Trump Is Falling. Are Democrats Rising?

[00:00] PodSafe America is brought to you by SimpliSafe. It's May, time to spring clean your home and your bank statement. Traditional security is built on predatory multi-year contracts. SimpliSafe is built on the wild idea that a company should actually earn your business every day with zero hidden fees or long-term traps. With SimpliSafe, you can customize your system to fit your needs. It ships fast directly to your door. The app-guided setup is simple and there's no drilling required, so you can install and arm your system in under an hour. SimpliSafe is more than just a security camera. It's a comprehensive system of sensors, indoor and outdoor cameras, and 24-7 professional monitoring. [00:30] Thank you. [00:39] We got a SimpliSafe fan right here across the table from me. You bet. I set up a SimpliSafe. Incredibly easy to do. I customized it to my house. The sensors and the base station and the keypads came, and then I installed it in a matter of minutes. And the customer service is great. The app is really easy and intuitive to use, and you can rely on it. It gives you peace of mind. [00:58] There you go. Right now, our listeners will get 50% off a new system when you sign up for professional monitoring and your first month is free. Just visit simply safe dot com slash crooked. That's half off at simply safe dot com slash crooked. There's no safe like simply safe. [01:11] Service opens doors and at American Military University, it can open doors for the whole family. If you have a loved one who served in the military, you may qualify for reduced tuition. [01:22] AMU offers flexible online programs designed to fit your schedule so you can keep moving forward wherever life takes you. [01:29] Learn more at amu.apus.edu slash military.

[01:34] open doors to the future for you and your family with the help of American Military University. [01:41] Hear that? That's the sound of busy. To a restaurant, all that shouting and banging might as well be a symphony. It means the long days and longer nights are paying off. [01:54] Sure, it's noisy, but there's a worse sound. [01:57] This. [01:58] Not busy. [02:00] Busy means business, which is why Toast gives restaurants the tools and tech they need to help them perform under pressure. Sounds pretty good, right? [02:09] Toast. [02:10] built for busy. [02:32] Welcome to Pod Save America, I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor. On today's show, we'll talk about how the Iran war has reignited as gas prices reach [02:42] used to crater. [02:43] with just six months left until the midterms. But could Democrats blow it? Of course we could. [02:50] We'll talk about all the reasons why, including redistricting hiccups, Republicans wooing John Fetterman and Ken Martin crushing it at the DNC. Then I talk with Strict Scrutinies' Melissa Murray about the appeals court ruling on Mifet Pristone, new threats to safe and legal abortion, and Melissa's new book explaining the Constitution for you, the modern reader. Thank you. Quick note before we start. If you are not a fan of right-wing propaganda or podcast ads, do we have a deal for you?

[03:20] our fight against the MAGA slop, clogging our feeds, and... [03:24] Enjoy ad-free episodes of all your favorite pods, including this show, Pod Save the World, Offline, and... [03:31] Love it or leave it, which... [03:32] Amazing news is adding more episodes in a brand new studio. Tell us all about it. Love it. So love it or leave it by popular demand by me is going to two episodes a week. We're doing it in a brand new studio with a live audience. Upcoming guests. We have Melissa Etheridge coming on. Huge. We have Ann Wilson from Heart on this week's show, which you could maybe get a ticket if you really try. But crooked.com slash events. Come see a bunch of our shows we have coming up. Rachel Bloom will be on. [04:02] in Isham. [04:03] And again, Crooked.com slash friends if you want to subscribe. Absolutely. And we'd love it if you did. All right. The ceasefire in the Iran war has basically collapsed and oil prices are spiking again after Trump rejected Iran's latest offer to deal with the Strait of Hormuz before tackling the nuclear issue. [04:33] Transcription by CastingWords

[04:50] And off we go. Trump, who continues to tell us that he holds all the cards, addressed the latest flare up at a White House event on Monday. [05:06] We hit all new highs, and I said, we have to take care of business because we can't let that happen. So we did a little detour. [05:12] And it's working out very nicely. Everybody was wrong. They thought that energy would be at $300. [05:19] Right. Three hundred dollars a barrel. And it's like at a hundred. They give me fake polls. They tell me about polls and this. You know, it's interesting. I did a poll on the war with Iran and Iran. [05:34] They said only 32 percent of the people like it. Well, I don't like it. And I don't like war at all. They said 32 percent of the people are against President Trump. Well, when you explain it, [05:44] Like, [05:45] Is it okay for Iran to have a nuclear weapon? [05:49] It wouldn't be 32%. But even if you said that, there'd be a 32% because the polls are fake. We watched that in our office, and it went on like that for about five hours, I think. It was a drone. It was an intermittent. Speaking of drone attacks, I mean, it was just an unbelievable monotone taking us through in and out, weaving back and forth between Iran and the economy. It's the weave. I know. I said it, and I regretted it. It's the weave. The guy from Pawn Stars briefly showed up. [06:12] and he was gone we were back to the spiel it's weird so trump keeps telling us he's holding all the cards what kind of a what kind of a card game do you think he thinks he's playing not a winning one yeah so this plan it it it's not that navy ships are physically escorting other ships to the strait or hamuz guiding you sounds like we'll give you directions and wish you luck like what right based on what happens today because um they're calling it a coordination effort to guide ships with real-time information safety guidance and coordination so like i don't

[06:42] we saw today, Iran is very willing to take shots at these vessels. They're willing to take shots at other targets in the region. The Pentagon can't guarantee that the Stratto Hormuz isn't mined. So it seems like, once again, more of a PR effort. They roll out over the weekend ahead of markets on Monday, but it didn't work this time because the price of gasoline shot up again. The average price is at $4.50 per gallon now in the U.S., but you've seen analysts say there could be a break at some point pretty soon in the global economy and get us to $7 or $8 a gallon. So we just seem [07:12] what's next. Iran is not going to backtrack. The bet seemed to be that we can create enough pain for Iran that they buckle and they capitulate. I still think that's a flawed strategy because the IRGC doesn't give a shit about their own people and they have all the guns. But yeah, yeah. In 10 days, Trump's supposed to go to China, which is by far the most important meeting of his entire second term so far. And now this is dominating the whole agenda, not the trade deal or anything else he wanted to get done. It seems like we're now begging China to help put pressure on Iran [07:42] I love it. He said also today in that event that we just saw, we're in, he's like, what is this? We're only in like the sixth week and it is the 10th week. [07:51] of war right now. Yeah, well, time flies when you're [07:54] Uh-uh. [07:55] Trapped in a conflict you thought would last a few days because you have advisors who like to drink in the morning. [08:05] Allegedly. The... [08:06] But it would... [08:08] The Strait of Hormuz was open. [08:11] There was a question around Iran's nuclear program.

[08:13] Now the Strait of Hormuz is closed, and there's a question about Iran's nuclear program. I don't know what kind of card game you're playing, where whatever number of cards you're holding, the situation keeps getting worse and worse all around you. I don't even know if he has a couple of twos. Right, yeah. And I also, like, you know, he's holding all the cards, but he's playing Uno. The point of Uno is to have no cards. The goal is no cards. They literally tweeted that out. The more cards you have, the worse you're doing. Also, if you're holding a bunch of wild Uno cards, the game's over, my friend. You've won. You've won the game of Uno. Play those cards. [08:43] Yeah, he's calling the blockade the greatest military maneuver or one of the greatest maneuvers in history. Then he sent a letter on Friday saying that we're actually no longer in any kind of a conflict. So don't worry about that. It's all resolved because we're saying that we haven't fired on each other in a while, but they're still sinking ships. He's saying if you attack our ships, then we will then destroy you. [09:13] threat is empty and we just keep doing this over and over and over again. And also... [09:19] Again, so people know, the strait isn't like green light, go, red light, stop. This requires confidence among the different commercial vessels that are going through the strait before they actually go through the strait. So Trump just shitposting or telling everyone that everything's fine and we're guiding ships and this and that. What do you think happens when there's a few more explosions? Even if we're knocking down some of the drones and apparently we sunk six boats today, small boats, we're doing this.

[09:49] if we do some of that, [09:50] What do you think that's going to do to the confidence of these ships and the companies that own the ships going through the strait? They're still not going to do it. These are hundreds of millions of dollars of oil in a tanker. Like the scariest thing imaginable, having an RPG shot at your giant tanker full of oil. Yeah, I mean, there's no way these insurance companies are going to cover it or the captains are going to go through. And also, yeah, Pete Hegseth last week was trying to claim that they were no longer in hostilities. So the War Powers Act didn't apply. Well, so much for that argument, pal. [10:20] bit like squirrels like i don't think they know where the mines are at this point so it's like they have no idea like you know you're you work on a on a commercial vessel you're not in the military you took a job it had trade-offs one of the trade-offs wasn't i'm gonna get blown up in the fucking straight over moves like i do this for money i'm not i'm not in the oil business for the love of the game right again these ships have to be insured and who's going to give insurance on these ships um it also doesn't seem like the iranians are taking trump's threat that they will be quote blown off the face of the earth very seriously uh if they target u.s ships right now [10:50] No, I mean, obviously, they'd probably prefer not to get bombed. Who wouldn't? But, you know, I suspect most of the Iranian leaders feel like they took the hardest punch that the U.S. and Israel could deliver and that they are still standing and that the world sees that and that they survived it. And so the experts I've talked to, they're not really sure what targets Trump could hit now. I guess we could go back to like the war crime bucket, hit all the power plants, hit all the bridges. Maybe we talk about a tactical nuclear weapon, but that's just going to lead to mass civilian death and suffering and make the reconstruction harder.

