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 AOC says, if you feel burnt
Speaker 1: out by the news, that's exactly what Trump wants. We
Speaker 1: have such a great show for you today. Former US
Speaker 1: Attorney pre Berarra joins us to talk about the legal
Speaker 1: obstacles that can at least hopefully keep Trump and check.
Speaker 1: Then we'll talk to citation needed Molly White about the
Speaker 1: tech bro oligarchy's plans for America. But first the news.
Speaker 2: So, Mollie, you and I we devoted a good amount
Speaker 2: of our Project twenty twenty five documentary to this fellow
Speaker 2: RUSS vote, and he's unfortunately now going to be doing
Speaker 2: exactly what he wanted to in Project twenty twenty five,
Speaker 2: which is running the omb, which we knew was going
Speaker 2: to happen.
Speaker 1: RUSS vote is the stuff of nightmares right here. He is.
Speaker 1: He is a person who has already broken the law
Speaker 1: with this impoundment stuff. Right. So, basically we've talked about
Speaker 1: this before, but Congress appropriates money, the President's Office of
Speaker 1: Management and Budget gets the money, and then they are
Speaker 1: supposed to allocate it to actions of the federal government.
Speaker 1: But what happened here is that Russ Vott in Trump
Speaker 1: one point zero refused to allocate the money, and that
Speaker 1: caused these sort of constitutional crisis which ended in Trump's
Speaker 1: first impeachment. We know from Project twenty twenty five that
Speaker 1: this is Vot's plan for the second Trump two point zero.
Speaker 1: And it's not just Vot's plan, it is the entire
Speaker 1: ethos of Project twenty twenty five to dismantle the administrative state,
Speaker 1: to shrink the federal government, to create a kind of
Speaker 1: more autocrat friendly federalism. So one of the things that
Speaker 1: I think Democrats have done, which is really smart, is
Speaker 1: even thought was Centatip proved last time, and so he
Speaker 1: does have a certain kind this is not his first rodeo, right,
Speaker 1: There is a sense in which sometimes set people who
Speaker 1: have already been confirmed are sort of thought as to
Speaker 1: be a sort of no brainer. And what Democrats did
Speaker 1: was they filibustered him. So he will in fact get
Speaker 1: confirmed because they are only forty seven Democrats in the
Speaker 1: Senate fifty three Republicans, so they don't have the votes
Speaker 1: to prevent him, but they were able to make it
Speaker 1: clear and so much of this, and I don't know
Speaker 1: that we talk about this enough. So much of this
Speaker 1: is a war of trying to as Chris Hayes who
Speaker 1: just wrote this book about attention, so much of this
Speaker 1: is about getting attention. So what Democrats are doing here
Speaker 1: is trying to message at Russ Vott is very much
Speaker 1: not the norm and that this is a departure from
Speaker 1: typical Republican businesses usual politics. And I think we're going
Speaker 1: to see this play out more. I think it's smart
Speaker 1: they spoke out against him during the roll call, during speeches,
Speaker 1: and you know we're seeing that at the state level.
Speaker 1: And of course, our friend who will be on this
Speaker 1: podcast very soon, Sheldon Whitehouse, said I vote against creepy
Speaker 1: billionaire influence and he cast his vote. So good to
Speaker 1: see Democrats doing this. Look, they don't have a huge
Speaker 1: menu of options, so they're doing what they can.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, every so often in the news cycle we're
Speaker 2: introduced to a new turn of phrase that well is
Speaker 2: worse and worse and worse by the day. And the
Speaker 2: one that I learned yesterday was I was racist before
Speaker 2: it was cool, which was said by one of Musk's
Speaker 2: doge teenagers who was fired by Doge after they found
Speaker 2: out about all his racist tweets. But there's some more
Speaker 2: revelations about this fellow that are not good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I mean he actually was fired than he
Speaker 1: was re hired because of a Twitter poll. By the way,
Speaker 1: Elon does these Twitter polls, and then if they don't
Speaker 1: say what he wants, he doesn't carry just keeps going,
Speaker 1: which I think is.
Speaker 2: Was going to step down from Twitter because Twitter pool.
Speaker 1: That's right. So there are two different Doge employees who
Speaker 1: have now captured the zeitgeist. One is the one who
Speaker 1: said that he was racist against Indians. Before it was
Speaker 1: cool to be racist against Indians. It's never been cool
Speaker 1: to be racist against anyone, so I think we can.
Speaker 2: I think he actually just said racist, not racist to Indians.
Speaker 1: Okay, So anyway, that was one of them. And then
Speaker 1: the other one. We have this really good reporting from
Speaker 1: everybody's favorite at Bloomberg, which is that Musk's Doge team
Speaker 1: was fired by cybersecurity firm for leaking company secrets. That
Speaker 1: guy is in the federal government, the federal payment system.
Speaker 1: Think about that for a second. Edward has been terminated
Speaker 1: for leaking internal information to competitors in a June twenty
Speaker 1: twenty two message from an executive of the firm. So, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, these are two of Elon's crew. It's really
Speaker 1: something to think about here, that these are the people
Speaker 1: who are being put it in these jobs, are not
Speaker 1: actually really the people who should be in these jobs.
Speaker 1: That this is not how any of this is supposed
Speaker 1: to work. So unsurprising, still disturbing, and that is where
Speaker 1: we are.
Speaker 2: I think it's even more disturbing that one of the
Speaker 2: reasons we know this is because he bragged about it
Speaker 2: in discord shots for Cloud.
Speaker 1: Well they're young.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I'm stupid.
Speaker 1: And in our federal government's computer systems.
