Trump's War on Blue America

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Welcome to Pod Save America.

I'm John Favreau.

I'm John Lovitt.

I'm Tommy Vitor.

On today's show, the shutdown continues with no end in sight.

The November elections are a month away, and this week we're going to talk about Gavin Newsom's ballot measure here in California to neutralize Republican gerrymandering.

And then you'll hear Tommy's interview with Ben Smith at Semaphore about the impact of Barry Weiss taking over at CBS News, how Donald Trump's media filter may be impacting his decisions, and whether the ABC News Jimmy Kimmel saga has changed corporate media.

But let's start with the president's war against Blue America, which has now come to Chicago and Portland.

I'll just quickly go through the facts of what's been happening on the ground, and then you guys can respond.

In Chicago, armed federal agents have been engaged in military-style immigration raids they're calling Operation Midway Blitz.

Last week, Blackhawk helicopters landed on a south side apartment building in the middle of the night where about 100 agents in tactical gear used flashbang grenades to bust through the residents' doors, dragged them outside, including legal residents and U.S.

citizens, including children, some naked, and zip-tied them together for hours.

No warrants, no lawyers, kids crying, separated from their families.

They have also deployed tear gas outside schools and on streets, not just against peaceful protesters, but people who were just passing by.

They arrested a city council member in a hospital who had merely asked to see a warrant.

They've shot rubber bullets and pepper balls at multiple journalists who just filed a lawsuit.

They shot lethal bullets at a woman in a vehicle they said was trying to ram them.

Though just before we started recording, I said that they had the body cam footage shows that maybe they rammed her as they're going through the court proceedings.

So of course you can't trust anything they say.

Some of the raids they filmed for social media so Christy Noam could tweet them out.

She was there in person last week in Chicago whining after local officials in one building didn't let her use the potty.

Then promising that Trump would be sending in the Department of War, which he did.

On Saturday, the president announced he'd be deploying 300 troops from the Illinois National Guard over the objections of Governor Pritzker.

And then on Sunday, he decided to send 200 troops from the Texas National Guard to Chicago as well.

Governor J.B.

Pritzker and the city of Chicago are suing to stop the deployments, and the judge scheduled a hearing for later this week.

Here's Donald Trump crowing about his progress on Monday afternoon in the Oval Office, followed by Pritzker's response to the takeover.

We're going to make Chicago really great again, and we're going to stop this crime.

Then we're going to go to another one, and we're going to go city by city.

We're going to have safe cities.

I believe that Pritzker and this mayor of Chicago that like to say about we have it under control, they don't have it under control.

Not only is it not under control it's the opposite and i believe they're afraid they're scared for their lives they think they can fool us all into thinking that the way to get out of this crisis that they created is to give them free reign well that plan will only work if we let it the state of illinois is going to use every lever at our disposal to resist this power grab and get noam's thugs the hell out of chicago

i'm not afraid i am not afraid and i won't back down.

So last week, we had Trump telling an audience of generals that they're now fighting, quote, an enemy within,

urge them to use America's cities as, quote, training grounds.

Looks like we're seeing that now.

We'll get to what's happening in Portland in a second.

But what do you guys make of the situation in Chicago, which, as Trump said, is not only not under control, but the opposite.

Yeah, that can be a little bit more control.

Which I guess is

out of control.

Right.

It's the opposite of under control.

Over control, that's not right.

That's not right.

Even the terminology is kind of chilling.

Operation Midway Blitz.

The Blitz was when the Germans bombed the shit out of London for about a year.

Yeah, I thought that was for like foreign military operations

we give names to.

Yeah, like just even, you know,

you're claiming you're doing this on behalf of the people of Chicago.

Call it something like safe,

safe dish.

Deep dish.

Deep, deep.

Hot dish.

Deep safety.

Tavern style safety.

Do you see the videos of the Chicago cops who were tear gassed by ice, too?

Oh, yeah.

I forgot about that.

There's so many of these videos that I forgot to include them all.

And look, I just think that the political take-home is this: this to me is the fight Trump wants.

He wants to call us weak on both immigration and soft on crime.

And I think he wants these images on TV of what looks like violent and chaotic.

And so he sends ice into these communities in the most inflammatory way possible to try to make that happen.

And like these ice raids, like that Black Hawk helicopters kicking down doors at night with flashbangs, that is like what the special forces did for two decades in Afghanistan or Iraq.

And they have their social media teams like filming it all and releasing it.

The hype video they did release reminded me of

the video Bukele released when we first sent all the Venezuelan men to Sukkot.

And so it's like clearly a strategy.

I don't think it's a smart strategy.

We'll get into some of the polling later, but like 58% of voters in a CBS poll said they disapprove of National Guard deployments.

I'm not sure like they want to see

people getting brutalized in these communities, but Stephen Miller does.

Yeah, to the point of not being able to believe the word they said.

So first of all, they're repelling into the roof

to what end?

For what purpose?

Like they're trying to get out of a bottle before the Pakistanis find us.

It's filled with trendy Aragua.

Well, that's the other thing.

They're like, we were actually doing this to get...

gang members.

They've released no information about that.

They can't be trusted.

They said a bunch of people who were innocent were gang members when they shipped them off to El Salvador.

So we can't take their word for it.

All we do see are images of of Americans and legal residents being bound up and complaining about this happening in their building.

It's a completely ridiculous outside show of force, which they're doing for the cameras to make their fascist adjaprop.

And, you know,

the defense, they're going to release information at some point saying, look at all these people that Democrats wish were still in these buildings, as if it is not possible for our laws to be enforced without a black hawk helicopter over an American city and people rappelling down onto the roof.

Yeah, I mean, imagine if, let's take their word for it that there were trendaragua, you know, gang members in that building and get a warrant from a judge.

You can, there's a million ways that you can go into the building and, uh, you know, and arrest these people without them running away or knowing that you're coming.

Right.

Stairs.

Stairs, right?

Like, not black hawk helicopters.

It's a five-story building, by the way.

This isn't, this isn't

like Harvey's Tower.

Yeah, no, no.

But also, like, there's a lot of people in there.

They took all the residents out.

And they're definitely lying, at least about some of the people, because a lot of citizens and legal residents

have already been released because they didn't do anything, but they were out in the cold for hours.

These kids are screaming, like little kids.

There's an eyewitness talking to like a local television channel there and just said it was like horrifying.

These kids who are like, some of them were naked, some of them weren't like fully clothed, and they're crying and they're separated from their parents.

And one of the ICE agents is saying, fuck them, kids.

And like, they just don't care.

And this is also the war on terror coming home to Roost because the cops now have MRAPs because there's all this leftover military equipment from Iraq and Afghanistan.

ICE has a Blackhawk helicopter in Chicago for some reason.

What are we doing here?

We've completely militarized policing in this country.

And the ICE agents now are acting with impunity because they have good reason to believe they're not going to be held accountable and because they are trying to meet Stephen Miller's quota of 3,000 arrests per day and I guess a million deportations a year.

And so they're going to just arrest everyone who they see.

And like, this is, this is what we're getting.

To your point about strategy, Tommy, like it's definitely, it's interesting.

Like, their strategy for sure is they want people to see that this is a militarized operation and that they are happy to use force.

Yeah.

The difference is like.

The lie is about who it's directed towards, right?

So they want to keep putting out videos that tell you, yes, it's a militarized operation.

Yes, they're using force, but it's against the the worst of the worst these terrible criminals like and democrats are against it and the videos that we're actually seeing are them using force against not the videos they're putting out but the videos that we're seeing otherwise are them using force against cops kids innocent people american citizens peaceful protesters right they drive a tank through the wall and they pull out andree the hairdresser from the other side right like come on guys this is bullshit Yeah, it's the other too is it's like, it's all predicated.

Like they do have a siege mentality now, right?

These ICE officers themselves feel like they're under siege.

They've been made, they've

they've internalized that.

Stephen Miller's whole life, like this is a country under siege.

Our side is under siege.

And so they respond with siege-like tactics.

And who does that work for?

Well, it works for people that are, like, it works fully for people that are only imbibing information in their ecosystem, right?

Because they see the reports about how these cities are in turmoil and in crisis, and then they see positive reports from Christina and all these people defending what they're doing.

If you're outside of that bubble, you see a mix, right?

You see what these guys are claiming.

You see the local leader saying that this is ridiculous.

You see footage of Portland and Chicago being normal places.

Yes, there are areas where there have been like a few blocks of protests, even unruly and protests that have turned chaotic and even violent.

But for the most part, of course, this is ridiculous.

And so then you end up with like the vast majority of Americans in these pollings saying, Look,

I don't support this.

I certainly wouldn't want it in my city, right?

They may not trust Democrats to enforce

either immigration laws or to be strong on crime, right?

They see Democrats as weak.

That's in the CBS poll, but they certainly don't want this crackdown.

