July 31, 2025 • 48 mins
Media Matters’ Angelo Carusone examines the right’s playbook for silencing left-wing media.
Congressman Greg Casar details Governor Greg Abbott’s extreme Texas redistricting map and a whole new level of gerrymandering.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
today's best minds and Vice President Harris will not run
from California governor.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
We have such a great show for you today.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Media Matterson, Angelo Kearrasone will join us to talk about
how the right is trying.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
To silence the left.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Then we'll talk to Congressman Greg Kassar about Greg Abbot's
in Sane Texas redistricting map, which involves a whole new
level of jeremandering.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
But first the stories the media is missing. Molly.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
There's this thing called the Rule of five that is
not a cheesy show that was on NBC in the
two thousands. That is a way that the Democrats can
use a rule to force the release of Epstein documents.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Voters have been mad at Democrats.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
We have been very cranky with Democrats, and this is
a kind of stuff we wanted. We wanted them to
do stuff like this. Congressional Democrats are trying to capitalize
on the Epstein issue, which has dogged President Trump for
almost a month and opened fissures between him and some
of his most ardent supporters. This is good you know,
(01:16):
good for Schumer for doing this. Schumer says, it's not
a stunt, it's not symbolic, it's formal exercise of congressional
power under the law.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
And you know, we really have been talking about this
a lot.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
Congress is being unable or unwilling to exercise its congressional power,
and it's pretty cool to.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
See them doing this.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
I'm really I'm glad, like this is what we wanted,
this is what we needed, We wanted Congress to do this,
so it's very cool, like this is exactly the right thing.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
And I'm really just.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Thrilled about this and thrilled to see them do this,
and it's really good, So very excited.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
We'll see what happens.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
But the Committee on Government Operations of the House of
Representatives can actually do the same thing. With a group
of seven members, Schumer says he could force the release.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
And again, by the way, if you're trying.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
To block the release of these of these files, the
question has to be why why are you trying to
do it, because I think you should just let all
the files be released. It's this is a really good
issue for Democrats in a lot of ways because it
really does to vote against it means you have some
kind of feeling that you want Jeffrey Epstein to have
(02:34):
gotten away with this.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
I just don't understand how you can be against this.
Speaker 4 (02:38):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Well, speaking of DEM's fighting, I can't believe I have
two instances of this in the segment. But the said
that dums are launching a lastage bid to block Trump's tariffs.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Again, another thing that we had just sort of been
begging Democrats to do is that they're now doing. And look,
maybe it doesn't work, but the point here is that
you have to try. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't work,
but you have to try. We need you to try,
and trying is the is the goal here. And so
this is very good good to see them trying. I mean, like,
(03:10):
this is the thing, like when you look at these numbers,
it says the tariff could add about twenty four hundred
dollars to the average Americans household expenses.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
That's a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Like twenty four hundred dollars for someone who's making you know,
thirty forty fifty thousand dollars, that's a huge, huge amount
of money. Jean Shihei from New Hampshire on Wednesday, evening,
we'll ask lawmakers to unanimously pass a bill affirming the
tariffs cannot be authorized under the International Economic Emergency Economic
(03:44):
Powers Act. Why this is important, and I think it
really is important, is that, believe it or not, Congress
has the tariff power. Trump doesn't have this power. He
took it from Congress using this emergency powers declaration.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Again, like emergency.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Powers, these are not his powers to use, right Like,
one of the big mistakes I think that politicians have
done is they've allowed emergency powers to continue on and
if that is created place where the executive was easier
for the executive to take power, and it's really bad.
So Sheen said that, you know, she has a group
(04:24):
to do this, So we'll see what happens.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
Yes, unfortunately, something bad has happened, which is the Senate
has confirmed a well I'm trying to think of words
that won't get me in trouble for a wibel. But
a person that I really don't think should be in
this office, mil beauvais.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Yeah, another Trump lawyer, which I think is important to remember.
This is his second Trump lawyer. There were tons of
whistleblower complaints. There are any number of reasons not to
put him in this lifetime appointment. Three different complaints in
recent weeks, two alleging he suggested violating court orders. They're
(05:00):
saying he reportedly misled Congress on the dropping of bribery charges.
So basically, this guy's a liar and now he has
a lifetime appointment. Republican Senators Murkowski and Collins crossing the
isle to join the Democrats but knowing. I mean, this
thing where the two Republicans vote with the Democrats but
(05:20):
they still know they have advanced to break the tie
is just absolutely so fucking corrupt, right Like it's like
they're pretending they care. It's so shitty, and a lot
of people are really worried. This is the runway for
Trump to nominate him to the Supreme Court. When Alido
or Thomas goes.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Yeah, it's so bad.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Well, something that could turn out well, but probably won't.
Josh Holly had a stock trading band that originally included
banning the president and the vice president from them, but
you'll be shocked to hear they carved those offices out,
but it has gone on to a vote in the Senate.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Look, man, I'm no Josh Holly fan but you know,
if you can get this done, do it.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
Man.
Speaker 2 (06:05):
I'm delighted. If they can get this pass, that would
be amazing. Good for them. If this works, good for them.
If this works would be amazing.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
Well we should say why this is important too, because
do you believe the way I believe that this will
get us much better candidates if they are not going
into office just the trade stocks.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
I believe that nobody should make money while working in government.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
That I mean, I think that the worst possible thing
is to have members of Congress trading stocks.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
I think it's wrong.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
I think it's morally wrong, I think it's ethically wrong,
and I think that they're not serving the people, they're
serving themselves.
Speaker 5 (06:42):
So yes, I think we'll have better people running out.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
So just think it's not okay, right, Like, it's not
how any of this should work. So I agree. Angelo
Kirasone is the CEO of Media Matters. Welcome to Fast Policy's.
Speaker 5 (07:00):
Antelo, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
I want you to talk about this legal battle that
you guys have been in, which is basically the legal
battle that all of us are going to be in
in the media right talk us through exactly what happened
and where you are right now.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
Yeah, I mean, I.
Speaker 5 (07:19):
Think what makes this significant is exactly what you said
in the intro. It's not just a lawsuit, right, you know,
we're not just getting sued by Twitter, you know, more
x whatever. That itself would be a hefty thing, right,
And we've seen that type of action play out all
the time, you know, to devastating consequences, even if it's
designed to suppress participate speech.
Speaker 4 (07:39):
Right.
Speaker 5 (07:40):
But this is so much different and bigger than that,
And I think it's hard for people to really understand
appreciate what's happening because this all started back in twenty
twenty three, and we don't have to get into the mechanics.
We published reports, we got sued for the reports by Twitter.
But beyond that, and this is why it's turning into
a significant battle for all of us, is that when
(08:00):
that took place, Steven Miller encouraged Elon Musk publicly to
encourage republic and state ags to launch investigations into media
matters that were parallel to the litigation, and that happened.
Ken Paxton launched an investigation, Andrew Barely launched an investigation
from Missouri, and the way that those investigations play out
(08:23):
typically is that they launched an investigation. You then argue
about whether or not you're going to give them the documents.
Eventually they go to state court. They sue you in
state court, and you eventually either win or lose, but
you have to go through this protracted battle there. We
sort of knew that there was a new playbook being written.
This is before Trump got elected, and because this is
what we do, we literally lived in these fever stops.
(08:45):
So we did something proactive. We said, wait, we can't
fight this out in the multi front war. We have
to actually be really engaged and sue the AGS to
shut that down, right, We need to actually start developing
new laws to this playbook.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
So that happened.
Speaker 5 (09:02):
But so the litigation was in excessuing US in Texas,
also suing US in Singapore and the and Ireland threatening
to sue US in the UK. That's the civil litigation,
and there were state Attorney general investigations. We have been
successful there.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
We won.
Speaker 5 (09:18):
The court agreed that it was a campaign of government harassment.
We won against Ken Paxton. Andrew Bailly lost and then
asked to settle with us. He has to settle with
us Paxston appealed to the d C Circuit Court. We
just won that victory back in May, so those are gone.
But then Trump got elected. Stephen Miller is now the
Deputy chief of staff. All of these MAGA figures are
(09:41):
spread around government, and we've seen them weaponized government against
a whole bunch of media properties and all their civic institutions.
The FTC launched an investigation into media matter as well
that was very similar to the State of g investigation
and so in totality, and this is part of the
calculus that we see with even the media companies. It's
not just oh, it's a really bad civil lawsuit and
(10:02):
nobody wants to fight it. Yeah, nobody wants to fight
it because civil lawsuits suck. But what everybody forgets when
they talk about CBS and ABC and Paramount is that
in the first week in office, Trump's FCC Commissioner, Brendan
Carr launched investigations into all of these media properties, the
same types of investigations we're receiving now. And the idea
(10:24):
is it's a one two punch. You drain people, you
drain resources, and civil litigation you leverage federal and government
power for rapid investigations and then all the potential consequences
that could flow from that. And by leveraging those two
things hand in hand, you have a lot of leverage.
They have all the cards, and so I think that's
(10:44):
the big picture here. And everyone is folding. Everyone is folding,
and we're fighting. So it's gonna suck. We are definitely bruised.
We've done a lot of big work and good work,
so I'm not discounting that. But I'm not going to
hide either. We are not We're bruised, but we're still fighting.
And the last thing else say on because I think
I keep thinking about this comment that Steve Bannon said
in a PBS interview last week. He was talking about
(11:05):
the fact that the reason why they're doing all that
they're doing is and why they're going to win is
because everyone's gonna fault. And he points to every civic, institutional,
law firms, right, media, and education, and his point is
you just don't have the stomach for a fight. Well,
we don't, and I think that and if we don't fight,
(11:26):
then everybody else will then receive the same type of attack.
It's inevitable. And you know that's it. So that's the summary.
I mean, they're running, they're building a new playbook, and
we're really on the front line of that.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
Yeah, and I think it's I mean, Steve Bannon is
quite smart and he is absolutely knows exactly how to
get what he wants, and he's We're watching it happen
in real time. And the thing that I'm struck bot,
which is so crazy in this whole thing, is that
(12:03):
they are trying to silence people. And why I was
so glad that you did this article on the New
York Times where you talk to them about this, or
where you were engaging with this, is that a lot
of this stuff is going on and nobody knows.
