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 the North Carolina GOP has centured
Speaker 1: Senator Tom Tillis for supporting LGBTQ rights.
Speaker 2: We have a really interesting show today.
Speaker 1: Flatformers Casey Newton talks to us about the increasingly bleak
Speaker 1: outlook for Twitter's financial future. Then we'll talk to las
Speaker 1: Cheris aired about her run against an anti choice state
Speaker 1: senator in the Virginia State House. But first we have
Speaker 1: Washington Post columnist and friend of the pod George Conway.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Fast Politics, my fan favorite man of
Speaker 1: the hour and also person who just told me it
Speaker 1: was just like Donald Trump.
Speaker 3: We'll talk about shit later.
Speaker 2: This is bullshit, your friend of mine, George Conway, Let's.
Speaker 3: Go okay, And you always say nice things about me,
Speaker 3: but the only reason why you have me on is
Speaker 3: you couldn't get anyone else.
Speaker 2: It's not even true.
Speaker 3: I am like the like, oh shit, we have twenty
Speaker 3: minutes to fill. No, I'm going to text Conway.
Speaker 2: I'm telling you it's not true. And in fact, let
Speaker 2: me say.
Speaker 3: Such great guests in the United States, I mean, you're George.
Speaker 1: The thing is, it's hard to find someone who is
Speaker 1: a lawyer, very very smart, entertaining, and also knows all
Speaker 1: the players.
Speaker 3: I don't know all the players.
Speaker 2: You wish you didn't know all the players.
Speaker 3: I was on CNN the other night and they brought
Speaker 3: in I guess it was Jim Trusty. I had no
Speaker 3: idea who he was. I had to leave, unfortunately, because
Speaker 3: I thought it would have been fun to kind of
Speaker 3: parry with him.
Speaker 2: But Jim Trusty is now out right, he is now.
Speaker 3: That was the night of the indictment when he was
Speaker 3: still going on TV kind of defending Trump but also
Speaker 3: incriminating him, and then the next morning he and the
Speaker 3: other guy resigned.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about this first federal indictment ever of
Speaker 1: a president. First indictment of a president, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: there is nobody who else has gotten indicted of an
Speaker 1: ex president.
Speaker 3: There's this guy, Donald J. Trump. He got indicted in
Speaker 3: New York.
Speaker 1: Right, But I'm saying this is the first federal Yeah,
Speaker 1: first federal Yes, So we had the first state and
Speaker 1: that was.
Speaker 3: Actually Donald Trump beat himself. He's the first and second
Speaker 3: president president, the third and fourth president to be indicted.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's really amazed. He's really just nobody. I mean, sir,
Speaker 3: you have, sir with tears in my eyes. I say, sir,
Speaker 3: no one.
Speaker 2: But let's just talk about a second.
Speaker 1: The first indictment was this Alvin Bragg indictment in New
Speaker 1: York State.
Speaker 2: It was a little bit untested, right it was.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's kind of a stormy case. So could
Speaker 3: go you know, it could go either way. They go, yes,
Speaker 3: stormy case. It's the stormy yes, but it.
Speaker 1: Also involves Stormy rough Jemy Daniels. It's a New York
Speaker 1: state case that has a sort of federal tentacles, which
Speaker 1: he should have been brought as a would have been
Speaker 1: a better federal case correctly, and there is talk with
Speaker 1: the New York indictment that the first case about inflating
Speaker 1: asset value might have been a better case.
Speaker 3: I am more complicated. It's very complicated. I mean, look,
Speaker 3: the thing about this case, the one that was just
Speaker 3: brought in Florida is I've always said that it represents
Speaker 3: the shortest distance between Donald Trump and Orange jumps here
Speaker 3: because it's a factually, I mean, they have a mountain
Speaker 3: of evidence. I mean, the volume of evidence is.
Speaker 1: Forty seven pages photos.
Speaker 3: It's a definitive evidence, so I mean, that's the only
Speaker 3: sort of hard thing that's sorting through all the evidence.
Speaker 3: But it's a very simple story and a very easy
Speaker 3: story to tell. It's like it's almost as easy as
Speaker 3: a nickel and dime drug bust case. The only kind
Speaker 3: of wrinkle, really, the only two wrinkles on it is
Speaker 3: that one is well three the amount of evidence it's
Speaker 3: so strong, which is harmful to drump. The second is
Speaker 3: there are classified document procedures that are required to be
Speaker 3: followed in a case like this that make the case
Speaker 3: a little more complex to handle because you can't present
Speaker 3: the classified documents in open court, and the agencies had
Speaker 3: to review the documents to make sure that they're okay
Speaker 3: with even the limited use of the documents secretly on
Speaker 3: the court.
Speaker 1: And we still don't know if those documents will be released,
Speaker 1: though the dj is asking for them to be released
Speaker 1: to the jury.
Speaker 3: Really so they will. I think the way this is
Speaker 3: going to work is that those documents will be shown
Speaker 3: or described to the jury, but in a manner that
Speaker 3: does not reveal them to the public. The jurors as
Speaker 3: a matter, because they have to see the evidence. They
Speaker 3: are entitled to see the evidence. They don't need security clearances.
Speaker 3: The judges need of security clearance, but the prosecutors and
Speaker 3: every court official and all the defense lawyers of which
Speaker 3: he has none right now need to have security clearances.
Speaker 3: And the third wrinkle is he got lucky on the
Speaker 3: draw and drew this judge who kind of helped him
Speaker 3: out the first time around when he brought a frivolous
Speaker 3: lawsuit to try to block the investigation or slow or
Speaker 3: he's she is.
Speaker 2: The judge who appointed the Special Master, or Judge Eileen.
Speaker 3: Cannon, and then got completely obliterated.
Speaker 1: By the Eleventh Circuit, which is a conservative and.
Speaker 3: The chief judge was on Trump shortlist for the Supreme Court.
Speaker 3: I mean, he's a great guy. I know him, and
Speaker 3: he's a very conservative judge, and he was Attorney General
Speaker 3: of Alabama and he was a friendly with Jeff Sessions
Speaker 3: on a Sessions ally. He is just he believes in
Speaker 3: the rule of law. And you could see that in
Speaker 3: that opinion that completely obliterated Judge Cannon's reasoning and appointing
Speaker 3: the Special Master.
Speaker 1: So there is a fantasy out there that Judge Cannon
Speaker 1: could somehow be removed.
Speaker 2: Is there a world in which that happens.
Speaker 3: I think it's a low probability event. I mean it's possible,
Speaker 3: I don't think it's likely. I think there is a
Speaker 3: decent argument for it, because I think the way she
Speaker 3: handled the Special Master litigation was sufficiently lawless, as reflects
Speaker 3: did by the fact this conservative panel of the Eleventh Circuit.
