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- [00:00]
Bowen Yang
This is Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers.
- [00:02]
Matt Rogers
From Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang.
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Bowen Yang
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Matt Rogers
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Bowen Yang
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Matt Rogers
With a touchscreen case which allows you to control your audio without reaching for your phone. They also have a touchscreen smart charging case for one touch control.
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Bowen Yang
I love being able to touch my.
- [00:22]
Matt Rogers
Buds and control the volume with a built in wireless transmitter that lets you.
- [00:26]
Bowen Yang
Plug and play with any device you want. JBL Wireless Earbuds connects you to all your favorite music, movies and games. JBL Wireless Earbuds Grab a pair@jbl.com we.
- [00:38]
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- [01:15]
Kylie Griswold
The soda and candy habits of people on food stamps? How long will Texas Democrats hide out in the massive Shadow of Illinois Governor J.B. pritzker? And will people finally go to prison for Obamagate? All that and more on the Kylie Cast. Hi everybody and welcome to the Kylie Cast. I'm Kylie Griswold, Managing Editor at the Federalist. Be sure to like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. And if you're just listening to the show, be sure to go check out the full video version on my personal YouTube channel or the Federalist channel on Rumble. As always, you can email the show at radio@the federalist.com I would love to hear from you. I don't know about you, but I am so not tired of winning.
- [02:10]
Matt Kittle
We're going to win so much. You may even get tired of winning.
- [02:14]
Kylie Griswold
You know, thanks to Democrats endless resistance efforts, sometimes conservative progress feels like one step forward, five steps back. But this week we are marching forward, baby. For starters, we got a big old Maha victory. On Monday, Trump's Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins authorized waivers for six new states that want to limit the sugary junk people can buy on food stamps, bringing the total number of states with approval to limit these taxpayer funded snap benefits to 12. This is just common sense. When you consider that SNAP literally stands for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Nutrition is in the name, but meanwhile it funds garbage food and drinks that fuel obesity and diabetes, such as soda, other sugary drinks, candy and processed junk. And SNAP is bankrolled by tax dollars. So in other words, the US Government is literally using the tax dollars of hard working Americans to subsidize the unhealthy habits of low income and non working Americans. Which basically just ensures that these welfare recipients will require yet more government spending in the form of Medicaid for all their junk food induced health problems. HHS Secretary RFK Jr. The face of Make America Healthy Again, made this exact point this week.
- [03:31]
Bowen Yang
We're spending $405 million a day on SNAP and about 10% is going to sugary drinks and between and if you add candies to that, it's about 13 to 17%. And we all believe in choice. We live in a democracy. People can make their own choice about what they're going to buy and what they're not going to buy. If you want to buy a sugary soda, you ought to be able to do that. The US taxpayer should not pay for it. US taxpayers should not be paying to feed kids foods. The poorest kids in our country with foods that are going to give them diabetes. And then my agency ends up through Medicaid and Medicare paying for those injuries reasons. We're going to put an end to that. And we're doing it step by step.
- [04:26]
Kylie Griswold
State by state, putting a methodical end to it. Yes. Bravo. Now this is a win on a policy level, yes, but it's also a win for culture. Body positivity has had its time in the sun. You've all seen the Lizzo magazine covers and the self care speak that pushes for fat acceptance and basically demonizes healthy people as fatphobic. But that time is over. A healthy society isn't one that pretends that all choices are equally valid and good and healthy because they're obviously not. Some discrimination is actually good, like discriminating against a bag of airhead extremes in favor of some carrots or an apple or some real clean protein. When it comes to our health, we need to be able to make value judgments for ourselves. Yes. But also on a societal level, no. A Mountain Dew, Big Mac and Little Debbie snack are not a nutritious lunch. And we don't need to pretend they are. And we certainly don't need to stamp them with the endorsement of the government by bankrolling them with billions of tax dollars per year. Especially when 4 in 10Americans is considered obese. So that's win number one. Win number two this week came courtesy of Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who exposed just how insane Democrat state lawmakers and their media enablers are after a group of Democrat legislators fled the state to avoid a vote on some mid decade redistricting. But here's the really funny part. These whiny Democrats who are making the redistricting out to be an unprecedented attack on democracy are hiding out in Illinois and New York, two of the most gerrymandered states in the entire U.S. but of course, without these lawmakers, the Texas legislature doesn't have a quorum. They need 2/3 of the House present and there are a few lawmakers short so they can't yet vote on the congressional maps. So in response, Governor Abbott threatened to kick these lawmakers out of the Texas House and the GOP led house issued civil arrest warrants for these AWOL lawmakers. And in response, media and Democrats are predictably going berserk over the whole ordeal. They're pretending the Texas redistricting is unprecedented and they're saying it's gerrymandering driven by Donald Trump. They're hailing these runaway Democrats as heroes while whining about the fact that Texas Republicans are using every tool at their disposal to get them back from for the vote. But this is nothing new, so it's absurd to hear anyone call this unprecedented. First of all, Democrats are gerrymandering experts and have basically snaked their way around every possible state to eke out as many congressional seats as humanly achievable. Second, just a few years ago, Texas Democrats employed this exact same maneuver when they fled to D.C. to avoid voting on election integrity measures. And third, in 2019, Republican lawmakers in Oregon fled the state to avoid voting on some ridiculous climate change legislation and it was Democrats that issued the arrest warrants for them. So literally none of this is unprecedented. Not the redistricting or the fleeing or the arrest warrants. None of it. Democrats have done it all before. But Texas and Oregon aren't the only analogs. The Federalists Senior elections correspondent Matt Kittle wrote a great piece this week at the Federalist comparing the Texas situation to a similar debacle that happened in Wisconsin in 2011. And he is here to join me now to discuss. Welcome to the Kylie cast, Matt.
