June 11, 2025 • 54 mins
Inside Elections’ Jacob Rubashkin examines his new report on how the House is shaping up for the midterms. Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries details the status of the Big Beautiful Bullshit Bill. Plus, we have a special bonus interview with L.A. Mayor Karen Bass on the status of Donald Trump unleashing chaos in her city.
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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 Trump threatens protesters who reign on
his military parade Saturday that they will be met with
big fours. We have a great show for you today.
Inside Elections, Jacob Lubashkin stops by to talk about his
(00:23):
new report on how the House is shaping up for
the midterms. Then we'll talk to Democratic House Leader Keem
Jeffries about the status of the phoebeb Big Bullshit Bill.
Plus we have a special bonus interview with Los Angeles
Mayor Karen Bass. But first the news.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
So Molly, like all things Trump, the planning just really
isn't their thing, you know, for people who had this
like Project twenty twenty five for like years before they
got in office. Everything they've done aside from that, the
planning is just, oh Jesus.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Not good.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
This crew is not good at planning. We have a
few protests in California, all of which were started by
ice cruelly kidnapping these people who were day laborers were
looking for work in the home depot parking lot. This
(01:21):
got Republicans very excited because they hate California and they
hate immigrants, so they deployed these troops to La. Now
here's the thing about La. La has a housing problem.
So here we have all these troops with nowhere to sleep.
And he said, you know these are so you have
National Guard troops that the governor did not call up, right,
(01:44):
So he's nationalized the California Guard. And then, because DoD
Secretary Pete Hegst has never seen a photo op he
doesn't want to get involved with, he sent seven hundred
active duty Marines. Now what are these marines going to do?
There aren't even seven hundred at least. I mean Sunday
they were a lot of protesters, but there aren't that
(02:04):
many protesters. So now you have four thousand National guardsmen,
seven hundred active duty Marines, all in central Los Angeles
and there's no place for them to sleep. There's no
setup for this, there's no planning for this. And Newsome
sensing the political opportunity, and he's right. It tweets out,
(02:28):
you set your troops here without fuel, food, water, a
place to sleep. Here they are being forced to sleep
on the floor. Now these images have gone viral. I
think it's smart for Democrats to do stuff like that.
That said, there definitely are Republicans who are saying and
in fact, the Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnow accused Newsom of
(02:50):
using the troops as political props. This is a little
ironic because these troops are actually there for political reasons,
not for actual war reasons. But there's a lot of
not to like about this scenario, right, And also I
think it's worth looking at the Pentagon comtroller that the
guy does the money. Byron MacDonald was on Tuesday and
(03:14):
he said that the cost of sending these National Guard
troops and marines would be about one hundred and thirty
four million dollars. That's money that could be spent on
building houses, feeding almost people. I mean, like the amount
of money that this administration spends on performative moronics is
pretty impressive, I have to say. And just we're very
(03:41):
very clear on that. This is all about, you know,
just creating an atmosphere where you can use all of it.
It's reality television, right, it's reality television. Trump thinks authoritarianism
works with the base. He is doing this. You'll remember
last week actually wrote a column about this. So in
order to plug my other gig. I'll just say I
(04:04):
wrote this column about how last week was actually a
really bad week for Trump. Elon was really crazy. This
is a guy he's given all our data to, which
is kind of scary, and that their relationship imploded. Trump
accused Elon of being a drug addict. Elon accused Trump
of being in the Epstein files, which is actually he
is in fact in the Epstein files. And then Trump
(04:27):
world lost a ton of different court cases in all
different ways, and then Trump's one piece of legislation is floundering.
So I do think there is a lot in Trump
World that he's unhappy with. And also you'll remember that
the trade war, we were promised ninety deals. In ninety days.
We have one framework of a deal, but we're seeing
that trade wars are going to be inflationary.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
So may someone who was involved with those was the
CEO of Gum Road Ach company. I used to use
what was it? They are a direct to consumer of
a relationship for creators. Would say, you put out your
book yourself, you could sell it to people directly. Okay,
So this person was very early to this idea. It's
now a very like oh yeah, duh idea. But when
(05:09):
they got to it fifteen sixteen years ago, no one
was doing it was a very innovative idea. Anyway, they
were amazed by how efficient the government was by taking
a look inside of it. And it's funny because I
have a couple group chats with people who work inside
the government, particularly in Washington, and they always were like,
I don't know what the fuck they're going to find.
We're already working with bare bodes, and some of what's
(05:31):
said here confirms just that.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Yeah, I mean so interesting in a lot of ways.
The whole idea of fraud raised interviews. They kept saying it.
But remember Elon had no government experience. He just didn't
understand what he was doing. So this was based on
like a weird belief that there was something that we
didn't have any evidence to support it. I mean, I'm
(05:54):
a little surprised that it was so efficient. I mean,
he says, I'm a little surprised because I thought that
some of the old computers. But he was surprised by
how efficient the government was. He was quietly dismissed publicly
after saying that, which I think is a really good
example of how they were using people to confirm their priors.
Abuse to me feels relatively non existent. This guy told MPR,
(06:17):
adding that what many ss waste is more about modernization
opportunities than mismanagement. I personally was surprised at actually how
efficient the government was. So this is a really good
example of how Elon wasn't transparent. Because if you were transparent,
you would take this person and say, oh wow, okay,
let's keep going with this, let's find you know, then
(06:39):
we're actually maybe we're not needed. But because they were
really this was about killing government programs that Elon didn't like.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Yeah, and speaking of doge, judges determined that OPM broke
the law with those access to data.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
Yeah. Look, Elon had before he got involved in politics,
he had all of these pending core cases. And do
you know why he had all these pending course cases
because he was doing stuff without making sure that it
was legal. So it should not be shocking that the government,
the fake government agency he created to do stuff he
(07:15):
wanted to do, broke the law.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
Yeah, I always go back to that. Peter Thiel told
the late David Graeber that their motto at PayPal was
to ask for forgiveness. Rather than permission, and this was
a perfect example of that. And it was their philosophy
literally almost thirty years ago, so it seems like it
still stayed there.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Yep, exactly exactly.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
So my the most horrifying news of the day I
saved for last, which is that RFK Junior removed all
the current members of the CDC Vaccine Advisory Committee.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Yeah, and he said he wasn't going to He said
he wasn't going to do it, So of course he
absolutely did it. His seventeen member Advisory Committee on Ammusation Practices,
which advises the Center for PC's Control and Prevention. Kennedy
writes an op ed in the Wall Street Journal Opinion, which,
by the way, has cooked up some of the most
(08:10):
brainworm ze takes. He says that he's going to remove
the entire panel. It's unprecedented. It may actually, like so
many things this administration does not be legal. But you know,
air pediatricians, etymologists, immunologists, and I'm telling you those are
(08:31):
not people that RFK Junior agrees with. So here we are,
ladies and gentlemen. Jacob Rabashkin is an analyst and reporter
for Inside Elections. Welcome to Fast Politics.
Speaker 4 (08:47):
Jacob, thank you so much for having me. It is
always a pleasure.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
So let's talk about you have new house race information pulling,
let's go, and also you have on the twenty twenty
five elections, so let's talk about all of it. What
does the landscape look like?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Yeah, let's let's get into it because there's so much
to talk about on the house race front. I really
think the battle for the House is the main event
of twenty twenty six. I mean, we can talk about
the Senate and it's really tough for Democrats there, but
like to the extent that there's a chance, a real
chance for a change in control of one of the houses.
It is the House of Representatives. And at the moment,
(09:27):
you know, Democrats are on offense right they've got the
wind at their back historically speaking, because this is a
midterm election, and the way that we see the battlefield
right now, you know we've got our ten toss up races,
our most competitive contests, seven of those held by Republicans,
just three held by Democrats. So already, you know, you
can see that Republicans have a little bit more vulnerability
(09:49):
than Democrats do. And so give me the seven the
seven Republicans who we see as toss up race.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Just give me them all the famous ones because we're
not going to know all them, So give me the
ones that we would have heard of, like David Valadeo.
Speaker 4 (10:04):
Interestingly enough, Valadeo we actually don't have as a toss up.
We think he'll be a little bit tougher to dislodge
for Democrats than some of these other guys. But so
this is Valdeo is a survivor.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
He's always on the red to Blue list every two
years because it's California. It's a district that's very swingy,
lots of Medicaid recipient all right, to go.
Speaker 4 (10:25):
On, Yeah, I mean, so the thing about Valadeo, right
is he's been this target for years and years, and
for a long time that was because he was in
a Democratic district. He was in a central valley district.
It's one of the poorest districts in the country. It
has one of the lowest levels of voter engagement. Fewer
people vote there than pretty much any other district in
America bar one or two. And what happened in twenty
(10:45):
twenty four was that the district swung really hard Republican
right so it went from being a seat that Biden
would have carried by ten points to one that Trump
won by five points, essentially a fifteen point swing from
twenty twenty to twenty twenty four. A lot to do
with shifts and Hispanic voting patterns. It's just going to
make things a little bit more difficult for Democrats, especially
(11:05):
because they don't have a candidate yet. They've got a
couple of people who are circling that race, but unlike
the last two cycles when they had their guy, Rudy
sallis a former state assemblyman who they've been trying to
get run for a decade, we don't know who the
nominee is going to be there, So Valdeo, I think
is going to be tougher.
Speaker 3 (11:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Can I just ask one question not to just focus
on this member of the House that nobody who's listening
to this podcast has any idea who he is. Don't
you think that the way that Trump is targeting these
Hispanic undocumented people and the way that he is deporting
people who are some of whom are actually documented, don't
(11:44):
you think ultimately that is going to hurt him in
the midterms with Hispanic voters.
Speaker 4 (11:49):
I think it's certainly possible. But you got to remember,
while the images that we're seeing come out, in the
stories that we're seeing come out in the last five
months have been particularly intense and particularly notable, Trump has
always had immigration as his number one issue. He's always
been more aggressive on immigration and more willing to you know,
paint people with a broader brush than other Republicans had
(12:12):
before Trump got along, and that hasn't stopped him from
improving among Hispanic voters every time that he's been on
the ballot. So I don't necessarily disagree, and I think,
you know, given what's going on in southern California right now,
there's tremendous potential for people's attitudes to change. But I
think Democrats have gotten caught in this trap over the
last eight years of you know, well, Trump says terrible
(12:34):
things about Mexicans, and he's cracking down on immigration, and
he's sending ice out into the streets like that's got
to win us back some votes, when in actuality, it
hasn't necessarily transpired that way.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Yes, Also, though one of the disconnects in the twenty
twenty four cycle was that you'd have voters waving mass
deportation now signs and you'd have other voters saying he's
not going to do that. We're seeing like this woman
who was Latino's for Trump now coming out against Trump.
I do think that they're actually seeing it happen. It's
(13:11):
much harder to say something isn't going to happen when
it's actually happening.
Speaker 4 (13:16):
Yeah, and that may well be the case. I think,
you know, we'd like to say that the worst time
to kind of assess the impact of an event as well,
it's still happening, and we're very much still happening right now.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Let's talk about the ten people. Go back to the
ten people. I get very distracted, but go back to
the ten people. Let's do it.
Speaker 4 (13:33):
No, absolutely, So, you know, Mike Lawler in New York
seventeen is probably the most prominent guy on this list.
You know, Juan Siscomanni in Arizona in the Tucson area,
Gabe Evans in Colorado, Marionette Miller Meeks in Iowa, Tom
Barrett in Michigan, Ryan McKenzie in Pennsylvania, and Jen Kiggins
(13:54):
in Virginia are the seven Republicans in the toss up races.
