Young Republican’s Backstabbing Saga EXPOSED (w/ Raven Schwam-Curtis)

Summary

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FYPod – Young Republican’s Backstabbing Saga EXPOSED (w/ Raven Schwam-Curtis)

Date: October 18, 2025
Hosts: Tim Miller, Cameron Kaskey
Guest: Raven Schwam-Curtis
Podcast: The Bulwark – For You Pod

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Overview

This episode tackles two main themes:

1. The rightward shift of Gen Z—especially in the wake of Trump’s 2024 campaign—and the challenge for progressive messaging among young voters navigating TikTok, meme culture, and highly shareable political performances online.
2. A bombshell exposé on a scandal within the Young Republicans: rampant racism, anti-Semitism, and internal backstabbing revealed through leaked group chats, and the political/human fallout.

Raven Schwam-Curtis (influencer, educator, former PhD-track scholar) joins to share her unconventional path to edutainment stardom, discuss how progressive ideas can still break through, and help analyze what the Young Republicans’ toxic implosion says about the future of American politics.

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Meet Raven Schwam-Curtis: Gen Z Edutainer

Background and Approach

• Raven’s upbringing was shaped by mobility and diversity (her mother was a Broadway performer, leading the family to move between New York, Houston, Las Vegas, LA, and ultimately Chicago).
• Academic overachiever: youngest editor-in-chief of her high school paper, president of the National Chinese Honor Society after 7 years of Mandarin study, and theater kid.
• Education: Double major (Feminist, Gender & Sexuality Studies, Asian Studies/China focus), two minors (Africana Studies, Inequality Studies) at Cornell, MA in Black Studies from Northwestern.
• She left a PhD track to pursue full-time “edutainment”—explaining politics and social issues through TikTok and Instagram reels, often accompanied by trending dance moves.

How the Edutainment Model Works

• Raven: “At the core of what I do, it's driven by community, care for community, and a desire to educate… I realized very early on that it works: you take the thing that’s already trending, you attach the hard news… and you marry them together and—suddenly—you have ‘edutainment.’” [10:52]
• Her dance videos are sometimes about positive news or overlooked wins, always designed to spark curiosity rather than trivialize heavy subjects.

Cameron: “I actually learn new things from your page… there’s information you share that I am not seeing every other person on the Internet cover.” [12:55]

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Raven’s Journey: From Academics to Social Media (Key Segments)

• Raven’s origin story and “nerd crew” [04:14–06:07]
• Mandarin skills and debates on high school newspaper standards [06:07–07:14]
• Her academic path, fields of study, and decision to leave academia [09:39–10:52]

Notable Quotes

“I never thought that I would be doing this as my full-time career… It’s a full 180 in some ways, but… at the core of what I do, it's driven by community.” —Raven [10:52]

“You take the thing that’s already trending, you attach the hard news… and you marry them together and—suddenly—you have edutainment.” —Raven [11:47]

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Platform Challenges & Cultural Impact

• Discusses the limits and power of TikTok and Instagram for progressive messaging—especially as these platforms increasingly come under right-wing influence.

Censorship & Platform Control

“It’s always a concern—censorship in these online spaces, especially when the major owners… are in Trump’s back pocket. At any moment, they could just turn off the tap…” —Raven [31:02]

• Stresses importance of building real-world, offline communities and migrating to platforms where creators have more autonomy (e.g., Substack, Patreon) [32:58–34:11]

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The “Dancing News” Model and Critiques

• Raven describes how dancing videos bring levity to serious issues, acting as “joy is resistance,” but she’s careful to only pair dance formats with uplifting or positive news—never with tragedy or suffering [20:16].
• Critiques often attack her methods as “not serious enough,” sometimes laced with misogynoir.

“I’ve gotten a lot of misogynoir… people who say this is mismatched, like, why are you talking about the news and dancing at the same time? ...My response is: you’re just mad because I can do it all.” —Raven [20:16]

Defining “Misogynoir”

• Tim: “I learned a new word there: misogynoir. It’s a mismatch… a very cool-sounding word for a very sad topic.” [16:33–17:09]
• Raven: “Misogynoir is a term that describes the intersection of anti-Blackness and misogyny… the intersectional harm that Black women experience.” [16:54]

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Reporting From the Ground: Chicago’s ICE Facility

• Raven describes visiting the Broadview ICE Detention Center, a “dystopian experience” with massive police and ICE presence, helicopters, and peaceful protests [21:14, 22:48]:
  • Community is “united in our distaste and disdain” for ICE, sharing real-time safety updates.
  • Despite ICE’s growing budget and power (nearly $80 billion in new funding), local civil resistance remains strong.

Tim and Raven Contextualize:

“…the amount of money going into ICE is only increasing… They have the resources… they’re opening new facilities, they have all the fancy weaponry… in Chicago they have the damn helicopter.” —Tim [25:34] “…so many of our civil rights movements are built on the political will of the people, not necessarily being as well resourced, but being extremely well organized and cohesive…” —Raven [27:01]

• Lively banter on the idea of “infiltrating” ICE with “twink strike forces” for subversion—a lighthearted aside, underscoring desperation for creative strategies [28:02–28:54].

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Breaking Down the Young Republican Scandal (Main Segment)

The Explosive Leaked Group Chats [35:00–47:48]

• Context: Leaked group chats from official Young Republicans circles—not fringe groups—show rampant use of slurs (N-word, F-slur, etc.), rape jokes, anti-Semitism, and references to Hitler and gas chambers.

Key Players & Factions:

• Peter Giunta: Former NY State Young Republicans chair, made explicit gas chamber and Holocaust jokes, fellow members joked along.
• William Hendricks, Bobby Walker, Samuel Douglas: All implicated in the racist/sexist/ableist leaking.
• Gavin Wax: Master "ratfucker," rumored as the orchestrator of leaks to sabotage rivals and extend his influence. Now a State Department aide, previously led NYC Young Republicans.
• Hayden Padgett: Rival faction leader, embroiled in internal backstabbing.
• Aiden: MAGA loyalist, defending friends and attacking “traitors” in a viral thread.

Media and Political Reactions:

• JD Vance: Refuses to condemn, dismisses as “boys being boys.”
• Cameron: “It’s not the boys private group chat... It is an official channel for the Young Republicans.”
• Raven: “It’s unsurprising but completely foul… This is a supposedly safe space where they were saying the quiet part out loud.” [47:48]

Scandal Contextualized

• Not just personal “lapses” or private jokes, but a systemic culture in an influential youth wing—reflecting what now passes for normal discourse in parts of the GOP.
• The “ratfucking” isn’t rooted in principle: leaking offensive material is a power play, not a genuine desire to purge toxicity.

Tim: “I don’t suspect Gavin was actually offended by any of this… This is ratfucking, they’re doing leaks. Not principled cancellations.” [42:48]
Raven: “If anyone is reading this and is surprised, you have not been paying attention.” [47:48]

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Bigger Picture: What This Means for American Politics

• The scandal exposes the normalization of “replacement theory” and other far-right tropes now mainstream within the official machinery—not just Internet fringe groups.
• Host disgust at not only racism but also the lack of institutional pushback against anti-Semitism and misogyny.

