The Worst Way to Spend $200 Billion

Summary

Pod Save America – The Worst Way to Spend $200 Billion

Date: March 20, 2026
Hosts: Jon Favreau, Dan Pfeiffer
Guest: Juliana Stratton (Lt. Governor of Illinois, Democratic Senate nominee)
Theme: A blunt, critical look at the ongoing Iran war's economic fallout, the politics behind a $200 billion war funding request, disarray in the Trump administration, and Democratic political dynamics in the wake of controversial primaries.

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Episode Overview

This episode breaks down the escalating U.S.-Iran war, the resulting global economic crisis, and the Trump administration’s pursuit of an additional $200 billion for military spending. The hosts analyze the political stupidity and lack of planning behind the conflict, the mounting domestic costs (from gas prices to possible stagflation), and the disastrous communications from Trump officials. They also address internal fractures in the administration, corruption scandals, shambolic Congressional hearings, Democratic primary drama (especially AIPAC's heavy hand in Illinois), and wrap with an interview with Juliana Stratton, Illinois’s Democratic nominee for Senate.

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Key Segments & Insights

1. War in Iran: Economic and Political Fallout

(03:19–11:39)

• Escalation & Energy Crisis

  • Israel struck Iran’s largest natural gas reserve (shared with Qatar), prompting massive Iranian retaliation against regional energy infrastructure.
  • The Strait of Hormuz is closed. Oil shot past $118/barrel; U.S. gas approaches $4/gallon. Inflation is surging, with the Fed holding rates steady.
  • Trump’s administration is considering ground troops to reopen the Strait, possibly via "boots on the islands" loophole.

• Out-of-Touch Messaging from White House

  • Economic advisors like Kevin Hassett and Scott Besant are portrayed as deeply disconnected from public pain.
  • Quote: “Saying that near $4 a gallon gas is not bad is just a historic gaffe.” — Dan Pfeiffer (09:05)
  • Trump’s repeated references to the conflict as an “excursion” are derided as tone-deaf.
  • Quote: "Calling the war with Iran...a synonym for a pleasure cruise is a truly insane choice." — Dan Pfeiffer (09:43)

• No Strategic Planning

  • The hosts excoriate Trump for launching a war without cause, plan, or exit, ensuring prolonged regional instability and economic pain.
  • Quote: “There was no reason to do this. There was no plan for how it was supposed to go… the damage to the economy is being done right now, and for no f***ing reason. It's insane.” — Dan Pfeiffer (10:09)

2. Practical & Political Consequences in the U.S.

(13:39–22:27)

• Ripple Effects Beyond Oil

  • Interruptions in fertilizer supply could spike food prices during U.S. planting season.
  • Rising mortgage rates and frozen capital threaten broader economic recovery.

• Military “Options” All Bad

  • The hosts detail various military gambits (taking islands, deploying Marines), dismissing them as fruitless and risky.
  • Quote: “There are no good options, which is once again why... we have decided not to go to war with Iran.” — Dan Pfeiffer (17:08)

• Political Disaster for Trump/GOP

  • Public is overwhelmingly against the war; economic pain will likely worsen Republican turnout while galvanizing opposition.
  • Quote: “This does not fire up Republicans, but it does fire up everyone else and infuriates independents.” — Dan Pfeiffer (21:55)

3. $200 Billion War Funding Request

(22:27–32:16)

• Funding Vote Framed as Political Suicide

  • The Pentagon’s forthcoming ask of $200 billion is called “the worst possible vote” for Congress to take, especially amid economic crisis.
  • Quote: “Can you imagine a more unpopular vote than supporting $200 billion for a war that is currently making a bad economy even worse?” — Jon Favreau (25:19)
  • Dan notes this figure might be leaked high to later pretend compromise at a lower (still outrageous) number.

• Alternate Uses for $200 Billion

  • Jon compares the cost to other possible policies: restoring Obamacare subsidies, eliminating medical debt, universal community college for two decades, food assistance for millions, etc.
  • Quote (on alternatives): “Pick one of those things… but instead we are using $200 billion to drop more bombs on Iran…” — Jon Favreau (28:24)

• Passing the Bill

  • Hosts doubt it can get 60 Senate votes and debate reconciliation. Both agree it’s a vote every Democrat should reject.
  • Quote: "To vote for this is to de facto vote to authorize this war. And no Democrats should do that." — Dan Pfeiffer (32:16)

4. Administration Fractures & Whistleblowers

(35:29–44:08)

• First High-Profile Resignation

  • Joe Kent (Trump’s National Counterterrorism Center Director) resigned, stating “Iran posed no imminent threat” and linking the war to Israeli pressure.
  • Tulsi Gabbard (now DNI) could not refute these points in Congress.
  • Quote (Kent): “We started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobbying.” (36:23)
  • Dan: “Tell me the person in the Trump administration who could resign in protest over something, who would not be an extremist... take the f***ing win, right?” (38:08)

• Decision-Making Dysfunction

  • Kent claims dissenting voices were actively blocked from Trump, a shift from prior internal debates.
  • Trump’s justifications for war (“a feeling,” “in his bones") are derided as unaccountable and unserious.

5. Congressional Chaos: DHS Confirmation Brawl

(44:11–49:08)

• Markwayne Mullin’s Chaotic DHS Hearing

  • Hearing opens with Mullin and Rand Paul arguing about past physical assaults and “dueling.”
  • Quote: “Dueling with two consenting adults is still there.” — Dan Pfeiffer, satirizing Senate decorum (45:53)
  • DHS shut down over an ICE reform standoff; TSA lines are daunting, but Democrats feel little real political pressure to cave.

• DHS Corruption: Lewandowski Bribery

  • Corey Lewandowski allegedly solicited bribes for private prison contracts, threatening companies that refused.

6. Democratic Primary Fallout: AIPAC and Dark Money

(58:04–66:46)

• AIPAC’s Heavy-Handed Tactics in Illinois
  • AIPAC super PACs poured $22 million into various House races, including $7 million trying (and failing) to defeat Daniel Biss—an Israeli-American and nuanced progressive.
  • Ads attacked progressives on unrelated issues, never mentioning Israel, reflecting public dissatisfaction with their tactics and purpose.
  • Quote: "AIPAC wants you to think they are a pro-Jewish organization. ... In reality, AIPAC is an organization that promotes Benjamin Netanyahu's government in Israel ... and supports the Iran war we have just spent most of the pod talking about..." — Jon Favreau (63:05)
• Backlash Building
  • AIPAC’s polarizing approach and shadowy ad buys are alienating Democrats and even, increasingly, independents and some Republicans.
  • Quote: "If you believe in your policies, then go f***ing have that debate—but you don't want to have that debate because your policies are unpopular." — Jon Favreau (64:55)

7. Chilling Trump Admin Sideshow

(66:46–73:34)

• Trump’s Self-Aggrandizement Amid Crisis
  • Approval of a commemorative 24k gold Trump coin and rare Trump sneakers on sale for $180k in Riyadh, even as missiles fly and refineries burn.
  • Personal “giddiness” over a UFC fight to be held on the White House lawn—a “hottest ticket” for major donors.
  • Quote: “Donald Trump is a really busy guy. He doesn't really have the time or energy to dig into the war he started in Iran. But he is going to spend hours on the friends and family list for the UFC fight.” — Dan Pfeiffer (69:32)
  • Poly Market Bar in D.C. to open, letting people bet on world events and watch live Twitter feeds—a symbol of D.C.'s dystopian, insider culture.

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Featured Interview: Juliana Stratton, Democratic Nominee for Senate (Illinois)

(76:47–93:44)

Getting Outspent, Winning by Listening (77:10)

• Stratton ran as an underdog, overcame a 4:1 spending disadvantage, and focused on centering the voices of Illinoisans, successfully appealing to urban, suburban, and rural voters.
• Quote: “We wanted to center the voices of the people of Illinois. ...We knew we had a message that would resonate with voters and we did the work and we came out on top.” — Juliana Stratton (77:10)

Progressive Vision Resonates Statewide (80:06)

• Her campaign for Medicare For All, a federal $25 minimum wage, and bolder policies led to wins even in many downstate, traditionally tougher, areas.
• “Too many people think small about what we can accomplish in Washington... We should think big.” — Juliana Stratton (81:26)

On Immigration and ICE (82:14)

• Strongly supports abolishing ICE, referencing the trauma of Operation Midway Blitz (mass ICE raids in Chicago area), and ongoing accountability efforts in Illinois for abuses.
• Quote: “I want to abolish ICE ... The trauma of Operation Midway Blitz continues ... and we're going to hold [Trump] accountable.” — Juliana Stratton (82:14)

On Special Interest Money & Crypto Attacks (85:11)

• Was the #1 target of crypto Super PACs this cycle ($10+ million in attack ads), which she attributes to her willingness to fight for working people and against DC status quo.
• Calls for ending Citizens United and broader campaign finance reform.
• Quote: “We need to fight for campaign finance reform... I was the number one target of the crypto industry Super PACs, the number one in the nation.” — Juliana Stratton (85:11)

On AIPAC & Outside Money (88:15)

• Reiterates need for transparency and warnings about deceptive, MAGA-backed super PACs.
• Supports a focus on lasting peace, two-state solution, and the need for a level electoral playing field.

Viral "F*** Trump" Ad (90:47)

• The unbleeped, viral campaign spot earned broad resonance, reflected authentic anger, and marked a turning point.
• Quote: “It broke through the noise… captured what people were feeling. ...People would say, ‘How come you didn't ask me to be in the ad?’ That’s when I knew it was a turning point.” — Juliana Stratton (91:19)

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• “The second Trump administration has been one giant gaffe. What a painful f***ing gaffe it's been.” — Jon Favreau (09:20)
• “He [Trump] didn't consider that the Strait of Hormuz might be blocked, which every person who's ever studied a war with Iran said would happen.” — Dan Pfeiffer (10:09)
• “Trump supporters will say they approve... but they're not excited about this. It's reflexive partisanship. ...That is very bad for turnout in a midterm.” — Dan Pfeiffer (21:55)
• “I don't care if they come down at 100 [billion], I don't care if they come at 50. ...Every Democrat should vote against. It is voting for... would be insane in my mind.” — Dan Pfeiffer (26:31)
• “There will be less Democrats in Congress willing to deal with AIPAC because of the way they are acting in these primaries.” — Dan Pfeiffer (62:18)
• “If you believe in your policies, then go fing have that debate—but you don't want to have that debate because your policies are unpopular, because you know if you told Americans you support ... Bibi Netanyahu's destruction of the Middle East, then they would tell you to go f yourself.” — Jon Favreau (64:55)

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Episode Flow: Timestamps & Key Sections

• [03:19] – Show Start: Iran war, global economic fallout
• [06:13] – U.S. economic impacts (gas, inflation, food, housing)
• [08:12] – Trump administration’s tone-deaf communication
• [13:39] – War’s broader effects (fertilizer, food prices, options)
• [22:27] – $200 billion funding request, Pentagon leaks
• [35:29] – Joe Kent resignation, DNI Gabbard hearings
• [44:11] – DHS confirmation chaos, Mullin vs. Paul
• [58:04] – Democratic primaries and AIPAC’s disruptive role
• [76:47] – Dan interviews Juliana Stratton (Democratic Senate nominee, IL)

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Takeaways for Listeners

This episode encapsulates the Pod Save America mission: dissecting political chaos, highlighting strategic incompetence and its real-world costs, exposing out-of-touch and corrupt actors, and uplifting progressive Democratic victories rooted in grassroots and bold vision.

