The Majority Report with Sam Seder - 3599 - GOP Lies About Shutdown Military Pay w/ Evan Simko-Bednarski, Josh Orton

Episode Date: October 9, 2025

It's a Samajority Report Thursday on the Majority Report On today's show: While appearing on a C-SPAN call-in show, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) listens to a military wife caller express her fear and outrage that her medically compromised children will not be able to get their medications unless Congress passes an emergency relief fund to pay servicemembers. In response to the caller, Johnson shifts the blame to Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and claims to have no control over the matter. Only one day before at a joint press conference with Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), Mike Johnson admits that Congress could and would like to implement emergency funding of military servicemembers only to kowtow to Thune who shuts the idea down - showing that it is not Schumer obstructing military paychecks. New York Daily News journalist and former Majority Report producer, Evan Simko-Bednarski joins the show to discuss paper's hostile union contract negotiations with the private-equity firm, Alden Global Capitol, that purchased the paper in 2021. Support the New York Daily News Union and call out Alden Global Capitol on social media as they have shown to be peeved when their name is dragged into the light. President of Demand Justice and also former Majority Report producer, Josh Orton joins the program to discuss his work as a progressive legal advocate. In the Fun Half: Sam is joined by Matt Binder & Brandon Sutton Oklahoma's Department of Education is dismantling the far-right culture war nonsense and begun a full audit of disgraced former State Superintendent Ryan Walters' tenure. Kristi Noem "stares down" a man in a chicken suit in Portland, Oregon. A man in a dinosaur costume serenades ICE agents with a Tears for Fears parody. Trump holds an interesting press conference to address Anti-Fa All that and more The Congress switchboard number is [phone]. You can use this number to connect with either the U.S. Senate or the House of Representatives. Follow us on TikTok here: https://www.tiktok.com/@majorityreportfm Check us out on Twitch here: https://www.twitch.tv/themajorityreport Find our Rumble stream here: https://rumble.com/user/majorityreport Check out our alt YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/majorityreportlive Gift a Majority Report subscription here: https://fans.fm/majority/gift Subscribe to the AMQuickie newsletter here: https://am-quickie.ghost.io/ Join the Majority Report Discord! https://majoritydiscord.com/ Get all your MR merch at our store: https://shop.majorityreportradio.com/ Get the free Majority Report App!: https://majority.fm/app Go to https://JustCoffee.coop and use coupon code majority to get 10% off your purchase Check out today's sponsors: DELETEME: Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to www.joindeleteme.com/MAJORITY and use promo code MAJORITY at checkout. WILD GRAIN: Get 5 dollars off your next order at MagicSpoon.com/MAJORITYREPORT. SUNSET LAKE:  Head to SunsetLakeCBD.com and use the code JustTreats25 to save 30% on all their gummies for sleep, focus, and relaxation Follow the Majority Report crew on Twitter: @SamSeder @EmmaVigeland @MattLech Check out Matt’s show, Left Reckoning, on YouTube, and subscribe on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/leftreckoning Check out Matt Binder’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/mattbinder Subscribe to Brandon’s show The Discourse on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/ExpandTheDiscourse Check out Ava Raiza’s music here! https://avaraiza.bandcamp.co

You are listening to a free version of The Majority Report with Sam Cedar. To support this show and get another 15 minutes of daily program, go to Majority.fm. Please. The Majority Report with Sam Cedar. It is Thursday. October 9th, 2025. My name is Sam Cedar. This is the five-time award-winning majority report.

We are broadcasting live steps from the industrially ravaged Gowanus Canal in the heartland of America, downtown Brooklyn, USA. On the program today, Evan Simco Bednarski, documentary photographer, and journalist covering transit for the New York Daily News on the Daily News Union and their fight. for a fair contract then Josh Orton president of demand justice former advisor

to Senator Bernie Sanders I should say both of those guests former producers on the majority report also on the program today

Israel and Hamas agreed to the first phase of a ceasefire will see. Meanwhile, National Guard poised to enter Chicago as Trump reportedly considering the Insurrection Act and jailing Democratic leaders. Republican fissures grow

as they feel the heat of the government shutdown. Presidential Records Act in DOJ Independence down the tubes as a new report shows Trump directing the DOJ to prosecute his enemies. Meanwhile, Trump scheduled for a Friday to have his second routine annual checkup in six months. New reports, David Frum, Douglas Murray, moonlighting as speechwriters for Israeli officials. Meanwhile, New York Times, CNN employed journalists giving us.

getting paid by a fellowship that, quote, helps Israel win the Info War. Over 25% of the FBI now has been reassigned to prowl cities looking for immigrants. Pentagon has 300 open investigations into criticism of Charlie Kirk amongst military personnel. Labor Department says immigration raids are causing significant, quote, risk of supply shock-induced food shortages. All this and more on today's majority report. I almost said a majority report, but she is out today, having done a majority report Wednesday this week. Emma will be back on Monday, nevertheless. I mean, I'm here, so we'll see.

We're already getting complaints. That's why I say that. I'm already noticing, like, people are complaining that I'm just saying. Like, it's just, it's one day. People can deal with it. Can't Emma have a day off? Yeah, exactly. Emma is having...

What kind of bull is this? I think we're going to be like on day two of at least, you know, for me, in a row of not criticizing Chuck Schumer, hopefully. We'll see. I'm not sure, actually. I mean, when we talk to Josh Orton from Demand Progress, I'm not sure we'll be able to sustain that. But we had at least one day. And the Democrats seemed to be holding tight.

not caving to Republican demands, not providing them votes to open the government. Now, the main point is, I mean, and the Democrats are, I think, quite effectively leveraging the fact that we have literally 20, million Americans who are about 25 days out from either losing their insurance or having to pay 35, 50, 100, 200 percent increases in their health care premiums. Impossible. And the Democrats, one of the stipulations to the continuing resolution, they won't. want is a fix to the ASA, excuse me, the Affordable Care Act subsidies, really not a fix, just an extension of these subsidies that have been ongoing for several years.

Remember, health insurance rates are going to go up simply because of the people who are being kicked off of Medicaid, because we're going to see people come into emergency rooms and seeking care. Hospitals are going to have to pay for that. All of their rates are going to go up, et cetera, et cetera. And insurance companies are already planning a gradual rise and increase in the prices of their premiums relative to what it would be if they just did it. in late 2026 when those Medicaid provisions come in. However, the other issue is, of course, why would you vote for a budget when the president and the head of the office of budget management have already said they're not going to

abide by this budget anyways, that they can, at any time they want, unilaterally cut funds and withhold funds that have been appropriated. So why would you participate in that process? That is part of the demands of the Democrats. It's not the one that they're pushing because they apparently don't think the American public can understand that. Maybe, maybe.

