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- [00:00]
Jessica Valenti
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- [00:29]
David Pakman
every home Hi, Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Are you looking for a beach read this summer? May I suggest your big wireless bill? It's got suspense, mystery, a slightly flat emotional arc, and a shocking twist where you realize you've been overpaying the entire time. Fortunately, though, Mint's story is better. Every plan $15 a month, even unlimited. That's it. Happy ending, zero tears. Give it a try@mintmobile.com Switch upfront payment
- [00:53]
Jessica Valenti
of $45 for three months, $90 for six months or $180 or 12 month plan required $15 per month equivalent to taxes and fees. Extra initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes. Me slow when network is busy.
- [00:59]
David Pakman
See terms Republicans are making the catastrophic mistake of admitting that the midterms are about Trump. As Trump's war drives gas prices above $4, an approval collapses. Oil is over 100 bucks. It's a very bad idea. Trump then delivers one of his most incoherent speeches yet, slurring, inventing a health care plan that doesn't exist and saying to Americans crushed by high prices, give me a break. Democrats should make it a campaign ad. We're also going to look at the administration using dead soldiers to promote the war that got them killed. And we have the anti vaccine politics of RFK bringing measles to a 35 year high. Mitch McConnell missing more than five weeks. He's probably alive. I don't think that can be the standard for senior senators and in Congress. And finally, despite attacks from the White House and the MAGA media machine, this independent show just outranked Fox News And CNN on YouTube, this show, the David Pakman show, all of it and more today. Glad you're here. When Donald Trump ran promising numbers the likes of which we have never seen before, I don't think he meant record measles cases, but that is where we are today. This is a public health emergency and it is happening again. Measles is a disease that the United States Kind of defeated more than 25 years ago. And as I've told you over the last year or two, it is roaring back. Kids are being hospitalized, and it is all because Donald Trump handed public health to two of America's loudest anti vax cranks, Trump himself and RFK junior. Now, what's fascinating is Trump gets all of his vaccines. Trump's anti vax is a political tool. Personally, he's like, of course I'm getting vaccinated. And quite frankly, I don't even know that he believes this crap. But it's politically useful to him. We're only in July, and the United States has already recorded almost 2300 measles cases. This is the highest number in 35 years. It has now surpassed last year, and it is only July. Now, of course, more than 90% of infections are people who are unvaccinated or have unknown vaccination status. Utah, 90% of those hospitalized unvaccinated, most needed IV fluids, more than 60% needed oxygen. Almost 30% got pneumonia because of measles. This is what happens when powerful people poison trust in vaccines. And we have seen this building because even before Donald Trump became president for the second time, we had this sort of vaccine skeptical rhetoric of the end of Trump's first term and continued anti vax rhetoric that grew because President Biden simply oversaw the vaccination distribution program of the COVID vaccines. And so it kept building and building. And you've got all of these enclaves that for one reason or another, have convinced themselves and others and parents that kids simply don't need to be vaccinated. And in fact, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Spent decades pushing the debunked idea that maybe vaccines cause autism. Now, should that be investigated? Of course, if vaccines really caused autism, we would want to know. But it's been investigated and we're working on a deeper dive about this. At some point over the next couple of weeks, Donald Trump falsely claimed kids get 80 different vaccines and suggested parents break up the MMR vaccine even though, number one, there's no evidence that that's safer. And number two, you can't get those individual vaccines in the United States. I have a lot of pediatrician friends who say, parents come in and they go, listen, I want to vaccinate my kids against measles, mumps and rubella, but let's give them the individual vaccines like Trump suggested. And my pediatrician friends look at the parents and go, those vaccines aren't available in the United States because the MMR is the default. It's safe, it works. We don't have these individual vaccines. Trump then made maybe the most famous vaccines conspiracy theorist the Secretary of Health and Human Services. And RFK loves presenting vaccination like a personal choice, but measles doesn't respect the boundaries of your personal choices because an unvaccinated person can carry measles into a pediatrician's office and expose a six month old baby or a kid getting chemo or someone whose immune system can't respond properly to the vaccine. And those people never chose to assume that risk. They, they depend on everybody else maintaining community immunity. One of my pediatrician friends has had four cases of measles. Works in a part of the country where this anti vax stuff is more common. And he's had really wacky conversations with parents where they bring a kid in and he, he asks is your in an er so they don't necessarily have all the medical records, is your kid vaccinated? And then go, yes, absolutely. Okay, hangs out for a bit. They do some initial investigation. My friend goes back to the parents and goes, listen, we suspect that this is measles. You're sure your kids vaccinated? They go, oh, not against measles. And then now all of a sudden they've got to contact trace everybody who was in the waiting room in the ER and might have been exposed. It's a mess. Now notice how backwards the anti vax standard of evidence becomes. A vaccine safely given to hundreds of millions of people must answer every speculative question imaginable. And meanwhile, if it's a Facebook post or a conspiracy video or some discredited autism claim, that alone is enough evidence that parents should think about not vaccinating. And they magnify these extraordinarily rare vaccine risks and, and they act like getting measles is no big deal. And that's where the excuse comes in. Measles isn't really dangerous. It's been a long time since people were regularly dying of measles. But they don't understand that the reason Americans rarely die of measles is because of the vaccine. If you go before the vaccine. In 1963, measles infected 3 to 4 million Americans a year. Hospitalized American, about 50,000, caused brain swelling in about a thousand a year and killed about 500 people annually. Vaccination drove the case numbers down 99%. And measles was declared gone in the United States in the year 2000. And so they use the low death toll today to go. We don't need vaccines. Nobody's dying of it. Right. Because of the vaccine. It's like saying we don't need seat belts because people aren't really going through windshields in car crashes. They're not going through the windshields because of the seatbelts. One in five unvaccinated Americans who gets measles ends up in the hospital. That's an insane rate. And about one in a thousand has that brain swelling that can cause permanent damage. So this is a great example. I was actually in Sacramento on Gavin Nasty Gavin Newscomb's podcast. It's going to be out today. And one of the things I talked about with him, which I write about in my new book as well, pay attention, is when I meet people who say I'm not really into politics. This is a great example of how politics is how Trump gained the power to choose RFK Jr to be in charge of American public health. And it led to a record high number of measles cases. Elections decide who controls policy and who is in charge of disease surveillance and the agencies that are responsible for containing outbreaks. The leaders we elect reach into doctors offices and into our kids schools and into our bodies. And Trump and Kennedy turned one of the biggest victories of medicine into a political target. And now you've got frightened kids struggling to breathe. The US May lose its measles elimination status. And this is what anti vax politics looks like when it leaves the Internet. It's not just on Facebook. It migrates into the lungs of our kids. So that's where we stand. A new record. Trump said he would set records. I don't think he meant a record number of measles cases, but that's where we are today and we've got to deal with it. So is Mitch McConnell alive or what? Mitch