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365 days a year for support. Visit Huntress.com slash prop g to start a free trial or learn more. Episode 309. During the New Zealand Co-Covering Parts of Illinois in 1909, Condonast was founded. Choose to it. My wife called me a panic and said, I found these weird SNM and bondage magazines under our son's bed and said, what should we do? And oh my God, it's obvious what we should do. And she said, well, what? And I said, spank them. Go, go, go.
Welcome to the 309th episode of the PropG Pot. In today's episode, we speak with Chris Voss, the CEO and co-founder of Black Swan Group and former lead FBI hostage negotiator. Jesus, that's a good rep. What do you do? I'm the lead FBI hostage negotiator. Okay. We are massive fans of Chris and here's take on how negotiation plays into all aspects of our lives, including politics war and relationships.
But first, we're bringing back our favorite, our gangster, the emerging political voice, the leader, the pundit we need now. Jessica Tarlov to hear what happens next now that Biden has officially dropped out of the presidential race.
So Jessica, kind of a slow news week. Not really. I'm not sure what we're going to talk about here, but let's start with I found this story that you might find interesting. And that is the president has actually dropped out of the race. And this, this woman named Kamala Harris has raised an astounding 81 million dollars within the first 24 hours of announcing her bid for president 60% of the donors are first time donors in this race. I'm actually, I'm supposed to press a stat.
Jessica, what's going on here? What's going on here? What are your thoughts? I thought coming back from Milwaukee, I would get like a weekend, right? We could we had the assassination attempt. Then we had everything that went on the RNC, Trump speaking, etc. And I thought, oh, maybe I'll just chill out like I made a couple of small people. I'll go with them. I'll hang in the park. The sprinklers are on very exciting in every two year old slave.
And then Sunday happens. And it was this weird moment where I thought does Mark Halperen actually knows something again because he was the first reporter out on Twitter on Thursday, Friday saying it's Sunday. And we were all like, what are you talking about? How does Mark Halperen have information that Democratic leaning reporters don't have someone less disgraced doesn't have.
And I still don't believe that Mark Halperen necessarily had inside information and the story of the campaign is giving that Biden basically decided on his own that he couldn't do this anymore and that it wasn't going to stop the kind of onslaught. But remarkable few days in American politics and what's going on is we've all been coconut piled now. I'm not a TikTok person. I have fear of the Chinese Communist Party being in my phone.
Though I'm sure they're in there for other reasons. And I just know that I spend hours and hours and hours on it. But I have taken a look and the kids are going crazy for her in amazing. And I do as an awkward person myself. I appreciate that online awkward people can be cool. And you're seeing that really coming to life for her. But I think kind of writ large what you're seeing is how desperate the Democratic Party was to feel inspired and alive again.
And that this doesn't actually have a lot to do with Kamala herself necessarily and she's still behind in the polls about five points behind she was running behind Joe Biden and in national polls and key swing states as well. But everyone needed this shot of adrenaline and it led them to their pocketbooks. And we've got a real election now.
Yeah, it really is striking. I've kind of gotten swallowed up in a net is I thought Biden was going to drop out. And then I wanted a competition on a coronation. And I got to be honest, I've been sort of this Kamala Mania has sort of swept over me. And I'm almost now kind of on the Kamala train. Like let's get on it. Let's and I have been really surprised and inspired. It's a little bit like living in London. And that is it feels as if it's been so gray so depressing for six months.
And then the sun comes out and you realize just what an amazing city it is. I feel like the sun came out Monday morning and we just realized what an amazing country party. It's all of a sudden it feels like everything is better and looks better. It's like literally the sun came out. What are your thoughts?
I'm loathed to make a comparison because we all know how it turned out. But what I'm feeling and what my text messages are indicating and what I'm reading online is the enthusiasm that women felt about Hillary Clinton in 2016. I walked around in my tank top that said a woman's place is in the White House. I went to vote with my dad. There was this belief that we could change as a country. And Kamala Harris represents an ability to change if we do take that route.
It goes in all sorts of different directions. She is meaningful to a ton of different demographic groups. And they've all really embraced her. And I'm not sure about how that manifests actually on election day and she has 105 days or 104 days now I think to redefine herself because the definition that the voters who determine these elections have is not good.
This is not a woman that plays well naturally in a Pennsylvania in a Michigan in a Wisconsin. She's bringing new spirit and life to the board. Right, especially if she picks Markelli out of Arizona. Maybe that's on the board in Georgia. And she's bringing bananas for her. Maybe we'll talk about North Carolina again if Roy Cooper who's the governor there is her running mate. But you are seeing a joyfulness and a hope of possibility and change in there is online.
Incredibly creative memes that are out there, but there's one that has four boxes and it has Obama, you know, in the cool. I don't know what the term is, but the filter right that the hope and change poster was in like the blue gray is with the red so it says hope. And then it has hate over Donald Trump and then it has heal over Joe Biden and then it has grow over Kamala Harris. And I think people are feeling the potential for that growth and there's opportunity.
I think to ignore a lot of her past policy positions and I you know she has to get out there and just say you've heard a lot from me before I have talked about things that are impractical I've talked about Medicare for all I have talked about giving free health care to people who are here that are undocumented I've talked about all sorts of incredibly
good things about the green new deal for instance, but I am part of the Biden Harris administration and Joe Biden's record is my record and this is how I plan to continue to govern let's finish the job. It's amazing the infrastructure that went to her you know 1300 people working on this campaign, but also all of the models let's finish the job. I think I'm going to stick to that I feel like we could do it we could pull off a total political miracle.