- [07:47]
Matt Kittle
Well, it's great to be here. I love the Kylie cast. How are you?
- [07:49]
Kylie Griswold
Aw, thanks so much. It's so great to have you, my fellow. Well, you are prior Wisconsinites, so it's always great to See a familiar and friendly Midwest nice face.
- [07:59]
Matt Kittle
We are Midwest Nice is what they call us. I'm of course in the Des Moines area now, but grew up, spent much of my life in the dairy state as a proud cheesehead. So one cheesehead to very excited to be here.
- [08:18]
Kylie Griswold
Awesome. God's country as we like to call it here.
- [08:20]
Matt Kittle
Indeed, indeed.
- [08:21]
Kylie Griswold
So Matt, you wrote about Wisconsin this week. Can you give us a rundown of this 2011 Wisconsin redistricting situation and explain how exactly it's similar to this Texas dust up?
- [08:33]
Matt Kittle
Yeah, well it's like you said, this is nothing new. This is just another page in the political theater of the left in the Democratic Party in Texas. They are desperate to hold onto something Democrats in this country because they have lost everything. And that is a loss of their own making, of course, their own failed policy ideas and their own agenda. And that was the case in Wisconsin back in 2011 if you recall. We go back nearly a decade and a half ago, the Republican revolution across the country had just swept in a Republican majority in the Wisconsin state legislature, its assembly and its Senate and in Governor Scott Walker, a conservative Republican into the governor's office. And immediately the governor and the Republican controlled legislature had to come up with a budget fix to take care of a, I believe it was a massive multi billion dollar deficit at that time. To do so they needed to get a handle on a problem that had been haunting Wisconsin and states like it for years. And that was out of control public sector union base more powerful than you can imagine. There was no taxpayer at the table when it came to public sector contract negotiations. So what the Republicans opted to do, put a plan in place to reform collective bargaining, public sector collective bargaining in the state. And of course the left driven by big labor went just after absolutely nuts. And when this legislation rolled out, the protests started. You recall back in late winter, early spring of 2011, I remember seeing reports from the major accomplice media players broadcast television, NBC, abc, cbs, comparing the great protest, the union funded protest in Madison, Wisconsin to the Arab Spring that was going on in the Middle east where people, people who truly had suffered for years and years under autocrats and religious theocracies were fighting for democracy. Although there were different motivations as well for that too. But nonetheless, to compare what was happening in the Middle east to the union temper tantrum and the Democrat temper tantrum in Wisconsin was beyond the pale. But that's what our accomplice media does. We know that. So looking at losing the battle, the Democrats in the minority in the Senate Decided if we can't beat them, we'll escape them. And that is exactly what they did. They absconded to Illinois where they were safe in the arms of the blue state leftist. And they stayed there for a long time attempting to. And they were successful for a few weeks to stall the vote on what became Act 10, the reforms to collective bargaining that significantly limited public sector unions from taking advantage of Wisconsin taxpayers over and over again. But there was an interesting turn and I'm curious if Republicans in Texas will do what Republicans in Wisconsin did. They're a little different situation, so I'm not sure they can. But ultimately, Senate Republicans took out Act 10 of the Budget repair bill and they took out all of the fiscal provisions. And so in state law, you did not need a quorum to deal with non fiscal issues. And that is exactly what the Senate did. They beat the Democrats at their own game. And while they were being heralded by the prov de press and the National Democratic Party, Republicans in the Senate got down to work. They passed Act 10 by a vote of 18 to 1, all Republicans. The next day it passed with all Republicans in the assembly and Act 10 became law. And these leftists who fled the state to Illinois stood there twiddling their thumbs, of course, and crying foul.
- [13:19]
Kylie Griswold
Of course. Yeah. And now the media and Democrats are crying foul over redistricting in general, which I think is one of the funniest parts of the story. Wisconsin, specifically, Democrats made redrawing Wisconsin congressional maps one of the main selling points of electing the most recent liberal judge to the Wisconsin Supreme Court. So this is something that they cry foul on. But this is like their go to play to get more power. And in fact, I wanna get your reaction to this op ed from New York Governor Kathy Hochul, which again, some of these Democrats are hiding out in New York. She wrote this piece in the Houston Chronicle and it just, it killed me when I read it. And I want your reaction, Matt, here it is. She says, quote, we are also reviewing every legal and legislative option to redraw our maps in New York. If Republicans are changing the rules, we'll meet them on the same field, with strategy, with resolve, and without apology. Some will say this is too aggressive. I say it's necessary. What Texas Republicans are doing under Trump's direction is nothing short of a legal insurrect in our Capitol. But using a legal system doesn't make it legitimate. It's a hijacking of democracy and it must be stopped. So, Matt, which is it? Is it an insurrection that must be stopped. Or is it something that they will also do because it's aggressive but necessary? They're going to change the rules. It's like New York is already gerrymandered thanks to Democrats. And the whole thing is just logically inconsistent, completely incomprehensible. It doesn't make any sense.
- [14:48]
Bowen Yang
Fall calls for comfort.
