The David Pakman Show - 2/2/24: Biden's approval at 38%, everything is a psy-op to Republicans

Episode Date: February 2, 2024

-- On the Show: -- Producer Pat Ford fills in for David (on David’s 40th birthday) -- According to a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll, Joe Biden's job approval rating has dropped to 38% -- The House of Representatives passes a tax bill that would expand the child tax credit, but it may not pass the Senate due to Republicans worried it would make Joe Biden look good -- Florida Governor Ron DeSantis says Congresswoman Ilhan Omar should be expelled, denaturalized, and deported -- Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley appears on the Breakfast Club and answers questions about race and Donald Trump -- Donald Trump meets with the Teamsters union, hoping to secure their endorsement even though they'll likely support Joe Biden again -- Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claims the Trump campaign asked him to be Trump's running mate -- Republican politician Michael Cassidy is charged with a hate crime after destroying a satanic temple display in the Iowa state capitol -- Right-wingers claim that the Justice Department, Hollywood, and Taylor Swift are all part of a pro-Democrat and pro-Joe Biden psychological operation -- On the Bonus Show: Trump's legal fees draining his campaign funds, Florida House votes to loosen child labor laws, Trump botching his shot at appealing to women voters, and much more... 💪 Athletic Greens is offering FREE year-supply of Vitamin D at https://athleticgreens.com/pakman 💻 Stay protected! Try our sponsor Aura FREE for 2 weeks at https://aura.com/pakman 💻 Get Private Internet Access for 83% OFF + 4 months free at https://www.piavpn.com/David 🧻 Reel Paper: Code PAKMAN for 30% OFF + free shipping at https://reelpaper.com/pakman 🖥️ UPLIFT Desk: Get 5% OFF with code PAKMAN5 at https://upliftdesk.com/pakman -- Become a Supporter: http://www.davidpakman.com/membership -- Subscribe on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/thedavidpakmanshow -- Subscribe to Pakman Live: https://www.youtube.com/pakmanlive -- Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/davidpakmanshow -- Like us on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow -- Leave us a message at The David Pakman Show Voicemail Line (219)-2DAVIDP

Hello and welcome to the David Pakman show. I am producer Pat Ford filling in for David today. In fact, David is turning 40 today, so he is spending some time with the family, doing a little vacation. So everyone make sure to reach out to David and wish him a very happy birthday. A little programming note, Luke Beasley is going to be hosting the show on Monday and then David will be back on Tuesday. So let's get into some stories. There is this new Reuters Ipsos poll that shows that President Joe Biden's approval rating is sitting at a dismal 38% right now. Now, this particular poll had Biden at 40% approval back in December of 2023. So that shows that he has dropped another two points in the month of January.

President Biden, as we know, enjoyed very high approval numbers at the start of his presidency, high 50s, low 60s, depending on the poll. Of course, that was around the time that voters were very, very aware and focused on Trump's bogus voter fraud claims and the attempted coup against the country, which combined with a general sentiment that the country feels often, which is that we should give new presidents a chance. And that all contributed to Joe Biden's high poll numbers back then. However, ever since

Biden has been dealing with declining approval ratings, it's been below 50% on average ever since August 2021, which obviously is raising apprehensions within the Democratic Party regarding his reelection prospects in November. The poll asked voters about some specific issues as well, highlighting a notable uptick in concern about immigration. Many of these polls find that America views immigration as the number one issue in the country right now. 17% of respondents in this particular poll marked it as the most significant issue facing the United States. This represents an increase from 11% back in December, and it has been the primary concern for Republicans surpassing worries about the economy. Now, despite the

heightened concern about immigration, the economy retains its position as the foremost worry among Americans in this particular Reuters poll, with 22% of respondents expressing anxiety. This economic unease is linked to challenges such as inflation, lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and many other things. And even 47% of Democrats right now feel that America is on the wrong track. So when we look at all these numbers, it's obviously frustrating. You have to wonder how many of these respondents who say that they disapprove of Biden's job performance and they're very concerned about

the border and inflation, how many of those people know that Biden and Democrats actually had a tentative deal in place with Republicans to do something that was, by all accounts, pretty drastic on the topic of immigration until Donald Trump killed the bill because he wanted to keep it as an issue that he could campaign on. You also have to wonder how many of these respondents who said that they don't like Biden and they're concerned about the economy, how many of those respondents realize that there are plenty of other economic indicators that show that the economy is actually doing relatively strong. Surely inflation has been a concern over the past couple of years, but it has been under control now for many months. And we also know that Biden really isn't the person to blame when it comes to inflation. We should be pointing the finger at corporate greed, reluctance from the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates during the pandemic.

Even Trump's trade war contributed to inflation in this country, and inflation was something that was going on all around the world. So it doesn't really make all that much sense to say that Joe Biden is the reason for it. But I get it. People are often ignorant of these details, and the president tends to get the blame when it comes to economic struggles, even when it's undeserved. At this point, we have nine months to turn these numbers

around. Some people are saying that we need to switch out Biden for a different candidate. I don't believe that's going to happen, especially with voting already underway. He almost certainly will be the nominee unless he drops out over a health issue or something like that. I don't see that happening. I should also mention how Biden is doing in the aggregate polling. So we're not just looking at one particular poll and cherry picking, but the aggregate polling actually does paint a similar picture. Five thirty eight shows thirty nine point three percent support for Biden with fifty four percent. I'm sorry. Thirty nine point three percent support for Biden. Yes, that's correct. And then five point fifty four point five percent disapproving. And then looking at

Donald Trump's approval numbers, he has slightly better numbers. He has 43.1% favorability and 52.2% disapproving. And when it comes to the general election matchup of Biden versus Trump, most of the polls show Trump up slightly. The real clear politicsPolitics average is Trump up 1.7%. Now, that doesn't sound so bad, but remember, we pick presidents based on the Electoral College, and it's not based on the will of the people in this country. So we actually want to see Biden up a few percentage points going into Election Day because the Electoral College tends to favor Republicans. Remember, Hillary Clinton won the popular vote in 2016 by two percentage points, but she still lost the Electoral College rather decisively.

