← The Jim Acosta Show
The Jim Acosta Show
A Great Conversation with Democracy Warrior Norm Eisen as America Turns 250
00:25:31
Loading summary
Transcript64 lines
- [00:00]
A
All right, we're at a thousand. We're at a thousand. And we're going to. We're going to kick off. Jim, let's start with making sense of the blockbuster Supreme Court week. You know, I had, in the space of 24 hours, I had two and a half landmark decisions at that very end of the term that I brought home for our wonderful clients and our wonderful contrarians, our paid subscribers support our litigation work. We had the Lisa cook case, defending Dr. Cook, the Fed, and the independence of our monetary system that is so essential to all Americans. Donald Trump would drive your cost of living even further into the toilet if we hadn't stopped him. We had birthright citizenship. Oh, my God, Jim. The moms called me, who I had worked with, and said, thank you for saving our families, for saving our babies, and for what we did for all Americans and the rule of law, if Donald Trump could line out birthright citizenship. And then we represented the Latino community, Latino American community, your community. Through Lulu in Watson, we filed a brief defending mail in ballot and ballots, and that was successful. But, Jim, I was so fascinated. I'm going to write about this in my publisher's note, because when I went out and did the obligatory media appearances, people were much more focused on what was lost slaughter, the loss of the independent agencies, TPS asylum, the immigration losses, and trans athletes. And I can't deny, on the one hand, there were tremendous wins. On the other hand, devastating losses. What do you make of it all as this moment in our democracy?
- [02:07]
B
Yeah, Norman, it's a big question, and I can't comment on this as well as you can, but I'll take a stab at it. I mean, I probably was the most shocked. You know, I was talking with my team about whether we should go live and do coverage after the birthright citizenship decision. And I thought, well, if it's upheld, is that big news? You know, should we. And it wasn't struck down. And I thought, well, let's do it anyway. And I'm so glad I did, because, you know, it. You know, Adam Klassfeld came on. Olivia Troy came on. Congresswoman Veronica Escobar came on. We had a great discussion. And Norm, I mean, the fact that birthright citizenship survived almost by the skin of its teeth is shocking to me. And I know that, you know, it was technically a 6:3 decision, but it was sort of like five and a half to four and a half.
- [02:57]
A
Exactly. That's exactly what I said when I was making my rounds.
- [03:02]
B
I know. And I just think that that's Not a close call if it's in the Constitution. And I just think that, and I had this conversation with Mark Elias yesterday and he was making the point about, you know, campaign finance and that, you know, we had the same laws, you know, by and large, for the last 30 years or so. It's the composition of the court that has changed over the last 30 years. And so little by little, they've chipped away and pulled strings out of the tapestry of campaign finance laws we've had in this country. And now it's just this heap of mess on the floor. And, you know, I just think that those two decisions right there really underline that we have, in my view, a very partisan Supreme Court right now. And the way that in your, your case, the Lisa Cook case, you know, I, yes, it's gratifying that they didn't allow Trump to willy nilly just get rid of Lisa Cook for trumped up reasons, but at the same time that in the Slaughter case, now Trump can just replace heads of independent agencies. So I mean, feel free to pick apart my legal analysis there. I just think that the three branches of government, the checks and balances, took some hits during this.
- [04:12]
A
You know, I'll say to this, of course, you're right. I do think that there's, and I had this fight all over CNN and MSNBC for days because first it was Cook, then it was, then it was Bir where I was saying the glass is half full. And my friends, and they are, my friends were saying to me, well, Norm, the glass is at least half empty.
- [04:43]
B
Isn't everything these days? No.
- [04:45]
A
And I think we need to be able to. And it's very appropriate for the 250th. Cause that's the story of America too. We had an idea that all men are created equal. And of course what it really meant was all white men.
- [05:01]
B
That's right.
- [05:02]
A
And slowly, slowly and even, you know, and what it really meant was all white land owning.
- [05:13]
B
Correct. Right.
- [05:14]
A
Because the franchise did not extend. And really what we've, the whole history of America is this glass half full, glass half empty. What an amazing idea. It has lit the world of fire for a quarter of a millennium, for 250 years. But we've never quite achieved it. And we've often had substantial backsliding and now we're in a period of, I don't know when we've seen democracy backsliding like this. Maybe since, you know, certainly since the civil rights and Jim Crow era and probably you could go back further. So I Think we need to address it. We need to talk about both. We need to address the situation. Jim, I'm gonna take you to the solution. Term limits. If we had a rule that every president gets to appoint two Supreme Court justices, it's constitutional, it's lawful. I came out for it years ago. Think about it. If that rule had been in place through two terms of Obama, a first term of Trump, a term of Biden and now a new term of Trump, you would have a 63 majority of sanity. We're not asking for special democratic socialist, democratic socialist rulings from the Supreme Court. Just we had a set of campaign finance rules. We've had birthright citizenship acknowledged by the Supreme Court since 1898. It shouldn't be a 5, 4 matter. They shouldn't be overturning this settled law and campaign finance or throwing out Humphreys executor independent agencies. We've had that for, we've had that since fdr.