You said something that I want to double click on and that is she doesn't play well in some of the swing states why is that because my impression is she's actually more moderate or conservative. A lot of people I think initially think that they mean it categorize as like a California Democrat very liberal she's actually you know she's attorney general I think an economic issue she's pretty moderate why doesn't she play well.
Well she ran away from her attorney general background and more towards her liberal side for the 2020 primary and she just got boxed out by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren who you know Bernie Sanders is.
You know he's the original thing right is like the OG's democratic socialist grump so he has his constituency and I think Elizabeth more and is one of the more talented politicians we've ever seen yeah ran incredible race I went to her rally in Washington square park and her policies were always to the left of where I was.
I wanted I was wearing her t-shirt I want her rip it off burn my bra do all the things right she just gets you going like that and so come on and really have a lane and she couldn't get to her Amy clobo char or people to judge was right you know people were I should say people actually from the Midwest advocating for that kind of common sense stuff so she hasn't run actually as a super cop before.
She's only run away from it and the kind of kudos that she's gotten the most from her time in the senate was when she was leaning into I'm the one who can prosecute the case her grilling of bill bar her grilling of Brett Kavanaugh so I think that's a lot of the reason that she hasn't played well in those more moderate places i'm sure there is room as well for sexism and racism in this I mean we've already seen it. bubbling up and I was reading before we jumped on the line.
A missive out of meeting with congressional or publicans and and senator public and sender saying do not call her a d e i higher do not do it talk about her policies we can win this on policy but you know you already have tape of JD Vance he called her like a crazy cat lady you know if they're going to run with cats deeply unhappy with no kids and cats.
Yeah okay right when she has i would say one of the more vibrant looking political marriages i've ever witnessed you know people kissing on the mouth and looking like they love it and she has two step kids and you know if they're going to be running on a platform of i'm not totally opposed to a national abortion ban and you know what we should look into IVF and then you're calling her a lonely cat lady that's not a recipe for success.
When I heard the news i was a mix of excitement sadness relief like like almost like a cathartic release and the other emotion i had was one of intense gratitude towards secretary Clinton and while she didn't shadow the glass ceiling i think she put enough cracks in it that America is finally decided i think a lot of people look back and think you know what we should have voted for the woman.
And i think that America really is ready and i need to go into identity politics but it is going to play a role here but i think it's going to be a positive here i think America has decided it's time or a lot of Americans have decided it's time for a woman president i think a lot of that is credited with from secretary Clinton do you have any thoughts.
Any opportunity to praise Hillary Clinton i'm going to jump right on that i think that she has created an environment where we are now so used to seeing a woman. In a politically powerful position going back to even how she transformed.
And being first lady and what she did for keeping the country together in the wake of her husband's affair you know we don't talk about that enough that she had every reason to just be able to say you know i'm getting up i'm leaving and i'm taking Chelsea with me and the country would have completely crumbled and there is strength sometimes in sticking it out and i think she's out of debt of gratitude on a whole host of levels she's also been right about every single foreign policy issue.
But yes i i think that she deserves a lot of credit for that and it was both more and would say that as well that she could get seven eight thousand people to come out to a rally for her is because they're used to the iconography of a woman in these kinds of positions and comah Harris as well and it's interesting because the candidate who had the most overlap in terms of donors in 2020 from secretary Clinton was comah Harris and a lot of Hillary's really big bumblers thought that she was.
And so she was the one to carry the torch and they were looking across the field and they had an Amy clovish are who I think the world of and frankly is more kind of policy positions like the rest of the country but they went with comah and there was tremendous disappointment that she didn't translate to the national stage in the way that they expected that her awkwardness was not embraced and that her joyfulness felt.
And that's the ability to do the job and I think that that switch has flipped a bit now and that we do actually really want to go back to how you felt on Sunday to be leaning into joy like when was the last time that we felt politically joyful but I do want to double click on what you said about the feeling of sadness when you heard that Biden was out.
This for Fox and talked about it on air that day I cried when I read that Joe Biden was pulling out of the race because I know that he still he believes he can win this race. He didn't do this because he thought that he wasn't going to be able to do it he did it because the pressure was mounting on him to an unsustainable level and Nancy Pelosi had floated that she was going to go public with it.
He was forced out that this week he was forced out and that is one of the more fundamentally good people that America has ever seen. And I think that he really got even though it was the right decision in the end he really got a raw deal and I know that he will be greeted at the convention rock star levels you know at least Obama levels.
And that we will remember his legacy for everything he accomplished with which is what it should be but it is so sad the way that this ended with him isolated in rohoboth with covid with people that he had worked with for decades people whose elections were probably owed to him because he showed up in campaign for them whether it was in the 80s 90s 2010s any of it and just stabbing him in the back or in the front.
And it's profoundly sad and it will feel that way for a long time and there are these incredible videos that are all over Instagram and tick tock of senior citizens talking about Joe Biden and that he was the greatest president that we've ever had that he had there's this one woman who's making the case that he combines all of the best qualities of these democratic heroes that we've had over the years. And that it really hit home for me and it deserves hanging on it for a while.
I had the same emotion but here's the thing that if you think it through and I just made me feel better and open makes you feel better people won't remember how long it took him to make the decision don't remember the decision right they won't remember that he didn't want to leave and he was in denial and a lot of his handlers were sequestering him for obvious reasons now.
