The Daily Beast Podcast - Trump Is More Like a Court Jester Than a King

Episode Date: February 21, 2025

On this episode of The New Abnormal, President Donald Trump’s attempts to fashion himself as America’s king fall flat with antics that are more akin to a court jester. Plus! Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Spencer Ackerman discusses Elon Musk’s potential undue influence over the Department of Defense, and MacArcthur Genius Cristina Jiménez Moreta delves into how Trump’s second term has escalated attacks on immigrants. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Andy Levy, former Fox News and CNN-HLN guy, and current cable news conscientious objector. I'm a former libertarian who now sits pretty comfortably on the left. Hi, I'm Danielle Moody, former educator and recovering lobbyist. But today, I'm an unapologetic, woke commentator on America's threats to democracy. And I'm producer Jesse Cannon, and I'm here to make sure things don't go too far off the rails. We're here to have fun, smart conversations with some of the most knowledgeable and entertaining people in politics, media, and beyond. goal is to try and make sense of our current crazy world, our new abnormal, and hopefully even make you laugh through the tears.

What an excellent show we have for you today. Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, Spencer Ackerman joins us to discuss how Elon Musk could use little-known government databases to dominate the defense industry and why his growing influence over U.S. security should alarm everyone. Then we'll talk to MacArthur Genius, Christina Jimenez, who's the co-founder of United We We Dream, and she'll discuss the escalating attacks on immigrants under Trump's second term and how Democrats need to join communities in organizing to fight back. But first, let's have some fun.

It is as if this president, this person, this man, Donald Trump, just stays up at night trying to figure out ways to piss people off, like, in all honesty. But really, this week calling himself a king on social media after he ended a New York City congestion pricing program, like, really took the fucking cake. It read like this, of course, all in capital letters, because he doesn't know what lower case is. Congestion pricing is dead. Manhattan and all of New York is saved. Long live the king. Fuck off. My God, you're more like a court jester than anything else. And to think that a picture of him with a crown was tweeted out by the White House, beyond. Beyond, Andy. I'm losing it. Yeah, I am exceedingly tired of people

trying to claim, oh, he's just trolling. He's just trying to own the libs here. First of all, I don't think that's true. Second of all, really not what the president should be doing anyway. But I'm getting really tired of being told to ignore stuff like this, that it's a distraction, that he's just trolling, that he's just, he's messing with us. Again, he's president of the United States. If it's trolling, it's stupid. If he's just messing with us, it's stupid. But I also don't, there's nothing that he's doing that makes me think that he doesn't honestly

believe that he has kinglike powers. And I'm not going to look at it that way. Dan Goldman, who's been a guest on this show, Congressman from New York, he posted on social media the other day, Dear Media, please do not waste time hyperventilating about this dumb comment. It is intended to be a distraction from all the damaging actions he's taking. Focus on those. I saw him get hammered on blue sky. My understanding is he got hammered on Twitter as well, just basically all across social media from people basically saying what I just said, this is not a distraction. Right. This is a guy who has been laying this out since before he was

elected exactly how he intended to govern. Dictator on day one, making noises about a third. term making his little jokes about people will never have to vote again. At a certain point, you have to stop saying that this stuff is a distraction and recognize that, no, this is part and parcel of who he is and what MAGA wants. So to the people on the right who are in the corner giggling because they think, oh, Trump got the libs again, you're as stupid as it gets. And if you think that that's all this is, I would say you're in for a root of awakening, except you have all shown that you want to be ruled by a king. You want to be ruled by an emperor. You want to be ruled by daddy. I don't need to hear you say, oh, this is just trolling.

And I certainly don't need to hear it from Dan Goldman and other elected Democrats. Honestly, who need to get off their asses and start pushing back at this shit. First off, the other point is that because of the Supreme Court's ruling, is Donald Trump wrong in the fact that he is a king, that he can do whatever he wants, that he can ignore court orders and that there's going to be no pushback to that whatsoever, that he can have his billionaire, Elon Musk, decide to threaten to primary anybody in the Republican Party that decides to vote against him or vote with their conscience or actually vote with their constituents. We say these things like that he's not a king, but he is moving and acting in that way. The White House social media is amplifying it and

making it so. Also, what the fuck is this man's obsession with fake Time magazine covers? I don't get it. The other day he says, oh, I don't, I didn't even know time was in business. And yet you like spend so much energy making fake ones. At this point, I really don't want to hear anything from Democrats unless it is about what action they plan on taking with his first state of the union address, unless it's what actions that they plan on taking in general, besides coming up with bullshit fucking, what was it the other day that they gave back as a great pushback. Hakeem Jeffries came up with the nickname Captain Chaos. That's the best that you can do.

Like, sir, I need folks to sit down and really do some deep thinking. I've reached a point where I would be very happy with mass resignations, but we can get into that another time. Every action that Trump has taken since becoming president has been. been to expand executive power, to minimize the power of Congress, which they, by the way, forget about the Democrats, the Republicans in Congress are showing themselves to be the biggest cucks we've ever seen on the national stage. So every action he is taking is in furtherance of this sort of turning the presidency into a kingship and turning a democracy into a kingdom.

