The MeidasTouch Podcast - Trump Gets CRUSHED by PECKER at Trial

Episode Date: April 26, 2024

On this episode of the MeidasTouch Podcast: Pecker sticks it to Trump in more devastating trial testimony; The Supreme Court hears arguments on presidential immunity and reproductive rights; President Biden lands another major labor endorsement; Arizona indicts Trump co-conspirators; and more! Ben and Brett break it all down! Deals from our sponsors! Fast Growing Trees: Head to https://www.fast-growing-trees.com/collections/sale?utm_source=YouTube&utm_medium=show+notes&utm_campaign=meidastouch right now and use code MEIDAS at checkout to get 15% off your entire order! Smileactives: Visit https://Smileactives.com/meidas today to receive a special Buy-One-Get-One-Free offer! Henson Shaving: Visit https://hensonshaving.com/meidas to pick the razor for you and use code MEIDAS for two years worth of free blades! Naked Wines: To get Naked Wines' 6 bottle for $39.99 offer, head to https://NakedWines.com/MEIDAS and use code MEIDAS for both the code AND password. NetSuite: Do you know your own numbers for your business? Download NetSuite’s ultimate KPI checklist right now at https://netsuite.com/meidas Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/lights-on-with-jessica-denson On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://podcasts.apple.com/za/podcast/coalition-of-the-sane/id1741663279 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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We will break it down. It was far more explosive than I even expected. We should talk about what went down in the United States Supreme Court, where Donald Trump's lawyers argued for absolute presidential immunity, arguing that Donald Trump or anyone who holds the office of the presidency should be able to sell nuclear secrets, take foreign bribes, overthrow free and fair elections, lead coups, order the military to kill political opponents. If you don't believe me, I'll show you all of the clips where Donald Trump's lawyer argued precisely that. At the same time, that was going on in Manhattan and that was going on before the United States Supreme Court in Washington, D.C. Also in New York, in federal court, Judge Louis Kaplan handed down an order denying Donald Trump's

motion for new trial in the E. Jean Carroll matter after Donald Trump was hit with a recent judgment for defamation, and this was a very, very powerful ruling. We'll go through what Judge Kaplan said. Let's talk about what went down in Arizona, where the Attorney General Chris Mays handed down and unsealed a grand jury indictment of those who aided and abetted Donald Trump in attempts to overthrow the results of the election in Arizona, a real powerful indictment there. Biden also received some good news in Pennsylvania where Donald Trump received some bad news in Pennsylvania. Believe it or not, there were still some primaries taking place and the same trend we've been seeing over and over again that the media refuses to report on for reasons that may or may not be clear. Biden exceeding expectations,

Donald Trump performing lower than expectations. In Pennsylvania, you had Nikki Haley receiving over 100,000, close to 150,000 votes in a closed Republican primary. What are the implications of that? We'll discuss. Also, President Biden received a major new union endorsement. We'll talk about that and more. This is the Midas Touch podcast. Brett, how are you doing? Jordy is off for the day. Sorry for all of the Jordy fans. You're stuck with Brett and myself. And I'm especially apologizing because you probably have all seen a lot of me today. YouTube through to one of our live broadcasts, whether it was the Supreme Court, the Manhattan Criminal Trial, breaking news updates. I haven't fully left this chair, but it's an honor to spend it with all of you in the Midas Mighty. Brett, how are you? I hope you're getting up to stand once in a while, Ben, though. Walk around a little bit, move your legs. No, not at all.

Watching you today, though, go like a marathon. I'm really starting to think, though, that we may need just a 24-7 Midas streaming channel at this rate. But just honestly, seeing the work that you've been doing all day, seeing the work of our incredible team, Salty, Jeremy, Sydney, everybody here over at the Midas Touch Network, absolutely just crushing it, putting on these broadcasts all day. So I want to make sure I start out the show today, giving you and them a tremendous shout out for keeping up this incredible coverage.

I know in the past 24 hours, it seems as if we have gotten enough legal news specifically and news in general to last months at this point. But we're going to try to break it all down for you in this hour or so today here on the Midas Touch podcast. We got a lot to cover and a lot of truly massively consequential legal cases. Ben, where do you want to start? I'll give a quick shout out to Hayden as well and to all of our correspondents as well. I think we start in Washington, D.C. because I want to highlight the lack of normalcy in the times that we are living in and those who also appease the lack of normalcy in these existing times. Now, I went to law school at this point, oh, at over 15 years ago. And if you told me that there would be a former president of the United States arguing before the United States Supreme Court that he should be able to kill,

to murder, to assassinate his political opponent, to steal and sell nuclear codes to stage a coup, I would probably tell you that I have no clue what in the world you are talking about. You must be punking me. This can't possibly be real. Is this an onion headline? What in the world is going on? But as I said in the introduction, let me show you that this is precisely the arguments that Donald Trump made to the United States Supreme Court earlier in the day where his lawyer said Trump should be able to assassinate political opponents, official acts. Trump should be able to create fraudulent elector slates. Official acts, they argue, Trump should be able to sell nuclear secrets to foreign adversaries. Official acts, they say, Trump should be able to stage a coup. Official acts, they say,

this is so absurd. And before just even playing you these clips, I just want to talk some common sense with y'all. We, the people, in creating this union that became the United States of America, rejected the concept of absolute immunity. It existed. It was called kings and authoritarians. And this great American experiment, our constitution, the very essence, the reason for our being was a rejection of this concept. What are we talking about? We, the people, not we submit to kings. We, the people, no one is above the law. That was the beacon that the United States used to represent. And it's why we create the Midas Touch Network to preserve and protect the democracy, our democracy. We, the people, deserve that. This isn't a complicated concept. You know, when I heard for hours, and we covered it here on the Midas Touch Network, the arguments that were being made. Well, you know, the structural safeguards and the structural this and the double jeopardy. No!

Our very essence, the foundation of our democracy, our country, is rooted in this most basic principle. This isn't up for debate. And the fact that this was even being debated or discussed, I just want to say, wake up. That's not the United States. This is embarrassing and a travesty to our great country that this is even before the Supreme Court. And the fact that there even appears to be Supreme Court justices who are open to these arguments of absolute immunity from kings just goes to show you that everything they're saying, everything they're doing, how do we have any belief in their credibility when this most basic foundational principle that we grew up with is being challenged so callously, so cavalierly. Let's take a look. This is where

Justice Sotomayor, one of the pro-democracy justices on the bench, talked about, started asking questions. So let me show you what Sotomayor, Justice Kagan, another pro-democracy justice. Here's what Sotomayor said. So what if a president decides to order a military assassination of their rival? Watch Trump's lawyer's response. Play the clip. Now, I think, and your answer below, I'm going to give you a chance to say if you stay by it, if the president decides that his rival is a corrupt person and he orders the military or orders someone to assassinate him, is that within his official acts for which he can get immunity? It would depend on the hypothetical, but we can see that

could well be an official act. It could, and why? Because he's doing it for personal reasons. He's not doing it like President Obama is alleged to have done it, to protect the country from a terrorist. He's doing it for personal gain. And isn't that the nature of the allegations here? That he's not doing them, doing these acts in furtherance of an official responsibility. He's doing it for personal gain. I agree with that characterization of the indictment, and that confirms immunity. Because the characterization is that there's a series of official acts that were done for an awful lot of people. No, because immunity says even if you did it for personal gain, we won't hold you responsible. What do you, how could that be? That's an extremely strong

doctrine in this court's case law in cases like Fitzgerald? Well, we go back to Justice Thomas's question. He's saying, in layman's terms, yes, that's an official act. A president can order the assassination of their political rival and it can't be challenged. Here, Justice Sotomayor says, what about creating fraudulent slates of electors? Is Trump okay with that? Are you okay with that? You get immunity for that? Watch the response. What is plausible about the president insisting in creating a fraudulent slate of electoral candidates? Assuming you accept the facts of the complaint on their face, is that plausible that that would be within his right to do? Absolutely, Your Honor.