Speaker 5 (12:20):
Yeah, because it's scary, you know. That's the other part
about it, you know. I always tell this some of
my stabmins. People think history doesn't have a lot of heroes.
That's what we know about them, right, Because people's natural
reaction when you're under attack is to duck and cover,
or when the people around you are under attack is
to duck and cover. It's an honest and understandable reflex.
And so when you are under attack in this level
(12:41):
of intensity, especially for an organization like ours, I mean
the shad fraud of us, you know, even is like
the right just could not be more excited, right, I mean,
the Shatonfoy is there, but when you put that to
the side, it's like you just you they have not
just civil litigation, so all the expansive discoveries against the
world richest person, but now the federal government stiffing art.
(13:04):
And again there are people involved in these investigations that
a year ago were outside in Model World telling my
staff and me that they were going to put us
in the gulags if Trump got a let kid, sending
us notes that they were going to put us in jail.
And now they're in power doing the very thing that too.
Janine Piro is the US attorney, you will be deciding
(13:25):
whether or not to prosecute us. Yeah, and that is
I mean, this is so I think to the point
that nobody knowing it, You just you hope you can
get through it, and so you're quiet. That's the first thing.
The second is your you. And I think we shouldn't
discount this, and this is partly why it's so significant
and where the soul what is for everyone. I don't
think people should care about it. I think they should,
but if it doesn't matter of the dot. I always
(13:45):
tell people be selfish. Here's the thing. Part of the
reason you don't talk about it is because you're being
brutaliated against. It is a retribution campaign. We like the
whole point of the First Amendment. It's not some academic thing.
It's so that you can say things and free from
retribution from the government. This is literally them doing it brazenly.
And if you look at history and look at in
recent history, in places like Hungary and El Salvador, where
(14:08):
lawfare is very effective, you close off civic spaces by
making an example out of a few parts in individual sectors,
and you shrink what is acceptable. Are people going to
do the same thing. Are they going to be as
willing to criticize and be vocal as we have been.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Of course not.
Speaker 5 (14:24):
They'll self censor to avoid the types of assault that
we're experiencing. That's the other part is there's a genuine
concern that the more you talk about it. I know,
even internally when we have these discussions, we very rarely
engage on it. Even now, I say no to discussions
about it publicly more than I say yes, because I
know that anytime I say something, it will lead to
(14:44):
more letters, more demands, more at tax from the government
and elsewhere, and potentially more consequences.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
And it's worst.
Speaker 5 (14:52):
And this is the last thing I was just say
on the second again spun up, is that we're not
just doing this in a vacuum like at a video game.
But we have all the money we need to do
this fight.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
Right.
Speaker 5 (15:00):
I imagine this thought experiment where George Soros and Barack
Obama got together to leverage money and the government against
Charlie Kirk six years ago, right ago, it would be
the biggest thing in the world. Everything he would be
swimming in cash because the right wing would never allow
that tactic to be legitimized. Right, But the left has
(15:20):
not done that. Right, what they think that they've tried
to do. And I don't just mean individuals, I mean
like the foundations, the places that are celebrating that they
raised a quarter billion dollars to protect civic spaces. Everyone
is saving it for a rainy day while standing in
two feet of water. I mean, the water is after
their needs and they are talking about how they're saving
these resources for a rainy day. And that's the real
(15:40):
tension here, I think is that you're not just being
asked to do it, you're asked to engage in an
environment where you're on a razor thin amount of resources.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Yeah. And also that there's a certain denial right. People
don't want to see what's happening. It's scary and it's
you know what. I've been so struck with the difference
between Trump one point oh and Trump two point Zho
is Trump one point oh? The reason why Trump wasn't
able to do a lot of stuff was because it
was a resistance. And then we were told that the
(16:11):
resistance was cringe and that nobody wanted to resist, and
so nobody resisted. And now the voting public is furious.
I mean I everywhere I go, normal people are like,
what the fuck? Why are people doing anything? And you
have to say, well, look, we had this intellectual conversation.
(16:32):
We decided resistance was cringe. I'm sorry, I don't know
what to tell you, but.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
The trends have changed.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
I mean, it's an insane way to be, and especially
when we can see Russia and Hungary and all the
different places where this playbook has worked.
Speaker 5 (16:49):
It's kind of wild, it is, and I think you know,
you're totally right that I think about that comparison a
lot too, because I think about what it means and
about how much people have already internalized where we're going,
you know, and some of it is that people have
already given up. And the part that the two things
that I take away from this is one I constantly
remind myself that today will be the freest day we
(17:09):
feel that every day we will feel less safe, less free,
less secure unless we intervene.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
Right.
Speaker 5 (17:16):
The only way to slow that down is to fight,
is to is to defy and to stand on very
basic principles like the First Amendment.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
I fight. What we mean is fight for our First
Amendment right.
Speaker 1 (17:31):
We don't mean fighting in any sense other than continuing
with the first Amendment right we have that are being
stripped away from us by this government.
Speaker 5 (17:41):
That's right. Advocate is what I say. Right every fight, essentially,
I say advocate. And you know the second thing is
that you know it's it's that in a way, twenty
seventeen of this, if we were doing this all over
again and the same stuff was happening to us, people
wouldn't have taken it into seriously and we would be
a cause to Leb maybe you know, we'd be because
it would be it would be like part of this
badge of honor thing. But now in a way people
(18:01):
have internalized, oh, this is different, this is darker. They're
serious now, and I think that's the fear. The fear
has sort of already started said. And the thing that
kind I feel is important to consider is that power
perceived is power achieved, and they're still in the perception
place right now. They're they're doing this on purpose to
create a sense of inevitability.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
I think that's a really good point, that that this
is power perceived, is power achieved, and that this is
all a kind of shell game at this minute. Right
they don't have the power. They certainly don't have his
longest country, but most people are not on board with this.
Much of the vote republic is still wants the Epstein
files released. I mean, they're not even they're not even
(18:44):
in this conversation. So I yeah, So I think that's
a really good point. So Elon and Trump together were
this unbelievably powerful force. Elon is no longer in the admin.
He can no longer ask for favors. Did you notice
a change in it because remember, your original lawsuit is
(19:05):
Elon and Matt just explained to us the original how
you got on the wrong side of Trump's ire so
to speak.
Speaker 5 (19:16):
Look, I mean what the original thing is we wrote,
We wrote, we published some articles about Twitter that they
sued us about back in twenty twenty That Twitter suit
us about back in twenty twenty three.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
That was when Twitter was newly bought by Elon.
Speaker 5 (19:29):
That's right, that's right. And you know, at that time,
you know, he was talking about us a lot. You know,
it was calling us the most evil organization and the world.
And you know, you know, Tucker was out there telling
everyone of the three greatest risks were the Washington Post,
the German government, and media matters. And I mean like
it was this moment where it just felt like media
matters needed to be stopped. And that's kind of what
(19:51):
he fell into. Obviously that overlapped with musks ascent into
Trump World. The thing to consider about these individuals is
that it's so much bigger than them. Worth remembering that
Steven Miller was out of the deputy chief of SAFF
when he was outside of the administration and he was
setting up his legal institute received a significant portion of
the funding for that institute from Elon Musk, right, I mean,
(20:12):
and so it's not just him. There's a whole constellation
of these individuals who are now in positions of power.
So you can the fallout between Musk and Trump is real.
But then in all these layers of government, you have
people that have these these sort of dual loyalties in
a way or at minimum and affinity for both. You know,
(20:33):
they're not they weren't forced to choose the side they've
you know, they obviously must still has a lot of
influence in juice, and but that's how we sort of
got on the radar. And look, I've been on Trump's
raider for a long time. Media matters has been all
the way back before he was president. So it's not
like it's a total uh in the middle. Have any
sense that we're a target. I think the biggest thing
is that we've made a lot of right wingers mad.
(20:53):
And this is the thing to remember. It's more than
two dozen Fox News figures in senior administration officials.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
They all know us, you know.
Speaker 5 (21:01):
It's like and Dan Bongino. I remember when Dan Bongino
was starting out as a podcaster when he was a
guest on Alex Jones's show, we sign used to read
those flags, and then he got a podcast on nra
A TV. We've been with dam Bongino his entire career. Yeah,
like all of these figures, we have a very long
history with and they don't like us, and they've been
(21:21):
very open about it. So that's how we're on the radar.
And I think the other thing is that they see
us as Look, if you break us, who are built
for this.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Is in our DNA to have you right right?
Speaker 5 (21:32):
What does I mean for the next group that's actually
not We're designed to have this type of back and forth.
What happens when the other organizations that do different types
of work, important work, they're actually not in their DNA
is not fighting with the right right? What happens when
you go after them? And I think that's the other
piece of this. So there's so much connective tissue within
this space that even independent of this fallout, it hasn't
(21:55):
actually changed the trajectory, which is to break us.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
One of the many great things about you is that
you understand this world almost better than anyone. Like I'm
very online, though less so lately which is is weird,
but but you are.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
You really know everyone.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
So explain to me why Dan Vongino and Cash Battel
are the heads of like these major the FBI, right that,
I mean, these guys are like there, they are like
the heads of this incredibly powerful, enormous agency.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Why have they sort of disappeared?
Speaker 5 (22:34):
Dan Bongo is the deputy director of the FBI and
yet his principal concern right now is his credibility as
a podcaster. So that is one and that explains your question,
which is that that for a lot of these figures,
you know, they're not civil servants who were going toward
a public life to do this type of work, right,
especially the positions that you described, you sort of you
(22:56):
have a trajectory to get there.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Now.
Speaker 5 (22:58):
I think a lot of the status called needed breaks
them out romanticizing that. But the point is it's a
certain type of work to be a civil servant for them.
This is part of their continual mess characters in this
right wing story that they've been a part of us
so long. We're gonna get in, We're gonna break the
deep state. We're gonna you know, we're gonna train our
mill operators to do better work. We're gonna we're gonna
expose all these secrets. So they get into these positions
(23:22):
because part of it is just it's just it's just
character development for their podcast career. And so that's the
reason why they're a little bit back, is that they
were forced to go out there up front and sort
of take the first hit, uh, you know, from a
public relations perspectives, to sort of soften the ground. They
were supposed to soft from the ground about the Epstein
stuff when they went out there and did this joint
interview saying that Epstein killed himself. We've seen the files.
