FREE ANDRY: A Big Gay Live Show With Tim Miller, Sarah Longwell and Jon Lovett (Full Show)

Summary

Podcast Summary: Bulwark Takes – "FREE ANDRY: A Big Gay Live Show With Tim Miller, Sarah Longwell and Jon Lovett"

Release Date: June 8, 2025
Hosts: Tim Miller, Sarah Longwell, Jon Lovett
Description: "Bulwark Takes" delivers concise and insightful takes on daily news from The Bulwark team, featuring contributions from prominent voices like Tim Miller, Sarah Longwell, and Bill Kristol.

---

1. Introduction and Event Background [00:00 – 01:20]

Jon Lovett opens the episode by announcing a special live show held on Friday night at the Lincoln Theater in Washington, D.C., during World Pride. This event served as a fundraiser benefiting the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, specifically supporting cases like Andre Hernandez Romero, who have been forcibly relocated to El Salvador without due process.

Notable Quote:

• Jon Lovett [00:00]: "It was a serious topic, but a very fun show with some important conversations and some very silly games."

2. Hosts' Banter and Origin Story [01:20 – 04:07]

Tim Miller shares the inspiration behind the live event, expressing his frustration over the kidnapping of gay individuals and their transfer to El Salvador. He emphasizes the importance of focusing on others rather than self-promotion. The conversation shifts to humorous exchanges among the hosts, highlighting their camaraderie and diverse personalities.

Notable Quotes:

• Tim Miller [01:20]: "I was thinking about how fucking pissed I am that we're kidnapping gay people and sending them to El Salvador."
• Sarah Longwell [02:16]: "I think [I was brought in] 'cause somebody needed to be the top on this stage."

3. Discussing Andre and Immigrant Detention [04:07 – 05:22]

Jon Lovett underscores the gravity of Andre's situation, noting it as a pivotal moment for the hosts' friendship and their collective stance against such injustices. They draw parallels to unlikely friendships, emphasizing the unnaturalness of their collaboration against authoritarian actions.

Notable Quotes:

• Jon Lovett [04:12]: "This is against nature. This is when a turtle and a horse are friends at a zoo."
• Sarah Longwell [04:43]: "It's the first protest I've ever been to, period."

4. Interview with Michael Fanone, Immigrant Defenders Law Center [25:13 – 34:21]

Tim Miller engages with Michael Fanone, President and CEO of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center, discussing Andre Hernandez Romero's case. Fanone provides a detailed account of Andre's persecution in Venezuela due to his sexual orientation and political activities. He highlights the legal challenges faced in advocating for Andre's return from El Salvador and underscores the broader implications for due process and democracy.

Notable Quotes:

• Michael Fanone [26:05]: "Andre is an asylum seeker from Venezuela. He came to the US last year when he was in Venezuela. As a gay man, he faced incredible discrimination."
• Michael Fanone [32:06]: "His case is fundamentally about due process. And due process is most important when the government is accusing you of a crime or alleging you are a gang member."

5. Humorous Game Segments: "Bitch Stop" and "Capture the Flag" [34:21 – 90:14]

The hosts transition into lighthearted segments to engage the audience. They introduce "Bitch Stop," where they play clips from Jesse Waters, offering humorous commentary and critiques. The segment is filled with jokes about political figures and cultural references, blending satire with performance.

Subsequently, the game "Capture the Flag" pits the LGBTQ+ representatives against straight participants. Tara Hoots, a renowned drag queen from D.C., joins the hosts to participate in the fun-filled competition, which includes trivia questions and playful banter about stereotypes and cultural knowledge.

Notable Quotes:

• Jon Lovett [35:01]: "Talking about what else? The human form."
• Tim Miller [45:01]: "JD Vance has never slayed in his life, except for one time in Vatican City."

6. Interview with Congressman Robert Garcia [50:05 – 63:02]

Sarah Longwell conducts an in-depth interview with Congressman Robert Garcia from California. Garcia passionately discusses the plight of Andre Hernandez Romero and criticizes Republican lawmakers for their role in the disappearance of immigrants to El Salvador. He shares his own experiences as an openly gay immigrant and emphasizes the importance of due process and constitutional rights. Garcia also recounts his role in ousting fellow congressman George Santos, highlighting issues of integrity and accountability within the Republican Party.

Notable Quotes:

• Robert Garcia [50:43]: "Andre is such a... This is what's happening to everybody else."
• Sarah Longwell [55:07]: "How do your Republican colleagues justify sending people, disappearing them to foreign countries without due process?"
• Robert Garcia [57:23]: "He has the right under the Constitution to defend himself in front of a judge and a courtroom."

7. Final Segments and Rants [63:02 – 96:07]

The show culminates with each host delivering personal rants related to Pride Month and the ongoing struggles faced by the LGBTQ+ community. Tim Miller shares a heartfelt plea about Andre's situation, expressing his anger and empathy. Sarah Longwell critiques the commercialization and extended duration of Pride celebrations, advocating for a more focused and impactful approach. Jon Lovett echoes the importance of resilience and unity in the face of authoritarianism.

Notable Quotes:

• Tim Miller [85:53]: "The point is, I just think, like, a week is enough, and we don't need a whole month."
• Sarah Longwell [86:59]: "They want you to feel, like, deeply exhausted. That's why they try to flood the zone with shit."
• Jon Lovett [84:07]: "We started by saying how many things had to go wrong for us all to be on this stage together... I feel really proud of the people that I've gotten to meet and know."

8. Conclusion and Final Messages [96:07 – End]

As the live show wraps up, Jon Lovett thanks all participants, including special guests like Tara Hoots and Congressman Garcia. The hosts reiterate the importance of supporting the Immigrant Defenders Law Center and advocating for Andre Hernandez Romero. They encourage the audience to stay engaged, resist authoritarian fatigue, and continue fighting for justice and due process.

Notable Quotes:

• Jon Lovett [95:22]: "Conversations like tonight are crucial in keeping the fight alive."
• Sarah Longwell [95:22]: "We have to stay filled with energy to do this because the biggest thing they want from us is to be tired. So never get tired. Never stop. And let's get Andre home."

---

Conclusion:

This episode of "Bulwark Takes" masterfully balances humor with serious advocacy, spotlighting critical issues like the forced relocation of LGBTQ+ individuals to El Salvador and the broader implications for democracy and human rights. Through engaging segments, heartfelt interviews, and spirited discussions, the hosts and guests deliver a compelling narrative that underscores the urgency of supporting organizations fighting for justice and due process.

Transcript

[Jon Lovett]

McCrispy strips are now at McDonald's. I hope you're ready for the most dippable chicken in McDonald's history. Dip it in all the sauces. Dip it in that hot sauce in your bag. Dip it in your McFlurry. Your dip is your business. McCrispy strips at McDonald's. Hey, everybody. Happy Pride. Today we're switching things up a bit. On Friday night, I did a very fun live show with Sarah Longwell and Tim Miller from the Bulwark at the Lincoln theater in Washington, D.C. at World Pride. It was a fundraiser benefiting the Immigrant Defenders Law center, which represents people like Andre Hernandez Romero and so many others who have been disappeared without due process to El Salvador. It was a serious topic, but a very fun show with some important conversations and some very silly games. If you want to help, you can [e-mail] Action ForAndre. We'll be back with a regular episode on Tuesday, but in the meantime, here's a live show. Hope you like it. Welcome, everybody.

[Tim Miller]

I was never a twink. Here's the thing. Love it. So thank you all for coming out. I wanted to tell you just a second about the origin story of this. I was in the shower one day. Watch out. Usually it's that. Usually it's that, calm down. But in this case, I was thinking about how fucking pissed I am that we're kidnapping gay people and sending them to El Salvador. And so I got out of the shower, and I texted Lovett. And I was like, lovett, like, we should do something for others for once, you know, like, we should stop being such narcissists who care about our own content creation. We should, like, do something for someone else. And he was like, great idea, Tim. I was like, and let's tie it.

[Jon Lovett]

I'll try anything once.

[Tim Miller]

So then I was like, let's tie it to World Pride, you know, so we can have one for him, one for us on the back end. So we'll see y' all at flower Factory later. Sarah, you got brought in. Why are you here?

[Sarah Longwell]

I think. Cause somebody needed to be the top on this stage.

[Jon Lovett]

Wow.

[Tim Miller]

Nobody vetted.

[Sarah Longwell]

Sorry, I didn't vet that joke. I didn't vet that joke. No, sorry. I just. I just. It was important to have a bipartisan event. It was important to be diverse because this is a pro democracy, and I mean, small D democracy event. I'm the pro democracy. They're the small D.

[Jon Lovett]

Wow. Unbelievable.

[Tim Miller]

She's so proud of herself.

[Jon Lovett]

I didn't realize lesbians knew about Jokes.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay, well, that's fine. That's fine. But these guys were like, hey, we're gonna go in, like pre game backstage. We're gonna do some shots. But they just took prep shots. That's all they did.

[Tim Miller]

It's a pill.

[Sarah Longwell]

How am I supposed to know that?

[Jon Lovett]

I don't need them. My shot is Ozempic.

[Tim Miller]

And you're looking great.

[Jon Lovett]

Thanks, buddy.

[Tim Miller]

We are going through old pictures of you and boy, big improvement. You're thriving right now.

[Jon Lovett]

Thank you, buddy. Thank you for saying that. It gets better. So, you know, look, we want to have fun, but also we're here because this is a serious moment. And we're really grateful to everybody who was willing to come out and during World Pride to be here to be part of this fundraiser to keep attention on the importance of freeing Andre and all the others who have been disappeared to a gulag in El Salvador in our name. Earlier today, I got to witness something historic, which is, I believe, the first time Sarah Longwell, you've been, like, a participant in a protest.

[Sarah Longwell]

It's the first protest I've ever been to, period.

[Jon Lovett]

And we were joking just now backstage. Do you know how much had to go fucking wrong in this society for Sarah and I to get close? Do you know how many different things we had to get wrong all along the way for us to be here at the Lincoln Theater together? This is against nature. This is when a turtle and a horse are friends at a zoo. It's not working.

[Tim Miller]

Who's the horse?

[Jon Lovett]

It's not working.

[Tim Miller]

I'm the horse. I think. I think you have a slideshow, don't you?

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, is it? We're up to the slideshow. Is it time?

[Tim Miller]

I think so.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay, great.

[Tim Miller]

Unless you got more chit chat you want to do.

[Jon Lovett]

We all know the name of Harvey Milk. Who? Pete Hegseth is trying to get his name off of a Navy vessel. There's a Navy ship named after Harvey Milk. And Pete Hegseth is like, gotta do some cancel culture on that ship. But Harvey Milk is not the first gay elected official in this country. He's the first gay man to be elected in this country. Because. Isn't that interesting?

[Tim Miller]

I didn't know that.

[Jon Lovett]

Yes, because. Because the first person to be elect. Gay, openly gay person to be elected is a lesbian from Michigan named Kathy Kozachenko, I believe. And we don't know her name because lesbians just don't do pr. They just. It's mostly. It's like woodworking and that kind of a thing. It's the Gay guys that went into pr, which is.

