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Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,

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Speaker 1: where we discussed the top political headlines with some of

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Speaker 1: today's best minds and Governor Greg Abbott and did water

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Speaker 1: break requirements for construction workers in a heat wave? We

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Speaker 1: have a star studded lineup for today's show. Mother Jones's

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Speaker 1: David Korn stops by to talk to us about Noah

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Speaker 1: Labels and all of their fuckery and their hope to

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Speaker 1: throw the twenty twenty four election to Trump. Then we'll

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Speaker 1: talk to the Washington Post Katherine Rampell about all of

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Speaker 1: the Republican fuckery towards the irs. But first we have

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Speaker 1: the host of the Enemy's List fan favorite the LinkedIn Projects,

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Speaker 1: Rick Wilson. We have the band back together.

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Speaker 2: Welcome back, Rick Wilson.

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Speaker 3: I am back and glad to be here.

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Speaker 1: We're delighted to have you, always so much fun and also,

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Speaker 1: more importantly than any of that, you are today he Trump's.

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Speaker 3: Target once again. I am Donald Trum's targets. We're running

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Speaker 3: some ads in Bedminster, one basically calling him a spy

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Speaker 3: because he's violated the Espionage Ack like famous spies in

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Speaker 3: American history. And the second head is called Rats, where

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Speaker 3: we're basically just doing what we do. Is yet anytime

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Speaker 3: Donald Trump is disrupted and distracted, it's good for America.

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Speaker 3: So the second head is our famous whispers girl saying, Donald,

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Speaker 3: the rats are all around you. They're selling you out

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Speaker 3: because we know how paranoid he is. So yeah, he's

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Speaker 3: raging on truth social this morning, his dollar store social

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Speaker 3: media platform. It's a good day. Anytime Donald Trump threatens me,

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Speaker 3: it's a good day.

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Speaker 1: Let's talk about this for a second. Where is Donald

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Speaker 1: Trump right now?

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Speaker 3: He is in Bedminster, New Jersey right now at his

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Speaker 3: mid tier golf club.

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Speaker 1: But I read the Times newsletter this morning, really smart,

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Speaker 1: and it talked about how even though this polling is

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Speaker 1: very good for Donald winning, that he's very likely to

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Speaker 1: win the nomination. You really can see in this cracks

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Speaker 1: of like some people getting their sort of heads back.

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Speaker 1: Do you agree with that? What do you think?

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Speaker 3: Look in twenty twenty at the Lincoln Project, we modeled

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Speaker 3: three to eight percent of Republican voters in nine key states. Okay,

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Speaker 3: we determined those people were persuadable, and we got five

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Speaker 3: point eighty five percent of those votes. We did really

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Speaker 3: well in our in our model. Little surprise, how well

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Speaker 3: it went, because you know, Republicans were all coming home

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Speaker 3: at the end to Trump. Our model has become much

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Speaker 3: more sophisticated and granular in the intervening years, and now

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Speaker 3: the model is like between seven and eleven percent. Now

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Speaker 3: that's not a ton of people, but it's decisive in

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Speaker 3: a closely divided nation and in the electoral college states

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Speaker 3: where it's going to turn on those states that have

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Speaker 3: very very competitive races. So we believe that several things

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Speaker 3: caused that expansion. One is Dobbs, which absolutely peeled off

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Speaker 3: Republican women like nothing else I've ever seen.

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Speaker 1: Say that again, I want you to talk about abortion,

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Speaker 1: because that's something where I've always, always, always always been right,

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Speaker 1: and I feel that everyone has not listened to me.

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Speaker 1: Thank you.

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Speaker 3: Well, here here's the thing. Between twenty and twenty five

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Speaker 3: percent of Republican women are either mildly or somewhat or

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Speaker 3: are fully pro choice okay, And it's mostly mildly pro

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Speaker 3: choice okay, like no third trimester blah blah blah blah blah.

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Speaker 3: About fifteen to eighteen percent of Republican men are somewhat,

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Speaker 3: are mildly or somewhat or fully pro choice, Okay, so

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Speaker 3: when Dobbs hit, it was like a nuclear bomb going

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Speaker 3: off because the dog caught the car. And now they've

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Speaker 3: recognized that a part of the party coalition. They've always

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Speaker 3: been sort of like, yeah, we got to have those

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Speaker 3: guys in the coalition, but we don't love them. The

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Speaker 3: evangelical crazies, right are going to look at Dobbs and say, well,

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Speaker 3: now we can set up snitch programs so women get

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Speaker 3: reported for having abortions. So the side that overshoots on

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Speaker 3: abortion is the side that loses, right, the side that

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Speaker 3: overshoots on the issue, and the Republicans at this in

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Speaker 3: this part of our history are overshooting it by many,

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Speaker 3: many miles, right right, all right, Now, this should not

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Speaker 3: be interpreted as as an excuse for Democrats not to

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Speaker 3: message on it correctly.

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Speaker 1: Right, But that's what you're seeing.

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Speaker 3: The Kansas model prove the case, and our current survey

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Speaker 3: work is proving the case that it's not abortion per

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Speaker 3: se that's changed that number. It's the sense of wild

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Speaker 3: government overreach and the snitch programs and the six week

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Speaker 3: abortion bans. I mean, the six week abortion ban is

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Speaker 3: defund the police for Republicans.

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Speaker 1: Right right, right, Oh, I love that.

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Speaker 3: It's like a narrow part of the party thinks that's

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Speaker 3: the greatest thing ever. But most people who hear it go,

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Speaker 3: what the fuck are you talking about?

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Speaker 2: I just want to get into this for one second.

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Speaker 1: One of the reasons why it seems like Republicans right now,

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Speaker 1: and again it's not all Republicans. I think the base

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Speaker 1: is ry much with him, but the quote unquote thought leaders,

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Speaker 1: the National Review crowd, right, the people who've read a book.

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Speaker 1: Those guys are freaking out because they know he doesn't

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Speaker 1: have the numbers, and that's why they're trying to get

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Speaker 1: third party candidates running.

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Speaker 3: Well that and look, the National Review guys in particular,

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Speaker 3: they are like the worst desantist stands you've ever seen.

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Speaker 3: I'm aware they are obsessed with Rond de Santas. I

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Speaker 3: think his ship doesn't stink. That he's the tallest, handsomest

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Speaker 3: man in the room.

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Speaker 1: Five point nine is the new six to one, right, and.

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Speaker 3: That he's that he's brilliant and ready to lead them

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Speaker 3: boldly into the future. Now that, of course, has collided

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Speaker 3: with two realities. One, he's a bad candidate. And I

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Speaker 3: say that objectively as somebody who's been in politics for

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Speaker 3: thirty five plus years, and they've seeing candidates good, bad,

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Speaker 3: and indifferent. He is on the lowest quartile of candidate performance.

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Speaker 3: He's not charismatic, I'm not being I'm not being partisan.

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Speaker 3: I'm not gaming the Republican primary anyway. I could say

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Speaker 3: he's not a good candidate.

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Speaker 1: He's Ted Cruz without the charm.

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Speaker 3: He's Ted Cruz without the charm. He's Jeb Bush without

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Speaker 3: the smoldering sensuality.

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Speaker 1: Let the record show I laughed at Jeb Bush without

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Speaker 1: the smoldering sexuality, but I didn't want to because I

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Speaker 1: see Jeb Bush joke is low like Ted Cruz. Okay,

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Speaker 1: but Jeb Bush, like please clap, the man doesn't even

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Speaker 1: exist anymore.

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Speaker 3: He's not Josh Hawley without the thick cloud of testosterone

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Speaker 3: musk around him.

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Speaker 1: Oh Jesus Christ, we're opening the door to a lot

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Speaker 1: of Problemsdcast. That's right, But I think that's a good

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Speaker 1: point so the national but you're seeing I mean, I

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Speaker 1: think this like anxiety that the RFK Junior prop.

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Speaker 3: Up Steve Bannon's monkey and.

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Speaker 1: The Twitter bros. You know, Jason Killococcus or whatever is

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Speaker 1: now spent three hours with RFK Junior and was like,

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Speaker 1: why won't Biden give me three hours? Why it's a mystery.

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Speaker 1: Why will the random guy who has nothing to do

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Speaker 1: give me three hours but not the president of the

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Speaker 1: United States. Math is hard when you're a tech bro.

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Speaker 3: Math is very hard when you're David Sacks or Jason

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Speaker 3: Calcanus or any of the.

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Speaker 1: Other Love that David Sacks pilot.

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Speaker 3: Fish swimming around Elon Musk's shark like anus.

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Speaker 1: I have to tell you that crew. Now Rick is

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Speaker 1: laughing at his own joke. Is the ability to crack

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Speaker 1: oneself up is something I've never had personally, but David

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Speaker 1: Sacks those crew have.

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Speaker 2: They're trying to.

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Speaker 1: Get famous off of Elon Musk having purchased Twitter. God

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Speaker 1: bless them. I mean, that's the other thing is they

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Speaker 1: hate the media and they hate celebrities.

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Speaker 3: They don't hate the media and they don't hate celebrity.

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Speaker 2: They want to be the media.

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Speaker 3: They desperately want to be in the media. They desperately

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Speaker 3: want to be celebrities. Listen, let me say something. If

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Speaker 3: if MSNBC called it David Sacks and said you were

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Speaker 3: going to offer you a contributorship, he'd be on that

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Speaker 3: so fucking fast. So yeah, he'd be on that speed

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Speaker 3: of fucking heat.

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Speaker 1: He'd be wearing his Montclair hat on MSNBC.

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Speaker 2: Right there you go, Yes, no question. Those guys.

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Speaker 1: They just think that now that their buddy bought Twitter,

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Speaker 1: they're going to be able to take over the media ecosystem,

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Speaker 1: and God bless them.

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Speaker 3: I mean, you know, I don't know about you, Molly,

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Speaker 3: but Twitter is insufferable right now.

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Speaker 1: Well, I mean he just made it very hard to use. Yeah, yes,

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Speaker 1: it's not as hard to use if you're Elon because

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Speaker 1: you have somebody who does it for you. But for

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Speaker 1: the rest of us we have to use her own Twitter.

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Speaker 1: It's very hard to use now.

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Speaker 3: No, But I mean I think the thing that they

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Speaker 3: did deliberately was added this ability for the fucking troll

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Speaker 3: armies to just take over the fyp you know, take

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Speaker 3: over your feed and one of these boggacy that he's like,

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Speaker 3: you were afraid of our intellectual power. I'm like, no, dude,

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Speaker 3: trust me on this one. That is the least of

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Speaker 3: my lories. I'm afraid you're going to continue to post

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Speaker 3: memes of Hillary Clinton dressed as the Devil.

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Speaker 1: But let's just talk about intellectual power, because we're going

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Speaker 1: all over the place here, But this is pretty great.

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Speaker 1: Maria Barbaroma, you may have remembered her as one time

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Speaker 1: mattering the money. Honey had James Comer on her show,

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Speaker 1: and James Comer said that people who watch MSNBC have

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Speaker 1: a very low IQ.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, James Comer has the intellectual horsepower of a fucking

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Speaker 3: go kart.

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Speaker 1: I thought I would miss Louis Gohmert.

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Speaker 4: Exactly where he is.

