Pod Save America - “Trump’s running again, again.”

Episode Date: October 11, 2021

Donald Trump returns to Iowa and teases a second run with the full support of the Republican establishment, the race in Virginia between former Governor Terry McAuliffe and Trump-backed private equity CEO Glenn Youngkin is way too close for comfort, and Congressman Adam Schiff (D-CA) drops by the studio to talk to Tommy Vietor and Jon Favreau about his new book, Midnight in Washington: How We Almost Lost Our Democracy and Still Could.”For a closed-captioned version of this episode, please visit crooked.com/podsaveamerica. 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 Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor. What are you laughing at? I'm just ready to dive into another fantastic episode of Pod Save America. All the news is good today. That's the subject. I'm just a little, I'm a little tired. There's some sort of cat fight that breaks out behind my house. Really? A cat? Like feral cats? Feral cats viciously fighting. And it wakes me up with a... It's really frightening. First of all, I thought it was an earthquake, but then I thought it was maybe a cat on my roof.

You don't send pundit out there to let them know what's up? Absolutely not. Absolutely not. There's no good outcome for that. Have you looked through your 8X HD security camera from SimpliSafe? No, I brought that one inside. Oh my God. On today's pod, Donald Trump is back in Iowa

and ready to run with the full support of the Republican establishment. The race in Virginia between Terry McAuliffe and Glenn Youngkin is way too close for comfort. And Congressman Adam Schiff drops by the studio to talk to Tommy and I about his new book, Midnight in Washington, How We Almost Lost Our Democracy and Still Could. It's a real feel-good sort of... It's always darkest before the dawn, I guess, or something. But first, we got some big Pod Save America scheduling news, everyone. So listen up.

Because you're going to tweet at us when it happens and you forget that you heard this. Starting in two weeks, we'll be releasing this episode first thing Tuesday morning instead of late Monday afternoon. Again, that's Tuesday morning first thing when you wake up. It's going to be right in your phones instead of late Monday afternoon. This is just a slight schedule change that's going to help us make sure we capture news on Monday mornings. All the biggest news is breaking on Monday these days.

Yeah, which sometimes we miss and we record and it's a whole you know it's a whole thing and also your boys want their sundays back all right i don't hear any fucking complaints that's what i was hoping someone would say i was hoping someone would just be honest about it i don't need an 8 a.m you know from john favreau saying trump bad how but this week how mean, I think you might. Just as Biff. One more thing before we start. What's new with Love It or Leave It? How are the outdoor Cine Lounge shows going?

They've been awesome. It's been a blast. We're doing live shows in LA every Thursday night, leading to our Beacon Show in New York on November 12th. This week, we'll be joined by Akilah Hughes, Solomon Giorgio, Brandon Wardell, and Larry Wilmar, all returning champions. We have great shows every week, crooked.com slash events. All right, let's get to the news.

We've been talking a lot about Biden's agenda, which is incredibly important. But while we wait for Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema to make up their fucking minds, it's starting to look like Donald Trump has made up his. Kyrsten Sinema apparently running in the Boston Marathon today. I was very disoriented by that news, but also the news that the Boston Marathon is today because, of course, we're still in COVID world. And I always think about April opening day. It's just marathon training. It's a pretty involved process, requires a lot of time and effort that could maybe be used better elsewhere. Like at a wine internship or writing a bill. Look, she's just certainly not helping with the negotiations in Congress,

so maybe if she wants to run the marathon, fine. Yeah, right away, I guess. Go ahead. Anyway, the twice-impeached one-term president held what he called a Save America. By the way, the trademark there is getting a little close to our show here. Cease and desist, sir. Anyway, he held what he called a Save America rally at the Iowa State Fair, where he was joined by the state's top Republican officials for a speech in which he focused once again on his attempted coup and teased a second run for the presidency.

And I'm telling you, the single biggest issue, as bad as the border is, it's horrible, horrible what they're doing. They're destroying our country. As bad as that is, the single biggest issue, the issue that gets the most pull, the most respect, the biggest cheers is talking about the election fraud of 2020 presidential election. Trump won! Trump won! Trump won! Trump won! Trump won! Trump won! We did.

But America is not great right now, so we're using the same slogan, Make America Great Again. And we may even add to it, but we'll keep it. Make America Great Again Again! Because we already did it, right? We're going to Make America Great Again Again. How about that slogan, you guys on board?

Tommy, what do you think? So, Make America Great is it's hilariously stupid it is but it's exactly the kind of perfect amount of stupid that will make uh liberals mock it online and reinforce the message ad nauseum am i wrong no i mean just i don't know i think it's pretty memorable we all know i'm not gonna forget it think it's pretty memorable. We all know it. I'm not going to forget it. Yeah, it's pretty good. So Make America Great Again was not his original line. He sold it from Reagan. But yeah, like we all remember it. And I think in a weird way, this kind of works pretty well when Biden's numbers have dropped and there's sort of a bit of this like COVID malaise feeling. I don't know. These rallies are his focus groups, right? We used to make fun of the 2008 Clinton

campaign for like rolling out new slogans and painting buses. And Trump just like goes up in front of a bunch of people and riffs on stuff and whatever lands becomes his slogan. I mean, I think it's tough to argue that life was great in America between 2016 and 2020 when every single poll showed huge majorities of the country saying the country was on the wrong track. But that was never really the point of MAGA. America is great when he's president. That's it the point that's that's always been the point it's not you can go all through the social oh what did he talk about he's yearning for an america that no no it was just like there's no thought behind it it's when i'm not president the country sucks when i'm president the country's great that's what the followers love no need to go below surface level there.

Right, and just, you know, because he is an avatar for their grievance. He has no, it's an identity-driven campaign. So when he is president, it is the victory for their identity. When he is not, their identity has been defeated. Shout out to some of my favorite slogans from the 2008 Hillary Clinton campaign. My favorite, of course, will always be strength plus experience equals change because that means you also have the will always be strength plus experience equals change because that means uh you also have the corollary strength plus experience divided by change equals one which

has always been my favorite formula in all politics math equations make great political slogans that's always been the case well the best thing to do is to not make any choices and then just tack them together like on the bus john kerry's 2004 slogan from the campaign i was on stronger at home respected in the world yeah wow real change what was the other what was the other hillary one that we always love from iowa that she put on the side of the bus yeah it just ends in time to pick a president real change strength the experience big problems real solutions time to pick yes there you go tommy which i just i always loved you just know you've kind of had a trunk situation of too many people throwing in ideas because the fact that it is time to pick a president is what we all know going into a presidential election. So slogans aside, joining Trump on stage was Iowa's Republican governor, both Republican members of Congress, and 88-year-old Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, who accepted Trump's endorsement for another six-year term, despite calling his actions on January 6th, quote,

extreme aggressive and irresponsible. That was Chuck Grassley back then. Here's Chuck Grassley over the weekend. I'm thrilled to announce tonight that Senator Chuck Grassley has my complete and total endorsement for re-election, Chuck. and total endorsement for re-election, Chuck. I really appreciate that. They love you. They love you.

Okay. Do you want to say anything? Yes. I was born at night, but not last night. So if I didn't accept the endorsement of a person that's got 91 percent of the republican voters in iowa i wouldn't be too smart i'm smart enough to accept that endorsement i mean points for honesty that was the weirdest thing i've ever heard i just loved it oh golly gee um i have to be here because of political expedience i'm an 88 year old man staring at the sunset years of my life and i'm gonna sell my fucking soul to be up here with

this guy i will die in office that was basically what he said that was basically what he said that's the campaign that's the grassley campaign i would rather supplicate myself to this monster than have even a moment of quiet in which to face the totality of my life in its end and perhaps that's what he's trying maybe he's just trying to avoid that you know yeah it's rare that a politician literally reads a poll on stage but there was just an iowa poll by ann seltzer that found trump at 53 approval which is the best number he's ever had in iowa even when he was president well and this tells you all you need to know about what Grassley is doing there. That same poll showed that two-thirds of all voters want someone else besides Grassley to be senator.