- [14:49]
Matt Rogers
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- [14:59]
Bowen Yang
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- [15:03]
Matt Kittle
Well, first of all, are you sure her name isn't Governor Kathy Holcomb? Because that's exactly what we are being sold by this Democrat and others like her. Oh my gosh, it's an insurrection. These folks, let me tell you, the Democrats in this country, no a thing or two about insurrection because they're behind arguably the biggest insurrection election interference scandal of our lifetimes, if not the history of this country. In Russiagate, of course, where they did indeed try to hold a soft coup, if you will, using the deep state and the intelligence officials and the Obama White House to set in motion what became the Russia collusion hoax. When it comes to redistricting, they also have a great deal of experience in that, particularly when it comes to gerrymandering. The left is nothing if not great projectionist, and this is absolute projections. Let me tell you something. Illinois is, as you mentioned before, perhaps the most gerrymandered state in the Union. Remember, Illinois is the land of Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln, in essence, the father of the Republican Party in Illinois. Under J.B. pritzker and a Democrat dominated legislature, they put in place a plan to take five Republican districts, that's all they had, and to pare them down into three, squeezing out Republican representation where it had been for years. It's not just yours truly calling Illinois arguably the most gerrymandered state in the country. People who work in this area of mapping, congressional mapping, and in this legal expertise have noted it as such. Threats are coming from Gavin Newsom in California. If they come from JB Pritzker in Illinois, I'm afraid everyone's going to have to have a good chuckle and say, well, wait a minute, how much more gerrymandering can you do in this state? It is the height of hypocrisy, it is the height of arrogance. And it is exactly what happens when you have more than an irresponsible media, a complicit media that is going along once again for the right. Just as they did in the state of Wisconsin and nationally in 2011 during the big public temper tantrum of Democrat senators there.
- [18:00]
Kylie Griswold
Yeah, that's right. I actually have a graphic. It is the congressional maps for Illinois. This is a reminder. If you are just listening to the Kylie cast on Apple podcasts or Spotify, you should be watching it on YouTube or Rumble, where you can actually see these graphics. But take a look at this, Matt. Look at the way that 17, 16, 15, 13, the way they snake around is just so absurd. I mean, this is the height of gerrymandering right here in Illinois.
- [18:30]
Matt Kittle
Yeah, this would send Elbridge Gerry, former governor of Massachusetts, spinning in his grave. You know, that's where all of this came from. Gerrymander is the salamander to make it, slithering all of these districts just to fit a political motive. But here's the thing.
- [18:50]
Matt Rogers
Thing.
- [18:51]
Matt Kittle
What the Supreme Court has essentially said over time is what is the case. And that is to the victor go the spoils. If you win, you get to set the maps. Now, there are some limits on that, but clearly, as you took a look at that congressional map in Illinois, there aren't many limits on that because that is one colorful snaking chart just to keep Democrats in just absolute control to the near extinction of Republicans in Illinois.
- [19:28]
Kylie Griswold
Right. I think you're right that it's typical Democrat projection and propaganda. And of course the media are not gonna hold any Democrats accountable for that. But you also brought up Gavin Newsom. And I saw this tweet from Gavin Newsom, biggest state in the Union. And I'm like, are they just that ignorant? Are they just projecting or are they that ignorant about how these congressional maps work? Here's Gavin Newsom's tweet. And I'm kind of blind, so I'm going to try to read this. He, quote, tweets DC Drano and says, oh, cool, I can do that too. Red states with zero Dem House seats. And then he lists a bunch of red states with zero Dem House seats. And the last four in this list are Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming, all of which only have have one House seat, which goes to Republicans. This is not a result of gerrymandering. This is a result of what we call apportionment. This is how population works.
- [20:22]
Matt Kittle
Well, and it's also how Gavin Newsom works. Gavin Newsom apparently is stupid. So stupid that he thinks the rest of us are stupid. That's absolutely right. You are in a red state. You have one representative. Based on the numbers that you are allowed. That's age old constitutional representation and the apportionment of that. So it doesn't come to me as any surprise that Gavin Newsom would try to gaslight through that kind of thing. It is surprising to me that Gavin Newsom would have the temerity to say, oh, you Republicans and the Kathy Hochul whole idea of, you know, you're undercutting democracy, you're the threat to democracy. When we have seen over and over again the Democrats, including Gavin Newsom, Kathy Hochul, J.B. pritzker, and the Democrats in Texas who are fleeing their jobs, their duty under the Constitution. That's what the governor, Greg Abbott, said. And I think he was absolutely right. Just as Governor Scott Walker then in Wisconsin was right. Do your damn job right. That's what the people elected you to do. And your job is not to run away or pull some political stunt. Your job is to debate. If you don't like the proposal, you fight like hell on the halls of, in the halls of your legislature. But you have to vote. And if it doesn't work out for you, then you take other remedies. Maybe you go through the courts like they will do ultimately when this passes. But for Gavin Newsom to say anything about, you know, Republicans taking advantage of poor Democrats, that is the motto of California in reverse. They have almost driven extinct Republicans in that state's legislature and certainly in its congressional representation. And they have done that by a, a scheme that involves counting massive amounts of illegal immigrants in their population totals to game the system. That's one of the greatest travesties on threats to democracy in this country, and it has been for a long time.
- [22:52]
Kylie Griswold
And you won't hear a single member of the media say a word about that, which is just wildly more problematic than redistricting.
- [23:02]
Matt Kittle
Yes, yes it is. And it's got to change.
- [23:06]
Kylie Griswold
So, Matt, how do you think this whole Texas situation ends? You mentioned that the dynamics at play are a bit different than Wisconsin. Maybe there's not something they can just pull out of the legislation to make it quorum proof or, you know, however you want to say it. But is there any maneuver that Texas has to replicate what Wisconsin did that you can see so that they can hold the vote without the Democrats or do they just have to wait for them to come home? What's the play here?
