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The Daily Beans
Aim High (feat. John Fugelsang; Saikat Chakrabarti)
00:38:39
Friday, November 28th, 2025 Today, we have a very special Daily Beans for you. My mom found a joint in my math textbook, and we're going to have to talk about the consequences. No, I'm just kidding. It's Fugelsang Fridays here on the Daily Beans. So of course we're going to talk to John Fugelsang. After that, I'm going to interview a progressive Democratic candidate running for Nancy Pelosi's seat. His name is Saikat Chakrabarti.
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- [00:00]
A
Msw media. Hello and welcome to the Daily beans for Friday, November 28, 2025. We have a very special Daily Beans for you today. My mom found a joint in my math textbook and we're going to have to talk about the consequences. No, I'm just kidding. It's Fuglsang Fridays here on the Daily Beans. So of course we're gonna talk to John Fugelsang. After that, I'm gonna interview a progressive Democratic candidate running for Nancy Pelosi's seat. His name is Shoikat Chakrabarti. But first, as always, my friend, host of Tell Me Everything, the podcast on Sirius XM progress channel, 127, weeknights, 9pm Eastern, 6 pa. The author of the New York Times bestselling book, the Separation of Church and Hate. Also the author of the John Feeglesang substack and the host of the John Fugalsang show podcast. Please welcome John Fugalsang.
- [01:13]
B
Oh, my God. You say my name so many times and all we wanna hear is about your mom and the joint and the math textbook. I'm not interested in anything. I'm gonna talk about now because you planted that seed. Wow.
- [01:26]
A
It's a very special episode where I get addicted to caffeine pills and I have to quit my band. Hot Sunday.
- [01:31]
B
Oh, my. We've all been there.
- [01:33]
A
We have. At least if you're Jessie Spanos. And then I go on to make Showgirls and now I'm relegated to cameo. But, my friend, it's very good to see you. We have a lot to talk about today. Let's kick this off. I mean, there's so many places we can start. But I'm really, really interested, first of all, in the idea that perhaps Donald Trump was going to aid and abet Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil when he tampered with his ankle monitor after talking with Donald Trump on the phone, which I was pretty interesting. But also we have Stephen Witkoff, the envoy to Ukraine, who was caught and a recording was released telling the Russians how to work with Donald Trump.
- [02:19]
B
Where to begin. I mean, this is just after the bailout. This is just after the bailout as well. So, I mean, Donald Trump has proven he loves South American lawbreakers, if they're powerful enough. And then, yeah, Witkoff, of all the people that have no business being part of a peace deal. And of course, I'm now guilty of calling it a peace deal. It's not a peace deal. It's more like Putin's ultimate pornhub fantasy. Come to life. You know what I mean? It's like Putin's vision board. This is a surrender deal, and that's what it's always ever been. And now we know it appears to have been. And Marco Rubio helped us know this. It appears to have been actually written by Putin, edited by Jared Kushner, and proofread by nobody. But again, it was never going to be a peace plan. It was always going to be a surrender deal, and there will not be any deal. This is going to be that Alaska summit all over again. You know this better than I do, Dr. Gill. Vladimir Putin doesn't want peace. Vladimir Putin knows in his bones that Ukraine is part of Russia. He's not going to stop. You think he's going to agree to these terms? Oh, you. We only get a little bit of Ukraine, and they can't join NATO. I mean, the entire threat thing is a middle finger to our allies. It's literally a violation of yet another treaty. As we've discussed, the Budapest Memorandum signed by America and Britain and Russia 30 years ago. And of course, Trump breaks treaties. He's broken the Paris Agreement, the Iran nuclear deal, the INF Treaty, three sets of marriage vows. But now they're threatening to cut off weapons if Ukraine doesn't sign the surrender. Everyone keeps talking about. Will Zelenskyy accept this? But Putin won't accept this. This is all a snooze alarm to make us think there's diplomacy going on, when in reality, Putin's not gonna stop till he has the country and Trump's gonna do whatever he's told.
- [04:07]
A
Yeah, it's the same surrender agreement that Konstantin Kilimnik peddled to one Paul manafort at the 66th Fifth Avenue building owned by Jared Kushner back in 2016. On August 2, 2016, right before the famed August 3 meeting in Trump tow one of the many infamous Trump Tower meetings with Russians.
