The MeidasTouch Podcast - Stop Electing Evil with former Trump staffer and NDA killer Jessica Denson

Episode Date: March 15, 2022

On today’s special episode of The MeidasTouch Podcast, you will listen to the most interesting story of courage in the face of Trump tyranny never before told. Our guest, Jessica Denson, is a defected former Trump Campaign staffer & NDA killer who goes into detail about her victory in court over the corrupt Trump regime and their ludicrous and unenforceable NDAs. The remainder of the episode, the brothers give you the latest breaking news from over the weekend that you need to know. We cover it all: the latest updates on Russia, a heinous Missouri proposed bill attacking childbearing persons & the absolutely dystopian Trump rally from over the weekend. If you enjoyed today's episode please be sure to rate, review and subscribe! As always, thank YOU for listening! DEALS FROM OUR SPONSORS: Athletic Greens: https://athleticgreens.com/meidas Buck Mason: https://buckmason.com/meidas Grove Collaborative: https://grove.com/meidastouch Thesis: https://takethesis.com/meidas Listen to Wondery Business Wars Airbnb vs NYC: https://wondery.com/shows/business-wars/ 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 Zoomed In: https://pod.link/1580828633 The Weekend Show: https://pod.link/1612691018 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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abroad. We have an incredible podcast for you today. And I know we always say we have an incredible podcast and we are always right. I've never failed to deliver. I've never failed to deliver yet on that promise. And today's is particularly great. We have as our guest, Jessica Denson. Now, if you don't know who Jessica Denson is,

you're going to learn to love Jessica Denson. A true fighter. Jessica Denson was a former Trump campaign staffer in 2016, who then went on to sue the Trump campaign for discrimination. She had a horrible discriminatory situation over there that she spoke out against, that she sued the Trump administration for. And she's challenged them in state court, in federal court, and she's gotten the Trump NDA to be declared invalid against her. And she's not done there. As she continues to pursue her discrimination case against the Trump campaign,

she's now fighting in a federal class action to get that same NDA invalidated against her, invalidated against everyone. And the theme of today's pod, we want to start developing a theme. You know how we like to develop a theme though, is that anyone can make a difference and it's never too late to be that person to make a difference. And so Midas Touch, Midas Touch, we're not political. All of a sudden the GOP official account was blocking us when we decided, hey, what, two years ago, almost two years ago, it's going to, hey guys, we're almost going to be like two years since our founding in like a week. Yeah, that's crazy. Today is the 25th. So we started this off not political people. We were just like, yo, Trump is a dictator and we need to stop him and his people.

Can we do something? Through that, we got one follower, 10 followers and growing to millions of followers across platforms. And now we've become pro-democracy. I don't even think that's political. We support sane, rational actors who fight for democracy. I'm right there with you. And that's why the whole labels thing is so weird to me. Because I know in the beginning, because we weren't political, we looked at our values,

looked at our beliefs, and we were like, I guess we're progressive, right? I think we're progressive. That lines up with our beliefs. But as we've gone on and we've seen the difference, we've seen like, I guess we're progressive, right? Like, I think we're, I think we're progressive. That lines up with our beliefs. But as we've gone on and, you know, we've seen the difference, we've seen like, yeah, no, you know what? We're not political. Like, I don't think you can neatly box anybody into progressive, the conservative left, right, whatever. Like at the end of the day, I want good humans in government. I want smart people in government and I want people who actually just care about others. And that's really what drew me to making Midas Touch in the first place is we saw a madman who was denying the reality that a disease was coming to our shores that was going to kill people. And we were scared. We were scared for our country. And we've just met so many other like-minded people who were

fearful for our country, remain fearful for our country and are doing something about it. And that's all you could really ask for. I mean, there's so much going on. There's so much stress. There's so much trauma that we're really burdened with every single day that at the end of the day, we just need good people, empathetic people who care, who are honest. And that's the core of my belief. And we've said this before. If Joe Biden starts telling people, you know what we need to do to combat COVID, the next COVID wave, start drinking bleach, everybody. You know what we would do? We would say, no, Joe Biden, we're not going to do that. Slow your roll, Joe. Slow your roll. But that is not the case. And yes, as Ben mentioned,

we woke up to news the other day that the official Republican Party account at GOP has blocked Midas Touch on Twitter. Can't say I am too upset about it. I'm not exactly going to miss their tweets, but I think it shows a lot about their character or lack thereof. I didn't even say anything offensive to them. Like there are some people who I may be a little offensive to, like people who deserve it, like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz and people like that. But to be clear, you're not saying offensive things, like really mean, cruel things. When you're talking to those people, you show them why they're wrong. Yeah, rightfully so. And occasionally, people are incredibly dumb, and I'm not afraid to tell them that. So with the GOP, though, the only thing that I've done,

not even super frequently is they will post lies. They just post propaganda and like straight up, like easily disprovable lies. And so occasionally I would just reply to them, but they would say like, America was energy independent under Trump and under Biden. We're no longer energy independent and we are producing less oil than ever. I mean, just a provable lie, like just straight up a lie. And I will just say, actually, I think the last tweet that really triggered them is I said, actually, this is a lie. And here's the data explaining why what you're saying is not accurate.

And that tweet went pretty viral just under as a reply. I think it ratioed them, which on Twitter is when your tweet gets more likes than the tweet that they sent out. I think they got offended. That's called a ratio folks. And so after getting ratioed and humiliated by facts, the GOP then decided to block Midas touch, woke up, noticed that somebody had quote tweeted a Republican party tweet. And it said, this tweet is unavailable to you. And when I clicked onto the account, it was the GOP and it said, you have been blocked. I've never heard of the GOP blocking anybody, anybody. I mean, the Arizona GOP blocks plenty of people, including us, people like Rudy Giuliani. There's a whole host of people. There's a whole host of people in the party who block people

and the most radical extreme factions of the party block people. I's a whole host of people in the party who block people and the most radical extreme factions of the party block people. I have never, ever, and I've asked many people, ever heard of the national GOP account blocking people. We may be like the only major account that they block. It's insanity. Brother, cancel culture. The cancel culture of it all is insane. So cancel culture, free speech, yada, yada, yada. I wear the block with a badge of honor. It shows the work that we're doing is resonating. And what I want to also amplify as well, and we had the pre-show with Roxanne on before she has the mail writing campaign,

mailing to voters and activating voters in different states, specifically swing states to vote blue in 2022 for democracy with the postcard campaign and focused on turning Pennsylvania blue. But I want to see more of that. OK, I really want to see more groups of people coming together, spending one day a week or one evening a week. If you post pictures of yourselves doing it like Roxanne and tag us, we will retweet it and amplify it. And you may say, well, I don't really have a big account. Well, we'll help you make the big account.

All we're asking you to do is spend some time with some friends and some colleagues and do something for democracy in this election cycle. And we will make sure that we are amplifying everything that you're doing. So special shout out to Roxanne. Now, I do want to talk about, what you had been saying earlier, which is if at some point the Democrats all of a sudden change their platform, or if they started not fighting for democracy, if they started taking Putin's side, if they started- I mean, exhibit A, Tulsi Gabbard. We don't go, oh, she's a Democrat, so we're going to dribble down because she has a D next to her. No, absolutely not. We go, no, that's fucked up. We're not going to support this. We can't support this. It doesn't align

with our values. I think there are some high-level, nuanced discussions, though, taking place on a foreign policy level with Mitt Romney over whether or not we should close airspace over Ukraine, whether it's premature to do that. To me, those types of technical debates could be what separates political parties. That's kind of what it used to be. And we can say, hey, this is a better approach than that's a better approach. But that's not even what we're seeing in the debate right now. Like Mitt Romney's articulation in an intelligent way of his view of how to support Ukraine, that is the 0.001% of the Republican Party. The Republican Party is like maniacs, you know, and not fringe random people.