I'm not going to argue with the success that has existed to this point. But understand, the Republicans could pass this budget if they wanted to. They have so-called nuked the filibuster on already three different occasions this year. They have done it for appointees to the Trump administration. They have done it with restricting California's ability to increase their cafe standards. And there's been at least one other occasion.

I can't remember off the top of my head. But the fact is, they have shown that the filibuster is not sacrosanct when they want to get rid of it. They just don't want responsibility to pass this budget without these extensions on the ACA subsidies. Because then they know they are really in the hot seat. As far as I'm concerned, let's get rid of the filibuster. let's get rid of it let's let the american public understand the implications of voting for one party or the other and let's make both parties own their votes the filibuster has been in too many situations a way to help both parties simultaneously avoid taking votes that they

think are politically um untenable or politically dangerous or risky meanwhile don't trump has floated the idea of not paying furloughed workers that is against the law but again he's been ignoring other laws so whether he can do it and get away with it is two different things what the government could do right now is they could fund a bill to pay people who are working and not getting checks. They could do this for federal workers, too, who are furloughed. They're supposed to get back pay. If you're working now in the military or in the Gestapo, otherwise known as ICE, I think ICE

is like some German acronym for Gestapo Yes, sir. Apparently. But they could be paid now with just a piece of legislation. Remember, Congress has been told to go off on vacation, but they can be called back. Congress and the Senate still can pass

laws. They could still swear in Congress people, but But Mike Johnson doesn't want to do that. And here he is taking a call on C-SPAN and lying to a constituent. Hi, Mr. Johnson. So my question or comments are related to what you said yesterday about not being open to pass any legislation to ensure that military gets paid. I'm sure you can tell by my voice, I'm very shaky. I just want you to hear a little bit about my family.

I have two medically fragile children. I have a husband who actively serves this country. He suffers from PTSD from his two tours in Afghanistan. If we see a lapse in pay come the 15th, my children do not get to get the medication that's needed for them to live their life because we live paycheck to paycheck. I heard you earlier say that you side with President Trump on anything that he says, well, I just read an article this morning that said he absolutely wholeheartedly believes

that there needs to be legislation put in so that we do not miss a paycheck. You have the power to do that. And as a Republican, I'm very disappointed in my party and I'm very disappointed in you because you do have the power to call the House back. You did that or you refused to do that just for a show. I'm begging you to pass this legislation. My kids could die. We don't have the credit because of the medical bills that I have to pay regularly.

You could stop this, and you could be the one that could say military is getting paid. And I think that it is awful, and the audacity of someone who makes six figures a year to do this to military families is insane. All right, Samantha. Samantha, I'm so sorry to hear about your situation. The reason I've been so angry this week, and they've been calling me out. on media, Johnson's angry. I am angry because of situations just like yours. I've been a state military district. And my district is the home of the Global Strike Command at Barksdale Air Force Base and Fort Polk, the Joint Rederness Training Center.

I have the most military districts and military families in America. I have a lot of airmen and soldiers who are deployed right now and they have young families at home and they have children in health situations like yours. This is what keeps me up at night. No, it doesn't. I want you to hear something very clearly. The Republicans are the ones delivering for you. We had a vote to pay the truth. It was the continued resolution three weeks ago. Every single Republican but two voted to keep the government open so that your paycheck can flow. Every Democrat in the House, except for one, voted to close it.

The Democrats are the ones that are preventing you from getting a check. If we did a vote on the floor, pay troops, it's not a lawmaking exercise because Chuck Schumer is going to hold that up in the Senate. He is demonstrating by voting now six times to keep the government closed that he does not want the troops to be paid. And you should listen to his comments last night, is reported this morning. He is enjoying this. He said every day gets better for us, quote, unquote. Chuck Schumer and the Democrats are preventing your family from getting the care they

need, not Republicans. And my heart goes out to you. Now, I don't know what it is in Mike Johnson's private life that has made him so good at lying. Like, I mean, to get that good at lying, you almost have to live a lie in your private life. But that's not important. What's important is let's just go. I think this is a clip from literally hours earlier. Was this press conference yesterday? No, this is two days ago.

So this was one day earlier. Here is Mike Johnson being asked that same question. Are you open to passing legislation? Because at the beginning of the call, the woman said, you said you weren't open to passing legislation he may have said that on wednesday but on tuesday this is what he said and guess what it was not chuck schumer who came in and said we won't pass that in the senate watch this clip i know you said the house has done its job however military members are going to be missing a paycheck on october 15th critical air traffic controllers are

already missing from the job in some areas would you be open to uh pay for members of the military and air traffic controllers as an emergency measure in the next week or so or two weeks. Yeah, we're monitoring it day by day. I'm certainly open to that. We've done it in the past. We want to make sure that our troops are paid. I have colleagues like Congresswoman Jen Kiggins of Virginia who has a big military district. She's already filed legislation to pay our troops. We're looking forward to processing all this as soon as we gather everybody back up. But again, the most immediate thing is turn the lights back on here and keep Congress working so we can take care of all this important business. Yeah. And honestly, I mean, you don't need that. You don't need to, obviously, there are certain constituencies, many of them are going to be impacted in a very negative way by what's happening here. But the simplest way to end it. Okay. All right. Let's stop it right there. Watch Mike Johnson's head. He's just said, we're open to doing that. And then John Thune, who is the majority leader in the Senate.

he doesn't want to bring that bill up and Mike Johnson like the little puppy he is he nods yes sir like Thune comes in and says little guy get out of the way excuse me let's get the six foot guy yeah exactly listen four foot three step over the side I'm going to come in here and tell you why this is wrong look at this one of that we've done it in the past we want to make sure that our troops are paid. I have colleagues like Congresswoman Jen Kagan's of Virginia who has a big military district. She's already filed legislation. Oh, there's already legislation.

Is that right? We would have processing all this as soon as we get everybody back up. We can do this if you just called everybody back in. Turn the lights back on here and keep Congress working so we can take care of all this. Well, you could call them back in and they can keep looking. Watch his head. Watch his head. You don't need that. You don't need to. Right, right, right.

Oh, I screwed up. I screwed up. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We could, but we don't need it. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Daddy. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Like a ventriloquist arguing with his dummy. Exactly. But, I mean, look at how Mike Johnson was able to take that call from a military wife, mother of two children, who she's afraid they're going to die.

The most desperate circumstances. And he then just does a 180. from what he had said, 36 hours before, completely lies about it, completely lies about it. They, and here's the thing, if you think the Democrats could hold out, if you think Chuck Schumer is going to stand in the way of military personnel getting paid, you're nuts, put aside whether they should be getting paid now or not. Frankly, all federal workers should be getting paid while they're furloughed. They're supposed to get back pay.