Speaker 3: So I mean they just completely, as I said, just
Speaker 3: obliterated her and castigated her, reasoning she was doing something
Speaker 3: there that those judges who, despite them being Conservatives or
Speaker 3: Republicans on the Court of Appeals, were doing, which is
Speaker 3: judging she was doing something other than what a federal
Speaker 3: judge is supposed to do, and that I think is
Speaker 3: a basis for recusal. That said, it's just I don't
Speaker 3: think she is going to do it, and I'm not
Speaker 3: sure that a Court of Appeals at this point, at
Speaker 3: this stage would force her to do it. I think
Speaker 3: if she did anything remotely resembling what she did in
Speaker 3: the prior litigation, then you might see the prosecutors bring
Speaker 3: that if they can, before the Court of Appeals, and
Speaker 3: in the course of that ask the Court of Appeals
Speaker 3: in correcting whatever error she may make. In correcting whatever
Speaker 3: error she make. They could ask the Court of Appeals
Speaker 3: to reassign the case on remand to it judge.
Speaker 2: But right, but that's miles away.
Speaker 3: That's miles away that I would take a trip to
Speaker 3: Atlanta and back.
Speaker 1: So right now, though Trump is looking for lawyers, can
Speaker 1: you explain to us what's happening there?
Speaker 3: Yeah? I mean basically, Trump historically and traditionally has gone
Speaker 3: through lots of lawyers and lots of lawyers. Very few
Speaker 3: lawyers actually are dumb or corrupt enough to work for him.
Speaker 3: I mean he had I remember he actually asked me
Speaker 3: for advice and assistance in finding a lawyer for the
Speaker 3: Lawler investigation. And basically most of the lawyers he got
Speaker 3: in touch with refused to represent him. Some very very
Speaker 3: good lawyers and he was able to get a couple
Speaker 3: of okay lawyers to help him. He went through the
Speaker 3: lawyers of the first appeachment, you didn't the second impeachment.
Speaker 3: You had this ragtag team of Bizarro from Bizarro World.
Speaker 3: And then for this investigation he had Alena Haba, the
Speaker 3: parking garage lawyer, where's the Halter tops or whatever?
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's great, the one whose friends was rooting.
Speaker 3: Well, no, that's the other one. That's Lindsay Halligan.
Speaker 2: Wait, who's the parking That's no, this.
Speaker 3: Is jenn Alena. That's another bad lawyer. Okay, there's jen
Speaker 3: Alice Alina Habba was the one originally handing the Egene
Speaker 3: Carol case and she has offices in Bedminster.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And then there's this other woman who's just like out
Speaker 3: of law school. But she oh, yes, very attractive. I
Speaker 3: believe very much Trump's type. And I don't mean that
Speaker 3: in any sexistlay. I just know.
Speaker 1: I mean this is how Trump operates. This is not
Speaker 1: a comment on the women, but I'm Trump no.
Speaker 3: Right, and she's got her. And the problem is all
Speaker 3: the lawyers are witnesses against it, and this re court
Speaker 3: for digital to Columbia, and before handling the grand jury,
Speaker 3: Supenas ordered these lawyers to test spot because you cannot
Speaker 3: use lawyers to conduct a crime or a fraud, and
Speaker 3: Trump was doing exactly that, and therefore the privilege dissipates
Speaker 3: the attorney client privilege. So basically, the only lawyers who
Speaker 3: weren't witnesses I think were these two guys who resigned
Speaker 3: the day the indictment was unsealed. So he's got to
Speaker 3: find new lawyers. And not only does he needs to
Speaker 3: find good lawyers, he really needs to find lawyers with
Speaker 3: experience in handling classified document criminal litigation because there's a
Speaker 3: lot of knowledge on the procedures that you need to have.
Speaker 3: And these lawyers also have to have security clearances, right,
Speaker 3: I mean, you can't just go drive out to West
Speaker 3: Palm Beach and find some lawyer who represents parking garages
Speaker 3: there and take her into federal court in Miami to
Speaker 3: litigate this case.
Speaker 2: Even if she has the look did the television lawyer?
Speaker 3: Look here, she's hot.
Speaker 2: So now he's going to have to find those lawyers.
Speaker 1: And yesterday he gave a speech he was should we
Speaker 1: be surprised at all?
Speaker 2: Defiant?
Speaker 3: He will never be, he will never quit, and he
Speaker 3: said something. There was a tweet by a journalist I
Speaker 3: respect who said it was breaking news, Trump will not
Speaker 3: with draw even if convicted. And my response to that was,
Speaker 3: that's not news. Now we know that we know exactly
Speaker 3: what Donald Trump's going to do. I mean, it's interesting
Speaker 3: that he finally went out and said it, but we
Speaker 3: know he wants to take as many people down with
Speaker 3: him if he has to go down as possible.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: I was thinking, actually, when I was reading about that
Speaker 1: Georgia rally that he did, the eighty minute speech he
Speaker 1: did last night, I was thinking, to myself.
Speaker 3: A lot of evidence in there. He keeps generating more
Speaker 3: evidence for Jacksmith, right.
Speaker 1: And I was also thinking, to myself, this is exactly
Speaker 1: what George Conway said would happen. You, I said, this
Speaker 1: is exactly what he said would happen. He's going to
Speaker 1: destroy the Republican Party and perhaps the const with it, or.
Speaker 3: Thinks that I've been saying that are going to happen,
Speaker 3: which I hope I'm wrong mostly right. A one which
Speaker 3: I have already right, and I'm glad that I'm right,
Speaker 3: is that he's going to be indicted multiple times. I
Speaker 3: think he's got at least one or two more annintments
Speaker 3: to go. The second is he's going to get the
Speaker 3: nomination anyway. I hope that doesn't happen, but I think
Speaker 3: I fear that it will. The third is, and I
Speaker 3: hope it doesn't happen, but he's certainly trying to do it,
Speaker 3: is that he will foment violence. And the fourth is
Speaker 3: and I hope this does happen, is that he loses
Speaker 3: the general election, but at great cost to himself, his party,
Speaker 3: in possibly the country. So those are my predictions, and
Speaker 3: I hope I'm wrong. As the two, three and four.
Speaker 3: Oh and they also get pre trial release. He's going
Speaker 3: to get bail.
Speaker 2: Oh, I mean, do you yeah? Of course, don't you think?
Speaker 3: Yeah? So any I mean, I.
Speaker 1: Wanted to ask you about this because I thought there
Speaker 1: was a moment after this indictment drop that felt like
Speaker 1: the moment after January sixth, where I thought, really detailed
Speaker 1: federal indictment.
Speaker 2: Perhaps this is the moment.
Speaker 1: And it did not happen, of course, because Republicans continue
Speaker 1: to offend him. But I was surprised at just how
Speaker 1: so South Dakota enitor Frank Rounds, who you never hear
Speaker 1: from the unprecedented action of indicting in federal court a
Speaker 1: former president who is also a current candidate for president
Speaker 1: cannot be taken lightly as it is inherently political and
Speaker 1: will have a lasting impact on our nation.
