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The Daily Beans
Crypto Corruption And Clarity (feat. Scott Greytak)
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Monday, July 20, 2026 Today, Senator Warren calls out millions in missing Trump library bribes; Markwayne Mullin threatens state election officials with jail time; a top IRS guy was fired for opposing the president’s tax immunity granted by Todd Blanche; more details emerge about the abusive past of the ICE agent that murdered Johan Guerrero; FBI said it will no longer investigate ICE murders as the agency is going to investigate itself; Donald is planning to sell insider trading tips early to Wall Street investors; an ICE concentration camp contractor shot a protestor in Colorado; the US military has launched a new round of strikes after Iran killed two service members in Jordan; the administration has launched the Alien Terrorist Deportation Court; a judge ruled the firing of the FEMA CFO was illegal; the Tate brothers were arrested in Miami for extradition to the UK on rape and sex trafficking charges; plus Allison delivers your Good News.
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I'm Brian Caram and I've spent decades covering politics. Now I'm taking you behind the scenes, one interview at a time.
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Join us as each week Brian confronts the issues that matter, posing the questions you wish you could ask. No filter, no agenda, just the truth.
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We're not here for sound bites. We're here for substance. Join me, Brian Caram, every week as we cut through the noise and get straight to it. This is Just Ask the Question where curiosity will lead us to the facts.
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Subscribe now on your favorite podcast platform and remember, when you want answers, all you have to do is just ask the question.
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Msw media.
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News.
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We're swearing
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daily beans.
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Daily beans.
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Daily beans. Daily beans.
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Hello and welcome to the Daily beans for Monday, July 20, 2026. Today, Senator Warren and others call out millions in missing Trump library bribes. Marquane Mullen has threatened state election officials with jail time. A top IRS guy was fired for opposing the president's tax immunity granted by Todd Blanche. More details have emerged about the abusive past of the ICE agent that murdered Juan Guerrero. The FBI says it will no longer investigate ICE murders as the agency is going to investigate itself. Donald is planning to sell insider trading tips early to Wall street investors. An ICE concentration camp contractor shot a protester in Colorado. The US Military has launched a new round of strikes after Iran killed two service members in Jordan and one in Iraq. The administration has launched the Alien Terrorist Deportation Court. A judge ruled that the firing of the FEMA CFO was illegal and the Tate brothers were arrested in Miami for extradition to the UK on rape and sex trafficking charges. I'm your host, Alison Gill. All right, lots of news this weekend. Dana's out. She's going to be back, I think in two weeks. So thanks for hanging out with me solo. Later in the show, I'm going to be talking with the deputy executive director of Transparency International U.S. his name is Scott Greytack and we're going to discuss cryptocurrency and the Clarity act and where it falls short. Also, Heather Cox Richardson has put out a video series called 250 to 250, celebrating the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence with 251 minute videos about the history of our democracy. I got to cover one of these one minute videos on the Palmer Raids, so definitely check that out on her YouTube channel. There's also a new episode of the Breakdown out. It came out Sunday at noon. It's on my substack@mullershirote.com it's an interview with Annie Farmer, an Epstein survivor who was in the meeting with Todd Blanche. There's also a new episode of Unjustified out that you can listen to wherever you get your podcasts. And this November 3rd going to be hosting an in person election night watch party for patrons of the Daily Beans and Unjustified. If you want to become a patron and get one of those invites, it's going to be I'm renting out a whole bar in San Diego and I'll be paying for food and drinks and we'll have the results on all the screens in this particular establishment. It's going to be fun and you can sign up to become a patron and get an invite@patreon.com MullershireRoad Also, Troy Jackson has pretty much sewn up the main Senate nomination replacing Graham Platner. This weekend was a delegate election and a majority of the delegates are going to vote for Troy Jackson next weekend. Shanna Bellows dropped out of the race and we're going to keep an eye on all of this for you. Troy Jackson ran for governor unsuccessfully but is a progressive candidate and kind of matches what Graham Platner's platform was. So we're all eyes on Maine this coming weekend. We have a lot of news to get to today, so let's hit the hot notes. Hot Notes votes First up from Democracy docket Homeland Security Secretary Marquene Mullen threatened top election officials in all 50 states and D.C. with criminal charges if they do not comply with the Trump administration's demand to feed their voter rolls through a flawed federal database. Mullen's threats came just hours after Donald Trump resurrected debunked claims of fraud in the 2020 election during a primetime address as part of his ongoing efforts to undermine US Elections before the upcoming midterms. In its totality, Mullen's speech amounted to a major escalation in the Trump administration's attempt to assert federal control over state voter rolls and their election procedures. Alongside his threats Friday, Mullen claimed that the database in question has identified over 250,000 noncitizens registered to vote in California, New Jersey, Nevada and Pennsylvania. But at no point during the speech did Mullin specify how DHS obtained those four states voter registration data, though many states offer public versions of their roles for sale or for download. He also did not claim that any of the alleged registered non citizens actually voted in US Elections. The secretary only said that the department identified the non citizens using the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements or the SAVE database originally designed to help states check the citizenship status of people applying for government benefits. The Trump administration has now retrofitted it into a broader citizenship check, but critics say the new version is deeply defective and regularly misidentifies eligible voters. Mullins threat came a week after the Department of Justice sent all state election chiefs letters warning they could face criminal prosecution over possible noncitizen voting. The