March 17, 2023 • 51 mins
Congressman Ritchie Torres stops by to talk about bank regulation and how the US handles our rivalry with China. Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold talks about the constant threats to democracy and how she’s fighting back. Plus, The Nation’s Jeet Heer talks about Republican primaries of the past and what they can teach us about 2024.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
where we discuss the top political headlines with some of
today's best minds. And Poland becomes the first NATO country
to send Ukraine fighter planes. We have a jam pack
show today. Congressman Richie Torres stops by to talk bank
regulation in how the US handles China. Then we'll talk
(00:22):
to Colorado Secretary of State Jenna Griswold about the constant
threats to democracy she's seeing in the state of Colorado. First,
we have the host of the Time of Monsters, the
Nation's get Here. Welcome, get Here, frequent flyer with Fast Politics.
So happy to have you back here. I am just
(00:45):
delighted to have you back. You are one of my people.
I want to talk to you about where we are.
Here's a country and Republicans have started their GLP primary
race presidential I'm Marry. I think we can all agree
that the next GOP candidate will be Nicky Haley. Yes,
(01:05):
it's already over. I think Trump and descentis should just
give up because that's obviously what Republican primary voters want.
A woman of South Asian descent who's totally tied to
the GOP establishment. But actually I think the fun news.
I don't know if you saw this morning, but there
was some reporting about which I think will be the
subject of Trump's next speech, which is run descentiss eating habits. Listen,
(01:30):
I'm not Emily post myself, Okay, so I'm not gonna
cast aspersions necessarily. Like apparently this guy he has what
his aid's referred to as a problem with soft social skills,
which is that he eats like a frigging animal and
discuss people like, you know, people his supporters, and what
the detail I got he was in a plane, which
(01:51):
is like a close confined space where you can't escape,
and he's eating pudding with his hands, like you know,
Andrew Jackson pay actually had very poor table manners, but
he was a populist. I don't know if an establishment
Republican like the Santist who's supposed to be you know, Trump,
without the bad aspects can succeed with all these stories
(02:13):
about his table manners. And I just I'm looking forward
to what Trump will do with it, you know, like
I call him hungry ron folks, there's something going on.
You know, he eats putting with his hands. We gotta
find out what's going on here. I'm not saying anything.
I want to talk to you about this because I
do think actually I am of the belief that Donald
Trump says tiny D. Here's tiny D with his high
(02:36):
held cowboy boots and it's over right. I mean, there's
so much for It's like Donald Trump has been gifted
with the most vulnerable Republican candidate ever. And that's the
thing I don't understand. It's like you put Jeb against
a Santist, Jeb would win. Yeah, No, it's really something.
I mean, I guess they were out of alternatives. I mean,
(02:57):
I think the remember is twenty sixteen, they put all
their top guys, you know, like Yo Marco Rubio once
thought of as someone who could be president, Ted Cruise.
They had like a lot of candidates out there because Christine,
they had the whole array, and he decimated them. And
so you know, the last man standing was this, you know,
Ron de Santis d tiny D and he's not gonna
(03:18):
Ronda Sanctimonius here. Yeah, they really are putting all their
eggs in one basket. And one of the interesting is
if you look at I see the polling already, like
the Santis is slipping and it's just a little bit
of like pricking on the part of Drum. Yeah. I
mean during this donor retreat in Palm Beach, this is
a piece from the Daily be Star meeting, and a
Tendy stood up and called him to Satan exactly exactly. Yeah,
(03:42):
So I just like, you know, it's not gonna take much,
and people forget Trump really went after like his arrivals
in a very vicious way that they could not respond
to because they're normal human beings on some level, you know,
the stuff that he's saying, like you know, like say
that Ted Cruise's dad was involved with killing Kennedy. I
(04:02):
don't know if you remember this right, but Ben Carson
there was like he was the only Republican who was
like ever briefly ahead or Trump in the polling, and
then Trump and twenty sixteen, and then Trump just let
loose with this, like taking stories from Ben Carson's autobiography,
which were about his you know, very hard background, genuinely
true that he Yoe came from our real poverty, but
(04:24):
like yeah, just saying like oh this guy pulled a
knife once. Guy, you know, like I don't know about
him just like a really deflated like balloon that pricked.
I want to ask you about this more because I
think what's happening here is a kind of conservative elite
witch casting of which we have not seen since twenty fifteen,
(04:47):
which is this idea that somehow the elite can control
the base despite the fact that they have continually given
in to every whim of the base. That's exactly right.
There's two aspects of this, one of which is that
all these candidates, they always have this sort of crew
of hanger ons who like you know, like I really
(05:08):
invested in them, and that includes that just a staff,
but the sort of media folks in the Republican media.
And so if people I want listeners to remember back to,
you know, those amazing days of twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen,
where like you know, Marco Robio and Ted crews had
a lot of media followers who would put the best
possible spin on things and who are like you know,
(05:29):
full of confidence that their guys had like everything going
for them. And that's all we're saying now with Ron Descentist,
as far as I can tell, his base is within
the sort of conservative incorporated and that's you know a
fair number of people. There's a vast welfare state for
like you know, people on the right, financed by various billionaires.
(05:49):
But these guys are very invested in decentists. And the
thing is that he has very little popular appeal outside
of that. Whereas Trump, Okay, first of all, here already
you had won the primary twenty sixteen, he had been president.
He's a very popular president with Republicans, Like, like, the
people who are Republican voters. I thought, like, this guy
did everything good and and he was robbed. It just
(06:11):
like blows my mind that they think. Add Also, Trump
is willing to attack the sentis and DeSantis is not
willing to answer back. And DeSantis's whole ideas, I'm gonna
be Trump but boring. I will be Trump without the charm,
without the time. Yeah yeah, yeah, I'll be exactly without
like saying funny things, without like you know, funny tweets
(06:32):
that you can't get out of your mind and without
and I will carry through the policies that we want.
And the thing is, at some level, like I don't
think like you know, Republican voters, especially the sort of
non college whites that Trump really bought on board. I
don't think they're that interested in policy. Like, these are
not people that like, you know, are reading the congressional
record to see, like, you know, what laws get past.
(06:53):
They're kind of here to be entertained, right, Like this
is kind of you know, late Roman Empire decadence, where
you know, like you want who can do the funniest things,
you know. I think that this is a really good point.
I want to just like go into this for a minute,
which is the Republican intellectuals and again at the danger
of committing an oxy more on here. I want to
(07:15):
say the people who were the brain trust of the
Republican Party, which you and I can both agree, were
not brain were they? Nor trust? Were they that crew
made a deal with the devil in twenty fifteen. They
decided that they were going to go with the guy
they knew would win, which was Trump, right, or they
maybe they didn't think he would win, but they decided
they would go along with the base. Yeah. Well, I
mean the thing is, look, the Republicans have had a
(07:37):
real trouble really going back to the nineteen nineties. They've
only won the popular vote once and all the presidential
elections since nineteen ninety two, and Trump really offered them
a way out that he could bring in new voters.
That it's also true he alienated a lot of other voters,
but the actual bargain that he offered that he could
(07:57):
bring in these non college white people who never voted
and never would people who never voted, who were like
alienating from the political system, bring them into Republican fold,
and that there were enough of these and they sort
of like Midwestern states that you could you know, have
an electoral college majority. And that was the true part
of his thing. There's actually a very smart Republican operative,
(08:18):
Sean Sendai, who did an article about that ten or
fifteen years old, called the Missing White Voters. That is
exactly what these white voters that were alienated that needed
like some figure like Trump that could bring them on
board and so so so to that extent that work.
The problem is that what these voters want is not
what the Republican elite want and to some degree, like
(08:40):
actually some of these voters are i mean people, you know,
especially Democrats, so there's like, well, they're deplorables, and it's
too like they have a lot of really bad attitudes,
especially on race and gender. But it's also the case
that like, you know, they don't want Medicare cut, they
don't want Social Security cut. So the Republican economic policies
to that they're not popular, not popular at all, you know,
(09:02):
except like maybe like tax cuts because you can kind
of like say, well, they create jobs or whatever. But
even then, I mean, like Trump's most unpopular moment as
president was when he tried to get rid of Obamacare.
That's when he pulled the lowest. That's when he's like
really trying to carry out a Republican wish lust. And
I think it's the case that one of the problems
(09:23):
with Rotten de santisis he's trying to be like mini
me of Trump. I'm Trump but boring. You know, that's
obviously a problem, but also that he's still tied enough
to these economic policies and so you know, like Trump
can't actually find genuine evidence that this guy wanted to
cut Social Security of Medicare. And I have to tell
you there's like enough of the Republican voters who are like,
(09:43):
you know that Trump brought on board, where like these
senior citizens who are gonna like you know, not be
very thrilled by this, I already like this is you know,
like Democrats win among you know, people who are like
forty five and younger, Republicans win among sixty five and over.
And so if you're if you're that party, like, why
the hell would you be talking about social security and
(10:04):
Medicare cuts? NICKI Haley doing that too, you know, like
we need to raise the retirement age, like good luck
ever getting elected on that. You know, mac Ron is
trying to do that. They could have another revolution, right
and they're trying to raise it to what sixty seven?
I mean I don't even think yeah, yeah, so anyways, anyway, yeah, no,
(10:24):
I it's also I mean I think, you know, like
anything could happen, and maybe this De Santas thing is,
you know, hungry Ron is a little bit more than
I suspect. We're right right now. Trump has a lot
of cards on his side, one of which is his
popularity among Republican voters, his fame, his name recognition, but
also the fact that all he has to do is
(10:45):
bring up the fact that the Santas you know, like
want social security and Medicare cuts, and uh, that's a
big thing. And you know De Santas tries to compete
with him by copying Trump on everything, and the thing
is like, if you have the original, why would you
go with a Copycatt decientist is saying, well, you know,
why should we be helping Ukraine? Like, well, if that's
(11:06):
the policy you want, then you already have a guy
who's going to do that for you. No. I agree.
If if pro pudent is your game, you got the guy. Man.
