Speaker 1: You're listening to Comedy Central. Hey, it's Roy Wood Jr.
Speaker 1: Correspondent for The Daily Show. Up Next is an episode
Speaker 1: of a new Daily Show podcast from my friend and
Speaker 1: Daily Show contributor Jordan Clipper. Clipper is going deeper into
Speaker 1: some of the conspiracy theories he's heard in the past
Speaker 1: seven years on the Trump campaign trail. Enjoyed this episode
Speaker 1: of Jordan Clipper Fingers the conspiracy Take it Away, Jordan.
Speaker 1: In the days after presidential election, CIA director Gina Hasspell
Speaker 1: flies to Flipford, Germany on a secret mission to secure
Speaker 1: a computer servers that contain evidence that the election has
Speaker 1: been manipulated. These servers, owned by a bankrupt Spanish company
Speaker 1: called Skital, could prove that the election was ragged for
Speaker 1: Joe Biden. Hasspell and a team of Special Forces troops
Speaker 1: to send on Freightfurt to destroy the evidence, but in
Speaker 1: the raid, five troops and the CIA official are killed.
Speaker 1: Haspell herself is injured, flown to Guantanamo obey and given
Speaker 1: a tribe funal for treason. In two thousand nine, Venezuelan
Speaker 1: leader Hugo Chavez creates a voting system that could change
Speaker 1: votes in elections in any country using this advanced technology.
Speaker 1: One of the technology companies that uses it is called
Speaker 1: smart Manneck, which supplies voting equipment to a single US
Speaker 1: county in election. The scheme between smart Mannick and Hugo
Speaker 1: Chavez is a secret and successful effort to ring the
Speaker 1: election for Joe Biden, even though Chavez has been dead
Speaker 1: for seven years. Patscara Italy, a rogue employee at the
Speaker 1: defense and aerospace company Leonardo Spa, hacks into military satellites
Speaker 1: to change the margin of victory in US states where
Speaker 1: Trump has beaten Biden. It's a variable coupdata and it
Speaker 1: would go down as the most extraordinary effort in history
Speaker 1: to overturn a presidential election. Oh you know what, that
Speaker 1: one actually sounds pretty fun. Italian military satellites, Mamma Mia,
Speaker 1: These sound great. Oh and forgetty one. How can I
Speaker 1: not mention the Hungarian victor. There's been so many bizarre
Speaker 1: stories going on through the media. You can have some
Speaker 1: pretty far fetched ideas on both sides, and what we're
Speaker 1: doing is simply proving or disproving as many of those
Speaker 1: as we can. Speaking at somebody on the outside, this
Speaker 1: feels like it's just feeding into conspiratorial thinking. We're MythBusters. Great, Okay,
Speaker 1: we're doing things we think are foolish, but people believe
Speaker 1: it's real. If we validate that something they think might
Speaker 1: have happened didn't happen, then we're not throwing fuel on
Speaker 1: the fire. Are you looking into the Hungarian vector? I
Speaker 1: didn't know about that one Hungary victor. It's a bullshit
Speaker 1: thing I just made up. That sounds cool and a
Speaker 1: little bit spooky. This is Jordan Clepper figures the conspiracy.
Speaker 1: And yes, those election conspiracy theories do sound a lot
Speaker 1: more exciting when we put public domain, suspenseful music underneath them.
Speaker 1: You may have heard a few of those theories, partly
Speaker 1: because the White House and Republicans in Congress. We're publicizing
Speaker 1: them in the week after the election to convince Americans
Speaker 1: that the election was stolen, and it worked to an extent.
Speaker 1: Republicans still believe the election was stolen, according to a
Speaker 1: Monmouth University poll from September of this very year. Today,
Speaker 1: we're gonna talk to someone who has had the most
Speaker 1: legal success against Trump's efforts in court to overturn the election,
Speaker 1: and we're also going to talk to Supreme Court expert
Speaker 1: about the cases in front of the court now that
Speaker 1: could determine how future elections here are conducted. But before
Speaker 1: we get there, I really want to go back to
Speaker 1: the Italian military satellites. This is what became known as
Speaker 1: Italy Gate, and it's filled with more juicy content than
Speaker 1: a piping hot kil zone. And the craziest part of
Speaker 1: this conspiracy theory is that Trump's chief of Staff, Mark
Speaker 1: Meadows was emailing details of it to the Attorney General
Speaker 1: Jeffrey Rosen to try to get him to do something
Speaker 1: or anything about it. I can't unpack Italy Gate alone.
Speaker 1: So let's introduce Eric Lavay. He's a digital research analyst
Speaker 1: at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue and a former investigative
Speaker 1: journalist who wrote extensively about the Italy Gate conspiracy theory,
Speaker 1: or as I like to call it, lasagna gazi. There's good,
Speaker 1: There's just there's gonna be a lot of these, Eric,
Speaker 1: So I hope you're ready. Thank you for being at hair.
Speaker 1: Let's start at the very beginning of this conspiracy theory,
Speaker 1: which comes from an organization called Nations in Action, the
Speaker 1: group apparently based in Sarasota, Florida, which published a press
Speaker 1: release titled Senior I t expert at global defense contractor
Speaker 1: that testifies an Italian federal court. He had others switched
Speaker 1: votes throughout America in the US presidential race. Can you
Speaker 1: explain some of this for US? Yeah, definitely. So it
Speaker 1: emerged it sort of in late and it's still a
Speaker 1: little bit murky about where it came from. The Washington
Speaker 1: posted a really good article on it, but it possibly was.
Speaker 1: It had sort of origins in an article in Italian media,
Speaker 1: and then a um AN x C I a station
Speaker 1: chief named Bradley Johnson put out a video. But the
Speaker 1: ones who really pushed it forward. To answer your question
Speaker 1: were Maria's Zack from Nations in Action and a woman
Speaker 1: named Michelle Roosevelt Edwards. Let's start with, let's let's break down.
Speaker 1: Talk to me a little bit about Maria Strolo Zac.
Speaker 1: You've talked to her, correct, I talked to uh. I
Speaker 1: called her number and an identical voice answered the phone.
Speaker 1: Um who said it wasn't her. UH So theoretically talked
Speaker 1: to somebody who may have been herself pretending to be
Speaker 1: somebody else. That's why I'm reporting, like, that's why I
Speaker 1: hate phone calls and I like emails. The Arab zoom
Speaker 1: works for you because you see what that person looks
Speaker 1: like as opposed to distrusting. But but who is this person?
Speaker 1: Who is Maria Strolo Zat So she's um a conservative
Speaker 1: activists and the next Georgia lobbyists who I guess was
Speaker 1: pretty successful and um, I think she ran for office
Speaker 1: a few times herself, just on the local level, just
Speaker 1: at some point got very involved in this Italy Gate
Speaker 1: conspiracy and pushed it very far. I feel like, if
Speaker 1: you're in this world you're talking about Italian satellites, those
Speaker 1: things flipping, you're probably a character. Is she a character?
Speaker 1: I'm guessing it's interesting because when I watched the videos, like,
Speaker 1: she's clearly like a very intelligent person. That's what's also like,
Speaker 1: So there's a little bit of uh, you know, you
Speaker 1: have this conspiracy theory obviously, which is which is false,
Speaker 1: But then you have a person who's like, you know,
Speaker 1: she's laying it out with confidence. Tell us a little
Speaker 1: bit about Michelle Roosevelt Edwards. So she um runs another
Speaker 1: organization called the Institute of Good Governance, and uh, she
Speaker 1: sort of worked closely with Maria zack On on Italy Gate.
Speaker 1: So the Washington Post had a big article that at
Speaker 1: some point in icelandic film crew went to interview Michelle
Speaker 1: Roosevelt Edwards. I don't know what that was for, but
Speaker 1: in the house, um, I guess there was remember that
Speaker 1: movie The Game where there's like there was something weird
Speaker 1: and like the house and she really, like in Michael
Speaker 1: Douglas is like, no, like this isn't a real house.