We have the historical precedent we cite in the lower courts of President Grant sending federal troops to Louisiana and Mississippi in 1876 to make sure that the Republican electors got certified in those two cases which delivered the election to Rutherford B. Hayes. The notion that it's completely implausible, I think, just can't be supported based on the face of this indictment. Knowing that the slate is fake, knowing that the slate is fake, that they weren't actually elected, that they weren't certified by the state, he knows all those things. The indictment itself alleges, I dispute that characterization, the indictment affixes the word label to the so-called fraudulent electors. It affixes the word fraudulent,

but that's a complete mischaracterization. On the face of the indictment, it appears that there was no deceit about who had emerged from the relevant state conventions, and this was being done as an alternative basis. Trump's lawyer says, absolutely, and then cites something that has nothing to do with it at all, but says absolutely, Brett. And here's the thing. Like literally yesterday, the fake electors in Arizona were indicted for basically doing exactly what Donald Trump's attorney there said was absolutely okay to do. And none of these arguments to me make any sense. All of them seem just so incredibly offensive and so opposite of all American values that are out there. And the most basic way of thinking about this, in my opinion, is if we have laws, if we have a rule of law that is designed to facilitate the peaceful transfer of power, which is what the United States of America was built on. And if those are our laws, how could there possibly be an exemption for the one individual who is in charge of facilitating that transfer of power, the then president of the United States?

We're seeing what's happening here, and we all know what's going on. It's that Trump is terrified of being prosecuted for his crimes. So what's he doing? He's working backwards from how do I get off of this to find reasoning. But instead, all they're doing is they're kind of creating this complete fiction of what the law is. And my mouth throughout this entire Supreme Court hearing today, my jaw was just dropped listening to a lawyer argue these things that are so fundamentally anti-American in the United States Supreme Court. And not only that, listening to some of these right-wing justices kind of humor these ideas like Alito.

It was completely bizarre and horrifying, quite frankly. I saw one commentator say, so let me get this straight. A president of the United States like President Biden can't forgive student loan debt. The Supreme Court said that that's unlawful. That's an overreach of your executive functions. But you can do fraudulent slates of electors and assassinate political opponents and sell nuclear secrets and stage a coup. And that's why when I look at the Supreme Court, the right-wing justices, not the justices who were playing Euclipsa, who are questioning Trump's lawyers, how do you say that they have any credibility at all? Just use that example. President Biden, they say, is overreaching, overreaching when he forgives student loan debt. Donald Trump, go ahead, murder your political opponent. All good. Nothing we can do about them. It's absurd. It's offensive. I don't care what political party you're from. We are still we the people, a nation of laws, not a nation of an authoritarian.

This isn't Saddam Hussein's Iraq. This isn't the Ayatollahs of Iran. This is not Kim Jong-un. This is not Gaddafi walking around throwing people bread. Give me bread, Gaddafi. Give me bread. Oh, my God. No, we're the United States of America, damn it. Let's act like it. Let's act like it.

This is Justice Kagan asking Trump's lawyer, what about, you know, can the president steal nuclear secrets and sell them to foreign adversaries? Well, if they're structured as official acts, I guess you could, is what Trump's lawyer says. Play the clip. If a president sells nuclear secrets to a foreign adversary, is that immune? That sounds like, similar to the bribery example, likely not immune. Now, if it's structured as an official act, he would have to be impeached and convicted first before. What does that mean if it's structured as an official act? Well, I don't know in the hypothetical whether or not that would be an official act. You probably

have to have more details to apply the blazing game analysis or even the Fitzgerald analysis that we've been talking about. By the way, what Trump's lawyer is doing, it's not smart. He's not saying smart words. He's just saying garbled word salad. I mean, he says that with a degree of confidence, but he just throwing it in Fitzgerald and blasting game and structure it and blast a game and you structure it. You're not even saying words. You're not making any sense. It's not a good oral argument. I don't even know what he's talking about. I'm listening to his words to try to come up with a coherent thread of what he's even- Structure it how? Structure it how? Tell me. Structure it how? Blassingame says that Donald Trump can be sued civilly because his conduct regarding January 6th involved campaign activity.

Fitzgerald, Nixon v. Fitzgerald was a civil case involving a lawsuit filed by Fitzgerald for retaliation against Richard Nixon after Nixon left office. I mean, you're just saying case names. And then like, well, President Grant in 18, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You're just saying names and dates. Again, there's nothing there that's even logical here. Justice Kagan says, well, what about if the president orders the military to stage a coup? Are you okay with that? The answer should be no. You can't stage a coup. No, you can't assassinate a political opponent. No, you can't sell nuclear secrets. put, you interpose Fitzgerald, and then you take blasting game and you combine it. And then you also talk about the structural issues and you take the structural issues and you talk about president Grant in 1850. And did you know that George Washington,

he sent a letter and George Washington's letter was very similar to the letter that Benjamin Franklin sent. It was a Benjamin Franklin letter. And so if you take a look at what Benjamin, what are you talking about? That's what it was listening to. It's like, we're the United States of America. We don't have kings. We don't have authoritarians. Shut it down.

What are you talking about? Play this clip about whether or not a president can stage a coup. Play this clip. How about if a president orders the military to stage a coup? I think that, as the Chief Justice pointed out earlier, where there is a whole series of, you know, sort of guidelines against that, so to speak, like the UCMJ prohibits the military from following a plainfully unlawful act. If one adopted Justice Alito's test, that would fall outside. Now, if one adopts, for example, the Fitzgerald test that we advanced, that might well be an official act, and he would have to be, as I'll say in response to all these kinds of hypotheticals, has to be impeached and convicted before he can be criminally prosecuted. But I emphasize to the court— Well, he's gone, let's say, this president who ordered the military to stage a coup.

He's no longer president. He wasn't impeached. He couldn't be impeached. But he ordered the military to stage a coup. He's no longer president. He wasn't impeached. He couldn't be impeached. But he ordered the military to stage a coup. And you're saying that's an official act? I think it would depend on the circumstances where there was an official act. If it were an official act, again, he would have to be impeached. What does that mean, depend on the circumstances? He was the president. He is the commander in chief. He talks to his generals all the time. And he told the generals, I don't feel like leaving office. I want to stage a coup.

