George Conway, Mondaire Jones & Dave Weigel

the one, the only, the Great, George Conway. Welcome too, Fast Politics, my friend and yours George Conway, thank you for having me again. Molly. I don't think you're a going to have me on again, really, because after you went down to Washington for your secret project that you wouldn't tell me about, don't tell anybody when I clean down to Washington why I can't tell you, and then be interviewed the Vice President, I figured out that I'm off the list forever and you just go back to

your liberal roots and no, are you kidding me? You know we had to have you back. So George Man, what the fund has happened to your Republican Party. They were like a little better and then they got worse again. Oh, they're getting worse. They're going to continue to get worse. And they hand help themselves. Why are they getting worse? I mean they had this mid term, they had their asses handed to them. They barely performed because you're not

focusing on the incentive structure for these people. The people who are running the show now are essentially threatening to blow everything up if they don't get their way, and they don't care. They don't care what happens in these other districts. They don't care if they get anything passed. They just want to create a ruckus and to get on TV and solicit money, and no normal incentives apply

to them. And as the Republican Party becomes more beholden to these people, it chases off for reasonable people, you know, really and including with some real conservatives, and you get more of the same. And it's basically it's like they're distilling the party down to the you know, the Marjorie Tailor Greens in the world. And that's you know, you've seen this has been happening for a number of years.

You see it in all of these congressmen who are pretty good, who don't run anymore, or who get turned on by the right. You're boiling the Republican Party down to the bare men. Was what's gonna happen? And they're not gonna you know, it's re later, they're not gonna get a majority, and then they're they're going to dirt. Incentives are going to get even worse because if they can't govern, who I bother even trying to appeal to the people who aren't voting for It's this weird downward spiral.

So let's talk about Donald J. Trump. He's still you know, what I saw with this leadership contest was whether or not he was involved. He was presented as having mt G called him on the phone, held the phone up so they could take the picture, and everybody waved them off. Again, that was probably performative. Who wants to talk to the president and you know, no one, no good thing to come from it. I don't think there's much to be drawn from that. I don't think really in his standing.

He is who he is, and they're just you know, they genuinelect to him, but they don't really take him that seriously. He has some legal problems. Can you talk to us about these legal problems? Yes, apparently. Again, well, his legal problems are the same legal problems we've talked about before. They're just getting closer and closer to their culmination, although it's you know, it's gonna be another year or two before a lot of this stuff works itself out.

The Georgia grand jury, the Fulton County grand jury, the special grand jury that was convened at the request of Fulton County d A. Fannie Willis has apparently prepared a report and submitted it to the court, and then the only question is when and how it gets released, and then whether Fannie Willis takes that report and brings it to a regular grand jury, which would have the power

to indict people, including Donald J. Trump. So that's you know, that's something that we can look forward to happening in the next few weeks to see see how that plays out. You know, we've got the special counsel, Jack Smith, who's busy, busy, busy apparently, and he's hired a bunch of new people. He's hired a bunch of new people. He seems to be on the job, on on the ball, and Andrew Weisman has called him aggressive. And Andrew Wisman was himself

an aggressive prosecutor. So you know, we'll see what comes of that too. I think that, you know, the documents of Marilago documents case is pretty strong, and the other cases, we'll see what happens with the January six cases that he's got that there. He's gonna work his way through that too. So what about the people who say, well, Trump had all these documents, but Biden also had documents

twelve documents in a Biden foundation. There's the volume of the documents, there's the location of the documents, but the most important distinguishing factor is what these men did with their documents. When Biden's lawyers found these documents, apparently in the beginning of November, they called up the White House Council's office and the next day they were delivered to

the National Archives where they belonged. And you know, that's in stark contrast to the behavior of the former president, who was he was told that he was believed by the Archives that he had documents, He stole all them for a period of time, gave them some documents back, was told again that they thought he had some documents. He gave some more back, but not all of them.

He moved someone around in the basement of his golf club in golf club, but his little resort in Florida, and had people moved the boxes around and went through

the boxes himself. Then he was subpoenaed and just a few more documents, and then had somebody issue a false certification that he produced all the documents, which turned out to be a lie, which we found out when the Justice Department, after showing a federal magistrate judge, probably cause that a crime was committed by someone, got a search warrant,

and that's how we found out about that. And that's a that's you know, that was a long I mean, if Donald Trump had done what Biden had done, or what Biden's people did for him, you know when when he was told, hey, we think you've got some stuff, he says, oh, well, let me go look and give it all back, even though the volume was much greater, we would be talking about any of this right now. It's a much more serious situation with with Donald J. Trump. And you know, on top of that, who do we

trust on this? You've got one guy who makes a few mistakes here and there, and then you've got one guy another another guy who, with all due respect to Congressman Santos, is the biggest pathological liar we've ever seen in this nation's politics and can't be trusted on anything. It is a big difference. And then look, but that's fine,

it's fine. I think it's appropriate that the Justice Department investigate the circumstances behind the finding of these Biden vice presidency documents, see who had them, how they try to figure out, if they can, how these limited number of documents found their way into this storage closet in Washington, and see what people knew about it, if anything, but chances are it was, you know, inadvertent. And if you

say oops, you know, it's like anything else. If you find something in your house that doesn't belong to you, either because you picked it up somewhere or somebody left it, you know, you call them up and you return it to them. And that's what seems to have happened in the Biden situation. You don't go and sit and hide it.

