Gaza, North Carolina’s Senate Race, and Trump’s Attack on Consumers

Summary

The Find Out Podcast: Gaza, North Carolina’s Senate Race, and Trump’s Attack on Consumers

Release Date: July 29, 2025

In Episode 29 of The Find Out Podcast, the hosts delve into a range of pressing political and social issues, including the ongoing conflict in Gaza, the pivotal Senate race in North Carolina, and former President Donald Trump’s recent maneuvers against consumer protection agencies. The episode culminates with an insightful interview featuring Rohit Chopra, the former Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). Below is a comprehensive summary of the key discussions, insights, and conclusions drawn throughout the episode.

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1. North Carolina’s Pivotal Senate Race

The podcast begins with the hosts discussing the significant developments in North Carolina's Senate race. Former Governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat, has secured victories in both the 2016 and 2020 elections against Republican opponents aligned with Donald Trump.

• Chris [00:00]: Highlights Roy Cooper’s consistent wins and notes Tom Tillis's retirement, citing his frustration with Trump: “I'm retiring, and I hate this BBB bill, and I'm just going to vote no and I'm out of here.”

• Tim [01:36]: Raises a rhetorical question questioning the feasibility of America retiring to escape Trump's influence: “Can America retire because we're done with dealing with Donald Trump?”

• Derek [03:31]: Emphasizes Cooper’s strong position in North Carolina: “He's North Carolina royalty, man. He's gonna win.”

The hosts unanimously express optimism about Cooper’s chances in the upcoming elections, underscoring his ability to outperform Trump by substantial margins. They also discuss the potential of a Trump-backed candidate, noting Cooper’s strategic advantages, such as his successful Medicaid expansion, which benefited nearly a million North Carolinians.

• Chris [03:56]: “Trump won by four points. But I think the thing about Governor Cooper is the fact that he ran when Trump won in 2016 and he outran him.”

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2. Democratic Party’s Unpopularity and Leadership Challenges

Transitioning to the broader political landscape, the hosts critique the Democratic Party's fragmented structure and lack of cohesive leadership, contrasting it with the unified front presented by Republicans under Trump.

• Chris [09:23]: Discusses a misleading Wall Street Journal poll headline claiming Democrats are “more unpopular than they've ever been in 35 years,” questioning the validity of such generalizations: “Who is the Democratic Party right now? To the person answering that poll, like, who are you literally thinking of right now? Because it's nobody.”

• Derek [10:29]: Analyzes the structural differences between the parties: “With Democrats, it's the polar opposite. We have no leadership. We also have different sects that are pretty equally paced.”

• Tim [05:29]: Highlights the strategic importance of Senate races in curbing Trump’s influence: “Imagine how cool would be if in the beginning of 27, Trump has zero leverage in Congress. It would just make everything stop him in his tracks.”

The hosts argue that the lack of a unified Democratic message and leadership hampers the party’s effectiveness, making it difficult to counteract Republican strategies that are more centralized and decisive.

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3. The Israel-Palestine Conflict and Democratic Response

A substantial portion of the episode is dedicated to the Israel-Palestine conflict, with the hosts critically examining the Democratic Party's stance and response to recent events in Gaza.

• Evan [14:44]: Points out the need for Democrats to address the humanitarian crisis: “It's two years over. Over two years into this conflict and we're finally just starting to see people talking about genocide is not good.”

• Senator Angus King [15:27]: Provides a poignant statement condemning Israeli actions: “I can't defend the indefensible. I am through supporting the actions of the current Israeli government.”

• Chris [17:19]: Expresses frustration over America's lack of moral authority due to its stance in Gaza: “And it doesn't give us the moral authority to stand up to Russia as they commit genocide in Ukraine.”

The hosts emphasize the importance of distinguishing between criticism of the Israeli government and anti-Semitism, advocating for a balanced approach that condemns human rights violations without vilifying entire communities.

• Derek [29:08]: Asserts the necessity of opposing genocide irrespective of the perpetrator: “Please don't support Israel. It's a terrible idea. It doesn't make me anti-Semitic because I am very attached to my culture.”

• Evan [34:27]: Shares personal experiences and moral dilemmas: “I, I'm holding a baby Jew in my arms right now. Like, my last name is Goldsmith. I am, I am not Jewish.”

This segment underscores the complex interplay between international conflicts and domestic political dynamics, urging Democrats to adopt a more assertive and morally grounded stance on human rights issues.

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4. Interview with Rohit Chopra: The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Under Siege

The episode features an in-depth interview with Rohit Chopra, the former Director of the CFPB, who provides insider perspectives on the agency's critical role and the challenges it faces under Trump’s administration.

• Chris [38:10]: Introduces Chopra and the CFPB, highlighting its mission to protect consumers from financial abuses: “The CFPB was one of the major things that came around, right, to make sure that this would never happen again.”

• Rohit Chopra [43:31]: Explains the CFPB’s role in regulating financial institutions: “This is actually about making sure that Wall Street and the financial system are actually serving America and not just serving themselves.”

Chopra details the CFPB’s accomplishments, including recovering billions in refunds and penalties for consumers wronged by major banks and financial entities.

• Rohit Chopra [47:58]: Criticizes the Trump administration's dismantling efforts: “They wanted to destroy some of the core checks over powerful institutions in the private sector, especially those on Wall Street and on Silicon Valley.”

• Tim [48:55]: Inquires about potential misuse of consumer data under Trump’s influence: “Is that true, were they actually going in and like being able to just access individual consumer level data?”

Chopra outlines the threats posed by deregulation and the erosion of consumer protections, emphasizing the importance of the CFPB in maintaining economic fairness and preventing another financial crisis akin to 2008.

• Rohit Chopra [52:32]: Advocates for robust government oversight: “We need a government that actually is willing to stand up to powerful people, you know, whether it's a mob boss or whether it is a company that is defrauding people at scale.”

The interview underscores the critical nature of regulatory agencies in safeguarding consumer interests and curbing corporate malfeasance, while highlighting the ongoing political battles that threaten these protections.

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5. Reflections on Capitalism and Regulatory Failures

The hosts engage in a broader discussion on capitalism, regulatory oversight, and the systemic failures that have allowed financial abuses to persist.

• Derek [65:27]: Critiques Republican laissez-faire capitalism: “Let the private and free market decide, right? And it's like, well, maybe sometimes, no, maybe that's a horrendous idea when you're letting all the people who have the most to gain decide how to rig the system.”

• Tim [58:55]: Connects historical populist movements to contemporary regulatory efforts: “The Tea Party movement was a response to, in large part, the bailouts of the big banks.”

• Rohit Chopra [61:21]: Emphasizes the disparity in accountability between individuals and large corporations: “What we saw was a complete contradiction between how individuals go through our justice system and how those truly at the top do.”

The conversation highlights the necessity of strong regulatory frameworks to ensure that economic systems serve the broader population rather than entrenching the power of the wealthy elite.

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6. Concluding Insights

As the episode wraps up, the hosts reiterate the importance of unified Democratic leadership, robust consumer protections, and a morally informed foreign policy stance. They emphasize the need for clear, decisive action to address both domestic and international challenges, advocating for policies that prioritize the well-being of everyday Americans over corporate interests.

• Chris [73:58]: Thanks Rohit Chopra for his contributions and underscores the significance of his work: “You guys did a lot of amazing work and I'm glad we could tell a little story about the billions of dollars that you helped to return to American taxpayers.”

The episode serves as a call to action for Democrats to consolidate their efforts, lead with conviction, and implement policies that safeguard consumers and uphold human rights on the global stage.

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Notable Quotes:

• Chris [03:56]: “Trump won by four points. But I think the thing about Governor Cooper is the fact that he ran when Trump won in 2016 and he outran him.”

• Derek [10:29]: “This challenge with somebody like Trump is the structural difference between parties now…”

• Evan [17:37]: “Some of us were hoping he would do something about it, but it seems like really nothing has changed.”

• Rohit Chopra [43:31]: “This is actually about making sure that Wall Street and the financial system are actually serving America and not just serving themselves.”

