The MeidasTouch Podcast - Senator Kim Calls Out Trump and MAGA for the Trump Shutdown

Episode Date: October 12, 2025

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on MAGA Mike Johnson quite literally sweating with fear on live tv as Trump’s government shutdown is sending him into a debilitating spiral and MAGA Mike gets confronted by caller after caller on CSPAN and Meiselas interviews Democratic Senator Andy Kim about what he’s observing as Trump’s shutdown is crushing Americans. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/legal-af-full-episode-6-18-2025/id1580828595?i=1000713545390 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At Desjardin, we speak business. We speak equipment modernization. We're fluent in data digitization and expansion into foreign markets. And we can talk all day about streamlining manufacturing processes. Because at Desjardin business, we speak the same language you do. Business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us. And contact Desjardin today.

We'd love to talk. Business. The new BMO ViPorter MasterCard is your ticket to more. More perks, more points, more flights, more of all the things you want in a travel rewards card, and then some. Get your ticket to more with the new BMO ViPorter MasterCard and get up to $2,400 in value in your first 13 months. Terms and conditions apply. Visit BMO.com slash ViPorter to learn more. Check out the big stars, big series, and blockbuster movies.

Streaming on Paramount Plus. Cue the music. Like NCIS, Tony and Ziva. We'd like to make up our own rules. Tulsa King. We want to take out the competition. The substance. This balance is not working.

And the naked gun. That was awesome. Now that's a mountain of entertainment. Paramount Wolf. Grab a coffee and discover Vegas-level excitement with Bed-MGM Casino. Now introducing our hottest exclusive, Friends, the One with Multi-Drop. Your favorite classic television show is being reimagined in your new favorite casino game, featuring iconic images from the show.

Spin our new exclusive because we are not on a break. Play Friends, The One with Multidrop exclusively at BedmGM Casino. Want even more options? Pull up a seat and check out a wide variety of table games from Blackjack, to poker or head over to the arcade for nostalgic casino thrills download the betmgm ontario app today you don't want to miss out 19 plus to wager ontario only please play responsibly if you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you please contact conex ontario at one eight six six three one two six zero zero to speak to an advisor free of charge bed mgm operates pursuant to an operating agreement with igaming ontario republican speaker maga mike johnson

just got a rude awakening and whatever staffer convinced him to go on c span and listen to what the actual people think about his conduct and behavior well those staffers need to get a raise so maga mike johnson was on c span and he heard how people feel about donald trump and his government shutdown as he and Donald Trump are ripping away the Affordable Care Act subsidies for tens of millions of Americans and how he and Donald Trump are continuing just to destroy the country and gaslight us all at the same time. So I want to show you Maga Mike sitting there as he's being told outside of his bubble what people are really experiencing. There are a number of of examples that I want to show you.

So in the first clip that you probably haven't seen anywhere else, Maga Mike is asked, I think, the most simple question. Okay, Maga Mike, how are you actually going to fix Obamacare? You all say you don't like the Affordable Care Act. You don't like the subsidies. You don't like this. You don't like that. What do you like?

What is your plan? And Maga Mike won't be able to answer that. Here, play this clip. So, and I also want to know, is y'all's plan to fix the obamacare great questions there's a lot of improvements that are needed obamacare did not do what was promised everybody can acknowledge that as i mentioned premiums are up 60 percent since it became law in 2010 and and you have less access to care and in some parts of the country lower quality of care so we got to fix that republicans are the party that have

the ideas to do that we have a doctor's caucus inside the republican conference that works around the clock, putting together these ideas, talking to stakeholders and other providers around the country. We have a lot of ideas to fix it. Some people say, why can't you just rip Obamacare out at the roots and start over? It's very, very complicated. It affects about 18% of the U.S. economy, health care, but there's lots of various improvement. We have not, this is not a talking point for us. We've demonstrated it in the one big beautiful bill, the working families tax cuts. We added lots of provisions, for example, to reform Medicaid. It was being drained. The resources there are intended for U.S. citizens that are in a small number of categories,

the disabled, the elderly, young pregnant women in difficult situations, etc. But what was happening is you had illegal aliens draining the resources who are not allowed to do it under law. And you had young able-bodied men, for example, without dependents who were riding the wagon. We reformed that in our bill. We reduced the cost. And the Congressional Budget Office, the CBO just analyzed late August, August 25th, in the report, they said it's going to have the desired effect. And again, as William Melvin noted, the Affordable Care Act became law over 5,000 days ago. Since that time, Donald Trump has not put forward a plan. Instead, Donald Trump and Maga Mike talk about lowering prescription drug prices by 1,600%, which is not a real number. Next up,

Maga Mike Johnson hears from another C-SPAN caller. And the caller says, you know, you're out there saying that people are smiling as troops are heading into the cities, blue states, blue cities, people aren't smiling. What are you talking about? What a dystopian and idiotic thing to even say? And this is, I think, so important for Maga Mike to just be there and hear this is what the Midas Mighty are saying. This is what Americans are saying. I understand Donald Trump's bubble and their talking points. People love this. People don't love ice ripping people. off the streets and putting them into concentration camps. Here, let's play this clip.