When he comes out and says it, I don't care if he's part. He probably is partially doing it to wind up people like us. But that's not entirely why he's doing it. He's also doing it because, as you said, Danielle, he's looking around and going, ain't nobody stopping me. As we discussed on the last episode and other episodes, the guard rails are, whatever few are left, are rapidly being dismantled. There is absolutely no reason for him not to be thinking himself as a king at this point.

And no, I'm sorry. I'm not just going to roll my eyes and move on when he says stuff like this. I'm just not. The thing is, when we talk about the fact that no one is saying anything, no one is responding in the way that they should to Donald Trump's remarks. Because according to a piece in Vanity Fair that is up now that, quote, they're scared shitless about death threats and Gestapo-like stuff. This is coming from a former member of Trump's first.

administration talking specifically about Republicans and their inability to, I don't know, act like elected officials that have any type of power whatsoever. And I got to tell you, I am so fucking tired of hearing about how Republicans are so scared of Donald Trump and so scared of his followers because you had the opportunity, I believe, multiple times to remove this man from office, to remove him from government life, which means that you could have removed the quote unquote threat that you feel like you're under from your lives. And you chose not to do that. So who is supposed to now turn around and feel bad when in fact Donald Trump and Republicans have sicked their violent base on so many people around the country

from judges to volunteer workers to political officials and more. And they say nothing. But when it comes to their own asses, like somehow we're supposed to be like, oh, well, they're just moving in lockstep with fascism because they're scared of him. I could care less. They had multiple chances to prevent any of this from happening. They had impeachment efforts in the first Trump term that they did not vote for. January 6th, you had actual violence and the actual threat of violence against members of Congress. And what did the Republicans end up doing? Well, for that day, they were highly upset about it. And then pretty much starting on day two, they started backtracking from that. And we're now at the point where you're hearing sitting Republican congresspeople and senators talking about how, oh, January 6th was overblown. These people were patriots. You have shown how weak you are. And you have shown that Donald Trump and the MAGA folks can get to you. you. And so what does that tell them? It tells them to keep getting to you. And it really does come down

to the old story about how to deal with bullies. And that if you don't stand up to a bully the first time, the bully's just going to keep coming after you. So look, I'm with you, Daniel. I do not feel bad for Tom Tillis. I do not feel bad for any of these Republicans getting death threats. No, they shouldn't be getting death threats from MAGIFOLFOLS. That should go without saying. But I'm not sitting here. clutching my pearls and hoping to God they're okay. I'm reserving that for the people who are being threatened by MAGA who have not enabled MAGA. Exactly. I'm sorry. There's only so much empathy to go around and I like to think of myself as a very sometimes overly empathetic person, but I'm out. I'm out for so many of these people. And Tom Tillis and his fellow

congressional Republicans are definitely on my list of people that I'm just not feeling. in it, Daniel. The first action that Donald Trump took was to pardon the most violent people who try to overthrow our democracy that had these very elected officials running for their lives and barricading themselves inside of offices. And then they turn around and continue to not even just enable, but applaud his violent rhetoric and actions and then think somehow that the leopard is not also going to eat their face. So no, they don't get my sympathies whatsoever because we have a rise in political violence that is going to get worse because of their lack of courage and their inaction around Donald Trump. He didn't need to be here for a second term. He should have never been

able to run again. And they made it so. So you get what you deserve. Yeah. And what we've got now is to sort of circle back to our original topic. We've got a president calling himself a king. We've got a president saying he who saves his country does not violate any law. And you all enabled that to try to play on my sympathies and on my empathy. It just ain't happening. It is absolutely not happening. This is your fault. This is your fault Republicans who rubber stamped all of this Trump stuff.

Don't come crying to us. Lay in the bed that you made. One person who is standing up to Donald Trump, unfortunately, he's not American, is Vladimir Zelensky, the leader of Ukraine. He has been very strong in telling Europe that they need to rally around Ukraine and rally against Putin because the U.S. just quite frankly can't be counted on anymore. And Donald Trump is not happy about this. And so he's been blasting Zelensky, and he's been doing it in the only way he knows how, which is by just brazenly lying. He has called Zelensky a dictator without elections.

He has somehow accused Ukraine of starting the war with Russia, which is a little baffling to me because it wasn't that long ago. And we have video. Daniel, we have video of Russia invading Ukraine. But again, what Trump has learned is that he can basically say whatever he wants. and not only is a large segment of the country just going to believe him, but the Republicans in Congress, they may not expressly back what he says, but they won't call him out on it. What we have here is one person who is actually standing up to Donald Trump. And like I said, it's just unfortunate that this person is not an American.

The other day, there was an underground reporter who was interviewing MAGA voters on Russia. and on Putin. And there was one woman who said, what's wrong with what Putin is doing? He's just going to take back what's his. And I don't see anything wrong with that. The reporter looked at her, eyes wide open and said, he's killed thousands of people. And Ukraine is not his. It's a sovereign nation. And she said, I don't care. The fact that at one time, it was a unanimous understanding that Russia was not a friend of the United States. It was not to be uplifted and applauded. And Donald Trump and Maga Republicans changed all of that.