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All right, let's turn to war-ravaged Portland, where Trump announced at the end of September he was deploying troops to use, quote, full force if necessary, against protests outside a single ICE facility that haven't involved more than 20 people since June.

There have been about 20 people outside this one ICE facility since the end of June.

Like a couple weeks in June, it was pretty unruly.

And I know that because it's in the court document.

It's in the ruling that we're going to talk about.

So like Governor Pritzker, Governor Tina Kotek opposed the deployment of the Oregon National Guard and sued the Trump administration.

On Saturday, a federal judge agreed to block the deployment, at least temporarily, saying that Trump's claims about violent unrest in the city are, quote, simply untethered to the facts, and that, quote, the plaintiffs are likely to succeed on their claim that the president exceeded his constitutional authority and violated the 10th Amendment.

The 10th Amendment, for those who don't know, is if it's not explicitly spelled out in the Constitution as a power or an authority that the federal government has, those authorities

go to the states.

The states have and the people, John.

The people.

And the fucking people.

That's us.

Yeah.

The judge also said, quote, this is a nation of constitutional law, not martial law.

I should note here that this radical left Marxist judge, Karen Immergut, was appointed in 2019 by Donald Trump.

The White House then tried to get around the ruling by sending troops from California to Oregon instead.

Texas is also trying to send troops to Portland.

Judge Immergut didn't think this move was all that clever.

She wasn't too happy about this, and she held a second emergency hearing on Sunday night where she clarified that no guard troops from any state could be deployed to Portland for the time being.

The administration appealed that ruling to the Ninth Circuit.

As of this recording, we are waiting for them to rule.

Trump had some choice words about Portland and the judge.

Let's listen.

Portland is on fire.

Portland's been on fire for years and

Not so much saving it.

We have to save something else because I think that's all insurrection.

You look at what's happened with Portland over the years.

It's a burning hellhole.

And then you have

a judge that lost her way that tries to pretend that

there's no problem.

She lost her way.

She lost her way.

Trump also said on Sunday that he only nominated Amergut in his first term because he got bad advice.

What did you guys make of her ruling and Trump's reaction?

He doesn't know why he nominated her.

He doesn't mean he's like, whatever.

A list he approved that came across his dad's.

Yeah.

Leah Littman did a great video breaking down what happened in Portland with this ruling on the strict scrutiny YouTube.

I highly, highly recommend it.

But in that video, she made the point that sending one state's National Guard to another state is basically an administration orchestrated civil war.

And I think that's how we should see this.

And, you know, as you mentioned, like the judge in this case could not have been more scathing.

You can see these protesters.

Their videos are all over Twitter.

It is like 20 people.

A lot of them are old.

People are in Halloween costumes.

There's a chicken suit.

There's a dude dressed like

Yoshi or something.

It's look, that bonchares are involved at one point.

Back in June, some shit went down.

But like, when people are violent, they should be arrested.

But like, the idea that the Portland cops couldn't handle that is crazy.

If people say mean things, guess what?

That's protected speech.

And that's how it goes.

I talked to Ben Smith about this.

I do wonder if comments like what we just saw do stem from his information bubble.

Because in Trump's world on True Social, it's all adulation and like Antifa videos from 2020 of people throwing, you know, bricks through Starbucks windows.

And the reality is very different.

And, but like either way, the suggestion that ICE can't do their jobs in Portland without a National Guard deployment is ludicrous on its face.

The Trump judge said as much.

And like, it's, I can't even believe we're talking about this.

I also think that it was in Ben's piece on this, on Trump's media filter bubble.

It's the people around him, too, right?

And so they know what his media diet is.

And so Stephen Miller is telling him things are so much worse than they are.

And, you know, Ben brought up that quote that Trump told Oregon's governor in late September.

Am I watching things on television that are different from what's happening?

My people tell me different, which I kind of believe.

There was a moment, too, where

in one press conference, Kodak talks about talking to Trump.

And Trump's like, oh, well, we'll just keep talking.

He's very kind of like convivial on the phone.

The ruling, by the way, like.

It's like just a, I recommend reading at least excerpts of it.

It's like a beautiful piece of logic and it's actually pretty conservative.

It goes through the case methodically and not with any kind of grand hyperbole, but it just starts from principle.

And what I appreciate about it is two things.

One, it uses these exact kinds of words from Trump against him, where

she basically says, this is not in good faith.

Look at how he's describing Portland.

That is not accurate.

That is not what's happening on the ground.

And the other part of it is, you know, there's been a lot of question about how deferential courts have to be to Trump.

These words, they're not defined.

Insurrection, rebellion, right?

And she's very careful of saying, yes, the president gets a great deal of deference, of course, but deference is not equivalent to ignoring the facts on the ground.

And I do think that's really important because even if you are being deferential to the president, no, like you do not have to be so open-minded that your brain falls out of your head.

There's no invasion, there's no rebellion, there's no insurrection.

The laws are still operating, the courts are still operating.

This is ridiculous on its face.

And you can be deferential to the executive on these matters without giving into that.

It's just a very careful argument, including asking as to whether or not this fits into a permitted range of honest judgment, which, by the way, is not just about this law, it's also about the Insurrection Act, which I know we're going to talk about, but I do think is important.

Well, clearly, this is all like the brainchild of Stephen Miller, who by all accounts is the person actually running the federal government.

He went a bit further than Trump in a series of tweets over the weekend that sound like a fascist chatbot.

He used the term, quote, legal insurrection, called the decision one of the most egregious and

thunderous violations of the constitutional order we have ever seen, and an attempt to, quote, nullify the 2024 election by fiat.

He also claimed that there's a large organized movement of, quote, left-wing terrorism being shielded by far-left Democrat judges, prosecutors, and attorneys general.

The only remedy is to use legitimate state power to dismantle terrorism and terror networks.

He just, he was on a fucking tear.

Is Sam Stein repugnant?

Sam Stein, like the least repugnant,

who just basically quotes we did the legal insurrection quote and was like what a thing to say on a Saturday night and he's like you are repugnant

you know what representative dan goldman broke

broken clock

we were we were all watching in our office uh Stephen Miller on doing this CNN interview earlier today and you notice he does every interview from the kind of a weird angle and he has this shrieking shrill like aggrieved tone it's just like so clearly a performance and it's remarkable to watch Stephen Miller rant and rave about domestic terrorism and nullifying the results of an election when like the clearest act of domestic terrorism in this country's recent history was January 6th, and he defends that.

Like, I assume this is the continuation of the post-Charlie Kirk rhetoric, where they are trying to build a conspiracy that will allow them to pull in, like, funders and progressive groups and say that they're somehow providing material support for terrorism and, you know, go after like the Soros Foundation, the Ford Foundation, or like Center for American Progress, or whatever groups that they decide are their enemies.

But

it's risable.

It's laughable.

After all of those tweets from Stephen Miller and the interview that we saw today in the office,

he tweeted something just now that he accused Democrats of raving histrionics.

It's unbelievable, right?

Like that if you refer if you refer to any of this as fascist, you're inciting violence.

Meanwhile, the left is an organized terror movement.

Our opponents are an enemy within.

The cities are war zones and a training ground for the military.

Judges who rule against us are legal insurrectionists.

And by the way, these are just facts.

And if you don't see that, you're the one that's being emotional.

I can't tell what to make of, like, Steve, look, there are all kinds of members of the administration that are saying, you know, Christine Ohm kind of is extreme.

There's all different versions of this, but Stephen Miller does stand apart.

I think in the rhetoric that he's using and the extremism and the language he's using.

And I really can't tell, like, is he like going to, is he the boy who cried terrorism, right?

Is he like making this all feel less real, even to his own side, right?

Like, does it all feel like it's not going to lead to anything?

Or is this, or, or, and, or is this just a preview of things to come that now it all feels so crazy?

And then all of a sudden they start treating these as facts and go from there, including insurrection, like calling the judges insurrectionists is not an accident.

The language, apart from being extreme and very fascist sounding, is also like, there's a lot of legalese in there in that he is, I think when you you say, is it a sign of things to come?

It's what he wants to have happen.

And he is the one who continues to push the envelope within the administration, I think, right?

So remember, he floated getting rid of habeas corpus and then sort of walked, like he keeps pushing and pushing and pushing.

And I think that's what this is about, right?

Which is every time a judge rules against them, even if it's a Trump judge, now it's legal insurrection.

We got to go after the judges.

Every time a Democrat says, every time there's a protest out there, it's Democrat violence.

It's left-wing terrorism, all this kind of stuff.

So he's trying to set the predicate for much more extreme action.

Right.

And he knows the bounds of what he it is rhetorical because he knows the bounds of where he's not getting ahead of Trump.

Because actually in one of these interviews, he's responding to a question about whether he should be, if the president should be ignoring or breaking the rulings that judges say.

And he goes, no, I'm just saying factually accurate things.

I'm just saying.

I'm just saying what the facts are.

And these are legal insurrections.

But that no is pretty important, right?