McConnell has now been missing more than five weeks and we still don't really have answers as to whether he's alive, recovering, as they've said, or what is going on. We have seen Mitch McConnell in the more than five weeks that he's been hospitalized and then allegedly in rehab, although again, we don't really have pre proof of that. We have a claim, we don't have proof. And he has missed every single vote, of course. And the public just can't get a clear, independently verifiable account of Mitch McConnell's condition. We got a picture of McConnell in a hospital or rehab with his wife, Elaine Chao. A lot of people said that's an old picture. Others simply didn't believe it was real. So at the risk of just kind of being blunt. Is Mitch McConnell alive? Mitch, are you still with us? Are you conscious? Are you ever going to be capable of doing your job again? What the hell is going on? It is. What is the date? July 23. McConnell was hospitalized June 14. So June 14 to July 14 is four weeks. July 21 would be five weeks. We are now into the sixth week of a hospitalization supposedly for falling, during which he lost consciousness and then later got, I guess while in the hospital, pneumonia. He has not been seen publicly since all the roll call votes he's missed. His staff won't explain what is going on, what work he's doing, when he expects to get back. And then, as you may recall, right around the one month mark after his disappearance, McConnell's office puts out this written statement and a photograph showing what appears to be Mitch with a newspaper sports section from that day next to his wife, Elaine Chao. The photograph, Some are saying he's not really holding the newspaper. The newspaper is garbled. It's a. I, I've not seen evidence proving that the picture is AI modified or years old. There are Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who say, I've spoken directly with Mitch McConnell. Scott Jenn, CNN, said, I spoke directly to him. So is he alive? Probably. I think probably he is technically alive right now. But the range of possibilities between alive and will ever be capable of serving as a US Senator again are as big as the Grand Canyon. The picture, if it's real, can't tell us whether he's lucid. It can't tell us whether he can communicate. It can't tell us whether statements attributed to him are actually being dictated by him. And if we could get a 30 second video, it would answer a lot of these questions and it would answer them quickly. And instead, Mitch McConnell's office has allowed this to become so opaque that even some Republican lawmakers want answers. Josh hawley said Mitch McConnell has an obligation to tell his constituents what's happening. Tommy Tuberville said, we need a video update. Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear says multiple agencies have contacted him suggesting Mitch McConnell had indeed died. And he has been pleading with the office to end the speculation, put out a video, do something definitive. Now, there may be a politically convenient, convenient reason to keep everything vague. And it's not that Andy Beshear, the governor, would get to pick Mitch McConnell's replacement. That's not how the law works in Kentucky. Kentucky has a different setup in which a special election is required to fill a vacant Senate seat. But it appears as though and this is becoming a key date. It appears as though August 3rd is the deadline, practically speaking, to organize a special election before November. If the vacancy occurs after August 3rd, if you more than likely there would be procedural delays that would let Republicans push the special election onto the same ballot as the General. Or it might even complicate whether you can have a special election. Now, I am not claiming that Republicans are secretly hiding Mitch McConnell's death. They might be. I don't have evidence for that at this point in time. But I'm looking at the situation at the 30,000 foot level when the senator disappears for five weeks, his staff refuses to answer basic questions, the silence is massively consequential. And again, some people, I guess, moved on from this after the one month anniversary picture of Mitch with Elaine Chao was published. But a lot of people are remembering we don't know that that really proves anything and are demanding more than a picture and a statement written in Mitch McConnell's name. Now, there's a bigger problem than Mitch McConnell here. We've talked about it before and it's actually kind of two problems. One, members of Congress are allowed to vanish for weeks or months while remaining in office, collecting salaries, leaving millions of people without functional representation. And that is something most Americans don't have at their jobs. And there is no meaningful process to determine is this individual medically capable of serving? Will he ever be able to come back? Mitch McConnell's 84 repeated falls, multiple hospitalizations, public freezing episodes like that, and other health problems. He's already retiring when his term ends. If he is recovering and capable of serving out these last few months, show us, put out a video, answer some questions, give us a real timeline. If he can't do the job, just resign. Resign when voters can still have a say, democracy right over what happens next. Probably alive simply cannot be an acceptable standard for serving in the United States Senate. Now, I want to mention one other thing. There's a lot of people out there who have no clue that this is going on. No clue whatsoever. And one of the things I write about extensively in my new book is that due to these algorithmic echo chambers and filter bubbles in which we live, there are people living in completely different realities where they are simply not even fed articles or content covering the fact that Mitch McConnell has been missing for five weeks and may or may not be alive. That is an algorithmic problem. That is a digital platform problem. And I talk about it extensively in my book Pay Attention. I would love it if you preordered this book. It is increasingly being suggested that there are forces suppressing this book. What they can't suppress are people who simply hear me talk about the fact that this book is coming out if I have anything to say about it. And if you Preorder at David pakman.com/attention it will signal to independent bookstores and Barnes and Nobles and others, hey, we should get some copies of this book. So if you want signed copies, there are a limited number available at David pakman.com/audition. You can get the Kindle version, you can get the audiobook. All of these versions are available and anybody who preorders whatever version of the book, you will be entered into a raffle to get this specific copy of the book, which I will dedicate to you. This is the first ever printed copy sitting on my shelf. All you need to do to enter in that raffle is send your preorder screenshot to info@david pakman.com that's it. And you'll be entered in that raffle. A lot of people carrying debt don't think to themselves I'm in trouble. They're not necessarily behind on payments. They're working. They're kind of managing. 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Get your free 30 second personalized assessment today at ptsdebt.com/pacman the link is in the description. Let's say you just finished a business call or a meeting, you think you caught all of the important parts and an hour later your notes are scattered and you don't remember exactly what was said. The Plaid Note Pro is designed exactly for that gap between I heard something, I'm going to need to use it later. It's about the size of a Credit card thin enough to slide into a wallet attaches magnetically to the back of my phone for a call, an interview, a meeting, talking through ideas out loud. I can hit record once, stay focused. Plod will transcribe the audio, separate the speakers, summarize the key points, and then convert them into action items. I can also search and interact with everything later using the Ask Plod feature. Unlike my phone, Plot also has up to 50 hours of battery life. It has enterprise level privacy and security standards. So go to plod.AI/pacman and use the code PACMAN for 10% off all products. The link is in the description. I received a dozen emails in the last few hours asking me, david, did Donald Trump have a stroke? On live television, he went and gave a speech. He's soaking wet and swollen like a beach ball. Glitched so terribly that it stunned people in the audience. For some reason, Donald Trump decided to go give a campaign style speech in Marietta, Georgia. Trump opening by musing about running for what would be an illegal third term. This counts for comedy in the right wing, I guess.
