The MeidasTouch Podcast - Jack Smith has Trump TRAPPED as GOP Chaos ENSUES

Episode Date: July 7, 2023

The June jobs report from ADP blows away all expectations, Republicans stumble on the campaign trail, Jack Smith is closing in on Trump for his crimes relating to 2020 election interference, President Biden appeals a decision by a radical MAGA judge, big Democratic wins in swing states and more! Ben, Brett and Jordy break it all down on this episode of The MeidasTouch Podcast! Thanks to our sponsors! Henson Shaving: Visit HensonShaving.com/MEIDAS to pick the razor for you and use code MEIDAS for 2 years worth of free blades! ALEX AND ANI: Head to Alexandani.com and get 20% at checkout with code MEIDAS. Discover the confidence that comes from a perfectly accessorized piece of jewelry. Fum: Head to TryFum.com/MEIDAS and use code MEIDAS to save 10% off when you get the journey pack today! Remember to subscribe to ALL the Meidas Media Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://pod.link/1510240831 Legal AF: https://pod.link/1580828595 The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://pod.link/1595408601 The Influence Continuum: https://pod.link/1603773245 Kremlin File: https://pod.link/1575837599 Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://pod.link/1530639447 The Weekend Show: https://pod.link/1612691018 The Tony Michaels Podcast: https://pod.link/1561049560 American Psyop: https://pod.link/1652143101 Burn the Boats: https://pod.link/1485464343 Majority 54: https://pod.link/1309354521 Political Beatdown: https://pod.link/1669634407 Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://pod.link/1676844320 MAGA Uncovered: https://pod.link/1690214260 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. A great jobs report was just issued today that exceeded all expectations. Private sector jobs in the U.S. increased by 497,000. The United States has the strongest GDP growth of any G7 nation post-pandemic and the lowest inflation of any G7 nation post-pandemic. All right, compare that with what's going on in MAGA world. Donald Trump is calling special counsel Jack Smith a crackhead. Marjorie Taylor Greene is kicked out of the far right wing group that calls itself the Freedom Caucus because she was not extreme enough for them and was mean to Lauren Boebert and former Vice President Pence bragged about how the rich should definitely not pay their fair share of taxes. Donald Trump's co-defendant, Walt Nauta, was finally arraigned today after he found a licensed Florida lawyer, I think, to represent him. Nauta was apparently too busy getting cheesesteaks for Donald Trump to find a lawyer. Meanwhile, federal judge Eileen Cannon has ordered all of the lawyers in the federal

criminal case brought by special counsel Jack Smith to file certifications of compliance that they have complied with requirements to handle classified information before the next hearing, which will be taking place before her on July 14th. Special counsel Jack Smith seems to be finalizing his criminal investigation into Donald Trump's 2020 election interference. Let's not forget there is that other criminal investigation taking place. And I think we can expect to see more indictments from special counsel Jack Smith there against Donald Trump in the next few months. We learned of a recent subpoena sent by special counsel Jack Smith to the Arizona secretary of state, Adrian Fontes, to get information about two frivolous lawsuits that were filed for Trump in 2020. Also,

a Trump-appointed federal judge in Louisiana ruled that the Biden administration can no longer contact social media companies to, quote, urge or persuade them to publish accurate information. The rest isn't a quote. I'm giving you how I feel what the opinion says now. They can urge or persuade them to publish accurate information about COVID, accurate information about vaccines, accurate information about our elections. The federal judge is basically claiming in this order when you break it down that disinformation, that anti-vax rhetoric and lies about COVID, that that's conservative speech and that you will be discriminating against conservative speech if the Biden administration provides accurate information to social media companies, the judge says that's like the ministry of truth.

No, it's actually disinformation and dangerous lies and should be corrected. But thankfully, President Biden is now being referred to as a judicial confirmation factory and has appointed 136 federal judges, qualified, law and order, diverse judges, far outpacing other presidents. And from the judicial confirmation factory to opening up actual factories and manufacturing plants across America, I don't know about you, Midas Mighty, but I like presidents who win, who do things for the American people, and who focuses on what matters. And that's what we're here to talk about today. Welcome to the Midas Touch podcast. How about positive news at the top this time?

I got a lot of feedback on a video I did where I showed President Biden's tweets and compared them to Trump posts. And a lot of the response were, Ben, do this more often. Give us the positive news and tell us what Biden is doing. You could touch on the negative. So I listen and I hear you. You got to give the people what they want, Ben. You got to give the people what they want. I know what the people want to know. they want to know the most important news of the day of the week perhaps is jordy's mic working again it is i am happy to report that jordy you're coming through loud and clear jordy can we can we hear you for a sec i'm so excited i'm sorry you guys sabotaged my mic last episode i'm ready to go tonight

yeah the fans are you know very upset by you last last week that you would treat your mic so poorly, but you are back in action. Just in time for us to talk about Threads. We're on Threads now. That's a new exciting development. Go and follow us on the Threads app. I've been addicted to the Threads app all day. I'm not even going to lie.

You're a Thread head. Thread head. Total Thread head. It goes to show you how horrible do you have to be as a human being and as a business person to make people want to go to the Mark Zuckerberg product. You got to be pretty horrific, but it is a lot of fun. It feels like the old Twitter without the Nazis and all that sort of stuff. It's a good thing. It's a good sign. I'm having fun. Follow us over there, all of us individually and at Midas Touch. Jordy, how are you doing? Other than the mic, is everything going okay? No, everything's going great. I'm really excited for tonight's show. I'm just ready to rock. Ben, I like that green shirt you're wearing. Really, really sharp. You don't wear green too much.

You look good in green, big bro. You know, I thought today was green because of the June jobs report. I'm corny sometimes. The June jobs report is out and wow. Private sector jobs in the United States increased by 497,000, blowing past expectations of 220,000. Leisure and hospitality led with 232,000 new hires followed by construction with 97,000 in trade, transportation, and utilities with 90,000 companies with fewer than 50 employees were responsible for most of the job growth adding 299,000 positions. In addition, annual pay rose at a rate of 6.4%. I want to show you the moment right now where Fox Business, because they cheer against the Biden administration, they cheer

against Bidenomics. The great thing when President Biden talks about Bidenomics now because the objective data, US has the strongest GDP growth of any G7 nation post-pandemic, that the United States has the lowest inflation of any G7 nation. So that was intended to be an insult, Bidenomics, before that at President Biden, right? And so President Biden's like, no, you coined it to make fun of me, but I'm okay with Bidenomics. Rather than trickle down economics, we're talking about bottom up, middle up, bottom up, middle out. How about we actually focus on, I don't know, the 99.99% of people out there, like workers, rather than like, what can we do to make sure billionaires don't pay their fair share? This is what like Republicans think. What if we, okay, get this. Here's a good plan. What if we basically say that they can get tax exemptions for private

jets? Oh, I love it, but let's not stop there. How about we also give them deductions for yachts? Okay, the private jet and yacht deduction, brilliant. I mean, that's what the MAGA Republicans are talking about. And President Biden's talking about what can we do for the people? How do we give you better working conditions when you're sick? How do we make sure you're paid for sick leave? How do we support unions? How do we make sure that there there not be a minimum wage, they would basically pay people slave labor. That's what they ultimately want. And you've got Democrats and led by President Biden saying, no, you need to give people not just a living wage, but a wage with dignity, Bidenomics. And by the way, what we are experiencing right now is the early signs of a manufacturing boom. We'll talk more about that on the show, but let me show you now the reaction by Fox to these job numbers. Play the clip. Hold on. 497. That is a big, big, big jump

above the estimate of 228K. That uh that is that's that's double of what economists uh have predicted let me look 497 000 jobs added on private payroll well that's not recessionary at all by the way look at the economist spread here the estimates were anywhere from 95 000 jobs added for adp to 334 000 jobs jobs for ADP. So this is even in the I mean, the range didn't even get anywhere near the actual number that we got. But yet private sector jobs, Sean, 497,000. Your reaction? Yeah, well, I mean, it's just a testament to the strength of the U.S. economy. I would I would expect there'll be some revision to that number. It's so far out of line. But, you know, that's that's what's going on right now. The US economy continues to move along in a very rapid...

