February 8, 2025 • 45 mins
Former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara examines the legal obstacles that can keep Trump in check. Citation Needed’s Molly White details the tech bro oligarchy’s plans for America.
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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 AOC says, if you feel burnt
out by the news, that's exactly what Trump wants. We
have such a great show for you today. Former US
Attorney pre Berarra joins us to talk about the legal
(00:21):
obstacles that can at least hopefully keep Trump and check.
Then we'll talk to citation needed Molly White about the
tech bro oligarchy's plans for America. But first the news.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
So, Mollie, you and I we devoted a good amount
of our Project twenty twenty five documentary to this fellow
RUSS vote, and he's unfortunately now going to be doing
exactly what he wanted to in Project twenty twenty five,
which is running the omb, which we knew was going
to happen.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
RUSS vote is the stuff of nightmares right here. He is.
He is a person who has already broken the law
with this impoundment stuff. Right. So, basically we've talked about
this before, but Congress appropriates money, the President's Office of
Management and Budget gets the money, and then they are
(01:13):
supposed to allocate it to actions of the federal government.
But what happened here is that Russ Vott in Trump
one point zero refused to allocate the money, and that
caused these sort of constitutional crisis which ended in Trump's
first impeachment. We know from Project twenty twenty five that
(01:33):
this is Vot's plan for the second Trump two point zero.
And it's not just Vot's plan, it is the entire
ethos of Project twenty twenty five to dismantle the administrative state,
to shrink the federal government, to create a kind of
more autocrat friendly federalism. So one of the things that
(01:57):
I think Democrats have done, which is really smart, is
even thought was Centatip proved last time, and so he
does have a certain kind this is not his first rodeo, right,
There is a sense in which sometimes set people who
have already been confirmed are sort of thought as to
be a sort of no brainer. And what Democrats did
(02:17):
was they filibustered him. So he will in fact get
confirmed because they are only forty seven Democrats in the
Senate fifty three Republicans, so they don't have the votes
to prevent him, but they were able to make it
clear and so much of this, and I don't know
that we talk about this enough. So much of this
is a war of trying to as Chris Hayes who
(02:41):
just wrote this book about attention, so much of this
is about getting attention. So what Democrats are doing here
is trying to message at Russ Vott is very much
not the norm and that this is a departure from
typical Republican businesses usual politics. And I think we're going
to see this play out more. I think it's smart
(03:01):
they spoke out against him during the roll call, during speeches,
and you know we're seeing that at the state level.
And of course, our friend who will be on this
podcast very soon, Sheldon Whitehouse, said I vote against creepy
billionaire influence and he cast his vote. So good to
see Democrats doing this. Look, they don't have a huge
(03:22):
menu of options, so they're doing what they can.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Yeah. Well, every so often in the news cycle we're
introduced to a new turn of phrase that well is
worse and worse and worse by the day. And the
one that I learned yesterday was I was racist before
it was cool, which was said by one of Musk's
doge teenagers who was fired by Doge after they found
out about all his racist tweets. But there's some more
(03:46):
revelations about this fellow that are not good.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Yeah, So I mean he actually was fired than he
was re hired because of a Twitter poll. By the way,
Elon does these Twitter polls, and then if they don't
say what he wants, he doesn't carry just keeps going,
which I think is.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Was going to step down from Twitter because Twitter pool.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
That's right. So there are two different Doge employees who
have now captured the zeitgeist. One is the one who
said that he was racist against Indians. Before it was
cool to be racist against Indians. It's never been cool
to be racist against anyone, so I think we can.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
I think he actually just said racist, not racist to Indians.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Okay, So anyway, that was one of them. And then
the other one. We have this really good reporting from
everybody's favorite at Bloomberg, which is that Musk's Doge team
was fired by cybersecurity firm for leaking company secrets. That
guy is in the federal government, the federal payment system.
(04:46):
Think about that for a second. Edward has been terminated
for leaking internal information to competitors in a June twenty
twenty two message from an executive of the firm. So, uh,
you know, these are two of Elon's crew. It's really
something to think about here, that these are the people
(05:07):
who are being put it in these jobs, are not
actually really the people who should be in these jobs.
That this is not how any of this is supposed
to work. So unsurprising, still disturbing, and that is where
we are.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
I think it's even more disturbing that one of the
reasons we know this is because he bragged about it
in discord shots for Cloud.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Well they're young.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Yeah, yeah, I'm stupid.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
And in our federal government's computer systems.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
I really appreciate too that jd Vance came to defend
that these racist remarks are not worthy of firing.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
Yeah, I mean there you go. I mean, look, this
whole sand castle is built on the idea that it's
okay to be that. So it's not surprising to me
that he was re hired despite what would otherwise. And remember,
like in normal life, in the real world, all these
(06:06):
people would have been fired, right, there's no you know,
we would have been fired. I mean, this is just
this is we've we're in Bizarro world here.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Yeah, the I of DEI is really doing a lot
of work in this administration.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
And better news, a judge has paused Trump's plan to
put USAID staff on leave.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
The good news about everything being legal?
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Is that what a phrase?
Speaker 1 (06:33):
But it's true, you know, is that when it's illegal,
the court stop it. So again, does that mean that
we are sanguine? We are very worried about American democracy
as well. We should be. But basically, lawyers and groups
like sky Perriman's group Democracy Forward are pursuing legal action
(06:56):
against each one of these illegal things. And what's happening
is they're working their way through the courts, and the
courts are saying, no, you can't fucking fire everyone in
a federal agency because you feel like it. What Elon
has been doing is going through all of the newspapers
and magazines that these federal agencies are charging on their
work accounts. And when it comes to Politico, you know,
(07:20):
woke Politico, which is mostly just tracks federal government, you know, process,
and in fact, the more expensive version of Politico, the
pay political keeps track of sort of bills that pass
and Senate phone numbers. I mean, it's not exactly like
woke indoctrination. But remember, so much of this is projection,
(07:44):
not all of this is actually you know, much of
this is showmanship. So anyway, a lot of this is illegal.
It's going through the courts. These people are going to ultimately,
you know, they're going to be injunctions. They're not going
to be fire Already, they know that Elon and Trump
(08:04):
that much of the stuff they're trying to do is illegal,
and so we're going to see more and more of that.
I just want to point out that what you're seeing
as Trump and Elon really squandering their credibility. And you know,
you think of credibility as maybe how credible are any
of these people, but actually squandering your credibility means that
(08:25):
when they fire people, the people just won't leave. And
that's what we're going to see more and more of.
Pret Bararra is a former US attorney for the Southern
District of New York and the host of Stay Tuned
with Welcome back to Fast Politics, Breed.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
Good to be here.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
We're just galloping along, as you said when you got
here a minute ago, fast, very fast, till every minute
of every day when I am reading the New York
times or watching cable news, or are watching c SPAN.
I spend a lot of time watching c SPAN. I
think to myself, it's not legal, is it? That can't possibly?
(09:07):
I mean, besides being a constitutional crisis. So how much
illegal stuff is going on right now? One hundred percent?
Eighty percent?
Speaker 4 (09:16):
I don't know what the denominator is because, like you,
I feel overwhelmed.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
I'm submerged by all this stuff. You know.
Speaker 4 (09:23):
Part of my professional job is to pay attention to
these things and digest them and think about them and
then talk about them on my own podcasts and with
you and with others. And if I have trouble keeping up,
then what chance does the general public have in keeping up?
Speaker 3 (09:37):
But I think I think a lot of it which
is by design.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
Yeah, a lot of it is unlawful and will be
adjudicated to be unlawful, you know, just just right off
the top. If you think the effort to end birthright
citizenship that's been blocked, I think by two different judges.
This whole other caper about freezing federal funds in a
way that was ambiguous and unclear and counterproductive, that's been blocked.
The buyout plan to try to reduce the ranks of
(10:01):
federal workers that's been blocked. You know, all these things
will be litigated, some will be one, some will be lost.
But there's going to be a lot of litigation and
a lot of fighting in a lot of courts.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
But right now, well these fights are going on, and
Donald Trump is musking about Trump Tower and Gaza. We're
seeing and I don't mean to be craven, you know,
with his talk about the Middle East is particularly offensive
for any number of reasons. But I'm just wondering if
you could explain Elon Musk and a number of teenagers
(10:35):
or maybe early twenty year olds who have dupious backgrounds
are in all of the computer systems in the federal
government making them do something? Is that legal? That seems
really dicey to may Well.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
There has been reporting that suggests that a lot of
Trump allies on the Republican side have been voicing precisely
that concern, have been saying behind the scenes, there's a
lot of stuff going on here. There's a lot of
stuff that the doge is doing. Even if we agree,
I mean, I think a lot of people on the
Democratic side too, can agree with the general premise that
parts of government are bloated and the waste, fraud, and
abuse should be cut out. There's a way to do it,
(11:13):
and there's a way not to do it, and I
think you're going to see a lot of suits in
that regards. Well, look, usaid it's a statutorially created entity
of significant size, which is why maybe it's a target
and significant value as suggested by lots of people, including
Lindsay Graham and Marco Rubio and a whole host of
other people. And the idea that you know, a few
(11:34):
folks who are not particularly accountable or accountable at all
are going to dismantle a ten billion dollar agency runs
a foul of how we think effective government should work.
