Is the MAGA cult turning on their king?

Hey, everybody, and welcome back to the Find Out podcast, episode 26.

We thought that we were only going to talk about Jeffrey Epstein for one episode, but Donald Trump seems to be getting deeper and deeper in trouble with his base, and it is the kind of the top story right now.

So, we're going to talk a little bit about that, also a little bit about his mental decline and also some weird makeup on his hands and things like that, and what this means for Democrats in 2026 and beyond.

So, guys,

this morning, Donald Trump actually lashed out at MAGA, or he didn't say MAGA, but it lashed out for the first time at people who believed the quote-unquote Jeffrey Epstein hoax, in his words, which is really, I guess I should say, oh, that's Rich.

Unfortunately, he's not with us, but

his name lives on today.

He's just traveling today.

That's why he's not here.

But

the guy that drove this story more than anybody, it would be sort of like him saying that the Obama birth certificate stuff was a hoax when he was the one

perpetrating that for so many years.

But we have never seen Donald Trump lash out at his own supporters before.

And there are some reports that internally they are freaking out, him in particular, because he doesn't know what to do.

We don't actually know if there is a list or if he's lying about a list to get elected or if he's on the list.

So it's a really fascinating moment to be watching all of this unfold, to see him attack his supporters for the first time.

I'm enjoying it.

Oh, oh, I love it.

I'm deeply enjoying it.

So Luke, I'm going to ask you first, does this, is this, do you think that this is a

split that

can't be healed?

Or will they just fall back in line whenever he says some bullshit?

Once the check clears, they'll be, uh, they'll be back in line, especially like, fuck, Charlie Kirk, they got his ass on camera.

I think it was the 11th of July, talking publicly about how they need to release the Epstein list four days later.

No, three days later, on his fucking show.

I'm done talking about Epstein now.

I trust my people in the administration.

They'll get it sorted out.

The check must have fucking cleared because that would be ridiculous.

ridiculous.

Between those two points, Charlie Kirk also had Steve Bannon, convicted felon,

up on stage with him at Turning Point USA, the conference where they, you know, try and brainwash college-age young white men.

Um,

and they talked about how Matt Gates should be appointed as a special prosecutor,

a pedophile who everyone in Congress knows is a pedophile

who has

who had sex with

He was using drugs with children.

And MAGA is so excited about the idea of Matt Gates coming back into the game.

The cognitive dissonance is

never fails to impress me.

It is.

tremendous.

I could not have made this up, but here we are.

We have two of the most influential propagandists from MAGA, Charlie Kirk and Steve Bannon, talking about how a pedophile should investigate the pedophiles.

I

think that

the logic behind this is because they know that Matt Gates will do

everything that he can to make sure that he and other Republicans like Donald Trump are not proven to be pedophiles.

Put this people in control.

That's the other thing.

I still think the craziest fucking cope I've seen about it on the internet is

maybe Donald Trump did fuck a child, but we as Christians should forgive him.

I was speechless, and I've seen it period.

That's not surprising at all, but this is what I'm saying.

I mean, it's shocking, but not surprising, right?

No, yeah, this is what they do, man.

I mean, like, I don't, to me, like, I really do.

Like, I know for a lot of people, it's not, but for a lot of people, they just enjoy the trolling element of this.

Like, they really love the fact that they're just like, well, you know, I know it's a pedophile thing, so let's put a pedophile up there.

Like deep down, a lot of the, especially the men that go along with this, they just think it's funny.

Like they just don't get the seriousness of it.

Like there's definitely people who want Mad Gates in there because they're horrendous, but the right has become like a fucking army of trolls.

That's what they are.

Yeah, it's

nothing more than the troll in my mind.

Yeah, it's owning the libs, right?

I mean, sometimes you see this, and you could even see this when you're arguing with your friends on Facebook or wherever about this, right?

Like a lot of times they just want to see the left suffer or complain or cry or whatever it is,

and that is their like political ethos.

And it's a really weird thing, but I think it goes

to a deeper problem where I think they

align liberals and progressives with elites and their lot in life.

And so they're just like, I just want to tear it all down.

But it is really, really fascinating, Chris, as you said, that like they want to put a, you know,

I guess I have to say alleged

pedophile in charge of investigating other alleged pedophiles,

which

seems like a bit of a conflict of interest to me, but

it does.

Trump's not winning this messaging war right now.

No,

he's in a lot of trouble, I think.

I mean, like, so let's think about it.

Do we think that the list exists and he's on it?

Or do we think that maybe they made this shit up and now they're scrambling because they can't get out of it?

Because if I'm Trump and I have the Epstein list, all I would do is go, yeah, I'll really sit and redact myself from it.

The end.

Like, that's it.

Yeah, but is there one black sharpie space, one name?

Well, I mean, you could do it artfully, but like, you know, if I'm Trump, he's, this is his game.

Like, this, he does his shit all the time.

Why would this be any different?

Like, that's why I'm sitting here a little skeptical.

Like, why is he not doing that?

And I imagine that the truth is, if he's on the list, that it's about, oh, there's somebody else who would come out that would out me.

Maybe, but, like, even then, all he's got to do is go, they're full of shit.

And everybody go, yeah, you're full of shit.

And that's it.

Like, he's gotten away with lies a trillion times.

Why not this time?

That's what I'm saying.

Well, did you see that

Jelaine Maxwell is willing to testify in front of Congress?

I didn't see that.

Yeah, she's willing to testify as to what the content of the list is or like

frequent clients were.

And yeah.

My prediction is.

She's angling for a pardon.

Yeah, she's angling for a fucking pardon.

That was where I was going with it.

100%.

So she's got a 20-year sentence, right?

