The Bulwark Podcast - Will Saletan: The Hammer Philosophy of Governing

Episode Date: September 5, 2023

Republican leaders in Wisconsin sound like they're planning an end-run around democracy, Musk is running with one of the oldest antisemitic tropes in the world, and even MAGA Republicans in Texas don't like Ken Paxton. Will Saletan joins Charlie Sykes today.

If it's a flat or a squeal, a wobble or peel, your tread's worn down or you need a new wheel, wherever you go, you can get it from our Tread Experts. Ensure each winter trip is a safe one for your family. Enjoy them for years with the Michelin X-Ice Snow Tire. Get a $50 prepaid MasterCard with select Michelin tires. Find a Michelin Tread Experts dealer near you at treadexperts.ca slash locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there. TreadExperts.ca Welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm Charlie Sykes. It is September 5th, 2023. Labor Day has

come and gone, which means that Will Salatan will no longer be wearing white shoes and a white belt. You're not one of them. No more golf clothes, Charlie. Happy fall. Well, it's not fall yet. I understand it feels that way. I mean, the kids are back to school,

and it's post-Labor Day, and all the fun is over, right? We're back to the grind. But it's still warm and sunny and I'm just not willing to give up on summer. I'm just not. That's just me. Well, it's going to be 100 degrees in Washington, so I am ready to give up on that summer. Okay, so enough happy talk because we have to get into the reasons you should be alarmed.

Now, those of you that subscribe to my Morning Shots newsletter, which means you subscribe to other newsletters at the Bulwark, and by the way, consider joining Bulwark Plus. But for those of you who do not subscribe to the newsletter, probably did not read what I wrote this morning, where I said, whatever alarming things you're hearing about what's happening here in Wisconsin, the reality is a lot worse. I mean, Republicans have been on a losing streak here, but right now they are seriously, and I want to underline this, they are seriously considering using their legislative majorities, not just to kneecap the state's top election officials, but to overturn this year's Supreme Court election. Now you remember that there was this huge election here in Wisconsin, the most expensive judicial election in history, that was in many ways a referendum on abortion. It was described around the country, and I think accurately is arguably

the most consequential election of the year. And it gave progressives a 4-3 majority for the first time in decades. Huge implications for abortion redistricting and how elections are run. So liberals now have a 4-3 majority on the court. And politics here, though, has always been very, very intense. But I think it's impossible to overstate the level of political and personal animosity around all of this. So here we are with the Speaker of the State Assembly,

whose name is Robin Voss. I know him well. He is threatening to use Republican votes in the legislature to impeach the newly elected justice, Janet Protasewicz, before she has even ruled on a case. Now, I mean, obviously, that is a huge deal. We have not had an impeachment of a judge in Wisconsin since 1853, and that judge was acquitted by the Senate. I mean, I think it should be obvious this is kind of like beyond a nuclear option to remove a justice for political reasons. Now, believe it or not, even though abortion hangs in the balance and all these other major issues, the pretext for this action is the fact that Janet Perduecewicz during the campaign said she thought that Wisconsin's ridiculously gerrymandered

legislative districts were rigged and that they needed to be looked at. It sounded like she was perhaps prejudging the case. That's what Republicans have complained about, that, well, you signaled how you would vote like it's never happened before. I have some concerns about that whole thing, but that's the mountain they want to die on. Robin Voss is talking about doing something that's never been done before in this way, flipping the control of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, basically wiping out more than a million votes that were cast just in April because she won't recuse herself from a case involving redistricting. And I have to tell you that for a guy like Robin Voss, this is their precious, this is their key to holding on to power. It's kind of ironic because I think they'd probably

still have a majority without the ridiculous gerrymandering, but that's the way it is. So this is what I wanted to point out to people, how this is going to work well, because this is bizarre. And I think it's just dawning on folks. See, under the Wisconsin Constitution, it takes only a majority of the vote in the Republican controlled state assembly to impeach a justice. Now, it's supposed

to be for corrupt conduct in office or for crimes and misdemeanors, but they get to do what they want, right, because it's political. So, Republican-controlled the state assembly, one house, I mean, there's a Democratic governor, there's, you know, there's two houses of the legislature, there's a, you know, Democratic attorney General, but one house of the legislature, by majority vote, can impeach a justice. Now, again, there's no allegation that Protasevich is engaged in any corruption. It's just over this one issue of recusal. Now, I have to make a confession here. I think for a lot of people, people just thought this was completely pointless because if they did this, if they impeached her in the House, and then she went to the Senate,

and she was, let's say they got a two-thirds vote, I don't think they would, but let's say they got a two-thirds vote in the Senate to remove her from office. In Wisconsin, the Democratic governor, Tony Evers, can immediately appoint another justice to take her place. I mean, there's no Senate confirmation. There'd be another liberal there the next day. So the whole thing seemed completely futile and pointless, right? Now here, Will, we get to the thing that is really kind of bizarre. I quote one law professor calling it diabolical. Under Wisconsin's constitution, after the assembly vote, the justice, anybody impeached by the lower house, is immediately suspended from office.

