The Daily Beast Podcast - How Fox News Made Every Moment of the Last 25 Years Worse

Episode Date: October 8, 2021

Over at Fox News, they’re marking a very important milestone.  “It’s a big day for them,” says Angelo Carusone, president and CEO of Media Matters for America. “They’re very very proud of themselves. They’re very excited.” Yes, it’s been 25 years since Fox News came on the air—25 years of “refracting the absolute most absurd and destructive and deadly disinformation and misinformation from the right wing fever swamps,” Carusone tells co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Jesse Cannon on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. Also on the episode, Farah Stockman, member of the New York Times editorial board and author of American Made: What Happens to People When Work Disappears, talks about following the lives of three workers after they lost their factory jobs. Finally, Planned Parenthood president Alexis McGill Johnson offers her reaction to a federal judge’s pause on the Texas abortion ban. Come to The New Abnormal Election Eve Party https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-new-abnormals-nyc-election-eve-party-tickets-177538832427 or visit caveat.nyc If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey folks, before we get started, I want to actually tell you about a special event we have coming up on November 1st. Molly and I will be doing the first new abnormal live show with an in-person audience at caveat in New York City. It will be doing a special election eve party where we'll be talking about both local and national politics with guests like Toray, the Daily Beast Harry Siegel, and New York City Council Speaker Corey Johnson, and we'll get a bunch of other fun people. We're going to do quizzes and have prizes, and it's just going to be a blast. It's a benefit for the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, and you could stream it from your home or come see it in person. For more info, head to caveat.n.yc, and I'll put a link in the podcast description. I'm Molly Jongfast, and welcome to The Daily Beast, The New Abnormal. I'm a left-wing pundit and an editor at large at The Daily Beast.

We're here to have fun, sharp conversations with some of the smartest people in media, politics, and science that help make what's happening in the country and the world clearer. Our world has been turned up day down. On the new abnormal, we'll talk about the people who got us into this mess and figure out how to get ourselves out of it. And I'm producer Jesse Kennan. I'm here to make sure things don't go too far off the rails. I feel like you're going to love this episode since we taped some super informative interviews today.

Ferris Stockman, author of American Made, what happens to people when work disappears, is going to talk to us about what she learned writing this book. Then we'll talk to Planned Parenthood President Alexis McGill Johnson about the state of reproductive health. But first, President and CEO of Media Matters, Angelo Corrason, is going to talk to us about what's going on with Fox News and Facebook. Welcome back to the new abnormal, Angelo. Thank you. Thank you for joining us on the 25th anniversary of Fox News.

Yeah, it's a big day for them. They're very proud of themselves. They're very excited. Right? I mean, everything is worse because of it. I mean, it's a blanket state. that usually, you know, would be too broad of a comment, but it's true. Everything is worse because of it.

And I don't think there's a moment right now that really reflects that or illustrates it better than, you know, how we're dealing with this pandemic. They've made it worse. And we are struggling to get out of this because of what Fox has done, which has refracted the absolute most absurd and destructive and deadly disinformation and misinformation misinformation from the right-wing fever swamps. Yeah. So, I mean, they did.

a bunch of clips to celebrate the impact they've had, ruining our society. I saw a clip today of, like, the many ways in which they've been sowing discontent from the recount. I mean, it seems to me, if I were Fox News, I might just pretend. Yeah, I would pretend. And, you know, I think for some reason, it feels like more people now are way more tuned into how damaging Fox is than, say, like, 15 or even 20 years ago. But if we think back over time, Dr. Tiller, who was an abortion provider, was murdered because of Fox News. Bill O'Reilly went on a multi-year campaign against this guy, calling him Tiller, Tiller the baby killer. That is a small example of the harms that they've created.

But, you know, that was considered pretty standard programming back then. I mean, they would zero in on an individual and absolutely smear them to the point where they would end up either getting threats or getting physically injured. They did it so often that it became normal when President Obama appointed a gay man to like a mid-tier level position in the Department of Education. His name was Kevin Jennings. And he was the first time, there was the highest official in the Department of Education that was gay at that time, is one of the highest-ranking LGBT officials. Fox News ran a multi-month campaign claiming that he was a member of Nambla,

the National Mambloy Love Association. I mean, there's not a single moment, whether big or small, as big as the pandemic as seemingly small as an appointment in the Department of Education, where Fox has not gotten in there and made it worse, honestly. The irony, I feel like, is that a lot of these Fox hosts have ended up being, you know, either, I mean, in the case of Bill O'Reilly, having to pay out million-dollar settlements, Ed Henry, it's like a plethora of sexual harassers and criminals. Yeah. I mean, that starts right at the top, right from Roger Ailes. And then importantly, a culture of consent, of tacit consent by the Murdox. I mean, they enabled it. It's not like they have clean hands here. They make it very clear that, Fox gets to operate contrary to all these other standards and norms and get away with it. And they knew what Murdoch was doing.

I mean, what Roger Ayles was doing. But he was obviously profitable. He was supporting their political interests. And he had the talent. And that meant that they could, that they would support and enable it. And it's what we're seeing today with Tucker. I mean, a big reason why he gets to do what he does is because Blackwood Murdoch is given him that seal of approval. It seemed this week, you know, it's always a race down the drain with them.

but like Tucker railing against vaccine mandates from employers when his own employer has it. And a 90% compliance. Yes. And Bathroom Gate with Kristen Sinba when one of their anchors, Jesse Waters, literally made his name by chasing people into bathrooms and elevators like for years on end. It's true. That's actually very true. It's a good point. They were always proud of those interviews, right?