I mean no, I think it's true, and I think
we're seeing again, which is this is the sticky wicket
that the Republican Party is stuck in. And by the way,
I'm delighted because fuck them. But to be trumpy enough
(11:27):
to win a primary means you are completely unelectable in
a general That's right, That's right, Yeah, I know, I
mean I think that, well, except that I think the
camp it is the electoral college thing, which is if
you can get enough, but I actually think that to
g Assue you win the kind of electoral college directory
trumpeted in twenty sixteen, you have to have you know,
enough real populous bunt of fundies and also be able
(11:50):
to reach those non voters. And comp could do that
because you know, he's on television for like twenty years, right, Right,
that's true. TV is the most more popular than any
politician in America. You know, more people watch TV. De
Santist doesn't have that, Like he those voters will not
know who he is or care about him. Unfortunately. You know,
like is a two party system, so like there's a
(12:11):
few things that could go wrong, either in terms of
Joe Biden's health or in terms of you know, the
the economy, and we haven't even talked about what's happening
with the banking system unfortunately. Like I'm not so sanguine
that I mean, I think the Santist is gonna have
our time getting the primary, the Republican nomination, but actually think,
like you know, any Republican has a decent shot unfortunately,
(12:34):
right because of the elements that we can't even predict.
That's said, I actually think and this is the one
thing that makes me a little bit sanguine. It's going
to make everyone else upset. I actually think that Desantist
is much more dangerous than Trump because people know Trump
is really dangerous, Like, I mean, he may still win,
but there is a knowledge that he is a dangerous autocrat.
(12:56):
Whereas there are people on this planet who still think
to Antis is not and they're wrong. Well exactly, but
I want to actually narrow that down to exactly what
the danger is, which is that because Trump was coming
from this reality show world, the you know, like the
centrist establishment never trusted him, whereas the Santists you can
kind of see that they're people, especially like you know,
(13:18):
the New York Times has done like I don't know,
a hundred different articles like why de Santist gould be
given some credit. I'm a liberal, but you know, I've
kind have been rescued. He saw this with this Axio business,
which is that, you know, like this reporter for Axio
got a press release from the Santist and he just
emailed back to them like you know this is in
press releases, propaganda, sparky comment but well with about yeah
(13:43):
add true yeah, And Axio fired the reporter. And I
think that's what's gonna happen if there is a Descantist presidency,
because he's not Trump, even though he has terrible table manners,
they'll cover that up. They'll hire a CIA duplicate that
will go to dinner parties and yeah, you use table manners,
has read Emily Post. But I think that the centrist media,
(14:04):
The Times, the Washington Post, CNN, Axio Political They're all
gonna be like, this is what they want, you know,
like a Republican that could carry out Trump's policies, but
without being unsettling and scary the way the way Trump
is or just vulgar. I mean for you and me, Like,
the scary thing about Trump was he's an authoritarian, right
and you know, he's a threat to American democracy as
(14:25):
a six For a lot of these centrists, the scary
thing about Trump was he had bad manners and he tweeted,
you know, which was actually the best thing about Trump.
I mean, his vulgarity was right right, No, no, great
arty was his best quality. Yeah. But anyway, but they're
gonna buy into it. You can already see hollinggood now,
Like you know, like if Hiss president of santast He's
gonna get much more favorable coverage, like in all the media, well,
(14:49):
the National Review Crew, I mean, I wrote a piece
about how De Santis was more dangerous than Trump because
he's much more effective and much smarter than Trump. I mean,
one of the good thing things about Trump, at least
for our case, was that when he tried to do something,
he usually fucked it up, whereas De Santis has been
incredibly successful as turning Florida into a mini autocracy. Yeah,
(15:12):
I don't know. I mean, I mean that is why
you know that on the right, he's the American orbon like,
he can use the powers of the state to like,
you know, try to create a one party state. And unfortunately,
like I gotta say, there's some buy in on that
from some of the centrist media as well, and I
think that's where that's really where the danger lies from
that it's going to be a little bit harder. I mean.
(15:34):
On the positive side, I think that he pushed for
more mobilization among liberals taxis like you know, and maybe
to break with the centrist media and try to create
more alternative media sources, because I think people are really
going to see with the scientists much more than Trump
the right sort of authoritarian Republican. There's a lot of
people in the establishment that that's what they want. I mean,
I agree that the Republican Party is completely without hope
(15:57):
and that they've embraced authoritarianism and that they continue to
engage in it. I don't think de Santists gets there,
like I think Trump just takes him down at the
knees because everything we're seeing evidence wise points to the
fact that he is a bad at retail politics, and
like we are a country where our politicians need to
(16:17):
go on television and be charming, and I just you know,
no evidence supports the idea that he could even do
that for a minute. Yeah, no, that's absolutely right right
now that the signs are very bad. And where success
is is in terms of like sort of fundraising with
the donor base. And I have to say, if that's
what is your success as a politician, then you know,
(16:38):
that's why we had President Jeff Bush. That's why we
had President Ted Cruz. That's why we had President Phil Brown.
I don't remember, you know, because that guy they could
like open up a bank account and that telling me
there'd be like one hundred and fifty million dollars. I
would say one other thing about this, which is that
you know, I was talking to someone who's a staff
(17:00):
and that person was saying that actually they're seeing some
GOP donors who do not like him because he can't schmooz.
And like you know Trump, I mean again, and I
am no fit. This is no one is defending Trump,
no one is liking him, no one is even saying
anything nice about him. But Trump could schmooz. Oh absolutely, yeah. Yeah.
(17:21):
I mean we kind of underrate that aspect. But I
mean the thing is that Trump was an ideal GOP
candidate in this era where they're kind of a shrinking
party because he could both you know, he's rub enough
money and he has Mara Lego and he knows how
to talk to you know, the real estate guys and
the card dealers to give them to pony up some money.
But he's also you know, it was on TV, so
(17:43):
like the non college whites can really relate to him.
So yeah, I just think, yeah, I just had to.
He sounds like, from what you're saying, he's weak on
both sides, which is like a really amazing thing. We'll
see how. I don't want to get too much into
prediction game, but I think these are real vulnerability, these
Indi Santos and right now, the people that love him
most are these guys who at National Review and elsewhere,
(18:06):
who I gotta tell you, like they get paid six
figure salaries for like a minuscule readership. I don't know
if he saw this thing with Rod Dreyer. Yes, that
was a Vanity Fair story. Yeah, yeah, Vanity Fair story. Yeah.
And so this guy been writing for like a long time,
blogging on a record conservative. It turns out this entire
support was one rich guy in California of real estate
(18:28):
failed son who had a lot of money like Rod's writing,
and was paying for his whole salary, which a six
figure for writing this gibberish. And then the Dreer like,
unfortunately like went too far with describing an uncircumcised penis
that he saw when he was a child as like
this kind of root weener or something like this, and
then the donor said, oh, that's a little too weird.
(18:50):
That's it. I'm sorry. Yes, roddrere a good point, completely
completely insane. Thank you so much for joining us. Always
is a delight. Oh it's good to be on the show.
Congressman Richie Torres represents New York's fifteenth congressional district. Welcome
(19:11):
to Fast Politics, Congressman Richie Torres. Always a pleasure to
be here. Delighted to have you. First. I want to
talk to you about what you just said to me
before we were recording, which was that what you were
told was that being in the minority would be more
laid back, and it has not been that case. Can
(19:33):
you explain. Yeah, I was told that, you know, since
I'm in the minority, I will have more free time
in my hands, and in fact, quite the opposite. It's
been much more demanding, partly because of the committees on
which I sit. I mean, financial services is demanding. But
I was appointed to the new Select Committee on Strategic
Competition between the United States and the CCP, and the
combination of those two committees has been quite consuming. You know,
(19:56):
it's Sunday. It happened to be my birthday. I just
turned thirty five, bragging I've been an elected official for
ten years shadow and I could not even I could
not even celebrate my birthday because I was bombarded with
phone calls about the banking crisis. See, I only emailed you,
so there we go. Well, I do not consider an
(20:16):
email from your work, thank you, So talk to me
about what happened with you guys and Silicon Valley Bank
this weekend. As you know, unlike in two thousand and eight,
when the bank's invested in distressed assets, right like you
know junk like subprime mortgages. Silicon Valley Bank heavily invested
(20:38):
in long term assets, long term treasuries and prime mortgage
backed securities, which are normally safe assets. Yes, those normally
safe assets became unsafe for a bank in a high
interest rate environment, and so when the FED began raising
interest rates, it had two effects. First, it drove down
the value of those long term bonds because investors could
(21:00):
get short term bonds with the same or better yields.
And second, it drove down the amount of startup funding,
which led startups to withdraw their deposits from Silicon Valley Bank,
which was the go to lender for the startup industry,
and in order to honor those redemption requests, Silicon Valley
Bank had no choice but to sell their long term
(21:20):
assets their valuable assets in the short term, which meant
selling them metal loss. People should keep in mind that
banking is as much about psychology as it is about finance.
It's a confidence game. And when Silicon Valley Bank announced
that it had sold more than twenty billion dollars in
securities at a loss of one point eight billion dollars,
that announcement, which was poorly timed against the backdrop of
(21:43):
Silvergate collapse had a customers into withdrawing their deposits. And
in a world of social media, financial panic can spread
more rapidly and more widely than ever before. And keep
in mind that the customer base of Silicon Valley Bank,
We're not retail customers. These were VC firm startups that
(22:03):
are hyper engaged online to have more social media savvy
than the average person. So this is the first bank
run in American history that was driven by social media.
And I want to provide a contrast that illustrates the speed.
So in two thousand and eight, Washington Mutual, which was
the largest bank failure, saw a loss of sixteen point
seven billion dollars over the course of ten days. That
(22:25):
was the largest bank failure. Silicon Valley Banks saw the
loss of forty two billion dollars in the span of
a single day. So the sheer speed of the bank
of the bank run is unprecedented in American history. And
much of that is social media work. A lot of
and rand types venture capitalists, people who sue for being
mentioned on a podcast, so their names will not be used,
(22:48):
but you know who I'm talking about. Peter two there
was a lot of involvement from that crew in ginning
up this panic. The VC community arguably planted the seeds
of its own decline. Like, the VC community made a
decision which is baffling beyond belief right to sabotage their
leading lender. Like without Silicon Valley Bank, the tech startup
(23:10):
industry is going to have far less access to capital. Yeah,
it's a dramatic disruption of their status quo. So this
was a case study in self sabotage. Yeah, that was
my thinking too. When I started to get calls on
Saturday from freaked out vcs, I mean, I just want
to like talk through this for two more seconds because
I know I want to talk to about China after this.
But the bank needed to recapitalize. The truth is as
(23:33):
much as losing money on mortgage back It's not mortgage
backed securities. It was it wasn't it. It was tea bills, right,
both treasuries and prime mortgage back securities. So safe, right,
so safe? Losing a billion dollars, I just want to
like contextualize this. A billion dollars on tea bills and
these securities is not necessarily like they could have come
(23:55):
back from that. There was no reason why that number
needed to destroy the bank. No. Look, the underlying finances
of the bank were sound, right, But keep in mind
that which rise bank runs is not economics or finance.