But also laws that I think you're going to see
a lot of fights there there too.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
You know.
Speaker 4 (11:48):
The other way I think about this is on the
optimistic side, is this flood the zone strategy with respect
to executive orders and the DOGE and the memos that
have been issued by the newly minted Attorney General Pam
BONDI is I wonder if I'm not a huge box
of okay, well good, So maybe you can tell me
if this this is valid or not that maybe it's
(12:10):
the sort of involuntary ropodope strategy. I'm the part of
the Democrats that at some point, I don't know if
this is true or not, but I'm trying to look
for silver linings that the Trump administration will so overextend
and exhaust itself with EO after EEO after EO and
memo after memo and changing things and eliminating things and
dismantling things by fiat, that they will be so roiled
(12:33):
up in litigation and fights both with the other side
and within their own side, that they tire themselves out
and ends up being not a good strategy because it
was not particularly well thought out. Look, you know, separate
apart from the legal defeats that some of these moves
have suffered at the hands of courts, there have been
withdrawals of some of these things on Trump's own part right,
(12:56):
because they don't think these things. They don't think these
things out. They have a blunder bus approach, and they
say this is bad, so we're going to eliminate all
of this. But they don't define what this is. And
the example I keep coming back to is in the
first term, in the first week, they issued this broad
and sweeping so called Muslim band, but they didn't distinguish
between who was allowed to come back and who wasn't,
who's allowed entry and who wasn't. And there was this
(13:17):
huge question for a while because they hadn't addressed the
issue of whether or not Green card holders were included
or excluded, right, And that keeps happening with these guys
because they value speed over accuracy and fairness, No.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
For sure, And I mean that's what we're seeing here
is we see them making a lot of mistakes because
they're moving too quickly and because they don't ultimately have
an ethos, you know, except move fast and break things
that are not theirs to break. Really, I'm glad you're
being optimistic because I often try to figure out there's
(13:50):
some some place for optimism in this whole catastrophe. So
I'm wondering, you know, it definitely seems like the courts
are going to say you can't do this stuff. Now
here's my question. When the courts say you can't do
this stuff, you could definitely see Maybe I don't know
who will be the first in Trump world to ignore
the courts. My guess is that Russ Vott is going
(14:13):
to be high on that list because he has done
it before, right and Trump one point zero he refused
to release the money, and for Ukraine he messed around
with impounding the funds. So I'm wondering with the funds
that were impounded releasing them. So I'm wondering if you
what make me feel better about what happens when they
(14:36):
ignore the law.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
Well, so far, and one of your student listeners will
correct me and us if I'm wrong. There's been a
defiance of law and clear interpretations of law. There is
defiance and a breach of the law related to Inspectors General.
That's one item I didn't take off my earlier list
because there's clearly a requirement that you must give thirty
days notice to Congress and an explanation as to why
(14:58):
you're taking that action against people are supposed to be
independent and above and beyond.
Speaker 3 (15:01):
And outside of politics.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
There has not been that I can think of, a
court order or injunction sustained all the way to the
Supreme Court that the Trump administration has said, f you,
we're not going to do it. That would be that
would be a real, real crisis. And my optimism is
and I don't know how well founded it is is
that we haven't seen that kind of absolutely clear, concrete,
(15:24):
deliberate direct defiance at a court order, vetted all the
way to the top, and I hope never to see it.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
I love that I'll take that to the bank.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
I wouldn't.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
I don't know. I don't know which bank will that deposit.
But hopefully that's the case. Look, it still happens to
be true that the Trump folks, you know, for sure,
at least at this point, but even you know, definitionally
autocratic societies. I've had this conversation with Gary Kasparrow on
a number of occasions, and wonder White is Putin is
basically a dictator, and you have them in other parts
of the world, and they can do whatever they want,
(15:55):
and they're acknowledged to have the authority to do whatever
they want. They revel in their dictator status. And yet
even they seek, you know, even as they break the law,
they seek to cloak themselves in legality and in constitutionality
and in norms, and they're always trying to defend what
they're doing, even as they imprison people like Alexi Navalni.
Now it may be all bullshit and a sham. There's
(16:17):
still something that autocrats are fretful about if they're overly seen, overly,
dramatically and directly defying the rule of law, even though
it happens all the time.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
If that makes any sense.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Yes, exactly. I would love if we're going to just
be anxious here and talk about Gary kasprov what do
we think. It strikes me that, like the worst case scenario,
and a lot of people who are very smart, who
I know, who I'm friends with, I have a lot
of anxiety about America turning into Russia. That is not,
(16:51):
in my mind, I think a likely scenario for any
number of reasons. And it sounds like you also believe that.
And I'm wondering if you could sort of make me
feel better because I'm very stressed out. Thank you.
Speaker 4 (17:07):
So there are other defenses, not the ones that we
normally think about. Separate from the courts and separate from Congress,
which has been basically supine. Hope springs eternal. That Congress
and the Senate and Center Republicans in particular will say,
you know, hey, we created this thing by statute, you
can't take it away by fiat, or hey, you know,
this is a totally unqualified person for this very important,
(17:27):
sensitive cabinet position. We can't do that, you know, at
any moment. I'm not holding my breath. That can happen
if there's the thing that has long been predicted and
has never come to pass, that Trump and his cronies
over extend to such an extent that people other than
Lisa Rakowski and now Mitch McConnell, you know, stand in
their way. So you know, there is that structural check.
(17:49):
There's also the courts, and the courts don't always decide
it was all Trump. But separate from that, there's other
things like public sentiment, and it is true, not often,
certainly not always, public sentiment when it is overwhelmingly negative
about something causes the Trump folks to change course. That
happened when you had separations of children from their parents
in the last term. And there's yet another thing, by
(18:10):
the way, you know, we haven't talked about tariffs yet.
There's all this controversy and pretty much consensus with respect
to anyone who's intelligent about economics about the inflationary pressure
the tariffs would cause. In particular, not just inflationary pressure,
but other diplomatic fiascos and ruination of our allies and
relationships with our allies with Canada and Mexico. On the
(18:32):
day that those tariffs were going to go into effect, well,
I don't know if you call it the fifth branch
of government for Donald Trump, but the stock market began
to tank, right, That.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Really is the fifth branch of government for Donald Trump. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (18:43):
Yeah, it's like it's like there's the executive, there's the judiciary,
there's the legislative, and then there's the now with the Nasdaq.
That wouldn't give a lot of political scientists and political
theorists a lot of comfort. But it's not like there
are not things that give Trump pause. There are, and
maybe in combination and when when you know, stitch together
shrewdly by Democrats, although I don't see that.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Ahead of yourself. Their breaks at the moment together shrewdly, yes.
Speaker 4 (19:13):
Stitch together truly rudely. Maybe something can happen. You just
don't know. I mean, some people are saying, look again,
it's only it's been five minutes.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
No, I know, it feels like it's been.
Speaker 4 (19:23):
Five minutes nineteen days and it takes some time.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
But when people listen this, it'll be twenty one days continue, yes,
or twenty days or whatever.
Speaker 4 (19:30):
It's also the case because of the incompetence of these
guys in so many areas and their lack of care
in vetting and doing so many other things. This is
not a great and most shrewd strategy, but I'm quite
confident that there will be overreaches of such significance and
opposition that there's going to be a straw that breaks
the camel's back with respect to at least one or
(19:52):
more of these things. It's just going to happen because
because you just can't move. I used a terrible analogy
on the podcast with Joyce fans Insider Fansider podcast.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
Yes, tell me about cafe and now I'm just kidding, actually,
joy Yeah, Joyce Fancy is really one of the great
So anyway, yes.
Speaker 4 (20:10):
He's terrific, and she was polite enough not to laugh
at my metaphor. But even if it's the case that
you find yourself in an inopportune place at the bottom
of the sea somewhere, or deep diving, and there's some
menacing fish or you know, a whale or a shark
or some you know some other thing and you need
to get up to the surface for safety, you can't
(20:30):
just rush up to the surface.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Because of this thing called the bends.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
You will dive, you know, either an equally quick or
quicker death if you rush to the top. So that's
my lame analogy in nature of the need to even
if there's some cause to fix something or do something differently.
