Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics, where we discussed the top political headlines with some of today's best minds, and Governor Greg Abbott is in Asia while a hurricane pummells Texas shades of Ted Cruz. We have a great show for you today, Democracy dockets, Mark Elias, Factcheck's Republican claims that Democrats can't nominate a different candidate, and all the other things they're doing to try to
undermine democracy. Then we'll talk to Semaphore's Dave Wigel about the lessons from twenty sixteen that are coming back to haunt all of us in twenty twenty four. But first we have the author of the Undertow scenes from a Slow Civil War as well as his amazing Substack newsletter, Jeff Charlotte. Welcome back to Fast Politics. Jeff Charlotte, thank you for joining us.
Hi, MOLLI good to be with you.
So, Jeff, I wanted to have you on because all the time what we cover effects may and Jesse and I just did this YouTube series which is coming out very soon everyone on Project twenty twenty five, and we interviewed all these academics and we started talking about what it looks like when fascism comes to America. You have written so well about this, I wanted to talk about this. So I wrote this column about my grandfather because my brother and I were talking on the phone. I live
in a lot of anxiety about if Trump wins. And my brother said, well, you know, it could actually be great for your career. And he said, you know, Grandpa was never that famous until he went to jail. So I'm wondering if we could talk a little bit about that time and what it looked like McCarthyism.
Yeah.
Absolutely, And I think that's such a valuable column. Your grandfather, Howard Fast too. Some readers may know and some may not. People probably known Spartacus and so on. But what's so fascinating about that, And I think this is important for us to recognize in the current moment, is it wasn't that when he went to jail or I wrote about him in my book about.
Talk about what you wrote about too, because that's interesting.
Well, in nineteen forty nine, Paul Robeson, the Great Singer, was going to do a free concert along the river in Peakskill, New York, and the townspeople he was.
Most famous for playing a fellow, and he was a civil rights hero. He was a little bit like Sidney Potier, but he ultimately was lost to history because he was a communist.
He was a communist at the Russia loving Negro baritone, as the headline of the local newspaper put it, organizing the crowd and rally. And so they came out. The local veterans clubs came out, one hundred strong, backed by the police, to violently attack the concert. Your grandfather bravely attempted to hold the line, although they were backed right
up to the stage. And that, to me, though, is such an example of what gets lost sometimes when we talk only about the national scale of Project twenty twenty five, your grandfather, but no one was sort of saying, get Howard Fast. The way fascism works is it happens locally. It happens Veterans organization and Peace Skill New York decides they're going to hurt people. A particular politician comes upon a particular writer, a journalist, and says, this one gets me.
Fascism comes for everybody, and it is irregular. It is hard to predict. And I think your column is really valuable in that because I think a lot of liberals and leftists they want to sort of put this in a neat system. Well, first they're going to come for the trans folks, then they're going to come from the people of color. And there's some structural truth to that,
But fascism happens as an explosion. The revenge that Trump has promised is going to trickle down to all the millions of little Trumps in your local school board, at your workplace, and revenge is going to come by surprise in many different places at once.
Yeah, that's so important because this was like the Muzzlim band, right, it was a fake war that Republicans hoped would help them Galvin the base, right, It's the same idea. Russia was the number one danger, even though they had recently helped to win World War Two, they were now the single biggest danger towards American life. And so these Republicans
decided that you could be a domestic enemy. And the part about domestic enemy is in this November speech at Trump gave, he talked about domestic enemies and that is new for him. And I'm hoping you could talk a little bit about what that means domestic enemies.
Or the enemy within. I've been going to Trump rallies since the beginning, and version was in twenty sixteen, early twenty sixteen in Youngstown, Ohio, and there's always been an enemy within. And I mean, your calm is very important because from the very beginning, one of the enemies within
were journalists. The way that you go to a Trump rally, and if you go and agreed to go and participate as the press, which I don't want to get my tick in, I just wander in the crowd because I don't want to be put in a metal pen in the middle of the arena, at which point Trump will turn and say, look at those scums, Look at those scum, and the crowd turns on mass and to twin birds in the air, find their fingers and screaming and so on.
And it's professional wrestling, it's showmanship. It's the performance of an enemy that is hard to identify. And I think sometimes we get stuck on the idea with the enemy within. Beginning of the Trump administration, it was Muslims. It still Muslims, but then it became quote illegals, it became trans folks. The enemy of fascism is always mutating, and that's a lesson we can learn back from the McCarthy period because they were always detecting a new possible subject who could
be communists. And that's how communism worked too, because communism, your school teacher could be a Communist, your neighbor could be a Communist. Always be on the lookout. You know. There's another parallel to that moment that I think about. I wrote about your grandfather in this pitched riot, trying to defend himself and others against massive mob backed up by police. They tried to hold the concert again, by the way, and even a crowd of five thousand kin
with New York State Police air power. They lent the rioting mob a helicopter to try and kill Paul Robeson and Pete seeger Woody Guthrie, your granddad. But when I dug into who these riders were, these veterans, these were a lot of this led by guys who had fought in Europe and they had been traumatized. They were terrorist. They didn't want any more trouble in their lives, and so the fascist message they came to them that said, attempts to improve the world, it's just more trouble it
seemed very alarm to them. Well, compare that to the current moment, with the trauma of the pandemic not so distant for us, and that helps us understand the appeal of fascism. I'm going to shut up anything that reminds me of that pain and suffering, and I need a strong man who will bring the fists down hard quickly on any reminder of the pain, which, by the way, he was absolutely instrumental in causing.
