Rick Wilson & Sen. Chris Murphy

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spk_0 The murder of an 18 year old girl in Graves County, Kentucky, went unsolved for years.

spk_0 Until a local housewife, a journalist, and a handful of girls came forward with a story.

spk_0 Listen to Graves County on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

spk_0 And to binge the entire season, add free, subscribe to Laval For Good Plus,

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spk_0 55% points since November 2024. We have such a great show for you today. The Lincoln Project's own

spk_0 Rick Wilson joins us to discuss Stephen Miller's continued efforts to cast Democrats as terrorists.

spk_0 Then we'll talk to Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy about how Democrats can fight back

spk_0 against the Trump administration, but first the news.

spk_0 Somali, we know that Democrats always have an uphill battle when messaging, because of the

spk_0 median environment these days, but it seems that Trump is facing more shutdown blame, but it still

spk_0 seems way too close to me in these polls about who gets blamed for this.

spk_0 Most Americans disapprove of how Republicans and Trump are handling the shutdown.

spk_0 39% of Americans blame Trump and Republicans for the shutdown. That's versus 30%.

spk_0 So that's actually, it was a little bit better for Democrats when it started. Half of Americans

spk_0 disapprove of how Trump is handling the shutdown. Here's a big prompt for Republicans about this.

spk_0 Is the like healthcare is an 80-20 issue? Okay, so the majority of Democrats,

spk_0 Independents and Republicans, for extending those enhanced tax credits, the Democrats demand being

spk_0 included in the government funding. So that's an 80-20 issue, right? 90% of Democrats, 80% of Republicans,

spk_0 80% of Independents, 60% of Republicans. So there it is. People want those enhanced

spk_0 tax credits. They don't want to lose their house insurance. Again, even if you, I think that that

spk_0 is sort of the most important aspect of this now. It's worth remembering there are Republicans.

spk_0 There are like not insignificant number of Republicans, in fact, quite a few in office who

spk_0 want this too, because they know that this will be a major inflationary pressure that will hurt

spk_0 voters before the midterms that will maybe make them lose their seats. You have tariffs,

spk_0 and then you have health insurance going up. There's only so much inflation that the American

spk_0 people can take, right? Like, your groceries are more expensive. Your health insurance is more

spk_0 expensive. You elected the guy because he said he was going to make stuff less expensive.

spk_0 So I don't know, you know, I do think I think that extending these Obamacare subsidies is just good

spk_0 business, but it is interesting that both parties are getting the blame. In earlier polls, we saw

spk_0 that it was more Republicans getting the blame than Democrats. Usually the party in power gets

spk_0 blamed for the shutdown. It doesn't matter if they start up as a government this week, if this

spk_0 federal employees eating at, you know, food banks, that's going to be very different kind of thing.

spk_0 So we have to see sort of what the shutdown ends up looking like. So another thing we have to see

spk_0 what it looks like is Gavin Newsome is going to sue the Trump administration for sending California

spk_0 national guard to Oregon. So in this episode of Fast Politics, you're going to hear my interview

spk_0 with Chris Murphy. And what, and I think Chris Murphy is really smart. And one of the things he

spk_0 said in this interview was, and that surprised me. And sometimes a lot of times a Democratic

spk_0 elected don't really surprise me. I'm sorry to tell you, but this I thought was really surprising

spk_0 and interesting, which is he said that he got a lot of faith from the fact that Newsome was planning to

spk_0 do this redistricting of the five seats. And he said it showed that you can push back against

spk_0 Trumpism. And this is, so this makes me think of that. Newsome is going to sue Trump for sending

spk_0 California national guard troops to Oregon. We already saw that Trump had no right to federalize

spk_0 the guard when it came to California. My guess is that this will also be deemed illegal. And I

spk_0 sort of point out like again and again. And this is something that Pritzker said to and his public

spk_0 comments. They keep, I think it's really important. This White House is out there with a press release

spk_0 as soon as humanly possible. And they are working it. Like, for example, in this piece, it says,

spk_0 zoom in, President Trump exercised his lawful authority to protect federal assets and personnel

spk_0 in Portland following following violent riots. White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in

spk_0 a statement to Axios, there are no violent riots. Right. So that's fucking bullshit. And if

spk_0 you're going to use statements that have lies in them, like, should you be putting a verbatim

spk_0 statement like that in a new, in any kind of news, like clearly, that is not true, right? She,

spk_0 I think Newsome will win. And I think this is illegal. And I think that if you're Axios, you should

spk_0 not put these statements that contain lies in them in your reporting. Now, yeah, I think we're

spk_0 sitting here in some research from the Goopmock Institute, what we assumed would happen, which is

spk_0 when you ban abortions and make it very hard for women to have abortions, they have less abortions.

