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- [00:01]
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- [00:32]
Abby Phillip
Foreign.
- [00:37]
Kara Swisher
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- [01:01]
Abby Phillip
IBM.
- [01:04]
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- [01:07]
Abby Phillip
Not sure where to start.
- [01:08]
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- [01:13]
Abby Phillip
Finish and satin or what that clunking sound from your dryer is.
- [01:17]
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- [01:22]
Abby Phillip
You can hire top rated pros, see price estimates and read reviews all on the app download today. But I will just say that I don't think that your presidential chances are related to your social media clout.
- [01:36]
Kara Swisher
Yeah. So he does look good. Astride an eagle with a chest. He does look good. Hi everyone, this is Pivot from New York magazine and the Vox Media podcast network. I'm Kara Swisher. Welcome back to God Free August. Scott is still away, so I have yet another fantastic co host, Abby Philipp, the anchor of CNN's Newsnight with Abby Philipp. Abby, welcome.
- [02:06]
Abby Phillip
I am so honored to be here when Scott is not around.
- [02:09]
Kara Swisher
I know we can do all kinds of naughty things. Just I don't know if you listened to Rachel last week, but this last week. But we can do whatever we want.
- [02:16]
Abby Phillip
I did. It was very lesbian. It was great.
- [02:19]
Kara Swisher
Yeah. You also get a little break cause you're usually the host, you're just the wrangler. So I will wrangle you if you don't mind.
- [02:24]
Abby Phillip
Great.
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Kara Swisher
Yeah. So I want to talk a little bit on a couple things you're up to. One, your show, which has been very successful, incredibly busy, as I said, wrangling and then sometimes wrestling to the ground. All sorts of personalities. On your five night week show this week, incredibly, you have a lot of viral moments. It's usually with Scott Jennings. We're not getting into Scott Jennings here. But I have to say the Jillian Michaels thing really took off this week. I'm gonna play the exchange that she had and how you dealt with her. And I wanna talk a little bit about how you handle this. Let's listen. He's not whitewashing slavery.
- [03:00]
Abby Phillip
So he's not.
- [03:01]
Kara Swisher
He's not. No, he's not. And you cannot tie imperialism and racism and slavery to just one race, which is pretty much what every single exhibit does. But let's talk about the fact that when you anti slavery.
- [03:14]
Abby Phillip
Let's talk about the fact slavery in America was Only less than 2% of.
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Kara Swisher
White Americans own slaves. But it was a system of white supremacy.
- [03:21]
Abby Phillip
You know, African American slavery is thousands of years old. White people were slave owned. I didn't realize this was controversial. Wait a second. Well, what's controversial?
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Kara Swisher
Very surprised. This is an extraordinary exercise in historical revisionism. I'm really surprised.
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Abby Phillip
Do you realize that, Gillian, I'm surprised that you're trying to litigate who was the beneficiary of slavery and who. I'm not.
- [03:42]
Kara Swisher
Okay. You handled that really well. I don't know how you jumped in there. That was nuts what she was saying, in my opinion.
- [03:49]
Abby Phillip
I mean, it was wild. Look, everybody was shocked. It was unexpected, to be frank, because we were not really in a discussion about that at the table when she just brings it up. And you know my philosophy about the show. First of all, I think I've seen some people questioning why was she even there. She's a fitness guru. All of that.
- [04:11]
Kara Swisher
I believe I texted you that.
- [04:13]
Abby Phillip
Well, no, no, no. Not just you, but a lot of people have said that. I'm just saying. I get it. I understand that there are some characters in our politics today who are like, how did this person even get here? But the truth is that she, first of all, she is a kind of MAGA influencer. She represents that point of view. And just like we have. Not that I'm comparing the two, but we have comedians and actors. We have Roy Wood Jr. Come on. We have Wendell Pierce. We have people who are not Washington voices. Come on and share their views. Gillian Michaels has views that represent about half the country. So there's that. The second thing is that you heard me there. Not really weighing in. When she started talking. There were other guests weighing in. And part of it was because I was literally listening to her trying to understand what the heck she was talking about. And then when it became clear that she was trying to sort of downplay slavery, I was just like shocked, like, are you really going to do this on national television? Giving her an opportunity to not do it. But she continued on and then later on she said that she got this list of talking points from the White House about exhibits that they wanted to dispute and frankly, it was pretty ignorant. Look, I don't like to talk about negatively about guests who come on the show because I just don't think that's good form. Even when I disagree with people, I respect their right to embarrass themselves on national television. I think it is their right to do that. And I don't wanna disparage people, even when they disparage, to be quite frank, online. But I'll just state as a factual matter what I told her, which is that it is nonsensical to suggest that slavery in the United States was about something other than race. A and B, even this idea that 2% of white people own slaves, that is such a ridiculous point because you don't have to own slaves to enforce white supremacy and slavery to benefit from it, to gain generational wealth as a result of it. And the percentage of Americans where slavery was lawful who had slaves or participated in slavery is much larger than 2%. So it's completely disingenuous. This whole thing is ridiculous. It's embarrassing more for her than anything else. But look, I also, I've been on this earth long enough that I know many people believe this. I have not. That was not the first time that I had heard that argument.
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Kara Swisher
Me neither.
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Abby Phillip
I've heard it from. Yeah, you've heard it, right? Yeah, so we've heard this before. So let's be honest, like people believe this stuff, right? And don't be shocked when they come out and say it on national television.
- [07:06]
Kara Swisher
That was a really smart thing you said. You're trying to litigate who was the beneficiary. Very even handed, but also smart minded. Talk a little bit about how you do that, how you think about what your job is there.
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Abby Phillip
I'm never bringing people on to say crazy things. Let's be frank about that. That is never the intention. Okay? People's decisions to say crazy things are never expected or predictable. However, I mean, and I know that folks really dislike Scott for his views, but I would say that there are views that you don't like that you think are unfounded but that are pretty widely Shared. And I think Scott falls into that category. Now. There are definitely times, if you watch the show, that we have conversations where I will say to Scott and others, just stop, because we're not playing whatever game it is that you want to play in this moment.
- [08:09]
Kara Swisher
We're going to clarify, by the way, we're talking about your Scott, not our Scott. Just, I have a Scott.
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Abby Phillip
I have a different Scott, not your. Yeah. Which is a point of major confusion between us, Kara. All the time you will say, oh, I did this thing with Scott. And I'm like, you did?
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Kara Swisher
Yes. Off screen, Scott Jennings and I are really. We play pickleball together. That would be good, though. I would beat him.
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Abby Phillip
But I do think that what I try to say is, if I detect that what you're doing is playing a game of let me say something that I think is gonna go viral, let me misrepresent what's being said here to try to create a mom, I will stop that.
- [08:54]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, you did that around when it happens. Who was that? There was one.