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Speaker 3: He's dumb even on the Gomert scale, and the Gomert

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Speaker 3: scale is widely used by scientists to measure the progress

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Speaker 3: of I mean, he is slow.

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Speaker 1: Yes, the Gombert scale used to measure both teeth and intellect.

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Speaker 3: You know, some molly, some focal never lose a toe,

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Speaker 3: but then again some focal. He's Comer Slackjohn Yokel.

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Speaker 1: I'm telling you Comer is an incredible politician. I am

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Speaker 1: delighted to see him. My favorite thing that happened. And

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Speaker 1: there were two incredible Republican politics stories that we did

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Speaker 1: not see because they were drowned out by Trump's.

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Speaker 2: Federal indictment is second indictment.

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Speaker 1: One was Republicans fighting with each other over a gas

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Speaker 1: stove messaging bill incredible stuff, and the other was right

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Speaker 1: around the time of the federal indictment Truck Brasley came

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Speaker 1: out and said they were tapes of Hunter Biden. Right,

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Speaker 1: do you remember this?

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Speaker 3: I did.

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Speaker 2: There were a Hunter of Biden tapes.

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Speaker 1: And more recently we discovered that the Hunter Biden tapes

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Speaker 1: may or may not exist.

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Speaker 3: And may or may not be real.

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Speaker 1: Well, they may they may not even be fake.

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Speaker 2: They may just not be.

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Speaker 3: Anything right, they may not exist at all at all.

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Speaker 3: But here's the thing. They live in a separate universe

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Speaker 3: and so on Oaan and Fox and every other goddamn

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Speaker 3: place in the world. They're being fed a steady diet

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Speaker 3: of bullshit every day. They're being told that this isn't

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Speaker 3: really Donald Trump criming. The real criminals are the Biden

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Speaker 3: family who have taken fifty jillion bazillion dollars in China. China.

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Speaker 1: China paid them a lot of money. Why did China

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Speaker 1: pay them money for Barisma?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, well, of course, and obviously that China was trying

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Speaker 3: to help Zelenski.

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Speaker 2: Right Zelensky. It all comes back to Zelenski.

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Speaker 3: The conspiracies always become more baroque with time.

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Speaker 1: I want to point out another thing that happened this week,

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Speaker 1: which was a little bit below the radar because we

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Speaker 1: have to now focus on the things that are that

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Speaker 1: the other incredibly fucked up things Republicans have been doing.

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Speaker 1: I want to talk to you about this Don Junior

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Speaker 1: email scandal. If this were Chelsea Clinton, we would be

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Speaker 1: talking about this every fucking day.

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Speaker 3: If Chelsea Clinton had said the things in an email

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Speaker 3: that Don Junior is now proven to have said in

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Speaker 3: an email that was published, that there would be a

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Speaker 3: batshit never ending Fox Memories day, there would be House

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Speaker 3: Oversight Committee hearings for a billion years. It would not,

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Speaker 3: in any way ever ever stop. So the madness of

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Speaker 3: these things.

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Speaker 1: Is like efensive emails among businessmen. Donald Trump Junior spark

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Speaker 1: fight in hedge fund case. One of the things that

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Speaker 1: Donald Trump Junior. You'll remember Donald Trump Junior.

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Speaker 3: As friend of the Jews, so I've been told.

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Speaker 1: So I've been told because his sister married a Jew,

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Speaker 1: so obviously he cannot be anti Semitic. We all know

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Speaker 1: this because that's how it works, except that in this

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Speaker 1: he says we're having Jews over, it'll be kosher.

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Speaker 3: Oh my god, you know, almost like don't like punching

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Speaker 3: Don Junior because he's so obviously impaired from a staggering,

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Speaker 3: staggering set of pharmaceutical challenges that that it's like.

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Speaker 1: In this way, he is like everyone else I grew

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Speaker 1: up with.

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Speaker 3: Continue It's like shooting fish in a barrel. And he's

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Speaker 3: also just not terribly bright.

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Speaker 2: I don't know what you're talking about.

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Speaker 3: I just find the guy. I find the guy just pathetic.

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Speaker 3: I mean, he's just he just makes me sad sometimes

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Speaker 3: watching him, because you know, he's down there in Jupiter, Florida,

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Speaker 3: and his buddy Skeeter just just came up through the

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Speaker 3: gated community to check in. And the guy at the

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Speaker 3: the guy at the gates like ice skate, and Skeeter's like, man,

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Speaker 3: I gotta, I gotta, I gotta a door dash for

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Speaker 3: don for Donny Junior man, and and the they wink

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Speaker 3: and Skeeter drive in. He sort of stands at the

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Speaker 3: door for a minute. They have that awkward transaction.

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Speaker 1: This is we've hit the Rick Wilson does fiction part

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Speaker 1: of the podcast.

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Speaker 3: Listen. I like a little fiction now and then I

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Speaker 3: never forget that, never forget that piece that we did

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Speaker 3: about Hillary again Jared Murder.

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Speaker 1: So let's just talk about this so that Republicans in disarray.

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Speaker 1: Trump's federal indictment. The Justice Department completely fought themselves, rolled

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Speaker 1: the dice Scott, Judge, Eileen Maga.

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Speaker 3: Cannon, and the other thing. I a piece about this

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Speaker 3: yesterday in Resolute Square. People are underestimating why a suthford

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Speaker 3: A jury is trouble. It's not just that there are

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Speaker 3: a lot of Magas down there. And by the way,

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Speaker 3: they're smart enough to play the game down there. They're

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Speaker 3: like sophisticated enough to play the game. Well, no, I

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Speaker 3: am a Republican, but I'm not a crazy person. The

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Speaker 3: chance of getting somebody who will blow up the whole

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Speaker 3: jury pool easy, It's high. And the other thing is

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Speaker 3: people done in Miami, in the South part of Florida.

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Speaker 3: Folks from outside this world don't understand. People from Moscow

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Speaker 3: come to Miami and go, Wow, this place is fucking corrupt.

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Speaker 3: People from Mogadishu go you know, the rule of law

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Speaker 3: really applies better back home than it does here. People

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Speaker 3: in Miami do not have the same standard of the

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Speaker 3: rule of law that the rest of the country does.

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Speaker 3: They are tolerant of corruption. It is part of the

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Speaker 3: ecosystem down there. God love it. I love Miami, like

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Speaker 3: like nothing, you.

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Speaker 1: Know, right, you're gonna have a not corruptury seems like

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Speaker 1: a zero.

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Speaker 3: Right, the idea that this people are gonna go. Yes,

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Speaker 3: so he had some documents in boxes? What the fuck? Man?

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Speaker 3: Oh yeah, let's go, let's go. Come on, I'm done right.

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Speaker 2: We've always had documents in boxes.

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Speaker 1: I mean that was the defense that you Hewitt made

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Speaker 1: like two hours after the thing came out. As serious

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Speaker 1: people are telling us that there's a serious case. You know,

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Speaker 1: we have serious lawyers saying this and that, and Hewett

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Speaker 1: goes he didn't even try to sell them.

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Speaker 3: I am stunned at a level.

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Speaker 2: Are you stunned? I'm not stunned.

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Speaker 1: The fucking this is what they do.

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Speaker 3: No, No, here's the thing. Here's the thing. I'm stunned

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Speaker 3: that anybody doesn't expect, now the Republican machine to rally

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Speaker 3: around the most absurd possible defenses. One of my favorite

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Speaker 3: civil wars the last few days Andy McCarthy and Mark

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Speaker 3: Levin fighting over Trump the amazing amazing. Like Andy McCarthy,

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Speaker 3: a relatively serious lawyer, says, you know, Trump doesn't have

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Speaker 3: a defense. It's done, and you know, so the civil

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Speaker 3: war inside the Republican Party over Trump's defenses and how

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Speaker 3: to defend him is fascinating. And again that there is

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Speaker 3: that sort of gentry conservative media at National Review, et cetera.

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Speaker 3: They hate Trump aesthetically, they don't like Trump aesthetically, it's.

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Speaker 2: Right, but they want to win. They'd rather win than lose.

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Speaker 3: That's right, that's right. And so what will happen if

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Speaker 3: Trump is acquitted in this case, or if DJ pulls

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Speaker 3: the plug because it gets too close to the election,

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Speaker 3: What will happen at that point is that every one

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Speaker 3: of them will bend the knee, right.

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Speaker 2: All right, which we saw this happen already National.

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Speaker 3: Review, Dan and Rich and all the rest of them.

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Speaker 2: Well, baseball Crank go along with it.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, oh that's Dan, Yeah he'll go along.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, oh then that's Basebook. I didn't even know what

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Speaker 1: baseball Crank's name was.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, every single one of them will. And I'll give

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Speaker 3: you exactly what it will be. While we have reservations

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Speaker 3: about Trump's character and behavior, Joe Biden is a communist, lesbian, Marxist,

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Speaker 3: wickan child predator.

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Speaker 2: If only except for child predator, that's some good.

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Speaker 3: Who is also senile. In this case, we must protect

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Speaker 3: America and hope that Trump has learned his lesson. And

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Speaker 3: all of them, including Chris Christy and Susan Collins, they'll say, well,

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Speaker 3: while I hesitate to vote for Trump, if I vote

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Speaker 3: for Biden, America will go full communist and he'll seize

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Speaker 3: the means of production and the krulax will be killed

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Speaker 3: in the fields. It's just that fucking crazy.

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Speaker 1: David Corn is the DC Bureau chief of Mother Jones

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Speaker 1: and author of American Psychotis.

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Speaker 2: Welcome back to Fast Politics, David Corn.

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Speaker 1: Good to be here, Always delighted to have you.

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Speaker 4: I'll try to keep up with the fast speed.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, don't know. Cursing, David Corn, talk to me about

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Speaker 1: what's going on.

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Speaker 2: Just t to our universe.

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Speaker 1: In the universe it is Kevin McCarthy fundraising off Donald J.

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Speaker 4: Trump discuss I really thought at some point in time

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Speaker 4: that we would get a break from the last seven

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Speaker 4: years of craziness.

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Speaker 5: Right.

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Speaker 4: I've been covering politics for decades. I don't want to

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Speaker 4: say how many decades, and it wasn't always like this,

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Speaker 4: young people out there. There used to be times when

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Speaker 4: the news cycle, well you didn't have to pay attention

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Speaker 4: to it. Things would come and go. You know, people

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Speaker 4: might be wrong, but they weren't crazy wrong. And the

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Speaker 4: amount of crazy happened intimidually. But now it's turned into

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Speaker 4: a fire hose with an endless supply of crazy water.

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Speaker 4: And every day, you know, if you're covering this, you

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Speaker 4: could literally have a dozen or two things to ride about.

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Speaker 4: Talk about mastic eight. It's just nuts. And of course

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Speaker 4: when you have these spasms like the Trump indictment, it

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Speaker 4: only puts everything from you know, from a level of

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Speaker 4: nine to eleven or even higher. And so one of

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Speaker 4: the small little things that popped up in the last

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Speaker 4: couple of days in this post Trump felony indictment period

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Speaker 4: is that Kevin McCarthy. And you know, we can laugh

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Speaker 4: about Kevin McCarthy. We saw how he barely became speaker

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Speaker 4: and how he's become completely a toady for Trump after

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Speaker 4: criticizing him following January sixth. Think about it, this guy

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Speaker 4: is second in line to be commander in chief. You

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Speaker 4: would think that that would make him act somewhat responsibly

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Speaker 4: at least some of the time, not all the time,

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Speaker 4: but some of the time. Yet we see little evidence

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Speaker 4: of that. You know, when after the indictment. A reporter

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Speaker 4: caught up to him and said, well, what do you

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Speaker 4: think of this? And he goes, bathroom doors have locks.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that was amazing that bathroom doors are somehow safer

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Speaker 1: than Biden's garage. Because but again, I think it's important

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Speaker 1: to mention Biden returned the documents, Pence returned the documents,

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Speaker 1: and Donald Trump told his lawyers to lie about the documents.