They can't exercise their office. They can't vote on any office. They can't exercise their office. They can't vote on any cases. They can't do anything. They're sidelined, okay? So she would be sidelined until she was acquitted or removed by the Senate, right? Now here's the rub. Senate Republicans have no intention of holding any trial or taking any vote ever. So there will be no conviction. There will be no acquittal. They will not act, which would mean she would be in permanent limbo. Okay. So the 4-3 liberal majority would disappear. It would go to 3-3. It's already dysfunctional. And this is a very potent tool because it means that with 51 votes, Republicans are going to realize, wait, we can remove any justice, any judge

at any time presiding over any case for any reason. We control the entire judiciary. We can do this anytime. All right right so i know this is going on a little bit long but there's a couple of weird scenarios so let's say that she in fact is sidelined realize i can't vote i can't do anything so what i'm going to do is despite the fact that people spent like 50 million dollars electing me i'm going to resign and let tony evers appoint another progressive the next day right does that work that work? That work for you? Well, here's the deal. That person would then have to stand for reelection next spring, which would set up another, you know, massively expensive race. And from the point of view of Republicans, it would be the dumbest thing ever. Because if the first election was a referendum on abortion, can you imagine what a

second election in the spring of 2024 would look like? It would be about the rule of law, democracy, and it would guarantee that abortion would dominate Wisconsin politics throughout 2024. So I'm writing this going, I know Robin Voss. He's a really, really smart guy, you know, and I understand how much he cares about his jury-maid majority. But seriously, does he understand what a total shitstorm he would unleash if he goes ahead with this impeachment? But I think they may do it anyway. Well, I mean, so that's what's going on here in Wisconsin. You can read about it all in Morning Shots, by the way. Well, I mean, so that's what's going on here in Wisconsin. You can read about it all in Morning Shots, by the way. So this is totally amazing. Charlie, correct me if I get any of this wrong. The voters of Wisconsin, now you say that the Republicans probably would have won at least a majority in the legislature without the gerrymandering, right? Yeah. But with the gerrymandering, they got a super majority, right? Correct. Like it's over 60 votes. So they use the gerrymander to get their super majority.

The voters then, the voters elect a Democrat, Tony Evers, in 2018 for governor. They vote for Joe Biden in 2020. They vote for Evers again in 2022. They vote for Protasewicz, the liberal, the left-leaning Supreme Court justice in 2023. All of these elections, that's what the voters want. And then the Republican self-gerrymandered supermajority in the legislature basically says, screw the voters. First of all, we're going to circumvent the Supreme Court election that just happened by impeaching this justice, except we're going to then bury it. So then having circumvented that, we're also going to circumvent the gubernatorial

election by using this clever maneuver to deprive the governor of the ability to appoint a new justice. By Jove, I think you've got it. So what we have is this wholesale circumvention subversion of democracy within the state of Wisconsin. Correct. It's the hammer philosophy of politics, which is, wait, I have this hammer in my hand. I have to go smash something. Let's smash the court. Let's smash the electorate. Let's smash the governor. And the issue over which they are threatening to impeach this justice is the gerrymandering itself. In other words, they've subverted democracy. This justice has stood for election, partly pointing out the gerrymandering. And for that reason, trying to deprive her of the ability to actually rule, to undercut their subversion of

democracy. They're trying to deprive her of the ability to correctcut their subversion of democracy. They're trying to deprive her of the ability to correct what their subversion of democracy. That's the basis of the whole impeachment. Yes, that's exactly right. Amazing. Just amazing. It actually gets a little bit better. So she's under attack because she's not recusing herself. You know, this is, and again, it's up to the justice to decide whether, you know, I can hear this case fairly or not. You're saying, well, she took, you know, she got a $10 million from the state Democratic Party. They, by the way, are not a direct party in this lawsuit. But what makes it even more interesting is that all the conservatives on the court used to take the exact opposite position when their ox was being gored, when people were raising questions, well, what about all the business community money? What about all the right-wing special interest money you were taking? Shouldn't you recuse yourself? And the very people, the very members of the court who were the most adamant in

killing that recusal rule are the ones who are pushing this case. Now, they've done an absolute 180 on this, and I have this as well. So it's a festival of hypocrisy as well on top of that. That's sort of the cherry on the cake that you've described. Okay. And there's one other thing about this that I wanted to raise, which is I never liked the idea of justices running for election. It seemed to me that the judiciary shouldn't be an elected branch. Become a very bad idea. Right. So I don't like the idea of this election having happened in the first place. However, what seems to be going on here is the legislature, one branch of the government of Wisconsin, is insulating itself from all other branches, from the governor, from the judiciary, and from the voters.

