The MeidasTouch Podcast - Whoa! Republicans Implode Under Pressure at Major Hearing

Episode Date: September 17, 2025

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on Democrats finally going on the offense and calling out GOP Congress Members and witnesses at an important hearing. For 20% off your entire order, head to https://LaundrySauce.com/MEIDAS20 and use code MEIDAS20. #laundrysaucepod Visit https://meidasplus.com for more! Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af MissTrial: https://meidasnews.com/tag/miss-trial The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Uncovered: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/maga-uncovered Coalition of the Sane: https://meidasnews.com/tag/coalition-of-the-sane Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Republicans did not see this coming. Democrats led by AOC were on fire, cross-examining these Maga-Republican witnesses at hearings yesterday. Obviously, I showed you the explosive hearing yesterday involving Cash Patel in the Senate. Let me show you what went down in the House of Representatives before the House Energy Committee. Let me show you what AOC's cross-exam of a guy named Jeffrey Novak, acting general counsel and principal deputy general counsel of the EPA looked like. AOC was just spitting the facts. She was saying, do you know how many jobs have been lost due to Donald Trump's closure of clean energy projects in the first half of this year alone? You know how many jobs he's costing the United States? Watch AOC go to work play this clip. Do you know how many jobs have been

threatened or lost due to the Trump administration's closures of clean energy projects in the last six months or so, the first half of this year? I'm not aware of any such analysis. 91,000. Trump administration and Department of Energy policies have cost Americans 91,000 jobs nationwide in rollbacks on efficiency. And, you know, these large numbers are statistics. They're hard to, I think, people to understand when they show up on a white paper. But in Colorado's 8th District, Amprius Technologies canceled plans to construct a $190 million battery plant in Brighton, Colorado. In that same district, actually, another company, VSK Energy, canceled plans due to the Trump administration, canceled their plans to build solar

panels, and they scratched a $250 million investment and up to 900 jobs in that same district. In Georgia, 12, an EV plant was canceled due to the Trump administration and DOE's freezing of the EV charging program. Registered Georgia has a population of 157 people. They lost out on 166 jobs. More jobs, they lost more jobs than they have people in that town. because of the cancellation and war on renewable energy and clean energy here. In that same district, a copper foil manufacturing plant went bankrupt as a result of these

rollbacks, and Augusta, Georgia lost out on 350 jobs. And, I mean, the list goes on. In South Carolina, 250 jobs, when a construction of an EV plant in Florence was halted due to DOE's freezing of funds? I mean, we could go on in Michigan 10th, 167 jobs were lost after $50 million worth of investment. These are all freezes in renewable and clean energy construction and development projects. This is an industry that has been a source of jobs and growth. This administration, the Trump administration, is destroying the American economy, destroying American jobs,

91,000 jobs in this sector alone. I have one simple question. In these towns and areas, what is the DOE's plan to replace those jobs in those affected areas? I'll say this is beyond the scope of what I'm prepared to testify to today. I'd be happy to take the question

for the record in regard to the analysis that you cited here regarding the job. Then you had Democratic Congress member Robert Garcia go to the floor of the House of Representatives because the MAGA Republicans put forward a piece of legislation that would lower the age to prosecute minors as adults from 16 down to 14 in D.C. First, let me show you what Congress member Garcia said. Play this clip. I want to remind our Republican colleagues that crime in DC over the last few years has actually been going down. And quite frankly, the idea that we are now going to put middle schoolers in prison, this should be called the Middle Schoolers

for Prison Act, is inhumane and shameful. We can all agree that crime should be taken on, that D.C. and other cities we want to make safer. But this idea that we're going to penalize children in middle school at the age of 14 and put them in prison, is irresponsible and, quite frankly, it's un-American. I want to remind my colleagues that at this moment, what we're doing right now is stripping 700,000 residents who have come together in D.C. To create laws, to bring community together,

to fight for statehood and representation, we're going to strip them from their ability to manage their own city. These efforts do nothing to reduce crime or improve public safety. And once again, I know that the president is obsessed with Washington, D.C. He's obsessed with its local laws. I ask him once again, he should step down as president and run for mayor if he's so interested. By the way, even Republican Thomas Massey from Kentucky had something to say.