We should be paying them right now. But if you think Chuck Schumer's going to stand in the way of that, no. John Thune and his little yes man, Mike Johnson, they don't want to take the pressure off. they want to force the Democrats to vote for a continuing resolution even though it means nothing.

Donald Trump can stop paying whatever he wants because they're not holding him to it. Johnson is just, I mean, the, I mean, this guy is a violent allergy to the truth. You're just sitting there like grinding out lie after lie. have a christian podcast about like how to have your principles reflecting politics and just be the most flagrant liar yeah it's unbelievable like the truth goes through a meat grinder with this guy

honestly all right um in a moment we're going to be talking to evan simco bednarski he's a documentary photographer and journalist covering transit for the new york daily news uh and then we'll be talking to Josh Orton, President of Demand Justice. First, a couple of words from our sponsors. This is a product, actually, that I've used for, I know, 10 years. And thank you for it. Delete me makes it easy, quick, and safe to remove your personal data online at a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everyone vulnerable.

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And we'll have Evan Simco Bednarski on from the New York Daily News Union to talk about their fight for a fair contract. We'll be right back after this. we are back sam cedar on the majority report emma viglin out today joining us now evan simco bednarski he is a journalist covering transit for the new new york daily news and he is also the vice unit chair of the daily news union and also a majority report of meredus produced sir uh heaven welcome back to the show happy to be here happy to be here um all right so uh i i saw a recently a testimony that you gave in front of the new york city council um let me give us a sense of like uh of what the situation has been with the daily news and for people who are uh outside of

new york maybe give us a little bit of a history of the daily news um because Because it really is the most local of New York papers, it seems to me. And yours is a story of the demise of local news in many respects or the threat to the local news. And if it can happen in New York, it's going to happen anywhere. Yeah, the Daily News represents what a lot of papers used to represent in the city. You know, it's a hard-scrabble tabloid from when that wasn't a bad word. And, you know, we've covered the city for about 106 years. I think we're coming up on 107.

And it was one of the first papers to really run photographs in a big way. Anything that's happened in this city, the Daily News has covered it. The Daily News was responsible for, you know, breaking the case wide open on the fact that the air wasn't safe after 9-11. You know, the Daily News famously reported on President Trump. afford not bailing the city out during the fiscal crisis of the 70s. You know, it is to the extent that New York has a sort of, you know, working class shoe leather, local daily newspaper anymore, it's the daily news. And about four years ago, the company that owned the Daily News Tribune was purchased

by Alden Global Capital, which is a private equity firm that has sort of earned the odious moniker of destroyer of newspapers and um we have been you know we unionized shortly after and have been um trying to negotiate contract ever since so you guys have not had a contract since the um since the new owner took over correct we've been at the table a little bit more than three and a half years now how much like what does it do to the morale when you get bought by somebody or some entity like that. It's not great. I mean, the thing about the Daily News is you work at the Daily News because you believe in this place.

You know, it's, I mean, I grew up, you know, I mentioned in my testimony, I grew up reading the paper at my grandpa's table, our unit chair, Michael Sheridan, he's a legacy member of the Daily News. His dad was a rewrite guy for many years. It's someplace that you work because you really believe in. the institution and the work. And, you know, morale has taken a hit because it's clear that our owners don't view us that way. You know, we're out there working really hard every day, you know, hours that we don't always get paid for. And, you know, it's not, that's not reflected

in the investment. You know, you mentioned that, you know, this is a story of the demise of of local news nationwide, and it is, and it isn't, because to the best of our knowledge, the Daily News still turns a profit. We just don't get to see any of that. That's not invested back in the paper in any way. I mean, what do you think, I mean, what's the agenda of somebody who buys a newspaper and then sort of starts to starve it? I mean, like, the Daily News, like you say, makes a profit, which is rare in the newspaper world,

if you want to make a profit you don't necessarily buy a newspaper like that's not like that's not what you would go and do for an investment strategy I guess like what do you think is the agenda of an ownership group that buys a paper starves the employees um like what's what's the what's going on there I mean we don't really know. And I think this is, you know, as good at times as any to say, like, Alden Global Capital and Heath Freeman, who's, you know, the head of it, it's an extremely opaque entity. We went out to Montauk to try to ring Heath's doorbell, and there isn't even a doorbell at the gate at the end of his very long driveway out there. We had to leave a handwritten note. So these guys don't, you know,

they don't always respond to the request for information that we make at the bargaining table. They don't, you know, we don't always even have staff meetings. It's very opaque. But the sense that I get is that this is like anything else that private equity invests in. You know, there's something with nominal value. You buy it, you squeeze as much of that value out, and then you drop it. You know, they sold our printing plant in Jersey City for $90 million. None of that money has come back. One of the things that happens a lot at this newspaper is that when people leave, either for better paying jobs or they retire, those positions don't get backfilled. So there's headcount floating around, you know, ostensibly.

And it's not gone to, you know, we don't have an Albany reporter. We don't have, in this year, we don't have a politics editor. We have very good politics reporters, but no editor who is, you know, in charge of managing this, you know, very fraught, very important election year. What ends up like, does the paper get smaller or thinner or is there, oh, can you hear me? Sorry. Okay. Has the paper gotten smaller or thinner?

Like what ends up, what ends up filling the space if you don't have a reporter in Albany, let's say? It's, you know, so I cover the trains. And the trains are funded in large part by Albany. When I started out, we did have an Albany reporter. And I would often, you know, call up the Albany reporter and just talk, just, you know, shoot the shit. Like, what's going on with funding on this thing? You know, where do you think, you know, X, Y, and Z legislatures are on this issue? And it was useful. It was really useful to be able to understand, you know, what was happening that would ultimately trickle down and, of affect our readers, you know, in terms of what train lines were getting upgraded, you know, what kind of repairs can be expected, that sort of thing. You fly blind when you don't have that. And that's just, you know, my little tiny local beat. But also on top of, I mean, obviously, like, it makes the report, I mean, did not have somebody in Albany.

It just seems crazy to me. But how do you fill the pages? Like, I mean, is it you, are you responsible now to produce X more, X plus words? or are they getting syndicated stuff or what is how do they make up the difference we do end up running a lot of wire copy um it does not translate so far into you know sort of an increased quota or anything on our end um but there are holes in the coverage and the paper is you know if you pick up if you're a regular reader of the daily news and you pick it up um you'll notice that it's a little bit lighter um it's it's hard it's hard to see it's hard to see this paper

that has been sort of a giant of covering, you know, power in the city and state, no longer really be able to fill as many pages as it used to. We're very proud of the work that we're doing. We've still managed to do some excellent coverage on the mayoral administration. You know, we've managed to hold a lot of folks, you know, to account for various things over the past couple of years. But that's all coming from, you know, the rule. reporters working hard.