Yeah. And so you see that number, then you see the Trump approval, and you're Chuck Grassley. You're like, yeah, sure, why not? What do you think Grassley's embrace of Trump says about where the Republican Party is headed? Not only in 24, we can put 24 aside, but just in 22. I mean, I think it shows just what we've seen before, which is constant short term thinking. Because if you listen to the other parts of that speech, it was an hour and a half long speech. He got to the Grassley endorsement at 70 minutes into it. We got to we dragged Chuck Grassley's old ass onto stage for less than a minute and then pushed him back off. 88 years old. But like what I don't know that these guys understand is that the MAGA movement wants to fucking destroy Mitch McConnell and the entire establishment. Anyone who has criticized him. Like I was listening to Steve Bannon's podcast on the way to work this morning. As you often do. As I do. Bannon says that

McConnell's more dangerous to the MAGA movementosi and schumer combined he wants trump to pull his endorsement for many senate candidates who say they will vote for mitch mcconnell as leader and next week he was previewing an interview with peter schweitzer about mitch mcconnell's wealth right like they're all in on just destroying the establishment and like that's the drug deal that chuck grassley just made though i don't know that he knows that he made it like. Well, and Grassley's a McConnell pal. Yes. And was getting some booze at the rally.

There were some there were some Trump fans. Very, very limited booze. I saw people tried to play that. It was like three people. Well, but I think I think the two thirds of all voters who want someone new shows you that like the Trump Grassley is not a natural favorite with Donald Trump's base at all. 91% of Republicans in Iowa in that poll like Trump, that's 10 points better than Grassley. So that's some weakness. That's where the boos are coming from. I think you see this, you saw this with Rubio doing the same thing. I think there's this sort

of lie they tell themselves, which is I do this event, I kiss the ring, I give the speech, I embrace it, and then I can go back to being my normal self. I can be the kind of politician that I was. But of course, you know, be very careful what you pretend to be. You are what you pretend to be. There's no going back. Now they have fully embraced this. Now these are the people that he will feel beholden to. They are the core of the Republican Party moving forward. And once they're in office, they have to govern exactly as they campaigned. And so we're just sort of stuck in this doom loop with these people. I think the calculus for every single 22 candidate in a competitive race is that if you embrace Trump's endorsement, you avoid a primary and

you have the best chance of getting his voters. And if you don't embrace his endorsement, you get shit on by Trump. You get a primary. You might not get the voters. So so why i don't i can't imagine any of them in a competitive district that reject trump's endorsement glenn youngkin didn't and he's he he needs to reject it probably more than most certainly not in iowa where what trump went on by what like seven something yeah something like that he mopped up yeah every republican primary now is a machine that turns whatever you are into a trump by the time you get to the end of it it was interesting to me to hear the speech and hear him go really hard against the both the Build Back Better bill and the infrastructure bill. Like there's the first 20, 25 minutes of

the speech was actually looked like it was on a prompter. And it was sort of a concerted message about like crime, the border, inflation, China, Afghanistan, leftist, socialist bubble, like all the stuff you hear. Then he said, as we speak, Joe Biden and the radical left Democrats in Congress are trying to ram through a five trillion dollar wild spending binge that costs more than the entire sum of the United States has spent on any war in the history of our country. That was weird. That was weird framing to me. Yeah. More than the war. Well, there was, you know, Politico reported that there's a bunch of Republicans who are a little nervous that Trump is just only focusing on in all of these rallies on the big lie and 2020, which, again, he did. Like, as you pointed out, Tommy, he was like on script, on message and this message about Biden and the country and Biden's record and radical left and all the all the greatest violent criminals, bloodthirsty gangs, illegal aliens, deadly drug cartels, trans people.

I don't know if he got to that, but he will. So he's got all those. But then the coverage becomes about him in the big lie because he, you know, wanders off message and focuses on that. And, you know, the Republicans think this is bad politics for them. Do you think that's true? Do you think they really believe that? think this is bad politics for them. Do you think that's true? Do you think they really believe that?

I came away feeling like the big lie arguments are more effective than I thought, because it's a blizzard of random facts and accusations that are state by state about like chain of custody of ballots in Georgia and serial numbers on ballots here. And it's sort of like it just washes over you. And if you're not fully versed in this stuff, I'm sure you're like, Oh, that sounds kind of bad. I don't know. Like I,

what I want them to be, what I want Trump to be focusing on this. If I were a Republican candidate, absolutely not. But what choice do they have? That's very, that's, I agree with that a lot.

Right. I mean, even he's saying it, they don't have a choice. He kind of, he doesn't, he, he sort of bounces around the words, but what he's saying when he gets to it,

even in the clip you played is nothing is resonating more when I'm speaking. So I'm going to keep coming back to it because I feel like it's working. I think it's working for me when I talk about the big lie. That's where I feel the passion from the crowd. So I think it's all, it's also the ultimate grievance for a politics of grievance that he's been, you know, practicing for the last several years, right? You were robbed, you were cheated, you were silenced. And me running again is about us getting revenge on the people who cheated us. That is all you need to know. It's not about issues, not about anything else. So in some ways, I think he might have a better sense of his base than certainly these other Republicans, though they have another problem, which is getting back independent Republicans who went to Biden. And that might not be as effective with

them. Totally. And he's squeezing McConnell here. I mean, he's out there saying everyone should vote against both of these, the spending bills that Biden has put forward, but also that the debt ceiling is this powerful card and McConnell should use it. And that what he did recently cutting a deal was a huge cave and that that shouldn't happen again. Like this is a scary bunch of political incentives for Mitch McConnell and for all these Republicans. So former Democratic Congresswoman Abby Finkenauer has said that she's running against Grassley because of what happened on January 6th. How much effort do you think Democratic candidates should be making to remind voters that Republican candidates are 100 percent behind the guy who incited a violent insurrection.

Love it. Like how much of that, how much of the message do you think that should be? We've talked about this. I don't, I don't know the answer. I don't know what polls. Well, I do know that it represents like an incredible break with our history and is one of the most significant and dangerous thing is any politicians have done throughout our entire lives. And by that standard, of course, it has to be central to it.

How do you tie that back to the larger political agenda of Democrats and make this part of a larger message about economics? I'm not totally sure, but I do think that is the challenge. Like, how do you make people care about this? I think the reason Chuck Grassley feels comfortable being on that stage when right after January 6th, he was appalled by Trump at a time in which Mitch McConnell felt free to criticize him, tells you something about how short our memories are. Yeah. And I don't know what you do in a situation which people really do forget. I am scarred by the fact that most voters, especially swing voters, hated impeachment,

and they sort of hate looking back and the blame game stuff in Washington. But I also, like when I see Trump recording a video for Ashley Babbitt's family, the woman who was killed on January 6th when she was trying to climb through a window to get to the area where members of Congress were all hiding. It's clear that he thinks she's the victim, that his supporters were the victims, that he is supportive of what they did that day and is just sort of waiting for the right moment to fully, fully say it. And so, yeah, it does work. For me, at least it raises the stakes for the January 6th committee. For someone like Abby, like I agree,. I would cynically pull test the best messages and talk about those and not act like making this. My focus is going to do anything if it doesn't help me win.

One thing we know for sure is that in January, when the insurrection happened, Trump's numbers were a lot lower. A lot more Republicans were criticizing him, a lot more elected Republicans. And part of why he's rebounded, like what you just said, love it, is that people's memories have faded. So one argument is remind people, right? And I think I agree with you, Tommy. I'm sort of scarred by the impeachment stuff too but i do think at least the first impeachment now we look back at it like complicated story whatever else the second impeachment and the insurrection i think made a much bigger difference in people's

minds at least in the public perception the insurrection did i think there's no evidence that the impeachment did i think i think it's all caught up on the same thing it was all a couple weeks well one thing we know whether or not the impeachment itself made I think it was all caught up in the same thing. It was all a couple of weeks. Well, one thing we know, whether or not the impeachment itself made this happen, the insurrection was so stark for people that a majority of people believed he should have been removed for office for having committed it. These morons should have taken care of him politically when they had the chance. The McConnell's of the world who are now getting attacked by him. But one thing we have learned after years of Donald Trump is when he is out of the spotlight, he is more popular. Like some of his best polling has come when he disappears.