If you missed the episode, this summary gives you a clear map of both the larger trends (war-driven economic and political pain, intra-party battles over money and influence) and the personalities shaping today's Democratic narrative—including a hopeful look at transparent, progressive new leadership in figures like Juliana Stratton.

Transcript

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[Jon Favreau]

Welcome to POD SA welcome to America. I'm Jon Favreau.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I'm Dan Pfeiffer.

[Jon Favreau]

On today's show, we're gonna talk about how the war in Iran is turning into a global economic crisis, why the Pentagon thinks it'll cost us at least another $200 billion, and whether Congress will actually approve that funding. The senior Trump official who just resigned over the war. The fight over confirming Trump's next Homeland Security secretary that involves an actual physical fight. The other actual physical fight that will take place on the White House lawn this summer. AIPAC's role in this week's Democratic primaries in Illinois. And then the winner of one of those primaries talks to Dan Lt. Governor Juliana Stratton, who's on her way to becoming the next Democratic senator from the state of Illinois. Also, please consider becoming a subscriber if you haven't already, so that you don't miss out on any crooked content for any of the POD subscribers, get our new extra episode of POD Save America called Pod Save America. Only friends, other subscriber only shows like Polar Coaster with this guy right here, Dan Pfeiffer. You just recorded another one, right?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I did. We talked about what happened in Illinois in great detail, the role AIPAC played in that race, and we did a deep dive in the polling on the Iran war and why this is not going so great for Donald Trump and the Republicans.

[Jon Favreau]

Never miss Polo Coaster. Never miss Pod Save America. Only friends sign up, become a subscriber. You also get ad free episodes of all your favorite crooked pods. You you get access to all of our great substack newsletters like Podcast of America, open tabs. And you get to feel good about supporting an independent pro democracy media company. And there aren't just many around these days, you know, that are independent, pro democracy and beyond the reach of Brendan Carr. So head to crooked.com friends and subscribe today. All right, let's dive in. Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu started a war in Iran that has now engulfed the Middle east and triggered a global energy crisis that's quickly becoming a global economic crisis. On Wednesday, Israel bombed the largest natural gas reserve in the world, which Iran shares with Qatar. Iran then retaliated with attacks on energy infrastructure across the Middle east, including a hit on a Qatari natural gas complex that has wiped out a good chunk of its capacity for several years. Trump claimed Israel acted alone and won't do it again, but also said that if Iran keeps attacking energy infrastructure, he'll, quote, massively blow up the rest of their gas reserve. The president is also reportedly considering sending in ground troops to secure the Strait of Hormuz, which remains closed on Wednesday night. Oil shot past $118 a barrel. Gas prices are approaching $4 a gallon. And after a worse than expected inflation report, the Fed decided to hold interest rates steady. Here's how this is all playing. If you turn on the tv, far

[Dan Pfeiffer]

worse news on prices than expected. Americans have been grappling, of course, with surging gas prices, up 86 cents a gallon since the Iran war began.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

It's almost the worst of both worlds. I guess stagflation would come close to describing the situation.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Since the war began. The price of the pump has risen

[Juliana Stratton]

every day this month.

[Jon Favreau]

I would think that records could be set. People are already seeing gas prices. Gas prices are up almost a dollar a gallon. Near term. Measures of inflation expectations have risen in recent weeks, likely reflecting the substantial rise in oil prices caused by the supply disruptions in the Middle East. Tough stuff. Pretty scary. So that's what people are seeing on their screens. And here's the Trump White House feeling people's pain.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Oil prices will go up. The economy will go down a little bit.

[Juliana Stratton]

I thought it would be worse. Much worse, actually.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

I thought there was a chance it

[Juliana Stratton]

could be much worse.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

It's not bad.

[Jon Favreau]

As much as we've got, we got

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

to focus on getting these gas prices down.

[Jon Favreau]

The reality is, overseas, they're feeling it far worse than we did.

[Pod Save America Host (Ad Read)]

If it were to be extended this,

[Jon Favreau]

it wouldn't really disrupt the US Economy very much at all. It would hurt consumers. And we'd have to think about, you know, if that continued, what we would have to do about that.

[Pod Save America Host (Ad Read)]

But that's really the last of our concerns right now.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

If you could say something to President Trump, he was going to hear you right now, what would it be?

[Juliana Stratton]

You are a worthless pile of.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And you voted for him. How Many times.

[Juliana Stratton]

Three times. That was my bad.

[Jon Favreau]

Apparently I'm an idiot.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Love that woman the best.

[Jon Favreau]

I can't tell which of those clips is worse. Like J.D. vance being like, I know you're paying a lot in gas prices, but just think of how high the gas prices are in Europe right now. At least you're not Europe. Or Kevin Hassett being like, yeah, if the war is extended, we may have to, you know, may, it's not going to really hurt anything but consumers and we may have to think about them, but really they're the last of our concerns right now.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Kevin Hassett is possibly the worst spokesperson that any White House has put out. He at every opportunity steps on a rake. Like it is very possible that somewhere there's some Democratic super PAC that books him on TV and he just assumes the White House is doing it. Cuz he's so bad.

[Jon Favreau]

I mean, so is Scott Besant, so is the Treasury Secretary. We could have included like five Scott Besant clips in here, but we didn't have time. Like the two chief economic spokespeople for the White House, Kevin Hassett and Scott Besant, are the most out of touch fucking doofuses that I've ever seen talk for a White House.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

They work for a president who spends all of his time during a era of high prices talking about the gold leaf that he's procuring for the White

[Jon Favreau]

House, how affordability is a hoax. And then, yeah, we shouldn't, we shouldn't let Trump off the hook there. Just being like, yeah, honestly, I thought it was going to be so much worse. It's not bad. It's not bad.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Saying that near $4 a gallon gas is not bad is just a historic gaffe.

[Jon Favreau]

There's so many gaffes.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

The whole thing is like, it is all a gaffe. It's the exception.

[Jon Favreau]

The second Trump administration has been one giant gaffe.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

What a painful fucking gaffe it's been.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, it's a tough gaffe. It seems like the chances are getting quite low that Iran will be a quick excursion, as Trump calls it, not an incursion, an excursion that just causes short term price hikes. What do you think?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I just, I've thought this for three weeks now. Calling the war with Iran that has put us on the cusp of a global energy crisis a synonym for a pleasure cruise is a truly insane choice.

[Jon Favreau]

Especially when, when the, the center of the war is keeping a body of water closed.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah, you know where you can't do an excursion? The Strait of Hormuz.

[Jon Favreau]

Oh, my God.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I mean, this is such. This really is the worst case scenario of Trump when you have a president who has no idea what he's doing, who's incredibly impulsive and is now surrounded by people who only tell him what he wants to hear. You end up in this situation, and it is like he. Trump got so lucky in his first term to avoid things like this. Maybe it was. He had different people around him. Maybe he just didn't have the confidence to actually push through on these things. But, like, he. This is so fucking stupid. It is like, it's unfathomable. Like, there was no point here. Like, we're going to talk about some of the. Later on this show. We're talking about some of the testimony about the various imminent threats and everything else, but there was no reason to do this. There was no plan for how it was supposed to go. They didn't think beyond the first bombs. They didn't consider that the Strait of Hormuz might be blocked, which every person who's ever studied a war with Iran said would happen. And they have no plan to get us out of it. And they're just, like, bubbling along the whole way. And it's like, it's people like, obviously, there's been. American troops have died. Civilians all across the Middle east have died. The girls school in Iran was bombed. Americans are paying a higher price at the pump. There are shocks in this economy that can be felt for months, if not longer, even if Trump somehow wraps this thing up in a week, which seems very hard to fathom, but the damage to the economy is being done right now, and for no fucking reason. Like, it's insane.

[Jon Favreau]

And. And that's an important point.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Because the no reason part.

[Jon Favreau]

The no reason part, Yeah, I think there's a. Because you. I've seen some people compare it to the tariffs, right? And, like, remember Liberation Day? And in the weeks after Liberation Day, we were like, why? Like, I've never seen a president inflict so much damage, political damage on himself for no good reason. And, you know, it turned out that on some of the tariffs, Trump eventually backed off. You know, there's the whole fucking taco thing. And. But that situation was one where if he decided to just stop imposing the tariffs, or at least stop imposing certain tariffs, then, you know, the economic damage would be reduced, right? And it would go away a little bit. This is so much different because like you said, if he. He could. This whole thing could stop tomorrow, which it's not going to. But if it did, you know, Tracy, Alloway from Bloomberg. They had the Great Odd Lots podcast with Joe Eisenthal. She wrote today. Each successive day of the Iran conflict now generates months of impact on the global economy. And the longer it takes the world to adapt to a new reality of reduced Gulf oil flows, the longer and deeper the pain. So what's happening now is even though gas prices are high right now, the pain in the price increase that's coming from the oil disruption and the gas disruption in the Middle east has not even worked its way through the economy just yet fully. And oil price experts told CNBC this week that right now we're very much in the $150 a barrel range for, like, what oil will hit, he said. But I don't think it's ridiculous at all to suggest $200. And even if the war ends right now, it'll take a, they think it'll take a long time for prices to come back down. And they probably won't come down to where they were before the war.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And that's not even the whole thing. It's not even just oil prices. Fertilizer moves through the Strait. Fertilizer prices impact food prices. Right now is planting season in much of farm country. And you were people making decisions about what, what crops to plant and how many acres to plant based on the price of fertilizer, what can they afford to do? And so that's going to affect food supply and food prices this fall when harvest happens. Mortgage rates have gone up for three weeks in a row because of the inflationary impact of this war, which is going to impact people willing to buy houses and sell houses, affects the housing market, it freezes capital. And all of these things are having an effect on an economy that was barely chugging along to begin with.

