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Speaker 1: Good morning, and welcome to the Counterpoints.
Speaker 4: Emily Crystal Sager film all way finishing their two.
Speaker 1: Day long argument. We're going to pick it.
Speaker 4: Up today though, because we've got more news on the
Speaker 4: Venezuelan migrants.
Speaker 5: Do I have to play the role of Sager and.
Speaker 1: Jenny whatever, whatever works for you.
Speaker 6: See, we'll say stay tuned for that because there's actually
Speaker 6: some pretty interesting updates and some interesting reaction to how
Speaker 6: Chief Justice John Roberts decided to handle the situation yesterday.
Speaker 5: We will get to that.
Speaker 6: We're going to start first with developments in the ceasefire negotiations.
Speaker 6: Donald Trump obviously spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday
Speaker 6: and did a big interview with Lord Ingram on Fox
Speaker 6: News last night where we got more and more information
Speaker 6: about what a potential ceasefire deal.
Speaker 5: Could end up looking like.
Speaker 6: We are then going to move on to how Chief
Speaker 6: Justice John Roberts rebuked Trump and Magaworld's calls to impeach
Speaker 6: the judge that halted those migrant deportation flights. The judge
Speaker 6: impeachment calls are actually a trend, It's not just this judge.
Speaker 6: So we're going to break all of that down. We're
Speaker 6: then going to move to really right in a segment
Speaker 6: I think is going to be really unique, to something
Speaker 6: that you're able to bring the show via drop site
Speaker 6: and talk to some people who have witnessed on the
Speaker 6: ground in Gaza these strikes.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we're going to have our midies that are Shreeve
Speaker 4: Hebdelkadu's join us. We may also have Abu Baker Abed
Speaker 4: who many of you on the show.
Speaker 1: No, he's amazing to appear. We'll see if he does.
Speaker 4: This morning, he witnessed uh An Israeli assault on a
Speaker 4: on a convoy, a tank shelling that killed some of
Speaker 4: his friends, that nearly killed him.
Speaker 1: He is he is, He is safe.
Speaker 4: He is obviously shaken up from the last couple of
Speaker 4: days of violence. And he'll'll join us if he can. Hopefully,
Speaker 4: hopefully he can. But if not, Sharif will be with us.
Speaker 4: Who has been editing him, you know over the last
Speaker 4: several months.
Speaker 5: How hold this up a back ar agon.
Speaker 1: Maybe he's twenty three now three? Okay, maybe twenty two.
Speaker 5: He does amazing work.
Speaker 4: Yeah, this is this is a guy who all he
Speaker 4: wants to do is be a soccer journalist.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Football, we will call it football for him.
Speaker 5: Yeah, give him on.
Speaker 6: So Chuck Schumer is having a hard time selling his
Speaker 6: new book, and man, Ryan, it just keeps.
Speaker 1: Getting trying to compete with Ezra Kleine. You can't. I mean,
Speaker 1: what are you doing, Chuck?
Speaker 5: You can't compete with what he was thinking? Did they know?
Speaker 5: Did they really?
Speaker 1: Did they not realize? Do not come out the same day.
Speaker 6: As as But Chuck Schumer managed to get booked everywhere yesterday.
Speaker 6: By everywhere, I mean the CBS Morning Show and The
Speaker 6: View and Chris Hayes. So we have some highlights and
Speaker 6: low lights to share of Chuck Schumer's media tour in
Speaker 6: the last twenty four hours and some really interesting, I
Speaker 6: think discussion points about where the Democratic Party has had
Speaker 6: it not in the long term future, I mean that too,
Speaker 6: but also just in the near term. Here and Ryan,
Speaker 6: we have, thanks to you, Alvarro Badoya, the FTC commissioner
Speaker 6: who was quote unquote fired by Trump yesterday. That is
Speaker 6: in dispute whether Donald Trump actually has the authority to
Speaker 6: fire him. Even some people on the right will say
Speaker 6: he doesn't have the authority because of Humphrey's executor, which
Speaker 6: is a case I know we'll get into, but they're
Speaker 6: trying to push that into the Supreme Court, like many
Speaker 6: of these battles, which are intentionally designed to test sitting precedent.
Speaker 4: Right, there's supposed to be three Republicans and two Democrats
Speaker 4: on the FTC. Trump just fired two of the Democrats
Speaker 4: who were Senate confirmed. Like you said, quote unquote fired
Speaker 4: one of them as commission Badoya I the breaking points
Speaker 4: guy and drops it and dropsite. And so he's going
Speaker 4: to be on the show later today talking about, you
Speaker 4: know what his approach to the FTC was, and what
Speaker 4: it means that now there will be only actually two
Speaker 4: Republicans because they haven't even confirmed the third. And why
Speaker 4: which faction within the Trump coalition may may have driven
Speaker 4: this move.
Speaker 6: Yeah, this is going to be a really interesting conversation.
Speaker 6: So very happy to have him here. Let's begin with
Speaker 6: Russia so we can put a zero up on the screen.
Speaker 6: This is a New York Times headline, just about sort
Speaker 6: of a TikTok everything that we know so far about
Speaker 6: this deal. As the New York Times says, put An
Speaker 6: agreed on Tuesday during a phone call with Trump to
Speaker 6: temporarily halt strikes on Ukrainian energy infrastructure. According to the Kremlin,
Speaker 6: that fell short of the unconditional thirty day sees fire
Speaker 6: that Ukraine had already agreed to at the urging of
Speaker 6: the Trump administration. They reportedly spoke, according to the Kremlin,
Speaker 6: again for more than two hours. Mister Trump, the Times continues,
Speaker 6: has stated as desired a broker truth as quickly as possible,
Speaker 6: while Putin has seemed to be seeking more concessions. Zelensky
Speaker 6: replied on Tuesday evening that Putin had quote effectively rejected
Speaker 6: the proposal for a full cease fire backed by the
Speaker 6: US and Ukraine. Now, Trump sat down with an interview
Speaker 6: sat down with Laura Ingram for an interview on Fox
Speaker 6: News last night, where we learned a little bit more
Speaker 6: about how he saw that call yesterday. This is a
Speaker 6: one will rolled Trump on Laura Ingram from the White House.
Speaker 8: Russia has the advantage, as you know, they have encircled
Speaker 8: about two five hundred soldiers. They're nicely encircled, and that's
Speaker 8: not good and we want to get it over with. Look,
Speaker 8: we're doing this. There are no Americans involved. There could
Speaker 8: be if you end up in World War three over this,
Speaker 8: which is so ridiculous, but you know, strange things happen.
Speaker 8: And I think we had a great quote, lasted almost
Speaker 8: two hours, talked about a lot of things and toward
Speaker 8: getting it to peace, and we talked about other things.
Speaker 6: Also, here's an interesting exchange between Ingram and Trump actually
Speaker 6: about what the Kremlins said after the call regarding aid
Speaker 6: to Ukraine.
Speaker 5: Let's take a look at this.
Speaker 9: A two negotiables mentioned by Putin. It was reported that
Speaker 9: I think the Kremlin media actually stated that he demanded
Speaker 9: an immediate cessation of aid to Ukraine in order to
Speaker 9: get to this multi step deal.
Speaker 8: No, we didn't talk about AID. Actually we didn't talk
Speaker 8: about aid at all. We talked about a lot of things,
Speaker 8: but AID was never discussed.
Speaker 6: So that's Trump directly disputing the Kremlins report of what
Speaker 6: happened on the call. And just lastly, let's roll this
Speaker 6: clip of Donald Trump talking about Russia and economic power.
Speaker 5: This is the eighth This should be a three.
Speaker 8: Next clip here, China needs us in terms of trade
Speaker 8: very badly, but we have to straighten out the deficit.
Speaker 8: We have now more than a trillion dollar deficit with China.
Speaker 8: It's not even unbelievable, and we're going to be doing
Speaker 8: something about that. And with Russia, they would like to
Speaker 8: have some of our economic power.
Speaker 6: Finally, Ryan, let's put how Donald Trump reported untruth social
Speaker 6: about the call on the screen.
Speaker 5: This is the next element.
Speaker 6: He says, quote, my phone conversation today with President Putin
Speaker 6: of Russia was a.
Speaker 5: Very good and productive one. We agreed to an immediate seasfire.
Speaker 6: On all energy and infrastructure, with an understanding that we
Speaker 6: will be working quickly to have a complete ceasefire and
Speaker 6: ultimately an end to.
Speaker 5: This very horrible war.
Speaker 6: Continues to say it never would have started if he
Speaker 6: were president. Many elements of a contract for peace were discussed,
Speaker 6: including the fact that thousands of soldiers are being killed
Speaker 6: and both Putin and Zelensky would like to see it
Speaker 6: and the process is now in full force and effect.
Speaker 6: But Ryan, interestingly, while the process does clearly seem to
Speaker 6: be unfolding, full force might not be the best descriptor.
Speaker 6: If you're Trump, It's one way to spend it, but
Speaker 6: might not be the best descriptor. Given the way that
Speaker 6: Zelenski responded to news from the call yesterday.
Speaker 4: Well you can tell Trump felt pretty good about how
Speaker 4: it went because he if you noticed, there was only
Speaker 4: one word in all caps in that truth social and
Speaker 4: it was end.
Speaker 1: It's going to end the war.
Speaker 4: Obviously, lots of exclamation points, but you know that's what
Speaker 4: that's what you're gonna get. Of course, when you know,
Speaker 4: you can kind of check his emotional register by mapping
Speaker 4: it to the number of all caps statements if it's
Speaker 4: if it's shot through with all caps, like he is
Speaker 4: feeling besieged and angry and how dare people be, you know,
Speaker 4: doing these things to him when all he wants is
Speaker 4: peace for the world. So in that sense, it seems
Speaker 4: like he feels like he's he's getting somewhere.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 4: They also, you know, he also talked about something that
Speaker 4: he understands, which is entertained sports and entertainment, as you know,
Speaker 4: through at a by the Bilateral Cultural Exchange of Joint
Speaker 4: Hockey Games.
Speaker 1: Put this one up, put a five.
Speaker 4: In March twenty twenty two, the NHL told the KHL,
Speaker 4: you forget.
Speaker 1: It, like, we're not partnering with you. Guys. You can't.
Speaker 1: You can't invade Ukraine. And they've been they've been kicked
Speaker 1: out of the Olympics.
Speaker 4: Russian agents weren't allowed to work with the NHL teams anymore.
Speaker 4: You may or may not know, ice hockey is a
Speaker 4: rather big deal over in Russia, and so Trump here
Speaker 4: is floating the possibility.
Speaker 1: Of thawing that.
Speaker 4: To use a terrible pun, Wow, I didn't do that
Speaker 4: on purpose, but after I.
Speaker 1: Got there, I'm like, look, but we got.
Speaker 5: To go bad joke Wednesday.
Speaker 1: I guess, accidental dad joke.
Speaker 6: So that's actually more like bad news anchored jokes.
Speaker 5: Someone writing the teleprompter script.
Speaker 4: I just kind of slipped onto that one. So the
Speaker 4: the problem here that the US is facing, as Trump
Speaker 4: clearly articulated to Zelenski in the White House, is that
Speaker 4: we don't have any cards like he's he says, he doesn't,
Speaker 4: you know, he told Zilenski doesn't have any cards. US
Speaker 4: really doesn't have any cards either, except for the economic power, which,
Speaker 4: by the way, can we just underscore the irony here
Speaker 4: that Trump wants to destroy our trade relations with Canada, Mexico, Europe,
Speaker 4: everyone else around the world except for Russia.
Speaker 1: Kind of hilarious, It is funny, okay, whatever. So the
Speaker 1: problem is.
Speaker 6: Especially because he doesn't he blame the lifting of sanctions
Speaker 6: of Nordstream two, and many people in the right dope
Speaker 6: myself included the Biden administration's lifting of stanctions on Nordstream
Speaker 6: two is one of the key factors that pushed Putin
Speaker 6: to invade uk de.
Speaker 4: Yeah, one of the many incoherent I think the approach
Speaker 4: is where Trump is both uber hawkish towards Russia and
Speaker 4: also then a dove when it comes to war, like
Speaker 4: he wants confrontation right up until the edge that he
Speaker 4: doesn't want war, but then he says that Putin was
Speaker 4: justified in the invasion because of the hawkishness of US
Speaker 4: foreign policy. It's like, wait, wait a minute, you're one
Speaker 4: of the most hawkish never mind. So Putin has a
Speaker 4: bunch of demands that are rooted in the fact that
Speaker 4: they are winning. And that is the fundamental structural problem
Speaker 4: that Trump is facing and trying to wrap this up
Speaker 4: immediately so we can put this up on the screen.
Speaker 4: The conditions that Putin is insisting on. The key condition
Speaker 4: is the one that Trump says. They didn't even talk
Speaker 4: about a complete cessation of foreign military aid and sharing
Speaker 4: intelligence information with Keith. You know, hopefully they're recording these conversations,
Speaker 4: because if historians are going to rely on the competing
Speaker 4: words of Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump to get an
Speaker 4: accurate rendition of how the conversation went. God help us,
Speaker 4: he said, he said, God, God helped the historians. So
Speaker 4: then the second one, Putin says he wants to stop
Speaker 4: the forced mobilization in Ukraine and the rearment of armed forces.
Speaker 4: So stop drafting people and stop arming Ukraine. It's pretty
Speaker 4: huge demand. And then any settlement should be complex, stable
Speaker 4: and long term in nature and must take in to
Speaker 4: account the absolute need to eliminate the root causes of
Speaker 4: the crisis. It must also consider the legitimate interests of
Speaker 4: Russia in the area of security. So the easy part
Speaker 4: of that is, you know, that means kind of no NATO.
Speaker 4: What it's subtly suggesting is that they don't just want
Speaker 4: the area that they currently hold, but they want, you know,
Speaker 4: deeper into eastern Ukraine, which their argument is, you can
Speaker 4: either give it to us or we're going to take it.
Speaker 4: And if we take it, it's going to be bloody
Speaker 4: and we're going to take a lot We're going to
Speaker 4: take a lot more with it. And so basically he
Speaker 4: is saying that if you're going to give up, we're
Speaker 4: turning Ukraine into a complete vassal state that will that
Speaker 4: we can basically manipulate, you know, politically from Russia, which is,
Speaker 4: you know, in other words, it would be like a
Speaker 4: country in our sphere of influence like this is. You know,
Speaker 4: that's how we That's how roughly we would handle Guatemala
Speaker 4: or something along those lines. So how much how much
Speaker 4: Trump cares about this, how versus how much the kind
Speaker 4: of US deep state cares about this, I think I
Speaker 4: guess would indicate whether or not the US is gonna
Speaker 4: be willing to capitulate to this. On the other hand,
Speaker 4: the encirclement that he talked about is very real.
Speaker 1: And this is the other thing that poods talking about.
Speaker 1: He's like, what about these guys.
Speaker 4: So we're like encircling these guys, We're about to capture them.
Speaker 4: So if we do a ceasefire, they can just walk out,
Speaker 4: And that isn't that is a legitimate questions like how
Speaker 4: does that work? Like they invaded that in that part,
Speaker 4: they invaded the curse region of Russia. They just walk out.
Speaker 4: I don't know, what do you think?
Speaker 6: Well, let's even put this last element back up to
Speaker 6: keep this conversation going about Trump and economic power.