[11:20] material change the thinking of the irgc because again they have the weapons they're in control and it's existential and they're willing to send i mean it is just despicable what they're all like what they are doing is despicable closing the strait of hormuz they are sending people on small ships to their deaths for the purposes of like extracting economic pain from other countries like that is what they are doing right now yeah uh and it's of course [11:43] causing all kinds of havoc here at home. As you mentioned, Tommy, as you all saw over the weekend, Spirit Airlines formally ceased operations on Saturday. And I mean, that is a sort of a fancier term for just, it just shut down. Just no longer there. Not like we're not selling tickets anymore, like thousands of flyers stranded, everyone with a future Spirit ticket screwed. They said in a court filing on Monday that, quote, recent geopolitical events resulted in a massive and [12:13] Yeah. [12:13] Average prices are now $4.45 a gallon, above $6 in many places, highest level since the pandemic, all-time record high here in California and Washington State. And then experts are saying we could hit a national average of $5 a gallon by Memorial Day. I know some of you crass political types are trying to link these things to the new forever war that Trump started. But here's Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Treasury Secretary Scott Besant trying to explain just how wrong you all are. [12:43] Yeah, I feel prices have gone up. This story was not written because of the Iran war. This story was written years ago because of what Elizabeth Warren, Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg and the DOJ under Biden, what they did to prevent the merger from happening. What do they want? A nuclear Iran? In the Democrat world, the alternative is to have a nuclear Iran. I recognize that prices have come up.

[13:04] but they will start to go down immediately once the straight issues are resolved. [13:11] that this short-term blip up in prices is affecting the American people. But I am also confident on the other side of this, prices are going to come down very quickly. I think the Iranians are starting to believe their own propaganda. [13:26] Good button on that one. I just love the argument now that they've reached, which is like, [13:31] Yes, yes, prices are high now, but just think of what will happen when the war is over. [13:36] it's very it's it's amazing like the parallels to how like when trump's up there saying like my foreign policy is not popular but actually if it was described properly people would be more receptive to it like he's doing biden and then his people are out there going actually these are longer term causes of inflation it's not because of this and it's not because of that and it's going to be okay uh look the the the ways in which they're out there trying to kind of spin this just it's very it's just amazing how much it sounds like uh the way biden was spinning this [14:06] there has been this thought that like, well, you know, it seems bad and people are saying it's going to be bad. But, you know, the prices of oil kind of gone up and down and then they had come down recently and maybe it is going to be fine. But of course, it seems like right now it's all catching up. And it's not just the hostilities in the Gulf that have reignited on Monday. It's just like the finally the supply issues for oil and not enough oil going through the straight for the last 10 weeks is finally happening.

[14:36] hitting oil prices and gas prices here especially really hard. I mean, the price of jet fuel has nearly doubled in the last two months. The FT reported that global airlines have cut 2 million seats from their May schedules in the past two weeks. So you get planes increasing prices, the airlines are increasing prices, they're downsizing aircraft to be more efficient, the routes are all screwed up. And so I saw Delta cut 3.5% of its flights to save fuel. Lufthansa cut 20,000 flights between May and October. [15:06] all blaming Biden for blocking this merger. But even if you blame Biden for blocking the merger, Spirit had gone into bankruptcy twice, and they asked the Trump administration for a $500 million bailout, which they were denied. [15:17] could have done that. Also, you see that Trump initially tried to blame it on Obama and said Obama blocked a merger with another airline that actually went out of business in 1987. [15:31] Spirit Airlines sucks. Not my favorite to fly, but having them in markets was a really good thing because it pulled prices down. There's a study that showed that markets with Spirit or discount airlines in them have 21% lower fares as compared to markets without them. This sucks for all of us. [16:01] because it was clear that if JetBlue were to acquire Spirit, all those ultra low cost routes would go away, which would eliminate something.

[16:08] Monopoly law, antitrust law has been really neutered. But one of the ways it was neutered was to say you had to show what the effect would be for consumers specifically. And there's all kinds of other effects that haven't been seen as important. But even JetBlue's own internal documents said this would cause costs to rise for consumers. Their own plans were basically to stop, to make Spirit part of JetBlue. [16:31] You'd have one bigger, ultra-low-cost carrier, and there might be problems with that, but you would still have the competition that Tommy's talking about. The CEO was aware of these regulatory problems. The judge who did it was a Reagan appointee. This was just a clear-cut case where the judge came in and said, the law is the law, and this would hurt consumers. And there was a famous quote, if you remember from the time, which is something I don't have in front of me. I lost it, but it was something of the effect of, spirit may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it has customers who love it. [17:01] a purpose and so when it didn't get approved oh one other point about this is spirit could have said hey if you don't approve of this merger [17:08] We're going to go out of business. And in fact, there's a provision in antitrust law. This is called the failing firm defense. And they could have said that at trial. In fact, at the trial, the CEO said the opposite, testified the opposite, that we have turned around and things are going well in spirit now. And so didn't invoke the failing firm defense when they could have.

[17:38] in the Biden DOJ. If only JetBlue had been able to buy Spirit, then they could have turned around this failing company and blah, blah, blah. That's not what the CEO was saying at the time, under oath. And by the way, look, maybe if the shareholders had not had dollar signs in their eyes and decided to merge with Frontier instead of JetBlue, it would have been a bigger airline that could have survived this. Stepping back, [17:59] One way to prevent airlines from going out of business is just to have one giant one. [18:04] One giant airline that you allowed all these guys to consolidate into bigger companies can weather financial difficulties more than others. It's not saying that a market with competition is not without tradeoffs. There are all kinds of examples of bigger companies are able to weather financial difficulties more than smaller ones. The purpose of having antitrust law is you weigh the costs and the benefits on behalf of consumers in a market that's competitive. And by the way, there is more turnover and more abilities for some companies rise and some fall. [18:34] in which you protect against monopoly. But in this specific case, it just doesn't apply because the judge who did it was a Republican and the deck was stacked against it from the beginning. The other thing you don't say [18:44] people pointing out is that like jet blue is also hurting. [18:47] and they've lost money now for the last six years in a row. They've cut routes. There's a real argument that the merger could have led to two failed airlines instead of just one. JetBlue would have taken on three plus billion dollars in debt if they merged with Spirit. They're having trouble right now. We don't know what would happen, but it's not like it was a clear-cut case where JetBlue buying Spirit and taking on three billion dollars in debt as it's now cutting roots and losing money is like a big win for JetBlue either. Yeah, all their costs went up.

[19:17] arguing about. Obviously, jet fuel costs is a huge driver here of the problem. What are we talking about? Yeah. [19:30] Pots of America is brought to you by Article. Article makes it effortless to build a home that lasts without the boutique markup. Their curated collections of mid-century coastal and Scandi furniture are designed to mix and match perfectly. So you can create a cohesive designer look that will stand the test of time. Article stuff is so well made. We've had stuff from Article at the office forever. And, you know, people beat the shit out of this stuff. We've got a bunch of furniture that we've had to throw out. But Article is just really tough and really well made. Takes a looking and keeps on ticking. Article offers fast, affordable shipping across the U.S. and Canada with options for professional assembly. [20:00] experience. [20:01] What if we prefer a hands-on experience? [20:26] of $100, [20:27] or more. To claim, visit article.com slash crooked, and the discount will be automatically applied at checkout. That's article.com slash crooked for $50 off your first purchase of $100 or more. [20:38] Pots of America is brought to you by AG1. The hardest part of taking care of yourself isn't knowing what to do. It's the effort of keeping up with it all. AG1 takes that effort off the table. One scoop, eight ounces of water every morning. That's it. AG1 is a daily health drink with a multivitamin, pre- and probiotics, superfoods, and antioxidants. One scoop,

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[22:27] too high on our own supply of hopium here. The first is the redistricting war, which we've been saying Republicans have basically lost. [22:35] but maybe not. After the Supreme Court's decision to further gut the Voting Rights Act last week in Calais, a few southern states are attempting to redraw their maps before the 2026 midterms, even though it may require the legally dubious move of pushing back the dates of their primaries or filing deadlines. Ron DeSantis signed Florida's new proposed map into law on Monday, though that will also face legal challenges. And even though Virginia Democrats won their redistricting referendum at the polls the other week, people are a bit nervous that the Virginia [23:05] state Supreme Court hasn't yet ruled on whether it's constitutional. Where do you guys think the math stands at this point? So if you look at the Cook Political Report, they basically have 192 seats that they marked as solid Democrat, 11 seats likely Democrat, 14 lean Democrats. That's 217 seats that are probably going to go to Democrats and 16 rated toss ups. But 13 of those are held by Republicans and three by Democrats. They're defending a lot more. That is... [23:32] good for us, but it's not great. That's not... [23:35] mopping up. That's not an ass kicking. And then you're to your point, like the redistricting fights complicate things. They'll probably net four seats from Florida. They could states that might move before the midterms include Louisiana, Tennessee, Alabama, and South Carolina that would all create more Republican seats. There will be lawsuits that complicate all of this. As you said, Virginia is up in the air, you know, longer term to 28. Some blue states could redistrict in ways

[24:05] closer than it should be with Trump at a 37% approval rating to me. If you give the four seats from Florida, you get four seats potentially from this redistricting, and then you lose the four that you were going to gain in Virginia. That's a 12-seat swing that you could potentially see, but nobody really knows. I don't know. I've seen different people are nervous about the Virginia redistricting just because there's been no ruling yet, but at the same time, they've ruled against some of the other objections. So I'm not sure if it's just Democrats are nervous or if there's a legitimate chance it gets thrown out. [24:35] of some of the recent developments that we saw. So Louisiana is like the most likely where GOP will pick up some seats because the case was about Louisiana, the voting rights case. And so the most likely result there is the Republicans get one to two extra seats in Louisiana. There'll be lawsuits there, but that is the most likely since it was directly impacted by the Supreme Court. And the governor literally declared a state of emergency and delayed their primary, which should be happening right now. [25:05] moves faster. So yes, that process is very much rolling motion. So yeah, the only thing that can stop that is, is lawsuits succeeding, but who knows, right? Um, Tennessee wants to get a seat, wants to pick up a seat, the Tennessee Republicans, but they would basically be eliminating all democratic seats in a, a black district, majority black district that has existed for decades. Um, and their challenge is they have a timing issue since the candidate filing deadline has already

[25:35] And because they're dismantling the only black district that has existed for decades, under the weird ruling in the Voting Rights Act, you could still have a Section 2 case there. And at the very least, you could have litigation that would take a while to play out. So, like, Tennessee is not a sure thing. But their special legislative session starts this week. It does. The day this comes out. Yeah. So they will have to change the primary date. The reason that it's more of a legal challenge there is they will have to retroactively change the candidate filing deadline. [26:05] already passed, which Louisiana doesn't have that problem. Louisiana is just going to move the whole primary. Louisiana has a problem. Some people already voted. Right. Well, that is that is. Yeah. So there's that. Alabama could get a seat is going to try to go for a seat. They have a bigger problem, which is they need SCOTUS to act on a separate case first and revert to old maps, not draw a new map. So the VRA thing was like, oh, if you're drawing new maps, whatever this, they would have to get then the Supreme Court to act immediately, lift an injunction and go back [26:35] Supreme Court itself had already ruled was wrong. So they have a bigger hill to climb. South Carolina, very, very hard. And it doesn't seem like the appetite is there, but they're going to try. But I think the timing issues for South Carolina are even worse. And in Georgia, Kemp has already ruled it out. So Georgia is not going to go. So here's the Virginia problem. [26:56] The worry there, I was looking into this. So the Virginia State Supreme Court is not like, it's not partisan like other courts where it's not like elected directly. It's a point, the legislature appoints the seats on the court and they're for 12 year terms. So it actually has a slight, small C conservative lean right now, which is why everyone's a little bit nervous about how they're going to rule. They did allow the referendum to go forward in the first place. Right.

