#1701 Lead, Follow, or Get Out of the Way: Installing the Backbone Democrats Need

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Now as a sneak peek, I'm gonna share a special piece of our most recent episode, currently only available to Best of the Left members, but it's very relevant to today's topic and I love it so much, I can't resist sharing. I don't think I've even mentioned it yet, but we're making songs for the show, and they've been coming out better than I dared hope. So definitely get ready for that after our Top Takes section today. And now onto the show.

Some people think we are in a constitutional crisis, that there is a plan in place to impose a dictatorship on this country that is being executed as we speak. And Senator Schumer does not think we are quite there yet. If democracy is at risk, that's a little different than what we're talking about now. Even a shutdown, as horrible as it is, we'll all have to stand up and fight back in every way.

I think actually this is useful because I do think just in again, in a genuine sort of good faith way, that there's a lot of people, and I think I probably count myself among them, who think that that's where we are right now. That the plan being deployed right now -- Okay. You may be right. I don't think so. We're there. I think we're getting -- You think we're not there yet? Well, I think we're getting there and we have to be really vigilant.

I just had a meeting today with the Judiciary Committee to decide how we're working through this, as it goes further. It hasn't been up to the Supreme Court yet, which would be the classic, if they disobey the Supreme Court. We're on our way there, God forbid. But I think we are. And we'll have to go at it and at it and at it. And that is different than anything else. Different than anything else.

It's a quantum leap different because our democracy is then 248 years of American democracy, the Magna Carta is out the window, and we will all have to take extraordinary action. I gotta say, I genuinely hope that Schumer's read on this is correct, right? But it makes it very hard to imagine a leader meeting the moment if they don't believe the moment is here. For me, Donald Trump's intentions are really very clear at this point.

He is in the process of attempting to undo the Constitutional Republic. His executive branch is in the process of overtaking, of reducing to subservience the legislative and judicial branches of the government, Congress and the courts, so that he can act unilaterally.

Even within his executive purview, the president is purging anything, anyone that falls short of pledging unshakeable, loyal to him personally and his personal political project, not the United States, not the Constitution, and not We the People. I mean from the FBI to the Department of Justice, to the Federal Trade Commission, and on and on and on.

These institutions, day after day, are being cleared of officials, career officials, who may favor the rule of law over Trump's wins, and they're being replaced with loyalists, all in open flagrant violation of the law, like clearly illegal.

As the New York Times reports, Trump is using the vast powers of the presidency to hobble his political opponents as well, including bogus investigations into Democratic fundraising platforms, threats to shut down nonprofit organizations he sees as oppositional. And it's not just the government or partisan entities. Trump wants to dismantle all forms of public opposition to his power grabs, starting with all sources of independent authority.

Any institution with credibility must either be bent to Trump's win or destroyed. That's the goal here. I mean, again, he says this every day. He's repeatedly threatened independent media outlets, including this one, for coverage he deems to be insufficiently fawning. He said that he thinks it's illegal, that people should be in jail.

He is currently conducting an unprecedented attack on American higher education, including just today, freezing $175 million in federal funding to his own alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania. He's openly defying the Constitution. He tries to deport a legal resident for his protected political speech. This is it, man. This is, he's, trying it. I'm not saying he is being successful. I'm not saying that all is lost and they're gonna win and doom and gloom. But they're trying to do it.

They're trying to get rid of independent voices of authority, purge them, fracture a pluralistic civil society. It is clear as day to so many of us, including, I will say, scholars of authoritarian regimes and especially -- and this is pretty important -- lots of folks who have lived through these regimes, like people that have been in dictatorships in Latin America or recently in Hungary or in Turkey or in Russia. Listen to them.

And part of the issue, I think right now, particularly with Democratic leadership and the role they're playing, in Democratic elected politicians, stems from a legitimate concern which ties to how we got to this point.

As we heard last night, there's a sense among Democrats, one that is not totally wrong and based in some of the data that democracy itself, preserving the Constitutional order, is just not a particularly salient political issue, particularly for people that are not super, super paying attention.

That's based on the facts that Democrats did spend a lot of the 2024 election cycle hammering their messaging about threats to democracy and civil society, and then they lost the election, ultimately because voters, particularly those voters on the most margins of paying attention to politics and news, were most concerned about pocketable issues, specifically the high cost of living, which is what they told every pollster.

And so because of that, I think a lot of Democrats in power, and political consultants around the Democratic Party, have come to conclude that democracy is a losing issue politically, and we should -- they should -- talk about Medicaid cuts, for instance, instead. Every day we are hammering away at Trump. And we have a simple, simple thought that unites the Democratic Party from one end to the other. He's asking the middle class to pay for tax cuts for the billionaires. It unites us all.

Bernie Sanders like it, and my most conservative members like it. We're hammering away at that. Today it was Medicaid. Tomorrow's gonna be, in the next few days, it's gonna be tariffs. He's raising those tariffs, raising your costs, Mr. and Mrs. American, by $2,000 a year if he raises all these tariffs, so that he can use that money for tax cuts for the billionaires. He's cutting your education funds and so your kids don't get a great education and your school taxes will go up for that.

Now, don't get me wrong. I think that's good and clear messaging and it, we do a lot of coverage of the economic dynamics and, destruction of Trump here. I understand the instinct to stick to kitchen table issues. I don't think it's necessarily the wrong lesson to have learned from the election. But again, the terrain has shifted too much since November of 2024. And I do fear Democrats are caught fighting the last war.

All of those things you enumerated, which all sound like good politics to me, are the kinds of things that you'd be doing if Mit Romney were president, that there's this weird asymmetry right now, which is that -- No, because -- They are acting in this totally new way -- Yes. In which they are ambitiously trying to seize all power and create a presidential dictatorship in the United States of America.

Yes. And the Democratic opposition is acting like, well, if we can get their pool rate down a few points, then what? No. No. Then what happens? Well, what happens is, look, first we get it way down. He's gonna have much like -- this worked in 2017, we say it didn't. Now it's a different government. It's different though. My God. Oh, it is different. But healthcare, we beat him. Taxes, we beat him. And guess what we did? Guess what we did, Chris?

We took back the House and won in the Senate and that got, and then we were allowed to do all those good things. Again, Senator Schumer understands political strategy and he's right about that history, and he is right that that type of resistance did work eight years ago. And in many ways, that first Trump administration just politically was a failure. I mean, it got a huget cut to billionaires, surprise surprise, and corporations.

But again, it just -- when you are paying as close attention as we are here on this program, here at the network, and I think a lot of you watching at home, it just does seem that now is the time to break glass, that it's not the time for politics as usual. I mean, first of all, Trump is already underwater for the first time in his career on the question of the economy, which is interesting, and I think welcome news both for Democrats and those opposed to what he's doing.

The state of the stock market amid Trump's trade war is doing a pretty good job messaging pocketbook issues itself, along with the terrorists that are coming April 2nd. But more importantly, I would say, you don't have to choose -- I strongly believe this. It's all one thing. It's all one thing. The threat to democracy has become so much more tangible than it was when folks went to the ballot four months ago, in part because this entire Mad King act is wreaking havoc in every direction.

And with that in mind, a lot of leader Schumer's Democratic colleagues believe it's time to basically fight back harder, as Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut has been out there saying. This moment requires us to break norms. This moment requires us to take risks. And I get it. A lot of my colleagues said, shutting down the government, being in a government shutdown, that's a risk. That hands power to Donald Trump and Elon Musk.

But how on earth are we gonna ask the American people to take risks for us, right? When there's a five alarm constitutional fire, and we need them to be out on the streets, not with hundreds, not with thousands or tens of thousands of people, but with hundreds of thousands of people, if we're not willing to show courage and take risks ourselves. He's right. Hundreds of thousands of people, that's what it's gonna take. Honestly.

I think now is the time to take political risks before it's too late. Politico released this article about a Democratic retreat in Loudoun County, Virginia last month. Attended by staffers, consultants, electeds, and party leadership, this group laid out 20 solutions to win back the working class. And all of them, at least the ones listed in this article, are various middle fingers.

Because instead of reflecting on where they went wrong in Harris's campaign, like not differentiating her and Biden at all, or courting this mythical Liz Cheney super fan, or putting a muzzle on Tim Walz, these Democrats have decided it's just easier to become Republican light. Here are some actual quotes from this Democratic party "Victory Plan." "Democrats should ban far left candidate questionnaires and refuse to participate

in forums that create ideological purity tests." This is a pretty obvious dig at an ACLU survey in 2019 given to Democratic primary candidates. Republicans exploited it for culture war reasons. I do think that that survey was unnecessary and weirdly worded, especially for a primary, but I'm not sure it's like the main thing we should be focusing on. Also, this point raises a lot more questions than answers. What counts as far left? In this case, would it be the ACLU?

Why do you need to control or ban these institutions? And like how often is this an issue? Are you spending all of your time doing ideological purity tests? When is the last time you saw your children? Okay, this one's my favorite. "Democrats should also move away from the dominance of small dollar donors whose preferences may not align with the broader electorate." Excuse me, what the fuck? Small dollar donors?

You mean the average American who can only spare like five to 10 bucks 'cause they're living paycheck to paycheck? Motherfucker, that is the broader electorate. Also, if you think corporate money and rich people are the answers to small dollar donors, guess what? You're a Republican. "Democrats should push back against far left staffers and groups that exert a disproportionate influence on policy and messaging." Once again, what's the far left here? Also, what groups?

That phrase is vague on purpose. But here's a little secret: Behind closed doors, a lot of powerful Democrats and donors refer to the millions of diverse, complex lives that make up our country as "the groups." And if that feels dehumanizing, that's because it is. Also, if you think transgender people or Muslims or disabled people had disproportionate influence over the last election, I'd ask how they feel about that.

Candidates should get out of elite circles and into real communities, like tailgates, gun shows, local restaurants, churches. Hypothetically, this could be good, but you have to wonder what they mean by "elites." Especially because we know big donors, i.e. rich people, are good. As someone who monitors political and particularly conservative media for work, I can tell you what it actually means. Academia, artistic communities, "the groups," you know, the opposite of real America.

Also, how fucking insulting is this? These devs watched one episode of King of the Hill, didn't understand what the episode was actually about, and was like, yeah, we're going with that. If you actually want conservative voters, don't cosplay what you think they are. They'll think you're disingenuous, because you're being disingenuous.

But if you actually wanted to make a difference, you could use some of those big dollar donors to provide physical aid to people who have lost their jobs because of Trump, who can't access their Medicaid. You could be the tangible lifeboat to the effects of the man they voted for. That would change far more minds than pretending that you know how to shoot a gun. But this leads beautifully into our last bullet. "The party needs to own the failures of Democratic governance in large

cities and commit to improving local government." This is a right wing dog whistle, plain and simple. Conservatives constantly complain about Democratic-run cities, so that way they can spread racist narratives that increase police funding and surveillance. It keeps their audience paranoid -- just how they want them. For Democrats to be saying that is scary. I do agree, we need to support and highlight local government way more, but to do that you need to look at large cities.

80% of America lives in urban areas. Those people matter just as much as the other 20%. This is not moderation. It's soft radicalization. We didn't lose to Trump because Kamala Harris was too woke. We lost to Trump because the Democratic party refused to change. They refused to have an actual primary to give voters another option besides Joe Biden. And once Harris was in, they stalled her momentum, reigning her in so she didn't go too far left.

And it's not because they didn't wanna alienate conservative voters; it's because they didn't want those goals -- those far left ideas -- to happen. Most progressive policies are wildly popular if you don't market them like an idiot. For example, the vast majority of Americans would love for their tax dollars to pay for the doctor. The vast majority of Americans want more than a month off when they have a baby, and to be able to afford childcare when they go back to work.

They want their tax dollars spent on fixing roads and funding schools and paying for their parents' social security rather than bombs and corporate tax breaks. There is no reason we can't have all of this, except for the fact that it takes a lot of work, and corporations would earn a little bit less in profit. And I mean, we can't lose their lobbying dollars, can we?

This is why a shit ton of people in Congress, regardless of party, don't even try to make things better, and why even more people in the media demonize those policies. If these policies weren't popular, people like Rupert Murdoch wouldn't have to spend billions of dollars to convince you that they're not. The Democratic party is supposed to be the opposition party. Yes, we deserve more than a two party system, but we don't have that yet.

So this means right now, Democrats either need to step up or step down. We don't need an opposition party that tries to accomplish the same stuff as the other guys, but a little quieter, a little more polite. There is one way to move the needle here, and we have to do it while we still can. The answer is to primary every Democrat who is not doing their job. And guess what? You can do it.

You'll either win and then you can run in the general election, and try to make your vision reality in Congress. Or you lose, and that sucks. But guess what? Most incumbent Democrats aren't used to primaries. And by running against them, you have jeopardized their access to power, which is the only thing the vast majority of Congress cares about. You're starting to see polls out of a real dissent within the Democratic Party.

And to be clear, these polls, 40%, I think it is -- this is off the top of my head -- 40% want the Democratic party, to move towards the center. I think it's 29% want to move to the left. And I can't remember the third percent feels it's just right. All those people agree with Bernie the way that, in my opinion, the center moderation stuff I don't buy. Well, the thing is, is that it's very difficult to quantify this, right? Or to qualify it.

I have spoken to people many, many times who have said I was either gonna vote for Trump or Bernie. I have spoken to people who considered themselves moderate Democrats during the Biden years who supported Bernie over Biden, and I'm like, you realize you're to the left of Biden? And they just didn't know. It's just -- That paradigm is not applicable. Very difficult, but liberal means professional type of stuff. Like Hillary saying "too big to fail" won't stop racism.

That's what people are reacting against. I'm convinced in those polls. That's the "liberalism" that they're rejecting. Let's put it this way. It's very hard to assess when you start talking about these isms. But when you start talking about issues, and you go issue by issue, there is absolutely no doubt that people are going to align themselves with what AOC and what Bernie are talking about.

The vast majority of Democrats, and I would also argue a significant, if not a majority of even Republicans, are going to subscribe to 80% of what AOC and Bernie say in this respect. But the base wants fight against the Republicans. That's what's the polling reflects. Here's the thing. Okay. Yes. But, right now they're associating themselves with fight. That's a good thing.

Yes. Across whatever, however people identify themselves ideologically within the Democratic party, the one thing they all agree on is that we want more of a fight. We want partisanship here. And partisanship is the way that you get to the win. That's it. You cannot, and you cannot pursue any of these ideologies, you cannot pursue any of these policies until you're in a position of power. And the one thing that is quite clear is that the Democratic party wants a party that is going to fight.

Here is AOC in Tempe, Arizona. And lemme tell you something. This isn't just about Republicans either. We need a Democratic party that fights harder for us too.

Hint hint. Oh, that's not a hint. Well, actually, I wanna continue on with just one more segment about that. Before we do, though, she's clearly talking about Kristen Sinema. No. She saw and then, but the hint is: me versus Schumer. Oh. yeah, I guess. But she goes on specifically, hat tip to Mark Kelly and Gallego. And let's be clear here.

Mark Kelly, and Gallego, at least the way the Gallego has been functioning since he's become a senator, are not terribly aligned with AOC's policies and Bernie's policies. In fact, they could be close to on the other end about, as close to the other end of that spectrum as you could find. So what's fascinating here is she is, and people have talked about her filing down certain edges and not challenging the supposed vow she made to not challenge incumbents, to get that position, the committee.

She is on an agenda to amass as much party power as she can within the context of this party, while maintaining as much of her agenda as she can. That's what's happening. And her status as a critic of the party, which when you heard in the audience when she said that, that there is a massive appetite for overhaul of the party and she's representing that. I feel she's dissected endlessly and I think there's a lot of reasons for that. And one of them does include her gender.

But this past month has been a master stroke. First of all, the fact that Bernie is still kicking and making this a priority, we have to give him his ultimate credit. It's amazing the energy this guy has. He has way more energy than Biden, with just a flashback over four years ago to the concerns about his health. But there's been a lot of discussion of who's the successor to Bernie, who is it? And I think he's making it fairly clear who he views as at least one of his ideological successors.

And he's touring around the country with her. And Bernie did very well in both times he ran, with Latino voters. What was the constituency that Democrats lost the most ground with? Latino voters this election cycle, arguably. They also lost a lot of working class support as well. Who does well with working class voters is also Bernie. And so going to Arizona here at the beginning of this tour, I don't think is an accident.

I think they're trying to reenergize that part of the party around the issue sets that both of them represent. Part of why Republicans have been able to run circles around Democrats is because Republicans are the ones controlling the narrative. Republicans say that they're conservative and that Democrats are on the left or even the radical left, but that claim doesn't match the reality because our entire politics has shifted dramatically to the right.

Conservatives want to conserve the current social order. They wanna maintain existing institutions. They're not totally against change, but any change should happen carefully, slowly, gradually. Essentially, they wanna maintain the status quo. They value social stability above all else. Republicans are a radical right wing party. They are fundamentally changing the social order, really destroying the existing order in order to suit their own interests.

They're overturning decades of Supreme Court precedent. They're taking away civil rights and due process. They're violating the Constitution. And as for the left, there is no left in this country. There's no elected politician suggesting that we should abolish landlords or eliminate private property. Bernie Sanders is advocating for social democracy, which is a moderate position, and it's no wonder that 70% of Americans agree with most of his policies.