Speaker 2: I really appreciate too that jd Vance came to defend
Speaker 2: that these racist remarks are not worthy of firing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean there you go. I mean, look, this
Speaker 1: whole sand castle is built on the idea that it's
Speaker 1: okay to be that. So it's not surprising to me
Speaker 1: that he was re hired despite what would otherwise. And remember,
Speaker 1: like in normal life, in the real world, all these
Speaker 1: people would have been fired, right, there's no you know,
Speaker 1: we would have been fired. I mean, this is just
Speaker 1: this is we've we're in Bizarro world here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the I of DEI is really doing a lot
Speaker 2: of work in this administration.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And better news, a judge has paused Trump's plan to
Speaker 2: put USAID staff on leave.
Speaker 1: The good news about everything being legal?
Speaker 2: Is that what a phrase?
Speaker 1: But it's true, you know, is that when it's illegal,
Speaker 1: the court stop it. So again, does that mean that
Speaker 1: we are sanguine? We are very worried about American democracy
Speaker 1: as well. We should be. But basically, lawyers and groups
Speaker 1: like sky Perriman's group Democracy Forward are pursuing legal action
Speaker 1: against each one of these illegal things. And what's happening
Speaker 1: is they're working their way through the courts, and the
Speaker 1: courts are saying, no, you can't fucking fire everyone in
Speaker 1: a federal agency because you feel like it. What Elon
Speaker 1: has been doing is going through all of the newspapers
Speaker 1: and magazines that these federal agencies are charging on their
Speaker 1: work accounts. And when it comes to Politico, you know,
Speaker 1: woke Politico, which is mostly just tracks federal government, you know, process,
Speaker 1: and in fact, the more expensive version of Politico, the
Speaker 1: pay political keeps track of sort of bills that pass
Speaker 1: and Senate phone numbers. I mean, it's not exactly like
Speaker 1: woke indoctrination. But remember, so much of this is projection,
Speaker 1: not all of this is actually you know, much of
Speaker 1: this is showmanship. So anyway, a lot of this is illegal.
Speaker 1: It's going through the courts. These people are going to ultimately,
Speaker 1: you know, they're going to be injunctions. They're not going
Speaker 1: to be fire Already, they know that Elon and Trump
Speaker 1: that much of the stuff they're trying to do is illegal,
Speaker 1: and so we're going to see more and more of that.
Speaker 1: I just want to point out that what you're seeing
Speaker 1: as Trump and Elon really squandering their credibility. And you know,
Speaker 1: you think of credibility as maybe how credible are any
Speaker 1: of these people, but actually squandering your credibility means that
Speaker 1: when they fire people, the people just won't leave. And
Speaker 1: that's what we're going to see more and more of.
Speaker 1: Pret Bararra is a former US attorney for the Southern
Speaker 1: District of New York and the host of Stay Tuned
Speaker 1: with Welcome back to Fast Politics, Breed.
Speaker 3: Good to be here.
Speaker 1: We're just galloping along, as you said when you got
Speaker 1: here a minute ago, fast, very fast, till every minute
Speaker 1: of every day when I am reading the New York
Speaker 1: times or watching cable news, or are watching c SPAN.
Speaker 1: I spend a lot of time watching c SPAN. I
Speaker 1: think to myself, it's not legal, is it? That can't possibly?
Speaker 1: I mean, besides being a constitutional crisis. So how much
Speaker 1: illegal stuff is going on right now? One hundred percent?
Speaker 1: Eighty percent?
Speaker 4: I don't know what the denominator is because, like you,
Speaker 4: I feel overwhelmed.
Speaker 3: I'm submerged by all this stuff. You know.
Speaker 4: Part of my professional job is to pay attention to
Speaker 4: these things and digest them and think about them and
Speaker 4: then talk about them on my own podcasts and with
Speaker 4: you and with others. And if I have trouble keeping up,
Speaker 4: then what chance does the general public have in keeping up?
Speaker 3: But I think I think a lot of it which
Speaker 3: is by design.
Speaker 4: Yeah, a lot of it is unlawful and will be
Speaker 4: adjudicated to be unlawful, you know, just just right off
Speaker 4: the top. If you think the effort to end birthright
Speaker 4: citizenship that's been blocked, I think by two different judges.
Speaker 4: This whole other caper about freezing federal funds in a
Speaker 4: way that was ambiguous and unclear and counterproductive, that's been blocked.
Speaker 4: The buyout plan to try to reduce the ranks of
Speaker 4: federal workers that's been blocked. You know, all these things
Speaker 4: will be litigated, some will be one, some will be lost.
Speaker 4: But there's going to be a lot of litigation and
Speaker 4: a lot of fighting in a lot of courts.
Speaker 1: But right now, well these fights are going on, and
Speaker 1: Donald Trump is musking about Trump Tower and Gaza. We're
Speaker 1: seeing and I don't mean to be craven, you know,
Speaker 1: with his talk about the Middle East is particularly offensive
Speaker 1: for any number of reasons. But I'm just wondering if
Speaker 1: you could explain Elon Musk and a number of teenagers
Speaker 1: or maybe early twenty year olds who have dupious backgrounds
Speaker 1: are in all of the computer systems in the federal
Speaker 1: government making them do something? Is that legal? That seems
Speaker 1: really dicey to may Well.
Speaker 4: There has been reporting that suggests that a lot of
Speaker 4: Trump allies on the Republican side have been voicing precisely
Speaker 4: that concern, have been saying behind the scenes, there's a
Speaker 4: lot of stuff going on here. There's a lot of
Speaker 4: stuff that the doge is doing. Even if we agree,
Speaker 4: I mean, I think a lot of people on the
Speaker 4: Democratic side too, can agree with the general premise that
Speaker 4: parts of government are bloated and the waste, fraud, and
Speaker 4: abuse should be cut out. There's a way to do it,
Speaker 4: and there's a way not to do it, and I
Speaker 4: think you're going to see a lot of suits in
Speaker 4: that regards. Well, look, usaid it's a statutorially created entity
Speaker 4: of significant size, which is why maybe it's a target
Speaker 4: and significant value as suggested by lots of people, including
Speaker 4: Lindsay Graham and Marco Rubio and a whole host of
Speaker 4: other people. And the idea that you know, a few
Speaker 4: folks who are not particularly accountable or accountable at all
Speaker 4: are going to dismantle a ten billion dollar agency runs
Speaker 4: a foul of how we think effective government should work.