Yes. O'Reilly would come on. Great work chasing Bill Yor and Boyers, an 80-year-old man, into an elevator. Evider, Jesse. You're really doing God's work, buddy. The other big news of the week, though, is this testimony that Facebook is well aware that they are, in some estimations, making it so that the Republicans feel they have to radicalize for their base. And it seems that that has also been a reflection of Fox News. What have you guys been seeing there? In a lot of ways, one, the damage is already done. And the right work the refs so effectively at the platforms, and in a particular Facebook

that what you basically had was a continuation of, you know, let me just take a step back on this, because here's what I think is significant. It's significant, obviously, in the moment, right? But when I look at it, I think about it a little different. We are living in the world that was built in, at least the information landscape, that really came to being in the mid to late 90s. So the Ascent of Talk Radio, Fox News, they sort of established themselves,

they transformed the information landscape, they transformed the way that other media did business because they were responding to that. And they transformed our politics and our society. And that was mostly that way for the past few decades. And what's happened is, you know, in 2015, 2016, you started to see a real shift in the significance of, in particular, Facebook with some of the other platforms, in changing it. And the moment we're in right now, it have been,

is kind of like where we were in the mid to late 90s, where whatever the new landscape is going to look like for the next few decades is being built right now. To me, when I think about the significance of the Facebook stuff, you can draw a straight line from things that the right-wing media were pushing the platform, in particular Facebook to do and complaining about, to policy changes that they put in place as early as 2017 to the harms that were talked about in the testimony this week. So, for instance, in 2017, when Glenn Beck and Tucker Carlson, I mean, I'm sorry,

in 2016, when Glenn Beck and Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingram complained to Facebook about the trending topic section being biased against conservatives, Mark Zuckerberg, overnight, contrary to their own internal data, changed the entire rules of the way

the trending topics sections worked. And for the first time ever on the platform, disinformation, misinformation, misinformation, fake news,

and right-wing media actually started to get greater reach and engagement than non-aligned or news sources. And what year was that? That was in 2016,

May of 2016. Oh, perfect. Yeah. Right before a certain election. A very significant moment. And you could draw, and you could go down the list, even and more recently with the, you know, explosion of QAnon, this was a byproduct of right-wing

complaints that held them, you know, from enforcing their rules, decision makers like Joel Kaplan, who was a former Republican operative, I guess current even at Facebook. And so to me, when I look at the testimony in just this week, big picture, it's that we're watching whatever world information landscape we're going to live in being built. And this was a really big part of it, the same strategy they did in the 90s that worked the refs. They were doing it at the platforms. And then the harms that were talked about, you could actually go back and see the moments where the last vestiges of the right-wing media as they're beginning of their transformation were actually adapting and sort of tipping the scales in their favor for what the new information landscape was going to look like. That is not fun now and does not make us happy. It strikes me that while we were watching this testimony, the normal senators were like,

this is really bad, this is really bad. And then you had like Josh Hawley being like, you know, I mean, then you had the Trumpy younger senators being like, how does this affect me? Right. That's exactly right. And then later on, that same day, we had Ben Shapiro and all the people, the conservatives who better, from Facebook being like, yet they will die on the Facebook Hill. That's right. And they, you know, for the last few years, right, all of these right-wing media

figures have been complaining that Facebook in particular has been aggressively censoring them, right? So they warn about shadow ban. They say their content's being depressed, right? They say that it's, but that is not, none of that was ever true. We've done the studies, we've done the data on any given day, right-wing content somewhere has between 55 and 60% of the entire share of voice on Facebook. That means the rest is left to do's, and left-leaning sources. And also dogs and horses, right? That's right.

It's a pretty big imbalance. But now that people are actually talking about regulation, and it starts to see a little more serious, and there's a possibility that they're, and they're zeroing in on the algorithms, which is these recommendation tools that help radicalize our children. That's right. Now they're going to defend Facebook.

And so what, to me, it shows is, one, that their complaints were all BS. Right. And two, it actually reinforced. is just how much they benefit from the current rules. And that's completely true. I mean, the reason why Ben Shapiro spends $10 million so far this year on Facebook ads is not because he's trying to sell a product. He's not trying to get subscriptions. He's trying to, you know, one, promote his content, but two, he knows that the more he spends, the more residual benefits he gets

from that because there's almost a pay-to-play environment. His other content gets rewarded as a result. and that means that he gets greater reach, greater engagement, and a greater political influence as a result of that. And that's it. I mean, it does expose it. Can you explain to me how he has $10 million to spend? What really underlies all of this, aside from the politics, the extremism, the lies, the reason it all works is because they have the resources.

