WEBVTT - Executive Disorder: Do Americans Hate ICE & Trump Now? DHS Shutdown, Shooting in Rhode Island 0:00:01.680 --> 0:00:07.160 Cool Zone Media. 0:00:08.280 --> 0:00:11.640 This is it could happen here? Executive Disorder, our weekly 0:00:11.680 --> 0:00:14.440 newscast covering what's happening in the White House, the crumbling world, 0:00:14.440 --> 0:00:16.880 and what it means for you. I'm Garrison Davis to name, 0:00:17.000 --> 0:00:20.279 joined by James Stout, Mia Wong and Robert Evans. This 0:00:20.360 --> 0:00:25.360 episode recovering the week February eleventh to February eighteenth. Some 0:00:25.600 --> 0:00:29.600 small news items up top. Last week, the FDA declined 0:00:29.600 --> 0:00:33.800 to review a new flu vaccine from Maderna. On February twelfth, 0:00:34.159 --> 0:00:37.640 Tom Hoeman announced that Operation Metro Surge has concluded and 0:00:37.800 --> 0:00:40.879 quote significant drawdown has already been underway this week and 0:00:40.920 --> 0:00:42.640 will continue through the next week. 0:00:42.760 --> 0:00:43.200 Un quote. 0:00:43.640 --> 0:00:46.239 Zarmamdani has ordered a new audit of city agencies to 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:49.120 ensure compliance with sanctuary city laws in New York and 0:00:49.159 --> 0:00:52.800 Stephen Colbert says that CBS refused to air his interview 0:00:52.840 --> 0:00:57.560 with Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Tallerico, citing the FCC's 0:00:57.680 --> 0:01:01.560 equal time rule. Despite this rule historically having an exception 0:01:01.720 --> 0:01:05.520 for late night talk show interviews. Last month, FCC Chairman 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:08.560 Brendan Carr threatened to enforce the rule regardless of the 0:01:08.560 --> 0:01:12.720 well established President that excluded talk show interviews. And finally, 0:01:13.160 --> 0:01:16.039 the owner of a warehouse facility in Hutchins, Texas, so 0:01:16.040 --> 0:01:18.399 so that they won't sell or lease the building to 0:01:18.440 --> 0:01:21.440 the federal government as a detention facility. The city's mayor 0:01:21.480 --> 0:01:25.319 and council all opposed the project. Seizure by eminent domain 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:26.360 is still possible. 0:01:26.880 --> 0:01:30.640 Yeah, And I guess with that, there's been campaigns in 0:01:30.720 --> 0:01:34.440 a couple of other small, traditionally conservative rural areas to 0:01:34.560 --> 0:01:38.679 not lease facilities for ICE. And it's still a little unclear, 0:01:38.680 --> 0:01:40.600 and I suspect it's kind of column A columbee. How 0:01:40.680 --> 0:01:43.759 much of this is, you know, nimbiism and how much 0:01:43.760 --> 0:01:46.000 of this is resistance to ICE specifically. 0:01:46.920 --> 0:01:49.280 Yeah, we covered a little of that in the episode 0:01:49.280 --> 0:01:52.480 I did on Social Circle, which is in Georgia last week. 0:01:52.680 --> 0:01:54.120 But I think it's fair to say both. 0:01:54.360 --> 0:01:56.400 Yeah, And obviously when I say nimbism, I don't mean 0:01:56.400 --> 0:01:57.640 it in a bad way. 0:01:57.880 --> 0:01:59.320 It's bad to have this in your bag. 0:01:59.400 --> 0:02:01.360 Yeah, right, But like their issue was into moral one 0:02:01.480 --> 0:02:03.280 in some cases, Yeah. 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:03.960 In some cases. 0:02:03.960 --> 0:02:07.320 I think in some cases it's their little columny, little 0:02:07.400 --> 0:02:07.760 column B. 0:02:08.200 --> 0:02:09.400 Yeah, it's hard to tell. 0:02:09.680 --> 0:02:12.639 Yeah, And I think like It's worth noting, for instance, 0:02:12.639 --> 0:02:16.080 hearing in southern California right a town called Dulzura, pretty 0:02:16.080 --> 0:02:18.280 small town. Maybe you've heard of it from when the 0:02:18.360 --> 0:02:21.400 KKK did border patrols there back in the day. But 0:02:21.600 --> 0:02:24.440 the Border patrol are trying to build a big new 0:02:24.480 --> 0:02:27.000 facility there and have been for some time called New 0:02:27.040 --> 0:02:30.480 brown Field. There has been local opposition to that among 0:02:30.800 --> 0:02:32.800 people who are very like people who I have spoken 0:02:32.800 --> 0:02:37.000 to are otherwise conservative, and like, some of it is, yeah, 0:02:37.000 --> 0:02:38.680 I don't want this changing the character of the town. 0:02:38.720 --> 0:02:41.040 I don't want a giant detention center that would eclipse 0:02:41.040 --> 0:02:44.400 the population of this very small town. Some of it 0:02:44.560 --> 0:02:46.880 is also like I want them to be locking up 0:02:46.919 --> 0:02:48.880 people out here. We have a nice life out here, 0:02:49.440 --> 0:02:51.040 and you know, we have little lots of fields and 0:02:51.080 --> 0:02:53.919 horses and space, and it seems like it would be 0:02:54.080 --> 0:02:54.920 really fucked. 0:02:54.720 --> 0:02:56.359 Up to have people detained out here. 0:02:56.400 --> 0:02:59.800 Like I think like that that Nimby impulse can sometime 0:03:00.200 --> 0:03:02.920 like could still combine with even people who are not 0:03:03.040 --> 0:03:06.560 you know, abolitionists. They don't want to be confronted with 0:03:06.639 --> 0:03:08.160 the horrors directly next to them. 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:09.040 Yep. 0:03:09.560 --> 0:03:11.640 And we'll talk a little bit more about the numbers 0:03:12.080 --> 0:03:15.880 like ICE's polling numbers, like how popular they are with Americans. 0:03:15.880 --> 0:03:18.360 But one of the things we've seen this year is 0:03:18.400 --> 0:03:21.920 that like they've been shedding support even from Republicans. So like, 0:03:22.240 --> 0:03:24.919 you know, whatever debate we have here, that's like certainly 0:03:24.960 --> 0:03:26.040 not a non factor. 0:03:26.960 --> 0:03:27.440 Definitely. 0:03:27.919 --> 0:03:30.280 I think it's now time for us to talk about 0:03:30.320 --> 0:03:34.720 the biggest news story this week, which is that Shilah 0:03:34.720 --> 0:03:38.520 buff was arrested in New Orleans during Marty Graw after 0:03:38.560 --> 0:03:39.280 getting into. 0:03:39.120 --> 0:03:44.360 A series of fights. Who he was in the movie Holes? 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:45.360 Oh? 0:03:45.480 --> 0:03:47.880 Yeah, he was also in a different production called Holes, 0:03:47.880 --> 0:03:49.000 but not based on a book. 0:03:49.360 --> 0:03:50.200 He was in Holes. 0:03:50.320 --> 0:03:52.080 I forgot, Yeah, it was in both holes. 0:03:52.160 --> 0:03:55.040 So I don't know who this person is. 0:03:55.120 --> 0:03:58.680 I've never Yeah, he's a he's a child actor who 0:03:58.720 --> 0:04:01.760 is a who was very popular during the early two 0:04:01.800 --> 0:04:05.839 thousands and has gone. He played the Indiana Jones's son 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:08.040 in the reboot event or in the new in the 0:04:08.080 --> 0:04:11.520 fourth Indiana Jones movie God and then he has He 0:04:11.600 --> 0:04:16.680 has since kind of fallen into madness and disrepute. He's 0:04:16.800 --> 0:04:22.440 a spousal abuser. He's repeatedly assaulted people in public. He 0:04:22.520 --> 0:04:25.440 showed up on that webcam white supremacists were drinking milk 0:04:25.520 --> 0:04:28.080 on once for reasons that are still to this day 0:04:28.240 --> 0:04:30.360 somewhat unclear to me. And he got into a fight 0:04:30.400 --> 0:04:32.320 in Marty Gras, which is just just just a fun 0:04:32.400 --> 0:04:34.080 little bit of news. My favorite part of this is 0:04:34.120 --> 0:04:37.600 that he assaulted a guy. He was repeatedly restrained by 0:04:37.640 --> 0:04:39.520 members of a bar, and whenever they would let him 0:04:39.560 --> 0:04:41.520 go because they just wanted him to leave they didn't 0:04:41.520 --> 0:04:43.719 want to call the cops, he would then continue to 0:04:43.760 --> 0:04:46.840 attack the guy he was assaulting until they forced they 0:04:46.839 --> 0:04:49.040 were forced to call the police and have him arrested. 0:04:49.760 --> 0:04:52.679 And I've been in Marty Gras over the last few days, 0:04:52.720 --> 0:04:55.680 and let me tell you, getting arrested by the police 0:04:55.760 --> 0:04:59.200 during Marty Gras not easy. I don't have a lot 0:04:59.240 --> 0:05:01.320 to say about that other than I was surprised by 0:05:01.320 --> 0:05:04.960 the number of very political floats that I saw, particularly 0:05:05.160 --> 0:05:08.360 at least one that was entirely paper mache ice guy's 0:05:08.560 --> 0:05:12.840 in a very like, non flattering way. There were a 0:05:12.880 --> 0:05:16.240 lot of like costumes and a number of like references 0:05:16.279 --> 0:05:18.839 on floats. There's a couple of pretty hideous caricatures of 0:05:18.880 --> 0:05:22.760 Trump on floats, and they all got like a widely 0:05:23.000 --> 0:05:26.839 positive reaction and I find this interesting, and I'm bringing 0:05:26.839 --> 0:05:29.719 this up because the research that I've largely been doing 0:05:29.720 --> 0:05:31.320 for the EED this week is trying to get a 0:05:31.360 --> 0:05:34.600 handle on, like where Americans are polling right now and 0:05:34.640 --> 0:05:38.600 how popular or unpopular is the president and his agenda, 0:05:38.720 --> 0:05:42.520 because like we see articles every week about like Trump's 0:05:42.560 --> 0:05:46.159 polls hit a new low, or the most recent article 0:05:46.200 --> 0:05:48.760 that I think it's gallup is no longer going to 0:05:48.760 --> 0:05:52.760 be doing presidential like popularity polling. But I wanted to 0:05:52.760 --> 0:05:55.039 get a look at, like how the actual parties and 0:05:55.080 --> 0:05:58.960 their agendas are holding up. And it's a pretty shocking 0:05:59.120 --> 0:06:02.520 gap between I mean September October, like fall of last 0:06:02.600 --> 0:06:07.200 year and today. So in September of twenty twenty five, 0:06:07.480 --> 0:06:11.720 per Yugov, the Democratic Party had about a sixty four 0:06:11.800 --> 0:06:15.720 percent unfavorable So like sixty four percent of polled Americans 0:06:16.040 --> 0:06:18.840 didn't like the Democratic Party and a little less than 0:06:18.880 --> 0:06:22.599 thirty four percent of Americans had a favorable opinion of 0:06:22.600 --> 0:06:24.479 the Democratic Party. And if you actually look at the 0:06:24.520 --> 0:06:28.040 graphs for those that you GOV presents, they're basically making 0:06:28.080 --> 0:06:30.719 like a wineglass shape, right, So what that means is 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:36.320 unfavorability is moving up and favorability is moving down rapidly, 0:06:36.560 --> 0:06:38.200 like at the time at which those bulls were taken 0:06:38.240 --> 0:06:42.159 in September of last year. Meanwhile, the Republican Party, neither 0:06:42.200 --> 0:06:45.159 party was popular, but the Republican Party the wineglass shape 0:06:45.200 --> 0:06:48.600 was a lot more muted, more like a shot glass. 