Speaker 4: But also laws that I think you're going to see
Speaker 4: a lot of fights there there too.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: The other way I think about this is on the
Speaker 4: optimistic side, is this flood the zone strategy with respect
Speaker 4: to executive orders and the DOGE and the memos that
Speaker 4: have been issued by the newly minted Attorney General Pam
Speaker 4: BONDI is I wonder if I'm not a huge box
Speaker 4: of okay, well good, So maybe you can tell me
Speaker 4: if this this is valid or not that maybe it's
Speaker 4: the sort of involuntary ropodope strategy. I'm the part of
Speaker 4: the Democrats that at some point, I don't know if
Speaker 4: this is true or not, but I'm trying to look
Speaker 4: for silver linings that the Trump administration will so overextend
Speaker 4: and exhaust itself with EO after EEO after EO and
Speaker 4: memo after memo and changing things and eliminating things and
Speaker 4: dismantling things by fiat, that they will be so roiled
Speaker 4: up in litigation and fights both with the other side
Speaker 4: and within their own side, that they tire themselves out
Speaker 4: and ends up being not a good strategy because it
Speaker 4: was not particularly well thought out. Look, you know, separate
Speaker 4: apart from the legal defeats that some of these moves
Speaker 4: have suffered at the hands of courts, there have been
Speaker 4: withdrawals of some of these things on Trump's own part right,
Speaker 4: because they don't think these things. They don't think these
Speaker 4: things out. They have a blunder bus approach, and they
Speaker 4: say this is bad, so we're going to eliminate all
Speaker 4: of this. But they don't define what this is. And
Speaker 4: the example I keep coming back to is in the
Speaker 4: first term, in the first week, they issued this broad
Speaker 4: and sweeping so called Muslim band, but they didn't distinguish
Speaker 4: between who was allowed to come back and who wasn't,
Speaker 4: who's allowed entry and who wasn't. And there was this
Speaker 4: huge question for a while because they hadn't addressed the
Speaker 4: issue of whether or not Green card holders were included
Speaker 4: or excluded, right, And that keeps happening with these guys
Speaker 4: because they value speed over accuracy and fairness, No.
Speaker 1: For sure, And I mean that's what we're seeing here
Speaker 1: is we see them making a lot of mistakes because
Speaker 1: they're moving too quickly and because they don't ultimately have
Speaker 1: an ethos, you know, except move fast and break things
Speaker 1: that are not theirs to break. Really, I'm glad you're
Speaker 1: being optimistic because I often try to figure out there's
Speaker 1: some some place for optimism in this whole catastrophe. So
Speaker 1: I'm wondering, you know, it definitely seems like the courts
Speaker 1: are going to say you can't do this stuff. Now
Speaker 1: here's my question. When the courts say you can't do
Speaker 1: this stuff, you could definitely see Maybe I don't know
Speaker 1: who will be the first in Trump world to ignore
Speaker 1: the courts. My guess is that Russ Vott is going
Speaker 1: to be high on that list because he has done
Speaker 1: it before, right and Trump one point zero he refused
Speaker 1: to release the money, and for Ukraine he messed around
Speaker 1: with impounding the funds. So I'm wondering with the funds
Speaker 1: that were impounded releasing them. So I'm wondering if you
Speaker 1: what make me feel better about what happens when they
Speaker 1: ignore the law.
Speaker 4: Well, so far, and one of your student listeners will
Speaker 4: correct me and us if I'm wrong. There's been a
Speaker 4: defiance of law and clear interpretations of law. There is
Speaker 4: defiance and a breach of the law related to Inspectors General.
Speaker 4: That's one item I didn't take off my earlier list
Speaker 4: because there's clearly a requirement that you must give thirty
Speaker 4: days notice to Congress and an explanation as to why
Speaker 4: you're taking that action against people are supposed to be
Speaker 4: independent and above and beyond.
Speaker 3: And outside of politics.
Speaker 4: There has not been that I can think of, a
Speaker 4: court order or injunction sustained all the way to the
Speaker 4: Supreme Court that the Trump administration has said, f you,
Speaker 4: we're not going to do it. That would be that
Speaker 4: would be a real, real crisis. And my optimism is
Speaker 4: and I don't know how well founded it is is
Speaker 4: that we haven't seen that kind of absolutely clear, concrete,
Speaker 4: deliberate direct defiance at a court order, vetted all the
Speaker 4: way to the top, and I hope never to see it.
Speaker 1: I love that I'll take that to the bank.
Speaker 3: I wouldn't.
Speaker 4: I don't know. I don't know which bank will that deposit.
Speaker 4: But hopefully that's the case. Look, it still happens to
Speaker 4: be true that the Trump folks, you know, for sure,
Speaker 4: at least at this point, but even you know, definitionally
Speaker 4: autocratic societies. I've had this conversation with Gary Kasparrow on
Speaker 4: a number of occasions, and wonder White is Putin is
Speaker 4: basically a dictator, and you have them in other parts
Speaker 4: of the world, and they can do whatever they want,
Speaker 4: and they're acknowledged to have the authority to do whatever
Speaker 4: they want. They revel in their dictator status. And yet
Speaker 4: even they seek, you know, even as they break the law,
Speaker 4: they seek to cloak themselves in legality and in constitutionality
Speaker 4: and in norms, and they're always trying to defend what
Speaker 4: they're doing, even as they imprison people like Alexi Navalni.
Speaker 4: Now it may be all bullshit and a sham. There's
Speaker 4: still something that autocrats are fretful about if they're overly seen, overly,
Speaker 4: dramatically and directly defying the rule of law, even though
Speaker 4: it happens all the time.
Speaker 3: If that makes any sense.