So this all suggests that there is work to be done. We need to make a stronger case on the economy. We need to make a stronger case on immigration. And whatever the top concerns of voters at any given time may be, we have to be vocal and talk about how Democrats are actually working to fix the problems, whereas Republicans are just trying to keep these as issues to run on in the 2024 election. We need to make sure that we have all of our surrogates on the ground. I'm talking Barack Obama, Gavin Newsom, Pete Buttigieg, Michelle Obama, maybe even pop

stars like Taylor Swift, who Republicans have been targeting recently. We're going to talk about her later on in the show. And we obviously have to make the case against Trump. It really shouldn't be all that hard to do. The guy, after all, risks going to prison in 2024. He's facing 91 felony counts. He tried to end the democratic process in the United States. He puts himself before the country time and time again. It really shouldn't be all that hard to defeat this guy,

but it doesn't mean that we can take it as a given, especially looking at these poll numbers. We're actually behind if you look at these poll numbers right now. So the hope is that as time goes on, as we get closer to the election, the gap between Biden and Trump will narrow as people start to pay more attention to the general election race. There's also that poll that shows that 20% of Americans, only 20%, would support Donald Trump if he's convicted of a felony. Now, if it actually happens, we may see higher support for him despite that because of the right-wing media sphere defending him at every turn, circling the wagons. So there is the potential that he is convicted this year at some point, and that dramatically reduces his chances at winning.

But we can't just assume that's going to happen, and we have to make sure that we're actively making the case for Joe Biden and for electing Democrats. So this may all sound like hopium. I understand. I'm not trying to get people high on hopium or anything like that. I'm just pointing out that while the numbers look concerning right now, we do have time to turn this thing around. But we have to take a multifaceted approach combined with circumstances outside of our

control like the Trump criminal trials. Things can turn around and we'll see if that does take place. Earlier this week, the House of Representatives passed a bipartisan tax bill aimed at expanding the child tax credit and reinstating certain business tax cuts. They passed it by a vote of 357 to 70. The $79 billion package was negotiated by Representative Jason Smith and Senator Ron Wyden, and it's facing challenges in the Senate where Republicans are raising concerns and demanding additional changes to the legislation just because it passed the House by a wide margin. That doesn't necessarily mean it will pass the Senate,

and we're going to discuss that component in a second here. So looking at the bill, the great news is that the child tax credit really was a focal point in this legislation. It would grow to $1,800 per child in 2023. Of course, that would be done retroactively because 2023 already happened, but people are starting to file their tax paperwork for the year 2023. So there is a sense of urgency when it comes to this. It would grow to $1,900 in 2024 and $2,000 in 2025 with adjustments for inflation over these next couple of years. The rest of the bill is more mixed with some wins for Democrats

here, some wins for Republicans there. Beyond child tax cut or credit expansion, the legislation provides tax benefits for natural disaster victims. It strengthens the low-income housing tax credit. It extends business tax breaks until 2025 and introduces benefits supporting trade with Taiwan. Now, there's also the component of SALT deductions. Those are state and local taxes, of course. The House proceeded with the deal without changes related to SALT. However, House leadership is working with blue state Republicans to introduce a standalone SALT relief bill. You may remember that when Trump passed his signature piece of tax legislation back in 2017, 2018, really the only thing that he did legislatively as president,

aside from the COVID era stuff, was this tax bill. And it changed around SALT deductions. It set a cap at $10,000 for the total amount that you could deduct of state and local property income and sales taxes to your federal taxes. He did that effectively to punish people who live in blue states. But these conservatives who live in blue states are upset, of course, with how this all works, and they want to make changes to that. I mentioned that the Wyden-Smith bill passed 357 to 70. 23 of those no votes came from Democrats. The overwhelming majority of the no votes, though, came from Republicans. They are arguing that the child tax credit is going to go to undocumented immigrants, even though there's no reason to believe that, of course, because undocumented immigrants don't have Social Security numbers.

So that's some more fear mongering there for you. There also has been some pushback from progressive lawmakers stating that it falls well short of expanding the tax credits to the degree that they want to see. And it gives disproportionate benefits to corporations. This is obviously something that we need to weigh out because just because you have something that you want in a child tax credit expansion, that doesn't necessarily mean it's worth giving up everything for. So you have to make sure that just like with any negotiation, that you're not giving up too much for what you want. The House Speaker, Mike Johnson, met with concerned lawmakers to address issues related to tax deductions, signaling ongoing discussions and potential adjustments to the bill.

We know that in recent weeks, Johnson has had to manage the interests of the far right, so-called Freedom Caucus, who want to obstruct government at every turn. They want to shut down the government constantly. He has to balance that with the interests of moderates who want to compromise with Democrats on certain issues and keep Washington functioning. If Johnson can't strike that balance, then he runs the risk of being ousted, just like former Speaker Kevin McCarthy was. And of course, we know that the margins over in the House Republican conference are very slim. So this is potentially risky for him. So the next step of this legislation is that it will need to pass the Senate.