0:06:49.000 --> 0:06:51.839 Fifty five point four percent of Americans pulled by Yugov 0:06:52.320 --> 0:06:55.599 expressed a unfavorable opinion of the Republican Party, at about 0:06:55.600 --> 0:06:58.840 forty two point three expressed a favorable opinion. You can 0:06:58.839 --> 0:07:04.039 compare this to October twenty twenty five polling by Pew Research, 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:08.680 which showed something similar. Sixty four percent of Americans were 0:07:08.720 --> 0:07:12.600 frustrated with the Republican Party, Seventy five percent of Americans 0:07:12.640 --> 0:07:15.920 reported being frustrated with the Democratic Party. Forty nine percent 0:07:15.960 --> 0:07:18.800 of Americans poll replied that they were angry at the 0:07:18.840 --> 0:07:24.560 Republican Party, Fifty percent reported being angry at the Democratic Party. Similarly, Republicans, 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:27.360 thirty six cent of Americans felt hopeful about the Republican Party, 0:07:27.720 --> 0:07:31.680 twenty eight percent of Americans felt hopeful about the Democratic Party, 0:07:32.160 --> 0:07:35.080 and then twenty seven percent of Americans were proud of 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:38.040 the Republican Party sixteen percent Democratic Party. 0:07:38.280 --> 0:07:40.680 Those are pretty bleak numbers. 0:07:40.360 --> 0:07:44.080 For the Democrats coming in the fall of twenty twenty five. 0:07:44.240 --> 0:07:48.600 Like that is kind of black pilling stuff, right. This 0:07:48.960 --> 0:07:50.960 was in the fall of last year, pretty rapid change 0:07:50.960 --> 0:07:53.920 fro where things had been about four years ago. For example, 0:07:54.000 --> 0:07:57.760 in September of twenty twenty one, about sixty four percent 0:07:57.840 --> 0:08:00.600 of Americans had expressed frustration with the Dimmerocratic Party as 0:08:00.600 --> 0:08:02.560 opposed to seventy five percent four years later. 0:08:03.200 --> 0:08:05.480 So that's all fall of last year. 0:08:06.200 --> 0:08:08.800 Now, between when the polls that I read to you 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:12.160 came out and now we've had a cup several major 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:16.200 things happen. One of the more significant was the long shutdown, 0:08:17.040 --> 0:08:21.200 which was disasters for Republican favorability and for Trump's own favorability. 0:08:21.960 --> 0:08:24.760 And we also had a significant I mean, obviously in 0:08:24.960 --> 0:08:27.640 LA and in Chicago. Ice had been doing very terrible 0:08:27.640 --> 0:08:30.320 and very like you know, I guess I should say, 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:34.640 like documented crimes, like horrible things that were spread widely 0:08:34.840 --> 0:08:39.360 on social media. But that has also accelerated massively in 0:08:39.440 --> 0:08:43.160 the first couple of weeks of twenty twenty six. And 0:08:43.520 --> 0:08:46.160 what we're seeing now in more recent polls taken in 0:08:46.240 --> 0:08:49.520 late January and from anywhere from like kind of early 0:08:49.640 --> 0:08:54.479 January to late January and early February is a significant reversal. 0:08:54.960 --> 0:08:58.120 So NBC News's Decision desk collated a bunch of different 0:08:58.120 --> 0:09:01.200 polls like Daily Mail, Marquette, Wall Street, Journal, Yahoo, you 0:09:01.320 --> 0:09:05.600 go of Fox News, Emerson, and over the last month 0:09:05.720 --> 0:09:08.800 or so, you're looking at an average spread of all 0:09:08.840 --> 0:09:12.800 of these polls of about negative nineteen point nine percent 0:09:13.559 --> 0:09:17.800 favorability for the Republican Party and about negative twelve point 0:09:17.840 --> 0:09:20.920 eight percent favorability for the Democratic Party. So when you 0:09:20.960 --> 0:09:23.000 think back to those numbers from last fall, that's a 0:09:23.040 --> 0:09:27.880 pretty dramatic change, and it kind of correlates to a 0:09:27.920 --> 0:09:30.640 dramatic change in Trump's own favorability, which has gone down 0:09:30.679 --> 0:09:34.199 by about twelve percent per the average of those polls 0:09:34.200 --> 0:09:36.920 that kind of aggregated by NBC Newsdesk. 0:09:37.760 --> 0:09:38.840 Their article notes quote. 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:41.480 Ipso's polling released in late January found fifty one percent 0:09:41.480 --> 0:09:45.599 of Americans say Trump's immigration policy is on the wrong track. Amazingly, 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:48.720 just a year ago, American said Republicans have a better plan, policy, 0:09:48.760 --> 0:09:51.360 and approach than Democrats on immigration by a twenty two 0:09:51.440 --> 0:09:54.920 point margin. Now that advantage is down to five points. 0:09:56.120 --> 0:09:59.160 So while Trump is underwater with immigration his and the 0:09:59.200 --> 0:10:02.880 Republican Party. These policies towards immigration are still more popular 0:10:03.000 --> 0:10:06.480 than the Democratic Party's responses to immigration, but they have 0:10:06.559 --> 0:10:10.040 also collapsed in terms of like. The gap between those 0:10:10.040 --> 0:10:12.760 two things, again, twenty two point margin to a five 0:10:12.840 --> 0:10:17.160 point lead is a is a pretty dramatic narrowing. And 0:10:17.559 --> 0:10:20.120 one of the things that has come along with this 0:10:20.480 --> 0:10:25.320 is an increasing agreement among Americans that ICE has not 0:10:25.440 --> 0:10:28.040 only gone too far, but needs to be if not 0:10:28.200 --> 0:10:31.720 abolished entirely, then severely curtailed, and a lot of Americans 0:10:31.720 --> 0:10:37.520 a shocking amount currently support abolishing ICE entirely. A PBS 0:10:37.760 --> 0:10:41.360 News NPR Merist poll released recently found that a majority 0:10:41.400 --> 0:10:44.720 of Americans feel ICE is making the country less safe 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:49.280 and has gone too far. Six in ten Americans disapprove 0:10:49.640 --> 0:10:52.240 of what ICE is doing, only about three in ten 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:54.760 approve of it, So by a two to one margin, 0:10:54.840 --> 0:11:01.400 Americans disapprove ICE's operations to approve of their behavior. This 0:11:01.440 --> 0:11:04.600 is a very like political breakdown. About ninety one percent 0:11:04.600 --> 0:11:08.880 of Democrats disapprove of ICE, sixty cent of Independence disapprove 0:11:08.920 --> 0:11:12.760 of ICE. Meanwhile, seventy three percent of Republicans approve of ICE. 0:11:13.200 --> 0:11:16.320 But even that number has dropped fairly recently. 0:11:16.480 --> 0:11:16.640 Right. 0:11:17.360 --> 0:11:20.360 In fact, the percentage of Americans that believe Ice hasn't 0:11:20.400 --> 0:11:23.800 gone far enough dropped from eighteen percent to twelve percent 0:11:24.000 --> 0:11:27.120 over the last year, and only about twenty two percent 0:11:27.120 --> 0:11:29.560 of Americans feel like Ice is doing a good job 0:11:29.640 --> 0:11:32.800 compared to twenty six percent of Americans a year ago. 0:11:33.360 --> 0:11:39.760 So we're seeing like pretty unequivocally Americans rejecting the Republican 0:11:39.840 --> 0:11:44.680 tactics on immigration, and they tend to be blaming Ice 0:11:45.120 --> 0:11:48.360 for it, right Like. That's one of the things that's 0:11:48.360 --> 0:11:50.880 most interesting to me is that both Ice and President 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:54.439 Trump have seen the most dramatic collapses in public support, 0:11:54.520 --> 0:11:57.720 which suggests to me that, like, Americans are kind of 0:11:57.800 --> 0:12:02.280 tying these two things together. Currently, per Yugov, as of 0:12:02.360 --> 0:12:06.600 January twenty fourth, twenty twenty six, more Americans support abolishing 0:12:06.640 --> 0:12:08.440 ICE than oppose it. Now, this has not mean a 0:12:08.480 --> 0:12:11.079 majority of American support abolishing ICE. I've seen some people 0:12:11.120 --> 0:12:14.880 mistate that forty six percent of US adults, as pulled 0:12:14.920 --> 0:12:18.920 by Yugov, somewhat or strongly support abolishing Ice, twelve percent 0:12:18.960 --> 0:12:22.080 are not sure, forty one percent somewhat or strongly oppose 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:22.880 abolishing ice. 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:25.280 Yeah, that's still pretty striking. 0:12:25.800 --> 0:12:30.160 Yeah, say a plurality, right, Maybe now would be a 0:12:30.160 --> 0:12:33.120 good time to talk a little bit about like where Democrats, 0:12:33.840 --> 0:12:36.719 different Democrats are, different wings of the Democrat Party are 0:12:36.760 --> 0:12:39.120 on abolishing ice, because I think it's one of these 0:12:39.160 --> 0:12:43.079 areas where like the further up the party you go, 0:12:43.440 --> 0:12:47.960 the more detached from that public opinion you get. So 0:12:48.840 --> 0:12:51.840 maybe you will start the Keem Jeffries, Democrat leader in 0:12:51.880 --> 0:12:54.920 the House, hit him on the Joy Reid Show on 0:12:54.960 --> 0:12:56.319 the topic of abolishing ice. 0:12:56.920 --> 0:13:00.160 Why not lead and say abolish ice? Because what you're 0:13:00.200 --> 0:13:03.959 telling us is you want our taxpayer dollars to pay 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:08.400 for a lawless, massed armed agency to continue terrorizing our cities. 