spk_0 Yeah. And now they have less abortions. But what's the second order effect? So much of

spk_0 Trumpism is a lot of like poorly thought-out ideas, a lot and very little trying to figure out

spk_0 the second order effect of when things happen. So I'll be curious, like, who's having these babies

spk_0 and what, you know, are these teenagers having babies? Because like, when I was young, we had a

spk_0 teen pregnancy epidemic. We even had that because we had abortions, we had warning after pill,

spk_0 we had things. It was just a very different world. And we didn't have a teen pregnancy epidemic

spk_0 the way we do now, or we may now, we don't know. So I mean, I think I'll be curious to see the

spk_0 second order effects of this for the first full, in the first full year after the dogs decision,

spk_0 about one in three abortions in the South and one in 12 nationwide happened in Florida.

spk_0 Now Florida doesn't have abortions anymore. So they, you know, so I don't know where people go.

spk_0 I mean, this is the end, it turns out maybe they don't and they have more children,

spk_0 they can't afford or care for. So, Molly, I find this case to be a really important

spk_0 flashpoint because it often shows which way the wind is blowing with how Trump pushes back.

spk_0 And what we're seeing now is Kamar Bregogarsia may have been charged because of Trump administration's

spk_0 dictiveness a judge has found. Everything we're going through is because of the Trump administration's

spk_0 predictive test. I mean, you know, we wouldn't have I.e. Sin Chicago. We wouldn't have this. We

spk_0 wouldn't have that. The whole, you know, when Trump kept saying like, I'm going to, you know,

spk_0 pay back my enemies and, and, you know, extract retribution. Everyone be like, no, you don't really

spk_0 mean that. He'd be like, yes, I do. Yeah, he does. So they, so they were not going to return him.

spk_0 Remember, they sent this guy, this poor guy, he's a Maryland guy.

spk_0 He was not in the country legally, but he did live in Maryland. They sent, they deported him,

spk_0 then they had to bring him back. Remember, they had all those people in that, they had all those

spk_0 people in that jail. By the way, we still don't know where the, the alligator alcatraz people are,

spk_0 right? They're just somewhere else in the system. I mean, the thing is like, we know people

spk_0 are, are dying in this. We know, but we don't really know like what the numbers are,

spk_0 but we certainly know. And I mean, because the mainstream media is so small now,

spk_0 there's just so much that we're missing. Like if we had the, the media we had in 2016,

spk_0 every day would be horror stories. But so much of this is going on reported because people just

spk_0 don't have the, they don't have the lawyers, they don't have the infrastructure, they don't have

spk_0 the things they need to do that report on. All I know is what I've been told, and that's a half

spk_0 truth is a whole lie. For almost a decade, the murder of an 18 year old girl from a small town

spk_0 in Graves County, Kentucky, went unsolved until a local homemaker, a journalist, and a handful of

spk_0 girls came forward with a story. I'm telling you we know Quincy, know that we know.

spk_0 A story that law enforcement used to convict six people and that got the citizen investigator

spk_0 on national TV. Through sheer persistence and nerve, this Kentucky housewife helped give

spk_0 justice to Jessica Kerr. My name is Maggie Freeling. I'm a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist,

spk_0 producer, and I wouldn't be here if the truth were that easy to find.

spk_0 From Lava for Good, this is Graves County, a show about just how far our legal system will go

spk_0 in order to find someone to blame. Merrick, you're gonna work the hell up. Bad things happens to good

spk_0 people in small towns. Listen to Graves County in the Bone Valley Feed on the I Heart Radio app,

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spk_0 And so I pointed the gun at him and said, this isn't a joke. And he got down and I remember feeling

spk_0 kind of a surge of like, okay, this is power. Plus, my old friend Gregor and his brother tried to

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spk_0 podcasts. I started trying to get pregnant about four years ago now. We're getting a little bit

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spk_0 Rick Wilson is the founder of the Lincoln Project and the host of the enemies list.

spk_0 Rick Wilson. Molly John fast. I am going to redo a tweet. We're going to just start right

spk_0 with a tweet. You ready? I'm ready. Strap down right ago. The core purpose of the organized terrorist

spk_0 attack on DHS. What? Where is an organized terrorist attack? Is to reverse. Through assault and

spk_0 as an asignation, the 2024 election mandate to expel millions of illegal aliens that bite in a minute.

spk_0 Okay. You. Yes. Look, this is another thing that Stephen Miller cranked out in his

spk_0 Goon cave somewhere in his house where he gets this enormously broke fantasy in his head that somehow

spk_0 anybody who opposes Donald Trump on any dimension is a terrorist. Anyone who speaks against

spk_0 Donald Trump is a terrorist. Anyone who funds a Democratic candidate is a terrorist.

spk_0 The problem with this is that the people engaging in the the terrorist acts by and large

spk_0 in our streets are a bunch of masked goons who are now arresting and abusing US citizens,

spk_0 who are assaulting journalists and whatever the cause. They killed two people, right? Or one or two

spk_0 people have been. Whatever the cause that started this the public opposition to them,

spk_0 it's because of Stephen Miller's desire to expel all the brown people from America. Let's not lie

spk_0 about what it is. He is an eliminationist. He does not just want to get rid of illegals. I promise

spk_0 you, it will not stop there. The next phase will be, well, these Mexicans aren't culturally like us.

