Pod Save America - “Who dat obstructing justice?” (LIVE in New Orleans)

Episode Date: February 10, 2019

Trump lashes out as investigators close in, Democrats introduce a Green New Deal, and former Mayor Mitch Landrieu joins Jon, Jon, Tommy, Dan, and Brittany Packnett live on stage in New Orleans. 

What's up, New Orleans? What's up, New Orleans? Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. Hey, y'all. I'm Brittany Packnett. I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor.

I'm Dan Pfeiffer. I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Dan Pfeiffer. A couple of Dan heads. Where my Dan heads at? Leave that in, please. On the show tonight, your former mayor, Mitch Landrieu, is here. And later we'll be talking about the official launch of the Green New Deal. Very exciting.

But first, we're going to talk about the latest in the multiple federal investigations into Donald Trump, his administration, his transition, his inaugural committee, his campaign, and his businesses. Never been so excited to cheer on the criminal justice system in my life. Okay, so the Democrats are now in charge of the House. They have, oh yeah, cheer that. They have subpoena power. They're conducting oversight. And as usual, the president is taking it all in stride. In tweets over the last few days, Trump has called the Democrats nuts, accused them of

stealing people from his White House, referred to congressional investigations as unlimited presidential harassment, and claimed that Republicans never did this kind of thing to Barack Obama. Tommy, Dan, is this how you guys remember that in the White House? I seem to remember eight separate Benghazi investigations. Yeah. In one Benghazi movie. In one Benghazi.

God. God damn it. Yeah, no. Not cool John Krasinski. I mean, the minute the Republicans took control in 2010, they were investigating God damn it. Yeah, no. Not cool, John Krasinski. I mean, the minute the Republicans took control in 2010, they were investigating everything they could think of with the goal of maximum political damage to Barack Obama. And in this case, I mean, there are a million things

that have not been touched because there's been functionally no oversight by the Republicans in Congress for a couple of years. So, yeah, welcome to the new reality, buddy. Like, this is going to get worse. I mean, it is different, right, in the sense that Barack Obama's

business foundation campaign transition inauguration and White House aren't being investigated by multiple law enforcement agencies. Barack Obama's campaign manager, deputy campaign manager, national security advisor, campaign foreign policy advisor, political advisor, and personal attorney were not indicted or pled guilty to crimes. And Barack Obama, who did have a Twitter account, did not use it to witness, tamper, to interfere

with investigations, to threaten rats and snitches like he's President Paulie Walnuts. But see, that's what makes Barack Obama so sneaky. Because he sometimes didn't wear a jacket in the Oval. But he did wear that tan suit. He put his feet up on the Oval Office desk. What kind of disrespect is that? He put his feet up on the Oval Office desk. Kind of disrespected that. I love this idea that Adam Schiff is stealing his employees like he owns them. I mean, so what happened was Adam Schiff apparently hired someone who used to work on the National Security Council.

But if you work on the National Security Council, you're not usually directly hired by the White House. You usually work at State or DOD or CIA or something like that and you're detailed over. Someone that had been detailed over from an agency, presumably, got hired by Congress. That happens all the time. It's not like they hired General Flynn, who has the keys to the kingdom for all the crimes. This is like some...

Well, they couldn't hire Flynn because Flynn just pled guilty to multiple crimes. He wouldn't pass the... I think he would pass the test if we're being honest. Most Trump employees they'd hire as part of a work release program. Flynn just played guilty to multiple crimes. You wouldn't pass Most from the place that hires part of a work release program Yeah, I did think shifts retort to Trump on this was pretty good though He was like maybe if you didn't want me to hire away people who worked for your NSC you'd have been a better boss That was hilarious So let's talk about some of the reasons why Trump is losing his shit this week

So let's talk about some of the reasons why Trump is losing his shit this week. First, his acting attorney general, Matthew Whitaker, testified before Congress today after threatening not to show up. Whitaker said under oath that he hasn't briefed Trump or the White House about the Mueller investigation and hasn't overruled Mueller or interfered in his investigation in any way. Brittany, do we think he's telling the truth here? No. Look, I... I mean, he was under oath.

Yeah, that always works. That's very old-fashioned of you. He was under oath and somehow decided that it was his place to tell the chairman, your five minutes are up. This guy has a whole lot of caucasity operating within him. I do not think he's concerned with telling the truth.

You don't think that a former toilet salesman for certain kinds of men... I mean, look, shout out to everybody making an honest living selling toilets, okay? However, you know, I like when Andrew Gillum said, the man who should be the governor of Florida, said in his debate, you know, I like when Andrew Gillum said, the man who should be

the governor of Florida, said in his debate, you know, he said, I'm not calling you a racist, but the racists think you're a racist. So I'm not calling you a liar. You just happen to be friends with a whole bunch of liars and I feel like it rubs off a bit. Love it. You were about to say something. Well. I could see the wheels turning. So, I'm not a fan of this Whitaker fellow. And you know, I'm the last person to be talking about things like decorum.

I tend to make fun of those kinds of people that worry about things like decorum. I will tell you, my Washington swamp inner voice went fucking nuts when I saw that S.H.I.E.L.D. cosplay guy, Michael Chiklis? Chiklis, yeah. play guy when I saw the commish at that hearing tell Gerald Nadler that his five minutes were up I was legit surprised at how fucking furious I was you are in front of our goddamn Congress you work for them they're your boss they write your paycheck and we write their paycheck. It does matter.

And it does matter that the other Republicans on that committee hearing care more about making sure Matthew Whitaker's feelings are protected than the integrity of that process. It matters when somebody thinks that they can disrespect Congress that way. I still think Congress is good, ultimately. You know, I'm still in favor of having a Congress. You know, especially this new one. I like it. Those ladies in white, I'm huge fans of theirs. And for the record, for the record, I was, look, I was a Nancy Pelosi roadie while you people were still listening to like other music. You don't know them.

Don't attack these lovely people. Love it taking a bold stance in favor of Congress and women in Congress. You know what, John? People need a no bullshit conversation. And if you think I'm going to come up in front of this group of... Continue. Yeah. So we don't know whether Whitaker actually has been telling Trump and the White House what has been happening with the Mueller investigation,

though obviously he knows that the penalty for lying, as he's seen many of his friends be convicted for false statements. But it does seem like he might have been telling the truth when he said he didn't do anything to interfere with the investigation, because we have seen the Mueller investigation just plow right on. Well, and also notably, he said he had not talked to Trump about the Mueller investigation, but he would not comment on whether he talked to him about the Michael Cohen investigation, which is getting done by the SDNY, the Southern District of New York. So that is a yes. Here's a rule of thumb. You can lie about what you've said to liars, but you can't lie about what you've said to people So that is a yes in Congress. Here's a rule of thumb. You can lie about what you've said to liars,

but you can't lie about what you've said to people that everyone knows tells the truth. So he can lie about what he said to Donald Trump, and he can lie about what he said to the White House counsel. He can't lie about what he said to Robert Mueller because Robert Mueller doesn't forget a goddamn thing. That square jaw is a huge hard drive of facts. It's a iPad Nano under there.