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Speaker 4: Listen, you know, having covered the government for years, you're

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Speaker 4: going to find in a mess of documents in the

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Speaker 4: White House or any place else, the occasional inadvertent classified

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Speaker 4: document or something else misplaced. And the whole key thing

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Speaker 4: is when that happens, you give it back. It's very

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Speaker 4: very simple, you give it back. And that's what Trump

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Speaker 4: didn't do. But then you know, not only was McCarthy

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Speaker 4: being absolutely absurd justifying what Trump was doing holding classified

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Speaker 4: material in a bathroom with a chandelier, we must add

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Speaker 4: it was athom chandelier. Chandeliers in your bathrooms, but I

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Speaker 4: certainly don't, and I think most Americans don't. Most American

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Speaker 4: bathrooms are un chandeliered. But in addition to all that,

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Speaker 4: he sends out a fundraising email calling Tuesday the day

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Speaker 4: of Trump's arrangement one of the darkest days in US history.

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Speaker 1: This is Trump's federal arrangement, not Trump's state level arrangement.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, the federal arrangment Tuesday, and McCarthy's out there calling

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Speaker 4: it the darkest day in the United States history and

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Speaker 4: repeats all these lies that Trump has been telling and

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Speaker 4: the Trump crowd has been telling, saying that Biden has

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Speaker 4: capped classified information for decades, not true, not decades, and

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Speaker 4: that this is a persecution and an unfair prosecution, and

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Speaker 4: that it was Biden who indicted Trump, not twenty four members.

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Speaker 3: Or however many there were, of a.

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Speaker 4: Grand jury of civilian Florida's of Floridians. So you know,

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Speaker 4: he's out there protecting Trump with absurd defenses. He's out

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Speaker 4: raising money off this, and it really shows that the

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Speaker 4: whole Trump thing here for the Republican establishment at least,

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Speaker 4: is based on money. It's really really based a lot

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Speaker 4: on money. What happened after January sixth when Mitch McConnell

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Speaker 4: and Kevin McCarthy both slammed Trump for inciting the riot

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Speaker 4: and being responsible for it, That's what Kevin McCarthy said.

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Speaker 4: Then within weeks they both turned and had nothing to

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Speaker 4: say about it. Kevin McCarthy ran down Tomorrow Lago and posed,

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Speaker 4: grinning with Trump, I'm your guy. He bent the knee

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Speaker 4: was because they realized that the base, the Republican base,

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Speaker 4: was sticking with Trump, and if they'd done Trump, Trump

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Speaker 4: would tell the base not to vote for establishment Republicans rhinos,

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Speaker 4: but probably even more importantly, would tell the base, don't

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Speaker 4: send them any money, not to the Republican Actional Committee,

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Speaker 4: not to the republic Senatorial Campaign Committee, not to Mitch

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Speaker 4: mcconnoll Mark, to Kevin McCarthy, not to the Republican Creational

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Speaker 4: Campaign Committee, all these things. And while they get a

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Speaker 4: lot of money from corporate interests and packs and all that,

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Speaker 4: they get tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars

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Speaker 4: from these small donor Republicans who get twenty emails a

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Speaker 4: day various Republican causes, and they are fully in the

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Speaker 4: pocket of Trump. They respond to all these lies that

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Speaker 4: he puts out their rubs. I call them troops Trump roots,

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Speaker 4: and they could not afford to lose these people. And

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Speaker 4: now McCarthy is out there exploiting them and pushing disinformation

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Speaker 4: to grind as many bucks out of them as he can,

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Speaker 4: while Trump is doing the same thing. Haven't raised over

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Speaker 4: seven million dollars since the indictment news broke last week.

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Speaker 1: So here's McCarthy fundraising on Trump. Two questions, Does Trump

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Speaker 1: mind because historically we've seen that he doesn't like this,

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Speaker 1: And then also, right, that's his money, Right, it's my money.

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Speaker 4: I think this is a question of a rising tide

436
00:23:27,640 --> 00:23:30,640
Speaker 4: lifting all boats. Trump is, you know, scoring a lot

437
00:23:30,640 --> 00:23:33,720
Speaker 4: of money at this point in time. He doesn't mine

438
00:23:34,320 --> 00:23:38,480
Speaker 4: all these Republican entities raising money off the indictment as

439
00:23:38,720 --> 00:23:42,800
Speaker 4: long as they're selling the same bogus narrative that Trump

440
00:23:42,880 --> 00:23:45,840
Speaker 4: is being persecuted. This is the worst thing that's ever

441
00:23:45,840 --> 00:23:49,520
Speaker 4: happened in American history, forgets slavery, and so they're all

442
00:23:49,520 --> 00:23:52,560
Speaker 4: singing from that page. I think that's fine by him

443
00:23:52,840 --> 00:23:56,800
Speaker 4: because a lot of other Republicans and Republican causes and

444
00:23:56,920 --> 00:24:00,320
Speaker 4: right wing groups, I mean, they're all, you know, those

445
00:24:00,760 --> 00:24:04,800
Speaker 4: the fish that sort of attached themselves to Wales, you know,

446
00:24:04,840 --> 00:24:07,720
Speaker 4: and or eat this. You know, this s gum off

447
00:24:08,040 --> 00:24:11,800
Speaker 4: what I forget and we can listeners, here's your homework assignment.

448
00:24:12,400 --> 00:24:14,080
Speaker 3: How do Google you know?

449
00:24:14,320 --> 00:24:16,639
Speaker 4: I think it begins to let it always something out. Anyway,

450
00:24:16,800 --> 00:24:19,560
Speaker 4: all these other Republican and writing groups, that's what they are.

451
00:24:19,800 --> 00:24:23,919
Speaker 4: They're parasites. They're you know, Trump's a big whale getting

452
00:24:24,000 --> 00:24:28,120
Speaker 4: all the money from the base, and they're they're sweeping

453
00:24:28,200 --> 00:24:31,880
Speaker 4: up the crumbs and the stuff that he doesn't quite collect.

454
00:24:32,320 --> 00:24:36,440
Speaker 4: And that is the Republican bio ecosystem.

455
00:24:36,600 --> 00:24:41,800
Speaker 1: So here's a question for you. You have a guy called

456
00:24:41,880 --> 00:24:48,040
Speaker 1: Asa Hutchinson. He is trying to run. You have a

457
00:24:48,080 --> 00:24:51,600
Speaker 1: guy called Asa Hutchinson. He was the governor of Arkansas.

458
00:24:52,080 --> 00:24:55,920
Speaker 1: He is trying to run as a non corrupt Republican.

459
00:24:56,520 --> 00:24:59,359
Speaker 1: It's a quite a narrow lane. He shares it with

460
00:24:59,720 --> 00:25:03,320
Speaker 1: a very corrupt but also anti Trump but also worked

461
00:25:03,359 --> 00:25:08,080
Speaker 1: in the Trump administration, Republican by the name of Chris Bridgegate. Christie.

462
00:25:08,320 --> 00:25:12,560
Speaker 1: I want to ask you, as Hutchinson asked the RNC

463
00:25:13,040 --> 00:25:17,280
Speaker 1: to make part of the pledge b that if the

464
00:25:17,480 --> 00:25:21,120
Speaker 1: candidate gets indicted criminal A back up.

465
00:25:21,080 --> 00:25:24,000
Speaker 4: A second, right now, the Republicans have a pledge. You

466
00:25:24,080 --> 00:25:27,160
Speaker 4: have to pledge. If you're running in the Republican primary

467
00:25:27,400 --> 00:25:29,560
Speaker 4: and want to be in the debates, you have to

468
00:25:29,560 --> 00:25:32,359
Speaker 4: pledge your support. Whoever the candidate will be at the

469
00:25:32,440 --> 00:25:35,400
Speaker 4: end of the day. And a sashin on this call

470
00:25:35,520 --> 00:25:39,119
Speaker 4: with the RNC said, what can we amend that to say,

471
00:25:39,640 --> 00:25:42,359
Speaker 4: you don't have to support the candidate if they are

472
00:25:42,440 --> 00:25:43,679
Speaker 4: convicted of a crime.

473
00:25:45,119 --> 00:25:48,520
Speaker 3: And they all said, the RNC on this call, no.

474
00:25:49,080 --> 00:25:52,240
Speaker 2: Right, because that's our guy. Is that the saddest thing

475
00:25:52,280 --> 00:25:54,560
Speaker 2: you've ever heard? Or have you heard sadder things?

476
00:25:54,840 --> 00:25:57,440
Speaker 4: I'm sure I can think of sadder things. I mean,

477
00:25:57,440 --> 00:26:00,600
Speaker 4: it's a sad candidacy. Face Utchinson, I mean, the whole

478
00:26:01,040 --> 00:26:01,560
Speaker 4: who is it?

479
00:26:01,600 --> 00:26:02,280
Speaker 3: What's his name?

480
00:26:02,320 --> 00:26:05,600
Speaker 4: One of the writers for the National.

481
00:26:05,280 --> 00:26:09,240
Speaker 2: Review baseball crank. That's the only one that exists. The

482
00:26:09,320 --> 00:26:10,160
Speaker 2: other ones aren't real.

483
00:26:10,359 --> 00:26:12,919
Speaker 4: Christopher Cook, the one with a British accent who always

484
00:26:12,920 --> 00:26:15,440
Speaker 4: sounds reasonable because he has a British accent. I think

485
00:26:15,440 --> 00:26:18,360
Speaker 4: I'm getting his name. Right after the indictment he put out,

486
00:26:18,480 --> 00:26:21,119
Speaker 4: the peony federal indictment, he put out a tweet saying,

487
00:26:21,600 --> 00:26:24,040
Speaker 4: aren't you people sick of this? Isn't it time to

488
00:26:24,080 --> 00:26:27,920
Speaker 4: move on? Shouldn't be talking about policies that make America better?

489
00:26:28,280 --> 00:26:32,080
Speaker 4: Conservative ideals that will bring about a renaissance in this country?

490
00:26:32,119 --> 00:26:32,760
Speaker 1: Hilarious?

491
00:26:32,880 --> 00:26:36,520
Speaker 3: And I'm the oh lad, I think maybe it's Charles.

492
00:26:36,720 --> 00:26:41,040
Speaker 4: I feel so sorry for you. You are so deluded if

493
00:26:41,080 --> 00:26:46,280
Speaker 4: you don't understand what's happened to the Republican Party and

494
00:26:47,000 --> 00:26:53,240
Speaker 4: the larger conservative movement. These people don't care about such

495
00:26:53,320 --> 00:26:58,480
Speaker 4: things of which Asa Hutchinson speaks and the National Review rites.