Speaker 1: Yes, exactly. I would love if we're going to just
Speaker 1: be anxious here and talk about Gary kasprov what do
Speaker 1: we think. It strikes me that, like the worst case scenario,
Speaker 1: and a lot of people who are very smart, who
Speaker 1: I know, who I'm friends with, I have a lot
Speaker 1: of anxiety about America turning into Russia. That is not,
Speaker 1: in my mind, I think a likely scenario for any
Speaker 1: number of reasons. And it sounds like you also believe that.
Speaker 1: And I'm wondering if you could sort of make me
Speaker 1: feel better because I'm very stressed out. Thank you.
Speaker 4: So there are other defenses, not the ones that we
Speaker 4: normally think about. Separate from the courts and separate from Congress,
Speaker 4: which has been basically supine. Hope springs eternal. That Congress
Speaker 4: and the Senate and Center Republicans in particular will say,
Speaker 4: you know, hey, we created this thing by statute, you
Speaker 4: can't take it away by fiat, or hey, you know,
Speaker 4: this is a totally unqualified person for this very important,
Speaker 4: sensitive cabinet position. We can't do that, you know, at
Speaker 4: any moment. I'm not holding my breath. That can happen
Speaker 4: if there's the thing that has long been predicted and
Speaker 4: has never come to pass, that Trump and his cronies
Speaker 4: over extend to such an extent that people other than
Speaker 4: Lisa Rakowski and now Mitch McConnell, you know, stand in
Speaker 4: their way. So you know, there is that structural check.
Speaker 4: There's also the courts, and the courts don't always decide
Speaker 4: it was all Trump. But separate from that, there's other
Speaker 4: things like public sentiment, and it is true, not often,
Speaker 4: certainly not always, public sentiment when it is overwhelmingly negative
Speaker 4: about something causes the Trump folks to change course. That
Speaker 4: happened when you had separations of children from their parents
Speaker 4: in the last term. And there's yet another thing, by
Speaker 4: the way, you know, we haven't talked about tariffs yet.
Speaker 4: There's all this controversy and pretty much consensus with respect
Speaker 4: to anyone who's intelligent about economics about the inflationary pressure
Speaker 4: the tariffs would cause. In particular, not just inflationary pressure,
Speaker 4: but other diplomatic fiascos and ruination of our allies and
Speaker 4: relationships with our allies with Canada and Mexico. On the
Speaker 4: day that those tariffs were going to go into effect, well,
Speaker 4: I don't know if you call it the fifth branch
Speaker 4: of government for Donald Trump, but the stock market began
Speaker 4: to tank, right, That.
Speaker 1: Really is the fifth branch of government for Donald Trump. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's like it's like there's the executive, there's the judiciary,
Speaker 4: there's the legislative, and then there's the now with the Nasdaq.
Speaker 4: That wouldn't give a lot of political scientists and political
Speaker 4: theorists a lot of comfort. But it's not like there
Speaker 4: are not things that give Trump pause. There are, and
Speaker 4: maybe in combination and when when you know, stitch together
Speaker 4: shrewdly by Democrats, although I don't see that.
Speaker 1: Ahead of yourself. Their breaks at the moment together shrewdly, yes.
Speaker 4: Stitch together truly rudely. Maybe something can happen. You just
Speaker 4: don't know. I mean, some people are saying, look again,
Speaker 4: it's only it's been five minutes.
Speaker 1: No, I know, it feels like it's been.
Speaker 4: Five minutes nineteen days and it takes some time.
Speaker 1: But when people listen this, it'll be twenty one days continue, yes,
Speaker 1: or twenty days or whatever.
Speaker 4: It's also the case because of the incompetence of these
Speaker 4: guys in so many areas and their lack of care
Speaker 4: in vetting and doing so many other things. This is
Speaker 4: not a great and most shrewd strategy, but I'm quite
Speaker 4: confident that there will be overreaches of such significance and
Speaker 4: opposition that there's going to be a straw that breaks
Speaker 4: the camel's back with respect to at least one or
Speaker 4: more of these things. It's just going to happen because
Speaker 4: because you just can't move. I used a terrible analogy
Speaker 4: on the podcast with Joyce fans Insider Fansider podcast.
Speaker 1: Yes, tell me about cafe and now I'm just kidding, actually,
Speaker 1: joy Yeah, Joyce Fancy is really one of the great
Speaker 1: So anyway, yes.
Speaker 4: He's terrific, and she was polite enough not to laugh
Speaker 4: at my metaphor. But even if it's the case that
Speaker 4: you find yourself in an inopportune place at the bottom
Speaker 4: of the sea somewhere, or deep diving, and there's some
Speaker 4: menacing fish or you know, a whale or a shark
Speaker 4: or some you know some other thing and you need
Speaker 4: to get up to the surface for safety, you can't
Speaker 4: just rush up to the surface.
Speaker 3: Because of this thing called the bends.
Speaker 4: You will dive, you know, either an equally quick or
Speaker 4: quicker death if you rush to the top. So that's
Speaker 4: my lame analogy in nature of the need to even
Speaker 4: if there's some cause to fix something or do something differently.
Speaker 4: You know, slowfulness is not good, and government often moves
Speaker 4: too slowly. But doing this at too great a speed
Speaker 4: can do more injury than good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I mean obviously, but it is interesting to me,
Speaker 1: like we'll watch this sort of lawlessness and the zeal right,
Speaker 1: the delight at disassembling things like USA and the EPA,
Speaker 1: and this sort of regit the federal government. And I wonder,
Speaker 1: you know, as someone who it's so you know, to
Speaker 1: me in my own personal history, right, I had a
Speaker 1: grandfather who was jailed by Republican Congress, I mean for
Speaker 1: his opinions, for refusing to name names. I wonder in
Speaker 1: your mind, like the rage that these people have towards
Speaker 1: the federal government. I mean, is I think about their
Speaker 1: fury towards the Federal Bureau of Investigations, which is, you know,
Speaker 1: has it ever had a head who was not a
Speaker 1: white Republican man.