Speaker 1: That the film crew was in there and they're like,
Speaker 1: is this your house because it's something and she's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's my house. Anyway, it turns out that it wasn't
Speaker 1: her house. It was mother woman's mansion and she's just
Speaker 1: a realtor like in the area and it's not her house.
Speaker 1: And the poor woman her husband died. She didn't even know.
Speaker 1: She's like, why is this woman in my house? Um?
Speaker 1: Was that woman in the house at the time, She's like,
Speaker 1: dear lord, dear lord who interviewed in my living room?
Speaker 1: She was somewhere else or something. But it was like
Speaker 1: I felt I felt bad for her. No, it's like
Speaker 1: she was just using this house for like, I don't
Speaker 1: know business. You're telling me this person who put up
Speaker 1: an entire false front to show that she's more successful
Speaker 1: than she has she's somehow connected to this whole Trump world.
Speaker 1: I don't buy it. I don't buy it. It It just
Speaker 1: doesn't It doesn't sit well with me. Yeah, it's it's
Speaker 1: tough to believe. That was like that was that just
Speaker 1: that killed me? Okay, and I want I want to
Speaker 1: dig into sort of their roles within this. But this
Speaker 1: this initial thought was sort of revolving around an employee,
Speaker 1: our touro Delia. Correct. Yeah, there's um. I was like
Speaker 1: about this last night. This is the hardest thing about
Speaker 1: Italy Gate, is I mean, to stay at the obvious
Speaker 1: is like explaining it. The short version is Italian satellites
Speaker 1: based in Piscara, Italy. Uh altered the votes, giving Joe
Speaker 1: Biden enough votes from Donald Trump to win. That's the
Speaker 1: short version of Italian satellites. They're the bad guys. Well,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of players in this, uh, the CI,
Speaker 1: A former president Barack Obama, A the hacker that you
Speaker 1: just referenced, and a lawyer who put out an affidavit.
Speaker 1: There's like those four those are the four. And so
Speaker 1: the hacker he worked for something called Leonardo Spa. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he worked there. Um, they said he left in two
Speaker 1: thousand seventeen, which is another problem because he when he
Speaker 1: was indicted for a separate Uh. I think it was
Speaker 1: like data theft. He didn't even work at Leonardo. What
Speaker 1: is Leonardo Spa? I mean it sounds like a massage
Speaker 1: parlor and like a deep one just outside Rome that
Speaker 1: like you you splurs because you're on vacation, but you
Speaker 1: don't have enough money, so here, so like what's the
Speaker 1: eper one? Like, come to Leonardo Spa. It's right next
Speaker 1: to Michelangelo nails. That was a very specific uh, not
Speaker 1: that this is a hypothetical. I've not had that experience.
Speaker 1: I imagine if you're pouring in Italy and just had
Speaker 1: had a hard time on a long plane because those
Speaker 1: seats there's not a lot of space and you're a
Speaker 1: tall person. Hypothetically you're gonna be looking for Leonardo Spa.
Speaker 1: This is not that kind of spa exactly. No, it's
Speaker 1: a uh somewhat more boring military you know, like a
Speaker 1: military they make military equipment and satellites stuff like that,
Speaker 1: like a like a Boeing. Okay, so a bow and
Speaker 1: then this is this Arturo Delia. Delia does he actually
Speaker 1: work for Leonardo Spa. My understanding is at some point
Speaker 1: he did work there, but he was gone by two
Speaker 1: thousand seventeen. Okay, And is there any information that says
Speaker 1: that he had access to these Italian satellites in a
Speaker 1: way that could alter election zero zero? Okay, okay, okay,
Speaker 1: But so walk us through this. So the head of
Speaker 1: uh nations in action this group to personate Maria Strolo
Speaker 1: Zach who you've spoken with in your reporting, What she
Speaker 1: what she like? Well? And to be clear, I was
Speaker 1: telling your producer that was that was a funny story
Speaker 1: because when I called Maria Zack for comment um, obviously
Speaker 1: being a phone, I can't I don't know for a
Speaker 1: fact that I can say that the person answered sounded
Speaker 1: exactly like her, but told me very quickly it was
Speaker 1: not her um and actually said it was her secretary
Speaker 1: and could she the phrases could she return? And I
Speaker 1: was I was telling mad I was like, it's this
Speaker 1: is a cell phone. But anyway, I was like, you know,
Speaker 1: sure of course, but so did you ever did that
Speaker 1: person then pretend to hang up, put on a gruff
Speaker 1: voice and then attempt to then answer the phone. It
Speaker 1: was the same voice, but they were just like, you know,
Speaker 1: can she return? And I was like, you know, when
Speaker 1: you're a reporter, like it's things like that happened. So yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: of course, no comment. Just to be where if if
Speaker 1: you're also like a public figure and somebody calls you
Speaker 1: and you tend to be your own assistant just because
Speaker 1: you think it gives you status, that doesn't make you weird.
Speaker 1: That's just a savvy media person thing to do. And
Speaker 1: if my parents or my friends think that's a desperate
Speaker 1: attempt or that I'm uh not in a good place,
Speaker 1: well that's more on them. Can you verify that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: What what jumped out of me I'll always remember about
Speaker 1: that was how quick it was. It was very I mean,
Speaker 1: you know your comedian, you're an improviser. It was real quick.
Speaker 1: There was no plus like like that had happened before.
Speaker 1: Maybe that's you know, that's I mean, that's an interesting
Speaker 1: way of looking at it as opposed to just somebody
Speaker 1: who's quick on the on the go. Um. All right,
Speaker 1: so you had a quick interaction with this Maria strolo Zac.
Speaker 1: But again to what what what? What? What is our
Speaker 1: understanding of this story? So she is head of Nations
Speaker 1: and Action. What is Nations and Action. If you go
Speaker 1: on their web page, there's a lot of sort of
Speaker 1: conspiracy theories, and I think they say that their statement is,
Speaker 1: you know, good government bringing transparency. Obviously, whether that's true
Speaker 1: is up to to be determined. And so, but she
Speaker 1: was able to get this conspiracy and this idea in
Speaker 1: front of important people. Can you walk us through some
Speaker 1: of that? Yeah, So she she used to be a
Speaker 1: lobbyist in Georgia's so she's got like close relationships with UM.
Speaker 1: As I reported on UM Congress from Barry louder Milk,
Speaker 1: one of the one of the top five names in
Speaker 1: all of Congress. Like, if if you're going to you know,
Speaker 1: if you're going to articulate what it feels like to
Speaker 1: hear a Southern Republican droll on, louder Milk feels right,
Speaker 1: it feels feels obnoxious and white, which is kind of
Speaker 1: spot Yeah. He's uh, he's an interesting guy. I think
Speaker 1: I think they were, he and his staff. Uh. I
Speaker 1: think we're getting pretty tired of my emails. After a
Speaker 1: while they stopped, they didn't ever respond to me, but
Speaker 1: then they added me to their mailing list. So that's
Speaker 1: how you shut somebody up, but just give him the spam. Um,
Speaker 1: she got it to him. She got it to Devin
Speaker 1: Noon as his staff. I mean she you know the
Speaker 1: thing about last night, Like the ordinary person has so
Speaker 1: much trouble reaching their elected officials, and yet this person
Speaker 1: pushing a complete, you know, a conspiracy theory that's not true,
Speaker 1: is able to reach very high up people. She claims
Speaker 1: she gave documents to louder Milk. Do we know what
Speaker 1: was in those documents? Yeah? I don't know. Did you
Speaker 1: I know, you guys are probably always working. Did you
Speaker 1: get a chance to see the affidavit that this is
Speaker 1: all based around? Tell us? Tell us about it. So
Speaker 1: the whole thing is that she delivered an affid David. Um. Basically,
Speaker 1: what it is is it's a photograph of an actual document,
Speaker 1: which right away is a little you know, unusual. It's
Speaker 1: not the document, Um, it's it's a lawyer stating that
Speaker 1: this hacker that you mentioned in the beginning, Uh, sat
Speaker 1: in front of him and told his story. That's what
Speaker 1: it is. No one's been able there is a lawyer
Speaker 1: that matches this name, but no one's been able to
Speaker 1: actually show that, like really that he uh, that it
Speaker 1: was that lawyer. So it's not clear if this thing
Speaker 1: is even real. You can't even verify that that conversation
Speaker 1: took place. No, and the document, you know, I can't
Speaker 1: say I'm an expert on court documents in Italy, but
Speaker 1: there's no numbers on it, like it's just it looks
Speaker 1: like someone like wrote it on Microsoft Word. And she's also, uh,
Speaker 1: Maria Zack was doing an interview about Italy Gate from
Speaker 1: the back of a car in Washington, d C. On
Speaker 1: January six. What's going on there? This happened. It's very real.