And it has to deal with economics, this bill does. So that means that it would need 60 votes likely to pass through the Senate. One senator who appears reluctant to support the bill is Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley. He was candid with a reporter saying, quote, passing a tax bill that makes the president look good, mailing out checks before the election means he could be reelected and then we won't extend the 2017 tax cuts. Grassley was actually wrong about this because the bill does not include checks for Americans. What it does include is a tax credit. And I also don't remember Chuck Grassley making

this argument when Donald Trump was signing stimulus checks and sending them out to voters back in 2020. Certainly other Republicans may feel the same way. And we could see Donald Trump pressure Republicans in the Senate to not support this bill as to not give Biden a legislative victory so close to the election. He was able to exert his influence when it came to axing a bipartisan border deal very recently. And so he may be able to do that again when it comes to this piece of tax legislation. So on the one hand, this is a rare bipartisan piece of legislation with some tangible good in it passed by the House by a wide margin. So that provides me with some hope of

Democrats and Republicans coming together and doing right by the American people. But I don't think we can make that case just yet. I think we have to reserve judgment. We have to do a wait and see. We have to see if Trump pressures Senate Republicans, if they effectively kill the bill here in this country continues to get more and more polarized. But as of now, this looks like some pretty good news and we'll be following up on the developments. All right, let's go to a break now. We'll be back with much more of the David Pakman show right after this. Let me tell you about something I use every day just because it's a way I can simplify my life. And I'm looking for simple these days. I don't always perfectly plan every meal and calculate every vitamin and mineral and micro. I get close. But the reason I turn to our sponsor, AG1, is that it makes it easy every morning before my

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I recommend AG one to friends. Many of them have picked it up and love it. Try AG one. day. Pacman. That's drink agey. The number one dot com slash Pacman. The link is in the podcast notes. You may remember a few years ago, the show got hacked and several thousand dollars were stolen. We never got it back. But now I have a lot more peace of mind because we use aura. Our sponsor aura is the all in one tool to protect your online and financial accounts. Aura alerts you anytime your personal info is found on the dark web or in data breaches,

could be social security number, logins, financial accounts. You will get very fast alerts if a criminal does something like try to open up a bank account in your name, take out credit in your name. Aura will also monitor your bank accounts, your home and auto titles, which can help up Welcome back to The David Pakman Show. Producer Pat Ford here filling in for David today while he is spending some time with the family, enjoying himself and celebrating his birthday. Let's get into some more stories. So we have pitiful Florida Governor Ron DeSantis fresh off of dropping out of the presidential race and bending the knee to Donald Trump. He's trying to get back on the good side of the MAGA base, and he's doing so by taking the tried and tested approach of going full mask off racist and xenophobic. The

backstory here is that Congresswoman Ilhan Omar recently spoke to a group of Somali Americans in her home state of Minnesota, and she made the following statement in the Somali language during her speech. This is, by the way, a translation which will become relevant later, and she made the following statement in the Somali language during her speech. This is, by the way, a translation which will become relevant later, but she essentially said, quote, we as Somalians love each other. There are areas of friction that led us to kill each other, but in reality, we are an organized society, brothers and sisters, people of the same blood, people who know they are Somali first and Muslim second, who protect one another So I look at that quote, and I think it's rather benign. She's saying there are Somali interests, there are Muslim interests, and we need to prioritize them in a certain way.

But right-wingers in America are very, very upset that she didn't even mention America in that quote. And she didn't say that America comes first and then Somali interest comes second and then Muslim interest comes third. Apparently, that was what she was supposed to say, according to these right-wingers. Now, this is all despite the fact that her statement actually went along with what stated U.S. policy is. Omar was discussing a recent Ethiopian deal with the separatist region of Somaliland, which Somalia considers part of its own territory. Omar's opposition to the deal aligns directly with the stated position of the U.S. government,

which has said that Ethiopia's incursion into Somaliland could potentially destabilize the Horn of Africa. But the most important thing is, in that conversation of international affairs, she didn't say America first. So she wasn't being politically correct, I suppose, is the argument that right wingers are making, although they wouldn't use that term exactly. Because she left out America from the analysis and because she was talking about Somalia and Islam and didn't insert the United States into that conversation awkwardly, Ron DeSantis is saying that she needs to be kicked out of the country and get her citizenship revoked. He went on X and posted the following excretion along with a video clip of Ilhan Omar's speech.

He said, quote, expel from Congress, denaturalize, and deport. So let's first talk about how this is illogical and illegal, and then later we'll get into the xenophobic component. Expel her from Congress. Well, expulsions from Congress, as we learned recently with the George Santos affair, it's pretty rare. It doesn't happen too often. Usually it comes after serious criminal charges come the way of a lawmaker. Other members in the past have

been expelled for corruption, for supporting the Confederacy. So it's silly to think that Omar's comments reach that level, especially when after all, she was merely exercising her freedom of speech, which Republicans recently have pretended to care so much about. Of course, they do so selectively. And then there's the denaturalize and deport component that Ron DeSantis brought up. Well, the U.S. Constitution provides protections to American citizens, and any attempt to revoke citizenship and deport someone without proper legal procedures just can't take place. Certainly these statements don't come anywhere near the threshold you would need to revoke someone's citizenship.

It's just so ridiculous. Of course, I don't think that DeSantis is expecting that this is going to happen. And it's funny to see how quickly Republicans no longer stand for the principles of free speech and the Constitution when it is no longer convenient for them. When there's some other priority that they want to take precedent, they get deeply triggered also when someone appears to be slighting the country. And finally, there's the racist and xenophobic element when it comes to this story. Omar is black. She's Somali, she's Muslim. And, you know, are we to believe that if some white congressperson, Democrat or Republican, if they had said a similar message to a group of Irish Americans or German Americans or Italian Americans, that we would be hearing from Ron DeSantis right now about how that person has to be kicked out of the country

and have their citizenship revoked. Of course, we wouldn't be hearing that. Of course, he wouldn't make that case. So it's a subtle bigotry, right? It's much like during Trump's presidency when he attacked members of the squad saying that they all need to go back to their countries, even though they are Americans, just like the rest of us. They are U.S. citizens, members of Congress. Most of them were actually born in the United States anyway. But for whatever reason, I suppose because they have darker skin, Republicans feel totally fine saying that they need to leave America and go back to the countries of their ancestors.