0:13:08.760 --> 0:13:11.000 And I'm trying to figure out how you, as a 0:13:11.080 --> 0:13:14.600 leader can be telling Americans that their taxpayer dollars should 0:13:14.640 --> 0:13:16.240 be going twice, I don't. 0:13:16.040 --> 0:13:19.240 Understand anything that you just said when I've moved English, well, 0:13:19.280 --> 0:13:21.560 I don't understand anything that you've just said to me 0:13:22.000 --> 0:13:26.880 when I've made clear that taxpayer dollars should be used 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:30.000 to make life more affordable for the American people, not 0:13:30.000 --> 0:13:32.800 brutaliz or kill them. That's the whole reason we're in 0:13:32.840 --> 0:13:35.760 this fight right now. That's the whole reason the DHS 0:13:35.880 --> 0:13:37.520 is getting ready to shut down. 0:13:37.880 --> 0:13:41.120 That's abolish abolish ice. 0:13:41.320 --> 0:13:44.640 That is a listen. I'm going to use the language 0:13:44.679 --> 0:13:46.560 that I want to use. You can use the language 0:13:46.600 --> 0:13:47.400 that you want to use. 0:13:49.360 --> 0:13:55.320 You can see Jeffries visibly kind of tense when the 0:13:55.360 --> 0:13:58.240 phrase abolish ice is used, right like, he's yeah, he 0:13:58.600 --> 0:14:01.280 wants nothing to do with it. The immediate responses is 0:14:01.320 --> 0:14:05.000 to go to affordability. I do want to note that 0:14:05.640 --> 0:14:07.880 when he was previously asked if he would use the 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:11.480 appropriations process to rain in eyes, he did exactly the 0:14:11.559 --> 0:14:12.200 same thing. 0:14:13.000 --> 0:14:16.640 But why not use the appropriations as to rain in ice, leadergen. 0:14:17.040 --> 0:14:17.720 For an operation? 0:14:17.880 --> 0:14:20.920 No, what I'm what I'm focused on right now, Chad, 0:14:21.320 --> 0:14:23.880 is to make life better for the American people by 0:14:23.920 --> 0:14:26.640 extending the affordable care and tax credits, which, by the way, 0:14:26.840 --> 0:14:30.640 a lot of folks in this institution believe was not possible. 0:14:31.800 --> 0:14:35.640 But Democrats made clear before the government was shut down 0:14:35.880 --> 0:14:38.360 that we were in this fight until we win this 0:14:38.480 --> 0:14:42.080 fight on behalf of the American lower the cost, save 0:14:42.200 --> 0:14:42.680 health care. 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:43.520 That's our objection. 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:47.440 Why there, he does the same thing, right, he goes 0:14:47.480 --> 0:14:51.160 back to affordability, which is something that Democrats have done 0:14:51.320 --> 0:14:53.600 for the last year and a half right when asked 0:14:53.760 --> 0:14:56.920 to take a strong leadership stance and ice, far too 0:14:56.960 --> 0:14:59.360 much of their leadership has instead like tried to deflect 0:14:59.360 --> 0:15:02.600 to affordabilit I do want to note that, like they 0:15:02.640 --> 0:15:06.320 are now doing exactly what he was deflecting from there, right, Yeah, 0:15:06.480 --> 0:15:08.960 and that was only less than a month ago. 0:15:09.160 --> 0:15:12.640 It's interesting because it's like this cowardice on like specific 0:15:12.800 --> 0:15:16.240 terms and messaging. Yeah, even though they are using the 0:15:16.280 --> 0:15:18.480 provisions process to try to rain an ice like that 0:15:18.560 --> 0:15:20.640 is that, Yeah, that is what they are doing now. 0:15:20.840 --> 0:15:24.440 But it's like a complete complete cowardice or actually like yeah, 0:15:24.440 --> 0:15:27.720 trying to like use like public pressure to your advantage 0:15:28.040 --> 0:15:28.760 at the moment, Like. 0:15:28.840 --> 0:15:32.720 Yeah, he's doing the thing and almost like failing to 0:15:33.520 --> 0:15:35.280 It's not that he's doing the thing, you know, as 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:36.840 many of us would wish he did, but like he's 0:15:36.880 --> 0:15:40.480 failing to take the easy win. Yeah, like because of 0:15:40.520 --> 0:15:44.160 like you say this like institutional cowardice or like these 0:15:44.840 --> 0:15:48.000 it's like there's some kind of red line rhetorically for 0:15:48.160 --> 0:15:52.240 jeffrees and other leadership Democrats that they will not cross. 0:15:52.560 --> 0:15:55.120 And I have to believe that some of that comes 0:15:55.200 --> 0:15:58.880 from what they see as like the long legacy of 0:15:58.920 --> 0:16:00.040 twenty twenty. 0:16:00.200 --> 0:16:02.440 Or like perceptions of the Democratic Party is like too 0:16:02.480 --> 0:16:04.800 far to the left, is too extreme or something. 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:08.120 Yeah, they that, like specifically the perception that they like 0:16:08.160 --> 0:16:11.680 attempted to abolish the institution of policing, which was not 0:16:11.760 --> 0:16:14.520 really anything that they had that was not in their 0:16:14.520 --> 0:16:17.840 policy platform. Right, they were not Democrat leaders saying We're 0:16:17.840 --> 0:16:20.720 going to do away with the cops. In fact, Biden 0:16:20.840 --> 0:16:22.560 was talking about how we need to fund the police, 0:16:22.600 --> 0:16:24.320 not defund the police in twenty twenty. 0:16:24.440 --> 0:16:24.640 Right. 0:16:24.760 --> 0:16:28.040 Yeah, But nonetheless, like that, there seems to be this real, 0:16:28.600 --> 0:16:31.920 like it's very hard for them to break that rhetorical boundary. 0:16:32.560 --> 0:16:37.280 It's not entirely just jeffreyes on this. Seven Dems cross 0:16:37.320 --> 0:16:39.680 party lines in late January to vote for a DHS 0:16:39.720 --> 0:16:44.200 funding bill. So we got Representative Henry Quella of Texas. 0:16:43.880 --> 0:16:46.520 Worst the worst Democratic congressman. 0:16:47.160 --> 0:16:49.840 Yeah, shit, fucking. 0:16:52.240 --> 0:16:55.960 Texas Deems hit different and like specifically like Rio Grande 0:16:56.000 --> 0:16:58.400 Valley Democrats are a different breed. 0:16:58.720 --> 0:16:59.840 God, it sucks so much. 0:17:00.280 --> 0:17:04.960 There's Jared Golden of Maine, Mary Glousen camp Perez Washington, 0:17:05.560 --> 0:17:09.280 Laura Gillen, Don Davis of North Carolina, Lauri Gillan is 0:17:09.320 --> 0:17:13.640 New York, Tom Swosey of New York, and Vicente Gonzales 0:17:13.720 --> 0:17:14.879 of Texas. 0:17:15.800 --> 0:17:16.359 This is not it. 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:19.760 There's not a position that is unique to Jeffrey's right, Like, 0:17:19.800 --> 0:17:23.000 this's this idea that like, perhaps there needs to be 0:17:23.080 --> 0:17:25.560 some reform of ICE, but bit abolishing it would go 0:17:25.600 --> 0:17:28.720 far too far. Other Democrats have introduced an act which 0:17:28.760 --> 0:17:32.840 would essentially move funding from ICE to local law enforcement. 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:37.560 So it would take that seventy five billion dollar budget 0:17:37.560 --> 0:17:40.560 allocation to ICE and move it to local cops. 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:40.760 Right. 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:44.679 This is called the Providing Useful Budgets for Localities to 0:17:44.920 --> 0:17:50.520 invest in cops by substituting six appropriations from federal enforcement 0:17:50.640 --> 0:17:51.960 to yield results Act. 0:17:52.960 --> 0:17:57.760 Holy shit, Now, wonder these people's favorabilities like negative onondrillion. 0:17:58.760 --> 0:18:00.480 Yeah, good word. 0:18:01.000 --> 0:18:03.520 It's what we call a backronym in that they have 0:18:03.560 --> 0:18:07.280 started with the word public safety and then made a 0:18:07.280 --> 0:18:10.800 really horrendous attempt turning that into an acronym. There is 0:18:10.840 --> 0:18:14.040 also like a wing of the Democratic Party right there 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:18.359 on the left, which is more forthright about abolishing ICE. 0:18:18.560 --> 0:18:21.960 His clip of AOC talking about why I should be abolished. 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:25.000 And this is at an event in Queen's Yeah. 0:18:25.280 --> 0:18:29.640 ICE is a very young agency relative to many others. 0:18:30.119 --> 0:18:36.080 Enforcements of people who committed crimes that were undocumented or 0:18:37.000 --> 0:18:39.720 had visas used to be under the Department of Justice. 0:18:39.960 --> 0:18:42.600 And in the Department of Justice, if someone wants to 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:44.680 come to your house, you need a judge. You mean, 0:18:45.320 --> 0:18:48.919 you need an entire judicial process, You need a warrant 0:18:48.960 --> 0:18:52.080 to ensure that your constitutional liberties would take are respected. 0:18:52.960 --> 0:18:55.080 You need all of it. What they did was that 0:18:55.080 --> 0:18:59.160 they took ICE out, well, they took Immigration enforcement out 0:18:59.200 --> 0:19:01.879 of the DOJ, which had very tight rains on what 0:19:01.920 --> 0:19:05.239 you're allowed to do. They take that they put it 0:19:05.320 --> 0:19:07.640 into this new agency that they put at the time, 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:10.200 which is a Department of Homeland Security. First of all, 0:19:10.200 --> 0:19:13.240 in what world does FEMA belong under the same umbrella 0:19:13.280 --> 0:19:17.680 as ICE. It makes no sense at all, no sense 0:19:17.720 --> 0:19:23.399 at all. And what happened is that once you take 0:19:23.800 --> 0:19:28.159 that enforcement piece out of that agency, they then start 0:19:28.320 --> 0:19:32.520 to answer to nobody. Even though I technically, statutorily their 0:19:32.520 --> 0:19:38.800 responsibility is just supposed to be on immigration enforcement. They 0:19:38.840 --> 0:19:41.800 are now expanding their data collection to US citizens, to 0:19:41.920 --> 0:19:43.119 everyone on this soil. 0:19:43.720 --> 0:19:44.960 They are waiving. 0:19:44.680 --> 0:19:48.400 These phones around and saying that they're implementing facial recognition 0:19:48.480 --> 0:19:52.320 technology to a centralized database. We have to fight this 0:19:52.440 --> 0:19:56.040 tooth and nail. We need to defund it. We need 0:19:56.040 --> 0:19:59.919 to not allow this to be collected by private companies. 