Speaker 1: Pushkin. You might remember back in December twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: right around the time crypto founder Sam Bankman Freed was
Speaker 1: arrested in the Bahamas. He was charged with various financial crimes,
Speaker 1: and we also saw a lot of headlines about his
Speaker 1: political donations, headlines with very large numbers attached to them.
Speaker 1: CBS News reported one of those stories, the crypto entrepreneur
Speaker 1: made about forty million dollars in political donations in the
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two election cycle. So why do I care
Speaker 1: about this now? I spent an awful lot of time
Speaker 1: with Sam Bankman Freed, as I reported my next book,
Speaker 1: because he sits right in the middle of it. And
Speaker 1: whatever you think about how he made his money, his
Speaker 1: eagerness to give large chunks of it away was fascinating.
Speaker 1: But the contributions to political causes and candidates is turning
Speaker 1: out to be yet another area where he's now in trouble.
Speaker 1: And all those politicians he gave money to they might
Speaker 1: have to give it back from against the rules. This
Speaker 1: is on background. I'm Michael Lewis. In order to understand
Speaker 1: the mess that Sam Bankmanfreed is in, I need to
Speaker 1: know a lot more about the world of campaign finance
Speaker 1: law that world's changed in the last decade. In twenty ten,
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court made a controversial ruling in a case
Speaker 1: called Citizens United. Basically, the ruling said the corporations and
Speaker 1: other groups can spend as much money as they want
Speaker 1: to on elections. Citizens United also spawned the creation of
Speaker 1: powerful political action committees called super PACs and so called
Speaker 1: dart money nonprofits that don't disclose their donors. It's a
Speaker 1: tangled web, and I need a guide. That's where Jordan
Speaker 1: Libowitz comes in. He's communications director for the Center for
Speaker 1: Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a campaign finance watchdog group.
Speaker 1: When Sam Bankman Fried set up his own superpack, it
Speaker 1: was called protect Our Future. It quickly became one of
Speaker 1: the biggest political donors around, and Jordan Libowitz took notice.
Speaker 1: He's been watching Sam bagman Freed even longer than I have.
Speaker 1: When did he come on your radar screen? Like? When
Speaker 1: did you first stop paying attention to him?
Speaker 2: So there were articles midway through the twenty twenty cycle
Speaker 2: about this new donor who no one had ever heard of,
Speaker 2: spending huge amounts of money and pledging to be one
Speaker 2: of the biggest donors in the election. Anytime someone is
Speaker 2: spending huge amounts of money, that raises our eyebrows. But
Speaker 2: crypto was still very very new to us. Then. We
Speaker 2: didn't see crypto influence building for another couple of years.
Speaker 2: But it was just here's this guy who got rich
Speaker 2: and he's spending a lot of money. You know, it's
Speaker 2: a name we recognize. It wasn't until FTX blew up
Speaker 2: that we really started paying attention to him.
Speaker 1: Do you notice any patterns in his giving? Like I'd
Speaker 1: love to hear kind of what campaigns he specifically gave to,
Speaker 1: but more generally, were there any patterns to the campaigns
Speaker 1: he was giving to.
Speaker 2: The first thing is that the giving was more ideological
Speaker 2: than political. These are helping pro crypto candidates or ones
Speaker 2: that could be beneficial to his business later on. The
Speaker 2: second thing is he seemed to concentrate much more in primaries.
Speaker 2: A lot of elections in this country, the general election
Speaker 2: is not particularly competitive, thanks in part to gerrymandering or
Speaker 2: to just the way states are. The actual election to
Speaker 2: decide is the primary. So when we talk about him
Speaker 2: as this massive democratic donor, most of his money was
Speaker 2: going to influence democratic primaries that we know about as
Speaker 2: opposed to helping Democrats be Republicans.
Speaker 1: And in those primaries, what was he looking for in candidates?
Speaker 2: So he had this idea of what the future should
Speaker 2: look like. We know that regulation and laws around cryptocurrency
Speaker 2: are coming. Who is going to be voting on that,
Speaker 2: Who's going to be casting the deciding vote, finding people
Speaker 2: who are likely to be friendly, and then supporting them
Speaker 2: in primaries to make sure they are in Congress.
Speaker 1: You have a of how much money he poured into this.
