Neera Tanden: Absolute Power Corrupts

Summary

The Bulwark Podcast: "Neera Tanden: Absolute Power Corrupts"

Host: Tim Miller
Guest: Neera Tanden (President/CEO, Center for American Progress, former Biden Domestic Policy Advisor)
Date: March 6, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode features Tim Miller in conversation with Neera Tanden, focusing on the chaotic state of the Trump administration, the consequences of unchecked executive power, current economic challenges, the deepening war in the Middle East, and the looming 2026 Senate landscape. The discussion is notable for its sharp analysis of Trump-era dysfunction, war mismanagement, the culture of impunity, and the complicated dynamics inside both parties. With signature Bulwark candor and gallows humor, Miller and Tanden examine how "absolute power corrupts" in American politics today.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

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1. Schadenfreude and Dysfunction in the Trump Administration

(01:54–12:51)

• Kristi Noem's Firing & the Culture of Fake Jobs

  • Celebration of the ouster of Kristi Noem and her close associate Corey Lewandowski from the Trump cabinet.
  • Trump assigns Noem to a made-up diplomatic post ("Shield of the Americas") as a face-saving maneuver.
  • Neera: "The crazier the title, the more made up it is." (03:00, D)

• Political Consequences and Republican Response

  • Trump’s resistance to firing officials rooted in his refusal to be constrained.
  • The unusual effect of political pressure causing action—even inside a regime that prizes loyalty over competence.
  • Tanden: "He believes no one should make him do anything... everyone has had carte blanche to be as incompetent or as horrifyingly cruel as possible." (04:14, D)

• Markwayne Mullin as Noem's Replacement

  • Mullin compared unfavorably to his predecessor; described as a sycophant with few credentials and inflammatory, even violent, rhetoric.
  • Mullin’s past attacks on Rand Paul highlighted as potential stumbling blocks for confirmation.
  • Miller reads Mullin’s past quote: “Rand Paul is a freaking snake. And I understand completely why his neighbor did what he did.” (09:19, C)

• Possibility for Rational Republican Replacement in the Senate

  • Oklahoma's governor could install a less extreme temporary senator, potentially shifting some dynamics.

• Subtext: The conversation underscores the degradation of government norms and the embrace of performative, unserious governance.

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2. Cracks in the Republican Coalition & Senate Dynamics

(12:05–12:51; 43:38–61:05)

• Rand Paul’s Libertarian Concerns

  • Focus on libertarians’ worries about militarized federal agencies amidst abuses and lies from DHS.
  • Neera: "Unless you are a complete hypocrite, you should be very worried about a incredibly armed DHS that is shooting citizens on the streets of American cities." (12:05, D)
  • Senate confirmations could open the door for greater scrutiny of Trump officials and administration scandals.

• Senate Map Analysis

  • Eye on states like Montana, Nebraska, Alaska, Ohio, North Carolina, and Maine as key for Democrats to regain control.
  • Miller: “The Democrats cannot consider this to be a good midterm or a blue wave unless they also take the Senate. Taking the House is not sufficient.” (43:38, C)
  • Tanden highlights the importance of the Senate as a check on courts and nominees.

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3. Economy: Self-Inflicted Wounds and Discontent

(15:34–24:46)

• Dramatic Job Losses

  • Recent labor report shows 92,000 jobs lost, along with downward revisions from previous months and concentrated losses in manufacturing, construction, transportation, and working-class sectors.
  • Tanden: "Donald Trump decided himself to create a tariff regime that just made everything a lot more expensive... that is why we’re having a manufacturing problem." (15:34, D)

• No Coherent Plan from the White House

  • Criticism of Trump’s lack of ideas in the State of the Union; administration focused on executive actions, not legislative solutions.
  • Miller: "It was self inflicted. 100%... And there’s no plan." (17:40, C)

• Tariffs and War Drag

  • Tariffs/backwards policies as a key driver for job losses.
  • War in the Middle East impacting oil prices, further worsening inflation (termed "warflation").

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4. The Middle East War: Strategy-Free Chaos and Escalation

(24:46–41:17)

• Economic Fallout of War

  • Gas prices up 11%, oil up 20% since the start of the conflict.
  • Tanden on the paradox: “I was kind of predictable that when you started a war with Iran, it might have some pressure on gas prices.” (22:08, D)
  • Administration’s ham-handed response: easing sanctions on Russia to stabilize oil prices to the benefit of a US adversary.

• Lack of Planning and Sudden Escalation

  • War started without proper buildup, consultation with allies, or adequate preparation (e.g., strategic reserves).
  • Miller: “If it’s that critical that you go on the BB [Netanyahu] timetable here, then there are going to be these other externalities, like people stuck over in the Middle East, like gas prices going up. And it doesn’t feel like they gave a fuck about that.” (25:38, C)
  • Allies alienated, embassies unprepared, civilians left at risk.

• Regime Change and No Clear War Aim

  • Trump’s public pronouncement: “There will be no deal with Iran except unconditional surrender… bring Iran back, Iran will have a great future, make Iran great again, MEGA.” (28:00, C reads Trump post)
  • Guest reflects on the seven conflicting war objectives in as many days, lack of public support, and war crime allegations after U.S. forces bomb a school.

• War Crimes and the Cost of Absolute Power

  • School bombing likened to Abu Ghraib for its long-term impact on U.S. reputation.
  • Tanden: “In my lifetime, the height of support for a military engagement, a war is the days after the first bombings start going off. The fact that the President has never been able to make the case as to why we have to do this...” (27:16, D)
  • No accountability culture, whistleblowers purged, administration openly suppressing dissent.

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5. The Corrosive Effects of "Absolute Power"

(37:13–43:38)

• No Guardrails, No Accountability

  • Republican institutions, the Supreme Court, and senior officials refusing to check presidential excess.
  • Neera: "Absolute power corrupts. Like, there have been no guardrails on this President because the Republican Party and the Supreme Court also made up of Republicans who refused to give him guardrails." (37:13, D)
  • Trump’s success in Venezuela emboldened riskier moves; anyone serving in his administration must accept complicity.

• Ghosts of Scandals Past: A System Without Whistleblowers

  • Previous administrations at least faced internal revolt, resignation, and public pushback.
  • Now: “They're still lying about it. Forget having whistleblowers or constraints or internal investigations. They fired all the JAGs. We don’t even have military lawyers anymore. Like, it’s fucking sick.” (40:18, C)

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6. Senate Race Deep Dive: Texas, Maine, and the State of the Democratic Party

(43:38–60:09)

• Wave Signs and Expanding the Map

  • Open seats and surprising GOP retirements (like in Montana) are early signals of a rough cycle for Republicans.
  • Texas: A competitive Democratic primary concluded—discussing the merits of James Talarico and Jasmine Crockett. Talarico faces general election challenges, given past progressive social media posts.

• Working-Class Realignments

  • Tanden: “What is really terrible about this jobs report is that the jobs we're losing are jobs… disproportionately working class people are in manufacturing jobs, hospitality jobs, service jobs.” (19:47, D)
  • Suggestion that Democratic candidates need to focus more on cost of living, security, and local concerns to reach working-class voters.

• The Maine Senate Quandary

  • Animated debate over Democratic contenders Graham Platner vs. Janet Mills vs. Susan Collins.
  • Miller objects to left-wing purity attacks on Platner as a “Nazi”, stressing the need for perspective and unity against Collins.
  • Tanden: It’s “reasonable to say, hey, that stuff was not so great... but not say this person is a Nazi.” (55:03, D)
  • Stark irony in electoral coalitions: "The people who are supporting like at very high levels, Graham Platner are people who are making over $100,000 in Maine. She's doing better with working class people. He's doing better with the college educated people who think that he, that working class people like him." (56:23, D)
  • Frustration over lack of compelling, younger options from the DSCC.

