Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
Speaker 1: where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
Speaker 1: today's best minds. And on Monday night, Donald Trump shared
Speaker 1: over one hundred and fifty brain rot posts on truth
Speaker 1: social We have such a great show for you today,
Speaker 1: The Majority Report Sam Cedar stops by to talk about
Speaker 1: Donald Trump's North Korean style press conference. Then we'll talk
Speaker 1: to The New York Times his own Ryan Mack about
Speaker 1: David Sachs and his double dealing in the Trump white House.
Speaker 1: But first the news.
Speaker 2: My the Republicans are in disarray. Elise Stefanic, whose aspirations
Speaker 2: are very large, about as large as her mouth when
Speaker 2: she's saying really racist and as long as public things.
Speaker 2: I was very very mad at the speaker today. How
Speaker 2: are you feeling about this?
Speaker 1: It's been a tough road for at least Stephonic and
Speaker 1: I don't hate it. You'll remember that last week Democratic
Speaker 1: Mayor elect Zori and mom Donnie went to the White
Speaker 1: House and Donald Trump threw a last Dephonic right under
Speaker 1: the bus, saying that she had called him a geh
Speaker 1: hottist because that's what you do in a campaign, and
Speaker 1: not because she's legitimately racist, which I guess is better.
Speaker 1: I don't know anyway, at least demonic. She's posting through it,
Speaker 1: and she's posting through it against the Speaker of the House,
Speaker 1: Mike Johnson, a lawyer who is known best for holding
Speaker 1: the phone when Donald Trump doesn't tell a rally. I
Speaker 1: don't know what's going to happen here. Look, he's got
Speaker 1: a very small majority. He is trying to do everything
Speaker 1: he can to keep control of the House. You know,
Speaker 1: you really see how having Donald Trump pick leadership and
Speaker 1: just picking the people who will suck up to him
Speaker 1: the best is really not working out so great. And
Speaker 1: so here we have it. Chip Roy argued that Congress
Speaker 1: should fully intervene a wide swath of issues in college athletics.
Speaker 1: Maybe we should fix the mess. I mean, again, these
Speaker 1: guys can't fucking do anything, so why are they going
Speaker 1: to get involved with college sports? It doesn't even make
Speaker 1: any sense. It's just very, very stupid. I think that
Speaker 1: we're going to see a lot more of these kind
Speaker 1: of problems that are you don't even think that can
Speaker 1: go wrong when you have someone like Nancy Pelosi in
Speaker 1: the job, and now we have Stephonic blaming Johnson for
Speaker 1: delaying and ultimately killing her nomination to keep the House
Speaker 1: GOP majority from further dwindling. You'll remember Marjorie Taylor Green
Speaker 1: is resigning in January. They're just in every point different
Speaker 1: sort of stupid things happening here that have gotten us here,
Speaker 1: and Stephonic has more bills she wants to pass. On Monday,
Speaker 1: Stefanic accuse Johnson of getting rolled by Democrats after Jamie
Speaker 1: Raskin succeeded in stripping this provision she wants. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is just like little backbiting in fighting, but it
Speaker 1: wouldn't be coming out on Twitter were these guys not
Speaker 1: in real trouble keeping the majority trying to pass stuff,
Speaker 1: and I, for one love to see it. By the way,
Speaker 1: this is Johnson said to a journalist. I don't know
Speaker 1: why at least won't just call me. I do. I
Speaker 1: texted her last night and said I would help figure
Speaker 1: out what happened. Again, Stavonik, being you know, the ultimate
Speaker 1: Trumpian move, she quickly shot back, posting on X just
Speaker 1: more lies from the speaker. This is his preferred tactic
Speaker 1: to tell members when he gets caught torpedoing The Republican agenda.
Speaker 1: I mean, just wild way to behave and pretty unusual.
Speaker 1: It's trump Ism has got to Congress.
Speaker 2: Yep. So this is a really interesting one. Costco is
Speaker 2: suing the Trump administration for a full refund of the
Speaker 2: tariffs incurred at their stores, which is quite a hefty
Speaker 2: penny considering how much inventory Costco moves.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is pretty nuts. There are a couple of
Speaker 1: other companies that have lined up for refunds that are
Speaker 1: suing the Trump administration. Trump unilaterally put together these tariffs.
Speaker 1: He did it as an emergency order, whatever that means.
Speaker 1: The Supreme Court may say he has no right to
Speaker 1: do any of this. That is very possible, slash likely. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is such a good example of how these private
Speaker 1: companies can in fact push back. They just have so
Speaker 1: far chosen not to. And here we have a really
Speaker 1: good example of a private company that is a huge retailer.
Speaker 1: And you know, we're still waiting. There's going to be
Speaker 1: a Supreme Court decision on this emergency powers law and
Speaker 1: we'll see, and you know, it may be that this
Speaker 1: gets repealed, that he has to pay back all the tariffs.
Speaker 1: The problem with having a president who does lots of
Speaker 1: illegal stuff is that you really don't know what's going
Speaker 1: to get ruled illegal by this court, and that's where
Speaker 1: Costco finds itself. But it's good to see that they're
Speaker 1: doing this, and probably this is the only way to
Speaker 1: push back.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's interesting too because Costco is one of
Speaker 2: the most different business models when it comes to employees,
Speaker 2: is that they pay their employees much better than their
Speaker 2: competitors at a bit of very lefty organization, as lefty
Speaker 2: as corporations get. So this is a very interesting way
Speaker 2: of fighting back against trump Ism.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and look, it's probably the best way to do it.