- [04:30]
B
But this, this, we should point out, this was a Miami hotel meeting, right? The. The Faina Hotel, where Jared and Steve Witkoff and Kirill Dmitriev, who's a Putin fixer, literally under US Sanctions, like, you can't make this up. The Trump team is meeting with a sanctioned Kremlin bagman to write American policy for us. I'm old enough to remember when conservatives would be outraged by this kind of crap, but this is just like Trump's just given this guy a lap dance. If he went any further, he'd be personally repainting Kremlin in tacky gold.
- [05:00]
A
Now, who do you think leaked this audio? Was it One of our five eyes. Yeah, People, maybe somebody in our own intelligence community that, I mean, whoever it was, wanted to make it real awkward for Witkoff to talk to Volodymyr Zelensky.
- [05:14]
B
Oh, yes, they did. And this is my favorite thing to talk about with you because you're more informed than most people. But just imagine the amount of people in the military and intelligence communities who are career spooks or officers and disgusted by all this reality TV corruption mishigas. I mean. I mean, my God, I can't believe more hasn't been leaked. And I'm of the opinion, as I've shared on your show before, that the oligarchs are done with this guy. The Epstein timing of all this stuff coming out right after he signed the budget and the crypto deal is very sus to me. So, I mean, this is just a long, long process of them trying to get him out. But, I mean, in this case, he wants every NATO country to pass laws banning Ukraine from joining. I fault all the media who take this seriously as a peace agreement. This is insane. It's a surrender document. And this is where Democrats have to get better at the language and messaging because Trump doesn't want peace for our ally. He has always wanted surrender.
- [06:09]
A
Yeah. And that meeting between Wyckoff and Volodymyr Zelenskyy, if it goes forward, is going to be almost as awkward as reading the headlines that Trump wants to fire Kash Patel. While Trump is in a meeting with Pamela Joe and Kash Patel in the Oval Office.
- [06:23]
B
Awkward.
- [06:24]
A
So they're like this headline, and she puts out a statement saying, oh, he doesn't want to fire Kash Patel. The reason I know that is because we got the headline as he was meeting with Kash Patel. And I heard that, too. Yeah. And I asked him, do you want to fire Kash Patel? He's like, heck, no. I think Kash Patel's doing a great job. Yeah, like you're going to tell him right to his face, more Exactly.
- [06:47]
B
And they're not going to do it until after the holidays anyway. But this is why he hires these losers, right? Hegseth and this guy, because he doesn't want qualified personnel. He wants these little puppets that he can cut loose as soon as they have no more value for him. The best thing about Kash Patel is he's going to get himself fired by embarrassing the bureau by having all these private jets for his country star girlfriend. And the best part about this is as soon as he is fired, you know, the girl's Going to dump him, right? Like, you know he's going to get broken up by this chick right away when she can't get a private, taxpayer funded jet to her crappy country Shows like this is who he hired. Man, it's going to get much worse. You've got the Fox News Weekend prompter monkey Pete Hegseth saying he's going after Mark Kelly. I mean, I don't understand how career military can't stop laughing.
- [07:32]
A
Yeah, and I mean, when you get hired in the Trump administration, I have to assume that the Presidential Personnel Office, the opp. I'm down with opp.
- [07:40]
B
Yeah, me too.
- [07:41]
A
You know me, I know you. Hands you a badge that just says fall guy on it. I mean, that's what you're set up to be. And we also saw that with the Department of Justice filing in the Boasberg criminal contempt Turn the planes around order issue. Kristi Noem did it, so now she's the new fall guy for the criminal contempt for the Alien Enemies act criminal contempt situation.
- [08:07]
B
You think Donald Trump hired Kristi Noem because he respects or cares about her? No, you're exactly right.
- [08:13]
A
Learned the hard way, man. Did these are the Muppets teach you nothing?
- [08:17]
B
Did three wives teach you nothing? This guy will do anything because he uses people. The one part that's kind of weird and sus is Marco Rubio. These men do hate each other very deeply, but Marco Rubio has one conviction in his life, and that is that he's supposed to be president. And the thought of a Rubio Vance ticket, like just, just the, the vaginal dryness tour 2028. I mean, to me it's, it's brilliant. But you know, Rubio deserves to be in the hot seat for this. Cuz he tried to explain this whole peace deal written by the guy who started the war. And first he told senators it came from a Russian representative. And then on social media, right, he says, oh, no, actually it came from the US and then he said, well, it's based on Russia's input and Ukraine's. So I'm like, Marco, which one is it? You can't say it's American and then turn around and say it's a group project with Putin and Zelensky. This is not Model un. Rubio is making it up as he goes along. And this is the same Rubio who of course persecuted Kilmar Garcia by lying that he had been anti Semitic. I mean, the stuff that'll never be held against this guy. Trump is going to take all the.