• Rohit Chopra [52:32]: “We need a government that actually is willing to stand up to powerful people…”

• Chris [73:58]: “You guys did a lot of amazing work and I'm glad we could tell a little story about the billions of dollars that you helped to return to American taxpayers.”

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Conclusion

Episode 29 of The Find Out Podcast offers a thorough examination of crucial political issues, blending critical analysis with expert insights from Rohit Chopra. The hosts effectively highlight the interplay between local elections, national party dynamics, consumer protection, and international conflicts, providing listeners with a nuanced understanding of the current political climate and the imperative for proactive, unified action within the Democratic Party.

Transcript

[Chris]

Foreign. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Find out podcast, episode 29. There are four of us today because I think Luke talked so much last week that he wants to take a break. Just kidding. He has an appointment that he couldn't. Couldn't shake. So that's the challenge with trying to get five people in three different time zones. But we have a great show for you today. Later, we're going to be talking to the former director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Rohit Chopra, who also is one of the only people that has both been hired and fired by Donald Trump as a Democrat. So you could stay tuned for that. I'm also going to do a couple of my announcements before we dive into the main topic, which is helping to support this show by becoming a member on Substack, which is find out podcast.substack.com and also our merchandise, which you can see I'm wearing our lovely shirt. We'll actually be announcing some new stuff, I think, maybe either in the next episode or after that. But you can find all that@findout podcast.com all right, so we had some really good news this morning in this for, for 2026, the former governor of North Carolina, Roy Cooper, who won both in 2016 and 2020. So when Donald Trump was on the ballot, is running for Senate, and that is an open seat because Tom Tillis basically threw up his hands and said, I can't deal with Donald Trump anymore. I'm retiring, and I hate this BBB bill, and I'm just going to vote no and I'm out of here.

[Tim]

Can we do that, by the way? Can, can America retire because we're done with dealing with Donald Trump.

[Derek]

That'd be fun.

[Chris]

Well, well, he's going to, he's going to cut all of our Social Security probably next. So maybe that's not a good idea. Perfect. Yeah. So, so this is an exciting news. I was actually on a call earlier with him, heard some, some of the stuff he had to say. I'm, I'm really excited about this. Do we think he's got a shot next year in North Carolina?

[Tim]

Is there any way he doesn't win? That's my question.

[Derek]

Yeah, he's, he's North Carolina royalty, man. He's gonna win.

[Evan]

I mean, what if North Carolina runs a Nazi again?

[Tim]

Mark Robinson.

[Chris]

Mark Robinson, the black.

[Evan]

I think Mark Robinson is, is going to come back.

[Tim]

The, the guy who was, he was secretly obsessed with trans porn.

[Chris]

Right?

[Tim]

That was his, that was Mark Robins.

[Chris]

Yeah. But wanted to penalize, like, wanted to Criminalize the LGBTQ community basically, but probably.

[Tim]

Because not enough of them were making porn for him. I think he was just angry when.

[Evan]

I first, I mean this, this is my lane, right. When I first started using Tick Tock, I got strikes every day trying to talk about the nominee in North Carolina. I mean, I was in North Carolina, like trying to report on and Tick Tock kept giving me strikes, like, kept banning me.

[Tim]

So when reality is too offensive for reality.

[Evan]

Yeah, it's, it's like, what are we supposed to do if the apps are like, no, reality is too messed up for you to talk about. You cannot talk about the news on our app. What, what are we supposed to do?

[Tim]

Did you try dancing? Oh, yeah. He got smoked. But still, I think like 35% of people, I think like 35% of people in North Carolina still voted for him because he was, Was he running for governor of the Senate? Lieutenant governor?

[Chris]

He was, he was the lieutenant governor and he ran for the government for governor. And he, I mean he did, he did lose by 15 points.

[Derek]

Yeah, like 14.

[Chris]

But, but, but almost 2.3 million people still voted for him.

[Derek]

Oh yeah, those are. 40% aren't going to change.

[Tim]

Zero votes.

[Derek]

Trump won that state by what, 2 to 3 to 4%? Something in that zone. So he underpaced Trump by almost 20%. Yeah, that's, you know, it's proof that like in the end the person does matter to a certain degree.

[Chris]

Yes, Trump, Trump won by. Trump won by four points. But I think the, the thing about Governor Cooper is the fact that he ran when Trump won in 2016 and he outran him. And then Trump, I mean, Trump won North Carolina in 2020 again, but Roy Cooper again outran him. And they have picked. I do believe there is a Trump hand picked candidate.

[Derek]

I was gonna ask.

[Chris]

It is sadly not, not Mark Robinson, but it is a guy that has, has numerous photos with his, himself wrapped arm in arm with Mark Robinson. Like he is a very, he is, I believe the chair of the RNC right now, Mark Something. He is a total DC insider. He has been in the establishment forever and he has supported the most right wing candidates that you could possibly imagine, including Mark Robinson. So I do think that, I think Governor Cooper, who first of all was a great governor, he got Medicaid because, you know, we had to play, they had to play this whole game when with Medicaid expansion in red states, he was the governor that got it done. And I believe it gave 8 or 900,000 North Carolinians health care. So this guy, and he negotiated that deal with Republicans. So he is, he is candidate number one. You know, I think when Chuck Schumer woke up the day after the election, it was like, who do I need in 2026, Roy Cooper was number one for North Carolina. So that makes our, makes our, Our, Our, our chances a little bit better in North Carolina.

[Derek]

I mean, imagine how cool would be if in, you know, the beginning of 27, Trump has zero leverage in Congress. He doesn't have the House, he doesn't have the Senate. I mean, that would change everything. Like, I don't think people understand how critically important it is that we win these Senate races, because if it's split, it's different than if we just have, know if we control both sides of this thing and it would just make. We just completely stop him in his tracks. It'd be all executive orders at this point.

[Chris]

Well, here's the, here's the thing that I think is the most important about that is that if we have, if the Democrats have the Senate and the house in 20, starting in 2027, that means they control the House and the Senate during the 2028 election, where a lot of people are worried about if Donald Trump is either. He can't really cancel elections. So, like, I don't buy that, but tries to run again, which he also can't do. But, like, you know, but like, we have levers there. It basically makes it impossible for him to do that. Yeah, if we have control, because then they don't have to. You know, in this case, actually certifying something like that would be nonsense.

[Derek]

Yes.

[Chris]

So it's really important to get to that 51 seats in the Senate as well.

[Derek]

I want to just pivot really, really quickly and say anybody who's just listening needs to turn on to YouTube because Chris just brought his beautiful daughter on and she's super cute. And I just want to point out that if you want to see a super cute baby, you should watch us on YouTube right now.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Derek]

Yeah.

[Chris]

Well, and since Luke's not here, we need a youth representative anyways.

[Derek]

It's pretty much the same age.

[Tim]

You know, Luke is more than a young man.

[Chris]

I know we are. We do not tokenize Luke. And if you listened last week, Luke was on fire.

[Tim]

So I think Chris, I think she is gen Alpha, like, or she's going to be like one of those, like, Alpha Beta babies. And actually, that's funny that you mentioned that, because I was like, there's going to be a generation Beta and that's going to Change the whole conversation. Politics, that's for sure.

[Chris]

Is she Alpha? Is that still Alpha, or is there a new generation? Because my, my son, if I had.

[Evan]

Two hands, I would Google it.

[Chris]

But yeah, no, no, no, no, don't.

[Derek]

Actually, I want to do that things.

[Tim]

Z ended at 12, and so Alpha started at like 13, 2013. And so we're probably right at the edge of another new one.

[Derek]

Yeah, it's between 2010 and 2024 is Generation Alpha.

[Tim]

There you go.

[Derek]

So let's see.

[Chris]

Generation. So then she is a new generation.

[Derek]

Yes, she's generation beta. 2025 to 2039 is going to be generation.

[Chris]

So they're just gonna, they're just gonna run through the Greek Alphabet now? Is that what they're gonna do?

[Derek]

I guess so. That's interesting. She's like. But she's gonna be one of the oldest generation Betas of all, so. Because she just barely snuck in there.