I like that they can't even fully believe it. I think that there's going to be a revision, maybe a revision up. Yeah. And by the way, it keeps getting revised up for previous months. Every single month that we get the job report, we get the revisions for the previous month saying that they actually underestimated the job growth. And it's like, while you're watching this and listening to these clips, don't you feel like you've been gaslighted for the past few months or even for the past couple of years by all these news networks that have continuously told you day in and day out recession's coming, recession's around the corner, here comes the recession. And we're like, that's not what any of this data is saying.

Of course, we're in unprecedented times with inflation from the pandemic and supply chains being out of whack. But if you actually look at the data of the recovery, it paints a much different picture from all these people trying to push this whole recession narrative. And one of my favorite traditions in the beginning of every month now is watching Fox have to react to these job numbers. So these are the job numbers that came through by ADP. A lot of people probably know ADP because it's the private payroll company who a lot of employers throughout the country use. You probably have seen it on many of your paychecks, ADP. The official federal jobs numbers will be released on Friday. This is, of course, a good sign for those. On an aside, I got to say it's a weird incentive structure for the economy.

It's kind of a tangent and a separate issue that when jobs numbers are good, it actually spooks the stock market because they then go, oh, no, does that mean the Fed is going to raise rates some more? Like you have stockbrokers, you have people in the stock market rooting for the economy to slow down, rooting for fewer people to have jobs. It seems like a bit of a perverse incentive structure when we should be happy that Americans are getting jobs. And especially from a small business perspective, especially from construction, from all these infrastructure projects. I mean, what we're really witnessing now is, frankly, everything that Trump continuously promised every day of his presidency. I mean, it became a laughing stock when he would say, it's infrastructure week, it's infrastructure week, and then somebody in his administration would get indicted. And that became a joke, infrastructure week. Anytime some major F-up happened in his administration,

which was really on a daily basis, you'd go, oh, it's infrastructure week again. But then Biden gets it done. And that's why you have all these distractions out there to just try to hide all the accomplishments at all times. It's like the quote that you always bring up that Biden says, don't compare me to the almighty, compare me to the alternative. And when you look at the way the economy is right now compared to, I saw like Byron Donalds, the Republican from Florida do a post like, don't you wish the American economy was like it was three years ago? I was like, when unemployment was over 11%, when we couldn't get toilet paper in the stores, when 6,000 people were dying a day,

this is the America that you want to go back to? I mean, that's sick. So you got to compare the economy to where we've come from. And you got to compare the economy to how we're doing against, frankly, every other nation in the world. And when you look at similar nations in the G7, you see the US has the strongest GDP growth of any nation, of all of them, any nation post-pandemic, the lowest inflation of any G7 nation, the lowest. else could you possibly, what else could you even ask for? Can we do better? Of course. Could we continue to push policies to make things better? Of course. But the answer to that is not to go backwards. It's not to go in reverse and go to the Republican policies that put us in those horrific situations every single time. The Republicans continuously drive the car into the ditch and then Democrats have to try to get the car out of the ditch. And then people complain that they're not getting the car out of the ditch

fast enough. And then they go to the Republicans who drill it back in. It's an insane cycle. And hopefully we can continue to get out of it. And I think people are seeing through it. I mean, people are feeling the results of these jobs. They're seeing the construction projects happen in their own neighborhoods now. So it's good that we're actually now getting to see the physical work, the physical manifestation of the bills, of the legislation that we've seen passed over the past couple of years. Absolutely, B. And look, what it comes down to is what you pointed out about Donald. So I saw Boebert make a very similar comment on social media today too, going after the economy. And it's like, look, numbers don't lie. Republican leadership lies.

And so ultimately at the end of the day, the people, American citizens can look at the economy, can look at those tangible numbers and understand how it's impacting their lives. And they don't have to be gaslit by these Republican leadership. I give you a sports analogy, Jordy. So let's just say the country that you were rooting for. I love your sports analogies because they're very good, but there's always like something kind of weird about them. The country you're rooting for in the World Cup, right? They get through all of the rounds.

They win. They're hoisting up the World Cup, right? They are number one. As against everybody else, they're number one. Right now, America, number one fastest growing economy. So what the MAGA Republicans would basically be doing, the team that's wearing the gold or hoisting up the World Cup, the Republicans are basically saying, look at those losers over there in the number one position.

They're freaking losers over there. They say, hey, remember when we didn't get into the sweet 16? Or remember when we didn't? See, that's the one, mixing analogies. That's what I'm saying, that there's always something that just a little bit off with your sports, but it's fine because I get it. I get it. The mightiest mighty gets it too.

It's like we won the World Cup, Grand Slam, home run, touchdown. Remember when we didn't qualify? How great were those days when we didn't even qualify? Remember those, hey, not qualifying is worse than winning the World Cup. So you have to, again, have some basis of comparison. So let's give another basis of comparison. While President Biden's now going around the country talking about manufacturing plants and factories that he's opening up, this is what former Vice President

Mike Pence is talking about, how the rich should not pay their fair share. Here, play this clip. I'm somebody that I don't really buy into the rich need to pay their fair share. I know there are some people who are saying, I want to hear the rest of that argument. You are just clipping. What else do you frankly need to hear? He's saying that he doesn't believe that the rich should pay their fair share. Everything else after that would not be clarifying. It would be worse. And indeed, if you want to go and find the longer clip, go look into it because his point is the

rich pay enough. He thinks that the rich are overtaxed. He thinks that they are paying their fair share, even though if you just look at the data, the Trump tax- That's such a crazy thing to say in general. No matter your beliefs, you can't say they should pay a fair share. No, they should get perks. They should get benefits. They should pay an unfair share. It's a crazy thing to say.