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7. Memorable Moments & Notable Quotes

• On the manufactured chaos of the administration:

  • "This is the problem with having a war in like a weekend." (24:46, D)

• On the Senate races:

  • "The Democrats cannot consider this to be a good midterm or a blue wave unless they also take the Senate." (43:38, C)
  • "If you take the Senate, you're a check on the courts. He won't get radically crazy nominees through." (48:05, D)

• On the culture of impunity:

  • "There are no limits. Nobody is telling this guy no, no, no. But… And when nobody tells you no… you don't think you can make mistakes?" (38:24, D)

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8. Timestamps for Important Segments

• Kristi Noem's Firing & Cabinet Dysfunction: 01:54–05:26
• Mark Wayne Mullen & Confirmation Drama: 06:04–12:51
• Economic Woes & Tariffs: 15:34–24:46
• Middle East War Disarray: 24:46–41:17
• Absolute Power, Lack of Accountability: 37:13–43:38
• 2026 Senate Map & State Races: 43:38–60:09
• Debate Over Maine Senate Race: 53:55–60:09
• Autopen “Scandal” & Endnotes: 61:05–64:13

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Conclusion

This episode is a bracing tour of post-democratic, Trump-led government in crisis: cronyism, chaos, corruption, and the absence of institutional limits. Neera Tanden and Tim Miller drive home the urgent need for checks on power and underscore the stakes of the 2026 midterms—especially in the Senate. In a landscape of crisis and dark humor, the core message is clear: without accountability and functional norms, American democracy and global stability are perilously at risk.

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Transcript

[A]

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[B]

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[C]

Hello and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Delighted. Welcome back to the show. The president and CEO of the center for American Progress, she was domestic policy advisor to Joe Biden, has worked for a lot of other Democrats. She is not at all polarizing on the Internet. You might have heard of her. It's Neera. It's Neera Tandon. How you doing, Neera?

[D]

I just want to say polarizing means people like you, too.

[C]

Yeah, right.

[D]

Polarizing.

[C]

Yeah. I always said that I was a polarizing child with teachers. I always made this case to my mother because she'd be upset because she'd go to parent teacher conference. There'd be like two teachers that really hate me and I'd be like, yeah, but there are five that really that I'm their favorite. You know, I just, I'm a polarizing figure.

[D]

I'm hoping for that same ratio.

[C]

I think that feels about right to me. Good news, Good news for you. Good news for listeners because we've had some downer podcasts recently. There's a lot of schadenfreude out there today for the Trump administration. Things aren't going great for the Trump administration, which also means things aren't going great for the American people. So that part sucks.

[D]

Yeah, that part's bad.

[C]

We're trying to focus on the political side of it and the problems for Trump. And we want to start with, I think, the most joyful element of Schadenfreude, and that is Kristi Noem and her lover Corey Lewandowski have been expelled from the government. Donald Trump posted yesterday that he is pleased to announce that Mark Wayne Mullen will become the US Secretary of Homeland Security effective March 31st. That's not actually how things work. You gotta be confirmed in the Senate. But anyway, he says that Kristi Noem, who served us well and had numerous and spectacular results, especially in the bedroom, I'm sorry, on the border, will be moving to special envoy, envoy for Shield of the Americas. This is a made up thing that's being announced at Trump's golf club on Saturday. So she gets a made up job for at Trump's at Durrell.

[D]

Totally made up. I mean, I have to say, like, you can almost tell how made up something it is by like just the title, right? So like the crazier the title, the more made up it is. And I mean, I have to say, like, I have been in an administration where you want to move someone out of a job and like they're bas basically being fired and then you give them something else. But usually it's an actual job and if you're smart enough, you negotiate for an actual job. And the fact that they've just like totally made up Shield of the Americas, which is like, I don't even know what that would possibly mean. I, I guess it's like defending Latin America from Russian attack. Who knows? Anyway, just a fascinating. Just like Linda, I'm open to the

[C]

possibility that Christie wanted that job. You know, gets her away from her family. You know, I assume it'll be in a tropical locale.

[D]

Yeah, maybe.

[C]

Who knows? That's one theory. But she's gone. We can enjoy that. We have, we have finally justice for Cricket, her dog. I want to talk about the negative part of this, which is Mark Wayne Mullen, but do you have any other Kristi Noem grave dancing you want to do before we do that?

[D]

Well, I mean, look, there's a lot. Whenever something like this happens and you know, we should acknowledge this is the first time a cabinet secretary and this is a cabinet made of, you know, multiple people competing for the worst people in their jobs ever, so. But I do think it's the first time he's fired someone and we should note like firing someone for this administration. Why has he resisted it? Because he, he believes no one should make him do anything. And everyone has had carte blanche to be as incompetent or as horrifyingly cruel as possible. So I do think it's important to acknowledge that the political system in some way, shape or form is impacting Republicans who then have become much more critical of her. So we should. You know, a lot of people are like, oh, my God, he's so much worse than she is. It doesn't matter because of Stephen Miller. But I do think we should all acknowledge there is a victory in her going. ICE has not changed. The policies did not really come from her. But it is an important thing that the Trump regime needed to act politically in response to political pressure.

[C]

Yeah. And the Republicans did. John Kennedy, my senator from Louisiana, who's a buffoon and a clown, like, the fact that he felt like he had to be the one to really go at her and to put pressure on her. And he'd publicly said in other settings recently that they'd gone overboard on some of their tactics. And if the Louisiana Republican senator is saying that, that is a sign that they at least have felt some political pressure and realize they need to recalibrate. We'll see how much they actually recalibrate.

[D]

But, yeah, yeah, absolutely, I agree that.

[C]

Let's talk about Mark Wayne Mullen. Here's the things to not be excited about about this trade. And he's kind of the male Christie.

[D]

Yes.

[C]

Like, they're pretty similar, I think. And they're just makeup SAT scores, like, the level.

[D]

I mean, they also compete on Psycho Fancy. Like, I mean, he's just like.

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

And also the fact that he's named after. He has this episode where he comes to the reporters and says, like, you know, the war is going well. And 30, literally 30 seconds later, it's like, there's no war. This is like, you know, I mean, you know, like, we're not talking about, like, Mensa leader here.

[C]

No, it's not a Mensa leader. And he is. And he has not been critical of any of the policies Christian put forth. And just. I just want to read a couple of things that he said. Mark Wayne Mullen. After Alex Preddy died, he called him a deranged individual who wanted to cause massive damage with a loaded pistol with an extra mag that was completely loaded. Obviously. This is ridiculous. He did not want to cause massive damage on Renee Good. Said she was interfering with police activity. There's no question about that. They had the right to defend themselves on the masks. He says that Democrats want reforms because they want to dox the agents. What do you wanna do? Expose their faces so you can intimidate their families. So, you know, he threatened to fight a union head. He once said that he thinks that there'd be less fake news if there would be duels between reporters and congresspeople like in the old days. So, you know, we're not pivoting back to Tom Ridge at the Department of Homeland Security.

[D]

I mean, look, we're talking about the Trump administration. I don't think we should expect rationality. I think what's actually a little interesting about this is that the governor of Oklahoma is actually a rational, seemingly more rational Republican. And he will get.