Speaker 2: Agreed. So another interesting move that could really really change
Speaker 2: our politics. One hundred former wallmakers have called on the
Speaker 2: House to band stock trading by members of Congress.
Speaker 1: Don't get my hopes up. I love those dock trading bans.
Speaker 1: That's like my favorite. You know, we were talking about
Speaker 1: it earlier, Like I love a stock trading ban. So
Speaker 1: let's hope it happens again. It's wildly popular. There's no
Speaker 1: reason not to do it. It's called the Restore Trust
Speaker 1: in Congress Act. I have a lot of trouble imagining
Speaker 1: that Republicans will passet, but you know, the former lawmakers
Speaker 1: to sign the letter. By the way, Tom Dashell, did
Speaker 1: gepart Olivia Snow, Fred Upton, sixty Democrats, twenty eight Republicans,
Speaker 1: two independents. Yeah, and look at the polling on it
Speaker 1: is wildly popular. There had been some machinations to pass
Speaker 1: something like this, and Donald Trump had said he wanted
Speaker 1: to cut out for the president. I mean, we have
Speaker 1: a president and executive branch that is doing corrupt things
Speaker 1: at a scale we've probably never seen before. Makes Tibat
Speaker 1: Dome look like Lincoln. So I do think it makes
Speaker 1: sense that you would want to have broad, sweeping reforms.
Speaker 1: But I also think that you're going to have a
Speaker 1: lot of trouble passing that in Trump world right now
Speaker 1: because for obvious reasons.
Speaker 2: So the entire chain of command under Pete's hexas Department
Speaker 2: of Work could be held liable for the boat strikes.
Speaker 2: I think this is pretty interesting. It seemed like in
Speaker 2: that press conference to a whiskey, Pete was trying to
Speaker 2: put on a smiley face as much as he could,
Speaker 2: but really wasn't giving a good acting job. To me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I don't know. Donald Trump hates firing
Speaker 1: people at least in two point zero. He hates firing people.
Speaker 2: I must say, very ironic for the year fire. Yess.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he does seem to not want to fire. Hegseet
Speaker 1: though ultimately, sooner or later, this whole thing is going to,
Speaker 1: you know, killing the fishermen. You know, there's only so
Speaker 1: many Laura Lumer Pedagon press conferences. There's only so many
Speaker 1: times you could have Matt Gates in there asking fake
Speaker 1: questions and pizza Jack. I'm talking about that incredible, incredible
Speaker 1: Pentagon press conference today where they called on an entire
Speaker 1: media made up of MAGA to tell them how great
Speaker 1: they are. But I think eventually the bill will come
Speaker 1: due on this, and it's hard for me to imagine
Speaker 1: that it's not going to end pretty terrible. Sam Cedar
Speaker 1: is the host of The Majority Report. Sam Cedar, Molly
Speaker 1: John Fast Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, Welcome.
Speaker 3: I just figured out what fast politics meant.
Speaker 1: What does it mean?
Speaker 3: It's your last name? Yes, I had not put that together.
Speaker 3: I was like, why fast politics? And then I realized, like, oh, okay,
Speaker 3: oh got it.
Speaker 1: When I start my own school of political theory, it'll
Speaker 1: be called FasTIS Oh?
Speaker 3: I like that?
Speaker 1: Yes, just like Trump's razor is that the stupidest explanation
Speaker 1: is always the right one.
Speaker 3: It's also the easiest one for him to reach for.
Speaker 1: So I actually believe that his North Korean style cabinet
Speaker 1: meetings where every member of the cabinet goes around and
Speaker 1: praises him are appalling, hilarious and also actually quite smart,
Speaker 1: and the Democrats should do them.
Speaker 3: I mean, it creates the mess of He's it's sort
Speaker 3: of like, you know, what it does is it reprises
Speaker 3: his role in The Apprentice, where everybody goes around and
Speaker 3: sort of placates him and looks like they're supplicating themselves
Speaker 3: to him. And in The Apprentice, to be fair, he
Speaker 3: never fell asleep, and this time around he did on
Speaker 3: multiple occasions.
Speaker 1: You know, I was reading this book. It's a very
Speaker 1: smart book of political profiles by someone whose name I
Speaker 1: will not mention because they are a serial fabulous and
Speaker 1: I do not want to give them any attention. But
Speaker 1: the writing is very, very good, and that's why I
Speaker 1: was reading it. And what I found so interesting about
Speaker 1: it is that it talked about Donald Trump as a
Speaker 1: seventy year old, and it made me remember that we
Speaker 1: have been doing this for an entire decade.
Speaker 3: Oh, I mean sort of more when it comes to Trump.
Speaker 3: But I mean, yes, we've been doing for a decade.
Speaker 3: It is exhausting. But you know, we had a problem
Speaker 3: with politics before and we were just saying, you know,
Speaker 3: before the show, like people forget that Mitt Romney made
Speaker 3: a big, big production of coming to New York to
Speaker 3: kiss Donald Trump's ring and get his permission in his impromatur.
Speaker 3: I mean then that was in twenty twelve, and so
Speaker 3: you know, Donald Trump was one of the intellectual pillars
Speaker 3: of the Republican Party. All of the birth certificate stuff,
Speaker 3: the brother stuff was he was the main tent pole
Speaker 3: for that, and people forget John Bayner wouldn't push back
Speaker 3: against it. This is well, you know what this is.