In Republican circles, as long as you have a shred of plausibility, plausible deniability behind your racism, and as long as it's targeted against particular groups, you're able to get away with it. And sometimes not only get away with it, you can actually thrive on it. My sense is that this actually will help Ron DeSantis get back into the good graces of Trump supporters so he can remain in the conversation for the 2028 presidential race. Other Republicans are calling Omar's statements treason. The same Republicans, of course, who would provide cover for Donald Trump at every turn, including following the 2021 Capitol insurrection on January 6th. Are we to believe that that wasn't treason? But Ilhan Omar not mentioning America in a conversation about Somalia and Ethiopia and Islam, that does rise to the level of treason, but Ilhan Omar not mentioning America in a conversation about Somalia and

Ethiopia and Islam, that does rise to the level of treason. It's just on its face absurd. So this is the Republican Party, folks. This is 2024 for you. This is Ron DeSantis trying to get back as the good graces of Republicans after failing so much in the 2024 presidential race. It's pretty pathetic and it's pretty transparently xenophobic. Going now from a former 2024 Republican presidential candidate to a current 2024 Republican presidential candidate, Nikki Haley. Nikki Haley participated in an extensive interview this week on The Breakfast Club. It's a popular hip-hop morning show. I'm sure many of you are aware of it. It's one of these places that politicians will go when they want to appear more genuine, more candid.

And it does come with a risk, of course, because these hosts tend to not pull punches. They're more unpredictable. You don't exactly know what they're going to ask. Whereas when it comes to reporters in typical mainstream media circles, you can more easily anticipate what the questions are going to be. I'm going to show you some clips from this interview because I thought that it made Nikki Haley look bad, certainly during a number of moments. She did criticize Donald Trump throughout the interview, but the criticisms were largely pretty weak.

She didn't aggressively go after him as much as I would like to see, certainly. We know that in recent weeks she has been ramping up the rhetoric about Donald Trump's cognitive decline, but there were many places that she was just unwilling to go, including stating that Donald Trump is racist or occasionally will make a racist statement. The first such example is when Breakfast Club co-host Charlemagne Tha God questioned Haley about former President Donald Trump mocking her given name, Nimarata. Trump sometimes refers to her as Nimbra as a way to effectively point out to Republican voters that Haley is of Indian ancestry and is not white. So this was a perfect opportunity to criticize Donald Trump for the racist remark, but she didn't take it.

Do you think Trump mocking your birth name was racist? I mean, I think we can let other people decide that. I think, you know, you look at it and it's kind of like the Tim Scott you sleep with yourself. I mean, we'll let Donald Trump sleep with that all he wants. Oh, he don't care. He sleeps very good at night. And then that's why we need a new president. So Nikki Haley, not willing to go there, unwilling to say that Trump's remark was racist. I think she didn't want to say so for the very same reason that she didn't want to admit initially that the main cause

of the Civil War was slavery. She doesn't want to go there because she doesn't want to upset her constituency. She doesn't want to offend the people who she's trying to appeal to in the Republican electorate. Next up, we have Nikki Haley asked why the idea of Kamala Harris becoming president terrifies her. And without skipping a beat, she goes right into making a point about race. Basically, she says that Kamala is black and we recently had a black president in Barack Obama and he was divisive. Therefore, Kamala Harris would also be divisive if she was president.

So that's why we can apparently never have another black president again. Check this one out. Kamala, I want to ask why you said if Kamala was president, why would send chills down your spine? Sure, so a couple of things. I think with Obama, that was, if you go back,

that's when we really started to feel the division. That's when we were, it was. A lot of that was because of white supremacists, though. No, I think it was everything. Everything was exaggerated with the Obama administration. It became more about gender. It became more about race. It became more about separating americans instead

of bringing them together that was for the right-wing media though well they were they were scared to death of a black president look i don't think everybody is at fault i'm not saying that one person did this but i'm saying under that administration it really did cause some you just felt people felt like they were being put in camps through that administration. So she was asked about Kamala Harris there, and she went on and on about the Obama administration. So that was pretty strange. I'm also with Charlemagne on this one. It wasn't Obama himself who was divisive. He actually did make an attempt to unify the country, unlike Donald Trump, by the way. It was the right wing over the top reactions about him and his presidency. Everything that he did was the end of the world. The tan suit, the Dij. It was the right-wing, over-the-top reactions about him and his presidency.

Everything that he did was the end of the world. The tan suit, the Dijon mustard on the burger, everything was cause for a media circus within right-wing circles attacking Barack Obama nonstop. Donald Trump was part of that effort at the time as well. We have to remember the birtherism conspiracy theory that essentially launched his political career. Next, here is Nikki Haley responding to pushback over her recent comment that America has never been a racist country. I wonder, why can't politicians, Democrat and Republican, because we've all heard, we've heard you say America's never been a racist country. We've heard the vice president say that before. We've heard OG Jim Clyburn say that before. We've heard Tim Scott say that before.

Why can't Democrats and Republicans just be honest and tell people, hey, we can't have honest conversations about racism in this country because it's not a good electoral strategy. I mean, that's not why I do it. That's why. No. That's why everybody does it. I have talked about, look, I have talked about racism as it affected me

and how we need to get past it. I mean, keep it. You can't talk about it and say America's never been a race. You can't say America's never been a racist country, but then talk about the racism you've experienced. There is racism in our country. I don't think that our country was founded to be racist. I don't. I think that it was meant to be this amazing experiment to see if we could have freedom and democracy in a way that all

men are created equal. We are not there yet. But if you didn't look at all men as equal from the beginning, then the ideology is flawed. But why do you want kids to hear that they live in a racist country? Why can't you tell kids, look, we're not perfect and we have some more things to fix. I just, I don't want any child to think like that. I don't want any child to believe that they're disadvantaged from the second they're born. I didn't want to feel that. I don't think it's a disadvantage. I think if you tell somebody, I think if you tell somebody it's cold outside, you just, that just makes them put on a coat.