Yeah.

Coincidentally, she's going to come up and say everybody except Trump and then

fucking six months later, there'll be a pardon involved.

Yeah.

I don't know.

It just seems like there's ways to wiggle out and he's just not doing it.

I'm like, why is he not doing this?

It's just.

That's why I, I mean, I don't know, obviously.

I mean, there was a vote in Congress yesterday and every, and there was a vote to release the Epstein list.

Every single Republican voted no, and every single, or maybe one,

I know Tom Massey is working on a bill with RoConna right now for an Epstein list.

list.

So maybe they're waiting for that.

But pretty much almost all Republicans voted against it and all Democrats voted for it.

Right.

But I didn't hear a lot of like it exists or it doesn't exist.

And I don't know the answer to that.

I mean, Pam Bondi, the attorney general, said she had it on her desk.

Right.

But I tend to think that

it doesn't exist because Trump is,

if anything, he's a survivor.

Yes.

And that is a really dangerous game to be playing.

Because what would have precluded somebody, you know in the Biden administration, for example, for releasing it

to show, I mean, why wouldn't they have done that?

And why wouldn't you have

had transparency around a pedophile sex ring?

But I think he, I, I don't know.

There's obviously names that haven't been talked about because there's testimony that's been behind closed doors.

Right.

But it seems to me he's just gotten caught, potentially got caught in a lie.

And he doesn't know how to tell them that he lied to them for their votes.

I think the bot, like I thought the same thing.

I was like, why didn't somebody in the Biden administration do it?

But then you get into like, well, Bill Clinton's probably in the list.

And there's a bunch of like high-value Democrats that will also be.

So like, it's like, that's probably why, but I don't know.

I mean, I'm, yeah, I really don't know.

It's, it's one of those things where like the murkiness is really fucking annoying.

And I just want to know what the truth is.

I, I don't think there's a list.

I, I think that, you know, it, what

the biggest problem for Trump here is this is the type of thing that breaks people's faith.

Like, yeah, we fucking believe that some, when you believe that God exists and you believe it, and it becomes part of your, your personality and who you are and how you live, right?

That's what this idea that Democrats are pedophiles dating back to the Pizzagate conspiracy theories, you know, amplified by alt-right figures like Jack Bisobiac,

you know, from the

emails that were hacked from

Anthony Weiner, you know, back in 2015, 2016, right?

This is 10 years of conspiracy theories based on the idea that children are being victimized and that there's a massive cabal of evil people.

Again, they've been promoting the idea that it's all Democrats,

that they've been,

you know, predators towards children and that this is the thing.

This is what

the prophets have been saying is going to happen.

That Donald Trump is going, you know, they believe this is all godlike stuff, right?

The whole QAnon thing, it's as much of a cult as it is anything.

They believe that like there is this divine prophecy that Donald Trump is going to come and blow this whole thing up.

And for this

thing to not exist, it is going to break their spirits.

And that's not like, I don't want to oversimplify it and make it sound like, oh, MAGA's just going to walk away from Trump.

Like I said last episode, I think, you know, they're going to pay attention to ICE raids instead.

But this will get at the core of who they are as people.

And

this will like fuck up their belief systems in all sorts of aspects of their lives.

It's going to go far beyond like the pedophilia obsession that they've had for a decade.

I think it's right.

And part of it, this is the double-edged sword of having your own information apparatus and that they've pumped in so much bullshit.

And everybody from Charlie Kirk to Ben Shapiro to

Bannon and all of these guys have been talking Epstein, Epstein, Epstein, Epstein, Epstein.

Even people that I knew growing up that are not politically inclined know about the Jeffrey Epstein list.

Like they are captivated by it because, again, as you said, Chris, like it plays into this narrative that the elites are out to get them.

But all of a sudden, in the last week, many of them, as we, as Luke, you pointed out, have stopped talking about it.

You know, Charlie Kirk says, I'm going to trust not the people in the government that I know, my friends.

My friends.

Very specific verbiage.

And he said he had a phone call with Trump.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

And the thing is, but like the challenge is that this is one of their core, like you said, their core values, which is a weird thing to have as a core value, but they do.

And then all of a sudden it turns out that this rich billionaire has been lying to them and manipulating them for a decade.

And that is a, I don't think it breaks all of them, but if you lose 10, 20% of the mega base, you don't win anymore.

No, you're done at that point.

But, like, I guess the question I have is: I kind of go back to QAnon, because QAnon has made a million different estimations of what was going to happen, and it was almost always wrong, and it was almost always disproven.

And they always found a way to make it not a problem.

Right.

So, like, why is this any different?

That's, I guess, my main question is: like, they just, that's their MO.

Like, when they hit a wall with their theories and the truth shows up, they go, well, let's just take a left, turn around, and find another wall to hit later down the line.

Like, they don't just lay there play dead.

You know, that's a very good question.

So, the

idea, again, going back to this being like a prophecy type of thing,

back in the day,

this mysterious figure would drop what they would call cue drops.

It would be like these coded messages that could mean fucking anything.

It was like no stradamis in your fucking tabloid newspaper.

When that, I don't know if that's even still a thing, right?

It was just like you could read anything into this crazy rambling shit.

And when people made predictions, it was these like QAnon influencers were,

you know, yoga moms and shit who got radicalized during COVID, right?

They were like kind of nobodies, kind of people who came out of nowhere, like people who built an audience in the QAnon world, but prior to that, had never had a public platform with a few exceptions.

There are guys like General Flynn,

again, who I'm Facebook friends with because he's a fucking moron.

He is writing the longest missives right now, like directly talking to Donald Trump.

Basically, in so many words, he's saying, like, Flynn has put himself on the line here.