Yes, I mean so, I mean, I don't want to laugh because there's nothing to laugh about it. It's just deadly serious. But it is interesting to me that, you know, had Donald Trump handled the pandemic a little better and not made masks of partisan issue, he could have saved maybe five hundred thousand, maybe seven hundred thousand of his own people. I mean Red State Republicans lost their lives because Donald Trump told them not to believe in science.
What happened here was very easily prevented. But somehow, I don't think they see it that way, right.
I refer to this period that we're in now as the Trump is seen, the age of Trump. That's true, whether Trump is in power or not, he's shaping the rhetoric the political record of a lives just the way Reagan did. Rad Age historians will say the age of Reagan went from nineteen eighty to twenty sixteen. Even Democrats would friends ideas of what government could be according to Reagan, who now we're in the Trump is scene and his language creeps into ours. I'm not putting you on the spot,
but I know she just said his people. He could have saved five hundred thousand of his people. He was president of the United States, the worst one in American history. But all of the people were supposed to be our people, his people. And he's got us thinking in terms of you know, he's already sort of started to split in
American life. The sharksplit in American life. But to that point that there are those dead, and when I think about people saying, well, because we're hearing this now, right, we're hearing yeah, it would be bad, but he's not really gonna do all that much. How bad would it be? Half a million dead? A million dead bad? We want to talk about genocidal killing and we must. Trump, I argue, is responsible for a genocide scale death and a lot of us knew that a while ago, and somehow it's
not in the rhetoric anymore. And I think this is key to fighting fascism, something that comes from studying, you know, the period of your grandfather and the ways in which the left of that time succeeded, and let's be honest, mostly failed. They were defeated, right, But then how they took inventory of those defeats. And one of that was if you don't mourn, if you don't acknowledge your losses, if you don't say, hey, this this really hurts. I
got to think about that. I had this grief and it can curdle into anger, which becomes fascism or I feel too much Star Wars and you know Yoda's anger because but there is some truth to that. The grief, unprocessed, unmourned, becomes fascism. And I think that's a huge part. Like when you go amongst Trump's I'm about to use his language too, amongst Trump's people. Now you hear this sort of you know the way I illustrate this, if you
think about climate change. We're not talking enough about Trump and climate change and the death he could bring to us. Ault you think about those Trump lovers who have those big trucks. They're called coal rollers, and they don't just burn a lot of gas, they'd burn an extra amount of gas. These people would rather pay more to show how much they don't believe in climate change. It reminds me of an old story. Now you've really got me thinking back on the thirties forties.
Well, no, because I really believe and I feel like I'm the only person in the world who believes this. But you know, history rhymes, and the fact that we are dealing with this autocrat and we have had other periods in American life when autocracy has reared its ugly head, and we are not looking back to them for lessons. Instead, we're treating this as if it's business as usual. And I think it's really important. So any way, go on. That's enough for me.
I was going to say, the guys in the coal rollers reminds me. There used to be something called the Yiddish anarchist ball. These were anarchists, our early twentieth century radical Jews. They spoke Yiddish and on Young Kipper they would have a feast, and not just a feast, they would have a pig roast. It's a little bit like shaking your fist and saying to God, see how much I don't believe in you. So this is my grand cold just saying see how much I don't believe in
climate change. That's a grief statement and it seems comic. And the rhyming history, I think sometimes we miss it because it seems like, well the way it was actually is the first time tragedy and second time farst. This is a forest, this is a fool, this is funny. We've got the funny videos of the guys at Trump rallies and so on, first the fares, then the fist.
As I think, how we best understand fascism and when would go back and look at look at that history, we realize that always fascism is derided and thought buffoonish and clownish at first. So our funny videos are not going to save us arm in arm and trying to hold the line like your granddad. I'm hoping we can sell some of Howard's fast books in this podcast.
I mean, you know what's interesting about my grandfather, I think was he grew up very poor with an immigrant father and a dead mother. You know, he said to me, the reason he became a writer was A he needed money and B he was in the lot. You know, there was no place for him to go. So he went to the library and he read books because the library was free. And then he started writing his stories. And he started writing when he was sixteen, and he never stopped because you know, that was the way he
processed the world. And I think a lot about why he fought for people who had less, because at the end he was quite successful. And the reality is is because this is what we are doing on this planet. You know, why even exist if we're not here to make it better for others. And I just appreciate what he did.
Yeah, there's two warnings. There's two more wantings in that story. Look at that he became a writer to make money and at this point we could fall. But also and then he went to the library. Let's talk about that project. Twenty twenty five, we're talking about the big headline items.
Let's talk about the national assault on libraries. The American Library Association just had a meeting in San Diego, and you know, they're trying to figure out what is going on and who is going to come to their aid. You know, we lost track of that habit of armed men, you know, whether they're oathkeepers or proud boys, or guns or whatever, lining up outside libraries during a story hour.
Very very very reminiscent of the nineteen thirties nineteen forties period of right wing action, the kind of stuff that we were just talking about. When we look at book banning, one of the lessons that I would want us to pay attention to is again, fascism is not always going to come announcing itself clearly, so we see all these attempts at book bans. I attended a session with one of Texas's leading book banners last fall, and she was explaining she had this was a PowerPoint for others on
how to do book bans, the formal book challenge. The formal book challenge. He said, that's a distraction that gets the local liberals all worked up. Where's the real action. She had a little slide show, so maybe they challenge a book like Alison Bechdeal's Great Fun Move, a queer memoir the Town, and they defend the book, and hooray,
we held the line. And then she says, now here's a picture three months later of the library that the library and censored because the library and is scared, scared for their livelihood, scared for their safety in that community. They said, I got the book out of the library. I just removed. I did it quietly after the storm had passed. He says, that's what we're doing. She says, the books that were removing, a lot of them are not in the official band. And I think about that,
your grandfather going to the library. I had a young student I teach fun Home House in Bechdel's fun Home to young writing students.
