The MeidasTouch Podcast - From Watergate to Trump with Jill Wine-Banks

Episode Date: October 1, 2021

On today’s episode of The MeidasTouch Podcast, the brothers have the absolute pleasure of speaking with Jill Wine-Banks! Jill is the first woman to hold the position of General Counsel of the Army, a former DOJ federal prosecutor, author, MSNBC legal analyst and host of the hit podcasts, #SistersInLaw and Intergenerational Politics. Jill’s book The Watergate Girl was released last year detailing her career in prosecutions of cases arising out of Watergate. During the interview, Jill details what it was like joining the DOJ on the prosecution team for Watergate and one of the most memorable cross-examinations ever where she examined Richard Nixon’s secretary Rose Mary Woods and proved that Wood’s story about accidentally deleting portions of Nixon's tape was not possible. After the interview, the brothers discuss what in the world is wrong with Joe Manchin & Kyrsten Sinema, as well as where we stand with the potential government shutdown. To round out the episode, the brothers cover the latest legal troubles with South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem & the bizarre way she’s connected with Trump aide Corey Lewandowski, who is facing legal troubles of his own. If you enjoyed today’s episode please be sure to rate, review and subscribe. As always, thank YOU for listening! Support our sponsors: Policygenius -- Head to Policygenius.com/MEIDAS and start saving now! BetterHelp -- Special offer for MeidasTouch Podcast listeners: Get 10% off your first month at BetterHelp.com/MEIDAS Grove Collaborative -- When you go to Grove.com/MeidasTouch, you will get to choose a FREE starter set with your first order. Limited time offer! Remember to subscribe to ALL the Meidas Media Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://pod.link/1510240831 Legal AF: https://pod.link/1580828595 Kremlin File: https://pod.link/1575837599 Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://pod.link/1530639447 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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With over 3,000 games to choose from, including fan favorites like Cash Eruption, We'll be right back. miss out visit betmgm.com for terms and conditions 19 plus to wager ontario only please gamble responsibly if you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you please contact connex ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor for your charge betmgm operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming ontario Welcome to the Midas Touch podcast, Ben, Brett and Jordy fighting for democracy with you on your side every single day and excited to deliver the Midas Touch podcast to you twice a week. This is our Thursday live show, our Friday podcast drop. For all of those watching this live on the streaming platforms, what's up? For all those listening, also what's up? We got a great

show for you today. Our guest, Jill Weinbanks. I'm excited to speak to Jill, former DOJ prosecutor. She was on the prosecution team in Watergate. She did one of the most memorable cross examinations of president, former president Nixon's secretary. And I want to talk to her about that cross exam, just from one lawyer to another. You guys are really going to geek out on that one. Yeah, right. Forced first woman to hold the position of general counsel of the Army, MSNBC legal analyst, and she hosts an incredible podcast, Sister-in-Law. So excited to have her on the pod, Brett Jordy. How are you doing?

Good. Happy National Podcast Day, everybody. Did you guys know? Stop, really? Are you guys aware it is National Podcast Day? I was not aware of such a holiday, but I feel like- They just make up holidays now. Here's the thing. I feel like it's like National Dog Day, like six times a year. It's very cyclical. Every couple of months, people will be posting pictures of their dog, National Dog Day. And I love it. I have nothing against dogs. I have a dog, love it. I'm just

saying, we're getting a little out of control with these random national whatever days. Well, they're totally like scams, right? Like they're total scams by like corporations who invent these days in order for you to buy things and show up and they go, come here for free coffee. And then you have to buy a bunch of other stuff. I mean, I like to have national dog day, national podcast day, national coffee day, I think was either today or yesterday. And then you get the double whammies also. So yesterday or today was National Coffee Day.

I don't know. I'm not up on my- Dude, how much coffee have you- A lot. I'm amped up today. I'm celebrating. I'm celebrating. But let me tell you this also.

Tomorrow, though, is International Coffee Day. So you get National Coffee Day right into International Coffee Day. I mean, that's a double hit right there. I don't know if that's... Are you allowed to have two of the same holidays? I'm calling your wife and having her take away your espresso maker immediately. You are hyped.

Brett is hyped for the podcast. I want to, as a podcast host now, I want to embrace National Podcast Day, International Podcast Day. Intergalactic Podcast Day, intergalactic podcast day, and happy to have an incredible guest to join us on intergalactic podcast day. Let's get into it. Marjorie Taylor Greene seems to be obsessed with Midas Touch. It seems that there's a deep obsession there. Marjorie Taylor Greene invited Cat Turd. What a callback to last episode. The

timing of this couldn't have broken any better. I love that we were talking about Cat Turd last episode just coincidentally. And a lot of people were saying like, is that even a serious figure in this? And we were like, yes, this is an actual person that people, these crazy people listen to. And then just a few days later, Marjorie Taylor Greene appears on the Cat Turd podcast, which is just to talk shit about Midas Touch. You see, I was confused. I thought the Cat Turd, when you hear Cat Turd, I assumed that was also the name of Marjorie Taylor Greene's podcast. But it turns out that actually the Cat Turd has a podcast and the cat turd is like an emoji of a cat. It's now cat turd two because, or cat turd one, because the original cat turd got suspended for spreading disinfo. Apparently,

Twitter let cat turd come back on again with the same moniker. I don't know. I mean, I think there was an initial cat turd that got thrown off. I think that's exactly what happened. Yeah, I think that's what, but maybe who knows. But I think that's what happened with cat turd that got thrown off. I think that's exactly what happened. Yeah, I think that's what, but you know, maybe who knows. But I think that's what happened with cat turd. When Republicans send their social media influencers, they're not sending their best. So you got this cat turd, Marjorie Taylor Greene interview that takes place. And so previously, as many of you know, Midas Touch had a litigation against Marjorie Taylor Greene. Marjorie Taylor Greene blocked Midas Touch on Twitter, which was a violation of our First Amendment rights to free speech, her being a public official, and there were rules against public officials blocking free speech on those

platforms. There was a federal lawsuit in the Central District of California brought by Midas Touch to enforce our free speech rights on her own volition with her own counsel. Marjorie Taylor Greene settled that case with Midas Touch, resulting in her paying Midas Touch $10,000 and preventing her from blocking anyone in the future from her accounts, as long as she remained a public official. Midas Touch donated $10,000 to two different groups, which support common sense gun reform and basically making sure that military style weapons are not near schools. That made Marjorie Taylor Greene incredibly obsessed and upset. She did not like that one bit. She then gave an interview where basically, I think the point of her interview was to call Midas Touch a communist pack, which is completely and entirely defamatory. And

Brett signed that settlement agreement as the pro-democracy chair. So she was aware that was defamatory when she said that. It caused us serious damages, more to come there as we keep you updated on our potential legal actions against Marjorie Taylor Greene for defaming Midas Touch the way she did. And here she went back on, I assume somebody told her that you previously defamed Midas Touch. And so you can't call people communist PACs and use your platform to do that. So she goes on the Cat Turd podcast and talks about crazy leftist PACs and doesn't identify us by name, but she's referring to us because apparently when you support democracy and the ideals of the constitution and support the United States of

America in their mind, that makes you a crazy leftist PAC, but play the clip. I get sued by crazy leftist PACs. I get attacked in many ways, like terrible ads that they put on TV in my district or billboards. And I have to spend money for my campaign to defend myself. Oh, poor Marge, poor Marge. I love this clip so much. This is the best. And to anybody who was wondering, you know, is Midas Touch effective in the work they do?

