The Majority Report with Sam Seder - 3605 - Trump Readies Ground Invasion of Iran; To Tax Cut or Not to Tax Cut w/ Perry Bacon, Sen Chris Van Hollen

Episode Date: March 20, 2026

It's Casual Friday on The Majority Report   On today's program:   Donald Trump is considering sending troops on the ground to seize Kharg Island in an attempt to force the opening of the Strait of Hormuz.   JD Vance asks Americans to take solace in the fact that our "allies" are suffering far more from the energy crisis we caused by our war in Iran.   Staff writer at The New Republic, Perry Bacon, Jr. joins Sam to wrap up the week's news. Check out Perry's podcast - Right Now with Perry Bacon, Jr.    Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) joins the program to discuss his new proposed tax plan and the war in Iran.   In The Fun Half:   Senator Mark Warner questions Tulsi Gabbard on why Donald Trump sent her to observe the Fulton County election office raid when the president was not meant to know about the raid ahead of time.   Senator Mark Kelly asks Gabbard and CIA director Ratcliffe on their thoughts on Trump offering "unfiltered national security" briefings to his big donors.   Donald Trump holds a press conference with the Prime Minister of Japan where he jokes about pearl harbor.   Markwayne Mullin is an idiot and thanks to John Fetterman he is moving forward into the Senate to get confirmed as the new secretary of DHS.   Patrick Bet-David has really upset their audience over their cheerleading for the war in Iran.   The new head   all that and more   New Yorkers if you live in Senate District 27 which includes the neighborhoods of Lower Manhattan, including the East Village, Tribeca, Little Italy, Chinatown, Soho, and the Financial District and Greenwich Village support Yuh-Line Niou for State Senate    To connect and organize with your local ICE rapid response team visit ICERRT.com 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: ZOCDOC: Go to Zocdoc.com/MAJORITY and download the Zocdoc app to sign-up for FREE and book a top-rated doctor. NUTRAFOL: Get $30 off your first box + free Croissants in every box. Go to Wildgrain.com/MAJORITY to start your subscription. SUNSET LAKE:  30% off all CBD tinctures for people and pets with code Spring26 at  SunsetLakeCBD.com  Follow the Majority Report crew on Twitter: @SamSeder @EmmaVigeland @MattLech On Instagram: @MrBryanVokey 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.com

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And Friday, casual Shabbat. The majority report with Sam Cedar. It is Friday. March 20th, 2000, 6. 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, Perry Bacon Jr., staff writer at the New Republic host of the TNR show right now with Perry Bacon. then Senator Chris Van Hollen, Senator from Maryland. We're here to discuss his new proposed tax plan and the potentially widening and deepening of this Iran war that we have launched. Meanwhile, Trump mulling sending troops on the ground and an invasion of Karg Island as the Pentagon wants to. $200 billion more for war. Meanwhile, three warships and 2,500 more troops

are in the process of being deployed to the region. In this country, Judge Rules, the RFK Jr. overstepped his authority in curbing transcare, providing at least some breathing room for hospitals around the country. And Fetterman, you remember that guy?

From Pennsylvania? Does he remember him? Yeah. He provided the win. margin to move DHS nominee Mark Wayne Mullen through committee. In other words,

Mark Wayne Mullen would not have gotten through committee, except for Fetterman's vote. Particanship. Yep. CBS News to end its century old radio service

cut 6% of its staff. as Barry Weiss continues to drive that entity into the ground. After $80 billion spent, meta is killing off the Metaverse. I spend so much time in it. It's because, and you understand, it's because billionaires are smarter than the rest of us. We allocate capital. You're too stupid to know how good the Metaverse was. Heat records breaking in the Southwest.

Country now is breaking 77% more hot weather records than in the 1970s, than any time since, frankly. FDA investigating seven E. coli illnesses suspected to come from a raw milk farm. They deny it. Postmaster General claims the Postal Service will be running out of money in 2027. All this and more on today's majority report. Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, Emma Vigland out today. She is headed to the West Coast. She's going to be doing some shows out there. We will provide you with that info as you need it.

You don't need it right now. You don't need it right now. They're not happening. I mean, Sunday afternoon, she's going to be doing it with Francesca, but that's already sold out. So you are S-O-L on that one. Should have done it earlier. You can join the Patreon to see a live stream of it for a bituation room.

Oh, you can't? All right. Well, then in that case, join the Patreon for the bituation room, and you will be able to check that out. We've got a lot to get to. Karg Island is a very small island, as Donald Trump will tell you, off the coast of Iran. it is the primary facility that Iran uses to export oil to the world. Two notes I would make on that. One is that I have read from other experts who say it is a mistake to believe that in shutting down or capturing Karg Island that you will prevent Iran

from exporting oil. They have already, they have pipelines that go to Iraq and then ships that load there and sail from there. They have pipelines that are south of the Straits of Hormuz, where they also ship oil, and that they have other mechanisms that they've been using to sneak oil out of the country, in part because of the sanctions. This is obviously important because if you destroy Carg Island, however, you are destroying a huge capacity of Iran to generate revenue to support itself. And while that might be helpful if you are fighting a war against them,

it's not going to be helpful if you win a war against them. And sort of counterintuitively, and because our government is panicking about the huge pile of crap they stepped in, they have lifted sanctions off of Iranian oil exports that are already on ships so that they can maintain the price of oil or at least create a downward pressure on it, even though now it's above $100 a barrel, people should be aware that every time a conservative ever said, Biden or Obama in particular gave Iran billions of dollars, that those monies were just frozen money in Iranian accounts that went back to Iran. And it was about maybe half the amount that is available to them now by lifting those sanctions on those oil exports, just so that for the record, not that any of these things matter anymore because of the insanity we go through.

But here is Donald Trump explaining, you know, how he's sort of like, I don't know, should we have gold LeMay over there or gold LeMay over there? or should we invade Carg Island? And as you know, their leadership is gone. Their leaders are gone. They pick new leaders, they're gone. They pick new leaders, they're gone. And now they're looking for new leaders again. We can take out the island.

Any time we want, I call it the little oil island that sits there, so totally unprotected. We've taken out everything but the pipes. We left the pipes because to rebuild the pipe, would take years for, you know, for them to do. But we are, I would say we are substantially ahead of schedule. And I had to do this. I had to call it an excursion. I had to take this little excursion and do something that no other president had the courage to do.

We're ahead of schedule, but be clear, there is no schedule. I mean, I think that's word for word what Pete Hagsit has said. but don't worry because and jaddy vance is going to try and spin this as a positive here he is in michigan yesterday as screwed as we are we've screwed over the rest of the world worse so feel good about that is that we actually worked with a lot of our allies all over the world who are suffering from this frankly more than we are because unlike the united states where we pursued an energy dominance agenda, you've got a lot of people all over the world

who have focused on a lot of green energy scams, and they're hurting a lot more than we are. So as much as we've got, we've got to focus on getting these gas prices down. All of those sort of like people in the back there who all just seem incredibly depressed, because maybe they thought they were coming to see Trump. Yeah, didn't you play YMCA?

