The David Pakman Show - 6/23/23: Trump attacks opponents, DeSantis squirms

Episode Date: June 23, 2023

-- On the Show: -- Luke Beasley, host of The Luke Beasley Show and TDPS correspondent, fills in for David -- Georgie election official Ruby Freeman is cleared of false election fraud claims made by Donald Trump and his allies -- The hearings put together by House Republicans keep backfiring on them tremendously -- Ron DeSantis struggles to answer whether he'd support Trump if Trump goes on to win the Republican nomination -- Donald Trump lashes out at Republican candidates saying "sometimes you have to punch down" -- Barack Obama talks about the impact of Donald Trump getting federally charged -- Congressman Adam Schiff responds to getting censured by House Republicans -- House Speaker Kevin McCarthy bogusly compares the prosection of Donald Trump to Hunter Biden's plea deal -- Trump has been talking about indicting Democrats if he wins the election in 2024 -- On the Bonus Show: Kari lake sued for defamation, and much more... ✅ Parcil Safety: Get 25% off with code PAKMAN at https://davidpakman.com/safety 🩺 Sign up for Wild Health Premium at https://wildhealth.com/premium ♨️ Bon Charge Sauna Blanket: Use code PAKMAN for 15% OFF at https://boncharge.com/pakman 👍 Use code PAKMAN for 10% off the Füm Journey Pack at https://tryfum.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

Welcome back everybody to the David Pakman show Luke Beasley here filling in for David while he is away you may remember remember Ruby Freeman. She was an election worker in the state of Georgia and became the center of conspiracy theorists. Of course, from the MAGA right to Trump himself spreading these conspiracy theories, Rudy Giuliani, and was accused of committing voter fraud in her role as an election worker. And of course, these claims were false, but the process kind of has to do what the process has to do. And so because these claims were being made and being sent to authorities constantly, nonstop in massive proportions, the authorities, the Georgia State Election Board, in coordination

with other entities, did an extensive investigation into a bunch of different claims about the 2020 election in the state of Georgia. And just now, Ruby Freeman and her daughter are being formally cleared. Previously, election officials were able to say there isn't any evidence at this time of what is being accused. But they do have to go through an investigation. And of course, it did yield the exact results that we would expect, which is no, these claims were false after an extensive investigation. And I use that wording because, and let me re-situate this cord, because so many people will say, and then we'll dive into some of this and look at a little bit

of Ruby Freeman's testimony on the January 6th committee previously. So many people will say, and then we'll dive into some of this and look at a little bit of Ruby Freeman's testimony on the January 6th committee previously. So many people will say, oh, the reason fraud hasn't been uncovered is because it hasn't been investigated properly. Oh, it's because they haven't done investigations of depth extensive enough to really uncover what's there. It's being hidden really effectively, so you have to do a really good investigation. But these claims get investigated, and we know after those extensive investigations that the claims are false. This is from NBC News. Years after their lives were turned upside down by conspiracy theorists. Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wondrea Archey-Moss, were officially cleared by Georgia authorities on Tuesday, and the impact on their lives was devastating.

Georgia's state election board dismissed its year-long investigation into alleged election fraud at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta more than two years after conspiracy theorists and then President Donald Trump claimed that Freeman and her daughter had committed election fraud in the 2020 presidential election. The fraud claims were unsubstantiated and found to have no merit. The investigation concluded reporting on the work of the FBI, the Georgia Bureau of Investigations and investigators from the Secretary of State's office vetting the alleged fraud and that goes through and we may read more from this article after taking a look at this clip. This is Ruby Freeman in front of the January 6th select

committee testifying about her experience having her life turned upside down because of these lies. I've lost my name and I've lost my reputation. I've lost my sense of security. All because a group of people starting with number 45 and his ally Rudy Giuliani decided to scapegoat me and my daughter Shay to push their own lies about how the presidential election was stolen. There is nowhere I feel safe. Nowhere. Do you know how it feels to have the President of the United States to target you? The President of the United States is supposed to represent every American. Not to target one.

But he targeted me, Lady Ruby. A small business owner, a mother, proud america citizen who stand up to help fulton county run an election in the middle of the pandemic so a few things on this the first is what i previously mentioned which is uh that yes these things are investigated yes they're taken seriously, which is why we shouldn't have so many bogus claims being made because then it wastes a whole lot of time and effort

trying to go through and make sure they get properly and thoroughly debunked. So that's number one. The claim of these things don't get investigated is just completely ludicrous. Number two is the impact on people's lives of these lies. It matters. It absolutely matters.