Speaker 5: This is an.
Speaker 6: Interesting juxtaposition here where you have Scott Besstt on April second,
Speaker 6: each country, we'll get a tear of number, and then
Speaker 6: White House future with an improved bilateral relationship between the
Speaker 6: United States and Russia has huge ups. This includes enormous
Speaker 6: economic deals. That's you know, we have all kinds of
Speaker 6: sanctions on Russia and who knows what Russia's tariff would
Speaker 6: be potentially if this economic relationship is blossoming under Donald Trump.
Speaker 6: But right, it's kind of I think it's interesting from
Speaker 6: the perspective of like what Donald Trump's foreign policy is,
Speaker 6: because it's very like we talk all the time. He's
Speaker 6: not a John Bolton type neo conservative ideologue, but he
Speaker 6: does believe in economic power as his like source of
Speaker 6: creating world peace, which is not an insane It's obviously
Speaker 6: not an insane idea that when you have economic ties
Speaker 6: to different countries it deters violence, but it's also sort
Speaker 6: of not where the right is anymore. And if that's
Speaker 6: you know, Gaza Riviera in Russia, if that's part of
Speaker 6: I mean, I think maybe that's being hyperbolic. But if Putin,
Speaker 6: does Putin respond to that in a way that Donald
Speaker 6: Trump actually wants him to.
Speaker 5: Does he respond to the.
Speaker 6: Prospect of economic opportunities with the United State, it's the
Speaker 6: same way that Donald Trump wants Flatimer Putin to. I
Speaker 6: think Putin has ambitions beyond I guess the economic ties
Speaker 6: with the United States, in that he wants regional power.
Speaker 5: And I'm not saying he wants I don't think she.
Speaker 1: Already has a virtue of being powerful.
Speaker 6: Yeah well yeah, but I mean I'm not saying that
Speaker 6: to say he has this like design set on Western Europe.
Speaker 6: But you know, he's his ambitions are not purely economic.
Speaker 1: Sure, And yeah, they clearly want influence in Western Europe. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's no doubt about that.
Speaker 5: But yeah, hence Northstream too.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and we you know, in we potentially there was
Speaker 4: an opportunity to try to end this in March of
Speaker 4: twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1: The US decided not to do that.
Speaker 4: Whether they could have actually ended it or not isn't
Speaker 4: open question which will never be answered because we didn't.
Speaker 1: Pursue it, and now it has not gone well.
Speaker 4: Like the US put whatever it could up against Russia here,
Speaker 4: you know, one hundred.
Speaker 1: Plus billion dollars put in a hundred plus billion that
Speaker 1: was worth of weapons.
Speaker 4: They drafted everybody they could find, and they're they're losing badly,
Speaker 4: and they hoped that they would weaken Russia.
Speaker 1: Russia came out stronger.
Speaker 5: I mean, Russia has been weakened absolutely, I.
Speaker 4: Guess if I mean certainly they have. They've lost a
Speaker 4: lot of men.
Speaker 5: They've lost a lot of men. Their economy is not incredible.
Speaker 1: Their economy is not incredible.
Speaker 4: But geos politically, are they weaker today than they were
Speaker 4: February twenty two?
Speaker 1: I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I think they're probably
Speaker 1: in a better position.
Speaker 6: Yeah, okay, I mean I think I guess that's fair.
Speaker 6: But there has been a cost to There's been a
Speaker 6: cost to them, right.
Speaker 4: But I think they sanction proofed their economy in a
Speaker 4: substantial way. They did not get the collect apps that
Speaker 4: that MSNBC promised this audience. Yes, yeah, there was no
Speaker 4: real split with China tighter than ever.
Speaker 5: Maybe I was gonna say, yeah, that's a that is
Speaker 5: a great point.
Speaker 4: So Joe Biden does not have a PhD in foreign affairs.
Speaker 1: He's just that good.
Speaker 5: He's so his just crushed it.
Speaker 6: We learn more about Joe Biden's successes with each passing day.
Speaker 5: All right, well, let's be he.
Speaker 4: Showed up for Saint Patty's Day. It was like his
Speaker 4: first comment on anything.
Speaker 5: I didn't see that he when he just put on
Speaker 5: the sweet or.
Speaker 1: Something to celebrate Saint Patty's Day. He just put out
Speaker 1: like a social statements.
Speaker 5: But nobody saw him in the wild, I don't think so.
Speaker 1: Okay, so that would be maybe he was at some
Speaker 1: bar in Lewis, Delaware.
Speaker 5: Would you do.
Speaker 4: I wore my o'kelly's shirt from from Guantanamo Bay. There's
Speaker 4: an Irish bar on Guantanamo Bay.
Speaker 6: So your fun. Let's move on to the raging battle
Speaker 6: over whether it is a good strategy not a good
Speaker 6: strategy for Republicans to start impeaching judges who block or
Speaker 6: obstruct Trump's attempts openly to exert the unitary executive theory
Speaker 6: of power, meaning you're trying to take some power back,
Speaker 6: as the right would argue from the court administrative state.
Speaker 6: This is a really interesting exchange between Laura Ingram on
Speaker 6: Fox News and Donald Trump on Fox News just last
Speaker 6: night Tuesday night, where Ingram pressed Donald Trump on whether
Speaker 6: he would defy court orders. That's obviously at the center
Speaker 6: and Crystal Densager have covered this of the debate over
Speaker 6: what happened with that migrant flight that was ordered by
Speaker 6: a judge to be turned around landed in Al Salvador.
Speaker 6: This was Venezuela migrants alleged to be members of the
Speaker 6: gang Trende or Raguar, designated by Trump administration as a
Speaker 6: foreign terrorist organization. So Laura Ingram pushed Trump on whether
Speaker 6: he would defy court orders.
Speaker 5: Let's take a look.
Speaker 9: This is leading people to wonder whether there are court
Speaker 9: orders that you will defy because you believe that the
Speaker 9: judge has no jurisdiction or their political questions and not
Speaker 9: justiciable at all. And what would you say to that,
Speaker 9: Are there circumstances where you would defy a court order?
Speaker 10: Well?
Speaker 8: I think that number one. Nobody's been through more courts
Speaker 8: than I have. I think nobody knows the courts any
Speaker 8: better than I have. I would say the Chief Judge does,
Speaker 8: but nobody knows them better than I have. And what
Speaker 8: they've done to me. I've had the worst judges. I've
Speaker 8: had crooked judges. I have judges that valued Mara a
Speaker 8: Lago at eighteen million dollars because that benefited his case,
Speaker 8: because he wanted to see me convicted of something. I
Speaker 8: have judges that were had relatives making millions and millions
Speaker 8: of dollars on the.
Speaker 1: Election, ruling on the election going forward.
Speaker 8: I had judges what.
Speaker 10: You defy a court orup?
Speaker 1: We all know that was out.
Speaker 11: I never did defy a court orner, and you wouldn't
Speaker 11: in the future.
Speaker 10: No, you can't do that. However, we have bad judges.
Speaker 8: We have very bad judges, and these are judges that
Speaker 8: shouldn't be allowed. I think at a certain point you
Speaker 8: have to start looking at what do you do when
Speaker 8: you have a rogue judge, the judge that we're talking about.
Speaker 8: You look at his other rulings, I mean rulings unrelated
Speaker 8: but having to do with me.
Speaker 10: He's a lunatic inger.
Speaker 6: By the way, was a clerk for Justice Clarence Thomas.
Speaker 6: A good bit of interest in some of these legal questions.
Speaker 6: But a lot of people, as a lot of people
Speaker 6: on the right now do Justice John Roberts, Chief Justice
Speaker 6: John Roberts, I should say, reacted. He released a statement,
Speaker 6: a very very rare thing. We can buy the next
Speaker 6: element up on the screen yesterday midday. He says, quote
Speaker 6: for more than two centuries, that has been established that
Speaker 6: impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a
Speaker 6: judicial decision. The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.
Speaker 6: Now here's how some people on the right reacted to
Speaker 6: John Roberts deciding to take that leap and actually issue
Speaker 6: a statement. This is Mike Cernovich who said Trump has
Speaker 6: the political capital and then some to ignore judges who
Speaker 6: tell them to allow terrorist gangs to remain in the USA.
Speaker 6: It's not a close call. John Roberts lives in his
Speaker 6: DC media bubble and overestimates his power.
Speaker 5: It's all made up.
Speaker 6: Trump can take it away easily, Jeremy carl He replied,
Speaker 6: this is actually a pretty funny one. John Roberts is
Speaker 6: George Bush's worst mistake outside of the Iraq War, and
Speaker 6: he still got time to take the lead. So this
Speaker 6: was pretty a pretty common argument Ryan on X yesterday
Speaker 6: that the Sternovich point about impeachment should be pursued by Congress.
Speaker 6: You obviously, like Congress really doesn't have the votes right now.
Speaker 6: There's no way to imagine that you could go get
Speaker 6: some of these impeachments through Congress. But Trump sort of
Speaker 6: throwing cold water on it in that primetime inner with
Speaker 6: Laura Ingram was quite interesting as well, because this was
Speaker 6: some of his like loyal mega media defenders who spent
Speaker 6: the day saying impeachment is a perfectly reasonable rational response.
Speaker 6: Here you have Trump instead saying, Nope, not going to
Speaker 6: do it.
Speaker 5: You can't do it, And.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there is history on this, That's why he's saying
Speaker 4: for more than two hundred years, and not for the
Speaker 4: entire history of our country. I think it was under
Speaker 4: Jefferson should have looked this up before we started the show.
Speaker 4: But there was a judge that I think it was
Speaker 4: a Federalist judge that was ticking Jefferson off, and his
Speaker 4: party tried to get rid of him and tried to
Speaker 4: impeach him. I think he was saved by like one vote.
Speaker 4: And that set the precedent where Congress decided, look, we're
Speaker 4: not we're only going to impeach judges for corruption, like
Speaker 4: we're not.
Speaker 1: If we don't like your ruling, we're going to appeal
Speaker 1: it and we're going to push it to a higher level.
Speaker 4: And so since then, basically no political part has ever
Speaker 4: tried to impeach a judge because they didn't like they
Speaker 4: didn't like the ruling. I heard the Cernovis of the
Speaker 4: world complaining where was John Roberts when AOC and the
Speaker 4: rest of the Democrats were saying that they were going
Speaker 4: to pack the courts, And I would say, okay, fair question.
Speaker 4: The answer is, that's not out of the realm of
Speaker 4: American historical precedent.
Speaker 1: Like FDR, that's right there in the.
Speaker 4: Law, like the the number of Supreme Court justices is
Speaker 4: not set by the Constitution, it's set by Congress. FDR,
Speaker 4: when he had a political fight with the Supreme Court,
Speaker 4: threatened to pack the court.
Speaker 1: There was public outrage at him.
Speaker 4: He backed down, and the court, kind of intimidated by
Speaker 4: his move, started letting a bunch of the green new
Speaker 4: Green New deals, the New Deal, the Blue New Deal
Speaker 4: stuff through.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so they let that.
Speaker 4: So they let that stuff go through, and so then
Speaker 4: a fine, so, but but it was a it was
Speaker 4: a push and pull of politics. It is also true
Speaker 4: that there was an effort to impeach a judge in
Speaker 4: whatever eighteen two or whatever for something they disagreed with,
Speaker 4: so Republicans could try again if they won, which is
Speaker 4: what gets me to Trump. I think he's like, why
Speaker 4: are you talking about this because you don't have sixty
Speaker 4: seven votes to do this. It's like this Elon, it
Speaker 4: all came from Elon Musk or it's probably a reply.
Speaker 5: Well, he started echoing Bukele.
Speaker 1: He actually like, get out of here, bou Kelly. We're
Speaker 1: not taking constitutional advice from seriously.
Speaker 5: Seriously.
Speaker 6: But Musk was quote tweeting approvingly the Boukell plan to
Speaker 6: you know, crack down and restore democracy.
Speaker 1: Kelly did that, but bu Kelly.
Speaker 4: Bu Kelly certainly did not invent an executive or getting
Speaker 4: rid of his independent judiciary like, that's that's like textbook.
Speaker 1: And yes, obviously, if.
Speaker 4: You want to set up a dictatorship or some type
Speaker 4: of extremely powerful like executive, you get rid of the
Speaker 4: judiciary that does That doesn't take a constitutional scholar to
Speaker 4: figure out.
Speaker 1: But but yeah, they don't. They don't have the vote.
Speaker 4: So his is to me, the almost more interesting answer
Speaker 4: there was about would you ignore one? Would you ignore
Speaker 4: a ruling? And he says, well, I never have, but
Speaker 4: he doesn't say he wouldn't. On the other hand, bro,
Speaker 4: yes you did. You just ignored one like yesterday? Are
Speaker 4: you acting like Monday? The acting like you were not
Speaker 4: told to not deport these guys to the El Salvadoran
Speaker 4: torture chambers? Well, hold the judge to f Off.
Speaker 6: Well, it was I think that was actually Another interesting
Speaker 6: part of what he said is he's maintaining and a
Speaker 6: lot of people in Mega world aren't maintaining that I
Speaker 6: shouldn't say Maga world in this case in the White
Speaker 6: House are actually maintaining that that was not done intentionally,
Speaker 6: that it just was happenstance.
Speaker 1: And so dude, what's that Huh, you're breaking up? Breaking up?
Speaker 1: Can't hear this ruling? Also it is I hope that's.
Speaker 5: What actually happened.
Speaker 6: He's like on Air Force one here.
Speaker 4: Also, it is important to point out Trump has named
Speaker 4: it the Gulf of America, so therefore not international waters.
Speaker 1: Right. Interesting, Well, where's fact check that for me?
Speaker 5: I mean things can be called America.
Speaker 1: It was the Gulf of America.
Speaker 4: Then he might have an argument, but it's not the
Speaker 4: Golf of Mexico anymore. It's Gulf of America. Go look
Speaker 4: up of there.
Speaker 6: Also would even on that they're disputing whether or not
Speaker 6: the like verbal order. I mean, it gets into like
Speaker 6: insane arcane legal questions whether the verbal order the time
Speaker 6: that the verbal order came out versus what time the
Speaker 6: written order came out compared that to the flight logs,
Speaker 6: and when all of.
Speaker 5: The process was able to We don't need to get
Speaker 5: into it.
Speaker 4: But also we have we have learned that as suspected,
Speaker 4: they made some mistakes. Somebody who came in legally was
Speaker 4: seeking asylum just an artist has nothing to do with
Speaker 4: this gang. So on the flight and who knows if
Speaker 4: who Kelly has tortured them since then has killed them.
Speaker 4: To me, the people involved in this when Bush used
Speaker 4: to do it, they would call it an extraordinary rendition.
Speaker 4: We have rules against torture, and so what Bush would
Speaker 4: do is he would send people, mostly to Egypt and
Speaker 4: elsewhere and say you torture them, Therefore we're not torturing them.
Speaker 4: We now understand that no, that doesn't count. Like that,
Speaker 4: that doesn't get.
Speaker 1: Around the constitutional prohibition on torture.
