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 Eli Lily will lower insulin prices
Speaker 1: to thirty five dollars after the Biden administration's pressure. We
Speaker 1: have the show of Shows Today, Media Matters. Angelo Karasone
Speaker 1: talks to us about the latest revelations from Fox's dominion
Speaker 1: lawsuit and what the future holds for the network. Semaphore's
Speaker 1: Dave Weigel sends us a dispatch from sepacks increasingly divided
Speaker 1: circus show. But first we have the host of the
Speaker 1: focus group podcast The Bulwarks to Sarah Longwell, welcome back
Speaker 1: to Fast Politics, Sarah Longwell, Hey, great to be here,
Speaker 1: very excited to have you. I want to start with
Speaker 1: this Atlantic headline. I'm sure you read this piece in
Speaker 1: the Atlantic today from one of my favorite Ron Brownstein.
Speaker 1: Republicans are trying to stop Trump again? Are they? I
Speaker 1: read it and I was like, oh, how is this?
Speaker 1: How is this happening again? It's definitely happening again. It's
Speaker 1: weird because we've definitely seen this movie before, So what
Speaker 1: you expect is that people will behave differently this time.
Speaker 1: But they're not behaving differently, yet they're acting exactly the
Speaker 1: same as they did in twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: which is that there's this big group of people that
Speaker 1: act like they're going to run for president and they
Speaker 1: all somehow think they can do it without taking on
Speaker 1: Donald Trump directly, and even worse in a lot of
Speaker 1: ways by not taking him on right. So the way
Speaker 1: that they're getting asked questions is like, well, are there
Speaker 1: any policies you disagree with Donald Trump on? Oh? No, no, no,
Speaker 1: I agree with him on just about everything. And as
Speaker 1: a result, it's like all just a reinforcing idea that
Speaker 1: you know, if you're Tim Scott, if you're Nikki Hayley,
Speaker 1: otherwise purported these sort of normy Republicans, you still think
Speaker 1: Donald Trump is just aces and had all the best ideas,
Speaker 1: And why would anybody vote for some down market simulacrum
Speaker 1: when they can have the og real thing because he's
Speaker 1: in the race. It is incredible to me that this
Speaker 1: we are just like living Groundhog's Day again and again. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean there's some differences, okay, so and those differences
Speaker 1: are real, and so I don't want to ignore them
Speaker 1: just to say, you know, Trump's still the center of
Speaker 1: the universe. He's the only thing going on because he's not.
Speaker 1: Because we did a poll at the Bullwark, we used Wiers.
Speaker 1: He's a very notable Republican polster. He was Rubio's guy
Speaker 1: in sixteen. He worked around to Stantis. I wanted to
Speaker 1: ask a pretty specific question that I hadn't seen. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of head to head polling between Trump and
Speaker 1: a Stantists and bunch of Poles have Trump ahead, bunch
Speaker 1: of Poles have to Santis ahead. It's kind of hard
Speaker 1: to get really clear on what's going on. But in
Speaker 1: our poll, I wanted to The main reason I wanted
Speaker 1: to do it as I wanted to figure out if
Speaker 1: Donald Trump didn't win the Republican nomination, what would his
Speaker 1: voters do. And we found that twenty eight percent would
Speaker 1: vote for him if he ran as an independent against
Speaker 1: Rhonda Santis and Joe Biden. And to me, like the
Speaker 1: reason I asked the questions, I was trying to figure
Speaker 1: out what's the universe of always Trumpers, the people who
Speaker 1: are just there for him and basically nobody else. And
Speaker 1: I also do a lot of focus groups. I talk
Speaker 1: to these always Trumpers and I realize there's a few characteristics.
Speaker 1: One is they value more than anything the outsider status
Speaker 1: that Donald Trump is not a politician, and that's one
Speaker 1: of the things that holds them up on a rounda
Speaker 1: Santists like, even if they think he's a fighter, even
Speaker 1: they like some of what he's done, he's still a
Speaker 1: traditional politician and they don't like that. The other thing
Speaker 1: is that these voters are the ones that are deeply
Speaker 1: hard committed to the idea that to twenty twenty election
Speaker 1: was stolen, so unlike a lot of the people who
Speaker 1: are kind of like maybe Trumpers, ready to move on,
Speaker 1: like Rhonda Santists, there's just this group of people it's like,
Speaker 1: this guy was robbed, We need our revenge store he
Speaker 1: should get another chance. That's notable because that means that's
Speaker 1: Donald's Trump's floor, right, it means like he's already got
Speaker 1: twenty eight to thirty percent of people who after seeing everything,
Speaker 1: already knowing everything baked in deep, they're still there for him.
Speaker 1: And Ronda Santis's vulnerability right now is that he is
Speaker 1: all hype, right, He's he lives in their imaginations as
Speaker 1: a guy who sort of, you know, yells at teenagers
Speaker 1: wearing masks and yells at Disney and they see him,
Speaker 1: you know, down there in the state of Florida. He
Speaker 1: won in a in a swing state in their minds,
Speaker 1: and so they like him, but they don't have like
Speaker 1: a deep relationship with him. They haven't gone through the
Speaker 1: insurrection and still decided that he's like the best guy ever. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and so while I see a meaningful movement both you
Speaker 1: can see it in the poll and you can see
Speaker 1: it in the focus groups. You know, I listened to
Speaker 1: these voters say, look, Donald Trump, he's been losing too much.
Speaker 1: He's not electable. We want Ronda Santis. We think he's
Speaker 1: Trump without the baggage. He's Trump not on steroids, which,
Speaker 1: by the way, Trump is still at the center of
Speaker 1: their orientation around politics, right right, right. But so that's
Speaker 1: real that there's this cohort of people who want to
Speaker 1: move on. But this is my big question. I don't
Speaker 1: know the answer to it, but it's how I would
Speaker 1: sort of think about this. All right, Let's say Rhonda
Speaker 1: Santis he gets in the race when he's done with
Speaker 1: his legislative session on May fifteenth, and he comes in
Speaker 1: and they start to see him and they see a
Speaker 1: guy who's kind of prickly, not super fast on his feet,
Speaker 1: maybe doesn't live up to the image that they have
Speaker 1: of him. In his imagination, Donald Trump's wailing on him
Speaker 1: and he's just got a glass jaw and can't take it.
Speaker 1: And they start to they start to decide, you know what,
Speaker 1: maybe I don't love this guy so much. Here's my question,
Speaker 1: maybe take a stab at it. Who do you think
Speaker 1: that those voters go to. Do they go to the field,
Speaker 1: do they say, you know, now, Rona Santis isn't my guy.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna really give Nicki Haley a shot, or like
Speaker 1: maybe Chris Christie, our old governor Senunu, or do those people,
Speaker 1: at least a majority of them go back to Trump.
Speaker 1: What do you think happens? I mean, I just think
Speaker 1: that DeSantis lost a debate to Charlie Kress, which strikes
Speaker 1: me as a sign that he may not be an
Speaker 1: incredible debater, or that debate looms so large for me
Speaker 1: in the way that I think about de Santis, because
Speaker 1: what Chris did at one point, he just says, well,
Speaker 1: Ronda Santist is going to run for president. He's not
Speaker 1: even going to be here to work for Florida, and
Speaker 1: ron Da Santist like doesn't say anything. He just puts
Speaker 1: this awkward smile on his face and says, after grimacing
Speaker 1: for a little bit, like let's move on. And it's
Speaker 1: so weird. It's like such a weird way, especially because
Speaker 1: not only should he be prepared for that question, but
Speaker 1: also every person who's ever run for president has an
Speaker 1: answer for that question, which is like, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: I'm devoted to the people of Florida, and I will
Speaker 1: think about that when the time comes. And Bubba, you know,
Speaker 1: like it's it's an easy one, yeah, hard one. Somehow
Speaker 1: he just like stood there like a weirdo yeah, and
Speaker 1: like stance right ahead. The other thing I wonder about is,
Speaker 1: and again this is not this is very superficial, but
Speaker 1: in the television age, we have never had a president
Speaker 1: who was under six feet tall. I know. This is
Speaker 1: always what keeps me from believing I can do it.
Speaker 1: Me too, This should be me, but I'm just so short. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean I think that the height
Speaker 1: is kind of baked into a larger question about what
Speaker 1: do you do with sort of an I hate to
Speaker 1: call him an alpha because he's so gross. But like
Speaker 1: this sort of alpha bully that Trump projects, right, I
Speaker 1: think a lot of this to do analysis on this.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people can be I don't know,
Speaker 1: have strong feelings one way or the other about who
Speaker 1: might emerge. I actually have a debate later where I
Speaker 1: have to take a position, and I'm going to take
Speaker 1: Trump in that position. But like Ronda, Santis is an
Speaker 1: unknown because we really haven't seen him on the national stage.