spk_0 They're not real Americans. I mean, hence the whole bad bunny attack. He's a Puerto Rican. He's

spk_0 I agree. Stephen Miller, but I also think it's really important to just like talk with

spk_0 this for one second, which is they are doing all this messaging because they know it's not working.

spk_0 And I feel like what I think Pritzker said this thing last week or last week a couple days ago,

spk_0 maybe it was like a day ago, but it feels like 10 years. Pritzker said this thing where he said

spk_0 videotape everything because everything because I think he really did have this realization,

spk_0 which is like there was a moment when Donald Trump saw the little girl crying over her shoes.

spk_0 When he when he was like, I'm a TV guy and this is not how I want my president to get a look.

spk_0 And Pritzker is in many ways trying to get that moment to Donald Trump. A degree disagree.

spk_0 No, I agree. Look, Trump is a primarily visual thinker. He is a guy who sees the picture.

spk_0 He is a guy who sees what's on the TV. I mean, he's the chancey gardener of our era only evil.

spk_0 And and because these pictures are increasingly not of ice arresting the imaginary, you know,

spk_0 terrorists of trend a Agua. Right. But in fact, abusing and assaulting and hitting and gasing

spk_0 women and not killed. They're recon citizens to the ground. And kicking in the door of the American

spk_0 citizens without a warrant. Yeah. And arresting elected officials who asked just ask the question,

spk_0 do you have a warrant? The Chicago Alderman was arrested the day just asked, do you have a warrant?

spk_0 They said, you're under arrest. Do you have a warrant? We just want to know, do you have a warrant?

spk_0 There was no violence. There was no assault. There was no, there was no call to to harm for them.

spk_0 It was a simple question that every American citizen has a right when they are dealing with

spk_0 law enforcement at any level. Do you have a warrant? But even non-citizens have rights. Like the

spk_0 whole idea that yeah. Yeah. And I'm by fricking this this problem a little bit here because non-citizens

spk_0 still have the right to do process under our constitution. Yes. I'm sorry if the Republicans

spk_0 today don't believe in that, but I'm sorry that is hard black letter law in the constitution.

spk_0 It is not a debatable matter that even non-citizens have certain constitutional rights. They don't have

spk_0 every single protection that we do. But for due process, they do. For interactions with the

spk_0 criminal justice system, including ICE and DHS, they do. The declaration of a phony national

spk_0 emergency, it does not cover is not legally sufficient to give ICE the power to go and decide,

spk_0 oh, a journalist asked me a question. I didn't like I'm going to knock the fuck out of them and hit

spk_0 them and knock them to the ground. Oh, someone was in someone was in my way on a public sidewalk.

spk_0 I'm going to bear mace them. Now look, there was one of these cases where the woman was armed.

spk_0 They shot her. I don't know the whole details of the story. None of this is an argument for violence

spk_0 against these ice guys. Right. But there is an argument for accountability for them.

spk_0 Well, and I think that's what's so important about what Pritzker said. He said he didn't say

spk_0 like he said videotape it, put it online. Yeah. Let that let people see what's happening.

spk_0 And I think that really is, you know, be peaceful, but videotape that have put it online. And I think

spk_0 I think that is this really the only way it's going to work. I, you know, I keep thinking back to

spk_0 when I was on a stage with this guy, Scott Jennings from MSNBC, but from CNN. And we're sitting there

spk_0 and he's saying all this like really inflammatory stuff. Right. Like on climate change, he says,

spk_0 we're a war with China. And that's why we have to build lots of power plants so we can win the AI

spk_0 war. And I just wonder so much of this like ethos of Trumpism is really just like getting people

spk_0 upset. And I just think at some point the American people don't you think they reject this?

spk_0 No, sadly, I don't. Here's why. Yeah, the American people broadly have already rejected Trump.

spk_0 Two thirds of the American people, for our Mogul listeners, I'm sorry, but these are

spk_0 math concepts you'll have to get used to. Two thirds of the American people do not want these

spk_0 rates. Right. They oppose it. Donald Trump is 18 to 20 points underwater on every economic cluster.

spk_0 And he's. And immigration. He said to 15 points underwater on immigration. Nothing he is doing

spk_0 that he claimed he would be good at doing. He is good at doing. And I think it's we'll talk about

spk_0 immigration for a minute because that was the one where he was okay. Like talked to

spk_0 that was his final that was the sort of final boss of Trump, right? Right. He always was believed to be

spk_0 even by some more conservative Democrats that right got us to seal the border and stopped illegal

spk_0 alien crime and all the themes they used. Now those things are real issues by the way. There are

spk_0 people here from other countries who commit terrible crimes and you know what they should be deported

spk_0 or they should be or they should be tried and put in prison. Either way, I'm fine. But the the

spk_0 focus of what they've done is not on lawbreakers. It's on people who just work. It's gardeners and

spk_0 nurses and home health care aids and farmers and constructioners. So this idea that that

spk_0 immigration was going to be Trump's like main thing was predicated on oh every day we'll catch

spk_0 a human trafficker every day we'll get a murderer every day we'll get 10,000 drug dealers from

spk_0 trend day or ragua. Those people are gone already but I also deported a lot of them. Right. But I