Some of his worst polling has come around ACA repeal and even around impeachment when we saw him at his absolute worst, around Access Hollywood. That's a good point. I have a theory here that being banned from Twitter and mainstream media coverage might be beneficial to him right now because he's sort of hiding out in the right-wing media swamp world. This is why Vice President Kamala Harris was absolutely wrong about the need to remove Donald Trump.

I was hoping to go there. Keep that in there. Listen, K-Hive, you and I, you know how much admiration and respect I have for how you have never forgotten my bad tweets. The Des Moines Register write up of the Iowa poll talked about the whole theme of it is like absence makes the heart grow fonder and why his numbers are up, including with independents. And they mentioned that suggestion that being off social media might be helping him

because people hated his tweets. I don't know. I think he can do a lot of damage on social media as well, but it was interesting. Yeah, I agree with that. Yeah, I mean, look, his popularity ebbed and flowed. He was on Twitter the entire time. This is like when people tell me to stop drinking Diet Coke doesn't help you lose weight. It's like I've been fat on Diet Coke. I've been thin on Diet Coke. Diet Coke is not the issue. Like the question is, the larger narrative is about how much time are

we really focused on Donald Trump and his worst proclivities and his policy agenda and how much of the time is it turned to Democrats, turned to Hillary Clinton or what have you at the moment? Meanwhile, like all his aides are trying to avoid, you know, well, not all of them. I think Kash Patel and so the others are say they're cooperating with the January 6th committee. But Steve Bannon is loudly saying that he will assert executive privilege along with Trump, even though he hadn't worked at the White House for years when the January 6th attack occurred. Yeah, he's also let's talk about the investigation now, because there is the news that Bannon's rejecting a subpoena. Some of the other aides are cooperating, even though Trump told them not to. Trump's also trying to hide documents by claiming executive

privilege. Fortunately, the White House just announced that President Biden will not invoke executive privilege for Trump, While one sixth committee chair, Benny Thompson and vice chair, Liz Cheney threatened anyone who refuses to testify with criminal contempt of Congress. What do we think Trump's so afraid of people finding out? That it was a coordinated effort involving top officials and outside advisors, including top conservative legal experts to overturn the election and

install Trump as president. Despite losing the election. I think you might be right. I think that might, I think it, I think we kind of know what he's trying to hide. I also just think it's better to be fighting than, than going along. Even if, even if we are, we have the basics. At best he'll drag it out. Well, I was wondering that, like, don't you think Steve Bannon's dream here is that he's a, he's a martyr for, you know, uh, getting a criminal contempt of Congress and

resisting the subpoena and all that bullshit. Steve Bannon loves that kind of a schlubby guy who's not that bright, who needs two things. One media attention to a billionaire to back him. He lost the Mercer family. That was his billionaire that left. Now he's got this dissident Chinese billionaire who's backing everything he's doing. And so he's kind of back. Yeah. There's a few things, you know, Trump's complicity in the insurrection, which you feel like is widely known but there's plenty of details that could highlight how bad it was and how deep it was um jonathan carl has a new book out um you know and and some of the stuff in the book we've heard before trump loved the insurrection he bragged about the crowd size we've heard that before i don't know have we

heard that before i thought that was new to me bragged about the crowd size on january 6th i had heard that before um the one that i hadn't seen is that he refused multiple times to say in the video that his supporters should leave the capitol um he also told the department of justice to say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to quote me and the republican congressman i think i had heard that before too uh this was a fun one that i hadn't heard this one was good yeah Trump believed that wireless thermostats made in China for Google by a company called Nest might have been used to manipulate voting machines in Georgia. And Trump asked the director of national intelligence to look into it. I didn't realize that my nest could change votes again. Totally crazy. But like you rant about that in front of a crowd

and they're like oh my god I didn't know that the thermostat could do that like I don't there's no one's fact checking this stuff in real time it's just a brain worm he just throws out little crazy theories and people believe them I hate it I mean we talk about but we talk about like bringing this stuff back up and what it's going to do

and whether it's going to have an effect I don't know obviously we're all partisans you know who we're voting for. But when I read these stories about one six and new revelations about Trump, it does get me in a place at least where I'm like, fuck, we got to get serious here. This is very scary that this could happen again. Like it does. It does work a little bit. I do. And I do think one lesson from impeachment was even though a lot of what we learned was already reported, it was riveting and dramatic and important testimony that actually, I think, shook people just by dint of being good television and being really captivating and really capturing just how dangerous it was. So I think sometimes we are not good at imagining how these details will resonate if they're part of a big hearing, if they're part of a big press moment. My problem with this, that theory, though, is like, what is the end game?

We all watched these sociopaths literally storm the fucking Capitol, kick down doors, beat cops to death. People got shot. And here we are a few months later and the approval ratings back up higher than it ever was before. You know what I mean? There's no end game that prevents him from running again or letting his approval pop back up. This happened in impeachment as well. So I'm not opposed to relitigating these things, having an on-camera conversation about what happened.

I guess I'm sort of skeptical that this stuff sticks long-term because it hasn't to date. So here's the question because who knows what effect it's going to have. We can't predict that. You're the Democrats on the committee. How do you make sure that after, like you said, we had two impeachments that led Trump to be the likely nominee in 2024. After that, how do you make this a little bit more effective? How do you put out the best foot forward?

I do think the fact that Thompson and Cheney are talking about threatening criminal contempt, which can get you a year in prison and like a hundred thousand dollar fine, could actually force people to testify that have not testified before and offer firsthand accounts of what might've happened that day. That to me is interesting. It requires, I think, a full floor vote to get to the criminal contempt. Um, I don't know what that means, like to issue it, I guess, whatever. Yeah. Or to vote on, to vote on whether you have to enforce it, but hearing those people on the record in front of a hearing is interesting. It would be new information potentially.

Yeah, and I hear you. I do think some of this is we are fighting against fundamentals that have been true for the past five years of dealing with Trump. There is a massive right-wing propaganda machine that exists to paint Democrats as evil and paint Republicans as victims. to paint Democrats as evil and paint Republicans as victims. And then there is a giant mainstream apparatus that teaches the controversy and treats Washington as a cynical and broken place. And into that kind of storm, we like throw these messages and watch them whirl around and come apart. But like, what else are we supposed to do? What are we what what else? What other options do we have? We have to fight within this horrible, ridiculous media ecosystem.

And then, I don't know, do the best we can from the outside to pressure cable companies to drop Fox and OAN. Like that is where the real fight then has to turn. If what you're saying is these messages don't make a difference,

I completely agree. We are stuck with the system we have. I also think in some ways, the media narrative is a zero sum game, right? So if we're getting close to November of 22, what would you rather the headlines be? Democrats still fighting each other about the Build Back Better agenda or the one six committee is talking about, you know, Trump's complicity in inciting an insurrection. And if I just had to pick certainly that straw man of the worst case versus a better case is yeah, that's an insurrection. And if I just had to pick, I would probably- Certainly that straw man of the worst case versus a better case is,

yeah, that's an easy pick. But like if they pass the Bill by Better Gen, and they do something, they pass the infrastructure bill, like then that's more of the actual conversation about what you should be highlighting.