Speaker 1: We haven't seen him against a Republican right, because the
Speaker 1: thing about the Santis is that they like Santis and
Speaker 1: they like Trump. Right, they are They're the same people,
Speaker 1: like both of them, that's the question. And like Donald Trump,
Speaker 1: we haven't seen in a long time, and he's gotten
Speaker 1: older and a little deflated. Yeah, yeah, we got these
Speaker 1: weird pictures coming out of Marrow lago, but you know,
Speaker 1: we haven't seen him have to like work at the
Speaker 1: level of campaigning and the constant talking and the rallies
Speaker 1: in a bit. And so the question is like, does
Speaker 1: he still have his fastball like Ken, is he the
Speaker 1: alpha or will it look sort of like a phoned
Speaker 1: in hatchet job. And one of the things that I
Speaker 1: also think is part of the dynamic that I'm not
Speaker 1: sure how it plays. Is one of the things that
Speaker 1: the people who liked to Santis dislike about Trump is
Speaker 1: that he's attacking to Santis. And I wonder how many
Speaker 1: people does Trump alienate by attacking another prominent Republican or like,
Speaker 1: does he alienate them or does he chip away at
Speaker 1: how much people like Ronda Santis? Because Ronda Santis hasn't
Speaker 1: really faced anybody criticizing him yet. Yeah, I mean, this
Speaker 1: is like the big question that we don't really know.
Speaker 1: But I think this polling that you have really shows
Speaker 1: that that trumpy base is not going to say, oh, well,
Speaker 1: the National Review likes to Santis. Banner right, Yes, the
Speaker 1: National Review is no longer the tastemaker or the populist right.
Speaker 1: And it's funny how the folks from the old days
Speaker 1: get really annoyed if you don't aren't aggressively pro to Santis?
Speaker 1: Oh really? Really? You don't say? I have to tell you,
Speaker 1: no matter how many times we at the Bulwark say, listen,
Speaker 1: if if Ronda Santis is the one that looks like
Speaker 1: he is in a position to beat Trump, will all,
Speaker 1: you know, register everywhere we can as Republicans to vote
Speaker 1: the Republican primary for Rhonda Santis so that he beats
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. As Donald Trump is a unique an existential
Speaker 1: threat to democracy. That does not mean, though, that Rhonda
Speaker 1: Santis isn't terrible and liberal and have all kinds of problems. Okay,
Speaker 1: So this is my question to you, because this is
Speaker 1: like something that I feel like I have started a conversation.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think that it was started before me,
Speaker 1: but it's something that I've certainly gotten involved in, which
Speaker 1: is I have a thesis. And again, you know, I
Speaker 1: could be wrong. I have been wrong before many times,
Speaker 1: but I do have a thesis that both Rhonda Santis
Speaker 1: and Donald Trump are coming at this from the authoritarian right,
Speaker 1: and that do Santis, well, not as charismatic as Trump is,
Speaker 1: really does authoritarian things in a much more successful way. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So this is I've heard, you know, people make this argument,
Speaker 1: and it's sort of the the de santiss is actually
Speaker 1: more dangerous than Trump, more competent. Yeah, and I'm familiar
Speaker 1: with it. I happen to not agree with it. I
Speaker 1: was just I was just arguing about this with Michael
Speaker 1: Steele last night. Michael Steele tell him, I say, Hi, Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's the best is the best. I guess my reason
Speaker 1: is this, and it involves a sort of a thought exercise,
Speaker 1: which is I ask you to think hard about what
Speaker 1: it would mean if Donald Trump was reelected in the
Speaker 1: United States. It would mean several things. One, it would
Speaker 1: say a whole bunch about the United States that somebody
Speaker 1: who attempted to overturn the results of an election didn't
Speaker 1: engage in the peaceful transfer power, that we reinstated them
Speaker 1: in power. And I think that would be the kind
Speaker 1: of catastrophic blow that I'm not sure you can recover
Speaker 1: your democratic I don't want to say cred because that's
Speaker 1: too demolishing of this, but yeah, I mean it's a
Speaker 1: it's a huge blow to who we are. The other
Speaker 1: thing is is like, think about a Trump administration. What
Speaker 1: does it do so he only gets one term? Hopefully hopefully.
Speaker 1: Every time I say whatever I make this, people are like,
Speaker 1: are you sure, and I'm like, actually no. But think
Speaker 1: about who is in his cabinet? What role does Don
Speaker 1: Junior have? Is he Secretary of State? Like is you know?
Speaker 1: I think what is Donald Trump doing to punish his
Speaker 1: enemies over the past few years? Like Donald Trump, now
Speaker 1: he wasn't particularly competent in his first term, but like
Speaker 1: he learned the levers over time, he would be much
Speaker 1: better at it a second term. So I just think
Speaker 1: that if you think about it practically, what it means
Speaker 1: for Donald Trump second term versus a De Santis first term,
Speaker 1: I don't think they're comparable, right, There is an unhinged
Speaker 1: quality to Donald Trump that Ronda Santis. He's not unhinged
Speaker 1: quite the same way. Right. I do think though, that
Speaker 1: one of the things that annoys me about the sort
Speaker 1: of natural review side of things, or the prota Santa side,
Speaker 1: that it is always accusing us of being like, well,
Speaker 1: you just want Donald Trump to stay on the scene
Speaker 1: because you guys love him. He's like your meal ticket.
Speaker 1: I would like nothing more than Donald Trump to go
Speaker 1: away forever. But that doesn't mean just because Ronda Santis
Speaker 1: is the number one like opponent Trump, doesn't mean we
Speaker 1: have to say that Rhonda Santis is great in service
Speaker 1: to defeating Donald Trump. They seem to think that we
Speaker 1: have to withhold any criticism of De Santis otherwise we're
Speaker 1: just doing Trump's bidding. But the fact is that Rhonda
Speaker 1: Santis is a product of the forces that Donald Trump
Speaker 1: unleashed on the party. Right, if you think about that
Speaker 1: he used to launch his campaign. It is him with
Speaker 1: his toddler daughter with blocks, saying let's build the wall together.
Speaker 1: He's reading the Art of the Deal to his baby
Speaker 1: in a Trump onesie, and then mister Trump said, You're fired.
Speaker 1: It's the most creepy, disgusting thing you've ever seen. And
Speaker 1: it's the first damage I ever had of Ronda Santis
Speaker 1: and I'll never forget it. And I've sort of loathed
Speaker 1: him from the jump. He can still be bad and
Speaker 1: deeply bad and deeply scary without having to be worse
Speaker 1: than Donald Trump, because I don't think there's anybody who
Speaker 1: would be as bad as a second term of Donald Trump,
Speaker 1: just because of what it would mean. Right, all right, Well,
Speaker 1: that's really interesting and I think an important data point.
Speaker 1: So we're in this weird period of sort of early
Speaker 1: seapack is what I like to call. At the beginning
Speaker 1: of the sea pack, we saw Mike Pence isn't going
Speaker 1: to Santis, isn't going explain to me how DeSantis can
Speaker 1: get the MAGA base if he doesn't appear before them.
Speaker 1: You know, it's a good question. I mean, I think
Speaker 1: it probably goes overall to De Santis's strategy and a
Speaker 1: little bit to what Trump's strategy is. So Trump's strategy
Speaker 1: right now is to try to get head to head
Speaker 1: with DeSantis. So Trump is looking for any opportunity to
Speaker 1: kind of draw De Santis in, And he's not going
Speaker 1: after Nicky Haley because he doesn't see Nicky Haley as
Speaker 1: his competition. He sees Ron Santis is his competition. And
Speaker 1: for De Santis right what he's doing right now is
Speaker 1: he's acting like a governor. He is very selectively engaging,
Speaker 1: and when he does, usually the way he responds to
Speaker 1: Trump's attacks is to be like, well, you know, I
Speaker 1: don't smear other Republicans, but he doesn't. He doesn't get
Speaker 1: into it with him. And I think that Seapack, which
Speaker 1: is much diminished, both because of Schlap's controversies and the
Speaker 1: fact that with Trump's somewhat diminished, he's not the rock
Speaker 1: star he was. He has a really committed base, but
Speaker 1: he's not the rock star that he was. Seapack is
Speaker 1: really his you know, Schlap turned it over to him. Basically,
Speaker 1: Johnald Trump is the featured person. It's a lot of
Speaker 1: his people, and so de Santis just doesn't want that
Speaker 1: head to head right now, Trump's probably gonna win the
Speaker 1: straw pole, and so there's no reason for De Santis
Speaker 1: to participate in that. He will either gain traction once
Speaker 1: he gets in you know, in May, in April, and
Speaker 1: Seapack will be his next year or not. You know,
Speaker 1: I think that remains to be seen, but I do
Speaker 1: it makes sense to me that he's not going this time.
Speaker 1: Mike Pence, what do you think the players there? This
Speaker 1: is why Mike Pence for a president is so funny,
Speaker 1: because Mike Pence doesn't go to places like Seapack because
Speaker 1: they thinks they will hurt him there. Yes, he's right,
Speaker 1: he might be correct. To me, Ron de santiss stuff
Speaker 1: makes sense because he has an actual strategy to deploy
Speaker 1: against Trump. Mike Pences makes no sense to me. How
Speaker 1: do you think you're going to run? Where do you
Speaker 1: think your lane is? Where do you think you're picking
Speaker 1: up your percentage of people? If you can't go to
Speaker 1: Republican events outside of sort of the think tank donor
Speaker 1: world and like not be fearful for your life, you
Speaker 1: just that's there's no lane there, there's no opportunity. And
Speaker 1: when I do the focus groups, the funniest responses are
Speaker 1: about Mike Pence. Usually, and you know, I just did
Speaker 1: one the other day with people who don't like Trump.