And I, you know, the fact that they think that Putin is going to stop at Ukraine if we don't continue to defend them is just wild to me. But again, they don't give a shit. Like long live the oligarchy. They don't care. It's such an unfortunate place to be. to now live inside of a country that is not interested in democracy or defending democratic, independent nations whatsoever and now is seen more so as a threat to our former allies than anything else.

Ugh, God. As Elon Musk and his idiotically named Doge continue to destroy our government systems, there are new concerns that he might get his hands on a database that my next guest says could help him corner defense markets around the world. Pulitzer Prize and National Magazine Award-winning journalist Spencer Ackerman first reported this at Ziteo, where he's a contributor. He's also the writer of the Great Forever Wars newsletter at Forever-Dashwors.com, and he pens the fabulous new Iron Man series, The Stark Rocks on War. He joins me now. Spencer, thanks so much for coming back. Hey, thank you for having me, Andy.

So this database is called U.S. exports. That's the letters U.S. X, followed by ports, for those keeping score at home. And its existence is not everyday knowledge for most people. What exactly is U.S. exports? So this is going to be a super bureaucratic thing that I'm going to try and keep as fun and as engaging as possible. So we'll do it on that basis. So this isn't super dry. Basically, everything that the gigantic United States arms manufacturing industry creates and sells abroad requires a license, putting on something called the ITAR list, that controlled by the State Department permits

this massive industry to do business overseas in the name of securing national security. Everything that they have, everything that the regulators are able to see, which is the contracts, the specific technological properties, which includes intellectual property and, like, deep for hardware systems, like machine tooling specifications, all of the things that make the item to be exported, the item to be exported. And then as well, any incidents of compliance violation or investigation is all in this gigantic database called US export. And this represents what people familiar with the database who were recently at finding themselves out of of government described to me as one of the most transformative corruption opportunities in the

history of the defense sector. Correct me if I'm wrong. We don't know if Musk has already gotten his grubby little mitts on this database. That's correct. I can't confirm that. My sources had been telling me about indications from within the government from colleagues of theirs who are still inside that indicate he might soon get it, but there's a tremendous amount of opacity, even to Congress, around what Doge has and has not accessed. Okay, so talk about exactly why it would be so catastrophic if Musk did or does get his hands on this database. I guess first, talk about how he could use it to enrich himself, because I feel like if there's one thing we can all agree on, it's that he doesn't have enough money.

Yeah, so it's one thing to be as wealthy as this man is right now, but what this database basically paves the way to do, were you to nefariously get your hands on it, is expand this even beyond like the pharaonic wealth that he's already possessing. Because inside this database is anything he could possibly want to know about his competitors that he would be unable to learn otherwise. the specifics of their rocket parts, the specifics of their satellites, the bandwidth necessary that they operate on, the contracts, this is very important, the contracts that his rivals have with other governments and other militaries, as well as the delivery schedules for whatever it is, they're being shipped, and particularly with things like launch vehicles, like the business that SpaceX is in, those happen according to specific timetables and for specific prices. All of that information that no competitor would be in this industry would be able to see, because this is a regulator-only database, is within U.S. exports. So if I can see my competitors' contracts, nothing prevents me from going to those competitors and being like, I see I can deliver this to you for like, you know, five cents on the dollar, and I can do it quicker.

Why not violate that contract and come with me? Or why not wait for that contract to expire? and then I get your next one. The United States, according to current estimates kept by an organization called CIPRI, which monitors the arms market, is about 42% of a multi-billion dollar export market. The next competitor to the United States is France. It has 11% of this market. This is an American-dominated market that can very quickly become a Musk-dominated market,

and not even just Musk. Because while he has businesses that are directly engaged in this for things like satellite launch, for things like rockets, he doesn't have everything. Like he's not like an ammunition manufacturer. There are entities like Anderil and Palantir that are aligned with Musk and with Musk's erstwhile partner, sometimes competitor, Peter Thiel, who could really use a view of their competition that only regulators can possess. And you could also imagine it's an opportunity to arbitrage this data to other companies that might wish to seek a competitive advantage that they could not otherwise get and all of this at taxpayer expense. Finally, while the database itself is geared toward material for the export market, people familiar with the database tell me that it's very often a kind of chocolate in the domestic peanut butter situation, export chocolate in the domestic peanut butter in the sense that like, you know, Boeing or Lockheed, might make the same kind of rocket part for the export market that it also sells to the defense department. That's something else that Musk could conceivably see and could conceivably engineer

the replacement of. And this database is sensitive enough that a lot of the stuff in it isn't even known to Congress? That's correct, particularly the compliance investigations. Because compliance investigation in like a regulatory context isn't necessarily malfeasance. It's not like a criminal investigation. It could be if it gets to that point. But the point is, is stuff like that, which could potentially be prejudicial, isn't disclosed to Congress. And who is in charge of this database? Who manages it? Is it State Department, Department of Defense? So the Department of Defense controls, there's a technical office within the Department of Defense called GITSA, which controls technical access. There's another department in the State Department, which issues the licenses for everything