Is that immune? If it's an official act, there needs to be impeachment and conviction beforehand because the framers viewed that kind of very low risk. If it's an official act, is it an official act? If it's an official act, it's impeached. Is it an official act? On the way you've described that hypothetical, it could well be. I just don't know. Again, it's a fact-specific, context-specific determination. That answer sounds to me as though it's like, yeah, under my attest, it's an official act, but that sure sounds bad, doesn't it? Well, it certainly sounds very bad, and that's why the framers have a whole series of structural checks that have successfully for the last 234 years prevented that very kind of extreme hypothetical. All the words that he used there is to say, yes, he believes that Donald Trump could stage a coup and that may well be an official act, to quote him. That may well be an official act. In what world is staging a coup may well be an official?

It's the craziest thing for an attorney to argue. And then he goes on and argues that in order for there to be some sort of criminal prosecution, and this was maybe even like the most offensive part of his argument to me, that the individual needs to be impeached and convicted in order for that to happen. It's so offensive, especially because Trump's own lawyers, Trump's lawyers during the impeachment proceedings argued that whether or not he was impeached and convicted, whether or not he was convicted in the impeachment trials during the Senate impeachment trials, it wouldn't matter because he could still be prosecuted in the court of law. Now we have his attorneys arguing the exact opposite, that you need one to have the other.

And we all know what our government is like right now. We all see how divided our government is and how divided it's been for a long time. People aren't going to be getting impeached and convicted when they're in the White House for a long time. And to make that the standard, to say you could commit a coup, and unless the same people who view you like a cult leader decide to vote you out, you could become a king. Basically what it's saying is as long as you have the presidency and the Senate, you could do whatever you want, right? As long as you have the presidency and the Senate, dictator. I mean that's all it takes. You just need the two things and then you're good.

And their whole concept though of like the structural safeguards when he says, well, the structural safeguards that have worked for 230 years. But your argument is that the president's entitled to absolute immunity. So your structural safeguard argument is actually that the structural safeguard doesn't exist because you're saying he's absolute immunity. Yeah, you're arguing to destroy the safeguards. Exactly. You're saying that there is no safeguard at all. And then one of the questions were like, well, what happens if you discover the crime

after the person leaves the office? So you couldn't go through impeachment and conviction. Under Trump's theory, you get off. You're free and clear. If you can conceal it and if you can hide it. Everyone knows if you steal the money from the bank, as long as you make it outside of the bank, you're good. I think that at least five of the justices are going to do something that's problematic here. I don't want to blow, you know, you know, you know, give you all lollipops and sunshine as I think that was the word. Low smoke and sunshine or something.

Yeah, exactly. Like, like I, I, I don't want to just make it sound like, well, ha, well, clearly Trump's going to lose. No, I mean, I think that there are five justices, right-wing justices on there, MAGA justices and other right-wing justices, who I think are going to remand this to the district court, send it back for individual analysis on each of the acts themselves and to determine, is this official or is this outside? Is this an official act? Was this a private act? And I think they'll say, actually, if it's an official act, you get immunity. If it's not an official act, you don't. Now, I could be wrong. And ultimately, the court can decide that categorically, you're not entitled to absolute presidential immunity. I just think after hearing Justice Roberts and Clarence Thomas and hearing Gorsuch and Kavanaugh and especially Alito, Alito and Thomas are great with just the dictatorship. They are so cool with Saddam Hussein. Their whole plan behind the Federalist Society was basically looking at countries that failed, looking at failed leaderships, looking at Gaddafi, Saddam, Kim Jong-un, and saying, you know what? What we mean by conservative is not actually conserving American institutions. We want to conserve the Ba'ath Party in Iraq. We want to conserve Kim Jong-un in North Korea. We want to conserve what Gaddafi did.

We want actually the whole fraud of conservatism, guess what? To conserve the monarch in disguise. So conservatism actually wasn't conserving our democracy apparently under now how it's being utilized. It was actually to conserve the monarch, to conserve the king, to conserve the authoritarian. This at the same time, by the way, that oral argument was taking place in the Supreme Court. You had a federal judge in New York deny Donald Trump's motion for a new trial in the E. Jean Carroll case where E. Jean Carroll prevailed and Trump was hit with a defamation verdict over $80 million. And let me just read for you the first paragraph from a federal judge about Donald Trump's

conduct and what a jury of Donald Trump's peers found not once but twice. This is from federal judge Lewis Kaplan. The jury in a closely related case tried previously found that Donald Trump forcibly sexually abused plaintiff E. Jean Carroll in the mid-1990s and maliciously defamed her in an October 2022 statement. In this case, another jury awarded Ms. Carroll $17.3 million in compensatory damages and $65 million in punitive damages against Mr. Trump for defaming her in two other statements that Mr. Trump issued from the White House. Mr. Trump now moves for a new trial or alternatively for judgment as a matter of law. The opinion goes on to say Mr. Trump's malicious and unceasing attacks on Ms. Carroll were disseminated to more than 100 million people. They included public threats and personal attacks, and they

endangered Ms. Carroll's health and safety, a woman who he had sexually abused. The jury was entitled to find that the degree of reprehensibility of Mr. Trump's conduct was remarkably high, perhaps unprecedented, castigating Carroll from the loudest bully pulpit in America and possibly the world. Through his courtroom demeanor and conduct, Trump put his hatred and disdain on full display. Think about that. Think about that. We'll be right back after this quick message, but think about that. and so much more. Whatever you're interested in, they have it for you. Find the perfect fit for your climate and space. Fast Growing Trees makes it easy to order online, and your plants are shipped directly to your door in one to two days. And along with their 30-day alive and thrive guarantee, they offer free plant consultation forever. I absolutely love Fast Growing Trees.

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That was good. A lot of, a lot of singing taking place there. Not a lot of singing taking place from the defense table, but singing like a bird was David Pecker. I think our headline writers on MidasTouch.com are having a bit too much fun. Here we got our story today. And for those, thanks to everybody who's been checking out our coverage every day on MidasTouch.com. Our editor-in-chief, Ron Filipkowski, every day is doing a beat-by-beat of the most important moments from the courtroom. And they are such a great way to get the breakdowns of everything that is happening in court in New York City. And today's headline, everybody, Trump's pecker problem persists. Every morning, Karen Friedman Agnifilo and I will do a what to expect in this specific day at trial. And then once trial is over, Karen Friedman Agnifilo and I go live again and we recap.