[Jon Favreau]

And again, like, we should talk about sort of options that Trump has right now to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and sort of end this crisis. So he's considering sending in ground troops, although I see that he thinks there's a loophole where he can get around calling it ground troops if he sends them to the islands around Iran in the Strait of Hormuz. And so if he has them take Kharg island, which is the island that they, that that Trump bombed last week, where I think Iran exports like 90% of its oil. But the challenge with that is, say you send a bunch of Marines in to take this island, you think Iran is then going to stop shooting at the Marines or they're going to just allow the Strait of Hormuz to be reopened. Because the idea is that if we take the island, then we can use it as a bargaining chip. And then Iran will say, well, no, no, if, if we're going to be hurt if you have control of this island where all of our oil is exported from, so we'll reopen the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for you giving us back the island. Like, they're not going to do that. They are fighting for the survival of their regime at this point. We're like killing off all of their leaders. They're becoming more radical. As you go down the. The org chart in the Iranian regime and what's to stop. And great destroyed a bunch of ballistic missiles. Great destroyed a bunch of their leadership. What's to stop random IRGC guys from just blowing up boats? You don't need ballistic missiles to shoot at boats in the Strait of Hormuz. All you need are mines and smaller guns and drones and all that shit. And then they're just gonna keep doing that. Why would they stop doing that at this point? Because even if Trump decides the war is over, Iran's are gonna think the war is over because Iran's pissed that they've been humiliated like this and so they're gonna make life miserable in the Strait of Hormuz for people who pass oil through there for I don't know how long until they feel like there's a settlement to end the war that they've negotiated and even in.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

So there's. When it comes to using ground, there are three options with ground troops, as I understand it, short of obviously invading Iran. One is to put them along the Marines along the coast of Iran. This would violate the boots on the ground loophole to try to take out, to secure the places where they are firing the missiles and launching the attacks. That's one. The second is to take Carc island, as you said, which would then be some sort of like Monopoly esque, you know, leverage piece that we would use.

[Jon Favreau]

And then the third, by the way, there's, there's, there's a lot of experts too that are like, Iran's been building pipelines. They've been figuring out ways to get their oil out to market without Carg Island. And so if, if the Americans took Carg island, it's not really even going to matter that much anyway. So there's some, some thought that that might happen.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And the third option is to take a bunch of the islands, because it's not. Carg island is where the energy infrastructure is. But you have a bunch of other Islands, most notably one called like, QSM or something like that, that's sort of at the entry point to the strait. I really feel like Tommy or Ben here, and I'm probably getting this wrong, but where. It's just where they launch a lot, where they have a lot of their military equipment, they have a bunch of the missiles and their boats and their ships there, and that these. And there are several other islands. Some of the islands are completely abandoned and uninhabited, and some of them are home to highly fortified Iranian naval and military installation. So that's not an easy thing to do either. None of these are good options, which is once again why over the last nearly 50 years, we have decided not to go to war with Iran, despite all of our concerns about the regime.

[Jon Favreau]

And again, I feel like we're back debating the end of the war in Iraq. Remember when Iraq became a quagmire and then everyone would say for years and years, there's no military solution to end this war. There must be a political solution. But, like, that's going to be the same thing with Iran, right? Like, you can't just drop a bunch of fucking bombs, kill a bunch of their leadership. And then in a country of 90 million people who are now with. With the regime still very much in place, more radical, angrier, more vengeful thinking that like, somehow they're just going to. Everyone's just going to pack up and go home.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

It's just. It's even so different from Iraq. Iran's obviously a much bigger country than Iraq. It's a much more geographic, large in population complexity there, but also the original, for a lot of people in Iraq wanted Saddam Hussein gone. We went in to invade to remove Saddam Hussein. And theoretically, for a lot of people, specifically, when you had a minority authoritarian representative of the ethnic minority, and so there was a world in which you could have possibly, if they had not the Bush administration had not fucked it up so bad, you know, begun to build a new democracy or peaceful society with the majority population. That is not what's happening in Iran. Right. We didn't go in to remove the people, the dictator everyone hated. We decided to bomb the shit out of the country and radicalize the population against us. I just remember reading someone say that there was a lot of people in Iran. There's an entire generation of people in Iran who did not grow up hating America.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, right.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

They're not part of. They weren't around 1979. They didn't believe any of that. They didn't. Maybe they didn't love Us, but their animating principles, not hate America. And then we blew up a girls school in their country. So we are way worse off with Iran than we were before this war.

[Jon Favreau]

And the Israelis just bombed their natural gas reserve. And I think that what happened this week with the Israelis hitting their natural gas reserve, the Iranians retaliating by hitting energy infrastructure all across the Gulf, but especially that Qatari natural gas hub is like, you see how the problem with like they call it, like the ladder of escalation, right? And like one side escalates and the other side then escalates and there's a lot of miscalculation and miscommunication and suddenly you've got Trump saying like, well, this was very bad and I don't want Israel to do this again, but if Iran keeps retaliating, then I'll blow up the rest of its natural gas reserve completely, which will only hurt everything more. Hurt everyone, would hurt us more, would hurt us more. Right? Like this is what happens. And so you just like, if nothing else happens and the whole thing ends tomorrow, it's still going to be incredibly hard to fix this, to put this back in the bottle. And I don't think you can. I don't know, like, how bad do you think the politics on this could get for Trump and the Republicans? Because right now it's bad. But like, you know, you see in the polls, he's still like hanging around at upper 30s, low 40s.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I don't know that it is going to that Trump's approval rating will change that much more. It might come down a few points as the economic consequences get worse for people, but Trump has a pretty high floor in his approval rating. The problem for Republicans here is people do not like this war, right? And they didn't like the war before their gas prices started going up. They never understood why we're going into it. You have polls that show that 2/3 of Americans have seen their gas prices go up in two weeks. You have six in 10Americans who disapprove how Trump is handling gas prices. And the thing that's interesting is you have the Republicans have not abandoned Trump on this, but you do have about 17% of Republicans in a recent poll who disapprove of Trump on Iran. You have about a quarter of former Trump voters, which includes independents and Democrats, who disapprove Trump on Iran. But I think the most important number here is that in almost every poll, the number of Americans who strongly disapprove of this war is two times the number of Americans who strongly approve of this war. So Trump supporters will say they approve of him for it, but they're not excited about this. They don't think it's a good idea. They don't like it. It's reflexive partisanship. And that is very, very bad for turnout in a midterm. Right there is just like this is not. You think about maybe the Kavanaugh confirmation in 2018, which fired up both sides. This is not something, or maybe even immigration could fire up both sides. This does not fire up the Republicans, but it does fire up everyone else and it infuriates independents.

[Jon Favreau]

Well, here's something that could make it worse. On top of higher gas prices and higher inflation, Trump and Pete Hegseth are also asking us to pay another $200 billion for their war, which is the price tag of the funding request the Pentagon will soon send to Congress. First reported by the Washington Post and then confirmed by Hegseth during his latest press conference on Thursday morning, where he once again kicked off his remarks with a series of angry war haikus.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

A dishonest and anti Trump press will stop at nothing. We know this at this point to downplay progress, amplify every cost and call into question every step. Sadly, TDS is in their DNA. They want President Trump to fail. We hold the cards. We have objectives. Those objectives are clear. We have allies pursuing objectives as well. And the truth speaks for itself. Iran is an energy rich country. Could be, should be. Instead, like so many other places, driven by a radical ideology, they've spent that money instead of investing in their people

[Jon Favreau]

and so of course getting it.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

And they invested in missiles and they invested in launchers and UAVs and we are destroying and degrading that, degrading that in historic proportions. As far as $200 billion, I think that number could move. Obviously it takes money to kill bad guys.

[Jon Favreau]

So many other places where government driven by radical ideology invests instead of its people in weapons and guns and bombs. Just horrible. I hate that.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Just, it seems, I can't put my finger on it, but it seems familiar in some way, shape or form.

[Jon Favreau]

TDS is in their DNA. We have objectives. We hold cards. We read remarks in a weird tone.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Who do you think the press criticism for is for in every one of these press conferences?

[Jon Favreau]

Donald Trump.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

It must be right. But it's so weak. It is so weak.

[Jon Favreau]

It's just, they're just so angry. Every day they think that they're like, I don't know if they've just convinced themselves that they're doing great and things are going well, and so they're just shocked that anyone would report otherwise. But, I mean, clearly they have thin skin. And he doesn't like the press, which is why he kicked most of them out of the briefing room and banned them from the Pentagon.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

He doesn't like the press.

[Juliana Stratton]

What.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

What did he do before this? Was. He was. He talked about defense official.

[Jon Favreau]

He talked about cable news punditry in that briefing today. He, like, mocked cable news punditry. The fucking. The Fox Weekend understudy Pete Hegseth.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yes. The guy whose primary responsibility was to answer the phone if. If Steve Ducey got the flu during the week.

[Jon Favreau]

Anyway, once we got through all the war haikus, the $200 billion which he said might come up or down, we'll see. Can you imagine a more unpopular vote than supporting $200 billion for a war that is currently making a bad economy even worse?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

No, I cannot. I think it would be. I mean, we asked this question about the big beautiful bill. Like, could you imagine a bill that cut Medicaid and food stamps and then took that money and gave it to millionaires and billionaires for tax cuts? Can you imagine something worse than that? Yes, we can, John. A $200 billion for an agency that has a $1 trillion budget for a war no one wants and is raising your gas prices. That would actually be a worse vote.

[Jon Favreau]

I thought this was horrific when it was going to be $50 billion.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yes. If they came in with 15 billion, I would think it would be a bad vote.

[Jon Favreau]

In fact, part of me thinks, and I don't know, they're probably not this smart, but part of me thinks that they leaked 200 billion so that they could go down to 100 billion or 50 billion and be like, see, it's not that compromise. We looked around and we cut some corners and we felt like we can do it for 50. We don't need 200.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I think this number will come down because I think Congress is not going to want to do to it. I know that. I don't think there are votes for $200 billion, but we can talk about that. I think this is the Pentagon leaking this ahead of the White House getting the number to try to lock them into 200 billion. So it's like the military says, this is what we need, because this is something that the military is sort of notorious for in their appropriations is to put the number out there because they think if it comes from the military, it's more likely to be passed before the White House tries to dumb it down. The White House certainly wouldn't want to be caught reducing the number, but you could see a role. I think this is a smaller number when it goes to Congress, just because there's a reality of trying to pass it. But even still, I don't care if they come down at 100. I don't care if they come at 50. This is a horrendous vote. It's something that every Democrat should vote against. It is voting for. This would be insane in my mind. Insane again.

[Jon Favreau]

Under Donald Trump, Congress approved about a trillion dollars for the Pentagon.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Where'd that money go, John?

[Jon Favreau]

Where'd that money go? $200 billion. Again, these are like big numbers. Sort of hard to get your head around them. I did this with the $50 billion when we thought it was gonna be $50 billion. Here's what $200 billion could do. This is what the government could do with $200 billion. Could restore Obamacare subsidies for 22 million Americans who just lost their subsidies and Obama and watching their premiums go up. It could restore those subsidies for six years for 22 million people. Could eliminate nearly all medical debt in America. All the medical debt that's out there in America. We could do that instead of $200 billion. So we could drop more bombs on Iran. Community college free for everyone for two decades.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Decade. Two decades.