[Chris]

Her, her generation probably has better chance of electing president than my generation, which is Generation X. We got completely skipped over.

[Tim]

You guys had any good candidates?

[Chris]

Com. We missed. Com. Six months. She was a boomer.

[Tim]

She was a, Was she really? Oh, that's true. Yeah, I, I, she, I mean, she wore Chuck Taylor's. I mean, she was pretty much like a, like an adopted Gen X. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She had Gen X energy. Because it's, it's like, it's more about who, who your siblings and your peers are and everything and like, than, than the exact birthday because I'm like a Xennial or whatever, but I'm very much, a lot of, a lot of my peers are Gen X. My microphone abandoned me, and so I had to disconnect and reconnect. But I did want to talk about the Senate situation and, and what's his name? Roy Cooper. Yeah, I'm not in North Carolina. No, I, you know, there was that headline the other day that, that Wall Street Journal, our new favorite people published, and of course it was a poll with about 700 items of horrific news for Republicans considering that they run everything. And so of course their headline was Democrats more unpopular than they've ever been in 35 years. That was one of the, like, 400 bullet points in the, in the poll. And that's the one they ran with. But, and so a lot of people were posting that saying, I can't, you know, explain how big of a problem this is. And my question is, who is the Democratic Party right now? To the person answering that poll, like, who are you literally thinking of right now? Because it's nobody. I'll just. I'll already. I'll spoil that. It's nobody. There is nobody who is in charge of the Democratic Party. And so they're thinking, well, it's the last person I knew of. It's Newsom. It's whoever. And. Or it's. Or it's just. They're not. Right. It's Joe Biden. Or it's just the people who aren't doing enough to help me. Yeah, of course that's going to be the case. It's going to come down to the candidates. The candidates always matter. And so when you start getting people who show up, people like Gavin Newsom showing up, Pritzker showing up, Roy Cooper showing up suddenly to those local voters, well, I don't know about the Democratic Party nationally. I don't know about the dnc, but I like this guy, or I like this woman. I like this candidate. That is how you win races. So people are freaking out on the left that, oh, the Democrats are so unpopular. First you got to define the Democrats, and then you can ask people, are they popular? Don't just give them this generic label.

[Derek]

Yeah, I mean, this, this challenge with somebody like Trump is the structural difference between parties now, because Republicans are just like, whatever Trump says, that's our shit. Whatever the fuck he says, that's the whole party. It's easy. With Democrats, it's the polar opposite. We have no leadership. We also have different sects that are like, you know, they're pretty equally paced. Like, there's moderates and then there's the progressives, and they're big chunks of folks, and there's leaders of each of those groups. Like, it just becomes too complicated. So I agree, like, there's really not a way to, like, go, oh, all Democrats are doing it wrong. If anything, I'm just going to blame, like, the DNC and be like, hey, you need to figure out how to, like, kind of smush you guys together into some sort of coherent message that people can understand what we stand for. Because right now, we just don't have the same infrastructure. And that's like, one of the few things that's good for Republicans with having Trump is that you've kind of got like a Mafia boss who's like, fuck you, we're doing it my way. And, like, as much as that's a bad system for being president, it's kind of a good way to run a political party when you have just so many different bits and pieces. Like, you watch the Democrats without it, they're kind of running blind. So it's annoying.

[Tim]

People like that energy. It's just like, if nothing, if nobody's saying anything with conviction, they'll go to the person who's saying the thing 100%.

[Chris]

Well, that's the one thing that I think that Democrats should take away from this, because I agree, like, there's no national leader, so it's a little bit like imaginary Democrat versus Donald Trump is a weird thing to pull. But it does point to the fact that, like, you know, it doesn't really feel like Democrats are in Congress, are fighting very hard. And I think a lot of this is a perception game. And I saw someone say this the other day, and I was quite surprised about it because usually this guy loves the camera, but Chuck Schumer hasn't given an interview in over a month. He's a Senate minority leader. He's one of the people. Well.

[Derek]

Well, stay the fuck out of it.

[Chris]

Well, he's.

[Tim]

Next speech.

[Chris]

I understand that, but, like, if you are going to be a leader in the party, then you have to lead.

[Derek]

Yeah.

[Chris]

And I'm sorry, but leading is not hiding. And I get. I get this notion that, like, let Republicans light themselves on fire, but look at the polls. It's not like you have a huge opportunity here. And yes, their numbers are low, but your numbers are lower. Right. Because you aren't saying anything. So I. I understand some of that. Like, let them sync themselves with bbb. But, like, it's going to really. Like, this is going to cost people a lot, and there's going to be a lot of suffering. Yeah. And, like, I want to see more rage from Democrats. And we don't really see some. Some of them.

[Derek]

I see a good amount of rage.

[Chris]

Not from the leaders.

[Derek]

Maybe not the leaders. I see rage from people like voters, but I don't. I definitely don't see it from elected leaders.

[Rohit Chopra]

They.

[Derek]

The only one I see who's doing anything is Gavin Newsom. Like, Gavin Newsom is directly just attacking right now, which I think is a great roadmap for Democrats. They're not taking at the moment, but, like, even the fact that he was. He's suing Jesse Waters. Like, that's fucking A plus work the way he's doing that. Like, he's like, hey, you want to lie directly about me and completely misrepresent something that I could prove is wrong? Fuck you. I'll see you in court. And then he's like, well, I'll apologize. Like, nope, not good enough. I'll see you in court. That is the kind of tenor everybody wants to see from every single Democrat. I'm glad somebody I like is setting the tempo. But everybody's got it.

[Chris]

You know, that's the other lawsuit. There's another lawsuit from an elected politician.

[Derek]

Oh, the French with the.

[Chris]

Yeah. President Macron is suing. What's her face?

[Derek]

Candace Owens.

[Chris]

Candace Owens. Because Candace Owens keeps saying that his wife is. Was born a man. Like a very. A very obvious lie.

[Derek]

She called him a bully. She said this loss, like, you're bullying. It's like, do you know what did you say?

[Chris]

She. She is. She. Well, she stepped in it big time. And I think it's going to cost her a lot because they are now suing and she's going to lose.

[Derek]

Oh, yeah.

[Chris]

Like she is. Because. Because it is a lie. I mean, that's what she does. Right. She's a Nazi sympathizer. Like, and what's funny is, like, 10 years ago she was a progressive activist and tried to do this type of content and no one bought it. And then she completely changed all of her positions and now all of a sudden she's famous, but she is about to be the subject of a multimillion dollar judgment and it is going to be very bad for her. But I agree. I think the fighting stuff, like, look like you fight where you can fight. And I think.

[Evan]

Can we talk the right thing real quick about where Democrats need to like, put up or shut up right now?

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Evan]

And this is like not trying to derail anything. It's the third rail. Israel, Palestine. Like, over the weekend, the New York Times came out with an article that talked about how Israel has. The Israeli government has been lying for years now about Hamas stealing aid, and they justify not allowing any aid to make it into these starving 2 million starving Palestinians. Right. And we're just beginning to see the dam kind of break, I think, in a mainstream kind of way where people are saying maybe genocide isn't good no matter who does it.

[Chris]

Right.

[Evan]

We're just. We're two years over. Over two years into this conflict and we're finally just starting to see people talking about genocide is not good and we should not be paying for. For military weapons to send to an ally that is committing genocide.

[Derek]

Right. There's no question. I literally had friends over yesterday and we were talking about this and I said, if they asked me, because, you know, we do all this stuff like, well, were president, what would you do? Like, I would get the fuck out of supporting Israel 100%. Not, like, say, hey, we are against you and start fucking funding anybody you know on the other side of it. But you just go, look, if you're going to commit genocide, we don't give you money or ammunition.

[Chris]

Yeah.

[Tim]

Find a new president.

[Derek]

It's not that.