I don't know the answer. I think it's a data-driven decision. It's probably state by state. At least we can all agree that the worst headline for us coming out of next week would be activists stop Kyrsten Sinema

from getting Gatorade midway through her marathon. Which I think they're going to do. Are they going to try to do that? No, there's people like, they're quote unquote bird-dogging her throughout the course and protesting her throughout the 26.2 miles. Even me, you just put me back in a headspace

that's like, what the fuck are Democrats doing when I had previously been a headspace about, hey, let's make sure that fucking Trump doesn't win again. Are you anti-marathon bird-dogging? No, I think it's, don't make me go anywhere on that. Yeah, I hope they all fucking trip her and then give her some toilet paper for when she goes into her next bathroom.

We're going to Rosie Ruiz Kirsten Sinema. I don't condone any of that stuff. Some activists are going to come in in the first mile, follow her for a while, then come in at the 10th mile, share the bid. I do think on the committee, though, you have the committee, it's happening, right? There's going to be hearings.

You make it about the future threat, not just about the past, right? You've got to... what could happen next. You make it about Trump's complicity as much as possible. Tie him to it. And you also have to fucking tie Republicans who like Grassley flip flopped on Trump. Make them own it. Right. Make them own it every single day. And the other thing is, I think you have to make it about the entire coup, not just the insurrection. And the other thing is, I think you have to make it about the entire coup, not just the insurrection. So the attempt to overturn the election and the threat that Republicans and especially Trump will try to overturn elections, not just in 2024, but also in the midterms in 2022. So I think that's and you do all that. Do I think it's going to change anything? Exactly. I'm probably more doubtful like you are, Tommy, but I think we have the investigation. You might as well make the best of it. And we wouldn't lose on the margins these days. Of course. I mean, I think that all the Ashley Babbitt video to me ups the stakes of the January 6th committee in a big way. It doesn't tell me that like candidates should be talking about this every day. Well, I also I also think

we can talk about politics and what's going to be popular and what polls well. But at some point, it's pretty fucking scary that Donald Trump could very well be the Republican nominee and potentially be like 40,000 votes away from winning the presidency again. And you might as well talk about that threat because it's coming. But and I do think part of this, our politics aside, like put the poll down and just talk about it. Right. And I do think like part of this frustration because it's turning on messaging is because what we really like to see is Democrats in Congress collectively, unanimously recognizing this as the threat that it is. And then what we'd be talking about is the effort to pass a version of H.R. 1, to pass reforms to the Electoral College, to the Electoral Count Act. Like there's

a host of reforms we desperately need. But people like Joe Manchin, Kyrsten Sinema are kind of sleepwalking through this crisis and we are left with the best that we can do, which is trying to message to people how important it is that they turn out anyway. Well, and not to make it more complicated, but the, you know, you pass HR1 and a lot of the things that Trump could do to overturn the next election don't get fixed. Right. Which is another problem. You pass the new better version. Yeah, the new better version. Yeah. Which is another problem. You passed the new better version. Yeah, the new better version.

Yeah, which helps a little bit, but still, it's brutal. All right. Let's talk about Virginia, where nearly half a million people have already cast their votes in a way too close for comfort election that's just three weeks away on November 2nd. 538 polling average has former Democratic Governor Terry McAuliffe leading the Trump-endorsed private equity CEO Glenn Youngkin by just two and a half points, 47.6% to 45.1%. The race for control of Virginia's legislature is believed to be just as close. This is all despite Joe Biden winning the state by 10 points in 2020 and Virginia Republicans embracing Trumpism

with Youngkin recently calling for a cyber ninja style audit of the state's voting machines and the Republican candidate for Lieutenant Governor, Winsome Sears, refusing to reveal her vaccination status. Very cool. What's going on, guys?

Why do you think this race is so close? Love it. There was an Emerson poll that I thought captured something interesting, which it said that by a larger margin, 55% to 44%, voters expect Terry McAuliffe to win. There's a kind of complacency among Democrats and a kind of exhaustion amongst Democrats. Yeah. I hadn't heard that statistic, and it made me feel actually better. Yeah. And then the other piece of this is, you know, the Washington Post looked at some of what happens when Trump is on the ballot when he is not. The Trump effect was most evident in big spites and turnout in heavily Democratic areas such as

Fairfax, Arlington and Alexandria in the D.C. suburbs. And so, you know, Youngkin is running as this sort of suburban norm court business dad. Meanwhile, he's trying to fan the flames at the base with critical race theory and anti-trans stuff and anti-COVID stuff. And everybody across the state are seeing all these ads that make him seem like he's not that big a deal. And so it's just in this off-year election, we are desperate to try to convince Democrats that this is real. This is happening. McAuliffe can lose and it is important. And back to our last conversation, as you said, in some of these suburbs, Democrats turn out when Trump is on the ballot. This is why it's maybe a good idea for Democrats to talk more

about Trump and the threat from Trumpism. I like suburban norm core business dead. Yeah. And very tall, as we talked about. Why do we do these off year elections? It's so stupid. I mean, people just Virginia, New Jersey, all these stories that people keep saying, like, we're exhausted by these elections. We're sick of this. Of course you are. You've been voting every single year. Yeah. Virginia has a pretty rough. They should think about that. And the mood music is just bad for Democrats right now. Biden's approval is down. It's been down since August. COVID isn't going away. There's broader economic concerns. I think that more than anything is behind this. And it's creating this sort of enthusiasm deficit for Terry in the Democratic base versus Yunkin's like sort of partial MAGA base. I'm not sure if they're full, like he's dancing around where he's doing a lot of dancing. He's trying to do both things, right? He's trying to seem normal to the people that want a normal governor. And he's trying to kind of do the critical race pantomime to the people that are Trumpy. Yeah. And the audit, the audit is a big deal. The audit's interesting. The critical race theory

is new but not new, right? Critical race theory is the new term of art. It's a new boogeyman du jour. But the- It's like MS-13. It's like MS-13, right? This race is MS-13, yeah.

But what they're really- The TV ads right now are about a comment Terry McAuliffe made about whether parents should have a say in what's in public school curriculums.

And that is a decades-old fight. The public school funding versus charter school funding fight is a perennial fight between Democrats and Republicans. So part of it is just sort of like, you got a new flavor to this. MS-1619, is that anything?

Oh, I see what you mean. Oh, yeah. I bet that's upsetting because that's going to be in an ad somewhere. It's not anything. It's not anything. Don't yeah. It's not anything. That's upsetting because that's going to be in an ad somewhere. It's not anything. It's not anything. Don't worry. It's not anything.

So I said almost half a million people have voted so far. What, if anything, can we learn about the race from the early vote? I don't know. Not much. I don't know why. Is there an answer to that question? I have no idea. Tommy, Tommy.

Of course we know. What do you think it is? We know. What do you think the early vote means? We think it's significant in the ways you do probably i brought that up because there's a lot of early vote numbers floating around and i want to give people uh some context around this uh virginia is a state where there's no party registration data so you don't know um like in california with the recall we knew from the ballots, which were Democratic ballots and which were Republican ballots. We don't know that from Virginia.

And the sorry, just trying to educate some folks here. That's number one. The other big one is the state made it a lot easier for people to early vote since the last gubernatorial election in 2017. A great thing. But that's why it's really hard to compare between the 2017 early vote and the 2021 early vote. There was no way to know. There was a fucking scam question. It's like double the number of people have early voted.