Either for people like Shapiro and other right-wing media figures, they get right-wing billioners, which they did in the 90s, right? They were standing up publications designed solely to put out misinformation and then attack the rest of the media for not talking about it, right? Like the Washington Free Beacon? Perfect example, right? And Ben Shapiro gets money, gets resources, gets investments. And that allows them then to build the infrastructure to make the sale, to spend ads and scale it. And the same thing applies to the rest of the right media. You know, you saw that with One American News this week, that they get to cheat, right? They get basically money. There's a reason that Fox doesn't care

about advertisers because they get to cheat with their way that they have their relationship with cable companies. And so a big piece of why it works is because ideologically, they're, they're billionaires give them massive amounts of money because they realize that ultimately the media is the issue. And that's why I work at Media Matters is like, and it's what drew me to in the first place was that it doesn't matter if it's a political campaign or a policy fight or a culture issue. However, the media is handling it is going to affect greatly what the outcome is. And, you know, a lot of times, you know, political ads matter. They're important, but they're just a small part of it. It's trench warfare. What the right-wing media does is invest in the rest of

the ballgame, the rest of the landscape. And that gives them disproportionate capacity to cheat and manipulate. We're just so traumatized. I mean, we know this and you've told us this before, and it's very useful and also important, but it's also a little bit traumatizing to remember this is what's going on. Yes. It's a total bummer because when you think down the road, what this means, it starts to get really scary because it either gets scary because of where it goes or it gets daunting because just holding the line starts to feel unsustainably exhausting. And we're not just holding the line against small political disagreements, right? We're talking about real existential questions about how authoritarian are we going to be, you know, and where the lines are going to be

drawn. And that's, that is daunting and scary. And a big part of what propels that and makes that possible is this, you know, is the right wing cauldron that they get plenty of resources to churn and burn that then they use to work the refs, whether at newsrooms in the past and even a little bit now, and the platforms. This is the real fight of our time. I mean, you know, if we're going to say we live in the information age, right, we have to think about how we get and consume information. And like, this is a part of.

So it's a fight. I remember when I started to learn who you are, you were fighting the fight against Glenn Beck, which eventually he was booted from Fox. Where should people be concentrating if they want to fight the fight against Fox or Facebook? So they're slightly different targets. So Facebook at this point, the reality is Facebook is not going to get any better without actual regulation. And I don't feel a ton of confidence in our legislative bodies. But the reality is it is at this point is the only thing.

They're too big. The problems are too manifest and they have too much protection already for the typical levers of accountability, say plaintiff litigation, which can help hold corporations accountable. Sometimes it gets a little out of control with those commercials. But like the reality is plaintiff's law is good. actually going after companies that hurt people is a way to get accountability. But that check doesn't exist in the Facebook context because of the way the law is right now. They really have incredible protection from it. So they need to become a publisher?

The best part of the testimony this week was actually that the recognition that they don't have to be identified as a publisher and that you could actually zero in on their algorithms and the way the rules that they set themselves and divorce that from the content itself and say, look, you're not accountable necessarily for the content, the way a platform is, but you are accountable for your algorithm. And the truth is, if that, if they were accountable for that, everything else downstream would greatly improve because they would get in trouble, say, for allowing their platform to aggressively recruit for the Q&on movement for six months during 2020. That, I think, was the best pathway for releasing conversation. So for Facebook, I think it's partly, there has to be that constant churn of pressure publicly,

but a lot of the zero, it's going to ultimately be about what the legislation looks like. On the Fox side, it's the cable carriers. And that's it. And the cable carriers need to hear it. They need to understand that this is going to only accelerate people cord cutting, that it's going to make their customers mad, that they're going to in some way lose money or not be able to adapt fast enough if they don't figure out a way to at least stop enabling Fox News. And the way that they enabling them is the same way that AT&T was enabling One American News by overpaying. And this is, as you pointed out, with Glenn Beck, Glenn Beck was pushed off from this massive advertiser campaign. That's how I came to Media Matters, color of change, these other organizations were doing this. They drove his advertisers away. No advertisers, no show.

What Roger L.S did after that was say, this is never happening again. And his strategy of focusing on the cable fees meant that they were inoculated and immune from any of the typical market pressures. So that means you have to pressure the cable company. is. That's it. It's where the, I mean, the advertising matters to an extent. It's not like it should be thrown to the side, but the cable companies are the ones that are really going to decide what Fox News is allowed to get away with. And, you know, that will be determined over the next eight months or so, and those contracts will last for five years. By then, we will be in a very, very different place. Either the trend line will be way worse for all of us, because they've managed to give

themselves a free pass against any accountability, and so they can be as extreme as they'd like, or they've at least had to rein it in a little bit, and as a result of that, other things have at least a chance to improve. And that's it. This is our question now, that I think we all have to decide and answer. We're both still trying to process how upsetting this is. Even though we know it, we're still even more upset about it. Jesse Go. I think the one last thing I'd love to here is, can you explain to the listeners a little bit about what this AT&T thing was and what the implications were of it? Yeah, basically, the short of it is that AT&T back in 2013 went to One American News, their owner,

Brad Herring, and said, look, we'll buy a piece of your company, and then that was kind of a fib. And what they really did is say, we will pay you way more for your channel to carry it. So much money, in fact, that you don't ever have to worry about commercials or anything. You just get to go on the air. That's how we're going to overpay, basically, for your channel. And the reason we're doing that is because we deeply and desperately want more right-wing media on our programming because we don't think Fox News is enough. That's it. That's how it started. And it lasted that way, obviously, until now. And even this year, I mean, without, you know, One American News admitted to themselves that if they didn't have their deal with DirecTV and AT&T, their company would be worth zero dollars. That is true. So, but even this year, when they had the chance to renew their contract, because their contract automatically renews, which is very unusual in that business. AT&T renewed the contract. And without negotiating, they just rubber stamped it. And that is after,

after all the COVID misinformation and the election attacks and the insurrection, they just did it. And so the scandal is kind of a sandwich because at the beginning, you know, it actually was started. You would not have had one American news if AT&T did not approach them in 2013 and say, hey, let's do this thing. And then on the back end, you wouldn't have one American news now if AT&T just let the contract expire at the B. They didn't even have to do anything. They literally just had to let it go. If they just would have let it go away, the contract ended in the beginning of this year. And they said, oh, no, you know what? We want to take.