You know, slowfulness is not good, and government often moves
too slowly. But doing this at too great a speed
can do more injury than good.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yeah, no, I mean obviously, but it is interesting to me,
like we'll watch this sort of lawlessness and the zeal right,
the delight at disassembling things like USA and the EPA,
and this sort of regit the federal government. And I wonder,
(21:14):
you know, as someone who it's so you know, to
me in my own personal history, right, I had a
grandfather who was jailed by Republican Congress, I mean for
his opinions, for refusing to name names. I wonder in
your mind, like the rage that these people have towards
the federal government. I mean, is I think about their
(21:35):
fury towards the Federal Bureau of Investigations, which is, you know,
has it ever had a head who was not a
white Republican man.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
Not in memory, not in recent times, right.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
I mean, what do you? I mean? It feels like
these people have gone through a blender.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
It's amazing how they have the ability to maintain and
maybe it's like a higher order intelligence to be able
to maintain such cognitive dissonance. And say, on the one hand,
you support the blue, you support law enforcement, and on
the other hand not only support full pardons and commutations
for people who are seen in black and white to
be beating and assaulting officers, but also now to be
(22:14):
cheering the idea that the prosecutors who in good faith
pursued those investigations and prosecutions god in open court convictions
either by guilty plea or by guilty verdict upheld by
judges appointed by both Democrats and Republicans, some are many
appointed by Trump himself. They should be investigated and punished
for doing their jobs. How you keep that in equipoised
(22:35):
with the idea that you're pro law enforcement. I don't
even understand. So I don't know if it's people who
think that way are geniuses or imbeciles, but it's not
something in between.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
Yes, it's very haphazard, and I think the good news
is that we're seeing the court say you can't do that,
and someday we may see Republicans in Congress do the same,
but we may not. Right, not necessarily necessary, right, I
guess terrifyingly.
Speaker 4 (23:04):
I think part of the explanation is nobody cares about
process anymore, whether it's due process or something else. And
that's how you can have these competing ideas that should
give any normal person cognitive dissonance in your head. It's
not that anyone is pro police, pro law enforcement, or
anti law enforcement. You're pro law enforcement when they go
after the people you don't like, and you're anti law
enforcement when they go after the people you do to like. Right,
(23:26):
So it's all outcome determinative. So you know, if a
senator votes, you know, for Trump on something, whether it's
on principle or not, that's a good senator. That's a
good Republican. If senator does not, that senator should be primary,
even if it is on principle.
Speaker 3 (23:40):
Right.
Speaker 4 (23:41):
So, this idea of being pro trade or anti tariff,
or pro First Amendment or anti First Amendment or pro
or con anything one enforcement or otherwise, those things don't
matter anymore. It's all about whether or not it was
your team or not. It's become you know, as many
many many other people have noted before me, tribal and
(24:01):
almost like a blood sport.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
But it's also just filthy to trump. The nuances of
it don't matter, it's if you are our guy or not.
I do think though, what you're saying about legality makes
me feel a little better. You know, this is just
the barrage of news and knowing that there is some
sort of larger principle, you know, legal principles in this
(24:25):
country still is probably a very good thing.
Speaker 4 (24:27):
So yeah, it's not enough because the damage. You know,
you asked before, why are they doing these things? They
know what the legal shot is on some of these things, right,
but like still, for example, the thing that I find
almost the most upsetting in the farious which is the
issuance of questionnaires to thousands of FBI agents to see
if they touch.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Which smacks of McCarthyism. I mean really it is.
Speaker 4 (24:48):
Yeah, of all the things, right, and you know, at
the end of the day, they're protected by civil service
laws and maybe they'll be vindicated, but in the interim
and probably for a long time, any agent going forward, Democrat, Republican, nonpartisan, neutral, independent, whatever.
When presented with the option of opening up an investigation
(25:09):
or pursuing a lead, or joining an effort to look
into potential malfeasance on the part of anybody in the
country who has some arguable connection to Trump or Trump's family,
or Trump's cabinet or Trump's government or Trump's business interests,
has to think fricking twice. If I do this, is
someday someone going to take my livelihood away?
Speaker 1 (25:30):
Well that's the goal.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
Yeah, And so the extraordinary chilling effect it has on
people who are just people, just human beings. To make
sure they're doing the right thing and taking care of
their family and putting food on the table, do they
have to think twice? Now, Well, maybe I'll go do
the surveillance, Maybe I'll go knock on that door, maybe
I'll serve the subpoena. But let me first do the calculation.
Will it offend anyone in the current regime, Because then ultimately,
(25:54):
maybe I will be fired, maybe I will be prosecuted,
maybe my pension will be taken away from me. And
that message has been delivered, whatever happens with respect to
the legal question.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
Pre thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3 (26:05):
Thanks Molly.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
Molly White writes the newsletter citation needed. Welcome back to
Fast Politics, Molly White, thank you for having me so
I feel like you have absolutely the right background to
cover where we are because it's the intersection of tech
and crypto and everything nefarious of the last hundred years discuss.
Speaker 5 (26:32):
Yeah, it's been a weird sort of coming together of
the tech worlds and the crypto world and the political
worlds in the last couple of years, and certainly in
the last week or so, we've seen that really ramping up.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
So let's talk about it. Your beat was originally in
the world whenever, you know, in the time when everything
was normal, Your beat started as crypto.
Speaker 5 (26:57):
Right right, Yeah. I started writing about crypto in twenty
twenty one or so, and I still write a lot
about crypto, but a little more broad these days as well.
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Why don't we talk first about how crypto got in
bed with Trump during the campaign, Because Donald Trump is
seventy eight years old, Crypto is not his de facto
and in fact, early or on in his first presidency
he thought crypto was a scam, right, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (27:23):
He made a really big change in his stance on
crypto this time around, largely thanks to the cryptocurrency industry's influence,
which has really increased over the handful of years since
his former presidency.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
So what changed his heart and mind.
Speaker 5 (27:39):
I think a lot of things really went into it.
I think part of it was his own personal success
in his crypto grifting, where he launched some NFT projects
and he was selling bitcoin themed sneakers and you know,
he was able to make some money off of it,
and he realized it could be lucrative for him. But
I think the bigger thing is that the crypto industry
(27:59):
has made itself an influential voice in politics, and they
were heavily involved in the twenty twenty four election cycle,
mostly at the congressional level in terms of where they
were spending money, but they were very much trying to
make crypto a focus of the election, something that politicians
needed to talk about, and they were swinging around huge
(28:20):
amounts of money to get everyone's attention.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
So this is the heartwarming story of lobbying.
Speaker 5 (28:28):
The tail is all this time, Yes it is.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
And they just figured out how to get in front
of the right lobbyist.
Speaker 5 (28:34):
I think that's true. But you know, crypto really emerged
on the scene as its own political force in sort
of an unheard of way this time around. I mean,
the crypto industry spent over one hundred million dollars on
congressional races in twenty twenty four alone, And you know,
compared to the size of the cryptocurrency industry, which itself
(28:56):
is very small, that was a shocking amount of money.
I mean they were rival big oil, big pharma, you know,
the typical lobbying powers. Suddenly crypto was up there in
the spending. I mean they were I think their super
pack was like number four, number five in the top
the list of super packs by the amounts that they
(29:16):
had raised, behind only like the Trump super packs and
the Senate and congressional super packs. So they were a
huge force in terms of spending this past cycle.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
So they figured out how to spend, they lobbied, they
got Trump on board, and now they are sort of
one of the biggest pieces of the Trump coalition. Is
that right?
Speaker 5 (29:40):
Absolutely? And I mean there's a fair bit of overlap
between crypto interests and the broader Silicon Valley tech interests
that we're seeing in Congress then sort of mulling around
the White House. So for example, Andresen Horowitz has a
number of their partners taking major roles at the White
(30:01):
House in advisory positions and so on, and they've been
investing in crypto and evangelizing crypto for a number of
years now. You know, David Sachs is the new AI
and crypto zar at the White House, and he obviously
has massive interest in both the crypto world and in
the tech world beyond. And I think altogether those people
(30:25):
have become their own sort of force in the White
House now, both officially and unofficially.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
So you got the crypto lobby, then you have the
tech pros run wild in this admin and that is
Elon's crew is basically David Sacks. Do you think of
these people as all the same entity and what are
the entities and how do they interact with each other?
Speaker 5 (30:52):
They're certainly very related entities, if they're not all the
same entities, but they do come from sort of similar backgrounds.
You know, David's and Elon Musk are both part of
the sort of PayPal mafia, which is, you know a
group of sort of early tech people who have been
you know, a lot of them got their start at
PayPal but have since become very influential in the Silicon
(31:14):
Valley world. Peter Thiel is another major member, and he
obviously has major political influence of his own. You know,
all of the andresen Horoitz people who are now installed
in positions of power Congress, people who themselves have not
only support from these interests, but often backgrounds in those
(31:35):
areas themselves. And so I think we now have this
massive influence from the tech oligarchy honestly in the White
House right now, which is quite shocking to see. I mean,
the tech industry has always, you know, tried to exert
power in the White House. I don't want to claim
that this is somehow a new phenomenon that you know,
(31:57):
did not happen during you know, the oba of years
and things like that, but it was never so overt,
and it was never so extreme in terms of the
direct influence and access of these high powered, enormously wealthy
people to push their own interests and to influence the
(32:18):
direction of the government in ways that will benefit them
personally and their businesses as well.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
There are a lot of conflicts of interest here. I mean,
that is the number one thing what I want you
to talk us through because I feel like you really
have an insight on this, which is interesting and different
than a lot of other journalists. I'm wondering if you
could talk us through what you think Elon Musk is
doing right now in the federal government. And maybe it
(32:44):
is what he's saying he's doing, and that's fine too,
And if you want to explain that to us, that
would be great. And if you think it's something else,
please explain that.