So Mueller's been charging along. On Monday, we learned that federal prosecutors issued subpoenas to the Trump inaugural committee to investigate potential money laundering and foreign influence. On Wednesday, Mueller got witness transcripts from the House's Russia investigation in order to determine if anyone in Trump's orbit committed perjury.

Probably. And this week, we learned that Mueller's prosecutors told a judge that Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort might have lied to them about his dealings with Russia in order to increase his chances of getting a pardon from Donald Trump. Was there applause for that? in order to increase his chances of getting a pardon from Donald Trump. Was there applause for that? Yeah, well, someone thought, like, is he going to jail or not? Do I applaud? I think someone was just applauding, like, finding things out.

So, guys, does this sound like Mueller is wrapping up his investigation here? I sure hope so. I mean, we've already talked about the fact that we've had a pretty rotten Black History Month so far. So I feel like this case finally coming to fruition is the Black History Month we deserve. Like all of us. I want them to take their time and do it right. But I also want it now. I want this to be handled. Because the thing about it is everyday Americans are sitting at their kitchen tables, and they are having trouble following all of this, right? They're like, I can't figure out which doc connects to which, who lied to who, who is testifying today. What they want to know is that the trial has begun and that it will be successful. And I'm excited for that day to happen. I mean, the question is, you've got the

Mueller investigation, but now you've got all these offshoots, right? Like, he's given some cases to the Southern District of New York. The federal prosecutors who are looking into the inaugural are a whole different crew. I mean, to me, it seems like maybe Mueller can wrap up some portion of this investigation himself

when it comes to the conspiracy with Russia, but it seems like Trump is going to be heading into re-election with investigations into his inaugural, his companies, his organization for a long, long time. I think the investigation to the inaugural committee is a big deal, right? So they raised $107 million for the Trump inauguration. That was double what Barack Obama raised in 2009. And there were fewer events. So something weird happened. And there was no people there.

Yeah, there was no one went. Fewer events. No one went. Sean Spicer, poor Sean Spicer had to lie about it. But it was also like the same goons and creeps like Rick Gates and Tom Barrett and all these people that are in the Trump orbit were running this thing. And we learned recently that Michael Cohen

has hours and hours of taped phone conversations with the woman who is planning the inauguration. So there is smoke and fire in this thing that's going to follow him. To sort of explain why it matters is the inaugural committee spent $175,000 a day at the Trump Hotel. Yes. Are you saying that's not the normal rate, Dan, at the Trump Hotel?

I mean, not on hotels.com. It does not seem that way. But what that means is so you have all – you can give businesses, billionaires, anyone can give – corporations can give unlimited amounts of money to an inaugural committee. Cool law. So they are giving money to this inaugural committee, who is then funneling it at overcharged rates into a hotel that puts money in the pocket of the Trump family.

Therefore, buying influence. Like this is a very, like this is how corruption happens. It's also the plot of Ozark. The self-dealing law, he's in trouble, there's a self-dealing law that prevents you from doing exactly that. Yeah, it's also against the Constitution. Like they foresaw this as a problem,

and it's still happening. It's also, again, like, this is the like like, scroungy, like, this is not, if Donald Trump was a billionaire, he'd be committing better crimes. Yes. You know what I mean? These are, like, these are low rent, I need money to get me through the month crimes. Payday crimes.

Billionaire payday lending. Yeah, this is, yes. Unbelievable. I just payday crime. Yeah. Billionaire payday lending. Yeah, this is yes. So unbelievable. This isn't exactly connected to everything else, but I feel like we should probably just break it up. We also have federal prosecutors. We learned today looking into whether the National Inquirer's parent company violated its immunity agreement in the Donald Trump campaign finance

felony case because they tried to extort Jeff Bezos. And Bezos pulled a Hamilton. He was like, I'm going to tell on myself before you can tell on me. And Bezos was like, fuck you. I, yes. And you know what? I don't want to live in a society where our lives and well-being are in the hands of billionaires

battling in the clouds. You know, I'd like to live in a world down here where we're in charge. But until that day, I'm glad that there are billionaires like Jeff Bezos ready to say fuck you to the worst billionaires. And until we get this Green New Deal through, I think that's the best we can hope for. But the allegation that Bezos made, someone intercepted his text messages, which is not an easy thing to do unless you had access to his or his mistress' actual devices. Now there's a suggestion in some of the reporting that maybe it was a state actor, like the

Saudi intelligence agency or maybe the Israelis. It's unclear. But if that's the case, that is a massive deal. And it's a huge question as to whether, if the Saudi intel guys were intercepting Jeff Bezos' communications, had Jared Kushner ever talked to them about this? How did this happen?

Why did they decide to do this? Yeah, why did the Saudis do the Trumps a solid? It's also, joking aside, it is really serious. Throughout this process, AMI, the parent company of the National Choir, has been trying to intimidate all sorts of journalists. Journalists going after Trump, journalists going after Harvey Weinstein. Ronan Farrow talked about this, about him being personally threatened. People like Ronan, of course.

He's Me Too's avenging angel. He knows when you've been bad or good. But, end of point. No, you know, we have elevated somebody who just feeds at the very bottom of our culture, and it is where the worst elements of the Republican Party meet the worst elements of the people that have, by viciousness or disgrace, fallen out of journalism, the worst people in consulting and in finance. I mean, this is the fetid, disgusting bottom of the American culture.

Some people might call it the swamp. It might be the swamp. I mean, so. But I, you know, shout out to Jeff Bezos for taking this path. I still don't think billionaires should exist. Yeah, I mean, we're on the billionaire's side for this skirmish. But, yeah. Battle, not the war.

Right, yeah. I have been disheartened, though, by the Twitter reaction to Bezos having all his private messages leaked. Like, again, as with Podesta and Hillary, no one's on the side of the person whose privacy was violated. They're just mocking them. And, like, I hope as a society we can figure out a different response to that

because that would be pretty fucked up for anyone if your personal messages... Publish your inbox. See what happens. Yeah, exactly. So a big question in all of this is how hard Democrats should push on these investigations. House Democrats this week started the process of getting Trump's tax returns. But Nancy Pelosi did say it's going to take some time.