And he's saying this to a very small crowd in a very tiny room. I think it was in Iowa that he's given this speech. You think there are any millionaires sitting in those seats? You think there are any billionaires that he's talking to about the rich? Maybe they shouldn't pay their fair share. How is that a winning message? Republicans at least used to pretend. At least used to pretend like they cared about giving people a fair shot. Even when they then put all the benefits onto the rich, they would at least dangle that out. So frankly, I don't know what's better,

that they're saying it out loud now or what. It's hard to even say. No, let them speak. Give them the microphone. Let them speak. I say it all the time. And I just feel for our audio listeners right now too, because that clip is extra bizarre. I mean, what is like from Pence's smirk to the way he's holding his hands on his belt to like him sticking his belly out, the whole clip is bizarre. They really don't engage in like the most basic human interactions. MAGA Republicans just don't get, like they don't get right. Like I won't go, i won't show you the clips again because it will make you sick but if you go over and you look at like just desantis right like he doesn't know how to eat a

pizza like he eats a pizza through his nose like what do you what are you doing he continue like it's not like once he continuously wipes his boogers on people. He takes his knot and just like wipes it on people. He laughs before jokes. He laughs before the jokes are told. So someone's saying a story and he's like, you know, and he laughs like a mad person. Like it's just these people have never, I think, engaged in like actual human interactions. But OK, again, don't compare me to the almighty, compare me to the alternative, right? You just saw Pence, let me show you President Biden promoting his economic record in South Carolina

and taking a shot at the same time at Marjorie Taylor Greene and basically saying, hey, one of the biggest manufacturing projects is in Marjorie Taylor Greene's district. I'll be there for the groundbreaking. Play the clip. Since I took office, we've seen over 60 domestic manufacturing houses all across the solar supply chain. One of the biggest is in Dalton, Georgia. You may find it hard to believe, but that's Marjorie Taylor Greene's district.

I'll be there for the groundbreaking. And what I love to see what President Biden is doing now, though, is going state to state and talking about these projects. And what we are seeing now with our own eyes is actually government working, how the Infrastructure Act is leading to more projects, how the CHIPS Act is bringing semiconductor jobs, high-paying jobs back to the United States. We're seeing when you actually try to make things better and you're smart and sophisticated and you talk through these issues, how you can achieve things that actually benefit people. Because how does this benefit people? I mean, pull up some of these Trump posts from the past 24 to 48 hours. He never once talks about, here's what I want to do for you. Here's what I can do. This is one of them. Does anybody really

believe that the cocaine, and he puts that in caps, found in the West Wing of the White House, very close to the Oval Office, is for the use of anyone other than Hunter and Joe Biden? But watch, the fake news media will soon start saying that the amount found was very small and it wasn't really cocaine, but rather common ground up aspirin. And the story will vanish. Has deranged Jack Smith, the crazy Trump hating special prosecutor been seen in the area of the cocaine? He looks like a crackhead to me. And these ridiculous things that he says, total and complete, all complete lies. This is the stuff that he says at events. And Brett, to your point, like when I see former

Vice President Pence telling people, the rich should not pay their fair share. When you've got Trump at these events that he says are far bigger than they actually are, like when he's in Pickens and he does the speech, deranged warthog. He calls him a warthog. Deranged warthog. You know he calls him a warthog, Jordy. Deranged warthog. He calls him a warthog. Deranged warthog. You know he calls him a warthog, Jordy. Deranged warthog. Jack Smith is coming after me and they're all out to get me because they're out to get you. It's like, what the heck? Who is, for real, who's like yeah yeah well that's you freaking warthog you you you freaking warthog i mean it's ridiculous it is a ridiculous it's a ridiculous warthog you know we went from yes we can yes we can to like warth hog oink oink it's no it's it's really actually crazy stuff and i know the large media networks want to be like oh what a a forceful showing in pickens south president

biden spoke about his education plan and pickens he did did he though pickens has 3,300 people in the whole town. I know what 75,000 people looks like. I've seen Taylor Swift concerts. I've seen Obama rallies. Humble brag. Really? Donald Trump's leading freaking Warthog chants. Okay? It's utterly – Real quick, going back to that post. You know how we also say that every accusation is an admission here? Talking about the ground up aspirin, how they were going to say was that, like that is such a specific thing to come out and say the White House was going to say. I mean, obviously Trump has used that one in the past. Here's one of the funniest things. So Don Jr. responded because a lot of people were like,

it must have been Don Jr.'s. And Don Jr.'s excuse wasn't like, I don't even do that. Don Jr.'s excuse was, I haven't been there in three years. I was like, oh, there was another answer to that question that he could have went with. But interesting that you chose that. It's why, though, that they have to make – it's why it's a cult, right? It's why they have to turn Trump into a cult leader, because when you're not actually pushing policies, you have to make everything about yourself and you have to make your own fate kind of be associated with the fate of the rest of the cult. So that's why you hear Donald Trump so often says, they're not coming after me, they're coming after you,

or they're only coming after me to come after you. He's trying to tie those two things together. When he says things like America is doomed, which he says in one of these other posts that we'll pull up shortly, America is doomed. You need to do something. He's not talking about the United States of America. He's talking about himself. He is talking about me, Donald Trump. If I go down, that means America is over. So he wants to connect those two, which is a move that dictators do. It's a move that cult leaders do. By the way, you know the project that is in Marjorie Taylor Greene's district? It's extra ironic because it is a solar manufacturing facility. That's like a $2.5 billion investment, which is going to create

thousands of jobs in her district, green energy jobs. And she consistently, just to show you how much these politicians in the Republican Party harm their own voters, she consistently rails against green energy, calls it a scam. Meanwhile, these are the jobs of the future. Selfishly, if you want to actually be doing good for your constituents, if you want to be able to say, look at what I've brought to my district, look at how I've helped the people, then you should want to promote green energy. You should want to promote these jobs of the future, but they are just so in the pockets of oil and gas. They are so just conspiratorial in Marjorie Taylor Greene's case. And it's destructive. It is all one big cult that does not exist in the factual world

whatsoever. Here's another one of his posts. And by the way, he says this in his speeches. This is just a freaking whiny fascist baby. Who is this person? And the Republicans are like, yeah, give him the nukes. Let him make life and death decisions over me. This guy, him. Pull this up. We have to talk about it. Here's the thing with large media networks, and I won't go fully on it. You have to look at this. Not that one. Let's go to the one with all caps. Yeah, this one. You have to look at this and go, this is a freaking crazy person, everybody. This is an insane person. You don't hear him say it once. That's what this is. Massive prosecutorial misconduct is currently taking place in America and the weaponization of law enforcement cannot be allowed to happen. Crime and

inflation are rampant. Our borders are open. Our elections rigged. Our economy is in shambles. Our energy independence is gone. Our leader is mercilessly mocked and our country is being destroyed both inside and out. Do the people of this great nation even have a choice but to protest the potential doom of the United States of America 2024! Psycho, crazy person. You have to be like, this is a deranged fascist lunatic. And if the media was doing their job, they would be saying it the way we are. But you know what? And it's another call to action, right, Ben? I mean, it's what he does. It's what a lot of these Republicans do. It's they make calls to action without explicitly saying,

attack so-and-so, carry out X and Y plan. They say, everything's about to be doomed. We need the people to rise up, right? Or they'll post like Trump did recently, post Obama's address. Next thing you know, you have armed people showing up at their house with an arsenal full of weapons looking to kill former President Obama. That is the purpose of a lot of this also. It's to cause chaos. And while you could sit back and say, well, I didn't say what I just said, you're going to be doomed. All I said was, you're going to be doomed. They're coming for you. And then I said, you better do something about it. And then I gave Obama's address. How am I responsible for it? Well, you know what? As you mentioned, Brett, Taylor Toronto is the individual, a January 6th

