviously been part of this process for a year now. You've heard this hearing. Many of your colleagues have already on the record asserted that crimes were committed. What is your view about whether crimes have been committed by the president or his allies or any of the people we've been talking about? So I think it's very clear that there's criminal activity here. And this is substantiated by a federal judge in the case that's been reviewed as far as releasing the emails from Eastman. Judge Carter essentially says, you know, there's sufficient evidence to show that a crime is likely. And, you know, there's certain counts of that,

defrauding the U.S. government, conspiracy to interfere with congressional proceedings. And we've referenced that over and over and over again as we present this information. And so, you know, I stand by my thought that, you know, when we as Congress, whether it's in this investigation or any other work that we do, become aware of criminal activity, it's our duty that we refer that to the appropriate authorities. Now, the question for the committee, I don't think there's as much disagreement as perhaps has been portrayed in the last couple of days. I think it's a question of really, you know, what does a criminal referral mean? How do we do that? I feel like the hearings we're doing right now, we're presenting everything very publicly. We intend to, the chairman has said,

that we'll provide this information to the Department of Justice that we've collected throughout our investigation. So, you know, we're already going to pass it all along in addition to what you're seeing through the hearing. Chairman Thompson said today that he thought that based on a report last night from the New York Times that Eastman had reportedly claimed to have some knowledge about debates inside the Supreme Court that he wanted the committee to talk to Ginny Thomas, the wife of Justice Clarence Thomas. Do you have anything you can tell us about when that might happen and what the process would be to get that to happen? So, you know, it's really the policy of the committee to not talk about people that we might ask to testify or approach, but this has become sort of very public in the last day or so.

And it's my understanding that during the hearing, and I have to go back and check this, but the Jenny Thomas put out a statement saying she's happy to come talk to the committee. So that really kind of simplifies this, if that's really true. And, you know, it is a case where we're still continuing to collect information for our investigation, even as we're presenting the information we've already gathered.

So, yeah, there is information from the recent Eastman tranche of emails that we received that lead us to believe that, you know, it's probably someone we need to hear from. The committee has been focused on and telling, I think, of this very powerful story about this plot to overturn the 2020 election, right? That includes, but goes beyond the violence at the Capitol on January 6th. This is happening in the context of a similarly ongoing plot all across the country to possibly do the same thing in the 2024 election. I was struck by turning Chairman Thompson, turning it back over to Judge Ludick to talk about this at the end of the hearing. How are you thinking about what role the committee plays, not just in telling the story of what happened in 2020, but the ongoing threat to

democracy and the integrity and legitimacy of our elections? Well, you know, I think that's a really important point about the committee, you know, and some critics of us might say, well, like, why are you just looking at the past? And I'm like, this is not about the past. I mean, we're evaluating things to have lessons learned from the past, but this is an ongoing threat today. It's an ongoing threat for the future. And that really pivots back to the core reason for the committee. We're a legislative committee. So we provide oversight and legislative recommendations to prevent something like this from happening in the future. So one of the things, for example, that was talked about in today's hearing a few times was the mention of the Electoral Count Act. So this was

a piece of legislation that's been on the books since 1887. And it was actually something they tried to weaponize and turn around and, you know, reinterpret. And, you know, so is it sufficient? Are there things that we could do to make that particular legislation stronger? And there's other things as well, if we're looking at security of the Capitol, the response to these types of incidents within the Capitol region, the National Guard, things like online disinformation, and you know, how that is monitored domestic terrorism, we've, you know, come to see not only in this case, but for example, the recent tragic shooting in Buffalo that, you know, our domestic terrorism statutes, really, we need to look at them. So there's just, you know, our domestic terrorism statutes, really, we need to look at them. So

there's just, you know, these are examples of things that we're talking about through the committee. And in our final report, you know, that's really one of the key elements of this is providing those recommendations. Congressman Luria, thank you so much for taking time out of what I mentioned. It's a very, very busy day to join us here on Positive American to update us about these hearings. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. All right. After a busy news week, it's time once again for another round of Take Appreciators with our Chief Take Officer, Elijah Cohn. Elijah, take it away.