And then Adam Grat, the Democrat from California Central Valley,
Derek Tran from Orange County, and Don Davis from eastern
North Carolina, or the three Democrats we have rated as
toss up.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
So Mike Lawler is often on television. He's much more
of the sort of media friendly Republican who says one
thing but still votes very much with the party line.
Why is he on that list? I know it's because
it's a Democratic district, but I'm sure it's Is there
also a challenger and what does that look like?
Speaker 4 (14:31):
Oh gosh, Molly, if you want challengers to Mike Lawler,
you're in luck because there are I think seven Democrats
in the field already and more seem to be jumping
in by the day.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
This is one of these districts.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
It's really feaster or famine, and a lot of these
districts where like some places, nobody wants to run for Congress.
It's kind of crazy. Who would have thought no one
wants to go to Congress right now? But some places,
like New York seventeen, it's like the line is around
the block to get the Democratic nomination against Mike Lawler.
And that is because because well it's because of two things. First,
you know, it is a Democratic district, right it's one
(15:04):
of three districts in the country that voted for Kamala
Harris but also voted for a Republican in the House.
And then also a lot of people still think Lawler
is going to run for governor, so people want to
get in early. In the event that he runs for governor,
it's an open seat, it's a little easier to win,
and so we've seen this crush of candidates running against
him in that primary, and time will tell who's going
(15:26):
to win. I think Beth Davidson, who's a county legislator
up there, I believe from Rockland County, is to the
extent that there's a front runner, it's probably her. But
nobody knows who any of these people are in this
primary right now, and whoever wins is going to come
out with you know, twenty to maybe thirty percent of
the vote at most before taking on Lawler or another
(15:47):
Republican in the general election.
Speaker 5 (15:49):
Interesting, So let's talk about what.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
You're seeing from these two twenty twenty five gubernatorial races
that are right now. Primary voting is already happening. What
does it look like for you in Virginia and New Jersey.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
Yeah, voters are voting in New Jersey. It's exciting. This
is the first kind of really big contest of the
second Trump administration. A lot of questions are going to
get answered tonight, you know, on Tuesday night in this
Democratic primary, and then it's going to be a tough
general election competition.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Is it in New Jersey? I think so who's running
as the Republican?
Speaker 4 (16:26):
So the Republican the likely Republican nominee and maybe by
the time you know, people are listening to this, the
actual Republican nominee is a guy named Jack Chiarelli who
is a former state assemblyman. He was the Republican nominee
in twenty twenty one and he nearly won. He only
lost by like three points to Phil Murphy in a
race that a lot of people didn't see coming. And
he's back again.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
You know.
Speaker 4 (16:47):
He also ran for governor twenty seventeen. He's a known quantity.
He was in the state legislature for a while, and
he's got a reputation in state as a hard campaigner,
as a hard worker who gets along with people. And
I think, you know, we saw such shifts in New Jersey.
I mean New Jersey shifted more to the right than
I think any other state except New York in between
(17:08):
the twenty twenty and twenty twenty four presidential election. It's
given Republicans some hope here that they can capitalize on
voter sentiment about property taxes and some other local issues
and try and make it a real race. We still
think that, we think that Democrats are still favored here,
to be clear, but I don't think it's a done
deal by any stretch of the definition, that Democrats are
(17:31):
going to win this race. I think it's going to
take a lot of money and effort from whoever the
nominee is to hold on to New Jersey.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Let's talk about Virginia, because Virginia seems like a state
that has been deeply affected by Doe and talk to
us about that.
Speaker 4 (17:46):
Yeah, Virginia is a little bit more clear cut in
some ways because there are no primaries on either side
for governor. The Democratic nominee is going to be Abigail Spanberger,
the former congresswoman, former CIA officer, national security Democrat, very
prominent within the party, and the Republican nominee is going
to be the lieutenant governor wins some Seers, who has
her own following in the party, she would be the
(18:06):
first black woman ever to be a governor in America
if she wins. As you said, though, right, I mean,
Virginia has bore a lot of the brunt of the
first six months of the Trump administration in ways that
have caught Republicans, including Seers, a little bit off guard.
I think that she's made some unfortunate comments about, you know,
how everybody's you know, everybody's lost a job at some
(18:27):
point in their lives. You know, it's not all that
big a deal. She's really tried to downplay the effects
that the cuts in the federal government have had on Virginia,
and the Democrats have really tried to capitalize on that
kind of sentiment against her. I think that the Virginia
State Republican Party has also really been having a tough time.
(18:48):
I mean, Glenn Younkin kind of single handedly brought them
back from the brink in twenty twenty one through sheer
force of will and several million dollars out of his
own pocketbook. And I don't think has either the kind
of campaign prowess or the fundraising or self funding capability
that Younkin had. So she's dealing with this kind of
(19:08):
feud with her lieutenant governor candidate nominee running mate, and
she's struggling to raise money against span Burger, and she's
dealing with Trump not at the top of the ticket,
but just north of Virginia and DC right at the
top of the state, causing political issues for her in
a way that are going to make it a challenging
fight for Republicans come this fall.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Good. Good, let them suffer political consequences for firing all
those federal employees and dismantling our federal government. What else
are you seeing in these House rices talk us through
kind of where do you see opportunities that don't have
candidates yet? Where do you see candidates that are opening
up opportunities, etc.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
Yeah, So on the Democratic side, I mean, I think
everyone is well aware of the historical trend here. Right,
You've go back one hundred years and the party in
power always has a rough mid term in the House,
with only three exceptions, and those are the Great Depression
in nineteen thirty four, the Clinton impeachment in nineteen ninety eight,
and the aftermath of nine to eleven in two thousand
and two. Those are the only three times that the
(20:09):
president's party has picked up seats in the House in
the last one hundred years. So unless the situation, the
political situation next year resembles the Great Depression, the Clinton impeachment,
or the aftermath of nine to eleven, Republicans are probably
going to lose seats in the House. And so Democrats
have been champing at the bit to get into a
lot of these races. I mean, I'm looking at my
(20:30):
list of most competitive House races and you have to
go down pretty far before you find a district that
there's no Democratic candidate running in. Democrats have done a
good job of getting people into these races, perhaps even
too good a job because now they've got some primaries
on their hands that they weren't anticipating.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Would you talk about those primaries? Sorry, finish your thought
and then talk about the primaries.
Speaker 4 (20:53):
No, No, I think it's just on the flip side.
Republicans have been a little slower to get into some
of these races. There haven't been as any recruitment successes
so far. I mentioned Derek Tran in California forty five.
There's nobody running against him. Yet there's nobody running against
Dave Minn in California forty seven, Christa McDonald, Rivett and
Michigan eight. Republicans have not gotten candidates into all the
(21:16):
big races yet, whereas Democrats have at least somebody in
pretty much every race that we have at the center
of our battlefield.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Tell me about the people being primary because that, I
think is that the Democratic tea parties or is a
big one to talk to me.
Speaker 4 (21:31):
This is something that I think is just getting off
its feet, kind of comes and fits and starts, and
to be quite honest, I think that the races that
are going to surprise us most are the ones that
aren't on anyone's radar. That's kind of how it works.
The big line here is age.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Right.
Speaker 4 (21:44):
We have started to see Democrats talk much more openly
about age and the fact that their politicians are getting
older and older much more openly. And that is a
conversation that I think has sprung up in the wake
of Joe and obviously everything that happened in twenty twenty four,
(22:04):
and so we've seen younger Democrats try and make that
an issue in their primaries. Some of the more notable ones.
There's a congressman in Georgia named David Scott who has
been around for quite some time, and he is getting
up there in age. He's seventy nine, and there have
been some stories about his health challenges. He was recently
(22:26):
photographed in a wheelchair being wheeled into the Capitol and
he started yelling at the photographer asking him, you know
who gave you permission to take my picture? And his
staff was saying he was going to get the photographer
fired or disciplined. You know, he's already got two primary challengers,
both younger guys, politically active local office holders. Stenny Hoyer,
(22:46):
you know, one of the longtime Democratic leaders. He's got
a primary challenger that I think is maybe not as competitive,
but it's still the fact that anyone's running against him.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Right, it's a big sign.
Speaker 4 (22:56):
Is a sign. We saw jan Schakowski, who again you know,
this is about age and less so ideology. Schakowski is
you know, a liberal liance. She's been a leader in
the Democratic progressive movement for a very long time. She
represents a suburban Chicago district and she got a primary
challenge from Kataboogazela, who's a progressive influencer and media researcher,
(23:19):
and she ended up not running for election. She announced
that she wasn't going to seek another term, so she
kind of got pushed out of that race when it
became clear things were going to get dicey for her.
I really do think that age and kind of willingness
to fight, and those two are intertwined. Those two elements
are going to be the dividing line in these primaries
far more than ideology. You know, we're not in the
(23:43):
kind of AOC versus Joe Crawley era of like ideological
primaries anymore. We're in the energy and willingness to stand
up to Donald Trump era of the Democratic primary.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
Yeah, exactly. Aren't you seeing with this poland that the
base is still very angry at the Democratic Party? Is?
I know everywhere I go people want to stop me
and tell me how mad they are, So that feels
like a real time Yeah.
Speaker 4 (24:10):
No, I mean, certainly, the polling that we have in
the first you know, half of the first year of
the second Trump administration, I think I got that right,
would suggest that, you know, Democrats are unhappy with Democrats
in Congress, right, Republicans are happy with how their leaders
are doing. Democrats are unhappy with how their leaders are
handling themselves. That kind of hit a peak, I would say,
(24:32):
or you know, a maximum during the debate over keeping
the government open and when Chuck Schumer cut that deal
to keep the government open after saying he didn't have
the votes to cut a deal, and it became a
very you know, it was a very contentious moment in
intraparty politics. But I think it certainly still holds true
right now. Democrats are unhappy. They're in the wilderness, I mean,
(24:52):
and they have very little, if any power in DC,
and so there's not a whole lot that Democrats in
Congress can do to placate their base because they don't
have a lot of power, and I think that puts
them in a vulnerable position in some of these primaries
as they materialize. But you know, we have to see
how voters are feeling a year from now, which is
(25:14):
going to be more important than how they feel right now.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
Do you have any polling on sort of the couple
of first things Trump has done, like Doge? Like do
you give a polling on Doge? Do you see anything
you know what is not working for him? What is
working for him.
Speaker 4 (25:30):
As with all these things, it matters kind of how
you're asking the question and how you're thinking about these issues.
I mean, you mentioned dog in particular. Right, If you
ask people, do you believe that there's waste, fraud and
abuse in government? You're going to get a very positive result.
If you ask people, do you think it's a good
idea to increase government efficiency or to reduce waste, fraud
and abuse, You're still going to get a very positive result.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
If you ask.
Speaker 4 (25:53):
People, do you support what Elon Musk has done in
his time is at the federal government in cutting programs,
You're gonna get a much more negative result.
Speaker 6 (26:03):
Right.
Speaker 4 (26:03):
It does kind of depend how you frame it, you know,
I think generally speaking, right, like, Trump's popularity has dropped
since he got into office. He came in basically the
most popular that he's ever been when you know, he
took office in January, and since then he's seen his
approval rating fall down, you know, into negative territory and
(26:23):
stabilized kind of in the you know, mid forty approvals
and low fifty disapprovals. And that pretty much holds true
across most issues. I mean, economy, trade, inflation are some
of his worst right, which is new. That's different from
his first term when he was very strong on the economy.
(26:44):
But voters really didn't like the trade war stuff. They
really didn't like the tariffs. They responded very poorly to
the stock market tanking, They are not responding great to
the bond market looking shaky, and they really don't like
how Trump is handling the econom me. Immigration, right is
his best issue now and we kind of forget. But
(27:04):
back in the first term, immigration was his worst issue
by far. Voters really were not on board with Trump
on immigration policy in the first term. They really rejected it.