(23:45):
That was the soft launch of all of this, you know,
well before it became a controversy. They just don't want
to put themselves on the line publicly. And I think
that calls you a lot.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
It's so interesting that like the possible thing that might
sort of save American democracy if we're gonna, I mean
that we if this ends up being that, like democracy continues,
it will be because of things like these guys in
their podcasts.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Yes, because they have to.
Speaker 5 (24:16):
That is their goal. They even though they left their
podcast role, they are still the same character. They're now
just in a different environment, but they're still thinking about
that business, that audience relationship and how do you go
on after this? Like they're not going to go join boards, right,
and even though they want to be, they want the
same influence that they had before they became they had
(24:38):
this job, and and that that is very revealing, even
people at Toulsi right, who didn't go all in on Epstein.
Instead she helped support the cause by trying to deflect
by putting out all this Obama stuff and.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Insane Obama treason thing, which is like, by the way,
if you're Tulsi, like that's all you cook up.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
I mean, but it's like it's Obama, like there's no like,
at least go after.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
Bill Clinton, Like that makes a little you know, he's
in the flight logs, like go after someone where there's
some churum of believability.
Speaker 5 (25:13):
Yep. And that I think that's a good point here,
you know that that it's revealing that if we do
ultimately get saved, this strong word, but they they will
be their their own selfishness well be a part of that.
It's not altruism, it's it is born out of this
idea that they are characters in this larger right wing
media story, and that is to me, the thing that
(25:34):
drew me to this work, and key especially now keeps
me here is that, Yeah, the politics are important, the elections,
but elections take place in an environment, and that environment
is shaped by the media landscape, the information landscape, and
the right wing it dominates it. Trump's power is his
narrative dominance. And part of the reason why the Epstein
story is so interesting is because he's losing his narrative
dominance in this moment as a result of it. And
(25:57):
so that that is so is so hard to escape
the day to day work from these externalities because ultimately,
part of the very check here why they've sort of
retreated into the bushes while they let Trump try to
sort this out himself, is that they are they are
more loyal to the larger information and media landscape than
(26:18):
even Trump.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
It It is wild, I mean, it's just wild. We
are in just I can't figure out if we're in
end times or if this is I don't know, will
you please, I just got got a sandwich between two
realities right one retail, Yeah, and we're like we somehow
bounce it between and it's very disorienting.
Speaker 5 (26:41):
All the time basically, and yeah, that's that's kind of
how I feel about it.
Speaker 1 (26:48):
Congressman Greg Kassar represents Texas's thirty fifth district. Welcome to
fast Politics, Congressman Gazarre, Hey, here we are. We're like
reacting to the breaking news that your state, Texas is
somehow going to do this insane redistricting. Which will I
(27:11):
think we can all take a top line here and go, Like,
Donald Trump is worried about losing the House of Representatives
because he's doing a lot of wildly unpopular stuff. So
he's decided to make Republicans and they're happy to do
it because they're because they're completely just in an arm
of the Trump presidency now redistrict in order to make
(27:34):
it so he won't lose the House of Representatives.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
Is that fair? Is that what we're watching happen in
real time?
Speaker 1 (27:40):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (27:40):
Basically, Trump doesn't have a plan for winning the midterm elections,
so this is his plan for rigging those elections before
we ever get a chance to vote. So all these folks,
of course ask me a great question all the time,
what do we do to stop all of the awfulness
and the craziness? And we oftentimes have said let's organize
(28:02):
for the midterm elections. Then now Trump wants to screw
that up now by radically racially jerrymandering Texas in a
way we've never seen before. And that's part of what
I think is really scary and new about this is
that Texas is already illegally jerrymandered to the hilt, but
(28:22):
now Trump is pushing an even more illegal jerrymander, basically
shredding the Voting Rights Act as we know it. And
if he's allowed to do it in Texas and in
Central Texas where I'm based, and he wants to spread
that all over the country. He's already saying that.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
There is no precedent for this for a president saying
I'm going to lose, so let's change the maps. It's like,
I feel like Eric Holder, It's like, I don't know,
it's like cheating plus plus plus right. I think Texas
has really been this kind of lab where Trump has
been able to sort of do crazy stuff and the
(28:57):
end the leadership has really been so partisan and so
insane that they've been happy to do it. But but
talk to me about what this app looks like.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
This is really sick.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
Basically, this is a kind of map that was supposed
to be made illegal by the Voting Rights Act of
nineteen sixty five. You know what MLK marched for. LBJ
signed it. Handed the pen to MLK after he signed
the Voting Rights Act. This sort of activity was supposed
to be banned by that. Basically, what they do and
(29:30):
what Trump explicitly said he wanted to do was he said,
had that DOJ send a letter to Texas saying there
are multiple districts where most of the voters are people
of color, and we don't like that anymore.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Get rid of it.
Speaker 4 (29:46):
And Texas is supposed to be handling addressing the flooding
that just killed.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
And that special sception, this special session.
Speaker 4 (29:55):
Is legislature supposed to be together about flooding, instead of
respecting texans lives, instead of recognizing the deaths of young
girls and so many others. They are just pushing through
this plan. And like you just said, Molly, there's not
even Texas Republican officials or congress people that say they're
(30:17):
for this. They all privately say they're against it because
they're screwing up their own districts and screwing over their
own constituents. It's just one man in mar A Lago
who is saying he wants to pick the members of
Congress from Texas rather than Texas voters. And now they've
released a map that does things like merge my district
(30:38):
here in central Texas with joining Congressman Doggett's district, essentially
getting rid of a Latino seat and merging it into
just one Democratic seat. Now that we're put in the
same place, they've gone and completely changed the historic district
in Houston that was Barbara Jordan's and Mickey Leland in
(31:00):
Shila Jackson Lee's and completely changed it. All of us
is to say, they're suppressing the votes of millions of
working class Texans and Latino Texans and black Texans and
they think they can get away with it. And if
the Supreme Court rubber stamps it. Trump has already said, okay,
five from Texas, then he wants to go to Missouri
and take one there, take a few from Ohio, and
(31:22):
make it so that by the time we vote in
the midterms, he's basically already made it so the House
can't hold them accountable.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
Explain how jerrymandering works and why this is actually kind
of a gamble for him the.
Speaker 4 (31:33):
Way jerrymandering usually works, and it should be illegal, to
be clear, I believe was every Democrat I think in
Congress right now has voted for getting rid of jerrymandering
and just having independent commissions across the country. But our
problem right now is you have blue states with these
commissions and then states like Texas. Yeah, and that's a problem,
(31:54):
but generally you have the Republican members of Congress jerry mander.
They're men app which is bad, but it usually results
in those Republican incumbents having their districts the way they
want them and then making they make themselves safe by
creating these democratic districts. In this case, Donald Trump's White
House drew the maps, or maybe it was Mari Lango,
(32:16):
and then they just we had a bunch of hearings,
a three hearing, not a bunch, I mean it's actually
poultry three hearings this last week, and the Republicans in
the legislature kept saying, we don't have a map. We're
just having hearings with no map. Basically they're still waiting
on the email from the White House. And then today
the email landed. They publish a map, and it's Trump
(32:40):
that drew it, and so that means that some of
these Republican members of Congress will represent totally different areas
than they're used to, and that gives us the chance
to run again, you know, run great candidates against them.
But they did try to shore themselves up and basically
crack minority communities apart into a bunch of different districts
(33:01):
to delete their votes and get rid of Democratic members
in the process.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
It's funny because it's like there's so many parts of
this story that are like Trump knows he's losing, and
so Trump is trying to figure out ways to cheat.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
They explain to us what the next step is with
the gerrymandering.
Speaker 4 (33:17):
With the jerrymandering. They have one more hearing, supposedly this Friday,
and so we are going to mobilize everyone we can
who cares about our democracy to come out against the
map on Friday. Then they'll try to jam it down
everyone's throats. The hope is that we draw this out.
We don't let them win here in the next few days.
(33:39):
And Texas has a great tradition of filibusters, like Wendy
Davis's filibuster against abortion, restrictions of quorum breaks where Democrats
if they leave the state actually under our constitution, then
the legislature shuts down. And so they could leave and
quorum break and demand that the session be about flooding,
not about carrying Donald Trump water. We can drag that
(34:01):
fight out, and then we need everyone listening in today
to be calling their governor calling their legislators to stop
this from happening in Texas because if people like Governor
Gavin Newsom keep pushing that, they'll retaliate against Greg Abbott.
If more governors get involved, that's our real chance to
stop this, because if they could just get away with this,
I mean, Trump wants to spread it like wildfire. So
(34:24):
we got to drag this out. Support right brave legislators
that drag it out, and then get the whole country involved.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
This is a really good point, like this should be
a line in the sand. If you care about democracy,
you don't want governors fucking with congressional maps, period paragraph.
If the sense says gives you more numbers in different districts,
you change the maps. But you don't change the maps
because you have an unpopular incumbent who might lose the House.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
That's right. I mean, right now, Trump is it knows
that if the Democrats regain the House, then we're investigating
the Epstein files and more, we could subpoena all of
the folks that are doing corrupt business deals with his family.
I mean, Trump remembers last time that we took the House,
how he got investigated and impeached, and how that helped
(35:13):
ultimately bring Trump's presidency to a halt. I mean, he
wouldn't be able to pass all these horrible bills that
kick people off their healthcare if Democrats take the House.
And so instead of trying to win the election fair
and square, he wants to change the lines right now.
And we've got to We've got to stop it, and
we all have to get involved and say, you know,
there's got to be a cost to Trump and Abbot
(35:35):
if they go through with this.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
There's a number of interesting things happening in your state,
and I would love you to talk first about the flooding,
because there seems like there's some breakdown of emergency communication
with the flooding. Talk us through what you're seeing on that,
what sort of culpability there with the flooding is and
where you think that takes us.
Speaker 4 (35:56):
I think clearly there were failures at every level of government,
and we need to look into those failures, not because
it's a blame game or political but because if we
want to respect the dead and then protect the living,
we need to know what we did right and what
went wrong. It seems clear there were issues at the
local level. The state of Texas also denied grants to
(36:21):
the local governments to put in alert systems that they needed.