What the Republicans like to do, and I send Brett a text, they like to show someone who purportedly identifies as progressive or whatever, who's not a leader in the party, who's not like an elected official, like just a random person who's like yelling and go see that random person in Oregon, like that represents the Democratic Party, you know, or that person in, you know, Maine or that person in New York. I'm not trying to pick on any states in particular. The one I sent you, I think, was at a school in Oregon. But here, these are the leaders of their party. Here are the main voices of their party. And we could start talking about the Trump rally, the leader of the Republican Party, again, apparently calling for insurrection over made

up issues. He wants his supporters. This is what he said at his grift rally, where he raises all of this money to pay for himself and to just put money into his own pockets and his family's pockets at this point. And he's calling for his supporters to, quote, lay down their very lives to fight against critical race theory. Again, using insurrectionist Taliban like suicide bomber rhetoric with a made up concept of critical race theory, which is taught in grad school. It's I mean, this is absolutely. I don't know at what point. And I think it has January 6th and before January 6th, by the way. But at what point does this rise to the level of legal incitement? He's telling his followers, he's telling his people to literally kill for him.

Like you said, Ben, this is what terrorist groups do. And that's why I'm not afraid to call Donald Trump a terrorist. He's a terrorist. And that's why and that shouldn't be a it's not hyperbole to say that. I mean, it's really not hyperbole to say that. And what's what's worse is the media, newspapers and stuff speaking about him as a legitimate political figure calling this legitimate political discourse. While the Republican Party may have said that in writing and let the quiet part out loud, the media, the way people speak about this man and this party, they normalize this crazy behavior as legitimate political discourse. They go, oh, well, the Democrats did this and the Republicans did

that when they are not just two sides of the same coin. We are not right now facing two different ideologies. I wish right now we were having a debate between, like you said, Ben, who has a better approach right now to Ukraine? Is Mitt Romney right? Is Joe Biden right? Should we be doing more? Should we? Is that escalation going to cause problems?

Let's have a debate. Let's talk about that. How should we do health care? Is this system right? Is that system right? Should taxes be on these people on people? Let's have those debates. Did this be a write-off? Should that be a write-off? Let's discuss policy. Let's talk about this because democracy shouldn't matter. It shouldn't

matter what letter is next to your name to defend democracy. It should not matter if you have a D, if you have an R, if you have an I, or any other letter. That should not matter. But when you see people saying, telling people their followers, their large crowds to lay down their very lives in the fight against critical race theory, you got to step up and you got to say, as a human being, as a human being, I cannot support this person and the party that harbors this person and refuses to speak out against him. I want to highlight another thing that Trump said at this rally. And the reason why we have to talk about this guy, because a lot

of people are like, why are you covering these rallies? Because he's a threat. He's the leader of one of the two largest political parties in this country that has a lot of power and sway on a large swath of people in this country. And during that same rally, Trump made this statement. He said, we will pass critical reforms, making every executive branch employee fireable by the president of the United States. The deep state must and will be brought to heel. First brought to heel, a very fascist terminology right there. That's a fascist phrase. They must be brought to heel. In addition to that, saying that the president should have uninhibited power to fire anybody who works for the government, any civil servant who works for the government without any sort of oversight, that is calling

for a dictatorship. That's calling to turn America into an autocratic country. It's calling to turn America into Russia. So when we're looking at Russia and we see images of protesters being whisked away for having signs that say literally nothing on it, when we see news about people in the Putin regime being put under house arrest and the like and being pushed out of buildings and killed, this is the America that Donald Trump and the Republican Party want us to look like. This is the way they want our country to be. And so instead of looking at that as, oh my God, what a horrible, horrible regime, that can never happen here. I want you to look at that as our possible future if we don't get energized and if we don't show up. And that's why we put so much emphasis on we got to get to

work. Writing those postcards, we got to do that because we need to do all these things right now while we still have the power to preserve our democracy. I can't sound the sirens loud enough at the rhetoric we are hearing from Trump, at the statements we are seeing from the GOP, and at the laws that the GOP is implementing throughout the country, which we'll also get to in a minute. But there are many other examples of these just horrible, horrible human beings that are infecting our country. The Trump sycophants eat it up. We have J.D. Vance, one of the top Republican candidates for Senate in Ohio. He tweeted out, everyone's losing their mind about this, but I've been calling for it every town hall I do.

Either the president controls the executive branch or he doesn't. If he doesn't, we don't live in a republic. We live in a civil service driven oligarchy. And Vance there, of course, referring to the Trump statements we were just talking about. You know, and that to me, you know, look, it goes without saying, but that to me is like we're not even we're not even having we're not even having discourse at this point. You're just saying stupid words. You're calling civil servants an oligarchy. You're trying to compare oligarchy. Civil servants who are making like $30,000 a year doing their best to help this country, doing the grind that actually moves the wheels of America, calling them an oligarchy.

This is who the Republican Party picks on. They pick on the librarians. They pick on the teachers. They pick on the other civil servants who literally don't make enough to probably put food on the table for their families. And they're the oligarchs. I mean, the oligarchs are Jared Kushner is the oligarch. The Trump family is the oligarch. That's American oligarchs who are not paying taxes and taking advantage of our system. And so when they call civil servants oligarchs, it is derangement. And then speaking of derangement, then you have Congresswoman Nancy Mace of South Carolina. Trump's speech happened in South Carolina. She's running against Trumpers.

And so she had to go to a, to go to Trump tower in New York and stand in front of it. And this, it starts before though. It starts, it starts way before. It's so crazy. Brett,

break it down. Well, Mace used to portray herself as a middle of the road. I'm just the middle of the road, conservative, common sense, practical sort of politician. And then she went along on the Trump train on this MAGA bandwagon and started doubling down, tripling down on I am the biggest MAGA supporter, Trump first, America first, this, that, spouting every Trump lie, every Trump bullshit, defended him every single step of the way. But as everybody learns, you guys, as I don't know how people have not gotten this lesson, and this is a lesson that will be repeated

throughout this video, that no matter how loyal you are to Donald Trump, he will always, always, always ruin your life at the end. He will always reject you when you need him most. It's not a two-way street with Trump. So yes. So ultimately a more MAGA friendly candidate, AKA a more insane candidate goes to run against Nancy Mace and Trump, instead of taking Nancy Mace's side, who has been defending all of his craziness this whole time, goes and defends her opponent. And so then Nancy Mace in an act of desperation, complete desperation, like this is the most embarrassing thing ever. She goes to Trump tower and takes like a selfie video of herself in front of Trump tower being

like, Oh, like not mentioning that. It's so cringy. Play the video. All right. We'll play it. Hey everyone. Congresswoman Nancy Mace here. I'm in front of Trump Tower today. And I remember in 2015 when President Trump announced his run, I was one of his earliest supporters. All right, all right. Honestly, that's all I need to see. But imagine debasing yourself and humiliating yourself like that. Again, for context, this is after Trump has now endorsed publicly the opponent running against Mace for that seat. And then what does Trump do and say and South Carolina about Mace? Play Trump now after Mace does that in the Trump Tower.

She went to New York and stood in front of the magnificent Trump Tower. Has anyone ever heard of Trump Tower? And did a commercial insinuating that I was endorsing her. She's standing over in front of Trump Tower in New York. I'm saying, can you believe this? It was untruthful, just like everything else she does. Thankfully, this June, you have the chance to dump these grandstanding losers and replace them with two rock solid America first champions. Congrats. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. That's what you get for bowing down to a dictator. And this is a very dictator move to shame you, to name you, to make you feel like a loser because you are a loser because you showed weakness and he showed

that he could, you showed him that he could run right over you. And that's what dictators do. And he did it too in that way because she's a woman. Let's also be clear that he wanted to make a specific example of her because she's a woman and because of her views and shamed her in that way to send a message to other people in MAGA. And that's why the Ted Cruz's and the Lindsey Graham's are so obedient to him. They're afraid of that. Where they could stand up and stand for what's right, that scares them, which to me is just so horribly embarrassing. Be a good person.