You know, you go back to twenty sixteen and people
you ask people about the wall, building the wall, and
the wall was getting like twenty five percent support and
pulling maybe thirty percent. And things have really improved for
(27:25):
Trump on the immigration picture overall. But from a perspective
of just this administration, even his support on immigration has
fallen a little bit since he took office. It's still
his best issue, but there's still a decrease there. And
you know, I think it fluctuates depending on what's in
the news. Right, So, when the Abrago Garcia case was
(27:45):
dominating the news cycle. Voters really didn't like that, and
Trump's approval on immigration took a big hit. And since
people have kind of moved on from that, we're not
talking about al Salvador anymore. You know, Abrego Garcia is back,
but everyone else who got sent there is still in
ol Salva Or. As voters kind of move on think
about other things, his immigration approval has rebounded a bit.
You know, we'll see how the situation in southern California
(28:08):
plays out. There was a poll out today from you
goov that said that voters disapproved of sending in the Marines,
sending in the National Guard by about a ten to
thirteen point margin. But we're talking like thirty five to
forty eight, right, We're not talking, you know, twenty five
seventy five disapproval. So I think voters are still kind
of figuring out, you know, they're like the rest of us.
(28:30):
They're just kind of chasing the latest thing that Trump
did and trying to understand it before he does something
else that totally shifts the news cycle in the narrative.
Thank you, Jacob, absolutely all. This This was a lot
of fun.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Hikeem Jeffries is the House Minority leader and represents New
York's eighth congressional district. Welcome Leader, Jeffries.
Speaker 3 (28:52):
Great to be with you.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
I just want you to get us up to speed.
The BBB made it through the House. We knew it
probably would, right because they do have the majority. It
is filled with stuff like you can't regulate AI for
ten years, a lot of crazy, crazy stuff, stuff to
limit judicial oversight, I mean, just not wildly unpopular. Cuts
(29:16):
to Medicaid food stamps also grows the deficit three trillion dollars.
Talk to me about what that passage was like in
the dead of night, et cetera.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
So the GOP tax scam is one big, ugly bill
that will hurt everyday Americans in order to reward their
billionaire donors. They're probably three important things to know about
the bill. And there are a whole hosts of other items,
as you indicated only that are highly problematic. But the
three things that I would mention at the top that
(29:46):
we battled against during markups throughout the month of May,
some of which went on for more than twenty four
consecutive hours, and then a marathon session before the Rules
Committee the day before the vote. We're more than a
hundred different Democrats showed up to testify. We introduced more
than five hundred different amendments, and under the leadership of
(30:07):
Jim McGovern, the top Democrat on the Rules Committee, really
pushed back aggressively against what Republicans are trying to jam
down the throats of the American people. And then of
course we had the floor vote and debate during the
dead of night. Why are Republicans trying to hide this
one big, ugly bill from the American people. One, it's
the largest cut to Medicaid and healthcare in American history.
(30:29):
More than sixteen million Americans will lose their health care.
Hospitals will close, nursing homes will shut down, People of
course will die, and tens of millions of Americans are
going to pay higher premiums, co pays and deductibles. Second
issue that the American people should be deeply concerned about,
(30:49):
and when they learn about this bill, are opposed to
this reckless legislation. It's the largest cut to nutritional assistance
in American history. More than three hundred billion dollars will
be taken away from the supplemental nutritional Assistance program, which
benefits everyday Americans. All across the country, but they are
literally taking food out of the mouths of children, seniors,
(31:13):
and veterans. Third problem, and final problem that I'd mentioned
at the top, is that all of this is being
done to provide massive tax breaks to their billionaire donors,
and they're going to skyrocket the debt and the deficit
by traions of dollars.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
I want you to talk about the snap cuts because
I think it's really important that you talk about what
they did with the age of seven. So explain that
to us.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Yes, so, under current law, if you have a child
in the household, these so called work requirements that they
would impose don't apply if your child is a teen
or a preteen. But under the GOP tax scam, what
they are trying to do is effectively say that once
(31:58):
your child turns doesn't matter if you have no childcare
or capacity to provide for your child outside of the
school hours, you're gonna have to find some way to
go to work. This basically means that children seven, eight
nine years old, very fragile ages, could be left to
fend for themselves. Under the Republican view of how to
(32:23):
stand up for American families, this is the opposite of
family values. But this is an example of the fact
that Republicans often say one thing and then do the
exact opposite exactly.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
So talk us through where we are at this very minute.
The bill went through, Republicans starting getting pushback, and I
think this is really worth thinking about for a second.
You know, you had people from Marjorie Taylor Green to
the left, right, or really to the middle saying I
didn't see any of this in the bell seems unbelievable
(32:53):
to me. Now this bill heads to John Tune. Can
you just talk us through how intent it is to
have Republicans There were two different members and they've probably
been more now. They didn't realize what was in the bill.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
Yeah, it's incredible. Several different Republicans have openly acknowledged that
they didn't read the bill in its entirety and as
a result, had no idea what was in it. This
is extraordinary because Republicans have not passed a single piece
of legislation throughout this entire Congress that makes life better
for the American people at all. These aren't serious people,
(33:29):
and this hasn't been a serious congressional session. And for
the last several months they've been working on this one big,
ugly bill, so they have every reason to have known
exactly what is in it. As you indicated right at
the top, you had an effort to prevent states across
the country from reasonably regulating artificial intelligence. This is extraordinary.
(33:52):
This is the most significant technological development in modern American history,
and Republicans have basically said, we don't want states doing
anything about it. It was a blanket prohibition. The other
thing that was in the bill that you mentioned at
the top, Molly, is an effort to limit the ability
of the independent judiciary, the federal courts from being able
(34:16):
to hold members of the Trump administration in contempt for
a refusal to comply with the law. That's extraordinary as well.
Now what's interesting this week, as you mentioned, the bill
is over in the Senate as these additional provisions come
to light, and Republicans, including people like Marjorie Taylor Green,
(34:36):
have said they would have never voted for the bill
had they been aware of these provisions. Next time, read
your damn.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Bill, or at least let have your staffers read it right.
Speaker 3 (34:47):
Well that's correct, and be briefed about it. If you're going
to cast this significant vote that can so dramatically change
the quality of life of the people that you represent.
Is your responsibility to fully understand what is in it
that Republicans in the House this week are going to
try to strip out actually the regulation related to artificial
intelligence in terms of preventing any states from acting, and
(35:11):
strip out the aggressive provision that would prevent certain courts
from issuing contempt decisions against members of the Trump administration.
So those two things look like they're going to go out,
which is a victory for the American right.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
But the Parliamentarian was never going to go along with that.
So this bill is this one piece of legislation that
the Trump administration is probably going to pass, right, this
is it, And it's a bill that puts together sort
of everything it possibly can to keep these tax cuts
from expiring, which is really the whole reason that rich
people voted for Trump in the first place. So the
(35:48):
Parliamentarian was never going to go along with a lot
of the work they put in there. So who even knows.
We don't even know, right, if Speaker Johnson, you know,
knows how this works. I mean, I would love you
to talk to us out here. We are in the
most important legislative body. Republicans have completely given away their power.
I mean, what's it like on the day to day
(36:09):
you have been in converse a long time, what is
it like. Is there anyone who sees how insane this
is on the Republican side?
Speaker 3 (36:16):
Yeah, you know, there are a handful of Republicans who
know that this is wrong, and we're going to continue
to try to press them on a whole variety of
issues to have some Liz Channy like courage, some Adam
Kinzinger like courage, and some John McCain like courage. All
we need are a handful of Republicans in the House
and a handful of Republicans in the Senate to do
(36:36):
what they know is right and to push back against
this GOP taxcam and we can actually stop it. So
we're going to continue to work hard to do that.
The bill limped out of the House of Representatives by
just a single vote, a single vote, and it faces
challenges in the Senate. Now. It's interesting because the challenge
is that the bill faces in the Senate similar to
the issues in the House, or that you have far
(36:58):
right Republicans who have basically suggested that the bill correctly,
is fiscally irresponsible and will continue to blow a hole
in the deficit and saddle our children and grandchildren with
trillions of dollars of debt. This was part of the
reason that Elon Musk came out against the bill and
correctly said that if this was pasted, it would actually
(37:21):
set us on a course toward bankrupting America. Then you've
got some so called swing seat Republicans who have publicly
expressed concern with the out of control nature of the
Medicaid cuts, but when it came time to vote, they
just caved as they always do and function not as
a separate and co equal branch of government, but as
(37:42):
a reckless rubber stamp for Donald Trump's extreme agenda. And
that was unfortunate in the House. And we've got to
try to push for some John McCain like courage in
the Senate.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
I mean, nobody expected the Democrats to be able to
stop this bill. But was there behind in the scenes,
because we haven't seen any TikTok reporting about what was
going on behind the scenes, except it seems as if
Mike Johnson was able to sort of bully people. Was
there a moment where you felt like there could have
been the numbers to derail this thing or now.
Speaker 3 (38:14):
Yeah, you know what's interesting is that it seemed to
us that there was a moment of opportunity where you've
got twelve to fifteen Republicans and some of the toughest
districts that they hold in the country that in any
given election cycle can go either way, like a Mike Lawler,
Don Bacon and others. David Valadeo's got more Medicaid recipients
(38:35):
in the country than any other member of Congress publicly
wrote a letter saying he was not going to support
a bill that cut Medicaid, and then turned around and
supported a bill that represented the largest cut to Medicaid
in American history. So the problem is.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
He may not be able to read right.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
God, yeah, maybe he didn't read the bill either. And
you know the problem is that these swing Sea Republicans,
they talk a good game and they go home and
they pretend to be moderate, but they vote with the
extremists every single time in Washington, DC. All we needed
were two of them to step up and join the
(39:11):
other two Republicans who were from the far right who
voted no, and his bill would have died In fact,
all we needed was one of them to do it,
because at the end of the day, this bill passed
by one vote. So we just have to keep the
pressure on them because the more the American people learn
about the GOP tax scam, the massive attack on healthcare,
the massive attack on nutritional assistance, all being done to
(39:33):
benefit their billionaire donors with massive tax breaks, the more
the American people rejected, and the greater the pressure is
on House and Senate Republicans to do the right thing
by their constituents.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
The Democratic base is I think fractured and also angry,
but just from like talking to people on the street.
But one of the things that I'm struck by, and
I write a lot and I talk to a lot
of members, is that Democrats have a sort of way
of doing things that is much more polite. You know,
everybody is sort of good to each other. They sort
of honor these older members, and you know, there's something
(40:07):
to be said for that. But as we're seeing now,
you know, with the ranking oversight, it's a really good example.
But Chasmin Crockett, it has a similar kind of ability
to communicate that AOC does. So now there's an oversight
this is still going I just am curious. I know,
I'm not going to ask you to say that younger
members should be elevated over older members, because I know
(40:30):
that this is like a seismic sort of crisis, and
it's a crisis we're all having, right I'm here doing
a book tour about aging parents. So we're having a
conversation about how Democrats can communicate effectively. But I'd love
you to talk about that.
Speaker 5 (40:44):
Well.
Speaker 3 (40:44):
Congratulations on your book. Very powerful memoir and very important
contribution at this moment. You know, it's interesting because in
the House we've been in the midst of generational change
and transition. You know, Speaker Emerits or Pelosi, who I
think will go down in history as the most effective
speaker of all time in terms of what she was
(41:06):
able to consistently get done for the American people. Speak
of Pelosi, Stenny Hoyer, Jim Clyburn, who collectively were in
leadership for twenty years, did an incredible job. All in
two thousand and twenty two decided to step down and
pass the torch to another generation of House Democratic leaders.