[Sarah Longwell]

That's funny. That's funny because actually, when we were promoting the show, the Advocate did a piece, and my PR guy was the one pitching the piece, and somehow the piece came out. Tim Miller and John Lovett to co host.

[Tim Miller]

Show the Advocate knows what sells magazines. Yeah, that's how we put butts in the seats. All right, no pictures of women in axes in the Advocate. That's not gonna be the point.

[Jon Lovett]

The point is we owe a great deal to lesbians, I've recently found out. And as a token of our gratitude, we wanted to hope to make you feel perfectly at ease during World Pride by showing you some options for different lesbian styles you could embrace this weekend.

[Sarah Longwell]

Is it a skirt? Because I'm not wearing that.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay, so we can rule out a couple right there. Now, we did manage to go into the archives, and we found some options from your past. So let's show what we've got here first.

[Tim Miller]

Oh, yeah. Lumberjack chic.

[Jon Lovett]

I would say Lumberjacklin. Scarecrow with a master's degree.

[Sarah Longwell]

I do love a flannel.

[Tim Miller]

Still, you can't see the fingerless gloves in the photo, but they're underneath.

[Jon Lovett]

Dwayne the Lesbian Johnson is an option for one of these, but we all. Do we have any more of those? Is that. Oh, here's another. We have this. That is.

[Sarah Longwell]

I'm cute. That's. That's my wife.

[Tim Miller]

I guess you are the top.

[Jon Lovett]

We. We came up. Wait, can we go back to that one? Oh, so this version of Sarah, we came up with a name for it, which is Katie Langley. But look, there are many different directions that you could go, which is why it's time for a segment we're calling Kara Beaner. I Hardly know her.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

Now.

[Jon Lovett]

First up, we do have. We do have the lipstick lesbian represented here by Portia de Ronci.

[Tim Miller]

Ooh, I gotta get out of the way here.

[Jon Lovett]

Now, the only downside here is you do run the risk of being Seduced by Ellen DeGeneres and then having to go live in the Cotswolds. I don't know what that is, but it doesn't sound.

[Sarah Longwell]

You are describing a lesbian fantasy right now. So I don't know what the problem is.

[Jon Lovett]

Right. I don't know your culture. I don't know your culture. Now, next up, as an option for you. Now, do we have a. Let's go to the next slide. Yes. Next up, we have the power lesbians.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yes. I love this Sex and the City episode.

[Jon Lovett]

Yes, of course you do.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, I'M in there.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah. Obviously, you're pretty much at ease in this photo. This doesn't feel like much of a stretch for you. Would you consider yourself a power lesbian?

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, I think so.

[Tim Miller]

A little humility, please. God.

[Jon Lovett]

I mean you. Okay, what. What did Tim say?

[Tim Miller]

A little humility. I mean, you're not supposed to call yourself a power lesbian. That's supposed to be a title bestowed upon you, I think, by others.

[Jon Lovett]

That's the kind of thing someone who's not a power lesbian would say. If you're any power lesbian, would describe herself as such. And if you can't, you're not, bitch. All right, next up, we have granola lesbians. Okay. I look fine. Gray Subaru Sophic, we call them. It's comfortable shoes, cargo shorts. It'd be very practical during the parade. Something to think about. Yeah, you might get hit by those national park budget cuts by Trump.

[Sarah Longwell]

That has been hard on the lesbians.

[Jon Lovett]

Actually, now we do like to camp. Yeah, you do like to camp. That's.

[Sarah Longwell]

Do you actually, you guys like camp? We like to camp, yeah. Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

Wow.

[Tim Miller]

Nobody likes to camp.

[Jon Lovett]

No.

[Tim Miller]

I refuse to believe that anyone actually likes to camp.

[Jon Lovett]

No.

[Sarah Longwell]

My friends are camping right now without me. I had to skip it to come to this show.

[Jon Lovett]

Wow.

[Tim Miller]

You're welcome.

[Jon Lovett]

No, I don't understand camping either, but that's why the flag has different colors on it, you know? That's why we have different.

[Tim Miller]

Straight women are our natural allies. Hello, straight women. You don't like to camp either, do you? You don't like to camp.

[Jon Lovett]

Yes. I often believe that the next great political realignment is when the straight women and the gay guys join forces and the straight guys and the lesbians join forces, and that becomes our political divide.

[Sarah Longwell]

Do we want to take a winner in that fight or.

[Jon Lovett]

We'll do whatever you say. Next up, a classic. A classic direction. We have the masks now. Oh, there we go.

[Tim Miller]

All of a sudden, I'm horny.

[Jon Lovett]

Now there is. This is working for Tim, so that's a bad sign. Now TikTok has declared a mask shortage. And, you know, you're a former Republican, so you care a lot about a free market. That's an opportunity for you. There's a market opening for some more. A more masculine Sarah Longwell. Have you thought about shorter hair spikes, maybe kind of more tattoos?

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, he was saying mask with a C. I thought he was talking about, like, Covid masks.

[Jon Lovett]

Get out of here, Fauci. Nobody's talking about masks. Wait, no, no. I'm talking about masculine A masculine lesbian. Well, if this isn't your style, we can try soft, butch, respected, classy, androgynous.

[Sarah Longwell]

I think a sweater vest is up my alley, actually.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, no, I think we could reach for one of those in your closet for sure. And then I think one last one. I think we have Diesel Dyke.

[Sarah Longwell]

That's Rosa Delario.

[Michael Fanone]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, I like. I honestly, I think you could try that.

[Tim Miller]

I don't know.

[Jon Lovett]

I think shave the sides of your head. I mean, honestly, this could work for you.

[Sarah Longwell]

Thank you. Straight man in the audience.

[Jon Lovett]

Get that attitude the fuck out of here.

[Tim Miller]

Thank you. It is pride month, sir.

[Jon Lovett]

It's pride. We say yes to whatever. And finally, just as one last option, we have the Elvira Goth era that you could perhaps enter. That's where we would like to see you. By the end of this pride.

[Sarah Longwell]

I feel like I.

[Tim Miller]

Which one do you think appealed on.

[Sarah Longwell]

My photo bits after this.

[Jon Lovett]

So, Sarah, so that's all a way of saying, you know, we. We want you to try any one of these directions as pride. We hope that even though Tim and I do take up as much space as there is. Yeah, you feel?

[Sarah Longwell]

I do. I look forward to interrupting you guys a lot during this show. As you talk.

[Tim Miller]

I don't like the sound of that.

[Sarah Longwell]

A form of historical retaliation, and I.

[Jon Lovett]

Love that for us.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

But now I understand, Sarah, you've. You've collected a dossier of your own.

[Sarah Longwell]

So here's the thing. Tim and I actually go way back. Like recliners back. Like, we have been friends since, like, 2006, when I had to go pick him up after the cops arrested him. And for some reason, his first call was to his boss because they needed a responsible adult to pick him up and drive his trust fund Cadillac home for him.

[Tim Miller]

I don't recall this. Did that happen?

[Sarah Longwell]

That's a real thing that happened.

[Tim Miller]

Are you sure?

[Sarah Longwell]

I remember pulling up in the cab because I also had a life. I was also out partying. And I pull up in a cab.

[Jon Lovett]

Let's try to keep this believable.

[Sarah Longwell]

I pull up in a cab and this guy is sitting on the curb. It's almost Christmas. I remember because the cop wished me a Merry Christmas as I was taking Tim away. And Tim's sitting there in the tiniest little glittery tank top you've ever seen while the cop lights are going, the red and whites are spinning. I remember the cabbie said to me.

[Tim Miller]

Coming out is a challenge. Okay? And I went through some rocky times. I'm sure there are people in the room that can relate to that. It's not nice to bully me about it all these years later.

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, I told you, somebody's gotta bring the top energy. So anyway, so Tim and I. Tim and I have been friends for a very long time. And so I have a lot of old pictures of Tim. And so I thought we'd just do something really quickly called the Tim Eras tour.

[Jon Lovett]

I love this.

[Tim Miller]

Sounds fun.

[Jon Lovett]

I love this.

[Sarah Longwell]

Let's go. This is the Tim. This is the Tim Beard era.

[Jon Lovett]

Holy shit. Look at that. Look at that.

[Tim Miller]

That is hot. I want to draw your attention to the fact that I spilled my drink all over my shirt.

[Jon Lovett]

Look, Tim, if you had kept that up a little bit longer, you could have been speaker of the.

[Sarah Longwell]

What else we got? Oh, yeah. I call this Tim's free Palestine era. That's Tim's husband, actually. Look how far we go back.

[Tim Miller]

Twins.

[Sarah Longwell]

Tyler. That was pride of 2008. How about that? Oh, yeah. Okay. This is Tim's frat bro era. You chugging a 40 at the RNC headquarters.

[Jon Lovett]

Who is that in the background?

[Sarah Longwell]

Is that Sean Spicer?

[Jon Lovett]

That is Sean Spicer. Shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame.

[Tim Miller]

And if I kept that up, I'd.

[Jon Lovett]

Be a new bench. That's how quickly. That's how quickly we could have our own dictator on our side. It's that best on a fucking dime. On a dime. Sorry, Sarah. Please continue. I'm so sorry for them.

[Sarah Longwell]

Look at this twink schoolboy era.

[Tim Miller]

That's hot.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, this was around the time I met Tim and he had a pair of fake glasses that he wore. This was his like Superman to Clark Kent thing that he did. It was like glasses, straight glasses, off gay. They were not prescription.

[Tim Miller]

I did wear non prescription spectacles.

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, my. You know.

[Michael Fanone]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

For those listening, I was.

[Tim Miller]

That was a gag.

[Jon Lovett]

For those listening, that is a photo of Tim, Sarah, and another Sarah Palin of Alaska. You know, it's so funny. You hear former Republican, but then you feel it. Then you feel it right here in the middle of the chest.

[Tim Miller]

You betcha.

[Sarah Longwell]

I call this Tim's why we did it era, which you only know if you've read Tim's book. But it's a good joke if you got Tim's book. All right, next one. This is Tim's please clap era.

[Jon Lovett]

We have Tim and Jeb Bush. Wow. Now look at this. This is just.

[Tim Miller]

If only we had Jeb. You guys didn't fucking deserve Jeb. Okay? I don't want to hear any of this nonsense.

[Jon Lovett]

If only we had Jeb. People Say to themselves all the time.

[Sarah Longwell]

Last one, last one.

[Tim Miller]

Okay, that's not cute. I said only cute pictures.

[Tara Hoots]

This is.

[Sarah Longwell]

Lastly, this is Tim's finally famous era. And I want you to know this is from the other day when Tim yelled at our staff because he didn't look cute enough in his YouTube photo.

[Jon Lovett]

And honestly, you know what?

[Sarah Longwell]

And he made some changes.

