Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett

Summary

Pivot Podcast Episode Summary
Episode Title: Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Release Date: April 4, 2025
Hosts: Kara Swisher, Scott Galloway
Guest: Jon Lovett
Produced by: New York Magazine and Vox Media Podcast Network

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Introduction

In this episode of Pivot, hosted by Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway with guest co-host Jon Lovett, the trio delves deep into the tumultuous intersection of technology, politics, and business. The discussion centers around Elon Musk’s rumored departure from his government role, President Trump’s aggressive new tariffs, the impact on major tech companies, the state of U.S. immigration policies, and the ongoing battle for TikTok’s ownership.

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Elon Musk’s Potential Exit from the Administration

Rumors and Denials:
The episode opens with speculation about Elon Musk's possible transition out of his governmental role. According to Politico reports, Musk might be stepping back in the coming weeks. However, the White House has swiftly denied these claims, with Press Secretary Carolyn Levitt dismissing them as "garbage" on X (formerly Twitter). Elon Musk echoed this denial by labeling the rumors as "fake news" on his platform.

Impact on Tesla and Dogecoin:
The hosts discuss the timing of Musk’s potential exit, coinciding with Tesla’s significant drop in sales—experiencing a historic 13% decline in Q1. They ponder the future of Musk’s ventures, particularly Dogecoin, which Jon Lovett predicts will "die a quiet death" without Musk's aggressive promotion. Scott Galloway adds, “[04:05] Trump put Elon out there as a shield...”

Operational Chaos:
Musk's involvement in governmental operations, referred to as "Doge," has led to systemic chaos within agencies like the VA, where employees faced disruptions in accessing critical systems. The uncertainty surrounding Musk’s role raises concerns about the sustainability of these government initiatives without his leadership.

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Wisconsin Elections and Elon's Influence

Elon’s Campaign Spending:
Elon Musk’s hefty investment of $25 million in Wisconsin’s state Supreme Court race intended to tip the scales in favor of conservative candidates. However, the Democratic-backed Susan Crawford triumphed over her opponent Brad Schimmel, maintaining the liberal majority.

Republican Dilemma:
Scott Galloway and Jon Lovett explore how Musk's failure to secure the desired electoral outcomes forces Republicans into a precarious position. Candidates must choose between aligning with Trump and Musk's aggressive tactics or focusing on constituent interests to avoid primary challenges. Lovett remarks, “[09:51] ... Elon Musk is political poison...”

Fundamental Political Realities:
Both hosts agree that foundational political dynamics cannot be overridden by monetary influence alone. Musk's attempts to manipulate elections have backfired, demonstrating that financial power cannot substitute for genuine voter support.

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President Trump’s Sweeping New Tariffs

Overview of Tariffs:
President Trump unveiled a series of expansive tariffs targeting all major U.S. trading partners. Notably, the EU faces a 20% tariff, Japan 24%, South Korea 26%, and China an additional 34% on top of existing tariffs.

Market Reactions:
The announcement sent shockwaves through financial markets:

• S&P 500: Dropped 3.4%
• Dow Jones: Fell by over 2%, losing 1,200 points
• Nasdaq: Down by 3.8%

Tech Sector Impact:
Major tech companies such as Apple, Amazon, Nvidia, and Alphabet experienced significant stock declines, reflecting the broad economic uncertainty induced by the tariffs. Galloway notes, “[29:51] ... the markets are down...”

Economic Analysis:
Jon Lovett cites former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, who estimated the tariffs could result in a projected loss of $20 trillion, translating to over $200,000 per family of four—a figure illustrating the severe anticipated economic repercussions.

Strategic Implications:
The tariffs are seen as a power play by Trump, aiming to consolidate control over spending and taxation. However, the lack of detailed reciprocal agreements and the haphazard implementation raise doubts about the administration’s strategic acumen.

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U.S. Immigration Policies and Deportations

Haphazard Deportations:
The hosts condemn the administration’s reckless deportation policies, particularly the practice of sending non-criminals to El Salvador’s prisons due to administrative errors. They highlight a heartbreaking case where an individual with protected status was deported erroneously, with no recourse for return.

Historical Parallels:
Comparisons are drawn between current policies and historical injustices, such as Nazi-era deportations, underscoring the severe human rights violations occurring under the guise of immigration enforcement.

Bureaucratic Incompetence:
Jon Lovett emphasizes the dual threat of an incompetent and cruel bureaucracy, which not only mishandles deportations but also undermines democratic principles by stripping due process from affected individuals.

Public Perception and Democratic Response:
The hosts discuss how these policies are fueling public fear and distrust, potentially galvanizing opposition against Trump’s administration. They advocate for Democrats to highlight these injustices to reinforce the importance of protecting democratic values and human rights.

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TikTok Ownership Bids and National Security

Ownership Proposals:
President Trump is reportedly reviewing bids from major companies like Blackstone, Oracle, Marc Andreessen, and a last-minute bid from Amazon to take over TikTok. The administration aims to ensure that no single foreign adversary holds more than 20% ownership.

User Experience Concerns:
Both hosts express skepticism about the potential new owners’ ability to replicate TikTok’s successful algorithm. Scott Galloway wonders, “What do you imagine it's going to happen here?”

National Security Implications:
Kara Swisher and Jon Lovett critique the administration’s lack of transparency and coherent public argument regarding TikTok’s national security risks. Lovett asserts, “[51:00] ... they didn't make the public case...”

Predicted Outcomes:
The consensus is that regardless of ownership changes, significant national security issues remain unresolved. They anticipate that the user experience will remain largely unchanged, with ownership primarily shifting among prominent American corporations without addressing underlying concerns.

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Predictions and Political Forecasts

Potential Cabinet Positions:
Jon Lovett reaffirms his prediction that if Trump wins reelection, Eric Adams could secure a cabinet position, potentially in Homeland Security or the FBI. He states, “[55:41] ... if Donald Trump won, Eric Adams would end up in the cabinet.”

Influence of Tech Leaders in Politics:
The discussion touches on the increasing presence of tech moguls like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg in political spheres. Scott Galloway expresses frustration over their entanglement with the administration, emphasizing the growing influence of wealthy individuals in shaping government policies.

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Casual Conversations and Light Topics

Towards the end of the episode, the conversation shifts to lighter topics such as favorite TV shows and personal anecdotes. Jon Lovett shares his newfound appreciation for Real Housewives of New York, while Scott Galloway discusses his fondness for cooking shows and reminisces about classic TV personalities.

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Conclusion

The episode of Pivot offers a comprehensive and incisive analysis of current political maneuvers and their implications on technology and governance. With sharp commentary and engaging discussions, Kara Swisher, Scott Galloway, and Jon Lovett provide listeners with a nuanced understanding of the complex interplay between power, policy, and public sentiment in today’s landscape.

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Notable Quotes:

• Jon Lovett [07:41]: “I think he's basically going to pull a Vivec and just slowly fade away out of.”
• Scott Galloway [09:51]: “Trump put Elon out there as a shield...”
• Jon Lovett [29:51]: “Shit...the markets are down...”
• Jon Lovett [51:00]: “They didn't make the public case...”

This summary captures the essence of the episode, highlighting the key discussions and insights while providing relevant quotes to illustrate the hosts' perspectives.