So we have here a justice who was elected by the people. And even if you don't like that, that's not as bad as a legislature gerrymandering itself into a supermajority and then undercutting every other branch that tries to correct its subversion. Not just every other branch, but they're not the legislature. This is one house of a two-house legislature. So it is, they actually are irrigating themselves all of this power because the Senate Republicans, first of all, I don't think the Senate Republicans in Wisconsin have enough votes to convict her. And so they're just not, they're not going to do anything. It's just, it's kind of remarkable. And I think there's a lot of speculation about this. And again,

going back to the decision to do this, I mean, I really understand the pressure and I understand the temptation when you have this kind of power to do this. And it's also part and parcel of the radicalization of the Republican Party nationally, which has really internalized obstruction of justice as part of their agenda and the attack on the independence of the judiciary. I mean, you're seeing this right from the top in the Republican Party. And if the base decides that they are really going to demand that Robin Voss do this, and obviously one of the subtexts is the abortion decision as well, I think they might pull the trigger on all of this, even though there's a school of thought here that Robin Voss is a really smart, savvy guy and has been willing to stand up against the complete crazies.

I cannot tell you how obsessed these guys are with their gerrymandered majority in the redistricting. I mean, it's kind of funny because I think people on the outside think that people in public life like worry about public policy, or they used to, they worry about, you know, which piece of legislation. Actually, what they care about is how those lines are drawn. They care about that more than whether they care about whether this 1849 abortion law is upheld or overturned, which, again, is kind of a sign of the times. Speaking of impeachment, there's also a big impeachment trial going down in Texas, which is completely different, right? I mean, there's some serious grounds there for impeaching the Texas Attorney General, Ken Paxton, who is a genuine deplorable.

Texas is my thing since I'm from there. Ken Paxton is, I mean, Charlie, on a scale of deplorables, he's at the far, far end. Other deplorables are trying to triangulate against him. That's how deplorable he is. With the bonus of being a corrupt asshole as well. So Ken Paxton is so bad. I mean, the underlying allegations here are that he's used his office to benefit a donor. The donor helped him conceal. Stop me when any of this sounds familiar. The donor helps him cover up an affair. Paxton uses his office to benefit this donor. So there's one hand washing the other. There's also like him trying to get, Paxton's own aides incriminated him. He then tried to get money to get the state to pay off this case. So there's multiple levels of corruption going on. It's so bad that most of the Republicans in the state house voted to

impeach him. So he got impeached in May. And now what's coming on is the Senate trial. And part of what's impressive here is that once again, we have some Republicans trying to stand up and do the right thing. And they're being attacked by other Republicans who are accusing them of siding with the Democrats, because you're supposed to do the opposite of whatever the Democrats want. You're supposed to protect any Republican who is in office, no matter how guilty they are. It's an interesting lesson because these Republicans that are standing up against Ken Paxton are not your Adam Kinzinger type Republicans. I mean, these are pretty MAGA Republicans themselves. So this is like a subset of MAGA versus a subset of MAGA.

Yeah. And part of what is truly impressive to me about the Texas case is the replication of arguments that you're seeing at the national level about Trump. So this is Ken Paxton writing on Twitter. What do we have to call it? X now? We don't have to. He says, everybody should fear the weaponization of state power they have harnessed to destroy him. So the point is, you know, if there's the weaponization of government, right? Anytime we try to use the law to prosecute people who are guilty or using impeachment to prosecute people who have abused their power. Also the witch hunt phrase, that's out the guy who's running the

PAC to protect Ken Paxton by attacking every Republican who stands against him says, this is a political witch hunt. The guy said, they're doing it to Trump. They're trying to do it to Paxton. So they're running ads against these Republicans and trying to threaten the Republicans in the state Senate to stop them from following through and convicting Paxton. What do you think is going to happen there? I think he's going to lose, but you know, I've been wrong so many times, Charlie, and every time I've been wrong, it's been in the direction of projecting a rational outcome. It just doesn't happen. Oh, my Tread Experts. Ensure each winter trip is a safe one for your family. Enjoy them for years with a Michelin X-Ice snow tire. Get a $50 prepaid MasterCard with select Michelin tires.

Find a Michelin Tread Experts dealer near you at TreadExperts.ca slash locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there. TreadExperts.ca A lot of angst about this big Wall Street Journal poll showing just overwhelming Republican support for Donald Trump that people are willing to say that we're more willing to support him because of the indictments. Does the fact that he's been indicted for stealing documents for doing X, Y, and Z make you more or less likely to support him? And I think a very strong plurality says, damn right. Now, I was on Morning Joe this morning and I said, that poll feels more like a big middle finger than anything else. But apparently the Republican heart wants what it wants. And they just want more

Trump and they just don't care whether or not he's a criminal and a liar and a rapist. They just don't care. So I desperately want to hear more of your middle finger theory, because this would console me. This would make me feel better. No, it wouldn't. I would like to believe that this is a temporary reaction that, okay, you're indicting our guy. Screw you. We're going to vote for him all the more. Right?