Speaker 6: Well, and we're referring to is these reports. This is
Speaker 6: one from the Miami Herald, that is the Venezuelan's alleged
Speaker 6: ship and gang members Trenda Arragua. They're families who have
Speaker 6: seen them in the actually the Bu Calai video. Speaking
Speaker 6: of Bu Cali, the video that Bukelly released of them
Speaker 6: getting off of the plane in Al Salvador, they sort
Speaker 6: of spotted their family members and have said they're denying
Speaker 6: actually that these family members have any ties whatsoever to
Speaker 6: trendday Ragua. We can put B seven on the screen.
Speaker 6: This is getting back into the tattoo debate. This says
Speaker 6: quote relatives that he had several tattoos that are testaments
Speaker 6: to his love of family. One bears the name their daughter.
Speaker 6: Another on his arm whereads Forte call Mama Strong Life Mom.
Speaker 6: A third show's two classed hands representing him in his
Speaker 6: partner next to the date they began dating. But it
Speaker 6: gets into that question again, Ryan, of whether people are
Speaker 6: being swept up into these deportations because they have tattoos
Speaker 6: that are identified with trenda arraguall which is something we
Speaker 6: do repeatedly here cited by the administration as reasons for
Speaker 6: those reasons for the deportations.
Speaker 4: Now you've met you've done some reporting down on the border,
Speaker 4: You've met ICE agents, Right, would you want your fate
Speaker 4: in the hands of the Think about the ICE agents
Speaker 4: you've met, all right, and it's a meritocracy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, these are the people.
Speaker 4: Who wound up as ICE agents, Right, did you want
Speaker 4: your fate in their just turning hands? And the question
Speaker 4: that they have to answer, this ICE agent, who's you know,
Speaker 4: working down in southern Texas or wherever they are, has
Speaker 4: to look at a tattoo on a Venezuelan person's back
Speaker 4: and they have to distinguish whether that tattoo is a
Speaker 4: trendy al Wagua gang affiliate affiliated tattoo, or it is
Speaker 4: some other ink that the person found to be attractive
Speaker 4: the day they went or like for many people, the
Speaker 4: artist just drew it because like this is you know,
Speaker 4: you go in you're like, you're an.
Speaker 1: Artist, give me what you got.
Speaker 4: So the fate, the question of whether or not you
Speaker 4: will be hooded, have your head shaved, tortured, and potentially
Speaker 4: killed in an El Salvador in prison is going to
Speaker 4: be answered by one ICE agent looking at your tattoo
Speaker 4: and deciding whether or not that like, is that is
Speaker 4: that enough due process?
Speaker 1: You think?
Speaker 5: I hate that?
Speaker 4: How confident would you be that that ICE is going
Speaker 4: to get it right? One hundred percent of the time.
Speaker 6: I hate the Salvadorian involvement here obviously hates that there
Speaker 6: are any allegations of torture. If I were concerned about
Speaker 6: due process, I would not enter a country illegally or
Speaker 6: stay in the country illegally. And that's one of the
Speaker 6: questions that I have right now is whether these hundreds
Speaker 6: of migrants or what people.
Speaker 4: Were What if you were told here's the process, Well,
Speaker 4: that's what I'm wondering.
Speaker 1: Asylum, That's what I'm wondering.
Speaker 4: You report to this particular spot, you get a number,
Speaker 4: then you show up for court.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's what I'm wondering.
Speaker 1: That's the process. That's you're told that's the process, that's
Speaker 1: the legal process.
Speaker 4: Yes, and then some myce agents has actually I'm kind
Speaker 4: of think that tattoo might mean you're in a gang.
Speaker 4: I'm going to tend you to bou Kelly to check out.
Speaker 5: We were talking about this months ago.
Speaker 6: I think one of the biggest challenges or tensions in
Speaker 6: the Trump administration's deportation policy is that the United States
Speaker 6: of America under Joe Biden unfortunately opened up an actual
Speaker 6: legal asylum process, and that's where you end up having,
Speaker 6: you know, some roughly eight million according to the New.
Speaker 5: York Times New People a net.
Speaker 6: Of migrants coming into the country just under the Biden administration,
Speaker 6: a huge, huge chunk of that close to half. I
Speaker 6: would say, it's hard to actually know exactly how many
Speaker 6: were people who came in and legally applied for the
Speaker 6: asylum process. Across the border you claim asylum, and Joe
Speaker 6: Biden had opened up people's ability initially when he was president.
Speaker 6: This is one of the things he cracked down on
Speaker 6: over the last year that brought immigration numbers down dramatically.
Speaker 6: So that's what I'm actually genuinely interested about with this
Speaker 6: number the hundreds of migrants, is whether any of them
Speaker 6: were here because the Biden administration said, claim asylum and
Speaker 6: coming out of Venezuela, the American government.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that the American government. That's like torturing and killing,
Speaker 1: and it's you know, it's a most awful government ever.
Speaker 1: Come to the United States.
Speaker 4: Will give you, it will protect you right, literally give
Speaker 4: you temporary protect a status right.
Speaker 5: Yes.
Speaker 6: So, and I would say the administration, I don't think
Speaker 6: this matters to most voters from my perspective, someone who's
Speaker 6: like in media, I don't think the administration has done
Speaker 6: a very good job explaining exactly what these migrants are
Speaker 6: accused of, because that distinction, to.
Speaker 5: Means really really important.
Speaker 6: Whether they cross the border illegally, state illegally, and then
Speaker 6: committed various crimes, didn't even show up for asylum hearings.
Speaker 6: That can be reason enough, in my book, to deport
Speaker 6: people if you're obstructing the process that you're benefiting from
Speaker 6: all of those things. That's what I'm curious about. So
Speaker 6: I don't think the administration has done a particularly good job.
Speaker 6: It's very there's a humorist because they know the public
Speaker 6: is completely on their side about deporting military age men
Speaker 6: who came to the country and are tatted up and likely.
Speaker 5: You know, I think krystill mentioned this the other day.
Speaker 6: If there's several hundred, as her estimate the investment she
Speaker 6: cited said, several hundred trendy Aragua members in the United States,
Speaker 6: that's a significant gang cell spread out throughout the country.
Speaker 6: It's not millions, but that's a significant gang cell spread
Speaker 6: throughout the country that people want to get the hell
Speaker 6: out of the United States of America. So I think
Speaker 6: because the administration knows the American people are rightfully supportive
Speaker 6: of that, they aren't really eager to pony up the evidence.
Speaker 1: And the problem for me is that on the right,
Speaker 1: there's this recognition that the government is inherently incompetent and fallible. Yes,
Speaker 1: like it.
Speaker 4: Anybody who's gone to the DMV, who like you, show
Speaker 4: up in a sold security office if it's still open.
Speaker 1: It sucks to dealing with the government.
Speaker 4: They're often there, they lose stuff, they lose stuff on purpose,
Speaker 4: you know, they say they're open, and they're not open.
Speaker 4: Like you know, there's a lot of legitimate criticisms that
Speaker 4: people have of the government from their immediate interactions with them.
Speaker 4: Right yet, and this is why I'm making fun of
Speaker 4: the intellectual capacity to the ICE agents.
Speaker 1: Yet we expect then the government to.
Speaker 4: Be infallible when it's picking up a venezuela and off
Speaker 4: the street, and to be certain that they are not
Speaker 4: grabbing a citizen, not grabbing a Green Heart cardholder, They're
Speaker 4: not grabbing somebody who legitimately and legally applied for asylum
Speaker 4: and has a case that is still being adjudicated. We
Speaker 4: know that in Chicago they picked up a brown guy
Speaker 4: and who turned out to be an American citizen, and
Speaker 4: he spent the entire night in detention.
Speaker 5: So they botched the Khalili arrest, right, they showed up.
Speaker 4: They showed up, arrested Khalil thinking that he had a
Speaker 4: student visa, telling him they were revoking This is a
Speaker 4: Columbia protester or thing that they were telling him that
Speaker 4: they were revoking his student visa, and his lawyers like, bro,
Speaker 4: he has a Green card and they're like, well, we're
Speaker 4: revoking that too, Like they didn't even know. So you
Speaker 4: want to enable these morons with this unchecked power, Like
Speaker 4: that point of due process from the right is you
Speaker 4: don't trust the government, like you don't you think they
Speaker 4: might make mistakes, and so you want to check because
Speaker 4: sometimes you can't get a do over, like if you accidentally,
Speaker 4: as they appear to have done, using accident very generously
Speaker 4: to them, Yeah, accidentally send people who are here legally
Speaker 4: and going through the correct process, and you send them
Speaker 4: to a torture chamber and they're tortured.
Speaker 1: There's no do over.
Speaker 4: You can't undo that you've destroyed that person. And maybe
Speaker 4: they get killed.
Speaker 6: And maybe they're actually legal avenues they can pursue.
Speaker 5: Depends but will I don't know.
Speaker 4: They didn't have jurisdiction over the Gulf of America. How
Speaker 4: do they have jurisdiction from this dungeon.
Speaker 6: The due process question is an interesting one because as
Speaker 6: long as you've established people are not in the country legally.
Speaker 1: But that's the thing. Do we trust that they even established.
Speaker 6: To establish that, That's what I'm saying, Yeah, I haven't
Speaker 6: seen enough, frankly from the White House to just trust
Speaker 6: that they established that, especially frankly after the Khalila grass Rest,
Speaker 6: where they did not know. There's the report of them
Speaker 6: on the phone. This is a report from his wife,
Speaker 6: who can hear them on the phone being like, oh okay,
Speaker 6: well take them in anyway, like that's the exact word anyway.
Speaker 6: So no, I mean I don't have a ton of
Speaker 6: trust in the government. So why I always say the
Speaker 6: most hillbilly thing that jade Vance has ever said is
Speaker 6: that he hates the cops.
Speaker 5: Get the apologize for it.
Speaker 6: But it was like an old post of his yes,
Speaker 6: and yeah it's yeah, I mean I don't disagree with that.
Speaker 6: I also think it's fairly important to get a hold
Speaker 6: of the eight million people, and that's going to make
Speaker 6: for some really unfortunate and sad and heart wrenching stories.
Speaker 6: But you know these if people are legitimately members of
Speaker 6: trend Ragua, you know, the government should make that very clear.
Speaker 5: They should show what their evidence is.
Speaker 6: Otherwise it's like you're just throwing people to El Salvador.
Speaker 5: So yeah, I don't That was a.
Speaker 4: Very real moment from from jade Vance because that is
Speaker 4: one of the key divides is of where you are
Speaker 4: in your in a soak and basically a social classes.
Speaker 4: When you see a copy, do you get scared, do
Speaker 4: you not care or or do you feel more comfortable?
Speaker 6: Yep?
Speaker 4: And the feel, the immediate feeling that you get puts
Speaker 4: you in a very particular place, and for Jdvans to
Speaker 4: understand that he should then understand that when you see
Speaker 4: that cop, that cop should not have the unilateral power
Speaker 4: to pick you up, hood you and send you to
Speaker 4: All Salvador to be tortured and then figure out later
Speaker 4: whether or not they did it right.
Speaker 5: I think Sager was getting at this the other day.
Speaker 6: But I think one of the tough things here is
Speaker 6: I care significantly more about the fact that Joe Biden
Speaker 6: let in eight million migrants than I do about And
Speaker 6: that's not to say I don't care about both.
Speaker 1: You can care about how met that point too. I
Speaker 1: don't understand that point.
Speaker 4: It's like, okay, okay, that's you can hate that, but
Speaker 4: like it is what it is like now here we
Speaker 4: are do we have or are we country of civil
Speaker 4: liberties and constitutional protectionis or not? The part that kills me,
Speaker 4: Like it's all the problems I have with the United States.
Speaker 4: At least we have these civil liberties. That's always the
Speaker 4: thing that has separated us from the rest of the world.
Speaker 4: The First Amendment, the Fifth Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, all
Speaker 4: of these different protections that we have against tyranny. We
Speaker 4: don't get universal health care, we don't get a decent
Speaker 4: minimum wage. Yeah, we have complete total economic procarity, but
Speaker 4: at least we have these other things.
Speaker 1: If we don't get that, then just give us China, like,
Speaker 1: just give us some economic security. Then if we're going
Speaker 1: to live in a totalitarian government without any individual freedoms,
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 6: The point Scacer was making either about the left broadly,
Speaker 6: not about even Crystal, is that sometimes it feels like
Speaker 6: concern trolling that after eight million plus people coming illegally,
Speaker 6: you have case studies like Lake and Riley, and the
Speaker 6: left is most angry. I'm not saying this about you,
Speaker 6: but like that's what I think people are reacting to.
Speaker 6: The left is furious about potential likely illeg lemore's not
Speaker 6: getting due process right.
Speaker 4: The left gets angry about different things than the right.
Speaker 4: Like that shouldn't be news to people.
Speaker 6: But part of our civil liberties are based on having
Speaker 6: the rule of law. And as soon as you start
Speaker 6: eroding the rule of law and letting people hide out
Speaker 6: in sanctuary cities over the course of years, that's a
Speaker 6: significant I mean, that's a significant threat to civil liberties
Speaker 6: of Americans, a significant threat to like and Riley and
Speaker 6: to other people who have found themselves in.
Speaker 5: The crosshairs of this. So I mean.
Speaker 6: That is legitimately tough for me. I think it is
Speaker 6: possible to care about both. I do care about, like
Speaker 6: genuinely care about not disappearing people into a Salvadorian prison.
Speaker 4: I also, I mean, you can't put these guys in
Speaker 4: front of a judge and be like, here's how we
Speaker 4: know they're part of a gang.
Speaker 5: Or at least put the evidence out, like let the
Speaker 5: public know how you know that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean I would, I mean preferably before you
Speaker 4: send them to the dungeon.
Speaker 6: Yeah, well, just don't send them to Al Salvador for
Speaker 6: it was a stupid a little bit. It's a stupid stunt.
Speaker 6: It's just Yes, I don't disagree with that at all. Well,
Speaker 6: I guess we've found some common ground there.
Speaker 4: We go against no extraordinary renditions to torture chambers, right.
Speaker 6: So let's stop fueling the boukel A pr stunts.
Speaker 5: That would be great.
Speaker 6: Let's move on to this Brian Dropsite reporting out of
Speaker 6: Gaza over the past couple of days, and we have
Speaker 6: some incredible guests, hopefully two guests, but at least one
Speaker 6: guest lined.
Speaker 1: Up for today's segment.
Speaker 4: We're fortunate enough to be joined by Abu Baker Abed
Speaker 4: joining us from Gaza, and Shreif abdel Caduce, editor at
Speaker 4: drop Site News often edits pieces by Abu Baker Abed.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much to both of you for joining us.
Speaker 11: Now you have wo com Thank you and.
Speaker 1: So Abu Bacher.
Speaker 4: We had an entire segment planned out where we want
Speaker 4: to talk about all the different updates that have been
Speaker 4: happening in the last couple of days. But then this
Speaker 4: morning you witnessed news that is now kind of trickling
Speaker 4: into the international consciousness, which was this shelling of a
Speaker 4: UN building.
Speaker 1: So can you can you.
Speaker 4: Describe for us where you were, why you were there,
Speaker 4: and what you saw.