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Donald Trump
Well, thank you very much everybody. It's a special place and I am here to announce my candidacy.
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David Pakman
I am here to announce my canacy. Incredibly glitchy speech making people wonder, is this guy okay?
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Donald Trump
Crack down on Marxist proxy. Oh, these prosecutors are so bad.
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David Pakman
Crack down on Marx. Prosecutors are bad. What is wrong with this guy? Something is very, very wrong.
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Donald Trump
Crack down on Marxist proxy oh, these prosecutors are so bad. They're so evil.
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David Pakman
At another point, concerns that maybe Trump had been drugged with sedatives.
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Donald Trump
And I saw what was happening. What a, what a disgusting thing took place. But we then, as you know, we won Venezuela, which is now working with us to produce.
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David Pakman
We won Venezuela and I think we're going to win Cuba as well. Now an incomparable moment where a guy dressed in a Trump like suit, you can see him in this video over Trump's right shoulder. He was mimicking Trump's accordion hands. I don't know how this guy got in. Eventually he was identified and I believe removed. But look at this guy mocking Trump. It's maybe one of the fun, actual funniest things I've seen at a Trump skirmish.
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Donald Trump
This is with this skirmish we have with the Islamic Republic of Iran. And I call it that because, let me tell you, they're getting hit so hard and they want to make a
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David Pakman
deal and I can't tell if the people around that guy are starting to realize, hey, I think this is an antagonist. I don't really know, but an interesting moment nonetheless. Trump then getting into the substance, and a lot of the substance included promoting stocks that he quietly bought but didn't tell anybody about. Donald Trump. Again, telling, telling the audience, go buy Dell computers. And as many of you may remember, due to a report that we did a couple of weeks ago, Dell is one of the stocks that Trump bought millions of dollars of and since has been encouraging random audiences to buy Dell computers.
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Donald Trump
Better than that. But people are loving it. And you know what? I say? Go out and buy a Dell computer. Okay? Because as far as I'm concerned, that's great stuff.
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David Pakman
And I read on all of these things. I do think Trump just knows a lot. If I want to know what's the best car to buy, I think of Trump. If I want to know what's the best computer to buy, I think of Trump. I actually am taking his recommendations as to I want one of those clicky keyboards and I don't know if I want the red switches or the green switches or what. But Trump is really the guy for electronics recommendations, as you can imagine. Of course not. He bought the damn stock and he's trying to pump it up. Now, what about health care? I know some of you have been waiting with bated breath Since July of 2020, when Donald Trump courageously announced we are two weeks away from signing a new health care bill into law. And here is Trump telling us it's imminent. And we have a name for it. It's called the Great Health Care Plan.
- [24:10]
Donald Trump
We will pass. The Great Health Care Plan is called Our Great Health Care Plan. That's the name of it. To stop all payments to big insurance
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David Pakman
companies and no more insurance companies. What?
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Donald Trump
Give the money directly to the people so they can buy their own health care, which will be much better and you will save a lot of money.
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David Pakman
Yes, negotiating by yourself to buy yourself health care will get you a much better deal, I'm sure. Said no one who understands markets and negotiating power ever in a moment really made to just be a campaign ad. Donald Trump said Democrats made up the word affordability.
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Donald Trump
They said they used the word. First time I heard it, it was a word, you know, made up by the Democrats. Affordability. They said affordability. I said, I've been here one day. Don't worry, I'll take care of it. And we're taking care of it.
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David Pakman
And notice that while the audience is essentially made up of clowns that clap like seals at anything Trump says, even their reaction is muted here because they know, wait a second. Democrats made up this whole issue of account of affordability. No, they didn't. This is a real issue. By the way, everything's gotten more expensive for us since you became president, even though you promised it would all get cheaper. This is a phenomenal campaign ad and there should even be zoom ins. I mean, look at the guy here over Trump's right shoulder in the dark two tone shirt behind the blonde woman. That's the look of a guy who's going, why are we laughing about affordability? That's a real issue. And then Donald Trump, in fact, makes it even worse, going, they're yelling at me about high prices. Give me a break. Trump said to them, I walk into
- [25:59]
Donald Trump
office, I have a press conference first or second day, and they're screaming at me, what are you going to do about high prices? Right? What are you going to do? I said, I just got here. What? What are we talking about? Tell me eggs. Eggs have gone up four times. Four times. I said, I just got here. Give me a break.
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David Pakman
I won't know why people were asking Trump on day one, what are you going to do about affordability? Because Trump promised on day one we're going to bring prices down. He made a lot of day one promises, none of which came true. And so Trump goes, why are they asking me on day one about affordability? Because you promised to deal with affordability on day one. You even promise. At one point, Trump even suggested that merely when he becomes President elect, prices would start to decline because everyone would know he's coming in and he's going to get tough with whoever and all of this crap. Trump, as is often the case in a battle with his tongue and the teleprompter. Listen to this one.