[27:26] the legislature, not necessarily the referendum itself. It was procedural issues to like, there's some people are a little worried now because they're not, it's not like a liberal court. If it was, or it's not a very conservative court, like Florida, everyone thinks, even though this could be a blatant violation of the Florida constitution, the Florida court is right wing enough that like Florida is going to just say sure and give Ron DeSantis' four seats. If it was like New York or California, we would. [27:50] probably the referendum would be fine, but because of the weird makeup of the Virginia court, I think that's why people are nervous about it. Yeah. Yeah. That's what's happening there. So all told, like if Virginia and Florida both survive, it's basically we net out at Republicans picking up three seats in the redistricting war net. And if, you know, and then beyond three, you get like maybe five to seven, depending on whether you get Louisiana plus Tennessee plus [28:20] We've had three across the entire redistricting fight we've just been fighting over the last year. If Virginia survives and Florida survives. And then there's a potentially plus four to Republicans through this, the post-VRA thing. So basically the floor is much worse for Democrats after this. The ceiling, it all depends on sort of Virginia. And then if you go out to 2028, a bunch of states. Oh, yeah. That's a real bad. Illinois could decide to go nuts and be a 17-0 Democrat state. Like California could redistrict again. [28:50] a bunch of Democratic districts, spread those voters all across. You could do it in New York, Maryland, New Jersey, Washington, Oregon. The problem is if the Republicans move in 2026, we can't move until 2028. Yeah. I mean, just I guess what I'm getting is the overall estimate for how much the Supreme Court voting rights ruling will impact things. They're all over the place, depending on where you look. It's like from a dozen to two dozen seats could be impacted to help Republicans. And then Fair Fight, the Stacey Abrams group, looked at a bunch of districts

[29:20] could change to help us. So it's just like it's a mess. It's impossible to know what's happening. None of this is good for democracy. No, I mean, someone just sort of posted this map as like a kind of a joke, I guess, but it's not really, which is you could end up by 2028 or beyond where if it's a red state, [29:37] with a governor and a legislature that is majority Republican, there are no Democratic seats left. And if it's a blue state with a governor, then there's no red seats left. So that's just talk about polarization. On Louisiana, Trump posted on Sunday, quote, we cannot allow there to be an election that is conducted unconstitutionally simply for the convenience of state legislatures. If they have to vote twice, so be it. Any idea what he's actually saying there, Lovett? [30:03] It's unclear who the they is there. Does he mean the legislators have to vote twice and approve new maps? Doesn't totally make sense. If this is because Louisiana is already voting and that's why there's some question as to whether the election could proceed, I think that's what it has to mean. [30:33] the Supreme Court would intervene in some way to say, we cannot have a bunch of states throwing out their maps and having people revote and all this chaos in the runoff before an election is a tradition of not disturbing election as it's already begun. I think that's what Trump is worried about. Yeah. And it does seem like they're even, that's why when I was talking about Tennessee, it seems like they would be more likely to do that in Tennessee, even in Louisiana, because the Tennessee thing is really like throwing out the filing deadlines, doing a new

[31:03] Like a really, it's a pretty. Yeah, there's supposed to be Supreme Court precedent. It's called the Purcell principle that says you should not be changing elections or the election rules right before an election. Republicans often use that to screw Democrats procedurally. Hopefully it should protect everyone from like really terrible things happening right before an election or people getting disenfranchised. But I don't know. We'll find out, I guess. Yeah. [31:33] But this definitely could put a dent in the number of seats that we pick up, even if we do get a majority. So that's the House. Let's talk Senate. We've been talking about the path to a Democratic majority in the Senate has been getting more realistic by the day, even though it would require defending every Democratic seat and then flipping for Republican seats. [31:55] But there is another potential wrinkle that JVL at the Bulwark and Jonathan Martin at Politico just wrote about. John Fetterman, specifically the rumors that Republicans are trying to persuade him to switch parties or at the very least become an independent, which would deny Democrats a Senate majority. [32:10] even if they pick up four seats. J. Mart reported that Trump has offered via Sean Hannity to totally get behind Fetterman and raise a lot of money for him. If he makes the switch, Fetterman told J. Mart, he's quote, staying a Democrat and that he'd be a quote, shitty Republican. What do you guys think? [32:27] Uh, specifically, is there anything Democrats can or should be doing about this possibility? Just imagine a Democrat making this offer via Rachel Maddow. It's so crazy.

[32:40] It's just like glosses over us at this point. Hannity is so biased. But I mean, this story, look, the details are like Fetterman finds the online left really annoying. He's gotten close to Senator McCormick. Look, we've all been there. We've all been there. He's close to his wife, Dita Powell, Goldman Sachs executive turned Meta executive. [32:57] As you said, Trump is offering him money and political support. It's not really clear what Fetterman wants politically. It's like nowhere in this article. I think, look, hopefully the best case that Fetterman knows this conversation gives him leverage to get something TBD. I don't know the guy. I like find it very weird that his thing is just like being super pro Israel now. And like, that's fine on policy. If you, if you believe in Israel and his right to exist and his right to defend itself, but [33:27] or the death toll. Obviously, this war is not good for anyone, not for Israelis, not for Palestinians. But it's more than just Gaza. Fetterman also never seemed to criticize Trump, which is an odd political choice when Trump's approval rating is rock bottom. He jumped out after the Correspondents' Dinner to start defending the ballroom, which again, is even more unpopular and even more stupid. So I don't know. Some of this just sounds personal. Jonathan reported that Fetterman spends hours hanging out with Republicans in their cloakroom, chatting them up. I get that [33:57] personal, all politics is personal. I get that when people annoy you, you can get pushed out of their tribe. Presumably you run for office because you have beliefs and you want to do things to turn those beliefs into policy or law. Maybe he does not, but it's terrible. It's a tough situation. I hopefully...

[34:16] I think we should all just, you know, [34:18] it does, it does remind you that, um, constantly annoying the shit out of someone is not going to get them to come your way, but that doesn't mean anyone needs to like, [34:28] not say what they believed in. Yeah, there was a post by like the Monroe County Democrats that said he's a traitor to Democrats, traitor to Pennsylvanians, traitor to those who work tirelessly to elect him. And that's a defensible statement on some of these issues. But according to Fetterman's, you know, by Fetterman's counties and votes with Democrats 93% of the time, he's pro-gay, he's pro-union, etc., etc. He's taking these heterodox views that I find strange. And he's [34:58] been much stronger against Trump. [35:01] The stat that I saw that I found, I first couldn't believe it made sense mathematically. Harry Anton posted this, that Fetterman has had a 108-point drop among Democrats. What do you mean? It means he's gone from plus 68 to minus 40 among Democrats. I don't know if Fetterman is going to run again in 2028, but it's very clear that he will have a huge problem if there is a primary challenge, and there almost certainly would be given how weak he would be in a Democratic primary. [35:31] side until then and i do think that's really really important even even the fetterman says in that piece uh if democrats get to 51 who do you think the 51st vote would be and he's referring to himself so he's seeing what power mansion had what kirsten cinema had and uh he clearly enjoys being at the middle of things in a way that sort of feels vaguely familiar so i i don't

[35:55] John Fetterman, but we have this way on our side of deciding that someone isn't on our side and then making it true. And I don't know that it's a balance, right? Because like, of course he should be criticized and of course he should face pressure to do the right thing when it comes to say like voting for on Trump nominees, for example. But I do think we would rather have Fetterman caucusing with us if he ends up being that 51st vote, then we would rather have JD Vance making all the decisions. Yeah, just like we'd, I'm sure we would all, [36:22] Rather have Joe Manchin in the Senate right now still. And now he just retired. But like we have Jim Justice who's voting with Republicans all the time. Joe Manchin pissed us off endlessly, but still voted with Democrats most of the time. Joe Manchin wasn't the Senate right now. We'd only be needing we'd be talking about picking up three seats and not four. We also wouldn't have had any of the investments that Joe Biden made in the in the Inflation Reduction Act at all because it wouldn't have passed. [36:48] I do think there's basically two points in the piece that I thought were worth it. One is that 93% number. And because Fetterman has been going around publicly and privately telling people he votes with the Democrats 93% of the time, right? So that's on his mind. [37:18] language, customs, and some positions of the other tribe with an "I'll show them" determination. Soon, they're identifying somewhat or entirely with the new tribe. The path only goes in one direction. Now, you can say that that is incredibly immature, bad, whatever. Fine. We have this guy until 2028.