Well, don't take it from us. Take it directly from the mouth of Marjorie Taylor Greene, who says we are bleeding her coffers dry by doing ad campaigns against her and by suing her. And she has to spend all this money to defend herself. aren't totally right about this is they said, hey, is she emitting to a federal crime by saying that she paid Midas Touch $10,000 from her campaign? And Ben, what's your legal take on that? Is that legally allowed? Well, I would say this. I think that it is problematic for her from the perspective of what she's telling donors that she's using the money for. I think ultimately a further inquiry, and I know I sound like a lawyer, though, is needed in terms of how she's classifying that payment ultimately.

You know, the lawsuit was against one of the, her main account that she uses basically as her non-office account, but she uses it for government statements. And so I think there's a broader issue about how the GQP has used their unofficial and official accounts. That's why I say that's probably problematic because they shouldn't be giving any policy statements from their private accounts, from the accounts that are their personal accounts. There's a reason you have multiple accounts. There's a reason why

you have to make that congressional account. There are rules behind it and they just are totally subverting the rules as they do with everything. Let me just say this before we move on here. I love the fact that people within the GQP are using this against her because Marge's whole thing is never back down to the radical left. Her words, not mine. Never back down to the left. What did she do the second we applied any sort of pressure saying, hey, you can't do that. That's against the law, Marge. She backed down immediately.

And I want to give a shout out to Moms Demand Action and Orange Ribbons for Jamie, the two incredible groups that we donated the $10,000 to. Thank you for all the work that you're doing to enact common sense gun reform in this country. Thank you very, very much. Speaking of the GQP, the Virginia governor's race is shaping up to be a GQP Trumpist crazy radical in Glenn Youngkin. Glenn Youngkin used to be a fairly normal private equity guy, which means that there's definitely some level of corruption that I'm sure was there. But at the end of the day, someone with a fairly decent reputation, but as he had to run for governor in the Republican Party, you have to be psychotic. You can't be a moderate Republican anymore in mostly every single state. I mean, I think Governor Hogan

in Maryland is probably amongst the most normal Republican governors that you have, but he's barely Republican anymore at all, but he still has that title. But anyway, to run right now, and he ran before, to run right now, you have to be all in crazy GQP. So Glenn Youngkin has had to take these crazy positions and he's showed himself to be. I don't even care if he's saying these things because he wants to get elected. When you say these things, that makes you who you are. And Glenn Youngkin is a crazy radical Trumper. He embraced the Trump endorsement. He embraced Governor DeSantis's views about punishing schools that have vaccine mandates and said that's what he would want in Virginia. And during the debate with Terry McAuliffe, he was asked a very simple question,

a very, very simple question. And the simple question was, do you think there should be vaccine mandates for mumps, measles, rubella, polio, like very basic diseases where there have been vaccine mandates forever? Play the clip. A quick follow-up to you, Mr. Young. Can you believe getting vaccinated for measles, mumps, or rubella is a personal choice for Virginians? I think that the data associated with those vaccines is something that we should absolutely understand the difference between this vaccine. And we have a moment here. We have a moment here to help people understand the real information in this vaccine. So you would keep those vaccines mandatory?

So that we could... So that we... Those vaccines mandatory, but not COVID. Those vaccines can be mandatory. I do believe the COVID vaccine is one that everyone should get, but we shouldn't mandate. We should have done a trigger warning, trigger warning Chuck Todd before playing that clip. And the Midas Touch podcast sincerely apologizes for forgetting to add that to the front of that clip. But when you get owned, Jordy, you know this, but when you get owned by Chuck Todd in a debate, it means you had a really rough night.

Good job, Chuck Todd. Right? Take a shower, Jordy, after that one. But what Glenn Youngkin was doing, Ben, and you were hinting at it before, is he's kind of playing a part, right? He feels like in order to win governor, he knows that he has to play the role of a crazy Trumper. And when you're in that role, he has to continue to play that role. So he's trying to remember his conspiracy theory talking points. And he couldn't remember his conspiracy theory talking points. And then he just rattled off the biggest non-answer

about vaccines saying, oh, well, we have to understand this vaccine versus those vaccines, and we need to deliver the proper information. Let's be clear though what you are doing, Glenn Youngkin. You are delivering false information to people, and you are spreading disinformation about the vaccines that they are unsafe and need to be studied further. These vaccines have been tested more than any other vaccine in the world. And when you do this, you are spreading that doubt amongst your base. That's exactly what you're doing.

And that non-answer was just disgraceful because there is zero, there is zero excuse for, you know, if you don't want to do the COVID vaccine, why you would have these other mandates already in place, measles, mumps, rubella. We already have 12 or 13 mandated vaccines on average across all these states. And then it comes to this one more while we're in the middle of a pandemic and the governor's go, we can't do one more. We can't do add one more. That's just too much.

That's communism. That's fascism. Just stop it. Just stop it just stop it we're in a public health crisis we're in a pandemic people are dying by the thousands every day put your ideology aside and let's work to keep people healthy quit with the death cult so you think about some of the great speeches that leaders have given over time. You've got JFK, right? Ask not what your country can do for you.

Impression guy over here. Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. Okay. Okay. So play JFK saying that so he can see how my impression was. And so my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country.

I'm going to give it a solid seven. I'm going to give it a solid seven. So my fellow Americans, just ask not what your country. Quit while you're on top here. Okay, so then you got JFK. You got Obama. you got Obama. We need to bring blue states, red states together. This is America.

In a common purpose. And then you have Glenn Youngkin, which is like, well, well, I think I think that the next point, though, that's obviously, Brett, that's he's trying to find his GQP talking point there. And then when he finds his GQP talking point, the next part is really where I want to analyze because it's way worse. Data associated with those vaccines is something that we should absolutely understand the difference between this vaccine. And we have a moment here. We have a moment here to help people understand the real information.