And Ruby Freeman has had just a complete devastating situation in her life that was unnecessary because of these lies. Just trying to serve her local election process, doing her civic duty, going above and beyond on that front, and then being targeted by the most powerful person on the planet just because he couldn't accept that he lost. And that brings us to the next point, which is that once again, we're reminded the danger of someone like Trump or Trump himself ever getting their hands on power again because of the anti-democratic views of this movement and anyone can be thrown into the fire whatever the phrase is can be sacrificed their well-being can be sacrificed in the eyes of these anti-democratic leaders and anti-democratic

supporters in the name of perpetuating this narrative. And so for her, it was false. We're seeing now, as we knew before, but once again, after a years-long investigation, false, false, false. But she had to have her life turned upside down because her life didn't matter as much to the people making the claims as believing that Trump still won. And that is what is so horrifying. Just to give you a little bit more in case you're curious on this story, during their efforts to overturn the results of the election, Trump and his ally, Rudy Giuliani, repeatedly claimed that Freeman and Moss,

I should say, had committed election fraud. And they had this heavily edited clip to try to make that point. And this is just super interesting to give you a sense of how these conspiracy theories explode. Giuliani said Freeman and Moss were passing USB drives like vials or heroin or of heroin or cocaine during ballot counting operations. Moss later explained her mother handed her a ginger mint during ballot counting so you'll hear all of these stories of usb drives were being handed and that was an election fraud tactic somehow or suitcases of ballots were being set on the table and if you dive into each individual one

you'll understand oh wait what they're, either they're seeing something incorrectly or they're seeing something correctly, but taking that to an incorrect conclusion. And this is how conspiracy theories spin off. This is how people buy into these claims, despite there being no evidence. Well, something I've been following pretty closely on my show, you can find my show at Luke Beasley on YouTube, is the bonkers hearings. I know David's been covering this, too, that Republicans have been putting together in the House of Representatives. Supposed to put forward some argument in each of these hearings and prove something and often attack President Biden. But so often the word that I would say characterizes these hearings from House Republicans is backfire. They keep backfiring. And today is yet another example of this.

This is from earlier in the week. I didn't have a chance to cover on my show or the David Hackman show, so I'm going to circle back to it now as we close the week, and this had to do with John Durham, of course, the special counsel who investigated the investigators in regard to the Russia pro-Molar investigation, Crossfire Hurricane. And as was reported on by David, by myself, it was a complete. are things in there that you can find interesting and there are notable parts of this Durham report as a whole especially when you set it next to what was promised from MAGA on this Durham investigation it was a nothing burger and it was supposed to prove that there was this big conspiracy at least in the eyes of MAGA it was supposed to prove that there's a conspiracy to take down Trump by the FBI and that's why the whole investigation into Russian interference started in the first place, when in reality, that's not the case, and that's not what Durham uncovered, and

it mainly just uncovered mistakes that were made in the investigation. Fair enough. Make sure those get corrected. But clearly, there was good reason to investigate the connection between the Trump campaign and Russian government because of all that we know is present there, all the connections that were uncovered. But the hearing most recently, led by Jim Jordan, didn't go too well where they brought John Durham in front of the House Judiciary Committee to tout the success of this report, I guess. And I'll show you a couple

right-wingers very angry about John Durham's investigation and this hearing specifically to give you a sense of how this isn't going as they probably wanted it to. This is Steve Bannon first, and then we'll get into Democrats making some great points. I mean, yesterday, Jordan was pathetic. He tried to make, Clarkark did he try to saint durham did he try to make uh durham saint durham yeah absolutely i mean you know so that's him saying jim jordan was pathetic who was leading the hearing that's not what you want to hear from a right winger after one of these political stunt hearings um and then this is matt gatesetz questioning Durham. And Matt Gaetz is saying that Durham's investigation was a failure. But for the opposite reason, probably than you and I would think,

Matt Gaetz thinks that Durham didn't uncover what's there. We realize he didn't uncover what wasn't there. But here's this exchange. I think that's beyond the scope of what's in the report. It's literally the scope of what your charging order is. Who put it in motion? We get after it was put in motion, the FBI did a bunch of wrong and corrupt things.

Totally understand we're trying to deal with that. But when you are part of the cover-up, Mr. Durham, then it makes our job harder. Yeah, well, if that's your thought, I mean, there's no way of dissuading you from that. I can tell you that it's offensive and that the people who worked on this investigation have spent their lives trying to protect the people in this country and pursue within the law what it is that we are authorized to do. You tried two cases, lost both of them, and then

the one plea, guilty plea you got, Clinesmith, Clinesmith is back to practicing law in Washington, D.C. today. That's beyond my control. Right, but the fact that you allowed that plea to occur, right, and then the punishment was insufficient, the fact that you didn't charge Andrew McCabe, you didn't convict the lying Democrats or the lying Russians,

you didn't investigate Mifsud or the Mueller probe, even though, as we sit here today in black letter, that was your charge. Have you ever heard of the Washington generals? The Washington generals? Yes. Yeah. And they're the team that basically gets paid to show up and lose. OK, so again, Matt Gaetz is coming at a very different perspective and I would say probably rather dishonest one. But he's recognizing the failure of this Durham investigation because he didn't really uncover anything that wasn't already covered by the inspector general's investigation and the think any reasonable person would say if you analyze the facts of both of those um investigations and just the whole situation kind of zoomed out there was definitely reason to investigate the connection and russian interference and then we find that there isn't evidence of trump directly coordinating with the russian government that's what investigation are

for and there's not investigation of that And if there's not investigation of that, or if there's not proof of that uncovered in the investigation, then so be it and follow the facts. And then mistakes were made, fair enough to criticize. But this idea that, number one, there was nothing to be looked into by the FBI and then by Mueller leading that FBI investigation with all of the convictions that Mueller got.

