The David Pakman Show - 10/16/25: Protests incoming, MAGA terrified, Bernie and AOC tell it like it is

Episode Date: October 16, 2025

-- On the Show: -- Representative-elect Adelita Grijalva, Democrat from Arizona's 7th congressional district, joins us to discuss the delay in her swearing-in and how it connects to the Republican effort to block the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files -- Donald Trump panics as the upcoming No Kings protests grow into potentially the largest demonstrations since his return to office, with Fox News hosts warning people to stay away -- Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent rants that peaceful No Kings protests threaten paychecks, exposing the administration’s paranoia and detachment from reality -- Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez warn that Trump’s one-year ACA subsidy plan is a political trap designed to spike premiums right after the midterms -- Trump rambles incoherently about Chuck Schumer, Venezuela, and nuclear wars, revealing confusion and delusion during a bizarre press event -- Trump slurs through donor remarks while bragging about multimillion-dollar checks and obsessing over White House décor -- Nancy Pelosi shuts down a right-wing reporter pushing a false January 6th conspiracy, calling out MAGA lies and refusing to play along with bad-faith attacks -- JD Vance defends GOP officials caught in a pro-Hitler group chat and falsely blames leftists for political violence -- On the Bonus Show: A judge halts Trump's shutdown layoffs, Capitol Police investigate a swastika found in a representative's office, the US revokes the visas of six foreigners over Charlie Kirk comments, and much more... 💳 PDS Debt: Get your free assessment & find the best option for you at https://pdsdebt.com/pakman ⚠️ Ground News: Get 40% OFF their unlimited access Vantage plan at https://ground.news/pakman 🛡️ Incogni lets you control your personal data! Get 60% off their annual plan: http://incogni.com/pakman 🥄 Use code PAKMAN for $5 off Magic Spoon at https://magicspoon.com/pakman -- Become a Member: https://davidpakman.com/membership -- Subscribe to our (FREE) Substack newsletter: https://davidpakman.substack.com -- Get David's Books: https://davidpakman.com/echo -- TDPS Subreddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/thedavidpakmanshow -- David on Bluesky: https://davidpakman.com/bluesky -- David on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow (00:00) Start (01:10) Trump panics over protests (06:21) Treasury official fears protests (11:19) Sanders/Ocasio-Cortez on healthcare trap (20:16) Trump rambling at press event (29:37) Trump slurs donor remarks (35:28) Adelita Grijalva interview (49:52) Pelosi shuts down reporter (54:42) JD Vance defends young Republicans    

The second no Kings protests are Saturday and the Trump administration is pretending not to care, but they're clearly panicking because these could be the biggest since Donald Trump came back to office. Now Fox News is already warning viewers to stay away. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had a meltdown about it. And meanwhile, Bernie Sanders and AOC did a town hall where they are tearing into the health care scam on CNN. We're going to break down all of it, including the delusion spreading through Trump's cabinet. And we will start with the desperate attempt to downplay what is coming this weekend. We're also going to speak to Adelita Grahalva who won her election, but Maga Mike Johnson

refuses to swear her in. I will ask her, does she ultimately plan to vote to release the Epstein files once she is sworn in? And lastly, J.D. Vance is covering for the I love Hitler leak saying these are just kids at the end of the day. All of that and more today. All right. All right.

The No King's protests are back this weekend and the Trump administration is both trying to project strength, but they are really terrified that these are going to be huge. Authoritarians don't like public displays of displeasure with what they are doing. And they will go to the ends of the earth to try to either prevent those protests from being public or from happening altogether if they can. Donald Trump is panicking about it. He said yesterday in the Oval Office with a very confused looking cash Patel standing over his right shoulder. They have their day coming up, but nobody is really going to be there.

Nobody is really going to be there. And of course, what Trump means is I hope nobody goes. stupid move. And they don't want to talk about it. You know, they have their day coming up. I hear very few people going to be there, by the way. But they have their day coming up. And they want to have their day in the sun. But they should really make a deal. So what we're doing, I mean, they call him Darth Vader, but he's actually a very nice person, Russell vote. But Russell vote is, is really terminating tremendous numbers of Democrat. Yeah, he's terminated, doing all sorts of termination.

For an administration that claims not to be worried about the No Kings protests, they are spending a lot of time and their media friends are spending a lot of time saying, oh, nobody's really going to go to this thing. Now, the truth is that we could see record turnout here. We're going to talk about the three and a half percent concept in a moment. And they are recruiting their media allies to try to convince people to stay home. Here is Sean Hannity after interviewing the Prince of Darkness, Stephen Miller. Here's Hannity doing his part to help the regime saying stay away from these rallies.

It's not a good idea. It's just just stay home. It'll be much better at home. Stephen Miller is with us. You know, I want to give some unsolicited advice because I love the people in this country. And in cities and towns around this country, they're going to have these no Kings rally. And to me, it has all the feel of the environment. in the summer of 2020, you know, the mostly peaceful riots where, you know, a couple of dozen

dead Americans, thousands of injured cops, billions in property damage, I would advise people, again, unsolicited, find out if there's a rally near where you are and stay away. I would hate to see innocent people hurt. Yep. Stay away. Definitely don't go. Don't make the protests big. Don't do any of that.