We need to ask questions about why. And then at
the federal level, we have whistleblowers that said that Christy Noam,
who's Trump's cabinet secretary above all of this, delayed search
and rescue for seventy two hours before approving it. That's
not something you should think about for seventy two seconds.
(36:43):
So we've got to actually really look into why that is.
The head of Search and Rescue at FEMA resigned over this.
They're trying now to smear him, but I think it's
important we look into that. And then also the National
Weather Service and Noah, who are the scientists that help
us know when a storm is coming and communicate that
to local communities. They've been deeply understaffed, and so I
(37:07):
myself and Converse Woman Jasmine Crockett led an effort to
ask an independent Inspector General to do an investigation, and
that independent investigator, who separate from the Trump administration, said
they're going to look into that understaffing and how that
affected our response to this storm. None of this can
bring back the dead, but we know there's going to
(37:28):
be more storms in Texas, more floods. We've got to
protect people from that. And this understaffing is happening right
now where there can be hurricanes and all sorts of
parts of the country. So we've got to be looking
into it now. This is what the legislators should be
looking into. Instead, they're, you know, Republican members are trying
to ignore the floods, cover up the Epstein files, and
(37:50):
then just protect Trump in the next election. I mean,
it's just cowardice at its core. And even worse, they're
doing it by trying to shred the Voting Rights Act
of nineteen sixty five. They took us bat PRE nineteen
sixty five on medicaid, now they want to take us
PRE nineteen sixty five on voting rights. It is the
example of what it looks like when these just wealthy,
(38:10):
powerful guys just do everything they can to protect themselves
and don't care about who they screw over in the process.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
There's a lot of drama happening in Texas with the
John Cornett and Ken Paxton drama.
Speaker 4 (38:25):
So Ken back, I get that whole bag of goons
confused sometimes too.
Speaker 1 (38:29):
The man and the Ken Baxton story is so because
I think of Ken Paxton as the guy who overturned
grow Vy Wade. Really who was the person who enacted
SBA the you know, the sort of guy who put
the wheels in motion on that. But he also is
an adulterer. Explain to us what's happening there. And by
(38:51):
the way, just the story like you couldn't make it up.
It's so incredibly craven.
Speaker 4 (38:57):
I mean, look at this point, pull after pull after
pull seems to indicate that Ken Paxton, you know, who
has been indicted for corruption, who was actually impeached by
his own Republican colleagues in the House, is likely really
the front runner for the Republican nomination by far. So
(39:17):
I expect he will be the front runner. And so
I just think that a very clear focus on the
fact that he's been ripping off Texans, the fact that, yeah,
he's the guy trying to deport dreamers, I mean, people
who have been here their entire lives he wants to
kick out. He was, you know at January sixth.
Speaker 5 (39:35):
You know, he's the guy that.
Speaker 4 (39:36):
Was trying to overthrow and overturn the election. You know,
this is just this is Trump's guy. But he is frankly,
you know, not supported by even some Texas Republicans, you know,
who voted to impeach him. So it creates a real
opportunity for us to take the Texas Senate seat. On
the Democratic side, I know a few names have been
(39:56):
tossed out there. I know Colin Allread is running. We're
gonna you know, support are Democratic nominee strongly there. And
of course, you know he's got all sorts of packs
in of course, as you mentioned, has his personal issues.
But frankly, you know, you don't even have to start that.
I mean, he is corrupt and you know, he literally
was doing business deals with folks that have like wind
up in jail. He's got federal indictments and federal investigations
(40:20):
into the way that he's handled his money, and so
it is just a disaster for him and creates a
real opportunity for us. So if Republicans jerrymander and create
their seats a little bit more vulnerable, if they've got
Ken Paxton at the top of the ticket, then we've
got a run like we've never run before in Texas
and we have some real pickup opportunities. At the same time,
(40:40):
we've got to stop the jerrymandering plan, because even if
we do an excellent job trying to flip some of
these seats, at the end of the day, they shouldn't
be allowed to suppress the votes of millions of people
and frankly steal at least some of these seats away
from us.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
I just don't see where this is fair at all.
Speaker 4 (40:58):
It's deeply unfair and should send a chill down the
spine of every American. I mean, we talk a lot
about gerrymandering. I just kind of want to give you
a sense of what this looks like. What it means
is you've got usually, you know, neighborhoods that have more
black voters or more Latino voters. And what these guys
in the White House go and do is they go
(41:20):
and say this neighborhood. We're going to chop it into
four or five or six little pieces so that those
folks can't all vote together for the person that's going
to represent them, and then they get stuck in districts
with folks that do not care about them. You do
not represent those neighborhoods, in fact, might resent those voters,
and they're just a little slice of a district to
(41:41):
be represented by you know, Chip Roy for example. You
know that's not going to be his priority if some
of these neighborhoods get put into his district or Troy Nell's.
Speaker 2 (41:53):
You know, you could look that up.
Speaker 4 (41:54):
You know, they just are not I.
Speaker 5 (41:56):
Don't need to look up Troy.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, nor do I want to.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
For the folks that are listening, this isn't just about
me as a member of Congress or somebody else. It's
those voters get purposefully targeted because they are people of
color and stuck into a district where their voices won't matter.
That's literally what we try to get rid of in
sixty five. And then on top of all that, the
(42:22):
outcome that they try to get is that no matter
how unpopular Trump's policies are, Trump gets his selected members
of Congress. It's hard to not sound alarmist in this,
but it's that alarming.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Texas isn't like Missouri. It's a purple if state. It's
becoming more purple. But you have a governor and an
Attorney's General who who both are very crazy and very
into enacting their own very right wing legislature or legislation.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
Why do you think that is?
Speaker 1 (42:57):
And I know there are a lot of talent to
Democrats in the Texas State House. Do you feel like
you're able to keep some of this at bay or?
I mean, why is it so? It feels like it's
just the state feels way more right wing than their
constituents are.
Speaker 4 (43:16):
That's exactly right. That's the whole Texas contradiction is that,
you know, demographically, we're not that different from say, California,
We're just heavily under organized there. Our Democratic parties are
so much more underfunded. Our state Democratic Party is puny
in funding compared to traditional swing states that you could
(43:36):
think of, like you know, Michigan or Nevada. And then
you also have to recognize we're usually ranked at the
very bottom of voter turnout of all of the states
there are so many people who rightly say, you know,
it doesn't matter if I vote or not. It seems
like the same crazy stuff happens. And so we've got
to get to a place where in this state of
over thirty million people, we organize at scale. And right now,
(44:00):
I know a lot of folks listening have heard about
great candidates we've had, from Wendy Davis to bechel or Rourke.
But if we just go in every four six years
and hope that in the last few months of election
we can rally as a country and pull it off,
we just don't get there. We have to have a
longer organizing strategy, and I think we could start it
right now, you know, just up the road from where
(44:23):
I am right now, we had an event in East
Austin with Jasmine Crockett and betel Or Rourke and Juaquin
Gastro and James Tall, Rico Gene and Ajosa myself. We
were hoping, you know, maybe a thousand people would chill up.
We had we blew past that, you know, well over
three thousand folks on very short notice. And do you know,
(44:43):
like planning anything else, usually you have an RSVP count
and then you expect the numbers are going to go
down a little bit. You don't usually think they're going
to triple on you. So right now is when we
can start organizing the state so that we have a
real shot at beating Ken Paxton come next November.
Speaker 1 (45:00):
It just strikes me that it feels very out of
whack over there. So how many sort of non voters
voters do you have in your state?
Speaker 4 (45:07):
Yeah, in my state, the percentage of registered voters turn out,
of course changes when it's a governor's race versus a
presidential but we usually rank they're in forty eighth, forty
ninth or fiftieth.
Speaker 5 (45:17):
Wow, yeah, turnout.
Speaker 4 (45:19):
Of the fifty states. And so what we badly need
to do is, you know, if we got those folks participating,
I think you'd have a totally different election. Folks argue
Texas as really a blue state, or Texas a purple
state or red state. I call it an under organized state.
I means we identified after the last election that there's
(45:39):
about one million anti Greg Abbott voters who we just
never talked to. But it's a big state. It takes
a lot of resources, and so part of what we've
got to do is lift up the next generation of
you know, leadership, be it elected officials and activists who
are going to go out there and do the work
of going and talking to folks, because I think too
(46:00):
often we've kind of gotten comfortable in our existing democratic
seats and people just govern over their democratic area, and
we've got to be going out there and reaching out.
That's why I've gone to multiple Republican districts myself and
held town halls there. No I was, you know, out
in the Texas Panhandle where they haven't seen their congressional
Democrat in forever. It was just me and you had
(46:22):
thousands of people in an auditorium. So we've got to
be willing to go out there to those rural areas
where you know, Democrats traditionally don't go, but people are
waiting to hear from us. So that's what I'm committed
to doing. We're going to fight this redistricting plan with
everything we've got in US and here in central Texas
where I'm sitting right now, you know, they're trying to
(46:42):
merge me and my fellow congressman next door, and we're
going to fight that like hell because it is just
deeply wrong to try to get rid of us by
merging districts together like ours.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Thank you, Congressman, thank you, thank you. No Jesse Cannon
my junk Fast.
Speaker 3 (47:03):
So this is, you know, really shocking news that this
would happen under a Trump swatch. The Office of Civil
Rights is now a place where white men replace minorities.
Who would have thunk this would happen.
Speaker 1 (47:15):
So the education agency that investigates discrimination claims faces a
sinister overhaul. Current and former staff telled The Times Donald
Trump spent years raging against the Biden administration for elevating
women and ethnic minorities into positions for which he said
they were not qualified. Well, you'll be shocked to know
(47:37):
now the president, that guy who was accused of bias,
well now he's being accused of bias.
Speaker 2 (47:45):
I am shocked, I tell you shocked that this is
what's going on.
Speaker 1 (47:51):
I am shocked, shocked, shocked, shocked, and by shocked I
mean nater all shocked.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics.
Speaker 1 (48:01):
Tune in every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear
the best.
Speaker 2 (48:08):
Minds and politics make sense of all this chaos. If
you enjoy this podcast, please send it to a friend.
And keep the conversation going. Thanks for listening.
Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
today's best minds and Vice President Harris will not run
from California governor.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
We have such a great show for you today.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Media Matterson, Angelo Kearrasone will join us to talk about
how the right is trying.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
To silence the left.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Then we'll talk to Congressman Greg Kassar about Greg Abbot's
in Sane Texas redistricting map, which involves a whole new
level of jeremandering.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
But first the stories the media is missing. Molly.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
There's this thing called the Rule of five that is
not a cheesy show that was on NBC in the
two thousands. That is a way that the Democrats can
use a rule to force the release of Epstein documents.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Voters have been mad at Democrats.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
We have been very cranky with Democrats, and this is
a kind of stuff we wanted. We wanted them to
do stuff like this. Congressional Democrats are trying to capitalize
on the Epstein issue, which has dogged President Trump for
almost a month and opened fissures between him and some
of his most ardent supporters. This is good you know,
(01:16):
good for Schumer for doing this. Schumer says, it's not
a stunt, it's not symbolic, it's formal exercise of congressional
power under the law.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
And you know, we really have been talking about this
a lot.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
Congress is being unable or unwilling to exercise its congressional power,
and it's pretty cool to.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
See them doing this.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
I'm really I'm glad, like this is what we wanted,
this is what we needed, We wanted Congress to do this,
so it's very cool, like this is exactly the right thing.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
And I'm really just.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Thrilled about this and thrilled to see them do this,
and it's really good, So very excited.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
We'll see what happens.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
But the Committee on Government Operations of the House of
Representatives can actually do the same thing. With a group
of seven members, Schumer says he could force the release.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
And again, by the way, if you're trying.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
To block the release of these of these files, the
question has to be why why are you trying to
do it, because I think you should just let all
the files be released. It's this is a really good
issue for Democrats in a lot of ways because it
really does to vote against it means you have some
kind of feeling that you want Jeffrey Epstein to have
(02:34):
gotten away with this.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
I just don't understand how you can be against this.
Speaker 4 (02:38):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Well, speaking of DEM's fighting, I can't believe I have
two instances of this in the segment. But the said
that dums are launching a lastage bid to block Trump's tariffs.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Again, another thing that we had just sort of been
begging Democrats to do is that they're now doing. And look,
maybe it doesn't work, but the point here is that
you have to try. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't work,
but you have to try. We need you to try,
and trying is the is the goal here. And so
this is very good good to see them trying. I mean, like,
(03:10):
this is the thing, like when you look at these numbers,
it says the tariff could add about twenty four hundred
dollars to the average Americans household expenses.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
That's a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Like twenty four hundred dollars for someone who's making you know,
thirty forty fifty thousand dollars, that's a huge, huge amount
of money. Jean Shihei from New Hampshire on Wednesday, evening,
we'll ask lawmakers to unanimously pass a bill affirming the
tariffs cannot be authorized under the International Economic Emergency Economic
(03:44):
Powers Act. Why this is important, and I think it
really is important, is that, believe it or not, Congress
has the tariff power. Trump doesn't have this power. He
took it from Congress using this emergency powers declaration.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Again, like emergency.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Powers, these are not his powers to use, right Like,
one of the big mistakes I think that politicians have
done is they've allowed emergency powers to continue on and
if that is created place where the executive was easier
for the executive to take power, and it's really bad.
So Sheen said that, you know, she has a group
(04:24):
to do this, So we'll see what happens.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
Yes, unfortunately, something bad has happened, which is the Senate
has confirmed a well I'm trying to think of words
that won't get me in trouble for a wibel. But
a person that I really don't think should be in
this office, mil beauvais.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Yeah, another Trump lawyer, which I think is important to remember.
This is his second Trump lawyer. There were tons of
whistleblower complaints. There are any number of reasons not to
put him in this lifetime appointment. Three different complaints in
recent weeks, two alleging he suggested violating court orders. They're
(05:00):
saying he reportedly misled Congress on the dropping of bribery charges.
So basically, this guy's a liar and now he has
a lifetime appointment. Republican Senators Murkowski and Collins crossing the
isle to join the Democrats but knowing. I mean, this
thing where the two Republicans vote with the Democrats but
(05:20):
they still know they have advanced to break the tie
is just absolutely so fucking corrupt, right Like it's like
they're pretending they care. It's so shitty, and a lot
of people are really worried. This is the runway for
Trump to nominate him to the Supreme Court. When Alido
or Thomas goes.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Yeah, it's so bad.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Well, something that could turn out well, but probably won't.
Josh Holly had a stock trading band that originally included
banning the president and the vice president from them, but
you'll be shocked to hear they carved those offices out,
but it has gone on to a vote in the Senate.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Look, man, I'm no Josh Holly fan but you know,
if you can get this done, do it.
Speaker 1 (06:04):
Man.
Speaker 2 (06:05):
I'm delighted. If they can get this pass, that would
be amazing. Good for them. If this works, good for them.
If this works would be amazing.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
Well we should say why this is important too, because
do you believe the way I believe that this will
get us much better candidates if they are not going
into office just the trade stocks.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
I believe that nobody should make money while working in government.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
That I mean, I think that the worst possible thing
is to have members of Congress trading stocks.
Speaker 2 (06:34):
I think it's wrong.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
I think it's morally wrong, I think it's ethically wrong,
and I think that they're not serving the people, they're
serving themselves.
Speaker 5 (06:42):
So yes, I think we'll have better people running out.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
So just think it's not okay, right, Like, it's not
how any of this should work. So I agree. Angelo
Kirasone is the CEO of Media Matters. Welcome to Fast Policy's.
Speaker 5 (07:00):
Antelo, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
I want you to talk about this legal battle that
you guys have been in, which is basically the legal
battle that all of us are going to be in
in the media right talk us through exactly what happened
and where you are right now.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
Yeah, I mean, I.
Speaker 5 (07:19):
Think what makes this significant is exactly what you said
in the intro. It's not just a lawsuit, right, you know,
we're not just getting sued by Twitter, you know, more
x whatever. That itself would be a hefty thing, right,
And we've seen that type of action play out all
the time, you know, to devastating consequences, even if it's
designed to suppress participate speech.
Speaker 4 (07:39):
Right.
Speaker 5 (07:40):
But this is so much different and bigger than that,
And I think it's hard for people to really understand
appreciate what's happening because this all started back in twenty
twenty three, and we don't have to get into the mechanics.
We published reports, we got sued for the reports by Twitter.
But beyond that, and this is why it's turning into
a significant battle for all of us, is that when
(08:00):
that took place, Steven Miller encouraged Elon Musk publicly to
encourage republic and state ags to launch investigations into media
matters that were parallel to the litigation, and that happened.
Ken Paxton launched an investigation, Andrew Barely launched an investigation
from Missouri, and the way that those investigations play out
(08:23):
typically is that they launched an investigation. You then argue
about whether or not you're going to give them the documents.
Eventually they go to state court. They sue you in
state court, and you eventually either win or lose, but
you have to go through this protracted battle there. We
sort of knew that there was a new playbook being written.
This is before Trump got elected, and because this is
what we do, we literally lived in these fever stops.
(08:45):
So we did something proactive. We said, wait, we can't
fight this out in the multi front war. We have
to actually be really engaged and sue the AGS to
shut that down, right, We need to actually start developing
new laws to this playbook.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
So that happened.
Speaker 5 (09:02):
But so the litigation was in excessuing US in Texas,
also suing US in Singapore and the and Ireland threatening
to sue US in the UK. That's the civil litigation,
and there were state Attorney general investigations. We have been
successful there.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
We won.
Speaker 5 (09:18):
The court agreed that it was a campaign of government harassment.
We won against Ken Paxton. Andrew Bailly lost and then
asked to settle with us. He has to settle with
us Paxston appealed to the d C Circuit Court. We
just won that victory back in May, so those are gone.
But then Trump got elected. Stephen Miller is now the
Deputy chief of staff. All of these MAGA figures are
(09:41):
spread around government, and we've seen them weaponized government against
a whole bunch of media properties and all their civic institutions.
The FTC launched an investigation into media matter as well
that was very similar to the State of g investigation
and so in totality, and this is part of the
calculus that we see with even the media companies. It's
not just oh, it's a really bad civil lawsuit and
(10:02):
nobody wants to fight it. Yeah, nobody wants to fight
it because civil lawsuits suck. But what everybody forgets when
they talk about CBS and ABC and Paramount is that
in the first week in office, Trump's FCC Commissioner, Brendan
Carr launched investigations into all of these media properties, the
same types of investigations we're receiving now. And the idea
(10:24):
is it's a one two punch. You drain people, you
drain resources, and civil litigation you leverage federal and government
power for rapid investigations and then all the potential consequences
that could flow from that. And by leveraging those two
things hand in hand, you have a lot of leverage.
They have all the cards, and so I think that's
(10:44):
the big picture here. And everyone is folding. Everyone is folding,
and we're fighting. So it's gonna suck. We are definitely bruised.
We've done a lot of big work and good work,
so I'm not discounting that. But I'm not going to
hide either. We are not We're bruised, but we're still fighting.
And the last thing else say on because I think
I keep thinking about this comment that Steve Bannon said
in a PBS interview last week. He was talking about
(11:05):
the fact that the reason why they're doing all that
they're doing is and why they're going to win is
because everyone's gonna fault. And he points to every civic, institutional,
law firms, right, media, and education, and his point is
you just don't have the stomach for a fight. Well,
we don't, and I think that and if we don't fight,
(11:26):
then everybody else will then receive the same type of attack.
It's inevitable. And you know that's it. So that's the summary.
I mean, they're running, they're building a new playbook, and
we're really on the front line of that.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
Yeah, and I think it's I mean, Steve Bannon is
quite smart and he is absolutely knows exactly how to
get what he wants, and he's We're watching it happen
in real time. And the thing that I'm struck bot,
which is so crazy in this whole thing, is that
(12:03):
they are trying to silence people. And why I was
so glad that you did this article on the New
York Times where you talk to them about this, or
where you were engaging with this, is that a lot
of this stuff is going on and nobody knows.
Speaker 5 (12:20):
Yeah, because it's scary, you know. That's the other part
about it, you know. I always tell this some of
my stabmins. People think history doesn't have a lot of heroes.
