The Bulwark Podcast - Ali Vitali and Will Saletan: An Epiphany on Ukraine?

Episode Date: April 18, 2024

Mike Johnson shows hints of Reaganism with his new push for a foreign aid bill that includes support for Ukraine. Meanwhile, Republicans in Arizona self-own on abortion, the GOP in DC flails on a staged impeachment, and Biden makes a populist move on tariffs. Ali Vitali and Will Saletan join Tim Miller. show notes: VOTE HERE for Will Saletan's 'Corruption of Lindsey Graham' podcast Sen. Chris Murphy's Bulwark piece Ali's book, "Electable" 

Landlord telling you to just put on another sweater when your apartment is below 21 degrees? Are they suggesting you can just put a bucket under a leak in your ceiling? That's not good enough. Your Toronto apartment should be safe and well-maintained. If it isn't and your landlord isn't responding to maintenance requests, RentSafeTO can help. Learn more at toronto.ca slash rentsafeto. Hey JVL, it's been months since I've seen you without a screen intermediary. I'm just dying to lick your face and put my hands on you, and so are you going to come do some public events with us and be among the people? Human contact? Yes, yes, I'm going to do it. I'm coming out out of the house i'm leaving the basement for two days

may 1st in philadelphia and may 15th in washington dc this will be the first book event where we encourage jeering because it's philly people so jeer us yes may 1st we have a bad show i expect the philly crowd to boo us please or anyway even if it's a good show, boo us anyway. We deserve it. May 1st in Philly, May 15th, 6 and I, Synagogue in Washington, D.C. Come hang out. Go to the bulwark.com slash events to get your tickets. The bulwark.com slash events and JVL. I just can't wait to get all up on you. Hello and welcome to the Bullard Podcast. It's Thursday, April 18th. I'm delighted to be here with my pal, Allie Vitale, Capitol Hill correspondent for NBC News. My favorite person.

One of my favorite. Let's not overdo it. One of my favorite people. My favorite person was just fine. One of my favorite people to be on MSNBC with. Author of Electable, Why America Hasn't Put a Woman in the White House Yet. Obviously, Allie is here to discuss the craziness on the Hill and maybe just a hint of sanity on the Hill, actually, from the Republicans. But

before we do that, because you've written that book, I'm just kind of dying to ask you about Vice President Harris and the context of the book. I think we can stipulate that she's had some political struggles. Yeah. I'd argue some of that's her own mistakes. Some of that's the nature of being VP. They made a satire out of Veep for a reason, but some is obviously succumbing to the misogynist tropes that have bedeviled other women politicians.

So I like you studied this. You looked at Geraldine Ferraro, you went deep. So I'm just curious what your take is on how Kamala has navigated all that. Well, Tim, this is my first time on the pod, but I'm definitely coming back because you just said I was your favorite of all the people you ever have done television with. Is that what I heard correctly? Well, one of my favorites sometimes. Yeah, sometimes I can buff it up a guest a little bit. You know, I'm new to the host game. I want people to come back. We love that. So you have me now on the hook. Look, when it comes to Kamala Harris, I think

that and I write this in the book, like she is subject to both the fair and unfair. Her allies would tell you that most of it is unfair. Her critics would tell you that all of it's fair. I actually fall somewhere in the middle right alongside of you, which is that as a politician, you got a deal in the world that you live in and you can't wave a magic wand and make people not still fall prey to misogyny and racism. You can call it out. And certainly that's the ecosystem that I hope that we're living in more. But I think that this last phase of the administration, the last two years and going into an election year are really Kamala Harris's chance at redemption in large part because abortion is such a front

and center issue. And we watch the ways that Joe Biden has been willing to talk about it, but he is more reluctant to dive in on this issue, in large part because of his background. Vice President Harris has been very outspoken. She has gone to the center of these states in Florida, in Arizona, immediately after those news cycles on whatever abortion restrictions were passed. That's a really motivating issue for the electorate. It's important to have a woman and a Black woman at that talking about that issue at this moment. And I do think that because she's at the forefront of that, it is an opportunity for her to be seen as a passionate advocate on a policy that she's comfortable about. And that's really going to be

important when we write the legacy of the first female vice president. I'd add one more thing to that. I agree with all that. I'd like to see her back in that prosecutor role this year, prosecuting the case against Trump aggressively. Biden is pretty good at that, but he's lost a step and she could really take that. I think that she's been a little reluctant to be the attack dog, but I don't know, in some ways, I'm curious your view on this. Being more aggressive might help overcompensate for some of those unfair implicit biases a little bit too. And I think it plays to her strengths a little bit.

It might. But also, and I again write this in the book, is like vice presidents are not supposed to overshadow the boss. True. Biden's actually an example of what not to do when you look at the ways that he overstepped Obama on a variety of different issues, including but not limited to gay marriage and the ways that he made news around Obamacare and other things like that. You're not supposed to do that if you're being a good vice president. Every former aide that I talked to who worked at a vice presidential office was like, the job is to ride the coattails

and amplify the message. If she were stepping out in front, what's the thing that we would be hearing consistently? Oh, she's too ambitious. Oh, she's trying to get ahead. Those are unfair misogynist tropes to begin with. But yes, I do think there's an opportunity for her, especially in a vice presidential debate. And I put that with an asterisk because like, I don't know if we're getting debates this time, but if we do, what an opportunity because we watched what she did with former Vice President Mike Pence, although the fly certainly played its own role, too. But I do think that if it's someone like Tim Scott, or Elise Stefanik, or Kristi Noem, that's a fascinating dynamic to watch in a debate stage. For sure. And maybe the expectations gave my play to our benefit there. Okay,

I want to get to the hill. But where are you right now for our YouTube viewers? You have fake books there. There's a flag. What is happening? Where are you right now? I look like I'm some mix of like a lawmaker with the flags. But no, I just found a closet in our area on the hill where reporters dwell, our little lair. So this is one of the nicer lairs.