I'm now starting to get physically angry at the staff of the White House and be like you really think you get high this from us and then I was mad at myself for falling under this delusion that everything might be all right. But here's the thing for the rest of his life every room he walks into he gets a standing ovation and his life can you imagine what his life would have been like the next four and a half years.
I think this is absolutely in the short term probably devastating for him and over the medium in the long term the absolute best decision for president Biden I think this is for him personally the best thing that could happen.
I totally agree and I think it's like anyone who is kind of going into retirement at least a little bit not of their choosing that within six to 12 months they're feeling pretty great right and he has the last six months he says that his not soul focus but his main focus is going to be getting the hostages back and negotiating a piece deal between Israel and Hamas and if he can get that done you know people have won no bells for less.
And he will be an icon and it wasn't guaranteed on a legislative basis I think he deserves it right you know I think the comparisons to what an LBJ was able to accomplish are reasonable but he wasn't a personality icon he wasn't a cult figure like an Obama like a Bill Clinton like a JFK and I think that those aviators now will live on right in a way that we didn't expect if he had a continued on.
And I ended up losing to Donald Trump in November certainly you know Democrats are love power as much as Republicans I just think we have better ideas and we're kinder and more concerned with people who have less than the Republican Party but of course we're mad for power and Nancy Pelosi is an incredible testament to all of that but I genuinely don't believe that people who have worked for them that long in love him as much as they do knew that the debate
was how Joe Biden is on a more regular basis and we're still trying to pass them off as a fine candidate I take offense to that idea and maybe I'm just trying to save my own but because I was on TV telling people that Joe Biden could do this job look at him on the
picket line with the United Auto workers look at him in North Carolina look at him in Detroit you know the decline was precipitous and I don't think that Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer Dick Durbin people who genuinely love him knew that and it was some big charade to fool the American people.
And what's interesting and I'm curious to get your thoughts about this is that age was the biggest issue in the campaign and I think it's going to remain the biggest issue but it's flipped from being a liability for Democrats to an asset I think you put a woman of color who's 59 on stage with Donald Trump he is going to look as old as Biden looked
at the same time and probably more in coherent at certain moments you know I was in the room in Milwaukee when he was giving his acceptance speech and there were 9,000 words of ad lib and probably 6,000 that didn't make any sense I worry though about Democrats kind of jumping into the deep end with that argument I saw a lot of and I smiled at them but a lot of snorkey tweets right away saying
how could the Republicans have nominated such an old guy yikes you know we we did do a bad thing for a long time and acted as if it wasn't going to matter for people and the voters were continually telling us that that it did matter for them and I thought as a Klein pointed that out and I thought was such a smart point he said the narrative right now is that this was an elites cabal right that they got together and they just decided we want to get him out
but the truth is is that the elites were late to this it was regular so interesting telling us right it's completely the counter narrative every survey was saying he's too old he's unfit to do this and these were Democrats who said we're going to vote for him we're going to vote for a dead person over Donald Trump but in fact it was those of us who are supposed to know it all that were late to the game and I think that that dose of humility is important for people in quote elite
positions to have in all of this and to say you know you might not like that there wasn't a mini primary and and I understand that and it was obviously Joe Biden's wish that there wasn't right he came out 20 minutes after the statement went out and said I'm endorsing
Kamala Harris which basically cut everyone and had other endorsements lined up clearly right. Oh yeah well they've been prepping for ages but she did it in the most elegant way I could have expected anyone to and I think it's such a credit to her and the type of person that she is I mean is there another human you could imagine to be a better team player going through the last month of politics and Kamala Harris.
They all were and I think that was smart I don't think they had any choice but to be seen as team players but just on this notion I was right after I heard I was the quote unquote in the competition camp and now I have fully and now I've just been overwhelmed and I'm on board with a coronation but what are your thoughts on this notion and it's it's kind of a move point at this point
because I do think it's a coronation but do you think we would have been better off with something resembling a competition debates and alike. Well I think it would have made great programming which is where my mind goes to all the time. You know we were musing that he should Biden should counter program the RNC right like well
Trump's about to go on stage we like you know what every considered I'm getting off you know I'm getting out of the race. I think that a mini primary would have served us well and there are a lot of people smarter than I
am who have figured out how you'd be able to do it I think if it was contained to just battleground states and to give the people who actually determine who's going to be our next president the chance to go see town halls and have the delegates vote for instance you know have them listen to the people that they represent I think it would have been good and Dean Phillips who was out front on all of this you know was musing that it would just give an air of appropriateness to everything and odds are actually that Kamala Harris.
Could have come out very likely I think as the as the winner and I think if you think if you look at who Conn La Harris has been the last three to four weeks I would put my money on her for that but the truth is we can't afford another moment of infighting I mean if you look at the damage that has happened to the democratic cause in all of this I think it made sense I also think it just makes sense because she's part of that administration you know people say
oh well it's not fair we voted for Joe Biden not Kamala Harris well when he's running for reelection you're voting for the Biden Harris ticket and she is the rightful air to that ticket her VP choice will obviously be a huge part of this I think all of the folks that they've asked for their for their papers for them to submit their packages would be fabulous and was interesting to see that governor waltz from Minnesota was on the list he was someone that I didn't expect to be that I am happy that he was the president.
back to be, but you can't really go wrong with those guys. And we have limited time to be able to do this. We have Trump and his folks on the back heel. They are prepared for one candidate and one candidate only. And now Joe Biden is not that candidate. And so we just got to relish the moment and run full steam ahead. And it looks like everyone has gotten the memo, more or less, that this is what we're doing. So let's talk about who would you want to be VP, who do you think's going to be VP?
