August 4, 2025 • 46 mins
The Lincoln Project’s Rick Wilson examines the cracks in loyalty to Trump.
Alvaro Bedoya, recently fired from the Federal Trade Commission by President Trump, details the implications of the commission now serving Trump’s interests.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
today's best minds, and Marjorie Taylor Green says, I don't
know if the Republican Party is leaving me or if
I'm kind of not relating to the Republican Party as
much anymore. What is going on? We have such a
(00:21):
great show for you today, the Lincoln Project Zone. Rick
Wilson joins us to discuss how everything is crazy and
Donald Trump is driving our economy into a ditch. Then
we'll talk to very adorable Alvero Beadoya about being fired
from the Federal Trade Commission by President Trump. But first
(00:44):
in the News.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Smiley, President Trump wants to get through his nominees. But
this is one of those things that Chuck Schumer has
been playing a little bit of coming up the works with.
But the GOP says in September thinks are going to change.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Okay, So we've all been very cranky with my Manchuck
for any number of reasons, deserved and not deserved. But
he did something good here, and as much as we're
all mad at him, I think we should say he
did He refused to back down from his demands. Trump
ultimately gave Majority Leader John Thuon cover to let his
(01:19):
fatigued conference go home and rest because August is not
for working, except if you're me or you. Senators will
stay voting Sunday evening on a small list of nominees
already primed for final confirmation. They did put justice box
of Wine. She's now the big boss of the DC,
so we're fucked. If you're in DC, don't do crimes
(01:41):
because Box of Wine is going to send you to
the camps. All right, I think that's fair.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
That's fair.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Try to stay on the right side of law right now.
Senators will then go home for a month of fundraising
and getting screamed at by their constituents in town halls
as well. They deserve it. They will try to put
some positive spin on the BBB, but they will have
a bad, bad, bad time doing it. We'll see what happens.
It's unclear exactly what Senate Republicans will do during that
(02:08):
August recess, but my guess is they will grovel for
money and suck up to Trump and probably there will
be golf.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
I think, back room meetings and all that fun stuff.
As well, yes, so interesting news. I've been told by
Stephen Miller and many other people that women are exaggerated,
that there's a divide in wages for women and things
like that, and new study shows up. I'm going to
shock you here that the right wing was down putting
(02:37):
something that's just getting worse.
Speaker 3 (02:39):
Never would have seen it coming.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
Yeah, here's what's happening. And this is something that Trump
got elected because people felt that there was no social mobility,
that it was a cast system, that you couldn't make
a living, that you couldn't have the world your father had.
Well guess what, you really can't. And Donald Trump doesn't
really give a fuck about that. But the class divide
(03:01):
among women in the workplace is widening. Shares of women
age twenty five to forty four who are employed full
time by education level. And basically, if you have a
college degree, you're significantly more likely to have a good career,
You're more likely to be employed. College educated women have
a much better time of it in this world right now.
(03:23):
This is a third way poll. And this is like
the case for think tanks. If think tanks don't do
this research, we don't know what's happening. I mean, it's
really important in this world that is just being eaten
away by AI and slomp to see that in fact,
bunnies don't bounce on trampolines. And also talking about a
(03:45):
viral videos Clop's the radio that's too cute to be real?
It probably is.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
What about the eight foot dog that walks around?
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Yeah, that eight foot dog is real. So if we
don't have research like this, we don't know what's going on.
It's like being blindfolded. And a really good point here
is that we need this research. We need to know
what's happening. And here we are. So that's right. And
the share of men without college degrees in the workplace
has been declining too for different reasons. It's just we're
(04:17):
in a very precarious state. It's worth remembering that that's
what it is.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah, So for weeks we've been reading a headline that
you know, Steven Miller is just getting angry and angrier
with how Ice is not arresting enough people for him
every day.
Speaker 3 (04:33):
He's just, you know, the bloodthirst cannot be quenched.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
And turns out it seems like now they're going to
walk it back because they realize they can't really arrest
three thousand immigrants per day.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah, you know, it turns out those videos of the
screaming children and the mothers being deported and the broken glass,
it's not helping Donald Trump's approval rating. And now they're
going to have to walk this back. Part of it
is that they just can't do it. I basically spend
all my time worrying about this country, and I feel
horrible about the situation. But it's important to remember that
(05:07):
these guys are really incompetent, and so they actually just
can't do a lot of the stuff they want to
do because they're not the best in the brightest And
by the way, thank god for that, because if they
were better at this job, we'd all be in a
lot of trouble. The venus is there are authoritarians who
want to put everyone in camps. The good news is
(05:28):
that they're very, very, very disorganized and not so smart.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
So, speaking of the disorganized and not so smart, though,
there is a contradiction to that last headline that I
think is interesting. I'd love to hear what your thought is,
which is apparently there's a weaked exits memo from the
brother Philip that they're going to put more troops on
US streets.
Speaker 4 (05:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
I mean they just did this in California. They're really
using California as LA particularly as a test case to
do everything bad that they think they want to do. Look,
Exit's office is looking like a sieve.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
I think if by capture more liquid.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
I also think like the nepotism here, it's like, well
Pete had to get somebody really tristed, so get fill up,
you know. And the wife's in the meetings. I mean,
it's a family affair over at the DOJ. Yeah, they're
going to send more troops to the streets. We'll see,
you know, they just send people to LA. I don't
think it really worked out the way they were hoping
it would for them, and they laughed it was expensive.
(06:28):
It was I think pretty soul crushing for the people
who were sent out there. You know, it's like having
the National Guard and the subways like people are trying it.
But you know, if there's nothing to do there and
you just have those people sitting around, I don't know
how much it does for anyone. So stay tuned on that.
(06:50):
Rick Wilson is the founder of the Lincoln Project and
the host of the enemy's list. Rick Wilson, Welcome to wash.
Speaker 5 (06:58):
How are you doing on this farm afternoon?
Speaker 1 (07:00):
I'm just living the dream, Live in the damn dream.
Donald Trump. You may have heard of him. He's President
of the United States. He's playing golf.
Speaker 5 (07:08):
That is a real shocker to learn that he is
uh that he is playing golf. That would be like that,
That would be like me being surprised to learn that
that Ted Cruz was stuffing another hobo in the trunk
of his car.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
My man trying to get sued. I just want I
wish that people could see Jesse's face. He's turned off
his video, but the face of horror was what we saw.
So let's talk about we are getting in another week
of unbridled trump Ism. It's true, it is.
Speaker 5 (07:38):
It has been buckmaking trump Ism all week, and you
know it hasn't gotten I mean, I think the things
he's set out to do that were outrageous were not
really outrageous. I mean, all the all the ship with
the Russia Gate stuff is just that's just ye.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
That didn't why they just like.
Speaker 5 (07:53):
As I like to say, that goes over like a
fart and a hurricane. Nobody cares. After five minutes.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
That was incredible. By the way, I want to do
another minute on that, because like, one of the things
that's happened with Trump is that despite you know, despite
the fact that every institution has happily caved to him. Right,
they've just been like, oh, I'm a billionaire, but if
you you know, God forbid, I lose.
Speaker 5 (08:16):
One hundred million dollars from our university. Sure, why not?
Speaker 1 (08:20):
So universities, lawyers, billionaires, cave cave cave. But what's interesting
is despite the fact that we are all cowards in America,
I think that's the fairest assessment of the case. His
power is lessening and it's like a bizarre phenomenon to watch.
So this week he's obsessed with trying to distract from Epstein.
(08:43):
It's been four weeks of the story. So so he
decides to release the Russia dossier because he feels that
everyone is still living in twenty seventeen discuss.
Speaker 5 (08:55):
Look, the most hilarious thing is that they're issuing this
secret addict. So the Durham repel, it don't prove and
what it is. What it proved was that all these
emails that that that they claim are the smoking gun
that Durham investigated them and said these were all bullshit.
They were made up. These aren't real. These didn't exist,
They never were, They were never that you could There's
(09:15):
no proof whatsoever they came from the people they say
they came from. Yet Maga went and ran with it
because they are really exactly didn't No, no, it didn't even
survive inside Maga world for twenty four hours. It didn't
even survive inside that that hothouse of horseshit for twenty
four hours.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
It's interesting because it's like Trump has had such a
hold on his base and really on the rest of
us phenomenal, and then this Evestein story just has They
just can't make.
Speaker 5 (09:52):
Every day I wake up and I'm like, Okay, They're
going to change the subject today somehow, some way, and
they don't. Every day it gets worse for them. I
sending Glayne Maxwell down to the Christional Club said where
the Real Housewives and the Elizabeth Holmes are part of
right now? That was a great optic, John, Yeah, that
was terrific, brilliant On a note on that that that
(10:13):
I was I read about yesterday. Bureau of Prisons does
not answer to the Justice Department.
Speaker 6 (10:19):
No, No, So Bondie or bow or or Blanche could
not have called up a Bureau of Prisons and said, hey,
move her.
Speaker 5 (10:29):
To the to club fed. It had to come from
the White.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
House and also a me and the White House, the
DJ they're the same now, right, Like there's no there's
no independent judiciary. I think my favorite part of the
story is watching Elizabeth Holmes working out the picture of
her blonde hair, pink lipstick, got weights running in the thing.
A friend of mine who has little kids send it
(10:56):
to me and said with the comment twenty four to
seven child, Like, I know jail is bad, but have
you taken care of small children?
Speaker 5 (11:08):
Yeah? I mean I find the whole thing. I find
the whole thing to be. I mean it was, and
it did not go over well with even his own people.
It really it's stick on ice. For even his own
people were like very angry about this and as desperate
as they are to get out of the ditch. The
other symbol of his power taking a big hit this
(11:31):
week was John Thune saying, we're gonna technical lya the
Senate open, so we can't do any recess appointments.
Speaker 7 (11:37):
Yeah, yeah, I think maybe maybe maybe Judge Janine was
the final bridge for some of these people, Like no, mos, dude,
I can't.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
They have been so craven, the Republicans in the Senate,
and they have been just so powardly. I mean they
just you know, the idea of a mean tweet, despite
the fact that the guy is you know, the polling,
by the way, the polling on Epstein is like amazing devastating, right,
Like eighty percent of Americans are like, he's involved and
(12:11):
if he pardons her it stinks to high have.