Transcript

[Kara Swisher]

This episode is brought to you by Lifelock. It's tax season and we're all a bit tired of numbers, but here's one you need to $16.5 billion. That's how much the IRS flagged for possible identity fraud last year. Now here's a good number. 100 million. That's how many data points Lifelock monitors every second. If your identity is stolen, they'll fix it, guaranteed. Save up to 40% your first [e-mail] podcast terms apply. This week on Net Worth and Chill, we're tackling the uncertain economic times we are all living in and how you can recession proof your finances. It's Financial Doomsday 101. In this practical episode, we break down what a recession actually is and review concrete steps to protect and potentially grow your wealth during economic downturns. From building a proper emergency fund to identifying recession resistant assets, you're going to walk away with a clear roadmap for financial stability regardless of market conditions. Listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch on YouTube.com YourRichBFF Scientists find weird.

[John Lovett]

Kinds of life all the time, and normally they can run experiments.

[Scott Galloway]

If I hypothesize life can live in bleach, well, I can get bleach and see if life lives in it.

[Kara Swisher]

But what if the weird thing about.

[John Lovett]

The life they find is that it lives for millions of years?

[Scott Galloway]

Time. I don't have any control over that. I can literally do nothing with time.

[John Lovett]

This week on Unexplainable Intra Terrestrials, Aliens on Earth, Deep Beneath the Seafloor. Follow Unexplainable for new episodes every Wednesday. Yeah, lesbians know what penises look like.

[Scott Galloway]

We know what they look like.

[John Lovett]

That's partly the way you figure out you're a lesbian.

[Scott Galloway]

That's correct. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media podcast network. I am the very nasty and openly lesbian Kara Swisher. That's according to my number one fan, Megyn Kelly. Scott is off today, but in his place I brought in someone who Megyn Kelly might also take issue with. And obviously will the host of Crooked Media's Pod Save America and Love it or Leave it, John Lovett. Welcome, John.

[John Lovett]

Hi. Good to see you.

[Scott Galloway]

Good. Did you see Megan trying to flirt with me online? Did you see that situation?

[John Lovett]

Yes. You know, dipping your pigtails in ink, for sure.

[Scott Galloway]

I mean, seriously, what is the deal? Did you understand I like LGB but not tea?

[John Lovett]

Oh, of, of course, of course. They're. They're trying to divide the t Off from the lgb. They. That's what they've done.

[Scott Galloway]

I don't think she knows what Q is. Or plus. Like what is. Plus what is Q?

[John Lovett]

No, I don't think they know what the Q is. They certainly don't know what the IA is. They're not into any of these letters, but they're mostly focused on trying to. They want the. They want the T off of the flag, and we have to keep the T on the flag.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. I didn't make a response to the New York Post when they called me, for one. I felt that was the right way to go. Didn't you think?

[John Lovett]

It seems as though this is. Is it just drumming up a misunderstanding from years ago to find a way to talk about you. Is that what this is?

[Scott Galloway]

I called her a rage machine last week on the show. Right. Cause she is. She just yells at everybody and. You know, and she wasn't. She. I hate to say it's so talking about Elon Musk. They weren't exactly like this then. And so it's kind of a shock. What happened is she had canceled on the show and we had back and forth and back and forth. And I think I wrot sort of a. To my. To the staff and her person, like, when are we going to do this thing? And then the person said her sister died. And then I wrote, I'm really sorry. So the whole thing is I didn't know. Right. And then it was ridiculous. Of course I'm sorry her sister died. It's just very strange. I think it was just an excuse to yell at me for a little while. But.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, that's what it seems. That's what it seems like.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. She has a podcast network like you guys. Did you know that I.

[John Lovett]

Well, the reason I know about it is because she called you a bitchy lesbian or whatever she said. That's how I. I mean, that's the whole purpose. That's. This is that this is. There's like a. Like she. There's a cycle to this. Right. Like you. She picks these fights. It generates a Page Six story. It gets attention.

[Scott Galloway]

Who do you beef with? Who beefs at you from the. Right.

[John Lovett]

Well, John got in a fight with JD Vance on Twitter.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, I saw that.

[John Lovett]

Which. It's just incredible that the vice president.

[Scott Galloway]

Explain that for the people. What it was about.

[John Lovett]

It was about the fact that the Trump administration is. I don't even want to call it deporting. It is kidnapping people and dispatching them to gulag in El Salvador. And we have Increasing evidence that they're making mistakes as they do this. And now the administration is claiming once you've been sent to this mega prison in El Salvador, they don't. They don't have the ability to bring you back. So no mistakes. So there's no due process to catch mistakes in advance and no way to rectify mistakes once they've happened, which is obviously wrong, even if you are getting it right. But now we see that they are getting it wrong. And Vance was defensive and dissembling and lying about what the record said about one example.

[Scott Galloway]

Right. That he was in M13 or whatever. That he was Ms. 13. Ms. 13. Excuse me. And then. And then he wasn't. Right. It was just like nonsense.

[John Lovett]

Well, we have no idea other than there is no evidence for it. Right. And the evidence. There's no.

[Scott Galloway]

They want.

[John Lovett]

Well, of course there's. There are certainly. Yes. They have provided no evidence that this person was in MS.13. Vance claimed he was convicted. As far as we could tell, this person has never been convicted in the US Of A crime. Right. And the evidence he cited wasn't there. We have, you know, similarly, we have this for other examples of people that seem to have been rounded up because they had tattoos that rubbed in ice Officer. The wrong way, including a tattoo for autism awareness.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. The guy that was the gay barber. Was that the gay barber?

[John Lovett]

No, the gay barber had a crown that said mom and a crown that said dad.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. I mean, it's ridiculous. It's just ridiculous.

[John Lovett]

It's evil.

[Scott Galloway]

It's evil. All of it. Well, good for John.

[John Lovett]

Yeah.

[Scott Galloway]

Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today. This is really kind of a dark time. At the same time, it's tons of material for us to talk about and tons of things to get up in arms about what's going on. And we've got a lot to get today, including Trump giving the middle finger to the rest of the world via tariffs with these sweeping new tariffs, which seem ridiculous. And every economist on all sides is pretty perplexed about the whole thing. And plus, what's next for TikTok? But first, President Trump has reportedly told his inner circle that Elon Musk will be transitioning out of his administration in the coming weeks. According to Politico, the White House is denying the report, with Press Secretary Carolyn Levitt calling it garbage in a post on X. Elon also waited on X saying it's fake news. We'll get to Elon's role in Wisconsin election in a bit. But the big picture, if Elon is indeed beginning to step back. What do you think about the move and the timing? The 130 day tenure as special government employees due to end in late May, early June, whatever that is, it might be time for him to focus back on Tesla. The company shared its dramatic numbers this week. Dramatically bad sales plunged 13% in the first three months of the year, the largest drop of deliveries in history. Nobody wants it. Obviously these protests are. But also the fact they don't have any innovative cars. From your perspective, what's going on here with their communications? And then what happens when he's not in his orbit and stops the day to day government business that he's doing? And what will happen to Doge when that happens in Scott's absence? Just to finish it up, I'll note he predicted Elon's X and the end of Doge just a few weeks ago. Let's listen.

[John Lovett]

I think he's basically going to pull a Vivec and just slowly fade away out of.

[Scott Galloway]

And I think Doge is going to.

[John Lovett]

Die a quiet death because he has, it looks as if his power has been emasculated. And two, he's just losing so much money right now.