Cameron: “This is… the people… officially involved with the party. This isn’t just… a fun little MAGA civil war… The next Republican nominee is going to be somebody who is way more like this than even Trump.” [52:24]

Should Democrats/Progressives Reach Out?

• Tim: “It’s a flaw… for the left to not try to reach people with lesser problematic views and bring them into the tent… given the scale of the danger.” [53:55]
• Raven: “There has to be a baseline of repair and trust… as a pundit, it’s not my job to reach across the aisle. That’s the politician’s job.” [55:35]

AOC Reference:

• Cameron: “AOC made a great point… It’s the Democrats’ responsibility to go to the MAGA people… That doesn’t mean you don’t deserve healthcare.”

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• Raven, on media autonomy: “It is so paramount in this moment that Black media comes to the fore and that we take autonomy over our stories and how we tell our stories… so I feel really, really energized by people… who are taking back the narrative.” [29:20]
• Tim, on internet organizing: “Discoverability is the challenge… you need to be in a place where your stuff is being delivered to folks that might not have otherwise seen it.” [33:44]
• On the Young Republicans:
  • “The F slur was used, the R slur was used, the N slur was used… 251 times.” —Cameron [36:28]
  • “J.D. Vance… you have a brown wife and brown children. You think there's room in this party for you when daddy goes away?” —Cameron [52:24]
  • “Let’s not infantilize grown people… It’s those kinds of sentiments that make more mainstream and palatable extremist culture that genuinely harms people who are most vulnerable.” —Raven [51:37]

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Conclusion

• The episode exposes the dangerous normalization of hate speech and exclusionary policies in mainstream Republican youth circles, not simply edges of the party.
• Raven provides actionable hope and resilience: building Black-led independent media, grassroots offline communities, and persistent public education—even in the face of platform censorship and rightward lurch.

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Transcript

[Raven Tram Curtis]

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[Raven Tram Curtis]

Could you be more specific?

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When it's cravenient. Okay, like a freshly baked cookie made with real butter available right down the street at a.m. p. M. Or a savory breakfast sandwich I can grab in just a second at a.m. p.m.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I'm seeing a pattern here.

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[Raven Tram Curtis]

Crave which is anything from AM PM.

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[Tim Miller]

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[Tim Miller]

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[Raven Tram Curtis]

New customer offer first three months only.

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Then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra.

[Tim Miller]

See mintmobile.com have you heard about my twink plan? Have I discussed that on this pod.

[Cameron Caskey]

That this show was your twink plan?

[Tim Miller]

Yeah. Well you're gonna get me into trouble with that. Hey everybody, I'm Tim Miller.

[Cameron Caskey]

And I'm Cameron Caskey. And today we're joined by my friend Raven Tram Curtis. But before we get to that, I want to give you all a preview of what's to come. I did some detective work, hence the outfit, into something that came up this week that I investigated very hard.

[Tim Miller]

It's a detective outfit.

[Cameron Caskey]

It's like the Sherlock is Fuck off.

[Tim Miller]

Got it.

[Cameron Caskey]

I discovered breaking news that might. I hope everybody watching this is sitting down. I assume you are. The Young Republicans in this country might have a racism problem and we'll get into that a little further. I just want to give you guys a sneak peek. Dante, if you throw it up on screen. This is extensive work that I've done to tie together some of the individuals who are involved with this. Whether that's Peter Jonta, Samuel Douglas, William Hendrix, Bobby Walker and then some other other characters that came out of nowhere.

[Tim Miller]

There might be some racism, Cameron, but the nice thing there with William Hendrix is that you know that non binary Americans are still welcome in the Young Republicans. Which is kind of surprising to me.

[Cameron Caskey]

I can't Speak to that for the individual named William Hendricks. I can't draw any conclusions. All I can. The one conclusion I can draw is racist. We'll get to that later. Raven. Thanks so much for joining, everybody. Raven and I met at the content creator conference and she has cracked the code for getting progressive messaging across to who also. Want to watch folks dance? How are you doing today?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I'm doing great. Happy to be here. How are y' all doing?

[Tim Miller]

We're doing okay. Raven, I have not got to meet you, so can we just do a little first date thing? And I want to know, like, where you grew up, where you sit at. Sat at the cafeteria, like, who your crew was. And also how sick of people saying, that's so Raven to you.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Like, are you literally. That was my entire childhood. Like, I could not talk to a single person my age and not be met with, oh, my gosh, your name is Raven. Like, that's so Raven. So I had two options. I could, like, resent it or I could lean into it. So I really leaned into it because at least at that point before Raven, you know, was saying things like, well, I'm not really black. It was cool.

[Tim Miller]

It's like, was your. Like, was your. I'm trying to think about what social media app it would have been for you. Like, did you have a that's so Raven handle even?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Oh, but I should have. Oh, my gosh. We gotta. We gotta build a time machine to go back and tell me to do that.

[Tim Miller]

I would have considered changing my name, I think, and going by, like, rave.

[Cameron Caskey]

How do you know? God, it's so fucking hot. How do you know what that so Raven is. I feel like that's after your time.

[Tim Miller]

I'm the oldest sibling. I. Very young. I have a younger brother that's like 13 years younger than me. So I'm up to speed.

[Cameron Caskey]

Does your daughter ever watch it or is it just too old?

[Tim Miller]

My daughter does not watch. That's so Raven. No, my daughter, I think, was born after Raven got a little weird.

[Cameron Caskey]

What about the Raven's Home Disney spinoff show?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Right.

[Tim Miller]

I was about to say, I don't know about that.

[Cameron Caskey]

Well, we'll get to that soon. Tim, I want to give you a preview in what Raven has been able to cook off.

[Tim Miller]

We didn't get. She didn't get to answer the question. Typical of this show, like, where we just talk. I wanted to hear about the high school cafeteria still.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Sure. So my whole life story. I'll break it down for you in 45 seconds. How about that? I grew up all over. My mom was a professional singer and dancer on Broadway for like a decade. So people often asked me if I was a military kid because, like, I lived all over. I was born in New York City and then I moved to Houston for a little bit, and then I was in Vegas for a little bit and then in la and then back in Houston, and then I went to college in upstate New York and then now I'm in Chicago, you know, living it up in the Midwest, so all over the place. As a result, I went to like a million different schools for K through 12. So I don't know if I had like an ironclad place at the table, you know, at the cafeteria table. But as a through line, I would say I was always with the nerdy kids. Almost always. My friends were like other young girls and we were all like super focus driven nerds.

[Cameron Caskey]

Debate model, UN deca.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

So I was. I was a little bit of like, athlete, but also in the academic stuff. So I was the youngest editor in chief ever of my high school newspaper, the Rampage.

[Tim Miller]

Congratulations.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Thank you. I was, interestingly, president of the National Chinese Honor Society because I studied Mandarin for like seven years.