[Jon Favreau]

Two decades.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Wow.

[Jon Favreau]

1.3 million affordable housing units. Food stamps for 42 million Americans for two full years. Free school lunches for every kid in America for five years. Fully fund wic, which is Women and Infant Children program for pregnant mothers and infants. Food assistance and medicine for them for 24 years. $200 billion. Pick one of those things that we could do with $200 billion, but instead we are using $200 billion to drop more bombs on Iran, to intercept missiles from Iran and to. I don't know what the fuck else we're doing there, just to send troops to take Carg island, which is not

[Dan Pfeiffer]

troops on the ground because it's surrounded by water.

[Jon Favreau]

Troops on. Troops on the island? Yes. Not troops on the ground. I don't know. Like, do you think this will pass Congress?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

It's hard right now to see they'll do it as a reconciliation bill. So they will do it in the Senate. They'll do it. I think. I think I read they were going to try to do this as a reconciliation bill because I don't think they can get 60 in the Senate, but I don't.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, they have to do it right there's. No way you get 60.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I'm trying to think. Not saying my knowledge of the Bird rule was great at the time or is really sustained over the last 15 years, but I'm curious how you would do that. But neither here nor there. Let's just start with the House.

[Jon Favreau]

If it's a 60 vote threshold and I see that many Democrats vote for it, I will leave the Democratic Party at this point. That's dumb.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Let's not. John, let's not put your entire future, your ability to participate in primaries in the hands of. I can name 10 Democrats who'd make you nervous right now. And they only need seven. They only need seven.

[Jon Favreau]

Okay. Fetterman. So Fetterman and six others.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Well, it's the people who open the government.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Now if you really look at that list. I don't. That list doesn't vote for this because, like Tim Kaine, I think was on that list and Tim Kaine's not voting.

[Jon Favreau]

I mean, I'm really trying to think of what, what the arguments that they would make. Right. Which is. Okay, well, actually, this isn't new money for Iran. This is money to replenish our munitions and the stuff that we've used in Iran. And it's actually over the last five or six or seven years, we've sort of running low on all these supplies. And because we used a bunch, we now have to refill them because it's about our defense and for the next war. And what if we get attacked? And so, like, isn't that the arguments that they would.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I think the argument they will make is we wouldn't have entered this war ourselves, but we're in it now. We have a lot of our troops who are in harm's way, either at military installations in the Gulf or in the Navy. The biggest armada ever, whatever Trump called it there. And we have to get the Strait of Hormuz opened, and that's going to take money. So we have to give them.

[Jon Favreau]

And lives now, apparently.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And lives. Yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. I think that's.

[Jon Favreau]

We need to send some troops to their death and we need to spend a lot of money, billions and billions of dollars that we don't have so that we can reopen the Strait of Hormuz that was only closed because we started a war.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah. I mean, it is, that is where we are. It's, it's, it's twisted logic, for sure. But, you know, a lot of the people on the Armed Services Committee and other parts of, you know, are captured by the military on some of these things.

[Crooked Media Contributor (Ad Read)]

And I'm.

[Jon Favreau]

And of course, of course. And of course, if, if we don't, if they don't vote for the funding and the funding doesn't go through, you can't bring the troops home. You just must leave them stuck there

[Dan Pfeiffer]

because we'll not ask boats.

[Jon Favreau]

We can't just, we can't just get on the boats and come home. We must leave the troo there. What else are we supposed to do? Anyway, whether it passes is Donald Trump

[Dan Pfeiffer]

did not ask for authorization for this war. This is a war. This is not an excursion. It is a war. Troops have died. It's obviously cost $200 billion. It has rattled the. It's created a spiraling conflict in the Middle East. This is a war. We know it's a war because Donald Trump keeps calling it a war. When he doesn't call it an excursion, he refers to it as the war.

[Jon Favreau]

And as does this defense secretary who kept saying war is hell a million times fucking briefing.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And so to vote for this is to de facto vote to authorize this war. And no Democrats should do that.

[Crooked Media Contributor (Ad Read)]

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[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Quick question. Are you politically engaged and spiritually exhausted

[Erin Ryan]

if you said yes to both? Welcome home. I'm Erin Ryan.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

And I'm Alyssa Mastromonaco and we're the

[Erin Ryan]

hosts of Hysteria, the podcast for women who care about democracy, culture and not losing their minds in the process.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

We break down the news, call out the nonsense, and spotlight the women actually fighting back on Capitol Hill, in classrooms and everywhere. The stakes are high.

[Erin Ryan]

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[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Listen to Hysteria wherever you get your podcasts and watch full episodes on YouTube.

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[Jon Favreau]

so we've talked a lot about the MAGA media stars who've turned on Trump over Iran. But this week we got the first actual defection from within the administration. Joe Kent, Trump's handpicked director of the National Counterterrorism center, resigned in a letter where he said that, quote, iran posed no imminent threat to our nation and that quote, we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobbying. Kent was a very far right, extremely Trumpy politician before taking this job. He's also a former CIA officer and retired Green Beret who served 11 combat tours. Regardless of who he is, his now former boss, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, didn't refute what he said about Iran not posing an imminent threat during her congressional testimony this week. Here's Kent talking about why he resigned on Tucker Carlson show and then gabbered in front of Congress in an exchange with Jon Ossoff.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation.

[Jon Favreau]

How did you reach that conclusion?

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

I think this is. This is key. I mean, this would be more challenging to explain had the Secretary of State, the President and the speaker of House, the House not come out and said that we conducted this attack at this time because the Israelis were about to do so. So that takes away the argument that there was an imminent threat, as in Iran was planning to attack us immediately. That just simply did not exist.

[Jon Favreau]

Was it the intelligence community's assessment that nevertheless, despite this obliteration, there was a, quote, imminent nuclear threat posed by the Iranian regime? Yes or no?

[Juliana Stratton]

It is not the intelligence community's responsibility to determine what is and is not an imminent threat.

[Jon Favreau]

Okay, that is. Here's the problem. No, it is. It is precisely that he received. It is precisely your responsibility to determine what constitutes a threat to the United States. This is the worldwide threats hearing. That is, That's Tulsi Gabbard who actually sold no war with Iran T shirts when she was running for president and as a Democrat.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And they what a journey she has taken to be the DNI to a Republican president who started a war with Iran.

[Jon Favreau]

What do you make of Kent's resignation? We should also say that now Kent is under investigation for leaking classified information. The FBI law enforcement sources maintain that the investigation was opened before he resigned because they clearly don't want it to seem like this is any kind of retribution. Who knows if they're telling the truth or not. They don't tell the truth about many things, so it's hard to believe them.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

When Kent first resigned, there was a bunch of Democrats who went out and said, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. This guy is a extremist who believes in conspiracy theories. Do not get on his. Get on his. Don't endorse this. Don't get on his side. Tell me the person in the Trump administration who could resign in protest over something, who would not be an extremist who believes in conspiracy theories. I know. Name one of them. It's like, people take the fucking win, right? His head of counterterrorism resigned because he said the war was a mistake. There was no imminent threat. And if you listen to the whole Tucker Carlson interview, there's a lot of wacky stuff in there.

[Jon Favreau]

There is some wacky. Well, actually, it gets so much wackier at the end. It starts off, and I will say Tucker sounds way wackier than Joe Kent, even though I know. And we look, we covered his race against Marie Glus and Perez. Like he is. He's a psycho. Like a lot of his beliefs are crazy. But he. The many of the things he said in Tucker Carlson's interview, you don't have to believe that Joe Kent is a wonderful person to believe them. All you have to do is line them up with other facts and other things that people have said.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And one of the most important things he says is one of the reasons we're at war is that the people who have contrary views to the president on many matters, but particularly the matter of war with Iran, is we're not allowed to see the president. That those views were kept from him. That has been one of the big problems with this administration. And this is actually a change, he said, under Operation Midnight Hammer. There was a large debate within the administration about the pros and cons of doing that. This time that debate did not happen. And so that, like what he is saying, put aside all of his other crazy views. The argument he is making here is the right argument about how we got here. And it is notable that someone this high up in his administration has resigned over it. Like that is a big fucking deal. And we can't be so precious about all of his views. I don't want to hammer on this, but if the idea is that we will accept no whistleblowers who are kind of wacky, we will accept no whistleblowers to the Trump administration who are political appointees. That cannot happen.

[Jon Favreau]

But it's also just like, if you want point out the parts of his argument that you don't like that are wacky. Right. Like so, you know, he leans pretty heavily into. It's like the Israel lobby got us into the war and they convinced Trump and clearly he and Tucker believe that. And this is where their argument falls flat because they can't bring themselves to just admit that Donald Trump is a fucking moron easily persuaded by anyone he talks to. So, yes, Bibi Netanyahu and Israeli intelligence may have persuaded Trump to bomb Iran and to join this war, but also Trump could have been just as easily persuaded by watching a fucking segment on Hannity with Mark Levin. Yes, like it doesn't like you. It doesn't, it doesn't matter whether it's Israel, whether it's Fox, whether it's someone on fucking Twitter, whether it's some jack off in his administration that persuades him, like Donald Trump is an easily persuadable moron. Tucker can't see that. Or maybe he can, he doesn't want to admit it. Same thing with Joe Kent. And so they do the Israel thing. But like it is clear that Bibi Netanyahu has wanted to invade Iran and do this forever. And he was very open about it just the other week and said, I've wanted to do this for 40 years and now the Americans are doing it with me.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Look, I mean, Joe Kent both in this interview and then in previous parts of his life as have been reported or alleged, like really dabbles in anti Semitic tropes. Like that is very clear. Put that aside. Even if you don't want to have the Israel discussion. Even though, as Joe can says in that clip, Marco Rubio and Mike Johnson said the same thing in public as to why we attacked Iran, then the point he is saying is there was no threat and the decision making process that got us into this war was fucked up and the people with dissenting views were not allowed near the president. So now we're in a bad war. So he has to quit to have his voice heard because his warning and cautions would not be heard in the administration. So he had to quit. That is like, I'm just so annoyed at all of these, especially these former Biden national security goobers are on here like lecturing us about the dangers of Joe Kent.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, sit down. So we don't like Iran was not close to getting a nuclear weapon. It did not have ballistic missiles that could reach the United States.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And wouldn't for 10 years.

[Jon Favreau]

And wouldn't for 10 years. It was not an imminent threat to the United states or to U.S. interests. And according to Marco Rubio, the Israelis decided that they were going to strike and we joined them, according to Marco Rubio, because if the Israelis struck, then Iran would retaliate against us. And so we wanted to go first,

[Dan Pfeiffer]

which is idiotic reason.