[Scott Galloway]

So talk a little bit about this. What do you imagine is happening here?

[John Lovett]

So I think first of all we should dispense with the idea that this is because the 130 day window is up, because as we all know, Trump has nothing but respect for arcane rules governing when people can and cannot serve. So that's, that's ridiculous. Yeah, I think it is probably too pat and too convenient for all of us that have found the way that Elon Musk has sort of rampaged through the government to be obviously disgraceful but also politically unpalatable to say, ah, look what's happening. We'll talk about Wisconsin. But he's deeply unpopular. Doge is bringing negative attention to Trump. Trump put Elon out there as a shield. He took all of these hits and now because he's unpopular, Trump's moving him aside. I don't think it's unreasonable for them to say this was always basically the plan, that he was going to come for a few months, get this thing rolling and then step back. That said, Elon Musk has drawn so much negative attention to what could have been a far more boring endeavor, that he has brought so much negative attention to the kinds of cuts that they might have wanted to make, but probably not with this much fanfare and probably with, without this much chaos. What is unclear is a how much of this can go on without Elon as this singular aggressive figure. And B, how much of what he's already done is so damaging and so complete that really they've gotten what they wanted to get out of Doge, and now they can get you.

[Scott Galloway]

Which is break everything.

[John Lovett]

Which is break everything. Fire everybody. You know, I have a friend at the va, and he was talking about how, yeah, you know, the surgeries are continuing, but a bunch of people lost their access to the computer system because they were fired and then unfired, but they haven't gotten it back, so they're not really able to work. Right. Like, a lot of the chaos, it leaves the headlines, but it's ongoing. Right. These agencies have been hobbled in ways that we know about, in a lot of ways that we don't know about. So it doesn't surprise me that he'd be stepping back. And I also, you know, Trump can't possibly be enjoying how much blowback this is getting and how much is coming onto him.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. I had talked about the idea of a heat shield that he does. Like, he wants to do these things and not get blamed. And it is interesting that Elon has such bad negatives. I think Harry Anton on CNN said he's political poison for anybody who's near him. And we'll talk about Wisconsin in a second. But Trump has less negatives, even though he's his boss, presumable boss. So peach yields are not the worst thing in the world. Someone, as you said, rampaging through the government. And I think one of the things I had said when these reports came out, when the Wisconsin thing happened, they were like, okay, that's it. I'm like, no, no, he's not. He doesn't care about a failure. He'll just keep. He'll make it not a failure. He'll pretend it's not what you did here, and then he'll move on to his next disaster, this kind of mess, and he doesn't care. I think the issue is making a nuisance of himself, making himself the center. And in Wisconsin, he was by himself. Right. Trump wasn't physically present there the way he often is, and he wasn't. And so with Elon as the center of attention, wearing that cheese head, it was kind of like Dukakis and the tank. Remember when he had that picture or any of those unfortunate pictures, or Ron DeSantis in the boots or things like that. But. So let's talk about the Wisconsin election, where despite spending $25 million, Elon was unable to buy a State Supreme Court seat. You can buy a presidency for $200 million, but you cannot buy a state Supreme Court seat for a tenth of that. Democratic backed candidate Susan Crawford handily beat her conservative opponent Brad Schimmel, maintaining the liberal majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. She's replacing another. Just in terms of the other elections this week, Republicans did keep those House seats in Florida replace Matt Gaetz and Mike Walz through margins were significantly narrower than in the last election. The strategy of making Elon the enemy was effective in the Wisconsin race. I think he's just irritating and though he didn't help himself, as I said with the cheesehead hat, what is the playbook? Because he's not always going to be there to beat up on. And of course on Sunday he said the entire destiny of humanity hung on this race. But he later said, I expected to lose. There is a value to losing a piece. A piece for positional gain which I'm calling downward facing Doge. What is happening here? Because I'm trying to sort of like, is it a good thing? Is it a bad thing? Like, I'm always quite wary, even when these people lose, of how much they actually lose.

[John Lovett]

Oh, it's a very good thing that he lost. He got nothing for that money. They lost the other statewide races as well. I was in Wisconsin in the run up and I went knocking on doors. And obviously that's anecdotal, but we went to 150 doors and Elon had made himself the main character. It was what's on people's minds. One example, we were just walking down the street and someone in the neighborhood was like, well, what are you knocking on doors for? And we said, oh, we're trying to make sure everybody gets out to vote for Susan Crawford. And they said, can you believe what's going on with Elon? They're setting the Teslas on fire. He's spending 25 million or spending millions of dollars in the state. And I think it again, like, I would love to say that, oh, Elon. This is proof that Elon Musk is political poison. I don't know that. I think what you can say is that in this environment, and this is very good news, no amount of money can overcome the political fundamentals. And Elon Musk is not a persuasive figure to the kinds of voters that Republicans need.

[Scott Galloway]

And so the independence. Yeah, he's supposed to be. I call him repellent. He's repellent to voters.

[John Lovett]

He is. He's toxic.

[Scott Galloway]

Why is that? Why is it obviously Rich guy rockets this and that. What has happened here?

[John Lovett]

Look, I think there's the obvious answer, which he has a terrible personality and.

[Scott Galloway]

So we're getting to know him more. Meaning.

[John Lovett]

Yeah. And he's, and he's abusing his wealth without respect for our democracy. And I don't mean even, you know, look, he, he puts out this announcement saying basically he's going to buy votes in Wisconsin. It faced a lot of blowback. He's accused of committing crimes. He changes the language on it so that it's more legally permissible. So he's no longer giving you money for votes. He's giving you money for, for signing a petition, whatever it may be. But fundamentally, he's flying in to Wisconsin on a private jet to throw money down in front of the populace like a grand vizier visiting the colonies. And he is cutting, in this chaotic and destructive way, parts of the government. They may not be, they may, they may be the parts where they view it as the weakest for Democrats to defend places like usaid. But they're also shuttering Social Security offices. They're coming after Medicaid. It's a small. I don't believe most people are seeing this. But, but I do think it's important that this figure who has taken on this vast amount of power, basically bought his way into this role, does it with so little respect for the tens of millions of people that are skeptical of him or don't like him that he, that if he is, if somebody is protesting him, their Soros backed Democrats oppose him only because they are evil and they want to send Social Security checks to undocumented immigrants. That when people are critical of Doge, he claims, oh, it is because they're not being specific. Have you noticed? They don't offer any specifics. This, they offer, they're. There has been, there's never been more valid, specific, clear, focused criticism.

[Scott Galloway]

Meet David Farinho Means like, are you.

[John Lovett]

Are you kidding me? You are cutting billions across or claiming to cut billions across this government. We are pointing to specific container ships holding specific amounts of food to get you to release it. So there's a total lack of respect for anyone who is not maga. Right.

[Scott Galloway]

That's one of his tricks, by the way. He does that in interviews all the time. Show me a specific example. And then I have 10. And then he goes, show me a specific. It's just, it's exhausting.

[John Lovett]

And so like the, the, the. So, so he is, he is basically, he's not acting democratically in any way that a person Would. You can imagine a version of. Of. Of this whole process unfolding where he says, you know what? I'm going to all these agencies, I'm going to listen to some of the people there, and I'm gonna go to the heads of these various departments and I'm gonna say, oh, you have three months, two months, three weeks to give me cuts. And these are the amount of cuts you have to give me. And if you don't give me this amount of cuts, I'm gonna do it for you. And you can imagine him engaging with people on the actual substance of these criticisms, but he can't do that. He has no aptitude or willingness to do that. And we don't know with Elon, when he goes in front of a crowd and says, this is a grandson scheme to bring in immigrants to turn them into voters. We don't know if he believes that or if he just believes that's an advantageous argument to make in front of the people for whom he has no respect.