Social democracy is the norm in every other developed democratic country. Bernie Sanders isn't the outlier, we are. And let me remind you that Bernie Sanders is not a member of the Democratic Party. So really when we're talking about Republicans versus Democrats today, we're talking about radical right-wing extremists versus conservatives.

When you understand this difference between the narrative and the reality, you can understand why Democrats are reading this entire situation completely wrong. They're buying into the Republican narrative. They're believing, "Oh, Republicans are conservative and Republicans are winning people over. Therefore, people must really want a conservative candidate, so we should be more conservative." False. Republicans are radicals.

Republican voters have been taught to think of themselves as conservative, but don't be bamboozled by the branding. The substance of what Republicans have been pitching is radical change. That's what's attractive to voters. If you continue to run like a conservative, you'll continue to lose. What's worse is that many Democrats are believing the Republican's narrative as to why Democrats lost.

Democrats and establishment media have picked up on "woke" and "DEI" as some sort of bad thing, as if we shouldn't try to include a diverse range of people within society. They allow Republicans to redefine woke as a slur instead of saying, "Yes, we are awake to the ways that the systems in this country are keeping people down, because we want justice and prosperity for all people, not just for those at the top.

Yes, we are awake to how the zip code you are born into can limit your opportunities for success, because we recognize that fairness requires not just competition based on merit, but also a level playing field. Yes, we are awake to how the privileged and the powerful within our society are controlling the rest of us, because we want everyone to be able to control their own destiny. Republicans want you to be asleep to how the system works so that you can be more easily controlled.

So yeah, stay woke." Nope, they couldn't say that, because Democrats are not the party of making systemic change because they're conservative. Republicans, on the other hand, being radical, are building something completely new. They're building out new interpretations of the Constitution that say, "actually, yeah, the executive is supposed to be a king." They're building out a new media ecosystem with influencers and content creators that can reach the public more directly.

And while Democrats are stuck in the old diplomatic way of doing politics, Republicans have embraced to the new coercive way of doing politics, including mass deception that's been enabled by that new media ecosystem. To be a real opposition party, you would need to both counter Republican coercion and build something new yourself that speaks to your interest.

If Republicans are trying to say, yeah, the President should be a king, you would need to say no, power is supposed to be with the people, and then would need to work towards a system that is more accountable and more representative of ordinary Americans rather than representing corporate interests.

But that would require Democrats themselves to be held accountable and to be more responsive to the interests of their ordinary voters, which means giving up some of the influence of their wealthy donors. If Republicans are doing campaigns of mass deception through new media, then Democrats would need to do campaigns of mass education through new media, teaching people, how does power actually work? How does the economy work? What's the difference between market freedom and human freedom?

And why does human freedom require social equality? But that would mean that Democrats are teaching us to question their power structure as well, and it would mean they'd have to embrace the two-way street of new media, rather than the establishment media power structure where they talk and we listen. The problem is that conservatism cannot defeat destructive radicalism. The conservative strategy is essentially non-action or very minimal action; decorum, civility.

But civility is an agreement between all parties that will be civil towards each other. If one party is sitting still and being civil and the other party is determined to drag everything to the far right, then everyone gets dragged to the far right. Even if you wanted to stand still, you would have to have a countervailing force that pushes things to the left.

If you have an opponent that's decided to wage war, and you've decided that you're only gonna act in peace, then you don't get peace, you get demolished. Now, that's not to say that conservatives don't have a role in society, they do, but they're actually best as a counterforce to progressives. Progressives who are always trying to push things forward and try something new and experiment and innovate. Conservatives are the ones that say, "Hey, slow down, not so fast.

Let's be cautious." It's like if our society was our little house in the middle of a big wide jungle, the progressive might be wanting to go out and explore and find something new and maybe push us into new territory, but the conservative would wanna stay inside the house and say, "Hey, not so fast. It's a jungle out there. We don't know what's out there. Maybe they're blood thirsty hyenas that are out." Now, that makes sense if there were blood thirsty hyenas outside of the house.

But if the blood thirsty hyenas are inside the house then you've gotta get out. You've gotta push for something new because the current house is not working and hyenas are tearing it apart. Different circumstances call for a different strategy. This is a time to act, not to cling to a false sense of security within a status quo that no longer exists. You can see this conservative approach in the entire Democratic strategy,

which has been, "Hey, don't you like normal? Don't you like the stability of the status quo compared to how scary and dangerous Trump is?" trying to convince people that normalcy is better. You understand why Kamala Harris' campaign started off sounding progressive and talking about freedom for all people and talking about price gouging and picking Tim Walz, and by the end of it, she was running like a female Mitt Romney.

By the time the establishment got their hands on her campaign, they had dragged her into running like a conservative. You understand Elissa Slotkin conservative response to Trump's address to Congress, why she praised Ronald Reagan and not FDR. Why she talked about American exceptionalism and not justice or equality. You understand Chuck Schumer's conservative decision to try to keep the government running as close to normal as possible instead of taking a risk and using the leverage he had.

Schumer believes in the current system. Based on what he said, he actually thinks that the courts could save us, or that we'll have a chance to renegotiate in September, but we know how quickly authoritarians consolidate power. In normal times then maybe you play politics and try to wait for Trump's approval rating to go lower before you step in and play hardball, but these aren't normal times. We're already in something unpredictable and scary.

His only choice was between chaos, where he had leverage and chaos, where he has no leverage. You understand why a OC was denied a leadership role. Sure, she has a huge following, but that's not our established process for seniority. Sure, she's the voice that resonates the most with this moment, but she has to wait her turn. But when change is thrust upon you, you have to adapt in order to survive. You have to be willing to try something new. Now, what does that something new look like?

I think it looks like progressive folks getting together and setting the agenda. Donald Trump and Elon Musk are dismantling our country piece by piece, and so many Democrats seem content to just sit back and let 'em. So I say it's time to drop the excuses and grow a fucking spine. I'm Kat Abughazaleh, and I'm running for Congress in Illinois' Ninth District.

Unfortunately, this party has become one where you have to look to the exceptions for real leadership as the majority work from an outdated playbook. We need a makeover, which means we need a vision that's bigger than what we've been told is possible.

There is absolutely no reason you shouldn't be able to afford housing, groceries, and healthcare with some money left over, families should have free childcare, social security should be expanded, and our inalienable rights shouldn't be dependent on who's in power. That means standing up to authoritarians. Not shrinking away when the fight gets tough. And while current democratic leadership might be fine cowering to Trump, I'm not.

I've spent my entire career reporting on the far right and being attacked by them as a result. In fact, just a few months ago, Elon Musk's lawyers deposed me here in Chicago to ask about my mean tweets. Look, I thought comedy was legal. Again, this is all to say I'm not scared of standing up to these people. I know how they think and I know how to beat them. But my campaign itself is gonna be different too, because I don't wanna wait a year to help people.

We're focused on meeting constituent needs with one simple rule, what if we didn't suck? My campaign and I would rather spend our money on book drives and clothing exchanges and public events than fancy fundraisers for rich donors. I also want my campaign to be as transparent as possible. That's why I'll be posting regular videos about the costs and steps of running for office. We all deserve better. We deserve human rights and financial freedom and a party that stands up to authoritarians.

We deserve to thrive, not just survive. And I plan to fight for those ideals both on the campaign trail and in Congress. If you wanna know more about me and what I believe, you can go to KatForIllinois.com. I do need to mention that campaigns cost money and ask you to contribute what you can, but I promise your donation will not be wasted on old ineffective tactics.

No spammy guilt trip texts, no focus groups to test my views, and no grifty consultants who care more about their paycheck than actually winning. It's time to challenge the status quo, and if our leaders won't do it, we will. I'm Kat Abughazaleh, and I'm running for Congress because it's time for Democrats to do more. I've always embraced the norms and rules of decorum that have governed our democracy for almost 250 years.

And as a Democrat, I believed that even when the other side of the aisle was periodically tossing those norms to the side, we had a responsibility to try and maintain the guardrails of our public discourse. I maintained that posture of decorum through the first two years of my term, which were the last two years of Donald Trump's first term, and I maintained that posture through the entirety of the Covid Pandemic.

Now, I also maintained that posture during the the four years of Joe Biden's presidency. But despite my own experience with this president back in 2019 and 2020 and my own warnings to the public on the campaign trail last year, I hoped that some part of Donald Trump's cruel nature would bow to two and a half centuries of tradition.

For 10 years, ever since Donald Trump descended that ridiculous gold escalator, to announce his entrance into the political world, I hoped that the Republican Party would seek out and find its better angels. Hope is a delicate and wonderful thing, a seed that we should never stop planting, but I won't let hope be a blindfold. And I won't continue to advocate that we wage a conventional political fight when what we really need is to become street fighters.

Now let me be clear that the Trump administration and his Republican lackeys in Congress are looking. To reverse every single victory this community has won over the last 50 years. And right now it's drag queens reading books and transgender people serving in the military, but tomorrow it's your marriage license and your job they want to take. Bending to the whims of a bully will not end his cruelty, it will only embolden him. The response to authoritarianism isn't acquiescence.

Bullies respond to one thing and one thing only, a punch in the face. But you see that starts with fully acknowledging what is happening. The meme lords and the minions in the White House are intentionally breaking the American system of government so they can rebuild it in their own image. They've shut down cancer research and HIV prevention. They've eliminated drinking water and clean air regulations, and upended the lives of veterans.

They've said that a recession that Trump is likely to cause will be worth it, which is an assessment worthy of Trump University. At its core, what Elon Musk and Donald Trump are doing isn't about efficiencies or cost savings, it's about giving their wealthy friends a tax break and making the middle class and veterans and public school kids pay for it. It's a few idiots trying to figure out how to pull off the scam of their lives.

Meanwhile, the scariest part is that they're using the power of the presidency to try to delight their base by targeting vulnerable people, people they think can't fight back. Calling them domestic enemies or claiming they'll ruin American culture. Remember their slogan. Make America Great Again. Authoritarians, target vulnerable minority communities.

First because they think that if they can conquer those that they deem weak, they can show everyone else whose boss, which is why we can't sit back right now and wait to see what happens. If we wait. I guarantee you the battle will have already been lost. Donald Trump cannot take anything from us that we don't choose to give him. He and his henchmen don't want people to realize that, but now is the time for us to wake up.

The good news is, every day I'm seeing more and more people across this country realize that they don't want to give him much at all. The question I get asked most right now is, so what can I do? What can I do? And I'm gonna be blunt about this. Never before in my life have I called for mass activism, but this is the moment. Take to the streets! Protest! Show up at Town Halls! Jam the phone lines in Congress.

(202) 224-3121, and afford not a moment of peace to any elected representatives who are aiding and abetting Musk and Trump's illegal power grab. This is not a drill, folks, this is the real thing. Seize every megaphone you have. Go online and make a donation to the legal funds fighting Trump, to HRC, and to the candidates for Congress that vow to take this country backward. And don't limit your voice to the traditional political channels.

Be like Lucy Welch. When JD Vance went to vacation at the Sugar Bush Resort in Warren, Vermont. Lucy, who writes the Sugar Bush Daily Snow Report, used her report to defend her diverse and wonderful community ending by saying, quote, "I am using my relative platform as a snow reporter to be disruptive. What we do or don't do matters." what we do and don't do matters. It matters right now more than it ever has before.

When my future grandkids look back on this moment, I want them to know that my voice was one of the loudest in the room, screaming for justice and fighting against tyranny. And in the midst of this existential fight, this battle that seems to consume everything, well, let's not take the soul sucking path of sacrificing the most persecuted for that which we de to be most popular.

I know that there are transgender children right now looking out at this world and wondering if anyone is going to stand up for them and for their simple right to exist. Well, I am. We are. We will. I know that amidst the ongoing assault on our institutions, it is easy for people to fall into despair about our democratic system, but I love this country too much not to fight for it. You're here tonight because you do too.

And when I think about that love, I think back to all the times in our history when our ancestors had to fight back against tyrants and racists and those who couldn't understand that freedom and justice are our foundational promises in this country. That small group of people that got together in Chicago to found this country's first known gay rights organization. It was called Society for Human Rights. It was 1924 and the flicker of light was brief.

It only lasted a matter of months before social persecution and criminal prosecution bankrupted the promise of the group's charter. But oh, that flicker ignited something. By whisper and by word of mouth, folks around the country started to catch wind of the idea, and eventually it ended up in the ears of a man here in California who later said the idea of gay people getting together at all was an eyeopener for him.

Well, that man's name was Harry Hay, and a couple of decades later he went on to found the Mattachine Society right here in Los Angeles. It was the first sustained gay rights organization in the United States. Harry said that he was first told about the Chicago group as a warning. That the idea was too dangerous and nobody should try to pull anything off like that ever again. How lucky the world is that Harry didn't listen.

When we say history repeats itself, it's not because the villains and battles don't evolve with the ages, they do, but the fight itself remains elemental. It's always men who would be king, blaming the suffering of the masses on those who look different, or sound different, or live differently.

And since the dawn of time, the triumph of good over evil has relied on those who believe in empathy and kindness, summoning the steel spine needed to defend those values, that by their nature leave us vulnerable to attack. This community knows that. You have lived and breathed this fight for generations. Our hope, our hope, lies in this room. The fact that we are still here today means that we have the faith and courage that we will win the battles that really matter.

Now, when I first ran for governor in 2018, I started every single stump speech by saying, and this will tell you why Donald Trump doesn't like me very much. I said, at the beginning of every stump speech, "everything we care about is under siege. By a racist, misogynist, homophobic, xenophobic, Donald Trump". And I ended every single speech with a question to the crowd, "Are you ready for the fight?" So, here we are again.

Everything we care about is under siege, so I guess I just have one question for all of you tonight. Are you ready for the fight? We've just heard clips starting with All In With Chris Hayes discussing fears of a looming constitutional crisis under Trump. Kat Abughazaleh critiqued the Democratic Party's recent retreat in Loudoun County, Virginia. The Majority Report discussed the internal divisions within the Democratic Party regarding their ideological direction.

Bean Thinking discussed how Republicans have effectively controlled the political narrative by branding themselves as conservative while actually implementing radical changes. Kat Abughazaleh announced her candidacy for Congress in Illinois's Ninth District, emphasizing the need for Democratic leadership to adopt a bold vision.

And JB Pritzker emphasized the importance of fighting against Donald Trump's authoritarianism, urged mass activism to protect the democratic values and vulnerable communities, and invoked historical struggles for justice and equality. And those were just the top takes. There's a lot more in our deeper dive sections.

But first, a reminder that this show is produced with the support of our members who get this show ad free as well as early and ad free access to our freshly launched other show SOLVED!—that's all caps, exclamation point —which features our team of producers discussing a carefully curated selection of articles and ideas to then solve some of the biggest issues of our day In each episode. Members get the podcast of SOLVED!

first each week, but we're also launching it on the Best of the Left YouTube channel where episodes will come out a week later, because we don't wanna keep all of our great ideas hidden behind a paywall indefinitely To support all of the work that goes into both of our shows and have SOLVED! delivered seamlessly to the new members-only podcast feed that you'll receive, sign up to support the show at best of the left.com/support.

There's a link in the show notes, through our Patreon page, or from right inside the Apple Podcast app. And as always, if a regular membership isn't in cards for you, shoot me an email requesting a financial hardship membership because we don't let a lack of funds stand in the way of hearing more information.

Now, if you have a question or would like your comments included in the show are upcoming topics you can chime in on, include the alignment of Christian nationalism with the attack on education, and the realities of the system of techno feudalism we very much seem to be living under. So, get your comments or questions. And now for those topics or anything else. You can leave a voicemail or send us a text at 202-999-3991.

We're also now findable on the privacy focused messaging app Signal at the handle BestOfTheLeft.01 or you can simply email me to [email protected]. Now, as for today, to be honest we don't get many voicemails these days. We used to get a lot. we don't get many anymore, which is why you don't hear me play them. Makes sense. Uh, but we got a heartfelt message in response to the recent episode on trans rights that I wanna share.

Jay, this is David from Gaithersburg calling the, um, last episode in your section five on trans joy and resistance of the, dehumanizing trans people is always the first step for fascists. I was so touched by the young people in that section. It brought me to tears. Jay, your curation is wonderful. Thank you so much. I just wanted to find out more about the kids. I wanted to know what things they wanted to do, what they enjoyed.

Trans is so much of their life, but I hope there's so much more in their life. I wanted to know, do they like tennis? Do they like soccer? Do they like dance? Do they like theater? Do they like reading? Do they like school? Do they like math. Anyway, thank you so much for your curation. Thank you so much for your show. We thank David for that message. It means a lot.

David also sent along a very nice email along with that audio and mentioned that he'd be helping out with the YouTube show, helping juice the algorithm and all that. So we very much appreciate his help with that as well. I said at the top of the show that I was going to share a bit of the newest show SOLVED!, all caps, exclamation point. And this bit I wanna share is currently only available as audio for Best of the Left members, but it will be coming to YouTube soon.

And I mentioned that we've been making music. This is a relatively new idea that came to me, but it has been working out so well that I quickly decided to make it a permanent part of the show. Now, none of us are musicians and we can't afford to hire any. So yes, I am using AI to make the music, but it's much more involved than just typing in a quick prompt.