He has been, he's, he's not anonymous Q, right?

He has been the guy who's been hosting these QAnon conferences.

He's been the guy that QAnon has believed is like this Christ-like figure who comes and

raises an army for the end times right he's and again flynn is this weird religious figure both in the qannon movement and in his own head yeah flynn doesn't know how to react other than to beg trump to release the list and and flynn is still communicating to his followers the most diehard of the q annon you know few tens of thousands of people at this point are are like really clued into everything that general flynn says.

And

he knows like his reputation is on the line too.

He loses all of the grifting power if no one believes in the Jeffrey Epstein shit anymore.

Like Flynn loses credibility, not just Trump.

I think the religious comparison is the right one.

And Zach, you're asking like why I this isn't going to be perfect, but I'm going to try this here.

But, you know, the Epstein list and the Epstein lore is kind of like the, is kind of like the Bible of that alt-right crew.

It's the core.

So, like, you know, religious people have said that there's, you know, that the Bible is against gay marriage.

Of course, it's not.

Those things they can kind of dismiss, right?

The edge things.

But if you basically said that the Bible was just, was fake, it would rock Christianity to its core.

And I think that that's obviously a more severe case.

But I think for these guys, like that,

QAnon has all been based on this mythical elites and cabals plotting against regular people to keep them down.

And then if you eliminate the core of that, then like, it's not just pulling on a string, the whole ball of yarn kind of comes out because then it's like, if we don't have the base belief, then what are we doing here?

Which is, of course, grifting, as Chris said.

Like these guys are taking advantage of people who are desperate for a narrative around why their lives are the way they are.

And it's it's much easier for, to go after those people and be like, you know, subscribe to my this for $15 a month and I'll send you all of the, you know, the, the deal from a two-star general, whatever he was.

And it's a very powerful narrative for people who are looking for an answer that they don't have.

And I think that

that's starting to blow up in their faces a lot later than it should have.

But you know, I'm still confused, too, about how these people didn't think that Trump was on the list when the connection to Epstein was so public.

Like it wasn't like we're making it up.

There's videos and pictures, and he knew it.

Like, all the shit was.

It's AI.

It's AI.

But, like, that's the thing.

I don't, like, all this doesn't make sense.

Like, I guess it's because I'm so just not one of those people.

So, I just, like, their psychology is just so confusing to me.

But all of this combined makes no fucking sense to me.

And it's like watching it fall apart.

I think the funny part is that, like, it makes no sense watching it fall apart too.

Like, the whole thing is just this big, confusing cluster.

Wait, are you, wait, are you saying that it is ridiculous to suggest that John F.

Kennedy Jr.

has been in hiding all of this time and he essentially did a 180 on all of his political beliefs, clearly had the worst plastic surgery that anybody has ever had in history because the guy who runs around proclaiming to be him looks absolutely nothing like him.

He's not even the same fucking height.

And they are like, and he goes to these events.

So you have to.

You have to put it in that perspective.

But your answer, the answer, and this, I am going to call it genius, but maybe it's luck of Donald Trump is that he managed to tell his entire base that everything that the media says is fake.

Yeah.

So then

none of that shit is real.

They just deflect.

Like, oh, those photos with Epstein are doctored or, oh, those were at some random fancy event and it was just a photo op.

They don't believe anything that is said about him.

Yeah.

Okay.

So question.

Yeah.

Suppose the Epstein list is real.

Who would be a person that would be on it that would shock you to your fucking core because i've got one that is so stephen king has been off twitter for like

years

off but in the last author stephen king proud anti-trumper but in the last like and maynor yeah and maynor in the last two months he's gotten active again on twitter doing like primarily trolling but so two days ago he made a tweet that said yes the epstein list is real just as real as santa claus and the easter bunny

which is that kind of an odd thing to say.

And then he doubled down on it yesterday and was like, boy, I really triggered some people with that Epstein thing.

And then there's some other second part to it.

But it was like, if he's on that list, it will ruin him for me forever.

I've read every fucking book he's ever written.

It's fucking great.

But that would ruin him for me.

I mean, that's really it, though.

Like the collateral damage of the list, I think, is the reason why there's all this murkiness around it.

And why, if it does exist, the Biden administration did nothing with it and why the Trump administration really can't do anything with it.

There's just,

it's not like, because it's not like they set it up where it's all these Democrats.

It's just one chunk of types.

It's all.

It's a fucking nuclear option.

Right.

It really is.

And it's just like so dangerous to do this.

I got two.

I got two.

The first is Mr.

Rogers.

That would be awful.

If that, if he is on the list, I don't really want to go on.

Millions of childhoods.

Childhoods are ruined.

Yeah.

All the amazing stories.

Like even in the late 60s, early 70s, he had an episode where he and

a black police officer put their feet in a pool together, like all this stuff.

Like, he's just an amazing human being, right?

So, like, of course, he's not, but like, it would be crazy.

The other one, Tom Hanks.

Oh, Tom Hanks is up there for me, too.

That would ruin him for me.

That would be, that would be bad.

I love Tom Hanks.

I mean, I don't know how to answer this hypothetical to anyone who's on the list.

Well, yeah, that ruins anybody.

You're right.

You're right.

Pick them like you're amazing person.

Somebody you look up to.

Oh, man.

Obama.

I'll have one.

Yeah.

Oh, Obama.

Yeah, that would be bad.

100%.

Zach, what about you?

I got nobody, man.

Like, I don't know.

Zach doesn't have any pure role models.

He thinks everyone's fucked.

It's the Republican in him.

Yeah.

I really don't.

I got another one.

Another one that would be bad is this is going back a little ways, but Paul McCartney, that would be bad.