Speaker 3: This is a Republicanism that has been around, I would
Speaker 3: argue for close to two decades plus.
Speaker 1: And you know, if you want to go down that
Speaker 1: rabbit hole of the America First Movement, I mean you
Speaker 1: can you can parse it back Pat Nickson, Pat Buchan, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, but even Nixon, I mean even you can
Speaker 1: go further and further back. I mean, you have Republicans
Speaker 1: supporting horrible dictators for you know, the.
Speaker 3: Last Democrats, Democrats too.
Speaker 1: I mean, look, you're talking to someone who's the granddaughter
Speaker 1: of the last living recipient of the Stalin Peace Prize.
Speaker 1: So people make mistakes. That's all I'm saying.
Speaker 3: It's true, people make mistakes. But also I mean I think,
Speaker 3: like you know, the we've had when it comes to
Speaker 3: foreign policy and being supportive of dictators, that has been
Speaker 3: largely a bipartisan project in many respects.
Speaker 1: But it stops today with Pete haig Seth bombing fishermen
Speaker 1: in the Caribbean.
Speaker 3: See here's what I find stunning about this story. This
Speaker 3: has been going on since September second, and we have
Speaker 3: heard virtually nothing, and now you know the issue is
Speaker 3: and I sort of, I mean, I sort of understand
Speaker 3: this dynamic. I don't want to be sort of Pollyannish
Speaker 3: about this, but the idea that it's only occurring to
Speaker 3: people now that this is a crime, like I don't
Speaker 3: even know if it's a war crime. People want to
Speaker 3: argue it's a war crime because once you attack vessel
Speaker 3: or the enemy, and if they're in a boat, and
Speaker 3: if there's any chance of them surviving, you're not supposed
Speaker 3: to double tap. But we're not at war with these people.
Speaker 3: We don't even know who they are, so it's not
Speaker 3: a war crime. It's a crime crime that is being
Speaker 3: committed on top of a crime.
Speaker 1: I laugh, to keep from crime, and.
Speaker 3: With alute no substantiation as to who they are, no
Speaker 3: authority even if they are who they say, who the
Speaker 3: administration says they are, and there's no reason to believe that.
Speaker 3: I mean, we were told they were going into that
Speaker 3: building in Chicago with the Blackhawk helicopters and they were
Speaker 3: basically putting Latino people in one moving truck and black
Speaker 3: people in another moving truck because that whole place was
Speaker 3: full of trend to Agua and there was none. And
Speaker 3: so there's only for us to believe them about this.
Speaker 3: But even if we were to believe that they were
Speaker 3: trend to Agua in these boats that were incidentally both
Speaker 3: on the Pacific and the Caribbean, there's no authority to
Speaker 3: you laterally bomb these people. Yet we haven't heard a
Speaker 3: word about it, and now it's just coming out as like,
Speaker 3: you know, because there are some Republicans who decide that
Speaker 3: they see this as an opportunity to get rid of
Speaker 3: HEG Sith, and of course heg sys is throwing his
Speaker 3: uh you know, is admiral under the bus. This is
Speaker 3: like three months overdue in my estimation.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh yeah. And also I mean they very likely
Speaker 1: are fishermen too. I mean there's there's the illegality of
Speaker 1: the war, which is maybe not a war because it
Speaker 1: has in Congress hasn't said it's a war. And then
Speaker 1: there's also just the fact that they're probably not even
Speaker 1: those people anyway, right.
Speaker 3: I mean, but who would you who would you declare
Speaker 3: war against boats? Like well, honestly, like like these are
Speaker 3: fish to not that there has any been any reporting
Speaker 3: on who they are, right, there's a lot of evidence
Speaker 3: that it was just uh, fisherman. But the United States
Speaker 3: is going to go to war with a gang. I mean,
Speaker 3: now there's no like, there's no authorization for this. It's absurd.
Speaker 1: You know what I think though, is the most interesting
Speaker 1: part of this is that in Trump one point, oh,
Speaker 1: we always see Trump is like a master of sequels, right,
Speaker 1: he cares a lot about So in Trump one point,
Speaker 1: h he had this idea that he was going to
Speaker 1: go to war with Mexico, remember that, And he wasn't
Speaker 1: going to go to war with Mexico. He's going to
Speaker 1: go to war with the cartels in Mexico. So I
Speaker 1: think this is a continuation of that. But it makes
Speaker 1: me wonder about the government in Mexico and how they
Speaker 1: managed to distract Trump with a new government, because like,
Speaker 1: do you remember all throughout one point, oh, he was
Speaker 1: like going to go to war with Mexico, And now
Speaker 1: Mexico has a woman president sort of she's kind of
Speaker 1: a cutout, but and she's sort of pretty, and now
Speaker 1: he's not going to go to war with Mexican.
Speaker 3: I think it's frankly, it's because I think they have
Speaker 3: stopped immigrants from traversing through Mexico. This is my guest,
Speaker 3: and I I've seen some reporting of about this, but
Speaker 3: not much that they've you know, essentially shut their borders
Speaker 3: to uh, Central America, at least for people, you know,
Speaker 3: for immigrants attempting to get to the US. And so
Speaker 3: I think he's happy with the amount of immigrants that
Speaker 3: are not coming into the border. And I think there's
Speaker 3: also like a I don't know who's driving this compulsion,
Speaker 3: if it's Rubio or what, but there's a serious compulsion
Speaker 3: within his administration to overthrow a Maduro in Venezuela. And
Speaker 3: I think there's probably you know, two projects, you know,
Speaker 3: only one project at a time in that region that
Speaker 3: he wants to pursue. I mean, that's why there, that's
Speaker 3: why he's bombing these boats. It has nothing to do
Speaker 3: with with drugs. And not even ten percent of drugs
Speaker 3: that enter into the United States are coming from Venezuela.
