Rep. Ritchie Torres, Jena Griswold & Jeet Heer

threats to democracy she's seeing in the state of Colorado. First, we have the host of the Time of Monsters, the Nation's get Here. Welcome, get Here, frequent flyer with Fast Politics. So happy to have you back here. I am just delighted to have you back. You are one of my people. I want to talk to you about where we are. Here's a country and Republicans have started their GLP primary race presidential I'm Marry. I think we can all agree that the next GOP candidate will be Nicky Haley. Yes,

it's already over. I think Trump and descentis should just give up because that's obviously what Republican primary voters want. A woman of South Asian descent who's totally tied to the GOP establishment. But actually I think the fun news. I don't know if you saw this morning, but there was some reporting about which I think will be the subject of Trump's next speech, which is run descentiss eating habits. Listen, I'm not Emily post myself, Okay, so I'm not gonna

cast aspersions necessarily. Like apparently this guy he has what his aid's referred to as a problem with soft social skills, which is that he eats like a frigging animal and discuss people like, you know, people his supporters, and what the detail I got he was in a plane, which is like a close confined space where you can't escape, and he's eating pudding with his hands, like you know, Andrew Jackson pay actually had very poor table manners, but

he was a populist. I don't know if an establishment Republican like the Santist who's supposed to be you know, Trump, without the bad aspects can succeed with all these stories about his table manners. And I just I'm looking forward to what Trump will do with it, you know, like I call him hungry ron folks, there's something going on. You know, he eats putting with his hands. We gotta find out what's going on here. I'm not saying anything.

I want to talk to you about this because I do think actually I am of the belief that Donald Trump says tiny D. Here's tiny D with his high held cowboy boots and it's over right. I mean, there's so much for It's like Donald Trump has been gifted with the most vulnerable Republican candidate ever. And that's the thing I don't understand. It's like you put Jeb against a Santist, Jeb would win. Yeah, No, it's really something.

I mean, I guess they were out of alternatives. I mean, I think the remember is twenty sixteen, they put all their top guys, you know, like Yo Marco Rubio once thought of as someone who could be president, Ted Cruise. They had like a lot of candidates out there because Christine, they had the whole array, and he decimated them. And so you know, the last man standing was this, you know, Ron de Santis d tiny D and he's not gonna Ronda Sanctimonius here. Yeah, they really are putting all their

eggs in one basket. And one of the interesting is if you look at I see the polling already, like the Santis is slipping and it's just a little bit of like pricking on the part of Drum. Yeah. I mean during this donor retreat in Palm Beach, this is a piece from the Daily be Star meeting, and a

Tendy stood up and called him to Satan exactly exactly. Yeah, So I just like, you know, it's not gonna take much, and people forget Trump really went after like his arrivals in a very vicious way that they could not respond to because they're normal human beings on some level, you know, the stuff that he's saying, like you know, like say

that Ted Cruise's dad was involved with killing Kennedy. I don't know if you remember this right, but Ben Carson there was like he was the only Republican who was like ever briefly ahead or Trump in the polling, and then Trump and twenty sixteen, and then Trump just let loose with this, like taking stories from Ben Carson's autobiography, which were about his you know, very hard background, genuinely true that he Yoe came from our real poverty, but

like yeah, just saying like oh this guy pulled a knife once. Guy, you know, like I don't know about him just like a really deflated like balloon that pricked. I want to ask you about this more because I think what's happening here is a kind of conservative elite witch casting of which we have not seen since twenty fifteen, which is this idea that somehow the elite can control the base despite the fact that they have continually given in to every whim of the base. That's exactly right.

There's two aspects of this, one of which is that all these candidates, they always have this sort of crew of hanger ons who like you know, like I really invested in them, and that includes that just a staff, but the sort of media folks in the Republican media.

And so if people I want listeners to remember back to, you know, those amazing days of twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen, where like you know, Marco Robio and Ted crews had a lot of media followers who would put the best possible spin on things and who are like you know, full of confidence that their guys had like everything going for them. And that's all we're saying now with Ron Descentist, as far as I can tell, his base is within the sort of conservative incorporated and that's you know a

fair number of people. There's a vast welfare state for like you know, people on the right, financed by various billionaires. But these guys are very invested in decentists. And the thing is that he has very little popular appeal outside of that. Whereas Trump, Okay, first of all, here already you had won the primary twenty sixteen, he had been president. He's a very popular president with Republicans, Like, like, the people who are Republican voters. I thought, like, this guy

did everything good and and he was robbed. It just like blows my mind that they think. Add Also, Trump is willing to attack the sentis and DeSantis is not willing to answer back. And DeSantis's whole ideas, I'm gonna be Trump but boring. I will be Trump without the charm, without the time. Yeah yeah, yeah, I'll be exactly without like saying funny things, without like you know, funny tweets that you can't get out of your mind and without and I will carry through the policies that we want.