That would be bad.

Yeah.

Pretty pure.

I mean, for one of the most famous people in the world, it's like generally considered one of the nicest, too.

And so that would, that would be bad.

Mr.

Rogers, I should probably just stick with Mr.

Rogers because I don't know.

Sam Jackson is on there for me, too.

Oh, yeah.

That would be sad.

That would be sad.

It's got a history of planes.

Sequel?

Oh, God.

I actually, by the way, I saw that movie in the theater and when it came up, because this is Snakes on a Plane, for those you don't know.

Yeah.

And it's a horrible movie, but like the marketing around it was so genius because they just leaned into the terrible.

And I watched it in Boston and it was like an event.

People were just like screaming and yelling.

It was just really funny to do.

So yeah, when you have a pile of shit movie, do that and you lean into your channel.

You have to lean into it.

Yeah, I think that was the point for the beginning.

I mean, it's pretty smart.

So, on a serious note,

let's kind of talk about why this whole conspiracy theory grew and why the right uses it.

If you poll Democrats, if you poll progressives, people who are against the death penalty, what do they think should happen to convicted pedophiles?

There is a spike in people being like, I am very against the death penalty, but right.

So

there is this recognition among these propagandists that the idea of pedophilia evokes really, really strong emotions,

anger primarily, and

the desire to protect the innocent.

So this whole thing has been deliberately used precisely because the propagandists understand that it's going to break into not just the Republicans, it's going to break into other people too.

That's why the Epstein list is

not just something.

There are a thousand conspiracy theories that none of you will ever hear of because you don't spend your time in the right-wing circles that I have to for my.

Special episode, Chris teaches us all about the craziest part of the world.

That would be theory.

I would love it.

This is the one.

This is the conspiracy theory that, like, really, really gets over there.

And it has attracted a lot of legitimate attention.

I mean, that's why we're talking about it.

Yeah, it's on fucking national news everywhere.

And full disclosure for our listeners: one of the reasons that we decided to talk about Epstein today is because we saw a 30% increase in

this past episode in terms of engagement.

People on, and we don't have MAGA listeners, people want to hear hear about this because they don't, it doesn't matter what their politics are.

What Epstein did was something that offends all of our humanity, and we're all angry about it.

Yeah.

And we want something to be done about it.

Yeah, I think they also are watching because they want to watch Trump fall apart.

Yeah.

And it has the added bonus for us where at this point, you know, the victims are safe from the primary predator and nothing but good things can happen in terms of justice being meted out as

more information is released.

But I wanted to like really crystallize this thing that like the idea that there are pedophiles makes people violent.

Yes.

And

that is like something that is worrisome.

That is something that has been used like a cudgel.

by Trump and his people for a decade.

And now they're finding that, oh, this shit bounces back.

We're about to get it.

I mean, pedophilic, even when you're a, when you're a pedophile and you go to prison, like you're instantly like the shittiest person in the prison.

Like it's, it's across the, you go to the bottom rung of society, even they are at the bottom rung of the bottom rung.

So no question.

Well, I think the other part about the bump in viewers, which thank you very much for listening.

Also, thank you very much.

Yes.

Is

that people, there have been so, because this is such a clickbaity society.

There have been so many times when people are like, Trump is done.

Trump's finally, you know, finally met his, you know, and there's all these clickbaity headlines from left-leaning sites that are trying to make money.

And so they do these things because it works.

And so people are just like,

is this real?

Like, is it a thing?

And like, I don't think, I don't think we are saying yes or no.

I think we're saying maybe.

I think today's escalation from Trump was, I was surprised that he said he didn't really want the support of anybody that

believes the Jeffrey Epstein thing.

And I'm like, that's, dude, that's like your entire base.

Like, what are you doing?

And, you know, this is already a group of people who do not tend to vote if Donald Trump's name is not on the list.

Yes.

Like this, I got to think that Mike Johnson in the House, the House Speaker, is sitting here like losing his absolute mind because they were already, what, they have a five-seat majority, I think.

They were already in a world of hurt.

next year, but like this, and I actually, if I'm John Thune as well, I'm like, oh, God, because, you know, even though like Susan Collins is quote unquote moderate, she's really not, but like Maine has a lot of these like Epstein like people who are already mistrustful of her.

They may just not, they just might just say, fuck it, I don't care about anybody.

I'm not voting next year.

And that is a real problem for them.

Oh, yeah.

It's an interesting blind spot, too, because like Trump, Trump's base is the group that pushed this forward, but Trump didn't really push this forward because it's bad for him.

Like he doesn't want to deal with this conversation.

Like Trump never really talked about Epstein ever.

Like that he avoided this conversation for as long as he could.

It was his following that liked this story.

But he, like, I could be wrong.

I never saw it.

I never saw Trump come out and be like, the Democrats are all, you know, on the Epstein list.

Like, he never, I don't think he ever perpetuated this once because I think he wanted to stay as far away from it as possible.

And now he's kind of just getting fucked by circumstance and he's just

Don Jr.

really leaned into it a lot.

He did.

You know, yeah, Don Jr., but he's a fucking moron.

Don Jr.'s the dumb as fuck.

Yeah.

I'm sure his dad's in there like shut up.

Shut the poor man.

It's like the poor man's succession right with that family oh 100

100 i can't watch right but i'm not a big fan either

oh i love it oh i love it they're all

in the yard throw them off a building or about others you guys watch any of ozark yeah i watched the first season but then i didn't all right i watched all of it i you know

i have a lot to say about it for another episode i'm a justified guy yeah justified oh i haven't watched that i need to watch it i love justified okay uh well oh god i've completely lost my train of thought thought now uh you got some we do a hard pivot let me let me just go

let's go

sure there's no rules so we recently had a guest on the show who is running in a special election and she's a real hard pivot real hard pivot she was trounced she's not on the list you know uh deja fox 25 year old um activist who was on our show just a few weeks ago was getting all sorts of earned media, right?