Well, that right there sounds to me like a feelings over facts argument that Haley is making. She seems more concerned with virtue signaling than actually getting to the truth of the matter, saying that, oh, we don't want to tell children that America is or has ever been a racist country. Of course, this was a wide-ranging interview, about an hour long. They got into policy discussions as well. There were some criticisms of Donald Trump here and there, just not the most powerful ones, in my opinion. I think the interview was worth checking out. But these were some of the highlights or should I say lowlights from the appearance. All right, let's go to another commercial break. We'll be back with much more of the David Pakman show after these commercial messages. The Household Product. You buy every week impact the environment.

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and my audience gets private Internet access for 83 percent off. This comes out to just two or three a month, plus four extra months for free. Go to PIA VPN dot com slash David. The link is in the podcast notes. Welcome back to the David Pakman show, producer Pat Ford here filling in for David while he's away. But fear not, David, we'll be back on Tuesday. Former President Donald Trump participated in a meeting this week with the Teamsters Union, of course led by President Sean O'Brien, in an effort to gain their endorsement and weaken one of President Joe Biden's key support bases. This comes on the heels of Sean Fain and the United Automobile Workers endorsing Joe Biden,

so Trump is trying to even the scorecard one-to-one. The meeting was held at the Teamsters headquarters in Washington, D.C. It included Trump, it included O'Brien, and plenty of other figures. Trump in the meeting expressed confidence in securing the Teamsters endorsement, highlighting the successes he believes that the union had under his administration. The Teamsters union endorsed Joe Biden, however, in 2020, and Biden was also invited to participate in a meeting with the Teamsters. The Biden campaign expressed eagerness to earn the union's endorsement for the upcoming election.

The Teamsters stated that the roundtable was an opportunity for candidates, including Trump and including Biden, to discuss how they could work collaboratively to empower workers, to protect workers, to discuss how they could work collaboratively to empower workers, to protect workers, to enhance labor standards and just overall improve the economy here in the United States. They also met with many of the lower tier presidential candidates. The Teamsters are known for typically supporting Democratic candidates, but they will assert that their members have a wide array of political backgrounds and affiliations. Teamsters President Sean O'Brien emphasized the importance of candidates of all stripes,

addressing the concerns of working people and highlighting the union's openness to hearing from candidates of all parties. Despite Trump's outreach, Joe Biden has already secured endorsements from plenty of other unions for the 2024 race, like the autoworkers, as I mentioned before. And it's likely he'll ultimately get the Teamsters endorsement as well. It looks like the union wanted to hear out Trump and these other candidates, but it seems to me like it's just lip service and they'll eventually support Joe Biden again. Biden, after all, has been one of the most, if not the most, pro-labor president in a long time, whereas Donald Trump did zip when it comes to collective bargaining here in the United States. Instead, he largely favored the interests of big business rather than the working person. Nevertheless, Trump realizes that it is politically beneficial to pretend like you're on the side of unions. That's why during the auto workers strike last year, Trump spoke to a group of non-union workers in Michigan who held up union members for Trump signs, thinking that he could bamboozle people, thinking that he could make it so that the American public thinks that unions are on the side of Trump when, in fact, they are by and large on the side of Joe Biden. It was actually Joe Biden who was putting pressure on the auto workers, on the auto industry, and actually stood alongside workers at the picket line in what was a presidential first. So even when the union inevitably endorses Joe Biden again, I think that Trump will show pictures from this Teamsters meeting and pretend like they endorsed him. He'll say something like, oh, well, even like the members of the union support me, even if the union bosses don't.

And sadly, those lies will work on some people. Trump spoke before the union in addition to having the meeting. And some of the questions got very off topic. Here's the former president getting defensive about his numerous civil and criminal trials. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure.

I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure.

I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I assume is what you're talking about. And we won that case largely in the Court of Appeals.

That's a ridiculous case. That case is a ridiculous case. We're appealing it. It is. She didn't know anything about me. She didn't know when it happened. There was nothing. People are looking at that case. It's a disgrace. We're appealing that case. We had a very hostile judge. We're appealing that case. It's a ridiculous case. Now here is Donald Trump taking a question about Iran and he starts talking about other countries, starts talking about inflation of all things, and he essentially makes the case that America wouldn't have any problems right now if Donald Trump was still president. It wouldn't have happened if I were in the White House. You would have never had this attack. You would have never had the attack on Israel. You would have never had the attack on

Ukraine. You would not have inflation that was, you know, just is destroying our country. The inflation is so bad. It never would have happened if I was still president. I think that's going to be the go to answer for Donald Trump over these next nine months before the general election. I find it laughable when it comes to all of the points that he raised. But it's especially ludicrous when he tries to make this case about the conflict in Israel right now. Are we supposed to believe that Hamas wouldn't have engaged in the October 7th attacks if Donald Trump was still president because, what, they would be too scared over Trump retaliating? That's an egregiously ignorant position to hold.