Speaker 11: Yeah, the first thing that you have to know is
Speaker 11: that Israeli tanks have been chilling ceaselessly thecent parts of Derribella,
Speaker 11: so very expectedly. We know that the buildings along the
Speaker 11: eastern outscuts we had why those shells. Eleven thirty I
Speaker 11: was out for an emergency exactly eleven thirty in the
Speaker 11: morning Gauzza time, and I was along Salahadeen Road on
Speaker 11: the eastern outskirts of Derbella. Then I had a massive
Speaker 11: shell which is like a booing sound, a very very
Speaker 11: horrifying sound, and it flew over the card which I
Speaker 11: was in and then it had uan compound and we
Speaker 11: saw the smoke, the cloud of smoke that emanated or
Speaker 11: went out from the belt in itself. And after that
Speaker 11: we went all the way along the Salahadeen road and
Speaker 11: we saw one of the two convoys two vehicles of
Speaker 11: the World Health Organization along with the U and convoy
Speaker 11: were one of the vehicles of them, so three vehicles
Speaker 11: and another ambulance which had a UK our UK logo
Speaker 11: on it, so it was it was for a medical
Speaker 11: organization based in Okay, which is cured US. And the foreigners,
Speaker 11: the foreigners, the medical staffers from outside cars that they've
Speaker 11: come in to take the casualties in their rushed to
Speaker 11: a lax Marto's hospital in Delnbella and just surrounded the
Speaker 11: place and they took the casualties. So understand that what
Speaker 11: we saw is that one of the foreign workers was killed,
Speaker 11: five were injured. But we have another report that another
Speaker 11: one was killed as well. But so far we understand
Speaker 11: that one was killed, four were injured. And this is
Speaker 11: what happened until the place for one hour of one
Speaker 11: complete hour, we saw, I saw the events myself, and
Speaker 11: I saw everything, so it was very clear it was
Speaker 11: a shell by Israeli tanks. And the arbitrary shilling has
Speaker 11: even caused many casualties over the past two days, so
Speaker 11: it's very expected.
Speaker 4: And the IDF is firmly and plainly denying that they
Speaker 4: struck this, that they struck this UN building. How can
Speaker 4: you how can you be sure that it was a
Speaker 4: UN building that you saw get hit? How could you
Speaker 4: be there was an IF shell?
Speaker 11: Yeah, there were. There were flags of you and over it.
Speaker 11: And we know since the UN got into Gaza, they
Speaker 11: have marked their places with either fences or flags of
Speaker 11: the place and with their vehicles parking in front of
Speaker 11: those buildings. And we understand that this is not the
Speaker 11: only building inside the real Bella because since the start
Speaker 11: of the war on Gaza as Gaza, as we wrote
Speaker 11: to drop Side News with ref the first story, we
Speaker 11: reduced together that de Rebella has the last standing city
Speaker 11: in the BC's territory. So the U and and the
Speaker 11: other international humanitary organizations make sure that they are going
Speaker 11: to be stationed in the most or in the safest
Speaker 11: place inside Garza that is Derel Bellach, which has been
Speaker 11: the least head of the course of the genocide. That's
Speaker 11: why it's not the only building. We have our Hustines Street,
Speaker 11: which is in the middle of the real Ballad that
Speaker 11: has several organizations like WFB and Honora as well as you.
Speaker 11: And but the fact is that this was along in
Speaker 11: Alberque area, along the eastern outskirts of the Ballad, the
Speaker 11: eastern part, and it was marked clearly with flags, and
Speaker 11: there were cars parked outside the parked outside the building
Speaker 11: with clear logo like emplacent with logos of the U.
Speaker 11: And at the same time the building itself has many
Speaker 11: flags over it, so it was clear that you I'm
Speaker 11: building and I know by the way from before this
Speaker 11: attack and before this head, I was very aware of
Speaker 11: all buildings that are working inside the back because I'm
Speaker 11: in the city and have been observing that over time,
Speaker 11: and they know where the buildings are, the organizations that
Speaker 11: were Yeah, that's why I left. That's why I'm telling
Speaker 11: you that was clearly you building in Israel hit it.
Speaker 11: But I think Israel as making the point based on
Speaker 11: the arbitrary shilling that they did not deliberately hit it,
Speaker 11: and this is something I might agree with because it's
Speaker 11: been arbituaries. I'm telling you, it's been random. So that's
Speaker 11: why they are claiming right now that they haven't hit
Speaker 11: the pace, but are really in the end, even if
Speaker 11: you purposefully or or not purposefully hit the place, it
Speaker 11: is you. It's a tank from your side, so it's
Speaker 11: not going to be on the other side. Because amass
Speaker 11: again has a fight back as single pology in Israel
Speaker 11: on Israel, despite the fact that they have killed more
Speaker 11: than four hundred and twenty people in because over the
Speaker 11: course of the past two days. This is apart from
Speaker 11: the fact that they have killed one hundred and fifty
Speaker 11: during the cease fire. So it's very clear that they
Speaker 11: hit this place. They must be held accountable for it,
Speaker 11: and they really must. I don't know what they have
Speaker 11: to do, but of course Israel it's responsible for that,
Speaker 11: and they can make sure that of that because I
Speaker 11: was in the place and I saw that myself. So
Speaker 11: there is no way that this can be debunked at
Speaker 11: all because in the place and it survived it very
Speaker 11: very miraculously.
Speaker 6: And sure, if what can you tell us about the
Speaker 6: I guess what we're hearing from Israel, what we're hearing
Speaker 6: from other involved parties. You know, the first person story
Speaker 6: they're from Amba Baker is unbelievable, and having reporting from him,
Speaker 6: what else do we know about how other people are
Speaker 6: reacting or other entities are reacting to what happened.
Speaker 12: Well to this story. The news is just coming out.
Speaker 12: So far, the only official statement we have is from
Speaker 12: the Ministry of Health saying that one person was killed
Speaker 12: and four were injured in an attack on what they
Speaker 12: described as you in facility, and these really military denying that.
Speaker 12: But we have to say that this comes in context
Speaker 12: of this renewed genocide within a genocide that began yesterday
Speaker 12: with Israel, you know, unleashing one of the deadliest wave
Speaker 12: of bombardment since this began seventeen months ago. The Ministry
Speaker 12: of Health just put out the latest figures. Over the
Speaker 12: past two days, four hundred and thirty people have been killed,
Speaker 12: including over one hundred and eighty children, which is one
Speaker 12: of the highest death holls of children in a single
Speaker 12: wave of airstrikes ever. And you know, once again we
Speaker 12: are timelines were filled with the images of dead children,
Speaker 12: of dead babies, of families being wiped out of the
Speaker 12: whales and shrieks of parents, and it came without warning,
Speaker 12: and it came across all areas of Gaza, very heavily,
Speaker 12: in the north of Gaza, where the Minstery of Health
Speaker 12: has also put out the kind of numbers of where
Speaker 12: people were killed, and it was one hundred and fifty
Speaker 12: six people were killed in Gaza, the Governorate of Gaza,
Speaker 12: which is where Gaza City is and Jabellia. This is
Speaker 12: an area that was already completely devastated by the Israeli
Speaker 12: military assault. And it's also the area where over half
Speaker 12: a million Palestinians had returned to following the seasfire, many
Speaker 12: of them returning and with no like creating makeshift shelters
Speaker 12: of putting tents on the rubble of their homes, and
Speaker 12: that's where they're living. And this is the area that
Speaker 12: was heavily bombed yesterday. And you know, I was Buckra
Speaker 12: called me when all of this began, and we spoke
Speaker 12: and he was seeing helicopters flying low outside of his window,
Speaker 12: relentless strikes and so forth. The next morning I contacted
Speaker 12: another drop Side contributor, Hasam Schabbat, who's in bit Hanun,
Speaker 12: which is all the way in the northeast an edge
Speaker 12: of Gaza. He replied with one word death.
Speaker 1: That's what he wrote.
Speaker 12: Another Drop Side contributor, journalist Russia Bujalel, who is among
Speaker 12: those people who went from Deer to Ballach to Gaza
Speaker 12: city after the ceasefire went into effect, an air strike
Speaker 12: hit right next to her home, collapsed onto her home.
Speaker 12: She somehow miraculously survived with her husband and five children,
Speaker 12: and she wrote a dispatch for that on drop site
Speaker 12: that you can read. But you know, and I think
Speaker 12: it's important to understand when we're talking about context, this
Speaker 12: seems to have been Israel's plan all along. You know,
Speaker 12: the seasefire that went into effect, that was agreed on
Speaker 12: and went into effect in January nineteenth. This was supposed
Speaker 12: to be a three phase deal, the first phase being
Speaker 12: forty two days. But we know that Israel was really
Speaker 12: only intending for this to be a phase one deal.
Speaker 12: As of Bboker mentioned, we saw them violate the seasefire
Speaker 12: nearly every single day since January nineteenth, killing Palestine in
Speaker 12: Gaza on a regular basis. Of over one hundred and
Speaker 12: fifty have been killed even before this massive aerial assault
Speaker 12: on Tuesday, morning, They refused to allow in the agreed
Speaker 12: upon number of tents in Tagaza. They did not allow
Speaker 12: in a single mobile home as agreed upon in the deal.
Speaker 12: They didn't allow builldozers and other forms of reconstruction equipment.
Speaker 12: And during all of this they also refused to hold
Speaker 12: negotiations on Phase two. And Phase two the negotiations was
Speaker 12: supposed to start in February third, and it was supposed
Speaker 12: to entail the release of all the remaining Israeli captives
Speaker 12: in exchange for a substantive number of Palestinians being held
Speaker 12: by Israel, the complete withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza,
Speaker 12: and the beginning of a permanent ceasefire. And this is
Speaker 12: something that Niahu has said plainly that they do not want.
Speaker 12: Hamas spent weeks calling for serious talks on the second
Speaker 12: phase to begin. Israel simply did not allow the negotiations
Speaker 12: to go forward. After the first phase ended. In early March,
Speaker 12: Nataniahu said, Israel agreed to what has been described as
Speaker 12: a new US proposal in which Hamas would release half
Speaker 12: the remaining captives that it has in return for a
Speaker 12: seven week extension, and kind of that's it. Nothing in return,
Speaker 12: and of course this was not part of the agreement
Speaker 12: that was set Hamas rejected that, and then you know,
Speaker 12: Israel reinforced a total blockade on March second. Not a
Speaker 12: single truck has been allowed into Gaza for the past
Speaker 12: seventeen days. No food, no medicine, no fuel. They cut
Speaker 12: electricity which affected a desalination plant, which severely limited the
Speaker 12: availability of water to hundreds of thousands of people, mostly
Speaker 12: in the Rebellachnunis. Prices are skyrocketing people can afford. So
Speaker 12: this is that, you know, a policy for starvation that
Speaker 12: is being reimposed, and we reported at drop site they
Speaker 12: also have started denying doctors in international humanitarian aid workers
Speaker 12: entry into Gaza on relief missions unprecedented rates. And then
Speaker 12: you know, on Tuesday we saw this deadliest wave of bombardments.
Speaker 12: And we've also seen that the Israeli militaries as sent
Speaker 12: out ordering people to evacuate, mostly along eastern Gossapa near
Speaker 12: the border in places like bit Hanun, places like Rosin
Speaker 12: and hanunis forcing people into the center of the territory.
Speaker 12: And this indicates that Israel is renewing plans for ground
Speaker 12: operations because this is what we saw last time, and
Speaker 12: today we have the Wall Street Journal reporting citing you know,
Speaker 12: Israeli security sources that they are planning to escalate a
Speaker 12: major ground operation using an even bigger force that they
Speaker 12: used last time, because much of the manpower that they
Speaker 12: needed on the northern border with Lebanon they don't need
Speaker 12: that there anymore because the attacks with Husbal Law have ceased.
Speaker 12: So you know, this is where it stands now and
Speaker 12: it's it's very ominous.
Speaker 1: And a obacca.
Speaker 4: You were telling me just before you came on that
Speaker 4: that your indications were as well that it looks like
Speaker 4: a ground another ground invasion is underway. What are you
Speaker 4: seeing that makes you believe that what the Israelis we're
Speaker 4: telling the Wall Street Journal is accurate.
Speaker 11: Yeah, because I think the shelling has intensified over the
Speaker 11: past twelve hours, particularly during the night hours, as we've
Speaker 11: been hearing that it's not all about this because when
Speaker 11: we see like the plumes of smoke from the skyline
Speaker 11: view that we're seeing at the moment because or have
Speaker 11: a highest point, I have one of the high spots
Speaker 11: that it can really climb up and see the sky
Speaker 11: from wearing out departments. So the eastern parts of the
Speaker 11: Aribella need to remind people that they have been utterly
Speaker 11: oblterated during the genocide. In the israeliancursion of East A
Speaker 11: Rebella last August twenty twenty four, every place, every ench
Speaker 11: in the eastern parts of Therebella was totally annihilated, didn't
Speaker 11: flat into the ground. And at the same time, when
Speaker 11: you see this, you know, when you see this increase
Speaker 11: of attacks and this increase of shells across those regions,
Speaker 11: you feel that there is going to be a military
Speaker 11: ground operation, not necessarily in the revalat because in the
Speaker 11: eastern parts and at the same time shere we've told
Speaker 11: you that the eastern parts and the northern border regions
Speaker 11: of Gaza and Honey Units. When we took about high units,
Speaker 11: we took about three areas in the east can units,
Speaker 11: which is which are near the borders like Abasan and Venezuela.
Speaker 11: So they have ordered all people living there to evacuate.
Speaker 11: That means they are preparing from military ground operation, the
Speaker 11: same as having the bit Layah and here there and
Speaker 11: central Gaza, the northern regions and Olbrich Camp. And in fact,
Speaker 11: the fact is that during the ceasefire, when we talk
Speaker 11: about the ceasefire, the so called seas fire. Israel has
Speaker 11: called many people, over twenty people in Oldberich camps northern regions,
Speaker 11: and I went one time to those places and I
Speaker 11: saw military forces there myself in Alberich Camp Northern as.
Speaker 1: The violation of the fire agreement right now, Yeah, and.
Speaker 11: During the violations of this is fire. This is absolutely
Speaker 11: a big, big indicator of an intent to military for
Speaker 11: military ground operations. Let me just because I wanted to
Speaker 11: make sure that I remember this or I mentioned this
Speaker 11: because here we've talked about that, we talked about the
Speaker 11: incident of attacking you in convoy. Now this really military
Speaker 11: has given approval for the entry of one of the
Speaker 11: ambulances from outside Gods or the Egyptian border to help
Speaker 11: treat the patients, the foreign patients inside Gods and take
Speaker 11: them outside Gods of the treatment. When the attacks happened,
Speaker 11: the convoys that were taking children, injured children, women who
Speaker 11: have been waiting desperately for evacuation, for medical evacuation during
Speaker 11: the past fifteen months has halted. And the whow the
Speaker 11: humanitary organizations haven't done any haven't really exerted any efforts
Speaker 11: to make sure that this process can be resumed. So
Speaker 11: when you talk about this that the lives of foreigners
Speaker 11: are much better or more important than the Palaestini children,
Speaker 11: women who have been I've been suffering every single day
Speaker 11: and people are and that comparison of so why the
Speaker 11: WHO and the humanitary organizations have worked so hard to
Speaker 11: make sure that they are going to take the patients,
Speaker 11: the foreign patients, or the war wanted from their workers,
Speaker 11: the foreign workers outside Canso. But when it comes to Palestinians,
Speaker 11: we're talking about more than twelve thousand patients inside Gaza.
