100 Days of Trump: What to Know, What to Do & What’s Coming Next | Jessica Yellin

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Speaker 2 Welcome back to We Can Do Hard Things, and Jessica Yalen and I are here to say

Speaker 2 you did it.

Speaker 2 Congratulations. You did the hard thing

Speaker 2 of surviving the first 100 days of the Trump administration. This is the landmark occasion that we are talking about today, both why

Speaker 2 is everyone talking about the first 100 days?

Speaker 2 What does it mean?

Speaker 2 And what we can extrapolate from that to expect

Speaker 2 of the next 1600.

Speaker 2 days. It's okay.
It's okay. Just chunk it day by day.
So, Jessica. Hi.
Thank you for always being here and telling us what we need to know and not telling us what we don't need to know.

Speaker 2 So we don't have to crowd our heads with unnecessary anxiety that we can just know

Speaker 2 what we need to know and what is useful and helpful to the world. So

Speaker 2 thank you.

Speaker 2 I don't know how to say, I don't want to say happy first hundred days. I want to say I'm happy to see you.
I'm happy to be alive at the same time as you as we endure and persevere.

Speaker 3 That is a very sweet sentiment. Thank you.
I'm happy to have this time when we can digest together because sometimes it gets a little intense doing all this work out here.

Speaker 2 Yeah. So yeah, you're in it every, every day in the weeds of it.
And then

Speaker 2 we appreciate you coming to synthesize with us what it means in context. So, okay,

Speaker 2 I would like to start with, it seems like everyone in the world is saying first hundred days, first hundred days.

Speaker 2 And so can you talk to us about why it seems a little bit of an arbitrary marker of time. So tell us why 100 days matters.
Why do we care? Why is it everywhere?

Speaker 3 So

Speaker 3 just going back, the idea of a first hundred days benchmark came about from Franklin D. Roosevelt's presidency.

Speaker 3 In 1933, he gave, I think it was in a radio address where he talked about the first 100 days.

Speaker 3 He was referring to Congress, but it's come to refer to the president's first hundred days to see how much they can get done in 100-day period.

Speaker 3 In other words, like, this is the period in which we're going to sign bills, issue executive orders, launch our major programs, and have a real impact.

Speaker 3 And it's because Roosevelt did actually succeed in doing all those things to a very different end.

Speaker 3 He, it was all meant to address the Great Depression and he launched the New Deal, which is what Trump's still taking apart.

Speaker 3 It's kind of become this idea other politicians have used and other presidents to say, this is a period in time when you're going to measure how effectively I do my job and understand what are the key aspects of my agenda.

Speaker 3 Am I hitting my promised goals? And how will the public react to what I've given them?

Speaker 3 So everybody kind of looks at a president's first hundred days as this honeymoon period where even in different kinds of presidencies, members of Congress are less likely to push back.

Speaker 3 Outsiders are less likely to be critical. It's sort of this time when you give the president space to enact his agenda and will.

Speaker 2 Okay, so it's like, all right, you got elected. Let's see what you'll do.
Let's see what your plan is. We'll kind of

Speaker 2 observe in a way, which if

Speaker 2 the purpose of Congress during this period is passive observance, they are nailing it.

Speaker 2 Yeah. This is our shot to kind of say, who are you? This is like the Tinder profile.
Right.

Speaker 3 It's your trial period on the job. Okay.
Okay. Now, there's nothing legal about this.

Speaker 3 And traditionally, it would not mean that Congress should not step in if the president is, say, you know, violating the law. So I'm not trying to suggest that.

Speaker 3 It's just this way we in politics make sense of how to evaluate and assess and measure a president's success with his agenda and with the public.

Speaker 2 And And effectiveness, really. Like when it comes down to it, it's interesting what you said about Congress because it's become this benchmark for presidencies.

Speaker 2 But when FDR was talking about it, he wasn't even talking about it as his presidency.

Speaker 2 It was the first hundred days after Congress gets here in my presidency, this is everything we're going to do together for the American people. And then they

Speaker 2 passed and he signed dozens of pieces of legislation during that period.

Speaker 3 Which is a crucial distinction, like we can emphasize. One thing we've seen after 100 days is Trump has enacted most of his agenda using force, i.e., executive orders, not the actual system.

Speaker 3 He's barely passed legislation.

Speaker 2 This is so interesting. Okay, let's just take a beat on the legislation piece because it seems like if you were just measuring your nervous system, you'd be like, Trump is doing so much.

Speaker 2 So much has happened. But when we look at the actual legislation in Trump 1.0 in his first administration, in the first hundred days, he signed 28 laws.

Speaker 2 The low record before him of the least number of laws was Bush, right? Bush signed seven in 2001.

Speaker 2 My read is that Trump has signed five pieces of legislation, including one that was passed before he took office. Is that right?