[Scott Galloway]

He burns pr, People like you can't believe. And he had some good ones many years ago. Right. But he obviously, PR is critically important to him. He wants to be seen as the center of attention when he seems like a nuisance and anything. He pretends to be funny when the only person that's funny is his. His daughter Vivian. Right. Who's actually funny.

[John Lovett]

I will just. Can I just. I will say, though, I do think the most important, like just stepping back from his sort of repellent qualities.

[Scott Galloway]

Isn't that a good word?

[John Lovett]

Very good word. Here's what I think we've learned, and I think this is what's most important. Even if you don't, for Democrats, for Democrats and Republicans, even if you can't totally figure, you can't tease the, you know, the correlation. From the causation, we learned that $25 million in Wisconsin did not change the outcome of these races. And Crawford overperformed against other statewide races. And then we learned in Florida, in these special House races, that Democrats overperformed by roughly whatever, 15 to 17 points. And what does that tell you? It tells you that there are a bunch of vulnerable Republicans that are. Whose margins of victory were well below 15 points, who are looking at this and saying, hold on, I have a terror. I have a deeply controversial vote coming my way for reconciliation that involves tax cuts for the wealthy and Medicaid cuts. Elon's. Elon's money cannot protect me from the general. So is it now the choice. Do I side with Elon, Prevent a primary and hope his money protects me in the fall, or do I side with my constituents, brace for a primary, get through it, and hope my voters reward me for not going along with the Trump agenda? Like that choice just got a lot harder for some of these Republicans.

[Scott Galloway]

It is. And I think one of the things that I heard one Republican making is we, they don't have any game below Donald Trump because I think he's still popular with the people. He's popular, period. And I do, you know, I think that if he's not present, their bench gets real thin and really irritating. Like, you've got the charmless J.D. vance, you've got the sad, soulful Marco Rubio who looks like a loser. You've got like, there's no game. And then a crazy Howard Lutnick, like, you know, he seems like crazy Eddie from the old days. And it just, it doesn't have, if Trump's not present, it's really hard, like for them to do anything. And at some point he's not going to be president. Interestingly, in contrast, New Jersey Senator Cory Booker invigorated Democrats this week with a 25 hour speech in the in Congress against the Trump administration. Booker is now in the record books for the longest speech Senate in Senate history, surpassing Strom Thurmond's stand against Civil Rights act of 1957. I have a serious question for you, but first let's listen to Senator Booker explain how he managed not to go to the bathroom for the 25 hours.

[Kara Swisher]

I talked to a lot of people. I copied some of the things we did for 15 hours. So I fasted for days into it. I stopped drinking water a long time ago. I think that had good and bad benefits. I definitely started cramping up from lack of water. So if some of you saw me really drink nothing at the end, I was just trying to do something to stop my muscles from cramping. So there's just a lot of tactics I was using to try to make sure that I could stand for that long.

[Scott Galloway]

So an impressive accomplishment of not peeing. But why do people like this? You got a huge following. Lots of people watched it. I was sort of surprised by those numbers. It had a Mr. Smith goes to Washington quality to it. But why do this? Because sometimes, I'll be honest, Booker does a lot of stunts that I'm like a stunt. But this was a good stunt. I feel like in some ways, and I don't mean to minimize it by saying stunt, but, you know, it is what it is. He's Trying to garner attention and get focus.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, it's a good stunt. I, too, was. I thought it was a good idea. I was glad he was doing it. I'm glad to see when anybody is basically trying things to try to grab attention in this chaotic media environment. I was also, but I was, like, blown away by the number of people watching it, the amount of clips that were circulating because of it. And it just speaks to the fact that there is a huge hunger among the majority of the country that does not support Donald Trump, that are looking for people who are going to fight, that just are gonna respond to the moment, to the scale of what we're facing, with a sense that this is a different time and we're gonna need to treat this differently. And we can't just go along with business as usual. That you can't. You know, the plan can't be to vote for the continuing resolution and then go on your book tour. Like, that's just not the world we're living in. This is a dangerous moment, and you want to see leaders that reflect that. And this is a. Look, it is a stunt, right? Because ultimately it doesn't have any impact, but it does draw people's eye to what is happening in our political system. And he is doing something that required him to sacrifice and to go through. Sounds like a fair amount of pain and good for him for doing that. And I think a lot of people will see moments from it, see his passion in it, hear some of the different arguments he was making. I thought he did a great job talking about Social Security and Medicaid and, you know, look, I think a lot of times, you know, Democrats are skittish about how to thread the needle, because on the one hand, they. They view Trump as an existential threat to democracy, but on the other, they hear from the consultants and the polls and genuinely believe that. Where their best argument is day to day is on the ways Trump is going after Social Security, Medicaid, health care, the basics, the services and programs people rely on. And I thought he did a really great job of articulating both of those arguments, specifically around. Look at all the chaos, look at all the destruction. He's bringing it to our democracy. What are we getting for it?

[Scott Galloway]

Right? What are we getting? Does that raise his profile as a presidential candidate going forward? I mean, he's always been bandied about. Is that.

[John Lovett]

I'm sure it does. I don't. I'm sure it does. Everybody is. Is he running for president? Is there any senator that isn't in their Minds in some way running for president.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, it was interesting. When I was in Michigan, a lot of the students were asking me who was going to run. It was sort of surprised. I'm like, oh, I don't know, like. And then maybe go through the barriers and sundry people. It was interesting. They certainly are interested in looking over the Democratic Party in that regard. He definitely raised his profile.

[John Lovett]

I sort of. It's funny, like, even as you ask that, like, I'm such a political fiend and for whatever reason, I have just no appetite for that right now. First of all, because it feels so far away. And also, like, I don't really think there's much you can do to kind of handicap this race right now. Anybody who wants to be president has gotta be somebody. And Cory Booker did this great. Has to be somewhere, someone out there in the fight showing that they understand the politics of this moment, that they have a passion and a rage in them to protect the country. And that's sort of. That's what I'm looking for. My one sort of feeling about it is I am so not interested in the kinds of planning and maneuvers that are about, like, building a profile and carefully managing the rollout. Like that is from another era. And I'm just completely not interested in it.

[Scott Galloway]

The book, the this, the that.

[John Lovett]

No, thank you.

[Scott Galloway]

At Harvard.

[John Lovett]

No, thank you.

[Scott Galloway]

It'll be interesting to see what works. Okay, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, it's Trump against the world with these new tariffs.

[Kara Swisher]

Last week, we at Today Explained brought you an episode titled the Joe Rogan of the Left. The Joe Rogan of the Left was in quotations. It was mostly about a guy named Hassan Piker, who some say is the Joe Rogan of the left. But enough about Joe. We made an episode about Hasan because the Democrats are really courting this dude.

[John Lovett]

So Hasan Piker is really the only.

[Kara Swisher]

Major prominent leftist on Twitch, at least.

[John Lovett]

The only one who talks about politics all day.

[Scott Galloway]

What's going on, everybody?