Speaker 2: I mean, what the hell is going on here?
Speaker 4: Man?
Speaker 2: Like, It's one thing to see a Jim Jordan die
Speaker 2: on this hell, but Frank Rounds.
Speaker 3: It's crazy, And I mean, they're basically two approaches that Republicans,
Speaker 3: most revolving women taking. One is they were criticizing the
Speaker 3: indictment before they even read it, right, And the other
Speaker 3: thing is that they're remaining silent. I mean, only very
Speaker 3: few people are out there banging the drumas saying this
Speaker 3: is bad and this shows that he's on fifth for office.
Speaker 3: I mean, like Chris Christy a little late in the day,
Speaker 3: but yeah, good for him and Asa Hutchinson. But the
Speaker 3: rest of them are just cowards and they're doing something
Speaker 3: that's very harmful and dangerous the country because they are
Speaker 3: forsaking the rule of law for this one man. They
Speaker 3: would not hesitate, and they would be right if they did.
Speaker 3: If a Democratic president, if Hillary Clinton had done what
Speaker 3: this guy had done, and they talk about Hillary, but
Speaker 3: Hillary didn't do one one hundred thousand of what happened here.
Speaker 3: If some Democrat or liberal had done one fifty of
Speaker 3: what Trump has been shown to have done in this indictment,
Speaker 3: with indisputable, irrefutable evidence, they would be calling for basically
Speaker 3: multiple life terms for that person and something they'd be right.
Speaker 1: Right, No, I mean that's a problem. So I want
Speaker 1: to ask you, as we are now in this sort
Speaker 1: of the indictments out. People have read it. It's forty
Speaker 1: seven pages, it has these photos, it's very organized, it
Speaker 1: has a lot of details. Tuesday, he will go into
Speaker 1: the courthouse in Miami.
Speaker 3: He will get he'll be a rained rain. I have
Speaker 3: to plead not guilty.
Speaker 5: Sing.
Speaker 3: Heil plead not guilty.
Speaker 2: He'll go in with his lawyers.
Speaker 3: Well, if if he has lawyers, he's still got to
Speaker 3: find lawyers with security clearances.
Speaker 2: Right, because he can't have normal lawyers.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 3: Well, I guess he could have somebody without a security
Speaker 3: clearance for the initial appearance in the arrangement, but to
Speaker 3: actually defend the case and look at the documents, which
Speaker 3: you'd have to do if you're conducting a competent defense,
Speaker 3: he's going to have to get somebody who's competent then
Speaker 3: has a security clearance. I don't know if he's going
Speaker 3: to be able to do that.
Speaker 1: So that's sort of where we are. I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: sure he'll be able to do that. I'm sure he'll
Speaker 1: be able to find someone.
Speaker 3: I think probably. I mean, he always managed to pull
Speaker 3: up somebody somewhere. But you got to say he's running
Speaker 3: out of options. He's got to be running out of options.
Speaker 2: And this must also be getting very expensive.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but remember this asshole raised a quarter of a
Speaker 3: billion dollars by lying about January sixth that he can
Speaker 3: use for his legal defense. So a quarter of a
Speaker 3: billion dollars he couldn't possibly spend that one formal defense.
Speaker 3: There's nothing, he has no defense, So what's there to
Speaker 3: spend money on? Okay, So then what do you think
Speaker 3: the timetable on this is. It's federal.
Speaker 1: Jack Smith wants it to go quickly, but it could
Speaker 1: it's still probably going to be a year.
Speaker 3: Right, Well, Look, a good judge, which we unfortunately it's
Speaker 3: not clear that we have, who understands the seriousness of
Speaker 3: the case and would realize that this has to be
Speaker 3: given priority for the sake of the country, for the people,
Speaker 3: and even for the defendant, and would give this case priority.
Speaker 3: And because of the security issues, you just can't have
Speaker 3: this case drag out. And so a good judge, like
Speaker 3: if you had one of these judges in the District
Speaker 3: of Columbia who's familiar with classified document litigation, or in
Speaker 3: the Eastern District of Virginia and very smart type kind
Speaker 3: of judges that you have up there, or like the
Speaker 3: judge Egene Carrol had in her case Judge Lewis Kaplan,
Speaker 3: who was just extremely smart and very able and very
Speaker 3: efficient and fast. You can get this case. I think
Speaker 3: the trial in a year or slightly less, right if
Speaker 3: the judge really just dealt quickly with pre trial motions
Speaker 3: and didn't put up with any bullshit and let things
Speaker 3: go up. If there were appeals, let them go up,
Speaker 3: and Appeals handles those quickly, which I think they will
Speaker 3: do because they did it in connection with the Special
Speaker 3: Master litigation where Judge Cannon was basically unceremoniously and brutally
Speaker 3: reversed by a conservative panel Eleventh Circuit last year. I
Speaker 3: think that this case could be brought to Drash and Guy.
Speaker 3: I think that's the one problem. I think that's the
Speaker 3: biggest problem with the draw of the judge is that
Speaker 3: she has that power to slow things down if she
Speaker 3: chooses to exercise it in that way. I don't know
Speaker 3: what she's going to do. I don't really understand her
Speaker 3: thinking and what she did the last time around. I
Speaker 3: mean she has that's where her discretion is maximal. She
Speaker 3: could slow this down. It wouldn't take pretty much because
Speaker 3: there's just gonna be a lot of pre trial motions,
Speaker 3: and the Trump people are going to do everything they
Speaker 3: can to slow it down because that's the only play.
Speaker 3: They don't actually have a substance of defense factually legally
Speaker 3: upon the merits.
Speaker 2: One last question and then we're out of time.
Speaker 1: Does this make Trump more likely to be the nomine
Speaker 1: I've thought.
Speaker 3: That it might. I don't know that it does, because
Speaker 3: I do think there is a Trump fatigue that is
Speaker 3: also setting in among Republicans, even along more some of
Speaker 3: the diehard Republicans. So I think there are some people
Speaker 3: who are much more optimistic than I am, who think
Speaker 3: that people are going to get tired of this, and
Speaker 3: when they vote in the primaries in New Hampshire and
Speaker 3: the caucases in Iowa and the South Carolina primary, they're
Speaker 3: going to pull a curtain behind them and pull the
Speaker 3: lever for somebody other than Donald Trump. But the problem
Speaker 3: there is you've got so many people running. I don't
Speaker 3: think there is anybody with the stature or the credibility
Speaker 3: among those people who have been besotted with lies from
Speaker 3: Trump and box news now for the better part of
Speaker 3: four to six years or more, who are going to
Speaker 3: sufficiently get behind one alternative that Trump could be defeated
Speaker 3: and Trump could win the nomination well less than fifty
Speaker 3: percent of the vote because it's designed to let the
Speaker 3: front run or run away with it. So I think
Speaker 3: he probably will get the nomination. But I also think,
Speaker 3: and as I said, I think he's going to ferment violence.