that goes on into the database that has a substantial amount of both oversight over in. This into it. It's called DTTC within the Bureau of Political Military Affairs. And there are also contributions from the Commerce Department and the Treasury Department for other aspects of export licensing. So are you telling me that the worry is that Pete Hegseth and Marco Rubio will just let Elon Musk into this database? Because I find that hard to believe, Spencer. I mean, particularly now with the executive order that came out last night that's ordering the government to cooperate with Doge. This is what caused a number of of people familiar with this database. Once they were hearing from their colleagues, one of them

told me it's chaos at DDTC right now, that this could very quickly become a vulnerability to Doge and a corruption opportunity like few others at scale from Musk. Unbelievable. I want to pivot a little bit to something else you wrote that I found absolutely fascinating. And it's something I haven't seen talked about much elsewhere, if at all. And you mentioned Peter Thiel and Palantir earlier. This piece that you wrote concerns J.D. Vance's little European tour that he was just on, during which he gave a speech in Munich that actually was widely covered, mainly because it had some of the more remarkably pro-No-Nazi oratory we've seen in some time. But before that, he gave a speech in Paris about artificial intelligence, and you wrote a piece talking about how that we need to take these two

speeches together to really show what the 2025-era MAGA agenda is. yourself, sir. Sure. So I really recommend everyone who's listening to this podcast to check out this speech Vance gave in Paris. It was at an AI summit, in which Vance operated as an emissary for the massive American investment in artificial intelligence. And the main aspect of his pitch was that Europe has grown too cautious about what it is willing to permit in terms of, of the development of AI. So most people, you know, observing the AI industry and it's very rapid development, all at enormous taxpayer subsidy, right? We are talking tens of billions of dollars poured into AI thanks to the Biden administration. We're looking at that and lots of

questions about what will the boundaries of AI be, how rapacious will this new technology be over existing industries, over worker protections, and so on, over the basic existence of lots and lots of jobs that you can imagine capitalists are salivating at the prospect of reducing labor costs over outright eliminating. And Vance's message to Europe, the Europe that a couple days later, it will say has rapidly divorced itself from shared transatlantic values because none of its parties are willing to coalition with neo-Nazis like the AFD in Germany. What Vance's message to Europe is, stop being so cautious. What is that actually mean?

That means allow more American AI companies access over enormous amounts of data that you keep that can be used to train these gigantic models. As well, when he gets specific, he talks about getting rid of the big post-Snowden European data privacy law, whose acronym I'm always going to magnetel, so I'm not even going to say, but it's the four-letter one. GDPR? Thank you, yes, GDPR. And so that's like a flashing red light. GDPR is not the strongest privacy law that is. It's nevertheless something that, on the one hand, is premised on the idea that you ought to have some control over the data you generate as inevitably you will when engaging with the 21st century capitalist economy, but also a way of

American companies not being able to siphon everything they would want from European data. So that's sort of Musk talking, I'm sorry, that's Vance talking on behalf of the both AI incumbents and the AI startups, one of which is GROC, which Musk is creating. Beyond that, Vance feels the need to kind of suggest that they're unbridled and, as he likes to put it, lack of concern with caution, development of AI will nevertheless not displace the noble American or European worker. There's absolutely no theory of the case whereby that isn't exactly what it does. This is a thing that will be available to capitalists, not to workers. Musk, I'm sorry, again, I did that, pardon me, Vance spoke about it in terms of the work that

people produce can't be replaced. Well, tell that to the previous round of capitalist automation. That's exactly what happened. And in places like the communities that Vance comes from. And then furthermore, he says that labor will be a part of the control boards that Trump will create and put in place. Well, look, that's going to be Sean O'Brien from the Teamsters, I bet, because O'Brien is the one who sidles up to Maga the closest.

And then second of all, it would be like putting a cow on the board of McDonald's. Right. Whatever it is that this, you know, labor representation will put forward will bear no resemblance to how the capitalist will use it in practice over the main element that he seeks to get his cost down on, which is labor. And compared, you know, looked at as well with the Trump moves to neutralize the national the Labor Relations Board, I would not put a lot of confidence in institutional protections around AI that Vance is putting forward. But when you look at that speech in combination with the ways in

which that Vance is describing the future of U.S. European security cooperation, he essentially pivots that security cooperation around this question of shared values and caches that out in terms of quote unquote free speech by which he means the willingness of these publics to accept their Nazi-derived political parties like, you know, most importantly, AFD in Germany. What this looks like is a future in which the United States on Europe, you saw some of this in the first Trump administration, but now that there's this added element of capital that's the characteristic probably of Trump's second term, you've got to provide both democratic legitimacy in the form of the acceptance of these extreme right parties. And you've got to

to open up your markets once these parties achieve power or joining coalitions with existing power to these companies of which the Trump administration is quite clearly playing favorites. That's going to be what the criterion for transatlantic security becomes. It's rent-seeking, for instance. It is a transformation of what admittedly is not a very successful, certainly presently, security structure in which a lot of people have legitimate questions about what it's there to do. But it doesn't resolve those legitimate questions. It makes them all worse by exacerbating the problem of not just a security guarantee for Europe, but one premised on the most rapacious

elements of European politics preying on the rest of it and permitting those American analogs in American capitalism currently favored by the in-power MAGIFPAT. action with rapacious access to the resource of Europeans' data, which is also to say privacy. We have like three minutes left, but I want to hit on the fact that you twice said Musk instead of Vance. And there's a reason I want to hit on that because there's a very telling line in your piece about this where you write Vance as a political figure is much closer to the constellation of capitalist forces Musk represents than Trump is. I thought that was such a key line as to where this MAGA experiment is headed in the future.

