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Speaker 1: is someone anybody elected after twenty sixteen I still call
Speaker 1: a new member of Congress, but he's been there a
Speaker 1: few terms now, so it's hard to call him a
Speaker 1: new member. And we're going to get to that in
Speaker 1: a minute. But it's Sean Caston. He is a republic
Speaker 1: Democratic sees me from suburban Chicago, and we're going to
Speaker 1: make him describe his district a little bit. He did
Speaker 1: the original district he won. He flipped a Republican seat.
Speaker 1: It has gotten after the normal redistricting. I have to
Speaker 1: say normal redistricting now considering all the different ways iterations
Speaker 1: that take place these days. But he got I think
Speaker 1: a slightly less competitive district these days. But I booked
Speaker 1: the Congressman because he did something that I've been dying
Speaker 1: for somebody to do at one of these open committee hearings.
Speaker 1: He asked detailed questions looking for a response, without being theatrical,
Speaker 1: without trying to dunk on a person. He was just
Speaker 1: trying to get information, and it went viral because the
Speaker 1: person that didn't answer the question. In this case, it
Speaker 1: was the Treasury Secretary didn't have an answer to what
Speaker 1: was a fairly simple question. Though it was fraught with
Speaker 1: how he answered. It was fraught with some political peril there.
Speaker 1: But it was a reminder that you don't have to yell,
Speaker 1: you don't have to perform for something to go viral
Speaker 1: if you just have a really good question and you
Speaker 1: stump the cabinet members. So Congressman, is good to see you.
Speaker 2: Thank you, and it's nice to it's nice to be
Speaker 2: recognized for not doing this job just so that I
Speaker 2: can become an influencer.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, look, that's it is.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: I used to joke and part of it is the
Speaker 1: way leadership has sort of hijacked Congress. And I say
Speaker 1: that I use that term intentionally because when I first
Speaker 1: started doing this in the early nineties, committee chairs meant something,
Speaker 1: subcommittee chairs meant something, and leadership would be deferential to
Speaker 1: committees and to subcommittees and things like that. Now you know,
Speaker 1: they're four hundred and thirty one excuse me, five hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty one elected pundits and four people that make decisions.
Speaker 1: And it's and when you do that, eventually you'll stop
Speaker 1: having legislators and you'll start having more political pundits as
Speaker 1: elected officials. You know. I I remember I interviewed Jake Laturner.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember him. Yeah, he's left
Speaker 1: no reason.
Speaker 2: To leave about Bob's big Boy's body double by the.
Speaker 1: Way, Yeah, he is a but he he essentially left
Speaker 1: because he didn't want to be an influencer that seemed
Speaker 1: to be what it is he was. Look, he's more
Speaker 1: of a Paul Ryan conservative and that's out of vogue
Speaker 1: these days in the Republican Party. But he saw that,
Speaker 1: you know, if he did something that meant that was
Speaker 1: good for his district on the Egg Committee, nobody was
Speaker 1: going to cover it. And he figured that that Congress
Speaker 1: was you know more Marjorie Taylor Green and Alexandria Cassio
Speaker 1: Cortes than it is. You know, the grinders. Do you
Speaker 1: feel that well?
Speaker 2: So I have a more I have maybe a more
Speaker 2: boy scouted you of Congress. I think hearings. Hearings have
Speaker 2: always been really important. There are places to get information.
Speaker 2: It's also not lost that in the age we're in,
Speaker 2: for better or for worse, they're all on TV, and
Speaker 2: so there's always going to be some theater too.
Speaker 1: Now I blame TV for a lot of problems. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think the minute the cameras got come came on.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is why I'm not for cameras in
Speaker 1: the courtroom generally. I'm for audio. I'm for live audio.
Speaker 1: I think the transparency matters. But I think that there's
Speaker 1: something that triggers human beings to behave differently.
Speaker 2: When they care. There definitely is, And I guess the
Speaker 2: only thing that I'd say in their defense is that,
Speaker 2: particularly when you're in the minority and you can't control
Speaker 2: the legislative calendar, the only tool you really have in
Speaker 2: the minority is to move public opinion, and so there
Speaker 2: is a value in the televised hearings the extent that
Speaker 2: you can inject something in. I mean, look, as you said,
Speaker 2: I'm on your show today because I injected something into
Speaker 2: the public conversation about what was going on in Venezuela
Speaker 2: and some of the legal authority that wouldn't have happened
Speaker 2: if this was a closed door hearing. And so there's
Speaker 2: there's a there's value within that, and you know, but.
Speaker 1: You also showed that you can you could do something
Speaker 1: that may I don't believe you were trying to be performative.
Speaker 2: Okay, no, well, I mean I'll tell you candidly because
Speaker 2: there was a there was a political reporter who was
Speaker 2: asking all this the day before, what are you going
Speaker 2: to ask percent? And I said, what I know is
Speaker 2: that he is going to be filled with talking points
Speaker 2: from the Trump administration. He's going there's going to be
Speaker 2: a lot of theatrics because that's his style. And therefore
Speaker 2: I'm not going to tell you what I'm going to
Speaker 2: ask him because I'm working on on some things that
Speaker 2: I don't want him to be prepared for, because I
Speaker 2: want him to be engaged in this. And this reporter
Speaker 2: came to me afterwards and he said, I understand why
Speaker 2: you didn't tell me now, but what we were trying
Speaker 2: to do was to say I had earlier written a
Speaker 2: letter to the oil majors pointing out to them that
Speaker 2: because the Trump White House has not outlined any legal
Speaker 2: authority for seizing Venezuelan and oil, any investments they might
Speaker 2: make to refine distribute that oil, they're going to be
Speaker 2: exposed to Venezuela's creditors, the largest of which is China,
Speaker 2: because this is a fraudulent conveyance. And I had wanted
Speaker 2: to go in with that, and we got the uh,
Speaker 2: the good fortune, the bad fortune that a day or
Speaker 2: two before, Marco Rubio had been before the Senate Foreign
Speaker 2: Relations Committee and had made some suggestions about things that
Speaker 2: we knew were legally not true. And so it was
Speaker 2: just an opportunity to go and frame those conversations with
Speaker 2: percent to say, Okay, you either have to either have
Speaker 2: to agree with Rubio, in which case you're in a problem,
Speaker 2: or clarify clarifying, which is going to put you in
Speaker 2: a pickle. And I didn't want him to be prepared,
Speaker 2: and we had to and we had to keep our
Speaker 2: tone down because if he got on the defensive of
Speaker 2: starting to throw out all of the you know, the
Speaker 2: Pam Bondi burn book stuff. Five minutes goes pretty quick
Speaker 2: in that situation.
Speaker 1: Well, what what I found interesting is that Besson didn't
Speaker 1: react sort of as as a you know, the the
Speaker 1: you know, he's you know, at first, he was sort
Speaker 1: of tried to be an adult when he first took
Speaker 1: the job, and now he you know, you see him,
Speaker 1: I guess he's an adult behind the scenes now, But
Speaker 1: you do, you know, because I think he look, I
Speaker 1: think he does talk Trump off off of some ledges
Speaker 1: that are even worse than the ledges that Trump that
Speaker 1: we see Trump go out on. But I've noticed that
Speaker 1: Besson is clearly trying to get on the President's good
Speaker 1: side by by being performative in public against the quote
Speaker 1: unquote owning the Libs or whatever it is that Scott
Speaker 1: Besson thinks he has to do to keep his job.
Speaker 1: But he didn't do that with you. Why do you
Speaker 1: think that is? You think he was embarrassed that he
Speaker 1: didn't know the answer.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure he understood the question, to be honest.
Speaker 1: I don't know if he did it either. Yea, Because and.
Speaker 2: This was where we get into it, because Rubio had
Speaker 2: said that Treasury was managing these funds under their authority,
Speaker 2: and we knew the Treasury.
Speaker 1: He didn't actually kept saying what authority, yeah and.
Speaker 2: So and so. You know, at least framing the question
Speaker 2: that way, you can't say, well, this is just because
Speaker 2: you know you're some liberal. You either have to point
Speaker 2: to the specific one of the you know, Congress has
Speaker 2: given Treasury ninety one separate authorities to manage ninety one
Speaker 2: different types of trust accounts. If if the Treasury Department
Speaker 2: had done what Rubio said they it had done, the
Speaker 2: Treasury Secretary would know which of those trust accounts applied.