And when somebody comes up to your door and said, hey, we think we might have left our wallet here, say, oh, I don't know, here's a credit card and slammed the door and then went from the bang on the door again, said what there was some other there's money in there, Oh, here's a dollar and then and say there isn't anything more when the cops come, and then you know have the issue of search warrant to get into your house.

That's a lot different, I think, right right, But you know you're not going to hear that on Fox News. And Trump is he does still have other you know, there's the fake electors he's got, well, the fake electors, the whole January sixth thing, the January sixth investigation is a is a number of fake electors. The pressure on like Pants, which was, you know, an attempt to get him to commit fraud. The call to Rathlnsburger is a

potential federal offense as well as a state offense. I mean, there's so many aspects of that that can lead to charges. He's got a big problem there. You ignore Trump at your own peril. Yeah, you shouldn't ignore Trump. Do you think he ends up being the candidate? Possibly? I mean you've got people like Asa Hutchinson talking about running for president. You've got Mike Pompeo. I know you're excited for this. I think we need to have a special podcast. His

book is coming out on January. I'm sure it's going to be a best seller. You know we're gonna end up talking about that nothing NonStop for a month than you know. You've got him gonna run, you've got to talk about the santis. I don't know he's actually gonna run. But you've got a lot of people who think they should be president, and they're sensing weakness. But the problem is they're all going to split the vote, you know, so you can win. It's quite possible to win with

I don't know the vote. The thing is, I mean we all sort of know that probably Trump won't get re elected, but he still could. No, I don't think so. I mean, I think the Democrats would have to. I think they'd have to nominate someone so horrible that people will just stay home. And I don't think they're going to do that. I don't. I think people would take their shot chances with any number of people over Donald

Trump before they would go back over Donald Trump. People will still crawl on broken glass to vote against Donald Trump, which is what happened in two thousand, notwithstanding the pandemic. And I think also that in four he's going to be much more insane than he's ever been. So say more about that, Well, you could just see, I mean,

you see his statements. He's more detached from reality, he's got fewer people around him to check his impulses, and he's you know, he's more and more obsessed with the stolen election, and he's he's going to get worse. These people who have this, these personality traits, these malignant narcissists, these psychopaths, they get worse over time, and they don't

get better, and he's continuing to get worse. I know, it's sorry, it's hard to fathom how he could possibly get worse, But I mean, the one thing that we have consistently seen what Donald J. Trump is but he does get worse. There is always a lower depth to which he can sink, and he will do that. The problem is it's still not going to be enough to turn away the last thirty of the Republican Party that still is going to support him no matter what. So you know, he can get he can he could probably

get the nomination. Are you still a Republican? No? Like we've done thing. I left the Republican Party in March of when I concluded that the Republican Party had become a personality called and boy was I right. Yeah, I mean it wasn't even it wasn't even a third of what it is today. It seems like every time Republicans lose, right, I mean they lost the mid terms, they lost, every time they lose, they just they won the House. You have, we have Speaker McCarthy. But I mean every time they lose,

they kind of they don't ever learn a lesson. They just want to do it again again. But that's the dynamic I'm talking about, is that the people, you know, you've got these districts where this stuff flies in their safe districts, and you you know, those people are ready to blow up the party, blow up the House if they don't get their way. So they have an inordinate amount of power. I mean, you know the Democrats were complaining for two years about Senators Cinema and Mansion. Well there,

you know, they have a lot. They had a lot of power because they made the difference between you know and fifty and you needed Kala Harris to make it. Well, these people, you know, just just a few of them. As we saw with the fifteen speakers votes um basically shut down the House's ability to function at any time, and one of them can at any point can make a motion under the new rules of the House to vacate the chair and throughout the speaker. The speaker is

completely beholden to them. I mean, the more moderate Republicans could also do that. They could, but there are not that many of them left, but some of them, I mean, the only way they could they could make a difference is they got to vote with the Democrats. That would be fatal for them. I mean, it might be fatal in a primary, you know, in one of those tight districts.

It's fatal in a primary. Then that's it. Primaries are huge threats to them, right Their object is to not get burned from the right and try to get by, but it doesn't work. So who do you think this sort of of the of the House caucuses right now? I don't think there is a head, but you can see that some people have. Matt Gates has come out of this states he clearly lost a lot of friends, but you know he's got his He's got his younger friends, elsewhere.

You know, I didn't say anything on tour, and i'n't saying what he did with him. He hangs out with him, right, certainly not. We haven't heard anything more about any of that either. No, No, No, I think I think that I think they're not. I mean, I think the last I heard is that they're not going in that direction of Justice Department. But even though they did a plea deal with his wingman. Yeah, but you know that, you know, they may be that the witnesses aren't all that great.