We like what's going on there. Let's do one more year of this. So that's the scandal. But it all gets back to this cable fees. They don't make their money off of advertising. They make it because of the fact that 18T pays them so much. So it's really amazing that one pillow magnate can't support all three of these networks. No, I was wondering, how is that way?

Where's my pillow? I mean, do we know who it is at AT&T who is making these decisions? It's unclear. I mean, back then it was their corporate leadership. Now this guy, John Stanky, who was their COO for many years, who just took over as their CEO. And look, I mean, it's hard to separate out this from what AT&T, say, was doing in Texas, right? Where, you know, I think there was that report this week from Ultraviolet that had come out that talked about how ATT was the single largest donor to all of the. state legislators that had drafted and then pushed for the abortion bill in Texas, I think it's

SB 6. You know, and obviously they walked back their promise after January, after the insurrection, saying they weren't going to give to any Republicans or any candidate that didn't, you know, that was like an election denier. They walked away from that. Judd-Bugam has done some great work on that. And so I think when you add it all up together, it's like, what, what's going on there? This doesn't feel like a one-off. So AT&T is really evil. They seem like they're pretty bad. That seems like they are. That's right. I don't know what else.

Nice thing is consumers have a lot of choices to not go with them in the future. It is very true. They have some choices, and I hope people use it. But, you know, AT&T is massive, and it's really something. I think it shows a lot of what we're living in now is manifest and kind of was started, you know, a few years ago. And, you know, at some point, they're rolling all these rocks down, the top. of these hills, and we may not know that they started it, but now we're starting to see them because the boulders are beginning to crash into people's, like, you know, houses and stuff.

And I think about that in this moment, because it's not like they stop doing these things that are going to have these long effects that we're all going to have to live with. And so I think this moment is as much about managing the incoming from things that happened already to thinking a little bit down the field so that we can actually, you know, stop some of this stuff from materializing in the future. Because if you think what we're dealing with now is bad, it will only be worse if we don't have real serious intervention, you know, at the top of that hill before they throw any more boulders at us. Thank you so much. Yeah.

Jesse and I are, we're good. We're not, we're not depressed. We are just taking it all in, right, Jesse? Oh, yes, that's what's happening. Yeah. Hey folks, in case you haven't heard every single week we do a bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast membership program. This week we have a special guest with Fiona Hill and she's going to talk to us about Trump and Putin's relationship, as well as her new book, there's nothing here for you. To hear this along with all of our past episodes and to support the Daily Beast fearless journalism, head to new abnormal.com.

That's new abnormal.thedailybeast.com. Faris Stockman is a member of the New York Times editorial board and author of American Made, What Happens to People When Work Disappears. Welcome to the new abnormal Faris Stockman. Hey, thanks for having me on. I love that you've put a name to what we're all going through. Yeah, exactly. So I want to talk to you about American Made, what happens to people when work disappears.

What does happen to people when work disappears? Oh, not good things, it turns out. I started writing this book. I conceived of it in 2016 when like you and many of your listeners were stunned. I was stunned by the fact that so many millions of Americans voted for a man who had not served even one day in government and elected in president. And I was like, what's going on here? And I'm from the rest of Alden from Michigan. I started asking around like, what, what's going on, dude?

And I heard a lot about factories. I heard a lot about he's going to save my job. He's going to bring the factories back. And so I spent seven months following a woman named Shannon Mulcahy at a plant in Indianapolis that was moving to Mexico. And I was like, what does that feel like to be told that, you know, you're going to lose your job because these people over here are going to do your job cheaper. And it was an amazing education for me. And so I followed Shannon through those seven months, and I watched her agonize over whether she should train this Mexican guy who was going to replace her or stand with the union. The union didn't want anyone to train.

She ended up really taking a liking to this guy who he was the same age as her son. And at the end of the training, he put his hand over his heart and he said, I'm sorry. I'm just really sorry. And she said, I was blessed to have this job. And now it's your turn to be blessed. I wrote the story in 2017 in the New York Times, and readers from all over the world wrote to me and said, please tell us what happened to her. Please tell us, you know, did she get another job? What's going on with her? And so I followed her throughout the entirety of the Trump administration. And I also followed a white guy named John, who was a diehard union guy. And I followed a black guy named Wally. Both of them were her coworkers. And just to figure out, like, where did they get jobs and what did losing their jobs due to? them. Did Trump bring back all their jobs? Oh, so many jobs. So many jobs. I mean, I hate to even ask the question because I know these are real people with real lives and real laws. I mean,

this was a factory he had tweeted about. And so when he, he tweeted about it and she tweeted right back, like, thank you, President Trump. She like felt like Trump cared about her personally. And it was just like there was this hunger for, you know, people like her, she was very, disengaged in politics. And you hear this from from these steelworkers, both Republicans and Democrats, you hear like, they're all crooks. There's so, there was so much cynicism about politics. And I really do attribute it to NAFTA and to a lot of what happened to the manufacturing jobs after China entered the WTO. There was a huge feeling of betrayal from a lot of those people. So what happened? So she didn't know, obviously, that plant movement.