department's notice angered both Republican and Democratic officials. Moments before his speech, the DHS announced that Mullen also sent letters to the Secretaries of State in those states warning them about the alleged non citizens on their rolls. In the letter, Mullen also demanded that Secretaries of State, quote, respond within two weeks and confirm their intentions to collaborate with DHS in order to ensure free, fair and honest elections. Quote Pay attention to what Mullen did not provide any evidence to back up his wild numbers or even an explanation as to where those numbers came from. That's Wendy Weiser, vice president of the Brennan center for Justice. She said that in a social media post on Friday, quote, they are almost certainly false or wildly overstated. This administration has a poor track record with false allegations of election impropriety, she said. Now. David Becker, executive director of the center for Election Innovation and Research, echoed her sentiments during a call with journalists Friday morning. Becker said he attended a White House briefing the previous day, during which an official said that the 250,000 non citizens figure was based on comparisons with commercial data. Such data is less detailed than voter records, often making exact identifications impossible. According To Becker, that 250,000 number is an irresponsible number to share given the opaque methodology that they claimed here. That's what he said. In recent months, federal courts have repeatedly ruled that the executive branch has very limited authority to demand access or changes to states voter rolls. That despite those rulings, Mullen threatened that state election officials who do not collaborate with the Trump administration and feed their voter rolls through the SAVE database could face criminal charges. Quote, the states who choose not to participate with the SAVE program and they choose not to participate in secure elections, we will make sure that we make those states a priority to look at who voted in their states and will hold them election officials accountable. That's what Mullen said. Starting with former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Trump's DHS appointees have endeavored to transform the SAVE database into a new system to monitor and directly shape state voter registration lists. And under Mullen, the department has taken several steps to force states to use the database to purge voters from their roles. The database, however, has repeatedly falsely identified eligible voters as noncitizens it particularly falsely flagged naturalized citizens and as ineligible to vote. A federal judge in D.C. last month barred the DHS from continuing to use the database to surveil and force removals from state voter rolls. U.S. district Judge Sparkle Sukhnanan, who was appointed by Joe Biden, found that the Trump administration violated several federal laws in refashioning SAVE into a centralized master citizenship database by pooling the private information of millions of Americans, including Social Security records held by agencies across the federal government, into dhs. Mullen attacked Judge Suknan over her ruling, calling her an activist judge opposed to secure elections. He also appeared to conflate the Save America Act, a massive anti voting bill pushed by Trump, with the similarly named database. Quote, currently we're getting pushback from activist judges that are saying that hold on the SAVE act or the SAVE program, they're trying to put a hold or a stop to. That's what Mullen said currently, because the SAVE program, we have a pending appeal because activist judges are saying what they don't want to secure our elections, unquote. And I'm quoting him, just so you know, if the grammar is awful, it's him. In inner order, Judge Suknan warned that the Trump administration haphazardly threatened the sacred right to vote by adopting the expanded SAVE system, knowing that it would falsely flag eligible voters as potential non citizens. After falsely alleging that foreign governments can hack voting machines and voter registration systems, Mullen announced that dhs, with the Department of Commerce, would soon make new security enhancements to voting machines mandatory by conditioning state grants on their adoption. Quote, if these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they're going to have to implement security issues, just security issues. He said, we're saying the machines have to be secured and that your voter registration list needs to be scrubbed. Mullen's announcement appears to be separate from the DHS's new threat to withhold terrorism prevention funding from states unless they adopt several anti voting policies, including sending their voter rolls through the SAVE database. All right, time for our Abolish ICE segment. We got a couple of ICE stories here. This one's from the Associated press. Brulette, who's 37, that's the ICE agent that murdered that person in Maine, told his ex wife, Ashley Brulette, late last year that he had been hired by ice. She said that because of his long history with psychiatric issues, she thought he was having a mental health episode and didn't believe him when he said, I was hired by ice. She thought he was crazy talking. She didn't realize he was telling the truth until this week when videos began circulating online of the moments surrounding the shooting. Now, Ashley Burlett told the Associated Press that she spoke to her ex husband in a Facebook audio call and he acknowledged that he had killed Duron Guerrero. Their 18 year old daughter, Madison, also told the Associated Press that her father called her Wednesday and said that he shot and killed Duron Guerrero. David and Ashley Burlett were high school sweethearts who got married in 2007. She said she divorced him two years later in 2009 because he had become physically violent violent with her, which began after she got pregnant with their daughter. According to Ashley, he once threw boiling water at her while she was holding their child, an incident her mother, Avis Collins, also recounted. The abuse continued after she left him. Hundreds of family court records obtained from the Augusta District Court Clerk's office detail years of allegations of physical and verbal abuse raised by his second ex wife on behalf of herself and his daughters. The ex wife, whom the Associated Press is not naming because she fears retaliation, alleged that he had stalked and harassed her and physically and verbally abused his daughter, according to multiple requests for temporary protection orders. Brulette tackled his teenage daughter and smashed spaghetti into her hair, and during another outburst, he dragged his daughter around the house as she cried. His oldest daughter, Madison, said she also witnessed her dad's volatility. Quote I watched my dad struggle with a lot of things, she told the ap. She said she came home from school once and he told her he had been sitting on a tree stump with a gun to his head. Quote if you don't really truly take care of yourself, there's no way you can protect other people. And with my dad, he never wanted to get help, she said. An immediate relative of Brulette, who spoke on the condition that their name not