Yeah, a lot more people. Yeah. But here's the there is one little one little thing to watch. Yeah. In the in the heavily Democratic northern Virginia suburbs, Alexandria, Arlington, Fairfax counties, they currently are making up just 17% of the early vote so far. In 2017, they made up

33% of the total early vote. Listen, you fellow Azubers, get those fucking ballots in. Yeah, that's a little more nerve-wracking because that's more apples to apples. It's time we go Ballston to the walls no well no is that something is that something listen for those outside of the metro uh dc area ballston is a an area in northern virginia it's also a metro stop

it's where hillary clinton's campaign was located in 2007 2008 maybe remind some of those voters that glenn yunkin has been endorsed four times now by the guy who just made a video uh trying to make ashley babbitt a martyr an insurrectionist uh who tried to attack the building where probably many people in northern virginia work yes that might be something to do uh terry mccullough has been saying he's frustrated with democrats in washington for not passing the bipartisan infrastructure bill and that he thinks the 3.5 trillion dollar price tag is a little high for build back better uh what do you think that's all about anyone got a uh anyone get a guess as to why terry's doing that why a governor why a gubernatorial candidate says washington sucks exactly a couple theories yeah yeah he's giving the heisman to the uh the washington democrats

who are fighting amongst themselves yeah i mean yeah mean, yeah, they're pissed at Washington. They want action. And honestly, I saw people getting upset about the 3.5 trillion thing. It's a free shot for Terry. He knows where this is headed. It's not going to end up at 3.5 trillion. So now he gets credit for being like, I thought it was too high. I'm sure there's some genuine sentiment there, which he like his political incentives are one month long. He's saying pass something that I could run on right now. The rest of us are fighting about how much climate change money will be in the

bill for a decade from now. But, you know, he also knows that like in northern Virginia, transportation funding, something that might alleviate traffic. That's a big deal. That's the thing people care about and will vote on. I mean, we've been saying nonstop how popular the Build Back Better bill is and how crazy it is for people like Josh Gondheimer and them to say that the infrastructure bill should be passed first. Does it give you pause at all that Terry McAuliffe, who's obviously steeped in the polling in the Virginia race, is like, hmm, maybe we should pass infrastructure? It actually doesn't because I don't think what he's saying is I think we shouldn't pass this despite the obvious popularity of the bill in my state.

I think he is dealing with the political reality that we've spent the last two months talking about a top line number and nobody fucking knows what's in it. And it's not his job to educate the entire country or the state of Virginia as to what the democratic agenda in Congress is. And he's just trying to win this race. I wish more people knew how much it did for healthcare

and childcare and a whole host of other things, but they don't. He's just saying, hey guys, I got an election in a month. Throw me a bone here. It makes me think that, man, I really hope they fucking come to an agreement on Build Back Better and then pass both of those fuckers before the race in Virginia. Three weeks. I mean, they've said October 31st. That's the new deadline.

If you have, back to the media narratives, if you have a bunch of headlines that Joe Biden saved his agenda from the dead and Democrats passed this thing a week before the Virginia race. Yeah, that's going to help Terry McCullough. Seems better than not having them. That's right. Looks like annoying infighting. Wait, the deadline is October 31st? That's the latest new deadline because that's the surface transportation bill that they reauthorized for 30 more days runs out. The Halloween metaphors are going to be insufferable. Yeah, you thought that the Biden shows up

at the congressional softball game metaphors were horrible, but Halloween's going to be even worse. Don't do it to us. Fooled back better. Oh, Jesus Christ. Is that something? Is that something?

We need a cut from this part of just all the time. Is that something? Is that anything? Riffing on slogans, I like it. Washington Post talked to some Democratic state legislators We need a cut from this part of just all the time. Riffing on slogans. I like Washington Post talked to some Democratic state legislators in Virginia who've been knocking on doors and swing districts. And they said that a lot of voters are saying they're tired of elections. They're tired of National Democrats and that they don't think that Youngkin is as polarizing as Trump. What do you guys think are some of the most compelling arguments for why Democrats should keep the governorship and their majority in the Virginia Assembly?

You're talking to organizers. They want advice. They're going door to door. What do you say? So we have 100 Virginia House of Delegates seats also up, right? Correct. We have a current 55 to 45 majority. Things that Virginians have gotten done.

They've expanded voting rights. They've removed abortion restrictions, which is becoming more and more important after the Texas ruling and this Mississippi case the Supreme Court's looking at. They passed some gun safety laws. They abolished the death penalty, legalized marijuana, new protections for the LGBT community. So they've got a lot of stuff done. Build on that. If you thought as an American, you're frustrated with Washington not doing shit, in Virginia, all the Democrats did shit. They did it over the last couple years. Ban conversion therapy for kids as well. They expanded insurance protection for reproductive health.

I would also point out, too, that, you know, Youngkin is trying to seem moderate, as we talked about. He's running on this audit. He's running on critical race theory. But also, down the ballot, the Republican Party in Virginia is funding some of the most vicious and anti-Semitic attacks that you can see. I mean, they are taking Jewish candidates, and they are making their noses bigger and putting them in front of funding some of the most vicious and anti-Semitic attacks that you can see. I mean, they are taking Jewish candidates and they're making their noses bigger and putting them in front of a bunch of gold coins and mailing that out to people. That is who

Youngkin is running with. That is the coalition he is trying to be elected with to govern. This will be, I don't care how he started out or I don't care what kind of posture he's trying to sell. This will be a radical right wing governorship and a radical right wing legislature if they get their way. Not subtle. I'll also go back to my hobby horse here, which is remind people how scary Republicans could be and what they could do to roll back all that progress. You know, one thing that I think is really indicative of who Glenn Youngkin is, uh, was when he told a bunch of activists, um, I'm not supposed to talk about abortion um but once i get into office i will restrict abortion access yeah um and i think you could

on abortion on a whole bunch of issues he gets he gets into office and we lose the assembly all that progress that tommy talked about is going to be rolled back by these republicans yeah um and they could help trump steal the next election he's he's proposing a cyber ninja style audit uh of virginia election even though there has already been an audit there was already an audit in virginia yeah i mean as the supreme court is chipping away at bro v wade these state-based abortion restriction laws become more and more dangerous and so i really keep an eye on um they'd also roll back vaccine requirements just as virginia is starting to recover from the Delta wave. So that's not great. And I saw this just today. Young in an interview was asked about climate change and he

said he's, quote, not smart enough to know whether human activity is causing climate change. There's your moderate North Core suburban. You're not very smart, sir. I love this from the Iowa poll, by the way. trump had an 86 percent favorability with iowans who are not vaccinated and won't get vaccinated so if you're wondering why he won't come out in support of the vaccine and help get his base vaccinated because he knows they don't want to do it and he's not going to take the hit politically and same reason why you know uh the lieutenant governor candidate in uh in virginia is not revealing her vaccination status and why youngkin is running against vaccine mandates, even though he's being like, oh, I think personally it's great to get the vaccine.

But he wants that base as well. Anyway, this should be a wake up call in Virginia. Like we we did a great job around California making sure that everyone woke up, got involved, volunteered to make sure that the recall didn't succeed. We need that same level of effort, probably even more in Virginia. Everyone woke up, got involved, volunteered to make sure that the recall didn't succeed. We need that same level of effort, probably even more in Virginia. So we need everyone to get involved. You can go to votesaveamerica.com slash Virginia to figure out where you can donate, where you can volunteer. A reminder that today, Monday, is the last day to register to vote.

Virginia does not have same day registration. So make sure you check your status and sign up today. I don't know when you're listening to this, but you'll get a couple hours left to tell all your friends in Virginia. But yeah, it's a big deal in Virginia. I want everyone to wake up there. And not the most important part, but do you understand what kind of nationwide

fucking political freakout we're in for? Oh, thank you. I forgot about that. Yes. I can't handle it. We can't deal with a freak out like that right now for the takes you thought the freak out over uh nancy pelosi pulling the vote on the biff was bad which it was you get you ain't seen nothing we lose virginia and you know what it will be deserved it will be deserved if we lose virginia if if a lot of those moderates who voted for Joe Biden decide to vote for Glenn Youngkin or a lot of folks, Democrats have over Joe Biden decided to stay home. That does say something about where we're headed in the midterms.

And it's and it's not good. So it's not a good place. Yeah. Vote Save America dot com slash Virginia. Go there now and see how you can help out. When we come back from the break, Tommy and I talk to California Congressman Adam Schiff. Congressman Adam Schiff, welcome back to the pod. Thank you.