You teach at dart mess Yeah.
Yeah, a queer kid from Oklahoma. And this book blew their mind. And they said, if I had found this in my high school library when I was coming out to myself, this would have changed my life. But it wasn't in that library. Couldn't be in that library. And I said, well, let me, wasn't name your high school. I'll send them a copy, And I wrote, they can't accept copy. The library would love a copy. They can't have that the way folks of the past, special people
without the money, the bid books that themselves free. That's being constricted, that's being constricted to the front line of fascism. Project twenty five it's national abortion laws, it's round them up undocumented camps. But it's also your local library, your little local library. Yep.
And that's the goal. I want you to talk about the thousand points sort of people doing Trumpism themselves. So like one of the things that Timothy Schneider writes about in his book, this brilliant little book he did on how to Resist Fascism, I can't remember the title now, but he says, don't censor yourself in advance. It's something like that. Can you explain to us why that's important.
You and I were talking about this before. The idea that we know that the majority of the American people, the majority of humans in all the world and all the countries that are under siege from this global fascism, they don't want fascism, they don't want these ideas. But the sad truth is we also know from history is that the majority will acquiesce, the majority will accept it. The majority will say, you know, wisdom, I better lay low, I'd better not stay. Oh that's the well. They're really
beating up my coworker. They're maybe physically, but also maybe false charges. The kind of investigations that you write about the hospitel has talked about will become standard in the new regime. That's acquiescence. And so don't fool yourself if you're sitting out there and saying, well, no, no, I'm not accepting fascist. I'm keeping my powder dry. I'm staying wise. You hold the line. You hold the line at each step, and if you have to retreat, you do so because
you have to, not because you've decided that. I'll just cleverly go hide here in the weeds until the stormtroopers pass.
Jeff Charlotte, I hope you'll come back.
Thank you.
Spring is here, and I bet you are trying to look fashionable. So why not pick up some fashionable all new politics merchandise. We just opened a news store with all new designs just for you. Get t shirts, hoodies, hats, and top bags. To grab some head to fastpolitics dot com. Mark Elias is the founder of Democracy Docket. Welcome back, Mark.
Thanks for having me.
I'm delighted. So the first thing I want to ask you is, because you are like all things voter law, I want you to explain to us if it did happen, if Biden did drop out of the race. Code Republicans because I've seen articles that say maybe they could try to keep a Democrat from getting on the ballot in certain states, or is there like really an okay path for a candidate that is not Joe Biden.
Yeah, so look, I'm going to stay clear of the you know, the politics around this. What I can tell you is this that Republicans are are unsurprisingly not telling the truth that they can get somehow they can stop the Democratic Party from nominating the candidate they decide to nominate.
The fact is that there won't be an.
Official general election candidate or the Democratic Party until the delegates.
Vote on who that is. So right now, neither.
Donald Trump nor Joe Biden are the candidates of their parties for the general election. That is why we have conventions, right the convention That is why you know, in a normal year, we usually refer to it as the presumptive nominee of the party. And the reason why they're the presumptive nominee is that they don't actually become the nominee until after the convention.
Is done doing its business, whether that is done in person or virtually, as we've seen in past years and maybe the case this year in the Democratic Party. At that point, there is.
A nominee and that name gets forwarded onto all fifty states plus the District of Columbia, and that person would then get automatic ballot access as the Democrat as a major party candidate in all those states.
But it is different for RFK Junior, as he is not from a major party. Can you just explain them?
That is I think where the Republicans are purposely confusing things. And you think purposely because I think the Republicans, you know, are never interested in spreading good information. They always want to spread bad information. But the reason why it's different for whether it's RFK or Cornell West or whomever, is that they do not enjoy major party status. So basically,
the states break ballot access into three categories. You have parties that historically have achieved a certain threshold of the vote, and those are the major parties, and their candidates automatically get put on one election after the next. That is the Democratic Party and the Republican Party in every state. In some states it is also the Libertarian Party or the Green Party. In New York it may be the Conservative Party and the Liberal Party.
Or the Working Families Party.
Yeah, yeah, so that's category one. Category two are what some states refer to as minor parties. These are parties that have not historically met this threshold, but they are sort of of it as like farm team parties, and they usually have a somewhat harder process to get on it.
And then finally there are just random people running who it as part of any party, and they typically in most states have the hardest time to get on because if you think about it, if you're a state, you don't want just everyone to be able to submit their name and say we want to be on the ballot. You'd have ballots that went on for pages and pages
and pages. So that's why it's different for RFK or for Cornos that it even would be for for example, Jill Stein, he's running as the Green Party candidate, right that is sort of more established.
But not that not a major party in most places.
Now are Republicans right now making it harder to vote. So yesterday they tried to pass a bell it's never going to go anywhere in the House where the idea is that non citizens can't vote, which of course we all know is bullshit because non citizens cannot vote, so they're fixing something that doesn't need to be fixed. But I wondered if they were doing that in the hopes
of opening the door to different voter roll purchase. And I was hoping you could talk about that, because when I heard them talking about it, I thought, well, there's only one reason this is.
Happening, yes, right, So I think there are actually two reasons that's happening. So, first of all, to your point, there's already a federal law that prohibits non citizens from voting, So congratulations, Congress. There is a law that says that non citizens can't vote in federal elections. And there's also no history of non citizens voting in federals of any significant number.