spk_0 also think it is important to realize that now that Trump is president. Immigration just like

spk_0 regular immigration is as popular as it's ever been. Yeah. The stupidity level of. Do you know

spk_0 what the polling on that is? I'm gonna dig it up for you right now. Yeah. The stupidity level of

spk_0 this. The point is we don't need to know the exact number but the point is that Donald Trump has

spk_0 done more from immigration than Democrats. Yeah. I mean, I hear. Legal immigration much more

spk_0 popular than Democrats could have ever. Right. Donald Trump ended up causing so much damage

spk_0 throughout the economy that now the public polling is much more favorable to and to and a legal

spk_0 immigration structure and system than it was even when Joe Biden was president and and what

spk_0 Trump has done. I think he's actually weirdly done a service to the immigration debate because when

spk_0 when the imaginary debate is there are all criminals they're all from third world hellholes here

spk_0 to steal your wife. Right. Beech your dog and cat. You know and burn your community down and put

spk_0 a taco truck on a recorder. Right. It's easier for Fox and for the MAGA infrastructure to

spk_0 demagogue this thing and go crazy on it. Right. When it's won the gardener or Rosa the home

spk_0 healthcare nurse right or or Carlos the Rufor it becomes a lot more difficult to make this case

spk_0 and the and the majority of the people that they are deporting the vast vast vast vast majority

spk_0 something like 95% of them are not hardened criminals are not in the past 13 are not in

spk_0 anglo. It is a it is a it is a diminimus number and and and they they've had now nine months to do this

spk_0 they've had nine months are you telling me that this panopticon government with all the data of

spk_0 Palantir and everybody else can't round up the bad guys in nine months. But I also think the

spk_0 the reason why they're having so much trouble making this quote is this because there aren't enough

spk_0 like there you know they have this idea there's 20 million illegal quote unquote but it's not

spk_0 it's not there have so much trouble finding it. It's like it's like yeah okay the it's like this

spk_0 it's like those things when the Russians used to say like the beat harvest will be 50,000 tons

spk_0 right they're only growing like 5,000 tons of beats or whatever the number was right.

spk_0 Well it is what Trump really I mean the thing with Trump that you really do say and he's got

spk_0 and he started doing this with numbers too you know like they they're writing us checks for

spk_0 10 trillion dollars. 17 trillion dollars has come in so far. I mean it is but the thing that would

spk_0 this shut down like the larger question is who's running the show because like clearly

spk_0 Russ Vaugh and Stephen Miller they're running the show. They're out sourcing going on this.

spk_0 Let me tell you what I'm what I'm given to understand by people around the Trump orbit right now.

spk_0 Stephen Miller and Russ Vaugh and JD Vance have formed a sort of loose governing alliance inside

spk_0 the White House. Susie Wiles is checked out pretty much. She's in the background now. She does the

spk_0 administrative stuff not the strategic stuff. She's not in the room for the big strategic plays

spk_0 anymore. She's she's a smaller character than she was and she was the one normie that everybody

spk_0 was like oh thank god Susie Wiles was there. That's a grown up in the room. It's now Miller and

spk_0 Miller's holdover Trump is very simple. He says to Trump every day well the base wants us to do this.

spk_0 The base wants you to do that. If you don't do this the base will be angry with you Donald.

spk_0 And and so you see that that Vaugh's Miller Vance and Vance is doing this because he's trying to

spk_0 take the immigration stuff as hot as they can as ugly as they can as as pressing as they can as an

spk_0 issue. I don't think that it's working. The numbers are not great. And the other part of this thing is

spk_0 you know Trump's inability to stay focused on anything for very long. Yeah. It always he always

spk_0 drifts off to something else. Now he wants to invade Iraq or Iran. Now I want to go back to

spk_0 Afghanistan. Now he wants to nuke Nicaragua or Venezuela or whatever it is this. Yeah.

spk_0 All of it. If he was every day out there messaging from the podium. Right.

spk_0 Might be a different case. But I don't think he can do that anymore. I don't think he has the

spk_0 the cognitive ability to do that these days. I think I think he's in a sort of a a quick

spk_0 sand right now when it comes to that. So some of the stuff I mean there were he did some speeches.

spk_0 He talked to that and he talked. He did a helicopter spray and he definitely was not you know.

spk_0 Right. I haven't seen that I haven't seen the footage of that yet. But I look his decline. I know

spk_0 we've been saying this for a while. It is not subtle anymore. It is much harder to pretend that he is

spk_0 not. I mean the JD Vansting somebody around Trump world literally said to me it's legacy planning

spk_0 right now. They don't want to get caught short if Trump dies one morning. You know on his second

spk_0 filet of fish and JD Vanst has to step up. They don't want to be short. So that's why

spk_0 Vanst is out doing all this populist rar rar agglie bullshit. I mean Vanst is he is a uniquely

spk_0 terrible politician. So I will be a fascinating. I mean he really is like he is like Steven Miller.