And rather than explain all the gory details, just know that the song you're about to hear incorporates a huge number of references from the latest episode of SOLVED!, because it's intended to not only be catchy and fun, possibly inspiring, but also to help listeners remember the key points we cover in our discussions.

The main theme of this one is about fighting a wildfire, and this is a metaphor that came from Senator Michael Bennett from a recent town hall meeting where he was attempting to reframe the current moment we're in. He compared the actions of the Trump administration to a wildfire and admitted that our ability to put an immediate stop to their actions is a bit like trying to extinguish a wildfire from behind. You can't do it. It doesn't work.

What you need to do is regroup, rethink, and prepare to build fire breaks. Other references you'll hear include Schumer's pathetic attempt to chant "we will win", Bernie's call for a collective action with his catchphrase "not me, us", emphasis on the need for overwhelming civic action combined with labor and non-labor groups coordinating together, and the long-term vision of Plan 2028, which involves an ambitious strike across industries in 2028.

And requires the building of power right here and now to get ready. Here's the song. In a time of wildfires, set by vengeful hands, The old guard chants "We will win" while the flames expand. The smoke fills the sky, and the air is hard to breathe, We're trapped in the chaos, with no way to leave. Oh, the fire’s raging, tearing through the land, But we’ll build firebreaks together, hand in hand.

It’s not me, it’s us, we’re the ones we’ve been waiting for, United we’ll rise, stronger than ever before. They say drown the government in the bathtub While corporations gum up all the works The poor and working people need a voice But they keep dividing us with false choice They've doused the forest, set it to burn Fiddling with joy while ignoring concern. But we'll hold the line, refuse to fall, Our strength and spirit will outshine it all.

Through unions' strength and civic might, We’ll break their chains and claim our right. It’s not about one, it’s about us all, Together we rise, we’ll answer the call— Oh, the fire’s raging, tearing through the land, But we’ll build firebreaks together, hand in hand. It’s not me, it’s us, we’re the ones we’ve been waiting for, United we’ll rise, stronger than ever before.

Plan 2028, it's a vision, it's a call Align the unions, the people, one movement for us all We’ll come together in strength, with hope to guide the way, And write a new tomorrow, born of what we dream today! Oh, the fire’s raging, tearing through the land! But we’ll build firebreaks together, hand in hand. It’s not me, it’s us, we’re the ones we’ve been waiting for. United we’ll rise, stronger than ever before! There we go. That's pretty good, right?

So that's the kind of stuff that we've been up to over at SOLVED! We are definitely having fun and we are really proud of the work it's taken to get to this point and extremely excited. It's finally ready to launch, so please support our work any way you can. Best of the Left members are currently making it financially possible and they're still getting both this show and SOLVED! ad free, as well as getting  SOLVED! about a week before the video goes out on YouTube.

So consider signing up at best of left.com/support. But in terms of helping get the show to more people, we would love if you would help juice that YouTube algorithm with all the views and likes and comments and subscribes that you can muster. Thanks in advance. And now we'll continue to dive deeper on five topics today. Next up, section A Failures followed by section B, conservatives, section C, energy, section D, pushback to the failures and section E history.

Tell us, uh, broadly the, the brief history of Indivisible and what you guys, uh, do. Yeah. So we started shortly. We started shortly after the, the first Trump election in 2016. Um, look, we, we started both because Trump was promising a, a heinous agenda, and also because there was a, a vacuum at the leadership level of the Democratic party folks not recognizing that they needed to fight back. So people all, all over the country were saying, gosh, what do we do? What do we do?

And my, my, uh, co-founder and spouse, Leah, we are former congressional staffers, we saw the. Impact of the Tea Party. We disagreed with their radiology. We disagreed with their violence. We disagreed with their bigotry, but we saw them organized successfully locally. And we said, gosh, that's what we need. We need people organizing locally to push their elected officials, fracture the MAGA Coalition and help Democrats find their spines.

And that's what we've been doing over the last eight years. Uh, well, I mean, there's also, we need some more work, right? Like here, and I know that, uh, Chuck Schumer is gonna come up in a second, but why don't you go ahead, Sam, and then I'll ask about that. Well, uh, part of that wa uh, spine stiffening, uh, started, uh, it seems to me, um, several weeks ago in which at that time, um, we heard, uh, minority leader in the house, Hakeem Jeffries.

And, uh, I remember one particular article, uh, Richie Torres, uh, Congressman, uh, from, is it The Bronx here? Um, uh, were very upset that people felt like they weren't doing enough. And I wonder how much of a coincidence is it that we saw them coalesce around and take what is a pretty bold step? I mean, at least. In the great scheme of things over the past couple of decades, the Democrats voting against the continuing resolution like they did in the house a week ago.

I. I don't think it's a coincidence. I think one of the, one of the features of grassroots organizing and pressure campaigns like we do is very rarely will the target of your pressure admit, okay, it worked. I've shifted positions because you pushed me. Congratulations, you've won. No, usually it pans out this way. Pans out this way. First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you. Then you win and they adopt your position.

So what we saw in the house was a historic level all around the country of grassroots movement building bigger than we've seen since 2017. What they were looking for were for Democrats to start fighting back and they were calling and showing up at the congressional district offices and showing up at the town halls of Democratic members saying, Hey, we'll have your back, but you gotta fight for us. You gotta fight for us. And it was slow going initially.

Initially they were ignoring and initially they were pushing back. But look. I've been plenty critical of Hakeem Jeffries over the last few months. He whipped his caucus into shape. They held firm on this, and we should be praising them to the rooftops for doing that. And I do think that's a direct result of organizing all around the country. Uh, is there a different challenge with the Senate?

Is it the fact that, I mean, Hakeem Jeffries was in part, able to keep his caucus together because everybody's up for reelection in two years, and they might be concerned about a primary challenge even soon, uh, closer or sooner than that. And you know, when you look at the votes in the Senate, uh, and who caved on this, on this, uh, on this dirty continuing resolution, these are all people who are far away from, uh, their reelection effort or retiring. I. Oh, obviously of, of course.

Look, the senate's a different body. It's not a majoritarian institution. They actually had leverage, unlike the house, the house, you know, it's a majoritarian institution. The Republicans had it. They were able to pass the bill with their own votes, the Senate, not the case. They needed 60 votes to pass this. And I think, I mean, your, your point out something real here it is. No coincidence.

That every single one of the 10 Democrats in the Senate who happen to vote for this bill, they happen to not be up for election next year. They just happen to just be the folks who have a few more years to build up their reputation. Again, that's not an accident. I guarantee you there are a lot of other Senate Democrats who would've voted for this if they needed to, but they didn't want to face the pressure from the base. So I think your point is something real here, but the basic idea.

Of local organized grassroots pressure works the same in the Senate as it does the house. It just works on a different timescale. Uh, let gi give me your sense, um, and I wanna get to, you know, obviously you've been, uh, critical and, uh, it's been reported that, uh, Schumer in, um, what appears to be an ongoing and frankly, um. Degrading, I guess not just degrading personally to him, but literally the exercise itself seems to be falling apart, uh, as the further it gets out.

Uh, sort of like a, an apology tour or a rationale tour. But before we get to that aspect of it, what do you think happened? Because it's quite clear now that we have Nancy Pelosi coming out that when Hakeem Jeffries was asked, do you think it's time for new leadership in the, uh, in the Senate? He said, next question. Uh, a OC when she released a statement suggested that the, the, the house members were blindsided. Do you have a sense of a TikTok?

I. Of what happened to Chuck Schumer's decision making? Was there any type of strategy involved? I mean, what's your sense of this? Oh, yeah. Look, we were deeply involved. We were working with members, uh, of the House Caucus and with, uh, Senate Democrats as well. Behind the scenes. I will say there were a lot of folks in the Senate Democratic Caucus who wanted to fight back and about five or six weeks before this. Came to a head, uh, in mid-March.

We put out a call and we said, look, Democrats should be planning a flag right now. They should be saying, we are not gonna give Elon Musk a blank check. If Republicans want our votes, they should put in some safeguards against Musk's rating of the Treasury and the rest of the federal government. And if Republicans refuse to agree to that, Democrats should say, fine. We will agree to a short term. Clean funding bill to open up negotiation again.

That was the plan that we put forward, and it's actually the plan that House Democrats embraced That is indeed what they embraced to their credit. Here's what I really think, real talk, what actually happened in the Senate. I think Chuck Schumer misjudged the Republicans. I think he thought they were going to fail to get their bill through in, uh, in the house, and he thought therefore, democratic votes were going to be necessary in just a different way.

So he wanted to cave, but he wanted to cave for a long-term clean cr. That's my guess. That is my guess. Then Republicans managed to pass the bill on their own through the house, and he was presented. With this new reality, and instead of updating his position and caving just for a clean, long-term cr, he caved for a Republican funding bill. That's my best guess. It was bad judgment at the outset, and then he did not update his thinking when the facts on the ground changed.

What was the point of the DEI bonanza in 2020 and now what is the point of its destruction five years later? And so I think on some level it's obvious that corporations like Apple, Amazon, soul Foods embraced these varying initiatives around DEI to basically get out of the way of the ire of protests. I think it's important to always remember that these were historic protests in 2020, what the New York Times estimated to be upwards of 26 million people in the streets.

And so, you know, there was an obvious effort as there was in the 1960s. What they called it then was socioeconomic capitalism. Capitalism with a conscience. These were efforts to avoid boycotts, to avoid protest and to make it seem as if the largest corporations in America were on the side of, uh, black people. Um, some went even, uh, further in ways that you could see how there was also a realization that DEI could be profitable for them. JP Morgan Chase.

One of the reasons why they have continued with their DEI initiatives, despite the pressure to jettison them, is because mostly that these are loans that they agreed to make. They agreed to expand their, you know, low income home ownership portfolio. And so, uh, I think the 50 largest corporations in the United States made $50 billion in pledges to do a variety of DI diversity initiatives. So that was obviously one manifestation of the DEI bonanza, but that wasn't all of it.

You know, I mean, most of the efforts have been centered around workplace culture, how to create what they describe as a more equitable workplace. And, you know, I mean, that is where some of the kind of conflicting. Issues. I think with DEI are legitimate and raise I important issues and questions that we shouldn't kind of avoid, uh, talking about. But I think sometimes what gets lost is that this is in reaction to real issues, right?

This is in reaction to real, uh, uh, racism in the workforce and on college campuses, which is one of the reasons why I think that given the relentless assault on these kinds of initiatives, they're actually not unpopular, right? If you look at Gallup APU polling adults in the United States, a majority of whom support businesses having diversity initiatives. And so I think that that all has to be a part.

The discussion, real racism, that these are in reaction to, just like affirmative action, uh, was a real response to real racism, um, in society and workplaces on college campuses. Do they go far enough? No, but there are plenty of reforms that exist within our society that don't go far enough, that we don't say. Thus, you should jettison them. Roe v Wade didn't go far enough. No one, you know, on the left with any credibility.

It was celebrating its demise because it didn't go far enough and, you know, drove a wedge between men and women, um, in the working class. I mean, it's a ridiculous premise. So, you know, I'll just, I'll, I'll say that to open things up. There's more to say about it, but I think the context is important.

I'll just add one thing to kind of underscore the last point Cange just made, you know, I think the, the argument that DEI, that anti-racist, that, you know, social justice policies in the workplace are suspicious because they don't go far enough, just strikes me as a particularly disingenuous kind of argument. Um, for, for exactly the reason Kanga just said, right? Like, no one says that that dental, you know, right.

No one in any part of the left thinks that the working class is a 5% raise away from dismantling capitalism, right? We fight for things that are less than the full society we want because we value those things, whether it's, you know, dental, whether it's, uh, pay raise, whether it's better benefits, and whether it's. Having less racism at work. And those are all just things that are independently valuable and that we should not confuse with the total victory of the class war.

But there's no reason to think that we should replace the total victory of the class war with any of those things.

Yeah. I would just want to add, I think a real, a real puzzle is why is it that this bundle of things that are actually so completely different from from each other have come to have this powerful force in our society politically, you know, everything from cancel culture to race, prioritizing hiring and college admissions, to sensitivity training, to even, you know, watching a com commercial and seeing somebody that appears queer to you and thinking, Ooh, that's woke.

Like how, how is it that all these things in our society have come to have this political salience when we can obviously recognize that they're of all sorts of different sorts? Right. And I, I think, I think it's important to keep in mind the, the role of liberalism and the Democrats in this story. To me, a key, a key part of the rise of anti wokeness is precisely the emptiness of liberalism and its own reaction.

To those movements and protests that Ang, um, was mentioning that sparked off in 2020. There's a really fascinating book. It's written by a, a Japanese Marxist named Saka, June, it's called the Japanese Ideology, published in 1935. June was basically the grump she of Japan. He was imprisoned, uh, under a fascist uh, regime. He died because of his treatment in prison. But he wrote this book and basically he argues that liberalism, it has basically three forms.

It has an economic form, a political form, and a cultural form. The economic and political are basically about sort of, you know, freeness from the state, political or freeness in the, in the economy. And when economic liberalism doesn't have legitimacy or salience, it can sometimes persist in its cultural form. And its cultural form is all about sentimentality and kind of empty ideas about the individual's freeness to identify themselves.

What's interesting about this book and why I think it's actually relevant to this discussion is that after, um, the protests kicked off the response and the way they were integrated into political discourse, I. By the Democrats and by liberals was in a de classed and a, uh, defanged way that presented them as simply a sort of free expression of people's individuality and their own I and, and their own identity.

And I think this, this kind of empty space, this empty reaction that liberalism had to Black Lives Matter created the context for the right to kind of subvert it and to turn this into like a politically salient and powerful issue in politics. It was, it was precisely that emptiness of the Democrats in their response to Black Lives Matter that created the grounds for the right to sort of repurpose this.

And so I, I think we really need to think serious about like, why is it that wokeness is even a thing? Like why, why can somebody say that? And, and, and we can kind of associate that with this bundle of very different sorts of things. And I think, again, we gotta, we have to tie that in some way to the failure of liberalism. It's not just that the Democrats got in line in order to pass this and once more.

I wanna remind everybody during the Biden presidency, I told you over and over again, they, everyone was like, oh, it's Joe Manchin. It's Ki Sinema. Those were the two people that were chosen to carry that load because they were going to be politically safe because of it. The Democrats are always going to wheel somebody in in order to. Pass these votes in order to make things run, because the Democratic party is loyal to two things.

One is their billionaire donors in the market that they represent, and two is making sure that they're the party that keeps this government working, even if it's authoritarian. The second part of this, and, and this is what really enrages me, Nick, there was no strategy here. There was no negotiation whatsoever. Schumer didn't get anything. He didn't get a single damn thing from this.

He was more than happy to roll over and show the Republican party, his belly, and we have to talk about the fallout from this. It wasn't just Schumer doing this. It wasn't just Schumer saying, we're gonna find a place where we have more leverage immediately after, because it's Chuck Schumer. He then went on to give an interview. Why Nick? Because he has a book coming out. Got it. He had a book tour that he wanted to go on, so he gives an interview with the New York Times.

And in this interview, just a few choice highlights, Nick, the this is it's, it's like picking up a greatest Hits album. You wanna listen to some Neil Young hits. Put it on. We got Old man, we've got the needle, we've got it all. Let's just roll. He reiterates his belief that Republicans will eventually come around and work with the Democrats. He comes around and says that the Democrats. We're on the right track now. We just need better social media.

He blames Columbia for Trump going after Columbia during the whole anti-Semitic bullshit thing. He then refuses to de defend Mahmud Khalil. He won't voice criticism of Eric Adams or Andrew Cuomo.

This was the quintessential Chuck Schumer interview that we saw in order to try and get his book tour back on track, which has been canceled because he is loathed and reviled and if he went to a single one of those book, book tour, uh, appointments, he would have been roundly booed out of the place and chase down the street.

Nick. Not only is it that he failed, not only is it he that he capitulated and collaborated, not only is it that he couldn't even come up with something decent to say about it. Chuck Schumer remains completely and utterly confident in everything that Chuck Schumer does. Yeah, I, I, I mean, again, it, it, I'm getting tired of saying it, but it's been five years. I think we should go back and find out exactly when we started calling for him to step down.

Um, it's just, it's, it's over for him at this point. Uh, and do you think is parenthetical to this, do you think that a OC is going to try and primary him? Well, I'll tell you this. I have been talking with some of the people I know within Democratic politics. This has resulted in one screaming match and breakdown after another behind closed doors. The Democratic Party is in complete and utter disarray. You have members who are pissed off, particularly in the house because they did their part.

They said no to this thing, and they expected their, uh, their Senate. Colleagues to do their part. So many people right now are talking about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, either primary, and this would be in 2028 for the record. Either primary Chuck Schumer for his Senate seat or running for president. And you're not gonna do both. You kind of gotta choose one or the other. But what we are seeing is that there is a revolt within the party.

There's one main issue here, Nick, and it's something that you and I have talked about, uh, over and over again when it came to Schumer and Pelosi. Schumer has his position because he's the most effective at bundling fundraising. That's it. Keeping democratic donors in line. Again, the biggest problem for the Democratic party in their minds. It isn't alienating the base. Everyone's pissed off. By the way, a new poll, Nick came out from NBC news.