That's number one. But there are two reasons they're doing so.
The first is, I do think there is a part of this that is just pure demagoguery.
Right.
They are demonizing immigrants through every possible vehicle, and so this sort of gets nicely in that it allows them to demonize immigrants in yet another way, or migrants in another way that kind of fits with their overall message. But on the voter suppression front, the reason why they're doing it is because what they're actually trying to say is that you have to prove you are a citizen
in order to register to vote. And so I'd ask how many people in the in the in the audience, how many of them have a.
Passport handy right? How many of them have their birth certificate?
Handy right?
Because there aren't a lot of ways to prove that you are a US citizen other than a US passport or a birth certificate. So what it will actually do is prevent lots and lots of lawful voters, lots and lots of US citizens from being able to vote, by putting up obstacles to prove citizenship, which, if you think about it, you know, Molly, if I said to you, can you show me voter ID, you'd say, sure, I have the driver's license. I can show you know, a
work idea government ID. Well, none of those prove citizenship. If I asked you, can you prove that you were born in Stanford, Connecticut? Like I mean, you weren't cognizant, you don't like, how would you prove it?
Right? You'd have to have a bircher to good or a passport right.
And remember that the people who get passports tend to be affluent people who go to Europe or go to you know, travel internationally, and they tend not to be poor people who can't write. Like what percentage of Americans have never been on an airplane, let alone to Europe. So it is actually meant to punish poor people, right, it.
Is poor people.
And also, and I think this is not to be overlooked, punish young people. A lot of these voter suppression laws are really targeting first time voters or young voters.
And the reason why is think about it.
You know, when I was coming of age and building a law practice and everything, I actually did have a need for my birth certificate.
Right. This was like before the Internet age, you know, and people would need to know. You'd need to be able to for various things, you know, be able to prove who you were, and like a birth certificate was really relevant. A young person that doesn't really have the same need for per certificate. There are a myriad of ways.
They could show a cable bill, you know, they could show a utility bill. They can show a student ID. I mean, when I was in college, I don't even if we had student id's. We did, they were probably written on paper, right, so that it is harder. Fewer young people tend to have these sort of critical family
documents that older people. And of course when it comes to passports, you know, just older people are more affluent, they're also just more likely to have the free time to travel internationally relative to young people, so that the older people tend to have passports or diar rates.
It's so interesting because it really is such a setup for Republicans making it harder for people to vote, which of course has always been the goal. Here we're in this run up to the twenty twenty for election. What are the things you're seeing that they're doing.
Yeah, so, look, I think you've hit half of it, and I want to focus on the other half, which is that they want to make it harder of an easier cheat. And you know, let's not look past the easier to cheat part, because what Donald Trump did after twenty twenty, after November was tried to cheat. First, he tried to cheat in the courts when he couldn't cheat in the courts. He tried to get Brad Rosenberger and others to cheat in the vote count. When he couldn't
cheat in the vote count. He inspired a violent insurrection in the nation's capital right, which was an effort to cheat on the results. So we have to always keep in mind that, as distracted as we may be by other political events going on in the day, the Republicans are continuing their march towards making it harder easier to cheat. And we are seeing, you know, as we are recording this, the state of Nevada is in court suing Washaw County,
which is the second largest county in the state. This is Reno, This is a swing county suing them because the Republicans on the canvassing board there are refusing to certify the election results in two local elections. Why are
they refusing to certify elections in the local elections? These are dry runs for what they plan on doing this fall, which is to refuse to acknowledge that Joe Biden and the Democratic candidates up and down the ballot have won the election and refuse to certify fill out the paperwork necessary. There is a rule, a lawsuit in Georgia that Republicans have brought to try to make this law in Georgia.
There's a proposed rule in Georgia to try to make this The rule in Georgia there is litigation in Arizona that Republicans have brought to try to facilitate this, and we saw this after twenty twenty two by law firm and I we had to suit Coache's County Arizona. We had to sue a couple of counties in Pennsylvania because
the Republicans are refusing to certify accurate election results. And what I'm afraid, Molly, is that people right now are so caught up in the moment, and they are so caught up in the day to day politics that we will wake up the day after the election and people will be like, oh my god, you know what happened here?
The Republicans are not certifying elections across the country. And my message is now is the time to focus on this, because the day after the election it's really hard to focus on this.
Now is the time to focus.
On Explain to us who are the people who certify elections? How can this be focused on right now?
Yeah?
So this is really really important. So after the voting is done and begins what I call the pageantry of democracy, right, so you have the typically you know, older people who work the polls, and they are Democrats and Republicans working together, and at the end of the night they shake hands and say good job, and they call in or send in the election returns from their local precinct to.
A town or to a county.
Those town and county officials then collect those results and they put that on their website and they shake hands and congratulate themselves. Then typically the next day or the day after, what's called a canvassing board meets, and this is now the formal meeting of the county or the town on a bipartisan basis, to celebrate democracy, to say
job well done, we have gotten these results. And essentially what they do is they simply tabulate the numbers that they've been given and put a seal and a stamp and their signatures on a big piece of paper, and
they celebrate democracy. Those certificates then go to the state, and the state again on a bipartisan basis Democrats and Republicans, they hold the ceremony where they tally up the results from all the counties, put it in a big spreadsheet, put a big calligraphy certificate, they put a stamp on it and sign it and celebrate democracy. Then that goes to the governor and the Secretary of State, and they put it on a huge certificate, lots of calligraphy, and
a big ceremony where the governor signs it. Those certificates then in the case of presidential elections, go to the floor of Congress in wooden boxes and those get opened on January sixth and the end of the pageantry of democracy. Well, think about it, Molly, we're fucked.
