Why Trump’s Grift and Destruction Will Doom Him

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Why Trump’s Grift and Destruction Will Doom Him"

The Daily Beast Podcast with Joanna Coles & Guest Rep. Jason Crow
Date: June 25, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this incisive and candid episode, host Joanna Coles welcomes Congressman Jason Crow, decorated Army veteran and member of both the House Armed Services Committee and Intelligence Committee. Together, they dissect the ongoing impact of the Trump administration, focusing on the physical and institutional corruption, the destruction of Democratic norms, and the fallout from perpetual wars and domestic grift. Crow shares behind-the-scenes insights from Capitol Hill, discusses bipartisan challenges, and explores how Democrats can reclaim patriotism, accountability, and hope for governance in a turbulent era.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Cost and Consequences of Endless Wars

• $5 Trillion Lost: Crow highlights the staggering cost of U.S. interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan—“Over $5 trillion spent by American taxpayers, over 7,000 Americans gave their lives.” – Crow [04:14]
• Opportunity Cost: He lays out what America could have built with that money: healthcare, education, energy, and more [04:34].
• Failure of Trump’s Foreign Policy: Since abandoning the Iran nuclear deal (JCPOA), the U.S. is worse off—loss of international trust, heavy casualties and wounded, damaged infrastructure, and empowered adversaries.

  “We have spent about $100 billion in the last three months on this war. Thirteen American service members have given their lives. Over 400 have been wounded.” – Crow [06:14]

• Allies Lost Faith: Traditional allies have distanced themselves; American respectability diminished.

The State of Bipartisanship & Republican Capitulation

• Bipartisanship Broken: Crow, once a highly bipartisan legislator, describes how the GOP now operates under Trump’s shadow:

  “The Republican Party has capitulated to Donald Trump. They have given up on bipartisanship and governing just to keep their jobs and do whatever Donald Trump tells them to do.” – Crow [08:15]

• Cowardice Behind Closed Doors: GOP colleagues privately express distaste for Trump but publicly support him out of fear:

  “If you're not willing to say this publicly or come out, if you know what you have to do and you’re choosing not to do it, then I just don’t care what you think anymore.” – Crow [08:38]

Political Reform: Open Primaries & Ending Gerrymandering

• Open Primaries Curb Extremism: Colorado’s open primary system allows independents to moderate politics, resulting in high turnout and less polarization [10:53–13:12].
• Voter Participation: Colorado as a model—with second-highest turnout nationally, benefits both parties equally.

The Spectacle of Corruption: Physical and Fiscal Grift

• Physical Manifestations: From the demolition of the White House East Wing to the gilded ballroom and UFC cage on the South Lawn, Crow details Trump’s obsession with showy, costly projects.

  “There are so many physical manifestations of the corruption of this administration... over $2 billion the Trump family has benefited over the last year and a half.” – Crow [17:50]

• Reflecting Pool Scandal: Trump’s fixation on the failed reflecting pool renovation becomes symbolic of his need for physical dominance—and his insecurity.

  “[Trump] is a weak, feeble, insecure man... Demonstrate their power by being a bully... Fading empires focus on statues and ceremony.” – Crow [21:32]

GOP Internal Dynamics: J.D. Vance as Fall Guy

• Trump uses surrogates like J.D. Vance as scapegoats for unpopular decisions.

  “Donald Trump literally went on TV and he said, wow, I don’t know if this deal is good or not. I'm gonna send J.D. Vance to sign it so that if it's bad, then he takes the fall for it.” – Crow [15:44]

Accountability, Oversight, and the Fight Against Corruption

• New Congressional Caucus: Crow, alongside AOC and Mike Levin, forms a caucus to increase transparency, shun corporate PAC money, and establish an oversight agenda [26:42].
• Public Awareness Tools: Joanna suggests, and Crow agrees, that Democrats need simple, powerful messaging (e.g., a public ticker counting Trump’s earnings from the presidency) [28:24].
• New American Patriotism: Crow advocates for a patriotism acknowledging both America’s failures and its resilience:

