The MeidasTouch Podcast - Panicked MAGA Mike Hides at 1 a.m. Disaster Hearing

Episode Date: May 21, 2025

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on the disaster 1 AM meeting arranged by Trump and MAGA Mike to try and hide how disastrous their Budget Bill is. Visit https://meidasplus.com for more! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane 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. More pathetic behavior from MAGA Mike Johnson and Donald Trump. So now MAGA Mike Johnson is refusing to even take questions from the press about this disastrous budget bill. Also, MAGA Mike set a hearing in the Rules Committee at 1 a.m. this morning or 1 a.m. in the night, however you want to characterize it, hoping that the media would not cover what was taking place at all to try to push through this budget bill through the Rules Committee, literally at 1 a.m. while Americans are sleeping. And I previously showed you how MAGA Mike was handing out talking points to his fellow MAGA Republican Congress members

to try to discredit the nonpartisan CBO, Congressional Budget Office, by calling it a leftist, radical extremist organization that hates Donald Trump, despite the fact that MAGA Mike Johnson and other members of Congress previously cited to the Congressional Budget Office's nonpartisan reports when it suited them to try to attack former President Biden when what would have been added to the deficit under some of the proposals by Biden are way smaller than what's being caused by this disastrous Trump budget plan, which on the small side would add about $4 to $5 trillion to the deficit. But a MAGA Republican Congress member who is not happy at all with this bill says it's going to add about $20 trillion. That would be MAGA Republican Congress member Thomas Massey saying it'll add

$20 trillion. So let's just go through what's taking place here. We have the Congressional Budget Office's recent score that just came out yesterday, where they're saying that the GOP bill would hurt the poorest 10% of Americans while benefiting the top 10% of Americans. And at least 8.6 million people are going to lose their health insurance on the low end. 7.6 million people will be dropped from Medicaid right away, and 1 million people will lose their Affordable Care Act plans. I mean, this is one of the biggest wealth distributions from not wealthy people, from poor people, to the richest Americans. As Brendan Duke explains, the official CBO analysis confirms the obvious. The House Republican tax and budget bill isn't

shared sacrifice. It makes poor people poorer and rich people richer. It does this by cutting health care and nutrition to help finance tax cuts skewed to the very, very, very wealthy. It's a really horrific, horrific budget. It's just, frankly, cruel. So let's go through the data points now. First, let me show you MAGA Mike Johnson yesterday refusing to answer any questions at all regarding this budget plan. Here, play this clip. Now, we're not going to take a lot of questions this morning because we've already done a ton of media with you in the halls. The president gave you a lot. We gave you a lot.

What we're leaving to do right now is gather up the small subgroups in the House Republican Conference and tie up the remaining loose ends. I'm very confident that we'll be able to do that. There's a great esprit de corps in the room this morning because everybody knows what's at stake. All the things we've talked about here this morning, we are going to get this done. So I'm going to, this is a rare thing. I'm going to say, hold the questions and let me go get back to work so we can finish this thing up. Okay.

Thanks for being here this morning. Thanks for being here. So Democratic Congress member, Jim McGovern from Massachusetts raised a very simple point. So if this bill is so great, if you all think this is really, really good, why are you debating it at 1 a.m.? Why are you trying to literally hide it while Americans are sleeping? Here, play this clip of Congressmember McGovern. What I do want to talk about is the fact that this morning, after midnight actually, Republicans told us that we would be considering their budget reconciliation bill at one o'clock in the morning on Wednesday. If Trump's big, beautiful bill is so great,

why not debate it when people are still awake? Wouldn't you want everyone to know how great it is? Why are you debating it at one o'clock in the morning? I think that's prime time in Guam. Any person with half a brain cell can immediately figure out why you want to notice a meeting for 1 a.m. It's because you don't want people to know what's in your bill. Remember what Trump said? Close your eyes and vote for it. That's exactly what you're all doing, because you all know exactly what the bill does,