away. And obviously he didn't have the answers, all the answers for saving factory jobs. But people didn't hold it against him that he couldn't save the plan. I mean, most people, most of the workers I followed felt like the decision to move the plant had been made before he was elected. And so they didn't actually turn on him. What made Shannon turn on him was COVID. So she spent a lot of time unemployed, ended up finally getting a new job at a new factory. And she was feeling pretty good. She went through a lot of depression and stuff like that from being unemployed. And I can tell you later, like what it, the conclusion I came to about universal basic income after watching her go through that. Because, I mean, jobs mean so much more than a paycheck, right? They mean so much more. And that was my

big takeaway from the book. But so she finally gets a new job. She's finally, you know, starting to fit in there and then COVID hit. And so she lost her job, high unemployment everywhere. And she saw how he was bullying people who were wearing masks. And so she just, she turned in the last like three or four months before the election, she turned on him. And in the beginning, she's like, I'm not going to vote for Biden. Then she's like, I'm going to vote for Harris.

Great. And then by the end, she, on election day, she said, I'm praying for Joe Biden. But it was like, it was fascinating to see that shift. And what shifted it for her? So John was the diehard union guy. White guy came from a long line of union people. His grandfather was coal miner. His father-in-law worked in an auto plant. And he was like, they were like almost militant in a way, union people. And it was fascinating to see him. You know, he basically went around the plant as it was closing, trying to get people. people to refuse to train their replacements. And he thought that might save their jobs. And a lot of the black workers at the time were like, dude, that's racist to train the Mexicans. And by the way, I remember when he didn't want to train me, you know, not John personally, but the union. So they sort of disintegrated along, I mean, I won't say totally along racial lines, but a lot of the diehard union guys, white guys who had maybe been in that plant since high school, they were taken

it really hard, much harder than some of the black guys who, you know, even though statistically speaking, the black guys were going to have a harder time finding a job, they were more like psychologically prepared for the company doesn't really care about you. Right, which makes sense because of the history of oppression. So John ended up getting another job pretty quickly and I thought, okay, he's, he's going to be all right. And then he complained about having to work the night shift and got fired. Oh. Immediately.

And so it was like a shock to him to be in a non-union world. No union protections. And then he agonized over whether to take a job working maintenance in a hospital, which had no union and was a lower paying job or getting back into a plant that had a union in it. He was going to be a steel worker again. And that was so important to his identity. And he decided not to because he was like, How long is that factory going to be here?

He had been through two plant closings. That was the second. And so one thing we have to understand is that every time a plant closes, you start from the bottom again. You have no seniority. You walk in that plant and you're nobody. You get the worst machines and you have to work the night shift. You might never see your wife for months. Like he has a job during the day and you have a job at night.

For him, he decided to work in this hospital because he's like, okay, those rich people, those rich doctors, those college-educated doctors have a job. And I don't think anyone's going to take this hospital somewhere else. So I'm going to stay in the hospital. We see where this is going. Right. So then COVID comes. And he's suddenly in the epicenter of the epidemic.

And he's like, he absolutely knew it was real because he saw it in the hospital. And it scared him. And then the hospital has to stop elective surgeries. And, you know, he gets scared about the future of the hospital. He votes for Trump again. Oh. I know he did. Even though the union, you know, Trump was so bad for unions.

John did not like the concept of free money. He didn't like the concept of free college. And he's, to him, nothing is free. He's like, who's going to pay for that? The working man, the working man is. He could have benefited from pre-college. He got an associate's degree during the day, and he had to leave class every day, an hour early,

so he could go lay tarmac at the airport at night. That's how he put himself through college. And it was not, but he didn't have a BA. He got an associate's degree in piping and age, you know, being able to design, I don't know, what is it, air conditioning in a building. And that job paid him like around $30,000 a year. It was not a very secure job. And then his uncle drew the lucky straw at a factory. And suddenly he was making $70,000 a year at a plant with no college degree.

necessary. So to him, you know, college was a bit of a scam, you know, and he wanted his kids to get a college degree, but he didn't, his daughter was like incurring $20,000 in debt just for room and board. And the family had gone through a bankruptcy the first time the plant closed. Anyway, so to him, money really mattered. And, you know, you had to make sure that these degrees were going to produce a job that made it worth it. And that, that isn't always the case. A lot of times, these Blue-collar kids go to college, and they end up dropping out with debt. Right. But free college could really help those guys. It's free college room and board. Because if it's not room and board, you're still working,

you're working while you're going to school, and then it's really hard to juggle that, and then you drop out with debt. And you have the debt, yeah, and you don't have the degree. Yes. So anyway, let's just close the loop on John, but I think we have a lot of assumptions about what's good for blue-collar workers, and we need to listen to them, times because they do know what's good for them. Oh, that's interesting. But do you think he knows what's good for him? Okay. So he's married to a Democrat. His wife is a Democrat. So they were a mixed marriage. And it was it was a point of contention. His wife really supported Hillary Clinton. So he knew that Democrats were out there. He knew they weren't like part of a secret cabal.