So bottom line, the Teamsters are hearing out different presidential candidates. They'll likely end up endorsing Joe Biden, and Trump will pretend as though they endorsed him instead. Like I said before, the United Auto Workers already endorsed Joe Biden. I believe we've shown you this before on the show, but let's play it again as a reminder why union workers should support Biden and not Trump. Let's hear it directly from Sean Fain, who leads the auto workers. He told Neil Cabuto and a Fox News audience something that they didn't want to hear quite recently. We had to look at a lot of things. And overall, you know, we just had our

contract fight with the big three and our most successful contract in history. And, you know, President Biden was standing, stood there with us on the picket line, you know, unlike President Trump back in 19 when GM was on strike for 40 days and he was completely non-existent and silent on the issue. You know, I can go down through the list of things, the difference in the candidates, but it's very clear to us who stands with working class people in this country and who stands against them. You know, your counterpart of the Teamsters, Sean O'Brien, has met with Donald Trump and, of course, the president,

all the major candidates when they were still in the race. You opted not to go that route, and I'm just curious as to why. Well, you look at the body of work. I'm not going to speak for President O'Brien, but I will speak for the UAW. In 2008, 2009, the economic recession, Donald Trump blamed the workers for what was wrong with these companies. In 2015, he talked about doing a rotation of good-paying jobs in the Midwest, somewhere where they'd pay less and have people begging for their jobs back at lower wages. In 19, also in 15, when Volkswagen workers voted to organize, he put an LRB in place that killed the organizing contract for those workers. You know, in 19, when he was president, he didn't support the strike.

He told workers at Lordstown Assembly Plant, which was closing, don't sell your houses. And then he did nothing to support them you know versus versus president biden who in 2023 when a plant was going to close in belvedere illinois for stelantis he stood with those workers he helped us save a community and helped bring not one plant but two plants back to life and he stood with our members on the picket line in our fight for economic justice i gotta say that is pretty brutal, but also pretty enjoyable to watch Sean Fain digging into Donald Trump in front of a Fox News audience. My hope is that when the Teamsters inevitably endorse Joe Biden, Sean O'Brien, the Teamsters president, will come out

and do the exact same thing that Sean Fain did, perhaps in front of a Fox News audience, go full on gloves off, just like he did in that Senate hearing with Senator Mark Wayne Mullen not so long ago. We anticipate that the Teamsters will endorse Biden, but Trump will take credit for it anyway, pretend like unions have his back when in fact they don't, and hopefully the American public doesn't fall for it. Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. claims that he was approached by Donald Trump's team back in April 2023 to be Donald Trump's running mate in the 2024 presidential election. The New York Post reported the alleged offer, citing anonymous sources. In an interview with News Nation, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. confirmed the overture, but stated that he is not interested

in serving as Donald Trump's vice president. He said, quote, I would not take that job, and I'm flattered that President Trump would offer it to me, but it's not something that I'm interested in. Notably, Kennedy's presidential campaign began in April 2023, so we don't know if the ask was made before or after he launched his campaign. We also know that, of course, in October of last year, Kennedy decided to pull out from the Democratic race in order to run as an independent. Now, the Trump campaign has denied that this took place. Senior Trump advisor Chris LaCivita firmly denied the report, saying that no one from the campaign approached Kennedy.

My sense is that the Trump campaign is lying about this, that they did approach Kennedy, but they got turned down, and so they want to save face. They don't want to admit that they asked Kennedy to be the VP, and he said no because that makes them look bad. Despite having ballot access in only two states, Kennedy has highlighted strong polling in three-way matchups against the likely candidates in the 2024 presidential race, Donald Trump and Joe Biden.

According to a recent Economist YouGov poll, Kennedy is among the best-liked national political figures, with 45% of Americans having a favorable opinion of him. Pretty funny how 45% support will make you one of the best-liked national political figures. However, this popularity has not translated into significant voter support. He could still play spoiler potentially, though, with a successful writing campaign. We believe at this point that Kennedy will take more votes away from Trump than Biden because Kennedy, despite being a longtime Democrat, his signature issue at this point and how he's gained prominence in recent years especially has been over vaccine skepticism and specifically COVID vaccine skepticism, which is far more prominent on the right these days. Now, the funny thing is that Trump apparently offering Kennedy the VP spot, they're very far apart when it comes to actual policy matters. Sure, they have some agreements here and there, but on the big issues, they are a lot different. Like on environmental policies, for example, RFK Jr. is known for his strong advocacy when it comes

to environmental protection, and he has been critical of policies that contribute to climate change. In contrast, Donald Trump has been skeptical about the impact of human activities on climate change, and he has pursued deregulation in the environmental sector, of course, pulling out of the Paris Climate Accord. On gun control, RFK Jr. has expressed support for stricter gun control measures to address gun violence. In contrast, Donald Trump has generally aligned with the pro-Second Amendment positions opposing extensive gun control measures. And on health care, RFK Jr. has advocated for broader access to health care and has been critical of certain aspects of the U.S. health care system, whereas Donald Trump during his presidency tried to

dismantle the Affordable Care Act, Obamacare, and kick a whole bunch of Americans off of their health insurance. Trump doesn't really care about policy, however. Neither do many Republican voters at this point. It's really just about getting Trump back into the White House for his ego. So my sense is that this move was just made for political purposes rather than any policy purposes. The effort was made to maybe pick up some votes from conservative Democrats and moderates. It wouldn't actually be about governing. It wouldn't actually be that he believes that RFK would be a good voice in his ear during a second administration.

I think Trump just liked the sound, by the way, of a Trump-Kennedy ticket. To me, it's not the craziest idea from a strategic standpoint. I've recently stated who I think that Trump should pick as his vice presidential candidate. We talked about it on a bonus show recently. I think the most strategic choices for Donald Trump would be Tulsi Gabbard, Vivek Ramaswamy, or Tucker Carlson. I think Tulsi would be a great pick for him because she's a former Democrat, so it would basically give credence to this idea that so many people on the left are defecting from the Democratic Party and coming over to the right. And she has built an audience in right-wing circles. She often goes on Fox News.

So the public already knows about her. She's already run for president before. So they know about her for that reason as well. She's a woman. She's a veteran. So I think she would be an effective pick for Donald Trump. Vivek Ramaswamy, of course, would be an effective pick for Donald Trump because he could serve as Trump's attack dog. He's articulate, whether you agree with him or not.