Speaker 2: And when you read those ninety one trust accounts, and
Speaker 2: none of them actually fit the bill. So, I you know,
Speaker 2: I think I think he was trying to well, let
Speaker 2: me not expect them what I was trying to do.
Speaker 2: I think there was no way for him to answer
Speaker 2: that question in ways that just sort of made Trump
Speaker 2: happy that he went viral and made a Democrat look bad.
Speaker 1: I think, you know, I fear something worse. I fear
Speaker 1: that they haven't thought about this yet.
Speaker 2: Well, look, and I don't want to. It's dangerous to
Speaker 2: go down too many conspiracy rabbit holes if we If
Speaker 2: you agree with my point that they have not, well,
Speaker 2: this isn't just This isn't even something I'm agree with.
Speaker 2: Administration has not given any indication that they have any
Speaker 2: legal authority to take title to Venezuelan oil or to
Speaker 2: distribute Venezuelan oil. As a result of that, you now
Speaker 2: have this account that we're taking. They've moved it to Cutter,
Speaker 2: which is a whole other set of problems because there
Speaker 2: are superios where Treasury takes custody to accounts, but we
Speaker 2: keep them in US banks where we can monitor. This
Speaker 2: is now in a place that's notorious for hiding money, right,
Speaker 2: and then said that they have no wateritor in place
Speaker 2: to monitor the inflows and the outflows. Well, if you
Speaker 2: were doing all that, then you take Trump in his
Speaker 2: face that there are a lot of bad people in
Speaker 2: Venezuela who are using money to funnel drugs and run
Speaker 2: these narco terrorism empires. How do you possibly know that
Speaker 2: the money you're distributing back to Venezuela isn't going to
Speaker 2: those bad actors. And as I was asking the questions,
Speaker 2: what I was trying to get them to acknowledge is
Speaker 2: I'll stipulate for the purpose of the hearing that Maduro
Speaker 2: a bad guy. You didn't want the way to go
Speaker 2: through there. Why wouldn't you have an audit regime in
Speaker 2: place to monitor that? Rubio said they did have an
Speaker 2: audit regime regime. Bessen said they didn't have one yet
Speaker 2: but would set them up, which suggests that the two
Speaker 2: of them didn't coordinate their story, right, And so now
Speaker 2: this raises this is where the conspiracy starts. Is it
Speaker 2: not being audited because it's going to shady characters in
Speaker 2: Venezuela or is it not being audited because it's going
Speaker 2: to shady characters in the United States?
Speaker 1: Right, I don't know if they want to.
Speaker 2: There's no time. Would you even know how to answer
Speaker 2: that question? Right?
Speaker 1: Well, it gets into this administration, and I think you know,
Speaker 1: and I'm curious if you now see this trickling down
Speaker 1: to the cabinet secretaries. Look, if the president doesn't believe
Speaker 1: that some of these rules don't apply to him, separation
Speaker 1: of powers doesn't apply, you know, all these little things
Speaker 1: in it. And it takes the Supreme Court rebuke that
Speaker 1: he got late last week on tariffs, and even then,
Speaker 1: he's not really accepting the rebuke the way normal presidents would.
Speaker 1: A normal president would do one of two things, find
Speaker 1: another you know, find another way, or ask Congress to
Speaker 1: give him the authority whatever. You know, he's just attacking
Speaker 1: the institution itself. Do you get the sense now that
Speaker 1: many of these cabinet agencies that come before you guys
Speaker 1: and these hearings, when they do these testimonies, they feel
Speaker 1: as if they don't really have to abide by the
Speaker 1: rules of Congress. They just have to do just enough
Speaker 1: performance and they'll be protected by the majority.
Speaker 2: Sadly, that's true, and frankly that's probably been true for
Speaker 2: a long time. I mean, remember, you know, Jim Jordan
Speaker 2: denied a sub poena to come and testify before January sixth,
Speaker 2: and he was never really prosecuted for that. And so
Speaker 2: I think there is a sense that, if you know,
Speaker 2: a government based on the rule of law is predicated
Speaker 2: on the idea that the people force in the rule
Speaker 2: of law will comply with the rule of laws, that
Speaker 2: falls apart pretty quickly.
Speaker 1: A constitution becomes a piece of paper if you don't
Speaker 1: use it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, I think there's a I think there's a
Speaker 2: separate issue in this Trump administration. And I certainly don't
Speaker 2: want to, you know, be here praising Jeff Sessions but
Speaker 2: in the first Trump administration, he was constrained because there
Speaker 2: were a number of people in his administration, people like
Speaker 2: John Bolton, people like Jeff Sessions who understood the independence
Speaker 2: of what they had to do and and you know,
Speaker 2: respected the president, were there to carry out his orders,
Speaker 2: but took took their oath to the constitution. Seriously, the
Speaker 2: people who Trump nominated for cabinet secretaries, virtually to a person,
Speaker 2: where nominated because they'll take orders. Anybody who was going
Speaker 2: to stand up has been has been merged from the party.
Speaker 2: I mean, Adam Kinsinger and I did not agree on
Speaker 2: very much. That Adam Kinzinger was dangerous because he challenged
Speaker 2: the president. Right, I agree with Marjori Taylor Green on
Speaker 2: virtually nothing. She's dangerous because she challenges the president. And
Speaker 2: so the people who are left there. I mean, think
Speaker 2: of all the criticisms Trump had of Marco Rubio back
Speaker 2: in the presidential race. Those criticisms stung because Marco Rubio,
Speaker 2: he's a beta dog, right, that's who is person.
Speaker 1: Well, I joke, you know, Marco, Marco needs to know
Speaker 1: and understand that when when Venezuela goes south, or Cuba
Speaker 1: go south, or Iron Goo South. Whichever one of these
Speaker 1: adventures that either we're about to embark on or have
Speaker 1: embarked on and we haven't and it sort of had
Speaker 1: some either becomes unpopular for some reason or whatever. It's
Speaker 1: Rubio that's getting thrown under the bus. Yeah, and you know,
Speaker 1: this is how he operates. He does not It is
Speaker 1: never his fault, no matter what happens. But it is.
Speaker 1: It also explains Congressman, you know what you've never heard
Speaker 1: ever out of this White House. Donald Trump had a
Speaker 1: meeting today with one of his business partners from thirty
Speaker 1: years ago. Donald Trump had a meeting today with an
Speaker 1: old college roommate. Donald Trump had a meeting today with
Speaker 1: some he has no friends or colleagues or acquaintances that
Speaker 1: will do business with him who did business with him
Speaker 1: in the seventies, eighties or nineties, or the first.
Speaker 2: Technoy at least not since I stained bad.
Speaker 1: Right, I mean, but he went through. It's a pattern
Speaker 1: about it. I mean you look at it from first
Speaker 1: term to second term. You basically have Steven Miller. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, it's basically it. And so because
Speaker 1: when he loyalty is one way with him, and when
Speaker 1: he throws somebody away and they you know, that's it,
Speaker 1: and they won't come back. You know, most of them
Speaker 1: don't come back into the fold unless they're kind of
Speaker 1: like Lindsey Grant, right, who were just desperate for it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, I mean, it's like it's a certain type
Speaker 2: of person I was. I was a CEO for sixteen
Speaker 2: years in the energy industry before I came to Congress.
Speaker 2: And there is a certain type of person who is
Speaker 2: who is transactional and always wants to make sure they
Speaker 2: get the best end of the deal. And you never
Speaker 2: do a deal with that person twice, right, the people
Speaker 2: who So.
Speaker 1: That's been the view of that's basically Donald Trump in
Speaker 1: his life. Nobody's ever done a second deal with him.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, the parable of Giuliani. Right.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you about why you're in Congress. Congress.
Speaker 1: You know, when you look at our problems today, it
Speaker 1: is ultimately Congress's fault. Like this is, and I go
Speaker 1: back forty years. Congress's inability to do things is put
Speaker 1: pressure on the courts. Congress's inability to do things is
Speaker 1: put pressure on the presidency's. Congress's decisions to to not
Speaker 1: make tough decisions, to let the executive branch do it.
Speaker 1: And it's been sort of a slow thing, right, It's
Speaker 1: it's an emergency here, trade authority there. You know, it's
Speaker 1: been it's been over time. But here you are running.
Speaker 1: You're a CEO. Here you are and I so I'm
Speaker 1: glad somebody who's had a real career, meta pay role
Speaker 1: wants to come to Congress. But it is not a functional,
Speaker 1: small d democratic institution these days, particularly when you join
Speaker 1: starting in twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen.