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Donald Trump
These people say, we're going to raise your taxes. I've never heard it before. It's a new phenomena. It's a phenomena.
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David Pakman
It's a nasty phenomena. At another point, when Trump's brain struggled to fire Trump, referring to Jon Ossoff not as Pee Wee Herman, but as Pinky Herman. Who the F is Pinky Herman? Is that the bathroom attendant at Mar a Lago?
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Donald Trump
Every single time. They're afraid of the communists. You look at it now. I was, I fought ourselves before, as you know, and we won. We had a great success against this guy. He reminds me of Pinky Herman. Do you ever see Pinky?
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David Pakman
Has anyone ever heard of Pinky Herman? Pinky Binky Herman? This is not a guy who can do this. This is not a guy capable of turning ideas in his brain into Coherent language. And the most remarkable thing is that even these clap like a seal crowds when Trump dismisses the affordability concerns. They don't look happy and they shouldn't be because they fell for it. And now Trump is screwing them. Donald Trump was on his way to receive the bodies of four American soldiers killed in his war with Iran yesterday. And even in that moment, Donald Trump turned their deaths into propaganda for himself. Here is a good supercut from our friend Aaron Rupar of Trump answering questions before this dignified transfer ceremony. And Donald Trump propagandizes the dead service member and goes, service members and says, no, no, no, they like this war. They knew Iran can never have a nuclear weapon. Take a look at this.
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Donald Trump
Some of you are going with us to honor our heroes. And they are indeed great heroes. Actually, they said, and they, all of them said very strongly, we can't let, we cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon. They won't have a nuclear, nuclear weapon. So we're going to honor them.
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Tom Emmer
Soldiers.
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Jessica Valenti
Do you have an update on the investigation as to how they were killed in Jordan?
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Donald Trump
No. They're doing that. That'll be released. You know what?
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Jessica Valenti
Targeting barracks.
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Donald Trump
I don't know. Well, they're going to pay a big price. They're getting. They're getting. They're being decimated.
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Jessica Valenti
Is that report inaccurate?
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David Pakman
Families of these fallen, fallen soldiers.
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Donald Trump
When Americans are wrongly against this war,
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Interviewer
how do you ask them?
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Donald Trump
Well, Americans aren't against the war. A poll just came out. Americans don't want gasoline prices, but they're not against the war. That just came out loud and clear in a poll. Nobody wants Iran to have a nuclear weapon. Do you want Iran to have a nuclear weapon? You think it's good? Go ahead. All I'm going to say is we love you, we love your child. And that's what they are to them. They're their children. There's no games, no nothing.
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David Pakman
That's all right. There are two lies here, and the first one is just, just disgusting. Trump says of the dead soldiers, all of them said very strongly, we cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon. How could Trump possibly know that? Did Trump speak to the deceased service members about Iran's nuclear program? And all four independently delivered the exact same line, conveniently matching Trump's justification for the war just before they died. Has Trump's White House provided any evidence for this claim at all? Of course they haven't. Trump took four people who can no longer speak for themselves and placed his own political talking point into their mouths. And it is vile and Disgusting. And he turned these deceased service members essentially into characters in a story that's designed to absolve Trump of responsibility for the war he chose to go into which killed them. And that is grotesque because these soldiers volunteered to serve their country. But that doesn't mean they endorsed every military decision made by Donald Trump, and it doesn't mean they supported this perspective particular war. And it certainly doesn't give Donald Trump the right to announce what they supposedly believed after they were killed. Now, these dignified transfers are supposed to center the fallen and their grieving families. And Trump used the trip to advertise his war and basically claim even the soldiers I got killed agreed that I was right to do this. Think of how depraved that is. Now, then there is the second lie, which is comparatively minor, but it's still a doozy, which is Trump goes, oh, a poll just came out. Americans are not against this war. They don't want high gas prices, but they're not against the war. I was not able to find that poll. What I did find are polls that say the opposite. The Washington Post Ipsos poll finds 68% of Americans say this is not a war worth fighting. 28% say, yes, it is worth fighting this one war. Even support within Trump's own MAGA base has been falling as the death toll and economic cost grow. Gas prices are again above 4 bucks a gallon. 18American service members have now been killed. More than 500 have been reportedly injured. And Trump doesn't cite a specific poll because he made it up on the spot. Listen to how he separates the war, by the way, from its consequences. Americans supposedly support the war. They just don't like high gas prices produced by it. But you really can't separate those things. The casualties are part of the war. The injuries are part of the war. The grieving families are part of the war. The gas prices and tens of billions of dollars spent and the escalation, it's all part of the decision that Trump made. The promise was, I'm the peace. President Hillary was going to start four wars. Biden was going to start four wars. Kamala was going to start four wars. He bragged under me, there will be no new wars. Now Americans are dying in a war most of the country is against. And Trump's answer is to speak on behalf of the dead and fabricate polling that tells him the war is popular and he is popular. We should be careful about remote diagnosis of people. I'm not diagnosing Trump with anything, but these comments sound sociopathic. Four flag draped transfer cases arriving at Dover, four families about to experience the worst moment of their lives and Donald Trump goes the dead soldiers told me they love the war. Disgusting. Absolutely disgusting how anyone can defend this crap. I don't know who doesn't love getting away during the summer, but traveling can make habits get kind of weird because you're sleeping somewhere different, it's a different schedule, you might be eating at different times. So all your basic stuff isn't automatic anymore. This is why our sponsor AG1 just makes a lot of sense for summer. 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- [36:49]
Interviewer
We are live on substack so good Thing we are not live on Instagram. Hey, everybody. I'm going to be speaking today with Jessica Valenti, who is a bestselling author and also the creator of the substack newsletter Abortion Every Day. Hey, so good to talk to you. I've been looking forward to this.
- [37:06]
Jessica Valenti
Me too. Me too. Thanks for having me on.
- [37:09]
Interviewer
So, I mean, I think first, just to kind of level set like we, we've seen the repeal of Roe v. Wade. We've seen efforts to ban abortion at the state level. Has the number of abortions in the country gone up or down since this happened? I mean, like, sort of, what's the landscape here?