That's what we know about them, right, Because people's natural
reaction when you're under attack is to duck and cover,
or when the people around you are under attack is
to duck and cover. It's an honest and understandable reflex.
And so when you are under attack in this level
(12:41):
of intensity, especially for an organization like ours, I mean
the shad fraud of us, you know, even is like
the right just could not be more excited, right, I mean,
the Shatonfoy is there, but when you put that to
the side, it's like you just you they have not
just civil litigation, so all the expansive discoveries against the
world richest person, but now the federal government stiffing art.
(13:04):
And again there are people involved in these investigations that
a year ago were outside in Model World telling my
staff and me that they were going to put us
in the gulags if Trump got a let kid, sending
us notes that they were going to put us in jail.
And now they're in power doing the very thing that too.
Janine Piro is the US attorney, you will be deciding
(13:25):
whether or not to prosecute us. Yeah, and that is
I mean, this is so I think to the point
that nobody knowing it, You just you hope you can
get through it, and so you're quiet. That's the first thing.
The second is your you. And I think we shouldn't
discount this, and this is partly why it's so significant
and where the soul what is for everyone. I don't
think people should care about it. I think they should,
but if it doesn't matter of the dot. I always
(13:45):
tell people be selfish. Here's the thing. Part of the
reason you don't talk about it is because you're being
brutaliated against. It is a retribution campaign. We like the
whole point of the First Amendment. It's not some academic thing.
It's so that you can say things and free from
retribution from the government. This is literally them doing it brazenly.
And if you look at history and look at in
recent history, in places like Hungary and El Salvador, where
(14:08):
lawfare is very effective, you close off civic spaces by
making an example out of a few parts in individual sectors,
and you shrink what is acceptable. Are people going to
do the same thing. Are they going to be as
willing to criticize and be vocal as we have been.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Of course not.
Speaker 5 (14:24):
They'll self censor to avoid the types of assault that
we're experiencing. That's the other part is there's a genuine
concern that the more you talk about it. I know,
even internally when we have these discussions, we very rarely
engage on it. Even now, I say no to discussions
about it publicly more than I say yes, because I
know that anytime I say something, it will lead to
(14:44):
more letters, more demands, more at tax from the government
and elsewhere, and potentially more consequences.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
And it's worst.
Speaker 5 (14:52):
And this is the last thing I was just say
on the second again spun up, is that we're not
just doing this in a vacuum like at a video game.
But we have all the money we need to do
this fight.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
Right.
Speaker 5 (15:00):
I imagine this thought experiment where George Soros and Barack
Obama got together to leverage money and the government against
Charlie Kirk six years ago, right ago, it would be
the biggest thing in the world. Everything he would be
swimming in cash because the right wing would never allow
that tactic to be legitimized. Right, But the left has
(15:20):
not done that. Right, what they think that they've tried
to do. And I don't just mean individuals, I mean
like the foundations, the places that are celebrating that they
raised a quarter billion dollars to protect civic spaces. Everyone
is saving it for a rainy day while standing in
two feet of water. I mean, the water is after
their needs and they are talking about how they're saving
these resources for a rainy day. And that's the real
(15:40):
tension here, I think is that you're not just being
asked to do it, you're asked to engage in an
environment where you're on a razor thin amount of resources.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Yeah. And also that there's a certain denial right. People
don't want to see what's happening. It's scary and it's
you know what. I've been so struck with the difference
between Trump one point oh and Trump two point Zho
is Trump one point oh? The reason why Trump wasn't
able to do a lot of stuff was because it
was a resistance. And then we were told that the
(16:11):
resistance was cringe and that nobody wanted to resist, and
so nobody resisted. And now the voting public is furious.
I mean I everywhere I go, normal people are like,
what the fuck? Why are people doing anything? And you
have to say, well, look, we had this intellectual conversation.
(16:32):
We decided resistance was cringe. I'm sorry, I don't know
what to tell you, but.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
The trends have changed.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
I mean, it's an insane way to be, and especially
when we can see Russia and Hungary and all the
different places where this playbook has worked.
Speaker 5 (16:49):
It's kind of wild, it is, and I think you know,
you're totally right that I think about that comparison a
lot too, because I think about what it means and
about how much people have already internalized where we're going,
you know, and some of it is that people have
already given up. And the part that the two things
that I take away from this is one I constantly
remind myself that today will be the freest day we
(17:09):
feel that every day we will feel less safe, less free,
less secure unless we intervene.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
Right.
Speaker 5 (17:16):
The only way to slow that down is to fight,
is to is to defy and to stand on very
basic principles like the First Amendment.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
I fight. What we mean is fight for our First
Amendment right.
Speaker 1 (17:31):
We don't mean fighting in any sense other than continuing
with the first Amendment right we have that are being
stripped away from us by this government.
Speaker 5 (17:41):
That's right. Advocate is what I say. Right every fight, essentially,
I say advocate. And you know the second thing is
that you know it's it's that in a way, twenty
seventeen of this, if we were doing this all over
again and the same stuff was happening to us, people
wouldn't have taken it into seriously and we would be
a cause to Leb maybe you know, we'd be because
it would be it would be like part of this
badge of honor thing. But now in a way people
(18:01):
have internalized, oh, this is different, this is darker. They're
serious now, and I think that's the fear. The fear
has sort of already started said. And the thing that
kind I feel is important to consider is that power
perceived is power achieved, and they're still in the perception
place right now. They're they're doing this on purpose to
create a sense of inevitability.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
I think that's a really good point, that that this
is power perceived, is power achieved, and that this is
all a kind of shell game at this minute. Right
they don't have the power. They certainly don't have his
longest country, but most people are not on board with this.
Much of the vote republic is still wants the Epstein
files released. I mean, they're not even they're not even
(18:44):
in this conversation. So I yeah, So I think that's
a really good point. So Elon and Trump together were
this unbelievably powerful force. Elon is no longer in the admin.
He can no longer ask for favors. Did you notice
a change in it because remember, your original lawsuit is
(19:05):
Elon and Matt just explained to us the original how
you got on the wrong side of Trump's ire so
to speak.
Speaker 5 (19:16):
Look, I mean what the original thing is we wrote,
We wrote, we published some articles about Twitter that they
sued us about back in twenty twenty That Twitter suit
us about back in twenty twenty three.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
That was when Twitter was newly bought by Elon.
Speaker 5 (19:29):
That's right, that's right. And you know, at that time,
you know, he was talking about us a lot. You know,
it was calling us the most evil organization and the world.
And you know, you know, Tucker was out there telling
everyone of the three greatest risks were the Washington Post,
the German government, and media matters. And I mean like
it was this moment where it just felt like media
matters needed to be stopped. And that's kind of what
(19:51):
he fell into. Obviously that overlapped with musks ascent into
Trump World. The thing to consider about these individuals is
that it's so much bigger than them. Worth remembering that
Steven Miller was out of the deputy chief of SAFF
when he was outside of the administration and he was
setting up his legal institute received a significant portion of
the funding for that institute from Elon Musk, right, I mean,
(20:12):
and so it's not just him. There's a whole constellation
of these individuals who are now in positions of power.
So you can the fallout between Musk and Trump is real.
But then in all these layers of government, you have
people that have these these sort of dual loyalties in
a way or at minimum and affinity for both. You know,
(20:33):
they're not they weren't forced to choose the side they've
you know, they obviously must still has a lot of
influence in juice, and but that's how we sort of
got on the radar. And look, I've been on Trump's
raider for a long time. Media matters has been all
the way back before he was president. So it's not
like it's a total uh in the middle. Have any
sense that we're a target. I think the biggest thing
is that we've made a lot of right wingers mad.
(20:53):
And this is the thing to remember. It's more than
two dozen Fox News figures in senior administration officials.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
They all know us, you know.
Speaker 5 (21:01):
It's like and Dan Bongino. I remember when Dan Bongino
was starting out as a podcaster when he was a
guest on Alex Jones's show, we sign used to read
those flags, and then he got a podcast on nra
A TV. We've been with dam Bongino his entire career. Yeah,
like all of these figures, we have a very long
history with and they don't like us, and they've been
(21:21):
very open about it. So that's how we're on the radar.
And I think the other thing is that they see
us as Look, if you break us, who are built
for this.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Is in our DNA to have you right right?
Speaker 5 (21:32):
What does I mean for the next group that's actually
not We're designed to have this type of back and forth.
What happens when the other organizations that do different types
of work, important work, they're actually not in their DNA
is not fighting with the right right? What happens when
you go after them? And I think that's the other
piece of this. So there's so much connective tissue within
this space that even independent of this fallout, it hasn't
(21:55):
actually changed the trajectory, which is to break us.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
One of the many great things about you is that
you understand this world almost better than anyone. Like I'm
very online, though less so lately which is is weird,
but but you are.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
You really know everyone.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
So explain to me why Dan Vongino and Cash Battel
are the heads of like these major the FBI, right that,
I mean, these guys are like there, they are like
the heads of this incredibly powerful, enormous agency.
Speaker 2 (22:32):
Why have they sort of disappeared?
Speaker 5 (22:34):
Dan Bongo is the deputy director of the FBI and
yet his principal concern right now is his credibility as
a podcaster. So that is one and that explains your question,
which is that that for a lot of these figures,
you know, they're not civil servants who were going toward
a public life to do this type of work, right,
especially the positions that you described, you sort of you
(22:56):
have a trajectory to get there.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Now.
Speaker 5 (22:58):
I think a lot of the status called needed breaks
them out romanticizing that. But the point is it's a
certain type of work to be a civil servant for them.
This is part of their continual mess characters in this
right wing story that they've been a part of us
so long. We're gonna get in, We're gonna break the
deep state. We're gonna you know, we're gonna train our
mill operators to do better work. We're gonna we're gonna
expose all these secrets. So they get into these positions
(23:22):
because part of it is just it's just it's just
character development for their podcast career. And so that's the
reason why they're a little bit back, is that they
were forced to go out there up front and sort
of take the first hit, uh, you know, from a
public relations perspectives, to sort of soften the ground. They
were supposed to soft from the ground about the Epstein
stuff when they went out there and did this joint
interview saying that Epstein killed himself. We've seen the files.