[Evan]

So today, today is Monday as we're recording this. And things are happening very fast. So who knows what this is going to look like by the time the episode drops. But Senator Angus King just issued a statement saying, I can't defend the indefensible. I am through supporting the actions of the current Israeli government and will advocate and vote for an end to any United States support whatsoever until there is a demonstrable change in the direction of Israeli policy. I personally, you know, I spent a year in the Middle east, right. The reason why I don't talk about Israel, Gaza is because what I am seeing Israel do to the Palestinians now is worse than what Americans did to Iraqis when I was there. I, I have seen people, not to the extent that Palestinians are starving right now, but I've seen people starve. I have seen people riot to try to get frozen chickens off of, off of my company's truck when they didn't have the propane to cook the chicken.

[Chris]

Right.

[Evan]

That is survivor's guilt, moral injury. I don't know what you want to call it, but it's fucking terrible and I hate to relive it well, but I have to right? Like, that is what our government is supporting right now and Democrats need to step the fuck up and say no more.

[Chris]

So there actually was an article in Politico New York Today that talks about. Because New York Democrats have 10 generally been the most supportive of Israel because New York City is the second largest population of Jewish people outside of Tel Aviv. So. And I've worked in it. I worked with our, with a governor that was, was a staunch supporter. This is where I think people are missing here, is that you can be against the Israeli government and Benjamin Netanyahu and still support Israel. And I think people are not, we are not having that conversation in the correct way. That what I'm hearing a lot of is, oh, you are critical of Bibi Netanyahu. You hate Israel, you don't want any, and that is not a fair place to be. I'm sorry. And I look like I, when October 7th happened, I did a video. You can go back and look where I supported Israel after that horrific crime that Hamas perpetrated. Right. And, but like the response back, which, yes, you are allowed to defend yourself, but they are mowing cities, don't exist anymore.

[Derek]

No, it's, they told people, they told.

[Chris]

People to go to safe zones where they would be safe refugees. And then they bombed them. They took, they took dead Palestinians and put them on the trucks of their cars and drove them through the cities that they were bombing. What the fuck is that? And I'm sorry. And I know there's a, there's a thing in war and like, yes, that was probably some very untrained soldiers. Doesn't matter. They can't wipe a whole population of people off the map. And that is exactly what they're doing. And that is exactly what Donald Trump is supporting as well. And I'll be honest, Joe Biden supported that too. And I was a Joe Biden supporter. And that what he did in Israel is going to be a stain on his legacy forever.

[Evan]

And it doesn't give us the, the moral authority to stand up to Russia as they commit genocide in Ukraine. Right, right. It simply doesn't. So it makes us, in our voices, irrelevant. And we've talked about this in earlier episodes. Most maga has no idea what the perception of United States is outside. They don't have friends outside the United States. They never go outside the United States.

[Chris]

United States.

[Evan]

But the rest of the world is making plans for their own governments to act as if the United States does not matter. And, and that I think people really need to internalize. We grew up, all of us grew up in what was considered by large parts of the world the indispensable nation. We are no longer the indispensable nation. Not to our allies, not to people who need aid to modernize. We are no longer it, We've lost the title.

[Tim]

For me, I understand, I mean, I understand fully how we got here. Because if you look at the 2024 election, you look at the demographics that Democrats lost, and then you say, what if you guys lost Jewish voters too? Because you fucked it up.

[Chris]

Right.

[Tim]

I, I, I understand. I mean, Paul, political wins and losses are not on the same, they're not on the same universe as human rights wins and losses. So let's make, let's say that now. But I do understand how non Jewish Democratic leaders could look at this and go, oh my God, we have another thing that we don't know how to navigate. And if we screw it up, we're going to lose 30% of our voters on top of the black men and the Hispanic men and all of the, you know, and so like politically, I mean, I haven't done a lot of videos about it because it's that difficult. But I also, I know probably a lot more about the history of Middle east conflict than the average American. And yet I still know about 3% of the history of Middle east conflict. It is for, from what I've read and learned, it's 20, 2500 years of constant conflict, constant war and atrocity and genocide. And this is why I'm not religious. One of the big reasons why I'm not religious is because religion is behind one way or the other. It's always a, it's always a card that's been played in every crusade, every genocide. It's always on the table. And so for, for so many reasons, I am like, I look at this and I'm like, I don't want to touch that with a 7,000 foot pole. But right when you see these, like, I have kids now and it, and it destroys me to see they, you know, New York Times published a whole bunch of photos of, of moms holding absolutely emaciated 2 year olds, kids who should be being swayed by their dad on a podcast, not, you know, stuck in, in Gaza hoping that they can find food. And if they can't find food, at least hoping they don't have a bomb dropped on their head. So, I mean, it's gotten so bad. Something absolutely has to change and things are starting to move. But it shouldn't have gotten this.

[Derek]

I want to say one thing to just on the political side of it, from a Jewish perspective, like, my whole family's Jewish. At least on my dad's side, my whole family's Jewish. And they are all Democrats. And if they took, if Democrats took a hard stance against Israel, they would lose none of those voters. I think that's an important thing for Democrats to understand is like, it's not just about, like, almost nobody is a single issue voter unless they're like truly entrenched within that space. But like, you know, us being Jewish doesn't make us look at Israel and go, they're great all the time. It's like, I mean, you know, like some of the people in my family are definitely a little more forgiving of the things that Israel does because of that heritage. But none of them are looking at it and going like, oh, if, if they take a hard stance on Gaza, I'm out. None of them. They all still vote for whoever the next candidate.

[Chris]

And here's, here's the reality. Most Israelis are against this war. So, so why can't we be like, just because we say that, like, we don't want this War. It doesn't. I'm not saying that I want Israel wiped off the map. I want the opposite of that. But like they are doing to Gaza what they are worried will happen to them. And it is very obvious. And Netanyahu has political and frankly personal reasons to keep this war going so that he doesn't have to be indicted. And I don't like, I just think that people, we have. Rich, you are a billion percent right. Democrats tried to play the both sides game and we ended up pissing off everybody because we didn't take a stand. I mean, even Kamala Harris's worst moment, I think on the campaign was when she, when she mocked some of the Palestinian protesters front row that right at the beginning. And like, yeah, it felt good because like they don't, you know, but like it was a devastatingly bad thing. And I think Dearborn, Michigan, where we lost like 100,000 votes, saw that and said, nope, because that is an Arab first population. And then finally what I will say is that, you know all these people who say, well then, you know, all these Magas mostly who say, like you, you know, well, those people just didn't support Hamas, it would be fine. And I'm like, what do you want a mom to do whose husband has been killed by the IDF and there is nobody else defending her? What is she going to do? Is she going to say no, not Hamas and then get a bullet in the back of the head? Or is she going to support the one person fighting back? Like, people just try to make this terrorism thing as a black and white issue. And the reality is most people are inherently good people who are in poor, desperate situations. They, they choose the thing that is going to keep them alive regardless of all the other things. And Americans, because we, we are so comfortable here, we don't have any of these problems. We are just incapable of understanding why somebody would do something like that.

[Tim]

Yeah, you see enough bad things happen and you start to say, okay, if this is the conversation we're having, if this is how this goes, then bad things are going to happen everywhere of the time until we get out of this. And so then at that point, it takes a leader or a movement or a revolution to stop the thing from happening. Because obviously when you get the family member killed and then you get revenge and then they get revenge, it just goes like that forever. And so I think it is absolutely essential and I wish I had, you know, if I could go back six months and tell myself to be a more vocal part of this. Israel is The Israel and the Israeli government and the Israeli people and Judaism are all different things conceptually and we can talk about them differently and separately. And Netanyahu is not the Israeli government, is not Israel is not the Israeli people. There are so many layers and, and it's that chaos versus clarity conversation that we always have with MAGA where they're chaos and we have to be able to, we can't just be chaos and return. We have to be able to have those more difficult, nuanced conversations and expect people to pause just for a moment, their emotional reactions to everything and, and allow themselves to be smart enough to hear the correct full fledged argument.

[Derek]

That's the hardest part.

[Evan]

What's crazy to me is that we, we give the benefit of the doubt to our so called enemy nations. Like I don't hate North Koreans, I don't hate Iranians, I don't hate, hate Russians.

[Chris]

Right.

[Evan]

I, I don't hate the Chinese. And both Republicans and Democrats in office very often make that distinction. They're like, the Iranian people are good. They are, are unfortunately controlled by an authoritarian government. They do not have realistic ways to depose that government without massive amounts of debt. Right.