Or whatever it is, they all seem incredibly depressed. if they weren't in this sort of like depressed stupor, they'd probably say, wait a second. So you're saying that countries that rely more on other energy sources outside of oil are suffering more from high oil prices than countries that don't. What you don't understand is Iran is one of the biggest exporters of wind and sunlight. That's right. Yeah, you're forgetting that. all over the world who have focused on a lot of green energy scams, and they're hurting a lot more than we are.

So as much as we've got, we've got to focus on getting these gas prices down, the reality is overseas, they're feeling it far worse than we did because we've taken the steps to protect our energy economy. So for example, what we did working with these allies, that we released hundreds and millions of barrels out of all these petroleum reserves so that we could put some downward pressure on prices. We're working on a number of things. In fact, a couple of things. We dumped a bunch of our reserves. Other countries dumped some of their reserves.

And it all goes into putting downward pressure on the cost of oil. But it feels like that surge of a resurgence of a, of resurgence. reserves is gone now. The price of oil has gone up above $100 a barrel again. There's a limited amount of that. We could drain all our reserves. But the bottom line is, if we go to Carg Island, and I think Senator Holland might be speaking about this, we go to Carg Island and destroy Iran's capacity to export oil, or at least a significant portion of it, they're in one of those situations where it's like, we don't have that much to lose at this point. And things get a lot worse.

I mean, J.D. Vance here is treading water, hoping that a ship is going to come by and rescue him. Because he is watching his entire future go down the tubes. That's what he's watching right now. We're working on a number of things. In fact, a couple of things that I think will be announced in just the next 24 to 48 hours. Yes, next week. The president on that. But we recognize this is an issue.

We are fighting against it. And we promise that when this conflict draws to a close, when this operation draws to a close, we're going to see those energy prices come back down to reality because that's what the president promised to do. You are a doucheback. First off, that's in the cradle. Exactly. I hope people, I hope people appreciate that J.D. Vance has appropriated and built on Donald Trump's habit of saying,

we're like, I'd say, two weeks away. Two weeks. Two weeks. We have a plan we're going to release. Vance says, like, we are going to release a plan within 24 to 48 hours. want to get ahead of the president. So therefore, like, what happened to that plant? Well, I don't want to get ahead of the president. The president said actually two weeks. So he's mastered that. And we're going to get back to reality soon, folks. Don't worry. Right now, you're all living a fantasy.

Once this conflict slash operation is over. Once we do this excursion, once I'm back from the excursion, we'll get back to reality. Don't worry. Don't believe you're having a dream right now. Yeah, and those are $4.00 oil prices. Just know that in Europe they fell for the scams. In a moment, we'll be talking to Perry Bacon Jr. Staff writer at the New Republic about this absolute insanity. Oh, speaking to which, also there was a report that Denmark, completely apropos of nothing,

Denmark back in January had sent troops to Greenland with explosives to blow up the airfields, just in case the U.S. decided to invade. I just thought that would be fun to drop in there. A little trivia. Yeah, a little trivia. You should know. This episode of The Majority Port is brought to you by Wildgrain. Wild grain is the first baked from frozen subscription box for artisanal bread, seasonal pastries, and fresh pastas.

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That's ZOC, doc.com slash majority. ZOC, doc, dot com slash majority. Thanks Zoc doc for sponsoring this message. All right back. We'll be right back with Perry Bacon, Jr. We are back, Sam Cedar on the Majority Report. Emma Viglin out today. It is a pleasure to welcome back to the program.

Perry Bacon, Jr., staff writer at the New Republic, host of the New Republic podcast and show, I guess, right now with Perry Bacon. Perry, it's been too long. I think it's been like two or three years, actually, and I was shocked by that. But it's great to see you. Thanks for being here. Thanks for having me. We were just saying before we came on, like, what a crap show.

And you've been talking about, like, we've had to talk about Donald Trump for 10 years, at least now. And it, time has not been good to him. and it's certainly almost been worse for the rest of us, I think, because of him. I mean, absolutely for the rest of us. I mean, because even when Biden was president, there was this looming Trump will run again the entire time. So it's been like this really, I've been doing political journals of like 22 years, something like that. So for presidents. But about 10 years now, most days have been, what did Donald Trump say?

And it's not like Donald Trump is some great orator of someone with great thoughts on politics. he's just he's like a cancer on our politics that is seems like he's never going away i guess he is going away eventually but it feels like it never is never going to happen well all right so let me ask you this i mean so you you know uh you and i have been doing this on more or less for the same amount of time like in the uh early bush years and um and and and here we are again on the cusp in a very different manner than the buildup to the iraq war um and with a very different context, you know, like, even as late, you know, I started doing radio in 2000, early 2004, and even as that was, you know, a year into the war in Iraq. And even then, the American public

had not really fully turned on the war at that point. And it was, it felt rather isolating in many respects to have been against that war, certainly in the run-up to 2003, but certainly by 2004, there was still a sort of sense of like, no one seems to understand how much of a mess this is. And it's completely different this time around. Like, we're at levels of disapproval of this war that it took like four years to get to in Iraq. I don't know. What are you, what do make of all that? You know, that's Will said. You know, I worked at 538 for some period,

so I read a lot of these poll numbers and stuff. And G. Eliot Morris, great journalist, he has a blog called Strength in Numbers. And he wrote about how this is the first war, I think, in modern history, where from the beginning, the American public was clearly opposed. Like, this was not an accident.

Like, Trump had been talking about invading Iran for months. I think Fox News, CBS, ABC, polled this. The majority of people opposed to it, only about 25% for it. Now that we're in the war, all the Republicans have going to get on board. So you're at 35% or so support this. But people oppose this from the beginning. And I think Trump, to be fair, I mean, not to be fair,

but my guess is Trump assumed the Venezuela invasion and takeover happen so quickly that that would happen again here. I think that's the miscalculation. You know, you couldn't really oppose the Venezuela overthrow because it happened in like three hours. So that was not a comparison of the war in Iraq. But this is looking like a quality. where we're not going to solve the issues. And my guess is Trump and I expect that. Yeah, I mean, it feels like a slow moving, I mean, like an actual slow moving train crash.

And he was obviously like encouraged to do this. And as opposed to sort of in his first term, there weren't people who were placed well enough in the administration to sort of thwart all of the different pressures, whether it was Lindsay Graham or Netanyahu or, you know, I don't know what other elements. Yeah, I mean, those are at least two of the big ones. And there may be a cadre of others. And now it also feels like it's the only other factor that is sort of digging us deeper is that he's still a sucker. And he's just, his ego is. such that he can't, he just can't find an exit strategy. Yeah, it's not clear he can declare victory right now.