- [09:21]
A
Heat that he had a deportation order. It doesn't look like he has that. And Costa Rica's doors weren't still open when Costa Rica came out on Friday night, last Friday and said, our doors have always been open. You're full of it.
- [09:34]
B
And this is why I keep saying on your show, the Democrats who promise accountability in the House in January of 2027 are going to clean up in the fundraising, they're going to clean up in the primaries. We're going to have a Democratic House that looks very different in two years or in a little over one year than what we have right now. I mean, the Christie gnomes and the, the Hegsets and all these morons, they don't realize something that your audience does realize. The immunity ruling doesn't apply to Donald Trump's henchmen and underlings.
- [10:03]
A
They've been promised pardons.
- [10:04]
B
Right, but not at the state level.
- [10:06]
A
No, not at the state.
- [10:07]
B
And we can look at what happened today with them trying to, I mean, kill another case against Trump for his crimes that are on tape in Georgia. But the reality is Jack Smith still has all of his evidence. Donald Trump was never going to go to jail for anything. He will not be exonerated by history. He was not exonerated today.
- [10:24]
A
Well, Jack Smith brought up the fact several times in the motions to dismiss the case after Trump won that they should be dismissed without prejudice and that there isn't a chance, even though it hasn't been litigated, that this statute of limitations can be told while he is a sitting president. So he wouldn't say that unless he was thinking ahead to 2028, 2029. So that's why I think that Jack Smith would make a great Attorney General. You know, depending on who we elect in 2028, which right now could be Mark Kelly, he's got a better chance than he did a week ago.
- [10:55]
B
This is my whole theory that Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth hate JD Vance so much, they have spent the last week of their miserable lives trying to make Mark Kelly the next President of the United States.
- [11:06]
A
Give me, give.
- [11:07]
B
Alison, you're smarter than me. Give me another option that makes more sense than this. Right? Like, why would Pete Hegseth make himself an even greater laughingstock to his own troops? Everyone in Milit knows that you're supposed to disobey illegal orders. There's zero controversy here. I get that he's a little Renfield blood slave trying to appease his vampire master, but like this makes both of them look terrible in the eyes of the Armed forces. There's conservative brothers and sisters in the military who are really going to see through this. This might wake a few people up out of their stupor, but at the end of the day, these guys must just hate J.D. vance, and that's why they're trying so hard. I was saying last year I thought Kamala Harris would pick Mark Kelly to be her vp. I love Tim Walls. I still think Kelly was a smart pick. And my God, from the great swing state of Arizona, I'm willing to say JB Pritzker better look over his back, because Donald Trump is really working hard to make Mark Kelly the Democratic nominee. I don't even understand any other option that makes sense. It's just so stupid and counterproductive.
- [12:09]
A
It's extremely counterproductive. Hey, I know, let's go. After a captain, did tours, was an astronaut. I mean, you can't get more heroic than that. But they tried to do it with John McCain as well.
- [12:20]
B
Yeah, of course. I mean, they care about authoritarianism. So if you have a bigger authority figure, they don't care about the military. This is why they're down with beating up cops, because it was done in the service of a greater authoritarian figure. But, I mean, just saying, you must refuse illegal orders. But Trump hears antifa, isis, Black Lives Matter, Sharia law, pride parade, right? Like, he wants to hang veterans for following the law. He reposted 16 separate posts calling for veterans to be executed. I'm just like Christians, go on supporting this guy. Just go on, please keep on publicly supporting this guy. But again, I think a lot of this is still trying to distract from Epstein this week because they know this thing's going nowhere. The economy's falling apart and Trump is screaming about hangings. Fox News actually said a lot of Americans say Trump's policies are hurting them. Fox News said this. So I think they're going to make as much noise over anything they can do. And he's going to yell, traitor, traitor. Death penalty. So we don't ask, why did you give such a cushy deal to a child rapist like Ghislaine Maxwell?
