← The Jim Acosta Show
The Jim Acosta Show
Rep. Joaquin Castro Slams Shutdown Deal, Indivisible's Ezra Levin Warns Dems, and Glenn Kirschner Rips Trump's Jan. 6 Pardons.
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- [00:00]
Glenn Kirschner
FOREIGN.
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Jim Acosta
Welcome to the Jim Acosta show where it's another day that ends in wine and Donald Trump's assault on American democracy. But it's also another day that ends in why for Democrats, at least some Democrats missing the moment. A small group of Senate Democrats is now backing a GOP plan to end the shutdown. That deal does not include extending those Obamacare subsidies for needy Americans. My big guest at the top of this hour is House Democrat Joaquin Castro from Texas. Congressman, always great to have you on. Thanks for doing this.
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Glenn Kirschner
Yeah.
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Joaquin Castro
Good to be with you, Jim.
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Jim Acosta
And so what do you think about this deal? You know, I know it hit a lot of us by surprise in Washington. You're in Texas right now. What do you think of this?
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Joaquin Castro
You know, I'm going to vote no when it comes to the House. I think it's got some serious problems. And look, I want to say I know that people in the House and in the Senate have been under a lot of pressure because of the shutdown. And I understand federal workers and employees who are upset at Congress generally for everything going on. But remember why this started. It started because Republicans were refusing to extend ACA tax credits that would end up hiking the premiums for 22 million Americans by hundreds or even thousands of dollars. And so I'm in the state that has the most percentage of people that have no health care coverage and a big chunk of people that are using those ACA subsidies because the governor of Texas refused to expand Medicaid. And so I really, Jim, I don't believe that there had to be a shutdown. I don't think any of this should it needed to happen. About 70% of Americans believe that we should extend these tax credits. And that should have been easy to do for both Democrats and Republicans on this budget from the beginning. Unfortunately, here we are. But without the inclusion, the explicit inclusion of those tax credits, then I'll be a no.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah, because I mean, to me it's a little bit mind boggling. It seems as though the Senate Democrats, we're hearing from people in the party who are saying, you know, that what's happening with Obamacare is outrageous. And they all seem to be sticking together somewhat. I know there were some moderate Democrats, if you want to call them that, centrist Democrats, if you want to call them that, who were, who are always up for the idea of voting with Republicans. But to just at this hour on a Sunday night out of nowhere say, well, we're going to go along with this on the promise, a so called promise that we're going to get a vote on this.
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Glenn Kirschner
Do you buy that?
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Jim Acosta
I mean, do you trust that they'll keep their word? I mean, to me it's like Donald Trump's been holding all this hostage. Why would you try? He's in charge.
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Joaquin Castro
These are not, trust me, people that we're dealing with here on the other side. Right. These are not people that you can just take their word. And I'm talking about Donald Trump and John Thune and Mike Johnson and these folks. They're not folks that you can simply trust. We've seen them make promises before and then it all falls apart. No, I mean, I think, you know, I've gotten a lot of angry outreach in the last, since this deal was announced and people saying, well then why did we hold out for X number of days and what was this all for? And during the course of this whole thing, we asked people to explain to us what these tax credits meant. And we got hundreds of responses of people talked about how it's a lifeline for them. And that's in the context of a president who, who has not refused to fight inflation. So grocery prices keep going up, rent keeps going up, childcare is going up, and we were fighting to stop people's healthcare from really going up. And you know, and unfortunately I'm worried that at this point we won't be able to do that because of this deal.
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Jim Acosta
And doesn't it reward some hostage taking on Donald Trump's part? I mean, he's the one who was holding the SNAP benefits hostage. He's the one who was, they were trying to fire federal workers, the so called rifs. And so apparently those get folded back in and people don't lose their jobs, which is good. We don't want that to happen. We want people to get their SNAP benefits and so on. But I mean, I heard Angus King, the independent who caucuses with the Democrats in the Senate up in Maine, he said on Morning Joe that standing up to Donald Trump didn't work. And he literally said it in those words. And I just could just, just a terrible message to send to the party right now. I mean, a lot of people want to stand up to Don Trump right now. And it just, you know, it just sends exactly the wrong message at a moment when Democrats were in a roll coming out of last week.