Right there. Stop. That is the, you see, that's the underrated part of what he said. That's the underrated part. We have a moment here to help people understand the real information. What the fuck does that mean? Now we do your own research. That's basically what he's saying, right? I mean, the pandemic has created this great opportunity, everybody, for you to all research disinformation. That's what the pandemic has created. We have a moment here to come together to stop the pandemic. We have a moment here to unite, whether you're a Democrat, a Republican, an independent,

regardless of your political beliefs, religious affiliations. This is a moment where we as Americans can come together and fight a common enemy, a pandemic of proportions we have never seen before. And we will tell our children and we will tell our children's children that together we stood up and we made sure that our country, our world would be a safer and better place. That right there, Youngkin, is how you answer that question. Moving on to other questions that we've been getting, which is, is the government going to shut down? What is going on with the debt ceiling increase? So there, we talked about this on the prior podcast that the GQP is refusing to allow the debt limit ceiling to increase to pay off

past debts because they want to see the economy tailspin so that they could use that as a talking point. They hate the United States of America. They want power for power's sake so they can get you sicker and make the world a worse place, but simply a better place for not even the 1% anymore, for like the 0.1 of 1%. That is their constituency at this point. But Brett, a deal is being reached, a temporary solution in the form of a continuing resolution passed in the Senate, passed in the House, cutting it like seconds before the buzzer beater of when our economy would go into a total tailspile. But everyone's expecting that this will be signed by Biden, at least temporarily. There's not going to be a debt limit increase yet, but it's let's basically kick the can down the road until December.

Yeah. The fact that we hold our economy hostage every few months with this is the most inane, crazy concept of our government ever. And so we are kicking this down the road. This should fund our government through, I believe it's December 3rd. And then we're going to have to do this whole song and dance once again in just a couple of months. Looking forward to it. You know, you think about basic things that you do to protect yourself and your loved ones at home. You look at what Congress is doing by basically waiting until the last minute to try to fund the government and to prevent the United States from going into default and prevent economic calamity. And you think like, why can't you just run the way like things like the way people try to take care of themselves and their family and their loved

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insurance, it is nice to get it right. Speaking about getting it right, Someone who has gotten it right, being a federal prosecutor, being involved as the main cross-examiner in that Perry Mason, Richard Nixon, Watergate moment with Richard Nixon's secretary. I am so excited. I am so honored to say Jill. Oh, no. Brett's having technical difficulties before the Jill Winebanks. I'm seeing Brett just cut out. Oh, no. Oh, no. With that preamble, Jordy, what do we do?

Should we? Let me text him. No, there's no time. She's in the waiting room. We just got to go. It's all good. Brett, there's no time. She's in the waiting room. We just got to go. We just got to go. It's all good. Brett is having some technical difficulties. We'll see if he joins.

Brett, one of the top editors, probably in the world, having tech difficulties. We'll address that later on the podcast. But for now, I am so honored to have as our guest, Jill Weinbeck, former DOJ federal prosecutor, the first woman to hold the position of general counsel of the Army, MSNBC legal analyst, podcast host of hit after hit, sister-in-law, intergenerational politics, and author. Her book, The Watergate Girl, was released last year, detailing her career and the prosecution of cases arising out of Watergate Girl was released last year, detailing her career and the prosecution of cases arising out of Watergate. Jill, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much. I'm enjoying being with you. One might say it's a conspiracy that Brett is not here, so I get to nerd out with you a little bit

on the law. So early in your career, you joined the DOJ. You were on the prosecution team for those Watergate cases. And one of the most memorable, I would even go so far as to say the most memorable and deleted and you showed how that was impossible. So from one lawyer to another, walk me through that experience of being a young lawyer in the most high profile case in the world and doing that cross exam and what was going through your mind. First of all, you have to understand that I basically was barely out of law school at that time. I was four or five years out of law school. And I was now up against the president and the president's lawyers, the White House. And it was an out-of-body experience. Rosemary Woods became the front page of every newspaper, every news magazine. It led to my reconnecting with my high school boyfriend, who is now my husband of 41 years. So it had a lot of good outcomes. But it also was, for those of you

who might remember Perry Mason, who used to every night on television cross-examine somebody who would then go, I did it. It isn't your client. He's innocent. Perry Mason moment where in the courtroom, Rosemary's foot came off a pedal that was making the reel-to-reel tape go forward, and it stopped erasing, proving that she didn't do what she said. And here's what she said. We had subpoenaed tapes, and the President Nixon stonewalled, said, you can't have them. We went to court. The court said, yeah, you have a legal right to them. He said, I don't care. You can't have them. He offered a compromise, which was to give us a transcript of the tapes, which of course is useless. It's his version of what it says. He was going to have it confirmed by a nearly deaf elderly senator, although I should be careful about saying elderly because I'm sure I'm older than he was at the time now, but at the time

I thought he was elder. And we said, we can't accept that. It's not admissible in evidence. And as a result, he fired his attorney general, his deputy attorney general, because neither of them would fire Archie Cox as he instructed. And then the third in command of justice took over in what is known as the Saturday Night Massacre, fired Archie Cox. And three days later, he had to revert and say, okay, I'll give you the tapes. Then we were waiting for the tapes we had subpoenaed and he sent his lawyers to court saying well nine we can't give you we could give you seven two are missing so we had a tapes hearing and it was in instead of in

front of a grand jury it was in front of the american people it was a public hearing and in that hearing i questioned rosemary woods who was a witness. She was what is known as a chain of custody witness, someone who had touched the tapes, but no one who was thought to have had anything to do with the two missing tapes. And indeed, she didn't. But a few weeks later, the day before Thanksgiving, we were called back to court by the White House lawyers who said, well, there's actually a third tape and it has an 18 and a half minute gap. And we have no innocent explanation for that. Only Rosemary Woods can explain it. So she had been my witness in the first tapes hearing. So I spent Thanksgiving weekend preparing,

looked at everything I knew about her, everything she had said in that first hearing. And it turns out I had asked a great question, just, you know, by happenstance, I had said, and did you ever handle the tapes? Yes. And did you take any special precautions to avoid erasing anything? And she screamed at me at that time. I used my head. It's the only thing I had. That was my precaution.

Well, of course, she looked pretty foolish when she, a few weeks later, had to admit that she had actually, in her view, erased 18 and a half minutes of a key tape recording. But I didn't know how she did it. So I was going to now violate the chief rule of any defense lawyer, of any criminal. You don't ask a question you don't know the answer to. Exactly. That is the key question, right? But all I knew was that the White House said I had to ask her and that there was no innocent explanation, but I didn't know what that was. So I said, well, tell us how you did it. And she described something that seemed incredible. So I said, I think it would help if we had your equipment here.