Karen Freeman Agnifilo was the number two at the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. She worked there for nearly 30 years. At some time, she served as the acting Manhattan District Attorney. She knows that office well. She knows Justice Mershon's courtroom well. She's tried lots of cases there and throughout the entire court building. And she said this was one of the most powerful direct examinations she ever saw in her career with David Pecker spilling the beans. Every day we have a scorecard that Karen

Friedman Agnifilo and I create where we go through all of the updates from each specific day. Today, we're in week two, Trump trial day seven. You can go back and look at all the other scorecards that we made. But let me recap them all. Got to catch them all. I'll recap what went down today. I'm a visual learner, so it's helpful for me to see things like this, to remember, and I hope these are helpful to you as well. On Trump trial day seven, Thursday, Thursday, week two, a new contempt motion was filed against Donald Trump for further violating the gag order at the end

of today's trial proceedings, just as Merchant set a hearing on that gag order violation. A new round of gag order violations for next Wednesday at around 2.15 or 2.30 p.m. Eastern time. MidasTouch.com's editorial team, shout out to Ron Filipkowski and others who were there, were the ones who identified one of Trump's violations. And Brett, you were, I think, one of the people who pointed out as well, where Trump said, the jury's so unfair and 95% are Democrats, that's a clear violation of subsection C of the gag order. The district attorney's office brought that up. Then we had direct exam of Pecker was complete and Trump's got a Pecker problem. David Pecker,

the former head of AMI, which owned National Enquirer, in addition to a number of other tabloids, talked again about the deal he had with Donald Trump, specifically saying he spoke with Trump. Trump was in the room. He was helping Donald Trump catch and kill bad stories, which was not benefiting the National Enquirer. It was to benefit the Trump campaign. In another line of the direct examination, Pecker said that Donald Trump specifically told him that he would take care of Michael Cohen for Cohen making the payment to Stormy Daniels. Also, Donald Trump held a thank you dinner at the White House for David Pecker and specifically thanked Pecker for helping him out with the woman situation,

as well as the doorman situation. And we learned about the involvement of Huckasara, Huckabee Sanders, and Hope Hicks were involved in trying to work with David Pecker to extend some of these catch and kill schemes while they were working for We the People in the White House. Then there was the cross exam of David Pecker by Donald Trump's lawyers. Interestingly, Trump's lawyer, Todd Blanche, who had been doing most of the talking was basically silent today. We saw on Tuesday, Justice Marchand telling Blanche, you are losing all credibility with me. And so it's interesting that he, and he looked pissed on Tuesday and he's not talking about it. That's where I would use it. Tuesday, on Tuesday and he's not talking about it. That's

where I would use it. Tuesday, Tuesday. And he's not talking like when I make my bizarre cultural references that I get. We probably have about six listeners who will understand that. Well, maybe six, six is still good. Adam Klasfeld hat tip to him. He's been doing a great job going through everything that's happening in the trial. Let me just show you basically the transcription that Klassfeld has of everything or the key moments from the testimony of Pecker. Pecker said that Donald Trump told him, quote, I want to thank you for taking care of the McDougal situation and thank you for taking care of the doorman situation. Asked by the prosecutor whether Trump's concern about these stories getting out was rooted in Trump's family or

the campaign. Pecker said, I thought it was for the campaign. Question, after Mr. Trump announced his candidacy for the presidency, did he ever express concern for how Melania would think about his affairs? Answer, no. Question, you said he invited you to the inauguration? Yes. Klassfeld describes Trump in the back of the courtroom appearing to sharply exhale when he reached the defense table before sitting down. Pecker's testimony continues. Did there come a time when you visited the White House? Answer, yes, I did. Pecker, Trump invited me to the White House for a dinner, describing it as a thank you dinner. Pecker says Trump told him, quote, bring your friends and business associates. It's your dinner.

Pecker took Trump up on the invitation. He brought some of his associates, quote. Jared Kushner was there. Sean Spicer was there. All of the people he brought were able to take a photo with Donald Trump in the Oval Office. According to Pecker, though, later on, Trump got angry after seeing Anderson Cooper interviewing Karen McDougal, who Trump had the affair with. Recall, Trump had the affair with Karen McDougal while Melania was pregnant and Melania had given birth. Then Trump cheated on McDougal, who he was cheating on Melania with, with Stormy Daniels

on a night that he was not with McDougal and when Melania had just given birth to Barron. Pecker replied to Donald Trump, we have an agreement, but I amended it to allow her to speak to the press. This was later on. Pecker said Trump got mad and couldn't understand why Pecker amended the agreement. At some point, the Federal Election on. Pecker said Trump got mad and couldn't understand why Pecker amended the agreement. At some point, the Federal Election Commission contacted Pecker about his activities with AMI. That's the parent company of National Enquirer. Pecker said that Michael Cohen tried to reassure him, quote, Jeff Sessions is the attorney

general and Donald Trump has him in his pocket. But Pecker said that he was still concerned more on Michael Cohen. Pecker describes Michael Cohen complaining about not being reimbursed yet. And Pecker said that he was telling this to Donald Trump when Pecker met with Donald Trump, quote, Michael Cohen paid Stormy Daniels out of his own funds, which was the first time I heard of that. I wasn't involved in that transaction. Pecker describes a conversation in Trump's office. So this is now a conversation between Pecker and Trump where Pecker said, quote, I said to Trump, Michael Cohen is very concerned about his bonus for this year. And I wanted you to do that. He's very loyal. He said that Cohen was working very hard. Quote, I believe that he would throw himself in front of a bus for you. That's what Pecker said

to Trump. Pecker said that Trump responded that Cohen had multiple apartments in his buildings and a valuable taxi medallion. Quote, don't worry about it. I'll take care of it, Trump added about Cohen, according to Pecker. I'll take care of Cohen, according to Pecker. So in terms of bombshell testimony, I mean, Pecker laid it all out. What Trump's lawyer is trying to do on direct examination is to basically make it seem like this was something Pecker did for other people. So if Pecker was killing stories for other people, isn't that just what politics is all about? Which of course it is not. And even if Pecker violated the law with other people, that doesn't immunize, to borrow what we talked about earlier, from Donald Trump.

But look, Pecker was credible. There was no exaggerations, nothing like that. The one thing that Trump's lawyers were trying to, I think, say to Pecker on cross-exam also was like, did Cohen ever tell you to do stories about Cohen's family? And there was one incident where Pecker said that Cohen wanted me to do a story on Cohen's daughter. And by the way, you all recall at the time that Trump had made statements about Cohen's daughter when she was underage, very sexually harassing type kind of statements about Cohen's daughter when she was underage, like very like, like sexually harassing type kind of statements about Cohen's daughter when she was, I think under 18. Um, and I think what that was referring to was, um, I think Cohen's daughter was raising $50,000 to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. And that

money was actually going, it was through the Eric Trump foundation. So it was actually a Trump thing. And I think that's where they were going with that. But I know that from reading Cohen's book. But Cohen's actually put the statement up, and I give him a lot of credit for doing this. Cohen said, I'm not going to be on my podcast, on social media. I'm not going to be talking about the case anymore. And I give Cohen a lot of credit for doing that. I think that's the right move. So that's your update in Manhattan, Brett, a lot, huh? Well, a lot to take in. And as I was watching the coverage, as I was watching the testimony