[C]

He's offered substantive critiques on the immigration issue in particular, which is interesting since he'll be able to put in a temporary senator. We'll see if he puts his money where his mouth is on that. But it's a little bit of a risk for the Republicans that in theory, he could put in a senator for, like, five or six months.

[D]

That is less crazy.

[C]

Yeah, he's not going to be Tim Miller, but maybe, maybe he is sympathetic to some DHS reforms or something. We'll see.

[D]

I think the thing about this that's interesting and, you know, who knows what will happen? You know, it's not like I like to, like, bet my house on the ethics and morals of the Republican Party these days, but I do think that it's possible to, Governor Stitt puts in a, you know, just a more rational Republican who could create some breaks, not just on immigration, but a whole host of policies. And, I mean, I think if you're, like, thinking of the array of buffoonery that's just on the field, it might be we have one less around us in this situation. So, you know, I, I, I try to be optimistic in these very dark times.

[C]

Here's another optimistic thing. I'll give you another element of optimism. So his confirmation, which still has to happen. Donald Trump thinks he can decree the date that he comes in. But as you know, there is a confirmation process.

[D]

I am familiar with the fact that you need confirmation.

[C]

Yeah. And a bunch of Republicans and even a couple Democrats did not want to confirm you because you had said mean things about them.

[D]

Yes.

[C]

And so there's an interesting subplot to this, which is that the chair of the committee that he'll have to be confirmed through is Rand Paul. And here's something that Mark Wayne Mullen has said about Rand Paul in the past. I respect Bernie Sanders because he's a socialist and you know, that he's a communist. So, you know what you're getting. Rand Paul is A freaking snake. And I understand completely why his neighbor did what he did. The neighbor beat up Rand Paul. For people who don't remember, I would like to know.

[D]

This is much meaner than anything I've ever said about.

[C]

I was going to say, did you ever cheer a senator getting their ass kicked physically? I don't.

[D]

I don't think so. I think I called. I mean, I think I called Ted Cruz, Voldemort, but I don't think. I think this is worse, actually.

[C]

That holds up. I think it's. I mean, he's. Again, he cheered an assault.

[D]

I know, exactly. Exactly. Yeah.

[C]

We'll see how Rand Paul handles it. But I think that there's at least some possibility that it's not quite as friendly of a confirmation as it could have been had, you know, it'd been one of the other Republicans for whom Mark Wayne Mullen has not supported physical violence against him.

[D]

I mean, it also. He could just slow everything down. That's like. It's a favorite tactic of senators.

[C]

Rand is not, like, super excited about the DHS funding bill. This is all happening in that context as well, in part because of just his libertarian ness. He's like, against most spending bills, it's a little bit less about the principle of the behavior of the agents and all that, but, like, it complicates things.

[D]

Kind of credit to Senator Paul.

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

In the aftermath of the shooting, killing, murder of Alex Prey, you know, he said, and I think this is basically, you know, animated by his concern about a federal government, almost unlimited power against citizens. You know, he basically said, like, he had concerns that the lies of dhs, the lies of Christine, the lies of, you know, the entire White House. Yeah, really, you know, should make people concerned. I mean, he was one of the senators in the days after that. That. And like Tom Tillis yesterday or two days ago in the hearings, who said we could see this video, and then we heard you lie about what happened. And, you know, I mean, I again, don't want to, like, actually, we've. We've had a lot of disappointments from senators, Republican senators, over the last year. But, you know, my own view actually is we are beginning to see more and more cracks in the Republican coalition, and the true libertarians recognize that. Donald. I mean, who should be most concerned about an authoritarian federal government? It is the libertarians.

[C]

Right.

[D]

Unless you are a complete hypocrite, you should be very worried about a incredibly armed DHS that is shooting citizens on the streets of American cities. And I hope Rand Paul asks, you know, Senator Mullen like some questions about this whole situation. And it also just gives people more opportunity. I mean, just having this confirmation hearing will give people more opportunity to air all the problems, Democrats to air all the problems that have happened at dhs. So I think, you know, I mean, again, I, I don't want to overstate, but you do see some Republicans who within the blithering attacks are actually standing up.

[C]

And Rand has gone on like, I can't remember if he's gone on Fox or criticized. No, I believe so. He definitely did on the Venezuela strikes and he, and he has since the Iran war started. So anyway, we'll watch Rand on this one in particular. All right, everybody. Just recently got a package from our friends at Mizzen and Main. Mr. Maine is offering some comfy dress shirts. And as a podcaster, it was getting criticized sometimes by people in the comments yelling at me. It makes me understand at like the tiniest level the burden of the, of women. You know, it just makes me empathize with women just like 1% more, which is nice because, you know, everybody gives me feedback on my outfits and, you know, they say I dress too slobbish. And one solution to that is our friends at Mizzen and Main who offer comfy dress clothes. Dress clothes that look good, make you look fancy, but they're also comfy if you got to sit in this podcast chair for a year and a half. Mizzen Domain makes classic menswear with performance fabrics, so it's effortless to look sharp and feel great. They invented the performance fabric dress shirt over 10 years ago and since then they've perfected it with modern fabrics. Mizzou Domain shirts and pants look refined, yet they're stretchy, lightweight, moisture wicking, wrinkle resistant and completely machine washable. No ironing or dry cleaning. Very important for me because I don't even know where my iron is. It's a timeless style you can invest in one time and enjoy for years. Right now, Mizzen and Maine is offering our listeners 20% off your first purchase at mizzeninmain.com promo code thebullwerk20. That's Mizzen spelled M I Z Z E N and main M-A I N.com promo code thebullwark20 for 20% off mizzenandmain.com promo code the bulwark20. And if you'd rather shop in person, you can find Mizzen and Main stores around the country. We're gonna get to Iran. We have another news item. This Morning, which is the jobs numbers came out and it was a big miss for the economy. 92,000 jobs lost. Just I want to read a couple of items for you. Here's Nate Silver. On top of the 92,000 jobs lost, also 69,000 in downward revisions from December and January. Not Nice. Manufacturing jobs, minus 12,000. Transportation, warehouse, minus 11,000. Construction, minus 11,000. So this was going to be a renaissance for the forgotten man, the blue collar man. Doesn't seem like it. Ran Insan over at CNBC said, since Liberation Day, since the tariffs, workers have been liberated from the yoke of work. Net 19,000 jobs lost since last April. The labor force participation rate has erased all of the gains of the last four years while inflation advances. It's that.

[D]

Yeah, I think the last point is really crucial. Donald Trump became president in January, and since April, we have not had job gains. And I just want to, just to remind everybody that in the previous four years, we were averaging about 200,000 jobs created a month. So it is a radical break from what we've been experiencing in the first Trump administration. It was basically 100, 150,000 on average until we got to Covid. Of course, with COVID big job shock. But then as we came out of COVID and you know, not just in the immediate aftermath, but, you know, through last year, we were seeing significant job creation across the country, and not just in healthcare, but in manufacturing and jobs kind of throughout various sectors. And the most important thing is, you know, there aren't like other forces in the universe. I mean, we have to see what AI is doing, but it's the policies of this administration that are creating headwinds for the economy. I mean, people, a big reason why we're seeing these job losses is because Donald Trump decided himself to create a tariff regime that just made everything a lot more expensive and made imports into the country to make things more expensive. That's why it's so, you know, that is why we're having a manufacturing problem in the country. It's like the whole idea of his tariffs were to make, you know, to help us compete. And actually they are like a lot of things this guy does, boomeranging into hurting the very people he said he would help, which is working class people.