Speaker 3: I mean, there's just.
Speaker 1: Now that's just coming from China.
Speaker 3: It's a complete pretense. And when he brought Juan Guido
Speaker 3: to Congress, I can't remember what year it was, Guido
Speaker 3: got a standing ovation for both sides of the aisle
Speaker 3: and he clearly he was not the president of Venezuela
Speaker 3: and he's never has been since. So you know, Trump,
Speaker 3: I think has they want Venezuela and oil, and that's
Speaker 3: what I think a lot of this is all about.
Speaker 3: At the end of the day, I think he says
Speaker 3: as much, almost.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the Congress because Mike Johnson, I am
Speaker 1: really enjoying this, the misery that is Mike Johnson's life
Speaker 1: right now. He had he's fighting with a least aphonic
Speaker 1: on Twitter. He has got this special election in Tennessee.
Speaker 1: It's in R plus twenty two, it's happening. So when
Speaker 1: people listen to this tomorrow, they will be they will
Speaker 1: know if it Democrats probably will overperform. How much we
Speaker 1: don't know enough to make Donald Trump tweet about it
Speaker 1: and call in on the phone. And it just seems
Speaker 1: to me, you know, he has a four or five
Speaker 1: seat majority, he has all these specials coming up, he
Speaker 1: still has another year before the midterms.
Speaker 3: I think this race is going to have a lot
Speaker 3: more relevance as a special election than most because putting
Speaker 3: aside the first order issue of like this would flip
Speaker 3: another seat, and he has a dwindling majority in the
Speaker 3: in the House, and put aside you know, the sort
Speaker 3: of like the tea leaves that people read from a
Speaker 3: special election, it's a you know, it's a Trump plus
Speaker 3: twenty two district. You know, you account for some Democrats
Speaker 3: are going to be more motivated in a special election
Speaker 3: than Republicans. But that's also case on the on the midterm.
Speaker 3: But I'm convinced that if ban gets in there, like
Speaker 3: within like let's say four or five points, or wins
Speaker 3: for that matter. But if she gets within four or
Speaker 3: five points, I think you're gonna see another two or
Speaker 3: three resignations or retirements, I should say, maybe even a
Speaker 3: resignation of House members, because if she's gonna overperform by
Speaker 3: seventeen points, again Trump, this with with with all the
Speaker 3: deployment of all the money, all the Trump I mean,
Speaker 3: most Congress people are not gonna get that much attention
Speaker 3: in their midterm races, and from the national Party and
Speaker 3: from Donald Trump. You've got a lot of people who
Speaker 3: are gonna be like, I don't want to spend the
Speaker 3: next year fundraising or running against somebody in the primary
Speaker 3: who's gonna be a pain, then running in the general election.
Speaker 3: And even if I win, which means I have to
Speaker 3: overperform what I did in the twenty twenty four election
Speaker 3: by ten fifteen points, I'm gonna be in the minority.
Speaker 3: And so I think there's gonna be if this is
Speaker 3: even remotely close, I think they we're going to see
Speaker 3: more resignations.
Speaker 1: Frankly, yeah, And I mean we already saw Marjorie Taylor
Speaker 1: Green is out in January, which is like a huge
Speaker 1: fuck you when you have such a small majority, and
Speaker 1: then you have members of Congress using discharge petitions.
Speaker 4: Yep.
Speaker 1: And so let's talk about Jeffries has actually put together
Speaker 1: a discharge petition. I'm not sure about the Obamacare premiums,
Speaker 1: trying to sort of get that together. I mean, it
Speaker 1: seems unlikely that goes. But Republicans don't have some other
Speaker 1: healthcare idea.
Speaker 3: No, and you have you know, some Republicans like you
Speaker 3: know Lawler, and you know, like New York Republicans, probably
Speaker 3: some California Republicans to the extent that they're going to
Speaker 3: exist as exist the redistricting.
Speaker 1: Who darryl Isa, darryl.
Speaker 3: Isa suppose're gonna run in Texas. You know, it's possible
Speaker 3: you get a couple of Republicans to sign on to
Speaker 3: something like that because they know they're going to get destroyed,
Speaker 3: you know, as these healthcare premiums go through the roof.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's going to be really debilitating for millions
Speaker 3: of people. But it also speaks to, I think, in
Speaker 3: many respects, the failure of parts of the Affordable Care
Speaker 3: part of the Affordable Care Act, right, it was the
Speaker 3: Patient Patient Protection Affordable Care Act is what the official
Speaker 3: name was. And the patient protection's pretty good. You know,
Speaker 3: you have, health insurance is a better product now than
Speaker 3: it was in twenty thirteen. But the affordable part. No,
Speaker 3: not so much, and hopefully slowly the Democrats will get
Speaker 3: to the point where they realize, like, we need to
Speaker 3: have a fundamental shift in the way that we pay
Speaker 3: for health insurance in this country, and that it'll be
Speaker 3: a single payer system. It's just more efficient.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm wondering if you think that, like there's any
Speaker 1: way in which like Trump clearly sees this coming. Members
Speaker 1: of the House understand, I mean, people see you know
Speaker 1: that we so Trump said We're gonna like, let's extend
Speaker 1: the premiums and basically let's do what Democrats wanted. That
Speaker 1: was last week's drama, and then members of the House
Speaker 1: were like, fuck, no, we're not doing that. But the
Speaker 1: but it is, if you wanted to not get completely
Speaker 1: creamed in the midterms, that would be really the only
Speaker 1: way to do it. Right.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, I think the problem is is that
Speaker 3: you have so many of the Republican lawmakers who are
Speaker 3: in such polarized and safe Republican seats. You know, we forget,
Speaker 3: this entire movement was built, you know, at least part
Speaker 3: of it on voting to repeal Obamacare, and the idea
Speaker 3: for them to like do a full one eighty one.