- [08:59]
Abby Phillip
I mean, Scott was involved in that one. I mean, Scott is often involved in those moments when I say, no, we're stopping. And I think that there are guardrails, but I also think it's, you know, this is an imperfect exercise. Right. So what you think should be a guardrail, I may not think should be a guardrail. I try to give people a decent amount of leeway to express their points of view, liberal and conservative. And I will tell you that there are times when. Many times, frankly, when liberals cross a line. And again, the same leeway that I give to the conservative guests, I give to the liberal guests to express themselves. But there are times when I have to stop things to keep things on the rails. We don't want to libel people on television. We don't want to. I don't like the personal attacks, which actually do happen more than I would like them to. So, you know, again. But I think the bottom line is there's an acknowledgement of the imperfection of this. Right. This is a conversation.
- [10:06]
Kara Swisher
Oh, I think you handle it. Sometimes I want to send you a bottle of tequila. I'm like. Because your face. I can see the exasperated look on you. I couldn't do it. I would.
- [10:15]
Abby Phillip
Sometimes I need it. I mean, there are. Look, are there times when I'm like, that was absolutely ridiculous. Totally. But somebody's gotta do it.
- [10:26]
Kara Swisher
So last question on this. When you think about shows like this and this sort of the partisanship. One of the things I remember you and I talked about was breaking having real discussions and breaking partisanism. Do you think it's gotten. Not necessarily on your show, but worse or better or how do you look at sort of the landscape and what you're trying to do here in general in this country?
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Abby Phillip
I don't think that we're solving the issue of partisanship on our show by any stretch of the imagination. I think what we are doing is creating a platform for us to really be honest about what the contours of the debate really are. And one thing that I've grown to really have very little tolerance for, just. Personally, I just find it to be boring, but also a little bit disingenuous, is when we have partisans kind of talking past each other where they're sort of like, you know, they're kind of like on parallel roads and they never really intersect. And I just. I don't think that that really is an accurate reflection of where the country is. So we're in a hyper partisan moment. And do I think it's getting better? Not really. But do I think that we need to better understand where we kind of agree and disagree? Yes. And the only way to do that is to really take that on head on. And I like that. What we do is actually we get the nitty gritty about what it says about us, that some people, you know, everything that Trump does, they love. Some people think that it's the dawn of fascism. And I think that we have those values debates and those conversations are important to. Look, we have to understand our neighbors, because these are people that we know. Right. More of your neighbors than you think probably voted for or supported Trump. And I think we need to understand them a little bit better. But we also need to have a little bit more honesty about what it says about our democracy, our values as individuals and as a community, that we want certain things for our country or we don't. So that's what I think we are doing.
- [12:35]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, I think when wrestling metaphors are used, I don't love that. Right. Like the idea of wrestling, because then it's a game, then it's the game. I mean, I think that's the difficult part that you face. I don't envy you in that regard. But let me ask you about something else you're working on. You have a book coming out in October, and it's sort of in that genre. It's called A Dream Defer, Jesse Jackson and the Fight for Black Political Power. It focuses on Jackson's presidential runs in 1984 and 1988. I'm surprised this is your first book, for some reason, I would imagine you've written books before, but why did you want to write about Jesse Jackson, who's not gone from our history, but in a way he is. He was such an enormous figure for so long. At least in my political upbringing, you know, Jesse Jackson was a permanent figure in politics. Talk a little bit about what you've learned and what will people be surprised to learn.
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Abby Phillip
I think it's exactly for the reason that you just laid out that I decided to write this book, because he is both this ever present, seemingly ever present figure in our understanding of the world and also somebody that has kind of faded from memory in recent years especially, and I don't think has really ever been well understood. And I thought that there had been so many years that had passed since there was a real kind of comprehensive book about Jesse Jackson. The last one was in the mid-90s. And so since then, as you can imagine, a lot has happened with him, with our politics. There was the Barack Obama of it all, there was the Donald Trump of it all, Joe Biden of it all. And all of those events that have occurred since then, I think actually need it forces a reframing of Jesse Jackson's legacy. And that's what this book is about, is really just to understand what. Let's really look back now that he is in his 80s. He, as you know, is suffering from Parkinson's disease, I think, is not really in a position to be a participant in the framing of his own legacy. And so.
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Kara Swisher
So you obviously couldn't talk to him, correct? Right.
- [14:57]
Abby Phillip
I did talk to him, actually, quite a. You know, I started working on this book and right as Covid was happening in 2020, and I went to Chicago. He's had Parkinson's then, but he could still talk. And we had, and we've talked a lot over the years, sometimes about the book, sometimes not. Increasingly, he has not been able to speak. So I was able to talk to him just enough when he was verbal.
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Kara Swisher
So he has Parkinson's but not dementia, Correct?
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Abby Phillip
Yes, he has Parkinson's, but not dementia, as far as I know. I don't want to speak too much about his medical diagnosis because I'm not fully read in on the latest on that. But as of right now, he has a lot of difficulty speaking. And that was beginning, you know, five years ago when I first started talking to him about this book. So one of the things about Jesse Jackson is that a lot of people don't even remember if you didn't live through it. That, first of all, he was insanely famous. He was like, he was a level of fame that people compared to Michael Jackson and to, you know, these massive celebrities, too. He was a black man who grew up in the segregated south who really kind of came from a very not well to do family. I mean, his mother, his father was his next door neighbor, and his mother became pregnant with him when she was unmarried, and his biological father had a whole other family. So his improbable rise, I think, was part of the story. But, I mean, he was also the celebrity candidate before Donald Trump was a.
- [16:47]
Kara Swisher
Celebrity candidate and had a long political history before that.
- [16:51]
Abby Phillip
Yeah, he was a populist candidate before Bernie Sanders was a populist candidate. He came in second place in the 1988 campaign before Barack Obama became the nominee. And had he not won concessions from the Democratic Party to change the rules of how you nominate candidates, Barack Obama probably would not have been the nominee in 2008. So there are so many aspects of his legacy that I think just are not very well understood. I think he is a very complicated figure, which makes made writing this book very interesting because it's a lot of good things and bad things, like personality traits that we see in politicians. Arrogance, grandiosity, narcissism, grandiosity. All of that incredible eloquence along with, you know, just. They're tied together. The good and the bad are very much tied together. But I think fundamentally, his story of running two presidential campaigns at a time when the Ku Klux Klan was still running rallies in Georgia is incredible. It's an incredible story.
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Kara Swisher
What made you want to cover him?
- [18:13]
Abby Phillip
I think that I would just start by saying I wasn't really jazzed about writing a book, just in general, because I'm not the type of. Some people are like, I was born to write a book. I need my name on a book. I'm not one of those people. I was like, if I have something to say, I will say it. I don't really want to write a book just for the sake of writing a book, but I did. I was convinced, a little bit, frankly, from my agent that there was some responsibility that I had as a journalist, a woman, a black woman journalist, in this moment, to participate in the telling of history. And I think as a political journalist, I wanted to choose a political figure whose story was not that well understood. And I think Jesse Jackson's story was. I realized as I was researching it was not terribly well understood, but super relevant. In this moment of rising economic Populism of questions about whether or not the Democratic Party should have a coalition that is actually diverse, that represents black people, white people, Asian people, Native American people, LGBTQ people, all of that. He was the person who really explicitly said that is what the party should look like and that is why the Democratic Party looks like that right now. So I felt like, okay, yeah, I do have a responsibility to tell these stories and to tell it with an understanding of the community that he spoke to, which is black Americans. And the more you research it, the more you realize that in the 80s, he was always viewed through the lens of white journalists who discounted him, who minimized him, who did not understand his appeal among black Americans, who largely saw him as a heroic figure, who saw him as a kind of manifestation of their dreams and their aspirations. And I think that was never fully represented in the media.