Speaker 4 (32:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (32:53):
I mean, it's obviously a little hard to know because
he has cut off so much access into what is
going on on Congress people even haven't been able to
get access to sort of observe what he's doing. But
you know, he has inserted himself in portions of the government,
you know, including the Treasury Department. You know, he's becoming
(33:14):
involved in you know, looking at data at various aid
agencies and other government agencies, and he's claiming that he
is slashing everything spending. How would he do that, Well,
that's sort of the question, because we're seeing some people
claim that he does not have access or the ability
to do that. So the Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessant, who
(33:36):
has just confirmed, has claimed that Musk and his team
only have read only access. But we're simultaneously seeing reporting
that his team of very young programmers are making changes
to code bases that control federal payments and that they
are stopping payments to basically various line items in these
(33:57):
federal agencies books. They're stopping those payments, And so we're
getting conflicting information around, you know, whether or not he
is simply reviewing the data versus actually making changes. But
you know, it seems that he is trying to pursue
sort of a similar approach as he took when he
took over Twitter, which was to come in and basically
(34:18):
fire everybody and slash the entire operation down to its
variess bones, you know, either by forcing people to leave
or firing them directly, and you know, creating chaos in
a way that is much more higher stakes than it
was when he was taking over a private social media company.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
So do you think that that is what's happening though, right,
because like he's offering biads, we don't know if they're real, right,
he sent the fork in the road letder to people.
I mean, do you think that any of this is
actually like how much of this is perception? How much
of this is reality.
Speaker 5 (34:55):
It's again hard to say, I think, with especially with
so little transparency to what's happening, which is quite ironic
given Musk's claims to want transparency, you know, and to
be pursuing transparency, we're simultaneously seeing him shutting access down
to potential outside overseers to you know, there was reporting
(35:16):
out of four A four media saying that they were
attempting to change their interpersonal communications so that they couldn't
be foid and so it's really hard to say, but
you know, we are seeing widespread layoffs at federal agencies,
you know, attempts to slash funding which are getting hung
up in the court somewhat, but certainly you know, are
(35:38):
being attempted. And we know that Musk has access to
incredibly sensitive data and systems, and you know, whether or
not he's making changes or the extent of those changes
is I think what remains to be seen.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
The thing is he doesn't have the authority to do
any of this all correctly. He has no congressional authority,
he doesn't work in the Festal government. All of this
is not constitutional. It's possibly illegal. You know. It's sort
of like me saying I am the czar of Palm
Springs and going and making citizens arrest. So, I mean,
(36:15):
it works until it doesn't, right, Right.
Speaker 5 (36:18):
I mean, I think there are a lot of very
legitimate challenges to what Musk is doing in terms of
his status as a federal employee. If he's actually a
federal employee, then is he you know, subject to federal
laws around you know, who's allowed to have access and
requirements for security clearance and ethics rules and conflict of
(36:39):
interest rules. You know, is he someone who should be
subject to congressional review? So I think there are a
lot of avenues through which people can challenge this in
the courts, and you know, Congress can challenge this. But
the problem is that you know, someone needs to actually
step in and stop him from accessing these systems, and
that as of yet, has not happened. And so unless
(37:03):
you know, people are perfectly able to do illegal things,
you know, just because something is illegal doesn't mean it's impossible.
And so it is the actual enforcement of that law,
and you know, people in Congress, in the courts, you know,
getting the courage to actually do something about it that
I think is going to be critical in the coming days.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
Right, And that is a real question that has no
answer really, So I wonder if you are at least
not yet, I wonder if you could talk to us
about what is Elon Musk's goal.
Speaker 5 (37:37):
Well, I think some of it is, you know, chaos.
I think he enjoys the power of, you know, having
the federal government sort of in his control. And I
think a lot of it is money. You know, he
has very lucrative federal contracts. He now potentially has the
ability to control the competition in those contracts or to
(38:01):
allocate additional contracts. He I think is also pursuing a
similar approach as some of the tech and crypto people,
where he is attempting to use this power to stop
anything in the way of doing what he might want
to be doing. So, for example, there are numerous ongoing
lawsuits and investigations and probes into his multiple companies and
(38:24):
to him himself personally that he I think would be
very interested in stopping. Certainly, we've seen that more broadly
with the tech companies who are hoping to see the
end of some of the antitrust actions that were happening
under Biden. The crypto industry. Pretty much every donor from
the crypto industry has open lawsuits against them from the
(38:45):
SEC or various other oversight agencies, and so I think
a lot of it is about pulling back any oversight
or challenge to the monopoly and to the business interests
of these companies and allowing them to extract even more
wealth from you know, everyday people via their operations that
(39:06):
you know, might otherwise be considered to be against consumer
protection laws or other various financial laws, or through these
federal contracts which can be extremely lucrative.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Right, So you think that's really the ply is just
to avoid scrutinay, avoid prosecution.
Speaker 5 (39:24):
I think that's a big part of it. I think
also it's very clear at this point that Elon Musk
and several others have very strong political interests of their
own and political agendas that they are trying to pursue
that are very very extreme.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
Tax cuts for billionaires too.
Speaker 5 (39:42):
Well, certainly that yes, but there's also the very sort
of right wing social end of it, where you know,
these are people who have been railing against trans people
and diversity inclusion programming and all of these types of things,
and they've all been very clear about making those primary
(40:02):
targets of their operations in the White House these days
as well.
Speaker 1 (40:07):
Right exactly, I'm wondering if you could just talk us
through where using this goes.
Speaker 5 (40:12):
It's really hard to say. I mean, it's it's hard
to see where this is going. I think, you know,
we're in a very uncertain time right now. I am
hoping that there will be widespread resistance both from elected officials,
from you know, government employees, from those in the judiciary
who are willing to, you know, defend what this country
(40:35):
is really supposed to be about, and you know, the
idea that there needs to be separation of powers and
a democratic government and all of that, and then certainly
resistance from you know, everyday people, the refusal to abide
by these attacks on American people and those you know
within America and outside, and you know, the attacks on
(40:58):
freedom of the press, freedom of speed, each freedom of expression,
all of these very core fundamental freedoms. And I think
we're at a really critical moment right now.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
Yeah. I know how we got here, but also I
don't know how we got here, if that makes any sense.
Speaker 5 (41:12):
Right. Somehow we've all seen this coming, and yet we
are all shocked to watch it happen.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
Right, Yeah, I mean, it just is incredible, and not
incredible like incredible sunset, but incredible, like you know, watching
nuclear tests. I'm wondering if you could just for a
minute give us some reason to not be completely catastrophic
about those. This is where we get into therapy for me.
Speaker 5 (41:39):
Yeah, I mean, I do you know, see those resistance
moments happening? You know, I think that it feels a
little bit like nothing's happening and like no one's doing
anything and that we're not seeing anything and everyone's just
sort of going about their lives. But I think that,
you know, that is something that is perhaps true if
you look at the front ages of some of the
(42:00):
biggest newspapers. But if you dig a little bit deeper,
you know, away from these media outlets that are run
by people who have been you know, kissing up to
Trump honestly and who are probably not terribly inclined to
report on these types of things, you actually see a
fair bit of resistance happening. There have been major protests
about various different topics, from you know, transgender healthcare bands
(42:23):
to immigration enforcement changes to the shutdown of federal agencies
across the country. We've seen you know, various lawmakers proposing
legislation or making statements that suggest that they are working
to fight back. In Congress, They've already been numerous lawsuits
challenging executive orders and the slashing of federal government employees.
(42:47):
Various judges have already issued restraining orders in some of
those cases to stop some of the illegal orders that
have come out. So, you know, I think there are
people who are standing up to what is happening and
who are demanding more from the democratically elected people who
are supposed to be representing us. And it's just crucial
(43:08):
that everyone, you know, make sure that we are aware
of what's happening, supports the people who are doing these
types of things, and honestly demands that type of action
from our elected representatives.
Speaker 1 (43:20):
Molly White, thank you. I hope you'll come back.
Speaker 5 (43:23):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3 (43:26):
No moment perfectly.
Speaker 1 (43:31):
Jesse Cannon, my jung fast.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
Bad things are happening down in Texas an evergreen statement.
So Texas has removed one point seven million people from
their healthcare plans.
Speaker 1 (43:43):
Yeah, so this is like reverse Medicare expansion. Right. We
saw during the Biden administration that a lot of these
states expanded Medicare that this is the opposite of that. Look,
Texas is a place where the far right loves to experiment.
It's the state that repealed Roe v. Wade a year
(44:05):
before Moby Wade was repealed. We're going to see, I
think more stuff like this. Not surprising, but pretty interesting
and pretty disturbing. And look at the Republicans in Texas.
The Governor Abbott and the Attorneys General Paxton are very, very,
(44:27):
very emboldened, and they consider themselves to be at the
forefront of Republican politics. And so that you will see
them over the next couple of years do things that
are perhaps even more beyond the pale than even Trump
World perhaps. And so this is the beginning of this,
kicking people off Medicare and children's healthcare. And I think
(44:52):
you're going to see more and more of this. And
so keep an eye on Texas because it like a
bunch of other Republican read st day. It's like Tennessee
and Oklahoma. These states are laboratories for Republican anti democracy.