[Jon Lovett]

You know what? You know what? That's exactly what Tim should do. That face is his goddamn moneymaker.

[Tim Miller]

Thank you.

[Jon Lovett]

All right. And we can't do anything. We can be honest about the fact that we want to be looking good on these fucking youtubes. All right, Sarah, thank you.

[Sarah Longwell]

All right, that's all my Tim. But I do have a bonus for Lovett because I didn't have old pictures of him. His freshman year college roommate and I worked together. And I was like, give me something. And he said, no. So John must be like a scary gay. Like.

[Jon Lovett]

Loyalty. Yeah, loyalty.

[Sarah Longwell]

So I had to do something else. So one thing that John and I have in common is that we both love the show Survivor. Okay? I've watched every season of Survivor, and when I saw that they announced Jon Lovett was gonna be on the show, I was so fucking pissed. I was like, now they will never have another gay, middle aged podcaster on the show. And I've missed it. I'll never get to do this. Luckily, this happened.

[Sam Stein]

First person voted out of survival 47, John.

[Tim Miller]

That's four.

[Jon Lovett]

That's enough.

[Tim Miller]

Need to bring me your torch. They misspelled your name.

[Jon Lovett]

Let's just watch the whole fucking thing.

[Sarah Longwell]

We live it all.

[Tim Miller]

Play it again bright and fast.

[Jon Lovett]

Time here to go. All right, see you. Bye, teams.

[Tim Miller]

You know, I have a little behind the scenes story from one of our podcasts. In the period between when John came home from Survivor and when they announced that he was the first person eliminated, we did a podcast together. And on the show I was like, by the way, I know you did terrible. And he goes, how do you know? I said, you look exactly the same as when you left. And I've seen the end of Survivor and people that make it long, they get tan, they lose weight. I was like, you look the same. And he made me cut it. He was like, sherry Whetstone will get mad at me and CBS if we leave it in.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, Sherry Redstone, There is a fragile.

[Jon Lovett]

Alliance between former Republicans and current Democrats. Fragile alliance.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay, okay. Well, I got. This is my last thing. I did get this one picture out of your roommate, which is.

[Jon Lovett]

So.

[Sarah Longwell]

So here's the thing. This is I just have to ask you, because I think I might know why you lost. Are you practicing making fire? Just like on concrete?

[Jon Lovett]

Like, I was learning how to spell. I was really trying to get the fire started. I was learning. I bought a machete on Amazon, which you shouldn't be able to do. And yet. And yet. But, yes, that is me trying to learn how to make fire. Which, if you had. If I had managed to miss more than three dinners, you might have seen.

[Sarah Longwell]

Okay, that's the end of my bit. That's the end of my photos bit.

[Jon Lovett]

Well, nice.

[Tim Miller]

Can you make fire?

[Jon Lovett]

I can make fire. I learned to make fire. Not as good at making friends, but I can make fire. Turns out you got to make fire and you got to make friends.

[Sarah Longwell]

Which was harder for you? Getting voted off first or the fact that none of them had heard of your podcast?

[Jon Lovett]

When we come back.

[Tim Miller]

Excuse me, we're staying. We have one more little.

[Jon Lovett]

Sorry. You're right. You're right.

[Tim Miller]

Oh, my God, you're right. Okay, well, we added it to the show late, so it's fine. It makes sense. I just figured that since we had the world's messiest divorce during Pride Month, we should probably just talk about it a little bit. So. You know, my take on this might be a little different than you expect, because I was thinking about it on the plane here, and I was like, you know, thinking about Donald and Elon. Gay men in the crowd. Maybe there's more that unites us than divides us, it turns out. I know it doesn't seem likely, but bear with me here. You have a relationship between two white male narcissists. It hits the skids, the breakup explodes in a messy ketamine fueled cat fight. There's accusations of bad behavior at sex parties and reckless spending of the couple's finances. It's a gale as old as time. I'm surprised this didn't burst out into the open at a 14th street brunch. We've all seen the Ark. The only question I have is, which one spirals and spends the night taking strangers loads in the darkroom at the Green Lantern? My money's on Elon. Was that too much?

[Jon Lovett]

No, I don't think so.

[Tim Miller]

You can keep that one as a souvenir. I can't throw. I'm gay. We'll give it to you later. I also feel like we're kind of living a preview of the Sophie's Choice facing the children of gay divorce. I don't know about you, I feel bad for those children. Like, imagine having to choose who you want to have custody. The K hole circuit dad or the cunty theater queen. Talk about hard choices by Hillary Clinton. Did you write any of that? Was that not involved? Okay, one other thing I never expected from this whole saga was that a straight man would end up becoming the poster boy for mixing meth and kid. I thought that was our thing.

[Sarah Longwell]

I don't understand any of these jokes.

[Tim Miller]

That's good. The jokes are for the seven gay men under the age of 50 in the crowd. What's up, boys? The good news is now we get a name for getting so geeked on a Kay and Tina snowball that you spend all night posting onto Sniffies or X. We can call it Getting Doged. And let me tell you guys, if you're out there, after that Troye Sivan show tomorrow, boys are gonna be getting doged all over town. So watch your apps.

[Jon Lovett]

That was beautiful, Tim.

[Tim Miller]

That's all we got. That was my type 5 on the gay divorce.

[Jon Lovett]

And on that note, when we come back, Tim is gonna sit down with Andre Hernandez Ramirez, lawyer, to talk about what brought us all here together. So we'll be right back.

[Tim Miller]

You don't get the fancy intro like everybody else. Okay, Introduce yourself. Tell everybody who we're talking to.

[Michael Fanone]

Hi, everybody. I'm Lindsay Toslowski. I'm the president and CEO of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center.

[Tim Miller]

Thank you. It's so great to see you in person finally, after all of our Twitter DMs. It's unfortunate we had to use Elon's platform to talk, but, you know, it's nice that he brought us together.

[Michael Fanone]

I'm glad he brought us together.

[Tim Miller]

I'm just so appreciative of all the work that you're doing, and I'm so grateful that we were able to support your guys work with this event tonight, I should say. I got a text from Congressman Richie Torres, folks. They donated $1,000 to your group as well, since he couldn't be here tonight. So we're doing the can. But I thought that. Why don't you start by just telling us about Andre and how you got to know him and how you got to represent him.

[Michael Fanone]

Sure. So Andre is an asylum seeker from Venezuela. He came to the US Last year when he was in Venezuela. As a gay man, he faced incredible discrimination. He also was politically persecuted. He was physically hurt. He was followed home by police officers. So he made the incredibly difficult decision to come to the US but he had a really rich life there. He's been in a theater troupe since he was seven years old. He actually worked on the Miss Venezuela pageant. He was in pageants himself as a contestant.

[Tim Miller]

Now is that common in Venezuela for trend Naragua men to be working on the Miss Venezuela pageant?

[Michael Fanone]

You know, I don't think that's been a cover I've seen before. Not common. He also worked professionally as a makeup artist. He, you know, had this really rich life. He's close to his mom. So for him to flee and come to the United States, things were really bad and it was really difficult for him to live authentically there. So he came to the US and he did everything that we were asking people to do. He made an appointment. He waited in Tijuana for that appointment. Once he got into the US he was kept in an ICE prison in San Diego. From the moment he arrived here, he's never stepped free in the United States at all. During that time, he passed his credible fear interview, which means he was on his way to getting asylum. We started representing him in December of last year. We were in the process of waiting for a court hearing for him and. And he was disappeared by the Trump administration on March 15.

[Tim Miller]

And so since you had started, you'd been talking to him at that time, did you kind of expect that or what was the situation between kind of December and March?

[Michael Fanone]

Yeah, so we were getting ready to move forward with his asylum case. We had a hearing on March 13. He was really suffering in an ICE detention center, which is one of the reasons that we worry so much about what it's like for him now in a torture prison in El Salvador.

[Tim Miller]

Suffering how suffering?

[Michael Fanone]

He was sexually harassed. He had actually made complaints in. This is a detention center in San Diego. But he also was doing other things while he was there, including at one point he gave us a. It was sort of like a business plan, a 19 page business plan that he had created for a nonprofit that he wanted to start. And it was to help kids who were homeless and to help other gay kids. And he was planning to do that once he got out. And he wanted to know if we could show it to the judge to show that he had good intentions here.

[Tim Miller]

In the US now you do a lot of these cases. Bring him fucking back. Yeah, it's ridiculous. You know, the Andre case has just taken up so much of. It's good. It's gotten attention, taken so much of my brain power. But I know you represent other folks as well. Are there any other stories you want to tell us about the people that you represent that are in El Salvador?

[Michael Fanone]

So we represent Eight other men who are also at the same Secot prison in El Salvador that Andre is. One of them is Arturo Suarez. He's a professional singer. He actually had a baby born since he's been there who he's never met. Another is Miguel Rojas Mendoza. He was picked up in Louisiana while working as a horse trainer and rancher. He actually had tps, so he had protected status here in the United States. He has two children, and his children's names were the tattoos that he had that likely landed him there. And there are so many other stories, so many other Andres that could be part of the more than 235 men who were sent on those US government planes to El Salvador.

[Tim Miller]

How do you not become just consumed by rage, murderous rage? That's a personal question. I'm looking for advice.

[Michael Fanone]

I think that every single day that I'm here, I feel like I'm doing exactly what I'm supposed to be doing. And I think all of the other. And I. And I think all of the other. We have a huge team that's working on Anthri's case, other immigrant offenders, other colleagues. We have a case that is actually the JGG versus Trump case. It's happening here right now. We got a positive decision this week, so we are keeping hope alive. I believe. I know in my heart that we will get him back, and we're not going to stop fighting until we do. And so I think, you know, to answer your question about rage, we're channeling our rage for good at this moment, because what the hell else are we going to do?

[Tim Miller]

Okay, I'm just going to play that back to myself from time to time to try to use your wisdom to help me out. Okay. We had a little news today with the Kilma Abrego Garcia case. I guess, kind of. I mean, it's good, but also, fuck these people. Just from the legal perspective, what does that development say to you about all these other cases?

[Michael Fanone]

So the news that we got in Kilmar's case is that he's on his way back to the United States. What that says to me is they need to stop lying, that it's impossible, and if they can bring him back, they can bring Anthony back.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. And this is the thing about all these cases. Like, the reason why they're bringing Kilmar back is because they want to make it about the details of Kilmar's life, which I don't know about one way or the other, but that's the fucking point here, right? Like, you can't kidnap 200, 150 people, send them to a foreign gulag, and then just be like, well, whatever, we'll see what happens. Some of them are bad guys. Some of them. Right. Like, that is the issue here. And so how do you think about framing that for people so we don't get bogged down in the details of individual cases?

[Michael Fanone]

Right. In many ways, what happened? I mean, there's lots of legal things I could tell you about the Alien Enemies act and all these things, and I won't.

[Tim Miller]

Thank you.