- [13:22]
A
Yeah, it's going to be interesting. And I think there's a lull right now in the Epstein stuff, because once that law was signed, the Epstein Files Transparency act, it gave Pamela Jo 30 days to release the file. So that comes December 20th. And then, of course, if she violates the law, which I am betting the bourbon that she will.
- [13:42]
B
Oh, she will.
- [13:43]
A
By inappropriately redacting or inappropriately withholding without providing the Requisite explanations triggers a lawsuit. And then we could go into that and we can have a lower court find that there's inappropriate redactions like they did with Bill Barr's redactions or the Mueller report.
- [13:57]
B
Yes, but this time I say let them, let them keep on covering up child rape. Let them keep on covering for powerful child rape. Draw it out. Let's get this well into the campaign year. It's going to be a really interesting midterms and they're going to keep on doing this. You know, Pam Bondi, I mean, I mean, I'm not going to say she's evil, but like Macbeth broke up with her and found a nicer girl to marry and she doesn't seem to realize that, you know, she can be disbarred. I mean, if you can disbar Bill Clinton in the state of Arkansas for lying about an affair, Pammy, I mean, you've been instructing your own people to lie to judges again, to the Supreme Court.
- [14:35]
A
They've lied in a filing case.
- [14:36]
B
They lied to the Supreme Court. And it took a 9 nothing Supreme Court ruling in the Garcia case to force this woman to obey the law. I am telling you, I am only going to support Democrats who are promising to eat flesh off of a bone. I want to elect savages for justice this time.
- [14:52]
A
Yes. In the primaries. I'm going to, I'm going to go for that and then, but I'm going.
- [14:56]
B
To miss a lot of 80 year olds. I'm going to miss so many 80 year olds that are in the house. But they, that's, it's happening. It's, it's all going to change.
- [15:02]
A
Yeah. And so not only are they going after heroes and veterans and astronauts, they're going after nurses. They're going after nurses.
- [15:10]
B
Nurses. I mean the contempt. They just capped student loans for nurses and social workers at 57,000 while all kind of doctors and lawyers still have a cap of 200,000. So this screws the mostly female heroes who saved our country during COVID Right. This is all part of the big bill. And this guy has just insulted the women and men who hold this country together. I mean, I'm very biased, okay. I am the child of a nurse. My mother worked in hospitals, she worked in schools, she worked at retirement homes. Nurses are the people who keep you alive, who keep you clean, who keep you medicated and breathing and keep you from dying from your own bad decisions. And he's decided they're not professionals. Like podiatry still is theology, still is chiropractic. Still is, and God bless all of that. But my mom didn't go to nursing school so she could get professionally downgraded by a reality TV aristocrat who thinks hydroxychloroquine is a freaking breakfast cereal. Alison, this is so. This is sabotage. We have a nursing shortage already. Half the profession is ready to quit. And Trump's solution is, what if we make it harder for nurses to get degrees? And you know what happens? Fewer loans means fewer students, means fewer nurses, means more American deaths. That is what they're going for here.
- [16:28]
A
I'm interested to see if the bank lobby pushes back. I know they make a pretty penny on gouging nurses for interest on their student loans, so it'll be interesting to see if their greed doesn't step in and say, he, you're taking away our I can't get a third yacht because you won't let nurses borrow $65,000 so I can gouge them for 10%.
- [16:46]
B
And in reality, if we were like our capitalist allies, you could go to school and become a nurse for free. Because once you are working as a nurse, you are helping the economy in every way, not just the taxes you pay. And again, why would he do this? Well, they're mostly women, working class. A lot of them are minority. They are the backbone of public health.
- [17:05]
A
Nurses that work for the Department of Veterans Affairs.
- [17:07]
B
Well, yeah, but again, and more signs of how much they hate veterans. And why is it still so hard for Democrats to weaponize this authoritarian movements? And you know, this always attack anyone who empowers the public. This is Project 2025. The rich are professionals and everyone else is is optional. And Donald Trump doesn't respect nurses because he doesn't respect empathy or care or service or expertise. And these are qualities every nurse has and he never will.
- [17:35]
A
Yeah, absolutely. Anything else you want to get off your chest today on this holiday weekend? First of all, thank you for joining me on a holiday weekend, my friend.
