What A Day - Do You Believe In Plasmagic

Episode Date: August 24, 2020

The Republican National Convention begins tonight, predominantly featuring speakers who are Trump’s employees or blood relatives. This weekend, Trump announced that the FDA granted emergency use authorization to a blood plasma treatment for COVID-19… we discuss what that means. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy testified to the Senate on Friday in his first appearance since the abrupt changes to USPS's operations. On Saturday, the House passed a bill that would give the postal service emergency funding. DeJoy is set to testify to the House today. And in headlines: police shootings in Louisiana and Wisconsin, California wildfires continue with less prison labor than normal, and Tennessee’s governor makes some forms of protest a felony.

This episode of What A Day is brought to you by HBO. Watch the show everyone has been talking about. From Misha Green and J.J. Abrams comes HBO's daring new series Lovecraft Country. This genre-bending drama follows a young man named Atticus who receives a strange letter from his missing father inviting him to Lovecraft Country. His search and rescue mission turns into a struggle to survive as he encounters the twin terrors of 1950s Jim Crow America and other worldly monsters. Along the way, he forges his own path to reclaim his power and find his true self. Lovecraft Country explores the themes of family, race, and history, taking viewers to unexpected new places in time or space in each episode.

Starring Jonathan Majors, Journey Smollett, Courtney B. Vance, and Michael Kenneth Williams, Lovecraft Country airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on HBO and stream it on HBO Max. Interested in diving deeper, you can be sure to listen to the Lovecraft Country companion podcast hosted by Shannon Houston and Ashley C. Ford available on all major podcast platforms. It's Monday, August 24. I'm Akilah Hughes. And I'm Gideon Resnick. And this is what A Day, where we've discovered leaked audio of Trump's sister saying, I wish Gideon and Akilah all the best. Yeah, she went on to say that we'd do a better job of being president than Donald Trump.

But all of this is like, you know, not the main story. So everybody's going to talk about Trump anyway. Yeah, I mean, but that's why you come here is to hear, you know, the good real news that like other people are avoiding. So thank you. There it is. On today's show, an update on where things stand with the Postal Service as we head into another day of congressional hearings, then some headlines. But first, the latest.

Okay, so last week was the Democratic National Convention, a mostly virtual event that went remarkably smoothly. If you've ever had to hook your computer up to a projector for a presentation, you've likely had more gaffes. In any case, the week was spent showcasing the empathy of Democratic nominee Joe Biden and the urgency of defeating President Trump. This week, it's the Republicans' turn to try and convince voters that the America we live in today is any greater than it was when Trump took office.

Their convention starts tonight. And yesterday, we got the tentative list of speakers. Many of them are Trump family members. It's always good when the only people who will say nice things about you are the people in your will, but I digress, Gideon. Let's talk about the lineup. Right, what you said is telling in and of itself that a lot of the people willing to vouch for this president

are in his family or in his White House. But here's what we know about the speaker list so far. Tonight features Senator Tim Scott, former UN ambassador and online popcorn buyer, Nikki Haley, and Donald Trump Jr., among others. Then Tuesday, there's the First Lady, Melania Trump, expected to speak as our Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, and Senator Rand Paul.

Wednesday has Vice President Pence, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, and Kellyanne Conway. And on the final day, it's Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Very sorry about that one. Specifically, Akilah, Ivanka Trump and Rudy Giuliani, among others. So those are kind of the top line elected officials and conservative allies that are speaking, some of whom are seen as possible presidential candidates in the future. But on top of that are the kind of trigger the lib type speakers, I guess, including Nicholas Sandman, the Covington Catholic High School student

who sued CNN and The Washington Post for defamation, and the mansion couple from St. Louis who pointed guns at peaceful protesters, a kind of made-for-Fox lineup right there. And if that wasn't enough, the New York Times has said that Trump is also going to talk every single night because it is his show. It's also notable, though, when we look at this, who is not speaking like you don't see a bunch of the Senate Republicans running for reelection in swing states or former GOP presidents or nominees, as is often the case with these.

Yeah, the planning going into this has looked pretty disorganized. The format keeps changing, the location keeps changing. So how much is actually set in stone? Or are they just seriously going to wing it? That's a really good question. Over the weekend, the answer was somewhat murky on that. So the Times also reported in the last couple of days that producers who worked on The Apprentice and the Comedy Central roasts of Donald Trump are involved in this whole process, and that there was still some amount of discussion as to what would be taped versus live. It appears as though most of the speakers are going to go live and speak in Washington, D.C., while some delegates are physically in Charlotte, North Carolina,

for the actual nominating part. That's where this whole thing was set to be in the first place before it got scuttled. The speeches at federal properties, though, could potentially violate the Hatch Act, which is supposed to mostly keep people from conducting political activities on properties owned by the federal government,

but breaking the laws is keeping it on brand. Broadly, though, if the DNC was kind of intended to pull in maybe Democrat skeptical voters who don't like Trump and are looking for other options, from what we know about the RNC, they don't seem intent on taking that kind of approach, i.e., if you're gonna be MAGA, they seem to want you to be MAGA all the way.