Speaker 2: What keeps you there? Well, so let me let me
Speaker 2: give you what I take a lot of inspiration from.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of beauty in the story. So I
Speaker 2: twenty eighteen. We sold our company in twenty sixteen. I
Speaker 2: was trying to figure out what to do next. I
Speaker 2: had a one year non compete, so I couldn't work
Speaker 2: in the industry that I was in for a year.
Speaker 2: And I started going around because I was frustrated that
Speaker 2: my representative wasn't standing up to Trump, and I felt
Speaker 2: like what we needed in this era, so someone was
Speaker 2: standing up to Trump. And my my big issue for
Speaker 2: my whole life has been trying to do something about
Speaker 2: climate change. That the businesses I ran and most of
Speaker 2: what the legislating I've done. And a good friend of mine,
Speaker 2: Katie McGuinty, who had been the head of the Council
Speaker 2: of Environmental Quality and the Clinton White House, she said,
Speaker 2: I'm not going to encourage you to run, but I
Speaker 2: will tell you that this is if you know what
Speaker 2: you wanted, I want to have written on your tombstone
Speaker 2: about what you contributed to the Earth during your time
Speaker 2: on it. There's no better job than being a member
Speaker 2: of Congress. And if you don't know what you want
Speaker 2: written on your tombstone, there's no worst job, because you
Speaker 2: have such enormous levers that you can pull on. And
Speaker 2: so you know, in my private sector life, we deployed
Speaker 2: a couple hundred million dollars I'm worth the capital projects,
Speaker 2: made some money for various investors. It looks good in
Speaker 2: a resume. My first year in Congress cut a billion
Speaker 2: dollars of legislation passed specifically to deploy clean energy technologies.
Speaker 2: Not that not that things are measured in dollars, but
Speaker 2: this was a fresh number of Congress and movement in
Speaker 2: different ways. And the part of it that I think
Speaker 2: is sort of beautiful and inspired hiring is that the
Speaker 2: I flipped seat. They'd been Republican for fifty years. There
Speaker 2: were forty of us in that class of eighteen who
Speaker 2: flipped seats. Of the forty of us, Jennifer Wexton, Ben mccadams,
Speaker 2: and Anthony Brindisi had held prior elected office. The other
Speaker 2: thirty seven had never held any elected office before coming in.
Speaker 1: No, it's what made it a really good class.
Speaker 2: And you know, and it was you know, me and
Speaker 2: Dean Phillips had been CEOs. Lauren Underwood with a nurse.
Speaker 2: Alissa and Abigail were spies. Tom Melanowski and Andy Kim
Speaker 2: were in the State Department. JOHNA. Hayes was a teacher.
Speaker 2: You had all these people who you know, the single
Speaker 2: greatest thing that Donald Trump has ever done is he
Speaker 2: made people feel like they wanted to contribute to society. Right.
Speaker 2: And yes, you know the I think everything that you
Speaker 2: say to criticize Congress is fair. I think it goes
Speaker 2: back way more than twenty years. I went forty founders.
Speaker 2: Our founders created a Congress that was the article one branch.
Speaker 2: It was where all the people were, it was where
Speaker 2: all the budget was. Congress is now less than one
Speaker 2: half of one percent of the total federal budget, because
Speaker 2: every time we identify a problem, we basically create an
Speaker 2: executive branch agency to fix it, and we gradually, you know,
Speaker 2: make ourselves weaker and weaker. And I, you know, I
Speaker 2: think other than other than the War Powers Act, I'm
Speaker 2: hard pressed to think of a time where Congress took
Speaker 2: power back from the other agencies or the other branches.
Speaker 2: But I can think of lots of time, starting with
Speaker 2: Marbori versus Madison, where the judicial branch took power from
Speaker 2: the legislative branch. Lots of times where the executive has
Speaker 2: taken power from legislative And I think we're vastly overdue.
Speaker 2: You know, if we still believe that it's important to
Speaker 2: have a government with three co equal branches, we got
Speaker 2: to be a little more equal. And I think we
Speaker 2: need to sort of push for some structural reforms. And
Speaker 2: the while I'm not naive about a loan that's going
Speaker 2: to take, what other job could I possibly get where
Speaker 2: I could actually have a role in fixing that.
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Speaker 1: use the code Chuck podcast. You you have made the
Speaker 1: case for why you should be there, and I appreciate
Speaker 1: that attitude. I fear that not many have the same
Speaker 1: attitude that you have. You know, some wanted as a
Speaker 1: stepping stone as well. Some are you know, some are
Speaker 1: Some actually want it on their resume so they can
Speaker 1: say they did it on that front. But let's talk
Speaker 1: about so one of the way. One of the ways
Speaker 1: I describe myself as I always say, I'm short term pessimistic,
Speaker 1: but long term optimistic that history shows that when we
Speaker 1: are in these moments, we do the structural changes or
Speaker 1: updatings that are needed. And the only question is whether
Speaker 1: how much violence it takes before we get to that point.
Speaker 1: And I know that sounds harsh. I don't mean to
Speaker 1: sound or doomer gloom, but when you look at the
Speaker 1: we've really only had about four periods where we've made
Speaker 1: serious changes to the constitution to try to update the democracy,
Speaker 1: right at the start, during and after the Civil War,
Speaker 1: and the period that I'm currently obsessed with, basically the
Speaker 1: first twenty five years of the twentieth century, where we
Speaker 1: had where we had three of the most important reforms
Speaker 1: that were added to the constitution, women, the right to vote,
Speaker 1: income tax, and direct election of senators, and all three
Speaker 1: were really direct responses to what felt like a crisis.
Speaker 1: In the moment. It felt like income inequality was out
Speaker 1: of control with the industrialists and they weren't paying their
Speaker 1: fair share. Tariffs were not the way to fund a government.
Speaker 1: People realize this, The democracy felt like it wasn't really
Speaker 1: responsive to the people. I think we now feel that
Speaker 1: same that same thing. Now I've got my own theories
Speaker 1: as to why that is. I think Congress is too
Speaker 1: damn small. But we'll get to that in a minute.
Speaker 1: And of course, with the feeling that hey, the Senate's
Speaker 1: rigged and it's it was a bribery scandal, by the way,
Speaker 1: in the great state of Illinois that helped accelerate the
Speaker 1: cause of direct election for senators. Illinois, of course, has
Speaker 1: its fair share of scandals political scandals over the century.
Speaker 2: You say a bribery scandal involving an Illinois senator, I
Speaker 2: have to ask which one you refer to.
Speaker 1: I know, I know, you know, I knew my five
Speaker 1: governors had served time. I was like, oh wow, so
Speaker 1: they also were the cause of the direct election of
Speaker 1: senators too. Yeah, apparently votes went for thirty five grand
Speaker 1: in today's dollars, was what a vote for a US
Speaker 1: senator was in the state ledge back in nineteen oh nine.
Speaker 1: But you know, a couple of weeks ago, there's a
Speaker 1: there was a constitutional amendment that was introduced in Congress
Speaker 1: to give Congress nullification powers on pardons if if enough
Speaker 1: members decided it was yes. While it was actually I
Speaker 1: think Johnny Olewinsky, Okay, he introduced it, and Bacon became
Speaker 1: the first Republican to sign on to it. What's the appetite.
Speaker 1: You sound like you're a reformer. You you'd like to
Speaker 1: get involved in some of the updating of the American democracy,
Speaker 1: reforming the institution. Maybe it's a constitutional amendment, some stuff
Speaker 1: you can do just with an Act of Congress. What
Speaker 1: are the reforms that you'd like to focus on for
Speaker 1: the rest of this decade?
Speaker 2: So Number one, I think you are spot on that
Speaker 2: there are so many echoes both to the reconstruction era
Speaker 2: and the twenties, and I think trying to not repeat
Speaker 2: the mistakes of reconstruction, but also to recognize, like we
Speaker 2: I think we appropriately lionized Teddy Roosevelt because he was
Speaker 2: someone who came in and said, I'm not going to
Speaker 2: burn the institutions down, but I'm not going to praise
Speaker 2: them as being perfect either. We have to make some
Speaker 2: significant structural reforms to fix this. And it's you know,
Speaker 2: the whole trust busting era. I think that, arguably, you know,
Speaker 2: is what set us up for such a booming century.
Speaker 2: I think if you look at the reforms we've made
Speaker 2: over time, everything we're really proud of in our history
Speaker 2: has made democracy more inclusive, whether that was you know,
Speaker 2: expanding the franchise to women, to minorities, to Native Americans,
Speaker 2: direct election of senators. The most anti democratic institutions in
Speaker 2: the United States are still the ones that hold us back.