That's what we're hearing from the same network. Fox News that spent years glorifying the patriots who stormed the capital. Now they say stay home, keep it calm, keep it low key, they're scared. Now Hannity is is sort of giving away the game when he goes, if you want to understand what the No King's number two protests will be like on Saturday, think back to 2020. But you don't need to do that. If Hannity were honest, Hannity would say, hey, you can think back to a few months ago. first no kings protests, which were completely peaceful. If we want an assessment about how we expect

No Kings number two to go, we would say, well, how did no Kings number one go? And it was completely peaceful and they hate that. They rioted on January 6th. And on No Kings day one, we were completely peaceful. I stopped by a bunch of these different events. There was a police presence. The police didn't need to get involved. Now, can you find some anecdotal incident from some chapter protests? Probably, right? But these were almost completely, and I would argue, overwhelmingly peaceful protests. They know that massive peaceful protests destroy their narrative. And they show the country that we aren't as defeated as Trump wants us to be. They are scared for good reason. Because when we look at history, remember the 3.5% concept, it is believed that it takes about 3.5% of a population actively peacefully protesting, refusing to go along with what the regime is doing to affect change. 3.5%. In the United States, based on our population, that's about 12 million people. 12 million people showing up, marching, speaking out, no violence, no chaos, just visible and clear.

We didn't quite get to those numbers and no Kings number one, but the numbers were big and it got a ton of coverage. They know that if the turnout is a little bit bigger this time than it was last time, we're going to start getting for them dangerously close to that three and a half percent. So Trump is insisting the protests are going to be small. Sean Hannity is saying to people stay away because if even a fraction of this country actually shows up, it won't just be a protest. It could actually be a turning point.

And that is what really terrifies these people. It is not only Stephen Miller saying stay away agreeing with Sean Hannity. It is not only Hannity himself saying, saying stay away. It is not only Donald Trump saying these are going to be small. Even people who have no business talking about this stuff like Trump's treasury secretary are talking about the protests. I want to talk about that next. Scott Besson is Trump's treasury secretary.

You may recall, I famously sat next to him at dinner at Haleo in Washington, D.C. not long ago, not at the same table. He was adjacent to me at the next table over. He looked miserable, didn't say a word to the people he was dining with the entire time, ate his chicken fingers and then, no, he didn't have chicken fingers, but ate his food and then quietly left. He truly seems miserable. And he now is jumping in with what some are calling a.

psychotic episode live on stage over a protest over the forthcoming no king's day number two. He is taking a different approach than Trump's approach and Hannity's approach. Trump's approach was it's going to be really small, small. Hannity's approach was for safety, stay away. Bessence approaches. These are going to be far left, hardcore, unhinged protests. We're on day 15, and it doesn't look like there's any sign of a deal. Well, there's a thought out there that they're at least waiting to this crazy no-kings rally. They're crazy.

This weekend, which is going to be the farthest left, the hardest core, the most unhinged in the Democratic Party, which is, you know, a big title. And, you know, no kings equal no paychecks. We are paying our military today. the Pentagon went into a surplus funds and will be able to make the pay paychecks and you know they're terrified they're they're terrified and they're completely detached from reality they want to tell you things about no kings as if we couldn't just think back to a few months ago when we had a no king's day they they want to act like this is going to be it could be anything it could be completely whacked, anarchy, violence, the No King's Day already happened. And it was massive

and it was entirely peaceful. So either Scott Besson doesn't know that or he's pretending that he doesn't know that, which raises the question is he knowingly lying? Is he psychotic? What is the deal with Besson? And honestly, the bigger question is what is the Treasury Secretary doing talking about protests? His job is the economy. His job is, you know, he is not supposed to be focused on whatever delusions Donald Trump's staff dreams up to scare viewers, in this case of CNBC, sometimes it's Fox News. It's like if Janet Yellen had gotten up at a press conference and warned about Burning Man, for example, I think a lot of us would be saying, why is Janet Yellen talking about

this? And what does it even mean to say no Kings equals no paychecks? Is he suggesting that the people going don't have jobs? because they mostly do it's it's a weekend most people have weekends off not everybody not a lot of service workers of course but the whole point is we're going to reject authoritarianism that's the whole idea it's not about being far left it's not about being hardcore but these are people so deep in the cult that they hear no kings and they think oh my god they're coming for capitalism now there's no question that there are people who will be protesting this weekend

who are not so big on capitalism and that's fine. That's not really what the protests are about. What they are really afraid of here is the truth. And the truth is for millions of people to peacefully mobilize and say we don't want kings. We don't want authoritarianism. We want democracy. And if people stand up again, they won't be able to gaslight the country into silence. They are scared of that. and that is at the at the foundation of what terrifies them so much now the other side of this is that there are new objectively terrifying things happening that have developed since no kings number one and one of those is that in the midst of this government shutdown which is ongoing my dc trip is canceled for those that were wondering there was going to be this creator summit

in dc we've been talking about it on the award winning bonus show and um that's been canceled because of the shutdown. Oh, well, that's not really a big deal. But the big deal is that there are millions of people who may no longer be able to afford health care as a result of what's happening with the health care subsidies. Let's talk about the latest from Bernie and AOC on that. Yesterday, CNN did a town hall with Bernie Sanders, Senator and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a congresswoman. The topic of health care came up. And what I love about this is that Bernie and AOC are talking not an esoteric, theoretical, hypothetical terms. They are talking in practical, tangible language, number one, about what happens when people can no longer afford health care.