Speaker 11: They are in disperate need of evacuator right now. Forty
Speaker 11: percent of them have been have died, and many of
Speaker 11: them five to ten have died when they reached the
Speaker 11: hospitals outside Garsa, like Egyptian Jordan, because of the continuous
Speaker 11: procrastination Manisulian military and the delays and the restrictions. This
Speaker 11: is a very very important point. And we took about
Speaker 11: another point that she have mentioned and quite elaborated on
Speaker 11: the overpricing. Right now, there are completely different prices we
Speaker 11: talk about.
Speaker 4: Can you talk a little bit about what the effect
Speaker 4: has been of the blockade going back in the place
Speaker 4: on March second, Like, what was it like before and
Speaker 4: what's it like now?
Speaker 11: Before the prices were quite reasonable for the entirety of
Speaker 11: the population people could really afford. But right now we
Speaker 11: took about an onion for two or for five dollars, sorry,
Speaker 11: an appliant for three dollars, a tomato for two dollars.
Speaker 11: We're talking about one of each type. How can people
Speaker 11: really afford? People are fast in here. They are spending
Speaker 11: almost twelve hours without a single without a single plate,
Speaker 11: and at the same time they don't have anything for sure,
Speaker 11: So the both meals that you should have very peacefully
Speaker 11: now they don't have them. A lot of families cannot
Speaker 11: really afford, not all families to have the ability to
Speaker 11: bring their to bring their kids and flood every single day.
Speaker 11: The insanity of these price is now. Right now, as
Speaker 11: I was rowing around and going inside gazas markets here
Speaker 11: and there are about high unison talking to people from
Speaker 11: northern Gaza. There is not a single bag of flour
Speaker 11: in the territory. There is not a single cooking oil
Speaker 11: inside the territory. So how can people really cope with that?
Speaker 11: When there is a cursive there is no single type,
Speaker 11: one single type of fruits is not found inside Gaza.
Speaker 11: Discursive vegetables are insane. We're talking about just very past
Speaker 11: quantities of vegetables like zachinia, like tomatoes, potatoes, and they're
Speaker 11: not even available, and their prices are extremely exorbitant. Like
Speaker 11: you talk about one putata for five dollars, Oh my god,
Speaker 11: how can people really do that? In the United States,
Speaker 11: It's not the same thing. I think you can buy
Speaker 11: a kilo for five dollars. So if people in the
Speaker 11: United States can't really afford that, how can people of
Speaker 11: Gaza who who eighty percent of them eighty percent of
Speaker 11: them have lost their work since the genocide started, and
Speaker 11: they are they have tried to get back to a
Speaker 11: sense of normality when the ceasefire started, but now their
Speaker 11: hopes are dented, their lives are shattered. You to gain
Speaker 11: I know people very one very important point about this.
Speaker 11: I know people personally that they were searching for the
Speaker 11: loved ones under the rubble before the start of the
Speaker 11: series of the tags that were killed yesterday. So instead
Speaker 11: of having retrieving the bodies of their loved ones and
Speaker 11: their families from under the rabble after they have been
Speaker 11: there and stuck there under the rubble for months. They
Speaker 11: are now killed, and they are now both buried in
Speaker 11: the same graveyard. This arbarity that we're trying to tell
Speaker 11: you and trying to tell the one is what we
Speaker 11: need to talk about. There's nothing about Hans here. There's
Speaker 11: nothing about the ongoing violations and the ongoiving escalation that
Speaker 11: we are living through. Most of the population here like sorry,
Speaker 11: what it really does want to destroying Gaza? I drove
Speaker 11: in northern Gaza, I drove in communits and drove in
Speaker 11: central Gaza. What else is there he wants to destroy?
Speaker 11: In Gaza? There is nothing like utter devastation, utter obliteration
Speaker 11: of every means of life. And there are no buildings.
Speaker 11: People are living in the wreckage of their horns. People
Speaker 11: are trying to salvage the ruins of their arms. How
Speaker 11: how what do you want to destroy? Really? Really, what
Speaker 11: do you want to destroy? What do you want at home?
Speaker 11: Do you want to kill? You want to kill the
Speaker 11: entire population? Do it with a new clubal bound. That's
Speaker 11: what people want because they cannot really take any more
Speaker 11: seconds of this brit in, this Polgorism. It can't really
Speaker 11: go on like this, but the word has allowed this.
Speaker 11: Our world has allowed this in the United States because
Speaker 11: I told you I need to remind you bout Ryan
Speaker 11: and Emily. We talked about tron Blost November. I told
Speaker 11: you that he's not good. He's not going to get
Speaker 11: he's not going to be good for Palestine, he's not
Speaker 11: going to do anything. He's not someone who wants to
Speaker 11: stop WAS. He wants to break out WAS and that's
Speaker 11: what we are seeing right now. And we talk about
Speaker 11: his clients to ethnically Clan's cass. So this is absolutely
Speaker 11: share hypocrisy and shared poperism that we haven't seen before.
Speaker 11: And he's much much worse than Joe Biden. That's my vote.
Speaker 6: Sure, if I actually wanted to ask you about that,
Speaker 6: because as people try to maybe find, you know, or
Speaker 6: think about where there might be a light at the end.
Speaker 5: Of the tunnel that would turn to politics.
Speaker 6: And I'm curious what you make about how potential ground
Speaker 6: invasion it sounds like from both of your reporting and
Speaker 6: as Ryan mentioned, that does seem to be on the horizon.
Speaker 6: How does that affect the Trump ad minute stration, which
Speaker 6: Donald Trump has been unorthodox in some ways, criticizing nt
Speaker 6: Nyahu for quote public relations crisis, He's obviously sensitive to seeing,
Speaker 6: you know, the awful images and stories like Abba Baker
Speaker 6: is just there people being pulled from the rubble and
Speaker 6: being killed while they're trying to pull their own deceased
Speaker 6: loved ones from the rubble. At the same time he is,
Speaker 6: you know, has Mike Huckabee and you know Tom Cotton
Speaker 6: surrounding him. So it's just a it's so so very
Speaker 6: hard to predict, but you followed this closely. What could happen?
Speaker 6: I guess politically if if Israel does move back into
Speaker 6: a ground invasion.
Speaker 1: Well, as you mentioned, Trump is very hard to read.
Speaker 12: He you know, says things, kind of shoots off the cuffs, says,
Speaker 12: you know, we're going to think that Cleton's guzza, and
Speaker 12: then kind of seems bored about it and doesn't mention it. Again,
Speaker 12: It's hard to know where he stands. I think we
Speaker 12: do have to acknowledge that the initial sees fire phase
Speaker 12: that did go into effect. I don't think it would
Speaker 12: have happened unless Trump was president. He wanted, you know,
Speaker 12: sometimes he does the right things for the wrong reasons,
Speaker 12: and he wanted some kind of optics for the day
Speaker 12: before his inauguration and you know, him and his envoice,
Speaker 12: Steven Whitcoff, did kind of force this through where the
Speaker 12: Biden administration completely failed in that and just allowed Israel
Speaker 12: to continue.
Speaker 5: And Witkoff went to Gaza, talked to Hamas. People didn't
Speaker 5: want him to do that.
Speaker 6: He's sort of willing to push the envelope, I guess
Speaker 6: a little bit more than a conventional.
Speaker 12: One in the US is negotiating directly with Hamas now,
Speaker 12: although apparently the Biden administration did that briefly as well.
Speaker 12: But you know, after these attacks on Tuesday, the Israel
Speaker 12: said that they had received the green light from the
Speaker 12: White House. The White House has voice it's approval of
Speaker 12: this new stage of Israel's assault on Gaza. Natania who
Speaker 12: took to the airwaves and said that this attack was
Speaker 12: only the beginning. Those are his world, his words, and
Speaker 12: that all further negotiations about the ceasefire will take place
Speaker 12: under quote under fire. So this is all happening with
Speaker 12: the approval of the White House. So it does seem
Speaker 12: that we're entering kind of this new normal phase where
Speaker 12: Israel is going to attack in these different ways. We
Speaker 12: may be seeing the beginnings of a major ground operation
Speaker 12: and that's where the negotiations are going to be. There
Speaker 12: isn't going to be you know, the second stage of
Speaker 12: a seasefire, any talk of a permanent halt to the conflict,
Speaker 12: any talk of permanent withdrawal. As I said, like at
Speaker 12: the same time, Stephen Woodcoff in his comments over these
Speaker 12: past few weeks, seemed much more reasonable than Anthony Blincoln
Speaker 12: was as Secretary of State under the Biden administration. He
Speaker 12: was saying things that seemed reasonable about Palestinians will be
Speaker 12: allowed to return to Gaza, that we will get to
Speaker 12: a permanent cease fire, that we do need to re built. However,
Speaker 12: none of this this seems to have all broken down,
Speaker 12: and basically Israel has completely, uh it violated the ceasefire,
Speaker 12: made very clear that it was never going to get
Speaker 12: past this first phase. And now we're kind of we're
Speaker 12: seeing what everyone predicted, a massive re engagement of this
Speaker 12: violence and trying to force Hamas to release all of
Speaker 12: the captives, which I don't think Hamas would do there
Speaker 12: if there's nothing in return. And so you know, we're
Speaker 12: in a in a moment now of just increased violence
Speaker 12: and death. They were just you know, as a book
Speaker 12: is describing these attacks. There was this incredible wave the
Speaker 12: other day, but they're they're continuing all throughout today. They
Speaker 12: bombed tents in moas Can units, killing a family there,
Speaker 12: and yeah, it's it's it's very it's quite frightening to
Speaker 12: see where this could go.
Speaker 4: We'll put Abu Baker's dispatch down in the notes, as
Speaker 4: as well as some of the other pieces, including Sharif's
Speaker 4: recent peace about you know, doctors and nurses being being
Speaker 4: kept out of Gaza. But Sharif, thank you so much
Speaker 4: for joining us, and Abu Baker, you know, please please
Speaker 4: stay safe.
Speaker 1: And thank you for all you're doing for us.
Speaker 4: After Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer cave to Republicans allowing
Speaker 4: the spending bill to go through, blocking Democrats from their
Speaker 4: effort to force a government shut down, things have gone
Speaker 4: from bad to worse from as he has canceled his
Speaker 4: book tour, citing security concerns but citing actually there would
Speaker 4: have been a bunch of protesters yelling at him from
Speaker 4: the left from the Democratic Party at his events, and
Speaker 4: now Nancy Pelosi is clowning him for his failure to
Speaker 4: do his job.
Speaker 1: Let's roll the former House Speaker here.
Speaker 13: Well, I'm concernative as the next time, concernative.
Speaker 7: Of the future.
Speaker 13: Last week was the last week. We're long edge to
Speaker 13: the future.
Speaker 10: And this morning King.
Speaker 14: Jeff's Chuck Schumer in this kind of an event in
Speaker 14: New York where I came, said that he had companies
Speaker 14: and shop tumor. So we're to the next stage on
Speaker 14: this now.
Speaker 13: But your question it is about when comes next.
Speaker 14: I myself don't give away anything for nothing.
Speaker 15: I think that's what happened the other day.
Speaker 13: We could have in my who perhaps gotten them to
Speaker 13: agree to a third way, which was a bipartisan CR
Speaker 13: for two week four weeks in which we.
Speaker 15: Could have had bipartisan legislation to go forward. I'm an appropriator,
Speaker 15: cenistorship is an appropriator, and with the Appropriations Committee, they
Speaker 15: may not have agreed to it, but at least the
Speaker 15: public would have seen they're.
Speaker 10: Not agreeing to it.
Speaker 4: The plan she laid out there, by the way, is
Speaker 4: precisely what Republicans did with Biden and a Democratic controlled
Speaker 4: Congress in twenty twenty one. Chris try to do a
Speaker 4: partisan CR. Republicans said, no way, we're not participating in that,
Speaker 4: and they forced Democrats to do clean. Sorry, cr So
Speaker 4: it's not a radical strategy that she's laying out there.
Speaker 4: Schumer has avoided politics and pros and other bookstores, but
Speaker 4: he hasn't avoided the cable circuit or the network circuit.
Speaker 1: Here he is on CBSS.
Speaker 5: In your own party, they're saying, look, it's time for
Speaker 5: you to go.
Speaker 11: They're no longer trust your leadership.
Speaker 5: They want somebody else in there.
Speaker 1: What do you say about that?
Speaker 11: Here's what I say in your own party saying that's
Speaker 11: to go.
Speaker 16: Here's what I'm saying. I'm the best leader for the Senate.
Speaker 16: We have a lot of leaders. You know, when you
Speaker 16: don't have a president, there's not one leader of the party.
Speaker 1: There are lots of them. We have a lot of
Speaker 1: good people.
Speaker 16: But I am the best at keep winning Senate seats.
Speaker 16: I've done it in two thousand and five to just
Speaker 16: in twenty twenty. No one thought we'd take back the
Speaker 16: Senate under my leadership.
Speaker 1: We took it.
Speaker 16: So we now are executing going. We have a great
Speaker 16: we're moving forward. Hakim and I have a plan.
Speaker 1: Here he is on the view also getting.
Speaker 17: And it gives me no pleasure to say this to
Speaker 17: you because we are friends. But I think you caved.
Speaker 17: I think you and nine other Democrats caved. I don't
Speaker 17: think you showed the fight that this party needs right
Speaker 17: now because you're playing with by a rule book where
Speaker 17: the other party has thrown that rule book away. True,
Speaker 17: and so in my view, what you did really was
Speaker 17: in supporting that gop partisan bill that Democrats had no
Speaker 17: input in. He cleared the way for Donald Trump and
Speaker 17: Elon Musk to gut Social Security, to gut Medicare, to
Speaker 17: gut Medicaid. Why did you lead Democratic senators to play
Speaker 17: by that book that the Republicans are not playing by it?
Speaker 16: Okay, first, I'd say, Sonny, no one wants to fight
Speaker 16: more than me, and no one fights more than me.
Speaker 1: You got to fight smart.
Speaker 4: And then Jen Zaki former Joe Biden White House spokesperson.
Speaker 18: Experience is a good thing. It's important, But seniority and
Speaker 18: keeping people in charge simply because they have done it
Speaker 18: before should not be the only thing. Chuck shar was
Speaker 18: a hell of a majority leader in his prime urban politics.
Speaker 18: When he was majority leader, when he was the aggressive Senator,
Speaker 18: when he was the aggressive member of Congress who is
Speaker 18: dominating media coverage, arm twisting Republicans and members of his
Speaker 18: own party and raising an absolute boatload of money for Democrats.
Speaker 5: But he is not in his prime.
Speaker 18: The Republican Party is not the party of McCain or
Speaker 18: Romney or even George W.
Speaker 5: Bush.
Speaker 18: Feels to me like, instead of just making tweets the
Speaker 18: martyrs of the message, which by the way, is important too,
Speaker 18: maybe it's time to spend more time to throwing out
Speaker 18: the hard copy of the old playbook.
Speaker 4: And a pretty fascinating exchange here with MSNBC's Chris Hayes.
Speaker 19: All of those things you enumerated, which all sounds like
Speaker 19: good politics to me, are the kinds of things that
Speaker 19: you'd be doing if Mitt Romney were president. That there's
Speaker 19: this weird asymmetry right now, which is that they are
Speaker 19: acting in this totally new way in which they are
Speaker 19: ambitiously trying to seize all power and create a presidential
Speaker 19: dictatorship in the United States of America, and the Democratic
Speaker 19: opposition is acting like, well, if we can get their
Speaker 19: tool rate down a few points, then what then what happens?