  “Our country is always a competition between our highest ideals and our worst impulses. When our highest ideals win out, we are great… That to me is the new American patriotism.” – Crow [33:32]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Oversight & Duty:

  “We have to do this. It’s not just our right or some option. It’s actually our duty… Congress exists… to conduct oversight and to do investigations… That’s why Congress exists.” – Crow [35:26]

• On the Trump Administration’s Legacy:

  “He wants to build an arch to himself, named after himself, that will cover up those hillsides [of Arlington Cemetery]. I can’t think of anything more revolting.” – Crow [24:28]

• On Connecting Corruption to Everyday Life:

  “You’re losing your home. They get a new golden ballroom. Your farm is going under. They get a fleet of new private planes. You can’t afford healthcare and they’re building a big ark.” – Crow [34:31]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Physical corruption and East Wing demolition: [02:12], [17:50]
• Cost of endless wars: [04:13]–[06:14]
• Partisan gridlock & GOP cowardice: [07:51]–[09:37]
• Colorado as a model for political reform: [10:17]–[13:12]
• J.D. Vance as Trump scapegoat: [15:32]–[16:16]
• Effects of Trump’s obsession with monuments: [21:32]–[24:28]
• New anti-corruption caucus: [26:42]
• Messaging ideas for Democratic accountability: [28:24]
• Vision for American patriotism: [31:18], [33:32]
• Immediate and future oversight priorities: [35:26]–[36:14]

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Tone & Takeaways

The discussion is frank, at times searing, and unflinchingly critical of the Trump administration. Crow brings both deep policy insight and an irreverent, occasionally dark wit—a tone matched by Coles’ wry observations. The episode weaves together the personal (Crow’s military service and family political divisions), the institutional (structural reform, Congressional oversight), and the symbolic (what monuments and physical changes in D.C. represent about power and legacy).

Through both policy prescriptions and narrative, the episode makes plain: the financial and moral cost of Trump’s tenure is immense—and the momentum is building on Capitol Hill to reclaim national integrity, democracy, and unity.

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For Further Action:

• Write or call your representative if you care about transparency and anti-corruption.
• Reflect: What symbols do you want to represent America’s legacy?
• Watch for the Democratic “new patriotism” movement and Congressional investigations in the coming term.

Transcript

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[D]

There are so many physical manifestations of the corruption of this administration, over $2 billion that the Trump family has benefited over the last year and a half. But then, but then there's all these physical manifestations of it. The huge a UFC cage that was erected on the south lawn, the demolishing of the East Wing. And that was actually, that was a turning point. You don't want to spend over a billion dollars for a gilded ballroom. And people are 20 million Americans are at risk of losing their health care.

[A]

I'm Joanna Coles. This is the Daily Beast podcast and the last time you saw Congressman Jason Crow, he was filleting Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Is it war? Is it defence? Who knows what. He's the secretary of the pocket square. The secretary of the pocket square. Anyway, Jason Crow is back with us to discuss because he's the recipient of a bronze medal and he's a member of the House Armed Services Committee and the Intelligence Committee, and he's on a subcommittee of superintelligence. What do you think of the Iran deal? The Memo of understanding? Whose understanding is it? Because the Iranians and the Americans to have different understanding of it. And his new caucus that he set up to investigate the President's grift. So let's get into it. Before we do, I just want to remind you we're almost at 700,000 subscribers. Please, please show your support for independent media. The very reason we can bring you these conversations, which aren't happening everywhere across the media, actually, is because of your support. Okay, let's get into it. Congressman Crow. Jason Crow. Congressman, you're a recipient of the Bronze Star, you've done several tours, including Iraq and Afghanistan. What do you make of the Memo of understanding?

[D]

Well, first of all, this war should never have started, right? What's really clear, after three combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, over $5 trillion spent by American taxpayers, over 7,000Americans gave their lives.

[A]

Five trillion?

[D]

Yeah, five trillion.

[A]

Incredible. Nobody knows that sum. Why don't people talk about that sum?