Hi. I just want to start by saying, hearing you say that everyone is smiling in the cities where troops, our National Guard, has been rolled into, feels dystopian and insane to hear you say that, watching the response to this. But that's not actually my question. My question, I just needed to say that while hearing you talk about this. My question is, if Republicans and Democrats can agree to a one-year extension to the ACA, to the ACA subsidies, removing this sort of talking point of illegal immigrants draining our

resources as you sit here and lie about this. Would you support that bill and bring it to a vote on the House floor? This is a big question that I have for you. Thank you. Yeah, well, not lying. I'm telling you the truth and you can go look at all the documents yourself. Don't look at Republican paperwork. Look at the congressional. Next up, you have Maga, Mike saying, he's asked, you may have heard this one before, but the caller, very powerful, left me almost in tears, where the caller says, I'm a Republican. And what y'all are doing with health care and also with veterans and with just people in general, like, y'all are torturing us. Stop it, cut it out. What are you going to do for us? Listen to this caller. Let's

play it. Hi, Mr. Johnson. So my question or comments are, um, related to what you said yesterday about not being open to pass any legislation to ensure that military gets paid. I'm sure you can tell by my voice I'm very shaky. I just want you to hear a little bit about my family. I have two medically fragile children. I have a husband who actively serves this country. He suffers from PTSD from his two tours in Afghanistan. If we see a lapse in pay come the 15th, my children do not.

children do not get to get the medication that's needed for them to live their life because we live paycheck to paycheck. I heard you earlier say that you side with President Trump on anything that he says, well, I just read an article this morning that said he absolutely wholeheartedly believes that there needs to be legislation put in so that we do not miss a paycheck. You have the power to do that. And as a Republican, I'm very disappointed in my party and I'm very disappointed in you because you do have the power to call the house back.

You did that, or you refused to do that just for a show. I'm begging you to pass this legislation. My kids could die. We don't have the credit because of the medical bills that I have to pay regularly. You could stop this, and you could be the one that could say military is getting paid. And I think that it is awful and the audacity of someone who makes six figures a year to do this to military families. is insane. All right, Samantha. I'm so sorry to hear about your situation. The reason I've been so angry this week and they've been calling me out on media, Johnson's angry. I am angry because of

situations just like you're. And then next, a C-SPAN caller says to Maga, Mike Johnson, all right, well, we're hearing you all are doing peace in Gaza. Who knows what you're with what you're telling us is true to begin with. But when are you going to care about America? When are you going to care about what's going on here where you're sending troops against American citizens? and against people living in America? When are you going to care? Isn't that what you meant by America first? Or America first means bail out Argentina

and always help Israel over-focusing on America? What is your plan? You're going to play this clip. Hi. I just want to start by saying, hearing you say that everyone is smiling in the cities where troops our National Guard has been rolled into

feels dystopian and insane to hear you say that watching the response. to this, but that's not actually my question. My question, I just needed to say that while hearing you talk about this. My question is, if Republicans and Democrats can agree to a one-year extension to the ACA subsidies, removing this sort of talking point of illegal immigrants draining our resources as you sit here and lie about this, would you support that bill and bring it to a vote on the House floor? This is a big question. that I have for you. Thank you. Yeah, well, not lying. I'm telling me the truth. And you can go look

at all the documents yourself. Don't look at Republican paperwork. Look at the congressional budget office who said that we had at least 1.4 million illegal aliens draining the resources from Medicaid, which is why he put their forms in the law and got it signed July 4th. Chuck Schumer and Hakeemachery's counterproposal for the CR. And then this next call there goes, Mega, Mike, have you ever voted against anything that Donald Trump supported? Have you ever taking your own opinion on any issue at all. And Mag and Mike's like, no, I would I ever do that? Here, play this clip. Uh, yes, uh, good morning. Just wanted to ask the speaker, a couple of questions. Have you ever voted against anything that Trump set forth as far as policy?