spk_0 I mean he just it's like why is this person screaming at me and yeah and look and the worst part of

spk_0 it is with Steven Miller you know he's psychotic. You know there's just some evil brewing in the heart

spk_0 of Steven Miller. With Vanst it's just ambition which to my mind makes it much less forgivable.

spk_0 You know I understand it's saying Vanst was never Trump. That was like JD Vanst used to be on all

spk_0 of our email chains back in the early days of never Trump. Fuck that guy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

spk_0 I mean yeah JD Vanst found that there was no place in the Republican party for never Trump.

spk_0 So and the obvious solution is to leave the party but that but apparently you know JD was never

spk_0 quite you know structured enough in his moral thinking to get the fuck out. This was much easier.

spk_0 I mean the secret about Trump is that if you just are loyal like that's all you need you don't

spk_0 have to be smart you know have to be cool you just have to be loyal. Well I think I think you

spk_0 are seeing as I like to call it this is the early stages of the Hunger Games of 2028. These people

spk_0 are going to rip each other to shreds. Right now you're seeing in the mug of influencer class

spk_0 them ripping each other to shreds. Like hell and hell. Oh Laura Loomer is after Tucker Carlson now

spk_0 you know she calls to her. Because he's not because he doesn't like me.

spk_0 Tucker Carlson you know all the you know she's a tag and you know you've got you've got all these

spk_0 different people racing around trying to be the one. Racing around trying to be like the person

spk_0 covering him Tifa and all that other garbage. Yeah. Benny Johnson armed up are tooled up in

spk_0 in in border patrol. There is level four sappy plates on his on his load bearing vest running

spk_0 around Chicago now like he's under gunfire the fuck out of here. Rick Wilson what do you think

spk_0 you know Jesse always has this smart thing he says which is like the worst kind of podcasting

spk_0 is asking someone to predict the future. But well about 20 billion years from now the sun will begin

spk_0 but I mean do you think like like when you think about Trump right now and you think about like

spk_0 I'm thinking about where we are in this ad men versus and I'm and I'm trying to sort of think of like

spk_0 where you know they're trying they're doing a lot of really scary stuff they're moving really fast

spk_0 and breaking things. But it doesn't feel it says feel it still feels like the American people I mean

spk_0 it doesn't feel as scary as it did to me six months ago. He does not have a mandate. Yeah.

spk_0 He does not have the mandate of the people they do not like him. Yeah. They do not like what he's doing.

spk_0 They assess him on the most important single valence to voters the economy as a complete and utter

spk_0 train wreck failure fuck up. He is the worst president on the economy in this country that that

spk_0 anyone including his own partisans could have conceived. All the things he claimed that Joe Biden was

spk_0 screwing up on. He has made so much worse. He has done such a poor job on. He has caused

spk_0 worse inflation. He has caused worse job loss and it wasn't because of something that Biden did.

spk_0 It was a choice. It was a cause of choices Trump made and people know it. He does not have a mandate.

spk_0 The novelty of Trump for a long time has been fading. It has not faded in the political

spk_0 media class. Right. Who still overscore his ability and his influence in this country. He is a

spk_0 dangerous, dangerous man, but he is also a grumbling edifice. He has also never been smart. He is

spk_0 also constantly obsessed about the things that he knows he's done in the past like the EBSC and stuff.

spk_0 And he is he is flailing around right now in a way that's not going to build public trust or

spk_0 confidence. It's not going to no one's going to wake up in the morning and go well thank god we're

spk_0 covering up the EBS team files. God, I like Trump now.

spk_0 Merkwellsen, we come back as always. You know me.

spk_0 Chris Murphy is the junior senator from the state of Connecticut. Welcome to Fast Politics,

spk_0 Senator Chris Murphy. Hey, thanks for having me back. I feel like I've interviewed you so many

spk_0 times and I read you. I watch you and I watch the way you've changed to this moment in American life.

spk_0 Like going from a safe blue senator with aspirations to a person who is just really worried about

spk_0 where we are in this country right now. And I feel like it's very clear to me that that you become

spk_0 like really a moral conscience of this moment. What is the sort of emotional journey you've been on

spk_0 in a way? I mean, I know you're a very senator but like you clearly have a meeting the moment in a

spk_0 way that a lot of people are not. It's like a really wonderful backhanded compliment. I will accept

spk_0 the fact that I used to be worse and now I'm better. You were good before but you know like what you're

spk_0 doing now is like full-time 24-7 just talking about what's happening. Yeah. So I mean,

spk_0 listen, I don't know why I have sort of seen the threat with clarity but I've seen the threat. I

spk_0 was confident from the minute he was sworn in that he was cooking up something fundamentally

spk_0 different in this term. Then from the first term and that we were going to be in a fight from the

spk_0 you know moment he showed up in that office to save our democracy. A part of that Molly is that

spk_0 you know I didn't spend a bunch of the last four years. I'm digging into the pseudo intellectual

spk_0 underpinnings of MAGA and you know there are these two ideas that have become very much mainstream

spk_0 inside Donald Trump's orbit and they are that democracy is really not worth it any longer

spk_0 that it's antiquated. Peter Tiel. Yes. And the second one is that you know progressives, the left