(23:45):
That was the soft launch of all of this, you know,
well before it became a controversy. They just don't want
to put themselves on the line publicly. And I think
that calls you a lot.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
It's so interesting that like the possible thing that might
sort of save American democracy if we're gonna, I mean
that we if this ends up being that, like democracy continues,
it will be because of things like these guys in
their podcasts.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Yes, because they have to.
Speaker 5 (24:16):
That is their goal. They even though they left their
podcast role, they are still the same character. They're now
just in a different environment, but they're still thinking about
that business, that audience relationship and how do you go
on after this? Like they're not going to go join boards, right,
and even though they want to be, they want the
same influence that they had before they became they had
(24:38):
this job, and and that that is very revealing, even
people at Toulsi right, who didn't go all in on Epstein.
Instead she helped support the cause by trying to deflect
by putting out all this Obama stuff and.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
Insane Obama treason thing, which is like, by the way,
if you're Tulsi, like that's all you cook up.
Speaker 2 (24:58):
I mean, but it's like it's Obama, like there's no like,
at least go after.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
Bill Clinton, Like that makes a little you know, he's
in the flight logs, like go after someone where there's
some churum of believability.
Speaker 5 (25:13):
Yep. And that I think that's a good point here,
you know that that it's revealing that if we do
ultimately get saved, this strong word, but they they will
be their their own selfishness well be a part of that.
It's not altruism, it's it is born out of this
idea that they are characters in this larger right wing
media story, and that is to me, the thing that
(25:34):
drew me to this work, and key especially now keeps
me here is that, Yeah, the politics are important, the elections,
but elections take place in an environment, and that environment
is shaped by the media landscape, the information landscape, and
the right wing it dominates it. Trump's power is his
narrative dominance. And part of the reason why the Epstein
story is so interesting is because he's losing his narrative
dominance in this moment as a result of it. And
(25:57):
so that that is so is so hard to escape
the day to day work from these externalities because ultimately,
part of the very check here why they've sort of
retreated into the bushes while they let Trump try to
sort this out himself, is that they are they are
more loyal to the larger information and media landscape than
(26:18):
even Trump.
Speaker 2 (26:19):
It It is wild, I mean, it's just wild. We
are in just I can't figure out if we're in
end times or if this is I don't know, will
you please, I just got got a sandwich between two
realities right one retail, Yeah, and we're like we somehow
bounce it between and it's very disorienting.
Speaker 5 (26:41):
All the time basically, and yeah, that's that's kind of
how I feel about it.
Speaker 1 (26:48):
Congressman Greg Kassar represents Texas's thirty fifth district. Welcome to
fast Politics, Congressman Gazarre, Hey, here we are. We're like
reacting to the breaking news that your state, Texas is
somehow going to do this insane redistricting. Which will I
(27:11):
think we can all take a top line here and go, Like,
Donald Trump is worried about losing the House of Representatives
because he's doing a lot of wildly unpopular stuff. So
he's decided to make Republicans and they're happy to do
it because they're because they're completely just in an arm
of the Trump presidency now redistrict in order to make
(27:34):
it so he won't lose the House of Representatives.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
Is that fair? Is that what we're watching happen in
real time?
Speaker 1 (27:40):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (27:40):
Basically, Trump doesn't have a plan for winning the midterm elections,
so this is his plan for rigging those elections before
we ever get a chance to vote. So all these folks,
of course ask me a great question all the time,
what do we do to stop all of the awfulness
and the craziness? And we oftentimes have said let's organize
(28:02):
for the midterm elections. Then now Trump wants to screw
that up now by radically racially jerrymandering Texas in a
way we've never seen before. And that's part of what
I think is really scary and new about this is
that Texas is already illegally jerrymandered to the hilt, but
(28:22):
now Trump is pushing an even more illegal jerrymander, basically
shredding the Voting Rights Act as we know it. And
if he's allowed to do it in Texas and in
Central Texas where I'm based, and he wants to spread
that all over the country. He's already saying that.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
There is no precedent for this for a president saying
I'm going to lose, so let's change the maps. It's like,
I feel like Eric Holder, It's like, I don't know,
it's like cheating plus plus plus right. I think Texas
has really been this kind of lab where Trump has
been able to sort of do crazy stuff and the
(28:57):
end the leadership has really been so partisan and so
insane that they've been happy to do it. But but
talk to me about what this app looks like.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
This is really sick.
Speaker 4 (29:10):
Basically, this is a kind of map that was supposed
to be made illegal by the Voting Rights Act of
nineteen sixty five. You know what MLK marched for. LBJ
signed it. Handed the pen to MLK after he signed
the Voting Rights Act. This sort of activity was supposed
to be banned by that. Basically, what they do and
(29:30):
what Trump explicitly said he wanted to do was he said,
had that DOJ send a letter to Texas saying there
are multiple districts where most of the voters are people
of color, and we don't like that anymore.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Get rid of it.
Speaker 4 (29:46):
And Texas is supposed to be handling addressing the flooding
that just killed.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
And that special sception, this special session.
Speaker 4 (29:55):
Is legislature supposed to be together about flooding, instead of
respecting texans lives, instead of recognizing the deaths of young
girls and so many others. They are just pushing through
this plan. And like you just said, Molly, there's not
even Texas Republican officials or congress people that say they're
(30:17):
for this. They all privately say they're against it because
they're screwing up their own districts and screwing over their
own constituents. It's just one man in mar A Lago
who is saying he wants to pick the members of
Congress from Texas rather than Texas voters. And now they've
released a map that does things like merge my district
(30:38):
here in central Texas with joining Congressman Doggett's district, essentially
getting rid of a Latino seat and merging it into
just one Democratic seat. Now that we're put in the
same place, they've gone and completely changed the historic district
in Houston that was Barbara Jordan's and Mickey Leland in
(31:00):
Shila Jackson Lee's and completely changed it. All of us
is to say, they're suppressing the votes of millions of
working class Texans and Latino Texans and black Texans and
they think they can get away with it. And if
the Supreme Court rubber stamps it. Trump has already said, okay,
five from Texas, then he wants to go to Missouri
and take one there, take a few from Ohio, and
(31:22):
make it so that by the time we vote in
the midterms, he's basically already made it so the House
can't hold them accountable.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
Explain how jerrymandering works and why this is actually kind
of a gamble for him the.
Speaker 4 (31:33):
Way jerrymandering usually works, and it should be illegal, to
be clear, I believe was every Democrat I think in
Congress right now has voted for getting rid of jerrymandering
and just having independent commissions across the country. But our
problem right now is you have blue states with these
commissions and then states like Texas. Yeah, and that's a problem,
(31:54):
but generally you have the Republican members of Congress jerry mander.
They're men app which is bad, but it usually results
in those Republican incumbents having their districts the way they
want them and then making they make themselves safe by
creating these democratic districts. In this case, Donald Trump's White
House drew the maps, or maybe it was Mari Lango,
(32:16):
and then they just we had a bunch of hearings,
a three hearing, not a bunch, I mean it's actually
poultry three hearings this last week, and the Republicans in
the legislature kept saying, we don't have a map. We're
just having hearings with no map. Basically they're still waiting
on the email from the White House. And then today
the email landed. They publish a map, and it's Trump
(32:40):
that drew it, and so that means that some of
these Republican members of Congress will represent totally different areas
than they're used to, and that gives us the chance
to run again, you know, run great candidates against them.
But they did try to shore themselves up and basically
crack minority communities apart into a bunch of different districts
(33:01):
to delete their votes and get rid of Democratic members
in the process.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
It's funny because it's like there's so many parts of
this story that are like Trump knows he's losing, and
so Trump is trying to figure out ways to cheat.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
They explain to us what the next step is with
the gerrymandering.
Speaker 4 (33:17):
With the jerrymandering. They have one more hearing, supposedly this Friday,
and so we are going to mobilize everyone we can
who cares about our democracy to come out against the
map on Friday. Then they'll try to jam it down
everyone's throats. The hope is that we draw this out.
We don't let them win here in the next few days.
(33:39):
And Texas has a great tradition of filibusters, like Wendy
Davis's filibuster against abortion, restrictions of quorum breaks where Democrats
if they leave the state actually under our constitution, then
the legislature shuts down. And so they could leave and
quorum break and demand that the session be about flooding,
not about carrying Donald Trump water. We can drag that
(34:01):
fight out, and then we need everyone listening in today
to be calling their governor calling their legislators to stop
this from happening in Texas because if people like Governor
Gavin Newsom keep pushing that, they'll retaliate against Greg Abbott.
If more governors get involved, that's our real chance to
stop this, because if they could just get away with this,
I mean, Trump wants to spread it like wildfire. So
(34:24):
we got to drag this out. Support right brave legislators
that drag it out, and then get the whole country involved.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
This is a really good point, like this should be
a line in the sand. If you care about democracy,
you don't want governors fucking with congressional maps, period paragraph.
If the sense says gives you more numbers in different districts,
you change the maps. But you don't change the maps
because you have an unpopular incumbent who might lose the House.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
That's right. I mean, right now, Trump is it knows
that if the Democrats regain the House, then we're investigating
the Epstein files and more, we could subpoena all of
the folks that are doing corrupt business deals with his family.
I mean, Trump remembers last time that we took the House,
how he got investigated and impeached, and how that helped
(35:13):
ultimately bring Trump's presidency to a halt. I mean, he
wouldn't be able to pass all these horrible bills that
kick people off their healthcare if Democrats take the House.
And so instead of trying to win the election fair
and square, he wants to change the lines right now.
And we've got to We've got to stop it, and
we all have to get involved and say, you know,
there's got to be a cost to Trump and Abbot
(35:35):
if they go through with this.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
There's a number of interesting things happening in your state,
and I would love you to talk first about the flooding,
because there seems like there's some breakdown of emergency communication
with the flooding. Talk us through what you're seeing on that,
what sort of culpability there with the flooding is and
where you think that takes us.
Speaker 4 (35:56):
I think clearly there were failures at every level of government,
and we need to look into those failures, not because
it's a blame game or political but because if we
want to respect the dead and then protect the living,
we need to know what we did right and what
went wrong. It seems clear there were issues at the
local level. The state of Texas also denied grants to
(36:21):
the local governments to put in alert systems that they needed.
