Speaker 1: All right, and joining me now is Congressman Jared Moskowitz.
Speaker 1: He represents a congressional district in South Florida. And as
Speaker 1: you know, I always mock anybody that says South Florida
Speaker 1: because that's always code for not Miami as somebody who
Speaker 1: grew up in Miami, and in this case, because that
Speaker 1: is correct. This is a little bit of Broward County,
Speaker 1: a little bit of Palm Beach County. I'm just sort
Speaker 1: of teasing my fellow South Floridian here a little bit.
Speaker 2: By the way.
Speaker 1: Well, I get very I'll say I'm from Miami, and
Speaker 1: someone will say, oh, I'm from South Florida too, And
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, so, where in Broward County are you from?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, it's like we matter to Chuck.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying you don't, but you know, it's a
Speaker 1: growing up in Miami is a different animal, my friend.
Speaker 2: That's now, oh especially.
Speaker 1: Now, I barely it's you know, it's a totally different Uh,
Speaker 1: it's a totally different place than where I grew up.
Speaker 1: But let me finish quickly your bio. You've been a
Speaker 1: state rep. He's a Democratic state rep. He served in
Speaker 1: the Dysantis administration. Doing emergency management, got elected to Congress
Speaker 1: on the twenty two midterms, I believe, serving now in
Speaker 1: his second term. He joins me. Now, and we were
Speaker 1: just joking. I'm beating up there in South Florida. We'll
Speaker 1: do a little South Florida stuff here in a minute.
Speaker 1: But the fact that you worked in the DeSantis administration,
Speaker 1: that is not a shock to a Floridian that a
Speaker 1: Democrat would work for a Republican governor if it had
Speaker 1: been Jeb Bush, Charlie Chris Rick Scott right like, in
Speaker 1: some ways Jeb Bush set the precedent on some of
Speaker 1: these things. But when I look at Disantis today and
Speaker 1: I was wondering, huh, you got hired in the first term.
Speaker 1: Would you have ever gotten that job in a second term?
Speaker 1: And you were telling me the answer, So tell me
Speaker 1: the answer, now, what do you think.
Speaker 2: The answer is? No, I don't think so. The second
Speaker 2: term DeSantis administration very different than the first term. Second
Speaker 2: term when you started.
Speaker 1: Susie Wiles' difference by the way, Well, Susie Wilds.
Speaker 2: Is the one who hired me, rightight, she vetted me.
Speaker 2: She was part of the transition team. No, I think
Speaker 2: the difference is when he ran for president and and
Speaker 2: started this tack on the social issues again. And then
Speaker 2: you know this, this the division that was not the
Speaker 2: first two years of the administration. It really started obviously
Speaker 2: during COVID. Although I think there were a lot of
Speaker 2: things that we were right about COVID, about opening schools,
Speaker 2: things of that nature that I was that I was
Speaker 2: involved in. But look, the division of e wordsy management
Speaker 2: in Florida had a history of previous directors being from
Speaker 2: a different party than the governor. Because it didn't matter.
Speaker 1: Fugate working for jab and worked for Obama, and he
Speaker 1: might be arguably right like one of the you know,
Speaker 1: the best advisors you can have in that era.
Speaker 2: No what, one of the best of all time at
Speaker 2: both at both levels. Those days I think are are
Speaker 2: over now in Florida and and in politics. Look the
Speaker 2: Trump folks, the Trump folks, you know, rumors that they
Speaker 2: were looking at me for or for FEMA. I think
Speaker 2: it probably worked out for both of us that we
Speaker 2: didn't go down that route. But that look at this climate,
Speaker 2: that would be an impossibility to do.
Speaker 1: Well, let's start there, because you know, I just got
Speaker 1: off the phone with just a longtime friend of mine
Speaker 1: he's an operative out in California, and we're basically having
Speaker 1: an argument about the redistricting situation, right, which is and
Speaker 1: it gets at this issue right here are we? Which is?
Speaker 1: And of course, like each party thinks the other one
Speaker 1: breaks the rules all the time, right, we know this, right,
Speaker 1: there is this base of both so they so you
Speaker 1: can convince yourself to break the rules because you think
Speaker 1: the other guy breaks the rules.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like it's like both It's like two of
Speaker 2: my I have two boys, it's like both of my children.
Speaker 2: When I hear crying and fighting up upstairs, it's who
Speaker 2: hit who first?
Speaker 1: Right, And it's exactly right. And then the question is
Speaker 1: do you stand on principle and bring a knife to
Speaker 1: a gun fight and lose? Right? And that's the argument
Speaker 1: he's making to me. And I'm like, well, if you
Speaker 1: don't stand on principle when it's hard, when are you
Speaker 1: going to stand on principle? And I guess where are
Speaker 1: you on this? Because you're in the middle of this,
Speaker 1: You've got you're in your house, Democrat. The political environment's
Speaker 1: probably going to be blowing in the Democrats direction, which
Speaker 1: maybe why Republicans are so aggressive and trying why Trump
Speaker 1: so aggressive and trying to do this? Where do you
Speaker 1: stand on this? And especially look, I'm always so offended
Speaker 1: by the by how redistricting has worked the state of
Speaker 1: Florida that I'm just always wanting politicians out of this process.
Speaker 1: That's sort of my instinct here. I understand the mindset
Speaker 1: of Hey, if they're going to do ends justifies the means.
Speaker 1: Why why shouldn't the Democrats? Where do you? Where are
Speaker 1: you in this?
Speaker 2: Well, let me say as someone who for the twenty
Speaker 2: years I've been in government elected appointed office, you know,
Speaker 2: when I see someone trying to start a fire, right
Speaker 2: and this is my emergency mandment background, the idea is
Speaker 2: to grab water, put the fire out, preserve as much
Speaker 2: as possible from the fire. I would tell you that
Speaker 2: I don't think that's where the base of the Democratic
Speaker 2: Party is right now. I think the date where the
Speaker 2: base of the Democratic Party is right now is that
Speaker 2: if there's if they're lighting a fire, don't grab water, Jared,
Speaker 2: grab gasoline. Okay, make that fire bigger, burn it to
Speaker 2: the ground. If they're going to burn it, we should
Speaker 2: burn it. Don't talk to me about protecting democracy. Look
Speaker 2: at this is not the democracy I want, don't go
Speaker 2: protect it, shut it down, shut the government down, do
Speaker 2: all of that. Jared. It's no longer about work together.
Speaker 2: Why would you try to work together with them? Jared?
Speaker 2: They don't want to work with you. Look at what
Speaker 2: they are doing. And so I think there's been a
Speaker 2: shift from us being the adults in the room, which
Speaker 2: we are, the responsible folks in the room, which we are.
Speaker 2: I don't think the base wants to hear that anymore
Speaker 2: at all. They don't want to hear about norms. They
Speaker 2: don't want to hear about anything that.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I would go in a room and people would say, Jared,
Speaker 2: you're not fighting hard enough. And I'm on TV all
Speaker 2: the time, I fight and committee, and I would say, well,
Speaker 2: what do you want me to do? Storm the Capitol
Speaker 2: as a sarcastic joke, and like half the room would
Speaker 2: look at half the room would look at me and
Speaker 2: be like, well have you tried?
Speaker 1: It seemed to work for them, It was always you know,
Speaker 1: one of the fears I had about a second Trump
Speaker 1: term was that it wasn't that it was going to
Speaker 1: change the Republican Party even more, but that it was
Speaker 1: going to change the Democrats. Has happened and we're watching
Speaker 1: it now, which is, if you can't beat them, essentially
Speaker 1: join them. It's so funny. Yesterday I just did this
Speaker 1: tweet above the Center for American Progress pulled their support
Speaker 1: right for independent redistricting commissions. And I just put a
Speaker 1: little note that like, I don't understand why the answer
Speaker 1: If you're upset about voters being disenfranchised in Texas, why
Speaker 1: is the answer to disenfranchised voters in California? And then
Speaker 1: Rob Flaherty, who was the deputy campaign manager for Kamala Harris,
Speaker 1: and he goes essentially made the argument you just said
Speaker 1: the base makes, which is, hey, we tried that nobody
Speaker 1: cares about protecting the democracy essentially, you know. And he
Speaker 1: wasn't like being angry. He wasn't like, I didn't feel
Speaker 1: it as a personal attack. He was basically like, hey,
Speaker 1: basically saying I've got I'm the one with the head
Speaker 1: up his ass, right, Like I'm the naive guy here,
Speaker 1: and and it sounds like that's the feedback you get.
Speaker 1: And I just think the other district.
Speaker 2: Chuck, chuck, I'm a moderate district, right, I don't. I
Speaker 2: don't have a plus twenty. I got a plus two. Right, Okay,
Speaker 2: And don't get me wrong. My general election voter isn't
Speaker 2: necessarily there, but my primary voter is absolutely well, unequivocally there.
Speaker 1: This is the conundrum for the party, right, is that
Speaker 1: primary voters want a fighter and swing voters want a uniter.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if you can be both.
Speaker 2: Well, Look, I try as much as I can. I
Speaker 2: hit him in committee, I hit him online, and if
Speaker 2: there's a bipartisan bill, I will vote for it. But
Speaker 2: those folks that are there, whether they're d's, are ours,
Speaker 2: they I now now have the dinosaurs feel right like?
Speaker 2: That error, that error is coming to an end. It
Speaker 2: is absolutely coming to it. And jerry mandering is going
Speaker 2: to speed that up. Because five seats in Texas, five
Speaker 2: seats in California, a couple in Florida, two in Ohio,
Speaker 2: one in Indiana, one in Missouri. Now the twenty five
Speaker 2: seats that we're always fighting over, now the twenty five
Speaker 2: or fifteen.
Speaker 1: Right, No, this is full on parliamentary national election now.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And by the way, this is if you don't
Speaker 2: think Congress functions. Now, I mean, just give it to
Speaker 2: or four more years. More power will go to the
Speaker 2: executive I don't care who's in charge. Basically, we'll get
Speaker 2: to the point where the only thing we can pass
Speaker 2: is a cr maybe maybe.
Speaker 1: So what do you do in a moment like this?