Please just be a good person. I don't want to give Mason out here, though, too, either. Think about the grand gesture that she did. She flew to New York. She went in front of Trump Tower to do a video, to bow down and literally kiss the ring of Trump. It's the most humiliating video ever. Just, I mean, I'd say it's like an episode of Jerry Springer, this whole saga, but that would be the service to Jerry Springer shows. And then just talking about these, you know, truly embarrassing people who are the face of the Republican Party.

I mean, play Madison Cawthorn first. Let's play the video of his views on Volodymyr Zelensky, and then let's play what he said about Nancy Pelosi. Remember that Zelensky is a thug. Remember the Ukrainian government is incredibly corrupt, and it is incredibly evil, and it has been pushing woke ideologies, and it really does the new woke world out. Okay. It's the same ideology also that he's, it's the same language and ideology that they use to refer to Democrats, woke, you know, thug and, you know, all, all of those words. They're all code words for democracy, right? They're all code words. Like when you say, oh, the woke, the woke agenda is what the woke agenda must be a pro

democracy agenda, democracy, diversity, diversity, like that, that is, that's what woke means to them, you know, and, and Zelensky so bravely fighting for democracy for the world at this point. And then let's play what Madison Cawthorn said about Nancy Pelosi the other day. A rule for me, but not for me. I think it's Nancy Pelosi's, it's Nancy Pelosi's campaign slogan. I'll tell you, I have to work with her every single day. And just lying about her. I mean, you know, engaging. Despicable.

Pelosi famously doesn't drink, first of all. And Cawthorn is a guy who's been arrested multiple times as a rap sheet, has a lot of other sexual assault allegations that have been levied against him. Even just recently was charged with driving without his license for the second time. And he may face up to 20 days in jail. They're all projectionists and they're criminals. I mean, they're straightists and they're criminals. I mean, they're straight up, they're criminals. And this is how dictatorships start though, is the people, the worst among us get power and they get elevated into positions in which they don't belong because they don't have morals and they will do the bidding of the leader.

And because they don't have a opposition that's willing to speak up, they can engage in that conduct because they're crazy. They've got nothing to lose and they're horrible people. But the rest, the rest, the true majority stays silent in the face of that though too. And that's why though we keep reiterating that you should do something, you know, like what Roxanne did. Anything is something and we will amplify anything that you're doing, you know, whether it's, again, we talk about a lot, Midas Jerry in Texas and her fighting with Beto O'Rourke, you know, any of, you know, and all the Midas Mighty for

all the work they do, having Midas Mighty meetups to talk about spreading the word of democracy, referring this podcast, sending videos to friends, family, relatives. You can't be on the sidelines. And I want to talk about some of these policies also that are being implemented. And specifically, I want to talk about these laws to ban abortion and the type of legislatures who are pushing forward these things. And before doing that, though, I do want to talk about our partner, Athletic Greens. This podcast is brought to you by Athletic Greens. They say the proof is in the pudding.

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It's been the precedent, the law of our land, a constitutional right, the right to choose for decades and decades and decades. Then there was a later case, Casey, which further codified Roe v. Wade. Americans across the country, when the issues are polled, close to 70% of Americans support the right to choose. Yet, particularly, it's usually male legislators, but legislators in all these radical right extremist states, they're Republicans, but the Republicans are the radical right. And they've said, oh, this is a state's right issue. We're just going to keep it in our state. And if you want to get an abortion in a different state, you can still have that right. I want to say, first and foremost, the right to choose is a constitutional right and should exist in every single state, number one. see where the radical right is going with this. A recent amendment to legislation in Missouri to prevent people from leaving the state to get abortions in other states, an amendment from a

Texas legislator to actually make getting an abortion subject to the death penalty. It's not hyperbole. There is a legislator in Texas who wants abortion to be subject to the death penalty. It's not hyperbole. There is a legislator in Texas who wants abortion to be subject to the death penalty. Also, as you go in Missouri, Missouri's recent legislation would make it illegal to get an abortion, even if the patient is having an ectopic pregnancy. And if I'm speaking to any men out there who don't know what that is, because apparently the male legislature who put that language in there when he was confronted about what the procedure was- Didn't know it. Didn't know what it was.

Oh my God. Why don't you just play that clip of one of the female legislators asking the male legislator who put forward the bill about ectopic pregnancies. You stated that women can get treatment for an ectopic pregnancy. Absolutely. Okay. Do you know how the treatment for ectopic pregnancies work? No, I do not. You don't. Okay. Okay. Do you know how the treatment for ectopic pregnancies work? No, I do not. You don't. Okay. Okay.

So that's the individual who's putting forth legislation that would prohibit abortions in the cases of ectopic pregnancies. Let's tell our listeners too what it is in case they don't know what an ectopic pregnancy is. It's basically, it's when a fertilized egg implants and it grows outside the main cavity of the uterus. And this is something that's a hundred percent fatal for the baby in the situation. And this could kill the mother. It's the number one cause of death in first trimester patients. So they're basically, they're forcing, they're, they're facing women there. So ultimately they're

forcing childbearing people to decide, do I want to die or do I want to go to jail? Those are your options in life. All because this legislator, this man doesn't even know what this procedure is, what this ectopic pregnancy even means. They don't even know what it is. Yet they are saying, okay, women, okay, any child bearing person, do you want to die? Or do you want to go to prison? You decide. You decide. That's the law here in Missouri. So that's what you have. What is this rooted in? Just evil? Just pure evil? What's your guys' opinion on that?'s it's the most despicable this is why you know the thing i can imagine going back to what we said in the beginning and i'll let ben you know expound on his things but this is why all of my political beliefs 100 of them are

through the prism of are you a good person are you a bad person is this for the good of society or is this evil this is for the detriment society? And there are some things that may be gray areas and we could discuss those, but there are some areas that are pretty damn black and white. And this right here, it's a pretty clear distinction right here between what's good and what's evil. And it goes also to, you know, sadly, and you see this in authoritarian regimes a lot, male desires to control other, male desires to control women, to tell women what they should and shouldn't do with their body. herself, with her faith, and not with a man like the legislator that Brett just played the video of, that disgusting man, that truly disgusting, vile human being who doesn't even know what it is that he's talking about, but is trying to control the bodies of women. And I honestly believe that this is going to be one of the key, if not the key issues in the 2022 midterms. No one's talking about it. We're talking about it on the podcast. We're talking about it because it's the right thing. It's the right thing to resist and oppose these domineering laws trying to get government involved in these decisions that should be made by women and childbearing persons. I also believe it's going to be incredibly important in the midterms as well, in terms of rallying people, because these laws are going to get worse

and worse and worse and worse. And America is going to start looking like Saudi Arabia. It doesn't stop there, right? I mean, the next thing you're going to start hearing about is regulating the clothes that men want women to wear. You'll start hearing about laws like that. You'll start hearing about whether women should drive or not drive. I mean, you think these are insane ideas, but this is what exists in other states. And hands made tells a documentary. And fundamentally, though, all those other issues, you know, kind of pale in comparison to the government making these decisions for women on the right to choose. And we have the Supreme Court case Dobbs versus Mississippi that will overturn Roe v. Wade. It's seeking to overturn Roe v. Wade. That ruling is going to come out in May or June.

So we're a few months away from that ruling. And I always keep saying, mark these words that that ruling either will overturn Roe v. Wade or will uphold Mississippi's ban and all these other states know it, that these radical right states, that's why they're passing this legislation. I don't want to just limit my criticism, but we'll bring in Jessica Denson in a second. I don't want to limit my criticism, though, just to, in that case, Republicans in that context. I want to talk about other legislation. And we should note that Joe Manchin's votes shouldn't really, like we should always recognize

when talking about Joe Manchin, one that he is from West Virginia and he's going to represent the interest of West Virginia. That's why, to me, a Manchin is different than a Sinema, because Sinema was actually voted to be a progressive and Manchin wasn't like that's just the reality of when West Virginia is voted for Manchin. And she she campaigned on a progressive agenda. And we should also, in talking about Manchin, note that all of the Republicans have far more radical views than him. So it shouldn't all hinge on Manchin. Like any criticism to Manchin is also a criticism because the right wing is even forcing Manchin to have this impact because they all vote no on common sense legislation. But today, Joe Manchin said he's going to vote against one of President Biden's Federal Reserve nominees, Sarah Bloom Raskin, a qualified progressive with a strong track record of holding big banks accountable.

