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- [00:00]
A
We're in a worse position. Everyone is paying the price at the pump. 14Americans most recently have paid with their lives, all because the president acts like a petulant child. Of course, in his second term now, he's also getting senile. I mean, he's. He's clearly getting walked straight. He talks about cognitive tests because he must be getting a lot of cognitive tests. I don't know. I'm not getting cognitive tests right now. So that's clearly. You've got some issues. Most people can see that Donald Trump is dangerous, that he's dangerous for our troops, for our country, for our economy, for our national security. I mean, it was a long list, but he definitely seems more dangerous now than he was even his first term.
- [00:43]
B
I'm Joanna Coles. This is the Daily Bees podcast. What is going on in the Strait of Hormuz, do you know? I have no idea. Neither, I think, does anybody else. It just sounds like it's a mess. Well, we're going to be talking to Congressman Seth Moulton, a Marine. He's got an MBA from Harvard, and he represents Massachusetts, where he's also running for the Senate seat currently held by the very popular Ed Markey. But he would represent a new generation of Democratic leaders if he were to win the primary for the Senate seat, like Donald Trump. Ed Markey turns 80 this summer. So let's waste no more time other than to remind you. Please press the subscription button if you haven't done already. Please. We can bring you conversations like this because we are independent media, and your subscriptions and your support makes all the difference. Okay, no more time to waste. Congressman Seth Moulton. Congressman Moulton, welcome to the Daily Beast podcast again.
- [01:51]
A
It is great to be back. Thanks so much for having me again.
- [01:54]
B
Good. Please, please, can someone explain what is going on in the Strait of Hormuz? Yesterday, the Secret of State, Marco Rubio said we'd achieved our objectives, but I don't think people really understand what the objectives were. So, first of all, just give us a sit rep. What the hell is going on?
- [02:17]
A
Iran controls the Strait. The Islamic regime has been in power in Iran for 50 years. And yet under every previous American president, even when Bush started wars in the Middle east, when Jimmy Carter had his failed raid, we never let them close the Strait. Nor did any previous president let Iran get a nuclear weapon. But this president and the most incompetent Secretary of Defense in American history, Ranger Pete Hegseth, have allowed Iran to close the Strait. And I think they're on a path to get A nuclear weapon, too.
- [02:51]
B
Oh, my God.
- [02:52]
A
It's very bad.
- [02:53]
B
So it's really bad. How do we get out of this, Seth? And what can Congress do to ensure. Well, there is a way out.
- [03:07]
A
It's not easy. And I've been asking a lot of people smarter than me on this, like former generals from the Middle East, State Department officials, you know, national security advisors, and no one has a good answer for where to go now, because there are really only two alternatives. One is a negotiated agreement, which is what Trump is literally begging the Iranians to give him at this point. The other is just to take over the country, like Iraq style. And everyone agrees we didn't really have quite enough troops in Iraq. Maybe we had 100,000. Probably should have had twice that. Well, Iran is twice the size of Iraq, so we're talking three or four hundred thousand troops. I don't think anyone wants that. Even Trump doesn't want that. And so we're really up a creek here. And the problem is that Iran is a serious national security threat. They are. They have become an economic threat to the whole world. And they're winning this war. They're winning this war. They have us in a worse position with more leverage on that side than before Trump started this war. So now Trump has to negotiate not only for a nuclear deal, much like the one that he was handed by Obama and tore up. He also has to negotiate to reopen the Strait. So it is a bad position to be in. He's really in a pickle, and he's gotten us in a pickle, too.
- [04:32]
B
So you talk to people across both sides of the aisle. What are the Republicans that, you know, what are they saying about this? Because they've got midterms looming in November. This must be particularly difficult for them right now.