[Michael Fanone]

You're welcome. But what I can say is that his case is fundamentally about due process. And due process is most important when the government is accusing you of a crime or alleging you are a gang member. The only thing that stands between any of us ending up in a prison in El Salvador, just like Andri, is the fact that we have due process, we have constitutional rights. When those are trampled, when you are like Andri, whisked away without getting to speak to your lawyer, without knowing where you are going, without being given an opportunity to. To refute what the government is saying about you, your day in court, this is what happens. And if it can happen to him, it could happen to any one of us. And that's why this case is not just about Andri. It's not just about the 240 men. It's about the future of our democracy and whether or not we're going to fight for it.

[Tim Miller]

All right, last thing. What can. Obviously, folks here care about this? They showed up tonight. We really appreciate all of you. What else you could people do?

[Michael Fanone]

Well, we're so grateful for this. You know, donating to organizations like Immigrant Defenders Law center and our partner organizations is so important because it helps us to do this work. All of our work is done for free for the clients. And so being here is really important. But we're asking people to continue to shine a light on this case, continue to lift up his story, lift up the stories of all these men. You can go to freeandre.org and you will see toolkits so you can reach out to your elected representatives. But really, the U.S. government here, the Trump administration, they are trying to erase his existence. And so what we need people to do is keep his story alive. Don't let them erase him. And most importantly, talk to your family and friends, those that live in Republican districts, make sure that they are going to town halls, that they are asking the questions about when Andre is coming back and when he's going to get his day in court. That is the best thing that people can do.

[Tim Miller]

I admire you so much. Thank you so much for everything you're doing. That's Lindsey. Appreciate her. Thank you, everybody. Yeah. Stand up. All right, up next. I don't know. Levitt's gonna do something. Oh, wait, I get to stay.

[Jon Lovett]

You stay. You stay there, Tim. It's time to bring back one of our classic, classic segments. Now, it has another name, but tonight, in honor of pride, we're going to call it something slightly different. Because it's time for a segment we call Bitch Stop. And here's how it works. We roll a clip and whenever we like, we say bitch Stop to talk about it. Tonight we have Jesse Waters.

[Sarah Longwell]

Bitch stop.

[Jon Lovett]

Talking about. Talking about. What else? The human form. Let's roll the clip.

[Sam Stein]

Now, I was at a resort a little while back and I saw Senator Thune at the gym. The man is jacked, and the guy is in great shape. And he lifts hard. You look at Schumer, he's built like a woman. Now, men do not want to be led by the party of women.

[Sarah Longwell]

Bitch stop.

[Tim Miller]

Hate to hand it to Jesse Waters, but I don't know. Show me the lie. My husband's a big John Thune fan over there. He was getting excited just listening to the description.

[Jon Lovett]

You like that? Kind of. Okay, so I'm sorry, 20 years ago, you had a crush on John Thune. Wow, that strong jaw. Is he a Dakota man?

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

Nice.

[Sarah Longwell]

I have a question. Do men refuse to be led by women?

[Tim Miller]

I don't know if you want the answer to that.

[Sarah Longwell]

You guys, as best I can tell, follow drag queens around everywhere, and you're.

[Tim Miller]

Telling a little something you might need to know about drag queens.

[Sarah Longwell]

I walked into that one.

[Tim Miller]

I had a drag queen. We had a drag queen show up to. This is the second Tyler shout out of the segment to his 40th birthday party. He's 40 now. My father came and the drag queen walks into the event. And my dad looks at my sister in law and he's like, that's a man. Right? That was Sarah as well. Not sure exactly what's happening underneath the wind.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, I also just think it's a funny thing to say. Cause it's like, are people really following John Thune? Is John Thune our leader?

[Tim Miller]

Well, that's a good question. And he's live, though. You have to say about John Thune, he's very fit.

[Jon Lovett]

That's true. Yeah, that's true. And it is also fair to say that sometimes with Chuck Schumer, the medium is the Message, you know what I'm saying? Yeah.

[Sarah Longwell]

You know what I remember about Schumer is, remember when he was like, the people are aroused. I've never seen the people so aroused. And I thought, chuck Schumer, you might need to. It might be time, man. It might be time for something else.

[Jon Lovett]

I also just. Wow.

[Sarah Longwell]

No shade to Chuck Schumer, but. And it has nothing to do with his gym. Just actually, real quick, what is the obsession among Republican men now to talk about, like, what it means to be a man? Like this. This is like a weird thing that's going on.

[Tim Miller]

You're turning to me for my expertise on that.

[Jon Lovett]

I think you know more about it than I do.

[Tim Miller]

Well, I just think that, you know, when you have somebody like Donald Trump at the top, you know, somebody that's really, really fit, won several golf tournaments, is like the 18 time champion of the Bedminster Seniors Golf tournament. And so when you have somebody with that kind of athletic prowess leading the movement, I just think it kind of.

[Jon Lovett]

Trickles down among people there's a connection to. So obviously we're gonna have this military parade next week. Oh, I guess you're not fans of the anniversary of the Continental Army. Not fans of what George Washington did for all of us. Shame on you. But, you know, Michael Beschloss was talking about. I'm sorry to bring bring up that name here, but.

[Tim Miller]

But, okay, but what's the next segment?

[Jon Lovett]

But, no, but Eisenhower said he doesn't want, you know, military parades. We did one after World War I and World War II. We've done them in event of big victories after the Civil War. We don't just have military parades on a random day. Because what Eisenhower said is, that's not strong, that's fucking weak. That's what weak countries do to pretend that they're strong. And you see, like Jesse Watters go on tells you, be like, well, men should do this and men can't do that and they can't eat soup and they can't drink from straws. And it's like, why is the stronger thing to be unable to do stuff like why? I don't. I genuinely don't understand it. It's like you're. You can't do all these things. Being a man means you have to do much, much less. That's how you show how strong you are. That doesn't make any sense to me. That doesn't make any sense.

[Tim Miller]

It is a little faggy to eat soup. Let's just be honest. Is that wrong?

[Sarah Longwell]

I don't know, but when I slurping, when I see Donald Trump throwing himself a big, like, military parade with tanks, that's when I really think about tiny Ds.

[Jon Lovett]

Like, yeah, for sure.

[Sarah Longwell]

That is a one big compensation ceremony.

[Jon Lovett]

For sure. For sure. Yeah. Like, look at that ICBM going by. So how could I, you know? You know, it's the Corvette. It's the military version of the Corvette, in a sense. Let's continue the clip.

[Sam Stein]

Men want to be led by other men. So Democrats need to become men. And then they can persuade men. But they have to lift first. I'm serious. There's a quote by Maya Angelou.

[Tim Miller]

Dana.

[Robert Garcia]

Thank you.

[Tim Miller]

Could you ask permission from Dana before you keep going?

[Sam Stein]

People will forget what you said. People will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

[Jon Lovett]

Bitch. Stop. How many loops in that fucking grave do we think she did? Like, is it a full. Like, how many? Like, it's like a car going over a cliff. She's, like, on bottom, you know, just fully rolling and rolling and rolling and rolling.

[Sarah Longwell]

It must be hard to be a man. Cause it's like you can't drink out of straws. But you must quote Maya Angelou.

[Tim Miller]

How much Maya do you think Jesse's read? Like, how familiar with his oeuvre do you think he is?

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, I. I think he's familiar with BrainyQuotes.com. i think he's also, like, as Abraham Lincoln once said, live, laugh, love. According to Gandhi, you miss all the shots you don't take. Quoting Maya Angelou on the five. On the five.

[Sam Stein]

People don't like the way they feel.

[Michael Fanone]

Around Democrats.

[Sam Stein]

Because Democrats don't like the way they feel. And if they lifted, they feel better. And then everybody around them would feel better.

[Jon Lovett]

You had me admire.

[Tim Miller]

Okay, bitch, stop. I mean, I do think Joe Biden probably has an uncomfortable touch that said, keep me as far away from Jesse Waters as possible. You know? So I think that, you know, I'm not sure that he is the best messenger. Maybe.

[Sarah Longwell]

But should we test, like, Let me. What he's saying is, men like to be around men who lift. Fact check. True.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah. During World Pride, for sure.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

It's so. It really is like the horseshoe theory for heterosexuality. It's like, how straight are you? I'll tell you how straight I am. I only want to see the fucking hottest guys. I'm so straight that I don't want to. I do not like talking to women. I don't think they're really people. I want to see Fucking ripped dudes. I think about them. I think about what it takes to be a ripped dude. It's on my mind. I see Chuck Schumer. Don't want to fuck him. Something's off. Something's up. Now, John Thune. John Thune could have his way with me. That's called leadership. I'm a straight man.

[Sarah Longwell]

He just wants to sit there with John Thune and quote Maya Angelou back and forth, and that's what they call Saturday night. Sounds good.

[Jon Lovett]

And that's bitch. Stop. Yeah. All right. Now, while they might try to ban our books, they can't stop us from keeping the library open. Well, not the literal libraries, but the library of the gay little human heart remains open 24 7, and it's full of the gnarliest reads we here at this show could muster. So joining me on stage. Oh, wait. Oh, no, no. I'm gonna go out to the audience. I know what we're doing. I know how to run a show. So can we bring up the lights?

[Tim Miller]

Love. It was on a red eye.

[Jon Lovett]

All right.

[Tim Miller]

We could just let him.

[Jon Lovett]

So here's how.

[Tim Miller]

I don't know that we're going to.

[Jon Lovett]

Use this, first of all. Hi, everybody. So here's how this works. I'm gonna come out there, all right, and we're gonna do. We have some rose jokes, and we'd like to hear you have a chance to throw some shade, as the kids say, 10 years ago, at some of these. You know, Trump, if you're straight, hey, do me a favor. Keep your hands in your fucking pockets, all right? We love that you're here, but we don't need to hear you. Okay? Straights tonight. Seen, not heard. All right, I'm coming.

[Sarah Longwell]

He just leaves the stage.

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, hello.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, he's just prancing around in that little skirt. Look at him.

[Jon Lovett]

Who would like to do our first joke or praise? All right, I'm coming to you. I'm coming to you. I'm coming to you. Please stay seated.

[Tim Miller]

I will sit.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay. All right, here's the joke here. Give us the joke.

[Tim Miller]

Donald Trump, given how he uses makeup and tries to destroy anyone who shares the stage with him. Donald Trump is our first drag queen president, so that's at least one queen I wouldn't trust around kids.

[Jon Lovett]

Nice. All right, who wants to go down? Coming around. I'm coming around. I'm coming around. I'm coming around. I'm coming around. Who wanted to go over here? I saw someone. Oh, hi. Hi, hi. Hi. All right, hit us with these JD Vance zingers. JD Vance.

[Tara Hoots]

Talk about someone with no charisma.

[Jon Lovett]

JD Vance has never slayed in his life, except for one time in Vatican City. Nice. Really good. Here. Here. Let's do that second J.D. vance. One there. J.D.

[Tim Miller]

Vance has always wanted to be a man's man. But failing that, he'll happily be Donald Trump's bitch.

[Jon Lovett]

Nice. Nice. These are good.