And number two, that this was a conspiracy with the Democrats to take down Trump. Rather dishonest. And then I have for you, Adam Schiff, during this hearing. Well, your report, Mr. Durham, doesn't dispute anything Mueller found did it. No, our object, our aim was not to dispute Director Mueller. I have the greatest regard, highest regard for Director Mueller. He's a patriot. The only distinction between his investigation and yours is he refused to bring charges where

he couldn't prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and you did. And I've noted this in the past when covering the Durham report. But as you've probably heard as well, multiple times, Durham brought two cases to trial and both of them ended in acquittal. And last clip we'll look at just because both for the sake of this hearing, making sure the attempt by the right to make the Durham report something that it's not, and also just because it's representative of how all of these political stunt hearings aren't going well for the Republican Party. I'll show you one more clip of Ted Lieu. Now, Mr. Durham, I'd like to ask you the following simple yes or no questions. Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, was convicted, correct?

I'm sorry, could you just repeat that one? Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, was convicted, correct? I'm sorry, could you just repeat that one? Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, was convicted, correct? That's correct. Trump's former foreign policy advisor to the campaign, George Papadopoulos, was convicted, correct? That's correct. Trump's former deputy campaign manager, Rick Gates, was convicted, correct? Not in connection with the Russian man. All right. Mr. Durham, you can hold yourself out as an objective Department of Justice official or as a partisan hack. And the more that you try to spin the facts and not answer my questions, you sound like the latter.

So I'm just going to ask this simply. Trump's former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn was convicted, correct? That's correct. Trump's longtime advisor Roger Stone was convicted, correct? I's correct. Trump's longtime advisor Roger Stone was convicted, correct? I'm sorry, I missed the last thing. Trump's longtime advisor Roger Stone was convicted, correct? Correct. In contrast to multiple Trump associates who were convicted, you brought two cases to jury trial based on this investigation and you lost both. And so I don't actually know what we're doing here because the author of the Durham report concedes that the FBI had enough information to investigate.

And thank goodness the FBI did because multiple Trump associates who committed crimes were held accountable. great points. And I really do wish that the specifics of the claims could be meaningfully broken down with a lot of these people. I imagine myself having a one-on-one conversation with someone who believes the FBI is being weaponized against the conservatives and just go one by one. We went through yesterday and likely we'll talk a little bit more about it today. The claims being made about Hunter Biden being treated with kid clubs. And if you walk through the deal that he got, it's very expected, very historically consistent. And same thing here where in any extensive investigation, can you find problems and mistakes that were made? 100%. But does that mean that it lives up to the claim that was made about the purpose of and the way the FBI went about their investigation into the Trump campaign, the connection with Russia,

Russian interference, and all of that? No. And so a lot of the the layers, as I mentioned yesterday, that are being laid on to one another, that build the narrative in a lot of people's mind that this is the reality, two tier justice system that targets conservatives, helps Democrats. It's each layer. If you discuss it one on one, it feels like a lot to them. But if you go one on one, you realize it isn't what they think that it is. Make sure you are subscribed to The David Pakman Show channel and my channel on YouTube, Luke Beasley. Thank you so much, David. sales have been way up in recent years. Natural disasters, wildfires, polluted air, chemical plant accidents, unrest of different kinds, militarized police, all sorts of different reasons. You never know when a respirator or a gas mask from parcel safety might come in handy, and it could be when you least expect it. Parcel safety respirators are also perfect for professionals, contractors, painters, people doing DIY projects at home. All of parcel safeties respirators come with a one year manufacturer's warranty. Every respirator or gas mask comes with a filter, competitive prices,

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What Wild Health does is take your genetics and biometrics and lifestyle data and give you tailored suggestions to your particular situation as far as nutrition, exercise, sleep and more. The idea being to help you function at your best in a way that's actually tailored to you. You might have a specific health goal. You want to sleep better or lose weight or stay healthy, feel good, be more active. Wild health will tailor a care plan with lifestyle interventions instead of pills, which I always prefer as an approach. Wild health pairs you with a care team. It includes a board certified precision medicine physician who you

can message anytime through the app and their newly launched premium program actually goes further offering concierge medicine with over 15 specialized testing options. You can look at epigenetics, a coronary CT scan and many other things. The results are compelling. Many patients have seen improvements to diabetic markers or reducing risk of cardiovascular disease and more. Wild Health has 10 new spots in their premium program. For my audience, go to wild health dot com slash premium to apply for membership. That's W.I.L.D. health.com slash premium. The link is in the podcast notes. Well, let's talk a little bit about what's going on in the Republican primary. DeSantis got asked about, uh, the hypothetical of if Trump ends up winning the primary as right now, he seems

poised to do. Would DeSantis endorse him, support him in the general election? And as you can probably expect, DeSantis dodged the question and started talking about his handling of COVID and Trump saying that New York handled it better. But we'll discuss this after taking a look. Regardless of his attacks, will you 100% pledge to support Trump as the GOP nominee? So what I would say is this. When you are saying that Cuomo did better on COVID than Florida did, you are revealing yourself to just be full of it. Nobody believes that. and you know why