spk_0 represent an existential threat to the national identity which to MAGA is a white Christian male

spk_0 dominated identity. And so you know they don't really care about getting rid of democracy because

spk_0 it serves their end which is to eliminate progressives in the left from the body politics. So

spk_0 I just think you have to understand that you know that sort of anti-small D democratic sentiment

spk_0 inside the Republican Party which maybe was a bit fringe in 2016 is now mainstream. And so this

spk_0 is a serious moment perhaps the most serious moment this country has faced since the Civil War

spk_0 and we have to treat it that way. Yeah like I feel like you lose the democracy in tiny ways and

spk_0 you know slowly and all at once. And I feel like you have been very clear about some of those

spk_0 moments. So I would love you to sort of talk about where you think we are right now.

spk_0 Well I mean I think we're almost there right I mean I think we're much closer to losing the democracy

spk_0 than people think we are. And I do think there's this fallacy whereby people are waiting for this

spk_0 one-sysnic moments. But that's not really what happens in the story of democracies that disintegrate.

spk_0 Elections don't really ever get canceled. There's not normally a coup. What occurs is that

spk_0 the space for political dissent just gets contracted so badly that the minority party, the

spk_0 opposition party can never win a national election. And I think we have this tendency to you know

spk_0 only live in one new cycle at a time. Yeah. And we forget on Tuesday what happened on Monday and

spk_0 we don't have the muscles to be able to understand the cumulative impact of everything that he has done

spk_0 but this has been systematic the way he has gone after law firms gone after college campuses

spk_0 going after states with governors who you speak to mainly about him using the power of the

spk_0 purse to reward loyal states and punish states that have leaders who criticize him the consolidation

spk_0 of the media happening as we speak right Trump allies now on the verge of owning CBS Tiktok meta

spk_0 CNN. This is the story of how a country like Hungary or a country like Turkey slipped into

spk_0 illiberal democracy bordering on autocracy and if we don't understand that time's running out

spk_0 for us to make a stand we may have an election in 2026 Trump's subrules might be at 32% and

spk_0 Democrats will still lose because our base stays home because they just gave up our donors run for

spk_0 the hills because they don't want to be grasped by Trump the media just doesn't tell the true story

spk_0 they platform magha content but they don't platform criticism that's a recipe for disaster. None of

spk_0 this is particularly popular like we're talking about project 2025 the unitary executive executive

spk_0 theory that Trump should be sort of a god king and that every branch of the federal government should

spk_0 serve his desires not popular but being implemented not popular and I think there is a conversation

spk_0 happening here in DC whereby you know some of my colleagues or some pundits um saying well you

spk_0 shouldn't really talk about democracy because you know democracy and win the election force in 2024

spk_0 and so let's not talk about it now I don't think that gives voters credit right they know that this

spk_0 is a different knowledge than 2024 I mean they've seen what he has done there's a new poll that

spk_0 shows 80% of Americans believe that we are in a political crisis and that for the first time ever

spk_0 over 50% of Americans worry that their ability to speak freely that the freedom of speech is being

spk_0 a bridge to the point of potentially being destroyed that's exceptional and so I think people are

spk_0 ready for us to elevate this question of the rule of law to come after him for his belief that he's

spk_0 a king you know just because we didn't win in 2024 talking about democracy doesn't mean that we

spk_0 can't win now people know the circumstances are different they know the threat is real is present

spk_0 is clear because he's doing it because he's been president for nine months and we've seen like

spk_0 just seismic rollbacks of our rights so this gets me no question which is like um friends with a lot

spk_0 of these people in leadership and I talk to their offices and again this is not like me criticizing

spk_0 because I think I'm you know whatever it's me criticizing because I'm genuinely worried that

spk_0 we're in a five-along fire why is it so hard for leadership to message that well I mean this

spk_0 is not I guess for me like right now in the middle of a shutdown fight I'm not super interested in

spk_0 internal critiques I just want everybody to start fighting the totalitarianism I do think though

spk_0 that for people that are more comfortable talking about for instance health care and health care

spk_0 premiums that are going up um these are the same story right so Trump is doing these super

spk_0 unpopular things robbing from people taking their health care away in order to pad the pockets

spk_0 of billionaires and the only way that he gets away with something down in popular is by also

spk_0 destroying your ability to protest and so if he gets away with the destruction of democracy then

spk_0 he's going to be able to more easily just take stuff from you your kids education your health

spk_0 care money for street improvements in your neighborhood and hand it to corporations and billionaires

spk_0 so the only way that you protect yourself and your ability to manage your budget as prices are

spk_0 going up is to fight is totalitarianism is to fight what he is doing to try to destroy our democracy

spk_0 because that's the other feature of these countries that have slid into illiberal democracy is that

spk_0 the separation between rich and poor just get bigger and bigger and bigger because they become

spk_0 totalitarian olgarcs not just totalitarian states like Russia I mean the polling

spk_0 show is that the base is furious that there are a percentage of democrats that are so

spk_0 incredibly angry and it's created a kind of complicated dynamic do you feel like there's a way