Like he's not getting ahead of the president on that.

well notably in the oval uh on monday trump called what's happening in portland insurrection and when asked said he would invoke the insurrection act if quote people were being killed and courts were holding us up or governors or mayors were holding us up uh that's quite a range of activities that was i know i know anyone explain like what's going on with the insurrection act and and how it's different than what's been happening so far i mean i i look there's the legal scholars for a long time have said the insurrection act is ridiculously broad and needs to be reformed.

Ah, just missed it.

Yeah, we're gonna do that.

That's a real bummer.

Again, can't even, the government is closed right now, so couldn't do that,

let alone reforming the Insurrection Act.

Not our biggest obstacle.

But that's like when I was

when gay marriage wasn't legal, like that wasn't my obstacle to marriage in the same way.

But

there are multiple parts of the Insurrection Act.

Some of them require state buy-in, some of them don't.

Some of them are more broader than others.

Some of them are not.

I don't want to play down the dangers of the president invoking the Insurrection Act.

At the same time, if you go back and look at the warnings of how a president could use the Insurrection Act, warnings from 2022, 2021,

what you find is a description of what Trump is already doing.

And it seems like what they like is the idea of signaling the Insurrection Act to some final boss for the lips, right?

But it's not.

And the other part of this, and Brennan Sener talks about this, legal scholars talk about this, there is no martial law in this country.

Even if there's military in our streets, you still have your constitutional rights.

Those do not go away.

And the court has held that.

The idea that the Insurrection Act is sort of beyond judicial review is just not true.

Like, I'm not saying it's a great day,

but as I said,

the ruling from that judge on the president deploying National Guard references the ruling that says there are limits on the invocation of the Insurrection Act as well.

So it's scary, but like, it's not some get out of court free card for them.

Yeah, no, they're just so horny to declare martial law.

Like Elon Musk was tweeting over the weekend that we need to bukele the court system here.

And what that means is basically throw out any independent judges, pack the courts with loyalists, and then declare what Bukele called a state of exception.

It'd be called a state of emergency here, where they just suspended due process and threw people indiscriminately in jail with no charges, some for life.

So that's what Elon Musk is advocating for on Twitter.

There is a difference between what Trump has already been doing with the troops and what he could do theoretically with the Insurrection Act is, you remember when the troops were here in LA, they were only guarding the federal buildings.

And if you listen to Miller and some people in the administration, they're saying, well, we're just sending them in to guard the ICE facilities, to guard the ICE facilities, to protect the ICE facilities because they're federal buildings.

And so

what he's trying to do now is basically say he's deploying troops to defend federal buildings and only to be on, to defend things, right?

And it's not offensive.

It's not, they're not supposed to be able to do law enforcement activities, right?

The Insurrection Act theoretically allows them to do law enforcement activities.

So that would be the difference.

But like you said, while there may not be much courts can do to review the invocation of the Insurrection Act, the manner in which it is carried out is definitely reviewable.

Meaning that you can't just suddenly have troops in the streets arresting Americans and

throwing their rights out.

I'd also just say, I've seen that distinction and maybe that could turn out to be very important.

But if you look at the way in which Stephen Miller and others are describing what they're already allowed to do, they've actually left behind the idea that they're just guarding buildings because now they can be there in support of law enforcement operations.

But they're defending the federal agents

as they get attacked.

Sure, yes, of course.

But that's what I'm saying.

That's the thin reed that they're hanging in.

Yes.

But even still, it's like, okay, they are.

They are hiring vast numbers of new ICE agents.

That will be the vanguard for all of this.

We're talking about a distinction.

Okay, if the Insurrection Act is invoked, if you have troops but without the radicalized ICE agents with them, is that better?

Is that worse?

I do think they probably think that the political impact of saying Insurrection Act is probably worse for them.

Yeah, all I'm saying is that like we've already gone so far.

I don't think anyone knows what it would mean for the president to invoke the Insurrection Act, but we already have troops on the ground, not just to defend federal buildings, but anywhere there's ICE, which is everywhere.

Well, let's talk politics because back when it was LA and DC, you know, there were all these warnings.

This could be good politics for Trump.

I remember there was in D.C., there was a lot of like Democrats are walking into Donald Trump's trap.

He wants to make everything about crime, and here we go.

New CBS poll over the weekend shows 58% of voters disapprove of the Guard deployments.

They also asked, you know, do you support sending active military to cities?

Only 39% said yes, 61% no, including 70% of independents said no, even one in five Republicans said no.

What do you guys think about the politics of all this?

Yeah,

his immigration handling was only at 45 approved, 55 disapprove, and the deploying National Guard was 42.58.

I mean, overall, his polling is just around this 42% approval number.

It hasn't really budged for like a decade now.

You know what I mean?

Like,

I'm a little skeptical.

We'll get to this in the shutdown too.

I'm a little skeptical of some of these under the hood numbers because I just like think most people aren't paying attention.

I don't think this is necessarily like, I don't think the images of what we're seeing in Chicago of like tear gassing cops and brutalizing kids and random people is like a good political message for them.

I don't.

I guess there was another number there, which is like they did a most important issue, and crime was only at 9%.

And it was, you know, ahead of crime was immigration, then healthcare, then inflation, then the economy, the most important.

So his whole goal of making this about fighting crime, which he'd started to do at least a little bit in DC, it just hasn't worked.

That's not what people think this is.

Yeah, and I do think to Tommy's points, he's kind of been stuck in the same place for a long time.

You look at this CBS poll and, you know, most people view Republicans as extreme and strong and Democrats as

weak.

Number one word.

The number one word is weak.

And so maybe they don't like this, but they don't trust us.

And so we think it's bad for him, but maybe it reflects a weakness on us as well.

By the same token, every image of Trump talking about how we're going to liberate the city of Chicago and Christine Ohm saying they wouldn't let me do a deployment at a facility that I needed to get into

is another moment where Trump is not talking about any issue that people cared about.

This poll had 75% of people saying Trump is not focusing on lowering prices enough, which is correct and like a pretty devastating problem for him that is not solved by more attention on these issues, even if this issue is better for him than others.

Yeah.

In some sense, they might not care.

At least they're acting like they don't care, right?

That the politics are bad.

They're just like forging right ahead.

I mean, we're still, you know, it's important to debate politics in regard to like what Democrats should do.

I think in the Trump administration's mind, they're like, you know, somewhat concerned about the politics.

Clearly, they want to win the midterms.

But when you get to people like Stephen Miller, he's like, no, I just want to deploy force.

Yeah.

Scare people.

Like, I don't give a fuck about the politics.

I really think that's what they're doing.

For some of them, that's what they're thinking.

I also honestly think that they have a kind of deeper and smarter relationship to like polling than a lot of Democrats do because they understand that you can lose on specific issues and specific questions for a long time while building up credibility in a broader way, in a deeper way that's harder to measure.

And like, I just, how have they not been validated by that over the years?

So

that's what I think is part of this, too.

Yeah, it's going to take an election or two for them to, at least some of them, to register that this is not popular.

Last thing before we get to the shutdown, Noam took the time on Friday to join MAGA's War Against Bad Bunny as the Super Bowl halftime show, saying ICE will be, quote, all over the Super Bowl and not necessarily seeming to know that people from Puerto Rico, which Bad Bunny is from Puerto Rico, are American.

And she shares that with many, many Trump supporters or Trump influencers.

They just seem to not know that Puerto Rico is part of America and they think that Bad Bunny is not U.S.

citizen.

It's like on some level, like they know it intellectually, but they can't feel it in their bones.

They know it every time.

It's in there.

They're not stupid.

They know it.

They don't feel it.

It doesn't feel true.

There's also a, there's a very funny Shane Gillis comedian.

His reaction to this

whole latest culture war thing around Bad Bunny in the Super Bowl is quite funny.

Let's listen.

Hey, I'll tell you what I'm mad about.

Bad Bunnies doing the halftime show.

That's good.

Pissing me though.

That funny thing is.

No, of course, of course.

Who gives a fing?

It was very funny funny to me that people were upset about that.

Every once in a while,

the right gets it so wrong with what they're outraged.

Everybody's outraged about everything, obviously.

But when it's like, dude, don't lose on this one.

Why have that show?

Who gives a f ⁇ ?

I think it's because he doesn't speak any speak English.

I'm trying to watch football.

You f ⁇ .

It's like, who does Christine Noam think attends the Super Bowl?

Does she think it's a bunch of Venezuelan migrants who left everything behind and just like made it to the United States?

They have like 10 grand grand sitting around to buy a ticket to go to

go to Santa Clara to Levi Stadium to go to the game.

This was all

because of a question from that bozo Benny Johnson at TPUSA to Christy Noam.

It kind of like kicked off this manufactured culture war thing.

And

Benny suggested that the selection of Bad Bunny was clearly a shot at MAGA.

It was a disrespect to MAGA and not the obvious answer, which is money.

The NFL wants to grow the audience.