I'd like to believe that they're having this momentary reaction and that on reflection in the election, either these people, some of them won't show up or will vote third party, will do some other thing than vote for Trump. But I'm kind of skeptical. I think that would be a misinterpretation of the middle finger. This is the permanent middle finger. This is the middle finger that has been up for the last eight years. ears. In fact, after the end of the, like probably the third or fourth Trump term, this will actually replace the Washington Monument as the tallest monument in Washington, D.C. It'll be the giant middle finger. You have the Jefferson Memorial. You have the Lincoln Memorial. You have the MLK Memorial, right? You have the World War II memorial, and then you have the Trump memorial,

this big freaking middle finger, just like facing down the Washington Monument, and we will be so proud. It's a middle finger forever. It's not just momentary. That's very depressing. I'm sorry. Am I correct, sir? This poll was conducted by Fabrizio, is that right? Okay. Could you comment on that? Because I just saw that a few minutes ago. It I correct, sir? This poll was conducted by Fabrizio. Is that right? Okay. Could you comment on that? Because I just saw that a few minutes ago.

It's like, wait, the Wall Street Journal is working with Fabrizio. Isn't he Trump's pollster? What am I missing here? Fabrizio and McLaughlin used to be an item. They used to be together. And McLaughlin now does Trump's polls. And Fabrizio has done some polling for Trump, but is not the main guy. McLaughlin's polls are just garbage.

They always make Trump look good. Fabrizio, I think, has a better reputation. He's supposed to be the sane guy. He's supposed to be the one who's actually giving Trump feedback from reality. So I don't want to cast aspersions. I also don't want to encourage all the folks who listen to us and who want to believe that any poll that shows Joe Biden in trouble can't be trusted. It's really a Trump poll. I think we should take this one seriously because other polls have also shown that this race is way too close.

There was a tweet, was it Greg Sargent or something, of a new NBC analysis basically that when Democratic elites look at Joe Biden, they see the second coming of FDR or Harry Truman. But the average voter looks at Joe Biden and says, he's an old guy. He's old. And so there is a disconnect between elite opinion and the actual opinion out there. And I'm sorry that when you and I point out, guys, this is a problem. We get lectured by the elites. Like, no, actually, we should look at what? You know, then they'll give us a series of acronyms which stand for pieces of legislation that people have forgotten about.

Yeah. You know the kind of reaction I'm talking about, right? I think the underlying problem here is that although Joe Biden has a good record to run on, he hasn't sold it well. I mean, I know people will tell us we're supposed to sell it. No, actually, the Democratic Party is supposed to sell it. The president is supposed to sell it. And it is amazing to me. Was it in the journal poll that by a significant margin, more people said that Donald Trump had done a good job running the economy than Joe Biden, which is not what the actual economic indicators reflect. But Donald Trump is out there all the time. Republicans are out there all the time claiming that Trump ran a great economy and that Biden isn't. And the lack of salesmanship seems to be just overriding the facts. Well, okay, that's true. But being the contrarian, I would also point out that the facts also include the fact that there's been a lot of inflation. And if you go to the grocery store, stuff costs a lot more than it did a couple of years ago. And so people who are concerned about that

are not stupid. I mean, they are noticing that. They have noticed that wages have not kept pace with inflation. Okay, so I don't want to get bogged down in that, but I think it's dangerous to just fall back on the, if you don't understand the awesomeness of Joe Biden, then you're stupid. That's just not going to work. That would be a nice story to tell one another, but I don't think that it's constructive at this point. I just saw Joe Biden talking at one of his things within the last week. And he just said this line that Trump was the first president in I don't know how long to leave office with fewer people employed, fewer people in the workforce than when he started. That's a good line. It's a good line, but I don't hear it enough. No, right.