You, you wanna take a guess at the, uh, the approval rating for the Democratic Party right now? 20%. 27%. Oh, and I'm shocked that it's that high. A historic low. 65% of people say that they actually wanna see some fight out of the Democrats, the Democratic Party, the leadership, including Chuck Schumer, they're not worried about those numbers. They're not worried about small donations. They're worried about the big dollar donors at this point.

So the question is, can they exercise Chuck Schumer out of leadership? Can they exercise him out of his office while maintaining those donors? And do you know what my answer is to that? Who gives a fuck? Yeah, who gives a flying fuck? Get him outta there. This cannot go on. Here's the answer for you on that. One is, uh, who raised more money? Uh, Harris or Trump? I. A Harris and by an order of magnitude. Who won the race.

Yep. So why do you think that these big donors are so important at this point? Right? If it's not gonna be about spending outspending your, uh, opponents and win a race, then let's not, let's put that aside and figure out how to get people back on your side. 'cause again, that's what they don't seem to acknowledge. This is not even just like we're fighting the good fight. We're maintaining our, the sheen of keeping the government running.

You now need to go back and, and, and get defectors from the Democratic party back on your side, and you have to go back and have town halls and listen to the people. I I was almost trying to think what would the solution also be on a local level because they don't control the federal stuff anymore. Um, they need to be able to figure out ways they get wins on the local level of, you know, uh, things being built that create jobs.

And they can have events around that, that bring constituents there. And they can also have q and As and they can. You know what I mean? You can kind of bring people together to celebrate something and then expose yourself to be able to listen to what they wanna say, what what they have to say, and then do that part, right. And not do what the DOP is doing on their town halls. You know what I mean?

I feel like that's the new level they have to get back to on boots in the ground, real, um, folksy stuff, because if they don't, then these, this, the low ratings are gonna translate into maybe not even people switching to the Republican party, but certainly not voting at all. I think it's an important point that you make about the fact that the Democrats are simply not willing to move left even if there are electoral gains to be got through through that.

Because some commentary that you see on on the Democrats is couched in terms of their incompetence. You know that they're useless. They dunno what they're doing. But, but we've, we've seen that they can, in certain circumstances, marshal their forces, be very effective, defeat their opponents.

And, you know, a a case in point would be the defeat of Bernie Sanders during his attempts to, uh, get the, the nomination and, you know, the mud that was thrown, you know, the sort of Bernie bro stuff, attempting to portray, uh, Sanders voters regardless in fact of who they were as motivated by chauvinism. Going back to some of your writing on this topic.

I dunno if you saw this, but in a recent article in the Financial Times, Jemiah Kelley had an article on the Democrats in which she wrote that there are tentative signs of change. I. California Governor Gavin Newsom considered a likely candidate for the Democratic nomination in 2028. This week launched his own podcast promising to invite guests he deeply disagrees with.

Now, in a recent article for The Intercept, you took quite a different position on Newsom's new initiative, particularly regarding the debut episode of his show in which he interviewed. Charlie Kirk, the co-founder of Turning Point USA, A Republican party activist, a man who's propagated anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and has spread various falsehoods about the COVID-19 pandemic and electoral fraud, and, and has made many straightforwardly racist statements as well.

I. Can you talk a bit about that conversation between, uh, between Newsom and Kirk and how it's perhaps indicative of the kinds of conclusions that you described that many Democrat politicians seem to have reached about how they can improve their electoral fortunes? I. Yes. So California Governor Gavin Newsom, who, uh, turns out has actually two podcasts running now and I think a TV show.

So really curious who's, um, bothering to run California, you know, within six months of some of the most devastating wildfires the state has ever seen, um, as the federal budget gets hacked away. So, uh, clearly Gavin should maybe get off the mic, but he is, yes. I mean, every day there's a new reason to be ashamed of being a podcaster, I should say. It's literally the worst industry. No, being a governor is the worst industry.

Um, but, uh, Gavin Newsom, uh, is yes, very much setting himself up, it seems, and he's not being particularly shy about it. For a 2028 run. The way in which he's doing it is in this, this mode of turning to the right, this classic gesture reaching across. To find middle ground, but what it does is just say hello. This extremely far right force are fine, normal, and set. What the middle is, and we've seen this in Gavin Newsom's podcast.

I think he's now had three episodes since the first Charlie Kirk won. The second was with Steve Bannon the the very man who helped advocate for, for the sort of Trumpian disposition of politics and mode of politics known as flood the Zone with shit, which with receiving in such aggressive doses right now from Trump and Musk and what Gavin is doing, and I'm calling him Gavin because I feel disrespectful is sitting and nodding along with these characters and you know, raising.

Mely mouth kind of challenges at a couple of points, but, but really in e, extremely weak ways, not calling out what are essentially. Fascistic, harmful, discriminatory, violent wealth, interested hyper capitalist, techno capitalist interests of this group of people.

It is just this sort of performance of getting along at the very moment that the Republican administration, that these people have been influential in propagating ideas for, in supporting in agitating to the right of ripping apart the very. Means by which a parliamentary force could challenge them in opposition in the first place. So this is Newsom digging his own grave. So what did they talk about?

They talked about the election and when they talked about the election, Newsom congratulated the Trump campaign for going so, so viciously after Harris for alleged support of, of trans people. The example they brought up was when Harris was, um, attorney General in California. She was just following a legal case that said, under the constitutional protections against torture in prison, trans prisoners are like other prisoners.

Required to receive adequate healthcare, and that includes by all scientific consensus, gender affirming healthcare. So yeah, when Harris was top prosecutor in California and, um, it was affirmed as law under the constitution that trans prisoners are, you know, required to have adequate healthcare. This was then used by the Trump campaign as a. You know, Harris for, they them, Trump for you. This was a highly successful campaign. Sure. And the Democrats failed to combat it.

They failed to demystify, they failed to challenge in exactly the same way that when the Trump campaign runs on fearmongering around migrant crime and America's incapacity to take in and care for millions more people, which it well can work it to have different economic policy. The Republicans Fearmonger and instead of demystifying and doing their job as political leaders, Democrats cater towards. So this is what we've seen Newsom do throughout his podcast episodes since he started them.

He also nod only nodded along with Kirk and congratulated them on their devious campaign. He said he completely agreed with Kirk about trans women in sports. Despite the fact that school districts, local authorities, state authorities, municipalities have been managing and dealing absolutely fine with transgender youth in sports for many, many years until this became a AstroTurf, completely fabricated Republican issue.

And now you have the governor of California who has always celebrated himself as an LGBTQ plus, um, champion when it came to things like gay marriage is jumping, going out of his way to agree with a man who has made his life about rolling back. Civil rights protections.

So, you know, it's, it's, it's a strategy and you know, it's one of those ones that even if it works, what a grim, miserable, cruel, and mean state of politics, it is to win on that kind of acquiescence as opposed to building an actual anti-fascist counterforce. To take on the ways in which the Republicans are decimating rights, lives, capacities for living, modes of flourishing. So yeah, it's, it's, it's grim and disappointing, but also not surprising.

Trump is the logical extension of the Democrats own policies over many decades. I mean, when, when, uh, Carter came in, he was chosen when the US government was in a state of collapse, and people worked at that time in mid seventies talking about the empire being in decline, and people thought it was on the way out, but of course, that was premature.

Uh, Carter came in as a, a handpicked democratic candidate who had no connection to labor, unlike earlier post World War II Democratic candidates, actually since Roosevelt. Then you had Bill Clinton in the nineties who adopted Ronald Reagan's program. He said, we're gonna end big government. We're gonna end welfare as we know it. They eliminated 10 million people from. Uh, public support overnight. 7 million of them were children.

Uh, it was who, uh, implemented the, the NAFTA agreement, uh, which was really codifying neoliberal policies, allowing jobs to be crushed inside the United States so that capitalist corporations in the United States could make super profits by exploiting low wage labor, uh, out outside the United States.

That was the beginning of the era of so-called free trade, which is a stand-in term for basically corporate looting, plundering, and pillaging, or what we now call in a vernacular term that's not fully understood, but it's neoliberalism. Mm-hmm. The Democrats did all that, uh, when, when George W. Bush wanted to go to war against Iraq based on lies, and everybody knew it was lies. The Democrats went along with it when, uh, Bush, uh.

Sort of rounded up all of those Muslim and Arab and South Asian people. After nine 11, the Democrats went along with it. Uh, in the last years, right before Trump came into office, 25 million people in the United States working class folks lost Medicaid coverage. That was under Biden. It was under Biden that the, uh, that the $300 a month per child for families, that was initiated as a covid relief, uh, program.

A, a program that, by the way, Eli, uh, reduced childhood poverty by 50% in one year by giving, uh, families $300 per child. Uh, Biden got rid of that. So childhood poverty went up again by it doubled, and that showed that childhood poverty was a po. Uh. A policy choice by the Biden administration. So doing all of these things and then waging war, unnecessary, relentless proxy war in Ukraine, uh, and, and banging the door, the, the war drums against China.

None of that is popular for the people in the United States. So it's inevitable not to mention the feeble quality of the candidates themselves, but their policies are antithetical to the needs and interests of the working class in the United States. That's why they failed and that's why Trump won. Absolutely. Could not have said it better.

And um, and so when you, when we hear Democrats and and supporters of the Democratic Party talk about them being the opposition party resistance, we have to stop fascism. We have to understand that they're completely complicit in this entire process. That ends us right exactly where we are. And socialist, Marxist communists have been pointing at this out for as long as I've been politically conscious that this is where this whole thing was going to. To end up and sure enough we're here.

You mentioned that you mentioned neoliberalism, and I think this, this gives rise to a very interesting question. Um, somebody like, um, verif AKIs for example, talks about tech no feudalism, and I have quips with that because there certainly, there's no shift in the mode of production. This is still capitalism, but maybe it's helpful to think about capitalism or US capitalism entering a new phase. Maybe it's not. So how do you think about this?

Is this an acceleration of neoliberalism or would we, can we start to see the outlines of like sort of a new phase of, of capitalist rule? Well, I think it's definitely a new phase. I mean, you, when you think about the revolution in computer technology and electronics, uh, and in transportation, that allowed the capitalist basically to set up enterprises anywhere in the world. Uh, and, and basically export, uh, factories.

The, the means of production outside the Metropolitan centers, outside, say the United States, where millions of manufacturing jobs were lost during this three decade period. And those, uh, factories were taken overseas and the capitalists could make shirts in Bangladesh and sell them back in the United States for like $8 and still be making super profits.

So the technology itself, uh, allowed capital to spread to all corners of the planet, uh, and, and to do it in search of maximum super profits. And so that had the effect of eviscerating, uh, working class communities and the working class writ large inside the United States, for instance, but also inside the other major advanced capitalist countries. They were less devastated in Europe because there was a, a wider social insurance net.

That provides basic things that people have there that Americans could only dream of. So, um, this is a new stage and a new phase, but it's, it's still capitalism. It's still driven by the same sort of basic principle of capital, which is to seek maximum profit. It's only that the place maximum profit could be derived was for, for in the case of the United States, largely overseas.

Um, then you had as a, as a consequence really of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the socialist camp, the ability of US banks and western banks to impose.

Strict austerity programs on most of the formerly colonized or semi colonized parts of the world, under what was called by the IMF structural Adjustment, whereby basically emerging anti-colonial countries or countries whose existence was due to the anti-colonial project after World War II basically sold their water systems, their sewage systems, their electrical systems, their natural resources, um, to the highest bidder.

Or in some cases it was even the lowest bidder if the, if the bidder had a lot of state power behind it, which was certainly the case for American corporations. Hmm. So we saw a sort of a redistribution of the way production takes place and the way, uh, distribution of goods takes place, but still under the domination of the US capitalist ruling class. So a kind of a new cruelty.

Based on their ability to maximize, maximize profits by creating a globalized sort of system of production and distribution. But when I think of globalization, I, I think about Christopher Columbus, um, 1492, the discovery, so-called by European Capital of the Americas. That was, uh, the beginning of real globalization.

And then when we go through the introduction of other technologies, the compass, for instance, whereby people could navigate the Seven Cs or other technologies, which under a socialist system could be emancipatory, were used by capital to bring, uh, European capital to, to grab workers, kidnap them, enslave them in Africa, and bring them to a third country or a third location, north America.

For massive plantation or South America for that matter, massive plantation labor for a global capitalist market. So there, there have been these different stages and phases of capitalism. The, the problem isn't really neoliberalism per se. The problem is that, uh, the ruling class, this tiny clique of billionaires, and they're not all billionaires, but they're very rich. Mm-hmm. Uh, they have a, a stranglehold over the resources.

They decide where oil will be pumped or if it should be pumped, what should be mined. They, they, they now in the United States own, it's not just in Latin America, in the third world, they own many of the water systems. They decide if you haven't paid your water bill or your electric bill or your, your gas bill, whether they can shut off water or heat or lights to your family. So it's. It's the same, the problem is the same, although we are in a different stage of capitalist production.

Now entering Section B conservatives. If Trump is as so many Democrat politicians say he is a fascist and a unique threat to American democracy. How do you account for this persistent asymmetry where the Republicans are ever more comfortable casting their opponents as illegitimate actors whilst the Democrats refuse to change their approach? I think it's slightly different for certain, certain different Democratic figures, but it's a deep faith in institutions.

This idea that that the institutions must be upheld through the practices and norms and conventions of civility, and that through upholding those practices required or expected of those institutions, the institutions will obtain, the institutions will protect and defend. That's a kind of basic, almost generous read of Democratic Center's delusion because obviously like a, an institution can, can hold and do extraordinary harm. Look at the state of the Supreme Court right now. It is a, a right.

Destroying machine and yet this rights destroying machine forged by Republican will, and in many cases, democratic incompetence and line faith in institutions serving them will be the thing we now have to rely upon to take some of the most crucial cases around Trump's executive orders. They will end up in this supreme court and you know, that is the sort of institution Democrats are trying to put all their. Faith in and, and all their eggs in that kind of basket.

I think there's also a, a less generous read is that, you know, I think a number of these people on the edge of retirement, um, on the edge of the end of their lives don't give a shit and are not willing to fight and would rather play politics as usual. Yeah. I don't think this is a political class of, of. People who are invested in change. I mean, that shouldn't be controversial to say at all.

They've pushed off change in many, many ways, and there are a lot of sites of agreement, whether they came about by virtue of ill thought political strategizing to lean to some. Imagined right wing, potentially democratic voting, Liz Cheney loving figure, or whether it is a genuine conservatism within the Democrats, which is very much a party of conservation. The result is the same. You have a party very much committed to refusing to move the political needle, the economic.

Terrain, the economic status quo in a way that shifts the conditions of possibility for the sort of right ring evangelism that we've seen refusing to make people's lives consistently better and refusing to reorient the political economy of this country. I. And when that in turn creates a mass of deeply resentful people who can be weaponized by a very well organized Republican party without any scribbles at all, you don't need Democrats.

Appealing to institutions and the a rule of law that doesn't seem to hold much sway in the eyes of those in actual power. You know, we've seen this just now, Chuck Schumer in the Senate and 10 other Democrats voted to allow Trump's continuing resolution budget. To go through as opposed to letting there be a government shutdown. Chuck Schumer's logic is, oh, you know, the, the, what they really want is a government shutdown. That's chaos.

What we must do is keep going and let their budget pass to avoid. Chaos. So we choose their chaos budget that we know for sure hands extraordinary power of the purse to Trump and Musk. Um, and this is the sort of Democrats we have. We have democratic leadership going against many even surprising figures in the Democratic party. Not just the AOCs and the Sanders, but even people like Rosa Delario in the house saying, we, we should not let them have this budget. We should not pass this.

And then you have. Chuck Schumer, Fetterman, Senator Gillibrand 10 Democrat Senators to allow this vote to go through and for this budget legislation to pass. And it brings me no joy to say it, but there just quite simply is not a large liberal to left united front against Trump's agenda. I mean, I hope I'm wrong, but I don't see a massive sea change in Democrats away from this moderation above all, continue as we work, continue to genuflect to the right.

It's desperate that that changes, but I don't see it on the horizon. Perhaps this is naive, but I suppose one reason, I guess why there might have been some reason to suppose there would be a shift away from this obsession with civility is that Donald Trump is obviously such a personally vindictive character and, and, and we see, you know, an ever greater radicalization of the Republican Right. To the point where, you know.

Elite Democrat figures may have reason to not fear for their personal safety ne necessarily, but perhaps fear for some of their financial assets that clearly Trump is open to a bit of, you know, a bit of law and and so on. And I guess the other thought that occurs is it can be quite easy to think that the Republicans casting the Democrats as illist act as is a phenomenon just of the, of the Trump era.

But of course, I mean, this goes right back to at least to new Gingrich and the attempt to impeach. Bill Clinton. And then of course we had the birtherism thing during Obama's presidency. So it's not as if the Democrats haven't had a long time to, you know, to, to change course and re rethink this. Um, I'm not, I'm not sure I really have a question there, but, yeah.