and you know why i know that because okay a couple of things then we'll continue this is surface level this is not super important but it doesn't have an effect in politics number one he always gets noticeably nervous when he gets asked about Trump. I can kind of a little bit hear his breath gets a little, um, whatever you call that. And also, uh, people criticize him for this. And I didn't think about it that much until now. He really does have this really whiny tone of voice, but that's less important. Continuing. As I remember in 2020 and 2021, when he was praising Florida for being open, saying we did it much better than New York and Michigan and everyone was coming to Florida and that we were one of the great governors in the United States. And he used to say that all the

time. Now, all of a sudden, his tune is changing. And I would just tell people, do you find it credible? Do you honestly find it credible? Would you have rather been in New York during covid under Cuomo regime? Or would you rather have been in the free state of Florida? And I probably can count the number of Republicans on my hand in the nation who would have rather been under Cuomo in New York. And we know that. And so these are just frivolous criticisms. But in some respects, I think it shows that, you know, if you have to make that argument, then you probably don't have very good arguments, because the reality is everything he said about us for years, about how strong we were, how good we were, how we've delivered for the state,

those happen to be true. And now he's trying to backtrack because he, you know, views he needs to do that. And he's saying things. Okay, so I know David has done deep dives into kind of the way that DeSantis blows out of proportion, how good Florida has done in honestly a lot of metrics, but COVID included, and DeSantis asious governance would be a disaster nationwide and all of that so we'll set that aside but to the point of oh trump said all these good things about me and now he's not can you believe it yeah you lined up behind a guy who understands nothing about actual meaningful um healthy loyalty and um cares only about someone as far as they can further his own goals.

So that's very unsurprising. But DeSantis did the same thing, right? DeSantis was doing that campaign ad, so cringy, saying, I don't know exactly the specifics of the ad, but you'll remember he's sitting with a book reading to his child and make America great again. And essentially indoctrinating his child into being a Trump supporter, showing the supporters in Florida, I guess, that I would be a good candidate because I love Trump so much and I'm teaching my child to be like Trump. And now he doesn't have that same tone when talking about Trump. Of course, that's what happens constantly in politics, especially with people that don't actually care about the people they purport to unless they're helping themselves politically. But as far as polling right now, will DeSantis have to make

the decision as far as supporting Trump or not supporting Trump in the general election? Probably he will based on polling right now. Five thirty eight has Trump at a fifty two point five percent average percentage point average there. And then Santa's down at twenty one point three percent. And then everyone else way lower. So especially in past primary times, could DeSantis make up that difference? Could a candidate at 21% end up jumping up and beating someone who was at 52%?

Sure. But because of how well known and how set in the feelings about these two candidates and Trump in particular, this particular primary is and the followers of these different individuals really have a sense of especially who Trump is, the likelihood of a massive shift is lesser. It is not as likely that will happen. Whereas other primaries, there's a lot of less known or a lot of candidates that people aren't yet set in their feelings about.

And so big shifts really can happen, especially this far out from the actual election, after debates and after lots of campaigning and all of that. But this is a very different situation. So likely very soon, DeSantis will have to make a decision about if he supports Trump in a general. And I can tell you almost 100% that he will support Trump if Trump's the nominee against Biden. That's just how these things work, unfortunately. We move from DeSantis to Trump

himself and more specifically his true social activity. Donald Trump posts these video statements talking about different things, often ranting about different subjects. This is kind of, I guess, his primary form of campaigning because most of the time he's just golfing. And this one on True Social that we'll watch is titled, Sometimes You Have to Put Them in Their Place. And it's him lashing out at the lower poll number candidates in the GOP primary field right now. And I guess answering the question that he feels he's getting asked of, why are you attacking people who have really low poll numbers, ignore them. And he's saying this is why in traditional bunkers deranged Trump fashion. Say don't punch down when talking about people like Chris Sununu or sloppy Chris Christie or Ada Hutchinson. I call him Ada, not Asa because of certain reasons

or others. But sometimes it's necessary to talk badly about those that for no reason other than politics speak badly about you. Otherwise, the people that love you don't know whether or not they're for real. Are they saying the truth? They're not. So sometimes you have to punch down and you have to say what's happening. Otherwise, they won't understand. It's not fair to them. You have to put them in proper perspective, these bad people. You have to put them in their place.

People like this are very destructive. And you have to tell the voters what it's all about. Otherwise, why should they be able to understand it? Thank you very much. So what he really means, because I agree that you have to tell voters why you're better than other candidates. that someone like Chris Christie is really dishonest and is sloppy Chris Christie, such a strange... People forget that... Oh, apologies, guys. Get this next video queued up for you.

He has to say all of that because, as he said, otherwise people might think that Chris Christie's statements about Trump might be for real. And this is Trump's whole playbook. Anyone who says something slightly negative has to become an enemy because then in the minds of his followers, it's really easy to think, okay, I don't have to listen to the very accurate criticisms coming from Chris Christie because he's an enemy. He's in the enemy category. He's sloppy Chris Christie. sloppy chris chrissy such a strange nickname or ada hutchinson or whoever um and that's why he has to do that because often they're saying very when these republicans finally turn on trump they'll say things that do need to be heard by trump's followers rare things being said by people

at least um rare things to hear within the gop about trump that are accurate his threat to so many things our democratic institutions being such a prominent example and finally someone in the primary field like chris christie is calling that out and others um and then this was on ronda santis specifically that ronda sanctimonious was a big lockdown man. Here, let me start this from the beginning. People forget that Ron DeSantis was a big lockdown man early on as governor.