Speaker 3 You know, I actually don't know the real number, but what matters in my view is you can sign a lot of pieces of legislation that are like, you know, rename this this post office, but are you getting the big stuff done?

Speaker 3 You know, in Obama's first hundred days, he focused on a stimulus package that was meant to save the economy from falling into a great depression.

Speaker 3 So even if you get one, and Trump's comparable piece of legislation is this tax plan and budget bill, which is a hard thing to pass because his margins are tiny and there's a lot of controversial stuff in there.

Speaker 3 And that's the kind of thing you want to get done in the first hundred days when you're at the max of your power as president.

Speaker 3 So what I'm really assessing is how much meaningful legislation has he passed? Has he done the big thing he came here to do? And it's partway there, but still floundering. Got it.

Speaker 2 So this is like Biden passes the like $1.9 trillion.

Speaker 2 corona relief package, Obama does the stimulus package. This is the time where you're going to want to put your best foot forward on the legislation you want.
Why hasn't he gotten his passed?

Speaker 3 Yes, this is the piece of legislation that, you know, if you look at Trump's donor base, this is what they want.

Speaker 3 His Wall Street donors, his small business donors, his big business donors, farmers, they all have something in this bill that sort of is the reason they put him in office and the thing that his team can say back to them, we delivered.

Speaker 3 We also, you know, immigration and all these other pieces are part of what he promised, But this tax and budget plan is what his biggest donors wanted him to do because it's meant to cut taxes to business and offer all sorts of protections to big business as well as individuals, wealthy individuals, and change our system in a lot of ways that benefit that donor base.

Speaker 3 It also is because it really benefits the wealthy at the expense of everyone else, it's a hard piece of legislation to pass. And so Trump has to pass it just with Republican votes.

Speaker 3 In order to do that, because of the elaborate way Congress works, he has to pay for some of the revenue that will be lost. And there's this huge hole.
How are they going to pay for it?

Speaker 3 They're not talking about it, but one of the reasons everyone's saying is Medicaid will be cut is because there's this huge hole that has to be funded.

Speaker 3 And the most obvious way to fund that at this point is by cutting Medicaid.

Speaker 3 And it's going to be hard to find enough members of Congress who want to cut Medicaid because it quite literally means rural voters, many people throughout the country will go without health care.

Speaker 3 I can't emphasize this enough. The governor of Kentucky just said, if they cut Medicaid, rural hospitals will close, rural health care will end.
And that's just part of the picture.

Speaker 3 Because that's not something a member of Congress should do. Many of them don't want to, and so it's hard to pass.

Speaker 3 There are other aspects of it that are equally difficult pills to swallow, but that's the most clear one. And that's why Trump's having a hard time getting the votes.

Speaker 3 So instead of spending the last hundred days either finding more reasonable pay fors, figuring out how to adjust this package, take down some of the tax cuts, whatever.

Speaker 3 He's expended all this political capital doing things like tariffs and immigration raids that are, frankly, wildly unpopular. And so it makes it even harder for Congress to pass this big package.

Speaker 3 So I say all this because it looks like Trump's been extremely busy and he has, but it's a little bit like there's been a lot of chaos doing a lot of executive orders that have undermined his popularity while he's failed to deliver the main thing he said he was, you know, these people put him in office to do.

Speaker 3 And he comes out of 100 days with a big question mark, you know, how does he get the rest done and where do we go from here?

Speaker 2 Got it. Okay.
So I was wondering why everyone is talking about Medicaid, et cetera. And that's because

Speaker 2 if I'm understanding what you're saying,

Speaker 2 Trump swears to God he's going to give the rich people tax cuts. This is what he wants to do.

Speaker 2 In order to do that, Congress, the way it works, won't let you just pass tax cuts without making up the revenue on the other side. The revenue he needs to make up is like 800 billion.

Speaker 2 It's a gigantic amount. And so people are deducing from that either Trump doesn't get his tax cuts or something gigantic needs to be cut, which is why the conversation about Medicaid.
Correct.

Speaker 3 And some say in private, Medicaid.

Speaker 1 So.

Speaker 2 And the fact that some people are saying it. Okay.
Got it. All right.
Well, we like to not take Trump at his word. We like to say he's joking until he does every single thing he says he's going to do.

Speaker 2 Okay. So if he has not

Speaker 2 achieved the legislation that he promised, It has seemed very chaotic and busy. And so

Speaker 2 that is a result of the unprecedented level of executive orders.

Speaker 2 Like, this is where the chaos, the feeling that everything is changing without any actual legislation happening is a result of the executive orders.

Speaker 2 I would like to just, I didn't know this, so I just want to make sure folks understand the historical context of executive orders versus prior administrations.

Speaker 2 So Trump, in his first 100 days, signed 142 executive orders. In his first 100 days of his first administration, he signed 33.
Okay, that is more than four times.

Speaker 2 To compare this to other Republican presidents,

Speaker 2 the number he has signed in his first 100 days of this administration is 12 times more than the number signed by Bush and eight eight times more than Reagan. This is significant.