And based on actions the president took over the weekend, he seems desperate to try and generate positive news for himself, given the poor position he's in for reelection. Yeah, there's quite a hole he has to dig himself out of. But that brings us to Trump's big weekend announcement. So Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany tweeted Saturday that Trump would announce a big breakthrough in COVID treatment, but I guess not so big that he couldn't just say it, you know, back then.

But anyway, on Sunday, he held a press conference and it ended up being blood plasma getting an emergency use authorization from the FDA. Is there more to this story? Yes and no. So quickly, what we're talking about here, like you said, is that plasma that has antibodies for people who recovered from COVID-19. And that kind of treatment has been used before for other infectious diseases like Ebola. So then on Sunday during this press conference, Trump said that this plasma treatment is, quote, very effective, despite the fact that no rigorous clinical trials have

proven that it works. There's a perception that it might have some amount of benefit, but there's disagreement about how much. Trump also said the emergency use authorization from the FDA would, quote, dramatically expand access to the plasma. But experts say that's not quite true, since you can't just magically scale up the amount of plasma available. You need to get the plasma from blood donations from human beings. And there's also some backstory here about the FDA's decision and how they came to it. So last week, a number of top scientists wanted the FDA to put the authorization on hold until more research could be done. Among them were Drs. Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins of the NIH.

So they had argued that while the treatment is considered safe, there hadn't been enough data to prove that it was effective. And others have said that this kind of emergency use authorization could make further research more difficult. Yeah, and the obvious danger here is the president potentially trying to push something through to help himself politically, undermining the FDA and its whole authorization process. Right. I mean, on Saturday, too, he sent a tweet which referred to the, quote, deep state at the FDA and suggested that they are delaying answers on therapeutics and vaccines

until after Election Day. And so the opinion on this particular treatment seems to be mixed with some saying it's good that there is an emergency use authorization and others questioning if it really does much. But this particular instance aside, Trump has just made it much more challenging to know what is good and what is not because he pushed things like hydroxychloroquine and will clearly say anything to win. Shifting gears, though, we got some news on the Postal Service over the weekend, and there's more on the way today with the Postmaster General set to testify to the House. So Akilah catches up on that. Right. The controversy around the post office is heating up quickly ahead of an election that will have record numbers of people voting by mail. So on Friday, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy

testified to the Senate in his first appearance since the controversial and inexplicable changes to how the USPS operates. He pushed back against claims that the changes were politically motivated and rather blamed long-term financial losses for the issues at the post office and called on Congress to provide the agency with relief, which is a little funny since the House has long since passed a massive second relief package that would have guaranteed billions of dollars for the Postal Service and Mitch McConnell refuses to hear it. DeJoy also claimed under oath that he has not spoken with the Trump administration regarding the changes at the Postal Service at all since taking his post. He said that the post office can handle the number of ballots, even if everyone in the country voted by mail. And finally, he reiterated that he himself plans

to vote by mail. So we shall see. Right. And Democrats haven't been satisfied with any of DeJoy's reassurances so far. And so they came back into town to take more action to get the Postal Service adequately funded ahead of the election. Yeah, that's right. On Saturday, the House again passed a bill that gives the Postal Service emergency funding $25 billion ahead of the election to continue running without a hitch. The bill would also reverse the operational changes from DeJoy to disconnect mail sorting machines and eliminate overtime, something DeJoy has not committed to. It's worth noting that this bill passed the House with bipartisan support. Twenty six Republicans voted in favor, along with the Democrats. Even if the Senate does vote in favor of the bill, the White House is expected to veto it. The White House has said that voting by mail isn't going to be reliable and they're kind of

making it their mission for that to be the case. In any event, it's clear that people are fed up with the unnecessary debacle. In Washington state, postal workers reinstalled the high speed mail sorting machines, defying DeJoy's order with direct action. On Saturday, Cher, yes, that one, organized her own protests that demanded DeJoy's resignation. I do believe in life after love, Cher. So what is next in this never-ending mail saga? Well, today there's a hybrid hearing with the House Oversight and Reform Committee. So hybrid here just means that some people will attend in person and others will dial in from home. And the hearing is expected to be more contentious than the Senate hearing last week. New York Representative Carolyn Maloney, who wrote the House bill to block changes

at the USPS, is on the committee. She's called for investigations into DeJoy and his potential conflicts of interest. Another member of the committee has previously called for DeJoy to resign. So we'll be following it and we'll update as we know more, but for now, that's the latest. It's Monday WOD Squad, and for today's Tim Check, we're talking about another music video record. On Friday, BTS had the most-watched YouTube video premiere with Dynamite, which drew more than 3 million live viewers. That's about twice as many as the previous record holder, fellow K-pop group Blackpink, who got 1.66 million with their song How You Like That. So, giddy. How do we start putting up those kinds of numbers here at WOD?