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

And it's like, what's going to get better? Like, that's the big question. It's like, what are we doing? I mean, maybe we'll spend hundreds of billions of dollars on this war and we'll get some people to work in, like, defense contractors. But what is on the table here to actually improve the economic conditions?

[C]

This is a key point. Yeah, it was self inflicted. 100%. It was totally self inflicted. The job losses. And there's no plan. It's not as if that there's this bill going through Congress like the JOBS act where they have a plan where they're gonna, you know, support certain industries or cut.

[D]

There's no idea. I mean that's like just to step back. What I thought was so amazing about the State of the Union, which I know feels like it was seven years ago, but it was really like last week is like, was it really last week? I thought maybe it was two weeks ago, but it wasn't it. I mean, but now, you know where the problem with time is? Like none of us can remember what happened last week because it's like last month. But the thing that I thought was fascinating about the State of the Union is, I mean I've worked on a couple of these and the idea of the State of the Union is that you're supposed to put out ideas about solving problems that compete with the other side. And there was nothing the President wanted to do in Congress because you know, basically I don't think he cares what Congress does. He just wants to do executive actions. And it really wasn't, weren't ideas there on like how are you solving the jobs problem? Because he can't admit there is a jobs problem. I mean his whole problem is he kind of adapted. One of the strategies of the Biden administration, which I'm here to tell you did not work so well, is to say actually tell people the economy is really awesome. And what is horrifying is right after they say the economy is awesome, like the next jobs report is pretty devastating. And he can't even blame some woke BLS administrator because he got rid of that person. Anyway.

[C]

And back to the AI thing, just like looking at a couple of the sectors, right? So maybe AI is having an effect on this. Derek Thompson, I were talking about this yesterday, but you know, in like the sectors that you would think, you know, kind of information services, that you know, thing like it's like minus 11,000 jobs. So it seems like maybe there's an effect in. Yeah, in these kind of white collar jobs. But like that's just a small piece of this. I mean like huge losses in hospitality, health care, manufacturing, warehouse. Like this is not, this is not AI.

[D]

This is a really important point. I mean, what is, what is really terrible about this jobs report is that the jobs we're Losing our jobs. Again, disproportionately working class people are in manufacturing jobs, hospitality jobs, service jobs. And you're absolutely right. There are areas that we know are most impacted are computer programming, financial services, and we're not seeing that. So you can't even blame.

[C]

Financial services was the best sector. Plus 10,000.

[D]

I know, exactly.

[C]

I assume that's because of crypto. I don't know. It does. They don't break it down. But there's a lot of crypto crime jobs out there. We've got a couple booming sectors. Crypto crime, private prison, briberies.

[D]

You know, just anything involved in bribery is probably, you know, on an up trajectory these days. So, I mean, I don't even know who's a rational actor in the White House, but the whole thing about serving in government is you look at data like this and you have to think about what to do about it. And the fact that we have this from an economic perspective, the fact that we've launched a Middle east war that is spreading throughout the region and has basically shut down the Strait of Hormuz while increasing gas prices, you're also basically creating a choke point on global trade. Not particularly helpful to economic growth either.

[C]

Well, let's talk about the economics of the war, then we'll get to the rest of it. But just as you mentioned, so we have from this week since the war started, gas prices up 11%, oil prices up 20%. So seems like gas prices more room to grow there. Catherine Rampal wrote about this if you want to get economic dorky for us, called warflation. So we've got some war inflation coming. And then a subtext of this story is Susie Wiles, there's a leak that Susie Wiles got mad. It's so interesting. We've never heard that Susie Wiles got mad. I mean, we killed American citizens. I don't think she was mad we were sending people to foreign gulags. Not mad, but like mad about gas prices. She's mad. She was yelling at them to find ways to lower prices. Apparently idea number one, because this is the only thing they've done was the US treasury eased sanctions on Russia and Putin and they can now sell oil to India and other countries in Asia without the same level of sanctions that we'd put on them. So that was idea one.

[D]

Were you not shocked that their go to was helping Russia in the war? I found it personally, just like I read it and I was like, my God, this is so radically different than everything else they do is helping out Vladimir Putin in any. In some form or shape or form. I mean, just to note that they are, they are basically easing the sanctions on Russia while Russia is helping Iran target U.S. forces, you know, in the war. Why? Because they're allies with Iran. So I just want to just, you know, for all the America first people, we are making it easier for Russia to have economic wealth. You know, this is like a whole issue for their economy, whether the sanctions exist on their oil and resources and while they are actively working against our military operation. So, you know, very odd. But I guess, you know, one thing that I also want to say about just the utter incompetence of this White House is, I don't know about you, but to me, it was kind of predictable that when you started a war with Iran, it might have some pressure on gas prices. I mean, I'm not, I don't have. I don't have anthropic clod systems like gaming outward to me. But for me, it occurred to me that that could happen. And, you know, one thing you might do if you were thinking of having a war with Iran was to ensure your Strategic Petroleum Reserve was actually full. So if gas prices went off, you would actually have some escape valve to, you know, increase production into the market to ensure that, you know, people were insulated. Not this group of cracker jack thinkers that actually did not fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. So they can't do what governments have done, like Republican and Democratic governments, which is when you see an oil shock, you could actually tap the reserve to mediate the price. Nope, don't have that option because these geniuses didn't think to actually increase the reserve. So, I mean, this is the problem with having a war in like a weekend. You know, I mean, generally speaking, you plan these things out, you look at various contingencies, and you decide to ameliorate kind of the harms. But this group is perfectly fine with all of us paying more for gas. Other than Susie Wells, they seem perfectly fine with all of us paying more for gas. We're all paying for this because it's a billion dollars and they're adding the

[C]

15% tariff back on. That's today, I think.

[D]

Yes, we're going to pay more in tariffs and we're paying higher gas prices. So so far, lot of costs.

[C]

It's interesting you say that about the timing. Cause there's kind of mixed reporting out there. And we've seen some reporting that like, you know, they've been thinking, they've been planning this for six months and it is true that we moved resources after. I mean, over there. On the other hand, there's been some reporting that, like, Bibi and Trump had a call, I guess would have been a week and a half ago now, where they were like, hey, we've got the intelligence on that. All these guys, the ayatollah and all of them are going to be in the same place. Like, this is our opportunity to go. This was not something that was urgent. Right. It is not as if there's any reporting that's like, hey, they're about to shoot a ballistic missile at Maine. Right? Like, that was not on the table. Right.

[D]

So that is ridiculous.

[C]

You know, if they felt like this was an important strategic imperative, which they haven't really made the case for, but if they felt that way, they could have done it whenever. Like, the only timing constraint here was allegedly like, that there was intelligence provided that they had this opportunity to get these guys on Saturday, and so they went in. But it's like, okay, well, if it's that critical that you go on the BB timetable here, then there are going to be these other externalities, like people stuck over in the Middle east, like gas prices going up. And it doesn't feel like they gave a fuck about that.

[D]

Look, I think the Iraq war was just a generational disaster, but there was a buildup over a long period of time. And just think of the differences, okay? Number one, look at the harms people are having. You know, it seems like these. Some of these soldiers were killed that should have had warnings about the war so that they could, you know, basically be protected. Number two, we have, you know, thousands of people in the Middle east stranded. The embassies haven't. Haven't pulled people out. Usually when we go to war, we pull people out of embassies. You know, that happened before and, you know, the strategic peritoneum reserve was unfilled. We didn't engage with our allies really at all in Europe. I mean, I still consider them allies. I know this administration doesn't. But now those allies are basically on their own, choosing to help various sides in this war. I know there's like a lot of kind of important talk about how the military is doing a great job degrading Iran and.