[Jon Favreau]

These are just the facts on the table that no one in the administration has been able to refute, including Tulsi Gabbard under oath in Congress this week.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah, just, you have to take a step back and think about this for a second, which is we're in A war. The President, United States has said repeatedly that he had a feeling that they were about to attack us.

[Jon Favreau]

And then in his bones, he's going to end this war when he feels it in his bones.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

But just millions of Americans woke up on a Saturday morning and were like, we're at war with Iran. And then the President goes out and tells you the reason we're at war with Iran is because he thought Iran was about to attack us, that it was an imminent threat. And now you have two of the highest ranking intelligence officials in the country saying that is not true, like, that is a scandal of epic proportions. But because Donald Trump's a doofus and everyone treats him, they grade him like a doofus on a curve, then we don't take that seriously. But that's the story he's telling the American people. That's what he's telling people, why we're at war. And that is being contradicted. And we can't because he just says dumb shit all the time. He shouldn't avoid it. Being held accountable for lying to the country about why we're in a war.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, yeah. Most of the government says dumb shit. That's also crazy.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah.

[Jon Favreau]

All right. The other big Congress. Speaking of dumb shit, the other big congressional hearing this week was about confirming Trump's pick to run the Department of Homeland Security. Mark Wayne Mullen, the Oklahoma senator took questions from his colleagues while the department he hopes to lead remains shut down over Republicans refusal to reform ice. People are waiting hours in airport security lines right now because so many TSA agents who've been working without pay because of the shutdown are calling in sick. Democrats keep trying to fund TSA and all of the non immigration related parts of dhs, but Republicans keep refusing. And the White House still won't concede to Democrats demands that ICE officers do things like stop wearing masks and obtain judicial warrants before arresting people during his confirmation hearing. Mullen wouldn't promise these concessions either. Nor did he offer any reassurances that he'd run DHS much differently than Kristi Noem. But he did spend a good amount of time arguing with fellow Republican Rand Paul about whether he deserved to have the shit kicked out of him and whether two consenting senators should still be able to settle their differences with a duel.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

Tell the world why you believe I deserve to be assaulted from behind, have six ribs broken and a damaged lung. Tell me to my face why you think I deserved it. And while you're at it, explain to the American public why they should Trust a man with anger issues to set the proper example for ICE and Border Patrol agents. You supported the felonious, violent attack on me from behind?

[Jon Favreau]

I did not say I supported it.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I said I understood it.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

Is it today your opinion that the caning of Charles Sumner was not only justified, but argues still for resolving our political differences with violence?

[Jon Favreau]

What I was simply pointing out is

[Dan Pfeiffer]

some of the rules that still apply to this body. For instance, dueling with two consenting adults is still there.

[Jon Favreau]

I was pointing out what is still

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

illegal for 170 years. There's no precedent for legal dueling. Even then, they fled the country.

[Jon Favreau]

I'm not going to be the smartest guy in any room I walk into.

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

What is the primary mission of Homeland Security investigations?

[Jon Favreau]

As I said, that's protect the homeland,

[Dan Pfeiffer]

bring peace of mind, and secure the.

[Jon Favreau]

And secure the confidence of the American people.

[Crooked Media Contributor (Ad Read)]

HSI specifically, is very important because they

[Mark Wayne Mullen]

specialize in dealing with human trafficking, human smuggling, you know, counterfeit bank fraud, things of that nature. Actually have a lot of friends that work for them.

[Jon Favreau]

I just want you to know that the whole thing about the dueling and Rand Paul getting attacked from behind, that was the open of the hearing that was in just the first few minutes. Dan,

[Dan Pfeiffer]

his use of two consenting adults is very funny there, because in the viral clip, when he tried to fight the guy from the Teamsters, he also used the term two consenting adults. He said, we're two consenting adults. We can finish this man to man. And then told him to stand up and go outside so they could fight outside this hearing room.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. For people who missed that. And Rand Paul brought it up, Mark Wayne Mellon did before the hearing, threatened to fight Sean o' Brien of the Teamsters physically fight. So this, you know, it wasn't just

[Dan Pfeiffer]

about take his wedding ring off. So I didn't want to damage it by punching Sean o' Brien in the face. I mean, the club is really worth watching, because then Bernie Sanders is like, sit down. You're a United States senator.

[Jon Favreau]

Bernie's going to break up the fight. So you'll be shocked to learn that Rand Paul voted against Mullen's confirmation, but he still got voted out of committee because of a yes vote from John Fetterman. How about that?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Not surprising.

[Jon Favreau]

It should be surprising. I mean, it's not surprising. It should be fucking enraging to people. What are you, like, John Fetterman's like, I called him my friend, and I'm glad that Donald Trump fired Kristi Noem. Like, I called on her to be fired and blah, blah. I was like, come on, man.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

He just trolls now. That's what he does.

[Jon Favreau]

Well, also the guy, like, I mean, the funny clip was the Rand Paul thing, but the Gallego thing, which we could have gone and done more of that. Like, he has no idea like, like a. What a large segment of the Department of Homeland Security is. Does what? Like he was just mumbling through that answer. The guy's been in Congress, he's been in the Senate for a couple years. He's been in the House for even before that. The guy's been in Congress for many years now. Many years. And you don't know what the Department of Homeland. You don't know the different functions of the Department of Homeland Security.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

He's never worked on these issues in any way, shape or form. Like, he, he went from just being a guy to being like two weeks ago, and now he's having his earache.

[Jon Favreau]

Do you think it's time to. First of all, he's probably gonna get confirmed, right? Because Fetterman's.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yes, that would be my assumption.

[Crooked Media Contributor (Ad Read)]

Yeah.

[Jon Favreau]

Great. Wonderful. So now we got Mark Wayne Mullen and maybe he's gonna bring back dueling at dhs. What do you think about whether DHS ever gets opened again? And these TSA lines and the airports and it feels like it's getting to the point where the public's like, what the fuck? And, you know, I still think it is hard for Republicans to explain why a fight over ICE has to hold up the funding of the rest of the department.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I think obviously there are some airports where the TSA lines have been, you know, like out the door, just like taking forever. I've seen, you know, footage from Texas, I think Austin at the end of south by Southwest where the line was like, unbelievable and took an incredibly long time. Other reports where that's not happening. I think that Democrats should bring two ideas into this decision making process. One is they are really under no political pressure to give in here. No one knows what this fight is about. They don't know that this is about a Democratic shutdown over ice. The Republicans are not going to be able to tell anyone that because Donald Trump launched a war that is dominating attention. And so when people see long lines, they're more likely to blame the incumbent party than the Democratic Party in this. So I just, I would not feel political pressure to cave here. I think you also have to be realistic about what you can actually achieve. So is there some real reforms that you can get that are maybe short of Everything you want but are real and make a real difference to people's lives now and then recognize that you're most likely gonna have the House and maybe the Senate next year and have even more leverage to demand even stronger reforms. So, like, what you don't want to do, I think, is be so stubborn now that you're going to have another 10 months with ice operating without these reforms, you know, because you're making the perfect the enemy of the good. So if there's something, some real things here and the White House wants a deal, they're sending a. I read in Punchbowl this afternoon they're sending another counteroffer back. So they sent an offer the Democrats rejected. They're sending a counteroffer. There seems to be some momentum to try to get something done here. So, like, set up, you know, what are the things where you think you really absolutely have to have it won't be everything. And then prepare for a much bigger battle next year when you control which bill gets to the floor of the House.

[Jon Favreau]

I think that's fair. I think that, yeah, the offer that the White House sent.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah, that's not the offer you're taking

[Jon Favreau]

was basically like, we'll do all the things that are in the law that we haven't been doing, which is just bullshit. You. And so you've got to have. You do got to have some kind of real reform there it is. I think what's most difficult is right now, some of the most egregious things that ICE and DHS are doing are not going to be fixed by reforming ICE's practices. Like, you know, I saw that. I was tweeted about this, but I saw that story this week that like a man who's been in this country his whole life, he's a DACA recipient. He was brought here as a young child. He works, he pays taxes, he's got a family. And he was on his way to visit his new baby in the icu and his wife and ICE picked him up and arrested him and is now trying to deport him, even though he was a DACA recipient protected by daca is applied. Was. Was already applying to renew his DACA status. And the Trump administration just decided not to renew it, just drag their feet on it. And so they scooped him up and now they're going to try to try to deport him. And it's like nothing that Democrats are asking for or nothing that ice, you know, no reforms to ICE right now would change that horrific practice. And so you're right. That like, you have to be honest about what you can achieve through these reforms. And I do think, like getting fucking, you know, forcing them to obtain judicial warrants and getting the masks off are two really important things. But I agree that you have to be. You have to be honest about what you can achieve. But I also think you're right that the political pressure is not on Democrats as much as it's on Republicans right now.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah, I think.

[Juliana Stratton]

Right.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Just as I'd say your motivating factor should be. We have 10 months or so until we are in charge of the House. If we win the House. Right. But that's what you're planning for. What can you do that improves people's lives and improves the conduct of ice over the next 10 months? That is actually achievable and would make a difference. And if you can find something that would make a difference and improve the process, maybe it's just a warrants, maybe something else, then be willing to take that now.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. Before we move on from this, I should also mention that NBC News reported on Thursday that a year ago Christine Ohm fuckboy Corey Lewandowski told a story

[Dan Pfeiffer]

the lawyers got in my ear and

[Jon Favreau]

said, say alleged told a DHS private prison contractor that in order for his company to win more government contracts, Lewandowski would need to get paid a success fee. Special government employee Corey Lewandowski getting paid a success fee. After the company declined to pay Lewandowski, the company's federal contracts with DHS shrank because according to a senior DHS official talk to NBC, Lewandowski told officials not to award any more contracts to the company. What do you think? Is that normal to solicit bribes from your private prison contractor when you're in government?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

There's not a lot normal going on with this whole Corey Lewandowski thing. Is it normal for the alleged lover of the married Department of Homeland Security secretary to become the gatekeeper and the person who made all the decisions? No. Is it normal for a random employee to demand a badge and a gun? No. Is it normal for someone to take on a temporary role that allowed them to only work, whatever it is, 120 days, then work much longer by going in the building without swiping their badge, which was in that Wall Street Journal story back then, so that wouldn't count on his days of service? So, no, not too normal. But it may be normal in the Trump administration so that we don't know.

[Jon Favreau]

We're not. And this isn't just like there's a million things we talk about that are corrupt and unethical. This is just like illegal. It's just a bribe. Is just soliciting bribes. And Corey Lewandowski, I mean, this is. I almost like don't want Democrats to start investigating it now because then Trump gives him the pardon. Just, just hold off till Trump. He might be the guy who doesn't

[Dan Pfeiffer]

get the pardon in the end.

[Jon Favreau]

I was gonna say. Just, just, just let everyone be quiet about Corey Lewandowski. Let's wait for Trump to leave office and then, then people.