coming of David Pecker, I was just flabbergasted by the things that he was saying. It seemed like just such incredibly damaging testimony. And sometimes as a non-lawyer, I wonder like, is this as bad as it seems? Because this seems absolutely brutal for Donald Trump. So what do I do? I check in with the experts. I check in with you. I check in with the rest of the people on our legal team. I reach out to other lawyers. I try to get their thoughts as well. And every single person that I reached out to said that that was one of the most brutal testimonies for a defendant, if not the most devastating they have ever seen. And I hope that folks watching this trial now, there were so many, so many people in the media that were trying to downplay this

case. Like, oh, why does this case have to be the first case to go? It's just a bookkeeping game. What's going on here? I can't believe this is the one that's going to trial. And to her credit, KFA on our network was one of the loudest voices out there pushing back on that entire narrative. And I think after seeing this trial unfold this week, I think people are now seeing that and understanding why this trial was so important. This election interference scheme was such a massive scheme, and it goes to everything. You got to take yourself back to that time in 2016 when Donald Trump was running, and he was an unlikely candidate for president of the United States. And every single news story mattered. And Donald Trump had competition early on from other people in the Republican Party. And so what did he do? He weaponized this tabloid magazine

to go after all of his political opponents. And the same way how we always talk about when dictators do these purges, what do they start with? They start with their own. That's what Donald Trump did in 2016. He started with his own. He directed people like David Pecker to put out stories to take down his political opponents like Ted Cruz, like Ben Carson. And they wrote some of the most horrific stories about those people imaginable. And the fact that these people still support him to this day and gush over him and talk about how much they love him? I mean, how little self-respect do you have to have for yourself to go to bat for this person who smeared you in the most evil of

ways? And then going to the general election, using that magazine twofold, using it to try to get rid of, to try to push down Hillary Clinton at a time when Donald Trump needed every single vote and to push away every single negative story about himself that voters could have used to change their mind on the election. When you look at these headlines, Ben, from back then, you remember they're vicious, these headlines. Hillary, six months to live. Hillary Clinton, brain cancer drama. Obama and Hillary ordered FBI to spy on Trump. You look at some of these other stories over here. Ben Carson lies over military and violent past. Ben the Butcher, Inquirer hailed for Ben the Butcher scoops. Donald Trump was right about 9-11 celebrations in America. Conjoined twins died

after Ben Carson's botched operations. Donald Trump gets the Duke's blessing. I mean, when you look at these stories, it's so clearly a propaganda op and a crisis communications firm for the Donald Trump campaign. And this relationship that he had with AMI, that he had with David Pecker, is the epitome of fake news as he was talking about fake news. As he was accusing people like Ted Cruz of having affairs with multiple women, Donald Trump himself was having affairs with multiple women. It goes to show you this idea of projection that we speak about with Donald Trump. It's always been his MO. It's always been his game. And he's always used his money and power in order to deflect any of his qualities onto other people to smear them and to take them down. Well, whether you want to call

it upgrading or downgrading, Donald Trump is doing the same thing now. He did it in 2020 with Fox, who just wrote a big defamation check settlement to Dominion. And you have Fox and Newsmax and OAN and Right Side Broadcast News. It's a great point. This is all happening right now as we speak. As we speak, this is happening. You see all these fake news channels out there that are MAGA news channels where you have Marjorie Taylor Greene's boyfriend as the announcer on one of them. You have just the weirdest host that was like kind of sexually harassing Alina Haba on the air the other day, Greg whatever on news, just very bizarre, weird

people. And the things they say about anyone who goes against Donald Trump, the things they say about Donald Trump himself, it's the same exact patterns that happen with the National Enquirer. So think about what's happening in the country right now, and why fundamentally our democracy is under the biggest stress test possible. And the wannabe authoritarian forces are relying on your complacency. And trust me, there is a huge amount of foreign authoritarian influence in geopolitical situations right now, every day, trying to influence our election, rooting for Trump to hoist up an authoritarian regime as an international order to replace a democracy, which for history is a blip in history. Dictatorship, authoritarianism,

kings has always been the way it is. The United States of America had really set an example for the importance of democracy and a beacon of hope, a new way forward. And things like NATO and other institutions internationally were ways that we checked

some of humanity's darkest days. And that is under attack. And that is being threatened right now. You have in the Supreme Court, you have Donald Trump arguing that he should be able to rule like a dictator, right? In Manhattan, you see how it all began with Donald Trump interfering with the 2016 election, manipulating it, falsifying business records. And it was like it's the prelude to it. If you're thinking about where this movie begins, whether it begins with 2020, the prelude in 2016, whether you go back in the way the media was dealing with him in the 1980s. So you have that in Manhattan, that in this Supreme Court, you have all of this taking place. And then you have right now, Donald Trump utilizing Fox and Newsmax and all of these networks to get out all of these lies and to create these narratives. The megaphone is actually bigger right now than David Pecker. Pecker's a little Pecker compared to Murdoch. It's not even close.

I mean, Murdoch's organization makes $14 billion and every day the stream of disinfo being injected into Americans is so dangerous. And they just figure, I'll just write a billion dollar check. I make 15 billion a year. One billion, we'll write it off as a settlement and we'll rinse and repeat. And then the forces of democracy right now, and we, the people trying to reclaim our democracy from this threat. That's what's happening right now. So I'll talk just briefly about Arizona, where you had election interference by Trump and Trump's co-conspirators.

There's been 11 fake electors and seven others were indicted for trying to overturn the results in Arizona. We know about it. We saw it. Republican members of the Arizona House talked about what went down. You know, finally, we saw Christina Bob. They recorded themselves on video signing the form like they taped themselves doing it. Here, show the video of them doing it. If we've got that. Let's play that. And the 2020 electors from Arizona, with the undersigned being the duly elected and qualified

electors for the president and vice president of the United States of America from the state of Arizona, do hereby certify the following. A, that we convene and organize in the city of Phoenix, county of Maricopa, state of Arizona, at 12 noon on the 14th day of December 2020 to perform the duties enjoined upon us. B, that being so assembled and duly organized, we proceeded to vote by ballot, and balloted first for president,

and then for vice president by distinct ballots. And C, that the following are two distinct lists, one of all the votes for president lists one of one of all the votes for president and the other of all the votes for vice president so cast as aforesaid for president Donald J Trump of the state of Florida number of votes 11 for vice president Michael R Pence and the state of Indiana. Number of votes, 11. You're indicted. Yeah, you're indicted. But here's the thing too, you know, as you think about the people in Trump's orbit, whether it's the Alina Habas or the MyPillowGuy grifters, or whether it's what you see there, I mean, what was Donald Trump known for

before all this? Fake news, fake TV, reality TV, right? And that's why all of these Trumpers, they constantly tape themselves. They're living in this bizarro reality, grifty world where they're constantly taping everything they do, basically to tip to each other who's more MAGA or who's more not. We are living in a MAGA reality TV show nightmare where all we crave is normalcy. I'll talk just a little bit about Christina Bob, who Lara Trump has appointed to be the head of election integrity. She was just indicted for interfering with the 2020 election in Arizona. Then I want to show you these clips of Lara Trump. And Brett, then I want you to talk about some news regarding President Biden, some economic news as well. I want to take our last quick break of the show first.