It's psychology. It's it's the irrationality of financial panting. And
there's no bank in America. I mean, the honest truth
(24:15):
is there's no bank in America. Right, they can withstand
that that has enough on hand to couple all your deposits.
That's the nature of fractionally reserve banking. I want to
go deeper on this because now that this news cycle
is sort of now that we're a couple of days
into this cycle, the Republican narrative is this was woke banking. Okay,
we know that's bullshit, right, We saw the twenty four
(24:36):
white guys in the management obviously, and by the way,
you know whatever, it wasn't fucking woke banking. That's bullshit.
But I want to go back for a minute and
talk about when this bank run happened. These regional banks
were not regulated the same way that the larger banks are.
Can you talk about that? Yes, So the banking system
(24:58):
was radically remade and the aftermath of the two thousand
and eight crisis, we passed dot frank, which subjected the
largest banks, the biggest banks to the most rigorous forms
of regulation, a stress test, much larger capital reserves. There's
a concept known as enhanced frudential supervision and enhanced Prudential Standards,
which is the highest form of regulation, and banks with
(25:21):
assets fifty billion or more were subject to the highest regulation.
In twenty eighteen, with lobbing from regional banks like Silicon
Valley Bank and Signature Bank, President Trump signed into law
a bill that would that raise the threshold for enhanced
supervision from fifty billion dollars to two hundred and fifty
billion dollars. And at the end of twenty twenty two,
(25:42):
Silicon Valley Bank had two hundred and nine billion dollars
in total assets, which was right below the threshold for
enhanced supervision. And that's significant because without enhanced supervision, it
radically reduces the amount of stress testing your undergoing and
radically reduces the granularity and the frequency of the stress testing. Now,
having said that, even if the law had never been changed,
(26:02):
one cannot know for sure whether the crisis could have
been prevented because there appears to have been an incestuous
relationship between the FED and Silicon Valley Bank. The CEO
of Silicon Valley Bank sat on the board of the
Federal Reserve of San Francisco, which is his regulator, right,
So that to me is suggestive of an incestuish relationship
(26:24):
that undermines regulations. Why did that happen, by the way,
I mean, how is that allowed to happen? I mean,
one of the lessons learned is that we have to
prohibit CEOs of sitting on the boards of their regulators,
Like common sense dictates that that is a conflict of interest. Right,
when we talked about this anxiety that a lot of
these vcs were having, you said, if this bank is
(26:44):
able to get a guarantee, we need to regulate the
out of them. So yeah, I mean, I want to
make that point because it's a trade off. Right, If
we're expanding the realm of too big to fail include
regional banks, then that has to come with strings attached.
That has to come with more rigorous regulation. You know,
(27:05):
regulation is important not only on its own merits, because
regulation inspires confidence, like we have confidence in the biggest
banks like JP Morgan, because those are the banks that
are subject to the most regulation, right, And I think that,
you know, it's funny because it's like we had the
last couple of months, we've seen both regulatory failures in
(27:26):
the trains and we've seen regulatory failures in the banks.
And remember we had this president for four years who
is like, every day I take away a regulation. You know,
for every one regulation, I take away fifty five. I
mean that. And like, you know, when you say stuff
like that, people don't understand it until they're you know,
(27:48):
trying to get to the get money out of the bank. Look,
for me, our highest priority has to be to protect
the safety and soundness of our banking system, which is
the beating heart of our economy. Everything else is secondary.
And you know, one of my criticisms of the FED
is that it has a dual mandate. Right when setting
interest rates, it considers employment and inflation. A case could
(28:08):
be made that the FED should expand its mandate to
include financial stability. We have to consider the impact that
interest rates have on the stability of the banking system,
which is the beating heart of the economy. Yeah, so interesting,
So talk to me about what's happening with this special
committee you're on, explain what it is and what it
does for all of us who are not completely brought in.
(28:29):
So the House has set up a new Committee on
Strategic Competition between the United States and the CCP, the
Chinese Communist Party, which is essentially the committee on everything.
It will touch on the jurisdiction of every standing committee.
We're going to tackle military, diplomatic, geopolitical, economic, technological issues.
(28:50):
But our goal is to ensure that America remains competitive,
that we remain the leader of the free worlds. You know,
I think we should be careful not to engage in
Bellico's rhetoric that will provoke even greater tensions between the
United States and China. But we have to recognize that
the Chinese Communist Party is a genuine challenge to the
United States. As you know, China, or the CCP rather
(29:12):
is committing genocide against weaker Muslims, detaining more than a
million Muslims and concentration camps in what it calls re
education centers. We know that the CCP is showing the
same kind of aggression toward Taiwan the Russia has shown
toward Ukraine in the lead up to the invasion. We
know that the CCP has stolen six hundred billion dollars
in intellectual property from the United States. We know that
(29:35):
the CCP subjects its own people to a mass surveillance
states the likes of which not even George Orwell could
have imagined. And we know that the use of China
as a global factory has utterly decimated manufacturing in the
United States. So those are challenges that are too glaring
to ignore. And I think the mission of the committee
is to create a comprehensive legislative agenda that touches on
(29:57):
all those topics that will position the United States to
be more productive at home and more competitive abroad. It's
such a hard thing with China because they are like
much of the world, I mean, and they're clearly one
fifth of the world, right, so clearly they're too big
to war with, right, Like I mean speak of too
(30:19):
big to fail. I mean, how do you deal with
the country that is? I mean, if you think about
like the war with Russia, whatever, the war non war
with Russia that we've been fighting for the last year,
Like in the end, eventually Russia will just get bored
with this. But I mean, or they'll or they will
get exhausted and they'll run out of money. But I mean,
you go to war with China, that's the end of
(30:41):
it for all of us. So I mean, what how
do you tread with a country that won't necessarily negotiate well.
The mission of the New Committee should be to prevent war,
not provoking, right, because the worst case scenario is a
World War three, a war between the United States and China,
which would be a complete catastrophe for the globe. I mean,
(31:03):
that could be the apocalypse. So our goal should be
to prevent war. And the relationship with China has to
be both cooperative and competitive. It has to be cooperative
on global challenges by climate change, but it also has
to be competitive. We have to ensure that the United States,
that the democracy of the world maintain a competitive edge
when it comes to critical technologies like semiconductors, artificial intelligence
(31:27):
wants some computing. You want democratic countries to be the
leaders in those fields. I want to ask you here
you are in this brave new Congress. I mean, like,
this new Committee was started in a GOP Congress. So
there are some not insane things coming out of this Congress.
(31:48):
Despite the fact that you know, it's led by a
guy who basically got his job because Tackle Carlson said
he could have it. There's a tale of two Congresses.
You know, the Republican Party has policymakers and formers. Right
if you sit on the Financial Services Committee under Patrick
mckenry or the Select Committee on the CCP under Mike Gallagher,
(32:09):
you know, I have differences of opinion with them, but
those are serious people, and those are serious committees, and
so I have a different experience of Congress. But if
you're sitting on Oversight or Judiciary or the Weaponization Committee,
you think they're not doing serious staff over a weaponization
you're in the realm of the absurd. I mean, it's
just funny. It's like, I don't see how the Weaponization
(32:31):
Committee could even hire a staff. If I were interviewing
someone and someone said, oh, I was the staff director
for the Weaponization Committee, like I would just laugh. It's
like it's just the title is silly. Well, I think
they must go to like Briebard, you know, people in
that crew. I steer clear of those committees because I
would rather legislate than be subjected to the utter stupidity
(32:55):
people like Marjorie Chella Green and Law and Bobbart. I
want to get into this for a second, this idea
of the a tale of two Congresses. How do you
have serious Republicans and how do they negotiate, you know,
the Kevin McCarthy crew. Well, even though there are serious Republicans,
make no mistake, the far right is in charge of
the Republican Party. Like there's nothing serious or there's nothing
(33:16):
responsible about playing a game of brinksmanship around the deadlomit. So,
even though there are serious Republicans, make no mistake that
Kevin McCarthy and the Republican Party brit large is hostage
to the far right, which is willing to breach the
debt limit of the United States to score political points
against Joe Budden. And that's so I want to be
(33:36):
clear that we cannot overlook or whitewash the fanaticism of
the far right, which is enabled by the cowardice of
the center, which to the extent that he'd even exists
in the Republican Party. Yeah, I mean, it's incredible, incredible stuff.
What else are you seeing, you know, you're in Congress.
I mean, is it all just as run up to
the dead ceiling or is there other drama going on,
(33:59):
although there's no short a drama. I mean, though you know,
I never thought in my first term, on my third day,
I lived through the insurrection, and then in my second term,
I lived through the longest speaker vote in American history,
one of the longest speaker votes in American history, the
longest speaker vote in one hundred and sixty four years.
So there's just an endless dream of drama in Congress.
(34:20):
And it's because of the Republicans. The Republicans create drama
where none is necessary. Obviously, the banking crisis is going
to continue away heavily on us, and we have to
focus on We cannot say, for granted that the crisis
is behind us, even though yesterday the markets had a
good day, though today they're not. And again the stock
market is not the economy. I want to ask you
one last question. You are from New York. Democrats got
(34:44):
creamed and lost the House because of Jay Jacobs. I mean,
there's a real opportunity there between Santos and all of
these other Republicans in these swingey districts. Do you think
that New York State can learn its lesson and get
a shit together. I just turned thirty five, and my
(35:05):
birthday wish is a Democratic majority in twenty twenty four
and Hakeem Jeffreys as the next speaker, and the road
to the Democratic majority runs through New York State. Am
I confident that we're going to reform the Democratic Party
in New York State now? But I am confident that
we can win back those seats because in a presidential year,
you're going to have dramatically higher democratic turnout and what
(35:26):
are essentially democratic districts, these are democratic leaning districts, and
so I'm cautiously optimistic, but we cannot take it for granted.
And as you know, House Majority pack is going to
invest forty five million dollars in six races in New York.