Thank you. It's great to be here in person. I know. I know. I think you're like our second in-person guest. Yeah. I don't know who the first was. Oh, I was going to say the first was going to be my warm-up, but that's not a warm-up.

Oh, we got the California crew back. You've got a new book out called Midnight in Washington, How We Almost Lost Our Democracy and Still Could. It covers both impeachments, January 6th, a lot more. You wrote about a couple sort of bizarre meetings with Trump, as I imagine every meeting with Trump is. Could you talk a little bit about the one after Devin Nunes' famous midnight run? Yes. Well, this was a completely surreal experience. Nunes had gone on this midnight run in the middle of the night and supposedly gotten documents from a whistleblower that showed this Obama conspiracy to eavesdrop on the Trump administration. Of course, it was a

whole charade because whatever he got, he'd gotten from the White House and went back to give it to the White House and nobody had seen what it was. And I was sitting in the bunker with the TV on watching a press conference and they announced that I would be coming to the White House to review the documents. And I looked at my staff and I said, I am? They said I was invited, and I'm like, really? That's news to me. And then-

Is the bunker like just a skiff in the House Intel Committee? Yes. Okay, got it. Yes, so three floors below the Capitol to where the Intelligence Committee meets, and heavy vault doors and all the rest. Cool name. Oh, yes.

Bunker. Yes. Good name. And so one of my staff walks in while this press conference is going on with an invitation from the White House to go to see these documents. And so I go to the White House. They won't let my staff come with me to see the documents. We're in this big fight over it. And so I'm at the National Security Council talking to John Eisenberg, the lawyer.

He's trying to tell me that the agencies won't approve my staff director seeing the documents, even though we both know that's nonsense. And I call him out on it. And during the midst of this fight, one of the president's staff comes in and says, the president wants to see you in the Oval Office. But pointing to my staff director says, he can't come. And I was, frankly, very worried that I would go to the Oval Office. Trump would then completely invent some phony conversation that never happened. As he has done many times. Yes. Yes. And to his own staff. I would have no witness. And so I argued with a guy for a while. And finally, I didn't want the White House to also say that I was unwilling to meet with the

president. So I went. So I go into the Oval Office, and there's Trump sitting behind this desk, this Courageous is the name of this desk, made from the timber of the ship that went through the Arctic. It has a storied history. We got to talk about these desk names. They're a little self-aggrandizing. It's not the Resolute desk, then. I didn't know there was a desk. Well, I think it was, shoot. We'll take your word for it. Yeah. You know, maybe it was resolute. You've been in there more often than we have.

But so he comes out behind the desk. And first of all, just seeing him behind the desk. Real bummer. Well, a bummer, but it's like, it was so strange. This person who did not belong behind that desk. It's strange. This person who did not belong behind that desk, here was this guy who had played this successful businessman on TV when he wasn't successful. And now it was like he was playing the role of president when he wasn't really the president. But he comes behind the desk, shakes my hand, and the first thing he says is, you know, you would do a really good job. And when someone says that to you, your natural impulse is to say, well, so do you. But I couldn't bring myself to do it. And there was this very awkward pause where I think I just said something like, thank you.

Also, you know that if you said something nice about him that later when you're in a fight, he would tweet like, shifty shift used to say great things about me all the time. Well, in fact, during that meeting, we got on the subject. I was trying to steer the conversation away from Russia. I didn't want to have him mischaracterize anything about Russia. So we talked about prescription drugs. point, he brought up Elijah Cummings, who had been one of the leading forces in terms of Medicare negotiating drug prices and bringing the price down. And he said, you know, Elijah says a lot of nice things about me. Now, I spent a lot of time with Elijah Cummings, and I never heard him

say anything nice about the president. So finally, the president says, you know, do you have everything you need? And I said, no, your staff won't let me see my staff director come with me to watch, look at the documents. And he says, well, I don't have a problem with it. And I thought at this point, I wasn't even aware there were people standing behind me in the Oval Office, but I hear this commotion behind me when the president says that he's fine with having my staff director review the documents with me. They start groaning. And the president picks up on this and he says, you know, if they're okay with it, I'm okay with it. Of course, they were not okay with it.

But the whole thing was just so otherworldly, just seeing him in that office where he so clearly didn't belong. And I had only one other meeting in the Oval Office with him during his tenure when the Iranians downed one of our drones. Oh, that was the context for this one. Okay. without telling him that I was coming, that he knew the chair of the Intelligence Committee was going to be there, but he didn't put two and two together. Because when he walked into the room, I was sitting across the table from where he sat down. He looked over and I was the first person he saw.

I was there with McConnell and the Senate Intel leadership. And so he looks across the table and he sees me and just physically blanches. And he says- Your relationship had soured at this point. Yes. Long before this point. And he says, I'm glad you're here. And I said, well, I'm glad that I'm here. And we were waiting for the speaker who was stuck in the Capitol meeting with a visiting head of state and trying to make small talk. And during this meeting, the outgoing secretary of defense and the incoming Mark Esper were both there because it was the transition. And I'd known Esper for a long time. And he was not an ideologue and I was kind of optimistic about what he might be like.

I didn't know whether he had the gravitas for the job. I think, frankly, the president didn't want anyone like Mattis again that could stand up to him. But anyway, so just to make small talk, I said, Mr. President, I think you made a great choice with Mark Esper. I've known him a long time. Kiss of death for Esper. So the topic, the conversation moved on to other things. And then he comes back to it and he says, just how long have you known Esper? Oh, no. It's so funny. Everything is an conspiracy. I thought, oh, shit, I've killed his nomination. It's interesting. Like, look, credit to Trump for inviting a bipartisan group of officials to talk I thought, oh shit, I've killed his nomination. all sorts of covert campaigns and assassinations and other efforts within Iran. But what was your sense of how hawkish he was in that moment in those discussions after that drone was shot down? Because I remember there was a Washington fever pitch of bloodlust for this poor robot that was

taken out in the ocean. This was really interesting because I had the distinct impression, you know, watching the other cabinet officials there and Trump's language and body language that he was very reluctant to provoke a war with Iran and that he felt he was being pushed by Pompeo or Bolton or others. And so he was generally interested, I think, in hearing other views. Um, and when I had an opportunity to share my own, I emphasized that Congress had not authorized an attack on Iran, uh, that whatever we did, we should do in concert with the international community. Iran would love to split us off from the rest of the world, uh, and isolate us instead of them. And whatever we did had to be proportional. And it was fascinating.

Bolton didn't say a word. And the president never turned to him, didn't want his opinion. It was apparent. Pence didn't say a word until the very end of the meeting when I think he had to ask the president's permission to say something. Go to the bathroom. And whatever Pence said was so inconsequential, I can't even remember it. Yeah, it tracks. Go to the bathroom. He actually was interested in a contrary view or having me there, which may not have been his intent. But then later when they did – when he did authorize this killing of Suleimani, this incredibly provocative act, which was really – went beyond anything that we were discussing in that meeting.