I think this is the core issue. It's like the regime is very clear. As long as we can write, we can all write promptly, they may have killed Ayatollah, but the regime still exists. So you can't claim that's a victory. Oil prices are going up. There's no victory there. Iran still has some weapons.

They didn't really have a nuclear program to start with. So I think part of the issue is like Trump always wants to be the victory. and ahead. And I don't think there's any clear way to say that right now. I think that's the issue. Yeah. And it feels, I mean, now they're deploying another, what is it, 2,500 troops, a couple more warships. It sounds like they're going to try and occupy Karg Island. That will undoubtedly cause the Iranians to strike other. I mean, it definitely feels like we're just sliding into this thing. And literally, in doing it in slow motion. At what point, I mean, and I guess this is another question.

You know, you started by saying, like, you know, we've had to talk about Donald Trump for 10 years, and at one point he'll go away. But it seems to me that part of the problem is that Republicans do not feel like they're going to pay a price, that the price that they would pay to break from. Donald Trump is greater than if they hew closely to him. And it feels to me, like particularly in the context of the war, the Democratic Party is failing to increase the pain that Republicans feel when they associate with Trump, because we have a Democratic leadership that is sort of in favor of this war in some ways.

Let me focus on the Republicans first. I agree with it with the Democrats. But I think part of it is like, we're in this. era where now 200 and 200 members of most Republican members of Congress, something like 185 of them, are in heavily conservative districts, probably 45 senators in a place. So the biggest threat of your Republican politician today, even more than the Bush era, is to lose a primary. And the way you lose a primary is to say, I don't like Trump or or have Trump not like you. So I think the loyalty to Trump makes sense. And you, and on some level, the Republican Party is kind of

built in that they're going to lose the midterm. I think that's the secret here is that when they pass that bill full of Medicaid cuts and tax-customer-rich, they know that's not popular. They know 10 or 12 members who are in moderate-sister-to-lose. They don't really care. They sort of went along. They know that's happening. So in the Bush here, you had the guardrails because you had Tom DeLay.

I'm not going to defend Tom DeLay too much, but he did care about the House majority and was trying to protect that. And at times when Bush did the Social Security thing, the Republicans in Congress were like, this is killing us. Social Security is very popular. Stop it. And so here you have this unpopular war, but the Republicans are saying nothing. You know, I look, in the run up to the war, I found Hakim and Schumerous comments to be too vague, not being critical. Because as you say, they, my guess is secretly support this war. And I don't think there's a doubt about that. they are not where the party is on Israel. That said, you know, now that we're here, pretty much all Democrats have been criticizing this pretty sharply. I'll see where the next

the next poker point is like, when this request for money comes to the hill, will the Democrats oppose this money? Because that's the big test here. Because right now, they're saying the right things, but will they refuse to fund this war is the core test? But I mean, doesn't that prove my point? The fact that we don't know. Fair enough. Yeah, yeah. I mean, like, right? Like, I mean, That's my point is a full-throated, this is a suicide mission. We should not be doing this. The American public is fundamentally against it. I mean, you know, this is like you say, like a 70, 30, 60, 40.

And that 60 is, I think, a lot more adamant than the 40 is. We should know. It shouldn't be, we need to find out if they're going to fund for another $200 billion, which of course is like what, that's just the cost of like kicking everybody off of Medicaid. You know, I mentioned I started doing this in 2002 or so, and we're still in this hangover where Democrats are afraid to be seen as voting against any kind of military action, any kind of war.

We're still in this era of we don't want to seem like the peacnick party. That's still what's driving this. Like we have a lot of Democratic members of Congress who were on the hill back when the Persian in golf war started in the 90s. And I think they're not adjusting to where the public, including independence, even some Republicans, the public is much more anti-war and skeptical of war than it used to be. And the Democratic leadership is not there because Chuck Schumer's been in Washington the entire time. Even the newer members are often having these consultants and so on around them. I think that's the issue is I'm not even sure they like this war as much

as they are like Schumer and Hakeem, I think, do like this war. But I think other people are more fearful of seeming anti-war. I think that's, I think. this was really driving this year. Right. I think, I mean, I agree with that. But it would be, if we didn't have leadership that is in favor of this war. I mean, Chuck Schumer, like, when I think of the times where he has been most critical of Donald Trump, it was a video he cut about Taco Trump doing side deals with Iran to presumably avoid a conflict. This was, I don't know, I guess, about a year ago now, maybe a little bit less. And he's out there.

It was all processed because he wanted to make sure that he thought this would be a good thing for Trump to do. He just didn't want fingerprints on it. But they need to be out here now talking about it because, like you say, the House is a foregone conclusion, I think, in all type of reasonable prediction. But there isn't actually an opportunity now for the Senate. and they're not forcing Senate Republican candidates to take a vociferous position. I mean, like, this is the leverage point, right?

Like, they're afraid to go against Trump. But if they're put on the spot, then they're really put on the spot. Yeah, that'll be like Susan Collins, who's in Maine, who's in this, you know, swing state, let's say, she's got to be worried about this. Because ultimately, the war of votes is going to require 60 votes. So the Democrats have some leverage here. and that in the Senate, that is the place where they can block this funding or do something about this funding. And one problem we have here is continuing to go like that is like one objection, which you hear from the Schumer types is,

Donald Trump did not get congressional authorization. Well, and the other group is like Graham Platner or AOC is like this war is, or Sam Cedar, this war is illegal and we should stop doing it. And the problem is the procedural thing is going to run out of time. Now Donald Trump is asking you for money, asking you for permission. So you actually have to, like, you can't do the process dance anymore. You now have to actually oppose this war or not. And I do think the base is so strong. I'll be how, I'll be curious which I'm having a hard time seeing any Senate Democrat voting.

Like if you're John Assoff, your base is a, you know, have to win swing, but your base is really opposed to this. I'll be curious what they do here. Voting for this is going to be a real problem here at Democratic Senate. Yeah, I think so. I mean, not for John Fetterman probably, but just about everybody. I think there's a few we could go through, yes. So let's talk about that.

You wrote about this earlier in the week. Illinois was the latest state to have their primaries. The primaries have been much more engaged in many respects than I remember really at any time over the past 20 years in that there is in all of these primaries. I mean, part because we're having some generational change, right? And so you're having long-term incumbents drop out of very blue districts. And so there's a much stronger opportunity for the Democrats in a district that's sure to go blue. And we had a couple of those in Illinois, sure to go blue to make a decision as to like, what does a safe Democratic seat look like?

And you wrote about that. 50-50 on like sort of the A-PAC, crypto money, AI, big money, the corporatists in many respects, and the more progressive justice Democrats, AOC style Democrats. What was your sense of how things turned out? Like to be very reductive, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton read each other, they did not have that many public policy differences. And there wasn't like a clear cut thing versus now we are in this era.