- [23:31]
Matt Kittle
It does. The next play is clearly in the court system. The district court will have to step in and rule. Okay, you are violating the terms of your agreement with your voters. You are not representing them. And they of course, claim that they're representing them by not representing them. And maybe a lot of their constituents in these Democrat controlled districts are hailing them as heroes. But they ultimately have to do their jobs and a court can do what it needs to do to make sure that those jobs are being followed. There is, as the governor has put forward, and he's right to do so, there is a mechanism to expel members of the legislature that takes away the necessary quorum numbers that are in place right now. So it's a matter of time and it's a matter of math and we may get there. I think it's a matter of these stunts only, only work so long. I think some members will be returning home because they ultimately have families too that they want to see. And their bravery, of course, will fade the longer they stay away. So we'll see. You know, again, Wisconsin Democrats pulled this stunt for a few weeks. Republicans finally said, okay, we're not going to play their games anymore. We're going to find a way to get around it. And they did. So extra. I think Texas ultimate Texas Republicans ultimately will. If not, I think the courts will have something definitely to say about it.
- [25:10]
Kylie Griswold
Well, and they don't need that many of them to come home to get the quorum. I think there's what, 50 of them that fled and then they only need less than 10 to meet that quorum threshold. And not only do they have families back home, but I assume many of them also have other jobs. They're not getting paid well to serve in the Texas legislature. So unless they all work remotely or, you know, have some weird arrangement, they're probably going to have to return home to get back to work in both senses. And I also want to know who's paying for them to be in Illinois because there's got to be something going on there, too. I don't have an answer to that.
- [25:39]
Matt Kittle
But I think we can suspect this. I think.
- [25:43]
Kylie Griswold
Yeah, I think so, too. I think so.
- [25:44]
Matt Kittle
Yeah. And let's, let's face it, Kylie, those french fries aren't going to fry themselves. So they got to get back to their jobs. They have things that they, that their managers in the drive thru want them to accomplish. So.
- [25:55]
Kylie Griswold
That's right. They would never dare to stoop that low mat. Don't, don't kid yourself.
- [26:00]
Matt Kittle
Indeed. Indeed.
- [26:01]
Kylie Griswold
All right, Matt, thanks so much. I appreciate you joining me today. I hope to have you back again really soon. Everybody go check out Matt's piece at the Federalist. It's called it won't end well for Texas Dems fleeing their duties. Just ask Wisconsin liberals. Thanks so much Matt. Appreciate your time.
- [26:16]
Bowen Yang
Thank you.
- [26:17]
Matt Kittle
Anytime.
- [26:21]
Matt Rogers
Ronald Reagan was right and it's worse than we thought.
- [26:23]
Bowen Yang
The Watchdog on Wall Street Podcast with Chris Markowski Every day, Chris helps unpack the connection between politics and the economy and how it affects your wallet.
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Matt Rogers
If I'm from the government and I'm here to help isn't bad enough the.
- [26:35]
Bowen Yang
Government spends $181 billion per year on direct cash to private businesses. Did you see a check in the mail? Whether it's happening in D.C. or down.
- [26:43]
Matt Rogers
On Wall street, it's affecting you financially.
- [26:45]
Bowen Yang
Be informed. Check out the Watchdog on Wall street podcast with Chris Markowski on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcast.
- [26:52]
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- [27:24]
Kylie Griswold
So that was win number two. The third win of the week was something we have all been waiting for for quite a while. After several tranches of Russiagate documents from John Radcliffe, Tulsi Gabbard, and now the declassified Durham Annex released by Senator Chuck Grassley, we learned that Gabbard, the Director of National Intelligence, made criminal referrals finally to the Department of Justice Attorney General Pam Bondi, then ordered the launching of a grand jury investigation and according to exclusive reporting from the Federalist Sean Davis Davis, the DOJ then requested a bunch more documents from Gabbard's office. Davis reports that in addition to requesting all documents, intelligence and correspondence related to Gabbard's memo exposing the Russiagate conspiracy, the DOJ letter also requests all records supporting the recently declassified HPSI report, which is the oversight report from the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, all information related to whistleblower complaints about Brennan Clapper and Comey's role in the hoax and the identification of everyone cited in Gabbard's memo, the HPSI report, whistleblower records, and the infamous and totally fabricated final intelligence community assessment known as the ica. The letter also reportedly requests records related to how the Inspector General for the DOJ and Intel community handled the whistleblower complaints and Davis Wright's code quote. The text of the letter also suggests that the DOJ may be looking into whether any media leaks related to the ica, the intelligence community assessment may have been criminal. End quote. So a grand jury is being empaneled and a federal prosecutor will be reviewing the explosive documents. This is very huge stuff, Federalist Senior contributor Ben Weingarten had an excellent piece at the Federalist this week about why it is indeed so important that we get justice for Russiagate that somebody finally goes to prison.
- [29:24]
Matt Kittle
Someone's got to go to prison.
- [29:28]
Kylie Griswold
Also, why it's going to be so tricky to do that. So please welcome Ben Weingarten here to join me. Now, Ben, I played that clip when I talked about this last week, but I think I'm obligated to continue playing it until someone prison. And also you are, Ben, So it felt like it just felt right to play it now. So welcome, welcome.
- [29:47]
Bowen Yang
I appreciate that. Tough to follow up that clip, but I'll do my best here.
- [29:50]
Kylie Griswold
It's a classic. Thank you national treasure for that one. So, Ben, you write that under Obama's direction, intel and national security officials coordinated with the media and the Clinton campaign to frame Trump as a foreign stooge. You write, quote, absent justice for Obamagate, the lesson to the conspirators is that they should go even bigger next time. This would be catastrophic, end quote. And of course, I agree. And it turns out so do the majority of voters. A Rasmussen poll came out on Monday showing that the majority of respondents said they believe Obama's deep state, quote, committed crimes in Russiagate, and more than 2/3, almost 70%, said there must be consequences for the crimes committed. Ben, can you describe what justice should even look like here and why you think the American people are so insistent on accountability when there's a million things they probably want to see accountability on? But Russiagate seems to be a pretty darn big, big one.