In an election, I think that point can make a difference, but I just don't hear it. He actually had a couple of good lines. He said, yeah, reminded people that Donald Trump was only one of two presidents who ended office with fewer jobs than when he took office. That's potent. He also pointed out that Donald Trump talked a lot about infrastructure, had a lot of infrastructure weeks, but he never built a damn thing. Whereas, you know, as we know that Joe Biden did get the infrastructure bill. So good messages. So speaking of Joe Biden, Joe Biden was down in Florida, you know, showing support for the people of Florida after the devastating storms there. And in an act of, I'm sorry, probably predictable pettiness, Ron DeSantis, who had originally agreed to accompany Joe Biden, decided he was going to

diss him because nobody wants to have a replay of that Chris Christie moment in 2012 where he embraced Barack Obama. We don't want to see any of that bipartisan cooperation when we are dealing with a natural disaster because this is all about performance and showing who you hate, not about working together to save people's lives and rebuild the state, right? We don't want no stinking bipartisan hugs or handshakes. Right. A couple of things about this. First of all, Joe Biden understands the game. He understands the game of politics. And Joe Biden is famous for having, I can't remember the context, Charlie, maybe you can remind me, for having said privately

to Republicans in situations like this or to Democrats, I think Joe Manchin might have been one example. I'll be there if you need me. And if you don't want me there, you know, if it's politically dangerous for you, I'll stay away. So I think he understands the idea that DeSantis can't be near him. And so he, he accommodated him. But I think your larger point is the important thing here, Charlie, which is that we've reached a point where it is so toxic to stand together with the other party. Well, let's put it this way. In the Republican Party, to stand with a Democratic president, to have your picture taken with him is so toxic that we can't allow that. And the example, of course, was Chris Christie after Hurricane Sandy, right? There was a hug with

Barack Obama. And that is so fresh in the minds of that is Vivek Ramaswamy literally brought that up. As a negative. As a negative. The governor of the state and the president of the United States working together to help American citizens who have been victims of a devastating storm. And Vivek Ramaswamy, after all of these years, brings that up as an example of what? I would never do that. And the crowd, by the way, loves that shit.

Yeah, they did. They applauded it. And people ask, was it always this bad? And the answer is, no, it wasn't. And one illustration of that is the difference between Christie and Obama after Sandy versus DeSantis and Biden after Adalia. Except, you know, it has not always been this bad, but it was obviously getting bad because the Republican Party reacted viscerally to that moment in 2012. And you could argue that Chris Christie never recovered from that moment of

grace, governance, and bipartisanship. years with a Michelin X-Ice snow tire. Get a $50 prepaid MasterCard with select Michelin tires. Find a Michelin TreadExperts dealer near you at treadexperts.ca slash locations. From tires to auto repair, we're always there, treadexperts.ca. Speaking of Vivek Ramaswamy, again, going back to this poll, one of the takeaways is that the debate meant absolutely nothing. I mean, there's no bump for anyone. I mean, zero. Do you see any movement at all?

I mean, Vivek Ramaswamy, he couldn't have shilled harder than he did. He couldn't have demagogued harder than he did. And he's at, what, 5%. You know, this was his moment. You want to hear a little bit of Vivek? Go for it. Okay. So he's on ABCs this week explaining why he's pledged to support Trump for president,

even if he's convicted of felonies. I think we had to stick with this. The way the party of law and order is just like totally into felon. I don't care. Okay, here's Vivek. That's what we need to revive in the United States, our civic spirit, remembering that even the America First movement is bigger than Donald Trump. It is bigger than me. It is bigger than one political candidate. It belongs to the people of this country, the people of this country who thankfully still get to decide who their next president actually is. I want to keep it that way rather than getting a federal police state as the new arbiter of who governs this country. And I

stand by that without apology. Oh, he's so brave. He's just so brave. It's just like, you have this kind of like, you know, diarrhea going of like, it's bigger than me. It's bigger than one candidate. And then he throws in this line of a federal police state. What the? Where to start with this guy? All right. So this, the- And I'm so brave. So we've been through the so-called party of law and order celebrating people who literally attacked police, you know, violently injured, caused the deaths of police on January 6th. But they're the victims. Yeah.

Right. Now we're in the phase of attacking not just the police, but the prosecutors, right? And by the way, it doesn't matter to Ramaswamy and other Republicans that these prosecutions are some of them federal, some of them local, right? Like it doesn't matter. It's all the federal police state. It's all the Biden administration. Four indictments have been presented, right? And Ramaswamy has claimed to have read thoroughly all four indictments. I mean, just take the one classified documents indictment. So it's just details this, you know, blatant obstruction of justice, his attempt to move boxes to obstruct, to get rid of the tapes. I mean, it's classic criminal behavior. And his

response to this is that this is the police state going after Donald Trump. So basically any crime that Trump commits, Ramaswamy and people like him are going to defend on the grounds that the people up against Trump are the police state. Okay, we have another soundbite of this where he's, you know, he wants to talk about American families, but watch how this goes. It goes from the Trump family to American families to, I just attempt to follow the logic of this soundbite. This is Vivek number two. We spent a lot of time talking about the Trump family. I want to talk about American families. Where do we lead this country? What are we actually running to? How do we shut down the administrative state that is the source