0:20:00.280 --> 0:20:01.879 A lot of what we need to do is not 0:20:02.000 --> 0:20:06.040 just revisit Session seven oh two. We need to abolish ICE, 0:20:07.240 --> 0:20:10.640 and we need to have complemented. 0:20:09.960 --> 0:20:11.320 Changes block that up. 0:20:13.640 --> 0:20:16.119 One thing I do want to note about her statements 0:20:16.160 --> 0:20:18.680 is that during the appropriations process, she did give statements 0:20:19.000 --> 0:20:22.600 about how she was pushing to defund ICE as an agency, 0:20:23.000 --> 0:20:25.879 and this did cause a reaction from some i'll call 0:20:25.960 --> 0:20:29.399 them over the online leftists, claiming that it had changed 0:20:29.400 --> 0:20:32.800 positions from wanting to abolish to defund, that this is 0:20:33.119 --> 0:20:34.919 some sort of slide. And then she then had to 0:20:35.119 --> 0:20:38.640 follow up with saying, well, currently, the way to restrict 0:20:38.640 --> 0:20:41.159 ICE and lead to abolishing it is through defunding it. 0:20:41.359 --> 0:20:44.320 So that's what we're doing through the appropriations process. No, 0:20:44.400 --> 0:20:46.240 my position has not changed. I still think think the 0:20:46.280 --> 0:20:47.840 agency should be abolished. 0:20:48.160 --> 0:20:48.480 Yeah. 0:20:49.200 --> 0:21:04.280 Yeah, there's a broad issue we had, which was that 0:21:04.440 --> 0:21:06.639 at the end of twenty twenty, as a result of 0:21:06.680 --> 0:21:09.520 all of the federal agents that were in American cities 0:21:09.520 --> 0:21:12.920 and had been video brutalizing citizens and places like Portland, 0:21:13.480 --> 0:21:16.320 there was a lot of anger about DHS. 0:21:16.359 --> 0:21:17.080 In particular. 0:21:17.160 --> 0:21:19.639 I wrote a column for Business Insider about like, look, 0:21:19.680 --> 0:21:23.120 this agency is going to remain under Biden, but if 0:21:23.119 --> 0:21:26.320 we don't cut the legs out from under the entire agency, 0:21:26.359 --> 0:21:30.200 it's basically set up to be the president's secret police. 0:21:30.520 --> 0:21:35.119 And broadly speaking, the Democrats didn't do anything to stop it. 0:21:35.200 --> 0:21:37.439 But I also, like, I guess where I am on 0:21:37.480 --> 0:21:42.880 this is. I think it's kind of counterproductive at this point. 0:21:43.119 --> 0:21:45.960 The failures of the Biden administration, I think are quite 0:21:45.960 --> 0:21:48.879 manifest in what the Trump administration is doing right now. 0:21:49.520 --> 0:21:52.840 And what I want to focus on is the fact 0:21:52.880 --> 0:21:56.159 that we've had, in the space of several months, Americans 0:21:56.600 --> 0:21:59.960 become more than twice as likely to support abolishing ICE, 0:22:00.920 --> 0:22:04.000 which is both a fragile coalition because the fact that 0:22:04.000 --> 0:22:07.080 the number has changed so rapidly means that it could 0:22:07.080 --> 0:22:10.520 potentially change back. Like, I don't feel solid in counting 0:22:10.720 --> 0:22:14.240 on that to be the permanent state of affairs, but 0:22:14.440 --> 0:22:18.760 it introduces an opportunity, and it's an opportunity to build 0:22:19.160 --> 0:22:23.200 support to destroy this agency. And I think it's probably 0:22:23.240 --> 0:22:26.200 too much to hope for DHS as a whole and 0:22:26.320 --> 0:22:29.960 anything close to the near term. But the fact that 0:22:30.160 --> 0:22:33.919 during the Biden administration so much got punted on, I 0:22:33.920 --> 0:22:37.280 don't know, like we're past that. We have the opportunity, now, 0:22:37.680 --> 0:22:41.320 we have the anger now I do I retain my worry, 0:22:41.400 --> 0:22:43.280 And I would say almost one of my biggest political 0:22:43.359 --> 0:22:46.080 fears is that twenty twenty six and twenty twenty eight 0:22:46.119 --> 0:22:48.720 go well for Democrats. They do again what happened under 0:22:48.760 --> 0:22:49.880 the Biden administration. 0:22:50.200 --> 0:22:52.040 Yeah, and they leave all these things intact. 0:22:52.400 --> 0:22:54.560 But one of the big differences that we have, at 0:22:54.640 --> 0:22:57.359 least right now is that at no point was abolishing 0:22:57.400 --> 0:23:00.199 ICE polling the way it is right now during the 0:23:00.280 --> 0:23:04.119 Biden or the first Trump administration. Yeah, And I think 0:23:05.000 --> 0:23:07.720 we have to take advantage of that. There's momentum right now, 0:23:08.119 --> 0:23:08.720 like this is a. 0:23:08.680 --> 0:23:11.000 Crucial time, not just like we're talking here in terms 0:23:11.080 --> 0:23:14.040 of like abolishing ICE moves us back to the two 0:23:14.119 --> 0:23:18.199 thousand and three norm right, Like what it doesn't do 0:23:18.760 --> 0:23:21.240 is fixed the fundamental issue here, which is that there 0:23:21.280 --> 0:23:24.280 are not legal pathways for people to come to the 0:23:24.440 --> 0:23:28.040 US and there need to be and like I think 0:23:28.080 --> 0:23:30.240 like now is the time for people who are involved 0:23:30.240 --> 0:23:34.159 in democratic politics right to agitate for like a genuine 0:23:34.240 --> 0:23:37.320 reform package. I don't think we will ever see support 0:23:37.640 --> 0:23:43.959 like this again for legalization of undocumented people, for Dreamers right, 0:23:44.320 --> 0:23:48.800 or people who are impacted by deferred action for childhood arrivals, 0:23:49.160 --> 0:23:51.760 which is a policy that it came to place under Obama. 0:23:52.320 --> 0:23:56.240 Like, now is the time for substantial immigration reform. 0:23:56.760 --> 0:24:00.160 I say this knowing that this will not fix a problem. 0:24:00.160 --> 0:24:03.160 Like more than most people you know, I have seen 0:24:03.200 --> 0:24:07.360 the horrors of our immigration system firsthand, but like there 0:24:07.480 --> 0:24:10.560 is a moment right now that we could change things 0:24:10.640 --> 0:24:15.199 for the better. And I share roberts worry that if 0:24:15.240 --> 0:24:18.680 Democrats get like an easy win even in the midterms, 0:24:19.080 --> 0:24:21.960 that we might not get that. And like what we 0:24:22.040 --> 0:24:25.400 saw rounder Biden was a big pointer to what we're 0:24:25.400 --> 0:24:29.520 seeing under Trump that essentially the DHS was almost impossible 0:24:29.520 --> 0:24:34.080 for him to control. Yeah, in that he acquiesced to oads, 0:24:34.080 --> 0:24:36.240 he is still responsible for them, like the buckstops with him. 0:24:36.240 --> 0:24:36.840 He's president. 0:24:37.000 --> 0:24:40.240 I'm not certain that he planned it, but nonetheless it 0:24:40.320 --> 0:24:42.359 continued to happen for months and months and months out 0:24:42.400 --> 0:24:45.760 of his presidency, right, Like, it was very obvious the 0:24:45.800 --> 0:24:48.040 way this was going to go if we got another 0:24:48.320 --> 0:24:53.439 Trump presidency, and if they do that again, we're just 0:24:53.480 --> 0:24:55.680 setting the table for things to get worse again. 0:24:56.560 --> 0:24:56.800 Right. 0:24:56.920 --> 0:25:00.800 And I think James the task before is twofold, right, 0:25:00.840 --> 0:25:04.520 because on one hand, we have to reform the system 0:25:04.600 --> 0:25:09.400 by which people gain legal acceptance to live in this country, 0:25:09.800 --> 0:25:12.480 and that also includes I think there needs to be 0:25:12.480 --> 0:25:17.560 a push for some sort of federal law that will 0:25:17.560 --> 0:25:20.560 make it impossible or at least much harder, to reverse 0:25:21.119 --> 0:25:24.680 these acceptances and to do things like nullify or cancel 0:25:24.840 --> 0:25:27.560 green cards and permanent residency like the administration is doing 0:25:27.680 --> 0:25:30.879 right now. Like both, we need increased pathways and we 0:25:30.960 --> 0:25:34.680 need increased resilience to promise people that, hey, if you 0:25:34.840 --> 0:25:37.720 go through all of these hoops to become a legal 0:25:37.760 --> 0:25:41.280 resident or a citizen or whatever, it can't just get 0:25:41.320 --> 0:25:44.320 pulled away the next time a Republican wins office. 0:25:44.640 --> 0:25:45.440 Yeah. 0:25:45.520 --> 0:25:47.640 And then on the other side of things, you have 0:25:47.720 --> 0:25:53.960 this vast, uncontrollable militant agency built as the armed wing 0:25:54.040 --> 0:25:58.840 of the presidency that has to be destroyed because it 0:25:59.040 --> 0:26:02.520 can't exist a democracy yeah, it's no compatible and then 0:26:02.560 --> 0:26:05.040 you have I mean I would extend that to DHS 0:26:05.080 --> 0:26:07.000 as a whole. But it's my same issue with like, 0:26:07.359 --> 0:26:09.919 if we can defund ICE right now, I'm always in 0:26:09.920 --> 0:26:11.879 favor of taking away some of their money. 0:26:12.080 --> 0:26:13.920 That's not the extent of what I think should happen 0:26:13.960 --> 0:26:14.320 to ICE. 0:26:14.359 --> 0:26:18.080 It's just like it's a salient, right, Like you have 0:26:18.119 --> 0:26:20.480 to look at it that way. Like it it would 0:26:20.520 --> 0:26:23.280 be as if you're you're like, well, it's not worth 0:26:23.320 --> 0:26:25.840 winning the Battle of Stalingrad because that doesn't give us 0:26:25.880 --> 0:26:28.359 Berlein It's well, but these are steps, you know, you 0:26:28.720 --> 0:26:32.320 try to damage and reduce the agency's power and ability 0:26:32.320 --> 0:26:35.159 to function. Yeah, while you're continuing. And I guess the 0:26:35.520 --> 0:26:37.880 worry about that too is that if you do defund ICE, 0:26:37.920 --> 0:26:40.040 if they because we've had some Trump has made a 0:26:40.040 --> 0:26:44.640 couple comments about worrying that, like we need to reduce 0:26:44.800 --> 0:26:47.320 kind of the tempo at which ICE is operating because 0:26:47.359 --> 0:26:48.840 it's bad for them. 0:26:48.880 --> 0:26:51.120 So that is kind of one of my concerns. 0:26:50.560 --> 0:26:53.600 That maybe if they, if they pull back on the 0:26:53.640 --> 0:26:57.760 throttle a little bit, the rage will decline enough that 0:26:57.800 --> 0:27:02.080 there's not this kind of motivation and behind abolishing but 0:27:02.600 --> 0:27:04.240 I feel like that's just a fear you kind of 0:27:04.240 --> 0:27:08.440 have to eat, as opposed to not trying to stop 0:27:08.480 --> 0:27:11.040 and reduce the harms the agency does in the immediate 0:27:11.119 --> 0:27:13.240 term while you're working long term for abolition. 