So that's an astonishing investment. That's how serious we are
about winning back the majority, and we see New York
(35:47):
as the road to the majority. Richie Torres, thank you
so much. I hope you'll come back anytime. Jenna Griswold
is Colorado's Secretary of State. Welcome to Fast Power Politics,
Secretary of State Griswold, So let's talk about what is
happening in Secretary of State world in Colorado. Again, I
(36:09):
want to preface this because we think of Colorado as
a blue state because it has a blue governor, it
has two blue senators now. But you're very much really
on the front lines in a lot of ways. That's right,
Colorado does have blue democratic leadership right now. But what
that said, I was the first Democrat to win Secretary
(36:30):
of State in over sixty years when we won in
twenty eighteen. I do think that Colorados unaffiliated Republicans and
Democrats just do not like the extremism. So I think
both are true. We've been at the front line on
a lot of the attacks on democracy which are ongoing,
but also have an electorate in a citizenry that just
(36:51):
does not like the extremism. So talk to me about
some of these ongoing attacks, because you are on the
front lines of voting and so your see a lot
of stuff that we may not be seeing yet. So
tell us what you're seeing. Well. Most recently this past weekend,
a prominent election denier won the race for chair of
the Colorado Republican Party, and it's the latest example of
(37:14):
how democracy remains under attack. Election deniers have been targeting
state GOP chair positions and winning key races. So so far,
I believe this is the fourth state party to go
to an election denier. Right, Michigan did recently too, Right, Yeah,
that's exactly right. The person who won was actually competing
(37:34):
against Tina Peters, who was the woman who breached her
own security trying to prove the big lie, a local
county clerk facing seven counts of felony indictment, and she
actually endorsed Dave Williams, who ended up winning. Jesus, Tina
Peters was an election denier who ended up facing real
legal consequences. That's right. So it was the first insider
(37:59):
threat and in the nation that we know of where
my team discovered the passwords to her county's election system
posted online by the person who allegedly is the leader
of QAnon. So we ended up investigating she did compromise
her system. She's facing a criminal trial right now, and
(38:21):
then was just convicted last week or the week before
on a separate trial, so as Artie was charged criminally.
These small county clerk jobs are sort of unsexy, but
they're real things and they have real consequences. They absolutely
have real consequences, and to be very clear, the vast
majority of county clerks Republicans, Democrats and affiliated to do
(38:45):
a really good job. They are elected to uphold the
right to vote, to actually administer the elections, and they
do a fantastic job here in Colorado. I was just
meeting with some of the clerks yesterday and mentioned that
the clerk from Fremont County, who's a Republican in my eyes,
got the best compliment because the county Democratic Party told
(39:09):
me how much faith they had in his leadership. And
that's how these county clerks should work. The local county
parties should have total faith in the county clerks, and
the best majority of them work around the clock. They
are the unsung heroes of American democracy. But of course
we've seen a couple of problematic ones pop up. I
just want to go back to these state party chairs
(39:32):
because can you explain to us why that matters? So
why electing an election denier for a GOP chair that
what the sort of consequences of that are. Yeah, I
think there's a couple of consequences, and it depends state
to state. First, and foremost, they're they're the leader of
the state Republican party and with the election of Dave Williams.
(39:53):
Here in Colorado, it's clearer that the state Republican Party
has embraced election denialists. That should be worrisome in itself.
You know, in Michigan, Christina Kuramo won her election of
the state Republican Party. She ran for a secretary of
state last cycle and has still refused to concede her failure.
(40:15):
She believes, by the way that like yoga is a
tie of Satan or something like that. It's really far
out there. The first thing is just the bully pulpit
of leadership. But then we work, the secretaries of state
work with the leadership of both political parties on election
issues through the election cycle. Depending on the state, the
(40:37):
county parties are compiling a list of election judges and
election watchers. Election deniers have also been elected to state
party chair in Ohio and Kansas. So it just underlines
that all the voters did their great service to democracy
in the midterms. Election denialism has not been defeated. Folks
(41:00):
far right are doubling down, So we just have to
continue to remain extremely vigilant and take action to protect democracy.
It's so dispiriting that this continues on and that like
the vos, just have to keep rejecting this kind of
crazy it is. But I'll tell you I am hopeful.
(41:21):
In the midterms, we had election deniers running for Secretary
of State, so the chief election officer in every battleground
state where we had a race. So we had election
deniers run in Nevada, in Michigan and Minnesota, in New
Mexico and Arizona. And why I'm so optimistic is that
(41:41):
when American voters know what's at stake, they are rejecting
these extremist candidates and ensuring that they are electing folks
who will be good stewards of elections, of ensuring that
every eligible person, regardless of their political affiliation or the
color of their skin, can have their voice hurt. With
that said, I do think we are not out of
(42:03):
the woods. But I also think that we will beat
this extremism. We're just not there yet. At the end
of the day, this is about power, and if Americans
continue to reject these extremist candidates, I do think this
will fade out of mainstream political thought. Yeah. No, I
mean I think if they keep losing with it, eventually
(42:23):
they'll decide that they have to run on something else.
But yeah, it's incredible that they keep losing on it.
You're seeing these state party chairs, You're seeing these county clerks.
What else are you seeing at the state level in Colorado?
So across the nation, we are seeing the continual effort
(42:46):
to strip Americans of the right to vote. If you remember,
the last couple of years, we sought an unprecedented passage
of voter suppression laws. It is now harder for many
Americans across the country to vote than before. That trimp continues.
This year alone, in at least thirty two states, over
one hundred and fifty voter suppression or election interference bills
(43:07):
were prefiled or introduced. And we are seeing across the
nation extremist Republicans continuing to try to undermine elections and
and pursuing a radical agenda. Our right to love who
we love, mary who we love, Provide kids with the
best possible education, the right for women and people to
(43:29):
have control over our own bodies. It all starts at
the ballot box. That's why protecting democracy is so important.
Lots of work ahead, but I am confident we're going
to get through this dark period. Of American history. In Colorado,
what does your state House look like? Are there still
allotted you? You are the state that has Lauren Boebert.
I'm sorry to tell you so. I mean there's a
(43:52):
real right wing contingent there. Yeah. So the Ate House
and State Senate are controlled by Democratic leadership, so there's
majority Democrats. But with that said, I will tell you,
if you could even believe it, my saddest day of
being an elected official was actually January of this year.
I was testifying in the Legislature and there were various
(44:16):
legislators in the committee that I was testifying in who
were straight election deniers. And seeing elected officials right in
front of you spew out these conspiracies. In a state
like Colorado, it's sad, not only because they're misleading or
trying to mislead their constituents and lying from a position
(44:37):
of power, but words have power. And I know that's
corny to say no, but it's true. These lies. They've
been cited violence. It's the reason that there was a
kidnapping attempt of the Michigan governor. It's the reason that
Paul Pelosi was attacked. It's the reason in December that
six elected officials. Houses in New Mexico were shot up,
(45:00):
So you know, we have to maintain our path on
pushing back on the disinformation with truth, on refuting the lies,
and that work isn't over either. Yeah, I think that's
so interesting. What about abortion access, I mean, I can't
believe I have to have this conversation with you, but
you are one of the few states in your area
(45:21):
that is I mean, there are a couple of states
in the West, but you are an abortion safe haven
for people who need treatment. Yes, the last time I
was on your podcast, I think was right after the
Job's decision, so that the gutting of Row, and it
was such a visceral shock, even though we, you know,
(45:42):
many of us suspected that it was coming. But to
have the Supreme Court literally decide that it would no
longer protect the full citizenship of women in this country.
But more than that, really dictate many women to death.
It is so outrageously shocking that I'm with you. I
can't even believe we have to have this conversation. But
(46:03):
luckily there are states like Colorado who are continuing to
protect women and provide services. Our state legislature did a
fabulous job last year of codifying the right to abortion
care the right to birth control in state law. I
think there will be more movement on protecting that work
in the state. But people are traveling from all over
(46:26):
the country and the wait time for abortion care has skyrocketed.
And if you can imagine, women are driving sometimes across
various states who want to have babies. They want to
have babies, and their pregnancy doesn't go right, and because
of it, they can their life is in danger and
(46:47):
they cannot get just the healthcare that they need in
their states. It's just horrible. Yeah, no, I mean I
remember being a new Maximan seeing these women sleeping in
their cars so that they can have abortions. And you know,
we're also seeing all of these women who have miscarriages
who can't then get treatment. Yeah, so there was I
(47:08):
heard from one of the providers a couple of months ago.
Is when they told me this. There was a woman
in Texas with her I think six year old son
and husband who had a natural miscarriage that was risking
her life. Her medical providers refused to help her. They
jumped in a car drove from Texas to Colorado. We're
(47:28):
sitting at the provider's office at six am in the morning,
and at any time she could have died on that drive. Yeah.
And can you imagine, like, if states supposedly care about
family values or the sanctity of life, that they are
telling this woman you may have to die in front
of your little son because we don't want to provide
(47:49):
you with healthcare. So I'm just so proud of the
state of Colorado and really honored to be a woman
and statewide elected office right now to fight for values.
And one of the things I did last year was
joined the governor of Colorado and saying we will not
extradite any person for the criminalization of abortion in another state. Yeah,
(48:10):
it's just unbelievable. I just can't wrap my head around it.
I mean I can, but I just, you know, the
hypocrisy is just incredible. I also wanted to ask you
what's next for you? You know, I think the next
two years are going to be difficult for secretaries of state.
We will beat the election denialism, I'm confident of that,
(48:33):
but it's not being so the presidential election. We have
a president who incited an insurrection, possibly tough of ticket,
if not election deniers very strong candidates on the Republican field.
So the next two years, I am going to continue
to strengthen our laws and address any situation leading up
(48:53):
to that general election for the president. So that is
our full focus, and I think we'll have great elections,
but they'll continue to be trying. So just going to
continue to do everything that we can, and I'm confident
the American people will again save democracy just like they
did in twenty twenty two, and I'll be fighting for
our rights right alongside with them. Oh, thank you so much.
(49:16):
I really appreciate having you and you making the time.
Of course, thank you for all your leadership and for
your fabulous fashion sense, which I always appreciate. Molly jun Fast,
Jesse Cannon. Marian Williamson run for president again, but I
(49:38):
feel like there's been some reporting about that she's not
the best person to have in office. I would like
to point out first that my relationship with Marian Williamson
is long varied and includes her complaining right, and includes
her dming my mother complaining about me. And so I
say this. We learned today from Politico, a political story
(50:03):
with twelve sources that very spiritual Mary Ann Williamson is
in fact a very bad boss. Again, being a bad
boss is complicated, and certainly there are a lot of
people who do not, who are quite tough on women,
especially women in power. But I think that when your
whole stick is built on the idea that you're so
(50:25):
spiritual and even handed and filled with love that the
fact that you throw your phone at people work for you,
it's probably not a great sign. And she gets our
moment of fuckery. That's it for this episode of Fast Politics.