Speaker 5 (12:13):
Thirty one percent of Republicans think he was involved in
crimes with Jeffrey Epstein.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
I mean, what these are your base. These are the
people who voted for you, and they still think you did.
Speaker 5 (12:24):
Those people are like, yes, perhaps Donald Trump was a pedophile,
but I still love him to death, right right, that's
the psychotic like super fringy Pole.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Oh, that's insane.
Speaker 5 (12:35):
It's it's madness, Molly, it is, it is beyond the
valley of madness. And nobody, nobody in Washington right now
is waking up thinking, man, this is going to get
so much better.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Yeah, no, they're not. There is no one, and but
it is. It's funny because it's like we're basically hurtling
towards a cliff. Right, the public markets are like, I
have decided that really now Trump is sirius. They don't
like the tariffs. We have all day Canadian officials on
MSNBC being like, please, please, please, are lower the tariffs.
(13:09):
Little do they know they should be going on Fox
and Friends because he doesn't watch it in his NBC,
you know, and my man is just like taking a change,
and you know, he's out playing golf. So it doesn't
strike me his.
Speaker 5 (13:24):
Reaction to this whole scandal, to this whole discovery. He
has gotten it wrong at every turn. Yeah, he's got
it wrong at every turn. And I think right now
you're right. I think the markets are finally saying, oh shit,
he's not playing anymore. Now this now this has become
a real crisis. He's not going to be able to
(13:48):
walk and chew gum on this. And if he just
replaces the person at the Bureau Labor Statistics, or even
if he got rid of your own Powell, just doing
these things has actually just doing talking about these things
actually made the market less confident, right, you know, it's
actually made the more more nervous about the future, and
(14:12):
there are a lot of reasons to think that that
that the market could take a very swift turn in
the wrong direction for Donald Trump.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
And the bad news is we're all going to lose
a lot of money. The good news, the good news
is I'm the retirement folks. The good news is and also,
by the way, I want another thing that you may
not have heard this week is that Elon Musk's Department
of Government Efficiency caused US billions of tax fare dollars.
Speaker 5 (14:39):
Right, another good money way to go, Elon. Good work there, Champ.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
The bad news about Donald Trump driving us into a
ditch is that Donald Trump is driving us into a ditch.
The good news about Donald Trump driving us into a
ditch is that he is changing public sentiment and he's
already pretty unpopular. It turns out those videos of the
crying women being dragged from their cars in front of
(15:04):
their children because Stephen Miller wants more people deported is
not it ain't it ain't it chief.
Speaker 5 (15:14):
It ain't in Chief, you know what, Molly, I think.
I think that's a really good point. And I think
one of the things that we're seeing right now is
is there's a. If you watch Fox and you get
your news from Facebook and Twitter, you believe that fifty
percent of the country is all in all the time
on Donald Trump. Right, If that's your news environment, that's
what you believe. What we're seeing right now is that
(15:35):
Donald Trump is twenty five points underwater on inflation and prices. Yeah,
he's sixteen points underwater on the economy. He's six points
underwater on immigration, which had been traditionally which is the
strongest issue. And so you're right, his power is now
at that point where it is diminishing, it is shrinking.
(15:55):
I think that makes him more dangerous in terms of
the use of executive power.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
Mm hmm.
Speaker 5 (16:01):
But it does show you that he's on a clock now,
that this that this, that this show is running out
of gas.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
I think, yes, it's out of gas. I also think
the power of trump Ism is not the same. Like
Lindsey Graham has been the Sicka fan to end all
Sicka fans, he's been he's being primaried. Yeah, bye bye the.
Speaker 5 (16:22):
Maga by a maga by a mega project twenty twenty five. Bro,
What do you think Lindsay's gonna learn from that? What
lesson is he going to learn nothing. If he wins,
he'll still say, oh, Donald Trump, he's the president. I
owe him everything. But you know, you're right. He's been
the ultimate as kisser for Trump over and over over.
He traveled the furthest from the light to the dark
(16:44):
of almost anybody in the Senate, and from John McCain
to Donald Trump. And his reward is affiliation and possible defeat.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
It is. I have to tell you, no one has
ever had a smarter book title than you, my friend. Serious, Like,
here's a guy who's he hitched his wagon to Donald J. Trump,
and now he is.
Speaker 5 (17:06):
Uh, he's going to get spanked in a primary and
looks I'll tell you, if Donald Trump comes out and
says vote for whatever, this probably five dipshit is Paul Dan's,
you know, Trump's. Trump's ward is law and Republican primaries.
There are very few cases where he doesn't win.
Speaker 1 (17:24):
Is there?
Speaker 5 (17:25):
So?
Speaker 1 (17:25):
North Carolina Democrats have Copper Cooper, Copper, Copper Cooper Cooper.
I think he calls the Copper, but I don't care.
I'll take Cooper because it sounds more saying he's a
just an unbelievably good candidate. One state wide governor the
dream in a rapidly purple in state. You could not
ask for better Maine. No one, what's happening in man?
Speaker 5 (17:47):
Look, I'm hearing the Page is trying to to make it,
trying to make a comeback run, you know, another another
run Republican.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
So but we have they have a Republican Yeah, I know, but.
Speaker 5 (17:56):
But that now they're all grumpy about Collins and you know.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
So the Page is going to run. So what wait?
Speaker 5 (18:02):
I hope So my understanding. About a week ago I
talked to somebody who does Senate polling who said they're
watching over their shoulder because Paula Page is making all
this noise and Trump wants Trump. Trump apparently wants him
instead as Collins, even though Collins ends up voting from
nine to nine percent of the time. He doesn't like.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
Any So if le Page wins, So is there a
where's the Democrat? Who is the Democrat?
Speaker 5 (18:26):
There is a man? I'm sorry, you've got me. You
got me short on this one.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
No one, There isn't anyone so far.
Speaker 5 (18:32):
Not so far. There was a there was somebody who
passed on in a former statewide officially.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
Passed on it, Janet Mills will but she's seventy seven
years old. She's the governor now, so it's a six
year term. Democrats are trying to phase out the older.
Speaker 5 (18:49):
There are a lot of good, good, younger politicians in Maine.
I don't know them as well as I know some
of the other swinging or states. I think something will
emerge there for two reasons. One, Maine is going to
be on the forefront of this rural healthcare wipeout that
the bad bill has engineered too. If it is lapage.
He evokes a very visceral reaction in Democrats because he
(19:10):
is a what's the word, I'm looking for, rabid psychopath,
and so I think he'll tell.
Speaker 1 (19:17):
Us what you really think.
Speaker 5 (19:19):
But look, North Carolina is a is a piece of
good news. I think we've got a very interesting situation
in the House right now because of all the redistrict
and garbage.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Let's talk about the House. Texas Republicans likely heading to
Illinois to break the quorum being protected by your friend
of mine, Governor Pritzker.
Speaker 5 (19:40):
Prisker.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Is there a world in which Governor Pritzker ends up
like this, ends up making him president in twenty twenty.
Speaker 5 (19:48):
It's way too early to like many a slip between
the cup and the lip between here twenty eight. But
Democratic governors are at the front line of this. And
if Texas and Ohio and Florida, all of whom we're
talking about doing this, do this in California and Oregon
and Washington and Illinois and New York and Massachusetts have
(20:11):
to do the same thing. Right, We cannot be disarmed here.
We cannot because you know, as I said on TV
this morning with Me with You, in fact, that was
a good hit. We had a good hit.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
That was a really long hit. We just kept going
and I was like.
Speaker 5 (20:26):
I kept thinking that. I kept like wrapping up and him.
Then he's like, and what about that? Fun? That was
a good one. He's always so good. My theory of
the case is if Republicans take back the House, I
don't think they'll certify the twenty twenty eight election. For
am it is definitely true. I don't think they'll certify
the election.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
But we can't get into I mean, yes, that.
Speaker 5 (20:45):
Far down the line. I really just crap out of
them this year.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
The Republicans are going to take that. I think Republicans
are to lose the House. I think the reason they
want to redistrict is because they know they're going to
lose the House.
Speaker 5 (20:56):
I think they're looking for a cheat code to win
yeah this year.
Speaker 1 (20:59):
And I also want to add I think that what
is happening now, the unpopularity of the Democratic brand is
not because the Democratic brand is unpopular, which it is.
It's because Democrats are mad at them because they suck,
are pissed.
Speaker 5 (21:14):
At their own leadership for not being fighters.
Speaker 1 (21:17):
Right, and there's that right. I don't think that means
they're going to vote for Republicans. I think it means
they're furious.
Speaker 5 (21:23):
Because they're furious. Look, it might mean they don't turn out,
but they're at a Swiss parties. They're not jumping in like,
hey you know what I need my week? The Democratic
Party leadership means I want fascism. It's not how this works.
Speaker 1 (21:36):
But I also think what's interesting about all those poll
numbers is to see, you know, we have had so
many news cycles about young men being Trumpers, but young
women are not, and they are. And the first of all,
Trump has lost a lot.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
Of ninety to ten now with YOUNGO right under thirty.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
But also like Trump has lost a lot of those
young men with the Ebstein Files. I mean, I was
just reading some reporting about you know, all these young
men who he went on these podcasts, He got these
low frequency voters, and then all these low frequency voters
want and one of the things that honestly Joe Robin wants, right,
you know, not to have COVID restrictions. All right, okay,
(22:17):
no COVID restrictions. They're very helpful when there's no COVID.
And then also, you know, they wanted the Epstein files
release because they felt that you know, somehow there was
some you know whatever.
Speaker 5 (22:30):
They had a theory. They had a theory of the
world that it's not exactly the same one that the
right wing has that the Maga wright has. Part of
their theory of the world is we've gotten fucked over
as young men, right because powerful, powerful people always protect
each other and they and they never protect us. So
eve see had kind of a resonance with them, different
than the QAnon Maga version of that theory they intercest.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
But equally stupid.
Speaker 5 (22:57):
Oh yeah, yeah, very ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
I'm sort So we are in the end times of moronics.