So like I said, I'm actually thrilled with all of the choices that are out there. I think my gut would initially be, I want Governor Shapiro. I think that he is just a beacon of light in all of this and has been since being a beacon of light. But I can't help but be concerned about him being Jewish.
And at this particular moment with such a high dose of anti-Semitism, especially within our party, which is something that I hate about us, that if you have a black woman at the top of the ticket and a Jewish guy, that there are too many opportunities to be turned off. What about two women? What if you had a, do you think the same, the same fear holds about? Having two women on the ticket? It does give me a little bit of anxiety. I hate to say it. I think she's fantastic.
I think she'll be an incredible candidate. I'm sure she'll, she will run in 2028. But it feels like the top is such an unsafe pick at this moment that we should go for a bit more safety. Roy Cooper, I think, is the safest one out of all of this. But Kelly is, Kelly has my heart and he has the nation's heart. And I think that the strength of also having Gabby Giffords out there who is such a hero to everybody would be incredible.
And Arizona, you know, we had basically relegated ourselves back to just the blue wall. But Arizona is ripe to keep if we have the right combination. And I think that Markelli does that. So right now, my heart is in the Markelli camp for sure. And I think it makes a lot of strategic sense. So your background is in data science and messaging. If you are advising the Harris campaign, which I mentioned at some point, you will be, what do you think are the core messages she should hone in on?
That nothing changes. That we are here to finish the job and that she was proud to serve with Joe Biden. I think that Joe Biden should be one of the most commonly used phrases out of her mouth. Because Joe Biden is personally a lot more popular than he is politically to people. They were never able to demonize him, right? They were never able to convince people that he was actually a mob boss.
I'm sure James Comer has been crying for 48 hours straight since the announcement that he won't get to have his Hunter Biden investigations anymore. And all of that has evaporated. But the American public loves Joe Biden. And I think there's opportunity also to frame the economy, which you said, you know, who didn't like this economy, but to talk about the accomplishments of the Biden Harris administration out of a new messenger. And she has been tight.
She has been pitch perfect in the last three to four weeks. And so I think that she's just basically got to take the playbook and she has the same campaign manager. She has the same campaign chairs as Joe Biden did. And she's got to go out there and do a Joe Biden impression with some coconut flair. Right? That's what people are looking for at this moment.
And I think that she can define herself as different in a lot of the personal moments, certainly talking about reproductive health, where I did feel that he struggled to do that. And some of that is just that men talking about it doesn't really hit as hard. So her doing that voting rights, galvanizing Gen Z and millennial voters, but be proud of what you've accomplished and Joe Biden picked her out of a huge field of possible VPs. And he did it for a reason.
And if the listeners haven't heard Joe Biden's call into now Kamala HQ from Monday, they should go back and listen to it. But there's this very sweet exchange where Kamala says, guys heard it from Doug's voice. We love Joe and Jill. We really do. They truly are like family to us. And we do everybody here. It's mutual. I know you were still there. You're not going anywhere, Joe. I'm watching the kids. I'm watching the kids. I love you, Joe. It felt like it was supposed to. That was real.
Yeah, totally. Yeah, the positioning I would go with is I'm a prosecutor. He's a felon. And I would just be relentless. I would say as Attorney General of California, I put 740 pedophiles in prison. And then I would just show overlay that with the voiceover with a ton of images of Trump and Epstein. And then I'd move on to, as AG, I stuck 300 people in for white collar crime. And I would show Peter Navarro being sentenced. I'd, you know, for racketeering I put it in.
And then I'd show my, I would just literally go to the Prophet College scams. Oh my gosh. Yeah, he's done everything. I shut down all these degree mills, but it had, I'd been in New York. I would have shut down a degree mill called Trump University. I would just be, I'm the prosecutor. He's the felon. I think it's absolutely going to deposition put them on their heels and they just won't know how to, know how to respond.
So I want to add to that quickly because I know that we have gone over as well. I totally agree with you. I think if there is a debate, that contrast old versus young, convex versus cop is important. But you need to also keep in mind that we're talking about swing voters. So those are base plays. But swing voters are going to vote on the traditional stuff. So they're going to be voting on the economy. And there are some of them who are very concerned about the border.
And she was in charge of our relationship with Central American countries, you know, or not supposed to call her the borders are. But that is what she has been framed as. So I think that if we move too hard into what folks in the heartland feel are ancillary issues that we risk coming off as unserious. So I want all of that, but I really want her to go hard on the stuff that they've accomplished. Like tell your insulin costs $35 because of me and Joe Biden. And also I'm a cop.
And I want to put this guy in jail. So it's a line to walk carefully, but it has to be balanced. Jessica Tarlaf is a political analyst and a co-host on the five Fox's weeknight news program. She joins us from her home and try back. It's great to have you back on the ground. Jessica back in New York and we'll look forward to catching up soon. Perfect. Thanks for having me. We'll be right back for our conversation with Chris Foss. Support for ProvG comes from Green Light.
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That's LinkedIn.com slash Scott. Terms and conditions apply. LinkedIn, the place to be. Welcome back. Here's our conversation with Chris Voss, the CEO and co-founder of Black Swan Group and former lead FBI hostage negotiator. Chris where does this podcast find you? I'm Emma Hassan Vegas. You live in Vegas. I'm willing to admit that. So let's jump right into it.