- [30:48]
Bowen Yang
Well, first of all, I think that the poll is very heartening in that it shows that despite, or maybe because of the media, legacy media propaganda that's been pumped in over the last eight years, plus, obviously longer than eight years, but certainly over the last eight plus years, people are not desensitized to it. They're actually to it. And they recognize that there has been a constant stream of efforts to delegitimize, destroy, jail, and ultimately attempts, obviously, to assassinate President Trump, but as a proxy in part for tens of millions of Americans who have rejected ruling class ran. And they understand that, I think intuitively, first of all, the notion that Russiagate, or Obamagate, as it probably ought to be called, because it all happened under Barack Obama and he's been the man sort of insulated by all of these key players, whether it's Brennan Comey, Clapper, Susan Rice, we can work down the list. But of course, the buck stops with him. He was in that Infamous meeting where Susan Rice then wrote the email in the last minutes of the Obama presidency about, about doing things by the book, so called. And it was his government, essentially his national security and intelligence apparatus, that was responsible for starting Russiagate. And then of course, those deep state actors continued on through much of the first Trump term. So first thing I'd say is it's heartening that Americans understand the stakes here, that if heads don't roll, if there are not massive, severe consequences commensurate with the severity of this abuse of power and attempt to disenfranchise tens of millions of Americans and also, frankly, genuinely prohibit the peaceful transfer of power, that we're not gonna have a republic at the end of the day. And it would just validate the corruption and the arguable criminality at hand, and what I believe is criminality at hand. So what does justice look like to the extent you can get it? To my mind, and I lay this out in, in my column, there's the ideal and then there's what's gonna be practically possible. And it's not clear whether the practical is gonna meet the ideal. But to me, the starting point is you have to have total and absolute transparency into the, quote, unquote, investigations into the Trump, into Trump, and then the investigations of the investigators. And we're starting to get that, obviously, and it's amazing. We're talking about events that were nine years ago and finally starting to get full transparency, even though we don't have fully unredacted documents, even for the documents that have been declassified and shared with the American people. You need to know the origins of the origins, so to speak, with respect to Obamagate. You need to know every single player involved who knew what, when, what did they do with it. You need to be able to compare the public statements and the sworn testimony to what was actually going on behind the scenes. And you need to know every player involved. And that includes, of course, notably when talking about what the DOJ is looking for, including the media leaks, anyone and everyone who could be implicated in criminality or who might know something to do the kind of ground up investigation that you actually need. And then the other purpose, I think, of the transparency is that the American people need to see it with their own eyes and they need to have the source documents to the extent, extent they can. So the first step is transparency. The second step, obviously, is accountability. And part of that accountability, of course, should be, ought to be that the American people distrust and all of the individuals implicated are entirely discredited that's obviously number one. But number two, of course, is to the extent crimes were committed or to the extent. Let's take the non crimes, let's start the There non crimes were committed. And anyone who has been implicated, however, in the corruption is still operating in the federal government, still has security clearance, still gets any and all the advantages of their government service. Those advantages need to be eliminated, full stop. It's not clear that that's necessarily happened because how many proteges and subordinates of the likes of Comey, Clapper and Brennan who might be implicated in these acts are still working in the federal government? I bet a number of them. Beyond that, though, of course, is the criminality. And so you have to unearth the crimes, marshal the evidence necessary to prosecute them, and then you would need to go after those people to the fullest extent of the law on the merits and then also as a deterrent, and to genuinely show that no one is above the law and that there will be a dear cost, a severe cost, to abusing powers to effectively undermine the republic and again disenfranchise tens of millions of voters. And then, last but not least, they're all the victims of Obamagate, people whose lives were upended, being investigated under false pretenses, whose civil liberties were eviscerated. Think, of course, of the likes of Carter Page, for example, whose coffers were completely drained trying to pay for legal counsel, and who will never be able to get their reputations back, back their careers back. The damage done to the families, it's incalculable, the number of people that we're talking about and the level of damage done to them, not to mention, of course, the chilling effect which itself will prevent good people from serving probably for generations after this. So restitution, recompense would be the last part of it. And so now we have started to get more and more transparency, thank God, even if it's nine years on, on. And it appears that we are getting towards justice, quad justice, which is prosecutions. But as I lay out in the piece, of course there are a number of potential stumbling blocks here to securing convictions, and that's even setting aside all of the other. The duress, effectively, that prosecutors are going to be working under and that the American people might suffer from once the resistance is unleashed, to the extent we actually get prosecution.
- [37:05]
Kylie Griswold
Right, yeah. So can you speak a little bit to what those main roadblocks are like? Why is achieving justice going to be so tricky in this case? And, you know, does the news this week about the grand jury and about the federal prosecutor give you any more hope that some of these roadblocks will be overcome? Or do you think it will truly be, you know, nigh impossible to actually achieve justice here?
- [37:29]
Bowen Yang
Let me start with the most pessimistic view would be, or cynical view would be that that grand jury probe is likely to commence and a there are no indictments that result from that. I think that's almost zero percent chance because I think, I don't think that the DOJ would start this process if they didn't intend to see it through to the end. So let's assume that there are indictments that come down and there is value to that alone, to those indictments coming down, because it shows, shows minimally that if you were implicated in criminality with respect to Obamagate that you're going to face the punishment of a legal process just like the punishment of the legal process that was meted out to innocent people in response to Obamagate. Then we get to what are the actual charges look like and can you prove those charges? And then where can you prove those charges? So start with the charges. It's very vague at this point.