I'm listening to you, and at every point I'm they.
Were fucked, right, because think about it. In today's day and age, you actually don't need any of that, right, Like Excel spreadsheets could do all of that, Like there actually isn't a need for it. But the value of it is historically that it is a way that we show that whoever whichever candidate went or lost, is less important than the fact that democracy worked, and it is a celebration of democracy. Well, what Republicans are doing is
they are weaponizing it. They have seen that this is a weak point.
So what they are doing is they are appointing people to the boards of these ministerial acts, the people who do nothing but put the stamps and sign them. They are arguing that those people should be able to exercise their own judgment of their own content and not sign
the certificates if they don't believe that they're accurate. And that is what we saw Donald Trunk do when he called the canvasson board in Wayne County with Ronald McDaniel in the aftermath of twenty and in Michigan, and it failed. And that's what we had to sue them over in twenty twenty two in Coachi's County because they were refusing to certify. And here's the really terrible news, Molly is states can't partially certify states.
Right.
You can't be like, well, we have the results from most of the counties, we just don't have them from all the counties, right, so it becomes a fight for the lowest common denominator of election. And I are crazy.
And so what we need everyone to do today? And I write about this on Democracy Docket constantly, but everyone needs to be finding out who and their local community are on these boards and they need to be publicizing and then and calling out and making holding those people accountable to do the right thing for their communities, not to do the right thing for the Magat movement.
How does the Supreme Court and these enormous decisions. You know, they've given a lot of power to the executive So I'm hoping you could talk about that.
Yeah, So look, I think there is no putting sugarcoating. The Supreme Court did the bidding of Donald Trump at the end of this term, and frankly, they did the bidding witting or unwitting of Project twenty twenty five at the end of this term. Let's review what we saw. First, we saw the Supreme Court say that Colorado couldn't kick Donald Trump off the ballot, and I was sending the plain text to the Fourteenth Amendment because they set soup.
Then we saw the Supreme Court actually throw out and narrow the tool throw out some criminal charges and narrow the tools the DOJ has available to prosecute January sixth insurrectionists. Then we saw the Supreme Court in the lower case cut back on agency expertise difference. Right, when we talk about agency difference, we're not really capturing it. The reason why we have been giving deference to agencies is because
agencies have an expert piece in what they governed. And then finally we saw them give near complete immunity to Donald Trump, not just for his past criminal conduct. But if he gets office for the past. Now, why do I tie all of those together? Because for Donald Trump to be a dictator for a day, and let's stipulate no one wants to be a dictator for a day, For him to be a dictator for a day, he needs to feel like he cannot be held accountable check.
The people who work for him need to feel like they won't be held accountable check, and they need to feel like they can run rough shot over the executive branch, that they can essentially dictate who gets prosecuted, dictate what laws get enforced, what laws don't get it forced, fire civil servants, and replace some of their own cronies, and that all of this can be done without anyone being able to hold them accountable. Well, what have I just
described Project twenty twenty five right? Project twenty twenty five is fundamentally a powergram.
Right.
It has bad policies in it, don't get me wrong. It talks about banning abortion and other stuff. But I think that that is secondary to what Project twenty twenty five is really about, which is creating an authoritarian regime.
Having Donald Trump have the ability to replace career experts with his own cronies, direct who gets audited by the IRS, who gets prosecuted, whose permits get granted and don't get granted by the Bureau of Land Management, who is stopped at the border by DHS, and who is let through right. He is able to command all aspects of the federal government and do it for whatever arbitrary, petty vengeance reason
he has. And that is why Project twenty twenty five is so dangerous, and it's the reason why what the Supreme Court did is so dangerous. I don't love the fact, obviously that Donald Trump is make it away with the
violent insurrection in twenty twenty and being immunized there. I am much more terrified though, about what this means if he gets in the Oval office again with immunity, and with the people working for him thinking that they because it is hardened power and because of the Supreme Court's attitudes, they too may have immedia.
I think it was Feta Scott Paul who told me that one of the ways to ensure domestic political violence is to harden people who've done it, because then it creates permission structure. It just explodes because there's no culpability. Right, there's nothing to stop them, right.
And there's nothing to stop them. And I don't want to earn this from dark to darker, but there's nothing that stops them inside of government, and there's nothing that stops them outside of government. So January sixth was fundamentally a mixture of government actors behaving treasonously and non government actors acting as part of an insurrection.
So it was a mixture of those two. And I think that we are underestimating what a second Trump term will mean for that mixture. There was an article in the New York Times today about a Republican on Long
Island who is building a militia. Okay, there is nothing that stops Donald Trump from having a permanent force of January sixth insurrectionists to be the outside force, because he can pardon them, and the Supreme Court is indicated not just a broad pardon power, but also remember, as I said, one of the things in my litany is they showed an unwillingness to read the existing statutes broadly enough to capture all of the bad conduct on January sixth.
That was one of the bad rulings from this. At the same time that Project twenty twenty five is building the infrastructure. How they misuse inside power government power inside without accountability. And it is that mixture of you know, when Donald Trump said about the proud boys stand by and stand back or stand back and stand by, that
you was speaking to one half of that equation. And I think we cannot sleep on that half of the equation that is going to be part of this, along with the cronies inside of government.
It's just every time I interview anyone about this, it just gets worse and scarier and very stressful. I would like one day to do an interview and for the person to be like, you're getting too upset. It's not going to be nearly that bad, but you're completely right. Just give us two seconds on the Wisconsin dropboxes, because that is one win.