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See site for details. Welcome back. We are live on the Midas Touch podcast. Shout out to Jordi for all of those great ad reads. I want to talk a little bit more about the Arizona indictment. I want to remind all of you as well, if you want to support our pro-democracy sponsors, check out the descriptions below. There are discount codes there. It's one of the ways we help fund this pro-democracy independent media network. So there's some great sponsors as well. And Jordy Vetsom, Brett, I know you're a big fan of those sponsors. All right, let's take a look

at Arizona. First, I should mention, though, too, about earlier this week, the Supreme Court heard oral argument about emergency abortion care, too, and the Supreme Court seemed skeptical in oral argument on Wednesday, the day before oral argument on absolute immunity, that a federal law can actually require hospitals to provide emergency abortion care in states that have strict bans on procedures for abortion. It's the latest legal battle over access to abortion since Roe v. Wade was overturned by the Dobbs decision based on Trump appointing right-wing Supreme Court justices. Trump continues to brag

that he killed Roe v. Wade. There's a law called EMTALA, the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, that requires hospitals to provide emergency stabilizing care, including emergency abortion care, regardless of a state's law. In this case, it's Idaho's draconian abortion restrictions. And these Supreme Courts seem to be indicating the right-wing justices. Let me be clear. It's the right-wing Republican justices. It's not a both sides issue. It's coming from the plan that Trump had to put justices on to specifically do this. And it seems like they're going to say that states can prevent women from getting emergency care. And basically women should die if they need abortion care. That's coming out of the United States Supreme Court. We'll get a written order

in a few weeks or so, but I think that's what the Supreme Court is ultimately going to rule. And I want to make sure that I mentioned that. Going back to this Arizona indictment for a moment, as we talked about, Christina Bob, the head of election integrity for the RNC, was one of the people who were indicted. Let me just show you this video of Christina Bob from July of 2022. Let me just repeat the date I just said, July of 2022. So the head of the RNC's election integrity as appointed by Lara Trump in 2022, you repeat it again, in 2022 was talking about how she believed they were going to overthrow the results of the 2020 election. This is what she's talking about in 2022. She now is the leader of election integrity for the RNC, and she was just indicted

for her conduct in Arizona. Let's play this clip. Evidence that Joe Biden cited cheated, so they could withdraw their electors or they could actually decide to award Trump electors, although I would anticipate they would probably just withdraw the electors. And if that happens from three different states, three different resolutions go into Congress. And I'm sorry, I'm summarizing this. It's a complicated issue. But it would have to go into the U.S. Congress to decide whether they want to accept the resolutions, whether they want to act on them or not. So it's a complex issue that needs to be handled complexly by different state legislatures and the U.S. Congress. And I actually think that it's designed well because you don't

want this to be something that you can quickly, easily overturn elections. It needs to be something that you need many, many elected officials to take action on. You have to have the majority of, in this situation, the majority of three different legislatures say, oh, you know what? We got it wrong. Then Congress. So it's a complex issue. I don't know that this Congress would take action on it. However, after 22, if we replace them, there might be who knows. Like you said, it's never been done before. But that's why this primary coming up in November is so, the midterms rather, is so important.

That's the head of election integrity. It's the stupidest thing. It's just bafflingly dumb and bafflingly not normal and bafflingly just not okay. That's a theme that I want to keep on hitting on in this episode. It's exactly what Russia does too, right? It's like put the person in charge who's doing the exact opposite and call them the election integrity person when they are the person that you got put in charge to actually attempt to steal the election. her behavior was going to land her. Eventually, we saw this moment here where a lawyer for the Oath Keepers was charged for conspiracy. And we said, hey, at Christina Bob, this is your future. I mean, hey, listen, at the end of the day, we're kind of just trying to help you. Christina,

you should have listened. I couldn't agree more with you. I mean, look, it's odd enough also that Donald Trump's daughter-in-law is now the leader of the RNC who has absolutely zero qualifications. It should be noted that President Biden's campaign has opened up over 450 field offices in key battleground states where Donald Trump's opened up precisely zero. And so if you want to take a look at like the results that just happened in Pennsylvania, where Donald Trump in a head to head against Nikki Haley in a closed Republican primary, Trump struggled to clear 80% of the vote. And if that was President Biden who did that, if someone running against President Biden who was out of the race was getting 150,000 votes in a state like Pennsylvania, it would be the front page of the New York Times. It would be every single page. Yet,

when we have actual raw data from primaries that reflect in a closed Republican primary in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Nikki Haley got 150,000 votes when she hasn't even been running for over a month. That is a- 157K. It's crazy. What'd you say? 157,000. 157,000. Look, President Biden has a machine to turn out the votes. And when you have Lara Trump and Donald Trump and people who care about the Trumps over the country and the party, this is part of the result that you get. And we've seen this data in all of the primaries. It's like when everyone was red wave, red wave, what were we focused on? Show me who's voting and where. If we have 40 million early votes, let's take a look at the way that looks so we can extrapolate not from just made up narratives, but from data. If we look at the data in all of these primaries, we see the same thing. So on election night, when the media is like, oh my gosh, we got it all wrong again. How are you? It's like the data is in front of your eyes. But speaking of Lara Trump and her incompetence, though, there's also just this lack of normalcy also, Brett. I mean, she keeps going on the show, Alex Stein. This is the guy who, while he's on the show with her, he like takes baby dolls and burns their heads. And he's like, ha ha ha, burning baby heads, baby doll heads. Isn't this funny?

I don't know. I don't think it would be funny if you're like a weirdo third grade. Like, like these are, this is supposed to be, she's the chair of the RNC. Yes, she's Lara Trump, but like act like an adult, act like a grownup. What's, what's this behavior for me? I yearn for just normalcy. I want to be able to agree to disagree with people, have normal conversations. I like this. Let's reach compromises. Okay, it's important that we get Ukraine funding. Republicans, you want this immigration bill.

I think your immigration bill is too tough on these issues, and it lacks basic human decency. So please, it's not even too tough. You're treating human beings not like human beings. Let's safeguard these things. Let's treat people with human dignity. Let's fix these things. Let's come up with a deal. James Lankford, conservative Republican from Oklahoma, I'll agree to all of these provisions, but you got to meet me over here. I like those days, not where Donald Trump goes, I'm going to kill it because it's going to be a win for President Biden. So I'm going to screw the country and I'm going to screw the country.

Or when Donald Trump's like, I'm going to meet with foreign leaders to undermine American policy in violation of the Logan Act. And Trump then meets with like the foreign leaders and gives them fake keys to the White House and things like that. That's never happened before. That's not normal. So stop normalizing like this is a liberal, conservative thing. Think about this. Could you imagine if the chair of the DNC or any democratic leader went on a show like Alex Stein and they start burning a baby doll. Have you seen portions of some of these other interviews that Lara Trump, the chair of the

RNC has done? Here's one where they talk about a Bud Light and just watch what Lara Trump says about Stein, like how much she likes this guy. Here, play this clip. You're the best. We love having you. Before you go, I'll need a two box producer because I want to show you this. So now there's Dylan Mulvaney, Laura, before you go, is now the sponsor of Bud Light. And so we're going to do a little test. I'm going to take a sip of this Bud Light and we're going to see if it turns me gay. Are you ready? Bye, Laura. You're a great guest. Oh my gosh, I'm gay, Laura. Oh my God, I love it. I love being gay. I don't notice a difference. Oh, you don't notice a difference?