- [20:17]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, you're absolutely right. I mean, of course his involvement with Martin Luther King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference was also important, but he was really one of the first. I remember being struck by his talking about economic issues over even though he's thought of as a racial figure, you know, I mean, like that kind of thing, the way he was portrayed. He had one quote, and I'm gonna read. I found it when we changed the race problem into class fight between the haves and have nots, then we're going to have a new ballgame. I mean, I think he clocked that same thing with Sanders. Same thing with a lot, you know, in aoc. In some ways, I mean, that's. And Mamdani. Really. In a lot of ways, yeah.
- [20:56]
Abby Phillip
I mean, people misrepresent him as this person who's like all about race. But when you look at his actual campaigns, he was actually arguing that the real commonality between people should be their interest, their class interests, their economic interests. He was rallying farmers in Missouri and in rural states and in Iowa. On the basis of what we have in common is our need to be treated fairly economically. That was the basis of his campaign, not a racial appeal, which is contra how he was conveyed to the public during his campaigns.
- [21:34]
Kara Swisher
Right. Because he did suffer from egomaniacal. You know, and look at me. You know, everything he did was sort of. And he was fantastic looking person. Right. You wanted to look at him in a lot of ways, but an important figure. I'm excited. We'll talk about it more on when it comes out. Hopefully we'll longer interview about it, but we've got a lot to get to today, including Gavin Newsom, Trolling Trump and the Costco abortion pill controversy, among other things. But first, President Trump is set to meet Ukraine's President Zelensky and European leaders of the White House, as we record on Monday. This follows Trump's summit with Putin in Alaska on Friday, where he rolled out the red carpet, but no deal was made. Trump seems to be siding with Putin right now after going in. Not siding, siding with him, saying over the weekend the best way to end the war is to go directly to a peace agreement, not negotiate a ceasefire, which he was talking about. He's also telling Ukraine to give up on getting back Russia annexed Crimea or joining NATO. You were part of CNN's live coverage of the Alaska summit. I just loved your thoughts. And the last time Zelenskyy was in the White House, things got pretty ugly. Dance kind of trolled him. He's bringing backup this time and others. He may wear a suit, which is so inane, but. But there you have it. They were making comments about his outfit, which was a military outfit. Talk to me a little bit about this, even though it's gonna go by the time we do. But how are you going into this? How do you look at it, especially from the Alaska summit?
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Abby Phillip
I think it's extraordinary that this is even happening. I mean, think about the fact that you have a phalanx of European leaders getting on planes at a moment's notice to flock to Washington to give Zelenskyy backup in this meeting with Trump. That's a level of concern that I think some people say hasn't been demonstrated since 9, 11. And it reflects a deep worry about Trump's decision making and his need to be surrounded by a certain point of view in order to come to what they view as the right conclusion. So I think that alone, I mean, says a lot. And I think that I said this on Friday. I mean, Trump really believes that he can get Putin to the desired outcome by simply treating him right, by giving him the red carpet, by giving him the military welcome, by the smiles, the round of applause, all of that, which is what he wants, which, which would work for him. But Putin doesn't really care about those things. He wants what he wants in the interest of Russian empire, which is what he wants to re establish. And so I still think we don't know terribly much about what was talked about and decided. There was some talk of security guarantees that do not involve NATO. So the obvious question is, what does that really look like? But I think that the devil is, is 100, 1000% in the details here.
- [24:37]
Kara Swisher
Which is not Trump's strong suit.
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Abby Phillip
Not exactly. I do think that's the problem, is that Putin is worried about the details. Trump, not so much. And the details also become insanely important to Ukraine because they have been in a situation before where they've been given security guarantees, and it's just they've still been bulldozed as a result of it. Putin also wants to divide the United States and Europe. So it is also in Putin's interest to disentangle Ukraine's security from Europe and NATO. And so it does work in Putin's favor to say, well, we'll give you security guarantees, but it's not gonna involve NATO. So will that fly? Something tells me, no, it will not.
- [25:21]
Kara Swisher
Because he will say, we'll do it and then won't do it. Right. Won't send us troops.
- [25:27]
Abby Phillip
Exactly. Exactly. I also just wonder, I mean, how does the America first crowd feel about Trump giving security guarantees unilaterally, perhaps, like, are we gonna be sending troops?
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Kara Swisher
Right. That's the thing if Russia invades?
- [25:42]
Abby Phillip
Because that's literally the thing that the America first crowd said that they did not want. So I think that there are a lot of words being spoken right now, but, you know, time will tell.
- [25:58]
Kara Swisher
What was your takeaway from the summit itself? Obviously, the Trump people are trying to spin it as something positive, but. But nobody is. There's not even a coverage, even on Fox News.
- [26:07]
Abby Phillip
I think it was not much. It was much ado about nothing. And that was told, by the way, that they came out of the meeting. They came out of the meeting, they said almost nothing. There was no sort of paper. There was no joint agreement. Putin and Trump were saying different things. Then over the weekend, you had Marco Rubio also downplaying it, saying, hey, we have a long way to go, and the ceasefire thing is super important. Putin wants to continue to pummel Ukraine while he spins his wheels on an end to the war, and that's what Trump is allowing him to get. So why the weird shift?
- [26:54]
Kara Swisher
He's gonna.
- [26:56]
Abby Phillip
Because that's what Putin wants.
- [26:58]
Kara Swisher
But why did Trump shift in that meeting? Nobody knows.
- [27:02]
Abby Phillip
Trump's right, but the readout from the call with Zelensky seemed to point to. What is happening here is that Putin is convincing Trump of a particular military reality on the ground that Zelensky disputes, which is that they're winning. Right. And Zelensky disputes that. And my question is, Trump has a. A whole military and a national security apparatus and an intelligence apparatus who he can ask about what is happening on the ground. So I am confused about why Trump would not ask those experts about what's happening and not take Putin's word for it, and why he would regurgitate Putin's view of the war to Zelensky without filtering it through what we know to be true about what's happening on the ground.
- [27:54]
Kara Swisher
It still reminds you of the hold that Putin has on Trump over and over again. We seem to get the same result every time he walks in a room with him and comes out, comes out different, as if his brain has been fried or something.
- [28:07]
Abby Phillip
I think Trump is super impressed by the way, Kara, by Putin. I think that's a big part of it. He's just very impressed by him. He thinks that he's got it figured out that he's arranged Russian society in a way that, that he admires. I think Trump really just thinks Putin is doing it better than anybody else and he's not concerned about the moral quandary of Putin killing dissidents and perhaps doing war crimes and all of that stuff. It's an admiration at the heart of it.