[C]

Sure, true.

[D]

And that is true, and it is important to acknowledge. But the things around this, in my lifetime, the height of support for a military engagement, a war is the days after the first bombings start going off. The fact that the President has never been able to make the case as to why we have to do this. And, you know, I'm being a little glib, but at least the Bush administration had the dignity of lying to us about weapons of mass destruction. These people are like, one day it's Khomeini the other day. Now they're like they were about to bomb us in two weeks. And, you know, that would have been maybe compelling if you said it before the war, but you didn't. So I just.

[C]

It's just. We have an updated missive on what the plan is. Are you ready? Donald Trump has bleeded about this this morning. Here it is. There will be no deal with Iran except unconditional surrender. After that and the selection of a great, an acceptable leader, we and many of our wonderful and allies will work tirelessly to bring Iran back. Iran will have a great future, make Iran great again, mega. I mean, we're doing regime change and democracy promotion. And Donald Trump said to Axios, who are his favorite sources for his war planning. So we have to take this at face value that he gets to pick.

[D]

Yeah.

[C]

So that's the plan. We're gonna bomb the fuck out of him. We're going to bomb a school. We'll get to that next. And we're going to bomb all the leaders. We're going to bomb the second and third tier leaders that we thought we were going to put in. They're all dead. And now we're just going to say, hey, you guys, surrender.

[D]

I mean, we're going to make up.

[C]

Okay.

[D]

What's like, you know, obviously somewhat terrifying about this whole situation is it does feel like they thought Iran would be another Venezuela. And yes, Iran has been engaged in essentially, you know, its own version of hot slash cold wars in the Middle east for decades. And, you know, it's not like that. I think when Trump came in, they thought their future was so safe. So, you know, they've done a range of planning, so they have leaders. I mean, you can take out a bunch of leaders and there still will be another leader. Like the regime is operational. And you know, I guess I, on top of all of this, the fact that we are relying for the, you know, this war operation on Pete Hegseth, his department. I mean, I know that there are generals there with, who are thinking rationally about all this and that's probably why they were leaking last week that they didn't really want to do this war and definitely leaking earlier this week that it was like essentially the White House who wanted to do all of this, that. But I mean, I think we should just be genuinely panicked that they don't seem to have any kind of plan. I mean, I worked in an administration. Bush did not. I mean, excuse me, Joe Biden did not actually start.

[C]

Okay, the blob.

[D]

Oh my God.

[C]

Now we know what the leftists are going to say about you. No difference.

[D]

I was against zero record from the get go. Just want to get my stupid credit on that. Did some protests, et cetera.

[C]

I was against in 2006. I got a fight over Thanksgiving with my mother about that. Over in 2006. Three years too late, but okay. Better than some of the other Republicans.

[D]

Yes, that's true. But anyway, I just think the fact that, you know, usually you need discipline, talking points on your goal, strategy, etc, that the fact that there have been seven different aims and goals of this operation since Saturday, so just, you know, one more than the days of the week is, you know, I think we should be, you know, hyper stressed and the. And I think that's reflected in the fact that the public does not support. Support what's happening. You know, I mean, essentially this is the lowest support of any military engagement that the country has experienced in this early in the process.

[E]

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[C]

I mentioned the school. There's some good reporting. This New York Times, a couple other outlets that are still doing reporting. Unlike the Washington Post and all the evidence appears to be that it was us. There's a lot of smoke around the fact that maybe this was related to the AI, you know, because AI was doing the packaging for us, I don't want to make any accusations there, but there, you know, there's. Among the reporting, there's, like, some evidence pointing to that. You know, look, on the one level, this. This is what war is, right? Like, innocent people accidentally get killed during war. Innocent people got accidentally killed when we were leaving Afghanistan because, like, the Biden administration thought that they were. That there was a terrorist in a car. You remember the story. And they. They droned people that were innocent. Like, this happens, like, in war. But in this particular case, I think it is especially galling because of all we've been talking about, which is, like, we don't even know why we're doing this. We don't have a plan for the war. And now it is our American material that resulted in the death of hundreds of innocent young girls. And now we want to go in and tell them that we want a mega. You know, like, the whole thing, it is. It's a farce. It's like, really. And it's wrong, and. And it's a war crime. It's also a farce.

[D]

I mean, I think this will be a. An action that, you know, the military will be living with the consequences of for a long time. And I personally think it will have the kind of impact of Al Ghraib.

[C]

And I was thinking about that, too.

[D]

You know, just let's say we were attacked on 9 11, and we, the American military went in with soldiers. They didn't nuclear bomb the mountains of Afghanistan. They went in with soldiers to try to capture places. There were incidents of civilian deaths in Afghanistan. You know, a wedding party hit. We did not bomb entire schools of children during Afghanistan or Iraq.

[C]

And if you talk to the Iraq and Afghanistan soldiers, just to put a word in for that, like Will Selber, he's straight for us and others, like, they went out of their way to. Not like, it doesn't mean that there weren't cases of civilian deaths. Like, of course there were, but the

[D]

plan was they knew actually killing civilians made the population much more oppositional. I mean, just think about this week. Trump is basically telling the Iranians, you know, rise up against Khomeini or the Khomeini regime. Khomeini was a horrifying figure. But it's a little hard to. For people to be, like, super sympathetic to the Americans when they just killed a school full of children. So this is why you do it. I mean, the military goal of avoiding civilian deaths is to ensure that the population does not work against you. And it took America months To pacify Mosul. Why? Because we didn't just bomb the whole area or kill. Like basically we had to do strategic hard work with people, you know, our soldiers going like basically block by block in order to not kill so many civilians. And you know, and just let's remind Pete Hegseth with all of his rhetoric, we're not going to like limit the military anymore. And we're, I mean, just think about what that means. It means things like this are more likely to happen. And the fact is that the whole world can see that the United States chose to have a war. It was not, it was a war of choice. There was no imminent threat to the

[C]

United States and we weren't attacked. We weren't attacked.

[D]

There's no attack.

[C]

Their post hoc rationalization for all this is like, well, we've, we've been, we've always been at war with East Asia. You know, it's like what this, you

[D]

know, but also it's like. And also, you know, I mean just to say those kids are killed in our name. I mean that's the horrifying aspect of all this is like I didn't sign up for any of this. And the, what's even worse is okay if he even said he was going to have wars and he got elected. Sure. But he told everybody he wasn't going to do things like this and got elected. What is the island of people who are justifying this at this point? Because you know, again, mass deportations, you could say the guy campaigned on it, but he said he was going to be the peace president. And we're like on war number 27 in the first year.

[C]

Yeah, I have a guest I'm talking about this with the next week who's on the MAGA side of this. But he's like, the people that are for this are kind of like the never Trumpers that stayed Republicans. That's like the opposite side of the corner for me. Right. You know, it's like the hawks, it's like the right wing hawks that hated Trump and all of a sudden like the Mark Levins and the Ben Shapiro's and now they're backfilling this and like they're the only ones for it. Like it isn't the core Trump voter that was for this.

[D]

John Bolton is like peace out on this. I mean even he's like, you know, I mean, I think he's just been fantasizing about war the ran for his entire adult life and even he's like, I'm not sure sure this is like, well planned. I mean, I think the problem, honestly is absolute power corrupts. Like, there have been no guardrails on this President because the Republican Party and the Supreme Court also made up of Republicans who refused to give him guardrails. He had success in Venezuela, so he kind of decided to just like start a global war. And this is at bottom the reason why you try to find a rational adult to be President of the United States. Because when you do not, they have a lot of toys that could really hurt, not just America, but like global peace. And I do not sleep easily at night knowing these people are in charge of an ever expanding war in the Middle East.