No, but I, I, I see you say, and we've seen an articulation of what the Democrats think they're doing in the best possible of ways in these moments, and that's, you know, when Michelle Obama said, when they go low, we go high, which I think is obviously a, a terrible way. To take on a serious political opposition that is putting millions of livelihoods and thousands of lives, hundreds of thousands of lives and lives around the world, and an entire climate at extreme risk.

That is, it's very generous to say that they truly believe that this sort of moral high ground is the way to win. And I think, uh, I don't think we should be that generous. Um, I think more of the problem is that there are too many actual sites of agreement. There are too, no actual continuities. Between democratic policy and Republican policy over the last 30 years, obviously I, I think Trump is making moves around governance control, executive power that are absolutely extraordinary.

But you know, this is an exacerbation of focus on a border regime. That was the rule of launder. Clinton, Bush, Obama. Biden and you know Trump won, and again, Trump two. This is a deep continuity, violent Islamophobia and anti Palestinian racism and state tools of repression. The most extraordinary oppression from rendition, extraordinary rendition, deportation, jailing.

Expulsion harassment, surveillance all built up since the War on terror and given license by Biden in his opposition to any sort of Palestinian solidarity movement opening the door for Trump's violent actions now for the sort of deportation regime we are seeing now. There's a way in which the Democrats claim to civility is all a smokescreen in in terms of policy. Even the collapse from Biden's Build Back Better, which was a more robust investment infrastructure plan.

I. And its inability to pass a very conservative, even democratic led house and Congress when you had figures like Senator Manchin and cinema voting No on public welfare and investments. You know, you've got a Democratic party that's been very willing to pass very brutal, cruel, and support very brutal, cruel and anti-social laws. So civility has always been like a li a limited and very unpleasant, I think smokescreen.

Know, I'd rather they be deeply uncivil and actually fought for a greater good. But that would be, this is not a shift in the Democratic party, as you say. This is a, a continuity, and it's all, it's really just a matter of style. In substance there's been nothing more kind of civil, in the broader sense of the world of like towards civilians, towards a, a civic society. You could hardly say that's a badge of, of democratic politics.

We have to understand how we got here and simply blaming Republicans is not a strategy. It's not the American people, particularly the Democratic party's base. They're sick and tired of the hypocrisy in politics. They're sick and tired of the hypocrisy among Democrats as well. And until we change the Democratic party and our republic will continue to fall, and we must name the culprits, the culprits are corporate Democrats. That's the obstructionism that we need to overcome.

So let's start with some basic facts on what Democrats actually believe. More than 90% of Democrats believe climate change is real, and it's caused by human activity, particularly by big oil companies like Exxon. Not a controversial statement to make. More than 90% of Democrats believe climate change is real. More than 90% of Democrats believe civil rights are sacred and should never be compromised for corporate profits. Like if you're a Democrat, tell me if you disagree.

Are civil rights sacred? Yes or no? Okay, good. We agree they are so, they shouldn't be compromised. More than 90% of Democrats believe banks should be regulated and taxpayers should stop bailing out major corporations when they run amuck and try to destroy our economy. Let those banks fail. Stop using taxpayer money to bail out billionaires. Not a controversial statement to make. More than 90% of Democrats believe that corporate money has no place in politics.

In fact, more than 90% of Americans believe that we want politicians to be funded by people, not by corporate or super pacs. Again, not a controversial statement to make more than 70%. Some say 80% of Democrats believe that healthcare is a human right and they want to join every developed nation on earth to ensure guaranteed universal healthcare. More than 70% of Democrats believe in an end to the arms trade causing global conflict.

In fact, 77% wanted the Biden administration to stop arming Netanyahu. And while this is not an exhaustive list, each of these are wildly popular policies among democratic voters that every democratic politicians should support it. So when I talk about this, it's not theory. This is reality, and I wanna provide in these last eight or nine minutes a clear case study of one corporate Democrat who if I didn't tell you he was a Democrat, I promise you you would think he's a Republican.

That question earlier, while a Democrat sell better than every Republican, keep that question in mind as I describe this corporate Democrat, because the thing is he's not alone. Too many corporate Democrats follow this model. It is an unsustainable model. These saboteurs are complicit in the collapse of our republic because they betray the Democratic party principles.

They side with Maggard Republic in their critical moments, and they give Republicans covered a claim that they're cruel and sometimes fascist. Yes, fascist policies have bipartisan support. So as I list out these receipts, I want you to consider why we tolerate such politicians in our party.

How as politicians are the cause of the distrust voters have with the Democratic party, and how much longer will we tolerate them before demanding they leave the party altogether, resign from their seats, retire, and just kind of go off into the sunset? So in our case study, I present to you Congressman Bill Foster, a corporate funded multimillionaire politician who is on the wrong side of every one of these issues I mentioned earlier.

Whose actively worked with Republicans to undermine our basic civil rights and human rights for corporate profit. Foster, who I think turned 70 this year, people like him aren't, is a problem for the Democratic Party. Their policies are a threat to our democracy, and it does not hyperbole. It's a factual observation of his eight terms in Congress. Maybe it's nine terms.

His voting record, his financial ties, his outright refusal to stand for core Democratic party principles reveals a really harsh truth. He's effectively a Republican hiding behind a blue label. But again, here are the receipts. Don't take my word for it. For example, more than 70% of Democrats believe healthcare is the human right fosters voting. Record doesn't now credit were due. He voted for the Affordable Care Act back in 2009. Good on you, bill.

Then he took about a half million dollars from big health and Big Pharma, and since then he's voted at least three times with Republicans to gut the a CA. He voted for HR 33 50, which rescinds the protection for people with pre-existing conditions. He voted for HR 35 22, which uh, would've rescinded the ban on charging women more than men for healthcare. He rescinded, he voted to, uh, uh, pass HR 1190, which would've rescinded a protection on seniors.

Had these bills that Bill Foster supported passed, it would've meant that people like my, my own daughter, for example, who has an incurable disease that is fatal, if not treated, that is a preexisting condition, it would've meant that she would be denied care and foster opposes guaranteed healthcare. He calls it unrealistic, even though every developed nation on earth has it. To him, it's unrealistic. Oh, and his beloved donors include United Health.

Yeah. The Luigi Manji United Health, same company caught using AI to deny. 90% of Medicare claims were senior citizens, took their money, never returned it, never apologized, continues to cash their checks proudly. Is this who we want representing the Democratic party? Let's talk about climate justice. 'cause folks are like, well, bill Foster's a scientist if you don't know this about him. He's a PhD scientist. He is a physicist. He brags about his PhD degree all the time.

You would think it's tattooed to his forehead. You can't talk to him for more than five seconds without him reminding you that he's a physicist. Good on you, bill. But here's my problem with Bill and his physics degree. His voting records says otherwise he votes with Republicans to expand offshore drilling during a climate crisis. He supports fracking during the climate crisis.

He supports the junk science of carbon cap capture the same trash that Exxon Big Oil used to justify continuing pollution. And speaking of Exxon, guess who proudly donates to Bill Foster And guess who proudly takes their money? That's right. Bill Foster is happily funded to the tune of thousands of dollars from Exxon, and we are in a climate catastrophe. California is on fire every year.

Bill Foster is too busy counting Exxon's dollar bills in his campaign account notice, and the thing is, it's scientists like Foster that give climate destruction a stamp of approval because it lets corporations like Exxon say, Hey, what do you mean we're doing something wrong? Bill Foster, the scientist supports us. He's complicit in climate disaster. Let's talk about the arms trade foreign policy. Democrats want an end. To the arms tree, they want an end to perpetual war.

77% wanted to stop arming Netanyahu. Bill Foster happily takes money from defense contractors and pro pro war packs, happily fund a Netanyahu and voted for more arms for him to commit genocide and Gaza happily refuse to even condemn the genocide or call for a ceasefire or uphold the US Lehi laws or uphold international human rights law if he can't stand up against war crimes.

When the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice confirmed these are war crimes, what does he actually stand for? Rebecca, I'm telling you, his betrayal of international human rights translates to his betrayal of domestic civil rights. Foster is one of the lead abusers of civil rights in this country, and I have the receipts to back it up. The Americans With Disabilities Act was passed in 1990 as a landmark piece of legislation.

To protect people with disabilities, to protect disabled Americans from abuse, to ensure they had accessibility under Trump. HR six 20 was proposed to make it more difficult for people with disabilities to sue if they were discriminated against more difficult. Bill Foster not only voted for HR six 20, he co-sponsored it under a Trump regime. He chose to co-sponsor this cruel Bill Republicans in hopes that Donald Trump would sign it into law. Yes, apparently to Bill Foster.

Disabled Americans have too much power in this country, and Bill Foster decided, you know what? You disabled Americans have way too much power. We're gonna knock you down a size. This is the cruelty of this man. He voted to extend the Patriot Act to continue mass surveillance on the American people. Even now, he's been silent on the arbitrary arrest of Mamud Klio. It's disgusting.

This is the man who is representing Democrats in Congress, a person who wants more government surveillance, a person who wants less rights for disabled Americans. And by the way, he co-sponsor that bill after taking thousands of dollars from a lobbyist organization working on behalf of. Corporations and businesses who are sick and tired of having to be accountable to disabled Americans. This is the kind of person that this Bill Foster corporate Democrat is.

So when you say, well, isn't it better to vote for a corporate Democrat over a Republican? My question to you is, what's the difference? With respect to the State of the Union. Holy hell, that was embarrassing. I wish other countries could not see this shit. Republicans looked absolutely blood thirsty and manic in their fey to this creep, and the Democrats looked bewildered. They keep playing into his kabuki theater. The tiny pre-made little signs, are you serious?

Only Bernie kept it real by storming out at the end and telling reporters follow me because he was giving the real response as usual. He hit all the high notes, Medicare for all. Blowing the cap on social security to preserve the trust and perpetuity, making the rich pay their share, and increasing retirement benefits to seniors. Building housing on federal land to house the homeless. Continuing to center climate change in our minds as we move forward. Progressive taxation and so on.

It was all classic Bernie, with a few tweaks. It's kind of the foundation of our plan. There are a million other things that we can do once we take back this country and show these charlatans for who they really are. Instead of getting behind the most popular politician in the country who just happens to caucus with the Democrats, they trotted out Alyssa Slotkin of Michigan to give the official response. And here's what we got.

I'm gonna give you the highlights of her speech in bullet point form, and uh, I'll link the transcript in the notes so that you can read it for yourself and I'll editorialize as we go here. So here are the points that she made in order. She was in New York on nine 11. She joined the CIA, and then the military mentions how George Bush and Barack Obama both believed in this country, said, we need to stop losing jobs to China. Okay. Need to lower prices and get better jobs.

The tariffs are bad, the national debt is too big. National security is of paramount importance, and we need to secure the border. Reagan, by the way, was a better Republican than President Trump. We're a nation of innovators and risk takers, and that we as Democrats should get engaged, do something other than doom scroll. How about this? Go fuck yourself. We don't need her hawkish Republican light bonafides. Don't give a shit that you are in the CIA. In fact, I hate that.

And keep George Bush and Ronald Reagan's names out your fucking mouth. Don't say healthcare costs are too high, unless you're talking about Medicare for All. And hitting on national security, national debt, securing the border that were risk takers and innovators. Are you fucking kidding me? How are we still leading with Republican talking points? This is how Kamala Harris just lost. We litigated this already. Even David fucking Brooks of all people was like, maybe Bernie was right all along.

I mean, you can't be fucking serious. Now, for those who say it's a pendulum, it'll swing back. It won't. Why would they destroy the economy on purpose? They say, first of all, why do you think they're all building fucking spaceships and designing chips to put in their brains? They're ready to piece out of this planet and they think they're gonna live forever.

And seriously, they don't care about you or the economy or economic theory, taxes, regulation, competition, whether anyone will even be able to buy anything. And I know this is the hardest thing to understand, right? If they light it all on fire, won't they also go up in flames? Well, no. Actually, no. That's not how it works. Not for them. Again, we don't have to guess at this shit. They wrote it all down.

The period of time in history that they covet the most is the second industrial revolution. The mid 19th century is their Roman empire, as the kids say. All the trappings of a futile society in the beginning stages of industrialization, the haves and the havenots. Please read your dickens. Read hard times. Read Jacob Reese, and how the other half lives. They don't want one economy, they want two. One for you to service the one for them.

See, they don't need all of you, just the ones that will help them and they're not gonna part with the penny to get there. What do you think the AI revolution is really about? Think about the hundreds of billions of dollars being spent. You got people like Larry Ellison out there telling you, listen, leave it alone. They're gonna cure cancer with all this money and research. And sure, that might be part of it. That's the moonshot, I guess. Right?

But if they destroy the healthcare system, then who the fuck is gonna have access to all these miracle cures from technology once they have them? Don't you see the vast majority of the money is going into labor replacing technology that is you. They're trying to fire you. The guy they hired to run things got famous for the catchphrase. You're fired. So if they live in gated communities with armed guards and service people who take care of them, they don't need an economy that works for you.

They know this because mansions were built in the mid 19th century. People had servants. They didn't pay income taxes. This country was theirs. That's the American dream in their minds. That's why they're working so hard and so fast right now to dismantle everything, and I mean everything. They want there to be nothing left to build by the time the Democrats get back into office. See, they're not even trying to prevent Democrats from getting there. They know that they're gonna get there.

They just want everything to be fubar when they do. So does that mean we're screwed even if we win the midterms? Yes and no. See, they're gonna drive the economy into the toilet and people are gonna be fucking pissed. But we can't just take back a few seats and push that old pendulum back. We need to crush them in the midterms.

We need to wipe 'em out in the house for sure, but we also have to send Susan Collins, Tom Tillis, John Usted, Ashley Moody, Joni Ernst, Roger Marshall, Steve Daines, John Cornyn, and Lindsey Graham packing. We need to make things impossible for Donald Trump and show a blue wave across the country that gives the house impeachment power and the Senate the ability to eliminate the filibuster and stand up to the oval office. I mean, make this guy's life a living nightmare.

Bill after Bill across his desk that helps the American people, let him veto them and then mock his giant veto signature that overcompensates for his tiny little hands. The way to get to Trump isn't to refute him, it's to mock him and then beat him at his own game. He can't handle it. Democrats have to play hardball for once in their political lives and be like, Bernie, not Chuck.

I. It's our job now to show up at Democratic Town Halls and demand they get rid of this Alyssa Slotkin bullshit and run on Medicare for all, housing First and Civilian Labor Corps. Then once you're back in control, you can await further instructions from us, the people who put you there. You wrote a column about how Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer did the right thing by not letting the government shut down the floor Is yours. Why was that the right move?

Well, because what were the other options? I mean, people, you know, they, they, they want Democrats to fight. I. And a shutdown would've been an opportunity for a fight. But I didn't see any of Schumer's opponents actually walking through what would happen next and providing a convincing story of why that fight would produce a better policy outcome for Democrats.

I think, in fact, Schumer has a strong argument that would've produced a worse outcome, which is to say if you shut down the government. You hand the president a lot more authority to decide what operations of the government to keep open, which ones to close. 'cause much of the government is supposed to close when the government is shut down. Things that are essential keep operating, and there's supposed to be some sort of objective standard for that.

But in practice, the president can basically say, this is essential. This is not essential. All this stuff that Doge has been trying to close and is getting tied up with in the courts, he could just close those things and furlough the people and try to build exactly the government he wants with only the things he cares about, continuing to operate. And because he'd have that power, he also has no particular incentive to want the government to reopen once it is closed. I mean, PE-people forget.

Donald Trump did the longest government shutdown in history 35 days, 2018 into 2019, basically just for funsies. And that was even before he had Elon Musk there and was really actually trying to dismantle the government. So if you, if you want the government to shut down, which has been their effort since day one of this administration, being handed a government shutdown is actually helpful for that. Meanwhile.

Democrats, if the government is shut down, muddy the water about whose fault everything is. I mean, you know, you have the president seemingly trying to induce a recession in the United States pursuing this unpopular trade war. You're seeing the stock market tank and you're seeing a growing realization that the stuff is, is his fault.

And so then if you have this shutdown, then it makes it easier for Republicans to raise questions about, you know, whose fault is all of this dysfunction in Washington? You, you don't want to get in the way of your opponent when he is making a mistake and forcing a shutdown here would've done that. Yeah, I, I think.

What we heard from some house Democrats was that passing this funding bill would give Trump and Elon Musk carte blanche to keep dismantling the government because the measure contained no protections for existing spending. But as, as you were saying, from Schumer and others in the Senate, we heard that shutting down the government would help Trump and Musk keep doing what they're doing. So. House Democrats are pissed in lack of a better term. Why do you think that they are wrong?

Like what, what is going wrong in their logic about this? Well, so I think there's a couple of things going on here. You know, the, the, the flexibility that the president has because we're will be operating under this continuing resolution, is the same flexibility that Presidents have from other continuing resolutions. It would be good to have a full year proper appropriations bill that would set more restrictions, but we didn't have those in place a week ago.

I think there's also something that's a little bit cheap politically where house Democrats are able to vote no on this and say they did their part to block it and then blame the Senate. Uh, and so, you know, the, when people in the Democratic base are angry and they are very angry, getting them also joining in the chorus, people who are mad at Chuck Schumer insulates them from, from political attack over this.