spk_0 to tap into that and do you feel like those people can use that energy for you know what needs to

spk_0 happen right now well I guess some of that is is due to Trump's successful you know strategy and

spk_0 approach I mean he he's engaged in this sort of dizzying attacks on free speech attacks on

spk_0 people's pocketbooks it's a new story every day and for a lot of people you know they retreat in

spk_0 part because it's just all too overwhelming but for other people they are retreating because they

spk_0 worry that democrats are powerless that's why you know probably the most important thing that has

spk_0 happened on our side in the last few months is Gavin Newsom's move to redistricting california

spk_0 because it sort of showed a pathway of power it showed that we had options tools that are

spk_0 disposal that you could use this is one of those tools right now right the leverage that democrats

spk_0 have to say here are the conditions upon which we are willing to vote for a budget and I think people

spk_0 want us to do more than just say we want health care subsidies turned back on for 22 million

spk_0 Americans I think they also want us to say we are not going to willingly fund a budget

spk_0 that destroys our democracy I'm not going to be a sucker and vote for to fund a DOJ that turns

spk_0 around and hunts me and my political how why on earth would I do that and if we do it it makes us

spk_0 look impotent and weak and it causes more people out there who hate what Trump is doing to just

spk_0 pull back from politics because they don't think that there's any use in voting for an opposition party

spk_0 that doesn't use all the tools that it has at its disposal to fight all of the illegality and

spk_0 the corruption and I'll just say this probably I'm not unrealistic about this when I say that we

spk_0 should fight to preserve democracy I'm not saying that we're only going to sign on to a budget that

spk_0 eliminates all of Trump's corruption but I think it'll make some progress we've at least got to

spk_0 throw some sand in the gears to try to slow down on the illegality in the corruption so we're

spk_0 Republican members appropriation have said that it would be it I mean this was reported you know

spk_0 under the cloak of anonymity as all Republican criticism is but that said Democrats would be

spk_0 crazy to sign on to any kind of budget because of the pocket recessions because this administration

spk_0 is not good on its word Democrats are coming up against the problem that foreign countries have

spk_0 which is you can't trust Trump literally figuratively metaphorically period you know it is worth

spk_0 just noting what an odd system we have here you know we are essentially in coalition government

spk_0 with Republicans because our rules require democratic votes for a budget in you know other

spk_0 parliamentary systems it's just the majority party that has to deliver the votes here they need

spk_0 our participation which means they have to present as good faith partners they cannot bring us to

spk_0 the negotiating table say yeah we're going to agree to this much money in New York and Connecticut

spk_0 and then once we give our votes we find out that none of the money in the budget is being spent

spk_0 on our states Trump's doing that right now right he's brazenly canceling projects only in

spk_0 democratic states as a means to I guess try to bully us to the negotiating table there are things

spk_0 that we can do in this budget that would at the very least make it harder for Trump to get away

spk_0 with that kind of sort of pulling the rug out from under democratic priorities provisions that

spk_0 would make it absolutely clear that he has to spend all the money in the budget not just in the

spk_0 states that he deems to be loyal to him and would give you know my governor an easy right to go to

spk_0 court to get the money turned back on so you can't stop him from acting illegally but you can make it

spk_0 a lot easier for the victims of his illegality to go to court and get a pretty quick injection and

spk_0 that's what we would be looking for in this budget that seems like something that would be sort of

spk_0 easy to slip by Trump world because they're not so detailed oriented with the exception of Russ

spk_0 Vaught and something that Republicans might agree to because they don't necessarily like this

spk_0 appropriations fight they have like lost the power of the purse and the power of oversight do you

spk_0 think there's appetite there for that or no well listen I I don't think it makes a lot of sense to

spk_0 negotiate the details in public right just for now we need to say and you know this is my

spk_0 recommendation we need to say that if you want our votes for this budget there are two things you

spk_0 got to do you got to stop people's premiums from going up by 75% fundamentally immoral that you

spk_0 are robbing people of health care in order to pad the pockets of billionaires and you've got

spk_0 cooked constraints on Trump's illegality you've got to give us a shot to have a free and fair

spk_0 election in 2026 and 2028 and I think what we're talking about constraints on his ability to

spk_0 seize spending power that's important but there's a number of other things that we could talk about

spk_0 including the way in which he is using federal troops to be deployed to our cities that could be

spk_0 on the table as part of that conversation about protecting our democracy so yes there are a lot

spk_0 of options we have at our disposal and I think a lot of that can be flushed out at a negotiating table

spk_0 these blue states are paying more money into the federal government and they're being denied the

spk_0 money back I mean some of these governors like you know California is the fourth largest economy

spk_0 in the world are there conversations about like what power the states have when it comes to federal

spk_0 funds obviously there are a set of much edger techniques that are on the table at our disposal

spk_0 to try to arrest the slide away from democracy whether it's taking unilateral action

spk_0 about the money they send to Washington whether it be you know the vaccines we saw that yeah

spk_0 tech techniques that have been used in in other fights like general strikes my feeling is this