Speaker 3 Yes.

Speaker 2 What does this say to you?

Speaker 3 It's a couple of things. One is he's trying to be an imperial president.
I'll explain what that means. And two is he doesn't want to work with others.

Speaker 3 And three is he's doing unpopular things that he can't get done by working with others. So stepping back, presidents did not used to use executive orders in this way.

Speaker 3 They were infrequent and much more tame.

Speaker 3 That's because you're meant to work with the other branch of government to pass things through legislation for a lot of reasons, but two main ones are it's durable.

Speaker 3 Once you pass a law that lasts, when you sign an executive order, the minute the next president's in, they can cancel that executive order, which is exactly what each of the last two presidents have done.

Speaker 2 Right, exactly. Biden did it to first Trump.
Trump just, I think he rescinded 78 of Biden's on the first day or something.

Speaker 3 And the other piece is, I said that he doesn't want to work with others. We have a Congress because the Congress is the voice of the people.

Speaker 3 You know, it's meant to represent in the Senate, the states, and in the House, much more individual, like local level voices.

Speaker 3 And that's supposed to be a check on a king-like persona running the government. So that, yes, the president can propose things, but he sends it over to Congress.

Speaker 3 And the voice of the people decides ultimately, do the people want this or not? And by circumventing that, Trump is basically overruling, not letting the people's representatives have a say.

Speaker 3 This has nothing to do with like whether Congress is, you know, Congress can do its own thing and they're failing to. Right.
We get that. But at the same time, Trump is just steamrolling.

Speaker 3 And one of the things that I think as an observation, as we step back and look at the first hundred days and what does all this mean, one of the pieces of information I've gained through reporting is that even inside the White House and Trump circles, they've been surprised by how much they've been able to do and how far they've been able to go, both in, I'm going to use the word invading the agencies through data and servers, which we can talk about, and also doing these executive orders with limited congressional pushback.

Speaker 3 They basically had a dream wish list of stuff they'd love to be able to enact, hoping they'd get some of it, and they've gone a lot of the way through.

Speaker 3 And so there's a lot of reasons behind that, but I think it's an important thing to note and understand.

Speaker 3 And we're going to have to look in the next hundred days beyond this, you know, after this point, how much will Congress start to push back the courts and also importantly, the people?

Speaker 3 One of the most surprising things is we're not seeing, yes, we're seeing protests.

Speaker 3 I don't mean to diminish who is going out or what is happening, but we are not seeing mass, mass, like protests in the streets like you see in Europe, where hundreds of thousands of people are marching all the time saying, We will not take this.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

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Speaker 2 One of the things I wanted to talk about today in terms of just like stepping back and saying,

Speaker 2 if you try to

Speaker 2 place yourself not as, you know, a frog that is slowly boiling in water, but if you just acted like you were seeing this for the first time,

Speaker 2 what would be your big takeaway, your biggest shock, your biggest concern? And mine has a lot to do with what you talked about with the king-like manner of things here. But I want to hear what you,

Speaker 2 there's myriad assessments you can have here, but when you think about this hundred days, like what is your key concern, key hope, whatever it is? Like, what did you wake up thinking about?

Speaker 3 That's a great question. There's two levels of things.
One is the actual stuff he's doing, and then

Speaker 3 what this tells us about who's in charge, where we're going, and what's possible next.

Speaker 3 In terms of stuff he's doing, you know, for me, it's the way we're treating human beings in these camps.

Speaker 3 You know, today, Reuters had an image of some of the undocumented people who are in a detention camp in the U.S., not folks in El Salvador, but in.

Speaker 3 Texas, who in their exercise break are outdoors and they have red uniforms, I guess, and they formed the word SOS

Speaker 3 in the sky so the drones can see it.

Speaker 3 And I, as a person who grew up studying, you know, concentration camps and camps and internment and always wondered, how do people let this happen knowing it's happened and they don't make it stop?

Speaker 3 I have a hard time sleeping, understanding that we're doing this to people. To be clear, you know, I have Republicans in my audience.
I have people who want our immigration system enforced.

Speaker 3 That's fine. I understand we can enforce our laws.
Doesn't mean you treat people subhuman.

Speaker 3 So to me, I find that no matter how you want to deal with the immigration issue more broadly, that part keeps me up at night.

Speaker 2 Can I stop you right there for a second? Because I think what you just said is so crucial, not only the humanity of it, but you said that's fine, we can enforce our laws. But what's happening is

Speaker 2 not that.

Speaker 2 I mean, what I find

Speaker 2 most

Speaker 2 concerning, most, what feels most divergent to me about this administration from our collective history, which has been deeply problematic, and I'm not idealizing it in the least,

Speaker 2 is this

Speaker 2 incredible departure from

Speaker 2 and

Speaker 2 blatant

Speaker 2 desire to disregard our laws. I mean, the whole idea, like what feels so interesting to me, and it feels,

Speaker 2 they feel very dovetailed, is this complete agenda of retribution? I mean, he did not hide the ball about this. He said in 2023, when he was running, he said to his people, I am your warrior.