I think it's important to take a minute to.
Speaker 5 (23:05):
Just I think we're to be very honest with ourselves
as a country that you know, MAGA really stands for
morons are governing America. We have placed a cultural frame
around it. Expertise, as our friend Dominicals has written about
brilliantly education and I use this word advisedly. But the
hatred of elites of any kind, whether cognitive or financial
(23:29):
or anything else, leads them down this rabbit hole where
they reward stupid behavior. Yeah, and they and they elevate
stupid behavior. And you know, three hundred thousand years of
human evolution or whatever the whatever, the hominid phase of evolution,
what you want to use is has been about us
being less stupid.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yeah, so we do not get yeah, yeah, yeah, and
we're getting eaten. I think that's it. We're definite yetting eaten.
At best, we're going to get eaten. Edwardst who knows.
So let's talk about the Trump has continued to express
his ir towards the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
(24:07):
He fired, he fired her, but now he's still tweeting
about true thing about her. So I wonder does the
does she end up in Seacott? Yes?
Speaker 5 (24:16):
Right, oh, listen, I wouldn't doubt anything at this point
with this guy, he could do the sort of thing
that he's doing trying to do with Jack Smith right now.
Oh Hatch Act. These are the people that have treated
the Hatch Act like it was right, I know, not
even a recommendation, but more of a broke But you know, look,
I think I think there are a lot of people
(24:36):
in the markets who do not like the idea of
not having good data to go by. Why not only
do they like making money, they also have a fiduciary
obligation to have correct data for their clients. And so
you know, Trump eliminating that and it's like a lot
of other Third world leaders have done.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
This is a problem that Biden world had too with
the inflation. Sure cannot people something and then have them
have a lived experience that does run counter so you know.
Speaker 5 (25:07):
You cost a dollar fifty now and people are.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
Like right where? And that's the thing is like Donald
Trump can bring in mister wonderful as the head of
Bureau and Labor Statistics, or he can bring in Eric,
give Eric the job, but what happens the job he does.
But what happens is people have their own lived experience
and their lived experience, will not drive with mister wonderful
(25:31):
telling them that's you know, Orange man great and so
I think we're going to play out and it's hard
for me to imagine that things don't get worse before
they get better.
Speaker 5 (25:43):
He's used up all the economic capital that he had,
He's burned it. The tariffs, this insanity fighting with the Fed.
The markets are are now reaching the point they're like,
oh God, okay, we can't fake this anymore. Yeah, they
got their tax cut, so they've they've they've achieved their
goals in the second Trump administration.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
By and large, at least, the estate tax has gone down,
which is what all of Americans really longed for.
Speaker 5 (26:12):
Every every middle class American really thinks that night, My god,
how am I going to dispose of my twenty five
million dollar estate if I die and not screw my
children financially.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Yes, for America has once again benefited from again trickle
down economics. Rick Wilson, Well, I drunk fast, Will you
come back?
Speaker 5 (26:33):
I'll come back, you come back, I'll come back every time.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
Right, all right, that's right, opening We'll see you next time.
I'll see you next time. Alvero Badoya is the former
commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission. Welcome to Fast Politics AFRO.
Speaker 4 (26:53):
Thanks for having them on.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
You should start by telling us what your job was,
exact exactly what happened to you.
Speaker 4 (27:01):
So I was a commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission,
and that's the agency that goes after fraudsters and monopolis.
So Martin Schrelly, we banned that guy from the pharmaceutical
industry from life. We block the largest grocery store Merger
Kroger and Albertsons. We go after corporate landlords that screw
(27:22):
their tenants over with hidden fees and junk fees, things like,
oh you don't want cockroaches in your building, You're gonna
have to pay for that. And on March eighteenth, I
was standing at my daughter's gymnastis class very much trying
to not look at my phone because she gets pissed
off if I'm looking at my phone, which she does
a cool trick. And then I got a call and
my colleagues saying, hey, have you looked at your email?
(27:44):
And I said absolutely not actually, and she said, well,
there's an email from the White House saying that they're
firing us. And the thing I left out about our agencies.
We're supposed to be independent of the president. We're supposed
to only be fireable for neglect, fraud, abuse, that kind
of thing.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
But you have this thing you do, which is you
stop fraud, which is never going to be popular in
this ADMN. So talk us to if it's nonpartisan, they
don't really have the right to fire you. How did
they do it exactly? And frankly, it's been argument that
we didn't do it. I think one of the most
(28:20):
important things that we did as commissioners is not go
along with this blatant, ridiculous illegality. And so a lot
of people similarly situated would have said, all right, you know,
I have just been illegally fired, mister President. I will
see you in court. And then they're quiet and you
don't hear from them until the data losing court. And
so what Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter and I did is say, no,
(28:44):
we're not fired.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
We're going to keep on doing our jobs. And so
we kept on, you know, commenting on what the agency
was doing. I literally took a trip to meet with
farmers in Iowa as a commissioner, and we kind of
tried to meet their chaos with chaos in return. And
so right now we're in the courts. We actually had
a big win where Commissioner Slaughter returned to the job
for I think about seventy two hours, and then a
(29:05):
court of appeal state it I had to leave because
I need to put food on the table and pay
the bills, and so I formally resigned on June nine.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
So it sounds like to me, what you're doing here
is that you are showing us that a lot of
this stuff is actually legal. Right, Explain to us a
little bit about this sort of illegality.
Speaker 4 (29:25):
Right, this will go to court. Talk us through that.
So let's talk about why it's illegal. Because I think
a lot of people here you got fired. They'll be like, bro,
I got fired, you know two times in the last
five years. What's the big deal? And I don't define
the terms of my job. Congress defined it in nineteen fourteen,
and they were just coming out of the era of
like John Rockefeller and the Carnegies, where basically these guys
(29:49):
took over government to cut themselves all sorts of sweetheart deals.
And so Congress in eighteen ninety nineteen fourteen was frankly
pissed and said we're going to create an institution to
check you, to check this corporate power. Back then, they
were called trusts, and so that is why they said
the president can't just fire whoever they want in these
(30:10):
seats at any time, because otherwise you're going to get
what's happening to us now, where basically all these crazy
deals are coming through that help the president and his
donors just because he didn't like us, right, and so
those protections were put in place, and that's why it
was illegal for the president to fire us. But one
of the sad things that you learn as a lawyer
(30:30):
or as the victim of an illegal action is the
law is and after the fact remedy, right, like if
you get fired, you know, I haven't been able to
access my email, my files, you know anything for three
months before I finally had to leave the job. And
so that's what's in the corps are on. That's what
we're fighting.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
Yeah, and where is your case now in the court.
Speaker 4 (30:51):
The case right now is soon going to be on
appeal to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals. The district
court judge ruled in our favor and put a commissioner
slaughter back in her seat, and then they approve to
stay at the request of the federal government to take
her back out of the seat until the district court
could rule on it.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
So what's going to happen now? Eventually this case getting
get kicked up to the Supreme Court, right exactly. And
one of the things that we've seen in this Supreme
Court is they tend to be just complete sick advanced
to Trump largely. We tend to see these six to
three decisions. I mean, occasionally we see a sort of
(31:32):
Roberts and Amy Coney going along with the liberals, but
that is pretty rare, right it is.
Speaker 4 (31:39):
And the other stunning thing about the current legal reality
is that there are instances in which the court will
effectively overrule you know, one hundred year old or ninety
year old precedent in like two pages in an unsigned opinion.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
In the shadow donc right even here, oral arguments just
up all at all and you don't even know who
wrote it up. It could be brainworm's alido exactly.
Speaker 4 (32:05):
And the really funny thing about this, Molly is, you know,
I was sitting as like a twenty something Senate Judiciary
staffer during a lot of these guys's confirmation hearings, and
they would tell you, you know, scouts, honor. You know, I'm
just here to call balls and strikes, balls and strikes,
and I mean literally you had some of them. I
think Amy Cony Barrett said on under testimony, I will
(32:26):
not overroll Roe versus Wade or she didn't say those words,
but called it a super president. Every single one of these.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
Guys story decisives, mister, you know story decisives. It's already decided.
We're not going to touch it.
Speaker 4 (32:39):
Yeah, that's right. And now two plus two equals five.
And we don't even need to tell you why. That's
what's happening all over the place.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
You went to Yale Law School, you're obviously very capable
of very high level legal thinking. One of the things
that we see in this world is that there's quite
a lot of the Supreme Court doing things like that.
It's journalism. So I would love you to I mean,
what it seems to me like and you can tell
(33:06):
me if you think I'm wrong. I'm happy to hear it.
Is that a lot of the anti corruption measures like
your organization started after the corruption, the sort of the
Gilded Age corruption, right, and then you have some of
the other parts of congressional creations that were put in
place after Nixon, as other anti corruption measures. These are
(33:30):
sort of the focus of Trump right now, taking a
part the things that were set up to stop corruption.
Do you think that's right? And how did your agency
function in that way?
Speaker 4 (33:41):
I do think that's right. I'll shore two things about this.
First of all, the agency function this way because most
agencies have been able in a law abiding way, because
most federal employees, despite what you see in the press,
are sticklers for ethics. You know, if a reporter takes
you out to lunch, you literally won't let them buy
you a sup at panera. And meanwhile, you have certain
(34:01):
Supreme Court justices who have like gold plated winnebagos out
of nowhere from just my good friend. And so you
have had these agencies where a lot of people there
could be making three x four x what they're making
in the private sector, who believe in creating a level
playing field for the little guy and bringing down the
Martin Screllis of the world. And so that's how they've
(34:22):
been doing what they're doing. But there's also something even
more problematic that we need to talk about which is, yeah,
they're removing the independence of these agencies, but they're also
starting to use them as toll booths, use the power
that they have to extract all sorts of weird promises.
And so the clearest example at the FTC, the Federal
Tree Commission was this merger between Omnikon and Publicists, which
(34:45):
has created the largest i think advert ad buyer in
the country, potentially the world. You're in media, you know
that this is how media functions, and our agency led
it through with this condition out of no where that
basically results in a requirement to buy ads from you
on musk. This has nothing to do with our job.