Tune in every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to hear the
(50:45):
best minds in politics makes sense of all this chaos.
If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send it to
a friend and keep the conversation going. And again, thanks
for listening.
Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
where we discuss the top political headlines with some of
today's best minds. And Poland becomes the first NATO country
to send Ukraine fighter planes. We have a jam pack
show today. Congressman Richie Torres stops by to talk bank
regulation in how the US handles China. Then we'll talk
(00:22):
to Colorado Secretary of State Jenna Griswold about the constant
threats to democracy she's seeing in the state of Colorado. First,
we have the host of the Time of Monsters, the
Nation's get Here. Welcome, get Here, frequent flyer with Fast Politics.
So happy to have you back here. I am just
(00:45):
delighted to have you back. You are one of my people.
I want to talk to you about where we are.
Here's a country and Republicans have started their GLP primary
race presidential I'm Marry. I think we can all agree
that the next GOP candidate will be Nicky Haley. Yes,
(01:05):
it's already over. I think Trump and descentis should just
give up because that's obviously what Republican primary voters want.
A woman of South Asian descent who's totally tied to
the GOP establishment. But actually I think the fun news.
I don't know if you saw this morning, but there
was some reporting about which I think will be the
subject of Trump's next speech, which is run descentiss eating habits. Listen,
(01:30):
I'm not Emily post myself, Okay, so I'm not gonna
cast aspersions necessarily. Like apparently this guy he has what
his aid's referred to as a problem with soft social skills,
which is that he eats like a frigging animal and
discuss people like, you know, people his supporters, and what
the detail I got he was in a plane, which
(01:51):
is like a close confined space where you can't escape,
and he's eating pudding with his hands, like you know,
Andrew Jackson pay actually had very poor table manners, but
he was a populist. I don't know if an establishment
Republican like the Santist who's supposed to be you know, Trump,
without the bad aspects can succeed with all these stories
(02:13):
about his table manners. And I just I'm looking forward
to what Trump will do with it, you know, like
I call him hungry ron folks, there's something going on.
You know, he eats putting with his hands. We gotta
find out what's going on here. I'm not saying anything.
I want to talk to you about this because I
do think actually I am of the belief that Donald
Trump says tiny D. Here's tiny D with his high
(02:36):
held cowboy boots and it's over right. I mean, there's
so much for It's like Donald Trump has been gifted
with the most vulnerable Republican candidate ever. And that's the
thing I don't understand. It's like you put Jeb against
a Santist, Jeb would win. Yeah, No, it's really something.
I mean, I guess they were out of alternatives. I mean,
(02:57):
I think the remember is twenty sixteen, they put all
their top guys, you know, like Yo Marco Rubio once
thought of as someone who could be president, Ted Cruise.
They had like a lot of candidates out there because Christine,
they had the whole array, and he decimated them. And
so you know, the last man standing was this, you know,
Ron de Santis d tiny D and he's not gonna
(03:18):
Ronda Sanctimonius here. Yeah, they really are putting all their
eggs in one basket. And one of the interesting is
if you look at I see the polling already, like
the Santis is slipping and it's just a little bit
of like pricking on the part of Drum. Yeah. I
mean during this donor retreat in Palm Beach, this is
a piece from the Daily be Star meeting, and a
Tendy stood up and called him to Satan exactly exactly. Yeah,
(03:42):
So I just like, you know, it's not gonna take much,
and people forget Trump really went after like his arrivals
in a very vicious way that they could not respond
to because they're normal human beings on some level, you know,
the stuff that he's saying, like you know, like say
that Ted Cruise's dad was involved with killing Kennedy. I
(04:02):
don't know if you remember this right, but Ben Carson
there was like he was the only Republican who was
like ever briefly ahead or Trump in the polling, and
then Trump and twenty sixteen, and then Trump just let
loose with this, like taking stories from Ben Carson's autobiography,
which were about his you know, very hard background, genuinely
true that he Yoe came from our real poverty, but
(04:24):
like yeah, just saying like oh this guy pulled a
knife once. Guy, you know, like I don't know about
him just like a really deflated like balloon that pricked.
I want to ask you about this more because I
think what's happening here is a kind of conservative elite
witch casting of which we have not seen since twenty fifteen,
(04:47):
which is this idea that somehow the elite can control
the base despite the fact that they have continually given
in to every whim of the base. That's exactly right.
There's two aspects of this, one of which is that
all these candidates, they always have this sort of crew
of hanger ons who like you know, like I really
(05:08):
invested in them, and that includes that just a staff,
but the sort of media folks in the Republican media.
And so if people I want listeners to remember back to,
you know, those amazing days of twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen,
where like you know, Marco Robio and Ted crews had
a lot of media followers who would put the best
possible spin on things and who are like you know,
(05:29):
full of confidence that their guys had like everything going
for them. And that's all we're saying now with Ron Descentist,
as far as I can tell, his base is within
the sort of conservative incorporated and that's you know a
fair number of people. There's a vast welfare state for
like you know, people on the right, financed by various billionaires.
(05:49):
But these guys are very invested in decentists. And the
thing is that he has very little popular appeal outside
of that. Whereas Trump, Okay, first of all, here already
you had won the primary twenty sixteen, he had been president.
He's a very popular president with Republicans, Like, like, the
people who are Republican voters. I thought, like, this guy
did everything good and and he was robbed. It just
(06:11):
like blows my mind that they think. Add Also, Trump
is willing to attack the sentis and DeSantis is not
willing to answer back. And DeSantis's whole ideas, I'm gonna
be Trump but boring. I will be Trump without the charm,
without the time. Yeah yeah, yeah, I'll be exactly without
like saying funny things, without like you know, funny tweets
(06:32):
that you can't get out of your mind and without
and I will carry through the policies that we want.
And the thing is, at some level, like I don't
think like you know, Republican voters, especially the sort of
non college whites that Trump really bought on board. I
don't think they're that interested in policy. Like, these are
not people that like, you know, are reading the congressional
record to see, like, you know, what laws get past.
(06:53):
They're kind of here to be entertained, right, Like this
is kind of you know, late Roman Empire decadence, where
you know, like you want who can do the funniest things,
you know. I think that this is a really good point.
I want to just like go into this for a minute,
which is the Republican intellectuals and again at the danger
of committing an oxy more on here. I want to
(07:15):
say the people who were the brain trust of the
Republican Party, which you and I can both agree, were
not brain were they? Nor trust? Were they that crew
made a deal with the devil in twenty fifteen. They
decided that they were going to go with the guy
they knew would win, which was Trump, right, or they
maybe they didn't think he would win, but they decided
they would go along with the base. Yeah. Well, I
mean the thing is, look, the Republicans have had a
(07:37):
real trouble really going back to the nineteen nineties. They've
only won the popular vote once and all the presidential
elections since nineteen ninety two, and Trump really offered them
a way out that he could bring in new voters.
That it's also true he alienated a lot of other voters,
but the actual bargain that he offered that he could
(07:57):
bring in these non college white people who never voted
and never would people who never voted, who were like
alienating from the political system, bring them into Republican fold,
and that there were enough of these and they sort
of like Midwestern states that you could you know, have
an electoral college majority. And that was the true part
of his thing. There's actually a very smart Republican operative,
(08:18):
Sean Sendai, who did an article about that ten or
fifteen years old, called the Missing White Voters. That is
exactly what these white voters that were alienated that needed
like some figure like Trump that could bring them on
board and so so so to that extent that work.
The problem is that what these voters want is not
what the Republican elite want and to some degree, like
(08:40):
actually some of these voters are i mean people, you know,
especially Democrats, so there's like, well, they're deplorables, and it's
too like they have a lot of really bad attitudes,
especially on race and gender. But it's also the case
that like, you know, they don't want Medicare cut, they
don't want Social Security cut. So the Republican economic policies
to that they're not popular, not popular at all, you know,
(09:02):
except like maybe like tax cuts because you can kind
of like say, well, they create jobs or whatever. But
even then, I mean, like Trump's most unpopular moment as
president was when he tried to get rid of Obamacare.
That's when he pulled the lowest. That's when he's like
really trying to carry out a Republican wish lust. And
I think it's the case that one of the problems
(09:23):
with Rotten de santisis he's trying to be like mini
me of Trump. I'm Trump but boring. You know, that's
obviously a problem, but also that he's still tied enough
to these economic policies and so you know, like Trump
can't actually find genuine evidence that this guy wanted to
cut Social Security of Medicare. And I have to tell
you there's like enough of the Republican voters who are like,
(09:43):
you know that Trump brought on board, where like these
senior citizens who are gonna like you know, not be
very thrilled by this, I already like this is you know,
like Democrats win among you know, people who are like
forty five and younger, Republicans win among sixty five and over.
And so if you're if you're that party, like, why
the hell would you be talking about social security and
(10:04):
Medicare cuts? NICKI Haley doing that too, you know, like
we need to raise the retirement age, like good luck
ever getting elected on that. You know, mac Ron is
trying to do that. They could have another revolution, right
and they're trying to raise it to what sixty seven?
I mean I don't even think yeah, yeah, so anyways, anyway, yeah, no,
(10:24):
I it's also I mean I think, you know, like
anything could happen, and maybe this De Santas thing is,
you know, hungry Ron is a little bit more than
I suspect. We're right right now. Trump has a lot
of cards on his side, one of which is his
popularity among Republican voters, his fame, his name recognition, but
also the fact that all he has to do is
(10:45):
bring up the fact that the Santas you know, like
want social security and Medicare cuts, and uh, that's a
big thing. And you know De Santas tries to compete
with him by copying Trump on everything, and the thing
is like, if you have the original, why would you
go with a Copycatt decientist is saying, well, you know,
why should we be helping Ukraine? Like, well, if that's
(11:06):
the policy you want, then you already have a guy
who's going to do that for you. No. I agree.
If if pro pudent is your game, you got the guy. Man.
I mean no, I think it's true, and I think
we're seeing again, which is this is the sticky wicket
that the Republican Party is stuck in. And by the way,
I'm delighted because fuck them. But to be trumpy enough
(11:27):
to win a primary means you are completely unelectable in
a general That's right, That's right, Yeah, I know, I
mean I think that, well, except that I think the
camp it is the electoral college thing, which is if
you can get enough, but I actually think that to
g Assue you win the kind of electoral college directory
trumpeted in twenty sixteen, you have to have you know,
enough real populous bunt of fundies and also be able
(11:50):
to reach those non voters. And comp could do that
because you know, he's on television for like twenty years, right, Right,
that's true. TV is the most more popular than any
politician in America. You know, more people watch TV. De
Santist doesn't have that, Like he those voters will not
know who he is or care about him. Unfortunately. You know,
like is a two party system, so like there's a
(12:11):
few things that could go wrong, either in terms of
Joe Biden's health or in terms of you know, the
the economy, and we haven't even talked about what's happening
with the banking system unfortunately. Like I'm not so sanguine
that I mean, I think the Santist is gonna have
our time getting the primary, the Republican nomination, but actually think,
like you know, any Republican has a decent shot unfortunately,
(12:34):
right because of the elements that we can't even predict.