I dressed it up for you. The Capitol Hill closet. It looks really great. Okay. So Mike Johnson has found Jesus on Ukraine and it's kind of shocking. And so I don't want to be loosey with the football. We'll see. We're taping this. The rules committee is about to meet here as we're taping this. So we'll kind of know more, I guess, by the time this publishes. But it seems like Mike Johnson is willing to take one for the team and maybe take one for

his speakership on this. Let's listen to what he said at a press conference yesterday on the Ukraine funding bill. You do the right thing and you let the chips fall where they may. If I operated out of fear over a motion to vacate, I would never be able to do my job. Look, history judges us for what we do. This is a critical time right now, a critical time on the world stage. I could make a selfish decision and do something that's different, but I'm doing here what I believe to be the right thing. I think providing lethal aid to Ukraine right now is critically important. I really do. I really do believe the intel and the briefings that we've gotten that I believe Xi and Vladimir Putin and Iran really are an axis of evil. I think they're in coordination on this. I think that Vladimir Putin would continue to march through

Europe if he were allowed. I think he might go to the Balkans next. I think he might have a showdown with Polander, one of our NATO allies. To put it bluntly, I would rather send bullets to Ukraine than American boys. My son is going to begin in the Naval Academy this fall. This is a live fire exercise for me as it is so many American families. This is not a game. It's not a joke. We can't play politics of this. We have to do the right thing. And I'm going to allow an opportunity for every single member of the House to vote their conscience and their will on this. And I think that's the way this institution is supposed to work. And I'm willing to take personal risk for that because we have to do the right thing. And history will judge us. That's a change of tune, Allie. I mean,

you've been over there, you've been following this more than me, but I haven't heard Mike Johnson sound like this in the time that he's been speaker. I think that's right. I mean, he definitely sounds different than he did as just Congressman Mike Johnson. Now that he's in the role of speaker, though, I do think this is the first time that he's really speaking explicitly to the stakes of this moment. I mean, even calling himself earlier this week a wartime speaker, it was real escalation in rhetoric on that one.

A little eye rolly. A little eye rolly, but I take that point. I agree with you. However, I do think that it also speaks to this moment and why we might be seeing a pivot from him. Whether or not it costs him his job, I don we might be seeing a pivot from him. Whether or not it costs him his job, I don't know. I guess we'll see. I just talked to him, you know, minutes ago before they, when they opened the House floor, and I asked, are you trying to change the rules

around emotion to vacate? And he sort of downplayed the idea of being like, we're focused on the supplemental right now. I don't know if that's the right way to take it, given the fact that Marjorie Taylor Greene says she's not going to privilege her resolution until after and if after this foreign aid supplemental vote on Saturday. So we'll see. Maybe he waits too long and he ends up being motioned to vacated. Maybe he gets McCarthy before he can change these rules. I don't know. But the rules are going to have to be changed at some point, because however this plays out, you can't keep governing. That's what you want to call this rigmarole that we've been in lately. You can't keep doing that with the rules as they are right now. That's not sustainable. Let me hear more about the reaction from the

crazies, but just really quick on Mike Johnson. Here's one thing that he said. I just want to read the sentence. I can make a selfish decision and do something that's different, but I'm doing here what I believe to be the right thing. That right thing being making sure that these aid supplementals get up for a vote. He really could have kind of blamed the crazy caucus, right? And sort of done the hemming-hawing, and I think we should do it, but I've got to defer to my caucus. He probably could have gotten away with that, right? And he has set this up specifically so that democrats are going to

have to be the ones that help bail them out and i saw this morning i was looking at this if they do get this to the floor and through the rules committee over the objections of republicans it'll be the first time since 95 that that has happened and that didn't happen in 95 that's just when we started they started measuring this so like it hasn't happened in recorded memory that would be a pretty i don't know maybe overstated to call it brave, but bold move by Mike Johnson. No, I mean, out of character. I mean, he said he's hoping not to have to rely on Democrats to get the rule through. And like, here's the best way that I think about the rules, because I do get questions from people about this all the time, even people who are political junkies, like the

House functions in a weird way. Basically, I think about the rule vote, both out of the committee and on the House floor as like the bouncer that you have to pass through to actually get drinks in the bar, right? Like you can't. Is this like the Berlin Club, though? Is this like the Berlin Club where the bouncer looks at your outfit and decides if you can get in? No, I think this is a strict idea. You have to pass the test. Yes or no. It is very strict here. But look, the fact that Democrats are even considering this, I think, speaks to why Johnson had to change his tactic in the first place. I am not someone who buys into the Hail Mary pass of discharge petitions. Democrats have tried this time and again, and they've never amounted to anything. But they had a discharge

petition brewing on the Senate supplemental, which is basically what this is, except Johnson wants to do this piece by piece as opposed to voting on it all together. But they've had this brewing and they've been asking explicitly this week in their Democratic caucus meetings, hey, use your personal relationships with Republicans. Get them to sign on to this discharge petition, maybe because they have trust issues over whether or not this is actually going to come to the floor. And I have to say, there are Republicans who really, really want this vote. And I know we often talk about the hardline conservatives who are often the thorn in the side. But at some point, maybe, I don't know, moderates decide that they have just as much sway here and could have gone the other way. Yeah, Mike Lawler and that. Again, yeah, that's the interesting thing about this. Lawler, McCall. Yeah. That Johnson hasn't forced them to do that, though.

Right? Like, Johnson could have played this in a way that's like, you guys have to do that over my dead body to help me survive. And if this comes up in a vote today, that's the interesting thing about the rules like if it happens so that who are the three it's norman roy and nassi that are on the rules committee the three republicans and the freedom caucus sent out a letter that was like comparing johnson to bayner and pelosi that's not a winning place to be as a republican speaker so if those folks go against it but the people you're talking about go for it i had moskowitz on the podcast moskowitz said he would help you know if it turns out like that, that it happens, that's definitely interesting. I mean, it's a change of tactic that puts Johnson,

I guess you hate to hand it to the Freedom Caucus, but that does make Johnson more kind of like Boehner than what we expected. Yeah, I think that's right. I think Democrats think about him differently than they think about McCarthy. Why is that, do you think? You know, I don't know. I think I'm trying to remember what Dan Kildee said this morning, but it was something to the effect of like he doesn't lie as much and he's a little bit less bad at the job. I don't know. Kildee said it much more funny than I ever would have. But I do think that there's a view that Johnson is someone that they can work with. There are some Democrats who I've spoken to who will offer the reminder that he is anti-LGBTQ, that he is anti a lot of the positions that progressives themselves espouse. But the people here who would call themselves, I think, institutionalists who want to see this

place just function, the bar is so low now that they'll pretty much do anything to make that happen. So I actually think, look, in the world where people like us, or at least me, love to see what strange political bedfellows can be made on policy and politics, I actually think that if we actually get a vote on these substantive bills, we're going to see some really weird vote totals because some Democrats won't vote for Israel and some will vote for Ukraine. And then there's the TikTok bill that also has maybe some border provisions in it. Like there are a lot of different things being lumped into this that could come up with some pretty strange ways of bipartisan pairing.