Speaker 2: So the pack itself was twenty something million, I think
Speaker 2: twenty three million, and then he I think he did
Speaker 2: at least another ten million on top of that. But
Speaker 2: then if he was also doing just as much through
Speaker 2: dark money, we're talking about sixty seventy million, which puts
Speaker 2: him easily in the top three, four or five biggest
Speaker 2: spenders in the country, along with who names like George Soros,
Speaker 2: Seon Adelson, the u Lines, the Kochs, those are the
Speaker 2: kind of the big families of money.
Speaker 1: So he was playing at that level. Yes, it's kind
Speaker 1: of amazing.
Speaker 2: What's really amazing is those other names I named decades
Speaker 2: in politics and decades in political spending. He came out of.
Speaker 1: Nowhere, Can we just back up a minute here, talk
Speaker 1: me through all these campaign finance terms like dark money
Speaker 1: and packs. I like a little campaign finance one oh one.
Speaker 2: So normally when you're giving to campaigns, there's a limit
Speaker 2: the FC sets the Federal Election Commission, and right now,
Speaker 2: that's thirty three hundred dollars per election. If you're giving
Speaker 2: to a candidate, more towards other organizations.
Speaker 1: And where does that and where does that amount come from?
Speaker 1: It's kind of arbitrary. Why can't I just give anything
Speaker 1: I want?
Speaker 2: So they set a fairly low limit, and then it's
Speaker 2: index to inflation. So there's actually a big boost for
Speaker 2: this cycle of I think four hundred dollars per election,
Speaker 2: But generally it's to limit the idea of you being
Speaker 2: able to just go out and buy an election. But
Speaker 2: then we get these decisions starting with Citizens United and
Speaker 2: Speech now versus the FFC, which essentially say book freedom
Speaker 2: of speech prohibits the government from limiting how money can
Speaker 2: be spent to influence elections and opened up corporations and
Speaker 2: unions and nonprofits to give money or to spend money,
Speaker 2: you have a put up collection committee or a pack
Speaker 2: which has a higher limit, it's five thousand dollars a
Speaker 2: year and has more regulations. Then you have what's now
Speaker 2: known as a super pack, which you can give an
Speaker 2: unlimited amount to with the two limits being that the
Speaker 2: super pack can't give that money then directly to a candidate,
Speaker 2: and it can't coordinate it spending with a candidate.
Speaker 1: So there's still limits on direct giving by corporations and
Speaker 1: individuals directly to the campaign exactly, but there's no limit
Speaker 1: on doing whatever you want with money to help the
Speaker 1: campaign without colluding it.
Speaker 2: Right now, it's going to get murkier. After Citizens United
Speaker 2: allowed nonprofit organizations to spend unlimited you have five oh
Speaker 2: one c four groups which are known as social wealth organizations.
Speaker 2: They're allowed to spend money on politics as long as
Speaker 2: it's not their primary purpose, so as long as it's
Speaker 2: less than fifty percent of their budget. Unlike all the
Speaker 2: political groups are just named, they don't have to actually
Speaker 2: disclose anything to the FEC. So the money coming in
Speaker 2: is a complete mystery where it's from.
Speaker 1: And it can do it can it do everything that
Speaker 1: a super pac can do right exactly.
Speaker 2: It doesn't have limits.
Speaker 1: Sold Why would anybody have a superpack if they were
Speaker 1: trying to disguise what they were doing exactly.
Speaker 2: Well, you're not supposed to be disguiseding what you're doing.
Speaker 2: All of this is done more or less with a
Speaker 2: wink and a nudge. You don't say that I'm giving
Speaker 2: you this money for the election, because that would make
Speaker 2: it a political donation, and they can't take political donations.
Speaker 2: What they can do is give money to politics. So
Speaker 2: let's say I want to help your campaign for Senate
Speaker 2: and I want to spend millions of dollars to do so.
Speaker 2: I'm going to write a check for two million dollars
Speaker 2: to a dark money group and tell them, you know
Speaker 2: this is because I support your mission, go out into
Speaker 2: what you want with it. They can then spend that
Speaker 2: two million dollars on ads that will help you. But
Speaker 2: as long as I am not saying, hey, I want
Speaker 2: you to spend this money to help him, then we're
Speaker 2: in the clear. And that's a problem.
Speaker 1: Okay, So so since twenty ten, if I, if I billionaire,
Speaker 1: want to go try to buy a Senate seat for
Speaker 1: someone without any letting anybody know, without anybody able to
Speaker 1: see my money, give it to you dark money group
Speaker 1: with a wink and a NOD and you go and
Speaker 1: buy as much litical ads or whatever as you as
Speaker 1: you want with that, and nobody will know where your
Speaker 1: money came from. That's good, right.