You tweeted recently as a lead former hostage negotiator in the FBI, I will say it was certainly that the level of manipulation by the mainstream media should not be overlooked when we look back on what exactly led to this moment and you were referring to the failed attempted assassination of Trump. What did you mean by that?
Well, principally, you know, I thought about when I put that up and also since, in point of fact, I believe the media professional wants to go and the son of the cross the board has really become accepted and any interviews somebody sticks a microphone, some of his face and said, can you believe so and so said this about you? And it's a little bit like I remember doing this when I was in college trying to instigate a couple of my friends and beginning into a confrontation.
Can you believe that you said that? Are you going to take that? You know, this instigating that comes from the side and if we have some reliance on the media overall, we don't think of them as instigators. You know, then just like when I was with some of my friends here, people say I'm so sorry. Yeah, you know, yeah, that's right. And it's an incitement. Unfortunately, they're instigators. When I was with the FBI, we're preparing for gathering the G20 in Canada, I believe it was at the time.
And they're talking about the preparations for the predictable demonstrations. And so in preparation for the crowd, they said for the gathering, they said you can put a thousand peaceful demonstrators someplace, a thousand. And then you just put six professional instigators around in strategic locations. And it'll take a peaceful demonstration and it turned them into a violent mob. Six people. And I've really been thinking about this a lot.
Unfortunately, the media's professional instigators and they look for the opportunity called gasoline on smolding coals and hopefully turning it to a flower. And point of fact, it's a contributing factor. I like the framing there that they're sort of they're in the business of instigating or taking the heat up, not taking it down. I would say that's the same as true online, but even worse.
If I look at my comments in my feed on social media platforms, it feels like it's a bunch of people in the third grade surrounding two kids who are barely even having words and then screaming fight, fight, fight. And I wonder, I'm curious what your thoughts are that if I were a bad actor or a foreign entity, the GRU or the CCP, I would absolutely employ the strategy to just get us fighting with each other. Yeah, we do it.
It's kind of the, there are no markets of Queen's Bay rules on international combat. I mean, the intelligence is globally always trying to stir up this content within the camps of the enemy to keep them confused so that they don't get rallied against us. So let's get back to it. How do you think the US government should be negotiating with nations at war?
What advice would you have Biden has essentially said that he's going to focus a lot of his Janus remaining time on trying to end the war in the Middle East and bring the hostages home? What advice would you have for him or generally speaking to the US as it tries to negotiate with nations that they're at war? Everything you've been doing up to now has been stupid. Unfortunately, argument has become a synonym for negotiation. And it's a horrible synonym. It shouldn't be there.
People just want to make arguments. And that's advocated principally by lords. You know, lawyers want to make arguments to calm themselves, my ghost readers. We don't have any better models and many cases that we don't know. Lawyers are make arguments. And great negotiation is invisible. So you don't see it. The only time Biden ever did anything foreign policy wise that I was really impressed by. And he did it very early in administration.
So what the government should do is not let the other side get caught off guard if you're going to say something they don't like. Biden was going to make a statement recognizing the genocide of the Armenian, I believe, which is largely placed at the blame was placed at the feet of the Turks. And what he did was he let the leader of Turkey know was coming. You know, we're going to say this. They're not going to like it. Don't want you to get caught off guard by it.
The president of Turkey's response was remarkably muted and professional instigators in the media said, can you believe he said that? You know, what do you think about Biden saying this blame place in his blame on him? And he'd been more than advanced. So he wasn't he wasn't upset about it. It didn't turn into the flame that the media was trying to get it turned into the argument. You know, the kids around the other kids in the school, you're going to fight fight fight.
So in very few politicians have really taken a cue from that. To at least if you're going to say something that you can't apart son get a like, then don't let them get caught off guard. At least don't blindside it. And I think that's the that's probably the first move international. People want to be warned when bad news is coming. That's one of the basic talents of the black swan method day to day. You know, I might have something negative to say.
I want you to be able to brace yourself before I say it in advance. How do I do that? We don't feel attacked. How you feel? I'm just trying to tell the truth. Again, to make analogy to what's going on on the media and social media today. There's a great seeking for truth. There's truth seekers and truth tellers. And a lot of people disguised as truth tellers are really just level in accusations.
But some of the people who have been around for a long time are really just, you know, let's stop the accusations. Let's start, let's start thinking about what's the truth. Let's try to speak the truth. And if you can say it in the other way, the other side is not offended by it. And you're probably in a way trying something. You said sort of resonates where I think has relevance with relationships.
I've always thought that the thing that really puts a strain on relationships is not bad news, but surprises. Like it's one thing when, all right, the investments have gone really bad. And you're in charge of the investments. But what I think people get really upset with is they've been bad for a year and they've been getting worse. You waited until now to tell me. Do you think a lot of this can be as relevance with personal relationships? Yeah, absolutely.
I see all this is relevant to personal relationships. And negotiations is relevant to personal relationships. We hear all the time, never split the differences. Great parenting book. I hear back from women. That for the first time my husband, it feels like my husband's listening to me. And then so first of all, what does it mean to actually listen? And then secondly, like how do we eliminate the surprises from the other side? People are remarkably resilient. And then I get caught off guard.
And it doesn't take a lot. Unfortunately, people blind sight of the people not out of bad intent because they don't know how to tell the truth or they're trying to fix the problem so that it never hits the other person. So it's never, it rarely is a result of a bad heart, if you will. These are mistakes in the head, not of the heart, because people just don't know. You know, if I could just warn you, it was coming. Then you could brace yourself.