of that illegal prosecution against Trump? That's what I'm focused on is how we get rid of that unconstitutional fourth branch of government. Okay, somehow that is what American families really are concerned about, like abolishing the unconstitutional fourth branch of government. See, I think what's scary about this is not just that they've accepted all the crimes that Donald Trump has committed. Okay, well, they're also signaling all of the crimes that he might do in the future that they will not stand up against, right? They're signaling what they are willing to accept that Trump has done, but they're also signaling what they are willing to accept if Trump does it in the future, in a Trump 2.0. Whatever he does, they're going

to stand against this. But this whole illegal prosecution, I mean, what way is it illegal? That's why we have courts. It's why we have due process. What is this unconstitutional fourth branch of government? This kind of takes me back to what's happening in Wisconsin and why they might do this, why they might actually remove a state Supreme Court justice just because they can. Once you delegitimize the rule of law, once you delegitimize the idea of an independent judiciary, why the hell not? Why not just, you know, strut around the Capitol with your hammer and smashing anybody that might do something you disagree with, right? Who needs constitutional checks and balances if you think

that everything that you don't like is illegitimate. Speaking of which, other end of the spectrum, you know that I was very impressed with Nikki Haley and the way she took on Vivek's demagoguery, particularly on foreign policy. So she is on CBS's Face the Nation, explaining that Americans are not going to vote for a convicted criminal. Let's play that. I will tell you that any Republican is better than what Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are doing. Even if they're convicted of a crime? We know that a vote for Joe Biden is a vote for a president Kamala Harris. First of all, he's innocent until proven guilty. But you are implying that the American people

are not smart. The American people are not going to vote for a convicted criminal. The American people are going to vote for someone who can win a general election. I have faith in the American people. Will, help me. Please, Will, help me. Help me. So just to be clear, everybody, Nikki Haley's position is that the American people are too smart to vote for a convicted criminal. But she's not. But I, Nikki Haley, but I, Nikki Haley, will support that convicted criminal because the RNC asked me to sign a pledge and I have no scruples. It's like a brain worm. You know, obviously these Republicans, she and, you know, the other six, they raise their hands because they're just too cowardly to stand up. And just to point out the most basic standard of

principle here, which is, you know, if you're convicted of a felony, no, we're not going to support you all, whatever pledge goes by the wayside. Can I, can I come back to Vivek for just a second though? Could you please? That soundbite that you played was, was perfect because Vivek says, you media, he's talking to George Stephanopoulos, who has been terrific on this, by the way, but Stephanopoulos keeps asking him about Trump. And Ramaswamy says, you, you know, liberal media people, you just want to talk about Trump all the time. I want to talk about what Americans care about. And it took Ramaswami less than five seconds from him saying that, to pivot right back to, we need to defend Donald

Trump from this fourth branch of government. which by the way, Charlie, to come back to your point about legitimacy and delegitimization, what Donald Trump started, began to do and what the Republican party has taken up from him is an attempt to delegitimize the entire civil service. So the unelected fourth branch is basically people who have sworn an oath to the constitution, to the government, to the rule of law and are enforcing that rule of law, regardless of who's elected and the Republican position, not just the Trump position, but now the Republican position is that because these people were not elected, i.e. they weren't swept in with the authoritarian who got elected. And because

they're trying to stand up to him, they are not legitimate. So basically, this is an attempt to clear out of the way. I mean, you talked before about the Wisconsin case, clear out of the way the governor if he's in the way, clear out of the way the state Supreme Court if they're in the way. Here we have clear out of the way the civil service and the so-called police state, anyone who tries to enforce the law against the authoritarian. Okay, so on the shows, there was actually a pretty interesting collection of folks. Former governor of Maryland, Larry Hogan, who unfortunately is flirting with these no labels folks. He has been an anti-Trump Republican for years now, and he had some thoughts about the presidential candidates who won't criticize the guy they're running against.

Let's play a little bit of Larry Hogan. If you're on the debate stage and you're willing to stand up and challenge the leader, that's at 50 percent. If you're unwilling to challenge Donald Trump, you should get off the stage. You know, Ramaswamy, for example, is up there being a cheerleader and a fill in for Trump. He shouldn't be running for president. He should, you know, he obviously is trying to apply for a job for Trump. But if you're in there running for vice president or you're trying to be a cabinet secretary or you're trying to become famous or write a book or get on television, you should get the heck out of the race. We need to

narrow it down to find a leader who can get the Republican Party back on the right track and that can get us back to winning elections again. It's not going to happen with 11 people in the race. No, it is not going to happen with 11 people in the race. So, well. So, Hogan is making a good point. First of all, you know, that Ramaswamy and others are not actually running for president. But Hogan's underlying point is that these people are splitting the anti-Trump vote or the non-Trump vote, right? Let's say Trump has about a third of the Republican primary electorate in the bag, right? So the faster the non-Trump vote consolidates, the better the chance of derailing Trump before he gets the election. Makes perfect sense. And that's why Hogan is telling Ramaswamy and others to get out of the race if they won't confront Trump. The problem to me, Charlie, is why doesn't Larry Hogan follow his own advice when it comes to the general election? Because Hogan is flirting with the idea of running as the no labels candidate for president. That's in a general election. That's splitting the non-Trump vote between himself and Joe Biden. And even if Hogan were to only take, you know, 5% of the vote, there's a good chance that