Who knows right on the particular things that they were investigating him about, which I don't really want to talk about it. You see Marjorie Taylor Green walking around like she owns the place. Yeah, because she does. She sort of does. It's unbelievable. So you think they shut down the government, it's only going to get worse. Yes, it's only going to get worse. It's only gonna get worse. I mean, you know, you've got the deat ceiling issues, You've got the next budget that they have to put

through next. With these appropriations bills, there's so many trigger points, so many places where things can go off the rails, and a lot of it's going to be performative, So don't plan any National Park vacations. No, I would not do that. George Conway, thank you so much for joining us. Mandara Jones is a former congressman from New York seventeenth District. Welcome too Fast Politics, Mandara Jones, thanks for having me back.

I feel like a regular at this point. Well, I I don't know if you know, but I tweeted earlier today that you have to become a regular until you're back in Congress. In fact, I almost liked that tweet, but I didn't want people to think that by virtue of liking it that I was announcing my intention to run in four I've still not made a decision on that. What the hell is going on over there? You were

in Congress? Yeah, in and what you're referring to happened in the one seventeenth Congress in January of two thousand twenty one, as shortly as you'll recalled. Before January six really opened a new chapter for us in Congress. But you know, prior to that point, prior to January six, we were going through the process of the first order of business electing a speaker. It was something that was not controversial. There were a few people who had expressed misgivings.

Some people had, you know, previously run on not intending to support Nancy Pelosi, but she was able to cobble together a true majority in the House. And contrast that with Republicans having to go to a fifteenth ballot, which broke all records except for those set in the eighteen fifties in this country, to simply name the next Speaker of the House. And I think it was really an invitation into what we're going to be seeing for the next two years. Unfortunate and in utter incompetence and utter

inability to get things done. On vote, he did win. No one knows what he's promised. I think some people know what he's promised discussed. I think the most powerful people in the House, GOP Caucus no what Kevin McCarthy promised.

And by most powerful people, I certainly mean Matt Gates, Lauren Bobert, Matt Rosendale and others who were part of that twenty to twenty one that became a whole bunch of people who voted present at the end, who couldn't vote for him, but who also didn't want to vote against him so that they could finally get on with

that process. I have been a little uncomfortable on behalf of some of my former Republican colleagues, because just today I've heard a number of Republicans new interviews with the networks in which they said that Kevin McCarthy did not

make promises to put people on specific committees. Well, you know, you should only say things that you have actual knowledge of, and and other things you may just want to hedge, because frankly, it's common to make promises to appoint people to specific committees, and I feel quite confident that Speaker Pelosi did that in the past, and she's a much better county than Kevin McCarthy is um. I think the issue is that this rules package really gives the keys

to the extremists in the party. And you will not hear me use the word moderate on this podcast. As someone said on Twitter a few days ago, there are no moderates in the House. Gopcock is there. There are lunatics, and there are cowards, even the members from from Biden districts congressional districts that Biden one of which there are many on the Republican side. This cycle. They all voted for a rules package that would allow just one of them to make a motion to replace the Speaker of

the House too. In this rules package gut the Office of Congressional Ethics, which is a deep concern to me as someone who cares about ethics and who recently completed a term on the Ethics Committee, and who knows that fifty of the case work that the Ethics Committee deals with is casework that was initially referred by the Office of Congressional Ethics, which does the preliminary legwork on those cases.

So I am deeply concerned by by those provisions and other provisions like putting members of the Freedom Caucus on key committees like the Rules Committee. But this is a recipe for dysfunction and disaster these next two years. And all of these Republicans, the so called moderates, they all voted for it, with the exception of Tony Gonzalez. And get this, Tony gonzalez Is objection isn't even a good one.

Like I'm glad he voted against it, but like his objection is that they're going to cut the defense budget by seventy billion dollars, which he alleges will make us weaker as a country. Not true at all, because the defense budget is, you know, it's full of lobbyists giveaways, right. The one thing that any of us would agree with is the reason why he you now, it's the it's that meme of the worst person, you know, right, having a good idea like cut the you know, cut the

defense budget. Don't threaten me with a good time. So it does seem like it's just they are in there. They are going to go full Benghazi all then I think that's right. You'll see investigations into Hunter Biden's private parts. You will see a false inquiry into the various federal agencies that happened to be investigating people like Jim Jordan's and Scott Perry. I did not believe that that is

a coincidence. I don't believe that they're trying to get the Office of Congressional Ethics after the January six committee just refer people like Kevin McCarthy and Jim Jordan's to the Ethics Committee. I don't believe that they're trying to embarrass the FBI and the Department of Justice. But after the FBI seized Scott Perry's cell, phone last August pursuing to a warrant and is investigating him for trying to

overturn the election. This is all part of a plan to keep bad actors from being investigated and from causing further embarrassment to the Republican Party. And we haven't even said the name George Santos. Talk to me about the fabulous, the talented Mr Santos. I first met George in November of two thousand. If that's his real name, right, he does not seem to answer to it, which makes me

think it might not be. I first met George in November because we were an orientation and at the time, because of the delay with which New York State was counting votes by mail. Uh, he hadn't been elected. He was. It could have been right, the race had not yet been called for Thomas Wiser. We all knew that Tom was going to win that race. But in the meantime, George Sandos went down to Washington and he was part of our freshman orienta. Well, why, I mean he does

that's kind of how he rolls. I mean, he might have just stayed in Congress if he could have, I think, until they told him he had to leave. He would