Speaker 16: Well, what happens is, look, first we get it way down,
Speaker 16: he's going to have much lef we this worked in
Speaker 16: twenty seventeen you say, now it's a different government. It's
Speaker 16: different though, Oh it is different. God, but healthcare, we
Speaker 16: beat them. Taxes, we beat him, and guess what we did.
Speaker 16: Guess what we did, Chris. We took back the House
Speaker 16: and won in the Senate and that, and then we
Speaker 16: were allowed to do all those good things. This is
Speaker 16: not the only tactic. We have to stand strong in
Speaker 16: certain instances and not give them the votes at all.
Speaker 16: Let me, but there are instances with this the two
Speaker 16: work together.
Speaker 4: First of all, I don't know what he means by
Speaker 4: we beat them on taxes. I truly have no idea
Speaker 4: what he's through his six trillion dollar tax cuts.
Speaker 6: He might be talking about some small ball things that
Speaker 6: we don't even remember.
Speaker 4: Or maybe he means because he doesn't care about policy,
Speaker 4: maybe he means, yeah, they let them pass the tax
Speaker 4: cut bill and it hurt them in the midterms.
Speaker 1: And so we beat them. That's what he means on
Speaker 1: the wow, on the issue of taxes.
Speaker 6: If that's what he means, we're another level of metah.
Speaker 4: So the reigning critique, as you saw from all of
Speaker 4: these different mainstream, you know, center left anchors, is that
Speaker 4: he's out of his prime. He's out of time. He's
Speaker 4: an anachronism. He was very good from two thousand and
Speaker 4: five to twenty twenty. That's that's a really good run.
Speaker 4: And he he was he was good at raising money,
Speaker 4: and he kept Democratics competitive and in a Senate that
Speaker 4: is unbalanced, and.
Speaker 1: Kept them unified. And it's unbalanced in the sense.
Speaker 4: That smaller states, small rural states get the same number
Speaker 4: of reublic of senators as like California and New York
Speaker 4: get And so you know, you have as as the
Speaker 4: Democratic Party, you have to you know, significantly over perform
Speaker 4: in order to just stay even to his credit. Yeah,
Speaker 4: like it's yeah, two thousand and six, two thousand and eight,
Speaker 4: twenty twenty, Yeah, great, but it's now twenty twenty five.
Speaker 4: And to me, the most revealing exchange there was with
Speaker 4: Hayes where he said it worked in twenty seventeen, so
Speaker 4: like he's going back to his twenty seventeen playbook.
Speaker 1: Well, I don't know, what did you think?
Speaker 4: And how are how are Republicans seeing this, like how
Speaker 4: do they see his resistance?
Speaker 6: That's a really smart point because I think one of
Speaker 6: the central divides among Democrats last week was whether or
Speaker 6: not to recycle the twenty seventeen playbook, which is you
Speaker 6: look like, from their perspective to voters, the adults.
Speaker 5: In the room.
Speaker 6: Do everything you can to look like the adults in
Speaker 6: the room, the people who are not the obstructionists, the
Speaker 6: people who are serious about doing business, so that you
Speaker 6: can frame Republicans as the un serious teenagers to quote
Speaker 6: Alyssa Slocke and kind of should probably equipple with my
Speaker 6: characterization there. But they're the ones who look like the
Speaker 6: you know, wild rabble rousers too. That's another quote actually,
Speaker 6: So I think that that was the playbook in twenty
Speaker 6: seventeen when Democrats were confident that Trump was going to
Speaker 6: sort of hoist himself by zone boitard and would inevitably
Speaker 6: crumble and melt into like a puddle of just political
Speaker 6: and viability. And that never happened, partially because Democrats never
Speaker 6: bothered to muster a serious response. Their response was just
Speaker 6: Trump is really bad, and now the question is, okay, so.
Speaker 5: What are you proactively? What do you want?
Speaker 6: What do you want from Republicans in a spending bill?
Speaker 6: You know you weren't going to get it, But the
Speaker 6: opportunity to shut down the government was an opportunity to
Speaker 6: fundamentally tell the American people what you think should be
Speaker 6: in the damn bill? What do you want Republicans to
Speaker 6: come in the table? Come to the table on So
Speaker 6: to me, that's that's a great point that it really
Speaker 6: was the split. Do we throw out the quote unquote
Speaker 6: resistance playbook that really banks itself on just resisting, not
Speaker 6: being sort of proactive about that resist since and you know,
Speaker 6: we talked about this last week. I think it was
Speaker 6: an insane, insane failure to learn from the lessons of
Speaker 6: the Tea Party about shutdowns and about populism, and just
Speaker 6: a complete wasted opportunity for Democrats. But I think part
Speaker 6: of it is because Schumer, even invoking the year twenty
Speaker 6: seventeen there tells me they are still stuck on this
Speaker 6: idea of just being the smart resistance and not even
Speaker 6: MSNBC is interested in that anymore.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's certainly true that going into a government
Speaker 1: shutdown is not without risk for Democrats. Yeah, although you know,
Speaker 1: I've spoken to a ton of federal workers.
Speaker 4: You and I live in here in Washington, d C.
Speaker 4: You know, a lot of the people we meet are
Speaker 4: federal workers, all of them wanted a government shutdown, even
Speaker 4: though it meant there was a possibility they might not
Speaker 4: even get back pay.
Speaker 1: You know, you could.
Speaker 4: Imagine Republicans saying, no, our line in the stands, we're
Speaker 4: not even gonna We're not even gonna do backpay, even
Speaker 4: though we've done that for every shutdown before. And and
Speaker 4: despite the fact that there was so much uncertainty around
Speaker 4: what would happen in a government shutdown, all of them
Speaker 4: were like.
Speaker 1: Do it.
Speaker 4: Just just put up a fight because if the second
Speaker 4: he passed that cr through the Senate that night, you know,
Speaker 4: Trump put forward the plans for this you know, massive
Speaker 4: reduction in force.
Speaker 1: For you know, put.
Speaker 4: Out memos saying, you know, just let it's time to
Speaker 4: absolutely completely gut the federal government to the greatest extent
Speaker 4: possible by the law. And the law that they had
Speaker 4: just passed made it that much more, that much easier
Speaker 4: for them for Trump to accomplish because it included some
Speaker 4: included some provisions that would allow them to sequester even
Speaker 4: more money. And because you know, people like russ Vote
Speaker 4: were we're telegraphing we we don't see this spending figure
Speaker 4: as a mandate. We figure we see it as a
Speaker 4: sealing we're not going to spend this, and we're going
Speaker 4: to use the authority that you grant us through this
Speaker 4: cru to destroy the administrative state. And they did it,
Speaker 4: and Democrats did it anyway. So and now the whatever
Speaker 4: is coming at federal at the federal government from Trump
Speaker 4: in the next couple of weeks I think is going
Speaker 4: to be very very very bad.
Speaker 1: For federal workers.
Speaker 4: Now maybe uh people will you know, maybe you love
Speaker 4: it as a member of the public, but you know,
Speaker 4: from the perspective federal workers who who really do believe
Speaker 4: that the federal government should work, they think it's the thing.
Speaker 4: It's going to destroy all of these different agencies that
Speaker 4: do have actual.
Speaker 1: That they do have actual roles.
Speaker 4: To play in a functioning government, functioning public. And now
Speaker 4: they've just kind of seated all at until September yeah
Speaker 4: to Trump.
Speaker 5: Yeah, where they.
Speaker 6: Could have had a fairly easy I don't mean this pejoratively,
Speaker 6: but a political.
Speaker 5: Prop to trot out from now until then.
Speaker 6: And I actually think they would have gotten something small
Speaker 6: from Republicans out of this.
Speaker 5: And small victories or even that. And Schumer is.
Speaker 6: Out now saying I don't know if you saw him
Speaker 6: say this. Republicans were telling him it would have been
Speaker 6: a six to nine month shutdown. What the hell are
Speaker 6: you talking about, bro, I don't like, I don't know
Speaker 6: what Republicans are genuinely telling you that.
Speaker 5: But they're messing with you, Chuck.
Speaker 6: It would have been a Saturday Sunday shut down because
Speaker 6: you could.
Speaker 5: Have controlled that. What are you talking about?
Speaker 6: A weekend shutdown was like the lowest risk. It was
Speaker 6: absolutely a risk, there's no question about it. But for
Speaker 6: risk averse Democrats, this was like the warmest pool for
Speaker 6: them to dip their toe into being like actually a
Speaker 6: party of taking risks, and they couldn't even do that,
Speaker 6: even when you have EM's, NBC and Nancy Pelosi, Jen Saki,
Speaker 6: all of these people saying, maybe our strategy needs an update,
Speaker 6: Maybe we actually need to give the bass a shot
Speaker 6: in the arm here that we can, you know, rally
Speaker 6: hundreds of people at protests over the weekend. We can
Speaker 6: tell people that we fought, we can get some small concession.
Speaker 5: They had leverage. They didn't have a lot of leverage,
Speaker 5: but they had a tiny amount of leverage. And you
Speaker 5: should use your tiny amount of leverage when you.
Speaker 6: Have it, otherwise you're gonna make your base more and
Speaker 6: more angry.
Speaker 5: And that's Brendan Buck.
Speaker 1: Buck out.
Speaker 5: Yeah, we were talking about this.
Speaker 6: Brendan Buck, who is a Paul Ryan stratagist, wrote not
Speaker 6: Bad for The New York Times, agreeing with Chuck Schumer,
Speaker 6: because he was saying that was the successful He said
Speaker 6: Republicans actually ended up giving too much to the Tea Party,
Speaker 6: like Republican leadership Paul Ryan, John Bayner were too nice,
Speaker 6: too indulgent of the Tea Party. It's again, no, the
Speaker 6: reason you ended up with Trump is because you guys
Speaker 6: were trying to block the Tea Party, which was representative
Speaker 6: of your own party's base, your voters. It reminded me
Speaker 6: of the Sam Goodaldig research paper that we covered about
Speaker 6: a year ago, where he showed the people from the
Speaker 6: poorest districts are in the are represented by the Freedom Caucus,
Speaker 6: and they're represented by Justice Democrats, and that's bipartisan. And
Speaker 6: these are the people that Washington is trying to treat
Speaker 6: as unserious. Quote rabble rousers is how Brendan Buck refers
Speaker 6: to them. So if you want to if you want
Speaker 6: to judge the wisdom of the Schumer strategy, look no
Speaker 6: further than the fact that establishment Republicans who now have
Speaker 6: zero influence in Washington are saying he made.
Speaker 1: The right move right.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean it goes back to that calculation that some
Speaker 4: establishment figures and both parties make. Would they rather win
Speaker 4: but empower their left or right flank? Yeah, or would
Speaker 4: they rather lose and disempower them? And for Brennan Buck,
Speaker 4: He'd have rather lost but maintained the cohesion of the
Speaker 4: kind of chamber of commerce wing of the of the
Speaker 4: Republican Party.
Speaker 1: Yep. Maybe Schumer's trying to make that calculation.
Speaker 4: On the other hand, Schumer's also taking the bullets for
Speaker 4: his entire caucus.
Speaker 1: It's not as if.
Speaker 4: Schumer pushed his caucus to cave like they all wanted
Speaker 4: a cave.
Speaker 1: No, I mean not all, not all of them. A
Speaker 1: lot of them wanted to fight. More than ten wanted
Speaker 1: to cave, and more than voted to cave wanted to cave.
Speaker 1: And so Schumer here is being.
Speaker 4: A kind of good soldier for his his own, you know,
Speaker 4: cowardly caucus that that wants to cave but wants to
Speaker 4: pretend that they don't. Now they can be mad, and
Speaker 4: then they tend to be mad at Schumer.
Speaker 1: Over it.
Speaker 6: Democrats should be furious with the way leadership has handled
Speaker 6: the entire Trump era, and I feel like that hasn't
Speaker 6: broken into the like main discourse. Now.
Speaker 1: It's pretty bad.
Speaker 5: Yeah, they have no idea what's coming for them.
Speaker 1: They lost to this guy so badly.
Speaker 6: Republicans lost to him badly first, and it was a
Speaker 6: year's long lesson in what not to do with your
Speaker 6: party's populists for Democrats, like it was handed to them
Speaker 6: on a silver platter by the way Republican leadership treated
Speaker 6: mostly not just Trump, but Trump's voters.
Speaker 5: Because Trump's voters took.
Speaker 6: That as a message that they were being rejected. It's
Speaker 6: the same thing with aost's voters. Now, it's the same
Speaker 6: thing with the voters of people who were like, you're
Speaker 6: doing nothing, You're laying down, what are you're doing. They
Speaker 6: take that as a front to them, and they're not
Speaker 6: wrong to do it. So good luck with that truck, Schumer.
Speaker 1: Yeah, right up.
Speaker 4: Next, Donald Trump fired both Democratic members of the Federal
Speaker 4: Trade Commission.
Speaker 1: One of them, Alvar Badoya, joins us. Next. Stick around
Speaker 1: for that are seemingly out of nowhere.
Speaker 4: President Donald Trump fired both Democratic commissioners on the FTC,
Speaker 4: that's the Federal Trade Commission. Lena Khan is no longer there,
Speaker 4: so that means that it's there are just now two
Speaker 4: Republicans because the third has yet to be appointed. Among
Speaker 4: them are Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Badoya. You can put
Speaker 4: up the second element here, former commissioner. I'm just going
Speaker 4: to call him commissioner because I don't recognize the commissions right,
Speaker 4: I don't recognize the validity of these firings. His statement
Speaker 4: that he put out last night. Can move on to
Speaker 4: E three as well. Lena Kahan standing up for the
Speaker 4: former Democratic commissioner as well, so that the administrations illegal
Speaker 4: attempt to fire Commissioners Slaughter and Vadoya is a disturbing
Speaker 4: sign that this FTC won't enforce the law without fear favor.
Speaker 4: It's a gift to corporate lawbreakers that squeeze American consumers,
Speaker 4: workers and honest businesses. Joining us today for his first
Speaker 4: interview since this illegal firing is Commissioner Badoya.
Speaker 1: Commissioner, thanks for joining us, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 4: So this was always considered to be a possibility. But
Speaker 4: on the other hand, there they could easily have three Republicans.
Speaker 4: All they have to do is hole to vote. They
Speaker 4: can get the third one, so then they have three
Speaker 4: to two.
Speaker 1: You know, you guys can complain.
Speaker 4: And also, you know Andrew ferguson the FTC Chow, You
Speaker 4: guys work with him fairly well, like when he was
Speaker 4: when he was named the chair over Holyoke and over
Speaker 4: other possibilities. It was seen in the anti monopoly circles
Speaker 4: as kind of a win for the Van swing because
Speaker 4: he's closer to you guys and Lena Khan than anybody else.
Speaker 4: And oh, this, this bipart is an anti trust thing
Speaker 4: were we're actually going to go after corporate power. Might
Speaker 4: actually be gaining some steam here, and they don't need
Speaker 4: to fire you because, like I said, they can just
Speaker 4: out vote you every single time if they don't like
Speaker 4: where you come from. So did you expect that they
Speaker 4: would do this? And how how did you learn? Did
Speaker 4: you learn? From Fox News?