So they had a big artist who might expand the number of people who watched the Super Bowl perform at the Super Bowl.

That's so clearly what's happening here.

And like the bigger picture, though, it's hard to imagine a more MAGA crowd than those who physically attend the Super Bowl.

It's like football fans, rich people.

Like if you're worried about crimes in that crowd, like get some dogs that can smell cocaine and then go bust people for solicitations.

Hey, hey, hey, hey, it's not.

Let's not say things we'll regret.

I'm not going to Super Bowl.

The other thing here, too, is clearly a lot of xenophobia and racism in this movement.

I don't know if you guys know that, but I will also say there are plenty of, especially up to 24, like prominent Latino Trump supporters now.

And if the person performing at the Super Bowl was Latino and speaks Spanish, but was like a big Trump fan, it would have been, you wouldn't hear anything.

Bad Bunny has criticized ICE, has criticized Trump, ICE specifically.

And so it is, it's like, if you are disloyal in any way, if there's, they cannot broach any criticism, any dissent whatsoever.

And if there is, and it's a prominent person, then it is full war against this person.

They talked to Noam about this, and I think Benny Johnson asked, like, what do you think about the NFL's decision?

She says, they suck and we'll win.

God will bless us and we'll stand and be proud of ourselves at the end of the day.

And they won't be able to sleep at night because they don't know what to believe.

Jesus.

They're so weak.

We will win and fix it.

This is about the NFL.

What are you talking about?

It's also like...

It's like, what are you fucking?

It's just a performer.

I just, these people cannot.

God will bless us.

They cannot internalize the fact that they're winners.

They're winners.

Because it's grievance politics.

And so that's, you know, they can't actually just say, like, imagine Christine Ohm saying, I'm not a fan.

He said some stuff I don't agree with, but the NFL is free to do what it wants.

It wants.

It's like it's inconceivable for them at this point to like brook any kind of dissent.

Like,

you say you you guys say all right like the the media is you just got you got cbs you know cbs belongs to you you have twitter you have social media you have a lot of you have a lot of the nfl's fucking fans there's a there's a halftime show is there not one thing for the fucking gays and days just muted it's not kaga you know

you realize you realize now there's going to be an alternative halftime show on fucking rumble or something no tpusa would there's some pitch that was going around of like tposa having decreed yeah well i did i did see that i thought benny johnson was going going to do something for only the fans.

He's going to do an only, something for only America fans.

Something like that?

Only fans of America.

Something like that.

Yeah.

I'm out.

I'm out.

I don't know.

I don't get it.

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So, the federal government's still closed, which is somehow only the second biggest story right now because of everything we just talked about.

Since Alex and Dan covered it on the Friday pod, Republicans and Democrats in Congress have made no progress on negotiations to open the government, with Republicans maintaining the refusal to discuss Affordable Care Act subsidies until the government reopens.

The White House has been trying to put pressure on Democrats by continuing to threaten mass layoffs of federal employees, though it's unclear when or if that will actually happen.

They're also trying to cut funding for

blue areas of the country, whether whether it's apparently did you see the thing with like law they cut law enforcement in New York City and then Trump was not aware of this yeah and then Hokle Governor Hokul called Trump and he's like again the filter bubble he's like oh I didn't know this and then and then he reversed it

So they're trying to cause all this trouble hurt all these people It's also unclear though whether Trump is not only on the same page as his staff but on the same page as Republicans in terms of like whether they should negotiate with Democrats or are negotiating with Democrats.

Here's what Trump said in the Oval on Monday about the shutdown.

If the vote today

I'd like to see a deal made for great health care.

I want to see great health.

I'm a Republican, but I want to see health care much more so than the Democrats.

Are you speaking with Democratic leaders?

What kind of difference is that?

Well, I don't want to say that.

I don't want to say that.

But we are speaking with the Democrats, and some very good things could happen with respect to health care.

What do you want to bet?

He was think about Hamas.

Just confused the guy confused negotiations.

To be a fly on the wall in Thun's office or Johnson's office when they saw that clip.

Yeah, it's a guy.

Oh my god, fucking damn it.

Schumer responded by saying it isn't true that Democrats have been talking to Trump.

Jeffrey said the same thing.

But Schumer said that if the president is, quote, finally ready to work with Democrats, we'll be at the table.

What do you think Trump was doing there?

Typical stream of consciousness moment?

Nonsense?

Or do you think he might want to negotiate on healthcare more than Republicans in Congress?

So, first of all, it's funny to say, what page is he on?

He's not on a page.

He's all over the place.

I will say like that, there's been a lot of debate about like, you know, are Democrats doing better in the shutdown than people expect?

There's reasons for optimism.

There's reasons not to have optimism.

This was the best reason for optimism I've seen because whatever he's thinking, whatever's going on, he is feeling the politics around a shutdown that is now over healthcare.

And he's really helping making that true.

He's acknowledging that.

Yeah, he said it, he goes, I think it's about healthcare.

And that was part of it.

We didn't get that part, but they first asked him, what do you think?

He's like, I think the shutdown is about healthcare.

Pretty valuable.

Pretty great.

And it's also a reminder that Trump is interested in Trump.

When that means standing shoulder to shoulder with Republicans in Congress, he will do that.

If he views his interests as being different,

he will ignore them,

damage their position.

He doesn't give a fuck.

He doesn't have ideological commitments.

He just wants a good deal and to seem like a winner and to have as many people behind him as possible.

So that's what I took from that.

Could it lead to anything?

Well, immediately you have Johnson and Thune figuring out how to get out of this, leading to anything.

And then you have Schumer and Jeffries saying, no, we're not talking to Trump, but saying they're open to it.

So I assume once this conversation, once Trump was done talking, the phone was already on, it had already rung and it had already been walked back internally, at least.

Yeah,

it's sort of the same reaction you did.

It's like, he wants to be the hero of every story.

He does not want a huge cut to ACA subsidies that he thinks would hurt him politically in the midterm.

He's not Paul Ryan.

Like this guy hasn't been dreaming of cutting the social safety net since he was at the Keg Party or whatever that weird quote was from 2012.

And so, like, if Schumer and Jeffries could just talk to him directly and try to cut a deal,

he would ice out Speaker Johnson in a heartbeat.

But to our earlier conversation about his filter bubble and the people around him, the reason I think it's less likely to lead to anything is at what other point is he going to get information that Schumer and Jeffries want to make a deal, that the polling is really bad on healthcare, that it's time for him to do something.

Like,

Stephen Miller is going to walk in there and all the rest of them.

A Breitbart online poll of like Twitter users or something.

Jeffries and Schumer are going to have to do a paper drop like it's North Korea.

Like they're trying to get information to Fiona.

Set up giant speakers.

You mentioned

the back and forth about who's winning this.

What did you guys make of the polling so far?

There were some of these questions in the CBS poll.

I would characterize the CBS poll results as like mixed to positive for Democrats.

I think I characterize all the polling like that, but I don't know.

What do you guys think?

Here's what I think.

I think the polling is good if you thought Democrats were going to be blamed the way Republicans were blamed in a previous shutdown.

If you didn't come to it with that knowledge, I don't know you'd feel super great about a poll that says Trump, congressional Republicans, and congressional Dems all are around 30%

in their approval for other handling a government shutdown.

Like a poll where half the country thinks you're making a mistake.

And by the way, only half of Democrats think your position is worth a shutdown.

Like I think that's better than it could be.

And I think we're in a better position than we should be and then Republicans should be at.

But it's not like great.

Yeah.

I mean, the big takeaway is people don't like the shutdown.

They're worried it will hurt the economy.

A big majority is worried it'll hurt the economy.

I'm a little skeptical when you start comparing the kind of like under-the-hood numbers, like who do you blame?

Because I just think most people like don't have an opinion on it, but it's a little better.

Like the Democratic Party's rationale is a little better than Republicans.

Nine points by about nine points people blame Republicans over Democrats.

So that's good.

But then the thing that like in that poll that would worry me if I was Trump is 75% of voters say you're not focused enough on lowering prices.

Like that's that's bad.

Yeah.

We know there are probably, uh, you know, a handful, if not more, Senate Democrats who were worried about making this decision, kind of thought they had to do it because the, the base was mad.

I think if you're looking at the polling now, you'd say at the very least, it was right to

say, I'm not voting for this funding bill.

And now that we're in it, now you got to stick.

You got to stick to it.

Like, so there's definitely nothing in this polling that would tell me if I was a Senate Democrat to like cave anytime soon.

So it is, I think, going well for them.

I still, and look,

good thing if premiums don't go up for sure, right?

I think at best, you're not going to get a permanent extension.

You're going to get an extension that is qualified with probably not as generous as it was.

And then surely for the time, we'll probably like take them right past the midterms.

I do have this fear that Democrats will have done the right thing, stand up, help people with health care, and then help Trump take it off the table.

You know, honestly, we've tried losing on issues for a while.

Maybe we tried winning.

It's better than losing.