And number two, what that might mean for Republicans. And Bernie pointed out that under Donald Trump, health care premiums are skyrocketing. November 1st, which we're getting close to, is the start of open enrollment where people are going to be notified, people, myself as well, right, I, as a person with my own business, I buy a plan on the exchange. And last year, I gave you a report. I think my plan went from somewhere in the 600s a month or maybe 580 or something like that, up to 747 a month. This year, I am paying 747 a month. Same plan. plan didn't get any better, 747 a month. I am waiting November 1st to be told how much is my plan going to go up. And there are millions of Americans who will not be able to afford their plan

once they are notified how much more expensive it's going to get. Here's Bernie explaining this. I think the Republicans are catching on that you can't throw 15 million Americans off of the health care they have. And studies indicate that when you do that, some 50,000 Americans a year will die unnecessarily. And then on top of that, just in Vermont today, Caitlin, people in my state and all over this country are beginning to receive notices from insurance companies about what their new premiums will be if we do not stop what Trump is doing. In my state of Vermont, there are people today who receive notices that their premiums are going to quadruple quadruple, some less, three times.

In my state of Iran, and again, this is true in many parts of the country, middle-class families will be paying $50,000 a year for health care. Anyone think that's sane? It's not. Who can afford that? Republicans are catching on. They're playing a losing hand. They are going to come to the table finally and address the health care crisis. All right. So Bernie says Republicans are going to have no chance, no chance to get away with this and that they're going to have to address it. That, I mean, hopefully that is true

to a degree. But I think that Bernie might underestimate the willingness of Republicans to take a bet that they can just blame Democrats. And they're trying to blame Democrats saying this is the Democrat shut down and blah, blah, blah. Let's hear from Congresswoman AOC briefly here before getting get get getting back to the discussion aOC talking about how a one year extension on those health care subsidies would simply be laughable the end of december obviously open enrollment starts november 1st over in the house there are 14 house republicans who have said that they will sign on and they will vote for a one year extension of the subsidies house or house minority leader hakeem jeffreys said he thought that proposal was laughable do you think that's

laughable or is that something you could get behind yeah no let me tell you why it's laughable because it's cynical. Republicans want to sign on to just a one little extra year of these ACA subsidies. You want to know why? What's happening next year? Midterm elections. They want to extend these subsidies just a year extra

so that people don't realize the dupe that they are pulling on everyone so that they can all re-elect themselves and allow those things to expire the moment that they win re-election. And it is time to get politics out of what should be a guaranteed universal right in the United States of America, and that is health care. And so I will not accept a measly one-year acceptance of a measly one-year extension of the ACA. We need to make sure, and I, and as a member of the party, we put negotiations in the hands of our party's leadership with he's he says it's no it's no and we have to make sure that we are expanding and continuing

the fight and not allowing not falling for the fine print not falling for the tricks and not falling for the politics around this now there are some in the usual places on the internet saying aOC has sold out did you hear how she said hakeem jeffrey said no and we're going to be united behind Dakeem Jeffries. She is sold out to Democratic leadership. We'll put that aside for a second and just analyze it for what she's saying. It is a trap. Trump and his allies want voters to think that their health care is safe until the day after the midterms. And then subsidies will vanish and premiums will explode. They're running the same scam that they pulled with the tax cuts, which is you give temporary crumbs to everyday Americans and you do massive dumps of giveaways

for billionaires. And then when the bill comes due, like I said, an AOC knows it. When the bill comes due, they'll go, oh, Democrat mismanagement caused this. So Bernie's warning about it. AOC is warning, warning about it. This is healthcare as political blackmail. And at the end of the day, it is cynical, it is cruel, but it's classic magonomics. Pretend to help working people quietly load the gun.

gun pointed at their own wallets. And if the left can communicate that clearly that this is really about your money, your coverage, your family, and your health, the Republicans lose the argument. The question is, are Democrats able, equipped, and prepared to communicate about it appropriately? Democrats often don't communicate well, as we spoke about yesterday with Jake Ockincloss. Let's hope the answer is yes. But AOC and Bernie certainly communicating clearly here. Let me know what you think.

Send me an email info at David Pakman. The question is, will voters fall for the Republican scam on who really wants to protect your health care? The debt system in this country is a trap. Credit cards, collections, medical bills. It piles up. And once you're in it, they don't want you to get out. But you can take control back.

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You are 30 seconds away from starting that path to getting debt free. Get your free assessment. Find the best option for you right now at PDSdebt.com slash Pacman. The link is in the description. A pending Supreme Court case could strip our Fourth Amendment rights and allow immigration agents to come into our homes for any reason, no probable cause needed, all while Republicans try to twist things so that you think this is all great for America. This should be the biggest story in the U.S. right now, but it's almost impossible to keep

up with the millions of moves that Trump is making every single day. That's why ground news exists. Ground news is an app and website that exposes the blind spots and spin before it takes control of our opinions. Ground News is the smarter, more reliable way to stay informed when MAGA is banking on us getting distracted. I'm partnering up with Ground News to give you 40% off the same vantage plan that I use. So you'll pay only five bucks a month for all of their premium features. Just go to ground.news slash Pacman or use the code Pacman in the app when you sign up. The link is in the description or scan the QR code. This is pretty funny.

Trump finally appeared to address the issue of his brain and of IQ points, but he was trying to do it in a way to attack a Democrat. In this case, the Democrat is Chuck Schumer. Trump started talking about Schumer's IQ and said, I believe Schumer's losing IQ in real time. If it happened with me, Trump says, you'd know about it very quickly, to which I would say, we have noticed, sir. We are aware of it.

This is a Democrat Schumer shutdown. And he's trying to do it to get relevance back into the party because he's a loser. I've known him all his life. He's always been sort of a loser, but an intelligent one. But I think he's losing IQ points with time. I think that happens. I hope it hasn't happened with me. I know if it did, you guys will let me know about it very quickly.

