What A Day - Trump's VP Wannabes
Episode Date: May 6, 2024Former President Donald Trump held an audition of sorts on Saturday for his top vice presidential picks. At least seven known Veep wannabes attended the Republican National Committee’s spring retrea...t at Mar-a-Lago, including South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, House GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, Florida Rep. Byron Donalds, and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott. The attention-seeking behavior continued into the Sunday talk shows when Scott refused to say whether or not he would accept the 2024 election results during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”And in headlines: Israel and Hamas traded blame over an impasse in the latest round of cease-fire negotiations, the Israeli government shuttered Al Jazeera’s news operation in the country and raided one of its offices, and the first civil trial over the lethal crowd surge at rapper Travis Scott’s 2021 Astroworld music festival has been delayed over a free speech claim by Apple. Show Notes:What A Day – YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/@whatadaypodcastFollow us on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/crookedmedia/For a transcript of this episode, please visit crooked.com/whataday
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It's Monday, May 6th. I'm Traevel Anderson.
And I'm Juanita Tolliver, and this is What A Day, where we recognize the first Monday in May for what it is, the Met Gala.
Yes, this year's theme is the Garden of Time, and I want to see tulips, Juanita.
Everywhere?
All over the place. Tulips, tulips as far as the eye can see.
On today's show, ceasefire talks between Hamas and Israel hit an impasse.
Plus, campus protests continue and DePaul University demonstrations fill the streets of Chicago.
But first, former President Donald Trump's latest reality show is in full swing as Republicans debased themselves in the audition process
to join him on the 2024 ticket as the Republican vice presidential nominee.
Now, it is reasonable to question why anyone would want to serve as Trump's vice president
after he publicly targeted his former vice president, Mike Pence, on January 6th as an armed mob shouted,
Hang Mike Pence.
But alas, at least seven known Veep Stakes contenders attended the RNC Spring Retreat at Mar-a-Lago last weekend,
including South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum,
Senator J.D. Vance of Ohio, House GOP Conference Chair Representative Elise Stefanik of New York,
Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, Representative Byron Donalds of Florida, and Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina.
That is a laundry list of potential VP picks.
I know they've been tap dancing, trying to stand out and get Trump's attention lately.
How have they been fighting?
Well, on Saturday, Trump paraded nearly all of them on stage during his speech,
except for Governor Noem, who reportedly left the event early and has been facing heavy criticism for killing her dog, an event which is detailed in her upcoming memoir. Based on a recording
reviewed by the New York Times and NBC, Trump made positive statements
about each potential VP candidate. He gave particular praise to Representative Elise
Stefanik for her questioning a former Harvard dean, Claudine Gay, during a congressional hearing on
anti-Semitism on college campuses in fall 2023, saying, quote, you destroyed her. And she did so
well, everyone said. she's going to be the
vice presidential candidate. So that's further confirmation of the type of behavior and actions
that Trump values. Some of the attention seeking behavior continued Sunday as Senator Tim Scott
appeared on NBC's Meet the Press and refused to say whether or not he would accept the 2024
election results. Take a listen. Will you commit to accepting the election results of 2024?
Bottom line.
At the end of the day,
the 47th president of the United States
will be President Donald Trump.
And I'm excited to get back to low inflation,
low unemployment.
Wait, wait, Senator, yes or no?
Yes or no?
Will you accept the election results of 2024
no matter who wins?
That is my statement.
But is it just yes or no? Will you accept the election results of 2024?
I look forward to President Trump being the 47th president.
Kristen, you could ask him multiple times.
Senator, just a yes or no answer.
So the American people, the American people will make the decision.
But I don't hear you committing.
For President Trump.
That's clear.
I don't hear you committing to the election.
Here's the deal.
Shout out to Kristen Walker, because she did what needed to be done in this moment.
But this response from Senator Tim Scott is unhinged.
And it paints a bleak picture of what we should expect after November 5th, 2024.
And again, it's what Trump values.
It's wild to me that you could ask somebody such a simple yes or no question
and they fumble their way through it.
It's actually kind of wild.
As for the sole potential VP candidate who did not appear on stage at Mar-a-Lago,
Governor Kristi Noem,
she went on CBS's Face the Nation to correct the record
about meeting Kim Jong-un, an account that has since been removed from her memoir. Take a listen.