[Pod Save America Host (Ad Read)]

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[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Quick question. Are you politically engaged and spiritually exhausted

[Erin Ryan]

if you said yes to both? Welcome home. I'm Erin Ryan.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

And I'm Alyssa Mastromonaco and we're the

[Erin Ryan]

hosts of Hysteria, the podcast for women who care about democracy, culture and not losing their minds in the process.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

We break down the news, call out the nonsense, and spotlight the women actually fighting back on Capitol Hill, in classrooms and everywhere. The stakes are high.

[Erin Ryan]

It's sharp, honest analysis featuring women's voices with humor and zero hand holding.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Listen to Hysteria wherever you get your podcasts and watch full episodes on YouTube.

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[Jon Favreau]

all right, let's talk Democratic politics. We got some primary results on Tuesday in Illinois. J.B. pritzker's chosen candidate, Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton, who you'll hear Dan talk to in a moment, will be the Democratic nominee for Senate. But the big story of the night was the role that pro Israel advocacy group AIPAC played in several House primaries where affiliated super PACs with AIPAC spent $22 million. At least 7 million of that $22 million was spent just in the 9th district primary, where Evanston Mayor Daniel Biss beat out progressive activist and longtime crooked contributor Kat Abiguizale. The catch is AIPAC directed most of their spending in that race against Bis, even though he has an Israeli mother and has refused to call what's happened in Gaza a genocide. But because he advocated for conditioning aid to Israel, AIPAC spent $7 million to defeat him. And they failed. And their candidate in the Illinois seventh lost as well, though AIPAC backed House candidates Donna Miller and Melissa Bean won their primary. So Aipac went 2 and 2. In his victory speech, Bis called out the group by name and criticized it, quote, supporting the idea that we can't accept nuance in the US Israel relationship. Other Democrats outside of Illinois are also reevaluating their relationship with the organization. Arizona Senator Ruben Gallego, a 2028 hopeful, told POLITICO this week that he wouldn't take any AIPAC money and called settler violence in the west bank, quote, disgusting. What do you make of the role AIPAC played in Illinois and just the role they're playing in Democratic primaries overall? I know you have a great piece about this in the message box today, today.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

It came out today, Thursday, yesterday.

[Jon Favreau]

Honestly, I read it this morning and I felt like it was already yesterday. God, it's been a long day.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Anyway, today is Jack's fifth birthday, so we have been at it since.

[Jon Favreau]

Oh, happy birthday, Jack.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yes, he woke up at about 5:20 this morning, which was awesome. He was very excited. But he also woke up at five yesterday because he thought yesterday was his birthday. So it's been a very busy day in our house. And if you want that message box or any other ones, you can subscribe it crooked.com yeswedan for a 20% discount. End of organic plug. I think that what happened in the 9th district of Illinois is just the classic example of how asinine and counterproductive AIPAC's political strategy has been. Because Daniel Biss would have been a potential ally, not a ardent supporter of everything AIPAC stands for, but someone that they can engage with in good faith. Instead, they spent millions of dollars trying to defeat him and now they've created an adversary. And you're seeing that across the board. And the problem for AIPAC is going in races, they don't run any ad. Now the important thing to know here is they don't run any ads about the US Israeli relationship.

[Jon Favreau]

Right?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

They only run ads about other things. In New Jersey, when they were trying to defeat Tom Malinowski and accidentally elected the progressive opponent Instead they spent $2 million attacking him on ice funding in this race, when they switched their funding to try to beat Kat and try to suppress her vote at the end to maybe help Laura find their chosen candidate through a group that was called Elect Chicago Women, they ran ads accusing her of being a fake progressive. And so they operate with these shadowy groups running ads that have nothing to do with their stated purpose as an organization to hand pick Democrats. And that has polarized Democrats against them and hurt their cause. There will be less Democrats in Congress willing to deal with AIPAC because of the way they are acting in these primaries. And the thing is that they refuse to acknowledge the reality of how Democrats perception, and really the country's perception of Israel has changed everyone. There's been a dramatic shift among Democrats who approve of of the US Israeli relationship. Dramatic shift around Americans who, whether they sympathize more with the Israelis or the Palestinians, people attribute that to being a dramatic shift primarily about a shift among Democrats, but it's not. Yes, that is true. It is mostly among Democrats, but even the independents. The number of independents who approve of the US Israeli relationship is down 19 points since the aftermath of October 7th. Among Republicans it's down 9 points. And so you can't Go in there and try to bludgeon people into 100% support of your agenda. And the way that they have operated is very bad for their cause. It is stretching, sort of exploiting every loophole in campaign finance. And essentially they're operating just in a way that Democrats should want to have nothing to do with them. It is such bad faith, cynical politics. And what makes it even worse is it's bad faith, cynical politics that is executed with abject incompetence. Which, as a former political operative, does bother me as well.

[Jon Favreau]

Here's the problem with aipac. AIPAC wants you to think they are a pro Jewish organization. They want you to think they are a pro Israel organization. In reality, AIPAC is an organization that promotes Benjamin Netanyahu's government in Israel. AIPAC is an organization that supports spending our tax dollars to fund the Israeli military.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

With no conditions.

[Jon Favreau]

With no conditions. AIPAC is an organization that supports the Iran war that we have just spent most of the pod talking about how badly it's going, how dangerous it is, how many lives it's taken, how much money it's costing. AIPAC is an organization that supports Israel fighting in Lebanon, which is starting to look like the war they fought in Gaza, which has led to thousands and thousands and thousands of civilians dying, most of them children. That is what AIPAC supports. That is the policies AIPAC supports. If AIPAC truly believed that those policies are popular, then it would spend its considerable resources making the case to voters in support of those policies. The ads that AIPAC ran would be about the policies that AIPAC supports and the policies it demands the people who run for office that it supports also support. AIPAC doesn't do that. AIPAC's too scared to run on their policies. AIPAC will tweet about their policies in the Twitter world, but when it comes to running ads, when it comes to actually presenting a case to voters, AIPAC hides Behind random super PAC, shady super PACs, different names. Concerned women for Chicago or Illinois. Right, Whatever they fucking called themselves in Illinois and New Jersey. And they do it all over the place. And they say, oh, other. Other super PACs do that too. Yeah, sure they do. That doesn't make them any better.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

The other ones who do that are primarily the AI industry and the crypto industry.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah. So good. Yeah. No, so you're. Yeah, okay, you're all the same then. So if you believe in your policies, then go fucking have that debate. But you don't want to have that debate because you know your policies are unpopular, because you know if you told a bunch of Americans that you support using their tax dollars to fund Bibi Netanyahu's fucking destruction of the Middle east, then they would tell you to go fuck yourself. That's what AIPAC is. And they have done this by being like, if you're, if you're against aipac, then you're anti Israel, and sometimes you're anti Semitic and you're promoting anti Semitism and you're promoting anti Israel sentiment and all this bullshit. And it is fucking bullshit because all they do is go around and hide their true intentions and hide behind these super PACs and just like, attack people for. They attack people from the left. They attack candidates from the left for things that they don't even believe just to try to win these races. It is pathetic. It is pathetic. And I really Hope that, like 2028 candidate, like, I, if I were a 2028 candidate, if I were advising a 2028 candidate, I would not. None of them should take a dime from apac. Yeah, it would.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

That would be a truly idiotic decision if you wanted to be President United States.

[Jon Favreau]

And now when you say. Now when you say this, then you get. Because we've gotten this before. Then everyone's like, oh, you guys are doing a litmus test. And now you're saying that people who take from APAC shouldn't be in the party. No, be in the fucking party. Run all you want.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I'm just giving you advice. That's just me saying you, advice.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, yeah. I'm not gonna, I won't support you. Like, I mean, you know, maybe if it's between you and Donald Trump, I'll support you. But like, if you make the primary

[Dan Pfeiffer]

and you're the Democratic nominee. Yeah, I will, Whatever. I will support you.

[Jon Favreau]

Yes, of course, of course. But like, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not support. I'm not putting my money behind a candidate that does that. I just don't want to do that. It's ridiculous. There's the, like, we're taught, like, thousands and thousands of lives are at stake right now, and there's zero self reflection from AIPAC about what the Israeli government has done. It's crazy. All right, before we get to Dan's interview, we just want to touch on a few stories that show Trump's not gonna let a little war get in the way of making money. Literally, in this first instance. On Thursday, Trump's handpicked arts commission voted to approve a commemorative 24 karat gold coin featuring Donald Trump. No oh, yeah. You didn't know this?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I can't. I just would have assumed it would have been historic figure of some kind, pioneer in civil rights or a suffragist or some of the other things that Donald Trump cares passionately about. It's also, like, Donald Trump himself.

[Jon Favreau]

We should, like, put it up on the screen for people who are watching this, right?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Someone just. They did it.

[Juliana Stratton]

It's.

[Jon Favreau]

It's him with, like, a. Like, a menacing, like, scowl, like holding a desk. It's very fucking weird. It's now going to be a U. S. It's going to be a gold commemorative, gold coin that the fucking mint creates or something. Is that. I don't know how it works, but that same day, the same day today, Thursday, as we're recording this, Trump posted an image of gold shoes on Truth Social with the caption, rare Trump sneakers listed for $180,000 at Sneaker Con in Riyadh. Hey, Dan, you think they're having a good time at Sneaker Con in Riyadh as the ballistic missiles from Iran are flying overhead and hitting their refineries? You think they're all excited to buy the $180,000 Trump shoes? Glad Trump let us know about that.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

There is some person in the middle of this war, some person who wants a deal with the government or a partner, who's gonna buy those shoes, put them on and post some instagrams and start DMing them to white House officials.

[Jon Favreau]

And finally, this is from an Axios piece today. Quote, while Trump deals with the war in Iran and rising gas prices at home, the President seems downright giddy. What's he giddy about? The UFC fight he'll be holding on the White House lawn this summer, which he told Axios is, quote, the hottest ticket he's ever seen.

[Crooked Media Contributor (Ad Read)]

Why?

[Jon Favreau]

Donald Trump spoke to Axios about this fight on the South Lawn.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I assume they called him.

[Jon Favreau]

I'm sorry.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

He talks to Axios three to four times a day, as far as I can tell.

[Jon Favreau]

I know he picks up. He picks up their calls. He hasn't picked up Tommy's call yet. Trump has apparently been personally fielding ticket requests for the UFC fight on the South Lawn, which will go to people who've donated to his super pac, his inaugural, and, of course, of course, his ballroom. What do you think, Dan? Where would you like to begin?

[Pod Save America Host (Ad Read)]

This is.

[Jon Favreau]

What's. This is for his mind.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Let's start with the ufc.

[Pod Save America Host (Ad Read)]

Great.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

So Donald Trump is a really busy guy. He didn't really have the time and energy to dig into the war he started in Iran. But he is going to spend, I would willing to bet, hours on the friends and family list for. For the UFC fight. He's. I see. He's going to be there. There is going to be some Together.