Speaker 3: I do think he's going to do a lot of
Speaker 3: damage to himself and to the Republican Party and to
Speaker 3: the country and continuing his question for the presidency. But
Speaker 3: he will continue that question no matter what. Just like
Speaker 3: he said yesterday, thank you, Thank you, George Conway.
Speaker 2: I really appreciate you.
Speaker 3: Always a lot of fun. And call me the next
Speaker 3: time you can't find anyone else.
Speaker 2: Would you stop.
Speaker 1: Casey Newton is a reporter, platformer, and co host of
Speaker 1: the podcast hard Fork Welcome back to Fast Politics, Casey
Speaker 1: Newton him, Molly, very excited.
Speaker 2: To have you here.
Speaker 5: Thanks, excited to be back.
Speaker 1: We're all going to be murdered by AI robots right.
Speaker 5: Discuss to be determined, but I think the pace of
Speaker 5: development there is definitely cause for concern.
Speaker 1: So explain that to me, because I can't figure out
Speaker 1: if I'm too worried or not worried enough.
Speaker 5: I think it's honestly hard to tell. I think what
Speaker 5: we know is that these systems are getting better really quickly,
Speaker 5: and we don't have a great understanding of how they work.
Speaker 5: So we know some things about them, but they are
Speaker 5: improving at a rate that has surprised even some of
Speaker 5: the people who are working on them. And so the
Speaker 5: fear is that they will keep getting better at the
Speaker 5: current pace and at some point they'll just kind of
Speaker 5: tip over into super intelligence. And if we don't really
Speaker 5: understand how they work, we might be at a disadvantage
Speaker 5: to them somehow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Oh, so that they could actually like they could
Speaker 1: actually just kill us.
Speaker 5: I mean, they probably wouldn't just start killing us, you know,
Speaker 5: I mean instead of like sort of skipping all the
Speaker 5: way to that scenario. I think there are some other
Speaker 5: others in between, Yeah, Like I mean, for example, we
Speaker 5: know these things will be pretty good at spreading misinformation.
Speaker 5: You'll be able to simulate an infinite number of propaganda
Speaker 5: campaigns and figure out which ones are the best at
Speaker 5: influencing a simulated group of people, and then you could
Speaker 5: take that sort of winner and use it in the
Speaker 5: real world, or another one that keeps a lot of
Speaker 5: AI safety experts up at night is what if these
Speaker 5: tools get really good at designing bioweapons and then all
Speaker 5: of a sudden, anyone with internet access can figure out
Speaker 5: how to something like that. So there are a lot
Speaker 5: of steps along the road to AI annihilation that don't
Speaker 5: even really involve the AI creating killer robots. It's just
Speaker 5: about the tools that they will put into the hands
Speaker 5: of people.
Speaker 1: Right, No killer robots is always good news, though there's
Speaker 1: certainly a lot to worry about there. I want to
Speaker 1: get to something else in a minute, but I just
Speaker 1: want to for one more second.
Speaker 2: Will AI?
Speaker 1: I mean one of the things, as with my own anxiety,
Speaker 1: is about AI. The writer skills is on strike right now.
Speaker 1: One of the things they do not want is for
Speaker 1: their writing to be used as an AI teacher. I mean,
Speaker 1: how worried should we writers be about You'll notice I
Speaker 1: do not ever say content create. I've completely weaned off
Speaker 1: of calling it content finally, like three years too late.
Speaker 1: But how worried should we be about the idea that
Speaker 1: writing will no longer be.
Speaker 2: A skill that people give a shit about.
Speaker 5: I think the writers are right to be worried that
Speaker 5: the studios will want to automate more of their labor
Speaker 5: ome and to reduce the amount that they have to
Speaker 5: pay them. So I think that's a totally valid concern.
Speaker 5: It's worth going on strikeover. You know, I would say
Speaker 5: respectfully that a lot of Hollywood films are pretty formulaic,
Speaker 5: and one thing that AI is good at is looking
Speaker 5: at formulas and re creating them. I also suspect, by
Speaker 5: the way, that even screenwriters will find that AI is
Speaker 5: a valuable thought partner, and they'll say, you know what,
Speaker 5: I want to write a romantic comedy, like, give me
Speaker 5: fifty ideas for how one might start. So I think
Speaker 5: there's potential there for it to be a creative tool.
Speaker 5: But to the extent it becomes more useful, I do
Speaker 5: think it could lower the price that studios are willing
Speaker 5: to pay writers. So I think it's going to be
Speaker 5: a really kind of tense fight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's really bad. It's also quite bad. So I
Speaker 1: want to ask you about this piece you wrote, the
Speaker 1: Platforms give Up on twenty twenty lies, what exactly is
Speaker 1: going on here?
Speaker 2: Because it seems really bad.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I think it's really bad too. There was this
Speaker 5: moment after the twenty twenty election the January sixth attacks,
Speaker 5: where the platform said, Okay, election denihilism is providing the
Speaker 5: fuel for a violent movement, and for that reason, we're
Speaker 5: going to remove election lies. So you can't go on Twitter,
Speaker 5: you can't go on Facebook, you can't go on YouTube
Speaker 5: and say the twenty twenty election was stolen, And one
Speaker 5: by one they all gave up on that policy. Twitter
Speaker 5: was the first that actually preceded Elon Musk taking over.
Speaker 5: They basically only enforced that policy for about a year
Speaker 5: after Joe Biden was inaugurated. Facebook, when they restored Donald
Speaker 5: Trump to the platform earlier this year, said that they
Speaker 5: were no longer going to remove those lies. I think
Speaker 5: because they thought there's no way that Trump will be
Speaker 5: able to run for president and use our platform if
Speaker 5: we force them to tell the truth about the twenty
Speaker 5: twenty election. And then on Friday of last week, YouTube said,
Speaker 5: you know what, We're not going to enforce these lies either,
Speaker 5: and so Trump is or whoever else is free to
Speaker 5: say that the twenty twenty election was stolen. So we've
Speaker 5: gone from a world where the platforms were, in my view,
Speaker 5: doing the right thing and they're now all doing the
Speaker 5: wrong thing. Yeah, why I think there are a couple
Speaker 5: of reasons. I think one, this is just a capitulation
Speaker 5: to the reality that Republicans lie constantly about the twenty
Speaker 5: twenty election. It's essentially, you know what we tech nerds
Speaker 5: would call a distributed denial of service attack. Essentially, they
Speaker 5: hit you with so many lies that the platforms throw
Speaker 5: their hands up and say, well, we're just not going
Speaker 5: to enforce this anymore. I also think the Republicans taking
Speaker 5: over the House and launching a bunch of bullshit investigations
Speaker 5: has scared the platforms because they don't want to have
Speaker 5: their executive sitting in the hot seat having to answer
Speaker 5: questions about why they're removing twenty twenty election lies. I
Speaker 5: think there's probably some feeling there that they think that
Speaker 5: the potential for violence has decreased, and so it's just
Speaker 5: not as dangerous to lie about twenty twenty as it
Speaker 5: used to be. So I think those are some of
Speaker 5: the reasons. I just don't really find any of them
Speaker 5: very compelling.