The other thing I would say, I would go further than just to say, like, oh, Democrats shouldn't cave.

I like, you look at this, and we talked about it briefly earlier, but like, if you ask people, 64% think Democrats are weak and 59% think Republicans are extreme.

Healthcare is an issue right now where if we hold the line, like we are painting Republicans as extreme.

And if we cave, we are giving into the idea that we are weak.

If we hold the line, there's an issue where we can prove our bona fida, say that we fought for something.

Maybe we win, maybe we don't.

But I would risk, look, the benefits on policy plus like proving to people that we're willing to fight, take a stand, and actually get something for people.

Like, I think that is worth taking an issue off the table.

Maybe that's bad politics.

I don't think anybody knows.

But given that nobody knows, wouldn't we rather like have a win than not?

Am I wrong?

I agree with you.

Yeah, I just don't see a path.

Like, I don't see a path to getting a win.

in this negotiation.

I think that's the hard part.

There's no end game that's clear here.

And like nut cutting time is coming on October 15th when 1.3 million members of the U.S.

military will miss a paycheck.

Then November 1st is open enrollment for Obamacare.

So there's a bunch of like challenging moments where this could really go from a thing that's like maybe you heard about on the news or saw on your TikTok to a thing that's like messing up your life and making you really mad.

Coming from the other direction, there's also the fact that these notices from insurance companies are going out too.

So it could be, and you're sort of seeing this in the polling, that if you talk to the average person about whose fault it is, like all of them.

They're not.

They all suck.

And now the premium increases go out and now the troops aren't getting paid.

And the feeling in the public could be they have to negotiate and figure something out, which is probably good for Democrats getting something at that point as opposed to just caving.

And then maybe the Republicans, if they're getting some of the blame too, then maybe Trump's like, you know what, guys?

Just figure it out.

Just give them some kind of short extension and let's just call it because we don't want to get blamed.

They're getting blamed.

It's not helping anyone.

Yeah, I also like.

So that's the only, that's like my optimistic case, but I also take your point.

Yeah, I don't think we know what's going to what the world's going to feel like a week from now.

I was like, right now, like, there's a lot of alarms not going going off.

Like, I am a, like, Democrats feel like they're on offense.

Republicans feel like they're on defense.

That is, like, the feeling when you look at like the stories coming out of the, the lack of negotiation.

You have Mike Johnson saying, if a, if a deal comes from the Senate side, we won't take it up, which is something you have to say to kind of like guard your flank against something coming out of the Senate.

Like, there's just Trump taking these questions and saying he's open to a deal.

All of that puts Thune and Johnson on defense in a way that I think is like, you know, shows Democrats playing a pretty weak hand better than you would have thought a week ago.

So where will we a week?

I have no idea.

I think they should ask for more at this point.

I mean, having seen, I know I've made this point before, but it's just driving me nuts.

Having seen, and maybe it's, I'm just crazy, but like having seen the last weekend unfold, like

there is a way.

I wouldn't even do it with the troops, but it's just like ICE should be able to go about and do their jobs and do immigration enforcement, but like you need warrants, no more just like raiding fucking apartment buildings, no flashbang grenades and militarized assaults.

Like you could put all this stuff, there's plenty of ice reform proposals out there.

You could make, you could put it in a bill and demand that shit.

And I get why they have not done that, but

it is still really off to me that this is happening and then the funding fight is about healthcare.

Yeah, I like, I go, I go, we've gone back and forth a million times, but I like, I, I look at this and it's like, it's a core question, right?

Do you want to pick a fight you have a possibility of winning?

Or are you trying to pick a fight you cannot win because you think it's important for the long term?

And right now,

the Democrats chose, right?

They chose the other.

They chose the fight over something they could win.

My view right now is play that to the end.

Try to get a win on healthcare.

Let's prove to people we can fight and win.

Like, you look at what happens with Kimmel, right?

There's all these,

there was a kind of almost organic protest and had a simple demand.

Put Kimmel back, we'll get Disney Plus again, right?

And it's a win.

And it shows people that we're a political force.

We got Kimmel.

Well,

it's small.

I know.

The monologue continues.

I know, but in the face of kind of like kind of,

I know.

It's just sort of like we have to be a political force that has power and leverage.

And that does mean like we're not just casting about for a kind of a years-long fight.

Like, we're going to, we're going to find a hinge and we're going to use it.

And like, to me, we've chosen that already.

So let's play it out.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's true.

The other way that this could end that I feel like is being under discussed is if it keeps going and going and going, they just, they change the rules and get rid of the filibuster.

Yeah, they could do that.

Again, make my day.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Go for it.

Yeah.

Because you you know what?

We're never getting 60 votes in the Senate as long as we're living.

Well, they've already,

if we ever want to, if we ever take power again, we ever want to pass anything, we're going to need to get rid of the filibusters.

So might as well do it for us.

They're already eroding it bit by bit while claiming it's still there.

Yes.

Anyway.

For sure.

So the only way to start making real progress here is winning the House back in 2026.

That's at least the

start of progress.

And the first chance we get to help make that happen is actually just a month from now, because here in California, we'll be voting on only one ballot measure in the 2025 off-year elections, Prop 50, which is Governor Newsom's initiative to temporarily suspend our nonpartisan congressional map so that Democrats can partially neutralize the partisan gerrymandering Trump ordered in states like Texas and Missouri to pick up more Republican seats.

Ballots are already in the mail.

Some of you, if you're in California, may have gotten yours already, or if you're a registered voter in California.

And the drop boxes to return those ballots open today, October 7th, when you're hearing this podcast.

Early in-person voting starts on October 25th.

What have you guys been seeing?

How optimistic are you feeling?

I mean, the Democrats, you've talked about the kind of Gavin Orbit, they feel like they're winning the argument and that they're up, but they're very worried about voter suppression.

That could be like Trump messing with the Postmaster General about mail-in ballots,

intimidation at the voting booths.

The real like X factor is there's a lawsuit in court right now challenging Texas's plan to redraw the maps, which is the reason Gavin is doing this in the first place.

The thing, there's a scenario where the plaintiffs win a first judgment in that lawsuit that will almost certainly be overturned, but kind of complicates the argument because it looks like maybe Texas won't go forward during the period where Californians are voting.

So that's all.

No one pays attention to that really.

Well, yeah, it's just a way of saying

if that happens, just know that it's almost certainly Texas is going to happen.

It's going to happen.

We might win one step in the process, but we're going to lose long term.

So we need to do this in California.

So everyone, vote yes on Prop 50, get your ballots in and do it soon.

Yeah.

And I would, yes,

the polling has been reassuring, but also California is a big place that's hard to poll.

And I like just worry about money coming in at the end.

Yeah.

A bunch of

ton of mailers coming in.

So I just saw a new coefficient poll.

54% of California voters support the Prop 50.

36% opposed.

And

all the ad spending is

having an effect too.

51% said they were very familiar with Prop 50.

And obviously, Democrats currently have a big spending edge.

So that's good news.

But also, again, it is a talk about not being able to model an electorate, an off-year election where there's no statewide races, where there's candidates running for stuff.

So you just have, and not even other ballot measures.

So you have one ballot measure.

So you have to remember: okay, the ballot's coming.

I got to fill it out.

What is Prop 50?

It's just, you know, it's, tell your friends.

If you live in California, tell your friends, make sure you do it, put on your calendar, and tell at least five people in your life who live in California that this is coming because I think it's really, really important.

One more thing.

The big focus of the Prop 50 campaign is relational organizing, basically just talking to friends and people in your network about the issue, why they need to get out and vote for it.

You can get all the info you need on that at votesaveamerica.com slash prop 50.

Tommy, I understand that you're hosting a VSA event next Wednesday, the 15th, where everyone's going to get together and reach out to their networks together.

And that's in the action hub.

We're all going to have relations.

Oh, it's for guys.

Stick with it.

Stick with it.

Stick around.

You're in the end.

You'll find you'll understand.

So you're going to get together and reach out to your networks.

We're going to talk to our networks.

What a cool way to talk about it.

What a cool thing.

That's cool.

That's all ready.

On the counter through, we're going to reach out to our networks.

So, what we're going to do, we're going to hop on a live stream.

We're going to have some fun.

We're going to hang out.

We're going to make it a good time.

We're going to text our friends in California to make sure they're voting guests on Prop 50.

We know that friends, family, the best messengers.

And you're doing this for the fans?

Yeah.

And then

only the fans.

Only the fans.

And the cam will be on.

We're going to make sure everyone understands the stakes involved here.

It'll be important.

What are you going to wear on your feet, you think?

Sandals?

Oh, okay.

Shoes?

That's exciting.

Can I quickly plug my Riyadh Comedy Festival terms to you?

Oh, yeah.

Headlining.

Khashoggi names.

It's good money.

It's good money.

Well, yeah, it's the anniversary.

Anyway, jump on the Prop 50 live stream.

