“Pod Save America” Co-Hosts: Re-Humanization Needs to be a Goal Now

Transcript

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Speaker 12 This is a real good story about Bronx and his dad Ryan, real United Airlines customers.

Speaker 13 We were returning home and one of the flight attendants asked Bronx if he wanted to see the flight deck and meet Catherine Andrew.

Speaker 14 I got to sit in the driver's seat.

Speaker 15 I grew up in an aviation family and seeing Bronx kind of reminded me of myself when I was that age.

Speaker 12 That's Andrew, a real United pilot.

Speaker 15 These small interactions can shape a kid's future.

Speaker 14 It felt like I was the captain.

Speaker 13 Allowing my son to see the flight deck will stick with us forever.

Speaker 11 That's how good leads the way.

Speaker 13 Part of what's always in my head is like, especially when I talk to younger people, it's like just reminding them that politics didn't always suck.

Speaker 13 It wasn't always about like one guy, like the worst person in the world, upsetting you every day. Like it can be inspirational.

Speaker 14 It's getting farther and farther away.

Speaker 11 I know, but we can do good things.

Speaker 13 You can help people. You can find some core decency.
We can get back there.

Speaker 14 Welcome to the Best People podcast. This week's guests are setting the bar for all of us aspiring podcasters.

Speaker 14 They don't just cover the news, they aren't just founders, they change the weather in our politics. Everyone looks to them when something big happens.

Speaker 14 I look to them when something big happened in my career when I started this podcast.

Speaker 14 It's an honor to have on the Best People podcast two of the founders of Crooked Media, two of the hosts of Pod Save America, John Favreau and Tommy Viter. Thank you guys.

Speaker 11 Wow.

Speaker 11 What an intro. Look at that intro.
That kind of intro anywhere.

Speaker 14 See, if I had to do it twice, I wouldn't have gotten all that in there, but I had my little elevator spiel. No, you guys are, you know, a lot of things pop up.

Speaker 14 I go and look for you guys and listen to you guys. I guess my first question for you is: how do you cut right to the bone with everything?

Speaker 11 Well, we,

Speaker 11 you know, we try to have our

Speaker 11 morning meetings before the podcast, to probably like you guys do at MSNBC to figure out what we want to cover that day.

Speaker 11 And I think that, look, we started this in 2017, not knowing that we would ever be professional podcasters.

Speaker 11 Is that a word? Yeah,

Speaker 11 it shouldn't be. It might be an oxymoron.
Yeah. If you want to repel a woman or clear a room, you're in the professional podcast.

Speaker 11 But I think because we always thought it was going to be a hobby, you know, we wanted to sort of narrow the distance between how we spoke with each other and our friends who've been in politics about politics in private with how people talk about politics in public.

Speaker 11 And so, you know, in terms of like cutting to the truth of it, we just try as hard as we can to talk about it in a way that we would, you know, talk about it off mic.

Speaker 13 Yeah. I think the best episodes are when you kind of forget that this thing is going to go out.

Speaker 13 Yeah. And sometimes that happens to me.
Like people will be like friends of mine from real life will be like, oh, I heard you guys talking about blah, blah, blah thing.

Speaker 13 I was like, oh, my God, you heard that?

Speaker 11 You have that reaction. Yeah.
But I think that's good.

Speaker 13 That's healthy.

Speaker 14 What is it about? Because I would say at a mission level, we try to put on television the same things that we say on our calls or in our meetings, because as you guys know,

Speaker 14 sometimes the distance narrows whether you want it to or not.

Speaker 14 But what is it about the intimacy or the obligation you have to someone maybe just listening to in their ears to make sure that there's no fluff or spin.

Speaker 13 I mean, I think television, I still view it as like rarefied air.

Speaker 11 These are important people who are anchors. They are well-known.
They are famous. What are you talking about? You, you, like your show.

Speaker 13 Like I watch TV, like it, it, like, like maybe that's muscle memory, right? And I'm of a certain age where that's changing for people that are younger than us. But I think I still view it that way.

Speaker 13 And I think with a podcast, you have someone literally in your ears. You feel like you know them.

Speaker 13 I both experienced this as a host where people come up to you and they kind of like jump into a conversation that they heard you have earlier that day. And I've also done this to people.

Speaker 13 Like the first time I met Bill Simmons, I like was trying to be like slap happy, be like, Tell me about house and like, what's up with Uncle Sal. You know, it's like, I don't know this guy.

Speaker 13 He doesn't know me.

Speaker 13 So there is something like weirdly intimate about it that I think is engaging and approachable because it should be, you know, because it's like not that impressive because it's a podcast, but I think it helps you build that connection.

Speaker 11 Yeah, I still, I mean, I'm more comfortable now doing TV, but still when I'm doing an interview, and I think it's it's the time too and the format, right?

Speaker 11 Which is like, you know, that if you have a cable hit, that you've got like five minutes, seven minutes, you know, to get everything in about the questions you're being asked.

Speaker 11 And so you just, you try to think in like we've all coached politicians, sound bites and, you know, get the topic sentence at the beginning and all that kind of.

Speaker 11 And with the podcast, you just don't, you stop thinking about that because it goes on for a while.

Speaker 11 You don't necessarily see that you're on screen all the time and you're just talking with your friends around a table.

Speaker 13 Yeah. I mean, Nicole, you'll appreciate this.

Speaker 13 Like, the first time I ever did TV, it was on one of those White House trips to Asia where you're gone for 10 days and you don't sleep for three of them and you're loaded up with like Ambien and Pro Vigil and God knows what else and just trying to like survive.

Speaker 13 And it was my last trip. And I like wanted to sort of like see if I could do TV.
So I was like, hey, Chuck, will you interview me? You know, you know, Chuck Ty, like, of course.

Speaker 13 Nicest guy, like, not intimidating. And so there's.

Speaker 14 I think I made the same request.

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 13 We're doing a live shot on the roof somewhere, like, we're probably in like Bali or something.