Yes, she knows how to use social media better than anyone else in the race.

Most people outside of Arizona probably have no idea.

You couldn't name a single other candidate in the race, right?

Nationally, she had this huge name recognition advantage.

You know, I listened to her talk for a half hour on her show, and

I thought she was great, thought she was really talented.

But the people of Arizona in her district, what, District 9?

7, 7.

District 7, they did not think so.

What were the numbers?

She lost like 3 to 15.

She was

62 21 then 13 for the next per 11 for the next

it's like a 40 point win so why why did that happen so i have a i have an answer to this um

one special election elections are funny and you really only get generally speaking you get the core democrats that are really tuned in really plugged in and know what's going on because it's just like a weird day a weird like all this stuff Also, she was running against the daughter of the most well-known politician in that district, who was Raul Grajalva, who was in Congress for about 3 billion years and passed away last fall.

So that name was already on there.

And she was actually a known quantity too, because she was on the whatever the county is there, school board, maybe even the chair of the school board.

So she was a known quantity.

There was also another candidate,

Daniel Hernandez, who I know a little bit.

He's a great dude.

He was one of Gabby Gifford's staffers on the day that she got shot in Tucson, and I think actually was the one that was like holding her as she was on the ground.

So there was a bit of a split of all of that.

I actually think that a 25-year-old that had no real political background besides, you know, she did yell at Jeff Flake about his horrible position on abortion, which is a brave thing to do for a 16-year-old, but like really wasn't an unknown quantity.

Getting 20%, 21% in special election, I don't actually think it's terrible.

I also think that a lot of her attention came in the last few days, and it's just too late at that point.

Like there was a political article yesterday, like, it's just too late.

And even though she did get all of that earned media, everyone in that county or in that district, everyone knows the name Grahalva.

Right.

And the other element is that Grahalva had almost the exact same platform as Deja Fox did.

Like they're both hyper-progressive, like really far left.

Like the only difference between the two was what Deja, I think, intelligently leaned into was the establishment versus you know, coming from literally like lived experience that, you know, she needed the things that she wants to provide when she was young.

That's cool.

But to me, like the bummer of it was like, in my head, I thought that narrative would work better.

Like people coming from like, I lived this, I need X, Y, and Z because people who are living this now, it'll help them.

I thought that would play a lot better, and it just didn't at all.

But, you know, that's how it goes.

This is why, this is why

there are essentially

legacy candidates that like if their parents ran or their mom or dad, they come in because name ID in a lot of these races is

so important,

especially because like the overwhelming majority of people who vote in specials are older.

And so they've got that, they're not the 25-year-olds.

There's not the Bemdani situation where pretty much everybody he was running against was either a no-namer or Cuomos.

Or Cuomo.

And so like he had a lane.

And also he could a mayor's race is different.

Also, there's ranked choice and all those things.

But like, I think it's just really, really hard.

But, and she did lose by a ton, don't get me wrong.

But like, I still think that that showing is not no, it's not terrible.

I'm sure she's disappointed, but like, sure, sure.

I think it could have been worse.

I think she did a great job.

I think, like, I'll just say this, regardless of win or lose, I think she's got a crazy future in politics.

Like, she was so good when she was on the show.

I was really impressed.

Like, I just, I think, like, hopefully, this doesn't,

and I don't think it will.

I don't think this will like push her off the path in any way.

I think it'll probably make her even go harder down the path.

So, I hope she does because she's super smart, good ideas, great communicator, understands social, like all the things you need to be successful.

She's got it.

So, she just got to keep going.

So, I do think it's worth mentioning since we're talking about,

you know, Mdani, Politico, and Cuomo, uh, that one of our co-hosts here

has the quote of the day.

I love it.

Do we have it?

Can we read quite the honor?

I'd have to hold on.

I have it.

I got it.

Lewis get it.

You got it.

You want to read it?

Wait, no, I don't.

Oh, okay.

I thought I did.

It was a good quote.

My response to it was, oh, that's going to make Cuomo's people.

So, for context, so

former Governor Cuomo announced that he was running as an independent yesterday or the day before.

And he put out this video where he's in this short-sleeved shirt that he'd clearly never worn before and did this direct-to-camera video and was saying, oh, I'm going to, you know, in this race, I've changed the team and I've got,

you know, I'm going to do more on digital and da-da-da-da.

So like Politico reached out to me because I worked for Governor Cuomo from 2016 to 2018.

And I am no longer supporting him and I'm supporting Mamdani, but they asked me about it.

And I said, uh,

there's actually a longer quote, but the quote of the day is, you can't fake this stuff.

And just sitting in a park without a suit on doesn't solve your authenticity problem.

And this is at the core of what I was, what the core, well, the core of what I was saying was that there are still candidates out there that think that digital will solve their problems if they just do digital, meaning social media and videos.

And it's like, no, it's the same with like a TV ad.

It's just like, you know, Mimdani, the reason that that worked is that he had an authentic, there's a longer quote in the article, if you go read it, that where I talk more about it, where it's like, Mimdani, first of all, is a digital native because he's 33 years old, but also like he's very good on camera.

He's, and he's very authentic.

Like he does,

and he has ideas.

Like he's talking about these ideas.

I mean, he did this, and this is probably only going to be relevant to the New York City crowd, but he did a video on why halal food is so expensive now.

And he tied it to the fact that you can't get a, you cannot get a license to be a food truck in New York without waiting years.