I want to put forward a thesis on going back to geopolitics and have you respond to it. I think that not only when you're negotiating, you have to recognize you're not just negotiating on the current situation, but you're setting a tone or an atmospheric or incentives for future negotiations.
And the thing I just really bothered me about, the Brittany Griner deal was I thought I personally believe the moment we cut that deal and traded, it was loosely called or accurately called the Merchant of Death, Victor Boode, that basically that day, Evan Gershkevich was taken prisoner.
That we created an incentive structure that we would trade quite frankly someone more, I don't know if it's valuable, but that had more, should have been imprisoned a lot longer, that we just set up an incentive such that we guaranteed more Americans would be falsely imprisoned. What are your thoughts? Well, so first of all, Brittany Griner was absolutely entitled to have the East Government come to her aid.
When I was the lead international kidnapping negotiator, Brittany Griner's thing was an illegal detention as opposed to a kidnapping. There are differences. But in any event, no American citizen should be abandon overseas. No matter how they got themselves into it, international kidnapping people were mostly just to it. They'll advise behavior, they'll put themselves in a really bad position, trying to trade on a form of camaraderie international that was never there.
And I don't believe that Brittany Griner, she may have made a minor mistake, but she's entitled to have the gun come to her aid and do a big can for it. So first point there, I'm absolutely in support of the government opener. So now let's get on to the stupidity of the trade. Once the instigators got going in the media, then increased pressure on the Biden administration, cut a deal, cut a deal, cut a deal. Then it's a matter of patience.
When the other side is more patient than you are, and the instigators are putting the heat on you, then they can lay back. And I don't think it was a poor trade. And I don't think the Biden administration has got the market is holding them in happily on bad trades. The Obama administration made bad trades. The Trump administration made bad trips.
I thought it was horrible that the beat us in the deal when the A-Wall soldier, the Obama administration swapped out five members of the Taliban who were being held in Guantanamo for an American soldier who'd gone A-Wall. Now that American soldier deserved help regardless of how you win A-Wall. It was a bad trade. The Trump administration out there at the Obama administration, when they put 5,000 Taliban back on the battlefield because they were in a hurry to make a deal.
Any time a government is in a hurry to make a deal, all the other side has to do is sit back and let time walk against them. And so the Brittany Grinder thing was no different. It was a bad trade and then the nature of the bad trade, not the nature of the fact that a trade was made. The nature of the bad trade is what encouraged the poor negotiation would set up further negotiations. You know, one of my favorite movies, Bridge of Spies, Tom Hanks. Love it. We engage in the same kind of trades.
And as portrayed in the movie, the American negotiator depicted by Tom Hanks got the better of the other side and got the better of the other side in the Russians. Same type of trade. It wasn't that the negotiations were bad. It was how good would the negotiators at the table. And not only did Tom Hanks' character and forgive me for not remembering the real life name of the guy, who I have tremendous admiration for. He turned around and cut great deals with Cuba, getting massively.
We beat the hell out of the Cubans in negotiations after the pay of pigs. So it's not negotiation itself. It's the problem. It's the level of ability of the negotiators at the table. The negotiation everyone's talking about is the negotiation with Putin and the negotiation with Hamas, right?
Well, if I think of the two highest profile negotiations, maybe that's true in American Central Glands, but one with Putin, you have an autocrat who's not worried about not being reelected and you have a nation that has just as a competence and incredible ability to endure hardship and suffering. You know, it's just, I find in terms of Russian history, it's pretty difficult to put pressure on Russia. They don't scare usually.
They're willing to put their own people through a lot of pain and suffering here. So I'd love to get your thoughts there. And then as it relates to Hamas, I even see a bigger challenge. And that is you're not even sure who you're negotiating with or how you even open lines of negotiation and who can even enforce the rules or outcomes of that negotiation. I'd love to give your thoughts or get your thoughts on both of those dynamics. I would agree with someone what you said about Putin and Russia.
I mean, I think the guy does worry about getting reelected, which is why he puts so much effort into it. I don't think that Russians would agree if you said that the elections were rigged. You know, they spawned openly. He's a nationalist and globally, nationalist, are getting a lot of influence. Populous, nationalist leaders, you know, they're a thousand percent in favor of what's in the best interest of our country. It's sweeping Europe. It's the reason that Trump is as popular as he is.
He's pro his homeland. Russia has shown the ability to endure what have they had to endure. They've been invaded more times than they've invaded other countries. They've been invaded by Japan multiple times. They've been invaded by, versus European countries multiple times. They've been invaded more than they've invaded other countries. They've got, they don't have the natural land bearing with geographical protections the United States had. We get the most pannvious geographical setup on earth.
You cannot come at us without us seeing you or you have across the ridiculously difficult terrain. Can't come at us from the north, the east or the west. Can't come at you. If you want to try to come at us from the south, you can't work your way to Latin America. It's not, they're on great ports down there. Russia on the other hand, it's got land bridges that makes it extremely easy to get at. Their natural resources are not high.
I once saw a red at the beginning of the Ukraine war that somebody dismissively, a varsha, said, Russia is just your gas station. All right, empathy. How does that look to the other side? I think that was McCain. It might have been. All right, so if that's true, you're the leader of a country that your principal way to feed your people is in industry. The entire world is trying to stop using it.