- [04:50]
A
Well, they're trying to somehow justify this and say, oh, this is good for us. But it takes. It's worth taking a minute to just go through the long list of different justifications Trump has given for this war to see how we're doing. So let's start with regime change. Now, I actually will give them credit. I think they did achieve regime change. They replaced an 86 year old in failing health with a fatwa against producing a nuclear weapon with his son in his 50s who's more hardline. And just in case he wasn't hardline enough, we killed most of his immediate family and. And reports indicate that he may very well have them rush to a bomb. So we got regime change, but we're worse off. The nuclear program which supposedly was obliterated last summer, is obviously not obliterated. And it sounds like this new guy in charge might actually use it to produce a bomb in short order. Then Trump said, oh, it's about the oil. Well, oil prices are up sky high. Americans are paying for it at the pump. There are shortages across Asia. Airlines are canceling flights and shutting down. Spirit doesn't exist anymore because oil prices are so high. So that's not going so well. Then there's the ballistic missiles. Yes, we took out some ballistic missiles. We can't say exactly how many. That's classified. But I'll add this, that amazingly, the Trump administration lifted the oil sanctions on Iran. While fighting them, Iran kills 14Americans. And what do we do? We lift the oil sanctions. That alone has given Iran an additional $14 billion in revenue. And let me just point out, you can buy a lot of very good ballistic missiles for $14 billion. How about some Chinese ones that are better than the ones the Iranians had in the first place, that we spent billions of dollars in ordnance destroying? So on every count, we're losing this war and Iran is a national security threat to us and our allies. It is not a good thing that we're losing a war to Iran, but that's where Trump and Hegseth have gotten us.
- [06:58]
B
So what happens with the supposed 60 day deadline that Congress is then supposed to ratify the war? I mean, I understand that Hegseth appears to have found a loophole and that's to to do with the ceasefire, but is there anything Congress can do?
- [07:18]
A
He's found a loophole that only he believes. I mean, it's ridiculous.
- [07:23]
B
Can you explain to us the loophole?
- [07:25]
A
Oh, yeah. The loophole is. He's trying to say, oh, the war is on pause, so it doesn't count. Well, first of all, let's just go back to the beginning. This is a war. If you have a war, the Constitution is very clear. You need to come to Congress. You don't get to just declare war on your own. So this war, not only being on top of being dumb for all the reasons we just went through, is also illegal. And it's been illegal from day one. But then the administration said, oh, well, at least we'll respect this 60 day kind of check in. And now at 60 days they're like, oh, wait, we're on pause because we have this ceasefire, so it doesn't count. I mean, that is not true. That is a complete farce. But on top of that, they're saying that they have a ceasefire when yesterday two American destroyers tried to go through the strait. They were escorted by an armada of armed helicopters, which after the ships were fired on repeatedly with Iranian missiles and drones, they used to take out six Iranian boats. You call that a ceasefire? I mean, they're just. I honestly wonder how much of the truth Hegseth is even telling to Trump because Trump has no idea what's going on. I mean, every other day he says the Iranians are coming in with a new deal. The Iranians are obviously not coming in with a new deal. They don't seem to be in any rush at all. It's Trump who's begging them to. And so I kind of wonder if Hegseth is keeping him in the dark just the same way that the generals kept him in the dark while recovering that pilot because they knew he would be dangerous to the mission. Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same Premium Wireless for $15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistant's assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today. I'm told it's super easy to do@mintmobile.com
- [09:18]
B
Switch upfront payment of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent to $15 per month required intro rate, first 3 months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees, extra fee, full terms@mintmobile.com so you got a Bronze Star, you saw lots of action in Iraq. I know you talk to a ton of people who are also Marines and you're part of a big group now of Democrats who fought in the war, in the Iraq war. What do you all make of Pete Hegseth as Secretary of War, as he calls himself now, but traditionally known as the Secretary of Defense. What do you make of the way he's handling this, of the way he presents information
- [10:10]
A
to quotas accurately would not be appropriate for this podcast. But he is without question the most incompetent, complete embarrassment that the Department of Defense has ever seen. I'm not sure that he explained to Donald Trump just how weak his resume was when he got this job. They also call him the Secretary of War Crimes. He's so fond of trying to call himself the Secretary of War. He wants to spend $50 million to change all the signs around the Defense Department to make it the Department of War.