be used, said he was diagnosed with severe bipolar disorder and attention deficit disorder as a child, a diagnosis that Ashley Burlett confirmed. The immediate relative described him as extremely mentally ill and said he attempted suicide twice at age 12 and was hospitalized multiple times. That relative said they've been estranged for years after they broke off contact because they feared he would harm them. He didn't respond to their outreach this week, the relative added Brulette was initially rejected by military recruiters because of his mental health diagnoses, but the recruiters encouraged him to go off his medications for a year and reapply, which he did. That's how he got in his immediate relative believes Brulette's time abroad worsened his emotional struggles. Quote, Afghanistan destroyed him, trained him to be a killing monster, a machine. They took someone who was extremely mentally ill and turned him into a killing machine. In March, the main agency that handles child support matters filed a lien against him. The filing suggests that Brulette may have been in line for a permanent impairment or disability settlement. In late 2025, around the time he joined ICE, his ex wife Ashley said he left a three minute voicemail mocking her for taking out a restraining order against him. According to the message she shared with the Associated Press, he repeatedly called her disgusting and suggested that she and the other women and girls in her bloodline should die. And content warning for this quote and all of you should have your throats cut, the voicemail said. Yeah, you should. Am I threatening that I'm gonna do that? Nope, nope. But do I think that you should have your throats cut or should have them cut? Yep, that's what he said. Now Ashley reached out to his current wife on Facebook and they spoke on the phone for several minutes. Her ex husband spoke with her, according to cell phone screenshots of the phone exchange shared with the Associated Press, and he acknowledged he fatally shot Duron Guerrero. Quote, he was asking if I could tell them he was a good person and not to talk about the abuse and stuff that I had endured while with him. And he said the most important thing is his character right now. She said she told her he is now hiding in protective custody. So wow, that's the kind of people serving in ICE. Next up, a man working at a U.S. immigration and Customs Enforcement processing facility in Colorado was arrested Thursday after allegedly shooting a female protester as she walked away from his car. The woman, who sustained non life threatening injuries, per the police, was part of a group of protesters outside the city's ICE processing center who had taken photos of employees waiting to get into the facility before walking away. It was at that point, the police say she was shot for taking pictures and then walking away. She should recover, but man, this is a contractor at an ICE facility. Next up from the Times, Federal agents around the country were told in recent days that the FBI would no longer investigate ICE shootings. FBI managers around the country received a written notice informing them of the change on Thursday. And under this change, responsibility for investigating cases involving federal immigration officers is likely going to fall to the Homeland Security Investigations Unit, which is an arm of ice, effectively leaving the agency to investigate itself. And from Politico, the Trump administration has activated a secretive and never before used legal process to quickly deport foreign nationals deemed to be, quote, alien terrorists or their immediate family members. The Justice Department submitted the first ever application to the Alien Terrorist Removal Court, which has lain dormant since it was established by Law in 1996 with little notice earlier this week. The details of the July 15 application are sealed and an accompanying cover sheet indicates the substance is classified. The Chief Judge of the court, US District Judge Joan Erickson, held a sealed hearing on the matter Thursday and subsequently issued an order asking the government to make a more thoughtful application. Quote, the government could benefit from the opportunity for a more thoughtful consideration, the Minnesota based G.W. bush appointee wrote in her one page order. She noted that she had lingering questions about the actions taken by the Justice Department and how they connect to the laws providing for the removal of alien terrorists. An updated response is due Wednesday. The activation of the court is another indication of the Trump administration seeking to maximize its deportation authority in unprecedented ways. Though the court has never been used, its existence became an obstacle for the Trump administration last year when they sought to abruptly deport more than 100 Venezuelan nationals by labeling them members of Trende Aragua, a transnational gang that Trump deemed a terrorist organization at the time. U.S. district Judge James Boasberg noted that the existence of the court seemed to suggest the administration could not simply deport people it labels terrorists without the involvement of any court. Now, I personally think that this court at least has judges that were appointed by presidents, not like the immigration judges who work for the executive branch. So. And their first application has already been questioned by this court. Now onto the Trump corruption portion of the show, now that we're done with the ice Corruption from the Wall Street Journal, the Treasury Department's top tax policy official was fired, forced out of his job after he warned that the White House was at risk of violating federal law prohibiting senior officials involvement with IRS audits. That's according to people familiar with the matter. Kenneth Keys, an assistant treasury secretary and acting chief counsel of the irs, is leaving the post, both of them in the coming weeks. Kees at times clashed behind the scenes with White House officials, according to the People. That included a recent meeting in which he contended that a potential White House request would violate Section 7217 of the Internal Revenue Code. The law prohibits the president, vice president, White House staff and certain agency heads from directly or indirectly requesting that the IRS conduct or terminate an audit or an investigation of any particular taxpayer. I brought this up in a video weeks ago, weeks ago, when they were trying to stand up the slush fund and the tax immunity thing, the judge, the amicus curi in the Miami courtroom, the same courtroom that found collusion and a fraud on the court and referred Todd Blanche to the bar along with Stanley Woodward. That amicus brief brought that law up and so did apparently, this tax guy who is now being fired. Violations are punishable, by the way, with up to five years in prison and up to $5,000 in fines. And IRS officials have long seen the prohibition as an important shield against the kind of political interference that Nixon tried to impose on the tax agency. IRS employees who receive requests they consider improper must report them to the agency's inspector general or risk the same punishments. The 1998 law is untested in court, and enforcement