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Joaquin Castro
Yeah, no, I think the American people were with us. Nobody likes a shutdown, right? Nobody likes what's going on. But I think the majority of the American people agreed with us and understood that this is an important thing. Remember it's the cost of health care. Of all the bills that you get, it's a cost of health care that often bankrupts people. That's why they lose their homes. That's why they have to sell their cars, take out a second mortgage, figure out how their kids are going to pay for their own way through college without the parents being able to help them at all. So this is a big, big deal for the American people. And even in the city of San Antonio that has a huge federal workforce. Look, I'm not saying people are happy, they certainly are not. But at the end of the day, they, they don't want those healthcare premiums to spike up in the way they've seen in years past. And this was a worthy fight. And you know, of course, look in the Senate, if they end up taking that vote on the healthcare tax credits and they can convince a number of their Republicans, I know, Josh Howley, for example, and others, maybe get them to vote yes. And it comes to the House, the problem is Speaker Johnson has said, hey, I'm not guaranteeing you that we're even gonna take a vote on any of this when it comes to the House. And that's what I'm talking about. And then, Jim, let me just say one more thing about politics. And first, like, I respect all the senators, even I disagree with them on this, but I respect them personally. I've worked with several of the people on that list. But, you know, I think it starts to feel to a lot of folks like there's a kind of choreographed surrender from people here where they decide, okay, who's up for reelection and who are and who's not up for reelection and doesn't have to worry about their constituents being really upset. And so everybody else, we're going to go out there and vote no and give these floor speeches and, you know, and be very upset about it. And then we're going to let the folks who, who are not up this year in 26.
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Jim Acosta
Right.
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Joaquin Castro
Try to give people a chance to forget we're get those are going to be the ones that or they're retiring. They're going to go ahead and vote yes for this deal.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah. And I guess that that raises the question who's doing the choreographing? And, you know, I mean, stuff doesn't really get past Senate Democrats unless the minority leader, Chuck Schumer, is signing off on it and giving it his blessing. I know he says he's planning on voting no on this, but one has to think there's some of this choreography going on behind the scenes.
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Joaquin Castro
Yeah. I think, you know, Chuck Schumer, he's at the end of the day with that caucus. Yeah. I mean, the buck has to stop with him.
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Jim Acosta
He's.
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Joaquin Castro
He is their leader. I don't know whether it's true or not, but I understand that he wasn't principally in the negotiations on this deal. If that's the case, I'm very surprised because this is the US Senate. It's not like the House. You know, you have 435 people and all this, like, this is the United States Senate with a lot fewer people. And so I'm surprised if it's true that he would not have been directly involved in those negotiations.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah. And I guess. What do you think? Do you think Chuck Schumer should stay on as the leader over in the Senate? What's your take on that?
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Joaquin Castro
I mean, ultimately, that's going to have to be for the Senate Democrats to decide. But I'll tell you, this is no way to handle Donald Trump. The more room you give him, the more inches, the more feet, the more yards, the more this man is going to take. And he will, he will abuse not only the Congress, in other words, taking away more and more power for himself, but he'll abuse the American people to get his way. And we've seen it over and over.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah, I mean, what's the. I mean, there's no guarantee that he's not going to do this again in January.
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Glenn Kirschner
Right.
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Jim Acosta
This extends things until January. He could do this, resume the hostage taking all over again. I, I mean, it, it seems like this is something that works with his base, plays with Fox News, plays with the conservative media. And he just wants to. And he, and he doesn't care. He doesn't seem to care about the snap benefits his own administration was trying to keep. They were going back to the courts to say, don't hand out the snap benefits, even though they were.