So what happens is that people do it illegally and then there's all this thing and then the prices get all screwed.

He's like, I want to, you know, he's like, I want to make halal $7 again because that's what it used to be.

And this genius, like, and people in New York City understand that because pretty much everyone in New York City has stopped at one of those trucks and has noticed the prices go up.

But Cuomo just going on and being like, hi, everybody,

kind of like my intro,

and like saying, I'm going to be different after being governor for, what was it, 10, 12 years?

It's just rings hollow.

And so, yes, I'm not going to be able to do that.

What are the lessons here?

Like, is our, should we expect what happened to Deja Fox to happen to Mamdani because Cuomo has greater name recognition than anyone in New York State?

No, because,

you know, legacy candidates.

Yeah.

The man's, he was the governor, but his father was also the governor as well.

Right.

Well, but then the bunch of things happened to lead him why he's not governor anymore, right?

Like, you know,

sexual harassment allegations.

And

then resigning and then coming back and not really having, I mean, his platform was, I'm going to make the city more affordable.

Right.

How?

I'm going to add more police.

Not very popular in New York City, particularly with Democrats.

Yes.

And

so it's a mixture, right?

And like, you know, if he had, you know, if he had managed to keep his highs from COVID and continue on, first of all, he'd either be governor or he would have, you know, or he would have run for president.

Yeah.

You know, but like, it's a, there's a lot of things, right?

But like the point of what I was saying was that social is not, it's not a, it's, it's not just like you turn it on and everything.

Yeah, you don't just check a box.

Right.

But I don't, I think they're very different because he has a long track record that a lot of people are not happy with.

Some, some love it, a lot don't.

And he really didn't live in New York City until he ran.

Let's be honest.

And,

you know, his, he doesn't do retail politics.

He doesn't engage with people.

He's very like, you know, he's of that age.

And, you know, he put out a video the other day of him like jump-starting some guy's car, and it was like very clearly scripted.

It was like, I mean, Dan Pfeiffer on Crooked was like destroying it.

I just, I don't want to be the only one criticizing.

Don't fucking kidding me.

Uh, but, but, but, um, no, it's just, it's the, they just missed it.

They just completely missed why Mandani is

as popular as he is.

And Deja, you know, Deja is younger.

She is eight years younger.

He was a two-term assembly member, so he could get around some of that.

But I think the thing that, that i

what i really respect about deja and i think how she's going to have more impact is i think people are going to look at her and there's the woman kate uh something in illinois uh

or something i don't know her last name is hard to pronounce that it's showing that how

it is showing young people that they can run for office and i love that um and i think we need more of that because it also makes our candidates better to win if there's a competitive primary yeah i definitely think that's true i really hope that this cuomo thing doesn't fuck over mamdani too because he really needs to win.

It won't.

He will win.

Who's going to win style?

Tim's going on record right now.

Is it going to be the former cop or is it going to be Cuomo?

Well,

don't forget, Eric Adams is in this race as well.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And you've got, and then you've got Curtis Sleewa, who is

Guardian Angels or something.

Fucking weirdo.

He's in it just for the attention, and everybody knows that.

But that's why they're trying to get him out.

He's like, you're going to have to put, he literally said, you're going to have to put me in a pine box before I jump out of this race because he loves the attention.

He runs around with a red jacket and a beret.

I mean, come on.

And then there's Jim Walden, who's like a financier guy.

So like there's four people running against Mimdani to his right.

Like there's just,

there's not enough.

Now, Staten Island.

Yeah, he'll win Sten.

Toma could win Staten Island, but like Mamdani's going to win Brooklyn, which is a hell of a lot bigger than Staten Island.

Yeah.

I mean, the risk that Mom Dani has, I think he faced, it's sort of like the risk that Sanders faced when he was trying to beat Biden in the primary and then everybody just said no we're all just going to back biden and then biden overstepped him where sanders is probably going to win if that didn't happen that could happen here i mean it's probably less likely if sill was just going to like never leave the race but if like everybody besides cuomo was like or mom dani cuomo was like hey we're going to drop out everybody vote for cuomo i think cuomo wins so you've but you forget a very important thing about new york politics everybody is out for themselves right so the adams what is his incentive to leave nothing he's done yeah after this and frankly, he probably needs to raise money for his campaign so he can pay some legal bills.

But he also came out yesterday, I think, and attacked Cuomo.

And he's like, we had a handshake deal.

Like, if he lost the primary, he wasn't going to get back in it.

So, like, he's not going to do Cuomo any favors.

And then you got Sliwa, who's just like dancing, just trying to get cameras.

And then you've got another guy, the wealthy guy, who's probably going to pull one, two percent.

There's just not enough independents and Republicans in this city.

Also, the more that people, the Democrats meet Mimdani, they like him more because there there is a i mean he has some things he needs to answer for and some things in his past that he has said that that need clarification for sure but he's already doing that

he's reaching out to the he's reaching out to the jewish community he's doing the things that he is supposed to be doing which has showed me that like he actually has a good team in place i don't i own i know one-ish person that works over there and they're running a good operation and i just don't think you know Cuomo doing social videos where he's like, hi, everybody, is going to swing any votes.

What do you mean?

Democrats doing TikTok trends doesn't do anything.

So bringing this full circle,

I fully expect after Eric Adams loses the election that Donald Trump is going to tap him for some sort of law enforcement thing.

100%.

Probably.

I see Eric Adams, you know, being put in the DOJ somewhere because that guy is compromised as fuck.

Yep.

Like he would, he would be, you know, and he's a black dude.

Donald Trump doesn't have a very big list of people of color who want to work for him.

No, he does not.