Right. So he cast a ballot for Trump. But when Trump started contesting the election and having the big lie, John was like, stop being the same. such a crybaby, John was disgusted by that. And then January 6th, John was like, what are you saying? The point is, there are people out there who supported Trump's agenda on trade, but did not support the crazy Q&N stuff. That's real. And I'm not saying that there's, and I don't know how many, but I'm just telling you what I saw with my own eyes, with John, and with many of the steel workers. That strikes me as incredibly important to note.

It's important because if you think, if you listen to what Trump was saying on trade, it's not that different than what Bernie was saying on trade. Like it was complete turnaround from the Republican Party. The Republican Party had been way in bed with the companies to do these trade deals for a long time. And so, you know, I just think we have to really understand sort of the reaction to globalization and understand the role that that played, not with everyone, but with some of these manufacturing towns, for sure. Yeah, and I mean, I think it's important.

I mean, I remember listening to him in 2016 to say that he was going to make coal great again and thinking, like, but if you're a coal miner, your choices are either someone who's like, come with me or someone who's like, I might give you your job back. I mean, it's a pretty easy choice. It's a really easy choice, right? And I think I think Democrats can do a better job talking about jobs. Like my big takeaway is, you know, if you're going to talk about climate change,

talk about jobs. Like social safety nets are not, nobody working class wants to live off the government. They want a job. They want it. A job is a reason to get up in the morning. It's a bowling team. It's a feeling like you're a part of the economy, like you matter. And, you know, because these folks over here are going to do your job cheaper, you're not needed anymore. No, thank you. You know, and by the way, here's a check for universal basic income. I'm not sure that's something they're wild about.

Explain to me about the third person you followed. Oh, my God. So Wally is the black worker that I followed. He was the most optimistic guy I had ever met. He was, he believed in the American dream. So we're, and he was. And he was. so big-hearted. He was one of those popular people at the factory. He had served a stint in prison as a young man. He had dealt drugs. You know, that factory job helped him get his life back on track. He was a super hard worker. He would always tell his coworkers, I'm blessed to have this job. I was locked up. I'm blessed to have this job. He was popular with everyone, with union, with management, men, women, black, white. He was everybody loved Wally. I met him when he gave a really fiery union in speech and afterwards he was like, you know what, God closed this factory so that I can go out and start my own business. I'm going to start a barbecue business. And I knew I was going to follow him

until he did it. And I would go deliver pans of pulled pork with him. He did catering for all these different places. And he died less than a year after that factory closed. And it was like he had chest pains and didn't go to hospital because he had chest pains and he had lost his insurance. And it's not just just, and he wasn't the only one who died. Three people died within a year out of 300 workers. Because they didn't have health insurance. Not just that. Somebody maybe could have drunk himself to death. So you're seeing a combination of stress, deaths of despair, people who, so we know that there is a link between employment shock and opioid overdoses. So in COVID, we lost 90,000 people to opioid overdoses. That's a 30% increase. There is a huge link between.

health and mental health and jobs. So these places that lose jobs, you see depression go up, you see anxiety, you see unrest, and you see people in Republican-leaning places, you see them go to the right, to the crazy right. That is an impact of the loss of jobs. You know, it was a real honor that they let me follow them and trusted me with their stories, but I learned a lot, and I wish that people would listen to folks like that. Because they have something we can learn. This is an incredible book. It sounds incredible.

I can't wait to read it. Just tell us again what it's called. It's called American Made. What happens to people when work disappears? Oh, thank you so much, Faris Stockman. Please come back. Thank you so much for taking the time to let me tell their stories. Alexis McGill Johnson is the president of Planned Parenthood.

Welcome to the new abnormal Alexis McGill Johnson. Thank you so much for. having me. We're thrilled to have you. And it's such a big day. So last night, a federal judge out of Austin paused Texas's unconstitutional abortion ban. Were you shocked? I mean, were you surprised? I didn't see this coming. Yes. I mean, you know, we were holding out hope. We were so, you know, grateful for the DOJ to have brought this lawsuit and everything that the administration has been been doing and engaging in it, but it wasn't just the ruling, right? It was how Judge Pittman was so clear, right? Like this was a scheme to deny the constitutional rights of Texans. And I thought

his language was powerful. I thought his ability to really distill the impact. It's happening to patients on the ground for the past 37 days was really incredibly compelling. And, you know, look, I prepared for the victory to be temporary and short. But yes, it definitely gave us, you know, be able to take a breath, right? And breathe. I mean, I do still think, and I'm curious to know your thoughts, that they will ultimately overturn Row because they're, you know, they were put there to do that, right, by Trump. One of the things the Texas law did was it set precedent. Yes.