spk_0 we have leverage right now through the ordinary political process to try to fix these problems and so

spk_0 before we go to those edger techniques which I think just have to be on the table those edger

spk_0 tactics let's try to use the sort of conventional route which is using our powers a minority party

spk_0 to say if you want us to sign on to this budget and right now they need us to sign on to this budget

spk_0 you have got to put our democracy back on a healthy pathway so I think that's where the focus

spk_0 needs to be right now you've been in DC a long time and you do know a lot of these people personally

spk_0 do you think that Republicans understand how different this is the Trump 2.0 is to Trump 1.0

spk_0 or they just like bottom no I mean I do not think Republicans are gonna save us there are a handful

spk_0 in the senate who know this is wrong but it is a shrinking number a number that is shrinking almost

spk_0 to the point of irrelevancy again it is just important to remember what I said at the outset that

spk_0 the mainstream Republican thinking right now is that democracy is not worth it if it elects

spk_0 democrats right period stop they they want power and they want power at any cost and that is the

spk_0 view of now the sizeable majority of Republicans in the house and in the senate and so well yes we

spk_0 have an ability right now to sort of force them to do the right thing because they might lose their

spk_0 seats if they raise people's premiums they're only gonna come to the table because they're worried

spk_0 about their election they're not gonna come to the table again the majority of them are not gonna

spk_0 come to the table because they actually know what he's doing is wrong that ship is kind of

spk_0 sailed as dire as things are we saw what happened with Kimmel that people stood up and canceled

spk_0 their subscriptions and forced it so like it is still within our power to stand up and mobilize and

spk_0 yeah I'm worried that people are losing faith in the democratic opposition my hope is that by

spk_0 standing our ground right now for people's health care for our democracy we can show folks that

spk_0 we're relevant and that we'll have big turnouts in the fall elections we'll get some momentum

spk_0 going we'll be back out on the streets for the no kings protests on the 18th sometimes I can

spk_0 you know be a little bit of a downer because I'm just trying to be realistic with people but

spk_0 there's a lot of promise a lot of hope and a lot of power in what we can do in the next couple

spk_0 of months I agree thank you thanks thanks my

spk_0 and now no more people fuck you Rick Wilson well I'm going fast we are at that moment the moment

spk_0 of fuckery the moment of which the fuckery begins that is right what would you what is your

spk_0 moment of fuckery oh look I think the moment of fuckery was little Pete Hegseth a man who

spk_0 wears more hair product than the two of us combined and more makeup than than the average drag

spk_0 queen um prancing around the stage lecturing 800 senior flag officers and senior enlisted figures

spk_0 from the military on on warrior prowess and and and and martial skill in combat and and toughness

spk_0 when he is a fox news weekend host and a chronic drunkard this this this went over as you might have

spk_0 expected like a wet fart in a hot car in a first date it was what it was a complete train wreck

spk_0 what what what were people saying in the room well it's what they weren't saying that matter

spk_0 they weren't applauding they weren't you know who they weren't jumping up and down when he finished

spk_0 that speech the very best moment of the entire thing he's like we're the department or go get

spk_0 and he looked at that audience and he waited and he waited another beat and then another beat

spk_0 and he looks down for one second you can see his whole face collapsed for one second

spk_0 he looks back up and walks off the stage I know it's a little thing but those 800 generals and

spk_0 admirals in that in that in that room in that auditorium and the and the and the dozens and

spk_0 dozens of senior enlisted folks in that room in the Trumpian climate the right thing would have been

spk_0 to clap stand up you know let's let the pit powers at bc you being on their team yeah one of them

spk_0 did it and not one of them stood or clap for Trump not one not one not once and it was it was to my

spk_0 mind the fuckery of Trump and hexeth trying to rally or get those people in the room so they

spk_0 could have a Trump campaign rally was pathetic and dangerous to the country and and and the great

spk_0 thing about it was this time their fuckery failed it blew up in their face and it embarrassed

spk_0 this white house and the barest sector defense dramatically my favorite part of it was that Trump

spk_0 wouldn't let hexeth have the photo op so he came like right that is and someone who's from a family

spk_0 of performers like I get that so hard like I get it man like you're calling all the generals back

spk_0 they're not gonna see you know like you may think you're the you're the main event but you are not

spk_0 right you know it that's a really good point and and Trump's ego drove him over there I also heard

spk_0 that Vance was pushing him to go over there to to make sure hexeth didn't get a solo show but you

spk_0 know with hexeth on the stage it was everything but him holding his camera up and doing a selfie

spk_0 and and the duck face for with the crowd it was I'm telling you the the game of throwing stuff with

spk_0 hexeth and RFK and JD bands and like it is Marco and all yeah yeah Rick Wilson hey Molly

spk_0 John fast I will not speak to you again until next weekend about this one issue but it's Nobel

spk_0 week what are you what are you what odds you taking that on Friday we're going to hear that Donald

spk_0 Trump is the nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize I think that Donald Trump is likely to get a Nobel

spk_0 prize as I am there you go all right good see you next week no pleasure to report because I would

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Rick Wilson & Sen. Chris Murphy

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