insurrectionist who was on the run. He didn't have a home address, so the Department of Justice and FBI couldn't find him. He was live streaming from right around the block from Obama's home. He had guns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition. And fortunately, he was detained by someone who was radicalized by Donald Trump. And by the way, we're going to talk about it in a little bit. Then the MAGA Republicans go, oh, oh, but Ben and Midas Touch, you are discriminating against conservative viewpoints. These are all conservative viewpoints, killing people, spreading lies about vaccines, singing freaking songs with the insurrectionists. You know what the funny thing is? We made such good friends also with a lot of actual

conservatives who were disgusted with the current day Republican Party. That's why Liz Cheney's statement, when's why Liz Cheney's statement, when I saw Liz Cheney's statement the other day, Liz Cheney, I don't have the clip, but she was speaking with NBC News and Lester Holt asked her a question. And it also showed how the media kind of gets things wrong here as well. And Liz Cheney called him out for it. The question was, do you still consider yourself a conservative? Yeah. And he added the second part though. The question was, do you still consider yourself a conservative? Yeah. And he added the second part though, which was important. Do you still consider yourself a conservative or do you feel like you have no place in the party? And she goes,

hold up, hold up, hold up, hold up. She goes, those are two separate things. Do I consider myself a conservative? Yes. Place in the party. That party is not a conservative party. The Republican Party is anything but conservative. So yes, I still believe in conservative values. The Republican Party no longer believes in conservative values. The Republican Party has become a fascist death cult. So those are entirely different things, which is why that we also try to separate those things, because we could have debates. We're going to disagree with conservatives who we're friends with most of the time, right? But they're at least like normal human beings who actually care about the country and who don't want to take us down a road of fascism and authoritarianism, which frankly is what this party wants to do. Couldn't agree more with you. And look, Trump posted like 20 other things like that. He also posted a QAnon meme. He posted a flag that says F Biden. I mean, completely, completely disqualifying stuff, but not in the modern day Republican Party. My,

have they fallen? We've got a lot more to discuss, including Marjorie Taylor Greene getting kicked out of the far right wing group, the Freedom Caucus in the House of Representatives because she was not extreme enough. We've got that and much more. And again, one more thing, those emojis, everyone loves those emojis. You could become a member of our YouTube channel, become a member, gift memberships with the dollar sign below. It is a fun way to contribute to the growth of this network and we don't have outside investors. We still got a lot of show left. Let's take a quick break. Jewelry is having a big moment right now. And with hundreds of products popping up in your feed every day, it can be hard to find a brand you trust.

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to save 10% off when you get the Journey Pack today. That's tryfume.com and use code MIDAS to save an additional 10% off your order today. We are back live on the Midas Touch podcast. Let's go. Ben Micell is here joined by Brett and Jordy Micell. It's just on the break. You can't see me during the break, but I have a big smile on my face because I honestly

have so much fun doing these podcasts. I try to look at some of the comments. So if you go, well, Ben, why are you like looking down sometimes? Because I'm reading your comments and I can't respond to them because it's hard for me to multitask that much. But I really appreciate your comments. I love your emojis. And I really just have the time of my life hanging out with the Midas Mighty community. And I know I always give the thanks at the end of the show, but I truly mean it. Thank you. You bring us so much joy. And for us, it's a thrill and honor to be a part of this community with you all, because this is more than a show. This is family. This is friendship. And this is just so great to spend this time together. All right, I'll stop being mushy.

That was my reflection during the break. I'm like, I'm just really having the time of my life right now. I don't know if other people who do news just enjoy it this much. But anyway, I could go on and on for that forever. Sorry. Weird digression. All right. Marjorie Taylor Greene has been kicked out of the freedom caucus. She's not extreme enough. See, I shouldn't call them the freedom caucus. That's what they call themselves. Good catch. They stand for the exact opposite of freedom. These are like the far, the furthest fringe, I suppose, although they're all very far fringe right-wing MAGA Republicans at this point, but that's what this self, it's what they call themselves, the Freedom Caucus. So Marjorie Taylor Greene used to be part of this. She was still a part of it until today. Today, they voted her out. You could see the divisions when

Marjorie Taylor Greene supported Kevin McCarthy, the weakest speaker of the House in history, so she could get on the House Oversight and Homeland Security Committee so we could all see her disgrace our nation at these committee hearings each and every day. And so she could go in sensitive compartmented information facilities, skiffs based on these positions, and then leak our classified documents to Fox and to other right-wing media. But I digress. So starting back in January, she was talking crap about Lauren Boebert and Matt Gates and other people who were part of this fake freedom caucus or whatever they call themselves. And there was all of those fights back then. And what we learned about the vote today, technically the vote happened last month.

It was just reported today. But yeah, Marjorie Taylor Greene got kicked out. And one of the reasons they say that she got kicked out is because on the House floor, she called Lauren Boebert a little bitch. And then she went on and bragged about how she called Lauren Boebert a little bitch. And then she went on and bragged about how she called Lauren Boebert a little bitch. And then Lauren Boebert went on the media, leaked to the media that that's what went down. And then Marjorie Taylor Greene got mad at Lauren Boebert for leaking to the media that she called Lauren Boebert a little bitch. This is the level of maturity of these MAGA Republicans. And this Freedom Caucus, again, this is what they call themselves. They were also upset at Marjorie Taylor Greene for supporting the bipartisan debt ceiling bill and just generally going along with Kevin McCarthy. And Marjorie Taylor Greene's Kevin

McCarthy thing, though, truly has like very, very weird as well. I mean, everything they do is weird, but like she spent a hundred thousand dollars of donor money to buy used chapstick that was used by Kevin McCarthy so that she could sit in on a meeting with Kevin McCarthy and donors. And then she like proudly displayed the used chapstick. How much do you think I can get for this chapstick? Used, half used. What do you think? I didn't know you were a chapstick guy. Now taking bids, everybody in the chat. By the way, that should have been even bigger. So much happens. That should have even been a bigger story to spend $100,000 of donor money

on Kevin McCarthy's freaking chapstick. i just want to make sure people know we're not making that up like if you missed that in the news cycle that literally happened marjorie taylor green is like kevin mccarthy's carry lake and it just borders on like a weird it's like hilarious it's just incredibly incredibly bizarre and if you remember from the Kevin McCarthy votes, the people who continuously voted against Kevin McCarthy during those votes were people of this so-called, I'll just call them the fascist caucus. The people of the fascist caucus were the people who kept voting down Kevin McCarthy. So there's a lot of discomfort there over Marjorie Taylor Greene's relationship with Kevin McCarthy and her desire basically to attain power at any cost, even if that means appeasing Kevin McCarthy every step of the way, whom they hate. So there's this tension that's been arising.