And the thing is, at some level, like I don't think like you know, Republican voters, especially the sort of non college whites that Trump really bought on board. I don't think they're that interested in policy. Like, these are not people that like, you know, are reading the congressional record to see, like, you know, what laws get past.

They're kind of here to be entertained, right, Like this is kind of you know, late Roman Empire decadence, where you know, like you want who can do the funniest things, you know. I think that this is a really good point. I want to just like go into this for a minute, which is the Republican intellectuals and again at the danger of committing an oxy more on here. I want to say the people who were the brain trust of the Republican Party, which you and I can both agree, were

not brain were they? Nor trust? Were they that crew made a deal with the devil in twenty fifteen. They decided that they were going to go with the guy they knew would win, which was Trump, right, or they maybe they didn't think he would win, but they decided they would go along with the base. Yeah. Well, I mean the thing is, look, the Republicans have had a

real trouble really going back to the nineteen nineties. They've only won the popular vote once and all the presidential elections since nineteen ninety two, and Trump really offered them a way out that he could bring in new voters.

That it's also true he alienated a lot of other voters, but the actual bargain that he offered that he could bring in these non college white people who never voted and never would people who never voted, who were like alienating from the political system, bring them into Republican fold, and that there were enough of these and they sort of like Midwestern states that you could you know, have an electoral college majority. And that was the true part

of his thing. There's actually a very smart Republican operative, Sean Sendai, who did an article about that ten or fifteen years old, called the Missing White Voters. That is exactly what these white voters that were alienated that needed like some figure like Trump that could bring them on board and so so so to that extent that work.

The problem is that what these voters want is not what the Republican elite want and to some degree, like actually some of these voters are i mean people, you know, especially Democrats, so there's like, well, they're deplorables, and it's too like they have a lot of really bad attitudes, especially on race and gender. But it's also the case that like, you know, they don't want Medicare cut, they

don't want Social Security cut. So the Republican economic policies to that they're not popular, not popular at all, you know, except like maybe like tax cuts because you can kind of like say, well, they create jobs or whatever. But even then, I mean, like Trump's most unpopular moment as president was when he tried to get rid of Obamacare. That's when he pulled the lowest. That's when he's like

really trying to carry out a Republican wish lust. And I think it's the case that one of the problems with Rotten de santisis he's trying to be like mini me of Trump. I'm Trump but boring. You know, that's obviously a problem, but also that he's still tied enough to these economic policies and so you know, like Trump can't actually find genuine evidence that this guy wanted to

cut Social Security of Medicare. And I have to tell you there's like enough of the Republican voters who are like, you know that Trump brought on board, where like these senior citizens who are gonna like you know, not be very thrilled by this, I already like this is you know, like Democrats win among you know, people who are like forty five and younger, Republicans win among sixty five and over.

And so if you're if you're that party, like, why the hell would you be talking about social security and Medicare cuts? NICKI Haley doing that too, you know, like we need to raise the retirement age, like good luck ever getting elected on that. You know, mac Ron is trying to do that. They could have another revolution, right and they're trying to raise it to what sixty seven?

I mean I don't even think yeah, yeah, so anyways, anyway, yeah, no, I it's also I mean I think, you know, like anything could happen, and maybe this De Santas thing is, you know, hungry Ron is a little bit more than

I suspect. We're right right now. Trump has a lot of cards on his side, one of which is his popularity among Republican voters, his fame, his name recognition, but also the fact that all he has to do is bring up the fact that the Santas you know, like want social security and Medicare cuts, and uh, that's a

big thing. And you know De Santas tries to compete with him by copying Trump on everything, and the thing is like, if you have the original, why would you go with a Copycatt decientist is saying, well, you know, why should we be helping Ukraine? Like, well, if that's the policy you want, then you already have a guy who's going to do that for you. No. I agree. If if pro pudent is your game, you got the guy. Man.

I mean no, I think it's true, and I think we're seeing again, which is this is the sticky wicket that the Republican Party is stuck in. And by the way,