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Joaquin Castro
You notice what he's doing? I mean, he's a guy driving the car with everybody in it who's willing to go off the bridge. I mean, that's really what he is at this point, spending $40 billion to help Argentina during a government shutdown. When you have people lining up at food banks across the country putting on this show of like a 1920s Great Gatsby party and, you know, and knowing that there's cameras there and video there and everything and showing it off. No, this guy has a real need to flaunt things, to dominate people, to show you that he's doing something and force you to accept it. And, you know, and so that's who you're. You're trying to cut a deal with. No, I think we needed to stand up to this guy. And Republicans also, you know, you started to see them say, hey, no, well, these subsidies are important, and that they were hearing from their own constituents. And so, yeah, I'm very concerned about where we go from here.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah. And I guess you were mentioning, you were getting some feedback from, from people who are just upset about this. People are pissed. People are. People are pissed at Democrats. And I know I have you on and you'll give Donald Trump hell and, you know, beat the hell out of him on this, that and the other thing. And, you know, when you have members of the party who are willing to negotiate and pretend as though we're back in the Ronald Reagan era or something like that, and it's. We're not that it doesn't feel existential to them, even though it feels existential to the rest of us. It must be difficult to. To deal with that, I have to think.
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Joaquin Castro
Yeah. I mean, it's incredibly frustrating both for our constituents. You know, even today, I was doing this radio interview earlier, and they were taking callers and everything from San Antonio, and people were saying, well, why shouldn't we primary every Democrat out there? And people are angry. People are upset. And it's not just Democrats, it's Republicans also. They don't lower the grocery prices for Republicans. They don't check your party ID and give you a discount if you're a Republican or a Trump supporter. So everybody is feeling this pain. And that's why you see consumer confidence, you know, so bad right now, because people know that Donald Trump is making things tougher for everybody.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah. I mean, we're getting comments from some of our viewers. Schumer caved. So tired of it. Clearly staged. And, you know, I just. And as you were saying earlier, some of these people are not up for reelection. People, I mean, I don't want to name names, but I'll say, you know, Senator Durbin's been very nice and done lots of interviews with me over the years, but he's not running. You know, there's several of them who. Not running. And what a message to send as you're on your way out. You know, people want to fight right now. It seems to me people want to.
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Joaquin Castro
No, I mean, I think that's right. And look, you know, in politics, I think what happens is, is that politicians will sometimes start to look out for each other. And they know that somebody's got a tough race and they're not going to be able to vote yes on this deal. So, hey, this person's got to vote no. Let them vote no. And so then somebody else will vote yes. And by the way, Republicans do the same thing. They do it, too, all the time.
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Jim Acosta
Oh, God, yes.
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Joaquin Castro
There's this kind of choreography that goes on, on a lot of big, controversial things like this.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah, well, I don't want to waste, you know, all of your time just talking about that. Not that any of it's a waste, because there's also the issue of ice. And, you know, what has been taking place in Chicago has been absolutely horrendous and other parts of the country. Country, obviously. But I know you've. You've been particularly concerned about what you've been seeing just lately in, in Chicago with ice. And there was this video, if we can show it, that happened over the weekend of a toddler who was sprayed with pepper spray. The fan, the whole family was sprayed with pepper spray. It looks like ICE or, or CBP or one of those folks. We're showing some of the video here. It's crazy. You know, what do you think when you saw this? I mean, it's just outrageous. This little girl apparently got hit with the pepper spray as these ICE agents or CBP agents were driving by and just sprayed dispersants right into this man's car.