- [38:30]
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- [39:27]
Matt Rogers
I've got Dan Morgan here on the pod. Say hi, Dan. Hey, how's it going today? It's going good, man. Tell us who you are and what you do. I'm Dan Morgan. I'm an attorney and a managing partner at Morgan and Morgan, which is America's largest injury law firm. That's pretty awesome. Why do you guys think you win so many cases? The insurance companies and other companies that we go against know that we're going to take it to the end that we believe in the case. So we fight for every dollar and we're not afraid to go that extra mile for our clients. Are insurance companies like actually afraid of you guys? We don't bluff. We take it to trial. And we are not strangers of getting very, very, very large verdicts. Awesome. So how does someone get in contact with Morgan and Morgan? What would I do if I got into an accident? Probably the easiest way is dialing pound law. That's £529 from your cell phone. Our call center is always waiting to take your call. 247365 wow. Dan Morgan from Morgan & Morgan, America's largest injury. LaFrum, thanks for coming by the show. Thanks for having me. Visit for the people.com for an office near.
- [40:25]
Bowen Yang
You. What potentially those charges might look like. But some legal scholars have said, and I think it's also fair to surmise that the most obvious off the bat is perjury, when you match up the statements, the sworn statements of the likes of the Brennan's, Comey's, clappers, etc. With what was actually happening. For example, with respect to the inclusion of the Steele dossier as a key source or substantiator for the most provocative and damning claims and probably and unsupported claims, it appears in the ICA about Russia favoring Trump and wanting to help Trump beat Hillary Clinton, when you look at the private acts and what was actually produced versus what was stated publicly, certainly looks like perjury, looks like they're dead to rights to the extent the statute of limitations is extant there. And so you have to look at what was the last statement that looks like a lie relative to what the truth was. And then you can bring those charges. But there are other potential charges where the statute of limitation issue may not be a barrier. That could be a challenge. And so that includes and I think there is a level of justice here in terms of hoisting the resistance on its own petard when it comes to charges like conspiracy to defraud the US or conspiracy to violate the rights of Donald Trump or many people in and around his orbit. When you read those charges, the question is going to be at least the way that a court would presumably look at it. And what the administration or what the DOJ will have to think through is can you find analogs here? And if you can't find analogs, what's your best argument for applying these charges to the conduct that we saw? And I'm not a lawyer, but in some ways, there's a political aspect to this and there's the legal aspect to this as well. If you were on the other side, that is, if you were on the Jack Smith side, you had no qualms about bringing these charges in Washington, D.C. for example, because you knew that you would have a favorable judge and a favorable jury, most likely, even if the charges are novel and even if they haven't been applied before now, maybe to the Trump DOJ's benefit, you had the Biden DOJ seeking to prosecute Trump on these sorts of grounds. So there is a precedent, perhaps, and that's why I talk about, about hoisting them on their own petard and there being some justice to it. But it's yet to be seen whether or not you can make these cases. But let's assume you can sufficiently make these cases, then the next part of it is the venue. Where are you bringing these prosecutions? And again, the scuttlebutt here, and what legal scholars have noted is obviously DC is probably the most hostile venue possible. But can you make a case that some or all of the acts which are involved in a criminal conspiracy or pertaining to perjury, et cetera, or maybe other charges that we haven't even conceived of? Because presumably prosecutors can be very creative and many things are criminalized to the extent they're applied. What's the venue? Where can you actually get a fair shake, essentially, as the DOJ in this case? And, and it's been speculated that Florida is the likely venue. It's yet to be seen. We'll have to see if that's the case. But so it really comes down to can you make those charges stick? Do the statutes of limitation, are you inside or outside the statutes of limitation? And then can you actually win? And then beyond that, if you win, at what cost? If you lose, at what cost? And those are all things that require both legal judgments, practical judgments, and then wisdom and courage as well, because you know that on the other side of this, no matter what happens, and again, luckily, perhaps the American people see through the regime media at this point. But of course, you know, they're all already going with, this is retribution. There's no there there. This is authoritarian. He's trying to, he's trying to lock up his political foes, which of course, course, is exactly what our ruling regime tried to do to Donald Trump and many in and around his orbit and try to destroy anyone who would dare represent these individuals in the court of law. That persists, by the way, when you look at, for example, this effort to try to disbar Jeff Clark, for example. But the bottom line is that you are going to have maybe the ultimate hysterical Trump derangement syndrome response to the extent you have prosecutions of these individuals and to the extent you secure any convictions. But of course, there's a massive cost to not seeking to secure these convictions and not actually securing them, because again, it simply validates the efforts of the other side and it will only make them that more zealous when they get back into total power over the federal government to use and abuse those powers to criminalize dissent. They, of course, have done everything they claim their opponents would do and worse. But the stakes of this are, of course, again, that you're gonna see, in my view, to the extent we actually go through with prosecutions, let alone secure convictions, you're gonna see street actions, you're gonna see regime media propagating a level of propaganda that will rival anything that we've seen to date. And then of course, you're gonna have a counter response from the left's lawfare mechanism, which is going to be egregious. And then of course, you have the more kind of near term political considerations. All of the wobbly members of the House and Senate on the Republican side, are they gonna get weak, needed when it comes to this? Is there gonna be political blowback, repercussions? Could you have a loss of the House or a loss of the Senate? Again, public sentiment here gives me some optimism and confidence that you're not gonna have that sort of issue. So let's hope that the American people continue to see what the truth is here, here. And let's see more transparency, because I think that's only going to fuel the cause for needed.