Speaker 13 and my leg was shaking so hard that i'm making the like the cameras move and stuff and again chuck is like it's okay man you know he's so nice

Speaker 14 i'll edit this for you but like that that is just like inherent in the medium right there's something that we put it on a pedestal don't you think the viewers that were over it i think that

Speaker 14 you guys are pushing us at least those of us paying attention to

Speaker 14 be more blunt, to be less produced, and to put some skin in the game in a way that's probably pretty healthy for television.

Speaker 11 I think so for sure. And I always see that when I tune into MSNBC.
We also have like Fox on in our office just to check it out. And you can tell that that's what they do over there.

Speaker 11 Like the part, I mean, it is, it's always been like this, but they've really gone fullboard into like entertaining people.

Speaker 11 And so they've got the five and they've got the, and they're just sitting around joking. And sometimes it's like, even when it's not about politics, it's like a little funny and it's loose.

Speaker 11 And, and you can tell the difference when you're switching between, and you guys have this on MSNBC as well. There's like a large panel conversation of everyone in person.

Speaker 11 It's like fun, it's light, whatever. And then it switches to an anchor reading the news.
And you can just feel the difference in a way that I don't think you could five, 10, 15 years ago.

Speaker 13 And with Fox, you could tell there's a runner show. Right.

Speaker 13 Because like the other day we're watching and you could tell at the top of the hour, there was a memo that went down that said, at the top of the hour, we are attacking Jen Saki for this completely benign joke about Usha Vance.

Speaker 11 And it happened over and over and over again.

Speaker 13 Like six minutes in, they're going to take a big whack at Jen Saki. And it's like, it like Fox is more formulaic in that sense, but it's also much more entertaining.

Speaker 13 Like they basically have like New York Post headlines under the screen all the time. I don't know.
I think we could all learn from it probably.

Speaker 14 Well, let me let me ask you about that. I mean, it's, it's what, year nine of the Trump story?

Speaker 14 And I, I know, I know Democrats hate this question, but why isn't there something on the left or on the pro-democracy side, which is such a bigger audience.

Speaker 14 Or is that why it's a bigger audience that doesn't all agree on what is entertaining?

Speaker 13 You know, I think the left ecosystem is developing quickly. Like it didn't exist.
And now there's a lot of folks that have some really big accounts. Like we're trying to build, you know,

Speaker 13 a counterweight to Fox News.

Speaker 13 For a long time, that was podcast focused, but we've really been focused on YouTube development and growth because that's where we're seeing all the numbers kind of explode.

Speaker 13 But there is this growing ecosystem. And frankly, we're trying to bring a lot of those people to CrookedCon, the event we're doing November 7th in D.C.
to sort of like help build it further.

Speaker 11 I also think

Speaker 11 there's something about the political context right now that makes it tricky. And we like feel this tension all the time.

Speaker 11 There's a ton of awful scary news to talk about every day, which makes it harder to joke around or to present it in a way that may reach someone who is not a political junkie like all of us.

Speaker 11 And I do think that the Democrats' challenge right now and has been for some time is like reaching beyond the political junkies to people who vote, but don't necessarily pay close attention to politics.

Speaker 11 And so, you know, it's just a, it's a delicate balance figuring out what's going to appeal to people who aren't necessarily paying attention all the time while still making sure that we cover the news and talk about it in a way that is commensurate with sort of the urgency of the challenge right now.

Speaker 14 I mean, that is an articulation of the asymmetry, though.

Speaker 14 I think people like Tim Miller and my people that are new to the Democratic Party's coalition are evangelical about it and are hurt and wounded and shocked when you see the poll numbers with the Democratic Party's approval rating almost as low as their, like you, you find it shocked.

Speaker 14 Like, how could that be? What is that about? I mean, and how does this broader pro-democracy movement help fix that? Or do we hurt it?

Speaker 14 I mean, is that part of the problem that the base is suspicious of people like me?

Speaker 11 I don't think, no, I don't think you heard. I mean, my view is that you don't heard it at all, and it's very additive, right?

Speaker 11 And I think in this moment, that if you are watching the news and watching, especially the second Trump term unfold, and you are responding to it genuinely with how you feel and what you're worried about, based not only on, you know, your experience as an observer of politics, but as someone who has been in politics and been in government in the past, then I think that's all you can really do.

Speaker 11 And that's valuable, right?

Speaker 11 And I think that there's a lot of people out there who, when they hear that former Republicans are alarmed about what Trump is doing, it's going to matter to them.

Speaker 11 But I also think that the asymmetry also sort of manifests itself in, I always think about that, you know, in the, in 2024, Trump said, oh, in four years, you're not going to have to vote anymore.

Speaker 11 And, you know, you can take that two ways. One, like he's going to cancel elections.
But I think the other way is him being like, I'm going to be in there. I'm going to take care of everything.

Speaker 11 And all of you guys don't have to pay attention to politics. And we can treat it as a joke.
And it's like, it's a cynicism that sort of, you know, melts into nihilism at one point.

Speaker 11 And it's all funny and who cares? And so like, this is entertainment for you all. You can go back to your lives and don't worry about it.
And our job is the opposite of that, right?

Speaker 11 We're trying to tell people, you actually do need to care. You actually do need to be involved.
And, you know, that takes more sacrifice on behalf of the people who are paying attention.

Speaker 11 And so it can't be as light and fun as the Republican side, though we have to figure out a way to make the struggle and the movement joyful.

Speaker 14 You're getting at something that I think every one of us grapples with, which is how much of what he says do you cover as,

Speaker 14 you know, catastrophic if it comes to pass? And how much of it do you hold up against the very public displays of incompetence that is a hallmark of 2.0?

Speaker 14 I mean, to me, the trickiest thing about covering him is this collision between brazen incompetence and brazen malevolence. And I wonder how you balance those two things out.

Speaker 13 Yeah, I mean, I think that a lesson we all learned early on, probably in 2017, 2018, is we can't cover everything he says, especially if it's outrageous, if sort of outrageous the only outcome of what he said.

Speaker 13 We have to focus as much as we can on what he has been doing. And I think you're starting to see why that focus is important.