I'm delighted because fuck them. But to be trumpy enough to win a primary means you are completely unelectable in a general That's right, That's right, Yeah, I know, I mean I think that, well, except that I think the camp it is the electoral college thing, which is if you can get enough, but I actually think that to g Assue you win the kind of electoral college directory trumpeted in twenty sixteen, you have to have you know, enough real populous bunt of fundies and also be able

to reach those non voters. And comp could do that because you know, he's on television for like twenty years, right, Right, that's true. TV is the most more popular than any politician in America. You know, more people watch TV. De Santist doesn't have that, Like he those voters will not

know who he is or care about him. Unfortunately. You know, like is a two party system, so like there's a few things that could go wrong, either in terms of Joe Biden's health or in terms of you know, the the economy, and we haven't even talked about what's happening

with the banking system unfortunately. Like I'm not so sanguine that I mean, I think the Santist is gonna have our time getting the primary, the Republican nomination, but actually think, like you know, any Republican has a decent shot unfortunately, right because of the elements that we can't even predict. That's said, I actually think and this is the one thing that makes me a little bit sanguine. It's going

to make everyone else upset. I actually think that Desantist is much more dangerous than Trump because people know Trump is really dangerous, Like, I mean, he may still win, but there is a knowledge that he is a dangerous autocrat. Whereas there are people on this planet who still think

to Antis is not and they're wrong. Well exactly, but I want to actually narrow that down to exactly what the danger is, which is that because Trump was coming from this reality show world, the you know, like the centrist establishment never trusted him, whereas the Santists you can kind of see that they're people, especially like you know, the New York Times has done like I don't know, a hundred different articles like why de Santist gould be given some credit. I'm a liberal, but you know, I've

kind have been rescued. He saw this with this Axio business, which is that, you know, like this reporter for Axio got a press release from the Santist and he just emailed back to them like you know this is in press releases, propaganda, sparky comment but well with about yeah add true yeah, And Axio fired the reporter. And I think that's what's gonna happen if there is a Descantist presidency, because he's not Trump, even though he has terrible table manners,

they'll cover that up. They'll hire a CIA duplicate that will go to dinner parties and yeah, you use table manners, has read Emily Post. But I think that the centrist media, The Times, the Washington Post, CNN, Axio Political They're all gonna be like, this is what they want, you know, like a Republican that could carry out Trump's policies, but without being unsettling and scary the way the way Trump

is or just vulgar. I mean for you and me, Like, the scary thing about Trump was he's an authoritarian, right and you know, he's a threat to American democracy as a six For a lot of these centrists, the scary thing about Trump was he had bad manners and he tweeted, you know, which was actually the best thing about Trump. I mean, his vulgarity was right right, No, no, great arty was his best quality. Yeah. But anyway, but they're

gonna buy into it. You can already see hollinggood now, Like you know, like if Hiss president of santast He's gonna get much more favorable coverage, like in all the media, well, the National Review Crew, I mean, I wrote a piece about how De Santis was more dangerous than Trump because

he's much more effective and much smarter than Trump. I mean, one of the good thing things about Trump, at least for our case, was that when he tried to do something, he usually fucked it up, whereas De Santis has been incredibly successful as turning Florida into a mini autocracy. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I mean that is why you know that on the right, he's the American orbon like, he can use the powers of the state to like,

you know, try to create a one party state. And unfortunately, like I gotta say, there's some buy in on that from some of the centrist media as well, and I think that's where that's really where the danger lies from that it's going to be a little bit harder. I mean.

On the positive side, I think that he pushed for more mobilization among liberals taxis like you know, and maybe to break with the centrist media and try to create more alternative media sources, because I think people are really going to see with the scientists much more than Trump the right sort of authoritarian Republican. There's a lot of

people in the establishment that that's what they want. I mean, I agree that the Republican Party is completely without hope and that they've embraced authoritarianism and that they continue to

engage in it. I don't think de Santists gets there, like I think Trump just takes him down at the knees because everything we're seeing evidence wise points to the fact that he is a bad at retail politics, and like we are a country where our politicians need to go on television and be charming, and I just you know, no evidence supports the idea that he could even do that for a minute. Yeah, no, that's absolutely right right

now that the signs are very bad. And where success is is in terms of like sort of fundraising with the donor base. And I have to say, if that's what is your success as a politician, then you know, that's why we had President Jeff Bush. That's why we had President Ted Cruz. That's why we had President Phil Brown. I don't remember, you know, because that guy they could like open up a bank account and that telling me

there'd be like one hundred and fifty million dollars. I would say one other thing about this, which is that you know, I was talking to someone who's a staff and that person was saying that actually they're seeing some GOP donors who do not like him because he can't schmooz. And like you know Trump, I mean again, and I am no fit. This is no one is defending Trump, no one is liking him, no one is even saying anything nice about him. But Trump could schmooz. Oh absolutely, yeah. Yeah.

I mean we kind of underrate that aspect. But I mean the thing is that Trump was an ideal GOP candidate in this era where they're kind of a shrinking party because he could both you know, he's rub enough money and he has Mara Lego and he knows how to talk to you know, the real estate guys and the card dealers to give them to pony up some money. But he's also you know, it was on TV, so like the non college whites can really relate to him. So yeah, I just think, yeah, I just had to.

