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Pardons, Prosecutions, and Perfume: Trump Unveils 100 Day Agenda
01:01:27
Donald Trump sits down for his first big interview since winning the election and unveils his plans for mass deportations, pardons for January 6th rioters, and revenge against his political enemies. Jon, Lovett, and Tommy explains what they’re watching for when his second term begins, the social media frenzy over the death of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, and how the end of Syria’s dictator Bashar Assad’s regime could impact Tulsi Gabbard’s nomination for Director of National Intelligence. Oh, and just in time for the holidays, Trump is launching a new fragrance: Fight, Fight, Fight—the perfect gift for anyone who wants to smell like grievance and power!
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- [00:00]
Tommy Vitor
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- [00:27]
Jon Lovett
Detect all objects around or behind the vehicle.
- [00:30]
Tommy Vitor
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- [01:21]
Jon Favreau
Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau.
- [01:24]
Jon Lovett
I'm Jon Lovett.
- [01:24]
Tommy Vitor
I'm Tommy Vitor.
- [01:25]
Jon Favreau
On today's show, Donald Trump sits down for his first major interview since winning the election and lays out his plans on deportations, tariffs, healthcare, political retrib, and more. The killing of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson crosses the barrier from cultural fixation to political debate, though it's still a cultural fixation. And in some incredible news, Syrian dictator Bashar Al Assad flees to Moscow, ending two generations of his family's sadistic rule. We'll get into what this means for the world and for America's new president. But first, President elect Donald Trump sat down with Kristen Welker and Meet the Press for a pretty newsy and substantive interview that lasted one hour and 16 minutes.
- [02:04]
Tommy Vitor
I wonder how long his staff was trying to call it. 30 minutes, 20 minutes?
- [02:08]
Jon Favreau
I didn't know it was that long. And I just started reading the transcript and I was like, why does this keep going?
- [02:13]
Jon Lovett
They must have budgeted an hour.
- [02:14]
Tommy Vitor
It's crazy. It's very long.
- [02:16]
Jon Favreau
There were a few big topics they went in depth on, and we're just gonna take them one at a time. Play some clips so you can get a feel for what it was like without having to suffer through the whole thing like we did.
- [02:25]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, that's a service we provide. You do not. We watch the whole thing so you don't have to.
- [02:30]
Jon Favreau
Let's start with immigration. They covered a lot here, including big questions on deportations and citizenship. Here's a sampling.
- [02:37]
Donald Trump
If they come here illegally, but their family is here legally, then the family has a choice. The person that came in illegally can go out or they can all go out together.
- [02:47]
Tommy Vitor
You promised to end birthright citizenship on day one.
- [02:50]
Jon Lovett
Is that still your plan?
- [02:51]
Donald Trump
Yeah, absolutely.
- [02:53]
Jon Favreau
So even though Trump wants to end birthright citizenship, he also said he wants to work with Democrats on a solution for the dreamers, who he spoke favorably about. Let's talk about birthright citizenship first, which I think is the big headline here, ending it, at least for the children of undocumented parents. Something of a right wing passion project. It's also birthright citizenship is also guaranteed in the constitution and the 14th amendment. Do you guys think he actually can end this?
- [03:21]
Jon Lovett
I think he wants the fight. I don't think he knows or particularly cares if he can end it. You know, it's yet another place where the Constitution is unequivocal, and yet we're having this debate because we don't know if six conservative justices will agree anymore. That's, that's the reason we can have this debate. But I think he wants the fight.
- [03:42]
Tommy Vitor
So you think he would just do something tested in court, see if the Supreme Court not go through, like the constitutional amendment process.
- [03:50]
Jon Lovett
So he said both.
- [03:51]
Jon Favreau
He doesn't have the, he wouldn't get the vote.
- [03:53]
Jon Lovett
He doesn't have the discipline. But he says that he said throughout this interview. It was a lot of moments of Welker trying to pin him down, and his whole sort of stance throughout the interview was just refusing to be pinned down. So this is one of the places where he did that, too. And he said, well, we may have to bring it to the people. But then he brought it back to the executive order and talked about the executive order he was going to issue when he was president.
- [04:15]
Tommy Vitor
It just so listeners know it's very hard to amend the Constitution just to propose an amendment to the Constitution. You require. You need support from 2/3 of both houses of Congress or 2/3 of state legislature, and then the bar is higher to 3/4 to ratify it. So, yeah, not going to happen.
- [04:30]
Jon Favreau
Supreme Court said something about this back in 1898. They ruled that birthright citizenship is part of the 14th amendment. They said the ruling there was the 14th amendment affirms the ancient and fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the territory, including all children here born of resident aliens. The only qualification, the reason that the right keeps talking about this and has for a while, is there's a qualification in the 14th Amendment that says children born in the US have to be, quote, subject to the jurisdiction thereof. But of course, undocumented immigrants are subject to U.S. jurisdiction and that they can be sanctioned for violating the law.
- [05:06]
Jon Lovett
Right. They're not ambassadors.
- [05:07]
Jon Favreau
Right. That's what I say. The only people who aren't subject to U.S. jurisdiction are foreign diplomats with diplomatic immunity. That's why that exception is in the Constitution.
- [05:15]
Jon Lovett
Something I am sure Donald Trump has ranted about. When all those ambassadors were racking up tickets in Manhattan over all those years. There's no doubt that Donald Trump fucking hated seeing those diplomatic plates. Diplomatic plates parked in the fucking fire zones.
- [05:30]
Jon Favreau
There was also a Trump appointee in the Fifth Circuit that just ruled in 2015 that the clause covers, quote, the vast majority of lawful and unlawful aliens. So it is a pretty. I mean, again, it's this Supreme Court, so who knows? But you could see Roberts, you could see. I mean, it's. It seems unlikely. What do you guys make of the cognitive dissonance between saying he wants to protect the dreamers who are children who were brought here, undocumented children who were brought here by their parents as kids, but he also thinks that kids born here shouldn't get citizenship.
- [06:04]
Jon Lovett
Yeah. So it's interesting. I actually thought the dreamers. The part where he talked about the dreamers was the most interesting part of this section because he actually was more compassionate in his language than he's been in a very long time.
- [06:17]
Jon Favreau
Yeah, not ever, but a long time.
- [06:19]
Jon Lovett
Not in a long time.
- [06:20]
Jon Favreau
He used to say that answer that he said where he was like, you gotta do something. Some of them, they're great people. You gotta do something. We're gonna do something for them. That's what he used to say when he was president.
- [06:27]
Jon Lovett
Yes. So he has not. He did not talk that way throughout the entire campaign. So I think the contradiction is that he doesn't care and he's not thinking about it that way. When he talks about birthright citizenship, he's talking about, you know, he's ranted about tourists having babies from Asia. He's talking about people that just got here. What he's. When he's referring to the dreamers, he's actually acknowledging what has been at the core of the Democratic position on this, which is you need to have a system of rules and laws going forward, but you need to recognize that people have been in this country for a very long time. It's sort of acknowledging both sides of that.
- [07:00]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, I just think he's a liar. I don't think. I mean, if he wanted to protect the dreamers. There's a deal on the table where the Democrats said he could pass tomorrow. Just do it. Protect them. Go for it. I mean, he got. There was an offer in 2018, 2019 that was basically protection for the dreamers in exchange for billions of wall funding. And Democrats walked away from it because of the wall funding at the time. But again, they could pass a narrow fix for the dreamers. I think.
- [07:22]
Jon Favreau
I wish we had taken that deal.
- [07:24]
Tommy Vitor
I do, too.
- [07:24]
Jon Lovett
Well, I think that. But I think that tells you, like, liar or not. Like, I think he would take that deal. I think that can still happen.
- [07:30]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, maybe.
- [07:30]
Jon Lovett
I'm just saying he would love the win.
- [07:32]
Tommy Vitor
I think he's a guy who doesn't want to get blamed for ugly images on tv, but ultimately supports an incredibly radical immigration agenda that includes mass deportations of tens of millions of people.
- [07:43]
Jon Favreau
Yeah, it feels like a past versus future thing. You know that he. You protect the children of undocumented immigrants who are already here, but you don't allow the children of future undocumented immigrants to become citizens. Because like you said, he believes that this birth tourism, that people come here illegally and have children as like, this is the whole quote, unquote, anchor babies. I mean, it's just.