Hey, guys. We're back to the past now. We just jumped forward in time for the listeners and we're back. Back to the morning before the hearings happened. It's confusing. It's confusing. All right. So I'm going to explain the rules again. Welcome back to the Take Appreciators. Administration takes with you all. The producers have seen these takes. John and Dan have not. They will react and rate them on a scale of one to four politicos with four being the worst. John and Dan, are you ready? Born ready.

Just glad to be here with the Jeffrey Clark of Crooked Media. Thank you, Elijah. Wow. Really flattering. I guess too many compliments to the video team earlier in the episode. No, it's the chutzpah. He's like, I got to pitch. Take me out from behind the camera.

Yeah, I got to cut us Take me out from behind the camera. I got to cut us back down. That's so funny. All right. Well, on that note, let's start with the January 6th hearings. We talked about this a bit in the A block, but this piece ran the morning before the hearings actually started in the New York Times. This piece is titled, The January 6th Committee Has Already Blown It. Here's a quote. Oh, I think I know this.

We don't need a committee to simply regurgitate what happened on January 6th, 2021. We need a committee that will preserve democracy on January 6th, 2025 and January 6th, 2029. We need a committee to locate the weaknesses in our democratic system and society and find ways to address them guys who wrote it um our our good friend and mentor david brooks wrote it that is correct it is david brooks and as i promised i'm i'm writing dropping the quote in the slack so you guys can see it if you want to take some more i here's the thing i think dan and I have pretty much given a version of this advice, maybe not so trollishly written, but it is to pass a bunch of reforms to make sure this doesn't happen again does seem a bit fanciful. And also the fault of the Republicans in Congress who won't go along with it, as well as two

Democrats who we will not name who have a fondness for the filibuster. But other than that, I sort of agree with it. Yeah, I agree with the idea. What I don't agree with is the lazy crutch of the false choice. Yeah, well, the headline is super New York Times troll-y. Yeah, and we can't truly blame David Brooks for the headline. That is someone else's fault. Which, again, we'd love to name some names. We've been attacking headline writers for years on this show. That's a great hot take. yourself which you reveal yourself headline headlines need a byline is our

take yes i i give this one one and a half politicos yeah one and a half politicos for the take uh three politicos for the headline writer i mean do you guys think it's valid to say that this is a key part of preserving democracy in 2025 and 2029 this is a key part of what he's looking for what is this and what was this in that in that scenario like what was this referring revisitingiting January? Yeah, revisiting January 6. I think it's part look, I think to the extent that January's these hearings have any influence over the elections whatsoever. And by influence, I don't just mean a swing voter changing their mind, but reminding Democrats and organizers and activists what's at stake. I do think it's it's part of the puzzle. It's part of what we need to do to preserve democracy, which is, I think, why we're talking about it so much.

So this piece suggests that Pence needs more praise for not going along with Trump on January 6th. Specifically, it suggests that Congress name a building after him or that Joe Biden give him the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Then it makes this argument, quote, about one in 20 Republican voters prefer Pence to Trump for 2024. Democrats ought to be trying to pry these voters away from the Republican Party in the event that Trump runs again. By making it clear that the Democrat Party appreciates Mike Pence as a hero of democracy, they might just persuade a small but crucial percentage of these Pence Republicans to cross over in 2024. Who wrote it? Is it Bill Kristol? Is it Bill Crystal? It's not. Is it, is it Bill Crystal's other name,

David Frum? It's not, it's not. Honestly, Bill, Bill Crystal and David Frum are too smart to write something like that. I, I, I've heard this take go around.

Clip that and put that on the socials immediately. I, it is funny though, because I've heard this take go around, and I didn't bother to see who actually wrote it, because I was so like, come on. All right. I'd never heard of this guy.

Is it Jonathan Last? It is Jonathan Last. There you go. He's Jonathan Last. Jonathan Last is a good writer. This is not a good take, but it's a good writer. And here's the thing. There's a lot of these Republicans who are speaking out about Trump trump and the insurrection all that stuff for doing the bare minimum like i would i

would say that liz cheney is doing above the bare minimum liz cheney holds like extremely conservative views that i find abhorrent but i think that the courage she has shown on this issue is commendable mike pence did the fucking bare minimum by not illegally overturning an election. And then, you know, now he's like sort of kind of speaking out and taking these like oblique shots at Trump that aren't much. Fuck that. Come on. No, I am. I am. Mike Mike Pence should get the Presidential Medal of Freedom for the simple act of not committing a crime is like the ultimate example of participation trophy culture from the Republicans. It's so bad. He didn't stop a crime. He didn't speak out about a crime.