[Chris]

Right.

[Evan]

Why if we can offer the benefit of the doubt to our supposed enemies, why can't we use the same logic for our allies and say that this government is fucked up, they are doing fucked up things. Genocide is bad no matter who does it. And we as Americans, as taxpayers, as voters should absolutely not support anyone, Democrat or Republican, who is going to continue funding genocide. Because we are all, we are all at fault. We, the United States. Whether you want to, if, if you're, I don't care if you're a fucking anarchist. It doesn't matter if you are eligible to vote in the United States. What the government does on your behalf, you are responsible for.

[Chris]

Yep.

[Evan]

Well, here's, so go ahead.

[Chris]

Well, here's another thing that people just don't know in the United States and I read about this the other day, it's fascinating, is one of the reasons that the, the war in Israel is so unpopular is because there are carve outs for ultra right wing nationalists on religious, on religious grounds, so they don't have to fight. But do you want to know who the most, the almost ardent supporters of that war are? The ones that don't fight. It's almost like it's the same thing with Vietnam and the Gulf War here where the poor and working class families are all putting up and then there's a group of elites that are like, oh I don't have to do that. Just, sure, go ahead at it. So Americans don't even know that these, these pieces that are going on here, but that's what, like, mentioning them. It's important because we can be against this war and against Benjamin Netanyahu, who is an evil, evil, evil man. Right. And not be, you know, anti Semitic, which is sometimes the charge that gets levied.

[Derek]

People who say that, I mean, we, we need to be able to say Israel is bad, Hamas is bad, but we support all the people of that region. Like, that's, that's the truth of the matter. Like, it's not complicated. And like, the Democrats attempted that in 24 and really it up because they just didn't actually take a hardline stance on anything. But, like, as a Jewish American, I sit here and go, please don't support Israel. Like, it's a terrible idea. It doesn't make me anti Semitic because I am very attached to my culture. I'm Jewish myself. I, you know, my, my family is very into the culture of being Jewish, but in no way, shape or form are we looking at Israel and going, thumbs up. Dude, you're doing awesome. It's like, no, you're committing genocide. It's genocide, flat out.

[Chris]

How do you argue. How does anybody argue opposite of that?

[Derek]

You can't. I mean, but, I mean, but here's the thing. Within my own family, there are people who would argue with that just because they, they are so entrenched in, like, well, Israel is, you know, it's important for us and our community. It's like, yeah, I understand that, but at the same time, like, I keep pushing back on them all the time of like, hey, there is a point where you have to give up this weird, like, cultural allegiance and just realize right and wrong. Right? There is a line for that. But even within that realm, like, it's not something where I know anybody who's like, so entrenched in it that they.

[Rohit Chopra]

Won'T change their mind.

[Chris]

We're also losing this battle because we have seen in the last few days the French have recognized Palestine as a state and they are pushing the United Kingdom to do so as well. Canada also has recognized Palestine as a. So Bibi is like, he is losing everywhere, and he is actually going to end up with the thing that he doesn't want, which is the entire world probably minus us, recognizing Palestine as its own country. Right. And that's going to cause all kinds of different problems for him. I mean, he is an idiot. First of all, an evil idiot. I mean he's not an idiot. I mean he's a smart guy because he's doing a lot of evil shit. But it's all coming like it's all going to end up in a place.

[Rohit Chopra]

That he doesn't want.

[Derek]

Yeah, he's not long term game planning very well. Yeah, it's very reactionary. I mean that's what happens too. Like the same thing happened for, with us after 9 11. Like all the shit that cascaded after that was just overreaction based on emotion. It's the same shit that happened after October 7th. It's like, well, here we go. It's you know, one terrorist attack versus a fucking giant genocide. Probably not proportional. You know, it's the same thing with us. We're like, maybe we shouldn't have gone to Iraq for, you know, however many fucking years we were there.

[Chris]

Oh you think, do you mean the country that had absolutely nothing to do with 911 whatsoever and then we killed a million of their people?

[Derek]

Exactly. But that's, we lost how many?

[Tim]

Well, yeah, just to maybe wrap up this conversation, I think we're probably getting close to the end as it is. But I wanted to make sure I encouraged all Democrats, but especially people, if you're like me and you're in a place where you're thinking, you know, do I have the air cover from the Jewish community to have a strong opinion about this? The answer is yes. But what really blew my mind was, and I'll probably say his name wrong, but Mandy Patinkin. Patinkin. I thinkin Rachel, he's a, he is a Jewish actor who played Inigo Montoya and in Princess Bride. And I didn't know, you know, how he was going to come down on this. He popped up on my feed and I ended up watching a lengthy, maybe five, six minute impassioned speech calling Israel's response to Gaza or Israel's actions in Gaza unconscionable. Comparing them to revenge business actually from Princess Bride. But and, and asks, and this was just published on July 12th so not long ago, and asks the Jewish community, is this acceptable and sustainable? And after watching that, it's like, okay, we have, we have everything we need. Like just, just stop, don't, don't, don't tiptoe around this because to Chris's point, the world is planning to lead without us because we're not leading anymore.

[Derek]

Worry about right and wrong.

[Tim]

It can't be. That can't be the future for us.

[Chris]

And let's reiterate being against the genocide in in Gaza is not anti Semitic.

[Derek]

Not at all.

[Chris]

And I think that's what a lot of people. I mean, I've been worried about it too, so. Well, with.

[Evan]

I mean, dude, I, it is, that is something that I take so fucking personally. I'm. I'm holding a baby Jew in my arms right now. Like, my, my last name is is Goldsmith. I am, I am not Jewish. I grew up on Long Island. Half the world was Jewish when I grew up.

[Chris]

Right.

[Evan]

Like, all of my, my best friends, family, like, right. People have come at me for expressing, like, saying, what is happening right now in Palestine because of the Israeli military, the IDF forces is very similar to what I witnessed in Iraq, except it's worse because we understood, you commit a war crime, you're fucked. You're done, you're. You're over. Like, you are spending the rest of your life in fucking Leavenworth.

[Derek]

Yep.

[Evan]

But we don't see that in the idf. The IDF keeps going, oh, oh, we bombed the hospital.

[Tim]

I was.

[Evan]

That was legit. Like, like, oh, we, we killed fucking 40 people to get one terrorist. Like, the logic that the IDF uses is exactly the same logic that Hamas uses.

[Chris]

Yeah, exactly.

[Tim]

Because they're one to one.

[Evan]

It is the same fucking logic. They're like, oh, we killed civilians. Well, you know, everyone. It's mandatory service in, in Israel. So they're all soldiers, right?

[Derek]

That's the thing, right? That's true. Like Hamas embeds themselves in civilian areas on purpose. Like, that's what they do. And Israel ignores civilians on purpose. That's what they do. Like, they're doing the exact same thing. They're just, you know, there's a complete disregard for how the average person is going to get affected there by both sides of this thing.

[Evan]

It's just, I can tell you from, from experience, right? I have been shot at by terrorists from a crowd and my entire platoon did not return fire. I'm sure that a couple of us had a clean enough shot, but we understood that in an alleyway, if you fire one round, the round follows the wall and anyone close to the wall is very likely to get hit. So all of us refrained from firing. IEDs are going off, we're, you know, we're surrounded. Like, I remember this like it was yesterday. Not one of us returned fire because we were surrounded by crowds. That, that is the discipline that I had as a 19 year old. And to. For anyone who excuses IDF troops being like, oh, well, they were reservists, they got called up, I spent. I don't Know, three months in basic training, like four months with my unit and went straight to Iraq. That was enough time. And I, and I didn't grow up surrounded by veterans who, who like, you know, had their own weapons and like that. That was not the culture I grew up in. I still had the self discipline not to murder innocent people.

[Chris]

Right.

[Derek]

And the training, the IDF's not training that they're training the opposite.

[Rohit Chopra]

Yep.

[Chris]

Yeah. Well, guys, do you want to talk about the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau? We, we, we have had, we have had some of the best pivots in this episode too, because Chris took us down a path too, which we were expecting. But it was a really good conversation.