[Kara Swisher]

I hope everyone's having a fantastic evening, afternoon prenup. No matter where, they want his cosign, they want his endorsement because he's young and he reaches millions of young people streaming on YouTube, TikTok and especially Twitch. But last week he was streaming us.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, I was.

[John Lovett]

I was listening on stream and you.

[Scott Galloway]

Guys were like, hey, you should come.

[Kara Swisher]

On the show if you're listening. I was like, oops, God, you're a listener.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. Oh, yeah, I am.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah. Thank you for listening. Head over to the Today explained Feed to hear Hasan Piker explain himself. If you've been online this week, you've probably seen an unending flood of those beautiful animated studio giving style images of everything from happy families being together to beloved cartoon characters committing unspeakable acts of violence against each other. That, my friends, is the AI world we live in. And it's not going to get less complicated. That is what we are talking about this week on the Vergecast, along with the future of robot vacuums, what's happening with car tariffs and everything else going on in the AI world. All that on the Vergecast. Wherever you get podcasts.

[Scott Galloway]

John, we're back and recording on the day after Liberation Day. Do you feel liberated? Do you feel liberated?

[John Lovett]

Yeah. So this is liberated. This is like Boxing Day for Liberation Day.

[Scott Galloway]

President Trump unveiled his latest tariffs, the most expansive yad at the White House on Wednesday. With the help of a giant poster board, he's imposing a 10% tariff on all US trading partners as well as double digit. He's calling the reciprocal terrorists. They're not just so you know about the worst offenders. He seems to Nobody thinks these are good things and the math is like nuts. The EU will face 20% tariffs, Japan 24%, South Korea 26% and China additional 34% on top of existing tariffs of I think 20%. Russia conveniently didn't make the cut. Trump also is slapping tariffs on unexpected places like some uninhabited islands in the Antarctic where only penguins live. People are having a good time with that. The eu, China and others are already planning retaliation. He's been very flip floppy on terror, sort of red light, green light, which caused chaos and now he just dropped the bomb. He really did essentially drop the mic. The markets opened just a little while ago. The S and P dropped 3.4%, the Dow fell 1200 points more than 2% and the Nasdaq is down 3.8%. Big numbers. A number of sectors are getting hit, but in terms of tech specifically, things are looking rough right now for tech, particularly because they're so invested across the world. Apple's down over 9%, Amazon down 8%, Nvidia 6%, Alphabet down 4%. US tech companies are becoming collateral damage when it comes to retaliation. Getting hit with fines, restrictions and new taxes by major markets worldwide. They also have obviously interconnected with so many different markets. What do you think of this rollout? Peter Navarro is back, my friend. He's back and he's crazier than ever.

[John Lovett]

Trump's building a wall and we're all going to pay for it is, I think, what's happening. Larry Summers. Larry Summers posted this and he's.

[Scott Galloway]

I don't think anybody, Former famous economist.

[John Lovett]

Former treasury secretary, and somebody who is not hyperbolic, saying that a crude estimate of Trump's tariffs puts the projected loss at $20 trillion or well over $200,000 per family of four. And then he walks through how he reaches that very conservative estimate of the damage. They're not reciprocal tariffs. People were baffled by the number. I'm not an economist, but people looking at this, they're sort of scratching their heads trying to figure out what this number is. And they realize that it's not based on the tariffs of these other countries. It's a crude calculation based on the trade deficit with these other countries and not the trade deficit on goods and services, but just the trade deficit on goods. Even the administration itself admitted that it was too hard to actually calculate for every country what the reciprocal tariffs would be. And so they came up with this ridiculous formula. The hope has to be that these fake numbers are just an opening bid in a negotiation, that he's trying to do it.

[Scott Galloway]

Chris Murphy had that in his. I'm gonna read from some of it. Chris Murphy, who's been very vocal, just like Cor Booker, the senator. Those trying to understand these terrorists or economic policy are dangerously naive. The terrorists are a tool to collapse our democracy, a means to comply loyalty with every business that will need to petition Trump for relief, which many people are. And what he was saying essentially is that this gives him power. And the reason he can is because he's taking control of spending and taxation into his own hands and rewarding loyalty and punishing dissent. Our own revolution was spurred by the king's use of heavy taxation on the colonies to punish our push for self governance. The king's message was simple, Stop protesting and I'll stop taxing. Just what do you think is happening here? Besides, even Scott Bessant looked like an idiot and I don't feel like he is.

[John Lovett]

I think Trump has believed since the 80s, the last time he formed any new ideas that tariffs are good and that we that are, that we have trade deficits because other countries are taking advantage of us. He has been pushing and pushing and pushing to do sweeping tariffs. He was stopped in the first term by cooler heads. Like there's many ways in which what we're seeing with Trump is a kind of extreme bizarro version of a normal pattern with first and second term presidents, which is in the first term presidents work for the White House in The second term, the White House works for the President. The President's figure out where they can get more control. They feel more confident in exercising the power. They feel like they belong there. They no longer feel like they're imposters. And so all the people that would have stopped Trump from doing this, they're gone. Right? It's a different set of people, but he has more responsible people. I mean, I think they're all, they all look like fucking idiots today, but he has more responsible people on, on economics than he does, say, running around the FBI or hhs. But Trump wanted to do this and nobody could stop him. They put together this half baked cockamamie plan involving a ridiculous calculation to create these charts. Nobody is really crossing the T's and dotting the I's, which is why we're taxing penguins. And the end result is this chaos. That said, I think the point that Chris Murphy is making is a, is a really important one. He has a lot of grand language there. Trump knows. Trump likes using his power. He likes the way it feels to exercise power. Congress has given way too much authority to the President on tariffs. He puts these tariffs in place and all of a sudden Republican House members are lobbying him, businesses are lobbying him for relief, countries are lobbying him for relief. And even if you view it, even if you take the most generous version of it, right, which is not that he's doing this to destroy democracy, but doing this to create leverage, the question is, what does he do with it, right? And can he use these tariffs, say, on agriculture, or to provide relief for these tariffs on agriculture, to rally votes for a bill, for example? And so I do think this is about power, I do think this is about control. But I also think he genuinely believes.

[Scott Galloway]

That tariffs are good implications right now, right at the beginning of this, obviously the stock market's down, obviously Wall Street's screaming, so are farmers. So are everybody screaming?

[John Lovett]

Essentially, I think we just don't know. It's interesting because we talked about this on Pod Save America on Monday and look, there's a lot of, like, hyperbolic partisans talking about how the markets are crashing. The markets are crashing. And they weren't. They actually weren't. They were down. They were, of course, down, but year over year they were up. And the question was why? And it seems like what we've learned today is nobody really believed it would be as bad as what they announced. And I still don't think we know. And what we have to watch unfold is are we seeing the beginning of a truly Disastrous long term tariff policy or is this an extreme version of what we saw when he first put in place the Canada and Mexico tariffs, which is, he talks a big game. But if he gets concessions in quote, or pushback or just, just fake concessions, like a fentanyl czar or a press conference in which the Mexican president announces policies she had already put in place months earlier, will he lower them? Right? Like what, what does he want to reduce these numbers? The, the hope has to be that because these figures are so ridiculous, right? Like they're, he's calling them reciprocal tariffs. Like how does Vietnam, they're being asked to reduce their tariffs that don't exist below. You know, this is about a trade deficit.