- [10:45]
B
$50 million. $50 million. That's what it's gonna cost. It's crazy. And doesn't that also have to be
- [10:52]
A
ratified by Congress that they're making that request. And there are surely enough Republican sycophants on Capitol Hill who will meet it for him. But it's just unbelievable that he's riding around in joyrides and in helicopters with Kid Rock when there's a war going on, a war that he's losing. If you want to call yourself Secretary of War Ranger Pete, maybe you shouldn't start wars we don't need, and maybe you shouldn't lose wars that you start. But you're doing both right now, and that's not good for America.
- [11:29]
B
Do you have any sense that Donald Trump is putting him out there now, understanding that this is a complicated situation for America and that Pete Hegseth will eventually take the fall for it? I mean, Donald Trump traditionally likes to blame people, and Pete Hegseth is pretty out there at this point.
- [11:51]
A
They put forward this program to this sort of freedom thing to escort ships through the strait, and Trump said, oh, this is the new program. And Hegseth was touting it. Well, it lasted all of a day because it was obviously a total failure. But it's funny, Hegseth initially described this as being defensive and brief, which is funny because many people would say that Pete Hegseth is defensive and brief, but he can't be brief enough for the United States of America at this point because he is so dangerous. So I don't really know if Trump is putting him out there or not. But whether he's a tool for Trump or just sort of a tool in general is yet to be determined. But he is definitely a dangerous person.
- [12:41]
B
So what do we know about the enriched uranium and the nuclear abilities of Iran? You said you thought the leadership change, the son of Khomeini, who was killed in the first day's bombing in this particular war, was even more hardline that he had said, let's rush to a bomb. We were told that the nuclear capabilities were obliterated last summer. So do you have a sense of what was left and what Iran? How can they rush to this? Do they have the facilities to produce a bomb quickly?
- [13:25]
A
So it's an interesting question, because you may not know this, but I am the senior Democrat in the House on the subcommittee responsible for basically everything nuclear and everything space. So you would think that I would know. The Constitution requires Congress to be briefed on this kind of information. But shortly after that, they obliterated the nuclear program. They put all of the material on Iran's nuclear capabilities in a special classification only available to the White House. So they can't tell us, so they don't tell us. So they're literally trying to keep us in the dark, which is obviously because they did not obliterate the program. And so they're just going to lie to Congress about that, just like they're lying to the American people. So the honest answer is I don't know the exact state of their nuclear program, even though constitutionally I should. And so we just have to assume that it's in better shape than the administration makes it out to be. And that means that nuclear material still exists. Exactly how accessible it is, I don't know. But you just need some nuclear material to make a crude nuclear weapon. And my grave concern is that that's exactly what this regime is going to do.
- [14:41]
B
Was there any truth in it when Donald Trump said that the Iranians had the capacity to make a nuclear bomb and we should be anxious?
- [14:50]
A
Well, let's just say they were a lot further along than they were under the Obama nuclear deal, the deal that Trump shredded when he came to office. And it's an important point because just before he started this war, Trump was trying to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran. Now, of course, he claimed that he was gonna get a better deal than Obama, but he didn't seem to be on a pathway to get one. And now he's literally given Iran more leverage over us than they had before because they've closed the strait. So it seems even less likely that he's going to get a deal even as good as the one that Obama had. If you go back to the Obama nuclear deal, which was not perfect, I supported it even though it wasn't a perfect deal, because I thought it was the best deal that we could get. But all the Republicans ever talk about is how it had sunset clauses it would be expiring now. Iran would be building a nuclear weapon anyway. And that is just unlikely, if not absolutely not true. Because first of all, the very first line in the deal said Iran will never have a nuclear weapon. And the first Trump administration, all these people who were supposedly opposed to the deal, certified that Iran was following the deal. And we knew that not because we trusted the Iranians, but because we had intrusive inspections, constant