Speaker 2 (45:08):
One hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (45:11):
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear the best
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 AOC says, if you feel burnt
out by the news, that's exactly what Trump wants. We
have such a great show for you today. Former US
Attorney pre Berarra joins us to talk about the legal
(00:21):
obstacles that can at least hopefully keep Trump and check.
Then we'll talk to citation needed Molly White about the
tech bro oligarchy's plans for America. But first the news.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
So, Mollie, you and I we devoted a good amount
of our Project twenty twenty five documentary to this fellow
RUSS vote, and he's unfortunately now going to be doing
exactly what he wanted to in Project twenty twenty five,
which is running the omb, which we knew was going
to happen.
Speaker 1 (00:52):
RUSS vote is the stuff of nightmares right here. He is.
He is a person who has already broken the law
with this impoundment stuff. Right. So, basically we've talked about
this before, but Congress appropriates money, the President's Office of
Management and Budget gets the money, and then they are
(01:13):
supposed to allocate it to actions of the federal government.
But what happened here is that Russ Vott in Trump
one point zero refused to allocate the money, and that
caused these sort of constitutional crisis which ended in Trump's
first impeachment. We know from Project twenty twenty five that
(01:33):
this is Vot's plan for the second Trump two point zero.
And it's not just Vot's plan, it is the entire
ethos of Project twenty twenty five to dismantle the administrative state,
to shrink the federal government, to create a kind of
more autocrat friendly federalism. So one of the things that
(01:57):
I think Democrats have done, which is really smart, is
even thought was Centatip proved last time, and so he
does have a certain kind this is not his first rodeo, right,
There is a sense in which sometimes set people who
have already been confirmed are sort of thought as to
be a sort of no brainer. And what Democrats did
(02:17):
was they filibustered him. So he will in fact get
confirmed because they are only forty seven Democrats in the
Senate fifty three Republicans, so they don't have the votes
to prevent him, but they were able to make it
clear and so much of this, and I don't know
that we talk about this enough. So much of this
is a war of trying to as Chris Hayes who
(02:41):
just wrote this book about attention, so much of this
is about getting attention. So what Democrats are doing here
is trying to message at Russ Vott is very much
not the norm and that this is a departure from
typical Republican businesses usual politics. And I think we're going
to see this play out more. I think it's smart
(03:01):
they spoke out against him during the roll call, during speeches,
and you know we're seeing that at the state level.
And of course, our friend who will be on this
podcast very soon, Sheldon Whitehouse, said I vote against creepy
billionaire influence and he cast his vote. So good to
see Democrats doing this. Look, they don't have a huge
(03:22):
menu of options, so they're doing what they can.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Yeah. Well, every so often in the news cycle we're
introduced to a new turn of phrase that well is
worse and worse and worse by the day. And the
one that I learned yesterday was I was racist before
it was cool, which was said by one of Musk's
doge teenagers who was fired by Doge after they found
out about all his racist tweets. But there's some more
(03:46):
revelations about this fellow that are not good.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
Yeah, So I mean he actually was fired than he
was re hired because of a Twitter poll. By the way,
Elon does these Twitter polls, and then if they don't
say what he wants, he doesn't carry just keeps going,
which I think is.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Was going to step down from Twitter because Twitter pool.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
That's right. So there are two different Doge employees who
have now captured the zeitgeist. One is the one who
said that he was racist against Indians. Before it was
cool to be racist against Indians. It's never been cool
to be racist against anyone, so I think we can.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
I think he actually just said racist, not racist to Indians.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Okay, So anyway, that was one of them. And then
the other one. We have this really good reporting from
everybody's favorite at Bloomberg, which is that Musk's Doge team
was fired by cybersecurity firm for leaking company secrets. That
guy is in the federal government, the federal payment system.
(04:46):
Think about that for a second. Edward has been terminated
for leaking internal information to competitors in a June twenty
twenty two message from an executive of the firm. So, uh,
you know, these are two of Elon's crew. It's really
something to think about here, that these are the people
(05:07):
who are being put it in these jobs, are not
actually really the people who should be in these jobs.
That this is not how any of this is supposed
to work. So unsurprising, still disturbing, and that is where
we are.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
I think it's even more disturbing that one of the
reasons we know this is because he bragged about it
in discord shots for Cloud.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Well they're young.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Yeah, yeah, I'm stupid.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
And in our federal government's computer systems.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
I really appreciate too that jd Vance came to defend
that these racist remarks are not worthy of firing.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
Yeah, I mean there you go. I mean, look, this
whole sand castle is built on the idea that it's
okay to be that. So it's not surprising to me
that he was re hired despite what would otherwise. And remember,
like in normal life, in the real world, all these
(06:06):
people would have been fired, right, there's no you know,
we would have been fired. I mean, this is just
this is we've we're in Bizarro world here.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Yeah, the I of DEI is really doing a lot
of work in this administration.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
And better news, a judge has paused Trump's plan to
put USAID staff on leave.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
The good news about everything being legal?
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Is that what a phrase?
Speaker 1 (06:33):
But it's true, you know, is that when it's illegal,
the court stop it. So again, does that mean that
we are sanguine? We are very worried about American democracy
as well. We should be. But basically, lawyers and groups
like sky Perriman's group Democracy Forward are pursuing legal action
(06:56):
against each one of these illegal things. And what's happening
is they're working their way through the courts, and the
courts are saying, no, you can't fucking fire everyone in
a federal agency because you feel like it. What Elon
has been doing is going through all of the newspapers
and magazines that these federal agencies are charging on their
work accounts. And when it comes to Politico, you know,
(07:20):
woke Politico, which is mostly just tracks federal government, you know, process,
and in fact, the more expensive version of Politico, the
pay political keeps track of sort of bills that pass
and Senate phone numbers. I mean, it's not exactly like
woke indoctrination. But remember, so much of this is projection,
(07:44):
not all of this is actually you know, much of
this is showmanship. So anyway, a lot of this is illegal.
It's going through the courts. These people are going to ultimately,
you know, they're going to be injunctions. They're not going
to be fire Already, they know that Elon and Trump
(08:04):
that much of the stuff they're trying to do is illegal,
and so we're going to see more and more of that.
I just want to point out that what you're seeing
as Trump and Elon really squandering their credibility. And you know,
you think of credibility as maybe how credible are any
of these people, but actually squandering your credibility means that
(08:25):
when they fire people, the people just won't leave. And
that's what we're going to see more and more of.
Pret Bararra is a former US attorney for the Southern
District of New York and the host of Stay Tuned
with Welcome back to Fast Politics, Breed.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
Good to be here.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
We're just galloping along, as you said when you got
here a minute ago, fast, very fast, till every minute
of every day when I am reading the New York
times or watching cable news, or are watching c SPAN.
I spend a lot of time watching c SPAN. I
think to myself, it's not legal, is it? That can't possibly?
(09:07):
I mean, besides being a constitutional crisis. So how much
illegal stuff is going on right now? One hundred percent?
Eighty percent?
Speaker 4 (09:16):
I don't know what the denominator is because, like you,
I feel overwhelmed.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
I'm submerged by all this stuff. You know.
Speaker 4 (09:23):
Part of my professional job is to pay attention to
these things and digest them and think about them and
then talk about them on my own podcasts and with
you and with others. And if I have trouble keeping up,
then what chance does the general public have in keeping up?
Speaker 3 (09:37):
But I think I think a lot of it which
is by design.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
Yeah, a lot of it is unlawful and will be
adjudicated to be unlawful, you know, just just right off
the top. If you think the effort to end birthright
citizenship that's been blocked, I think by two different judges.
This whole other caper about freezing federal funds in a
way that was ambiguous and unclear and counterproductive, that's been blocked.
The buyout plan to try to reduce the ranks of
(10:01):
federal workers that's been blocked. You know, all these things
will be litigated, some will be one, some will be lost.
But there's going to be a lot of litigation and
a lot of fighting in a lot of courts.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
But right now, well these fights are going on, and
Donald Trump is musking about Trump Tower and Gaza. We're
seeing and I don't mean to be craven, you know,
with his talk about the Middle East is particularly offensive
for any number of reasons. But I'm just wondering if
you could explain Elon Musk and a number of teenagers
(10:35):
or maybe early twenty year olds who have dupious backgrounds
are in all of the computer systems in the federal
government making them do something? Is that legal? That seems
really dicey to may Well.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
There has been reporting that suggests that a lot of
Trump allies on the Republican side have been voicing precisely
that concern, have been saying behind the scenes, there's a
lot of stuff going on here. There's a lot of
stuff that the doge is doing. Even if we agree,
I mean, I think a lot of people on the
Democratic side too, can agree with the general premise that
parts of government are bloated and the waste, fraud, and
abuse should be cut out. There's a way to do it,
(11:13):
and there's a way not to do it, and I
think you're going to see a lot of suits in
that regards. Well, look, usaid it's a statutorially created entity
of significant size, which is why maybe it's a target
and significant value as suggested by lots of people, including
Lindsay Graham and Marco Rubio and a whole host of
other people. And the idea that you know, a few
(11:34):
folks who are not particularly accountable or accountable at all
are going to dismantle a ten billion dollar agency runs
a foul of how we think effective government should work.