That's said, I actually think and this is the one
thing that makes me a little bit sanguine. It's going
to make everyone else upset. I actually think that Desantist
is much more dangerous than Trump because people know Trump
is really dangerous, Like, I mean, he may still win,
but there is a knowledge that he is a dangerous autocrat.
(12:56):
Whereas there are people on this planet who still think
to Antis is not and they're wrong. Well exactly, but
I want to actually narrow that down to exactly what
the danger is, which is that because Trump was coming
from this reality show world, the you know, like the
centrist establishment never trusted him, whereas the Santists you can
kind of see that they're people, especially like you know,
(13:18):
the New York Times has done like I don't know,
a hundred different articles like why de Santist gould be
given some credit. I'm a liberal, but you know, I've
kind have been rescued. He saw this with this Axio business,
which is that, you know, like this reporter for Axio
got a press release from the Santist and he just
emailed back to them like you know this is in
press releases, propaganda, sparky comment but well with about yeah
(13:43):
add true yeah, And Axio fired the reporter. And I
think that's what's gonna happen if there is a Descantist presidency,
because he's not Trump, even though he has terrible table manners,
they'll cover that up. They'll hire a CIA duplicate that
will go to dinner parties and yeah, you use table manners,
has read Emily Post. But I think that the centrist media,
(14:04):
The Times, the Washington Post, CNN, Axio Political They're all
gonna be like, this is what they want, you know,
like a Republican that could carry out Trump's policies, but
without being unsettling and scary the way the way Trump
is or just vulgar. I mean for you and me, Like,
the scary thing about Trump was he's an authoritarian, right
and you know, he's a threat to American democracy as
(14:25):
a six For a lot of these centrists, the scary
thing about Trump was he had bad manners and he tweeted,
you know, which was actually the best thing about Trump.
I mean, his vulgarity was right right, No, no, great
arty was his best quality. Yeah. But anyway, but they're
gonna buy into it. You can already see hollinggood now,
Like you know, like if Hiss president of santast He's
gonna get much more favorable coverage, like in all the media, well,
(14:49):
the National Review Crew, I mean, I wrote a piece
about how De Santis was more dangerous than Trump because
he's much more effective and much smarter than Trump. I mean,
one of the good thing things about Trump, at least
for our case, was that when he tried to do something,
he usually fucked it up, whereas De Santis has been
incredibly successful as turning Florida into a mini autocracy. Yeah,
(15:12):
I don't know. I mean, I mean that is why
you know that on the right, he's the American orbon like,
he can use the powers of the state to like,
you know, try to create a one party state. And unfortunately,
like I gotta say, there's some buy in on that
from some of the centrist media as well, and I
think that's where that's really where the danger lies from
that it's going to be a little bit harder. I mean.
(15:34):
On the positive side, I think that he pushed for
more mobilization among liberals taxis like you know, and maybe
to break with the centrist media and try to create
more alternative media sources, because I think people are really
going to see with the scientists much more than Trump
the right sort of authoritarian Republican. There's a lot of
people in the establishment that that's what they want. I mean,
I agree that the Republican Party is completely without hope
(15:57):
and that they've embraced authoritarianism and that they continue to
engage in it. I don't think de Santists gets there,
like I think Trump just takes him down at the
knees because everything we're seeing evidence wise points to the
fact that he is a bad at retail politics, and
like we are a country where our politicians need to
(16:17):
go on television and be charming, and I just you know,
no evidence supports the idea that he could even do
that for a minute. Yeah, no, that's absolutely right right
now that the signs are very bad. And where success
is is in terms of like sort of fundraising with
the donor base. And I have to say, if that's
what is your success as a politician, then you know,
(16:38):
that's why we had President Jeff Bush. That's why we
had President Ted Cruz. That's why we had President Phil Brown.
I don't remember, you know, because that guy they could
like open up a bank account and that telling me
there'd be like one hundred and fifty million dollars. I
would say one other thing about this, which is that
you know, I was talking to someone who's a staff
(17:00):
and that person was saying that actually they're seeing some
GOP donors who do not like him because he can't schmooz.
And like you know Trump, I mean again, and I
am no fit. This is no one is defending Trump,
no one is liking him, no one is even saying
anything nice about him. But Trump could schmooz. Oh absolutely, yeah. Yeah.
(17:21):
I mean we kind of underrate that aspect. But I
mean the thing is that Trump was an ideal GOP
candidate in this era where they're kind of a shrinking
party because he could both you know, he's rub enough
money and he has Mara Lego and he knows how
to talk to you know, the real estate guys and
the card dealers to give them to pony up some money.
But he's also you know, it was on TV, so
(17:43):
like the non college whites can really relate to him.
So yeah, I just think, yeah, I just had to.
He sounds like, from what you're saying, he's weak on
both sides, which is like a really amazing thing. We'll
see how. I don't want to get too much into
prediction game, but I think these are real vulnerability, these
Indi Santos and right now, the people that love him
most are these guys who at National Review and elsewhere,
(18:06):
who I gotta tell you, like they get paid six
figure salaries for like a minuscule readership. I don't know
if he saw this thing with Rod Dreyer. Yes, that
was a Vanity Fair story. Yeah, yeah, Vanity Fair story. Yeah.
And so this guy been writing for like a long time,
blogging on a record conservative. It turns out this entire
support was one rich guy in California of real estate
(18:28):
failed son who had a lot of money like Rod's writing,
and was paying for his whole salary, which a six
figure for writing this gibberish. And then the Dreer like,
unfortunately like went too far with describing an uncircumcised penis
that he saw when he was a child as like
this kind of root weener or something like this, and
then the donor said, oh, that's a little too weird.
(18:50):
That's it. I'm sorry. Yes, roddrere a good point, completely
completely insane. Thank you so much for joining us. Always
is a delight. Oh it's good to be on the show.
Congressman Richie Torres represents New York's fifteenth congressional district. Welcome
(19:11):
to Fast Politics, Congressman Richie Torres. Always a pleasure to
be here. Delighted to have you. First. I want to
talk to you about what you just said to me
before we were recording, which was that what you were
told was that being in the minority would be more
laid back, and it has not been that case. Can
(19:33):
you explain. Yeah, I was told that, you know, since
I'm in the minority, I will have more free time
in my hands, and in fact, quite the opposite. It's
been much more demanding, partly because of the committees on
which I sit. I mean, financial services is demanding. But
I was appointed to the new Select Committee on Strategic
Competition between the United States and the CCP, and the
combination of those two committees has been quite consuming. You know,
(19:56):
it's Sunday. It happened to be my birthday. I just
turned thirty five, bragging I've been an elected official for
ten years shadow and I could not even I could
not even celebrate my birthday because I was bombarded with
phone calls about the banking crisis. See, I only emailed you,
so there we go. Well, I do not consider an
(20:16):
email from your work, thank you, So talk to me
about what happened with you guys and Silicon Valley Bank
this weekend. As you know, unlike in two thousand and eight,
when the bank's invested in distressed assets, right like you
know junk like subprime mortgages. Silicon Valley Bank heavily invested
(20:38):
in long term assets, long term treasuries and prime mortgage
backed securities, which are normally safe assets. Yes, those normally
safe assets became unsafe for a bank in a high
interest rate environment, and so when the FED began raising
interest rates, it had two effects. First, it drove down
the value of those long term bonds because investors could
(21:00):
get short term bonds with the same or better yields.
And second, it drove down the amount of startup funding,
which led startups to withdraw their deposits from Silicon Valley Bank,
which was the go to lender for the startup industry,
and in order to honor those redemption requests, Silicon Valley
Bank had no choice but to sell their long term
(21:20):
assets their valuable assets in the short term, which meant
selling them metal loss. People should keep in mind that
banking is as much about psychology as it is about finance.
It's a confidence game. And when Silicon Valley Bank announced
that it had sold more than twenty billion dollars in
securities at a loss of one point eight billion dollars,
that announcement, which was poorly timed against the backdrop of
(21:43):
Silvergate collapse had a customers into withdrawing their deposits. And
in a world of social media, financial panic can spread
more rapidly and more widely than ever before. And keep
in mind that the customer base of Silicon Valley Bank,
We're not retail customers. These were VC firm startups that
(22:03):
are hyper engaged online to have more social media savvy
than the average person. So this is the first bank
run in American history that was driven by social media.
And I want to provide a contrast that illustrates the speed.
So in two thousand and eight, Washington Mutual, which was
the largest bank failure, saw a loss of sixteen point
seven billion dollars over the course of ten days. That
(22:25):
was the largest bank failure. Silicon Valley Banks saw the
loss of forty two billion dollars in the span of
a single day. So the sheer speed of the bank
of the bank run is unprecedented in American history. And
much of that is social media work. A lot of
and rand types venture capitalists, people who sue for being
mentioned on a podcast, so their names will not be used,
(22:48):
but you know who I'm talking about. Peter two there
was a lot of involvement from that crew in ginning
up this panic. The VC community arguably planted the seeds
of its own decline. Like, the VC community made a
decision which is baffling beyond belief right to sabotage their
leading lender. Like without Silicon Valley Bank, the tech startup
(23:10):
industry is going to have far less access to capital. Yeah,
it's a dramatic disruption of their status quo. So this
was a case study in self sabotage. Yeah, that was
my thinking too. When I started to get calls on
Saturday from freaked out vcs, I mean, I just want
to like talk through this for two more seconds because
I know I want to talk to about China after this.
But the bank needed to recapitalize. The truth is as
(23:33):
much as losing money on mortgage back It's not mortgage
backed securities. It was it wasn't it. It was tea bills, right,
both treasuries and prime mortgage back securities. So safe, right,
so safe? Losing a billion dollars, I just want to
like contextualize this. A billion dollars on tea bills and
these securities is not necessarily like they could have come
(23:55):
back from that. There was no reason why that number
needed to destroy the bank. No. Look, the underlying finances
of the bank were sound, right, But keep in mind
that which rise bank runs is not economics or finance.