have absolutely stayed for the full extent of orientation. He was ironically one of the people, if not I think, the person who asked the most questions, who stood up and until the microphone the most, and we're all like, dude, you're not even gonna be part of At some point he approached me to tell me that he is a gay Republican, which I imagine is something that he did because he knows that I'm gay. I'm sure he loved it. Many of these people are pleasant. They will say how

do you in the hallway? I mean, Mary Kayla Green was in my all in the basement of long Worth last term. And you know, people are friendly, but you just gotta remember how terrible they are in terms of in terms of their policies. So and I remember, you know, after George said that to me, speaking of my colleagues and asking did you know that there was a gay Republican and the caucus and and everyone was surprised. And so I have to believe that George is actually Gary

or something, even though I don't want to. And now he is in Congress. I thought that that what school he said where he said he's going to sit down and talk to him was pretty good. I mean, it's like, what are they going to say to him, like, don't be a sociopath. I'm really looking forward to seeing what the federal agencies do with respect to these really troubling things. Right, UM, I will tell you, I am and have been increasingly

concern learned with the politicization of the Ethics Committee. UM specifically concerned by the behavior of my Republican colleagues on that committee. But the Department of Justice, specifically the U. S. Attorney's Office in the Eastern District of New York is probing, uh several of the allegations against Mr Santos, and I think it's untenable that that he would remain in office

for these next two years. But Kevin McCarthy would love to have him for as long as he can because it's a district that you know should be represented by a Democrat when you look at Bliden's marginal victory and you know it's a district frankly that I believe Tom

Swazie could win all over again. I think they were a special election well, and also Republicans have decided or at least they made the macin nations that they are going to try to kick from committees, kick out Eric Swall while Adam Schiff and Johan Omar as a sort of payback for Marjorie Taylor Green. I mean that says everything you need to say when you talk about this

one Congress. When you look at the criticism of Adam Schiff, for example, who has been one of the democracy champions that we've had, someone who has been taking Donald Trump won and Maga extremism, it really reveals that a number of the objections don't have met I think, you know, the stuff about Ilhan Omar is rooted in Islamophobia and racism.

I mean, look, you can absolutely take people to the mat when it comes to disagreeing with their policy positions, but the idea that you know, some of these people should not be allowed to serve on their committees is extraordinary. And again, this is about partisanship. This is not about concern for anything, but to be able to say, look, you took Marjorie Tyler Green off something, we took Adam

Cheff up something. That's right. You know, some of us, myself included, thought that people would be taken off of all committees. So this is actually more of a modest reprisal than I than I expected from the Republican Party. Will you explain Margae Taylor Green was taken off all of her committees, same thing for Paul Gosar. I have not heard Kevin McCarthy say that Adam Ship cannot serve on any committees in the Congress. I've heard him say

he'll be taking out the Intelligence Committee. I've heard him say that Ohani will be taken off the Foreign Affairs Committee. Do you have any sort of thoughts on how the Biden administration should handle this continual Benghazi I mean, do you think they should fight back? Do you think they should ignore it? Do you think I mean, you know, what's the calculus in your mind? I think they have

to fight back. I think that not taking the Benghazi investigation seriously a few years ago did great harm to Hillary Clinton in the general election, and it wasn't fair

and it was not based in any merit. But you know, you have to make that case to the American people because increasingly we have a splintering in our media such that a large segment of the American population will believe that somehow Joe Biden is responsible for the conduct of his son and potentially, you know, hold that against him when when voting in in two thousand twenty four. It's such an insane, insane and and also incredibly stupid time

to be alive. Yeah, the House is pretty raggedy these days. Do you think that McCarthy will be speaker? Do you

think he'll last the whole hundred No? I do not. Um. I think that Kevin McCarthy will be lucky to get through the year of two thousand twenty three as Speaker of the House, because what's going to happen been is that because any person can create a you know, can can require a vote to replace Kevin McCarthy, you're going to have a bunch of Democrats waiting to vote with you, with five or so other Republicans on the other side

of the eye, to replace Kevin McCarthy. So it's it's a very fraud straight jacket to use a word that Macates and others have have you used with respect to Kevin McCarthy, You heard it here first. Thank you, mon dare I hope you will come back to cover this before you start running again. No pressure, Well, thank you, I appreciate it. Still have to make a decision. I know you, our dear listeners are very busy and you don't have time to sort through the hundreds of pieces

of punnentry each week. This is why every week I put together and use of my five favorite articles on politics. If you enjoyed the podcast, you will love having this in your inbox every Friday. So sign up at Fast Politics pod dot com and click the tab to join our mailing list. That's fast politics pod dot com. Dave Wigal is a political reporter at Semaphore. Dave, welcome to Fast Politics. Thanks for having me. It's good to be here. I don't even know where to start here. This gop

house seems kind of incredible to me. I mean, you've been doing this a long time. What is your take here as this starts? Well, it was both odd to cover and inevitable. And Michael, last weeks with Semaphore was really the first time a bunch of us who joined the publication were out in the house giving people, grabbing them, interviewing them, irritating them. I was not pulling my hair