- [08:05]
Jon Lovett
He wants. He doesn't want. Right. He wants to, after a certain date, be able to deport people without having to consider the fact that the children born here are American citizens. He wants to have a date after which he doesn't have to worry about that anymore. But unfortunately, the Constitution says otherwise.
- [08:19]
Jon Favreau
Also, there's a bigger challenge here. Like, if you. There's bigger consequences here if you suddenly decide that citizenship in the United States is not, Is not granted because you're born here. Like, the, the, the amount of people that you could start stripping citizenship from is just. It goes on for. It's crazy getting rid of birth certificates. Crazy. But we'll. I mean, they're going to try via executive order, so we'll see.
- [08:41]
Jon Lovett
Or they want. Like, we don't. Like, again, like, it's just like, this was an interview where.
- [08:44]
Jon Favreau
I mean, it seems like they're. The Wall Street Journal says they are drafting an order, so it seems like they're going to at least try. But whether. What, what happens to.
- [08:50]
Jon Lovett
What happens next? We don't know. Yeah, I just. Like, he is. It was a strange interview in that, like, basically on a few different. Few different places, Welker was like, challenging. Did you really mean this? And every single time he said, of course I did. Of course I did. But then he does this sort of more moderate sounding language on dreamers on a few other issues. So it was like an interview where he was making himself hard to pin down.
- [09:12]
Jon Favreau
It sounds like the deportation plan is to start with immigrants who've committed crimes here in America, but then go far beyond that to include undocumented immigrants who've been here for years, have jobs, pay taxes, live with American citizen family members. We've talked a lot about Democrats not becoming the defenders of the status quo, but obviously, immigration was one of the defining issues of the campaign. How do you guys think Democrats should fight this or can fight this really well?
- [09:37]
Tommy Vitor
I mean, we know there's a bunch of states where the Attorney Generals are preparing legal challenges. Groups like the ACLU will challenge in court any effort to use the military to deport people. And. And then there will be cities that will refuse to work with ICE and prevent deportation operations. So that's kind of the policy side. Then. I think part of it as Democrats, I mean, this starts to happen, you start seeing families ripped apart. You start to see he's gonna go well beyond criminals, these sort of deportations. It's gonna be farmworkers, students, people who served in the military, teachers. I think you have to lift up those stories and talk about the impact on communities.
- [10:15]
Jon Lovett
Yeah. There was a moment in the interview where he said something he hadn't said before, where Welker's asking about all these. About the kind of impact of all this kind of mass deportation, and he says, well, you know, there are these criminals. They're hiding. They're in our cities, they're on our farms. And it was a strange. Like, wait, you don't. He hasn't. He doesn't talk like that. He doesn't reference the fact that undocumented people do a ton of the labor on farms in this country. And it was. It felt like reflective of some kind of conversation he'd had where it's clear that this rounding up of people is going to impact the nation's food supply. And so he's starting to think about how to message around the impact of that. I don't know, but it was strange.
- [10:57]
Jon Favreau
Yeah. I think the hard reality of this is that it's very difficult to fight deportation. Since Trump is well within the law and past presidents of both parties have deported undocumented immigrants, cities can try not to cooperate with ice. You know, Tom Holman, the new border czar, said, if they don't cooperate, I'll just have my agents do it. It's whatever. We don't need their cooperation. But I do think you show, like Tommy said, how cruel and unnecessary and harmful it is to the country to expel people who are doing nothing more but trying to live their lives, do their jobs, haven't committed any crimes, or.
- [11:31]
Tommy Vitor
Giving back a lot to the country, contributing to the economy, to society in a million different ways.
- [11:35]
Jon Lovett
I was paying, by the way. Also, just one other lie. In all of us, undocumented people are paying into Medicare and Social Security and not able to ever recoup it.
- [11:44]
Tommy Vitor
He also lied and says we're the only country in the world that does birthright citizenship. That is totally wrong. Dozens of countries do it. The Canadians do it. Chile, like lots of countries.
- [11:52]
Jon Favreau
I think that another challenge for Democrats is because they are going to start with criminals or people who have committed crimes here in America. Obviously, you break the law if you cross the border unlawfully, but for the people who have committed crimes here in America, they are going to make a big deal out of them and then try to bait Democrats into, you know, look, the reason that there are, to the extent that there are people who've committed violent crimes or either other crimes in America who are undocumented, the reason they're still here is not because the Biden administration or other Democrats just didn't want to go after them. Part of it is because either they can't find them, or, you know, law enforcement's been looking for them but can't find them. Or sometimes people are here because we don't have agreements with the countries that they came from to send them back to those countries. And so this is. There's a number of challenges, just logistical challenges the Trump administration is going to have to grapple with just in order to do some of these deportations. I read that they're actually thinking of sending some of these undocumented immigrants back to countries that aren't their home countries because they don't have the agreements with all the countries, which is just.
- [12:55]
Tommy Vitor
And this is where Tom Homan's full of shit, the immigration czar. Sure, ICE could go to a community and find someone and take them and deport them, but they're gonna have a hard time finding them. That's the part that you need the local cops for, is the law enforcement piece, tracking people down, knowing where they are.
- [13:10]
Jon Favreau
Yeah, but it's gonna be hard. And I also think that Democrats just need to be clear in laying out the alternative. Right, which is we, of course, support going after criminals and people who've committed crimes in this country. And also you know, people who've just arrived here, or like, let's, let's. We, we're fine with removing people. Recent arrivals. Right. But people who have been here for years who just want the chance to become citizens. We should give them the chance to become citizens, and we should give them. Bring them out of the shadows so that they can contribute, which is what they wanna do in this country. I mean, I think you just have to be very clear about the message.
- [13:42]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, I think you have to. I also think, like, this interview that Trump gave is an opportunity for Democrats to say, like, okay, right, we will do your. We have. We have a conservative border bill right now. We will tie that with protections for finally letting these dreamers who did nothing wrong and who only know this country to become citizens, which you now say is something you want to do. So let's do that right now. How about. That's the first thing. That's one of the first things you can do when you become president. We should be out there taking him at his word.
- [14:11]
Jon Favreau
All right, let's talk about what to make of Trump's answers on whether he'll actually go after his political enemies. Here he is answering questions about the January 6th committee.
- [14:19]
Donald Trump
I think those people committed a major crime and Cheney was behind it. So was Benny Thompson. And everybody on that committee. We're going to. For what they did.
- [14:29]
Jon Lovett
Yeah.
- [14:30]
Donald Trump
Honestly, they should go to jail.
- [14:33]
Jon Lovett
So you think Liz Cheney should go.
- [14:34]
Jon Favreau
To jail for what everyone on the committee, you think?
- [14:38]
Donald Trump
I think everybody on the. Anybody that voted in favor.
- [14:40]
Jon Lovett
Do you want Cash Patel to launch.
- [14:42]
Jon Favreau
Investigations into people on that list?
- [14:45]
Donald Trump
No. I mean, he's going to do what he thinks is right. If they think that somebody was dishonest or crooked or a corrupt politician, I think he probably has an obligation to do it.
- [14:54]
Jon Lovett
But are you going to direct him to do it?
- [14:56]
Donald Trump
No, not at all. Not at all. I'm not looking to go back into the past. I'm looking to make our country successful. Retribution will be through success.
- [15:06]
Jon Favreau
All right, where do you think we are on the spectrum of rule of law to. Trump decides who goes to jail.
- [15:12]
Tommy Vitor
Just some pure uncut fascism there.
- [15:15]
Jon Lovett
Yeah. You know, it's funny, again, like, if you could. There he. Before that section, he's saying the right things. Saying, I'm not. I don't want. I'm not going to tell Cash Patel what to do. I'm. Pam Bondi is great. I'm not going to tell her what to do. They're going to do what they want to do. I don't want to go backwards. I'm not. That's what Biden did. I'm not for that. And then the second Welker brings up the select committee, he's like, jail. Jail for every fucking one of them.
- [15:39]
Tommy Vitor
Who voted for.
- [15:40]
Jon Lovett
Who voted for it. Jail. Well, we, we don't hear the end of that sentence. I think maybe amendment on the committee.
- [15:45]
Tommy Vitor
Because weren't there on the committee. Vote. Yeah, that's what.
- [15:47]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, right.
- [15:47]
Tommy Vitor
You vote for. Vote against me and you go to jail. I mean, just pure adulterated fascism.