[Derek]

I like it.

[Chris]

But yes. So like there's, there's terrible stuff internationally and now you're about to learn, well, you're about to learn a little bit about good things that both the Obama and Biden administrations did with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. But now you're going to hear about how they're basically stopping all that so that their millionaire billionaire friends can get.

[Derek]

Really positive episode we got going on.

[Evan]

Can I, can I just do one, one last thing? It's not going to be angry. So this is, this is a reading assignment. I personally do not like the author, but I think it's still worth reading. It's called the Girl who Stole My Holocaust by Noam Hyatt. I personally don't like the author. He annoys the shit out of me. But it is the perspective of an IDF soldier who comes to a realization after seeing the fear in a young girl's eyes as he presented as a soldier in front of her young Palestinian girl. In that moment, that's all it took for him to, to gain his conscience back because he had justified everything that the Israeli military had ever done to the Palestinian people because of the Holocaust. So I want to encourage people to read this book. Again, I don't like the author. I don't think in real life we could be friends. But the story, you can learn from it. So sorry, Tim. We can talk about cfpb and.

[Chris]

I.

[Evan]

Promise I will be less emotional on that side.

[Chris]

You get more, you get more. We got some anger on this side. We're going to get a bit of a more cerebral take, but there's some funny parts in it, so definitely stick around. And yeah, our interview with Rohit Chopra begins right now. All right, everybody, we have a great guest today. We have somebody that is on the left and has the honor of being both hired and fired by Donald Trump, the former director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Rohit Chopra is with us. He was also on the Federal Trade Commission as well. And he's going to tell us all about how important the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is and how Donald Trump is a fake populist. So, Rohit, thank you for joining us today.

[Rohit Chopra]

Thanks for having me.

[Chris]

So I want to talk a little bit about your journey because people probably are like, wait, you were hired, you're a Democrat and you were hired by Donald Trump. Can you kind of explain a little bit how that, how that worked and what that experience was like?

[Rohit Chopra]

Sure. So in 2017, I was put forward by Donald Trump to be one of the two Democratic members of the Federal Trade Commission. And this has been something that there's lots of these commissions and boards, and typically you choose two people from the other party. And what we actually see today is that he's firing them, in many cases illegally firing them. And now I see it more as just censoring people and not wanting to have someone inside that is expressing a different point of view.

[Chris]

And what was the process? Because you are one of the very few Democrats ever to been nominated by, by Donald Trump, obviously out of necessity like you, you know, I'm sure he wasn't gonna pick you because you want, you know, because of your background. But I'm just how, how was that process like? It's, that's a, you're in a very unique position that most people have not experienced before.

[Rohit Chopra]

Yeah, it's interesting. The way it often works is that the senators kind of flex their muscles too. They say, you know what, we want to make sure that if you're putting forth majority members of these commissions and boards, you got to put people who are on the minority as well. So it kind of greases the skids a little bit. And that's how it's worked actually for decades. But now I think you see something very different, which is how do they weaponize each of these institutions and rather having law enforcement really focus on crime. Now law enforcement, it feels like, is picking and choosing winners and losers in the economy or in some cases, those who favor the President's agenda.

[Chris]

Shocker. Yeah. Well, and then let's move. So you, you know, you were in that position for a couple years, and then Joe Biden wins the presidency and then he nominates you to be the next director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which if those of you who don't know what that is. It was a bureau that was created during the Obama administration. It was something that was championed by Senator Elizabeth Warren and she was the first director of it. And there have been a few cents. But you were both there with Elizabeth Warren and then became the director. Right. So you are the perfect person to tell our audience how important the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is not only from a national level, but from, from people's pocketbooks as well.

[Rohit Chopra]

Yeah, I think a lot of people often feel overwhelmed by thinking about finance and loans. But what they don't feel overwhelmed about is knowing how much the system feels like it has been rigged against them. It feels that something in the fine print is a gotcha. It feels like the whole system is tilted toward those who are big and powerful. And this isn't about necessarily, you know, regulating or protecting. This is actually about making sure that Wall street and the financial system are actually serving America and not just serving the themselves. And what we saw, and I know some of us served in the Obama administration, we saw how the response to the financial crisis really did not fully address or fix some of those huge abuses of power by big financial institutions. But what we did see though was finally an agency with a real law enforcement enforcement power to crack down on the worst abuses when it comes to mortgages, credit cards, auto loans and so much more. And the fact that it didn't exist was one of the big reasons we had a massive financial crisis before the cfpb, the Federal Reserve and other agencies were in charge of regulating this. And we all are seeing how the Federal Reserve often is much more attuned to the needs of Wall street rather than the needs of Main Street.

[Tim]

Yeah, it's funny, I worked in like real estate marketing and then the credit union industry for seven years through the entire great recession and recovery. And so seeing it firsthand, people don't understand, especially like the young voters who, you know, it's easy to be, to be enticed with the like, government's too big and there's too many regulations. But like every one of those regulations as we know is, you know, paid for either in blood or in somebody's lost home in this case. But people could buy a house on stated income back then and there was so much greed in the system, it was just embedded at every checkpoint. So that if, if, let's say I'm self employed and I want to buy a half a million dollar house, I could go to a bank and say I make $300,000 a year and they would say, congratulations, here's a mortgage. And then a machine would sign the loan and then they would immediately sell the loan to another bank. As a plus quality debt. And this is how of course the whole housing market imploded. But you multiply that by 5 million and you've got whole bunch of people who say that they make some amount of money that they don't. And maybe they might actually work in real estate or entitled companies. And so they're part of this balloon that's being inflated. And so like it's all, you know, everybody's just building a house of cards and there was nobody watching out and saying, well, you can't actually afford that, you know, and the consumer wants a bigger house and the lender wants the commission and the realtor wants a commission and then they offload it at the highest level and call it an investment for other people to put their retirement accounts in. I'm like, this is the kind of shit that the system does to itself and to us. Because like the system is not people, right? It's just, it's just numbers being traded. And as long as everybody gets their cut, it worked out for everyone, except for all of the people who then had houses they couldn't afford and they all lost their jobs. Turned out none of the money was real. And then you were 300, $400,000 upside down on your mortgage and you had to either have your house taken from you by the bank or you had to short sell it and take like a 200 point hit on your credit. I mean this, this was not long ago. This was a real thing and it destroyed the whole economy. And the CFPB was one of the major things that came around, right, to make sure that this would never happen again.

[Rohit Chopra]

And can I also say there was so many aftershocks, including all of those families who lost so much home equity or even face foreclosure, you know, guess what, they didn't have any money to help their kid go to college. And afterward we saw a massive run up of student loan debt. We saw the same neighborhoods that were affected by the foreclosure crisis were also the ones that got hit by opioids. And guess what? These were also some of the same places that were really hit hard by the trade agreements of the 1990s and 2000s as well. And I think it really speaks to who, who is actually caring about the real economy and people who are actually busting their ass to try and make it. And where are the regulators and law enforcement when it comes to big multibillion dollar frauds? I mean, I'll never, I can't remember exactly, I'm paraphrasing But Alan Greenspan, the famed Fed chair, went on Jon Stewart's show many years ago and was asked about the financial crisis. And he said something like, I guess we made a mistake by letting the banks regulate themselves.

[Tim]

This is possibly thought that would be the case.

[Rohit Chopra]

When you have that much power to dictate where money flows, that's like having the power to determine who gets electricity, who gets core power in the economy. And when we let it be sitting with just a handful of people, I think that really spells trouble for what could happen to the rest, for sure.

[Derek]

I mean, it sort of speaks to the central concept of what Republicans think of when they think of capitalism is like, let the private and free market decide, right? And it's like, well, maybe sometimes, no, maybe that's a horrendous idea when you're letting all the people who have the most to gain decide how to rig the system. You know, I've heard that argument over and over and over again from people and it's just like, I don't understand what more you need to see. After 2008 happened to realize that's a terrible idea. And it just, it's absurd. I mean, my, my question is the Doge factor in the whole thing, right? Because obviously that was the critical point where everything just went awry with the whole, you know, with the second Trump administration. But there were other elements of this that were alarming from the Doge perspective. The, the one was, to me, that was one of the scariest things was it seems like they were getting access to consumer data through this. Is that true? Were they actually going in and like being able to just access individual consumer level data?