[Tim Miller]

A little on the nose. Love it for that one. A little on the nose.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah. Okay, Good note. We'll fix it in post, I guess. Who else wants to go?

[Tim Miller]

Hi.

[Jon Lovett]

Hi. Oh, right. All right, here. Oh, okay. This is perfect. Okay. It says, for a lesbian, but just a woman works. Okay. I don't know. I just don't know your story. I don't know your story. Okay, read both of these jokes, right? Starting from there.

[Michael Fanone]

Seeing RFK Jr. Always makes me wonder. Can someone be a double lesbian?

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, you got him. You zinged them. You zing them real good. Now. Wait, don't do the second one. You're doing great. You're doing great. We need more lesbian.

[Robert Garcia]

What?

[Jon Lovett]

Did you hear the power lesbian thing earlier? Confidence. Do the next bit.

[Tim Miller]

I'm nervous.

[Jon Lovett]

I love you. You're nervous. That's. That's stupid. All right, read the next. Read the next one. You got it. You're doing great. It's the same feeling as excitement. Here we go.

[Michael Fanone]

RFK Jr. Is truly a man who has everything. At least according to his most recent blood work.

[Jon Lovett]

See, that's pretty good. Did great. You're doing great. Great job. From the spouse of a Kenyan alum. Who else wants to go? Okay, I'll come over to you. Oh, we have some more RFK material. That's fun. Hi. Yeah, hi. Here, read this card.

[Sarah Longwell]

RFK Jr recently faced blowback after going for a swim in DC's Rock Creek. Oh, I'm sorry. I read that wrong. After swimming in DC's Rock Creek, RFK Jr. Blew back. Blew out from diarrhea.

[Jon Lovett]

What'd you think of that one, Tim?

[Tim Miller]

The execution on the read wasn't great, so I missed the punchline.

[Jon Lovett]

Wow. Shame, shame, shame, shame. I'm in the crowd now. It feels awesome. Wait, who else wants. Okay, I'll come over to you. Oh, my legs do look great. Thank you. Hi. Okay, read this next one about RFK junior. Say what you will about RFK junior but he's truly killing it. And by it, I mean the entire.

[Tim Miller]

Herd of deer he's hit with his.

[Jon Lovett]

Car and stashed in his trunk for later.

[Sarah Longwell]

That was a good read.

[Jon Lovett]

Sarah, what'd you think of that one?

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, I think it was well read, well delivered.

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, look at that. Look at that. Okay, who wants to go next? Who wants to. Oh, hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi. Okay. Hi. Hi. Okay. Oh, Sarah and Tim, we have two Mike Johnson jokes that are in the same kind of vein. All right. And we couldn't decide, so you're gonna pick your favorite.

[Tim Miller]

Okay.

[Jon Lovett]

All right. Joke number one.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, great. I have to read Mike Johnson.

[Jon Lovett]

Well, what'd you think was gonna happen when you raise your fucking hand? No. You're out. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, okay.

[Sarah Longwell]

I'm a nervous reader. English is my second language. Mike Johnson threw all of his weight behind one big, beautiful bill this month. He also helped pass the budget reconciliation package.

[Jon Lovett]

That one's a thinker. He did great. What?

[Tim Miller]

He put all his weight behind big, beautiful Bill. Bill is a guy. A man named Bill. And it's not a great sign. We have to explain the joke, but I enjoyed it. That was a joke. That was kind of like my Troye Sivan joke earlier. It was only for me.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay, well, let's try this one. You want to go? Okay, here we go. Here. Okay. Mike Johnson uses an app where he and his son monitor each other's porn use, presumably to prevent him from looking at one big, beautiful guy named Bill.

[Sarah Longwell]

That's good. I forgot about that first one.

[Tim Miller]

First one was.

[Jon Lovett]

First one. First one. Oh, hi. Hi. Hi.

[Tim Miller]

That's kind of a.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay here.

[Tim Miller]

High minded.

[Jon Lovett]

Dan Bongino, FBI Deputy Director. You're right. Dan Bongino Epstein did kill himself after listening to your shitty podcast.

[Tim Miller]

Got him like that.

[Jon Lovett]

Got him.

[Tim Miller]

I like that. Now that's combining a couple of my interests.

[Jon Lovett]

I want everyone to know something. I believe that is the first time someone has edited the joke as he read it. And, you know, next time it's one for me and then one for you. Okay. Oh, hi. Hi.

[Tim Miller]

Hi.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay. Hi. Oh, my God, I'm so sweaty. Okay. Oh, there's so many people over here.

[Tim Miller]

Love it. Are you gonna have enough energy for the club later? Think about that swamp ass. What happens if things get a little frisky tonight?

[Jon Lovett]

We'll be right back. Up next, Sarah gets into it with Congressman Robert Garcia.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yes. Please welcome Congressman Robert Garcia from California. There.

[Jon Lovett]

You sit right here.

[Robert Garcia]

Okay.

[Sarah Longwell]

My drink's right here, my friend. Thank you for being here.

[Robert Garcia]

Happy to be here.

[Sarah Longwell]

You know, I have been so impressed with you because you have been very vocal. You've been outspoken, You've been somebody who's been standing up and saying something about Andre and what's happening. Tell me why. Yes. Yes.

[Michael Fanone]

Cheer.

[Sarah Longwell]

Tell me why it upset you so much. Tell me why you got vocal.

[Robert Garcia]

Absolutely. I mean, first, thank you all for being here. Andrea is such a. Especially during Pride Month. This is such an important story for all of us to uplift and to push. This is what's happening right now should be alarming and concerning every single person in this country and what's happening every single person. So for. For me, I obviously, as a openly gay person, I'm also an immigrant. I came to this country as a young kid, and so I feel very much I can relate, and I connect to his story. And what drives me absolutely crazy is that we, the United States government gave Andre the appointment. We told him, come to the United States at a port of entry on this date and on this time for your asylum process and interview. We told him to come to the interview. So he comes to the port of entry to do his interview. He passes that first check, essentially, that first interview process, and then after that, he gets, of course, sent to the detention center and then taken to a country that he is not from, in a foreign prison that we know nothing about with no proof of life. That is shameful. Donald Trump, Christy Noem, Marco Rubio should all be ashamed of themselves. They're causing massive harm, not just to Andrew, but to everybody else. And we. This fires me up, because I don't understand how we can be so cruel as a country. This is a country that was built largely on immigrant labor, and we know this to be true. And I remember, you know, we went down to El Salvador to advocate for not just Andrew, but to ensure that people are getting their due process. And I think what's really important, what I've told folks, including some more conservative members and Republicans, I've said, look, regardless of your opinion on the immigration debate, and we all have different opinions. This is about due process. This is about the Constitution of the United States and whether we. Whether we're going to defend it. And I remember looking at the ambassador, the US Ambassador to El Salvador, in El Salvador, just directly at him. We were this close away from each other. And I shared with him Andrew's story, and he looked right back to me and said, you know, this is the first I've heard of this. And I'm sitting here thinking, we've been promoting and talking about him, and people are talking about him across the country, and this is the first that you are hearing about his story. And he. That part. And he, you know, he, that day told me that he would be, he would do an inquiry, and he actually did the first official inquiry to try to get a wellness check on him, which, of course, we never got. And so since then to now, the work you're all doing to telling his story is so important, we cannot forget him. We must get a proof of life. We are demanding a proof of life check. And I'm just grateful just to be a part of advocating for him and his story.

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, thank you for doing that and thank you for being here. They are bringing, we just found out. We just found out they're gonna bring Kilmar Abrego Garcia back, and they're going to try him, which is just. That is it right? I think, I think the Republicans right now are sort of like, oh, we're going to show you that this is a bad guy. And I'm sort of like, I don't care if he's a bad guy because he still deserves due process. Like, that is what we're doing here, right?

[Robert Garcia]

That's right.

[Sarah Longwell]

Like, if he's a bad guy, prove it, and then we can all move on.

[Robert Garcia]

But, like, that's exactly right.

[Sarah Longwell]

But here's. Look, I spent a long time as a Republican, and I haven't seen it for maybe a decade now, but when I was coming up as a Republican, they talked a lot about the Constitution, about due process, about the rule of law, about all these things, things that mattered to them that became sort of the, that were the underpinnings of democracy. How do your Republican colleagues justify sending people, disappearing them to foreign countries without due process?

[Robert Garcia]

Well, I think, I mean, they can't. I mean, the reality is, is that they, they're completely focused on doing whatever Donald Trump tells them to do, following their, their leader. And they know, and many of them know, that the things they're advocating for are against the Constitution. I mean, the Constitution means nothing to them, them anymore. And, you know, I, I, and I really believe this. There are probably other immigrants here in this theater, and I truly believe this, that immigrants, those of us that have gone through the process of becoming US Citizens, we are some of the most patriotic people in this country. We, we love this country. And I, I think we know what. I have the right to be a US Citizen. I get the honor of serving in Congress because I fought for citizenship. I fought for the thing that most folks here were born with. So immigrants that go through that process believe in this country, and we want to fight for it. And so in the case of these Republicans, I mean, they most have been born into this incredible honor and privilege of being a United States citizen and forget where their parents or their grandparents came from and the struggles that they had to go through to also come to this country. And I'll say this, and you mentioned the Abrego Garcia case. We have the Supreme Court in a 9.0 decision, said that he deserved his due process. And the important thing is everyone deserves their day in court. I don't know what Mr. Abrego Garcia did or didn't do, but he does have a right under the Constitution to defend himself in front of a judge and a courtroom. He has that right. And so whether what he did or what he didn't do, that will be up to a judge and a jury. What we have to do and every single person in this room needs to do, is to defend the Constitution of the United States, which affords, as we all know, all persons, not just U.S. citizens. It affords all persons in this country the right to due process. And we can't forget that the founders.

[Sarah Longwell]

Knew what they were doing when they said all persons, they knew. You know, I was just. We did a rally right before this. Maybe some of you were there. But I do just want to say something that I said there. Yeah, great. Thank you for coming. Thank you for coming. It was my first, like I said, my first rally, my first protest. But, you know, when you came up as a young Republican, I swear to God, Republicans were different on immigration than they are now. I remember, I'm telling you, Reagan used to say he had this great line about how you could go to Japan and you'd never be Japanese and you could move to France and you'd never be a Frenchman, but any person with freedom in their heart who loved the ideals of America could come be an American. And that was a thing that we people see, like agreed was an American value.

[Robert Garcia]

That's right.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. I'm going to quote Reagan up here. All right, so. So tell me. This is something I've wondered and a lot of people ask at the shows. They all want to know, what can I do? And one of the things they ask is they're like, I don't know. I call my congressman, but I don't know if it matters. You're a congressman. Tell us, does it matter when people call?