Speaker 2: The five oh one C four group needs to disclose
Speaker 2: its donors to the IRS, yep, But there's not a
Speaker 2: there's not that overlap between the I R S and
Speaker 2: the FC and.
Speaker 1: The IRS not could disclose it publicly.
Speaker 2: Right, And because you're just writing this check for general purposes,
Speaker 2: you're in the clear. And it gets even more of
Speaker 2: an issue in that to make a political donation, you
Speaker 2: can't be a foreign national writing a check from another country,
Speaker 2: but a dark money group can take that legally.
Speaker 1: The Saudis could put a billion dollars into a dark
Speaker 1: money fund and without as long as they didn't tell
Speaker 1: them what to do with it, and the dark money
Speaker 1: fund can go and buy election.
Speaker 2: So they're not supposed to spend any foreign money on elections.
Speaker 2: But could it be happening.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, that would be that. But that would be illegal, Oh,
Speaker 3: incredibly illegal. Sure, But what's done legally is what's amazing.
Speaker 3: I mean, my two thoughts now that you've explained this
Speaker 3: to me that pop to mind is that one if
Speaker 3: this is true that I can get the same results
Speaker 3: from a dark money group as I can from a
Speaker 3: superpack with my money. The only reason I'd go with
Speaker 3: the superpack is if I wanted everybody to know that
Speaker 3: I was giving the money exactly Otherwise I would and
Speaker 3: maybe I would Maybe I'd want like the Senator who
Speaker 3: I get elected to know it was my money.
Speaker 1: So so, but it would be it would be positively
Speaker 1: advertising the fact. But otherwise I just wouldn't do that.
Speaker 1: I would go with this, this other entity. The second
Speaker 1: thing that like this, this is this has bewildered me
Speaker 1: for a long time since the citizens in the United
Speaker 1: decision is given how easy it is to get money
Speaker 1: into politics, unlimited sums of money into politics to influence
Speaker 1: elections without anybody knowing where the money came from. It's
Speaker 1: amazing how little money there is in politics. If you'd
Speaker 1: told me in two thousand and five that these laws
Speaker 1: we're going to change, i'd a thought in a presidential
Speaker 1: election cycle, one hundred billion dollars would be spent on
Speaker 1: Senate on congressional seats in the presidential election. But it's
Speaker 1: nothing like that. Is that a weird reaction or do
Speaker 1: you do you agree with that.
Speaker 2: The big, big cost is TV ads. There's a limit
Speaker 2: to the number of ads you can run, right, But
Speaker 2: generally the very very rich do not necessarily want to
Speaker 2: spend all their money on one election.
Speaker 1: Right. So the limiting factor isn't the money. The limiting
Speaker 1: factor is the effect that money can have. Given that
Speaker 1: it's so easy to legally hide your campaign contributions and
Speaker 1: give unlimited sums of money to help the candidates of
Speaker 1: your choice, how is it even possible to break the
Speaker 1: law or why would anybody break the law?
Speaker 2: Sloppiness, It's very easy to hide these things and to
Speaker 2: get away with it. You have a designated group that
Speaker 2: is run by someone you know who is going to
Speaker 2: spend the money the way you want it, and you
Speaker 2: give them the money and they do it, and your
Speaker 2: hands are clean. What you don't do is say the
Speaker 2: quiet part out loud. You don't say I am doing
Speaker 2: this and I am breaking the law.
Speaker 1: I'm laughing, because, as we'll hear after the break, Sam
Speaker 1: bagmanfree did say the quiet part out loud, of course
Speaker 1: he did. On background. We'll be right back. I'm back
Speaker 1: with Jordan Livewitz of the Center for Responsibility and Ethics
Speaker 1: in Washington. All right, so let's talk about Sam Beckman Freed,
Speaker 1: who is among the seven hundred and forty two things
Speaker 1: he's accused of is making illegal campaign contributions. What do
Speaker 1: we know about them? I actually, even though I've been
Speaker 1: marinating in this world for eighteen months, I haven't paid
Speaker 1: that much attention to his political life. So you're probably
Speaker 1: going to educate me.
Speaker 2: So there are actually two kinds of illegal political activity
Speaker 2: with Sam Beakmanfried. So the first one is something called
Speaker 2: contributions in the name of another. When you give money,
Speaker 2: there's one really really important rule, and that is it
Speaker 2: has to be your money. So what he is accused
Speaker 2: of knowing is taking money that just people had put
Speaker 2: in their accounts in the business.