At the end of the day, isn't that how this place should work? But it's not. I mean, that's the utopia, right? Yeah, I know. That sounds very bulwarky, actually. Like, oh, my God, we could get some bipartisan foreign aid passed. Wow. Things keep coming up bulwarky, actually. We're like, oh, my God. Holy cow. We could get some bipartisan foreign aid passed. Wow. Things keep coming up bulwark. Okay. Just really quick on the crazies. Your word.

My word, not yours. I wouldn't put it in your mouth. You're a reporter. You know, you were over there during the McCarthy regular role and the gates and we had all the votes. You can kind of sense the tension in the conference at that time. It's hard for me as an outsider to see right now. Is that tension bubbling up to the same one of that crew that's come out and explicitly said, I'm going to go the route of motion to vacate. I could go that route.

I would co-sponsor it. Roy and Norman are different in that they do not like this approach and they have very powerful positions on rules that, frankly, several of their colleagues are calling for them to not have if they vote against this rule. So we'll keep an eye on that space. But they're not for, at least in my conversations with Ralph Norman, they're not for another motion to vacate and another cycle of just complete and total dysfunction. A, I think because everyone here recognizes like no one would get 218 or 216 if that's the magic number. No one is getting those

votes. So like, I don't even know where we would go. They were scraping the barrel for names the last time around at the end of the year when they were looking for Mike Johnson to ultimately get this job. So I don't even know where that would put us if they were to do this again. That's why I think a lot of people don't know if it's real. But when you talk about the emotional aspect of this, yes, there are people who are very angry. Is it at the fever pitch that it was last year at Matt Gaetz and the rest of the folks who voted to oust McCarthy? No, not yet. But I'm also someone who thinks that could easily get there if more people keep piecemeal adding to Marjorie Taylor Greene's effort. Ralph Norman's got to be the most interesting guy in the hell right now. He was at the January 6th or helped organize the January 6th rally, endorsed Nikki Haley,

and is now going anti-Mike Johnson on this. Say what you want about Ralph Norman, I guess. He goes his own way. He marches to the beat of his own drummer. I mean, look, I spent a lot of time with him when I was on the road with Nikki Haley because he was consistently out there. And I think on paper, for those of us who have watched him in Congress the last two years, especially, it's like, what do you have to do with this woman who is sort of espousing like a different way of being a Republican, even if on policy, she is in line with a lot of the things that this Trump era has brought us certainly not on foreign policy, but like on a lot of the domestic issues, certainly she's there. But it always seemed like a mismatch. But again, South Carolina political roots go deep. And that's

what that was about. And again, I think that Ralph Norman, while he might vote against this rule, the idea that any of these hardline conservatives were ever going to support this foreign aid package, however you chop it up, chunk it up or put it together is just wrong. Like they were always going to have a problem with it, but they were also never going to vote for it. All right. Last question. I'll let you go. What are you hearing from the Democrats on that weird fourth element to this? The TikTok ban, there's maybe border, there's a lend-lease act. There's like, it's one of the stuff I like actually, but it's just like, it's a weird mishmash. What's the sense from the Democrats on that? I think this one's the wild the stuff I like, actually. It's a bit, it's just like, it's a weird mishmash. What's the sense from the Democrats on that?

I think this one's the wild card because I hung out with our friends at way too early this morning, filling in for our friend, John Lemire. We had Jake Auchincloss on, who is a national security minded Democrat, obviously a former Marine or a Marine himself. He never stopped being a Marine.

And he was excited about the TikTok component of this. He was excited about the fact that Senator Maria Cantwell seemed on board with the fact that her version of this bill was in it. That might make it a sweetener over on the Senate side. But then the hang up, of course, is something like the border provision, because Democrats want to be careful about what this actually is. And if Republicans, again, speaks to the lack of trust, if Republicans are trying to sneak something in here, that's going to be the real wild card, that fourth bill that sort of has the potpourri of issues of the day in it. Because I think at the end of it, there's probably more things that Democrats want to vote for in that than against. But one bad

thing could outweigh all of the pretty good things. And that's the, you know, the balancing act that we're watching play out here. Cause frankly, the other three bills, the Ukraine, the Israel and the Indo-Pacific bills are basically the same as what they were in the Senate supplemental,

except for like this loan forgiveness piece in the Ukraine thing that says you can't forgive the loan that we're giving Ukraine until after like mid November of this year or something. Okay. I lied. One last really quick question for those of us that are not, don't understand the parliamentary procedure as well. loan that we're giving ukraine until after like mid-november of this year or something okay i lied one last really quick question for those of us that are not don't understand the parliamentary procedure as well so do all four need to pass then to get to senate like or like what would happen if they passed three and then that one failed so this is actually i think one of the things that we do not yet know in theory all four of these bills are under the umbrella of that. Actually, maybe we don't know this. I going to see this play out. I think maybe because it's

still being figured out. And also, I think they're watching the rules committee right now pretty closely to see how that actually goes. Okay, well, we'll keep an eye on that. And if we if we have some clarity before this pod comes out, I'll pop on and do an intro. Allie Vitale, thank you so much. Come back soon. You're the best. I will. Thanks, my favorite contributor. I appreciate you. We'll be back on the other side of Will Salatan. All right, we are back by popular demand with Will salatan writer at the bulwark this is also the last day to vote for his podcast uh in the webbies the corruption of lindsey graham he's currently in the lead for people's voice award stop the count stop the count well i know that you'll cherish a

webby and we appreciate all the listeners that are voting for you. We'll put a link in the show notes so you can vote as well. How are you doing, brother? Good, good. You sat in and listened to my convo with Allie. She's one of the best reporters on the Hill on this stuff and just a workhorse and knows what's happening. But, you know, being a reporter sometimes limits your ability to editorialize. I'm interested in your take on this Mike Johnson, Saul to Damascus thing on Ukraine that's happening right now. That's pretty astonishing. Who knows, maybe he'll wimp out, maybe he'll revert to being Saul again any minute, but I don't know.