So talk about that a little bit, which is basically what you'd been doing. But talk about how what we're really seeing here is we keep talking about Trump 2.0, but we're kind of seeing a MAGA 2.0. And one vid is that you said very much a captive of these forces that people like Musk and Teal and Vance represent. Yeah. So it's well known that Teal, and his other Silicon Valley oligarchic allies funded Vance's Senate run in Ohio and basically took

this figure that had risen to national prominence on the back of liberal pity about what was happening in Appalachia without actually addressing materially the devastation of Appalachia and recognized that this would be an exceptionally appealing vessel for the kind of rapacious oligarchic political economy that will benefit the teals and the musks and so forth. Now, your mileage may vary about how charismatic and appealing a figure J.D. Vance is, but, like, as a matter of a bet paying off, it paid off extremely well, where Vance is now the next person in line of the presidential succession. Whatever will happen with Trump, you know, long live the king as he tweeted the other day, asserting his, you know, alleged right to a third term or whatever, there's no constitutional

prohibition on J.D. Vance, making himself the heir apparent. He can unequivocally run for the presidency twice. And so it makes him a very viable figure for the, sorry to use this word so much, but the oligarchic elements that are behind this version of the Trump administration. This is a viable pathways is what I'm pointing out. And the point of that piece was to look at these two major speeches that are part of this guy's first foreign tour as a way of setting up where his politics and his agenda on behalf of these figures seem to be coalescing. Yeah. And that's why, like I said, I read your piece. And it doesn't feel like something that's being talked about enough. So I'm so glad that you wrote it. Spencer Ackerman, always a pleasure to have you on the show.

So listeners, if you're not subscribed to Forever Wars, I can't help you. You need to be subscribed to it. Spencer, thanks so much for coming back, man. Hey, thanks so much, Andy. Appreciate it. Folks, I am very excited to welcome to the new abnormal. Christina Jimenez, who is the co-founder of United We Dream, a MacArthur Genius Fellow, and the author of the upcoming book, Dreaming of Home, How We Turn Fear, into Pride, Power, and Real Cheap. and the book is out April 29th, but you can pre-order it right now. Christina, it has been so long since I've been in conversation with you. And I want to start out with just saying that this

second Trump regime is creating a series of unrelenting, chaotic, overwhelming, executive orders that are just steeped in white nationalism and hatred. Hatred directed specifically towards a lot of groups, but really the undocumented people in this country. And I just want to get your thoughts on the breathtaking pace at which this administration is moving and the differences that you see from the first Trump term to now this second regime. It's great to be in this podcast, Danielle, and it's so good to be in conversation with you and your listeners. For me, this is personal. I grew up undocumented in New York, and I lived with the constant fear of eyes agents, picking us up arresting one of our family members, separating our families or coming home and not finding my parents.

This moment for me is not just outrageous. in the sense of how aggressive this administration has been and how undemocratic it is and all sorts of issues, but certainly on immigration. But it's heartbreaking because it is about my community, it's about my family, my brother who has DACA. And what we know with this administration is that everyone is a priority from deportation. In the first administration of Trump,

I was the executive director of United We Dream. and I was part of the work of defending, protecting undocumented communities, but also engaging with Congress to try to find a legislative solution that could protect people. What I could tell you is that there was some time that the administration took to really understand how to navigate governing within agencies, whether the Department of Homeland Security, the White House, and then in relationship to Congress. And what we are seeing now is just moving really fast and navigating governing actually in a way that it's unchecked and where no rules matter. So just like the overt defiance of our constitution of any check imbalance is gone.

So this administration now in the second round has come just emboldened. and we are seeing their results very, very fast. Like ICE agents abducting people all over the country, no one is safe. Workers are afraid to go to work. Farm workers in California and other places are afraid to show up. Students are afraid to go to school. Why? Because ICE agents are going everywhere.