Speaker 1: It is so incredibly crazy that they've just made this decision.
Speaker 1: One of the things that strikes me is this RFK
Speaker 1: Junior town we have el on. So, I mean, I
Speaker 1: think that it's important when we talk about this. RFK
Speaker 1: Junior is a creation of Bannon. Right, He's not a
Speaker 1: real Democratic candidate. The goal here is to kind of
Speaker 1: get the left leaning into Penance to abandon Biden. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think Bannon has identified this sweet spot of anti
Speaker 1: vas left leaners who could be lured into this candidate.
Speaker 1: Maybe Elan and that crew very excited to platform him.
Speaker 2: I mean, just talk to me about that. Yeah.
Speaker 5: I mean the thing that I have been focused on
Speaker 5: with RFK is that if he were any other person,
Speaker 5: he would not have access to Instagram certainly, Right. Instagram
Speaker 5: doesn't let you show up every day and say vaccines kill. That,
Speaker 5: of course, is basically rfk's whole shtick, right, is just
Speaker 5: trying to scare people away from getting vaccinated. And in fact,
Speaker 5: he did lose his Instagram account in twenty twenty one,
Speaker 5: but then he announced he was running for president, and presto,
Speaker 5: he's back on the platform. Because if you want to
Speaker 5: spread a bunch of obnoxious lies, it turns out there's
Speaker 5: a loophole where by running for president, you can get
Speaker 5: back on the platform and say whatever you want. So this
Speaker 5: is just another I think, really disturbing case of a
Speaker 5: platform that had done the right thing that walked it
Speaker 5: back out of a desire to platform all the presidential candidates.
Speaker 1: Elon has a sort of group of groupies. They have
Speaker 1: become the Twitter power users. Will you talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about who they are? And they're sort of tech pros,
Speaker 1: but they're actually not really like the primer, they're kind
Speaker 1: of sort of ancillary hangers on too, right.
Speaker 2: Will you discuss?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 5: I mean, I think what I have observed is that
Speaker 5: once Elon Musk destroyed the old verification system and started
Speaker 5: to let people buy their blue checks for eight bucks
Speaker 5: a month, a very particular sort of person bought those checks.
Speaker 5: It was somebody who was a bit big Elon Musk fan,
Speaker 5: somebody who wanted heightened visibility on Twitter, and somebody who
Speaker 5: is okay with it transforming into a right wing social
Speaker 5: network with essentially no content moderation standards. And so now
Speaker 5: if you look at the replies of any tweet, what
Speaker 5: you see is a bunch of folks who are mostly
Speaker 5: right leaning, who have those paid blue checks, and they
Speaker 5: kind of spread their ideology. And so if you look
Speaker 5: at any tweet, you're sort of more likely to see
Speaker 5: a right wing point of view than you were, you know,
Speaker 5: three or six months ago. So I think that's that's
Speaker 5: kind of the core dynamic, and it's one of the
Speaker 5: reasons that Twitter is falling apart.
Speaker 1: Talk to me about where Twitter is right now with
Speaker 1: advertisers and users, etc.
Speaker 5: So advertising revenue is down about fifty nine percent is
Speaker 5: the last reporting that we've read on that subject. It
Speaker 5: seems kind of low to me, Like, I'd love to
Speaker 5: know why forty one percent of advertisers are still there.
Speaker 5: That's kind of what we know on the revenue front.
Speaker 5: Musk continue to say that the platform is roughly at
Speaker 5: a break even rate, but I just kind of don't
Speaker 5: believe it. They've lost so much ad revenue. Their subscription
Speaker 5: program is not making any significant amount of money, and
Speaker 5: it seems like usage of the platform has been in
Speaker 5: a sort of gentle decline. So you know, it isn't
Speaker 5: as if people have abandoned it entirely, but as it
Speaker 5: becomes more of a kind of right wing media network,
Speaker 5: it's it's declining in influence and more people on the
Speaker 5: left in the middle are just seeking out alternatives. So
Speaker 5: it's not totally dead yet, but in terms of like
Speaker 5: you know, how quickly can you kill a platform. It's
Speaker 5: pretty fast for someone who only bought the thing last October.
Speaker 1: What I think is so interesting about Elon buying Twitter
Speaker 1: was he bought it for the influence, right, because if not,
Speaker 1: you could buy true social and save forty billion or more.
Speaker 2: That is the thing he is killing off, right.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I mean, there's just no doubt that Twitter is
Speaker 5: less influential than it used to be. I'm not sure,
Speaker 5: honestly how much he cares he I think he loved
Speaker 5: it just sort of as a megaphone for himself, and
Speaker 5: if the entire platform died around it, that was really
Speaker 5: never going to be any skin off his nose because
Speaker 5: he would still have his you know, one hundred million
Speaker 5: plus followers. I'm not somebody who believes that there was
Speaker 5: a that there is a grand plan here. I don't
Speaker 5: think there really ever was.
Speaker 1: I think the grand plan is to is that overconfidence
Speaker 1: is a hell of a drug, or like I think
Speaker 1: you're a genius because you you know, you've done some
Speaker 1: smart stuff, or you've been very lucky, depending on you know,
Speaker 1: who's who's describing it. But I don't think there's some
Speaker 1: huge conspiracy here. But this will affect the twenty twenty
Speaker 1: four elections.
Speaker 5: Yes, although I think there's still time to build up
Speaker 5: other platforms and other media networks, you know, Like I
Speaker 5: think that because of how Twitter has declined over the
Speaker 5: past six or eight months, already, media attention is starting
Speaker 5: to splinter onto other platforms. They're looking at Macedon, They're
Speaker 5: looking at Blue Sky. Instagram is going to launch a
Speaker 5: kind of Twitter clone.
Speaker 2: When does that happen.
Speaker 5: I think it'll be before the election, for sure, so
Speaker 5: kind of like keep an eye out for that. But
Speaker 5: the media ecosystem is fragmenting again, and Twitter just is
Speaker 5: no longer at the center of the conversation.
Speaker 1: Right It does seem like that. I mean, I'm on
Speaker 1: Blue Sky. I like it a lot. I mean I
Speaker 1: think it's good.
Speaker 5: It's fun like it. It has a quirky energy to it.
Speaker 5: You know, people are actually having fun there, which I
Speaker 5: think is almost entirely not true of Twitter anymore. You know,
Speaker 5: I don't know that it will be Yeah, I don't
Speaker 5: know that that Blue Sky is going to be the
Speaker 5: big winner in all this, but it's like fun for
Speaker 5: right now, and I'll take it.
Speaker 1: When does Blue Sky sort of open its doors that's
Speaker 1: a good question.