[Jon Favreau]

A wedding.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Wedding with a seating chart. And he's like moving people around. He's like, you know, I can't put Jake Paul and Logan Paul on other sides of the arena. They got to be together.

[Jon Favreau]

Megyn Kelly can't sit next to Mark Levin.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yes. And he can be in a smaller seat for all the obvious reasons. Right.

[Jon Favreau]

Corey Lewandowski can't sit next to Kristi Noem because the husband's coming. These are like, big problems.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah, big problems. It's going to be hard to do this, but he is the man for the job. He will do the seating arrangements properly.

[Jon Favreau]

What a. I can't. I can't wait to go.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

They don't want to sit you next to Stephen Miller.

[Jon Favreau]

Right? Of course, Yeah.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I mean, it's going to be.

[Jon Favreau]

But they also can't put me next to JD Vance or Megyn Kelly

[Dan Pfeiffer]

and Trisha.

[Jon Favreau]

Even though, Trisha. We're on the same side of the

[Dan Pfeiffer]

world and never acknowledge your existence. They probably put you near her either.

[Jon Favreau]

See, here's a good example. I unfollowed Trisha McLaughlin because you know what? She's gone. Not in the White House anymore. I don't need to see what lies Trisha McLaughlin's peddling in here.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Okay, well, good. You know what?

[Jon Favreau]

She's gone from my mind now.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Growth. I like to see that growth here at the end of the podcast.

[Jon Favreau]

Finally, Dan, if you're looking for a place, if you're in D.C. if you happen to be in D.C. and you're looking for a place to follow the news, catch a drink, and maybe bet which member of the Iranian regime Israel will assassinate next, look no further than the Poly Market Bar. The Poly Market Bar, which is set to open this Friday in Washington, D.C. the bar is named the Situation Room, and it will essentially be a prediction market sports bar. And on all the screens everywhere, you know, like a sports bar, they got all the games and all the screens. Well, this has got live Twitter feeds,

[Dan Pfeiffer]

if they're X feeds, Bloomberg feeds, and

[Jon Favreau]

of course, Poly Market feeds all the bets that you could imagine.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And flight radar, that's in there, too. You can track flights.

[Jon Favreau]

Bunch of fucking losers.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I assume this was a prank.

[Jon Favreau]

Not a prank.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

It's not a prank. No, it's real. And can you just imagine being like you know what I would like with my Twitter feed? A big screen and a pitcher of beer.

[Jon Favreau]

Now, I can imagine some people thinking that I would like that.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Are you all of a sudden reconsidering it? Yeah, that's.

[Jon Favreau]

But then I have to hold the phone. Then I can just sit there.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Well, here's the thing.

[Jon Favreau]

You're double tested. I could be drinking.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

You're in it for the tweeting, not the reading of tweets. So.

[Jon Favreau]

That's right.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah. You're like, there's a world of people who play in the games and people who watch the games of Buffalo Wild Wings. You're more of a player in the Twitter games.

[Jon Favreau]

I just can't think of anything more. I mean, I actually shouldn't say anything because everything is more dystopian, but I can't think of many things more dystopian than, like, betting on, you know, when will the US Bomb Iran next at a bar? While you're watching this fucking live feed of a map and betting with polymart.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I mean, you're just waiting for that Osint tweet to come through with the latest data.

[Jon Favreau]

Oh, God, that fucking city. Anyway, I don't miss it.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Let's not besmirch the whole city.

[Jon Favreau]

I meant more in the Mark Leibovich

[Dan Pfeiffer]

vein of the town, not the town. Yes, the town loves the Polymarket bar.

[Jon Favreau]

Plenty of other great bars, I guess CNN that probably no one goes to anymore because we're old.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

And those bars aren't around anymore in China, the ones. That's what I'm saying. Those are long gone. They're new bars, I assume, that don't have large Twitter feeds.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah, the days of old glory are gone.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Those were your days of glory, I'll tell you that.

[Jon Favreau]

All right, Dan. When we come back, everyone will hear Dan's interview with Juliana Stratton, the Democratic nominee for Senate in Illinois.

[Crooked Media Contributor (Ad Read)]

Today's show is sponsored by Strawberry Me. Let me ask you something. Are you where you want to be in your career, or are you waking up every day knowing you're capable of more but not sure how to get there? Listen, success doesn't just happen. And the most successful people in the world don't figure it out alone. They have mentors, coaches, and people guiding them every step of the way. That's where Strawberry Me career coaching comes in. Career coaching gives you the clarity, strategy, and accountability needed to turn your goals into reality, whether it's landing a new job, advancing in your current role, or transitioning into a field you love with expert guidance. You'll identify obstacles holding you back, develop a step by step plan and take action with confidence, knowing you have a dedicated coach supporting you every step of the way instead of relying on guesswork or waiting for the right time. Professional coaching helps you take control of your career trajectory, ensuring you make intentional strategic moves towards success. Look, I have a lot of friends who, honestly, they didn't make it. They didn't make it. They needed coaches. You know, they're wasting away. No, I have like some of my friends who have been the most successful in part. They have like mentors. They've gone. They have people in their lives that they like go to for advice. They're not just, I don't know, making decisions willy nilly like and then end up hosting podcasts. You know, go to Strawberry Me slash crooked and get 50% off your first coaching session. That's Strawberry Me Crooked. It's like therapy for your career.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Quick question. Are you politically engaged and spiritually exhausted

[Erin Ryan]

if you said yes to both? Welcome home. I'm Erin Ryan.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

And I'm Alyssa Mastromonaco and we're the

[Erin Ryan]

hosts of Hysteria, the podcast for women who care about democracy, culture and not losing their minds in the process.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

We break down the news, call out the nonsense, and spotlight the women actually fighting back on Capitol Hill, in classrooms and everywhere. The stakes are high.

[Erin Ryan]

It's sharp, honest analysis featuring women's voices with humor and zero hand hold.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Listen to Hysteria wherever you get your podcasts and watch full episodes on YouTube.

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[Dan Pfeiffer]

Joining me today is Illinois Lieutenant Governor Julian Estrant, who just became the Democratic nominee for Senate Lieutenant governor. Welcome to Pot Save America.

[Juliana Stratton]

Thank you for having me.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

So you were an underdog for most of the race. You trailed by some pretty big margins up until the very end. It was a very exciting night. How are you feeling a couple of days after your win?

[Juliana Stratton]

Well, I'm feeling great, certainly on the outside. The inside might be taking a nap right now, but I'm really excited about the fact that we got our message out. We always knew that this was a campaign where we wanted to center the voices of the people of Illinois. And I spent time crisscrossing the state. We certainly were outspent, I think by a 4 to 1 margin. But we knew that we had a message that would resonate with voters and we did the work and we came out on top. And I'm very grateful. And now I'm going to work for the next eight months to make sure that we can win this general election in November.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I would say if we don't win the general election in November in Illinois, I'm going to be very concerned. But I recognize you don't want to count your chickens before they're hatched here.

[Juliana Stratton]

You're going to take it seriously, right?

[Dan Pfeiffer]

As you should. But I don't want our listeners to panic here. Your race, interestingly enough, I'm sure it felt like to you it got a ton of attention, but nationally, less attention. Some of these other primaries in these states, like Maine, Michigan, Texas, particularly the Texas in Maine, where we're trying to figure out which Democrat is the best one to take to flip this Republican seat. But so for our listeners who weren't, you know, who, maybe who didn't watch it, you said your message worked. Tell us what your message was. Yeah.

[Juliana Stratton]

Well, first of all, let me just say to what you just pointed out that I've always said that even though Illinois is considered a, quote, unquote, safe blue state, and this was a safe blue seat, I think that, you know, it was important to get out to voters that it matters who's in the seat, especially in the moment that we're living in right now, that we can't take anything for granted. And it's not just let's just elect a Democrat. We needed someone who was going to fight for the people. And that was what I was hearing from voters across the state, that they wanted someone who was going to go to the Met, fighting for them and stand up to this president. They were looking for new energy New voices, just new perspectives and people who are going to meet this moment. And I think that it also was. It wasn't just about what we were fighting against, but what we were fighting for. And so I developed that message of what I was going to fight for in Washington by listening to people and not trying to tell people what they should care about, but rather take what they were telling me and craft my messaging around that.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

I think as people looked at this race, who's maybe. Maybe had at least a passing understanding of Illinois politics. This is an oversimplification, so I will admit this, but you have a potentially slightly more moderate candidate in your opponent. You have yourself. You ran really progressive with some very progressive positions. The expectation is that you would crush in Chicago, your opponent would do very well downstate in the burbs, but you actually won 44 or 50 wards. Talk a little bit about what. What lessons you take from that, about the ability of a progressive message to work in rural areas, suburban areas, exurban areas.

[Juliana Stratton]

Yeah. And I do want to point out that we were pleasantly surprised to see how many downstate counties we also won. I mean, we got Chicago. We did great in some of the collar counties, but also downstate. And as the only candidate that has represented the entire state of Illinois for the last seven years as Lieutenant governor, I always knew that there were unique parts of the state. Each part of the state has its different character, different issues that are important. But when I think about the messaging, these are things that everybody wants access to affordable health care, which is why I'm fighting for Medicare for all, especially at a time that we see a president and an administration that's stripping millions of people of their health care. I'm fighting to raise wages, and I personally want to fight for. For a $25 minimum wage at the federal level. I don't see it as minimum. I see it as a livable wage. Because with everything getting so expensive, and we're certainly seeing that, it's important that we recognize that $7.25 is not enough for anyone to take care of themselves, let alone a family. And even with what we've done in illinois with a $15 an hour minimum wage, it's important that we recognize that's only $31,000 a year, and that's not enough to take care of yourself or your family either. So I think we need a livable wage. And I'll tell you one of the things that was really surprising to me on this trail, which is why it's important to think about all of the different diverse communities that this message resonated with. I noticed that too many people think small around what we can accomplish in Washington, and then it's, oh, well, that's going to be too hard. And I'm not sure what people will think about it. But why should we think that way? We should think very big. We should have a big vision for what's possible and fight for it. And I think, because that was my message, people really just thought, you know what? She's going to be someone who's going to try to make my life better. And they feel like too many in Washington get there and forget who they represent.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Can you talk a little bit about the role, your views on ICE and how you talked about it and how that played downstate as well?