We have to do it in a very careful way. She wants to be careful about this. There's also a Politico headline from this week that reads, 2020 Dems see danger in the Mueller probe, calling it, quote, a scandal that grips regular Rachel Maddow viewers, but seems confusing and distant from the kitchen tables of many Americans. And look, you know, Brittany, you were just talking about this. Now, I know we've basically said similar things in the past, but how much do you all think the candidates in 2020 should talk about these issues, and what should they say? I think it is a two-step process here, what they talk about. And it is important that we don't allow the four corners of the conversation around

Trump's criminality to be in what is in Robert Mueller's report. Because it is very possible we are going to get a report that says that Trump did all of these things that walk up to the line of obstruction of justice, and it'll be up to the United States Congress and the United States Senate to decide whether those are high crimes worthy of impeachment. And we may never have some piece of evidence that says Trump himself, even though everyone around Trump colluded with all kinds of Russians and then lied

about it under penalty of prison time, Trump himself, we may never know that. And what we can't allow is that for the absence of evidence to be evidence of absence that Trump is innocent. But there's also all these other crimes. And I think the message for Democrats has to be around something we've talked about before, which is chaos and corruption. So what, like we're talking about with the Trump Hotel, what Trump is doing is his message is not, his approach is not America first, it's me first. Right? He is doing these things to put himself first, but money in his pockets. And the second, so the positive part of that, so we have to widen the aperture to everything that Trump has been doing corruption-wise, including the inauguration, the foundation, the businesses.

But our message also has to be is we're going to put an end to this chaos. Think of the opportunity cost, all the things that we could be getting done if we did not have a president who was ensnared in multiple federal investigations at all times. If we got the chaos out of our politics, we could focus on the real challenges that matter to the people that Brittany's talking about. Here's what I'd say. I also think you need to make a distinction between what the 2020 candidates are going to say and what Congress is going to say. I mean, I think one way to think about it is, so you think of Mueller as like a quarterback who's trying to run out the clock. And you got to see that you got members of Congress out there on the field, keeping an eye on the other players and they got to make sure that because

sometimes the refs aren't going to be looking in the right direction. You need those refs to be paying attention. I'm telling you, no, I'm a, because I'm on your side. It's a good analogy. I'm no your side. It's a good analogy.

I'm... No. Nope. Nope. Because... Lock him up. Lock him up. Lock him up. Lock him up.

Because if you're not paying attention, they will get away. They will get away with something on that field, and a great injustice will not be punished. Clean it up. Trust me. Thank you. Mayor Landrieu told him not to raise this or he might get shot

I was excited what are we even talking about oh yeah Democratic candidates and Robert Mullen I mean look by the way I just want you guys to know the mayor is shaking his fucking head at me I was on their side I was on their side. I was on their side.

What is happening? I told, he walked up to me in the back and said, you need to know that I'm a Los Angeles Rams fan. Wait. Wait, wait, wait, wait. Wait, wait, wait, wait. He's trying to get me killed. Shh, shh, shh, shh.

I told him he needed to go to hell. And then I told him that if he told y'all that, what y'all were going to do was say, now join me. Who dat? Who dat? Who dat saying they're going to beat them? Say, who dat?

Who dat? Who dat? Get out of here. Come back later. Unbelievable. That is a good politician. Yeah. It's like pro wrestling.

New segment over. Now we're going to play a good politician. Yeah. Wow. It's like pro wrestling. New segment over. Now we're going to play a little game. Now it's time for a game called OK Stop. The world will quit and the panel can say OK Stop at any point to comment. There's this guy from Seattle who loves coffee. He thought he knew what was best for everyone and was always trying to get in people's business, even though he was elitist and disconnected from normal people's lives. I'm talking about Frazier.

But here's a clip of Howard Schultz at Purdue University. Let's watch it. People are living in fear of losing health care or going bankrupt if they get sick. The truth is that health care costs are the biggest driver of unaffordable care. Okay, stop. No shit. What? What does that mean?

What wouldn't... What? What if it's not the... Continue. The biggest driver of unemployment is people without jobs. The driver of unemployment is people without jobs. The extreme left, extreme right has offered and developed any kind of credible plan to reduce costs by increasing competition. Schools can be bold and entrepreneurial. Look at Purdue. It's incredible what's happened here. And this can be scaled. Under President Daniels, the cost of an education here will be less expensive in nominal dollars

in 2020 than it was in 2012. Congratulations. You've got to clap for that. Okay, stop. I just... You've You gotta clap for that. Listen, when you're a student trying to pay for college, nothing brings you to your feet like finding out that when adjusted for potential inflation, the cost curve for the tuition at that institution will only be

more expensive in nominal dollars in a decade. Hashtag... Hashtag nominal dollars. Nominal dollars. This guy is the least inspiring motherfucker I've ever seen on a debate stage. Billionaires shouldn't exist. Remarkable. I do think that he...

You should clap for that. I was going to say, I think he's found himself a campaign slogan. Howard Schultz, you've got to clap for that. I was going to say, I think he's found himself a campaign slogan. Howard Schultz, you've got to clap for that. I mean, the thing is, as Democrats who are worried that Howard Schultz could potentially tip this election to Trump, what worries me most is his riveting speaking style. And as I explore whether to run for office, I'll do so with the conviction that my final decision must not make his re-election a possibility. I can assure you no one wants Donald Trump fired more than I. Okay, stop, stop, stop, stop. I can assure you that people who cannot afford your six dollar

coffees want him out more. Trust me, The folks for whom the tax code does not benefit them want him out far more than you do. Trust me. Like, I get it. You're trying to distinguish yourself from the rest of the field. But don't play this game with us where you act like an everyday American.

It's insulting. I am a person. I generally enjoy Starbucks coffee. I often use my local Starbucks as a co-working space But I cannot fucking stand Howard Schultz I mean this like his when he says something says be would be I will not make a decision to help Donald Trump win But in the interim while I'm thinking that decision I will spend every day Shitting on democratic policies using Donald Trump's talking points. That is not helpful to the cause my friend

yeah, like on democratic policies using Donald Trump's talking points, that is not helpful to the cause, my friend. If you want to make a decision that will make sure that Donald Trump isn't re-elected, get off the stage, bro. Take your billions of dollars and fund a non-partisan voter registration drive, my friend. Voter registration forms in every Starbucks

in America. You can help so many people. There it is. There we go. Dan for CEO of Starbucks. I choose to run. I promise. I will absolutely release my tax return.

Okay, stop. You know what, dude? We don't give a shit. I'm sorry, but we're through the fucking looking glass now. I'm done with tax. I know we're supposed to still care about them. Honestly, I don't care anymore. Just get out.