[37:34] It's going to be in the Senate till 2028. That's the deal. And do you want him to say a Democrat after 2026 or not? Because if he stays a Democrat after 2026, then we have a Democratic majority leader. And that means we're blocking Supreme Court appointments, all this other kind of stuff, or at least we have a chance to do that. If we don't have a Democratic majority. [37:51] then we have two years of just John Foon as leader, right? And so then it's like, do you, now, does that mean Democrats need to compromise their positions where they disagree? No, of course not. But, like, you don't have to be a dick to him, like, just for the fun of it and keep pushing him into the other side. Yeah, it's a strange balance. And it's, like, it's very clear from the piece in previous reporting on Fetterman that he's way too online and reads all the criticism and, like, takes it to heart and gets pissy about it. [38:21] That's what will happen to you if you don't give it to him, like Bill Cassidy or Tom Tillis. Again, the weird thing to me is like, [38:27] In the olden days, John Fetterman would want a thing, an earmark for a bridge in Philadelphia or Pittsburgh. Like, what do you want, dude? Very unclear. Do you just want to troll people over Gaza? Is that like your animating thing? Like, I understand, like, sort of taking positions where you punch left and punch right sometimes, and that can be good politics. Doesn't seem like it is currently in Pennsylvania for him. So I'm just sort of I'm just confused by this.

[38:57] support John Fetterman. That's not what this is about. This is about from now till 2026, when he will be in office, no matter what, do you want to push him into the Republican Party or not? Yeah, that or do you want not to push him in? But do you want to do whatever it takes to stop him from getting into the Republican Party? Like the fact that that he can see to being a Republican, he's already flirting with it in his mind, even though he's sort of publicly saying that he's not considering at all. But actually, Trump's Republican Party is so unpleasant for anybody who's heterodox to tell us a little bit about how we should be dealing with people like this. [39:27] Stepping back also, we hear all the time about how we need to be a big coalition and that we don't have people have to have all the same points of views. We need to be a party that embraces all these people. Turns out that was just something we said, Lovett, after 2024 when we lost. It doesn't seem like a lot of people mean that. And it goes both ways, by the way. It does go both ways. But part of it is like, okay, he has taken positions that we think are wrong on immigration and ICE. He's taking positions that a lot of people in Democratic Party view are wrong on, say, funding Israel's military. [39:57] you against those fine but that when people reach a different conclusion and don't vote with you 100 percent of the time what happens the next day and it can't be that they're all traitors it just can't be because or that you're a bad person or that you're a bad person well i remember i mean speaking of broadening the tent we can bring up hassan piker but i remember like the the the fight i had with hassan on the pod not the last pod but the one before the bigger fight was when he was like yeah you know what joe biden should have done to joe mansion he should have like you know threatened

[40:27] First of all, you can you can argue whether or not that's a good idea from a legal and constitutional perspective. But beyond that, like, do you think that would have scared Joe Manchin into voting the right way? Or do you think that would have maybe said to Joe Manchin, like, fuck you, people, I'm leaving and I'm going to the Republican Party because it's human nature to be like, oh, you're going to yell at me more and threaten me like, fuck you. I'm going to go take my toys and go to the other party. [40:57] to hang you with the Capitol. So the downside risk is a little greater on their side. You need a bigger rope for Fetterman than for fucking Pence. But you can see from the... He's a big dude compared to Pence. That's a really good point. You can buttress that fucking... What do you call it? What's the thing you hang people from? Gallows. Gallows. You can see from the piece, too, like Katie Britt and... And what's his name? David McCormick. They're like working overtime to be nice to Fetterman because they think to themselves, oh, if we're nice to him, then maybe he'll do this. It must be so obvious. Yeah. [41:27] with me again. One would hope. Take a Katie. No, no. Katie Britt loves me. Loves hanging with me. [41:34] Great. I'm John Fetterman. [41:43] Pod Save America is brought to you by ZipRecruiter. Sometimes when you're trying to hire somebody, you're not just looking for somebody who's qualified, but also somebody who's genuinely interested in the role. And when you find somebody like that, it makes all the difference because you find somebody who's both has the right skills and the right experience, but also really wants to be part of what you're doing. That's what we're always trying to find. It's important. If you're hiring, you want a candidate who's passionate about your role, but you can't get that insight from a resume unless you post your job on ZipRecruiter. And now you can try it for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash crooked. ZipRecruiter's powerful matching technology finds qualified candidates quickly.

[42:13] And ZipRecruiter has a new feature that shows you the most interested qualified candidates first. So you meet the right people faster. Candidates can tell you in their own words why they're interested in your job. No wonder ZipRecruiter is the number one rated hiring site based on G2. Find candidates who really want your job on ZipRecruiter. Four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate within the first day. Try it for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash crooked. That's ZipRecruiter.com slash crooked. Meet your match on ZipRecruiter. [42:43] This hasn't gotten a lot of airtime, but President Trump's Religious Liberty Commission is reportedly meeting with a specific focus, advancing a Christian nationalist agenda rather than protecting universal religious freedoms. Religious freedom should be a shield for personal belief, not a sword used to harm others. Currently, we're seeing this right being distorted by taxpayer-funded agencies that discriminate against prospective foster parents. By imposing a religious litmus test, these organizations are prioritizing dogma over the well-being and dignity of children in need of loving homes. [43:13] the Sum of America United's clients. Liz and Gabe Rutanram, a Jewish couple in Tennessee, were ready to foster to adopt a child until a state-funded agency refused to work with them because they're Jewish. Amy Madonna, a Catholic mother of three, was rejected because she did not agree to an evangelical Protestant statement of faith. [43:30] Fatma Marouf and Bryn Esplin were turned away because they're a same-sex couple. If you believe religious freedom should protect everyone, we need you to join the fight now. Visit au.org slash crooked to learn more and become a member today. This fight is far from over and every one of us has a part to play.

[43:46] So, in the category of Democrats being Democrats, there's also some new concerns swirling about the DNC after Ken Martin's stellar performance on this very show last week. After you threw him off that ship in the harbor like Osama bin Laden's corpse. [44:01] Is that okay to say? Look, he was a bit testy, I think, about his decision to not release the 2024 autopsy, despite promising to do so, as well as the state of the DNC's finances, which are not great. [44:14] Deegan at the Bulwark reported that some DNC members have recently considered trying to force Martin out, but that effort was, quote, put on hold after members failed to identify an alternative candidate willing to step into the role. Sort of like trying to be the new Ayatollah, I guess. Party members are also trying to force a resolution that would put constraints on Martin's spending and how he handles the budget. I can confirm the Bulwark reporting. [44:44] real conversations. There's been real conversations about trying to potentially oust Martin. What do you guys make of how big of a problem this is? [44:50] what is the... Here's what I don't understand. What do we want the DNC to do between now and November, right? It seems to me like at this point... This November. This November. We want it to raise a ton of money, right? But even then... [45:04] The DNC has very little to do with the midterms. So if we succeed in the midterms, Ken Martin's going to say, see, you're all a bunch of bedwetters and I'm amazing. And look at what the DNC did. That's going to be wrong because the DNC doesn't really have a lot to do with the midterms. If we fail at the midterms and people say, oh, this is why Ken Martin's off. That's also not doesn't really hold water because it's just the DNC plays the biggest role in presidential elections. So this is a this is a 2028 issue, not a 2026 issue.

[45:34] obviously I'm biased here. I'm a host of the show. I'm your friend. I'm friends with Ben Wickler. But I didn't go into the interview feeling like, oh, I have beef with Ken Martin. I was just kind of like, what does this guy have to say? And I came away feeling like he was insulting my intelligence. Because on the autopsy debate, specifically, the 2024 DNC autopsy and why they haven't released it, nothing in that report could be as bad as the series of news cycles about spiking the report or going back on your promise to release it. Nothing. Nothing. And despite what [46:04] expected there to be a silver bullet in there i did hope there would be a granular look at the efficacy of like voter contact door knocking phone calls ad spending like issues that in hindsight move voters um if vendors or like you know [46:19] Various individuals spent money poorly. We should name and shame them. But now we don't have any of that. And everyone is filling the void left by the lack of information with their priors. Right. So the DNC defenders say I was all just inflation or Biden was too old. And the left says it was all Gaza. And we just argue in circles ad infinitum. And it just it sucks. It's a terrible setup. And there was a DNC member saying on Twitter that the truth is the autopsy report just never really [46:49] will be. And that's why it wasn't released. And if that's true, that shows a lack of candor in previous statements and the interview with you that it's really bad and a problem. And so then the fundraising, like the fundraising is not good. There's a bunch of big donors on the sideline who will not give to the DNC. I know that from personal conversations with them and we can't pretend otherwise. So like this process about, uh,

[47:13] pushing them out or selecting someone new. I don't know how that would work. I don't think you can constrain... You pick someone to lead the DNC, you pick them to lead the DNC. You can't constrain how they spend money. If you're at that point, you should get a new person in there. This person needs to be able to spend money. I came away shocked that a political professional... [47:31] struggled that badly in just answering questions that I feel like were asked in good faith and could have been answered properly. [47:37] better but just it was a mess it is now like accepted as a fact that the dnc covered up the autopsy because it showed that kamala harris lost because of gaza that is like on the whole parts of the internet that is just an assumption a known thing that we all know about the fact of this of this report now there has been reporting that that played a role and i would like to know what that information is but it just speaks to the damage done by either not finishing the report or not and like the way in which [48:03] saying you're not going to release the port and not finish the port, go hand in hand, is this thing kind of just sort of slowly like kind of ends with a whimper. We're probably not going to put it out. Like the work, you know, everyone kind of slows down. The meetings get canceled and all of a sudden there's no report and nothing to release. And so like part of the problem is there's no way to answer for that in an interview now, because what should happen is go back in time, aggressively finish the thing and get it out the door.