Speaker 2 I am your justice. I am your retribution.
That was his goal coming in. And the way that that has manifested is the seizing of power through these executive orders and punishing, using

Speaker 2 the office,

Speaker 2 using the power to punish anyone who has an ideal or value or sense of conscience beyond unquestioning loyalty to him. And the reason I think this is significant, besides the massive impact it has

Speaker 2 on people,

Speaker 2 and we should talk about those things, those actual targeted campaigns of using the full power of the American system against an individual whose only

Speaker 2 crime was disloyalty to Trump. Beyond that,

Speaker 2 it becomes very difficult because if your only law, your only standard is retribution and loyalty,

Speaker 2 you have to break the rule of law. You have to

Speaker 2 replace the rule of law with the rule of loyalty in order to make that happen. And that is my big concern is that, you know, among these executive orders, we have Miles Taylor.

Speaker 2 He served in the first administration. The only thing he did was write an op-ed

Speaker 2 calling Trump an amoral agent of chaos. And there was an executive order directly about Miles Taylor recommending the Department of Defense to investigate him.
And Trump said he was guilty of treason.

Speaker 2 Chris Krebs, who everyone will remember, remember we knew everything was going on with the 2020 election where Trump said it was all rigged. Chris Krebs was his head of cybersecurity.

Speaker 2 He came out, did his job for the American people and said these elections were free and fair. And there was an executive order directly about Chris Krebs investigating him.

Speaker 2 Now he, he's a person who lives just down the street from me, is being investigated because he was doing his job for the American people. I mean, the list goes on and on.
It's terrifying.

Speaker 2 And that is the new rule. The rule is don't defy me.

Speaker 2 And that is the prevailing rule, which then trickles into all of these other areas, which is, I want these people out. We don't have to follow the rule of law.
I said, this is what I want.

Speaker 2 It's really scary.

Speaker 3 And there's a piece in all this that has echoes of, you know, past eras that's really terrifying. And it's the targeting of the people you talked about, the law firms, all of that.

Speaker 3 When it comes to targeting immigrants, you know, there was a woman who was just raided by ICE who's a U.S. citizen.
And because the wrong person was targeted and she's a U.S.

Speaker 3 citizen, she was able to be free and tell her story.

Speaker 3 And the degree of dehumanization and the brutality that our ICE agents used is something that we're going to have shame around for centuries to come, I think. And it's happening now.

Speaker 3 So All of this is, you know, we talk about this and people say, what can I do?

Speaker 3 I think part of what we need to do is never get okay with it, keep talking about it and keep sharing these stories so people are aware.

Speaker 3 And the goal is for enough people to be aware that we do start, you know, pushing back so much that members of Congress can't stomach this either and make it stop.

Speaker 3 Two other things that I think are worth really clarifying is one is the attacks on our healthcare system and our medical system. We haven't talked much about that.

Speaker 3 We should probably do a whole conversation about it, but we all haven't started to feel this yet.

Speaker 2 But

Speaker 3 soon, the consequences of what RFK has done, the programs he's ripped out, the funding that Doge ripped away, the medical research they shut down is going to hit us like, you know, thunder.

Speaker 3 It's, you know, cancer, longitudinal cancer studies that have been going on so long, they've just stopped it. So you cannot recreate that without just starting again.

Speaker 3 Programs that are providing essential health care to children and others.

Speaker 3 I asked a doctor who does, Jeremy Faust, who's a great person on all this, if you want to get knowledgeable inside medicine as his newsletter, what's going to happen soon?

Speaker 3 And if they rip out Medicaid, are we just going to have people in long lines at the ER to get healthcare all the time?

Speaker 3 And he's basically like, yes.

Speaker 3 unless something changes fast. So that's one thing.

Speaker 2 And you're going to have Dr. Jeremy Faust, who you just mentioned, he's going to be on an event on your sub stack.
So y'all should tune into that and listen to it.

Speaker 2 Jessica has him on her News Not Noise sub stack and all of the interviews are so helpful to me to listen to. So tune in there, everyone.

Speaker 3 Thank you for shouting that out. I forgot to.

Speaker 2 I love that you do.

Speaker 3 So Jeremy, he's great and he really makes it clear and he keeps me calm.

Speaker 3 Another thing, and I know we're moving through these things like each one of these could be an era defining change, but another important thing to mark is the tech bros and what Elon Musk has done with with the data, both ripping out our federal bureaucracy and pulling apart, you know, he's kind of essentially gone behind closed doors and ripped out some of the plumbing.

Speaker 3 So we don't know what's not going to work soon. That's one thing.
And the other is we don't know what he's done with the data and what's going to happen there.