But this is why he's opposing her. He's opposing her because she supports clean energy. And this is the quote that he said about it. This is actually a quote from Joe Manchin. Quote, I'm very reluctant to go down the path of electric vehicles, Manchin said. I'm old enough to remember standing in line in 1974 trying to buy gas. I remember those days. I don't want to have to be standing in line waiting for a battery for my vehicle because we're now dependent on a foreign supply chain, mostly China. That's what Joe Manchin said today. How does Joe Manchin think people charge their electric cars? The great thing is, is that

if there is a crisis, like the one we're currently in, by the way, or like the one that he's referring to in 1974, if you have an electric vehicle, guess what? You're not affected by that crisis because you're charging your vehicle in your own garage, or you're charging your vehicle at charging stations that in many states now are basically everywhere. I know in California, they are everywhere. So what he's saying is the most ridiculous argument on the planet. And it's informed by who pays Joe Manchin. And Joe Manchin is quite literally paid by oil and gas companies. And if believing in climate change is a disqualification for a job in the federal government for an appointment, we're in a lot of trouble. I mean, we're in a lot of trouble.

Because at this point, I think not pushing clean energy is a national security threat. We're seeing it. And by the way, I want to say right now we are producing more oil really than ever in this country, certainly more than the end of the Trump administration. And we export more oil than we import by vast numbers. But we're seeing what happens to a global oil and gas supply chain when there are global crises and we rely on countries like Saudi Arabia to set the prices. We rely on a supply from Russia. When these all impact global prices and supply and demand and affect the global oil markets, guess what? It's

a national security threat to the United States. So to me, anybody opposing clean energy right now, which would actually make America energy independent, you're a national security threat. You've crossed that line. And to oppose somebody because they believe in clean energy is just a disgrace. And you're hurting America's interest to line your own pockets. And that's what Manchin's doing. And that's what the rest of the Republican Party is doing. And Ben, I'm going to do something here that I've never done in the history of the Minds Touch podcast. I'm going to push back on you a little bit here. You said that Manchin represents the people of West Virginia. I don't think he does. He represents

the people who line his pocket. I think when the policies were being passed in the Build Back Better initiative, it was overwhelmingly popular within West Virginia. Now, fast forward, Manchin opposes everything. Why? Because he's getting paid by these big lobbyists. I think that's a fair pushback. I would only say that Manchin didn't run on an agenda of being a candidate for these types of issues. That's the only distinction of him versus him. But you're right, when you actually poll the people of the state on the Build Back Better pieces of legislation, at least, they overwhelmingly support it and he's against it. Now, would their views here be different given the coal industry in West Virginia? I don't know, but broader than that, I think there is a fundamental education that needs to take place that America needs to be a

leader in clean energy. If that's where energy is going in the future, we see where it's going in the future. So it is in our capitalistic interest. By the way, he's complaining about the fact that a lot of these batteries from electric vehicles come from China. And I think that's a valid complaint. I think that's something that we should maybe do something about though. Maybe we push for clean energy and we work to make America the hub of clean energy where we can make all of our batteries here in America and make America the clean energy capital of the world? Why is that not the suggestion? Why is, oh, then we have to rely on oil and gas forever. That's our plan. We got to rely on coal. That's the future. That's the future for Joe Manchin. Absolutely. No, absolutely. I want to bring in Jessica Denson, though. We've talked

about how individuals, we spoke earlier in the podcast about what you can do at home to make a big impact on the election. I want to talk about what Jessica Denson has done in her fight against the Trump campaign. And then it's never too late to stand up for what's right and to make a big difference. And just before doing that, I want to give a shout out to one of our partners, Grove Collaborative. I love Grove Collaborative. Did you know that only- Being friendly for the environment. Exactly. We're talking about the environment. Did you know that only 9% of plastic actually

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I love it. Plus shipping is fast and free. Please get started right now. This is good for you. This is great for the environment. Get started right now. Go to grove.com slash Midas touch. Again, grove.com slash Midas touch. Now, without further ado, let's bring in Jessica Denson. We are joined by Jessica Denson. Now, Jessica was a former Trump campaign staffer in 2016. Don't hold it against her. I said former. She ended up suing the Trump campaign. She is also known, or I call her the NDA killer because through her pioneering legal work, she won a major federal court ruling declaring that the NDA used by the Trump campaign, which may be the NDA Trump uses across the board in all of his matters, though, was unenforceable, unduly overbroad,

vague and ambiguous. And Jessica, for most of this fight, fought it alone, pro se, without lawyers, and took on the Trump campaign as they sued her and battled her. Jessica, welcome to the podcast. Oh, thank you so much for that glorious introduction. I feel very welcome. Let me try to give some of the procedural background of it. If I get anything wrong, just you could correct me. You work at the Trump campaign approximately three months. The experience is horrible. You sue the Trump campaign because not just is it horrible, it was discriminatory and the things you went through there were horrible. So you sue in state court for discrimination. The Trump campaign, in typical Trump campaign fashion, they sue you in an

arbitration for violating the NDA. You also sue in federal court. You now also have a class action pending in federal court to take away the NDA. The federal court action was also to negate the NDA. They, in typical Trump fashion, because you didn't know how to even proceed in the arbitration, they technically win the arbitration, but you appeal it, you win that, you win the federal court proceeding to get rid of the NDA. And now you have a class action pending to get rid of the NDA for everyone. And your discrimination case is still pending. Is that a somewhat good summary of the events in two minutes? You just condensed like four years of really, really intense fighting. But yes, very good job. And by the way, I did have that beautiful victory pro se

early on in 2018, where my state court judge for the discrimination claim said that my claims could stay in open court because they tried to push my entire lawsuit behind closed doors into a secret arbitration. But massive credit to my two lawyers that I brought on after I got this $50,000 judgment against me, David Bowles and Mari Josephson. They were responsible for getting that vacated in the first department in New York. Fast forward, like you said, I have a second class action going now, which is the one in which I got that beautiful judgment that this NDA in court, it's a court precedent, which is something that they have avoided because these are arbitration agreements. And it's an amazing story how this case got out of arbitration into court and there's a court precedent that the NDA is invalid. Thanks also to my expanded legal team with Protect Democracy who came on and is a massive part of that fight too. So now that we have that set up,

let's rewind a little bit. It's interesting. You and I, we discovered this yesterday, we're in the same class at George Washington University. We graduated the same year. We probably sat based on our last names somewhere in the same area. We took somewhat different paths and you had an acting career. I went, I did a law thing. I found myself in politics and you found your politics. Now we find ourselves on the same side, but at some point in, you know, right before the, you know, Trump started running, you found yourself, you know, in this Fox bubble and believing what Fox News was saying. And so you left a successful acting career to join the Trump campaign. So walk our viewers and listeners to like, how does that happen?