- [15:51]
Jon Lovett
Yes. Also, the Constitution has protections specifically designed to protect legislators from the executive for doing their jobs. Not something that comes up in the interview. It also reminded me that there was a part in that Atlantic profile of Patel that said he's the kind of guy you don't have to tell him to do it.
- [16:09]
Tommy Vitor
That's why that question was dumb. That's why you chose Cash Patel. He has an enemies list in his book. Why you chose Pam Bondi. Well, I guess Matt Gaetz washed out. But why she was your second choice? Because you don't need to tell these people what to do. They know they're there to punish your enemies.
- [16:23]
Jon Favreau
Yeah. You could read it two ways, I think, which is one, exactly how we just talked about it, how you guys just talked about it. The other is he genuinely doesn't want to go back and doesn't want to have all these investigations. But you bring up things that he's pissed about and that he's talked about before, he's going to set him off because the man has no control of his emotions. And also, he's never been someone who's like, I changed my mind. I actually like this chain. Let's let bygones be going. He's always going to be be like, yes, she should go to jail, but I'm not going to make anything happen right now. Again, the huge problem here is whether or not you believe Trump, whether or not he means he really is going to make them go to jail or he doesn't want to go back to the past. Cash Patel and Pam Bondi are the problem because they'll either take his comments as a green light to go investigate and prosecute, or they may just decide to do whatever the fuck they want, knowing that Trump either won't care or he will approve and they will curry.
- [17:25]
Jon Lovett
Favorable glad they're doing it despite his lack of intervention, which is sort of an ideal outcome for him. Yeah. Just stepping back, this was the most unleashed Trump in this entire interview. It's an hour and 16 minute interview. It was much more like Trump on Rogan, where the clips are taken out of context to make it seem like the most dangerous and kind of unhinged version of Trump. But for the majority of this interview, he is trying to seem as reasonable and mainstream as humanly possible. And he, I think, does succeed in a lot of places. This was one place where I was like, whoa, he's definitely going beyond his, his, whatever goals he had for this interview, he has left those behind to start railing against Liz Cheney. The one thought I had while watching, I'm curious, it was a little galaxy brain which is like, man, this is not. Somebody like, this is baiting Joe Biden into pardons. That's what I, I was like, why, why would you go so hard at these people right now? You're, you're so careful throughout the rest of it to try to seem more, more, more, more disciplined.
- [18:25]
Jon Favreau
I think he just has no impulse control.
- [18:27]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, I agree.
- [18:28]
Jon Favreau
Saying this Liz Cheney is bait. I think it's like that. It's just it, he's just triggered by hearing Liz Cheney in January say, and same thing when she mentioned 2020, like, it's, it's wild to me that one of the questions was like, do you, did you win the 2020 election? I'm like, oh, we're going back there now. But like, there are certain things, not certain things. There's a lot of things you can say to Trump to, to set him off. To set him off.
- [18:48]
Tommy Vitor
He is also very mad that the January 6 committee destroyed all their records and evidence and thinks that's prosecutable now, the whole thing.
- [18:55]
Jon Favreau
He's.
- [18:55]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, he's very mad. I think he's seeking retribution. He was trying to be serious, but the minute you push him is like, he's electrocuted.
- [19:02]
Jon Favreau
But I do think, I guess where I come down on this is I would not be surprised if they do launch investigations and try to do everything he had said during the campaign he wanted to do. I would also not be surprised if nothing happens.
- [19:16]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, it's all, look, Joe Biden, it's.
- [19:21]
Jon Favreau
But if I was Biden, I think I, that's, I mean, if I was Biden, I think I would, I would, I would do, I think, really hard about preemptive pardons and blanket pardons for the J6 committee and Jack Smith and his team. And I would do the team and I would do the staff. I would do, like, for anyone who was caught up in federal employees who are investigating Donald Trump in some way. I would think seriously about pardons.
- [19:48]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, I just. It's like an umbrella, you know, you're. It's okay if you have it. You don't need it. Better than to need it and not have it. And we don't. We will knock. We do not get to go back and man, Joe Biden. Look, I think it's why he pardoned Hunter. He doesn't want to look back and realize he had this chance to save his son, didn't take it well. It's time to use that in the same way for the rest of us.
- [20:07]
Jon Favreau
He also talked about pardoning the January 6 protesters, rioters who have been convicted, who pled guilty, who are currently serving time in prison. He said that's a day one thing that he's going to do. Do you think people are going to care about that?
- [20:25]
Tommy Vitor
I do. I mean, I don't think the voters want to look back, and this is looking back. And I think. Here's what I think we have to do. The Republicans are very good at picking out a couple specific stories and examples and lifting them up.
- [20:37]
Jon Favreau
Right.
- [20:38]
Tommy Vitor
Like Lake and Riley. Any sort of incident of horrible crime against an individual by an undocumented migrant. Trump will tell that story ad nauseum. We need to not just, like, look at the statistics around January 6th or talk about it in the big picture. We need to find individuals that he pardons who are hitting cops or beating people up or being violent and get the footage of that and the stories of those individuals out on day one. I do not think that people. I mean, I think the polling on this was like 30% support for pardoning January 6th insurrectionists.
- [21:11]
Jon Favreau
Yeah, I saw. I saw Tarrion had this on CNN. It was like 33% said they were patriots, 64% were postpartums. 1% want it to be a priority, which he's clearly making it a priority if it's on day one. And 53% think that what the rioters did was an insurrection. So the public opinion is clear. I totally agree with you, Tommy, that, like, you've got to. And he kind of danced. She goes back and forth.
- [21:33]
Jon Lovett
This is what I was gonna get.
- [21:34]
Jon Favreau
Yeah. She goes back and forth on the police officers. Like, what about the people who violently assaulted police officers? Some of the way that it was written up had Trump responding by saying they had no choice. He wasn't saying. I don't think he was saying they had no choice to assault the police officers. He was referring to a different part of her question, which was, they pled guilty and he's saying they have no choice to plead guilty because it was like a forced confession kind of thing.
- [21:56]
Jon Lovett
Well, it's amazing how realistic Donald Trump can be about the criminal justice system when it's his own fucking people. Like all the J is is not fit for people. And oh well, you understand that people take plea deals just to get out of something and confess to things that they didn't actually do. Incredibly generous to his own people. Yeah, I think it matters. The other thing he did throughout this section was bounce around who was going to get pardoned. Is it who's going to be affected? He, he really didn't give any straight answer. He avoided it completely. So I think it matters who ends up getting these pardons.
- [22:26]
Jon Favreau
Right.
- [22:26]
Jon Lovett
If it's a blanket pardon for a bunch of people that assaulted cops, like we should be fucking talking about it for years. But huge issue.
- [22:32]
Jon Favreau
We should make it. I think this is a one, number one, a really big deal out of Trump is letting violent criminals out of jail to roam the streets in your neighborhood. This is when you go from, yeah, Democrats shouldn't be talking about like democracy because it doesn't really resonate with people. But criminals in your neighborhood who were committing political violence and assaulting cops. Yeah, people are going to care about that.
- [22:58]
Tommy Vitor
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- [23:59]
Jon Favreau
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- [25:06]
Tommy Vitor
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- [25:58]
Jon Favreau
All right. Trump also talked about his economic plans, including a lengthy back and forth on tariffs, with Trump saying he, quote, can't guarantee Americans won't end up paying more. He also said I can't guarantee that I can't guarantee tomorrow.
- [26:10]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, it was very, very, very metaphysical.
- [26:13]
Tommy Vitor
It was very funny.
- [26:14]
Jon Lovett
Very funny.
- [26:15]
Jon Favreau
He also talked about how his other big priority is extending the Trump tax cuts, which mostly benefit the richest Americans. Uh, he was also asked about raising the minimum wage, but didn't sound as favorable on that, even though he said he would consider it. We've talked about how Democrats need to focus on working class voters issues very early, of course, but how do you think Democrats should respond to the Trump economic agenda?
- [26:35]
Jon Lovett
What I took from this is you'd say Donald Trump has just told us what his priorities are as president. To free people that assault comps and cut taxes for the rich. That is, those are his two big priorities. Right. It's not raising the minimum wage. It's not protecting access to health care. It's not even lowering costs. It's tax cuts for the rich and freeing the people that assaulted the cops on his behalf. And that should tell you something about what you can expect from Donald Trump over the next four years.