[D]

It is unbelievable. I mean, this is about opportunity cost, right? Like, if you choose to do something, you're choosing not to do other things, right? And for $5 trillion over 20 years, we could have built a public health care system in America. We could have rebuilt our schools, we could have given our teachers the pay that they deserve. We could have done. We could have built out a new energy economy. Like, we could have done so many things. But instead we chose to go to these wars, which both ended poorly, right? We spent this money to replace the Taliban with the Taliban in Afghanistan and to have things generally end poorly in Iraq for ISIS to sweep into control and for now, Iranian proxies to control much of Iraq. So listen, Americans see all this, by the way, which is exactly why Donald Trump campaigned on it. Like he campaigned on ending these wars, right? Because he saw that the American working class, rural Americans who did the fighting and dying largely were over it. And I'm over it. So. And then he stumbles into yet another war, actually stumbles, not the right word. He starts actively, another war. So it never should have started, do you think?

[A]

I mean, Hillary Clinton's been out talking about how Bibi Netanyahu was always trying to strong arm the Obama administration into going into Iran. We appear to be significantly worse off than we were with the JCPOA agreement. Is there anything that we have benefited from by doing this war?

[D]

We're not better off now than we were even in February, let alone at the start of the first Trump administration when they tore up the jcpoa. Right. So here's where we are now. We have spent about $100 billion in the last three months on this war. Thirteen American service members have given their lives. Over 400 have been wounded. Vast amounts of our infrastructure have been destroyed throughout the Middle East. Our allies don't trust us and have walked away from us. We've lost respectability in the eyes of the world. Iran has realized that they now can leverage control of the straits in a way that they didn't realize before. They now have the ability to charge tolls, which they didn't before. And they know that all they have to do is dig in and just wait us out. Right. There's a saying. There was a saying in Afghanistan that applies throughout much of the Middle east, and the Afghans used to say, the Americans have all the clocks and we have all the time.

[A]

The Americans have all the clocks, but we have all the time. So they can just wait us out.

[D]

That's right.

[A]

Yeah. That's a great expression, actually. And you hang out, obviously, in D.C. all the time.

[E]

We.

[A]

What are your Republican colleagues saying behind closed doors about this? Because this isn't good for them either. I mean, obviously you're a Democrat. You represent a suburban area of Denver, but it's hard to imagine that this is good for any politician trying to sell this Donald Trump war.

[D]

Most of my family are conservative, and most actually support Donald Trump, which is, you know, awkward at times.

[A]

You know, I bet that makes for very odd Thanksgiving.

[D]

Yeah, I was just going to say, like, my focus groups are called Thanksgiving. So I. I save a lot of money in that respect, my campaign. But, you know,

[E]

this is.

[D]

This is the. This is the vibe here. I have historically been one of the most bipartisan members of Congress. In my first couple of terms, I was in the top 10. Not 10%. Top 10. 75% of my bills I introduced with a Republican because I want to pass them. I want to legislate. I want to actually do things. I'm not here just to send out sensational tweets and get more followers. I came here to actually legislate. So I believe in that project. I believe in bipartisanship. But it's broken Right now it's broken because, largely because the Republican Party has capitulated the Donald Trump. They have given up on bipartisanship and governing just to keep their jobs and do whatever Donald Trump tells them to do. And then they'll tell me behind closed doors, and I have a lot of relationships. I talk to him a lot. They'll tell me, oh, I don't really like Trump. He's terrible. He shouldn't do this, he shouldn't do that. And then I say, well, then say that publicly. And they say, well, I'm not going to say that publicly because then he'll beat up on me. And then I say, well, then I don't care. I just don't care what you think anymore. If you're not willing to say this publicly or come out, if you know what you have to do and you know the right thing to do and you're choosing not to do it, then, I'm sorry, I can't and don't want to help you.