It is through deep mental malpractice on the right, through their media outlets and their constant propaganda. I went from being, you know, coming from a Republican family, but really considering myself a moderate and even pretty far left on some social issues. I mean, I wrote my high school thesis on why we should abolish the death penalty. So I'm not your classic Republican. But I went from 2008 being a supporter of Barack Obama in the primary to ultimately voting for John McCain, but then just gettingenses down to one word. And it is a word that we are dealing with right now on a global scale. And that word is freedom. And in my opinion, the right wing media has hijacked the freedom platform in the most vile way. Because as we saw through the Trump years, they propped up Trump, they did not call out his transgressions against democracy time after time. And they allowed their supporters to believe that following Trump was still following a candidate who believed and was supporting the cause of freedom. I got sucked in. I mean, they really, really vilify. You have to understand if you are not a Fox viewer and if you have family that that is and that watches, you know, that side, how how deep the mesmerism is into believing that the the other side, the Democrats are not just,

you know, they don't just have different policy views. They're evil. They want to destroy this country. They want to turn it into a communist state. I mean, it is very, very aggressive. And so despite my better angels, despite having a background in journalism, I mean, I literally as a journalist. And even with that background, caring about journalism, caring about press freedoms and human rights, I got sucked into believing that networks like Fox had moral authority to represent what our country stands for. You were on stage at our graduation. You gave Wolf Blitzer his honorary degree. I know. I remember that moment. I know. And to go from that to support Trump, it's terrible. But it is true what you say. CNN, MSNBC are doing whatever it is that they're doing. But you have Fox who are literally telling people you need to hate the Democrats, that the Democrats are not just wrong, according to Fox, but they are worse than our foreign enemies or they're equal to our. That's the message over and over again. And it's poison. Yes. Yes. And, you know, speaking of GW, I went to so many

journalism events when I was in college there. And one of them I remember was, I think it was International Women for Media Freedom. Correct. You know, I might be getting that wrong. But it was an event where we had, you know, these very respectable women journalists. It was right after a Russian journalist had been killed. And we know that Putin kills journalists. And just to I reflect back on that moment and remember that I literally went from that world and understanding what a country like Russia and a dictator like Putin is to during the Obama administration because of the propaganda of Fox News. I literally had more respect. This is so shameful. This is so shameful. But I literally, I'm telling you this for perspective, had more respect for Vladimir

Putin than I did for the Obama administration. That was the effect that that propaganda had on me, even with my background, even with the things that I care so deeply about. So understand, understand how aggressive, like I said, this mental malpractice that the right-wing media plays on its viewers is when you think about, oh, we have this divided country. We really don't have such a divided country. We just have half a country that's brainwashed and lied to constantly. And so with that propaganda, you go from writing at the GW Hatchet, shout out to the GW Hatchet, our school paper, and then you have your acting career and then you leave your acting career to join the Trump campaign in 2016. And then right away, as soon as you join, you kind of realize, what have I gotten myself into?

What is going on here? Describe the experience of working there and then, you know, your abrupt termination and exit from the Trump campaign? Well, it's currently, let me let you know, it's being litigated to this day. My state discrimination lawsuit, I think mine actually, as a litigant against the campaign, as a former employer, may be the only outstanding lawsuit to this day. But it's still being litigated to this day. I will give you a brief rundown. I was hired to work in the data department by an individual named Camillo Sandoval.

If you Google him, you'll see that he went on to Treasury, VA, and in and out of the White House, ending up as a federal chief information security officer in the final days of Trump's campaign. I happen to think this is a highly questionable individual who should be nowhere near data or government clearances. That said, I went to work for him in his data department. So I got to see how he worked on the backside. And this is a very, very controlling individual. He hired myself and another woman who happens to be a lingerie model with a very, very controlling individual. He hired myself and another woman who happens to be a lingerie model with a very large Instagram following to work in his data department, two,

you know, young, pretty women who have no background in data, and it was very clear that we were there to be his kind of mindless cheerleaders, and I guess his plan didn't go so well because a week or two in, I was asked to do a translation project by Steve Bannon and did very well on it. And Steve Bannon, of all people, promoted me to be the first Hispanic engagement director for the campaign. So he put me in charge of mobilizing a Hispanic engagement initiative that was pretty much dormant. And that became my job. And I was doing very well and trying to make the Trump campaign for diversity engagement something that it could never really be. But my idealized version, it was a very welcoming place and inclusive. I created a slogan for them, did bilingual literature, bilingual Twitter, engaged with, you know, several states where we were reaching out. Anyway, fast forward, this did not sit well with the man who hired me, Sandoval. And he launched an all-out assault on my character.

He told people that I was leaking Trump's taxes, that I was shopping bids to the media. He basically portrayed me like a spy and a criminal within this campaign. And I really did not. I was so naive as to who Donald Trump was, so ignorant as to his background and his MO that I thought that this Sandoval character was an anomaly and, you know, he was just this bad guy and I reported him to HR. Even the woman who replaced me in his data department had the same experience with him and was taken out of the department after two days. And they, in typical Trump fashion, you know, retaliated against me, banned me from Trump Tower, expelled me to Colorado, told people to keep me away from Donald Trump.

To try to give you just a sense of the weight that I felt at that time, a lot of this was going on on Access Hollywood weekend. And I just, I literally felt, I was so terrified. I was so afraid. And I felt like the weight of that presidential campaign was weighing on my shoulders to basically keep quiet. I lived with this for a year. I obviously did not get any job opportunities coming out of the Trump campaign. You know, I was PNG after this. But I lived under a very dark shadow for a year, just wanting to walk away and pretend like this never happened to me. And I ultimately came to kind of an existential moment in my life where I realized I couldn't move forward representing anything that I cared about as a human being, as a woman, if I did not take a stand about what happened. And so a year later, without having time to get a lawyer, without having money for a lawyer, I literally filed a pro se lawsuit against the Trump campaign.

And that was the beginning. So you bring the discrimination lawsuit. They claim that the state court case that you bring in the New York Supreme Court, for all those listening, the New York Supreme Court is the trial court in New York. The Trump campaign argues that should be subject to arbitration. And not only that, they sue you in an arbitration for breaching the non-disparagement agreement for filing the lawsuit. And at that time, you had a very small Twitter following of about 30 people and discussing that you filed the lawsuit. Not even yet. Not even yet. That was added later to their claim. The original claim was just the lawsuit. Just that you had filed a lawsuit. And you're a good pro se litigant, but you're not familiar with all of those processes.

So meanwhile, they're going in this private arbitration forum and almost sneakily getting a $50,000 judgment against you? What was going through your mind at that time when they then sued you? My goodness, my goodness. Well, I'll tell you, first of all, the suit against me was for $1.5 million. That was what the arbitration demand was. They served it to me on Christmas Eve. This is this is their style, you know, coal in your stockings is nothing compared to the hatred exuded, you know, expressed by these campaign and their actions. But it was it was terrifying. It was absolutely terrifying. Like, as you know, as a pro se litigant, I did not know all of my options. One option would have been to file a stay to this arbitration saying, please stay this pending the outcome of my state claims.

But I didn't I just you don't know what you don't know. I didn't know I could do that. And I felt like the way that I had to handle this was proactively. I thought that entering that arbitration in any fashion was going to be extremely dangerous. I thought that it would compromise my claims. I thought that all my claims from the state case, even if they weren't arbitrable, would be drawn into this behind closed door proceeding. And I just didn't know any better way than to avoid it altogether. So it was very daunting. I went to federal court, like you mentioned before, and filed my first iteration of a lawsuit to invalidate the NDA. And I, you know, rolled up my sleeves. And as I was trying very hard to get a lawyer who would take my case on contingency, like you said, I started a Twitter feed, very humble.

I had 32 followers. I had a small GoFundMe account. I mean, this was, this is, understand when you have this NDA, the catch-22 that I'm under. So here I am entirely alone, needing, I needed the publicity more than anything just to get representation. That's what I needed. Even at this point, you know, my story is mostly out in the lawsuit, at least the legal aspects of it. And I just need help. I need legal help. And so I do the most, you know, meager thing and start this little Twitter account and go fund me to try to get a lawyer or get money to pay a lawyer.

And they go after that in this secret arbitration that they have going on behind the scenes. And, you know, I had some I had some lawyer friends who couldn't represent me because they're in other jurisdictions kind of trying to, you know, help me as they could and guide me along. And everybody was saying, especially I had this one motion coming up in state court, which is the one I told you I won, where I had to argue to keep my claims out of the arbitration. And they told me, don't do don't file this motion on your own. You need to get a lawyer first, just get your extensions, get another extension and others. And it came down to the wire and I couldn't get any more extensions. And I just had to, I had to write that motion myself. And I did it. I, you know, did an all-nighter, wrote that motion, you know, put in everything about why this NDA did not apply to my case. And I went to court, just me and the Trump campaign lawyer. I had, you know, a little notepad with a couple notes on it. He had his transcript and was like reading like this from it. And the judge had to say,

Mr. McPartland, can you please put your head up? I can't hear you. And it was just, it was so beautiful because the words were like, I mean, to take you back to where I had to get as a human being, as a woman to file this lawsuit, I had to say, I had to almost take myself out of the picture and be like, this happened to some other woman. And I'm going to represent this other woman that this terrible thing happened to because it was too close to me. And I almost felt like, you know, who's going to care about me? You know, you have these self-doubt feelings. So when I went to court and I was, you know, had tried so hard to get a lawyer, I thought, OK, I'm going in there to represent this woman and represent what this woman is worth.