Schools, churches, people's homes, in our neighborhoods. So just like the level of terror, has definitely escalated to a point that there is really no holding back and no hiding of the real intentions of the vision that they have, which is, you know, when they say make America great again, they are driving a white nationalist vision of this country, which means that, you know, people that look like me who are brown, who are immigrants, are not welcome here. And they want us out. I do think that the intensity is different, time, I think that they're knowledge of how to navigate and play and play with the different

tools that they have. It's better this time. But I will say that what has given me so much hope in the midst of such a fearful time, right, because every time I worry about my brother, I worry about my parents who are still not U.S. citizens, and I worry about undocumented people I know and the communities that I work with. But what we've seen is that people are coming together. people are exerting their rights. So all the work that we've been doing for so many years, organizing, it's working. And Americans from all backgrounds are reaching up to me and to other community leaders and their organization saying, how can we help? And so I know that this is, this is the potential and the America, the possible that I know, you know, it's really there. You use the word terror a few

times and I believe that that is the goal. The goal is to terrorize and overwhelm people into a state of hopelessness so that they feel like there are no options. They have no options and they have no pathway forward. I believe that we are here in this moment, not just because of the unrelenting desires of white supremacist rule that Donald Trump and MAGA, Republican, have, but also because of the inability of Democrats to really be able to message to the American people the importance of undocumented people in this country, the importance of immigration in this country and what truly does make us great. Donald Trump was able to weaponize, right, people's prejudice and their fear as a way to successfully win

a second term, which I don't think that he's ever going to let go of. So I wonder for you, what do you think that Democrats should have been doing? And what do you believe that they can do in this moment? Well, you know this from, you know, the many years that we know each other, Danielle, doing this work, that our movement has been quite independent and really calling on both parties to pass immigration reforms, to hold them accountable on their actions or lack of off on immigration. This is how our movement won't the Deferred Action for Child Hull Arrivals program in 2012, pushing Democrats, pushing President Obama at the time to fulfill on the campaign promises and the commitments that he had made to Latinate communities,

to immigrant voters, and to undocumented young people like myself who met with him when he was a senator. And what we learned from that work, Danielle, was that we needed to be relentless about fighting for our community and not yield our power to any of the parties. Because what we learned is that our issue in our communities was constantly used as a football. I will not see here to defend the Democrats' record on deportations either. When we were in the Obama administration, he drove breakthrough numbers of deportations in comparison to prior administration. before him. We even called him the porter-in-chief. Certainly, you know, I'm not saying here that Trump and Obama are in the same boat, certainly they are not. And Trump really holds central

a white nationalist vision and authoritarian vision of his leadership and the kind of regime that he wants to lead. We're certainly far, far from even evaluating these elected leaders in the same way. But what I will say about Democrats that it's been such a disappointment is that through this whole time, what they have done is actually caved in into Republicans' narratives and lies of criminalization. No Democrat has ever stood up to challenge this narrative and to actually drive a narrative that speaks about how actually immigrants are good for this country. Our history shows that.

Our economy shows that. But they've just been such a refusal to be outspoken about the truth and about the role of immigrants in our economy, in our society, and through our history. And the terms of the fight have been defined by Republicans. And so we have been in a situation where both parties have agreed to criminalize immigrants, have agreed to deportations, have agreed to family separations. and no party has actually moved forward not only on a vision that acknowledges the truth about the fact that we are a better country because of immigrants. We depend on immigrant labor and to

actually push for solutions. So when I think about the now, I think that the election showed not just an immigration, but on all of the issues that Democrats have just really lost touch with working class people. They have not engaged in really tapping and connecting with people's concerns and fears about the economy, about their jobs, about the prices of food, about access or lack of health care. And they have not engaged people in a way where they can feel like they can depend and or rely on political leaders and our government. So I definitely take the, you know, the results of the election as a pushback against the status quo that has failed people.

And I think where Democrats have an opportunity right now is to reconnect with working class voters, to be able to put forward a vision and a strategy for how to get there. And to show people, the reality is that we have a lot of opportunities at the local level, at the city level, at the state level, where governors, mayors and others can really show people that their government and that their political leaders can deliver for them. And on immigration in particular, I believe that this is an argument for our country to finally acknowledge the role of immigrants in this country. And that allowing undocumented people, who, by the way, for the most part, have been here over a decade or more years, to have a pathway to citizenship is not just the right thing to do morally, because clearly, you know, not everybody and very few people these days care of morals.

And so we're beyond that. But truly because it will be the best solution for our society and our economy. Because what we are seeing right now, these chaos that is being created by the Trump administration is going to actually expose. Like, as you are deporting workers, your food prices are going to get more expensive. Right. The thing is, Christina, they don't seem to care. We are so interconnected.

our lives, our fates are so interconnected with immigrants. And yet, as we are seeing folks be terrified and not go to work, ice trucks at farms and raiding factories, I feel like people are not going to get it until it impacts them. And usually when it impacts them economically, the thing that I want to get to before we wrap is particularly what has happened in New York, where New York City, I believe was, in fact, a sanctuary city. Mayor Eric Adams has recently sold out New York City to Donald Trump in order to save his own ass from federal charges. We are watching, right, like as our city is now being taken over by this kind of hateful

sentiment of opening up Rikers, for instance, to ICE. What do you think can be done? in New York? What should the governor be doing in order to keep New Yorkers safe? Danielle, I really appreciate this point because what you are naming here is just how much immigrants are just the scapegoat. They're trying to distract us from realizing that it's people like Trump and all of his friends who are the billioners who are taking away from all of us and destroying institutions, our policies, and our democracy. And so by blaming immigrants, by criminalizing people and pointing the finger our immigrants