Speaker 2: Well, look, I think for me, I've been doing this
Speaker 2: since I was twenty five. I'm going to continue to
Speaker 2: do what was right. I'm really guided by the shooting
Speaker 2: that happened and Marjorie Stollman Douglas at my high school
Speaker 2: in my backyard, when I saw government failed, the FBI failed,
Speaker 2: school board failed, the braw Sheriff's office failed. Right, this
Speaker 2: was a preventable event. Government failed, and kids and adults
Speaker 2: died as a result of it. And so I got
Speaker 2: to be honest, truck, I do what I think is right. Okay,
Speaker 2: I obbaubly want to represent my voters, Okay, but I'm
Speaker 2: still gonna do what I think is right. If the
Speaker 2: voters decide that I'm not for them, right, I got
Speaker 2: two boys at home right behind that door, right, Okay,
Speaker 2: I'll go back to them, like my life will go on.
Speaker 2: If keeping my job is so important that I'm going
Speaker 2: to lose who I've been, then so be it so
Speaker 2: for me. You obviously, look at the climate you're in,
Speaker 2: you adjust, you see where you're going, but you still
Speaker 2: got to stay true. It's true to yourself. And that's
Speaker 2: always been me. It's how I passed gun control in
Speaker 2: a Republican legislature. We raise the age of twenty one.
Speaker 2: After the shooting, we got red flag laws. I didn't
Speaker 2: do that by lighting the Republicans on fire. I did
Speaker 2: that by bringing them to the school, making them meet
Speaker 2: with parents, trying to see that, Look, yes, we want
Speaker 2: to protect the Second Amendment, but isn't there mitigation we
Speaker 2: can do right to kind of lessen this problem. But
Speaker 2: that way of thinking, Chuck is gone. Everything Trump touches
Speaker 2: as bad, we can't, we can't work with him. And
Speaker 2: don't get me wrong, he's deserving of all of that.
Speaker 2: I mean, just look at the look at what's going
Speaker 2: on here, okay, I mean every day it's something new
Speaker 2: that you know, wasn't in any book of political science
Speaker 2: I ever learned about.
Speaker 1: Well, certainly not the version that you and I, you
Speaker 1: and I grew up with, which you know, sometimes I
Speaker 1: kind of wonder if we ended up growing up in
Speaker 1: an outlier period of American history, meaning the Cold War
Speaker 1: kept both parties more sober and then it you know,
Speaker 1: after the Cold War ends, that's when you saw both
Speaker 1: parties start to move further and further away from each other.
Speaker 1: If you look at that that I used to work
Speaker 1: in National Journal. We used to do these vote rankings,
Speaker 1: and you know, who was the most liberal Republican, who's
Speaker 1: the most conservative voting Democrat. For thirty years, there was
Speaker 1: always the lines always crossed, And sometime in about twenty
Speaker 1: nine to twenty ten they started to be here. Right,
Speaker 1: You'd get like Mansion and Collins, and it's farther and
Speaker 1: farther away because politically it's hard to even support a
Speaker 1: bipartisan bill.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, And look, jerry mandering is a big piece
Speaker 2: of how we got here. But also, Chuck, let's be honest,
Speaker 2: the amount of foreign interference that's going on now online
Speaker 2: especially Look, China has like one aircraft carrier. Okay, they're
Speaker 2: not going to beat us militarily. Neither are the Russians.
Speaker 2: They're not military threats from the Pentagon standpoint. So what
Speaker 2: they've done is if they have invested heavily on trying
Speaker 2: to divide us from within, getting Democrats and Republicans foaming
Speaker 2: out the mouth, get us to hate each other, divide us,
Speaker 2: division all the time, create enemies, create boogeymen, do all
Speaker 2: of that, and by the way, they have had tremendous
Speaker 2: success doing that. We are at each other's throats. And
Speaker 2: if we're at each other's throats, then we can't make decisions.
Speaker 2: If nine to eleven happened tomorrow, god forbid it, another
Speaker 2: nine to eleven, you think we would come together as Americans,
Speaker 2: we would immediately start attacking each other. Rather than focus
Speaker 2: on who who committed it, we'd immediately start the blame game.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean this comes and this is where leadership matters, right.
Speaker 1: We always are reflected by how the president sets the tone.
Speaker 1: And there's no there's he doesn't believe in win win.
Speaker 1: There's one winner and one loser. And if he's succeeding
Speaker 1: somebody else in the.
Speaker 2: Talladega Knights version of politics, if you're not first, your last.
Speaker 1: So let's I want to you. You mentioned two important
Speaker 1: laws you got passed. Governor Rick Scott signed them into law,
Speaker 1: and it was raising the age and it was the
Speaker 1: red Flag warnings and now both I believe have they
Speaker 1: have they repealed the twenty one completely.
Speaker 2: They're all still there. They're all still there. They're trying, right, Yeah,
Speaker 2: the House, the House has tried, the Senate has stopped them.
Speaker 2: But seven years later, we still have twenty one in
Speaker 2: Florida and we still have red flag laws.
Speaker 1: Even though the governor's trying to get rid of it, right.
Speaker 2: Correct, but hasn't hasn't succeeded, and quite frankly, truck hasn't
Speaker 2: he put a ton of capital into it. Yeah, he's tried,
Speaker 2: but he hasn't really tried. You don't want to know
Speaker 2: why he hasn't tried. You know how many times red
Speaker 2: flag laws have been used in Florida and seven years
Speaker 2: now since we've put them in place, over twenty thousand times.
Speaker 2: It's being used more by Republican sheriffs than Democratic sheriffs,
Speaker 2: getting hands out of the getting guns out of the
Speaker 2: hands of people who are your number.
Speaker 1: Those are the most supportive of this law. Where the
Speaker 1: sheriffs weren't they correct all? You know, the sheriffs are
Speaker 1: probably politically more right leaning than left leaning, but this
Speaker 1: was always something law enforcement has been dying for something
Speaker 1: like that.
Speaker 2: We're seeing that it's it's stopping domestic violence. We're seeing
Speaker 2: that it's helping veterans who are having or suffering from PTSD.
Speaker 2: We're seeing that it's stopping suicides, and yes, obviously it's
Speaker 2: preventing you know, mass casualty events by getting guns out
Speaker 2: are the people who are clearly a danger to themselves
Speaker 2: and a danger to others.
Speaker 1: So is the same issues that make it hard to
Speaker 1: do much governing at all across the board? Is would
Speaker 1: you assess that it's the same issue here when you
Speaker 1: look at look at the Minneapolis shooting. Frankly, you hate
Speaker 1: to say this, but they all look at the same right,
Speaker 1: meaning you know, the reaction is the same. People take
Speaker 1: what they politically believe they want to get done and say, see,
Speaker 1: we told you so. And it's always an or. I
Speaker 1: always say there's or or? Is it an and issue?
Speaker 1: And to me, we need to look at access to
Speaker 1: guns and mental health and school security and language divisive
Speaker 1: language on the internet. It seems that it has to
Speaker 1: be all of the above. And that seems to be
Speaker 1: you would think that would be an easy thing to sell.
Speaker 1: That's actually a hard thing to sell.
Speaker 2: Believe it or not. That's actually what we did in Florida.
Speaker 2: So in Florida we raised age of twenty one. We
Speaker 2: did three d waiting periods. We did in flag laws. Okay.
Speaker 2: Then we mandated soros in every school, right, putting guns
Speaker 2: in schools right as we.
Speaker 1: Police are basically police officers, said, right with police officers, correct,
Speaker 1: So a police officer in every school.
Speaker 2: Then we put hundreds of millions of dollars into mental health.
Speaker 2: We mandated a mental health counselor in high schools. We
Speaker 2: mandated health a mental health program and every school board.
Speaker 2: We then put hundreds of millions of dollars into creating
Speaker 2: secure campuses, okay, by making sure that we had single
Speaker 2: points of entry. We put money into video camera systems,
Speaker 2: alert systems. Because the response is also a big failure
Speaker 2: in a lot of these events and lead to more tragedies.
Speaker 2: We change the programs and the school board. Now there
Speaker 2: are threat assessments, right, so that we can identify someone
Speaker 2: who needs help. Earlier, we did the kitchen sink. We
Speaker 2: threw the kitchen. I didn't get everything I wanted on gun,
Speaker 2: I'll see. That's okay, that's what compromise means. But my
Speaker 2: Republican colleagues moved out of their corner, and so I
Speaker 2: moved out of mine. And we came, we came to
Speaker 2: an agreement. I gotta be honest, I don't know that
Speaker 2: we could do that again. I really don't know. In
Speaker 2: the seven years the change that has gone on, no
Speaker 2: one feels that they need to move because.
Speaker 1: There's no reward for moving, Chuck, no reward.
Speaker 2: The reward is for staying in your corner, not for
Speaker 2: actually solving a problem, but just looking tough.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the it's it's when you look at I actually
Speaker 1: have a specific question. This happened at a private Catholic school.
Speaker 1: Does did your law apply to private and charter schools? Importantly?
Speaker 2: Yes? Yeah it does. Yeah, it does apply.
Speaker 1: Where because it does seem as if we know we
Speaker 1: throw all this we can throw all this money at
Speaker 1: public schools. How does a private school get that taxpayer
Speaker 1: security money?
Speaker 2: Well, look, they're gonna have to do an after action
Speaker 2: review obviously to figure out where the gaps were.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: First of all, this kid was posting for a month online, right,
Speaker 2: So what did the FBI miss here? Did the FBI
Speaker 2: miss it because they're busy doing other stuff? Did the
Speaker 2: FBI miss it because they've cut the amount of people
Speaker 2: that work at the FBI. Did they miss it because
Speaker 2: they are now underfunding programs. We don't know. That should
Speaker 2: be part of the after action review that goes on here.
Speaker 2: How did he get on campus? Okay? You know where
Speaker 2: did he get his weapon from? Okay? You know how
Speaker 2: did he get through the door? Okay? All of that
Speaker 2: stuff needs to be looked at. Private schools in Florida
Speaker 2: can draw down state grant money, they can apply for
Speaker 2: state grant money. Okay. In fact, in Florida they've gone
Speaker 2: even further. Kids that go to private school, right, do
Speaker 2: they now get a grant in general to attend that
Speaker 2: private school? Okay? The schools are very expensive here now,
Speaker 2: and they put a ton of money towards security. But
Speaker 2: but yes, this is this is all about figuring out
Speaker 2: what failed, right, That's what we did here when we
Speaker 2: saw what failed in Douglas.