Are you wearing your Nike sports bra as well? I am wearing my Nike sports bra. It's right here. So that was the end of the interview. So Lara had already been asked some of these other questions. And Lara says to him, you are the best. You heard what you said? You're the best. The guy who's lighting the baby, making those, you know, just vulgar and gross. And watch what happened in the interview before Lara said, you're great, and co-signs him and says what a great person he is. This is what he asked Lara. Let's play this clip. I asked her if it was okay if you're married to have anal sex. And that was a big deal.

I asked that. I asked that. Because I said, is that legal? And I would never, I just want to say, Laura, I would never ask you a disgusting question like that. You never ask me something like that. I would never, Laura, I would never say anything like that. This is a free speech. If you have, you know, if you want to say, if you want to give your opinion on it, you're welcome.

But I'm not, I would never ask you anything about that. Hold on. I have a question. Is it legal to do? Yeah. Well, you know, they say sodomy is illegal now. Yeah. In the Bible.

Is it legal in the Bible to do that? Like with your husband, of course. I mean, as far as I'm concerned, once you are married, everything is legal and everything that everyone enjoys, whatever it may be. That's it, Laura. Oh my God, I love you. See, you're such a good sport. Everything's legal. So my wife and her boyfriend, whatever they do, it's totally legal. It's just, it's a sad state of the Republican party. I mean, act like adults, act like grownups. What are you doing? But Brett, President Biden is acting like a grownup.

And again, you may agree with Biden on issues. You may disagree with him on issues. That's fine. That's normal. In fact, if you agreed with someone all the time, that'd probably be a little bit weird if you agreed with someone on every single issue. But Biden's out there not talking about things like that, not whining. Biden's out there talking to unions, talking about wages, talking about protecting seniors, talking about protecting social security, lowering prescription drug prices, protecting veterans. Biden's talking about a coherent set of policies and principles. And Brett, that's what I want to hear. I want to hear someone who's talking to me about issues that matter. Take it away. Here's what we'll do. Let's start with the economy. I want to hear someone who's talking to me about issues that matter. Take it away.

Here's what we'll do. Let's start with the economy. I want to break down some economic news that we have for you, give you some updates there. And then I want to get into a lot of news in terms of President Biden, in terms of policies that are being implemented in the country. So first, let's go, and I know this is everybody's favorite segment here on the Midas Touch Network. This is the NetSuite Know Your Numbers Minute. This is the NetSuite by Oracle Know Your Numbers Minute. All right, everybody, we got economic news, NetSuite Know Your Numbers Minute. So we heard about the GDP today. The US economy grew at a 1.6% annual pace in the first quarter. It was slightly softer than expected. The first quarter GDP, however, had been revised up to 3.4%.

The biggest drag on the economy last quarter was the surge in imports, which actually suggests strong domestic demand for goods, but imports are actually subtracted out of the calculation of GDP, just so you get kind of the full picture of it. RSM chief economist Joe Abrasulius, he wrote earlier, the underlying data in the GDP report reflects the rock solid economic activity that has been on display inside other high frequency data. Axios is reporting that indicators of the underlying trend in U.S. economic activity were steady in the new report despite the slight downshift in overall GDP growth. Inflation continuing to remain a little sticky.

It went up slightly to 3.7%. We saw final domestic private sales coming at 3.1% annualized rate in the January to March period, slowing only slightly from the 3.3% in the previous period. And that's the result of the solid consumer spending that increased that a 2.5% annualized rate last quarter, which is down from that 3.3% in the fourth quarter of 2023. Janet Yellen, the Treasury Secretary of the United States, was speaking about the report. She says that she ultimately expects that this first quarter GDP data will ultimately be revised up. I should remind you that with NetSuite, it gives you convenience, like easy access to economic data like this and trends to their integrated analytics and customization. You can have these customizable dashboards to monitor specific economic indicators that may impact your business.

So that's a valuable thing. You know, if you want to be tracking trends, tracking what's going on in the economy, so you always have an edge in the business world. It's so important whether you are a small, medium, or large-sized business. Check it out. And that is... That was the NetSuite Bioracle Know Your Numbers Minute. Do you know your own numbers for your business?

Download NetSuite's Ultimate KPI Check checklist right now at netsuite.com slash Midas. Do us a favor, if you can, tell NetSuite that we sent you. It goes a long way. Just, if you can, email them or say what's up, say Midas sent us, and that you heard about them on Midas. That goes a very long way. Brett, tell us about- Link in the description, as always. President Biden got another huge, huge, huge endorsement yesterday. And the endorsement also came with one of the most powerful video advertisements, video endorsements that I have seen from any of these labor unions. It's the North America's building trade unions. They endorsed President Biden. Biden, we posted the entire, it's a five minute video release. We posted it on our social media accounts. If you check our, our Twitter account or our Instagram or TikTok, anywhere we are, we posted this and it is powerful. It not only discusses why they're supporting somebody like president Biden, it also discusses their personal relationship. if you want to call it that, with Donald Trump and why they are rejecting Donald Trump completely.

They made sure to endorse President Biden this year earlier than usual. This is way earlier than NAP2 normally endorses. And they have plans to spend eight figures on mobilizing its 250,000 members with plans to specifically mobilize these members in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. It's another reason why these labor union endorsements are so important. Building Trades President Sean McGarvey said that Biden is, quote, almost like the perfect leader was sent at the perfect time for working people, Donald Trump was furious about this endorsement because Donald Trump has been trying to court these labor endorsements and keeps getting rejected every single time. Well, remember when he held that fake union rally that he staged and he said, you're not protesting for the right things, union workers, sorry. He just kind of mocked them and he

said, you better talk to your leadership. He was speaking to fake union workers because every single thing that he does is fake. Well, the head of NABT who was asked, so what do you think about Donald Trump? Do you think Donald Trump is going to be upset about this? The head of NABT who said, I really don't give an F if he's pissed. I love that he's so blunt, so direct. They had a big event yesterday with the North America's building trade unions, and Biden threw some shots at Trump. And this moment in particular, I thought was pretty strong. Let me know what you think of this one, Ben. Donald Trump still thinks windmills cause cancer. that's what he said

by the way remember when he was trying to deal with COVID he said just inject a little bleach in your veins he missed it all went to his hair look I shouldn't have said that. It's so good. It's so good. Biden also talked about walking in the picket lines while Trump spoke in front of non-union workers and pretended to – and yelled at them and pretended that they were union workers.