- [07:19]
B
Yeah, I mean I know in my thing Norm, is, is okay, let's game this out. What if Clarence Thomas and Alito had been successful in overturning birthright citizenship? I think sometimes they're just trolls and they're just throwing caustic opinions out there just to get everybody riled up because are we going to put Stephen Miller in charge of deciding who gets to stay in the country if we repeal birthright citizenship? And my sense of it, Norm, is, is that this five and a half to four and a half decision on the Supreme Court is a signal that we're in for a multi year, multi decade battle over what is citizenship in this country. Much like the far right has, has done this with abortion. This took a generation for them to overturn Roe versus Wade. And I think the Stephen Miller's at the. Keep in mind Stephen Miller is in his 40s. He's going to be fighting over this until he, you know, until he's very long in the tooth. And I, you know, Mike, you know, you were saying, well we're not asking for democratic socialist decisions from the Supreme Court but we're getting far right MAGA decisions from the Supreme Court. And you know I, I totally agree with you in terms of reform and solutions. I think that it's high time that we have term limits on Supreme Court justices. They should only be able to serve, you know, 15 to 20 years, something along those lines. And then, and then you're, you're gone. And then we wouldn't have this arms race of let's, let's nominate somebody in their 40s and in their 30s. I mean, what's next? We're going to nominate, you know, kids right out of law school, you know, like, because that person will be on the Supreme Court for 60 years. It's nuts. It's insane. And I know, and Heather Cox Richardson was saying to me the other day that we shouldn't be talking about this, but I, you know, I, maybe I can't help myself, but I do think that.
- [09:02]
A
Why does she think that? Well, she thinks that it's not politically unwise.
- [09:07]
B
I think she thinks it's politically unwise, and she's probably right to have these conversations. But I also think there's a case be made for expanding the Supreme Court, too. So I, you know, I wish progressives would think a little bit more like Mitch McConnell. You know, you know, he, he doesn't. He threw caution to the wind and, and, and did all these things to, you know, you know, engineer the court that we have today. I don't know why progressives don't think along the same lines. I know you do, but, Jim, the
- [09:39]
A
problem is if you don't talk about the structural changes that are needed, there'll be no massive popular push for it. The conservatives did that with Supreme Court reform for decades following the war in court, and it took decades, but they achieved their wish. Politicians don't always lead. They very often follow where the public is at. I think we're seeing, I think we're
- [10:09]
B
seeing now the people are leading us.
- [10:14]
A
The public speaking out about what they want. That is the vibrancy, the genius of American democracy. SCOTUS reform is the long game. So I think.
- [10:24]
B
Yeah, and I don't know, I don't want to take us off in too many different directions. And.
- [10:28]
A
No, you're.
- [10:29]
B
This is your wheelbarrow.
- [10:30]
A
Multiple, multiple directions is what we do here on Coffee with the Contrarians.
- [10:35]
B
But the far right, you know, in the Fox News crowd, they're having a field day with a couple of different races and very progressive congressional districts in New York. But why don't we pay attention to what took place in Colorado where Senator Michael Bennett lost a primary for governor of Colorado to what was perceived to be a more, you know, fiercely anti Trump progressive candidate.
- [10:57]
A
Yeah.
- [10:58]
B
The base of the Democratic Party, it seems to me, is really, you know, coming, coming to the forefront here.
- [11:04]
A
But I know Phil Weiser. Well, we were White House colleagues back in, in 09 and 10, and his office was just upstairs from mine. Phil is no firebrand.
- [11:24]
B
No, no, it's true.
- [11:25]
A
Yeah. Lefty. But he's A fighter. He's a fighter and he has taken on Trump as ag, and he stands for those, those, those big ten Democratic values. Yeah, FDR was a fighter and we need, and you know, we, we, we need Truman and get him hell, Harry. Right. And that tradition of the, of the Democratic Party and Obama did that and that's why he was successful. Let me, let me talk about Trump's main fight, Jim, which is the fight to make as much money as possible from the presidency.
- [12:09]
B
It's such, it's unbelievable. I know. I'm going to, I've been writing about this. I'm probably going to publish something later today. I'll be the last one to publish. But I mean, I've been thinking about this and you know, just reading all of the different ways that he's money and grifted off of the presidency the second time around, I, I think of it as like those supermarket game shows that you see where people try to sweep as many goodies into the shopping cart in under a minute. And that's sort of what he's doing with the presidency this second time around. And you know, he, they put in the financial disclosure form the money that he made off of the ABC and the cbs, bogus lawsuits and of course the crypto stuff. And he's buying stocks, you know, at opportune moments before he pulls the trigger on certain things. It's just not over.