And so I just kind of, you know, took myself out of it. And it was it was a beautiful hearing. And like I said, I ended up winning that, which was, you know, set in motion a lot of the rest of the case. Now, the Trump NDA, for those who don't know, is it basically says anything that Donald Trump deems to be confidential, anything he feels is confidential should all of a sudden be confidential. And he's weaponized this NDA against his victims and against the victims of his companies for decades into his presidency. And so now we see, because of your court victories, people like Omarosa who signed the NDA.

And that's just a high profile example. But the class action that you brought, I mean, this is real legal jujitsu out there for those who don't know that you've been doing. I mean, you got an arbitration judgment against you set aside. You filed a state court action. You went to the Court of Appeals and state court to get that arbitration set aside. You filed a federal court case on your own behalf. You filed a class action federal case on behalf of all similarly situated people who signed the NDA. You won the federal case on your own behalf, but you're not done. Now your fight is on behalf of all the individuals similarly situated who have signed that NDA. So how do you have, with all that said, where are you finding the power and determination to do all of this as one individual? Because we have lots of followers out there and people who watch this who goes, I don't know if I can do it on my own. I'm not sure if I have the ability, but you didn't have a legal background and you're doing

all of this. Well, you know what? I'm so glad you asked me that question because every one of us has so much more power than we realize. We are so powerful. And this moment that we find ourselves in, you have to understand when I dropped, you know, I didn't drop my acting career. I'm an artist. I still want to act. When I put it on hold in 2016 to work for this campaign, you have to realize how much of a cause I thought I was joining. OK, I thought I was joining a cause to save America. That gaslit expression that Trump still uses to this day, realizing that I was so deceived that the up is down propaganda that is the same playbook that we're seeing that that Putin uses, the dictators use. I'm going into de-Nazify. Okay. This is the same playbook that Trump uses

about freedom. Trump is a dictator. Having lived this experience and realizing how I was deceived and going through this experience of this NDA, this weapon, like you've said, that he's used for decades to silence and intimidate people and create this facade of who he is. That is a total phony picture that is totally unreal that millions of Americans still so tragically believe in. How can I not how can I not use everything that I know to continue this fight and to encourage others? I mean, what I did was you have a lot of your followers, a lot of the people watching this probably have never heard of me, but what I've been doing is I've been using the legal system. I think the legal system in this moment in history has such a huge role to play in the future of our democracy.

And I say that specifically with regards to the criminal justice system. The duty of this generation of Americans is to demand that our justice system holds Donald Trump accountable for his crimes against this country. This isn't a political thing. This is his own followers are his victims. And I just want everybody to feel that glimmer of hope that I felt when I was a year later after having gone through this terrorizing experience on this campaign. And just feeling so crushed. And like,

I just wanted to walk away and learn from my own mistakes. And I realized I have a role in the world. It was just a very simple realization. My wellbeing matters to the whole universe. And as resistant as I was to taking action, I took that without any idea of how any of this legal jiu-jitsu, as you describe it, would play out without having any idea that I was going to be responsible for, you know, killing Trump's NDA that he used for decades. I just knew that I was doing what was right, the right thing in my own situation at the moment.

And look where it brought me. So I, we, each of us has so much power. And if we exercise that power, and, and, you know, bring it to bear upon our institutions. And, you know, I want, I want to say one other thing about about the Department of Justice and the possibility and the need for criminal charges against Donald Trump. They need to know that the American people are going to have their back. We've all seen Donald Trump bully and, you know, claim witch hunt when legitimate investigations and, you know, prosecute, you know, potential prosecutions into him are going on. We, the justice system needs to know that the American people have their back and we are not going to allow this false narrative that is attempting to, you know, make it so there's impunity for the largest, most defensive criminals against democracy be something that we're okay

with in America. I stepped forward, I jumped off that cliff and you can do it. You can do it too. And you step forward in the very, very, very beginning of everything. I'm curious, what do you make of the progression or rather the regression, I guess you could say, of Trump over these past few years? What do you think of the Donald Trump you're seeing right now doing these rallies, the things he's saying in comparison also to the guy who you knew back then? You know, in some ways it's a regression. In other ways, I think this is who he's always been. We all know that he surrounds himself with people who maybe at some times challenge him,

but ultimately, ultimately loyalists, quote unquote loyalists, people who tell him what he wants to hear are the people that he keeps close to him. Do you think at this point, all the people who may challenge him, do you think they've all basically been purged? And now it's just the most diehard sycophants who are next to him? Oh, sure. I think so. I mean, I think that I think that you need to think about the answer to that question in the context of a God forbid future presidential run. I mean, we we just narrowly averted, you know, almost an authoritarian takeover of the United States president. Trump had been reelected.

So, yes, it's extremely dangerous. It's extremely dangerous. One thing with my interactions with him, I had several, you know, one-on-one interactions with him. The man is morally insane, but he's not insane. He knows that his behavior is wrong. He knows that he lost the election. There's there's a quote that always sticks with me. If you remember in early 2020, right after the pandemic, Bob Woodward interviewed Trump.

And there were tapes that came out afterwards of their interviews. And one of the things that Bob Woodward said to Trump was, I think I know you pretty well now. And Trump said, you don't know me. You'll know me after the election. To me, that says everything you ever need to know about mens rea, about intent, about what is on his mind, about keeping himself in power, in control. This is not a leader of a free country. This is someone with a dictator's mentality. And the only way those people survive is by keeping close to them people that will sanction their behavior, no matter what it is. It's scary. I mean, it's really, really scary stuff. What would your message be to those still

in the Trump bubble, the Fox News bubble? How do we pull those people out? What's your message to them? My message is take your lives back. Take your lives back. We've all at this point heard reports of Russian soldiers who have not understood what they're going in to fight for in Ukraine. They say that we've been lied to. We've seen, you know, these images of Ukrainians giving them tea and them surrendering in that prison of war, talking about how he'd been lied to. And, you know, an image that came to me when I first saw that was something I've actually never seen again. I want to find this clip, but there was a young man who was interviewed outside the Capitol on January 6th and he was crying and he had tear gas in his eyes and he had been, I think he even had blood on him.

He had been very close to Ashley Babbitt when she was shot. And he said, we're just here. We're fighting for freedom. We're just here fighting for our country. And I as much as you can, you know, you know, we know all these January 6th rioters, they have different motivations, many issues. but they were used by Donald Trump. He didn't walk to the Capitol with them. They were used to do his bidding to, to literally they thought save their country. It's such a vile use of, of people's, you know, miss misguided good intentions. It's my message to these people is take your lives back. If you are a supporter

of Donald Trump and Donald Trump, or God forbid, his one of his children, his corrupt children ends up in the White House, there's going to be there's going to come a time when the interest of your family, the interest of someone you love comes up against his interest. And you are going to have to learn the hard way and listen to us who have suffered and experienced this. You're going to have to learn the hard way that he will do anything to destroy you to preserve his interests. That is not a leader. That is not a president, not a dealmaker, not a good businessman, not an American. Donald Trump might have been born in this country. I think he's the most foreign president we've ever had. So take your lives back, be a patriot,

stand up for freedom and realize that you've been lied to. That's been a major theme of this episode. Don't tell someone you love them and then vote for someone or support someone who ultimately will hurt them. Jessica Denson, thank you so much for joining us on the Midas Touch podcast. One of the most interesting stories of courage in the face of Trump tyranny you may never have heard until now. Jessica Denson, thank you for joining us on the podcast. Thank you so much for having me. It's been great. Welcome back to the Midas Touch podcast.