Speaker 1: They're done with him, they're ready for de Santis. But
Speaker 1: when we asked him about Mike Pence, they were all
Speaker 1: a kid. Now, he'd be a fine neighbor. He's a
Speaker 1: nice person, but he will never be president of the
Speaker 1: United States. I wouldn't vote for him. No one I
Speaker 1: know would vote for him. I don't know why anybody
Speaker 1: would vote for him. There was actually a great line
Speaker 1: in that group to where we were just asking about
Speaker 1: all the people and we were like, well, what about
Speaker 1: Mike Pompeo, And somebody was like, what is the point
Speaker 1: of Mike Mompo? Probably not the first time that's been asked. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: great question, great question. So they don't want to hang
Speaker 1: him now, not this group. And this is where, you know,
Speaker 1: one of the things I've really been exploring in the
Speaker 1: focus groups is what is the state of the party
Speaker 1: and what is the kind of desantist Trump split. And
Speaker 1: it's important to know that there really are only two camps,
Speaker 1: which is there are people who want to move on
Speaker 1: from Trump in a lot of ways because of electability.
Speaker 1: Don't think he can win, think he's alienated. He lost
Speaker 1: three elections, right, that's right, And they seem unlike unlike
Speaker 1: back in twenty twenty when everyone wanted to kind of
Speaker 1: maintain that it was because of fishy things. Now they're
Speaker 1: a little more like, you know, he's lost too many times,
Speaker 1: he's alienated too many people. We need somebody new, and
Speaker 1: those people are de Santis people. Sometimes they'll be like, ay,
Speaker 1: I like, man, Nicky's nice, She's fine. They're pretty much
Speaker 1: DeSantis people. But then the other half is Trump. And
Speaker 1: I think what's instructive about that is how there's Desantist,
Speaker 1: there's Trump, and there's the field and that like middle
Speaker 1: tier of Nicky and Pompeo and Pence and Christy. There's
Speaker 1: not a big group of voters who were excited about them. Now,
Speaker 1: could they somehow find a way to manage to get
Speaker 1: them excited about them? I don't know, maybe, but like no,
Speaker 1: I think we can't agree. Now. That's where the party is.
Speaker 1: It is it is you either get the Aristotelian sort
Speaker 1: of the original og Trump himself, or you get the
Speaker 1: de Santists, which is like I'm sort of a trumpy
Speaker 1: orbon Those are your two choices in the party, right,
Speaker 1: incredible staff, Sarah Longwell, do you have anything you're watching
Speaker 1: right now in Republican world that you want to tell
Speaker 1: us about? Oh my gosh, I'm watching so many things
Speaker 1: in Republican Well, you know, I think one of the
Speaker 1: things that I'm interested in, going back to the Trump
Speaker 1: to Santists divide, is how is Trump going to attack
Speaker 1: to Santists? Like what is his method? And I think
Speaker 1: one of the things I'm starting to hear bubble up
Speaker 1: in some of the groups is Trump is going to
Speaker 1: define de Santist is like a rhino globalist standard politician,
Speaker 1: which I think can land because these voters have been
Speaker 1: told for a long time they like outsiders, they don't
Speaker 1: like politicians, and so like I am curious. I can
Speaker 1: see that there's this group of move on from Trump,
Speaker 1: and I can see that there's this group of always Trump.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to get a grip on how big they are,
Speaker 1: and I'm just not quite sure, and I'm not quite
Speaker 1: sure how many of the move on from Trump are
Speaker 1: just like really happy to swing back to Trump if
Speaker 1: De Santist doesn't fulfill all their hopes and dreams, or
Speaker 1: Trump's looking like he's bulling him. But so how Trump
Speaker 1: is going to approach it like he did that he
Speaker 1: went to East Palestine, you know, and that was sort
Speaker 1: of the first time you'd seen him look like he
Speaker 1: was going to do anything resembling campaigning, right, And maybe
Speaker 1: he's just waiting for round to Santist to get in
Speaker 1: before he actually starts taking shots. But I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: sort of watching how these strategies shape up. We're probably
Speaker 1: still two months out, but it's not that far away.
Speaker 1: In the shadow primary. Oh sorry, I'm going to tell
Speaker 1: you one last thing I'm really watching, which is which
Speaker 1: is the calendar, the Republican primary calendar. I think people think, well,
Speaker 1: we're really far out, but this year twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: there's going to be a shadow primary. Can you explain
Speaker 1: to listeners what a shadow primary is? Yeah, So, basically,
Speaker 1: because we have all seen this movie before, these candidates
Speaker 1: should understand that there needs to be a consolidation around
Speaker 1: somebody who's an alternative to Trump prior to the early
Speaker 1: primary states, which means that by January of twenty twenty
Speaker 1: four or February of twenty twenty four, so a year
Speaker 1: from now, basically someone has to be picked. Now, normally
Speaker 1: you'd be like, well, we're going to run this primary,
Speaker 1: but because of the way the calendar is, you do Iowa,
Speaker 1: you do New Hampshire, you do South Carolina, Nevada and
Speaker 1: the same day, and then you kind of bounce into
Speaker 1: this Super Tuesday that has a ton of Winter take
Speaker 1: all and Winter take most states, which means that whoever
Speaker 1: gets the momentum in those early states and then locks
Speaker 1: up the sort of the Super Tuesday delegate hall is
Speaker 1: very it's really hard to undo that later on, which
Speaker 1: means that so much of the primary is going to
Speaker 1: play out in twenty twenty three, as early as May
Speaker 1: or June, when de Santist gets in and you have
Speaker 1: a real race, Like that's when we're going to see
Speaker 1: what's going to happen. And like some people have alternative
Speaker 1: theories where Ron Desantist and Donald Trump, you know, they
Speaker 1: kill each other, they blood each other, and that creates
Speaker 1: room for Chris Christie Counter or Dim Scott and I
Speaker 1: think that's a silly theory, but that is there's going
Speaker 1: to be candidates to have that theory. Some real wish
Speaker 1: casting over there. Huh yeah, thank you so much, Sarah
Speaker 1: due Bet, thanks for having me. Angelo Carosone is the
Speaker 1: president and CEO of Media Matters. Welcome too Fast Politics. Angelo,
Speaker 1: Thanks for having me. So I wanted to talk to
Speaker 1: you about our favorite topic, what's happening at Fox News.
Speaker 1: What's happening at Fox News? I think that we are
Speaker 1: watching it's sort of at the beginning of a cascade effect.
Speaker 1: And you know, this is something we talked about in
Speaker 1: the pod like a last summer when this ruling came through,
Speaker 1: that that dominion was going to be able to have
Speaker 1: access to the Murdoch's in discovery and depositions. And there's
Speaker 1: significance of that because at the time I compared it
Speaker 1: to what happened with the phone hacking scandal, which is
Speaker 1: that you know, a little bit of a crack urged
Speaker 1: and then the second people were able to pierce the
Speaker 1: veil and get a slight look inside, it just unraveled.
Speaker 1: And I think this is a similar moment where what's
Speaker 1: going to happen is they're going to go to trial
Speaker 1: and it's you know, more information is going to come out.
Speaker 1: There's still a lot of redactions in the documents, that
Speaker 1: we've already seen, and then I think you're going to
Speaker 1: see additional follow up. You're going to see shareholders to them,
Speaker 1: You're going to see pushback from cable companies. There's going
Speaker 1: to be some tensions within their audience. Like this is
Speaker 1: going to be a real tumultuous time for Fox and
Speaker 1: the Murdos. That's such bad news. Just kidding. I'm delighted
Speaker 1: so far in the filing. What have been the things
Speaker 1: where you're like, holy shit, yeah, because I mean, obviously,
Speaker 1: the fact that Fox News functions like a political operation
Speaker 1: is not a surprise, or that Fox News lies like that,
Speaker 1: none of that's surprising, right, I mean, there are some
Speaker 1: people that are like, I can't believe this. For the
Speaker 1: most part, that's not surprising. But there really were a
Speaker 1: few of these I can't believe that. One of them
Speaker 1: was In October of twenty twenty, the Joe Biden campaign
Speaker 1: made a national ad buy on Fox, and Rupert Murdoch
Speaker 1: himself took the ad before it went public and shared
Speaker 1: the ad and other sort of accompanying information that he
Speaker 1: got access to was a part of that ad by
Speaker 1: with Jared Kushner, who was with the Trump campaign. So
Speaker 1: essentially gave them confidential information about a competitor that was
Speaker 1: like in order to help them politically. I was surprised
Speaker 1: about that, even for Fox. That's that's a pretty big
Speaker 1: breach of confidentiality. It's a journalistic integrity ha ha ha,
Speaker 1: it's sure right, no, And also the law possibly it
Speaker 1: actually really could amount to an incind campaign contribution, which
Speaker 1: is going to create additional legal problems for them, So
Speaker 1: that I was kind of I was shocked, and I
Speaker 1: was also shot that it was Rupert Murdock himself. I mean,
Speaker 1: just think about how help both sort of pathetic and
Speaker 1: also how monumental that is. Is that like it wasn't
Speaker 1: like it was a staffer or you know, Hannity's producer
Speaker 1: or somebody. Right, it was Rupert Murdoch took the ad
Speaker 1: and gave it to Kushner. It just that that was
Speaker 1: surprising to me, where it's like I can't believe that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I can't believe rich Republicans are corrupt? What this is
Speaker 1: right face everyone? And so that was the big one
Speaker 1: that I couldn't believe. And then the other thing that
Speaker 1: I couldn't believe was the scale. So like we've always
Speaker 1: sort of known and that this kind these kinds of
Speaker 1: like political abash nations were happening. But there is a
Speaker 1: lot of direct instructions from Rupert Murdock to Susan Scott,
Speaker 1: who was the president of Fox News, directing her to
Speaker 1: re orient Fox News's coverage for very explicit political reasons.