And they say that the Lauren Boebert situation on the House floor was the straw that broke the camel's back in this situation. But the true reason was in a vacuum, they don't care about her behavior, in my opinion. They don't care what she says, what she does. They care that she supported McCarthy. They care that she ultimately did not vote to torpedo the entire economy, crash and burn the entire US economy, which was the ultimate goal of the fascist caucus in Congress. So this whole party right now, this whole Republican party is all in chaos. They're all at war with one another. And the extremists are also being really detrimental to the party as a whole here because they're also scaring away

donors. They have this weird catch-22 now, right, where the energy of the party is with the most insane people in the party, these crazy Trumpers, these fascist caucus people, the total, for lack of a better word, the total nutjobs. But those people are the same people who repulse the average voter, who turn away all voters and who turn away all the big dollar donors that Republicans actually need to win races. So you're seeing right now in a lot of these swing states, these Republicans and the Republican committees are just burning, burning cash. There was a report in Reuters recently that said the major Republican donors to the Arizona Republican Party, the Michigan Republican Party, who have in the past donated tens of thousands of dollars, hundreds of thousands of dollars to the party

over the past six years, have completely stopped even giving these Republican parties any money because they give them the money. And what do they do? They go on these wild goose chases for Donald Trump. They start spending the money on these election fraud campaigns and all their dumb stuff. And they're like, why am I giving you $100,000 if you're going to burn it? And so they've stopped. And now you have situations like Arizona's Republican party on March 31st reported that they had less than $50,000 in cash. By the way, these are the so-called fiscal conservatives, right? They had less than $50,000 in the bank, the Arizona Republican Party. And if you want to compare that to the same point four years ago during the previous election cycle, four years ago, they had $770,000 in cash reserves.

And this is not just limited to Arizona. This is like all the big swing states. Michigan, they had $116,000 in the bank as of March 31st compared to $867,000 two years ago. This is what the former head of the Michigan GOP said about the situation. This is a guy named Jason Rowe, quote, they are effectively broke and I don't see the clouds parting and the sun coming out on their fundraising abilities. Absolutely brutal and devastating for them heading into this election cycle. Well, look at those two states, right? So Arizona, the GOP chair was Kelly Ward, right? We are the Orange Mafia,

who here is ultra mega. I mean, in sound. Real thing she said. Actual, it's a far better impression than many of my impressions right there. And then in Michigan, you've got Christina Karamo, who's like a deranged conspiracy theorist. And she's like, I was going to work today and I saw a possum being eaten by a bald eagle. And so therefore, I thought of the globalist conspiracy. She's like, what is going on? What are you talking about? Go back. I'm not going to show the clips. And Brett knows I love to get both of those clips into as many videos as I can. Because it's such a symbol. These are the highest position in the Republican Party for a state. I'm not taking a cheap shot. I'm not finding the Charlie Kirk McGurk follower who's- You're not Libs of TikTok in it, right?

Yeah, exactly. I'm not finding some random person and punching down, okay? I don't do that. This is the top people who are supposed to be the top leaders of the party. So for me, these are real symbols that need to be reinforced over and over again, that these people are not serious people. These are very dangerous people. And that's why I do the impressions and I show you that because that's actually what's going on and the way you're like ben that's hilarious and you know and you do but like that's truly what they did like that's like that's that's real life that's that's who they that's who they are speaking about real life i like your i like your impression of the audience too and i know you're like ben you're

so hilarious ben ben ben you are so good looking and funny. And like, and but like, guys, it's what I didn't take. I didn't take I did not take it there. I just simply you were you were you were very close to taking it there. Can I add this to heading into this next election cycle? Brett, to your point there, I think the American voter is going to sit down at a certain point if they haven't already and really ask themselves, what has this Republican Party done? Since they've taken control of Congress, what have they been able to do for me? It took them 15 rounds to elect a speaker. They've held a bunch of weird sham hearings that didn't help any people at all.

They continue to just fight with them. And they're only in the news when Marjorie Taylor Greene calls Lauren Boebert a little bitch. It's just like, what have they actually done for you, America, and for the American people? What have they done? The answer is absolutely nothing. And I think they've sort of caught wind of that in the last midterm cycle. That's why it was not a red wave. And that's going to continue to carry over. And that's why I say all the time,

give them the microphone, let them speak. They're professional rake steppers. They're going to cause a scene every step of the way. And it's not going to resonate with American voters. And then I respond and we have to showcase what's really going on. Y'all remember, I'm dating myself here, but remember Game Genie, that you could just cheat on Nintendo and then you do Game Genie and then you get infinite lives and you could just beat the game of all of your favorite games. I don't need the media to give these MAGA Republican fascists a media version of Game Genie. Why are you helping them? Another example from our video game days, putting computer assistants on to make the games close like i don't need you to do that like our democracy is

on the line here like can you just say what we all see i don't need to be gaslit by you that's fascist that's dangerous that's crazy just please just just say what it is and you know i i guess we found a niche here at the Midas Touch Network, just looking at something and going, here's what it is, right? You see it too, right? And then people are like, yeah, I see it. Why isn't anybody else saying it this way? Anyway, as I said, how is this real life? Walt Nauta got a taste of real life today. Walt Nauta finally, finally is able to have his arraignment. That's where you enter a plea.

He pled not guilty at the June 13th arraignment. Walt Nauta showed up with an out-of-state lawyer who's not licensed to practice in the state of Florida, Stanley Woodward. And Stanley Woodward said, we need more time. This is the state of Florida, Stanley Woodward. And Stanley Woodward said, we need more time. This is the case brought by special counsel, Jack Smith Walton. Now, just to be clear, as Donald Trump's co-defendant in the obstruction of justice, willful retention of national defense information, conspiracy and making false statements case before Judge Eileen Cannon. The arraignments, though, take place not before the Article 3

federal judge, but before a magistrate judge. So the June 13th arraignment, Donald Trump pled not guilty. Walton Outta didn't have a lawyer. All right, come back on June 27th. Only Stanley Woodward showed up. Like, Walton Outta missed his flights. Like, the flight got canceled. Stanley Woodward's like, but judge, we take it very seriously. We're trying to find a lawyer. So they continued it one more time to July 6th. And finally, Walton Outtis found a lawyer. Her name is Sasha Dayton. If anyone wants to correct my pronunciation, I'll get it right.

But I think it's Dayton. And this is Sasha Dayton. Hurt in an auto accident. Call the Dayton and Bonoo law i'm not advertising the firm don't call them um please don't call please not a sponsor that not a sponsor don't definitely not a sponsor please definitely don't call them and and here is from her other website that she is part of the sex crime defense team. The sex crime defense, a lot of people were saying, this Sasha Dayton, you are throwing your career away by representing

Walt Nauta. I really don't view it that way. I'll give you a truthfully, I know we've been doing lots of jokes, but my view of it is everybody, including Donald Trump, has the right to competent counsel. Don't take my word for it. It's a constitutional right. So I of it is everybody, including Donald Trump, has the right to competent counsel. Don't take my word for it. It's a constitutional right. So I think it is an important part that criminal defense lawyers play. But if you notice, we don't really criticize Trump's lawyers like Todd Blanch or Susan Necklace or lawyers who are just acting like lawyers and who are asserting defenses. The

people who we criticize are people like Alina Haba and Christina Bob and the lawyer Jim Trusty, when he would former lawyer, because he's Jim Trusty, unlike Alina Haba and Christina Bob, like Jim Trusty actually had a very good reputation. He used to work with special counsel Jack Smith decades ago. He was in the public integrity section. So when he would go on and do these interviews, he was lying. He knew he was lying in the interviews. So to me, when you do that, then you're going to come under the lens of the Midas touch. Now, Joe Takapina, he's like snatching the papers and acting like a maniac and attacking-

Taki Takapina. Taki Takapina. like snatching the papers and acting like a maniac and attacking, you know, attacking, attacking, attacking. Yeah. I mean, like in this case, Ben, right. I think this speaks more to Walt now to situation than it does to this attorney. I mean, we've yet to hear from her, know her. We don't know if she's going to do the TV rounds or anything like that, but, but everyone has a right to competent counsel. The worst, the worst person in the world has a right to competent counsel. Absolutely. The worst person in the world has a right to competent counsel. That is a constitutional right.