Speaker 1: So it's it's it's messy, and it looks like you
Speaker 1: can accuse him of of using other people's money to
Speaker 1: make campaign contributions. Does that happen? How often have you seen.
Speaker 2: That, like taking money out of a business to do that.
Speaker 2: There's pretty much effort. This was a new one for me.
Speaker 1: So this is a new one. But I'm just this
Speaker 1: is what about the general idea of like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: rating your grandmother's bank account and stealing it and giving
Speaker 1: you a politician. Does anybody as any has anybody ever
Speaker 1: been put in jail for taking other people's money and
Speaker 1: giving it to politicians.
Speaker 2: So I remember there was one some years ago where
Speaker 2: basically a guy used his wife's money and tried to
Speaker 2: hide it so she wouldn't know, and he just admitted
Speaker 2: it paid a fine. There's things like that, like contribution
Speaker 2: in the name of another is sometimes you know, I'm
Speaker 2: going to give a bunch of people money to make donations,
Speaker 2: and then you know, all my family and then all
Speaker 2: your family gave maximum donations, but it was really my
Speaker 2: money to begin with. This is the opposite of that.
Speaker 1: This is what you're saying is it's such a rare thing,
Speaker 1: and probably because people never care enough about a politician
Speaker 1: to steal money from others for them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, It's definitely not something we see every day.
Speaker 1: Yeah, right.
Speaker 2: So, he in an interview talked about how while he
Speaker 2: had given thirty some odd million to Democrats, he gave
Speaker 2: pretty much the same thing through dark money donations to Republicans.
Speaker 2: To hide that he was giving Democrats and republicans, he
Speaker 2: wanted to be seen just as the Democrat guy, but
Speaker 2: he was doing these hidden dark money donations to hide
Speaker 2: that was coming from him. And the two rules again
Speaker 2: are that you can't do it explicitly tagged for the politics,
Speaker 2: and you can't do it to hide the decay from you.
Speaker 2: And he just went out and said that, yeah, I
Speaker 2: did both of those things.
Speaker 1: So his crime is confessing it.
Speaker 2: The crime is doing it. But yes, he would have
Speaker 2: gotten away with it hypothetically pretty easily. I mean, there's
Speaker 2: a decent chance that it could come out in the
Speaker 2: course for prosecution as we see where money went. But yeah,
Speaker 2: essentially we would have not known about this kind of
Speaker 2: thing if he did not say it to the press
Speaker 2: that he was doing it.
Speaker 1: How often do people go to jail for campaign finance contributions,
Speaker 1: not taking campaign finance money and like using it for
Speaker 1: other purposes, But how often do donors go to jail
Speaker 1: for how they've given the money?
Speaker 2: Very rarely. It's not something the DOJ tends to bring
Speaker 2: just on its own.
Speaker 1: They use it to season the dish, to make yeah,
Speaker 1: just to make it look like there's more things this
Speaker 1: person did.
Speaker 2: The prosecutions we tend to see are usually for the
Speaker 2: misuse of money after it's been given.
Speaker 1: On background. We'll be right back. I'm back with Jordan Libowitz.
Speaker 1: We're now in this situation where people running the bankruptcy
Speaker 1: at FTX are making the case that you just made
Speaker 1: a little earlier. The money he gave away wasn't his money,
Speaker 1: it was the customer's money, and so the candidates who
Speaker 1: receive this money need to give it back. And first,
Speaker 1: have you ever seen that situation where campaign contributions get
Speaker 1: clawed back?
Speaker 2: So claude back is something we don't see very often
Speaker 2: at all, but is a thing they's likely going to
Speaker 2: happen in this case if it is in a legal
Speaker 2: contribution and found to be one. I believe the VC
Speaker 2: rules already have thirty days to give it back or
Speaker 2: to try to get it to the original person.
Speaker 1: So he could only give a few thousand dollars directly
Speaker 1: to the candidate, right, So the big money was, you know,
Speaker 1: in a dark money entity that the candidate theoretically had
Speaker 1: nothing to do with, that was helping the candidate without
Speaker 1: the candidate knowing how.
Speaker 2: Or to the packs or that gave funds to packs.