0:27:13.840 --> 0:27:15.600 Yeah, yeah, yeah, I. 0:27:15.680 --> 0:27:18.360 Did want to talk a little about other numbers, because 0:27:19.080 --> 0:27:22.720 immigration is obviously a major issue for American voters. It's 0:27:22.760 --> 0:27:24.800 an issue people pick who they're going to vote for 0:27:24.800 --> 0:27:27.119 the presidency on. It's one of them, but it's not 0:27:27.280 --> 0:27:30.359 the main one. As a general rule, throughout most of 0:27:30.480 --> 0:27:34.560 modern political history, the kind of the top issue for 0:27:34.640 --> 0:27:38.359 Americans is the economy. And if the economy is bad, 0:27:38.520 --> 0:27:40.760 it is very hard for your party to stay in power. 0:27:41.200 --> 0:27:43.520 If the economy is good, it is a lot easier 0:27:43.640 --> 0:27:46.439 for your party to stay in power. Right, Like, these 0:27:46.480 --> 0:27:49.920 are fairly basic facts of political life in the United States, 0:27:49.920 --> 0:27:53.280 always with some caveats, but that it bears looking at 0:27:53.320 --> 0:27:56.320 how do Americans feel about the economy and who do 0:27:56.400 --> 0:27:58.760 they blame for the fact that they feel badly about 0:27:58.760 --> 0:28:02.879 the economy? And per Politico, which carried out a recent survey, 0:28:02.920 --> 0:28:05.240 about forty six percent of Americans say the cost of 0:28:05.280 --> 0:28:08.280 living is the worst they can remember it ever being 0:28:08.600 --> 0:28:11.439 This includes thirty seven percent of people who voted for 0:28:11.480 --> 0:28:16.720 Trump in twenty twenty four, and Americans pretty like significantly 0:28:16.760 --> 0:28:20.920 agree that this is a Trump problem. Inflation, the fact 0:28:20.960 --> 0:28:23.720 that they can't afford things is on him because he's 0:28:23.760 --> 0:28:27.719 the present. Again, forty six percent of Americans say it's 0:28:27.800 --> 0:28:31.960 Trump's economy and his administration is responsible for rising costs. 0:28:32.680 --> 0:28:36.879 And this is true both among Republicans and Democrats, which 0:28:37.119 --> 0:28:40.360 is very interesting to me. A percentage of Americans, based 0:28:40.360 --> 0:28:43.920 on the vote in the twenty four election, fifty three 0:28:43.960 --> 0:28:46.320 percent of Harris voters in twenty twenty four say the 0:28:46.360 --> 0:28:48.360 cost of living is the worst they've seen it, and again, 0:28:48.440 --> 0:28:51.360 thirty seven percent of Trump voters in twenty twenty four 0:28:51.560 --> 0:28:55.000 feel the same way. So that is it's an example 0:28:55.040 --> 0:28:57.840 of something that we've talked about and wondered about on 0:28:58.040 --> 0:28:59.680 this show a lot, which is like how much. 0:28:59.560 --> 0:29:03.560 Does reac break through the fever swamps? And this is 0:29:03.600 --> 0:29:07.040 suggesting that, like to a pretty solid degree, that actually 0:29:07.400 --> 0:29:10.520 Trump is I still think he's got a floor of 0:29:10.600 --> 0:29:13.560 somewhere around thirty percent of Americans who will follow him 0:29:13.560 --> 0:29:16.080 into the pits of hell, even if it means shoveling 0:29:16.080 --> 0:29:18.600 themselves into it, but that number used to be like 0:29:18.640 --> 0:29:22.480 forty percent, right, and it does seem to be declining. 0:29:23.320 --> 0:29:26.200 This is being treated as a five alarm fire among 0:29:26.480 --> 0:29:29.640 the Trump White House, which is interesting me for a 0:29:29.680 --> 0:29:32.760 couple of reasons. You know, anytime you talk with especially 0:29:32.760 --> 0:29:35.480 people them left about but also increasingly a lot of 0:29:35.520 --> 0:29:38.840 Democrats about the midterm elections in the twenty twenty eight elections, 0:29:39.160 --> 0:29:40.680 I think you have to deal with his people saying, 0:29:40.680 --> 0:29:42.040 but are there going to be elections? 0:29:42.240 --> 0:29:42.480 Right? 0:29:43.160 --> 0:29:46.840 And you know it's I don't dismiss those concerns out 0:29:46.840 --> 0:29:49.560 of hand, obviously in part because the administration is talking 0:29:49.640 --> 0:29:52.120 right now about having ice agents and polling places, right, 0:29:52.440 --> 0:29:55.640 you do have to acknowledge that as a concern. But 0:29:55.680 --> 0:29:57.640 at the same time, I think if you're looking at 0:29:57.640 --> 0:30:00.800 this rationally, you have to note that the Trump administration 0:30:00.920 --> 0:30:03.840 internally is acting as if there will be elections and 0:30:03.880 --> 0:30:06.920 that those will be competitive elections. They are worried about 0:30:06.920 --> 0:30:09.960 the economy, they are worried about their polling, and they 0:30:09.960 --> 0:30:12.720 are taking actions to try to mitigate the worries that 0:30:12.760 --> 0:30:14.960 they have, which they wouldn't be doing if they were 0:30:15.000 --> 0:30:18.000 already sure there's never going to be another election. Right, 0:30:18.040 --> 0:30:20.200 and that is important to remember. It doesn't mean there's 0:30:20.200 --> 0:30:22.560 not a danger, doesn't mean they won't try shit if 0:30:22.600 --> 0:30:25.840 they lose, but it does mean that they are treating 0:30:25.880 --> 0:30:29.720 these political issues as political issues that they have to 0:30:29.800 --> 0:30:32.760 deal with via messaging. There is an article in Fox 0:30:32.800 --> 0:30:37.320 News recently about Trump's team huddling to decide on midterm messaging. 0:30:37.520 --> 0:30:38.680 I'm going to quote from that now. 0:30:39.160 --> 0:30:41.400 The meeting, which was confirmed to Fox News by sources 0:30:41.400 --> 0:30:43.560 familiar with the gathering, was hosted by White House Chief 0:30:43.600 --> 0:30:46.400 of Staff Susie Wilds and Deputy Chief of Staff James Blair, 0:30:46.560 --> 0:30:49.520 who is steering Trump's political strategy. According to sources, the 0:30:49.520 --> 0:30:52.200 message during a slide presentation by chief polster and Chief 0:30:52.240 --> 0:30:55.760 Strategists and strategist Toorney Fabrizio was that the economy will 0:30:55.800 --> 0:30:57.720 be the top issue in the minds of voters, and 0:30:57.760 --> 0:31:00.920 the White House needs to spotlight its efforts on easy affordability. 0:31:01.520 --> 0:31:03.320 The meeting was held as the GOP ares to defend 0:31:03.360 --> 0:31:05.320 their control of the Senate and their razor thin House 0:31:05.360 --> 0:31:09.200 majority in November's midterm elections. Republicans are also dealing with 0:31:09.240 --> 0:31:12.880 the presidents continued underwater approval ratings and a slew of surveys, 0:31:12.880 --> 0:31:15.600 including the latest Fox and News pulling that indicates Americans 0:31:15.640 --> 0:31:20.640 are pessimistic about the economy, and publicly, the administration's claim 0:31:20.680 --> 0:31:22.719 is that Americans are happy with the economy. The economy 0:31:22.800 --> 0:31:24.400 is the best it's ever been. Look At how good 0:31:24.400 --> 0:31:27.240 the doo is. It's over fifty thousand, right, Yeah, But 0:31:28.080 --> 0:31:31.400 everything we're hearing internally, like all of the reports that 0:31:31.440 --> 0:31:33.960 from people inside the administration about like what's going on 0:31:34.080 --> 0:31:35.920 day to day, is that they're wide awake and worried 0:31:36.200 --> 0:31:39.760 over the fact that their economic numbers are completely fucking 0:31:39.840 --> 0:31:43.880 dog shit. Now, what does this mean for the midterm elections, Well, 0:31:44.920 --> 0:31:46.840 very few people that I have found who are like 0:31:47.000 --> 0:31:52.840 credible analysts don't expect the Democrats to retake the House, right. 0:31:53.200 --> 0:31:57.800 Meaning, most credible analysts do think the Dems are likely 0:31:57.920 --> 0:31:58.960 to retake the House. 0:32:00.720 --> 0:32:04.000 That said, there's a fairly few people who expect a 0:32:04.040 --> 0:32:08.280 twenty eighteen style Democratic blowout, among like the professional bull 0:32:08.320 --> 0:32:12.360 watchers and stuff, which is, if you remember the Democrats 0:32:12.400 --> 0:32:15.920 flipped about forty one seats. There's a couple of reasons 0:32:15.920 --> 0:32:18.520 for this, right, And I found a good article in 0:32:18.560 --> 0:32:22.960 The Hill that's kind of analyzing like why we shouldn't 0:32:23.000 --> 0:32:26.280 be expecting some of the exuberants that you're seeing on 0:32:26.320 --> 0:32:29.120 social media about like early elections and how bad Trump's 0:32:29.160 --> 0:32:33.320 numbers are, is maybe making people overly optimistic about like 0:32:33.400 --> 0:32:37.440 flipping all of Congress to Democratic control, which is not 0:32:37.720 --> 0:32:41.040 currently the likeliest outcome. And there's a couple of reasons 0:32:41.040 --> 0:32:43.720 for this. One of them is that, as unpopular as 0:32:43.720 --> 0:32:45.920 Trump is, and I've hit on that quite a lot, 0:32:46.640 --> 0:32:50.760 the Democratic Party's overall favorability is at about thirty three percent, 0:32:51.280 --> 0:32:55.280 which is nine points lower than the Republican Party's favorability 0:32:55.760 --> 0:32:58.320 and you know, depending on the poll, five to ten 0:32:58.360 --> 0:33:00.440 points lower than Trump's own favorability. This is based on 0:33:00.520 --> 0:33:05.080 a Marquette Law School pol Right, So Trump is very unpopular, 0:33:05.120 --> 0:33:08.040 so with the Republican Party, but people don't like the Democrats, 0:33:08.040 --> 0:33:10.880 the Democratic Party as a whole. People like individual Democrats, 0:33:11.280 --> 0:33:13.320 a lot of people like their Congress person, a lot 0:33:13.320 --> 0:33:15.200 of people like whoever it is they want to see 0:33:15.200 --> 0:33:18.000 as the presidential candidate. You know, you can look at 0:33:18.080 --> 0:33:20.720 you know, you've got folks who really like Mamdani or 0:33:20.760 --> 0:33:24.760 really like pritzkerp But as a whole, voters, including Democratic 0:33:24.840 --> 0:33:28.320 voters don't feel very positively towards the Democratic Party, in 0:33:28.360 --> 0:33:31.080 many cases more negatively still than they feel about the 0:33:31.120 --> 0:33:34.800 Republican Party that started to turn around. But if you're 0:33:34.880 --> 0:33:37.200 kind of hoping that there's going to be like a 0:33:37.240 --> 0:33:40.240 full on switch that makes it immediately possible to successfully 0:33:40.280 --> 0:33:44.880 impeach President Trump, that is extraordinarily unlikely to come in 0:33:44.960 --> 0:33:48.440 twenty twenty six, right, which doesn't mean that it's unlikely 0:33:48.440 --> 0:33:52.320 to have a good result. Republicans losing control of Congress 0:33:52.560 --> 0:33:53.640 is a good result. 