- [17:42]
B
Thank you for being so flexible and having me a different time. Honestly, I just want to wish a happy Thanksgiving to all of your wonderful audience and say that I'm going to be at the Beverly Hills Public Library for Book Soup in LA with our friend Stephanie Miller next Thursday. Stephanie was free, Allison. So she's doing a thing with me over there. And then Separation of Church and Hate is on sale now. And no, I'm just. I wanna thank you for all that you do. Every time I do these shows on the road and I've been on tour, like I do these Meet and greets afterwards and the amount of people who come to me and I've been doing this for 30 odd years and people who tell me they discovered me through your show. I mean, you do so much good that you don't know about. So on behalf of your deeply sexy audience, thank you this Thanksgiving for making America a better place.
- [18:27]
C
Yeah.
- [18:27]
A
And thank you for all your work. You know, I walked into the Democratic Club of Coronado to give a speech this week and sitting there on my lectern was a cop. The Separation of Church and Hate. And I said, oh my gosh, John Fuglsang's book. And the president of the Democratic Club in Coronado said, yeah, we're just about to start a whole book club series on this book.
- [18:44]
B
Oh, nice. That's great.
- [18:46]
A
Wonderful.
- [18:47]
B
Well, I can't wait that it'll be even more valuable when it's banned in Florida. And we just found out that we're gonna be in airports for the holidays. As of yesterday, my book is now in Hudson Booksellers in America's Airports, which to me is better than a Daytime Emmy.
- [19:00]
A
So that's really, really good. We need to get the word out. And it's always good to prepare. When you're flying home to your family and there's some maga in your family, you got to have those arguments prepared. And that's what the all you gotta do.
- [19:13]
B
Know a few verses. Yeah, know a few verses. Don't, don't look for a fight. Try to avoid it. But if they do, just ask questions. Where does Jesus say this? Where is a Jesus teaching that Donald Trump has ever fought for? If God tells us to welcome the stranger and treat the alien as our own, and Jesus says we'll be judged by how we welcome the stranger, why should I reject them and listen to you and Trump Just ask him questions. Let him argue with the Bible.
- [19:36]
A
Yeah. And once you're done asking questions from Separation of Church and Hate, pick up Uncle Frank's phone, go in there, subscribe him to the John Fugal Saying show podcast and the Daily Beans. We really appreciate it. Then it'll pop up right on their phone. They can listen to it whenever they want. And you know, maybe, and maybe they're listening right now. Hi, Uncle Frank.
- [19:55]
B
Change your mind and maybe your relationship will survive that. Dr. Gill, thank you so, so much for having me.
- [20:01]
A
Thank you so much, my friend. Everybody, if you stick around for a minute, I'm going to have an interview with a progressive Democrat running to take Nancy Pelosi's seat. She is retiring at the end of this term. His name is Shoikat Chakrabarti. You don't want to miss it. Stick around. We'll be right back after these messages.
- [20:16]
B
We'll be right back.
- [20:20]
A
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- [23:50]
C
Hi. Thanks for having me on here.
- [23:52]
A
I am excited to talk to you because I absolutely love this platform. I think what a couple of Tuesdays ago showed us is what constituents are hungry for. And I know that the constituents in the district that you're running in are different than some of the demographics and platform dreams that some other districts have. So tell us a little bit about your district and what you're finding out from the voters because if we've learned anything, it's important to speak to your constituents to find out what they want instead of wagging fingers at them and telling them what they need.
- [24:28]
C
Yeah. You know, talking to folks here, I would say, honestly, I don't think they're that different from folks in a lot of other parts of the country. I mean, the number one concern that I hear about is the cost of living in San Francisco. I mean, that's what we're hearing in races all over the country because it's real. And I'd say in San Francisco, we face this cost of living crisis worse than pretty much everywhere in the country. And that's why I actually think it's very important for us to have a representative who's really going to the core root issues of this cost of living crisis, talking about solutions that will really fix our healthcare crisis, our affordable housing crisis. But I'd say the other piece that I do hear about, that maybe not everybody's hearing in every other district, people here are really worried about the authoritarian takeover that Trump's enacting right now.
- [25:12]
B
Right.