Very quickly. Well, we have. We have. And we now have Governor Gavin Newsome, Senator Ruben Gallego, Governor J.B. Pritzker, a whole bunch of other people. I heard Heather Cox Richardson the other day saying something is going on with Trump's brain. And so it's less about IQ, but this is yet another one of those moments, more about cognition. It's another one of those moments where Donald Trump sort of ends up giving up the game on his biggest insecurities for all of the talk about how it's usually black women, he says,

are low IQ. He goes, Jasmine Crock, it's low IQ. AOC, who's not black but Hispanic. She's low IQ. But sometimes it's just Democrats. Chuck Schumer's losing IQ points. This as usual goes to one of Donald Trump's own insecurities. Trump's dad had dementia. And there is a degree to which these things are, it's not totally well understood, but they can run in families. And I don't know if hereditary is the right word, but where it makes sense Trump would be worried

about his big a brain based on family history. And the answer to Trump saying, I think if this happened to me, people will. would let me know, people have been trying to let Donald Trump know. Now, Trump later started talking about him being hard. Like he, he went on and on about how he's not soft. It was really, really weird. After Don in particular, he, I'll never forget Adam Shifty Schiff, a total crooked guy, lying in Congress, making up a phone conversation that I have with you, totally made up. Then when he heard it was taped, he wanted to disappear. And Nancy Pelosi went crazy because they wanted to impeach me based on the conversation that was made up.

When they heard the tape, everybody, you know, I won it unanimously in the Republican Party. I got every single vote, something that never happens. And I beat it. But think of it. They want to put my son in jail for something that they made up. So they know they made it up. And they say, he will serve the rest of his life in prison. These are sick, bad people.

And don't tell me about us going after them. If anything, we've been very, very soft. I wouldn't be that soft. I'll tell you that. Thank you very much, everybody. No softness from Trump whatsoever, figuratively, metaphorically, nor literally. And people around the country hearing that and going, what the hell is Donald Trump talking about?

Now, it then got authoritarian, as it often does. does when you put Trump together with his team of sycophants and dilettance. And Trump was asked after striking Venezuelan boats, Trump was asked, are you considering striking land on Venezuela? And Trump goes, well, I don't know that I want to say. Sounds like a yes. What's the next step in this war on cartels? And are you considering options, are you considering strikes on land?

Well, I don't want to tell you exactly, but we are certainly looking at land now because because we've got the sea very well under control. We've had a couple of days where there isn't a boat to be found. And I view that as a good thing, not a bad thing. But we had tremendous amounts coming in by boats, by very expensive boats. You know, they have a lot of money, very fast, very expensive boats that were pretty big. Big, fast, powerful boats. You look at it is every boat that we knock out, we save 25,000 American lives.

So every time you see a boat and you feel badly, you say, wow, that's rough. It is rough. But if you lose three people and save 25,000 people, these are people that are killing our population. Trump with a sort of demented utilitarianism, I do find myself. It's sort of like who cares about the law anymore these days, not the administration. But I do feel inclined just to mention that Donald Trump has absolutely no act of Congress to support any of this action against Venezuela.

unlawful. It's obviously disgraceful. And a reporter asked a pretty good question, which is why not just have the Coast Guard stop the boats? Like, why are we bombing boats off the coast of Venezuela? The Coast Guard is legally allowed to stop the boats and there's no question of legality there. And Trump goes, well, it's just not that effective. Mr. President, on Venezuelan's votes, I want to ask you, why not have the Coast Guard stop them, which it is empowered by law to do. You know, this way you can confirm who's on the boat and ensure that they're doing what they suspect.

Because we've been doing that for 30 years, and it has been totally ineffective. They have faster boats. Some of these boats are seriously, I mean, they're world-class speedboats, but they're not faster than missiles. But we've been trying to do that for years, and so much of the drugs, 25, 30 percent, would come in through the seas. You know, uh, I don't know why you wouldn't give the Nobel Peace Prize to the guy going, well, we're bombing the boats instead of stopping them because it's easier and the missiles are faster than the boats. Give this man a Nobel Peace Prize. Why wouldn't they? In another one of these strange moments of is he having a stroke. Donald Trump talked about a trade deal with India. I'm sorry, with Iran and Pakistan and talked about terror. tariffs to prevent war, I guess, it's very much unintelligible.

We tariffs are a very important tool for our defense, for our national security. If we don't have tariffs, we're not going to have national security. As an example, if you look at Pakistan and Iran, I told them, I was in the midst of negotiating a trade deal with, actually with Iran and Pakistan was going to be in line. And because of tariffs, they all want to negotiate much differently. We'll make it a good deal. And then anybody understanding this? I heard that they're shooting at each other.

And I said during one of my conversations, are you guys going to go to war? Two nuclear powers, we are thinking about, I said, here's the deal. You go to war, I'm going to put a 200% tariff. I'm going to stop you from doing any business in the United States. I said it to both of them. Within 24 hours, the war ended. That would have been a nuclear war. And again, the prime minister of Pakistan, who was here two weeks ago, said that that man saved

many millions of lives. I guess what Trump is saying is that tariffs prevented a nuclear war. Your mileage may vary with that as a technique. Finally, in a horrible moment, Trump turns to Newt Gingrich and says, Newt, You agree I won Georgia in 2020, right? No matter what the election results say, good, because otherwise I would have you fired. And everybody has a good time. But this is the, this is the loyalty test that we've been talking about.

By the way, you won Georgia three times. Yeah, I agree with me? I do. For someone that he's a lot of time in Georgia, I believe you won that. I really have a question. You know, the word believe isn't strong enough, right? You know. So here he's talking to Brian.