Speaker 1: We did if you could have waived a magic wand
Speaker 1: from what you learned from Parkland, you know, if you
Speaker 1: could be king for a day, what would be the
Speaker 1: what would what do you think is the best answer?
Speaker 2: Well, that's the problem, truck. When these things happened, one
Speaker 2: thing doesn't fail. It's not one point of failure. So
Speaker 2: it's not like, oh if I just got rid of
Speaker 2: AR fifteen's this would this would end No, I wouldn't.
Speaker 2: He would have come in with handguns. He was there
Speaker 2: for he was there for minutes. There were no police
Speaker 2: because the officer didn't run into the building, and you
Speaker 2: would have killed as many people as he could with
Speaker 2: his handguns. Okay, So one thing doesn't fix it here.
Speaker 2: That's why it is an all of the approach. You
Speaker 2: can't just do all of one category. You can't just
Speaker 2: do s r os. We had an s R O
Speaker 2: at Douglas. He decided to stay outside because he didn't
Speaker 2: want to die.
Speaker 1: So the other issue, obviously is rhetoric online and when
Speaker 1: do you ticket seriously, when do you let it go?
Speaker 1: There's censorship questions. And what's interesting about this issue, as
Speaker 1: you said, there was all this there's in hindsight now
Speaker 1: all these red flags given what he was doing online.
Speaker 1: We obviously the entire online conversation. Frankly, as a parent,
Speaker 1: you feel like you have very little ability to sort
Speaker 1: of to monitor it or to prevent it. We're all
Speaker 1: at the mercy of these five big tech companies. And
Speaker 1: I think about the other thing you brought up, which is, hey,
Speaker 1: we have foreign adversaries that are intentionally trying to use
Speaker 1: essentially social media to do this. So this is a
Speaker 1: societal problem that on one hand is a problem for
Speaker 1: our young men and boys right now, but it's also
Speaker 1: this larger problem in our society as a whole. How
Speaker 1: do we deal with this big tech issue.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, look, it's a big piece to the PU.
Speaker 2: I mean that the TikTok piece, okay, is a huge
Speaker 2: piece on how we're going to control how propaganda gets
Speaker 2: fed to the American people TikTok. And I don't want
Speaker 2: to be clear, I don't want to ban TikTok, right,
Speaker 2: but you have to also recognize it's a psyops weapon. Okay,
Speaker 2: there's a reason why I'm not allowed to have it
Speaker 2: on my official devices.
Speaker 1: Hey man, I won't put it on my phone because
Speaker 1: if you guys won't, I'm sitting here going, well, look,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, and I'm hard I'm having a
Speaker 1: harder time trusting my government these days. But that's a
Speaker 1: separate issue. But I am I'm awfully you know. My
Speaker 1: kids are both on it, you know, but they're now
Speaker 1: grown adults and there's nothing I can do about that.
Speaker 1: But I certainly see how it can easily be a
Speaker 1: psyop and and I guess I could argue, why shouldn't
Speaker 1: we band it?
Speaker 2: No Listen in India has banned it, okay. And China's
Speaker 2: TikTok is not our TikTok. Their is an educational program. Okay.
Speaker 2: So they're making their kids smarter, they're making our kids dumber,
Speaker 2: they're feeding our kids false information. I mean, don't get
Speaker 2: me wrong. Twitter or x is also a cesspool of
Speaker 2: hate and garbage, but there at least is community notes.
Speaker 2: TikTok has no community notes. I mean, I remember when
Speaker 2: that letter from the love letter from Osama bin Laden
Speaker 2: was circling on TikTok. Do you remember this? And American
Speaker 2: kids were reading the love letter and they were like, man,
Speaker 2: Osama bin Laden was right. And all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: China was like, oh shit, that we're getting caught in
Speaker 2: our algorithm and they took it down. Okay, that is
Speaker 2: the power of that should have showed every American, Oh
Speaker 2: my god, look what they can do. And so what
Speaker 2: they're doing, because China thinks in one hundred years, thousand years,
Speaker 2: what they're doing is getting us addicted, getting it attached,
Speaker 2: get it, setting the seeds, getting it fully ingrained in society. Right,
Speaker 2: and that way with the young people of the eighteen
Speaker 2: to thirty five demographic right now, thirty percent of them
Speaker 2: get their news exclusively from TikTok. They don't check a
Speaker 2: second source. So with young people, they can move them
Speaker 2: whatever direction. You ever hear about what the Chinese do
Speaker 2: to the Wigers on TikTok, Right, do you think any
Speaker 2: of the kids in school know anything about the Wigers.
Speaker 2: They know everything about Gaza, they know nothing about the Wigers.
Speaker 2: They don't know that China's got a genocide going on
Speaker 2: over there, right, scrubbed from the platform, Right, that's how
Speaker 2: you do a syops operation.
Speaker 1: Well, you just made the case to ban it.
Speaker 2: I voted for It's why most of Congress voted for it.
Speaker 2: To force the sale. You know, China's position on this
Speaker 2: was interesting. They were like, no, no, we're not going
Speaker 2: to sell it and make billions of dollars hundreds of billion.
Speaker 1: To me, that's what was the tell. They were like,
Speaker 1: we're going to make more money. Oh no, no, no,
Speaker 1: we'd rather shut it down.
Speaker 2: We'd rather shut it down, well, because we can't get
Speaker 2: the source code, chuck, Because if we get the source code,
Speaker 2: we can see what they've been doing.
Speaker 1: Gets it to a larger, larger issue. I mean, look,
Speaker 1: I am, I was reading an interesting piece talking about
Speaker 1: young men and the issue of pornography right and these
Speaker 1: and I think they've I've been glad to see it's
Speaker 1: more red states than blue states. But as a parent
Speaker 1: that trying to at least put some hurdles in pornography.
Speaker 1: Shouldn't be so easy to get on the internet. Shouldn't
Speaker 1: be so easy, And how it's really sort of really
Speaker 1: negatively impacted the way young people interact, the way they date,
Speaker 1: all of these things. And yet the First Amendments, the
Speaker 1: First Amendment, what are some of the lines that you
Speaker 1: think government could be doing more with here on a
Speaker 1: federal level in order to sort of clean up this
Speaker 1: social media mess.
Speaker 2: Well, I don't have a problem with the age of
Speaker 2: verifications with pornography. That's fine. Age verifications are great. We
Speaker 2: have to start trying to protect our kids right from
Speaker 2: being just totally sold everything as soon as they get
Speaker 2: onto the internet, right to be part of the grift
Speaker 2: that has going. My kids are on YouTube, they're not
Speaker 2: on TikTok okay, but man, are they getting pitched everything
Speaker 2: at all days, at all seconds on YouTube, Like it
Speaker 2: is crazy to.
Speaker 1: Be careful of that recommendation algorithm.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: I mean my son, and when he first started on YouTube,
Speaker 1: he was just a baseball fan, just following that stuff.
Speaker 1: And then all of a sudden he's in Joe Rogan's podcast,
Speaker 1: And when how did that happen?
Speaker 2: It happens to you fast, It happens fast. I let
Speaker 2: them on YouTube, not in their bedrooms. They got to
Speaker 2: do it in the living room, so I can at
Speaker 2: least hear some of the stuff. And I got to
Speaker 2: be like, get off that. I have to sometimes delete
Speaker 2: the app, try to reset the algorithms, try to clean
Speaker 2: it up. So yeah, there is no doubt that I
Speaker 2: think the majority of Americans would do something, and the
Speaker 2: majority of elected officials would probably do something. But the
Speaker 2: tech lobbyist strong Chuck.
Speaker 1: The texture is no, it's it's replacing the healthcare industry
Speaker 1: and the defense industry right now.
Speaker 2: They're strong, no question they are. They are one hundred
Speaker 2: percent stronger.
Speaker 1: I mean the fact that every one of these companies
Speaker 1: has their own Washington office, the fact that these CEOs
Speaker 1: have bought property in DC. You think they're doing it
Speaker 1: because they like hanging out at the wharf.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, well, I mean you don't think that the
Speaker 2: fact that all the tech titans were at the inauguration,
Speaker 2: sitting on stage with the president, that was a very
Speaker 2: clear message to me, one hundred percent.
Speaker 1: So what's the is Normally I would expect a populist
Speaker 1: administration not to be in bed with some of these
Speaker 1: big titans here, but it does seem I mean, I
Speaker 1: think you and I both know the average American doesn't
Speaker 1: want to be controlled by a corporation, and yet this
Speaker 1: issue with big tech and how much influence they have
Speaker 1: on us has actually been really hard to communicate to
Speaker 1: the average voter. You know, I've tried to come up
Speaker 1: with different ways, and it's clear, you know, theoretically the
Speaker 1: voter's concerned about it, but I don't think people really
Speaker 1: understand how it influences their day to day lives.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, Chuck, it's it's like trying to get
Speaker 2: a drug addict to stop taking drugs. Right. I mean,
Speaker 2: we collectively, me included, so I'm not passing judgment and others,
Speaker 2: we are addicted to this. Now. It's it is like smoking. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean we are addicted. Okay, I mean you know,
Speaker 2: it's tough to put the phone down. I deal with
Speaker 2: it all the time. Trust me, I'm I'm doom scrolling
Speaker 2: on Twitter too much. I'm just as guilty. Right, But
Speaker 2: trying to protect the kids, I think should be a
Speaker 2: separate conversation. Right. We all know it's not good. So
Speaker 2: we all know what's not good for twelve year olds
Speaker 2: and thirteen year olds having some age verifications, having some
Speaker 2: restrictions with age limits, right, doing more in that space.
Speaker 2: There should be some bipartisanship there among parents, right. But
Speaker 2: if we don't, it's just it's just a win for China.
Speaker 1: It does feel like if there's one area of bipartisan cooperation,
Speaker 1: it is on this potentially. Right, This is something Marshall
Speaker 1: Blackburn seems to care about. Right, So I mean, like
Speaker 1: and Brian Shatz in the Senate, right, And you're not
Speaker 1: going to get those two on the same on many
Speaker 1: bills that are exactly uh yeah, And.