He sounds like, from what you're saying, he's weak on both sides, which is like a really amazing thing. We'll see how. I don't want to get too much into prediction game, but I think these are real vulnerability, these Indi Santos and right now, the people that love him most are these guys who at National Review and elsewhere, who I gotta tell you, like they get paid six figure salaries for like a minuscule readership. I don't know if he saw this thing with Rod Dreyer. Yes, that

was a Vanity Fair story. Yeah, yeah, Vanity Fair story. Yeah. And so this guy been writing for like a long time, blogging on a record conservative. It turns out this entire support was one rich guy in California of real estate failed son who had a lot of money like Rod's writing, and was paying for his whole salary, which a six

figure for writing this gibberish. And then the Dreer like, unfortunately like went too far with describing an uncircumcised penis that he saw when he was a child as like this kind of root weener or something like this, and then the donor said, oh, that's a little too weird. That's it. I'm sorry. Yes, roddrere a good point, completely completely insane. Thank you so much for joining us. Always is a delight. Oh it's good to be on the show.

Congressman Richie Torres represents New York's fifteenth congressional district. Welcome to Fast Politics, Congressman Richie Torres. Always a pleasure to be here. Delighted to have you. First. I want to talk to you about what you just said to me before we were recording, which was that what you were told was that being in the minority would be more laid back, and it has not been that case. Can you explain. Yeah, I was told that, you know, since I'm in the minority, I will have more free time

in my hands, and in fact, quite the opposite. It's been much more demanding, partly because of the committees on which I sit. I mean, financial services is demanding. But I was appointed to the new Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the CCP, and the combination of those two committees has been quite consuming. You know,

it's Sunday. It happened to be my birthday. I just turned thirty five, bragging I've been an elected official for ten years shadow and I could not even I could not even celebrate my birthday because I was bombarded with phone calls about the banking crisis. See, I only emailed you, so there we go. Well, I do not consider an email from your work, thank you, So talk to me about what happened with you guys and Silicon Valley Bank

this weekend. As you know, unlike in two thousand and eight, when the bank's invested in distressed assets, right like you know junk like subprime mortgages. Silicon Valley Bank heavily invested in long term assets, long term treasuries and prime mortgage backed securities, which are normally safe assets. Yes, those normally safe assets became unsafe for a bank in a high interest rate environment, and so when the FED began raising

interest rates, it had two effects. First, it drove down the value of those long term bonds because investors could get short term bonds with the same or better yields.

And second, it drove down the amount of startup funding, which led startups to withdraw their deposits from Silicon Valley Bank, which was the go to lender for the startup industry, and in order to honor those redemption requests, Silicon Valley Bank had no choice but to sell their long term assets their valuable assets in the short term, which meant selling them metal loss. People should keep in mind that banking is as much about psychology as it is about finance.

It's a confidence game. And when Silicon Valley Bank announced that it had sold more than twenty billion dollars in securities at a loss of one point eight billion dollars, that announcement, which was poorly timed against the backdrop of Silvergate collapse had a customers into withdrawing their deposits. And in a world of social media, financial panic can spread more rapidly and more widely than ever before. And keep in mind that the customer base of Silicon Valley Bank,

We're not retail customers. These were VC firm startups that are hyper engaged online to have more social media savvy than the average person. So this is the first bank run in American history that was driven by social media. And I want to provide a contrast that illustrates the speed. So in two thousand and eight, Washington Mutual, which was the largest bank failure, saw a loss of sixteen point seven billion dollars over the course of ten days. That

was the largest bank failure. Silicon Valley Banks saw the loss of forty two billion dollars in the span of a single day. So the sheer speed of the bank of the bank run is unprecedented in American history. And much of that is social media work. A lot of and rand types venture capitalists, people who sue for being mentioned on a podcast, so their names will not be used, but you know who I'm talking about. Peter two there was a lot of involvement from that crew in ginning

up this panic. The VC community arguably planted the seeds of its own decline. Like, the VC community made a decision which is baffling beyond belief right to sabotage their leading lender. Like without Silicon Valley Bank, the tech startup industry is going to have far less access to capital. Yeah, it's a dramatic disruption of their status quo. So this was a case study in self sabotage. Yeah, that was

my thinking too. When I started to get calls on Saturday from freaked out vcs, I mean, I just want to like talk through this for two more seconds because I know I want to talk to about China after this. But the bank needed to recapitalize. The truth is as much as losing money on mortgage back It's not mortgage backed securities. It was it wasn't it. It was tea bills, right, both treasuries and prime mortgage back securities. So safe, right, so safe? Losing a billion dollars, I just want to

like contextualize this. A billion dollars on tea bills and these securities is not necessarily like they could have come back from that. There was no reason why that number needed to destroy the bank. No. Look, the underlying finances of the bank were sound, right, But keep in mind that which rise bank runs is not economics or finance. It's psychology. It's it's the irrationality of financial panting. And there's no bank in America. I mean, the honest truth