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Joaquin Castro
I mean, it's. It's inhumane. It's. You know, I don't believe that most Americans, when they see that and when they see people being questioned aggressively about whether they're citizens or not, just because they're brown and walking down the street or, or people being tackled and twisted in all sorts of ways, folks being basically disappeared where they're picked up and taken to some detention center. And they don't tell their relatives, they don't tell anybody where these people, where they've taken these folks. The other day, you may have seen that they took. They yanked a guy out of the car and his. His toddler was in the backseat. They drove off with the toddler. I mean, that's. That's just crazy shit. You know, I mean, for that, I mean, I know there is a segment, a slice of people that really get off to that, but most Americans, I don't believe that they see that as. As our country, as Americans. And that's why Donald Trump is suffering in the polls. That's why. Republican. Part of the reason, at least, that they got beat so Badly. Because I do think that actually people care about the United States, you know, being at base, a humane country, you know, to the people who are here and to its own citizens. I mean, they're profiling. They're racially profiling their own citizens, Jim. And this is what we warned about. And the governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, is contributing to that. There are state governors like Greg Abbott who are actively contributing to this.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah. And I mean, what's the solution to this? Because, I mean, I was advocating this, this. It's been a while since you've, you and I have done an interview, but I was saying, you know, if Democrats are going to dig in their heels during a government shutdown, something ought to be done about ice. Because I, I think this is, to me, this is like Donald Trump declaring war on Latino people in America is what it feels like to me. They're just, and they have this Bevino guy, this Greg Bevino guy, who's apparently like the, the field marshal of this insane ICE response in Chicago. And is, I mean, is there just, is there nothing that can be done? It just seems to me this needs to be added to the negotiating process as we're making our way through these, you know, shut down brinksmanship cycles. Somebody needs to bring this up. It's, it's lunacy that this is allowed. They're pepper spraying babies and driving off with babies. There's another guy in Massachusetts the other day was going into a seizure as his kid was being pulled away from him. It's bananas. Yeah.
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Joaquin Castro
No, and that's why I voted against these budgets. And that's why ultimately, I think we need to break up ice. ICE cannot operate in this way. You can't be treating people like that. You can't be doing illegal things the way they're doing. Those agents who are acting illegally, who are acting as though they're above the law because they've been told that they're above the law, they need to be held accountable. Ultimately, they need to be prosecuted. I don't have confidence that Pam Biondi is going to do that or the Justice Department right now, which is corrupt, is going to do that, but ultimately they need to be held accountable. And, and you know, you, you're still, you're going to have Customs and Immigration Enforcement, but it can't be with this cast of characters who are just out of control.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah. I mean, I can't imagine what a Democratic president would walk into in, in January 2029, and you take the reins of ice and it's just Become like the proud boys or something.
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Joaquin Castro
You know, I think that's right. I think that, you know, you never know at the beginning, like what's a conspiracy theory, and ultimately what actually may have happened or have merit. But the idea that they went out and hired some of these proud boys who have no training, who have this white supremacist ideology, many of them or most of them, you know, I think. I think at first people were kind of skeptical. Oh, well, they wouldn't do that.
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Glenn Kirschner
Or.
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Joaquin Castro
No, you know, they got to get people that are trained. But no, I think that there's a good chance that they actually hired a big chunk of these people who obviously are untrained, who are pointing guns at people, shooting tear gas into cars with kids. Yeah. That's who these folks are at this point. So the next Democratic president needs to break them up, needs to take away the responsibility of immigration from them and put it somewhere else, and needs to evaluate all of the people that were hired during this period.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah, well, I mean, I think you're absolutely right about that. And put somebody in charge of homeland security. Who. Who cares about homeland security? I mean, this is. This is not homeland. This is homeland terrorism. I mean, to me, it's just. You're terrorizing people. And if you. If you're a Latino person, how do you feel secure? How do you feel safe? You feel like you're being hunted?
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Joaquin Castro
No, I think that's right. And, you know, there was video that came out of the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, where they're asking this construction worker basically to. To prove his documentation. And then all of this spreads out. Right. It doesn't just affect undocumented immigrants or even US Citizens that may be at a construction site. We're going backward. There was video, I don't know if you saw it, out of El Paso, Texas, recently, where this girl recorded a teacher telling her not to speak Spanish in class.
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Jim Acosta
Wow.