I mean, we clearly have to get into the k-pop business some way or other i don't i don't know how we could do such a thing maybe you know i i manage or i i consult and say what people no i have no expertise in doing that um but what do you think i mean do you you're the video expert of this uh fearsome twosome how do we actually get to three million well the truth is if we just did an interview with even one member of bts we would get there uh as a person who was once on the same red carpet as bts and was not at all as fanned over i got like one of them in the background of an Instagram story and it got like 50,000 views immediately. Like their fan base just loves it

and they want like to the minute updates, which I appreciate. So yeah, I think if we did a live episode of WOD and you know, perhaps Jungkook comes through, RM comes through, the whole band comes through, then we'll get at least 3 million. Like that's the, you million like that's the that's the you know that's the floor not the ceiling yeah i think right i think that we should be shooting for something quite a bit higher because like i personally don't want to see our record get

broken as swiftly as this like i i wanted to you know we maxed out like the numbers that are conceivably possible here it's like five 5 billion. It's never going to happen again. And everybody looks back and be like, that was the best thing that's ever been created. Yeah, that's a good point. Well, I'll keep working on it. But just like that, we've checked our temps. Stay safe, everyone.

And we will check in with you all again tomorrow. Let's wrap up with some headlines. Headlines. into a convenience store before he was shot several times by police. Police claimed that he had a knife and the shooting was caught on video by an 18-year-old bystander who described the incident as traumatic. The ACLU described it as a, quote, horrific and deadly incident of police violence against a black person and called for an independent investigation. Ben Crump, the lawyer representing Pellerin's family, said they believe Pellerin was experiencing a mental health crisis at the time. Crump also represents the families of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, and protesters came out over the weekend in Lafayette and were met by police in riot gear. In a separate event late yesterday, a video surfaced of police in Wisconsin shooting a black man in the back as he got into a car. As we go to record, he is in

serious condition, and we'll have more on that as we learn more. Firefighters in California are still struggling to put out massive wildfires burning across the state. They're simultaneously battling the second and third worst wildfires in state history, which, in combination with smaller fires, have burned down nearly one million acres of land. California's oldest state park, Big Basin, had to close its gates due to extensive fire damage. And the crisis has also exposed California's dependence on prison labor to fight fires. With many inmates being sent home as part of an early release program to protect them from COVID-19, the state's main fire agency is struggling to fill their ranks. Normally, inmates would be paid $1 an hour to fight fires on the front lines, which many critics call exploitative, especially because their convictions almost always preclude them from working as firefighters upon release.

Fire officials say things might get worse, with more lightning expected in the coming days. Grim, grim, grim. Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was comatose but stable in a Berlin hospital yesterday after his suspected poisoning in Siberia last week. Navalny was initially hospitalized in the Siberian city of Omsk, but was evacuated amid concerns that Russian doctors were covering up investigations into his poisoning. Russian state media is also reporting that Navalny was under constant surveillance during his tour of Siberia, a process that involved large numbers of federal agents dressed in civilian clothes. The alleged assassination attempt on Navalny comes one month before local elections in Russia, where he had planned to help opposition candidates. He's one

of Putin's most prominent critics, known in part for his videos exposing government corruption, which he posts to YouTube. These are the videos the site should recommend to impressionable 13-year-olds, not video game streams that are also alt-right. Enemies of Russia's Kremlin have often been targets of poisoning and assassinations. Last Thursday, Tennessee's Governor Bill Lee signed a law that makes camping out overnight on state property a felony. The law seems to directly target protesters who have been sleeping outside the state capitol until the governor agrees to speak to them about police brutality. Now, those people can be arrested and denied their right to participate in elections since Tennessee doesn't let people with felony convictions vote. Asked why he won't just talk to the protesters, Lee said he only has time to,

quote, meet with those groups that are willing to work together to move forward. Good reminder to activists that if you want to see your demands met, simply make them easy, inconsequential and palatable to people who want to put you in jail. Many also said the law criminalizes homelessness by forcing unhoused people to risk arrest unless they sleep on private property. And those are the headlines. That's all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review,

help us beat BTS's live stream record, and tell your friends to listen. And if you're into reading and not just riddles on fruit roll-ups like me, What A Day is also

a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe. I'm Akilah Hughes. I'm Gideon Resnick. And enjoy watching Trump's family at the RNC. I won't. They're all certainly going to talk about him

being in their family. Yep. What a Day is a Crooked Media production. It's recorded and mixed by Charlotte Landis. Sonia tun is our assistant producer our head writer is john milstein and our senior producer is katie long our theme music is by colin gilliard and kashaka