What do you think? So, this makes me think back to, remember when Kevin McCarthy went down, it was like three weeks the Republicans were trying to get a speaker. And they cycled through just about everybody. And they ended up with Johnson. And you and I were both like, who the hell is Mike Johnson, right? He was like deputy undersecretary. I'd seen a single Mike Johnson speech. It wasn't even really a speech. I'd seen a single thing of Mike Johnson.

I was like, hmm, that's a weird character. Remember who was right before Mike Johnson? Jim Jordan was right before that, right? And so Jim Jordan couldn't quite get there. And then we ended up with Mike Johnson. Jim Jordan was right before that, right? And so, Jim Jordan couldn't quite get there. And then we ended up with Mike Johnson. That turned out to be pretty consequential because Jim Jordan is basically an isolationist. And Mike Johnson is a Reagan Republican on foreign policy. Pretending to be an isolationist. His heart is there. He, you know, the way he talks about, like, if we don't stop Putin,

he's going through the rest of Europe, you know. Anyway. Every once in a while, I'll sound like Kinzinger or Bill putin he's going through the rest of europe and you know anyway every once in a while sound like kensinger bill crystal or something and then all of a sudden he reverts i don't know it's very strange but you can tell it's in there there's like a little hint of something yeah a little hint of reagan in there yeah somewhere i think that was historically could turn out to be an important moment then the next question of course is he willing to fall on his sword is he willing to die for this and he's got the whole christian thing going on like this is this is all about what's right and wrong. And look, when he gets to stuff like anti-gay, you're like, the Christian stuff doesn't really help there. But when he believes that the right thing to do is to, you know, save Ukraine, he's the kind of guy who seems willing to like,

take a sacrifice for that. And he talks about his, that was so weird yesterday, he talked about his place in history. And we'd like members of Congress, we'd like speakers to think that way, wouldn't we? Like, I'm going to do the right thing. Like, this bill, getting this passed, saving this country, stopping this aggression is more important than my job. We'd love for members of Congress to think that way. And God bless him, Mike Johnson seems to be doing that. Maybe there's a Mike Pence element of this.

Again, it's like, plenty to criticize. So please, this is not a hagiography and it's six months late. But go back to that line, I can make a selfish decision and do something that's different, but I'm doing here what I believe to be the right thing. It could be bluster, right? It could be fake moralizing. There's plenty of people that do fake moralizing. But if it turns out that he really jams this thing through with Democrats and faces potentially getting overthrown in his speakership and conceivably it could end up making him more powerful also, right? Because like, let's say he jams it through and these guys fail in that

motion to vacate, which is also possible. He could end up coming out of this. It's sort of like, why don't more people try this? This is one of my biggest frustrations the last nine years. If he follows through on this, there seem like some pretty big upsides, both for policy and politics and his eternal soul. All across the world, it feels like it could be working for him. Let me pull on that eternal soul theme for a minute. People who believe this, people who believe that they're part of some large thing, God's plan or whatever, they can be appealed to, to do this large thing that ends their career because they believe that's going to last into eternity, right? Did they do the right thing in the story? Like a biblical character, right? If Mike Johnson sees himself that way, that's good.

And speaking for myself, I can't speak for you on this, but maybe you would agree with me. I think it's really important for those of us who want conversions, like you were for myself, I can't speak for you on this, but maybe you would agree with me. I think it's really important for those of us who want conversions. Like you were for Trump, you know, now you like Chris Christie. At the end of Chris Christie's career, he does the right thing. He turns against Trump. Did you have to pick Chris Christie as the example? I think I'm going to agree with you, but you picked an example that's going to make it really hard for me. But go ahead, finish your thought.

Okay, good, good. We should make it hard to test the proposition we should let people be remembered for the last thing they did if it was the right thing i understand all of what chris christie's did going into this but so if mike johnson ends his career as speaker by getting the money to ukraine and at least preventing them from, which seems to be what's going on with the front over there. God bless him. And I'm willing to forgive and not forget, but to forgive a lot of what he did before that. And I want to incentivize that. I want people who come after Mike Johnson to say, you know, I may have been a cynical character here and there in my career, but here is a great way to go out. And instead of like the Kevin McCarthy character, where you're always conniving to stay in power, have people be willing to say, this bill, this thing I'm going to do right now, probably will cost me my career might cost me my career. But it doesn't end the history of me. It makes the history of me. It is the headline in the history of me i did the right thing i also think maybe it's sometimes okay to look at these things more in micro examples and some of my friends that work for campaigns that

give me shit they're like oh you're gonna shit on my person constantly right like i had a friend that went and um he meekly informed vid he was gonna work for desantis's super pack it's not like it would have been helpful for the bulwark to compliment around desantis there are always all these demands like why aren't you nicer to Ron DeSantis? You really hate Trump. Like the nicest thing I can do to Ron DeSantis is talk about how crazy he is. So maybe the crazies will be like, oh, okay. If the Never Trumpers hate him that much, he might be pretty good. Anyway, point being, I always said, look, if Ron DeSantis does the right thing one time, I'll say it. I'm for that on incentivizing that way. Does that change their character? Does it change the life story for me of Chris Christie?