Speaker 10: I thought it might happen.
Speaker 20: I was surprised at the moment it happened, because well
Speaker 20: when did I learn? I was I just left work
Speaker 20: and I was at my daughter's gymnastics practice when Commissioner
Speaker 20: Slaughter called me and said, have you checked your email?
Speaker 20: And there was some guy at the White House claiming
Speaker 20: that the President was firing me. Look, I think timing
Speaker 20: is important because if this were just a unitary executive thing,
Speaker 20: we would have been on that checklist week one or
Speaker 20: week two along with gwyn Willcox at the NLRB. I
Speaker 20: think instead you got to ask who this is helping
Speaker 20: and why they did it when they did, because this
Speaker 20: doesn't help Maga, this helps Musk. I think you got
Speaker 20: to think about the billionaires over the President's shoulder at
Speaker 20: the inauguration.
Speaker 10: Three examples.
Speaker 20: I am currently suing Amazon and not one, but two lawsuits.
Speaker 20: I am responsible for enforcing a privacy consent decree against
Speaker 20: Elon Musk and X, and I am a judge in
Speaker 20: a matter of FTC staff is trying to ramp up
Speaker 20: the privacy protections that apply to its users. Who else
Speaker 20: have we been investigating pharmacy middlemen who allegedly, you know,
Speaker 20: send kids with cancer home and say no, no, no,
Speaker 20: you can't get your cancer medicine at that independent pharmacy.
Speaker 20: You got to get it in the mail and the
Speaker 20: pharmacy we own.
Speaker 1: Can we pause for two seconds on the pharmacy middlemen?
Speaker 4: Sorry, constantly in the Lame Duck between the election and
Speaker 4: the inauguration of Donald Trump, there was pharmacy middleman reform
Speaker 4: included in that legislation that was about to pass when
Speaker 4: Elon Musk jumped in and stopped it from passing, and
Speaker 4: a new bill passed. I understand since then something like
Speaker 4: three hundred plus pharmacy pharmacy closed as a result. Can
Speaker 4: you tell people, just very briefly, like who are the like?
Speaker 10: Absolute?
Speaker 1: What's going on?
Speaker 10: Absolutely?
Speaker 6: So.
Speaker 20: It used to be that there were multiple health insurers
Speaker 20: and lots of independent pharmacies, and over time there grew
Speaker 20: to be this middle layer of these entities called PBMs
Speaker 20: pharmacy benefit managers. And frankly, when they're all independent, it's
Speaker 20: great because they cut good deals for the insurers from
Speaker 20: the manufacturers, all right, But what happened It started to
Speaker 20: be that each of the big three insurers bought or
Speaker 20: got their own pharmacy middlemen, and then those pharmacy middlemen
Speaker 20: have their own pharmacies, often mail order, sometimes not. So
Speaker 20: what happens a lot of those multi billion dollar companies
Speaker 20: don't consider it profitable to serve rural America, urban America.
Speaker 10: It's the independence that serve those looks.
Speaker 20: My first trip as an FTC commissioner was the Charleston,
Speaker 20: West Virginia meant a strip malle with a bunch of
Speaker 20: pharmacists who who took care of a lot of folks during.
Speaker 10: COVID when no one else did.
Speaker 20: And what those folks say is, yeah, I got people
Speaker 20: showing up my pharmacy with prescriptions for cancer medicine and
Speaker 20: they're told go home wait for it because the PBM says,
Speaker 20: I can't give it to you.
Speaker 10: You need to get it from their pharmacy.
Speaker 20: I met with pharmacists in Louisiana who said after IDA
Speaker 20: came through, there were about twenty four pharmacies served two parishes.
Speaker 20: People were showing up at the four pharmacies that were open,
Speaker 20: including like three or four independents, and they got a
Speaker 20: screen that said, you cannot give this a person their
Speaker 20: insolent prescription. They need to go to the pharmacy we
Speaker 20: own down the street, which is under three feet of water.
Speaker 10: That is who we're.
Speaker 1: Talking about here, and you guys are coming, We're coming
Speaker 1: after that.
Speaker 20: We have been in the middle of a I think
Speaker 20: more than a year long market study into the pharmacy
Speaker 20: benefit managers. What's more, me and Commissioner Slaughter are sitting
Speaker 20: as judges in a case in which FTC staff alleges
Speaker 20: that these mintlemen are competing not to lower the price
Speaker 20: of insulin, but to raise it. And if our lawsuit
Speaker 20: to be clear that we are still Commissioner's fails, I
Speaker 20: don't know what happens that lawsuit.
Speaker 5: So I'm curious about this timing question as well. That
Speaker 5: is very interesting.
Speaker 6: And you know, Ryan mentioned some of the common ground
Speaker 6: between you and Andrew Ferguson and common ground that Andrew
Speaker 6: Ferguson had found with Lena Kahan, But you guys had
Speaker 6: a dust up recently over I think it was diversy
Speaker 6: equity inclusion stuff at the FTC, which Andrew Ferguson said
Speaker 6: he would strip out. And I'm curious also if maybe
Speaker 6: because it tracks me as you know, Sinder Pitchai had
Speaker 6: is trying to have a great relationship with Trump despite
Speaker 6: the Trump DOJ originally filing the Google anti trust suit
Speaker 6: and all of that, So they had to have known.
Speaker 6: I mean, Ferguson has been no friend of Amazon and
Speaker 6: Jeff Bezos.
Speaker 5: They had to have known some of this was coming.
Speaker 6: I wonder what you make of the case that maybe
Speaker 6: they realized you wouldn't be cooperative with them.
Speaker 5: At all, that there wouldn't be and who is they?
Speaker 6: Just people like whoever was pushing for you to be
Speaker 6: quote unquote fired.
Speaker 5: He said, well he's not getting Yeah.
Speaker 20: Look, I don't know who the day is, but I
Speaker 20: can tell you how I spent the last couple of weeks.
Speaker 20: About a week and a half ago, I called out
Speaker 20: Jeff Bezos by name for his blithe statement that the
Speaker 20: Post editorial page wouldn't focus would focus on free markets
Speaker 20: and personal liberties. And I said, hey, man, when I
Speaker 20: think about free markets and person liberties, I don't think
Speaker 20: about the Post editorial page. I think about the vending
Speaker 20: machines and Amazon warehouses that dull out painkillers and not
Speaker 20: potato chips. Bernie Sanders put out a report showing that
Speaker 20: people are literally working so fast, so hard their hands
Speaker 20: stopped working, their shoulders stop working, the dis and their
Speaker 20: back bulge and break, and it called him out. I
Speaker 20: got twent five million views on it. That was the
Speaker 20: last thing I did a little before that, I pressed
Speaker 20: Chairman ferguson who you're right was did a great thing
Speaker 20: in ratifying the merger guidelines, which had special protections for
Speaker 20: labor in them. That was a good move, and I
Speaker 20: respect them for it, But my beef with him, as
Speaker 20: it were, has been that he is in a position
Speaker 20: to do extraordinary things for affordability in this country, and
Speaker 20: I was disappointed he spent the first four weeks not
Speaker 20: saying anything about the price of eggs, about the price
Speaker 20: of milk, about grocery prices, and I was pressing him
Speaker 20: to investigate the price of eggs and calling out the
Speaker 20: fact that eggs in this country, our ability to get
Speaker 20: them is controlled in part by what appears to be
Speaker 20: a duopoly in Europe that controls the supply of layer
Speaker 20: breeder hends.
Speaker 10: Since then, DJ said they're investiating.
Speaker 20: I think it's a great move, but I think it's
Speaker 20: pretty notable that the firing comes now after I've been
Speaker 20: calling out duopolies and agriculture and the way mister Bezos
Speaker 20: treats his employees on the warehouse floor, and not in
Speaker 20: week one or two.
Speaker 10: Along with Gwyn Wilcox at n.
Speaker 4: RB, I think your point about the timing, which and
Speaker 4: we picked up on, is really important because I can
Speaker 4: easily be persuaded that a president should actually be able
Speaker 4: to control like the various agencies, then the executive like
Speaker 4: if Bernie Sanders had magically won the White House, I
Speaker 4: wouldn't want, you know, some like retrograde commissioners on the
Speaker 4: NLRB and FTC thwarting the Bernie Sanders' agenda that the
Speaker 4: people had elected. So on a level of Princeville I've
Speaker 4: met up, most of our viewers would probably can agree
Speaker 4: on a level of principle. Fine, but so your point
Speaker 4: about the timing is right, because if that's the principle,
Speaker 4: then he just like day one, he gets what he
Speaker 4: would fire you on day one.
Speaker 1: But the maga world, that of which.
Speaker 4: You know jd Vance is a strong element, has liked
Speaker 4: your work, has liked Lena Khan worked, has liked Jonathan
Speaker 4: Cantor's work over at DJ Doha, Mecki's work. And so
Speaker 4: therefore you stuck around for a while. The fact that
Speaker 4: you're now getting booted, I think has some political implications
Speaker 4: raises the question that Emily was asking, like, well, where
Speaker 4: did this come from? Because let's say, what is it
Speaker 4: goes back to my original question, what is getting rid
Speaker 4: of you accomplish? And I'm curious, like, so on the commission,
Speaker 4: let's say you're reappointed.
Speaker 1: Right, you're back there.
Speaker 4: I would imagine that you would you know, you might
Speaker 4: disagree and might agree with Ferguson and some of the others.
Speaker 4: They can then move to vote three to two and
Speaker 4: move something forward. But you would be party two deliberations.
Speaker 4: You'd be able to come on this program and talk
Speaker 4: about what's going on, and you might also hear, oh, hey,
Speaker 4: by the way, we got a call from the White
Speaker 4: House that said that these deliberations are out the window.
Speaker 1: We actually want you to drop this case.
Speaker 4: So having you there is kind of an intel for
Speaker 4: the public because you'd be able to say, actually, Ferguson
Speaker 4: is Ferguson is for this enforcement action against Amazon or whatever,
Speaker 4: or Facebook or Elon Rusk.
Speaker 1: But Elon Musk called precisely, so is it so? What? What?
Speaker 1: What would be the role of a minority commissioner?
Speaker 10: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Are you a potted plant? Or is there some reason
Speaker 4: for you to be there?
Speaker 10: No?
Speaker 20: I think I think there's two elements that need to
Speaker 20: be uh looked at here. The first is our ability
Speaker 20: to keep suing. The folks were suing in the face
Speaker 20: of this claim by the President that he can give
Speaker 20: us the boot any time for any reason. Right, Because,
Speaker 20: like you said, Chairman Ferguson has said, I'm going to
Speaker 20: keep on suing Amazon. I'm going to keep on suing
Speaker 20: Meta Excellent. What happens if he gets the phone call
Speaker 20: that says, well, actually, you know, we just nominated Jeff's
Speaker 20: guy for OSHA.
Speaker 10: And the other thing he said is you got a
Speaker 10: pesky lawsuit.
Speaker 1: Because literally they just literally.
Speaker 20: They nominated the guy to run OSHA, the one agency
Speaker 20: that's consistently called out the horrors on Amazon warehouse floors.
Speaker 20: The guy is a former Amazon executive, that's right. And
Speaker 20: so hey, you know, Jeff is also saying he wants
Speaker 20: this lawsuit to go away. And by the way, what's
Speaker 20: that lawsuit about. That's about small business sellers. If you're
Speaker 20: a small business owller, you have to.
Speaker 10: Be on Amazon. It's a monopolist.
Speaker 20: It is forcing them to pay up the fifty cents
Speaker 20: on every dollar they sell on the site and making
Speaker 20: it impossible to offer lower prices.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 20: And so whether or not Chairman Ferguson wants to bring
Speaker 20: the lawsuit if you get fired for just saying no,
Speaker 20: what's the point?
Speaker 10: Right?
Speaker 20: And so it's more it is both calling out misconduct,
Speaker 20: but it is also about about laying the groundwork for
Speaker 20: overt corporate pardons and corruption. You know, I saw Roli
Speaker 20: Chopray talked about this when he was on earlier.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And I'm actually surprised Ryan you mentioned you could
Speaker 6: see the sort of unitary executive theory about control over
Speaker 6: some of these independent agencies from the president. I'm surprised
Speaker 6: that you say that. I'm really curious what you make
Speaker 6: of that, because that, to me seems like maybe the
Speaker 6: biggest ideological difference between me and you guys is that,
Speaker 6: you know, Eric Schmidt, who's been very good on anti
Speaker 6: trust from a kind of populist perspective, did a thread
Speaker 6: agreeing with Andrew Ferguson yesterday where he goes back to
Speaker 6: Humpty Humphrey's exactcutor says it's bad law undermines the president's
Speaker 6: centralized authority is granted under Article two and creates very
Speaker 6: power on accountable federal agencies. That is the key to
Speaker 6: the entire fight against the administrative state, et cetera, et cetera,
Speaker 6: et cetera. But that is the project of the conservative
Speaker 6: movement is saying this is the growth under Woodrow, Wilson
Speaker 6: and Franklin Dola Roosevelt that has created, as they we say,
Speaker 6: on unaccountable bureaucrats whatever, and so by firing you, for example,
Speaker 6: the president is reasserting whether or not he had any
Speaker 6: quibbles with you.
Speaker 5: He's this is a matter of taking Humphrey's.
Speaker 6: Executor to the Supreme Court. I'm curious what your defense
Speaker 6: of these independent agencies is. I think it's a good one.
Speaker 6: I disagree with it. I think it's a reasonable one.
Speaker 6: But these these agencies existing as independent from presidential.
Speaker 20: Power, who is Eric Adams? Pardon me, who is Eric Schmidt?
Speaker 20: What does he care about?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 20: I'm pretty sure he doesn't care about the small businesses
Speaker 20: we're trying to defend in the Amazon case. I'm pretty
Speaker 20: sure you know, a world a merger goes through if
Speaker 20: a billionaire donor has the president's ear is a great
Speaker 20: world for the Magnificent seven. It's a shitty world for
Speaker 20: startups and small businesses. But I have some news for
Speaker 20: mister Schmidt, which is, if the president can fire me
Speaker 20: for any reason at any time, he can also fire
Speaker 20: Jerome Powell for any reason at any time. And so I,
Speaker 20: frankly don't care about mister Schmidt, not one bit. I
Speaker 20: do care about a bunch of retirees who have their
Speaker 20: four oh one k's loaded up with a bunch of
Speaker 20: stocks in the stock market, and I am deeply sympathetic
Speaker 20: to the chaos they're experiencing right now, and so I
Speaker 20: agree with you. Look, I understand folks who want the
Speaker 20: president to be empowered to have their agenda be made law. Understood,
Speaker 20: But this is about corruption, it's about chaos, and it
Speaker 20: is about having happened. My worry is that what happened
Speaker 20: with Eric Adams at DOJ happens at FTC. Let me
Speaker 20: make one concrete example. So you guys know about Kroger
Speaker 20: Albertson's merger. So we had one of the largest grocery
Speaker 20: chains in the country try to merge.
Speaker 1: With so Wisconsin native here.
Speaker 20: Oh yeah, one of the third or fourth largest grocery
Speaker 20: market chains. And most thousands of small towns that had
Speaker 20: taken the biggest chain merge it with the next biggest chain.