We don't have a newsroom, which is something that I think people don't fully appreciate who read us regularly. The newsroom was, you know, it was closed like many newsrooms were during the COVID lockdown, but when other papers started to come back, our owners decided it wasn't worth paying the rent on the space anymore. And so, you know, I work, I'm in my apartment right now. we have had a more than one occasion reporters who are collaborating on a story sort of meet after hours, you know, around their kitchen table or something.

I was going to ask, like, do you guys get together, like in a informal, come up with your own makeshift newsrooms and like a diner or something to that effect? Yeah, kind of. I mean, you know, we will get together to plan things out and to compare notes. We're on the phone with each other a lot. You know, I, when I can, like to go into, there are still press rooms in certain places around the city, like in city hall and some of the courthouses, you know, and that's someplace where you can sort of set up. Alden did shell out to rent a six-desk co-working space in Midtown, but we really kind of go there to, you know, charge our laptop batteries, which, by the way, the laptops that they issued us. have very poor batteries.

So I would imagine at this point. Yeah. So give us a sense of like what were you doing in front of the city of city hall in terms of like testifying and what are you guys asking? I mean, I get a better sense. Obviously you want a contract. And I know you guys are looking for like fair wages and cost of living increases. I mean, very sort of like vanilla requests.

here for basic for workers job protections benefits even for part-time workers some measure of security and some standard benefits what what were you asking from the city council and what can folks do who read the paper do so city council a couple of folks in the labor committee reached out and, you know, wanted to author a non-binding resolution in support of our contract fight. And we're, you know, when people that you cover not always favorably want to back you in a fight, that's a good sign. So, you know, that we were speaking in support of that resolution last week. And, I mean, really what we're asking for, like I said, it's not super radical. We have 55 full-time employees and seven part-time employees covering the city of, you know,

eight and change million people. And we want a living wage. We want to be able to, you know, live in the city that we cover. And, you know, about 19, so we've got, like I said, 55 full-time employees, 19 of those folks are making less than $65,000 a year, which is not livable in the city. We even have some folks making less than 55,000. We want some of the money that we make to come back and be reinvested in this newspaper. And, you know, for that to come to us in the form of like a real, you know, tangible wage increase.

Some of the folks who took wage decreases at the beginning of COVID in lieu of a furlough have not been made haul. None of them who took that have been made whole. So you've got folks who've worked here for, you know, a decade or so and are making less now than they, did when they started. So we, in a very real way, need to be able to afford to live in the city if we're going to cover it well and we're going to do our jobs for our readers. But the other things we're asking for are things that I think most folks assume people like daily news reporters already have. We want paid parental leave. We want to be paid on days when we have to go to jury duty, which they don't want to pay us in the upcoming time. I thought that was illegal. I thought you

had to pay people. I mean, you know, there are legal guidelines for things like... That's what Matt told me. And he was on, he was on like a grand jury for like six months. Special extended one. There are legal requirements for like parental leave and things of that nature. And, you know, and that's what they're saying as well. We'll give you that, you know, but I, listen, I raised one of my two kids on that when I was working at a different outlet. And it's not great. You know, it's not great. they're, you know, trying to eat away at our vacation days. It really is just sort of nickel and

diming stuff. You know, in the grand scheme of things, we want to just be able to keep paying our rent and keep doing our jobs. So what can folks who want to support the daily news workers do, whether they read the paper on a regular basis or not? What can folks do to help? One thing we know is that the private equity firm that owns us, Alden Global Capital, and their head honcho, Heath Freeman, they don't like when their names get dragged out. They like to do their buying and selling in secret. And so just talking about it, just like raising the issue, just, you know, supporting. Is that A-L-D-E-N as an Alden Global?

Yeah. Okay. Just curious. And they are, you know, if people, can sort of join their voice to the city council resolution. We have a petition that you can find at nydnunion.com and sign off on that. That helps us sort of leverage the support of New Yorkers. But I think part of what's going on here is private equity firms buy something

because they think it's valuable and they sell something once they think it's not valuable. So any demonstration of the value of this paper to this city is good. for us. It helps us. It helps us be able to continue to do our jobs. You know, we don't, we don't want to inflict any pain on our owners. We want our owners to invest in us and we want to be able to do our job. So, you know, anything as simple as subscribing to the paper, buying the paper, talking about the coverage we have, you know, making it clear that we're still a power in this city is important and helps. This is where getting on social media can actually have an actual impact. Evan Simcoe, but Narski, we will put a link to

to the New York Daily Union, N.YD.Union.com and the petition as well. Thanks so much. Great to see you again. Have you on the show. It's been a lot of years. 16 years, 14, 15 years? That's right. All right. Really appreciate it. Evan. Thanks so much. Good luck. And hope to see you again soon. All right. all right folks we're going to take quick break and when we come back we'll have another former producer of the majority report on uh josh orton who is now uh the president of demand justice after working for bernie sanders and the labor department and russ fingold oh come home we'll be right back after this I don't know.

We are back, Sam Cedar on the majority port, Emma Viglin out today. Joining us now, Josh Orton, former advisor to Senator Bernie Sanders, former advisor at the White House, former advisor to Senator Russ Feingold, and Harry Reid, and now president of demand. and justice. And of course, former producer of the Major Report, going back to the Air America Days. Former executive producer of the majority. And, you know, we'll start this off on a bad note of getting bumped behind a more

junior former producers. So I just know. Well, that's called the lead end. That's the opener. I see it. I see. Yes. Good. All right. Josh, great to see you. And congratulations. Thank you. I was so excited about this. We had, it was Bill, your predecessor on, Brian. Brian Fallon on this program years ago, at the beginning of the Biden administration, maybe leading up to the Biden administration, and he had worked for Obama and had acknowledged

that they really blew it when it came to judges. and um and and this organization was meant to sort of move democrats and have them appreciate uh what goes on with the judiciary which of course you know has been one of my belly wicks for a long time so I was very excited um when you uh took over this organization or I should say became uh it's what I what do you call it president president president um tell us about uh demand progress I mean and demand justice, rather, and what the agenda is, before we go into the things that you want to do to execute it. Yeah, so I guess when I first became aware of demand justice, it was when I was actually doing

work for Nairal, then, which is now reproductive freedom for all, fighting the Kavanaugh nomination. And, you know, you and I have the sort of same experience at this. I remember, you know, back in law school reading, you know, 14th Amendment abortion cases and the democratically nominated Supreme Court justices were talking in the medical terms and, you know, being precise and accurate and apolitical. And you had the Republican-nominated justices like Scalia or Thomas using Frank Luntz language,