- [27:02]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, I would hammer the tax cut issue. I was reading a report on the 2017 Trump tax cut. It found that large US pharma companies saved about $6 billion in taxes over the course of four years. And during that time, they expanded their workforce by less than 1% globally. So they saved a ton of money on taxes and they created no jobs. In 2023, Pfizer made over 27 billion and paid zero federal income taxes, thanks in part to the Trump tax cut, because they make the bulk of their money in the US and then they use loopholes and tax avoidance schemes to recognize that revenue in Ireland or whatever. So this is the opposite of populism. This is the opposite of the bullshit that Steve Bannon and his types try to tell us that the Trumpet MAGA message is about. And I think we need to really push it hard. I mean, again, like, the richest point one percent of taxpayers got a $250,000 tax cut. The poorest quintile in this country got a $70 tax cut. That's the story of the 2017 Trump tax cut that he is trying to extend.
- [28:01]
Jon Favreau
Yeah, and I do think, much like your point, Tommy, on the J6 rioters, Democrats are going to have to work hard to publicize and lift up the stories of, like, who's going to benefit from the tax cuts. Because my guess is that the Trump folks will sell the tax cut extension as middle class tax cuts for sure. In fact, I wouldn't even be surprised if they gave if they tried to propose, you know, especially with J.D. vance and that crew in there, like larger Tax cuts for the middle class. So they actually are bigger than the $70 they got last time. And I think that we need to lift up the stories of the big CEOs and billionaires who are getting the tax cut. I also think, by the way, look, there's already companies that have said they're going to raise prices thanks to the tariffs. I think every time a company announces that they're going to raise prices because of the tariffs or every time they do raise prices, we need to make a huge fucking deal of it. We need to make a huge deal of who's getting the rich people who are getting tax cuts. And I think we should also talk about people who are making minimum wage and can barely afford to get by. And I think the frame of this is we took Trump at his word. You know, he ran on making life more affordable for people and cutting costs, and he's breaking his promise. He's betraying the people who voted for him. And you know what I wouldn't do is say things like, oh, well, too bad. This is what you voted for people. Or they're idiots. Or they deserve it. Because you can already see this. People are already posting this. This is the same people who are like, well, the Latinos and immigrants who voted for him. They deserve it if they get deported. Right. This is not. When he does this, it is, he is breaking a promise to people that he made.
- [29:39]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, Chipotle just announced that they're raising prices next year. And then you look and they had an incredible increase in profits over the previous year. They're raising costs because they think they can get away with it. Corporations and Donald Trump and the billionaires around him are conspiring to raise prices. They are not focused on what you need. They are focused on each other. And you will pay the price.
- [30:01]
Jon Favreau
Another big topic in the interview is healthcare. Welker pressed him on the repeal of the Affordable Care act and on RFK Jr. S plans for childhood vaccines. Let's listen, sir, you said during the.
- [30:12]
Jon Lovett
Campaign you had concepts of a plan. Do you have an actual plan at this point for healthcare?
- [30:17]
Donald Trump
Yes, we have concepts of a plan that would be better. I'm not against vaccines. The polio vaccine is the greatest thing. If somebody told me, get rid of the polio vaccine, they're going to have to work real hard to convince me. I think vaccines are certain. Vaccines are incredible, but maybe some aren't. And if they aren't, we have to.
- [30:37]
Jon Favreau
Find out before we get to vaccines. What do you think his answers, their signal about how serious he is about taking on healthcare reform and going after the ACA again.
- [30:49]
Tommy Vitor
I don't know that he cares about health policy as much as he hates Obama and acts accordingly. I don't know. It seems like he wants credit for all the good parts of the aca, but maybe doesn't want to touch that hot stove again. But I don't know. What do guys think?
- [31:01]
Jon Favreau
I agree.
- [31:02]
Jon Lovett
I, I took it. He spent a while talking about how much he did to make Obamacare work, which is his new lie. It's obvious it's not true. He sued to get rid of Obamacare. And, you know, and, and he even responds. Welker points that he says, well, that's what I was doing to try to get rid of it. But actually administering it, he was trying to sabotage it internally, sabotaging the enrollment periods, making it more difficult to sign up. So he wasn't. He was trying to undermine Obamacare at every turn. But it does seem like he doesn't want that fight. He also.
- [31:28]
Jon Favreau
Yeah, I mean, I think he understands that the appetite for ACA repeal isn't there. It's popular.
- [31:34]
Tommy Vitor
It's like 60% approval.
- [31:35]
Jon Favreau
It's the most popular it's ever been. Only 38% of people disapproved. The appetite isn't there in Congress either. I do worry about Medicaid a lot because I think Republicans will want to gut Medicaid as part of the budget bill they're going to use to extend the Trump tax cuts. So I think we should watch that. Obviously, Biden did the Inflation Reduction act as part of a budget reconciliation bill. We talked about that more than enough when it was happening. But I think Republicans are going to now do something similar with the budget bill, and they're going to try to do tax cuts and then all of their other cuts to the budget. And I worry about health care programs that can be just, you know, cut or radically reduced just in the budget. I don't think they're going to have the votes to actually repeal the insurance protections or the law, the Affordable Care Act. But I think a lot of the money that goes to making health care affordable for people, I really do worry about that.
- [32:27]
Jon Lovett
Right. The places where they'll look to make cuts that they think they can get away with will be Medicaid and will be food stamps. They will go after the programs that target the poor, especially because in this interview and previously, Trump has said that he wants to carve out Social Security and Medicare. He knows politically it's toxic. And so where Are you going to find the money to pay for a $200,000 tax cut for a person making $5 million? You're going to cut food stamp increases by $20 a month.
- [32:52]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah. And the Doge bozos like Elon and Vivek are like learning in real time on Twitter that most of us spending, federal spending, is entitlement programs like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security. And they're like, amazing. Look at this quote.
- [33:04]
Jon Favreau
Tweet drives me fucking nuts.
- [33:07]
Tommy Vitor
It's like day one.
- [33:08]
Jon Favreau
Did you guys all hear about this?
- [33:10]
Jon Lovett
The Elon posting? Elon posting something like, we're paying so much for healthcare, but we're not really getting a good value for it. Like you fucking. We've been dealing with this. This is talking about this for fucking 20 years.
- [33:20]
Jon Favreau
Good thing a brilliant man like me has looked into this.
- [33:23]
Jon Lovett
Yeah.
- [33:23]
Jon Favreau
You guys know that no one has done that before.
- [33:25]
Jon Lovett
You know the administrative cost on private insurance versus Medicare, it's out of control.
- [33:29]
Jon Favreau
Dilatants brief exchange about abortion. Welker asked if he would be restricting access to abortion pills and he made it seem like he would not. I think the question is like, does he come under more pressure from Republicans in Congress now that they have a majority in both houses to do more an abortion than he might be inclined to do? Or, you know, she asked the question about the abortion pill. That would be an administrative action. Does some of the loons he has put in charge of his government decide to move on that?
- [33:56]
Tommy Vitor
That's the big question. I think clearly Republicans want a national abortion ban. This is part of their project. There are a bunch of right wing zealots in the House in particular who will stop at nothing to get a federal abortion ban. The question is whether Speaker Johnson will keep those people under wraps if he and Trump have cut some sort of deal.
- [34:16]
Jon Favreau
I don't. Yeah, I think that the votes aren't there in the House. The Republicans don't have a big enough majority and the frontline members are not in districts where they're going to. Especially since the frontline members are a lot of them blue state Republicans. They're not going to want to do that. I think it's not. The appetite's not there among enough Republican senators to do that. They're not going to vote in the Senate either. I worry about the Comstock act and what happens within the administration.
- [34:42]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, the question is always on abortion with Trump has been not what does he want to do, but what is he willing to stop. That's why the most important question during the election was, would you veto a bill? That's. That's why the questions around what he would do administratively are so important, and he has evaded those answers. I think he clearly understands how damaging politically this has been for him and does not want the fight, but a lot of people around him do.
- [35:04]
Jon Favreau
All right, let's have the vaccines all over the place there. He says that Kennedy won't be upending the system. That's.
- [35:13]
Jon Lovett
That was.
- [35:13]
Jon Favreau
Yeah, but if you watch or read through, it's also pretty clear he's bought into the idea that there. There's been a huge spike in autism in America and that it has. Has to be attributable to something external, maybe vaccines. Who knows? Let's investigate. He also mentions at one point that it could be chlorine in the water, presumably meaning fluoride, which we know RFK wants to get rid of.
- [35:32]
Tommy Vitor
Oh, that's what he meant.