You releasing your tax returns doesn't impress me at all. I don't give a shit. I mean, I still want them, but like I'm not impressed. I'm not, wow, you'll release your tax. Thanks a lot, pal. While you're getting the 2% in Michigan that keeps Donald Trump in the White House, I'll be sure to peruse how much you made in 1998.

Being with you at Purdue today, I know who we are. And in this room, on this campus, I see a generation that is up to this challenge. I love America. I love our country. I know you love our country as well. And I know that we, people have the potential to restore, renew, and reimagine the United States of America. Please clap.

Did you see that riff he did at the end there? It's like a renew. Reimagine, restore. That was very cool. Listen. It's a little speechwriter's trick right there. Speechwriting. It is very easy. You get words that sound alike. You do rhymes at the State of the Union. Investigation legislation. Now you're in business. Alliteration alert. Ask not what you can do for Howard Schultz. Also, one quick note.

You can get on that Starbucks app, and there's no $6 drink at Starbucks that you can't make for $3. Putting it together. There it is. You know about it. All right. And that's OK Stock. All right, let's get back to the news.

On Thursday, Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York I didn't tell you what they did yet. Introduced a much-anticipated resolution calling for a Green New York, I didn't tell you what they did yet, introduced a much anticipated resolution calling for a Green New Deal, a massive World War II style mobilization that would address both the climate crisis and the economic crisis of stagnant wages and growing inequality. On the climate side, the plan calls for converting 100%

of the power demand in the United States to clean, renewable, zero-emission energy sources within 10 years, with investments in things like energy-efficient buildings, electric cars, all kinds of good stuff. On the economic side, it calls for a federal job guarantee, universal health care and housing, the right to organize, fair trade, and busting up monopolies. So I guess my first question is, do we think it's bold enough? Why do they trim their sails?

I mean, look, it's so nice to talk about climate change not in the context of we are so fucked. When the UN climate report came out that said we have 12 years to live basically uh it is overwhelming and to see like a incredibly bold huge plan that we can start to debate to move the conversation away from republicans who refuse to admit that climate change is real and caused by man uh or to sort of nibble around the edges with cap and trade bills that everyone concedes before they're introduced won't actually solve the problem. It's great to talk about something big. Yeah.

You know, I saw a video of a student activist a couple weeks ago, and she said, I keep hearing adults tell me that I need hope, that they need to give me hope. She said, I don't need your hope, I need you to panic. She said, I need you to take that panicked energy and turn it into action. Like, we do not have any time to waste. We have been doing this incremental thing for long enough because people have not been courageous enough to imagine what is possible. And so is this thing perfect? No, we're still trying to figure out what it is, but does it at least give us something to imagine and aim for where we can put the bar high enough

that we can actually have something good to shoot for? Absolutely. And I'm grateful that we're finally having that conversation instead of the one that we're usually having. Like, yeah, it's time to panic. It's time to be bold. It's time to be urgent. Stop playing around. Let's stop playing around. Why do you think the authors of the Green New Deal combined climate policies with so many economic policies? Is the strategy substantive, is it political, or is it both? I think it's both.

I mean, part of this is, there's the old saying, never let a good crisis go to waste, which is there needs to be action here, and we should try to do as much as we can. But the political part of this, it's not political in the sense that you're trying to make it the best polling thing, although that may end up being the case, but it's building a true coalition of people to push for this, right? It is uniting environmentalists and labor, two groups that have been at odds over climate policies for a long time.

It's one of the reasons why we didn't pass a cap and trade bill 15 years ago. It is uniting all kinds of communities, people who need health care, people who are struggling in this economy, people who need more wages, all together on one thing, because you know that the forces on the other side, which are the Koch brothers, the fossil fuel industry, are going to be so well funded, so well organizedized that the only way to beat it is a united front of people who need help in this economy right now. Yeah. Here's the thing. This bill with the fact that it combines both of these things actually addresses what everyday Americans are going through. When we look at what's happening in Flint, which let's be clear,

still does not have clean water. When we look at what's happening in Flint, children are being poisoned every single day and 45% of the residents in Flint are living under the poverty line. 58% of children under 18 in Flint are living under the poverty line. So we don't lead single issue lives. We can't just care about the environment or the economy. Every single day people are living in a state of emergency in both. So it's time for us to act like it. And that's a really important point politically. Because the argument against action

to deal with climate change is always around hurting the economy in the short term. And if you're going to do things to fundamentally address the true weaknesses of the economy in the short term It's gonna give you political permission to do the things you need to do in the long term To deal with carbon emissions and climate change. Yeah, so like we have we passed in California Sort of a mini version of the Green New Deal and what California did in 2016 is they set Targets for reducing carbon emissions and then they said okay

we are going to raise money from corporate polluters to hit these carbon emissions targets and then we're gonna take that money and we're gonna invest it in low-income communities and communities that are the most hurt by climate change and that are most economically disadvantaged and so what they said is they plowed money into whether it's rural farmers who are hurt by drought whether it's people in inner cities who live downstream from a chemical factory or live in the shadow of a smokestack. And they invested all this money in these communities and it created jobs and it helped clean up the environment. And you're starting to see that it worked for California. And I think what we finally

learned is when Democrats just talk about climate change as an individual issue, you know, it's a lot of, frankly, well-off people who are saying, this could be a problem in the future, and I want to deal with it, and I want to raise money for it, and all that kind of stuff. But it leaves out a lot of working people who are like, I need help with what I'm going through right now. And some of it's climate-related, and some of it's not. But I want to make sure there's going to be a job there. I want to make sure that I have enough money to pay the bills. I want to make sure that I have health care. And the idea of having a massive nationwide mobilization on the scale of World War II to say, we are going to beat this climate threat, which could exterminate humanity in our lifetime,

and we're going to do so in a way that makes sure that working class people are lifted up. I think that's a good goal. I mean, these issues, you know, economic inequality, climate, they have a lot in common. They're both issues that Democrats are often saying are the defining issues of our time. They are both issues in which, despite saying that for a very long time, Democrats have not offered answers commensurate with the threat. Right. And so they're issues, both issues in which Democrats have said it's the defining challenge of our time,

Democrats haven't offered answers, and Republicans have offered policies that make matters worse. And the other thing they have in common is on both issues, the politics have been stagnant for a very long time.

And we've all been saying, we need to do something else, we need to do something else, we need to do something bigger. And you know what? When it comes along, it's scary. It's new., it's scary. It's new and it's hard and it's not going to be perfect.

But when you ask for something big and it comes, that's good. So let's talk about the support it's getting. More than 60 House Democrats have already signed on as co-sponsors as well as 11 senators including presidential hopefuls Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, Kirsten Gillibrand, Bernie Sanders and Amy Klobuchar. Other Democrats have been a little more wary including Nancy Pelosi who said she has no plans to bring it to the floor for a vote just yet and before it was released she said the green dream or whatever they call it, nobody knows what it is, but they're for it, right? Absolutely withering.