[Rohit Chopra]

Well, they fired me. And a few days later, Elon Musk and Doge got in. And our understanding is that they obtained access that I wouldn't have even wanted to request because you want to make sure that that information is hugely protected. You know, many people tell me one of the reasons they think I was fired, I don't know if this is true, is that a few days, few days prior, a few months prior, there was X. You know, formerly Twitter inked a deal to start something called X Money. This is a way to kind of create social media into a banking and payments platform. Kind of what we see.

[Tim]

That's what I've been waiting for, honestly, that's, that's the consumer, that's the consumer problem I have faced my entire life is I couldn't send money through social media.

[Rohit Chopra]

Well, I think, or save all my.

[Tim]

Money in social media.

[Rohit Chopra]

This is what you see with a lot of big tech companies, Apple, Google, and remember, Facebook tried to create its own currency in 2019, which didn't, didn't get off the ground. That was something the CFPB was really looking into because we saw how that's being used in China to surveil people. And ultimately, I think the holy grail is they want to use personalized pricing, be able to give you an individualized price based on your behavioral map, your social map, who you've called. Maybe they know you're grieving, maybe they know you're excited. And so we were worried about all of the ways that payments and data could be used against you. And so during my term, we actually did a lot of looking into this, and there was a lot of worry, including from some of the banks, that what is doge creeping on? Right? What are they? What is this kind of government sanction Peeping Tom? And what are they sharing with other companies, maybe to their potential competitors? We don't know. But I think it raises all of these conflicts, questions when there is not a clear reason of why you want to defund the police that look after Wall Street. CFPB was an agency that recovered billions of dollars. I think during my term, we obtained, I think, close to $10 billion in refunds and penalties, which went to millions of people across the country who were cheated by the likes of Wells Fargo or, or Citibank, other big companies who needed to be made whole. And this affected people across the country, every single part of America, and the fact that they wanted to kill this agency. Elon Musk tweeted, delete the cfpb.

[Chris]

Right.

[Rohit Chopra]

And I think this is all part of wanting to destroy some of the core checks over powerful institutions in the private sector, especially those on Wall street and on Silicon Valley.

[Chris]

So you had 11 days of overlap or something like that with the Trump administration. When you were there for those days, did you have any interactions with them? Or is it sort of like you were left to your own, you know, to run the. The agency? And then I've always wondered this myself because it's never happened to me. But, like, how do you find out that you are terminated by the President? Does he call you apprentice style, or. Which I assume is not true, or the recording, or like, does the Treasury Secretary, how does that work?

[Rohit Chopra]

Yeah, so there's a number of positions throughout the government that served what's known as fixed terms. They don't necessarily change with the President, the FBI director, the CFPB director. There's a. There's a, the commissioner of the irs. You know, I took a five year, I was confirmed for a five year term and I took an oath to discharge that. And I didn't feel it was appropriate to resign. I know others in the administration did. I felt it was important to serve every day until I could. And we kept business going. We even did an enforcement action. We kept doing our work that was in service of people who were just trying to use their credit card. Right. And I found out in a letter it was, it was transmitted by email. And I think, though, those 11 days were actually really tough because you saw a series of executive orders that were attempting really to fundamentally change the agencies, I think in ways that were designed to undermine and destroy some of that, especially that key law enforcement. And I think to this day, the cfpb, it's been nearly six months, has not done a single enforcement action. They did one settlement on the cheap, and they have done a series of pardons, including over some of the biggest financial companies on the planet, by essentially ending litigation that was years ongoing. And in one case, they are even seeking to return the penalty that was agreed to by a mortgage company caught for discrimination. And what, what kills me is that that that case was brought by my predecessor, nominated by President Trump. Trump. So it is all, there is now a perception that there is a new way in which you can dodge accountability, that you can go to someone and make some deal and with no explanation to the public, have all your crimes against consumers or whoever it may be, be completely just washed away.

[Chris]

So are you suggesting that Donald Trump is a fake populist?

[Rohit Chopra]

Well, it's. You know what's funny? The while I, during those 10, 11 days, there was all sorts of conservative rags, you know, publishing things. Why haven't he, why hasn't he fired him yet? And he gives a speech at Davos that really goes after bank of America and JPMorgan Chase and actually goes after their CEOs by name. And so I think there is a desire to really want to appear that they're, they're going after the big guys, but then on the other side of the ledger, they're pardoning those same companies for serious issues and massively deregulating those banks in ways that could really create more risk of another financial crisis or another kind of Silicon Valley bank meltdown. So I think that's it. We're hearing one thing, but this substance is completely different.

[Tim]

Well, I think this is one of the opportunities for the left where somehow we still haven't figured out how to make this argument. And I even look at like the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, like the name, just putting like bureau in it. We should have called like the Big Bank Killer Task Force or something like that. Because like we had Joe Walsh on, you know, and he, he came out of the Tea Party movement. He's, he, he's a Democrat now. He very much wants the Democratic Party to embrace populism. And I think that is one place when you look at the attack on the Constitution and the attack on the rights. The Tea Party movement was a response to, in many, in, in I think large part the, the bailouts of the big banks. Because let's all also remember that millions of people lost their homes and then went through these cascading consequences that, that happen when you have a really hard fall like that. And all of the big banks were too big to fail and so they all got bailed out. And so the, like that level of populist rage from the Tea Party movement is correct. It was of course misplaced the rage. But we should have been able to harness the Tea Party rage if we had harnessed populism itself. Because CFPB is a populist movement. I mean, it's a populist tool. It's a tool to protect us, protect the workers and the people from abusive bureaucrats essentially, and lobbyists and bankers and, and those are the people who got the most help. So we know we're the ones trying to do this right. How do we, I mean, may open question for the team. How you do, how do we reclaim, how do we keep doing what we're doing but say it in a way that people actually understand so they're not listening to 2Face McGee over here saying he's a populist while he bails out and pardons corrupt bankers.

[Rohit Chopra]

Well, let me jump in first, which is that it was not just the Tea Party, we also had Occupy Wall street in some ways, of course, having some of the same anger. And I agree. I don't think we should be telling people and teaching people about each agency an acronym. What they need to know is that their government is not a lap dog for some of these big powerful players. But it is a watchdog and it is actually delivering. And I think that we tend to, I see some of the politicians kind of communicate with all, all these complexities and we should have an aggressive agenda that really puts into place strong, bright line bans on practices that everyone is sick and tired of. But it feels like the politicians are trying to just make everybody happy and I do think that we saw it. We have to have the courage to learn on this. We have seen past administrations of both parties seek to placate those with lots and lots of money in power. And I just think the country really knows that they want their government to stand up to that, not to bow down to it.

[Chris]

Well, let me ask you this. This is a tough question for Democrats and especially for Democrats in the Obama administration, because obviously you mentioned, you know, the Occupy movement and Sunrise, along with a lot of the anger on the right and just the fact that, you know, we almost hit an economic depression and that we lost. You know, we got murdered in the 2010 midterms, two years after we came in and did a lot of fixing. A lot of people have said of a critique of the administration that both and I were part of was that we didn't prosecute anybody for what happened with those banks. There was a lot of shady, possibly illegal activity that was going on and taking advantage of people, and no one was held accountable. Was that a miss on our part? Is. Does the next person that's running for president need to be more forceful in prosecuting financial crimes, or was this all misunderstanding and the regulations were just not strong enough?