[A]

Do they ever say to you that they think he's, you know, he's obviously 80. Do they say that they think he's of sound mind? I mean, do you hear conversations? Cause obviously, across social media, in the media, there's endless speculation that he has dementia. We can see that his health isn't great. He has chronic venous insufficiency, has terrible bruising on his hands. He tweets frantically in the middle of the night, which seems very paranoid behavior. And clearly he has sleep disorders, which we've tracked to the Daily Beast. But when you're hanging around and you're just all talking informally or you're at the gym or something, is there a sort of level of which people are discussing this?

[D]

Yeah, yeah. I don't think they. I mean, I've never had. I'm just trying to think. I don't have a conversation where I go into, like, the medical diagnosis or the medical issues. But a lot of them clearly think he's not well, you know, physically and mentally. But again, they're not willing to do anything about it. Right. And then this is the bottom line. They have made a conscious decision that what's most important right now, because he still has a grasp on the mega base of the party, and the primaries, show pretty clearly that if you want to win your primary, you got to placate Donald Trump. So that's what they're doing. Which actually is why it goes to my kind of larger point that if we want to change the nature of politics, if we want to fix this, you have to a get rid of gerrymandering nationally across the board, not patchwork of different states so that we have the gerrymandering wars like we're having right now, but across the board, national prohibition on gerrymandering. And then open primaries, like in Colorado, we have open primaries. So independents can choose to vote either way. And that's a huge moderating function. Right. The extremes of either party don't really have as big of a voice because, you know, 55% roughly of Coloradans who are independent or unaffiliated, they vote in the primaries.

[A]

So your point is that if there were just open elections and independents could vote, you wouldn't have both parties. And we saw this with the Democratic Party last night, get really over influenced by the edge cases. So you have the Trump obviously for maga and then you have the Democratic socialists for the. Well, for the Democrats.

[D]

Yeah, that's right. There's a whole swath of Americans, probably 80% who feel disenfranchised because in the House of representatives we have 435 seats. Right?

[A]

Right.

[D]

Only about 40 are actually swing seats. Right. 10% less than 10% of the seats are true swing suites that can go either way. The rest are safe seats. Right. And how does that create an environment of collaboration? How does that create an environment where people are incentivized to work together to figure things out? In Colorado, we have automatic voter registration. We have mail in voting. Right. And we have open primaries. You don't have to affiliate with a party. You actually receive both ballots in the mail. You choose which which party you want to vote for, which ballot you want to send in. And what's amazing about that, we actually implemented this about 15 years ago. No one party benefits more than the other. When you, when you implement those.

[A]

That's so interesting.

[D]

In Colorado, voter participation went up for everybody. It went up equally for Republicans and Democrats. So more people engage in the process on both sides. And we have the second highest voter participation in the country in Colorado. How is that not a good thing? I wrote a little song to remind you. Choice hotels get you more of the experiences you value. The Cambria Hotel's got it all. A rooftop bar. Have a ball, bring a date, your squad or even your mom.

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[A]

you had just basically filleted the Defense Secretary for what you felt was a conflict of interest with one of his advisors. We seem to have heard less from Secretary Hegseth over the last few weeks. Do you think he survives this war?

[D]

So far he seems to be. Listen, the man was not hired to be Secretary of Defense. He was hired to play the Secretary of Defense on tv. Right? And he's very good at that. And he understands that his job is to tap dance for a party of one Donald Trump. That is, in his mind, his job. And it appears right now he does that. Well, he kisses the ring, bends the knee frequently, and he says and does the things that Donald Trump likes to see in here. And Donald Trump spends most of his days, as far as most people can tell, watching tv. Right. And Pete Hegseth knows that. And he goes on TV and he just feeds Donald Trump a steady diet of what Donald Trump likes to see and hear. And that seems to be working for him.

[A]

So do you think that J.D. vance is being set up as a fall guy, having been presented with the peace deal to bring home?

[D]

I don't have to think that literally, Donald Trump said that. Donald Trump literally went on TV and he said, wow, I don't know if this deal is good or not. I'm gonna send J.D. vance to sign it so that if it's bad, then he takes the fall for it. Donald Trump said that on tv.

[A]

I know. It's remarkable, isn't it?