- [37:27]
Jessica Valenti
Yeah, it's, it's pretty incredible, actually. You know, conservatives spent 50 years preparing for the end of Roe, preparing for this moment. Billions of dollars, all sorts of political capital passing bills, and the abortion rate has not gone down even a smidgen. It's gone up a bit. So I think it is fair to say that these laws have just been an incredible failure. If anything, the only thing that has gone up has been maternal mortality, infant mortality in states that have bans. And so I don't know that anyone could credibly argue that these laws have done anything nominally pro life.
- [38:07]
Interviewer
So what's happening in terms of is this shifting procedures from certain states to other states, or like, what are the dynamics of this going up slightly?
- [38:20]
Jessica Valenti
I mean, the anti abortion movement is really, really pissed off. And this is why you see them going after abortion pills, because the primary reason that the abortion rate is not going down is because women in banned states are able to have pills shipped to them from providers in pro choice states and essentially sidestep those bans. And so Republicans are furious that women are able to sidestep those bans, that they are not being punished in the way that Republican lawmakers would like to see them punished. And so you see Republicans, the conservative movement, really going all in on abortion medication, trying to get abortion medication banned entirely. But most importantly to them, they're trying to make it illegal to ship abortion medication. And so you're seeing this huge effort on the state level to call abortion medication a controlled substance, to enforce further restrictions and laws about shipping abortion medication. And they have a case that they are hoping will convince the Supreme Court to step in and make it illegal to ship abortion medication. But so far they have not had much luck, which is amazing. And I think it really speaks to the power of the abortion rights movement that they were really prepared for this moment. They were prepared for how to prescribe and dispense this medication to make sure that the people who needed care could get it. And so I think when it's all said and done, they're just really mad. They're just really pissed off that this hasn't turned out the way that they would like it to. And they're really mad that the Trump administration is not doing more to help them, though they've done plenty of.
- [40:03]
Interviewer
There were a lot of articles shortly after the repeal of Roe v. Wade about though. Let me see how I can say this. There were motivated individuals to look at charging people, for example, for crossing state lines for a surgical abortion or if you helped someone who, for example, needed a ride, saying that you were an accessory to something, which while not a crime in the state you went to. And if they were minors, that could
- [40:33]
David Pakman
be an aggravating factor.
- [40:35]
Interviewer
Has anything come of that in terms of actual criminal charges in any significant way?
- [40:41]
Jessica Valenti
I don't think that anyone has been criminally charged as far as I know, but they are working really hard to institute a chilling effect. Right. And like, that's a big part, a big point of these laws. If someone thinks that it is illegal or criminal for them to drive their friend across state lines, then conservatives have done their job. Right? Like the idea is to attack community, attack our ability to support each other. And I've been covering a lot of this at my newsletter. That fear really does lead to people being denied care, either denying themselves care or sometimes you have local agencies that are confused about the law that make it more difficult for people to travel. I talked to an attorney for one woman in an anti abortion state who she found out her 14 year old daughter was pregnant. They decided that they wanted to get her an abortion. They were going to drive her out, out of state. Someone tipped off Child Protective Services. Child Protective Services came into the home, took the teenage daughter out of the home, kept her out of the home until that appointment date had passed and threatened the mother with murder charges if she were to bring her child out of state. Even though it's completely legal. Right. And so something doesn't even have to be illegal in order for those policies and those fears and that sort of enforcement to have a really terrible impact.
- [42:07]
Interviewer
What about the providers? Because one of the things that made a lot of news in the three to six months after the repeal, there were a couple different things. One was OB GYNs leaving certain states and going to others for legal concerns as to what the repercussions to them may be of providing the care that they believe is medically appropriate. We also heard stories of problems in ERs where there is a pregnant woman who then has another condition or reason that they're in the ER and how that might relate to the pregnancy. And talk to us a little bit about that medical landscape.
- [42:44]
Jessica Valenti
Yeah, I mean, it is really bleak. We are seeing obgyns leave anti abortion states. One of the best examples of that is Idaho. Idaho has lost about a third of its obgyns and I think half of its maternal fetal medicine specialists. And that has this domino effect that is not just about abortion, but is about all care. Right. If you lose a third of your ob gyns, then you have maternity wards at hospital shuttering. When you have maternity wards at hospital shuttering, all of a sudden a woman in Idaho needs to drive an hour and a half in order to get to a hospital where she can give birth. That's going to drive up the maternal mortality rate. Republicans know that. And so in Idaho, they originally disbanded their maternal mortality committee. And we're seeing that sort of action across anti abortion states where they're disbanding maternal mortality committees, they're stacking them with anti abortion activists. They really don't want Americans to know just how bad the consequences have been since the end of Roe. And as you said, we're seeing situations in hospitals, not only in emergency situations, but people who have cancer who need chemotherapy and they find out that they're pregnant and, and they're not going to be able to get chemotherapy in their home state and they need to leave. Right. That is traumatic and horrific. It doesn't need to be a maternal mortality situation. It doesn't need to be someone dying in order for those consequences to be really serious and horrific.
- [44:12]
Interviewer
Do you think that the repeal of Roe v. Wade and some of these other legal attempts that now the anti abortion right is sort of tied up with have supplanted sort of like the violent incidents at family planning clinics or targeting of specific doctors that we saw over the preceding 10, 15, 20 years, or is that still taking place? I'm not hearing about it. If it is.
- [44:36]
Jessica Valenti
Yeah, you're not hearing about it, but it is on the rise, unfortunately.
- [44:40]
Interviewer
Oh, is that right?
- [44:41]
Jessica Valenti
Yeah. They have been really emboldened. If anything, they feel like the government is on their side. And that's in part because the government is on their side. One of the first things that that Trump did when he reentered the white was pardon nearly two dozen violent anti abortion extremists who had been convicted of violating the Face act, which is the federal law that protects abortion clinics. He pardoned them. Then a couple of days later, I think it was J.D. vance spoke at the March for Life. And he made very, very clear in his speech, he said, you will never have the government go after you ever again. They really have paved the way for anti abortion violence and the anti abortion movement sees that. They recognize that at the same time, Republicans are trying to repeal the, the Face act entirely. They're trying to do away with any clinic protections. It's hard to see what that could possibly be about other than enabling political violence and enabling violence against abortion providers, patients, escorts, volunteers.