partial birth abortion in the opinions. I mean, we were a generation behind on the left or more behind Republicans in the Federal Society and Leonard Leo and sort of stacking the federal courts. And so when demand justice sort of came about in 2017, I almost felt this, this is what I would record with NAROL, like the sense of relief that finally an organization, and I think NAROL was doing this well too, finally an organization was like speaking openly and truthfully about what was going on with the judiciary and was not

sort of talking in like laborious, like, you know, elitist terms about the sacrosanct institution. I mean, the Republicans have been treating this as a political fight for a generation. And we, as Democrats or progressives, just had not been. And so one of the things that most appealed to me to demand justice's work was that willingness to be blunt and transparent about how the fight for the judiciary Supreme Court on down was political. But then also push Democrats who, you know, were sort of clinging to norms and, you know, comedy, C-O-M-I-T-Y in the Senate and sort of a belief that our Democrat institutions would sort of like protect themselves and not realize. that if we want to protect our rights, if we want to fight for these institutions, you know, if we want them to protect us, we actually have to fight to protect them. This was sort of like my slug in interviewing for this job was that I worked for Harry Reid and sort of high-level

democratic politics before I ever stepped foot in law school. And so the idea that judiciary and these domination fights weren't another institution that we had to fight to protect that we couldn't just trust. You know, the jig was sort of up by the time I stepped into law school. That was why demand justice was so appealing to me. I think that you're absolutely right that the Obama administration blew it on judges. And to me, I think the moment or the incident that sort of crystallized to me, everything that was wrong with the democratic approach to judges was when Justice Scalia died. And when President Obama nominated Merrick Garland as his replacement,

knowing that Mitch McConnell was saying, well, we're not going to confirm anybody with the election coming up November. And, you know, so Obama was basically making a choice of whoever we're nominating is essentially a message choice, right? We're trying to send a signal to who Democrats believe should sit on the Supreme Court. And rather than nominating someone who had a clear record of protecting civil rights, had a clear record of protecting worker and union rights and standing up to corporations, he chose someone that I think he and his political advisors would make the Democrats look reasonable on judges. And, you know, that strategy was not only a failed one but it has an audience of no people right and so that's what

I was going to whom correct who is it that's out there that is going well it's absurd that Mitch McConnell's not like Merrick Garland is very tempered he's got a total judicial right right it's like as if as if the case that had to be made was that Mitch McConnell was unreasonable it's like it's the the argument like we don't need to prove that Mitch McConnell was unreasonable we have to defeat Mitch McConnell and win the fights that Mitch McConnell is engaging in. And to me, that, that to me was the epitome of everything that's wrong and how the Democratic Party has approached the judiciary for generations. And so my agenda now with demand justice is, you know, we've already seen, you know, in Trump 2.0, I think in Trump, you know, the first Trump administration,

he did the sort of standard thing of outsourcing the nominations to Leonard Leo and the Federal Society. You know, they had Republican nominee. Just, I know this. I know this. but remind people who the Federalist Society is and who Leonard Leo is because I don't think people you know I mean you can imagine every couple of weeks I'm talking about this but I don't think it can be said enough there has been there is nothing equivalent even remotely equivalent there was an attempt at one point like I'd say 10 years ago to do the AJS and that ended up like almost back frankly like the federal society you need to join the federal society as a conservative in law school they do if you want any future you cannot be appointed

to the judiciary unless you are a member of this society it's the one that barry weiss uh is now famously went and spoke to and said i know you're against uh my marriage because i'm gay but we all want tax cuts i mean that speaks about both parties in that instance but the fed just remind everybody who Leonard Leo is in the federal society. So I would say sort of equate the federal society and the way you're describing is actually right is absolutely right. It's like it is basically the if the road to the, if the Supreme Court is the major leagues, right? The federal society is the whole farm system where you have to join in the sort of you start in the farm leagues and you play single A ball and then double A ball and triple A ball. Joining federal society is the

path upward. If you ever as a as a law student, and a practicing lawyer, if you ever want to be nominated to a federal judgeship and, you know, to others too. But they essentially raise political lawyers from, you know, Pups to be not just sort of legal thinkers, but to sort of dual track them as like political mercenaries and jurists at the same time. And you sort of see the evolution of this in the last couple Supreme Court nominations from Trump is they are extremely good. They are very, very, very almost. almost, you know, they are almost geniuses at being able to talk in legal terms in a way that masks political ideology to try and achieve some far-right, you know, extremist goal, some very

pro-corporate goal. The federal society is essentially, if you want in, if you want any chance of being a federal judge nominated by a Republican president, you have to join the federal society, you have to, you know, you basically have to follow their ideology. Leonard Leo is essentially its head and has been, I think, the singular figure in Republican politics and nominations to the federal judiciary, going back several Republican presidents now, he is the point person, right? And so he and the federal society see the vacancies on the federal bench. They, you know, I'm sure they encourage existing Republican nominated judges on the federal ones to take senior status to retire. They have an inventory of what the vacancies are.

and then they essentially create lists and manifest of who they want to appoint to those judgeships. And Republican White Houses have traditionally outsourced this whole project to Leonard Leo because he's basically built an outsourced farm system for these judges. And so what you have is a combination of people who have either far-right credentials or corporate credentials or some combination of far-right and corporate credentials, who they can place, depending on, you know, the makeup of the Senate, on these federal benches. And it has been this way for a very long time.

And in Trump's first term, it was sort of the standard that way, right? They did it that normal way. And, you know, they, you know, said the right things on the corporate issues. They said the right thing on, you know, the sort of individual rights, the gay marriage and reproductive rights where they sort of hedged enough, you know, that they wouldn't be called out on it explicitly. What's interesting is I think that actually Roberts was the last, and as they've gotten more brazen, as this has become more successful, and as Democrats have not fought back, the nominees, if you could see the evidence of this in the hearings as they've gotten more successful, the nominees have actually answered less as they realize they can get away with answering less. I believe, and I'm sure someone will check, I believe that John Roberts was the last SCOTUS nomination nominated by a Republican to actually defend Brown v. Board. on the merits, right? He actually sort of endorsed, well, yeah, separate equal is inherently

unequal. And since then, they've realized they don't even have to answer those questions. They can just sort of duck those questions. This has been a massively, it is one of the most successful institutional political projects that the right wing has and has built over generations. And to your point, Democrats have had nothing in response and not just institutionally nothing. But they haven't even sort of talked about or treated the judiciary as a political entity that has to be fought for in order to preserve either the rights that already exist or the progress that we make legislatively and and electorally. There's there's a couple of things that come to mind.