The Iraq war. I mean, really? I mean, it was a proxy for all that. Right. That was why Obama won. That was the difference before they started. Once you got into the primary, they didn't Hillary pretended to be against the war and Bush didn't do it right. And, you know, so, yeah, so that's what I mean is like, yes.

But now we have like seven or eight issues where I can tell you the AOC Canada is different than the moderate other Canada. And every primary is becoming a contest between, I'll say, AOC, Bernie Sanders, Warren, Justice Demerrest, Progressive Caucus versus the other is hard, though, because the other is not being overt often. Hakeem Jeffries does not endorse the moderate candidate in most situations, but we know he is rooting for those people. And so the part of this is the party is moved now to where populist stands, you know, on economics and also being a, being anti-Net Yahoo, being skeptical of big money. In some ways, the progressives have won the policy arguments right now, but the big money said has lots of money. And when you saw in some of these races where these conservative Democrats

are running these ads, I stood up to ice, I hate ice, I voted for a bump. They're sort of like lying about their record, and they have the money to do it because they know where the party is. So in two of these races, the more moderate candidate, or Crypto Candid 1, but they didn't run for the office saying, I love crypto, I love APEC, AI will make the world a better place. They set all these liberal things in their ads or have ads run on their behalf saying they're liberal. So this is the real test is now. Progressive candidates not only have to be on the right side, they have to on some level to communicate

to voters that the other person is lying about and when they get to Congress is not going to be on our side. And that's tricky. It's tricky. I saw somebody on Twitter. I can't remember who it was, but it was a great comment, and I wish I could credit them. But they said, we are one cycle away from APEC back candidates coming out against Israel.

I think that's exactly right. And well said, I laughed. I saw the same tweet you did, which is like, yeah, because they're just like, they cannot, this is a good sign. We should say this openly. This is a good step that APEC is no long. It's not, you're not required. When Obama and Hillary ran, you were required to say

how much you loved the Israeli government. and how little you cared about Palestinians. Now you have to say the reverse in public. That's a good shift. But we have to get the members there. At the end of the day, Kristen Gillibrand, when it came, push-come-the-strup, would not endorse Zaron Mandani.

And I think that was related to this issue a lot of it. So we need to get the people in office to ultimately change their actions on this issue. But, you know, the rhetoric change is better than nothing, I would say. Yeah. I mean, it seems to me there's like there's a two-step process. to this. One is, and I think I just saw a piece today, I don't know if it was in Axios, I think it was, about the CPC, the Congressional Progressive Office and Kesar, meeting with outside groups, presumably, like, a Justice Democrats and maybe some other groups, to saying, like, look, we got to figure this out,

because we're splitting the vote. I mean, that certainly happened in, in, in, in, And the ninth, I think, with Kat Abizela. It certainly happened in which one was the, I can't remember the numbers off the top of my head now. But we saw that in a couple of cases. And I, there's really, we've got, I think until May until the next big round of primaries. And it's going to be interesting to see if the model of Mamdani and Bradson, Ladd Lander can be replicated across, because when Lander, you know, cross endorsed essentially and seated in some ways to Mammondani in that race, it's not a one-to-one analogy, but that dynamic.

And it could go the other way, too, where the DSA person says, okay, I'm going to go with this sort of not DSA person, but someone who is clearly to the left of the establishment candidate. that's going to be an interesting dynamic. Yeah, you have this Michigan Senate race. I think it's Mallory McMorrow is more progressive. There's another progressive candidate. And then you have Haley Stevens, the real DFC moderate. And like right now, the two progressive-ish candidates are splitting the bows.

So Stevens is leading most polls if one of them co-less. But in New York, at worst, you had this ranked choice thing. That's the most of the difference is. With the ranked choice, Brad landed it at the line not to leave the race. He was able to stay in the race. I think that's a huge difference. So you've got to get that in line. I guess ultimately I'm thinking ahead a little bit.

Another problem with this is like Bernie and Senator Warren are probably the biggest progressive voices. They sometimes endorse the wrong, endorse different people. Like they, I know they don't love each other, but they work in the same building. It would be nice if they got on the same page because that, that'll, that'll, if they both endorse someone, that becomes clearly the progressive candidate we're all, you know, people are looking to. So they should not be, you know, they're, they're, they're, they're, they're, they're they want to do, but they should not be splitting and they're splitting in Michigan, for example. Well, Michigan is actually a great example because, like, as I, I certainly would espouse

the, the broader left versus the establishment candidates to sort of like be adults and get together. But when I start to think about it, particularly in Michigan, I have a problem, right? Because obviously, I don't want the Schumer picked Haley Stevens. I think it's well understood that that was their preferred candidate. But McMorrow is she's got the same sort of like, what's it, Liz Smith, then there's a lot of like, there's a lot of establishment-y people who have sort of surrounded her. And it's almost as if like these candidates, they're not people. They're like dingies, right?

And when Haley Stevens took on water, all the wrong people got into the McMorrow dingy, it seems to me. And that's what we're voting on. We're not just voting on the candidate. We're voting on the people that are around her and that support her and her constituents in some way. And so I find it hard to deal with it. But on some level, it's like I also don't want Haley Stevens. Like I personally I would vote for Abdul Abdul al-Sayed over Miller and McMorro without question. For the reasons you're McMoros more progressive, but on a big vote, I worry, would she go with the donors?

I'm concerned about that. Yes. It's not a clear case versus like in Maine is a very clear case. Platner is going to be progressive and Mills is going to do whatever Schumer says. Like that is one where it's obvious. And I'm not defending everything platinum is done, but in there are said. But I think that was more obvious. And Michigan is tricky.

And part of it is like the Warren side says we're more practical, we're more electable, we're more establishment. And the Bernie side says, well, we're going to, we need to fight the system. And we're going to, our person gets in there, they're going to throw elbows and so on. And there's, like, would Warren have done better if she was the final progressive candidate than Sanders? I think there's, you can debate the question. I get the point that they're making, which is that sometimes Warren's approach brings more of the regular Democrats along, but in many, but there's some dangers there too.

So yeah, it's, um, I mean, I guess it's just a matter of time, but I wonder if that ends up being, I mean, there's a certain sort of like, uh, I wonder if this ends up being a stretch. Because if there was a third person in Maine, now, I think at this point, uh, Platner has like one over Mainers, um, uh, you know, in a way that I, I, I, I, you know, in a way that I, I, I, frankly, I find almost like surprising to see a primary candidate who was not chosen by the establishment have like thoroughly sort of like, you know, it's a small state. And so it's a very different dynamic. But if there was a third person, the day that Platner had come in, who was younger, you know, who was like a McMurrow in that race, it would be a lot murkier right now.