[Tim Miller]

I'm sorry, I did Google you, and my understanding is that you're black and Jewish. So how did you achieve the championship of the presidency of the Chinese Society? I feel like the Chinese would be unhappy about that. Cultural appropriation or something.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Well, you know, I went to an international school. I went to the Audi International School where we did the IB program. And there were like just so many amazing opportunities to study different languages. And so kind of on a whim, I was like, yeah, I want to study Mandarin. Why not? That sounds so cool. So I did.

[Cameron Caskey]

Okay, fine, Tim, I'll count to 10. Er Sun Tzu Wu Liu Qi Ba.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Joe Shi Zhonglangzhou Shi.

[Cameron Caskey]

I don't know. I've only spent so much time on TikTok.

[Tim Miller]

How is your Chinese now?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Honestly? Definitely used to be better. Don't have a lot of opportunities to practice these days. But if I got back into tutoring, I could probably build back up to like a strong intermediate advance.

[Tim Miller]

So, president of the Chinese club, youngest editor of the newspaper, track and field.

[Cameron Caskey]

What was the biggest, like, social scandal that happened while you were editor of the newspaper? Because at my school newspaper, some kid submitted an All Lives matter think piece and it got published and there was a huge backlash to it, understandably. So did you guys have something like that?

[Tim Miller]

What? You don't believe that all lives matter, Cameron?

[Cameron Caskey]

I don't believe that Any Lives Matter.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Oh, wow, okay. You said nihilism or fatalism or both. I don't know if we had like an All Lives Matter scandal. I think at least the people I spent my time around were pretty social justice oriented. So none of that. I mean, you know, there were scandals about, like, teacher turnover and things of that sort, and interpersonal scandals about people cheating on other people. But we didn't really publish on that in the paper.

[Cameron Caskey]

No think pieces on the cheating?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

No think pieces on the cheating? No. I don't think I could have gotten that past our history professor or teacher who was overseeing everything.

[Tim Miller]

Wow. So did you have a tiger mom then? Are you. Are you of the tiger mom generation to achieve all those markers? Are you familiar with Amy Schwa? She was. It's kind of her fault that we have the fucking worst person in America as the Vice President of the United States. Kind of a long story. Anyway, you could do it.

[Cameron Caskey]

Can you explain this? I don't know what this is.

[Tim Miller]

Amy Chua. Chua Chua, I think it was Chua wrote a book. This is all kind of from memory, so we're going to have to fact check me. But the book, I believe, was called Tiger mom or it was about tiger moms. It was about Asian mothers and the way that they get their children to be strivers and achieve. And when J.D. vance went to Yale, she was like a mentor of his and she gained a lot of fame and notoriety from the. From the Tiger mom book. And so she helped open a lot of doors for J.D. vance. She was one of his first mentors. And then he had a mentor of David Frum. Then he kind of left David Frum by the wayside. When David Frum got on step with the Trumpies, then he got Peter Thiel as a mentor. And then he really kind of hit the jackpot with that one. So he's been kind of popping around for daddies for a while now. And in that case, I guess it was a mommy originally. But I don't know, I just thought the Amy Chua, like, book was about, like, my child will be the president of the Chinese Club and do track and field and do the editor of the newspaper. And so was that. But was that just you? It was not driven by your parents. You're just a striver.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Definitely not driven by my parents. I mean, also my mom is black. I don't know.

[Tim Miller]

Wouldn't work.

[Cameron Caskey]

Did your mom try to make you a theater kid?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

No, but I also was a theater kid. I was Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors.

[Cameron Caskey]

I was the dentist.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Hey, let's go, Tim.

[Cameron Caskey]

I played the character that was her character's abusive boyfriend.

[Tim Miller]

Guys, I just, I'm feeling really bad about how I spent my time in high school is all. So we got to move on to something else. I think I'm feeling really embarrassed. I did. I mean, I was a model UN champion, but I was doing.

[Cameron Caskey]

And I hold space for that truth. But now I'm going to tap into my detective powers one more time. I have a feeling that you went to Northwestern and that after that you probably ended up going to Cornell. And I'm not going to reveal how I might have put that together, but am I hitting the right notes here?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Almost inverse. I went to Cornell for undergrad and Northwestern for grad school.

[Cameron Caskey]

What'd you study?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Okay, it's a very long obnoxious list of things because if you haven't noticed, I'm a super overachiever. So I double majored and I double minored in undergrad. My majors were feminist, Gender and Sexuality studies and Asian studies with the concentration in China. I studied Mandarin throughout college as well. And then my minor. Thank you. Then my minors were Africana studies and Inequality studies, which is basically like sociology. And then my master's degree is in Black studies. So basically like the DEI nightmare that Republicans talk about.

[Tim Miller]

Boy. Yeah. I think the IRS is going to be coming for you. Based on the recent news, I think that you're a problem. In that case, I guess I got to ask you this then. My follow up question is, given that credentials, you know, given how high achieving you were, if you go back to 20 year old Raven and you say you, you're going to be successful and it is going to be doing Instagram dances where people follow you and you post about politics and you're. And you're something called an influencer that we wouldn't have had then, what do you think Young you would have thought about that?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

She would have been incredulous. I mean, I tell people all the time I never thought that I would be doing this as my full time career. It really is a full. Well, in some ways a full 180 and in other ways very aligned. A full 180 in the sense that I was in an MA PhD program. My plan was to become a professor and work in the academy for the rest of my professional life. So it's a 180 in that sense, but not a 180 in the sense that at the core of what I do, it's driven by community, care for community, and a desire to educate. So maybe not doing that in the classroom anymore, but I am doing it every day on social media. I am doing it through edutainment, right? So, you know, it's kind of funny. It's a weird vehicle to teach people things or to share positive news, to, like, do a trending dance and then have texts above me. But I realized very early on that it works like you take the thing that's already trending, you attach the hard news or the good news or what have you that maybe people wouldn't engage with or read an article about because people have a very short intention span and you marry them together and then suddenly you have edutainment. You're educating people and entertaining them at the same time.

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[Cameron Caskey]

And that's one of the things that I like about your content, that there's other content creators who go viral. I don't think that they hit these notes in a way that they should. Is I actually learn new things from your page. There is information you share that I am not seeing every other person on the fucking Internet cover. And I actually think that's a great way to segue into the video that I pulled so everybody in the audience can know what we're talking about with dancing news. Dante, can you throw it up right now?

[Tim Miller]

What you doing?

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This bitch is giving it girls that are wham In a circle even if a little make a jump like a herd around Girl that I wham In A circle.

[Cameron Caskey]

I didn't know that about North Carolina. Like, that's new information that I just got.

[Tim Miller]

I didn't either. I had a follow up on that. I watched that video as well. That reel. What? How. What happened? I needed a little more. I need you to do, like, three dances. I needed two more slides.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Well, see, but that's the great thing about this format. It's an invitation for curiosity, for people to do the deeper dive. Right. Like, there's only so much I can actually capture in a sentence or two of text. But hopefully the goal is that it'll pique interest enough to encourage more research.

[Tim Miller]

Could you do my research for me right now, though? Because I'm kind of lazy and we're live on the podcast and I could Google, but I would be not focused on you, you know?

[Cameron Caskey]

Is that Roy Cooper?

[Tim Miller]

That's Josh Stein now.