He locked it down and other governors that were Republican of nature did not lock down. If you look at South Carolina and Tennessee and South Dakota and others, they didn't lock down, but Florida was locked down. He locked it down. Okay, we'll stop that one there. It's interesting. We talked about yesterday the very concerning

characteristic of this primary that's getting developed where DeSantis and trump are going to try to argue over who was the most irresponsible in their handling of covid who rejected the science the most um who was against taking precaution and did we take incorrect ones here and there and did tons of politicians make bad decisions and hypocritical decisions and all of that yes but does that mean we should have gone radically in the direction that maybe desantis wishes the country had gone uh no and now because desantis's attack line against trump is he was too pro-fauci and he was pro-lockdown trump has to turn around and go no desantis. And they have to argue about who took the science the least seriously, which is a really strange, strange thing to be developing.

Quickly, just to wrap up our discussion about this primary, the indictment, interestingly, the second indictment, the federal one, is having an effect on the Republican primary. Not in a huge way, but at least in some way that is negative. So this is from CNN. Foreign President Donald Trump's support appears to have softened following his indictment and arrest on federal charges, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS. And we'll look at first the whole country and then the GOP specifically. Most Americans approve of Trump's indictment stemming from his alleged mishandling of classified documents after leaving office, even as 71% say politics played a role in that charging decision.

Though Trump continues to lead the GOP field by a wide margin in the race for the Republican Party's nomination for president, the poll suggests that his support has declined as have positive views of him among republican and republican leading voters nearly a quarter now say they would not consider backing his candidacy under any circumstances the survey also finds that those gop aligned voters not currently backing his 2024 bid have different views on his indictment and behavior than those in his corner that's pretty obvious and then here's the notable part overall 47 percent of and Republican-leaning registered voters say Trump is their first choice in the party's nomination for president, from 77% in May to 67% now. So you're seeing shifts in the GOP, and that could be in part one of the most notable things that has changed over the last few months is Trump's legal troubles. And so maybe the idea of having even possibly a

convicted felon as your candidate isn't so appealing to some Republicans, even though many of them, as I very much witnessed at his arrest and arraignment outside the Miami federal courthouse a couple weeks ago, many of them still are very much on board. One lady said I would vote for him even if he's in jail. I don't care, but some are shifting and that's good to see. Former president Barack Obama did an interview recently on CNN and one of the moments caught a lot of people's eyes and it was pretty interesting. I'll show it to you. It's on the subject of the threat to democracy that is currently so present, especially because of the MAGA movement within the United States right now and within the Republican Party specifically.

And Barack Obama responded to that saying this. Creaky or not institutions in the United States. The spectacle of a former president being federally indicted. How is the rest of the world, the democratic world, maybe even the non-democratic world, meant to interpret that indictment and indeed the fact that a federal indictee is running, is able to run for the highest office in the land, maybe even the world? It's less than ideal. The fact that we have a former president who is having to answer to charges brought by prosecutors does uphold the basis. And you see the lower third is talking about state of democracy.

We'll get to that specific topic topic in a second. The notion that nobody's above the law and the allegations will now be sorted out through a court process. And I think I'm more concerned when it comes to the United States with the fact that not just one particular individual is being accused of undermining existing laws, but that more broadly we've seen, whether it's through the gerrymandering of districts, whether it's trying to silence critics through changes in legislative process, whether it's attempts to intimidate the press, a strand of anti-democratic sentiment that we've seen in the United States. It's something that is right now most prominent in the Republican Party, but I don't think it's something that is unique to one party. I think there is a less tolerance for ideas that don't suit us.

And it's sort of the habits of a free and open exchange of ideas and the idea that we all agree to the rules of the habits of a free and open exchange of ideas and the idea that um yeah we all agree to the rules of the game and even if the outcomes aren't always the ones we like we still abide by those rules i think that's weakened uh so the interesting part is that he throws in and i think it's accurate but within the context of how present it is on the right right now um throwing in that this isn't unique to one party is definitely an interesting sentiment because i do think there's there's truth to number one anyone can be susceptible to prioritizing power and um the ambition for a position of power over respect for democratic institutions and the democratic process.

And I think recognizing that is important to make sure that people don't fall into that, to make sure that people who support democracy now stick to that even when we really want to win. I think that's really important. It's always important to make sure we don't both side. Sometimes right wingers will say, well, people said that Hillary should have won in 2016. That's the same thing as our election systems aren't working, like our election processes with the workers and the casting of the ballot that is being incorrectly run or there's fraud involved, because then you're telling people that their voice doesn't matter and uh it's being decided kind of on high or some corrupt group of people or some conspiracy is deciding and that definitely guts the legitimacy of democracy and so i don't think ever throwing into the same box the two things is fair. But I do think does the ambition for power become more important than the importance of protecting the institutions. And it is wild that we're in a