Speaker 1: The president is right for an interference did occur, and
Speaker 1: people need to be prosecuted in our country. Who actually participated.
Speaker 1: That was the show called America Can We Talk? And
Speaker 1: that's a very strange interview just because, as you said,
Speaker 1: it's taking place while our capital is being attacked. But
Speaker 1: there's no mention of it till the end. They're like,
Speaker 1: I think Maria is actually something like, well, if they're
Speaker 1: able to, you know, get this under control, we can
Speaker 1: you know, get this affidavit to more people. It's like,
Speaker 1: whoa like, you know, it's very strange. Um. So there's
Speaker 1: there's a lot of interesting red flags and characters within this.
Speaker 1: But after all these conversations, meetings, talking to congressmen, louder Milk,
Speaker 1: how high did this go? Like who in government was
Speaker 1: actually taking this theory seriously? That's a great question. Seriously,
Speaker 1: I mean in terms of as you said yourself, Meadows,
Speaker 1: I guess would be the highest ranking person to get it.
Speaker 1: But taking it seriously, you know a lot of work
Speaker 1: with conspiracy theorists. You wonder who's an opportunist who's not? Well?
Speaker 1: I mean, it's interesting question you say, like taking it seriously.
Speaker 1: We we we don't exactly know what people actually thought,
Speaker 1: but I I would argue that part of the whole
Speaker 1: game plan here was just so doubt so the fact
Speaker 1: that there were different threads for people to hold on
Speaker 1: to to grasp clearly Donald Trump as somebody who was
Speaker 1: just flooding the marketplace with any thought out there, so
Speaker 1: that it's getting in people's heads, like who had awareness
Speaker 1: of it? We're talking Meadows, Meadows knew about this, which
Speaker 1: means ub had awareness on this. How did this thing
Speaker 1: get into more mainstream culture? Yeah, and Zach too um.
Speaker 1: She says she delivered or she told Trump about this
Speaker 1: at Maral Lago in twenty. I can't confirm that, but
Speaker 1: she said that a number of times. Um, so I
Speaker 1: guess to answer your question, if if that's true, then
Speaker 1: that reached Donald Trump. Now what all this is happening?
Speaker 1: Is it fair to say that we didn't know how
Speaker 1: much of the voter fraud conspiracy theory would stick. Uh,
Speaker 1: these stories were so outlandished that it didn't seem possible
Speaker 1: that millions of people would believe them. And yet even
Speaker 1: today the majority of Republicans say they don't think the
Speaker 1: election was legitimate. Does that encourage Republican lawmakers to push
Speaker 1: more conspiracy theories? Either probably won't be consequences, and then
Speaker 1: doing so probably will at least help them in some way.
Speaker 1: Consequences are like obviously incredibly important. Like when there are
Speaker 1: no consequences, we're giving a wide latitude to speak and
Speaker 1: that's a good thing. But as you know, some of
Speaker 1: these conspiracies are incredibly harmful. So I don't know. In
Speaker 1: cases like I don't know what's saying, Alex Jones, when
Speaker 1: people are actually held accountable makes a huge difference. They
Speaker 1: some of them stop tomorrow and you never hear from
Speaker 1: them again. What do you think it was about Italy
Speaker 1: Gate that made it so sticky and interesting to people.
Speaker 1: So there's a conference call I think it was on
Speaker 1: January four. It's between Maria Zack and supporters. Uh so
Speaker 1: it's right before the attack on the Capitol. It's like
Speaker 1: forty five minutes long, and it's just she lays out
Speaker 1: Italy Gate, and then it's weird, like all these random
Speaker 1: people are popping in, like like I said, like Marlon
Speaker 1: Maples pops in, and just like it's just she's the
Speaker 1: only Everyone else is just a first name, so you
Speaker 1: don't even know really who they are. What's one of
Speaker 1: the Maple's doing there? I I don't know, like, uh,
Speaker 1: a supporter, I guess, uh, very strange. And all of
Speaker 1: this was sort of to just hip everybody to the
Speaker 1: Italy Gate theory so that they had it in their
Speaker 1: back pocket. I mean, I don't want to say that.
Speaker 1: She comes right out and but there's some hints of
Speaker 1: to continue this work. I we will need funding. UM
Speaker 1: like a private plane has talked about at one point.
Speaker 1: So no, she's she's she's asking for a private plane.
Speaker 1: I don't know. It might have been um one of
Speaker 1: the other people, but there's definitely more than one hint
Speaker 1: there about like we need you know, money, this sounds
Speaker 1: like a timeshare situation. She gets everybody on a conference call.
Speaker 1: Let me tell you about this fascinating Italy situation. If
Speaker 1: you give me your attention and enough money for a
Speaker 1: private plane, I have something that is going to take
Speaker 1: your breath away in pops. Marla Maples was like, Oh,
Speaker 1: tell me more. It's like, thanks, Marla. Marla has been
Speaker 1: on this for quite some time. Her her family are
Speaker 1: big Italy Gate supporters, and you too could be an
Speaker 1: Italy Gate supporter. For just a mirror two thousand dollars,
Speaker 1: we can give you the correct mindset to keep you
Speaker 1: happy from this day forward. Listen to the last seven
Speaker 1: years kind of feel like a time shared. Like do
Speaker 1: you ever feel like that, like you're just trapped? Yes,
Speaker 1: I do feel like I've given over a portion of
Speaker 1: my life to live in a different reality every year.
Speaker 1: And you look at it, You're like, I think this
Speaker 1: is a bad investment. I think the time share is
Speaker 1: giving in to all of this bullshit that we're talking about.
Speaker 1: It just it sucks away so much time that I
Speaker 1: could be using for something else. It's not a time share.
Speaker 1: Maybe that's maybe what we're describing as a time suck,
Speaker 1: we've all invested in a time suck that we will
Speaker 1: never get back. We can all agree is a really
Speaker 1: bad investment. It's wild. I mean, this is the conspiracy
Speaker 1: theory that like I think I was telling your producer,
Speaker 1: Like even other conspiracy theorists are like like, like, that's
Speaker 1: how far this one is is out there? Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: what does this Italy Gate conspiracy rank in terms of
Speaker 1: all the conspiracies related to the election? I would say
Speaker 1: in terms of the ones that are like the wildest,
Speaker 1: this has to be at the top. I can't think
Speaker 1: of I know you guys have been doing this for
Speaker 1: a while on your podcast. If there's an another one,
Speaker 1: I can't think of one. You've got Hugo Chaves so dead.
Speaker 1: Hugo Chavas is a fun one. It's definitely takes a
Speaker 1: stretch of imagination, but there's intrigue their sexiness to this. Uh,
Speaker 1: I'd have to put it up there as well. It's
Speaker 1: also like the little details that kill me, like the data.