Speaker 2: It's gonna take it's going to take action in Washington
Speaker 2: because look, obviously there's parental responsibility. So my kids are
Speaker 2: not allowed on it during the week they're allowed to
Speaker 2: do it on the weekends, right, So that's my that's
Speaker 2: our rule in the house, right, But their friends are
Speaker 2: on it. I can't keep them totally away from it, right,
Speaker 2: They're gonna they're left out. They still learn stuff from
Speaker 2: other from other people, right, that stuff that's not on
Speaker 2: their YouTube, but it's on their friends YouTube.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So you can't put your kids in a cocoon. Right.
Speaker 2: So this is going to take parents from both sides
Speaker 2: to figure out, how do we protect our kids until
Speaker 2: they're adults. How do we protect our kids from being
Speaker 2: targets from companies or foreign governments who are very active
Speaker 2: on all of these all of these platforms.
Speaker 1: Let me shift slightly. It's actually related you brought you
Speaker 1: alluded to it, and I have actually done some survey
Speaker 1: work on this, which is if among eighteen to thirty
Speaker 1: year olds, those that use TikTok have a much more
Speaker 1: negative view about Israel than those that don't use TikTok.
Speaker 1: The Democratic Party right now is Look, I always say
Speaker 1: I'm pro Israel, and I don't like BBI okay, and
Speaker 1: guess what, I'm aligned with the majority of Israelis. And
Speaker 1: to a lot of my friends on the laugh, they
Speaker 1: sometimes don't even realize the majority of Israelis don't like
Speaker 1: BB's policies right now and have real issues with it.
Speaker 1: But it feels like that the Democratic Party as a
Speaker 1: whole is losing the nuance on this issue.
Speaker 2: Do you still look at one hundred percent? And obviously
Speaker 2: we could do twelve hours on I know we could
Speaker 2: on this issue alone. I mean, look, obviously, most Democrats
Speaker 2: don't like the president, disagree with the president, hate president.
Speaker 2: Most Democrats still love their country, you know. So, But
Speaker 2: with Israel, it isn't just BB, it becomes the country.
Speaker 2: It's different, and so look Israel, there is double and
Speaker 2: triple standards. Right. We didn't get fed the genocide that
Speaker 2: was committed in Syria. I didn't have any I didn't
Speaker 2: have any kids talking to me about what Asad did
Speaker 2: to his known people, or what's gone on in the
Speaker 2: Sudan Okay, or what's gone on in other areas in Africa,
Speaker 2: or like with the Wigers. I don't hear about any
Speaker 2: of that. No one talks to me about it. And
Speaker 2: I'm not saying what isn't going on in Gaza isn't horrific,
Speaker 2: It's terrible, Okay. I want the war to end. I
Speaker 2: want the hostages out, I want everybody fed. I want
Speaker 2: everyone fed, Yes, I want everyone fed.
Speaker 1: I don't want to I'd be in favor of sending
Speaker 1: in the Marines to feed everybody while we dealt with this.
Speaker 2: Correct. I mean, you know, I'm all for that, correct,
Speaker 2: one hundred percent. But the reason why there are protests
Speaker 2: in the street on this issue you and not the
Speaker 2: other problems. First, I mean, how many people have died
Speaker 2: in the Ukraine Russian War? A million plus people have
Speaker 2: died there, over a million. There's fifty thousand kids that
Speaker 2: have been kidnapped there. Okay, do you see any protests
Speaker 2: in the screen on that, Chuck, No, Because what's happening
Speaker 2: is the Chinese, the Russians, the grifters, the Katari's right.
Speaker 2: They want to bog America down in this problem. They
Speaker 2: want to get us divided. This is an easy target.
Speaker 2: The Russians don't like that we're in Ukraine. The Chinese
Speaker 2: don't like really anything that we do or our pre
Speaker 2: position on Taiwan. Right, Sell this to the next generation,
Speaker 2: Sell this to the American people.
Speaker 1: Way, what are the Chinese doing for the Gazans? Have
Speaker 1: you figured that out?
Speaker 2: I know what they're doing it for the Gozens? Zero yeah, right,
Speaker 2: so are the Russians zero. Okay, but but this is
Speaker 2: something that has been completely weaponized. But when I didn't
Speaker 2: want to be clear when I say that this has
Speaker 2: been weaponized, I don't want to minimize the suffering that
Speaker 2: is going on in Gaza.
Speaker 1: Well, this is this is our problem with our politics
Speaker 1: is that nobody can handle that two things can be
Speaker 1: true at the same time.
Speaker 2: That's correct, That's correct. I can't say I support Israel,
Speaker 2: right and then not be called genocide Jared, which is
Speaker 2: what I get called. I get screamed at, right. I mean,
Speaker 2: my grandparents all escape the Holocaust. Right. You know what's
Speaker 2: going on in Gaza is a war. Okay.
Speaker 1: Irai is mortified by what's happening in Gaza and is
Speaker 1: highly critical of Bbing, you know. And that's that's what
Speaker 1: really frustrates me, is that there are people on the left.
Speaker 1: I don't unders you know, you know who's the you
Speaker 1: know who's more has pained about this. A large chunk
Speaker 1: of the Jewish committee in this world.
Speaker 2: Oh no, listen, even some of the most pro Israel
Speaker 2: Jews that I know, and you're talking to one of them, right,
Speaker 2: look at what they did with Hesbelah, brilliant well executed.
Speaker 2: Look at what they did with the Iranians, brilliant well executed.
Speaker 2: Look at Gaza and say, those don't look alike. There's
Speaker 2: no strategy, there's no endgame, right, what is going on here? Okay?
Speaker 2: You know this idea that we're just going to pick
Speaker 2: up a million Gosms and move them to the Congo
Speaker 2: is never going to happen, right, and so these right
Speaker 2: wing elements of Ben Gavie and Smoltrich. I mean, the
Speaker 2: damage they're causing to the Jewish community around the world
Speaker 2: is not just existential, it may be permanent for the
Speaker 2: remainder of my lifetime.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, it's this generational. You're right. I you know,
Speaker 1: I always said, look, I my father wasn't Jewish, my
Speaker 1: mother's Jewish. Obviously I'm Jewish. I raised my kids Jewish,
Speaker 1: but my last name didn't automatically doesn't automatically send a
Speaker 1: signal that maybe I'm Jewish or not, And maybe I
Speaker 1: hid in plain sight. Sometime around twenty fifteen twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: boyd you know, suddenly it was the first time I
Speaker 1: have a friend of mine and I both said this.
Speaker 1: He's a little bit old than I am. I said,
Speaker 1: you know, my mom would tell me stories about anti Semitism.
Speaker 1: I'd be like, really, mom, that really happened, you know,
Speaker 1: be the fifties. I was like, come on, you know,
Speaker 1: so we're not that way anymore. And then all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, the way the last five years have gone,
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, every story my mother told me about
Speaker 1: her her days is like the only Jewish family in
Speaker 1: a Midwestern town. Yeah, I get it. I see it.
Speaker 1: And it took a generation to clean that up. And
Speaker 1: I guess here we go again.
Speaker 2: No, Chuck, it's happening again. My grandmother is part of
Speaker 2: the kinder transport out of Berlin. Her parents were killed
Speaker 2: in Auschwitz. It's happening again. What was happening on college campuses?
Speaker 2: They'd see a Jewish student, they would just see a
Speaker 2: Jewish star. He wasn't Israeli, they didn't know if he
Speaker 2: supported bb He maybe against against net and Yahoo. But
Speaker 2: they circled him, assaulted and kept him from going to
Speaker 2: class because he's just Jewish. Right, they're vandalizing Jewish stores,
Speaker 2: you know, holding up a sign at the protest go
Speaker 2: back to Poland. That doesn't really sound like you have
Speaker 2: a problem with the net in Yahoo administration. So people say, hey,
Speaker 2: can you be anti Zionists without being anti Semitic? And
Speaker 2: I would say, in theory, you could, But most of
Speaker 2: this movement is just not. They're conflating the two things.
Speaker 2: One of my constituents is being sentenced tomorrow, okay, because
Speaker 2: he tried to kill me all over Israel right target
Speaker 2: practicing in his backyard, had a manifesto. I was the target.
Speaker 2: He was googling where my wife worked, what temple I
Speaker 2: belonged to. He had a rifle, a sniper, a scope,
Speaker 2: a vest, unlimited rounds of ammunition. He was a former felon.
Speaker 2: The only reason we knew about this is because when
Speaker 2: he was target practicing in his backyard, his neighbor called
Speaker 2: the police and he was arrested because he was a
Speaker 2: former felon. Otherwise not on the radar, totally targeted just
Speaker 2: because of my positions on Israel. Okay, this is not
Speaker 2: an isolated story. I have police in front of my
Speaker 2: house twenty four hours a day now. Other members are
Speaker 2: experiencing this, and other members see this and say, oh,
Speaker 2: I don't want that to happen to me. So they're
Speaker 2: totally silent. Totally silent.
Speaker 1: Look, this is equivalent. This is exactly what's happened with
Speaker 1: MAGA and Republicans. You know, there's a couple of Republican
Speaker 1: senators during the whole Pete Hegseth controversy, and there was
Speaker 1: there was a majority not to confirm him, and then
Speaker 1: there were threats, literal threats, protests against the life of staffers.
Speaker 1: In the world of Joany Ernst family members of Tom Tellis.
Speaker 1: I heard all sorts of stories about the two of
Speaker 1: them being targeted, and they both caved. And here's the thing.
Speaker 1: I don't begrudge them caving. I get it right, they
Speaker 1: have people are being harassed that didn't get elected office,
Speaker 1: and so you feel protected. You feel like you've got
Speaker 1: to protect your family, You feel like you should protect those. Hey,
Speaker 1: they didn't sign up for this, I did type of thing,
Speaker 1: So I understand. I'm sorry they couldn't stand up to
Speaker 1: the to the moment, but I have empathy for what
Speaker 1: they were. They were trying to in some ways thinking
Speaker 1: they were protecting their own families or their own friends.
Speaker 1: But this is this is what happens, right when intimidation
Speaker 1: over time, then all of a sudden, all principles are going.