[Scott Galloway]

No. And I think the one thing that's not being noticed is service terror, service issues, because that's tech companies. And we are in a, not a deficit. We're in quite the opposite. Where you have the advantage there by I think $300 billion, we're in a surplus in that regard. And now Europe is going to target, you know, the McKinsey's of the world, the cloud business of whoever, Microsoft and whatever. And so we have a real vulnerability in the service, which is why you're seeing the tech companies get so whacked here.

[John Lovett]

Well, look at just the Canada example, right? Trump rails against this. They're taking advantage of us. This trade deficit, this trade deficit. If you take away fossil fuels, if you don't look at oil and gas, we have a trade surplus with Canada. They're our biggest customer, right? This is supposed to be to help domestic manufacturing. Domestic manufacturers, a lot of their customers are around the world. They're gonna take a huge hit because of this. The other big problem here is even on Trump's own terms, the fact that nobody truly believes or can know whether these will be upheld consistently. How is anybody gonna plan to build in America? How is that possible?

[Scott Galloway]

Why would you build a factory?

[John Lovett]

Why on earth would you build a factory when you know that a, when you, when you don't know that these tariffs are going to stay in place. And even if they do, you know that, that America is going to be isolated from the rest of the world? It's actually just another example of just the chaos and incompetence makes them fail even on their own terms. Even though on their own terms, right. Doge is going to end up costing the government money, right? Because of how ham fistedly and stupidly they've done this. Getting rid of the IGs, getting rid of the parts of the government that Figure out what's effective and what's not, right? Firing the best and the brightest, the new and excited people that have just been hired, the people that were just promoted, the lawsuits that will inevitably come, that will cost the government millions and millions and millions of dollars. Billions of dollars. Who knows? Same here.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, I think we know now how he bankrupted his casinos. I just feel like we have such insight into why his businesses are so shitty. At the same time, I'm going to move on really quickly because one of the things. Another podcaster, Joe Rogan, thinks the Trump administration's deportations are horrific because now even the thing that he polls strongest on, which is immigration, some of he's starting to get pushed back there. Let's listen.

[Kara Swisher]

You got to get scared that people who are not criminals are getting, like, lassoed up and deported and sent to, like, El Salvador prisons. This is kind of crazy that that could be possible. That's horrific. And that's, again, that's bad for the cause. Like, the cause is, let's get the gang members out. Everybody agrees. But what's not, innocent gay hairdressers get lumped up with the gangs, and then, like, how long before that guy can get out? Can we. Can we figure out how to get him out? Does every. Does. Is there any plan in place to alert the authorities that they've made a horrible mistake?

[Scott Galloway]

Sounding somewhat reasonable for Joe Rogan, although you watch the penny drop slowly with this guy. The administration has acknowledged it deported a man, for example, with protected status to El Salvador because of an administrative error and says they can't get him back. They can invade Greenland, but they can't get him back from people who are paying. Again, same thing. Haphazard. People do not like the haphazard nature of a lot of these things. The tariffs, the rollout on things that he actually. He polls well on immigration, for example.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, look, I mean, it's. It's. Forget the politics. What they're doing is despicable. It is despicable. It is despicable. It doesn't serve public safety. It doesn't serve the goal of immigration enforcement, border security. As Rogan points out, it doesn't serve their own agenda. It's just cruel. It's just evil. And there's just not been enough. Like, Rogan has had more moral clarity than a lot of Democrats on this who have scared themselves into believing that if they're talking about immigration, they're falling into a trap. As if the American people cannot handle a position as simple as we believe in Enforcing our immigration laws. But we have to have due process because government makes mistakes and everybody has rights. Right. Like, that's not that complicated an argument. The other part of this, and you know, Liberation Day is now kind of. Obviously we're glib about it, and they've mostly used it to mean tariffs, but they don't just mean tariffs. Right. Stephen Miller has used it to refer to immigration as well. Do we believe that the administration is gonna ramp down deportations? Do we believe the administration is gonna maintain this level of deportations? They are building towards greater and greater deportations. Do we believe the number of mistakes will go down as they do this more? Of course not. Of course not. And the judge, one of the judges that was looking at this, said that the Nazis got better treatment under the Alien Enemies act in World War II because, she points out, you could accidentally sweep up somebody who's here legally, who's a citizen. They would have no ability to seek recourse. They end up in a gulag in El Salvador, and now they can't get out. Now the government is claiming they don't have the ability to bring them home.

[Scott Galloway]

It's just like a movie. I keep feel like a Sylvester Stallone movie. I feel like I've seen these. You know, I'm an aficionado of all these kind of movies where someone's in a prison for the wrong reason or they get swept up into something silly and then they're stuck.

[John Lovett]

I mean, look, this example, right? Like they keep saying, oh, you know, we were deporting the most dangerous members of Trende Aragua. The Andries, the gay hairdresser. He was not being held when they. He. He came for an appointment, an asylum appointment. He thought he was gonna be deported until he found himself in this nightmarish situation. He has not spoken to his family. He doesn't know that right now there are people anger and angry and fighting for him. He is in a nightmare. He is in a. He's in a country that's not his own.

[Scott Galloway]

Think about it.

[John Lovett]

His head has been shaved. He's been there for weeks. There's no outside. It's torture. We're torturing these people. This is not a deportation. This is a kidnapping. The government has kidnapped these people.

[Scott Galloway]

And then meanwhile, Kristi Noem poses in kind of like, you know, torture porn, essentially. Her outfits are strange. And in her Rolex, in her role. Not just the Rolex, the outfits themselves, the super shiny shoes. I'm like, what are you doing? Modified Nazi? What's happening? What's the fashion.

[John Lovett]

Think about the inhumanity that is required to stand in front of a group of people that are forced to be there to film this kind of. Yeah, fascist porn.

[Scott Galloway]

Are you surprised in any way?

[John Lovett]

I am surprised, actually.

[Scott Galloway]

Really?

[John Lovett]

I'll admit to being. I'll be admitted to being. Well, when I saw it, it was surprising. I couldn't believe that they were doing it. I believe there are a lot of people who like it. I'm not surprised that there are a lot of people who liked it. But I am surprised by how quickly we've gotten this low to have the Secretary of Homeland Security basically making Viet Cong style propaganda.

[Scott Galloway]

Do you remember the Movie Network?

[John Lovett]

Of course I remember the Movie Network.

[Scott Galloway]

I mean, this reminds me of this. Like this is, you know, can you.

[John Lovett]

Believe Network is 50 years old?

[Scott Galloway]

It's completely pertinent. Everything on there we've done.

[John Lovett]

It's unbelievable. It's unbelievable how good network is.

[Scott Galloway]

They're gonna start broadcasting execution. That's what I see. Like, you know, that kind of thing, you know, we talk. That's sort of a sci fi trope. The idea of national, you know, broadcast of executions. This was one step in that direction.

[John Lovett]

Absolutely.

[Scott Galloway]

And, and it's, it's just the whole, the whole nine yards of it is. And they, they won't fix it. Cause they're incompetent also. They're incompetent and cruel, which makes it different.