[C]

You're getting me madder and madder as we talk about this. But it's also just. It speaks to the.

[D]

I'm definitely not trying to get you

[C]

less mad about this, but it is a culture, like you talked about, how absolute power corrupts. Right? But that's really where we are. It's a culture of corruption and no accountability. This is the thing.

[D]

There are no limits. Nobody is telling this guy no, no, no, but. And when nobody tells you no. And honestly, like, you fire anybody who's not psychophantic and you spend all your power trying to just discipline any institution, whether it's Netflix and Losing out or any other group, then, you know, then. Then like the. You don't think I can make mistakes? I mean, I really was genuinely a little surprised that he decided to do this because in the past he has seemed to be constrained by the idea of American soldiers dying overseas.

[C]

No, he said it again today. More people will die, whatever, Something like that. He said, that's a time some people will die, some people will die. If there's no constraints, if everyone in there has already been so corrupted that they decided that I've signed up for this. This guy. We know this guy is bad. But I'm going in there because I think on balance, I prefer him, or because I'm maga or because I'm also whatever. Like, everybody that has gone in there made the determination that if you sign up for this, like, you're signing up for it all. And so that has created like a culture that we haven't had in government for a long time. Like you mentioned Abu Ghraib, which is horrible and horrifying. But there were whistleblowers, right? I mean, there were whistleblowers within the military. They were speaking out against Rumsfeld and felt like they had to. And the policies. And then there were political people, whistleblowers who quit? Scott McClellan quit. And it'd be like Carolyn Levitt quitting. He was a White House spokesperson. He quit over it. Right. And so it doesn't make what happened in Ivan Gray better or. Right. But it's a system in a process. Yeah, it's a system in a process that works. That's not happening here. They're lying still. They're not even admitting they killed the girls at the school. Yeah. Like, they're still lying about it. Forget having whistleblowers or constraints or internal investigations. They fired all the jags. We don't even have military lawyers anymore. Like, it's fucking sick.

[D]

Look what happened in the first couple of months of this administration. I think the administration, which has been incompetent in every possible way, has demonstrated policy creativity in two arenas. One, how do they come to power and basically eliminate all possible oppositional voices? So that's why they fired a bunch of admirals and generals in the first couple of days, and they've fired a bunch of people, some of whom are now running for office. But they fired, basically hatcheted a bunch of military leaders who I think they thought would offer some opposition and not just go online. And that sends a message to everyone else in the military, which is that if you say anything, you will be fired from your job. So that's an area where they've had some policy creativity. And the other is in rank corruption. But, you know, the truth is, in government, in every administration, you know, when you serve the public, you are supposed to serve the public. And all of us who've served in jobs in the White House or in the administration or in the executive agencies, you have to ask yourself every day, you know, are you truly serving the public? And, you know, I mean, I didn't feel like I had that many conflicts on that, but, you know, like, when I was serving. But in the first term, there were of the Trump administration, as you mentioned, in the Bush administration, there are people in government who think, I am a Republican appointee and I am an American who is supposed to serve the country. And when there were conflicts, they chose to be Americans who serve the country. You know, John Kelly, others who were trying to constrain this president, and he has systematically eliminated everyone. But, you know, you mentioned Susie Wiles earlier, and it is her job as White House chief of staff to tell the president he should not or cannot do something for the country. His White House counsel is supposed to not just tell him how he gets to do things, but when he's doing something unconstitutional or illegal, that he should not do it. It is your job not to just service the president's ego, but actually to serve the country. And when people are doing, when you're. The president is doing something gravely crazy, I mean, how is Marco Rubio escaping any accountability here? He could have gone to the president and told him this is like, you know, kind of nuts what you're doing. And, you know, what we've, I've heard is that he was sort of like, ah. And so, you know, I mean, I think they all just tell themselves he's a president, he's the one who's elected, but, you know, they are there in those jobs not to just do his bidding, but like previous administrations, serve as some kind of constraint. Because right now, the scariest thing in the world is Donald Trump is in charge of, like, you know, essentially whether this war spirals out of control or not. And, and the, the first week does not seem to be any kind of, you know, reassurance like, if you can't protect American citizens in the Middle east to get out of there, how do we think we're going to handle this war in three weeks, four weeks, five weeks, weeks, or six months?

[C]

I want to move on to politicking the Senate map. I've been saying for a while that the Democrats cannot consider this to be a good midterm or a blue wave unless they also take the Senate. Taking the House is not sufficient. They're going to take the House just because of structural forces. Almost certainly the Senate is where the fight is. I've been pretty skeptical of the Senate map for a while, but now you're believing.

[D]

Now you're believing.

[C]

The war and the economy has me starting to believe a little bit. So I want to talk about it a little bit. I want to put the main Senate race over here into a side bucket. And we're going to come back to that at the end. Oh, great.

[D]

I'm so excited to talk about the main Senate race.

[C]

Oh, my gosh. Let's focus on that.

[D]

Can't wait for that. Let's focus on that as long as possible.

[C]

Now we're going to make it to the main Senate race. We can have an extra long podcast if you want. No, the filibustering won't. Won't save you. You could do the thing where you pretend you're. The audio went out if you want. The Democrats need to win four seats. Three would be okay because the Republicans would still be in control, but it would kind of put Murkowski in an Interesting pickle. But they really need to win four, not four seats. North Carolina is a race we don't talk about that much because the Democrats have been acting competently. They've nominated a popular governor, former governor, that fits the state, and he's winning in the polls. And we'll see how that shakes up. There are also some states that Democrats need to hold.

[D]

Michigan.

[C]

Yeah, Michigan, Georgia. But in this theory, we're going to assume that they've held them or else this conversation's moot. So now you start to look into the expanded states. Where do you get some other states out of? In Texas, you had the primary this week. Tellarico wins over Crockett. I want your take on that. You look at Alaska is one that I'm looking at. Mary Peltola is a great recruitment.

[D]

Fantastic recruit. Fish family, freedom.

[C]

Fish family and freedom. Now you start to get into, okay, Ohio. Sherrod Brown's a little bit of a retread. Iowa candidates are okay. Montana then comes onto the map this week, which is exciting. Steve Danes drops out three minutes before the filing, which is an attack on democracy and embarrassing and sick. And they just, they squeak in. Some guy, though, but he's never, he's a prosecutor. He's never run for office. He hasn't been tested. Kurt Almi, the Democrats, it seems like, are gonna do the thing that they did in Utah with Evan McMullen and kind of align behind an independent candidate. Jon Tester's been pushing this guy. He's a former college president. I like the independent candidate thing in theory. I know nothing about this guy. I worry a little bit. You know, colleges aren't really that popular these days among swing voters.

[D]

I mean, he's a veteran.

[C]

He's a veteran. So, yeah, hopefully he's got some other predators by. We'll see how that works out. Then you have Nebraska, also with an independent, and Dan Osborne has been on the show. Interesting candidate. So the map is getting a little bit more interesting. I'm wondering, I just kind of want you to take me through what you got your eye on and your thoughts on Texas.