Speaker 13 Like, look, I'll be honest with you, when I first heard about the reports of the East Wing getting torn down, I was like, I don't care. I just, I just don't care.
Pay for it how you want.

Speaker 13 Let these tech guys bribe you, like, whatever. Build the friggin' East Wing.
I'm focused on other things. But voters are really bothered by it.

Speaker 13 Like, they think it's, they don't like that he's tearing down a house that he doesn't own. They don't like that it's paid for by these private special interests.

Speaker 13 And I think that should be a lesson to us in that surfacing stories like that, the corruption, the double dealing.

Speaker 13 I mean, like, he, he just pardoned this tech billionaire named CZ, who runs this company called Binance, whose company was facilitating money laundering for ISIS, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Speaker 13 It was doing sanctions violations with Iran. They were allowing the platform to be used with child sex abuse material, websites, like the most disgusting things you can imagine.

Speaker 13 And Trump pardoned this guy. And like in any other administration, that would be a like, you know, deal breaker of a scandal, probably.

Speaker 13 But for Trump, like he does so many outrageous things that stuff like that can get washed away.

Speaker 13 And I think it's incumbent on us to surface those things, to talk about them, to highlight them over and over again, just so people hear about it.

Speaker 11 And here in year 400 of Trump, I try to spend less time now trying to guess what his motivations are or the motivations or the people who work for him. Like, is it incompetence? Is it malice?

Speaker 11 And just focus on the effects of what they're doing. Because I think ultimately that is what's going to matter to people who are going to be affected by these decisions.

Speaker 11 You know, and I've done plenty of guessing. We still do.
Like, why is he doing this over the years?

Speaker 11 But I try to to focus more on the effects of what he's doing because, you know, you can have plenty of authoritarians who are incompetent fools and they can still do a lot of damage.

Speaker 14 What do you sort of wake up and feel most drawn to?

Speaker 14 I mean, I, for years, have covered the assaults on the rule of law and the indictments of Comey and Tish James over the objections of sort of MAGA adjacent career prosecutors. To me, it's so galling.

Speaker 14 And then the ICE stuff.

Speaker 14 I mean, I just can't believe we live in a country where where a person on their way to the market could be disappeared, not just arrested and questioned and brought to court, but actually like disappear before they come home with the groceries to make dinner.

Speaker 14 And those two stories are like the two poles of what for me seemed to be the most abrupt and jarring and dangerous pieces.

Speaker 14 But what are the sort of poles of Trump 2.0 that pull both of you guys in first in the morning when your eyes are open and you stare at your phone?

Speaker 11 It's the ice, the ice raids for me.

Speaker 13 And John's a big fan. I'm a big fan.

Speaker 11 I love the ice raids.

Speaker 11 And I'm like sort of, I'm surprised by that because it's not an, it was something I was worried about, but the way he's going about it and the way they're going about it is, and I do think it connects with the Comey stuff and the political prosecutions because, you know,

Speaker 11 we've had this challenge over the last several years of talking to voters about attacks on democracy, attacks on the rule of law, because it doesn't really land with people.

Speaker 11 People see even Jim Comey be prosecuted and they're like, well, that's Comey. That's not me.
That's not going to happen to me.

Speaker 11 And, you know, first you start seeing the ICE stuff and you're like, well, those are undocumented immigrants. That's not going to happen to me.

Speaker 11 Well, you know, now they're going after American citizens. Right.
And it's just, it's hard to read those stories and not think, oh, it's going to stop with. immigrants.

Speaker 11 It's going to stop with Jim Comey and Letitia James and all the rest of us are going to be fine. Like, I just don't think that's the case.

Speaker 11 And I, and what I don't understand is why like more people in the country aren't hair on fire about this. And at the very least, more politicians aren't talking about it every single day.
Right.

Speaker 14 Because if they do what they did to Senator Padilla, if they do what they're doing to Alder people in Chicago, there is obviously no line for them.

Speaker 14 And so this adaptive mental trick that Americans understandably are engaged in, like, oh, that doesn't affect me, has already been disproven.

Speaker 13 Yeah, it's a completely lawless organization. I mean, look at the ICE stuff stuns me as well.
I mean, I basically wake up on Mondays, it's sort of like entirely focused on domestic politics.

Speaker 13 Then Tuesdays, I record a show that's about foreign policy and national security. And that's the stuff I worked on in the White House.

Speaker 13 And I'm old enough at this point that your brain develops grooves that I think are like your comfort zone. So you go to that stuff.

Speaker 13 I'm very focused on what's happening in the Caribbean and off the coast of Venezuela. I mean, the strikes in these boats are shocking.
It is extrajudicial murder, full stop.

Speaker 13 There is no legal authority to kill these people.

Speaker 13 You know that's the case because when we captured two survivors the other day, we, the United States government, they returned them to their home countries rather than prosecute them.

Speaker 13 That's how flimsy the legal case is for these murders.

Speaker 13 And on top of that, there is report after report after report that Donald Trump wants Venezuela's oil and that Marco Rubio wants to run a regime change operation in Venezuela because he thinks that Venezuela is supporting Cuba and that the key to toppling the Cuban government as well is taking out Venezuela.

Speaker 13 And I just think like... That is likely to be Libya 2.0, where you have a country with a lot of resources, but is split split and factionalized, and there's well-armed militia groups.

Speaker 13 And you could see a scenario where we topple the Maduro government, who's a bad guy, but there's a lot of bad leaders out there.

Speaker 13 And then the impact just ripples throughout South and Central America and leads to another migration crisis. So I'm very worried about that as well.

Speaker 14 We'll sneak in a quick break right here. Next up, more of my conversation with Crooked Media co-founders Tommy Beter and John Favreau.
Stay with us.

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Speaker 14 When you look at the strategic frame around ending this period, you sort of already have the preconditions, right? So what he's doing is already wildly unpopular.

Speaker 14 You've got the Republicans totally hostage to things that there are decades of tape of them opposing all the policies they're now greenlighting, whether it's tariffs, whether it's extrajudicial strikes by the military.