Speaker 3 And that's a big open question mark for me that I track. I'll say on that, they're trying to roll out Doge in the states.
So this isn't over.

Speaker 2 What do you mean? They're like taking the federal infrastructure and want to do the same to the states.

Speaker 3 So, a lot of this is being sort of advised by outside groups. And some of these

Speaker 3 outside groups that are kind of giving the Trump world direction and ideas about what to attack inside the government are now using the same playbook and going to states with Republican-dominated legislatures or Republican governors where they have some freedom to move politically.

Speaker 3 And they're trying to deploy a Doge entity in each state. So it's not from Trump.
It's from these outside groups. And so, you know, certain red states are going to see this too, or efforts at it.

Speaker 2 So the puppet masters of Trump are starting to puppet master the state

Speaker 2 executives. Yes.

Speaker 3 And then in the federal level, you know, there's this misconception that because Elon Musk is stepping back from Doge, that's going to kind of ramp down.

Speaker 3 And I heard one person doing a video saying, so that just dissolved and went away like everything else Trump's done. Not true.

Speaker 3 basically what happened is that elon musk used servers right used tech to burrow into agencies and give officials more visibility deeper into the bureaucracy than anyone's had before and now

Speaker 3 basically project 2025 guys are at the laptops looking for what they want to target and so that is still playing out and it kind of leaves you know while trump's out front doing his crazy stuff and talking about tariffs or whatever else.

Speaker 2 And talking and distracting him and saying he wants to be the pope. And Lindsay Graham saying, yeah, sounds like a good idea.
I mean, these are the things that they're doing.

Speaker 2 He literally, y'all, said he was his own number one choice for the pope. And Lindsay Graham wrote

Speaker 2 with a straight face that. he strongly endorses this idea and wants it to be considered.

Speaker 2 So yes, these are the kinds of circus acts they perform to prevent us from focusing on the actual nefarious deeds.

Speaker 3 Yes, while Trump is doing his show,

Speaker 3 behind the scenes, there are other interests that are hard at work quietly making profound changes inside the system.

Speaker 3 And this is some of what they say they've been surprised by their ability to get so much done. When we say that, I'm talking about a lot of this Project 2025 stuff behind the scenes.

Speaker 2 Okay.

Speaker 2 So this is all very bad. We're living in an environment where I'm just thought about trying to paint a different way, but this is all very bad.

Speaker 2 And in the meantime, you have judges being arrested, calling for the impeachment of judges, all of these things happening. What is working and what has held?

Speaker 3 So I guess the courts have held. You know, they have not caved.
At the beginning, before Trump took office, there were all these people warning the courts are going to collapse. It's going to be over.

Speaker 3 That has not happened. The constitutional clash remains, we're on the cusp of it still.

Speaker 3 There are ways that the Trump administration has defied the courts, but we've also seen that when the Supreme Court speaks, they back off.

Speaker 3 So that's promising that they don't want to have that direct conflict. They don't want to openly defy the Supreme Court and declare themselves kings openly.

Speaker 2 Did you see last night the interview that this is going to be two nights ago for folks listening, but what was so interesting is that that interviewer, Terry Moran, who Trump said was being very mean, he

Speaker 2 was

Speaker 2 able to appeal to Trump's ego and get him to basically trick him into his ego conceding that what they said about Obrego Garcia was not true because how the court said you have to facilitate this return.

Speaker 2 Trump sits in the office with the president of El Salvador and says, oh, shucks, you know, nothing I can do because he says he won't do it. And then he admits that he didn't actually ask him to do it.

Speaker 2 And the reporter says, there's a phone right there. You could call the president of El Salvador right now and have Abrego Garcia returned.

Speaker 2 And he said, I would do that if he was a good guy, but he's not.

Speaker 2 And I'm just wondering if that kind of thing can be used in a court to be like, wait, now you're admitting you haven't asked him, even though you were directly told by the court to facilitate the return?

Speaker 3 It's a great point. And courts have used Trump's tweets and interviews in the past to success.
You know, Jack Smith used it. So good on Terry.

Speaker 3 He used to be a reporter for, I can't remember if it was court TV or legal TV, but he knows the law.

Speaker 2 Oh, it was hilarious. The way that Trump was saying that, I mean, if it wasn't so horrifying, it would be hilarious.

Speaker 3 Oh, there was so much in that interview that was wow. I mean, really wow.
It's yeah, partially entertaining, also quite upsetting.

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Speaker 3 On the front of what else is working, you know, this is a kind of unfortunate thing to say that it's working, but you know, Trump's tariffs have so been received with such a thud and his economic policy is such a disaster that the market is reacting negatively, and business leaders are showing that they are unhappy.

Speaker 3 So

Speaker 3 I caveat this because, you know, it's shocking they're not speaking out publicly and criticizing Trump and saying, you got to reverse this, but we understand why, because they're afraid that he'll use what you've talked about, which is his capricious use of the power of government to attack individuals and individual businesses.