that 5% is what allows Donald Trump to claim a plurality and win the presidency. Well, that's exactly right. So at the risk of killing more brain cells this morning, I mean, I kind of feel the need to kind of protect them and husband them, the brain cells. You want to listen to Marshall Blackburn on Fox News? Okay, this is like eating our spinach. Although I don't know, I like spinach. Do you like spinach? That phrase, you have to eat your spinach. I actually like spinach and think I've always liked spinach. I think so. I mean, what was the anti-spinach?

Was the anti-spinach lobby or something that came up with that? No, you have to eat your spinach before you get to eat what? Something you like. Some deep fried thing that killed you in 1957. Do you like your spinach cooked or raw? Oh, cooked. Okay. I'm a raw spinach guy. So I'm just going to strut around and pretend to be holier than thou.

I learn something every day. I learn something every week on this podcast. With apologies to the brain cells of our listeners, Tennessee Senator Marshall Blackburn on Fox News explaining how Mitch McConnell is just fine, but not that Joe Biden. When you see Joe Biden struggle with words, with days, with times, with places, then it drives home the point of how important it is to have someone who is capable in leadership. And quite honestly, I don't think anyone wants to have a president Kamala Harris. But Senator, I do need to ask you about Mitch McConnell. Twice he's been at the microphone and had a dramatic pause. There's some belief that he had an accident, a slip, a fall, perhaps a concussion. Can he continue to lead the Senate Republicans in that capacity? I've talked to people who were with him right after that,

and he was alert and fine and moving forward, asking questions, very involved with the meeting that he was attending and seemed to be on top of his game. See, nothing matters, Will. There's no position that anyone will take that they won't just simply reverse, you know? Yes, Joe Biden stumbles over a word. He's done. He's out of here. You have Mitch McConnell having what may have been like a stroke on national television. It's like, nothing. No, he's top of his game. No, no, nothing, it doesn't. Then we have to listen to one of the dumbest members of the Senate talk about mental acuity.

Yes, I want to judge the mental acuity of somebody. Let's get Tommy Tuberville and Marsha Blackburn on the air. Hey, has anybody got a direct number for Tommy Tuberville? Okay, let's get Marsha Blackburn on because we want to talk about IQs. I'm sorry. So can I defend Marsha Blackburn? I am grateful. I am grateful to Marsha Blackburn for being an idiot. I'm grateful because she's, she was too dumb to do what Marco Rubio or somebody else would have done in this situation, which was to recognize the blatant contradiction that she was about to utter and to avert it,

right? So she just says it out loud. And what she does is to expose that this has become an entire mode of being for the Republican Party. So we've all seen the examples of principles that used to be espoused by Republicans. They were in the platform and the parties disregarded them. We're the party of family values, but be espoused by Republicans. They were in the platform and the parties disregarded them. We're the party of family values, but we support a rapist. We're the party of American leadership in the world, but we support appeasement in Ukraine. We're the party

of the rule of law, but anytime someone tries to prosecute crimes by our leader, that's the police state. So here we have a new issue that has come up, which is this whole mental competence thing. And it's been emerging, but Mitch McConnell's episodes, you're exactly right, Charlie. These are alarming. This was passed off by McConnell's office and by some physician of his as lightheadedness. Anyone who watches these can see that it is some kind of seizure. He seizes up. He dissociates from what's going on around him.

His eyes disengage from the world. Now, this does not mean Mitch McConnell can't think, but it's clearly a serious incident. No one who has faulted Joe Biden for his mental competence based on any of his public gaffes can look at the McConnell episode and say, it's not significant. But that is exactly what Marsha Blackburn does here, because she has learned exactly what you said. Nothing matters. Not nothing matters in reality, because it matters to you and to me and the folks who listen to us. But inside the Republican Party, nothing matters, which is just another way of saying the party has no principles. It will simply defend the Republican and attack the Democrat, regardless of what principles ought

to apply. Even if you have to take a position exactly opposite to the one you took before. Okay, so we've kind of saved the most disturbing story of the weekend for last. This is Elon Musk wading deeper into anti-Semitic propaganda. I mean, Rolling Stone has a piece, a hashtag pushed by right-wing ideologues and rife with anti-Semitic content is trending on X, the site formerly known as Twitter, and being shown support by owner Elon Musk. It is a new low for a platform that has seemingly abandoned the fight against hate speech. On Thursday, a number of accounts began tweeting hashtag ban the ADL, calling on Musk to remove the Anti-Defamation League from the site. The ADL is a civil rights organization focused on combating anti-Semitism and extremism. Momentum for the action seems to have been stirred by a meeting earlier in the week between the ADL's national director, Jonathan Greenblatt, and Linda