is the way that they're trying to distract us. But I believe and what I have hope, and this relates to your question about New York, what I am hopeful about is that people are starting to notice, and organizers like myself and others across the country are doing the work to continue to raise awareness in our communities, that they are scapegoating and that this is really for us a moment to notice that they're trying to distract us from looking at the real enemy here, which is really Trump and millioners that are trying to accumulate power. And what you're seeing in New York, it's also someone in power that is trying to have used power,

like the mayor, trying to get favors by saying that he'll cooperate with the new administration And what I think needs to get done, it's very clear. Our state has passed already some of the robust policies that protect immigrant communities from deportation that make sure that we are not cooperating with ICE when people are showing up to a church, when people are showing up to a government building. And I think that the right thing to do here is for the mayor to resign, for the governor to call for that resignation. and to really support what New Yorkers and what the people of New York has set firmly time after time. That we are not going to criminalize immigrants in our state and that we're going to celebrate the role that immigrants play in our communities.

They are our neighbors. There are teachers. They're the folks that are supporting and fueling our economy. That's what our policies reflect right now. And we as voters, as residents of New York, as people from New York, need to make sure that our calling our representatives at the state level, at the city level, to ensure that these policies are upheld and that we do not cooperate with this chaos, division, and violence from the federal government.

A hundred percent. Well, Christina, I cannot thank you for your continued work and voice on this integral issue. We will continue checking in with you throughout the. the year to receive updates on one, how people can better get involved and engaged in protecting their communities and themselves. So I just want to, again, thank you for your time and remind folks that Christina's book, Dreaming of Home, How We Turn Fear into Pride, Power, and Real Change. And the book is out April 29th, but you can pre-order it now. Christina, thank you so much for making the time for the new.

abnormal. Really appreciate you. Thank you so much, Danielle. Danielle Moody. Andy leaving. Danielle, start us off. I was like, yes. I know, I know. Start us off with a bit of a hot off the presses as we record this bit of, fuck that guy.

I don't know what's wrong with me. Why I keep holding on to faith that people who continually show you who they are are going to act differently. But when Governor Kathy Hokel decided to call an emergency meeting with leaders in New York and advocates to discuss our current Maga Mayors situation, the fact that he is selling out New York City to Donald Trump to save his own ass, from opening Rikers to place undocumented individuals in as if they are some type of craven criminal, to giving up New York City's sex. sanctuary status, all of these things that mayor Eric Adams has been doing on top of, you know, fucking stealing from the people of New York, which is why he was brought up on federal charges anyway. I thought that maybe in this meeting, Governor Hokel would come out and have seen the light and have recognized that as governor of New York, that she actually has power to do something right to ensure the safety of the people of New York City from an obvious grifter who will do and say

anything in order to curry favor with Donald Trump. The man quoted from Mind Comph in one of his recent press conferences, albeit a wrong quote, but still quoted it nonetheless. So you would think with all this evidence that has been built up as tall as the tallest building in New York City that Governor Hockel would have come out of that meeting and said, you know what? He's out of here. But instead, breaking fucking news, she's a coward. And instead of removing Adams from office, which she has the authority to do as governor, this is what this feckless person is doing right now. So from the New York Times, it reads this. Governor Kathy Hokel intends to create new guardrails for the state to oversee the city's affairs amid Mayor Eric Adams' troubling behavior.

But she does not plan to remove him at this time. Hockel of New York plans to announce on Thursday that she will not exercise her authority to remove Mayor Eric Adams from office at this time, but we'll seek to impose strict, strict guardrails, and these are what is coming out of people familiar with her. And it was also, she met with Jeffries, Hakeem Jeffries, who came out and said, oh, he doesn't think that Eric Adams should be removed. And I'm just like, you know what, you all need to fucking go.

I am so done with these bullshit, fake-ass, quote-unquote, moderate Democrats that are selling us out and doing, nothing, nothing to defend us against fascism and to defend us against Adams who has sold this city out. So for that reason, Hockel, Jeffrey, Schumer, fuck all y'all. Like all of you can get it. Yeah, I don't really know how to add to that. I will endorse everything you just said. Thank you. Danielle Moody for mayor. Just saying. I will sponsor your bill. Why would you want that job? No, I do not want that job.

I will work for your campaign for free. Yeah, I looked at the full New York Times article and what these guardrails supposedly are. And honestly, they all seem like good things. It's just not enough right now. It's talking about creating a new state deputy inspector general dedicated to New York City, establishing a fund for the city controller, public advocate and city council speaker to hire outside council to sue the federal government if the mayor is unwilling to do so. That seems like a very key one given that Mayor Adams certainly ain't soon. in the federal government right now.