Speaker 14 I mean, what does sort of the moment look like to you? Were we waiting for a leader to emerge? Are we waiting for the shock to wear off? Like, what phase of this do you think we're in?

Speaker 13 I mean, I think the first phase is winning these elections in 2025, you know, Virginia, New Jersey, the New York mayoral race. And then the midterms in 2026 is going to be huge.

Speaker 13 And I'm very worried about the trend on both sides, but Democrats are responding to further gerrymander these states because I think that dynamic is what leads Republicans to refuse to ever peel off from supporting Trump because they're all more worried about a primary than a general election, or the vast majority of them are.

Speaker 13 But we have to win the midterms, and then Democrats need to step up.

Speaker 13 I mean, I think that Trump's numbers have gone down, but Democrats' numbers are in the toilet. People need to understand who we are, what we're for, what we're fighting for.

Speaker 13 Some of that will come from the Democratic primary as we go into 2028, but some of it is just like rank-and-file members doing things that matter.

Speaker 13 Like Chris Van Holland going to El Salvador to meet with Kilmar Obrego Garcia or speaking out on the war in Gaza in a way that showed courage and leadership.

Speaker 13 It's like got to be more moments like that, I think.

Speaker 11 Yeah, I think you can understand to some extent right now why a party with just about no power in Washington and that's basically leaderless is struggling.

Speaker 11 But it's also like, you know, the Democratic Party has lower favorable ratings than any time since I've been alive.

Speaker 11 And I think that, you know, people compare this to after Bush won re-election in 2004 with the Democratic Party.

Speaker 11 But like even then, you know, Barack Obama had won and was giving national speeches and was being talked about as a candidate. Hillary Clinton was being talked about as a national candidate.

Speaker 11 John, like the people who are running in 08 were out there.

Speaker 11 And I do think right now in this context and the fact that like, you know, Trump is unpopular, but also he has a ton of power and he's using it in ways that no president has used it.

Speaker 11 So it it means that you need a leader who's even more charismatic or several leaders in the Democratic Party who are even more charismatic than ever before.

Speaker 11 And, you know, there's a fight going on in the party about positioning and ideology. And I think that's a good argument to have and good debates to have.

Speaker 11 But to get people's attention nationally, like you do need charismatic leaders. And I worry that we don't quite have that yet, or at least no one's broken through in a big way.

Speaker 11 And hopefully that ramps up as we get closer to 28 and you get a bunch of candidates, right? But that's what I think is holding people back right now.

Speaker 11 You need, like, you can build movements and movements are really important, but you got to have someone to follow and you got to have an alternative.

Speaker 11 If you're a voter who's unhappy with Trump and the Republican Party, you got to be like, okay, well, this person seems like that's a good alternative. And right now we don't have that.

Speaker 14 I guess the ex-Republican in me appreciates the psyops of what Gavin Newsom's doing. Like you don't fight Trump with a more optimistic vision.
You fight him by kicking him. You know,

Speaker 14 I like the way Gavin Newsom's fighting, but I'm just not sure that that's in the cellular, you know, longings of the Democratic base. I mean, who do you guys like?

Speaker 14 And what do you like that you're seeing out there?

Speaker 13 I'm with you on what Gavin's doing. I think it's been very smart and savvy.

Speaker 13 And part of it is having fun on Twitter and the tone, but then part of it is having real power and then using it with Prop 50, which will redistrict California and blunt the impact of what's happening in Texas with their redistricting.

Speaker 13 So I think like voters see that and they know, okay, this guy isn't just full of it. Like he's actually really doing something.
You know, look bigger picture. I don't know.
No one's blowing me away.

Speaker 13 I feel like it's my job to like sometimes pumpkins.

Speaker 14 I hate that answer. I was hoping you'd be like, you just have your head in the sand, you dumb cable hosts.
No, you don't. This and that.

Speaker 13 You are better informed than like 99.99% of people. And I think all of us are waiting for that moment of inspiration.
It doesn't mean people are bad.

Speaker 11 Like, I think there's great candidates out there.

Speaker 13 Like, Pete Budigej is a great guy. He's really smart, doing important things.
Like, I don't know. I don't want to start listing because then you get in big trouble.

Speaker 11 But I think we set up this, what I think, what I've come to think is a false choice between a fighter or someone who's hopeful and positive and inspirational.

Speaker 11 And I don't even know if that's the access. I think you need both.
I think you can be both, right?

Speaker 11 Like, I mean, Barack Obama was known for sort of hope and inspiration, but he could, he could be pretty tough.

Speaker 11 And I know, I was going to say, and in fact, like, you could tell, yeah, anyone on the Clinton campaign, anyone in the McCain campaign, people who've run against him can be like, oh,

Speaker 11 he's known as like hope and change and inspiration, but he can be really tough. And I think you can do both.

Speaker 11 And I think actually a Democratic leader needs to do both because if all you're doing is you're out there kicking the shit out of Donald Trump every day, like that is going to get you attention.

Speaker 11 It is going to excite people who are already Democrats.

Speaker 11 It's not necessarily going to excite people who voted for Donald Trump or who thought about voting for Donald Trump, but are unhappy and are open to Democrats, right? Like they want more.

Speaker 11 They want a vision of where you want to take the country. And so I do think you have to do both.
But to your point, to like, how can you keep up and sustain the conversation?

Speaker 11 That is like table stakes now for a nominee or for a candidate, right?

Speaker 11 Because we have now come of age with a president Donald Trump who was, for better or worse, mostly worse, just tweeting all day long. You hear from him all day.
He's in our faces constantly, right?

Speaker 11 And everyone's on social media. They get their news from social media, YouTube, everywhere else, where you are just seeing people talk like themselves all day long.
They are authentic.

Speaker 11 They are casual. They are informal.

Speaker 11 People now, I think, have come to expect from their politicians, from their leaders, you've got to be yourself. You've got to sound like you're just having a conversation with a friend.

Speaker 11 And you've got to be in our faces all the time. Otherwise, I don't know who you are.