It will be votaveamerica.com slash prop 50.

It's really important.

We got to do this.

So reach out to your friends.

Where are we on whether we have the chance to sort of counter Texas and other states?

Yes.

So I talked to our buddy Brian Tyler Cohen about all this because he is way deep on all things redistricting.

And subscribe to Brian's YouTube if you want to learn more.

So the states that are screwing us right now, Texas and Missouri, if California redistricts to Indiana, Ohio, and Florida are preparing to screw us.

So get excited for that.

We then, Democrats, could retaliate in Illinois and Maryland and then longer term New York and make some changes, but that wouldn't go into place until 2028.

And then if we win the governor's seats in Virginia and New Jersey, maybe we can do, make some gains there.

And then there's the states that are kind of hoping this conversation goes away are Colorado, Oregon, and Washington.

The Dem governors there just like won't step up, seemingly.

So that's the state of play.

I don't think it's a net benefit for us if all those Republican states go, though.

Also,

one.

One issue that's happening in California too is, look, redistricting is great, but also states like California have been losing population to Texas and Florida and others, and we can't redistrict our way out of California not building enough affordable housing.

And so I'm very glad Gavin is pursuing Prop 50.

He has not yet signed, as of this recording on Monday night, SB 79, which will allow people to build more housing near transit and help address our housing crisis.

So if you are hearing this and you think Gavin Newsom should sign it, I would suggest posting about it or giving him a call because I do think it matters here in the home stretch.

What's going on there?

I haven't been following why there's been a pause and he hasn't signed it.

So there's a lot of pressure, especially from LA, especially from our mayor, Karen Bass, who wants Newsom to veto it.

She claims she's for affordable housing and we've got to build more housing, but this law will go too far and it doesn't allow for historical buildings and all these exceptions.

Los Angeles currently

is not even on track to build half of the housing we've promised to build the state.

It's actually about a third.

We said we'd build 456,000 units.

We are nowhere near that.

We are just completely failing.

I'll get the stat slightly wrong, but we've seen the lowest number of housing starts and construction in Los Angeles in more than a decade.

We're just, the city is failing and does not deserve the trust.

But he's under a lot of pressure.

Look, I think Prop 50, fighting Trump, those are unifying and galvanizing issues.

This is a slightly divided issue because this is about taking on parts of your own coalition and saying, you know what?

I get that there are problems.

It's not a perfect law, but we have to do it.

Donald Klein, Derek Thompson.

Yeah, right.

All the abundance brothers.

All the fascists.

But like, yeah,

there are democratic interests that want this to be vetoed.

And so the goal is not just for him to sign it.

I believe he will sign it.

It is to sign it unequivocally without any kind of using bureaucracy to limit it in any way.

And that to me is what is important.

And it's actually, I think, an important test for him because, like, oh, great, you're tough when you're fighting Trump.

Like, we need somebody that doesn't just want to fight Trump, but understands that Democrats have to be willing to take on our own to actually do hard governing.

You might think it's progressive to make sure that every person can have a roof over their head in this country.

But I think it's progressive to keep those historic buildings preserved just right and maybe have just a little bit bigger yard.

First they came for the historic building.

And to make sure just

a little extra yard and I don't want, I just don't want a tall building next to my train tracks because then I'm just, it's just too much.

Historic parking lots.

You got to preserve these historic parking lots.

You know what's progressive?

A beautiful view.

It's progressive.

It's been infuriating.

And like, and

Karen Bass.

Fucking NIMBYS.

Karen Bass, who has like, like, I would say like a mixed record on housing.

She signed some good EOs, then she watered them down.

Like she's done some stuff.

Some of the best, some of the building that is happening in Los Angeles is beyond some of these affordable housing executive orders she signed, but still like this is such an abdication.

The city council, most of them, Nithya and others did vote against the city council,

which is great.

But they are just completely abdicating their responsibility and hoping somebody else solves it.

This is the way to solve it.

He has to fucking sign a thing.

So that, and also Prop 50.

And if you want more info about Prop 50, votesaveamerica.com slash prop 50.

You can go get all kinds of information and that'll help you go, you know, try to get as many friends as possible voting the same way.

Okay, after the break, you'll hear Tommy's conversation with Ben Smith about Barry Weiss taking over CBS News and lots more.

Two things before we get to that.

You may have heard that Crooked Con sold out faster than we ever expected.

So big news, we decided to move to a bigger location.

That means more panels, more guests, and more tickets.

The new venue is the Ronald Reagan Building.

You know, I don't think that...

It's honestly a dream for me to be in the Reagan building.

I feel like it would have been funnier 10 years ago to have us in the Reagan building.

Now, the Reagan building seems like a potential natural ally

for this movement.

Win one for the Gipper.

The most scorching opinion about Trump so far just came from a Reagan judge, a judge appointed by Reagan last week.

So, yeah, of course, makes sense.

Your favorite crooked podcast hosts will be there.

Plus, Ruben Gallego, Andy Bashir, Janelle Bynum, Sarah McBride, Yasiman Ansari, Anderson Clayton, Sarah Longwell, Hassan Piker, Maurice Mitchell, lots more.

The full list is up at Crooked.com.

We'll be announcing even more great guests soon.

We're adding a Vote Save America Action Hub, a space where our partner groups will be hanging out and focusing on activism so you can leave with the tools you need.

Action hub.

Action hub.

What kind of action hub?

Doing karate?

I don't think it's going to be.

What are you thinking?

Oh, I was talking about intercourse, Tommy.

I was talking about fucking.

That's what I was saying.

You know where the action hub is going to be?

His hotel room.

Yeah.

Those pants.

That's where the action hub.

And you know where it's what says right here.

All these pants.

You can leave with the tools you need to fight democracy.

That's right.

There you go.

Head to CrookedCon.com before this last batch of tickets disappears.

And we'll see you at the Action Hub on November 7th in DC.

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Yeah, hey.

And Love It, you have an announcement?

Yes, there is a new series that just launched today on the Love It or Leave It feed.

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I'm interviewing some of the biggest icons in reality TV.

That starts with Dr.

Terry Dubrow of Botched and the Swan and Real Housewives Housewives of Orange County.

I have obviously been turning off my brain at night and watching Bravo and other reality shows.

And I do think you really can't understand politics in this moment unless you understand the world of these shows and why it is more important to be interesting and hated than boring and good.

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insurrections?

None so far.

But so

Dubrow is really interesting and he talks about the parts of filming Bravo shows, including Real Housewives, that he fucking hates.

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They were every single time we finished one.

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my guest today is the editor-in-chief of semaphore and the co-host of the excellent mixed signals podcast he's also a man who tends to be on the the bleeding edge of changes in the media business ben smith great to see you thank you for having me tommy

uh so on monday barry weiss was named the new editor-in-chief of cbs news and paramount cbs's parent company bought her startup the free press for 150 million dollars in cash and stock my My first question to you is the question that everyone is asking, Ben, which was how much do we think Barry cleared off this deal?

Do you know what her ownership stake was by the end here?

You know, I don't, but I would say that the nature of these deals is usually they don't just say, here's a pile of money, buy.

They say, if you work really hard for us for a period of four, five, 10 years,

we will, you know, we will compensate you gradually in stock.

So like, I would say, whatever the actual terms of the deal, I would think this is a pretty long-term arrangement.

Like, I think Barry Weiss will be there for a long time.

Yeah, it struck me as an aqua hire, which is basically they're purchasing her entire company to get her to work there.

You're right.

She probably did have a long earn out, but I bet she did okay off it.

Yes.

Next time you see her, you should make her buy dinner.

Okay, that's what I'll do.

I've never met her, but I'll do that.

So help me understand why this hire makes sense for CBS.

As far as I know, Barry Weiss has no TV news experience.

Her print experience was more on the opinion side.

I find CBS News to be kind of like the textbook example of the just the facts ma'am kind of old school journalism.

But she has been better known, I think, recently at least for more activism, for being kind of anti-which views as woke, for being a full-throated defender of Israeli government policies.

So why do you think CBS decided she's the person we need?

Well, I would say there's a couple of different things here.

One is that I don't know if you are a regular viewer of the CBS Evening News.

If you are, you are very unusual for our age group.

But like, you know, CBS is a broadcast television network that, for for complicated reasons, kind of missed out on cable and then kind of also missed out on digital.

So this is the Titanic, like well after it has hit the iceberg in a place that has been in a kind of state of real crisis and decline for many, many years.

So it's not like, I mean, so I don't really, the idea that like these guys were just doing fine and these maniacs are coming and changing everything, what are they doing?

It's ridiculous.

I mean, I think CBS is sort of a poster child for a company that really failed to figure out the digital transition, lost most of its value, and is getting swallowed by some billionaire's kid, which is

at a discount as a result.

And that's true of CBS, which is News, which is a tiny, tiny portion of a bigger company that is now called Paramount, that includes all sorts of other things that used to have a lot of value.