One is that Trump was able to place somewhere around 260 people on the federal judiciary to lifetime appointments, which was record breaking up to that point because there were so many that were empty from the Obama years, because it was not considered a priority, both as a policy matter and as a political matter. Yes. And those two things go hand in hand. Yes. The blue slips that were ignored under in the blue slip is just an old tradition in the

Senate where the norm. Senators from a certain state have to basically give their sign off to any potential judicial nominee from that, that may be in that circuit court. or in those district courts, and if they don't, if they hold their blue slip back, they don't even have to make a proactive argument against it. And blue slips were respected regardless of the party, right? So in other words, even if it was a Republican nominee, and there was one from the Seventh Circuit today, passed through Senator Judiciary, and Tammy Baldwin from Wisconsin, did not return

the blue slip. They ignored it. They sort of voted to move this. The Democrats respected the blues list. Even after the Republicans had ignored. boarded under Trump 1. And then they went back, and the big thing that I think it was at the time was it from Vermont. I can't remember his name.

Lehi was like, we're going to reinstitute blue slips, as if like the whole country is like, thank God, we've returned to normal. Electorally, when you look at the issues when people really like, the difference between a regular voter and irregular voter getting off the couch and voting is like, does my, does this candidates support the blue slip system that i mean that is and then of course as soon as the republicans take control again blue slips are ignored by democrats of course and this is like and this is like this is like this obviously follows a pattern in the democratic caucus generally and especially in the senate where like you know i think this is sort of a indicative of what i would call the post harry reed

senate in the democratic caucus like you know to the extent that um you know they still existed under harry reed there was some notion that you can't Like, if the norms were getting away, getting in, in, in, if sort of norms and procedures were getting in the way of achieving our ideological gains in sort of, you know, if they were used improperly, if they were sort of, if they were used unfairly and they were, like, there was at least some notion that, like, maybe they shouldn't exist anymore. And you saw this when Harry Reid used the nuclear option, um, to, to be able to confirm district court judges with 50 plus under Obama, because he was.

so frustrated that not only was Obama not nominating enough that the Republicans were filibustering all of them. Like, Harry would actually sort of, and, you know, he took a lot of flack from all the normies at the time for using the nuclear option to be able to confirm Obama's district, lower court nominations on district court and circuit court judges with with just 51 votes instead of 60. But there's none of that now in the Democratic caucus. No. And so let's let's talk about where we are. And someone just asked, is there a progressive of our liberal version of the Feralist Society. And again, like I say, the A.J.S.

I think it was the American. ACS. American Constitution Society, yep. Attempted and has yet to really sort of like develop that type of thing. There really is nothing equivalent, even remotely close. And the only thing that comes, you know, like, it seems to me that demand justice is doing like one part of that job, which is sort of the training and educating the senators in particular or hoping to and getting Democrats to understand whether they are rank and fight, whether they are lawmakers or

voters. This is important. I mean, right now, the only thing standing between the full deployment of, you know, military in these places, in this instance, it happens to be a judge appointed by Ronald Reagan, I think it was. But largely speaking, if Joe Biden, one of the things he deserves credit for, and a lot of this is a function, frankly, of demand justice. The pressure from the left, absolutely. The pressure that came in, Joe Biden put 250 some odd justices on the court. And it was also justices that came that were sociologically, economically, legally, and you know it wasn't just a question of identity it wasn't just all corporate lawyers right from white shoe firms it was defense attorneys it was anti-trust lawyers it was Dale Ho is a was a voting rights

attorney from the ACLU and now sits on a district court in New York yes that was hugely that was a huge innovation it seems to be well and I think so I think there's there's sort of two problems that I want to sort of talk about the macro problem for a second because I think there's a chicken and egg thing and one of them is you know the problem I think in this is having fallen on a generation behind. You know, I think the senators look at the Democratic base and see that they just have not been as activated and don't care about the courts over the years as much as the Republican base has. And so they've been less reactive on these things because they don't think they have to, because they don't think they're going to get pressure from the base if they're

crappy on judges. And I think, you know, and I think on the right, you see, you know, you see the aggressive corporate, you know, the corporate actors who know, that they need pro-corporate judges in order to sort of externalize all their costs, right, so that, you know, to strike down regulations so they don't have to pay to clean up their own pollution. You know, there is a financial gain for them in investing in organizations that build a right-wing judiciary. And there hasn't been that kind of like, they almost have like a fiduciary responsibility to corrupt the judiciary, right? And there just hasn't been that kind of an incentive structure on the left. And I think, so there's a bit of a chicken and egg thing of like, at one point,

are we sort of, who's going to sort of take the lead? And so demand justice has sort of like, has a couple different projects ahead of us. One of them is just, you know, is making sure that we get to. And I think that, you know, I'm sort of, I want to sort of say like Normie Dem base is aware of how much the judiciary is at stake, how much it matters, how much is a political fight because Democrats have been treating it as like an academic fight for too long, right? And so there's sort of this weird feedback loop. So we actually have to have, Democratic activists demand that their senators fight for the judiciary. The second is that to your point about who are we nominating?

What are these, like, what is the make of these courts? Obama, like, President Biden deserves a lot of credit. And if you remember, demand justice at the beginning of the Biden administration when he was elected. They had a list. Not just had a list, but started a campaign demandings, demanded that the new incoming by administration not appoint a single federal judge who was a corporate lawyer. Now, do I think the demand justice thought that the Biden administration was going to follow that to the T? Probably not. But I think Ron Clayne and the Biden administration understood that that gave them space. You know, they were being pushed and that gave them space to a point, like you were saying, people who were, I don't know, public defenders, voting rights attorneys, right? And so that moved the whole conversation. So there's a couple of things. We have to sort of activate. We have to, you know, for all the people that are outraged at whatever the assault on the rights are, the invasion of the National Guard, the deportations, the you know, the Fifth Circuit ruled a few weeks ago. A Trump judge, the Fifth Circuit ruled,

the NLRB was like blanket unconstitutional in favor of Elon Musk and SpaceX, right? And we said a peep about that. So we actually have to sort of, our job is to sort of connect people and how their rights and their sort of, you know, how corporations are screwing them, how their rights are being taken away. All that leads back to a judiciary that the Democrats have not been fighting for for a generation. And I think the second thing is we have to move, So part of that we have to move the conversation to demand that Democrats actually do things that they have been, one, uncomfortable doing, because there is a, they want to sort of all get along and not, you know, plant their feet and make things awkward in the caucus whenever possible and no more so than on the Senate Judiciary Committee. And two, you know, get Democrats and activists and progressive activists to hold them accountable when they don't. And I think one of the, you know, we can sort of talk about what happened last week.

But I think in Trump one, you know, he was breaking the law. And I think the urgency here in the second Trump administration is he's sort of systematically dismantling not just the rule of law, but all the institutions that uphold the rule of law. You saw, you know, he's going after law firms and getting them to sort of capitulate. That was intentional, right? That was intentional. And demand justice, you know, this spring launched a campaign called Big Law Cowards to call them out for doing it, right? But we degrade everyone's rights.