So empathy is about not necessarily agreeing with the actions of the other side, but understanding where they're coming from. And being able to say it to them out loud. Nobody has, you know, the Western European leaders, the president of France showed up and had audiences with Putin. I promise you that all that guy did with, if they got a direct meeting with him, was telling why it was wrong as opposed to, all right, so here's what your problems are. You get invaded. You got no natural offenses.
You're worried about whether or not you can feed your people. You're worried about your people starving in the cold and the dark. Let's talk about what the problems are on a different solution. Nobody's opposed to them like that. So I think what he's done, what Russia's done in regards to Ukraine is absolutely wrong. War is an environmental catastrophe, little on a humanitarian catastrophe. But a little bit starts with, all right, so here's your motivations. Here's why you don't want to do it.
Now, let's potentially talk about a different course of action. Because as soon as you start talking to somebody about what their motivations are, getting it out of the open air, it helps them clear their head. And maybe see war is a short-term catastrophe, whereas economic collaboration was the long-term solution. So that kind of might take on Russia. Now, and as I continue to babble on, there's a massive amount of influence on a mosque who cut all the negotiations that are going on to there.
Some of the Hamas leaders are hanging out at Cut. And if you really want to talk to a mosque, even if you're an American diplomat, you're going to cut it. So there's ways to influence them. The real difference, in my view, I was listening to Jared Kusner giving in about the Abraham Corps, and the problem with Hamas and why they didn't participate in the Abraham Corps and the pro-Palestinian people were saying, well, we weren't given a seat at the table.
You could have had a seat at the table if you'd have paid table stakes. And table stakes for that negotiation was everybody that comes to the table gets to keep their job. And he cannot come to the table saying, I'm going to put you out of this. You have to agree that the other side gets to keep their job. Mosques and I've been willing to say the Israelis get to keep their job. All the Abraham Accords, all the Muslim countries, it signed off to collaborate with Israel.
They all said, you know what? If you're willing to negotiate with me in peace and look for an economic settlement or we can all thrive, you get to keep your job. And Hamas has not been willing to say that. It's not that they haven't been invited to the table. They say refuse to pay the table stakes.
And in this case, the table stakes are, when you say get to keep your job, you mean saying that we're not going to be totally 100% committed to exterminating your people, is that we're referring to as table stakes? Yeah, yeah, and even larger times, that's the first time the United States has been willing to make that agreement. When the Second of Iraq war started, and it's easier to criticize it in the high itself, it's a bad move. And I'm not going to go there.
But I do remember, President Bush giving us an address to the American people and saying, this is the opportunity to bring democracy to the Netherlands. And what he didn't know that he was saying at the time was, he was saying to all the Middle Eastern leaders, none of whom are the democracies.
If you, my goal is for you to lose your job, because you're not at democracy and you're going to have to subject yourself to the whims of the votes, just like all the Western European countries, they'll have everybody else. And you got to, if you want to collaborate with us, we're going to bring democracy to the country, you're going to lose your job. And that was a mistake.
So the other thing about the brilliance of the Abraham Accords and the accords in that particular negotiation was the agreement, you get to keep your job. If you come to the table and negotiate with us a good faith. And so it's obvious with Hamas, but America has made this mistake a number of times in the past, we didn't realize what we were saying. I want to bring democracy to the country, to the monarchy, the person on the other side is here. And I'm going to lose my job. Why should I do that?
Well, let's get back specifically to Biden has said he wants to bring the hostages out. My understanding is there's still five Americans being held hostage. I'm not even sure we understand this proof of life or not. Obviously it's a priority for the American government to get those five hostages home. Let's go back to that. What advice or what are the atmospherics here to try and successfully bring these folks home?
So first of all, if I can say when I was a hostage, a little shitter and probably a principal is where you can't negotiate in the middle of a riot or gunfight. It looks very much like the gunfight's still going on. So to expect effective negotiations in a short time in the middle of a gunfight, you got to get the gunfight stopped. Now what's the inducement for you to decide to stop the gunfight?
Ultimately, it's the people that are supporting them, the economic harm of violence as opposed to the economic prosperity of peace. And Hamas continues to stand a gunfight because of the support they're getting globally. They're either winning the PR or they're intentionally putting their people in harm's way. I don't think we'll get an accurate reports in the media of how tired the Palestinians are of being human shields for Hamas and getting their people killed.
They got a hostage rescue in a residential area and all sorts of quote innocent people are killed by these rallies are coming in the hostage rescue. Well how do those innocent people get placed in harm's way? You know, Hamas is sacrificing Palestinians by the tens of thousands to gain world support and they're getting their world support. So what are the kids standing around them shouting and yelling?
Here's the Biden administration, their challenge in getting the hostage is back is calm but rancor that's blaming Israel for a current bloody conflict that didn't start. That begins to change the perspective of the leadership. Are they one of the PR war? Hamas is one of the PR war right now. That's what's keeping them engaged and what they're doing.
I'd love your thoughts on how to take some of these skills and apply them to your relationship with your spouse and then I'd love to hear do you have kids Chris? I get grandkids. You got grandkids. Okay, I would love specifically to hear lessons to your younger self or a new father on how you can apply these skills to enhance your relationship with your kids. Wow. Okay, when we begin it was a lot of good stuff. It goes from Hamas to more unreasonable third party from talking about teenagers.