496
00:26:59,040 --> 00:27:02,480
Speaker 4: They just don't. They want Trump. I mean when he

497
00:27:02,560 --> 00:27:04,760
Speaker 4: said I could shoot some on Fifth Avenue and it's

498
00:27:04,800 --> 00:27:08,160
Speaker 4: still well for me. I mean, they want someone who

499
00:27:08,160 --> 00:27:11,640
Speaker 4: will shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue. That's what they're looking for.

500
00:27:11,680 --> 00:27:14,880
Speaker 4: They're looking for someone who lies and cheats and steals,

501
00:27:15,119 --> 00:27:17,680
Speaker 4: as long as it's to own the Libs, and as

502
00:27:17,720 --> 00:27:23,760
Speaker 4: long as that person mirrors their sense of grievance and resentment,

503
00:27:23,800 --> 00:27:27,560
Speaker 4: whether it's economic resentment, are racist resentment, or cultural resentment.

504
00:27:27,640 --> 00:27:31,040
Speaker 4: They don't care that he promised the best healthcare system ever.

505
00:27:31,359 --> 00:27:33,440
Speaker 4: But if he's going to get out there and slam

506
00:27:33,520 --> 00:27:37,960
Speaker 4: transgender rights and go on about the deep state, that's

507
00:27:38,000 --> 00:27:40,040
Speaker 4: what they want. They don't want a guy who will

508
00:27:40,040 --> 00:27:44,400
Speaker 4: deliver policy wins for them. Infrastructure Week. They don't care

509
00:27:44,480 --> 00:27:47,520
Speaker 4: about Infrastructure Week. They don't care if their towns and

510
00:27:47,600 --> 00:27:51,320
Speaker 4: cities are getting more jobs because of government policy. That's

511
00:27:51,320 --> 00:27:53,760
Speaker 4: not what they want and their tribal leader and the

512
00:27:53,760 --> 00:27:56,240
Speaker 4: American president. So it's kind of sad for me to

513
00:27:56,280 --> 00:28:03,280
Speaker 4: watch these principal Republican policy See minded people believe that

514
00:28:03,359 --> 00:28:07,600
Speaker 4: they can talk sense to the Republican base and the

515
00:28:07,640 --> 00:28:08,879
Speaker 4: politicians that serve it.

516
00:28:09,200 --> 00:28:12,200
Speaker 1: So let's talk about no labels.

517
00:28:12,240 --> 00:28:13,000
Speaker 3: No labels.

518
00:28:13,280 --> 00:28:15,880
Speaker 1: They have a label, it's called Republican.

519
00:28:16,200 --> 00:28:18,320
Speaker 4: There's so much that they've done the last couple of

520
00:28:18,359 --> 00:28:20,800
Speaker 4: weeks that's mind blowing. And I had a big scoop

521
00:28:20,840 --> 00:28:24,160
Speaker 4: that went viral on Twitter the other day that showed.

522
00:28:24,040 --> 00:28:26,640
Speaker 3: Me the tremendous interests that people have in this group.

523
00:28:26,920 --> 00:28:30,679
Speaker 4: No labels, you know, started in twenty ten, twenty eleven claim,

524
00:28:30,760 --> 00:28:33,840
Speaker 4: you know, Democrats are too left, Republicans are too right.

525
00:28:34,240 --> 00:28:39,040
Speaker 4: We need common sense, bipartisan centrism. And they got some

526
00:28:39,200 --> 00:28:42,080
Speaker 4: members of Congress on the right and left to Republicans

527
00:28:42,120 --> 00:28:45,680
Speaker 4: and Democrats to work together. And they are okay, fine,

528
00:28:45,720 --> 00:28:48,480
Speaker 4: go ahead and do that, raise money for that whatever.

529
00:28:48,840 --> 00:28:54,120
Speaker 4: But now they have working on a project to get

530
00:28:54,200 --> 00:28:58,040
Speaker 4: on the ballot in states across our great land so

531
00:28:58,080 --> 00:29:01,920
Speaker 4: they can then put a residential nominee and vice presidential

532
00:29:01,960 --> 00:29:05,240
Speaker 4: nominee what they call a unity ticket on the twenty

533
00:29:05,680 --> 00:29:09,440
Speaker 4: war ballot. Now, their idea is like, well, we only

534
00:29:09,520 --> 00:29:11,880
Speaker 4: do this if the Republicans are too extreme and the

535
00:29:11,880 --> 00:29:14,680
Speaker 4: Democrats are too extreme, and we can win with a

536
00:29:14,880 --> 00:29:19,280
Speaker 4: centrist ticket that consolidates the Republicans and the Democrats. Of

537
00:29:19,280 --> 00:29:23,640
Speaker 4: course that's nonsense, that it won't win, and most political

538
00:29:24,240 --> 00:29:26,920
Speaker 4: analysts and I have to agree with this, but people

539
00:29:26,960 --> 00:29:30,040
Speaker 4: who run the numbers and the nominees were Biden and Trump,

540
00:29:30,600 --> 00:29:33,960
Speaker 4: it would likely draw more votes from Biden. Therefore it

541
00:29:34,080 --> 00:29:37,520
Speaker 4: could help elect Trump and spoil the race for Biden.

542
00:29:37,840 --> 00:29:39,520
Speaker 4: They claim that's not what their intent is.

543
00:29:39,800 --> 00:29:41,640
Speaker 1: It clearly is what their intent is.

544
00:29:42,080 --> 00:29:46,040
Speaker 4: They're a dark money group, meaning they don't reveal who's

545
00:29:46,040 --> 00:29:46,640
Speaker 4: funding them.

546
00:29:46,680 --> 00:29:48,160
Speaker 3: Although over past.

547
00:29:47,960 --> 00:29:49,920
Speaker 2: Years largely Republicans.

548
00:29:50,160 --> 00:29:54,040
Speaker 4: We have seen that big Republican pro Trump donors, including

549
00:29:54,080 --> 00:29:57,400
Speaker 4: Harlan Crowe remember him, the Nazi member of Billire collecting

550
00:29:57,440 --> 00:30:01,560
Speaker 4: billionaire benefacturers. Yeah, remember that guy, Clarence Thomas.

551
00:30:02,120 --> 00:30:04,640
Speaker 3: I lose my breath just identifying who he is.

552
00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:08,000
Speaker 4: But he gave money to old Labels and other billionaires

553
00:30:08,040 --> 00:30:11,040
Speaker 4: of that ILK have given money and they won't reveal

554
00:30:11,080 --> 00:30:14,840
Speaker 4: their donors. It's the very suspicious, very question while they

555
00:30:14,880 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 4: do have never Trump Republicans like your Power, Rick Wilson's

556
00:30:18,680 --> 00:30:21,280
Speaker 4: and other Democrats very worried. All they have to do

557
00:30:21,480 --> 00:30:24,880
Speaker 4: to screw up the election is get a Joe Manchin

558
00:30:24,960 --> 00:30:27,520
Speaker 4: who won't say whether he will or won't accept their

559
00:30:27,720 --> 00:30:31,480
Speaker 4: nomination on the ticket, and then if he draws ten

560
00:30:31,560 --> 00:30:37,000
Speaker 4: twenty thousand votes in some key states Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia,

561
00:30:37,600 --> 00:30:40,680
Speaker 4: the most likely come from Biden, and that could give

562
00:30:40,720 --> 00:30:44,240
Speaker 4: Trump a way to win the electoral College vote. Once again,

563
00:30:44,440 --> 00:30:47,200
Speaker 4: that's the worry about them. The story that I did

564
00:30:47,240 --> 00:30:49,000
Speaker 4: this week to bring it back to the most important

565
00:30:49,000 --> 00:30:52,280
Speaker 4: thing me. The story that I did was I was

566
00:30:52,320 --> 00:30:55,440
Speaker 4: looking on their website, just sort of thinking about various

567
00:30:55,440 --> 00:30:58,280
Speaker 4: story ideas I might do on them, various articles looking

568
00:30:58,320 --> 00:31:01,200
Speaker 4: for leeds, and I clicked on the donate but here

569
00:31:01,440 --> 00:31:04,000
Speaker 4: help us donate money to us, and it took me

570
00:31:04,080 --> 00:31:06,960
Speaker 4: to a website run by a group called anadot a

571
00:31:07,200 --> 00:31:08,120
Speaker 4: n E d O T.

572
00:31:08,720 --> 00:31:10,400
Speaker 3: I said, Huh, I've never.

573
00:31:10,240 --> 00:31:12,280
Speaker 4: Heard of these guys, but it's not my expertise.

574
00:31:12,680 --> 00:31:13,400
Speaker 3: I'll look them up.

575
00:31:13,600 --> 00:31:16,600
Speaker 4: And I took a few Google searches to realize that

576
00:31:16,720 --> 00:31:21,560
Speaker 4: anadot is a right wing online tech company that processes

577
00:31:22,120 --> 00:31:27,760
Speaker 4: donations and its clientele is mostly almost entirely the far

578
00:31:27,880 --> 00:31:31,840
Speaker 4: right Maga Republicans. People like it tries to raise money

579
00:31:31,880 --> 00:31:35,480
Speaker 4: from Marjorie Taylor Green, Jim Jordan, Lauren Bobert. It works

580
00:31:35,520 --> 00:31:39,480
Speaker 4: for Turning Point USA, for the Susan b Anthony, which

581
00:31:39,520 --> 00:31:42,680
Speaker 4: is anti abortion, focus on the family. And you know,

582
00:31:42,760 --> 00:31:44,400
Speaker 4: it not only works for them, it actually has a

583
00:31:44,560 --> 00:31:47,120
Speaker 4: has a service in which it tries to encourage direct

584
00:31:47,120 --> 00:31:52,200
Speaker 4: payments to these organizations. So here is a group No

585
00:31:52,360 --> 00:31:55,160
Speaker 4: Labels that says we don't like the extremements of the

586
00:31:55,240 --> 00:31:57,400
Speaker 4: right or the left, but every time you give them

587
00:31:57,400 --> 00:32:01,160
Speaker 4: one hundred bucks four dollars or so, of that goes

588
00:32:01,280 --> 00:32:05,760
Speaker 4: to this tech firm that's working to amplify and support

589
00:32:06,400 --> 00:32:11,959
Speaker 4: far right Maga Republicans, ultra conservatives, and folks like Marjorie

590
00:32:11,960 --> 00:32:16,240
Speaker 4: Taylor Green and Jim Jordan. It seems completely out of whack.

591
00:32:16,760 --> 00:32:20,040
Speaker 4: And the funny thing was Annaot wouldn't talk to me.

592
00:32:20,440 --> 00:32:24,400
Speaker 4: And I tried a gazillion times to reach somebody at

593
00:32:24,440 --> 00:32:28,120
Speaker 4: No Labels to get an explanation, and again and again

594
00:32:28,120 --> 00:32:29,840
Speaker 4: and again they did not return my calls. They did

595
00:32:29,840 --> 00:32:32,040
Speaker 4: not return my emails, and I got some on the

596
00:32:32,080 --> 00:32:33,760
Speaker 4: phone and they said, oh, you need to talk to

597
00:32:33,800 --> 00:32:37,440
Speaker 4: our communications deputy, Marianne Martini.

598
00:32:37,920 --> 00:32:39,040
Speaker 2: She's not real and.