[Rohit Chopra]

Yeah, I mean, I think we have an issue when it comes to accountability and law enforcement. I do really feel like if you are a janitor somewhere and somehow you're caught, you know, taking. Taking something on the job, you're quickly arrested and you may actually go to prison. But it feels like when it comes to very large companies, whether it's the opioid crisis, whether it's the mortgage crisis, whether it's the privacy crisis in social media. I mean, I really saw this upfront when I was at the Federal Trade Commission. Facebook was caught aggressive, egregiously breaking the law, and rather. And it was very obvious that individual executives could be liable. But under the last Trump administration, we got out. I got outvoted. The settlement was a $5 billion fine and a bunch of paperwork, and Facebook stock popped. So there is a complete contradiction between how individuals go through our justice system and how those truly at the top two. And I personally think this extends on so many levels. And, you know, I wasn't. I think you're right to ask this question that, did the Justice Department do everything it could to hold people accountable, responsible for, in some cases, major nationwide fraud? I don't have all the facts, but I'm pretty positive It's. It's clear they did not.

[Evan]

I think that failing the. It is an American. It's part of our DNA to let the bad guys get away with anything. It is. The original sin of America was slavery.

[Chris]

Right.

[Evan]

The next greatest sin that America committed was a failure. A failure to punish those who sought to continue slavery, seceding from the nation. Right. Keeping human beings as, as, as slaves. We saw the same thing with, with the Great Recession. We saw the same thing with January six.

[Chris]

Right.

[Evan]

Because we fail to punish those who try to destroy our democracy. And all of these things are rooted in white supremacy. Everything I've just named is rooted in white supremacy because we fail to punish the rich and the powerful. Like we are still tied to America's original sin.

[Chris]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I do think that, you know, we obviously did not prosecute the most important person on January 6th, but know, I, I do think that at.

[Tim]

Least the, the shaman guy.

[Chris]

Oh, he went to jail.

[Derek]

He did, didn't he?

[Evan]

You know, the shaman is, is now criticizing Trump.

[Tim]

He's, he's out breaking up with him over Epstein. He's out and he hates Trump. Yeah.

[Chris]

Well, yeah, I mean, it just all points with this, with these Trump guys, right? Like, it just points that, that they're going to let their rich bodies off the hook. I mean, we're seeing with Jeffrey Epstein right now why it's still in the news is because Trump won't release the report that he's very clearly in or the files that he's in. And now Ghisn Maxwell is like as or as petitioned to the Supreme Court as of today for an appeal. So we don't know what's going on with that. But something I would, going back to CFPV for a second, like you guys were working on some big project or big cases that would have meant not a windfall, but a return, like a, a penalty for. I think it was banks going, you know, targeting low income people and others. Can you explain a little bit about what you, what you guys were working on, hoping to do that the Trump administration shut down?

[Rohit Chopra]

Yeah, well, to be clear, they've kind of shut down everything.

[Chris]

Right.

[Rohit Chopra]

It was though, a really broad way of looking not just at the things that have been long occurring, you know, redlining and mortgage, but also the new digital types of crimes. What involving data brokers who have information and can sell it to stalkers, scammers and spies. You know, dealing with all of the newfangled products like buy now, pay later and other things that are marketed online that have gotten so big. We were putting into place also some really important rules that would allow people to get some power back and to fire their bank or financial company that was giving them bad service. Our rule would allow people to switch their bank, almost like you can switch your mobile carrier by taking your phone number with you. And we have seen how now all of this is gone away. And I think this is really important. We don't want to be in the mode of just protecting people. We are actually wanting to shift power back to people. That's really what we were doing. And what Lina Khan at the Federal Trade Commission was so transformative with is shifting power back to individuals, to businesses. I've written a lot about how the rules have been rigged against farmers, against pharmacists, against all of these people just trying to make a living. But again and again and again, you really see how that is just not happening. And it is the people at the top who control some of these big companies. They are the ones getting rewarded. And it's not good for our long term economy. And it is not good, I think, to satisfy the real issues people are dealing with. On cost of living, that was everywhere I trapped. Every state I went to was about monthly bills, you know, and people think about the rent, they think about groceries because they're walking down the aisles all the time. But, you know, they were also really feeling it on their credit card bill, their credit card bill, the interest rate. The Fed had raised interest rates, but the credit card companies, just a couple of them, really raised them dramatically higher, raised a lot of questions about their pricing. And in 2022, I think Americans paid about $125 billion in interest in fees to credit cards. There was more bills. Their, their homeowners insurance was skyrocketing. Their auto loans that they were paying were getting bigger. And I think that this is really squeezing people to the brink. And what I'm seeing is really no action to deal with these core costs that people, people are facing every day or every month. And I think that people just want. And many of them, I think, who voted for Donald Trump were hoping he would do something about it, but it seems like really nothing has changed.

[Chris]

Yeah. Are you, are you suggesting that the tariffs are not putting money back into people's pockets? Is that I was told the tariff.

[Tim]

We'Re going to get a tariff check.

[Chris]

We're going to get a tariff check.

[Rohit Chopra]

Yeah, I think it was, it was amazing to see, you know, they were proposing tariffs, you know, on penguins, on Canada.

[Chris]

Right.

[Rohit Chopra]

And I think that now, and when we're taping this, it's really recently when there's A trade deal announced with the European Union and there's all sorts of fine outside the tariffs. There's all these fine print now that they're engaging in. And we really worry that a lot of this is just big giveaways in the fine print again of these trade deals. And I think that that is not going to be something that is going to be good for people. And I think everyone, we can have a debate about, you know, reasonable people can think that maybe we need higher tariffs on China. You know, I think we probably do. But I think the penguins in Canada and the fine print, I mean, this is, this is not, this is not on the up and up.

[Tim]

But see if I could go to the southern tip of South America and, and in an airport there was a duty free penguin section that would make all of this worth it. Bring like five penguins back. No tariffs.

[Rohit Chopra]

Well, I don't know, maybe the Fish and Wildlife service is closed, Tim.

[Chris]

Oh, yeah.

[Rohit Chopra]

No one to inspect it or.

[Chris]

Rohit was giving me a little bit of flack about the Interior Department before we came on, which was, which was well deserved. Yeah, well, and also the European Union deal isn't. They put a 15% tariff on their goods. Right. So doesn't that make them 15% more expensive for the American public? Like, I don't know. They've been spinning this as a win, I think, because they had to, because they said they were going to make 100 deals in 100 days and they made zero in 100 days and so now they're like trickling out. But yeah, I think you're right. I think that like, these are not, these are wins. So he can say he has a win and like everything when he negotiates, we lose because he's one of the worst negotiators in history. But I know we got you. You've got to bounce here in a second. I'm going to ask you one question that's more of a political question. So obviously silly season is about to start. Candidates for president are probably in the next year or so going to be announcing because it's going to be the longest presidential campaign in modern history, I'm sure. What are some of the lessons, if you, if you were to advise the Democrats, what are some of the lessons from your time Both in the FTC and the, and the CFPB. CFPB. I've been out of D.C. for a while, so my, my acronym speaks a little off. But what, how would you advise them to talk about like these regulatory issues and how Donald Trump is actually just making rich people richer.

[Rohit Chopra]

Yeah. I think that we need everyone gets that we need law enforcement. We need law enforcement to really watch over whether it's, you know, a school crossing card or at the mall or wherever it is. I think that we want always law enforcement to be fair, to follow the facts. But when we just muzzle and silence or fire all of the law enforcement that looks over big companies, we feel that pain in so many ways that we may not even get. So I hope that people will be able to talk about we need a government that actually is willing to stand up to powerful people, you know, whether it's a mob boss or whether it is a company that is defrauding people at scale. I'm not a political consultant, but I just feel it is crazy to do what Alan Greenspan said to Jon Stewart and just let companies regulate themselves. I don't think that's ever worked in the entirety of American history.

[Chris]

No. And it's surprising to see the Fed chair saying this after we were losing a million jobs per month that like such a flippant response. But I think it just points to the fact that, you know, in this country we have always favored the rich and powerful and I think it was probably second nature to him. It's also weird that his wife was a reporter for NBC for a long time which felt like little bit conflict be. But you know, anyways they're, they're both retired now, so I guess we don't have to talk about them anymore. But anyways, Rohit Chopra, thank you very much. Former director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. You guys did a lot of amazing work and I'm glad we could tell a little story about the billions of dollars that you helped to return to American taxpayers. So hopefully we'll have you back again. And thanks for joining us.

[Rohit Chopra]

Thanks so.

[Chris]

Much.