- [45:44]
Interviewer
Where is HHS on this? Because I, I've, for example, I've covered a lot about what's going on with measles. We've talked about some of the MAHA stuff. We had Dr. Jessica Nuric on last week or the week before to talk about some of the nutrition aspects of what's taking place. What's your sense of where HHS has been on this?
- [46:03]
Jessica Valenti
They are doing something very, very sneaky. They have changed, the Trump administration has changed the guidelines around a lot of the federal programs for reproductive health. So Title 10, for example, which is the nation's family planning program, provides contraception access for low income Americans. They change the guidelines to focus instead on natural family planning and on people essentially building their families and having babies. So moving away from contraception, which is what the program is basically entirely about, we saw the same thing with the teen pregnancy prevention program. Not only did the Trump administration cut $65 million in teen pregnancy prevention programs, they also released a new set of guidelines that does not mention contraception unless it's to say kids should be taught that contraception is not all that good for you. And instead they want young teenage girls taught, period tracking, which is notoriously ineffective. And so they really are using hhs, they're using guidance, they're using these federal programs, a really conservative pro birth rate effort, rather than focusing on what people really need with their reproductive health. And because not that many Americans are out there reading like the Title 10 guidance or the notice of funding opportunities for the teen pregnancy prevention program, it has largely gone unnoticed. That's part of the reason that I do the work that I do trying to pick those pieces out and trying to find those documents that unfortunately are just not being covered in mainstream outlets.
- [47:43]
Interviewer
Yeah, the discussions around contraception are interesting in a sort of dystopian sense where I've seen that now there's an attempt to kind of reclassify the so called morning after Pill, as well as IUDs, as abortions, abortion causing procedures or medications or whatever has that it, from a legally relevant standpoint, successfully been done in any state so far where these things are being reclassified and are subject to abortion law.
- [48:15]
Jessica Valenti
Not that they're subject to abortion law, but we have seen bills where there will be. There'll be a bipartisan effort to try to increase access to contraception, but Republicans will refuse to include IUDs in that. Right. Because they. Because they're saying that it's an abortive patient. I think the most significant thing that's happened that again, like, really did not get any coverage, is that the Trump administration did, in like, an official capacity, classify IUDs, hormonal birth control pills, hormonal implants, as abortifacient birth control. And that happened when. I'm sure some of your viewers have seen this. The Trump administration wanted to incinerate a multimillion dollar stockpile of birth control that was marked for women abroad. And the reason that they gave was that they said, well, it's not really birth control, it's abortifacient birth control. You are talking about the most common forms of birth control. And the Trump administration saying, in an official capacity, both USAID and the State Department saying, no, no, no, those are abortions. That is incredibly, incredibly significant. It goes to show where their head is at the way that they are trying to pave the road, lay the groundwork to make this argument that certain forms of birth control are actually abortions because it gives them this ability. When a reporter asks them, well, are you against birth control? They can say, no, of course not. I'm just against abortion. It's the rhetorical equivalent of crossing their fingers behind their back. Because when they say abortion, they also mean IUDs and they mean the pill.
- [49:50]
Interviewer
Is there any. When we talk about the pill and IUDs, both prevent implantation of an egg.
- [49:59]
David Pakman
Right.
- [49:59]
Interviewer
Like, I mean, I guess my question is if we want to open ourselves to the possibility that there is some medical difference between the two, is there? Or is this something where they found it eas to go initially after IUDs than the hormonal pill, I think they
- [50:12]
Jessica Valenti
found it easier to go after emergency contraception and IUDs. There's a certain form of copper IUD that can prevent implantation of a fertilized egg rather than prevent fertilization. Right. And so that is sort of their, their sticking point.
- [50:29]
Interviewer
Okay.
- [50:29]
Jessica Valenti
It's still, It's. It's it all prevents pregnancy at the end of the day. Right? It all prevents pregnancy. And to them it's not. But I think that they would like to make it about those, like, little distinct differences. It's not about that. To them, they are anti birth control. They will use whatever, like, rhetorical tools they have. They will use whatever, like, little definitions they can to try to make that make sense to American people because voters don't support banning birth control. And so anything that they can do to try to make it sound logical, to try to make it sound reasonable, they will do. At the end of the day, they do not want women to have access to birth control. They don't even want women going to college. Right. Like you are talking about a movement when you're looking at, like, the Heritage foundation and the kinds of documents that they're putting out. They want young women pushed back into the home, unable to leave unhappy marriages with, with no fault divorce. They want us not to be going to school, not to be going to work. Controlling our reproductive lives and ensuring that we are forever pregnant is a really terrific way to trap women in the domestic sphere. And they know that.
- [51:34]
Interviewer
Last thing I want to ask you about, there's a bunch of issues where I don't think Trump personally believes what has become the policy of his administration. So, for example, like just to go through them quickly, a big part of Donald Trump as president is he's the Christian guy. But I don't believe Trump is religious at all. And he sort of found this identity when he was 68 years old in order to become a political figure. Trump's administration is very friendly with anti vax ideas. That's connected to the record high number of measles cases. But Trump gets all of his vaccines. And I think Trump sees this anti vax thing as something that's politically interesting, but he doesn't believe in it. He gets all of his vaccines and probably all his family does. Do you believe that? Not that it matters when it comes to policy, but do you think it's the same way when it comes to abortion? Because Trump was always pro choice. I wouldn't be shocked if Trump, in any of his, you know, various, you know, situations with different women over the years, has been involved in situations like the morning after pill, et cetera. What is your sense of Trump personally? But maybe more importantly, does it even matter? Because what seems to matter to me is the policy of the administration.