599
00:32:39,040 --> 00:32:42,280
Speaker 4: I don't know she exists on Lincoln's I think she's real.

600
00:32:42,880 --> 00:32:46,480
Speaker 4: And I said, okay, it's through to her. They said, oh,

601
00:32:46,880 --> 00:32:50,200
Speaker 4: well you can't, but you can email her. I said great,

602
00:32:50,560 --> 00:32:52,640
Speaker 4: and I said, can you give me her email address?

603
00:32:52,920 --> 00:32:56,880
Speaker 4: They said no. Now, two listeners out there, this may

604
00:32:56,920 --> 00:33:00,360
Speaker 4: not sound so bizarre, but we covered politics so many

605
00:33:00,440 --> 00:33:05,360
Speaker 4: years I have never come across a political organization as

606
00:33:05,360 --> 00:33:09,040
Speaker 4: a reporter. If you ask for the email of their

607
00:33:09,280 --> 00:33:13,200
Speaker 4: communications spokesperson, they won't give it out. But they didn't,

608
00:33:13,520 --> 00:33:16,680
Speaker 4: and I left a message and Mary Anne Martini, remember

609
00:33:16,680 --> 00:33:20,200
Speaker 4: that name, Mary Ann Martini not email me back, did

610
00:33:20,200 --> 00:33:23,160
Speaker 4: not call me back. So, for whatever reason, they are not,

611
00:33:23,640 --> 00:33:28,240
Speaker 4: you know, being transparent or accountable about the firm or

612
00:33:28,320 --> 00:33:29,920
Speaker 4: about where their money comes from.

613
00:33:30,280 --> 00:33:32,040
Speaker 3: So we'll see.

614
00:33:32,120 --> 00:33:34,920
Speaker 4: At the end of the day, they may not put

615
00:33:34,960 --> 00:33:37,680
Speaker 4: anyone on the ballot and this may all blow over,

616
00:33:38,120 --> 00:33:40,200
Speaker 4: but right now they are setting up to do that,

617
00:33:40,520 --> 00:33:44,000
Speaker 4: which is why Rick Wilson and others are very worried

618
00:33:44,040 --> 00:33:44,480
Speaker 4: about them.

619
00:33:44,600 --> 00:33:47,560
Speaker 1: They're trying to get mansion to run as an independent right,

620
00:33:48,040 --> 00:33:48,760
Speaker 1: that's the goal.

621
00:33:49,080 --> 00:33:51,440
Speaker 4: That seems to be the goal. He is affiliated with them.

622
00:33:51,800 --> 00:33:54,280
Speaker 4: He won't say one way or the other whether he'll

623
00:33:54,320 --> 00:33:56,760
Speaker 4: do this. You know, I don't like making predictions. My

624
00:33:56,920 --> 00:33:59,920
Speaker 4: hunches that he knows he's sort of to know that

625
00:34:00,080 --> 00:34:01,520
Speaker 4: he can't win running.

626
00:34:01,880 --> 00:34:04,600
Speaker 1: Of course he knows he can't win, but that doesn't

627
00:34:04,640 --> 00:34:05,960
Speaker 1: matter necessarily.

628
00:34:06,200 --> 00:34:09,279
Speaker 4: But I don't know. Being blamed for the restoration of

629
00:34:09,320 --> 00:34:12,440
Speaker 4: Donald Trump is a pretty heavy thing to have on

630
00:34:12,480 --> 00:34:16,680
Speaker 4: your resume at the end of your career. So I

631
00:34:16,760 --> 00:34:18,560
Speaker 4: don't know if he would go for this or not.

632
00:34:18,840 --> 00:34:22,640
Speaker 4: But of course he won't say so until the very,

633
00:34:22,760 --> 00:34:25,920
Speaker 4: very very last minute, because you know, like a lot

634
00:34:25,960 --> 00:34:28,839
Speaker 4: of these folks, if power to not say you get

635
00:34:28,840 --> 00:34:32,399
Speaker 4: booked on shows, people you know are more kind to you.

636
00:34:32,480 --> 00:34:34,680
Speaker 4: Chuck Schuert may want to make sure not to piss

637
00:34:34,719 --> 00:34:36,880
Speaker 4: you off. You know, he has no interest in not

638
00:34:37,320 --> 00:34:40,200
Speaker 4: in saying that he won't do this. So we probably

639
00:34:40,239 --> 00:34:43,160
Speaker 4: won't know until sometime next year.

640
00:34:43,640 --> 00:34:46,880
Speaker 2: Incredible stuff. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

641
00:34:46,960 --> 00:34:48,000
Speaker 1: I hope you'll come back.

642
00:34:48,360 --> 00:34:50,239
Speaker 3: You know what, there's one way to get me to

643
00:34:50,239 --> 00:34:51,400
Speaker 3: come back, ask.

644
00:34:52,880 --> 00:34:55,080
Speaker 2: Thank you, David Hi.

645
00:34:55,560 --> 00:35:00,640
Speaker 1: It's Molly and I am wildly excited that for the time,

646
00:35:01,120 --> 00:35:05,719
Speaker 1: Fast Politics, the show you're listening to right now, is

647
00:35:05,760 --> 00:35:09,640
Speaker 1: going to have merch for sale over at shop dot

648
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Speaker 1: fastpoliticspod dot com. You can now buy shirts, hats, hoodies,

649
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650
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651
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652
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Speaker 1: at shop dot fastpoliticspod dot com. Thanks for your support.

654
00:35:45,600 --> 00:35:48,240
Speaker 1: Katherine Rampel is a columnist at The Washington Post.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to Fast Politics, Katherine.

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Speaker 1: Rampal, thanks for having me. Very excited to have you

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Speaker 1: and for the Washing Post. You have a very interesting

658
00:35:58,280 --> 00:36:01,640
Speaker 1: story this week. I feel like what's happening with the

659
00:36:01,719 --> 00:36:04,600
Speaker 1: IRS right now, and what's happening with this sort of

660
00:36:04,600 --> 00:36:10,360
Speaker 1: politicization of the IRS is so weird and just like

661
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Speaker 1: kind of a little bit terrifying. And I remember that

662
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Speaker 1: you are the person who went to the IRS to

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00:36:17,120 --> 00:36:18,640
Speaker 1: that cafeteria, right.

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Speaker 6: Yes, I have been on the let's give more money

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00:36:24,440 --> 00:36:29,080
Speaker 6: to the IRS bandwagon for like over a decade.

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Speaker 2: Will you start by telling us about the cafeteria.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, After many months of pleading, I got permission to

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Speaker 6: visit one of the Internal Revenue Services processing centers where

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Speaker 6: they I know, this is like every reporter stream.

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Speaker 1: I can't even imagine how hard it was to get there.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, yes, yes, I mean they take textpayer privacy very seriously.

673
00:36:52,400 --> 00:36:55,359
Speaker 6: And also, as you can imagine, the IRS periodically gets

674
00:36:55,400 --> 00:36:58,680
Speaker 6: threats against it, et cetera. They don't really want strangers

675
00:36:59,280 --> 00:37:03,080
Speaker 6: wandering around. But basically, I've been writing for a really

676
00:37:03,080 --> 00:37:05,080
Speaker 6: long time about how we need to give more money

677
00:37:05,120 --> 00:37:08,960
Speaker 6: to the IRS, not only for enforcement but also for

678
00:37:09,360 --> 00:37:15,440
Speaker 6: basic IT modernization, because they are using software from the

679
00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:20,000
Speaker 6: Disco era, and a lot of the work that's done

680
00:37:20,040 --> 00:37:23,600
Speaker 6: processing tax returns is still done manually, like with red pens,

681
00:37:23,640 --> 00:37:27,280
Speaker 6: and then they have somebody manually typing into a computer.

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00:37:27,400 --> 00:37:29,640
Speaker 6: They didn't have scanners at the time that I visited.

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00:37:29,920 --> 00:37:32,879
Speaker 2: Okay, so a year ago they didn't have scanners at

684
00:37:32,880 --> 00:37:33,520
Speaker 2: the IRS.

685
00:37:33,880 --> 00:37:37,720
Speaker 6: Yes, So I had heard all these crazy stories about

686
00:37:37,719 --> 00:37:42,040
Speaker 6: how antiquated their it was, and I had been writing

687
00:37:42,080 --> 00:37:45,160
Speaker 6: about for many years, like we need to invest in

688
00:37:45,200 --> 00:37:49,000
Speaker 6: the administrative capacity of government, including in the IRS, And

689
00:37:49,080 --> 00:37:50,719
Speaker 6: I finally got permission to go visit again.

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00:37:50,760 --> 00:37:54,080
Speaker 2: This was about a year ago, and it was wild.

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00:37:54,440 --> 00:37:59,000
Speaker 6: It was like the weirdest Willy Wonka tour you can imagine,

692
00:37:59,080 --> 00:38:01,400
Speaker 6: because again like this, this is a place that is

693
00:38:01,520 --> 00:38:04,440
Speaker 6: usually closed off to outsiders, and they have all of

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00:38:04,480 --> 00:38:08,640
Speaker 6: their own strange lingo for different things, like there's the

695
00:38:08,680 --> 00:38:12,520
Speaker 6: thing that opens the mail that's called the nibbler. They

696
00:38:12,600 --> 00:38:16,360
Speaker 6: literally manually would cut open envelopes that they receive and

697
00:38:16,360 --> 00:38:19,520
Speaker 6: then they would cut them open along three sides and

698
00:38:19,520 --> 00:38:21,680
Speaker 6: then hold it up to the light to see if

699
00:38:21,680 --> 00:38:23,759
Speaker 6: there was anything inside that might have been missed. And

700
00:38:23,800 --> 00:38:27,400
Speaker 6: that was the candler. So there was all sorts of

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00:38:27,440 --> 00:38:30,400
Speaker 6: stuff like that that was just fun. But it was

702
00:38:30,440 --> 00:38:33,440
Speaker 6: also really sad in a way because again, we are

703
00:38:33,480 --> 00:38:35,879
Speaker 6: the richest country in the world, and we just did

704
00:38:35,920 --> 00:38:39,759
Speaker 6: not invest in having a government that is even in

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00:38:39,800 --> 00:38:42,640
Speaker 6: the late twentieth century, let alone the twenty first century.

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Speaker 6: And when I was there, you mentioned the cafeteria. The

707
00:38:45,880 --> 00:38:49,680
Speaker 6: reason why that was significant is that the agency was

708
00:38:49,760 --> 00:38:54,160
Speaker 6: so backloged due to a combination of again really really

709
00:38:54,239 --> 00:38:58,600
Speaker 6: old it and COVID. Like in many offices right in

710
00:38:58,600 --> 00:39:01,680
Speaker 6: many industries, public and private sector, there had been major

711
00:39:01,680 --> 00:39:05,600
Speaker 6: disruptions because of the pandemic, but they were very severely

712
00:39:05,600 --> 00:39:08,440
Speaker 6: disrupted by COVID, as you can imagine, and they had

713
00:39:08,520 --> 00:39:11,360
Speaker 6: tons and tons of these paper tax returns because a

714
00:39:11,400 --> 00:39:13,560
Speaker 6: lot of people do still sit in their TEX returns

715
00:39:13,640 --> 00:39:17,959
Speaker 6: on paper that they could not get through. And everywhere

716
00:39:18,360 --> 00:39:21,360
Speaker 6: you walked on this campus, which is like basically a

717
00:39:21,400 --> 00:39:25,800
Speaker 6: giant warehouse, there were just stacks of unprocessed tax returns,

718
00:39:25,840 --> 00:39:29,720
Speaker 6: including in the cafeteria. The cafeteria it was no longer

719
00:39:29,760 --> 00:39:32,280
Speaker 6: really functioning as a cafeteria. It looked like a giant

720
00:39:32,480 --> 00:39:37,800
Speaker 6: corn maze almost of the stacks of paper tax returns.