Well, so what do we think, why do we think that the presidential candidates and Pelosi aren't on the same page here? Are the 2020 folks not seeing the political risks or is Pelosi being too cautious? I mean, I think that this bill was released as a messaging bill, right? It's like a resolution, really. It's a resolution. It's a big picture thing you can get behind because you support the concept and you believe the goal is

important. And like Lovett said, the threat is important. I think the 2020 candidates are getting behind it because the Democratic Party wants them to get behind it. I think the risk inherent in that is that huge corporate interests are going to fight them in the most vicious way possible.

I mean, you're literally, I can't remember who reported this, someone got leaked a memo of corporations talking about how to benefit financially from climate change. It was a bunch of like, it was like Raytheon and like people that sell arms and all sorts of deplorable human beings.

So I understand that if you're Pelosi and you're in Congress and you're gonna amend the thing and you're gonna vote on it, you're gonna take your time and you're gonna wanna improve it and make it the right bill before you jump on. I think that's a reasonable position to take as long as you support the concept.

And I think there's a history here, right? Like Dan, Pelosi has passed a cap and trade bill back in 2009 when we were all in the White House. And what did we all learn from trying to pass major climate change legislation when we were in the White House? It's very challenging because of the Senate. Because even if you have enough, we had 59 Democratic senators at the time,

but many of them were from fossil fuel producing states, like West Virginia, for instance. And those senators were going to go nowhere near a climate change bill. So what I think Pelosi is doing is she knows this cannot become law with Trump as president and Mitch McConnell as leader of the Senate. So what she's not going to do is make the same mistake that was made in 2009, which is make all of her members take a tough vote for a bill that cannot become law. If you're going to take a tough vote,

it's going to be because you can actually make a difference in people's lives, and that's why you can send out a press release. The reason all the Democratic presidential candidates are behind it is because they all have the same policy director. AOC's Twitter feed, and so... I mean, look, Pelosi is very cognizant of the fact that we have a House majority right now, and the only reason we have a House majority right now is because we elected a lot of Democrats in very moderate districts, and a lot of Republicans elected some of these Democrats, too, and that's why they have them.

And, you know, is it okay that the resolution doesn't say anything about how this is paid for? Obviously, if you're going to, you know, zero out carbon emissions in 10 years and give everyone universal health care, housing, a federal job guarantee, and all the rest, it seems like it might cost some money. Well, I think one more thing about Pelosi is one thing I promise you is that if there was a path to make this law tomorrow, she would be beating down the doors of those members to get them to pass it. For sure. For sure.

For sure. But do we think it's okay that it's- I just want to make sure we're all pro-Pelosi here, right? Yeah, of course. But do we think it's okay that they said, we're not going to talk about how to pay for this right now? I think it is. I mean, look, we're talking about it right now.

The country is talking about it right now. It's leading the news. It's on conservative websites all the time, and they're trying to rip it apart, but they're talking about it. The country is talking about climate change and talking about a big new plan to fight it. For a very long time, there were a lot of people that said, you know, when Democrats are incrementalists, they cede territory to Republicans.

Republicans are talking about their vision, how far right they want to take the country, where are the Democrats willing to do the same. And there was this question, right? Well, what happens if Democrats actually start doing that, right? There's this phrase, the Overton window, which Republicans liked, because it basically says moving the acceptable level of discourse by pulling the country to the right, by pitching really far right things and seeing what happens. Well, guess what? It turns out when liberals in Congress start doing that, it works. I mean, AOC comes in, and because she thinks it's the right thing to do,

and she doesn't care what the older guard thinks, says, I think there should be a 70% tax rate. Next thing we know, Republicans are up in arms, and it's polling at 60% among Democrats, Republicans, and independents. So there's a lot of hard politics. There's a lot of hard politics to come, but I think we should be excited about the possibility of actually putting out a big vision and then letting the chips fall where they may.

I used to be a teacher. And I said shout out to the teachers, baby. People love teachers. They hate oil companies. I'm fine with it. But one of the very first things you learn when you are becoming a teacher is the importance of high expectations. And you understand that whether it's young people or adults that you are teaching, if you set high expectations, people will rise to the occasion.

If you set low expectations, they'll rise to the low bar. The problem is we have gotten so used to the bar being below the floor right now, and we've got folks like Marky and AOC coming along and reminding us of who the hell we are that we can actually raise the bar that high. So let's now, now's the time that we figure out how to rise to the occasion. We don't get scared of how high the bar is.

I mean, two things on this. No one ever asks Republicans how they're gonna pay for tax cuts for the rich. Right. We know that because they just passed a treaty on our tax for the rich. They didn't pay for it. Second, the planet is fucking melting.

Right. Like, what are we going to do with these deficits? Right. With our shrunken deficit when we're all underwater. Yeah, right. It's just going to be like Howard Schultz. They cast the Morning Joe. And Paul Ryan on this melting iceberg floating out,

holding up the GDP ratio. You can float on a balance budget. That's right. People are going to be complaining about debt to GDP ratios. There's forest fires every year, and Louisiana's in underwater. I mean, that is what has changed in this debate right now. And I think this is what Democrats need

to do when they talk about this, is to frame the urgency of the threat right now, right? And I think this is what Democrats need to do when they talk about this, is to frame the urgency of the threat right now. Every scientist in the world, every scientist in the United States has said, we have 10 years. And after 10 years, there is going to be climate devastation on a level that humanity has never seen.

And this is the world that our children are going to grow up in. So we have put out a plan. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ed Markey, the presidential contenders on the Democratic side, they have endorsed this plan. If you don't like that plan, that's fine. What the fuck is your plan? That's right.

You tell me what your plan is. Like, so far, the Republican plan is, we don't believe in global warming. The Republican plan is name a lobbyist to run the EPA and every other relevant agency. Right. And I think every time they attack this plan and say, it's socialism, which, by the way, they've been calling everything the Democrats have done socialism for 50 years, so they're the party that's cried socialism. So, like, no one's going to know when it's really here because they've been calling everything

socialism for 40 years. But it's like... You'll know when it's here because you have free health care. Right, yeah. Exactly. So, they are going to call everything socialism. They're going to say it's too expensive. And we say, okay, fine.

What's your plan to meet this urgent deadline that in 10 years we are going to be fucked as a planet? Tell me your plan. We can debate the plan. You know what we should do? Because the client, I mean, it's kind of worked for the Republicans. Like, they don't have to have a plan

because they just don't accept the problem. We should say we don't believe in deficits. Deficits are a hope by big economics. I am sick of these conservative economic fake reports about this thing called a budget, which no one has ever actually seen. Yeah. Okay. Well, I think we figured this out.