Speaker 1: It wasn't enough that it was the Italian satellites. They
Speaker 1: routed it through Germany. It's like like why, Like that's
Speaker 1: what I don't understand, like, but it's just fascinating there's
Speaker 1: somebody on the ground or in the air in Germany
Speaker 1: that was getting this information or or or working through
Speaker 1: the satellites through Germany. Yeah, they're saying like at some
Speaker 1: point they never got into the sort of like how
Speaker 1: the stuff was transmitted, but it was from the satellites
Speaker 1: and went through I think some servers in Germany and
Speaker 1: then I guess back to the USUM. So they're theoretically,
Speaker 1: if this were real, not only are there folks in
Speaker 1: Italy who are culpable, but there are are folks in
Speaker 1: Germany as well. Is what always kind of blows my
Speaker 1: mind with a lot of these conspiracy theories because they
Speaker 1: they hype the idea behind it involves so many people
Speaker 1: that even afterwards, you'd expect. One thing we're really bad
Speaker 1: at is keeping secrets, especially if it's multinational effort to
Speaker 1: overturn results in very specific states, and then it just
Speaker 1: disappears into the void, which is sort of h I
Speaker 1: think people should consider a major I don't know if
Speaker 1: red flag is the right word, but if if you
Speaker 1: believe so strongly in something you believe has happened, and
Speaker 1: then thirty seconds later. When it doesn't, you know, when
Speaker 1: it's gone, You're just onto the next thing. It kind
Speaker 1: of questions like credibility. You know, I think we lost
Speaker 1: that a long time ago. Well, Eric Leavy, thank you
Speaker 1: for unfolding this conspiracy theory like carefully needing a perfect
Speaker 1: pizza pie. Thanks so much for having me. We're gonna
Speaker 1: take a short break. When we come back, We're would
Speaker 1: talk to Pennsylvania Attorney General and Governor elect Josh Shapiro.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. In the days after the election,
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania became the focus of Republican efforts to overturn the results.
Speaker 1: They ramped up their attacks on the legitimacy of mail
Speaker 1: in ballots and claimed that ballots would arrive after election
Speaker 1: day and be mixed with ballots that arrived before election day.
Speaker 1: Anticipating a possible Supreme Court showdown, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh
Speaker 1: Shapiro began separating those post election day ballots and became
Speaker 1: a high profile example of a Democrat fighting back against
Speaker 1: the voter fraud conspiracy theater, and as the Trump team
Speaker 1: became litigious before and after election day, Shapiro beat Trump
Speaker 1: more than forty times in court. In last month's mid
Speaker 1: term Shapiro won the race for governor of Pennsylvania, defeating
Speaker 1: one of the country's most prominent voter fraud conspiracy theorist
Speaker 1: Doug Mastriano. And Josh Shapiro is with us today to
Speaker 1: talk about the exciting world of voter fraud. Welcome to
Speaker 1: the show. Good to be with you, Jordan, Thanks for
Speaker 1: having me, of course, and we were debating a current
Speaker 1: governor elect soon to be governor, Josh Shapiro. That's that's
Speaker 1: most of it, right, Yeah, And look, I only require
Speaker 1: our four children to use all of the titles when
Speaker 1: they address me. You can call me whatever you want,
Speaker 1: and well, not whatever you want, but you can call
Speaker 1: me one of those titles. I was gonna say, do
Speaker 1: you also throw in the beat Trump forty times in court,
Speaker 1: Monica or there's probably a lot of people also have
Speaker 1: that in their their name as well. The guy has
Speaker 1: been to court many, many times. I don't know about that,
Speaker 1: but listen, we went to court forty three times against
Speaker 1: the former president and his enablers, and we beat him
Speaker 1: every time. We protected the right to vote. We had
Speaker 1: a free and fair, safe and secure election here in
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania back in again and most recently in two the
Speaker 1: will the people was respected each time. When you've been
Speaker 1: at the center of these claims over voter praud for
Speaker 1: over two years. Now, even though you did win the
Speaker 1: race for governor, Uh, it appears as if the state
Speaker 1: is moving forward. Does it still alarm you how many voters,
Speaker 1: obviously many of them Republicans, appeared to have bought into
Speaker 1: these conspiracy theories. It does, But you know Jordan's I
Speaker 1: don't blame the voters, and hear me on this. I
Speaker 1: blame the leaders who've been lying to them for the
Speaker 1: better part of the last two and a half years
Speaker 1: about voting by mail, about this phony election fraud. Um.
Speaker 1: When you have leaders who you trust, who you put
Speaker 1: into positions of authority, and then they lie to you
Speaker 1: over and over and over again, it's hard to blame
Speaker 1: the public. I blame the leaders. And the good news
Speaker 1: is we're defeating those leaders who pushed the big life
Speaker 1: from the former president to his chief enabler here in Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: who I just beat in the governor's race, And hopefully
Speaker 1: now what we can do is continue to speak truth
Speaker 1: to the good people of Pennsylvania, to the American people
Speaker 1: and help them understand reality from the fiction that the
Speaker 1: former president pushed and get us back to having a
Speaker 1: healthier democracy. Well, I went to one of the rallies
Speaker 1: your opponent held right there at the state Capitol and
Speaker 1: talk to some of the tens of people who showed up.
Speaker 1: Showed up that day, and after a minimal amount of fanfare,
Speaker 1: Mastriano appeared and he was freaking hilarious going after the
Speaker 1: pillow guy, are you serious? Give me a break? Beat Scotty,
Speaker 1: beat me up. No sign of intelligent life anywhere. Boom.
Speaker 1: But even with the Covenant Trump endorsement, the crowd was tiny.
Speaker 1: Was it small because of mass Triano's far right policies
Speaker 1: and election denialism? Nope, this is Facebook speech. The reason
Speaker 1: there aren't people here because Facebook is SI. Yes, it
Speaker 1: was a low turnout. I felt like it. It seemed
Speaker 1: as if you had a good shot of winning that race. Uh.
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit about Mastriano though,
Speaker 1: because he may have spread more election related conspiracy theories
Speaker 1: than any other uh candidate. Let's go through a couple
Speaker 1: of these. He Uh. He was claiming the voting machines
Speaker 1: glitched in Michigan and switched six thousand Biden votes. So
Speaker 1: we're also responsible for a hundred thousand vote dumps that
Speaker 1: were all for Biden. In the middle of the night,
Speaker 1: sharing a Gateway pundit post of suspected fraud issues that
Speaker 1: included away for people to search for dead people who
Speaker 1: voted using something called the Social Security death master file.
Speaker 1: Pretty catchy. He was claiming dominion voting machines were built
Speaker 1: intentionally to rig the election for Democrats, and claiming that
Speaker 1: Acts seventy seven of Pennsylvania law that allows no excuse
Speaker 1: voting by mail was illegally passed and was responsible for
Speaker 1: Biden's win. Can you walk us through some of these
Speaker 1: and tell us how how you pushed back against them,
Speaker 1: Well by calling them what they were, complete and utter bullshit,
Speaker 1: that's what they were. He was lying to the good
Speaker 1: people in Pennsylvania, um and his conduct to try to
Speaker 1: overthrow the last lecture. Remember, he was part of the
Speaker 1: violent mob that stormed up to the capitol on January six,
Speaker 1: and he went there that day, and this real important, Jordan.
Speaker 1: He went there that day not just to hear a
Speaker 1: speech from the former president or be part of some
Speaker 1: peaceful protest. He went there that day with a singular purpose,
Speaker 1: that's why they were all there, and that was to
Speaker 1: deny people's votes from county because remember, when you vote
Speaker 1: here in Pennsylvania. It's true in other states, but let
Speaker 1: me focus on Pennsylvania. You vote for the presidential race
Speaker 1: in Pennsylvania, your vote gets tallied by your local county
Speaker 1: board of Elections, gets certified by the governor and the
Speaker 1: Secretary of State in Pennsylvania. But then in order for
Speaker 1: your vote to finally count, it has to be read
Speaker 1: across the desk in the U. S. House of Representatives.