Speaker 2: The Senate, the Electoral College, and the structure of the
Speaker 2: Supreme Court. The Senate sort of has a self destruct
Speaker 2: button that Article five of the Constitution says that you
Speaker 2: can't You're not even allowed to amend the Constitution in
Speaker 2: a way that would reduce the proportional power of the states.
Speaker 2: Because I think our founders understood how deeply anti democratic
Speaker 2: the Senate was and what the problem is, We've introduced
Speaker 2: a bill to get around that in a sort of
Speaker 2: a sideways way by saying, let's create twelve nationally elected
Speaker 2: at large senators so that the Senate would actually have
Speaker 2: a significant block of senators who had to be responsive
Speaker 2: to national public will, as a way to fix that.
Speaker 2: The Supreme Court, I think, on any objective analysis, has
Speaker 2: always been political and has always been lowercase C conservative.
Speaker 2: I mean, with the exception of the War in Court,
Speaker 2: they have always protected the power of incumbents over expansions
Speaker 2: of democracy. And there's nothing particularly wrong with them being
Speaker 2: political other than the fact that they tell themselves a
Speaker 2: story that they are just gods on high who live
Speaker 2: in a temple and dispense wisdom, and they're not political actors,
Speaker 2: and yet we all know they are. And so we've
Speaker 2: introduced some legislation that would basically take advantage of the
Speaker 2: fact that Article three of the Constitution specifically says that
Speaker 2: the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court is limited to disputes
Speaker 2: between the States admiralty law and the maritime law, matters
Speaker 2: related to ambassadors and such a pellet jurisdiction, as the
Speaker 2: Congress provides. So Congress has the ability if we choose
Speaker 2: to strip all the pellet jurisdiction from the Supreme Court.
Speaker 2: And so what we've done is introduced legislation that would
Speaker 2: say the Senior Appellate Court would now be a separate
Speaker 2: court and judges would be randomly assigned from the seventy
Speaker 2: or eighty Senior Circuit Court judges, so that you couldn't
Speaker 2: you couldn't choose your docket right, And that would go
Speaker 2: through to set that case so that we would actually
Speaker 2: have you wouldn't have a way to politicize the court
Speaker 2: and do that. We can do that, you know, and
Speaker 2: I for one, think that Clance Thomas and Samuel Lto
Speaker 2: are really good at maritime law and admiralty law, and
Speaker 2: they could continue to do that. Matters related to ambassadors, fine,
Speaker 2: you can have your lifetime appointment. I think beyond that though,
Speaker 2: on the Supreme Court, prior to nineteen twenty five, the
Speaker 2: Supreme Court didn't get to set there on docket. Congress
Speaker 2: gave them the power to set their dockete and grant
Speaker 2: cert in the judges active nineteen twenty five. We could
Speaker 2: take that away, right, and all of a sudden you
Speaker 2: wouldn't have the situation where Thomas makes a footnote in
Speaker 2: a dissent and somebody says, Okay, I see what you're saying.
Speaker 2: If I bring this case, we can go in and
Speaker 2: bring this down. We can take that away. We could
Speaker 2: We have the power of the purse. Why don't we
Speaker 2: always give the Supreme Court one hundred percent of the
Speaker 2: appropriation they ask for. We could go back and say
Speaker 2: we're going to give you less next year unless you
Speaker 2: institute the following ethics reforms. Right, let's make people trust
Speaker 2: the court. Then, all things that we could do within
Speaker 2: our power, And I know there are a lot of conversations.
Speaker 1: I you know, I'm one of those who thinks incentives
Speaker 1: you got to fix incentive structures, meaning you can have
Speaker 1: a good person with bad incentives, they'll do bad things. Yeah, agree, right,
Speaker 1: and a bad person with good incentives can end up
Speaker 1: doing good things. You know what if it took seventy
Speaker 1: five votes to confirm a Supreme Court justice, I promise
Speaker 1: you would get people that were the least partisan people
Speaker 1: you could find, no matter who the president was.
Speaker 2: True, although I would remind you of that Hamilton's line
Speaker 2: that supermajorities create the problems they're designed to solve.
Speaker 1: I understand that he argues that, but he also argues
Speaker 1: in Federal seventy eight that the goal should be to
Speaker 1: find the least If the goal in finding a judge
Speaker 1: is whatever it takes to get the least, you know,
Speaker 1: sort of the most neutral person you can get. That
Speaker 1: was the point of lifetime appointments. I mean, look, imagine
Speaker 1: if we didn't have lifetime appointments, Donald Trump would have
Speaker 1: fired Neil gorsicch this weekend. Yeah, okay, right, I think
Speaker 1: that's what we do. Know that he probably does that,
Speaker 1: and probably you would have fired Amy Cony Barrett after
Speaker 1: you know, a couple of times ago. So it is,
Speaker 1: I take your point on supermajorities, but if you so,
Speaker 1: I had a source of mine who worked in the
Speaker 1: Bush Justice Bush Council office in the Bush w forty
Speaker 1: three's and back then it took sixty votes essentially to
Speaker 1: get a judge through, and he said, if it had
Speaker 1: been fifty that they wouldn't have nominated any of the
Speaker 1: people they nominated.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, dad, what Kevin? I got what fifty one votes? Like? Right?
Speaker 1: So the point is that we haven't had you would
Speaker 1: You'll nominate a partisan, You'll nominate a partisan warrior. I
Speaker 1: think the three Liberals are, you know, I mean, I
Speaker 1: think Kagan's the least of the least partisan of the
Speaker 1: three liberals, but I think all of them are more
Speaker 1: partisan warriors than Stephen Bryer was or Ruth Bader Ginsburg was,
Speaker 1: And you certainly see that with Alito in particular, I mean,
Speaker 1: he certainly is a partisan warrior. I mean, although ironically
Speaker 1: he came through during the sixty the sixty zone.
Speaker 2: I mean, and I don't have a way legislator to
Speaker 2: fix this because of Article five, but it's worth noting
Speaker 2: that for every state in every country that's copied the
Speaker 2: US form of democracy. None of them copied the structure
Speaker 2: of the Senate, you know, the over representation.
Speaker 1: The way we don't would we export a democracy. We
Speaker 1: also recommend multi member districts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's funny so many This was probably three
Speaker 2: or four years ago. We run a bipartisan, bicameral trip
Speaker 2: to Iceland. Iceland has had they have the longest continuously
Speaker 2: active parliamentary form of government. They first met in like
Speaker 2: the year nine hundred. There's all this fascinating history and
Speaker 2: so we're meeting with them and they're showing us their
Speaker 2: chambers and they described how sometime in the last century
Speaker 2: they essentially adopted the US form of government. And they
Speaker 2: went through and he said, after twenty years we got
Speaker 2: rid of what you would call the Senate because it
Speaker 2: just come things up. And there sitting there and Tom Carper,
Speaker 2: it's this big frown in his face and all of
Speaker 2: US House members start churning. But there's sort of an
Speaker 2: acknowledgment that that structure and I say this on the judges,
Speaker 2: because the Senate always is going to skew you know,
Speaker 2: conservative and again in the lowercase see sense because it
Speaker 2: always overly represents rural areas, people closer to the land.
Speaker 2: You know, we're sort of you know, you know, traditional,
Speaker 2: all that sort of stuff, And maybe that made sense
Speaker 2: in seventeen eighty nine, but it means that, you know,
Speaker 2: the the swing vote in the Senate is always very
Speaker 2: far to the right of the Median American voter.
Speaker 1: Look, the national Senators are because I have a founding
Speaker 1: founding father historian, and she's she runs the George Washington
Speaker 1: Library right now at Mount Vernet, and her fix for
Speaker 1: the Senate is to essentially carve out you know, you
Speaker 1: basically you take the top six, get five senators. The
Speaker 1: top six most popular state gets five senators, The next
Speaker 1: say six, get four senators, the next five or six
Speaker 1: get three, and then everybody else gets two. I don't
Speaker 1: know if that passes Article five muster only it.
Speaker 2: Does because it says that you can't you can't amend
Speaker 2: the Constitution in any way that would change the proportional
Speaker 2: representation in the Senate.
Speaker 1: But it's a but it in some ways, what you're
Speaker 1: describing a twelve national Senators is potentially one thing. Let
Speaker 1: me get something that I'm obsessed with because I think
Speaker 1: it solves a couple of problems without touching the Constitution,
Speaker 1: and that is and that is uncapping the House.