out over what a crazy thing was happening. Was interesting that this had not happened in a hundred years but it was exactly the thing that conservative media had been mitigating towards for a long time. I mean, if you paid attention to Turning Point usas sort of parallel conservative conferences they've been having. I mean I've watched them in December when Carry Lake was the special guest and getting most the attention. And you've been to a lot of

these too. Well, that one I was just watching remotely. So that's that's if somebody. If somebody is going to put the whole thing up on a stream, I'm gonna watch the stream and then get something else done. But I've been to a lot of it too. Yeah, I've heard a lot of this. This happening in things got less less coverage in this. I think what got ignored

was Gates and other incumbents who showed up. We're talking about challenging Kevin McCarthy, talking about not just the demands that make but really in personal terms, saying that this guy was was a schmuck who couldn't be trusted and was never gonna do what conservatives sent Republicans to Washington

to do. Like this was very hard hardened. It wasn't just because I've seen a lot of comparison by people on the left to what they wanted their representatives to do when there was a similar narrowed ever credit majority in one like why didn't you guys get in there

and protest her? And a big reason is that even left wing Democrats who were left to Congress respect Nancy Pelosi and thinks she thinks she I a should say it was good at the job you You did to hear this drumbeat for years and Republicans saying, one, we don't think this guy is very good at this, and two in the in the last few weeks, there's a lot we want. We want that we think the guy is so weak he can't deliver on. So I I was looking at it saying, Okay, what are they going

to pull out of this? Like the chaos of having to wait a couple of days to figure out who's the speaker, that's not really affecting most people. And it's not like the debt limit where you're you're really worried. Okay, I'm getting advice from my broker about what Congress is doing. I wouldn't say no one cared, but this did not

have a huge impact on people's lives. It was kind of a free game to play for for right wing members of Congress who said so much on the record you can barely read it all about why they why they wanted to do this. So it was inevitable, but it wasn't inevitable. It was inevitable. I didn't treat it like a crazy event that was gonna impact the Republic for generations that to come. It was just they saw

a bargaining tactic and they used it. And unlike people on the left were pretty happy with Nancy Pelosi respected her, people on the right, we're pretty blatant about how little they respected to Ket McCarthy and didn't think he was gonna gonna be worth worth it in the job. So I was interested in what they're going to extract from the guy, which which we're only now learning about and we still don't really know. Right yesterday, I saw reporting

Nancy May saying she didn't know. I saw a Democratic compress people saying they don't know. They don't really know because it's not in the rules package. Right, Yeah, that's right. I mean the stuff that is most important in terms of an effect to a normal person who don't care about politics, was okay, what are they going to demand exchange for the debt limit? What are they going to demand exchange for passing normal appropriations bills? And that's still

kind of opaque. I mean, we've seen some some screenshots of things that they've told members, we don't have something on paper the rest of this and the rest of the rest of the rules that they were passing who served on committee. I don't think that that materially changed a lot. They were saying before the election they were going to use this email. Yeah, so it sounds like a lot of these people think that Kevin McCarthy is a moron. And and actually, I'd love to go into this.

I know there was a really interesting piece in political last year about how Kevin McCarthy is a moron, but people don't really reporters don't really report that, even though it is sort of a baked in in the Kevin McCarthy experience. Yes, and that was another strange externality with this whole fight last week is if you polygraphed one of reporters covering and asked them, did you think if somebody told you a couple of years ago, Kevin McCarthy will be the Republican leader at a time they have

a narrow majority. Do you think it will go well, they would say no. And it's it's not I don't like to get into like i Q testing because I don't think I would. I would beat a lot of people I cover. Um. It's more that he's a very glib and friendly leader who who never says no to anyone and has been very blatant in the past to

his to his detriment about what his strategy is. And he just has never shown the ability took her al a difficult conference the way that Nancy Pelosi did, the freak of the way that Pelosi, like alone among recent Republican leaders, been able to Paul Ryan could do it for a little while. Remember Paul Ryan become speaker because

McCarthy bumbled those way out of contention. Doesn't have the votes, right there was the second time that McCarthy did that, right this, and and so that experience lasted for a lot of people. But but a lot of I mean, I think any Republican leader, and you saw this with some of the members. We were all grabbing in the halls,

like Dan Bishop and Matt Gates. A lot of these guys just said, even a different candidate, if they were part of their public Republican leadership, if they were Steve Scalise, there at least offended. If they've been part of the leadership over the last few years, they thought that leadership was so weak and incompetent that they didn't want any

of them to take charge. Because I think Gates would say this, can you imagine Kevin McCarthy going into negotiations with the White House and trying to get anything done. I think that that is compelling to a lot of people who cover Congress, and that was compelling to a lot of Republicans. They just said, Okay, we this guy is going to be the leader. We're going to extract whatever we can from him because we know how weak he is. That was their approach, and I think, again,

we're waiting for the rules. We're not sure exactly what they got, but that was the strategy, and it was a smart strategy. It's interesting I'm thinking about this reporting we saw come out of Congress at the end of the week from the Washington Post that talked about the idea that actually Mark Meadows was whipping votes against Kevin McCarthy, that seemed pretty incredible. Yeah, he just does not somebody who has accrued a ton of I wouldn't say good will.