Speaker 1: So there was this moment where Lindsay Graham was getting
Speaker 1: a little pushback during his election run and he says,
Speaker 1: you know, he says to Susan, will try to get
Speaker 1: you know, Hannity to say some nice things about him.
Speaker 1: And Hannity of course went above and beyond and hosted
Speaker 1: him like six times in rapid succession over the next
Speaker 1: week and a half, sort of just just flattering him
Speaker 1: in each segment, or telling him to telling her to
Speaker 1: redirect resources to help Republicans in tight Senate races in
Speaker 1: October and in the days leading up to the twenty
Speaker 1: twenty two election, or really getting into the substance of
Speaker 1: some of the programming because it was to ensure that
Speaker 1: they were trying to win Georgia. Like I mean, there's
Speaker 1: just so many individual and explicit instructions and it all
Speaker 1: seems so normal that it should give you a sense
Speaker 1: of this is happening basically on a daily basis over there.
Speaker 1: And that part I was a little surprised by. I
Speaker 1: sort of knew it, but I thought mostly it was
Speaker 1: a somewhat autopilot and muscle memory. I didn't really expect
Speaker 1: there to be that much day to day explicit instructions
Speaker 1: at least written down that they were doing their politics.
Speaker 1: That that was a surprise. I'm surprised they were stupid
Speaker 1: enough to write all of the stuff down. I know,
Speaker 1: they wrote it down like a lot. They wrote it
Speaker 1: down a lot that they this is murdockx over reliance
Speaker 1: on email and written communication. They're going to do bad things,
Speaker 1: don't write them down, you know, And they did. And
Speaker 1: I think also that is a reflection of their hubris.
Speaker 1: There is this sense that they were just untouchable. They
Speaker 1: managed to avoid any scrutiny or accountability whatsoever. And I
Speaker 1: think at this point they just felt like it, you know,
Speaker 1: nothing can happen to us. We're untouchable. And I do
Speaker 1: think that that created a climate where they were so
Speaker 1: brazen about what they wrote down, and not only they
Speaker 1: had so much disregard for their responsibilities, but that they
Speaker 1: just didn't think that there was any chance that anything
Speaker 1: could ever come back around the bikele. It's funny because
Speaker 1: it is true. This is not Rupert's first scandal, and
Speaker 1: in some ways there really is a sort of if
Speaker 1: there's a phone hacking on the wall in the first act, right,
Speaker 1: this has shades of that last scand all. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: does because it unravels, you know, when you obviously we've
Speaker 1: always known how politically corrupt it was, how how much
Speaker 1: they were sort of treating Fox and the Fox Corporation
Speaker 1: like their own personal piggy bank, when in fact it's not.
Speaker 1: It's a publicly traded company. They have shareholders, and they
Speaker 1: don't own a majority of the company. That's the part
Speaker 1: about this that's so shocking is that, you know, because
Speaker 1: they don't own a majority of the company, they have
Speaker 1: obligations to shareholders to return investments and to have their
Speaker 1: fiduciary duties. But they also have to, you know, a
Speaker 1: delicate balance because they need to basically ensure that there's
Speaker 1: at least another ten percent twelve percent of the voting
Speaker 1: stock that will always vote with them in locksteps so
Speaker 1: that they maintain control of the company. They're the largest shareholder,
Speaker 1: but they're not the majority shareholders, and so to me,
Speaker 1: that's the part where it's a little bit precarious, is
Speaker 1: that you know, they have overly relied on in the
Speaker 1: past a few proxies. One of the ways they navigated
Speaker 1: the phone hacking scandals that you know, Prince Alaouid was
Speaker 1: the number two shareholder and he basically gobbled up a
Speaker 1: big part of the company to give them that functional proxy.
Speaker 1: That's how they were able to basically get through that
Speaker 1: period of time is that Prince Alouid voted with the
Speaker 1: Murdocks in lockstep so that they always had the majority vote.
Speaker 1: It was sort of an arrangement that they sorted out.
Speaker 1: That arrangement no longer exists. They don't have a replacement
Speaker 1: for where Prince Aloid was. Obviously he had to divest
Speaker 1: his shares a while backas of stuff that was happening
Speaker 1: Insaudi Arabia. Right now, it's basically owned by institutional investors
Speaker 1: that just want their money. They don't really care about
Speaker 1: the murdocksmosh Nations, and so they're in a much more
Speaker 1: vulnerable position now even just from a control perspective than
Speaker 1: they were back during the phone hacking scandal and there's
Speaker 1: this the thing that isn't surprising at all, but it
Speaker 1: just goes to show you what a weasel Paul Ryan is.
Speaker 1: And I really don't think that we should discount how
Speaker 1: much of a weasel Paul Ryan really was in some
Speaker 1: of his communications. Is that when he's a board member
Speaker 1: and Fox has a very small board, there was like
Speaker 1: five people on it, and when he was reaching out
Speaker 1: about this, he was telling her that they needed to
Speaker 1: stop doing some of these things in terms of their coverage,
Speaker 1: and he explicitly said, I am contacting you as a fiduciary.
Speaker 1: This is a breach of fiduciary duties, Like he was
Speaker 1: literally writing a document for the record. It seems so
Speaker 1: that if and when inevitably it came back around and
Speaker 1: the Murdos and Fox was in trouble and possibly the
Speaker 1: board for not doing their due diligence and their fiduciary duties,
Speaker 1: that he would get off the hook. He literally wrote
Speaker 1: himself a get out of jail free card. And I
Speaker 1: thought that for sure, given that one, I think that's
Speaker 1: a little bit surprising. Maybe it's not that he's such
Speaker 1: a weasel, but that he was so explicit about it
Speaker 1: and to me that Murdoch both acknowledged that it was
Speaker 1: his email and his notes, but didn't do anything about it,
Speaker 1: even when Fox's legal counsel followed up and basically echoed
Speaker 1: the same thing. So this is why I think that
Speaker 1: they're in a little bit of trouble with their shareholders,
Speaker 1: is that it is going to affect their bottom line
Speaker 1: and they don't have a proxy anymore. And what this
Speaker 1: basically shows is that the Murdocks are in a weird way,
Speaker 1: not only interested in money, which they are, that's their primary,
Speaker 1: but they are really interested in power too, and those
Speaker 1: two things they are willing to sacrifice money sometimes in
Speaker 1: the short term for power in the long term. A
Speaker 1: heartwarming story sacrificing money for power. It is very very heartwarming.
Speaker 1: Some of the things I was surprised by, and I
Speaker 1: didn't read the entire filing, so you can correct me
Speaker 1: if I'm wrong, but some of the things I was
Speaker 1: surprised by were the text messages. Will you talk a
Speaker 1: little bit, because you know about this much more than
Speaker 1: I do. The hosts tech messaging to each other and
Speaker 1: to leadership at Fox. Yeah, the thing is, and you're right,
Speaker 1: that is a little bit surprising. I mean, I guess
Speaker 1: they always pretend that they're like that, they're just like
Speaker 1: their audience, even though they're they're obviously not. They're very
Speaker 1: very rich and elite themselves, but the host kind of
Speaker 1: hate their audience, which kind of came out in these
Speaker 1: text messages because basically they were pushing what they called,
Speaker 1: you know, they were calling people who were promoting these
Speaker 1: conspiracies effing lunatics, you know, batshit, all kinds of stuff like,
Speaker 1: I mean, they were just insulting the conspiracies itself about
Speaker 1: the election. They didn't believe them, but they were sort
Speaker 1: of lamenting that they had to push them because this
Speaker 1: is what their audience wanted. So that was the first thing.
Speaker 1: It's like they didn't believe much of the stuff that
Speaker 1: they didn't believe really anything that City Powell and really
Speaker 1: to Giuliani were pushing. They didn't believe the claims of
Speaker 1: the Trump campaign. So you're saying that Tucker Carlson didn't
Speaker 1: believe that there were ballots made in China through a
Speaker 1: satellite to Italy. He didn't believe that. No, he said,
Speaker 1: believe it or not, He did not. He did not.
Speaker 1: Now he was happy to say it and promote it.