So Pete Aguilar and Ted lou and jo Nagoose and
(41:27):
myself and a whole host of others, including Maxwell Frost,
most recently the youngest member of Congress, were able to
step into leadership roles, and that was a sign that
generational change had come to the House of Representatives. We
had an additional effort that was supported by the members
(41:48):
of the Caucus where Jerry Nadler, a long serving member
at the top of the Judiciary Committee, stepped aside so
that Jamie Raskin, an incredible lawyer, advocate, leader, constitutional scholar,
was able to step in for such a time as
this and use all of his skills to lead the
Judiciary Committee, perhaps the most important accountability committee in the Congress.
(42:11):
Angie Craig actually defeated two more senior members who are
north of seventy five, she's in her early fifties to
lead the AD Committee. And now, of course Angie has
made the decision to pursue a seat in the Senate
and the House. We think that's a demotion, but we
understand her decision. But she's still doing a great job
leading the AD Committee, pushing back against the snap cuts.
(42:32):
And you have members like Jasmine Crockett, who we were
able to get a seat on the Judiciary Committee this Congress,
as well as Castio Cortez, who we were able to
put on the Energy and Commerce Committee, where she's been
a champion and pushing back against the Medicaid cuts. And
so we're seeing generational change come to the House. But
we do have about two hundred and fifteen members, and
(42:53):
so it's a process and everyone assesses these things on
a case by case basis. No one would argue that
Maxine Waters still doesn't have the fire in the belly
to push back aggressively against the Trump administration, and so
she continues to lead the Financial Services Committee. But listen
to the House. We have elections every two years. I
think we as an institution are all about renewal, and
(43:17):
every two years there's that opportunity to have a fresh
infusion of newer members of Congress to contribute to the
work that we try to do as House Democrats.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
Sure we are in this moment there is an opportunity
for Democrats to win back the House. There's a lot
going on. We have these Democratic National Committee. Whatever is
going on there, there's a recap, you know, there's vice chair,
there's chair. I mean, there's just a lot of conflict there.
I am not convinced that that's necessarily bad, because I
(43:48):
think when people are talking about it, it's actually maybe good,
especially because there's so little breaks through. I think one
of the lessons about Biden administration was that because I
remember talking to them and they just could not break
like they would do these things and nobody noticed. Do
you have ideas about how Democrats can break through and
sort of what they should be doing.
Speaker 5 (44:08):
It's different, it's new.
Speaker 3 (44:09):
Yeah, Well, we'll definitely in a more is more environment,
and we have to meet the moment in terms of
the flooding of the zone that Donald Trump engages in
the unleashing of a parade of horribles. He's trying to
disorient the American people, tries to distract the American people
to hide the extreme things that they are trying to
do in terms of the assault on the economy, the
(44:30):
assault on healthcare, the assault on the rule of law,
the assault on the American way of life, the assault
on democracy itself. So we're in a more's more environment.
To me, that means more press conferences, more town hall meetings,
town hall meetings in Republican districts, townhall meetings in Democratic districts,
steering in policy meetings that we convene as we've been
doing on Capitol Hill, steering in policy meetings that we
(44:53):
and hearings that we take on the road and districts
all across the country, site visits, sit ins, speeches on
the House, flow speeches on the Senate, new media, traditional media,
and social media. It's all of the above, and I
think that over time we begin to break through. And
one example of that is the fact that Donald Trump
(45:14):
at the one hundred day mark, was the most unpopular
president in American history, and so the American people are
actually paying attention and they don't like what they see
in terms of how Democrats and others are communicating from
the standpoint of principled opposition. And as you mentioned, another
indication that we are having some success in breaking through,
we have to do more is that the GOP tax scam,
(45:36):
the disgusting abomination, the one big ugly bill, is also
very unpopular. Notwithstanding the fact that Donald Trump controls this
massive megaphone and the bully pulpit of the Oval Office,
but he hasn't been able to pull the wool over
the eyes of the American people with respect to this
legislation that They're trying to jam down the throats of
everyday Americans and we just have to keep it up,
(45:59):
sustain the entire desity, do more, and then, of course
make sure that we make our case as to why
to save the country. One of the most significant things
we can do is take back control of the House
of Representatives in November of next year.
Speaker 1 (46:15):
Thank you, thank you, Thank you, Leader Jeffries, Thank you
very much. Karen vass is the mayor of Los Angeles.
I'm Mayor Vass. Hi. How are you, I'm god, how
are yell?
Speaker 5 (46:28):
I'm doing okay, thank you doing all right?
Speaker 1 (46:30):
I'm actually in Los Angeles too. Oh. Tell me what
the city is like right now?
Speaker 4 (46:35):
Well, you know, the overall city.
Speaker 5 (46:37):
It's two ways.
Speaker 3 (46:38):
Let me describe it.
Speaker 6 (46:39):
You do have a sector of a city that is
absolutely terrified in fear that they don't know if they
should go to schooler work, because who knows when the
ice raids are going to hit their one place. So
it's a degree of uncertainty that is very, very strong
and very corrosive. The other side is is if the
city is functioning perfectly normally, the protests and the vandalism
(47:06):
has taken place over a few blocks in the downtown area,
and I'm not making light of that these few blocks.
It is not citywide civil unrest, and that is how
it's being portrayed. Some of the national pictures that I've
seen were actually pictures from nineteen ninety two and twenty
twenty that are all mixed in with what is happening to.
Speaker 1 (47:28):
That right, there's a real disinformation problem. So I understand
that Trump is targeting Los Angeles, and we have a
similar thing going on in New York too, But I
just wondering what can and what are you doing to
sort of push back against him.
Speaker 6 (47:44):
You know, I cannot interfere with what federal officials are doing.
We are trying to make sure that people in the
city feel safe by making sure that they are well
informed of what their rights are, what they can do,
what they shouldn't do, all of that, and then absolutely
content in you my advocacy on the federal level. At
some point, I am hoping that the administration will cease
(48:07):
that when they describe our city as being in chaos
and all of that, it is a misrepresentation of the city.
But to the extent that there is tension and turmoil,
it's tension and turmoil that was started on Friday with
the first rates.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
So we've seen pictures of marines sleeping on the floor,
we've seen I mean, they've sort of not gamed out
what this looks like. So are the people who are
down there? Is there a place for them? Is it
set up for them? What's that like?
Speaker 6 (48:36):
Right now we have one hundred soldiers and those hundred
soldiers are guarding the Federal building and that is it.
That is their sole mission. They're not involved in crown
control or anything like that. The thing is is that
the one hundred soldiers are not needed, and I have
no idea where the seven hundred marines are going to go.
And so to me, this is just, you know, very
(48:58):
troubling and contributing to the sense of fear and terror
that so many people feel. What is going on here?
Can I go to work? Can I go to school?
Can I find my father who I watch get taken away?
Speaker 5 (49:12):
You know, those kind of things are really impacting the city.
Speaker 6 (49:16):
And that is in a lot of different neighborhoods because
people never know when and where the raids will take place.
Speaker 1 (49:22):
Yeah, for sure, and the terror is really the point.
So you've had a tough time a bit. I think
that there's been a lot of targeting of you. The
city is now in a moment of crisis. You've been
through so much, right, You've been through these fires. You've
got a lot of people being quite I don't know,
just aggressive towards you. I wonder where you are at
(49:44):
this moment with this job. I mean, this is seems
like the worst job in the world.
Speaker 6 (49:49):
Well, I mean, you know, I feel very honored and
the privileged to be here in this position. Yes, I mean,
I don't know a mayor around that doesn't come under
criticism and attack, and especially in this environment. It is
not surprising at all.
Speaker 5 (50:07):
But I am a fighter.
Speaker 6 (50:09):
I've been involved in community issues, city issues, state, federal,
international issues for years and years. And I'm a fighter
and I come from a city of fighters. So I
know that LA will be okay, LA will rebound, But
I really wish that the administration would not make our
lives more difficult. For example, when they bring in these
(50:32):
federal troops, Lord knows where they're going to be or
what they're going to do, then that's going to.
Speaker 5 (50:36):
Cost one hundred and thirty million dollars.
Speaker 1 (50:39):
Yeah, I saw those numbers. Is that federal money?
Speaker 5 (50:43):
Yes, yes, no, it's federal money.
Speaker 6 (50:45):
But my point is, is it in a year we're
going to have the World Cup. The President wants the
World Cup to be a real moment for our country.
How about giving us thirty million dollars so we can
prepare for the games.
Speaker 1 (50:57):
Yeah? Where are you guys with rebuilding after the fires?
Speaker 5 (51:01):
So, actually, that has been going well, and the irony
is is one of the reasons it has been going
well is because of the support from the administration. So
last week I was bragging about their support. This week,
I'm baffled and at their response to this. Last Thursday,
there were no problems in the city. The city was functioning.
Speaker 6 (51:22):
Normally, and there was nothing happening in the city that
warrants the aggressive response on Friday. That aggressive response has
really been a provocation and it feels intentional, which is
why I feel like we are part of a grand experiment.
What happens when the federal government steps in and seeses power.
Speaker 1 (51:41):
So what is your situation with ICE? I mean, how
much power do you have against ICE?
Speaker 6 (51:48):
Well, I think you know that as a city official
that I do not have power over the federal government.
So I do not know when they're coming, where they're coming, why,
or any of that, and so what I have to
do is do my best to keep it to leap
safe and make sure that they are informed with their rights.
Speaker 5 (52:06):
That is what I have to do.
Speaker 1 (52:08):
Yeah, it feels like a pretty dark moment in American life.
We've had many of them. But I just wonder, are
you able to work with the governor in tandem, are
you able to sort of provide a kind of as
much as possible firewall against some of the federal stuff.
Speaker 5 (52:26):
Well, I mean, I think we're both grappling with that.
Speaker 3 (52:28):
I work very well with the governor.
Speaker 6 (52:30):
He has been very, very supportive, and I certainly expect
for that to continue. But as you know, the President
took the power from the governor of the National Guard.
So I think that kind of says what the situation is.
Speaker 1 (52:45):
Yeah, it's true. Are there things that you guys can
do as a city to make you guys safer against buyers?
Speaker 6 (52:52):
Yes, there's a number of things you know that we
can do, and we definitely are doing that.
Speaker 1 (52:57):
Yeah. So interesting. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 5 (53:01):
Okay, you're welcome.
Speaker 6 (53:04):
No more.
Speaker 1 (53:06):
Thicko Jesse Cannon Molly.
Speaker 2 (53:10):
So, yesterday I started seeing a thing that I always
think is funny, which is that it's no secret that
there's some coordination of messages on both sides, but the
right wing always seems to be a little bit more vast,
Like Hillary said, a conspiracy. I thought it was very
funny when I saw some of my least favorite characters
on that side, Matt Walsh, Charlie Kirk, and Jack Pisobiac
(53:32):
all tweeting that it's time to ban third world immigration,
legal or illegal. We've reached our limit. We have a
huge cultural, educational, housing, financial, and essential services problem. And
almost all of them used the exact same language. No
creative input here, What are you thinking?
Speaker 1 (53:48):
Yeah, so this is really get to see exactly what
it looks like. There's clearly like a group chat where
everything is and here it is ban all third world
called immigration illegal or legal period And they start each
three Matt wash Charlie Kirk, and Jack Pasobiac all start
(54:08):
with the same sentence and then they continue on. It's
all the same, Every piece of it is the same.
We need a net zero immigration moratorium with a ban
on all third worlders. I don't know what a Third
worlder is.
Speaker 2 (54:24):
I think it's a fan of the reggae band Third World.