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Joaquin Castro
Getting after her, reprimanding her, humiliating her about speaking Spanish in class. That's what used to happen to our parents and grandparents in this country, where if you spoke Spanish when my mom was growing up in the 1950s, if you spoke Spanish in class. First of all, it was illegal in Texas for 40 years to speak Spanish in schools. But if you spoke Spanish, they paddled you or they punished you somehow. That is the America that Donald Trump has taken us back to.
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Jim Acosta
Yeah, well, we can't go back to that. There's no question about it. I'm passionate about this. I know you are as well. Congressman Joaquin Castro Great to see you, as always. Thank you so much.
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Joaquin Castro
Good to be with you.
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Jim Acosta
All right. Really appreciate it. Thanks so much. We're going to continue to talk about this, this deal, if you want to call it. Deal with the devil, if you want to call it that, to end the government shutdown here in Washington. And I thought of a perfect guest to bring in today. It's Ezra Levin of the group Indivisible. He's been the, the grand poobah of organizing these no Kings protests that have been wildly successful across the country. Ezra, great to see you, man. And I know, I mean, I heard from your people this morning that you wanted to come on. And I was waking up this morning saying, I want to get Ezra to come on because did you see this Angus King? I'm sure you saw what Angus King said. Standing up to Donald Trump didn't work. I mean, are you kidding me, man?
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Ezra Levin
Look, we. I've spent a lot of time gathering my thoughts on this. Jim and I went to bed with incandescent rage as I was writing the newsletter going out today and where we go from here. Because I, I do think a couple of things. It's important for us to understand what went down. What I do not want is for folks to throw their hands up and say, well, I guess none of this matters. We can check out that. That's really dangerous. When an authoritarian is terrorizing our communities, as we just heard from Castro, they are, they are invading our cities. They are zip tying children and dragging them out of their apartments, in some cases naked. They are, they are tear gassing children on the street. These, these, these images are horrific. And we need a unified opposition party to this. We can't afford to check out because otherwise they win. So let me say a couple things. Angus King doesn't live in the same world that you and I live in. Doesn't live in the same world that most rank and file Democrats live in. Because everybody else who is watching this was saying, Democrats are winning this fight for the first.
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Jim Acosta
Exactly.
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Ezra Levin
For the first time in a year, we felt like the wind was at our backs. We had the largest peaceful protest in American history, followed by the best election night in a decade. Plus with the Republicans fracturing with Trump, blaming the shutdown for their losses. With Democratic approvals for the first time increasing because people were seeing them fight back. And with public polling showing that Democrats were winning the fight. That was the context for. You called it a deal or a deal with the devil. I called it surrender. An utter capitulation. They got nothing they got nothing. And so after a year spent organizing to try to convince the Democratic Party to unify and oppose this regime, here's where I am. The time for convincing is over. We need new leadership. And the place to demand new leadership is the primaries. And that's right around the corner. But we have to demand a better party. We have to demand a party that fights because Chuck Schumer isn't listening anymore. Yeah, Angus King isn't listening anymore. These Dems who are siding with Republicans, they're not listening anymore. And we can't afford that. We need an effective Democratic Party that will fight back.
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Jim Acosta
And Ezra, I mean, I think that this is, you know, this is pretty far down into the, into the soil, into the clay, and into the layers of sediment below. It's baked in at this point. I mean, let me just play you what Hakeem Jeffries said. If we can play that clip. He was asked about Chuck Schumer earlier today and should he keep. Yes and yes. Do you view him as effective? Should he keep his job? Hakeem Jeffries? Yes and yes. I mean, you know, a lot, a lot of Democrats like yourself woke up this morning really pissed at Chuck Schumer. And there's a. I mean, he's a fellow New Yorker. I guess Hakeem Jeffries feel like has to say it. Fellow leadership has to say it. But look, that, that doesn't go down good.