And so Michigan is going to be sort of like, I think is going to be an interesting and it's going to be a dilemma because, you know, McMurrow has come out against a single payer health care. I mean, with the most ridiculous ways. But, I mean, that's the reality there. I was a little surprised Warren jumped out there. I didn't expect that. I thought she might stay. I thought she might stay undecided on that one. That was like that.

McMorrow does strike me as being not like not as nearly as populous as Warren. So I would that one so, you know, I mean, you know, Warren probably talked to her, so I'm not going to like. You're curious, like if Warren is pushing a big bill to regulate something hard, is she sure McMorrow would vote for it? Because I'm not. But, but I assume Warren is I suspect Warren got assurances on some things. I mean, that Warren is very, very good at getting at, at, at, at, at, at, like the transactional inside game. She came from academia, I think combined with like her sort of her actual background. She's,

she's able to sort of manipulate those things. But the breadth of her, the width of her, her portfolio maybe is not. Yeah. Yes. And so that is interesting. And I think it could also be an indication. that there is an understanding that she's going to win, that McMorrow is going to, like, or that Stevens is not going to win.

Let's put it that way. Stevens, Stevens has a good chance of winning, so I don't, but maybe there's an understanding. I don't have a good sense. I guess my sense was that Abdul has been in third in most of the polls. So that would be, if you're like looking period, how do we win? If you just like, if I was like going to just in a raw sense, we even endorsed one person, the person who is polled.

pulling better. It's very narrow. The person who's polling better. Although it's worth noting I'm not on the ground either. My sense is I have a couple of friends who are in Maine and it's not just that Platner is progressive in Mills's establishment. Platon is a great job getting out there. People like him. There are plenty of actual Democratic voters who are not in the, you know, I'm in the progressive camp, other people in the moderate camp, but many, many actual voters are not in any camp. And so it might be on the ground that McMorro is more charismatic or getting out there more. There's certainly local campaign factors that are non-ideological that do shape these races, obviously.

Like, Platters on a really good job of just being connected with everybody and being out there. In a way, Mills happens to be kind of a flat candidate. I think it hurts her a lot. Oh, definitely. And just as a, I mean, here's the thing that, I mean, we talk about this race quite a bit around here, but Mills has this liability that, I think, has been unexplored in the context of a general election. not just that like there's no, you know, there's obviously a difference between Mills and Collins just because of who could conceivably be the Senate majority leader. But in giving up Collins, you're giving up a lot of seniority.

And for Mills, you're trading that for someone who is guaranteed to never have seniority. You're getting a senior, but you're not getting seniority ever. because she's going to, she's, I mean, she's vowed to, to serve only one term. I think that is, we got to take that as she's actually going to make it through one term as opposed to she's going to not going to do two. But you lose all the seniority and you have no, you're setting the clockback six years to regain it. And it's not like Angus King, Angus King is older than I think both of them. And so Maine will be in the backwoods forever. And I don't know how much discussion that actually gets.

And I'm surprised. Well, the thing I'm focused on most is like, I just think this age thing has landed with people. Like Biden's staying on too long. You know, people, people are talking about it's like Democrat, Republican, independent. The age thing has landed. So both in Texas, I think Tala Rica will benefit from the fact that Cornyn and Pxton, and they're not 80, but they are old and have been there a long time. Platon is going to be effective.

He's young and new. Mills has been governor, Collins has been in Congress for a thousand years. Like I think the real contrast is people want to see new faces in, and I think that's the argument Platton should lean into is maybe not seniority, but like we just need a new person with youth. And I think he can run the same campaign. He's running against Mills and against Collins in a certain way because a new voice is what just a lot of voters want, particularly voters under 50, I would say.

Like I was talking to a friend of mine. I went to Yale for college. Rosa DeLauro was the congresswoman when I enrolled in college in 1988. She's still, like this is insanity. Like people should get a chance to vote for somebody else in their adult. I don't live in New Haven, so I'm not. But people should get a chance to vote for somebody else in their adult life. I'm in Kentucky.

Mitch McConnell has been one of the senators actually. almost my entire adult life. This is just insanity. Well, um, uh, one, one last note on Platter, but I want to ask you about Kentucky since you're, you're there. Um, I think that's true, but I think like Platter doesn't have to make an argument about the age difference. It is quite obvious. It seems to me, he looks young, right, right. But I think in small states, the notion of seniority where a senator brings back, uh, material benefits in a way that like, you know, some people might associate with their congressperson more, but in a state like that size, I think that's probably, I don't know how much it's being talked about.

McConnell is run on that here in fact. So I think that's a good point. McConnell often emphasizes I'm the most, you know, I've been here a thousand years. I'm all on its committees. Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah. I'm not thinking about it now. Yeah. I mean, it's an interesting. I think it would come out more in, uh, in a general election than it would. But I, lastly, in Kentucky, um, is there any chance for a guy like, Booker? No. I know Charles.

Charles is a great guy. You know, like Andy Bashir won here because his dad was governor. He won a 2019. He was an off year. Matt Bevan, the previous governor, was very, very unpopular. People view state politics a little bit differently, but the rest of the down ticket loss with Bashir

in 2020-3 as well. I just don't, yeah, I just think this is kind of a, even the Republicans have three people who are running and I think one of their ads is criticizing DEI and saying it's okay to be white. That's literally stated in the ad, basically, it's okay to be white. So they're running MAGA, MAGA, MAGA, aggressive MAGA.

But I just, this has just become an extremely conservative state. So if the Democrat gets the 43, that'd be a win in a certain way. Wow. All right. Well, I guess we'll see. Well, it's still early. Hope Springs Eternal because, you know, who knows what's going to. Cooper actually could win. If I was supposed to be like, Roy Cooper is in a great position in North Carolina, close to our state, but just less conservative.

Yeah. And we'll see what this war does if we're in this in three or four months is as bad as it's going to, as it appears it might be. Perry Bacon, Jr., it's a real pleasure. We'll link to right now with Perry Bacon and, of course, to your work in the New Republic. Really appreciate your time. Good to see you, Sam. All right, folks. We're going to take questions. quick break when we come back senator chris van holland will be here uh i imagine we'll be talking about some of the similar topics he's also got a big uh tax plan that he has uh rolled out as a proposal um there's elections coming up over the next three years so i don't know all right we'll see we'll talk to the moment all right back we're going to take quick break we are back sam cedar on the majority

Emma Viglin out today, much to her chagrin, because of our next guest, Senator Chris Van Hollen from Maryland. Welcome to the program. Sam, it's great to be with you and really give my best to Emma. I will. She'll be glad to hear that. All right, let's, before we get into Iran, I want to start with some news that you've made over the past couple of days. you released a proposal, a pretty significant one, tax proposal. It's being paired. Corey Booker also released his. There's some similarities, some differences. Just walk us through sort of the broad strokes of the proposal.