- [35:34]
Jon Lovett
Yeah. Okay. That's. That's what he meant. Got it. Cool. I mean, think of it. Unless you're worried about public pools, I don't know. I took it to mean fluoride.
- [35:41]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah.
- [35:42]
Jon Favreau
It seems the danger to me seems again that, like, Trump is at risk of just getting convinced by RFK Jr. To make these major public health changes. And by the way, if RFK goes off on his own and does some investigation, it's just an investigation, like, oh, I wonder what's going to turn up. You know, this is the problem.
- [36:00]
Tommy Vitor
Rfk, this is what he cares about. This is the only thing he cares about. In 2021, he did a podcast interview where he said he goes hiking. If he sees a parent carrying a little baby, he'll say to them, better not get him vaccinated. Like, literally, like he says, as strangers on the hiking trail. He said this. So that is not a nuanced perspective. That includes a carve out for polio. This is an ideologue who is dishonest, who is sloppy, and if he gets access to a big bunch of data, he's going to find what he wants to find. And in the process, I don't know where Trump will land on all this, but in the process, the US Government sowing chaos and making people hesitant or scared to get vaccines, like that is going to do damage.
- [36:40]
Jon Favreau
Yeah. To me, that's like the best case scenario is a huge fight over vaccines. And Whether, you know, RFK's bullshit study is right or wrong. You could get a whole bunch of people in HHS who, whistleblowers, saying, no, this is bullshit. Blah, blah. If There is conflict about it that is going to increase hesitancy. That's going to do damage enough.
- [36:59]
Jon Lovett
Yeah, I'm, I'm, I think RFK Jr. Coming out and trying to withdraw vaccine approvals, causing a kind of giant national debate over this. Do I think that's necessarily going to happen? No. I worry about the kind of quiet power this guy's going to have behind the scenes to decide what gets funded, what doesn't get funded, who's in charge of overseeing like these investigations. And like it's going the ways in which, like for a long time on abortion, the question was, would the court overturn Roe v. Wade? And what they did was then the headlines would end up being Court upholds Roe v. Wade while undermining abortion all along the way. And I worry about what happens when you have somebody like RFK Jr. In charge of the Department of Health and Human Services and it comes out RFK Jr will not be banning vaccines, but the policies that are now coming down from the top throughout HHS are undermining vaccination campaigns, undermining public health research, undermining the institutions that are not just making sure people are getting vaccinated now, but investigating and doing the research into the next generation of vaccines. Like, I'm worried about the, like what happens when the headlines fade because he's not doing the big terrible thing and we just live with the slow degradation of what is the incredible public health apparatus, like the incredible achievements of America's public health system.
- [38:17]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, I think he's going to do both. I mean, he's already said, I mean, there's some quote out there. We said, I'm going to tell the, you know, the researchers that we're going to hit pause for eight years on basically R and D on some of these vaccines and things. But what always happens with these anti vax advocates is they get a mound of data and they find in what they want and then the scientists on the other side are left having conversations about correlation, not causation and other variables and the uncertainty of the scientific process and yada, yada, yada, and we just lose that public debate. And in the process, a bunch of parents are like, I don't know, man, this measles thing is scary.
- [38:49]
Jon Favreau
And I heard this story, I read something online.
- [38:52]
Tommy Vitor
There's this awful example of a child who, you know, got the shots and then all of a sudden wasn't responsive. And you know, that stuff is really powerful.
- [39:00]
Jon Favreau
Yeah. Next thing you know, they take away your Diet Coke.
- [39:03]
Tommy Vitor
Never.
- [39:03]
Jon Lovett
He's not Stupid enough to go after Maya and Donald Trump's Diet Coke.
- [39:06]
Jon Favreau
I know. That's where he draws the line. Foreign policy was not a major focus of the Meet the Press interview, which Trump recorded on Friday morning, two days before Assad's regime fell in Syria. Though the issue did come up when Welker asked about Tulsi Gabbard's nomination to be Director of National Intelligence. Gabbard had a couple of infamous secret meetings with Assad that reportedly have a bunch of senators worried about her nomination. With good reason. Let's listen to Trump's response.
- [39:32]
Jon Lovett
Let me ask you about former Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard. You picked her to be the Director of national intelligence in 2017. She had two secret meetings with Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad.
- [39:41]
Tommy Vitor
Do you have questions or concerns about those meetings?
- [39:44]
Donald Trump
No. And he's got bigger problems right now.
- [39:46]
Tommy Vitor
Well, do you think it makes it hard for her?
- [39:48]
Donald Trump
His country is collapsing? Yeah.
- [39:49]
Jon Lovett
I mean, do you think it compromises her ability to.
- [39:51]
Donald Trump
I met with Putin. I met with President Xi of China. I met with Kim Jong Un twice. Does that mean when you were president. When you were president.
- [39:58]
Jon Favreau
Well, when you were president, they weren't.
- [40:00]
Jon Lovett
Do you have confidence in Tulsi Gabbard?
- [40:02]
Donald Trump
I do. As soon as. I mean, she's a very respected person.
- [40:06]
Jon Favreau
Before we get into the politics of it, Tommy, can you just walk everyone through what actually happened this weekend, since this is now the biggest story in the world? I know you and Ben did a bonus episode about this for Pod Save the World that everyone should check out.
- [40:18]
Tommy Vitor
We recorded something Sunday. We'll do another one on Tuesday for Wednesday. But check them out if you want the longer story. I mean, the short answer is that in Syria, these opposition forces toppled 50 years of Assad rule and 13 years of the civil war, and they just drove them out of town. It was lightning speed. The rebels basically started coming south from northwestern Syria and over the course of eight days, took city after city after city until they just rolled into Damascus and Assad had to fly to Russia, where he will now live out the rest of his life, hopefully in some squalid conditions. So it's just a truly historic moment where one of the most brutal regimes in modern history fell, and Bashar Al Assad came after his father, who was just as brutal, and took power in a couple. And Bashar killed 500,000 of his own people through the course of the civil war. He's a truly horrific human being.
- [41:14]
Jon Favreau
Sounds like when push came to shove, Iran and Russia really weren't there for their pals in Syria.
- [41:19]
Tommy Vitor
They were not there. They were either tied up in Ukraine or tied up in Lebanon or Hezbollah had been decapitated by the Israelis. So his benefactors were not around to bail him out this time.
- [41:31]
Jon Favreau
Well, then let's talk about his other friend, Tulsi Gabbard. What do you think this means for Gabbard's nomination? Anything?
- [41:39]
Tommy Vitor
I mean, that's a good question. So the kind of hit list on her, they mentioned it there. She met with Assad twice. She flew to Syria to meet with him in 2017. Then she got this kind of PR tour around Aleppo after it had been bombed to dust by Assad and the Russians. She said, Assad is not the enemy of the United States. She refused to say Assad as a war criminal. She also refuses to believe that Assad used chemical weapons on his own people, which he very much did. And so there's all these other weird examples. Like in 2018, the House Foreign Affairs Committee held a closed door meeting with a Syrian defector who had smuggled all this evidence of Assad's brutality and war crimes out of Syria. And bipartisan groups of staffers were so worried about Tulsi being there that the guy wore a mask in, like, closed door hearings. And then there's this, that same NBC report that talked about that mentioned a trip Tulsi took to the Turkey Syria border in 2015. There she met with two little girls who had been horrifically burned from airstrikes while they were living at this IDP camp. And she asked them, how do you know it was a Russians and Assad who bombed you and not isis? And the answer is, ISIS doesn't have an air force, you fucking moron. So it's like, are you an Assad fan? Are you just that stupid? You know what I mean? Like, how do you get to.
- [42:55]
Jon Favreau
Neither speaks very well for qualifications for dni.
- [42:59]
Jon Lovett
No, yeah, there's also the. She embraced the conspiracy theory around biolabs in Ukraine. And like, you know, this has become, like, ideological and because, like. And John Bolton has been one of the most, like, fervent opponents. But the point he made, which is just like, this isn't. She just seems like she has terrible judgment, like, it's not ideological. She's a fucking kook. And like, whether or not the fact that she was so solicitous towards Assad and like, the specific situation in Syria aside, like, the fact that all this is unfolding as she's about to go into these hearings is a reminder, like this is a serious and important job. Like the, like Trump. One part in the Welker interview, Welker says, you know, you said you would end the war in one day if you were president. So how's that going?
- [43:47]
Tommy Vitor
It's going.