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Ezra Levin
It's no longer about them. Can I be honest, Jim? It's not about them. They have shown us time and time again this year that given the chance, they will cower. Given the chance, they will capitulate. If they can find plausible deniability, they will give in the regime. At some point we got to ask ourselves, do we have self respect? Are we willing to take no for an answer? That they are unwilling to be the leaders that we need them to be? And if we're willing to take that for an answer, fine. We've got the Democratic Party. We're going to have. But what I would encourage people to think about is there is a better way. This is not the entirety of the Democratic Party. We, we have Maxwell Frost, we've got Jasmine Crockett, we've got Chris Van Hollen and Chris Murphy's. We've got Bernie's and Warrens. There is a faction of fight back Democrats. And it happens to be that that faction, which is somewhat ideologically diverse, that faction is ascendant. That that faction is ascendant. That is where rank and file Democrats are. We took a Poll. It was not a push poll. We tried to make it fair this weekend, asking, hey, yeah, Democrats might need to cut a deal to end the shutdown and they might not get the ACA credits. That might be part of the deal. They could do that or they can continue fighting for the ACA subsidies. What's you indivisible folks? The folks who were helping put on no Kings rallies, the folks showing up at town halls, the folks helping build the turnout for last week. What do you want to see them do? This shocked me, Jim. I, I, I thought I knew where the majority was, but 98.67% said, keep fighting. 98.67%. Wow. I mean, this is the chasm. The chasm between rank and file Dems and Democratic leadership is so vast that it gives me hope for a primary season where we get to choose a Democratic party that it actually fights back.
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Jim Acosta
Because if there's one in there.
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Ezra Levin
Yeah.
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Jim Acosta
You just need people to hang in there until next year. Yeah.
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Ezra Levin
And believe that there is a way to change things for the better. If there's a silver lining to all this, it's that this capitulation was so complete that it will be impossible to hide. Everybody can see that, that the party is not up to the task now. And so we should be asking every single Senate Democratic candidate, are you supporting Chuck Schumer for leadership? And if you are, you don't got my vote, you don't get my donation, you don't get my support, you don't get my attention. So indivisible today. It's going to go out in about an hour or so, Jim. We, we're launching the largest primary program in the history of indivisible. And it's going to be focused not on ideology, but on building a Democratic Party that fights back. That is what we're going to be focused with on. And we're going to be working with indivisible groups from around the country to build that party.
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Jim Acosta
Wow. Okay. So that's a big deal. And I mean, if you're marshaling the resources of, you know, the what, put on no kings and so on, this is, this is a big deal. I mean, this is going to, you know, get some folks a little worried back in Washington. The thing, though, is, Ezra, is that, and I was talking about this with Joaquin Castro is there was, there's some choreography, it seems, going on behind the scenes. Chuck Schumer was like, okay, you just got reelected, so you're not up for a while, and, oh, you're retiring over there, so we don't have to worry about you. And so now we've cobbled together the number of votes we need to go ahead and make this compromise, make this.
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Glenn Kirschner
Deal with the devil.
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Jim Acosta
And I, I guess you're basically, you have to send the message to all the incumbents, just about all of them. Like if you're part of this surrender caucus, you know, good luck, you're not looking trouble.
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Ezra Levin
I appreciate you focusing on this because this is like Congressional Procedure 201 instead of 101. The 101 version is eight Senate Democrats voted for capitulation. You say, God damn those eight Democrats. We've really got to give it to them. But then you look and see who they are. Well, it was eight. The perfect number, the exact number they needed. And every single one of those eight is either retiring or not running for reelection. Come on, see through it. This is how that works. A healthy percent of the caucus. I don't know if it was a dozen or two dozen, but more than those eight.
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Glenn Kirschner
Agreed.
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Ezra Levin
We got to capitulate. And Schumer and them identified. Okay, who's going to take the heat? It can't be anybody up for reelection. It can't be a Mark Warner who's up for reelection next year. Yeah. Who's going to be primary? We don't want them to take the heat. Now let's give it to these folks. That's how it work, which is why it is up to us to demand what separates a fight back faction Democrat from a rollover and play dead Democrat. There are going to be a lot of factors. One that I would offer for the Senate is do you support current Senate leadership?
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Jim Acosta
Yeah.