Jessica Benson's story needs to be told more. I can't believe that we are the first people to really interview Jessica about this. I think her story is fascinating. And I love that she spoke out from the beginning. She was was like basically day one realized, oh, this is like a corrupt enterprise with evil intentions and they're doing bad things. And she spoke out and she's still speaking out. And even though she won personally, that wasn't enough for her. Now she's trying to protect all the other people

who were put under these NDAs who want to speak out, who want to be able to say things without having to go through what she's gone through, go through the monetary loss, the loss of time, the emotional damage, everything else that she's had to experience as a result of this. And I think that's to be respected and commended. I think that's really, really, really, really cool. Absolutely. One of the most intriguing things to me, it really just shows you that it's not just the folks who aren't college educated who get duped by Trump. She's a very intelligent person.

Ben, you guys were in the same graduating class. You said she gave an award to Wolf Blitzer on your commencement day or whatnot. That's incredible. But it just goes to show how manipulative Fox News, Rupert Murdoch, and that Trump bubble can really be. And once it gets the grips on you, man, it's hard to shake. And so just shout out to her for getting out. You know, and speaking about the grips that it gets on you, I mean, and Jessica, obviously very highly educated. I mean, she's brilliant.

And I'm so glad that she's standing up for people. But Jordy, you and I had the experience. I'm not going to give the individual's name, but it caused us to... I called her daddy. had the experience, I'm not going to give the individual's name, but it caused us to, I called him daddy. You know, you, we called, and again, I don't want to give this person's name, but this is how the conversation with me and this individual started. They texted me and they said, fight me. And then they sent me a Joe Biden meme that says, dementia my ass. I've always been this dumb. And then I responded.

And I don't respond to a lot of these because I get so many. Mostly love. But this one I responded to just because I saw his picture. And it looked like just like a nice person. It didn't look like it was some random troll account. It looked like just a kid. And then I said, you want me to fight you? And then he wrote, you have no political knowledge. Stay out of it. And I wrote, out of what? Then he wrote, stop acting so fucking dumb and innocent. You should be banned from the United

States and talking politics for your entire life. I hope you enjoy paying $100 at the gas pump. And I responded, thanks for the DM with his name. And then he goes, I'm always here to educate you. So that was four days ago. Four days passed. Then I get a message. I'm sorry for what I've said. And I said, it's okay. And then he said, man, listen, I'm mad at the time. And I never meant anything. I didn't mean to hurt you guys. I hope we can move forward. I told Jordy I was sorry too. It was the first time I realized Jordy was somehow involved in this.

We were all getting messages. We were all getting messages from the same person. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I guess I engaged in Jordy. I wrote, great, no worries. I said, didn't hurt me. I get about a thousand messages of love and support each day and about five to 10 that are pretty harsh and mean. And then even a few that are death threats and just very hostile.

I am okay with it as long as it's free speech and a good old fashioned criticism and ribbing is fine. I wrote, I'm sure you'd be surprised if we ever chatted that our views may not be all that different. Lots of people make stuff up about me and my brothers, but we are pretty just pro democracy in our views, but also support workers and believe people should be treated well, have a good paying job, get healthcare, be able to live the American dream. There really is very little that is radical about any of my views. He goes, I understand. Is Jordy mad at me? Now I'm thinking what's going on. He goes, because my dad asked me about something and I'm scared.

And I promised it won't happen again. First off, Jody, call him the dads is my move. I know. I totally took a page. That's what I realized. Jody called his daddy. So I, so I called his dad and I just want to frame, he's not, he's not a 12. Ben called him a kid. He's not 14. This kid is this adult man child has a full grown beard in his profile picture. I won't say his name. He's probably what, 18 or 19? No, he's probably like 26 to 35, that sort of range. And by the way, the messages he sent to you were tame in comparison to what he was sending to me. I mean, just like really, really egregious stuff that he even deleted before I could take a screenshot of it. I think he gave up by the time he got to me.

Because so once I heard that you had a conversation and Ben had a conversation with him, I thought I'm going to feel left out if I didn't get some hate from this too. Like I must have, right? I was going to genuinely feel bad about it. Like he must like, what, I'm the reject here? I don't get the hate too? This is what my brothers do?

So I go and I check out my DMs. And of course I had one waiting there for me and I'm reading it now. It said, you want to fight? Which I think how he started yours off. And I already knew what you all had been through with him. So I said this, I said, Hey, I know times are tough and sometimes that can make people scared and angry. I completely understand. So his name, I'm going to assume you just aren't quite sure how to process your pain and your frustrations. And completely understand. So his name, I'm going to assume you just aren't quite sure how to process your pain and your frustrations. And I understand that, but I hope that you're able to find some inner peace during these times. And he responded back to me the next day. No. And he just said, I'm sorry, man. And I never responded after that. But what forces this, what forces the

apology though, is when you push back, it wasn't just our kind words to start this dialogue with this lunatic. I had to, and I mean, this kid is just, this adult man child, just the dumbest person, his name, he's a junior. His dad has the same name and his dad owns a company and he works for his dad's company. So all I did was plug into Facebook, this kid's name, adult man child's name, and his dad's company. So all I did was plug into Facebook, this kid's name, adult man, child's name, and his dad popped up right away, liked his picture. So I called the company, called the dad. And then that's why he apologized to all of us. I don't want to make it like this kid, adult man, child has done this out of any goodwill, but at least it opened up a

dialogue and a space for us. But here's the thing. And this is where Brett, this was where Brett's about to hit. I think though, which is I'm not, I'm not, we're not talking about this person's experience. We get so many experiences like this, but it speaks to the control of, of Fox,

the control of these cultures of hate and these people saying, you know, really radicalizing these, these people, kids, these people saying, you know, really radicalizing these, these people, kids, men, women, you know, who are turning, who, who, who are, who are turning their hate towards us and to others in a way that's just so weird, Brett. And so I know, I think you were going to speak. Yeah, no, it actually was a little weirded out by the fact that I knew exactly where I was going with it. But I guess we do this podcast pretty often. But I'll add to that, that it's just like, I mean, I implore you.

I mean, you've heard this podcast. We've been speaking for a while today. Find me anything where we've said anything disrespectful. Find me anywhere where we've spread hate, where we've spread lies, where we've encouraged division. We don't do that at Midas Touch. Yet there is this view on the right and on Fox News and Tucker Carlson and all these people who will view us as being divisive because we speak out against hate, because we speak out

against intolerance. But intolerance against intolerance is not intolerance. If somebody does something bad, you should be able to speak out against it without then you being like, why are you being so mean that you're speaking out against the guy and calling him a bad person because he wants to... Like you're trying to cancel me. I'm not trying to cancel you. I'm criticizing you because you said racist things. How dare you think that's me trying to cancel you? If you say good things and funny things, I'll go and I'll say, hey, I enjoyed that episode. I enjoyed that show.

But when I see something wrong, I'm going to confront it. And that's not canceling you, especially not canceling you if you have a platform of millions and millions of people also for me to criticize you and say, you know what? That's wrong. You support Vladimir Putin. That's wrong. You say racist things and horrible things. That's wrong. And you should correct that and not do that. Oh, cancel culture. Cancel culture's coming for me. No, it's not cancel culture coming for you. You're supporting someone who wants to cancel what makes America truly a special country. You are trying to cancel tolerance.