I thought it was very interesting, the other nine Democrats who joined Chuck Schumer in voting for cloture. 'cause it was not a very ideologically cohesive group of people. You had some moderates, but you also had, for example, Brian Shatz, the, the senator from Hawaii who's pretty progressive. He's widely rumored to want to be majority leader in the future.

And I think that was him showing, you know, I'm ready to take tough votes that are unpopular, but in the interest of the party in the long run. And then the third reason I think they're angry is that I think, you know, while I think Chuck Schumer did the right thing in the end, he didn't telegraph it very clearly. No, he did not. No, he basically, uh. You know, on Wednesday he came out and said Republicans didn't have the votes to pass the spending plan.

And then on Thursday he says he's gonna vote for it. And I think, honestly, I think that that's part of why Democrats are so mad. I mean, there are lots of reasons why we're gonna get to that. There was a lot of mixed messaging. Do you think that was a failure on Schumer's part? Well, I, I think on Wednesday there was a failure. I think, you know, up until Tuesday when this passed the House Democrat's strategy was, Republicans are incompetent.

They cannot line up their very narrow majority together to agree on shared priorities, and Republicans would've to come crawling to Democrats to say, we have to do a bipartisan bill because we're too incompetent to do our own party line bill. And in fairness to them, this, this has happened a lot over the last few years. Republicans have had terrible problems with cohesion. The problem is once. The, the thing passed the house on Tuesday, Democrats were just screwed.

They had no, you know, the, and this is what happens when you lose elections or it's ordinarily what happens when you lose elections. I think people have sort of forgotten because the Republican party has been so dysfunctional for so many years, they've forgotten that normally when you lose the election and the other party is in power, they pass their agenda. And that's a problem for you. And it, and it sucks. Like I, I, I get why Democrats are mad. It sucks to lose elections.

Um, it especially sucks to lose elections and then have the party that won. Get its shit together and figure out how to actually do things that especially sucks. So like I get that it's an unfortunate situation, but the only thing to do about that, I mean there's two.

One thing is that, you know, some of the things the administration is doing are illegal, and that's a matter for the courts, but ultimately the political win where you become able to block stuff through Congress, you have to win the majority back in the midterms next year. And Democrats I think will work very hard to do that. But the problem is that. Those elections aren't until next year and Republicans run things for the next 22 months. Yeah, I think that there are two separate issues here.

There's the micro issue of this cr, which sucks, but there weren't that many options. Right? And then there's kind of the macro issue of people are furious and they're furious at Congressional Democrats. And Congressional Democrats are desperate for a way to push back against Trump, or at least be seen as pushing back against Trump. And that's what you see from the house. And I think that for many people.

I mean, you're hearing from pe, people are talking tea party in a way that I haven't seen Democrats talk in a really long time. And the government funding plan, I think for some people was like the first real tangible piece of leverage that they had. So if not this, then what I. I think it's really funny when I see people talking about, you know, Democrats need our own tea party. I think they should look a little bit about how the Tea Party worked and what it did to the Republican party.

You know, you know, from start in 2009, 2010, when that movement starts, the Tea Party has over many election cycles saddled the Republican party with. Unelectable candidates. You have these revolts in Republican primaries insisting that you have to nominate these quote unquote ideologically pure fighter people.

And then they lose general elections to Democrats, even in places like Missouri and Indiana because they, you know, they forced the party into nominating, unappealing candidates and then they lose. The Tea Party also created this dynamic. In the Republican conference, in the house especially, and to a lesser extent in the Senate where you have these people who define themselves by, I fight, I fight, I am obstinate. I do not cooperate.

And that led to this dynamic that that persisted basically up until this month where republicans could not get their ducks in a row, could not agree on a partisan agenda, and actually pass it through the house where they nominally had a majority. And that empowered Democrats, so.

If you wanna rebuild that on the Democratic side, if you want to go lose general elections, if you wanna nominate presidential candidates and saddle them with platforms that will cause them to lose the presidential election. If you want to not be able to have an effective Congressional majority, then go ahead.

Many of you will have seen Representative Al Green, Democrat of Texas being removed from the chamber when he disrupted President Donald Trump's joint address to Congress after he stood up, shook his cane at the President and accused him of lacking a mandate. Many of you will have cheered Al Green's protest of a president who speaks and acts like an authoritarian. But not 10 of his house Democratic colleagues who voted with all House Republicans to censure Congressman Green for his behavior.

When I saw one of those 10, Congressman , Democrat of Connecticut, talking about the importance of decorum and civility, I tweeted, we are 10 years into the Trump era. Over a month into Trump term two, we watched a speech in which Trump castigated Dems as radical left lunatics. And use the racist jibe against the Democratic Senator.

And this Democratic representative, Jim Hymes, is still talking about demo decorum and civility, really, really, to which the congressman responded, really, really champions for what is good and right, cannot win by suggesting that what is good and right can be compromised just because the other side does it. That's crappy moral reasoning. And how you lose politically decorah may not matter much, but what is right does, let's continue that debate in person.

I appreciate Congressman Jim Hines joining me now here, uh, in the studio with me to continue, I hope our good faith disagreement about the best way to approach, uh, Donald Trump and his authoritarian administration. Um, in your own words. Congressman, why did you vote to censor your colleague Al Green for doing something a lot of grassroots dems are glad he did? Yeah. Yeah. And by the way, you can be glad he did it. Uh, and I'm sort of ambivalent on that. Okay. And also vote to censure. Why?

Okay. And that may actually be the way I feel about it. Why it's not really about decorum, incivility. I put that in my tweet. Decorum. Incivility are important parts of a functional system. And yeah, I think we should be a little careful about the political aspects of casting aside decorum and civility. But what this is really about is the rules. Now I get this all the time, and as you might imagine, the last 72 hours, I've gotten it a lot. Yeah. Don't follow the rules. Do not follow the rules.

Well, so then I ask, um, activists who take that approach, what rules shall I not follow? Shall I stop following the rules against violence? Can I, can I now lie regularly? Because all of the rules are suspended? And I ask those questions to make the point that when we start talking about breaking the rules, we have to be enormously careful. And we have over a century structured a way in which we break the rules and we feel good about it. This is the tradition of civil disobedience.

And of course this was constructed by people like Moham Gandhi, Martin Luther King, who said two things I. An unjust rule can be righteously and in fact should be righteously broken. Now whether the house procedures are unjust rules, we'll set that aside. And then this thing, two part, and this is the nodding to the importance of rules and the concepts of the rules as the thing that stop us from chaos.

You can break an unjust rule and then you happily accept the circumstances, which by the way, is where Al Green was. Yeah. He said, I'm gonna get in the way and I expect there to be consequences. And on Twitter, he put the resolution and he said, guilty.

So as a principle of reasoning, and this is why I talked about crappy moral reasoning, you can't say, and it's completely inconsistent with the tradition of civil disobedience to say you should break the rules, but seek to evade the consequences. So just to finish this thought, so why does Jim Himes vote for it? Because I voted for the censure, um, of Joe Wilson when he shouted at President Obama. So now I get asked by a, let's, let's, let's sort of transition this to a little bit of politics.

I get asked by an unaffiliated voter who isn't very online. Wait, you voted to chastise Joe Wilson, and then you didn't vote In the case of Al Green. In a world where everybody thinks that politicians have no principle and believe. That it's okay when our side does it. That's a bad message to send. So cut. You said a lot there. A lot of interesting points, fair points. Just on one of them. Even if you accept the consequences of what you do.

The Republicans could have all voted to censor him and he could have accepted this cons. He didn't need 10 Democrats to join him. To use your analogy of Moham, Gandhi, of the Mahatma, you know, he accepted the consequences of the British punishing him, but his own side didn't punish him too. The question is, is punishment righteous? And you can say, no, it's not. Which is by which is inconsistent with the traditional understanding of civil disobedience.

And you can be angry at me for participating in that, which is a bit odd if you believe that the punishment is righteous. But what you can't do is to say, we get. The one half of civil disobedience breaking the rules, but we're gonna seek to evade the other half. Why? Again, you're absolutely right. I have thought about this a lot. Um, I could have voted no, and I could have constructed an argument that would've been about what is right and true.

The people who visited my workplace on January 6th with the intent to stop a procedure to get in the way of the operations of the Congress, horrible, horrible thing. In that moment, they and their supporters believed that they were righteous. So you can't simply rely on your own belief of righteousness. To say, I'm going to break the rules and I'm not going to accept the consequence. I wanna push back and say, you kind of can, because it sounds like you're a little bit both sides in this, right?

The people who came to Congress violently to interrupt a illegal proceeding were breaking the law and doing immoral, dishonest things, right? Whatever they believed in their heads, and many of them who knows what they believed in their heads, that is not the same thing as a congressman standing up against a president who is being authoritarian is violating the Constitution from day one. Um, and taking what you said, you, you even began the interview saying, I kind of admired what he did.

Uh, in a sense it was a good thing maybe that he did it. So I'm not sure. I, I get this argument of saying if they do it, it doesn't mean we should do it. And this is gonna sound very partisan, but, but when they do it, it's wrong. And maybe in this case it's right. Yeah. But, um, Medi, the whole concept of a society under law. Yeah. Is that you and me and no one else. Not the young man. He didn't break any laws. Uh, people on January 6th. Broke laws. What I understand what law understand.

I understand. Rules. Rules, decor rules. I mean, Shannon, no, no, no, no, no. Let's just go back to decor. One second. 'cause you gave a very long answer at the beginning. You just bypassed the decorum. Yeah. You did bring up decor. I did civility. In your original remarks. I did, I did. Shannon Watts, who's a gun control activist, you may know her founder of Mom's Demand Action. She had this viral post, she said, democracy dies in decorum. Kind of riff on the post Democracy dies in darkness.

She's right, isn't she? Democracy's on the line. And people like you're talking about decorum. I think there's a lot of ways to fight. Righteous battles. Think of the civil rights movement. Um, Malcolm X was part of that. Stokely Carmichael. Fairly radical, right? Um, Martin Luther King criticized by radicals for being way too accommodating and moderate. You know, who else was important?

John F. Kennedy. And Lyndon Baines Johnson, I, I think it's a mistake to get into the question of, do you wanna be John F. Kennedy, or do you wanna be Malcolm X? All of those elements are really important, but I am gonna, and I'm going to acknowledge that focusing on decorum is the wrong thing to do. I probably should have said the rules, and I'm gonna acknowledge that rules and laws are different, but.

They are alike in the way that if we are to live in a society of laws and rules, we have to take off the table that I can break a rule or a law simply because I have strong conviction. This is why a young man murders the CEO of United Healthcare. He had strong conviction. This is why to bring up another potentially sore topic. Too many people seek to justify. The extremely aggressive, brutal war on Gaza Because of the horridness Yeah. Of the murder of 1200 Israeli.

But those are, those are, those are killings and crimes. We could disagree. Al Green saying the president has no mandate, is not in the same moral or political universe. You've reached Section C Energy. When Alexandria was a kid, you correct me if I'm wrong, she cleaned, uh, houses with her mom in order to make enough money for the family to survive. And then after she graduated college, she was a barista, working paycheck to paycheck.

But what she did as she looked around her and in her community in the Bronx, New York, is she saw that change had to come. And so what she did is decided to run for Congress and people said, what are you kidding? The guy who represents the district was one of the most powerful members of Congress. He had access to unlimited kinds of money. How much money did you have when we started? You started None. None. Alright. But she put, she did what Real politics is about.

Real politics is not sitting at million dollar fundraisers. Yes, it's working with people in your community and she worked hard and her friends worked hard and she pulled off and major upset. And since then she has been a great member of Congress. But not only that. She has been an inspiration to millions of young people all across this country. Now, the reason I say all of that is not just to praise Alexandra and I love her, but is to tell you and the people of America.

That what Alexandria did, you can do. There are millions of young people out there who love this country. Who are disgusted with what they are seeing, who are prepared to get involved in the political process. So Alexandria, thank you for being that inspiration. I think this is one of the more important moments to come out of these town halls is this message to the audience. Because these people that are, there are ones that are, that want to be more politically engaged if they aren't already.

And having a OC there as an example of what you can do, I think is, uh, a great way to, um, to message to these people who want to be more involved and understand that, hey, you could be a bartender and you could take down someone like Joe Crowley. One of the most important, or I should say powerful Democrats at the time. In Congress take, you can take him down if you have an actual connection to your community and you actually are willing to fight for people.

So it's a great message We have heard quite a bit from the Democratic caucus admonishing their own. And how they choose to object to Donald Trump. I'm a son of the segregated south. The rights that were enshrined in the Constitution for me, my friends and neighbors denied me. I had to go to the back door and drink from a colored water fountain, sit in the back of the bus, and I had relatives who were locked up in the bottom of the jail.

Uh, I, I have acclimated to this kind of behavior, but quite candidly, it is a double standard. And it is a form of invidious discrimination, but I, I was prepared to suffer whatever the consequences are when I decided that I would engage in this peaceful protest. I never used any sort of a profanity. I never made any threats. I merely said, you do not have a mandate, and this is true. Is there another. Pardon me. Is there another extension of this?

Does, does your moment end up serving as a distraction to when your party seems to be struggling to exercise a real cohesive approach here? I believe what I did puts a focus on Medicaid. I believe that this may be the means by which we can prevent Medicaid from being cut, because I think it would be difficult now for them to move forward to cut it. Given that we have brought this to the attention of the public, I don't see it as a distraction. I see it as a positive action to protect Medicaid.

Now, I would like to, uh, reassert my feelings that rolling over and playing dead does not a strategy make. So if you aren't as outraged. By seeing the rampant corruption that we have seen just on the course of the last couple of months, and seeing our democracy not only in decline, but in actual peril. If you are not as upset as I am, then what are you doing in Congress?

We also, we also knew that it was only a matter of time before those more vocal members let their feelings be known and we know who that was going to be. It's really bad because not only are we enduring something we've never experienced before, as we came up on the State of the Union address, we started to look through history and figure out what does one do when a dictator is coming through.

Like, I mean, like, we were trying to figure out like what are the options and, um, it is true that we are in a time that we've never seen before. This actually reminds me of a tweet that I saw this week that said, we have no protections in our constitution and in the way our, um, elect our, uh, democracy is constructed. We have absolutely no protections against apathy. We have all of these checks and balances in place.

But if people don't see fit to stand and do their duty to protect those checks and balances as set forth in the constitution. Everybody has had that one job where you knew the supervisor that wasn't going to enforce the rules. You, you know what I mean? You, the, the rules don't really work when you have the supervisor that, that doesn't enforce the rules. And by the way, shout out to Jerry 'cause I wouldn't have made it through my early twenties without you. All those, all those days.

I came in late smelling like mad dog. But when it comes to our constitution, the stakes are a little different. We have someone that does not believe in co-equal branches of government. And then we have people that are party to those other co-equal branches that have decided that they would seed their constitutional oath and responsibilities, um, to kneel to, I don't even know if it's Trump. Right? Like, it, it feels as if Elon.

It is really like running everything and, and Trump is just hanging out, um, signing whatever executive order somebody puts in front of him and when he is not doing that, he's just posted up in Mayor Lago. Um, you know, playing golf. And what she just did in, in combining Elon Musk and, and Donald Trump is obviously a sensible thing to do when you see two people together more than most. Middle-aged couples like that, that's, that just, that just makes all the sense in the world.

But it's also why I have the bit of energy that I take towards the, the magos that have found out recently. Because even in their finding out, even in the find out stage, as we saw with the farmers, as we see with federal workers, they will find a way to separate Donald Trump. From Elon Musk. Now, one of the reasons that you used to.

To elevate Donald Trump over Kamala Harris when it came to their, their candidacy for president was that you needed a strong man, was that you need somebody that can stand up to, uh, the, the leaders on, on the world stage and and advocate for America. But you are perfectly fine for Elon Musk putting him in his pocket and leading him around by his ear to the point that you absolve Donald Trump of all accountability for the litany of things you object to Musk and Doge engaging in, that's insane.

Elon hasn't seen all the waste 'cause we've, you know, spent a whopping more than $10 million already. On Trump and golfing and Mar-a-Lago, I'm sure there's a few things we could do with that $10 million that would be more productive. Um, and what's most concerning to me, and it's why I am so happy that I'm specifically here with this platform, is that there is not only an attack on us as Americans, and when I say us, it's not Democrats.

I specifically say us as Americans because there were those that really thought that Donald Trump was gonna make their lives better. And they went out and voted for him because of that. Right. Right. But right now they're like, well, wait a minute. Veterans are being fired and you know what's gonna happen to the va? Because they're talking about they wanna get rid of 80,000 jobs at the va. And if you know anything about the va, people been telling us more and more is needed. Not less.

Not less, less. Right. Yeah. Um, or the people that don't understand that when you're looking at something like the Consumer Protection Bureau, that they actually have. Fees that they charge, and a lot of those fees go to take care of a lot of the salaries. Like there are no savings really that we will see by firing people. But I can tell you that by firing people and with costs going up that a recession is upon us. We do town halls all the time.

I haven’t had a town hall in the last couple of weeks. We had a big telephone town hall, which we had 8,000 people on. I had a Spanish telephone town hall that had 11,000 people on. And we’re having some in person town halls here in the weeks ahead. So town halls are important, and everyone should be doing them, especially, Republicans who are now choosing not to.