Speaker 1 (54:27):
Yes, it's the only answer. So here we are hearty
fuck all of them. 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
(54:51):
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 Trump threatens protesters who reign on
his military parade Saturday that they will be met with
big fours. We have a great show for you today.
Inside Elections, Jacob Lubashkin stops by to talk about his
(00:23):
new report on how the House is shaping up for
the midterms. Then we'll talk to Democratic House Leader Keem
Jeffries about the status of the phoebeb Big Bullshit Bill.
Plus we have a special bonus interview with Los Angeles
Mayor Karen Bass. But first the news.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
So Molly, like all things Trump, the planning just really
isn't their thing, you know, for people who had this
like Project twenty twenty five for like years before they
got in office. Everything they've done aside from that, the
planning is just, oh Jesus.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Not good.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
This crew is not good at planning. We have a
few protests in California, all of which were started by
ice cruelly kidnapping these people who were day laborers were
looking for work in the home depot parking lot. This
(01:21):
got Republicans very excited because they hate California and they
hate immigrants, so they deployed these troops to La. Now
here's the thing about La. La has a housing problem.
So here we have all these troops with nowhere to sleep.
And he said, you know these are so you have
National Guard troops that the governor did not call up, right,
(01:44):
So he's nationalized the California Guard. And then, because DoD
Secretary Pete Hegst has never seen a photo op he
doesn't want to get involved with, he sent seven hundred
active duty Marines. Now what are these marines going to do?
There aren't even seven hundred at least. I mean Sunday
they were a lot of protesters, but there aren't that
(02:04):
many protesters. So now you have four thousand National guardsmen,
seven hundred active duty Marines, all in central Los Angeles
and there's no place for them to sleep. There's no
setup for this, there's no planning for this. And Newsome
sensing the political opportunity, and he's right. It tweets out,
(02:28):
you set your troops here without fuel, food, water, a
place to sleep. Here they are being forced to sleep
on the floor. Now these images have gone viral. I
think it's smart for Democrats to do stuff like that.
That said, there definitely are Republicans who are saying and
in fact, the Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnow accused Newsom of
(02:50):
using the troops as political props. This is a little
ironic because these troops are actually there for political reasons,
not for actual war reasons. But there's a lot of
not to like about this scenario, right, And also I
think it's worth looking at the Pentagon comtroller that the
guy does the money. Byron MacDonald was on Tuesday and
(03:14):
he said that the cost of sending these National Guard
troops and marines would be about one hundred and thirty
four million dollars. That's money that could be spent on
building houses, feeding almost people. I mean, like the amount
of money that this administration spends on performative moronics is
pretty impressive, I have to say. And just we're very
(03:41):
very clear on that. This is all about, you know,
just creating an atmosphere where you can use all of it.
It's reality television, right, it's reality television. Trump thinks authoritarianism
works with the base. He is doing this. You'll remember
last week actually wrote a column about this. So in
order to plug my other gig. I'll just say I
(04:04):
wrote this column about how last week was actually a
really bad week for Trump. Elon was really crazy. This
is a guy he's given all our data to, which
is kind of scary, and that their relationship imploded. Trump
accused Elon of being a drug addict. Elon accused Trump
of being in the Epstein files, which is actually he
is in fact in the Epstein files. And then Trump
(04:27):
world lost a ton of different court cases in all
different ways, and then Trump's one piece of legislation is floundering.
So I do think there is a lot in Trump
World that he's unhappy with. And also you'll remember that
the trade war, we were promised ninety deals. In ninety days.
We have one framework of a deal, but we're seeing
that trade wars are going to be inflationary.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
So may someone who was involved with those was the
CEO of Gum Road Ach company. I used to use
what was it? They are a direct to consumer of
a relationship for creators. Would say, you put out your
book yourself, you could sell it to people directly. Okay,
So this person was very early to this idea. It's
now a very like oh yeah, duh idea. But when
(05:09):
they got to it fifteen sixteen years ago, no one
was doing it was a very innovative idea. Anyway, they
were amazed by how efficient the government was by taking
a look inside of it. And it's funny because I
have a couple group chats with people who work inside
the government, particularly in Washington, and they always were like,
I don't know what the fuck they're going to find.
We're already working with bare bodes, and some of what's
(05:31):
said here confirms just that.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Yeah, I mean so interesting in a lot of ways.
The whole idea of fraud raised interviews. They kept saying it.
But remember Elon had no government experience. He just didn't
understand what he was doing. So this was based on
like a weird belief that there was something that we
didn't have any evidence to support it. I mean, I'm
(05:54):
a little surprised that it was so efficient. I mean,
he says, I'm a little surprised because I thought that
some of the old computers. But he was surprised by
how efficient the government was. He was quietly dismissed publicly
after saying that, which I think is a really good
example of how they were using people to confirm their priors.
Abuse to me feels relatively non existent. This guy told MPR,
(06:17):
adding that what many ss waste is more about modernization
opportunities than mismanagement. I personally was surprised at actually how
efficient the government was. So this is a really good
example of how Elon wasn't transparent. Because if you were transparent,
you would take this person and say, oh wow, okay,
let's keep going with this, let's find you know, then
(06:39):
we're actually maybe we're not needed. But because they were
really this was about killing government programs that Elon didn't like.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
Yeah, and speaking of doge, judges determined that OPM broke
the law with those access to data.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
Yeah. Look, Elon had before he got involved in politics,
he had all of these pending core cases. And do
you know why he had all these pending course cases
because he was doing stuff without making sure that it
was legal. So it should not be shocking that the government,
the fake government agency he created to do stuff he
(07:15):
wanted to do, broke the law.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
Yeah, I always go back to that. Peter Thiel told
the late David Graeber that their motto at PayPal was
to ask for forgiveness. Rather than permission, and this was
a perfect example of that. And it was their philosophy
literally almost thirty years ago, so it seems like it
still stayed there.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Yep, exactly exactly.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
So my the most horrifying news of the day I
saved for last, which is that RFK Junior removed all
the current members of the CDC Vaccine Advisory Committee.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Yeah, and he said he wasn't going to He said
he wasn't going to do it, So of course he
absolutely did it. His seventeen member Advisory Committee on Ammusation Practices,
which advises the Center for PC's Control and Prevention. Kennedy
writes an op ed in the Wall Street Journal Opinion, which,
by the way, has cooked up some of the most
(08:10):
brainworm ze takes. He says that he's going to remove
the entire panel. It's unprecedented. It may actually, like so
many things this administration does not be legal. But you know,
air pediatricians, etymologists, immunologists, and I'm telling you those are
(08:31):
not people that RFK Junior agrees with. So here we are,
ladies and gentlemen. Jacob Rabashkin is an analyst and reporter
for Inside Elections. Welcome to Fast Politics.
Speaker 4 (08:47):
Jacob, thank you so much for having me. It is
always a pleasure.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
So let's talk about you have new house race information pulling,
let's go, and also you have on the twenty twenty
five elections, so let's talk about all of it. What
does the landscape look like?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Yeah, let's let's get into it because there's so much
to talk about on the house race front. I really
think the battle for the House is the main event
of twenty twenty six. I mean, we can talk about
the Senate and it's really tough for Democrats there, but
like to the extent that there's a chance, a real
chance for a change in control of one of the houses.
It is the House of Representatives. And at the moment,
(09:27):
you know, Democrats are on offense right they've got the
wind at their back historically speaking, because this is a
midterm election, and the way that we see the battlefield
right now, you know we've got our ten toss up races,
our most competitive contests, seven of those held by Republicans,
just three held by Democrats. So already, you know, you
can see that Republicans have a little bit more vulnerability
(09:49):
than Democrats do. And so give me the seven the
seven Republicans who we see as toss up race.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Just give me them all the famous ones because we're
not going to know all them, So give me the
ones that we would have heard of, like David Valadeo.
Speaker 4 (10:04):
Interestingly enough, Valadeo we actually don't have as a toss up.
We think he'll be a little bit tougher to dislodge
for Democrats than some of these other guys. But so
this is Valdeo is a survivor.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
He's always on the red to Blue list every two
years because it's California. It's a district that's very swingy,
lots of Medicaid recipient all right, to go.
Speaker 4 (10:25):
On, Yeah, I mean, so the thing about Valadeo, right
is he's been this target for years and years, and
for a long time that was because he was in
a Democratic district. He was in a central valley district.
It's one of the poorest districts in the country. It
has one of the lowest levels of voter engagement. Fewer
people vote there than pretty much any other district in
America bar one or two. And what happened in twenty
(10:45):
twenty four was that the district swung really hard Republican
right so it went from being a seat that Biden
would have carried by ten points to one that Trump
won by five points, essentially a fifteen point swing from
twenty twenty to twenty twenty four. A lot to do
with shifts and Hispanic voting patterns. It's just going to
make things a little bit more difficult for Democrats, especially
(11:05):
because they don't have a candidate yet. They've got a
couple of people who are circling that race, but unlike
the last two cycles when they had their guy, Rudy
sallis a former state assemblyman who they've been trying to
get run for a decade, we don't know who the
nominee is going to be there, So Valdeo, I think
is going to be tougher.
Speaker 3 (11:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Can I just ask one question not to just focus
on this member of the House that nobody who's listening
to this podcast has any idea who he is. Don't
you think that the way that Trump is targeting these
Hispanic undocumented people and the way that he is deporting
people who are some of whom are actually documented, don't
(11:44):
you think ultimately that is going to hurt him in
the midterms with Hispanic voters.
Speaker 4 (11:49):
I think it's certainly possible. But you got to remember,
while the images that we're seeing come out, in the
stories that we're seeing come out in the last five
months have been particularly intense and particularly notable, Trump has
always had immigration as his number one issue. He's always
been more aggressive on immigration and more willing to you know,
paint people with a broader brush than other Republicans had
(12:12):
before Trump got along, and that hasn't stopped him from
improving among Hispanic voters every time that he's been on
the ballot. So I don't necessarily disagree, and I think,
you know, given what's going on in southern California right now,
there's tremendous potential for people's attitudes to change. But I
think Democrats have gotten caught in this trap over the
last eight years of you know, well, Trump says terrible
(12:34):
things about Mexicans, and he's cracking down on immigration, and
he's sending ice out into the streets like that's got
to win us back some votes, when in actuality, it
hasn't necessarily transpired that way.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Yes, Also, though one of the disconnects in the twenty
twenty four cycle was that you'd have voters waving mass
deportation now signs and you'd have other voters saying he's
not going to do that. We're seeing like this woman
who was Latino's for Trump now coming out against Trump.
I do think that they're actually seeing it happen. It's
(13:11):
much harder to say something isn't going to happen when
it's actually happening.
Speaker 4 (13:16):
Yeah, and that may well be the case. I think,
you know, we'd like to say that the worst time
to kind of assess the impact of an event as well,
it's still happening, and we're very much still happening right now.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Let's talk about the ten people. Go back to the
ten people. I get very distracted, but go back to
the ten people. Let's do it.
Speaker 4 (13:33):
No, absolutely, So, you know, Mike Lawler in New York
seventeen is probably the most prominent guy on this list.
You know, Juan Siscomanni in Arizona in the Tucson area,
Gabe Evans in Colorado, Marionette Miller Meeks in Iowa, Tom
Barrett in Michigan, Ryan McKenzie in Pennsylvania, and Jen Kiggins
(13:54):
in Virginia are the seven Republicans in the toss up races.
And then Adam Grat, the Democrat from California Central Valley,
Derek Tran from Orange County, and Don Davis from eastern
North Carolina, or the three Democrats we have rated as
toss up.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
So Mike Lawler is often on television. He's much more
of the sort of media friendly Republican who says one
thing but still votes very much with the party line.
Why is he on that list? I know it's because
it's a Democratic district, but I'm sure it's Is there
also a challenger and what does that look like?