Speaker 3: Not in memory, not in recent times, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, what do you? I mean? It feels like
Speaker 1: these people have gone through a blender.
Speaker 4: It's amazing how they have the ability to maintain and
Speaker 4: maybe it's like a higher order intelligence to be able
Speaker 4: to maintain such cognitive dissonance. And say, on the one hand,
Speaker 4: you support the blue, you support law enforcement, and on
Speaker 4: the other hand not only support full pardons and commutations
Speaker 4: for people who are seen in black and white to
Speaker 4: be beating and assaulting officers, but also now to be
Speaker 4: cheering the idea that the prosecutors who in good faith
Speaker 4: pursued those investigations and prosecutions god in open court convictions
Speaker 4: either by guilty plea or by guilty verdict upheld by
Speaker 4: judges appointed by both Democrats and Republicans, some are many
Speaker 4: appointed by Trump himself. They should be investigated and punished
Speaker 4: for doing their jobs. How you keep that in equipoised
Speaker 4: with the idea that you're pro law enforcement. I don't
Speaker 4: even understand. So I don't know if it's people who
Speaker 4: think that way are geniuses or imbeciles, but it's not
Speaker 4: something in between.
Speaker 1: Yes, it's very haphazard, and I think the good news
Speaker 1: is that we're seeing the court say you can't do that,
Speaker 1: and someday we may see Republicans in Congress do the same,
Speaker 1: but we may not. Right, not necessarily necessary, right, I
Speaker 1: guess terrifyingly.
Speaker 4: I think part of the explanation is nobody cares about
Speaker 4: process anymore, whether it's due process or something else. And
Speaker 4: that's how you can have these competing ideas that should
Speaker 4: give any normal person cognitive dissonance in your head. It's
Speaker 4: not that anyone is pro police, pro law enforcement, or
Speaker 4: anti law enforcement. You're pro law enforcement when they go
Speaker 4: after the people you don't like, and you're anti law
Speaker 4: enforcement when they go after the people you do to like. Right,
Speaker 4: So it's all outcome determinative. So you know, if a
Speaker 4: senator votes, you know, for Trump on something, whether it's
Speaker 4: on principle or not, that's a good senator. That's a
Speaker 4: good Republican. If senator does not, that senator should be primary,
Speaker 4: even if it is on principle.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 4: So, this idea of being pro trade or anti tariff,
Speaker 4: or pro First Amendment or anti First Amendment or pro
Speaker 4: or con anything one enforcement or otherwise, those things don't
Speaker 4: matter anymore. It's all about whether or not it was
Speaker 4: your team or not. It's become you know, as many
Speaker 4: many many other people have noted before me, tribal and
Speaker 4: almost like a blood sport.
Speaker 1: But it's also just filthy to trump. The nuances of
Speaker 1: it don't matter, it's if you are our guy or not.
Speaker 1: I do think though, what you're saying about legality makes
Speaker 1: me feel a little better. You know, this is just
Speaker 1: the barrage of news and knowing that there is some
Speaker 1: sort of larger principle, you know, legal principles in this
Speaker 1: country still is probably a very good thing.
Speaker 4: So yeah, it's not enough because the damage. You know,
Speaker 4: you asked before, why are they doing these things? They
Speaker 4: know what the legal shot is on some of these things, right,
Speaker 4: but like still, for example, the thing that I find
Speaker 4: almost the most upsetting in the farious which is the
Speaker 4: issuance of questionnaires to thousands of FBI agents to see
Speaker 4: if they touch.
Speaker 1: Which smacks of McCarthyism. I mean really it is.
Speaker 4: Yeah, of all the things, right, and you know, at
Speaker 4: the end of the day, they're protected by civil service
Speaker 4: laws and maybe they'll be vindicated, but in the interim
Speaker 4: and probably for a long time, any agent going forward, Democrat, Republican, nonpartisan, neutral, independent, whatever.
Speaker 4: When presented with the option of opening up an investigation
Speaker 4: or pursuing a lead, or joining an effort to look
Speaker 4: into potential malfeasance on the part of anybody in the
Speaker 4: country who has some arguable connection to Trump or Trump's family,
Speaker 4: or Trump's cabinet or Trump's government or Trump's business interests,
Speaker 4: has to think fricking twice. If I do this, is
Speaker 4: someday someone going to take my livelihood away?
Speaker 1: Well that's the goal.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And so the extraordinary chilling effect it has on
Speaker 4: people who are just people, just human beings. To make
Speaker 4: sure they're doing the right thing and taking care of
Speaker 4: their family and putting food on the table, do they
Speaker 4: have to think twice? Now, Well, maybe I'll go do
Speaker 4: the surveillance, Maybe I'll go knock on that door, maybe
Speaker 4: I'll serve the subpoena. But let me first do the calculation.
Speaker 4: Will it offend anyone in the current regime, Because then ultimately,
Speaker 4: maybe I will be fired, maybe I will be prosecuted,
Speaker 4: maybe my pension will be taken away from me. And
Speaker 4: that message has been delivered, whatever happens with respect to
Speaker 4: the legal question.
Speaker 1: Pre thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3: Thanks Molly.
Speaker 1: Molly White writes the newsletter citation needed. Welcome back to
Speaker 1: Fast Politics, Molly White, thank you for having me so
Speaker 1: I feel like you have absolutely the right background to
Speaker 1: cover where we are because it's the intersection of tech
Speaker 1: and crypto and everything nefarious of the last hundred years discuss.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's been a weird sort of coming together of
Speaker 5: the tech worlds and the crypto world and the political
Speaker 5: worlds in the last couple of years, and certainly in
Speaker 5: the last week or so, we've seen that really ramping up.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about it. Your beat was originally in
Speaker 1: the world whenever, you know, in the time when everything
Speaker 1: was normal, Your beat started as crypto.