Speaker 2: Oh, I mean, listen right back to your whole point
Speaker 2: about how Trump is affecting the Democrats. You were worried
Speaker 2: about that. Trump has changed the whole thing, right, So, yes,
Speaker 2: he intimidation politics. Right when people view what Trump is
Speaker 2: doing in his success, intimidation politics works. So they're just
Speaker 2: doing their intimidation politics on their issue and it is
Speaker 2: absolutely having an effect on what can get done in Congress.
Speaker 2: What can't that get done in Congress? Whether you communicate
Speaker 2: on something, whether you stay silent, whether you avoid a
Speaker 2: target on your back, and whether you cave. I mean,
Speaker 2: by the way, there is lots of caving going on
Speaker 2: on a bunch of issues because of intimidation politics.
Speaker 1: Republican Democrat, I'm curious what kind of outreach do you
Speaker 1: get from Netnyahu's government, because it's clear to me they've
Speaker 1: really messed this up, right they You know, I think
Speaker 1: what Bibe did during the Obama years is he you know,
Speaker 1: he drove a bigger wedge inside the Democratic Party in
Speaker 1: this issue.
Speaker 2: No doubt that, no doubt that.
Speaker 1: Simply he he is the cause of this problem. He
Speaker 1: is one of the he's part of the root cause
Speaker 1: here and now you've got a majority of the country
Speaker 1: that doesn't want to send give aid right now Israel.
Speaker 1: And that's all due to Bebe's leadership.
Speaker 2: Do you the majority of the Democrats, a majority of
Speaker 2: the Democrats in the sense and a.
Speaker 1: Big third way a chunk of third of Republicans Democratic
Speaker 1: primary voters. But it's not like it's he's got unanimous
Speaker 1: support on the right either.
Speaker 2: No, that what's going on in the right is a
Speaker 2: new thing. Right, you know, the Republicans used to be
Speaker 2: able to point out Democrats and say they're an anti
Speaker 2: Isra party. But now there's this, there's this movement on
Speaker 2: the right, you know, Tucker Carlson, Right, you know, there's
Speaker 2: a roll.
Speaker 1: There's please you know, as I joke, when I hear
Speaker 1: the words populism, as a Jew, I run for cover
Speaker 1: because populism has been you know, somehow the Jews are
Speaker 1: always targeted when the rise of populism, whether it's on
Speaker 1: the left or the right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and the usual conspiracy theories are all back. But
Speaker 2: I I would tell you, look, the majority of people
Speaker 2: in Congress are still very pro Israel Israel, but there
Speaker 2: is a shift coming in the Democratic Party. There is
Speaker 2: a shift coming in the voter in twenty six, and
Speaker 2: there'll be a shift coming on the voter in twenty eight.
Speaker 2: It will be a shift to.
Speaker 1: The an actual voting issue, because I'm not convinced it is,
Speaker 1: but we're going to find out.
Speaker 2: So I don't think it's a voting issue like you
Speaker 2: go to the ballot box.
Speaker 1: I'm going to vote right a true one issue like
Speaker 1: abortion and guns. We know there are voters that will say,
Speaker 1: you know what, I'm voting on this issue first and
Speaker 1: everything else is secondary for me.
Speaker 2: But the people will be treated differently by the base
Speaker 2: when they're trying to run a primary in twenty eight.
Speaker 2: Let's just say, okay, everyone's going to try to out
Speaker 2: left themselves on this particular issue, especially Chuck. If the
Speaker 2: war is still going on, God forbid. Yeah, okay, if
Speaker 2: this is still fresh, if this is still going on,
Speaker 2: we're going to eat ourselves alive. And the replies I
Speaker 2: got to sit back and watch.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm curious about. Does the net Yahoo government
Speaker 1: get that hey at some point, I'm not.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure, Chuck. I'm not. I'm not sure that they. Oh,
Speaker 2: I think they've seen the shift in the policy. Are
Speaker 2: now worried about AID. The question is do they care? Oh, okay,
Speaker 2: that's a second question. Okay. No one can deny some
Speaker 2: of the decisions that they've made. We can debate whether
Speaker 2: it was good or bad for Israel, but it's definitely
Speaker 2: not been good for Jews around the world. We can
Speaker 2: debate why that's happened, and who's weaponized that, and who's
Speaker 2: taking advantage and is there a double triple standard? And
Speaker 2: is this the same old thing that's happened for thousands
Speaker 2: of years. We can debate that. To the cows come
Speaker 2: home home. Okay, But but but there's no doubt that
Speaker 2: the net Yahoo government didn't care about the pr perception
Speaker 2: of this. They were focused on the war on the ground,
Speaker 2: and they didn't realize that there was a war for
Speaker 2: hearts and minds online. And by the time they realized it,
Speaker 2: they lost.
Speaker 1: Yeah, is it?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 1: I said this to a friend of mine. He sort
Speaker 1: of laughed and he sort of agreed. Which is Israel
Speaker 1: in America have one thing in common. They have unpopular
Speaker 1: leaders that they don't know how to get rid of.
Speaker 2: Well, ours will eventually be gone. He's got three and
Speaker 2: a half years left. Okay, But who knows what's going
Speaker 2: on in Israel. I don't know how what's the timeline
Speaker 2: on at Yahu till his government collapses, till the war
Speaker 2: is over? When's that?
Speaker 1: Well, every time his government collapse he goes further to
Speaker 1: the right and finds it way back in. I just
Speaker 1: don't know how much further to the right he can go.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I mean, look, there's been shifts over there, right,
Speaker 2: I mean there has been shifts. October seventh moved them
Speaker 2: further to the right.
Speaker 1: No, the majority of Israelis are no longer in favor
Speaker 1: of the two state solution, are they.
Speaker 2: I guess what, Chuck? After nine to eleven? Which direction
Speaker 2: did we move? Did we move to the left? No,
Speaker 2: we moved to the right. We instituted the Patriot Act? Yeah, okay,
Speaker 2: So this is what happens when countries are attacked in
Speaker 2: large scale events. Okay. Remember Hamas's goal here. Hamas's goal
Speaker 2: isn't to win the war, Okay, it's to destroy Israel.
Speaker 2: If that if they if Hamas destroys themselves and Israel
Speaker 2: at the same time, mission accomplished. I know, mission accomplished.
Speaker 1: No, they're ntilists.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and Israel looked at this. Israel looked at this
Speaker 2: like we got to win on the ground, We got
Speaker 2: to beat them on the ground. And Hamas was playing
Speaker 2: up here like, yeah, we're losing. You know, Hamas doesn't
Speaker 2: care what the Palestinians, They don't care how many people.
Speaker 2: It's just it's new material for Hamas to sell out there.
Speaker 2: They want that were Israel's falling into their propaganda hands.
Speaker 2: And it's just it's been unfortunate to watch.
Speaker 1: All Right. You predicted we could go on and on
Speaker 1: on this issue, and I think both of us could
Speaker 1: keep going. But I did promise I try to keep
Speaker 1: you here in less than an hour. So I want
Speaker 1: to end with the state of Florida politics, the state
Speaker 1: of the Democratic Party and Florida. How much of this
Speaker 1: is a voter shift and how much of this is
Speaker 1: a lack of investment and leadership in the state party.
Speaker 2: Well, again, Chuck, there's not one thing that has gone
Speaker 2: wrong to get us here, Okay. Obviously, you know, being
Speaker 2: at a power for thirty years hard to raise money, okay,
Speaker 2: which helps with voter turnout. You know, if when you're
Speaker 2: not empowered helps with you know, quality of candidates. Tallahassee
Speaker 2: is not like a great place to go to. Not
Speaker 2: easy to get to, especially when the Democratic base is
Speaker 2: from the South. Okay. But at the same time, I
Speaker 2: think you really got to look at COVID. COVID was
Speaker 2: a seminal moment in politics. You know, even though we
Speaker 2: had more Democrats in Florida, registered Democrats in Florida, you know,
Speaker 2: when Rick Scott got elected, when to say this got
Speaker 2: elected with Jim Bush got elected, when Charlie Chriss got elected,
Speaker 2: we still had more Democrats, but we were still electing
Speaker 2: Republican governors. Okay, now there are one point two million
Speaker 2: more registered Republicans. It's starting to get to a point
Speaker 2: that it's not recoverable, at least not in the short term. Okay.
Speaker 2: But I think COVID was a big piece of it.
Speaker 2: I think COVID was a big piece and I was there,
Speaker 2: I was involved in it. On on on the other side,
Speaker 2: I think, and I.
Speaker 1: Have how did Joe Biden only lose by three points?
Speaker 2: Then? How did you only lose it?
Speaker 1: He lost Florida in twenty twenty by just three points?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean again, as Joe Biden would say, don't
Speaker 2: judge me against the Almighty, judge me against the alternative.
Speaker 2: And so twenty twenty, right, we were still mid COVID, okay,
Speaker 2: and you know, people wanted to change. They wanted to change, right,
Speaker 2: and so that was a mood politic. Meanwhile, Ronda Stantis
Speaker 2: won his reelection in Florida by nineteen points and Donald
Speaker 2: Trump and Donald Trump has won Florida by thirteen points. Yeah, okay.
Speaker 2: So the policies that came out of COVID, closing of schools,
Speaker 2: the fact that Florida opened schools early because the data
Speaker 2: was clear it wasn't spreading in schools, right, that's a
Speaker 2: big piece, Chuck, I mean, and I was telling my
Speaker 2: Democratic colleagues, like, guys read the data. Like I would
Speaker 2: sit at a conference table with the governor. We'd be
Speaker 2: reading the data from Denmark, right, and Germany and Europe
Speaker 2: because they were ahead of us and it was clear
Speaker 2: it wasn't spreading in the schools. Okay. And I said
Speaker 2: to my Democratic colleagues, I'm like, when we open schools,
Speaker 2: it's going to be very popular when you guys come
Speaker 2: out and tell parents you want to keep their kids
Speaker 2: in the house for another year. Okay, I'm telling you
Speaker 2: this is where this is going. And none of my
Speaker 2: colleagues wanted to hear it, Chuck, None of them wanted
Speaker 2: to hear.
Speaker 1: Is that the power of the teachers union that would
Speaker 1: would you ascribe it to that?
Speaker 2: Or is it just part it's part teachers union, part
Speaker 2: teachers union part. Also, we were at a point of
Speaker 2: polarization that if DeSantis wanted to open government, I had
Speaker 2: to be open schools. Then I had to be against it.