We need to ask questions about why. And then at
the federal level, we have whistleblowers that said that Christy Noam,
who's Trump's cabinet secretary above all of this, delayed search
and rescue for seventy two hours before approving it. That's
not something you should think about for seventy two seconds.
(36:43):
So we've got to actually really look into why that is.
The head of Search and Rescue at FEMA resigned over this.
They're trying now to smear him, but I think it's
important we look into that. And then also the National
Weather Service and Noah, who are the scientists that help
us know when a storm is coming and communicate that
to local communities. They've been deeply understaffed, and so I
(37:07):
myself and Converse Woman Jasmine Crockett led an effort to
ask an independent Inspector General to do an investigation, and
that independent investigator, who separate from the Trump administration, said
they're going to look into that understaffing and how that
affected our response to this storm. None of this can
bring back the dead, but we know there's going to
(37:28):
be more storms in Texas, more floods. We've got to
protect people from that. And this understaffing is happening right
now where there can be hurricanes and all sorts of
parts of the country. So we've got to be looking
into it now. This is what the legislators should be
looking into. Instead, they're, you know, Republican members are trying
to ignore the floods, cover up the Epstein files, and
(37:50):
then just protect Trump in the next election. I mean,
it's just cowardice at its core. And even worse, they're
doing it by trying to shred the Voting Rights Act
of nineteen sixty five. They took us bat PRE nineteen
sixty five on medicaid, now they want to take us
PRE nineteen sixty five on voting rights. It is the
example of what it looks like when these just wealthy,
(38:10):
powerful guys just do everything they can to protect themselves
and don't care about who they screw over in the process.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
There's a lot of drama happening in Texas with the
John Cornett and Ken Paxton drama.
Speaker 4 (38:25):
So Ken back, I get that whole bag of goons
confused sometimes too.
Speaker 1 (38:29):
The man and the Ken Baxton story is so because
I think of Ken Paxton as the guy who overturned
grow Vy Wade. Really who was the person who enacted
SBA the you know, the sort of guy who put
the wheels in motion on that. But he also is
an adulterer. Explain to us what's happening there. And by
(38:51):
the way, just the story like you couldn't make it up.
It's so incredibly craven.
Speaker 4 (38:57):
I mean, look at this point, pull after pull after
pull seems to indicate that Ken Paxton, you know, who
has been indicted for corruption, who was actually impeached by
his own Republican colleagues in the House, is likely really
the front runner for the Republican nomination by far. So
(39:17):
I expect he will be the front runner. And so
I just think that a very clear focus on the
fact that he's been ripping off Texans, the fact that, yeah,
he's the guy trying to deport dreamers, I mean, people
who have been here their entire lives he wants to
kick out. He was, you know at January sixth.
Speaker 5 (39:35):
You know, he's the guy that.
Speaker 4 (39:36):
Was trying to overthrow and overturn the election. You know,
this is just this is Trump's guy. But he is frankly,
you know, not supported by even some Texas Republicans, you know,
who voted to impeach him. So it creates a real
opportunity for us to take the Texas Senate seat. On
the Democratic side, I know a few names have been
(39:56):
tossed out there. I know Colin Allread is running. We're
gonna you know, support are Democratic nominee strongly there. And
of course, you know he's got all sorts of packs
in of course, as you mentioned, has his personal issues.
But frankly, you know, you don't even have to start that.
I mean, he is corrupt and you know, he literally
was doing business deals with folks that have like wind
up in jail. He's got federal indictments and federal investigations
(40:20):
into the way that he's handled his money, and so
it is just a disaster for him and creates a
real opportunity for us. So if Republicans jerrymander and create
their seats a little bit more vulnerable, if they've got
Ken Paxton at the top of the ticket, then we've
got a run like we've never run before in Texas
and we have some real pickup opportunities. At the same time,
(40:40):
we've got to stop the jerrymandering plan, because even if
we do an excellent job trying to flip some of
these seats, at the end of the day, they shouldn't
be allowed to suppress the votes of millions of people
and frankly steal at least some of these seats away
from us.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
I just don't see where this is fair at all.
Speaker 4 (40:58):
It's deeply unfair and should send a chill down the
spine of every American. I mean, we talk a lot
about gerrymandering. I just kind of want to give you
a sense of what this looks like. What it means
is you've got usually, you know, neighborhoods that have more
black voters or more Latino voters. And what these guys
in the White House go and do is they go
(41:20):
and say this neighborhood. We're going to chop it into
four or five or six little pieces so that those
folks can't all vote together for the person that's going
to represent them, and then they get stuck in districts
with folks that do not care about them. You do
not represent those neighborhoods, in fact, might resent those voters,
and they're just a little slice of a district to
(41:41):
be represented by you know, Chip Roy for example. You
know that's not going to be his priority if some
of these neighborhoods get put into his district or Troy Nell's.
Speaker 2 (41:53):
You know, you could look that up.
Speaker 4 (41:54):
You know, they just are not I.
Speaker 5 (41:56):
Don't need to look up Troy.
Speaker 2 (41:58):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, nor do I want to.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
For the folks that are listening, this isn't just about
me as a member of Congress or somebody else. It's
those voters get purposefully targeted because they are people of
color and stuck into a district where their voices won't matter.
That's literally what we try to get rid of in
sixty five. And then on top of all that, the
(42:22):
outcome that they try to get is that no matter
how unpopular Trump's policies are, Trump gets his selected members
of Congress. It's hard to not sound alarmist in this,
but it's that alarming.
Speaker 1 (42:32):
Texas isn't like Missouri. It's a purple if state. It's
becoming more purple. But you have a governor and an
Attorney's General who who both are very crazy and very
into enacting their own very right wing legislature or legislation.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
Why do you think that is?
Speaker 1 (42:57):
And I know there are a lot of talent to
Democrats in the Texas State House. Do you feel like
you're able to keep some of this at bay or?
I mean, why is it so? It feels like it's
just the state feels way more right wing than their
constituents are.
Speaker 4 (43:16):
That's exactly right. That's the whole Texas contradiction is that,
you know, demographically, we're not that different from say, California,
We're just heavily under organized there. Our Democratic parties are
so much more underfunded. Our state Democratic Party is puny
in funding compared to traditional swing states that you could
(43:36):
think of, like you know, Michigan or Nevada. And then
you also have to recognize we're usually ranked at the
very bottom of voter turnout of all of the states
there are so many people who rightly say, you know,
it doesn't matter if I vote or not. It seems
like the same crazy stuff happens. And so we've got
to get to a place where in this state of
over thirty million people, we organize at scale. And right now,
(44:00):
I know a lot of folks listening have heard about
great candidates we've had, from Wendy Davis to bechel or Rourke.
But if we just go in every four six years
and hope that in the last few months of election
we can rally as a country and pull it off,
we just don't get there. We have to have a
longer organizing strategy, and I think we could start it
right now, you know, just up the road from where
(44:23):
I am right now, we had an event in East
Austin with Jasmine Crockett and betel Or Rourke and Juaquin
Gastro and James Tall, Rico Gene and Ajosa myself. We
were hoping, you know, maybe a thousand people would chill up.
We had we blew past that, you know, well over
three thousand folks on very short notice. And do you know,
(44:43):
like planning anything else, usually you have an RSVP count
and then you expect the numbers are going to go
down a little bit. You don't usually think they're going
to triple on you. So right now is when we
can start organizing the state so that we have a
real shot at beating Ken Paxton come next November.
Speaker 1 (45:00):
It just strikes me that it feels very out of
whack over there. So how many sort of non voters
voters do you have in your state?
Speaker 4 (45:07):
Yeah, in my state, the percentage of registered voters turn out,
of course changes when it's a governor's race versus a
presidential but we usually rank they're in forty eighth, forty
ninth or fiftieth.
Speaker 5 (45:17):
Wow, yeah, turnout.
Speaker 4 (45:19):
Of the fifty states. And so what we badly need
to do is, you know, if we got those folks participating,
I think you'd have a totally different election. Folks argue
Texas as really a blue state, or Texas a purple
state or red state. I call it an under organized state.
I means we identified after the last election that there's
(45:39):
about one million anti Greg Abbott voters who we just
never talked to. But it's a big state. It takes
a lot of resources, and so part of what we've
got to do is lift up the next generation of
you know, leadership, be it elected officials and activists who
are going to go out there and do the work
of going and talking to folks, because I think too
(46:00):
often we've kind of gotten comfortable in our existing democratic
seats and people just govern over their democratic area, and
we've got to be going out there and reaching out.
That's why I've gone to multiple Republican districts myself and
held town halls there. No I was, you know, out
in the Texas Panhandle where they haven't seen their congressional
Democrat in forever. It was just me and you had
(46:22):
thousands of people in an auditorium. So we've got to
be willing to go out there to those rural areas
where you know, Democrats traditionally don't go, but people are
waiting to hear from us. So that's what I'm committed
to doing. We're going to fight this redistricting plan with
everything we've got in US and here in central Texas
where I'm sitting right now, you know, they're trying to
(46:42):
merge me and my fellow congressman next door, and we're
going to fight that like hell because it is just
deeply wrong to try to get rid of us by
merging districts together like ours.
Speaker 2 (46:53):
Thank you, Congressman, thank you, thank you. No Jesse Cannon
my junk Fast.
Speaker 3 (47:03):
So this is, you know, really shocking news that this
would happen under a Trump swatch. The Office of Civil
Rights is now a place where white men replace minorities.
Who would have thunk this would happen.
Speaker 1 (47:15):
So the education agency that investigates discrimination claims faces a
sinister overhaul. Current and former staff telled The Times Donald
Trump spent years raging against the Biden administration for elevating
women and ethnic minorities into positions for which he said
they were not qualified. Well, you'll be shocked to know
(47:37):
now the president, that guy who was accused of bias,
well now he's being accused of bias.
Speaker 2 (47:45):
I am shocked, I tell you shocked that this is
what's going on.
Speaker 1 (47:51):
I am shocked, shocked, shocked, shocked, and by shocked I
mean nater all shocked.
Speaker 2 (47:58):
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics.
Speaker 1 (48:01):
Tune in every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear
the best.
Speaker 2 (48:08):
Minds and politics make sense of all this chaos. If
you enjoy this podcast, please send it to a friend.
And keep the conversation going. Thanks for listening.
Host
Molly Jong-Fast
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