Speaker 5: Right right, Yeah. I started writing about crypto in twenty
Speaker 5: twenty one or so, and I still write a lot
Speaker 5: about crypto, but a little more broad these days as well.
Speaker 1: Why don't we talk first about how crypto got in
Speaker 1: bed with Trump during the campaign, Because Donald Trump is
Speaker 1: seventy eight years old, Crypto is not his de facto
Speaker 1: and in fact, early or on in his first presidency
Speaker 1: he thought crypto was a scam, right, Yeah.
Speaker 5: He made a really big change in his stance on
Speaker 5: crypto this time around, largely thanks to the cryptocurrency industry's influence,
Speaker 5: which has really increased over the handful of years since
Speaker 5: his former presidency.
Speaker 1: So what changed his heart and mind.
Speaker 5: I think a lot of things really went into it.
Speaker 5: I think part of it was his own personal success
Speaker 5: in his crypto grifting, where he launched some NFT projects
Speaker 5: and he was selling bitcoin themed sneakers and you know,
Speaker 5: he was able to make some money off of it,
Speaker 5: and he realized it could be lucrative for him. But
Speaker 5: I think the bigger thing is that the crypto industry
Speaker 5: has made itself an influential voice in politics, and they
Speaker 5: were heavily involved in the twenty twenty four election cycle,
Speaker 5: mostly at the congressional level in terms of where they
Speaker 5: were spending money, but they were very much trying to
Speaker 5: make crypto a focus of the election, something that politicians
Speaker 5: needed to talk about, and they were swinging around huge
Speaker 5: amounts of money to get everyone's attention.
Speaker 1: So this is the heartwarming story of lobbying.
Speaker 5: The tail is all this time, Yes it is.
Speaker 1: And they just figured out how to get in front
Speaker 1: of the right lobbyist.
Speaker 5: I think that's true. But you know, crypto really emerged
Speaker 5: on the scene as its own political force in sort
Speaker 5: of an unheard of way this time around. I mean,
Speaker 5: the crypto industry spent over one hundred million dollars on
Speaker 5: congressional races in twenty twenty four alone, And you know,
Speaker 5: compared to the size of the cryptocurrency industry, which itself
Speaker 5: is very small, that was a shocking amount of money.
Speaker 5: I mean they were rival big oil, big pharma, you know,
Speaker 5: the typical lobbying powers. Suddenly crypto was up there in
Speaker 5: the spending. I mean they were I think their super
Speaker 5: pack was like number four, number five in the top
Speaker 5: the list of super packs by the amounts that they
Speaker 5: had raised, behind only like the Trump super packs and
Speaker 5: the Senate and congressional super packs. So they were a
Speaker 5: huge force in terms of spending this past cycle.
Speaker 1: So they figured out how to spend, they lobbied, they
Speaker 1: got Trump on board, and now they are sort of
Speaker 1: one of the biggest pieces of the Trump coalition. Is
Speaker 1: that right?
Speaker 5: Absolutely? And I mean there's a fair bit of overlap
Speaker 5: between crypto interests and the broader Silicon Valley tech interests
Speaker 5: that we're seeing in Congress then sort of mulling around
Speaker 5: the White House. So for example, Andresen Horowitz has a
Speaker 5: number of their partners taking major roles at the White
Speaker 5: House in advisory positions and so on, and they've been
Speaker 5: investing in crypto and evangelizing crypto for a number of
Speaker 5: years now. You know, David Sachs is the new AI
Speaker 5: and crypto zar at the White House, and he obviously
Speaker 5: has massive interest in both the crypto world and in
Speaker 5: the tech world beyond. And I think altogether those people
Speaker 5: have become their own sort of force in the White
Speaker 5: House now, both officially and unofficially.
Speaker 1: So you got the crypto lobby, then you have the
Speaker 1: tech pros run wild in this admin and that is
Speaker 1: Elon's crew is basically David Sacks. Do you think of
Speaker 1: these people as all the same entity and what are
Speaker 1: the entities and how do they interact with each other?
Speaker 5: They're certainly very related entities, if they're not all the
Speaker 5: same entities, but they do come from sort of similar backgrounds.
Speaker 5: You know, David's and Elon Musk are both part of
Speaker 5: the sort of PayPal mafia, which is, you know a
Speaker 5: group of sort of early tech people who have been
Speaker 5: you know, a lot of them got their start at
Speaker 5: PayPal but have since become very influential in the Silicon
Speaker 5: Valley world. Peter Thiel is another major member, and he
Speaker 5: obviously has major political influence of his own. You know,
Speaker 5: all of the andresen Horoitz people who are now installed
Speaker 5: in positions of power Congress, people who themselves have not
Speaker 5: only support from these interests, but often backgrounds in those
Speaker 5: areas themselves. And so I think we now have this
Speaker 5: massive influence from the tech oligarchy honestly in the White
Speaker 5: House right now, which is quite shocking to see. I mean,
Speaker 5: the tech industry has always, you know, tried to exert
Speaker 5: power in the White House. I don't want to claim
Speaker 5: that this is somehow a new phenomenon that you know,
Speaker 5: did not happen during you know, the oba of years
Speaker 5: and things like that, but it was never so overt,
Speaker 5: and it was never so extreme in terms of the
Speaker 5: direct influence and access of these high powered, enormously wealthy
Speaker 5: people to push their own interests and to influence the
Speaker 5: direction of the government in ways that will benefit them
Speaker 5: personally and their businesses as well.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of conflicts of interest here. I mean,
Speaker 1: that is the number one thing what I want you
Speaker 1: to talk us through because I feel like you really
Speaker 1: have an insight on this, which is interesting and different
Speaker 1: than a lot of other journalists. I'm wondering if you
Speaker 1: could talk us through what you think Elon Musk is
Speaker 1: doing right now in the federal government. And maybe it
Speaker 1: is what he's saying he's doing, and that's fine too,
Speaker 1: And if you want to explain that to us, that
Speaker 1: would be great. And if you think it's something else,
Speaker 1: please explain that.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I mean, it's obviously a little hard to know because
Speaker 5: he has cut off so much access into what is
Speaker 5: going on on Congress people even haven't been able to
Speaker 5: get access to sort of observe what he's doing. But
Speaker 5: you know, he has inserted himself in portions of the government,
Speaker 5: you know, including the Treasury Department. You know, he's becoming
Speaker 5: involved in you know, looking at data at various aid
Speaker 5: agencies and other government agencies, and he's claiming that he
Speaker 5: is slashing everything spending. How would he do that, Well,
Speaker 5: that's sort of the question, because we're seeing some people
Speaker 5: claim that he does not have access or the ability
Speaker 5: to do that. So the Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessant, who
Speaker 5: has just confirmed, has claimed that Musk and his team
Speaker 5: only have read only access. But we're simultaneously seeing reporting
Speaker 5: that his team of very young programmers are making changes
Speaker 5: to code bases that control federal payments and that they
Speaker 5: are stopping payments to basically various line items in these
Speaker 5: federal agencies books. They're stopping those payments, And so we're
Speaker 5: getting conflicting information around, you know, whether or not he
Speaker 5: is simply reviewing the data versus actually making changes. But
Speaker 5: you know, it seems that he is trying to pursue
Speaker 5: sort of a similar approach as he took when he
Speaker 5: took over Twitter, which was to come in and basically
Speaker 5: fire everybody and slash the entire operation down to its
Speaker 5: variess bones, you know, either by forcing people to leave
Speaker 5: or firing them directly, and you know, creating chaos in
Speaker 5: a way that is much more higher stakes than it
Speaker 5: was when he was taking over a private social media company.