Iaccarino, in which the pair discussed how to curb the hate and toxic propaganda that have flourished on X ever since Musk's takeover last year. The Jerusalem Post reporting, Elon Musk is engaging with white nationalists and anti-Semites who want to ban the Anti-Defamation League from Twitter. Musk on Saturday asked his followers whether he should poll the platform about a hashtag, ban the ADL, and embraced in recent days by white nationalists and others on the far right. Musk had earlier liked the tweet launching the hashtag by Keith Woods, an Irish white nationalist and self-described raging anti-Semite. Now, this just touches it. Until you see all this stuff, you cannot understand how bad this gets.

Elon Musk essentially launched a 72-hour social media storm of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and attacks. This is just breathtaking here. And in my newsletter, I actually have a piece from Claire Berlinski, you know, asking Linda Iaccarino, do you really want to be associated with the most vile public outpouring of any Semitism in American history? You know, it ought to be one of the top stories of the day. We're talking about it. Unfortunately, I saved it till the end here. But just when you thought that Elon Musk could not be more vile, we have what happened over this weekend, and it is really disturbing. Yeah. So Twitter was on its way already to becoming Truth Social, right? The place for a bunch of right-wingers to their own little echo chamber. Twitter is now on the way,

it's going past Truth Social, it's becoming Gab, right? Which was the site where the anti-Semites could hang out freely. What Musk has done is to drop the filters. And that's part of it. And that's what has happened in the Republican Party. Generally, that's what's happened to Donald Trump. But it's not just dropping the filters. He now is actively pushing these anti-Semitic hashtag. He is now actively saying that X slash Twitter's financial problems are because of the Jews. The Jews have started, you know, are pressuring advertisers, the Anti-Defamation League. And he's also using that trope that by criticizing anti-Semitism, the ADL creates more anti-Semitism, which is an old, old, old canard that, you know, if the Jews didn't object so loudly to Jew hatred, then there wouldn't be so much Jew hatred. I mean, and this

is coming from this guy himself. Right, right. And I just wanted to add, so that's the second part of the cycle. The first part is you drop the filters and you let the anti-Semites in, and then you defend them. We're, you know, free speech or whatever. And then the second part is when you're called out for it, when you're called out for indulging them. Now you develop a kind of resentment of the watchdogs and you blame the watchdogs, in this case, the ADL, but it could be the NAACP, it could be any other organization. And you say, you know, those uppity black people or Muslims or Jews, you don't say Jews, but this organization is attacking me and they're to blame. So now we're in the state, in the stage where you're blaming the Jews for calling you out for what you've said

about the Jews. And it just goes on and on with that. It's a spiral that can lead you down. I don't mean to defend Musk as some kind of victim here, but that's how it happens. I think you're exactly right. And so this is another one of those moments where, you know, you think you'd hit bottom and we're not even close yet. The online world operates a lot like the offline world in the sense of Twitter has become a neighborhood with broken windows. Right. And all of the anti-Semites and the racists have looked at it. They see that the police have been removed. That is all the folks who used to work at Twitter who kept an eye out for content like this. They're gone. And Musk doesn't care. He signaled that with everything he says.

So those folks have all moved in. They've recognized this as a good home. So the entire site is becoming a crack den for anti-Semites and bigots of all kinds. Oh, Will, this is inspired. I hope you're taking notes on your own comments. You have to write this one up. The whole broken windows theory applied to social media. This is good. This is good stuff. Every time I'm on it, I see all this garbage and I'm like, I've got this is a great analogy. By the way, while you and I are speaking, the Ken Paxton impeachment trial is going on.

There was a motion to exclude evidence of alleged conduct that occurred prior to January 2023. This was brought by Paxton. It was voted down 22 to 8 by the Republican-dominated Texas Senate. I mean, when you are too sleazy and too corrupt and too whatever for Texas Republicans, that's saying a hell of a lot. You know what I'm saying? Do you know what I'm saying here? Yeah.

Okay. Well, I think they need half of the, I think there were 19 Republicans in the state Senate. They have a majority. But if the pro-Paxton PAC and its allies can cut away half of those people, that'll prevent his conviction. But 22 to 8 tells me that they got 8 and that's not enough. All right. Stay tuned, Mr. Salatan. As always, great to start the week off talking with you.

You too, Charlie. Thanks. And thank you all for listening to today's Bulwark Podcast. I'm Charlie Sykes. We will be back tomorrow and we'll do this all over again. The Bulwark Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper and engineered and edited by Jason Brown.