[Robert Garcia]

It does matter. And I think that we, we and all others, especially, you know, folks that are engaged, we track what folks that call, what they're calling about. It does matter. What we also need, though, we need folks to call Republicans. We need folks to call those Republican members that need to be held accountable for just blindly supporting Donald Trump's policies. And we have to understand that at this moment, we have to be engaged. And I will tell you this right now, what's happening tonight and telling Andrew's story. Please share his story. We have an opportunity also during Pride Month, where there's more attention on our stories, to uplift what's happening to him, because we know it's not just about him, but he does represent that idea of due process. And by uplifting him, we are uplifting due process. We're uplifting the Constitution, and trying to make our country and the world a better place.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah. I have one last important question.

[Robert Garcia]

Sure.

[Sarah Longwell]

So you were very involved in ousting a colleague of yours named George Santos, AKA Kintaro Ravage.

[Robert Garcia]

Yes.

[Sarah Longwell]

Why'd you do. What was the reason for that? Gay.

[Jon Lovett]

On gay violence.

[Robert Garcia]

Man, I have so many George Santos stories. We'd be here all night. But I'll just start. I met him. I met George during our orientation. And, you know, first I was struck, of course, I obviously gay Latino, and on the other side is another gay Latino. And I thought, well, maybe there's, you know, an opportunity here just to have some, like, bipartisan friendship. I mean, I don't know. I knew that he was already. His ideas were already pretty extreme, and so I generally not try not to engage with people that don't believe in, like, human rights for LGBTQ people and other folks. And as we more. We learned more and more about him, I just got really angry about it, and I thought, this is someone that is working to dismantle our rights. And yet you're from the same community. And so pretty early on, I mean, I was a freshman. I. You know, I made the very first expulsion motion on the floor of the House to expel George Santos. And I submitted. And everyone, a lot of folks were like, this is a bad idea. You're a freshman. You shouldn't do this. And I was like, fuck it. Like, we gotta do. We gotta lean in. Like, we gotta do it. And I remember we filed the resolution and we forced a vote, and that initial vote that we took is what then got Kevin McCarthy at the time to then take that motion, table it, send it to the Ethics Committee for them to do their report. The Ethics Committee does their report, and then months later, once that report comes out, it triggered that second expulsion vote that then, because the report came out.

[Sarah Longwell]

And everybody was like, I'm sorry, what?

[Robert Garcia]

Exactly. And then that came, and then that came out. And then, of course, we expelled him really quickly. The day of the vote, I went to the back of the house with him and I said he wanted to talk. I said, okay, let's talk. So we go to the back by the cloakroom, and we're about to vote to expel him like, like within 30 minutes and.

[Sarah Longwell]

Awkward.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah.

[Robert Garcia]

And obviously. And I, you know, I helped start the whole thing. And so he wrote in the back, and he's trying to convince me still that he shouldn't get expelled. And I remember just, I looked him right in the eye and I said, you know, I said, george, I said, one is, you deserve to be expelled. But I also hope that you can reflect and you take this time to think about who you are and that deep down, like, I want you to get better. Like, I want. I. There was a moment, like, where I felt I was just looking at somebody that was really sad. And it doesn't excuse the horrific things that he has done or voted on. And he should be held accountable for those. And he's now going to be held accountable for the crimes he committed.

[Sarah Longwell]

He's been indicted.

[Robert Garcia]

Exactly. But I, I. There was a moment where I, I, you know, I did feel so us as gay people, as queer people, we. We have sometimes have a very hard path to getting to who we really are. And so I felt a little bit for him. And I'm glad he is going to be held accountable for what he did. And I hope that on his way out, he works on himself.

[Sarah Longwell]

You have a good heart, man. Guys, let's give it up. All right? Thank you so much.

[Robert Garcia]

Happy Pride. Happy Pride.

[Tim Miller]

I gotta tell you. Thank you so much, Congressman. I have to. I gotta tell you, I thought that. What? What? I couldn't let Lovett be the only one in a fucking skirt.

[Sarah Longwell]

I'll stand here.

[Tim Miller]

I couldn't be shown up by love. Just stood right in front of. I'm sorry if this is inappropriate.

[Jon Lovett]

You just stood right in front of Sarah?

[Tim Miller]

Well, yeah. Is Sarah still here?

[Jon Lovett]

The.

[Tim Miller]

I was thinking that George Santos cloak room story was going to go somewhere else. I got to tell you, I thought you were building this.

[Jon Lovett]

Absolutely not.

[Tim Miller]

We went to the cloak room.

[Jon Lovett]

We told him, I hope you get help. What did he say?

[Robert Garcia]

No, I think that he was just, I mean, honestly, he was really upset and sad and he said, thank you, I hope I do, too. Something to that effect. And then we voted to expel him.

[Jon Lovett]

And then he went to go sit down for an interview with Zwe.

[Robert Garcia]

Thank you so much.

[Tim Miller]

Thanks, guys. Bye.

[Jon Lovett]

Thank you for being here.

[Tim Miller]

Thanks, guys.

[Jon Lovett]

Listen, Pride, it's about anything. It's about the superiority of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, asexual, two spirits. Whatever is going on with the I plus plus if you're in the plus. Still, if you're figuring. No, none of those apply to me. I'm plus. I'm plus if you're plus. Love that, too for you. Which is why it's time for a game we're calling Capture the Flag. Nope. Okay, there we go. Oh, wow. Now.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, you guys were very generous to yourselves there.

[Tim Miller]

Well, that looks about right for me. I don't know about life.

[Jon Lovett]

That's just me after a pump. Get my pump on, get the lighting right. That's all it takes. Now, we can't just do this with gays alone, because it's time to pit the gays against the straights. So we need some support. All right, let's start by bringing out one additional member of our gay family to help us round out your team. This will be Sarah and Tim. Let's please welcome to the stage DC's own wonderful drag queen, Tara Hoots. Woo.

[Tim Miller]

Oh, hey.

[Jon Lovett]

Hey, girl. What's happening? Why don't you go right here for now, all right?

[Tara Hoots]

Just in case there's confusion. I'm a man in a dress, all right?

[Sarah Longwell]

Literally three men. I'm the only one in pants.

[Jon Lovett]

Well, you know, like, look, when Crooked and the Bulwark were deciding to figure out how to do this event, we're like, well, we got to figure out who to talk to. And we said, who wears the pants at the Bulwark? That should have worked better. That was pearls before swine. Sometimes it's my fault. That one's on you, Tara Hoots.

[Tara Hoots]

Yes, darling.

[Jon Lovett]

I love that. Now you're from. Is it from Terre Hoot, Indiana?

[Tara Hoots]

I was born in Terre Haute, Indiana, hence my name. Terre Hoot. Yes. Are you Hoosiers out there? We got out. We got out, darlings.

[Jon Lovett]

Yes. Now, you are a renowned D.C. queen, and you were bumped off the Kennedy center programming schedule by its new artistic director and genius, Donald Trump. No space on the sketch.

[Tara Hoots]

So we actually. I was part of a drag show that was the Trump got really mad about the family specific one. That was one that I was involved in. Yeah.

[Jon Lovett]

And he was angry because he thought it would be inappropriate to have somebody out there talking about drugs and all the kinds of, you know, all the horrible things that might. Someone might say in the space of children.

[Tara Hoots]

Now, I've been a teacher for 27 years. And I. Yes, thank you. And I've been a drag queen since the pandemic. And I describe my type of drag as like, Mr. Rogers in a dress. Right. And, like, I just want to lift people up, and if they complain about what I do, they don't know what I do.

[Jon Lovett]

What do you do?

[Tara Hoots]

Basically, I started doing drag because I wanted. I thought the world was terrible, and it really hasn't changed, has it? During the pandemic, I wanted to lift people up and bring joy and love to people. So that's what I do with my drag.

[Jon Lovett]

Well, thank you for being here. Absolutely.

[Tara Hoots]

Let's do this.

[Jon Lovett]

Now we need to do some choreography. So I would love to have the gay team come over here.

[Tim Miller]

Right. So can you hold on? This is.

[Jon Lovett]

Is that Tara Hoots? Okay. And Sarah and Tim in this zone over here, because it's time to meet your competitors.

[Tim Miller]

Right? Bring it on, straights now. How you doing, girl?

[Jon Lovett]

Now, first up, you really got lucky.

[Tim Miller]

You really got lucky. You would have had to hang out with Rick Grinnell had they kept you at the Kennedy Center. Big best firing ever happened to you.

[Jon Lovett]

Big dodgeable. Now I want to bring out two, I believe they're called. I think it's pronounced straight. The G is silent. It's weird, actually. Weird that the G is silent. There's a G inside of str. There's a G inside of every straight when you think about it. Something to think about. So please welcome, from the Bulwark, Sam Stein. And Come on out, Sam. Come on out and.

[Tim Miller]

Dress like a lesbian. Kind of an el, really.

[Jon Lovett]

And because Sam is straight, but in a journalist way, we wanted to bring out a man. So please welcome Michael Fanon, who is a hero.

[Sarah Longwell]

Come on, Michael.

[Jon Lovett]

Former Capitol Police officer.

[Tim Miller]

Now that is a man. Take it off.

[Jon Lovett]

Thank you, Michael, for being here.

[Tim Miller]

Take it off. Let's unbutton a couple of those buttons.

[Jon Lovett]

Look at this. Look at this. Michael, I have a question for you. They love you. Have you find it helpful to get tips on how to be a man from Jesse Waters? No, that's. That. That's a straight man. That's a strong strile. That's a straight man right there. No. Now, I do want to say that you have a little bit of advantage in this game, because we were talking before the show, and you have some experience. This is true. You did have to go undercover, Is this right?

[Lindsay Toslowski]

I did. 2011, 2012. I spent two summers undercover working in some of your fine gay clubs right here in Washington, D.C. what's your favorite. We talked about this backstage. My favorite was Apex.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, the video bar. That video bar got real.

[Jon Lovett]

Now, you were saying that you were. You were working with another officer, right?

[Tim Miller]

I was.

[Jon Lovett]

And now the first time you did it, you went in and. Well, why don't you tell us what happened?

[Lindsay Toslowski]

All right, so.

[Jon Lovett]

This is good stuff.

[Tim Miller]

I got.

[Jon Lovett]

I got no detail.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

I got detail to the Second District, the great Second District here in Washington, D.C. for the summer. They were having an influx of crystal meth in a lot of the. Tina.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, yeah.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

Tina.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. So I go. I've heard. Not for me.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

So it was me and. And one of my buddies who was assigned to the 6th district, which is east of the Anacostia river, and the two of us got temporarily detailed to 2D, and we were part of this investigation, and we were going into a bunch of different gay clubs. The first club we went to was Fireplace. And so this is, like, my first experience inside of, you know, a. A place such as this. And, yeah, I remember going in there, and I was like, all right, all right. I told him, I'm not going to name names, but we'll call him Bill. I was like, well, we're going to divide and conquer. I was like, we don't know each other. We're going into the place. We're both going to go in. We, you know, we pros. We've been buying crack, heroin, everything else. Like, we can. We can do this. And so we get into the club. I sit down at the bar, and, like, within five shit seconds, there's, like, some. One guy's, like, holding my hand, and another guy's, like, literally, like, kissing on my earlobe. And I was like, all right, well, I'm just trying to buy some fucking drugs. So. So we came. We came back.