But also laws that I think you're going to see
a lot of fights there there too.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
You know.
Speaker 4 (11:48):
The other way I think about this is on the
optimistic side, is this flood the zone strategy with respect
to executive orders and the DOGE and the memos that
have been issued by the newly minted Attorney General Pam
BONDI is I wonder if I'm not a huge box
of okay, well good, So maybe you can tell me
if this this is valid or not that maybe it's
(12:10):
the sort of involuntary ropodope strategy. I'm the part of
the Democrats that at some point, I don't know if
this is true or not, but I'm trying to look
for silver linings that the Trump administration will so overextend
and exhaust itself with EO after EEO after EO and
memo after memo and changing things and eliminating things and
dismantling things by fiat, that they will be so roiled
(12:33):
up in litigation and fights both with the other side
and within their own side, that they tire themselves out
and ends up being not a good strategy because it
was not particularly well thought out. Look, you know, separate
apart from the legal defeats that some of these moves
have suffered at the hands of courts, there have been
withdrawals of some of these things on Trump's own part right,
(12:56):
because they don't think these things. They don't think these
things out. They have a blunder bus approach, and they
say this is bad, so we're going to eliminate all
of this. But they don't define what this is. And
the example I keep coming back to is in the
first term, in the first week, they issued this broad
and sweeping so called Muslim band, but they didn't distinguish
between who was allowed to come back and who wasn't,
who's allowed entry and who wasn't. And there was this
(13:17):
huge question for a while because they hadn't addressed the
issue of whether or not Green card holders were included
or excluded, right, And that keeps happening with these guys
because they value speed over accuracy and fairness, No.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
For sure, And I mean that's what we're seeing here
is we see them making a lot of mistakes because
they're moving too quickly and because they don't ultimately have
an ethos, you know, except move fast and break things
that are not theirs to break. Really, I'm glad you're
being optimistic because I often try to figure out there's
(13:50):
some some place for optimism in this whole catastrophe. So
I'm wondering, you know, it definitely seems like the courts
are going to say you can't do this stuff. Now
here's my question. When the courts say you can't do
this stuff, you could definitely see Maybe I don't know
who will be the first in Trump world to ignore
the courts. My guess is that Russ Vott is going
(14:13):
to be high on that list because he has done
it before, right and Trump one point zero he refused
to release the money, and for Ukraine he messed around
with impounding the funds. So I'm wondering with the funds
that were impounded releasing them. So I'm wondering if you
what make me feel better about what happens when they
(14:36):
ignore the law.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
Well, so far, and one of your student listeners will
correct me and us if I'm wrong. There's been a
defiance of law and clear interpretations of law. There is
defiance and a breach of the law related to Inspectors General.
That's one item I didn't take off my earlier list
because there's clearly a requirement that you must give thirty
days notice to Congress and an explanation as to why
(14:58):
you're taking that action against people are supposed to be
independent and above and beyond.
Speaker 3 (15:01):
And outside of politics.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
There has not been that I can think of, a
court order or injunction sustained all the way to the
Supreme Court that the Trump administration has said, f you,
we're not going to do it. That would be that
would be a real, real crisis. And my optimism is
and I don't know how well founded it is is
that we haven't seen that kind of absolutely clear, concrete,
(15:24):
deliberate direct defiance at a court order, vetted all the
way to the top, and I hope never to see it.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
I love that I'll take that to the bank.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
I wouldn't.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
I don't know. I don't know which bank will that deposit.
But hopefully that's the case. Look, it still happens to
be true that the Trump folks, you know, for sure,
at least at this point, but even you know, definitionally
autocratic societies. I've had this conversation with Gary Kasparrow on
a number of occasions, and wonder White is Putin is
basically a dictator, and you have them in other parts
of the world, and they can do whatever they want,
(15:55):
and they're acknowledged to have the authority to do whatever
they want. They revel in their dictator status. And yet
even they seek, you know, even as they break the law,
they seek to cloak themselves in legality and in constitutionality
and in norms, and they're always trying to defend what
they're doing, even as they imprison people like Alexi Navalni.
Now it may be all bullshit and a sham. There's
(16:17):
still something that autocrats are fretful about if they're overly seen, overly,
dramatically and directly defying the rule of law, even though
it happens all the time.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
If that makes any sense.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
Yes, exactly. I would love if we're going to just
be anxious here and talk about Gary kasprov what do
we think. It strikes me that, like the worst case scenario,
and a lot of people who are very smart, who
I know, who I'm friends with, I have a lot
of anxiety about America turning into Russia. That is not,
(16:51):
in my mind, I think a likely scenario for any
number of reasons. And it sounds like you also believe that.
And I'm wondering if you could sort of make me
feel better because I'm very stressed out. Thank you.
Speaker 4 (17:07):
So there are other defenses, not the ones that we
normally think about. Separate from the courts and separate from Congress,
which has been basically supine. Hope springs eternal. That Congress
and the Senate and Center Republicans in particular will say,
you know, hey, we created this thing by statute, you
can't take it away by fiat, or hey, you know,
this is a totally unqualified person for this very important,
(17:27):
sensitive cabinet position. We can't do that, you know, at
any moment. I'm not holding my breath. That can happen
if there's the thing that has long been predicted and
has never come to pass, that Trump and his cronies
over extend to such an extent that people other than
Lisa Rakowski and now Mitch McConnell, you know, stand in
their way. So you know, there is that structural check.
(17:49):
There's also the courts, and the courts don't always decide
it was all Trump. But separate from that, there's other
things like public sentiment, and it is true, not often,
certainly not always, public sentiment when it is overwhelmingly negative
about something causes the Trump folks to change course. That
happened when you had separations of children from their parents
in the last term. And there's yet another thing, by
(18:10):
the way, you know, we haven't talked about tariffs yet.
There's all this controversy and pretty much consensus with respect
to anyone who's intelligent about economics about the inflationary pressure
the tariffs would cause. In particular, not just inflationary pressure,
but other diplomatic fiascos and ruination of our allies and
relationships with our allies with Canada and Mexico. On the
(18:32):
day that those tariffs were going to go into effect, well,
I don't know if you call it the fifth branch
of government for Donald Trump, but the stock market began
to tank, right, That.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Really is the fifth branch of government for Donald Trump. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (18:43):
Yeah, it's like it's like there's the executive, there's the judiciary,
there's the legislative, and then there's the now with the Nasdaq.
That wouldn't give a lot of political scientists and political
theorists a lot of comfort. But it's not like there
are not things that give Trump pause. There are, and
maybe in combination and when when you know, stitch together
shrewdly by Democrats, although I don't see that.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Ahead of yourself. Their breaks at the moment together shrewdly, yes.
Speaker 4 (19:13):
Stitch together truly rudely. Maybe something can happen. You just
don't know. I mean, some people are saying, look again,
it's only it's been five minutes.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
No, I know, it feels like it's been.
Speaker 4 (19:23):
Five minutes nineteen days and it takes some time.
Speaker 1 (19:25):
But when people listen this, it'll be twenty one days continue, yes,
or twenty days or whatever.
Speaker 4 (19:30):
It's also the case because of the incompetence of these
guys in so many areas and their lack of care
in vetting and doing so many other things. This is
not a great and most shrewd strategy, but I'm quite
confident that there will be overreaches of such significance and
opposition that there's going to be a straw that breaks
the camel's back with respect to at least one or
(19:52):
more of these things. It's just going to happen because
because you just can't move. I used a terrible analogy
on the podcast with Joyce fans Insider Fansider podcast.
Speaker 1 (20:01):
Yes, tell me about cafe and now I'm just kidding, actually,
joy Yeah, Joyce Fancy is really one of the great
So anyway, yes.
Speaker 4 (20:10):
He's terrific, and she was polite enough not to laugh
at my metaphor. But even if it's the case that
you find yourself in an inopportune place at the bottom
of the sea somewhere, or deep diving, and there's some
menacing fish or you know, a whale or a shark
or some you know some other thing and you need
to get up to the surface for safety, you can't
(20:30):
just rush up to the surface.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Because of this thing called the bends.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
You will dive, you know, either an equally quick or
quicker death if you rush to the top. So that's
my lame analogy in nature of the need to even
if there's some cause to fix something or do something differently.
You know, slowfulness is not good, and government often moves
too slowly. But doing this at too great a speed
can do more injury than good.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yeah, no, I mean obviously, but it is interesting to me,
like we'll watch this sort of lawlessness and the zeal right,
the delight at disassembling things like USA and the EPA,
and this sort of regit the federal government. And I wonder,
(21:14):
you know, as someone who it's so you know, to
me in my own personal history, right, I had a
grandfather who was jailed by Republican Congress, I mean for
his opinions, for refusing to name names. I wonder in
your mind, like the rage that these people have towards
the federal government. I mean, is I think about their
(21:35):
fury towards the Federal Bureau of Investigations, which is, you know,
has it ever had a head who was not a
white Republican man.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
Not in memory, not in recent times, right.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
I mean, what do you? I mean? It feels like
these people have gone through a blender.