Yeah.
So look, we've seen actually a series of wins over the last few days, and so let me just rattle on the number one, the ballot drop box case in Wisconsin. Wisconsin had ballot drop boxes in place for twenty twenty. In twenty twenty two, conservative state Supreme Court bans ballot drop boxes. Well, my legal team and I brought a lawsuit in Wisconsin and the newly constituted state Supreme Court
said ballot drop boxes are legal. They are going to be back in place for the twenty twenty four election.
Another case out of Wisconsin just today, just today, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals and another case that my team brought said that arabs in the ballots will not be thrown out because the witness address, the witness, the witness, the absentee ballot when they fill out their address, doesn't put a zip code or doesn't put street or doesn't put road, as long as it they fill out there address enough that the clerk could know where they were or where they are located.
It's going to count.
And one more for you as a voters around here in Alabama. Today the Federal Court rejected the latest ever by the state of Alabama to discriminate against black voters under section to the Voting Rights Act. Said that there is the right of private citizens and groups to bring litigation to vindicate the rights of black voters on mean section of the Voting Rights Acts. So it's not all bad news. We're having success in court. It's just the
Supreme Court is the real problem. And you know, the Republicans every day are hammering away at democracy.
Yeah, Republicans don't want democracy anymore. And the Supreme Court is in the tank for Donald Trump. But otherwise things are great.
Thank you, Mark, Thank you.
Dave Wiveall is a reporter at Samophore. Welcome back, Too Fast Politics, My friend Dave.
It's good to be here. Thank you.
It's always good to have you. And one of the many reasons that I appreciate you so much, besides the fact that you're such a good reporter, is that you go everywhere. You know, you are on the ground everywhere. Are you heading to Wiscon to Milwaukee after this?
I am. I keep bragging to everybody we'll save money. I'm flying. Probably we'll pick elsil station, will piccking a frame. Both there money reasons and also it's just I think it's very lindy and predictional the take a frame convention, you know, waving, waving from the back of it into approach, getting that nature.
So one of the things I wanted to ask you about is this is sort of the first year that I can remember, the first cycle where conventions feel enormous. I'm wondering why you think that is, and if you think that will continue, We're first going to have the Republican Convention and then like about three weeks later the.
Democratic Yes, they failed bigger because well, one, we haven't had real ones in eight years. I was at the Charlotte and Milwaukee sunk down conrencens that basical for meeting. We had already ran a little site, so Democrats had a little nerd center war for a virtual convention, revelicens had there were mandatory boats and they had all the main events of DC. But we haven't had one in
eight years. And the last time you had one, Trump was not believed man yet and Democrats were divided, so divine made a very different way, and they were actually there was a real divide. Deligates wouldn't stand each other, who blamed one faction of the party for rigging quote unclose to the primary, and just talking to Delius, lady, I think this one, it's more everyone was plowing in the same direction, but pless agreeing over whether they little followed.
There's more happening and some still physic has been in a while.
Yeah, you know, this is what I want to talk to you about, because you know I'm on the opinion side and I don't necessarily have to swing for every pitch the way that some opinion writers feel they must. And so I am really interested in having a few minutes with you to talk about twenty sixteen because I think that a huge lesson was learned by Democrats during twenty sixteen. I'm hoping you could talk a little more about that. Well, Culs these were large in by sixteen.
So what one didn't get out of the way quickly is party changed the rules so that if they are used to this already, there are superdalla whelts, there are people who are automaticality that part of long and co looking gents, dog rules moves, et cetera, and they don't get a vote on the first ballot. The party change the rules because of the burning party protests over the game. If you're a party leader, you can lobby right now, but they all get to vote on that minion formal
second ballots. The party has also changed the left is like a lot of the movements tend to in the two party system, but let's go a lot of what it want. Did term Deir Biden and not everything by any means. Leader the role and everybody is that nine months ago before the war in Gaza. There were a lot of set if that will Biden, if not el more. But they don't have to stay rolling the party. They've been falling off partly for the reason the does in the pet spending middle to people. So I sixteen has
shaped how the party works and then the results. It's really more Bernie movements. I'm not saying it's over, but it transform party and that work has been done already. It's not in imposition chafe a party right now. You see that in the way well Bernie and AMC etc. Are talking about Biden. You're not in the front line people saying that Biden needs to go because they're more willing to compromise inside the party to get the things they want. They don't feel like they need to rebel or proteste.
It's funny because it's like, that's actually what I want to talk to you about. We had Bernie Sanders on this podcast recently. He has gotten a lot of legislation he wanted past right, like thirty five dollars insulin and this sort of healthcare spending stuff. You know, the roots of progressimism. I say this as someone who feels very committed to progressive values are you know, at least financially
happening in this admin. And so one of the first people to endorse, reindorse Biden for reelection was in fact Bernie and one of his strong his strongest allies, has been AOC. And so I just think it's quite interesting that the people who are really committed to progressive values are just like they have learned the lessons of twenty sixteen, right, they have decided that every descent helps Trump, whereas people
movie stars and other white guys. I don't know if every person who's called on and again, I am not taking a I have no idea what Democrats should do, but I do think it's quite interesting that it seems like every single person who has called on Biden's step aside has been a white man. I mean, I'm sure there have been some women to like Maureen Dawd, but it just is it's sort of an interesting phenomenon because, as you and I both know, white man will do
the best under a Trump presidency. Not that they're doing it because they want a Trump presidency, but just because they have the least to lose, is what I'm trying to say.