And Sherry Redstone, who owned it, managed it gradually downward over a period of years.

And so in the new ownership,

David Ellison, whose dad is one of the richest guys in the world, Larry Ellison, I think both seem authentically to share Barry's politics, which are, I don't know if you'd call them center-right.

They're eclectic.

They're very pro-Israel,

very,

very upset about the direction the media took in the last few years.

And,

you know, and

I think Ellison obviously kind of shares those to some degree.

And CBS News, by the way, is a single-digit percentage of the business of CBS, which is mostly the movie business.

And Ellison has spent his career in the movie business.

And then people say, you know, the news is like 4% of the revenue and 95% of the headaches of these businesses.

But sure, this is like kind of the first, one of the first big splashy things he's doing is bringing in Barry as the editor-in-chief, not the president, a new title as editor-in-chief of CBS News to direct the editorial back to the center.

That probably...

is what the owners want in terms of the political, in terms of their own political views.

Although that's not going to like rescue a dying broadcast operation.

It also comes at a time Donald Trump, you know, loves to rage against these networks, is very focused on CBS and others, and feels that they've, you know, treated him unfairly, already extracted a big settlement for them.

And I think

this is a company that's looking for another wave of regulatory approval to buy Warner Media.

And doing things that Donald Trump likes seems like a pretty good way to get regulatory approval.

And honestly, I think if you told one of these companies they could pay 100 to 150 million bucks to make a big deal go through faster, they probably would.

Yeah, like I'm with you on the problem and certainly wasn't suggesting that like CBS, everything was going perfectly.

I guess I'm just still not there on the solution.

Like is Barry Weiss viewed as like a Trump whisperer that can get deals through the FCC or whatever, right?

Like a lot of the reporting is focused on kind of coverage about Israel generally being a big point of tension between the new ownership and, let's say, 60 Minutes.

But I just can't tell how central this is to the acquisition itself.

Yeah,

there are a lot of different things going on here.

And I think that's what you're seeing, which is CBS has one problem, which is its business is collapsing.

That's not because of where it stands on Israel.

There's CBS News.

And in fact, isn't going to be fixed by tweaking their political stance because it has to do with the fact that they're a broadcast television network with a massive cost structure.

There's also

people, you know, and I think there is also a sense of like it will please Donald Trump to stick it to the old, the people at CBS, whoever they are.

And like, that probably is a good way to put a good, like, if it seems like they're giving some kind of human sacrifice to Donald Trump in order to get regulatory approval, like, that doesn't, I don't know, in the cynical world of big media, that seems like a decent idea.

Yeah.

Do you have a prediction for how it's going to go?

Any sense of like what this is, how this is being received internally?

I mean, you know, CBS, it's like, I don't know if you've ever worked at one of these institutions where like, which has been like rocked by scandal after scandal and leak after leak for longer than you've been alive.

But everything always goes badly there.

The only story, so and I think people underestimate the extent to which like, yeah, like she, you know, she is being given the job, maybe not as captain of the Titanic, but as first mate post-iceberg.

And like

that's a very, very challenging situation.

And I don't know, we should all be rooting for them to succeed.

Because I think the most natural thing here is that they cease to exist.

Like just, and that's the course that they've been on for a long time.

Yeah, no, look, I want CBS News to succeed generally.

I really had not thought of it that way.

This is being first mate or captain on an iceberg or a ship hitting an iceberg.

That does suck.

When Barry Weiss quit the New York Times, she cited bullying by colleagues.

She said the New York Times had become an illiberal environment.

She said there was a, quote, civil war inside the New York Times between the mostly young wokes and the mostly 40-plus liberals.

You worked at the New York Times from 2020 to 2022.

Was it illiberal?

Was Michael Barbaro bullying you in the lunchroom?

Like, what was the scene there?

So it was, A, look, there was no lunchroom.

It was all Slack, which did make it

certainly totally insane.

And, you know, I guess I, you know, knew Barry there at the time, and I think didn't, maybe I didn't take these things as personally.

Like, I think, you know, people react to things differently.

But I do think of it, you know, the Slack became some rough equivalent of Twitter.

And I do think the culture was more dominated by younger people who were more comfortable on social media and sometimes really did take on some of the crazier features of social media.

Like there was a 2,000 person,

I wasn't allowed in most of the Slack because I wrote about the New York Times.

And so like I got tossed out of Slacks and Taylor Lorenz created a Slack called Ben Chat where people could come talk to me.

But there was one giant slack with everybody in it.

And that was the one where when James Bennett, there was a controversy that I feel like we don't need to revisit involving the opinion editor, but people were reacting.

You can react with emojis and people were reacting with guillotines.

Oh boy.

Like intended ironically, perhaps, but not, I would not say that is collegial.

And when I, at some point, somebody complained to the executive editor, Dean Bucket, that my being in the Slack made people unsafe because I might write about it.

Okay.

And he, I thought, quite reasonably, and this is a sense of like,

I don't think it was not totally homogenous culture.

He told them that's ridiculous.

This is a slack with 2,000 people in it.

Of course, it's going to leak.

But yeah, I mean, I guess I think that maybe I don't have as think it was quite that straightforward, but certainly there was the kind of like left-wing political waves and social waves swept through there, has swept through all of society.

And I do think it was pretty, yeah, I think it was, I think the management has spent the last couple of years pushing that back.

It's interesting.

I mean, look, what I'm taking, what I'm inferring from your, your very

delicate answer is that you saw some illiberalness, you saw some cruelty maybe in this like, it's just interesting with some people, that radicalizes them.

And then there's people like Matthew Iglesias over at Vox, who kind of just tweets through the most vicious attacks on a daily basis, seems impervious to it, doesn't, you know, kind of just like does his thing regardless and just has a very different reaction.

Yeah, and I think you're probably, I think if you've spent a lot of your career being attacked by strangers on the internet, as I have, you develop like a kind of pathologically thick skin to it.

But I don't think you can actually expect other people to act that way.

Like that's not normal.

If your colleagues are being mean to you, like probably you hate it and you're going to quit.

Like I don't think that's an unreasonable reaction.

No, I don't think it is either.

I'm a huge baby and I've had exchanges on Twitter ruined an entire weekend and my wife looking at me like, why aren't you parenting our children right now?

Are you really in a fight about the JCPOA with someone with like a Twitter egg?

And I'm like, yeah, that's actually who I am.

That's who you married.

So I'm sorry about that.

But I do think like the question you asked for, like, what is like, what is the, I think, I think what this means, like, what is Barry's role at CBSME is like, very, I don't think it's decided.

I think it's very open to interpretation.

I think a lot depends, you know, in particular on how they decide to cover Donald Trump.

Because, I mean, I talked to somebody who was involved in the deal and who was very aware that they're just now dealing with this shadow of this sense that, well, like, oh, they've made some secret corrupt deal with the president in exchange for, you know, to get regulatory approval for their real business, which is the movie business, the entertainment business, in exchange for favorable coverage on this tiny little.

you know, news thing that they have to own.

And how do you deal with, like, and I asked them, like, well, how do you, how do you deal with that impression?

And they said, well, we're just going to have to cover Trump really.

We have to be really tough and adversarial and do great journalism that the White House doesn't like

when that's fair.

And I think that is ultimately the test.

Yeah, well, you're right.

And we should not prejudge her tenure there.

It is challenging, though, because it comes in the wake of some major departures at 60 minutes and a pretty high-profile dust up over that show feeling like they were being censored by corporate execs and then the lawsuit and caving to Trump.

So a tough, challenging time to go into that job, like you said earlier.

You have a great column out this week in Semaphore about Donald Trump's information filter and sort of information bubble.

Can you explain how Trump's information diet has changed from the first term to today and why that might have some of his supporters a little worried?

Yeah, I mean, one thing about the White House, and you worked there and you know this, is that just inevitably the president is a little bit a prisoner of the building, a prisoner of what kind of information he's getting, who's talking to him, like Eisenhower, Nixon's aides were referred to as the Berlin Wall because they were German Haldeman and and Ehrlichman and they wouldn't let anybody through.

But in any case, Trump in his first term, like almost uniquely among presidents, like totally busted out of that and was just on Twitter engaging everyone.

He was like reading like the rage bait from you.

He was like soaking up the adulation from his fans, but he was just seeing the same stuff everybody else was on Twitter.

And now, I think actually sort of like everybody else, he's retreated into much more comfortable spaces, in his case, Truth Social, where where he sometimes goes on these sprees of like re-truthing really weird memes and where he posts stuff and where he sees adulation.

And he's also, you know, he does watch TV, mostly Fox.

Fox is more pro-Trump, more sort of consistently pro-Trump than it was in his first term.

And there's also these other right-wing networks he can watch.

He does, you know, he reads the papers, he reads the New York Post and other papers.

But I think people around him, both people who like him and don't like him, have started to think like, oh, maybe he's not seeing everything.