I mean, what the Texas law did was it created this whole other, you know, crazy scheme to avoid judicial, you know, review, right? This bounty hunter provision that I think has had, you know, just such a chilling effect on abortion provision. It still is blatantly unconstitutional, though, right? I mean, just because they have this little trick doesn't necessarily mean that it is constitutional. I think that the work with the, you know, the case to be heard on December 1 really is the one that will set the terms as to whether or not Roe is overturned. I mean, it's just such a weird time to be the head of Planned Parenthood. It's incredibly emotional the past 37 days of hearing about the impact, certainly to patients who are traveling thousands of miles. We just had our, you know, first patient in Vermont from Texas.

patients in Oregon, patients from New Mexico who can no longer get into their local health centers who are now having to travel. And so just the ripple effect of the logistics, right? Caring access and navigating a patchwork of, you know, the rules differ by state. You know, Texas was already like, you know, a complicated place to have an abortion because of the number of restrictions. But then they're going into states next door that also have restrictions. And so that kind of logistical patchwork, you know, and seeing people having to face those barriers unnecessarily is hard. But it's the emotional barriers, too, for providers who can no longer provide care, right, who have, you know, taken on this work with the explicit

value and purpose of being there for their patients, right? You know, and as we say care, no matter what, to have a provider essentially be denied their instinct to provide care because of this craziness, I think is also incredibly emotional. But the work is the same. You know, the work is in the same as I've been, you know, involved with the organization for the last 11 years. It is about building, power, building kind of momentum, which I actually think we do have, and really fighting back and holding these lawmakers accountable because, you know, that's it. Jessie sent me the report you guys just released, and it strikes me that your organization is already kind of planning for a post-row America.

Yeah, I mean, look, we've had to have a provider response, you know, that we actually started planning a few years ago. You know, as you know, the courts have always been our backstop. They've been the places where when something unconstitutional happens, you go and you get it adjudicated so that you can continue providing care. The number of restrictions that we've seen 600 this year alone, in concert with the way in which the federal judiciary, including the Supreme Court, has been remade under Trump and McConnell, you know, gave us obviously, you know, all of us foresight that the post-row world could be ushered in sooner than we would have imagined. And because of these bans and our fighting of these bans and that intersection into the court system means, that there are now, you know, somewhere like 15 or 15 cases that are winding their way up through

the court a step away. So if it's not the Texas ban, right, which could usher in, I think, a de facto post-row or the Jay-hoo case in Mississippi, which, you know, threatens to completely overturn row, they're still, they still have a docket, you know, of cases to decide. And that could also mean the ushering of of more restrictions that essentially never mean the court says something like, you know, the court now overturns the law, Roe v. Wade, but rather that it just really becomes meaningless like it is in Texas right now. You have this list of the states most likely to quickly ban abortion after a Supreme Court decision.

And some of these states, I mean, they're all red states, though some of them are a little bit purple, right? You talk about these trigger bans. Can you explain what that is? Yeah, a trigger ban is essentially the law that is on the books that if Roe is overturned, the power to determine the laws around abortion go back to the states. And in these states with trigger bans, they have laws on the books that already outlaw Roe or have some significant restrictions on them. You know, like Michigan, for example, has like, I think like a 1931, 32 law on the books. So will that just come back? Technically, yes. You know, I think that there is, you know, obviously a lot of good work that's happening in many of these states. Right. And Michigan has a Democratic governor. Yeah, to really create the awareness of what could happen. And I think there are many states where we've already heard, right, the governor Abbott of Texas, the AG in Mississippi, be Governor Hutchinson, who have all been incredibly clear that they're pushing these, signing

these things into law because they explicitly want to create the challenge to overturn Roe. So they're saying the quiet parts out loud. That's very clear. What's really interesting in this report is it talks that 75% of the people who have abortions are not wealthy. The vast majority of abortion pays in 75% are people with low incomes for, you know. So, I mean, I do think ultimately the people who will suffer when Ro goes away will be women who don't have the money to drive 12 hours. Absolutely. We are still in a pandemic, a pandemic that has laid bare the disparity in health care, the racial disparity, the income disparity, and how hard it is just to access basic health care. And you layer on these restrictions.

We're asking people, Texas is asking people to take off from work, right, which likely a wage, you know, low wage job to secure child care, likely because the majority of people who have abortion are already parents, you know, asking them to drive. In some cases, we had a patient who drove a thousand miles by herself because she was a, she didn't know whether or not having somebody in the car with her would go. get them in trouble. So she took the trip by herself. We have, you know, the intent of SB8 has been to so confusion and chaos and trauma to patients and providers and, you know, and the people who are the least likely able to bear yet another set of barriers are the people who are most impacted. And that is clear in what we're seeing. I feel like I see tons of coverage. whenever one anti-vaxxer has a sign-up, but I did not see a lot of coverage about the massive, massive protests this weekend.

Can you talk about them and Planned Parenthood's role in it? Oh, absolutely. Look, let me tell you something. The rallies for abortion justice, 600 of them across the country were fire. Okay? It was like unbelievable energy to see, I think somewhere like 20,000.

thousand people showed up in D.C. alone. The power of centering the states who were most impacted, patient abortion storytellers, providers, Planned Parenthood and Independent providers, and really a mostly BIPAC-led kind of front line, as it were, of national and state and local organizations that came together to really, I think, create the most. expansive, most inclusive, multiracial, multi-generational kind of movement. And it was just the opening

salvo, right? So I was really inspired by this weekend. It was just the energy, the momentum, especially after a year that we've had, people were incredibly fired up and

ready to work, right? I mean, like, ready to continue to make sure that we're holding folks, we're educating folks and building out accountability strategies. Do you feel like during this pandemic when Republicans have been so profoundly anti-mask and anti-vax and anti-sensible mitigation strategies and yet they are obsessed with this quote-unquote idea of life? I mean, does it just drive you crazy? I mean, to see Ted Cruz talk about my body, my choice. Yes. Yeah, it is. It's hypocritical. It's so cavalier about life, right?