[Cameron Caskey]

Josh Stein, he's the one who's gonna run without Franken so he could have the Frankenstein ticket. Okay, I'm gonna look into that right now.

[Tim Miller]

Cameron's going. Well, Cameron Googles Raven. I want to know, like, the first time that you did an edutainment dance video, what was going through your head? What was the topic? Why did you decide to do it? Do you think it was just for your friends or were you just like, I'm gonna try to be an influencer?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

So honestly, when I started posting, the goal wasn't to necessarily become an influencer. It was to democratize what I was learning in the classroom. So I started posting content back in late 2021, and at the time, I was about a year into this MA PhD program in black Studies at Northwestern. And it was actually my mom's idea. She was like, raven, you know, you're always talking about how what you're learning in these classes is so interesting, you can't believe you're just now encountering this information and you feel like everyone should know this. So why don't you start making TikTok videos and teaching people about what you're learning? And that was really resonant for me as someone who's like a student of bell hooks and very passionate about taking complex, big jargony topics or. Or verbiage and breaking it down in a very simple, accessible way. So that's really how the social media journey started. And then specifically why I started dancing. I mean, it's kind of like a sad answer as a black studies scholar. So much of the conversations we have in the classroom are about suffering and anti blackness and misogynoir. And like, really, really, really heavy stuff. And I think that was starting to burn me out. And so people say like, joy is resistance as sort of this thing that sounds nice, but it's actually also a truism. And I also feel like we have a responsibility to practice it. And so then I asked myself, like, how can I communicate things to people that give them that levity so every video isn't. And today another incident of anti blackness. Like, I don't want to be that person. We. We need something to hold on to. So the dancing series actually started as. Did you know that? Like, if you go way back to the archives, it started as. Did you know that? And. And I would do cam exactly what you're naming. Like, I would find information that I thought was really interesting. I wasn't seeing anyone talk about. And did you know that would pop on the screen and then I'd teach people something while doing a trending dance and folks loved it and it gave them something, you know, wonderful to hold on to.

[Tim Miller]

So that's cool. I learned a new word there, Massage noir. It took me a second to figure it out. I first thought you were talking about.

[Cameron Caskey]

You just learned massage noir.

[Tim Miller]

Well, you just both said it very different ways, so I still don't actually know how to say it. I thought we were talking about like a deep tissue situation, but no. For other listeners who aren't familiar, could you explain the words?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Sure, yeah, happy to. So misogynoir is a term that describes the intersection of anti blackness and misogyny. So it is used to describe the particular kind of intersectional harm that black women experience.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, that's a very sad topic and like a great word. I feel like it's a mismatch of like massage noir. Sounds like very cool. And it's. It's about a very sad topic.

[Cameron Caskey]

Before I ask any further questions, I. By the way, I just read the thing about the governor sign and honestly, it's boring. Sorry everybody. You can do your own research. I tried. I tried to like think of a three bullet point explanation. Raven absolutely nailed it in the video. You're welcome to look further into it if you want. I don't. I'm not interested anymore. Happy about it though. But do you agree that the will to change in terms of the bell hooks of it all is just far superior to All About Love? Because while I think All About Love is filled with unbelievable wisdom that could be stretched a million miles long, I also feel like it's just a lot of really good quotes kind of strung Together, whereas the will to Change feels like more of, like, a piece. I wanted your opinion on that.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I mean, I think both are fabulous. I'm. I'm partial to All About Love, though. I don't know. I think it kind of leans into that joy and hope ethos that we've been talking about.

[Cameron Caskey]

Do you know All About Love, Tim?

[Tim Miller]

I know a lot about love. You know, I've had just a lot of different kind of relationships with love. And I'm familiar. I have, like, a Twitter level knowledge of bell hooks.

[Cameron Caskey]

It's basically. It's this tough thing where it's this book that really changed my perspective on so many things. Relationships, interpersonal dynamics, even those that are not romantic and things like that. But I also am trepidatious to tell women how much I love All About Love because it's very quintessential performative male. Like, maybe the OG thing for a dude to, like, virtue signal that he's actually super feminist. Might be. Oh, you know, I've read Bell Hooks. I've read the Will to Change and everything, so I have mentioned it several.

[Tim Miller]

Times on the pod. I should mention. Have I. Couple. I must be. I would say the third, probably bell hooks.

[Cameron Caskey]

Okay, well, I have. I have a copy of it. I didn't put it on my bookshelf just to avoid the accusations of that performative male feminism. It's mostly fantasy novels.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

But is it performative if you, like, really believe in the sentiment and you're not just doing it in theory, you're, like, practicing it?

[Cameron Caskey]

I mean, look, I can really cook on it. I mean, I. I don't want to get too far into the bell hooks of it all, but I'm so well versed in bell hooks that I could also address that there's almost no recognition at all of queerness in any of the work. But anyway, question for you.

[Tim Miller]

It's hard for me to take a hard, dry turn to where I want to go. Why don't you? Maybe. Maybe my transition will be easier. Following your next question. Cams. Let's see.

[Cameron Caskey]

I was just gonna say, like, I feel like people are gonna be so quick to judge you and say that the dancing stuff is silly, especially when you're talking about topics that are very serious and pertain to news that is very important. And I understand that the kind of core ethos of that is. Yeah, but the joy is the form of resistance there. But do you face people who are kind of, like, demeaning the means by which you communicate this stuff?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Yeah, absolutely. I'VE gotten a lot of misogynoir since we learned a new term today in. In response to that content. You know, people who, who say this is mismatched, like, why are you talking about the news and dancing at the same time? But also I'm very intentional about what I do in those videos, right? So, like, I would never take a, like, super serious, negative, heavy topic and be dancing underneath it. It's me sharing positive news, you know, good news. And then for the heavier topics that do need to be sort of scaffolded out and discussed with a different kind of care and a different kind of approach in a different kind of vehicle that I'll normally deliver sort of straight to camera. So I guess my response to the haters is, you know, you're just not. You're just mad because I could do it all. Like, what's, what's wrong with me being smart and being able to tell you straight to camera what's happening in the world that you need to grapple with while also being a human being who likes to dance and move my body and share things with you in interesting ways that will hopefully reach and positively impact a lot of people.

[Cameron Caskey]

Tim, does that make it any easier to transition into your thing?

[Tim Miller]

It does. One of the serious topics you did a straight to camera video on was your visit to the Broadview facility ICE facility in Chicago. And I just kind of want to let you cook on that a little bit. I want to hear what you've seen on the ground there.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Yeah, so I've been to the Broadview ICE detention center twice now. I went a couple of months ago with J.C.U.A, which is like a local progressive Jewish organization. I also went with Kat, who's running for congress here in illinois in the 9th district.

[Cameron Caskey]

Guest of the show. We had a great time with her.

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[Raven Tram Curtis]

What do you think makes the perfect snack?

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[Raven Tram Curtis]

Could you be more specific when it's cravenient?

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[Raven Tram Curtis]

I'm seeing a pattern here.

[AMPM Advertiser]

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[Raven Tram Curtis]

Crave, which is anything from am, pm.