[D]

It is remarkable.

[A]

What are you hearing from your fellow Republican congressman about J.D. vance? Do they think he's being set up for a fall? I mean, I take your point about Donald Trump saying that.

[D]

Yeah, they do.

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

Yeah. And he routinely gets the worst jobs, right. Like when there's something nobody else wants to do or that seems like a failing situation, they kind of send JD In, Right. Like they sent JD Into Hungary, right, to campaign for Orban, right before Orban got crushed in the elections. They sent him over to sign this mou, which is actually really unpopular on the right as much as it is on the left. They, you know, they gave him this, this kind of made up job as the czar, the anti fraud czar, which, you know, nobody really knows what it is and what it does. So. Yeah. Meanwhile, Marco Rubio seems to be kind of winning this, this, you know, shadow war within the administration for who's going to be the heir apparent to MAGA and Trump in the post Trump world.

[A]

Well, and we can't forget they sent him to meet the Pope and then the Pope died the next day. So that was the title for J.D. vance. So you're spending a lot of time in Washington. What is it like watching the physical environment of Washington change? Do you think that people mind about the East Wing, which, as we know, was sort of demolished basically in the dead of night when you're walking around, do people talk about it and you know, the reflecting pool, have you been down there to see the dead paint floating to the surface?

[D]

Yeah, yeah. It's wild, really, because there are so many physical manifestations of the corruption of this administration. You know, in the past it would be almost kind of abstract and, or ethereal.

[E]

Right.

[D]

Like some kind of fraud scheme or something like. But. And that stuff still happens actually in spades. Right. Like most of the corruption, just quantitatively is that type of stuff. You know, the pay to play operations, how they've monetized the government and they're setting up all their buddies and cronies in the over $2 billion that the Trump family has benefited over the last year and a half. But then, but then there's all these physical manifestations of it. And you mentioned them, right? The East Wing, the huge UFC cage that was erected on the South Lawn, the demolishing of the East Wing. And that was a turning point, I think, in people's view of the conduct of this administration, when he demolished the East Wing. And people on both sides of the spectrum really disliked that because that is a sacred place for Americans. And we're not against reform or repair, but you just don't go in there and trash it without a plan. And of course, you don't wanna spend over a billion dollars for a gilded ballroom. And people are. 20 million Americans are at risk of losing their healthcare. At least most normal people don't.

[A]

And again, when you talk to your Republican colleagues, are they anxious about this too? Because so many Republicans are deeply conservative. They love the city of Washington. They can't like watching this, these changes either. And this can't be playing well in their constituencies.

[D]

Yeah, well, it's not. I mean, they're getting beat up in their constituents and they should, Right. Most of them are a whole bunch of them are going to lose. And I'm actually making sure of that and doing a lot of work to send them home because they're getting crushed by their constituents, as well they should. Right. And that's those who are actually doing public events. Many of them have stopped doing town halls and public events because they know they can't face their constituents anymore because it's gotten so bad for them. Not just healthcare, but tariffs, the tariff wars have destroyed small businesses, destroyed farmers and ranchers and all sorts of other industries. So they are now avoiding their constituents. Because the situation that they have designed for themselves, the bed that they have made, that they now have to sleep in, is they have supported an administration that has done things that have devastated their constituents, and they've done that just to placate Donald Trump in the mega base. And now they've set up a situation where they're damned either way, and they should be. So we're going to send those folks home, we're going to beat them in the midterms and hopefully bring a new generation of folks in to kind of reset things. That's my hope, and get us past this dark phase.

[A]

So do you think that Donald Trump has become. I mean, what we're hearing is that Donald Trump has become completely obsessed by the reflecting pool, that he can't think about anything else, he can't talk about anything else, he can't believe it's gone wrong, that the American flag blue hasn't worked, that ducks are dying in the. In the pool, and that, as we've seen, people are being arrested for simply going down to the pool to take a look at this American treasure and put their hands in the water and sort of see them. You know, they come out and they're covered in algae. Do you think he's become obsessed by it?