Speaker 1: But those super packs presumably can like vanish overnight and
Speaker 1: reappear as something else. I mean, those seems. It seems
Speaker 1: to me like if I had a super pac that
Speaker 1: had spent ten million dollars of Sam bankmun Freed's money
Speaker 1: and it looked like I was going to now have
Speaker 1: to give it back, I might just close the superpack.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that is a real problem that we have. It's
Speaker 2: kind of playing whack a mole that we will find.
Speaker 2: We'll find a dark money group that has violated the law,
Speaker 2: file a complaint, and then they've already you know, spend
Speaker 2: all their money. They've shut down shop. They've said we
Speaker 2: no longer exist, we are no longer an entity, and
Speaker 2: they'll go start up another one in another state, do
Speaker 2: it again. By the time you know, we can find them,
Speaker 2: they've shut down, keep moving right.
Speaker 1: So it seems it just seems highly unlikely to me
Speaker 1: that this money is going to come.
Speaker 2: Back if he gave it to I know, he made
Speaker 2: major donations to the potal action committees that back Democrats
Speaker 2: in the House and Senate. Yep, those are not going anywhere.
Speaker 2: Those are not the fly by night organizations. Those are
Speaker 2: the big players. So they're going to be on the hook.
Speaker 1: Oh that's interesting. So they they're stuck right your organization crew, Yeah,
Speaker 1: file an FEC complaint against SBF in late November. Can
Speaker 1: you explain that, like why and what response you've gotten
Speaker 1: and where it might lead.
Speaker 2: Right, So, our complaint was about the dark money. That
Speaker 2: he said that he had given this, that he had
Speaker 2: directed it specifically for certain Bublicans, and that he did
Speaker 2: it to hide his name, which is really silly.
Speaker 1: If he's going to go tell everyone, tell everybody that
Speaker 1: he's done it, why it doesn't really make it doesn't
Speaker 1: really scan this crime.
Speaker 2: Right, So we're asking the FEC to investigate. We haven't
Speaker 2: really heard anything, but the FEC moves at glacial pace,
Speaker 2: so we won't for a while. They have to investigate
Speaker 2: it in their votes and they're more investigations, so it'll
Speaker 2: take a while. But basically two things can come out
Speaker 2: of it. One finds of some sort obviously will not
Speaker 2: be to the level of, you know, the money he
Speaker 2: was playing with, but also being able to see a
Speaker 2: full accounting of how much money this was and where
Speaker 2: it went. The way to fight dark money is to
Speaker 2: bring it out into the open. The whole idea is
Speaker 2: hiding it, so being able to say, hey, he actually
Speaker 2: spent this much money through these groups to help these people.
Speaker 2: It's about transparency and that's what we're working for here.
Speaker 1: But it's not going to change the system.
Speaker 2: No, we need Congress to change the system.
Speaker 1: Because the system still is that the laws are still
Speaker 1: in place to if you're just more a little more
Speaker 1: clever about it, you do this and no one will
Speaker 1: ever know. It's this interesting thing about the game, sort
Speaker 1: of like what the game is now with dark money,
Speaker 1: like who or let's assume that Democrats get as smart
Speaker 1: at using it as Republicans. Okay, they're there now, so
Speaker 1: but then it may become it may become something that
Speaker 1: incumbents like more than challengers.
Speaker 2: You know that that is the problem of having incumbents
Speaker 2: be the ones who who rate the laws, because this
Speaker 2: definitely benefits incumbents.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: What we're seeing a lot of bipartisan outrage is there's
Speaker 2: been a lot of dark money campaigning around Supreme Court nominations,
Speaker 2: and for the first time, when Biden announced his pick,
Speaker 2: there was a dark money operation ready to back it,
Speaker 2: and there were a lot of outrage Republicans. Now, there
Speaker 2: was the same kind of thing on the other side
Speaker 2: a couple of years earlier, but no one really likes
Speaker 2: it when there are tens and hundreds of millions of
Speaker 2: dollars being spent against what you want. Yeah, So the
Speaker 2: hope is that, you know, we can find a happy
Speaker 2: medium where enough members of Congress are just done with
Speaker 2: this and want this influence out of politics.
Speaker 1: Okay, how do you feel This is a very wily
Speaker 1: minded question, but how do you feel about Sam Bangmin
Speaker 1: free You've seen You've been sitting in this world of
Speaker 1: people doing kind of nefarious things with dollars in politics.
Speaker 1: Like on your outrage meter, what does he score?
Speaker 2: Oh? I love him. I want them all to be
Speaker 2: like him and be that sloppy and that outrageous that
Speaker 2: everyone is angry at him and he just admits to things.