in the near term would require action by the Trump administration. So that's not happening. But it could happen in the next term. All right, next up from NBC, Trump Media and Technology Group, the parent company of Truth Social, has unveiled a paid for licensed data feed that'll give banks and trading firms, quote, the fastest access to posts from influential Truth Social accounts, such as President Trump and his account, who often posts about stuff that moves global markets. The product, called Truth API, will deliver posts from the 10 most influential accounts to customers at a significantly faster pace than regular push notifications on the Truth Social platform. The feed is designed for organizations, quote, most impacted by the cost of delay in information, such as algorithmic trading firms. That's what the company said in a statement went on to say, until now, firms that prioritize tracking influential Truth posts have relied on manual monitoring. But Truth API closes the gap. So you can pay a huge fee to get his Truth Social posts pushed to you. Now, the move is TMTG's first step in data licensing, and it opens up a new revenue stream for the company, which has faced significant challenges in scaling its media business amid stiff competition from larger social media firms. Yeah, that's why they are failing so poorly. I mean, basically that's like, give me $100,000, I'll tell you what I'm about to post that could influence the markets. My God. Next up from Ms. Now in the corruption section, three congressional Democrats said Thursday that as much as $21.5 million paid by ABC, Meta, Paramount and Twitter to settle lawsuits brought by Trump is missing or has been spent without explanation. And they're requesting a full accounting from the foundation building his presidential library. Now in a letter to the treasurer of the Donald J. Trump Presidential Library Foundation, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Richard Blumenthal and Rep. Melanie Stansbury cited discrepancies between Trump's newly released financial disclosures and the foundation's own filings with Florida charity regulators. The letter asks the treasurer to explain those discrepancies and which the lawmakers discovered after Trump released his annual financial disclosure forms earlier this month. Democratic lawmakers opened an investigation into the settlement funds earlier in March. Now, Trump's disclosure form filed in late June with the Office of Government Ethics indicated that Meta, ABC and Paramount paid a combined 56.5 million in settlements, with net proceeds going to the Trump Library Foundation. Twitter paid an additional 8 million, but the disclosure does not say where that money went. The four settlements total 64.5 million. The Trump Library foundation, however, listed $50 million in revenue, a financial reporting form submitted to the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services in October of last year, a figure described as a proposed budget of expected fundraising. The lawmaker said the difference leaves at least 6.5 million and as much as 14.5 million with the Twitter settlement included unaccounted for based on public records. Ah, yeah, so another big slush fund with disappearing money. This is my shocked face. All right, let's move on to Trump's illegal war of choice in Iran. This is from the Associated Press. The U. S military said it carried out new airstrikes against Iran Sunday to, quote, swiftly punish the country's Revolutionary Guard after an attack on a base in Jordan killed two American service members, left one missing and four requiring hospitalization. The strikes were designed to further degrade Iran's ability to restrict traffic of oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz. According to US Central Command, the waterway accounted for roughly 20% of global oil supplies before the war. Iran effectively closed the strait to shipping traffic after the war started with US and Israeli strikes on February 28th. Now the new strikes came after the US military announced its first troop deaths from direct Iranian fire since the opening days of the war following a drone and missile attack on a base in Jordan on Friday. The dead were not identified and sent comms didn't offer any further details. Since the war began, 16 U.S. service members have been killed and over 430 wounded. And this is just coming in Sunday afternoon as I record this from Reuters. A U.S. service member was killed on Saturday during a controlled detonation of unexploded ordinance in northern Iraq. That's according to centcom. The unexploded ordinance was from a, quote, downed Iranian one way attack drone, CENTCOM said in a statement released on Sunday. All right, before we get to listener submitted Good news. We have a couple of good news stories here. First is from Politico. A federal judge has ruled the Trump administration broke the law when it fired the Federal Emergency Management Agency's chief financial officer without going through the steps Congress has mandated for terminating civil servants. Following an hour long hearing Friday, U.S. district Judge Michael Nachmanoff rejected arguments that Trump's power over the executive branch gave officials the right to fire FEMA CFO Mary Comins last year without giving her a hearing or the right to transfer to another job. Quote, for the last 140 years, the Supreme Court has affirmed the President does not have plenary power to remove inferior officers, Nachmanoff said. And he ruled from the bench. By the way, Nachmanoff said the Justice Department was effectively arguing to overturn Supreme Court precedent, including an 1886 ruling that upheld Congress's authority to set rules for the removal of what the Constitution calls inferior executive branch officials. The judge, a Biden appointee based in Alexandria, Virginia, appeared to acknowledge that the High Court has repeatedly expanded the president's power to dismiss top decision makers in the executive branch. But he said the justices have never explicitly overruled the 19th century decision letting Congress set rules for lower ranking employees. Quote, judicial restraint requires that this court follow the law as it stands today. That's what the judge said. And some great news from CNN. U.S. marshals arrested social media influencers Andrew and Tristan Tate in Miami on Saturday on an extradition request from the United Kingdom following an investigation into sexual offenses reported by seven victims, according to the UK CPS Crown Prosecution Service. UK officials accused the brothers of abusing women in the east of England region just north of London between 2010 and 2017. Andrew Tate, a self proclaimed misogynist with billions of views online, faces 42 charges including rape, human trafficking, indecent images of a child and assault. That's according to the CPS. Bedfordshire Police also said that now Tristan Tate faces 17 charges, including sexual assault, rape and trafficking. Quote, Officers from our Major Crime Unit have been working closely alongside the Crown Prosecution Service and both national and international law enforcement agencies as part of this complex investigation. That's Bedfordshire Assistant Chief Constable Karina Thomas. The