But beside those, by the way, whether it’s the telephone town halls where I’m shopping at the grocery store, not one single person has come up to me and said, oh, by the way, you should lay back a little bit or be bipartisan or you should find common ground. No one has mentioned that to me. Everyone says, fight harder or thank you for taking on Elon Musk or please keep calling out Donald Trump whenever you can. Continue to be more aggressive or be even more aggressive.

That’s what people are saying, and I know that that’s what people are hearing. My other colleagues, by the way, are all hearing the same thing. People want people want us to be aggressive and tough.

Okay. I’m just going to make the argument on the other side, not that I believe it, but just to present it because I think it’s got some substance to it, which is the argument on the other side is this is precisely the problem that the Democrats have been captured by the part of their electorate that are the kind of people that vote in special elections, the kind of people that consume a lot of news, the kind of people who are totally locked in. That’s the core democratic constituency.

It’s a constituency that went overwhelmingly for Harris, but precisely the reason that Harris lost the election is people who are the most checked out went for Trump. And so if you allow yourself to listen to that most in tune group, you will be alienated from the marginal folks that you need the most. That’s the argument. Yeah. I don’t buy that. I mean, look, I think first, we have to always excite the base.

I mean, the base is something that I think we oftentimes don’t do a good enough job exciting, by the way. The reliable Democratic voter. Obviously, we’ve got to do that. We’ve got to do that by being tough taking on Donald Trump and do and being good Democrats. All the folks that I believe we actually have to reach in the election, those voters are casual voters. We don’t do a good job of actually reaching them because they’re not watching, like me or you.

They’re not watching MSNBC or CNN or the cable news all the time. They’re not reading the “New York Times.” What they’re doing though is they’re watching maybe their favorite YouTube show or pop culture or they’re invested in entertainment media, and those are the spaces where Republicans have learned to reach that casual voter. We can win those casual voters, but we’re not going to win those casual voters by just doing politics as usual.

I think we’re going to win them by trying to get their attention by being a little bigger, a little bit more in different types of spaces, and bringing those folks in and winning the argument. Now can we actually persuade them when we have their attention? I think that’s something that we’re going to find out. I’m hopeful that we can. I think we have the right people to do it. I guess the thing I’m sort of working through is, like, okay. So we agree it’s not normal.

We know that Democrats are sort of locked out of power. So here’s my take on where things are, which is that elected Democrats are just not that important to this moment. That’s my feeling. My feeling is that, like, for all the people that say, like, what are the Democrats doing, and I have Democrats on my show. I’m interviewing you right now. What matters is mass public opinion in civil society. That’s really what matters. And public opinion probably more than anything.

A world in which Donald Trump’s approval rating is 30%, a world in which frontline members are like, really looking down the barrel is a better world for the outcomes it produces than the world we’re in now in which its approval rating is 45%. Like, I’m using these numbers, they’re just sort of rough estimates, but public committee matters. And the most important thing to do right now is to move public opinion against the person attempting an authoritarian end to the democratic project.

I mean, that is a hundred percent. And I also think that that’s where elected officials or people with some megaphone -- Yeah. -- have a responsibility to bring him down, right? So, look, there’s two ways we’re going to actually start winning. I think one is, the issues are going to actually impact Donald Trump, right? His approval rating is going to be impacted by what? When he makes these cuts to Medicaid and people actually feel it.

When tariffs actually raise prices, people are going to feel that. When eggs don’t come down and when people are going to the grocery store, those things are going to impact Donald Trump’s approval and bring him down and certainly keep at a minimum, it’s not going to let him go above where he’s at right now, and you can see his numbers continue to go down. What else is going to bring those numbers even lower?

Is those folks that have, particularly those that have big megaphones, Hakeem Jeffries, Alexandria. Now, folks that are coming up like Jasmine, other people that can actually take the mic and amplify a message of bringing Trump down and bringing truth the way he’s actually doing. He’s cutting Medicaid. He’s after Social Security. They’re trying to cut programs in your in your public school. That will also impact Trump, and it’s going to be amplified not just by a few of us, but by all of us.

And so, where the Democratic caucus comes in? I agree with you. First, it’s events that are happening on the ground, his policies will impact his members the most. But where we can actually have an impact is to every single day is talk about in as many spaces as we can -- Yes. -- and not just traditional media, what the hell Donald Trump is doing and its impact to your family. That’s what we’ve got to do. This is Section D, pushback to the failures.

After 2020 Nevada caucuses, 'cause we were still in the caucus system at that point, uh, we actually were able to organize. And win big for Bernie in 2020 here in Nevada. Um, a lot of people don't realize that, but, but Bernie actually won Nevada in 2020 and that was because the organizing, the huge organizing effort we did on the ground. Um, in past, in past election, the past events starting in 2016, a lot of times we were unable to build on that momentum.

But after 2020, we decided we had to do something to keep people organized. So the way we did that was to actually get all of his delegates, which was over 5,000 delegates to attend the state central committee meeting. Right. And so by doing that and by getting them enrolled in the state central committee, we were able to. Affect the elections of the inner party Democratic party workings here in Nevada. But that took a lot of effort.

I mean, organizing 5,000 people right, and saying has a big effort and, and getting them to understand the value of working. Toward that goal of taking over the Democratic party, and we were successful in, uh, 2020 through 2023, um, in controlling the party and making sure that the, that we conducted everything above board. Transparently and that we were able to get young, progressive candidates elected to our state legislature. That was a big deal. Right?

Um, and that wouldn't have happened without that. Uh, because the structures, there's so much dark money even in our Democratic primaries, as. So much dark money that that's what we're always fighting against. And that's why we need people to organize around candidates and to get these people elected. Like the energy here today was amazing. Yeah. But what do we do next? Well, that's my, Judith, that's my question for you.

Um, so in, in response to progressives, the, the more establishment side, just for lack of a better word. They weren't okay with you guys having control of the wheels. My, so my next question is that is how deeply did that affect the Harris outcome in the state? Because it was a very thin margin that Donald Trump won by. Right. So. All of that ugliness spilled over in the Democratic party elections, the Nevada Democratic Party elections.

And you know, they actually worked to make sure that progressives were disenfranchised from the party. And that young people, a lot of young people were disenfranchised from the party. So when that happens, guess what? You wasn't with razor thin margins in your elections, like Senator Rosen barely pulled it out and we lost Nevada. We lost the governor's race and we lost the President. So that's a big deal. It's a really big deal in a swing state that for the last few cycles, swung blue.

Then all of a sudden, you know, vote for Trump. That means you're, you're doing something wrong as a party. And I think that the Democratic party needs to take a hard look. And how they're doing business. You know, I do think that's part of it. The Republicans win by simply suppressing the progressive vote, don't they? So if, if the Democratic party appeals to its more corporate. Arm. Right?

And they talk about putting, you know, not, not, I'm not talking about reaching out to grassroots Republican voters that are angry right now about Elon Musk and hurting financially. We're talking about those individuals. Some of those even guys even support Medicare for all. Right?

Yeah. We're talking about the corporate interests, the big moneyed interests we're talking about, you know, that sort of thing where, where these two parties agree on that level, but if, if, if that is what's placated and not this. Then it's enough to suppress progress progresses from coming out because the progressives are like, I, I'm not gonna be down with somebody that's anti-trans or racist. That's not what I'm here for.

It's almost like Bernie made this, this, the divide isn't, is the divide, isn't this, it's this. What are your thoughts on that? Deeper than that though, because the machine, the corporate machine actually runs the Democratic party. It's not being run by individuals. It's being run by consultants and lobbyists. That are part of that machine. So there's a lot of people at the top still making a ton of money whether we win or lose.

And that's what, that's what we've gotta get past that cycle of corruption, right? Like we, when we have democratic primaries, people should feel that they have the right to elect their own candidate, not have that choice taken away from them by dark money that comes in and says, okay, we're clearing the field. Only this candidate can run because this candidate has pledged loyalty to them.

The machine, that's what has to stop, and then people will start to feel like they're franchised again to vote. Right now, non-partisan voters make up the majority of the electorate in Nevada. People can't forget that the Democratic Party has disenfranchised all those voters. And they're not doing anything to recoup those losses. Like, why aren't we reaching out to Nonpartisans? Why aren't we reaching out to small business owners? I mean, isn't just about corporate right in, in the state.

There are a lot of small business owners that the Democratic Party should be engaged with and supporting as well as our unions. There's this podcast that went on between Gavin Newsom and Tim Balls. This is the, the first person who's left of center that was brought on by Gavin Newsom. His, uh, first podcast episodes were sloppy. Steve Bannon, Charlie Kirk, and Michael Savage. Three hard right wingers. And why is Gavin doing that?

Because he believes in the first philosophy I told you, oh, maybe we got stuff to learn from him. Like that dumb bullshit. But what you're gonna see here is Tim Walls, without even trying, really ends up exposing how hollow and vapid Gavin Newsom's approach to politics is right now and why he's massively falling out of favor with Democrats, which I'll prove to you in a minute. By the way, after we watch this clip, um, and why Tim Walls is, is.

More on the, on the positive side of the democratic base. People are looking at him more favorably now because of how he's been acting. So let's watch and we'll break it down. Base where we wanna, okay. We challenge you to a, to a, a, you know, a, a wwe e fight here type of thing. But it is, it's a natural reaction. I think it's one of the reasons we're losing so many men. And again, it's multiethnic. It's not just white men. Uh, we're losing them. We're losing them to these guys online.

We're losing people that I'm bringing on this podcast as well. That's why I brought, these are bad guys though. These are, I brought Charlie guys, but they exist. So who are they talking about? Charlie Kirk. Steve Bannon, Michael Savage. People like that. Oh, we're losing. We're losing to these guys, bro. So I'm bringing 'em on the podcast. Now, if Gavin Newsom brought these people on the podcast and fought them tooth and nail, I'd be saying, great. I'd be giving 'em credit.

I'd be covering the clips, but he's not. He's playing fucking Patty cakes with them, right? Look at Tim Wall's reaction when these people are brought up. He's like, these are bad guys. Which reaction is more in alignment with democratic voters in the Democratic base? I think it's Tim's. When you think of sloppy Steve and Charlie Kirk and, and Michael Savage. These are bad guys is the correct reaction. All right, let's keep going. And we could deny they exist. They exist.

Not only they exist, they persist and they're actually influencing young kids every single day. How do push, how do. Push some of those guys back under a rock is what I think. We have to first understand what their motivations are. I think we have to understand what they're actually doing. That's don think racism and misogyny. I think there's a lot of that, but I don't think it's exclusively that.

When you talk to a guy like Steve Bannon, I, you know, he reminded me a little bit of my grandfather when he talks about working folks and he talks about how we hollowed out the industrial for this country. I understand that, but so I, we can dismiss the notion of, of election denialism.

We could completely dismiss what he did on January 6th, but I don't think you can dismiss, uh, what he's saying reminds me a lot of what Bernie Sanders was saying reminds me a lot of what Democrats said 20, 30 years ago. I mean, he's arguing against, he, he hates Musk, right? He hates Musk. He hates Musk. He hates the oligarchy. He totally agrees with you on the concentration of monopolistic powers. Gavin Newsom is being played for an absolute fool.

That's what you need to understand because here's the bottom line, Steve Bannon is lying. Gavin, he is lying to your face. He virtue signals and poses like, oh, I'm on the economic left. Actually, I'm like against the oligarchy and stuff, bro. And then Donald Trump does a massive tax cut for the 1% corporations and he doesn't say Dick to oppose it. Nothing. When Trump backs every single thing Elon Musk is doing, cutting the CFPB going after social security. Going after flight safety officials.

He might take some shots at Elon, but then when Trump comes out and says, I agree completely with Elon, Steve goes, yes sir. He's a posr. He's a liar. By the way, he also literally committed, committed a massive amount of fraud, stole money from the MAGA base by telling them we're gonna privately fund the border wall and just took the money. This is a guy that you're doing well, you gotta hand it to him. No, you fucking don't. You gotta fight him. That's what you gotta do. Completely.

Uh, dismisses the notion that we should extend the tax cuts for corporations and the very wealthy he thinks we, and then Trump does it and he's got Dick to say, and he still says, I want, he says, I want Trump to get a third term. Even though Trump cut taxes for the wealthy in corporations in the first term, they're gonna do it again in the second term as they're broadcasting while raising taxes on the bottom. 95%. And Mr. Populist, I'm a populist.

He sees Trump do this two separate times and goes, he's still my guy. Well then maybe just, maybe you're not a populist. Maybe you're not anti oligarchy. Maybe you're not left wing. Maybe you're a fucking liar who uses those issues to try to trick people into, into supporting your fascist regressive agenda. Lower taxes, uh, uh, for the middle class. I want to see increase taxes. Message. I, I can't message to misogynist. I can't message that women shouldn't have.

But I think if we say, so, the point that the point that he's making is that like Gavin, these people are like beyond the pale. Like you have to acknowledge that they're beyond the pale. This is the point that Tim Wal is making, and this point is undeniably true, and Gavin is refusing to acknowledge it. And if anything, he's normalizing and humanizing these fucking assholes. So let me prove my point here for you because this guys, I need you to stop and think about this.

He had on three far right wingers on his podcast as the first guest. One of them is Michael Savage. A lot of you are probably too young to remember who Michael Savage is. He was one of the biggest radio hosts in the country during like the Rush Limbaugh era, the Sean Hannity era, late nineties, early two thousands, right here. Here's what you need to know about Michael Savage. He was banned from the United Kingdom for his extremism.

He said, quote, I was very disappointed in Trump attacking white supremacy. He said, trans healthcare quote should be outlawed. He said, Bernie and Hillary are communists. And then he used the famous quote of, first they came for the rich people and I said, nothing. I. To try to go after. Uh, Bernie and Hillary, he said, put down BLM protestors, like feral dogs. He compared Obama to Hitler and said Obama is doing white genocide. He mocked PTSD and depression implying it wasn't real.

He called Obama, quote, the new leader of the caliphate. He said Obama is spreading Ebola virus on purpose. He said Trump saved white kids from slavery. He defended torture. He calls left-wingers Vermins. He talked about wanting to reach for his Glock to shoot lesbians. He said, quote, our children are being destroyed by gay marriage. He said, quote, the children's minds are being raped by the homosexual mafia. He. He said, white people are the only people that don't vote based on race.

He says Autism is a fraud, a racket, a brat who hasn't been told to cut the act out in 99% of cases. He said, quote, we have to go to war with Iran. He said, quote, our freedoms are choking us to death. He got fired from M-S-N-B-C because he screamed at a guy to quote, get AIDS and die. And then finally, his most controversial of all this controversial is one way of describing him, he said, we should kill 100 million Muslims. This is who Gavin Newsom had on his podcast with.

This is who he had on his podcast, and this is who he played fucking Patty cakes with. And again, it'd be one thing if you bring him on a fight with him the entire time until you're blue in the face, dog, I'd be defending you. You didn't do that. You didn't do it. You didn't do it. Mainstream Democrats still haven't decided how to respond to the second Trump presidency, but some on the left of the party think the time for silence is over.

At last, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders are on a fighting oligarchy tour of America. It's been drawing record crowds with 34,000 people estimated to have attended their stop in Denver, making it the largest rally of either of their political careers. And in Vegas. The two politicians sat down with Hassan Piker for an interview. What are you guys, uh, trying to accomplish with these rallies?

The kind of moment that we're in and also something that Trump was able to exploit was really practicing. Even though he doesn't believe in working class politics, they had a very focused working class strategy. And I think for a while, like democratic. Party clearly didn't, wasn't affected at that, wasn't successful at that.

And I think one of the things that we're here to do is to actually rally a class conscious movement to bring people together and to show that we can fight for a better future. Not in marginalizing and attacking people, uh, you know, marginalized people, but actually in rejecting the differences that we have to come together in common cause and to organize folks. To me this country faces, I. The worst set of crises that we have faced in a very, very, very long time.

Uh, we are looking at a nation, which is now oligarchic, and they don't hide it. I mean, I must give them credit for, but you know, they are, they're there out there. Mr. Must, the richest guy in the world is running all over the place, cutting veterans, the needs of veterans cutting after Social Security, uh, there are thir in addition to Musk. He got 13. Uh, nominees of Trump, the head major agencies are all billionaires.

So you got a government clearly no embarrassment of the billionaire class by the billionaire class for the billionaire class. And then what is, I would hope, would be upsetting to all Americans, no matter what their politics may be. You can be a conservative about this. You got a president who is moving us very rapidly. Into an authoritarian form of society. I mean, you don't sue media in America because they say something bad about you.

Alexandria and I got about 500 lawsuits there, but we happen to believe in democracy. These rallies have generated quite a lot of buzz. Apparently there are like more people turning out than during Bernie's actual primary run is. Is that significant? What do you think is in the future for these two, if anything? I think it's incredibly significant. This is a real kind of point of inflection in democratic party politics and where they want the party to move moving forward.

And we are seeing a real sense of anger amongst the Democratic base, right, in terms of what Trump is being allowed to do with very little pushback and a bunch of what was described by the Umani campaign in NYC as being a bunch of fossils and free people like Chuck Schumer. He, he's been, there's outrage, genuine outrage in terms of what we're seeing at town halls. Somebody said. Clearly being nice isn't working. Have you tried violence?