Uh, that's one question. Uh, the other is what is going on with the, uh, swearing in of the, uh, Congresswoman who would make the 218 vote? I noticed that you were speaking in the Paul yesterday with someone regarding the idea that, you know, maybe she would make the 218 vote that would open up the vote for the Epstein files to be released. This is not something that we are going to forget about. This is serious business. The other thing is that Trump is a dictator. So it doesn't matter what Johnson does or what the guy over in the Senate does.

All the thing that has to happen is if Trump says open. the government, it will be open tomorrow. We have to understand that. And they keep talking about we're putting names out there about Trump being the dictator and this and that. You just call and he continues to call. All right, Alexander, and he's talking about Representative Adelito Grijalva not being sworn in. Yeah, Alexander gave me a lot to answer there. Let me go real quickly. I typically vote with President Trump. I do because that's my party and I lead my party in the house and our agenda is working for the American people. You can make an argument. We have the most productive, successful opening of a Congress and administration in history, the one big beautiful

bill was a massive achievement for the American. So now I want to bring in New Jersey, Senator Andy Kim. Senator Kim, it's great to see you. You know, you see those clips right there. And the American people understand what's going on with this government shutdown. They recognize that Donald Trump and the Maga Republicans control all branches of government. They recognize that they have no plan when it comes to health care. They recognize how important it is to protect Americans health or to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies. And all of these lies that usually have worked before for Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans blaming immigrants or transgender people or whatever. It's not working this time. What do you make of this moment, Senator? Well, right now there's a giant spotlight

on the Republicans and how they govern. And what we realize and what the American people see is that they don't govern that they are as the speaker as the caller said to speaker johnson i mean this was a woman who's a republican but said like she knows that speaker johnson is giving house republicans a paid vacation right now while she and her family are struggling to make ends meet worried about getting their next paycheck and they find it offensive because it is i mean they are pissed off rightfully so because speaker johnson is having you know i'm Honestly, it's dereliction of duty, in my opinion, that fact that he is putting his own job ahead of the job of hundreds of thousands of federal workers, millions of our troops and others, he's just only trying to protect his own speakership, his own job, and people can't stand that. And the other thing that I'll just share is that in New Jersey, for instance, what I keep hearing from people there, is there are a lot of people, including a lot of Republicans that are pissed off at Trump for saying that he's going to withhold.

funding to our gateway tunnel project, something that's supposed to transform our state in terms of the ability for hundreds of thousands to be able to commute into New York City, to be able to revitalize our economy. And the fact that Trump is taking these mob boss tactics to punish the American people for political retribution, people find that disgusting. During that bizarre cabinet meeting he held on Thursday, you know, it was just very strange yet again, where he seemed to like enjoy saying that he was going after Democrat programs. He's like, like, I'm coming. He literally said, I'm coming after the Democrat programs. This is what you did. This is an opportunity for me. And these are programs that are not Democrat programs. These are American programs. I mean,

Republicans live in New Jersey also. And they, you know, use tunnels and they want less traffic and they work in the city and it's just a it's a very strange concept to hear a president of the united states behave like this but it seems the shutdown is showing a spotlight like we've never seen before yeah that's right and look one of those republicans that lives in new jersey happens to be secretary duffy transportation secretary and in his confirmation hearing the first question i asked him is is the gateway tunnel project of national importance and he said yes absolutely this is important for our nation's economy that if the train line on the northeast corridor uh breaks down because of a problem with the tunnel that's going to cause

huge economic repercussion to our entire nation so the fact that they are willing to do national harm to us uh to our country because again he's got a gripe with chuck schumer hakeem jeffreys with me and corey booker like we get it uh but again the American people can't stand that. And it's just like, you know, just a self-inflicted wound. It's like just self-sabotage, honestly. You know, it seemed that their only idea was like, let's own the libs, let's mock liberal people and let's destroy them. And Trump's even taking that they're the enemy from within. Let's send the military and go after areas that we consider to be liberal areas, whatever that means. And meanwhile, you have the American people saying,

I can't afford my groceries right now. You promised me, Donald, that this was going to be cheaper, and it's not helping me when you say it's cheaper and it's not cheaper. When you say you brought in $17 trillion, well, if you really did that, shouldn't that be helping everybody? Where's our dividend checks that you promised? Where is our doge checks and our tariff checks? And our tariff and all of the things that you said, you know, and we don't want to hear two more weeks, two more weeks. It just feels like, you know, whether it's like a Bernie made off or people who have been involved in the Ponzi schemes,

at the end, people keep saying, all right, I want my money now. Let's go. And, you know, they're trying the same most. Oh, well, I'm trying to get you your money. But the migrants, stop with the migrants this time. I need it. That seems to be the moment we're in. It feels different.