- [28:37]
Kara Swisher
And he doesn't admire someone like Zelensky, by the way. First Lady Melania Trump entered the chat, oddly. She wrote what's being called a peace letter to Putin that Trump hand delivered at the summit. In the letter, she tells Putin it's time to protect children and says he can single handedly restore their melodic laughter. It was a strange letter, but I see her point. Some people are wondering if the letter was AI generated. They don't know. It's about the children that Russia has taken from Ukraine and are bringing to Russia. It's really quite a heinous act on behalf of the Russians. Any thoughts on this? Were you surprised?
- [29:11]
Abby Phillip
I'm not surprised, no. Because I think this is how Melania likes to engage in these things. She picks an aspect of it that she thinks is sort of universal, which I think this probably is, and weighs in. And I think it's fine. I think it's good and it's nice. Do I think it matters? No.
- [29:35]
Kara Swisher
Yeah. She's somewhat anti Putin, from what I can read that she's the one shifting him over a little more. Again, she's obviously from countries for this, right?
- [29:45]
Abby Phillip
Yeah. I mean, I think that would make sense, just like, given her background. But I also think that, I mean, she has a lot of influence over her husband. So if it were me, I think that's probably the best place to exert influence is with the President of the United States.
- [30:03]
Kara Swisher
Yeah. Presumably, yeah. I was sort of surprised by it. It was a strange letter, but I was like, okay, sure, we'll see what happens. Talk a little bit about this takeover of Washington. You don't live there any longer, but he's. Republican governors from three straits are sending National Guard troops to D.C. joining already 800 mobilized in the Capitol. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that guard troops may soon be carrying weapons, which is frightening for a D.C. resident like myself. A reversal from the original orders. But the Trump administration has backed off its offic original push to take over the police force after the city filed an emergency restraining order calling Trump's actions a hostile takeover. It's been one week since Trump announced the takeover. He's obviously putting troops on display in places where there's not high crime, such as at Union station or on 14th. I mean, there is petty crime in 14th street, really, for the most part. But what do you think about what's happening there as a former D.C. resident and what it represents?
- [31:02]
Abby Phillip
Yeah, alongside. I mean, I, you know, Kara, I was there on Friday briefly, very briefly. And I don't know if you feel this way. I don't know how recently you were because you traveled so much, but I was shocked by how quiet and almost deserted the city felt.
- [31:23]
Kara Swisher
Well, it could be the summer, but.
- [31:24]
Abby Phillip
Yeah, it could be the summer, but it was striking. And then. So I say that, and that was my gut feeling. I was like, this is odd. I was in the middle of Chinatown. There were no people.
- [31:35]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, restaurants are down. Restaurant reservations.
- [31:38]
Abby Phillip
So then there's this reporting about a dramatic drop, 25%, 33% in restaurant reservations and foot traffic. And bars. Bars are, you know, these businesses are just saying this is totally unsustainable. And look, we will know more later, but I'm starting there just because the premise of this whole thing is that D.C. residents want this deep down inside because they want to feel safer so that they can go about their lives without fear. A threat of violence against.
- [32:12]
Kara Swisher
We don't fear that, but go ahead.
- [32:13]
Abby Phillip
But the reality of it is that people are avoiding being in the city right now because nobody wants to live in a society that is militarized.
- [32:23]
Kara Swisher
Right. I don't like going to countries that are military. When you go to a military, nobody.
- [32:27]
Abby Phillip
Likes going to countries that are militarized. When we travel, I've been to places that are more militarized than here and you see the tanks in the street and the guards with the semi automatic long guns and all that stuff, it does not make you feel more safe. It makes you feel surveilled. And I think that the proof is in the pudding. So even if you take their premise that DC is so unsafe that there's a quiet support for this among people who live there, I think the proof is that that's not the case, because otherwise they would be running around like.
- [33:07]
Kara Swisher
Woo, now we can finally have sushi.
- [33:09]
Abby Phillip
Yeah, now we can finally do all the things. No, they're avoiding being in parts of the city. That's the first thing. And I think the second thing is that I. DC is the place that they are doing it, because they can. And that's the challenge with D.C. is that truly the citizens of the District of Columbia have very few rights compared to other people in this country.
- [33:32]
Kara Swisher
None.
- [33:33]
Abby Phillip
No voting. None. Virtually.
- [33:35]
Kara Swisher
And our representative seems to be aged, not speaking out.
- [33:41]
Abby Phillip
But even if they were, I mean, he can do this. This. He can do this. And so should he do it? Probably not, but he can. And as you pointed out, I mean, where are they sending these troops? It's not to the places where the crime is actually happening. And they're also predominantly doing immigration arrests, just pulling undocumented immigrants from mopeds and delivering iced coffees from Bluestone Lane. So I just think the reality versus the rhetoric is so stark here. I want DC to be safe. I think crime is absolutely a problem in the city. But I also think that the people who need protecting are not being protected.
- [34:22]
Kara Swisher
Well, that's because it's also racial. Right. It's like scary city run by black people. I think that's a lot of it. The visuals is what they're going for in some fashion and then doing nothing. They're at Union Station. I mean, maybe at 1:00 clock in the morning, Union Station's a little sketchy, but otherwise not at all. It's a very strange. I don't know where it's gonna go. And we'll see if he extends it to other cities like New York, if Mamdani wins.
- [34:46]
Abby Phillip
Have you also noticed, Kara, like, I mean, the thing that I think we should keep an eye on with this is the videos of the masked agents, the ones who. There was the one that went viral over the weekend where one of them said, you know, liberals have already ruined America. The degree to which Trump has successfully turned immigration agents. Now, the Secret Service hsi, which typically are tasked with some of the most sensitive federal law enforcement investigations into his personal police force that are ideologically aligned with him, I think is one of the most important developments in the last several months. And it's gone almost entirely unchecked and it will only be exacerbated as we go down the road.
- [35:37]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, I don't think it's a long trip, Abby. I think these people are already down that road in a lot of ways. But wearing the mask, he's creating his own personal stasia and that's what's really disturbing. And it's gonna be hard to put them back in the box for sure. Okay, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, how Gavin Newsom has become the ultimate Trump troll. Support for this show comes from DeleteMe. Even if you haven't personally been a victim of identity theft, harassment or doxy, you probably know someone who has. We're all online all the time and we've all unfortunately left a breadcrumb trail for data brokers, those people who compile your personal information and sell it. But Delete Me makes it easy, quick and safe to remove your personal data online. At a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everyone vulnerable, I think it's really important for people to do this. I am a huge privacy person around my stuff and I have been shocked by the stuff that I found on Delete me, especially as they assemble stuff about me, like old addresses, all these things, addresses I've forgotten. And it just sort of creates a profile of me that is actually pretty accurate and also is wrong in many ways. So take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for Deleteme now at a special discount for our listeners. Get 20% off your Delete Me plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com pivot and use the promo code pivot at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to JoinDeleteMe.com pivot and enter the code pivot at checkout. That's JoinDeleteMe.com pivot code pivot.
- [37:10]
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- [37:15]
Abby Phillip
Budget.