And a lawyer should not be ashamed to take a case like that. But when you start just blatantly lying, when you yourself become a co-conspirator, and like all the situations Ben said with those other attorneys, then you cross the line into different territory. Yeah, John Eastman, Rudy Giuliani, when you become criminals. But when you're looking at Walt Nauta and he is picking somebody who in this space is relatively inexperienced, I think it shows that to me, at least, I don't know your take, but to me, it seems like he's not taking the process all that seriously.

And you see, he's always with Donald Trump Trump too which is one of the most interesting things because they have like a court order right where they're not even supposed to be really speaking about this case but Donald Trump is keeping a very tight watch on Walt Nauda they're going everywhere together we saw them at the Philly cheesesteak place recently we see them at all these various events together we saw him at the Cuban restaurant in Miami right after Trump's arraignment. It's very bizarre. And the only thing that I have to assume with somebody like Walt Nauta is he is taking a bet right now.

He's making a gamble that if Donald Trump gets elected, I will be pardoned. And that's what I'm going to shoot for. I have no other shot. Otherwise, I am being watched by. And that's what I'm going to shoot for. I have no other shot otherwise. I am being watched by Trump. He's paying for my attorneys. I believe Trump is paying for this attorney as well. And so I have no choice right now other than to just go all in, no matter how ridiculous it is, no matter how ridiculous my argument is, no matter what the sentence may be, no matter how guilty I am, I am going to plead not guilty. I'm going to make my case. And if they say I am guilty in the court

of law, I'm going to hope that Donald Trump becomes president and that one of the first acts he will do is pardon me for my loyalty. That's the long game that to me, I think Walt Nowt is playing. I'm not sure if you have a similar theory. Look, he is caught on surveillance footage doing exactly the opposite of what he told the FBI he was doing or what he was aware of, like the day before. So you see him on the surveillance footage in May and June that the DOJ got their hands on hiding the classified document boxes and moving them around. He was asked in an interview with the DOJ if he knew anything about these boxes. What boxes? I don't know what you're talking about. What do you mean with boxes? I'm not even sure of the procedures. So it is very basic liability that he engaged in making false statements. And we learned a lot about that in some of the additional portions of the search warrant affidavit that was used to support the search Nauta back in 2022 was identified as witness number five, not as

co-conspirator, not as anything. And he would have been treated as a witness had he cooperated in the process. They've got him on tape. They know what he did. There's really no great defense for him at all. And to your point, Brett, his bet is Judge Eileen Cannon, hopefully Trump or another Republican wins one day and I am pardoned. And ultimately, my loyalty will be rewarded and I'm going to go down if he goes down. That is the gamble that he is taking. And look, there does also feel that there is a bit of a kind of eerie quiet right now in special counsel Jack Smith's investigation before the storm. I don't know if something's coming next week. I have no inside information about it, but it certainly feels like there is

some big news about to drop. And I mean, I feel like a little bit like one of those psychics who predict things, but they make it so general. I predict something's going to happen tomorrow because a lot of big things are happening. So I want to let you know I am a little self-aware and critical of what I just said. But I truly believe that there is big... I'm like mocking myself right now. I'll tell you what's going on in the special counsel Jack Smith investigation, but let's take our final break of the show. Oh, hey, when did you get here? Let's take a quick break to talk about our next partner, Henson Shaving. Look, everyone knows how annoying cheap razors are. The cuts, the irritation,

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Crystal ball, Ben. What do you got? What do you got? What have you conjured for us now? There is a Jack Smith update I would like to report. An exclusive CNN report that special counsel. From the word hawk himself. special counsel Jack Smith is questioning witnesses about the chaotic Oval Office meeting after Trump lost the 2020 election. I feel like CNN just did what I did, though. Like, I mean, clearly, Jack Smith would be interested in this meeting, like, duh, like the December 18th meeting

that was covered. That was like covered all the time by the January 6th committee, where one of Donald Trump's aides opened the door and allowed into the White House who other Trump lawyers called team crazy. You had Sidney Powell and you had Giuliani and you had the former Overstock CEO who just gets thrown in there. You had like Mike Flynn and they were basically telling Trump, you know, you got to appoint Sidney Powell as like a special counsel and you got to appoint Jeff Clark as the acting attorney general and you've got to seize voting machines and declare martial law. So yes, CNN, great exclusive. I'm glad that you've nailed down that witnesses are being asked about this. But I mean, obviously, it is something that Jack Smith,

in his election interference criminal investigation- Crystal Ball says Jack Smith is curious about- He's curious about the key meeting where Donald Trump was about to declare martial law and seize voting machines. Well, but that does come after Rudy Giuliani is, you know, the timing of this story, I guess, is how I think we should analyze this, right? Because we talked about on the last episode here that Rudy Giuliani has entered into a proffer agreement with Special Counsel Jackson. He's been awfully quiet lately also. And a proffer agreement with special counsel Jackson. He's been awfully quiet lately also. And a proffer agreement is like a cooperation agreement. It's pretty much

the same thing. You get a limited immunity. It's only limited to what you say during that meeting with Department of Justice officials. You're not immunized from things that the DOJ and FBI know about you from other incidents or that they got independent of your meeting. You can't lie. If you lie, you get charged with perjury and making false statements. That's a crime. And if you leave out any detail, any limited immunity, you lose it. And so then you get basically prosecuted for all the things you say, even if you have a small omission. So that's why when you do a proffer agreement, it's like your lawyer will advise you like you better say everything. If you leave something out, the whole point of this not only is thrown out, but now you've just made a confession that they can use against you. So that just broke from CNN. That was a CNN exclusive. And we also have been learning that special counsel Jack Smith has been focused on Arizona. In particular, we had previously reported how Doug Ducey, the former governor of Arizona, said that he was subject to kind of a

pressure campaign by Donald Trump that felt or looked similar to what Donald Trump was doing with Brad Raffensperger, Secretary of State of Georgia. Notice, I mean, Doug Ducey, Republican. Brad Raffensperger, Republican. Like Rusty Bowers in Arizona, who we now also know that Special Counsel Jack Smith spoke to earlier in the year, like very Republican. Like Rusty Bowers, okay? Rusty Bowers. Rusty Bowers. If I were to come up with a movie script before Donald Trump of who would be like the conservative Republican, I would name him Rusty Bowers, okay? He also sounds like a very old-timey baseball player. Rusty Bowers.