I wondered what had changed because we were in the middle of his impeachment and the need to generate Republican support evaporated because at the end of the day, the only thing that mattered to Donald Trump was Donald Trump. Yeah. Did Kevin McCarthy really admit to you that he lied to the press about something you said? Yes. Yeah. I mean, everything I ever needed to know about him, I learned on a plane. This was 2010, and we were seated together on United Airlines flying back to the Capitol. I really don't think I'd spoken two words to him up until that time, not for any dislike, but his district is far from mine. We just never had any opportunity to speak. And we had that kind of conversation you have on a plane before the movie starts and you can escape. It was a total nothing burger who was going to win the midterms. And I said, I thought the economy

was going to be good and we were going to win the midterms. And he thought the Republicans were going to win the midterms. And- He got you there, 2010. That was a tough one for us. got you there 2010 that was a tough one for us you know he you know his forecasting was better than mine that's true but um you know the movie starts uh and that's the end of the conversation we get to dc we go our separate ways i don't remember what his position in the republican party at the time was but he gave a press briefing that night unbeknownst to me. And he told the press that I had said that the Republicans were going to win the election, which was absurd and completely false. Literally the opposite. And literally the opposite. And so I didn't know about this that night because I had to wait till the newspaper came out in the morning to even know that he'd given a briefing. So one of the Hill papers comes out in the morning, and it quotes McCarthy as saying,

everybody knows Republicans are going to win the election. I sat next to Adam Schiff on the airplane last night, and even he admitted the Republicans were going to win the midterms. Just lying for lying's sake. It was breathtaking. And I made a beeline for the house floor and went right up to the middle of the house floor. And I said, Kevin, um, I would have thought if we were having a private conversation, it was a private conversation, but if it wasn't, you know, you told the press the exact opposite of what I said. And he looks at me and he says,

yeah, I know Adam, but you know how it goes. And I'm like, no, Kevin, I don't know how it goes. You just make shit up and that's how you operate because that's not how I operate. But that is how he operates. And in that respect, he was really made for a moment like this when his party doesn't believe the truth matters at all. You make up your own alternate facts. And you say anything, you do anything

to get power, to keep power. And in that sense, McCarthy and Trump were really made for each other. I imagine McCarthy kind of pocketing his lie before he puts on like How to Train Your Dragon or whatever, whatever kids movie was out in 2017. So you started this by mentioning, we talked about Devin Nunes, another member of the California delegation here. He's the ranking member on the Intel committee in the House side. That used to be a committee where there was more bipartisanship than in other parts of the Congress. But Nunes has gotten extremely angry, extremely partisan, extremely litigious. He's suing a cow that made fun of him on Twitter. Still, I believe he might be suing a couple of cows. What happened to Devin

Nunes in your, has he always been like this? Were we confused? No, no, he hasn't always been like this. And in fact, for years and years, we got along very well. We worked together very well. He was in the mold of a John Boehner country club Republican. In fact, one of my favorite expressions that Nunes used during the Tea Party movement is he described the Tea Party as lemmings with suicide vests. I remember that. Yeah. And that was where he was coming from in the era before Trump. What happened, I think, to Devin Nunes is he got to know Trump during the campaign. He wasn't, I think, a supporter of Trump's, but Trump was in the Central Valley. They spent a couple of days together. And after the election, Trump offered him a position on the transition team. And he was helping to pick cabinet people. I'm told, I don't know whether it's correct, that he helped pick Mike Flynn, for example. Oh, wow. Good job.

Thanks for that. Exactly. Although, egg on our face, too, for Obama having him in a job. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway. And I think that when the election was was over and it was clear the Russians had intervened to help Trump and there were all these unexplained contacts between the Trump

campaign and the Russians, um, the investigation fell to our committee and he was chairing it at the time. And he had to try to both chair it and an independent investigation. And he still wanted to maintain his seat at Donald Trump's table, table, which would have been a difficult thing for anyone to do, but it was particularly difficult for Devin Nunes. And where things blew up is our very first open hearing of the Russia investigation was with James Comey. Now, Nunes and I knew because we were part of the Gang of eight that there was an investigation into the Trump campaign that had been confidential we did not know that Comey was going to make it public at that hearing and so it was a bombshell to the public and it was it was kind of shocking to

to us as well that this had now become public and of, we now know that the whole sorted double standard where the Clinton investigation was very much in the public and the Trump investigation was in secret. So Comey discloses this in this bombshell testimony. The very next night is when Nunes goes on the midnight run. And I have to imagine what happened is that the White House came down on him like a ton of bricks. We, as Democrats on the committee, were very well prepared for the hearing with Comey. And we walked through methodically all of the issues that had come up, all of the ties that we knew about at the time between the Trump campaign and Russia, all of the things that needed to be investigated. And on top of that, you had this bombshell. The Republican members were

completely fixated on leaks. And I think to the public that was watching, and I think to the president who was watching from down Pennsylvania Avenue, the hearing was an unmitigated disaster for Trump and the Republicans, at least that's how they viewed it. And so they must have concocted this scheme of the midnight run and these documents and this bogus allegation that the Trump campaign was spied on by Obama. When that blew up, which it blew up within a week

when it was publicly revealed that the place Anunna's went to get these documents from the supposed whistleblower was the White House. It was so, I think, utterly humiliating that it really forged a much closer bond between Nunes and Trump and all of the Trump apologists and acolytes. And I think it was this really formative event in his life that really bonded him to this hard right. But this is really what Midnight in Washington is about. It really tries to tell the story. I try to tell readers how people went through this transformation, how people that I worked with and admired and respected came to embrace this completely amoral president. Let me ask this question, thinking about all this. You helped

impeach Donald Trump twice, once for inciting an insurrection that you are currently in the middle of investigating. Despite all of that, he is gearing up to run for president again with the full support of the Republican Party and probably half of its voters at least. Does that ever make you wonder that maybe impeachments, investigations, everything that the DOJ has done, the FBI, like all of our institutions, all of the tools that we have to hold people in power accountable are useless at this point because the Republican Party is the way it is? No, they're not useless. And in fact, the system held, if barely, over the last four years. And I think that what we did to expose the president's

misconduct in Ukraine and his incitement of insurrection and what the Justice Department and Bob Mueller did to expose what it did contributed to the public understanding of who he was and the danger that he was, and he lost. Now, the danger is still here. And as you say, it is really remarkable, maybe even unfathomable after all that, that he is still a viable candidate for president. I look at one scenario alone that shows you how far we've gone down the rabbit hole. Man runs for president on a platform of building a wall that mexico is going to pay for an absurd promise to begin with um he becomes president of course mexico doesn't pay for a wall a wall doesn't really get built so his closest advisors steve bannon among them

start raising money from his own supporters to pay for the wall and then they steal it yeah total grift and trump pardons them they're stealing from his own people and he pardons them but it does seem like the the only check on his power now in the power of the republican party is people voting laws institutions none of that's really holding like you said he he he lost but he lost because people voted he didn't lose because he was impeached and removed from office or anyone was held accountable or anyone like that like it just i i worry that we get to the point where trump gets the nomination and then we're back to the election being about 40 000 votes in three swing states and that's it yeah well. Well, you know, the Republican Party

right now is a cult, an autocratic cult around the person of the former president. As long as that's what the GOP is, they just need to be beaten. There's no negotiating with them. There's no working with them on the big, big ticket items because they're just in a different place. You know, they're celebrating the Viktor Orbans of the world. They're having their conferences in Budapest because want to be dictator is now their model. And as long as that's the case, we have to fight tooth and nail to save our democracy, which means we need to fight tooth and nail to get H.R. 1 passed and the voting rights legislation passed. And we need to pass the Protecting Our Democracy Act.