Speaker 3 So behind closed doors, they're using quiet pressure and the public is getting it.

Speaker 3 You know, the public confidence in our economy is falling, consumer confidence, and voters are giving Trump a failing score in polls on the economy.

Speaker 3 And overall, I should note, you know, NPR did a poll and found 45% of the American public said Trump deserves an F

Speaker 3 for his first hundred days.

Speaker 2 45% said that F failing. F so

Speaker 3 that includes half of all independents.

Speaker 3 So that's meaningful. It's not just, you know, liberal Democrats.
Only 23% gave him an A. And before people say, oh my gosh, who are these 23%?

Speaker 3 His base is about 28, 29, 30%. So even some of his base is not giving him an A.
And only a tiny percent of the regular Republicans give him an A.

Speaker 3 And, you know, that includes people who aren't paying much attention or who like something he's done a lot, right? Or just like him.

Speaker 3 And specifically, when you look at other polls, Fox did a poll and found that the vast majority of Americans are unhappy with his performance on the economy, foreign policy, and tariffs.

Speaker 3 And we're going to see in the next couple of months, unless he reverses his tariffs program quickly, they're going to be empty shelves.

Speaker 3 We're going to have supply chain shocks that will make the pandemic look mild, right? Meaning you go to the store and the things you need aren't there.

Speaker 3 And that ripples through the economy in all sorts of ways. So I say this is, this is not something that's working because the policy is bad.
Right.

Speaker 2 It's just obvious it's not working, which is helpful.

Speaker 3 And it goes to something you said earlier.

Speaker 3 I want to point out, which was, you said, if we're, if we're not frogs boiling in the hot water and we step back and we really look at what's happening, it's important that, you know, when other governments have come in in other countries and tried to take a democratic society in an anti-democratic direction, something like Viktor Orban in Hungary, who is a hero of Trump's and a model.

Speaker 3 They did it over eight years or more. Trump has tried to do this in 100 days.
And what's good about that is we all see it. It is not a frog boiling in water.
It's not like we don't notice.

Speaker 3 We're constantly shrieking and pointing it out, and we still have the freedom of speech to do it.

Speaker 3 So that also is

Speaker 3 bad for his goals and good for the goals of people who want to push back.

Speaker 3 And I do think it's having the effect of making the American people, you know, kind of brace themselves and have a second look.

Speaker 3 And we could get to the place where they say, this is so not what I voted for. I'm more of us are going to town halls.

Speaker 3 More of us are going to march in the streets or let our members of Congress know you got to act.

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's so interesting to me because it is the

Speaker 2 although markets are clearly like a structure, they're a made-up thing,

Speaker 2 it's the unique way in which Americans care about money and the unique way in which markets don't give a shit about your propaganda. You can't say,

Speaker 2 this is working and have it stick the same way he seems to be able to say, everything's perfect, everything's working.

Speaker 2 in the market setting.

Speaker 2 So it's, it's this interesting, you know, I heard someone talking recently and they said, you can scare the law firms, you can scare the universities, you can scare the government workers, although those government workers are badass.

Speaker 2 You can scare a lot of things. You can't scare the market.
Like the market is going to just show you what you've done.

Speaker 2 And I think that the stock market being down 7% since he took office, which is considerable.

Speaker 2 And him saying that he was going to fix inflation on day one, you know, he's going to fix the war in Russia on day one. He's going to do all these things in day one.

Speaker 2 People are really forced to look and say, he wasn't able to do it. It's not effective what he's doing.

Speaker 2 And so with these tariffs, I think what we're seeing is just it's whatever he was trying to do is not effective. He's now in a game of chicken with China and we are the chicken.
We blinked.

Speaker 3 It's also important to remember we do have 10% tariffs on the entire globe, and he has threatened to reinstitute these extremely high tariffs on our trading allies.

Speaker 3 And 10% tariffs is having a profound impact already. I mean, there's all sorts of crazy trade deficit record, hiring slows, the housing market demand is falling.

Speaker 3 West Coast ports, there are ports with... you know, docks empty.
There are trucks driving empty. There are ships sailing empty already.
This is not only China.

Speaker 3 So we are in an economic contraction and we don't know what the ripple effects of this are because it's so untested in such a globalized economy.

Speaker 3 So the push-pull on this is what's working is, you know, everyone said something catastrophic is going to happen. Americans are going to have to feel real pain in order for Congress to act.

Speaker 3 Unless Trump pulls back, we're seemingly on track for something like that. I mean, it is what it is.
I feel bad saying it.

Speaker 3 I also feel irresponsible to not point out that unless something changes and it could,

Speaker 3 we need to prepare.

Speaker 2 When you say need to prepare, what do you mean?

Speaker 3 I don't know how to prepare really, because if we're looking at a scenario where there are people in line for ERs to get healthcare and the shelves are empty, you know, we're all in this boat.