Yeah. All right. Case closed. Well, that's the news. He's the former lieutenant governor of Louisiana and the former mayor of New Orleans, Mitch Landrieu. You warned him. I did.

Hey, everybody. Where you at? Who dat? I told him. I swear. I told him, don't do that if you go out there. He didn't believe me. He looked at me like I was stupid.

And I said, all right, well, go ahead. He warned him many times. Did I not? You heard it. He told him to stop, and nevertheless, love it persisted. Thank you all for showing him a little bit of sunshine. Yeah, that was good. I just think, look, talk about, the Saints won the Super Bowl, okay?

That's just kind of hot egg. I'm sorry. All right, I'll act right. I'm not going to talk about my team. Y'all look great. So I have wanted to talk to you ever since I first read the speech you gave about your decision to take down the Confederate monuments in New Orleans. Thank you. And I will tell you, I spent a lot of my career writing speeches with Barack Obama

and writing speeches about race with Barack Obama, and that to me was one of the best speeches on race that I've ever read. And I was just wondering, can you talk about how it is that a white southern guy decided to write a speech like that? Where did that speech come from? Yeah, from New Orleans. I mean,

you know, our city, you only have to spend a minute here to know that this is a city that's deeply rooted in love and caring and affection. And we bleed diversity as a strength, not a weakness. That's kind of who we are. And so a lot of people have been trying to take those monuments down for a long time. And I certainly didn't do it by myself.

A lot of people helped. I think about Aretha Castle Haley and Lola C. Lye, and a lot of really important folks, Memorial, both Memorials, worked on it. But in the South, and we continue to struggle, and of course nationally now with what's going on in Virginia, with the issue of race. And we've never in this country acknowledged, although there have been some people that have talked about the original sin of slavery, and we've never really kind of gone through the discussion of race and racial reconciliation the way that we need to, the discussion of race and racial reconciliation the way that we need to, which is why we can't exercise it from who we are as a country and why we're never ever gonna get to be that more perfect union

that President Obama talked about. And in his echoing of Dr. King about the arc of the moral universe bends towards justice, we always down here at it, but somebody has gotta do the bending. And as we were, everybody in probably everybody in here got beat to death by katrina some of our brothers and sisters literally 1800 people city got destroyed 500 000 homes hurt 250 000 gone everybody in here lost i mean like really important stuff

and as we started to rebuild the city one of the things that the people the city gave me permission to do and which we all did together was to start trying to rebuild the city but we of the things that the people of the city gave me permission to do, and which we all did together, was to start trying to rebuild the city. But we had to really look hard at ourselves. And this was really a miracle that you guys should just pat yourselves on the back for. We didn't build it back the way it was. We realized that on August 28, 2005, when that storm hit and it destroyed everything, that it wasn't perfect the day it hit. And if we're going to build it back, we kind of started thinking about, well, what would it look like if we got it right the first time?

And so when we started doing that, besides building back our schools and our health clinics and our hospitals and the new airport, by the way, which you're going to love, it's going to be open in May. You're going to love it. The public spaces came into focus for us. And what happened to me personally was in 2014, which was a good four and a half years ago when I started thinking about how to commemorate the 300th anniversary, because we're older than the country, by the way. Everybody else is welcome. We were here first. We were here

first, getting it on together, having a good time, hanging out, mini jazz fest a long, long time ago. I asked Wynton Marcellus, who I grew up with, help me curate the 300th anniversary. I mean, how would we do it? What would it look like? How long would it take? And he said, I'll do that for you.

He says, but I want you to do something for me. And I said, what? He goes, I want you to think about taking Robert E. Lee down. And I mean, honestly, no, I swear. Brittany. And I said, no, honestly, honestly, I swear. I said, I mean, my first reaction was not good. I was like, what?

What? What did you say? He goes, you ought to think about taking that down. And I said, well, why would I do that? I mean, it was such a startling thing. And he said, this is what he said to me. He said, have you ever thought about it from my perspective? And I said, went and I've walked by those monuments every day of my life.

And no, I haven't. He goes, would you do me a favor? He goes, will you think about it from my perspective? And he said, oh, by the way, he said, you know, Louis Armstrong never came back here and left because of that. Those monuments. And when he when he said that to me, besides being embarrassed. I thought to myself it was like getting hit in the head with a ton of bricks because I had known already about the great diaspora and how many of our fellow

Americans left the South and took their intellectual capital, their raw material, their raw talent to New York and to Baltimore and to St. Louis and to Chicago and to Los Angeles. And all of our people are like helping people learn how to cook and dance and being doctors all over the country. And all of our stuff, like we did post-Katrina, where we got up in everybody's pot around the country, that happened back in the day. And so I just thought about how much we had lost because, you know, our folks were not here. And so as I started to do what Wynton asked me to do, which was really think about it from his perspective,

it became pretty clear to me pretty quickly, number one, that those monuments were a lie. That in essence, what they, was revering an individual for doing something that was contrary to what the values of the United States of America ever stood for. And it was done for the purpose of preserving slavery. So here we were in a majority African-American city. Here's a guy named Robert E. Lee who had never been here. Or if he was here, he was here for a minute.

And we were revering him for trying to destroy the United States of America for the purpose of preserving slavery. And I thought to myself, you know, that's not the New Orleans that I know. And that's not the New Orleans that we're trying to build. that's not the New Orleans that I know. And that's not the New Orleans that we're trying to build. So if our 300th anniversary is coming and we're trying to reflect to the rest of the world that diversity is a strength, not a weakness, and that we're an inclusive society, then that thing really couldn't stay there. But I really did say to myself, you know, I'm not sure I'm responsible for that. And then I found out that actually the city owned it and the mayor was directly responsible for it. So I was like, oh, hell.