721
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Speaker 2: And you took a picture.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it just was a sort of incredible moment of like,

723
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Speaker 1: this is an institution that Republicans are trying to kill.

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Speaker 6: And they've been trying to do it for many years.

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Speaker 6: Like I said, I've been on this beat for a while,

726
00:39:55,080 --> 00:39:59,280
Speaker 6: roughly around the Tea Party revolution, So twenty ten that's

727
00:39:59,400 --> 00:40:04,759
Speaker 6: when Congress led by Republicans really started gutting the irs.

728
00:40:05,040 --> 00:40:09,120
Speaker 6: And I think from then to maybe about ten years

729
00:40:09,160 --> 00:40:13,000
Speaker 6: after that, their budget fell around twenty or twenty five percent.

730
00:40:13,000 --> 00:40:15,640
Speaker 6: I forget the exact number in inflation adjusted terms, and

731
00:40:15,680 --> 00:40:18,960
Speaker 6: that's part of the reason why they had not been

732
00:40:19,000 --> 00:40:21,680
Speaker 6: able to invest I mean they had obviously they're still

733
00:40:21,760 --> 00:40:23,640
Speaker 6: using technology from the nineteen seventy so they had not

734
00:40:23,680 --> 00:40:26,360
Speaker 6: been investing for a long time in upgrading their IT.

735
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Speaker 6: But also they ended up cutting back on enforcement. They

736
00:40:29,719 --> 00:40:33,080
Speaker 6: ended up cutting back on customer service. You know, if

737
00:40:33,120 --> 00:40:35,920
Speaker 6: any people listening out there ever tried to call the

738
00:40:35,960 --> 00:40:40,240
Speaker 6: IRS during that period, you know your call never got answered,

739
00:40:40,360 --> 00:40:41,680
Speaker 6: or if it did, you know you might have been

740
00:40:41,719 --> 00:40:45,400
Speaker 6: waiting on hold for an hour, which is unfortunate because

741
00:40:45,600 --> 00:40:48,240
Speaker 6: if you're calling the IRS, it probably means you're trying

742
00:40:48,320 --> 00:40:50,240
Speaker 6: to pay your taxes correctly.

743
00:40:50,280 --> 00:40:51,839
Speaker 2: And honestly, I knew have a question.

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Speaker 6: So anyway, so the whole thing was really wild and

745
00:40:55,719 --> 00:40:59,719
Speaker 6: as I said, using this really dated technology leading to

746
00:40:59,760 --> 00:41:04,240
Speaker 6: a very frustrating experience for honest taxpayers and an easier

747
00:41:04,239 --> 00:41:08,839
Speaker 6: way for dishonest tax payers to get away with their dishonesty.

748
00:41:09,239 --> 00:41:14,799
Speaker 6: And the piece published like in August of last year,

749
00:41:14,800 --> 00:41:17,160
Speaker 6: so I visited I think in late June maybe, and

750
00:41:17,160 --> 00:41:19,960
Speaker 6: then it finally ran in August, and it was around

751
00:41:20,000 --> 00:41:23,360
Speaker 6: the time that the Inflation Reduction Act passed, which is

752
00:41:23,360 --> 00:41:28,040
Speaker 6: significant because the Inflation Reduction Act invested eighty billion dollars

753
00:41:28,560 --> 00:41:32,919
Speaker 6: long term in the Internal Revenue Service and gave them

754
00:41:33,320 --> 00:41:38,000
Speaker 6: the ability to plan right like, rather than than dealing

755
00:41:38,040 --> 00:41:42,000
Speaker 6: with the whims of congressional appropriations from year to year,

756
00:41:42,160 --> 00:41:46,239
Speaker 6: which you know, again, they could massively fluctuate from one

757
00:41:46,280 --> 00:41:49,080
Speaker 6: year to the next, and it was very difficult to do,

758
00:41:49,239 --> 00:41:52,480
Speaker 6: like an IT upgrade, which might require several years and

759
00:41:52,600 --> 00:41:56,239
Speaker 6: stages of upgrades that had been challenging to do. So

760
00:41:56,280 --> 00:42:00,719
Speaker 6: this was the opportunity for the agency to finally invest

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00:42:00,800 --> 00:42:02,799
Speaker 6: in those longer term investments.

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Speaker 2: Again.

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Speaker 6: Both they bought scanners amazing, Wow, they bought scanners, and

764
00:42:08,120 --> 00:42:11,160
Speaker 6: they hired a bunch of customer service representatives and grave

765
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Speaker 6: and you know a lot of that stuff. A lot

766
00:42:12,760 --> 00:42:16,960
Speaker 6: of those kinds of investments require training. So you might

767
00:42:17,040 --> 00:42:20,520
Speaker 6: hire someone today, but they can't actually begin work for

768
00:42:20,560 --> 00:42:24,120
Speaker 6: several months, or they can't begin interfacing, I guess with

769
00:42:24,160 --> 00:42:26,080
Speaker 6: the public for several months because they need to get

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00:42:26,080 --> 00:42:28,719
Speaker 6: trained on taxpayer privacy and whatever else.

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Speaker 1: And now with this debt ceiling deal, explained to us

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Speaker 1: how that's changed.

773
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Speaker 6: So the Republicans, after the Inflation Reduction Act was passed,

774
00:42:41,080 --> 00:42:45,320
Speaker 6: almost immediately began trying to undo the investment in the IRS.

775
00:42:45,880 --> 00:42:50,640
Speaker 6: And even before this debt limit deal, when you know,

776
00:42:50,760 --> 00:42:54,680
Speaker 6: was was finally resolved, like one of the first acts

777
00:42:54,719 --> 00:42:59,160
Speaker 6: that the Republican House did this term, you know, after

778
00:42:59,239 --> 00:43:02,279
Speaker 6: assuming the mature already was they tried to defund the

779
00:43:02,320 --> 00:43:06,520
Speaker 6: IRS and they wanted to take away most of the money,

780
00:43:07,239 --> 00:43:11,000
Speaker 6: particularly from the enforcement efforts. So when I say enforcement,

781
00:43:11,040 --> 00:43:15,759
Speaker 6: what I mean is basically audits, exams, appeals, all that

782
00:43:15,840 --> 00:43:21,359
Speaker 6: kind of stuff. Through the negotiations over deficit whatever, you know,

783
00:43:21,400 --> 00:43:25,000
Speaker 6: like Republicans were claiming that they really cared about holding

784
00:43:25,000 --> 00:43:28,040
Speaker 6: the debt limit hostage because they cared about our long

785
00:43:28,120 --> 00:43:32,560
Speaker 6: term fiscal health, which to me is a contradiction in terms,

786
00:43:32,640 --> 00:43:36,400
Speaker 6: because holding the debt limit hostage and threatening a global

787
00:43:36,400 --> 00:43:39,920
Speaker 6: financial crisis will only make US debt look riskier and

788
00:43:39,920 --> 00:43:41,680
Speaker 6: make it harder for us to burrow whatever. That's a

789
00:43:41,680 --> 00:43:43,840
Speaker 6: whole other thing. One of the things that they demanded,

790
00:43:44,200 --> 00:43:49,359
Speaker 6: ostensibly in the name of reducing deficits, reducing spending, was

791
00:43:49,640 --> 00:43:54,880
Speaker 6: to at least partly defund the IRS. And again, the

792
00:43:54,960 --> 00:43:57,200
Speaker 6: IRS is a little bit different from other agencies, and

793
00:43:57,280 --> 00:44:01,000
Speaker 6: that when you spend a dollar or you know, you

794
00:44:01,040 --> 00:44:04,200
Speaker 6: spend if a government spends a dollar I don't know,

795
00:44:04,560 --> 00:44:07,680
Speaker 6: on a Medicare bill. That may be a dollar well spent,

796
00:44:07,920 --> 00:44:10,800
Speaker 6: but it is a dollar out the door on net

797
00:44:11,160 --> 00:44:13,760
Speaker 6: gross and net. Let's say when you spend a dollar

798
00:44:13,840 --> 00:44:16,879
Speaker 6: on the IRS. It's a little bit different because the

799
00:44:16,920 --> 00:44:23,040
Speaker 6: IRS brings in money both through those enforcement efforts i e.

800
00:44:23,560 --> 00:44:27,239
Speaker 6: Enforcing the tax laws that already exist when people break them,

801
00:44:27,320 --> 00:44:29,680
Speaker 6: whether deliberately or not. You know, I guess I should

802
00:44:29,680 --> 00:44:32,440
Speaker 6: be careful. Not everybody who underpays their taxes is a

803
00:44:32,480 --> 00:44:36,239
Speaker 6: tax cheat per se. People make mistakes, but when the

804
00:44:36,280 --> 00:44:40,319
Speaker 6: IRS gets money, it uses that money to bring in

805
00:44:40,360 --> 00:44:45,000
Speaker 6: more money, unlike most other forms of government spending. And

806
00:44:45,080 --> 00:44:50,640
Speaker 6: so the effect on deficits, on our long term fiscal health,

807
00:44:50,680 --> 00:44:53,959
Speaker 6: on fiscal responsibility, whatever term of art you want to use,

808
00:44:54,719 --> 00:45:00,160
Speaker 6: is actually quite bad if you take money away from

809
00:45:00,200 --> 00:45:03,480
Speaker 6: the IRS. And the way that this deal was structured,

810
00:45:03,760 --> 00:45:06,359
Speaker 6: it's still kind of vague. As you may know, there

811
00:45:06,360 --> 00:45:09,400
Speaker 6: were like some side deals that went on with this

812
00:45:09,480 --> 00:45:13,000
Speaker 6: debt limit agreement. There's some stuff that was actually in

813
00:45:13,040 --> 00:45:16,200
Speaker 6: the bill that both chambers of Congress passed and the

814
00:45:16,200 --> 00:45:19,520
Speaker 6: President's signed, and then there's like some gentlemen's agreements kind

815
00:45:19,560 --> 00:45:22,840
Speaker 6: of things about what they're going to do with future appropriations,

816
00:45:22,880 --> 00:45:26,400
Speaker 6: and most of the clawback of funding from the IRS

817
00:45:26,920 --> 00:45:30,360
Speaker 6: is in that ladder category, so they haven't actually, we

818
00:45:30,400 --> 00:45:32,720
Speaker 6: haven't actually seen the full extent of where that money's

819
00:45:32,760 --> 00:45:37,000
Speaker 6: coming from. Most likely it will come out of future

820
00:45:37,160 --> 00:45:41,040
Speaker 6: enforcement efforts, because that's the thing Republicans most want to

821
00:45:41,080 --> 00:45:45,640
Speaker 6: go after, and that is frankly hardest, I think for

822
00:45:45,880 --> 00:45:50,239
Speaker 6: even politicians who are not anti IRS to defend right,

823
00:45:50,320 --> 00:45:53,719
Speaker 6: because like, it sounds scary when Republicans say, oh, all

824
00:45:53,800 --> 00:45:57,160
Speaker 6: of this money is going to be used to hire

825
00:45:57,200 --> 00:46:01,359
Speaker 6: eighty seven thousand gun toting IO agents to you know,

826
00:46:01,920 --> 00:46:03,560
Speaker 6: bang down your door whatever.