It feels different. it does and i think because the american people are are wisen up to this and they're seeing it i mean look you know whether it's the farmers that got screwed over because of trump and his tariffs and you know him going after and antagonize all these different allies and partners around the world uh and we see that you know where they're doing they're taking that tariff money they're plowing it right into you know getting black hawk helicopters for ice you know flying over Chicago. I was actually just, I just visited with the National Guard in D.C. to get a sense of what's going on there. We are paying as a nation $1.3 million a day to have the National Guard go

around D.C. And what are they doing? They're spreading around mulch. They're trimming trees. I kid you not. They literally gave me statistics. How many trash bags they lifted up? Is that really the best use of our money? By the end of this year, it's expected to have cost over $200 million to have National Guard in D.C., there's much better use to be able to help families be able to afford their health care, be able to afford housing and other things like that, rather than just putting on a show for Donald Trump to pretend like, you know, he's the commander-in-chief able to just put the U.S. military on the ground in our own streets, like he said to the generals, using American cities as a training ground. Also, just, like, weird moments where

I'm watching him and I know he doesn't make sense, but like, I'm watching him and I'm thinking to myself, like, just in general, like, what the hell is this guy even talking? What's he legitimately even, like, what's coming out of his mouth? You know, and the thoughts aren't coherent. He was asked a question about suspending habeas corpus, and he believed that habeas corpus was a person. He said, who? Who's that? Who's that? You know, and, and, And how long, when I spoke to Senator Gallego, he was like, even when Donald Trump's here in D.C., this is what Gallego said to me. He goes, he's not here. Like, you know, and it just is, he says something. And then the Republicans try to, then he says another thing. It's just a mess. It's not leadership.

And the American people see it, even if corporate news doesn't want to talk about it. What do you make of that? Yeah, look, what I can tell you from my vantage point, seeing how this is unfolded, you know, that there are two people running this government, which are as Russell. vote, the OMB director who's pushing his dangerous agenda all over, creating so much of the mass firings and the destruction of our government, as well as Stephen Miller, who needs no introduction because of just the sheer amount of danger that he poses to our nation, pushing such an extreme agenda and is literally running point from his office at the White House in terms of these

ice raids and National Guard efforts. Those are the two that are in charge. And everybody here at the U.S. Senate, they know that, that that's who's running our government. Donald Trump, you know, he'll, you know, give some talking points and a press conference here and there, but, you know, this is what I hope the American people see, is that our government is run by some of the most extreme radicals that I've ever seen during my time in government. They are trying to reshape our country, not just for the next three years, but for decades to come. And I'm a father of an eight-year-old and a 10-year-old, and I've refused to let Stephen Miller, Russell Vote, and Donald Trump shape the America that my kids are going to grow up in.

Before we go, we talked a little bit about the cancellation of the Holland Tunnel money going there. Can you describe, I mean, just being from New Jersey, what a big deal this is and how venomous and vicious this really is and what it means in terms of just our country in general? Yeah, absolutely. So it's not the Holland Tunnel, but it's a Hudson Tunnel. It's meant to double the number of train lines we have. We have this tunnel that is over 100 years old, very much could pose a huge transportation challenge of it falls apart and continues to crumble.

This is something that we need because if we lose that train line connecting the East Coast, it's going to cause so much economic damage. It's going to raise prices for so many American families with goods being transported around. It's going to cause enormous disruption. And for my state, it's a lifeline. It is necessary for being able to people to commute into New York City. You know, the challenges we faced last summer with Penn Station having the problem, well, in New Jersey Transit having problems and tens of thousands of people getting stuck at Penn Station.

This is the number one transportation infrastructure in the entire region, and it's something that unifies everybody in the state of New Jersey. And I'll be honest with you, the moment that Donald Trump said he was going to hold back on that funding, I think is a moment that Donald Trump lost a governor's race for the Republicans in New Jersey as we have a race coming up in just a few weeks because people, again, they don't like that. They don't like the idea that Donald Trump is just actually trying to harm the American people. Think of the American people as just collateral damage in his own political retribution and mob boss tactics. So, you know, that's sort of the latest dynamic that we're seeing in

New Jersey. Senator Kim, thanks for joining us as always. We hope you come back. Thank you so much. everybody hit subscribe let's get to six million subscribers want to stay plugged in become a subscriber to our substack at midasplus dot com you'll get daily recaps from ron philipkowski add free episodes of our podcasts and more exclusive content only available at midasplus dot com