Speaker 2: I've got to abile to do that too.
Speaker 1: It is we are you know, when we shut it
Speaker 1: down to nineteen thirty, when they when they locked in
Speaker 1: in at four thirty five, we were at about one
Speaker 1: percon three hundred and fifty thousand each district. We're now
Speaker 1: one per eight hundred and as I like to remind people,
Speaker 1: eight hundred thousand is the population of the fifteenth largest
Speaker 1: city in America. I don't think the Founders meant for
Speaker 1: four hundred and thirty five congressional districts to be all
Speaker 1: the size population wise of one of the fifteen largest
Speaker 1: cities in America. So if you go back to what
Speaker 1: it was in nineteen thirty, because we were doing it
Speaker 1: every decade, expanding the House with the size of the population,
Speaker 1: I think you might need a constitutional amendment to put
Speaker 1: a put a numerator in there and say that no
Speaker 1: congressional district can be bigger than point oh three percent
Speaker 1: of the right Now, that would make it point oh
Speaker 1: three percent of the population. If we went to one,
Speaker 1: say three point fifty one per four hundred. Right around there,
Speaker 1: we'd have about eight hundred and fifty eight hundred and
Speaker 1: seventy members of Congress. But what it really does is
Speaker 1: that it allows the electoral college to level, basically become
Speaker 1: a level playing field. Wyoming goes from being six six
Speaker 1: times more more an advantage of a presidential vote over
Speaker 1: a Californian. They still have an advantage, but it's two
Speaker 1: and a half. So it's it's what I would argue,
Speaker 1: it keeps in what the founders always wanted, which is
Speaker 1: at the small stage, should get a little more influenced,
Speaker 1: but not a lot more influence. Right, two and a
Speaker 1: half to one feels better than six to one, And
Speaker 1: I think it would make jerrymandering just less necessary. You're
Speaker 1: going to have it in some places, but it's it's
Speaker 1: less and somebody's harder to do, and you probably lower
Speaker 1: you probably diversify Congress just by sheer numbers in ways,
Speaker 1: and you'll get different walks of life and and it
Speaker 1: will be the people's house again. But try telling, try
Speaker 1: making the case that the problem in Washington is not
Speaker 1: enough politicians.
Speaker 2: Well, it's it's number one. It's worth reminding people that
Speaker 2: for all the people who work in Washington only five
Speaker 2: hundred and thirty seven and won an election. If you're
Speaker 2: concerned about size of government, the elected folks are not
Speaker 2: the problem. So we've got we've got legislation to do that.
Speaker 2: We we The way we did ours is say we
Speaker 2: will on every going forward census, you expand the members
Speaker 2: of the You expand the number of members in the House,
Speaker 2: rather than expanding the number of people we represent it.
Speaker 2: And you lack a district at five hundred thousand. We
Speaker 2: picked five hundred thousand for sort of arbitrary reasons. But
Speaker 2: there's been a number of political scientists who look at
Speaker 2: this cube root law that if you look at all
Speaker 2: the parliamentary democracies of the world, you put population on
Speaker 2: one the access how many members, It kind of follows
Speaker 2: a cube route, and it's about five hundred. So at
Speaker 2: least just say, well, we know this works because other
Speaker 2: governments kind of run on this form.
Speaker 1: I'll just tell you my math. When I went to
Speaker 1: I went to the fiftieth largest city in America, which
Speaker 1: happens to be Arlington, Texas. They have a population of
Speaker 1: four hundred thousand. Fair enough, I thought, you know what,
Speaker 1: that's pretty that they are one community of interest, right,
Speaker 1: A suburban you know, small city from Dallas is a
Speaker 1: community of interest, and I thought so it felt fair.
Speaker 1: But I take your point at five hundred. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think at this point four to five hundred isn't.
Speaker 2: A huge Yeah. The distinction there's there are people smarter
Speaker 2: than me who have argued that you increase the odds
Speaker 2: that the chance for gerrymandering shenanigans if you expand, and
Speaker 2: I can't argue either side of that. I think broadly speaking,
Speaker 2: you are going to get more districts where there are
Speaker 2: more people, which means that I think you counter some
Speaker 2: of the reason why the electoral college stuff works out
Speaker 2: is that essentially large rural areas are overrepresented, urban areas
Speaker 2: are underrepresented.
Speaker 1: Since the people are in the right that levels that out, you're.
Speaker 2: Going to skew more votes that way. We added a
Speaker 2: provision that said if any state has more than two
Speaker 2: districts allocated, they can at their at their choice, go
Speaker 2: to multi member districts with choice voting, because there's there's
Speaker 2: some really interesting analysis that if you have a multi
Speaker 2: member district, it's really hard to jerrymander so that the
Speaker 2: top two are of the same race and same party
Speaker 2: all the time. You can do that for the top one,
Speaker 2: but it's hard to do it for the top two.
Speaker 2: And so if you get a situation where you know
Speaker 2: me and whoever comes in second are representing the same communities,
Speaker 2: you should, in theory get rid of some of the
Speaker 2: polarization in Washington. But put it that way, and we're
Speaker 2: with other ideas, but that's the way that we've structured it.
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Speaker 1: the few members that engages in this conversation. There aren't
Speaker 1: many members that are thinking about this. You know, is
Speaker 1: it a caucus of twenty thirty. Who's the group that
Speaker 1: you're working with that are animated on this.
Speaker 2: So I would say there have always been a number
Speaker 2: of members. Don Bayer from Virginia is very thoughtful on this.
Speaker 2: Earl blooming Hour was great, still is, but not a
Speaker 2: member of Congress anymore. Jamie Raskin's very thoughtful. I think
Speaker 2: the challenge that all of us get in, you know,
Speaker 2: we're elected every two years. We got to stay focused
Speaker 2: on things that the public cares about. And I think
Speaker 2: the number of members who think about this stuff and
Speaker 2: care about it is much higher than the number of
Speaker 2: members who are willing to say, I'm going to prioritize
Speaker 2: this over all the things that voters are telling me
Speaker 2: to prioritize at any given time. And so I did
Speaker 2: a thing about this with some various other podcasters recently,
Speaker 2: and when everybody said, what's the most important thing we
Speaker 2: can do to drive this forward is just make noise
Speaker 2: about it. You know, the more that voters care, the
Speaker 2: more that those of us in elected office have to
Speaker 2: do something about it now.
Speaker 1: So I've made it a huge part of any time
Speaker 1: I do a speaking gig. I talk about this all
Speaker 1: the time, like, there are things that we can do
Speaker 1: and you don't even have to pass constitutional amendment. And this,
Speaker 1: this to me, is one of the biggest small de
Speaker 1: democracy reforms you can make without a constitutional amendment, because
Speaker 1: then there's a bunch of there's a bunch of after
Speaker 1: on effects that are that are interesting.
Speaker 2: And I would also say that whether it's you know,
Speaker 2: five hundred thousand or four hundred thousand, the barriers are
Speaker 2: more construction, Like we're probably need another office. We could
Speaker 2: do that. There's space on the mall.
Speaker 1: You know what I'd love to do. You know what
Speaker 1: I'd love to see that we flip the script and
Speaker 1: a majority of all staff is in the district and
Speaker 1: only a small handful of staff is in Washington. I
Speaker 1: could argue that you could you could do that. I'd
Speaker 1: also allow for remote voting. I think that with eight
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty members of Congress, maybe that is something.
Speaker 1: Because here's the thing. You know, if you make it
Speaker 1: just a little bit harder for the lobbyist to find
Speaker 1: the member of Congress, maybe that's not so bad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I want to sound like an old
Speaker 2: fuddy duddy who I know you're going to last see. Well,
Speaker 2: I was you know, the last time I was a
Speaker 2: CEO was before COVID. I I'm still a firm believer
Speaker 2: in the water cooler.
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that isn't look I'd love to see that.
Speaker 1: I'd love to see all of the members of Congress
Speaker 1: move here with their families. I think that, you know,
Speaker 1: if you want to. There's I teach a class called
Speaker 1: How Washington Works to college students, and I was doing
Speaker 1: a whole thing on Congress last week and I said,
Speaker 1: we've had these various moments where it just got worse
Speaker 1: for a specific reason, and this current era it began basically,
Speaker 1: it began with the rise of Gingridge and the rise
Speaker 1: of Gingrich happened because of partisan of a partisan decision
Speaker 1: by Democrats back in eighty six in an Indiana congressional district.