Speaker 11 And so I do think that whoever is going to emerge in 2028 is someone who's going to be so comfortable in every kind of setting themselves and not sound like a talking point robot machine.

Speaker 11 And Nicole, I mean, you were a former comms professional too, like we were. What does that mean anymore, right? God only knows.

Speaker 11 I mean, think about all the meetings we all sat through where it's like, there's a grid and there's like message discipline and Monday this. And Trump doesn't know what to do.

Speaker 11 Don't repeat the attacks. And don't, you know, yeah, Trump will do like three ad hoc press conferences per day, and it's all live.

Speaker 13 And he riffs, and he does it like when times are good, and he does it in the middle of the Epstein debacle.

Speaker 11 And he's just like, that's, that's just how he rolls. Yeah.
It's highly effective.

Speaker 14 What do you make of the fact that there's this slow burn around,

Speaker 14 and it's serious.

Speaker 14 I mean, you, you hear that Trump and Levitt seem to be trying to get us to cover it, but of pulling President Barack Obama into their efforts to investigate the investigation into Russia's attack on the 2016 election.

Speaker 14 Is that the way to talk about it? I mean, I've heard, I think his name's Mike Davis, this right-wing agitator, talking about a grand jury in Florida.

Speaker 14 You hear, I mean, Levitt has this diatribe from the podium in July, I think, laying out this grand conspiracy. She's reading from a piece of paper.

Speaker 14 I mean, do you think that they will present evidence to a grand jury against President President Barack Obama?

Speaker 13 I mean, I think sometimes Democrats, we call too many things a distraction when really it's just like Trump talking about what he wants to talk about.

Speaker 13 That to me was the ultimate moment of distraction. This was like in the worst moments of the Epstein fiasco.

Speaker 13 All of a sudden, they rolled out the Obama did treason button and started hitting it for a couple of weeks. Like, I don't know that we've heard about it much since.
Maybe they will go after him.

Speaker 13 I think it's a lot easier for them to go after lesser-known, less popular political figures than the extremely popular former president who literally no one in this country, except for the most brainwashed lunatics, think actually rigged an election against Donald Trump.

Speaker 13 But I mean, I guess they could try. They're scared.

Speaker 11 I really, like, they realize that that was politically, I think they, I think some of them realize, enough of them realize that that is politically stupid. That you're right.

Speaker 11 Like if you go after people who are, you know, John Bolton's a great example, right? Which is like, who's coming to John Bolton's defense? Not Democrats and liberals necessarily.

Speaker 11 He wasn't a favorite there, right? Same with Comey, right? And so you can pick on people like that and start, but like they, they go to try to arrest Barack Obama or indict Barack Obama.

Speaker 11 They are going to like, they're going to have

Speaker 11 the most popular politician, living politician in the country.

Speaker 14 Do you think that, do you think there are enough people around him to slow that down?

Speaker 11 I mean, slow down. I don't know.

Speaker 11 I mean, I do think that like some people in the Obama administration that they're investigating, they will certainly try to go after them, John Brennan, people like that.

Speaker 11 And the question there is like,

Speaker 11 can you even get an indictment? Can you get it that far? Since some of these indictments, James, Comey, are incredibly weak.

Speaker 11 So, you know, they have to go about getting an indictment and indicting them on something, which some of this stuff is just like, there's just nothing.

Speaker 13 And like most of these indictments are based on congressional testimony that was within five years to get past the statutes of limitations questions.

Speaker 13 I mean, look, Trump has like kind of a feral political genius, right? He like every rally is a focus group. He figures out what plays and what doesn't.

Speaker 13 I suspect he's smart enough enough to know that indicting Barack Obama probably wouldn't go well for him and he'll avoid it, but we'll find out.

Speaker 13 I shouldn't predict.

Speaker 14 Do you welcome your old boss's role in helping in California with Prop 50?

Speaker 14 I mean, his voice is so missed, and I know he's choosing his spots carefully, but what do you make of the choices he's making about when and how to speak out?

Speaker 13 I'm glad he did the Prop 50 thing. I think that was great.
I'm glad he's campaigning in these final weeks.

Speaker 13 I do hope that he and his organization will make a bit of a strategic shift, which is, I understand, like picking your spots, not weighing on everything. Like that is a trap.

Speaker 13 But I think there is a, there's a challenge around elections, but then there's a Democratic Party brand problem that we are failing to address.

Speaker 13 And I would love to see him part of the solution to that brand problem. And that could include like, Barack Obama, go on Joe Rogan.
Why not? He could hang for three hours. It might not be a good time.

Speaker 13 You might get some weird questions about how actually the polio vaccine didn't work or something. But like, I don't know, go do it.

Speaker 11 Let risk.

Speaker 14 No, you have to talk about the pyramids. The thing is, like, once you start listening to Joe Rogan, you realize that like the politics is such a little.
I started listening to it. It's like a snedge.

Speaker 14 And I listened for three hours. It was all about like the...
the pyramid thing is like as big

Speaker 14 as politics.

Speaker 11 Prep would be funny.

Speaker 14 Prep would be funny, right? Like you could just, I could just imagine any normal person saying, he's going to ask me about what?

Speaker 11 The thing with him is like every time he gets back out, like knowing him, every time he gets back out on the trail to campaign, he's really into it.

Speaker 11 He does not seem like a person who feels like he's been forced to go there. And so because he is a, he, I think he realizes like I'm a very successful Democratic politician.

Speaker 11 I care a lot about these issues. I care a lot about the country.
I care a lot about what's happening to the country right now. I know he's very alarmed at what's happening right now.

Speaker 11 And I don't think the choice has to be do nothing or get out there every single day and be in Trump's face. Like there's a whole lot of space in between.

Speaker 11 And to Tommy's point, that the democratic branding and where the party should go, he's like particularly useful to talk about that.

Speaker 11 And I think just giving people like his argument is, or one of his arguments is like he does, he's a big figure, right?