- [52:44]
Jessica Valenti
Right? I think that's exactly right. I honestly don't think he cares. I don't think that he cares about it at all in terms of how it impacts women. I don't think he has any strong personal beliefs on this. I think that he doesn't like losing and I think he knows that abortion is a losing issue for Republicans. And I think that that is why you have not seen the administration make very big public explicit moves. Right? They're not calling for a national abortion ban. They haven't enforced the Comstock act which would criminalize shipping abortion pills across state lines. He knows that it's a losing issue. I do not think he cares at all about it though. But as you said, his administration is stacked with Heritage foundation employees. Very, very anti abortion, you know, lifelong anti abortion maniacs. Really like real, real extremists. And that who, that's who is in the federal government right now. And that is what matters because that's who is at the helm of that anti abortion policy, of that policy that, that impacts women.
- [53:44]
Interviewer
We've been speaking with Jessica Valenti. Check out Jessica's substack abortion every Day on Substack. We'll also link to it. Jessica, really great talking to you. Appreciate your time and your insights.
- [53:57]
Jessica Valenti
Thank you.
- [53:57]
David Pakman
Have a good again.
- [53:58]
Interviewer
Bye.
- [54:00]
David Pakman
The David Pakman show is an audience supported program and the best, most direct way to support the show is by becoming a member@join pacman.com youm'll get the daily bonus show, the daily commercial free show and plenty of other great membership perks. Get the full experience by signing up@join pacman.com we just beat Fox News and CNN. What on earth am I talking about? Well, I'll tell you. I want to show you something that it's almost difficult for me to believe in. The latest ranking of YouTube accounts by views. The David Pakman show is number 26, Fox News is number 30 and CNN is number 38. We are beating Fox and CNN thanks to you. This data is from Cluvio which tracks YouTube channels and other platforms. This independent show, which we built from nothing, nothing is now generating more YouTube views than two of the largest corporate news organizations in the US which have billions of dollars behind them. Billions with a big capital B. Why capital? I don't know. Trump puts capitals on random words, why don't I? Now to be completely precise, this is specifically on YouTube and this is over a particular period. I'm of course not suggesting that my entire operation is larger than Fox News or CNN TV websites, all of that. Again, they have billions. They are massive corporations. We are just a little independent show. But that's what Makes this incredible. Fox was built with the backing of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation media empire. CNN was built by a super rich guy and is now owned by one of the largest media conglomerates on earth. They have massive studios, they have corporate infrastructure, international bureaus, gigantic promotional budgets. Effectively speaking, they have unlimited resources. We built this with no media conglomerate, manufacturing and audience. We don't. A lot of people don't understand when Fox and CNN decide to get on YouTube, they can put the full weight of their entire platform into driving people to their YouTube channel. And still without a billionaire underwriting. Years of losses and all of that. But we have defeated them on YouTube because individual people watched and subscribed and shared clips and directly supported the show. And look at what that has produced. So this to me is an inspirational story of without any of that, just me sitting here doing the content, my team getting it packaged and distributed, and folks like you in the audience saying, I'm going to watch it, maybe I'll share it it. We are not just on the same list as Fox and CNN. We are above Fox News. We are above CNN. We jumped 16 positions in this ranking and I don't think it is, it's worth mentioning. This is happening while we're under attack by people in power at a level we have never experienced before. The Trump White House put me on his media offenders list. Don Jr. And Caroline Levitt are retweeting attacks against me. Someone in the Trump administration reportedly tried to interfere with the distribution of my previous book. We expect that with my new book. Pay attention. They're going to do the same thing. And so you've got this broader MAGA movement producing lies, smears and propaganda designed to discredit me and other critics of Trump and to discredit you. They've got the White House, they've got Fox News, they have billionaire funded media networks and some of the largest accounts on every every major social platform. And we moved up 16 slots above Fox and above CNN. Now, there is a really important message about independent media here. The attacks can work if people assume someone else will keep these shows alive. What do I mean by that? Independent outlets like this one don't have a big corporation that can absorb losses or rescue us when algorithms change or when advertisers get nervous or powerful officials start applying pressure. The only protection I have is from you. It's from the audience. Every shared video, YouTube subscription, substack, subscriber, direct membership on my website. Every one of those is like a brick in the moat. Protect. No, that's the moats are. It's okay. It's a brick in the wall, not in the moat. That analogy didn't make sense. Metaphor. It is a brick in the wall that protects us so that when powerful people try to silence independent voices, we can just keep covering the stories that we believe need to get covered. We don't need to soften our critiques. We don't need to abandon our critiques. So this victory really belongs to you. There just is no version of the David Pakman show ranking above Fox and CNN without millions of you deciding, hey, this is worth watching and supporting. So I want to take a moment to appreciate this and to thank everybody. We are building an independent show without corporate billions or millions, and the most powerful political forces in the country are trying to marginalize it. They're trying to intimidate you out of here. They're trying to intimidate me out of doing this. And we beat them. If you want to make sure we keep climbing and that the attacks only make us Stronger, subscribe on YouTube share a clip subscribe to my substack Get a membership@join pacman.com and really importantly, because we know where their focus increasingly is, Preorder the Book Pay Attention I had a phenomenal conversation with Governor Gavin Newsom in California two days ago about this book and he seemed to understand the ways in which the digital platforms and algorithms reinforce these right wing ideas. And we are fighting an uphill battle pushing a big boulder up the hill. So please consider preordering the book@david pakman.com attention and again, if you want to get this specific copy, this the first copy ever printed. It's on my shelf. I will dedicate this specific copy and send it to someone. Any preorder of the book qualifies, audio book, Kindle, whatever. Just send a screenshot to info@david pakman.com and say, David, put me in that raffle. But thank you to everyone. It's an insane milestone and I'm humbled and we did it because of you. Republican Congressman Tom Emmer just accidentally explained why his party is in big, big trouble. Republicans need the midterms to be about anything other than Trump. They need it to be about how Democrats are terrible and all of that. But they don't need, they don't want, they can't afford for these midterms to be about Donald Trump. And Tom Emmer went on TV and decided to make Trump the centerpiece of the campaign. Tom Emmer says he's optimistic about the midterms because Voters know it's about Trump. Well, Trump's approval is 30%. Listen to this. This could be disaster for Republicans.