- [25:12]
C
They're really worried about ICE coming into our neighborhoods and kidnapping people off the streets and these unmarked vehicles and ripping families apart. And they want to know how a representative will act differently, take on more of a role than just being a legislator to stop that coup. And then the third big piece that I say does come up a lot, and this I'd say, honestly, I think we see it all across the country, too, is this political corruption. People are sick and tired of corruption in our politics. And people really do make the connection between this broken economic system we have right now and the political corruption, the role of big money in our politics that's led us to this place. So I'd say those are the big three things that I end up talking about. And I do calls with voters every single day. It's kind of a new thing I'm trying on this campaign. I don't know anyone else who does this, but if anyone goes to my website, you can just sign up for a video call with me if you live in San Francisco. So I do these every weekday. They're like little mini virtual town halls. And they've been so instructive. You know, that's really how I've learned so much about what folks in my district really, really demanding right now.
- [26:15]
A
Yeah. And I think what we've shown throughout this year's special elections, going back to Florida 1 and Florida 6 or Iowa, going back to the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, going back to what we saw on Tuesday. When you have a campaign focused on the things that your constituents care about. And I think you're right. Like, nationwide, it seems to be affordability, freedom and transparency. And, you know, people talk about the Epstein files. Stick that under transparency. People talk about not having their neighbors kidnapped and disappeared. File that under freedom. People talk about health care. I file that under freedom as well, and affordability, because it's costing us so much, as is childcare, particularly in California, where we do have a little bit of a different view because of the amount of immigrants that we welcome here in our state. And I think we have a little bit. It's a little different than maybe if you were running in a district in Kansas, even in a blue district in Kansas, it impacts us a little bit differently. So talk a little bit about your time as chief of staff with Alexandria Ocasio Cortez and how that has informed your strategy for campaigning.
- [27:31]
C
Yeah, you know, because I ran her race in 2018, and. Yeah. After she won, as her chief of staff for a year. And I'd say there's a strategy for campaigning here and a strategy for governing that are both things I learned from that experience. So in the strategy for campaigning, you know, that first election that she won, she had no institutional or establishment support at all, you know, and we had to come up with a way to talk to voters directly. So a lot of my philosophy of how you campaign, especially if you're kind of an outside of the establishment candidate at who I am in this race, is you have to find creative ways to get in front of voters directly. Don't go through the political gatekeepers. And so that means things like door to, you know, going door to door and having a very strong field campaign. And that's a big part of our campaign. We've already knocked about 100,000 doors. We've got over 2,000 volunteers signed up, and it's all about to make a field campaign work like that. Energy, you know, you need energy. So, you know, we host rallies. I did a rally about a month ago in the mission here. We had about 800 people show up. Right. And you turn that energy into people on the ground knocking doors, getting the word out about the campaign. And the other piece about running a campaign like that is you have to be completely transparent. You have to be able to answer every question. You can't dodge on any issues. You can't avoid any questions. And you have to know that you have a message that will win when voters hear about directly. And that's basically the theory of this whole race, is I know that when voters hear about my background working in politics, in federal politics and congressional politics, and when voters hear about what I'm running on, it's all overwhelmingly popular in the district. So our job is just making sure everybody hears about it. And that's where things like my video calls with voters in the district also come into play. That's the way to get in touch with voters directly. Right. I'm not going through any gatekeepers.
- [29:10]
A
Yeah, that's very important that you don't have that. You don't go through those. Those gatekeepers. Right.
- [29:14]
C
Yeah. But, you know, when it comes to governing and this is where I'd say I have a pretty strong difference when it comes to basically most people who run for Congress or run for the seat. In terms of how I think you actually get change done is I actually do think you need to push up and fight up against maybe even the Democratic establishment to get big things done. And so my experience here was working on the Green New Deal. So when AOC first won, I was a chief of staff and I was really in charge of launching the Green New Deal, writing and launching the Green New Deal, and the way we introduced the Green New Deal. And just for context here, the thing we were trying to do with the Green New Deal wasn't to pass a bill. It was really to try to completely change the conversation around climate change. And it was two big things. Like, one was we were saying, all the climate plans out there right now, they're just way too small. We have to up the ambition. Even Bernie's plan in 2016, it was like 80% reductions by 2050 through carbon taxes. Not good enough. Right. And the other thing we're saying is to tackle climate change, we shouldn't be talking about it as just a thing to tighten our belts and all of us have to suffer a little bit and give up a little bit. We're saying we actually need to build a new clean, high wage, high value economy. That's the same project as reversing the decades of economic devastation and deindustrialization that we've been seeing all across the Midwest. So it's talking about climate as this huge economic opportunity. And the way we introduced the climate or the Green New Deal was AOC. On her first day in D.C. she joined the Sunrise movement in a sit in Nancy Pelosi's office. Now, she was very respectful about it. She said, you know, Speaker Pelosi, we're doing this to show you that the people have your back if you want to go big on climate. But that took some guts, right? I mean, imagine doing sitting in your boss's office on your first day.