Department of Justice confirmed U.S. marshals arrested Andrew and Tristan Tate quote, pursuant to extradition proceedings, adding the arrests were, quote, made in accordance with the treaties and law enforcement agreements governing Justice Department extraditions. The brothers will appear in federal court in Miami next week, according to a law enforcement source. Quote, there is a long standing agreement between the UK And Romanian governments that the UK would not seek extradition while the Romanian proceedings are pending. That's according to Joseph McBride, who went on to say those proceedings are ongoing now and that agreement exists because no nation gets to trample the judicial sovereignty of another for political convenience. Romanian prosecutors previously accused the Tate brothers of trafficking women across Romania, the United Kingdom and the United States, and sexually exploiting them. They have repeatedly rejected the allegations made against them in that case. CNN has reached out to Romania's Justice Ministry for comment. Andrew Tate is known for his aggressive speech about male dominance, female submission and his wealth, and at one point he was suspended from major social media platforms. The brothers, who have dual American and British citizenship, face dozens of new charges added onto previous charges brought by the Crown Prosecution Service after evidence was submitted by Bedfordshire police. The new charges were brought after officials had investigated reports made by four additional victims in the East England areas of Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire. That's according to the police. The brothers left Romania after Romanian authorities lifted travel restrictions on them. They arrived in Florida in February of 2025. Upon their arrival, they found themselves at the heart of another criminal investigation when the Florida Attorney General, James Uthmeyer, announced the probe led by the Office of Statewide Prosecution, they had taken aim at Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who previously suggested they were not welcome in his state. Quote, when Americans who are unfairly imprisoned abroad return home, you betray them, andrew Tate said on Twitter. You better nail me now. Let's go. Arrest me, unquote. Deal. I hope you burn in hell. I added that at the end. All right, we've got a great interview coming up next to clarify the Clarity act about cryptocurrency and regulations and what's missing from it and what we can do to help. We're going to do that after this break, followed by the good news. Stick around. We'll be right back after these messages. We'll be right back. So good sleep is one of those things you do not fully appreciate until you stop getting it. I know because before I switched to my helix midnight, I was dealing with restless nights, sweat, morning soreness, the frustrating experience of waking up tired and spending plenty of time in bed. Now, my body was technically resting, but I wasn't getting the kind of sleep that restores anything. And I've had my helix for years now. I've been talking about it, gosh, six, seven, eight years now, and the difference has been clear from the beginning. The mattress gives me the support I need without feeling stiff, and the comfort helps me stay in one position instead of constantly shifting around so I fall asleep more easily, I wake up less often and I start the day with more energy and my Apple watch backs all that up. I pay attention to my sleep data and I've seen better results since switching to Helix. Helix also offers cooling upgrades which are especially useful during hot nights and for perimenopause. 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I once had a water heater break and without HomeServe would have been in real trouble. It was like $4200 to replace, but when I needed it, HomeServe was there for me. Then they'll be there for you too. And knowing there's a plan in place 24. 7 and a number to call 24. 7 gives me peace of mind so I can relax when it comes to thinking about future home emergencies. With nearly 4.5 million customers, a 4.7 out of 5 rating on Trustpilot, and an A Better Business Bureau 0 rating, Home Service earned some serious trust. Home repairs are stressful enough. You shouldn't have to figure everything out during an emergency when every minute already feels expensive. Your next costly home repair is already coming, so act now. Get protected with a plan through home serve for 50 less your first year. Go to homeserve.comdailybeans to find a plan that's right for you. That's homeserve.com dailybeans for 50 less savings compared to renewal price void in Florida.
- [33:25]
A
I'm Brian Caram, and I've spent decades covering politics. Now I'm taking you behind the scenes, one interview at a time.
- [33:32]
B
Join us as each week Brian confronts the issues that matter, posing the questions you wish you could ask. No filter, no agenda, just the truth.
- [33:41]
A
We're not here for sound bites. We're here for substance. Join me, Brian Caram every week as we cut through the noise and get straight to it. This is Just Ask the Question for curiosity will lead us to the facts.
- [33:56]
B
Subscribe now on your favorite podcast platform and remember, when you want answers, all you have to do is just ask the question.
- [34:11]
C
All right, everybody, welcome back. So, as we know, due to financial disclosure reports, Donald Trump earned 2.2 billion billion with a B dollars in 2025, and over a billion of that, I think about 1.4 billion came in crypto, cryptocurrency, investment, meme, coins, stuff like that. I'm not versed at all in this, and so I figured we'd bring an expert in to talk about it because there's a bill that's passed the House called the Clarity act that is meant to regulate cryptocurrency. But it falls pretty woefully short in a lot of areas, including shifting the responsibility of oversight to an agency outside of the sec, not including information on ethics and how to run that, and for one, allowing the president or any executive officer or their families the ability to make tons of money. We also know this is a way to launder money. We've been seeing that going back to Nadal, you know, in 2016, when the Trump campaign was paying people in cryptocurrency to get psychographic information from that Nigel Farage joint, Cambridge Analytica, stuff like that. It's been going on for a long time and it needs to be regulated. So let's welcome an expert in this field. His work focuses on designing anti corruption and financial integrity laws. This is what he does for a living. He builds ideological diverse coalitions, engages Congress and the executive branch on reform. He was named top lobbyist by the National Institute for Lobbying and ethics in 2021, 2023 and 2024, and serves on the advisory board for the Vandenberg Coalition. Please welcome Scott Greytack. Hi, Scott, how are you?
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D
Hey, Alison. Good. Good to be with you today. Thanks for having me on.
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C
I am so excited to talk to you because I have had conversations in pubs about crypto for the last decade and it still just goes right over my head.