(35:07):
The other crazy requirement was in this recent merger between
Paramountain Skydance and you had the Federal Communications Commission say,
oh yeah, and you got to install a special bias
monitor at CBS and the other thing I did is
kicked out Colbert. None of that has anything to do
with the agency's mission. And so, just like the President
is using tariffs which could be used to help workers,
(35:29):
to just exact random promises from countries to buy X
and Y and Z from his golfing buddy, you have
these agencies that used to stand up for the American
worker and consumer and small business owner being used to
line the president's downer's pockets.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
So this gets me thinking about something that I think
about a which is we are down a road that
starts with not obeying the hat to act and get
ends to Donald Trump takes a plane from the Kataris
so right? This is all you go down this road?
You say, like, I don't understand why the Biden people
(36:06):
can't talk to me about the DNC while we're standing
in this office. And now we're like Donald Trump and
in the Katari plane fiasco, there's actually it's written so
that the plane goes to the Trump Presidential Library.
Speaker 4 (36:21):
So talk to me about what that looks like. The
example we had at FTC was this, So if you
actually do something unlike us, I suspect all of us
that probably bust. Your listeners are paying very close attention
to the news, right, but look, most people don't. Most
people have other main interests, right, And so all they
hear in the background is like today Facebook settled for
(36:42):
twenty three million dollars, a settlement a lawsuit by the president,
you know, filed shortly before as inauguration, and the word
bride doesn't appear in the news story. And part of
the way that that's achieved is through these I wouldn't
even call them loopholes because I don't I in my view,
they're not legal. But like the president library, So what
happened with Facebook is in the first Trump administration, a
(37:04):
bipartisan group at the FTC, including I think it was
two Democratic commissioners and one Republican chairman, sued to undo
Facebook's takeover of Insta and WhatsApp. And you know, if
you're hearing this and be like, what's the deal with that,
well you should read Mark Zuckerberg's emails, because they basically say,
I don't want to compete with instead of WhatsApp, I
just want.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
To just buy them.
Speaker 4 (37:23):
And so we sued to stop it bipartisan vote. Facebook
saw that Trump two was coming into office, and so
they settled this furious lawsuit that Trump had filed against
them for I think it was twenty three million dollars,
not to the President himself but to his Presidential library.
And lo and behold, what do they get. They get
this Oval office meeting to lobby the president to drop
(37:46):
the lawsuit, and now they haven't dropped the lawsuit yet,
but it doesn't mean they won't. And that in and
of itself, an oval office meeting in and of itself
is the achievement, right. And so you have legal settlements
being used as brides to stop the president and using
what he sees as is infinite leverage in the federal
government to squeeze people for money.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
I'm often thinking about, like what's the chicken, what's the egg? Right?
So I wonder you get to a place like this,
And obviously, like Alena Khan would say, it's a regulation problem,
like the fact that technology got here, right, Like Facebook,
for example, they're you know, somewhat responsible for the Rhingan genocide.
(38:27):
These people are sort of too big to be checked.
Is this a failure of congressional regulation? Is this a
failure of like congress seating it's authority a decade ago
or two decades ago? I mean, like what gets you
down this path?
Speaker 4 (38:45):
Two things? FIRSTUS money in politics, and look, you know
Republicans and Democrats are guilty alike, oh, one hundred percent,
they're just bathed in money. And so meaningful laws to
check corporate power. I think now in twenty twenty five,
you're seeing people on the left and the right waking
up to say like, hey, this stuff's out of hand,
can't do this anymore. But for most of the last
(39:05):
forty years after Reagan in particular, the idea was bigger
is better. You know, let's unfetter the economy from these
troublesome rules and regulations. That's one thing. And here's the
second thing, which is that for you know that time,
that same time, forty years or so, you've had this
that Reagan Ie ideology, you've had this other trend that
(39:26):
at a lot of enforcement agencies like the FTC. Not everyone,
and I'm not talking about everyone, but most of the
people who had come into these leadership jobs would subsequently
go on to work for Fortune one hybrid companies. And
so the sad fact is in the back of their head.
And again these are Republicans and Democrats would go in
and they'd be tough. But you don't want to be
too tough.
Speaker 1 (39:46):
Lake, because you want to be able to get a
job after this.
Speaker 4 (39:49):
And the power of what Chirkan did is to not
give a damn what they think about her in Aspen
and Sun Valley and Davos. She's going back to be
a law professor of Columbia, a job that she'll probably
have for the rest of you rest of her life.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
There's still a Columbia.
Speaker 4 (40:06):
Well that's so good point.
Speaker 1 (40:08):
Yes, I have not accounted for that, but you know what, Yeah,
not to go totally dark here, but yes.
Speaker 4 (40:14):
Oh yeah, no, sadly we're there. That is what was
so extraordinary about her, which is wonder plaudits you know,
from from a whole lot of people who am the
paying close.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Attention to politics. Yeah. So it starts with Citizens United. Yes,
and it starts with a world in which members of
Congress cannot go into lobbying.
Speaker 4 (40:32):
Oh oh, In other words, how do we undo it?
You reverse Citizens United? Yeah, like say tomorrow that we
are in a world.
Speaker 1 (40:41):
Where we have a government that is neutral, that is
a non authoritarian leaning government. What do you do next?
Speaker 4 (40:48):
Yeah, there's a couple of practical things, and there's a
one big picture. Think practical things things like you said,
reverse Citizen United, band stock trading by members of Congress.
You do serious campaign finance reform so that public financing
of the campaigns is an actual thing. Ranked choice voting.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
I'm going to push you for a minute, because please,
I live in New York City. And this is maybe like,
as a taxpayer, I find the government funded campaigns very annoying,
Like I don't know why I should be paying for
fucking mayoral candidates ads.
Speaker 4 (41:22):
Yeah, But here's the thing is that we don't have
a choice. We've got two shitty choices. Right, You've got
a choice between public financing, which, like you said, is
an ideal because people are paying for elect people to
try to run for office, versus ConAgra paying for their
candidates and big tech paying for their favorite carogate. For me,
that's an easy choice. But here's the big picture thing
(41:42):
I would say is that we need to start looking
at things a little less as left versus right, and
a little more as the money could taps everyone underneath. Yah, right,
you know. And so let me tell you, Like the
last meeting I had as a commissioner was in Iowa.
Guy stood up and said, Hey, my name's Dengler. I
just harvested my last season after one hundred and fifteen
(42:03):
years of farming in Tama County, Iowa. Turned on my
John Deere Combine. It broke down. John Deere has locked
down at software, so I can't fix it. I got
to pay their guy to come out two three times
on his time to charge me an arm and a leg.
And that was the straw that broke my back. The
meeting before I had with a Bangladeshi uber and Lyft
driver from Queens who said, yeah, I just woke up
(42:26):
this morning, and Uber lift both blocked me out of
their apps. You know, so much of our politics says, oh, no,
you're from Iowa, you're white, you've been here one hundred
and fifteen years. You've got nothing in common with the
Bamgladeshi immigrant. You know who's driving in New York City,
When if you look at what these guys need, they
have everything in common because they're fed up with oligarch's
telling them what to do and the monopolies and didiopolies
they run control in their lives. I think if we
(42:48):
can feed more of that awareness into our politics, it's
going to be helpful and it's going to create coalitions
that otherwise.
Speaker 1 (42:54):
Would be impossible. It's a really good point and it
is also how we got here right. I mean there,
we didn't think about the people who were the working people,
and that's part of the problem, part of democrats problem.
I don't think Republicans consider it to be a problem,
but they should be. But it is that this idea
(43:14):
versus of sort of working people versus the olimarchy.
Speaker 4 (43:19):
One of the things people forget is our country was
founded in part on these ideas. You know, the Boston
Tea Party was a protest against the monopoly on tea
right in the Boston Harbor. Thomas Jefferson, for all his flaws,
did think that one of the things missing in the
Bill of Rights was an anti monopoly amendment, a rule
to fight monopolies. And so this has been around since
(43:40):
our founding, and now is the time to recapture some
of that and see what kind of bridges we can
build them. Frankly, I think Zaron Mamdani has done this
in New York City in the way that he has
made working with the small business owner, the guy who
runs the bodega, the guy who runs the whole aal cart,
part of his campaign, bringing them into the progressive populace
fold the less populous vault. I think that's been very positive.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3 (44:04):
For having me.
Speaker 5 (44:06):
No no moment.
Speaker 1 (44:09):
Rick Wilson, Yes, it's a lot of fuckery to choose
from there's so.
Speaker 5 (44:14):
Much fuckery, and I have a semi Ebstein related fuckery item,
but it's not purely it is the whole White House
Liberachi GLITTERBOOCOCKI bullshit redecorating plan to build a ninety thousand
square foot Sam's Club warehouse on the side of the
White House. He's doing this in part as a distraction
because he knows how mad people get about it. But
I've read a lot in my career.
Speaker 8 (44:35):
About George Washington, who really believed that the President of
the United States, which was never going to be a king,
but should be a man of enormous dignity. The fact
that he wants a giant sportatorium entertainment complex grafted onto
the White House for a ballroom so we can rent
it out for weddings and bar mitzvahs is making my
brain ache.
Speaker 1 (44:53):
Can I say one thing. I have a slightly different take,
which is this is the East Wing, which is the
legacy of one Eleanor Roosevelt. Donald Trump is very focused
on destroying the legacy of famous Democrats. Right. He's obsessed
(45:14):
with Carter destroying FEMA Apartment of Education. You could see
how Donald Trump would not have liked I mean, he
probably has no idea who eleanor Roosevelt is. But if
she did, I don't think he would think she was hot.
Speaker 5 (45:29):
No, oh god no. Also, it's like Melania is never there,
so why bother with it?
Speaker 1 (45:33):
Right? And so it is erasing the legacy of the
first Lady and all she does.
Speaker 5 (45:39):
Donald to buy my office now in Tyson Corner, Virginia,
Rick Wilson, Fally, John Fast, I'll see a pig's time.
Speaker 1 (45:48):
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear the best
minds and politics make sense of all this chaos. If
you enjoy this podcast, please send it to a friend
and keep the conversation going. Thanks for listening.
Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics,
where we discussed the top political headlines with some of
today's best minds, and Marjorie Taylor Green says, I don't
know if the Republican Party is leaving me or if
I'm kind of not relating to the Republican Party as
much anymore. What is going on? We have such a
(00:21):
great show for you today, the Lincoln Project Zone. Rick
Wilson joins us to discuss how everything is crazy and
Donald Trump is driving our economy into a ditch. Then
we'll talk to very adorable Alvero Beadoya about being fired
from the Federal Trade Commission by President Trump. But first
(00:44):
in the News.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Smiley, President Trump wants to get through his nominees. But
this is one of those things that Chuck Schumer has
been playing a little bit of coming up the works with.
But the GOP says in September thinks are going to change.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Okay, So we've all been very cranky with my Manchuck
for any number of reasons, deserved and not deserved. But
he did something good here, and as much as we're
all mad at him, I think we should say he
did He refused to back down from his demands. Trump
ultimately gave Majority Leader John Thuon cover to let his
(01:19):
fatigued conference go home and rest because August is not
for working, except if you're me or you. Senators will
stay voting Sunday evening on a small list of nominees
already primed for final confirmation. They did put justice box
of Wine. She's now the big boss of the DC,
so we're fucked. If you're in DC, don't do crimes
(01:41):
because Box of Wine is going to send you to
the camps. All right, I think that's fair.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
That's fair.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Try to stay on the right side of law right now.
Senators will then go home for a month of fundraising
and getting screamed at by their constituents in town halls
as well. They deserve it. They will try to put
some positive spin on the BBB, but they will have
a bad, bad, bad time doing it. We'll see what happens.
It's unclear exactly what Senate Republicans will do during that
(02:08):
August recess, but my guess is they will grovel for
money and suck up to Trump and probably there will
be golf.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
I think, back room meetings and all that fun stuff.
As well, yes, so interesting news. I've been told by
Stephen Miller and many other people that women are exaggerated,
that there's a divide in wages for women and things
like that, and new study shows up. I'm going to
shock you here that the right wing was down putting
(02:37):
something that's just getting worse.
Speaker 3 (02:39):
Never would have seen it coming.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
Yeah, here's what's happening. And this is something that Trump
got elected because people felt that there was no social mobility,
that it was a cast system, that you couldn't make
a living, that you couldn't have the world your father had.
Well guess what, you really can't. And Donald Trump doesn't
really give a fuck about that. But the class divide
(03:01):
among women in the workplace is widening. Shares of women
age twenty five to forty four who are employed full
time by education level. And basically, if you have a
college degree, you're significantly more likely to have a good career,
You're more likely to be employed. College educated women have
a much better time of it in this world right now.
(03:23):
This is a third way poll. And this is like
the case for think tanks. If think tanks don't do
this research, we don't know what's happening. I mean, it's
really important in this world that is just being eaten
away by AI and slomp to see that in fact,
bunnies don't bounce on trampolines. And also talking about a
(03:45):
viral videos Clop's the radio that's too cute to be real?
It probably is.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
What about the eight foot dog that walks around?
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Yeah, that eight foot dog is real. So if we
don't have research like this, we don't know what's going on.
It's like being blindfolded. And a really good point here
is that we need this research. We need to know
what's happening. And here we are. So that's right. And
the share of men without college degrees in the workplace
has been declining too for different reasons. It's just we're
(04:17):
in a very precarious state. It's worth remembering that that's
what it is.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah, So for weeks we've been reading a headline that
you know, Steven Miller is just getting angry and angrier
with how Ice is not arresting enough people for him
every day.
Speaker 3 (04:33):
He's just, you know, the bloodthirst cannot be quenched.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
And turns out it seems like now they're going to
walk it back because they realize they can't really arrest
three thousand immigrants per day.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah, you know, it turns out those videos of the
screaming children and the mothers being deported and the broken glass,
it's not helping Donald Trump's approval rating. And now they're
going to have to walk this back. Part of it
is that they just can't do it. I basically spend
all my time worrying about this country, and I feel
horrible about the situation. But it's important to remember that
(05:07):
these guys are really incompetent, and so they actually just
can't do a lot of the stuff they want to
do because they're not the best in the brightest And
by the way, thank god for that, because if they
were better at this job, we'd all be in a
lot of trouble. The venus is there are authoritarians who
want to put everyone in camps. The good news is
(05:28):
that they're very, very, very disorganized and not so smart.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
So, speaking of the disorganized and not so smart, though,
there is a contradiction to that last headline that I
think is interesting. I'd love to hear what your thought is,
which is apparently there's a weaked exits memo from the
brother Philip that they're going to put more troops on
US streets.
Speaker 4 (05:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
I mean they just did this in California. They're really
using California as LA particularly as a test case to
do everything bad that they think they want to do. Look,
Exit's office is looking like a sieve.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
I think if by capture more liquid.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
I also think like the nepotism here, it's like, well
Pete had to get somebody really tristed, so get fill up,
you know. And the wife's in the meetings. I mean,
it's a family affair over at the DOJ. Yeah, they're
going to send more troops to the streets. We'll see,
you know, they just send people to LA. I don't
think it really worked out the way they were hoping
it would for them, and they laughed it was expensive.
(06:28):
It was I think pretty soul crushing for the people
who were sent out there. You know, it's like having
the National Guard and the subways like people are trying it.
But you know, if there's nothing to do there and
you just have those people sitting around, I don't know
how much it does for anyone. So stay tuned on that.
(06:50):
Rick Wilson is the founder of the Lincoln Project and
the host of the enemy's list. Rick Wilson, Welcome to wash.
Speaker 5 (06:58):
How are you doing on this farm afternoon?
Speaker 1 (07:00):
I'm just living the dream, Live in the damn dream.
Donald Trump. You may have heard of him. He's President
of the United States. He's playing golf.
Speaker 5 (07:08):
That is a real shocker to learn that he is
uh that he is playing golf. That would be like that,
That would be like me being surprised to learn that
that Ted Cruz was stuffing another hobo in the trunk
of his car.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
My man trying to get sued. I just want I
wish that people could see Jesse's face. He's turned off
his video, but the face of horror was what we saw.
So let's talk about we are getting in another week
of unbridled trump Ism. It's true, it is.
Speaker 5 (07:38):
It has been buckmaking trump Ism all week, and you
know it hasn't gotten I mean, I think the things
he's set out to do that were outrageous were not
really outrageous. I mean, all the all the ship with
the Russia Gate stuff is just that's just ye.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
That didn't why they just like.
Speaker 5 (07:53):
As I like to say, that goes over like a
fart and a hurricane. Nobody cares. After five minutes.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
That was incredible. By the way, I want to do
another minute on that, because like, one of the things
that's happened with Trump is that despite you know, despite
the fact that every institution has happily caved to him. Right,
they've just been like, oh, I'm a billionaire, but if
you you know, God forbid, I lose.
Speaker 5 (08:16):
One hundred million dollars from our university. Sure, why not?
Speaker 1 (08:20):
So universities, lawyers, billionaires, cave cave cave. But what's interesting
is despite the fact that we are all cowards in America,
I think that's the fairest assessment of the case. His
power is lessening and it's like a bizarre phenomenon to watch.
So this week he's obsessed with trying to distract from Epstein.
(08:43):
It's been four weeks of the story. So so he
decides to release the Russia dossier because he feels that
everyone is still living in twenty seventeen discuss.
Speaker 5 (08:55):
Look, the most hilarious thing is that they're issuing this
secret addict. So the Durham repel, it don't prove and
what it is. What it proved was that all these
emails that that that they claim are the smoking gun
that Durham investigated them and said these were all bullshit.
They were made up. These aren't real. These didn't exist,
They never were, They were never that you could There's
(09:15):
no proof whatsoever they came from the people they say
they came from. Yet Maga went and ran with it
because they are really exactly didn't No, no, it didn't even
survive inside Maga world for twenty four hours. It didn't
even survive inside that that hothouse of horseshit for twenty
four hours.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
It's interesting because it's like Trump has had such a
hold on his base and really on the rest of
us phenomenal, and then this Evestein story just has They
just can't make.
Speaker 5 (09:52):
Every day I wake up and I'm like, Okay, They're
going to change the subject today somehow, some way, and
they don't. Every day it gets worse for them. I
sending Glayne Maxwell down to the Christional Club said where
the Real Housewives and the Elizabeth Holmes are part of
right now? That was a great optic, John, Yeah, that
was terrific, brilliant On a note on that that that
(10:13):
I was I read about yesterday. Bureau of Prisons does
not answer to the Justice Department.
Speaker 6 (10:19):
No, No, So Bondie or bow or or Blanche could
not have called up a Bureau of Prisons and said, hey,
move her.
Speaker 5 (10:29):
To the to club fed. It had to come from
the White.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
House and also a me and the White House, the
DJ they're the same now, right, Like there's no there's
no independent judiciary. I think my favorite part of the
story is watching Elizabeth Holmes working out the picture of
her blonde hair, pink lipstick, got weights running in the thing.
A friend of mine who has little kids send it
(10:56):
to me and said with the comment twenty four to
seven child, Like, I know jail is bad, but have
you taken care of small children?
Speaker 5 (11:08):
Yeah? I mean I find the whole thing. I find
the whole thing to be. I mean it was, and
it did not go over well with even his own people.
It really it's stick on ice. For even his own
people were like very angry about this and as desperate
as they are to get out of the ditch. The
other symbol of his power taking a big hit this
(11:31):
week was John Thune saying, we're gonna technical lya the
Senate open, so we can't do any recess appointments.
Speaker 7 (11:37):
Yeah, yeah, I think maybe maybe maybe Judge Janine was
the final bridge for some of these people, Like no, mos, dude,
I can't.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
They have been so craven, the Republicans in the Senate,
and they have been just so powardly. I mean they
just you know, the idea of a mean tweet, despite
the fact that the guy is you know, the polling,
by the way, the polling on Epstein is like amazing devastating, right,
Like eighty percent of Americans are like, he's involved and
(12:11):
if he pardons her it stinks to high have.