So you did not meet with Kim Jong-un. That's what you're saying.
No, I've met with many, many world leaders, many world leaders. I've traveled around the world. I
think I've talked extensively in this book about my time serving in Congress, my time as governor,
before governor, some of the travels that I've had. I'm not going to book about my time serving in Congress, my time as governor, before governor,
some of the travels that I've had. I'm not going to talk about my specific meetings with world leaders. She doesn't want to talk about specifics, but literally had a specific that she had to
since take out of the book. And while Noem was rumored to be out of the running to be Trump's VP,
Trump did acknowledge her last weekend saying that the South Dakota governor is, quote,
somebody that I love.
And last but not least,
Senator Marco Rubio went on Fox
and attempted to deliver an attack on President Joe Biden
that didn't quite work out.
I think Biden, he hasn't done it again
because he's weak and he's feeble.
He's weak and he's feeble.
That's what you get when you have your stock lines that you are trying to get across.
You just end up bumbling over yourself.
So tell us, when will Trump make a final decision and announce his running mate?
Trump is in no rush to pick a running mate.
His campaign has not sent out any questionnaires to the potential VP picks, nor have they begun any deep vetting of their prospects. Here's what Trump told WITI TV in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, about his timeline during
a campaign stop on May 1st. When you look at that timeline, though, what's the timeline for
picking this vice president? Well, I'll be picking, but probably not too much before the convention,
which I happen to be having in the great state of Wisconsin. So Trump plans to continue this
process well into July as the Republican National Convention is scheduled to begin on July 15 Wisconsin. So Trump plans to continue this process well into July as the
Republican National Convention is scheduled to begin on July 15th. So buckle up, y'all,
because the worst is yet to come. Yes, and we will be watching so you don't have to.
But that's the latest for now. We'll get to some headlines in a moment. But if you like our show,
make sure to subscribe and share with your friends. We'll be back after some ads.
Now let's wrap up with some headlines.
Headlines. Headlines. Headlines. Headlines.
Headlines.
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Headlines. Headlines. Headlines. Headlines. Headlines. Benjamin Netanyahu says he'll only accept a temporary pause in fighting. The delegation for Hamas left Cairo on Sunday, where negotiations were taking place, but multiple outlets report
that they may return later this week to continue discussions. Both Hamas and Israel launched
attacks on each other Sunday night, killing three Israeli soldiers and more than a dozen
Palestinians as of our recording time. Meanwhile, Netanyahu said Sunday on X that
his war cabinet voted unanimously to shut down the operations of Al Jazeera in Israel.
Israeli officers were seen raiding one of the news network's offices at a hotel in East Jerusalem,
carting out camera equipment and boxes. It's unclear if Al Jazeera's closure in Israel will
affect its reporting in Gaza and the West Bank. In a statement, Al Jazeera's closure in Israel will affect its reporting in Gaza and the West Bank.
In a statement, Al Jazeera media network called Israel's move a, quote, criminal act that violates human rights and the basic right to access of information.
And the Foreign Press Association said in a statement that Israel, quote, joins a dubious club of authoritarian governments to ban the station. The move came after Israeli lawmakers
passed a bill last month that allows the government to temporarily shutter foreign
media outlets that the prime minister deems a threat to national security. The closure order
is for 45 days, but Israeli officials can extend it for another 45 days. The decision threatened
further to disrupt ceasefire negotiations over the war in Gaza because Qatar, Al Jazeera's sponsor, plays a major role in mediating those talks.
Student protests of the war in Gaza continued on college campuses across the country over the weekend.
In Chicago, an encampment was set up by students from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Columbia College Chicago on Saturday morning, according to ABC7.
Just several hours later, police forcefully dismantled the demonstration,
then arrested and charged protesters with criminal trespassing.
And on Sunday, tensions rose at DePaul University's pro-Palestinian encampment as pro-Israel demonstrators showed up to counter-protest.
The unrest in Chicago over Israel's war in Gaza brings up questions
about what the upcoming Democratic National Convention could look like in August.
The 1968 Democratic Convention was also in Chicago, and it was marred by violence as police clashed with protesters of the Vietnam War.