827
00:46:03,680 --> 00:46:04,360
Speaker 2: Do they have guns?

828
00:46:04,360 --> 00:46:08,680
Speaker 6: See, there is a very limited subset of IRS agents

829
00:46:08,760 --> 00:46:10,640
Speaker 6: who are carrying firearms.

830
00:46:10,760 --> 00:46:13,440
Speaker 1: Oh wow, I mean, why should they be different than

831
00:46:13,480 --> 00:46:14,720
Speaker 1: everyone else in this country?

832
00:46:14,800 --> 00:46:15,000
Speaker 4: Right?

833
00:46:15,320 --> 00:46:19,080
Speaker 6: Well, it's like if you're protecting a witness who is

834
00:46:19,200 --> 00:46:23,360
Speaker 6: testifying in court, for example, Okay, in some heated case,

835
00:46:23,680 --> 00:46:26,239
Speaker 6: there are some people who have that job, who work

836
00:46:26,280 --> 00:46:28,960
Speaker 6: for the IRS, who are armed, and the IRIS actually

837
00:46:28,960 --> 00:46:31,279
Speaker 6: does a lot of other stuff that I think people

838
00:46:31,320 --> 00:46:34,960
Speaker 6: don't necessarily realize that they do. So you may recall

839
00:46:35,200 --> 00:46:40,000
Speaker 6: that last year when Russia invaded Ukraine, there was this

840
00:46:40,560 --> 00:46:43,759
Speaker 6: effort to like seize all of these Russian yachts and

841
00:46:43,800 --> 00:46:47,400
Speaker 6: things like that. Actually the IRS was tasked with doing that,

842
00:46:47,440 --> 00:46:49,839
Speaker 6: I mean, I think in conjunction with some other agencies.

843
00:46:50,239 --> 00:46:52,600
Speaker 6: So they do a lot of like sort of law

844
00:46:52,680 --> 00:46:55,960
Speaker 6: enforcement d type stuff, even if it's not the core

845
00:46:56,160 --> 00:46:58,880
Speaker 6: part of their business that most people associate with the

846
00:46:58,880 --> 00:47:02,080
Speaker 6: Internal Revenue Service, So there are a few that are armed.

847
00:47:02,120 --> 00:47:05,440
Speaker 6: But you know, if you get audited, like you're a

848
00:47:05,520 --> 00:47:08,160
Speaker 6: Joe taxpayer and you get it audited, I do not

849
00:47:08,440 --> 00:47:11,200
Speaker 6: think the agent showing up at your door is going

850
00:47:11,280 --> 00:47:13,240
Speaker 6: to be you know, armed.

851
00:47:13,320 --> 00:47:16,280
Speaker 2: Yeah, well that's something explain to us.

852
00:47:16,560 --> 00:47:21,240
Speaker 1: How really, funding the IRS is a good idea.

853
00:47:20,640 --> 00:47:22,799
Speaker 6: If you want people to pay the taxes that they

854
00:47:22,840 --> 00:47:26,920
Speaker 6: already legally owe. That is, we're not talking about raising

855
00:47:27,000 --> 00:47:31,160
Speaker 6: tax rates. We're just saying, whatever the laws already are,

856
00:47:31,640 --> 00:47:34,520
Speaker 6: we want people to pay to pay that amount. So

857
00:47:34,560 --> 00:47:38,080
Speaker 6: like nobody feels like a sucker because they're the one

858
00:47:38,840 --> 00:47:42,000
Speaker 6: dope abiding by the law and their next door neighbor

859
00:47:42,120 --> 00:47:45,040
Speaker 6: is cheating a tax man, right, in which case the

860
00:47:45,120 --> 00:47:47,560
Speaker 6: honest person in the long run is going to have

861
00:47:47,600 --> 00:47:49,680
Speaker 6: to make up for the shortfall. If you want to

862
00:47:49,760 --> 00:47:53,200
Speaker 6: collect the taxes that are already owed, if you want

863
00:47:53,239 --> 00:47:55,400
Speaker 6: to make it easier for people who are trying to

864
00:47:55,400 --> 00:47:57,719
Speaker 6: follow the law to follow law, because we do have

865
00:47:57,760 --> 00:48:02,719
Speaker 6: a really crazily complicated tax code, which is a whole

866
00:48:02,719 --> 00:48:06,120
Speaker 6: other thing, and that's Congress's fault, that's not the IRS's fault.

867
00:48:06,280 --> 00:48:07,880
Speaker 6: You want people at the agency to be able to

868
00:48:07,920 --> 00:48:11,440
Speaker 6: answer the phone and to respond to mail, and to

869
00:48:11,520 --> 00:48:16,160
Speaker 6: have ways of answering questions. That requires money. And the

870
00:48:16,239 --> 00:48:18,360
Speaker 6: piece that I wrote this week, which I think is

871
00:48:18,400 --> 00:48:21,920
Speaker 6: the reason you wanted to have this conversation, was about

872
00:48:21,960 --> 00:48:27,560
Speaker 6: some really fascinating new research from a group of economists

873
00:48:27,600 --> 00:48:31,760
Speaker 6: at Harvard, the Treasury Department, and the University of Sydney

874
00:48:32,040 --> 00:48:37,919
Speaker 6: that looked at internal IRS records to see basically what

875
00:48:38,080 --> 00:48:41,120
Speaker 6: the ROI was on different types of audits. So, like

876
00:48:41,120 --> 00:48:44,399
Speaker 6: I said, you give IRS a dollar, they bring back

877
00:48:44,440 --> 00:48:47,080
Speaker 6: more than a dollar because they use it to collect money.

878
00:48:47,400 --> 00:48:51,239
Speaker 6: This team of researchers used internal accounting data from the

879
00:48:51,280 --> 00:48:56,160
Speaker 6: agency and also records from the results of like seven

880
00:48:56,239 --> 00:49:00,160
Speaker 6: hundred thousand audits to figure out, Okay, well you is

881
00:49:00,200 --> 00:49:02,920
Speaker 6: a dollar to audit a poor person. How much money

882
00:49:02,920 --> 00:49:05,600
Speaker 6: do you spend like how many audits can you do

883
00:49:05,719 --> 00:49:07,360
Speaker 6: and how much money do you get back for audit?

884
00:49:07,719 --> 00:49:09,720
Speaker 6: And if you use a dollar to audit a rich person,

885
00:49:10,040 --> 00:49:15,799
Speaker 6: same deal. And they basically found that, yeah, it is

886
00:49:16,040 --> 00:49:22,640
Speaker 6: more expensive upfront to audit higher income taxpayers because you know,

887
00:49:22,680 --> 00:49:26,400
Speaker 6: if you're Donald Trump, you have a really complicated tax

888
00:49:26,440 --> 00:49:30,919
Speaker 6: return and a bunch of partnership returns and other things

889
00:49:30,960 --> 00:49:34,400
Speaker 6: that are really hard to sift through. That requires many

890
00:49:34,520 --> 00:49:39,799
Speaker 6: hours of examination from government employees to figure out where

891
00:49:39,840 --> 00:49:43,080
Speaker 6: you might have done something wrong. And it also generally

892
00:49:43,080 --> 00:49:47,640
Speaker 6: requires a little bit more specialized skills from those IRS employees. Right,

893
00:49:47,719 --> 00:49:50,400
Speaker 6: the kind of person that you might need to employ

894
00:49:50,560 --> 00:49:53,719
Speaker 6: the IRS to audit Trump is different from the kind

895
00:49:53,719 --> 00:49:57,320
Speaker 6: of person or the level of training, level of whatever

896
00:49:57,400 --> 00:50:01,840
Speaker 6: sophistication degrees, whatever that I'd be necessary to audit like

897
00:50:01,920 --> 00:50:04,320
Speaker 6: a low income person who has a very simple tax return.

898
00:50:04,880 --> 00:50:06,640
Speaker 6: And so they did find that it costs a lot

899
00:50:06,640 --> 00:50:10,400
Speaker 6: more money upfront for those reasons. You know, mostly that

900
00:50:10,440 --> 00:50:14,400
Speaker 6: it requires many more hours to audit high income people,

901
00:50:14,600 --> 00:50:18,680
Speaker 6: but the amount of money that it comes back is

902
00:50:19,520 --> 00:50:24,759
Speaker 6: ginormously greater. So for like the bottom half of the

903
00:50:24,800 --> 00:50:30,600
Speaker 6: income distribution on average, the IRS basically breaks even. They

904
00:50:30,600 --> 00:50:35,360
Speaker 6: spend a dollar auditing you know, the local plumber or whoever,

905
00:50:36,280 --> 00:50:40,160
Speaker 6: or school teacher, like, maybe they get about a dollar

906
00:50:40,200 --> 00:50:43,759
Speaker 6: back on average. You know, some people maybe they pay more.

907
00:50:44,160 --> 00:50:46,080
Speaker 6: They maybe they owe more, and some people maybe they

908
00:50:46,080 --> 00:50:50,520
Speaker 6: owe nothing more or even you know, maybe they overpaid whatever.

909
00:50:50,960 --> 00:50:54,920
Speaker 6: On average, the IRS basically breaks even. Not the case

910
00:50:55,719 --> 00:50:58,440
Speaker 6: at the very top of the income distribution. So for

911
00:50:58,480 --> 00:51:04,360
Speaker 6: the people in like the top one percent, for every

912
00:51:04,400 --> 00:51:07,800
Speaker 6: dollar that the IRS spends auditing them, they get back

913
00:51:07,840 --> 00:51:11,560
Speaker 6: on average about three bucks. The top point one percent

914
00:51:12,040 --> 00:51:15,360
Speaker 6: they get back over six dollars. And again that's accounting

915
00:51:15,400 --> 00:51:17,759
Speaker 6: for the fact that people are going to appeal and

916
00:51:17,840 --> 00:51:23,240
Speaker 6: preach people in particular, sometimes the IRS will lose those cases. Still,

917
00:51:23,360 --> 00:51:26,439
Speaker 6: on average they get back six bucks back, and that's

918
00:51:26,520 --> 00:51:29,680
Speaker 6: just what they get from the audit. The other really

919
00:51:29,719 --> 00:51:35,400
Speaker 6: interesting findings from this research was that what matters even

920
00:51:35,640 --> 00:51:37,960
Speaker 6: more in terms of baying for the buck from the

921
00:51:38,000 --> 00:51:41,799
Speaker 6: spending on auditing is not what they get back from

922
00:51:41,800 --> 00:51:46,520
Speaker 6: the audit itself, but how the tax payers behavior changes

923
00:51:46,600 --> 00:51:49,640
Speaker 6: going forward. So when you audit Donald Trump, if they

924
00:51:49,640 --> 00:51:52,640
Speaker 6: ever conclude the never ending audits, of course, maybe you

925
00:51:52,760 --> 00:51:56,279
Speaker 6: get a few bucks back. But what really matters is