- [46:47]
Matt Rogers
Justice. I've got Dan Morgan here on the pod. Say hi, Dan. Hey, how's it going today? It's going good, man. Tell us who you are and what you do. I'm Dan Morgan. I'm an attorney and a managing partner at Morgan and Morgan, which is America's largest injury law firm. That's pretty awesome. I think I saw a billboard of yours recently that said 20 billion. 20 million is an insane number. Yeah, 20 billion recovered. It's actually, I think, somewhere north, probably closer to 22, 23 after this year. And each year we get bigger and better and our army grows. So the number will hopefully keep getting bigger and bigger as time goes on. Awesome. So how does someone get in contact with Morgan and.
- [47:27]
Kylie Griswold
Morgan?
- [47:27]
Matt Rogers
What. What would I do if I got into an accident probably the easiest way is dialing pound law. That's £529 from your cell phone. We are always open or call. Call center is always waiting to take your call. 247365 wow. Dan Morgan from Morgan & Morgan, America's large injury law firm. Thanks for coming by the show. Thanks for having me. Visit forthepeople.com for an office.
- [47:47]
Kylie Griswold
Near you. Right. It seems to me that the stakes or I guess the risks of making a half hearted effort and not walking away with convictions are much higher than any potential political blowback in the midterms. If you do secure convictions or any potential media blowback, which I mean the trust in media has tanked. I mean even trust in media now versus in 2016 is like markedly different. And so, you know, I think the biggest risk is only making a half hearted effort, not actually walking away with any convictions and just, you know, useless Republicans being useless Republicans and not actually securing any victories for Republicans for their constituents. What have you. You also talked about the victims of this, of course, Carter Page. And I mean there have been many. But I'm also just thinking about the American people as a whole being victims of this and the way that, you know, Donald Trump only got eight years, four years under the Russia hoax and just how much opportunity and time was lost that just can never be recovered. And I hope that prosecutors just get really creative in the way that Democrat prosecutors have gotten creative in coming up with legitimate but unique legal means to go after the co conspirators here. And yeah, you brought up the statute of limitations too on potential crimes. But then every day we see the media still peddling the same hoax, up to and including Clapper and Brennan themselves penning their own piece in the New York Times that's full of lies, full of the same Russiagate lies, the same lies they told under oath. I mean, in your mind, I know you're not a lawyer, but does this extend the statute of limitations at all? Are they just engaging in more obstruction of justice or conspiracy here or do you think that.
- [49:27]
Bowen Yang
Doesn'T apply? Well, I think in the court of public opinion it's a conspiracy that's very live and. Well, look no further than what they wrote in the New York Times a week before we're recording this, where they continue to gaslight and obfuscate and disingenuously try and defend themselves, but they're also trying to keep their story straight, a crooked story straight. And then of course you have potentially since you referenced the media and obviously I view the Media as co conspirators in this, whether that's legal or not, obviously is open for debate. And of course, those in the media are gonna claim all manner of defenses. By the way, it's interesting to think about why is it that besides wanting to secure fat paychecks, that the likes of the Brennans and the clappers and the comeys of the world are out there in the media and some of them are contributors, is that in part a measure of defense? Potentially, we'll have to see. But at the end of the day, were there illegal leaks? I think it's very clear there were illegal leaks. And what this further shows, discrediting the media, is that regime media has effectively become not just a mouthpiece for our ruling regime and our national security and intelligence apparatus when it's not under control of conservatives or America first type leaders. But what it shows that they're an extension. Essentially, something that Leah Smith has argued before is that, that this is what the media is like in the Middle east. And that's exactly what our media has become like. It's part of the intelligence apparatus. Now, some will argue that this goes back many decades to talk about Project Mockingbird, etc. And you could have a fascinating conversation about that, but it's never been more transparent. How corrupted. And the extent to which the media has served as an extension of our ruling regime, and of course, as a federalist has reported on extensively, the circularity with respect to what was presented to the FISA courts. One party feeds the other party and then there's a report in the press, and then the report on the press is cited as a justification for eviscerating the civil liberties of an American. So whether or not we're gonna be able to make the case that the statutes are starting just now because they're still talking the way that they were before war is yet to be seen. And then obviously they're not under oath when they're talking in the public, but it may show something about the patterns that they have pursued. And so I think what they say publicly is certainly gonna be fair game when you come to things like state of mind and intent and questions like that, and the patterns in their public proclamations versus what went on privately. And then another aspect of this, by the way, that's worth noting, is with the DOJ looking into essentially anyone and everyone involved from the jump, are people going to commit crimes now? Are people going to obstruct or defy or lie under oath now? Potentially. And so could you have new crimes that people engage in today as a consequence of their responses to being probed. That's something to bear in mind as well. But the one thing that's very disconcerting here is obviously there's been substantial reporting about documents being in burn bags, etc. Etc. There's been, as I noted in my article, a nine year head start, effectively for those who were culpable and those who are complicit here to destroy potentially evidence or otherwise seek to obstruct. Let's not forget, of course, we had the Mueller special counsel. If you think that that was part of the COVID up, what bodies did they find and what was buried by the Mueller special counsel. So all manner of very live questions. And the one thing that might give one hope is that this appears to be being executed by the Trump doj, like a RICO case where you're looking at all of the fish involved and maybe you're gonna get some people to flip and turn and there may be some people you can squeeze as you move your way up to the ringleader. So I remain cautiously optimistic. But what I will say again is that I don't think that the doj, they would let it be known that there was a grand jury probe coming unless they didn't intend to try and go all the way to indict and try and prosecute, and that the shrewd legal minds there will try and bring the charges that they think have the best chance of sticking before a venue that is going to give the fairest shot on behalf of the American people. And to your point, to try and restore to the American people that which really can't be restored to your point, because. Because we didn't get four years of a first Trump term, we got only a fraction.