We sort of shift the power towards the powerful when we don't fight back against the right-wing takeover, the judiciary and the rule of law. Let's talk about what your action is right now that you're looking to do and why. Yeah, so one of the things that we saw when in Trump 2 is every single judge who's nominated for the federal bench under Trump has to essentially take a loyalty pledge. This is unlike it was in Trump one, because every one of the senators is asking about who won or lost to 2020 election and what happened on January 6th. And if you are to be in Trump's favor, and unlike the first administration, he announces all these nominations on truth social. People don't know about him ahead of time. So it's clear that he's looking at every single one of these, not federal judicial nominations very closely. Every single one, in order to be nominated by Trump, you cannot have said that he lost the 2020 election.

and you cannot be truthful about what happened on January 6th. So every single one of these judges, in everyone who's been asked. And just to be clear, this is not a comedy routine that you're saying. This is actually true. You literally have to make sure that your record on any public discourse and in any type of hearing. And when asked in this process, you cannot say that Trump lost the 2020 election. And to the extent where you see every one of them has essentially the same language in their written questions, it's like they're out. is, well, officially the House certified Biden as the winner, which is not, did he win?

It just says that this third party said he won, right? And then on January 6th, they say some version of, well, I'm weighing in a political matter, and there's active litigation about the pardons, which is like mostly not true. They can't, because we know those are the two things that Trump, you know, if you on the wrong side of those things, you are done with Trump. And I think it's funny because can you imagine any single one of these nominees in a hearing if they're asked the question, who lost the 2020 election? If they said Donald Trump lost the 2020 election, everybody who pays attention to politics, everybody knows that their nomination would be yanked the same day. They would be done, right? And so yet we have all of these people being nominated to federal judges at a time when he's weaponizing the DOJ.

He's like, he's initiating these revenge prosecutions against his political enemies. And last week, we saw Senate Democrats in the Judiciary Committee, six of them last week, and now Herono today, more, have voted to approve these judges and report them out favorably to the floor. And none of these people can say that Trump lost the 2020 election. And to me, that means they're politically compromised. Why, like, so we launched an ad campaign. We're spending six figures and we're going to increase the five. That's a great question. Like, what is the?

I mean, part of it is log rolling. Like, part of them, like, might want the, you know, white need the vote of, one of these home state senators in the future. I think part of them like want to look like they're bipartisan some way. But as a result, they're sort of, they're enabling Trump to lower the bar of what constitutes is qualified. They're essentially enabling the authoritarianism by saying these judges are qualified when they have to take political loyalty oaths. And like, here's the thought, here's the sort of experiment here. None of them yet were, like, None of them were nominees to the Eastern District of Virginia where the PAC Lindsey Halligan is prosecuting Jim Comey.

Yes. Imagine if one of these nominees was being nominated to a district court where Trump had installed, had fired the United States attorney for refusing to prosecute his political attorneys, his political enemies, had put in a crony like Lindsay Halligan to file BS charges against his political enemies. And you had a judge presiding over that case in row. Iraq. He did not say that it's completely right. The election, it's a banana republic at this point. Yeah. And here's the thing.

Yes, some of the, they weren't appointed to the Eastern District of Virginia, but a couple of them were appointed to district courts in Alabama. Imagine if one of Trump's enemies was Doug Jones, was former Senator Judge Jones. Like, you can't, you can't, there is no, there is no moral, historical, or frankly, political rationalization for voting for any of these judges. And the reason why seven Democratic. senators and more will sign off on these is because there is no political price for them to pay to do it. And it's the easiest. I mean, this is the way they always make decisions, right? It's like, okay, there's some marginal benefit. I might need a, I might need a favor from somebody, whatever it is.

And there's no price to pay. So that's it. That's the equation. And imagine 20 years from now when we're looking back at these votes in Senate Judiciary Committee where, you know, Peter Wells was one of the first, and he gave this quote about, well, I found a needle and a haystack, I found a Trump judge that was qualified. Qualified to do what, right? This guy had, you know, had a very scant record. He came from, he was the central, he came from the Central District of Florida. I believe he was the son of a, of a lobbyist who had defended police misconduct cases. Like, because they lack any smoking gun in their overt record does not mean, like, You are participating in the sort of shrinking down of what's constitutes qualified because Trump is so bad.

Like, that's enabling. And there's no, again, there's no price to pay. So the idea is make it costly for these Democratic senators to cast this vote. Make them feel like there is a downside to making these votes because people are paying attention to it. and so what is the current campaign that you guys are doing so the first campaign we launched last week we're spending you know uh six figures we're targeting both durbin who's the ranking member and and and chris coons who's of a long time member of the judiciary committee and has been sort of on the opposite side of some demand justice campaigns in the past um billboards and digital ads um in their home states and online basically asking them like what are they thinking right they voted to capitulate to drum why is derbin of all people doing isn't he retiring don't know. I mean, I think maybe to give cover to other Dems on the committee, I just don't know. And we saw even Schiff in California vote for one of them, like one of them favorably off the committee last week. And so today, we're going to expand that to a couple more senators. We saw, you know,

Sheldon White House from Rhode Island, Amy Kloberchard from Minnesota, Maisie Hirono, sadly, from Hawaii even voted one off favorably. And I think one of the things, the funny thing is, is last week when they did this, they had talked, some of these senators who did this had talked earlier in the committee, like moments earlier, bemoaning the weaponization of the DOJ to prosecute Comey, and then turned around moments later and voted for these judges who could not say that Trump lost the 2020 election. And so, like, part of this is going back to this whole notion of like thinking through the Obama nominating Garland for the Supreme Court of it all, right, is that part of this is that if they're going to sort of send these angry tweets, if they're going to go on cable

news, like calling Trump and authoritarian, you can't then in the sort of confines of the judiciary committee when you're sitting next to your Republican colleagues and it's sort of all friendly and you're sort of arguing about norms, like you can't then vote for his judges, right? You actually have, if you're going to, you have to act honestly, you have to act consistently with what is going on in the world outside with the attacks on the DOJ. You can't, you can't have it both ways. You can't sort of like try and show some bipartisanship, and at the same time, say the sky is falling because Trump is attacking the rule of law. Right. And the idea is, on some level, reflective of what's happening now with the government shutdown. People are paying attention.