- [37:15]
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That's why there's upwork. Upwork is your one stop shop to find, hire and pay top freelance talent, saving you time and keeping costs in check all in one place. Companies at every stage turn to upwork to get things done and find more flexibility. You can staff key projects and initiatives by accessing a global marketplace filled with top talent in it, web development, AI design, admin support, marketing, and more. Posting a job on Upwork is super simple and there's no cost to join. You can browse freelancer profiles. Get help drafting a job post or even book a consultation. From there you connect with freelancers that get you and you can hire them to help you move your work forward. Upwork makes the entire process easier and more affordable with industry low fees. Post a job today and hire tomorrow with Upwork. Visit Upwork.com right now and post your job for free. That's Upwork.com to post your job for free and connect with top talent ready to help your business grow. That's you. Upwork.com upwork.com support for the show comes from select quote one important part of planning for the future is making sure you have life insurance. But different policies work for different people and there's a ton to consider like how much are you being covered for? And did you know if you receive life insurance for your job and you're unexpectedly laid off, you could suddenly be covered for nothing. Scary. Scary to think about, but simple to get right thanks to SelectQuote SelectQuote is one of America's leading insurance brokers with nearly 40 years of experience helping over 2 million customers find over $700 billion in coverage since 1985. SelectQuote's licensed insurance agents work for you to tailor a life insurance policy for your individual needs in as little as 15 minutes. And selectquote partners with carriers that provide policies for a variety of health conditions or if you don't have any major health issues, they work with carriers that get you same day coverage with no medical exam required. Get the right life insurance for you for less@selectquote.com pivot go to selectquote.com pivot today to get started. That's selectquote.com pivot.
- [39:21]
Kara Swisher
Abby we're back. California Governor Gavin Newsom can play President Trump's social media game too. He's quite good at it. Newsom's press office this social media feed has been focused on capital letters and AI memes mocking the president's tactics, and it's winning the attention game. The strategy is part of Newsom's response to Trump backed redistricting plan in Texas. That's where it began. The California governor has responded by saying he would pursue a special election to redraw California's congressional maps to offset Republican gains. It's a dicey thing to do because other states could also participate, a post from Newsom's office reads in all caps, Donald Trump, the lowest polling president in recent history. This is your second to last warning. Stand down now or California will counter strike in parentheses legally to destroy your illegal Crooked maps in red states. Meme posts include comparing Steven Miller to Lord Voldemort, responding to a photo of a rainbow over Marine One with happy pride. An image of Newsom on the COVID of Time magazine saying, long live the king. Meanwhile, Texas Democrats who fled the state to stall and redistricting plans have returned. The state legislature wrapped its first special session last week, with Governor Greg Abbott quickly calling for a second special session. Talk about what Newsom's doing here in your thoughts. You know, the right is trying very hard to say he's cringy and this and that. I think he's very funny. It's getting a lot of attention and certainly a lot of views, et cetera. But what is happening here from your perspective with him? And has he breaked a code on how to break through in the Trump era?
- [40:44]
Abby Phillip
You know, my views on Newsom are that he's trying to get attention and he's getting attention, and I think that you enjoy it. I'm neutral on it. It's all just trolling. Fine. My filter on some of this stuff is what's the actual electoral impact? Because you can rally the base, you can make Democrats, you can tickle their funny bone with this stuff, and that's great. But at the end of the day, Democrats need to start winning elections. So after all of this is done, what I wanna know is what are they actually doing to change the electoral reality in the country? Because that's ultimately the only thing that matters. I mean, on the redistricting bit of it, is it a race to a bottom? Absolutely. It's interesting that Arnold Schwarzenegger is, like, very much opposed to this.
- [41:39]
Kara Swisher
Yeah. He had when he was governor, he passed something that they couldn't do this. He was trying.
- [41:43]
Abby Phillip
Yeah. And has made it more difficult. And even within that paradigm, you know, Gavin Newsom is still trying to actually. I mean, it's the hard way. You have to take it to a referendum in order to get this to happen. So, I mean, look, if he's able to take it to a referendum and get a. Get approval from voters to redistrict, then I guess by all means. But I do think, and I see this a lot, Democrats do get held to a higher sort of almost like moral standard than Republicans do on stuff like this. There's always the question of why aren't you moving to the middle? Why aren't you trying to appeal to moderates? Meanwhile, the fact of the matter is that Trumpism and the rise of MAGA has occurred by completely ignoring this. Even the Mildest concept of moderation. I mean, Trump and Republicans have gone farther to the right than they have been. Right.
- [42:43]
Kara Swisher
They don't care about, in a very long time, the Rhinos at all.
- [42:45]
Abby Phillip
Yeah, they don't care. So I do think that it's worthwhile. Democrats saying, okay, let's really address the desires of voters here. And if this is what their voters are asking for, I think that politics is the business of adding and not subtracting. So building support for. With people for the things that you want to accomplish. And I think Democrats probably do need to start listening to their voters more. And I'm not sure how many of them are asking for this sort of, like, mushy middle. They're asking for people to stand up for something, and what that thing is, I think they're gonna have to figure out. But they do need to start standing up for something as opposed to trying to be in this weird, like, neither here nor there place.
- [43:29]
Kara Swisher
Neither place. Yeah, we're supposed to be real nice and the others can do whatever they want. In other words, words. So when you look at the Texas Democrats standing up, which they did, they fled the state to stall these plans. It may not work, but they did it. That's sort of a version of leadership. And then what Newsom's doing, how do you compare them? Like, what is. Do Democrats have to be doing things like this that show some level of backbone? Because a lot of complaints you hear from Democrats are everyone's a noodle, like Chuck Schumer or whoever it happens to be. Noodles, noodles, noodles everywhere. And they are kind of like this. Do you think it pays off from. From a political point of view for Newsom or these Texas Democrats?
- [44:09]
Abby Phillip
I think the Texas Democrats, it's an exercise in futility. But there was also a precedent for doing it. There was an attempt to do this very same thing in Texas in the early 2000s. They did the same thing. They left the state. But ultimately the courts sided with Texas Republicans in the redistricting fight. So they knew that this was going to end the way that it is ending. But I think if they want to make a statement by leaving the state, then fine. I think that's totally fine to do. And I think that there is some value in showing your voters that you care enough to put yourself on the line, even if it's going to end a certain way on the Newsom part of it. I mean, same thing, really. I mean, Democrats have to figure out how they fight back, and they may need to fight back by simply fighting fire with fire. Because I don't think that by Democrats sort of unilaterally disarming, you're gonna resolve the problem of gerrymandering in this country. Gerrymandering needs to be resolved, but it's not gonna be resolved by one side just kind of laying down and getting rolled over while the other side gerrymanders the place into oblivion.
- [45:26]
Kara Swisher
Right. Although some Republican state governors have resisted in New Hampshire and elsewhere. They don't want to be pulled down into this muck, but they probably will be, presumably.
- [45:37]
Abby Phillip
And we should be clear that some of the most gerrymandered states are not just Republican states. Places like Illinois are heavily gerrymandered. So it's not to say that gerrymandering is the domain of one party over another, although Republicans do utilize it heavily, especially in Southern states. And I would also add that Democrats nationally have been way more willing to say, we would like to take this off the table for everyone, ourselves included, whereas Republicans have not said that. And so there is for the midterms. And they don't want to not utilize gerrymandering, period. So, I mean, in this moment, I think it makes sense what Gavin Newsom is doing if he's. And I think it helps.