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[Raven Tram Curtis]

Oh, you did okay. Amazing. Yeah, I love Kat. Yeah, so I got to see her there. We went together. I went with her and Sam and then I went again this past week to see how things have sort of developed because that was before sort of tensions really extremely escalated and obviously it's gotten, you know, really, really pretty, pretty intense on the ground. I mean, honestly, it felt like I was walking into a police state, more so than we do on a day to day navigating through this country. You couldn't even drive into the area because police were blocking it off. So I had to park like maybe a mile away. I walked over. It was a group of people. I ran into a lot of friends who were just very peacefully waiting there as cars were going in and out and booing them as they came in and out. There conservatively were probably like 100 ICE agents and police officers just on the ground surveying everything. No one had any weapons. People were just voicing their distaste for the presence of ICE agents in the operations that are unlawfully happening in those buildings. And, and there were helicopters swarming all over the place. Like it really was a dystopian experience. I've never, never experienced anything like it.

[Tim Miller]

What else are you seeing around town with the ICE goons?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I know the neighborhoods that I spent a lot of time in have absolutely been impacted. I have not seen any of the invasions happening in real time. Yeah, but I mean, the Nextdoor app is popping off all the time, the Ring app. I don't know if you know, the security system alerts are going up there all the time. I've really just been so impressed by the people of Chicago sharing in real time what's happening so that people can make decisions to protect themselves. I think this is a unique experience as someone who also spent a lot of time growing up in Texas that like, it feels like a united front both in terms of our leadership, Lieutenant governor, the governor, the mayor, being on the same page about, we don't want you all here. We didn't ask you to be here. We're going to do everything in our Power to get you out and to limit your jurisdiction while you're here, and then also among just the residents of the Chicagoland area being united it in, in our distaste and disdain. So that's empowering.

[Cameron Caskey]

But still, was Chicago the city where that guy on the delivery bike outran the goons who like tripped over each other in like a Three Stooges way?

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I believe so. I believe so, yeah.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

There's so many videos. I haven't seen that one.

[Cameron Caskey]

It seems like a lot of the stuff I've seen in Chicago, I, I know that the word resistance has kind of become a description for a specific type of generally center left liberal Gen X mother, but I feel like what we're seeing in Chicago is actual resistance and it's been really interesting to see. Tim, I'm curious with the people that you've talked to, because I know that immigration is one of the top things Bulwark is focused on right now. Like, do you think there's a point at which they just get bored somewhere like Chicago? Like, what does it take for them to withdraw from a city?

[Tim Miller]

Like, yeah, I don't, I mean, I don't know the answer to that because I know a lot of other cities I could go to and Trump has already kind of alluded to that. I think that definitely there has been meaningful pushback, you're saying, from both the people of Chicago, politically, legally, and it has slowed the process of what they wanted to do there. But these guys are going to have an unimaginable amount of money. And you talk about just seeing this being outside of the ICE facility there, Raven, but the amount of money that is going into ICE is only increasing. Like they've just allocated a ton and they are flush. So like it would have to be a political opposition that would stop them. And even still, it almost feels like, you know, with, with Stephen Miller and the administration and Gnome and Homan, like they, they have an objective, I don't know they actually care that much about the political consequences. They have the resources and they're going to have a lot of new hires are gonna be able to do. They're opening new facilities, you know, they have all the fucking fancy weaponry and in Chicago they have the damn helicopter that they are people repelling off of. So I don't, to me, I feel like it's escalating, unfortunately, but I don't know if that's necessarily true about Chicago. I talked to Pritzker about this this week and he kind of felt like it's, you Know, it was expanding out of the city a little bit, but there had been less. I don't know. What are you hearing?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Well, I think to your point, Tim, a lot of people don't realize that the Big Ugly bill included nearly $80 billion in funding for ICE. So we are in a situation where ICE is extremely well resourced, extremely well funded, and citizens and people who are inhabiting this shared home space are like, we don't necessarily have the resourcing, but we have the will. And I guess I just want to name for people. While I certainly understand the pessimism, and I think what you're naming is real, so many of our civil rights movements are built on the political will of the people, not necessarily being as well resourced, but being extremely well organized and cohesive in our desire for whatever bad actor to stop being present in shared space. So certainly helps to have resources, but it's not all be all for. For how everything will shake out.

[Cameron Caskey]

That's true. Is it true that they're offering, like, $50,000 signing bonuses and student debt relief and everything? So they're just trying to lure in zoomers who can't get a job because their job got fucking stolen by AI.

[Tim Miller]

Have you heard about my twink plan? Have I that on this podcast?

[Cameron Caskey]

I thought that this show was your twink plan.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, well, you're gonna get me into fucking trouble with that. No, it is not. My twink plan is related to ice, and I want to infiltrate it with twinks. Twinks need money and resources. They live expensive lifestyles. Like, you know, you see them wanting to fly around, spending beyond their means. They join ICE, get 50 grand. Okay. And then can be kind of like a reporting vessel from the inside, you know, like a secret unit from the inside giving us the tea.

[Cameron Caskey]

And otters are just incapable of this, I guess.

[Tim Miller]

I guess otters could do it, too, but it's funnier to think of them as, like a twink strike force within the unit, you know, that is. That's working against the, you know, the leadership.

[Cameron Caskey]

I'm in, like, three group chats that could be described as that.

[Tim Miller]

I feel like this would be a good Netflix show also.

[Cameron Caskey]

Twink strike force.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[Cameron Caskey]

We could probably just cast it, like, off of a bunch of our guests, too.

[Tim Miller]

Right. Anyway, we're just. I'm just throwing out ideas, you know, we're. It's. It's still at the development stage before.

[Cameron Caskey]

We get into some of my detective work, because, boy, have I got a powder keg for everybody today. Raven, do you have any. Any hopeful messages to share, any. Any things that are kind of empowering you right now beyond just sort of the opposition you're seeing in Chicago?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I think I derive a lot of hope from other people that I see colleagues in this space who are standing 10 toes down in this moment. I'm thinking specifically of Roland Martin. I've been on his show a couple of times, and he says all the time, you know, when we go on his show as panelists, that it is so paramount in this moment that black media comes to the fore and that we take autonomy over our stories and how we tell our stories. Because as we've seen, right, a lot of these, like major media conglomerates are in Trump's pocket. They just are. Are bending the knee, are preemptively doing away with dei, are making decisions that are antithetical, with actually preserving free speech and an integris free press. So let's not say that integris free press only happens in black media spaces. But the immediate thought that came up is that I feel really, really energized by people that I'm in community with in this moment who are taking back the narrative in a very intentional way, doing things like on the ground reporting. Right. Like when I went to the detention center, that was me trying to be a part of that sort of unfettered viewpoint on what's happening.