Speaker 2: Then I had to be against it. You know, things
Speaker 2: had become so toxic at that point, and so I
Speaker 2: don't know what the future, the future of the Democratic
Speaker 2: Party holds in Florida. Democrats had powered Florida for one
Speaker 2: hundred plus years. We are thirty five years into Republican rule.
Speaker 2: We may be here for another seventy so. But right now,
Speaker 2: right now, there's systemic This is a red state. It's
Speaker 2: a systemic red state. There was no repercussion for Republicans
Speaker 2: when they passed the abortion ban. Okay, there was no
Speaker 2: repercussion for Republicans when they didn't legalize marijuana. There's been
Speaker 2: no repercussion for the Republicans on anything they have done politically,
Speaker 2: all the social issues, all the attacking of the LGBTQ community,
Speaker 2: no political consequences, Chuck, So I.
Speaker 1: Guess the question, well, and that's just are there no
Speaker 1: consequences there is there's not a good opposition, or are
Speaker 1: there no consequences because there there's just more more supporters
Speaker 1: than opposition, all of it, Yeah, all of it.
Speaker 2: There's more supporters in opposition the opposition. You know, because
Speaker 2: we've been in the desert so long, can't figure you
Speaker 2: know which way is up? Okay, we fight amongst ourselves.
Speaker 2: Democrats are excellent at that. Like, you know, Democrats are
Speaker 2: having policy fights. Republicans are not having policy fights, right,
Speaker 2: they're having personality fights.
Speaker 1: They had a big fight. I mean, you know, it
Speaker 1: is funny you say that, but I look at you know,
Speaker 1: the rules of party politics for decades, where the party
Speaker 1: that's divided in a primary usually loses a general. And frankly,
Speaker 1: in sixteen it was just the opposite. Rightublicans looked like
Speaker 1: they were totally divided, and all that did is that device.
Speaker 1: It's why I actually think the Democrats could use a
Speaker 1: big public fight. This is healthy, have it go. You know,
Speaker 1: I worry that actually debates being stifled a little bit
Speaker 1: because of part of it has to do with social media.
Speaker 1: Where only the leftists got the loudest voice on social media.
Speaker 1: So anybody that's not from that wing of the party.
Speaker 2: Well, that's the problem. The moderates aren't in the fight, Chuck. Yeah,
Speaker 2: the moderates aren't in the fight because they're not paying attention.
Speaker 2: They're a general election voter, they're not a primary voter.
Speaker 2: So there are in a primary voter. Those people don't
Speaker 2: have voices, they don't want to participate, They got their
Speaker 2: own lives, they're doing other stuff. And so that public
Speaker 2: fight that you're talking about isn't going to happen, okay.
Speaker 2: And so all I'm saying is that even if we
Speaker 2: had the public fight, could we then coalesce? Could we coalesce?
Speaker 2: Could we come back? A lot of people stayed home
Speaker 2: on Harris, didn't vote for Harris.
Speaker 1: Let me give you a riddle that Dan Pfeiffer tweeted.
Speaker 1: He said in twenty twenty eight, he was talking about
Speaker 1: the Mom Donnie primary in New York and he was
Speaker 1: because there's a lot of moderates uncomfortable supporting Mam Donnie.
Speaker 1: And his argument was to these moderates why they had
Speaker 1: to support Mom Donnie. And his argument was this, if
Speaker 1: if a moderate wins the Democratic primary for president in
Speaker 1: twenty eight, let's say it's Shapiro or Bashir, there's going
Speaker 1: to be an expectation that the progressives get on board.
Speaker 1: And if a progressive wind should the should the same
Speaker 1: rule go the other way? What do you say to that?
Speaker 1: What do you say to Pfiffer in that sort of
Speaker 1: line of thinking.
Speaker 2: I would say, I was at the convention for Hillary
Speaker 2: when the Bernie people bowed her. I was there, So
Speaker 2: this is this is not a news thing, right, Okay,
Speaker 2: all right, That's what I would say, Like, let's go
Speaker 2: backwards a little bit, okay, And yes, we always say
Speaker 2: to the progressives, you gotta get on board with a moderate,
Speaker 2: and they always bitch and complain and throw it in
Speaker 2: our face, isn't it. That's fine? Okay? But you know,
Speaker 2: when it came time to trying to beat Donald Trump, okay,
Speaker 2: and maybe they didn't understand the existential threat that he was. Okay,
Speaker 2: a lot of the Burnie people weren't on board, Chuck right,
Speaker 2: they weren't. They weren't on board. And so you know,
Speaker 2: and that's a question that Democrats have to ask themselves.
Speaker 2: Do they want purity or do they want power? Republicans
Speaker 2: have made that decision. They want power. Power is the
Speaker 2: only thing that matter. In fact, Republicans tell me all
Speaker 2: the time, Jared, you should try it. Sometimes it's great, okay,
Speaker 2: But but Democrats seem like we want purity. We want purity, right,
Speaker 2: don't We don't want power, And that's gonna be something
Speaker 2: we're gonna have to decide in twenty six and twenty eight.
Speaker 2: Do we want to win the House? Do we want
Speaker 2: to make Hakkeen Jeffrey speaker or do we want to
Speaker 2: nitpick some of the things we don't like about Hakim
Speaker 2: or the left doesn't like about Hakim? Okay? Do we
Speaker 2: want to win in twenty eight or do we want
Speaker 2: someone who's so pure they're not electable. I mean, these
Speaker 2: are decisions that we're gonna have to make. That doesn't
Speaker 2: mean you pick the most right leaning Democrat. That's not
Speaker 2: what I'm advocating. What I'm advocating is is electability the
Speaker 2: only thing that matters. And I think at this point
Speaker 2: the Republicans have made that decision. It's power. Get everybody
Speaker 2: in line to win power. If this is the way
Speaker 2: we got to go to win, then that's what we're
Speaker 2: going to do to win, period, and Democrats we're having
Speaker 2: all these wonderful policy debates. We got our hie charts
Speaker 2: and our grats, and we're going to send out talking
Speaker 2: points with eighteen things on it that nobody reads. Okay.
Speaker 2: Trump is selling blenders, he's throwing in free shipping, Chuck. Okay,
Speaker 2: and we have we have lost it. There are people
Speaker 2: who know how to communicate, right, Like I don't necessarily
Speaker 2: agree with everything on AOC, but brilliant communicator, she knows
Speaker 2: how to do.
Speaker 1: It's really good.
Speaker 2: I don't necessarily agree with mom. Donnie, brilliant communicator, knows
Speaker 2: how to community. He had three things he sold people,
Speaker 2: three things. That was it? Three and it was repetition,
Speaker 2: similar to Trump. Remember, no collusion, no collusion, no collusion.
Speaker 2: I had breakfast this morning, No collusion. Milania is beautiful.
Speaker 2: No collusion, no collusion, no collusion. Over and over and
Speaker 2: over again. This is this is how political communication works. Now.
Speaker 2: I have students that come up to me and they're like, oh, Jared,
Speaker 2: I want to run for Congress. I am studying political science.
Speaker 2: I say, drop political science, go study commun ye, go
Speaker 2: study communication. You need to learn how to communicate. If
Speaker 2: you don't know how to communicate in today's politics, then
Speaker 2: good luck to you. It's the communicators that are going
Speaker 2: to rise on and know how to sell the package
Speaker 2: to the American people.
Speaker 1: There is a US Senate seat that is up in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty six. Your name's been floated. Uh are you
Speaker 1: looking at it? And if not, why not?
Speaker 2: Well, what I would say is, I'm not looking at it.
Speaker 2: I'm looking at reelection. But if for some reason Republicans
Speaker 2: decide to do all the jerrymandering and decide to set
Speaker 2: me free from my district, perhaps then I would look
Speaker 2: at it. Chuck, So I'm.
Speaker 1: Not looking are you assuming you're going to get targeted?
Speaker 2: Oh? I'm absolutely going to get targeted. I mean my districts.
Speaker 2: The closest in the state is Palm Beach.
Speaker 1: I mean I've sort of been watching Palm Beach.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: There's always been this idea that the three counties or
Speaker 1: these rock blue counties, and of course, guess what, Miami
Speaker 1: Dade has gone the other way. It's probably pretty much
Speaker 1: a fifty to fifty county, maybe slightly leaning right right
Speaker 1: now versus left, but it's right. It really is a
Speaker 1: center right down the middle county. At the moment, Broward
Speaker 1: is still a pretty rock solid Democratic county. Palm Beach
Speaker 1: I would assume that the more sort of the magnet
Speaker 1: of Trump has had some impact in shifting your Palm
Speaker 1: Beach constituency a little bit to the right. Is that
Speaker 1: is that the case?
Speaker 2: Not some impact? Major impact? It's okay. It started again
Speaker 2: with COVID New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Chicago came down
Speaker 2: to Florida. Republicans. Republicans moved here. Okay, you can see
Speaker 2: it just in the price of real estate. Quite frankly so.
Speaker 2: Boca Ratone used to be a Democratic town. It's now
Speaker 2: a Republican town. I've lost Pokratone twice Noble to my elections.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was a rock solid decount d town forever.
Speaker 2: Republished Republican town. And I'm not losing Boca by a point.
Speaker 2: I'm losing Boca by six or seven points. Wow. Now,
Speaker 2: I'm a moderate dam who's pro Israel.
Speaker 1: Pro Israel. I was just gonna say that should have
Speaker 1: been that should be just, that should have been an
Speaker 1: eighty five percent number for you.
Speaker 2: It's there, But it's tough, Chuck. When DeSantis is winning
Speaker 2: by nineteen points, and Trump's winning by thirteen points. Those
Speaker 2: are headwinds and people are just voting down ticket. The
Speaker 2: fact that I'm outperforming Democrats by five points, I'm outperforming
Speaker 2: them in Parkland, where I'm fromt I outperform commonly here
Speaker 2: by nine points. Parkland's a republican town, is always voted
Speaker 2: for Republicans, has always been a republican town. The northern part.
Speaker 1: Of the mistern Broward has always been a bit more
Speaker 1: conservative than than closer to the coast. Right, No, it's
Speaker 1: the other way. The coast is, the coast is republican.