And the White House immediately brought over the tape machine. We didn't bring her typewriter, just the tape recorder and the pedal. It was a reel-to-reel tape, and it operated by a pedal. And she said she had her left foot on the pedal. And I want everyone to put their foot under the desk in front of them that they're pretending is there. Put your left foot on it. Imagine that perpendicular to your typing stand, there is a desk. And at the far end of that desk, more than six feet away, a phone rings. And you take off your headphones that you're listening through, you put them down, and you reach six feet behind you to get that

phone. And you keep your left foot on the pedal. And it's important because if it was your right foot, you could actually stretch a lot further to reach behind you than if it's your left foot. So in the courtroom, when she tried to do it, in the witness box, which is a teeny little space, she failed. The tape stopped erasing. The courtroom, which was filled with press, emptied as they ran to call in the story on a bank of pay phones. This is 1973. There's no cell phones. And she said, well, it's different in my office. I did it there.

And so I said, well, Your Honor, maybe we should adjourn to her office. And that's how I ended up in the White House where she demonstrated. And we had the White House photographer photographed her doing it. And everyone looking at those photographs knew that although she physically actually managed to reach the phone, that she was holding on white knuckle to her chair to reach it. And you couldn't have sat that way for 18 minutes there's no way and so everybody knew she was lying and that's how it came to pass that we had this really dramatic perry mason moment in the watergate tapes hearing people talk about law war stories and lawyers like

this i'm going to tell you my war story. One time at trial, that right there is beyond an epic war story. And for lawyers, that goes to the concept of you have to be fluid. There's got to be fluidity. You can't just be rigid. And as a chain of custody witness became one of the most important witnesses in the Watergate prosecution, you realize that and exposed the truth there. But what it also goes to is experience and being an experienced lawyer. I gave some of your background. I didn't mention you also served as the executive director of the American Bar Association. But having that leadership is incredibly important in the legal community. One of the things in the Trump administration that was so disheartening,

and I'd love to get your feelings about this, unqualified judge after unqualified judge appointing these young associates who never even took a deposition. Remember, there was that hearing where they asked, who here has sat at a deposition? Who's done a trial? That to me is one of the most dangerous things where you know

here in contrast to your story and the experiences you have being an actual lawyer in courtrooms we now have federal judges who don't know what they're doing and are crazy Trump conspiracy theories talk to that a little bit well that is definitely a serious problem but before I answer that I have to say I although I know the audience doesn't see these pictures, you have great Halloween decorations up. I love it. Thank you for that. All credit to my girlfriend, Sochi.

Well, it's my favorite holiday, so I love that. And I also want to add one other tidbit to the story I just told, because there is a feminist angle to it. And that is that when I started at the Department of Justice as the only woman, it took me a while to realize that the men I started with were trying cases and they had moved from appellate and I was still doing appeals. And when I went to my boss, he said, well, yeah, but you're a girl and it's so much more dangerous for you in a courtroom. In appeals, it's just the lawyers. In a trial, you'd be with made members of the mafia because I was in the organized crime section.

And I said, well, I don't know what you didn't notice about me when you hired me, but I want a trial. And it was only by speaking up for myself that I got a trial. And the same thing was true when the tapes hearing first started. Rick Benvenista, who is one of the best lawyers ever, is a terrific lawyer and a dear, dear friend, I felt was taking an unfair number of the witnesses. And we were the only two lawyers handling the witnesses for that. And so I pulled him out of the courtroom and I said, I'm taking the next witness the White House calls. And then we're sharing equally after this. The next witness called in the first tapes hearing when this happened was Rosemary Woods. And it's only because I spoke up for myself and said,

I'm taking the next witness. And the next witness was Rosemary that I ended up in the second tape searing with, well, the witness of a lifetime. So it's an important lesson for women to learn when you're being discriminated against. Sometimes you have to speak up and take action. Sometimes you can use humor and other methods, but sometimes you just have to say, it's my turn. So I just wanted to add that. Back to the judges. Obviously, our legal system, and right now, our democracy depends on having fair-minded judges who will look at precedent, who will look at the law, who will look at congressional intent, and not impose their own desires and their own conspiracy theories. And so far, knock on wood, we have been lucky that the courts have not done too much damage,

although there are troubling trends at the Supreme Court. I would say that the Texas law is, the SB-8 abortion law, is a troubling sign of a loss of constitutional rights. But for the most part, the conspiracy theorists, the fake fraud for the election, the stolen election, has all been thrown out of court as having no factual foundation and no legal foundation. But mostly there's just no fact to support that there was any fraud. And the courts have been good about protecting us. But I fear with what's happened and without the Democrats taking it as seriously as I think they should, it's going to continue. And if the Democrats don't get rid of the filibuster. The Republicans will when they take over again.

And right now, they control gerrymandering in many, many states. And it's a very troubling issue. There are so many judicial vacancies that must be filled right away while the democrats still have the majority so you've raised a very troubling issue and there is no good answer there's a lot of good candidates that are in the pipeline and i hope they can get pushed through fast of course today is the day that the government could shut down. I don't think it will. But assuming that there's still a government going after midnight tonight, they better get on that appointment of judges. You know, with your prosecution, with kind of eventual bipartisan accountability in the aftermath of Watergate, there was at least an appearance of accountability. And there seemed to be real accountability. You had

a president resign, you had a vice president resign, you had 40 government officials who were indicted or jailed. And now we look at the Trump years, we had no president who resigned, we had no vice president who resigned. There was probably 40 or more pardons of people who were conspirators with foreign governments seeking to destroy and overthrow our democratic institutions. And people are asking, where's Merrick Garland? Where's the DOJ? What's anybody doing right now? And I like to say as a lawyer, look, the DOJ, they're being deliberate. I think they want to dot their I's and cross their T's here. But what do you think is going on?

And why don't we see that level of accountability, swift accountability we saw with Watergate? Well, Watergate was extraordinary and it was swift. I mean, if you think about the break-in at the Watergate offices of the Democratic National Committee was in 1972, June. And by January of 73, so six months later, those burglars were convicted. By May, which was less than a year later, the Senate was investigating and Archie Cox was appointed a special prosecutor. And by January of 75, the conviction, you know, the main obstruction case, the verdict came in from the jury on January 1st of 1975. So that was pretty fast. You know, there's only been six, what, eight months that Biden and Merrick Garland have been in charge.