Speaker 3 If it's something more short-term, you know, there's things like, what do you rely on that is clearly from overseas? Coffee.

Speaker 3 I know this sounds frivolous, but there's certain makeup I use every day and I like it and that's imported.

Speaker 3 I thought about what do I, I literally sat down and made a list of what do I rely on every day and what in here might be from overseas. But then there's other stuff that, you know,

Speaker 3 who expected toilet paper to be in short supply because of a pandemic? There's other stuff that's just going to hit and you don't know.

Speaker 3 So what I'd say to get prepared is, you know, know your neighbors.

Speaker 3 Set up a chat group with people around you who are close so that you can, you know, trade the proverbial cup of sugar if you need to. I don't know that we'll end up there and we need it,

Speaker 3 but we're pointed in that direction. So it seems wise to be aware of it.

Speaker 2 It seems like a wise way to live regardless. I mean, if we knew our neighbors and talked to our neighbors about our needs, we might not be in this political environment to begin with.

Speaker 2 So it's not a bad way to live. I have a question about

Speaker 2 clearly

Speaker 2 Congress has abdicated its role to work on behalf of the American people and instead capitulated to the era of the oath being loyalty to Trump. Or,

Speaker 2 and I don't honestly know what the hell Democrats are doing. And maybe we could talk about that at some point.
But what do you see?

Speaker 2 These poll numbers that came out that, of course, Trump said are rigged that are historically bad for our first 100 days.

Speaker 2 Does that give you any hope that the Republican congresspeople, who should have been moved by their loyalty and fidelity to the country and the Constitution?

Speaker 2 So I'm not giving them any points for it whenever they do it,

Speaker 2 might be moved just out of sheer politics to be like, ooh, I might be on a sinking ship. I'm getting the hell out.

Speaker 3 Yes, the reason so many Republicans have sort of rubber stamped or not stood in the way of some of Trump's more radical policies that they object to is because he's so popular.

Speaker 3 They're afraid of getting attacked by his fans or losing office. I think the part where they're afraid, physically afraid of being targeted, that remains.

Speaker 3 But with poll numbers like this, they also have to worry about their own political viability. Before they were worried, well, if I don't go along, I'll get primaried and lose my job.

Speaker 3 If these poll numbers continue to stay here and get worse, they're going to be in a place where if I don't do something to block some of these policies, I will lose my job.

Speaker 3 So yes, those are meaningful. That's also why it matters when you go to town halls, what matters when you march in the streets peacefully.

Speaker 3 I'd also add as another layer, something we talked about in the early days of the administration was how he has these different factions around him, different interest groups that are right now at that point working together so well.

Speaker 3 Those interest groups are are starting to fray, right?

Speaker 2 Where do you see that happening?

Speaker 3 Specifically, one very obvious case is what Wall Street and big business want is at odds with Trump's tariff policy, right?

Speaker 3 This is terrible for business. It's awful for Wall Street.
So they're not happy.

Speaker 3 It's also the case that Elon Musk was in there running things and he was aligned with Project 2025 because they both wanted to get into the system to do different things.

Speaker 3 Musk got a lot of favors or Musk gave himself a lot of favors. How do you say that?

Speaker 2 Basically, self-dealing, I think is the term.

Speaker 2 Thank you.

Speaker 3 Cut deals that benefit him financially. But the tech pros have a certain goal and the Project 2025 people have different goal.
So we're going to see if that starts to fray a little bit as well.

Speaker 3 You know, at one point, Trump's people said,

Speaker 3 Because we have this hole in the big budget we're trying to pass, maybe what we should do is roll back some of the tax cuts.

Speaker 2 Well, it is a reasonable suggestion, right?

Speaker 3 And one of the big people in the tax, you know, lower tax base, one of the top Republicans who's raised money for this forever, Grover Norquist, he's, you know, reduced tax guy.

Speaker 3 His brain exploded, right? He couldn't believe that the guy he got in office was talking about this. So you're starting to see some of these things fracture.

Speaker 2 So we are 100 days in, which means, not that I've checked but a four-year administration is 1460 days

Speaker 2 we have 1360 days left we are 6.8 percent through this term okay that's not a lot but it's not nothing

Speaker 2 do you think like in your assessment of things

Speaker 2 if we are going to have

Speaker 2 concerted movement away from these policies as opposed to just maybe people not getting a spine, but saying, ooh, Trump isn't so popular. I'm going to back away from my active support of his policies.

Speaker 2 Do you think we are realistically that's a midterm thing?

Speaker 2 Because in midterms, my understanding, and tell me where I'm wrong, but we don't have a ton of hope for Democrats taking the Senate, but there is a feasible possibility of the House.

Speaker 2 Do you see that as kind of

Speaker 2 if we're holding our breath, waiting for something, which none of us should be doing because we need to be fighting, as you said, is that a moment of change for us?