[D]

Well, I, you know, I think the truth is you, as you said, you have to win four of Maine, North Carolina, Ohio, Iowa, Texas, Alaska. So, you know, Montana, Nebraska. Montana, Nebraska. So basically, you know, you have to win four of them of those multitudes. And they're all hard. You know, I'm not, I'm not arguing they're not hard. I guess I would say, you know, we, you and I have been in a few cycles in our time. And a sign of a wave. Is that where the map goes in the cycle itself, is it expanding or contracting? And the fact that you have, I mean, I just think it's amazing. Steve Daines was like, I'm not running again. And, and it's not just he decided not to run. Ryan Zinke, the House member, decided not to run. So that's a lot of Republican incumbents in a state choosing not to run for re election at a time where Trump has a 37 approval rating or 38 in the country. Obviously it's higher in Montana, but I think at a very high level, what we're seeing is the reflection of an incumbent president with a below 40, probably approval rating. And that means Republicans are, you know, understanding that it's going to be a really tough election cycle. The reason why the Senate matters the most or not the most? These both matter. The House and Senate matters. He needs the Senate to approve any nominees and Supreme Court, if you take

[C]

the Senate, replace Alita.

[D]

Yeah. And if you take the supreme, if you take the Senate, you can, you're a check on the courts. He won't get radically crazy nominees through and you can just say no to nominees. Right. So. So I think it is really important to aim for both. And you know what I say about the race in Texas is Talarico is an incredibly talented person. Jasmine Crocker also very talented. And I thought what was great about this is it was a primary.

[C]

Did you think that race demonstrated a lot of talent?

[D]

I think she came into this race late and she wasn't able to create the kind of campaign that he'd been building for a long time. But, you know, I mean, I will say Jasmine Crockett lost Tuesday night. She goes the next day to DHS and has amongst the most effective questioning to the DHS hearing with Kristi Noem. And like, you know, that's a woman who was rolling with the punches. That was very. She was really effective and that's a real strike.

[C]

You could have salt could have pouted and I, by the way, she's also really good at that. People can be good at different other at different things.

[D]

Honestly, the fact that I've been through primaries where it's a rough primary and it makes a candidate better and James Talerico is a better candidate today because he had to go up against Jasmine Crockett. And I personally think this race is in within reach. And John Cornyn and Greg Abbott. Greg Abbott is going for his third term in Texas. Okay. And Cornyn is going for six term, so it's corny. Six term. Cornyn or Paxton, I think both of them have flaws against a candidate with just, you know, a fresh way of speaking. He's like not been there forever, actually is really trying to build a big tent and has a lot of messaging that doesn't just start like yesterday, but over years of trying to create, you know, a pathway for Trump voters, Harris voters, Democrats, independents and Republicans.

[C]

I worry just about a little bit of the incentives there because there's so much attention on it. And you mentioned fish family freedom. I always bring this up like, Mary Peltola has no pressure to appeal to any constituency except for Alaskans, like left, right or center. I'm not even really making an ideological point. Like she's just like, I'm going to run this race focused on Alaskans. I do feel like Talarico and Crockett because the race had so much focus on it and there was this pressure to appeal to various factions and interest groups within the Democratic side. When you list all the states like the Montana, Nebraska, Iowa. I like James Delrico and I hope to talk to him on this and have him refute this worry. There was a lot of Woke posting in 2020 from him with some weird stuff, you know, about white skin and having a virus.

[D]

And I, you know, it's just like talking about racism. Yeah, yeah, I know.

[C]

It's just the way he was talking about it is like not, not really the way that they're talking about it in Midland is all. And I'm just trying to win a Texas Senate race. And I just, I do worry a little bit like these races get caught up in the discourse. It's like candidates are really on the left, are really trying to appeal to the people tweeting at them and like, rather than trying to appeal to the 58 year old that didn't go to college that is the swing voter in these red states. I don't think that they're part of the discourse.

[D]

Well, first of all, I would say I think it is really important for people to remember that working class people care a lot about higher costs. So I guess to just pull back. I think a real opportunity in these Senate races and for Democrats writ large is we have never had a president who has just screwed over working class people as much as Donald Trump. I mean like there's Ronald Reagan, George Bush, nobody, none of them took health care away from 20 million working people. Okay? None of them added basically a tax increase, basically a version of a national sales tax on everybody and who pays the tariff disproportionately working class people. So I think at a very high level, there is an area of opportunity to kind of realign voters. And you're seeing who are the groups that have fallen away from Trump. I mean, people have talked a lot about Latinos. They've also talked a lot about young people, young men, but like really struggling working class people. And people making less than 30,000 are moving away from him as well. And I think that's an area of opportunity. What's important for people to remember is that working class people actually care a lot about security. They care about reducing crime, because working class people experience at a higher rate than college educated people. They care about. They still care about the border.

[C]

I'm with you on all this. Is this part of the filibuster to get away from talking about the main center?

[D]

It's actually a cap promotion, which is. That is why the center for American Progress, I love promoting cap, has put forward ideas that I hope, you know, James Talarico and people candidates all across the country will look at, because we also have to offer ideas on how do we secure the border and secure the border while not having a dhs. You don't have to, you know, you could basically secure the border without threatening everyone's rights. That's an area of opportunity for him to talk about. We can reduce crime without mass incarceration. So I, you know, so I think it's important for them to have ideas in those spaces. And I think. James F. Look, we've seen candidates recently, you know, in, in various places who are charismatic, who can kind of shy away from past positions. And I think he needs to explain his views early and often. And I have a lot of confidence in his ability to communicate.

[C]

AmericanProgress.org? people can go look at those policies and you have a great corruption tracker as well. It's a little suck up. Before we get to the main, we have to talk about Maine because we find ourselves in a very strange position, which was me as the former Republican, being like, I think some of these nitpicks of Platner's visits to these podcasts and Reddit posts, they feel a little, they feel like nitpicky to me. And I have people on the Internet yelling at me. They're like, he's a Nazi. He has a Nazi dad. And I'm like, does anybody actually think Graham Platner is a Nazi? Does anybody think that Graham Platner wants to put people Into. I'm just going to make my point. No game. Does anybody think that they want to put people in concentration camps? No. Does anybody think if he gets in the Senate, he would want to advance policies that hurt Jews or that do to Jews what this administration's doing to Palestinian activists or Venezuelans or Somalis? Like, of course not. Like, of course not. So now does that excuse his past comments? Like, no. Like we should talk about that. But I just, I get a little bit frustrated with that. Like, there's a little bit of, well,

[D]

you're kind of straw manning the significance.

[C]

I'm not really here.

[D]

Let me. I just want to say at the beginning of this, any discussion of this, I will love whoever the people have main pick. Okay? It's really important to take this race. And whoever people pick, I am like a thousand percent supportive of. So don't really want to say much here to like, that could be used against anybody in the future by anybody. But I guess I'd say at a very high level. You know, I take seriously the idea that the Democratic Party is very focused on racism, sexism and homophobia. And I think we should be sensitive to any concerns about anti Semitism. That doesn't mean that anything that's happened here is Hitler or Nazi ask or anything like that. But I think you could have like a safe, like it's a safe thing to say. That was really not great. Okay. And not say this person is a Nazi. Okay. Like, I think there's a reasonable place to say I have some concerns. And maybe you could say, like, sometimes we sort of go on the off on the. Like we're too nitpicky. But I guess from my perspective, I think it's reasonable to say, hey, that stuff was not so great. I would also say, you know what I think is fascinating about this race, which I will really, I like to avoid talking about. But if you actually look at the coalitions behind Janet Mills, Graham Platner, the funniest irony to me, not funny, but like, the people who are supporting like at very high levels, Graham Platner are people who are making like over $100,000 in Maine. She's doing better with working class people. He's doing better with the college educated people who think that he, that working class people like him. So, you know, I mean, I just think this is like a funny aspect

[C]

of all of this.