- [12:56]
A
It appears there's over a billion dollars in crypto crypto gains. Jim, while he's pushing his own things like his own meme coin, that many of these investments where he's profited have crashed every dollar, that easemaking people are losing money, average people.
- [13:21]
B
That's right.
- [13:22]
A
It's just like his other scams. It's hitting the American people in the pocketbook. Then there's the stock trades. He's profoundly conflicted. Just like over on the crypto side, you get uae, these Gulf countries where we have profound conflicts of interest. He's making choices about them getting highly sensitive computer chips right after they firms linked to these countries are putting hundreds of millions of dollars in his pocket. And Jim, he's regulating or failed to regulate crypto at the same time.
- [14:09]
B
That's right.
- [14:10]
A
Nuts.
- [14:11]
B
Yeah.
- [14:12]
A
And then you get the stock trades. He's involved in things like it's gonna affect our oil. The attempted Paramount Warner's merger. We're fighting that. He's got Paramount Warner's stock. He says, oh, I'm not in. He says, I'm not personally involved. Well, prove it. The guy has lied so much. Excuse me, if I wanna see the receipts. You know, can we ask some questions about. Some hard questions about that? Of course. That's what Congress will do if it changes hands.
- [14:40]
B
And I think this is why there's.
- [14:42]
A
Under. Of.
- [14:43]
B
This is why he wanted that immunity from the IRS for him and his. His kids. You know, it's, It's. You know, there's. He doesn't want to be. He. He learned maybe a little too well from Al Capone or something. You know, I. I think that he wants total immunity to do whatever he wants in any venue that he sees fit. And, I mean, look at the Qatari jet. The taxpayers are paying 400, half a billion, billion to retrofit the Qatari Air Force One. And then he gets to keep it. And, and you know, the, the story.
- [15:15]
A
It's madness.
- [15:16]
B
They're going to put it in the presidential library. Bullshit. He's going to fly that thing around until the day he'll have a flying library.
- [15:22]
A
It'll be like a presidential bookmobile, Jim.
- [15:25]
B
Yeah, yeah. The Melania, you know, coffee table book or whatever it is.
- [15:31]
A
Right. It'll only have the Trump books inside of it. The whole thing is such a fetid corruption mess. Trump doesn't care about the American people, about affordability. There were only 57,000 jobs created in June in this country of well over 300 million people. And that's. Trump is killing the economy with his grift, his corruption, with his foreign wars, the needless battle that empowered Iran. He handed the Strait of Hormuz control over the Strait of Hormuz to Iran. He gave them the excuse. Who suffered? You did. At the gas pump.
- [16:17]
B
That's right. That's right.
- [16:18]
A
The American people did. And these corruption scandals, Jim, the $1.7 billion slush fund, we helped stop that in court. We're now fighting the settlements that went along with him, the super pardon that he got together with the slush fund, the Kennedy Center. We scraped the name off the building. The judge is forcing the government to say why the TARP is up the reflecting pool. We're representing Olympic rower Davey Hearn, who. All he did was touch the reflecting pool to see the. To feel the corruption. That's crime.
- [16:58]
B
Yeah. How many people have they arrested in the Epstein files? You know, they haven't.
- [17:02]
A
Yeah. You know, and our colleague, and she works with us at Democracy Defenders, Katie Fang, we have our own Epstein file cases we're fighting there. And then, Jim, the latest scandal is this. This $2 billion, and I think this is why Donald Trump is hated by the American people. He has reached Nixonian Lowe's when Nixon was at the nadir of his corruption. That's Donald Trump's approval ratings. And you see in the cross tabs the corruption is driving it. And do you know what else you and I have been down there? It shows how hated he is, what a loser he is. The state fair on the Mall, his state fair.
- [17:50]
B
I went down to the Great American State Fair to check it out for a couple hours on Monday and it was by, thank goodness, it was probably the coolest day of this week. We're going to be at like 110 degrees. You know, feels like temperature this weekend. It's not going to be pretty down on the National Mall for that. But, you know, there are no line. If you want to go somewhere with no lines, it's the, you know, Reverse Disney World. You don't need a fast pass to go to the Great American State Fair. You can ride any ride that you want, about two seconds. And you know, but it's, it's filled with, you know, ode Trump, you know, artifacts, things like the, the miniature arch that he down there. You know, you can sign up for the Trump savings accounts. I saw that. You know, they have this whole ode to the religious right in this other pavilion where they've just got these goofy things that are set up. And it, it just goes to show you what happens when you have a president of the United States who totally and completely politicizes something as important to this country as the 250th birthday for the United States. And people resent it. They don't like it and they don't want to be a part of it. And the only people, I saw people in MAHA T shirts and I saw Fox News had their own, you know, programming booth down on the mall. They were set up down on the mall, but there ain't much else besides that. It's pretty pathetic. And you know, to the rest of the world, this is a massive embarrassment. It's just absolutely embarrassing.