There was this odd instance where he had talked to the governor of Oregon and he got off the phone and said, yeah, you know, she said one thing to me and I've been seeing this other thing on TV and hearing things from my staff.

And like, I'm not really sure what's going on.

And then I've saw the other day that Kathy Hochul, the governor of New York, I guess, told him that the federal government had cut off funding to New York and that was news to him.

And it...

And it just, and I think in some sense, the biggest question is, like, what is he hearing about the economy?

And like, how good is the information he's getting?

And I think that's, I mean, I didn't like, I don't really know but they're basically the core of this situation is that there's a aide named natalie harp who follows him around with an ipad and that people who really really really want to get his attention particularly in the conservative movement have her number and text her things and hope that she will go then play the video to him and that's like the key key gatekeeping function

god help us all i mean yeah there he tweeted this video the other weekend or other week about med beds i don't know if you tracked this controversy it's this like q anon thing it's the yeah i was assumed that's you looked so ageless, Tommy.

Yeah,

it's a filter.

So that's a Barbara Walters filter.

Medbeds, like basically, they think it's alien technology that's being hidden by elites that could cure every disease.

All of a sudden, Donald Trump like tweets or truths this AI video that AI renders his own voice of a made-up technology.

And I would just kill for some deep reporting into how on earth that actually happens.

Like, how does that go from creation to his feed to shared?

You know, I think he's just on Truth Social seeing memes.

And if you look through, he's like re-truthing some like really terrible memes that like, I think he's just seeing like, oh, here's somebody who likes me saying something nice.

And I assume that's what the medbed thing was.

It seemed vaguely positive.

It said that he was giving everybody special medbed cards.

So like, but I don't know, when you were in the White House, did you, like, how did you think about kind of controlling President Obama's access to information?

Well, he famously kept his Blackberry, right?

That was sort of an early battle he won to get information.

You know, I think he certainly would go on at night and whatever a, you know, a mean David Brooks column would post, Dan Pfeiffer would get an email being like, we need to deal with this or whatever.

The other way he spent a lot of time was playing words with friends with Reggie Love and other people.

So he had his own way of sort of getting around us.

But you're right.

Like when you're president of the United States, all your jokes are funny.

Everything you say is brilliant.

People stand up when you walk in the room.

So that's got to just kind of fuck with your thinking, whether you're Donald Trump or anybody else.

Yeah, but I do.

And I do think in a weird way, this is a return to a more traditional kind of presidency where he is trapped in an information bubble.

Yeah, and probably more so than before, right?

With given the security challenges that come

with multiple assassination attempts.

But didn't he used to hate watch TV all the time?

Like, I feel like he used to routinely tweet about Morning Joe.

Yeah, he used to hate watch more because I think there was like, it was just Fox and then a bunch of stuff he hated, but now he's got OAN and Newsmax and all sorts of stuff on social that he can watch.

And once in a while, like a Democratic senator made their way onto Fox yesterday morning and he freaked out about it on Truth Social and demanded that they not let Brian Schatz back on there to lie about him.

But I think that actually almost is an indication of what you said, that

he's not rage tweeting the sort of, he's not hate watching anymore, which in a way, like, I mean, I guess it seems like he is all of us, right?

Like

the sort of experience of the media between 2015 and 2020 was that this social media machines were so good at finding the worst thing that the people you dislike had said and just like shoving it in your face.

And the new TikTok world is that like, no, you just get like pleasing stuff that affirms your prejudices all day.

That's right.

Yeah.

The biggest surprise in your piece, by the way, was seeing Laura Loomer of all people kind of

talking about Trump's information diet and sounding like a voice of reason.

She's very concerned.

Is she really?

Okay, for those who don't know who Laura Loomer is, she's like a far-right nut, in my opinion.

She once tweeted like an applauding emoji over an article about 2,000 migrants dying while trying to cross from North Africa to Europe.

She chained herself to the Twitter office door in New York while wearing a yellow star of David to compare herself to the treatment of Jews in the Holocaust.

My point being,

doesn't always, you know, sometimes seems like she's got a screw loose, but she

seemed reasonable there.

How did that come from?

I mean, I think, you know, she is somebody who thinks a lot about how you get information to Donald Trump and, you know, and has seen herself boxed out a bit by

White House staff, although she finds her ways to get to him directly.

I mean, but the one thing is it used to be that like influencers, like right-wing influencers who had like a really good fastball could just sort of like get in front of him by tweeting stuff and like getting retweeted and going viral.

And now you have to be like the only two people who I think can really do it just because by just absolute like intensity and velocity and saying such intense stuff on social media are her and the kind of MAGA legal figure Mike Davis, who denounces judges very heatedly.

And I think that stuff makes its way to him.

But I think the rest of the sort of right-wing Twitter sphere is like really having trouble kind of making their way into Trump's personal consciousness.

Interesting.

Bigger picture, like a couple of weeks ago, we were all talking about ABC News and Jimmy Kimmel.

Kimmel got pulled off the air, and then FCC chairman Brendan Carr made all these threats that he would hurt the network or we could do the easy way or the hard way if Kimmel wasn't punished for comments he made about Charlie Kirk.

Kimmel's now back on the air, but Trump threatened to sue ABC again.

Now that the dust has settled settled a little bit, what do you think the impact was of that whole ordeal?

Are networks rethinking things or it's just, I don't know.

I mean, I just think that the big kind of corporate media executives are really wary of angering the president.

They're thinking about it all the time.

And it's a matter, it's not that they wouldn't ever do anything, you know, publish, you know, an accurate, important story that didn't make the White House happy, but it's that they're thinking about picking your battles.

And this really is familiar to any journalist who's worked in like complicated places.

I mean, I I think, you know, for instance, if you're, you know, major, I once talked to somebody who'd been a correspondent for a great newspaper in Tehran.

And like, you kind of know at some point you're going to get booted because you're going to write a story that angers the regime.

But so you think like, all right, like, is this one worth it?

Like, this is kind of a dumb story about somebody's family being corrupt.

Like, let's skip this one.

Let's wait for the one that really, you know, that really gets them.

And so in situations like this, you just start to pick your battles and decide, like, look, we're not going to do this story about the president's family.

It's going to annoy him.

Let's like wait till we and it does change the shape of the coverage and means that there's less criticism i think the the other thing that happened at abc though was that i think you saw that there are these other stakeholders in these companies who they have to deal with too and in particular for abc it's it's it's a list actors and directors and or for disney and i think you saw that you saw i don't think it ever really was a public protest but people clearly called up bob iger and said hey we're going to start polling movies we're going to refuse we're going to publicly refuse to work with you and you know these media companies are very very very, very dependent on talent and talent does have leverage.

Yeah, you got to imagine Iger is getting some

rude texts from some real A-listers over that weekend.

Yeah.

Final question for you.

I just don't think Democrats have fully internalized kind of what the new media landscape looks like.

We have, you know, Barry Weiss leading CBS News, TBD, if that matters or not.

But Elon Musk owns Twitter.

A group of Trump allies are going to run TikTok.

Fox News is not just the dominant cable player, but like the dominant news channel, period.

And then I think conservatives, I mean, tell me if you disagree, but they seem to be dominating the independent media world and the podcast charts.

There's not necessarily a question there.

It's more just like an observation of how grim things seem for progressives.

Well, I actually think that, I mean, if you look at the

sort of new media charts, you're starting to see left-wing voices dominate more.

I mean, like Midas is the, I think, often the biggest channel on YouTube.

And it follows to some degree where's the most engagement, where's the most energy.

And,

you know, I think a lot of these, particularly a lot of the really kind of independent podcast sphere, is really built around this profound suspicion of power, but also of government and of truth and of anything.

And you saw with the Epstein stuff that there's just this like intense tendency to eat their own.

But no, I think there's a real kind of like conservative

control of the mainstream media now.

And it's not exactly mega conservatives.

I think people like David Ellison and Jeff Bezos are kind of, I don't really know what their politics are, kind of like center right, so it's what you'd call center right.

And

probably,

but, you know, I don't, I don't really know.

But I think that like the thing that is actually, I think there are two things.

One is that you have people with right of center views owning and running some of these media properties.

But I think the much more important thing is you have people who are scared of the government and of Trump making decisions.

Definitely.

Lots of scared people making decisions for financial reasons.

Ben, thank you for joining the show.

Everyone should check out Semaphore and subscribe to the Nix Signal podcast.

It's excellent.

Who do you guys have recently?

You had the new head of MSNBC.

Yeah,

we had the new CEO of Versent, which owns MSNBC, and he spent the whole time talking about how he wants to buy crooked.

So watch out, everybody.

Come on in.

I'll be your Barry, sir.

Whatever it takes.

Ben, thank you again.

Great to talk to you.

Yeah, good talking to you.

That's our show for today.

Thanks to Ben Smith for coming on.

Dan and I will be back with a new show on Friday.

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Chip was convinced that the president of the United Mine Workers, one of the most powerful labor unions in America, was behind the murders.

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