And it does take time to build a case. And you don't want to bring a weak case. So I'm going to give them a break and say that they are keeping their investigation secret as they should, because that's the appropriate and very important reasons for keeping it secret, because you don't want to announce something that may never come to pass. A lot of people get investigated, and you don't develop enough evidence. And it would be wrong to announce, I mean, let's look back to what happened with Comey and Hillary. Nothing came of it, but it killed her election. And so you don't want any public announcement of an investigation. That's totally a bad idea. So it may take some time. I look at

the evidence just from the Mueller report and I say, what about those obstructions of justice that are listed there? I think there's a half dozen of those that are valid. I also love that Adam Schiff is sponsoring the Protecting Our Democracy Act, which would codify the norms that have kept our government going in the past, which have been ignored by the, were ignored by the Trump administration. And so that you now need to have laws passed to require things that have always been done because people were moral in the office. And after Watergate, there were a lot of laws passed. Unfortunately, one of the most important, the campaign finance was undone by Citizens United, the Supreme Court decision. And now we need new legislation to undo the damage of Citizens United. But, you know, Congress investigated and Congress said these are the laws that need to be put in

place to prevent a future occurrence of this. We need laws to protect from January 6th ever happening again, from a president ignoring the emoluments clause ever again, from all of the horrible things in terms of the contact between the Department of Justice and the White House. That's just not supposed to happen. And we need laws now to prevent those from happening ever again. So I hope that things will take place, that judges will evaluate those who have experience as litigators. By the way, I think one of the good things that Biden is doing, President Biden is doing, is looking for diversity. And that doesn't mean just women and people of color, but for example, having defense lawyers and public

defenders appointed to the bench so that not everybody comes to the bench as a former prosecutor or a former corporate lawyer. We need all of those, but you need a balance and you need to have people who have seen how the system works from the defense side as well. So, you know, these are reasons why we need to get busy on getting judges appointed. And so I give Merrick Garland the benefit of the doubt, but let me rewind a little bit with the Mueller investigation because Mueller seemed to have a lot of information, a lot of money was spent investigating. Ultimately, he prepared his report, but ultimately he resulted, he defaulted to norms about not prosecuting a sitting president,

where you had a sitting president violating every norm and rule. And it almost seemed to be a very unfair game for the fight for democracy versus a fascist threat that still exists today. And a lot of people, including myself, were disappointed in the outcome that it was a ivory tower, high level report with footnotes and it was crafted very beautifully. But at the end of the day, all of that with all the information, no accountability. And so were you let down by that report or were you? I agree with you that it was ivory tower. I don't agree that it was well written. I think that the language used of double negatives did not clearly convey and you had to interpret

that what he meant was, Congress impeach this man. But I also want to say I have a more fundamental disagreement, which is, at the time of Watergate, and to this day, I believe a sitting president can be indicted when there's sufficient evidence, as there was for Richard Nixon, and as I believe there was for Donald Trump. Evaluating the evidence, I think they both had it. But just looking at the law, there is nothing in the law that says that a sitting president cannot be indicted. That should not be taken lightly, because it would interfere with the conduct of the office. On the other hand, where you have a Congress that will the office. On the other hand, where you have

a Congress that will do nothing to hold the president accountable, you may need a prosecutor. Now the problem also is the president appoints the attorney general and that controls who's going to get prosecuted. So it's very difficult unless you have a truly independent special counsel. And Mueller's terms of appointment did not create that kind of independence. The law that we were appointed under gave us, during Watergate, much more independence from the Department of Justice. We didn't have to report to them and get their permission whereas Robert Mueller had to go to the Attorney General. And that puts a limitation on what kind of prosecution could ever result. So there's no way he would have gotten permission

as he required to indict. So we need to change the Office of Legal Counsel opinion. Someone needs to re-look at that just so we can take that off the books. But you still are going to have the same problem if the investigation is of the sitting president, the attorney general, so you'd be left with only state crimes that could be indicted. And that's, you know, sometimes there will be state crimes committed as well as federal. So, you know, what's happening with, for example, the audit. Please, somebody tell me how this audit could possibly take this long. There's never been an audit that took this long. It was underway before he announced in 2015.

And I just don't get why that hasn't been resolved one way or the other, either resolved so that we can have his tax returns or not resolved. I mean, I don't mean not resolved, resolved so that he's either paying back what it seems he might owe in back taxes, or it's resolved and they say, well, there's no liability. And so you can release your tax returns. Something needs to happen with that. One of the things we say on the podcast is under the Trump administration, it felt like there was a Watergate happening every day and no one was doing anything. I get to speak with a prosecutor from Watergate.

So was your perspective similar that, wait a minute, if Watergate happened in Trump, which essentially it did every day, that wouldn't even raise an eyebrow today because Trump just does things infinitely, almost worse every single day and literally trying to destroy america yes is the answer and you know one of the themes of my book watergate girl is that it was a time when democracy worked justice prevailed and things got done because there was bipartisan support. The impeachment articles were supported by bipartisan vote. Legislation was resulting from compromise. Nobody got 100%, but everybody got something done. And if we don't return to that, you mentioned early on about fascism.

I think we're in worse than that. I really feel in many ways almost depressed about what's happening to democracy. If laws, the voting restrictions, but particularly the voting restriction that says, if we don't like the outcome, we're going to turn it over to the legislature and they'll decide who the electors are. That means that, okay, you might get to cast your ballot, but if we don't like the outcome, too bad. And that's the end of democracy. So I'm very concerned about voting right now and the voter restrictions that have passed. I'm worried about a Supreme Court looking at DOBS, which is the Mississippi abortion restriction, 15 weeks. And there's a lot to worry about that I think that anybody who feels the way I do needs to help get out the vote and needs to be involved in whatever

the particular issue is. There's so many issues, whether it's climate change, voting rights, civil rights, police reform. I mean, when a police reform bill can't pass Congress because the Republicans simply won't even consider it. It's absurd. I mean, this is something that we all acknowledge needs to happen. And no one's saying, well, there's one little thing I don't like about it. I'm not doing it. So we definitely have some serious issues.

And you're right. Every day in the Trump administration, I went, I can't believe this is happening. And yet it did. And then it became normalized. The other big difference that I think plays into this is during Watergate, there were three networks. They all had the same facts. Nobody said there were alternative facts. People disagreed on policy results of facts, but they agreed on the facts. People disagreed on policy results of facts, but they agreed on the facts. Now, when you have MSNBC, and then you have Fox and Newsmax and OAN, people actually believe what they're hearing on Fox. People who listen to Trump actually believe that the election was stolen and that he's coming back. And there's no evidence of that. I believe in evidence. I really do. When I hear that someone

was indicted, I don't read a news article about it. I read the indictment. I look at how it's laid out. I look at what evidence is alleged there. And then I can make a judgment based on facts. So we've got to get back to a fact-based discussion. That's one of the most important things that will help us get through this very bad period. Absolutely. And Jill, almost to that. So you said earlier in the interview that Democrats should be doing better. I agree.