So let's start with using this as a means of establishing better rules of engagement with your spouse. Well, it is a problem with spouse and children. We've conditioned them though when that lesson. So parents and spouses, we want to flip over to continue to ask our list of questions to make it sound like what I'm saying. And interested or given advice and a lot of moms start to report that the use of the merit and skill got their teenage daughters to talk to them for the first time in years.
So what's the typical interaction? Kid comes home from school. How is your day? Kid answers. Parents goes immediately to the next class. Well, what that makes a kid feel like is that they want to listen to. Now a parent is taught show interest. You know, I got a checklist to show interest and get back to my life. It's like a person in the media doing an interview.
They got a list of questions that are going to run through the questions and not going to pay attention to the answers and then they're going to move on. So how is your day? Kid's been conditioned of mom or dad ain't going to listen. So they're going to say fine or I forget. Because they're not going to get interrogated over that. I forget is the best one. I forget what it's on. I forget and then move on. Well, and a parent is like, you know, why won't my kid talk to me?
Well, you got your list of questions. You ain't listen. You've conditioned them that you're not going to listen. The people in our family who have conditioned each other that were not listening. So the tiny little two-millimeter shift that moms are telling us constantly, why was your day? I forget. If you're going to marry that, what'd you say? You forget? Not accusatory, but to just repeat what the person said confirms that you heard and you listen.
And suddenly the child's shocked like, wait a minute. We actually paid attention to what I said. And by the second time they do that, suddenly the kid's opening up. All mom or dad is still on his mirror. And just as we wrap up here at Gris, what do you think of the two earth? Three things that young people should keep in their back pocket as it relates to negotiating, whether it's for a salary or for, you know, a different type of job responsibilities, whatever it might be.
What are there any sort of go-tos you'd say, look, this is what young people get wrong a lot. And they should remember whenever they're in a situation that involves some type of negotiation. You know, if you can show the other person by saying that lie with their perspectives, that seems like a tangent, a inefficient, but just repeating back to them what their perspective is, is breaks, long James. And you don't even, here's the thing, you don't even got to get it right.
If you just make the attempt, the other side's going to feel your collaborating and they'll correct you. They'll help you get it right. You go into instantaneous collaboration and it doesn't matter what the negotiation is. It could be what you boss, it could be what you parent. You know how they see things, saying how they see it is not agreeing. And you're going to find that a lot of your log jams are just going to disappear half of it.
Half of it, I promise you, will go away the minute you start trying to repeat what you think is going to be. Chris Voss is CEO of the Black Swan Group and the author of the National Best Seller never split the difference negotiating as if your life depended on it. He previously served as the lead international kidnapping negotiator for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the FBI, as well as the FBI's hostage negotiation representative for the National Security Council's hostage work and group.
Before becoming the FBI's lead international kidnapping negotiator, Chris served as the lead crisis negotiator for the New York City Division of the FBI. He joined us from his home in the great and underappreciated city of Las Vegas. Chris, I really enjoyed this conversation. Thanks for your good work, Andrew Sherrish. Scott, thank you very much. We'll be right back. Support for the show comes from AWS.
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Today explain Sean Ramas firm standing outside of the White House to ask Americans how they feel about a historic moment, their president dropping out of the presidential race. Mixed feelings, I think it's sad, but overall I think he might be making the right decision. I'm sad to see him drop out, but I think it needed to be done. So I think like hopefully it brings out more young voters. Joe Biden is considered as an anti-cris. I wanted to stay in this way. I know Trump would have won.
Now it's up in the air. But I just feel like his America ready for a woman and also a black woman. So that's what scares me. I just don't really see Camelar or really anyone else being a Bible threat to Trump. Camelar, Camelar, we need the facts, man. I don't know. You know what I mean? I think it's something fishy going on, but don't pull me. Yeah. I'm going to quote you. Yeah. We're going to ask Vox's Andrew Procop and David Axelrod how they feel on today explained.
Amen. Now, how do we wrap happiness? How to make sure you know and accidentally lose 50 percent of your friends. My primary residence for the last decade has been in Delri Beach, Florida. And I would say it feels like a half. It's probably a third because they stand out to me. But somewhere between a third and a half of our friends down there are not only Republicans, but Trumpers. And I really have tremendous amount of disdain for President Trump. I don't think he's a good person.
I think he's a terrible role model for men. And I think he has tantalinated America much weaker, not great again. And but at the same time, there's a lot of smart people, good people. It's so pedantic and arrogant and quite frankly just exclusionary to immediately write them off because they support Trump. But that's not what this is about. What this is about is you have to separate or I would suggest you separate the person from the politics in your own relationships.
I remember when I was younger, I was trying to think back when I was dating, when I was a young man, I couldn't tell you what the politics were of anyone that I dated. We just didn't care. You know what? Those were simpler, happier times. It was one less reason not to find opportunity to form a relationship. And this is what I'm going to suggest you do and what I started doing about 10 years ago, separate the person from the politics. Do you want to be friends with them?
Do you enjoy their company? Do you think they're smart? Do you have things that bond you? Whether it's kids going to the same school, whether it's an affection for a certain sport, whatever it might be. It's so difficult to maintain relationships and it's so important. We don't want to alienate 50% of the populace just because they don't have the same political views as you separate the person from the politics.
This episode was produced by Caroline Shagrin, Jennifer Sanchez is our associate producer and Ju Boros is our technical director. Thank you for listening to The Prof. Pod from the Vlox Media Podcast Network. We will catch you on Saturday for No Mercino Males, as read by George Han. And please follow our ProvG MarketsPod wherever you get your pods from new episodes every Monday and Thursday.