Speaker 5: I think they're still trying to figure out some pretty
Speaker 5: tough questions around how do you enable content moderation. But
Speaker 5: Blue Sky's kind of a weird company. It was always
Speaker 5: intended to be kind of a proto type that, like
Speaker 5: other developers would come in and build their own clients for.
Speaker 5: But people were so ready for an alternative because Twitter
Speaker 5: is in decline that it blew up pretty quick. So
Speaker 5: they're trying to figure out I think, Okay, how do
Speaker 5: we actually let millions of people in this thing without
Speaker 5: it all falling apart?
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think that's a really good question.
Speaker 1: I do wonder like it's so funny because for such
Speaker 1: a long time I always thought of Zuckerberg as the
Speaker 1: big villain in the social media space because of the
Speaker 1: genocide that was organized on Facebook and the anti vax
Speaker 1: stuff and all of the many ways in which Facebook
Speaker 1: had done had sort of allowed terrible things and perhaps
Speaker 1: was a platform for terrible things to take place. But
Speaker 1: Elon has really made him look good.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I mean, you know, at the end of the day,
Speaker 5: Facebook slash Meta is a pretty normal company. They have
Speaker 5: content standards, they try to enforce them, They make tons
Speaker 5: of mistakes and we should talk about those, but like
Speaker 5: they'd make generally a good faith effort to keep terrible
Speaker 5: stuff off the platform. And then Elon Must came along
Speaker 5: and just didn't really care about any of that stuff
Speaker 5: at all. And so yes, by comparison, the Facebook crew
Speaker 5: looks great.
Speaker 2: I was with.
Speaker 1: Someone really smart the other day who said the only
Speaker 1: way because I've heard a lot of stupid people say this,
Speaker 1: so but I heard someone smart say this, So then
Speaker 1: I thought, maybe this is actually a good idea, that
Speaker 1: the only way to regulate social media. And again, these
Speaker 1: social media companies have really skirted regulation, maybe for any
Speaker 1: number of reasons, was to repeal section two thirty. I mean,
Speaker 1: is that a really stupid idea?
Speaker 2: Again? And can you do a two seconds on what
Speaker 2: section two thirty is?
Speaker 5: Yeah, So Section two thirty is the law that prevents
Speaker 5: platforms in most cases from being held liable for what
Speaker 5: their users post. So if I defame Molly on Facebook,
Speaker 5: Molly can't see Facebook. She can only sue me. So
Speaker 5: that's section two thirty. Your question was who is doing what.
Speaker 2: To get rid of section two thirty, So basically that
Speaker 2: they should repeal section two thirty and get rid of
Speaker 2: it and remove the protections the Internet companies have for
Speaker 2: the sort of platform protections and make them like a publisher.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: No, I hate this idea so much. So here's what
Speaker 5: happens when you do that. Okay, what happens when you
Speaker 5: do that is nobody can publish anything, right, because they're
Speaker 5: so terrified that they will be sued that if you
Speaker 5: are a queer person, a person of color, you want
Speaker 5: to challenge the power structure in any way you want
Speaker 5: to flirt with saying anything that comes close to breaking
Speaker 5: the law gets removed automatically. So like if you want
Speaker 5: to repeal section two thirty, you are asking the platforms
Speaker 5: to radically increase their level of censorship to the detriment
Speaker 5: of social justice movements.
Speaker 1: So how do you solve a problem like the platform
Speaker 1: feels it has no responsibility for what is published on
Speaker 1: it or has no skin in the game.
Speaker 5: Right, I'm in favor of a few things. One mandating transparency.
Speaker 5: They have to tell us what kind of content they're removing.
Speaker 5: Maybe you mandate that they look for hate speech and
Speaker 5: report it. Anything that sort of requires them to look
Speaker 5: for stuff and tell us what they found. I'm generally
Speaker 5: in favor of I think there's also some interesting ideas
Speaker 5: around like, are we really worried that people are posting
Speaker 5: things that are offensive or are we worried that millions
Speaker 5: of people are seeing them?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 5: So, do you want to maybe require that any post
Speaker 5: over a certain number of views gets viewed by a
Speaker 5: human within a certain amount of time to determine whether
Speaker 5: it's still on the platform something like that. So I
Speaker 5: tend to favor the those kinds of solutions over more
Speaker 5: draconian stuff. You know, I just accept at the end
Speaker 5: of the day that if you want people to be
Speaker 5: able to talk about social issues and politics, like, there
Speaker 5: is just going to be a lot of stuff that
Speaker 5: you don't like. So, you know, I just accept that
Speaker 5: I'm going to see a lot of stuff that I
Speaker 5: don't like on social networks. And I'm nervous about letting
Speaker 5: the government come in and regulating that because once you
Speaker 5: sort of open up that door, a lot of other
Speaker 5: terrible things happen. But I do think that there is
Speaker 5: stuff that can be done around sort of how many
Speaker 5: people see those posts and what platforms tell us about it.
Speaker 5: And then the third thing I would say is let
Speaker 5: researcher study this stuff right, Like mandate researcher is being
Speaker 5: able to get access to internal systems that let us
Speaker 5: see how posts are being ranked and what content is
Speaker 5: being viewed and that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: Is Elon Musk a liar or is he just like
Speaker 1: kind of aspirational in his truths? And the case and
Speaker 1: point I want to say is like he tweeted that
Speaker 1: like they'll be if there are ads at your replies,
Speaker 1: you'll make money. He's releasing the algorithm for transparency. I mean,
Speaker 1: did he release the algorithm? And I mean it seems
Speaker 1: to me like he makes a lot of promises that
Speaker 1: aren't really true discuss I mean, I'm not inside the
Speaker 1: guy's head, so it's hard to say.
Speaker 5: But like, has he said many many, many many things
Speaker 5: that have turned out not to be true? Yes, Like
Speaker 5: I apply basically a ninety percent discount right to everything
Speaker 5: he says, you know, in my own newsletter. Like if
Speaker 5: he says something like we're gonna start paying out creators,
Speaker 5: you know, based on ads and their replies, I don't
Speaker 5: even put it in my newsletter because my feeling is
Speaker 5: until it starts happening, I have no reason to believe
Speaker 5: that it's true. I don't assume anything he says is true.
Speaker 1: I'll say that it's like the Donald Trump school of truth,
Speaker 1: very much truth thing. And then the one last question
Speaker 1: was their algorithmic transparency when.
Speaker 5: They publish their like open source algorithm.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: My understanding, you know, based on our conversations with Twitter engineers,
Speaker 5: was that they did reveal some of their code, but
Speaker 5: it is not truly a glimpse all the way inside
Speaker 5: their systems. There are a lot of things that they
Speaker 5: left out that you would probably want to know if
Speaker 5: you wanted to fully understand how their algorithm works. So
Speaker 5: you know, in practice, I don't think it's a bad
Speaker 5: thing to release part of the algorithm. I think it's
Speaker 5: probably good to let outsiders understand how ranking systems work.