how unpopular it is, and what regular Americans think of it. It's going to give a huge, massive, historic tax cut to billionaires, paid for by stealing, stealing from the American people, ripping away Medicaid from parents and grandparents, ripping away food assistance from kids. This is not hyperbole, my friends. We're not fear-mongering. And no matter how many times you use the word, that doesn't make it true. Your big, beautiful scam is a historic giveaway to those at the very, very top, financed and paid for by the rest of America. So again, I ask, if this bill is so great, why debate it at one o'clock in the morning? And we all know

the answer. So then you have the MAGA Republican Congress members who are against this bill and who have said that they will not vote for it, despite Donald Trump showing up on Capitol Hill and attacking them and threatening them. So here you have MAGA Republican Congress member Thomas Massey, and he's asked by Manu Raju from CNN what he thinks about the Trump claim that this is not going to add to the deficit, to which, again, Thomas Massey, MAGA Republican, he says this is going to add $20 trillion to the debt over the next 10 years. Play this clip. Are you worried about the pullback of Trump allies from the MAGA base for funding them? 10 years. which is $3.5 to $5 trillion more than would have been. Now, here's what MAGA Republican Chip Roy warns about the discussions that are underway. And specifically, you have a number of kind of

factions taking place. Let me just show you Chip Roy, then let's talk about these factions. Let's play. If they increase the saw cap, then my price for yes just goes up. I fundamentally reject that. We have met the parameters that Chip Roy and the Freedom Caucus set. They can't keep moving the goalposts along the way. So you have people like Chip Roy who want even more cuts to Medicaid, more cuts to SNAP. They think that there's not enough cuts. They also don't like this idea of blue states either significantly raising the salt cap state and local tax cap, which Donald Trump artificially put at $10,000 state and local tax deduction back in 2017, really punitive against blue states. And some of these other

blue state members of Congress either want the cap raised or eliminated. You have MAGA Republican Congress members who want the cap remaining at $10,000. You've got other MAGA Republicans who think it's bad optics to take away people's Medicaid. And then you have other MAGA Republicans who say it adds too much to the deficit. Those are the fights taking place right now. This was yesterday on Capitol Hill where you have MAGA Republican Rep Burleson and MAGA Republican Congress member Self and others criticizing this bill. Here, play this clip. This bill comes to the floor, you're a no.

Right now, I'm a no. I want to get to a yes. I absolutely want to get to a yes. But I ran on balancing the budget. I don't know that I could sleep at night if I don't stick to that. It's already very expensive. We've tripled it with no negotiations. Everybody's just assumed the $30,000. Now they're asking for more. Are you still in now? Nothing's changed.

Don't work for the Freedom Caucus. They just need to get over themselves. So then you have MAGA Republican Congress members like Warren Davis, Warren Davidson, a New York MAGA Republican Congress member, La Lota. And again, La Lota was basically yelled at by Donald Trump yesterday for requesting that the SALT deduction cap either be significantly higher or just removed entirely. Let's play this clip right here. But if this bill came to the floor right now, could you vote yes? I couldn't vote for this bill right now. I mean, it grows this clip right here. middle class people who are just trying to make a living. Those are the people who need to be included in this bill. He said, we're done negotiating with you guys. Did he not? What I took that is, hey, everybody figure it out. Everybody get in a room and figure it out for the country and for your district. And here we hear more from MAGA Republican Congress members

as well, like Mike Lawler, who says this was all pretty stupid, waiting until the last minute. MAGA Republican Congress member Bacon, and another clip here of MAGA Republican says this was all pretty stupid waiting into the last minute uh maga republican congress member bacon and another uh clip here of maga republican uh chip roy play this clip they chose to wait to the last minute and why is that what's the reason for that you'll have to ask them it was a pretty stupid exercise frankly well we work hard to get an agreement and the committee's passed stuff out and then people come in and want to undo them. Makes us mad. You got an angry group of folks out there. Can you support it? No, we've got lots of work to go. Lots of miles to put in on this thing. Should they have this 1am meeting on Wednesday? No, they're trying to run it in through the jet teams. And I just don't

agree with that. I mean, I'll keep working in good faith to try to make the dole as good as it can be and then decide where things stand. I think it's not the way we should do business. Here's MAGA Republican Congressmember Ogles and Bacon. Here they are right here. Does the Speaker not bring this to the floor by Thursday? Well, that's up to the Speaker. But I would say that if the vote were held right now, it dies a painful death. You're concerned about what the Freedom Caucus is pushing for right now?