Right. It's so completely backwards. I mean, really, the thing that I am so struck by is this has never been about life. No, it's always been about freedom, right? It's always been about control, right? So, you know, so, yeah, I guess the hypocrisy in that way makes sense because it has always been about controlling our bodies, you know, the fact that they can't even see the irony in their, you know, incredibly, even if they, you wanted to argue that they were. were libertarian, right? We missed, you know, we missed, or we missed the point, right? That, like, the majority of Americans don't want lawmakers making choices for them. And so I do think that the, most of the attacks on abortion and reproductive rights writ large are intellectually dishonest. They're really intended to create, you know, support to, for laws that create more barriers.

And that's essentially what we are seeing over and over again. If you had one thing you could get the Biden administration to do that you think would concretely save Roe, what would it be? Look, I think that the Biden administration really advocating right now for the Women's Health Protection Act is a critical first step, supporting and signing into federal legislation law that would codify Roe, minimum stop these crazy bans that are restricting access. You know, and I think that the administration's, you know, whole of government, you know, has been incredibly thoughtful and, and creative in the conversations that we've been in, you know, I think suggests that they are full-throated support for sexual and reproductive health care,

including abortion and I'm really trying to think about the best way to engage. But, you know, I think it's both the Women's Health Protection Act. And then I would also say the John Lewis Act, right? You know, that these same states where we are seeing these restrictions are also the same states that are limiting access to voting. And so when both our democracy and reproductive freedom are under attack, it's really important for us to, you know, make sure that we create, you know, stronger protections around both that the majority of constituents have representation that

truly reflects them. Yeah. Oh, thank you so much for joining us. I hope you'll come back soon. Of course. It was my pleasure. What's crazier than QAnon, more outlandish than Pizagate, and scarier than a Mexican getaway with Ted Cruz?

The answer is what the American right wing has planned next. Be one of the first to listen to Fever Dreams, new podcasts from The Daily Beast, tracking the conspiracy slingers, orange acolytes, and straight-up grifters pushing to retake power. Every Wednesday hosts Swin Tsubisang and Will Summer, checking in on the movement of the radical right. Head to the DailyBeast.com slash podcasts

or your favorite podcast player to catch the first episode and get subscribed. That's fever dreams, which you can subscribe to wherever you get your podcasts. Jesse Cannon. Molly Jong Fast. Who is it today? It's the fucking conservatives on the goddamn motherfucking Trump Supreme Court. Those sound like lovely people. Tell me more.

So Trump put these justices in with the hopes of overturning row, taking away women's right to choose. They were more than half. to let Roe be overturned in the middle of the night on the shadow docket September 1st, women couldn't get abortions in Texas, period, paragraph. No matter what anyone said, that was really what it boiled down to. So last night, district judge from Austin, an Obama appointee, said, fuck you. No, you can't do that.

And he paused the abortion ban. So now, today, if you live a woman in Texas, you get back your right, the one that you've had for 50 years to end your pregnancy. Now, how long this lasts is anyone's guess? My guess is it won't be long. But ultimately, it's further proof that this Trumpy Supreme Court is really no longer a legitimate court. And this district judge pointed that out, and I think it was pretty fucking brave. and also great. And so I would like to say,

Justice Kavanaugh Kegstand, Justice Amy Comey Barrett, Justice Neil Gorsuch, Justice Alito, and fucking Clarence Thomas, you know, fuck you, all of you. Thank you.

Well, speaking of Justice Thomas, I want to introduce people to this not-so-lovely human named Crystal Clanton that they may not be familiar with. According to a really great piece in The Daily Beast today by Callie Holloway, she's upping the ranks through the GOP

after previously writing a text saying, I hate black people. Like fuck all, them all. I hate blacks, end of story. You know, oftentimes these conservatives when they say things like this, they're like, it was out of context. I think that that would be a record.

I hate the black family. Mr. Black. That might be the hardest one to, put in a different context I've ever seen. Anyway, so her next stop after that was a highly visible media position with Judy Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and Stop the Steel conspiracy theorist. Callie has a wonderful, wonderful piece about this that we should really get to know because sadly, in the connection she makes, I think is right, is when you say this now, now that

we're in a post-white replacement theory being a dominant thing in the GOP world, this is what you get rewarded for, and now she's on the ascent up the ladder. So to that I say, and for that whole concept, I say, fuck you, Crystal Clinton. It is amazing that Republicans are no longer trying to hide the fact that they're racist. I think it's, uh, instead of being the hidden feature, it's now becoming the slogan under the name. The only feature. On that note, we'll wrap this episode of the new abnormal from The Daily Beast. In future episodes, be talking to smart folks from The Daily Beast and beyond from media, culture, politics, and science will help us understand what's happening to our country and the world. We hope you'll

subscribe to us on your favorite podcast app and share the show on social media. Thanks so much for listening and we'll see you again on the next episode. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh and our star-studded the Daily Beast podcast at thedailybeast.com slash podcasts. If you enjoyed this episode, consider becoming a Daily Beast subscriber. Subscribing is the best way to feed the beast and support all of your podcasts as we cover what might become the darkest timeline. Head to the DailyBeast.com slash membership slash podcast and sign up today.