And we need to make sure that we overcome any obstacle put in our way to mobilize our people to get out. There's not much persuasion going on. It's about mobilizing your people. And right now, we need to feel that sense of mission that this is about mobilizing to save our democracy. The system held but barely. people and equally pernicious in stripping independent elections officials of their powers and giving them over to partisan legislatures and boards, they are setting up to do insurrection by other means. On the January 6th Select Committee, we are very mindful of the fact that there may be another violent attack on the Capitol. But my own feeling is if there is, it will fail like the last one. If we lose our democracy, it's going to be what's

going on around the country right now. In setting up to succeed for the Republicans to succeed where they failed in the last presidential election, that is to overturn the results if they lose. That to me is the most pressing risk. Yeah. Look, violent agreement at this table. I don't doubt for one second your sincerity, but you're right. I mean, the system held, but the system is being tinkered with and changed as we speak in state legislatures. And you're full-throated about the need for H.R. 1 to pass, but it seems dead in the water no one that you we've got joe manchin kirsten cinema others in the senate who will not budge on the filibuster so

people like us we feel like we're tearing our hair out you know like we're like the the political cassandras of of 2020 you can see this train coming mix a couple metaphors here we're all about to get just destroyed by gerrymandering, voter suppression, voter subversion laws. And these institutionalist dinosaurs in the Senate won't do what needs to be done to change things. I guess I'm just sort of being pissed off out loud, but I'm wondering what you'd say to activists who share this frustration that we feel. Yeah. Well, look, I share the sense of alarm. that we feel. Yeah. Well, look, I share the sense of alarm. I had lunch with a couple of friends of mine, married couple, both in their mid-90s a month ago. And I asked them, have you ever been, have you ever seen anything like this? And they said, we've never been more concerned about the

fate of our country and our democracy than we are now. We remember the depression and World War II and Vietnam and Korea. We never, during any of those times, wondered whether the country would go on as a democracy, but we do worry about it now. And, you know, I wrote this book because I wanted to sound the alarm about this, but I also wrote the book because I want to give people optimism that there is a path out of this. out of this. And to me, what I found most inspiring over this really dark time are seeing some of those heroic people who did step up and who ought to be an encouragement to all of us. I remember vividly watching Marie Yovanovitch walk into this hearing room, someone who had been attacked and vilified by the president and Giuliani and by others to the point where she was called as our ambassador to get on the next plane out of Ukraine because they couldn't vouch for her safety anymore.

And she comes in, she sits down at this witness table alone, staring down the most hostile Republican members in the Congress, one of whom was put on the committee just to be a hostile member, Jim Jordan. And she had surfed in these dangerous places around the world. She had been told by the president's people and the State Department not to testify. And she defied them. And had she not done that, we might never have known the full story of what the president did in withholding hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid from an ally at war with Russia to get them to help them cheat in the election.

People like her ought to give us hope. And the thing is that, you know, none of us are in a position like she is to make that kind of a difference, but we're all in a position to make a difference. And we just need to find out where we can do that in our lives. And if we do that, we're going to get through this. But the more we do, we'll determine how long it's going to take to get through this time. I have no doubt we will look back on this as a successful democracy about an awful gauntlet we ran through as a country. We will wonder how it was possible, but we will look back on this. When you're in the midst of it, it's hard to see how it comes to an end. Um, but, but we'll get through this and it will require us all, especially the activist

core, not to despair. Uh, we, we don't have the luxury of despair. Uh, as the speaker likes to say, we don't agonize. We organize, we have to organize. I mean, I look, i've been an optimist forever work for barack obama it's hard not to be um but and you're a red sox fan so that's not been easy yeah we're all red sox fans here so we get that too no but i'm just trying to like see the path out right like do you have you guys talked about like a backup plan on voting rights

like there's all these great ideas we know what it takes to protect our democracy, not just because some people stand up once in a while, which is admirable, but like in a systemic way with laws, you have the Protect Our Democracy Act that you're trying to push. We got voting rights legislation. People have talked about amending the Electoral Act to make sure that there's, you know,

we're not overturning elections. But none of this is getting done before the 2022 elections or even the 2024 elections with Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema there. Joe Manchin's not even going to remove the filibuster to fucking get, you know, prevent default at this point. So, like, have you talked to Speaker Pelosi or anyone else in leadership about, like, what are we going to do to protect our democracy in advance of the midterms in 2024 if we can't get anything else done? Or is it just, hey, we got to organize and we got to get out the vote, which is what the White House has sort of been saying? Yeah. Well, you know, I think there are a couple of tracks. One of the most important, and I think the president is exactly right about this, is making sure that we have a positive record of achievement for the American people to run on in the midterms.

And that means passing the Build Back Better Act and the infrastructure bill, which we will get done. And it won't be pretty. It hasn't been pretty already, but it will get done. And when it gets done, that will be huge for the American people. And this is, I think, fully integral to saving our democracy too, because one of the reasons we are where we are and our democracy is so on edge is that the economy, the global economy has changed so dramatically in the last few decades with globalization and automation and millions of people in the middle class desperately worried about falling out of the middle class, that produced very ripe, fertile soil for a despot, for a demagogue, someone with a quick answer to their difficulties, that answer being, it's because of all the people who don't look like

you. And a democracy at the end of the day has to prove that it can deliver. And so these bills that would really deliver for the American people in a way we haven't seen since the New Deal, I think, are also part of the pro-democracy agenda. But in addition to the near-term plan of getting those bills passed, we need a midterm plan, and not just for the midterms, but we need a plan to end the gerrymander, which makes the House unrepresentative of a majority. It essentially guarantees minority rule for large periods of each decade until we can overcome it. We need to rebalance the Senate so it's more representative of the American people. So you don't have 23 percent of the people in the country controlling 60% of the votes in the Senate. We need to do away with the filibuster. And we need to get to that point in the multi-state compact where we effectively do away with the electoral college so that the majority elects the president, the majority controls the Senate, and the majority controls the House.

As long as we have a minority controlling things, how long can a democracy persist if a minority of the voters are running the country? And so in addition to the very near-term imperative of getting these New Deal bills passed, we're going to need to make these structural changes. And in terms of what happens if we can't get H.R. 1 passed and what happens if we can't get the voting rights stuff through, we are pursuing both the legislative track and the filibuster track, the do whatever we can to persuade the mansions and the cinemas track. But also we are trying to develop a Stacey Abrams-like effort in all 50 states. We're not waiting to see whether we succeed in the legislative path because we can't. What she demonstrated is you can't wait until election time to develop a relationship suddenly with people who want to vote for you. So those things are

going on contemporaneously. I really do think, and I've communicated this to the White House, that we need to bring a sense of urgency, though, to the voting rights issue as if it's existential to our democracy because it is, and it's existential to the presidency. If they can gerrymander their way into the majority and the clock is ticking, and Kevin McCarthy, God forbid, should ever get anywhere near the Speaker's office, they may succeed where they failed in overturning the election. Yeah. Last question. I know you're now the d triple c battleground finance chair can you commit to sending us fewer emails with all capital letters screaming at us to donate and text oh that's a really tough one all right it is a lot who's opening that shit come on i'm gonna donate i

will donate i'll donate more if you stop emailing yeah no i think you should what if what if i just cut down on the capital letters but yeah like just like our democracy is over alarm alarm emoji that kind of stuff yeah that's what i'm looking at fewer emojis well unlike kevin mccarthy um we will make sure that everyone knows you said that we will win the midterms we will win the midterms in 2021 it's broadcast for all let me just give give people a bit of optimism about that um we had we had a special election a couple months ago in new mexico as you know our candidate not only won but did better than biden performed in the district and that's early but it's suggestive that our people are still highly motivated to turn out. Without Trump on the ballot, their people are less motivated. We need to make sure, we can only control our own voters.

We need to make sure that we communicate with them, that we give them the information, the reason to vote, that we perform for them. we can only do our part. And I'm confident if we do that, we will hold on to the House, we'll gain ground in the Senate, we can do away with the filibuster if we haven't already, and we can begin the process of turning the page and restore our democracy. We will end on that note of optimism. Congressman Adam Schiff, thanks for joining.

Pleasure. Thanks for having me. Thanks to Adam Schiff for joining us and hope you all have a great day and we'll talk to you on Thursday. Build back booter. I was thinking more like Biden's like spooky agenda or spooky fall or terrifying agenda. The death of the agenda, the graveyard. Yeah, we get all that. You forgot about all that. Trick or treat. There's like a candy metaphor, like plucking all the items out of the bill. Yeah, more trick than treat for Biden and the Democrats.

There we go. Oof. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our senior producer is Flavia Casas. Our producer is Haley Muse. And Olivia Martinez is our associate producer. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick.

Kyle Seglin is our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Somanator, Katie Long, Roman Papadimitriou, Brian Semmel, Caroline Reston, Madison Hallman, and Justine Howe for production support. Thank you.