is there's no bank in America. Right, they can withstand that that has enough on hand to couple all your deposits. That's the nature of fractionally reserve banking. I want to go deeper on this because now that this news cycle is sort of now that we're a couple of days into this cycle, the Republican narrative is this was woke banking. Okay, we know that's bullshit, right, We saw the twenty four white guys in the management obviously, and by the way,

you know whatever, it wasn't fucking woke banking. That's bullshit. But I want to go back for a minute and talk about when this bank run happened. These regional banks were not regulated the same way that the larger banks are. Can you talk about that? Yes, So the banking system was radically remade and the aftermath of the two thousand and eight crisis, we passed dot frank, which subjected the largest banks, the biggest banks to the most rigorous forms

of regulation, a stress test, much larger capital reserves. There's a concept known as enhanced frudential supervision and enhanced Prudential Standards, which is the highest form of regulation, and banks with assets fifty billion or more were subject to the highest regulation.

In twenty eighteen, with lobbing from regional banks like Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, President Trump signed into law a bill that would that raise the threshold for enhanced supervision from fifty billion dollars to two hundred and fifty billion dollars. And at the end of twenty twenty two, Silicon Valley Bank had two hundred and nine billion dollars in total assets, which was right below the threshold for

enhanced supervision. And that's significant because without enhanced supervision, it radically reduces the amount of stress testing your undergoing and radically reduces the granularity and the frequency of the stress testing. Now, having said that, even if the law had never been changed, one cannot know for sure whether the crisis could have been prevented because there appears to have been an incestuous

relationship between the FED and Silicon Valley Bank. The CEO of Silicon Valley Bank sat on the board of the Federal Reserve of San Francisco, which is his regulator, right, So that to me is suggestive of an incestuish relationship that undermines regulations. Why did that happen, by the way, I mean, how is that allowed to happen? I mean, one of the lessons learned is that we have to prohibit CEOs of sitting on the boards of their regulators,

Like common sense dictates that that is a conflict of interest. Right, when we talked about this anxiety that a lot of these vcs were having, you said, if this bank is able to get a guarantee, we need to regulate the out of them. So yeah, I mean, I want to make that point because it's a trade off. Right, If we're expanding the realm of too big to fail include regional banks, then that has to come with strings attached.

That has to come with more rigorous regulation. You know, regulation is important not only on its own merits, because regulation inspires confidence, like we have confidence in the biggest banks like JP Morgan, because those are the banks that are subject to the most regulation, right, And I think that, you know, it's funny because it's like we had the last couple of months, we've seen both regulatory failures in the trains and we've seen regulatory failures in the banks.

And remember we had this president for four years who is like, every day I take away a regulation. You know, for every one regulation, I take away fifty five. I mean that. And like, you know, when you say stuff like that, people don't understand it until they're you know, trying to get to the get money out of the bank. Look, for me, our highest priority has to be to protect the safety and soundness of our banking system, which is the beating heart of our economy. Everything else is secondary.

And you know, one of my criticisms of the FED is that it has a dual mandate. Right when setting interest rates, it considers employment and inflation. A case could be made that the FED should expand its mandate to include financial stability. We have to consider the impact that interest rates have on the stability of the banking system,

which is the beating heart of the economy. Yeah, so interesting, So talk to me about what's happening with this special committee you're on, explain what it is and what it does for all of us who are not completely brought in. So the House has set up a new Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the CCP, the Chinese Communist Party, which is essentially the committee on everything. It will touch on the jurisdiction of every standing committee.

We're going to tackle military, diplomatic, geopolitical, economic, technological issues. But our goal is to ensure that America remains competitive, that we remain the leader of the free worlds. You know, I think we should be careful not to engage in Bellico's rhetoric that will provoke even greater tensions between the United States and China. But we have to recognize that the Chinese Communist Party is a genuine challenge to the

United States. As you know, China, or the CCP rather is committing genocide against weaker Muslims, detaining more than a million Muslims and concentration camps in what it calls re education centers. We know that the CCP is showing the same kind of aggression toward Taiwan the Russia has shown toward Ukraine in the lead up to the invasion. We know that the CCP has stolen six hundred billion dollars

in intellectual property from the United States. We know that the CCP subjects its own people to a mass surveillance states the likes of which not even George Orwell could have imagined. And we know that the use of China as a global factory has utterly decimated manufacturing in the United States. So those are challenges that are too glaring

to ignore. And I think the mission of the committee is to create a comprehensive legislative agenda that touches on all those topics that will position the United States to be more productive at home and more competitive abroad. It's such a hard thing with China because they are like much of the world, I mean, and they're clearly one fifth of the world, right, so clearly they're too big to war with, right, Like I mean speak of too big to fail. I mean, how do you deal with

the country that is? I mean, if you think about like the war with Russia, whatever, the war non war with Russia that we've been fighting for the last year, Like in the end, eventually Russia will just get bored with this. But I mean, or they'll or they will get exhausted and they'll run out of money. But I mean, you go to war with China, that's the end of it for all of us. So I mean, what how do you tread with a country that won't necessarily negotiate well.