Glenn Marjorie Taylor Green's boyfriend, but now he turns to Newt. It's true. I know I want, too. Oh, we have the great Newt Gingrich. Newt, you agree with us? Good. Otherwise, I'd have him dismissed immediately from, you know, his wife, as you know, is becoming an ambassador to a great country, Callista. So congratulations. And we're going to take a picture. And the only reason I'm doing, he speaks so well of me. Yep. He said, I'll go down as the greatest president and history. And then And he blew it. He said, I'm not sure if I put him above Washington or Lincoln.

So I'm not that happy about that, dude. This is a, it's sort of joking, but this is cronyism. These are the loyalty tests. Mute. You believe I won Georgia in 2020, right? You do? Well, then your wife gets, gets an ambassadorship. This is how Trump operates.

He's doing it in a plain daylight. And he's getting away with it because nothing and no one seems to have the teeth to stop him. All right, the bribes are just pouring in to Donald Trump and he is bragging about it yesterday speaking in the East Room of the White House and talking about how people were desperate to give him 25 million bucks just pouring money upon him. Why do I feel like this clip might be evidence in a future criminal trial? Oh, wait, no, that would be only if we had a function. justice system.

I mean, I have so many friends and so many of you have been really, really generous. I mean, a couple of you I'm sitting here saying, sir, would $25 million be appropriate? They said, I'll take it. I mean, I have so many friends and so many really. Would 25 million be okay with you? And I would love that. I would love that. Donald Trump also pointing out.

I guess yesterday was the sort of like just admit everything, don't cover it up anymore. Trump admitting that there are people who, for whatever reason, even. though they didn't support him in 2024, suddenly they're on his side. And of course, this is the way authoritarian's work. You'd better come over to my side or it'll get really ugly for you. If you're Mark Zuckerberg, for example, or Trump's political adversaries or whoever, and he's saying it all in broad daylight, victory changes minds when people are terrified about your dictatorial ambitions.

Three years ago, four years ago, it developed spirit of November. 5th where a lot of you were with me. Some of you weren't, but you quickly became with me. It's amazing the way a victory can change the minds of some people. Oh, yeah. But most of you were with me. And Pepe, you were fantastic. He's got a little sugar business. He has a monopoly. He has a monopoly on the world's sugar. I would say that's a good business. I know nothing about sugar, but I would say a monopoly on sugar is pretty good, Pepe. Monoplies are good if they're your friends, obviously. Trump then adopting the persona of of dementia j trump a character that we have come to know very very well talking about the lincoln bedroom

little things like at the lincoln bedroom the bathroom was done by the truman family and you know long time ago and it's done in a green tile and it's done as a uh in a style that was not exactly a lincoln it's a style that's not good there you go very very important stuff and then also trump talking about the gold leaf that they have covered the Oval Office. They're all lit up and gorgeous and perfect and we take good care of it too. Wasn't taking good care of the Oval Office is now at a level that it's never seen before. We take really great care of it. They weren't taking good care of it for four years, I'll tell you that. Yep. The White House had no gold paint on it while Biden was president. And by the way,

that's true. I was in I was in the Oval Office when Biden was president. It didn't look tacky. it just looked nice and now it is covered in gold paint and finally donald trump continuing his obsession with legacy and his delusions of grandeur holding up the i guess we're calling this the ark de trump uh i guess it's a model of something they are going to build for trump i i don't know uh and it reminds me quite frankly it reminds me of when hitler would sort of preside over little models of what Berlin or Munich would look like. So it's Lady Liberty, Lady to the other year of language, ladies on top. But, so the sizes would be very different.

And this is the same thing. And this is sort of place in this way. Trump is showing people little models of the things he wants to build. This is where we are, folks. And so we have to direct line. They did this and to that. So this would be, you know, small medium and life. This is, you know, people in the room are laughing.

This is, this is humiliating to see. And it's a reminder that Trump doesn't really want to be president. He wants to be real estate guy at the end of the day. He wants to build and do development and the stuff he was able to do thanks to his. his daddy's money, but he doesn't want to be president. And you can tell because he's barely doing it. Make sure that you are subscribed on the YouTube channel, YouTube.com slash the David Packman show Adelita Grahalva will join me next.

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This gives them a unique level of credibility. Try Incogni risk-free and get 60% off when you go to incogny.com slash Pacman and use the code Packman. The link is in the description. It is great to welcome to the program today, representative elect for Arizona 7th congressional district at Alita Grahalva. I can't think of a better day to talk to you than today, although any day would be fine, but today, today is a good day to talk to you because the delay of your being sworn in in the House of Representatives is sort of taking on a life of its own with conversations and questions as to why are you not being sworn in? Is it about the Epstein files? And there's all of these different questions that I want to unpack with you.

So let's maybe start at the top. Have you spoken to House leadership, Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson? What reason have you been given as to why you are not being sworn in? So we've had no communication with Speaker Johnson at all. So initially, Initially, I called and left a message that we sent a letter last Monday, and then yesterday before yesterday, our attorney general sent a letter from Arizona. So there has been no communication. The only thing I hear is comments, you know, some flippant little comments every now and again through media sources.

And then leader Jeffries has reached out to try to, you know, there was a comment made. Well, whenever she wants to get sworn in, she can get sworn in. So leader Jeffrey's office jumped on it right away. And then immediately there was backtracking on that comment is to go through it in layers. You have no reason to believe anybody is questioning the legitimacy of your election victory, right? Like they're not going that far. No. Initially, the comment was made.