electronic monitoring. One of the points I made to the real hardline Iran hawks was, even if you think at the end of the day we have to bomb them, at least with the deal, we know exactly where their nuclear materials are. But Trump shredded that had he actually kept it in place, it would have done three things first, it would have prevented Iran from getting a nuclear weapon and they'd have a lot less nuclear material than they do today. Second, it would have provided a foundation for more deals. Remember, we didn't just get one nuclear deal with the Soviets. We got one, which was really hard to get, and then we built on that to get a lot more. That's usually what happens with diplomacy. And third, it would have empowered the moderates in Iran, the people who might finally overthrow the Islamic regime, the hardliners. It would empower the moderates, the people who were protesting in the streets. And so by now, we might literally have a pro Western Iranian regime. But instead, Trump shredded the deal. He tore it up. That just gave credibility to the hardliners, the ones who said you should never make a deal because you can't trust the West. They're the ones who are now in ascendancy in Iran. They're the ones who were machine gunning the protesters in the streets. They're the ones who have the power and they're the ones who chant Death to America all day long. So there's this alternate path that President Obama set us on where we could actually be moving towards a friendly relationship with Iran, because all the pro American people in the streets would have been empowered by having that deal and then building on it to have more deals, stronger deals, continuations of the original nuclear deal, and perhaps deals on ballistic missiles, on limiting their support for proxies and everything else that we want to contain the threat of the Islamic republic. I think by this time we might have even seen it actually overthrown. So Trump threw this all out the window when he tore up the deal. So the next question is, why would Trump tear up a deal if here, 10 years later, he's just trying to get another deal himself? Well, look, the honest answer is that he tore it up just out of spite for Obama, because Trump is all about personal retribution, politics. That's why he tore it up. He just wanted to spite Obama. And now a lot more Americans are dead, we're in a worse position. Everyone is paying the price at the pump. 14Americans most recently have paid with their lives. But they're not the only ones that Iran has killed in the last 10 years. And all because the President acts like a petulant child. Of course, in his second term now, he's also getting senile. I mean, he's clear, he can't even walk straight. He talks about cognitive tests because he must be getting a lot of cognitive tests. I'm not getting cognitive tests right Now. So that's. Clearly, he's got some issues. And so you add that senility on top, it's like everyone's got some old uncle who was kind of grumpy and then gets outright angry when he gets older. Well, that's what we're witnessing with this president. It's really sad because there is an alternative reality in which we could have a much more peaceful, manageable Iranian regime.
- [19:42]
B
So let me ask you something, because I want to come on to Trump's health in a moment. Do you think there is any chance that there will be a domestic uprising in Iran? Do you think the events of the last 10 weeks that the war has now been going on for, do you think that's put paid to there being an internal uprising and an overthrow of the regime?
- [20:09]
A
I mean, this is the saddest thing, because there actually at least was a lot of pro American, pro Western sentiment in Iran. And that's what we saw with these brave, courageous protesters coming out in the face of machine guns to protest the regime. But after they were all machine gunned down, despite promises from Donald Trump to save them, which, by the way, he couldn't fulfill because he had all of our naval forces in Venezuela, another personal vendetta he was pursuing. So instead of actually coming in to rescue the protesters, tens of thousands of them were killed by the regime. And that all just further empowers the Iranian regime. The hardliners are running the country now. And I've said, as I've said before, I think that the regime change they've achieved by taking out the ayatollah and putting in his son has actually made the government even more hardline.
- [21:07]
B
Do you have any evidence that the Ayatollah's son is even. I mean, he seems such a mythical figure at this point. He's supposedly badly wounded. Half his face was blown off. He's only got one leg. I mean, nobody seems to have set eyes on him. Nobody's allowed to go and see him. Obviously, they're keeping him, if he's truly alive, in very confidential quarters. But do you think he's actually still with us?