[Juliana Stratton]

Well, I made it very clear that I want to abolish ice. You know, that here in Illinois and the city of Chicago and surrounding areas, we were, you know, terrorized, quite frankly, by Operation Midway Blitz. We saw our neighbors being snatched off the streets by masked agents, stuffed into unmarked vehicles, and no due process, no warrants, and a president who said he was going after the worst of the worst. And that's not what happened. We saw tamale vendors and we saw, you know, being snatched off the street. We saw people working in daycare centers. And, you know, I think this is just an example of, you know, why, you know, I was out there protesting and doing everything that I could helping students get from school and have safe passage. I was on rapid response. It was important to be present. And I think one of the things that certainly as Democrats that our party is looking for is people who are going to be there in community, showing up and being leaders, not just in an office somewhere, but being amongst the people. And that was really important. And I can also say that the trauma of Operation Midway Blitz continues. It wasn't just while they were in full force here in the city of Chicago or surrounding areas and, you know, our suburban areas and even downstate. This trauma is continuing. And Governor Pritzker and I launched what's called the Illinois Accountability Commission, because this president is not always going to be president, and we're going to hold him accountable. And we're collecting data and stories and narratives and photos and videos because we want to make sure that we're capturing what has happened and the harm that he has caused, and we're going to be ready to bring some real accountability. And by the way, that's what voters and the people of Illinois want. They want this president to be Held accountable.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

What's the vehicle for that accountability? Is that potential criminal charges down the line?

[Juliana Stratton]

Well, yes, we want to see anything that will hold them accountable. And I've said very clearly, even as it relates to federal agents and what we're looking for when it comes to DHS and this, this funding question, I mean, I wouldn't vote to fund any agency that I want to see abolished, but we certainly need to make sure that federal agents are held accountable and should be. If they've committed crimes, they're be a full investigation and they should be prosecuted. And we should also make sure there's no total immunity for these individuals. People have been killed now and it's unacceptable. It's unacceptable. And Democrats need to hold firm.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

There was obviously a lot of super PAC activity in Illinois, both in your race and in the four key House races. One group that put a lot of money into the race against you was the crypto industry. I believe they put in several million dollars, especially right after you started to surge in the polls towards the end there. Talk to me a little about the role they played, your views on crypto, and how you think we should deal with this sort of dark money, or not dark money, but this sort of special interest money in politics.

[Juliana Stratton]

Well, I talk all the time about how I need to fight for campaign finance finance reform and we need to end Citizens United. I mean, I think I was, I don't want to quote exactly, but I believe I was the number one target of the crypto super PAC industry. You know, the crypto industry, super PACs, the number one target this election cycle, number one in the nation. And they came at me with attack ads in the amount of $10 million plus. And I think about that and, you know, I think it was really important that we made a statement that when you continue to be the kind of candidate that's going to speak in a way that's going to resonate with voters when you're going to stand up and talk very clearly about your bold vision. We were successful, but we need to do more to level the playing field and allow good candidates to run for office. We saw all of this outside money pouring into these campaigns, and I think it's really important when I get there. I'm proud to be endorsed by, in Citizens United because I'm taking a stance of the kind of campaign finance reform that we need to see in this country. And it starts, number one, with ending Citizens United.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

What particularly was it about your record or your policy positions that made the crypto industry come after you so directly.

[Juliana Stratton]

I don't think it was about policy positions in per se, and certainly not about crypto per se, but I think it was. I made it very clear that I was here to stand up for everyday working people. That's what we should be focused on, how to make sure people can, you know, have a little more money in their pockets, how we can make sure that they can have access to health care, and how we're going to stand up to a president who is, to me, a wannabe dictator who does not have the best interest of the American people at heart. And they knew that I was someone that, you know, this industry has made Donald Trump rich. And they didn't want anybody who was gonna stand up to him or fight back against him or hold him accountable. They wanna just keep going with business as usual. And by the way, that's what I've heard from people that they are so fed up with in Washington. They don't want business as usual. They want to see somebody who's going to come in and really deliver for them. And I think that that's what they didn't want. They knew that as a candidate, I was not going to be someone who would go along with the status quo in Washington.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

The other interest group that played a huge role in this Tuesday's primaries, not in your race per se, but in the four House races, was aipac. They spent a lot of money through sort of shadowy groups to try to defeat some candidates like some other candidates, although I recognize that they did not, I believe, get super involved in your race. Just. But I know it was a huge topic of discussion in Illinois over the last couple of months here. Do you have any takeaways about the role AIPAC played in the relationship with AIPAC going forward for the Democratic Party? We now have candidates like Ruben Gallego and Gavin Newsom who say that they will not take AIPAC money going forward or if they were to run for president.

[Juliana Stratton]

Yeah, I mean, again, I think we need to get big money out of politics. And that's why, as I said before, we need to fight for campaign finance reform. We need to do something different. I mean, we saw millions of dollars flowing in from so many different sources here in Illinois. And it impacts, you know, can impact as we see, as we've seen the outcomes of these elections. And so that's something that, again, you know, I want to make sure that people know who's funding these campaigns. That's important. And those are the kinds of things that I'm going to fight for when I get to Washington.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Anything specific, anything about AIPAC specifically and how you think about them or.

[Juliana Stratton]

Well, look, I've always made my position clear about what I want to see in general in terms of, you know, working towards lasting peace and a two state solution. But I think more importantly, you know, when it comes to these elections, I know they, you know, I have not accepted any money from the pac, but I know that in these elections we saw a lot of activity here in Illinois. And again, the goal for me is to make sure that we can really level the playing field, allow people to get out there, campaign, make their messages heard, you know, raise from whomever they have to raise from. But the idea of what we've seen just sort of coming in with these different names like the crypto industry and my race, for example, example, you'll see all of these terms. I, I don't even remember the exact name.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Like the Fair Shake Pack or something. Something like that. Right.

[Juliana Stratton]

Even, you know, I think people might have. There was one that was like Illinois Progressive something, you know. Yes, crypto industry. So it, it, it, it gives people. Paid for by the progressive, whatever. And that's not ex, not what it was. A lot of these packs were MAGA aligned packs. And so that kind of thing does not, you know, it's really meant to sort of give voters. It's deceptive for voters, let's just put it that way.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yep, yep. Okay. You ran what I think may end up being the most memorable ad of this cycle. And I'm saying that in March of the cycle, with, you know, about $3 billion of ads to come, it got a ton of attention. Some people have pointed that as a pivot point for in your race when you sort of maybe started to take off. For those who don't know, the ad featured a number of Chicagoans saying fuck Trump and ended with Governor Pritzker, who had endorsed you, making the case for you. Talk to me about the decision to run that ad. What the reaction was. Did you get some blowback from it? So I'm just very curious about this. It was very interesting ad.

[Juliana Stratton]

Well, we knew we needed to, I mean, so much noise, you know, that in any election cycle there's so much noise. And honestly, the amount of noise with the chaos that's coming out of Washington D.C. people just felt like, what do I pay attention to? And so there needed to be a real way to break through the noise and capture what people were feeling. And when I would go around the state, I talked about previously that people were Looking for a fighter. They were frustrated with Washington, really angry at feeling like, look at this president and what he's doing and who is standing up to fight and who's going to go toe to toe with him. And the ad just captured it so perfectly in 30 seconds to just say this is what the American people are feeling, this is what Illinoisans are feeling and that they don't want to just have business as usual for somebody who's a wannabe dictator. Why are we acting like this is normal? It's not. And I think that I'm just really proud that the ad just broke through. And what I mostly heard was people saying things like, how come you didn't ask me to be in the ad? How come I couldn't be a part of that? And I just thought that's when I knew that it was just really a turning point. One of the ways that it was a turning point in the campaign.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

In the process of making the ad, did you any point consider bleeping the fuck in the fuck Trump part?

[Juliana Stratton]

Well, it was bleeped for, for broadcast for tv.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Juliana Stratton]

I think that, I'm not sure the bleep, you know, quite got all of.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah, I, I support the non bleeping decision, but many people have asked that

[Juliana Stratton]

the non bleeping group, like there's a non bleeping caucus, I think, and I think many people are part of it.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

When the ad first came out, one of your supporters in Chicago, good supporters, who's an old friend of mine from the Obama days, texted me the ad to ask my thoughts about it. And my view was I thought it was the right move for the reasons you just said, which was you were getting massively outspent and just it's hard to get attention anyway. And so a very visible viral way of getting attention in Illinois. And it was a very Chicago ad. Like it felt very, it was a great ad.

[Juliana Stratton]

Chicago, Dan. South side of Chicago.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah, no, I know, I know. That is, it is authentic. I would say yes.

[Jon Favreau]

Yeah.

[Juliana Stratton]

And I think that one way or the other, people were talking about it.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah, you need that in politics in this day and age.

[Juliana Stratton]

I'm happy it turned out the way it did.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Yeah. Well, whether it's causation or correlation, you ran the ad, you won. We're very excited for you. We excited. I know you're not counting your chickens before they're hatched. You still have a general election coming, but we're very excited to see you in the senate starting in 2027. Lt. Governor Stratton thank you for joining us on Pod Save America.

[Juliana Stratton]

Thanks for having me, Dan.

[Jon Favreau]

That's our show for today. Dan will be back in your feed on Sunday with a new episode of Pod Save America.

[Dan Pfeiffer]

Sunday. Bye everyone.

[Jon Favreau]

If you want to listen to Pod Save America ad free and get access to exclusive podcasts, go to cricket.com friends to subscribe on Supercast, Substack, YouTube or Apple Podcasts. Also, please consider leaving us a review that helps boost this episode and everything we do here at Crooked Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. Our producer is Saul Rubin. Our Associate producer is Farah Safari. Austin Fisher is our Senior producer. Reed Churlin is is our Executive Editor. Adrienne Hill is our head of News and Politics. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Kanter is our Sound Engineer with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Matt de Groat is our Head of Production. Naomi Sengel is our Executive Assistant. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Hayley Jones, Ben Hefcoat, Mia Kelman, Kiril Pelaviev, David Toles, and Ryan Young. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Quick question. Are you politically engaged and spiritually exhausted

[Erin Ryan]

if you said yes to both? Welcome home. I'm Erin Ryan.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

And I'm Alyssa Mastromonaco and we're the

[Erin Ryan]

hosts of Hysteria, the podcast for women who care about democracy, culture and not losing their minds in the process.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

We break down the news, call out the nonsense, and spotlight the women actually fighting back on Capitol Hill, in classrooms and everywhere, the stakes are high.

[Erin Ryan]

It's sharp, honest analysis featuring women's voices with humor and zero hand holding.

[Alyssa Mastromonaco]

Listen to Hysteria wherever you get your podcasts and watch full episodes on YouTube. Work moves fast. Every email report and proposal counts. That's where Grammarly comes in. It's your one place to think, write and finish. Grammarly's AI agents help you find natural phrasing, fine tune tone and confidently write wherever you work. It's the premier writing tool that 93% of users trust to get more work done in a world of generic AI. Don't sound like everyone else. With Grammarly, you never will. Download Grammarly for [e-mail], with VRBoCare.

[Juliana Stratton]

Help is always ready before, during and after your stay.

[Jon Favreau]

We've planned for the plot twists, so

[Juliana Stratton]

support is always available because a great trip starts with peace of mind.