Is Chris Christie's headline that he did the right thing this year? Maybe if he really goes for it, maybe he can earn it, right? But to me, his headline might still be what he did in 2016. But that doesn't mean we can't say, hey, good on you, chap, right? This was good. This was meaningful. Humans are complicated. We all make choices that are good and bad. We all have angels you, chap, right? This was good. This was meaningful. Humans are complicated. We all make choices that are good and bad. We all have angels and devils, right? In this case,

you did the right thing and good on you. No caveats. And I would like to be able to say that about Mike Johnson next week. We'll see. Look, I understand your point that in like, when this is all written, do we really want to forgive and forget? Maybe not. But in terms of actually having an effect in the present, leaving open the possibility that somebody who has done the wrong thing a hundred times might do the right thing, even for reasons of some quirk that they, you know,

happened, you know, I always remember, who is it, Rob Portman found out his son was gay and suddenly like changed his position on the issue. And I had people telling me like, don't forgive this guy. And I'm like, look, this one thing happened in this guy's life that made him do the right thing. And that's great. And here's a thing which is going to be,

it is not yet decided what happens in Ukraine. And if Mike Johnson can be incentivized to do the right thing this one time, I am for any portrayal of him that gets that done. And then we can settle historical accounts later. Same. And by the way, on the Rob Portman situation, some people have gay sons and don't do the right thing. So just, I always was like, okay, I mean, yeah, I guess it helped him that he had that experience. But that still

took courage. I mean, shoot, he came out for gay marriage for a lot of Democrats did. Okay, here's somebody that I don't think is ever going to do the right thing. After that kind of moral hand wringing over how to judge someone, how to handle complicated people, here's an uncomplicated person, Marjorie Taylor Greene. I don't know if you've seen this. I literally thought it was a spoof. This is where AI is going to make our lives hard. Somebody posted onto Twitter screenshots of two amendments that Marjorie Taylor Greene had filed. The first one was calling for all members who vote for Ukraine aid to conscript in the Ukrainian army. I don't think

she knows what the word conscript means, but that was one. The other one that was really what made me think it was a spoof said that Israel aid will be used instead for the development of space laser technology on the southern border that's real so i saw both those i was like that's not real the person linked to them it's like okay it's real she's filed three more amendments since then amendment to the ukraine aid bill all the money in the bill is reduced to zero and instead provided to hawaii and east palestine ohio another one no ukraine aid can be expended until ukraine closes all their bio laboratories this is russian propaganda that's not that's not real and lastly she wants to use the money to start

deporting people so mike johnson said he's gonna have an open amendment process so i guess in the people's house we're gonna have to vote on these very serious amendments any of those sound good to you no but the one you know we know that she's got this bugaboo about Ukraine, you know, wants to zero it out. And she buys this garbage about bio labs and Zelensky and all that. Her district is what, Trump plus 37 or something? I forget what it is. Like, you can't get rid of her in her district. You can Madison Cawthorner.

That's maybe the right way. Like a MAGA person, but it would be really tough. They kind of gay baited Madison Cawthorne and he's maybe the right way. Like a MAGA person, but it would be really tough. They kind of gay baited Madison Cawthorne and he like had a lot of weird personal issues. It's probably, it's really hard to get rid of her, but you need somebody that's like, that would be totally unacceptable to you and me. You know, you would need a MAGA person to primary her. So, okay, Tim, you know how this works. I don't really know this world, but like, you know, Kevin McCarthy has this revenge pack going where he's like trying to, trying to take down everybody who voted against him. So there are smart people who operate in what now passes for the middle, the mainstream,

the leadership of the Republican, like the House Republicans. Some of them have got to be targeting. How can we get rid of her? Right. She's the one who's like got the motion to vacate bug. And, you know, she's constantly, they're working with a small margin, even if they win some seats this fall, which they probably won't. They'd love to have a hook to get her. Ukraine is not it, right? You're not going to like find like a pro-Ukraine candidate in that district is going to run on that issue.

But Israel, this Israel thing, it sounds like a joke. Is that amendment a joke or is she totally serious about that? It's like some kind of troll throwback to her Jewish space lasers. I don't know. I got to tell you, sometimes I get called to be on liberal podcasts and stuff where they're like, help us understand what's happening. And it's getting harder and harder for me. You know, I can do my best in certain cases or certain things where I have expertise, where I know these people, but getting inside the head of Marjorie Taylor Greene is a task too large for me. So, I don't know if that one's a joke or not.

Maybe the Israel aid. And I also just don't know that the military aid to Israel is the hook for beating somebody in a primary either. I think it's going to be kind of split. I know there are going to be some people that very strongly want Israel aid in the conservative base, in the evangelical base. But I don't know. I don't know that that's going to be a deal breaker. Well, I was kind of hoping that Israel would be the hook because I think she's cast some votes also that have put her in a position where you could run somebody to the right of her on Israel. You know, you always wonder how the new Republican isolationism intersects with the old

Republican support for Israel. You know, on Russia, of course, the isolationists seem to be winning. But on Israel, don't send money to Israel. We need to protect our own border. Is that really becoming a thing? A little bit. I think that younger, right? This is something that people misunderstand. Like the magnetization of the party is kind of inverse, right? The older voters, Mike Johnson isn't that old, but he said this. He's like, I'm a child of the 80s. He said this in the Jake Tapper interview, right? Like, I still believe in the Reagan peace through strength. So that's good. You can use that.

You can work with those people. The younger folks, so the TPUSA, for example, I thought this was super interesting. They polled their members, Turning Point USA. And the guy gave it to me when I was out there reporting on it. And he showed me the poll. And it was like, should we give aid to Ukraine, financial aid poll and it was like should we give aid to ukraine financial aid and it was like 397 or something like nobody thought we should israel was like 50 50 i thought that was interesting it was more for military aid but like financial age we provide

aid to israel and it was kind of like okay is that number headed towards three? Or is this really a 50-50 split on something like Israel? And I just think that's kind of a TBD, you know, because Ukraine started at 50-50, right? We had many podcasts. You and Charlie were out here talking about this. It's like, what's going to happen with the Republican base? It's interesting. The Tucker Carlson's, a lot of influencers were out there saying we shouldn't help them. But the voters were kind of split. And now that, you know, slowly but surely, the voters have moved more into

the Trump-Tucker camp. Would that happen on Israel? I don't know. Israel, there's a lot more depth of relationship there. This is the religious element. I don't know that it's going to go the same trajectory, but you can see it moving that way slightly, I think. Yeah, I wonder if I were in Israel, Israel obviously watches US politics a lot, and they want to have hooks in both parties. And if I were in the Israeli government, or just an Israeli citizen, I might be worried about what's going to happen to the Republican Party in the United States and whether the isolationism that has already corrupted the party on Europe will also corrupt it on Israel.