- [21:39]
A
I don't know for sure. But my suspicion is that part of the reason he was chosen, he's more hardline, but people say he's also weaker, is because it gives more control to the irgc, to the Republican Guards, to the most extreme military forces in Iran. And so that's another reason why this is more dangerous. I mean, if you have all this pro American sentiment in a country whose leadership chants Death to America. Death to Israel. I mean, what's the best way to turn them against us? These Iranians are amazingly resilient, these amazing civilians in Iran. But if you want to turn them against us, most people would say the best way to do that is to bomb them. Right? To rain bombs down on their heads. But there is actually one better way to turn all the pro American Iranians against us, and that's to bomb them with Israel. So we did that, too. It's extraordinary. I think Trump has succeeded in significantly empowering the hardliners in Iran. That's gonna make it harder to get a nuclear deal, harder to see any sort of revolutionary change that would actually overthrow the Islamic Republic and bring Iran back to a normal relationship with the rest of the world. And obviously, now they have the additional leverage of controlling the Strait of Hormuz on top of all that.
- [23:10]
B
Yeah, it's remarkable. You mentioned the President behaving like a petulant child. You've been in Congress long enough to watch him over the years. Do you think there has been a decline in his speech patterns, in the things that we would look for that might signal that he is aging mentally as well as physically? Physically, we can see he seems to be shrinking in on himself. He seems to be compressing. But do you feel that he's actually declined, having watched him for the last time, few years, watched him up close?
- [23:49]
A
I mean, again, I'm no doctor, I'm no psychologist, just. I'm no child psychologist, which might be more appropriate for the President. But he definitely seems to be getting worse. He really seems to be getting worse. He seems to be getting more senile. I mean, you don't talk about cognitive tests a lot if you're not taking cognitive tests. And you only take cognitive tests if your doctors are concerned about your cognitive abilities. So he really does seem to be getting senile. I mean, he's in his 80s. You know, everyone declines whether we like it or not, and at the. At that age. And it's just, it's. I don't know. I think it's. It's. It's just that much more dangerous. I mean, most people can see that Donald Trump is. Is dangerous, that he's dangerous for our troops, for our country, for our economy, for our national security. I mean, it was a long list, but he definitely seems more dangerous now than he was even in his first term.
- [24:53]
B
So you're not undangerous yourself to Senator Ed Markey, who's also in Massachusetts and who, like Donald Trump, will be 80 this summer, how is your campaign to unseat him and grab his Senate seat going? Last time we talked to you, you were beginning to talk about it. The primary is in September, I believe, in your neighboring state or almost neighboring state in Maine. Janet Mills, the former or the current governor, who's been a popular governor, has stepped aside to let Graham Platner in, also a Marine. How are you feeling about your chances?
- [25:34]
A
I'm feeling great. And I'm not gonna get ahead of ourselves here. It's always tough to take on a long time incumbent. I mean, he's been elected longer than I've even been alive.
- [25:44]
B
Won't he have spent, I think, 50 cumulative years in public office by the time he hits his birthday?
- [25:53]
A
Yes. He's the longest serving member of congress of all 535 of us in the House and the Senate, except for Chuck Grassley. So he's a secondary leader.
- [26:03]
B
92. Chuck Grassley is 92.
- [26:07]
A
Look, he's a nice guy, as a nice guy, he's a decent man, we should think, thank him for that lifetime of service. But there's never been a time when the Democratic Party is more desperate for a new generation of leaders. I mean, the old playbook is just not getting it done. We've got a second term of Trump. He's hurting people all across America, all across Massachusetts, all across the world, as we've been discussing this morning. And so there's a great opportunity here for the Democratic Party to put forward next generation leaders who can fight Trump more effectively but also have an agenda for the future. I mean, I've put out one of the most aggressive affordability agendas of anybody, any elected official today. I'm talking about high speed rail. I'm talking about redoing transit to make it faster than driving in Massachusetts. I'm talking about real leadership on issues that are so contentious, like immigration. How do we actually take leadership back? On the economy from the Republicans, on national security from the Republicans. I mean, so many of these next generation veterans are people that I help bring in with my organization and serve America. Cuz I'm trying to build the Democratic bench and win majorities in the House and the Senate, not just get myself reelected. So all of that is wrapped up in this Senate race that really is a referendum on the future of the party. And I still have more work to do to just get to know more people in Massachusetts. He has a longtime lead on me. I mean, he was shaking hands when I was still an embryo. So I mean, he's got an advantage there. But the polls are moving in our direction. We're getting better fundraising numbers. We're doing better on social media. This is an interesting statistic that my team recently compiled. We do an in person town hall public event every four and a half days. So even with going back and forth to Washington, with everything going on in the world, every four and a half days, you can come and meet me at a public event and ask a question. He does in person public events once every 62.7 days. So once every two months you can come. And he usually does not take questions. So we're pounding the pavement. We're getting to know people in Massachusetts, and importantly, we're listening. I think that Democrats especially need to do a lot more listening to Americans. We kind of have this reputation of being a preachy party that gets on a pedestal and talks down to people. And if you don't agree with me, you're not only wrong, you're a bad person. How about listening? How about listening to the people that we are supposed to represent, the people that I want to work for all across Massachusetts? Well, I'm doing that every single day. And it's paying off on the campaign trail.