Speaker 1: And I think this is one thing where Rupert Murdoch,
Speaker 1: and this is the part that was shocking, and it
Speaker 1: ties into the host is that Rupert Murdoch during his
Speaker 1: deposition explicitly acknowledged that the hosts were not just giving
Speaker 1: a platform for these conspiracies and for these false claims,
Speaker 1: that they were endorsing them. And he kind of threw
Speaker 1: them under the bus there because that is a significant
Speaker 1: admission on their part, and it obviously isn't It didn't
Speaker 1: get explosive in terms of the out out the immediate
Speaker 1: coverage of these filings, but from a legal perspective, it's
Speaker 1: a really big deal because part of their defense was
Speaker 1: that they were just giving a platform for these ideas
Speaker 1: and that they were not themselves active disseminators of it.
Speaker 1: And during his deposition, Rupert Murdoch's actually said, no, they
Speaker 1: were endorsing it, and I should have done more to
Speaker 1: stop them from doing it, and to get back to
Speaker 1: what the hosts were saying as they were pushing more
Speaker 1: and more of these of these conspiracies, these false attacks
Speaker 1: about dominion. The same day or days after, they were
Speaker 1: texting each other about how incredulous and ridiculous and unfounded
Speaker 1: and not true. They were, and yet and at the
Speaker 1: end simultaneously attacking the network for for some of the
Speaker 1: decisions it had made in the immediate aftermath of the
Speaker 1: election simply by calling the election for Joe Biden, and
Speaker 1: Chucker was texting people about how they didn't appreciate how
Speaker 1: much damage they were doing to their relationship with Fox News,
Speaker 1: this audience, and so those exchanges were they were revealing,
Speaker 1: I would say, because they were pretty explicit and how
Speaker 1: much contempt they have for their audience or frustration for
Speaker 1: what their audience wants sometimes, but a recognition that they
Speaker 1: know that they're there to service their audience. And that's it.
Speaker 1: The central tension, which you kind of could see as
Speaker 1: an outside observer, which I think is pretty interesting, was
Speaker 1: this idea that if Fox did not give the MAGA
Speaker 1: crowd what it wanted, someone else might is that your
Speaker 1: sense and yes and yes and these are the two
Speaker 1: so two things that are significant on that track. One,
Speaker 1: and we talked about on the pot a couple of times,
Speaker 1: is that you know, is that Fox News accepted the
Speaker 1: election results for a short period of time and then
Speaker 1: all of a sudden because one American News was out
Speaker 1: there in Newsmax, and One American News was on the ascent.
Speaker 1: You know, they're gone now because of these cable fights
Speaker 1: that happened against them, but at that time they seemed
Speaker 1: like a real threat. Fox's audience was leaving Fox for
Speaker 1: these other two networks because they were essentially pushing these
Speaker 1: election conspiracies. And so Fox went from accepting the results
Speaker 1: to all of a sudden, on a dime, in the
Speaker 1: last two weeks of November, doing more than seven hundred
Speaker 1: segments explicitly attacking the election results. I mean, they literally
Speaker 1: flipped and went all in on these election denials and
Speaker 1: did it much more intensely than One American News and Newsmax,
Speaker 1: in part because they really were afraid of losing their
Speaker 1: audience and it was happening in real time. So that's
Speaker 1: one tension, and then the other tension is, and I
Speaker 1: thought this was revealing two, is that in the filings,
Speaker 1: one exchange comes out that Rupert Murdoch was talking and
Speaker 1: some other Fox executives about how Fox was unique amongst
Speaker 1: anyone in the media landscape because they were basically, as
Speaker 1: far as they were concerned, the only entity out there
Speaker 1: that could tell people that the election was not stolen
Speaker 1: and that Joe Biden was actually the president or the
Speaker 1: president elect at the time, and Murdoch himself acknowledged this
Speaker 1: in these discussions about how they had a very unique
Speaker 1: role and that they should do something. They should go
Speaker 1: out there and finally say, Okay, the election is over
Speaker 1: and Joe Biden actually won, even though they fully acknowledged
Speaker 1: that they were the only entity that could actually do
Speaker 1: that to take the wind out of the sales of
Speaker 1: this election denial sort of movement because their audience, a
Speaker 1: very large tunk of their audience would believe them when
Speaker 1: they said that, and they fully accepted this, they ultimately
Speaker 1: decided not to do it, and that discussion that took
Speaker 1: place on January fifth, So they could have on January
Speaker 1: fifth if they had followed through with what they all
Speaker 1: said they were going to do, made a big push
Speaker 1: to say the election was not stolen, and January sixth
Speaker 1: might have looked a lot different because a lot of
Speaker 1: people would have been like, Okay, we're mad, We're mad
Speaker 1: at Fox remitted the world, We remitted everything, but at
Speaker 1: least we know it wasn't stolen now. But they decided
Speaker 1: they ultimately didn't do it, and I do feel like
Speaker 1: that was a significant exchange, and it ties back to
Speaker 1: your question because part of the reason they didn't do
Speaker 1: it was that they were afraid that their audience would
Speaker 1: backlash against them, and so you couldn't find a host,
Speaker 1: and that's ultimately where they concluded that their host would
Speaker 1: get mad if they tried to force them to do this,
Speaker 1: and so you could see that tension playing out at
Speaker 1: various moments, and when they felt like it'd served them,
Speaker 1: they did things like when they flipped on a diamond
Speaker 1: November and when they were trying to sort of grapple
Speaker 1: with their unique role. They ultimately didn't exercise the power
Speaker 1: that they had, even though they knew full well they
Speaker 1: were pushing lies. And this decision and seeing this happen
Speaker 1: in real time with tax, is that proof that there
Speaker 1: was actual malice and that dominion can actually win this case.
Speaker 1: I think so there's a lot of evidence here because
Speaker 1: actual malice standards that you either knew that it was
Speaker 1: not true the things you were saying, that you push
Speaker 1: them anyway, or you acted with reckless disregard for the truth.
Speaker 1: And one of the important things that came out during
Speaker 1: these filings, was that along the way, as Fox hosts
Speaker 1: and Fox News was pushing specific claims about Dominion that
Speaker 1: we're not true, Dominion itself was sending memos and messages
Speaker 1: to Fox News basically debunking these claims in real time
Speaker 1: and begging them to let them book somebody on air,
Speaker 1: offering up guests to basically offer a counter perspective on
Speaker 1: these claims about dominions. So Fox very intentionally along the
Speaker 1: way said we're not going to We're going to ignore
Speaker 1: the things that Dominion is literally saying to us, and two,
Speaker 1: we're not going to let anybody on air that is
Speaker 1: going to challenge these claims. And in fact, Fox personalities
Speaker 1: a very hand, a small few had started to soft
Speaker 1: fact check some of the Dominion claims in reporting, and
Speaker 1: they got punished by network executives for doing it out
Speaker 1: during these filings, Right, I saw that tweet, yep. And
Speaker 1: so that is a part of the actual malis standard.
Speaker 1: It's that it's very clear that they were knowingly pushing
Speaker 1: things that were not true and that they acted pretty
Speaker 1: recklessly when they were making very specific claims about Dominion.
Speaker 1: And so that is a standard here that definitely seems
Speaker 1: to have been met and it is extraordinary. And I
Speaker 1: really want to emphasize this because I know this is
Speaker 1: like really in the Louise, but dominion filed for emotion
Speaker 1: for summary judgment that just doesn't really happen at all
Speaker 1: in a defamation case. It's it's nearly impossible to ever
Speaker 1: even seriously put together a summary judgment. Emotion, can you
Speaker 1: explain to our listeners what a summary judgment as? So
Speaker 1: basically it basically says, hey, we're suing this this entity,
Speaker 1: and I know we're supposed to go to trial, but
Speaker 1: the evidence is so overwhelming already that judge, I think
Speaker 1: we could skip the trial and you could just ruin
Speaker 1: off favor. Why that matters is that they thought, and
Speaker 1: I think that has born itself out so far, and
Speaker 1: the file in the pleadings is that their case was
Speaker 1: so strong that they could credibly go to the court
Speaker 1: and say we don't need a trial because it is
Speaker 1: it is plain now. I don't think they're going to
Speaker 1: win their motion for summary judgment, not necessarily because they
Speaker 1: don't have the goods. It's because it is such a
Speaker 1: monumental thing when it involves free speech in a purported
Speaker 1: News channel, which obviously they're not. But that's the argument
Speaker 1: that they're going to make, and I think a judge
Speaker 1: is going to not try to sort of really go
Speaker 1: too far ahead. But the trial is set for April.
Speaker 1: But what it does give us is a chance now
Speaker 1: to look at a very large part of the record
Speaker 1: and say, Wow, look how bad this is. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think that's totally right. So what is the timetable here?
Speaker 1: Then it goes to trial in today shapel So they
Speaker 1: will probably get a decision about this summary judgment motion
Speaker 1: in the next couple of weeks, and then it's full
Speaker 1: steam ahead for the trial, assuming that dominion is not
Speaker 1: successful in their summary judgment motion. And it's worth noting
Speaker 1: that more things come out in trial, and you're gonna
Speaker 1: have people testify. People are going to testify. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff that was in the filings that was
Speaker 1: redacted that we still don't know or didn't see, so
Speaker 1: and I would say that some of that stuff going
Speaker 1: to be even more damaging. This will cost Fox millions
Speaker 1: of dollars. The trial alone will cost him a fortune.