Speaker 5 (12:13):
Thirty one percent of Republicans think he was involved in
crimes with Jeffrey Epstein.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
I mean, what these are your base. These are the
people who voted for you, and they still think you did.
Speaker 5 (12:24):
Those people are like, yes, perhaps Donald Trump was a pedophile,
but I still love him to death, right right, that's
the psychotic like super fringy Pole.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Oh, that's insane.
Speaker 5 (12:35):
It's it's madness, Molly, it is, it is beyond the
valley of madness. And nobody, nobody in Washington right now
is waking up thinking, man, this is going to get
so much better.
Speaker 1 (12:47):
Yeah, no, they're not. There is no one, and but
it is. It's funny because it's like we're basically hurtling
towards a cliff. Right, the public markets are like, I
have decided that really now Trump is sirius. They don't
like the tariffs. We have all day Canadian officials on
MSNBC being like, please, please, please, are lower the tariffs.
(13:09):
Little do they know they should be going on Fox
and Friends because he doesn't watch it in his NBC,
you know, and my man is just like taking a change,
and you know, he's out playing golf. So it doesn't
strike me his.
Speaker 5 (13:24):
Reaction to this whole scandal, to this whole discovery. He
has gotten it wrong at every turn. Yeah, he's got
it wrong at every turn. And I think right now
you're right. I think the markets are finally saying, oh shit,
he's not playing anymore. Now this now this has become
a real crisis. He's not going to be able to
(13:48):
walk and chew gum on this. And if he just
replaces the person at the Bureau Labor Statistics, or even
if he got rid of your own Powell, just doing
these things has actually just doing talking about these things
actually made the market less confident, right, you know, it's
actually made the more more nervous about the future, and
(14:12):
there are a lot of reasons to think that that
that the market could take a very swift turn in
the wrong direction for Donald Trump.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
And the bad news is we're all going to lose
a lot of money. The good news, the good news
is I'm the retirement folks. The good news is and also,
by the way, I want another thing that you may
not have heard this week is that Elon Musk's Department
of Government Efficiency caused US billions of tax fare dollars.
Speaker 5 (14:39):
Right, another good money way to go, Elon. Good work there, Champ.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
The bad news about Donald Trump driving us into a
ditch is that Donald Trump is driving us into a ditch.
The good news about Donald Trump driving us into a
ditch is that he is changing public sentiment and he's
already pretty unpopular. It turns out those videos of the
crying women being dragged from their cars in front of
(15:04):
their children because Stephen Miller wants more people deported is
not it ain't it ain't it chief.
Speaker 5 (15:14):
It ain't in Chief, you know what, Molly, I think.
I think that's a really good point. And I think
one of the things that we're seeing right now is
is there's a. If you watch Fox and you get
your news from Facebook and Twitter, you believe that fifty
percent of the country is all in all the time
on Donald Trump. Right, If that's your news environment, that's
what you believe. What we're seeing right now is that
(15:35):
Donald Trump is twenty five points underwater on inflation and prices. Yeah,
he's sixteen points underwater on the economy. He's six points
underwater on immigration, which had been traditionally which is the
strongest issue. And so you're right, his power is now
at that point where it is diminishing, it is shrinking.
(15:55):
I think that makes him more dangerous in terms of
the use of executive power.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
Mm hmm.
Speaker 5 (16:01):
But it does show you that he's on a clock now,
that this that this, that this show is running out
of gas.
Speaker 1 (16:09):
I think, yes, it's out of gas. I also think
the power of trump Ism is not the same. Like
Lindsey Graham has been the Sicka fan to end all
Sicka fans, he's been he's being primaried. Yeah, bye bye the.
Speaker 5 (16:22):
Maga by a maga by a mega project twenty twenty five. Bro,
What do you think Lindsay's gonna learn from that? What
lesson is he going to learn nothing. If he wins,
he'll still say, oh, Donald Trump, he's the president. I
owe him everything. But you know, you're right. He's been
the ultimate as kisser for Trump over and over over.
He traveled the furthest from the light to the dark
(16:44):
of almost anybody in the Senate, and from John McCain
to Donald Trump. And his reward is affiliation and possible defeat.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
It is. I have to tell you, no one has
ever had a smarter book title than you, my friend. Serious, Like,
here's a guy who's he hitched his wagon to Donald J. Trump,
and now he is.
Speaker 5 (17:06):
Uh, he's going to get spanked in a primary and
looks I'll tell you, if Donald Trump comes out and
says vote for whatever, this probably five dipshit is Paul Dan's,
you know, Trump's. Trump's ward is law and Republican primaries.
There are very few cases where he doesn't win.
Speaker 1 (17:24):
Is there?
Speaker 5 (17:25):
So?
Speaker 1 (17:25):
North Carolina Democrats have Copper Cooper, Copper, Copper Cooper Cooper.
I think he calls the Copper, but I don't care.
I'll take Cooper because it sounds more saying he's a
just an unbelievably good candidate. One state wide governor the
dream in a rapidly purple in state. You could not
ask for better Maine. No one, what's happening in man?
Speaker 5 (17:47):
Look, I'm hearing the Page is trying to to make it,
trying to make a comeback run, you know, another another
run Republican.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
So but we have they have a Republican Yeah, I know, but.
Speaker 5 (17:56):
But that now they're all grumpy about Collins and you know.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
So the Page is going to run. So what wait?
Speaker 5 (18:02):
I hope So my understanding. About a week ago I
talked to somebody who does Senate polling who said they're
watching over their shoulder because Paula Page is making all
this noise and Trump wants Trump. Trump apparently wants him
instead as Collins, even though Collins ends up voting from
nine to nine percent of the time. He doesn't like.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
Any So if le Page wins, So is there a
where's the Democrat? Who is the Democrat?
Speaker 5 (18:26):
There is a man? I'm sorry, you've got me. You
got me short on this one.
Speaker 1 (18:30):
No one, There isn't anyone so far.
Speaker 5 (18:32):
Not so far. There was a there was somebody who
passed on in a former statewide officially.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
Passed on it, Janet Mills will but she's seventy seven
years old. She's the governor now, so it's a six
year term. Democrats are trying to phase out the older.
Speaker 5 (18:49):
There are a lot of good, good, younger politicians in Maine.
I don't know them as well as I know some
of the other swinging or states. I think something will
emerge there for two reasons. One, Maine is going to
be on the forefront of this rural healthcare wipeout that
the bad bill has engineered too. If it is lapage.
He evokes a very visceral reaction in Democrats because he
(19:10):
is a what's the word, I'm looking for, rabid psychopath,
and so I think he'll tell.
Speaker 1 (19:17):
Us what you really think.
Speaker 5 (19:19):
But look, North Carolina is a is a piece of
good news. I think we've got a very interesting situation
in the House right now because of all the redistrict
and garbage.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Let's talk about the House. Texas Republicans likely heading to
Illinois to break the quorum being protected by your friend
of mine, Governor Pritzker.
Speaker 5 (19:40):
Prisker.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Is there a world in which Governor Pritzker ends up
like this, ends up making him president in twenty twenty.
Speaker 5 (19:48):
It's way too early to like many a slip between
the cup and the lip between here twenty eight. But
Democratic governors are at the front line of this. And
if Texas and Ohio and Florida, all of whom we're
talking about doing this, do this in California and Oregon
and Washington and Illinois and New York and Massachusetts have
(20:11):
to do the same thing. Right, We cannot be disarmed here.
We cannot because you know, as I said on TV
this morning with Me with You, in fact, that was
a good hit. We had a good hit.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
That was a really long hit. We just kept going
and I was like.
Speaker 5 (20:26):
I kept thinking that. I kept like wrapping up and him.
Then he's like, and what about that? Fun? That was
a good one. He's always so good. My theory of
the case is if Republicans take back the House, I
don't think they'll certify the twenty twenty eight election. For
am it is definitely true. I don't think they'll certify
the election.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
But we can't get into I mean, yes, that.
Speaker 5 (20:45):
Far down the line. I really just crap out of
them this year.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
The Republicans are going to take that. I think Republicans
are to lose the House. I think the reason they
want to redistrict is because they know they're going to
lose the House.
Speaker 5 (20:56):
I think they're looking for a cheat code to win
yeah this year.
Speaker 1 (20:59):
And I also want to add I think that what
is happening now, the unpopularity of the Democratic brand is
not because the Democratic brand is unpopular, which it is.
It's because Democrats are mad at them because they suck,
are pissed.
Speaker 5 (21:14):
At their own leadership for not being fighters.
Speaker 1 (21:17):
Right, and there's that right. I don't think that means
they're going to vote for Republicans. I think it means
they're furious.
Speaker 5 (21:23):
Because they're furious. Look, it might mean they don't turn out,
but they're at a Swiss parties. They're not jumping in like,
hey you know what I need my week? The Democratic
Party leadership means I want fascism. It's not how this works.
Speaker 1 (21:36):
But I also think what's interesting about all those poll
numbers is to see, you know, we have had so
many news cycles about young men being Trumpers, but young
women are not, and they are. And the first of all,
Trump has lost a lot.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
Of ninety to ten now with YOUNGO right under thirty.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
But also like Trump has lost a lot of those
young men with the Ebstein Files. I mean, I was
just reading some reporting about you know, all these young
men who he went on these podcasts, He got these
low frequency voters, and then all these low frequency voters
want and one of the things that honestly Joe Robin wants, right,
you know, not to have COVID restrictions. All right, okay,
(22:17):
no COVID restrictions. They're very helpful when there's no COVID.
And then also, you know, they wanted the Epstein files
release because they felt that you know, somehow there was
some you know whatever.
Speaker 5 (22:30):
They had a theory. They had a theory of the
world that it's not exactly the same one that the
right wing has that the Maga wright has. Part of
their theory of the world is we've gotten fucked over
as young men, right because powerful, powerful people always protect
each other and they and they never protect us. So
eve see had kind of a resonance with them, different
than the QAnon Maga version of that theory they intercest.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
But equally stupid.
Speaker 5 (22:57):
Oh yeah, yeah, very ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
I'm sort So we are in the end times of moronics.
I think it's important to take a minute to.