- [46:27]
Kara Swisher
But you're neutral. It's interesting. You're like, I'm not amused by you, Gavin.
- [46:32]
Abby Phillip
I think. I think that the Twitter X, whatever, I guess I should call it X. The X shenanigans do not move me at all. Like, I find them to be very unimpressive. Not important, does not matter to the average person, but it tickles people's fancy. So great, go for it. It's giving him a lot of impressions on social media. Great, go for it.
- [46:56]
Kara Swisher
Does that up his presidential chances from your perspective? Because that's starting now, right?
- [47:02]
Abby Phillip
No, that's another discussion for another day. But I will just say that I don't think that your presidential chances are related to your social media clothes clout.
- [47:11]
Kara Swisher
Yeah. So he does look good astride an eagle with a chest. He does look good.
- [47:16]
Abby Phillip
You are. You will become well known, but that doesn't mean that you are more likely to be elected president. And so that's the other part of this that I think is why I'm kind of super neutral about it, is that I just feel like people often mistake those two things is does this person go viral on social media versus can they actually bank votes? And those things are not the same. And the folks who are interested in Democrats beating Republicans should pay very close attention to that distinction because that's also one of the reasons why they didn't see Kamala Harris loss coming, because they falsely believed that chatter on social media was related to votes. And it's not, it's not Snakes on.
- [48:01]
Kara Swisher
A Plane, that's what they're called, which was very popular and then didn't do very well. It's a movie because it was a bad movie.
- [48:06]
Abby Phillip
But it's still iconic and it's, it is still iconic.
- [48:10]
Kara Swisher
That still has to be a good movie. That's what I say. All right, Abby, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, the Trump administration's plan to rank companies.
- [48:22]
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- [49:30]
Kara Swisher
Support for Pivot comes from Groons. If you've ever done a deep Internet dive trying to discover different nutrition solutions, you've likely had the thought, surely there's a way to improve my skin, gut health immunity, brain fog without offending my taste buds. Well, there is is. It's called Groons. Groons are a convenient, comprehensive formula packed into a daily snack pack of gummies. It's not a multivitamin, a greens gummy or a prebiotic. It's all of those things and then some for a fraction of the price. In a Groons daily snack pack, you get more than 20 vitamins and minerals, 6 grams of prebiotic fiber, plus more than 60 ingredients. They include nutrient dense and whole foods, all of which will help you out out in different ways. For example, Groons has six times the gut health ingredients compared to the leading greens powders. It contains biotin and niacinamide, which helps with thicker hair, nails and skin health. They also contain mushrooms which can help with brain function. And of course you're probably familiar with vitamin C and how great it's for your immune system. On top of all, Groons are vegan and free of dairy, nuts and gluten. Get up to 52% off when you go to Gruns Co and use the code Pivot. That's G R U N S C O using the code pivot for 52% off. I know it can seem like we're drowning in problems, but the truth is for every issue the world is facing, there are sharp, brilliant minds conceiving big ideas to solve them. That's why my friend and Business Insider co founder Henry Blodgett, whom I brought to Vice, Fox Media, is launching a new podcast, Solutions with Henry Blodgett. Every week he'll interview leading thinkers across business, tech, politics and more to get to the bottom how we finally put these pressing problems to bed. Make sure to check out the first episodes of Solutions with Henry blodgett on Monday, August 18th on YouTube and other podcast apps. Abby, we're back with one more story. The Trump administration has reportedly created a scoring System to rank 550 through companies and trade associations based on sport and promotion of Trump's Big Beautiful Bill. Factors in the rating include social media posts, press releases, ads and attendance in White House events. Very similar what they're doing to people who are immigrants, looking at their social media, looking at them, and law firms and universities, et cetera. Companies that have the honor of being labeled highly include Uber, DoorDash, United, and AT&T. And one company may be looking to work its way up the rankings. Costco. And it won't dispense Mifeprestone, the abortion medication at its pharmacies. The company said the decision was made due to lack of demand. Groups from both the left and right have been placing political pressure on Costco. Should we expect even more corporate sucking up in response to this ranking? Why not? The law firms have and others have, other administrations obviously have corporate favorites and they play it more quietly. How do you look at this ranking? It's sort of the list you're on our list kind of thing, which Trump has done in any number of ways with other groups of people.
- [52:32]
Abby Phillip
Yeah, I mean, it's not surprising at all. I mean, I know many people who work on K Street. And they've been operating in this environment since the very beginning with Trump, where there is a clear. There has always been a clear sense that you have to prove your loyalty to Trump by things that you say publicly, things that you say privately, your willingness to put money behind the things that you do. That's how they've been operating from the beginning. So now we just know that there's, like a spreadsheet that they're using to keep track.
- [53:05]
Kara Swisher
Right? Yeah, yeah.
- [53:06]
Abby Phillip
But the truth of the matter is that the way I look at this is that corporations, especially multinational ones, which is what we're talking about here, in most cases, they operate all over the world. They operate in free countries, and they operate in unfree countries. They operate with strongmen, and they operate with democratically elected leaders. And so they have been doing this stance in other parts of the world for a very long time. They are not new to this. So they know how to operate in Trump's America. Their willingness to very quickly adjust to A, White House that, A, wants loyalty, B, wants control. I mean, Trump doesn't just want them to say nice things. He also wants to own shares of private corporations. He wants to tell them how to operate their boards. He wants to hire their economists. He wants to. All of it. He wants his hand in all of it. But they know how to deal with that. And I think if people thought that corporate America was gonna be, like, the place where there was gonna be resistance to Trump, you are not paying attention. Yeah, no, it's the last place. Right.
- [54:11]
Kara Swisher
It's particularly anxious and repulsive, but, you.
- [54:14]
Abby Phillip
Know, they have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders to do what they need to do in order to. To sail through this era of American history.
- [54:26]
Kara Swisher
Yeah. Like Tim Cook, giving that. Giving that statue. Everyone was so upset. Totally like, are you kidding?
- [54:33]
Abby Phillip
They are going to do it. If you think that there is not a thing that they're willing to do, you are wrong.
- [54:37]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, that's true.
- [54:38]
Abby Phillip
Totally wrong. They will do it. All of it. They will say, yes, Mr. Trump, you can own shares of our company. Yes, Mr. Trump, you can select members of our board. Yes, Mr. Trump, we will stop. Stop utilizing hiring practices that you don't like. All of it. They will do all of it. And they will do it because they know that it's. For a time, maybe four years, maybe something else will come after that, but they just have to weather this storm and maximize the shareholder value, and they will do that.
- [55:10]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, I think you're 100% right. Certain groups will Resist. Certain companies will. But Costco is quite a liberal company and, and resisted dei pushing on dei. They may be telling the truth about lack of demand or they just are like, oh, this is just causing us so much of a headache. We'll just do it.