Well, the race needs to be certified. Okay. The, you know, hypocrisy of that. statement was short, you know, it happened right away because there are two Republicans that were sworn in with, you know, elected on April 1st, sworn in on April 2nd in a pro forma session less than 24 hours from their election, two Republicans from Florida, Petronus and Fine, and then their representative Watkinshaw was elected and sworn in less than 24 hours later. So those are the three that this speaker, that's sort of the precedent that this speaker has set.

And so with me, I assumed, you know, votes were canceled on the 29th and 30th, which were the next few votes after I got elected. And I thought, okay, fine, it'll be October 7th. This speaker is choosing to close the house. But there is absolutely no reason for the house to be closed right now. And so the excuses are just that. They're just excuses. My race was certified 70% of the vote, nearly 70% of almost 40 points ahead of my nearest opponent. So there's no argument.

I won. The big question everybody has is whether this is an attempt to delay of signing of the discharge petition with regard to the Epstein files. Now, of course, the speculation is if given the opportunity, you would take every vote and every opportunity to release those files. Is it your intention when you were ultimately sworn in to work for the release of the Epstein files? In other words, are they right that you would vote in that way?

Oh, I absolutely would. And I would be the 218th signer, which is the vote needed to, you know, push a vote on the floor over the Epstein files. So initially, it was interesting because on my victory night, like the celebration, somebody came up to me and said, you know, he's not going to swear you in because of those Epstein files. And I thought, oh my gosh, that's a lot of conspiracy theory. But here we are.

I did not think that this would be on my bingo card to like people know me because I'm not working. But yeah, that's where we are. And I do believe that that's definitely what it is. I mean, if you look at what Trump did during the campaign. He promised on day one that those files would be released. And then I think they got a gander at what was in all of that information and thought better of it.

And so he started, Trump started to backtrack even before winning where on that infamous Fox News interview, they said MLK files, absolutely, JFK files, absolutely, Epstein files. And Trump said, yes, well, you know, that one's a little different. That told me everything I needed to know about ultimately he doesn't really want the. files out. Right. And the public wants them. It's this push for transparency that I think is really important. And also, more importantly, these victims deserve justice. And whomever is implicated in those files should have to deal with the consequences of what they did and the crimes that they committed. And then giving these victims an opportunity to be able to, you know, start to move

forward. I mean, I can only imagine how often this comment comes up. And if you are part, you are one of the victims, how it has to reopen wounds over and over again that have never healed. Now, the thing I, to be honest, don't really understand. Even Marjorie Taylor Green recently said, eventually you're going to get sworn in and you're going to be number 218 if you want to be. What is the point of delaying what might be? I don't know, a few. more weeks or maybe a little longer, like what, what do you believe is the point since inevitably this is going to happen? Well, I think what has been happening based on comments that have sort of been circulating

in the media is that Johnson has taken this time to try to convince one of the four Republicans to withdraw their names. Ah. So in other words, maybe they can, you would be 218, but they could cross someone else off the list and prevent it. They, they, they, they, they, they, they, you think they have a plan here to actually prevent the 218 from becoming a reality. Oh, I think so. And then this other argument that will oversight has the information. I talk to chair Garcia. That's, and he literally said, that's BS. We do not. Everything is redacted. We don't have all of the information and it needs

to get out. What, um, my audience increasingly is expecting. And I'm curious your thoughts is that, Yes, at some point, something that will be called the Epstein files will come out. But that between now and that point, a lot of damage will be done to expectations about transparency and believability. And so that whenever whatever they call the Epstein files come out, they will either be so highly redacted or incomplete as to be effectively useless or if the quote, real files do come out, Republicans will be ready to say, we don't even really trust that these are legitimate documents.

Do you think that either of those scenarios is likely or possible? Absolutely. Absolutely. I do. And more and more being here in Washington and seeing how like the truth is spun in some crazy ways. Like we, myself and members of the Democratic Women's Caucus march together to Speaker Johnson's office. There was an a frame, like one of those little, like little tiny a frames with a foam

sort of display on it. That was moved over to one side. There was a police officer there and he said, he put his hands on one of the members and she said, do not touch me. I'm a member of Congress. He moved to one side. We stood there at the podium, not at his door, and ended up going back out into the rotunda. And one of the spins I heard that that was like the January 6th and beige. I'm like, oh my gosh, we were literally there. I'm so glad that someone was filming the entire time because that's the kind of stuff that you just have to scratch your head and go, how does that come out of your mouth

with you having a straight face? I mean, have you been lying so often that you just don't even recognize the truth if it comes up invites you. Does this disillusion you in a sense? Like, you know, I know a lot of people who are running right now. Our friend Dan Co announced today that he's running for the seat that Seth Moulton is vacating in Massachusetts. And I'm just kind of in this mindset of I would be so disillusioned about my ability

to be an effective representative for my constituents, not because I don't want to be, not because they don't deserve it, but because of the dysfunction that it's taking place. I mean, is it you haven't even been sworn in yet. If I were you, I would be extraordinarily discouraged. You know, I'm very hopeful. I have been welcomed by every member of the Democratic caucus, the women's caucus, the Hispanic caucus, especially the Progressive Caucus, who supported me from very early on in our campaign. And there were a lot of really good people here that all they want to do is good work.