[48:33] said there was a dnc member on twitter who said some of this but then i've heard it from other people i've heard it from others too lots of other people citing just the tweet that ken martin um had his his friend paul rivera um who was unpaid which is why ken was telling me then he was like oh we didn't spend hundreds of thousand dollars on it and i was like oh it's a free report and he was like well so he he got this guy to do it the guy went around and talked to people didn't even talk to all the right people a lot of people weren't interviewed at all um did a shitty job [49:03] And Ken the whole time was like, [49:05] just letting him do his thing. And then when he came back and didn't have any of the good information, then they just wrote up the report, what they had. It was a garbage report and they realize, and then Ken realized they couldn't release it. And so instead of either saying like, this was a bad thing, I'm going to try another, you're going to try another archetype. So we're going to hire someone else. We're going to do it right. Has apparently just decided to not be honest about it. Yeah. I've heard that from a bunch of people too. I can't confirm that it's true or not. It would certainly, I've heard, we've heard from a lot of people who are like

[49:35] better job explaining why you would endure this torturous series of news cycles about a thing rather than just dump it out over Christmas or something and just like... [49:45] move on. I've also talked to people who have raised money at the highest levels for Democrats for a very long time. And they said that the finance situation is a disaster. And they're like, he can talk about state investments and this and that. The problem is he is spending more money than he is raising. That is very simple. And it is a mismanagement of funds. And so even if he was raising a lot more money and having more success there, if you're spending more than [50:15] investing in state parties, the portion that they're investing in state parties still, even if you take all that money, that nowhere near makes up the large gap between the fundraising and the spending that's going on at the DNC right now. So there is a mismanagement. Since that interview, I've heard from DNC members, from people inside the DNC, current and former officials, and heard from donors. [50:45] who were very upset about this and no one knows what to do because I guess, Tommy, to your point, like the bylaws make it very difficult to actually oust Martin. And so people are sort of wondering what to do now. And look, I think Amanda Lippman, our friend who runs Run for Something, you know, she made a good point about this. She put a video about this on her Instagram.

[51:06] The real challenge here is building trust in the Democratic National Committee ahead of 2028, because what the DNC does ahead of 2028 is they're going to set the primary calendar, which is going to be very contentious because depending on which states go first, that's going to help different candidates. They are going to set the debate qualifications and who qualifies for debates. And so we are going to have a a raucous primary in 2028. And the you know, the supposed to be the referee of that primary is supposed to be the DNC. [51:36] I do think that it's incumbent on all the candidates who are going to run in 2020 and their campaigns to speak out publicly and get some transparency, more transparency than we've gotten from Ken Martin on what the rules are going to be, how the process is going to go, make it transparent, whatever happened to the fucking autopsy, and what's your plan to be financially viable in 2028 because it is important for the DNC to have money ahead of the presidential election in 2028. Yeah, I guess the thing is... [52:03] I agree with all that. [52:05] Right now, the most important thing is... [52:08] Is that like [52:09] Every conversation we're having about the Democratic National Committee, like, it is important going forward. But for right now, it is, like, about... [52:17] um democratic party problems that ultimately will have no impact what happens in 2026 and that doesn't mean we don't have to have this fight in this conversation right now um the thing i think well yeah no because to that point love it like the folks i was talking to said like their biggest worry is 2026 happens we do well and then ken martin's like see you are all wrong bunch of bedwetters and blah blah blah and we're moving on and then suddenly you're in the primary in the 2028 primary which happens like right after the midterm elections and by then it's too late to

[52:47] over who would be DNC chair plus the sending money all over the world, combined with either the inability or refusal to release the autopsy, have together created this storm. And the question is, those are due very specific problems, right? [53:02] They may carry knock on effects into the next year, but they don't actually speak to whether or not he would be able to do those jobs. Right. Like what he would do to run the party in the next year. But like what I took away from this is we saw him at that party. I had always seen Ken Martin in these kind of like talking point mode interviews, which I found generally frustrating, but not more or less than a traditional politician. But at that time. [53:26] At that meeting, he was so intense and direct, like in a way that I'd never seen in a kind of public facing way. It was like, oh, like there's the real guy. He's like an operator, like an actual kind of like hard nosed guy who's like pretty upset about bad coverage, pissed about it, thinks it's unfair, wants to argue about it, wants to make his case. And I thought, oh, that's like an interesting situation. [53:45] kind of version of this person that I hadn't seen because publicly he does a kind of more traditional democratic politician thing. And I think what I took away from the interview overall is like the era of that kind of talking point is over. Like, don't talk down to people like this. Doesn't fucking work. Certainly not solving your problem. It was direct, but he's also very, it's very defensive. And what you've heard from DNC people and people in the Democratic Party is that the relationship building element of the job, which is also important for the

[54:15] and he has not reached out to people, especially people who supported any of his opponents in that race, which is... [54:22] Tough. But also, like, his whole point was like, we're looking forward, not backwards. It's like, well, none of us want to wallow in the past, but it's about learning from and correcting mistakes. And like, look at the Democratic Party right now. We have not learned from and corrected a lot of mistakes. Like, remember when voters were like, hey. [54:37] You have a gerontocracy problem? [54:39] Have we solved that beyond removing Joe Biden from the ticket? Absolutely not. Whenever he's doing this like Bill Belichick, we're on the Seattle, we're on the Seattle thing. It's like we want to figure out what we screwed up last time and fix it. And like it just – it was very frustrating. And his repeated point about lessons, we're releasing the lessons, the lessons. I encourage everyone to go onto the DNC website and sign up for the 200-page lessons report and see what it is because it's not really a lot of lessons. [55:09] A lot of it is lessons from success in 2025 and then like various case studies from different groups that are just sort of pasted into the document. Like our friends at Swing Left, who did a lot of that research door to door when they were, which is great. We love it. But like that's not that's not an autopsy of 2024. No, it's not. Whenever someone says, like, we got to look forward, we can't look towards the past. It's like, OK, where do you learn from? Because I only I face the past. The future is actually in a lot of ways behind me. [55:39] going to happen there when it becomes the past. The present is infinitely small. So I tend to live in this present that I can't really quantify. And everything I know, 100% of it actually comes from the past, which is interesting. So I don't know how you're supposed to learn from the future as before you've gotten there. So I think the past is a good place to look to find answers, I find.

[56:01] Anyway, it's an issue. It's an issue. Looming over all these issues, though, is the fact that even though Trump and the Republicans are polling horribly, the Democratic Party isn't popular with voters either. Lakshad Jain at the argument had a piece last week pointing out the collapse in Trump's approval ratings has not yet resulted in Democrats gaining by a corresponding amount on the generic ballot. [56:31] has gone from [56:32] plus six to plus six. And yet some Democratic candidates are still polling quite well against their Republican opponents. So that's good. Even in purple states, maybe the most prominent example here is John Ossoff in Georgia, who has also gone all in on a corruption message. Here's his latest, very good, very viral video. [56:51] We're told a story. Work hard, play by the rules, and you'll thrive. No matter who you are or where you start, the grind will pay off. But for too many, this story just isn't true. The problem is a corrupt and failing political system. The problem is that the people's elected representatives don't represent the people. They represent the donors and special interests. [57:21] To fix it, we have to understand it. Corruption's impact isn't abstract. It shows up in our daily lives. Take prescription drugs.

[57:34] So he goes on there to talk about how, you know, when Bush passed Medicare Part D prescription drug program in 2003, that's what stopped drug company or stopped the United States government from being able to negotiate for lower prices with the drug companies, just like other countries do. And that, like, I remember talking about this when we were like back in the Senate, Billy Towson, who was the head of the House committee there, then left Congress to go be the lobbyist, the pharmaceutical company. [58:04] In the Biden administration, you know, he helped lead the fight in the Senate to actually let, you know, lower prescription drug prices for a lot of these for a lot of these prescriptions, which I thought was the way he told it was a more effective and better story than I ever heard from the actual Biden administration itself, even though they were very responsible for the win. But what did you guys think of that video and also just whether Ossoff's message is should be a model for other Democratic candidates? I mean, I think the corruption message is really interesting. [58:31] powerful because it's true. And it also gives you a why to explain why things are so broken. You're not just blaming the other side, you're blaming something more tangible. And I think it also speaks to the moment, which is the voters are furious. They want to burn down the system. That was true in 2016. Trump effectively channeled that fury. He's lost those voters now, but those voters are probably even more angry, right? Because they're pissed off about prices and inflation. And so Obama ran against Washington, Bill Clinton ran against Washington. And also, [59:01] Trump did too. And when you run on that kind of message, hopefully it creates a mandate to actually change some of the things that we're talking about in there. But it also does let us tell a story about Trump that isn't just like he's bad, because I think what Trump has done to personally charge the corruption in government is so far beyond Billy Towson becoming a pharma lobbyist.

[59:31] when the president of indonesia was like hey donald should i call don jr or eric to cut a deal right remember this um they're making billions off their crypto interests they even sold half of it to this emirati-backed company eric trump is uh advisor to a robotics company because he's a big robotics drone genius apparently he got a 24 million dollar pentagon loan and maria bartiromo was like hey congrats eric well well done on that uh don jr advises calci and polymarket which these [1:00:01] doing with insider information. Jared Kushner is negotiating with Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Iran, all these Gulf countries. 99% of the money he's raised in his investment fund is foreign. He's trying to raise $5 billion more from mostly foreign interests. He was doing so at the sideline of an event at Davos. He has not filed a personal financial disclosure for him. So this story is [1:00:25] It's very real. It tells itself if you have some time and you have the ear of the person. And I think Ossoff has done a better job prosecuting that case than most because he's consistent. [1:00:36] And one thing he says in that video that we didn't play, and I hear him say in the Sump 2 is, and look, both sides do it. [1:00:42] Both sides do it, which is the scale of it on the right. And especially with Trump is just exponentially greater. But like it is important to voters to acknowledge that, like, yeah, Democrats aren't fucking perfect on this either. Yeah. I think there's two questions. It's like, what is the source of America's ills? And then what is the best message going into the midterms? I like the corruption message is great. I think this video is great.