Speaker 1: It's known as the Bloody eighth. It's a it's got
Speaker 1: sort of this this there's a sort of mythical status
Speaker 1: to it. But it gave rise to Newt, and then
Speaker 1: Newt when he became the leader, basically got rid of
Speaker 1: He didn't want any more. He wanted all his members
Speaker 1: to be in the you know, he stop people working
Speaker 1: Mondays and Fridays, and everything became about, you know, only
Speaker 1: be in Washington Tuesday through Thursday and be in the
Speaker 1: district and that prioritize not bring in your family. And
Speaker 1: then you know, that had all sorts of and frankly
Speaker 1: both parties now have accepted that schedule. And so yeah,
Speaker 1: I'd love to see you guys two months here, one
Speaker 1: month not here, two months here, you know, something like that.
Speaker 2: But I'm curious, Chuck, if you think through that. I've
Speaker 2: only served obviously in the post Gingridge era, there are
Speaker 2: members who stay in DC through the weekends and there
Speaker 2: are those of us who go home. Broadly speaking, you
Speaker 2: don't stay in DC over the weekend if you're not
Speaker 2: in a really safe seat. And so I would I
Speaker 2: would worry a little bit about that because since so
Speaker 2: much of this job as relationships. Wouldn't that concentrate power
Speaker 2: in sort of the senior safest seat members who could
Speaker 2: stick around you got to go back to your district
Speaker 2: if you don't know whether you're going to win your
Speaker 2: next election, well it could.
Speaker 1: But if you're changing the way Congress works, right and
Speaker 1: it's sort of everybody has to work two months on
Speaker 1: right and it's sort of, then that's that's evening out
Speaker 1: a little bit. Look, I think the fact that you
Speaker 1: know you could. The other idea that sits out there
Speaker 1: is if you're going to do term limits for House members.
Speaker 1: And I'm not a huge fan of term limits. I
Speaker 1: don't think they've worked in the state legislative level. I
Speaker 1: think they've only made lobbyists more powerful. They've made governors
Speaker 1: more powerful, they've made state legislatures less powerful, just generally.
Speaker 1: I mean, I could doing a broad stroke. But the
Speaker 1: best idea I've heard if you do institute term limits,
Speaker 1: which would need a constitutional amendment, is to make the
Speaker 1: House four year terms. And if you had the House
Speaker 1: at four year terms, would you at least maybe for
Speaker 1: the first you know, and and by the way, if
Speaker 1: you end up doubling the size of the House, you
Speaker 1: might actually want to have half the house up two years,
Speaker 1: the other half up the other two years, and go
Speaker 1: with four years. There might be some logistical reasons to
Speaker 1: do that. But if you did four year terms, would
Speaker 1: it would it encourage what it discourage? Because right now
Speaker 1: you're running for reelection. The day you get sworn in
Speaker 1: on January third, you're dialing for dollars.
Speaker 2: And I again, I'm gonna sound boy scouty, but I
Speaker 2: had this conversation with Timmy Duckworth at one point, you
Speaker 2: know who, of course was in the house before, and
Speaker 2: she made the observation that the one thing she missed
Speaker 2: about the house, like she didn't miss not having to
Speaker 2: run every two years, right what she missed was that
Speaker 2: in the house you you have to be right on
Speaker 2: the pulse of where Americans are all the time. And
Speaker 2: in a six year term, you know, you can the
Speaker 2: first couple of years just working on things like dictated
Speaker 2: by your own wisdom. And there's a value in that
Speaker 2: in the Senate. But you do that, there's you know,
Speaker 2: none of us like dialing for dollars. Some of us
Speaker 2: like kissing babies for weird reasons.
Speaker 1: And that in the Epstein files, be careful sorry, thinking.
Speaker 2: Much, yeah, week but but there is a value in
Speaker 2: being out there and saying, Okay, where's the pulse of
Speaker 2: the country right now? And I have to respond to
Speaker 2: because I'm going to be on the ballot again shortly.
Speaker 2: I think our founder has got that right, even though
Speaker 2: the consequences of that have for a little goofy.
Speaker 1: Let's talk a little bit about the Democratic Party brand.
Speaker 1: There's a poll over the weekend that if you just
Speaker 1: looked at Trump's numbers, you'd be like, oh, this has
Speaker 1: got to be good news for Democrats, right, He's sixty
Speaker 1: percent disapproved upside down in every issue. But then, when
Speaker 1: given the choice of you have the main problems, who
Speaker 1: do you trust? Democrats are Trump? They were both in
Speaker 1: the low thirties, and neither was also in the thirties.
Speaker 1: The Democratic brand has really taken a beating. Do you
Speaker 1: think the four years of Biden we're a successful four
Speaker 1: years and it's just been bad messaging or is this
Speaker 1: a is this a much bigger problem than Democrats want
Speaker 1: to face.
Speaker 2: So I never quite know what to make of those
Speaker 2: studies because are those polls because named members always perform
Speaker 2: well ahead of what the party idea is, like you know,
Speaker 2: Congress broadly is unfavorable. The Democratic Party is broadly unfavorable,
Speaker 2: the Republican Party is broadly unfavorable. Sean Caston is popular,
Speaker 2: right at least in our district. You know, you know,
Speaker 2: go on down the list and I think the I
Speaker 2: think depending on the question we're asking. You know, we
Speaker 2: for all sorts of reasons that you were well aware of,
Speaker 2: we have political parties. If you ask people what are
Speaker 2: the things that you want government to do and where
Speaker 2: your values are those those things are very popular across
Speaker 2: broad bipartisan swaths of the economy. We want we want
Speaker 2: to get shot when we go to school. We think
Speaker 2: all people should have equal rights. We you know, we
Speaker 2: want a peaceful transfer of elections. You know, those things
Speaker 2: tend to skew democratic in this moment. The brand isn't
Speaker 2: so good. But it's sort of like saying, do you
Speaker 2: like do you like Jerry flavored kolas? That's one question.
Speaker 2: What is the brand status of mister pibb. That's a
Speaker 2: different question, right even though even though they're synonyms, so
Speaker 2: so all that really says to me is, okay, maybe
Speaker 2: don't hang your don't hang your party after your idea
Speaker 2: and get votes. But that doesn't necessarily mean whether or
Speaker 2: not Democrats or Republicans are going to win the next election.
Speaker 2: I think ultimately that's a race by race.
Speaker 1: No, I I guess what I'm I mean. Do you
Speaker 1: think the the party has a leadership problem or a
Speaker 1: brand problem or is it just you know, a better
Speaker 1: I mean, I look at look, I think a better
Speaker 1: leader if Biden, And I don't know if maybe if
Speaker 1: he had fifteen years younger, he could have done the
Speaker 1: job better, could have traveled the country more or whatever.
Speaker 1: But I look, I look at the Biden term and
Speaker 1: I think a better leader keeps the country from looking
Speaker 1: to Trump again. Like I think that a better leader
Speaker 1: turns figures out how to help the country turn the page,
Speaker 1: and he couldn't do it. Is that all on him?
Speaker 1: Was it circumstances? Was it starting the presidency with an
Speaker 1: impeachment trial and create an impossible situation? Maybe I'm not like,
Speaker 1: but you know, I do think that the Democrats are
Speaker 1: being punished by some voters for somehow not putting Trump away.
Speaker 1: And I don't know what that means in their head, right,
Speaker 1: It doesn't mean putting him in jail, just means, you know,
Speaker 1: how is it that we did not how did we
Speaker 1: end up with him still here?
Speaker 2: Yeah? So I think, look, everybody knows who the voice
Speaker 2: of the Republican Party is. Nobody knows who the voice
Speaker 2: of the Democratic Party is right now. And that's not
Speaker 2: a criticism of the Democratic Party. That's just the reality
Speaker 2: of when you're out of power in all three chambers ways,
Speaker 2: nobody is. Nobody's going to look to the Senate Majority
Speaker 2: leader or Senate Minority leader to be the voice of
Speaker 2: the party you know, or that you know, etcetera, etcetera.
Speaker 2: I think at the same time, Biden's great strength and
Speaker 2: his great weakness was that he was a senator. Trump's
Speaker 2: great strength in his.
Speaker 1: Way, by the way, you really don't like the Senate.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, I'm not saying true. But that's not
Speaker 2: why I'm making a point. Trump's great strength and his
Speaker 2: great weakness is that he's always been a CEO, right.