People were talking about seeing themselves in very intersection all day. They really see the sea. So everyone who's calling for Biden from me for this reason for the age, oh we can't win a reason see's listening as a condition
to win the election. On Cinta, Joe Biden. That was the change, and I really not trying to probably in ith I half satisfied that the reason the left it had Biden governed like Jimmy Parter and little was clashing with called progress at that point, collective liberals over national health insurance, disappointing people out abortion that had he been antagonistic towards the left, even on Gaza when he's protested, Biden has answers they don't like, but he's not back
when count of equlums will get out there. They've been happy with what they feel is being allowed inside the tender Biden, which wasn't really happening under Hillery for lots of reasons, will stay that the Bellaery fermament was much stronger. She had a longer list of people who he owed things too were things and the left wasn't really getting at the tables. They've been at the table with Joe Biden, and so the progressives. One thing I've been asking you, Unt,
I'm talking delegates and one of organizers. There's one main passes towards strain wile getting leave. They're not even that worry. I asked, are you worried about if Biden goes in takamalai eris Roy Cooper tape? Not really. They need to see that the impediments to progress of the Denmorbary Party now were Percy Sema and Joe Manchin, and they're both going to be gone now again if the saw off Basle, it's different by wibbing walls. But the the rest, they're
not worried. They're going to all of their mind when they gets a democratic president. They worried, but there's nothing that believing will happen on the strump And I think one other business globe what would be a quoralizing than a ball hurt. But if you look at additional last day, the Democratic Centrals of America owning doors in the ALC, the tumult they had with with Chambo, the left isn't a weaker organizing position that it was in twenty seventeen
to only eighteen. I bith I covered in s the want where Hillary lost. A lot of people in the inside the party gradually thought wan Berry could have won the election because in the conditions that time, and maybe there were a bunch of popular ideas that they they will adopt. And that's not fub the party feels anymore, and the Left doesn't have the organizable capacity used to. It's made all these games, but right now it's not.
The Bowman race was meant to be a shot across the bout by the Impact saying that we can beat you league guys on primaries that steedd ploys and state they have been gaining ground beyond this book. They were winning electro They the party was listening to them and worried that they were going to wools young votes, black votes, his batic votes, and they did not go along with what actings will say, and they don't feel that well a little more, this is not really an outside force
of the party. The only people can disagree with this are the people who don't believe in winning electros on. So we have a batch of people who can agree with party all facts people and support Cornell West. Some people in again this is mostly dossil centric, will be abandoned Biden Morgan for saying what rules the election, will fight from the opposition very little back while compared to twenty sixteen. Well really was a sense of twenty sixteen.
And I remember talking with a lot of people at Fernie rallys and Soilalton worst that they need to over him. Oh if some guests in we're going to organize the four years and the progress a movable silence and that's not how people see a little more whatever they know about brought in flat plenty five. Let's say you're if your ears, if you are frands were delable trans rights, Biden will disappointed you in a couple of ways, mostly people of pressure from conservatives, for example not flying the
bride to flight to embassies. This will compromise that in the NBAA after I'm just trying to put a bunch of different anti gay the LD and T writers said, Okay, we're gonna give no flights of cares. The administration will when asked if it supports a limit on gender surgeries for minors. If I went back and forth, it's did a lot of cover got site into the media, but or the advocate frankfully, but they ended up coming out with you know, for a days we look up twenty two.
They want to use the letters of Policy and the executive branch to reverse all of the just the definition of gender, assent them from sex, stop any funds going to schools and support grass gender rights, stop any elfcare for gender firmatare period. Well we're nottal about surgery. We're talking all paraffe medication or theft are hormones. I think people who are in this movement actively looking at how
needs power. There's much more honest about the states, and it's a pretty small even we look at rfka's vote is not really those people rm case voters at this point, very few Democrats I'm on them. Well yeah, but just the system is breaking in in ways that Democrats are never going to end. Nevers is not going to shut down the anlot we're going to do that. And so yeah, the leftis the leftis in a different position now where it just doesn't see what it can win under Trunk.
It does see what win blonder will Biden or Democrats even the administration.
Well that is I think a really important point because Jesse and I we were talking to someone who said you can't win if you alienate the left. The lesson of the Hillary Clinton debacle of twenty sixteen is that if you isolate an alien innate the left part of your party, you will not win because that is the base. One of the happy things I think for Democrats is that the Democratic base is filled with people who want free kindergarten, and there are Republican bases filled with people
who want deportation squads. So the good news for Democrats is the things that they are people want are things that are morally okay and not morally abhorrent. Can you talk to us so you're tell us where you are right now and explain to us a little bit about what it is.
Yes, I'm at the Network's Nation conference, which is better after two sales to six. It started as in gabbering of course era progressol Internet, rgules and bloggers, and it changed over the years and be a much more of an ecuable sting on microlical sectional bouthcranks and vorts pfetial I mean the people who develop software well currency, pop the road and people who canvas saying that those lords
WoT speakle called fence. It's two thousand people. It used to be se as a presidential candida short case, maybe it will be again in the feature. Once it became more of an actistvent actually just kept interrupting the speeches and procession cadients. They'll stop fill up, So the Obama master would sending year to talk to progressives and calm things over. And the Biden wistration doesn't bother it is. It is a little bit of its own sad wall
of the movement. I will here because I'm interested in what's going on right now with people who, like I said, don't know what the heck they're going to do. From fum this back to tower. I'm here not every year, but most years. I remember just the moon shift in twenty twenty one for all in Afghana stand which crashed Biden's phone numbers. See what was very happy with how much he was able to do this a lot. I
had never seen the progressive movement even under Obama. There is more depressional about what was getting warm and between twenty judges all this stuff. People we are very good bold. So I'm kind of here who takes the tass sure of what people thinking, what they're worried about.