[1:01:06] electing Democrats, like [1:01:07] Democrats are corrupted by the money in politics because we're all people and money corrupts. And it has made it so that Democrats, when in power, do less, make less change, make more compromise. It takes more to get certain votes because those people are either they're explicitly in their own minds trying to protect their donors or they've kind of convinced themselves they believe what it's financially best for them to believe. This happened when we're passing Obamacare. [1:01:37] uh um joe lieberman for killing the public option but actually it was a bunch of democrats in the senate when we had [redacted address] of having uh an option for people to get public health care like medicare uh because uh of lobbying because of fear of negative ads because joe lieberman had a bunch of insurance companies in his state um but even even more after that joe lieberman personally stopped a medicare buy-in for 55 plus that would have made a huge difference for everybody and he did that because he had donors in his state it was and even though he was retiring [1:02:07] So these things do make a difference, and it is both sides. But we're in this mess. Why is this corruption tolerable? It's because Republicans are excusing it. Barack Obama wins in 2008. He is punished in part because he is paying for the consequences and economic fallout of the previous Republican administration. Joe Biden and Democrats are punished because of this mismanagement of the pandemic and the economic fallout that came after that pandemic. But when you elect Democrats, they tend to do things that are more popular and more economically progressive.

[1:02:37] you end up with tax cuts for the rich and deregulation. It happens every time. Most of what our politics is about obfuscating that for people. I think in a world in which people don't generally believe that instinctively, and they come to doubt and mistrust Democrats for reasons having to do with economic mismanagement, but also because of a whole ecosystem that exists to make Democrats look extreme and silly. And because some Democrats have taken stupid and embarrassing and unpopular positions, I think it is smart to have Democrats making an argument like this. But to me, [1:03:07] story because nobody votes for generic Democrat. They vote for the Democrat on their ballot. And then how we address our broader problem with the electorate where people mistrust us, don't believe us on the economy, but they don't believe that we'll do what we say on the economy. And they still believe we'll do what we said in 2020 and everything else. That to me is a fight we're going to have to fight. [1:03:25] in the primaries in 2028. [1:03:27] To the broader question that Blackshear raises in that argument piece about why Democrats aren't gaining on the generic ballot by as much as Trump's approval is falling, I do think there's probably a number of reasons. [1:03:57] And at the end of the Biden administration, Joe Biden running as part of it, you know, Laksha points out the Democratic position on crime is a big part of it, or at least what the perception of the Democratic position on crime is, which was unfortunately hurt by the defund the police discussion, which, of course, you know, you didn't have Democratic candidates saying defund the police. But enough activists were that the perception became that Democrats want to defund the police. Most Democrats didn't, but a few did.

[1:04:27] elevated by some often by the other side. Yes. I think some of the positions on border security and immigration contributed as well. There's some cultural issues as well. So like there's, there's a lot going on. But I think, I think even beyond all those individual issues, because I do think if you take an unpopular position on an issue, because you really believe in that position, and you sell it, and you say, I'm sorry that I'm not on your side on this, but this is just what I believe. That is one thing. There was a perception that Democrats are just like, maybe I'll be on [1:04:57] somebody that's unpopular and the wishy-washiness, which is another version of corruption. That's not just money. It's, it's, it's power and, and, and fame corrupting as well. Right? Like I like my position of power and I don't want to lose it. And so I'm going to say whatever I think is popular. There's lack of faith in the political system generally, which I think spreads to everyone. And I think on the Democrats to look inward, I think that, you know, voters had high hopes for Obama that they didn't feel we're met. Right. That's an area where we all look inward on, on the Biden administration. Like this is why it's so annoying to hear see Hunter Biden running [1:05:27] himself for his father's political standing because he did more to nullify the Democratic Party's position on waging this corruption message against Trump than literally anybody else because of his scummy business dealings. And yes, they're nothing compared to what Don Jr. and Eric Trump do on a given Tuesday, but still he was a huge problem. And that's why it's so like galling to hear him out there. But yeah, I mean, I think there was a broader trust thing with Joe Biden, where we as a party were like, no, no, no, he's not too old. He's totally fine. And then he ran

[1:05:57] rejected it than there were the pardon issues you were talking about. That said, I do think like, like I'm worried about us not doing better in the generic ballot rating, but we have no leader. We have no standard bearer. That's a huge part. Like we are, yes, we are off sides where the electorate is on some issues. Like the Washington post just had a poll out this weekend. It found 53% of voters think Democrats are too liberal, but a similar number of thought the Republicans were too conservative. Right. So like people just maybe don't like the other side. What gives me some hope for the midterms, [1:06:26] I think there are going to be a referendum on Trump and the party in charge. I also think it's a turnout election. And if we can turn out our far more motivated base, then we will win. And in that same post poll, 73% of Democrats say voting this fall is more important than previous midterms versus 52% of Republicans. So our side is considerably more motivated to go out right now. I have now heard from a few people who've just asked me advice on who to support, what Democrats to support, where to put their money, their time. [1:06:56] is, you know who I want to support this time around because of the state of the politics of the party? First-time candidates, new candidates. And there is something. And this is where the Joe Biden issue and the Ken Martin issue are somewhat connected because there is a... [1:07:11] Don't piss on our leg and tell us it's raining kind of thing where you look at Democrats and it was very obvious that Joe Biden was too old. And then a bunch of people in the party were like, no, no, he's fine. Everything's great. The debate performance was fine. No big deal. And then Ken Martin's like, well, you told us you would release the autopsy and you're not releasing the autopsy. And he's like, we are releasing it. We have been releasing it. You know, just like it's like when you're.

[1:07:32] When someone tells you something that obviously seems dishonest, because we all have eyes and ears, you lose a level of trust in that person in that institution that it's hard to get back. And I think that's part of the issue as well. [1:07:45] I think that's right. The age thing is a stand in, though, for because if you look at who were the people that were the most behind Joe Biden, even towards the end, it was actually it was it wasn't ideological, even like Bernie and AOC were the ones that were behind progressives. But people really know what Bernie stands for. They really know what AOC stands for. And I don't think AOC or Bernie particularly pay a political price for that position, in part because their deeper kind of values are so clear. And what Ossoff to me is doing with these kinds of anti-corruption mess with the story he's telling is he's trying to have a kind of. [1:08:13] an ideologically kind of broad story that [1:08:18] can represent a vision for what Democrats stand for, what they care about. And to me, what I worry about [1:08:23] Okay. [1:08:24] What does it mean to care about corruption? Because if we can win, [1:08:29] and then all of a sudden we're talking about whether or not to do hearings, right? There's going to be a ton of pressure from polling. Because when you ask people, you know what the polling is going to say? Do you want people to look backward? Do you want them to look forward? Oh, I want people to go forward. Do you want people to investigate Trump or do you want them to focus on issues that are affecting your family? I want them to focus on issues affecting my family. And I worry that that... [1:08:46] kind of like simple reading of what the polls will certainly say will lead people to think, oh, we shouldn't, we got to just focus. I'm not focused on what Trump did. And we got it. That was bad. And I hate it. You know, I've always been against it, but we got to focus on my plan. And I get that. But one way you prove to people that you really care about something, that you really stand for something is you say, look, we got to get to the bottom of this for the future. We got to do this. Even if the polls say it's bad, we got to make sure we root out this corruption to protect our country from a future Trump, whatever it sounds like.

[1:09:16] behind an actual anti-corruption agenda when we're in power yeah i agree all right uh when we come back uh i'll talk to uh strict scrutiny's melissa murray about uh the latest rulings on abortion medication the voting rights act and her new book [1:09:30] That's right when we come back. [1:09:40] Pod Save America is brought to you by Aura Frames, looking to upgrade your Mother's Day gift beyond the usual flowers. Look no further than Aura Frames. [1:09:47] John and I have been talking about this, how great an AuraFrame is as a gift for Mother's Day. Because you get flowers, you get something expected. But if you go with an AuraFrame, you can load it up with a bunch of pictures. And then that's a gift that keeps on giving. And moms love frames with lots of pictures in them. It's just so easy to continually... [1:10:05] upgrade the gift. So like months after you give it, you just, you know, pop in some pictures on your app and suddenly your mother or your father or whoever you give it to gets a nice little present. Yeah. Like, you know, let's say, you know, the flowers are long dead, but now what are you going to do with all those photos you took of your family on that cruise to the Strait of Hormuz? Free unlimited storage. Add as many photos and videos as you want. Preload photos before it ships. You can keep adding photos from anywhere, anytime. Personalize your gift. You can [1:10:35] You can share your photos and videos effortlessly. You download the free Aura app or text photos straight to your frame. Make Mother's Day special with Aura frames. Name the number one digital frame by Wirecutter. You can save on the gifts moms love by visiting AuraFrames.com for a limited time. Listeners can get $25 off their best selling Carver Matte frame with code Crooked. That's A-U-R-A frames.com promo code Crooked. Support this show by mentioning us at checkout. Terms and conditions apply.

[1:11:01] Service opens doors and at American Military University, it can open doors for the whole family. If you have a loved one who served in the military, you may qualify for reduced tuition. [1:11:11] AMU offers flexible online programs designed to fit your schedule so you can keep moving forward wherever life takes you. [1:11:19] Learn more at amu.apus.edu slash military. [1:11:24] Open doors to the future for you and your family with the help of American Military University. [1:11:31] Out here, if you're doing nothing, you're doing everything right. Though, on a cruise with Norwegian, even if you're doing nothing, you're still basking in the warm sun, enjoying the peaceful ocean waves, you're breathing. Don't forget about breathing. Definitely need to be breathing. [1:11:45] So you get to do nothing or everything. [1:11:47] But you still need to be breathing. [1:11:49] It's like, [1:11:49] Really important. [1:11:50] Experience the difference with cruises to Alaska, the Caribbean, and Europe. Norwegian Cruise Line. It's different out here. Visit ncl.com, call your travel advisor at 1-888-NCL-CRUISE. Norwegian Cruise Line ships registered with Bahamas and USA. [1:12:05] Melissa, welcome back. Thanks for having me. Congrats on your new book. Thank you. It's going to be coming out on Cinco de Mayo. I think the best thing to do to celebrate is to pour salt all over it, lick it, maybe do some body shots. I don't know. What do you think? You know, people will be hearing this on Tuesday on Cinco de Mayo, and I'm going to be doing that then. That's why I'm going to grab my copy. I mean, Taco Tuesday, Taco President, Cinco de Mayo. This is perfect.