And fine. Like all of these are good and probably necessary right now. But they're not enough. The message here should have been, hey, we're Democrats. We're not like the Republicans. When we see a grifter, when we see someone perpetrating fraud on the voters, we get rid of them. We don't let them stay in office and elevate them the way the Republicans do. And instead, what Kathy Hockel has shown us for, I don't know, the hundred and

79 millionth time is that when it comes to stuff like this, the Democrats are at best barely better than the Republicans. So fuck all those guys you mentioned. So Andy, thank you for your endorsement. Who is your fuck that guy to end this week? I'm going to jump down to the state of Mississippi and highlight something that happened this week. And I don't know how much national coverage it's gotten. It's kind of a local story. But it's It was brought to my attention by some people on Blue Sky. And of all places, the British newspaper, the Independent, reported on it. And the British press has been sort of killing it when it comes to coverage of America in the Trump administration.

And this is sort of part of it. So a newspaper in Mississippi called the Clarksdale Press Register ran an editorial that criticized city officials in Clarksdale. And the city sued the paper over the editorial. So, A, fuck those guys because newspapers are allowed to run editorials critical of city governments. But even worse, a county court in Mississippi, without even having a hearing to address the allegations, ordered the newspaper to remove the column from its website, which the newspaper has now done because they sort of had. no choice. There is nothing that A, gives the city the right to legally demand a newspaper to take down an editorial, and B, gives a judge the power to agree with the city and tell a newspaper to take down an

editorial. And ironically, the editorial was basically about the fact that it criticized city officials for not notifying the public about a hearing, a hearing about tax increases. And the newspaper was saying, hey, you're supposed to let the public know about these hearings. The city claims that this is defamation, which, A, it's not because it's true, and B, it's not because you're public officials. And in fact, there was an affidavit submitted to the judge from a city clerk admitting that she failed to notify the media about the hearing, the media being the public in this case. They're literally admitting that they acted in the manner that the editorial laid out. And yet they sued for defamation. And yet a judge who,

I can only imagine got their law degree from like a box of count Chalkula. Because I cannot figure out how else a judge could make this ruling. So this is a really, really bad case. And the reason I want to highlight it is because on its own it's really bad. But I'm extremely worried that this is foreshadowing. And we've already seen a bunch of national media outlets caving to threats from Donald Trump, caving to threats from Elon Musk over lawsuits. And this ain't going to help.

And so I look at this and I look at the idea that a judge could make a ruling like this. And then I think about all the federal judges who have been appointed by Donald Trump, who really don't seem to care much about anything that it says in the Constitution and just want to push their ideologies. This is right now is a city, is a county in Mississippi. but I don't think it's going to be the last we hear about things like this where newspapers, where TV news shows, where things published by news organizations on the internet are going to be told they have to pull things down.

It's pretty damn scary. So to the city government of Clarksdale, fuck that guy. To the judge, who, again, I do not understand how she dresses her something. in the morning. Judge Crystal Wise Martin, fuck that guy. And to all the, I'm going to do a preemptive fuck that guy to all the future lawsuits we're going to see against newspapers that publish editorials that public figures decided they didn't like. At this point, it's just so obscene and is becoming increasingly the norm that you are going to continue to see media capitulate to these bullies in black robes that say that they are

judges. I don't know on what grounds you have as a judge to say to a newspaper to remove things that are true. It's just absolute and total bullshit. So fuck those guys. Andy, I'm sorry we have to do a fact check. You know, Counts is a hereditary term. And Count Chocula does have a law degree. Mm-mm. What? No, I'm kidding. Count Chocula has a law degree. I'm kidding. I'm kidding.

People will just come on this podcast and say anything. No, Count Chocula does not have a law degree. Count is a hereditary term that you inherit. It does not contradict that. He could have gone to law school, Andy, Jesus. I am just saying that Count Chocula does not have a, I've seen no evidence that Count Chocula has, first of all, has any kind of graduate degree, let alone a four-year degree. Next, you're trying to tell me the count on Sesame Street doesn't have an accounting degree.

Oh, my God. The dad jokes right now. Look. Look. The count on Sesame Street, and this is not meant to belittle him, and this is not a shot at him. He does good work. It's elementary school level work. Mm-hmm.

And that's fine. You know, that's what he was hired to do. But to extrapolate from that, that he must have. some degree in accounting or high finance or applied mathematics. I mean, Jesse, do you even hear what you're saying? Do you hear what you sound like right now? I live in a Doge world, buddy. That's what I'm saying.

I'm like, it sounds to me that he can absolutely work for Doge. We have no idea if he doesn't. Honestly. That's a fair point. We have no idea if he doesn't. That's a very fair point. He could be the Doge administrator for all we know. Because according to the administration, it's not Elon Musk.

Yeah. Listen, I saw Donald Trump and Elon say they don't know how long Elon's going to be there. The count from Sesame Street for Doge Administrator. For Doze Administrator. Get me a T-shirt. Let's get the hashtag going, people. Mm-mm. Oh, my God.

I think all of this really is because Jesse is very upset that the owner of the Bubba Gump shrimp company is buying Zero Bond at the nightclub that Mayor Adams and Jesse both frequent. where I will be rushing to our taping on Monday from. Hope you enjoy checking out this episode of The New Abnormal. We're back every Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday. If you enjoyed it, please share it with a friend and keep the conversation going. This podcast is a Daily Beast production with production by Jesse Cannon and Seamus Calder. Want more great listens?

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