- [43:47]
Jon Lovett
And it is like, to me, like, it is a the Heg says stuff, the Gabbard stuff. It's a reminder to me like, Trump has won twice as a challenger. He has lost as an incumbent. It is easy to say how you will solve every problem and understand how to turn every key when you are a candidate, but when you were president, these are serious, real and complicated issues that demand serious, capable people. And Tulsi Gabbard, Pete Hegseth, these are not those people.
- [44:15]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, you need a team. And I get where Tulsi's coming from. On not saying Assad is not the enemy of the United States. She's just trying to make an argument that we shouldn't go to war in Syria or on behalf of the Syrian opposition. I understand that. But in service of that goal, she became an apologist for this evil war criminal who was using chemical weapons on his own people, who's throwing people in these gulags and torturing them for years and years and years. And so, you know, there's going to be the Gabbard hearing, but then there's going to be a set of policy questions for Trump. There's 900 U.S. troops sitting in Syria right now working with these Kurdish forces to keep ISIS at bay. There's Syrian chemical weapons stockpiles that are kind of littered throughout the country still. These Israelis were bombing those over the weekend. CENTCOM was hitting all these ISIS targets. There's going to be this need to make sure that this isn't just chapter one of the Syrian civil war, but that something good comes out of it, some sort of viable state. Because the Syrian civil war led to 5 million people, I think, fleeing beyond Syria who are living as refugees. Most of them are in the sort of neighboring countries like Jordan, Egypt, Lebanon, et cetera. But, you know, I think Germany took like 800,000 refugees in. A lot of those people want to go home. A lot of that migration destabilized the politics in these European countries and led to the rise of these far right parties. So there's a huge opportunity right now for the international community to step up, help Syria, help people come home and make it a viable state and not let it devolve into just another fucking nightmare for these people who have lived through hell for the last decade and the Question is, what is Trump gonna do? Cause his tweet is like, not our problem. That's his take. And then his DNI is like an Assad fan.
- [45:54]
Jon Lovett
And then you have Rubio who's been a hawk. It's just like the contradictions get resolved. When you're govern, they can exist while you're campaigning, they don't get to continue to exist when you're governing.
- [46:02]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah.
- [46:03]
Jon Favreau
Did you see in Playbook today, they were reporting that Gabbard's defenders now are gonna say, well, she once called him a brutal dictator. And also she has top secret clearance. So if there was any problems this would have come up. Then that process is always perfect. Right. And then she was just promoted also to be a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve. So that's all of this stuff is qualifications for that.
- [46:29]
Jon Lovett
But I'm like, the army reserv process probably isn't geared to look into international fucking trips to meet with Assad. Like, I'm sure she did what she needed to do to earn that promotion, but like, it's a ridiculous defense.
- [46:40]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, they're the. The Air Force reservist named Jack Teixeira was the kid who leaked all those top secret documents onto Discord to his gamer buddies. So I, I don't know that that's the bar we're going to hold the DNI to.
- [46:50]
Jon Favreau
Seems. Seems Pods of America is brought to you by the Zero Emission Transportation Association Education Fund. The Zeta Education Fund is working to ensure more Americans are aware of the positive economic impact the EV and battery supply chain is having on communities across the country, especially since the passage of the Inflation Reduction act and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. So here are the facts to date. The EV and battery supply chain has already created 240,000 jobs, attracted $177 billion of investment, and supports millions of jobs in the electricity industry. More than a million EVs were sold in the US last year, and three out of four were made in America. There are currently 200,000 public charging locations in the United States and 1,000 more coming online each week. EVs are great cars, but it's also important to know that they're already making a positive economic impact, creating jobs and strengthening communities. Whether or not you drive one. Join forces with the Zeta Education Fund and help spread the facts about what a transition to EVs means to the future of the United States. Get on board@zeta.org join that's zeta.org join.
- [48:05]
Tommy Vitor
Pod Save America is brought to you by GiveWell. You like to optimize things. You've chosen the perfect credit card to maximize your travel points. Shouldn't you handle your charitable giving the same way? GiveWell spends 50,000 hours every year doing deep dives into charitable programs to try to find the ways to do the most good for your dollar. Over 100,000 donors have used GiveWell to donate more than $2 billion. Rigorous evidence suggests that these donations will save over 200,000 lives and improve the lives of millions more. Givewell wants as many donors as possible to make informed decisions about high impact giving. You can find all of their research and recommendations on their site for free. You can make tax deductible donations to their recommended funds or charities and GiveWell doesn't take a cut. Go to givewell.org to find out more or make a donation, select Podcast and enter Pod Save America at checkout to make sure they know you heard about them from us. Again, that's givewell.org to donate or find out more and then select Podcast and enter Pod Save America at checkout to make sure they know we sent you Pod Save America is brought to you by Aura Frames. I think the perfect gift is something that shows real thought and effort and time and is personalized and meaningful to the person. Which is probably why the people we love the most can often be the hardest ones to shop for. Luckily, there's one gift that everyone on your list is sure to enjoy. The Aura Digital Picture Frame. Named number one by wirecutter, Aura Frames makes it incredibly easy to share unlimited photos and videos directly from your phone to the frame. And when you give Aura Frame as a gift, you can personalize and preload it with a thoughtful message and photos using the Aura app, making it an ideal present for the long distance loved one. I've got Aura Frames for a bunch of family members. It's a great gift because you can just constantly upload new photos. You know if you've got a new baby in the house, you've got a pet you love. If you just want to show mom and dad what you're up to, consider an Aura frame. I guarantee you they will love it. Save on the perfect gift by visiting auraframes.com to get $35 off Aura's bestselling Carver Matte Frames by using the promo code Crooked at checkout. That's a U R A frames.com promo code crooked. This deal is exclusive to listeners, so get yours now in time for the holidays. Terms and conditions apply.
- [50:20]
Jon Favreau
We've been following the shooting of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Like everyone Else a story that now clearly has a political angle.
- [50:27]
Jon Lovett
Well, because he's running for the 2028 primary, correct?
- [50:30]
Jon Favreau
Yes. We don't know which party. As of this recording Monday afternoon, LA time police have a, quote, strong person of interest in custody, 26 year old Luigi Mangione, who was apprehended at a McDonald's in Pennsylvania with a backpack containing a gun, a silencer, fake IDs matching the ones used in New York, and a handwritten manifesto that didn't give the health insurance industry the best reviews. This was after the bullet casings found at the scene had the words delay, deny and depose written on them. The reactions on social media, which is why this is one of the reasons why this is a big story, have ranged from people joking about the murder to celebrating it. UnitedHealth Group had to shut off the Facebook reactions to the announcement of Thompson's death. After nearly 75,000 users responded with a laughing emoji. The reaction inevitably reached the point where politicians got asked about it. Here's California Congressman ro Khanna on ABC's this Week on Sunday.
- [51:24]
Donald Trump
Let me just say it was horrific.
- [51:27]
Tommy Vitor
I mean, this is a father we're.
- [51:28]
Donald Trump
Talking about of two children and my sympathies to the entire family. There is no justification for violence. But the outpouring afterwards has not surprised me. Look, I as A congressperson had UnitedHealthcare deny a prescription for a nasal $100 pump spray and I couldn't get them to reverse this. So imagine what ordinary people are dealing with. The biggest denial comes when it's cancer treatment, where people are getting denied on cancer treatment. And my view is very simple. Why can't we have a rule that if a doctor prescribes something and if Medicare, traditional Medicare is going to cover it, then private insurance companies should be forced to cover it? I mean, it's absurd in this country. What's going on?
- [52:10]
Jon Favreau
I think that's a good idea. What do you guys think of Ro's answer and what's your general take on this story?
- [52:17]
Jon Lovett
So when I saw that the shooting had happened, I was like, okay, so here's what's going to happen next. I just was waiting for it. Like, there's going to be a round of people celebrating it. There's going to be a round of people criticizing the people for celebrating it. Then a round of people criticizing, criticizing those people for not understanding the pain that people are experiencing in their lives.
- [52:35]
Jon Favreau
Everybody, next thing you know, universal health care, right?