Speaker 1: So do you think that that is what's happening though, right,
Speaker 1: because like he's offering biads, we don't know if they're real, right,
Speaker 1: he sent the fork in the road letder to people.
Speaker 1: I mean, do you think that any of this is
Speaker 1: actually like how much of this is perception? How much
Speaker 1: of this is reality.
Speaker 5: It's again hard to say, I think, with especially with
Speaker 5: so little transparency to what's happening, which is quite ironic
Speaker 5: given Musk's claims to want transparency, you know, and to
Speaker 5: be pursuing transparency, we're simultaneously seeing him shutting access down
Speaker 5: to potential outside overseers to you know, there was reporting
Speaker 5: out of four A four media saying that they were
Speaker 5: attempting to change their interpersonal communications so that they couldn't
Speaker 5: be foid and so it's really hard to say, but
Speaker 5: you know, we are seeing widespread layoffs at federal agencies,
Speaker 5: you know, attempts to slash funding which are getting hung
Speaker 5: up in the court somewhat, but certainly you know, are
Speaker 5: being attempted. And we know that Musk has access to
Speaker 5: incredibly sensitive data and systems, and you know, whether or
Speaker 5: not he's making changes or the extent of those changes
Speaker 5: is I think what remains to be seen.
Speaker 1: The thing is he doesn't have the authority to do
Speaker 1: any of this all correctly. He has no congressional authority,
Speaker 1: he doesn't work in the Festal government. All of this
Speaker 1: is not constitutional. It's possibly illegal. You know. It's sort
Speaker 1: of like me saying I am the czar of Palm
Speaker 1: Springs and going and making citizens arrest. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: it works until it doesn't, right, Right.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think there are a lot of very
Speaker 5: legitimate challenges to what Musk is doing in terms of
Speaker 5: his status as a federal employee. If he's actually a
Speaker 5: federal employee, then is he you know, subject to federal
Speaker 5: laws around you know, who's allowed to have access and
Speaker 5: requirements for security clearance and ethics rules and conflict of
Speaker 5: interest rules. You know, is he someone who should be
Speaker 5: subject to congressional review? So I think there are a
Speaker 5: lot of avenues through which people can challenge this in
Speaker 5: the courts, and you know, Congress can challenge this. But
Speaker 5: the problem is that you know, someone needs to actually
Speaker 5: step in and stop him from accessing these systems, and
Speaker 5: that as of yet, has not happened. And so unless
Speaker 5: you know, people are perfectly able to do illegal things,
Speaker 5: you know, just because something is illegal doesn't mean it's impossible.
Speaker 5: And so it is the actual enforcement of that law,
Speaker 5: and you know, people in Congress, in the courts, you know,
Speaker 5: getting the courage to actually do something about it that
Speaker 5: I think is going to be critical in the coming days.
Speaker 1: Right, And that is a real question that has no
Speaker 1: answer really, So I wonder if you are at least
Speaker 1: not yet, I wonder if you could talk to us
Speaker 1: about what is Elon Musk's goal.
Speaker 5: Well, I think some of it is, you know, chaos.
Speaker 5: I think he enjoys the power of, you know, having
Speaker 5: the federal government sort of in his control. And I
Speaker 5: think a lot of it is money. You know, he
Speaker 5: has very lucrative federal contracts. He now potentially has the
Speaker 5: ability to control the competition in those contracts or to
Speaker 5: allocate additional contracts. He I think is also pursuing a
Speaker 5: similar approach as some of the tech and crypto people,
Speaker 5: where he is attempting to use this power to stop
Speaker 5: anything in the way of doing what he might want
Speaker 5: to be doing. So, for example, there are numerous ongoing
Speaker 5: lawsuits and investigations and probes into his multiple companies and
Speaker 5: to him himself personally that he I think would be
Speaker 5: very interested in stopping. Certainly, we've seen that more broadly
Speaker 5: with the tech companies who are hoping to see the
Speaker 5: end of some of the antitrust actions that were happening
Speaker 5: under Biden. The crypto industry. Pretty much every donor from
Speaker 5: the crypto industry has open lawsuits against them from the
Speaker 5: SEC or various other oversight agencies, and so I think
Speaker 5: a lot of it is about pulling back any oversight
Speaker 5: or challenge to the monopoly and to the business interests
Speaker 5: of these companies and allowing them to extract even more
Speaker 5: wealth from you know, everyday people via their operations that
Speaker 5: you know, might otherwise be considered to be against consumer
Speaker 5: protection laws or other various financial laws, or through these
Speaker 5: federal contracts which can be extremely lucrative.