[Sarah Longwell]

I could just hear Michael Fanon being not that kind of crack, right?

[Lindsay Toslowski]

But I was like, yeah, whatever. Like, is this what I got to do to, you know, get.

[Tim Miller]

Get the.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

The buy I've done worse things with, you know, Whatever.

[Tim Miller]

Let's.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

Anyway, so the next day we go back. The next day we go back, and we. I think we hit Apex and we went to Nelly's and a couple other spots, but we were like, we're a fucking couple, and we're in a monogamous. We're in a fucking monogamous relationship.

[Tim Miller]

Like that's ever stopped anybody at Nelly's before.

[Jon Lovett]

Incredible. Incredible. So I can't think of a better straight person to join Sam and being part of this game. Now here's how it works. I'm going to ask the gays questions about straights. I'm going to ask the straights questions about gays. We'll see who takes it in the end. You have filthy fucking minds. All right.

[Tim Miller]

A lot of cards there.

[Jon Lovett]

I also have a card that just says loose lesbian questions. All right, first question for the gays.

[Tim Miller]

All right.

[Jon Lovett]

Now, do you go by. Do I say Tara? Yes.

[Tara Hoots]

You can call TARA Tara. Or Ms. Hoot. Whatever works for you.

[Jon Lovett]

Yes. Hoots. Or hoot?

[Tara Hoots]

Hoot.

[Jon Lovett]

Ms. Hoot.

[Tara Hoots]

Like I'm.

[Jon Lovett]

Yes, like Tara Haute. I get it. Okay. First up, director and Madison Square Garden staple Spike Lee recently said he would give up an Oscar to see what happen.

[Tim Miller]

The Knicks win the championship.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, he got it. He got it. He got it.

[Tara Hoots]

There you go.

[Tim Miller]

I was sport gay, okay? But the Pacers, You a big Larry Bird fan?

[Tara Hoots]

Yeah. Big Larry Bird hick from French Lick.

[Tim Miller]

Pacers win last night.

[Tara Hoots]

I know. Last second shot. Last second shot, baby. I'm from a town that has two Mr. Basketballs from Indiana. So try me. All right. Yes.

[Sarah Longwell]

Are there any questions about women's soccer? No, it's.

[Tim Miller]

No, we're getting the straight. We get the straight question. Straight men do not watch women's soccer. Soccer. Except for the Brandy Carlisle or whatever.

[Jon Lovett]

You're talking to a. I am an Angel City season ticket holder, thank you very much. All right.

[Tim Miller]

Because 1 0.

[Jon Lovett]

All right, you're. You're up. A new Pew research study shows that LGBTQ Americans are twice as likely to be into astrology. In astrology, or Big Three, consist of your rising sign, your sun sign, and your. What? Don't Google it. Don't Google it. You don't know tomato soup? No. Call it out. It's their moon sign. Now, I will just also say to all of you that believe in astrology, you're welcome. That you get to live in the light that science fucking provides you. Unbelievable. Next up for the gays, what brand makes these iconic patterned bags? Wait, I heard someone say, shut up, straight culture. What is this? You don't know? They don't know.

[Tim Miller]

What in the fuck is this?

[Jon Lovett]

Wow.

[Tim Miller]

That is hideous.

[Jon Lovett]

That's so interesting. Right? Because Sarah is a woman. I should know, but she doesn't know because she's not a straight woman.

[Sarah Longwell]

Is that a purse?

[Jon Lovett]

No. What is it, Flower?

[Tara Hoots]

It's not lily poo.

[Jon Lovett]

They don't know either. I mean, I like it. I see a straight woman raising her hand. What's it? What is it? It's Vera Bradley. Vera Bradley. Wow. I Don't know.

[Tim Miller]

Ter whispers to me. She goes, is it Vera Wang?

[Tara Hoots]

I heard Vera out there.

[Tim Miller]

Someone says, I don't think Wang is in there.

[Jon Lovett]

Next up, Euphoria. Star Hunter Schaer is rumored to be up for the titular role of what video game adaptation. That's so hard. Yeah, that's right. A video game adaptation starring Hunter Schaer from Euphoria. You know her, don't you? Michael Fanon?

[Tim Miller]

I don't know.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

This is rigged.

[Jon Lovett]

Is this the last of us? What? No, it's not the last. I was the only one I had. It's Zelda. It's the Legend of Zelda. It's the Legend of Zelda.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, she's a Zelda.

[Jon Lovett]

Did you know that one?

[Tim Miller]

None of your business. It's 1 0. I think their questions were going to be things like, what do poppers do for you during sex? I thought it was going to be a little gayer.

[Jon Lovett]

You know what? Next question. What do poppers do? That must have come up in your research as you got into character. Yeah, yeah. So it's not undercover.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

Manner of ingestion inhaled.

[Jon Lovett]

That's right.

[Lindsay Toslowski]

And they provide a temporary euphoria.

[Jon Lovett]

Okay, yeah, yeah.

[Tim Miller]

But what about during sex, though?

[Lindsay Toslowski]

Also known as nitrate.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, that's right. There we go. We got a point for that. I'm giving it to him.

[Tim Miller]

All right, one, one.

[Jon Lovett]

Great job. Back over to the gays. Country singer Morgan Wallen posted what phrase to his Instagram after appearing to storm off the Saturday Night Live stage. Back in.

[Sarah Longwell]

I gotta get back to real America.

[Tara Hoots]

I'm in a country.

[Jon Lovett]

God's country. Saved it. A lesbian saved by a drag queen. A first time for everything. All right, next question for the straights, what is this object?

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, I know.

[Jon Lovett]

Is that a carabiner? You got it. Sam Stein. Dude, what's up?

[Lindsay Toslowski]

I was gonna say that. I was gonna say carabiner, but then I was thinking, like, there's gotta be some weird sex thing.

[Jon Lovett]

That's an anal speed.

[Tim Miller]

I gotta say, lesbians don't do sex.

[Jon Lovett]

I didn't know.

[Sarah Longwell]

We use it to carry our keys.

[Jon Lovett]

To your Subaru. To the gays. What two kinds of alcohol are in a Manhattan?

[Tara Hoots]

Whiskey and sweet vermouth.

[Jon Lovett]

You got it. Yes. Gotta say yes. The drag queen carrying them. Drag queens carrying them. All right, another. A drag themed question for our straights, please. Name one of these two drag queens. Incredibly popular. Have an incredibly popular podcast. Don't say a word. Don't say a word. Can you name one of these people? Oh, my God, they are famous. They are celebrities.

[Tim Miller]

One of them is my flat profile picture.

[Jon Lovett]

Oh, my God.

[Sarah Longwell]

I have no idea who these.

[Jon Lovett]

You have no idea?

[Sarah Longwell]

No idea.

[Jon Lovett]

You don't know either. I have no idea. Sarah, go over here.

[Tara Hoots]

Shame, shame. You know what?

[Tim Miller]

We're done with the L's.

[Sarah Longwell]

I really like Sam's shirt. I would wear Sam's shirt.

[Tim Miller]

What is the L's out of here.

[Jon Lovett]

I have no clue. Wow.

[Tim Miller]

Gotcha.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah.

[Tara Hoots]

Trixie Mattel, baby.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[Tara Hoots]

All right.

[Jon Lovett]

It's now. The game has now been revised to tops versus bottoms. All right, all right. Back over to the games.

[Tim Miller]

What side are we on?

[Jon Lovett]

Last week, this Yellowstone spinoff starring Harrison Ford and Helen mirren aired at 6. Season 2 finale. What is the name of the show?

[Tara Hoots]

It has numbers.

[Jon Lovett]

It's like 1862 set during prohibition.

[Tara Hoots]

It's numbers Yellowstone. I think it's 1860-1862-1845-1935.

[Sarah Longwell]

1876.

[Jon Lovett]

Wrong. 1923.

[Tara Hoots]

Oh, we were close.

[Sarah Longwell]

I knew it was a date.

[Jon Lovett]

All right.

[Tim Miller]

What is with you people in like horses and fucking buffalo? Who cares what's happening on the plains?

[Jon Lovett]

All right, this one. Honestly, I'm nervous. All right. What year did the Stonewall riots happen? It was in the 60s. Okay, getting. That's okay. One in ten shot from here on out in the late 60s, I'm gonna go with 60.

[Tim Miller]

Nice.

[Jon Lovett]

Nine. You got it, James.

[Tim Miller]

Time somebody gave him the E. That's okay. We'll let him have it. Listen, we'll let him have it.

[Tara Hoots]

Judy Garland died that year.

[Jon Lovett]

Let's close this out. Is there a question?

[Tim Miller]

Nobody cares if you know the answer to the question, okay? It's a competition up here, all right? So just fucking keep it to yourself.

[Tara Hoots]

That's right. I wanted to say that, but I can't because I'm a good Christian woman.

[Jon Lovett]

All right, all right. This is going to be a question for both teams. Okay? This is it. We're tied.

[Sarah Longwell]

Bisexuals are not allowed to answer. It's a slow burn on that one.

[Jon Lovett]

What was the first lesbian wedding to take place on television? Ellen DeGeneres. No, fuck. That's just a lesbian. That's just one lesbian. That's just naming all lesbian you could think of.

[Tim Miller]

Name a lesbian.

[Jon Lovett]

I didn't say name a lesbian. Michael Vanone. Name a lesbian.

[Tim Miller]

Sarah.

[Jon Lovett]

Sarah.

[Tim Miller]

Sarah.

[Sarah Longwell]

I'm the only lesbian you've heard of. Oh, man.

[Jon Lovett]

Gays. You can take it if you know the answer. First lesbian wedding aired on television. Do either of you know I put.

[Tim Miller]

You on the other team? What the Fuck. You don't know this one.

[Sarah Longwell]

Hold on.

[Jon Lovett]

This is bad.

[Sarah Longwell]

Sarah, Donald, marry someone I don't know.

[Tim Miller]

Is it in Dawson's Creek?

[Jon Lovett]

God, no. Does anybody here know Friends? It was the Friends episode. The one with the lesbian wedding. And you know what? Honestly, because we have all of Pride, I want to thank our straights for being willing to subject themselves. Hey, everybody. Michael Fanone, Samstein. Two equally heterosexual men. Thank you both so much. And we're back. I've lost all my cards, but that's not important. First of all, thank you all for coming out tonight. There is nothing that brings Crooked and the Bulwark together quite like ranting about whatever happens to be on our minds. And so we thought we would end tonight's show in a way that was suited to our great desire for yelling in a segment we're calling.

[Tim Miller]

Rant Wheel.

[Jon Lovett]

The Rant Wheel. What did we call it? I think we called it Bulwark. Whatever. There's a wheel. And we're going to yell about topics.

[Tara Hoots]

Oh, my God.

[Jon Lovett]

Do we not have a wheel? Are we up to that? Oh, here we go.