The mission of the New Committee should be to prevent war, not provoking, right, because the worst case scenario is a World War three, a war between the United States and China, which would be a complete catastrophe for the globe. I mean, that could be the apocalypse. So our goal should be to prevent war. And the relationship with China has to be both cooperative and competitive. It has to be cooperative on global challenges by climate change, but it also has

to be competitive. We have to ensure that the United States, that the democracy of the world maintain a competitive edge when it comes to critical technologies like semiconductors, artificial intelligence wants some computing. You want democratic countries to be the leaders in those fields. I want to ask you here you are in this brave new Congress. I mean, like, this new Committee was started in a GOP Congress. So there are some not insane things coming out of this Congress.

Despite the fact that you know, it's led by a guy who basically got his job because Tackle Carlson said he could have it. There's a tale of two Congresses. You know, the Republican Party has policymakers and formers. Right if you sit on the Financial Services Committee under Patrick mckenry or the Select Committee on the CCP under Mike Gallagher, you know, I have differences of opinion with them, but those are serious people, and those are serious committees, and

so I have a different experience of Congress. But if you're sitting on Oversight or Judiciary or the Weaponization Committee, you think they're not doing serious staff over a weaponization you're in the realm of the absurd. I mean, it's just funny. It's like, I don't see how the Weaponization Committee could even hire a staff. If I were interviewing someone and someone said, oh, I was the staff director for the Weaponization Committee, like I would just laugh. It's

like it's just the title is silly. Well, I think they must go to like Briebard, you know, people in that crew. I steer clear of those committees because I would rather legislate than be subjected to the utter stupidity people like Marjorie Chella Green and Law and Bobbart. I want to get into this for a second, this idea of the a tale of two Congresses. How do you have serious Republicans and how do they negotiate, you know,

the Kevin McCarthy crew. Well, even though there are serious Republicans, make no mistake, the far right is in charge of the Republican Party. Like there's nothing serious or there's nothing responsible about playing a game of brinksmanship around the deadlomit. So, even though there are serious Republicans, make no mistake that Kevin McCarthy and the Republican Party brit large is hostage to the far right, which is willing to breach the debt limit of the United States to score political points

against Joe Budden. And that's so I want to be clear that we cannot overlook or whitewash the fanaticism of the far right, which is enabled by the cowardice of the center, which to the extent that he'd even exists in the Republican Party. Yeah, I mean, it's incredible, incredible stuff. What else are you seeing, you know, you're in Congress. I mean, is it all just as run up to the dead ceiling or is there other drama going on,

although there's no short a drama. I mean, though you know, I never thought in my first term, on my third day, I lived through the insurrection, and then in my second term, I lived through the longest speaker vote in American history, one of the longest speaker votes in American history, the longest speaker vote in one hundred and sixty four years. So there's just an endless dream of drama in Congress. And it's because of the Republicans. The Republicans create drama

where none is necessary. Obviously, the banking crisis is going to continue away heavily on us, and we have to focus on We cannot say, for granted that the crisis is behind us, even though yesterday the markets had a good day, though today they're not. And again the stock market is not the economy. I want to ask you one last question. You are from New York. Democrats got creamed and lost the House because of Jay Jacobs. I mean, there's a real opportunity there between Santos and all of

these other Republicans in these swingey districts. Do you think that New York State can learn its lesson and get a shit together. I just turned thirty five, and my birthday wish is a Democratic majority in twenty twenty four and Hakeem Jeffreys as the next speaker, and the road to the Democratic majority runs through New York State. Am I confident that we're going to reform the Democratic Party

in New York State now? But I am confident that we can win back those seats because in a presidential year, you're going to have dramatically higher democratic turnout and what are essentially democratic districts, these are democratic leaning districts, and so I'm cautiously optimistic, but we cannot take it for granted. And as you know, House Majority pack is going to invest forty five million dollars in six races in New York.