Sure, and it's good to be with you. And there are very important distinctions between these different proposals. I want to make that clear for the beginning. So the proposal I introduced with 19 of my colleagues all together, including Bernie Sanders and some of the more moderate members of our caucus, is essentially designed with this idea. If you're simply making enough income to meet your basic cost-of-living expenses, then you should be able to keep more of that income.

And for a single person, a single worker, that turns out to be about $46,000 across the country. That's the median. And the idea, Sam, is if you're making a living wage, you should be able to live off of that wage and not be subject to federal income tax. Now, we pay for this with a surtax on millionaires. In other words, if you're making over $1 million a year, you will pay an additional, you know, starting with 5% on that first dollar over a million. So this is a proposal designed to say to folks who are working hard every day just to make ends meet, that we're going to provide you a little relief that you can keep a little bit more of your paycheck

to meet your basic cost of living needs. All right. And I should say, you know, I've read quite a bit on, on how it impacts things across in terms of distributionally and horizontally, et cetera, et cetera. And it gets very good scores. And we should also say those taxes on the wealthy are taxed on the adjusted gross income. So you can't really sort of slide out of that with capital gains tax or other things.

it really um in many respects sort of like shifts that burden but i and and and it it scores i think uh it's a net positive in terms of like uh the the deficit for folks who are concerned about those issues but what do you say to the criticism of this is problematic because in i mean i get the affordability situation, but it sends in a message that the burden of affordability that Americans are subjected to is a function of taxation or our government, as opposed to the things that need not be necessarily handled by the private market, health insurance, maybe energy in some respects. I mean, we can go on and on, but or child care.

I mean, free college. I mean, there's a whole host of things that the government could be doing for Americans, that it's not, but it's going to need everybody to pay some tax for it. So I would say two things, Sam. We are facing an affordability crisis in the United States. People's rents are going up or their mortgage payments, groceries are going up. As you said, electricity prices are going up. And we should be very focused on using all of our powers to rein in some of the special interests to try to contain and bring down

those costs. But the other side of the coin is how much income you have to meet your needs and pay your bills and deal with those costs. And so I see this is helping those individuals who are simply earning enough in their paycheck to meet their basic living expenses. Why wouldn't we want to make sure that they have a little more room to help pay for all those things we talked about? I do want to be clear, this is not designed to be the only part of a Democratic tax plan. I mean, I also support Bernie Sanders' wealth tax, for example, because we do need to address other things. We need to restore the Affordable Care Act tax credits that were caught. We need to expand the child tax credit.

I'm a co-sponsor of those bills, but I think it would be a big mistake if we say to working people who are just getting by that they're not entitled to any kind of relief as well. Many of those individuals, Sam, don't benefit from some of these other programs. And I think that they deserve a little relief. These folks go and paycheck to paycheck. I guess, I mean, philosophically, that is the point, like, why not have them benefit from these other programs? I mean, there's two ways you can do it. You can say that the government is causing this burden or that the government could be doing more to alleviate these other burdens. Because down the road, where is the room for, and where is the room to expand government services?

like, you know, child care proposals, for instance, or stuff that was, you know, Joe Biden had proposed to be in the billback better bill before, you know, Joe Manchin and Kristen Cinema were allowed to sort of interfere with the process. What happens when we need to, when we want to provide those things for Americans? Well, I would say two things. First of all, we're not saying that the government is important. posing these burdens. We are saying that these individuals should be able to keep a little bit more of their paycheck to meet expenses. These are individuals, again, who are just earning enough to

get by and meet their basic needs. As I said earlier, there are other ways to generate revenue, which I support, and I'm a co-sponsor of those bills. I mean, for example, Senator Sanders' wealth tax generates over $4 trillion over 10 years. Elizabeth Warren has a proposal that I also support. So there is, of course, room to do both of these things. In other words, you can provide for, you know, the health care, you know, tax credits and also provide a little bit of relief to these people who are being squeezed. I don't see them as mutually exclusive at all.

You know, Republicans provided a big tax cut that essentially. essentially disbenefited the very wealthy. If you look at their proposal, 75% of the benefits went to the top 20%. In the case of this legislation, all of the benefits go to individuals, you know, from the 80% down, people with individual tax liability. So I don't think this is an either or, Sam. I think we need to do both. And we need to have the political will to do both. Yeah, I hope so. I mean, I certainly appreciate the high-end increases on taxes and agree with that. I think it's more, you know, from my perspective, the thing that makes it a little queasy is just sort of like philosophically speaking. We're all citizens. And if our government is providing us benefits. And I certainly, you know, I think there's definitely reason for people to say, I feel like I'm paying these taxes and I'm not getting back. But American, taxes are broadly much lower than most industrialized countries, not most, all industrialized countries. And I think it's a really just question of like, let's get more services.

But let's, we'll leave it there because we're also, unless you want to just. Just really briefly. Yeah, really briefly. So look, as you know at the federal level, people already pay their bike of taxes, right? We pay for Social Security. We pay for Medicare. and unlike a lot of European countries where the government provides at the central level a lot of services, in our system, as you know, our federal system, a lot of those are provided at the state and local level. So education, for example, there are a lot of European countries where the central government is the main payer. Here we have people who are paying their state and local taxes, they're paying property taxes, they're paying state and local sales taxes. So it's not as if all

the people here we're talking about aren't paying taxes to provide services for schools or roads in their local neighborhoods. We have a different system than a lot of the other countries, our peer countries. And so the question I guess I would ask folks is really if someone is making a living wage, what we all agree is a living wage, meaning just enough to get by, shouldn't we let them keep that money, those folks, so that they can pay their bills? I mean, that's the fundamental question here, and we ask the folks making over a million dollars a year to pitch in more so other people can get by. I like the second part of that. The first part, I would say, let's take a couple of things off their plate that they don't have to spend money on and free up

their money that way. But with that said, one of those things is going to end up being gas prices because of what now appears to be an escalation, I mean, a side-finding. I mean, a side-finding. from the absolute insanity of this war in the first place, it feels like a slow motion car wreck, like we're watching us just devolve into what could be just an incredibly protracted war. Give me your sense of where we're at and how we got to hear just without seemingly any motivation. Yes, Sam, this is a disaster. The Trump administration took us into this war with constantly shifting rationales. They never had a clear purpose.