But how do we do that with Sinema and Manchin? Well, that's a really good question. Obviously, I was tweeting this morning about who's going to primary Sinema. Someone needs to in the Democratic Party, because, you know, while you can say, well, now we have the 50, so we have the Speaker of the House, and I don't want to minimize the importance of our having the Speaker of the House. And just because they call themselves Democrats, we get to have the Speaker of the House. And that's clearly, clearly important. Same thing with the Senate, We need to have control of the Senate.

But and so. But having Sinema and Manchin who are defeating the very agenda that. Biden was elected on means that it's time for them to go and that we have to take the chance of having someone a little more liberal. And I was reading statistics today, some of which came from a Kyle at NBC, MSNBC, who is just one of the most accurate reporters. And over 70% of the people disagree with the abortion rule in Texas, for example. And someone commented that it was the same thing in terms of West Virginia supporting the infrastructure bill. So why is Manchin opposing the infrastructure bill? Why is Sinema?

Why are they opposing getting rid of the filibuster, which I guarantee you, if the Democrats don't do it now, when the Republicans get control again, they will do it. So you may as well use it now, get rid of it and use the simple majority to get laws passed that you want, because it's harder to undo a law than it is to pass a law. And I think we need to start getting busy on getting these things done. I think both Manchin and Sinema, but Sinema maybe especially because she's not even saying what she wants. What would it take? And obviously it's distressing. I want to have control. I want to have the Speaker of the House and I want to anything come up and wouldn't let Merrick Garland get a hearing and rush through Amy Coney Barrett. So the power needs to be there, but it needs to also be used. And there's no point in having it if you don't use it.

Talking about going out there and doing things in the last few minutes of this interview, Jill, would love to hear about the Sister-in-Law podcast. I want to focus on that because I love the podcast as a fellow lawyer. And to me, it shows exactly what you just said, which is that whatever you can do, do it. And you reaching out, teaching people about these issues. We have our own legal podcast legal af that we do on the weekends i plug that right here during the interview sorry tell me you know we do that so that we can help people understand some of these legal issues but tell us a little bit about the sister-in-law podcast it's it's hashtag sisters-in-law and it has been such a joy. It is Barb McQuaid, Kimberly Atkins, and Joyce Vance, who are all MSNBC analysts along with me.

So it's the four of us just talking. And we pick three issues every week to talk about. Plus, we have some chit chat just about things that our audience might be interested in. And we answer questions from our audience. And we get great questions. They reach us either through Twitter or through at sistersinlaw. And it is a delight because we all have different backgrounds. Barb and Joyce were US attorneys. Kimberly Atkins was in private practice,

but is now an opinion writer for the Boston Globe and a host on NPR and is a political analyst, but is clearly a lawyer. And so we talk about whatever legal issues, and they range from the R. Kelly trial to the Sussman indictment to SB8 to the appointment of judges. It's a different set of issues, and we get to go more in depth into those issues. So it's been a pleasure. I also, love my other podcast, which I co host is called I gen politics now used to be intergenerational politics. And it's because I do it with an 18 year old,

he was 17. When we started, he's now a sophomore at UCLA. And it's an interview format. And this one is actually like my dream come true. I started my college degree is in journalism. And now I get to interview the most interesting people. Anybody that we think of, we get great. We justahin, who has just filed suit for sexual assault by his boss, a male boss. And he was sexually assaulted by his boss in his first job out of college three times. And the company did nothing about it. And he's suffering the same trauma that women rape victims share. He is having trouble in relationships because every time somebody tries to touch him, he flashes back to this horrible invasion. But we've also interviewed Madeleine Albright. We've interviewed, I mean, you name it.

We've interviewed senators, congressmen. We've interviewed, I mean, you name it, we've interviewed senators, congressmen, we've interviewed cabinet officers. And it's just been a delight for me to get to talk to, a lot of journalists. We talked to some of the best and brightest of the columnists. And it's been just a real joy to do. So love both of them and they take a lot of work so you guys know you don't just do these without thinking about what are the subjects what are the questions but then you know it's something you pointed out and you have to listen to the answer and follow up on it it's not enough to have your planned questions because someone may say something that's, you know, you weren't expecting and then you have to follow up on it.

So active listening is as important in the interview segment as doing the questions in advance. And I love them both. And they're both available anywhere you get podcasts. iGen Politics is also on YouTube. But the others, they are also available on podcast platforms, as is hashtag sisters-in-law. Well, it's been an absolute delight talking with you today. I mean, for me personally and professionally, it really is a true honor, Jill. Jill Weinbanks, thank you for joining the Midas Touch podcast. Thank you, Ben. Thank you, Jordi.

Sorry, I missed you, Brett. We will be right back after these messages. Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast, Brett. Look who decided to show back up. I can't, I got to say that was one of the most stressful experiences of my life. What happened? Where'd you go? My internet went off and then I got a text message from the internet service provider, which I don't want to shame them or name names, Spectrum. And they said that the internet would not be on for a couple hours,

but luckily the internet is now back on. So my internet connectivity, you don't understand. That's like a bird without its wings. When my internet connection goes offline, I am not going to know. Oh no. I don't even know what to do. Brad, Jordi and I were thinking, what do we do? We've got Jill Winebanks in the lobby.

We decided to do it on our own. We decided to give you some help at the end of the day. You know what I'm a little bit frustrated about though, before we move on? I only got one question in still. Why? No, I got less questions than I have been getting when there's been three of us. Yikes. Well, now you see it's not me. No, it's okay. One variable was removed. Now we need to do this again. Exactly. I was just thinking of one of my favorite, I don't know if you guys, No, it's okay. One variable was removed. Now we need to do this again. Ludicrous. Exactly.

I was just thinking of one of my favorite. I don't know if you guys, anybody out there watches Parks and Recreation, but there's a very funny moment. I think it was a blooper improvised by Chris Pratt, which reminds me of the situation that I was just having. I'll just play it quickly because I find it funny. Who's your doctor?

Anne's my doctor. And she's the most beautiful nurse in the world. Come on. Oh God, now I'm hot. Now it's really hot in here. the most beautiful nurse in the world. Come on. Oh God, now I'm hot. Now it's really hot in here. Okay, well that's your fever. Leslie, I typed your symptoms into the thing up here and it says you could have network connectivity problems.