He just quietly did not commit the crime. So that's point one. Point two is one thing that's never been said about Mike Pence before is that he has a small but enthusiastic base. There's no such thing as a Pence Republican. No one cares about Mike Pence. He's the plain yogurt of politicians. The idea if we were just nice enough to Mike Pence, we could get these Pence folks to cross over. They do not care.

The Pence Republican is a placeholder for mildly non-insurrectionist Republican voters. And those are available to Democrats potentially in 2025, but it doesn't require giving Mike Pence an award. never been a fan, but if he had like delivered a speech the day after the insurrection or the week after or the month after where he sort of just tore into Donald Trump and everything that happened, I would have a different view of this, but he did not do that. He just decided to slink away because he somehow thinks he's going to run for president again. And there's going to be people who support him in any significant majority. Yeah, it's crazy. Can you be president of the Bulwark? Is that a job? And I don't even want to make fun of the Bulwark

because the Bulwark is full of really talented, smart writers too. You know what? This gets three and a half. I'm not going to give it a full playbook, but it gets three and a half. I'm going to go with three just to be slightly different.

Okay. Okay. All right. Well, we're going to move with three just to be slightly different. Okay. Okay. All right. Well, we're going to move away from January 6th for our last, uh, take here. And hopefully this will get you guys to a full playbook,

which is what, which is your goal. Now you're definitely not getting one. That is guaranteed. Oh, just wait and see. This one is from the wall street journal and it's titled cannabis and the violent crime search oh no oh god yeah i know this piece makes the argument that weed is more potent and is linked to psychosis and violent behavior. And then it makes this insane point.

Here is an abridged quote. The Uvalde shooter fits a pattern. Mass shooters at Gabby Giffords meeting, Aurora, Colorado, Pulse nightclub, Sunderland Springs, and Marjorie Stoneman Douglas high school were all reported to be

marijuana users. It could be a coincidence, but increasing evidence suggests a connection oh guys who wrote it i don't know who wrote it was it the it wasn't the editorial board was it it was not it was a member of the editorial board i mean is it kim strassel it is not i mean it's the only member of the editorial board whose name i've ever heard yeah i don't know the rest so you're just going to tell us it's uh al member of the editorial board whose name I've ever heard. Yeah, I don't know the rest, so you're just going to have to tell us. It's Alicia Finley.

Never heard of her. Yeah, never heard of her either. Is that an alias, like Barry Loudermilk? It might be. I mean, I'd want to hide my real name after this take. Look, without saying anything else, I will just note that personally, I am one of the most non-confrontational people you'll ever meet to the point of it being a fault i do appreciate this person leaning into the uh causation correlation debate by saying could be could be a coincidence i mean it's just

that is one of the stupidest fucking things I've literally ever heard. That is that. Yeah. Full playbook. You win, Elijah. You got it. OK, here's here's where I think this take really leads itself in where it says many violent people have used marijuana. Therefore, there's a chance marijuana contributes to violence.

But you know what? A hundred percent of violent people use? Oxygen. Yeah, I would look into oxygen. I would look into it. It's just not a coincidence, is it? There are no conspiracies, but there are no coincidences, Steve Bannon always says. I wanted to deny you, Elijah, the playbook, the full playbook, because you wanted it so bad.

But the power of the take compels me to give this one a full playbook. Wow, I did it. You did it, Elijah. And just in case it didn't go without saying, you know what else all those shooters had in common? They had access to guns. Obviously, come on. I mean, I felt like that was the obvious one. But yeah, but apparently not obvious to the Wall Street Journal editorial board member whose name I have already forgotten. Elijah Cohn, chief take officer. Thank you, as always. Thanks to Representative Elaine Luria for joining us on a busy day. We will see you. We have a live show in Oakland Sunday night, and that pod will be released on Monday. So check it out. We'll talk to you later.

Bye, everyone.