- [54:14]
Kylie Griswold
Of it. Right, right. Well, and I'm also encouraged by the fact that, I mean, the media doing a full court press on downplaying or ignoring the story the way that Brennan and Clapper and like you said, members of the intel community coming out and speaking on this publicly to try to downplay it. And I mean, you know, the nine year head start, yes, but I believe it was Kash Patel and maybe some others in Trump's intel community who have, have implied that the raid on Mar A Lago was an attempt to find a copy of this HIPC report and destroy it or whatever. You know, it's like. And the fact that they're finding these documents in the burn bags and whatnot, they clearly did not get rid of as much evidence as they sought to. And so hopefully their head start wasn't enough to head off these indictments. And hopefully people are going to go to prison, Ben. That's.
- [55:02]
Bowen Yang
The hope. That's the only thing, the only deterrent at the end of the day to this kind of criminality and corruption is people have to face massive, massive, unrivaled punishment for engaging in massive and unrivaled attacks on our republic. And since you mentioned Cash Patel, I mean, it is worth noting, if anyone would be well positioned and uniquely qualified to engage in this investigation, it's the person, probably the lead co author of and researcher behind the Devin Nunes memo, which played an essential role in starting to unravel this plot. And the fact that you had our ruling regime go after Devin Nunes, then leading the House Intelligence Committee, as well as going after Cash Patel, I think speaks volumes about the capability and the will that's being brought to bear here on the investigative side. So that's another heartening aspect of this. But the challenge, of course, is, is you are up against the ruling regime in exile, let's say at the highest possible levels. And as Chuck Schumer said, they can get you six ways from Sunday and they have done that in scores. But that said, there's never been a better chance, notwithstanding any potential statutes of limitation issues, to get this done. Donald Trump is a lame duck. There are unique opportunities here to pursue justice. And like you said, people needed to go to jail because if they don't, we won't have a republic at the end of.
- [56:35]
Kylie Griswold
The day. Yeah, completely agree. Completely agree. Thanks so much, Ben. I appreciate you joining me today. Definitely go check out his piece on the Federalist website. Why reigning justice on the Russia hoaxers is so tricky and so important. Definitely go check it out. Thanks so much, Ben. I hope you'll join me.
- [56:51]
Bowen Yang
Again soon. Thanks so much for having me. It's.
- [56:54]
Kylie Griswold
A pleasure. All right, it's time for a quick little. I mean, come on. I said I mean cub oet because I couldn't pass up the opportunity to comment on this insane and frankly, super creepy clip from Jim Acosta this week. Now, you'll recall that Jim Acosta worked at CNN for a long time and is probably best known for being a self important political activist rather than a journalist. But he left the network in January after CNN switched up its lineup, which looked an awful lot like an attempt to demote Acosta to a less favorable time slot for his show. And boy howdy, what a trajectory he has had. Now Acosta hosts a blog slash show on Substack and his latest guest was not real. Jim Acosta tweeted on Monday that you wouldn't want to miss that day's show because, quote, quote I'll be having a one of a kind interview with Joaquin Oliver. He died in the Parkland school shooting in 2018, but his parents have created an AI version of their son to deliver a powerful message on gun violence. End quote. And of course Acosta turned off replies to his post so nobody could ratio him with comments about how bizarre this is. But as you can see, there are an awful lot of quote tweets and not a whole lot of likes. Here's the.
- [58:14]
Matt Rogers
The clip. Joaquin, I would like to know what your solution would be for.
- [58:19]
Bowen Yang
Gun violence. Great question. I believe in a mix of stronger gun control laws, mental health support and community engagement. We need to create safe spaces for conversations and connections, making sure everyone feels seen and heard. It's about building a culture of kindness and understanding. What do you think.
- [58:36]
Matt Rogers
About that? I think that's a great idea.
- [58:38]
Kylie Griswold
Wake up. This is all so bizarre and weird and dare I say, demonic. He's essentially conjuring up an AI fueled humanoid that resembles a real person who was murdered by a school shooter just to make a political statement about guns. It's hard to imagine being Joaquin Oliver's parents, but imagine not only generating a humanoid version of your child, but then also giving AI to a has been journalist to air all over the Internet. And then imagine being Jim Acosta and saying out loud to an AI. I think that's a great idea, Joaquin. Dude, he's not real. It's really disturbing in part because it elicits this uneasy uncanny valley response. Because it's not convincingly human for obvious reasons, but also because of the way Oliver's parents and Jim Acosta create and then go along with this. You know, I've seen other people do this too, with still images on Twitter where they use AI to animate a still photo of a since deceased loved one. And it evokes this weird emotional response of creating a memory that's not really there and not quite human. This Acosta thing evokes a similar feeling to when you're in a room full of people who are all using biologically incorrect pronouns to refer to a trans identifying person. It just doesn't feel right. Right. Anyway, super weird at best, unhealthy at worst, demonic. And you know, I never thought I'd be surprised that Jim Acosta could get worse, but I mean, come on, I said I mean cud all right, that's going to do it for me today. Thanks again so much for tuning in to the Kylie cast. I will be back here with more very soon. Until then, just remember the truth hurts, but it won't.
- [60:23]
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- [61:11]
Bowen Yang
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