[1:12:32] the U.S. Constitution, a comprehensive and annotated guide for the modern reader. I want to ask you a few questions about that. But first, I just want to start with a little legal news, specifically the latest legal news on Mifepristone, the abortion medication responsible for about [1:12:49] 65% of abortions in the U.S. Can you walk us through both what the Fifth Circuit ruled on Friday in the Louisiana versus FDA case and what the Supreme Court did on Monday? Sure. So let me roll back a little bit. Some of your listeners will remember, and if they're strict scrutiny listeners, they'll definitely remember that there was a case a few terms ago in the court called FDA versus the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine. And I had such a hard time [1:13:19] hypocritical medicine is something of a Freudian. I was going to say, yeah. Right. So these are a group of pro-life doctors that were challenging the FDA's approval of mifepristone. And that case was argued before the Supreme Court. The court in an unexpected decision in advance of the 2024 election said that there was no jurisdiction to hear the case because the doctors who were part of the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine lacked standing, which is to say that their professed [1:13:49] because of the FDA's approval of mifepristone were too attenuated to actually sustain federal court jurisdiction. So the case was thrown out, although the court obviously didn't answer important questions regarding the FDA's approval of mifepristone, its authority to approve mifepristone, nor did it weigh in on the absolute ridiculousness of some of the claims that the Alliance for

[1:14:19] suit, this time in Louisiana. That was honestly the biggest surprise that they didn't go back to Amarillo and Judge Matthew Kaczmarek to file this case. They instead filed it in Louisiana. And last Friday, the Fifth Circuit issued a decision on the case where they effectively issued a nationwide ban on Nifepristone, basically saying that the FDA had not done what it needed to [1:14:49] regarding the FDA's approval of mifepristone that required staying the distribution of the telehealth aspects of the protocols for distributing mifepristone. So I just want to emphasize, like the Fifth Circuit did this, but they got a real assist from the Trump administration. So the Trump administration has been at great pains to stay out of abortion, likely because they recognize it's a really bad issue for them. [1:15:19] doesn't sell well even in the red states. So the administration has been pretty hands-off on abortion and reproductive rights. But the FDA, under Secretary Bearjuice, aka RFK Jr., has been making some statements about mifepristone. For example, they've challenged or questioned whether the FDA's approval of mifepristone was appropriate. They've challenged or said that some

[1:15:49] of males should be questioned or re-examined. So in making those kinds of statements and concessions about the efficacy and safety of mifepristone, the administration basically laid the groundwork for the Fifth Circuit. And indeed, the Fifth Circuit cited many of these statements from administration officials at the FDA in making its decision. So they relied on those statements. So this wasn't issued by the Trump administration. They didn't put a ban on mifepristone, [1:16:19] path for doing so. So the Fifth Circuit basically had this nationwide ban that went into effect on Friday. They issued it at around four o'clock Central Time, five o'clock in the East, and it is a nationwide ban. And on Monday, the Supreme Court, through the circuit justice, who is assigned to the Fifth Circuit, like this is Justice Alito, so... [1:16:44] Interesting. Yeah. He stayed the ruling. [1:16:48] This is obviously important because a stay means that Mifepristone is now available again on a nationwide basis. But one of the things that our friend of the pod, Steve Vladek, noted in his Substack and on Blue Sky is that Justice Alito will issue stays in cases that come to him on an emergency basis. But in cases where he's more sympathetic to the causes, the stays are usually indefinite. [1:17:18] the causes or the issues underlying the case, he makes the stay time limited. And in this case, it was a time limited stay. So this sets up a schedule for briefing and whatnot. And, you know, this will be back before the court, but the stay will not be finite. There's going to be a timeline on this.

[1:17:35] So in this new case, I noticed the manufacturers of Mifepristone filed a brief that basically says Louisiana's standing theory is an even more attenuated version of exactly what the court already rejected. Do you buy that argument? And more to the point, do you think the court will? [1:18:05] like when people are using the Fipristone, the doctors are denied the aesthetic privilege of watching babies born. It was just like, [1:18:13] Okay. So it's like [1:18:15] really fanciful stuff. And I don't know that it's that much better here. I mean, they're basically arguing in very fetal person forward terms that the state of Louisiana is prevented from protecting unborn life because mifepristone is available nationwide and can be distributed via telehealth and through the mail. Hard to make that as a specific injury to Louisiana [1:18:45] of the safety of mifepristone. And they note that there are two people in Louisiana who suffered ill effects from the use of mifepristone. But they also say that, you know, over thousands of women have been using mifepristone since Roe versus Wade fell in Dobbs. So, I mean, make that make sense. You know, thousands of women are using it. Two women experience ill effects. Therefore, it's a safety concern. And that's one of the predicates under which they're bringing this lawsuit. So,

[1:19:15] I don't buy their claims of injury. [1:19:19] I don't know that the court will be as skeptical this time of those claims as they were when this case first came or a case like this came before the court. Again, when FDA versus the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine was before the court, it was right before a really consequential election. It was just after the Supreme Court overruled Roe versus Wade and Dobbs. I think the court knew that the court. [1:19:46] galvanization of abortion fervor was not great for the court, also not great for the Republican Party. I don't know if they're thinking that the same kinds of popular conditions exist right now. The abortion question for a lot of people may have fallen to the wayside right now, just because the administration hasn't done anything explicit or obvious as an overture toward abortion rights. People are worried about other things, the economy, the war in Iran, [1:20:16] this might actually be a moment where the court is like, you know, nothing to see here. No one's paying attention in the way that they were between 2022 and 24. And this could be the moment. I mean, even if the court buys the standing argument this time around, wasn't a big line of legal reasoning in Dobbs that the states must decide this, this cannot be a federal issue.

[1:20:46] here, doesn't that make, isn't that just a national, effectively a national ban on all abortion medication? Look at you making constitutional claims, Jon Favreau. It's almost like you read Brett Kavanaugh's Concurrence, let the states decide what they want, federalism for everybody. Yeah, I guess. Um, [1:21:05] It's true that this question... [1:21:09] certainly could be decided on federalism grounds, like Louisiana has made a choice for itself. And certainly they could address the question of the importation of Mifepristone into its borders for use by Louisianans. But the broader question of a nationwide ban, like that seems to be a question that's asked and answered by the whole concept of federalism, whether this court will do [1:21:39] principled about its prior stances on questions like federalism, the sovereignty of individual states, including blue states that may want to allow for access to abortion, and just [1:21:52] Or whether they'll just do what they want to do because they can, and they have a super majority of six. And when you have six, they let you do what you want. [1:22:02] Let's say... [1:22:03] Let's take the optimistic view and say that SCOTUS does the right thing here. The Trump FDA... Are you Kate Shaw? Well... What's going on here? Don't worry. I'm going to bring us back to Earth soon. This is more of just an exercise. The Trump FDA, as you pointed out, is still doing its own review of Mifepristone, prompted by a debunked Project 2025 report.

[1:22:33] at this stage? Like, could we just see the FDA itself, you know, cause us to lose telehealth and mail order, Mifeprestone, either way? So any agency action, I'm sure, would be challenged by reproductive rights groups, reproductive justice groups. So certainly the FDA could move ahead of this case and go forward. And again, the whole question, the timeline of this case may be upended, like whether this is an emergency appeal that was made to Justice Alito in his capacity, [1:23:03] justice. So that sort of while the litigation is pending. But the next step for this litigation anyway would have been the Supreme Court. So this is an initial stay. There's going to be a question about whether the court takes this up. Something could obviously happen at the FDA that possibly could moot this case. But I think anything the FDA does would likely to be challenged. [1:23:22] But it does seem like this is a tricky one in which if they if the court rules for Louisiana, like what does that mean for someone in California or New York or Massachusetts trying to get a Mifepristone prescription? I think it depends on how this decision writes. You know, if this is a decision. [1:23:43] that [1:23:44] take seriously the question of federalism, as you alluded to earlier, then you [1:23:49] There is probably an opening for someone in California. It just may limit the importation of my profisto in two states that have very robust restrictions on abortion. It wouldn't necessarily, depending on how it's written, it wouldn't necessarily prevent people from Louisiana from leaving the state unless Louisiana wrote a law that made it impossible for people to leave the state.

[1:24:19] and Dobbs as well. So there are a lot of open avenues. I think one thing that is really interesting and deeply implicated by this case and the questions it raises is what happens to physicians in blue states who prescribe mifepristone, and then the prescriptions are going to people in other places, whether it's Louisiana or whatnot. And those are big questions [1:24:49] wake of Dobbs that haven't really been tested at the Supreme Court yet. Let's move to another cheery topic. The other big court ruling from the other week is Calais, which was about the Voting Rights Act. It was a 6-3 decision, again, with our friend Alito writing for the majority. [1:25:09] What did the court do there? And what is the actual practical consequence going to be, do you think, over the next two, four, six years? Well, what did the court do there? So what does the court tell us it's doing and what does the court actually do may be two very different things. And maybe we should parse that for a little bit. [1:25:39] with the jurisprudence that it has issued. Anytime the court says it's realigning something, it's pretty much either eviscerating it or overruling it. So, [1:25:49] They are presenting this as a kind of modest change or update. But as Justice Kagan said in her dissent, it is effectively the evisceration of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. And to understand what she means by that, I think you have to understand the procedural posture of this case and what the case is actually about. One thing to note here was that back in 2023, the court took up a very similar case called Allen v. Milligan.