I would just save respect in the conservative movement. I was looking at, you know, CBS is pulling that came out over the weekend with their with their Sunday shows. Like one of the questions they asked people was what did you think of this House leadership fight? Obviously most maybe not obviously, but maybe you can guess most Americans said, oh, I didn't like it. I think fifty forty five No, No, didn't approve most Republicans. And and like this, a huge

minority of Trump voters did approve of it. They really did like the process there of the mind that there is a existential threat to America really every day that Joe Biden is in office, that Republicans should be using every tool they have to stop what Biden is doing, and that McCarthy is going to give up, give up on stuff. And when I was talking about the members who had no faith in the leadership, every time a deal is cut, they would blame the Republican leadership for

cutting that deal. So Brian mass from Florida, who put this to me first, I think he was kind of repeated when he want on some some TV shows was the base did not like the leadership in either house, and not because they had a plan in mind that those guys should have executed. They just didn't like to watch them lose. They had I think a substantive disagreement

with how Mitch McConnell handled the last year. I mean McConnell's approach to the Senate was to block the big things at the left wanted, which you could do that because the filibuster exists. That wasn't that hard, and to had a few things through to help his members lower the salience of some of these fights. Right so here, the infrastructure bill passes because in McConnell's mind, if you could pass infrastructure bill, there's not going to be another

spending bill. He looks like a genius for a couple of months, then he doesn't. And what Mass is saying is our base is angry with Mitch McConnell. Paul Ryan, it's not angry with Ken McCarthy. Just blumps him in with those people. And the opponents knew that they knew who Ket McCarthy is, and they knew that who did what they just said, this guy is a nonentity who's going to get rolled the same way as the other guys we don't like. And so that's McCarthy is speaker.

So far, I think has he put this down by giving Rebels a lot of stuff that we don't know all the details of, but also by promising to be just a conservative speaker. He's not doing I mean, he's not introducing himself the way that Baynard did, the way that that Ryan to an extent did, the way that

something he he came in said. He came in basically as the leader in tandem with a caucus that's as much power as he did, just of of saying, Okay, we didn't have very good twent twent two elections, but we see see a mandate for what we're running on. So we're going to pass House versions of all the conservative stuff that wasn't that popular in the mid term. Yeah, so that actually gets to our next question. We're gonna pass House versions of the stuff that wasn't that popular

in the mid term. They barely eked out when he has a four seat majority. The mid terms obviously are not the presidentials, but we saw, you know, the general feeling was that none of Trump's swing state candidates one. They only one in these very red states where you know, it was kind of baked in that they were going to go red. So I think it's interesting that the Republicans didn't have a moment of like, well, it seems

like some of this isn't so popular. I mean, if you think about the House, like someone like Nancy Mace, you send a Nancy Mace to the suburbs, she can sell this Republican party too in a way that Trump couldn't. But they don't seem to be interested in that. Not that I'm a fan of anyone in this, but just more that they're just going full Trump Agan. What is it that people say they want? I mean, the Democrats did lose the House by not as many votes, not

as many votes as they thought. I mean, they really came within like eight thousand votes of holding onto the thing. So what did voters say that they they were voting Republican for. It was concerns about the economy, it was concerns about inflation. There's a lot of issues where Biden is not popular, where most people think he's not doing a good job. They're most economic, the immigration it has

been weak. So they have a few areas where not just the Republican pub position, but where the where the incumbent Democratic position is unpopular and voters say they're they're willing to see a difference there. What what the they attack first though, is the stuff that like Fox News talks the most but most about, which is I R. S. Agents. Well, I mean that's a dead letter. That's so that's this bill that pastor House they allowed to celebrate. They passed it.

It's not gonna get picked up by the Senate. They're they're in the same position that House Democrats were in twenty nineteen, where you can pass the bill, it will get laughed out of the Senate. You have no no show, no shot. They're gonna do that a lot of that, and so they're not coming in as they could have come in with some ideas that answer would voters say they're worried about and Democrats kind of do do this.

Like Democrats had a very weird twy n t because they came in with a shutdown underway, and their position was would like to shut down to be over and get back to normal government without the border wall. They usually come in with an agenda of positive stuff they want to pass. Republicans didn't put this that together even and I'm not trying to be too pupijorative to smug about what they what they ran on to get McCarthy liked it. But they had mentioned we're gonna with the

party of the commitment to America. I read the Commitment to America. There's not just there's not details in it. There are a few things that the party has has included bills before, but it is not like a as an alternative agenda that they can deliver on. They're not really even attacking that. Like the It's these big, big, big themes about economic recovery, the first one being I