Speaker 3: I think it opens them up to primary challenges in
Speaker 3: their districts. And two it I think it you know,
Speaker 3: opens them up to charges of being you know, rhinos
Speaker 3: and the margins are so thin. I think it's wrong
Speaker 3: these days to look at at least the Republican Party
Speaker 3: and frankly on some level of the Democratic Party, to
Speaker 3: look at them as the first lens being their party
Speaker 3: affiliation on things like this, because I don't think there
Speaker 3: is a if they wanted to do something. I think
Speaker 3: it's a bunch of individuals who are making the assessment
Speaker 3: as to what helps them in their district first, and
Speaker 3: what their brand is, and you know, what their relationship
Speaker 3: with their voters are. So I think it's hard to
Speaker 3: you know, assess like if the Republicans were smart, they
Speaker 3: would have done that. If the Republicans were smart, they
Speaker 3: would have done this, they would have just brought it
Speaker 3: to open up the government. But you know, in those things,
Speaker 3: they don't function as a hive mind. They all, all
Speaker 3: of them as individuals know that. Like I made my
Speaker 3: bones on arguing against Obamacare, I can't fine off on
Speaker 3: Obamacare on anything. I can't validate it in that way.
Speaker 3: If the members of the Democratic Party were more aggressive,
Speaker 3: they would take any capitulation by Republicans on this and
Speaker 3: walk the other distance, you know, the other direction like
Speaker 3: the Republicans would.
Speaker 1: They don't do that, though, Yeah, if only they were
Speaker 1: more aggressive.
Speaker 3: I mean, just think there has been a significant portion
Speaker 3: of the Democratic Party which is vehemently against any type
Speaker 3: of expansion of Medicare. We could have done that during COVID,
Speaker 3: could have said, if you've lost your job and you
Speaker 3: need health insurance, we're going to expand Medicare temporarily. Nancy
Speaker 3: Pelosi fought that tooth and nail, and instead we subsidize Cobra,
Speaker 3: which possible efficient for a dollar for a dollar a
Speaker 3: way of providing health insurance to people. I mean, just incredibly,
Speaker 3: it's the most expensive way. But I think that was
Speaker 3: done as a way of maintaining the sort of fiction
Speaker 3: that we can't expand Medicare for people under the age
Speaker 3: of sixty five. I mean, that's absurd. It's the more
Speaker 3: you expand it going down in age.
Speaker 1: The cheaper against because those people don't need.
Speaker 3: Yes, and so, I mean everybody knows this, and but
Speaker 3: there's just too much. I don't know if it's there's
Speaker 3: a reason for ideological stuff. It's both.
Speaker 1: Probably there's a reason that Canada doesn't want old people
Speaker 1: coming there. It's because it's very expensive the healthcare, whereas
Speaker 1: if you're younger, it's cheaper because you don't have to
Speaker 1: And I think that's a really good point. And also
Speaker 1: I just want to add, if you were going to
Speaker 1: bring up Nancy Pelosi, who was in many ways a
Speaker 1: great fighter for the cause, the most important thing now
Speaker 1: is to ban congressional stock trading, because that is something
Speaker 1: that we opens the door to trump ism. Right, it's
Speaker 1: not as bad, but you get when you have members,
Speaker 1: you know, but when you have members of members trading stock, yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, the only downside is is that,
Speaker 3: you know, those people who use an app to shadow
Speaker 3: Nancy Pelosi's stock trading and have made a killing off
Speaker 3: of it will feel bad. But yes, of course, I
Speaker 3: mean we're just watching the complete like sort of monetization
Speaker 3: of of our government. And you know, this is the
Speaker 3: thing if like you've ever been involved in like small
Speaker 3: town governance, it's it's the same dynamic. You know, people
Speaker 3: people become the city councilman or all the people or whatever,
Speaker 3: or sit on boards because it's an extension of their business.
Speaker 3: This is the way I network. I'm going to throw
Speaker 3: this county grant to my friend who does food distribution,
Speaker 3: and they're gonna give me a deal on this. And
Speaker 3: that's what Trump is doing, you know, but doing it
Speaker 3: on a national level. And the inside insider trading that
Speaker 3: takes place with congress people's is a perfect example of this. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it seems to be to be a no brainer, and
Speaker 3: I think when she's gone, it's going to happen.
Speaker 1: Sam Cedar, will you come back, of course anytime. Ryan
Speaker 1: Mack is a journalist at the New York Times and
Speaker 1: the co author of Character Limit, How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Fast Politics.
Speaker 4: Ryan Mack, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: We're going to talk about David sax in the micro
Speaker 1: and the macro right, because like David Sachs is both
Speaker 1: a guy who found himself in the Trump administration, but
Speaker 1: he's also like a larger example of things that the
Speaker 1: Trump administration is doing that are not subject to the
Speaker 1: normal ethical anything. So I want you to first talk
Speaker 1: about David Sachs, the investor Slash cryptos are slash ai.