[D]

Yeah, of course. Where Donald Trump is obsessed by physical manifestations of his. Of his strength and power, like he is a weak, feeble, insecure man, and weak, feeble, insecure people want to demonstrate their power by being a bully. Right. He often punches down. He's a bully. He almost never punches up. He punches down.

[A]

Well, where is the up to go? Jason, if you're the American president, how can you punch up?

[D]

Well, you can at least punch across to China and Russia, our biggest adversaries and competitors, but he placates them all the time. China and Russia are our largest challengers and adversaries and competitors that pose the biggest challenge to us, not just from a national security perspective, but an Economic perspective, that is great power competition right now. And he ignores that, largely. Right. He's done very little to combat China, and he's actually emboldened Russia. But what does he do? He talks about Greenland, he talks about Mexico, he talks about Venezuela. He goes to war with Iran. He's constantly trying to pick off what he thinks are the most vulnerable situations and people. And now as he gets more feeble and weaker and more insulated, as his world gets smaller, we see him more focused on his ark, more focused on the reflecting pool, these physical manifestations of his power and his influence. Fading empires focus on statues and ceremony. Right. Strength takes different forms. Like I, I am a Teddy Roosevelt, speak softly and carry a big stick person. And as we're talking about the Roosevelts, another Great American President, FDR, right, which, which, you know, helped us win the Second World War, you know, the 1930s reconstruction, you know, legislation got us out of the Great Depression. As he was, as he was ailing on his deathbed, he was asked famously, what do you want? To honor you. And he put his hands on his desk and he says, I don't want a monument bigger than this desk. Right. And there's actually a monument in D.C. that's the size of his desk. Now, later on, we built a huge, huge monument to him, you know, a multiple acre thing. But that was his mentality, right? He wanted to be remembered by what he did and how he helped people, and that is how he viewed his greatness, not some monument.

[A]

What do you think about the Arch?

[D]

Well, I think it's an abomination. Nobody wants this other than Donald Trump. It's going to cost tremendous amounts of money. And even worse, what it's going to do is obscure the view. As you're driving over the Potomac of Arlington National Cemetery, as you're driving over the Potomac towards Arlington, you see this view of Arlington National Cemetery and you can see the graves. Our most sacred. This is our most sacred place as a nation where we have laid to rest our fallen, my brothers and sisters. I know people buried there. And you see those gravestones and those hillsides speak for themselves. That is service and sacrifice right there. And what Donald Trump wants to do is he wants to build an arch to himself, named after himself, that will cover up those hillsides. In that view, I can't think of anything more revolting. And I also can't think of anything more symbolic of Donald Trump's view of himself in this nation and what leadership means.

[F]

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[A]

you've talked about the grift of Donald Trump too, and you've now set up a new. Is it a committee? It's a working party to try and understand, understand the level of corruption that's going on in D.C. and as you say, we have the physical manifestations of it, but so much of it seems to be going on behind closed doors. We see the family benefiting. How are you planning to do this?

[D]

Yeah, so it's a caucus, which is kind of like a Congressional club, right. We form these caucuses, and I did it with Alexandria Ocasio Cortez and Mike Levin from New York and California, respectively. And we wanted to do it for a couple of reasons. Number one, let our colleagues know, put pressure on our colleagues that there are things you can do right now, today, as a member of Congress and elected official. You don't need to pass a bill, you don't need to legislate, no big reform agenda. But you can just decide to do things, act in ways that show your commitment to ending corruption. Like all of us, for example, have sworn off corporate PAC money. Like, we don't take any corporate PAC money. I never have. And what that does is send a very clear message to our constituents that we're not listening to big companies or lobbyists, but we're listening to them. I post my public meeting schedule on my website so people can see where I'm going, what I'm doing, who I'm meeting with. So there are just things you can do and act in certain ways today. And we're trying to elevate that so their constituents can, can ask their members and force their members to do the same thing. That's number one. Number two, support each other's legislation. I have multiple reform bills that end the influence of dark money and corrupt money in our politics. So we're going to support each other's bills and legislation, and then the third is start working together to create an oversight agenda. So if we retake power, we can actually go after corruption, go after all this money that's being wasted, American taxpayer money that's being wasted on corruption projects and contracts, and we can actually coordinate our oversight. So those are kind of the three things we're looking to do.