Speaker 11 And every time he gets out there and speaks, it doesn't allow for a new generation of Democrats to go out there and sort of grab the spotlight. And that is true

Speaker 11 in a sense.

Speaker 11 But in a vacuum, which is what we're in right now, I think we need every voice that has a huge platform, a lot of followers that people really respect, I think should be out there right now talking about this because any way to break through to a lot of people who aren't political junkies, which Barack Obama speaking will do, I think could have a really important effect.

Speaker 14 Well, you guys know better than me, but my sense is that his two of the red lines that might get him back out there were the military and the Department of Justice.

Speaker 14 And those lines have been crossed back and forth and back and forth. It seems that the things that he warned about in some of those most urgent speeches ahead of Election Day have come to pass.

Speaker 11 Yeah. That's a fair point.
Yeah.

Speaker 11 And I would imagine it'll be interesting to see what his events with Spanberger and Cheryl are like, because he tends to have a lot of the thoughts that, you know, we're all talking about.

Speaker 11 And then he just sort of uncorks

Speaker 11 at a at a campaign event,

Speaker 11 you know, when he's just out there feeling it. And so I'm interested to see what he, if he, if he goes off on those events.

Speaker 14 How much of your time with him for both of you is sort of in your brain when you're either trying to pull things out of other people and the way that he pulled things out of you guys or just in the way you see the world?

Speaker 13 So I worked for him for nine years. I started in the 2004 center race and I left in 2013.
John, I left the same time. So I, it, you know, I'm sure you dealt with this too.

Speaker 13 Like I had to deprogram myself. I had to remember how to think for myself because like my entire spokesperson.

Speaker 14 Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 13 It was like DNA was like this guy's political views became mine and that that overlap became very real. It took some time.
I got better at it.

Speaker 13 I think what that experience does is it gives you empathy for how hard the job of governing is. It's very easy to take shots from the sidelines and I do a lot of it.

Speaker 13 But, you know, you also realize like.

Speaker 13 actually implementing these things, actually breaking through, actually convincing voters and winning elections and governing is really, really hard. And I think that comes through.
I hope it does.

Speaker 11 I have tried to deprogram myself and I don't know if I've done it completely successfully. And it's not necessarily about the political views.

Speaker 11 Like I, you know, look at a news story and form my own opinion, but in the way that I think about arguing, I think about persuading people, I think about like topics to choose, stories to tell, the way.

Speaker 11 he talks and thinks is just, you know, I think because I spent so long with him and wrote with him, it's just like a part of me.

Speaker 11 And, you know, there's still times these days where I'll have made a point on the pod or said something. And then he says something.
And I'm like, oh, yeah, he's still without knowing it.

Speaker 11 I'm like, we're still sort of channeling him without knowing it.

Speaker 14 Isn't that a good thing, though?

Speaker 14 I mean, isn't that, I mean, I guess what's funny coming from the other side is I would love to, you guys are talking about deprogramming yourself from the greatest political athlete of our lifetimes.

Speaker 14 I would love to like program myself.

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 13 I mean, that's very kind. I mean, he is, look, I, he's an extraordinary communicator, speaker, decent human being, like never yelled at me in nine years.

Speaker 13 It's kind of insane when you think of other people's political experiences. I do think it's valuable to be able to say, with the benefit of hindsight, these were mistakes.
You know what I mean?

Speaker 13 Like the war in Libya, not the best idea. Surging a bunch of extra troops to Afghanistan, given the results we saw in 2021, in hindsight, like was not the right thing to do.
Right.

Speaker 13 So I think just like being able to be candid about those things gives you credibility or just perspective to be smarter about stuff today.

Speaker 14 My conversation with Pod Save America's Tommy Beter and John Favreau continues right after the break. We'll be back in one minute.

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Speaker 14 What do you guys think about your own roles as sort of public figures? Like, it's clear that covering a public figure and Charlie Kirk, who paid with his life for being in the arena, was really

Speaker 14 shook everybody. It shook all of us.

Speaker 14 You guys didn't try to hide that experience of being shaken by seeing political violence.

Speaker 11 Yeah, it is,

Speaker 11 it's interesting. I think part of podcasting is, you know, we're in a studio, we're with each other, and you just talk all day and you don't really see yourself as a public figure all the time.

Speaker 11 And then something like that happens and you realize, like, you know, we do live shows and we go on the road and it makes you think twice.

Speaker 11 In terms of the public figure stuff, I just think about like, I feel like I have an obligation to people to, like I said, give them factual information and correct myself when I don't.

Speaker 11 And I feel like I have an obligation to use the platform I have to continue trying to persuade people who are with us to get involved and stay involved and persuade other people and people who may not be with us to change their minds.

Speaker 11 You know, and I wake up every day thinking about when I read the news, okay, well, how can I convince that person that this is a big deal and that we should do something about it who might not be completely on board?

Speaker 11 Like, what is the best way to persuade?

Speaker 14 I mean, I think that might be like the mental illness of being former government workers or political operatives, right? I never feel like I'm just reading the news.

Speaker 14 Like, I instill at my core a partisan. And now I don't even know a partisan what.
I guess a pro-democracy partisan, but I want to bring people along.

Speaker 14 And if I can find this little kernel that I think might bring them along, I want to make sure that that part is abundantly clear. Do you think that's a weakness

Speaker 14 in the media bubble that we should all have a stake in whether we remain,

Speaker 14 I mean, only in a democracy is the First Amendment, the First Amendment, and is it honored? Like, do you think the sort of old models of neutrality are outdated?

Speaker 11 Probably a little bit.

Speaker 13 I mean, I think there's real value to it.

Speaker 13 You know, I mean, I have so much respect for reporters who wake up every day and file like 700 FOIAs and, you know, like grind it out and call sources and bring the information that we then talk about.

Speaker 13 You know, and I always want to just be like honest about that and like have some reverence for the fact that our work and like punditry basically is built off the backs of reporters who are nonpartisan or like just the facts and trying to do that work.

Speaker 13 I do think there's space, though, in a broader media ecosystem for people that are partisan and who are activist.