Speaker 1: That's what they were there to do on January six,
Speaker 1: and he was there as part of the violent mob
Speaker 1: to stop them from doing. Then he comes back home
Speaker 1: to Pennsylvania, launches a campaign for governor and Jordan's He
Speaker 1: says in his campaign that he was going to use
Speaker 1: his power as governor to be able to review all
Speaker 1: the voting machines, make corrections, as he called alls them,
Speaker 1: and then he would pick the winner. That's not how
Speaker 1: our democracy works, that is not how our republic has
Speaker 1: survived over the last two and forty six years, and
Speaker 1: so it was important for us to beat him to
Speaker 1: just obviously win the election, but also to protect our democracy,
Speaker 1: to protect the will of the people, and to make
Speaker 1: it clear to folks that spewing conspiracy theories, being part
Speaker 1: of a violent mob pledging to overturn the next election
Speaker 1: is not the way things work in the Commonwealth, in Pennsylvania.
Speaker 1: Were in this country, well, I was surprised many of
Speaker 1: the people I talked to that day were also there
Speaker 1: at January six. It was almost a mini reunion. Uh,
Speaker 1: you have been aggressive at pushing back and it made
Speaker 1: headlines for that. Do you think that your victory is
Speaker 1: a sign that voters are energized by candidates who pushed
Speaker 1: back aggressively against election desers. You gotta fight back against it,
Speaker 1: and and look, we've done it in big ways and small.
Speaker 1: I mean I've I've been to the hunt clubs in
Speaker 1: rural communities in Pennsylvania and confronted folks directly, and they'll
Speaker 1: say to me, um, where they were saying to me, Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, the election stole and so so what what
Speaker 1: evidence do you have that let's just have a conversation, Well,
Speaker 1: there was massive voter fraud. And I say, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm the Attorney general it's my job to prosecute
Speaker 1: election fraud, along with some district attorneys as well. And
Speaker 1: we had about a handful of cases of election fraud
Speaker 1: in by the way, where each of those individuals who
Speaker 1: were prosecuted, we're trying to cast one extra single vote
Speaker 1: for their candidate for president, by the way, for Donald Trump,
Speaker 1: not for Joe Biden. But even if they were trying
Speaker 1: to do that for Joe Biden, it wasn't going to
Speaker 1: affect the outcome of the election. It was not this
Speaker 1: widespread voter fraud, and they were prosecuted for it. And
Speaker 1: so I confront folks with truth and try to force
Speaker 1: them to think about the reality of what they are saying.
Speaker 1: In addition to that, it was critically important for us
Speaker 1: here in Pennsylvania, in Arizona, in Michigan and other places
Speaker 1: to defeat those people who continue to spread the lies. Now,
Speaker 1: I said on election night when I won Jordan's that
Speaker 1: this is the beginning of our work. Just because we
Speaker 1: beat these election deniers doesn't mean that it's rid from
Speaker 1: our system. We have to now do the hard work
Speaker 1: that folks have been doing for the last two forty
Speaker 1: six years in this nation. Right our ancestors and their ancestors,
Speaker 1: to perfect our union, to speak truth, to make sure
Speaker 1: that the will of the people is respected. So I
Speaker 1: think we've done step one defeating those extremists. But now
Speaker 1: we've got to do the hard work of perfecting our union,
Speaker 1: and that test now falls to me as the next
Speaker 1: governor of Pennsylvania. How complete do you think step one
Speaker 1: truly is? Because I do look looking at those the
Speaker 1: major election deniers, the races in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania. Here's
Speaker 1: swing states where the people in control roll of verifying Uh,
Speaker 1: those ballots, uh could have very well gone to election
Speaker 1: deniers those big places. They were defeated. But but there's
Speaker 1: still a lot of people who are election deniers who
Speaker 1: are in position of power in America. UM, a lot
Speaker 1: of very close races where perhaps election deniers were defeated,
Speaker 1: but it didn't. When I looked at this, I didn't
Speaker 1: exactly see the idea of election denialism expunging from the
Speaker 1: American narrative. But perhaps stepping back for a little bit,
Speaker 1: is there is there a fear that Democrats are a
Speaker 1: little too confident in the pushback of election denialism after
Speaker 1: this election. Well, well, let me say, I'm not confident
Speaker 1: that it's over at all, So don't you know, certainly
Speaker 1: don't put me in that category. I'm in the category
Speaker 1: where we had a good day on Tuesday, November eighth
Speaker 1: in defeating those extremists, those election deniers. But we have
Speaker 1: so much more work to do now. I believe that
Speaker 1: these election deniers are Mastriano particularly just profoundly and pathetically
Speaker 1: weak people. And let me explain what I mean by that.
Speaker 1: They know it's bullshit, but yet they say it over
Speaker 1: and over again because they're willing to sell out our
Speaker 1: democracy and our country for some short term political gain,
Speaker 1: for some short term attention, maybe some love from the
Speaker 1: former president. That's why they do it. That's the definition
Speaker 1: of weak. If you're willing to sell out your nation
Speaker 1: and our values on behalf of your own short term goals. Well,
Speaker 1: now we've denied many of them that short term goal,
Speaker 1: and hopefully in defeating them the way we have it
Speaker 1: forces that next batch of candidates to go along and say, Jesus,
Speaker 1: that really the path I want to take to be successful.
Speaker 1: It doesn't make them any stronger. It just speaks to
Speaker 1: how again, how kind of spineless so many of these
Speaker 1: folks are letting them know they're not going to be
Speaker 1: rewarded for the lie, and so I think hopefully this
Speaker 1: will have an effect on the politics as we go forward.
Speaker 1: We all so need to work on ridding our system
Speaker 1: of these weak folks and getting some people with backbones
Speaker 1: back in it. And by the way, Jordan's even folks
Speaker 1: who might disagree with me on some policy, that's okay,
Speaker 1: But we got to get back to the point where
Speaker 1: we have strong, capable people in positions of public trust
Speaker 1: who argue about tax policy and healthcare policy and educational housing,
Speaker 1: all the things that we shouldn't be arguing about. The
Speaker 1: healthy fights were supposed to have. But we've got to
Speaker 1: continue the battle against these weak people in defeating them
Speaker 1: in their elections and defeating them in their in their
Speaker 1: political aims. Did you have any Democrats from other states
Speaker 1: reach out to you to ask advice on confronting this
Speaker 1: selection denialism. I did a lot of them, folks running
Speaker 1: uh for governor and other offices, and you know, I suppose,
Speaker 1: obviously I'll keep those conversations in private, but I did
Speaker 1: speak to them about the need to take the fight
Speaker 1: on directly, to not give an inch on this. You know,
Speaker 1: when they say that something was stolen, challenge them on it.
Speaker 1: Put the facts out there. Make sure that you're going
Speaker 1: directly to the good people in my case of Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: with the facts. Do not let any of that nonsense stand. Okay,
Speaker 1: looking forward, Well, where we are right now, Trump is
Speaker 1: running again, Elon Musk is green lighting misinformation all over Twitter.
Speaker 1: We know that voter fraud conspiracies, they're gonna get worse.
Speaker 1: What are tangible steps the Democratic Party can take to
Speaker 1: fight and to push back? Knowing the world are in
Speaker 1: right now, you know, try to meet people where they are.
Speaker 1: That's why I'm talking to you today. I mean, you've
Speaker 1: been out front on the importance of combating election denialism.
Speaker 1: You have exposed a lot of these folks and and
Speaker 1: the lies they tell by you know, mocking them and
Speaker 1: and and showing not the humor in it, because obviously
Speaker 1: this is incredibly serious, but but showing people this in
Speaker 1: a way that they can comprehend it if they don't read,
Speaker 1: you know, from page of the Wall Street Journal, the
Speaker 1: New York Times. Not to say that your listeners don't
Speaker 1: read the New York Times, but the plant at least
Speaker 1: read the headlines. Good at reading the headlines, But like
Speaker 1: you know, you've got to meet people where they are.