And every time they said, you know, we're going in, for example, to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, you know, we all know that Iran was nowhere close to getting a nuclear weapon. So then they changed their rationale. They have no endgame. And what they've done is take the lid off Pandora's box. They've made us all less safe. They've made the region less stable. And in the process, we've already lost 13 of our service members, hundreds injured,

over 2,000 civilians in the region killed, including over 150 Iranian school girls, costing us $2 billion a day in gas prices and oil prices are going up. This is a disaster, in my view, and the sooner we can put an end to it, the better, and that's my focus. What do you make? I mean, I know that you, I think, if I remember correctly, you were a freshman congressperson when Bush invaded Iraq. It was a very different time in terms of like the sentiment of the country. I mean, where are the leverage points to, I mean, this is a president who's going in committing us to what could be. a massive, massive war without even 50% approval of this war on day one. I mean, it's at best

40% maybe. And I don't, you know, I don't, I think it's basically where Iraq was at the end of where are the leverage points for the 60% of the country that doesn't want to be engaged in this. Well, you're right. This is an unpopular war, and for good reasons. I mean, Donald Trump seemed to understand that as a candidate when he promised that he would not drag us into foreign wars, especially wars in the Middle East. And you're right about the Iraq War. I mean, the Iraq War was also one we got dragged into. And at the end of the day, the biggest winner from the Iraq war was actually Iran. I mean, we're at this moment, but ironically, it was Iran that was strengthened because we help, you know, take out one of the counterbalances to Iran. But the leverage

point, you know, given that we have Republicans who have essentially signed away their constitutional duties to the president and keep voting against these war powers resolutions, is the funding. And, you know, I've been very clear. I will not vote for additional funds for this very stupid war. And if you want to protect our troops, if you want to make us more safe, we should put an end of this war now. Now, as you say, it's very unpopular here. It is a very, it's a popular war in Israel with Prime Minister Netanyahu. And Prime Minister Netanyahu said within the last couple weeks, you know, he'd been waiting 40 years, 40 years for an American president who would join him in going after Iran in this particular way. And, you know, Donald Trump is a president

who's stupid enough and reckless enough to do it. And, you know, We've heard from the Secretary of State where he said that Israel sort of forced. He tried to walk it back the next day. But people forget that also Mike Johnson almost simultaneously said the exact same thing. I think Tom Cotton said something similar. The president said something similar. About voting against more funding for this war. What is your perspective on how the Democratic leadership, both in the House and in the Senate?

like how um i was just uh talking to a perry bacon junior who writes for the new republic and uh he said we'll have to see how democrats vote for that isn't there a problem if we have to see like before like like why we don't know right now where democrats stand on funding this war because it it's letting the republicans off the hook it's hard to argue about that war powers resolution when we don't know how Democrats are going to vote on the funding of the war. Well, Sam, you're right. I agree with you. And, you know, there are a lot of folks whose opposition to the war was primarily based on procedure

and, you know, the Trump administration not consulting, as opposed to going to the core problem, which is this war is making us less safe, not more safe, and creating more instability and imposing huge calls. both in lives and in treasure. So we're going to be working to make sure that we build democratic unity against funding this war. As you know, at the end of the day, in the Vietnam War, for example, it only came to an end because people decided not to provide more money for it. We should be doing that right now when it comes to the Iran War.

And I really urge everybody to be reaching out and contacting their members of the Senate in the house to ask them that fundamental question because we should not be prolonging this war. Paying more money for the war is just another way of keeping it going and we should be ending it. Let me ask you about that sort of that question of leadership because it's been reported that you're part of a fight club. I know you're not supposed to talk about fight club or I've seen the movie or whatnot. But this notion that there is, is a caucus, whether, you know, a specific caucus or just sort of like a group of people who are meeting, talking about supporting new, different candidates maybe in some of these Senate elections and also

encouraging. Is there a sense of like, what is your sense of Chuck Schumer's position as a Senate minority leader right now. Like how, how safe is that position in your mind? Well, let me just say the fight club, and you're right, the first rule of fight club is supposed to be. You don't talk about fight club, but here we are. There's a group of us who got together because we did not think that the Senate Democrats were fighting back hard enough and strongly enough. That was especially true months ago, but these questions may come up, as you say, with respect to funding for the Iran War and other things. We were also unhappy with the fact that the DSCC seemed to be putting its foot on the scale,

and in some cases was putting its foot on the scale, with respect to certain Democratic primary Senate candidates, who seemed to be more like just old establishment candidates who were not meeting the moment we're in. And so that's why we got together. So, for example, a group of us are strongly support. Peggy Flanagan. She's a lieutenant governor out in Minnesota against what we think are more sort of establishment corporate Democratic candidates running. And we're looking at some of the other

races as well. But that was the origin of this. And I think many of us remain concerned with, especially with respect to, you know, weighing in on these Senate races. Do you think that it's going to stick to the leadership? Because, I mean, as far as I can tell, I mean, Obviously, we're months out. And we don't know even what the primaries are going to do. But I'm looking in Maine. I'm looking in Michigan. Like you say, Minnesota.

I mean, there's the, at least in terms of what has been reported, the preferred candidate of the Democratic Senate campaign committee is not doing that well. And so, like, I'm happy about that both from like a sort of a ideological standpoint, but as just a sheer objective political measure, if we have a leadership that can't even assess who Democrats are interested in, that seems to me to be a big problem and a recipe for like new people to be in those positions. Well, look, obviously everyone's goal is to elect more Democrats to the United States Senate so that we can. and get a majority in the Senate and in the House. But to your point, there's a difference of opinion on who is best positioned as Democratic candidates to do that. And I strongly believe that a lot of it depends

on the momentum people have, the grassroots energy they have, and that means these insurgent candidates who are taking on the establishment. You know, God help us if Democrats think in the next, you know, 20, 20, election, for example, that our goal should be simply to go back to the pre-Trump status quo. Obviously, people were very unhappy with the pre-Trump status quo. That's how we got this crazy man in the White House. But there are a number of candidates who are more, you know, let's not

rock the boat. Let's sort of just go back to way business was being done as usual. This is not a business-as-usual moment. So that was really what gave rise to the fight club. And, you know, we're continuing to be very engaged. One last, a final question, since we, you know, that idea that we can't go back to where we were. Obviously, I think it's pretty clear the autopsy's been buried by the DNC. It may come to light at one point, but I think it's become increasingly clear to people, understand that Harris and the position that she essentially inherited from Biden regarding Israel and Gaza was not only a moral problem and a strategic problem, but also a political problem

for the Democrats. What else? Is there anything else that you would point to during the Biden administration that you think was a mistake? I'm thinking in terms of like the billback better bill. But was there ever, what was a mistake that you think that Biden did? that still sort of rings that stands out to you, if there was one?