R S agents. They're obsessed, as I talked to you, about what they can investigate from Biden in the Biden Zone, whether it whether they can investigate something related to the vice president having some classified documents in a in a file where they shouldn't be. They're just behaving as as a normal opposition party that that believes if you drag down the president and his party, then there'll be a

presidential election and you can win that. Because the weekend, which is the one the one strategy that McCarthy has talked about executing. Remember, this is the reason how he wasn't speaker years ago is because he he said blatantly the Big Gasi Committee was great because it was hurting Hillary Clinton and making her easier to beat. Like, that's kind of like they're not really doing much to contradict this idea that that is what they're going to do

with the majority right now. I mean that I think that's what they're gonna do with the majority. I mean, I think that's pretty clear. Any rising stars you're seeing come out of this, well, Yeah, the the way that the McCarthy team ended up closing out its floor speeches, lose mandatory floor speeches that clue you into the people they would like everyone to pay attention to is the

future of the party. And and as as it went on, it was most Lee non white members who were elected fairly recently, Juancascamani from South Phoenix like the old guy to Gifford's district which has been recovery drawn, uh, Mike Garcia from from l A County, John James from Macomb County, Michigan. That was who the party was promoting and saying they're there are people who are you know, they're under fifty, they they have had real careers, they're they're not like

born white guys. And you had this with Byron Donald's who I think also fits in that zone although he was on he was on the conservative side. That's who they wanted to introduce. And a theme there was we know that we are as Republicans, this is going for years, that we are varnerable, if not vulnerable, at least irritated by Democrats like saying that we're all doing the bidding of rich white guys. Look at us. We're obviously not you guys. Are you guys would be worried about how

much you're getting. So those are the most immediate stars who got elevated. I think within every one of the twenty not everyone. So the twenty one Republicans who kept causing problems I think victorious parts who who end the voting present. I'm not sure what where she goes with that. She encouraged the Gates faction without really doing much to win over the McCarthy faction, or maybe I mean her her point was that it looked like McCarthy had lost

the confidence of the caucus. So she wasn't going to vote him. Not much there. She's Ukrainian too, right, Yes, yeah, she's Ukrainian American. She has been uh first a supporter of whatever it takes support Ukraine, a little more recently critical. But I don't think her her stock rose because of this. I think I do think most of the conservatives UH working on on this, their their stock within the movement increase.

Remember I was pointing that poll. Both conservatives looked at this and said, great, I think you can you can draw a line from there to say, if you're a conservative, your opinion of Matt met Gates is higher now than it was a month ago because he actually went to the mat and did something delivered on And these guys are also using conservative media very effectively to talk directly to those people and make fun of how the media

covers this. I think that helped them a lot. So you think the winners here are like a Matt Gates and a Lauren Bow. Yeah. I think the stars were some people elevated by the leadership to to say, okay,

the media is paying attention to the house floor. These new young, diverse stars are are are in the forefront of our party stands for UH and the people who want more immediately are are are the holdouts, not all of them, I mean, but like Paul Gossar being somebody that McCarthy has to deal with, that's new for Paul Gossar. He went from somebody that um Bayner and Ryan just kind of were annoyed by and didn't didn't have to genuflect too, to somebody who can go into a room

and they can peel off his vote. He's more relevant now, who just objected more more relevant. Marjorie Taylor Green is more relevant in the process. I think has not a ton yet. I mean, just in my monitoring conservative media, I'm seeing people full fully rebelling against her for dealing with leadership. But she she now has the selfies with her and McCarthy and lots of coverage of how she's responsible for settling this in this fight with inside the party.

That is an enhancement of her role which McCarthy signed on, signed off on. So I think they were enhanced a lot by this. A lot of the new members who I think were the Republicans were happier to deal with and talk about. A lot of these guys got elected in you know, the New York New York City suburbs, etcetera, were just annoyed. I mean, they spent the whole week just giving quotes to people like me about how irritating this all was. I don't think they have gained much

from it yet. So McCarthy has tacked real maga. Right, he was already maga whatever with whatever spinelessness he believes, but he tacked even more maga. But here's a question for you. Now, some of these are more middle of the road congressmen who are Republicans, but you know, one in the New York City stuff suburbs and in California those guys. Is this, you know, a kind of West

wing witch casting? Or do you think that there's a world in which McCarthy gets out there enough that these more centrist Republicans decide on a unity candidate or do you think that will never happen. Are you talking about in the future, In the future, yeah, or if that just if it sets up, or if there's some if you feel like there's some, or if that's just complete witch casting. I think it's possible because the numbers are so tight and you'd only need I mean, I'm just

to give the math, not of the psychic psychology. The members were tight, you had in twenty two. You you had no change in special elections for us the year, but you did have vacancies and things that made the margins closer. I feel like you need you need an insighting event for this. You need some sort of some sort of absolute stasis over the debt limit for that

conversation to start again. But what happened is there is a vote and the chair is vacated, vote to vacate the chair and McCarthy doesn't have the support because of some crisis going on. That's much easier for to imagine for McCarthy right now it is for any recent modern speaker. I mean this. There was a motion to vacate the chair when Bayner was Speaker over over much less over some of these issues over we don't trust this guy is going as hard as we would preventing deal from

being cut to raise raise spending. We know what tools exist and these and everyone in the House now knows what tools exist to drag this out. And that's not crazy. I don't think it would be McCarthy. The problem is in a in a presidential cycle, Republicans who were will be willing to vote for some compromise speaker who's not McCarthy. They'd have to look back at their districts and think

about what's coming to them in primaries. If they ditched this speaker in favor of one who's going to deal with Democrats and let's say, for example, raise the debt limit without a ton of concessions, I feel like that would be a huge crisis for the party. But I wouldn't rule it out because there are I mean we identified, not not just me and my colleagues, but everyone around

the Hill identified. You know, a couple dozen Republicans who are so exhausted by the holdouts that they were at least open to this, Like guys like Don Bacon Omaha, who keep winning their elections and running well ahead of Trump. They don't have people on a short leag but they've they've they've said, here are here's what I would love for this majority, for the speakership that are ageda to look like. I think some of this is can be mollified.