[1:26:19] of the 2020 census, Alabama essentially packed its black citizens into one district. That map was challenged as an impermissible racial gerrymander under Section 2. A lower court agreed it was an impermissible racial gerrymander, and it ordered Alabama to draw a new map with more representation for African Americans. And so Alabama drew a map with two voter opportunity districts where minority voters would have the opportunity to elect the candidates of their [1:26:49] Fast forward to October term 2022, but June 2023, when the court issued its decision in Allen versus Milligan, the map that had been drawn, the second map with the two voter opportunity districts had been challenged as itself an impermissible racial gerrymander because they were thinking about race when they were trying to remedy the racial discrimination of the initial map, which seems right. [1:27:19] the minority voters with the first map. And the court in that case said this map is fine by a six to three vote. So they upheld the new map with the two minority opportunity districts. Subsequently, the same thing happened in Louisiana. So it's a virtually identical case. Louisiana draws its maps after the census. It makes one opportunity district for black voters, even though black voters comprise about a third of the Louisiana electorate. A court says it's an impermissible

[1:27:49] gerrymander orders the state to draw two new districts. The state does that. A group of non-African American voters challenge the new map with the two opportunity districts as an impermissible racial gerrymander on the view that in trying to remedy the discrimination done by the first racial gerrymander, the state has now engaged in more racial discrimination. And the second round of racial discrimination is racial discrimination against white voters. And in [1:28:19] week, Justice Alito said, yeah, that sounds right. Even thinking about race in the context of trying to remedy past racial discrimination is itself a racial violation. So this is basically applying to the context of voting rights, the same logic that this court has used in the context of affirmative action. Like the constitution does not see race at all. If you're even thinking about race, even if it's for remedial purposes, that is suspect and should be invalidated. And if you [1:28:49] to use race as a remedy. The only context where it will be applicable and permissible is in circumstances where you can prove intentional discrimination, which is really, really hard to do, especially in the context of voting where, and especially in the South, often race and political affiliation run together. So most Black voters in the South are going to be Democrats. So if Black

[1:29:19] totally diluted our voting power. This is a racial discrimination issue. It's a racial gerrymander. The state just has to say, no, we were doing this because we were trying to consolidate partisan advantage. And that's probably true, but it doesn't mean it's also not racial discrimination. The court says, full stop, you've got to have absolute proof that this was intentional racial discrimination. Most states are not dumb. Most state officials aren't dumb. They're going to figure out how to do this without making it look intentional, and they're going to keep doing [1:29:49] We're going to see more and more districts being drawn in ways that disadvantage minority voters and voters of color. We are going to see more and more states that try to consolidate partisan advantage. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee reportedly said that, you know, this decision leaves the state legislature of Tennessee free to make Tennessee a red state in perpetuity. [1:30:12] All of this is... [1:30:14] unbelievably anti-democratic, but it's also deeply, deeply anti-multiracial democratic, right? Like this is how you kill a multiracial democracy. So how did the court differentiate its ruling in the Louisiana case from its ruling in the Alabama case, where I believe Roberts and Kavanaugh voted with the liberals in that case? Well, I think part of how they did this was that they created a new question to be asked. So the [1:30:44] term 2024. There was oral argument. The court was expected to issue a decision by June 2025. In June of 2025, it said, wait a minute, we're going to hold this case over till the next term. They ordered another set of oral arguments, and then they instructed the litigants to answer a new question that the litigants didn't even ask. So this is a question the court was supplying, and the question was whether the use of race in the context of remedying this racial gerrymander

[1:31:14] amendments. Nobody asked them to brief that. Nobody wanted that. The court wanted it, and they wanted to get to that question. And part of how they're distinguishing is because of that question and the unique circumstances around that. So that question was not even asked or answered in the Alabama case, and this was just a way to, okay. Cool, cool, cool. If the goal was to just gut section two, which it functionally does, why dress it up in the way that Alito did? Is that just his style, or do you think there was a strategic reason to do that? [1:31:44] Well, I think there's two strategic reasons. One redounds to the benefit of the court. The other redounds to the benefit of non-African American litigants. Let me explain the court benefit first. This is a court that for almost every year that it has had a conservative supermajority has overruled some precedent. So Roe versus Wade in 2022, the affirmative action precedents in 2023, [1:32:14] The Voting Rights Act basically overruled jingles, which was the jurisprudence that really laid out the factors for drawing these minority majority minority districts. That would have raised some eyebrows from a lot of people who think this court is really on one and probably needs to be curbed. So there's that issue. I don't think the court could say we're just completely throwing out the Voting Rights Act.

[1:32:44] popular antipathy against the court. The other thing, though, that simply preserving Section 2 does is that it leaves Section 2 available to be used by the [1:32:56] non-African-American litigants every time a state tries to remedy. So blue states trying to draw opportunity districts, now non-African-American litigants can come in and say, that violates my rights. So in California, for example, this new redistricting effort that is being done to counteract what is happening in Texas and in other red states, if non-African-American voters say that [1:33:26] consolidating racial minority groups, political power, then all of a sudden you have a Section 2 claim that can be brought and that the court is probably going to look at. And they're probably not going to think that it's an effort to consolidate partisan advantage. They're really going to focus on the racial aspect of it. All right. The happier news, your new book, which when people hear this will will be out called the U.S. Constitution, a comprehensive and annotated guide for the modern reader. [1:33:56] First, there are a lot of books about the Constitution. Why this one? Why now? First of all, this is for the modern reader. And all right. I don't. Yeah. Like I think about it. Who are you? If you're a modern reader, this is for you. If you're Sam Alito, it's probably not for you. Not a modern reader. Why now? Because I think we need to engage with the Constitution, perhaps.

[1:34:15] now more than ever. This is a document that was meant to be read, it was meant to be debated, and if you ask most Americans, [1:34:24] I think very few people have read the Constitution cover to cover, in part because some of it's just really boring. Trust me, I read it and I wrote about it. And I was like, there were times I was like, whoa. [1:34:34] Article one's really long, but I did it so you don't have to. And I go through and I explain what every single clause is doing, what it's for, what they were animated by when they decided to include it. There's all kinds of really fun stories about the Constitution that you probably didn't even know that are in this book and detailed here. [1:35:04] the final word on our rights and [1:35:07] I guess that's kind of true unless we take seriously the idea that we can be constitutional changemakers in our own right. And in fact, there are people in our history who have done exactly that and have changed the Constitution and made it more responsive to be the people. Talk about the project of explaining the Constitution to a general audience, the modern reader, if you will, in a in a moment when its meeting is this contested. So. [1:35:33] This is not what I would have done on Struck Scrutiny. So, you know, one of the things my editor and I talked about at length was whether this is going to be as. [1:35:42] forthright about my particular take on things as we are on strict scrutiny. And we decided that maybe it was just better to sort of explain things, really focus on the history of certain things, and do a kind of one group says this, one group does that, in order to give people of all stripes the tools that they need to dive deeper, draw their own conclusions. And I think that was probably the right choice. I think there are certainly some places where my own views come into play

[1:36:12] One of the things that I felt very strongly about was being absolutely forthright about all of the ways in which slavery is literally all over the original Constitution, even though the document never says the word. But there are all of these compromises, not just the three-fifths compromise, but lots of different compromises about whether or not this is going to be a free nation or whether we're going to allow half the country to own people. And that literally shapes this document. [1:36:42] the way this country tries to knit itself back together after the American Civil War. So those are choices. You do such a great job of... [1:36:51] making the Constitution and the law feel sort of real and alive to people who do not have legal degrees. You do that on strict scrutiny. You do that on TV. And now now in this book, what's one thing you want just a regular layperson with no law degree, maybe like myself, who picks this book up and reads it to sort of walk away understanding about the Constitution, both in what the founders [1:37:21] what it means today. Well, let me say two things. One for the reader like you, who doesn't have a law degree, and maybe one for the reader like John Lovett, who thinks he has a law degree. [1:37:32] And for you, Jon Favreau, I'm going to offer this origin story about the project itself. So there was a time, you'll remember this time, when I was in these Twitter streets quite a lot. And I really was. And Twitter was fun back then. It used to be fun. Anyway, I was in the Twitter

[1:37:51] And Luther Campbell, you may know him as Luke Campbell. I am from Florida and I grew up in the 90s in the dirty South. So I know Uncle Luke as the lead rapper of Two Live Crew. And he was out here in these Twitter streets talking about all of the things that Joe Biden should be doing. President Joe Biden should do this. President Joe Biden should lower the price of gas. He should do this. He should do that. And I was just reading this litany and I was like, wow, Uncle Luke has never read the Constitution because Joe Biden can't do any of these things. Like, oh, my God. And. [1:38:21] That was sort of the origin story of this project. I think I wanted Uncle Luke to know what the president can do, especially now that he's running for Congress. I really hope he'll buy this book and read it, because if he's going to be an elected official, I think this is critically important right now for him. He is the audience. He is the primary audience for this book. Maybe not primary, tertiary, perhaps. I think this is a book for all Americans. This is the document that scaffolds our government and indirectly our lives. You should know what it says and what it doesn't and what it authorizes and what it does not. [1:38:51] You should know that this is a trauma-informed document. When these guys sat down to write the Constitution, they were going through it. They had this period, this colonial period, where England was literally on their necks constantly. So they wanted to have rights, and they wanted to be able to have a society where they were free to do things.

[1:39:21] And they're like, we actually need a strong central government, but not one that's so strong that it becomes despotic. Like, that's the tension. And they try to structure this government that is limited. And we need to remember that. And this is now for John Lovett. [1:39:37] This is a government right now that doesn't feel that limited. And in being unlimited and even excessive in certain ways, that's not in keeping with what they were trying to do and what we have continued to try to do. And what this book reminds us is that there have been times where the people have just said, I'm not having it. I'm not doing this anymore. I want something different. And they've actually stepped up and they've made constitutional change. Fantastic. I'm excited to [1:40:07] a good time to take a look at that Constitution and see where we started and where we are now. I think the 1776 Commission is going to love it. [1:40:16] You think Trump's going to maybe hold it up at the White House at the UFC celebration? I think it might be in the gift bag, the swag bag. [1:40:25] The book is The U.S. Constitution, A Comprehensive and Annotated Guide for the Modern Reader. Everyone go pick it up, please. [1:40:37] It's going to be fantastic, and you're going to learn a lot, and you're going to enjoy it. So take a look. Melissa Murray, thank you, as always, for joining Pod Save America. [1:40:45] Thank you for that great windup. All I will add to it is we'll be wild. Thank you for having me. Bye. That's our show for today. Thanks to Melissa for coming on. Dan and I will be back with a new show on Friday.

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