Speaker 1: You gotta communicate to them. You got to show them
Speaker 1: the difference between fiction and reality. And then I have
Speaker 1: responsibility now as a governor um to hold myself up
Speaker 1: to that high standard and to continue to speak truth
Speaker 1: and continue, uh, you know, to communicate meet people where
Speaker 1: they are, whether we're talking to them on TikTok, on
Speaker 1: your podcast, anywhere. We've got to meet people where they
Speaker 1: are and continue to share the truth. You say, you
Speaker 1: you you went to hunt clubs, You went to places
Speaker 1: where people had questions about the election. I get the
Speaker 1: question all the time, do you ever change people's minds? Boy,
Speaker 1: that is that's a unicorn. I can't say I'm watching
Speaker 1: people change their minds about information when you were at
Speaker 1: those places, being confronted with outside facts doesn't always is
Speaker 1: often met with resistance and the doubling down of the
Speaker 1: things they think, they believe. They feel challenged away that
Speaker 1: I have not found conducive to reaching a new understanding.
Speaker 1: Did you actually see that in those moments, in those
Speaker 1: those those those hunt clubs with people who were confronting
Speaker 1: you and you're pushing back. Sometimes I did directly, But
Speaker 1: what I was really going after was was not to
Speaker 1: embarrass anyone in front of their peers. We're forced someone
Speaker 1: to have to look at me in front of their
Speaker 1: peers and say, you're right, I'm wrong. What I've thought
Speaker 1: for the last year, you know, is incorrect. What I
Speaker 1: really wanted was when they left there to be thinking
Speaker 1: about it and the process it and to maybe make
Speaker 1: a change in their thinking or their politics or the
Speaker 1: way they might vote. And Jordan, I got some pretty
Speaker 1: good evidence that we we made a whole lot of
Speaker 1: people think because I won this governor's race by a
Speaker 1: big margin, and we wanted by about fifteen points, but
Speaker 1: I got more votes than anyone in the history of
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania running for governor. And the reason I'm telling you
Speaker 1: that is not to pat myself on the back, but
Speaker 1: because it would be impossible to win with the number
Speaker 1: of votes we did in the margin we did with
Speaker 1: only Democrats. We got a whole lot of Republicans and
Speaker 1: independence cross party lines to support us, a whole lot
Speaker 1: of people who clearly rethought their politics after even and said,
Speaker 1: you know what, we're gonna go with this guy. We're
Speaker 1: gonna we're gonna go against the election denier. We're gonna
Speaker 1: believe this truth and and hopefully we're gonna all be
Speaker 1: able to continue to come together to repair our politics.
Speaker 1: Well after such a clear hubble bragg such as that,
Speaker 1: chill about that. Now that you did a pretty good job.
Speaker 1: That's that's where I can You're a savvy politician. Even
Speaker 1: even the bragging does come across somehow as as humble
Speaker 1: and informative. That's that's well played. Uh well, your high
Speaker 1: profile and your success here has up some of the
Speaker 1: speculation where people have have seen you in the light
Speaker 1: of somebody who could be a Democratic nominee for president.
Speaker 1: Do you want to use the Jordan Clepper Fingers the
Speaker 1: Conspiracy podcast as a platform that you confirm loving hearing
Speaker 1: that speculation? Yeah, now, man, Look, I'm just so excited
Speaker 1: to be governor. I haven't even been scorning yet. I
Speaker 1: got a lot of work to do. That's all I
Speaker 1: want to do. That's all my wife and kids want
Speaker 1: me to do, and that's all I am gonna do. Awesome. Well, Well,
Speaker 1: thank you for talking to me, Governor Elect Josh Sapiro.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back We're back and we're talking election fraud.
Speaker 1: It's obviously something I hear over and over on the
Speaker 1: campaign trail, But unlike some of the other conspiracy theories
Speaker 1: we've covered on this podcast, this one has some serious
Speaker 1: implications on the future of our democracy. This about the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court is hearing arguments in a case called More
Speaker 1: versus Harper, and it could fundamentally change how elections are conducted.
Speaker 1: To break this down with me, I have Supreme Court expert,
Speaker 1: author of Lady Justice, Women, The Law and the Battle
Speaker 1: to Save America, and host of the Slate podcast, Amicus
Speaker 1: Dalia Lithwick. Welcome to the podcast. Hi, Jordan's Dahlia. I
Speaker 1: have to call it the fact, and you're well aware
Speaker 1: that you are wearing not one but two headphones today.
Speaker 1: Is there a conspiracy in this? Do you want me
Speaker 1: to do a secondary podcast on your hyper attention or
Speaker 1: you're just a super big Jordan clapper fingers a conspiracy fan.
Speaker 1: I mean I can repurpose the joke I made the
Speaker 1: first time you teach me where I said that if
Speaker 1: Rudy Giuliani can wear two watches, I can wear two headphones.
Speaker 1: But I I you know, I'm a belt and suspenders guy.
Speaker 1: I went to law school and we learned to be very, very,
Speaker 1: very compulsive. So that's my story. I'm stick and do it.
Speaker 1: You're a belt and suspenders guy. What does that mean?
Speaker 1: That means? It's it's it's is that an overabundance of
Speaker 1: caution or fear that your pants could at any moment fall? Like?
Speaker 1: What is? This is what we do on this podcast.
Speaker 1: We really get into the nitty gritty. But this this,
Speaker 1: this is a move out of fear respect. True story.
Speaker 1: I heard the expression at one point very early in
Speaker 1: my career covering oral arguments at the court, and I
Speaker 1: was like, what the hell does this mean? And all
Speaker 1: these lawyers were like, it just means being careful, idiot.
Speaker 1: So I think not to suggest that you're not knowing
Speaker 1: this term implies anything, but it was. I learned the
Speaker 1: hard way that apparently everyone but me knew that belt
Speaker 1: and suspenders is just kind of shorthand for lawyer Lee.
Speaker 1: Over cautiousness maybe, but also fear that your pencilful do
Speaker 1: I was going to say, it's interesting, isn't like you.
Speaker 1: It's it's all about spin. It's either caution or it's fear.
Speaker 1: But but I see how the attorneys do it. It's
Speaker 1: a it's a deductive sound, and I appreciate you taking
Speaker 1: that certain suspenders action to listen to this. I want
Speaker 1: to talk about, you know, the potential collapse of democracy.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a hobby of mine, and I want
Speaker 1: to discuss this more. V Heartbrook. Can we talk about
Speaker 1: that case itself and what that might mean for elections?
Speaker 1: Sure it is. It's hard to say this crisply Jordan's
Speaker 1: but it's both the most serious and least serious case
Speaker 1: of my career. It's serious because the implications are vast,
Speaker 1: which we're going to talk about. It's also rooted in
Speaker 1: so much nothing that it's almost painful. Like when they
Speaker 1: call it the independent state legislature doctrine or the independent
Speaker 1: state legislature theory. Almost everybody puts doctrine in theory in
Speaker 1: air quotes because there's no there there. It's not something
Speaker 1: that is rooted in constitutional history. It's not something that's
Speaker 1: rooted in tradition. It's something that was almost entirely plucked
Speaker 1: from a chunk of a Rernquist opinion uh in Bush
Speaker 1: Vigore that only got three votes. It's not a majority
Speaker 1: opinion where he was kind of spitballing. You may recall
Speaker 1: Bush Vigor also not a serious decision. So this is
Speaker 1: like a Rank quest fever dream that we're in the
Speaker 1: midstup right now. It's a rank with fever dream where
Speaker 1: he's sort of spitballing. Hey, maybe state legislatures have, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of plenary unreviewable power and state courts can't come
Speaker 1: in and bigfoot on them. It gets two votes, that
Speaker 1: should be the end of the story. But instead it's
Speaker 1: being lifted up as this important piece of doctor um.
Speaker 1: And not to get too in the weeds, but the
Speaker 1: really the reason it's serious is because if the claim
Speaker 1: in this case, and this case comes from a North
Speaker 1: Carolina gerrymander, the North Carolina Supreme Court says, oh hell,
Speaker 1: now do do your maps again. And the North Carolina
Speaker 1: Republican Legislature takes this to the Supreme Court and says,
Speaker 1: we're here profering this completely assinine, rootless theory that when
Speaker 1: a legislature does election stuff, no court can review it.