While we're on anti-Semitism, you've been digging in on Alejandro Mayorkas and that impeachment. So we'll get to that next. But while we're on Israel, we'll listen to an audio, some audio from Capitol Hill. Yesterday, there was a hearing on anti-Semitism. They brought the head of Columbia to try to do a rehash of the successful hearing where the Republicans feel like they got a scalp of the Harvard and Penn presidents. They brought the Columbia president through. Here is Congressman Rick Green of Georgia, Republican, in case you're wondering, speaking to the president of Columbia. I mean, maybe you should have a course and, you know, you don't have to believe it, but, you know, the Bible is an incredible book. There's a lot of history there,

and you don't have to believe it, but you need to know what's in there. Maybe you should have a course suggested for those who are having problems with all of this on the Bible and what's in the Bible and kind of what will happen if, you know, under the wrath of God. Oh, my God. Yeah, that's really something, Will. I didn't even play you the whole thing. Actually, that was Rick Allen. I think I said Rick Green. You know, maybe he could be a cousin of Marjorie.

Rick Allen of Georgia, he also asked the Columbia University president if she's worried about suffering the wrath of God. Interesting stuff there in the wrath of God. Interesting stuff there in the House of Representatives. On the one hand, I think it speaks to your point that maybe there's some still old style religiosity in the Republican Party that's going to prevent them from going full isolationist on Israel. On the other hand, that's some weird shit. That is some very weird shit. I mean, the idea of like, I'm sure this was true 150 years ago, but we, you know, to have people in Congress who believe in the Bible, literally things,

I mean, look, I love the Bible. There's a lot of good lessons, but the Bible says things like, if you mix fabrics, you know, your blood shall be on your own head. The idea that God's wrath is going to punish you for your policy on speech on a campus. Come on. And it degrades the larger issues, which is what are the boundaries of free speech in the context of university? What counts as anti-Semitism? What is just anti-Israel? What is anti-Jewish? These are like serious issues. This wrath stuff is just not representing anybody well. No. And it also just speaks to the unseriousness of what is happening in these oversight hearings, which is related to my orcas. The campus anti-Semitism stuff, I take very seriously. And sometimes I mock some of the most absurd right-wing arguments related to it because

they are mockable and they deserve to be mocked. I think they undermine, like you're saying, the legitimate concerns. But I still think sometimes we need to have a little perspective about what's actually happening with the youth. And there's a Harvard poll out this morning that I think is interesting. The question that they ask is kind of weird. But they ask whether or not they believe Israel's response so far to the October 7 attack by Hamas has been justified. And justified is an interesting word. Because I'm like, when I'm thinking about that, I would kind of answer that question. I think, yes, I think it's justified.

But if you used a different word, like, has it been proportionate right like maybe i would have so anyway that said 45 said they didn't know 21 said justified 32 said not justified i think it's like a very different picture of the youth than you're hearing and some of this stuff i think there's definitely some anti-semit. I think there's definitely some anti-Semitism on campus. There's definitely a trendy kind of anti-Israel sentiment on social media. But I don't know, maybe the kids are all right a little bit on this. Like, I think that's a pretty rational response, that breakdown. What say you? Yeah, so to me, the most interesting number that you read off was the don't knows. That was 45%,

right? This is a Harvard poll, right? But it's done by Ipsos. There's another poll that has Harvard's name on it, right? The Harvard-Capps-Harris poll, which is a Mark Penn poll. Yeah, that's crap. These guys are good. The Harvard youth poll guys. Harvard needs to get its name off the Mark Penn poll. But here you see a difference in methodology because one of the things that the Mark Penn poll does is they eliminate all the don't knows when they report the number so imagine if they took that breakdown you just gave me and inflated both sides of it right and made it what would it be right it would be like 65 35 or something probably 60 saying not justified right yeah and so that's a completely different read when you put the don't knows in

there you get the nuanced portrait these kids are like wait a minute what read. When you put the don't knows in there, you get the nuanced portrait. These kids are like, wait a minute. What do I, you know, it's complicated. Those are people who are saying what you're saying, right? Like, well, I sort of think it's right because of what happened on October 7th, but they kind of went overboard. And so I'm going to say don't know. You got to give people space in polling to express nuance. At least give them a don't know and at least publish those numbers. Yeah, I agree.

It's interesting. I've been trying to get a couple other guests on the campus anti-Semitism stuff because I think it's interesting. I think that there's some really bad stuff happening that is worth discussing and exploring, but I also think it's a more complicated picture than sometimes people want to paint. All right, Mayorkas. It's been hard for me to care about this, I got to say. I've got to care about so much. David Sanger had me reading about the history of China yesterday. And so I'm doing my best here. And so occasionally, I see something in the news. I'm just like, I don't care about this anymore. The Mayorkas impeachment was, to me, preposterous from the start. I went to the Senate, I did notice yesterday that both Murkowski and Collins voted for the conviction, which was pretty disappointing, but they didn't

really seem to have a real trial. It's a party line thing. You've been following this more closely. What say you about, you know, what's been happening over there with regards to the oversight, so to speak, of Alejandro Mayorkas? Murkowski and Collins didn't vote for, they voted to continue and have a trial. That's important clarification. The Democrats were trying to dismiss it up front. So this was just to, and Romney, you know, like there is an argument for having the trial. Just really quick, actually. So, because I want to get this right.

So the vote was kind of like in the Trump impeachments, right? You vote on whether the Senate is going to take this. The House has passed an impeachment. The Senate decides whether to take it up and whether we have an actual trial and then create some rules around when the trial is, right? Like that's how the process goes. And the Democrats are saying, let's dump this. There were some Republicans I was saying, I thought we were saying, let's table it. And then there were others saying, let's take it up, right? That was basically how it broke down. Okay, so what they're required to do, what the

Senate's required to do is to meet as a court of impeachment. But what they do from that point on is up to them. And Schumer just basically said, we're going to dismiss this thing because it's garbage. And it is garbage. And so then there were a series of motions that Republicans did to try to end run that, to like table this, postpone that, change this. And then you have party line votes on all that stuff. But all of it was about whether to have a more serious trial where you hear all the evidence. And the Democrats prevail, and they prevail because they were right. This impeachment was one of those impeachments that says more about the impeacher than the impeachee, right? I mean, Mayorkas was not guilty of anything that they accused him of, but it was absurd that they did this. And it's a reflection of how dysfunctional the Republican