Speaker 13 And in addition to thinking about the need to persuade people, part of what's always in my head is like, especially when I talk to younger people, it's like just reminding them that politics didn't always suck.

Speaker 13 It wasn't always about like one guy, like the worst person in the world upsetting you every day. Like it can be inspirational.

Speaker 14 It's getting farther and farther away.

Speaker 11 I know, but we can do good things.

Speaker 13 You can help people. You can find some core decency.
We can get back there. And just like, you know,

Speaker 13 Tim Miller once called us cloyingly optimistic or something along his life, but, you know, you need a little of that.

Speaker 11 Yeah. I think that we, I have come to appreciate the value of objective reporting.
even more since I've over the years.

Speaker 11 Like I think I was more of a media critic right after I got out of the White House, which I guess people in the White House, that's probably common.

Speaker 11 But over the years, I've become less of a media critic, especially for sort of straight news reporting, because we just desperately need that information now.

Speaker 11 And we need people in the country to trust that it is truthful and real. And that's obviously a huge problem.

Speaker 11 And I think if there weren't people who also felt comfortable offering opinion and analysis on television and everywhere else that we watch and consume news now, that would be a problem.

Speaker 11 But there is plenty. There's no shortage of pundits out there like us who are offering people's opinion.

Speaker 11 So I do think that people who work for the Times, The Post, CNN, wherever MSNBC, wherever it may be, like we really, really need some original reporting right now because people don't trust anything anymore.

Speaker 14 What do you think about when you look at your kids? Like my kid is old enough. Well, I have a teenager and I have a baby.
So I've got one who President Obama is the first person he knew as president.

Speaker 14 And when Trump won in 16, he said, but we still have President Obama, right? And it was, right, it was true. Like it was a transition.
I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 14 And then he was just too young for the first Trump years. But I do think like they might know kids who die of measles.
What do you think about as parents?

Speaker 13 I mean, it changes everything. It's completely cliche, but it does.
I mean, I have a two-year-old and a one-year-old.

Speaker 13 So after the Charlie Kirk assassination, I mean, I saw all these videos of, you know, him and his daughter and it just absolutely gutted me because I just imagined the loss that those kids were experiencing, that his wife was experiencing, what it would be like to be in his shoes.

Speaker 13 And that honestly drove my entire reaction. I just, frankly, was kind of, I understand the politics of it, but like to me, that was the thing that hit me first.

Speaker 13 In terms of how it influences politics, like it makes you rethink everything. Like, what are these kids going to study? What are these kids going to do for a living?

Speaker 13 What kind of country are they going to grow up in? The RFK stuff, like you, like it genuinely freaked me out.

Speaker 13 Like we had to have a conversation with our pediatrician because there was some measles outbreak. Like, should we move James's schedule up? Is that a bad idea? Is that unsafe?

Speaker 13 I know I have close family members that frankly have been swayed by the RFK kind of Maha anti-vax movement and the impact there.

Speaker 13 So, you know, it changes everything and it just ups the stakes of everything we do and talk about every day because I want them to grow up in this country too and feel safe and be healthy and have a a meaningful life ahead of them.

Speaker 11 I have a almost two-year-old and a very precocious five-year-old.

Speaker 14 I think in a cast, right?

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 11 Yeah. The younger one was in the cast.
The older one also just had a forehead injury. John's had a week.
Yeah, both of them have been the hospital the last couple of weeks.

Speaker 13 I overheard two calls from my desk.

Speaker 11 I'd be like, he's in the ER? Okay.

Speaker 11 Yeah.

Speaker 11 It was quite a week at our hospital. But Charlie, my eldest, is like just constantly asking questions.
He's at that age.

Speaker 11 And it is really challenging trying to explain what is going on in the world to a five-year-old who is starting to get it.

Speaker 11 And I have been, you know, we live in Los Angeles, the ice raids are everywhere. And I am like dreading the moment when he asks about that and he hasn't yet.

Speaker 11 But even, you know, he's very obsessed with the weather and storms. And so he's asking all about Hurricane Melissa that was hitting Jamaica.
And he's asking all about hurricanes and what happens.

Speaker 11 And he goes, well, if the people in Jamaica needed help, he's like, maybe they could come here. He's like, would we have them here? And I'm like, you know, in the past we would.

Speaker 11 But I'm like, we don't now. And he's like, why not? I'm like, Donald Trump doesn't really like offering people the chance to come here anymore.
He's like, well, why is that?

Speaker 11 And I'm like, you know, and I try to avoid too, being like, he's a bad person.

Speaker 11 He does bad things, right? Because I'm also cognizant of the fact that I want to raise kids who are.

Speaker 11 generous and kind and see like a different conception of what it means to be strong and what it means to love their country, you know, than what they're seeing from Donald Trump.

Speaker 11 So I I don't want to, I want to be like, oh, this, here's the orange man. He's awful.
But it's hard to explain why these people do the things they do and the decisions that they make.

Speaker 14 I think a lot about how is he doing all this, right? Like, how are their ICE agents fronting around LA disappearing people?

Speaker 14 Like, and some of it is the success of Republicans operationalizing the dehumanization. And what was promised to their voters was the worst of the worst would be deported.

Speaker 14 People who would commit violent crimes, it takes them like 20 minutes to do much, much, much more than that.

Speaker 14 And I wonder, is rehumanization, is making sure that people realize these aren't the worst of the worst. If it were, we'd hear all about it.

Speaker 14 I mean, Trump doesn't do anything secretly, not even the bad things. That's why we know about the strikes, but he definitely doesn't do anything good in secret.

Speaker 14 I mean, there would be like show deportations if they really were the worst.

Speaker 14 We would all know about it. How do you make people

Speaker 14 care about, or how do you make more people care? How do you persuade the people who are indifferent to one, understand the facts that these are not the worst of the worst?

Speaker 14 How do you make people care at a human level about the things that are happening?

Speaker 13 I think that's where the individual stories are so important. When Andre Hernandez Romero was sent to Sukkot.