You know how you try to get out of raking the leaves, but your mama says you're going to do it? Did you have doubts? Did you have concerns? When I first started, I didn't want to spend... We were rebuilding the city, right? We were building the streets. I was filling the potholes, fixing the lights. You know, 470,000 of them, by the way. Trying. And everybody... you know 470,000 of them by the way trying and uh and everybody and we had a we felt we feel 470,000 I'm sorry I know we got a lot more I had to I had to I

had to explain I had to when we decided to take him down I think I was at a I was at a meeting of racial reconciliation, and I said something really simply. I said, I think we ought to start thinking about taking the monuments down. And I'm telling you, all hell broke loose when I said that. And all of a sudden, everybody in the world who wasn't from here that doesn't own a piece of New Orleans, I thought they could tell us what to do, went crazy and said, you can't take them down. So we went through about, I don't know know two and a half years 13 judges seven lawsuits a

lot of yelling and screaming at the City Council and at the legislature and we finally got it but I thought I had to explain to the country and particularly to the people of New Orleans why we did what we did and I intended to write a speech that would course correct history and that actually is a was a direct refutation to a speech that was given on the day that it was put up by a guy named Charles Fenner and uh and I wrote the speech so that when people read it years from now they would see that a mayor who was a confederate general by the soldier by the way a confederate officer who was the mayor back then, Mayor Behan, and Charles Fenner on the day that they put it up, I wanted to directly challenge the

fact that they had made a historical error, that it was a lie, and that we were going to course correct history and then write the reason for it. And that's why I wrote the speech. So, thinking about history, my wife always says that one of the most difficult things to explain in our history books is going to be that the first black president of the United States was followed by Donald Trump. And not only that, but that there were a lot of voters, not just in the South, but in every region of this country, who voted twice for Barack Obama and then voted for Donald Trump. And I know you spent a lot of time thinking about this.

What do you think about those voters, why they did that, and sort of how we can move out of this place that we're in right now? Well, first of all, I'm very unhappy about it. For sure. I'm very unhappy about it. For sure. I'm very unhappy about it. I did not vote for Donald Trump. I'm unhappy that he got elected. But I did think, like every American should,

that when you have a new president, that hopefully the president or whoever that person is that occupies that office, and you've been there and you've worked there, you know what it is, and you'll understand what I'm saying, that every human being that got any sense of humanity in their body would be formed by the majesty of that office. And it's such an ominous, awesome place, and it's got so much power that almost every human being that's occupied that space has gotten better over time, even though they've made mistakes. It just, it just, that, that way

to that office has a way of doing that to you. And so early on, I was, I was hopeful that that was going to happen to him, but it became very clear pretty soon that this guy is very different than anybody that's ever stepped in that office and that he's denigrated it. And he has continued to every day, almost in a weird kind of way, dumbed down the office of the presidency lower than anybody would ever think that it would go. So I think I can't get into the heads of people that voted for Obama and then voted for Trump

other than to say that we ought to all be aware of the fact that that happened, all right? And then ask ourselves, well, what was the environment wherein somebody who voted for Obama would vote for Trump? What kind of pain were they in? They obviously were not casting a racial vote at that time. They were thinking about something else. Now, having said that, one of the things that President Trump has done, and I think he does it purposefully, intentionally, and tactically, is he has unleashed this sense that white supremacy and white nationalism and hatred and racism is okay. And a lot of people have begun to speak overtly about this, and we continue to struggle with this in the country in a way that

we have to be very forceful in pushing back against. So whether it's voter suppression, whether it's mass incarceration, a criminal justice system that doesn't work, blackface, I mean, all of that stuff is a, it's kind of the same string in a long history of oppression that we have got to confront as Americans and get past and get beyond because we're never ever going to be the country that we want to be if we don't really value that proposition that diversity is a strength. We're obviously in a very difficult moment and we're being led in the wrong direction

by a man that does not have a good heart and doesn't have a good mind relating to this particular subject. Now, last question. You have recently said that you are leaning against running for president in 2020. What's made you decide that? And then what specific qualities are you looking for in the Democratic nominee for president? Well, first of all, you know it's a very hard thing to do. You've been there before.

There are a lot of other great people running, and my sense of it is right now that the field is really crowded, and there are going to be a lot of great candidates, every one of whom is going to be better than Donald Trump. So I think that that's all right. I struggle, though, and you guys may not like what I'm about to tell you, but I struggle with a couple of different things, my heart and my head.

And y'all were having this discussion just a minute ago about policy and what you would like to see happen and which one of these candidates you think is going to articulate where they might be on issues that are of great importance to you. I think that tactically, the only thing we ought to think about is who is the person that can best and most assuredly beat Donald Trump. Period, end of story.

And that's going to require... What do you think, How do you measure that? How do you measure who can beat Donald Trump? Well, first of all, on election night, I couldn't breathe. I could not believe what I was watching. And I would have bet a million dollars that morning that Hillary Clinton was going to be the next president of the United States. Hillary Clinton was going to be the next president of the United States. So I think we have to be very smart. And as we struggle with these aspirational and very important visions,

how do you have a great and clean environment? How do you beat back climate change? I mean, look, the people in this audience know a lot about the impact of the coast disappearing. Our coastline goes away 100 yards every 45 minutes. And it's shrinking. And the sea's rising. And we're not getting any nutrients into our marsh from the Mississippi River. And in 50 to 100 years, New Orleans, as you know, it's going to look very different unless we do something dramatically different. So they know. But I'll say this.

As we get into the primaries, I think that we have to be very smart. I think there should be an aggressive primary. I think people ought to have to fight like crazy to get the nomination. I think they ought to have good thoughtful ideas, but I think we ought to be all smart enough to make sure that the person standing is standing well, standing tall, standing strong, so they can do the thing that we absolutely need. Because here's the thing, if you don't win, you win you cannot govern I mean you just got to remember that as we go forward and so we're going to have to struggle through this tension of how far and how fast we go on matters that are really really important to us into the future the country knowing

that the country is generally split even if there was another Republican in office so if Trump's not there the next guy standing in line is Pence. I'm just saying, you got to think about these things. This is chess. It's not checkers. Do you think a Democrat can get elected president speaking as honestly and powerfully as you did about race in America? Well, honestly, I don't, I hope so. I mean, I just think that, I mean, this is just me. I'm free, I'm not elected anymore.

I'm a old politician that's unemployed, basically. I mean, that's kind of what I am. But I did find, I did find in my later years of elected office the freedom to speak my mind. And you all gave me the freedom to do that. And what you got from me was kind of like my unvarnished opinion about what needs to be. I've been doing this 30 years. I'm 58 years old.

And by the way, I became a grandpa today. Oh, congratulations. Bexley Grace Landrieu was born this morning at 730. And I'm a pawpaw. Y'all can call me Papa Mitch. But once you get to this point, you kind of just have to say to people, look, I've been doing this for 30 years. I have a pretty good sense of what works and what doesn't work.