Just the whole thing is very weird. Donald Trump keeps staging these events. By the way, we caught him staging another event today in New York where it was like all MAGA operatives there. We have a story on MidasTouch.com, literally like people who appear on Steve Bannon's show in Georgetown. Those are the people in the crowd. And he tries to use that to try to pretend like he has support in places. It's a really, really sick thing. Anyway, in other news, President Biden also signed that $95 million foreign aid package for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. It also includes that TikTok divestment that calls for TikTok to divest from the Chinese-owned overtime pay by almost $20,000. This would affect over 4 million workers.

The new rule says that anyone who makes under $58,656 and works over 40 hours a week must be paid time and a half. The old number was around $35,000. It's a huge win for workers. Here's another win for consumers. Airlines must now issue refunds for canceled and delayed flights. The Department of Transportation is implementing the stricter passenger flight rules, including one that requires the airlines to provide cash refunds when flights are canceled or significantly changed.

None of those will give you this voucher that has all these blackout dates and you can't really use it. You got to get the cash immediately refunded right to you. Airlines must now refund the passengers if a domestic flight is delayed over three hours or if an international flight is delayed by over six hours. Power to the consumer. This is also a massive, massive policy put through by the Biden administration this week, voiding non-compete agreements. The Federal Trade Commission issued a final rule making it illegal for bosses to make workers sign non-competes in any scenario, voiding nearly all existing non-competes.

And then also later in the day, today, we learned that the FCC voted to restore net neutrality protections, which is a big to restore net neutrality protections, which is a big thing. Net neutrality has been a hot-button topic for a while. The 2015, the open internet order enshrined net neutrality into law, which prevents these large corporate internet service providers from throttling internet speeds, favoring one side over another, blocking certain types of content, engaging in this sort of anti-competitive behavior. Of course, when Donald Trump came in, Trump overturned the net neutrality provisions.

Well, today they were reinstated. Oh, and one more thing, because I think this is important and this will wrap it all up. The Biden administration also expanded HIPAA protection to shield medical records for women seeking abortion care from state law enforcement officials seeking to prosecute people. So healthcare providers will now be prohibited from disclosing the records to state prosecutors who are trying to prosecute women who get reproductive care. Just to show you, that all happened within the past couple of days within the Biden administration. And that's a lot of real stuff that people are going to feel on a daily basis. So I think it's important that we're always talking

about that and getting that news out there because it just doesn't get enough coverage. You mean President Biden wasn't just out there saying, oh, it's so unfair, and they're treating me wrong, and they're being mean to me, and they're so mean, and this is so unfair, and no one's ever been treated as unfairly as me and nobody will. You mean he's actually just putting his head down and working and talking about policies and issues of whether you agree or disagree. You know, you have an adult in the room. I mean, you mean that's what's happening. That's all I'm looking for. And that's what we talk about over all the time here on the Midas Touch Network. And by the way, also the thing is like when the Republicans don't, when we're

able to get past the Republican obstruction, like things happen, like weapons are going to be sent to Ukraine, like basically instantaneously, they're going to be able to defend themselves. In Gaza, humanitarian airdrops are already happening. So people are going to get equipment and food and aid that they really, truly need. All of this stuff was being blocked by the Republicans for no reason. They didn't get anything more by holding out. All they did was they probably resulted in a lot of other people's deaths, scared the crap out of a lot of other people, and got nothing accomplished other than further tearing apart our country and other countries. And so it's great that we're able

to actually get stuff done. I think people like to see that bipartisanship in action and progress and bills being passed and government actually working. I just want to remind everybody that one of the characteristics of fascism is they want to make you feel hopeless. They want to make you feel that you have no agency. They want to take away your power. They want to make you feel hopeless. They want to make you feel that you have no agency. They want to take away your power. They want to make you feel like it's always going to be this way. Nothing's going to change. So why bother? Why get out there?

Why do anything? Do not have that mentality. I want to let you know we're all in this together. The pro-democracy community is bigger. And if we stand united, the pro-democracy community is going to prevail. I promise you that. So stay in the fight. Keep on spreading the information. Get the data out. Let's focus on facts. Let's focus on the truth. And we are so grateful for you in doing that. Hit subscribe. The best way you can help us is by expanding this pro-democracy platform. It's free to subscribe to our YouTube channel. Also, if you're not subscribed to the Midas Touch audio podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts, just search Midas Touch. Subscribe there. And I think you will enjoy the podcast that we do as well. Just click the little plus button on the apps.

It adds right to it. Just search Midas Touch. Just click the plus button. I want to give a shout out to some of the other YouTube channels that we've been building and working with. I want to give a shout out to the Mockler Media channel, Adam Mockler. Check that out right there. He's on his way to 200,000 subscribers. Subscribe to the Adam Mockler channel right after this. How about Tennessee Brando? The Tennessee Brando YouTube channel is growing also on its way to 200,000. Let's help them get 200,000 YouTube subscribers. Of course, we've got the True Crime MTN channel, the Midas Touch True Crime channel led by David Arenberg.

Got to give a shout out there. How about Talking Feds? The Talking Feds YouTube channel crushes it with Harry Littman. And then we've got Coalition of the Sane, Coalition of the Sane led by former Congress member Denver Riggleman. So all Midas Touch YouTube channels, all Midas Touch podcasts, subscribe to all of them. And as soon as this episode ends, Brett,

are we going to be dropping part two of the Lev Denver interview? Have we talked about that? We haven't talked about it, but we certainly can. Let's do it. The last one crushed and got so many views. Here's the thing. Lev is completely unfiltered. The stuff he is saying is mind-blowing, front-page newsworthy, every sentence. part one was insane where he dissected this entire scheme of Rudy Giuliani to do this whole pay for play scheme for foreign entities to basically buy access to people like Donald Trump and Bill Barr and other people in the administration.

Part two is somehow like 10 times crazier. It's an unbelievable interview. Denver did a great job. It's going to be airing on our channel right after this. It's just going to be a video posted. And so you can check for that under our videos on our channel. Just check. We'll post it in like five minutes. It'll get loaded.

Brett, always a pleasure. We'll do our after show, patreon.com slash Midas Touch, P-A-T-R-E-O-N dot com slash Midas touch P A T R E O N.com slash Midas touch. Join now. Cause Brett and I will be announcing when we're going to host our live meeting. We'd love to meet you in person or on zoom. So you could meet Brett and I and Jordy on zoom, but you got to be a member.

Patreon.com slash Midas touch. Join now. And we're going to announce soon when we're going to be hosting our next Zoom meeting. We always have a ton of fun there. Thank you, everybody, for watching. And, Brett, I'll let you do Jordy's part. Shout out to the Midas Mighty. The Midas Mighty standing strong

Against the fascists We sing our song We will get it right Whenever It's Ken Harbaugh with the Midas Touch Network. The film Against All Enemies, which I co-produced with Ben Mysalas and this network, has won awards around the world

for its up-close portrayal of America's insurrectionist movement. It premieres in the U.S. on March 29th on Amazon and Apple TV. Go to againstallenemiesfilm.com or click the link below. But don't just watch Against All Enemies. Tell your friends about it.

It's one more way to hold accountable those who threaten our democracy. Thanks, Midas Mighty. Let's use our power well.