But Eric Adams owes him a lot.

Right.

Like Trump ordered the DOJ to drop some pretty substantial charges against Adams.

So, you know, I think that Adams, while his career,

you know, as a former Democrat may be gone.

Like the rest of all of the, you know, grifters who don't give a shit about anything except themselves, like there's probably a warm seat for him somewhere in the Trump administration.

Well, if Cash Patel and Dan

resign over the Epstein stuff, I mean, Eric Adams is a former police officer.

And we also can't forget that most of Eric Adams' life, he's been a Republican, not a Democrat.

Right.

Yeah.

Fishes don't fucking matter.

No, no, but like give him a chance to go like work with his buddy Tom Homan and like go attack a bunch of immigrants in New York sounds like Eric Adams' dream come true.

Get back at Bomb Donnie.

Can you tell what I think of Eric Adams?

I don't think he likes me.

Not a fan.

Not a fan.

I had an interaction with him once it was just atrocious.

But

when I was a constituent, it was just crazy.

But yeah,

I could totally see that.

Totally.

I could too.

It's painful, but it's true.

All right.

And before we wrap, there was one thing we were talking about before we went live that I generally wouldn't talk about because it is, again teetering into the world of conspiracies, but a lot of people are talking about it is what's going on with Donald Trump's hands and feet?

Yep.

For example, there are these weird,

and these are real.

They're from news outlets.

These, these zoomed-in photos of Donald Trump's hands, which are caked in makeup, like the bandits.

People think of bandages.

Yeah, it's a cover-up for an IV.

Yeah.

And it's...

Like, is that, is that, I don't think that's the thing that I've been the commonly accepted theory.

It doesn't make any sense.

An IV.

I mean,

hands like that.

I've only seen one video like this so far and

like shortly before we came on air.

And it looked to me like melanoma, like a

raised spot getting covered, like a real dark spot.

Now, it

could not be melanoma.

It could just be old dance spots.

You know, some sort of...

freckle or some shit and he doesn't want to reveal a freckle but you know

there's no evidence.

What about it?

There's no evidence, so I don't want to promote a conspiracy theory.

Like, this is the opposite of what I do, but like, there's a chance the guy's, you know, sick.

Oh, he's definitely 79 and eats McDonald's every day.

A diet of McDonald's, yeah, no exercise.

No, I really cannot help you.

I mean, the ankles are afraid of stairs.

Like, you know, I like the hand shit, it's typical old person stuff.

You get cuts, whatever, bruises, it's easy.

But if he's got a circulation problem,

could that hardware get

nice?

Yeah.

so the reason why i think this is important is because the republicans in congress in their desperate attempts to find anything to distract from the failure of the trump administration have been going after the in this quote-unquote investigation into joe biden's mental decline and i tell you what i would make a trade with them in an instant both of these guys go to an independent doctor for a physical and we see the results of both.

Yes.

What do you think?

I would love that.

With stage four cancer, Joe Biden looks healthier now than he did when he stopped being president.

Yes.

I'm serious.

I'm serious.

If they really want to play this game, I think that's what Democrats should do.

Because what does it matter at this point?

If it turns out that Joe Biden, like,

first of all, I don't think so from the people we've talked to.

I think he was old and he had a hard time communicating because he has a stutter and you slow down when you're old.

I don't think he was mentally unfit, but let's have it out.

If it's true, and but then we find out that, first of all, Donald Trump is not 235 pounds.

Exactly.

For one,

and he's not 6'3.

Well, I bet that doctor would fear for his fucking life.

You know,

Joe Biden, there's a lot of reasons.

I always liked Joe Biden as a person.

You know, I had the opportunity to see him speak when he was vice president.

It was, it was extremely entertaining.

And I wish that I could find the video because he said things that he didn't mean to be appropriate that came out that way.

It was, it was very funny to hear a vice president do that.

This is in the context of well before Trump.

But,

you know, I think that he has a responsibility as a former president who was warning us, who is using the word fascist to describe Trump.

You know, he's a former president.

If he walks out and sets up a

podium in his driveway from Delaware and starts speaking into it, people are going to listen.

And

I think that President Biden, you know, has a responsibility.

And one way that he could be, I think, very useful is Tim's idea, saying, hey, we both get a physical from the same person.

An independent person.

I can get behind that.

I mean, I guess it was my idea, but I love it.

Like,

I think that President Biden, like, he's got not too much time left on his, on the planet.

He's, he's old.

He's not very healthy anymore.

Yeah, he's got cash.

If he wants to preserve his legacy and his legacy is losing to a fascist, right?

Of all the,

again, I love Joe Biden.

I think he accomplished a lot.

He was very good, you know, to I, my community, the veterans community always had been, right?

Lost his son to burn pit exposure.

That is something near and dear to my heart, right?

I love Joe Biden, but

just because he's retired from being president doesn't mean, I mean, he wanted to be president right now.

Yeah.

So, you know, I think he owes it to us.

I think he owes us.

He had six months off.

Yep.

Work for the next three and a half years.

Do nothing but criticize Donald Trump's health.

Coming from an old, frail man,

that means something.

It's one thing for me and

us to talk about how Donald Trump's old and frail.

But if Joe Biden just comes out and is just like, hey, look at me.

I can ride my bike.

Donald Trump, can you ride a bike?

No, you can't.

No, you can't ride a bike.

Let's write.

Like, just have Joe Biden do

things like ride a fucking bike and be like, Donald Trump,

I will give you a million dollars if you can ride a bike, right?

If Joe Biden just trolled Donald Trump

for the rest of his life,

that would be the most patriotic thing that he could do for America right now.

That's a really good idea.

I actually love this idea.