It's psychology. It's it's the irrationality of financial panting. And
there's no bank in America. I mean, the honest truth
(24:15):
is there's no bank in America. Right, they can withstand
that that has enough on hand to couple all your deposits.
That's the nature of fractionally reserve banking. I want to
go deeper on this because now that this news cycle
is sort of now that we're a couple of days
into this cycle, the Republican narrative is this was woke banking. Okay,
we know that's bullshit, right, We saw the twenty four
(24:36):
white guys in the management obviously, and by the way,
you know whatever, it wasn't fucking woke banking. That's bullshit.
But I want to go back for a minute and
talk about when this bank run happened. These regional banks
were not regulated the same way that the larger banks are.
Can you talk about that? Yes, So the banking system
(24:58):
was radically remade and the aftermath of the two thousand
and eight crisis, we passed dot frank, which subjected the
largest banks, the biggest banks to the most rigorous forms
of regulation, a stress test, much larger capital reserves. There's
a concept known as enhanced frudential supervision and enhanced Prudential Standards,
which is the highest form of regulation, and banks with
(25:21):
assets fifty billion or more were subject to the highest regulation.
In twenty eighteen, with lobbing from regional banks like Silicon
Valley Bank and Signature Bank, President Trump signed into law
a bill that would that raise the threshold for enhanced
supervision from fifty billion dollars to two hundred and fifty
billion dollars. And at the end of twenty twenty two,
(25:42):
Silicon Valley Bank had two hundred and nine billion dollars
in total assets, which was right below the threshold for
enhanced supervision. And that's significant because without enhanced supervision, it
radically reduces the amount of stress testing your undergoing and
radically reduces the granularity and the frequency of the stress testing. Now,
having said that, even if the law had never been changed,
(26:02):
one cannot know for sure whether the crisis could have
been prevented because there appears to have been an incestuous
relationship between the FED and Silicon Valley Bank. The CEO
of Silicon Valley Bank sat on the board of the
Federal Reserve of San Francisco, which is his regulator, right,
So that to me is suggestive of an incestuish relationship
(26:24):
that undermines regulations. Why did that happen, by the way,
I mean, how is that allowed to happen? I mean,
one of the lessons learned is that we have to
prohibit CEOs of sitting on the boards of their regulators,
Like common sense dictates that that is a conflict of interest. Right,
when we talked about this anxiety that a lot of
these vcs were having, you said, if this bank is
(26:44):
able to get a guarantee, we need to regulate the
out of them. So yeah, I mean, I want to
make that point because it's a trade off. Right, If
we're expanding the realm of too big to fail include
regional banks, then that has to come with strings attached.
That has to come with more rigorous regulation. You know,
(27:05):
regulation is important not only on its own merits, because
regulation inspires confidence, like we have confidence in the biggest
banks like JP Morgan, because those are the banks that
are subject to the most regulation, right, And I think that,
you know, it's funny because it's like we had the
last couple of months, we've seen both regulatory failures in
(27:26):
the trains and we've seen regulatory failures in the banks.
And remember we had this president for four years who
is like, every day I take away a regulation. You know,
for every one regulation, I take away fifty five. I
mean that. And like, you know, when you say stuff
like that, people don't understand it until they're you know,
(27:48):
trying to get to the get money out of the bank. Look,
for me, our highest priority has to be to protect
the safety and soundness of our banking system, which is
the beating heart of our economy. Everything else is secondary.
And you know, one of my criticisms of the FED
is that it has a dual mandate. Right when setting
interest rates, it considers employment and inflation. A case could
(28:08):
be made that the FED should expand its mandate to
include financial stability. We have to consider the impact that
interest rates have on the stability of the banking system,
which is the beating heart of the economy. Yeah, so interesting,
So talk to me about what's happening with this special
committee you're on, explain what it is and what it
does for all of us who are not completely brought in.
(28:29):
So the House has set up a new Committee on
Strategic Competition between the United States and the CCP, the
Chinese Communist Party, which is essentially the committee on everything.
It will touch on the jurisdiction of every standing committee.
We're going to tackle military, diplomatic, geopolitical, economic, technological issues.
(28:50):
But our goal is to ensure that America remains competitive,
that we remain the leader of the free worlds. You know,
I think we should be careful not to engage in
Bellico's rhetoric that will provoke even greater tensions between the
United States and China. But we have to recognize that
the Chinese Communist Party is a genuine challenge to the
United States. As you know, China, or the CCP rather
(29:12):
is committing genocide against weaker Muslims, detaining more than a
million Muslims and concentration camps in what it calls re
education centers. We know that the CCP is showing the
same kind of aggression toward Taiwan the Russia has shown
toward Ukraine in the lead up to the invasion. We
know that the CCP has stolen six hundred billion dollars
in intellectual property from the United States. We know that
(29:35):
the CCP subjects its own people to a mass surveillance
states the likes of which not even George Orwell could
have imagined. And we know that the use of China
as a global factory has utterly decimated manufacturing in the
United States. So those are challenges that are too glaring
to ignore. And I think the mission of the committee
is to create a comprehensive legislative agenda that touches on
(29:57):
all those topics that will position the United States to
be more productive at home and more competitive abroad. It's
such a hard thing with China because they are like
much of the world, I mean, and they're clearly one
fifth of the world, right, so clearly they're too big
to war with, right, Like I mean speak of too
(30:19):
big to fail. I mean, how do you deal with
the country that is? I mean, if you think about
like the war with Russia, whatever, the war non war
with Russia that we've been fighting for the last year,
Like in the end, eventually Russia will just get bored
with this. But I mean, or they'll or they will
get exhausted and they'll run out of money. But I mean,
you go to war with China, that's the end of
(30:41):
it for all of us. So I mean, what how
do you tread with a country that won't necessarily negotiate well.
The mission of the New Committee should be to prevent war,
not provoking, right, because the worst case scenario is a
World War three, a war between the United States and China,
which would be a complete catastrophe for the globe. I mean,
(31:03):
that could be the apocalypse. So our goal should be
to prevent war. And the relationship with China has to
be both cooperative and competitive. It has to be cooperative
on global challenges by climate change, but it also has
to be competitive. We have to ensure that the United States,
that the democracy of the world maintain a competitive edge
when it comes to critical technologies like semiconductors, artificial intelligence
(31:27):
wants some computing. You want democratic countries to be the
leaders in those fields. I want to ask you here
you are in this brave new Congress. I mean, like,
this new Committee was started in a GOP Congress. So
there are some not insane things coming out of this Congress.
(31:48):
Despite the fact that you know, it's led by a
guy who basically got his job because Tackle Carlson said
he could have it. There's a tale of two Congresses.
You know, the Republican Party has policymakers and formers. Right
if you sit on the Financial Services Committee under Patrick
mckenry or the Select Committee on the CCP under Mike Gallagher,
(32:09):
you know, I have differences of opinion with them, but
those are serious people, and those are serious committees, and
so I have a different experience of Congress. But if
you're sitting on Oversight or Judiciary or the Weaponization Committee,
you think they're not doing serious staff over a weaponization
you're in the realm of the absurd. I mean, it's
just funny. It's like, I don't see how the Weaponization
(32:31):
Committee could even hire a staff. If I were interviewing
someone and someone said, oh, I was the staff director
for the Weaponization Committee, like I would just laugh. It's
like it's just the title is silly. Well, I think
they must go to like Briebard, you know, people in
that crew. I steer clear of those committees because I
would rather legislate than be subjected to the utter stupidity
(32:55):
people like Marjorie Chella Green and Law and Bobbart. I
want to get into this for a second, this idea
of the a tale of two Congresses. How do you
have serious Republicans and how do they negotiate, you know,
the Kevin McCarthy crew. Well, even though there are serious Republicans,
make no mistake, the far right is in charge of
the Republican Party. Like there's nothing serious or there's nothing
(33:16):
responsible about playing a game of brinksmanship around the deadlomit. So,
even though there are serious Republicans, make no mistake that
Kevin McCarthy and the Republican Party brit large is hostage
to the far right, which is willing to breach the
debt limit of the United States to score political points
against Joe Budden. And that's so I want to be
(33:36):
clear that we cannot overlook or whitewash the fanaticism of
the far right, which is enabled by the cowardice of
the center, which to the extent that he'd even exists
in the Republican Party. Yeah, I mean, it's incredible, incredible stuff.
What else are you seeing, you know, you're in Congress.
I mean, is it all just as run up to
the dead ceiling or is there other drama going on,
(33:59):
although there's no short a drama. I mean, though you know,
I never thought in my first term, on my third day,
I lived through the insurrection, and then in my second term,
I lived through the longest speaker vote in American history,
one of the longest speaker votes in American history, the
longest speaker vote in one hundred and sixty four years.
So there's just an endless dream of drama in Congress.
(34:20):
And it's because of the Republicans. The Republicans create drama
where none is necessary. Obviously, the banking crisis is going
to continue away heavily on us, and we have to
focus on We cannot say, for granted that the crisis
is behind us, even though yesterday the markets had a
good day, though today they're not. And again the stock
market is not the economy. I want to ask you
one last question. You are from New York. Democrats got
(34:44):
creamed and lost the House because of Jay Jacobs. I mean,
there's a real opportunity there between Santos and all of
these other Republicans in these swingey districts. Do you think
that New York State can learn its lesson and get
a shit together. I just turned thirty five, and my
(35:05):
birthday wish is a Democratic majority in twenty twenty four
and Hakeem Jeffreys as the next speaker, and the road
to the Democratic majority runs through New York State. Am
I confident that we're going to reform the Democratic Party
in New York State now? But I am confident that
we can win back those seats because in a presidential year,
you're going to have dramatically higher democratic turnout and what
(35:26):
are essentially democratic districts, these are democratic leaning districts, and
so I'm cautiously optimistic, but we cannot take it for granted.
And as you know, House Majority pack is going to
invest forty five million dollars in six races in New York.