Speaker 2: And I think, and I say that that because Biden
Speaker 2: was an extremely effective president in terms of the infrastructure
Speaker 2: bills that we passed, the climate bills, we passed, the
Speaker 2: recovery from COVID, the way the economy turns around. He
Speaker 2: got that done because he had a masterful understanding of
Speaker 2: how to get things through the Senate. And I think
Speaker 2: that reads the American people as being way down in
Speaker 2: process that I don't care about. Why are we Why
Speaker 2: am I having to talk about what we did to
Speaker 2: make a compromise with Joe Manchin in order to get
Speaker 2: this thing through. Compare that to Trump, who says, look,
Speaker 2: this is what we're going to do. I don't care
Speaker 2: what happens. I don't care what my favorability is. This
Speaker 2: is where it's going. And I think there's a I
Speaker 2: think there's a forceful executive that we need in the
Speaker 2: White House that you just don't get there if all
Speaker 2: of your formative years are crafted in a legislative body
Speaker 2: with an ousesource in it. We haven't had a leader
Speaker 2: of the Democratic Party with executive experience. It's Bill Clinton, right,
Speaker 2: and the Republicans consistently nominate people with executive experience. And
Speaker 2: you know, when you look back, go back to your
Speaker 2: period in the twenties, you know Roosevelt Teddy. Roosevelt walks
Speaker 2: into a room, you are not under any confusion of
Speaker 2: who the top dog in this room is. Donald Trump
Speaker 2: walks into a room, You're inder no confusion about who
Speaker 2: the top dog is. Biden walks into a room. He's
Speaker 2: a nice guy, right and and like morally I like him.
Speaker 2: I think he was extremely effective for what he did.
Speaker 2: But I think we need to you know, as we
Speaker 2: get to our nomination process, we need we need to
Speaker 2: get people who, you know, make it very clear that
Speaker 2: this is where the buck stops.
Speaker 1: You want an alpha dog, whatever that means in the moment.
Speaker 2: Yeah, look like, Look, we're at a moment that demands
Speaker 2: you know, I want a Churchill. I want somebody who
Speaker 2: says I have nothing to promise you but blood, sweat
Speaker 2: and tears. I can't guarantee will win, but I can
Speaker 2: guarantee we'll lose if we don't fight. So once more
Speaker 2: to the Battlement's my dear friend. Like, that's that's what
Speaker 2: we need in this moment, right. I don't particularly want
Speaker 2: someone who's going to talk about the reconciliation process.
Speaker 1: What have you seen out there that you like?
Speaker 2: I mean for the people who are running or look,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna My prediction is that whoever we nominate is
Speaker 2: not going to be someone who has no executive experience.
Speaker 2: Does that mean a governor? Does that mean someone who
Speaker 2: haven't named yet. I think it's a I don't think
Speaker 2: the leading candidate at this point in the cycle has
Speaker 2: ever emerged.
Speaker 1: I mean, Scout Walkers, that is one hundred percent true.
Speaker 2: Didn't become president, right.
Speaker 1: I remind people of this all the time. Well, just
Speaker 1: the three Democratic presidents of my lifetime. I guess Biden
Speaker 1: is the outlier because he was kind of always pulled
Speaker 1: well early on, and I've look I've always viewed his
Speaker 1: nomination as sort of a COVID accident. I don't think
Speaker 1: he earned it. I just think it the band, you know,
Speaker 1: the music stopped and everybody agreed to just give it
Speaker 1: to him. But if you look at the other three Obama, Clinton,
Speaker 1: and Carter at this point in time and all of
Speaker 1: those presidential cycles that they ended up president, they were
Speaker 1: not the front runner at this point, and they were
Speaker 1: not even being they were they were barely registering as can.
Speaker 1: It's in the in Carter and Clinton, and you know,
Speaker 1: Obama was seen as somebody that was going to be
Speaker 1: four years down the road. You know, he wasn't necessarily
Speaker 1: right away. So I tend to agree with that. Do
Speaker 1: you think this is a party that would nominate somebody
Speaker 1: with a CEO background, and I'm not you know, it's
Speaker 1: unusual for the Democrats to do something like that, like
Speaker 1: a Mark Cuban.
Speaker 2: Or or you know, you know, or a governor. I mean,
Speaker 2: I think we we lionized the business sector a little
Speaker 2: bit too much. Government's a fundamentally different job. I think
Speaker 2: it's important to have somebody who's led a large organization,
Speaker 2: you know, who has been who has been the decider
Speaker 2: in that George Bush ism. You know, you could get
Speaker 2: that in the private sector. You can get that in
Speaker 2: a governor's mansion. You know, you could get that, you know,
Speaker 2: you know, major cabinet secretary, you know it kind of
Speaker 2: but I think I think it needs to be someone
Speaker 2: with those kind of backgrounds. I also think, you know,
Speaker 2: I think you want somebody who's who's who's authentic. I think,
Speaker 2: without naming names, there are some people who are in
Speaker 2: the mix right now who are very different people when
Speaker 2: the curtain is down, then when the curtain comes up
Speaker 2: and it becomes very clear as they go through, you know,
Speaker 2: and I think there are some people who are just
Speaker 2: sort of consistent in who they are at all at
Speaker 2: all moments. And I think that's again, like for all
Speaker 2: of Trump's faults. People appreciate that that he is who
Speaker 2: he is all the time.
Speaker 1: Right, Well, it's interesting, let me and you may have
Speaker 1: already kind of answered this question with your Churchill response
Speaker 1: with your Churchill remark that you're really looking for Churchill,
Speaker 1: which because one of the things that I like to
Speaker 1: I look at the divide inside the party right now
Speaker 1: is less left versus center, and that exists. I think
Speaker 1: that's more of a tactical debate. What I the real
Speaker 1: divide I'm sensing and I think the Texas primary really
Speaker 1: sort of shows this one pretty well is U And
Speaker 1: even in the presidential I could I could compare Gavin
Speaker 1: to rom which is, do you want a fighter or
Speaker 1: do you want a uniter? Are you looking? Are we
Speaker 1: looking for? Is the next president need to be somebody
Speaker 1: who's going to take the fight and one you know
Speaker 1: you're to or is the next president going to be
Speaker 1: tough but try to bring the country together? And I
Speaker 1: think it's a fun of Mike. I think there are
Speaker 1: some Democrats who say, hey, we tried the united stuff
Speaker 1: with Biden. It didn't work. It's time to It's time to,
Speaker 1: you know, get somebody who's not afraid to throw a
Speaker 1: punch somebody more like Bill Clinton. I mean, you could argue,
Speaker 1: do you want Bill Clinton or Barack Obama? Right? You
Speaker 1: know that? And those are distinctively they were two different
Speaker 1: types of presidents. Where do you fall?
Speaker 2: So I had this conversation with Pelosi after January sixth
Speaker 2: that I said, this moment calls on us to figure
Speaker 2: out how to be better politicians than Abraham Lincoln. Because
Speaker 2: in Abraham lincoln second inaugural when he said, it may
Speaker 2: seem strange to you know, for any just God to
Speaker 2: bless a man for earning his spread from the sweat
Speaker 2: of another man's face. But let us not judge less
Speaker 2: we we judged ourselves. And the butt was Lincoln saying,
Speaker 2: I don't I don't know how to unite the country
Speaker 2: and be morally clear about what just happened. And I
Speaker 2: think that tension has always been in our politics, doesn't
Speaker 2: you know? To be a uniter is to is to
Speaker 2: forgive some sins. To not forgive the sins is to
Speaker 2: not be a uniter. I see the divide as being
Speaker 2: a little bit different than you going into this cycle
Speaker 2: that I think the particularly with the wealth inequality and
Speaker 2: with the huge disruptions and unemployment. My daughter's a freshman
Speaker 2: in college right now. When we were looking at colleges,
Speaker 2: one of her comments was that every college she looks
Speaker 2: at is sixty sixty five percent female. The you know, you,
Speaker 2: you've got a whole lot of young men who who's
Speaker 2: who's forward forward expectations is different than what they thought
Speaker 2: it was going to be. And AI is making that
Speaker 2: worse because the jobs that are being displaced are jobs
Speaker 2: that historically skewed very male people who analyze large sets
Speaker 2: of data, identified trends, and prepared memos for their bosses,
Speaker 2: right whether that was a bank or a law firm
Speaker 2: or an engineering firm. There's a lot of uncertainty there.