Yeah, because there is this, look, and I think that a lot of people, including myself, criticize Barack Obama for this, that there is this, the President's Club, right?

Where they, they, it is underneath or beneath them to criticize their successors.

But Biden has put out a few things.

I mean, I will say, like, it's not earth-shattering, but like, he was against this horrible bill that they passed and everything.

But I love it.

If he were to do that and like, and just let him go out there without any notes, just be like this whole like, let Joe be Joe, just let him do it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

He's just, he swears.

Put his aviators on.

Yeah, put the put the aviators on.

He's got the like, you know, the old POTUS

collared shirt and be like, hey, fucker.

like, you want to talk shit?

Let's do this.

Drop him in a Camaro.

Yep.

Yeah.

Have it revving his engine.

Marie's could be in the Camaro revving the engine while he's doing it.

This is great.

I think it's great.

And he, like, talk about connecting with younger voters.

There's nothing that a young voter loves more than an old person going crazy, yelling and screaming at somebody they hate, right?

Like, it's kind of like, you know, it's kind of like the grand Torino, Torino, Torino, where

Grand Clineswood thing, right?

But like, only a much less racist and nicer person than this character.

But

so bad example.

But you know what?

Really?

I would love it.

Real talk, I'm going to spend the next week trying to make this happen.

Yes.

This really needs to happen.

I mean,

I don't want speed dial.

I've got a way I think I can get the message there.

Okay.

Hey.

All right.

I like it.

That's great.

We'll see.

I think the chances of happening are zilch, but I think it's also the most patriotic thing that Joe Biden could do.

And I think it'd be very good for the country.

So I'm going to do it.

And like a little humility, right?

A little humility, right?

He's like, you know, like, I, you know, I, I probably didn't realize how I, you know, I made some mistakes too, but like, you know what?

Like, this guy's been talking shit on me for like six years now.

Like, you know, my chart.

I love it.

Yeah.

I think it's great.

You know what else is great, guys?

Find out merch.

Let's, yo, let's, let's, let's design a shirt that that, like,

tries to encourage Joe Biden to start challenging

push-up contests.

Maybe we should do a whole campaign, get a petition going.

Yes.

If, oh, I'd love to.

Listen, if, if people could leave comments on our sub stack, if you go to findout podcast.substack.com, just leave comments or join the community.

You know, you can talk in a chat directly to us.

Tell us your ideas for merch.

Let us know what we should sell.

Please.

A, because we have to make money to keep doing this and and we're not selling a ton of merch but it it makes a difference every sale but how can we possibly like amplify the shit out of this message i think like a uh if we could get people fucking just relentlessly posing with the shirt that like demands joe biden challenge trump to a physical content to ride a to ride a bike right like i don't know a hundred yard bike ride or something i like it one time around one time around the track quarter challenge him to a race of any kind He'll lose downhill.

He'll lose all of them.

Race downhill, down a ramp, you know, anything but a golf quarter race.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, Chris.

We don't want them to get hurt.

A flat surface is probably safer than having them running.

Can it be made out of like that playground material that's real spongy?

Yes.

You know what?

Put them in like a pedal cart, like a four-wheeled pedal cart that neither of them can possibly fall over.

We'll make sure that Donald Trump has some like real suspension to keep the bottom off the ground and see who makes 100 meters fastest.

Should we bring back that old show?

Do you guys remember the show Gladiators at all?

Chris, make like people, those guys, those huge jack dudes, a lot of them are like former football players and stuff.

And then there's like little, little like squirrely guys that are trying to like get through these obstacle course and they're like pounding them with pads and stuff.

Luke, have you ever seen this?

Do you know what this?

Oh man, you got it.

We'll send you some clips.

It's so we got to find clips.

I feel like this, this could be a like a generational like connection, gen X and millennials.

Maybe it could be a giant fundraiser to pay down the national debt.

You know, start to make a what's the like up the, it's the patriotic thing to watch these guys beat the shit out of each other.

These are great ideas.

This episode is going to be exactly like the gorilla episode, where

like we lose all of our women listeners.

Yeah, they're like, you idiots.

You fucking idiots.

Like, I also, by the way, I did not think

my shameless pivot to merch was going to lead to the gladiator batch of Trump and Biden, but I love it.

But I'm going to go back and say, while we do need more merch, our merch that we have now, I think is still really good.

If you look over Chris's left shoulder, there is a lovely mug over there.

And like you said,

we rely on your merch purchases and your substack memberships to keep the show going.

And we want to do more.

We want to get bigger.

So the more you can help support us by buying merch at findoutpodcast.com and becoming a member of our substack at findoutpodcast.substack.com.

That makes it a lot easier for us to do new shows, create more content, because we do want to create more shows and we've got a few ideas, but we need the money to do it.

So if you can chip in a few bucks,

and I'm sure now that we have proposed a steel cage match between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, you guys will be opening your wallets.

Maybe we get 10% of the proceeds for our idea and the rest can go to the debt.

We'll take care of that.

I love it.

All All right, guys, I think that I think we have exhausted the conversation.

Like my brain is just going crazy.

He's ready.

Put them both on tricycles, like adult-sized tricycles.

That way, Donald Trump's not going to fall off.

My money's still on Biden.

It's still on Biden.

Unquestionably.

So also Biden's shorter, so it's a little easier.

But

all right, guys.

Well, this was kind of a cluster fuck at the end of this, but

Rich is going to be like, what the hell are you guys talking about?

Don't go without me.

Anyways, well, if you made it this far, you guys are amazing.

Thank you.

Until next week, have a lovely weekend.

Buy that merch.

Subscribe to us on Substack.

And we'll be back on Tuesday.