moment right now where this is what we have to discuss. For so long, I think we took for granted our democratic institutions. We assumed with whatever is going on, our democratic institutions we assumed with whatever is going on our democratic institutions will continue to function but now both with the election denying and the attempts to keep trump president and all that has spun off of that but also once again contending with how anti-democratic something like gerrymandering is and that is done on both sides to different extents it's quite the moment and hopefully this reckoning and the negative parts of this moment will motivate uh will be a launch pad for a lot of us to improve those systems and it is something that i deal with on a smaller level not denying elections or trying to overthrow elections but gerrymandering is a good example

where do you stand on? Do you gerrymander to get the correct people into power so that they can implement laws to ban gerrymandering? Or do you not play that game and get crushed by Republicans? And it's tough. And there's definitely a balancing act there. Let me know what you think of all this in the comments of this video and make sure you are subscribed to my YouTube channel

at Luke Beasley on YouTube. Thank you so much, David. blanket. And it's tremendous. I love getting in there for reading or get a little work done, a little meditation, take a nap, just gets you really relaxed, super easy to clean, really compact, lightweight design, simple to fold up and put away when you're done with it. And it comes with a 12 month warranty. If you don't love it, returns are really easy. Welcome back, everybody, to the show. Luke Beasley here filling in for David while he is away. I talked about on yesterday's bonus show the fact that Adam Schiff was censured by the Republican Party and the House of Representatives for his role in investigating

Donald Trump. Yet another, as I mentioned yesterday, distraction attempt to take the attention away from the chaos that is their own party and the chaos that is Trump, the leading candidate right now within their party's presidential primary. And so instead, it has to be something like this and an attempt to show the base. Once again, we're still pro Trump. Well, I want to look at some remarks that Adam Schiff delivered when he had a chance to talk, responding to this effort, and some really good stuff. Before we do that, though, this is from the New York Times. The GOP-led House formally censured Representative Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California, on Wednesday over his role investigating former President Donald J. Trump, the first in what could be a series of votes seeking to punish those

whom Republicans have deemed the party's enemies. This ensure passed by a party line vote of 213 to 209, with six Republicans voting present. The measures had the backing of Speaker Kevin McCarthy after its lead sponsor, Representative Anna Paulina Luna, a Republican of Florida, altered its language to remove a multimillion dollar fine some Republicans viewed as unconstitutional. So with that being said, here's this from Adam Schiff. To my Republican colleagues who introduced this resolution, I thank you.

You honor me with your enmity. You flatter me with your enmity. You flatter me with this falsehood. You, who are the authors of a big lie about the last election, must condemn the truth-tellers, and I stand proudly before you. Your words tell me that I have been effective in the defense of our democracy, and I am grateful. And yet this false and defamatory resolution comes at a considerable cost to the country and to the Congress. At a moment when millions of people in our home state of California are unable to find a place to live or afford a place to live,

Speaker McCarthy chooses to occupy the resources of Congress for two straight weeks on this hollow sop to the MAGA crowd. He offers nothing to those who are homeless or addicted to opioids or to millions of college students mired in debt but this paltry distraction. Donald Trump is under indictment for actions that jeopardize our national security and McCarthy would spend the nation's time on petty political payback thinking he can censure or fine Trump's opposition into submission. We'll stop that one there. And before discussing further, I'll show you one more from this bit of remarks. No matter how many false justifications or slanders you level against me, you but indict yourselves. As Liz Cheney said, there will come a day when Donald Trump is gone,

but your dishonor will remain. This resolution attacks me for initiating an investigation into Trump campaign solicitation and acceptance of Russian help in the 2016 election, even though the investigation was first led not by me, but by a Republican chairman. It would hold that when you give internal campaign polling data and you're polling data to a Russian intelligence operative, while Russian intelligence is helping your campaign, as Trump's campaign chairman did, that you must not call that collusion. And you've heard him make that case before. We'll stop that one there. So a couple things on this. First off, the reference to Liz Cheney saying,

there'll come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain. That is just so applicable to the modern-day Republican Party. It has done so much to destroy itself in its own integrity for the purpose of supporting Trump. And right now that's helping a lot of people be politically successful, I guess. I mean, also losing a lot, but some individuals get the support of the base because they do that. So it might seem reasonable in their eyes but one day trump will be gone and only as was said the dishonor um the humiliation that was this part of american history this part of the republican party being the maga gop that's what will be remembered and that should horrify these individuals

who are going along with this movement the other other thing is, Adam Schiff used the word multiple times, I think, distraction. And something I talk a lot about on my own show, you can find that at Luke Beasley on YouTube, is distraction, the distraction politics that is played by the Republican Party. And the reality that because right now the modern uh republican party is putting forward policies that just when they do put them forward explicitly that just aren't beneficial to the lives of their own constituents in large part i mean what is the big economic accomplishment for the most part over the last multiple decades from republican administrations and congresses tax cuts right tax cuts for the wealthy um and so often their governance just serves to make the powerful more powerful and the wealthy more

wealthy. And they aren't more fiscally responsible while doing so. When you look at the record, comparing different parties in recent history, and they aren't better for the economy, looking at pretty much every metric we use to measure the economy over the last hundred years or something and so with both of those in mind and the fact that their policies aren't directed most of the time um at benefiting the lives of the working class why would people vote for them why on earth would people vote for them well it's because they're effective at branding. One of the things I also say a lot is the GOP is really effective at one thing, and that's branding. And they're