- [30:59]
A
I can't imagine doing anything going against Nancy Pelosi.
- [31:03]
C
I know, I know. I mean, I can tell you it was terrifying. It was terrifying for her. But that one act of political courage, it really changed everything because the result of that was the media ate it up because they love reporting on fights. And we use that to really pitch this big idea. And, you know, through continued organizing, this inside, outside organizing where Sunrise, they're showing up to presidential town halls and they're telling everybody running for president what is Your plan, what's your response to a Green New Deal? While on the inside I'm calling up their staffers on the campaigns, I'm saying here, push this idea, push that idea. Right? We're doing this thing inside and outside. The result of that was everybody running for president responded with their own climate plans, including Joe Biden. He responded with Build back Better and that turned into Inflation Reduction act and that turned into largest investment in climate change and clean manufacturing in history. And so that's a big part of my approach is I'm going to have, you know, the strategy at the end of the day because I don't want to sound like it's all about just activists coming in and pushing. It has to be this actual strategy to get to this place. We're changing the bounds of what's politically possible and I think that's really doable. You know, that's all that happened on the climate with just one member of Congress taking no corporate money with some courage. I imagine if you had like 10 or 100 people like that in Congress, we could totally get single payer health care. We could get affordable housing all over the country. It's all possible.
- [32:21]
A
Yeah. And it's about aiming high. They aimed for single payer healthcare, they got the aca which was a incredible thing. You aim high, sometimes it comes back down. But the higher you aim, the higher the come back down part is right. If anything haggled before, like I am, I am for universal, not just single payer healthcare, Medicare for all. I am for direct provided health care, government health care. Like I am like make the VA available to. Everybody thinks I'm nuts for that. But I'm like, hey, they might come down to Medicare for all at that point, you know, so it's all about aiming high and then it's about the nuts and the bolts too. And being ready on day one, that's so important because you know, like when you, when he, Joe Biden put together the inflation Reduction act, the just tiny little things like we, all of our windmills will be made with U.S. steel and it will all be made by union U.S. steel. Like you put all these little things together so it benefits. So it's not just a win win, it's like a win, win, win, win, win. It benefits all sorts of different people, groups, the environment and everybody gets it. And the, and the rich people, they get a bunch of money out of it. You know, like everybody wins. And I think that it's important to aim high like that. And that's why I love these progressive ideas.
- [33:33]
C
Can I add something to that real quick?
- [33:35]
A
Yeah, please do.
- [33:35]
C
Because you brought up a really important point. It's something I've been trying to push in the Democratic Party for years, which is this idea of planning for the future. Right. Actually having detailed plans, you know, at the think tank I run right now at New Consensus, that's exactly what we've been working on. We've been working on this thing called the Mission for America, which is it's like a Green New Deal with all the details filled in. It's, you know, I don't really campaign on it because like a thousand page plan, but it's like a version of a Project 2025. It's what do you do on day one to hit the ground running to actually build that economy? But you know, one other thing I never talk about with that whole Green New Deal moment. The initial ask we had was for the Democrats to create a committee to come up with a 10 year plan to tackle climate change. And we didn't get exactly that, but we did actually get a climate committee passed as a result of that. And because of that, the Democrats spent two years planning. They actually came up with a very detailed policies. So when the Inflation Reduction act happened, they had all these policies that they could pull off of because we did some planning up ahead. So I completely agree. It's not enough to just push and to just say we should do stuff. We have to then have a plan ready to execute when you take power.
- [34:37]
A
Yeah. Now, I have two other things I want to ask you about. When we get the majority back in the House of Representatives, I think it's a foregone conclusion at this point. What are some of the things that you would like to see done to hold this current regime accountable for the crimes it's committing? Like for example, a lot of folks I talk to who are running want to hold hearings, bring in people like Gregory Bovino and people from DHS and Kristi Noem, unmask these ICE agents and put them in front of a, like a commission style hearing. What, maybe impeachment? What are some of the things that you. I know a lot of people are concerned about not just moving forward on what we can, like these big ideas that we have, but how we can actually hold these people accountable so they stop.