I know the difference between advocating. I was a legislator for 16 years, and that's mostly what legislators do. They come up with big ideas, and then they're one of, when I was in the legislature, I was one of 105. In Congress, you're one of 435. You've got to put something together, and you can be content with just advocating for something that you know is not going to pass so that you can move the ball down the field, but at some point in time, if it's going to become law and everybody's going to be governed by it, you're going to have to compromise, and that's hard for us to do. And the next president of the United States, praying that it's a Democrat, is going to take over a country that is divided at least 60-40, maybe 55-45. You're going to have

a Congress that's split down the middle. And if you don't want them to stay in status, you've got to find a way to move forward, but you got to get the votes. And if you have the votes, you can do something, and if you don't have the votes, you can't. So I heard your question about Nancy Pelosi, who I very much like and have tremendous respect for. We should not ignore her years of experience. She is the one that put Obamacare over the finish line in the House when she was there. put Obamacare over the finish line in the House when she was there. So if you go and you say, as Democrats, we believe investing in brains by investing in early childhood education and primary and secondary and high school, we believe in worker training, if we believe in really dealing with climate change, if we believe really

in health care, all of which, by the way, are a national security issue, because the Department of Defense the other day said, if you really want the country to be strong, I got to have smart people, got to have healthy people, and by the way, climate change is going to wipe out a whole bunch of bases, so we ought to pay attention to them. There is a convergence between domestic policy, national security, and foreign policy, and it fits very nicely if we're smart enough about how to actually get it done. And I think the next, whoever the nominee is, should be a person of experience, they should be a person that can stabilize a country immediately, they should be a person that can restore the nation's credibility at home and abroad as we speak, and then they should,

whoever he or she is, begin to prepare aggressively for the future by reaching down to a young generation of leaders and lift them up. That's what I would do. Mayor Mitch Landrieu, thank you so much. Alright you guys, thank y'all. You stick around for a game? I'm here. Alright, alright.

Thank you. Here's the thing. I'm from LA you know, now. You're from New Orleans. But we all hate Tom Brady. Let's play a game. Disagree.

The Confederacy. The bad boy of American history. Leather jacket, flame decal on the bandanas. They're like the South Side serpents on Riverdale, except they fought to preserve a brutal system of racial oppression that haunts our country to this very day. But don't worry. Lots of folks are fighting to keep that spirit alive. There are almost 2,000 Confederate symbols in American public spaces, 800 of which are full-blown monuments or statues. These monuments can be found in more than 23 states,

which is 12 more than the number of states that actually belong to the Confederacy. That's wild. But since we are lucky enough to have Mayor Landrieu here, and he wrote a fantastic book on this topic, far more nuanced than this, I thought we'd explore this phenomenon in a game we're calling The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down and then Old Dixie Waited 150 Years and Quietly Rose Again

and now we have to drive Old Dixie down again and it's exhausting. You all have your cards. Would someone out there like to play the game? Hi, what's your name? Jessica. Okay. Hey, Jessica.

All right, Jessica. That was a lilt. I didn't think I would get to do this. How are you doing? Wonderful. Great. So great. Let's play the game.

Question one. Most people assume that these statues were erected immediately after the Civil War. When were the majority of Confederate monuments actually installed? Is it A. They were actually erected before the Civil War, but everyone laughed at Beauregard Jones, the racist time traveler. Or is it B. Through a miracle of physics, one of these monuments truly just materializes out of thin air every time a white person steals a phrase from black Twitter.

Stop saying lit. It's not lit. That ain't it, chief. Or is it C? All right. They were put up in the mid-1980s as a very elaborate marketing campaign for Pepsi's failed competitor to New Coke white Pepsi Or is it D

Decades after the Civil War most of the monuments are erected between the 1890s the 1950s in other words the Jim Crow era of That period the stretch between 1900 the 1920s saw the most new monuments That was also in the Ku Klux Klan saw a major resurgence. And get this, 34 new monuments were dedicated after 2000. What do you got, Jessica? D. You got it. Way to go.

One for one. Question number two. Some argue that Confederate statues were erected to memorialize those who died in the war, and that removing the statues dishonors the dead. What's the problem with his argument? Is it A? While some of the monuments erected after the Civil War were intended to memorialize soldiers, those were usually placed in cemeteries. Most monuments built after Reconstruction in town centers and other public spaces were usually dedicated to Confederate leaders like Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee, and were designed as a statement of Confederate values, which is why many went up in the 1950s and 60s explicitly in response

to the civil rights movement. Or is it B? It's sad, but we need to use the stones from these statues to build Trump's wall. Apology accepted. Or is it C? No. Thank you for that very important question. And you can find out more in the book, written by a very handsome Jason Statham-type guy, called In the Shadow of Statues, A White Southerner Confronts History. Or if you don't buy that, the commish. Or is it D?

Sir, this isn't a statue. It's a centerpiece. It's made of cheese. Fox News Denise made it for the potluck. If you think I'm going to let this deliciously, morally questionable statue remain uneaten, you are wrong, sir. You got it.

And I want everyone to know that it's my fault that Dan had to read something that crazy. Question three. Which of the following...Hobbs and Shaw. Which of the following... Hobbs and Shaw. Which of the following is a real story of a Confederate monument? Is it A? Really? All right. I'm reading this for the first time. A statue to Confederate hero Drew Brees was erected in downtown New Orleans. I'm just hiding. Showcasing the moment he completely screwed up the pass during the NFC Championship

and the refs accurately awarded the Union Rams the victory. Tommy writes the game. Travis writes the games, too. She's vulnerable. That is dangerous. Mayor Landrieu, what are we going to do about Tommy? What is the problem? I thought we learned our lesson.

What is the problem? Unbelievable. What a shame. Lock him up. Lock him up. Lock him up. Unbelievable. Or is it B? God. A statue, a statue of Confederate Lieutenant Ellen Ripley

remains standing in South Rock, Alabama, despite the claims by liberal local historians who argue she did not actually fight in the Civil War. It's actually a statue of Sigourney Weaver. And the Planet Hollywood people are still pissed about losing that shipping container. Or is this the real story of a Confederate monument? The Confederate Memorial carving is a massive nine-story tall stone portrait blasted into the side of Stone Mountain, Georgia.

It depicts Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, and Stonewall Jackson as the world's largest bas-relief carving. It was started in 1915 by sculptor and Ku Klux Klan member Gutzon Borglum. What a name, which is his real name. And that's where the Klan held its inaugural meeting after it reorganized that same year. The Klan helped raise funds for the carving, and the guy who owned the mountain was also a member. The sculpture was revealed to the public on the park's official grand opening April 14th, 1965. The 100th anniversary of Lincoln's assassination. Wild. Can you believe that? Or is it D? This one time my great-grandfather on my stepmom's side stabbed a Union soldier in a bar fight.

They put up a statue of him in Albuquerque. What do you think the real story is, Jessica? C with Mitch. You got it. Fuck the Rams. Yes. Yes. Fuck the Rams. Yes. Yes. Jessica, you've won the game.

Thank you to Mayor Mitch Landrieu for being here tonight, for playing this game. Thank you to everybody from New Orleans for coming out tonight. Fuck the Patriots. And have a great night. This is time. We'll be right back. guitar solo We'll see you next time.