really good at bumper sticker politics, making some message, solidifying down a message into something that resonates with people, but often doesn't actually reflect an authentic policy proposal that would benefit that person's life. So with all that in mind, the way that they get people to continue supporting them and thinking that they're fighting in the interest of them, when in reality, they're just assisting and making the wealthy more wealthy and the powerful more powerful while demonizing tons of people and all that is by doing the distractions. It's by doing stuff like this. So people go, yes, they're standing up for Trump or by dehumanizing and demonizing so many populations of people are

saying woke, woke, woke, it's the biggest threat to America. Woke, woke, woke, woke. And on and on it goes. If you're focused on that, you're less focused on their lack of actual policy proposals that would benefit your life. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy responded to the Hunter Biden plea agreement. And we talked about this on yesterday's show. Hunter Biden is expected to plead guilty to two misdemeanor charges in relation to not paying his taxes. He since has paid them back, but not paying them for a time there. And then he will get one felony gun related charge dismissed. He lied on a form saying he wasn't addicted to a control substance to get a gun when he

was. And that will be dismissed if he follows through with certain guidelines. And the narrative from the right, as we talked about yesterday, has been sweetheart deal. This is a sweetheart deal. And we're kind of wrapping up the week. Going back to some clips i didn't have a chance to talk about this being one of them just because of the dishonesty that is gushing out of kevin mccarthy it's notable that this is how dishonest so many people have to be to cover for trump and their narrative that uh there's this two-tier justice system hurting people like Trump. So here's the first clip we'll look at. The reaction is it continues to show the two-tier system in America.

If you are the president's leading political opponent, the DOJ tries to literally put you in jail and give you prison time. If you are the president's son, you get a sweetheart deal. Now, this does nothing to our investigation. It actually should enhance our investigation because the DOJ should not be able to withhold any information now saying that because of pending investigation, they should be able to provide Chairman Comer with any information that he requires. The fact that the DOJ would try to put the political opponent of the president in jail while giving a sweetheart deal to Hunter Biden proves the two-tier justice system talking point we've been perpetuating, which we'll talk about Trump, but I'll show this clip. I think I showed this one yesterday once again to remind you that that talking point of sweetheart deal is not accurate.

Then we'll circle back to the Trump component. Obviously, you're already hearing a lot of shouting, oh, sweetheart deal, oh, this, oh, that. None of us really knows the details of the possible charges here and exactly what was agreed to as part of this plea, Jennifer. But how does one assess whether this is the type of deal that a normal person, not a president's child, would get in this circumstance? So you would look to other similar cases, right? So on the gun form charge, it's very, very standard for someone in this situation who lies on the form because they're an addict. The gun is long gone. Apparently only had it for a couple of weeks. It's very

standard in these circumstances for this diversion to occur and to wipe out the charges, assuming he successfully completes it. So that's totally standard. And the tax fraud is similar as well. I mean, he paid those taxes back a long time ago. That's something that DOJ takes very, very seriously. Okay. And when you look at historical precedent, when you look at other cases like this one, it's not some sweetheart deal. But then he mentioned Trump and this is a narrative, then we have one more clip to get to of Kevin McCarthy with Monty Raju, but it's a narrative that is so present right now, so annoying.

Oh, the DOJ is trying to lock up the political opponent of Biden. What that tries to do is to take the conversation away from what Trump is being accused of. Because if there was nothing substantive to what Trump was being accused of, then you could have a conversation about why are these charges being brought then. But the indictment is extensive in the evidence it brings forward. So then what is so enraging is that individuals like Kim mccarthy refuse to just completely engage with the evidence engage with the accusations because if they were to do that then the conversation is no longer hunter biden got a sweetheart deal when he didn't and

trump is getting locked up um which we'll see obviously the whole he has his due process and everything but if that ends up happening and trump was indicted, see, that shows inherently there's something unfair. They couldn't do that because they would have to argue then, therefore, not enforcing the laws that Trump is being accused of violating, which they would never say. They would never explicitly say, no, yeah, I don't think we should enforce the Espionage Act. I don't think we should enforce that.

Or I don't think we should protect national security secrets they would never want to say that so it just has to be vaguely trump's being indicted and hillary's not yeah well what are the facts of the case uh here's another moment congress has to have a right we have the constitutional right to investigate to oversee and for any investigation that we have or any information we need, it can't now stand behind that there's an investigation going on. But there's two separate cases. I mean, the Trump case is involving alleged obstruction of an investigation, alleged misstatements. This is a tax case and a gun case. There's two separate cases. Why conflate them? I'm not conflating them. But they're alleging he lied to investigators. That's the issue. What? What? There are different cases. There are different facts. You talk about equal justice.

What? You talk about equal justice. Is that what you think equal justice is, Kevin McCarthy? Okay. The universe says if Trump is indicted, then that means some Democrat somewhere has to be indicted. What? Oh, it's so unserious. It is so humiliating.