Speaker 4 (21:50):
It's amazing how they have the ability to maintain and
maybe it's like a higher order intelligence to be able
to maintain such cognitive dissonance. And say, on the one hand,
you support the blue, you support law enforcement, and on
the other hand not only support full pardons and commutations
for people who are seen in black and white to
be beating and assaulting officers, but also now to be
(22:14):
cheering the idea that the prosecutors who in good faith
pursued those investigations and prosecutions god in open court convictions
either by guilty plea or by guilty verdict upheld by
judges appointed by both Democrats and Republicans, some are many
appointed by Trump himself. They should be investigated and punished
for doing their jobs. How you keep that in equipoised
(22:35):
with the idea that you're pro law enforcement. I don't
even understand. So I don't know if it's people who
think that way are geniuses or imbeciles, but it's not
something in between.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
Yes, it's very haphazard, and I think the good news
is that we're seeing the court say you can't do that,
and someday we may see Republicans in Congress do the same,
but we may not. Right, not necessarily necessary, right, I
guess terrifyingly.
Speaker 4 (23:04):
I think part of the explanation is nobody cares about
process anymore, whether it's due process or something else. And
that's how you can have these competing ideas that should
give any normal person cognitive dissonance in your head. It's
not that anyone is pro police, pro law enforcement, or
anti law enforcement. You're pro law enforcement when they go
after the people you don't like, and you're anti law
enforcement when they go after the people you do to like. Right,
(23:26):
So it's all outcome determinative. So you know, if a
senator votes, you know, for Trump on something, whether it's
on principle or not, that's a good senator. That's a
good Republican. If senator does not, that senator should be primary,
even if it is on principle.
Speaker 3 (23:40):
Right.
Speaker 4 (23:41):
So, this idea of being pro trade or anti tariff,
or pro First Amendment or anti First Amendment or pro
or con anything one enforcement or otherwise, those things don't
matter anymore. It's all about whether or not it was
your team or not. It's become you know, as many
many many other people have noted before me, tribal and
(24:01):
almost like a blood sport.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
But it's also just filthy to trump. The nuances of
it don't matter, it's if you are our guy or not.
I do think though, what you're saying about legality makes
me feel a little better. You know, this is just
the barrage of news and knowing that there is some
sort of larger principle, you know, legal principles in this
(24:25):
country still is probably a very good thing.
Speaker 4 (24:27):
So yeah, it's not enough because the damage. You know,
you asked before, why are they doing these things? They
know what the legal shot is on some of these things, right,
but like still, for example, the thing that I find
almost the most upsetting in the farious which is the
issuance of questionnaires to thousands of FBI agents to see
if they touch.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Which smacks of McCarthyism. I mean really it is.
Speaker 4 (24:48):
Yeah, of all the things, right, and you know, at
the end of the day, they're protected by civil service
laws and maybe they'll be vindicated, but in the interim
and probably for a long time, any agent going forward, Democrat, Republican, nonpartisan, neutral, independent, whatever.
When presented with the option of opening up an investigation
(25:09):
or pursuing a lead, or joining an effort to look
into potential malfeasance on the part of anybody in the
country who has some arguable connection to Trump or Trump's family,
or Trump's cabinet or Trump's government or Trump's business interests,
has to think fricking twice. If I do this, is
someday someone going to take my livelihood away?
Speaker 1 (25:30):
Well that's the goal.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
Yeah, And so the extraordinary chilling effect it has on
people who are just people, just human beings. To make
sure they're doing the right thing and taking care of
their family and putting food on the table, do they
have to think twice? Now, Well, maybe I'll go do
the surveillance, Maybe I'll go knock on that door, maybe
I'll serve the subpoena. But let me first do the calculation.
Will it offend anyone in the current regime, Because then ultimately,
(25:54):
maybe I will be fired, maybe I will be prosecuted,
maybe my pension will be taken away from me. And
that message has been delivered, whatever happens with respect to
the legal question.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
Pre thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3 (26:05):
Thanks Molly.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
Molly White writes the newsletter citation needed. Welcome back to
Fast Politics, Molly White, thank you for having me so
I feel like you have absolutely the right background to
cover where we are because it's the intersection of tech
and crypto and everything nefarious of the last hundred years discuss.
Speaker 5 (26:32):
Yeah, it's been a weird sort of coming together of
the tech worlds and the crypto world and the political
worlds in the last couple of years, and certainly in
the last week or so, we've seen that really ramping up.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
So let's talk about it. Your beat was originally in
the world whenever, you know, in the time when everything
was normal, Your beat started as crypto.
Speaker 5 (26:57):
Right right, Yeah. I started writing about crypto in twenty
twenty one or so, and I still write a lot
about crypto, but a little more broad these days as well.
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Why don't we talk first about how crypto got in
bed with Trump during the campaign, Because Donald Trump is
seventy eight years old, Crypto is not his de facto
and in fact, early or on in his first presidency
he thought crypto was a scam, right, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (27:23):
He made a really big change in his stance on
crypto this time around, largely thanks to the cryptocurrency industry's influence,
which has really increased over the handful of years since
his former presidency.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
So what changed his heart and mind.
Speaker 5 (27:39):
I think a lot of things really went into it.
I think part of it was his own personal success
in his crypto grifting, where he launched some NFT projects
and he was selling bitcoin themed sneakers and you know,
he was able to make some money off of it,
and he realized it could be lucrative for him. But
I think the bigger thing is that the crypto industry
(27:59):
has made itself an influential voice in politics, and they
were heavily involved in the twenty twenty four election cycle,
mostly at the congressional level in terms of where they
were spending money, but they were very much trying to
make crypto a focus of the election, something that politicians
needed to talk about, and they were swinging around huge
(28:20):
amounts of money to get everyone's attention.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
So this is the heartwarming story of lobbying.
Speaker 5 (28:28):
The tail is all this time, Yes it is.
Speaker 1 (28:31):
And they just figured out how to get in front
of the right lobbyist.
Speaker 5 (28:34):
I think that's true. But you know, crypto really emerged
on the scene as its own political force in sort
of an unheard of way this time around. I mean,
the crypto industry spent over one hundred million dollars on
congressional races in twenty twenty four alone, And you know,
compared to the size of the cryptocurrency industry, which itself
(28:56):
is very small, that was a shocking amount of money.
I mean they were rival big oil, big pharma, you know,
the typical lobbying powers. Suddenly crypto was up there in
the spending. I mean they were I think their super
pack was like number four, number five in the top
the list of super packs by the amounts that they
(29:16):
had raised, behind only like the Trump super packs and
the Senate and congressional super packs. So they were a
huge force in terms of spending this past cycle.
Speaker 1 (29:26):
So they figured out how to spend, they lobbied, they
got Trump on board, and now they are sort of
one of the biggest pieces of the Trump coalition. Is
that right?
Speaker 5 (29:40):
Absolutely? And I mean there's a fair bit of overlap
between crypto interests and the broader Silicon Valley tech interests
that we're seeing in Congress then sort of mulling around
the White House. So for example, Andresen Horowitz has a
number of their partners taking major roles at the White
(30:01):
House in advisory positions and so on, and they've been
investing in crypto and evangelizing crypto for a number of
years now. You know, David Sachs is the new AI
and crypto zar at the White House, and he obviously
has massive interest in both the crypto world and in
the tech world beyond. And I think altogether those people
(30:25):
have become their own sort of force in the White
House now, both officially and unofficially.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
So you got the crypto lobby, then you have the
tech pros run wild in this admin and that is
Elon's crew is basically David Sacks. Do you think of
these people as all the same entity and what are
the entities and how do they interact with each other?
Speaker 5 (30:52):
They're certainly very related entities, if they're not all the
same entities, but they do come from sort of similar backgrounds.
You know, David's and Elon Musk are both part of
the sort of PayPal mafia, which is, you know a
group of sort of early tech people who have been
you know, a lot of them got their start at
PayPal but have since become very influential in the Silicon
(31:14):
Valley world. Peter Thiel is another major member, and he
obviously has major political influence of his own. You know,
all of the andresen Horoitz people who are now installed
in positions of power Congress, people who themselves have not
only support from these interests, but often backgrounds in those
(31:35):
areas themselves. And so I think we now have this
massive influence from the tech oligarchy honestly in the White
House right now, which is quite shocking to see. I mean,
the tech industry has always, you know, tried to exert
power in the White House. I don't want to claim
that this is somehow a new phenomenon that you know,
(31:57):
did not happen during you know, the oba of years
and things like that, but it was never so overt,
and it was never so extreme in terms of the
direct influence and access of these high powered, enormously wealthy
people to push their own interests and to influence the
(32:18):
direction of the government in ways that will benefit them
personally and their businesses as well.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
There are a lot of conflicts of interest here. I mean,
that is the number one thing what I want you
to talk us through because I feel like you really
have an insight on this, which is interesting and different
than a lot of other journalists. I'm wondering if you
could talk us through what you think Elon Musk is
doing right now in the federal government. And maybe it
(32:44):
is what he's saying he's doing, and that's fine too,
And if you want to explain that to us, that
would be great. And if you think it's something else,
please explain that.