That is such a good baseball name. Oh, my God. It's a good baseball name. All fame, Rusty Bowers. That is such a good baseball name. Oh my God. It's a good baseball name. Hall of Fame, Rusty Bowers. Rusty Bowers. Rusty. The Detroit time.

Yeah, 100%. Rusty Bowers. But anyway, so people may be saying, why special counsel Jack Smith though? See, he's just issuing a subpoena to the Arizona Secretary of State.

We believe it took place in May to Adrian Fontes. By the way, he was a friend of the Midas Touch network, a friend of the show, a Democrat Secretary of State. He beat a very dangerous election denying candidate as well. So that was a big victory for democracy there. And so now these documents are actually going to be turned over. By the way, imagine these subpoenas happening and you have a guy like Mark Fincham, who Adrian Fontes was running against, one of these election deniers. It'd be a much different situation right now, which is also why the Secretary of State races throughout

the country are so incredibly, so incredibly important. No doubt about it. But we also learned as well that this really isn't the first subpoena. Special Counsel Jack Smith has been speaking with a lot of these people for the better part of the last year, nailing down these interviews and pretty much speaking to Republicans, Republican members of the Senate in Arizona, the House in Arizona, and people who were subject to these kind of Trump pressure campaigns and also spoke to Rusty Bauer. So that's some big news to report there. But Brett, why don't you give us also some good news about what's taking place in some Democratic states? Talk about some state Democratic wins. I really like this one in

Wisconsin. What happened there? The Wisconsin one is really one of my favorite stories in politics, possibly of the year. I love a good legal jujitsu. This move by Governor Tony Evers of Wisconsin, it reminds me a lot of what the Disney lawyers did with Ron DeSantis, where they put provisions in the contract for that Reedy Creek agreement that the DeSantis lawyers were too incompetent to actually read. And they ended up like extending their power in the district for like hundreds and hundreds of years. Well, governor Tony Evers of Wisconsin did a very similar thing in his state.

So they have a Republican legislature in Wisconsin and they submitted a budget to Tony Evers, right? And they wanted to basically, they wanted to phase out the funding for the school funding, right? By the 2024, 2025 school year. This was for child care, school safety, public universities. And here's what the governor did. It was so brilliant. So he used his ability to issue a line item veto. And instead of... I'll pull it up because you almost have to be able to visualize it if I have it. So what he did was he took out his veto pen and he wiped out from, it said 2023 to 24 school year and the 2024 to 25 school year. He crossed it out

so that it said the funding extends to the 2425 school year, the year 2425, effectively extending these benefits for 400 years rather than expiring next year. And it's really like a brilliant, brilliant act of legal jujitsu. He's dealing with this Republican legislature who wants to get rid of these policies, who wants to get rid of childcare, who wants to get rid of school safety, who wants to get rid of the public universities. And all the Republicans had to do in their budget was like spell it out and not write the numbers like that. Or in addition to the numbers, when you write a check, you also spell out the numbers. Well, they did not do that here. So he literally just crossed out the digits

until it said, this will go until 2425. And he extended those benefits for literally four centuries. Like just a absolutely brilliant way to deal with those Republicans trying to take away these rights. Then we move to Ohio, another obviously very, very important state. A state also where Democrats in recent years have been very boxed out by Republican majorities. But you have the people rising up. This is the Republicans' worst nightmare when the people decide to take actions into their own hands. And you have a lot of activist groups who said, okay, you want to try to take away our rights to abortion. Guess what? We are going to put a constitutional amendment to enshrine abortion rights in the Ohio State Constitution.

So in order to get there, they needed, I believe the number I have here is 413,446 signatures to get it on the ballot. Well, they got over 700,000 signatures for the ballot measure. That's 70% more than they actually needed. So now those go to the Republican Ohio Secretary of State, Frank LaRose. They're going to review the signatures. They do signature checks and all of that. They make sure that there's enough valid signatures there in order to get this on the ballot. So it is far more likely than not that a constitutional amendment to enshrine abortion rights in the Ohio State Constitution will be on the ballot in the next election. Another huge win for people. And these are the

actions that you see Republicans also immediately regret. They go, we got to give the power to the states, right? We got to let the people decide, let the people decide. And once the people decide, you'll see even with this one, you will see, they will try to see what they could do with the courts. They will try to do everything they can to try to revert the decision of the people the same way they did, I believe in Kansas, when they freaked out after the people voted, because people, whether you're a Republican or Democrat, they do not want their freedoms to be taken away. And what the Republicans have been incredibly consistent of, aside from their absolute craziness over the past few years, is they've been incredibly consistent in stripping

away the freedoms of Americans. And that's something that we need to also be incredibly vocal about, that that really is the fundamental thing they stand for. How could we restrict your freedom? How could we make it so you want to do less, say less? Your kids have less opportunity, so you get less benefits, fewer benefits. It's really unbelievable to see it play out. And that's why we need to use these terms. We cannot let them co-opt the term of freedom like Ron DeSantis tries to do as he strips away your freedom. We cannot let that kind of thing slide anymore here. The Supreme Court though, dating back at least to the 70s and maybe even into the 80s with a lot of their decisions though, did somewhat reflect the views of the American population and in fact had certain rulings to enshrine these freedoms and to recognize

civil rights and to stop attacks on taking away these freedoms. And in many ways, if you look back at the court at the time the Roe v. Wade decision was made, was even slightly a little bit ahead of its time. And you would have right wingwing justices, but even a right-wing justice would be like, okay, the Second Amendment doesn't mean that people can have limitless access to weapons of war. That doesn't make sense at all. You had, quote unquote, conservative judges and Republican appointed judges who joined with, quote unquote unquote liberal. I don't like the terms because they don't really make sense anymore. But generally there would be this consensus of like, of course a woman should control her body. Of course-

We forget, Ben, Roe was a seven to two decision. Roe was a seven to two. This wasn't a close call. Roe was a seven to two decision and Roe itself was a compromise. It had a lot of the restrictions, by the way, that Republicans now go, we need this restriction and that restriction. We had those restrictions in Roe. Roe had very clear guidelines for the process of getting an abortion, the requirements, what needed to be. Republicans took that away. So this is on them when they say, okay, well, what do you want? And then they try to do those despicable lies where they go, oh, so you want abortion after birth? We're like, no, that's called killing a person. That's actually not something that is allowed. But guess what? We had something that we could all look to. We had Roe. You took that away. You ruined the compromise. Don't get it twisted here.