Speaker 5: But in terms of I think what was promised it
Speaker 5: fell short of that.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for joining us. I hope you'll
Speaker 1: come back. You're very lively guest.
Speaker 5: Oh well, I have a great time doing what I do.
Speaker 5: Molly so happy to come back anytime.
Speaker 2: That's great.
Speaker 1: Hi, it's Mollie, and I am wildly excited that for
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Speaker 1: Thanks for your support. La Cherise Aired is the former
Speaker 1: representative of the sixty third district in the Virginia House
Speaker 1: of Delegates. Welcome to Fast Politics, La Cherise Aired.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me.
Speaker 4: I'm looking forward to our conversation.
Speaker 2: So tell me what you're running for.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm running for Senate District thirteen down in Virginia
Speaker 4: and a highly competitive Democratic primary against the last anti
Speaker 4: choice senator here in Virginia.
Speaker 1: Okay, so now this is for the Virginia House of Delegates.
Speaker 1: Explain to our listener a little bit about what the
Speaker 1: Virginia House of Delegates is. I have actually been there
Speaker 1: because I have history buff children. But it's very interesting,
Speaker 1: but it's also important part of Virginia politics.
Speaker 2: So I am actually running for Virginia Senates. But I did. Oh,
Speaker 2: you were in the House of Delegate.
Speaker 4: I was in the Virginia House of Delegates, but I'm
Speaker 4: running for the Virginia Senate now.
Speaker 2: And in Virginia.
Speaker 4: The House of Delegates is the equivalent to your two
Speaker 4: term representative body, and your Senate is your four term
Speaker 4: or year I should say, representative body to make up
Speaker 4: our the entirety of our general Assembly.
Speaker 1: So now explain to me who you're running against and
Speaker 1: a little bit about who that candidate is.
Speaker 4: So there's a lot you could say about my opponent's
Speaker 4: Joe Morrissey.
Speaker 2: I will leave the but he is a Democrat, but
Speaker 2: he's anti choice.
Speaker 4: He is a Democrat, but he is anti choice, and
Speaker 4: I would say questionable on many of us our democratic values.
Speaker 2: But that alone has made for me to.
Speaker 4: Really fight hard back against his candidacy, especially in this
Speaker 4: moment when thinking about number one, the integrity and decency
Speaker 4: we should want from our elected leaders. But furthermore, while
Speaker 4: we are battling to hold on to the rights that
Speaker 4: we have here in Virginia, his stance is just unacceptable.
Speaker 1: It is so interesting that there are still anti Chruois demos.
Speaker 2: I was like, that's a very narrow lane. I hope
Speaker 2: it's the last of a dying greed.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and especially in a state like Virginia, where it's
Speaker 1: such an important state for any number of reasons, it's
Speaker 1: so evenly divided, you have a really problematic governor. I mean, yes, yes,
Speaker 1: all of the above, So talk to me about those issues.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 4: I mean it was very unfortunate that we had a
Speaker 4: trifecta in Virginia between twenty nineteen and twenty twenty one.
Speaker 4: And when I was in office during that period of time,
Speaker 4: we passed so many incredible progressive policies to really undo
Speaker 4: a decade or more long of Republican rule, to just
Speaker 4: bring us to a state of normalcy, to protect families
Speaker 4: and workers and our environments. And at that time there
Speaker 4: were social unrest, so criminal justice reform, and I think
Speaker 4: we got a little comfortable. We felt like we had
Speaker 4: checked all of these boxes and we were cruising. We
Speaker 4: were now a blue state will come along. Glenn Youonkin
Speaker 4: in his red vest spewing sort of a moderate approached
Speaker 4: in his gubernatorial race, and I think that he moved
Speaker 4: a lot of people, especially in a post Trump error,
Speaker 4: But it didn't take long for him to get into
Speaker 4: office and undo many of those great policies that we move.
Speaker 2: Forward, and so now we have to fight back.
Speaker 4: We were comfortable, and now it's time for us to
Speaker 4: get back in the game, get through this next general
Speaker 4: election where we're fighting to take back the House and
Speaker 4: take back the Senate, and for me in particular, to
Speaker 4: fight in a blue district where you have someone who
Speaker 4: is anti a lot of democratic values and make sure
Speaker 4: that in two more years from now we take back
Speaker 4: the governor's mansion.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about some of what Youngkin has done
Speaker 1: in Virginia.
Speaker 2: Let's start with yesterday, great perfect So.
Speaker 4: This week alone, we are talking about the fact that
Speaker 4: we have clouds that are orange in New York, even
Speaker 4: down here in Virginia, you have low air quality alerts
Speaker 4: around the commonwealth, and you have a governor who is
Speaker 4: pulling Virginia out of Reggie.
Speaker 2: Let's explain what Reggie is.
Speaker 4: So Reggie is a policy, one of those amazing policies
Speaker 4: that we ourselves into the come both added ourselves into
Speaker 4: again while we have the majority, and it's all about
Speaker 4: trying to make sure that we're cutting regional greenhouse gases.
Speaker 4: So Reggie is original greenhouse gas initiative and it's basically
Speaker 4: one of those efforts to say, if we're going to
Speaker 4: truly combat what we are experiencing from climate change, this
Speaker 4: initiative lays out several.
Speaker 2: Metrics and approaches to take to do so.
Speaker 4: And to think that we have a governor who's going
Speaker 4: to now pull us out of that initiative and pretend
Speaker 4: like global warming, climate change is not real, Virginia is
Speaker 4: not being affected.
Speaker 2: On a day where we are literally tixo.
Speaker 4: Theoriating the impacts all these things, it's pretty unbelievable.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I have to say we got it
Speaker 1: first in New York, and I had never The New
Speaker 1: York Post, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch, a very
Speaker 1: far right tabloid, was like, blame Canada. But you don't
Speaker 1: blame I mean, this is climate change is not Canada.
Speaker 1: I mean, yes, there's a fire there, but climate change
Speaker 1: made this possible.
Speaker 2: We never live like.
Speaker 4: This exactly exactly, And so I mean, I think that
Speaker 4: is the difference between this man who ran as a
Speaker 4: moderate what has come into office and truly been another
Speaker 4: maga Republican.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is.
Speaker 1: I have to say I've been really surprised at how
Speaker 1: he has really tacked to the right, even more than
Speaker 1: I thought he would.
Speaker 4: Yes, no, I'm not surprised at all. I think as
Speaker 4: you started out saying, Virginia is very much a state
Speaker 4: that has trended blue and or purplish in the past,
Speaker 4: and he knew in order to be successful he had
Speaker 4: to run in that way. But now Virginia is suffering
Speaker 4: because of his presidential ambitions and design to compete against
Speaker 4: a Trump and a Desantus, and so it's been quite dangerous.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that.