Why? Why is that the narrative? And people have said this. I went, as you all know, to Miami to Trump's arrest and arraignment and talked to Trump's supporters. And one of them, actually a bunch of them, but one of them kept repeating, well, why hasn't Hillary been indicted that's not how it works because hillary didn't do the things or there wasn't evidence for her doing the things that trump did they didn't uncover the very criminal intent that it seems they're uncovering uh uncovering with trump and they didn't even ever get accused of

the same things why are so that's one level of absurdity the hillary or biden conflation with with trump a whole nother level of uh conflation is saying that hunter biden should be compared with trump's case hunter biden was accused of evading his taxes for two years and lying on a federal form about a gun. Trump's accused of, you know, keeping classified information he's not supposed to have, lying to federal authorities about having the classified information, obstructing an investigation as they're trying to get back the classified information, and on and on, conspiring with other individuals to keep out of the hands of federal authorities these classified documents. And that compares to Hunter Biden how?

That's as absurd as you're accused for any crime and you start talking about someone's speeding ticket. That should justice should be served there, too, but just very different levels of justice, unless they're saying that all the other cases that have ended in very similar deals as the Hunter Biden one has should have led to prison sentences, which I don't think they would say. Can you imagine if Trump did the very things? Can you imagine if Trump went to prison for evading his taxes. They would go bonkers. I don't even know how that would work. Or he lied on a federal forum about getting a firearm and they put him in prison. They would go bonkers. But dishonesty is inevitably going to lead to a humiliating moment like that one, I guess. We have much more on the other side of this break. One of our sponsors today is fume. Not everything in a bad habit is wrong. So instead

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Head on over to try fume dot com and use the code Pacman to save 10 percent. When you get the journey pack, which comes with the device and three flavors, that's try FUM dot com code Pacman saves you 10 percent on the journey pack. The info is in the podcast notes. During a recent interview with Sebastian Gorka, Donald Trump continued to promise what he has been quite frequently recently, which is they're going to indict me. Well, I'm going to indict them then. And I'll show you this moment and then we'll discuss really dangerous rhetoric. Numbers are through the roof. We're beating everybody by a lot, and we're beating Biden by a lot.

And one of the reasons, it was interesting, somebody wrote a very strong piece the other day. I could tell you who, but let's not even use his name, because perhaps you wouldn't want it, but wrote a very strong piece that they're afraid to have me back in. That's why they're doing the indictments up, because they don't want to be indicted. Now, I would do it only very fairly, of course, of course, but they don't want to be indicted. So they say we can't let this guy win. But there was tremendous corruption on the other side. Don't forget, they spied on my campaign and we caught them false. They did things that nobody would have believed.

Then they had two fake impeachments that we won and so much else. The Mueller report, which showed no collusion at the end of two years, showed no collusion. Okay, so we also heard a similar sentiment during his recent Bedminster speech. In addition to closing the border and removing all of the criminal elements that have illegally invaded our country, making America energy independent and even dominant again, and immediately ending the war between Russia and Ukraine, I'll have it ended in 24 hours. I will appoint a real special prosecutor to go after the most corrupt president in the history of the United States of America, Joe Biden. And the entire Biden crime family.

So what's fascinating is we've heard from Republicans for a while now, we've talked about this a lot this week and even just on the show, that there's this two-tier justice system designed to go after conservatives and benefit Democrats. And that's what Trump is a victim of. And the evidence they bring forward is not evidence. They don't bring forward evidence, I guess. It's just the accusation. Very empty. And that is going to then be the justification to actually weaponize's not let the system play out if there's crimes investigate them if there's something um that is a clear violation of the law and has evidence for that that can be proven in court law all that let the process play itself out as president i want to

be um separated from that no it's going to be i'm going to figure out a way to get biden locked up and it's a similar thing we're seeing with this weaponization subcommittee within the house of representatives where it's by its name supposed to be looking into the weaponization of the federal government um but in reality it's those individuals in their positions in the federal government weaponizing that position in the federal government to help Trump politically and to perpetuate these conspiracy theories about the FBI doing this thing and that thing and Twitter and Jim Jordan trying to get involved in the Manhattan D.A. investigation in the name of investigating the weaponization of the federal government, they're weaponizing the federal government. And it's pretty terrifying thinking about the prospect of Trump using his position if, God forbid, he were able to get back into that position in that way. One other narrative that kind of was intertwined in that little clip you saw was one he also recently posted about on true social here's a screenshot it says congress will hopefully now look at the ever-continuing witch hunts and election interference against me on perfectly legal boxes of course that doesn't

seem to be accurate and what i've been warning of and talking about a good bit on my show you can find that at luke beasley on youtube definitely go check out my show if you uh are liking what you're watching now is that trump is preparing similar to how he did before 2020 to claim on election interference there was fraud but this time while he'll probably include dead voters and um we talked about earlier today's show ruby friedman or freeman and claims like that the suitcases and ballot stuffing and big massive dumps of ballot dumps all over the place he will probably make those claims as well and on top of it he'll say it was rigged if he loses to joe biden because of election interference when in reality what we're seeing is just trump being held accountable for his violations of the law.

It has been great being with you today. One more reminder to check me out at Luke Beasley on YouTube. Make sure you are also subscribed to this YouTube channel, The David Pakman Show. And I will see you, if you remember, on The Bonnie Show.