The committee investigations, the things of the party actually is delivering on. I think they're they're feeling better because it was so embarrassing last week for them to go through this. But yeah, the conditions are there for some crisis to unfold. People say, what about these tools we put down when we let McCarthy become a speaker. Let le's pick them up and do it again, right exactly, Dave, Thank you

so much. I hope you'll come back. I think there's gonna be a lot of ship going down every day. I think so. Yeah, And I really, I really think it's good to not like hyperventilate about this and say, like, okay, actually are in disarray, like what is the disarrayed driving towards Because the reason this happened is because Gates had all understood you could you could create a problem for the leadership and get a lot of what you wanted.

So I think the question is all right now that everyone knows that what happens next so with they will be stuff for us to talk about in this zone. Thank you very much. Yes, thank you very much. Molly, Junk Jesse Cat and in so Molly, as you know, we haven't had a moment of fuckery on this podcast for the last two weeks, and some people may have suspected this is because there was a vacation, but I really like to think of this as we were sitting

shiv up. Since we lost a reoccurring character on our podcast together, your favorite Congressman, Louie Gomert, sometimes known as my Louis by you, is no longer with us. How are you feeling. I've been meaning to do a wellness check. I'm very conflicted because there are a lot of very stupid new members of Congress. There are some very stupid returning members of Congress, like Lauren Boebert and MTG. There are some very stupid people who are now committee chairs.

So I'm very conflicted because I do feel that the moron quotation has not dropped in that way. I'm relieved, but I also feel a little bit sad because my incredibly racist Texas judge, who is a fucking moron, is no longer in Congress. Well, I'm glad you're handling it okay, But I thought it was nice since the Republicans are so napt you've got a few extra days with them, since none of the new Congress can get sworn in.

But since this is our first moment of fuckory since the swearing d and of officially being gone I prepared for you today A twelve gun salute to Louise dumbest moments. Are you ready? I was born ready for this. Okay, First, I'd like to start with when he thought the Obama administration was staffed by the Muslim Brotherhood. I mean, who

among us? Who among us didn't think that, Yes, this administration has so many Muslim Brotherhood members uh that have influence that they just are making wrong decisions for America. I'm telling you, if only. How about the time he very accurately predicted that socialized healthcare would make kill less for seniors. Been battling the social healthcare, the nationalization of healthcare. It is gonna absolutely kill seniors, said as soon as they'll put him on a list and and force them

to die early. We call that death panels for cuney. Now, this is what I can't play a clip. But my lovely girlfriend Lord would never forgive me if I didn't mention her favorite luism when his two spell out mid press conference shortly after the election. But next we have

the time he said bestiality and necrophilia. So I'd like, among us, if you're oriented toward animals beastiality, Uh, then you know that that's not something that could be used held against you, or any bias be held against you for that, which means you have to strike any laws against beast reality. If you're oriented toward corpses towards children, you know they are all kinds of perversions what most of us would call perversions. Some would say it sounds

like fun, nice, nice. I mean, it's it's good because you never think of Congress. You you really want your local congressman to weigh in on necrophilia. That's one of the mean things you want Congress working on. How about what he told us all how he used to handle outbursts at his court when he was a judge. I had one guy that was particularly out of line and warning three times, and then we du taped his head and we didn't hear from him till it was his turn to talk. And when that was when I was

a judge and fell in the court. I'm sorry. Imagine having Louis Gohmert to decide your future and duct tape you up to shut you up. Stuff doesn't sound fun. But who could forget what He wouldn't stop banging on the desk because he didn't like a witness sing bild bar lies and they had to ask to remove him from the committee. Either we have rules or we don't. This chairman, there's not order in the room. There's a a Mr Carvin, would you have Jane Cooper removed? The gentleman?

The gentleman, the witness will conclude. Then there was the time that he harasked Peter Struck while he was on the witness stand. How many times did you look so innocent into your wife's eye and lied to her about Mr Sherman. It is outragebility of a witness. Shame how Mrs Inspowerable harass me the way that you need your medication that many Congressmen have been told they need their

medication while in the middle of a hearing. You know, I want to as we say goodbye to this incredible racist idiot who never should have gotten as far as he did, a testament really truly to a culture that honors white man above all else. I would like to say goodbye, sweet more on, goodbye. Well, I'm glad you did that, because we have one last one that I'm gonna get four shots too, because it was so dumb when he asked Eric Holder to not cast aspersions on

his asparagus. The best, the the Gentlemans. If the chair Ms supposition I'm on my asparagus, that's the chair Ms supposition, I'm on my asparagus. Well, I think what's important about that is Louie Gomer got the laughs, just not intentionally. That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to her the best minds and politics makes sense of all this chaos. If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send it to a friend

and keep the conversation going. And again, thanks for listening.