- [28:49]
B
Does the Democratic Party and last time we talked, we pointed out there seems to be a civil war going on in the party between the progressives and the moderates. Does it need a national leader at the moment to get it to through the midterms?
- [29:05]
A
That's actually not. I, actually, that's not what's happening. I mean, we talked about this. But actually where I come out is it's not a war between the progressives and the moderates. That's been the case in the past. But there's a lot more commonality. I mean, the House, for example, is much more united, the House Democratic Caucus under Hakeem Jeffries than it was before. I mean, you don't hear about a bunch of revolts from the squad or whatever. But the big debate in the Democratic Party right now is between the old guard, the Schumer establishment, and this next generation of leaders. Are we going to change? And there are progressives and moderates who want change. So it's across the ideological spectrum, but there are also a lot of people, this real Democratic old guard that's gotten us into this position in the first place, that don't want anything to change. They just want to continue. This is sort of characterized by James Carville when he says Democrats just need to roll over and play dead, like just run off of opposition to Trump. That's Enough. My argument is that when people are hurting and people are scared, they don't want just resistance, they want leadership. Leadership means putting forward agenda. Leadership means uniting people. Leadership means having plans for what you're actually going to do to improve people's lives. I don't think people look at Senator Markey and Senator Schumer, with all due respect, and say, okay, they're going to figure out AI. You know, they're in their 80s, but they can figure out AI.
- [30:32]
B
Okay, that's a very good question. What should we be doing about AI?
- [30:37]
A
There's a lot we need to be doing because there's, there's sort of two polls to the debate. One poll is, well, we've got to win the race against China and we just need to do everything we can to empower the AI companies to do so. The other is, this is so dangerous, we should literally shut it down. That's what Bernie Sanders is trying to do with AI.
- [30:55]
B
I heard Bernie Sanders earlier this week and he was saying, slow down, we have to slow it down. And you're like, well, I don't think you can slow it down. It's not something that it's not like traffic. It's not like a car coming at you. It's like, that's not what's going to happen.
- [31:10]
A
Look, we can hate AI if we want, but it's going to be a part of our future. And so rather than pretending that we don't want it to come or we can prevent it from coming, what we've got to do is figure out how to survive and thrive as an economy, as a community, as a society, as a country with AI. So we need to make sure that our kids are graduating, prepared for jobs in an AI enabled world, because a lot of the old jobs are going to get automated out of existence. We've got to make sure that communities have regulations in place to prevent data centers from stealing their water or their electricity, raising prices and whatnot. But we can't pretend that we don't need data centers and we certainly don't want to have all the data centers built in China, which is what we might get out of Bernie Sanders plan. Likewise, we need to make sure AI is safe. We've heard these horrific stories of AI contributing to teen suicide, for example, in the same way that social media does. Well, Congress is 20 years behind in regulating social media. We've got to make sure that that's not happening with AI as well. But we also have to win the AI race against China. We must win the race against China. We cannot have China setting the rules of the road for how AI is used. We can't have Americans dependent on Chinese AI companies. So both things have to be true. Yes, we want AI to be safe. And actually at the end of the day, if we want to use AI models, of course we want the models to be safe. And that's, I think, why you see companies like Anthropic really trying to put some emphasis to this.