Speaker 2 And are there any kind of moments you can point to that are coming besides the natural consequences of his actions, which are, you know, clearly there will be a response if the economy totally tanks.

Speaker 2 Where is the relief? Where's the reprieve? What are we waiting for? Or are we the ones we're waiting for? We're the ones who are so inconvenient.

Speaker 3 I know. So to your specific question about midterms, yes.
Historically, the party that's out of power wins in the next midterm after a new president in the House.

Speaker 3 And even though the races seem close right now, I think Democrats have a good shot of winning in the House.

Speaker 3 I also think historically, presidents who have imposed tariffs have seen devastating political losses at the next election. I mean, 40 seat margins.

Speaker 3 And I think in the reality we're moving into Democrats. This typical political analysis does not hold.
We don't know what we're going to be facing soon. We're waiting for this shoe to drop.

Speaker 3 And I mean, for the impact of tariffs to hit, for the impact of all these policies to hit, for people to really understand what they're living through.

Speaker 3 You know, I can't tell you how many conversations I have with people who are like, I'm just not ready to really process.

Speaker 3 what you're saying. And I'm like, okay,

Speaker 3 we're not going to have that luxury soon. If you're a person with brown skin right now, you already know.
Right.

Speaker 3 So I'd say I think that the Democrats could have a chance to win both the House and the Senate if what I fear is coming happens.

Speaker 3 And then they have the ability to push back in all manner of ways by blocking legislation, by passing new legislation that is meant to block him through investigations, hearings, et cetera.

Speaker 3 But I also think it's, you know, that saying it's later than you think.

Speaker 3 We can't wait for Congress.

Speaker 2 No, that's a losing proposition.

Speaker 3 The president signed an executive order this week that said police departments should have the power to take more gear from military and even personnel. You know, that'll get blocked by the courts.

Speaker 3 There'll be all sorts of action. But given what I've been saying around how they're interacting already with people they deem subhuman immigrants, right?

Speaker 3 This is a terrifying prospect. It starts there.
Things grow. We're talking about targeting law firms, individuals, the press.
We haven't even talked about how they've targeted the press. Yeah.

Speaker 3 It's important for people to take action now.

Speaker 2 Yep. We need to get fired up and get activated and act like this is as serious as it is.
So

Speaker 2 really find

Speaker 2 your local groups. I mean, this is all local stuff.
Find your local groups. Find people who are as concerned as you are.

Speaker 2 Show up, make calls, and be loud. I mean, this is the way we've been a little bit privileged in America to have this muscle unexercised for the vast majority of privileged people in this country.

Speaker 2 And that's a muscle we have to start working.

Speaker 2 And it's important to start now. You're exactly right.
Even if we lived in a fantasy where Congress switching was a panacea, that's more than 555 days from now.

Speaker 3 One other thing people can do is part of this is an information war, and they can share information they trust.

Speaker 2 Yes, share information they trust. May I recommend News Not Noisy? Ah, perfect.

Speaker 2 Okay, the good news is, look, we're still here. We did this.
Some of us are not. Some of us are in disappeared in prisons.

Speaker 2 We need to both remember that we are still here, remember that many of us are not. And I also

Speaker 2 just think it's a really, as I think about this rule of law thing and think about it as kind of the overarching protection for all of us. Yes, it is inconvenient.
Yes, it is slow.

Speaker 2 And that is the point. But I saw something.
It was just a person's meme. And it said,

Speaker 2 I need people to understand the importance of the rule of law. And it said, let's do a little conversation.
Hey, do you

Speaker 2 care that alleged gang members have the protection of due process? And the person says no, and they say, That doesn't affect me. And then they say, Okay,

Speaker 2 that's fine. You're an alleged gang member.
See how that affects you?

Speaker 2 If there is no protection of due process, and if anything the government says is true by definition,

Speaker 2 then the ability for them to do that makes everyone

Speaker 2 lose their protection of rule of law.

Speaker 2 Because then, whatever they say is untested,

Speaker 2 is uninterrogated, and they can do what they want. It's just a very basic

Speaker 2 concept that every person who is just exclusively self-interested should be fighting as hard as they can to maintain.

Speaker 2 At least as much as you're fighting for your 401k to be back on track. Any parting words, Jessica?

Speaker 3 I think that he was at the apex of his power in the first hundred days and things will start to fray a bit. Factions will go against each other.
Congress will push back in some ways.

Speaker 3 And, you know, that's what gives me sense of hope and optimism right now. And that so many people are engaged and paying attention.
It really does make a difference.

Speaker 2 Well, thank you.

Speaker 2 Thank you for being engaged and paying attention with us. Thank you for being by our side, pod squad, as we try to dissect and understand just what the hell is going on in these crazy times.

Speaker 2 We are still here. We are still here with you.

Speaker 2 Let us persevere. We can

Speaker 2 and we will and we have to do hard things.

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