Speaker 4: Zar, who is David Sachs. Basically, yeah, So David Sacks
Speaker 4: is a born in South Africa guy that came to
Speaker 4: the US as a child, went to Sanford University, linked
Speaker 4: up with Peter Teel at Stanford, worked for The Stanford Review,
Speaker 4: the libertarian newspaper that Peter Teel founded, and then was
Speaker 4: an early employee of what became PayPal. So he's part
Speaker 4: of the PayPal mafia, this famed group of entrepreneurs and
Speaker 4: investors in Silicon Valley that have gone on to create,
Speaker 4: you know, other companies, and you know, over the years,
Speaker 4: has just become a fixture in Silicon Valley. He's you know,
Speaker 4: founded companies. He has a venture firm called Craft Ventures.
Speaker 4: He's established himself as a podcaster as one of the
Speaker 4: four members of All In this podcast about tech and
Speaker 4: politics and culture that is very popular with you know,
Speaker 4: the tech crowd, and recently became a kind of close
Speaker 4: associated the Trump family. A recent Trump supporter. Eventually was
Speaker 4: named as the AI and cryptos are of the Trump administration.
Speaker 1: So historically in administrations you wouldn't have people like this
Speaker 1: because so David Zax besides being a podcaster, he's also
Speaker 1: an investor in many, many, many companies that actually will
Speaker 1: benefit from his job in the federal government.
Speaker 4: When you first asked a question, I was like imagining
Speaker 4: like Woodrow Wilson having a cryptosar.
Speaker 1: Right exactly, or even like having a railroad zar, right,
Speaker 1: or I mean who also was a Carnegie, which is
Speaker 1: basically what this is.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 4: There certainly have been people from the private sector that
Speaker 4: have gone into government to advise or lead cabinet positions
Speaker 4: what have you, Rex Hillerson for example, in the last
Speaker 4: Trump administration. But this is a very unique position for one.
Speaker 4: David's sex as a special government employee, which means he's
Speaker 4: not a full time employee of the US government, and
Speaker 4: he's not sent and approved in any way. There's no
Speaker 4: congressional approval. And it's really a new position, this position
Speaker 4: that the White House created to essentially what they call,
Speaker 4: you know, keep the US as the leader in AI
Speaker 4: and crypto globally. And so his job is to facilitate
Speaker 4: anything that will help, you know, the US artificial intelligence
Speaker 4: industry or the US cryptocurrency industry, while at the same
Speaker 4: time he still maintains a position as a venture capitalist,
Speaker 4: the leader of this venture fund that invests in crypto
Speaker 4: related companies, and invests in AI related companies and that
Speaker 4: is very unique.
Speaker 1: So he's advising on something and also investing on something,
Speaker 1: and he has portfolio companies that could be pipped as
Speaker 1: winners or losers by his job in AI and crypto right.
Speaker 4: I think he would argue he is not current investing,
Speaker 4: but he certainly holds hundreds of stakes in AI related
Speaker 4: companies and crypto companies. You know that we've gone through
Speaker 4: with his financial disclosures, and yes, so as he is
Speaker 4: helping to influence policy as it relates to AI in
Speaker 4: the White House or cryptocurrency, the very companies that could
Speaker 4: benefit from those policies are the ones in his portfolio
Speaker 4: or could you know? And that is typically been a
Speaker 4: no no in you precedented times.
Speaker 1: I guess it's technically an enormous conflict of interest to
Speaker 1: have somebody who's serving in the government while also owning
Speaker 1: parts of companies. He is perhaps dolling out, but I mean, again,
Speaker 1: nothing new for Trump world. We saw Trump the administration,
Speaker 1: the federal government took a share of Intel, and then
Speaker 1: right afterwards Donald Trump bought between one and three million
Speaker 1: dollars of debt he personally bought it in Intel. So
Speaker 1: we are seeing conflicts of interest every which way in
Speaker 1: this admin. But I'd love you to talk about what
Speaker 1: we're you were surprised about when you were reporting the story.
Speaker 4: App What I was surprised about was this was kind
Speaker 4: of all in plain sight. So basically, David Sachs received
Speaker 4: these two waivers, an AI waiver and a crypto waiver
Speaker 4: in March. That said, it was the White House that
Speaker 4: gave him these waivers and essentially acknowledge that there could
Speaker 4: be some conflict of interest, but his value as an
Speaker 4: advisor outweighed those potential conflicts, or you know, the things
Speaker 4: that he held were so small he couldn't be conflicted
Speaker 4: by them. So, you know, all we did was kind
Speaker 4: of go through these waivers and analyze what he continued
Speaker 4: to hold in terms of his his stockholdings and his
Speaker 4: private holdings. You know, he has he has shares in
Speaker 4: these private companies and some of these are clearly AI companies,
Speaker 4: are clearly companies that incorporate AI into their everyday business.