[Tim Miller]

Cam is doing some integris reporting, but it is. It is, sure. And further between the. Do you worry about the TikTok purchase and have you thought about that at all? And obviously, I don't know what. How much of you, I guess, are you doing more Instagram or TikTok for, like, you know, the content center? It's the same, Right. So I don't know. I mean, who knows how the algorithm could shake out? But it sure seems like there's some. Some monkey business at play with the. With the administration and the people that purchase this and the purchase price, what their plans are, for sure.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I mean, I think that's always a concern, censorship in these online spaces, especially when the major owners of a TikTok and an Instagram are in Trump's back pocket. I mean, I think about this often that at any moment, they could just turn. Turn off the tap, right? Like, our accounts could just stop getting pushed out to the masses. And so, honestly, what that makes me think of is how important it is to be building community offline. And I know that's like, kind of the cliche thing to say, but I think now that we, like, fully truly are in the throes of fascism. It's actually more important than ever that we're actually really building like that grassroots, in person, offline community that doesn't depend on these apparatuses to connect and get the message out. Because we can't guarantee that we're going to have the same access or that when we do engage with these apparatuses, we'll actually be able to reach the people we've historically been able to reach. So I think that's a question for creators to ask themselves both in terms of actually getting the message out and also what kind of autonomy we want to have over our work. So maybe moving things to platforms where we do have more native control over the content that we're putting out native to those platforms relative to other platforms that we know are more hostile to our work.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[Cameron Caskey]

What types of platforms? I'm just curious because, like, I want to know. I mean, the, the only platform right now I could think of that seems unencumbered by that type of meddling is Twitter. But also Twitter puts right wing on my. Well, I, I feel like, I feel like I don't hear Twitter explicitly saying, oh, we're gonna, you know, we're gonna have Bibi Netanyahu use us as a weapon. Like, I feel like Twitter is at.

[Tim Miller]

Least still possible for you page of Twitter is like very musky.

[Cameron Caskey]

That's what I was going to say. I do see a lot of right wing shit on my for you page all the time. So I suppose that's just happening behind the scenes. But like, are there platforms right now? Like, besides what, like signal where you think people are going to be able to post unencumbered by that type of shit?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Well, there's always going to be some degree of hindrance. I don't know if there's a complete attachment unless you just have your own email list. Right. But the first thing that comes to mind is Patreon. I know there's been critique of Substack. I haven't personally done a deep dive into this, so I don't want to like speak on things I'm not well versed in. I know there's been some critique of Substack, perhaps making. Making it easier for extreme right wing positions to be pushed out. So this is not an endorsement, but I also think a lot of creators have found autonomy on Substack and being able to build out their bases off of an Instagram where Zuckerberg is, you know, saying wild stuff and co opt and bending the knee. Preemptively to a Trump. So there are more autonomous platforms I think we can be building on. I don't know if they're wholly autonomous.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, it's tough because the discoverability is the challenge. Right? Like you can build your own audience, especially for people that already have audiences. You can build audience, build a community, move it to some place, you know, and subsector is pretty good for that, or Patreon or whatever. But like, if you're trying to find new people or reach new people, that becomes challenge, you know what I mean? You need to be in a place where your stuff is being delivered to folks that might not have otherwise seen it. I mean, I guess YouTube is like where we're doing this is I guess the best example of that for sure.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I think YouTube's great.

[Cameron Caskey]

We're going to jump into our next segment, which is called Cameron's Detective Work on the Young Republican. So as some of you might know, Young Republican group chats have been leaked. There was a lot of racism, anti Semitism, rape jokes and other things that I consider to be rather unseemly. But it gets so much more complicated than that. Some of you might have seen the headlines, some of you might seen some of the tweets, oh, this person was joking about gas chambers. Oh, this person was dropping N bombs. Oh, these things were happening. But it goes deeper and it has led to some real fractures being shown. Now of course we know that Elise Stefanik has posted pics with some of these guys. We know that JD Vance has been apologetic and said, oh, even though they're joking about gas chambers and just making like racist jokes straight out of the fucking 1800s, you know, you can't blame a bunch of guys for what they said in a group chat.

[Tim Miller]

And look, boys being boys, who among.

[Cameron Caskey]

Us hasn't said some stuff in a group chat that maybe is not completely representative of our public decorum? The difference is this isn't the boys private group chat. This is an official channel for the Young Republicans. So what they are saying on here is reflective of how they are showing up for their actual efforts, not just their, you know, boys talk. Not that these things are in any way excusable during boys talk, but it is worth noting that I think it should.

[Tim Miller]

We should. We're saying it's really a men's talk. I mean, there's like 31 year olds or like 30 something year olds.

[Cameron Caskey]

Oh no, it's like 28 to 40 or something like that. Yeah, so.

[Tim Miller]

But state senator on there.

[Cameron Caskey]

Yeah, I don't, I'm not, you know.

[Tim Miller]

The high school, high school lacrosse teams.

[Cameron Caskey]

Chat group, you know, very important to note and we'll, and we'll be getting into that but basically I want to give you guys sort of a bird's eye view of who some of the big players are going to be right now. Dante, you throw it up on screen.

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[Cameron Caskey]

The F slur was used, the R slur was used, the N slur was used. All of which appeared more than 251 times combined. It's caused a lot of infighting and I want to break down the different factions and interests. Part 1 Williams Fuck Mary Kill Part 1 William Hendricks, right in the middle. Kansas Young Republicans vice chair used the N word in multiple different spellings. Then we've got Bobby Walker, top right, was vice chair of the New York State Young Republicans referred to rape as epic. He also uses the moniker I patch. McCain, originally coined by conservative commentator Tucker Carlson in an apparent reference to GOP Rep. Dan Crenshaw. Walker also makes the remark I prefer my war heroes not captured. A repeat of a similar 2015 line from Trump. Then we've got Peter Giunta, kind of the star of this story. He was chair of the New York State Republicans and said in regards to a vote about him that everyone who votes no is going to the gas chamber. That vote was for him to be chair of the Young Republican national federation, the GOP's 15,000 member political organization for Republicans between 18 and 40 years old, which again, by political standards 40 is actually pretty sprightly and plucky, but fully grown adults. Great point, Tim. Then we've got Samuel Douglas's when talking about a woman who was apparently Indian, but then he discovered she was not Indian. He said she just doesn't bathe often. This is Samuel Douglas, a state senator, a state senator from northern Vermont and the head of the state's Young Republicans in a replied to Giuda. Then a guy named Joe Maligno, who previously identified as the general counsel for the New York State Young Republicans, who said can we fix the showers, gas chambers don't fit. The Hitler esthetic woman named Annie, which by the way, none of these people pictured here have anything resembling esthetics. So that's worth noting. Annie, Katie, New York's national committee member.

[Tim Miller]

It's a woman. There's a woman on the chat, there's.

[Cameron Caskey]

A woman here who said in regards to the Hitler conversation, I'm ready to watch people burn now. Alex Dwyer, chair of the Kansas Young Republicans, made a joke about Trump burning the Epstein files. And JD Vance, instead of the layup of denouncing it, said, I refuse to join the pearl clutching when powerful people call for political violence. It is of course worth noting that there was anti Indian hate language being used and disgusting jokes about Indian people in these very texts. And J.D. vance has a, an Indian wife and Indian children. So that is very brave of you, J.D. vance, to be such a fucking loser about that. You ought to be fucking ashamed of yourself. But I want us to meet Gavin Wax, the next big character here.

[Tim Miller]

Cameron. Cameron, you underestimate me.