0:33:53.960 --> 0:33:56.760 Right. There's just a lot less. I mean, there's a 0:33:56.800 --> 0:33:57.200 lot less. 0:33:57.200 --> 0:33:59.600 Even if you're kind of taking the unfavorability of the 0:33:59.600 --> 0:34:02.360 Democratic Party out of it, there's a lot fewer seats 0:34:02.480 --> 0:34:04.960 up for grabs right now. In twenty eighteen, and when that, 0:34:05.200 --> 0:34:08.440 you know, the Democrats flipped forty one seats. There were 0:34:08.480 --> 0:34:11.640 seventy five competitive races this year. Heading into the midterms, 0:34:12.040 --> 0:34:15.520 there were only eighteen. Right, there's a lot less that 0:34:15.600 --> 0:34:19.440 can flip. And I don't think Republicans are likely to 0:34:19.480 --> 0:34:23.720 lose control of the Senate, right, And the polling shows 0:34:23.760 --> 0:34:26.239 things being pretty razor thin there. Democrats have about a 0:34:26.280 --> 0:34:30.879 four percent advantage according to Economist. You GOV polling right 0:34:30.920 --> 0:34:34.840 now in the congressional midterms, and there's a three point 0:34:34.840 --> 0:34:37.560 margin of error, so you're looking at like a lead, 0:34:37.680 --> 0:34:42.719 but not enough of one for a complete fucking blowout. Right, 0:34:43.200 --> 0:34:45.920 there has been some more positive data, like kind of 0:34:46.000 --> 0:34:48.880 right before we came on to record this, like I 0:34:48.960 --> 0:34:51.719 looked at some charts by Focal Data that was kind 0:34:51.760 --> 0:34:54.319 of breaking down midterm voting and tensioned by groups and 0:34:54.360 --> 0:34:58.040 looking at like likely voters, And this is always kind 0:34:58.040 --> 0:35:01.160 of a little bit like voodoo, right in terms of 0:35:01.160 --> 0:35:03.480 how you're trying to, like, well, how likely is a 0:35:03.600 --> 0:35:06.680 likely voter and how do we like factor in realistically 0:35:06.680 --> 0:35:09.839 are they going to show up anyway if you're kind 0:35:09.840 --> 0:35:12.919 of assuming that like people who self report as likely 0:35:13.040 --> 0:35:15.640 voters will only actually vote about a third of the time. 0:35:16.239 --> 0:35:19.720 Per this study, Democrats are ahead by about seven points 0:35:19.719 --> 0:35:22.439 in a generic house ballot. So you know, that's kind 0:35:22.440 --> 0:35:25.280 of where we are right now. I think we're looking 0:35:25.360 --> 0:35:28.160 at a midterm season that's going to go well for 0:35:28.400 --> 0:35:31.160 the Democrats, But I don't think we're looking at a 0:35:31.200 --> 0:35:36.600 midterm season that delivers us from the Republican Party being 0:35:36.640 --> 0:35:40.680 able to ram through legislation. I think our kind of 0:35:40.719 --> 0:35:43.920 best case scenario is one in which they have to 0:35:44.760 --> 0:35:49.960 give major concessions because the Democrats have you know, flipped 0:35:50.320 --> 0:35:52.399 the House at the very least like. 0:35:52.320 --> 0:35:54.360 And that's that's big. But I don't think. 0:35:54.760 --> 0:35:58.440 I don't think Trump's going to get impeached starting January 0:35:58.440 --> 0:35:59.040 of next year. 0:36:00.440 --> 0:36:02.279 The one thing I will say about the polling data 0:36:02.360 --> 0:36:06.120 is that so obviously Democrats tend to perform better in 0:36:06.120 --> 0:36:08.600 special elections because to vote in a special election, you 0:36:08.640 --> 0:36:11.120 have to be a higher interest voter. And that also 0:36:11.800 --> 0:36:16.960 special election cycles get driven by immediate like anger over stuff, 0:36:16.960 --> 0:36:19.799 and there's a bunch of different factors that dry special 0:36:19.800 --> 0:36:23.080 election turn out. And also the Democrats have been absolutely 0:36:23.120 --> 0:36:26.319 obliterating the Republicans in all the special elections that have 0:36:26.360 --> 0:36:30.200 been happening recently, or even in the cases where they're lose, 0:36:30.239 --> 0:36:33.120 they're losing by very small margins in places where Trump 0:36:33.200 --> 0:36:35.759 was wining blowouts. Yeah, so I think if you want 0:36:35.800 --> 0:36:38.200 to be optimistic, I think that's the case for optimism. 0:36:39.400 --> 0:36:42.239 But also, yeah, like we're not going to have all 0:36:42.239 --> 0:36:45.040 of our problems magically solved by the mid terms. 0:36:45.200 --> 0:36:48.640 Yeah, yes, to specify on that, what you were saying, 0:36:48.719 --> 0:36:53.120 there was a special election in Tennessee and Republican Matt 0:36:53.200 --> 0:36:57.200 Van Epps beat the Democrat often Bane by nine points, 0:36:57.680 --> 0:37:00.439 but Trump had won in twenty twenty five, were there 0:37:00.480 --> 0:37:01.520 by twenty two points. 0:37:02.719 --> 0:37:04.840 Yeah, and like like a few we talked about this 0:37:04.840 --> 0:37:06.319 on the show. But like last year there was there 0:37:06.320 --> 0:37:08.320 was an election in like a special election in western 0:37:08.360 --> 0:37:11.000 Iowa that Trump had won by double digits and the 0:37:11.000 --> 0:37:12.360 Democrats won by double digits. 0:37:12.840 --> 0:37:17.160 And that kind of thing shouldn't be happening. 0:37:17.600 --> 0:37:21.319 It sure shouldn't, No it is, And yeah, you know, 0:37:21.360 --> 0:37:23.280 so that's that's the optimistic case. 0:37:23.560 --> 0:37:26.120 And hey, like I've just come in saying like, hey, 0:37:26.120 --> 0:37:29.839 don't expect Congress to be completely flipped, but like, you know, 0:37:29.960 --> 0:37:32.359 it's the times are crazy. Who knows what else? Who 0:37:32.360 --> 0:37:34.359 knows how many more people Ice is going to murder? 0:37:34.520 --> 0:37:37.600 Who knows like what other like how bad the economy's 0:37:37.640 --> 0:37:38.200 going to get. 0:37:38.480 --> 0:37:41.240 We might have invaded Canada by then, Like who knows. 0:37:42.440 --> 0:37:45.440 Anything's on the table, anything's still on the table. We're 0:37:45.520 --> 0:37:48.400 just kind of looking at shit from February. 0:37:48.520 --> 0:37:50.520 Yeah, yeah, and some of this shit will depend on 0:37:50.600 --> 0:37:55.640 like what atrocities they commit in the weeks and days 0:37:56.200 --> 0:37:59.520 before the midterm election. Right then, I think we see 0:37:59.680 --> 0:38:03.319 so around certain the killing of Rene Good, the killing 0:38:03.360 --> 0:38:06.480 of Alex pretty right, we see those things shift public 0:38:06.520 --> 0:38:14.080 opinion dramatically. And the ongoing snatching of immigrants and deportations 0:38:14.120 --> 0:38:16.080 and sending people back to places where they be tortured 0:38:16.080 --> 0:38:20.799 and killed. Like that's kind of the background and it 0:38:20.800 --> 0:38:23.719 makes people angry, but like it's these these these specific 0:38:23.760 --> 0:38:40.799 actions which seem to shift public opinion dramatically. All right, 0:38:40.880 --> 0:38:43.920 So on that topic, I guess we should talk about 0:38:43.920 --> 0:38:47.520 the quote unquote shutdown, and specifically the shutdown of the 0:38:47.520 --> 0:38:48.840 Department of Homeland Security. 0:38:48.920 --> 0:38:49.120 Right. 0:38:49.440 --> 0:38:51.200 I guess the first thing to clarify is this isn't 0:38:51.200 --> 0:38:53.480 a government shut down in the sense of the shutdown 0:38:53.520 --> 0:38:56.200 we saw last year, right that that lasted like forty 0:38:56.200 --> 0:38:56.920 plus days. 0:38:57.320 --> 0:38:59.080 Right, It's a partial shutdown. 0:38:59.760 --> 0:39:01.160 It's partial shutdown. 0:39:01.520 --> 0:39:03.520 What's happening right now is the Democrats are holding up 0:39:03.560 --> 0:39:06.640 further funding for DHS until the administration agrees to some 0:39:06.760 --> 0:39:11.640 concessions that they have asked for. This is unlikely to 0:39:11.719 --> 0:39:15.359 impact ICE and CBP a very great deal for a. 0:39:15.280 --> 0:39:16.080 Couple of reasons. 0:39:16.120 --> 0:39:19.680 Firstly, the Taxi Spending Cuts Bill right, twenty twenty five 0:39:20.200 --> 0:39:27.080 bill funded them to an absolutely unfathomable degree, I think 0:39:27.160 --> 0:39:31.440 sixty five and seventy million, respectively. More quickly, it will 0:39:31.440 --> 0:39:36.319 affect other agencies under DHS. Those includes Transport Security Administration, 0:39:37.000 --> 0:39:41.240 Federal Emergency Management Administration, the Secret Service, and the Coast Guard. 0:39:41.960 --> 0:39:45.120 Some TSA workers will be working that they will likely 0:39:45.280 --> 0:39:50.400 not be receiving pay. This is pretty common right that 0:39:50.440 --> 0:39:53.640 they're deemed does quite unquite essential workers, and that means 0:39:53.719 --> 0:39:55.880 that they will be expected you to work. What we 0:39:55.920 --> 0:39:58.920 saw last time was that as the shutdown dragged on, 0:39:59.160 --> 0:40:01.680 people were calling in sick or not coming into work 0:40:02.280 --> 0:40:04.719 because they were taking other jobs right because they had 0:40:04.719 --> 0:40:08.279 bills to pay. The reason this is happening is because 0:40:08.320 --> 0:40:11.800 Democrats successfully managed to get Trump to separate DHS funding 0:40:11.840 --> 0:40:15.600 from another spending bill, which passed through and funded the 0:40:15.600 --> 0:40:16.720 rest of the federal government. 0:40:17.360 --> 0:40:20.600 They are demanding an end to masking. 