[John Lovett]

Well, think about, think about the. Yes, they are incompetent and cruel. And the most, the most dangerous force in any society is an incompetent, cruel bureaucracy. A bureaucracy that doesn't know what it's doing and doesn't care who it hurts. In history, it is the most dangerous force. And it starts with these unsavory gang members. And the next step is a wider roundup that gets a bunch of people that they'll point to as being awful human beings who were glad to get out of the country, who how dare Democrats try to protect. While meanwhile, as part of these sweep ups, you end up with legal residents, visa holders, students, citizens. Citizens who don't look like a Norman Rockwell painting, who have tattoos, have accents, maybe don't speak English as well as they would like, who look like the kind of immigrants they want to deport. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's where we're heading. And, and as they're doing that, as they're doing that, they're accusing people that do vandalism of being domestic terrorists.

[Scott Galloway]

Right, exactly. Do you imagine that it's from. You have to think about it from a political. Is there a good political point of view? Because people can feel it. Right. People are like, wait a minute, that could happen to me. I think that's really what gets it. Like that seems strange. And people have that trope in their heads or people being unjustly grabbed and sent somewhere. It's very familiar from movies and history and things like that. Do you think it's an effective tool for Democrats to. To push in on?

[John Lovett]

So we have increasing evidence that Donald Trump maybe not only outperformed among recent immigrants, but maybe won recent immigrants. There are more and more stories of people who can't believe that their family members are being impacted by this. That's not the kind of immigrants I thought Trump would. Not my wife, not my husband. I thought that he was going to.

[Scott Galloway]

Go against the leopard ate your face kind of.

[John Lovett]

Right, right. And I hope people see that and feel that in the same way people voted for Trump and some of his positions on trade poll well in the run up to an election and then they watch tariffs unfold and people hate it, they don't like it. They learn through the public debate and come to a new point of view. Right. Public debates still do manage somehow, despite ourselves, to educate people about the substance of issues. My deeper hope is you see a lot of sort of hand wringing coverage about how Trump's turning us into Russia and Trump's turning us into Hungary, but that we have an advantage, which is that America is still filled with Americans and that we are an individualistic, rambunctious, rebellious, freedom loving group. And even after years of anti immigration propaganda and misinformation and caravans, Americans still largely are against draconian immigration policies. If you look at the polling, people want sensible. It depends on how you ask it. People still want those positions. People still obviously believe in due process and people believe in the Constitution. And so we just have to figure out, we just have to make this real for people. And it is unfortunate that it does require playing defense and watching Trump do these things and then using those as examples to make it real for people.

[Scott Galloway]

Right, right. Well, I think it's. That it could happen to you.

[John Lovett]

Absolutely, absolutely.

[Scott Galloway]

That was a trope. A friend of mine was in local news and I said, well, how do you get your marketing is so interesting on everything. And he goes, oh, it's the it could happen to you trope that they do in local news. Like no matter what it is killer bees, it could happen to you mold, it could happen to you. And it was very effective of getting People to listen to things. So that's why I felt it could happen to you. And I think people then that's what Joe Rogan was doing. Wait a minute. I have tattoos. Just a second here. All right, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about the latest in the bid for TikTok. I know you're fascinated with TikTok, John.

[John Lovett]

I am.

[Scott Galloway]

John, we're back with more news. President Trump is reportedly reviewing proposals for TikTok this week. Obviously the administration is said to be considering bids from Blackstone, Oracle and Marc Andreessen. Amazon threw in a last minute bid. It actually makes sense. It's probably not a top contender, but Walmart was in the last go around here. Oracle was too. The TikTok ban requires no more than 20% of TikTok or its parent companies owned by foreign adversary countries. So they're thinking about letting ByteDance stay in for 19% apparently. I'd love to know you use TikTok a lot, correct? Well, I'd love to know a day in the life of your for you page, but what do you think is going to happen here? And there was an interesting story which I think there's sort of a pall that's been cast over for or TikTok on this, like where it's going, who's going to own it. A lot of people feel that if they don't get the algorithm, it's not going to be as good as a product. It's lagged a little bit recently. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but it feels like it a little bit that people aren't creators aren't putting their shoulders into it the same way. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but how do you imagine it's going to happen here? I thought Elon might get a hold of it. Maybe not a good idea to give it to Elon right now.

[John Lovett]

From a perceptible point of view, he seems busy. I haven't noticed any change in the actual use of the app. It is interesting how much this has become Trump's decision, right? Like how far down the road we've come. We talk about how he wants to be the main decider on tariffs and wants people to come kind of kiss the ring. That's what we're seeing here, right? This presumably should be ByteDance's decision, right?

[Scott Galloway]

Well, China has to cooperate here and now with these tariffs, I'm not so sure they're feeling cooperative.

[John Lovett]

But Trump is right. Well, that's. And that's that, that there was some hope apparently on the, the part of the Chinese that TikTok was a bit of leverage in the, in the tariff fight, but that, that doesn't appear to have, have, have, have gotten them anything. Um, I don't know what happens with TikTok. I was pretty upset about the way this all went down.

[Scott Galloway]

The law itself.

[John Lovett]

The law itself. Because there was very little public debate or explanation about why TikTok was so dangerous. And a lot of the explanations were about the harm it does to people, but people didn't seem to mind if that harm was being done to Americans by Americans. Instagram is awful for young people. I think TikTok can be really awful for young people. So why is it a good thing if Americans do it to each other, but a bad thing if a foreign country does it to us? Why do our own billionaires, you know, running rampage through our minds? Why is that acceptable? And so I never thought they made the public case, which is why when all of a sudden they caught the car and TikTok was about to be banned, they did this ridiculous save TikTok, thank you, President Trump bullshit. And it worked. So I really don't like the way this went down.

[Scott Galloway]

The law itself that it should. They didn't make the case. Many people argue that they didn't make.

[John Lovett]

The case at all. They didn't, they didn't. They didn't. They're just always a national security threat. Excuse me, Excuse me. Like my for you pages.

[Scott Galloway]

Show me your homework. Show me right.

[John Lovett]

My, my for you pages. You know, recipes and old clips of Conan. A lot of recipes. Got to make the viral Turkish pasta, Cara.

[Scott Galloway]

Really? Your recipes and Conan O'Brien just, you.

[John Lovett]

Know, among other things. Hot, hot guys. Hot guys doing new kinds of exercises. Teaching me ways to lift weights.

[Scott Galloway]

You know, that's Scott Galloway's favorite too. Just to, you know, I think that.

[John Lovett]

There'S a big overlap between fit middle aged men and gay guys like that. There's a big overlap in what they're seeing, which are just handsome men rocking their delts.

[Scott Galloway]

Rocking their delts. What do you imagine is on mine? I don't use TikTok that much, but what do you imagine?

[John Lovett]

Oh, I think there'd be, I think we'd see. You know, lesbian talk and gay talk are so separate. They're so distinct. They're such distinct universes. I don't know what we'd see with you. Woodworking tips of Brandi Carlisle, that kind of thing.

[Scott Galloway]

No, you'll be surprised. Asmr asmr.

[John Lovett]

Asmr.

[Scott Galloway]

And cooking. I like watching people cook.

[John Lovett]

Okay.

[Scott Galloway]

I like watching people. I don't want to do recipes. I just like watching people. Especially there's one on threads called Food Porn that I love. It's just like people. I don't. I do. I'm a good cook, but I don't. I have. I don't do it very often as much as I should, but I like watching other people cook. That's weird. But I used to watch the Galloping Gourmet when I was a kid. I'm not gonna go into it. John, you remember him? And then he drank at the end. Drank himself.