He said, tonight Congress will vote to lower the age to prosecute minors as adults, from 16 down to 14 in D.C. So let me get this straight, Congress member Massey said. Congress wants to prosecute 14-year-olds as adults, but they don't want to prosecute adults who sexually abuse 14-year-olds. Release the damn Epstein files. And of course, you know what Cash Patel said

at the hearing yesterday, just to remind you when he was asked by Mago-Republican Senator Kennedy about who else is in the Epstein files, And who did Epstein traffic to? Cash Patel said that there's no credible information from the FBI that Epstein trafficked to anybody else. He was a lone wolf is what they're going with now. To try to cover up Donald Trump's dark past,

they're going with Epstein was a lone wolf. Utterly disgusting. Here play this clip. You've seen most of the files. Who, if anyone, did Epstein traffic these young women too? besides himself. Himself, there is no credible information. None.

If there were, I would bring the case yesterday that he trafficked to other individuals. And the information we have, again, is limited. So the answer is no one? For the information that we have. In the files. In the case file. Okay.

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conspiracies that Maga Republicans push is that all of these storms that are taking place right now are the result of human cloud seeding and weather modification and not climate change and not global warming. That's why they push this. My own view is, of course, we need to analyze weather modification. We need common sense solutions. And we need to understand what it is to make sure that it isn't dangerous. So I agree with that. But that's not how MAGA Republicans are using this issue. They're using it to spread conspiracies that when there are these disastrous storms taking place, that it's some secret government plot that's doing it. But they're Again, Marjorie, Donald Trump's running the government right now.

So how are you? Anyway, here's what Marjorie Taylor Green had to say at the hearing yesterday. Play this clip on weather modification. Let's play it. Do we believe in God and that he has dominion over his perfect creation of planet Earth? Do we believe that he has given us everything we need to survive as a civilization since the beginning of time? Or do you believe in man's claim of authority over the weather based on scientists that have only been alive for decades and weren't here to witness the climate changes since the beginning of time. This was why I've introduced my bill, the Clear Skies Act, to end weather modification and geoengineering because I don't believe planet Earth is a lab and I don't believe people

are lab rats. I believe that people have the right and they have the God-given right to have clean air, clean skies, clean water, and clean food. And here she is again. Let's play this clip. What we've learned here today has been fascinating. I hope the people watching at home have been able to see the radicalized positions on the other side of the aisle. Remember, if you even question that someone could control the weather, you were labeled a conspiracy theorist or crazy. Then they changed the message to, well, it's not hurting anyone, and it is to provide water for people. And now they've come full circle around to the point that modifying the weather is how they save the planet from the global, from the global warming

hoax. Whether you agree or not, the people clearly disagreed with the climate hoax and disagreed with my Democrat colleagues. Now, I want you to contrast that to Democratic Congresswoman Melanie Stansberry. I want you to watch this full clip because, first off, Congresswoman Stansberry deserves far more attention than she gets. She is an incredible Congress member. She is diligent. She comes with receipts. She's fact-based.

And this is the type of leadership that I want to see more of. Fact-based, science-based, database. Let's take a while. Watch this whole clip. She says, Doge is back. And what's the GOP up to? Rooting out waste, fraud, and abuse? Nope.

They're using Doge to platform climate denialism and anti-science theories. You saw that right there. Here, play this clip. Doge is back, and there's going to be a lot to unpack in this hearing. But I think first and foremost, we want to acknowledge that the purpose of this subcommittee and why it was created in the first place by the majority was to root out waste, fraud, and abuse.

That's literally the mandate for the Doge subcommittee. And I want to emphasize that we remain focused on that mission. In fact, we are working on a report. on the waste, fraud, and abuse that we're currently seeing in this administration. And I think it's important to also recognize that we are 14 days from a government shutdown. And so I'm troubled to see that the subcommittee, which is designed to address government spending, to streamline efficiency of government programs, has strayed so far from its mission, especially as there's such pressing matters facing our country, including a government shutdown,

down the passage of the big ugly bill, which not only drove at the federal deficit by four trillion dollars, but is kicking millions of Americans off their health care and about to make their health care premiums go up, tariffs that are causing inflation to go up and putting small family businesses out of business, an administration that's flouting the rule of law every day, and a total lack of transparency in the Epstein case is the administration has still refuse to comply with the subpoena that this committee issued. So there's a lot of important things that this committee could tackle. And I would think that a topic involving environmental science would be more well suited to a committee that actually deals with science or environmental issues.