Speaker 4 (32:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (32:53):
I mean, it's obviously a little hard to know because
he has cut off so much access into what is
going on on Congress people even haven't been able to
get access to sort of observe what he's doing. But
you know, he has inserted himself in portions of the government,
you know, including the Treasury Department. You know, he's becoming
(33:14):
involved in you know, looking at data at various aid
agencies and other government agencies, and he's claiming that he
is slashing everything spending. How would he do that, Well,
that's sort of the question, because we're seeing some people
claim that he does not have access or the ability
to do that. So the Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessant, who
(33:36):
has just confirmed, has claimed that Musk and his team
only have read only access. But we're simultaneously seeing reporting
that his team of very young programmers are making changes
to code bases that control federal payments and that they
are stopping payments to basically various line items in these
(33:57):
federal agencies books. They're stopping those payments, And so we're
getting conflicting information around, you know, whether or not he
is simply reviewing the data versus actually making changes. But
you know, it seems that he is trying to pursue
sort of a similar approach as he took when he
took over Twitter, which was to come in and basically
(34:18):
fire everybody and slash the entire operation down to its
variess bones, you know, either by forcing people to leave
or firing them directly, and you know, creating chaos in
a way that is much more higher stakes than it
was when he was taking over a private social media company.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
So do you think that that is what's happening though, right,
because like he's offering biads, we don't know if they're real, right,
he sent the fork in the road letder to people.
I mean, do you think that any of this is
actually like how much of this is perception? How much
of this is reality.
Speaker 5 (34:55):
It's again hard to say, I think, with especially with
so little transparency to what's happening, which is quite ironic
given Musk's claims to want transparency, you know, and to
be pursuing transparency, we're simultaneously seeing him shutting access down
to potential outside overseers to you know, there was reporting
(35:16):
out of four A four media saying that they were
attempting to change their interpersonal communications so that they couldn't
be foid and so it's really hard to say, but
you know, we are seeing widespread layoffs at federal agencies,
you know, attempts to slash funding which are getting hung
up in the court somewhat, but certainly you know, are
(35:38):
being attempted. And we know that Musk has access to
incredibly sensitive data and systems, and you know, whether or
not he's making changes or the extent of those changes
is I think what remains to be seen.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
The thing is he doesn't have the authority to do
any of this all correctly. He has no congressional authority,
he doesn't work in the Festal government. All of this
is not constitutional. It's possibly illegal. You know. It's sort
of like me saying I am the czar of Palm
Springs and going and making citizens arrest. So, I mean,
(36:15):
it works until it doesn't, right, Right.
Speaker 5 (36:18):
I mean, I think there are a lot of very
legitimate challenges to what Musk is doing in terms of
his status as a federal employee. If he's actually a
federal employee, then is he you know, subject to federal
laws around you know, who's allowed to have access and
requirements for security clearance and ethics rules and conflict of
(36:39):
interest rules. You know, is he someone who should be
subject to congressional review? So I think there are a
lot of avenues through which people can challenge this in
the courts, and you know, Congress can challenge this. But
the problem is that you know, someone needs to actually
step in and stop him from accessing these systems, and
that as of yet, has not happened. And so unless
(37:03):
you know, people are perfectly able to do illegal things,
you know, just because something is illegal doesn't mean it's impossible.
And so it is the actual enforcement of that law,
and you know, people in Congress, in the courts, you know,
getting the courage to actually do something about it that
I think is going to be critical in the coming days.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
Right, And that is a real question that has no
answer really, So I wonder if you are at least
not yet, I wonder if you could talk to us
about what is Elon Musk's goal.
Speaker 5 (37:37):
Well, I think some of it is, you know, chaos.
I think he enjoys the power of, you know, having
the federal government sort of in his control. And I
think a lot of it is money. You know, he
has very lucrative federal contracts. He now potentially has the
ability to control the competition in those contracts or to
(38:01):
allocate additional contracts. He I think is also pursuing a
similar approach as some of the tech and crypto people,
where he is attempting to use this power to stop
anything in the way of doing what he might want
to be doing. So, for example, there are numerous ongoing
lawsuits and investigations and probes into his multiple companies and
(38:24):
to him himself personally that he I think would be
very interested in stopping. Certainly, we've seen that more broadly
with the tech companies who are hoping to see the
end of some of the antitrust actions that were happening
under Biden. The crypto industry. Pretty much every donor from
the crypto industry has open lawsuits against them from the
(38:45):
SEC or various other oversight agencies, and so I think
a lot of it is about pulling back any oversight
or challenge to the monopoly and to the business interests
of these companies and allowing them to extract even more
wealth from you know, everyday people via their operations that
(39:06):
you know, might otherwise be considered to be against consumer
protection laws or other various financial laws, or through these
federal contracts which can be extremely lucrative.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Right, So you think that's really the ply is just
to avoid scrutinay, avoid prosecution.
Speaker 5 (39:24):
I think that's a big part of it. I think
also it's very clear at this point that Elon Musk
and several others have very strong political interests of their
own and political agendas that they are trying to pursue
that are very very extreme.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
Tax cuts for billionaires too.
Speaker 5 (39:42):
Well, certainly that yes, but there's also the very sort
of right wing social end of it, where you know,
these are people who have been railing against trans people
and diversity inclusion programming and all of these types of things,
and they've all been very clear about making those primary
(40:02):
targets of their operations in the White House these days
as well.
Speaker 1 (40:07):
Right exactly, I'm wondering if you could just talk us
through where using this goes.
Speaker 5 (40:12):
It's really hard to say. I mean, it's it's hard
to see where this is going. I think, you know,
we're in a very uncertain time right now. I am
hoping that there will be widespread resistance both from elected officials,
from you know, government employees, from those in the judiciary
who are willing to, you know, defend what this country
(40:35):
is really supposed to be about, and you know, the
idea that there needs to be separation of powers and
a democratic government and all of that, and then certainly
resistance from you know, everyday people, the refusal to abide
by these attacks on American people and those you know
within America and outside, and you know, the attacks on
(40:58):
freedom of the press, freedom of speed, each freedom of expression,
all of these very core fundamental freedoms. And I think
we're at a really critical moment right now.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
Yeah. I know how we got here, but also I
don't know how we got here, if that makes any sense.
Speaker 5 (41:12):
Right. Somehow we've all seen this coming, and yet we
are all shocked to watch it happen.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
Right, Yeah, I mean, it just is incredible, and not
incredible like incredible sunset, but incredible, like you know, watching
nuclear tests. I'm wondering if you could just for a
minute give us some reason to not be completely catastrophic
about those. This is where we get into therapy for me.
Speaker 5 (41:39):
Yeah, I mean, I do you know, see those resistance
moments happening? You know, I think that it feels a
little bit like nothing's happening and like no one's doing
anything and that we're not seeing anything and everyone's just
sort of going about their lives. But I think that,
you know, that is something that is perhaps true if
you look at the front ages of some of the
(42:00):
biggest newspapers. But if you dig a little bit deeper,
you know, away from these media outlets that are run
by people who have been you know, kissing up to
Trump honestly and who are probably not terribly inclined to
report on these types of things, you actually see a
fair bit of resistance happening. There have been major protests
about various different topics, from you know, transgender healthcare bands
(42:23):
to immigration enforcement changes to the shutdown of federal agencies
across the country. We've seen you know, various lawmakers proposing
legislation or making statements that suggest that they are working
to fight back. In Congress, They've already been numerous lawsuits
challenging executive orders and the slashing of federal government employees.
(42:47):
Various judges have already issued restraining orders in some of
those cases to stop some of the illegal orders that
have come out. So, you know, I think there are
people who are standing up to what is happening and
who are demanding more from the democratically elected people who
are supposed to be representing us. And it's just crucial
(43:08):
that everyone, you know, make sure that we are aware
of what's happening, supports the people who are doing these
types of things, and honestly demands that type of action
from our elected representatives.
Speaker 1 (43:20):
Molly White, thank you. I hope you'll come back.
Speaker 5 (43:23):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3 (43:26):
No moment perfectly.
Speaker 1 (43:31):
Jesse Cannon, my jung fast.
Speaker 2 (43:34):
Bad things are happening down in Texas an evergreen statement.
So Texas has removed one point seven million people from
their healthcare plans.
Speaker 1 (43:43):
Yeah, so this is like reverse Medicare expansion. Right. We
saw during the Biden administration that a lot of these
states expanded Medicare that this is the opposite of that. Look,
Texas is a place where the far right loves to experiment.
It's the state that repealed Roe v. Wade a year
(44:05):
before Moby Wade was repealed. We're going to see, I
think more stuff like this. Not surprising, but pretty interesting
and pretty disturbing. And look at the Republicans in Texas.
The Governor Abbott and the Attorneys General Paxton are very, very,
(44:27):
very emboldened, and they consider themselves to be at the
forefront of Republican politics. And so that you will see
them over the next couple of years do things that
are perhaps even more beyond the pale than even Trump
World perhaps. And so this is the beginning of this,
kicking people off Medicare and children's healthcare. And I think
(44:52):
you're going to see more and more of this. And
so keep an eye on Texas because it like a
bunch of other Republican read st day. It's like Tennessee
and Oklahoma. These states are laboratories for Republican anti democracy.
Speaker 2 (45:08):
One hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (45:11):
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear the best
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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