You are trying to cancel love and harmony amongst us. You're the cancel culture artist. You're being criticized for it. Brett, that's right. Intolerance against intolerance is not intolerance. On that note, Brett, tell us about our partner, Thesis. Yeah. And I think we're on fire today because of Thesis, by the way. I think it's just, I feel focused. Listen, I mean, how many unread emails do you have sitting in your inbox? I know

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I'm having trouble getting out of bed. They'll provide you with exactly what you need to help those issues. It's been a godsend for me. So that's takethesis.com slash Midas, M-E-I-D-A-S. Make sure you use that URL to let them know that we sent you. And Ben, Jordy- I'm glad you said URL and not Earl. No, it's not an Earl, Ben. It's not an Earl. But let me tell you, as we approach the midterms, the GOP is going to put a higher and a higher emphasis on the costs that Americans are facing. And I think we need to be cognizant that Americans are being hit hard right now. I mean, we're being asked to make a lot of sacrifices after two years plus of making sacrifices. And by

the way, COVID is still with us. I know people are acting like COVID is gone. There are waves right now in Europe springing up. There are waves in China happening that are shutting down cities and hurting the supply chain again. And those waves are going to come to us. They're going to come right back here. So we've been asked to sacrifice. We're still sacrificing. But what I won't accept are Republicans acting like they are the ones who are going to save us from high costs. Because let's talk about costs and let's talk about who's actually put forward legislation to help about costs and let's talk about who's actually put forward legislation to help with costs and who's put forward the legislation,

comments or whatever to actually hurt Americans. Because all I know is the Democrats spent basically all year trying to pass the Build Back Better bill, which would have lowered costs, free childcare, paid leave, universal pre-K, free community college. It would have extended the child tax credits. It would have capped insulin at $35 a year, expanded Medicare, increased healthcare subsidies, tax credits for clean energy. Every Republican voted against that. Those provisions, every single one, would be helping Americans tremendously right now. Tremendously.

We're also coming up right now. It's just about the one year anniversary of the American Rescue Plan, President Biden's first major piece of legislation. Every Republican voted against the American Rescue Plan. To be clear, the American Rescue Plan lowered taxes for working families. It gave funding to schools to deal with the pandemic, funding for the vaccination effort, which now has over 75% plus of Americans fully vaccinated. It sent checks to every American. Look at every bill out there.

Look at everything out there. I think you are being intellectually dishonest. I think it is journalistic malpractice if a Republican goes on a show to complain about inflation or to complain about gas prices and not be asked about those votes and why they did not support any of those immediate cost-cutting benefits that would be directly helping you and your family and your loved ones. And it just seems that time and time again, every time Democrats introduce bills, they're to help people. Democrats are like, how can we make your healthcare costs lower? How can we cap insulin? And when the GOP introduces bills, it's how can

we make your pregnancy illegal? How can we lock you up? How can we restrict your freedoms? How can we take away your right to vote? The contrast couldn't be more clear. And we need to constantly be spreading the message about who is really trying to help. And you might have, oh, but Democrats have power of the presidency and the Senate and the House of Representatives, and they didn't get X, Y, and Z done. Well, first, they did get a ton done. It actually has been a historically successful first couple of years, despite the fact that we couldn't pass some of these major pieces of legislation. But then we have to be honest about how government works.

And when you need two thirds of the Senate to pass a bill and you have 50 senators on a good day to pass those bills with really one or two that aren't even quite full Democrats to vote with you, and you have a filibuster that those people are not willing to subvert, you have to run to the reality is government. And so you have two options. You have, okay, I'm not going to vote. I'm going to vote for more Democrats so we could actually pass these things that they've been working their asses off to pass, or I'm going to elect more Republicans that when they get into power, they're going to work their asses off to turn America

into a Russia-style autocratic nation. Those are your options. So don't reward this bad behavior. I'm tired of the rewarding of this bad behavior. I'm tired of the rewarding of this bad behavior and these autocrats who want to bring us into the dark ages. There's this incredible quote that I read. I hadn't heard it before from a Instagram account, voters for like the number four equality. And the quote was, and I mentioned it on the interview before, was, don't tell someone you love them and then vote for someone who will hurt them. It really resonated with me. I haven't heard it said so succinctly before, because I think, unfortunately, you have to come to the sad realization that if it's a husband or wife or significant

other or brother or sister or coworker, if they're voting for someone and they're proud to support that person or just support that person and be proud to, whose policies can directly kill you, whose policies will harm you, whose policies won't recognize you as a human being, whose policies will strip you of your dignity, who will put you in danger. You have to look at that person in the eyes and say, you don't love me. You don't care about me. You don't respect me. You may say you do. You may continue to be around me. It may make you feel good to be around me, but your actions show that you hate me. And that's really sad. And so when I fight for democracy, when I go on these podcasts, whether you're Democrat or Republican, I'm looking for policies that support humanity,

that push us forward and help people be happy, that tries to find a more perfect solution, that tries to fix the problems of the past. And when I think about what Midas Touch stands for, and when I think about, and Brett, we talked about this at the very beginning, and Jordi, we talked about this at the very beginning, the labels. For me, it's about pro-democracy. It's pro-love. It's pro-compassion. It's pro being anti-hate, anti-racism, anti-sexism, anti-discrimination against the LGBTQ plus community. That's, that's where I stand because, you know, when I, um, no, there's, there's a song that I heard recently. It's a country song. The lyrics are, I'm in a hurry to, I'm in a hurry and don't know why, when all I gotta do is live and die. Like, why am I at the end of the day, we share this very short time together on, on planet earth. And so why are you supporting policies and people who use that short period of time to

spread hate and not love it's beside me for money for a short period of time to spread hate and not love. It's beside me for money, for a short period of material wealth, because it makes you feel strong, because it makes you feel a part of something. That's how you're spending your time, your short life to hate others. That's sad. That's why I'm so grateful to have the platform of Midas Touch and all of your support. And really, really, I mean this. I mean this. When you turn off this podcast, go and do something. It could be small. It could be big. It could be big, it could be violent, it could be whatever. Just do something that will help spreading the message of pro-democracy. Jordy? I'll tell you, I'm just tossing to me about Wondery. I'm just spreading something. And as we close the show out-

You should start going into a Wondery read. In 2007. in 2007 as we as we close we should keep that in the pod too it's funny as we as we as we close we close the pod jordan you can tell them about the podcast that everybody should i mean they should really they should really listen to this seriously please listen to this podcast. No, seriously, please listen to this podcast. In 2007, two roommates rented out an air mattress to strangers to earn extra money. Their little experiment turned into Airbnb and exploded into a worldwide phenomenon with rentals in over 100,000 cities. But one of those cities didn't want anything to do with the startup. New York. Business Wars is a podcast from Wondery that examines the world's biggest company rivalries and how the outcomes of these battles shape what we buy and how we live.

In a new season, Airbnb versus New York City, hear how the battle with the city became a symbol of struggle between startups and regulators. As Airbnb hosts realized how lucrative this side hustle could be, it quickly expanded to include entire apartments, luxury units, and even castles. Soon, real estate speculators were snapping up properties left and right to rent out on Airbnb. But rather than make money for regular people as it promised, Airbnb began to limit New York's already short supply of affordable housing. Angry renters complained so much that New York City officials decided to do something about it. But Airbnb wasn't going down without a fight.

What I love about this podcast, there's a lot of different twists and turns. You really don't know who to root for, the startup, the big guy, the city. Hey, check it out. It is suspenseful as heck. Listen to Business Wars on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, or you can listen ad-free

by joining OneTree Plus in the Wondery app. Thank you, everyone. Thank you. Great, great ad-reader. I love Wondery. So definitely really check that out. They do an incredible job immersing you in the narrative. It's fun.

It's educational. It's inspirational. Did you guys like how I changed my inflection from the start? Yeah, it was great. You made your voice really deep. I was great. Great, great inflection. Thanks, guys.

Thank you, everybody, for listening to this episode of the Midas Touch podcast. We hope you enjoyed it. We did tell you it was going to be a great one. Special thanks to our sponsors, Buck Mason, Athletic Greens, Thesis, Grove Collaborative, and Wondery Business Wars. Thank you to our guest, Jessica Denson, for all of her work and inspirational footwork and the fights that she has and the success she has beating Trump in court. I want to thank all the Midas Mighty. Check out the Midas Mighty merch store, the Midas Touch merch store, and definitely get all the Midas Touch gear as we head into the summer. You just go to store.midastouch.com. Again, it's store.midastouch.com. We'll see you next time on the Midas Touch podcast, where truth is golden. Shout out to the Midas Mighty.