But I am happy to talk about climate change and weather modification. It's a topic that I've spent many years in my career working on. In fact, I worked more than 20 years as a water resources manager working on drought and water planning issues in the state of New Mexico. And I know how important addressing drought and water issues is for our farmers and ranchers out there. And personally and professionally, there's a lot to discuss with respect to weather modification. And so if we're going to talk about it, let's talk about it. Certainly, there's a lot of Doge-related topics we could talk about with respect to climate change and weather programs, including the dismantling of climate, natural resources, emergency response programs,

the firing of federal officials, dismantling of EPA, the illegal freezing of federal funding, removal of the U.S. from international climate agreements, dismantling clean energy programs, catastrophic response to natural disasters, including what we saw in Texas. And all of these topics would be ripe for an oversight hearing. So I hope that we can use this hearing to discuss some of those issues. issues. But with respect specifically to weather modification, whether it's cloud seeding or other technologies, I actually agree with many of the assertions about the need for further discussion, further science, and potentially further regulation of these particular technologies. But it's

important that we distinguish between fact and fiction, between clickbait and real solutions. So let's talk about some facts. Whether modification and cloud seeding, as was mentioned, It's a real thing. It exists. It has been practice in varying forms since the 1940s. Increasingly, folks are looking at this as a opportunity to increase rain and precipitation. But the science is still out on many of these technologies. And we absolutely need to understand what are the implications for air quality, for precipitation,

and the implications also for water rights in the West because this could have far-reaching implications. But it's also important to understand that many of these technologies are in the R&D phase. They're in limited use in a number of states. And it's not actually technologies that the federal government even widely supports. This is largely in the private sector. So in the world of science, it is widely acknowledged that more science is needed to understand use, efficacy, and impacts of these technologies. So those are the facts. Those are the facts. But it's hard to understand why we're discussing banning these practices outright in this committee when the oversight committee in another subcommittee literally as we're sitting here right now is having a

hearing about dismantling the environmental protection agency and the actual bill under discussion in this committee is trying to use the EPA to regulate these particular practices so the inconsistency and governance is very confusing here but there's a more insidious issue here, which I think we've already heard in some of the comments, which is the using of the platform of Congress to proffer anti-science theories, to platform climate denialism, and to ultimately put our communities at risk by continuing to put out disinformation. Now, finally, I want to show you Democratic Congresswoman Summer Lee. Here's what she's got to say. She similarly deserves far more attention than she gets.

I think she is a very strong Congresswoman. She's always calling out the lies. And what you notice the difference is that Marjorie Taylor Green is out there in that performative way, attacking science, attacking common sense. And here you have these Democratic Congress members just speaking to the people about actually helping them. Just imagine that Congress members helping the people. Here, play this clip.

I believe we incarcerate too many people in this country. I believe the criminal legal system disproportionately harms communities of color. and people without resources. I believe we should be skeptical of expanding criminal penalties as a first resort. But this committee applies these principles selectively.

When environmental enforcement protects communities from toxic pollution, suddenly we care about proportional punishment. When it's the corporations that face accountability for poisoning the air children breathe, suddenly criminal penalties are excessive. When businesses with multi-million dollar monthly revenues face consequences

for breaking the law, suddenly we discover concerns about government overreach. Where is the same compassion for the teenager caught with marijuana? Where is this concern about disproportionate punishment for the mother struggling with addiction? Where is this skepticism about criminalization when it affects people who don't have corporate lawyers and public relations teams? The answer is nowhere, because this isn't really addressing over-criminalization in our government. It's about who deserves protection from government power and who doesn't. The selective application of justice principles reveals everything about our priorities.

Environmental crimes that harm entire communities get sympathy hearings. Street level offenses get mandatory minimums. Corporate executives get understanding. Working families get prison sentences. The community's breathing polluted air like mine deserves better. The children in those communities deserve a government that protects them, not one that protects the corporations that's poisoning them. They deserve the same concern.

This committee shows for corporate defense. until every person gets the same consideration we've shown here today for environmental lawbreakers, our criminal legal system will remain fundamentally unjust. Well, there you have it, folks. Let me know what you think. Hit subscribe. Let's get two six million subscribers together. Want to stay plugged in? Become a subscribers for our substack at Midasplus.com. You'll get daily recaps from Ron Phillipsowski, add free episodes of our podcast, and more exclusive content only available at Midasplus.com. You know,