Democrats are signaling this is not normal. What's going on here, the president is, you know, trying to unilaterally cut the budget. There's no point inside. Like, it creates an awareness of what the issue is because people need to be engaged with the courts and with the idea that every judicial nominee is going to have implications down the road, maybe next week for that matter, or six months from now or whatnot. And even more so when we have a president who is assaulting the foundations of, I mean, the judiciary, it's, yes. I mean, on some level, Well, I didn't expect to have to do this so quickly after I took over dementia. I mean, on some level, I feel like it's almost absurd that we're having to do this, that

we're having to call on these, we have to sort of put pressure on these Democrats for voting for these Trump judges. It's, I'm a little gobsmacked about, I mean, I guess I should never overestimate the Democratic Senate caucus, or at least some of them. But to me, this is, I can't believe that we have to do this. And I can't believe, and I think especially, look, you're going to say people are to say, well, why are you going after Dems? You should be going after Republicans?

Like, here's the thing. There is, it's not just sort of a historical and moral argument for doing it this way. There's an election coming up next year. And one of the biggest problems Democrats have now that they need to sort of work on is they are seen by the general voting public as incapable of going to DC and taking on the big fights and reforming the institutions so that government serves people better. They are not seen as people who are strong on taking on the fights for reform. form. And so part of this is this is in their own political interest to actually be consistent

and plant their feet and do their job, right? This isn't just a moral question. This isn't just a historical question. There's like a political imperative here to actually standing up to Trump. Josh Orton, we'll put a link to Demandjustice. Demandjustice.org. People can go there, support your organization, support your work, petitions, and also you'll get cues as to which senators you should be calling and saying, how are you? Like, I know there are people, I've seen it in our IMs. People are like, what, Maisie Hirono or any Democrat? It's voting for Trump's nominees.

People just aren't aware of it. And I'm glad you're in a position now to help raise people's awareness. And we'll talk again soon. Yeah, and next time, let's get a little better spot on the program. Maybe a little earlier. Yes, we're upgrading. And I'm sorry. It's very hard to find

We'll talk about it later We'll talk about it It's hard to find I understand We'll get to the extent All right Thanks Josh Thank you Sam

All right folks Before we go into the fun half Let's bring on Another former producer Of the program This is the most former producer Well Brandon's that's not Brandon What?

Oh we don't have bender yet What is he doing? Brandon Sutton Welcome Which one is He's not on here yet. All right, let's bring it. You're not on.

Brandon, you're not, you're not, we can't hear it yet. Oh, we can't hear you. No. Oh, that's too bad. What's going on? In a moment, Brandon Sutton will be joining us. I see him.

Wisconsin Disco just said, can't wait for Brian to go on to lead the Southern Poverty Law. center nice nice yeah there is brand there i'm here i was starting to think i was a hallucination i honestly i don't know what was going on but uh you know you're not here and where is where's bender he's just going to okay all right we got bender in here um we got one more former producer of the majority report to join the show number three of the day is going to join us yeah here you're a kingmaker sam um well we just like we just we just fire we just fire people why is it messed up because of me oh because you're used to

having that other cameras don't worry about it we go there we go all right uh matt bender brandon sudden it's thursday um and uh emma is out today so uh sadly you have her substitute why don't you guys Brandon tell me what's happening on the discourse before we go to the break yes so today we checked out Pam Bondi's escapades in front of Congress and tomorrow we will be diving deep was that her crying in the background no she'd never do that and tomorrow I don't know if you have been keeping up with the adventures of Patrick Bet David but he had the foremost expert on the dustification of the Twin Towers on 9-11 on to discuss what really happened to the Twin Towers, Dr. Judy Wood. And so us on the discourse will be asking sort of, I guess, met a question of what happened to the quality of the Patrick Van David podcast, while also, I guess, finding out the true nature of what happened on 9-11.

So join those things answered at the simultaneous. We need to get some of that footage and examine it. um i actually think that patrick bad david could be a hologram by now so that could be uh matt bender how are you what's going on on your like multiple podcasts that you do i'll keep it short just tune in tonight 830 p m at youtube dot com slash matt bender for leftist mafia and you got to keep those kids quiet yeah i know i know all right uh we're going to take a break head into the fun half just a reminder to your support that makes this show possible you can become

a member join the major report.com also just coffee dot co-op fair trade coffee hot chocolate used the coupon code majority get 10% off Matt left reckoning yeah left reckoning we had a show Mark Laravala talking about a guy stealing

valor in the Rogan Manosphere also what has gone on with our society is just like this is what kind of Valour I remember when Valor men Castor valour? No.

Justification of valor. The proper military valor. Say I had a bronze medal of honor with valor. Somebody asked me, do you have one of those with valor? And he's like, yep. And the cool thing about saying things, yep, instead of yes, is like, it's faster. So like the lie, you might be able to get out there with the lie. And then Justin Chen, who represents union workers for the federal government, particularly

at the EPA, talking about the shutdown. So check that out. focused. All right, folks, quick break, then fun half. Three months from now, six months from now, nine months from now. And I don't think it's going to be the same as it looks like in six months from now. And I don't know if it's necessarily going to be better six months from now than it is three months from now. But I think around 18 months out, we're going to look back and go like, wow. What?

What is that going on? It's nuts. Wait a second. Hold on for, hold on for a second. The majority report. Emma, welcome to the program. Hey. Fun hat.

Matt. Who? Fun hack. What is up, everyone? Fun hat. No me keen. You did it. Fun hat.

Let's go Brandon. Let's go Brandon. Let's go Brandon. Bradley, you want to say hello? Sorry to disappoint. Everyone, I'm just a random guy. It's all the boys today. Fundamentally false.

No, I'm sorry. All right, women's talking for a second. Let me finish. Where is this coming from, dude? But dude, you want to smoke this? Seven, eight. Yes. Hi, me.

Is this name? Yes. Is this me? Is it me? It is you. It is me. I think it is you. Who is you?

Who is you? No sound. every single freaking day. What's on your mind? We can discuss free markets and we can discuss capitalism. I'm going to guess how life. Who libertarians?

They're so stupid though. Common sense says, of course. Gobbled e-gook. We fucking nailed him. So what's 79 plus 21? Challenge met. I'm positive equilibrium. I believe 96, I want to say.

857. 210. 35. 501. One half. 3-8. 9-11, for instance. $3,400.

$1,900. $6, $5, $4, $3 trillion sold. It's a zero-sum game. Actually, you're making anything less. But let me say this. Hoop. You're going to call satire. Sam goes satire.

On top of it all, my favorite part about you is just like every day, all day, like everything you do. Without a doubt. Hey, buddy, we see you. All right, folks, folks, folks. It's just the. week being weeded out, obviously. Yeah. Sun's out guns out.

I don't know. But you should know. People just don't like to entertain ideas anymore. I have a question. Who cares? Our chat is enabled folks. I love it. I do love that.

Got to jump. I got to be quick. I get a jump. I'm losing it, bro. 10 o'clock, we're already late, and the guy's being a dick. So screw him. Sent to a gulaw? Outrageous.

Like, what is wrong with you? Love you, bye. Love you. Bye-bye.