This is how angry Democratic party voters are with their own party. And Chuck Schumer, his decision to try and whip, uh, senators, democratic senators to vote for the, the budget bill, the Republican budget bill, to try and stop their being a shut down, as if that would look, make the Democrats look bad, rather than the Republicans has made every single Democratic party voter who is.

Really angry at Trump personally and the Democrats for not pushing back, really feel disconnected with their elected representatives in a way they haven't felt in a long time. Noah really is a time for there to be a kind of democratic tea party moment, a real taking over of the party to change direction when the level to which the people feel represented by Democratic party politicians has never been lower. They approve this is low approval rating. The party they've not seen in.

Decades and decades and decades and at a time when people like Elisa Slotkin are being chosen as the democratic representative to respond to Trump X-C-I-A-A thesis slotkin. Mm-hmm. Giving a very kind of milk toast response that didn't mean anything really to, as opposed to, uh, a OC and Sanders. Drawing huge crowds touring across the country. Speaking about, frankly, about the nature of billionaire capture and, and control of politics and oligarchy, this is where the divide is.

It's grassroots politics versus establishment. Politics is the politics of appeasement versus their politics of opposition, and this is what Democratic party votes as one. Do we think this be electorally successful? I have no idea. I dunno what the long term future for this looks like. But in the absence of any action, in the absence of kind show themselves as being. Hardworking political operatives rather than just being people sitting there collecting their super PAC checks, right?

Sanders and a OC and people like, uh, Sean Fein, the leader of the United Auto Workers Union, who's spoken at a previous Sanders rally on his fight oligarchy tour. These are the only people who are showing some resolve, and there's a reason why we're seeing record out of crowds and from apparent reporting on the ground that I've looked at. These aren't, you know, DSA members.

The DSA have just moved away from endorsing a OC because she's moved towards kind of the Democratic party establishment to, for better or or worse. I will let viewers at home take their own opinions on this, but the people who are turning out to these rallies, these aren't hardened socialists. These aren't people who've, you know, these aren't Marxist ISTs out there looking for a Vanguard party.

They're just normally lib wine moms who are looking at the Democratic party and seeing a pathetic bunch of appeases. And any amount of opposition, and now is the time to bring these people over, and I can have so much sympathy with people who are angry with a OC and Sanders for not being vociferous enough in their criticism of Biden and of Harris in terms of what's happening in Gaza. I have that same criticism. I can certainly empathize with what you are thinking here.

But this is, this is, this is the five alarm fire. This is, you know, this is Defcon one. Right now, when we're looking at the dismantling of American democracy, people being black bagged off the streets, we are seeing the potential for there to be an authoritarian coup of the government. We're seeing what's happening with Elon Musk and Doge now is not the time for infighting. Now is not the time for partisanship. Now is the time for a popular and broad fund against fascism. And if.

We are seeing a time when establishment neoliberal corporate politicians are doing nothing in response. Now is the time to win people over and build bridges with people who otherwise would be Normie Libs who want to see some actual change. And if we can use this point of inflection to bring people to our side of the aisle by reaching out and trying to get them to understand our anti-establishment politics that will, there will never be another time again.

So rather than I think what I think is some short term. Probably legitimate criticism of what Sanders and a C have represented for the past four years. Now is the time for reconciliation and thinking about what could be and how we use these moments.

Just like we used the BLM uh, movement in the 2020s to rally people towards that kind of progressive politics and support of civil rights for the minority communities in America, now is the time to galvanize class conscious politics and to re make people realize internally amongst liberal circles that now is the time for class consciousness and think that every single person on the front line is somebody who can get a hit by the elites tomorrow. And finally, section E History.

A lot of the, uh, people who in the Midwest, you know, middle America, Heartland of America, people who used to have unions as a place of, of gathering together, uh, feeling a sense of community. They're going into the, to the NRA meetings now and into church meetings and things like that. What, what's your, uh, sense about winning those people back into unions? Well, as I said, union people have to organize the unions where they are.

Yes. Um, but, you know, filling that, I mean, I think one thing I, I mentioned, um, in this piece you mentioned the dissent came out. I wrote it just a couple days after the election was over, um, last month. Is, um, people, people want community, you know? Yes. Uh, people want a place to meet with like-minded folks, um, and. Um, and also I think they want a sense of power in their lives and, and to a certain extent in the society as a whole as well.

And, uh, one of the things the Democratic Party used to have, uh, way back was local parties. Sometimes they were machines and they were authoritarian. They were run by party bosses, but sometimes they were really more participatory groups and, and, um. One of the things that Ben Wickler, who's the, uh, chair of the Democratic Party in Wisconsin Yes. Has done very successfully, and he's actually running right now to be indeed head of the DNC.

Yes. Is that the Wisconsin Republican Party has offices all over the state, including in some of the most Republican rural areas in the state, as well as in Milwaukee and Madison, which is the centers of, uh, democratic, uh, strength in, in Wisconsin. People go to these, uh, places to of course, you know, uh, help to elect uh, local officials, but also they go there just for recreation to a certain extent.

Sure. And uh, um, and it's in a lot of these towns, there's not a lot of places, uh, where you can go. People just sort of live online, you know? Um, yeah. Um. Not even movie theaters anymore in a lot of places.

So, so, um, this is not an answer to the lack of a working class movement, but it is an answer I think to the Democrats being seen as this elitist party that just, uh, has consultants and advertisers and pollsters who, who try to figure out what the ordinary American thinks and they sell it back to them. Mm-hmm. The way the way corporations do with consumer products.

Um. Um, you know, I think, um, parties in Europe, by the way, Senate left parties and also www parties in Europe do have these local headquarters. Uh, Uhhuh, I remember one time I was talking to, um, uh, at, at, at, uh, ban who for a short time was the head of the Labor party in Britain, and we had a, um, we had drinks, uh, the House of Commons a few years ago. Um, and, and he asked me, why don't the Democratic Party have members. Um, and I thought, yes, that's right.

You know, I mean, people consumer themselves to be Democrats, uh, with a capital D, but there's no membership. Uh uh you can give money, but there's not a sense of you're a member of a local party and maybe you do something without local party. And that's something I think Democrats should, uh, should consider. But look, in the end. Movements are organized by people who are most affected by them. And, um, uh, democratic consultants who make six figures are not gonna organize people at Walmart.

Uh, they have to, they can encourage people at Walmart to organize, but you're gonna have to have a, the development of a working class culture that is friendly to unions, not just friendly unions, but also wants people to take the time outta their lives to organize unions. Um, and on the positive side. There's a lot of support for unions out there. The Gallup poll. Yes, there is, uh, recently showed, uh, over 70% of Americans, uh, think unions are a good thing.

And, um, uh, even Donald Trump, um, uh, and some of his, uh, advisors have said good things about unions. Republicans like Josh Hall, he just got reelected. Um, senator from Missouri, um, uh, is friendly with the Teamsters Union in Missouri, which is an important union in Missouri. And as you know, uh, the head of the Teamsters Union. Uh, supported. Well, he didn't support Donald Trump, but he didn't support anybody. Uh, in, in the election he spoke at the Republican Convention.

So, um, even if you're a Republican working class person, you know, unions are, uh, are not, you know, anathema the way they, they, they once were to almost all Republicans. So. That makes it possible, I think, to convince people across partisan lines, to, to, to, to organize unions. And once the unions are organized, then of course the Democrats have to be the party that supports them. And as Joe Biden tried to too, um, but, but first the unions have to be there to, to be supported. They do.

And his, his, as you say, Biden was the only president in history, I believe, to walk a picket line, but that was one afternoon. One of your suggestions in the article in dissent is that Democrats should quote, make their advocacy of unions central to their rhetoric and emphasize it all year long, end of year quote, and that there can be no true left populism without institutions that represent and fight for the needs and beliefs of the people themselves.

And I've heard stories about, uh, democratic politicians going into, uh, uh, black, uh, barbershops once a year. Just before the election, they go into black churches once a year, just before the election. You cite one county in Pennsylvania where the idea of, uh, fighting for the needs of the people and connecting with people themselves. One county in Pennsylvania where this was put into action and it worked. Tell us about that, please.

Um, unfortunately, your depiction of it is a bit too, it is a bit, a little too rosy. Yeah. Well, um, I mean, I, I was ca I was canvassing in York County, which is the southeastern part of the state. Right. York, Pennsylvania is the, is the county seat. And, and then Democratic party basically was, uh, from what I could tell a little more then, uh, than the unions. Um, uh, the canvassing, uh, headquarters was at a rather large, uh.

A building owned by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. Uh, one of the, one of the, you know, important building, building trades workers, uh, building trades unions. And it was a, a huge place. And, you know, there were meals and there were, uh, it, a childcare center and, uh, it was kind of community center. That's great. Mm-hmm. But. York County is not a Democratic county, it's still a Republican county because most of your county is rural.

And, um, and of course, most, most, most, uh, people in rural areas, whatever their income are now voting for, uh, right, for Republicans. So, um. But it does point out something which, uh, I mentioned this other article, uh, in Descent, which is about, takes off from a very interesting book called West Belt Union Blues. Yes. Wanted mention by, uh, by Theta Scotch Bowl, and, uh, can't remember her co-author, uh, who's a former undergraduate, a student of first, um, Laney Newman.

Yeah. Uh, thank you, um, letting Newman and, and, and, and Newman. Newman and, and Scott Poll point out that, um, one of the things that the same union, the IBW does in Winsell Penn, Western of Pennsylvania, which is what their book is about, um, is it brings together electrical workers and their families from different parts of Western Pennsylvania who usually work separately because they work in different building sites.

They sometimes work wiring up, uh, offices, you know, electrical workers do a lot of, a lot of kinds of work in different, uh, work sites. They'll work in factories for the most part. Um. But they bring 'em together with, uh, softball games and with, uh, you know, pizza parties and, uh, they have family affairs of, of various kinds as well. And it gives those workers, uh, in Western Pennsylvania, electrical workers and their families a place to gather a community.

And not surprisingly, um, because those workers feel a sense of ownership of their union and the union leadership cares about them, um, and wants to help to nurture a community of, of their members. Uh, they tend to respect the political opinions and decisions endorsements made by the leadership of the local union and the local union, like most unions in America, does support Democrats, uh, for state and local and, and national office.

And so most IBW workers in that part of Pennsylvania vote for Democrats. Whereas, um, Newman and Scotch Pole profile, United Steel Workers Union, which is one of the original CIO unions in the 1930s, a lot of the people organized CIO unions were radical socialists and communists. Uh, but today the steel workers have shrunken to a, just a small fraction of its, uh, historic, uh, size 'cause steel, you know, steelwork steel has been made. A lot of other countries besides this, uh, and um.

But also, uh, the steelworkers Union doesn't provide that kind of community, doesn't define that kind, doesn't provide that kind of identity for steelworkers. Steelworkers who still exist in wins Pennsylvania. And so the steel workers, as you said earlier, um, in our interview, uh. Gravitate towards other kinds of community groups, rifle groups, right? Evangelical churches, right? Conservative Catholic churches.

Um, now it doesn't mean they wouldn't still be members of those churches if the union was providing them a community, but at least they have a, a, a countervailing, um, place where they could talk about politics, learn about politics. But the Steel Workers Union, um, has a, has a headquarters in Pittsburgh, doesn't really go out to people much in the, uh, local towns where steel mills still exist. Um, it's not a presence in their lives.

And, uh, we often forget that when unions were strong, they were as strong as important as political institutions. Yes, as it were, as economic institutions. Now, of course, if they hadn't done the job of representing workers, getting them better wages, better working conditions, health plans, and so forth, they would not have been right. Trust in political either.

But, uh, but because they were trusted economically, uh, and they could make the case that Democrats were doing things for working people, whether they were in unions or not, um, they were trusted and, and, uh, union voters voted overwhelmingly for, for Democrats. Um, and that was true up until the 1970s and 1980s when unions began to weaken in the private sector. The 37th presidential election in American history took place on November 8th, 1932. A lot had changed since 1928.

Herbert Huber's time in office started out so promising, but on October 29th, 1929, also known as black. Tuesday, the stock market crashed and triggered a bunch of events into motion that devastated economies around the entire world. During the Hoover administration, industrial production shrank by 46%. Wholesale prices dropped by 32%, and foreign trade shrank by 70% while unemployment increased by 600 and.

7%. One in four Americans couldn't find work, even though they often moved across the country, sometimes on foot in order to find it. Personal income tax revenue, and profits all dropped. The crime rate increased as unemployed workers often stole food to survive suicide rates and alcoholism. Rose marriages were delayed because many men wanted to wait until they could actually provide for a family less. Kids were born. It just sucked. It really, really sucked.

Today we call this period of severe economic turmoil. The Great Depression. Hoover had the great misfortune of being in charge when this happened, and so therefore became a great scapegoat. It's not like he didn't try very hard to stop it. He called for billions of dollars and taxpayer money for public works programs to create jobs. Ever hear of the Hoover Dam? Yep. That was named after him. He called for stronger labor regulation laws.

He called for the federal government to start bailing out struggling industries to pay for this. He called for more taxes. Oops. He also raised tariffs by signing the Smoot Holly Tariff Act, and many argue that by doing all these things, Hoover was actually making the depression worse. Economists. Still argue about this today, but the bottom line is, in 1932, Hoover was not so popular.

You could see this by the thousands of World War I veterans and their families camped out in Washington DC demanding payments of a bonus that had been promised, or the slums nicknamed Hoovervilles, built by the poor people who couldn't find work. Hoover had grown to hate the presidency, but he didn't think any other Republican could do a better job than him, so he decided to run again. What's surprising is that the Republican party overwhelmingly supported his renomination.

Charles Curtis would also run again as VP Baby Kansas represent, although he barely got renominated. The Democratic Party seemed rejuvenated in 1932. They had three candidates competing for the nomination. Al Smith, the former governor of New York, seeking the presidency a fourth time, his friend, but increasingly vocal critic Franklin Roosevelt, who now was the governor of New York. And Speaker of the House, John Nance Garner, who was from Texas.

The Democrats went with Roosevelt, with Garner as his running mate. There were many third parties, but only one really stood out much. The Socialist Party they nominated Norman Thomas, a minister from New York. He also ran in 1928, but this time had growing support as so many Americans were unhappy with Hoover. Yet also not satisfied with the Democrats. The socialist nominated James Mauer, a trade unionist from Pennsylvania as his running mate.

On the campaign trail, Hoover did his best to defend his record, but the odds were against him. Not only did many Americans blame Hoover for the Great Depression, most now were strongly against Prohibition, which was also associated with his administration. Roosevelt now seemed like a rockstar, drawing huge crowds in inspiring hope that he had solutions to end the depression.

While Roosevelt didn't offer many specifics solutions, he did get specific when criticizing Hoover Roosevelt criticized the Smoot Holly Tariff and the Hoover administration for taxing and spending way too much. His running mate Garner went further accusing Hoover of quote, leading the country down the path of socialism. Toward the end of campaigning, things got downright nasty between the two. With Hoover calling Roosevelt a chameleon and plaid and Roosevelt, calling Hoover a fat timid capon.

A Capon is a castrated rooster by the way, and here are the results. No surprise here. Franklin Roosevelt won becoming the 32nd president in American history. He received 472 electoral votes and 57.4% of the popular vote. It was the first win for the Democrats since 1916, and an impressive one of that Roosevelt received the highest percentage of the popular vote ever for a Democratic nominee. Hoover got just 59 electoral votes in 39.7% of the popular vote.

Norman Thomas finished third with 2.2% of the popular vote. John Nance garner AKA cactus Jack became the 32nd vice President in American history. This election was significant because it marked the beginning of 20 straight years of democratic control of the White House. In fact, Democrats would be in office 28 out of the next 36 years That's going to be it for today. As always, keep the comments coming in.

I would love to hear your thoughts or questions about today's topic or our upcoming topics. Coming up, we have the alignment of Christian nationalism with the attack on education, and the realities of the system of techno feudalism we seem to be living under. You can leave a voicemail or send us a text at 202-999-3991. You can now reach us on the privacy focused messaging app Signal at the username BestOfTheLeft.01 or simply email me to [email protected].

The additional sections of the show included clips from the Majority Report, The Dig, the Muckrake Political Podcast, Politics Theory Other, Revolutionary Left Radio, Unf***ing the Republic. the Rational National, Reese Waters, Why Is This Happening?, Status Coup, Novara Media, Secular Talk, Keeping Democracy Alive, and Mr. Beat. Further details are in the show notes. Thanks to everyone for listening.

Thanks to Deon Clark and Erin Clayton for their research work for the show and participation in SOLVED!. Thanks to our Transcriptionist Trio—Ken, Brian, and Ben—for their volunteer work helping put our transcripts together. Thanks to Amanda Hoffman for all of her work behind the scenes and co-hosting SOLVED!. And thanks to those who already support the show by becoming a member or purchasing gift memberships.

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Coming to you from far outside the conventional wisdom of Washington DC, my name is Jay and this has been the Best of the Left podcast coming to you twice weekly, thanks entirely to the members and donors to the show, from best of the left.com.