Speaker 1: And one of the things that happened after Rupert Murdock's
Speaker 1: deposition is Fox said, up, We're not gonna We're no
Speaker 1: longer going to remerge our companies. So even if nothing
Speaker 1: happens as a result of this, and I don't, I
Speaker 1: think that's highly unlikely, something really big has already taken place,
Speaker 1: because up until the beginning of January of this year,
Speaker 1: News Corps and Fox were on a glide path to remerging,
Speaker 1: to becoming one company again. And so something else we
Speaker 1: talked about this was part of a strategy for Rupert
Speaker 1: Murdock to reconsolidate his two companies and then buy CNN. Wait,
Speaker 1: he was going to buy CNN. Who was going to
Speaker 1: make another run at CNN? Because it is his white whale.
Speaker 1: Rupert Murdoch has never attempted to buy something that he
Speaker 1: has not been able to successfully buy, even if he's
Speaker 1: lost a bunch of times. That's how we got the
Speaker 1: Wall Street Journal. It took him a couple runs before
Speaker 1: he got it. He's tried repeatedly to buy CNN. He's
Speaker 1: failed every time. In fact, you know, he tried to
Speaker 1: get Donald Trump to lean on AT and Tay seventeen
Speaker 1: and force AT and t through the regulatory process to
Speaker 1: sell CNN. And I think it was pretty clear. All
Speaker 1: the indicators were there that he was gearing up to
Speaker 1: make another buy for CNN. In fact, he was so
Speaker 1: sort of excited about the prospect that he started teasing
Speaker 1: the first couple of days of January that he had
Speaker 1: one big deal left in them, and everybody in the
Speaker 1: inside sort of knows what that means. But right after
Speaker 1: his deposition ended, they decided that they could no longer
Speaker 1: remerge the companies because the independent commission that they're legally
Speaker 1: obligated to hire to sort of assess the deal would
Speaker 1: not have been able to endorse it because it would
Speaker 1: have created too much liability for News Corps shareholders, which
Speaker 1: is now technically a separate company even though they're both
Speaker 1: run by the Murdoch. So, if nothing else has happened
Speaker 1: when it thwarted that effort, and it weakened the ability
Speaker 1: for Lachlan, who was much worse than his dad, believe
Speaker 1: it or not, at a jointly confirmed you know, a
Speaker 1: joint a combined company, and that's a big deal in
Speaker 1: it of itself. So there's already been repercussions from this
Speaker 1: litigation well beyond you know what will with all this,
Speaker 1: and the last thing I'll say on that is that
Speaker 1: where this is taking place is also significant because Dominion
Speaker 1: is suing for one point six billion dollars, but that's
Speaker 1: only in damages that they can say, look, this is
Speaker 1: how much damage we've experienced as a result of these laws.
Speaker 1: But they're suing in Delaware, which does not have a
Speaker 1: cap on punitive damages. Yea. So unlike Alex Jones, where
Speaker 1: the states where he was getting punished had caps on
Speaker 1: punitive damages, Delaware doesn't have that. So depending on the
Speaker 1: scale of how egregious this behavior is, and it certainly
Speaker 1: seems pretty egregious, a jewelry can award a pretty hefty
Speaker 1: set of punitive damages on top of the compensittory damages. Angelo.
Speaker 1: I hope you will come back as this trial goes on.
Speaker 1: Really really great, you bet. Dave Weigel is a political
Speaker 1: reporter for Semaphore. Welcome back to Fast Politics, Dave, Thank
Speaker 1: you every good to be here. Really excited to have
Speaker 1: you tell us where you are. I am at Seapack
Speaker 1: right now. I'm next to where between the Right Stuff
Speaker 1: dating app and the new federal state of China, which
Speaker 1: is Steve Bannon's combating the Changese Commnist party, and who
Speaker 1: are you sitting between? I am sitting between my elderly dog.
Speaker 1: That's also interesting not there. Yeah, so I'm curious to know,
Speaker 1: first of all, is it like the new and improved Seapack?
Speaker 1: I mean, what is happening over there? Improved would not
Speaker 1: be the way to put it. So everyone wrote this story.
Speaker 1: I'm being a little bit apologetic because everybody wrote a
Speaker 1: verd of this story and I feel like we're in
Speaker 1: her and but it's just actually true that seapack lost
Speaker 1: sponsors over the last year. Some of that was due
Speaker 1: to match lap scandal, though. Sponsorships for seapack, you know,
Speaker 1: they're kind of locked in pretty early, so or they
Speaker 1: can be. So you had a Fox Nation which put
Speaker 1: in the quarter million dollars. The last couple of years
Speaker 1: they didn't sponsor it. Um had the Liberty Health Share,
Speaker 1: which is kind of a falling apart. Yeah, that used
Speaker 1: to be quarter million dollars sponsor. They pulled out. So
Speaker 1: you have more obscure sponsors. People kind of shooting your
Speaker 1: shot because there because there's a there's a vacuum. One
Speaker 1: thing I've heard walking over here was that one of
Speaker 1: the Perry Johnson, who's kind of a fringe Republican candidate
Speaker 1: for president. Um, he bought a booth, wasn't spending even
Speaker 1: more money to get a space on stage? That hasn't
Speaker 1: happened yet, and see if it does. And so you
Speaker 1: see it is um smaller than it's been in the past.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think the last times in this hotel
Speaker 1: was twenty twenty, right when COVID was coming to America.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think the thing that is remembered Ben
Speaker 1: saying right now there are only twenty seven cases of
Speaker 1: COVID and the you invite it, you know, remember, yeah,
Speaker 1: and he's not here. He has not been back to
Speaker 1: Sea pack since then, although some stuff happened between twenty
Speaker 1: and now. Yeah. So yeah, it is a smaller by
Speaker 1: no mean, it's like dinky, but if you can tell
Speaker 1: if puts some costs back. I remember also that Mike
Speaker 1: Penn's talk about how few cases there were. Of course
Speaker 1: there were cases of people who were at the events
Speaker 1: who had it, which is what we later found out
Speaker 1: he did. And I actually wasn't that that one that
Speaker 1: year because I was covering the Democratic primary for prosidence,
Speaker 1: so I was I think Arkansas or something which has
Speaker 1: a very low vaccinatory but nobody had any vaccinations back then,
Speaker 1: so it didn't really matter. One of the things that
Speaker 1: I wanted to ask you about actually was a story
Speaker 1: you have been You wrote about in July twenty six,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two, but it has come up again now,
Speaker 1: which is this story of Ron de Santis creating his
Speaker 1: own media outlets. This is something and especially I'm gonna
Speaker 1: make this a longer question in a very annoying way,
Speaker 1: but you are at Seapack, so you know that there
Speaker 1: are these Maga news outlets. So can you talk to
Speaker 1: me about first sort of the origin of the Magan
Speaker 1: news outlet and then where do Santis has gone with that?
Speaker 1: Sea is actually a great place to ruminate on this
Speaker 1: because a dream for years, like the spot nick for
Speaker 1: the conservative move for a very long time, was how
Speaker 1: do we great an alternative media. There have been setbacks,
Speaker 1: there have been advances, but right now there's a conservative
Speaker 1: media that through a bus enough where a lot of Republicans,
Speaker 1: you know, including Don Trump, I think they can just
Speaker 1: ignore requests from the main from the mainstream media or
Speaker 1: what the Santis called legacy media, and they can talk
Speaker 1: to their base through conservative media. That was the goal.
Speaker 1: I think there you can always take it further. They're
Speaker 1: pretty much there. I mean a lot of what I
Speaker 1: do as a reporter has changed because ten years ago, um,
Speaker 1: you know, you might be able to have a sit
Speaker 1: down with a sertive congressan doesn't like media, and now
Speaker 1: he'll grow that requested in the tracks and talk to
Speaker 1: Newsmax or talk to real American news. They talk. I could.
Speaker 1: I want to lift them all because there's don and
Speaker 1: with de Santis did I thank you for the date.
Speaker 1: Lots write about this, but I was one of the
Speaker 1: not that many reporters who went to the san The
Speaker 1: Santis has an event ironically called the Sunshine Senate in Floridas.
Speaker 1: It's been all the sunshines up for years, um, Like
Speaker 1: it was very very very normal for the media to
Speaker 1: show up. And actually when he won the governorship, who
Speaker 1: was eighteen, that same event, like Fox News was the
Speaker 1: guests and c SPAN was filmed in the debate, the
Speaker 1: c spand the film into defeating Uh. They I went
Speaker 1: there knowing that they were going to keep most media
Speaker 1: out and actually Politico Mats and Politico obtained the list
Speaker 1: of media that was invited in, and that was that
Speaker 1: was not invited me. There's actually a very good story
Speaker 1: in created by Maggie Severns about some of the Florida
Speaker 1: sites that he was standing up instead the Florida Standard
Speaker 1: who I talked to there yours who was a conservative,
Speaker 1: Brandon Leslie had Florida's voice. They were the halblets I
Speaker 1: had either been familiar with or just totally never heard of.
Speaker 1: But you know, we're not covering the event like news reporters.