Party is. The articles of impeachment for people who haven't followed this were, there were two of them. One was claiming that Mayorkas had refused to comply with the law. And the second one was that he had lied to Congress. Okay. The refusal to comply with the law was basically some policy differences that Republicans had with Mayorkas. And they just decided to criminalize those and make it an impeachment thing. And by the way, they had all these hearings with Mayorkas. And they just decided to criminalize those and make it an impeachment thing. And by the way, they had all these hearings with Mayorkas and he would come in and they would say, you're not doing what the law requires. And Mayorkas would say, yes, I am. And he would explain his position. And okay, if you don't like that, Republicans, you can sue to like

say the DHS is not complying with the law. And there were suits about this, right? And then you let the courts decide it. You don't impeach the guy over it. Then they said he's lying to Congress. What were the lies, Tim? What were the awful lies? I recommend everyone read the articles of impeachment. He said the border was secure. He used the word secure. He said the border was closed. He said that we had operational control and we didn't. I mean, okay, like you can argue that that wasn't true. Then you're arguing about the meaning of things like, did Michael Brown do a heck of a job? You know, was mission accomplished in Iraq, you know, in 2003? Okay, these things weren't true, but they're like interpretive

things. It was absurd that they impeached him. You probably could have got some Democrats voting to impeach W over mission accomplished, the mission accomplished banner that I don't know if it would have passed the House of Representatives, but you probably could have got some Democrats to vote for them. Yeah. And then they said he had this scheme and they quote from this guidance he issued about how to enforce the border in like 2021. And like, this is some secret document. Tim, this was like a published thing. He said, here's how we're going to enforce this. We have too many people coming in. The point is, all of the problems that Mayorkas has at the border could be solved by increasing border enforcement, supplying more agents, more judges, right? And like tightening things like

asylum standards. The Republicans had legislation in front of them that, you know, James Lankford helped negotiate, and they refused because, Tim, they don't want to solve the problem. They want to stage garbage like this theater of impeaching Mayorkas. The whole thing is ridiculous. There's no precedent for it. There hadn't been a cabinet secretary impeached since somebody that like literally stole money. It was like an actual bootlegger. I don't remember the exact story. I read it a couple months ago. But, you know, it's from the 1800s. You know, the whole thing is silly. And I think that the Biden administration has some failures on the border.

Mayorkas has maybe not been the best cabinet secretary of all time, but we don't impeach cabinet secretaries for being bad. There have been a lot of bad cabinet secretaries. We could go down the list of the Trump cabinet and, you know, Obama had a couple of duds and Bush had some duds, you know, we could go back through John Ashcroft. You know, I mean, like, it's just stupid. The whole thing is stupid. But part of the reason to me is what it says is, is going back to the Mike Johnson thing. These guys can't govern, right? They need Democrats to govern. What can they do? They can

virtue signal. You know, they also passed a thing condemning from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free. And so it's like, they can condemn people, they can finger wag, they can name post offices. That's what the Republican majority can do, right? So that's why that's what they did. Tim, that is the core of the whole thing. And this extends to so many other issues. Like take immigration. No one is representing the Tim Miller position. And I share it, right? This is an issue where we actually need a conservative party. We need a party that says there's too many people coming to the border. We can't handle it. It's chaos. Whatever you think of immigration in general, this kind of immigration is like people

abusing the asylum system. We need to tighten the standards. We need more enforcement. And the Republican party ought to be doing that. They're not doing that because you just nailed the important point. That involves governing. That involves compromising. Lankford tried to do it and they said, no, no, because we just want the issue. And instead you get this theater. So you have a liberal party, which the Democrats are, and then you don't have a conservative party. You have this non-governing virtue signaling Fox News theater party. And we're not going to have a conservative party. You have this non-governing, virtue signaling, Fox News theater party. And we're not going to have a healthy country. And we're certainly not going to solve this issue until we have a real conservative party.

And there are a handful of conservatives that are like board of security only, but none of them are serious. Like there's really nobody that is representing the real Tim Miller position, which is like the gang of eight bill was great. Like we had a lot of people representing my position back then. Like let's give the dream. I get as crazy when I was with my younger brother, his bachelor party, I was there with one of his friends.

He's quite a bit younger than me. And so this person is in the late twenties or early thirties. And they had a friend that's a dreamer. And it's like kind of crazy to think about that, right? Like it's been so long that like dreamers are in their ths and are still going through this we're like they are not permanent residents they don't have a green card right like and like these sorts of deal making we're not talking about people like oh you know the least sympathetic migrants right like we're not talking about that we're talking about people that were brought to this country they're really young

like they've been here now for 30 years they have jobs they're paying taxes right and so can we not cut a deal where we give them you know some stability in exchange for more judges more security i don't know about the space lasers on the border but sometimes right like like there's like literally nobody represent a handful of democrats that basically reflect that position but but not that many. Like there aren't that many Democrats that are out there actually, you know, trying to push the compromise side of it. You know, part of the tragedy is the people who think like you, they're leaving. A lot of them left. Like they looked at what's going on. They're like, we have no future here. They're the problem solvers kind of people. And can we bring this back to Mike Johnson for a minute? It would be awesome if Mike Johnson had to rely on Democratic votes to survive a motion to vacate. If you had the beginnings of some cross-partisan, you know's going to kill him on the right because everybody's so defined by opposing the other side. But I would

love to see something trigger a little bit of bipartisanship because on an issue like the border, there is a lot of agreement and there was demonstrated in that border bill. You know, to be fair, I was a little glib about this. There are a couple of members that are really pushing for compromise on this and understanding. And just for one example, by the way, Democratic Senator Chris Murphy is in the bulwark today with a op-ed about immigrants and American anxiety and how the left can address the immigration issue while also still being humane and true to their values. And of course, James Langford worked across the aisle on the Senate bill. So there are some examples of this. Okay, what else do we got here?

Do you want to talk about Arizona? Or do we want to talk about Biden's tariff push? I'll just say one thing about Arizona. I'm totally shocked. Just really quick, actually, and I'll let you explain your shock. What happened? So yesterday, they tried to bring up a couple of bills to repeal the 1864 law that the pedophile guy signed when Arizona was a territory, when women couldn't vote. And the Republicans blocked it. The Republicans blocked it so that it couldn't be overturned, which is just insane because it wouldn't have overturned it to pre-Roe, actually.