[A]

So we used to have, in New York City, where I live, there used to be a huge ticker of the national debt, and it was obviously just going up and up and up. Many people have said to me, why isn't there a version of that that the Democrats are doing? So that we can see the amount of money that Donald Trump is making from this second presidency, and we can. What his family is making from this presidency. Cause everything that you describe sounds incredibly worthy, important work, but it doesn't have the immediacy of connecting the population to one of the things that appears to be going on that you feel people would be very concerned about. I mean, to your point about service, Donald Trump has never really pretended he's about service. In fact, he's frequently complained that he's lost money by becoming president, or he certainly did, he says, in his first term. So his second term is determined to help himself.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

Is there not a more effective way of drawing people's attention to this?

[D]

Yeah, I love that idea, Joanna. I'm going to talk to people about. That is actually a great. That's a great idea. That's a great idea. We need to be simple, we need to be clear, and we need to be consistent. Right. Repetition and, and simplicity is really important. Democrats traditionally are not great at messaging, at communicating. Right. Because we, you know, we get in our own way. We go to too in the weeds. And that's not to say that, you know, being focused on policy isn't important. I actually think the opposite. I think policy is really important. And I'm actually a policy wonk myself. I'm a policy nerd. But, you know, when you're, when you're campaigning and building coalitions, people think in broad ideas and values. Right. And belonging. Right. And that's kind of the, the conversation we're in as a country. Like, we're, what is our identity? Where do we belong? What is our future? What is the vision of this country? Who are we? Who do we want to be? Right? And that is the preliminary discussion that we need to have. And the person or people or party that can articulate that positive, proactive vision for how to move our country forward will. Will win the day. Right. Which is, which is why I've been talking about, and I have proposed this notion of a new American patriotism. Right. A new type of patriotism that doesn't sweep under the rug all of Our failings, all of our missteps, all of the things we haven't done well and the fact that we have not fulfilled the more perfect union yet, but embraces that and has an honest discussion about it, but at the same time can make people proud of the fact that we have resiliency and can self correct.

[A]

Only a Democrat could talk about the new patriotism and then start with a list of all the things that America hasn't done. Right. One of the discussions I hear all the time from Democrats is why isn't the party just reclaiming the flag? Why is it that the Republicans seem to have made off with the stars and stripes? And I just wondered if, you know, July 4th is coming, it's 250 years since obviously the country officially began, why don't the Democrats have a sort of 250 across a Democratic version of the stars and stripes?

[D]

Well, because we need to do both. Right. And you know, you had mentioned only a Democrat could could start with a list of things that haven't done we haven't done well. Yeah, because that's the way Americans are feeling right now. Right. Americans are losing their health care. They can't afford to buy homes. They know that their kids life is going to be harder and less secure than their life people. The American dream is broken for a lot of Americans. And if we don't recognize that, if all we want to do is celebrate and wave the flag, then that that is tone deaf and we're not getting it. And people are like, well, wait a minute, like my farm just is going under. Like I'm just losing my home right now. I just lost my health care. And we want to have a big celebration. So my point is we need to do both of those things. You need to be able to say yes and look at our political system which is badly broken. So you have to acknowledge that and you have to be honest about it. And you can do the other thing too. You can also say, yeah, we have moments of greatness. Our country is always a competition between our highest ideals and our worst impulses. And when our highest ideals win out, we are great. We do things that nobody else can do. And we have an ability for self correction and resiliency and moving forward and fixing things that I haven't seen anyplace else in the world. So I don't see either of those things as mutually exclusive. And that to me is the new American patriotism.

[A]

So we've talked a little bit about Donald Trump's grift. Clearly his extended family appear to be getting in on the action too. How can you draw people's attention to that?