Speaker 1: They were covering kind of their highlights and they were
Speaker 1: so I was there because I thought this is an
Speaker 1: interesting and because they were having these debates between house
Speaker 1: candidates and they didn't let the media come and cover them.
Speaker 1: So there's basically no record of what was happening in
Speaker 1: these debates. The debates conterminative, not really. I mean, I
Speaker 1: just had to kind of chase people afterwards. One day
Speaker 1: I noticed that day was the Santis thinking made a
Speaker 1: joke about his staff was on Twitter making fun of
Speaker 1: reporters for being outside the room. These are people who,
Speaker 1: like whatever I am, kind of crop around the country,
Speaker 1: but people who have covered Florida for years or decades
Speaker 1: and were there to cover the event and quote people, etcetera, etcetera.
Speaker 1: There's making fun of them and taking you know, taking
Speaker 1: photos of them being stuck outside. It was in the casino,
Speaker 1: So I worked a whole day in as cafe and
Speaker 1: I look that event. To me, was this proof of
Speaker 1: concept for what they were trying to do. Now, did
Speaker 1: did any normal non politics junkie Maybe they read the newspaper?
Speaker 1: Will they ever find out what happened in these congressional debates?
Speaker 1: Well they won't, but that small group of conservatives in
Speaker 1: the room did, and Larda's Voice and the other the
Speaker 1: Santist news sites had their version of what happened, and
Speaker 1: that was enough. So the Santist I think, has been
Speaker 1: ahead of the curve among Republicans in creating this media
Speaker 1: and going around the main stream press. And like he's
Speaker 1: got his reasons. I want to like ramble on endlessly
Speaker 1: about it, but he does not. Like the press never
Speaker 1: has back from me. You know how it covered the
Speaker 1: congressional baseball shooting to how it pumped up Andrew Gilling
Speaker 1: when he's running Gainstom for governor. He takes like real
Speaker 1: joy in this and has won elections by blowing the
Speaker 1: press off like his book which just came out this week,
Speaker 1: is a huge section about sixty minutes. They know not
Speaker 1: very well received the poor, and every one of these
Speaker 1: is feeds in the arguments like why why would I
Speaker 1: need to talk to like the prestigious quote unquote media
Speaker 1: when I've got consertive outlets that asked me friendly questions. Right,
Speaker 1: I have my own media. One of the things that
Speaker 1: I thought was pretty interesting when I wanted to see Pack,
Speaker 1: that was the first time I realized that there was
Speaker 1: like an entire media ecosystem of these Maga news is one, two, three,
Speaker 1: these outlets that you never heard of, they'd have really
Speaker 1: a lot of readership in Mega world. They do, and
Speaker 1: you can kind of pokeground for private metrics. One of
Speaker 1: the things I've noticed a Tea Pack since at least
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one, but I know since the Trump rails
Speaker 1: point twenty was, you know, the Epic Times media network,
Speaker 1: the anti anti Bade communists we've following gone we didn't work,
Speaker 1: made this big bet on American conservatives and it's been
Speaker 1: very successful. It gets interviews with with with people again
Speaker 1: that would be repreated myself that like might talk the
Speaker 1: rest of the press, the press, and they have a
Speaker 1: gigantic presence here Newsmax. There's Newsmax is on stage seapack.
Speaker 1: Because of their fight over access to direct TV, OAM
Speaker 1: had its own flight over direct TV. In addition to
Speaker 1: these people, these the outlets being places Republicans to talk
Speaker 1: to a friendly audience, friendly questions, they're also being undermined
Speaker 1: by cable organizations, by big tech quote unquote. It's just
Speaker 1: an interesting dynamic. It's it's as if the Nation Muger Jones,
Speaker 1: like liberal outlets, if they were getting banned and Democrats
Speaker 1: were promoting them on stage and not talking some Fox
Speaker 1: and not talking to you know, the Wall Street Journal.
Speaker 1: It is. It is a considerably dynamic. And it's like
Speaker 1: I'm not saying it's hypocritical, because this is how this
Speaker 1: movement increasingly it habits a its own media landscape, and
Speaker 1: increasingly what happens in the baystream media it was not
Speaker 1: mattered to them. You know the story. One thing we
Speaker 1: do it's such more than it's kind of fun, is
Speaker 1: like checking out stories by by online metrics are what's
Speaker 1: the story that no concern I've heard about this week?
Speaker 1: What's the story that know liberal heard about this week?
Speaker 1: There's always something. There's always something because people who are
Speaker 1: reading the New York Times cover to cover are completely
Speaker 1: unaware of things happening on you know, Florida news sites
Speaker 1: for the De Santensis boarding. People who are are watching Fox,
Speaker 1: they had no interest in reading what the New York
Speaker 1: Times is saying, unless it's like, oh, the Times are
Speaker 1: finally covering something we care about. That's as much price
Speaker 1: as they'll give it. I mean, certainly there are things
Speaker 1: that the left doesn't cover, but I'm not or that
Speaker 1: it's quite the same, if that makes sense. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean I just think like the
Speaker 1: right is in this world where they don't They still
Speaker 1: don't believe the twenty twenty election was for real. That
Speaker 1: has been changing a little bit only because they're Republicans
Speaker 1: who want to be the presidential nominee. Is there interesting
Speaker 1: like the actually down Trumpleblue Ning lost. But apart from that, yes,
Speaker 1: that is something that we've not advanced very much on
Speaker 1: these media networks. When you saw this and discuss this,
Speaker 1: the Fox needs intertal communications. Like it's pretty clear if
Speaker 1: you are not just kind of reading the public facing
Speaker 1: part of what Box is telling you, it is pretty
Speaker 1: clear that to capture this audience and to keep this audience,
Speaker 1: you need to have certain opinions that may or may
Speaker 1: not be accurate. And look, I think there are some
Speaker 1: conserva critiques of the establishment media that like, like I said,
Speaker 1: mainstream pickure Pitt, you're active, and there's some of that's right.
Speaker 1: There's there's obviously stuff that the press doesn't cover as much.
Speaker 1: I mean, look at this kind of the protest of
Speaker 1: by Glad of New y Times. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: anger that they're covering transitioner. So like some of that pattens,
Speaker 1: but not through this scale where it's it's basically right
Speaker 1: the twenty twenty election, Yeah, we're going to either not
Speaker 1: correct things that are false or not cover things that
Speaker 1: are unsettling to us because our audience is going to
Speaker 1: turn the channel. I mean, that really did happen to
Speaker 1: Fox in twenty at the end of twenty twenty, where
Speaker 1: people were switching over to Newsmax because Newsmax was saying
Speaker 1: Trump could still win this and Fox wasn't. And I
Speaker 1: mean I just meant to the epic time on it.
Speaker 1: The first time I really kind of realized what their
Speaker 1: angle was was if you click on the Epic Times
Speaker 1: website up until January sixth, there is a big map
Speaker 1: every day. The first image was a big map that
Speaker 1: had the contested quote unquote states and it was pretending
Speaker 1: January fifth, twenty twenty one that, for example, like New
Speaker 1: Mexico was up for grabs. That was not true, right,
Speaker 1: New Mexico. Yes, if you want to believe it was true,
Speaker 1: you click that. Yeah, right, all right, no, no, for sure.
Speaker 1: I mean that is what is so important, incredibly just
Speaker 1: unbelievable about all of this. So I want to ask
Speaker 1: you as a Nembo baby myself, and I'm not a
Speaker 1: baby anymore, so I'm like a Nippo oldie. I'm always
Speaker 1: sort of very impressed by how much the Trump kids
Speaker 1: have squandered their status? Are they there? Have they sort
Speaker 1: of just seated that? So Don Jinger is here Don
Speaker 1: Jingior in the seapack and has a couple books that
Speaker 1: are set up by the Make America Great ag impact.
Speaker 1: The Trump superPAC one is modeled took the White House.
Speaker 1: One is also modeled with kind of like the White House, sorry,
Speaker 1: the Oval Office. One's more like the like I didn't
Speaker 1: run the White House. That is not an issue for
Speaker 1: people here like the Trump family remains incredibly popular mom
Speaker 1: by fans. I have not seen much pushback to that idea.
Speaker 1: The idea the possibility of a Trump restoration and very
Speaker 1: exciting the people, and basically don't mind hearing from Eric
Speaker 1: or I haven't seen Eric here yet, but I've seen Don.
Speaker 1: Besides being smaller and slightly less lavish, how else is
Speaker 1: this different than other sepacks? Like I heard match SLAPPs say,
Speaker 1: would they sort of dismiss the idea that less electeds
Speaker 1: were there? Yeah? He leaned into that in the very beginning.
Speaker 1: The conference kicks off this morning. The main sessions kick
Speaker 1: off on the morning of Birthday, and he says, the
Speaker 1: media is really focused on who's not here, but we
Speaker 1: have him Jordan with us. He is not. I trying
Speaker 1: to find him to talk him because he kind of
Speaker 1: he didn't connect on Tuesday and he's told me today
Speaker 1: he doesn't want to fuck. That's a question I have
Speaker 1: for him, is, Look, is there a reason round the santificate?