That's exactly what I had, network connectivity problems. And I needed help guys, I needed help. But what I think we all need is BetterHelp in our lives. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Is there something interfering with your happiness or preventing you from achieving your goals? I know, you know, with all the news, you know, I think a lot of people now are just experiencing this anxiety. I mean, we're all in this COVID world. We're just so inundated with chaos every single day. It's always good to be able to speak with somebody

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Love having great sponsors like BetterHelp on the show. Brett, Jordy, Mansion, and Cinema. It is a- You trying to totally ruin my mood? Because I've been in a good mood all podcast. I know you've been in a good mood all podcast, but we have to address this mansion and cinema issue. We've addressed it on past podcasts,

but it's almost as if they are, or they believe that when they try to reach these kind of broader compromise plans, you know, at first the Democrats wanted to have an infrastructure plan that could be upwards of seven to ten trillion dollars to truly make the impact it needed over the next decade. The Republicans came back basically with like a few hundred billion, you know, nothing that wouldn't help infrastructure at all. You know, I believe that there was a compromise plan that had been worked out with Manchin and with Sinema's involvement at $3.5 trillion in the form of a reconciliation bill. And then another infrastructure plan that was about, what was it, a $1.5 trillion or so infrastructure plan. These plans were basically worked out. It just appears that the goalposts will constantly move for cinema and mansion, and that at the end of the day, they really don't support, won't support real

infrastructure plans. And they've each had varying statements over the past few days. Manchin at least gave like a written response that, you know, tried to articulate his views, although it was kind of wish-washy describing that that there needs to be additional diligence basically looked into regarding the amounts of money and that it's too much money to spend. Sinema, on the other hand, when she was asked, well, I'll just let her words speak for herself. And this was from, I'll have Lawrence O'Donnell frame the issue from his show last night. Here's the clip. Senator Sinema's response to the question of what does she want is not just unsatisfying. It is something that no senator

with the slightest sense of accountability to voters would ever say. What do you say that progressives that are frustrated that they don't know where you are? There are progressives within the Senate that are frustrated that they don't know where you are? I'm in the Senate. There are progressives within the Senate that are frustrated that they don't know where you are either. I'm like sort of a right-wing elevator. Oh my, that made my blood boil more than anything. And let me just read it to everybody because it's so infuriating and I want to make sure that everybody heard exactly what Senator Sinema said. The question was, what do you say to progressives who are frustrated that they don't know where you are? Meaning where you are on the bill. Everybody knows what this question is about. Where are you on this reconciliation package?

Sinema answers, I'm in the Senate. Just being incredibly flippant with her answer. So the follow-up, there are progressives in the Senate that are also frustrated they don't know where you are either. She goes, I'm clearly right in front of the elevator. This is not the words of a serious person who wants to help the American people. This is just an incredibly disgraceful way to behave. It's incredibly immature, incredibly flippant. And this place, this person in my mind has zero, zero, zero, zero right to be in the United

States Senate. This is just an absolute disgrace. This is everything the Democratic Party stands against. And I think personally that Sinema needs to be primaried. It's a must, in my opinion. Yeah, well, you weren't on for weinbach's answer when we had asked her what what the hell are we going to do and that's essentially what she said she said pretty much you know enough's enough and do you guys know what we're doing right now by the way talking

about mansion and cinema we're addressing we're addressing the elephants in the room do you guys know what i mean because they're the two republicans exactly yeah in the democratic party yeah and you know i have different opinions on Manchin and Sinema. At least Manchin, you kind of know who he is. You know what he's doing. You understand that he is a conservative in Virginia in an area where Trump won by an insane amount. So it's incredibly impressive that Manchin is

able to have that seat at all. So I at least understand his mindset. And we talked about this with Heilman last time on that show. But Sinema is a real enigma to me. And there is a control group in Arizona in the form of Senator Mark Kelly that shows that you don't have to be behaving like this. Arizona is a purple state that is becoming more and more blue every single year. President Biden won Arizona. There are no excuses for the way that she's behaving. And she's had this just bizarre evolution from this Green Party person to now being like one of the most conservative

members of the Democratic Party. She's giving these flippant, unserious, disgusting answers to questions when negotiating just needs to be about let's lay our cards on the table and let's try to find common ground. But this is a person who clearly does not want to help the American people. She just wants to get attention for herself. She just wants to party with lobbyists. And that's what's so disgusting to me because she ran on a progressive platform, which is everything against the way that she is currently governing. And so I support a primary challenge to Kyrsten Sinema. I actually don't support a primary challenge to Joe Manchin though and that might get some people mad at me but I just don't think I think if you are a progressive and you think a progressive can win in conservative deep red West Virginia I just think you're kidding yourselves and

I think Manchin's just somebody we have to learn to deal with and we have to vote for more people who are going to help people and just make Joe Manchin's voice more relevant. That's my opinion of how we get around Joe Manchin. I don't know how you guys feel about that breakdown. The only correction I'd have there is I don't believe calling West Virginia conservative. I think that GQP is the more appropriate terminology there, is that there's lots of GQP ideology permeating. I think that

Manchin, to your point, though, actually tends to be more in line, at least with what conservative may mean as it relates to spending, although lots of people who pretended to be conservative when it comes to spending do not have any any issues whatsoever when you're spending trillions and trillions of dollars that help the trillionaires already and giving trillionaires and billionaires tax cuts. And yes, I say trillionaires because there are companies worth trillions of dollars. And under Citizens United, we're supposed to treat corporations as persons, which is absurd. But yes, there are trillionaires and billionaires and those who benefit from the GQP policy. Speaking of people who benefit from the GQP policies, it's the GQP nepotism. It just never seems to get old. Part of Trumpism and part of

the cult is also these weird, unfathomable favors that totally breach public trust and confidence and abuses of your powers. I mean, just look, obviously we know all about Trump and his kids and it's just disgusting, but you go to South Dakota with Governor Kristi Noem, who's a very problematic governor over there, who's got a number of- She only traveled by horseback? No, she travels by spreading COVID to everybody through interstate is how she travels. And she has a pro COVID agenda. She is anti-living, anti-people who are alive right now

and just speaks in all these GQP talking points about South Dakota's open for business. South Dakota's open for business. South Dakota's open for business. We love America. We love America without actually having any policies behind it. Well, recently it was reported by the Associated Press and wasn't just reported by Associated Press.

This was the subject of a lawsuit where there was actually a payout of approximately $200,000 to the person who filed the lawsuit. Sherry Bren, she ran the agency that oversaw providing certifications to state real estate appraisers. She oversaw the state real estate appraiser certification program. And the South Dakota governor's daughter was not getting her certification.