- [52:37]
Jon Lovett
Like, right. It's sort of like Medicare for all or Else, Right? That's the worst ideas I've heard. But the, but the kind of like performative, the way, the way you demonstrate you really understand what's broken in our healthcare system is by performing this lack of empathy. That's how you demonstrate you really get it. And if you don't have that lack of empathy, that means you don't really get it. All of that I was just sort of like, just sort of waiting for. And of course, like unfolded actually worse than I expected. It was all pretty ugly. The thing that I. There is a lot of like earned vitriol, like insurance companies. Some are better than others. Plenty play games, even break the law to try to avoid paying. We have a cruel and broken system. Like, that's what we have. Like this guy, well compensated, is a tool of a broken system. This insurance company exists and benefits from a broken system and like that. To me, like, I want to have a debate about the broken healthcare system and why we have this ridiculous system where half the people get insurance through work, which creates these incredibly convoluted and broken incentives. Where we have publicly traded companies that exist to create a difference between how much they pay out in health benefits versus how much they recoup in premiums. Like their job is to maximize that differential. We built a whole system around it. That's fucking stupid. That is terrible. That causes all kinds of harms. But like, the idea that we're going to associate the murder of a health executive with Medicare for All, to me, does not bring us anywhere closer to Medicare for All. We're not going to shoot our way to universal healthcare and it ends up becoming a kind of vicious and negative and divisive debate. A debate we can win without kind of needing to resort to this sort of like ridiculous, kind of performative, I don't know what you'd call it. Theatrics, heroics, I don't know.
- [54:26]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, people can make jokes. The reason I don't make them is because I just think that people all have families and, you know, let's think about it on a human level. And then also, you know, deciding that we're tacitly supporting targeted assassination is the slipperiest of slopes in my view. And I saw people saying, well, you know, United Healthcare is responsible for more deaths because they deny claims. Well, what if someone decides that rationale applies to like, you know, abortion rights groups, goes after their CEOs. Right. I just, I think copycat violence is a real problem. So let's just not celebrate this stuff. That said, everyone has had a terrible interaction with an insurance company. Every single person. The insurers reject one in seven claims for treatment. ProPublica had a really long investigation in February of 2023. That worth reading about UnitedHealthcare. It's one story about the treatment of a patient who finally found an effective treatment for a debilitating disease that was wildly expensive. He was denied his family then sued and they got access to all these recorded calls and documents and things that just outlined the way UnitedHealthcare put profits ahead of his healthcare or anything else and lied and did all these horrible things. So. But I think the net effect of this incident is probably going to be that a bunch of corporate CEOs getting armed security and their customers pay for it. And that's, you know, the frustrating part.
- [55:46]
Jon Favreau
Yeah. According to the New York Times, some people on social media said that people who have information about the killing shouldn't share it with authorities. The hostel that he was staying in was cooperating with the authorities and they got threats because they were cooperating. Some people posted names and pictures of other health insurance executives. I'm going to take the, I'll take the neolib, squishy, centrist position that murder.
- [56:09]
Jon Lovett
Let's hear it.
- [56:10]
Jon Favreau
Murder is bad.
- [56:11]
Jon Lovett
Yeah.
- [56:12]
Jon Favreau
Also denying people life saving health care because they can't afford it. Bad. How about that?
- [56:17]
Jon Lovett
Wow, that's incredible.
- [56:18]
Jon Favreau
How about that?
- [56:19]
Jon Lovett
Incredible. Incredible.
- [56:20]
Tommy Vitor
Start the third way.
- [56:22]
Jon Favreau
Hope all them, hope all the murderers are caught and punished. Also hope we pass more laws to make sure that everyone can get the health care they need without the insurance company putting them through hell, which insurance companies frequently do.
- [56:33]
Jon Lovett
Yeah. I feel like the other, like, why do we have a system where all these people have horror stories, like terrible stories about what it's like to engage with these companies? These companies exist to deny claims and make life harder. And you know, Barack Obama used to tell stories about what it was like when his mother had cancer and how you're, you're dealing with the worst moment of your life and you're on the phone with insurance companies, like, why does this system exist? And the debate online. Fine, it's not real life. But I do think it captures something that is real about the healthcare debate, which is there are all these people that are screaming like, this system is fucking stupid. It is stupid. Right? And yet when you try to change it, you run into this buzzsaw. Now, part of that is because the insurance lobby donates a lot to campaigns. They run a lot of ads. There's a lot of anti government, anti Medicare, Propaganda, a lot of right wing propaganda about this. But the reality is when you ask people, do you like your insurance? The vast majority say they do. Even when a majority of those people say they've had problems with their health insurance, that one in six say that they've had claims that they could never resolve. Yeah, that they could never resolve.
- [57:37]
Jon Favreau
Just, just to put some statistics there, like Kaiser Family foundation did very large poll, June of last year, June of 23, 81% of people give their health insurance a rating of excellent or good. Now if you're in poorer health, that number falls, but it falls to 68% still pretty high. 58% say they've had a problem with their health insurance in the last year though half of those people say it was resolved to their satisfaction. And then 27%. So one in three people say in the last year they've had a specific issue with a claim denial or the insurance company paying less than they had hoped the insurance company would pay. Clearly a problem. To your point though, let's talk about what the barriers are, right? What happened in when we tried to pass the Affordable Care act. Right. Which was a herculean effort that cost a lot of Democrats their jobs, a lot of House members. Everyone talks about what happened in 2010 and like why didn't down ballot win and was it OFA or this or that? No, no, no. A bunch of people took the vote, knew that they would probably lose because they took the vote for Affordable Care act, but they thought it was important enough to do anyway and they did it. The Affordable Care act, which didn't even pass with a public option because we didn't have the votes for a public option which still isn't single payer. We passed a bunch of insurance company reforms that put a bunch of new regulations on insurance companies, but we couldn't get more than that. Fast forward to the 2020 Democratic primary where the central debate in the primary was over Medicare for All. And what happened there. Medicare for all ended up less popular than it started at the beginning of the primary. Because when you ask people, should the government guarantee health insurance? People say yes. Like 60% say yes. When you ask people, do you think it should be a government run system or a private insurance system? More people want private insurance than they do government. That number has narrowed now, but that's still. So it is not. It is a problem with the insurance industry, it is a problem with their lobbying, it is a problem with the money in politics. It is certainly a problem with the Republican party, but it's also, we have work to do convincing people to change this system.
- [59:35]
Tommy Vitor
Well, it's also, I think, look, I think the fact that profit is in the healthcare system is the original sin here. The thing that we would all want.
- [59:42]
Jon Favreau
To get rid of, but the if we were doing it over again, we would have profit in the system.
- [59:47]
Tommy Vitor
Single payer, Medicare for all type system. The challenge that you outlined though is getting people to trust that the government is going to competently administer that system is also a great challenge. I imagine that challenge was not aided by the rollout of healthcare.gov during the ACA fight and roll out in the second Obama term. So.
- [60:06]
Jon Favreau
Well, and let's talk about why that was such a challenge. Right in 2013, as part of the Affordable Care act, we said, look, if insurance companies try to give people these shitty plans that don't cover anything where they're paying a lot of money, but they still can't get good coverage, what the government's gonna do is say we're gonna cancel those plans. And the government canceled those plans. And suddenly there was a fucking uproar like you wouldn't believe. Because people said, I thought I could keep my health insurance if I liked.
- [60:33]
Jon Lovett
My health insurance because of a line that you had to include when you were campaigning to reform the healthcare system, which is if you like your plan, you can keep your plan. Which was going to be true for it. 98% of people.
- [60:43]
Tommy Vitor
The website didn't work too. That wasn't great.
- [60:45]
Jon Favreau
But I was saying the bigger one was the real political problem was why did we get all these cancellations? And now people are like, well, everyone hates their health insurance plan. Well, actually no, we tried to cancel a bunch of really shitty plans that didn't do a lot to cover people. And there was a fucking uproar. So that's not to say that we, of course we should try again, but it is much more complicated with actual people.
- [61:06]
Jon Lovett
The other part of this is like, oh, people. People also say they're comfortable with expanding insurance by the government. They just like, I do think like, okay, so half the country roughly has health insurance through their employer. That is the system we built. That is a convoluted, broken system that creates a bunch of perverse incentives. It, it means that insurers don't cover, don't have much of an incentive to cover preventative care because if you change jobs, you change insurers, creates a whole host of problems. Small percentage of people buy their own insurance, about 10%. The rest are either uninsured or in the public systems. We already have a huge chunk of the country in public health care. And that poll that John talked about, it said that 81% of people like their private insurance. It's even higher for Medicare. Medicare is extremely popular. And I do think like, like the point that Ro Khanna makes in that, in that interview is smart. Right. Like that private insurance should cover anything Medicare should cover. He's thinking about the ways in which to make private insurance more like Medicare basically, which costs far less to administer.