Speaker 4: For example, he is a shareholder and Palanteer, which is
Speaker 4: a major government contractor. He is Craft Ventures as an
Speaker 4: investor in and Erroll, one of the leading drone defense
Speaker 4: companies in AI companies led by Palmer Lucky that is,
Speaker 4: you know, signing government contracts and right. You know, all
Speaker 4: this was kind of just there to see, and it
Speaker 4: wasn't like he was necessarily hiding it. You know, It's
Speaker 4: just that no one had ever taken the time to
Speaker 4: go through these disclosures and analyze what was going on here,
Speaker 4: and some of it was just so again, I wouldn't
Speaker 4: say blatant, but like in his disclosures he designated somebody
Speaker 4: these companies as software companies or hardware companies, you know,
Speaker 4: in order to say, you know, these aren't AI companies,
Speaker 4: therefore I should be able to hold them. Some of
Speaker 4: those very software companies had AI literally in their names,
Speaker 4: like more than forty I think is the calculation we did.
Speaker 4: Something like Tesla was designated as a hardware company in
Speaker 4: these waivers, and Tesla, you know, has a self driving
Speaker 4: car AI. You know, it's central to the business. Elon
Speaker 4: Musk has described the company as an AI robotics company,
Speaker 4: and so in some ways it felt I don't know,
Speaker 4: disingenuous might be too far, but you know, there was
Speaker 4: you know a certain kind of smoke and mirrors to
Speaker 4: it in a way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and if you don't have journalism and you have
Speaker 1: such a small world of journalism versus Trump. One point
Speaker 1: out the world has gotten so small and there's so
Speaker 1: few outlets. There aren't that many people who have them
Speaker 1: wherewithal to be able to chase down just what the
Speaker 1: disclosures mean and what they look like.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think having worked at various other places than
Speaker 4: The New York Times, it is discouraging to see, I guess,
Speaker 4: the lack of options when it comes to well financed
Speaker 4: and well resourced newsrooms. You know, this story took months
Speaker 4: for us to do. It has five people on the
Speaker 4: byline as well as a number of people that contributed
Speaker 4: reporting and research. You know, that's that's a big investment
Speaker 4: to do in a big investment by this newsroom to
Speaker 4: examine something like that. And I think if you'd ask
Speaker 4: anyone on the street, Democrat or Republican, you know, you
Speaker 4: probably you'd want the press to, you know, scrutinize this
Speaker 4: type of power, whether that you know who levers in
Speaker 4: the administration. So, you know, the New York Times has
Speaker 4: the ability to do it. And it's sad as an
Speaker 4: industry that we don't have other folks that have those
Speaker 4: kypts of resources.
Speaker 1: I guess one might argue that Bloomberg has the resources
Speaker 1: and that the Washington Post may or may not have
Speaker 1: the you know, there are a few other places, but
Speaker 1: not much. Right, Really, nobody has the kind of resources
Speaker 1: at the Times has.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I guess, you know, and that's kind of the
Speaker 4: stay of journalism today.
Speaker 1: So I want to talk about what happened next, because
Speaker 1: David Sachs completely melted down and had all his friends
Speaker 1: circle the wagons talk to me about what happened next.
Speaker 4: So we published our story on Sunday morning, And to
Speaker 4: be honest, I didn't know what to expect in terms
Speaker 4: of the reaction to the story. I mean, he's certainly
Speaker 4: a big name in the White House, but he is
Speaker 4: not a household known by any means. But yeah, there's
Speaker 4: been a big reaction to the story in large part
Speaker 4: field by the reaction on X. And these tech folks
Speaker 4: are pretty big on X now that Elon is taken over,
Speaker 4: and they made their opinions very clear on the piece.
Speaker 4: You know, they've called this all sorts of names and
Speaker 4: attacked a reputation, but haven't been really able to dispute
Speaker 4: the merits of the story or the actual reporting in
Speaker 4: the story. But that cycle has gone on for the
Speaker 4: last couple of days, and it's I think draw more
Speaker 4: readers and attention to the story itself, which you know,
Speaker 4: something called the stress end effect. I guess.
Speaker 1: Yeah. It's a great example of like the power of
Speaker 1: not posting through things, right that if you really have power,
Speaker 1: you probably want to not post. I just wonder his
Speaker 1: crew said, it's a hippiece. But ultimately, what you did
Speaker 1: was follow the disclosures, find the companies, match the companies. Obviously,
Speaker 1: Tesla is a company that uses AI. Like there wasn't
Speaker 1: like a huge amount of hiding going on here.
Speaker 4: That was certainly one part of the story, and it
Speaker 4: relies on those wave reforms, which are public documents for
Speaker 4: anyone to see. I think what's really interesting here that
Speaker 4: we really didn't go over is, you know, David Sachs,
Speaker 4: in taking this position, did somewhat say like, you know, look,
Speaker 4: I'm actually potentially conflicted here, and he did divest from
Speaker 4: certain shareholdings, divested from Meta Amazon, Taiwan Semiconductor, which is
Speaker 4: a mixed chips for AI companies, and he said he
Speaker 4: was going to divest from Xai Elon Musk Company. So
Speaker 4: there was almost an acknowledgment here that you know, I
Speaker 4: probably should do this because I'm taking this role. But
Speaker 4: he left hundreds of the other stakes on the table,
Speaker 4: and it was just you know, took a bit of
Speaker 4: organizing and spreadsheeting and going through that some of that
Speaker 4: stuff to realize that, you know, that that was kind
Speaker 4: of an incomplete picture of what he divests or probably
Speaker 4: you know, someone argues she should have divested.
Speaker 1: I'd love you to talk about sort of what you
Speaker 1: think is happening right now with this White House and
Speaker 1: AI and Crypto.