And I am very optimistic at the special that's coming up in November. and also for the midterms, because I do think that the general public can see that this is what is happening here is a complete attack on our democracy, like that Trump continues to be able to rewrite history, to manipulate information. I mean, a bedrock of our democracy is free and fair elections. And so if this speaker can do this to me, what will he do to others? And so what he has done by trying to obstruct my swearing in is really detrimental to him and any of the arguments that come up. Because even on my socials, which, you know, we have a lot more progressives than everybody else, at first they said, well, wait till her

race is certified. She's, you know, putting the cart before the horse. blah, blah, blah. So now it's certified. What are we waiting for? And I, we had a press conference with all of the Arizona delegate, Democratic delegation. Everyone was there with me. And the Hispanic caucus was there. And I really, who should have been there is everyone in our Arizona delegation. Because regardless of party, you should want the people in our state to be represented and have services. And that's the biggest issue. Right now I'm sitting in my dad's old office. It'll be mine for like the next 14 months or so, completely empty. I have phones that don't connect to anything. We have, you know, screens for computers with no computers. I have a key

to a space. That's it. And in district, you know, people are going up to my dad's old offices and pulling on the door asking for help. It breaks my heart that there is nobody there. I can't enter into leases. People can't just, you know, reopen an office. You need staff. Right. You need like all of the services available. Do you know that when I come into this building here at the Longworth, I stand in line through security. And people are like, aren't you a member of Congress? I'm like, apparently not yet. Because here I know. I can get into places with other members. You know, we had a big showing, walking down the steps of the Capitol.

I was stopped at security until AOC walked by and I was like, hey, can I hit your ride with you in because I can't get past. So having to be validated by other members who are so gracious, everyone has been so kind, staff has been so welcoming, but it is a reminder every day, every time I leave this building, that I am not a member, not until Johnson does his job. Bottom line, do you think when the shutdown ends, you'll be sworn in right away? I mean, is that going to kind of be the end of this? You know, if he doesn't, then they'll be, it'll help the legal case.

That's for sure. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, listen, we're watching it very closely and anxiously awaiting your swearing in and these subsequent votes. We've been speaking with representative elect for Arizona, 7th, Congress. congressional district at Alita Grahalva.

Thank you so much for your time. I know it's been busy and we're going to follow all of it. Thank you. Much. Our sponsor, Magic Spoon, has been with us a long time. They do the high protein zero sugar cereals and treats, nostalgically reinventing some of my favorite childhood snacks. Many of you know, for me, cereal was not breakfast.

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The question was, are you worried that you'll end up in trouble because you refused to deploy the National Guard on January 6th? And Pelosi turns around and says, shut up. I didn't do that. It's up to the president, not the Speaker of the House. and Maga are furious. Oh, she's treating the reporter so poorly. I will discuss that in a moment. Here is how the conversation went. Congressman Pelosi.

Are you at all concerned that the new January 6th committee will find you liable for that day? Are you at all concerned about the new January 6th committee finding you liable for that day? Why did you refuse the National Guard on January 6th? Shut up. I did not refuse the National Guard. The President didn't send it. send it. Why are you coming here with Republican talking points as if you're a serious journalist?

The American people want to know. We still have questions. Thank you. This grin on the face of the reporter, people who are watching the video see the reporter turned around and is now she's got this shit eating grin on her face. It tells you just about everything that this is about. Now, let's take it piece by piece. Without hesitating or appeasing, Nancy Pelosi cut through a bad faith tired argument in five seconds flat, which is it's not up to the speaker. It's up to the president. That's the factual part of it.

Now, of course, the right is furious because Nancy Pelosi was mean. She was nasty. She was unhinged because an 85 year old woman ambushed by this Smurf reporter wasn't willing to indulge the false premise of the question. And now they're saying it's bullying. Now, these are the same people who worship Trump for calling reporters disgusting and horrible and enemy of the people. They don't care about civility.

They care about control. And so people should be treated exactly as they deserve. If you are a reporter that asks Trump a follow-up question based in fact, and Trump says you're nasty and tries to get your press credentials stripped, we have a problem with that. If on the other hand, you are someone that just yells a conspiracy question at Nancy Pelosi on the street. She doesn't try to get you fired. She doesn't try to strip you of your credentials or livelihood.

But she says, shut up. The premise of your question is false. All of a sudden, now they're concerned. You can't debate people that are just lying to your face. And you shouldn't humor people that are pushing propaganda in this way to try to get. clicks and get a reaction. And you know, if you can make any criticism here of Nancy Pelosi, it's that she took the bait in a sense.

Part of what the reporter wanted, and you can tell that from that grin, is she wanted to trigger Nancy Pelosi and she succeeded in that way. But then they go and they say, oh, my goodness, she got so triggered. You got to shut him down quickly. And of course, it is a lie. Nancy Pelosi refusing the National Guard, refusing to deploy the National Guard on January 6th, is one of the most debunked myths of the entire January 6th narrative. It was Antifa debunked. The FBI set it up. Debunked. It was Nancy Pelosi who didn't deploy the National Guard completely and totally

debunked. It is not under the purview of the Speaker of the House. She had no authority to send troops. She had no authority to reject troops. That was Donald Trump's job. But MAGA doesn't like that. And so what MAGA does is they keep repeating the lie. And it gets some of their, uh, audience to believe it. They're angry. They're confused. And the most telling part of this clip is this last frame. The smug, self-satisfied little smirk after being publicly humiliated. It is theater. And it's the face of someone who knows she's lying, but I got a reaction from Nancy Pelosi. They want to be respected, but they're spreading misinformation. They want to be treated like journalists, but they're just propagandists at the end of the day. And so Nancy Pelosi, should she

have blown up or not? Let me know in the comment. Was Nancy Pelosi right or should she have maintained her composure? But she did treat this individual exactly how she deserves to be treated, which is you're a clown wasting our time about four years debunked conspiracy theories. cringe edge lord j d vance couldn't help himself and kind of self-cucked during a bizarre interview with real america's voice i'm going to explain yesterday we went over these leak text messages or telegram messages from uh local republican leaders where they said things such as i love hitler among others j d vans was asked about it and he just kind of goes, not a real issue, it's kids in a chat room.