Speaker 4 (14:31):
Oh gosh, Molly, if you want challengers to Mike Lawler,
you're in luck because there are I think seven Democrats
in the field already and more seem to be jumping
in by the day.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
This is one of these districts.
Speaker 4 (14:43):
It's really feaster or famine, and a lot of these
districts where like some places, nobody wants to run for Congress.
It's kind of crazy. Who would have thought no one
wants to go to Congress right now? But some places,
like New York seventeen, it's like the line is around
the block to get the Democratic nomination against Mike Lawler.
And that is because because well it's because of two things. First,
you know, it is a Democratic district, right it's one
(15:04):
of three districts in the country that voted for Kamala
Harris but also voted for a Republican in the House.
And then also a lot of people still think Lawler
is going to run for governor, so people want to
get in early. In the event that he runs for governor,
it's an open seat, it's a little easier to win,
and so we've seen this crush of candidates running against
him in that primary, and time will tell who's going
(15:26):
to win. I think Beth Davidson, who's a county legislator
up there, I believe from Rockland County, is to the
extent that there's a front runner, it's probably her. But
nobody knows who any of these people are in this
primary right now, and whoever wins is going to come
out with you know, twenty to maybe thirty percent of
the vote at most before taking on Lawler or another
(15:47):
Republican in the general election.
Speaker 5 (15:49):
Interesting, So let's talk about what.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
You're seeing from these two twenty twenty five gubernatorial races
that are right now. Primary voting is already happening. What
does it look like for you in Virginia and New Jersey.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
Yeah, voters are voting in New Jersey. It's exciting. This
is the first kind of really big contest of the
second Trump administration. A lot of questions are going to
get answered tonight, you know, on Tuesday night in this
Democratic primary, and then it's going to be a tough
general election competition.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Is it in New Jersey? I think so who's running
as the Republican?
Speaker 4 (16:26):
So the Republican the likely Republican nominee and maybe by
the time you know, people are listening to this, the
actual Republican nominee is a guy named Jack Chiarelli who
is a former state assemblyman. He was the Republican nominee
in twenty twenty one and he nearly won. He only
lost by like three points to Phil Murphy in a
race that a lot of people didn't see coming. And
he's back again.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
You know.
Speaker 4 (16:47):
He also ran for governor twenty seventeen. He's a known quantity.
He was in the state legislature for a while, and
he's got a reputation in state as a hard campaigner,
as a hard worker who gets along with people. And
I think, you know, we saw such shifts in New Jersey.
I mean New Jersey shifted more to the right than
I think any other state except New York in between
(17:08):
the twenty twenty and twenty twenty four presidential election. It's
given Republicans some hope here that they can capitalize on
voter sentiment about property taxes and some other local issues
and try and make it a real race. We still
think that, we think that Democrats are still favored here,
to be clear, but I don't think it's a done
deal by any stretch of the definition, that Democrats are
(17:31):
going to win this race. I think it's going to
take a lot of money and effort from whoever the
nominee is to hold on to New Jersey.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Let's talk about Virginia, because Virginia seems like a state
that has been deeply affected by Doe and talk to
us about that.
Speaker 4 (17:46):
Yeah, Virginia is a little bit more clear cut in
some ways because there are no primaries on either side
for governor. The Democratic nominee is going to be Abigail Spanberger,
the former congresswoman, former CIA officer, national security Democrat, very
prominent within the party, and the Republican nominee is going
to be the lieutenant governor wins some Seers, who has
her own following in the party, she would be the
(18:06):
first black woman ever to be a governor in America
if she wins. As you said, though, right, I mean,
Virginia has bore a lot of the brunt of the
first six months of the Trump administration in ways that
have caught Republicans, including Seers, a little bit off guard.
I think that she's made some unfortunate comments about, you know,
how everybody's you know, everybody's lost a job at some
(18:27):
point in their lives. You know, it's not all that
big a deal. She's really tried to downplay the effects
that the cuts in the federal government have had on Virginia,
and the Democrats have really tried to capitalize on that
kind of sentiment against her. I think that the Virginia
State Republican Party has also really been having a tough time.
(18:48):
I mean, Glenn Younkin kind of single handedly brought them
back from the brink in twenty twenty one through sheer
force of will and several million dollars out of his
own pocketbook. And I don't think has either the kind
of campaign prowess or the fundraising or self funding capability
that Younkin had. So she's dealing with this kind of
(19:08):
feud with her lieutenant governor candidate nominee running mate, and
she's struggling to raise money against span Burger, and she's
dealing with Trump not at the top of the ticket,
but just north of Virginia and DC right at the
top of the state, causing political issues for her in
a way that are going to make it a challenging
fight for Republicans come this fall.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Good. Good, let them suffer political consequences for firing all
those federal employees and dismantling our federal government. What else
are you seeing in these House rices talk us through
kind of where do you see opportunities that don't have
candidates yet? Where do you see candidates that are opening
up opportunities, etc.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
Yeah, So on the Democratic side, I mean, I think
everyone is well aware of the historical trend here. Right,
You've go back one hundred years and the party in
power always has a rough mid term in the House,
with only three exceptions, and those are the Great Depression
in nineteen thirty four, the Clinton impeachment in nineteen ninety eight,
and the aftermath of nine to eleven in two thousand
and two. Those are the only three times that the
(20:09):
president's party has picked up seats in the House in
the last one hundred years. So unless the situation, the
political situation next year resembles the Great Depression, the Clinton impeachment,
or the aftermath of nine to eleven, Republicans are probably
going to lose seats in the House. And so Democrats
have been champing at the bit to get into a
lot of these races. I mean, I'm looking at my
(20:30):
list of most competitive House races and you have to
go down pretty far before you find a district that
there's no Democratic candidate running in. Democrats have done a
good job of getting people into these races, perhaps even
too good a job because now they've got some primaries
on their hands that they weren't anticipating.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Would you talk about those primaries? Sorry, finish your thought
and then talk about the primaries.
Speaker 4 (20:53):
No, No, I think it's just on the flip side.
Republicans have been a little slower to get into some
of these races. There haven't been as any recruitment successes
so far. I mentioned Derek Tran in California forty five.
There's nobody running against him. Yet there's nobody running against
Dave Minn in California forty seven, Christa McDonald, Rivett and
Michigan eight. Republicans have not gotten candidates into all the
(21:16):
big races yet, whereas Democrats have at least somebody in
pretty much every race that we have at the center
of our battlefield.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
Tell me about the people being primary because that, I
think is that the Democratic tea parties or is a
big one to talk to me.
Speaker 4 (21:31):
This is something that I think is just getting off
its feet, kind of comes and fits and starts, and
to be quite honest, I think that the races that
are going to surprise us most are the ones that
aren't on anyone's radar. That's kind of how it works.
The big line here is age.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Right.
Speaker 4 (21:44):
We have started to see Democrats talk much more openly
about age and the fact that their politicians are getting
older and older much more openly. And that is a
conversation that I think has sprung up in the wake
of Joe and obviously everything that happened in twenty twenty four,
(22:04):
and so we've seen younger Democrats try and make that
an issue in their primaries. Some of the more notable ones.
There's a congressman in Georgia named David Scott who has
been around for quite some time, and he is getting
up there in age. He's seventy nine, and there have
been some stories about his health challenges. He was recently
(22:26):
photographed in a wheelchair being wheeled into the Capitol and
he started yelling at the photographer asking him, you know
who gave you permission to take my picture? And his
staff was saying he was going to get the photographer
fired or disciplined. You know, he's already got two primary challengers,
both younger guys, politically active local office holders. Stenny Hoyer,
(22:46):
you know, one of the longtime Democratic leaders. He's got
a primary challenger that I think is maybe not as competitive,
but it's still the fact that anyone's running against him.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Right, it's a big sign.
Speaker 4 (22:56):
Is a sign. We saw jan Schakowski, who again you know,
this is about age and less so ideology. Schakowski is
you know, a liberal liance. She's been a leader in
the Democratic progressive movement for a very long time. She
represents a suburban Chicago district and she got a primary
challenge from Kataboogazela, who's a progressive influencer and media researcher,
(23:19):
and she ended up not running for election. She announced
that she wasn't going to seek another term, so she
kind of got pushed out of that race when it
became clear things were going to get dicey for her.
I really do think that age and kind of willingness
to fight, and those two are intertwined. Those two elements
are going to be the dividing line in these primaries
far more than ideology. You know, we're not in the
(23:43):
kind of AOC versus Joe Crawley era of like ideological
primaries anymore. We're in the energy and willingness to stand
up to Donald Trump era of the Democratic primary.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
Yeah, exactly. Aren't you seeing with this poland that the
base is still very angry at the Democratic Party? Is?
I know everywhere I go people want to stop me
and tell me how mad they are, So that feels
like a real time Yeah.
Speaker 4 (24:10):
No, I mean, certainly, the polling that we have in
the first you know, half of the first year of
the second Trump administration, I think I got that right,
would suggest that, you know, Democrats are unhappy with Democrats
in Congress, right, Republicans are happy with how their leaders
are doing. Democrats are unhappy with how their leaders are
handling themselves. That kind of hit a peak, I would say,
(24:32):
or you know, a maximum during the debate over keeping
the government open and when Chuck Schumer cut that deal
to keep the government open after saying he didn't have
the votes to cut a deal, and it became a
very you know, it was a very contentious moment in
intraparty politics. But I think it certainly still holds true
right now. Democrats are unhappy. They're in the wilderness, I mean,
(24:52):
and they have very little, if any power in DC,
and so there's not a whole lot that Democrats in
Congress can do to placate their base because they don't
have a lot of power, and I think that puts
them in a vulnerable position in some of these primaries
as they materialize. But you know, we have to see
how voters are feeling a year from now, which is
(25:14):
going to be more important than how they feel right now.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
Do you have any polling on sort of the couple
of first things Trump has done, like Doge? Like do
you give a polling on Doge? Do you see anything
you know what is not working for him? What is
working for him.
Speaker 4 (25:30):
As with all these things, it matters kind of how
you're asking the question and how you're thinking about these issues.
I mean, you mentioned dog in particular. Right, If you
ask people, do you believe that there's waste, fraud and
abuse in government? You're going to get a very positive result.
If you ask people, do you think it's a good
idea to increase government efficiency or to reduce waste, fraud
and abuse, You're still going to get a very positive result.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
If you ask.
Speaker 4 (25:53):
People, do you support what Elon Musk has done in
his time is at the federal government in cutting programs,
You're gonna get a much more negative result.
Speaker 6 (26:03):
Right.
Speaker 4 (26:03):
It does kind of depend how you frame it, you know,
I think generally speaking, right, like, Trump's popularity has dropped
since he got into office. He came in basically the
most popular that he's ever been when you know, he
took office in January, and since then he's seen his
approval rating fall down, you know, into negative territory and
(26:23):
stabilized kind of in the you know, mid forty approvals
and low fifty disapprovals. And that pretty much holds true
across most issues. I mean, economy, trade, inflation are some
of his worst right, which is new. That's different from
his first term when he was very strong on the economy.
(26:44):
But voters really didn't like the trade war stuff. They
really didn't like the tariffs. They responded very poorly to
the stock market tanking, They are not responding great to
the bond market looking shaky, and they really don't like
how Trump is handling the econom me. Immigration, right is
his best issue now and we kind of forget. But
(27:04):
back in the first term, immigration was his worst issue
by far. Voters really were not on board with Trump
on immigration policy in the first term. They really rejected it.