So that's an astonishing investment. That's how serious we are about winning back the majority, and we see New York as the road to the majority. Richie Torres, thank you so much. I hope you'll come back anytime. Jenna Griswold is Colorado's Secretary of State. Welcome to Fast Power Politics, Secretary of State Griswold, So let's talk about what is

happening in Secretary of State world in Colorado. Again, I want to preface this because we think of Colorado as a blue state because it has a blue governor, it has two blue senators now. But you're very much really on the front lines in a lot of ways. That's right, Colorado does have blue democratic leadership right now. But what that said, I was the first Democrat to win Secretary of State in over sixty years when we won in

twenty eighteen. I do think that Colorados unaffiliated Republicans and Democrats just do not like the extremism. So I think both are true. We've been at the front line on a lot of the attacks on democracy which are ongoing, but also have an electorate in a citizenry that just does not like the extremism. So talk to me about some of these ongoing attacks, because you are on the front lines of voting and so your see a lot of stuff that we may not be seeing yet. So

tell us what you're seeing. Well. Most recently this past weekend, a prominent election denier won the race for chair of the Colorado Republican Party, and it's the latest example of how democracy remains under attack. Election deniers have been targeting state GOP chair positions and winning key races. So so far, I believe this is the fourth state party to go to an election denier. Right, Michigan did recently too, Right, Yeah,

that's exactly right. The person who won was actually competing against Tina Peters, who was the woman who breached her own security trying to prove the big lie, a local county clerk facing seven counts of felony indictment, and she actually endorsed Dave Williams, who ended up winning. Jesus, Tina Peters was an election denier who ended up facing real

legal consequences. That's right. So it was the first insider threat and in the nation that we know of where my team discovered the passwords to her county's election system posted online by the person who allegedly is the leader of QAnon. So we ended up investigating she did compromise her system. She's facing a criminal trial right now, and then was just convicted last week or the week before on a separate trial, so as Artie was charged criminally.

These small county clerk jobs are sort of unsexy, but they're real things and they have real consequences. They absolutely have real consequences, and to be very clear, the vast majority of county clerks Republicans, Democrats and affiliated to do a really good job. They are elected to uphold the right to vote, to actually administer the elections, and they

do a fantastic job here in Colorado. I was just meeting with some of the clerks yesterday and mentioned that the clerk from Fremont County, who's a Republican in my eyes, got the best compliment because the county Democratic Party told me how much faith they had in his leadership. And that's how these county clerks should work. The local county parties should have total faith in the county clerks, and the best majority of them work around the clock. They

are the unsung heroes of American democracy. But of course we've seen a couple of problematic ones pop up. I just want to go back to these state party chairs because can you explain to us why that matters? So why electing an election denier for a GOP chair that what the sort of consequences of that are. Yeah, I think there's a couple of consequences, and it depends state

to state. First, and foremost, they're they're the leader of the state Republican party and with the election of Dave Williams. Here in Colorado, it's clearer that the state Republican Party has embraced election denialists. That should be worrisome in itself. You know, in Michigan, Christina Kuramo won her election of the state Republican Party. She ran for a secretary of state last cycle and has still refused to concede her failure. She believes, by the way that like yoga is a

tie of Satan or something like that. It's really far out there. The first thing is just the bully pulpit of leadership. But then we work, the secretaries of state work with the leadership of both political parties on election issues through the election cycle. Depending on the state, the county parties are compiling a list of election judges and election watchers. Election deniers have also been elected to state

party chair in Ohio and Kansas. So it just underlines that all the voters did their great service to democracy in the midterms. Election denialism has not been defeated. Folks far right are doubling down, So we just have to continue to remain extremely vigilant and take action to protect democracy. It's so dispiriting that this continues on and that like the vos, just have to keep rejecting this kind of crazy it is. But I'll tell you I am hopeful.

In the midterms, we had election deniers running for Secretary of State, so the chief election officer in every battleground state where we had a race. So we had election deniers run in Nevada, in Michigan and Minnesota, in New

Mexico and Arizona. And why I'm so optimistic is that when American voters know what's at stake, they are rejecting these extremist candidates and ensuring that they are electing folks who will be good stewards of elections, of ensuring that every eligible person, regardless of their political affiliation or the color of their skin, can have their voice hurt. With that said, I do think we are not out of the woods. But I also think that we will beat

this extremism. We're just not there yet. At the end of the day, this is about power, and if Americans continue to reject these extremist candidates, I do think this will fade out of mainstream political thought. Yeah. No, I mean I think if they keep losing with it, eventually they'll decide that they have to run on something else. But yeah, it's incredible that they keep losing on it. You're seeing these state party chairs, You're seeing these county clerks.