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Ezra Levin
So ask Mark Warner that, ask Hickenlooper that, ask Booker that, ask Markey that. Look, this is cross ideological. We should ask every incumbent running for reelection, are you going to stick with this leadership? Because if you are, you're part of the problem.
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Jim Acosta
And I just wonder if there's, if you just need a generational change to some extent, at least from boomers to Gen Xers or maybe elder Millennials. I mean, I love the Gen Z or sure, put them in the Senate. That, that sounds great to me too, if they, if they meet the qualifications and so on. But I, to me, part of this feels like, like when Angus King is saying, you know, standing up to Donald Trump didn't work, I'm like, dude, come on, man, if it doesn't work, then why are you there? If you're not going to stand up to Donald Trump, who would you Stand up to.
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Ezra Levin
And it also, it's factually incorrect. Work on, work on what level? The Democrats were winning the fight in the polling. We had just won a massive, a massive turnout. It was working. We were winning. By what measure wasn't working? You mean, you mean the Republicans didn't have their come to Jesus moment? That's not going to happen. That's never going to happen. If that's your goal, of course that and nothing else will work. But, but, yeah, but this, I mean.
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Jim Acosta
You guys had Marjorie Taylor Greene kind of saying the right stuff, and it was like, you know, holy smokes.
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Ezra Levin
You know, Look, I, I, I do. I, I want people to understand how bad this capitulation was, and I don't want people to then throw up their hands. Because if you think that none of this matters, that it's all fatalistic, that you should be cynical, that the, the two sides are the same, I agree with you.
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Glenn Kirschner
We will lose.
- [28:23]
Ezra Levin
And so I would highly, highly encourage people to take a look at the primaries coming up. Pick a couple favorites. Maybe it's in your state or maybe it's from somewhere else in the country, but help us build that Democratic Party that fights back. That's our goal now. And I think it's necessary for us to successfully push back, because it's not just this vote. We all see what the regime is doing. They are gearing up to steal the election next year. They are setting up to contest overwhelming election results. And if we don't have a party prepared to fight back and fight for our democracy, I'm very worried for what comes now. The good news is these happen on two different timescales. We've got primary season coming up over the next few months, and then we've got general election. And regardless of how the primary shakes out, we will rally around the winter. I'm not going to win every election here. We're going to lose some. We're going to be disappointed. And we will rally around the winner in order to wall up the fascist in the midterms. That's our plan. But first step is let's try to build a Democratic party that doesn't fail us and that people can believe in.
- [29:16]
Jim Acosta
All right, well, Ezra, great to talk to you. We'll be looking for that email that, that campaign that you're launching here very shortly. The, the mighty Indivisible team. They're about to, They've, they're, they've had enough. They're, they're dusting themselves off after last night, and they're saying Hell, no.
- [29:33]
Ezra Levin
That's right.
- [29:34]
Jim Acosta
And, and, and some folks who are running for reelection next year hoping that they're going to just breeze through their primary, take note. Ezra11, always great to see you, man. Thank you so much.
- [29:43]
Ezra Levin
Great to see you.
- [29:44]
Jim Acosta
All right, take care. That's Ezra 11. And, and for folks who are like, oh, well, you know, indivisible, that's nice. What are they going to do? Remember, they're the ones who built up these no King rallies. I mean, so they, they kind of know what they're doing right now. They kind of have this down. So that's, that's a very big development and a big announcement from Ezra there that, that the no Kings folks, indivisible, will be basically sending, you know, a warning shot to a lot of, you know, incumbent Democrats in this country that there is a campaign coming for more fighters running in next year's midterms. All right, I want to change gears a little bit and cover some other stuff because there's been some batshit crazy stuff happening on the legal front. Let's bring in our friend Glenn Kirschner, and he is with justice banners, of course. And Glenn, great to see you. There's so much going on, and somebody who does not believe that giving that standing up to Donald Trump doesn't work would be Glenn Kirschner. I, I still can't get over this comment that was made. I know that's not really in your, in your wheelhouse, the political stuff, but, I mean, when you hear Senate Democrats saying, or people who caucus with the Democrats saying standing up to Donald Trump didn't work, I'm like, are you kidding me? You're killing me, Smalls. As the saying goes, standing up to.