Speaker 1: Right, So you think that's really the ply is just
Speaker 1: to avoid scrutinay, avoid prosecution.
Speaker 5: I think that's a big part of it. I think
Speaker 5: also it's very clear at this point that Elon Musk
Speaker 5: and several others have very strong political interests of their
Speaker 5: own and political agendas that they are trying to pursue
Speaker 5: that are very very extreme.
Speaker 1: Tax cuts for billionaires too.
Speaker 5: Well, certainly that yes, but there's also the very sort
Speaker 5: of right wing social end of it, where you know,
Speaker 5: these are people who have been railing against trans people
Speaker 5: and diversity inclusion programming and all of these types of things,
Speaker 5: and they've all been very clear about making those primary
Speaker 5: targets of their operations in the White House these days
Speaker 5: as well.
Speaker 1: Right exactly, I'm wondering if you could just talk us
Speaker 1: through where using this goes.
Speaker 5: It's really hard to say. I mean, it's it's hard
Speaker 5: to see where this is going. I think, you know,
Speaker 5: we're in a very uncertain time right now. I am
Speaker 5: hoping that there will be widespread resistance both from elected officials,
Speaker 5: from you know, government employees, from those in the judiciary
Speaker 5: who are willing to, you know, defend what this country
Speaker 5: is really supposed to be about, and you know, the
Speaker 5: idea that there needs to be separation of powers and
Speaker 5: a democratic government and all of that, and then certainly
Speaker 5: resistance from you know, everyday people, the refusal to abide
Speaker 5: by these attacks on American people and those you know
Speaker 5: within America and outside, and you know, the attacks on
Speaker 5: freedom of the press, freedom of speed, each freedom of expression,
Speaker 5: all of these very core fundamental freedoms. And I think
Speaker 5: we're at a really critical moment right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I know how we got here, but also I
Speaker 1: don't know how we got here, if that makes any sense.
Speaker 5: Right. Somehow we've all seen this coming, and yet we
Speaker 5: are all shocked to watch it happen.
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, I mean, it just is incredible, and not
Speaker 1: incredible like incredible sunset, but incredible, like you know, watching
Speaker 1: nuclear tests. I'm wondering if you could just for a
Speaker 1: minute give us some reason to not be completely catastrophic
Speaker 1: about those. This is where we get into therapy for me.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, I do you know, see those resistance
Speaker 5: moments happening? You know, I think that it feels a
Speaker 5: little bit like nothing's happening and like no one's doing
Speaker 5: anything and that we're not seeing anything and everyone's just
Speaker 5: sort of going about their lives. But I think that,
Speaker 5: you know, that is something that is perhaps true if
Speaker 5: you look at the front ages of some of the
Speaker 5: biggest newspapers. But if you dig a little bit deeper,
Speaker 5: you know, away from these media outlets that are run
Speaker 5: by people who have been you know, kissing up to
Speaker 5: Trump honestly and who are probably not terribly inclined to
Speaker 5: report on these types of things, you actually see a
Speaker 5: fair bit of resistance happening. There have been major protests
Speaker 5: about various different topics, from you know, transgender healthcare bands
Speaker 5: to immigration enforcement changes to the shutdown of federal agencies
Speaker 5: across the country. We've seen you know, various lawmakers proposing
Speaker 5: legislation or making statements that suggest that they are working
Speaker 5: to fight back. In Congress, They've already been numerous lawsuits
Speaker 5: challenging executive orders and the slashing of federal government employees.
Speaker 5: Various judges have already issued restraining orders in some of
Speaker 5: those cases to stop some of the illegal orders that
Speaker 5: have come out. So, you know, I think there are
Speaker 5: people who are standing up to what is happening and
Speaker 5: who are demanding more from the democratically elected people who
Speaker 5: are supposed to be representing us. And it's just crucial
Speaker 5: that everyone, you know, make sure that we are aware
Speaker 5: of what's happening, supports the people who are doing these
Speaker 5: types of things, and honestly demands that type of action
Speaker 5: from our elected representatives.
Speaker 1: Molly White, thank you. I hope you'll come back.
Speaker 5: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3: No moment perfectly.
Speaker 1: Jesse Cannon, my jung fast.
Speaker 2: Bad things are happening down in Texas an evergreen statement.
Speaker 2: So Texas has removed one point seven million people from
Speaker 2: their healthcare plans.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so this is like reverse Medicare expansion. Right. We
Speaker 1: saw during the Biden administration that a lot of these
Speaker 1: states expanded Medicare that this is the opposite of that. Look,
Speaker 1: Texas is a place where the far right loves to experiment.
Speaker 1: It's the state that repealed Roe v. Wade a year
Speaker 1: before Moby Wade was repealed. We're going to see, I
Speaker 1: think more stuff like this. Not surprising, but pretty interesting
Speaker 1: and pretty disturbing. And look at the Republicans in Texas.
Speaker 1: The Governor Abbott and the Attorneys General Paxton are very, very,
Speaker 1: very emboldened, and they consider themselves to be at the
Speaker 1: forefront of Republican politics. And so that you will see
Speaker 1: them over the next couple of years do things that
Speaker 1: are perhaps even more beyond the pale than even Trump
Speaker 1: World perhaps. And so this is the beginning of this,
Speaker 1: kicking people off Medicare and children's healthcare. And I think
Speaker 1: you're going to see more and more of this. And
Speaker 1: so keep an eye on Texas because it like a
Speaker 1: bunch of other Republican read st day. It's like Tennessee
Speaker 1: and Oklahoma. These states are laboratories for Republican anti democracy.
Speaker 2: One hundred percent.
Speaker 1: That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
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