The MAGA base likes him because he didn't really criticize Donald Trump during his presidential campaign. And he's young, too, which is important in a race between two octogenarians. And Tucker Carlson would be a good pick in my mind because he would be an out-of-the-box pick. He's a non-politician. He's a media figure and someone that the base trusts and would be excited about. Will he pick any of these three people? Maybe. Maybe not. We'll have to see what happens. But, you know, the fact that he was considering RFK Jr.,

apparently, if we're to believe the reporting and what RFK is saying about this, then my sense is that he would be also open to these other out-of-the-box choices. We most likely have a long way to go before Donald Trump chooses his running mate. Typically, it occurs in the summertime before the election, so this may be a long ways away. But with Donald Trump chooses his running mate. Typically it occurs in the summertime before

the election. So this may be a long ways away. But with Donald Trump essentially being the presumed Republican nominee at this point, that is where the conversation is going to shift. All right, let's go to another break. We'll be back with much more of the David Pakman show right after this. When I'm doing any kind of my work prepping for the show, whatever it might be, I love a standing desk, an adjustable desk that can go up or down for sitting or standing. It gets the creative juices going. It's good for your health. There's really no substitute.

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That's U.P.L.I.F.T. Desk dot com slash Pacman. Then use the code Pacman five to get five percent off. The info is in the podcast notes. Welcome back to the show. So during the Christmas season, we brought to your attention on the bonus show, a story about how a satanic temple display was set up in Iowa's state capitol alongside the Christmas tree and alongside the menorah to ostensibly honor a satanic holiday. But actually, it's just to troll people and to make a statement about religious freedom in the United States and separation of church and state. The Supreme Court over the years has ruled that religious displays may be permissible on public lands if they are part of a broader holiday context and do not primarily endorse or promote a specific religion. But you have to also provide space for other religions if you're going to have a display dedicated to one religion.

Well, the Satanic Temple, they don't want religious displays on public grounds. And so to make their case, they put up a shrine and a statue of a baphomet, which is a creepy goat-like figure in the Iowa State Capitol building, basically saying that for as long as we're going to have to deal with seeing your Christmas trees and menorahs and other religious symbols on public lands, you're going to have to deal with seeing our Satan-worshipping symbols on public lands. Well, a politician from Mississippi, Michael Cassidy, he didn't like this and he realized that he could raise his public profile if he attacked the statue. And that's essentially what he did. He beheaded the Baphomet display on December 14th, apparently thinking that he was doing God's work or something. Well, this was illegal as it should be. It's destroying private property and it led to charges of fourth-degree criminal mischief. Michael Cassidy justified his actions at the time by saying that his

conscience is held captive to the word of God, not bureaucratic decree, which I suppose is fine, but you have to accept the consequences for that, right? If you're going to put your own religious beliefs ahead of the rule of law and the Constitution of the United States, then sure, that may be fine for some people with moral compasses, but you have to be able to accept the consequences, and you have to understand that this is unbecoming of someone who is trying to serve the public in official capacity, someone who's trying to become elected to public office. Well, the update on the story is that Polk County prosecutors have now upgraded the charges

against Cassidy to felony third-degree criminal mischief, citing a violation of individual rights under Iowa's hate crime statute. The charging document made public on Tuesday mentions Cassidy's statements to law enforcement and the public, and it indicates that he destroyed the public property because of the victim's religion, triggering the hate crime enhancement. So he was too honest with the public, he was too honest with law enforcement officers,

and it appears as though because of that honesty, he has dug himself into a deeper hole. Lynn Hicks, a spokesman for the Polk County Attorney's Office, explained that the cost to replace or repair the statue, estimated by the Satanic Temple, ranges from $750 to $1,500, making its destruction an aggravated misdemeanor. However, the charge is elevated to a felony

due to the hate crime statute, which focuses on the violation of individual rights based on the evidence of the defendant's actions. Cassidy's attorney, Sarah Pasquale, declines to comment on the new charges accusing the Satanic Temple of making premature filings designed to evoke strong emotions. Court records indicate that Cassidy is scheduled to be arraigned on February 15th, and he has raised over $84,000 for his legal defense from nearly 2,000 supporters through GiveSendGo. No surprise there.

So personally, I'm not the biggest proponent of having hate crime legislation. I think it's often gratuitous. I think it borders on being a thought crime to use an Orwellian term. The argument for them is that sometimes people aren't just committing an act against a specific person, but they're committing a violent act against a group overall. So that should carry with it extra charges for the added harm done to society. My sense on this is that if their motive is to attack a broader group, well, then we can address that in the sentencing phase of their trial and we can give them a more punitive sentence. It doesn't mean we necessarily have to tack on extra charges based on the motivations. But so long as this is the law, as long as we have hate crime laws on the books, it should be applied equally. It should be applied when someone attacks a Christian or a Christian

symbol or a Jew or a Jewish symbol or Muslim or Muslim symbol. And at the Iowa State Capitol, it was a satanic symbol that was attacked. And so you have to apply hate crime laws to that like you would any other religion. My sense is that Cassidy knew what he was doing with this move. Like he knew he was going to get charged. He knew he was going to get arrested for the property damage

and that would raise his public profile and that Republicans would love it. And he would maybe use it to get elected to public office. But he probably didn't anticipate hate crime charges. He probably didn't anticipate that it would blow up this much in his face. He probably thought, oh yeah, I'll pay a fine. I'll get a little slap on the wrist. And overall, it'll be a net positive for me.