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D
Sounds right.
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C
And so I wanted to talk to you a minute about what crypto is. The difference between meme coins and stablecoins and bitcoins, blockchains, ways to be anonymous. Can you give us brief overview of what we're looking at here?
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E
Yeah.
- [36:17]
D
So to keep it simple, like crypto is just another way to move value, to move money. Look, we don't take a position on cryptocurrency writ large. I work for the world's oldest and largest anti corruption organization. So we primarily we look at this as how can folks move money? And if you're in a country that's a really high risk for corruption, we know that public officials, literally employees of a government going up to their senior levels, will steal money from their treasury, they'll accept bribes, they'll engage in all kinds of acts of corruption, and then they want to launder that money outside of their country so that their citizens, if they find out about it, they can't just hide it under a mattress and wait for the pitchforks to come. They want to get it overseas. And more often than not, our former treasury secretary actually said the United States is the go to destination for that dirty money globally. So the United States is a huge hub for taking the recipients or receiving stolen money. And the proceeds of corruption and cryptocurrency is increasingly a way to do this. But at bottom, it's really just another form of value and moving money. So it's got some new technologies that make it better in that it can be more transparent and traceable over the blockchain, et cetera. But it's really just, it's the same old kind of story. How are bad guys able to take what they steal or what they earn through a crime and hide and grow those proceeds in another? Crypto is no different on that front. Right.
- [37:45]
C
Your job is to make sure, whether we're moving actual money back and forth or things of value like cryptocurrency back and forth, that it's regulated, that we can't be used as a laundromat for cash. It can't be used unethically to line the pockets of public officials who might have some sway over how those investments are poised to the public, for example, or might have some sway over the Treasury. I know that they were going to, with the 1.776 billion dol dollar slush fund, pay everybody out in cryptocurrency. So let's talk a little bit about the Clarity act, meant to put some regulations in place on cryptocurrency, because the House, like I said, it passed the House and it's coming up for a vote in the Senate. A pretty tight timeline. But there are critics of this bill because it falls short. There's some things that are not in it that we need to be lobbying our members of Congress to ensure are in it if they are going to vote for it. Can you talk about the Clarity act and what's missing from it?
- [38:46]
D
Yeah. So the Clarity act is this big piece of legislation that the cryptocurrency industry has been asking for the last couple of years, and they think with this Congress that's controlled by Republicans and having President Trump obviously in the White House, that they've got the pathway for doing it. Now, just for background, the crypto industry spent massive amounts of money on the last two election cycles. They spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to get candidates they thought were favorable to crypto in office. They were very success on a lot of those fronts. They spend millions of dollars in lobbying up on the Hill. And in this cycle, they've already spent upwards of $150 million trying to get future candidates and keeping candidates who they think are favorable to them. So there's a huge level of outside influence coming from this industry. And they want this bill because it's called the Clarity act, because they're saying, look, we don't really have rules of the road for how cryptocurrency is going to be regulated. If you want to be the focal point of innovation globally, the United States needs this roadmap. People need to know what they can and can't do, what rules apply to them, et cetera, as opposed to the government just intervening every once in a while when they see something that's crossed a line. So that's fine. We think that having rules of the road for our financial systems are great. We have that for every traditional bank has clear rules about what it has to do. So it's not that the regulation is the bad part, it's the fact that, that the framework that they're bringing is missing pieces that every other bank in the United States has to comply with. So we focus a lot on, as I mentioned, money laundering. We want to make sure that the same rules that every bank, every casino, a travel agency, jewelers, people who sell yachts or expensive cars, these are all looked at as, by our federal government as higher risk ways that people can move dirty money through them. And so we want those same rules to apply to the cryptocurrency industry. That's number one. But number two is what you started this piece off with, which is that cryptocurrency has been a way for a lot of people to make a lot of money in a short amount of time. And many of those folks are occupying even the highest levels of our government. So you mentioned President Trump. He's holding stakes connected to him in World Liberty Financial. He has made more money off cryptocurrency in the last year than some say he made over his entire career. We're talking about $1.4 billion. And so we want to make sure that the same people who are informing those rules and eventually will be implementing them and enforcing them or not enforcing them, are not biased, are not partial, because their bottom line personal income, their personal profits are tied to that same industry. So we want Clarity to have strong anti money laundering rules, the same kind of rules that every bank in America has. And we don't want our elected officials or their immediate family members to be able to profit off cryptocurrency, to have holdings in it, to be able to start their own crypto ventures, to be able to solicit investment in that at the same time that they're writing and enforcing those rules.
- [41:56]
C
And so the Clarity act is missing a lot of these things. So what is Transparency International's mission here with regard to the Clarity act or future legislation?