Speaker 1: And it's so funny because it's not funny, but it's
Speaker 1: so odd because that's what's happening in Florida. I mean,
Speaker 1: you have all these states, even Texas, where you have
Speaker 1: these governors who really believe that the more they radicalize
Speaker 1: their state and turn them into many hungaries, the more
Speaker 1: this will serve them.
Speaker 4: And just to bring it back to my opponent, it's
Speaker 4: been very clear watching this guy and seeing him align
Speaker 4: himself with Yonkin and on issues regarding education in this district,
Speaker 4: public schools are really important. Yankin has this desire to
Speaker 4: put lab schools all over the place. On environmental issues,
Speaker 4: on choice in particular, Yonkin has finally come on record
Speaker 4: saying that he would be in support of putting a
Speaker 4: abortion ban in place in Virginia, and my opponent has
Speaker 4: on record publicly stated he would work with Yonkin to
Speaker 4: put that band in place.
Speaker 1: And so I was at a Democrat as a Democrat exactly.
Speaker 4: So we have to get to a place where that
Speaker 4: is unacceptable. We have to get to a place where
Speaker 4: we're not going to settle for these Democrats in name
Speaker 4: only that are doing harm to our communities, especially in
Speaker 4: Democratic districts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that is just incredible.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's so shocking to may tell me about
Speaker 1: what your race looks like, and what you need and
Speaker 1: when is your primary, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 4: We are trying to make sure every voter in this
Speaker 4: Democratic district is both aware of this election that takes
Speaker 4: place on June the twentieth, that they are aware that
Speaker 4: they can vote early. Fortunately, we have those great voting
Speaker 4: laws here in Virginia that we are working to hold
Speaker 4: on to, but they can vote early up until June
Speaker 4: the seventeenth. But also that there is no way we
Speaker 4: need to keep someone in power like Joe Morrissey, who
Speaker 4: is proving you won't stand up for our rights, who
Speaker 4: has proven that he will side with Republicans when it's
Speaker 4: a convenient for him, and quite frankly, we won't get
Speaker 4: into the personal life, but frankly, his personal life is
Speaker 4: disqualifying of him being in a position of power altogether.
Speaker 4: And so we are organizing, we are knocking on doors,
Speaker 4: we are making phone calls, and we would love to have.
Speaker 2: Any additional support to do those things.
Speaker 1: So this is a safe blue seed, and the competition
Speaker 1: really happens at the primary level here.
Speaker 4: Absolutely, this race, this Democratic primary, is the race.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: I want to ask you, why do you think that
Speaker 1: he's sort of did he has?
Speaker 2: He just been in the seat for such a long time.
Speaker 4: Well, he has been in office, quite frankly, longer than
Speaker 4: I've been alive in some form or another.
Speaker 2: So there is that.
Speaker 4: But I will say for most readers or most of
Speaker 4: your listeners that are just baffled by this all together,
Speaker 4: you have to go all the way back to his
Speaker 4: time as an attorney, where he had a reputation of
Speaker 4: being that attorney to get I don't want to say criminals,
Speaker 4: but I will say those who were facing challenging cases
Speaker 4: off and that made him very popular, that made him
Speaker 4: grow a brand that was the only thing people knew,
Speaker 4: So they never looked at his legislative record. They never
Speaker 4: looked at what he was doing while he was in
Speaker 4: the House or in the Senate.
Speaker 2: But now that we have gone.
Speaker 4: To look and saw just how in effective he has
Speaker 4: been and how out of sync with democratic values he
Speaker 4: has been, we're calling it out every step of the way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's great, And I want to ask to you
Speaker 1: how important is it on the state level.
Speaker 2: What can you guys do at the state level to
Speaker 2: protect choice?
Speaker 4: I mean, we are the last stop. I mean it starts,
Speaker 4: it ends with legislators. So right now, Virginia passed the
Speaker 4: Reproductive Health Care Act. Shout out to Congresswoman Jennifer McClellan
Speaker 4: during her time in the Senate for leading part of
Speaker 4: that effort. But that is the law of the land
Speaker 4: in Virginia right now. Prior to that, we did not
Speaker 4: have that access here in Virginia, and so it is
Speaker 4: only because of legislation paths at the state level that
Speaker 4: we still have that protection in place. In twenty twenty three,
Speaker 4: we try to cement that protection into our constitution and
Speaker 4: take a while, guest, my opponent was the deciding vote
Speaker 4: and decided to take a walk, and that is the
Speaker 4: only reason we don't have that permanent protection in our
Speaker 4: constitution right now. So these seats are critical, These seats
Speaker 4: are very important. And what's happening at the state level
Speaker 4: is becoming far more critical because of an action at
Speaker 4: the federal level and because of what we see happening
Speaker 4: among the Supreme Court undoing some of the protections that
Speaker 4: we've long had in place. And so the last stop
Speaker 4: really is coming down to our state legislatures.
Speaker 2: Wow, wow, wow, so important. And I mean I'm sure
Speaker 2: the state legislature stuff is happening all over the country.
Speaker 2: So your election is actually in eight days, a little
Speaker 2: more than a week.
Speaker 4: Yeah, So in eight days, all of those olders and
Speaker 4: seidate District thirteen here in Virginia will head to the
Speaker 4: polls for Democratic Primary Day. And I am looking forward
Speaker 4: to getting excited and fire up about protecting both abortion
Speaker 4: rights and much more here in this race.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, no, thank you so much.
Speaker 4: And if there's anyone who'd like to find out more
Speaker 4: additional information about our race and how to get involved,
Speaker 4: they can find me at lacharisair dot com and on
Speaker 4: every social media network.
Speaker 3: No moment fut.
Speaker 5: Jesse Cannon, Miley, Jong Fest, Everyone's favorite corrupt wrestling coach,
Speaker 5: Jim Jordan.
Speaker 2: He's twisted himself into a pretzel like not these days,
Speaker 2: which I know is common and wrestling.
Speaker 1: Jim Jordan was on Dana Bash's show today. I'm a
Speaker 1: big fan of Dana Bash. He defended the indefens of
Speaker 1: all again and again and again, and it was pretty incredible.
Speaker 1: And at one point she was trying to make the
Speaker 1: case that if you wanted to lock up Hillary Clinton,
Speaker 1: then you probably would want to lock up Donald Trump
Speaker 1: because of Donald Trump's huge quantity of classified documents hidden
Speaker 1: in his bathroom.
Speaker 2: And in the mar Lago ballroom.
Speaker 1: But instead, Jim Jordan said, it's totally different because Trump
Speaker 1: was president and Hillary Clinton was the Secretary of State.
Speaker 1: And for that false equivalency, Jim Jordan gets our moment
Speaker 1: of fuck Ray. That's it for this episode of Fast Politics.
Speaker 1: Tune in every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to hear the
Speaker 1: best minds in politics makes sense of all this chaos.
Speaker 1: If you enjoyed what you've heard, please please send it
Speaker 1: to a friend and keep the conversation going. And again,
Speaker 1: thanks for listening.