Speaker 20: We had an executive under oath say they're jacking up
Speaker 20: the price of milk and eggs above inflation. We had
Speaker 20: union leader saying, I can't negotiate higher wages if I
Speaker 20: can't point to the guy down the street paying higher wages.
Speaker 20: You would not believe the amount of political pressure that
Speaker 20: was sent to us in the form of letters, some
Speaker 20: folks saying, yeah, block at other folks saying, including prominent Democrats,
Speaker 20: let this thing go right ahead, right But we still
Speaker 20: blocked it because we can call balls and strikes without
Speaker 20: fear that some mega donor is.
Speaker 10: Going to give us the boot via the White House.
Speaker 10: And this was under Biden, it's under Biden.
Speaker 20: And what happens with the next mega grocery store mercher,
Speaker 20: I'm worried that it's not going to matter if it
Speaker 20: jacks up prices, It's not going to matter if it
Speaker 20: pulls down wages. What's going to matter is what billionaire
Speaker 20: donor has The press Sident's here and I'm glad you
Speaker 20: raised Joe Biden because I think this problem of money
Speaker 20: in politics is not limited to the Republicans. I think
Speaker 20: a lot about what happened during Vice President Harris's campaign
Speaker 20: when what Chircon did for the American.
Speaker 10: People was wildly popular.
Speaker 20: Who likes not being able to cancel a subscription unless
Speaker 20: they call on Tuesday mornings, you know, between ten am
Speaker 20: and noon.
Speaker 4: Right that's the breaking points. Premium policy that you have
Speaker 4: to get Saga on the phone.
Speaker 10: That's right, you have to tweet it him and you
Speaker 10: have to follow you back.
Speaker 20: Who likes non competes, Who likes cancer companies trying to
Speaker 20: cancer a corner of the market on cancer tests or
Speaker 20: companies trying to monopolize treatments for pompies these nobody? And
Speaker 20: yet Vice President Kamala Harris would not say I will
Speaker 20: keep Lena khan on as the chair of my FTC.
Speaker 10: What's that about? It's about money? Yeah, ahead and read Hoffman,
Speaker 10: Yeah she did, indeed.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, read Hoffin out there saying so where does
Speaker 1: this go? Now? Are you what you do? Filed suit?
Speaker 5: And what are you doing today?
Speaker 6: Like what are you going to try to go back in?
Speaker 6: Is it like an USA A D situation?
Speaker 10: Good question.
Speaker 20: So I'm not going to put the security guard at
Speaker 20: the front desk in the position of having to listen
Speaker 20: to me or listen to the White House, Right, I'm
Speaker 20: not going to do it to that guy. And so
Speaker 20: what I'm doing is calling out the fact this opens
Speaker 20: the door to corporate pardons, that this was not an
Speaker 20: effective legal firing, that I remain an FTC commissioner and
Speaker 20: will soon be following filing suit to make that clear
Speaker 20: for everyone involved.
Speaker 1: And what's the legal argument?
Speaker 20: So much as people are trying to overrule Humphrey's executor,
Speaker 20: you know, in their heads, Humphrey's executor is still good law.
Speaker 20: And the day the Supreme Court says it's not and
Speaker 20: the President says, you're gone, I'm gone, no problem, right,
Speaker 20: But until that day, I am still there. I will
Speaker 20: say something about Chairman Ferguson, who I do agree on
Speaker 20: and I think genuinely cares about working people. When he
Speaker 20: was nominated to the Senate, he was asked, do you
Speaker 20: think Humphrey's executor is good law? He said it is,
Speaker 20: and he also said the only people who can change
Speaker 20: Supreme Court law is a Supreme Court. Right, So I
Speaker 20: believe in that. Uh uh, And that's what I'm gonna
Speaker 20: go to court to try to reinforce.
Speaker 4: You think this was a Trump kind of pushing back
Speaker 4: on Robert's statements, Like Robert Roberts came out with a
Speaker 4: statement saying, you can't, you know, stop all this tweeting
Speaker 4: about impeaching judges, and then Trump kind of ramps it up.
Speaker 4: I mean, who knows, because you know, Trumpe's whoever he
Speaker 4: talks to last.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, Harry's executive is such a it is
Speaker 6: seen in the conservative movement as such a foundational ruling
Speaker 6: for the creation of everything that Elon Musk right now
Speaker 6: says he opposes and he's a crony capitalist.
Speaker 5: He's not. Yeah, we don't even.
Speaker 1: Get any of that.
Speaker 6: But you know, it's just to me. I imagine they always,
Speaker 6: you know, Russ Vote and Stephen Miller always envisioned somehow
Speaker 6: finding a way to get Humphrey's executive, which is why
Speaker 6: Ferguson was asked about it, because it was and this
Speaker 6: is a target of the conservative legal movement and the
Speaker 6: conserv the greater conservative movement, and has been for decades.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess, I mean guess the last point. I'm
Speaker 1: curious for your take on this.
Speaker 4: My I I like, I agree with the principle that
Speaker 4: a president should be able to be the president and
Speaker 4: execute you know, his his vision within the law. My
Speaker 4: concern from the rights attack on the administrative state is
Speaker 4: they're they're not worried about more efficiently creating an executive
Speaker 4: that can enact you know, legislation and the will of
Speaker 4: the people. They want to destroy the administrative state. They
Speaker 4: want to end the capacity of the government to be
Speaker 4: able to govern, so that even if there is a
Speaker 4: will from the public to go after corporate power, all
Speaker 4: of a sudden, they don't have the capacity anymore to
Speaker 4: do that. Right, what from your perspective inside the government,
Speaker 4: what is it?
Speaker 10: What will?
Speaker 4: What would it take to denude the FTC of the
Speaker 4: capacity to actually take on corporate power even if Ferguson
Speaker 4: wanted to.
Speaker 10: Well, look, this is a great first step in that effort.
Speaker 20: I watched the Republican Party, you know, as closely as
Speaker 20: maybe not as closely as you do, but but quite closely.
Speaker 20: And you're right, there is an element of rural pharmacists,
Speaker 20: rural grossers, working people, people in unions who voted for
Speaker 20: the president because they wanted to make sure they could
Speaker 20: pay the rent. Right, That is not the wing that
Speaker 20: won here.
Speaker 10: You're right.
Speaker 20: You know, there's you know, there's folks who want to
Speaker 20: have a unitary executive, but there's also folks who want
Speaker 20: to marry that executive with corporate Yes, and just look
Speaker 20: at the numbers here, they are grotesque. You have Elon
Speaker 20: must donating two hundred and eighty million dollars to the president. Again,
Speaker 20: I'm the guy who enforces the privacy rules against Elon Musk.
Speaker 20: You have Jeff Bezos million bucks of the inauguration, twenty
Speaker 20: million dollars for the First Lady at least that was
Speaker 20: the cut, oh the documentary, and just licensed episodes for
Speaker 20: the Apprentice. You know you think he's not going to
Speaker 20: place a phone call to the White House saying, look,
Speaker 20: I got too longlawsuits against me from the EMPTC would
Speaker 20: be great if that was one.
Speaker 10: You think it's not going to happen.
Speaker 20: And if you look at the law, because we've been
Speaker 20: talking about Supreme Court precedence. Corruption isn't just about the
Speaker 20: actual act Eric Adams style of quid pro quote. It
Speaker 20: is also about avoiding the appearance of corruption. And that
Speaker 20: is what's being defeated today. The ability for us to
Speaker 20: have the appearance of independence and not be a fair
Speaker 20: minded people trying to promote a fair market and call
Speaker 20: balls and strikes. That's what's happening here. And if we lose,
Speaker 20: but we will contest this and I think we'll win.
Speaker 5: Super super interesting. Thank you for giving us your first interview.
Speaker 5: Thank you. Eager to see where this goes.
Speaker 1: Catch them tonight on Aaron Burnette and later Chris Hayes tonight.
Speaker 10: I'll be on for with Chris h Okay looking forward
Speaker 10: to that.
Speaker 1: All right, that was alvar Obadoya. That's it for us.
Speaker 5: Still going through those JFK files.
Speaker 1: You know, it's right we forgot to cover that. Well,
Speaker 1: it's not we were We didn't forget.
Speaker 6: We didn't forget, right, but we'd plan to cover it.
Speaker 6: But the volume of documents and the ostensible lack of
Speaker 6: redactions is fairly impressive. It doesn't mean we're going to get,
Speaker 6: you know, significant new information out of it, but we
Speaker 6: did want to read the Jefferson Morley statement ring you
Speaker 6: sent this morning, and I think it's helpful.
Speaker 5: Jefferson Morley is.
Speaker 6: Probably just say it's fair to describe him as the
Speaker 6: pre eminent living Kennedy assassination researcher. He wrote, quote the
Speaker 6: first JFK files release of twenty twenty five is an
Speaker 6: encouraging start. We now have complete versions of approximately a
Speaker 6: third of the redacted JFK documents held by the National Archives.
Speaker 6: Rampant overclassification of trivial information has been eliminated, and there
Speaker 6: appear to be no redactions, though we have not viewed
Speaker 6: every document. Seven to ten JFK files held by the
Speaker 6: Archives and sought by JFK researchers are now in the
Speaker 6: public record. These long secret records shed new light on
Speaker 6: JFK's mistrust of the CIA, the Castro assassination plots, the
Speaker 6: surveillance of Oswald in Mexico City, and CIA propaganda operations
Speaker 6: involving Oswald. The release does not include two thirds of
Speaker 6: the promised files, nor any of the five hundred plus
Speaker 6: IRS records, nor any of the twenty four hundred recently
Speaker 6: discovered FBI files. Nonetheless, this is the most positive news
Speaker 6: on the declassification of JFK files since the nineteen nineties,
Speaker 6: and that is a better sort of report from the trenches.
Speaker 6: I'm sure Jefferson Morley was up all night. This one
Speaker 6: was last edited at nine forty two pm. Put that
Speaker 6: statement out on X with the Mary Farrell Foundation.
Speaker 1: Me CNN finally reached out to him.
Speaker 6: Fabulous, wow, interesting, but kind of a mix. It sounds
Speaker 6: like a mixed bag, but one that's mixed enough to
Speaker 6: be positive. So it's a crazy volume of things to
Speaker 6: go through. There was all kinds of like armchair quarterbacking
Speaker 6: happening on X right now. People are the old Ramparts
Speaker 6: magazine excerpt that people have been circulating thinking that it's
Speaker 6: some new evidence of CIA connections to I think it
Speaker 6: Israel in that case. So there's there's a lot of
Speaker 6: stuff floating around, but I think it's it's valuable to
Speaker 6: wait out.
Speaker 1: So much of this was already released.
Speaker 4: Like you said, though a third of the remaining documents
Speaker 4: that we know of, there's we can get into what
Speaker 4: we don't know of, So that's good, and keep it coming.
Speaker 4: Jeff was telling me after this is over, he wants
Speaker 4: to get back to kind of broader reporting he was
Speaker 4: doing in the nineteen eighties before spending forty years dedicated
Speaker 4: to this.
Speaker 1: Great to have him back in the game.
Speaker 6: I mean, and I'm just looking forward to seeing more
Speaker 6: and more from him on this. The last thing I
Speaker 6: wanted to recommend was I meant to mention this in
Speaker 6: the Black when we were talking about the courts, but
Speaker 6: over at the Volot Conspiracy, Josh Blackman had I thought
Speaker 6: a very interesting case. He said, the constitutional crisis is
Speaker 6: a coin with two sides. Trump causes judges to overact,
Speaker 6: and the judges caused Trump to overreact. Any resolution must
Speaker 6: be bilateral, not unilateral. Roberts could deescalate the situation by
Speaker 6: promptly reversing some of these out of control lower court rulings,
Speaker 6: but instead he would rather sit on his hands and pontificate.
Speaker 6: I've long said that the Chief Justice is living in
Speaker 6: a different reality than the rest of us. This episode
Speaker 6: proves it. There are three co equal branches of government.
Speaker 6: The judiciary is not is not supreme. And the only
Speaker 6: reason I wanted to point that out is it's true
Speaker 6: in conservative circles, especially conservative legal circles, people are increasingly
Speaker 6: very frustrated with John Roberts and see him as somebody
Speaker 6: who's like.
Speaker 5: Would maybe be described as like.
Speaker 6: A I don't know, a dispatch or Bulwark reader, or
Speaker 6: somebody who's kind of it doesn't understand what time it
Speaker 6: is to borrow the phrase from a lot of people
Speaker 6: on the right, and I don't think Vulock the black
Speaker 6: men writing in the Bullock Conspiracy's entire is either entirely
Speaker 6: wrong to or be frustrated by Roberts jumping in here
Speaker 6: and not jumping in when their efforts to impeach Clarence
Speaker 6: Thomas or whomever else. If your Republican appointed justice. Seems
Speaker 6: like those concerns would maybe prompt equal responses.
Speaker 5: But anyway, this is a huge trend.
Speaker 4: However, Okay, last however, let's do it. The effort to
Speaker 4: impeach Clarence Thomas was over corruption. And so from Robert's perspective,
Speaker 4: where he's saying, there, we do not impeach judges over rulings,
Speaker 4: that actually stands outside the.
Speaker 1: Scope of that.
Speaker 5: Like, oh, I see what you're saying.
Speaker 1: They were going after Clarence Thomas.
Speaker 4: And I'm sure Roberts was actually very upset, yes, with
Speaker 4: Clarence Thomas, for constantly getting caught taking all of these
Speaker 4: trips with billionaires who had business before the court, and
Speaker 4: they just had business before the court, Like we're like
Speaker 4: central to the entire political strategy of revamping the court
Speaker 4: buying his neighbor's house, and like this is old school corruption.
Speaker 4: And so it is not out of the norms or
Speaker 4: the precedents of American jurisprudence to impeach judges over corruptions.
Speaker 4: So I think that that's why Roberts could be forgiven
Speaker 4: for not jumping out and saying, hey, we don't impeach
Speaker 4: judges for corruption because actually we.
Speaker 5: Do black men.
Speaker 6: We're not going to black man addresses that and the
Speaker 6: pieces by saying that the AOC wasn't THEOC one wasn't
Speaker 6: like good I don't know if you would use this
Speaker 6: for but good faith because it was just Thomas, and
Speaker 6: we could have an entire argument about this was just
Speaker 6: Thomas and Alito and not Sida may Or Ginsburg, Katanji
Speaker 6: Brown Jackson, who had had similar disclosure lapses that I
Speaker 6: think they corrected.
Speaker 7: Yeah, so anyway, right, but there's a disclosions and then
Speaker 7: there's taking a bunch of gifts from people, like it's
Speaker 7: there's an effort to like shoehorn it into a paperwork violation,
Speaker 7: or it's like the problem was robbing the bank, the
Speaker 7: problem was not filing PaperWorks saying that you rob the bank.
Speaker 6: Read the face right, right, and I we'll argue about
Speaker 6: it later.
Speaker 5: Maybe we're canna argue about that in the future. All right, Well,
Speaker 5: thank you so much for tuning in. That was a
Speaker 5: long and duendum.
Speaker 6: Sorry everyone for taking this down the rabbit hole, but
Speaker 6: you know, right, sometimes it's fun to tag things on
Speaker 6: a little bit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, right, And we'll see you on Friday.
Speaker 5: Sounds good,