Well, yeah, but we have to defend against it because they're, in a sense, putting poison pills in that won't pass. That's what the president's saying. So I hope they heed the president. And you can see this is all Republicans fighting Republicans right now, right? So you have MAGA Republican Patronus attacking MAGA Republican LaLota over the SALT issue, saying, you know, LaLota, you know, he's losing his constituents to Florida from New York. So why are we trying to help New York in any way raise the state and local tax deduction cap? Play this clip. Let's talk about one of those, which is something that concerns Congressman LaLota and others. the state and local taxes, this deduction cap, it's a huge issue in higher earning districts like New York, as we certainly understand. Why should someone like

Congressman Lolota vote against the interests of their constituents? I get it. But you know what? Every single day, Congressman Lolota is losing constituents to the state of Florida because we have no state income tax. So again, this is failed leadership in New York's Albany's capital. You've got governors in Illinois and New York and California that just do not know how to get their financial house in order. So this problem is not his problem. This is the governor of New York's problem and their inability to control their own finances. I just want to say this, okay? Blue states, by and large, are donor states and red states are taker states.

It's such a wild concept to me that these Congress members from the red states, whose entire states are subsidized by the blue states, they wouldn't exist without the blue states, are so punitive and attack the blue states the way they do. And there are some Congress members who are still Republican from these blue states. Even if this thing gets through in the House of Representatives, the next hurdle is going to be in the Senate. And from what we're hearing from all of these senators, whether it's Rand Paul, Susan Collins, Ron Johnson, Josh Hawley, they're saying they're not going to support this

bill in the way that the House of Representatives is trying to push this forward, play this clip. I don't think people who voted for President Trump thought that we would continue spending at President Biden's levels. My objection is still raising the debt ceiling by either four or five trillion dollars. I think what that does is basically show that conservatives and Republicans aren't concerned with the deficit. As you know, I've been very wary of having Medicaid. It is wrong to cut health care for the working poor. And that's what we're talking about here with Medicaid. My is wrong to cut healthcare for the working poor. And that's what we're talking about here with Medicaid. My state is a Medicaid expansion state.

So that's the dynamic on Capitol Hill right now with MAGA Mike Johnson refusing to take questions. And then I'll just leave you with this fraud that Donald Trump is engaged in, where Donald Trump is saying, I'm not worried about the deficit, he said, because he claims that he brought in $7.1 trillion in his Middle East trip, which in the same sentence, he says $5 trillion or $5.1 trillion. Then he says $7 trillion.

He adds $2 trillion in the same sentence. He has not brought in $7 trillion. He's not brought in $1 trillion. The entire GDP of Qatar is $200 billion. So Qatar can't give $1.2 trillion. Their entire annual GDP is $200 billion. The entire GDP of the United Arab Emirates is $400 million. The entire GDP of Saudi Arabia is $1.1 trillion. They're not giving their entire annual GDP to the United States, and they're not giving it immediately to the United States. It would take them 20, 30 years if they were going to do that, and they would bankrupt their own countries. But here's Donald Trump saying that in order to

justify this bill, which I agree with Massey. I've always said this number, it's going to add $20 trillion. Here's what Trump said. We have other things like this. They are very, very cash rich, to put it mildly. And they're spending 5.1 trillion. Probably it's going to be 7 trillion by the time we stop. And, you know, somebody said every other president goes and leaves and spends money, gives other countries money. I'm the only one that goes and takes money back. You know, when you think of it, I said that's an interesting statement. I never thought of it that way. But we have a, this is really just a pep talk. We have a very unified house

and we have a very unified Senate. Well, there you have it, folks. Let me know what you think and hit subscribe. Let's get to 5 million subscribers. Can't get enough Midas? Check out the Midas Plus sub stack for ad-free articles, reports, podcasts, daily recaps from Ron Filipkowski and more. Sign up for free now at MidasPlus.com.