Speaker 1: End of story. There's that in a nutshell. If you're
Speaker 1: to explain it to our audience or even our host,
Speaker 1: pretend there's somebody who read the headline of a box article,
Speaker 1: but maybe didn't get all the way through because they're busy.
Speaker 1: Is that basically it? It's it's something that's looking at
Speaker 1: the power of state legislatures over federal elections and question
Speaker 1: whether or not they have ultimate power. Is that is?
Speaker 1: That's ish. But there's there's one clarification. There's one section
Speaker 1: of this that has to do with the electors clause
Speaker 1: in the Constitution. That's the federal elections. There's one that
Speaker 1: is the elections clause that has to do with state elections.
Speaker 1: So this particular case actually doesn't implicate some of the
Speaker 1: stuff we talked about Brad Raefinsburger and you know, state
Speaker 1: electors and sending over fake state electors. This is not
Speaker 1: scooping up that this is about state processes. But it
Speaker 1: does mean that if read state and let's remember thirty
Speaker 1: of the fifty states have read state legislatures, if they
Speaker 1: aside they want to make up new rules about ballot initiatives,
Speaker 1: they want to do new vote suppression, they want to
Speaker 1: um uh close polling plate, whatever they want to do.
Speaker 1: They are saying nobody can take this to a state
Speaker 1: supreme court, not even a federal court, a state Supreme
Speaker 1: court and complain because basically, nobody is the boss of me.
Speaker 1: So this, this particular one, is about the state, how
Speaker 1: state election procedures are handled. But one tiny wrinkle there, Jordan,
Speaker 1: this worth saying. One consequence of that is that if
Speaker 1: they win on that claim, you're going to have on
Speaker 1: the same ballot they used to have state and federal
Speaker 1: elections complete chaos because one set of them can't be
Speaker 1: reviewed and one presumably can. So one of the things
Speaker 1: that this is going to inject into the system is
Speaker 1: totally different lanes for state and federal office. Okay, so
Speaker 1: you're looking perplexed. I'm worried that I've I mean, it
Speaker 1: sounds it sounds like there maybe should be a checker,
Speaker 1: a balance in there that these state legislatures should be
Speaker 1: able to be the final say, where do the justices
Speaker 1: stand on this? Like, what is the actual likelihood that
Speaker 1: state legislatures will gain control of federal election procedures? I Mean,
Speaker 1: here's the tricky part. We already have four justices on
Speaker 1: the current Supreme Court who have evinced real enthusiasm for
Speaker 1: this theory. So we have Justices Alito, Gorschen, Thomas that
Speaker 1: are kind of like pedal to the metal, this is cool.
Speaker 1: Uh And in some of the pre election cases we
Speaker 1: saw them sort of effusing about how cool this was.
Speaker 1: And then we have a fourth Justice Kavanaugh, who's done
Speaker 1: some like chin stroking e like, oh, this is kind
Speaker 1: of I think this is pretty compelling, but isn't necessarily
Speaker 1: all in. Let's remember it takes four votes to grant
Speaker 1: a case, so that might be it. We don't know
Speaker 1: where Amy coney Berry's Barrett sits on this. We do
Speaker 1: know that Chief Justice John Roberts doesn't think this is
Speaker 1: necessarily a fantastic idea. We also know he's irrell, event
Speaker 1: so there might be five votes already going in. It's
Speaker 1: probably coming down to Amy coney Barrett is going to
Speaker 1: uh decide this case. That's that's your best guess right now.
Speaker 1: My guess is that John Roberts thinks this is too extreme,
Speaker 1: and he's written lots of prior cases of famously uh
Speaker 1: an Arizona case where he has said time and time again, no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: we're not taking state just judges powers away over state legislatures.
Speaker 1: So I think he's pretty much going to adhere to
Speaker 1: some version of that. This is whacky do right, we
Speaker 1: have we made that point enough. This is insane and
Speaker 1: John Roberts has many things insane, he is not. So Yes,
Speaker 1: I think it comes down to what Justice Barrett thinks,
Speaker 1: and we have no idea on this doctrine what she thinks. Well,
Speaker 1: this issue has popped up over the last hundred years.
Speaker 1: Supreme Court has batted it down over and over again.
Speaker 1: Why is it cropping back up? Now? It's cropping back
Speaker 1: up as part of this kind of law you're larger,
Speaker 1: and I think this goes to your sort of vote
Speaker 1: suppression frame. What do you do when you can't win
Speaker 1: majorities anymore in America? Right? What you do is you
Speaker 1: capture state houses and then you gerrymander the heck out
Speaker 1: of your state voting systems to make sure that tiny
Speaker 1: minorities stay in charge. And so I think this is
Speaker 1: of a piece with a whole subset of things, whether
Speaker 1: it's voter suppression bills like you know, the stuff that
Speaker 1: Stacy Abrams has been fighting, or whether it is ridiculous
Speaker 1: you know, malapportionment that means that you know the Alabama
Speaker 1: case that that the Court heard earlier this year, Meryl,
Speaker 1: where you have a third of Alabama. Of Alabama is
Speaker 1: African American almost a third seven percent. They're all smashed
Speaker 1: into one of seven districts, so they can't um elect
Speaker 1: the candidate of their choice. So I think there's all
Speaker 1: sorts of ways that you suppress majorities. And I put
Speaker 1: this in the bucket of why do its small if
Speaker 1: you can do it huge? Right, if you can just
Speaker 1: do whatever you want. Is a state legislature and it's
Speaker 1: unreviewable by any court. And by the way, just one
Speaker 1: other parenthetical, there's a maximalist, crazy version of this not
Speaker 1: at issue in mor V. Harper that would also say
Speaker 1: that governors like you talked about checks and balances, also
Speaker 1: have no power to do anything they can't veto this.
Speaker 1: So I think one way to sort of lock in
Speaker 1: minority rule for time and memorial is to just make
Speaker 1: it impossible for majority will to be represented at the
Speaker 1: ballot box. Go big or go home, and while you're
Speaker 1: at home, just stay there because there's no reason to
Speaker 1: go out to vote, or that you can have an
Speaker 1: entire orderly election. And this is where folks should think
Speaker 1: about what happened in Georgia, in where you have a
Speaker 1: completely orderly, non chaotic election, and then you have the
Speaker 1: legislature be like, hm, no, we don't like those electors.
Speaker 1: Let's go for this slate of it, which is what
Speaker 1: John Eastman and Donald Trump were asking Brad Raefinsburger to do.
Speaker 1: So I want to be super clear that issue is
Speaker 1: not I think in the four corners of what this
Speaker 1: appeal is. But I think it's of like, you have
Speaker 1: to draw a straight line between this and the kind
Speaker 1: of election denialism we're seeing in where you had states
Speaker 1: and state legislatures being lobbied by Donald Trump, by Jenny Thomas,
Speaker 1: by John Eastman to be like, never mind what the
Speaker 1: voters say, let's do it this way. Well, let's let's
Speaker 1: let's draw that line. So we do have conspiracy theorists
Speaker 1: and election deniers and pretty prominent positions. Granted, quite a
Speaker 1: few of them did lose in the mid terms, including
Speaker 1: Kerry Lake in Arizona, who is now contesting her loss
Speaker 1: for governor even though the results have already been certified.
Speaker 1: Is it crazy to think that whole states that have
Speaker 1: election deniers and their legislatures could just choose to throw
Speaker 1: out the results in federal elections. I don't think it's crazy,
Speaker 1: and I think, in fact, one of the things this
Speaker 1: doctrine is setting up is the stepping stone toward that right.
Speaker 1: I mean, the reason it didn't happen in when Donald
Speaker 1: Trump called Georgia and said, you know, give me a
Speaker 1: fresh ballot of fake collectors is that there was no
Speaker 1: architecture in place to support that right. This case would
Speaker 1: be part of building the architecture that says state legislatures
Speaker 1: can do whatever they want. It is unreviewable, nothing can
Speaker 1: go to a state Supreme court. And one other point
Speaker 1: again on this is in there's an easy way to
Speaker 1: solve this particular North Carolina case, which is the actual
Speaker 1: legislature in North Carolina has already said that the state
Speaker 1: judiciary can review these questions. So this is an easy case.