- [62:05]
Jon Favreau
Right.
- [62:05]
Jon Lovett
There's a huge percentage of private insurance costs go towards administration. What's administration? It's paying the staff that reviews claims, tries to make their costs low. Right. It's money that goes to getting worse health care than actually paying providers. But like part of what happens when you end up only debating when the debate becomes about are you for single payer or against single payers. You don't have other debates, a debate like should we lower the Medicare eligibility age to 60, how about that?
- [62:31]
Jon Favreau
Or I was going to say to your point about people liking Medicare so much, I think that the plan offered in 2020, that was both the best plan but also the most politically palatable plan and that most people liked it was. Remember Pete Buttigieg proposed Medicare for all who want it.
- [62:47]
Jon Lovett
Yes.
- [62:47]
Jon Favreau
And so basically it would allow anyone, if you really want Medicare and you want to be covered by Medicare, you can choose that. And if you really don't want that and you really want your private health insurance plan, you can choose that. And the idea would be that Medicare would be so popular that more and more people would buy in and we would eventually transition to a system where Medicare covers everyone.
- [63:04]
Jon Lovett
There's a lot of yes, that was sort of a form of a public option. But like you lower the medic, like, you know, the public option was killed from Obamacare and it was killed by a bunch of senators. They all hid behind Joe Lieberman. It was killed by a bunch of people. But one thing that Joe Lieberman personally killed was the Medicare buy in for people. And that was just a policy to help. Like if you were between the ages of 60 and 65, that is where your health. You're not yet in Medicare, but you still are in the age where you're starting to have more and more health problems. It's extremely expensive group to ensure if you get laid off when you're 58, you're incredibly expensive. Like there's a huge bunch of problems that happen there. And Joe Lieberman personally killed a Medicare buy in. But like if we could get the Medicare age down to 60. It costs about $25 billion a year, but tiny, tiny fraction of the budget. And that alone would bring health care costs down for everybody just by dint of getting this pool of expensive people to insure off. But like, these are the kinds of things I think we should be talking about, like simple fixes that get us on the road to Medicare for all. Because if you're, if you, if, like, if, like, like Rose Ro Khanna said, like, not surprised by the reaction. There's an incredible amount of anger and antipathy towards health insurance companies. We should target it, we should direct it towards a political aim that could actually help people as soon as possible.
- [64:15]
Jon Favreau
Well, guess what? If there were Democratic majorities in Congress and Democratic president, we'd, we'd get a public option. We didn't last time around, even though Joe Biden proposed it because we had Kirsten Cinema and Joe Manchin. If we had won the Senate this time around and won the House and won the presidency, then we'd be talking about a public option for a second term.
- [64:31]
Jon Lovett
And these should be part of the, like, when we talk about, like, what are Democrats for? We spent a long, you know, what is our big agenda for the future? Like, these kinds of big changes have.
- [64:40]
Jon Favreau
To be part of it. All right, before we go, if anyone's looking for a last minute stocking stuffer, we do have a gift for you.
- [64:46]
Donald Trump
My new Trump fragrances are here. They make a great Christmas present. I've named them Fight, Fight, Fight because they represent winning. We all want to be winning. We have to win as a nation. We want to win as a family. This fragrance is all about strength and success and confidence for men and for women. Get yourself a bottle and don't forget to grab one for your loved ones too. They'll thank you and they'll even smell good.
- [65:14]
Jon Lovett
How is that real?
- [65:15]
Jon Favreau
I hadn't listened to the smell good.
- [65:17]
Jon Lovett
Hey, did, did, did a raccoon with Axe body spray wander into McDonald's? No, no, that's my new cologne. That's, that's my new cologne. It's fight, Fight, Fight, Fight, Fight. I'm wearing my Donald Trump scented cologne. It's fight, Fight, Fight.
- [65:30]
Jon Favreau
Donald Trump was in Paris this weekend at the reopening of the Notre Dame Cathedral. The first lady was there, Jill Biden. Apparently they were sitting near each other. They spoke. It was a pleasant exchange. There's a picture of Trump talking to Jill Biden where she's smiling. Trump posted that picture with a caption that said A fragrance your enemies can't resist. Used as an ad for Fight, Fight, Fight.
- [65:56]
Jon Lovett
Look, I think. I think you don't want to. The fucking liberal media doesn't want to face it. Jill Biden wants to fuck Donald Trump. That's. That's in Notre Dame Cathedral in a holy fucking place. That's what. That's what. The news won't fucking cover it. The news won't talk about it. The news won't talk about it.
- [66:11]
Jon Favreau
It will say. There's a lot of laughter from the coach. Farah's draw dropped.
- [66:19]
Tommy Vitor
It's like he kept rolling out these products during the campaign. And I was like, maybe he thinks he's gonna lose and he's just getting, like, one last grift in. But now he's president and he's rolling out a fragrance. Come on, man. You have so many avenues for corruption. You're going to be just fine. You don't need a fragrance.
- [66:34]
Jon Favreau
I always want more. I always want more.
- [66:36]
Tommy Vitor
Get the crypto.
- [66:37]
Jon Favreau
Get the. It's called Fight, Fight, Fight because it represents winning. That just doesn't make. Doesn't make a lot of sense.
- [66:43]
Jon Lovett
You gotta smell it. Listen, Smell like a winner. You gotta. That.
- [66:47]
Jon Favreau
He would have been a better tagline.
- [66:49]
Jon Lovett
You got it.
- [66:51]
Jon Favreau
Trump fragrance. Smell like a winner.
- [66:52]
Jon Lovett
You gotta go in the store and smell the fragrance. Well, you gotta trust it based on a brand. It could smell like anything.
- [66:57]
Tommy Vitor
Yeah, there needs to be some place to buy this stuff where the money doesn't go to him. Like a secondary sale, you know, kind of used fragrance store. I don't want to give him money, but you do smoke a bottle around the office and squirt it on you guys.
- [67:11]
Jon Lovett
Fight, Fight, Fight.
- [67:14]
Jon Favreau
That's our show for today. If you have smelled Fight, Fight, Fight cologne, please let us know what it smells like.
- [67:19]
Tommy Vitor
If you bought it, sell it. Me.
- [67:21]
Jon Favreau
Yeah. And it says if anyone's looking for a present for me, you know what to get me. That's our show for today. We'll be back with a new show on Wednesday. If you want to listen to Pod Save America ad free or get access to our subscriber discord and exclusive podcasts, consider joining our friends of the pod community@crooked.com friends or subscribe on Apple Podcasts directly from the Pod Save America feed. Also, be sure to follow Pod Save America on TikTok, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube for full episodes, bonus content, and more. And before you hit that next button, you can help boost this episode by leaving us a review and by sharing it with friends and Family Pod Save America is a crooked media production. Our producers are David Toledo and Saul Rubin. Our associate producer is Farah Safaree. Reed Churlin is our executive editor and Adrian Hill is our executive producer. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Writing support by Hallie Kiefer Madeline Herringer is our head of news and programming. Matt DeGroat is our head of production. Andy Taff is our Executive assistant. Thanks to our digital team Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Phoebe Bradford, Joseph Dutra, Ben Hefcoat, Mia Kelman, Molly Lobel, Kirill Pelaviev and David Toles.
- [68:41]
Tommy Vitor
The first ever Kia K4 seamlessly combines bold style and advanced tech. With striking star map, LED headlights and an available panoramic display, the Kia K4 delivers design and function. The available Surround View and Blind Spot View monitors can help provide added confidence. Plus SiriusXM comes standard, bringing you closer to what you love. The Kia K4 balances aesthetics and innovation. Learn more at kia.com K4 surround view and blind Spot View monitors may not.
- [69:09]
Jon Lovett
Detect all objects around or behind the vehicle.
- [69:12]
Tommy Vitor
Hell's gates are open. Get ready to save Humanity in Diablo 4 Vessel of hatred Continue the saga and carve your own path through Sanctuary's cursed lands with massive updates to character progression difficulties and loot systems for powerful demon slaying action. Unleash fierce skills as you embark on an immersive campaign. Tackle new co op dungeons and team up with allies using the new party finder. Hell awaits you. Get Diablo 4 and the new expansion Vessel of Hatred, available now in the Diablo 4 expansion bundle. Rated M for mature.