By focusing on what kids are saying in a group chat, grow up, I'm sorry, focus on the real issues, don't focus on what kids say in group chats. But there's another angle to this that I just have to be honest about. I'm like an old guy at this one. I'm 41 years old. I have three kids. You know, I grew up in a different world, right? We're not most of what I, the stupid things that I did when I was a teenager and a young

adult, they're not on the internet. Like, I'm going to tell my kids, especially my boys, don't put things on the internet. Like, be careful with what you post. If you put something in a group chat, assume that some scumbag is going to leak it in an effort to try to cause you harm or cause your family harm. But the reality is that kids do stupid things, especially young boys, they tell edgy a few. Young boys, kids. Like, that's what kids do. And I really don't want us to grow up in a country where a kid telling a stupid joke, telling a very offensive stupid joke is caused to ruin their lives. And at some point, we're all going to have to say enough of this BS.

All right. So there's like 10 issues here. Now, when J.D. Van says, should we ruin someone's life over something they said as a little kid? Well, let's get to the little kid thing in a second. We're not necessarily talking about ruining lives, but the question is, should local Republican chapters and local Republican offices be led by people saying, I love Hitler in a group chat? It's not about ruining your life.

It should they be leading the Republican Party. But JD Vance is painting this like it was teenagers saying stupid stuff online. That is not what happened. These were not middle schoolers or high schoolers. These were state and local Republican leaders from young Republicans. They are directly connected to the Republican Party's national infrastructure. In fact, if JD Vance ends up being the future of MAGA and runs in 2028, it is likely that some of the people in this telegram saying stuff like, I Love Hitler, would be working for

J.D. Vance. The types of people. J.D. Vance wants you to believe that it's an 11-year-old video gamer who said the N-word while playing World of Warcraft. These are local Republican leaders, and they're the types of people that might run J.D. Vance's New Hampshire operation in a a 2028 campaign. They are chairs and vice chairs of young Republican chapters in Texas, Florida and New York. They are campaign staffers. They are consultants. They are aides to sitting Republican lawmakers.

In other words, it's the next generation of Republican leadership. Some of them are in their mid-30s. Joe Maligno, who's one of the people in the group chat, is 35 years old. Peter Junta is 31 years old. Trump does this too. Trump often will talk about his children and he'll go, you know, they're going after Don Jr. He's a, he's a good kid. He's a good kid. Don Jr. is like 46 years old or something like that. Hold on. Let me be precise. I always forget. 47 years old. And Trump goes whenever

they go out, these are kids, these are good kids. J.D. Vance didn't limit his inane and dilapidated commentary just to the Isle of Hitler chat. He also talked about political violence and he's continuing to insist most political violence comes from the left i know you all know this it does not that real unity comes from acknowledging the reality of the situation that we're in right unity requires everybody being on the same page having some common out commonality of values and and real unity requires us to acknowledge the fact that while yes there are crazies on both sides we have a country of 330 million people you're going to go to find crazies on either side political violence is just a statistical fact. It's a bigger problem on the left. And if you had, God forbid,

somebody on the left who was assassinated, yeah, I'm sure that you could find one person who would maybe celebrate it or one person who would be offensive. But the fact that it became mainstream to celebrate Charlie's death, to talk about the fact that he may be deserved to die because he had said hateful things like that just wasn't happening. It never became mainstream to celebrate Charlie Kirk's death. No serious left commentator celebrated his death. There were some people who made like random civilians who made social media posts, some of whom lost their jobs. It was never mainstream to celebrate Charlie Kirk's death. What is he talking about? But the real issue I have is that he's going back to this trope of most political violence in the U.S. is from the left. If you look at any

major data set, so you look at the FBI data, you go, oh, I don't like that. Well, look at the Department of Homeland security. Oh, I don't like that. Well, look at the ADL. I don't like the ADL. Look at CSIS. They all show the same thing. Right wing extremists are doing most American political violence in the United States. The ADL has it at over 75 percent of extremist murders came from the right, only four percent from the left. None of these are justified, but they're overwhelmingly from the right. CSIS says two thirds of terrorist plots or attack since 1994 were right wing. That's like 67% only 13% were left wing. We got to do away with the left wings one left wing ones too, but they're a much smaller

portion. You look at FBI or DHS data, both of them identify white supremacist and far right domestic terrorism as the most persistent and lethal threat to the country. They are lying about reality because reality makes them look really bad. And so the truth is think, think about the truth and the story J.D. Vance is telling you. The truth is most political violence is right wing in the United States and the people involved in the telegram chat are state and local Republican leaders and aides and staffers. J.D. Vance is telling you, these were kids in a chat room who's.

lives shouldn't be ruined and that most political violence is coming from the left. How do we come together and solve any problem in this country if we have one side that is giving you a version of reality that has no connection whatsoever to the facts? I would argue we can't. I don't know how we would do it. On the bonus show today, we will talk about visas getting revoked for foreigners, by the way, over comments they made about Charlie Kirk's death. We will talk about the U.S. Capitol police investigating a flag with a swastika in a Republican representative's office, and a judge has stopped Donald Trump's planned layoffs of federal workers during the shutdown saying they are against the law.

When has something being against the law ever stopped Donald Trump from doing it anyway? Well, we've got to consider that. But we will discuss all of those stories and more when producer Pat joins me on the bonus show. sign up at join packman.com and make sure you're also getting my free daily newsletter via substack, substack.davidpack.com. See you on the bonus show. New show tomorrow.