It was a very popular decision. It was not even a close call in the courts, but because this court is so extreme, so radical, has been so radicalized, this party as a whole, everything seems so skewed now compared to what it was decades ago. It's like- You know, you have these people aren't even qualified. You want to talk, these are the people who lecture us, these right-wing justices on merit. It's got to be merit, merit, merit, merit. I remember those hearings, the confirmation hearings in the Senate where Trump appointees would be sitting there. And the senators would say, okay, so how many people here have done a trial before? Raise your

hand. To people who Trump was appointing as judges, nobody would raise their hand. Okay, okay. It'd be a table of like five or six people. How many of people have conducted a deposition? I think it was one person who raised their hand. Okay, did you take the deposition? No. Okay, what did you do? Well, I assisted the partner at the deposition. So you want to talk about merit? These are unqualified, radical people who are not merit-based. Katonji Brown Jackson, as merit as you get. I mean, she was a judge at every single level in her career. Does get more qualified. You want to compare Ketanji Brown Jackson to some of these right-wing justices appointed by

MAGA Republicans? It's not even a close competition. And then you get- And Ben, I was going to say, that's why it's so important though, that Biden has gotten all these judges confirmed, 136. He's outpacing George W. Bush. He's outpacing Obama. He's outpacing Trump. And we see the effects though that these federal judges have. And I want you to explain, because this case just seems so wild to me. This Trump appointed judge in Louisiana, the social media company ruling, deciding what the Biden administration's communications can be with social media companies related to COVID. What is happening here? It's hard for me to even explain it. It's like the Biden administration would put it, let's not take social media,

for example, right? Let's say a news outlet is putting out false information, right? You have a press department at the White House, right? You have communications directors, right? They reach out to the writer and say, hey, you got this wrong. Can you correct it? Does the writer have to? Does the writer go, oh my God, you threatened me. No, I feel horrific. No. I mean, that's just what you do. If there was a threat, that should be illegal, right? So the Biden administration as social media proliferated basically would do the same thing and all administrations would do it, except Trump would actually threaten the people, take it down or else. But when it came to the Biden administration, they would reach out to social media platforms if there were very dangerous accounts, big accounts, spreading lies

that were resulting in killing people or misrepresenting policies. Hey, you know, RFK Jr. is saying all these false things about vaccines. Here are the facts. This is very important to us. Do what you want to do, but here's what the actual facts are. And then whether it was Twitter before Elon Musk or Facebook or YouTube or whoever, they could take that and they could go, okay, we agree with that or we don't agree with it. It wasn't like you take this down or else we are going to do something bad to you. There was no threat at all. Just, hey, this is a problematic, this is important to us. But that's kind of part of what communications departments are supposed to do. And it's particularly important here where we're talking about issues like vaccine hesitancy, which basically just

means that there were accounts lying about the vaccine to try to get people killed. There were people lying about election results and lying about what was taking place and spreading lies about election fraud that didn't exist. And the Biden administration would reach out and say, hey, this is problematic. That's not true. Here are the facts. And this Trump-appointed judge says, this is like the ministry of truth from 1984. That's what the judge, I'm not just making that up. The judge actually said in the ruling that the Biden administration behaved like the ministry of truth. The judge sounded like the writing sounded like Jim Jordan tweets or like something you'd see on Truth Social, like QAnon, like just batshit. Crazy. And by the way, this was the judge who previously has blocked all Biden stuff. So you

try to get in front of this judge. That's part of the hustle here. If you're a MAGA Republican, you get in front of this judge. And in another decision where he blocked the vaccine mandate by Biden, which wasn't really even a mandate, it was get vaccine or get tested. Like, hey, can you maybe get tested so you don't get other people? He's like, no, I refuse to get tested. I'm just going to walk in and cough on people. He just spread so much lies about COVID and downplayed it and acted like it wasn't even like a big deal. And so here in this opinion, he uses all of that propaganda from the right wing and says, the Biden administration is attacking conservative speech. Notice how they're just going after conservatives. And it

goes back to what we said at the outset of the show, which is what Liz Cheney said, which is like, that stuff's not conservative. That stuff is crazy. That stuff is fascist. That stuff is Trumpism. Please do not conflate conservativism. We ain't talking about the Democrats saying, hey, you know that tax policy post? You need to remove that tax policy post or else. It's not saying that, oh, this is a state's rights issue. By the way, Republicans aren't for any of that crap regardless. But this is like right-wing, dangerous MAGA stuff. And the judge is like, notice, they're just attacking conservatives. So the judge issues a incomprehensible injunction. Because on the one hand, they're like, well, the Biden administration

can still warn social media companies about foreign threats and danger and lies about the election. But the Biden administration and all of its officials are enjoined, meaning they're stopped, they're blocked from contacting social media companies to either encourage or persuade them to remove things that may infringe upon their free speech rights. So like, as you read that, what does that even, so if you're defining though,, election interference by Donald Trump and COVID conspiracies as, quote unquote, conservative thought, then it would seem to mean that you believe that's an infringement on free speech, so you will be holding the Biden administration in contempt if they reach out. It provides no guidance, but is this opinion that is, again,

it looks like Jim Jordan combined with Lauren Boebert wrote the thing. It didn't. The judge wrote it, but it is completely, completely deranged. So the Department of Justice has appealed it to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans. The Fifth Circuit has previously overturned this judge in this case already. From the outset, the judge ordered that all of the top Biden administration officials had to sit for depositions right away, which is unheard of. And the Fifth Circuit, in a unanimous opinion to George W. Bush and one Obama appointees were like, yeah, no, that's not the way it works, Judge. So the judge from the outset was going to reach this conclusion, and now it's going to get appealed. But again, this is why control of the

Senate was so vital because McConnell would have blocked all of these appointees. This is why elections truly matter. This is why you can't get complacent. By the way, Ben, speaking of Louisiana, President Biden just got a district judge confirmed in Louisiana, and he's got two more nominees in the pipeline. So this is important. This is structural, and this is something that does ultimately take years and years and years, if not decades and decades. It is truly why every single election is important. Just while we're on the topic of elections, I saw somebody mentioned it in the comments. So I just want to do a shout out for all the mightiest mighty who are in Ohio that there is a very important election as well on August 8th, where Ohioans are going to decide on issue one. Issue one would raise the threshold for a constitutional amendment to pass

from what it currently is as a simple majority or 50% plus one to 60%. So they are basically trying to make it more difficult to pass constitutional amendments, which would affect the law that we spoke about earlier that they're trying to get to enshrine abortion rights in the Ohio State Constitution. So that is something to look out for if you're in Ohio. You want to make sure that you research that vote, that you vote no, and that you make it as easy as possible to enshrine these rights into the Constitution and not let these Republican legislatures just have full control over the people. I think that's super important. August 8th, look it up, issue one. Do some more research on that if you're in Ohio. Make sure you know. People aren't really talking about it, so we just got to give it a megaphone.

We're talking about it. I think the big theme is don't compare us. Don't compare Biden. Don't compare the Democrats. Don't compare pro-democracy to the almighty, right? Compare to the alternative. This is about choices and these are very serious matters, right? I have so much fun. I love joking around. I love bringing a sense of humor to this and breaking these issues down in fun ways. But look, this is really important stuff. It really is. This is life or death stuff that ultimately will affect your life, your family lives, your friends, your coworkers, colleagues, neighbors, community, state, and our country. And preserving and protecting and defending our democracy is so, so critical. And that's why it's such an honor to be a part of this pro-democracy community, because we know that after these shows are done, you don't just turn off the show. You share

the Midas Touch videos, you let other people know, and just think about the power collectively we could have in supporting our democracy. If frankly, everybody who watches this just shares that with one person, then two, then three, however many people, the exponential effect can be, and I think will be the game changer in not just the 2024 election, but in all future elections and all primary elections and all elections coming up. It is so vital that we get out these messages of the truth right now. My dogs agree to get out the messages of truth right now. I love that the dogs want to bark at the very end of the show.

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