- [55:28]
Abby Phillip
I wonder if they're afraid also of lawsuits because I think there's a little bit of a. With the mifepress stone stuff. I do think that there is a sort of almost like it's different from the DEI thing. There's like a threat of, you know, lawsuits about the safety. Even though the mifepressone is a safe drug. There are these organizations that have been threatening on safety grounds to go after companies that provide it to patients. And so there are layers to this with the medical stuff that I think are different.
- [55:58]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, you can see, you can be in those rooms. You're like, ugh, let's just get this off our plate. Let's give them a gold statue. It's fine. Whatever. These are small little things to them. They aren't ultimately because it creates us. It feels very Putinesque. Right. It feels he doesn't have to kill them to get them to do these things the way Putin does, of course, with his enemies. But it's a version of that. And don't be surprised for companies. Some people, I'm more surprised by others. But last week I was talking to Rachel about university. It's not like they were an ad for tolerance and anti wokeism. Any of those university presidents ever, if you've ever met one, including corporate owners. Corporate owners of media and things like that. You've seen it all over the place. All right, Abby, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails.
- [56:53]
Abby Phillip
The Disney Hulu HBO Max bundle plan starting at just $16.99 a month.
- [56:58]
Kara Swisher
No one will ever break us apart. Catch Marvel Studios Thunderbolts the New Avengers on Disney. You can't escape the past. Alien Earth on Hulu.
- [57:06]
Abby Phillip
This ship collected monsters and Final destination.
- [57:10]
Kara Swisher
Blood Lines on HBO Max.
- [57:12]
Abby Phillip
Death is coming for our family.
- [57:14]
Kara Swisher
The Disney Hulu HBO Max bundle plans.
- [57:17]
Abby Phillip
Starting at $16.99 a month.
- [57:18]
Kara Swisher
All these and more streaming soon. Visit disney plus hulu hbomaxbundle.com for details.
- [57:24]
Abby Phillip
My name is Sean Ramisvirum for today explained.
- [57:27]
Kara Swisher
I'm outside the Air and Space museum in Washington D.C. with one question.
- [57:31]
Abby Phillip
Do you think we should go to Mars? I don't think you should live in Mars, no.
- [57:36]
Kara Swisher
Well, I don't know why Just Mars.
- [57:38]
Abby Phillip
I think as earthlings, we are a nosy group of people. And I really don't think that we have any business going to Mars.
- [57:46]
Kara Swisher
Our knowledge about the solar system and the universe will grow substantially. I think maybe we should just leave Mars alone, just sit with Earth.
- [57:59]
Abby Phillip
Like so many innovations are going to come out of it because, because so.
- [58:02]
Kara Swisher
Many different companies are gonna be fighting.
- [58:03]
Abby Phillip
To get that first ticket to Mars.
- [58:06]
Kara Swisher
So I feel like we should.
- [58:07]
Advertisement/Announcer
But at the same time we should solve some problems here first.
- [58:10]
Kara Swisher
I think we need to expand what.
- [58:12]
Abby Phillip
We know, what we see.
- [58:13]
Advertisement/Announcer
Honestly, for our own benefit.
- [58:15]
Kara Swisher
We should go way beyond today Explained.
- [58:17]
Abby Phillip
From Vox is taking a summer sojourn on Mars.
- [58:21]
Kara Swisher
Join us Megan Rapinoe here this week on A Touch More. We are welcoming a very special guest. Yes to the show. She speaks multiple languages. Her middle name is literally tough. And I used to dread playing against her on the field. That's right. It's five time Champions League winner Lucy Bronze and now two time Euro winner. Plus sue and I discuss the bonkers.
- [58:48]
Abby Phillip
Scoring in the W and share our.
- [58:50]
Kara Swisher
New workout of the week. Check out our latest episode of A Touch More wherever you get your podcasts and on YouTube. Okay Abby, let's hear some wins and fails. Would you like to go first or I can very quickly. Whatever you want.
- [59:08]
Abby Phillip
You can go first.
- [59:09]
Kara Swisher
I think my, my win is Steve Wozniak. He's the co founder of Apple Computer with Steve Jobs. He, he made an appearance in a thread about his lawsuit against YouTube over Internet scammers using his likeness. Which happens by the way to you Abby, and to me and everyone else all across Internet. He said I gave all my Apple wealth away because wealth and power are not what I live for. I have a lot of fun and happiness. I funded a lot of important museums and arts groups in San Jose, city of my birth and they named a street after me for being good. He liked that. I remember him telling him about it. He has about $10 million. I think he's of all the money he's made and he's always been like this and I just like a reminder of someone like this in this sort of get while the getting's good kind of thing. He is a very happy, jolly person and I find it really nice that he, you know there are other kinds of billionaires, they're not all the same or very wealthy people. And he certainly his impact has been massive on us. Steve Jobs gets all the attention but Steve Wozniak was also critical to Apple which we all use today. And so I really like that my fail is something I talked about with Rachel last week was the name Versant, which is the new company about to come out and we were joking. It sounds like a medication that would be advertised on late night cable to resolve your rash. And results may vary but they're now having to change msnbc, which when it was started it was Microsoft NBC. I was there when it was started, when they had that deal a long time ago. Now it's changed to msnow, which is short for my Source News Opinion World. What Semaphore's Josh Bilinson said Ms. Now sounds like a short lived Windows operating system for the early 2000s. Needlessly redesigned too much and failed to be adapted by a mass critical.
- [61:00]
Abby Phillip
This is bad, Kara.
- [61:02]
Kara Swisher
I know.
- [61:02]
Abby Phillip
Msn, sorry to say, but it's.
- [61:05]
Kara Swisher
You can say in Ms. Nice.
- [61:08]
Abby Phillip
It doesn't roll off the tongue.
- [61:09]
Kara Swisher
Does not roll off the tongue. I don't know what you. Do you have a name. You'd call it any name.
- [61:14]
Abby Phillip
I mean, that's the thing. It's like how to rename a thing in this day and age. It's so hard. I mean, I empathize because there are no good choices here. Year.
- [61:24]
Kara Swisher
No, to be fair is not, you know, Windows Off. It's true. They made me download Ms. Now and I hate it. It's like ChatGPT5. Those people are all upset they don't have ChatGPT4O. But whatever. It's just like, oh come on. It'll matter how they do. Ultimately, not the name because, you know, HBO now, hbo then HBO this, Max this and that happens all the time, but it's particularly bad. Sorry, sorry. Rebecca Cutler.
- [61:57]
Abby Phillip
Yeah, I know we love Rebecca, but not her fault. I thought it was, it was nice to hear Rachel being so optimistic about it. Yeah. I mean, and I think she's right. I think this is nothing but opportunity going forward.
- [62:10]
Kara Swisher
It's coming for you, Abby. That's what they're doing.
- [62:12]
Abby Phillip
Yeah, exactly. Right. Like, but who cares what it's called? I mean, at the end of the day, that's not what matters.
- [62:18]
Kara Swisher
Yeah, you get to keep cnn. There's no names. There's no name conflict over there. And it should keep CNN as a global world.
- [62:25]
Abby Phillip
No, no, I don't think CNN is. I mean, I, I don't know, but I don't think CNN is going anywhere in terms of.