Speaker 2: Okay, the coast, the coast is Republican. And so what
Speaker 2: what I think they'll try to do is they're going
Speaker 2: to try to take the district more north. Give me,
Speaker 2: give me del.
Speaker 1: Ray Palm Beach, Yeah, had a huge Haitian population. Is
Speaker 1: that that that further north?
Speaker 2: Further north, that's where that I don't know that I'll
Speaker 2: go that north. But look, I think there are probably
Speaker 2: ways that they can take my D plus two you know,
Speaker 2: to a to a zero. Right, they start to do
Speaker 2: other stuff, they're gonna get they're gonna start getting in
Speaker 2: the way.
Speaker 1: And it's going to become a plight between Schumer and
Speaker 1: Jeffries for you. What's that It's going to be a
Speaker 1: fight between Schumer and Jeffries for you because Jeffries is
Speaker 1: going to want you to run because you're probably the
Speaker 1: only d that can win if they if they if
Speaker 1: they redo your district.
Speaker 2: Well, to be honest, I actually hope we don't get there.
Speaker 2: I actually hope that I'm running for your election. They
Speaker 2: don't mess with fair districts and violate the Constitution. And
Speaker 2: then I helped to make HAKEM. Jeffrey Speaker because no
Speaker 2: offense to Chuck Schumer flipping Senate versus flipping the House.
Speaker 2: Different Democrats have to get a wing of government back.
Speaker 2: We have. We have to for two reasons, one for
Speaker 2: the country too. If we don't win in twenty six,
Speaker 2: I don't know what will we left of the party.
Speaker 1: You're not wrong, it is a it is It is
Speaker 1: pretty bleak. If somehow Democrats don't win anything in the
Speaker 1: mid terms of.
Speaker 2: Twenties, well, Republicans are doing a great job jack with
Speaker 2: jerrymandering in that if they take to if California doesn't happen,
Speaker 2: and look, I've always been four independent commissions Okay, back
Speaker 2: to her, what should we do? Should we respond or
Speaker 2: should we send? In our principle, I think what Gavin
Speaker 2: Newsom is doing is correct.
Speaker 1: You have to he's going to the voters. I mean,
Speaker 1: I do think that California is different than these other places.
Speaker 1: I think they now the voter. They have to, but
Speaker 1: I actually think that deserves that's at least a small
Speaker 1: d democratic way of fighting back. He's got to make
Speaker 1: his case to the voters in order to do this.
Speaker 2: No, no, But if that doesn't happen, Let's say the
Speaker 2: voters voted down. Let's say they reject it and Texas
Speaker 2: gets their five, and it's two in Ohio, and it's
Speaker 2: one in Missouri, and it's and it's one in Indiana.
Speaker 2: We're at nine now, okay, and they do two or
Speaker 2: three in Florida, right, and it's eleven seats, now twelve seats.
Speaker 1: Now, I mean, you can win the national popular vote
Speaker 1: and still not getting.
Speaker 2: Up that that that that's that's correct. And so that's
Speaker 2: why we have no choice but to do this. It's
Speaker 2: not the game we wanted to play, but we have
Speaker 2: to play the game. We cannot unilaterally disarm. Understand, in
Speaker 2: our Laurels. It's an unfortunate situation, Okay. I like the
Speaker 2: president's position. By the way, it's just and he gets
Speaker 2: away with it. Texas, give me five seats. California, I'm
Speaker 2: going to sue you for what you're doing.
Speaker 1: It's you know, I'd love to understand the psyche of our,
Speaker 1: of of of the American public on this, because if
Speaker 1: Joe Biden behaved the exact same way, oh, forget it,
Speaker 1: there had been the twenty fifth I think the twenty
Speaker 1: fifth Amendment might have been in voked.
Speaker 2: Forget it. Remember when Trump said I could shoot someone
Speaker 2: in Fifth Avenue get away with it. We thought that
Speaker 2: was just like an odd Wait man, did he really early, early,
Speaker 2: early understand the following that he had and could get away?
Speaker 2: I mean, he just he knew it. He got away
Speaker 2: with it. And and that has been I mean, what
Speaker 2: is there anything I mean, even sure the Epstein stuff
Speaker 2: maybe for the first time right challenged his base, but
Speaker 2: I don't know, Chuck, it's kind of gone right. I mean,
Speaker 2: they moved her, they moved her.
Speaker 1: My god, they manufactured something to release. It was actually
Speaker 1: weirdly brilliant. I'm gonna send my personal lawyer who now
Speaker 1: has works for the government to interview you. And oh,
Speaker 1: by the way, before we do the interview, let's openly
Speaker 1: talk about the pardon and a commutation.
Speaker 2: Chuck. It wasn't it's nice, it was it was.
Speaker 1: It was quite reason that don't.
Speaker 2: Looked good at necessary? Is Brillian? I look at it
Speaker 2: as totally predictable. Remember the most parent, most transparent administration
Speaker 2: in American history. How do we be transparent. Let's go
Speaker 2: create a record that will then release, right, and we're
Speaker 2: not going to pardon her now, but we'll tell her,
Speaker 2: we'll move her, we'll give her on work release, and
Speaker 2: then we'll tell her wink wink, if you play along,
Speaker 2: that's how you get your pardon. Okay, I mean this
Speaker 2: is this is easy to figure out. We were going
Speaker 2: this direction. But again, yeah, it looks like he got
Speaker 2: away with it.
Speaker 1: It does at some point. I don't think voters like
Speaker 1: to be lied to, right and don't like to be
Speaker 1: treated like stooges.
Speaker 2: And yeah, but he's not on the baut at, Chuck,
Speaker 2: He's not on the ballut anymore. I mean that's why
Speaker 2: when people say to me, like he's never leaving, he's
Speaker 2: running for tenths term he'll be one hundred and fifty. Right,
Speaker 2: He's acting like a guy who knows he's not up
Speaker 2: for it.
Speaker 1: Know, I agree with that. I'm glad you said that
Speaker 1: he's fumba lueizing this a little bit. I complete, I
Speaker 1: weirdly think, and in fact, there's a part of me
Speaker 1: that wonders, is he's starting to see his mortality right
Speaker 1: He's staring mortality clearly is not very healthy right now,
Speaker 1: and suddenly that is motivating him to say, well, throwing
Speaker 1: all caution out the window.
Speaker 2: And yeah, I mean there used to be. I'm going
Speaker 2: to get a plane from Qatar. What are you gonna
Speaker 2: do about it? I'm not on the I'm not on
Speaker 2: the ballot again. I'm gonna build a bull ballroom. I'm
Speaker 2: going to paint over the rose garden. What are you
Speaker 2: going to do about it? I'm not on the ballot again.
Speaker 2: I'm going to paint the whole Oval office gold because
Speaker 2: guess what, you can't do anything about it. I'm not
Speaker 2: on the ballot again. It just I'm going to put
Speaker 2: troops here. I'm going to do this. I'm going to
Speaker 2: do that. I'm not going to be held accountable because
Speaker 2: one I'm not on the ballot, and two I have immunity.
Speaker 1: Look, I've kept you past an hour, and I promised
Speaker 1: your staff I would keep this under an out and
Speaker 1: I had to say.
Speaker 2: One more thing, Chuck before we go.
Speaker 1: Ease?
Speaker 2: Can we just talked really quickly about what the administration
Speaker 2: has done to FEMA because I think it's really important
Speaker 2: for your list.
Speaker 1: I'm looked this was going to be absolutely I'm petrified
Speaker 1: if a hurricane. Let's let's put it in real war terms.
Speaker 1: We are, we are two days away. We're taping right
Speaker 1: now in August twenty eighth. When this rolls next week,
Speaker 1: it'll be September. You know, I look at the calendar.
Speaker 1: My mother wished me a happy Andrew Anniversary on the
Speaker 1: twenty fourth. We know to on the twenty ninth is
Speaker 1: our Katrina anniversary. We know it's Florida. The likelihood there's
Speaker 1: what's gonna What is the FEMA response going to look
Speaker 1: like in October if a major storm hits South Florida.
Speaker 2: So let me say this. When Trump said FEMA needed reform,
Speaker 2: a lot of the emergency management industry said, he's right.
Speaker 2: FEMA does need reform because it doesn't work in homeland
Speaker 2: Homeland has stifled it. It can't move fast. Homeland has
Speaker 2: it doing grants that it shouldn't be doing. Okay, and
Speaker 2: people booked about.
Speaker 1: Reforming Homeland just the DHS, Department of Homeland Security, Partment of.
Speaker 2: Homeland Security correct. And this has been something that previous
Speaker 2: FEMA administrators have said, Democrat and Republican. The last three,
Speaker 2: in fact, have said, we're dying in Homeland. You got
Speaker 2: to get that.
Speaker 1: I should it go? Would you just make it independent or.
Speaker 2: It was an independent agency before or would you put it? Look,
Speaker 2: it was an independent agency beforehand. So if you couldn't
Speaker 2: make an independent agency, I don't know you could put
Speaker 2: it in the National Security Council. I don't know that
Speaker 2: putting in the Pentagon, another giant bureaucracy helps the agency.
Speaker 2: But if you want to make it faster, right, you
Speaker 2: want to make response faster, that's a good goal, not
Speaker 2: what NOME has done. What NOME has done is actually
Speaker 2: the opposite. It's slower, it's more efficient. Now we don't
Speaker 2: have enough people. Everything that's that it was one hundred
Speaker 2: thousand dollars has to come to her so she can
Speaker 2: know where the money is going. That slowed down the
Speaker 2: response in Texas. The idea that we didn't put the
Speaker 2: swift water rescue crews on the road for three days, Chuck,
Speaker 2: I never heard anything in my life in emergency management.
Speaker 2: Everything we've ever learned. Put them on the road, mobilize
Speaker 2: and move them from the Omaha district, move them from
Speaker 2: the New Orleans district. I mean the director of that
Speaker 2: program resigned days later because his people shoudn't move totally. Crazy.
Speaker 2: Where do we stand. Here's where we stand, Chuck. If
Speaker 2: you had a Category four or five storm building to Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia,
Speaker 2: they're in big trouble. South Carolina, North Carolina, they're in
Speaker 2: big trouble. Their state em departments cannot handle the logistics
Speaker 2: without FEMA. Then let's talk about the money expedited reimbursement.