[Cameron Caskey]

What do you mean I underestimate you?

[Tim Miller]

Yes, just keep it going. You think your investigative skills are going to be the. Are going to really blow my socks off. I know more about Gavin Wax. Let's just hear what you got, okay?

[Cameron Caskey]

Peter Giunta claimed the release of the chat was part of a, quote, highly coordinated year long character assassination led by Gavin Wax and the New York City Young Republican Club, which is of course an allusion to a once obscured war that has now spilled into the open. Quote, these logs were sourced by way of extortion and provided to political by the very same people conspiring against me. What's most disheartening is that despite my unwavering support of President Trump since 2016, rogue members of his administration, including Gavin Wax, have participated in this conspiracy to ruin me publicly simply because I challenged them privately. Now this Gavin Wax, according to POLITICO and LinkedIn, was a staffer in Trump's State Department, formerly led the New York Young Republican Club to pull some other stuff that June that has said. The chair of the Arizona Young Republicans asked if New Yorkers in the chat were watching an NBA playoff game. And Giunta responded, I'd go to the zoo if I wanted to watch monkey play ball. Junta elsewhere refers to black people as the watermelon people. Jesus fucking Christ. In another exchange, Dwyer, the Kansas chair, informs Junta that one of Michigan's Young Republicans promised him the group will, quote, vote for the most right wing person to lead the national organization to which Giunta responded, great, I love Hitler. Dwyer reacted with a smiley face. Now, before we get to Hayden Paget, I'd love to know what I'm missing on Gavin Wax.

[Tim Miller]

Gavin is such an interesting character, actually, and I was going to do a big long form thing on him that just didn't happen for a variety of reasons. But so I spent a bunch of time with him at the New York City Young Republicans Club, which they have a speakeasy in New York City that opened during COVID where they would have Covid parties because other places.

[Cameron Caskey]

Is that Dime Square?

[Tim Miller]

No, they definitely did some stuff with Dime Square, but they have a much more dorky young Republican speakeasy clubhouse that is not in Times Square, but that's not so far from it. Your New York geography is better than mine, but it's more closer to Midtown than Times Square. But Gavin also leaked a separate racist group chat about. This was maybe two years ago about another. About some Ron DeSantis influencers. This was like a Trump versus DeSantis type thing where there was a group chat of young Republicans that were DeSantis supporters that Gavin Wax leaked and trash them. So he is skilled at the, at the art of text leaking. He does seem to have access to a lot of racist chats, I guess I would notice among Gavin Wax. But dude has. Dude has bald with this. He is like a senior aide at the State Department now and had no experience. Just took over the New York Young Republican Club, New York City Young Republican Club, made it as Trumpy as possible. Got a bunch of Trump bros to come there, got a bunch of people to come there because they wanted to have parties during COVID and he has leveraged that into the State Department. So there you go.

[Cameron Caskey]

You see, Raven, I feel like one of the differences here is that we don't leak the texts in the lib group chats. We're all in for everybody else to cancel people, we cancel each other internally.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

That's true. We keep it in house for sure.

[Cameron Caskey]

And we still hold people's feet to the fire, but not by way of Politico.

[Tim Miller]

Also, another difference, I guess I would say, is that sometimes to a degree, that's a little oversensitive for my tastes. Progressives and young libs genuinely don't want people to say mean things about other people, you know, or other groups or deride them or be derogatory about them. And it's a genuine thing. So when they cancel people, it's usually because they're genuinely upset about that person's behavior. Right. And sometimes maybe they go a little overboard with it, but it comes from a serious place. I guess my point is that I'm on the detective work here is that I don't suspect that Gavin was actually offended by any of this based on the behavior that I watched at the New York City Young Republicans clubhouse. This is just a purely an op. Like this is rat fucking they're doing. They're doing leaks. They're doing rap fucking leaks. Not like principled cancellations.

[Cameron Caskey]

No, it doesn't seem like Gavin spoke to the ghost of Racist Future and said, oh, you know what? Actually it behooves me to point this out because I want our party to be better. If anything, very often when there's criticism within the Young Right about racism, it's normally that people are not being racist enough. But real quick, I want to hit Hayden Padgett who is so far the best looking of any of the guys.

[Tim Miller]

I don't know anything about this guy. So this I'm interested.

[Cameron Caskey]

So this is where the beef really kicks in because obviously Gavin's got his rat, but there's kind of a war here between Peter and Hayden. Hayden defeated Peter Junta and was re elected chairman of the Young Republican National Federation this summer. Junta went off on Republicans from states that supported him, saying that Minnesota is a bunch of f slurs. Arkansas, inbred cow fuckers. Nebraska, revolt in our favor, blocked their bind and had a majority of their delegates. Maryland, fat stinky Jew. Rhode Island. Oh, by the way, a lot of Hitler, a lot of Holocaust, a lot of anti Semitism, Not a word from the ADL or AIPAC or these other organizations fighting at.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I wonder why.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, was he onto something with Arkansas there though? Could we just go hear Arkansas one more time?

[Cameron Caskey]

Arkansas, inbred cow. I don't think anybody's fucking cows. Rhode island, traitorous sea slurs who I will eradicate from the face of this planet. Somebody else in the Peter Giunta camp of Peter vs Hayden said that people should rape Hayden. So it seems like we've got Giunta who has it out for Hayden Padgett, and we've got Gavin Wax who seems to be leaking it all. Which sets us up for our big finale. Aiden.

[Tim Miller]

Oh, I love Aiden.

[Cameron Caskey]

Meet the mysterious Aiden who had a viral tweet that went a little something like this. A friend of mine got blackmailed in a leak in these chats. A total fucking coward and useless piece of shit. One of the people in here. He attended his wedding with me and still sold him over to the devil all over some useless Young Republican beef. And then the GOP condemned them. Fuck these people. The geo tree the GOP treated to fire my friend and Vice chairman from his AG job because of tiktoks I posted about immigration. I wasn't allowed to talk about replacement theory or any mainline immigration stances which to his credit with Stephen Miller, that is now a mainline immigration stance. They asked me to resign over Trump's green card diploma. Mail Comments I was blacklisted by Young Republicans national and blocked by their account because their leader is a BLM sympathizing closet case. Everyone in this article is a patriot and attacking them is a dirty, treacherous, impotent, cowardly bundle of sticks. They all deserve to be destroyed. And then Aiden said I want to be clear, I have always liked the New York City Young Republicans guys, especially Gavin. I don't want to attack them. I want the truth. For whatever reason, Gavin went to a Democrat reporter and destroyed many people he once called his friends. The White House has proof that Gavin planted this story. There is.

[Tim Miller]

Wow.

[Cameron Caskey]

If I'm wrong I would retract everything and issue a full throated apology and condemnation. But he hasn't provided counter evidence. This is him going after the Bulwark's very own Will Sommer. Summer Summer Summer Summer.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, you had it.

[Cameron Caskey]

Will Summer. That's also a picture that Aiden posted of himself shirtless in response to people commenting on the physical appearance of the the Young Republicans folks because not everybody was necessarily looking very superior.