So what did South Dakota Governor Kristen Noem do? She set up a meeting with the head of the agency, Sherry Brenn, and Brenn's direct supervisor, who was the state's labor secretary. And this meeting took place in July of 2020, where South Dakota Governor Kristen Noem had her daughter on the phone. Shortly thereafter, Sherry Bren was fired from her job. Remember, her supervisor were on that call. What a coincidence. Yeah, she gets fired from her job. A few months after that, Governor Noem's daughter gets her certification. What a coincidence. gets her certification. And then a lawsuit transpired where Sherry Bren filed an action

against the agency that she worked for, again, resulting in that $200,000 resolution. In response, Governor Noem basically does the Trump talking points of, you know, this is the media, you know, the AP is smearing. She here the Ted Cruz offense she did the Ted Cruz defense which is blame your kids that's what she said the Associated Press is disparaging the governor's daughter in order to attack the governor politically no wonder Americans trust in the media is at an all-time low South Dakota is open for business so her official office blaming her daughter for this action and treating

her daughter like she's a child when she is a full grown adult. Her daughter is 26 years old. I think she's 27 now. And she was 26 at the time. That brings us to our other consistent GQP conduct. I guess Cora Lewandowski's consistent GQP conduct. I mean, I feel like there's a story about Lewandowski every six months. That's kind of like this story that comes out. He was accused of making unwanted, vile and disgusting sexual advances during a political event recently. Odom, who's the wife of a construction executive, John Odom, told Politico that Lewandowski approached her at a charity dinner in Las Vegas and made repeated advances, including touching her legs and buttocks over the course of the evening. Four people who attended the event corroborated Odom's account.

So strange, because usually I thought that kind of conduct was rewarded in Trump world, but apparently they kicked Lewandowski out of Trump world is what they're at least saying right now. But I'll tell you exactly why they kicked him out. It's because he was messing with a donor's wife. And of all things, they bow down to money. And once you get in the way of their money, that's where they draw the line. Make no mistake, they did not kick him out of Trump world, whatever that even means. I bet he's still very much involved with them because they thought his conduct was offensive, but because they realized, oh, this billionaire backer is now upset with us. And then we can bring this back to Kristi Noem because Lewandowski just keeps getting

his hand caught in all the cookie jars because apparently Corey Lewandowski was having an affair with Governor Kristi Noem. What a bizarre, bizarre, bizarre story. Noem is calling the rumors a total garbage and disgusting lie. She's just now deny, deny, deny the same Trump strategy that we all know. The governor has been married to her husband for 29 years, and they have three adult children. So quite the week for Kristi Noem and Corey Lewandowski. Just the bottom of the barrel, these people.

I need to take a shower after hearing all of that. I think that's the theme of the episode. I need to take a shower. We need clean, healthy lifestyles. And that brings me to the next point. Grove Collaborative is another sponsor of the Midas Touch podcast. I really love Grove Collaborative. Grove's amazing. Grove Collaborative's great. It's an online marketplace that delivers natural home beauty and personal care products directly

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Free. Go to grove, G-R-O-V-E dot com slash Midas Touch to get your exclusive offer. That's grove.com slash Midas Touch. Brett, Jordy, I think we have some special episodes of Midas Touch coming up that we may want to talk about. Ooh, good call. We do, I am in great call. I'm really excited about this. Okay, so this was pitched by the Midas Mighty

and we're putting it into action. So for the next two weeks after this, so starting on next Monday's episode, if you're watching live, we are going to do episodes that we are calling Goldmines. Yes, it's a play on goldmine and Midas Touch. You get it. You get it.

Goldmines. It's a play on so many different things. Yeah, goldmines with a DS. And so what these are going to be is we're going to bring you the best of moments from Midas Touch. So many of you have said, get Beto O'Rourke on the show. Why don't you have Scaramucci on the show? Why don't you get Tim Ryan on the show?

He's running for Senate. And we were like, hey, we've had all these people on the show, in some cases, multiple times. So we are bringing you some incredible episodes of our favorite interviews and some of your favorite interviews. And we can't wait to introduce these interviews to our Midas Touch audience, which really every single week now is growing exponentially. So first off, thank you to everybody so much for joining us in the Midas Touch podcast. Keep telling friends about the show. That's how we grow the show. Keep rating it five stars and get ready for an extra special week. We're also going to be bringing you some exclusive stories

about the forming of Midas Touch. That's what I'm excited for. Yeah, we're going to really get into it and it's going to be revealing for all. And I cannot wait. You'll tune in on Monday live at 8 p.m. Eastern, 5 p.m. Pacific, or listen right after that anywhere you get your podcasts. Remember to subscribe. Special thanks to our guest, Jill Winebanks, and special thanks to our sponsors for this episode of Midas Touch Podcast, Policy Genius, BetterHelp, and Grove Collaborative. And please feel free to go reach out to them on social media. Let them know that you heard about them from Midas Touch. They appreciate that outreach and knowing that their brands are being heard through the Midas Mighty. Should we make infrastructure predictions that will age poorly?

Infrastructure predictions that will age poorly. I think that, you know, here's what I truly think, Brett and Jordi. I think with the pressure of the Midas Mighty, the pressure of all these other groups out there, we need to keep the heat up. We can't take a defeatist attitude. I know that it seems insurmountable with Manchin and Sinema changing the goalposts, but we need to make this happen and we need to exert full maximum pressure on them. Sinema needs to know she continues down this path.

She absolutely will be primaried. And Manchin needs to understand that the polling shows that 70% of people in his state support the infrastructure. West Virginia support this. And remember, that money is also across 10 years. So don't let anybody throw out a 3.5 trillion number without explaining that that is over the course of 10 years. Here's where I think we're going to land. And if I get this right, I will replay the hell out of this clip. And if I don't, we'll forget it ever happened. But I think we're going to pass both bills.

This is my guess here. I think that every side of the party understands how important this is. I think Speaker Pelosi, I think Majority Leader Chuck Schumer all know how important this is. I think that the reconciliation bill will probably be adjusted, probably go down quite a bit in the price tag. And I think it will be at a point where you have Manchin and Sinema who are a little uncomfortable with the bill being a little higher than they wanted and the progressive faction of the party being a little upset

that it's a little less than what the rest of the Democratic Party wanted. I think it's going to end up as a little bit of compromise. I think that's what's going to happen. But I do think we will have in some form both of these bills pass and we'll be delivering for the American people. Jordy, most importantly for you, before you give the closing shout out, the fans want to know from you because you seem to be the number one preeminent authority on whether the infrastructure bill will pass or not. What do you think, Jordy Maiselis? I agree with Brett. Shout out to the Midas Mighty!