Speaker 2: And I think the I think the person who gets
Speaker 2: really energized at Bernie Sanders rally is not that much
Speaker 2: different than the person who gets really energized at a
Speaker 2: Charlie Kirk rally. The institutions are terrible, and I want
Speaker 2: to I'm going to support them and burns them down. Yeah,
Speaker 2: And I think the I think there's sort of a
Speaker 2: nihilism at the fringes that's really dangerous. If you if
Speaker 2: you come forward as a politician and say trust me,
Speaker 2: the institutions are going to be fine. You're not very credible.
Speaker 2: I think there are very few politics I've seen, but
Speaker 2: I think this is what we wanted. I keep going
Speaker 2: back to Teddy Roosevelt, who says, I love the institutions
Speaker 2: and they are desperately in need of repair, and this
Speaker 2: is what we're going to do, right, And that I
Speaker 2: think is the more interesting divide right now. Not uniers
Speaker 2: have dividers. But who's the person out there who can say,
Speaker 2: I can I understand your pain. I understand that the
Speaker 2: system did not work for you in the way that
Speaker 2: you thought it was going to go for it, But
Speaker 2: we're not going to burn it down. We're going to
Speaker 2: work together and make it better and make it more inclusive, right,
Speaker 2: you know. I keep going back to the twenties. Was
Speaker 2: that there was that Louis Brandeis line when he said,
Speaker 2: when you have great concentrations of wealth, you only have
Speaker 2: three choices. You can let the wealth take over the government,
Speaker 2: which is to embrace fascism. You can have the government
Speaker 2: take over the wealth and embrace communism, or you can
Speaker 2: break up the wealth and embrace capitalism. Right there, you go,
Speaker 2: That's that's kind of where we are right, but that.
Speaker 1: Well you're you're you're not wrong, I mean, I am.
Speaker 1: You know, if if if Trump supporters decide to prioritize
Speaker 1: their economic concerns over their cultural concerns, there is a
Speaker 1: majority that will burn this place down. I have often
Speaker 1: I you know, I it's sort of like there's a
Speaker 1: you know, the the you know, Steve Bannon and Bernie
Speaker 1: Sanders talk very similarly at times, they have a lot
Speaker 1: more in common they Burnie would hate. Neither one of
Speaker 1: them would accept that premise, though they may agree in
Speaker 1: a couple of acknowledge that they agree on some of
Speaker 1: this stuff. But the distrust of big corporations in particular,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, and I think that moment is coming.
Speaker 1: And I think the question is is the person who
Speaker 1: puts that coalition together a responsible actor or an irresponsible actor?
Speaker 1: FDR was did that FDR put that coalition together? And
Speaker 1: he was a responsible actor.
Speaker 2: I find myself thinking that there's almost an exact parallel,
Speaker 2: but exactly inverted to the Reconstruction era. Time it was,
Speaker 2: you know, the Democrats were the party of essentially the
Speaker 2: oligarchs and the white working class. The Republicans were everybody else.
Speaker 2: And if you're the oligarchs in the white working class,
Speaker 2: you have plenty of room for the klan. Right. But
Speaker 2: in that era, the Republicans who said we need to
Speaker 2: hold people account for their sins, they were the radical Republicans, right,
Speaker 2: and they had that same sort of like they were
Speaker 2: defined not by who they were, but who they weren't.
Speaker 2: And I feel like we're flopped on that right now
Speaker 2: and strung a lot of the same issues. And I
Speaker 2: don't know what lessons we learned from that era, because
Speaker 2: ultimately the radical Republicans didn't. You know, we got three
Speaker 2: solid amendments out of it, and one hundred years later
Speaker 2: we actually started enforcing those amendments.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, and that's the I guess that's why I'm
Speaker 1: long term optimistic. I know we're going to make these changes.
Speaker 1: I just wondered, do we have to have do we
Speaker 1: have to run into more roadblocks? Do we have to
Speaker 1: have more people die? I go back to this. You
Speaker 1: know we didn't you know, we had to see you know,
Speaker 1: child labor laws didn't pass overnight. We had to see
Speaker 1: kids getting you know, abused and die from from these
Speaker 1: terrible workplaces before we made the changes. That were necessary
Speaker 1: because we were letting the industrialists were running a monk, right,
Speaker 1: AIS kind of may end up running a mock. So
Speaker 1: we'll get there. It just how much damage has to
Speaker 1: be done before we before we collectively decide to act, right. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: to quote Churchill, right, you can trust the Americans to
Speaker 1: eventually do the right thing after they've exhausted every other
Speaker 1: what is it, every other path of that doesn't work.
Speaker 2: So I don't I don't want to throw this member
Speaker 2: under the bus. But at one point we were voting
Speaker 2: on one of these gotcha votes and he came up
Speaker 2: to me on the floor. I said, he, you're voted
Speaker 2: on this one. And I said, well, you know, Churchill said,
Speaker 2: you can always count on Americans do the right thing
Speaker 2: after they have exhausted all the other options. So if
Speaker 2: you just always do the right thing, history will view
Speaker 2: you as being very precient. And I voted one way
Speaker 2: and he sticks his card in the machine boats the
Speaker 2: other wind and says, yeah, I can't do that.
Speaker 1: Well, maybe his districts just slightly more purple than yours.
Speaker 2: It isn't, but that's another story.
Speaker 1: Well, look, I didn't know where our conversation was going
Speaker 1: to go. We went deep in the reform rabbit hole,
Speaker 1: which I I I will jump right in when that
Speaker 1: will take place. We look you, you are the type
Speaker 1: of member of Congress, and I'm glad to know is there.
Speaker 1: You're thinking about these things. You're thinking about the institution.
Speaker 1: You're thinking about what what are you gonna what's the
Speaker 1: institution going to look like when you leave? I hope
Speaker 1: there are more members like you.
Speaker 2: No, we'll look there. Congress is better than you think.
Speaker 1: There are a lot line Look and I used to
Speaker 1: tell people this too. I'd say, you know, ninety percent
Speaker 1: of the stuff that that Congress does, they you know
Speaker 1: they do without much debate because we agree on ninety percent.
Speaker 1: Ten percent we disagree on, we disagree on vehemently.
Speaker 2: One of the things I like to point out to
Speaker 2: people is if you think through all the members of Congress,
Speaker 2: come up with a list of the members that you
Speaker 2: think are bona fide knuckleheads, and just come up with
Speaker 2: your list and count them, divide that by five thirty five.
Speaker 2: That's the congressional knucklehead ratio. Then then go to your
Speaker 2: own office. Your own office probably has the same knucklehead ratio.
Speaker 2: We are a representative body, and you know, and it's
Speaker 2: and you know, is it is it ten to fifteen percent? Maybe,
Speaker 2: but it's it's not ninety percent.
Speaker 1: Is there a let me ask you this for I
Speaker 1: let you go, Is there a reform caucus that has
Speaker 1: developed that people where this stuff's being incubated, whether it's oh,
Speaker 1: should we uncap the House? Should we do this constitutional amendment?
Speaker 1: Should we do this? Or is it just certain members
Speaker 1: doing it?
Speaker 2: And it's certain members and you and you you raise
Speaker 2: the good question that maybe we should start a caucus.
Speaker 1: But I think i'd like to see that because I
Speaker 1: bet you you get a biparty. I bet you'd be
Speaker 1: quickly become a bipartisan caucus, you know, sort of how
Speaker 1: to remodel the democracy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Derek Kilmer had his Modernization Caucus that was very
Speaker 2: bipartisan last term. They tended to focus on some smaller
Speaker 2: boar issues, you know, and one of the things that
Speaker 2: sort of makes it partisan that you wish it wasn't.
Speaker 2: And I had conversation with my Republican colleagues, is that
Speaker 2: the Republican Party today has a has a strategy that
Speaker 2: can win the control of the minoritarian institutions. The Democratic
Speaker 2: Party has a strategy that can win the minoritary institutions.
Speaker 2: So the democratic policy agenda is much better at winning
Speaker 2: the House than winning the state in the electoral college.
Speaker 2: And to really make democratic reforms is partisan because of that.
Speaker 2: It shouldn't be, but it's just sort of the way
Speaker 2: we're skewed right now.
Speaker 1: No, it's that that's a that's a I totally understand
Speaker 1: how that works out to be the case.
Speaker 2: But uh, yeah, we appreciate having me on. You give
Speaker 2: me more.
Speaker 1: No, this was great, and I want to you know,
Speaker 1: the next time, if you've got a new thing you're
Speaker 1: to do any if you get this caucus started, whatever
Speaker 1: it is, I want to do this again.
Speaker 2: Sounds great.
Speaker 1: H