[Tara Hoots]

Oh, my God.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, no.

[Jon Lovett]

Tara Hoot. What? This is Pride. Is there something on your mind that you'd like to vent about just to be mad about or happy about?

[Robert Garcia]

Happy about.

[Jon Lovett]

Is there anything you'd like to. To be emotional about? Around 60 seconds.

[Tara Hoots]

Listen. Okay, 60 seconds. The drag queen with a microphone. That's at least four minutes too short. All right, so I do want to say I did an event on Wednesday, and with the drag artists, and the audience was so excited and so enthused, and I really feel like Washington, D.C. needs a lot of hope and joy right now. And I'm one of the. Ryan, we need to look up. We need to find ways to be inspired, even though things are, like, falling apart sometimes around us. And something I'm proud of. I'm going to say that I'm proud of. I got out of Indiana. I'm proud of my friends who are in Indiana, still in New Castle, Indiana, who are fighting the good fight and making the place better for people. I'm proud of my husband, Mr. Hoot, who's in the wings, who was a government worker for 37 years. He was forced out of the federal government by this. By this. And I'm like, I'm so mad at the people. If you are those people that have been treated so poorly, know that I see you. I love you. Thank you, our government workers, for doing so much for everybody. I think that I'm a little over clamped. All right, I got a little. But that. That just makes me so mad. I think it's evil. It's angry. And I want to make sure that we're trying to lift people up and look for the kindness when there seems to be such a lack of it from who's running our country right now.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, Beautiful idea. It's a beautiful idea. A beautiful sentiment. Let's spin it again. Oh, it has landed on Sarah.

[Tim Miller]

It has landed on Sarah.

[Jon Lovett]

We have an order. It's. It is. It has land.

[Tim Miller]

Is that Sarah?

[Jon Lovett]

It has landed on Sarah.

[Tim Miller]

She's getting butch.

[Sarah Longwell]

You guys run a tight show. I'll tell you what, man. All right, all right. I've got a ranch.

[Tim Miller]

Nice crooked Bulwark collaboration.

[Sarah Longwell]

I actually had hoped you were going next, because following that with mine feels funny. But I'm gonna give you my rant unvarnished, which is, do we need to really, like, need a whole month for pride? Like, the way we do pride, like, our need for a whole month is so extra and so on brand, and it's ridiculous. What? My Uber leaves a little rainbow trail as it goes. And, like, you walk into Target, and you're like, oh, my God, did a rainbow throw up in here? Like, it just feels like, look, you want to do Black History Month? Whole month.

[Tim Miller]

Okay, the people are getting restless.

[Sarah Longwell]

Oh, wait, I'm sorry. Did you just say I should stop?

[Jon Lovett]

They don't like Target. They're mad at Target. They're mad at Target. They're mad at Target. All right, we got it.

[Sarah Longwell]

Whatever. Whatever. The point is. The point is, I just think, like, a week is enough, and we don't need a whole month. And, like, it's enough.

[Jon Lovett]

Shame, shame, shame, shame, shame, shame.

[Sarah Longwell]

I needed one of those tonight, and I decided it would be on my rant.

[Jon Lovett]

The second somebody tells you something you don't want to hear, you turn on them. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Let's spin it again. Oh, it's landed on me. You know, here's what I wanted to say. Maybe it was a little more earnest, I suppose, but, you know, we started by saying how many things had to go wrong for us all to be on this stage together? There was this. When they sent up one of the satellites many years ago, they realized that they had made the mirrors wrong. The mirror before Elon Musk. Not his fault that they'd actually bent. They'd done the mirrors instead of. They were spherical instead of hyperbolic or hyperbolic instead of spherical. I don't remember which one is. Was spherical instead of hyperbolic. And what that meant is, even though it was imperceptible when it was on Earth, the heat from that light was so intense that it would shatter the mirror. It didn't work. It didn't work as a telescope. And one thing that I feel like I have learned over the last decade, as we faced all these different pressures and challenges from what happens when a country, a segment of a country, loses its faith in democracy and freedom is you see who bends and who breaks under pressure. And it is a gift to find out who has the stuff and who is strong enough and who really cares and who actually believes the things that they said for a long time. And I feel really honored that I get to work with Sarah and work with Tim. People that, you know, we Democrats. We Democrats, we talk a big game. We talk a big game, but we didn't really face a choice. We don't like Donald Trump because he's the fucking worst human being on planet Earth. And we oppose him because we oppose everything that he stands for, every policy he stands for. But there are a lot of people who faced a political choice and failed in that choice, but not Tim and not Sarah and not the people at the Bulwark. And as we think about building a small d Democratic movement, I feel really proud of the people that I've gotten to meet and know because it's revealed who was made strong enough and who was going to break. And the people that have broken, they're fucking broken. And we know now. And now we get to figure out who we get to build something new with. So I feel really proud about that during this prime. Let's spin it one more time.

[Tim Miller]

I think it's gonna be me.

[Sarah Longwell]

I think it's gonna be me. Oh, my good boy.

[Tim Miller]

Look, I just wasn't on the board at all.

[Sarah Longwell]

Good work.

[Tim Miller]

All right.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, we talked about it. We thought, how should we end it? Two Tim rants, one John rant, the drag queen. We're done.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. Out.

[Jon Lovett]

All right, Tim, you've landed on you.

[Tim Miller]

I have a rant, but just really quick. That was really sweet, what Love had said. And I was trying to feel emotions about it, and then I'm in this, like, little tennis skirt, and I was like, can you compliment me again when I feel less uncomfortable? That would be great. Maybe another year. I also have a comment on Sarah's rant. It's the difference between the L's and the G's. Okay, we're going to Madrid Pride. Is anybody going to be in Madrid Pride? We're Doing a little vacation there. That's July 4th. So the G's are adding a week to Pride. She's trying to constrict us. We're trying to expand into July. I'm about to be sad for a little bit, so I'm sorry that I have to end you on something sad. But the reason that we're doing this is because of Andre. And I think there are two reasons why this has affected me so much. One is because kind of what Levitt was saying, I came out of this tradition of, like, being pro life and being pro freedom and thinking that that was, you know, what was animating my political work. And Jeb used to say something about how, you know, we wanted to make sure everybody had a chance to live a life of purpose and meaning. And I, like, believed that and thought it wasn't bs. And so the idea that we are doing that, that Republicans, that Donald Trump, that our country is doing, taking away somebody's life, their purpose and their meaning, really pisses me off. And so that's one reason. And the other reason is just because, I guess just because both me and Andre are gay, I guess I can just imagine it. And I just want. I'm sorry to do this, but I just want everybody to imagine this with me for a second. He flees Venezuela. He flees communism. He takes a horrible journey across Central America, through Mexico, goes through unimaginable shit, has to deal with cartels, has to find food and shelter just to get to America because he wants. Because he thinks here he can live a life of purpose and meaning. He thinks he can be free. And he gets to the border and he does what he's supposed to do. He signs up for the stupid CBP1 app and explains why he had to flee a communist country. And then we let him in, and he sits in a cell, and he's sexually harassed in the cell, and he is abused and attacked, and he is hoping that it's worth it, because at the end, there's this thing. There's this, like, freedom in this country that he can get. And instead of that, one day he's in the cell, and people come in there and they shackle him, and they shackle his legs and his hands, and they take him with other Venezuelans to a plane. And he's thinking, this is horrible, but at least I'm going home to Venezuela, right? At least I get to see my mother and my best friend. And instead of sending him to Venezuela, we send him to a fucking hell in El Salvador. And he gets off the plane, and they beat him up, and they shave his head, and he screams out for his freedom, and he says, I'm gay. I'm not a gang banger. I want just, you have the wrong person. And there's nothing he can do. And they put him in a fucking hole. And he's living a nightmare that, like, you can't imagine. Like, it is just an unimaginable nightmare. And the reason that he's living it is our country, is that we did it to him. Like the US did it to him. And so it's up to us to get him the fuck out of this nightmare. And so sorry. And so that I can't look at Levitt right now because I'm gonna cry. And so that's why we're doing this. And I really appreciate that y' all came. I appreciate especially the gays that came. Cause you could, you know, I don't know, have been at the music festival or something more fun. And so the lesbians were gonna do something way less fun. So I appreciate you for coming, too, but also kind of. You're welcome.

[Jon Lovett]

Yeah, look, here's the thing. The gays chose this instead of a concert. The lesbians, they would have been asleep by now.

[Tim Miller]

And so Sarah usually ends our bulwark shows with something a little bit more uplifting. And so I want to give her the last word.

[Sarah Longwell]

First of all, thanks, everybody so much for coming. This has been super fun, and you guys were a great, awesome audience. But here's the thing that we do close out most of the bulwark shows with. And I really want to thank Crooked, though, for us doing this together. This was so fun to do together and to bring our audiences together. But, you know, the thing about authoritarians is what they want from us. It's not a joke. Authoritarians are bad. The thing about authoritarians is they want you to be tired. Not like, I did poppers all night and now I'm tired the next morning and I need brunch. They want you to feel, like, deeply exhausted. That's why they try to flood the zone with shit. It's why they try to do so many corrupt things that you don't know where to grab onto.

[Michael Fanone]

Right.

[Sarah Longwell]

It's why they come back. They didn't lose. Donald Trump didn't lose the election. He just didn't won yet. That's why they come back. And they try to keep you so tired that you won't fight back. So confused, so unable to understand what is truth and what is fiction. And that's what they're doing to people, confusing them and making them tired. So the one thing that we have to do and it relates to the Andre thing, is don't get tired ever. Like, we have to stay filled with energy to do this because the biggest thing they want from us is to be tired. So never get tired. Never stop. And let's get Andre home.

[Tim Miller]

Thank you all so much for coming.

[Jon Lovett]

That's our show. Thank you so much to Tara Hoot.

[Tim Miller]

Thank you.

[Jon Lovett]

Thank you to Michael Fanon and Sam Stein. Thank you to Congressman Garcia. Thank you to Andre's lawyer and everybody at the Immigrant Defenders Law Center. Thank you all for supporting this. Have a great night. We'll see you at Pride. Bye, everybody.

[Narrator]

If you want to listen to Pod Save America ad free or get access to our subscriber discord and exclusive podcasts, consider joining our friends of the pod [e-mail] friends or subscribe on Apple Podcasts directly from the Pod Save America feed. Also, be sure to follow Pod Save America on TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube for full episodes, bonus content, and more. And before you hit that next button, you can help boost this episode by leaving us a review and by sharing it with friends and family. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. Our producers are David Toledo, Saul Rubin and Emma Illich Frank. Our associate producer is Farah Safari. Reed Churlin is our executive editor and Adrian Hill is our executive producer. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Kanter is our sound engineer with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Madeline Herringer is our head of news and programming. Matt de Groat is our head of production. Naomi Sengel is our executive assistant. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Hayley Jones, Ben Hethcote, Molly Lobel, Kiril Pellegrin Aviv, Kenny Moffatt and David Tols. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America EAS.