Speaker 2: They used to send money down really early before you
Speaker 2: waited for the rest of it. Twenty five percent of
Speaker 2: it would come down. That program seems to be gone.
Speaker 2: How about pre landfall decks where you would get a
Speaker 2: land you'd get a declaration from the president two or
Speaker 2: three days before landfall, so that day you speed up
Speaker 2: the process. You can start spending money. You know, you're
Speaker 2: going to get reimbursement. Your cities and counties who might
Speaker 2: be fiscally constrained. They know that they're getting their stuff.
Speaker 2: They can start moving, you know, their logistics operations, their
Speaker 2: debris removal, their water, ice power restoration, all of these things.
Speaker 2: We don't know if we're getting pre landfall declarations. We're
Speaker 2: watching these declarations for other events. You know, we watched
Speaker 2: the governor of Arkansas who worked in the Trump administration's
Speaker 2: bay for two weeks to get a declaration. So I
Speaker 2: can tell you I speak to a lot of state
Speaker 2: directors deathly worried, God forbid. We had a Northridge in
Speaker 2: California hasn't happened. In fact, there's no one really who
Speaker 2: went through that. That's still in emergency management. Okay, FEMA
Speaker 2: is not ready. So when they sent that letter and
Speaker 2: called it the Katrina Declaration, what they're really trying to
Speaker 2: say is FEMA has to work in a Cat five. Sure, okay,
Speaker 2: you want states to handle Cat ones on their own,
Speaker 2: no problem, we could get there. But they can't do
Speaker 2: a Cat five on their own. It would take generations
Speaker 2: and generations of investment for them to build that capacity. Okay,
Speaker 2: But now FEMA's not ready for a Cat five. They're
Speaker 2: not ready for a Cat four. They're not ready to mobilize,
Speaker 2: they're not ready to prop it up in the event
Speaker 2: that happens. So in Florida and Texas, where we have
Speaker 2: better emergency management departments, okay, we'll fail better unless in
Speaker 2: Atlantic Atlantic storm that goes into Palm Beach, state of Rowark. Okay,
Speaker 2: remember Dorian a couple of years ago that like paused
Speaker 2: over the Bahamas and just destroyed the Bahamas. It was
Speaker 2: a Cat five storm stopped seventy five miles off.
Speaker 1: Her coastow didn't come on shore right and just turned
Speaker 1: due north.
Speaker 2: Yep, right, God forbid that that storm that was erin
Speaker 2: right didn't had turned over land and not over water.
Speaker 2: We're not ready in those in the Tri County area.
Speaker 2: Without FEMA's health and we have one of the best
Speaker 2: emergency management directors in the country and Kevin Guthrie, FEMA
Speaker 2: would have to move military assets, okay to this area
Speaker 2: in order to do swift water rescues. We would need
Speaker 2: the amount of food we would need to feed millions
Speaker 2: of people.
Speaker 1: I went through Andrew, I mean, it was a catastrophe
Speaker 1: and we and it was two about two thirds of
Speaker 1: what the population is today down in Did County.
Speaker 2: And don't ask me why, because I haven't been able
Speaker 2: to figure out the why. But Christy Nome has absolutely
Speaker 2: gutted and destroyed the agency. We talk about what's going
Speaker 2: on in the Department of Education or Social Security or Medica,
Speaker 2: and FEMA doesn't get a lot of attention. FEMA is
Speaker 2: in worse shape than anything.
Speaker 1: It's weird about it is it goes against his sort
Speaker 1: of you know, he wants to be the benevolent king,
Speaker 1: right Trump, So this you would think would actually be
Speaker 1: in his wheelhouse that he would want to be the savior.
Speaker 1: He would want to be the guy the way he
Speaker 1: wants to control interest rates and control this in a
Speaker 1: weird way. Why wouldn't he want more? This is the
Speaker 1: one thing he doesn't want control for it. My only
Speaker 1: thesis on this is he didn't like getting blamed for
Speaker 1: FEMA's mistakes in his first term, so he's decided anything
Speaker 1: that provided that gave him a negative approval rating right
Speaker 1: Hurricane Maria down Puerto Rico and some of these other places.
Speaker 1: That's my only theory is that he didn't like that
Speaker 1: he accumulated that if FEMA messed up, that he took
Speaker 1: the fall, so now he wants to turn it into
Speaker 1: a state thing. It's my only explanation of why he's
Speaker 1: this way, because on anything else, See wants more control
Speaker 1: when it comes to handing out money, not less.
Speaker 2: Well, of course, FEMA is a political football, right, So
Speaker 2: that's and that's always been the case. I'll give you
Speaker 2: another theory. Any think I'm crazy when I say this.
Speaker 1: Look, any theory these days with Trump is not crazy
Speaker 1: because they didn't know.
Speaker 2: How about that the theory he didn't know. He didn't
Speaker 2: know actually what she was doing over there. They didn't
Speaker 2: know how bad it was. Similar to how like they
Speaker 2: didn't know that we got rid of the guys that
Speaker 2: run like our nuclear programs when we were doging everyone,
Speaker 2: and they didn't know and then found out later. I'll
Speaker 2: give you another theory. They didn't know. They didn't know
Speaker 2: what Christy and Corey Lewandowski had done over there, and
Speaker 2: they're finding out now. And the problem is, as you know,
Speaker 2: very easy to break this stuff, much harder harder to
Speaker 2: fix it.
Speaker 1: Texas was a test run. I mean we already you
Speaker 1: just pointed out that was actually a massive theme of
Speaker 1: failure whether Texas basically back Texas had a decent respect,
Speaker 1: so it sort of covered up how bad The female
Speaker 1: response was right.
Speaker 2: Correct, which that's what I've said. If it was a
Speaker 2: state without a robust department, it would have been dramatically exposed.
Speaker 2: And now I think there are people in the West
Speaker 2: wing that recognize this is a problem. But Chuck, that's
Speaker 2: not how Trump works. He's a brilliant marketing and sales guy.
Speaker 2: So you know what he'll do. He'll say, He'll say,
Speaker 2: I told you so, I told you they were broken.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, one of those cases where I thought Susie
Speaker 1: Wilds would have impact on this. There were a couple
Speaker 1: of spots that I thought she was going to have impact.
Speaker 1: One was keeping the Kennedy's crazy from being too influential.
Speaker 1: That's been a failure, and on and on.
Speaker 2: Storm response, Well, I'll tell you this, okay, And again,
Speaker 2: you're talking to a Democrat who worked in a Republican
Speaker 2: administration and you know.
Speaker 1: Her a little bit, so you may have some insight.
Speaker 2: And I know her, you only know what has gotten through.
Speaker 2: You don't know what she has stopped. I know, I
Speaker 2: hear this a lot, and so yeah, I was in
Speaker 2: a Republican administration, there's a lot of stuff that got through,
Speaker 2: but you also don't know like what came and you're like,
Speaker 2: oh my god, that got stopped, whether it was one
Speaker 2: chief of staff for another.
Speaker 1: Describing I joke, this is what every trump book is like, right,
Speaker 1: every trump book is you won't believe what he tried
Speaker 1: to do, and you won't believe who stopped them, right
Speaker 1: Like that was every trump book in the first administration
Speaker 1: with some form of that. So I take your point,
Speaker 1: but I guess there are fewer things that get stopped.
Speaker 1: That'd be my one.
Speaker 2: Listen, I don't underestimate the presidents of that imagination on
Speaker 2: what he thinks he can do under his power. But
Speaker 2: also there are the people around him. Okay, the people
Speaker 2: around him in some instances are worse okay on what
Speaker 2: they want to do and now have full reign to
Speaker 2: go do okay. And so yeah, we never know what
Speaker 2: what she has or what she hasn't what she hasn't stopped.
Speaker 2: But look Susie's very qualified, runs a very tight shoit.
Speaker 1: No, I look, there there's a few people, you know.
Speaker 1: I deal with people that are just like they assume
Speaker 1: it's all alarmists. I'm like, yeah, but there are going
Speaker 1: to be people that end up that. I always say this,
Speaker 1: the hero of this story will be somebody you don't
Speaker 1: like at the moment.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, of course, Mike Pence was the hero of
Speaker 2: January sixth.
Speaker 1: Liz Cheney, Right. I mean I tell this all the
Speaker 1: time to my liberal friends. You don't know, just like
Speaker 1: in the first term, somebody's going to be the hero
Speaker 1: that right now you don't like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I appreciate it. Thanks for being talking.
Speaker 1: About I would too. Am I going to see it
Speaker 1: at the Miami Notre Dame game?
Speaker 2: I don't know that I'll be at the Miami Notre
Speaker 2: Dame game.
Speaker 1: Here's what I just since you you're good with disaster management,
Speaker 1: you may have some insight on the weather. I just
Speaker 1: want hot, humid, horrible weather for those boys from South Bend.
Speaker 2: That's all I can guarantee. You're going to get hot, miserable,
Speaker 2: humid weather. What I can't guarantee is whether you're gonna
Speaker 2: get rain.
Speaker 1: Well, the last I saw, we're supposed to get first
Speaker 1: half ranged, so we'll say, but hey, I hope that's
Speaker 1: the case, because it rains every day at Green schrein
Speaker 1: practice field. So there's there's got to be there will
Speaker 1: be no problem on that side of the ball at
Speaker 1: least I hope.
Speaker 2: Hey, Jared, don't isolate me from my Irish voters, please,
Speaker 2: I won't.
Speaker 1: I hear you, And especially if you run statewide, you
Speaker 1: know you've got to be You've got to be for
Speaker 1: all three Florida schools or four Florida schools. I'm gonnaccount
Speaker 1: you see.
Speaker 2: F these days. Well, thanks, ing U appreciate there.
Speaker 1: It is great to I was just going to say
Speaker 1: you lived, you live the life GW. I mean, we
Speaker 1: have a grown up in South Florida go to GW.
Speaker 1: You had the guts to run for office. I didn't,
Speaker 1: So kudos to you.
Speaker 2: I actually think perhaps it may have worked out for you. Jock.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, I've always wondered about the other path traveled,
Speaker 1: and so I've admired watching you from afar. It was
Speaker 1: really good to It was great to get to know you.
Speaker 2: Thanks Jock, appreciate it.