2467 - Fighting Trump’s Power Grab w/ Robert Weissman, Rohan Grey

It's Wednesday! Sam and Emma are joined by Robert Weissman, co-president of the non-profit advocacy organization Public Citizen, which has filed 8 lawsuits against the Trump administration and says they have more coming. Later, Rohan Grey, Assistant Professor of Law at Willamette University, discusses his latest research on the Trump administration’s attempt to seize direct political control over the core payments software of the Treasury’s Bureau of the Fiscal Service, which handles spending for most of the federal government, to block funds to politically disfavored agencies and programs. First, they run through updates on the victory by liberal Susan Crawford in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, Democrats’ growing margins in deep-red regions, Trump’s tariff fears, the GOP’s anger at proxy voting for new parents, Mike Waltz Gmail whoopsie, Senator Cory Booker’s marathon filibuster, the closure of free measles vaccine clinics in Texas amid a breakout, Ed Martin nomination for D.C. U.S. Attorney, Tesla’s tanking earnings, and the Senate GOP’s budget reconciliation, before expanding on the beautiful revelations around the toxicity of Elon Musk in US politics as seen in the incredible leftward swing amid his intense campaigning for conservative Brad Schimel Wisconsin. Robert Weissman then joins, first previewing the typical work of Public Citizen including advocacy, litigation, and organizing on behalf of the public against corporations, touching on everything from trade and consumer financial protection to drug pricing and campaign finance laws. Weissman then unpacks Public Citizens tactical shift under Trump 2.0, walking through the various legal battles they have taken on against Trump’s attempt to dismantle the federal U.S. government through executive reform, with a particular focus on their case to save the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau – an agency birthed from the 2008 Financial Crisis’ overwhelming impact on consumers – also touching on their effort to protect USAID and the Department of Education. Robert, Sam, and Emma expand on these lawsuits' ultimate goal of preventing the full-scale deletion of these agencies, understanding that, even with success, the Trump Administration will constantly be searching for (and finding) new ways to obstruct any accountability or pushback from this project, and focusing instead on ensuring the potential of rebuilding under future leadership, before wrapping up by looking to the upcoming fights over Trump’s insistence on using his executive power to fire any and everybody, and the role of “national emergencies” in bolstering executive power. Rohan Grey then joins, diving right into Elon Musk’s outrageous (and obviously untrustworthy) agenda of digitizing America’s fiscal regime, stepping back to walk through the process by which US fiscal policy operates, with said policy – be it spending, taxation, issuing debt, etc – originating in Congressional legislation, moving through the Office of Management and Budget under the President to manage the allocated spending over the allotted time, to the Treasury’s instructions with the Federal Reserve as the ultimate entity in charge of the dollars. After expanding on the utter absurdity of Elon’s plan – outside of if, perhaps, you wanted to completely rid the system of accountability or pushback – Rohan, Sam, and Emma parse through DOGE’s opaque takeover of the Bureau of Financial Services amid their project to indiscriminately cut funds, including Elon setting up an obvious assault on Social Security, wrapping up by expanding on what a botched system shift for the federal payment systems would look like, and assessing a more realistic idea for bringing our systems into the modern era.

And in the Fun Half: Sam and Emma listen to Wisconsin Justice Susan Crawford celebrate winning an election against tens of millions of Elon Musk’s money, unpack Elon’s very-related copium, and watch Fox try to justify the extensive negative