Speaker 5 (23:05):
Just I think we're to be very honest with ourselves
as a country that you know, MAGA really stands for
morons are governing America. We have placed a cultural frame
around it. Expertise, as our friend Dominicals has written about
brilliantly education and I use this word advisedly. But the
hatred of elites of any kind, whether cognitive or financial
(23:29):
or anything else, leads them down this rabbit hole where
they reward stupid behavior. Yeah, and they and they elevate
stupid behavior. And you know, three hundred thousand years of
human evolution or whatever the whatever, the hominid phase of evolution,
what you want to use is has been about us
being less stupid.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yeah, so we do not get yeah, yeah, yeah, and
we're getting eaten. I think that's it. We're definite yetting eaten.
At best, we're going to get eaten. Edwardst who knows.
So let's talk about the Trump has continued to express
his ir towards the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
(24:07):
He fired, he fired her, but now he's still tweeting
about true thing about her. So I wonder does the
does she end up in Seacott? Yes?
Speaker 5 (24:16):
Right, oh, listen, I wouldn't doubt anything at this point
with this guy, he could do the sort of thing
that he's doing trying to do with Jack Smith right now.
Oh Hatch Act. These are the people that have treated
the Hatch Act like it was right, I know, not
even a recommendation, but more of a broke But you know, look,
I think I think there are a lot of people
(24:36):
in the markets who do not like the idea of
not having good data to go by. Why not only
do they like making money, they also have a fiduciary
obligation to have correct data for their clients. And so
you know, Trump eliminating that and it's like a lot
of other Third world leaders have done.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
This is a problem that Biden world had too with
the inflation. Sure cannot people something and then have them
have a lived experience that does run counter so you know.
Speaker 5 (25:07):
You cost a dollar fifty now and people are.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
Like right where? And that's the thing is like Donald
Trump can bring in mister wonderful as the head of
Bureau and Labor Statistics, or he can bring in Eric,
give Eric the job, but what happens the job he does.
But what happens is people have their own lived experience
and their lived experience, will not drive with mister wonderful
(25:31):
telling them that's you know, Orange man great and so
I think we're going to play out and it's hard
for me to imagine that things don't get worse before
they get better.
Speaker 5 (25:43):
He's used up all the economic capital that he had,
He's burned it. The tariffs, this insanity fighting with the Fed.
The markets are are now reaching the point they're like,
oh God, okay, we can't fake this anymore. Yeah, they
got their tax cut, so they've they've they've achieved their
goals in the second Trump administration.
Speaker 1 (26:03):
By and large, at least, the estate tax has gone down,
which is what all of Americans really longed for.
Speaker 5 (26:12):
Every every middle class American really thinks that night, My god,
how am I going to dispose of my twenty five
million dollar estate if I die and not screw my
children financially.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
Yes, for America has once again benefited from again trickle
down economics. Rick Wilson, Well, I drunk fast, Will you
come back?
Speaker 5 (26:33):
I'll come back, you come back, I'll come back every time.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
Right, all right, that's right, opening We'll see you next time.
I'll see you next time. Alvero Badoya is the former
commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission. Welcome to Fast Politics AFRO.
Speaker 4 (26:53):
Thanks for having them on.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
You should start by telling us what your job was,
exact exactly what happened to you.
Speaker 4 (27:01):
So I was a commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission,
and that's the agency that goes after fraudsters and monopolis.
So Martin Schrelly, we banned that guy from the pharmaceutical
industry from life. We block the largest grocery store Merger
Kroger and Albertsons. We go after corporate landlords that screw
(27:22):
their tenants over with hidden fees and junk fees, things like,
oh you don't want cockroaches in your building, You're gonna
have to pay for that. And on March eighteenth, I
was standing at my daughter's gymnastis class very much trying
to not look at my phone because she gets pissed
off if I'm looking at my phone, which she does
a cool trick. And then I got a call and
my colleagues saying, hey, have you looked at your email?
(27:44):
And I said absolutely not actually, and she said, well,
there's an email from the White House saying that they're
firing us. And the thing I left out about our agencies.
We're supposed to be independent of the president. We're supposed
to only be fireable for neglect, fraud, abuse, that kind
of thing.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
But you have this thing you do, which is you
stop fraud, which is never going to be popular in
this ADMN. So talk us to if it's nonpartisan, they
don't really have the right to fire you. How did
they do it exactly? And frankly, it's been argument that
we didn't do it. I think one of the most
(28:20):
important things that we did as commissioners is not go
along with this blatant, ridiculous illegality. And so a lot
of people similarly situated would have said, all right, you know,
I have just been illegally fired, mister President. I will
see you in court. And then they're quiet and you
don't hear from them until the data losing court. And
so what Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter and I did is say, no,
(28:44):
we're not fired.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
We're going to keep on doing our jobs. And so
we kept on, you know, commenting on what the agency
was doing. I literally took a trip to meet with
farmers in Iowa as a commissioner, and we kind of
tried to meet their chaos with chaos in return. And
so right now we're in the courts. We actually had
a big win where Commissioner Slaughter returned to the job
for I think about seventy two hours, and then a
(29:05):
court of appeal state it I had to leave because
I need to put food on the table and pay
the bills, and so I formally resigned on June nine.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
So it sounds like to me, what you're doing here
is that you are showing us that a lot of
this stuff is actually legal. Right, Explain to us a
little bit about this sort of illegality.
Speaker 4 (29:25):
Right, this will go to court. Talk us through that.
So let's talk about why it's illegal. Because I think
a lot of people here you got fired. They'll be like, bro,
I got fired, you know two times in the last
five years. What's the big deal? And I don't define
the terms of my job. Congress defined it in nineteen fourteen,
and they were just coming out of the era of
like John Rockefeller and the Carnegies, where basically these guys
(29:49):
took over government to cut themselves all sorts of sweetheart deals.
And so Congress in eighteen ninety nineteen fourteen was frankly
pissed and said we're going to create an institution to
check you, to check this corporate power. Back then, they
were called trusts, and so that is why they said
the president can't just fire whoever they want in these
(30:10):
seats at any time, because otherwise you're going to get
what's happening to us now, where basically all these crazy
deals are coming through that help the president and his
donors just because he didn't like us, right, and so
those protections were put in place, and that's why it
was illegal for the president to fire us. But one
of the sad things that you learn as a lawyer
(30:30):
or as the victim of an illegal action is the
law is and after the fact remedy, right, like if
you get fired, you know, I haven't been able to
access my email, my files, you know anything for three
months before I finally had to leave the job. And
so that's what's in the corps are on. That's what
we're fighting.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
Yeah, and where is your case now in the court.
Speaker 4 (30:51):
The case right now is soon going to be on
appeal to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals. The district
court judge ruled in our favor and put a commissioner
slaughter back in her seat, and then they approve to
stay at the request of the federal government to take
her back out of the seat until the district court
could rule on it.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
So what's going to happen now? Eventually this case getting
get kicked up to the Supreme Court, right exactly. And
one of the things that we've seen in this Supreme
Court is they tend to be just complete sick advanced
to Trump largely. We tend to see these six to
three decisions. I mean, occasionally we see a sort of
(31:32):
Roberts and Amy Coney going along with the liberals, but
that is pretty rare, right it is.
Speaker 4 (31:39):
And the other stunning thing about the current legal reality
is that there are instances in which the court will
effectively overrule you know, one hundred year old or ninety
year old precedent in like two pages in an unsigned opinion.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
In the shadow donc right even here, oral arguments just
up all at all and you don't even know who
wrote it up. It could be brainworm's alido exactly.
Speaker 4 (32:05):
And the really funny thing about this, Molly is, you know,
I was sitting as like a twenty something Senate Judiciary
staffer during a lot of these guys's confirmation hearings, and
they would tell you, you know, scouts, honor. You know, I'm
just here to call balls and strikes, balls and strikes,
and I mean literally you had some of them. I
think Amy Cony Barrett said on under testimony, I will
(32:26):
not overroll Roe versus Wade or she didn't say those words,
but called it a super president. Every single one of these.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
Guys story decisives, mister, you know story decisives. It's already decided.
We're not going to touch it.
Speaker 4 (32:39):
Yeah, that's right. And now two plus two equals five.
And we don't even need to tell you why. That's
what's happening all over the place.
Speaker 1 (32:45):
You went to Yale Law School, you're obviously very capable
of very high level legal thinking. One of the things
that we see in this world is that there's quite
a lot of the Supreme Court doing things like that.
It's journalism. So I would love you to I mean,
what it seems to me like and you can tell
(33:06):
me if you think I'm wrong. I'm happy to hear it.
Is that a lot of the anti corruption measures like
your organization started after the corruption, the sort of the
Gilded Age corruption, right, and then you have some of
the other parts of congressional creations that were put in
place after Nixon, as other anti corruption measures. These are
(33:30):
sort of the focus of Trump right now, taking a
part the things that were set up to stop corruption.
Do you think that's right? And how did your agency
function in that way?
Speaker 4 (33:41):
I do think that's right. I'll shore two things about this.
First of all, the agency function this way because most
agencies have been able in a law abiding way, because
most federal employees, despite what you see in the press,
are sticklers for ethics. You know, if a reporter takes
you out to lunch, you literally won't let them buy
you a sup at panera. And meanwhile, you have certain
(34:01):
Supreme Court justices who have like gold plated winnebagos out
of nowhere from just my good friend. And so you
have had these agencies where a lot of people there
could be making three x four x what they're making
in the private sector, who believe in creating a level
playing field for the little guy and bringing down the
Martin Screllis of the world. And so that's how they've
(34:22):
been doing what they're doing. But there's also something even
more problematic that we need to talk about which is, yeah,
they're removing the independence of these agencies, but they're also
starting to use them as toll booths, use the power
that they have to extract all sorts of weird promises.
And so the clearest example at the FTC, the Federal
Tree Commission was this merger between Omnikon and Publicists, which
(34:45):
has created the largest i think advert ad buyer in
the country, potentially the world. You're in media, you know
that this is how media functions, and our agency led
it through with this condition out of no where that
basically results in a requirement to buy ads from you
on musk. This has nothing to do with our job.