What else are you seeing at the state level in Colorado? So across the nation, we are seeing the continual effort to strip Americans of the right to vote. If you remember, the last couple of years, we sought an unprecedented passage of voter suppression laws. It is now harder for many Americans across the country to vote than before. That trimp continues. This year alone, in at least thirty two states, over one hundred and fifty voter suppression or election interference bills

were prefiled or introduced. And we are seeing across the nation extremist Republicans continuing to try to undermine elections and and pursuing a radical agenda. Our right to love who we love, mary who we love, Provide kids with the best possible education, the right for women and people to have control over our own bodies. It all starts at the ballot box. That's why protecting democracy is so important. Lots of work ahead, but I am confident we're going

to get through this dark period. Of American history. In Colorado, what does your state House look like? Are there still allotted you? You are the state that has Lauren Boebert. I'm sorry to tell you so. I mean there's a real right wing contingent there. Yeah. So the Ate House and State Senate are controlled by Democratic leadership, so there's

majority Democrats. But with that said, I will tell you, if you could even believe it, my saddest day of being an elected official was actually January of this year. I was testifying in the Legislature and there were various legislators in the committee that I was testifying in who were straight election deniers. And seeing elected officials right in

front of you spew out these conspiracies. In a state like Colorado, it's sad, not only because they're misleading or trying to mislead their constituents and lying from a position of power, but words have power. And I know that's corny to say no, but it's true. These lies. They've been cited violence. It's the reason that there was a kidnapping attempt of the Michigan governor. It's the reason that Paul Pelosi was attacked. It's the reason in December that

six elected officials. Houses in New Mexico were shot up, So you know, we have to maintain our path on pushing back on the disinformation with truth, on refuting the lies, and that work isn't over either. Yeah, I think that's so interesting. What about abortion access, I mean, I can't believe I have to have this conversation with you, but you are one of the few states in your area that is I mean, there are a couple of states in the West, but you are an abortion safe haven

for people who need treatment. Yes, the last time I was on your podcast, I think was right after the Job's decision, so that the gutting of Row, and it was such a visceral shock, even though we, you know, many of us suspected that it was coming. But to have the Supreme Court literally decide that it would no longer protect the full citizenship of women in this country. But more than that, really dictate many women to death. It is so outrageously shocking that I'm with you. I

can't even believe we have to have this conversation. But luckily there are states like Colorado who are continuing to protect women and provide services. Our state legislature did a fabulous job last year of codifying the right to abortion care the right to birth control in state law. I think there will be more movement on protecting that work in the state. But people are traveling from all over the country and the wait time for abortion care has skyrocketed.

And if you can imagine, women are driving sometimes across various states who want to have babies. They want to have babies, and their pregnancy doesn't go right, and because of it, they can their life is in danger and they cannot get just the healthcare that they need in their states. It's just horrible. Yeah, no, I mean I remember being a new Maximan seeing these women sleeping in

their cars so that they can have abortions. And you know, we're also seeing all of these women who have miscarriages who can't then get treatment. Yeah, so there was I heard from one of the providers a couple of months ago. Is when they told me this. There was a woman in Texas with her I think six year old son and husband who had a natural miscarriage that was risking her life. Her medical providers refused to help her. They

jumped in a car drove from Texas to Colorado. We're sitting at the provider's office at six am in the morning, and at any time she could have died on that drive. Yeah. And can you imagine, like, if states supposedly care about family values or the sanctity of life, that they are telling this woman you may have to die in front of your little son because we don't want to provide

you with healthcare. So I'm just so proud of the state of Colorado and really honored to be a woman and statewide elected office right now to fight for values. And one of the things I did last year was joined the governor of Colorado and saying we will not extradite any person for the criminalization of abortion in another state. Yeah, it's just unbelievable. I just can't wrap my head around it. I mean I can, but I just, you know, the hypocrisy is just incredible. I also wanted to ask you

what's next for you? You know, I think the next two years are going to be difficult for secretaries of state. We will beat the election denialism, I'm confident of that, but it's not being so the presidential election. We have a president who incited an insurrection, possibly tough of ticket, if not election deniers very strong candidates on the Republican field. So the next two years, I am going to continue to strengthen our laws and address any situation leading up

to that general election for the president. So that is our full focus, and I think we'll have great elections, but they'll continue to be trying. So just going to continue to do everything that we can, and I'm confident the American people will again save democracy just like they did in twenty twenty two, and I'll be fighting for our rights right alongside with them. Oh, thank you so much. I really appreciate having you and you making the time.

Of course, thank you for all your leadership and for your fabulous fashion sense, which I always appreciate. Molly jun Fast, Jesse Cannon. Marian Williamson run for president again, but I feel like there's been some reporting about that she's not the best person to have in office. I would like to point out first that my relationship with Marian Williamson is long varied and includes her complaining right, and includes her dming my mother complaining about me. And so I

say this. We learned today from Politico, a political story with twelve sources that very spiritual Mary Ann Williamson is in fact a very bad boss. Again, being a bad boss is complicated, and certainly there are a lot of people who do not, who are quite tough on women, especially women in power. But I think that when your whole stick is built on the idea that you're so spiritual and even handed and filled with love that the fact that you throw your phone at people work for you,

it's probably not a great sign. And she gets our moment of fuckery. 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.