[John Lovett]

Who was the Gallop? I wanna look up the Galloping Gourmet.

[Scott Galloway]

Galloping Gourmet. Who was a guy who seemed gay but wasn't.

[John Lovett]

Oh, the Galloping Gourmet. Look at that.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, yeah. He was like Julia Child, but funnier. I used to watch him cook all the time and then he'd always drink a bottle of wine by the end of it. And this is very amusing to an 8 year old.

[John Lovett]

When I was a kid, the Food Network launched.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah.

[John Lovett]

And everyone was like, that's gotta be a joke. How can you fill a whole network with food content? And the answer was, you can. And it's great. It was ahead of its time, but I used to watch the Food Network with my mom.

[Scott Galloway]

I bet you like Paula Deen. I bet you secretly like Paula Dean, didn't you?

[John Lovett]

You know, I was at Jeffrey Weingarten. Remember Jeffrey Weingarten?

[Scott Galloway]

Of course.

[John Lovett]

Yeah, I remember. He said, my mother and I used to joke about this for years because he said, fava beans are very in right now. And that's just something we said to each other for years. Fava beans are very in right now.

[Scott Galloway]

They are never in. They've never been in anyway. What do you think the resolution's going to be? Make a prediction.

[John Lovett]

I think one of these deals is going to be the deal and it's going to basically look the same at the other side of it. And the user experience will roughly be the same, but there'll be this sort of change in ownership.

[Scott Galloway]

It's a nothing burger. You know, it's owned by a lot of us people. Us people own a lot of this thing. And then it's not going to be any more protect. If there are problems with China. And I, unlike you, believe there are indeed abuses by the Chinese and they're a little different.

[John Lovett]

I believe that. I believe that.

[Scott Galloway]

I agree Mark Zuckerberg is dangerous. But I don't really want the Chinese government also up in our grill in this way because they have different goals besides just fucking us. They want to fuck us and beat us kind of thing. But I think that it's going to be more dangerous than ever in those regards from a national security point of view. And. And they won't solve the problem. And then everyone will make money. The people that. The same people you're complaining about. But we'll see. I don't think Elon will be part of this, but maybe he will. Maybe he'll get him. He's such a nuisance. He'll probably try to get in there. All right, John, one more quick break. When we come back, we'll be doing some predictions. Okay, John, let's hear a prediction. Do you have a prediction for us?

[John Lovett]

I do have a prediction. I'm actually re upping a prediction that I made before the election, but I wanna make it here because I want it on the record, which is I said this last year, which is that if Donald Trump won, Eric Adams would end up in the cabinet. And I just wanna just lay that down once again that I believe that that is the end result of a.

[Scott Galloway]

Lot of this mayoral election. He's going. He just announced today he's gonna be an independent.

[John Lovett]

And he's already. He's already started the suck up process with Trump. I just.

[Scott Galloway]

What job will he get? I guess. Who are they going to take out? Kash Patel?

[John Lovett]

Well, I always. I thought he was always a. I thought he was a natural for Homeland Security.

[Scott Galloway]

Oh, Kristi Noem. Hip chicken. Kristi Noem.

[John Lovett]

That's a. That's a natural fit for him. But I could see him at FBI too. We'll see. We'll see. Depends on when Kristi Noem lasts.

[Scott Galloway]

Oh, my God, they're all moving here. Speaking of moving here, I'll tell you what I'm pretty pissed about. Supposedly Elon's leaving. I don't think he is. I think he'll. He's such a nuisance. He's gonna stay. Apparently Mark Zuckerberg bought a $23 million mansion in D.C. so he's here too. I moved here, John, and they followed me here. The stalkers that they are, they're all here.

[John Lovett]

You gotta get close to the king.

[Scott Galloway]

And it's all the bad ones. The ones I liked are not here. The bad ones are.

[John Lovett]

If America's gonna go from having a democracy to a court, you gotta be near the court.

[Scott Galloway]

That's true. I get it. I get it. Honestly, although $23 million seems cheap for a house in Wall street, like one of the big ones. But he. He was fully lobbying Trump to avoid the antitrust trial. I'm not so sure that's going to work, because ultimately, as dislikable as Elon has become, Mark Zuckerberg has always been dislikable. And I think he. Polls, all those polls show they still don't like him at the White House. They still don't like him. But anyway, he's here. I'm so excited to see him at brunch or over drinks at Cafe Milano.

[John Lovett]

Do these people leave there? Do they leave the compound? Are you going to see him at the restaurants? They just don't leave their houses, right?

[Scott Galloway]

They're not going to leave their house. Not going to do anything. I mean, unless there's some MMA fighting or something happening, he'll not be going anywhere. But we'll see. I just don't want them here. I'd like them to leave, you know, already. I'm not thrilled to be here, but here I am, and I actually live here.

[John Lovett]

You're not thrilled to be there?

[Scott Galloway]

I like it. I like it. I like it.

[John Lovett]

You should try la.

[Scott Galloway]

I love la. I love California. I cannot get my wife to move California.

[John Lovett]

Put me in. Put me into this debate. Put me in.

[Scott Galloway]

All right, I'll make the case.

[John Lovett]

I really want to be part of that.

[Scott Galloway]

I have this beautiful new studio you're seeing behind me. I like D.C. very much. It's very lovely, and you've spent a lot of time here. But I really miss California so much. That's where you live, right? Los Angeles. I love Los Angeles. It's so beautiful. Despite all the problems you've been having lately, it's still. I was just in San Francisco. It was gorgeous. It's wonderful. So, anyway, I will not go on about that. John, one thing before we go. Is there something you're watching or reading that you love lately? I mean, everyone's talking about White Lotus, obviously, or Severance. Is there anything else?

[John Lovett]

I'll tell you, I've gone back to the beginning of Real Housewives of New York, and it is a joy look when the world is rewatching it. Okay, I'm starting from. I never watched it before. So I'm going back to the very first season of Real Housewives of New York. I have been resistant, I think, from a kind of snootiness to Real Housewives. For years. I've always said to myself, I don't like the reality shows. I like competitive reality shows. But I don't like the true Bravo. Right. And in hindsight, that was. I was hurting my own viewing. The Real Housewives are incredible. And I do believe it is hard to understand Trump. Right. People call up, talk about him being a reality show because of the Apprentice, but that was a competitive show. You really need to understand Real Housewives. Now that I see is a great way to understand how Trump operates and the way these women use conflict to draw attention to themselves.

[Scott Galloway]

Oh, all right. You love it.

[John Lovett]

It's a joy.

[Scott Galloway]

That's interesting. So go and watch that. I'm gonna give the recommendation. Hacks is about to come back, and I love Jean Smart and Hannah Einbender. Yeah, they're amazing. It looks hysterical. And I think they're the best pair of, like, speaking of. Of conflict, the two, the most fantastic pair that I never expected. So I'm very excited for that to come back online. Anyway, okay, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot. Be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back next week with more. And Scott will be back from his college tour. Just so you know, he hung out with my son in his frat yesterday, and I can't wait to hear that story. But thank you. Thank you so much, John. You can hear John on Pod Safe America and love it or leave it every week. Wherever you listen to podcasts, they're wonderful podcasts. I will read us out. Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Anderjot engineered this episode. Jim Mackill edited this video. Nishat Kurwa is Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York magazine and Vox Media. You subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com pod. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. And, John, thank you so much.

[John Lovett]

Thank you.