[Tim Miller]

But I guess what was his tech on Will Summer? Hard for me to read there.

[Cameron Caskey]

Will reached out and said, hi Aiden, I'm a reporter with the Bulwark. Any chance I could get that Bartel's affidavit that Politico got that claims Wax is behind the leak? Thanks. And then sent his email to which Aiden replied, I would never help you or the Bulwark. Everything you stand for I am against. Even if we both want to attack the same people.

[Tim Miller]

Well, I'm happy to be not be on the same side as Aiden. Can I just say that I don't know Raven, this is a lot to dump on you. I'm wondering what your reactions are. What's kind of going through your head right now learning about all this.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I mean it's unsurprising but completely foul, right? That these spaces exist where people are just peddling out misogyny and ableism and anti Semitism and anti blackness. But it's not surprising. Like this is just a supposedly safe space where they were Saying the quiet part out loud. A lot of the quiet part gets said out loud anyways, but this was like a totally unfiltered version of that. If anyone is reading this and is surprised you have not been paying attention.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I want to get to Cam's big finish. But the interest to your point right now, it's like the quiet part out loud, right?

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[Tim Miller]

I just. Let's take seriously it's very challenging because he's such a douche. But let's just take seriously the argument presented by J.D. vance and, and Mr. Mr. Ayden and his triceps and others who are like this is fucking around. This is joking. You know what I mean? Like you guys are. This is like bad people, you know, whatever. Our political enemies are trying to use this when it's really nothing. This story is interesting pair to me with another news story that came out this week for the New York Times which is that we are trying to whiten the refugee program where now the US is just going to be bringing in. We're focusing on white South Africans, Europeans who are upset with migration and people who can speak English. Those are going to be the priorities going forward in the refugee program. And it's like that is the refugee program that you would put in place if the people on this text chain were in charge of the refugee program. Right? And they are.

[Cameron Caskey]

These people are talking about replacement theory, which again, it's not like these are the fucking groipers in the Nick Fuentes 4chan. Like these are people with real positions in the party. And it's also what Stephen Miller is saying. And Stephen Miller is somebody who's calling a lot of shots in the White House. But I think that it's so crazy that Republicans are going to bat for this stuff. I'm not surprised that they're going to bat for the racism and everything. I'm sort of surprised that they're going to bat for the anti Semitism, but also not because again, anti Semitism. As far these people as these people Concerned like anti Semitism is only the most inflammatory thing that a 21 year old says at a college protest that gets caught on camera. It's not actual fucking people within the system who are repeatedly joking about Hitler and shit like that. Like, that's no problem to these folks. But we were talking about this on the show earlier this week when Vivek Ramaswamy was talking to Turning Point USA kids in Ohio and they were all like, you are not Christian enough to lead our pure blooded nation. Like, this is the norm now. This is what the regular people are doing. This is not the fringe group chat. This is not the private group chat. This is an official Republican channel. And, and then you've got the Republicans, like, could you imagine Mitt Romney being like, oh, let them make their gas chamber jokes?

[Tim Miller]

Not a lot of gas chamber jokes on the Romney text chain. I don't think usually they're, I think they're texting out milk their underwear, you know, things like that.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Oh my God. I mean, I think it's the infantilizing for me, you know, J.D. vance being like, oh, just kids being kids. Like, these are grown ass people. Let's not infantilize grown people. Let's hold grown people to account. And it's honestly giving to me the same energy as like, boys will be boys. Like, it's those kinds of sentiments that make more mainstream and palatable extremist culture that genuinely harms people who are most vulnerable. And so it's interesting to see like people from the White House coming out responding to this and acting, you know, incredulous. Like, how could you say this chat has anything to do with Trump? He's not in this chat. Everyone just wants to blame everything on him. Well, when you have a bigot who's the President of the United States constantly peddling bigotry and making it more mainstream and making it more palatable, of course we're going to see more sentiments like this to your point, Cam. Right. Like become the norm.

[Cameron Caskey]

It's directly the result of the political environment that he's fostered. And the idea that it's not is so insane. And it's like, again, I already said this, but J.D. vance, you have a brown wife and brown children. You think that there's room in this party for you when daddy goes away. You think that when you are not being fucking held up like a puppet by Donald Trump, I don't even think Peter Thiel can protect you. Like, you are somebody who is broken beyond the white supremacist standards that these important people in this base. And I think this group chat is actually very important. This isn't just like a fun little MAGA civil war to take a look at on the podcast. This is the people who are affected officially involved with the party. There are actual members of the party in this chat. This is not just the people on the fringe. This is, you know, this is the same thing as seeing Laura Loomer and Stephen Miller in the White House. Like, this is the norm now. And the next Republican who is going to be. I genuinely think the next Republican nominee is going to be somebody who is way more like this than even Trump. And it is extremely concerning to me. And I don't really understand how Republicans could possibly combat it. And that's, in my opinion, the, like, the fatal flaw of any moderate conservative at this point who thinks that there's any return for that party to anything resembling what they looked like 12 years ago.

[Tim Miller]

Can I offer maybe an unpopular view on that front? Because I share your view of the trajectory of where we're heading, and I don't. Yeah, and it's kind of like, kind of goes without saying that the moderate conservatives are like, have made a deal with the devil and are making a flawed choice. I also think it's a flaw of sometimes, like, folks on the left's engage way to engage some of this because, like, these guys, like, their opinions are so fucking gross and sick. You know that, like, honestly, if you showed that picture of those four guys and then you showed their texts, like, what, 28% of the country is for that. A pretty small percentage of the country is for that. And trying to appeal to people that have maybe some other lesser problematic views and reach them and figure out ways to reach them and bring them into the tent is something that I think is probably wise, given the scale of the danger of the threat on the other side. And sometimes I feel like that's not really happening. I don't know. What do you guys think about that?

[Raven Tram Curtis]

In theory, I agree with you, but my heart is like, so I think everyone is so disgusted with one another. Like, I'm so disgusted with people who chose this man. Again, like, knowing who he is, knowing what, you know, like, what his presence in that position of power means for our nation, I think. So any modicum of trust that was there has been so fundamentally broken. And I guess for me, as, like, a pundit, it's not my job to necessarily, you know, reach across the aisle and be like, come into the camp. That's the politician's job.

[Tim Miller]

Well, but it's your job to like appeal to different people online, I guess. Try to appeal the different.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

[Tim Miller]

Or educate different kinds of people, for sure.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

I just, there has to be like a baseline of repair and trust to even reach over, I guess is what I'm saying.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I hear that.

[Cameron Caskey]

Well, everybody, I think AOC made a great point in her town hall with Bernie, which is it's the, it's the Democrats responsibility to go to the MAGA people and the people who have set us up in a situation like this and say no matter, you know, no matter how much we need to combat your belief system and the results of it and everything, that doesn't mean you don't deserve health care. That doesn't mean the government should not be working to provide you with things. And two things can be true at once. Raven, thank you so much for joining Timothy. Have a wonderful day. Everybody will be seeing you soon here at the Bulwark.

[Tim Miller]

Appreciate you guys. Thank you so much.

[Raven Tram Curtis]

Raven, thank you.

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