[D]

Hopefully it all worked out.

[C]

I'm glad you brought that up because I'm just, I do think that I agree with that. I want to go through the cross tabs. Now I have 20 more minutes worth of talk about this race before I let you go. It is this deep irony, right, that Graham Platner is appealing to like Colby College liberal arts graduates, the people who

[D]

are like, this is what working class people want, right? A guy.

[C]

And meanwhile me as the former Republican is defending the leftist and you are defending the 79 year old centrist that you'd think I'd be for. I just wish that we had another choice. I wish that we would have had somebody that was not either 79. But yeah. And so this is the problem with politics. Unfortunately we don't. The choices are Susan Collins, who is supporting and funding the terrorizing of Brown people in her state. And I guess this is what I just keep coming back to on Platner and why I just want to keep picking this fight with people is like if you show me. No, no, no, to my point. It's like if you show me that he wants to do something like that, then I'm against him as I'll be. I'll be at the front of the line being like, fuck you. But I just, you know, your choice

[D]

right now isn't between Graham Plattner and Susan Collins. The fact that you're like mad at Susan Collins, between grand Prattner and a

[C]

79 year old, that might let Susan Collins win. She'll be 85 at the end of her term. It's crazy. It's a crazy run.

[D]

Susan Collins is 76 and Janet Mills is 79.

[C]

Well, it's crazy for her to run too. That's why I want the beer guy

[B]

to get back in.

[C]

Why can't the beer guy get back in? I just want a normal 45 year old Democrats. Can I just. Why can't I have that? Unfortunately, I can't. These are the options, I guess.

[D]

I think the thing to think about is what is the case Susan Collins is going to prosecute against Janet Mills and what is she going to prosecute against? Green Platner? And is she going to prosecute a case that Janet Mills is too old when she's three years older? Maybe she will. I don't know. That's like a great. She could like, you know, she's a wily. I mean the only thing I'd say pro trans, probably.

[C]

She'll probably prosecute against the children the race will be she's pro trans, I think.

[D]

But they're, you know, they're both very pro trans. Just to say it's one of his claims to fame and it is Like a very decent thing that he was defending.

[C]

It was kind of weird. He was talking about how he was wrestling against girls in High School 20 years ago.

[D]

Now you're just, you're really like, way more into this race than I am. But if you know what's going on.

[C]

I don't think that's true.

[D]

My, I guess my, my take, that's the thing for everyone to think about. And, you know, like, again, I will love and campaign or whatever, or not campaign. Whatever's helpful for whoever wins, I am happy to do.

[C]

Sometimes keeping Neera out is better. We learned that. Bush has learned that.

[D]

It was like, maybe in Florida. But anyway, I think that's the thing to think about that race. And I just don't know.

[C]

I don't either. This is why it's interesting to talk about. It's frustrating to talk about and people don't like it.

[D]

The one thing I would say about this race is I know the Democratic Party is definitely, and I get it 100% definitely not down with the old.

[C]

Okay. But I have no problem with old people. She's gonna be 85 at the end of her term.

[D]

Maine is pretty.

[C]

Maine is pretty old.

[D]

Pretty old. And that's again, I'd say, like the great.

[C]

My issue about the Democratic Party is just like the dscc, like, why are we. Anyway, whatever. We are where we are. Yeah, we are where we are.

[D]

I mean, I mean, shouldn't we talk more about Trump being terrible?

[C]

It's fun to talk about it. It's not really fun to talk about it because everybody gets very mad no matter what your opinion is about it. It's a lot of high emotions about a state that almost nobody lives in or has been to. The commenters are very passionate about it.

[D]

There are people who I greatly respect who are, who are in Maine who are like, this is the candidate Green Platner. And I like, maybe they're right.

[C]

Sadly, it's a very important race. And that is I guess, why I just wanted to mention, sadly, this is the thing. We wouldn't even talk about this if this was a primary in Florida or whatever. Who cares? They're probably not going to win. Neither's trying to win the race. But, like, the Democrats have to win. So figuring out who's strong, they do have to win.

[D]

And. But just also, you know, like in 2020, that was a very tough race. She won by. Collins won by 10 points against a very well funded opponent. So this is, like, important to think about every aspect of that race.

[C]

We're Way over. But I have a final thing I want to leave you with. Not about Graham Platner. There was an investigation. The administration keeps looking into new people. They're trying to jail people. They wanted to jail Obama, they wanted to jail Tim Walls and Jacob Fry. They wanted to jail Jim Comey, they wanted to jail Tish James, they wanted to jail the sandwich guy. They're struggling to jail their political foes. Another person people thing that they wanted to jail was Joe Biden and the auto pen and anyone who worked alongside the auto pen.

[D]

Yeah.

[C]

And that investigation seems to be fizzling. And I'm just wondering if you can talk about this if you're concerned at all, if you're concerned being in the administration, do you think that. Are you shaking in your boots thinking about Pam Bondi and Judge Box of Wine coming for potentially you and other auto pen related staffers? Yeah.

[D]

So I should say to everyone, I was staff secretary and I oversaw the auto pen. And the most important aspect of this, which I told the House Oversight Committee that asked me about it last summer, is every time I authorize the use of the autopen and any kind of decision, I had a memo signed off by the president for that. Now my suspicion since the only president I'm familiar with who has denied he knew anything about a decision that an autopen was just used for was Donald Trump himself last year, spring, there was a tariff action that was taken and it was taken at like Friday at 5. Auto pen went used. I assume it was an auto pen and not a signature. It'd be more worrying if it was his actual signature and he couldn't remember he did it like, and he said he didn't know anything.

[C]

Didn't he also do this with the pardon, with the pardon of the crypto?

[D]

Yeah, yes, he did do that. There was an actual auto pen use for this or signature for this. And so my suspicion is that that occurred to the people at the actual prosecutors that the only person that we know in America has, has had auto use without their awareness as president was Donald J. Trump. So I have not been quaking in my boots because I would feel perfectly happy to make that case to anyone in America. And I there's no aspect of what I did as staff secretary or anything in which I acted it anyway without the president full knowledge. And we actually talk to the president about things we do and stuff like that. So I never, you know, I felt I've never quaked in my books on this.

[C]

So you think that you and the pen will continue to Walk free.

[D]

Yeah. I mean, it's funny. I feel like. I feel like it's almost good, honestly, because there's all these crazy, wacky conspiracy theories. And I kind of think, honestly, it's actually better when they're doj. Now I'm going to, like, induce them to prosecute me. But, like, when they're doj, like, we can't find evidence, you know, like that. It's like, it's a pretty good aha for the likes of Scott Jennings, Neera Tanden, Free Woman.

[C]

They can't get you, baby. They can't get you. They're struggling on their effort for political revenge. I appreciate you very much. Thanks for being on the show.

[D]

That was a blast.

[C]

On a Friday.

[D]

That was a blast.

[C]

We're going to take people out. We had a little vote in our internal production team whether or not to do this, and we're going to take people out with just a little bit of my favorite line from Corey Lewandowski, no longer a member of the administration. We'll see everybody on Monday. Bye. Hey.

[F]

This message is from Mickey. Mickey, your daddy, Papa Dicky, reached out to me and told me that you're toilet training. You must be a very special little boy. But I hear that you're starting to use the big boy toilet, so congratulations, and you're doing a great job with your poopies. Congratulations. I know your mom is going to be so happy for you, and I want to thank you in advance for being a Donald Trump supporter when you get older. All the best from your daddy, Papa Dicky.

[C]

The Bulwark podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.