- [35:17]
B
Yeah.
- [35:17]
C
You know, I think a big part of this is going to be holding folks accountable, not just in 26, because Trump's still going to be president. 26. And I don't know what the status of the Senate's going to be. So we have to pick the battles we can actually win, because I think it's a big. It's really important to win these battles. Like, I don't. I don't want to have, like, a show trial. I actually want to go after the real stuff around corruption, because Trump is committing so much crime right now in terms of the bribes he's taken to give countries favorable treatment and companies favorable treatment. I want to hold that stuff accountable. And at the same time, I want to pass legislation to make corruption illegal. So things like banning congressional stock trading. I've got Republican, you know, future colleagues who claim they want to do this. So, sure, let's. Let's do a discharge petition, go around leadership, do the same thing Ro Khanna and Tom Massey just did on the Epstein files, but do it for a congressional stock trading ban. It's a thing that 90% of Republicans say they want. Right. And that way, I think, makes it not just a partisan fight, it makes it a larger fight against corruption overall. And anyone who's caught up in that, we, you know, they get caught up in it. That's. That's part of it. Right. The law should not turn a blind eye, but I think that's how you also get the people behind you when you're doing a fight like that. I think we have to have a hard reset, especially after 2028, I'd say, of really calling out what just happened and how we can never repeat it again. I think that that sort of truth and reconciliation kind of process has to happen.
- [36:44]
A
Yeah. I think it would also be great to hold hearings and gather all of the evidence of the crimes of this regime so that on day one in 2029, when we get a new attorney general, the Congress can hand over all the evidence immediately. Here you go. Run with it. All right. One last thing before I let you go, because I know we're out of time, but I love your plan for the Fuhrer Bunker, for the Epstein Ballroom. Tell me your plan.
- [37:06]
C
Yeah, so I'm calling for turning this ballroom into a new Smithsonian museum on authoritarianism and corruption. And this is a big part. You know, I kind of talked about how we're gonna have to have this hard reset in 2029 where we really call out what just happened for what it is. You know, the crazy levels of corruption, the, you know, blanket throwing out of Democratic norms. We are going to have to, you know, end that and then actually have a museum that explains how it happened, including the private sector actors who led us There, you know, calling out companies like Microsoft and Amazon and Apple who are all donating to this guy, enabling this kind of authoritarianism because that needs to be memorialized so we do not repeat this history again.
- [37:48]
A
I agree with you, my friend. Thank you so much. Can you tell everyone where they can find, follow and support your campaign?
- [37:53]
C
Yeah, well, you can find me on social media anywhere. I'm shoykat for Congress, pretty much on all the platforms. But you can also go to my website. It's shoykat us S a I K A T us. We've got the largest grassroots volunteer operation going on in San Francisco history right now. And we've got, I mentioned over 2000 people who are knocking on doors. We've got phone banks going on. So I would love, love, love if anybody here in this would be, would be interested in volunteering. You know, if I can get your time, it really makes all the difference. But if you don't have time, you know, throw a few bucks our way. You can also donate at the website. But thanks so much.
- [38:26]
A
Yeah, it's been great talking to you and I want to tell everybody to thank you very much for listening on this wonderful Thanksgiving weekend or this holiday weekend, depending on how you celebrate. I hope you got to spend time with food and friends and family and I know I'll be with my chosen family. But thank you so much for joining me today. Shoikat Chakrabarti, I appreciate your time.
- [38:47]
C
Yeah, thanks for having me on.
- [38:48]
A
Thank you, thank you and everybody, thank you for listening to the Daily Beans today. We'll be back in your ears on Monday. Until then, please take care of yourselves, take care of each other, take care of the planet, take care of your mental health and take care of your family. I've been AG and them's the beans. The Daily Beans is written and executive produced by Allison Gill with additional research and reporting by Dana Goldberg. Sound design and editing is by Desiree McFarlane with art and web design by Joelle Reader with Moxie Design Studios. Music for the Daily Beans is written and performed by they Might Be Giants and the show is a proud member of the MSW Media Network, a collection of creator owned podcasts dedicated to news, politics and justice. For more information Please visit msw media.com msw media.