[D]

I talk about it all the time. So I go around the country. I'm the battleground chair for House Democrats. So I'm traveling the country supporting our red to blue candidates. You know, I, in the last couple of weeks I've been campaigning in Virginia and New York. I've gone to Michigan twice, Wisconsin, Illinois, Arizona, California, multiple times. I am canvassing this country to help us win and I am constantly talking about it and, but I always say you always have to couple it. You just can't talk about corruption in an abstract way. Right. Because it's just not, it's just not real to folks. If you just talk about some abstract corruption, you have to tie it. Right. And you have to make it clear that what's happening is what corruption is, is theft from American taxpayers.

[A]

Right. This is our money.

[D]

Yeah, it's their money. And guess what? So you're losing your home. They get a new golden ballroom, your farm is going under. They get a fleet of new private planes. You can't afford health care and they're building a big arc and no bid contracts to trump cronies for the reflecting pool. Like they're taking your money. And this is money that should be in your pocket to help you pay the bills to reduce the cost of your healthcare. So we are directly tying it because it is directly tied to the suffering of Americans.

[A]

So Congressman, final question. Assuming that the House returns to the Democrats in November, where are you on investigations and what do you think the way forward is to hold people accountable for some of the fraud and the grift and the corruption that you've just talked about?

[D]

Yeah, well, absolutely. We have to do this. There's just no question in my mind. Right. Because this isn't just our right or some option. It's actually our duty to do this. Like the Constitution has put this duty in Congress. Congress exists and is structured to legislate to appropriate money and to conduct oversight and to do investigations and make people are following the law. Those are our roles, why Congress exists. So I am not going to actually not do our job as the Constitution requires. I'm not going to turn away from our job is what I'm saying. I'm going to do our job and I'm going to do what the Constitution says we should do. So that's number one.

[A]

Who's going to be, who are the top three people that you most want to investigate as of now?

[D]

Well, I don't know, there's so many. But we have to have a plan to. Your larger point is we just can't do everything right away, right? We have to make sure we have a plan that is strategic, that it goes after the worst corruption and the corruption that's most impacting our national security and the integrity of our government. And we have to sequence that. Right? If you try to do everything at once, it collapses under its own weight, and we won't have the resources and we won't have the ability to do it, and it'll get lost in the mix. So we have to make sure that we are balancing our affirmative agenda to reduce costs, to save people's healthcare, which is going to be our priority, to fix the integrity of our election system that I've talked about before and do the oversight. So that is a leadership function. We have to figure out how we balance those and how we sequence them. Me, personally, how we started this conversation. Pete Hegseth is short on my list, right? The corruption of this man, the incompetence of this man, and why I think about that is because I started my career in public service in uniform. So I have a special place in my heart for our servicemen and women. And the incompetence of this man is putting them at great, great risk every single day and this country at great risk. Is there somebody sitting here in charge of millions of uniform servicemen and women and millions of civilian employees that's responsible for our national security? And he doesn't give a damn about doing the job, and he doesn't know how to do the job. So, yes, I'm going to continue to go after Pete Hegsheth.

[A]

I do think some kind of national ticker with the amount of money that's being snaffled somehow from taxpayers would be a very appealing way of reminding people that taxpayers money needs to be accounted for. That is what Congress is for. And yet Congress doesn't appear to be able to do its job. And they're spending $350 million in DC revamping the environment when, as we know, people are losing benefits all over the place. Anyway, if you've enjoyed this conversation, please let us know. What are your thoughts on what Congressman Crow has said? Do you think they're doing enough? Do you think they should be doing investigations if the Democrats win the midterms? And if so, would Pete Hegseth be the person you'd go after? Would you go after the president? Who would you go after first? Okay, write and let us know. And in the meantime, if you have been big fans. Thanks for joining us. And a big thank you to our production team, Ryan Murray, John Romero, Heather Passaro, Rachel Passer, and Neil Rosenhaus. So the good news is we have so many Beast Tier members now, there are too many names to read out. And we really appreciate your support.