Speaker 1: It shouldn't even be a question because the legislature has
Speaker 1: taken this power away from itself. But I do think
Speaker 1: you're exactly right to say this is really a building
Speaker 1: block toward a future where state legislature's power are so
Speaker 1: utterly unreviewable or even creepily reviewable only by the U. S.
Speaker 1: Supreme Court, that you should just stay home. Well, you
Speaker 1: say this shouldnt even be a question, and I guess
Speaker 1: I'm curious what that says about our country's political ideology
Speaker 1: and also the ideology of the justices. There are a
Speaker 1: number of conservative legal figures who are coming out against
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court even hearing this case. The fact that
Speaker 1: they are, what does that say about the ideology of
Speaker 1: the justices. So this is without a doubt for me,
Speaker 1: the most interesting part. Right, You've got Mike Ludig, the
Speaker 1: guy who almost got Chief Justice John Roberts seat at
Speaker 1: the court, right, he was on the shortlist. This is
Speaker 1: a stalwart conservative legal movement giant. He's also the guy,
Speaker 1: by the way, who you may recall, Mike Pants was like, dude,
Speaker 1: can I do this thing that Donald Trump is asking
Speaker 1: me to do and not certify the election? It was
Speaker 1: Mike Ludig, you know, conservative legal giant, who was like, no, Mike,
Speaker 1: you can't do that. So he's wildly come out opposed
Speaker 1: to this, and in fact, I think he's one of
Speaker 1: the people, at least he said on my podcast like
Speaker 1: this would signal the demise of orderly elections and checks
Speaker 1: and bounces. So he's come out against it. Ben Ginsburg,
Speaker 1: famous Republican election lawyers against it. Every chief justice of
Speaker 1: every State Supreme Court is on a brief in this
Speaker 1: case saying like this is insane. Stephen Kellibrasy, co founder
Speaker 1: of the Federalist Society, has come out again like there's
Speaker 1: very few sane conservative figures who are for this. So
Speaker 1: then your operative question is why the hell is the
Speaker 1: court flirting with this? Like why are they playing footsie
Speaker 1: with a theory advanced principally by John Eastman, the guy
Speaker 1: who was the architect of the January six legal coup.
Speaker 1: And I think the reason is because there's no breaks
Speaker 1: at the U. S. Supreme Court, because they have a
Speaker 1: six justice supermajority. Everything in the world they wanted last term,
Speaker 1: abortion guns, you know, kneecapping, the e p A, kneecapping,
Speaker 1: the CDC. Everything they wanted, they got. Everything they didn't
Speaker 1: get last year they're getting this year. So this is
Speaker 1: just a my friendly. A litment at Michigan calls it
Speaker 1: the hashtag Yolo Court. You know, they used to have
Speaker 1: some solicitude and sensitivity for what the public could tolerate,
Speaker 1: and I think now they're like directly in opposition to
Speaker 1: what the public can tolerate. There like, oh, Americans hate this,
Speaker 1: let's do it great, This is what what an uplifting conversation.
Speaker 1: It's so good to hear about the people who are
Speaker 1: pulling the levers here. Okay, so let's if states choose
Speaker 1: to do this. If this is a situation that does
Speaker 1: come into fruition, what happens next is that it for democracy?
Speaker 1: Is there anything people in these states could do to
Speaker 1: prevent that? Well, I think that you're going to see
Speaker 1: very much what you're sort of seeing post Dobs, which
Speaker 1: is blue states will rush to bolster blue state supermajorities
Speaker 1: and will create, you know, supermajority districts, and will do
Speaker 1: all the things that New York tried to do and
Speaker 1: failed to do in the midterms. But you'll see red
Speaker 1: states rushing to bolster uh, you know, the power of
Speaker 1: Republican uh supermajorities and all the ways that they do that.
Speaker 1: And so I think, in a weird way, maybe it's
Speaker 1: a sort of second iteration of the red state blue
Speaker 1: state patchwork we're seeing around guns, around environmental protection, around abortions.
Speaker 1: We're just going to see both sides further, you know,
Speaker 1: push whatever it is that they can do to make
Speaker 1: sure they have unlosable power. And that's pretty scary. The
Speaker 1: important question. I think we're all thinking about what does
Speaker 1: this mean for me in the short term? Am I
Speaker 1: going to go out into the world and just here
Speaker 1: stop the steel forever or at least until rogue Red's
Speaker 1: days decide to reinstall President Trump again. That is what
Speaker 1: we call Stephen Bryer four part hypothetical question. Can we
Speaker 1: start with There's so many pieces of that. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think, uh, what it really means is that, first
Speaker 1: of all, this is an incredibly abstract case. Nobody understands
Speaker 1: this case. This should be bigger than Bush figre. The implications,
Speaker 1: as I said, are vast, and yet I think folks
Speaker 1: are just like flummox right on the stop the steel folks,
Speaker 1: I have to say, just looping back to where you
Speaker 1: started Jordan's I'm pretty happy about the fact that the
Speaker 1: stop the Steelers got absolutely she lacked in the mid
Speaker 1: terms because it tells me it was not as salient
Speaker 1: as they thought it was. And more urgently, and I
Speaker 1: think the polling really showed this people kind of like democracy.
Speaker 1: I mean, it was one of the issues that people
Speaker 1: showed up. You know, in addition to reproductive rights, people
Speaker 1: were really anxious that the machinery of crushing democracy had
Speaker 1: kind of gotten a toe hold, and so I actually
Speaker 1: think it's not to say this isn't a worry. It's
Speaker 1: a huge worry because the Supreme Court, as we have
Speaker 1: both stipulated, does not care what you and I think.
Speaker 1: But I do think that the appetite for crazy, lawless
Speaker 1: vote suppression democracy uh shattering initiatives is not what I
Speaker 1: think Donald Trump and carry Lake thought it was. And
Speaker 1: so I'm like, I was like eight Bourbons in this
Speaker 1: time before the you know, before the midterms. I think
Speaker 1: maybe this isn't terrible because I think as much as
Speaker 1: it sucks that the U. S. Supreme Court is an
Speaker 1: unchecked your stocracy that is going around doing whatever the
Speaker 1: hell it wants with life tenured people, when of whom
Speaker 1: has a wife who was involved in January six, that's bad.
Speaker 1: Let's agree. I think that folks recognize that after Dobbs
Speaker 1: in a way they didn't. And I think that the
Speaker 1: ability to just sit there and like take it on
Speaker 1: the chin because the Supreme Court says so is much.
Speaker 1: I think the taste for that is in decline right now.
Speaker 1: I think people are sort of angry, and so I'm
Speaker 1: not as hopeless as you sound well, I will drink
Speaker 1: to that. That looks like a a good place to end.
Speaker 1: Diala Lithwick, thank you for coming out of the podcast.
Speaker 1: Who is a pleasure? Thank you. Well, that's it. The
Speaker 1: end of our six episode limited edition mini series something
Speaker 1: like that. It's a limited series, it's a podcast, whatever
Speaker 1: it is. We did six episodes. That's what we said
Speaker 1: we're gonna do, and now we've wrapped it up and
Speaker 1: there's a chance we'll come back because there's always a
Speaker 1: world in which Americans believe dumb shit and we want
Speaker 1: to talk about all of that. Thanks for listening. This
Speaker 1: has been a blast. Listen to Jordan Clapper figures the
Speaker 1: Conspiracy from The Daily Show on Apple, podcast the Heart Radio,
Speaker 1: Apple or wherever you get your podcasts. What's the Daily
Speaker 1: Show weeknights at eleven tent Central on Comedy Central and
Speaker 1: stream full episodes anytime on Paramount Plus. This has been
Speaker 1: a Comedy Central podcast.