926
00:51:56,320 --> 00:51:59,680
Speaker 6: that in the decade after the audit, Donald Trump starts

927
00:51:59,719 --> 00:52:03,839
Speaker 6: falling the law right right right and stops or Don

928
00:52:03,880 --> 00:52:08,040
Speaker 6: Trump or whoever, but you know, stops taking dodgy deductions

929
00:52:08,160 --> 00:52:12,399
Speaker 6: that they shouldn't be taking, starts reporting income that maybe

930
00:52:12,440 --> 00:52:16,440
Speaker 6: they had been receiving under the table, or stops reporting

931
00:52:16,560 --> 00:52:19,600
Speaker 6: as a dependent a child who doesn't live with them

932
00:52:19,640 --> 00:52:21,520
Speaker 6: most of the year. Whatever the thing that they were

933
00:52:21,520 --> 00:52:23,920
Speaker 6: doing that turned out to be wrong again, whether that

934
00:52:24,080 --> 00:52:27,440
Speaker 6: was an honest error or deliberately cheating Uncle Sam, they

935
00:52:27,800 --> 00:52:30,720
Speaker 6: generally stopped doing it. The amount of additional tax revenue

936
00:52:30,719 --> 00:52:35,600
Speaker 6: that comes in from these sort of chastened taxpayers is

937
00:52:35,719 --> 00:52:39,239
Speaker 6: roughly triple what gets recovered from the initial audit and

938
00:52:39,320 --> 00:52:42,600
Speaker 6: requires basically nothing more from the IRS. Right the IRIS

939
00:52:42,640 --> 00:52:44,960
Speaker 6: has done its audit, but now these people are following

940
00:52:44,960 --> 00:52:47,320
Speaker 6: the law going forward, and the RIS doesn't have to

941
00:52:47,880 --> 00:52:50,759
Speaker 6: get on the case anymore. So all of which is

942
00:52:50,800 --> 00:52:55,400
Speaker 6: to say that when you take money away from the IRS,

943
00:52:56,120 --> 00:53:02,760
Speaker 6: it costs a ton of money, especially if the line

944
00:53:02,840 --> 00:53:05,680
Speaker 6: item that you are taking money away from is auditing

945
00:53:05,719 --> 00:53:10,400
Speaker 6: the rich. The headline number is basically for the highest earners.

946
00:53:10,760 --> 00:53:14,399
Speaker 6: Every additional dollar that Congress could give to IRS could

947
00:53:14,440 --> 00:53:17,800
Speaker 6: bring back twelve dollars in return. When you include those

948
00:53:17,920 --> 00:53:21,600
Speaker 6: deterrence effects and you include you know what gets recover

949
00:53:21,640 --> 00:53:23,920
Speaker 6: from the audit all of that, that's an enormous return

950
00:53:23,960 --> 00:53:27,480
Speaker 6: on investment. Like any rich person can tell you, you know

951
00:53:27,480 --> 00:53:28,960
Speaker 6: the rich person is being audited. They'd be like, that

952
00:53:29,000 --> 00:53:30,799
Speaker 6: would be a great return if I could get twelve

953
00:53:30,840 --> 00:53:32,720
Speaker 6: dollars for every one dollar I spend.

954
00:53:33,080 --> 00:53:36,320
Speaker 1: So interesting. Thank you for joining us.

955
00:53:36,320 --> 00:53:37,360
Speaker 6: Thanks for having me.

956
00:53:39,440 --> 00:53:43,680
Speaker 2: Act Jesse Cannon.

957
00:53:43,480 --> 00:53:44,160
Speaker 3: My junk fast.

958
00:53:44,160 --> 00:53:46,280
Speaker 5: We're going to bring Rick Wilson in for a special

959
00:53:46,480 --> 00:53:48,719
Speaker 5: moment of fuckery right after this. But I think you

960
00:53:48,840 --> 00:53:51,760
Speaker 5: want to address what's been going on with Joe Rogan

961
00:53:52,000 --> 00:53:55,880
Speaker 5: RFK Elon and doctor Peter Hotez.

962
00:53:55,800 --> 00:54:00,520
Speaker 1: Elon and Joe Rogan wants doctor Peter Hotez to debate

963
00:54:01,040 --> 00:54:05,680
Speaker 1: demented anti vaxer RFK Junior, and so I have an

964
00:54:05,719 --> 00:54:10,839
Speaker 1: offer for Joe fear factor bug eater Rogan. You can

965
00:54:10,920 --> 00:54:15,600
Speaker 1: debate me anytime you want. So, Rick Wilson, let's talk

966
00:54:15,800 --> 00:54:18,680
Speaker 1: about our moment of fuck ery. Do you guys want

967
00:54:18,760 --> 00:54:21,600
Speaker 1: us to podcast again? Listeners? If you want Rick and

968
00:54:21,640 --> 00:54:24,680
Speaker 1: I to start a podcast again, tell us, tell us Rick,

969
00:54:26,280 --> 00:54:29,000
Speaker 1: send Rick lots of text messages. Rick.

970
00:54:29,480 --> 00:54:31,360
Speaker 3: Yes, if you were to take.

971
00:54:31,200 --> 00:54:34,320
Speaker 1: A moment that was your most fucked up moment, perhaps

972
00:54:34,320 --> 00:54:38,000
Speaker 1: a person who is who has sparked your ire who

973
00:54:38,000 --> 00:54:38,480
Speaker 1: would it be?

974
00:54:39,520 --> 00:54:40,680
Speaker 3: God? This week?

975
00:54:40,880 --> 00:54:41,400
Speaker 2: Yeah?

976
00:54:41,440 --> 00:54:44,080
Speaker 3: Look, I mean I think I think the pinnacle of

977
00:54:44,120 --> 00:54:46,239
Speaker 3: all of this this week has to be you know,

978
00:54:46,320 --> 00:54:50,520
Speaker 3: Trump himself. He continues to play this fucking game with

979
00:54:50,600 --> 00:54:54,319
Speaker 3: America that he's above the law, that he knows he

980
00:54:54,360 --> 00:54:56,759
Speaker 3: will never be held to account. At some point, it's

981
00:54:56,840 --> 00:55:01,160
Speaker 3: like it's like a morally offensive grind on everything, and

982
00:55:01,280 --> 00:55:04,560
Speaker 3: I seriously, I do it kind of weighs on me sometimes.

983
00:55:04,200 --> 00:55:06,759
Speaker 2: Like the death of American democracy weighs on you.

984
00:55:06,880 --> 00:55:09,200
Speaker 3: I wish there was some sort of shame factor that

985
00:55:09,280 --> 00:55:11,239
Speaker 3: still existed in American society, but there's not.

986
00:55:11,560 --> 00:55:13,920
Speaker 1: You want mine, yes, because mine is part of yours.

987
00:55:14,160 --> 00:55:17,360
Speaker 1: This week, Donald J. Trump, perhaps you've heard of him

988
00:55:17,480 --> 00:55:20,960
Speaker 1: after he had his federal indictment. On the way out,

989
00:55:21,160 --> 00:55:26,760
Speaker 1: she went to a famous restaurant in Miami called Versailles, right, yes, indeed,

990
00:55:27,000 --> 00:55:30,120
Speaker 1: and at Versaill in the Palace of Versailles, not to

991
00:55:30,120 --> 00:55:33,759
Speaker 1: be confused with the Versailles in France. He told the

992
00:55:33,760 --> 00:55:38,279
Speaker 1: group that he no, indeed, he told the group that

993
00:55:38,840 --> 00:55:40,840
Speaker 1: he would treat It was all his treat.

994
00:55:41,320 --> 00:55:43,960
Speaker 2: People then ordered and he properly left.

995
00:55:44,200 --> 00:55:47,000
Speaker 1: I feel like that is the lesson of trump Ism

996
00:55:47,080 --> 00:55:50,719
Speaker 1: right there, like Burla Scone all his treat and then

997
00:55:50,760 --> 00:55:51,240
Speaker 1: he leaves.

998
00:55:51,440 --> 00:55:53,279
Speaker 3: So I was in Italy two weeks ago and this

999
00:55:53,760 --> 00:55:55,680
Speaker 3: one guy said to me, he goes. You know, Trump

1000
00:55:55,760 --> 00:56:00,719
Speaker 3: learned everything everything he had about criminality from berlo He goes.

1001
00:56:00,719 --> 00:56:02,680
Speaker 3: But the thing about Burla Sconey was he was a

1002
00:56:02,719 --> 00:56:05,160
Speaker 3: real crook. But he would also pay for dinner. Trump

1003
00:56:05,200 --> 00:56:07,239
Speaker 3: has never paid for a dinner. Is fucking life. I

1004
00:56:07,320 --> 00:56:09,759
Speaker 3: promise you I will say this too, Molly. I mean,

1005
00:56:09,920 --> 00:56:12,120
Speaker 3: if you're in Miami and you go to Versailles and

1006
00:56:12,160 --> 00:56:15,160
Speaker 3: you don't eat a croquetta or as I say, I

1007
00:56:15,200 --> 00:56:17,080
Speaker 3: will eat my body weight in croquetta's, and that's a

1008
00:56:17,080 --> 00:56:20,040
Speaker 3: lot of fucking croquettas. And he didn't take any croquettas

1009
00:56:20,040 --> 00:56:22,239
Speaker 3: to go, didn't get a media note, che or a

1010
00:56:22,280 --> 00:56:26,360
Speaker 3: Cuban sandwich hot and pressed or anything. Right, he stops

1011
00:56:26,400 --> 00:56:29,279
Speaker 3: at a goddamn McDonald's drive through on the way back

1012
00:56:29,320 --> 00:56:31,720
Speaker 3: to the airport, and he's McDonald's on the plane. It's

1013
00:56:31,800 --> 00:56:35,080
Speaker 3: just like it's like the well done steak of visiting Miami.

1014
00:56:35,320 --> 00:56:37,279
Speaker 3: You don't eat a well done steak. You don't get

1015
00:56:37,320 --> 00:56:39,239
Speaker 3: McDonald's when you're in Miami, one of the greatest food

1016
00:56:39,280 --> 00:56:41,839
Speaker 3: cities in the country. That's so inffo lesson and.

1017
00:56:41,800 --> 00:56:44,400
Speaker 1: There it is our moment of fuck gery, Rick Wilson.

1018
00:56:44,440 --> 00:56:45,680
Speaker 2: I hope you will come back.

1019
00:56:45,960 --> 00:56:49,640
Speaker 3: I will certainly come back, as you know. And I

1020
00:56:49,680 --> 00:56:51,719
Speaker 3: think I'll have you on the on the enemy's list

1021
00:56:51,719 --> 00:56:53,040
Speaker 3: again soon because people liked you.

1022
00:56:53,160 --> 00:56:58,640
Speaker 1: I can't imagine why. That's it for this episode of

1023
00:56:58,680 --> 00:57:02,480
Speaker 1: Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to

1024
00:57:02,520 --> 00:57:05,359
Speaker 1: hear the best minds in politics makes sense of all

1025
00:57:05,480 --> 00:57:08,959
Speaker 1: this chaos. If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send

1026
00:57:09,000 --> 00:57:12,080
Speaker 1: it to a friend and keep the conversation going. And again,

1027
00:57:12,320 --> 00:57:13,280
Speaker 1: thanks for listening.