Speaker 1: Is there a reason that Fox Nation pulled out? Is
Speaker 1: the reason that jo Fawley, who has come here before,
Speaker 1: he gotten good reception, didn't come I think part of
Speaker 1: that is due to I don't think that had a
Speaker 1: huge role, Ticket says. I mean, there are not many people.
Speaker 1: I can't speak for the and Argy Maras, there are
Speaker 1: not many people Conservatives who would be interested in seeing
Speaker 1: it Don Frump speech. But let's give it if it
Speaker 1: just Jock Holly will not be there two days earlier,
Speaker 1: like like Trump being at this event is the draw.
Speaker 1: But there are Republicans senators who have been given a
Speaker 1: good reception here. The crowd's very supportive. Members of Congress
Speaker 1: who are not back, and there are leaders. One thing
Speaker 1: I'm kind of quivaling with a lot of articles. There's
Speaker 1: reporting on how Mitch McConnell did not Tom Mittercondd was
Speaker 1: not comb to this, whichcon hasn't been in ely nine years. Right,
Speaker 1: it was odd that he was. It was kind of
Speaker 1: he was trying to promote sendicandis and Kevin McCarthy has
Speaker 1: skipped for places and miss Crew hates Mitch McConnell. Right.
Speaker 1: So that's that's what I'm getting too, is that there
Speaker 1: are Republicans who are in the leadership. If they show
Speaker 1: up in this conference, they will be bood the story
Speaker 1: from the conference. They could deliver the greatest orations since
Speaker 1: ancient Greece, and the story will be Kevin McCarthy booth.
Speaker 1: They know that, and so they're not showing up for
Speaker 1: that reason. There's nothing Seefa I can really do about that.
Speaker 1: Mc McCarthy. I think we get some booze and then
Speaker 1: get the crowd back on his side by talking about investigations. Well,
Speaker 1: why bother, why bother, creween, you can do something else.
Speaker 1: You also right, he already has it already. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you have some competition for for candis for him. Who
Speaker 1: are going to plub for instead? But it makes sense
Speaker 1: that they are. I mean there's a get someone I
Speaker 1: was talking to here who often sets up happy hours
Speaker 1: around tea packer used to you after the intervents are over,
Speaker 1: running out a room, having a cigar party, that sort
Speaker 1: of thing. We say, just like, it's harder to do
Speaker 1: that now because people who would fun that sort of thing,
Speaker 1: DC lobbyists, et cetera. They just don't think anyone here
Speaker 1: is going to be gettable or useful to that. They
Speaker 1: think it's it is older people who loved on Trump,
Speaker 1: which is true. I mean you see people wearing They're
Speaker 1: like I'm in the front row of Trump rally teacher,
Speaker 1: the front row Joe. You see people who have who
Speaker 1: are fear for Trump, and then you see younger people
Speaker 1: who are kind of finding their way in a movement.
Speaker 1: But a lot of the kind of DC conservative ink people,
Speaker 1: it's just not worth the trom to coome anymore. So
Speaker 1: it's not worth it for what meetings is sketting The
Speaker 1: park you're going to have here at the city doesn't
Speaker 1: need to be there for I think there are bunch
Speaker 1: ofies the wind into that, but the overall right in
Speaker 1: that seapack, even apart from this slap scandal which broken
Speaker 1: January is, once got elected, this became a Trump conference
Speaker 1: built around his popularity, built around the Schlaps connection to him,
Speaker 1: built around the media network they're trying to create, and
Speaker 1: it became more about I'd say that like kind of
Speaker 1: the second circle, or not just a Trump family, but
Speaker 1: the second circle of close supporters and less about the
Speaker 1: whole conservative So you can come here seven years ago
Speaker 1: less than that, and the Libertarian Party would be here,
Speaker 1: are the Constitution Party will be here or people who
Speaker 1: they know who know they're not going to get a
Speaker 1: good recepting the apeist liberty who I think it might
Speaker 1: be back, but I haven't seen them yet. Like that's
Speaker 1: just not a priority for them anymore because they think
Speaker 1: this is a conference or Trump people. One thing I
Speaker 1: can say, there's been half empty today. That's not unusual.
Speaker 1: It's emptier, that's not unusual. Yeah, it's it's emptier than
Speaker 1: it used to be. But but you know it fills
Speaker 1: up for Trump. One of the keyback stories I was
Speaker 1: happiest with is like I shadowed Nagural Farage when he
Speaker 1: came in twenty fifteen. He was not a big household
Speaker 1: day yet it sentity is now there's true Brexit, etcetera.
Speaker 1: And he spoke to a mostly empty room. I think
Speaker 1: it was like ten percentful if that so, everyone who
Speaker 1: was who was writing about him from the UK to
Speaker 1: said Karage speaks to have imperious kind, mostly empero. It was.
Speaker 1: That's the reason too, But it just it used to
Speaker 1: be more of a the pornucopia of the conservative movement.
Speaker 1: Here is every everyone who wants to have a role
Speaker 1: in cons heard a movement here, everyone who might run
Speaker 1: from breadleton And it's not that anymore. I think it
Speaker 1: could be that again. I think the biggest threat to
Speaker 1: that if there is one um and this is important
Speaker 1: gathering to have is actually turning point. USA Charlie Kirsch
Speaker 1: organization which broke out here in a big way. It
Speaker 1: spent a lot of money, had big boots when it
Speaker 1: was getting started. I remember meeting those folks in two
Speaker 1: under Cafeine when they held this Antiper and Sanders as well.
Speaker 1: They really were relevant here until this year and they
Speaker 1: pulled out. But they've been doing their own conferences that
Speaker 1: have not just suddenly the same guests, but a larger
Speaker 1: audience of mostly young people. They'll get people like lap
Speaker 1: or not really close to close to Trump per se.
Speaker 1: They are not afraid of offending some people that might
Speaker 1: be offended if the match left the on stage. And
Speaker 1: they are trying to compete. It's kind of like a
Speaker 1: Microsoft versus Zero Sting. And I think they've got the
Speaker 1: Sea pack model. They're gonna they're gonna they're going to
Speaker 1: improve on it. So lots of competition. I wouldn't say
Speaker 1: few people showing up a tea pack means the movement
Speaker 1: is weaker in any way. This the way this has
Speaker 1: been designed and built inside the Republican Party, which at
Speaker 1: the moment is very bound to Trump and for that
Speaker 1: reason and not winning as much as at once. Um,
Speaker 1: that is the way of life here, now, that is
Speaker 1: the way of seatpack. It's still very interesting to see
Speaker 1: who does show up and who and who ends up
Speaker 1: who ends up finding an art here? Yeah, I just
Speaker 1: want to ask you though, really the only member of
Speaker 1: Congress right is at least a fauna the leadership Yes,
Speaker 1: sorry sorry, if you want to leap, yes, I can say, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: at least to find is the only member of the
Speaker 1: leadership team who's here. They are kind of some rising
Speaker 1: stars in the party and committee mean Jordan as a
Speaker 1: committee chair. He was introduced as the most powerful man
Speaker 1: in the Congress, which he probably is in some ways. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: but for Republican leaders I think for that reason, I
Speaker 1: was saying, if Steve Stilly shows up here, he'd probably
Speaker 1: get a great reception, but he might get confronted by
Speaker 1: somebody who's angry if they haven't introduced articles to impeachment
Speaker 1: against biding At or something. Marjorie Tellergreen will be here,
Speaker 1: He'll get a great reception. There's still some Republicans where
Speaker 1: they have the chance to not be on the same
Speaker 1: state before they'll take him thank you so much, Dave
Speaker 1: John Fast, Jesse Cannon. This Leonard Leo Fellow, a fellow
Speaker 1: so not nice they named him twice. He's really been
Speaker 1: up to some bad stuff. His personal wealth appears to
Speaker 1: have accelerated, has seems to have ballooned as his fundraising
Speaker 1: prowess accelerated since his efforts to cement the Supreme Court's
Speaker 1: conservative majority. Already Basically, this is not a good guy.
Speaker 1: He's got the largest hall of dark money probably of
Speaker 1: all time that we know about at least. Yeah, this
Speaker 1: is peak trumps m right by the Supreme Court. Yeah,
Speaker 1: do dark money, you know, the whole thing. We should
Speaker 1: be surprised that we are surprised. It really is. I
Speaker 1: feel like in recent weeks we see a new floodgate
Speaker 1: of like, oh wow, like the later effects of Trumpism
Speaker 1: and just the egregiousness. I've really really really ramped up
Speaker 1: when you see stuff like this. Yeah, And I mean
Speaker 1: I think also like every time you see this Supreme
Speaker 1: Court make an incredibly horrible decision like overturning Row and
Speaker 1: making sure that's you know, messing with student loans and
Speaker 1: the EPA and the many many ways in which this
Speaker 1: conservative Supreme Court is shaping our country. You know, we
Speaker 1: have these people who are not elected, who are the
Speaker 1: most powerful people in America, all thanks to Citizens United,
Speaker 1: all thanks to Citizens United. So from that they are
Speaker 1: our moment of fuckery. That's it for this episode of
Speaker 1: Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to
Speaker 1: your the best minds in politics makes sense of all
Speaker 1: this chaos. If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send
Speaker 1: it to a friend and keep the conversation going. And again,
Speaker 1: thanks for listening.