Speaker 13 And we saw the images and heard the story about him crying for his mom and getting his head shaved and slapped and beaten, and then saw photos of this man who was an openly gay makeup artist.

Speaker 13 And we were told that he was in a gang because he had a tattoo. I think that just like laid bare how idiotic and wrong and immoral and frankly evil that policy was.
I mean, it shook people.

Speaker 13 And I think you've seen similar things recently.

Speaker 13 Like when a bunch of ICE agents in Chicago shot a priest who was asking them to pray in the head with a pepper ball, you know, like there's no explaining that. There's no spinning that away.

Speaker 13 Trisha McLaughlin can,

Speaker 13 you know, lie and, you know, go on TV and say whatever nonsense.

Speaker 13 But when ICE is cracking the ribs of a 60-year-old man who's just trying to drive home from a jog, people, when they hear that story, know what's wrong.

Speaker 13 I think the statistics just wash over your head and no one cares or under contextualize them. It's these individual stories that are powerful.

Speaker 13 And that's where I think you come in, we come in, the media comes in, just lifting these things up so it gets people.

Speaker 11 But I also think Democratic leaders have to not be afraid to talk about this. And I get the polling.
I have been steeped in it. I know the immigration polling.
I know the politics of immigration.

Speaker 11 I know how difficult it is. But the advice from your median democratic strategist Holster remains, you know, it's not our best issue and cost of living is.
And that's what more people care about.

Speaker 11 And I think that is true in a period of normal politics. And I think we are not in a period of normal politics anymore.
And rehumanization is actually

Speaker 11 that needs to be a goal of ours now because

Speaker 11 we are dealing with an authoritarian threat where they are trying to dehumanize people.

Speaker 11 Look, there is a difference between people saying, I support tighter border security, more asylum restrictions, no public benefits at all for non-citizens.

Speaker 11 Like I'm not surprised that those things are popular.

Speaker 11 Those things are not, do you support masked armed federal agents in the street shooting pepper balls at priests, breaking people's ribs and disappearing people.

Speaker 11 And I get that there's not a lot of research about those polling questions because it hasn't happened in the country before.

Speaker 11 So, like, we're sort of operating as if it's normal times and it's not.

Speaker 11 And I do think that, like, if the polling and the strategy started reflecting what's actually happening, I think you would see that more people would be appalled by this if you asked them.

Speaker 11 And then maybe that would give Democratic politicians a little bit more courage to talk about these issues just as much as they talk about healthcare and other really important cost of living issues.

Speaker 14 I guess my last question is:

Speaker 14 Are you optimistic? And if you are, of what's happening? Like, how do you think this ends?

Speaker 13 I don't feel that optimistic. I can't lie to you.
It's a little worrisome. I'm very concerned about the weaponization of the Justice Department.

Speaker 13 I'm very worried about the people in charge of election security and integrity and what they're planning to do and the possibility of the Voting Rights Act getting thrown out and, you know, just...

Speaker 13 Republicans gerrymandering a bunch of districts to hell that are currently represented by Democrats. I think, though, like the only way out is through.

Speaker 13 And the only way out is all of us coming together, uniting, putting away the kind of intra-democratic party or intra-pro-democracy factionalism that can sometimes spill out, right?

Speaker 13 Like we all know the frustrating feeling of the fact that the 2016 Democratic primary has never ended. We are still fighting about it today.
Those scars are deep and lasting and it is bad.

Speaker 13 But I think when you look around the world at the way authoritarian movements are defeated, it's by creating the biggest coalition possible and those people organizing and marching and hitting the streets.

Speaker 13 And the No Kings protests was a start of that, but we got to keep it up.

Speaker 11 Yeah, I think there's only two choices, give up and keep fighting. And choosing to give up sort of guarantees, if enough people do it, that the worst outcome happens.

Speaker 11 And it also means that if you give up on this, that other people are making decisions that are going to affect your life and you're not even part of that.

Speaker 11 And fighting gives you a chance and it has throughout history.

Speaker 11 And so it's taken me 44 years now to understand the cliche that you're supposed to take one day at a time and sort of like live in the present but that is what i've been trying to do especially in the second trump term is not doom about the future not dream about the future but basically just say we are going to get through each day we are going to try to convince more people persuade more people and we're going to see what happens and you know like tommy said you go out to no kings and you see a bunch of other people and you're like okay we're not alone this is good You know, and I think that building that muscle that's going to sustain us beyond just election to election, because I think we are past just going from cycle to cycle right now.

Speaker 11 What will get us out of this is a movement and a movement that is sustained, that is fearless, and that is not going to back down.

Speaker 11 And I think that building that movement is probably going to take way more than just one election cycle, even a presidential cycle.

Speaker 11 So I think we're all in it for the long haul, but I think that if we keep fighting, that there's a, there's a chance we can get out of this.

Speaker 14 i think the world of everything you guys create and i'm so honored that you had time to talk to me today thank you so much thank you for having us feel the same about you thank you so much for having us on thank you guys thanks take care

Speaker 14 Before we wrap up, I wanted to share that Crooked Con is happening. It's a gathering of the, quote, smartest organizers and least annoying politicians.

Speaker 14 They're all strategizing, debating, and commiserating about where we go from here. It's happening November 6th and 7th in Washington DC and tickets are on sale right now.

Speaker 14 Thank you so much for listening to The Best People. You can subscribe to MSNBC Premium on Apple Podcasts to get this and other MSNBC podcasts ad-free.

Speaker 14 You will also get early access and exclusive bonus content. All episodes of the podcast are also available on YouTube.
Visit msnbc.com slash the bestpeople to watch.

Speaker 14 The best people is produced by Vicki Vergalina and our senior producer Lisa Ferry. Our associate producer is Rana Shabazzi.

Speaker 14 Our audio engineer is Bob Mallory and Katie Lau is our senior manager of audio production. Pat Berkey is the senior executive producer of Deadline White House.

Speaker 14 Greg Gold is the executive producer of Content Strategy. Aisha Turner is the executive producer of audio.
And Madeline Herringer is senior vice president in charge of audio, digital, and long form.

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