- [62:30]
Kara Swisher
Well, you're about to go on that journey too. And it's all about being an entrepreneur.
- [62:33]
Abby Phillip
I know. It's gonna be a fun little trip that we'll be on.
- [62:35]
Kara Swisher
Yeah.
- [62:36]
Abby Phillip
So.
- [62:36]
Kara Swisher
Yeah. We'll see. All right, Your wins and fails.
- [62:39]
Abby Phillip
All right, my turn. Okay, Should I. Let me start with my fail because I wanna end on a high note. My fail is the President of the United States going on this bizarre anti mail in voting screed over the weekend about how he's going to. He wants to outlaw mail in voting. Maybe this is because Putin brought this up with him on Friday as a way to try to flatter him, but he said all kinds of false things, including some things that led me to question whether anyone had shown him the actual Constitution. Because he does claim that the states are merely an agent for the federal government in counting and tabulating the votes, which is, needless to say, not what the Constitution says. I cannot wait to hear how states rights conservatives defend this, because not only does it make no sense at all, but his opposition to mail in voting just defies reality. If Democrats were so good at rigging votes, do you think that he would have won in 2024?
- [63:57]
Kara Swisher
No.
- [63:58]
Abby Phillip
Truly? I mean, no. Right. So Democrats have done a really crappy job of rigging elections with mail in votes.
- [64:06]
Kara Swisher
I think he's trying to deal with 2026, either the census or the voting. Right?
- [64:11]
Abby Phillip
Yes. And he says he wants to do it right before the midterms. I say this as a little, somewhat lightheartedly, but it's also super important and terrible at the same time. I do think that this is just a bald faced lie that ought to be immediately slapped down.
- [64:26]
Kara Swisher
And voting machines, same thing. He wants to get voting machines. I think he wants to use rocks. Everyone gets a rock he wants.
- [64:33]
Abby Phillip
He said something about watermarked paper. I don't, I can't even begin to unpack that one.
- [64:40]
Kara Swisher
But it creates distrust in voting.
- [64:42]
Abby Phillip
That's my fail.
- [64:44]
Kara Swisher
Okay, good job.
- [64:44]
Abby Phillip
He just wants more. He wants more paper, which I, I don't know what to tell you. My win is I have a four year old now. Kara and I successfully executed a four year old birthday party this weekend. And I will tell you that this one was hard. It was harder than the ones that came before because she had so many freaking opinions about this party and about the gifts that she was expecting and about, you know, I mean, I was like tracking down the RSVPs like it was my party. Like, is her best friend coming? You know, like, oh my God, what if there are not these people that she really loves? And I just, I'm glad to be through it. But that's my win. First of all, I've kept a human alive for four years.
- [65:38]
Kara Swisher
Yeah.
- [65:39]
Abby Phillip
I successfully planned a birthday party for said human.
- [65:43]
Kara Swisher
Yeah.
- [65:44]
Abby Phillip
I still have my hearing because the kids screamed like banshees for at least 45 minutes at the start of this party. Just non stop running around and screaming.
- [65:56]
Kara Swisher
Yeah.
- [65:57]
Abby Phillip
And I'm here to live, to tell the tale.
- [65:59]
Kara Swisher
Oh, Abby, you have no idea what's coming. I'm on. I have four kids in Vermont right now, and let me just tell you, you're gonna love 7 and 10 and 13.
- [66:12]
Abby Phillip
Oh, yeah.
- [66:12]
Kara Swisher
Yeah.
- [66:13]
Abby Phillip
I mean, I'm worried because the way four went, I was like, wait a second.
- [66:17]
Kara Swisher
You're not supposed to get some endurance going here, Abby.
- [66:21]
Abby Phillip
You're not supposed to do. Do it.
- [66:22]
Kara Swisher
Yeah.
- [66:22]
Abby Phillip
She also asked me for a gift that then she told me that she didn't want anymore.
- [66:26]
Kara Swisher
7.
- [66:26]
Abby Phillip
And that I should return.
- [66:28]
Kara Swisher
I'm gonna give you some advice. 7, 10, 13, 16. Let me just. 20, 20. I didn't have the right yogurt this morning. Sleeper is macros. Don't even talk to me. I had to buy two chickens.
- [66:41]
Abby Phillip
The macros, not the macros.
- [66:42]
Kara Swisher
Don't even. I'm not gonna let you know about that yet.
- [66:45]
Abby Phillip
You got a protein monster in your house.
- [66:47]
Kara Swisher
Oh, my God. Don't even talk to me. Everyone has a different situation. Anyway, congratulations on that. And get ready. That's all I have to say. We want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-Pivot elsewhere this week, I talked to philosopher and author Jason Stanley about fascism in the Trump era for just a light interview. Let's listen to a clip.
- [67:17]
Abby Phillip
It's a kind of paint by numbers fascist dictatorship that is emerging. It's something that you would read a book and it says, this is what they do, and that's what they're doing. Sometimes I feel like they're reading my books, you know, it's not hidden. It's not a sophisticated version of authoritarianism. Not even as sophisticated as Putin.
- [67:41]
Kara Swisher
Right. But it doesn't have to be.
- [67:43]
Abby Phillip
It doesn't appear so. It appears that the United States is exceptionally vulnerable to fascism.
- [67:50]
Kara Swisher
Just what you were saying, Abby. He's really an interesting fellow. He's the one that moved to Canada, which I chastised him for.
- [67:57]
Abby Phillip
The one thing I would say is that even though I think it's super important to understand the history of all of this, I think people need to be very focused on the here and now in terms of of tactically what is being done to, if you disagree with what Trump is doing to address it. And I think people forget about that as they are sort of like, well, this is like what happened, you know, X number of years ago or over there. And the question is, how do you convince your neighbors to vote for something different the next time around?
- [68:27]
Kara Swisher
Right. Although he did point out there are primers of how to resist its civil rights movements. Speaking of which, you just wrote a book about this. In the civil rights movement, the images that weren't there, especially the brutality, moved over a group of people, mostly white, that suddenly became empathetic and things changed. Right. And more and more protests happened. So. And Jackson was part of that. Right. Calling attention to it, as you noted. So we'll see. He's an interesting guy. Okay. That's the show. Abby, thank you for joining me. I really appreciate it. And people can watch you on Newsnight every weeknight on cnn. And your book A Dream Deferred, Jesse Jackson and the Fight for Political Power comes out in October. And again, we're gonna have you on on to talk about that. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much for coming on.
- [69:16]
Abby Phillip
Thank you, Kara. I really appreciate it.
- [69:17]
Kara Swisher
We did it. We did it. Anyway, everybody, thanks for listening to Pivot. Be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel, which is growing by leaps and bounds. We'll be back. Cause now podcasting is video. Abby, I don't know if you know that, but FYI, we'll be back on Friday and I will read us out. Today's show is produced by Lara Naiman Zoe Marcus, Taylor Griffith and Kevin Oliver. Ernie Enderdot engineered this episode. Jim Mackill edited the video. Nishat Kurwa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcast. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine@nymag.com pod we'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Again, thank you, Abby, and say hi to your Scott.
- [70:03]
Abby Phillip
I will close.