It would have overturned it to a 15-week ban that had already been passed. And the Republicans in the legislature in Arizona blocked it. Crazy. Right. Crazy. By the way, just one side note about the pedophile guy. Tim, you can understand why somebody like that would oppose women having the right to vote because his wife was 15. So, if you're 12- I think he had a 15-year-old and a 12. So, if you're marrying minors, you can sort of see how like, she's not of age yet.

But seriously, Trump, Carrie Lake, people who are actually looking at the politics of this issue know that you can defend the 15-week line. You can't defend a zero. Particularly in Arizona, it's a Republican state in some ways. It's a purple state. But it's a libertarian state. You're going to lose all those people.

So it was a no brainer that they should dump that law as fast as they could for the Republicans to get rid of it because it's a loser of an issue. And the Speaker of the House, Thomas, seems to be like, no, no, we're going to hold on to this. If they hold on through November, then the pro-choice ballot measure will pass and Arizona will go from 15 to 24 weeks or go to viability. But even if they don't, they're out there gathering signatures for this ballot measure right now, right? And you

can't possibly do more to boost the signature drive than to be like, yeah, you know, abortion is totally illegal, even for rape and incest in Arizona. Yeah, that's just going to juice the pro-choice side. And they've already lost what the governorship, the Senate seats, they're hanging on to margins of like two votes in the House in Arizona, the Republicans, and similar margin in the Senate. They're just going to be completely cleaned out in November if they don't get rid of this law. Yeah, they're going to lose a couple judges too. I just it's a total unbelievable cell phone. They could have also just being Machiavellian about this, like gone on off it, like they could have repealed it, tried to pass something something else they controlled legislature and forced or tried to cut some deal where the repeal is tied

to something else that's pretty draconian and made and made katie hobbs veto it the wild-eyed freaks that are like being recruited to run for these offices and that are attracted to the donald trump era republican party let's just be honest donald trump might have you know some of instinct, some kind of lizard instinct when it comes on abortion, that he's attracted the craziest possible people to the party. And the people that were already in the party who are crazy have been emboldened. And like you said, the people who are like, this is a little too much for me have left. So you end up this trickles down like this whole the whole impact isn't just happening in national conferences at the legislative level. All right item the biden tariff push oof so there's a policy and a political element here that are worth discussing biden is is campaigning in pennsylvania he's got

an ad up it's pretty good it's not the best ad he's ran but it's a steel worker black steel worker talking about that the thing that i like about it is he's talking about how how don didn't do shit for them, which is true, which I think a really good message for Biden to stick on by that Trump talks populist. He talks like he cares about the forgotten man, but he doesn't. He only cares about himself. I think that's a really potent message for Biden this year. So that's good. But they're tying it to like they're going to increase the tariff on steel from seven to 25%. And maybe there's a lag on this on what the consumer impact is going to be. But even still, in a time where you're still worried about high inflation, I think the policy here is pretty bad. What do you think about that whole offensive here from

Biden with an ad, you know, putting some policy behind it with the tariffs, going to Pennsylvania, leaning in on, you know, the industrial Midwest. Well, so you and I are democracy people, democracy, rule of law. That's the big issue here, right? And for Democrats, they seem to be, the Biden people seem to be betting, at least in Pennsylvania, and maybe the other blue wall states, they're going to do the same thing. Like, thank you very much about the democracy message. Yeah, we'll talk about that. But if you look at polls, what you and I care about is not cutting enough. Maybe in Fulton County, you know, that'll, it'll make enough of a difference. I don't know. Sure. Philly burbs. Hello, by the way, we got a live event coming in Philly, May 1st, go to the bulwark.com slash events. Come see us. Yeah. Sorry. Well, yeah, no, good. Go see.

But in the blue wall States, they seem to be going with the class message. Like, you know, like we're, we're for the common man Trump's for the, and as you point out, I mean, the ad's got a lot of good stuff in there and Trump really took care of his buddies, the billionaires, he's a country club guy. And that's all true. Tariffs are not my favorite issue for a couple of reasons. One, a tariff is a tax. It hits everybody who buys the product. So it's a regressive tax. I don't like them. I think this is a case where markets generally work. The other reason is there used to be a division of xenophobia between the two parties. The Republicans had like anti-immigrant xenophobia, you know, and the Democrats had trade xenophobia, which was like, and this goes back to Dick Gephardt and like, you know, we're going to stick it to the Japanese.

Yeah, right. You could play on people's hatred of the Asians, right, by talking about tariffs. And what Trump did, when Trump came in, he was like, hey, why not both? I'm a xenophobe. I'm like universal xenophobia. So like I'm against immigrants and I'm against trade. Right. And so that was a that was a politically smart play playing to the worst in people.

But it was effective. And it looks to me, Tim, like Biden's just trying to take that back. Like your tariff is what percent we're going to triple your tariff, you know? So the Democrats, I think, are going to use some of the xenophobia. Like I don't have a problem with the anti-rich message. Rich people can protect themselves. I don't like the attacking of ethnic angles. I hear you.

I think that your broader case is correct. I love that you mentioned the Japanese because it was the Japanese before the Chinese. And that was Trump. Like Trump was still stuck on not liking Japan when he started the campaign in 2015, right? It was like, you know, he had to kind of switch it because his head is still stuck in like the 1980s New York tabloid. But yeah, I don't know if they're preying on xenophobia. The Biden campaign is so much as they're just trying to do the rah-rah American worker thing in a way that is a little cheap and not actually going to work and maybe hurt consumers a little bit on the margins. But I'm trying to have a Democrat who's very excited about this kind of democratic populism come on the pod in the next few weeks. So I will argue about that with him, not with you, Will Salatan, since we basically agree.

That's a great Thursday podcast. I'm looking forward to seeing what happens on the Hill. We'll be back tomorrow with one of our favorite friends of the board podcast. So make sure to check us out then. Thanks so much, Will Salatan. Thank you, Tim. Everybody else, we'll see you back here tomorrow. Peace. This is Ground Zero, I'm rising from the ashes The first step on the road to Damascus I redefined my narrative, I'm Frederick Douglass I can't harbor hate, although they never loved us Nah, I tell my guys I miss them, they in dire conditions Tryna survive in prison, prayin' they don't die in Dixon Bro said send them some pizza meat without strayin' bitches

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