0:40:20.920 --> 0:40:23.759 I should clarify specifically like masking in the sense of 0:40:23.800 --> 0:40:27.800 law enforcement officers wearing gates over their faces, a return 0:40:27.840 --> 0:40:31.840 to opposites displaying their name, badge, and ID number, increased 0:40:31.920 --> 0:40:36.000 oversight of detention conditions, coordination with local law enforcement, and 0:40:36.160 --> 0:40:39.480 end to the detention of US citizens targeted enforcement and 0:40:39.600 --> 0:40:43.960 not roving patrols, and a unified use of force and 0:40:44.280 --> 0:40:48.879 uniform conduct policy for CBP and ICE, and then an 0:40:49.040 --> 0:40:53.080 end to raids using Form two point fifteen. I'm just 0:40:53.120 --> 0:40:55.600 going to note here them moving forwardre going to refer 0:40:55.719 --> 0:40:58.560 to that using its it's that name and not call 0:40:58.600 --> 0:41:03.279 it an administrative warrant, because an administrative warrant like kind 0:41:03.320 --> 0:41:06.000 of implies the action of a judge. But these are 0:41:06.120 --> 0:41:08.880 forms that are filled out right that it is not 0:41:09.520 --> 0:41:12.000 the same early aspected as a warrant, and that's a 0:41:12.080 --> 0:41:16.880 judicial warrant. The Republican counterproposals so far have shown pretty 0:41:16.880 --> 0:41:20.000 little common ground on this, aside from over body cameras 0:41:20.040 --> 0:41:24.800 where Gnome did implement body cameras. As I said, ICE 0:41:24.920 --> 0:41:28.839 and CBP will continue doing what they do right. I 0:41:28.880 --> 0:41:32.440 was at the border on Saturday and I saw tons 0:41:32.840 --> 0:41:37.600 of CBP patrols. They do not seem to have slowed 0:41:37.640 --> 0:41:42.279 down with their wall construction. That may overtime slow down. 0:41:42.520 --> 0:41:44.839 They won't be paying like the workers week by week 0:41:44.880 --> 0:41:47.520 on those contracts. They will be paying a contractor who 0:41:47.600 --> 0:41:50.160 might be paying a subcontractor, so that would take time 0:41:50.239 --> 0:41:54.040 to slow down. The things that will slow down. Are 0:41:54.160 --> 0:41:58.160 things like the oversight function to DHS, potentially administrative and 0:41:58.400 --> 0:42:02.239 hiring functions, things like that, right, But the actual like 0:42:02.320 --> 0:42:05.040 on the ground patrolling, most of those people are deemed 0:42:05.080 --> 0:42:09.560 as essential workers. So it seems unlikely that we will see, 0:42:10.239 --> 0:42:13.880 for instance, fewer CBP patrols at the border or fewer 0:42:14.200 --> 0:42:18.120 ero iscera agents like tasked with doing these ongoing raids. 0:42:18.719 --> 0:42:21.200 So yeah, talking about DHS, I want to talk a 0:42:21.200 --> 0:42:23.520 little bit more about the Coast Guard. I think it's 0:42:23.560 --> 0:42:25.759 likely that some people won't be aware that the Coast 0:42:25.800 --> 0:42:28.920 Guard is an element of the DHS. They're also a 0:42:28.960 --> 0:42:31.000 branch of the military, right they're the only branch of 0:42:31.000 --> 0:42:35.440 the military that's under the DHS. Yes, so they considered veterans, 0:42:35.480 --> 0:42:39.799 but they're not on the DoD or the DOW as 0:42:39.800 --> 0:42:42.800 you can now call it. The NBC has a piece 0:42:43.000 --> 0:42:46.080 suggesting that there is, I guess, a split in the 0:42:46.120 --> 0:42:49.720 Coast Guard between lower ranks and higher ranks, and specifically 0:42:49.760 --> 0:42:53.280 they're talking about feeling that Coast Guard is moving away 0:42:53.320 --> 0:42:56.359 from its court mission, which is search and rescue. They 0:42:56.440 --> 0:42:59.680 highlight one incident in February of last year when a 0:42:59.719 --> 0:43:03.440 Coast guardsmen went overboard and a Coast Guard see one 0:43:03.560 --> 0:43:07.799 thirty was detailed to participate in the search for that 0:43:07.880 --> 0:43:08.560 Coast guardsman. 0:43:08.719 --> 0:43:08.799 Right. 0:43:09.440 --> 0:43:12.040 It had previously been detailed for a deportation flight that 0:43:12.120 --> 0:43:14.480 it was retasked to assist with the search. According to 0:43:14.520 --> 0:43:18.480 the piece, quote non verbally instructed the acting Commandant of 0:43:18.560 --> 0:43:22.600 the Coast Guard, Admiral Kevin Lunday, to pull the plane 0:43:22.640 --> 0:43:24.759 off the search and rescue mission so it would not 0:43:24.800 --> 0:43:27.640 miss the immigrant flight, a part of DHS's so called 0:43:27.719 --> 0:43:31.239 alien expulsion operations. According to two US officials and a 0:43:31.280 --> 0:43:34.720 Coastguard official, as a result, what happened is that local 0:43:34.719 --> 0:43:38.000 Coast Guard officials in San Diego scrambled to find two 0:43:38.080 --> 0:43:42.279 C twenty seven's that could fulfill that deportation flight. In 0:43:42.400 --> 0:43:44.719 doing so, that freed out the Sea one thirty to 0:43:44.800 --> 0:43:47.560 then go return to participate in the search. Right. They 0:43:47.560 --> 0:43:50.680 did continue searching, I believe, for one hundred and ninety hours, 0:43:50.680 --> 0:43:53.280 but they never found the missing Coast guardsmen. 0:43:53.400 --> 0:43:53.560 Right. 0:43:54.200 --> 0:43:57.960 You cannot and will never be able to conclusively prove 0:43:58.080 --> 0:44:00.200 that all of this back and forth with this one 0:44:00.360 --> 0:44:03.960 thirty had any impact on that, But this incident has 0:44:03.960 --> 0:44:07.960 clearly had an impact on morale and it suggested general 0:44:08.000 --> 0:44:10.280 shift in priorities away from search and rescue. 0:44:09.920 --> 0:44:12.360 And towards doing more border enforcement. 0:44:12.480 --> 0:44:12.640 Right. 0:44:13.280 --> 0:44:15.960 Under NOME seven hundred and fifty flights have been redirected 0:44:15.960 --> 0:44:19.320 from their regular work to instead deport migrants. This comes 0:44:19.520 --> 0:44:23.239 after she removed a high ranking Coast Guard official from 0:44:23.320 --> 0:44:26.320 her house so that Nope could live at the house. 0:44:26.960 --> 0:44:31.120 Wait what Yeah, yeah, she kicked the Coastguard person out. 0:44:31.040 --> 0:44:31.520 Of their house. 0:44:31.600 --> 0:44:35.480 Yeah, this was last year. She moved with like very 0:44:35.480 --> 0:44:38.839 short notice. She moved onto a shit, Yeah, she moved 0:44:38.840 --> 0:44:39.520 onto a base. 0:44:40.800 --> 0:44:45.200 Yeah with Lewandowski, right, that might be the case, goes, 0:44:45.400 --> 0:44:48.360 there was like a few people in like the cabinet 0:44:48.440 --> 0:44:48.920 or orbit. 0:44:49.040 --> 0:44:51.279 Yes, yes, I thought you meant like they were cohabiting. 0:44:51.640 --> 0:44:55.960 Oh no, no, no, okay, yeah, okay, beautiful domestic life. 0:44:56.200 --> 0:44:59.160 Yeah okay, I was, I was. I don't want to 0:44:59.160 --> 0:45:02.160 doubt you. That would have been in news to me. Yes, 0:45:02.200 --> 0:45:05.759 a number of Trumps, like executive officials, are living on 0:45:05.800 --> 0:45:09.800 basis more than is usual. I think the Millers maybe 0:45:09.800 --> 0:45:10.480 do as well. 0:45:10.840 --> 0:45:11.600 But yeah. 0:45:11.840 --> 0:45:14.520 She also purchased two Gulf Stream jets to fly her around, 0:45:15.080 --> 0:45:18.120 unlike most government jets, which tend to be returned towards 0:45:18.200 --> 0:45:21.120 what's called a sterile state after use. That just means 0:45:21.680 --> 0:45:24.439 that they go back to being completely clean, like they're 0:45:24.480 --> 0:45:28.480 like a generic jet. They're not your jet. Nome prefers 0:45:28.520 --> 0:45:31.719 to keep some personal items aboard the Gulf streams, but 0:45:31.880 --> 0:45:35.760 one of these items, a heated blanket, was left behind 0:45:35.920 --> 0:45:38.240 after her jet broke down she had to switch planes. 0:45:38.560 --> 0:45:42.640 Coylewandowski reportedly sheltered at the Coastguard flight staff and demanded 0:45:42.680 --> 0:45:46.239 they turn around before attempting to fire the pilot, who 0:45:46.840 --> 0:45:48.160 fused to do so. 0:45:48.640 --> 0:45:51.840 Jesus right, I need my blanky. 0:45:51.920 --> 0:45:52.800 I need my blanky. 0:45:52.880 --> 0:45:53.520 Turn around. 0:45:53.640 --> 0:45:56.400 Yeah, I think she'd she had a rough week. I 0:45:56.400 --> 0:45:58.040 guess one of the blankets. 0:45:58.239 --> 0:46:01.719 These are absolutely just like the softest fascist that have 0:46:01.800 --> 0:46:05.080 ever ruled the country. Like it, turn off flight around 0:46:05.120 --> 0:46:07.319 because I left my baby blanket like. 0:46:07.880 --> 0:46:09.480 Yeah right, like I oh god. 0:46:09.800 --> 0:46:13.600 Fortunately, I guess they de escalated that one and continued 0:46:13.640 --> 0:46:19.840 the flight. Blanket free, the fire the pike. Yeah, I 0:46:19.840 --> 0:46:23.680 think it is interesting to look at Coast Guards morale. Right, Like, 0:46:23.800 --> 0:46:27.799 Coast guards traditional mission has been search and rescue and 0:46:27.840 --> 0:46:32.440 then the interdiction of like drug vessels, and they have 0:46:32.600 --> 0:46:36.800 been doing a great deal of order enforcement stuff and 0:46:37.160 --> 0:46:40.680 removal stuff. And it is obviously like people who have 0:46:40.760 --> 0:46:42.719 been at the Coast Guard for a long time, not 0:46:42.800 --> 0:46:44.879 what they joined the Coast Guard to do. I will 0:46:44.920 --> 0:46:47.560 just say that there are very few areas in which 0:46:47.600 --> 0:46:50.960 the United Kingdom has worked shit out, but the lifeboats 0:46:51.040 --> 0:46:53.879 are one of them. They are mentioned in Mutual Aid. 0:46:54.280 --> 0:46:57.279 The Royal National Lifeboat Institute has an article on for 0:46:57.400 --> 0:46:58.840 Popkin on their website. 0:46:59.080 --> 0:46:59.920 Incredible and it. 0:47:00.120 --> 0:47:04.000 Is one of the really genuinely good things about Britain. 0:47:04.360 --> 0:47:07.799 By contrasting that are not part of our government security apparatus. 0:47:07.880 --> 0:47:10.120 Yeah, because that makes no sense. The entire agency of 0:47:10.200 --> 0:47:12.200 DHS makes no sense whatsoever. 0:47:12.360 --> 0:47:13.759 Yeah, it's just because. 0:47:13.600 --> 0:47:14.880 Yeah, there are better ways to do this. 0:47:15.280 --> 0:47:16.799 I mean it makes again, it makes a lot of 0:47:16.840 --> 0:47:18.920 sense as the president's private army. 0:47:19.360 --> 0:47:20.160 Yeah. 0:47:20.760 --> 0:47:25.560 For our final segment in this episode, some tragic news. 0:47:26.360 --> 0:47:30.480 On Monday afternoon, February sixteenth, two people were killed in 0:47:30.520 --> 0:47:33.440 a shooting at a hockey game in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. 0:47:33.960 --> 0:47:38.000 Before the shooter died by suicide. Three others were shot 0:47:38.040 --> 0:47:41.000 but survived their injuries. In the aftermath of the strategy, 0:47:41.120 --> 0:47:44.200 people across the right and the left have both used 0:47:44.200 --> 0:47:48.880 this shooting offensively and defensively in the culture war because 0:47:48.880 --> 0:47:52.520 of the shooter's general identity and far right conspiratorial politics, 0:47:52.960 --> 0:47:57.760 even though evidence points towards this being targeted domestic violence. 