Speaker 2: Please more, Sam Bankman freeze less people that are running
Speaker 2: it through you know, complex webs of LLCs and five
Speaker 2: oh one c four groups and just moving the money
Speaker 2: between them in ways that it makes you know, you
Speaker 2: need a forensic anthropologist to like figure out just where
Speaker 2: the money is coming from and going to give me
Speaker 2: a guy who's like, yeah, I'm spending a bunch of
Speaker 2: money and I'm also doing some of it illegally.
Speaker 1: He's kind of parodying the system.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's because the system as it exists is
Speaker 2: fairly ridiculous. You know, he is the the he is
Speaker 2: the political spender America deserves after putting this system into place.
Speaker 2: But also because he's so outrageous, people get angry about.
Speaker 2: And that's what we need people to get angry about
Speaker 2: this kind of thing. We want and need people to
Speaker 2: be putting pressure to make change because it's not going
Speaker 2: to happen without that. And if it takes some crypto
Speaker 2: bros doing some ridiculous things to get us there, then
Speaker 2: that's what gets us there.
Speaker 1: So Sam Begman Freed making American great again, intentionally or unintentionally,
Speaker 1: I'll thank him for you. I don't think he'd be
Speaker 1: that appreciative. Jordan Libowitz is the communications director for the
Speaker 1: Center for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. Let's end today
Speaker 1: by answering a question from one of our listeners. Here's
Speaker 1: one from Reuven Learner. He writes, I've been a cryptocurrency
Speaker 1: skeptic for a long time, but there are, as you've said,
Speaker 1: real true believers have the FTX and other crypto collapses
Speaker 1: led anyone to abandon their belief that it's good and practical,
Speaker 1: not because they've lost their money necessarily, but because they
Speaker 1: now see how how high the hurdles are to it working.
Speaker 1: So in general, this is a funny it's a funny question.
Speaker 1: In general, I have found in my life people don't
Speaker 1: change their beliefs, that they do everything they can to
Speaker 1: avoid changing their beliefs, and especially as when they're as
Speaker 1: dug in as people are on crypto. That the crypto
Speaker 1: people are all religionists. They're different religions. There's the Bitcoin
Speaker 1: religion and the Ethereum religion and the Ripple religion and
Speaker 1: all that, and they can be at war with each other.
Speaker 1: But once they kind of have their position, you know,
Speaker 1: it's hard to change. However, I'll give you a funny exception.
Speaker 1: Several of the people who work for FTX and who
Speaker 1: were true believers when it all blew up, have decided
Speaker 1: that crypto is all bullshit, and they just they just
Speaker 1: it's like some spell was broken. And I think maybe
Speaker 1: it helps to lose all fifty million of the dollars
Speaker 1: you thought you had. But something happened in them, and
Speaker 1: it was quite noticeable. Anyway, I noticed it because I'm
Speaker 1: so used to people never changing what they believe, so
Speaker 1: there're three of them, so I know three people who've
Speaker 1: changed their beliefs. Ruven has identified yet another error of
Speaker 1: a mine, and here's what he has to say in
Speaker 1: a PostScript. Please stop saying backslash in URLs. The slash
Speaker 1: leaning to the right is a slash, but leaning left
Speaker 1: is a backslash. I know I'm pedantic, so this isn't
Speaker 1: my fault. This is the producer's fault. Yeah, I don't
Speaker 1: know what I'm talking about, but they're supposed to stop
Speaker 1: me when I don't know what I'm talking about, and
Speaker 1: they didn't do it. So we will not do that again.
Speaker 1: And it's easier to say slash. So you saved us
Speaker 1: a syllable for the rest of our lives. Thank you,
Speaker 1: Rubin on Background is hosted by me Michael Lewis and
Speaker 1: produced by Catherine Girodeau and Lydia gene Kott. Our editor
Speaker 1: is Julia Barton. Our engineer is Sarah Bruguerer. Thanks to
Speaker 1: our SVP of production read a Cone, our show is
Speaker 1: recorded by cofer Ruth at Berkeley Advanced Media Studios. Our
Speaker 1: music was composed by Matthias Bossi and John Evans of
Speaker 1: stell Wagonsymfonet. My old friend Nick Burtel composed our theme song.
Speaker 1: On background is a production of Pushkin Industries. Don't forget
Speaker 1: that we have a website atr podcast dot com in
Speaker 1: case you want to send me a question or a complaint,
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Speaker 2: I