You know, you go back to twenty sixteen and people
you ask people about the wall, building the wall, and
the wall was getting like twenty five percent support and
pulling maybe thirty percent. And things have really improved for
(27:25):
Trump on the immigration picture overall. But from a perspective
of just this administration, even his support on immigration has
fallen a little bit since he took office. It's still
his best issue, but there's still a decrease there. And
you know, I think it fluctuates depending on what's in
the news. Right, So, when the Abrago Garcia case was
(27:45):
dominating the news cycle. Voters really didn't like that, and
Trump's approval on immigration took a big hit. And since
people have kind of moved on from that, we're not
talking about al Salvador anymore. You know, Abrego Garcia is back,
but everyone else who got sent there is still in
ol Salva Or. As voters kind of move on think
about other things, his immigration approval has rebounded a bit.
You know, we'll see how the situation in southern California
(28:08):
plays out. There was a poll out today from you
goov that said that voters disapproved of sending in the Marines,
sending in the National Guard by about a ten to
thirteen point margin. But we're talking like thirty five to
forty eight, right, We're not talking, you know, twenty five
seventy five disapproval. So I think voters are still kind
of figuring out, you know, they're like the rest of us.
(28:30):
They're just kind of chasing the latest thing that Trump
did and trying to understand it before he does something
else that totally shifts the news cycle in the narrative.
Thank you, Jacob, absolutely all. This This was a lot
of fun.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
Hikeem Jeffries is the House Minority leader and represents New
York's eighth congressional district. Welcome Leader, Jeffries.
Speaker 3 (28:52):
Great to be with you.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
I just want you to get us up to speed.
The BBB made it through the House. We knew it
probably would, right because they do have the majority. It
is filled with stuff like you can't regulate AI for
ten years, a lot of crazy, crazy stuff, stuff to
limit judicial oversight, I mean, just not wildly unpopular. Cuts
(29:16):
to Medicaid food stamps also grows the deficit three trillion dollars.
Talk to me about what that passage was like in
the dead of night, et cetera.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
So the GOP tax scam is one big, ugly bill
that will hurt everyday Americans in order to reward their
billionaire donors. They're probably three important things to know about
the bill. And there are a whole hosts of other items,
as you indicated only that are highly problematic. But the
three things that I would mention at the top that
(29:46):
we battled against during markups throughout the month of May,
some of which went on for more than twenty four
consecutive hours, and then a marathon session before the Rules
Committee the day before the vote. We're more than a
hundred different Democrats showed up to testify. We introduced more
than five hundred different amendments, and under the leadership of
(30:07):
Jim McGovern, the top Democrat on the Rules Committee, really
pushed back aggressively against what Republicans are trying to jam
down the throats of the American people. And then of
course we had the floor vote and debate during the
dead of night. Why are Republicans trying to hide this
one big, ugly bill from the American people. One, it's
the largest cut to Medicaid and healthcare in American history.
(30:29):
More than sixteen million Americans will lose their health care.
Hospitals will close, nursing homes will shut down, People of
course will die, and tens of millions of Americans are
going to pay higher premiums, co pays and deductibles. Second
issue that the American people should be deeply concerned about,
(30:49):
and when they learn about this bill, are opposed to
this reckless legislation. It's the largest cut to nutritional assistance
in American history. More than three hundred billion dollars will
be taken away from the supplemental nutritional Assistance program, which
benefits everyday Americans. All across the country, but they are
literally taking food out of the mouths of children, seniors,
(31:13):
and veterans. Third problem, and final problem that I'd mentioned
at the top, is that all of this is being
done to provide massive tax breaks to their billionaire donors,
and they're going to skyrocket the debt and the deficit
by traions of dollars.
Speaker 1 (31:28):
I want you to talk about the snap cuts because
I think it's really important that you talk about what
they did with the age of seven. So explain that
to us.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Yes, so, under current law, if you have a child
in the household, these so called work requirements that they
would impose don't apply if your child is a teen
or a preteen. But under the GOP tax scam, what
they are trying to do is effectively say that once
(31:58):
your child turns doesn't matter if you have no childcare
or capacity to provide for your child outside of the
school hours, you're gonna have to find some way to
go to work. This basically means that children seven, eight
nine years old, very fragile ages, could be left to
fend for themselves. Under the Republican view of how to
(32:23):
stand up for American families, this is the opposite of
family values. But this is an example of the fact
that Republicans often say one thing and then do the
exact opposite exactly.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
So talk us through where we are at this very minute.
The bill went through, Republicans starting getting pushback, and I
think this is really worth thinking about for a second.
You know, you had people from Marjorie Taylor Green to
the left, right, or really to the middle saying I
didn't see any of this in the bell seems unbelievable
(32:53):
to me. Now this bill heads to John Tune. Can
you just talk us through how intent it is to
have Republicans There were two different members and they've probably
been more now. They didn't realize what was in the bill.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
Yeah, it's incredible. Several different Republicans have openly acknowledged that
they didn't read the bill in its entirety and as
a result, had no idea what was in it. This
is extraordinary because Republicans have not passed a single piece
of legislation throughout this entire Congress that makes life better
for the American people at all. These aren't serious people,
(33:29):
and this hasn't been a serious congressional session. And for
the last several months they've been working on this one big,
ugly bill, so they have every reason to have known
exactly what is in it. As you indicated right at
the top, you had an effort to prevent states across
the country from reasonably regulating artificial intelligence. This is extraordinary.
(33:52):
This is the most significant technological development in modern American history,
and Republicans have basically said, we don't want states doing
anything about it. It was a blanket prohibition. The other
thing that was in the bill that you mentioned at
the top, Molly, is an effort to limit the ability
of the independent judiciary, the federal courts from being able
(34:16):
to hold members of the Trump administration in contempt for
a refusal to comply with the law. That's extraordinary as well.
Now what's interesting this week, as you mentioned, the bill
is over in the Senate as these additional provisions come
to light, and Republicans, including people like Marjorie Taylor Green,
(34:36):
have said they would have never voted for the bill
had they been aware of these provisions. Next time, read
your damn.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Bill, or at least let have your staffers read it right.
Speaker 3 (34:47):
Well that's correct, and be briefed about it. If you're going
to cast this significant vote that can so dramatically change
the quality of life of the people that you represent.
Is your responsibility to fully understand what is in it
that Republicans in the House this week are going to
try to strip out actually the regulation related to artificial
intelligence in terms of preventing any states from acting, and
(35:11):
strip out the aggressive provision that would prevent certain courts
from issuing contempt decisions against members of the Trump administration.
So those two things look like they're going to go out,
which is a victory for the American right.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
But the Parliamentarian was never going to go along with that.
So this bill is this one piece of legislation that
the Trump administration is probably going to pass, right, this
is it, And it's a bill that puts together sort
of everything it possibly can to keep these tax cuts
from expiring, which is really the whole reason that rich
people voted for Trump in the first place. So the
(35:48):
Parliamentarian was never going to go along with a lot
of the work they put in there. So who even knows.
We don't even know, right, if Speaker Johnson, you know,
knows how this works. I mean, I would love you
to talk to us out here. We are in the
most important legislative body. Republicans have completely given away their power.
I mean, what's it like on the day to day
(36:09):
you have been in converse a long time, what is
it like. Is there anyone who sees how insane this
is on the Republican side?
Speaker 3 (36:16):
Yeah, you know, there are a handful of Republicans who
know that this is wrong, and we're going to continue
to try to press them on a whole variety of
issues to have some Liz Channy like courage, some Adam
Kinzinger like courage, and some John McCain like courage. All
we need are a handful of Republicans in the House
and a handful of Republicans in the Senate to do
(36:36):
what they know is right and to push back against
this GOP taxcam and we can actually stop it. So
we're going to continue to work hard to do that.
The bill limped out of the House of Representatives by
just a single vote, a single vote, and it faces
challenges in the Senate. Now. It's interesting because the challenge
is that the bill faces in the Senate similar to
the issues in the House, or that you have far
(36:58):
right Republicans who have basically suggested that the bill correctly,
is fiscally irresponsible and will continue to blow a hole
in the deficit and saddle our children and grandchildren with
trillions of dollars of debt. This was part of the
reason that Elon Musk came out against the bill and
correctly said that if this was pasted, it would actually
(37:21):
set us on a course toward bankrupting America. Then you've
got some so called swing seat Republicans who have publicly
expressed concern with the out of control nature of the
Medicaid cuts, but when it came time to vote, they
just caved as they always do and function not as
a separate and co equal branch of government, but as
(37:42):
a reckless rubber stamp for Donald Trump's extreme agenda. And
that was unfortunate in the House. And we've got to
try to push for some John McCain like courage in
the Senate.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
I mean, nobody expected the Democrats to be able to
stop this bill. But was there behind in the scenes,
because we haven't seen any TikTok reporting about what was
going on behind the scenes, except it seems as if
Mike Johnson was able to sort of bully people. Was
there a moment where you felt like there could have
been the numbers to derail this thing or now.
Speaker 3 (38:14):
Yeah, you know what's interesting is that it seemed to
us that there was a moment of opportunity where you've
got twelve to fifteen Republicans and some of the toughest
districts that they hold in the country that in any
given election cycle can go either way, like a Mike Lawler,
Don Bacon and others. David Valadeo's got more Medicaid recipients
(38:35):
in the country than any other member of Congress publicly
wrote a letter saying he was not going to support
a bill that cut Medicaid, and then turned around and
supported a bill that represented the largest cut to Medicaid
in American history. So the problem is.
Speaker 1 (38:49):
He may not be able to read right.
Speaker 3 (38:51):
God, yeah, maybe he didn't read the bill either. And
you know the problem is that these swing Sea Republicans,
they talk a good game and they go home and
they pretend to be moderate, but they vote with the
extremists every single time in Washington, DC. All we needed
were two of them to step up and join the
(39:11):
other two Republicans who were from the far right who
voted no, and his bill would have died In fact,
all we needed was one of them to do it,
because at the end of the day, this bill passed
by one vote. So we just have to keep the
pressure on them because the more the American people learn
about the GOP tax scam, the massive attack on healthcare,
the massive attack on nutritional assistance, all being done to
(39:33):
benefit their billionaire donors with massive tax breaks, the more
the American people rejected, and the greater the pressure is
on House and Senate Republicans to do the right thing
by their constituents.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
The Democratic base is I think fractured and also angry,
but just from like talking to people on the street.
But one of the things that I'm struck by, and
I write a lot and I talk to a lot
of members, is that Democrats have a sort of way
of doing things that is much more polite. You know,
everybody is sort of good to each other. They sort
of honor these older members, and you know, there's something
(40:07):
to be said for that. But as we're seeing now,
you know, with the ranking oversight, it's a really good example.
But Chasmin Crockett, it has a similar kind of ability
to communicate that AOC does. So now there's an oversight
this is still going I just am curious. I know,
I'm not going to ask you to say that younger
members should be elevated over older members, because I know
(40:30):
that this is like a seismic sort of crisis, and
it's a crisis we're all having, right I'm here doing
a book tour about aging parents. So we're having a
conversation about how Democrats can communicate effectively. But I'd love
you to talk about that.
Speaker 5 (40:44):
Well.
Speaker 3 (40:44):
Congratulations on your book. Very powerful memoir and very important
contribution at this moment. You know, it's interesting because in
the House we've been in the midst of generational change
and transition. You know, Speaker Emerits or Pelosi, who I
think will go down in history as the most effective
speaker of all time in terms of what she was
(41:06):
able to consistently get done for the American people. Speak
of Pelosi, Stenny Hoyer, Jim Clyburn, who collectively were in
leadership for twenty years, did an incredible job. All in
two thousand and twenty two decided to step down and
pass the torch to another generation of House Democratic leaders.