- [32:40]
B
Right. So as a Congressman, what does that actually mean in terms of making AI safe? Does this mean you're, you're coming up with legislation? Does it mean you're having conversations with the founders of these big AI companies? How do you actually.
- [32:57]
A
All the above.
- [32:58]
B
Right, right. And is that what, is that what you're doing? I mean, you live in a high tech, you live in a very high tech state. You've got mit, you've got Harvard, you've got all sorts of colleges there. You've got a very high group of, of IT specialists there. Is that. Do you feel the community coming together? Are you able to work with them to make sure that America gets enough speed that it can beat the Chinese, but also that we've got some guardrails on it?
- [33:28]
A
Yes, I mean, that's where we want to end up. And I do think there are a lot of people who agree with that, with those goals. But these are difficult debates. And that's part of why I'm out there listening to people in Massachusetts every single day to hear their concerns and making sure that we're responding to them. But I'm also talking to the leaders in these fields, the people who are thinking about how to make it safe, the people who are thinking about how we beat the Chinese in the AI race. And this is a lot of work. It takes a lot of work. You got to roll your sleeves up and be willing to do this. I mean, it reminds me of passing what seems like a much simpler piece of legislation, my 988 National Mental Health Hotline, which people in retrospect will say, oh, that seems like it makes so much sense to have a three digit hotline for mental health. But it was really hard to get it passed because there were a lot of debates about how it would be funded, how it would be staffed, a lot of partisan disagreements, even over the number that would be used. But instead of just sort of prognosticating about it, you gotta get out there and do the work and figure out how we navigate through this. And it matters to me not just because of my future, but because I got a five year old and a seven year old here at home and they are going to grow up in an AI enabled world. They are going to be using AI every single day in the future. And we've got to make sure that we win that race and we've got to make sure that it's safe, that it's safe for little kids like my own.
- [34:59]
B
I think I need to ring your mental health hotline every day, Every day we wake up to more challenges to our mental health. But I feel reassured that you are in Congress, Congressman, and I want to thank you for joining us.
- [35:15]
A
It's great to be back. And remember, it's not just me, there's this new generation of leaders who are coming up ready to leave. Think about Mikey Sherrill in New Jersey, for example, who's doing a lot of this stuff herself. She's an amazing Navy helicopter pilot that I helped bring to Congress with Serve America. So there are great leaders out there who are ready to take the reins and help us navigate through this tough, dangerous world and also defeat Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans.
- [35:45]
B
Well, and Micah Sheryl's got four children, which to me is even more impressive than having a helicopter pilot license. Yeah. Twice as many as me. Yeah. Full respect, full respect to Governor Sherrill. Congressman, thank you very much for joining us. I hope you'll come back next month, keep us appraised of your progress in your Senate race.
- [36:07]
A
Absolutely.
- [36:08]
B
Very many thanks for, for joining us.
- [36:11]
A
Thanks for having me.
- [36:16]
B
I always enjoy talking to Congressman Moulton because he feels completely unafraid. Not only does he criticize the Republicans, but he also goes after the older guard in his own party, the Democrats, who he feels are now, well, they're just not supporting the new, younger, more energetic leaders coming up with different ways of winning power. Anyway, my favorite part of the conversation was, I think him just talking about the Secretary of War and the Secretary of War crimes, as he says he now called Pete Hegseth. But write and tell us your favorite parts of the conversation or the bits that you felt most riled up by. Put it in the comments. Thank you. We'll be back tomorrow with an episode of Inside Trump's Head. As long as I can get our WI fi working here in Yorkshire, which I'm very much hoping I can. I'm now going over to my neighbours in the hopes of uploading it faster than it uploads at my parents house where my parents refer to the WI fi as the vibes. So the good news is we have so many Beebeast Tier members now there are too many names to read out. And we really appreciate your support. Thanks to our production team. Ryan Murray, Rachel Passer, Heather Passaro, Neil Rosenhaus.