Well, I would say, first of all, as you mentioned, the fact that the Biden administration essentially gave a blank check to the Net Yahoo government, while the Net Yahoo government just flattened and destroyed Gaza with the huge humanitarian and civilian toll there. And also didn't do much, rein in, you know, violent Israeli settlers on the West Bank, and we're watching that now spike even more as the United States does nothing. I think that, as you said, that was a moral

failure and a strategic failure. I would say the other thing, Sam, goes to this issue of making sure that we take on powerful special interests and we make sure that we have a tax code that works for working people and not a tax code that essentially benefits people who make money off of money. Right. We have a system now that rewards. boards people who make money off of money and penalizes people who are working hard for paycheck every day. That's one of the reasons I've advanced the working Americans tax cut plan. It's also why I see this is only one pillar of a larger plan. And I think we need to be clear, Democrats, that in order to take on this huge amount of inequality, income, and wealth, we also do need to have that

wealth tax because people are passing on millions, hundreds of millions of dollars tax free to their errors when they die because we have this stepped up basis. So we are creating more and more an American aristocracy. And that is going to destroy our democracy and our country. And so I think that, you know, a lot of the proposals the Biden folks put forward were good on the tax front. The problem is we never saw the fight and the energy to get it done. And I think it's going to be absolutely essential going forward. We do that. The other thing is, and you know, I've been focused on this like a laser beam. We mentioned electricity costs. You know, I put forward a proposal that makes it absolutely clear. You and me and my constituents and people around the country should not be paying one more

cent, not one more cent in higher electricity costs because the richest companies on the planet want to build data centers. In the area that I live, it's a regional grid called PJM, people have already paid $28 billion, Sam, and additional costs for data centers. No. So we need to be very clear, we Democrats, that we're going to take on these powerful special interests,

we're going to look out for working people, and clearly we lost our way because the American people supported Donald Trump in the last election. They thought he was the guy to break the status quo, and he has, but he's done it in all the wrong ways. And now people are realizing just how much he betrayed them on all these issues. Said he was going to reduce costs.

Costs are going up. Keep us out of foreign wars. He's launched a war in Iraq, in Iran. So I do think people are feeling betrayed, rightly so, by Donald Trump. But Democrats need to do more than say what we're against. We need to be really clear what we're for. Senator Chris Van Hollen, I also just wanted to say, just note, you know, the work you did. in terms of Kilmara-Brega Garcia and fighting against Trump's immigration proposals at a time

where there was a lot of pressure from different quarters in the Democratic Party saying, keep your head down, don't say anything about this. I just wanted to say, appreciated that as well. Well, thank you just for mentioning that, because you're right, it was about a year ago now. It was about a year ago right now that that happened. And you're right, I got really mad, because, you know, we had a 9 to zero Supreme Court decision telling the Trump administration they need to bring him back home. They were ignoring it. They said he would remain in El Salvador in a gulag essentially forever.

So I got mad and went and got him. But you're absolutely right, Sam. There were a lot of Democrats at the time that were really queasy, finger to the wind. And if we've all learned a lesson, it should be that the finger in the wind calculating politics is weak. It's absolutely weak. And, you know, there's room for people to disagree with us on different things. But what people I do think appreciate is when people take a stand and stand on principle.

And protecting people's constitutional due process rights should be one of those. Yeah, it seems like a gimmie. Senator Chris Van Hollen, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it. Back at you. Thank you. All right, folks. That is our free hands.

half of the show. That's a lot of free material. My God. What more? What do you people want from us? Exactly. What are we going to do? Bring J.D. Vance on now? It's defensive for no reason. Yeah, exactly.

I feel bad. It's only one. It's only been a 90-minute show. And so I feel like we're, Folks, it's your support that helps this show thrive and survive. You can become a member by going to join the majority report.com. When you do, you're not only get the free show, free of commercials, but you also get an extraordinary amount of content for free. Some people say too much. Too much.

I've never had a conversation with somebody who works in this space who hasn't said, like, you do too much content. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, my laptop of the show says you get 50 minutes free of, or 50 minutes and the bonus. Yeah, exactly. The whole show was supposed to be an hour and a half, free and fun half. And it's just like grown, like a monster.

You're kidding me. Oh, when we first launched, the first half was 45 minutes and the second half was 45 minutes. That lasted like two weeks. Let's bring that back. Yeah, no kidding. It's not like much is happening. No. It's not a lot to cover.

You can become a member at join the majorioport.com. Also, just coffee. Dot co-op, fair trade coffee, hot chocolate. Use the coupon code. Majority, get 10% off. Great coffee, folks. Don't miss out.

Matt, what's happening in the Matt Leckian Media Universe? Yeah, over at the Jacob and Meg YouTube channel at 3 o'clock Eastern. Folks will be rated actually from this YouTube stream or the Fun Half YouTube stream to it. We're talking with Alex Brunel about the lessons of Zoraamam Dani and can they be applied to a state like Texas. Alex is a really great DSA organizer and he's also with local progress. I believe he co-founded San Antonio DSA.

If there's a more relevant commentary on that question of like, can Zoran be, what lessons from Zoran can be applied across the country? It's this one. So I highly recommend anyone wondering about what the next steps forward are. It's coming up at 3 o'clock Eastern at the Jackman, M. YouTube channel. All right, folks. And also, if you want to see Emma live on the Bituation Room,

you'll have to join the Bituation Room Patreon because the show itself is sold out. Sold out weeks and weeks ago. So, plus a lot of people don't live in California, apparently. Because of the taxes? Yep.

Because of the blue... Because it's a tax. They're Democrats. Just so crazy. Come on. Too woke out there. See you in the fun half. You are in for it.

All right, folks. 64, 646, 257, 39, 20. See you in the fun. Oh, no. Are you ready? Who sent us this? Alpha males are back, back, back, back, back, boy,

and the alpha males are back, back, back, back. Just as delicious as you could imagine. The alpha males are back, back, back, back, back, boys. And the alpha males are back, back, back, back. Just want to degrade the white man. Alpha males are back, back, back. I take all of it to my throat. Alpha males are back, back, back, back, back.

Snowflakes has what? The alpha males are back, back, back, back. You are a madman. And the alpha males are back, back. Oh no, Sam Cedar. What a fucking nightmare. We bring back DJ Dan. Yeah, or a couple of them.

Just put them in rotation. DJ dinner. Well, the problem with those is they're like 45 seconds long, so I don't know if they're enough for the brakes. That's fucking nonsense. You see white people doing drugs that look worse than normal white people and all white people look disgusting. And the alpha males are psych.

Fuck them. Fuck them. Snoblox. What? What, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, a hell of a lot of bank. A hell of a lot of bank, okay, I'm making stupid money. Hell of a hell of a lot of bank. Hives matter. Have you tried doing an impression on a college campus?

I think that there's no reason why reasonable people across the divide can't all agree with this. Syke? And the alpha males are back, back, back, back, back, back, back, back. And the Africans are black, black, black, black, black, African. And the alpha males are black, black, black, black, black, black, black. And the Africans are back, back, back, back, black. When you see Donald Trump out there, doesn't a little party you think that America deserves to be taken over by jihadists? Keep it at 100.

Can't knock the hustle. Come up. Fuck them. Fuck them. Things I do for the bigger game plan. By the way, it's my birthday. My birthday. Happy birthday to meet you, boy.

I have a thought experiment for you. And the alpha males are back, back. Africans are black, black. Pass you, pass you, pass you, pass, you, pass you, passion, possible.