- [42:06]
D
Yeah, so we're focused on Clarity because we know when the United States acts on this, it's going to have a enormous influence on how the rest of the world regulates cryptocurrency. So again, we don't take a position on the technology itself, but there's a lot of diversity in how other countries handle this. Cryptocurrency is actually illegal in about a dozen countries. There are some authoritarian regimes that do not want the opposition parties or dissidents or activists to have access to Resources and cryptocurrency offers a way for them to get around the traditional banking system that those leaders can close off to them. So there are some good uses here. We don't take a position on the technology. We want to make sure when the United States does this, it does it right. Because we know it's going to be a model framework for all these other countries around the world that are looking at this technology and deciding how to work with it. So we gotta make sure that we have the same anti money laundering rules. We gotta make sure that we have strong ethics safeguards to ensure the integrity of that regulatory framework at the end of the day. We've been working with a coalition of law enforcement organizations, fake leaders, the banking industry has been strongly opposed to this. Obviously civil rights and economic justice and consumer protection advocates who were concerned about how cryptocurrency operates. It is a really broad tent of folks who are concerned about what happens if you pass this law and you don't include the kind of safeguards that can protect everything from consumers to giving law enforcement the information and the tools to be able to go after criminals who use crypto. Down to folks who are worried day to day level about things like human trafficking or child exploitation. Cryptocurrency has been a new and emerging way for criminals who engage in those kind of crimes to be able to move, finance and make money off those crimes. So you got a really incredible diversity of folks who've come out against this. It is. At the end of the day, I think this is a money versus morality moment. Cryptocurrency and their organizations have spent a ton of money. They are up on the Hill every day lobbying on behalf of keeping these protections out of the Clarity Act. We're working with folks who want to make sure that we pass a good bill that gives the folks who are going to be protecting us and our financial system going forward.
- [44:18]
C
Well, thank you. We appreciate your lobbying efforts. Is there anything that we can do as consumers, as citizens? I'm thinking grab my five Calls app and make calls to my representatives, particularly senators at this point because it's already passed the House to add these provisions or to not vote for the Clarity act as it is written.
- [44:37]
D
That's right. I mean, we've been doing a big social media campaign on our own to say that without strong ethics rules at the least, the Clarity act shouldn't be, shouldn't be voted on in the Senate. So we know that this bill is going to come to the Senate floor probably this week. This is happening right now. It is a real test for the folks in Congress who are saying that they want to hold this president and his conflicts of interest and corruption risks accountable. This is a in real time moving vehicle. If folks can pick up the phone, call their senator and say, hey, you say that you want to be a champion fighting corruption and holding this administration accountable, here's your opportunity. Should vote no against Clarity unless they include strong ethics guardrails.
- [45:23]
C
Awesome. Thank you so much. And tell everyone where they can find and follow you and Transparency International US to get maybe some ideas about what they might say to their senators or to keep up with what happens if it does pass and becomes law. The fight will continue, I assume, and I know that there are people listening who want to be able to continue to stay plugged into this issue. Where do they find and follow you?
- [45:46]
D
Yeah, we've made it pretty easy. We just dropped a very a big collaboration video on our Instagram channel. It's transparencyusa. It has all the information on the bill. It has the number to be able to call your senator. It has the script that you can use to talk about why there needs to be ethics protections in this bill. That's all up on our instagram @transparency USA. You can also look to our website. We've got a ton of information, fact sheets about the bills, testimonies from folks who've seen the harms that cryptocurrency has caused to everyday people, other organizations and people who are opposed to this. It's a big, broad tent, as I mentioned, and that's up@www.us.transparency.org. you can find all that information there.
- [46:27]
C
Well, I really appreciate you coming on and explaining this to us today. The importance of this, it's massive because like you said, as goes the US So will many other countries. And so I urge everyone to find and follow Transparency USA on Instagram and other social media sites and to go to the website and check it out so that we can contact our senators and make sure that the Clarity act does not pass. As it stands, it must have at least these ethics guardrails placed into the bill, you know, in some sort of language. But I do appreciate your time today. Deputy Executive Director of Transparency International, U.S. scott Greytach. It's been wonderful to speak to you.
- [47:05]
D
Thanks so much, Alison. My pleasure.
- [47:06]
C
Everybody stick around and we'll be right back with the good news. Diamond Dames, mount up.
- [47:15]
F
I'm Charlotte Clymer.
- [47:17]
C
And I'm Alison Gill. Hey, Charlotte, what if you and I joined forces to create a weekly podcast amid all the chaos of the news to chat about the most recent episode of season four of TED Lasso.
- [47:27]
F
Well, Alison, we'd be taking delights amid the spite to sit and write and bring some light on Wednesday nights. I mean, look, everything right now is ridiculous. I know we're all stressed out with the state of the country and we all deserve some joy. Ted Lasso was there for us in the middle of the pandemic and he's back to offer us a respite from Trump 2.0 right before the midterms.
- [47:50]
C
That's right, we believe in Rom communism. I mean, if Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan can go through smart felt struggle struggles and still end up happy, then so can we. So subscribe to Diamond Dames for free right now to get notifications. And then you can join us every week after each episode of ted Lasso Season 4 wherever you get your podcasts.
- [48:07]
F
And remember, be a goldfish. Diamond Dames Dismount
- [48:16]
C
barbecue sauce, everybody. Welcome back. It's time for the good news. Who likes good news?
- [48:24]
B
Everyone?
- [48:25]
D
Then good news everyone.