So that's an astonishing investment. That's how serious we are
about winning back the majority, and we see New York
(35:47):
as the road to the majority. Richie Torres, thank you
so much. I hope you'll come back anytime. Jenna Griswold
is Colorado's Secretary of State. Welcome to Fast Power Politics,
Secretary of State Griswold, So let's talk about what is
happening in Secretary of State world in Colorado. Again, I
(36:09):
want to preface this because we think of Colorado as
a blue state because it has a blue governor, it
has two blue senators now. But you're very much really
on the front lines in a lot of ways. That's right,
Colorado does have blue democratic leadership right now. But what
that said, I was the first Democrat to win Secretary
(36:30):
of State in over sixty years when we won in
twenty eighteen. I do think that Colorados unaffiliated Republicans and
Democrats just do not like the extremism. So I think
both are true. We've been at the front line on
a lot of the attacks on democracy which are ongoing,
but also have an electorate in a citizenry that just
(36:51):
does not like the extremism. So talk to me about
some of these ongoing attacks, because you are on the
front lines of voting and so your see a lot
of stuff that we may not be seeing yet. So
tell us what you're seeing. Well. Most recently this past weekend,
a prominent election denier won the race for chair of
the Colorado Republican Party, and it's the latest example of
(37:14):
how democracy remains under attack. Election deniers have been targeting
state GOP chair positions and winning key races. So so far,
I believe this is the fourth state party to go
to an election denier. Right, Michigan did recently too, Right, Yeah,
that's exactly right. The person who won was actually competing
(37:34):
against Tina Peters, who was the woman who breached her
own security trying to prove the big lie, a local
county clerk facing seven counts of felony indictment, and she
actually endorsed Dave Williams, who ended up winning. Jesus, Tina
Peters was an election denier who ended up facing real
legal consequences. That's right. So it was the first insider
(37:59):
threat and in the nation that we know of where
my team discovered the passwords to her county's election system
posted online by the person who allegedly is the leader
of QAnon. So we ended up investigating she did compromise
her system. She's facing a criminal trial right now, and
(38:21):
then was just convicted last week or the week before
on a separate trial, so as Artie was charged criminally.
These small county clerk jobs are sort of unsexy, but
they're real things and they have real consequences. They absolutely
have real consequences, and to be very clear, the vast
majority of county clerks Republicans, Democrats and affiliated to do
(38:45):
a really good job. They are elected to uphold the
right to vote, to actually administer the elections, and they
do a fantastic job here in Colorado. I was just
meeting with some of the clerks yesterday and mentioned that
the clerk from Fremont County, who's a Republican in my eyes,
got the best compliment because the county Democratic Party told
(39:09):
me how much faith they had in his leadership. And
that's how these county clerks should work. The local county
parties should have total faith in the county clerks, and
the best majority of them work around the clock. They
are the unsung heroes of American democracy. But of course
we've seen a couple of problematic ones pop up. I
just want to go back to these state party chairs
(39:32):
because can you explain to us why that matters? So
why electing an election denier for a GOP chair that
what the sort of consequences of that are. Yeah, I
think there's a couple of consequences, and it depends state
to state. First, and foremost, they're they're the leader of
the state Republican party and with the election of Dave Williams.
(39:53):
Here in Colorado, it's clearer that the state Republican Party
has embraced election denialists. That should be worrisome in itself.
You know, in Michigan, Christina Kuramo won her election of
the state Republican Party. She ran for a secretary of
state last cycle and has still refused to concede her failure.
(40:15):
She believes, by the way that like yoga is a
tie of Satan or something like that. It's really far
out there. The first thing is just the bully pulpit
of leadership. But then we work, the secretaries of state
work with the leadership of both political parties on election
issues through the election cycle. Depending on the state, the
(40:37):
county parties are compiling a list of election judges and
election watchers. Election deniers have also been elected to state
party chair in Ohio and Kansas. So it just underlines
that all the voters did their great service to democracy
in the midterms. Election denialism has not been defeated. Folks
(41:00):
far right are doubling down, So we just have to
continue to remain extremely vigilant and take action to protect democracy.
It's so dispiriting that this continues on and that like
the vos, just have to keep rejecting this kind of
crazy it is. But I'll tell you I am hopeful.
(41:21):
In the midterms, we had election deniers running for Secretary
of State, so the chief election officer in every battleground
state where we had a race. So we had election
deniers run in Nevada, in Michigan and Minnesota, in New
Mexico and Arizona. And why I'm so optimistic is that
(41:41):
when American voters know what's at stake, they are rejecting
these extremist candidates and ensuring that they are electing folks
who will be good stewards of elections, of ensuring that
every eligible person, regardless of their political affiliation or the
color of their skin, can have their voice hurt. With
that said, I do think we are not out of
(42:03):
the woods. But I also think that we will beat
this extremism. We're just not there yet. At the end
of the day, this is about power, and if Americans
continue to reject these extremist candidates, I do think this
will fade out of mainstream political thought. Yeah. No, I
mean I think if they keep losing with it, eventually
(42:23):
they'll decide that they have to run on something else.
But yeah, it's incredible that they keep losing on it.
You're seeing these state party chairs, You're seeing these county clerks.
What else are you seeing at the state level in Colorado?
So across the nation, we are seeing the continual effort
(42:46):
to strip Americans of the right to vote. If you remember,
the last couple of years, we sought an unprecedented passage
of voter suppression laws. It is now harder for many
Americans across the country to vote than before. That trimp continues.
This year alone, in at least thirty two states, over
one hundred and fifty voter suppression or election interference bills
(43:07):
were prefiled or introduced. And we are seeing across the
nation extremist Republicans continuing to try to undermine elections and
and pursuing a radical agenda. Our right to love who
we love, mary who we love, Provide kids with the
best possible education, the right for women and people to
(43:29):
have control over our own bodies. It all starts at
the ballot box. That's why protecting democracy is so important.
Lots of work ahead, but I am confident we're going
to get through this dark period. Of American history. In Colorado,
what does your state House look like? Are there still
allotted you? You are the state that has Lauren Boebert.
I'm sorry to tell you so. I mean there's a
(43:52):
real right wing contingent there. Yeah. So the Ate House
and State Senate are controlled by Democratic leadership, so there's
majority Democrats. But with that said, I will tell you,
if you could even believe it, my saddest day of
being an elected official was actually January of this year.
I was testifying in the Legislature and there were various
(44:16):
legislators in the committee that I was testifying in who
were straight election deniers. And seeing elected officials right in
front of you spew out these conspiracies. In a state
like Colorado, it's sad, not only because they're misleading or
trying to mislead their constituents and lying from a position
(44:37):
of power, but words have power. And I know that's
corny to say no, but it's true. These lies. They've
been cited violence. It's the reason that there was a
kidnapping attempt of the Michigan governor. It's the reason that
Paul Pelosi was attacked. It's the reason in December that
six elected officials. Houses in New Mexico were shot up,
(45:00):
So you know, we have to maintain our path on
pushing back on the disinformation with truth, on refuting the lies,
and that work isn't over either. Yeah, I think that's
so interesting. What about abortion access, I mean, I can't
believe I have to have this conversation with you, but
you are one of the few states in your area
(45:21):
that is I mean, there are a couple of states
in the West, but you are an abortion safe haven
for people who need treatment. Yes, the last time I
was on your podcast, I think was right after the
Job's decision, so that the gutting of Row, and it
was such a visceral shock, even though we, you know,
(45:42):
many of us suspected that it was coming. But to
have the Supreme Court literally decide that it would no
longer protect the full citizenship of women in this country.
But more than that, really dictate many women to death.
It is so outrageously shocking that I'm with you. I
can't even believe we have to have this conversation. But
(46:03):
luckily there are states like Colorado who are continuing to
protect women and provide services. Our state legislature did a
fabulous job last year of codifying the right to abortion
care the right to birth control in state law. I
think there will be more movement on protecting that work
in the state. But people are traveling from all over
(46:26):
the country and the wait time for abortion care has skyrocketed.
And if you can imagine, women are driving sometimes across
various states who want to have babies. They want to
have babies, and their pregnancy doesn't go right, and because
of it, they can their life is in danger and
(46:47):
they cannot get just the healthcare that they need in
their states. It's just horrible. Yeah, no, I mean I
remember being a new Maximan seeing these women sleeping in
their cars so that they can have abortions. And you know,
we're also seeing all of these women who have miscarriages
who can't then get treatment. Yeah, so there was I
(47:08):
heard from one of the providers a couple of months ago.
Is when they told me this. There was a woman
in Texas with her I think six year old son
and husband who had a natural miscarriage that was risking
her life. Her medical providers refused to help her. They
jumped in a car drove from Texas to Colorado. We're
(47:28):
sitting at the provider's office at six am in the morning,
and at any time she could have died on that drive. Yeah.
And can you imagine, like, if states supposedly care about
family values or the sanctity of life, that they are
telling this woman you may have to die in front
of your little son because we don't want to provide
(47:49):
you with healthcare. So I'm just so proud of the
state of Colorado and really honored to be a woman
and statewide elected office right now to fight for values.
And one of the things I did last year was
joined the governor of Colorado and saying we will not
extradite any person for the criminalization of abortion in another state. Yeah,
(48:10):
it's just unbelievable. I just can't wrap my head around it.
I mean I can, but I just, you know, the
hypocrisy is just incredible. I also wanted to ask you
what's next for you? You know, I think the next
two years are going to be difficult for secretaries of state.
We will beat the election denialism, I'm confident of that,
(48:33):
but it's not being so the presidential election. We have
a president who incited an insurrection, possibly tough of ticket,
if not election deniers very strong candidates on the Republican field.
So the next two years, I am going to continue
to strengthen our laws and address any situation leading up
(48:53):
to that general election for the president. So that is
our full focus, and I think we'll have great elections,
but they'll continue to be trying. So just going to
continue to do everything that we can, and I'm confident
the American people will again save democracy just like they
did in twenty twenty two, and I'll be fighting for
our rights right alongside with them. Oh, thank you so much.
(49:16):
I really appreciate having you and you making the time.
Of course, thank you for all your leadership and for
your fabulous fashion sense, which I always appreciate. Molly jun Fast,
Jesse Cannon. Marian Williamson run for president again, but I
(49:38):
feel like there's been some reporting about that she's not
the best person to have in office. I would like
to point out first that my relationship with Marian Williamson
is long varied and includes her complaining right, and includes
her dming my mother complaining about me. And so I
say this. We learned today from Politico, a political story
(50:03):
with twelve sources that very spiritual Mary Ann Williamson is
in fact a very bad boss. Again, being a bad
boss is complicated, and certainly there are a lot of
people who do not, who are quite tough on women,
especially women in power. But I think that when your
whole stick is built on the idea that you're so
(50:25):
spiritual and even handed and filled with love that the
fact that you throw your phone at people work for you,
it's probably not a great sign. And she gets our
moment of fuckery. That's it for this episode of Fast Politics.
Tune in every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to hear the
(50:45):
best minds in politics makes sense of all this chaos.
If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send it to
a friend and keep the conversation going. And again, thanks
for listening.
Host
Molly Jong-Fast
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