- [61:53]
Tom Emmer
There's a Harris Poll on voter enthusiasm that came out within the last two weeks. Very interesting. Usually you have an enthusiasm gap right now, and it doesn't close till sometime in September, October, this. They broke out MAGA Republicans, and they have Republicans and Democrats. They didn't break out socialists, communists, Marxist, anarchists, just Democrats. And then they had independents. Guess what? The MAGA Republicans, eight to nine out of ten of them are planning on voting in the midterms. Those, by the way, are the MAGA Republicans. The Trump voters that we've told, we've been told for two years, aren't going to show up, up without President Trump on the ballot. Then you look at Republicans and Democrats, and 7 to 8, 8 out of 10 of each are planning on voting already here in July. They're saying they're going to be voting in the midterms. I just want you guys to think about that for a second. There is a ton of enthusiasm out there, and it's not necessarily because they love Republicans and they hate Democrats. You know what it's about? It's about President Trump and his America first policies.
- [62:59]
David Pakman
You know, Tom, there may be some enthusiasm out there, but have you checked whether this is actually enthusiasm on your side? Because Trump's approval is 30 in many polls and large majorities disapprove of his performance, nearly half of Americans now describe the economy as being in poor condition. Republicans are terrified that Trump's unpopular war with Iran and gas prices above 4 bucks a gallon and the affordability crisis will crush them in November. And Tom Emmer has the bright idea to go on TV and say, don't worry, everybody. This election is fundamentally about Donald Trump. It sounds like a confession because Republicans have a structural problem. Trump's not on the ballot. He doesn't have to worry about ever running again. But every single vulnerable Republican in Congress has spent years allowing Trump and kind of making Trump, Trump, the center of the Republican Party. And every scandal he has, they defend him, they vote for his agenda, they celebrate the tariffs, they support the war. They insist he is the one who can fix the economy. And now they want voters to treat the midterms as a series of completely unrelated local elections. And Emmer has sort of thrown dynamite on the escape hatch. If voters are unhappy with Trump, the only way to punish him is vote against these Republicans. And Emmer is saying, a vote for a Republican is a vote for Trump. Well, then I Guess that's not what I want to do. Please proceed, Congressman, if that's the approach. Emmer then in another moment of this interview made what I think is a huge mistake, which is he tried to sell the Trump economy to the audience. Even Newsmax said, I don't know about that. I don't know about that. Check this out.
- [64:45]
Tom Emmer
Southern border. It's about an economy that is starting to work for everyone. You look at real wages are growing faster than inflation. You look at the lower rungs of the prosperity ladder in this country. They are actually catching up for the first time in years. Their spending is up about 6% right now. They are feeling better about the economy. And if their perception is they're in a better place than they were under Joe Biden and they see a bright future, guess what, guys, we're going to hold the House, we're going to hold the Senate, and we're going to finish out Trump's term in style.
- [65:15]
Jessica Valenti
And Congressman, I do have to point
- [65:17]
David Pakman
out, though, that there still are many
- [65:18]
Jessica Valenti
Americans on both sides of the, oh, the aisle who are feeling financial pressure, financial strain on various levels, whether it be because of the war in Iran or maybe inflation not going down as
- [65:34]
David Pakman
quickly as we had hoped.
- [65:36]
Jessica Valenti
What is your message to them?
- [65:38]
David Pakman
Because we keep telling them to, to be patient. And they may feel that they just
- [65:43]
Jessica Valenti
don't have patience left.
- [65:45]
Tom Emmer
Well, Katrina, I guess I'm pushing back on that by telling you that while there are people, and there always will, that are going to be struggling, what they're saying compared to what is happening is not matching. And what you're going to see, I believe is by early September, those two things, the perception of their economic reality and their literally the economic reality, are going to be intersecting the economy. Nobody's talking about 99 cent eggs. And you're correct, by the way, when you talk about, for instance, gas prices.
- [66:17]
David Pakman
So he just starts going into this hemming and hawing if Sands and buts, you know, the Republican economic message is in big trouble when Newsmax won't let you get away with the the economy is starting to work for everybody. That's the kind of sentence that politicians love to manufacture in a conference room. The economy is starting to work for everyone. And then they just repeat it, repeat it, repeat it until people don't, don't pay attention to their own bank account and they just believe you. But that didn't work for Biden. It didn't work for Harris. Inflation was still 3.5% in June after being 3.8 in May energy prices were up 16% over the last year, gas up 27%. One in five Americans says the economy is good or excellent. In Pennsylvania, which is often sort of a bellwether of on the economy, 44% of voters say, I'm worse off than I was a year ago. It's just Republicans in power. It's only Republicans. Those people can't pay their grocery bills, but they're hearing Tom Emmer's talking points about the economy. And so the trap Republicans have created themselves is that they spent the whole Biden presidency insisting every price increase. That's the president's fault. Trump said it will be immediate relief when I get into power. And now prices are higher than they were when Trump took over. Gas is again, again up over $4 a gallon. And Republicans want voters to appreciate how complex these economic trends are because prosperity is coming very soon. Emmer connected two things Republicans have to keep separate. Separate Trump and the economy that people are actually experiencing. If the midterms are about Trump, which Emmer says they are, and if voters judge Trump by whether their lives become more affordable, Emmer may be right that there's tremendous enthusiasm, but it may be enthusiasm to vote out every single one of these clowns. Now, let me issue one other reminder. Your Republican elected official almost certainly agrees with 100% or 98% of what Donald Trump has done and has rubber stamped everything Trump wanted when it came through the House or Senate. So for the people who are sort of like, yeah, Trump's not my thing, but I like my congressperson. I like my senator, who happens to be a Republican. Your congressperson or senator has been part of rubber stamping and not putting any obstacles in front of Trump for doing all of the stuff you claim not to like. Remember that when you vote in November. On the bonus show today, we have new polling in Maine involving Graham Platner's replacement. The president of Nicaragua says no more elections and House AIs. The House's AI kill switch bill has been unveiled after a very alarming hack involving open AI. All of those stories and more on today's bonus show, Sign up@join pacman.com you'll get instant access to the bonus show and more. I think you'll love it. I'll see you then.