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C
Good news. And if you have any good news, it can be big, it can be little, it could be recent, it could be way in the past, it could be pretty much anything that you just want to write in and talk about. That'll bring a smile to our faces. You can also send in good trouble suggestions if you have any or maybe some good Trouble success that you've seen. We would love to hear about that. You can also give a shout out to a loved one or a non profit or a small business in your area or a self shout out. We love self shout outs. Everybody who listens to this show is pretty awesome. So tell us why you're amazing and all you got to do to get your stuff read on the air is attach a photo. It can be anything. It can be your pet. It can be an adoptable pet in your area. It can be a random animal on the Internet. I'm accepting any and all jimothy photos from Seattle. Please send in your jimothy photos. Maybe you got a jimothy tattoo or you have a jimothy shirt or a sticker or something. I'm obsessed with Jimothy in case you haven't realized it. You can also send in baby pictures, family photos, pictures of a sunset of your favorite meme. Just seriously, anything at all. Send it to us dailybeanspod.com click on Contact. First up is your Good Trouble. Good Trouble today comes from our good friends over@diance.org. we're partnering with them right now. If you're not a member and you want three free months, you can use our link defiance.org after that, it's a pay what you want model. So you have every reason to continue getting their excellent newsletter and calls to action. Your mission, should you choose to accept it. Volunteer with Powered by People Texans can volunteer in person on campuses this fall. Out of staters have distance volunteer opportunities as well. Beto will be on the road for 12 weeks starting in August and you can join him to help save Texas from Ken Paxton. We'll have a link in the show Notes for more information. All right, good news. First up from Scott Pronouns he and him. I recently discovered your podcast from a woman I met on an online dating site in Texas. Ha ha. FYI, no happily ever after story to come. She ghosted me. Scott, that's okay. You're here now. Welcome. But I've still added the beans to my daily diet of podcast. Here's my daughter's cat that stays at my house. Her name is appropriately Bean Adorable baby tabby. Oh, that's what I call a Ned cat because I had a ned that was that color. Love it. Scott welcome. Welcome to the fam. We were happy to have you. Next up from anonymous pronoun she and her hello dear. Ladies first. I wanted to thank you for bringing me trusted news each morning. I'm a blueberry in the steaming tomato soup that is Indiana, and sometimes the complete idiocy that comes from our legislators is just too much. Your dedication to doing and reporting what is right humbles me. Recently, my incredible mother passed away. As a means of distracting me from my sadness and the myriad tasks that come with a loved one's death, my sweet husband recently arranged for a weekend away in Minneapolis to watch a Twins game and enjoy that beautiful city. It so happens that when we were there during the last week of Pride Month and a large city celebration now, it should be noted that my husband comes from a very conservative background and but as we walked the city, we crossed paths with individuals who were clearly representing the LGBTQ community. And normally this would have resulted in some snarky or offensive comments, but I'm proud to report that my husband didn't utter a disparaging word nor act uncomfortable in any setting we encountered. Apparently, years of discussions have been productive. Deep in his heart, he knows that you cannot claim to represent God's love if you only love those who live and look like you. Years of indoctrinated prejudice are hard to overcome. I encourage Others not to give up on friends and family who have spent years hearing the vile rhetoric about any group. There's hope for my pod tacks. I'm enclosing two photos. One is the last quilt of my one hundreds my mother pieced. And the other is a photo of the three females from our most recent litter. Their breed should be obvious. Look at the beagle babies. Thanks again for all you do. Beautiful quilt. I hope those are beagles. What they seem like to me. Our good friend Anna Bauer has a lovely beagle named Lucy. If you don't follow her on Blue sky, you should, because she posts photos of Lucy all the time. All right, next up from Diane Pronoun. She and her good news. We had doggos at the office earlier this week, so I'm sharing a screenshot of the pictures I took of those sweeties to get them into one submission. And also a pic of our home therapist, River. Oh, River's a great dog name. Oh, my goodness. Hey. Question is, river looks familiar. And I know a big white dog named River. This looks more golden retriever, though, not Pyrenees. But Diane, if you're in the San Diego area, and that's you. Hi, River. If not, hello, other River. Look at these beautiful babies. Look at the ears. Is that a King Charles? Oh, so pretty. Thank you for all the doggo photos. Next up, from Deb Pronoun. She and her. I'm making a hundred little animals for my son. You said you wanted red pandas, and I have one, so here it is. Okay, I have to find it. There it is. Hi, red panda. Look at all these little animals. These are. I'm taking. I'm taking it that these are little ceramic animals you've created. They're beautiful. Thank you, Deb. Look at the red panda. So great. All right, next up from Karen K. Hi, beanies. Mom made this quilt years ago while I worked in an X ray department. I had a water bed at the time, and this was the perfect size. One night, I threw the covers off for the call of nature and got a sharp pain on my butt. Bathroom visit over. I went back to sleep. The next morning, I found a huge scratch on my butt and felt a pin in my quilt. I folded it up and took it to work. An x Ray revealed 18 pins. You x rayed your mom's quilt? I think mom was trying to drown me in my sleep pod. Pet tariff is Kizzy, whose job it is to roll in the dirt before she comes inside. Love your show. Okay. Beautiful quilt. And yeah, there's a kitty getting dusty. Pretty void, baby. Thank you. Next up, Greg pronouns he and him the 47 courtesy of the wild horses of Shackelford Banks, North Carolina. Okay, so 86 in seashells and 47 in horseshit.
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D
I love it.
- [55:05]
C
Thanks Craig. Thank you everyone. These are great submissions. Please send in all of your Good news to DailyBeenSpot.com click on Contact. Really, really appreciate it and I'll be back in your ears tomorrow and I'll see you over on Beans Talk. 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 aging 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 mswmedia.com MSW Media
- [55:58]
E
History is messy. It's weird, wild and anything but boring. Rainy Day Rabbit Holes is a history podcast about unhinged stories that make you stop and ask, wait, is this real life? From crazy disasters and tasty scandals to enlightening and surprising, heartwarming tales, we explore the moments where where people behave badly and sometimes beautifully. We've got naughty politicians, cultural chaos, and a deep love for the Pacific Northwest, including Bigfoot. It's thoughtful, irreverent, occasionally serious, and always entertaining. Let's fall down the Rabbit Hole.
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C
MSW.