I'm sure he's now reassessing his actions now that he's been hit with this hate crime charge. So we'll follow up on the case. Once again, the Republicans who claim to be for the Constitution and claim to be for the rule of law, they'll turn their back on those supposed principles whenever they want to accomplish some other feat. Right wingers in the United States are convinced that anything and everything these days is a psyop either to elect Joe Biden as president again, or just to make people more liberal in general. Recently, we heard about this when it comes to Taylor Swift, but apparently it also

is going on in Hollywood and it's happening at the U.S. Justice Department as well. For those of you who don't know, a PSYOP or psychological operation is a tactic that uses communication and propaganda to influence people's beliefs, emotions, and behavior in order to achieve specific objectives. This can be carried out by governments, military organizations, or other entities to shape opinions or perceptions. And it's become the flavor of the month for these conservatives to call everything a PSYOP. They can use it to explain away anything that they'd like to explain away, something going on in society that they don't like. They can just call it a PSYOP and be done with it.

So let's look at some recent examples. I'm first going to play a clip for you of Newsmax host Rob Schmidt saying that the investigations into Cori Bush, Bob Menendez, and Hunter Biden are all part of a PSYOP so that the Biden Justice Department can get away with prosecuting Donald Trump. Here is Rob Schmidt on Newsmax. Now these moves by the DOJ are the perfect way to keep the wool over the eyes of millions of unawake Americans, the ones still convinced to ignore a story when they all scream conspiracy theory and the media, which of course does the bidding of our government, is fully exploiting these Democrat indictments. From New York mag, Biden's weaponized Justice Department goes after another Democrat. Sleepy Joe is doing a terrible job targeting his

enemies, they say sarcastically. A wonderful psyop by the Department of Justice is happening in this election year. The DOJ going after some high profile newsmaking Democrats to dupe everybody into thinking that what's happening to former President Trump is somehow normal and credible and not strange. But at the end of the day, the DOJ is exactly what you think it is. You absolutely got to love this because when Donald Trump was getting charged left and right last year, the talking point from Republicans was that this is part of the weaponization of the Justice Department

and this has never happened before and this only ever happens to Republicans and it never happens to Democrats. Well, since Trump's indictments, we've heard about Hunter Biden being investigated and charged over tax and gun issues. We've seen New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez

facing bribery and corruption charges. And most recently, we've seen Cori Bush being investigated for hiring her husband for private security and allegedly misusing campaign funds. So that obviously all flies in the face of the argument that Trump is being targeted uniquely because he's Trump and because he is a

Republican and the Justice Department only goes after Republicans. So now they have shifted into saying that they are targeting Democrats too, but they're going to be lenient against those Democrats. And it's all part of a psyop to make it seem as though Lady Justice still wears a blindfold in this country. It's just so pathetic. But it's not just the Justice Department that is involved in a PSYOP. We also are getting it from the movie industry. Here is Turning Point USA's Charlie Kirk saying he doesn't watch movies anymore because they are all part of a psychological operation. By the way, this was in the context of a conversation where they were discussing

whether women can be good directors of movies. I'll leave that aside for the purposes of this commentary. But here is the revealing component where Charlie Kirk says that Hollywood movies are all part of a psyop. Apparently a woman won best director in 2020 and 2021. Jane Campion and Chloe Zhao. I don't really watch movies because they're all CIA tight ends, Travis Kelsey, will be playing in it. And he did an ad for Pfizer and he is dating Taylor Swift who is progressive and supports Joe Biden so apparently the Chiefs are going to win the Super Bowl and it will be followed by Travis Kelsey's proposing to Taylor Swift and then Swift is going to say

go vote for Joe Biden or something like that I could play a number of examples of Republicans claiming that this is going to take place. Here's one such example. Benny Johnson, conservative talk show host, offering his theory as to what's going to take place on Super Bowl Sunday. And you'll see in October the release of like a what will look like a hostage video or a visiting angels ad. Right. Visiting angels. And I'll have Joe Biden sitting there all like twisted up like a you know in a wheelchair like an eggplant and he's glazed over skin like a crispy cream donut they're drooling out of the side of his mouth and taylor swift and mr bud light pfizer

will come in and pat grandpa on the shoulder and tell all of their brain dead fans to go vote for him. Taylor Swift, of course, also a psyop for the NFL wives out there. All the moms who are like just not really watching the games, but maybe watching because of Taylor Swift. And then they tell their husbands, well, you better not vote against Trump. Taylor told me not to. And I saw her at the NFL game. You wouldn't want to cross your favorite team, would you? Just to guess.

Or it could all be totally authentic. This could be totally organic. It's all happening naturally. You know, watching that commentary, I'm getting the sense of someone who's just making stuff up as they go along. I suppose you can get away with that to some degree when it comes to the realm of speculation, when you're just operating on speculation and you're not actually basing your talking points on any facts. But to me, it just comes across as deeply unserious and disingenuous. So this is a psyop, that's a psyop. Apparently, the term is becoming the new woke. It's the new catch-all term. It's the new term you can slap a label on everything that you don't like

if you're part of the MAGA movement in this country. Part of me wonders how these people are able to keep a straight face as they say this stuff. But at the same time, I do wish that Democrats could be on the same page when it comes to political messaging in the way that Republicans are able to be so effective at it. Surely I would like us to do it when it comes to actually relevant political topics and policy issues here in the United States. Republicans do it for bogus, silly culture war things. But there is some aspect to it which I do sort of envy.

All right, that's going to do it for today's episode of The David Pakman Show. But the fun does not stop here. If you are a member, make sure to sign up for a membership at joinpakman.com, and then you'll get access to the bonus show. Have a great weekend everybody once again luke beasley is going to be hosting the show on monday and then david will be returning on tuesday happy birthday to david he's spending some time with the family enjoying himself i hope that he is celebrating his big day uh with with the people that he loves and enjoying the things that he likes

to do so that'll do it for today's show. Thanks everybody for tuning in. Producer Pat Ford here, signing off.