The whole world is watching became a phrase chanted by anti-war protesters outside of the Conrad Hilton Hotel. The demonstrations lasted for seven days. Hundreds of protesters were arrested
and suffered horrible levels of police brutality
and violence by the Chicago Police Department.
More than two million people in southeastern Texas
are under flood watch since heavy storms began on Friday.
More than 400 people were rescued from rooftops,
homes, and roads from floodwaters.
Tragically, a child stuck in a car died on Sunday
after being swept away by rushing water. Officials have been instructing people in low-lying areas to
evacuate quickly. Harris County, which includes Houston, is the third most populated county in
the United States. It's also incredibly prone to flooding. This most recent batch of storms brought Houston's rivers to levels not
seen since Hurricane Harvey in 2017. And heavy flooding isn't just hitting the U.S. Over the
weekend, hundreds of people have been killed and many are still missing in both Kenya and Brazil
because of dangerous flooding. Dubai also experienced its heaviest recorded rainfall
in the past few weeks. The first civil trial related to the 2021 Astroworld Music Festival tragedy was scheduled to start on Tuesday, but it's been delayed.
Ten people died and hundreds of others were injured in a crowd surge during rapper Travis Scott's set.
One of the victim's family sued Scott and other entities with ties to the festival, including event promoter Live Nation.
Attorneys for the family alleged that the defendants were negligent in their organizing of the event and that they were responsible for the victim's wrongful death. Jury selection was
supposed to start on Tuesday, but now everything's on hold because one of the defendants in the case,
Apple, wants to be removed from the lawsuit. The tech company, which live-streamed Scott's
concert in 2021, filed a motion to be dismissed from the case last month. The victim's family argues that
the placement of Apple's camera equipment limited the audience's space at the venue.
But Apple claims that it can't be prosecuted for the lives lost because it was capturing the
concert as a member of the media and is therefore protected by the First Amendment. The judge
presiding over the case
initially ruled against apple last month but apple repealed the decision last week halting the entire
trial indefinitely and speaking of rappers the internet has been in shambles over the beef
between hip-hoppers drake and kendrick lamar my goodness the toronto and compton rappers have been
going at it with diss track after
diss track for weeks the beef between kendrick and drake goes back over a decade if you know you know
but the most recent drama stems from kendrick's verse on a metro booming song that dropped last
month called like that featuring drake's longtime collaborator future kendrick mercilessly ripped into drake during his feature
and the back and forth has only intensified since then we're not gonna get into all the details of
each disc because baby there's just not enough time but the consensus seems to be that kendrick
is the winner here juanita who do you got i mean i'm always gonna bet on a Pulitzer Prize winner shout out
but also I feel like J. Cole deserves an honorable mention for disappearing into the hedges like
Homer Simpson pretty early on sometimes you just gotta go mind your business you know what I mean
the world would be better if everybody did that. But actually that part. OK.
And those are the headlines.
One more thing before we go.
Freaking out about the presidential election.
Take a few minutes to breathe deep, unclench your jaw and focus your attention on some down ballot races instead.
And a special new episode of Liberal Tears.
Tommy Vitor and Brian Tyler Cohen draft the most extreme
Republican candidates running in 2024. Get acquainted with this year's roster of shameless
Trump wannabes from Arizona's Carrie, Strap on a Glock Lake, and Florida's resident filthy rich
reality star Fabian Basabi. Head to Pod Save America's YouTube page to watch and make sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode.
That is all for today.
If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review, watch the Met Red Carpet, and tell your friends to listen.
And if you're into reading and not just the lyrics to Drake diss tracks like me, let's be real, I don't need to read Drake's lyrics.
I do need to read Kendrick's though.
Complexity, layers, all the things.
What a Day is also a nightly newsletter.
Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe.
I'm Juanita Tolliver.
I'm Trevelle Anderson.
And who's going to dress like a tulip?
Who's invited?
I don't know, but I feel like Janelle Monae would dress as a tulip.
Oh, 100%.
Or Rihanna, if she decides to participate.
Literally.
She will deliver on your demands.
Well, today's a production of Crooked Media.
It's recorded and mixed by Bill Lance.
Our associate producers are Raven Yamamoto and Natalie Bettendorf.
We have production help today from Michelle Alloy,
Greg Walters, and Julia Clare. Our showrunner is Erica Morrison,
and our executive producer is Adrian Hill. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kashaka.