(35:07):
The other crazy requirement was in this recent merger between
Paramountain Skydance and you had the Federal Communications Commission say,
oh yeah, and you got to install a special bias
monitor at CBS and the other thing I did is
kicked out Colbert. None of that has anything to do
with the agency's mission. And so, just like the President
is using tariffs which could be used to help workers,
(35:29):
to just exact random promises from countries to buy X
and Y and Z from his golfing buddy, you have
these agencies that used to stand up for the American
worker and consumer and small business owner being used to
line the president's downer's pockets.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
So this gets me thinking about something that I think
about a which is we are down a road that
starts with not obeying the hat to act and get
ends to Donald Trump takes a plane from the Kataris
so right? This is all you go down this road?
You say, like, I don't understand why the Biden people
(36:06):
can't talk to me about the DNC while we're standing
in this office. And now we're like Donald Trump and
in the Katari plane fiasco, there's actually it's written so
that the plane goes to the Trump Presidential Library.
Speaker 4 (36:21):
So talk to me about what that looks like. The
example we had at FTC was this, So if you
actually do something unlike us, I suspect all of us
that probably bust. Your listeners are paying very close attention
to the news, right, but look, most people don't. Most
people have other main interests, right, And so all they
hear in the background is like today Facebook settled for
(36:42):
twenty three million dollars, a settlement a lawsuit by the president,
you know, filed shortly before as inauguration, and the word
bride doesn't appear in the news story. And part of
the way that that's achieved is through these I wouldn't
even call them loopholes because I don't I in my view,
they're not legal. But like the president library, So what
happened with Facebook is in the first Trump administration, a
(37:04):
bipartisan group at the FTC, including I think it was
two Democratic commissioners and one Republican chairman, sued to undo
Facebook's takeover of Insta and WhatsApp. And you know, if
you're hearing this and be like, what's the deal with that,
well you should read Mark Zuckerberg's emails, because they basically say,
I don't want to compete with instead of WhatsApp, I
just want.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
To just buy them.
Speaker 4 (37:23):
And so we sued to stop it bipartisan vote. Facebook
saw that Trump two was coming into office, and so
they settled this furious lawsuit that Trump had filed against
them for I think it was twenty three million dollars,
not to the President himself but to his Presidential library.
And lo and behold, what do they get. They get
this Oval office meeting to lobby the president to drop
(37:46):
the lawsuit, and now they haven't dropped the lawsuit yet,
but it doesn't mean they won't. And that in and
of itself, an oval office meeting in and of itself
is the achievement, right. And so you have legal settlements
being used as brides to stop the president and using
what he sees as is infinite leverage in the federal
government to squeeze people for money.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
I'm often thinking about, like what's the chicken, what's the egg? Right?
So I wonder you get to a place like this,
And obviously, like Alena Khan would say, it's a regulation problem,
like the fact that technology got here, right, Like Facebook,
for example, they're you know, somewhat responsible for the Rhingan genocide.
(38:27):
These people are sort of too big to be checked.
Is this a failure of congressional regulation? Is this a
failure of like congress seating it's authority a decade ago
or two decades ago? I mean, like what gets you
down this path?
Speaker 4 (38:45):
Two things? FIRSTUS money in politics, and look, you know
Republicans and Democrats are guilty alike, oh, one hundred percent,
they're just bathed in money. And so meaningful laws to
check corporate power. I think now in twenty twenty five,
you're seeing people on the left and the right waking
up to say like, hey, this stuff's out of hand,
can't do this anymore. But for most of the last
(39:05):
forty years after Reagan in particular, the idea was bigger
is better. You know, let's unfetter the economy from these
troublesome rules and regulations. That's one thing. And here's the
second thing, which is that for you know that time,
that same time, forty years or so, you've had this
that Reagan Ie ideology, you've had this other trend that
(39:26):
at a lot of enforcement agencies like the FTC. Not everyone,
and I'm not talking about everyone, but most of the
people who had come into these leadership jobs would subsequently
go on to work for Fortune one hybrid companies. And
so the sad fact is in the back of their head.
And again these are Republicans and Democrats would go in
and they'd be tough. But you don't want to be
too tough.
Speaker 1 (39:46):
Lake, because you want to be able to get a
job after this.
Speaker 4 (39:49):
And the power of what Chirkan did is to not
give a damn what they think about her in Aspen
and Sun Valley and Davos. She's going back to be
a law professor of Columbia, a job that she'll probably
have for the rest of you rest of her life.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
There's still a Columbia.
Speaker 4 (40:06):
Well that's so good point.
Speaker 1 (40:08):
Yes, I have not accounted for that, but you know what, Yeah,
not to go totally dark here, but yes.
Speaker 4 (40:14):
Oh yeah, no, sadly we're there. That is what was
so extraordinary about her, which is wonder plaudits you know,
from from a whole lot of people who am the
paying close.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Attention to politics. Yeah. So it starts with Citizens United. Yes,
and it starts with a world in which members of
Congress cannot go into lobbying.
Speaker 4 (40:32):
Oh oh, In other words, how do we undo it?
You reverse Citizens United? Yeah, like say tomorrow that we
are in a world.
Speaker 1 (40:41):
Where we have a government that is neutral, that is
a non authoritarian leaning government. What do you do next?
Speaker 4 (40:48):
Yeah, there's a couple of practical things, and there's a
one big picture. Think practical things things like you said,
reverse Citizen United, band stock trading by members of Congress.
You do serious campaign finance reform so that public financing
of the campaigns is an actual thing. Ranked choice voting.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
I'm going to push you for a minute, because please,
I live in New York City. And this is maybe like,
as a taxpayer, I find the government funded campaigns very annoying,
Like I don't know why I should be paying for
fucking mayoral candidates ads.
Speaker 4 (41:22):
Yeah, But here's the thing is that we don't have
a choice. We've got two shitty choices. Right, You've got
a choice between public financing, which, like you said, is
an ideal because people are paying for elect people to
try to run for office, versus ConAgra paying for their
candidates and big tech paying for their favorite carogate. For me,
that's an easy choice. But here's the big picture thing
(41:42):
I would say is that we need to start looking
at things a little less as left versus right, and
a little more as the money could taps everyone underneath. Yah, right,
you know. And so let me tell you, Like the
last meeting I had as a commissioner was in Iowa.
Guy stood up and said, Hey, my name's Dengler. I
just harvested my last season after one hundred and fifteen
(42:03):
years of farming in Tama County, Iowa. Turned on my
John Deere Combine. It broke down. John Deere has locked
down at software, so I can't fix it. I got
to pay their guy to come out two three times
on his time to charge me an arm and a leg.
And that was the straw that broke my back. The
meeting before I had with a Bangladeshi uber and Lyft
driver from Queens who said, yeah, I just woke up
(42:26):
this morning, and Uber lift both blocked me out of
their apps. You know, so much of our politics says, oh, no,
you're from Iowa, you're white, you've been here one hundred
and fifteen years. You've got nothing in common with the
Bamgladeshi immigrant. You know who's driving in New York City,
When if you look at what these guys need, they
have everything in common because they're fed up with oligarch's
telling them what to do and the monopolies and didiopolies
they run control in their lives. I think if we
(42:48):
can feed more of that awareness into our politics, it's
going to be helpful and it's going to create coalitions
that otherwise.
Speaker 1 (42:54):
Would be impossible. It's a really good point and it
is also how we got here right. I mean there,
we didn't think about the people who were the working people,
and that's part of the problem, part of democrats problem.
I don't think Republicans consider it to be a problem,
but they should be. But it is that this idea
(43:14):
versus of sort of working people versus the olimarchy.
Speaker 4 (43:19):
One of the things people forget is our country was
founded in part on these ideas. You know, the Boston
Tea Party was a protest against the monopoly on tea
right in the Boston Harbor. Thomas Jefferson, for all his flaws,
did think that one of the things missing in the
Bill of Rights was an anti monopoly amendment, a rule
to fight monopolies. And so this has been around since
(43:40):
our founding, and now is the time to recapture some
of that and see what kind of bridges we can
build them. Frankly, I think Zaron Mamdani has done this
in New York City in the way that he has
made working with the small business owner, the guy who
runs the bodega, the guy who runs the whole aal cart,
part of his campaign, bringing them into the progressive populace
fold the less populous vault. I think that's been very positive.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3 (44:04):
For having me.
Speaker 5 (44:06):
No no moment.
Speaker 1 (44:09):
Rick Wilson, Yes, it's a lot of fuckery to choose
from there's so.
Speaker 5 (44:14):
Much fuckery, and I have a semi Ebstein related fuckery item,
but it's not purely it is the whole White House
Liberachi GLITTERBOOCOCKI bullshit redecorating plan to build a ninety thousand
square foot Sam's Club warehouse on the side of the
White House. He's doing this in part as a distraction
because he knows how mad people get about it. But
I've read a lot in my career.
Speaker 8 (44:35):
About George Washington, who really believed that the President of
the United States, which was never going to be a king,
but should be a man of enormous dignity. The fact
that he wants a giant sportatorium entertainment complex grafted onto
the White House for a ballroom so we can rent
it out for weddings and bar mitzvahs is making my
brain ache.
Speaker 1 (44:53):
Can I say one thing. I have a slightly different take,
which is this is the East Wing, which is the
legacy of one Eleanor Roosevelt. Donald Trump is very focused
on destroying the legacy of famous Democrats. Right. He's obsessed
(45:14):
with Carter destroying FEMA Apartment of Education. You could see
how Donald Trump would not have liked I mean, he
probably has no idea who eleanor Roosevelt is. But if
she did, I don't think he would think she was hot.
Speaker 5 (45:29):
No, oh god no. Also, it's like Melania is never there,
so why bother with it?
Speaker 1 (45:33):
Right? And so it is erasing the legacy of the
first Lady and all she does.
Speaker 5 (45:39):
Donald to buy my office now in Tyson Corner, Virginia,
Rick Wilson, Fally, John Fast, I'll see a pig's time.
Speaker 1 (45:48):
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in
every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear the best
minds and politics make sense of all this chaos. If
you enjoy this podcast, please send it to a friend
and keep the conversation going. Thanks for listening.
Host
Molly Jong-Fast
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