- [19:19]
A
I've never seen anything like it. And with the heat coming, his vanity speech, he's got no entertainers like the wonderful entertainers we had at the Obama Presidential center opening.
- [19:33]
B
What a split screen. My goodness, he's got a letter.
- [19:36]
A
If anybody shows up for his speech, they're taking their life in their hands with the Heat Dome. Yeah, it's going to be a total flop for him.
- [19:44]
B
Well, I will say one other thing, Norm, before we get going. And that is, and I'm going to put a note out on this. I do not think the networks should carry his speech live. I think it would be a major, epic fail on the part of the networks, all of them. If any of them play his ridiculous speech. We know Fox will play his ridiculous speech, but it's going to be lie filled, hate filled, conspiracy theory filled. You know, he's going to say stupid, idiotic things like he didn't know that Eisenhower was a general. You saw that. He said that yesterday. You know, he's, he's, you know, and, and so why are we, why would they, why would the networks put this out there? You know, I know that they are, you know, cowering in fear of him these days. But, Norm, this is why independent media is so important, because we don't have to do that sort of thing. We don't have to play his speech. And I just, it makes me sick that they might, on the 250th birthday of this country, play the rambler wannabe dictator who is going to lie and spew hatred nonstop for 90 minutes. And he wants to do it on purpose because, because he knows that he has a captive audience in the networks.
- [20:59]
A
And Jim, let me say that's what we're not looking forward to. Here's what I'm looking forward to. Ordering my Jim Acosta show merch. Stand up. Here we go. Right here.
- [21:13]
B
It's right here.
- [21:14]
A
See the gym. I thought the show merch maybe, maybe this is gonna look great.
- [21:17]
B
The logo has to be higher on the shirt.
- [21:19]
A
I don't know, but it's, we did that. On the contrary. And it's a little higher. Yeah, I'm looking forward to ordering my merch. I'm looking forward to celebrating all that is good about America, acknowledging what is bad on this 2 50th. But I'll still enjoy the fireworks. Even if, even if Trump is the president and getting back to what our country is all about, that is resuming the forward march of progress. Trump will be gone and we will get our country back on track. What about you, Jim?
- [22:01]
B
I agree with you wholeheartedly, Norm. I've been talking about this on my show. I see what's happening right now. I mean, I think people should look at it as a challenge, a challenge to all of us that we outlast this moment. There's not a whole lot. If you want to do absolutely nothing. And I don't encourage that. I encourage people to get off the sofa, organize, be involved, vote, drag people to the polls this fall, volunteer campaign, do all of those things contribute to norms, legal causes, you know, all of those things support independent media and so on. But if you can just do the bare minimum, and that is tell yourself I can outlast this moment, you will be contributing to, I think, a very noble and important cause, and that is ensuring the survival of this great republic, preserving and protecting democracy, making sure that this country that we all grew up with can be handed off to our kids and our grandkids. That is so vitally important. And if at the very least people can do is say, I can survive this, if you can just say that to yourself, then we're going to be okay. And I. Because I know it's hard and why is this son of a bitch the president at the moment that we're celebrating the 250th birthday of this country? I get it. But if you can just hang in there, then we're going to be okay. And that's all. That's the bare minimum that I ask in this moment. Norm. Pardon my French. Pardon my language. I shouldn't say French. I love the French. Pardon my.
- [23:31]
A
Right on, brother. Right on. For those who are staying inside in the heat, please read the contrarian special. 250 coverage. And next week we've got some incredible essays up, friends. And I'll have my publisher's note as usual. Next week we're going to have fantastic lineup coffee with the contrarians. My guests will be Joy Svance, Katie Feng, and special guests on Thursday, Jim, Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan. Oh, wonderful. Trump. And Trump may hate Maggie almost as much as he hates you and me. I know.
- [24:16]
B
I think it might be a little
- [24:17]
A
bit more, but it may be more. Maybe more.
- [24:20]
B
She's been terrific. She really has.
- [24:22]
A
Join us, join us, Join us next week. Thank you, Jim Acosta. Thank you, Contrarians. Your paid subscriptions make possible coffee with the contrarians. All of our great contrarian coverage, our partnerships with independent media besties like Jim Acosta, and all profits, since we're owned by no one, go to support our pro democracy litigation like our huge wins in the Lisa Cook and Birthright citizenship case. Thank you. Happy 4th. See you next week.
- [24:58]
B
See you, Norm. Thanks. Thanks, everybody.