0:47:58.400 --> 0:48:01.000 The deceased or the shooter's X onefe and eldest son, 0:48:01.480 --> 0:48:04.840 and the deceased ex wife's parents were critically wounded but survived, 0:48:05.000 --> 0:48:08.799 as did a family friend. The shooter's other son was 0:48:09.000 --> 0:48:13.080 on the ice playing hockey while the shooting took place. Ordinarily, 0:48:13.120 --> 0:48:15.400 we would not talk about an instant like this in 0:48:15.440 --> 0:48:18.720 the news because there's a lot of domestic violence shootings 0:48:18.719 --> 0:48:21.200 that happened across the United States every week, and not 0:48:21.280 --> 0:48:24.120 all of them become national news stories. This is news 0:48:24.160 --> 0:48:27.520 because of its weaponization in the political culture war, but 0:48:27.640 --> 0:48:30.600 under most methodologies like this incident would not even be 0:48:30.719 --> 0:48:34.640 categorized as a mass shooting because less than four people died. 0:48:35.280 --> 0:48:39.399 It does qualify under the Gun Violence Archive criteria, which 0:48:39.440 --> 0:48:42.600 counts injuries not debts, in which this would be the 0:48:42.680 --> 0:48:47.200 forty first shooting in the US this year. But after 0:48:47.239 --> 0:48:50.080 the shooting took place, right wing accounts and influences started 0:48:50.160 --> 0:48:52.680 using this as a part of their trans mass shooter narrative. 0:48:53.560 --> 0:48:57.040 On Monday night, the Pawtucket Police that they believed the 0:48:57.040 --> 0:49:00.960 shooting stemmed from a family dispute. The shooter was fifty 0:49:01.040 --> 0:49:04.359 six years old with six kids. About ten years ago, 0:49:04.400 --> 0:49:07.799 the shooter started identifying as a transgender woman and used 0:49:07.840 --> 0:49:12.960 the name Roberta Esposito. The legal last name is Dorgan. 0:49:13.560 --> 0:49:19.360 They're not Hispanic, oh. The shooter was divorced about five 0:49:19.400 --> 0:49:23.160 to six years ago, and Dorgan's ex wife lists the 0:49:23.239 --> 0:49:28.200 grounds for divorce in the documents as quote, gender reassignment, surgery, 0:49:28.400 --> 0:49:33.080 narcissistic and personality disorder traits. Then she crossed that out 0:49:33.880 --> 0:49:39.359 and instead wrote quote irrevocable differences which caused the remediable 0:49:39.560 --> 0:49:46.200 breakdown of the marriage unquote. The shooter was extremely active 0:49:46.360 --> 0:49:51.600 on Twitter, made anti semitic and conspiratorial posts, and frequently 0:49:51.600 --> 0:49:55.319 interacted with a large assortment of mega influencers, as well 0:49:55.360 --> 0:49:59.120 as far right, neo Nazi, and conspiracy theory influencers like 0:49:59.239 --> 0:50:04.080 Nick Fuentes and Alex Jones. Dorgan also shared pictures of 0:50:04.120 --> 0:50:07.919 a massive like SS toteen CoV tattoo on their right 0:50:08.120 --> 0:50:12.160 arm and wrote on Twitter quote post off trans to 0:50:12.239 --> 0:50:15.560 the right of Hitler and quote you can be pro 0:50:15.800 --> 0:50:21.440 LGBT and pro Trump unquote. From looking through their Twitter 0:50:21.600 --> 0:50:24.120 it it mostly appears to be someone who is suffering 0:50:24.160 --> 0:50:27.959 from extreme mental distress. It's hard to, you know, chart 0:50:28.040 --> 0:50:30.360 how much of the political beliefs that can be to 0:50:30.400 --> 0:50:33.960 split on Twitter are like genuinely held versus how much 0:50:34.000 --> 0:50:37.000 they relate to long standing mental health issues this person 0:50:37.000 --> 0:50:38.600 suffered from, which I'll get into in a sec. 0:50:39.560 --> 0:50:41.439 I'm still a little hung up on the name. 0:50:41.920 --> 0:50:44.920 The name also, I think relates to just this person's 0:50:45.080 --> 0:50:46.040 very very not well. 0:50:46.080 --> 0:50:49.080 Okay, they're just trying to pay people off, flick with correct. 0:50:49.160 --> 0:50:52.160 I think everything about this person can be seen as 0:50:52.200 --> 0:50:58.439 an expression of like antisociality politics their presentation the name now. 0:50:58.600 --> 0:51:02.200 While right wing news agent Season influencers have used this 0:51:02.280 --> 0:51:05.840 horrifying instant of domestic violence for their trans mass shooter narrative, 0:51:05.960 --> 0:51:09.520 framing every transperson is at risk of randomly becoming a 0:51:09.520 --> 0:51:13.920 mass killer while ignoring this shooter's own extremist politics, people 0:51:13.960 --> 0:51:16.200 on the left have blamed this tragedy on the shooter 0:51:16.360 --> 0:51:18.880 being a quote unquote far right Trump supporter or a 0:51:19.080 --> 0:51:22.759 quote unquote Nazi groper. And this is in part a 0:51:22.800 --> 0:51:25.960 defensive reaction against the right zone like misleading and non 0:51:26.000 --> 0:51:29.719 source claims about a statistical epidemic of trans violence. But 0:51:30.080 --> 0:51:33.240 laying blame on Make America Great Again and the MAGA 0:51:33.320 --> 0:51:38.440 movement doesn't really get us much closer to understanding this violence. 0:51:39.280 --> 0:51:43.200 We're so used to defaulting to this heartizan culture war 0:51:43.400 --> 0:51:47.200 like ideological explanation for the cause of public violence, whether 0:51:47.200 --> 0:51:51.200 that's you know, for the right, trans ideology or neo Nazism, 0:51:52.040 --> 0:51:54.840 even though both in this case and the shooting in 0:51:54.880 --> 0:51:56.839 Canada last week, which I talked about a few days 0:51:56.840 --> 0:52:00.640 ago on the show, this was like anti social, unstable 0:52:00.680 --> 0:52:03.839 and self destructive individuals who kill family members and then 0:52:03.920 --> 0:52:08.040 created a deadly public situation leading them to kill themselves. 0:52:08.560 --> 0:52:13.040 Despite Nazi tattoos and Twitter posts, this hockey game shooting 0:52:13.120 --> 0:52:18.440 was not ideologically motivated violence. This was targeted interpersonal violence 0:52:18.440 --> 0:52:22.279 against family stemming from extreme mental health issues. This goes 0:52:22.320 --> 0:52:25.360 beyond like right left politics. This shooter just seemed to 0:52:25.360 --> 0:52:28.799 be drawn to anything seen as extreme or anything that 0:52:28.880 --> 0:52:33.200 produced anti social effects. The daughter of the shooter briefly 0:52:33.239 --> 0:52:37.160 spoke to local news on Monday, saying that the shooter 0:52:37.440 --> 0:52:40.080 was her father and that the shooter had quote unquote 0:52:40.200 --> 0:52:44.279 mental health issues and was quote unquote very sick. The 0:52:44.360 --> 0:52:46.840 Rhode Island Coalition Against Domestic Violence said in a statement 0:52:46.880 --> 0:52:50.120 Monday night, quote while details are still emerging, we know 0:52:50.239 --> 0:52:53.640 that violence within families and intimate relationships can have devastating 0:52:53.760 --> 0:52:57.040 and far reaching impacts. Domestic violence does not stay behind 0:52:57.080 --> 0:53:00.960 closed doors. It affects children, extended family members, and entire communities. 0:53:01.480 --> 0:53:01.920 Unquote. 0:53:02.719 --> 0:53:04.719 Yeah, I mean, I guess if you want to do 0:53:04.760 --> 0:53:07.400 analysis of it, it's that like the thing that's actually 0:53:07.400 --> 0:53:11.200 a predictive for violence is domestic violence, and this is 0:53:11.840 --> 0:53:14.120 another really horrible to mastic violence incidents. 0:53:14.320 --> 0:53:16.840 But yeah, it's it's pretty tragic. 0:53:17.400 --> 0:53:18.520 Yeah. 0:53:18.560 --> 0:53:21.480 Interestingly, there was some news that came out today, which 0:53:21.480 --> 0:53:25.320 is Wednesday, that one of the other sons of this 0:53:25.400 --> 0:53:31.000 shooter was arrested a few years ago in North Providence 0:53:31.680 --> 0:53:35.600 for setting fires to a black church, which did appear 0:53:35.640 --> 0:53:41.240 to be ideologically motivated violence. Police found notebooks inside of 0:53:41.400 --> 0:53:45.480 this person's home filled with hateful writings quote, gutten down 0:53:45.520 --> 0:53:48.960 everyone that isn't white. If one is white, spread the gospel. 0:53:49.040 --> 0:53:53.000 Always give our bloodline a chance unquote. So this incident 0:53:53.080 --> 0:53:57.719 of a arson in a black church is definitely ideologically motivated. 0:53:58.480 --> 0:54:01.240 Yeah, it's been a great, stremely normal country. 0:54:02.000 --> 0:54:04.640 And this person was sentenced to six years in prison. 0:54:04.840 --> 0:54:05.160 Oh wow. 0:54:05.239 --> 0:54:08.640 So the person that's the son of the person, the. 0:54:08.560 --> 0:54:10.400 Son of the shooter, one of the sons of the shooter. 0:54:10.680 --> 0:54:11.959 Yeah, they had several sense. 0:54:12.320 --> 0:54:17.040 Yeah, just a pretty tragic series of incidents with this family. 0:54:17.120 --> 0:54:20.600 I do find it really disturbing that the thing that 0:54:20.640 --> 0:54:22.840 you mentioned where people just kind of drop into a 0:54:22.960 --> 0:54:26.239 channel when it comes to responding to a tragedy like this, like, 0:54:26.360 --> 0:54:28.400 and I find it really upsetting when I see it 0:54:28.400 --> 0:54:34.280 from like, yeah, left and progressive organizations that promote firearms 0:54:34.280 --> 0:54:35.120 training or like. 0:54:35.640 --> 0:54:37.280 I just find it really kind. 0:54:37.200 --> 0:54:40.640 Of disappointing, I guess, to see people dropping into these 0:54:40.680 --> 0:54:44.160 same kind of callous and dismissive responses. 0:54:45.160 --> 0:54:47.160 It's just something that's been weighing on me recently. 0:54:47.400 --> 0:54:50.280 I am a person who owns guns, but it's still 0:54:50.719 --> 0:54:52.120 I don't know, I'm disappointed. 0:54:52.160 --> 0:54:52.520 I guess. 0:54:52.960 --> 0:54:53.200 Yeah. 0:54:53.880 --> 0:54:57.440 All right, well we reported the news. 0:54:58.160 --> 0:54:59.480 Put a transcrol on your couch. 0:55:00.160 --> 0:55:03.120 Yeah, And if you have some news that you think 0:55:03.320 --> 0:55:07.160 we should report, tips, you can do so by emailing 0:55:07.200 --> 0:55:10.120 Cool Zone Tips at proton dot me. 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