One of the many things that I really appreciate about you is you go everywhere, and there really is value in that, especially right now in the time when people are not going anywhere. I'm wondering if you could talk for a minute about at the end of the session, the Supreme Court did a number of really insane decisions. I'm thinking about Chavron deference. I'm thinking about this broad immunity. When the president does crimes, it's okay if he's doing
it in the name of the presidency. And I'm wondering, do you think the base is just galvanized because Trump is so scary? I mean, in my mind, I'm fucking scared of another Trump presidency. Do you think the base is too or do you think the base is like eh.
Progressions Party, the Democratic Party base, I feel like with analog employee apart from Dazo s ident wants to became an administration stations crymes so the African American base the party that's still very in fact. So when you say with the Democratic eniencils, well college educating liberals and the not white logans in this party, the first group has been more satisfied and more host more happy. Even elections. The Democrats with blad the law in local world wars
are runoffs, special elections. We've seen just there's people being it tent and yunking their important most as New yorkle Hope bag Well, they're really organized and have not stopped keeping money. I think you're going to see this as people put up their campaign A finance supports that even as Biden's under pressure in the last they were just giving a ton of money to set it in house scanning.
There's still very organised. Yet all we've never covered everything Likecense because he just so isolated to Biden's age, and I was in twenty sixteen again very different way. Someone already had little epics question around the server, the threat
of the FBI and investigating, and were in retrospect. I think that even at the time it was over overbooked the Richess Schick, we're saying that Trump was saying, oh, it's gonna be in a POSTPU of Bude, you wouldn't have been turns out, I can't actually know what they think to a president office where people really worried about get selectors who going to need to ask for and now people think no, but we just like we need
the candidate, we can be something unpopable, all beating. Why are we going down this route with our risk?
Right?
No? I mean, look, there are a lot of good faith actors who are asking the question, is it a mistake to go with the very old guy? And I think that is something you have to talk about. But there are a lot of bad faith actors who are like, it'll be easier for Trump to win against someone who isn't an incumbent, And that is another question, right, I mean, this is you know, and the reality is none of
us have enough information to make this decision. I mean some people think they do, but ultimately I'm not sure they have enough accurate information. But that is neither here nor there. Talk to me about you're going to the RNC next. I already see that Marjorie Taylor Green is speaking. They sort of have given up trying to appear normal. What is your sort of hot take on what you're going to look for and what that looks like.
Yeah, I've been dealing with this on the platform invention planning angle. So there are Republican ACTI Wiles who are unhappy with I would say pandering that Trump is not due back up a little bit the whole discourse of a Project Life one five that's about can we trust the Trump administration to be staffed Will Magick and Sarah Wolves who will act and wat slow gentle. There is
widespread confidence that he's going to do that. What has been annoying Republicans about the summer the platform is that Trump is too cautious to embrace stuff they know we will do. I'm not to Texans fear even pro life ers that we wouldn't point for light people that you've obsessed he did last poet.
There's no question.
Well they turn it by the executive orders for choice into pro license that, yeah, they will. They're pretty happy with Trump and Nicky Haley, who came in second the primary and will not even speaking. Will mention it was very confident at this Trump and his brand and his vision of the party, even the one that contradicts itself the rights and doesn't want to get close tough. They're very happy Buffalo. We'll see what's in the following or there is a rump of Republicans voter don't want him
to be the nominally, it's pretty small. They're in people who protest a little forli They're just not representative invention. And you saw this there recording I cni's almost worst. But a lot of people who were fake electors are deligant style. The RNC members who were pretty full of trout, but four years ago if they were replaced by friend Trump one. So it's a very Trump party. That's not like, do not worry about him, not not saying if it may want they trust.
Him, We're out of time. But I just want you to say that again. There are fake electors who are now Republican delegates.
Yeah, well they were Reublican activists. Last time they got in trouble for their role in somewhere Neil elching On. In this Republican party, they were sold, Yeah, you're fine. Maturity for the USA. Joe Corns organization was very effective at changing who is in the RNC, and they've been celebrating that this is this is a very Magga built party.
And what frustration Democrats have is that Trump doesn't get any flax for his less popular the parts of party that he's embraced that are unpopular local, how we're going to stand taxt stuts with a rich et cetera. They've had some being next to snick. That's not what the activists care about at this point. That's what the other skin revolt. But Trump is successful when just eating a rally, and it's not about that's fall. They're really happy with
the Wayne. The party is Brandon underhand, even if he lost the popular low twice, even though his favorable rating is in the four eas and good day. Not worried at all. I don't think you're really not worrying at all about about that, as a lot of people finding that.
I'm legal, Dave, thank you please come back.
Yeah, of course, thank you for talking about.
No mo.
Jesse Cannon, my young fast.
I have a new rule for the Internet.
I'm gonna be Bill Maher over here. I got a new rule.
Jesus.
Twitter spaces are always bad.
This was a Twitter space started by one Alex Jones and the title of it was assassinated President Biden. I'm sorry. Isn't like threatening the murder of the president against the law. I seem to remember Kathy Griffin having her life ruined because she posed for a picture. But you know it only Democrats get in trouble for stuff like that.
It's a good thing.
Elon.
Let him back on the platform.
Yeah, great job, Elan. Another win for our sad, sad, dying democracy. That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday to hear the best minds in 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.