So Pete Aguilar and Ted lou and jo Nagoose and
(41:27):
myself and a whole host of others, including Maxwell Frost,
most recently the youngest member of Congress, were able to
step into leadership roles, and that was a sign that
generational change had come to the House of Representatives. We
had an additional effort that was supported by the members
(41:48):
of the Caucus where Jerry Nadler, a long serving member
at the top of the Judiciary Committee, stepped aside so
that Jamie Raskin, an incredible lawyer, advocate, leader, constitutional scholar,
was able to step in for such a time as
this and use all of his skills to lead the
Judiciary Committee, perhaps the most important accountability committee in the Congress.
(42:11):
Angie Craig actually defeated two more senior members who are
north of seventy five, she's in her early fifties to
lead the AD Committee. And now, of course Angie has
made the decision to pursue a seat in the Senate
and the House. We think that's a demotion, but we
understand her decision. But she's still doing a great job
leading the AD Committee, pushing back against the snap cuts.
(42:32):
And you have members like Jasmine Crockett, who we were
able to get a seat on the Judiciary Committee this Congress,
as well as Castio Cortez, who we were able to
put on the Energy and Commerce Committee, where she's been
a champion and pushing back against the Medicaid cuts. And
so we're seeing generational change come to the House. But
we do have about two hundred and fifteen members, and
(42:53):
so it's a process and everyone assesses these things on
a case by case basis. No one would argue that
Maxine Waters still doesn't have the fire in the belly
to push back aggressively against the Trump administration, and so
she continues to lead the Financial Services Committee. But listen
to the House. We have elections every two years. I
think we as an institution are all about renewal, and
(43:17):
every two years there's that opportunity to have a fresh
infusion of newer members of Congress to contribute to the
work that we try to do as House Democrats.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
Sure we are in this moment there is an opportunity
for Democrats to win back the House. There's a lot
going on. We have these Democratic National Committee. Whatever is
going on there, there's a recap, you know, there's vice chair,
there's chair. I mean, there's just a lot of conflict there.
I am not convinced that that's necessarily bad, because I
(43:48):
think when people are talking about it, it's actually maybe good,
especially because there's so little breaks through. I think one
of the lessons about Biden administration was that because I
remember talking to them and they just could not break
like they would do these things and nobody noticed. Do
you have ideas about how Democrats can break through and
sort of what they should be doing.
Speaker 5 (44:08):
It's different, it's new.
Speaker 3 (44:09):
Yeah, Well, we'll definitely in a more is more environment,
and we have to meet the moment in terms of
the flooding of the zone that Donald Trump engages in
the unleashing of a parade of horribles. He's trying to
disorient the American people, tries to distract the American people
to hide the extreme things that they are trying to
do in terms of the assault on the economy, the
(44:30):
assault on healthcare, the assault on the rule of law,
the assault on the American way of life, the assault
on democracy itself. So we're in a more's more environment.
To me, that means more press conferences, more town hall meetings,
town hall meetings in Republican districts, townhall meetings in Democratic districts,
steering in policy meetings that we convene as we've been
doing on Capitol Hill, steering in policy meetings that we
(44:53):
and hearings that we take on the road and districts
all across the country, site visits, sit ins, speeches on
the House, flow speeches on the Senate, new media, traditional media,
and social media. It's all of the above, and I
think that over time we begin to break through. And
one example of that is the fact that Donald Trump
(45:14):
at the one hundred day mark, was the most unpopular
president in American history, and so the American people are
actually paying attention and they don't like what they see
in terms of how Democrats and others are communicating from
the standpoint of principled opposition. And as you mentioned, another
indication that we are having some success in breaking through,
we have to do more is that the GOP tax scam,
(45:36):
the disgusting abomination, the one big ugly bill, is also
very unpopular. Notwithstanding the fact that Donald Trump controls this
massive megaphone and the bully pulpit of the Oval Office,
but he hasn't been able to pull the wool over
the eyes of the American people with respect to this
legislation that They're trying to jam down the throats of
everyday Americans and we just have to keep it up,
(45:59):
sustain the entire desity, do more, and then, of course
make sure that we make our case as to why
to save the country. One of the most significant things
we can do is take back control of the House
of Representatives in November of next year.
Speaker 1 (46:15):
Thank you, thank you, Thank you, Leader Jeffries, Thank you
very much. Karen vass is the mayor of Los Angeles.
I'm Mayor Vass. Hi. How are you, I'm god, how
are yell?
Speaker 5 (46:28):
I'm doing okay, thank you doing all right?
Speaker 1 (46:30):
I'm actually in Los Angeles too. Oh. Tell me what
the city is like right now?
Speaker 4 (46:35):
Well, you know, the overall city.
Speaker 5 (46:37):
It's two ways.
Speaker 3 (46:38):
Let me describe it.
Speaker 6 (46:39):
You do have a sector of a city that is
absolutely terrified in fear that they don't know if they
should go to schooler work, because who knows when the
ice raids are going to hit their one place. So
it's a degree of uncertainty that is very, very strong
and very corrosive. The other side is is if the
city is functioning perfectly normally, the protests and the vandalism
(47:06):
has taken place over a few blocks in the downtown area,
and I'm not making light of that these few blocks.
It is not citywide civil unrest, and that is how
it's being portrayed. Some of the national pictures that I've
seen were actually pictures from nineteen ninety two and twenty
twenty that are all mixed in with what is happening to.
Speaker 1 (47:28):
That right, there's a real disinformation problem. So I understand
that Trump is targeting Los Angeles, and we have a
similar thing going on in New York too, But I
just wondering what can and what are you doing to
sort of push back against him.
Speaker 6 (47:44):
You know, I cannot interfere with what federal officials are doing.
We are trying to make sure that people in the
city feel safe by making sure that they are well
informed of what their rights are, what they can do,
what they shouldn't do, all of that, and then absolutely
content in you my advocacy on the federal level. At
some point, I am hoping that the administration will cease
(48:07):
that when they describe our city as being in chaos
and all of that, it is a misrepresentation of the city.
But to the extent that there is tension and turmoil,
it's tension and turmoil that was started on Friday with
the first rates.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
So we've seen pictures of marines sleeping on the floor,
we've seen I mean, they've sort of not gamed out
what this looks like. So are the people who are
down there? Is there a place for them? Is it
set up for them? What's that like?
Speaker 6 (48:36):
Right now we have one hundred soldiers and those hundred
soldiers are guarding the Federal building and that is it.
That is their sole mission. They're not involved in crown
control or anything like that. The thing is is that
the one hundred soldiers are not needed, and I have
no idea where the seven hundred marines are going to go.
And so to me, this is just, you know, very
(48:58):
troubling and contributing to the sense of fear and terror
that so many people feel. What is going on here?
Can I go to work? Can I go to school?
Can I find my father who I watch get taken away?
Speaker 5 (49:12):
You know, those kind of things are really impacting the city.
Speaker 6 (49:16):
And that is in a lot of different neighborhoods because
people never know when and where the raids will take place.
Speaker 1 (49:22):
Yeah, for sure, and the terror is really the point.
So you've had a tough time a bit. I think
that there's been a lot of targeting of you. The
city is now in a moment of crisis. You've been
through so much, right, You've been through these fires. You've
got a lot of people being quite I don't know,
just aggressive towards you. I wonder where you are at
(49:44):
this moment with this job. I mean, this is seems
like the worst job in the world.
Speaker 6 (49:49):
Well, I mean, you know, I feel very honored and
the privileged to be here in this position. Yes, I mean,
I don't know a mayor around that doesn't come under
criticism and attack, and especially in this environment. It is
not surprising at all.
Speaker 5 (50:07):
But I am a fighter.
Speaker 6 (50:09):
I've been involved in community issues, city issues, state, federal,
international issues for years and years. And I'm a fighter
and I come from a city of fighters. So I
know that LA will be okay, LA will rebound, But
I really wish that the administration would not make our
lives more difficult. For example, when they bring in these
(50:32):
federal troops, Lord knows where they're going to be or
what they're going to do, then that's going to.
Speaker 5 (50:36):
Cost one hundred and thirty million dollars.
Speaker 1 (50:39):
Yeah, I saw those numbers. Is that federal money?
Speaker 5 (50:43):
Yes, yes, no, it's federal money.
Speaker 6 (50:45):
But my point is, is it in a year we're
going to have the World Cup. The President wants the
World Cup to be a real moment for our country.
How about giving us thirty million dollars so we can
prepare for the games.
Speaker 1 (50:57):
Yeah? Where are you guys with rebuilding after the fires?
Speaker 5 (51:01):
So, actually, that has been going well, and the irony
is is one of the reasons it has been going
well is because of the support from the administration. So
last week I was bragging about their support. This week,
I'm baffled and at their response to this. Last Thursday,
there were no problems in the city. The city was functioning.
Speaker 6 (51:22):
Normally, and there was nothing happening in the city that
warrants the aggressive response on Friday. That aggressive response has
really been a provocation and it feels intentional, which is
why I feel like we are part of a grand experiment.
What happens when the federal government steps in and seeses power.
Speaker 1 (51:41):
So what is your situation with ICE? I mean, how
much power do you have against ICE?
Speaker 6 (51:48):
Well, I think you know that as a city official
that I do not have power over the federal government.
So I do not know when they're coming, where they're coming, why,
or any of that, and so what I have to
do is do my best to keep it to leap
safe and make sure that they are informed with their rights.
Speaker 5 (52:06):
That is what I have to do.
Speaker 1 (52:08):
Yeah, it feels like a pretty dark moment in American life.
We've had many of them. But I just wonder, are
you able to work with the governor in tandem, are
you able to sort of provide a kind of as
much as possible firewall against some of the federal stuff.
Speaker 5 (52:26):
Well, I mean, I think we're both grappling with that.
Speaker 3 (52:28):
I work very well with the governor.
Speaker 6 (52:30):
He has been very, very supportive, and I certainly expect
for that to continue. But as you know, the President
took the power from the governor of the National Guard.
So I think that kind of says what the situation is.
Speaker 1 (52:45):
Yeah, it's true. Are there things that you guys can
do as a city to make you guys safer against buyers?
Speaker 6 (52:52):
Yes, there's a number of things you know that we
can do, and we definitely are doing that.
Speaker 1 (52:57):
Yeah. So interesting. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 5 (53:01):
Okay, you're welcome.
Speaker 6 (53:04):
No more.
Speaker 1 (53:06):
Thicko Jesse Cannon Molly.
Speaker 2 (53:10):
So, yesterday I started seeing a thing that I always
think is funny, which is that it's no secret that
there's some coordination of messages on both sides, but the
right wing always seems to be a little bit more vast,
Like Hillary said, a conspiracy. I thought it was very
funny when I saw some of my least favorite characters
on that side, Matt Walsh, Charlie Kirk, and Jack Pisobiac
(53:32):
all tweeting that it's time to ban third world immigration,
legal or illegal. We've reached our limit. We have a
huge cultural, educational, housing, financial, and essential services problem. And
almost all of them used the exact same language. No
creative input here, What are you thinking?
Speaker 1 (53:48):
Yeah, so this is really get to see exactly what
it looks like. There's clearly like a group chat where
everything is and here it is ban all third world
called immigration illegal or legal period And they start each
three Matt wash Charlie Kirk, and Jack Pasobiac all start
(54:08):
with the same sentence and then they continue on. It's
all the same, Every piece of it is the same.
We need a net zero immigration moratorium with a ban
on all third worlders. I don't know what a Third
worlder is.
Speaker 2 (54:24):
I think it's a fan of the reggae band Third World.
Speaker 1 (54:27):
Yes, it's the only answer. So here we are hearty
fuck all of them. 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
(54:51):
it to a friend and keep the conversation going. Thanks
for listening.
Host
Molly Jong-Fast
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