Speaker 4: At this point, it's I view it as in some
Speaker 4: ways a reaction to the Biden administration. And you know,
Speaker 4: the tech industry viewing the Biden administration is so antagonistic
Speaker 4: and so over regulatory to the point where they'd support
Speaker 4: anyone that had a lighter touch. And so when the
Speaker 4: Trump administration came in with David Sachs, the idea is,
Speaker 4: you know, we need someone who can remove the red tape,
Speaker 4: who can get out of the way, who can you know,
Speaker 4: create policies that encourage the A industry and help us
Speaker 4: build and help us grow, that can encourage things like
Speaker 4: the Genius Act, which you know, allow for stable coins
Speaker 4: to be sold in the crypt industry, that allow for
Speaker 4: easier trading of crypto assets, and so that's what they're
Speaker 4: essentially getting someone that is, you know, rubber stamping everything
Speaker 4: that these companies want. David Sachs's feelings on AIRE are
Speaker 4: pretty widely known. If you look at his x account,
Speaker 4: he's calling it, you know, the driver of the American economy.
Speaker 4: We can't you know, he said, like, we can't have
Speaker 4: the a industry fail. And his policies and his actions
Speaker 4: and his speech reflect that very much.
Speaker 1: So can we just have a real conversation about AI
Speaker 1: for two seconds? Can you explain to me just as
Speaker 1: someone who maybe I'm stupid, but AI has yet to
Speaker 1: do anything good for me.
Speaker 4: There's two camps I think on this. You know, some
Speaker 4: people that don't use AI at all in their daily lives,
Speaker 4: and millions of people around the world that do you
Speaker 4: use chat, GPT, or do use Claude or Gemini for
Speaker 4: drafting of emails or writing speeches or what have you.
Speaker 4: So there are seemingly real world applications for these things,
Speaker 4: and they help people in their everyday lives, whether or
Speaker 4: not they're these like insane valuations that we're seeing. They
Speaker 4: justify that is, you know, remains to be seen. But yeah,
Speaker 4: you don't use opening eye, or you don't use chat,
Speaker 4: GPT or anything, or you're not making memes or no
Speaker 4: fake images.
Speaker 1: I'm not making slop that I can you know, kill
Speaker 1: the planet with. And I mean I just I spend
Speaker 1: so much time trying to read out crap that wasn't
Speaker 1: written or drawn by a human that I've become very
Speaker 1: anti AI.
Speaker 4: Have you had AI slop made about you or like
Speaker 4: shay I trained against your voice or anything like that.
Speaker 1: I hope not.
Speaker 4: It's probably out there.
Speaker 1: I try very much to like keep my blinders on
Speaker 1: and not like Google myself and not I just because
Speaker 1: I don't think it does me any good. Elon Musk
Speaker 1: also took an interest in this story. He also was
Speaker 1: a special government employee who managed to do as much
Speaker 1: as it install. His people in the government do a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff that certainly seems on the boundaries of legality.
Speaker 1: What do you think of.
Speaker 4: That, Elon? So I'm going to cover regularly. You know,
Speaker 4: David Sachs is a close friend and associate of his
Speaker 4: who worked on the Twitter takeover with him, and so
Speaker 4: I felt like it was natural for him to weigh
Speaker 4: in and then defend his friend. He doesn't like critical
Speaker 4: reporting or pretty much any reporting at this point, so
Speaker 4: it's not surprising for him to join in the name
Speaker 4: calling and the mud slinging. I think it's very interesting
Speaker 4: to distinguish between the two of them, though, you know,
Speaker 4: you mentioned they're both special government employees. But Elon went
Speaker 4: in flamed out, really hard fought with Donald Trump, and
Speaker 4: he's sort of on the outs in some ways. You know,
Speaker 4: at least he's at arms distance now from the Trump administration.
Speaker 4: With David Sachs, he's been able to play in both worlds.
Speaker 4: You know, he's very close with Elon. He's obviously very
Speaker 4: close to Trump and Trump administration still in the administration,
Speaker 4: and he's been able to kind of play this very
Speaker 4: political role and please everyone in a way, and that
Speaker 4: may be you know, his best quality in some ways.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so interesting. Brian Mack please come back of course anytime. No, normlutely,
Speaker 1: Jesse Cannon my junk fast.
Speaker 2: So it seems we're going to go to war with
Speaker 2: Venezuela for oil, but in the meantime, we're gonna pardon
Speaker 2: former Honduran President Jan Orlando or Hernandez, who did a
Speaker 2: lot of the things that they're accusing Maduro of. What
Speaker 2: the hell's uppling here?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's hard to keep consistent when you have no ideology.
Speaker 1: But Donald Trump is doing it. Yeah. So here's the thing.
Speaker 1: He wants to stop drugs, but he also wants to
Speaker 1: pardon drug dealers. Make it makes sense, it doesn't. He
Speaker 1: formally pardoned former Honduran president. He did it. It's a
Speaker 1: full and complete pardon. This is a guy who is
Speaker 1: raising a major US drug trafficking conviction for a one
Speaker 1: time US ally. He was sentenced to forty five years
Speaker 1: in prison. I think that Trump is going a little
Speaker 1: pardon crazy. But you know, it's amazing any Republicans are
Speaker 1: still in jail at this point. I like that. Carolyn Levitt,
Speaker 1: whose job is basically to defend the Indiventivill said, it's
Speaker 1: a clear Biden over prosecution. I bet it's not. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say it's not. Yeah, So killing Fisherman okay, Pardoning
Speaker 1: drug traffickers also, okay, make it make sense? It doesn't.
Speaker 1: That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
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Speaker 4: M