- [30:59]
Glenn Kirschner
Donald Trump is the only thing that will work for American democracy in the long run, period. End of story. Jim. And listen, there are still plenty of people who are out there standing up like you, the folks who are kind of at the pinnacle of independent media at this point. And, you know, I was so disappointed to see the Dems cave. The, the Dems that are apparently not up for re election. So I think we can take something away from that data point. But if you don't fight the monster, if you feed the monster, you're going to lose every time because the monster is never satisfied. The monster wants more and more and more and more. And I wish all of the Dems would, would learn that lesson well.
- [31:40]
Jim Acosta
And, and there Donald Trump gave us a reminder in the last 24 hours, sort of as everybody was hopping mad over this shutdown deal from this deal with the devil that some of the Democrats entered into. There was this announcement from Trump and his people that he is pardoning the 2020 election gang, as I like to call them. People like Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, remember all those knuckleheads who tried to subvert our democracy and overturn the 2020 election. Trump just sent out pardons for all of them in federal court. Now, of course, they could still be in hot water in state matters, but it has a chilling effect. I would have to think your thoughts on all of this, Glenn, and what do you make of it? What happens next?
- [32:22]
Glenn Kirschner
Yeah, the gang that couldn't insurrect straight. He's so. For a very long time, Jim, I talked about the boots of the insurrection and the suits of the insurrection. The boots of the insurrection were Donald Trump's angry mob that he ginned up on January 6th with his pre insurrection pep rally. Of course, he summoned them to Washington, D.C. by posting, come to D.C. january 6th will be wild. And I want to talk in a minute about how I fear we're going to see a similar post from Donald Trump on the eve of the elections, the midterm elections nationwide. And he is recruiting. This is a recruiting tool for that, potentially. But the boots of the insurrection, it took Merrick Garland forever to get off the dime and get after them. But then he finally did get after them. They were convicted to the tune of well over a thousand insurrectionists. And Donald Trump pardoned the boots of the insurrection all along. Jim, I was asking, when will we get to the suits of the insurrection? The lawyers who did Donald Trump's dirty and criminal and unconstitutional bidding with, among other things, the fake elector scheme. Lawyers like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, Kenneth Chesbrough and Jeffrey Clark, John Eastman, Boris Epstein and others. And they were actually named, not named, but identified in substance. Those six people I just mentioned in the federal criminal indictment of Donald Trump, right, for his alleged January six crimes designed to steal the office of the presidency. Those six people were identified in substance as unindicted coconspirators. That's so important because take it from this old career prosecutor, you put unindicted coconspirators in an indictment for a couple of different reasons, but primarily because they have either flipped and are providing information about the biggest criminal fish, which in that instance would have been Donald Trump, or because you planned to indict them in the future, which is what I believe Jack Smith intended to do. He was going after Donald Trump. He felt like time was growing short. He wanted to hold him accountable for trying to criminally steal a presidential election. And then I am just as sure as I'm sitting here, Jim, Jack Smith, knowing the prosecutor he is, was going to go after the unindicted co. Conspirator. Conspirators, yes. After he held Donald Trump accountable, then of course we had an election. We had a presidential immunity opinion from the Supreme Court and that case went away in its entirety. But in theory, those six unindicted coconspirators could still have been prosecuted federally. But now Donald Trump has pardoned the suits of the insurrection. Not only those six, but 71 others, 77 pardons. And you know, this I view. And let me tell you, Jim, one of the reasons I love that we are here as independent media together, no longer corporate media or legacy media, is because when I read, I don't mean to, you know, for this to be a knock on the New York Times or NBC News. I worked for MSNBC for six and a half years. They are reporting things like, well, you know, these are just symbolic pardons. And I see it very differently.
- [35:44]
Jim Acosta
Interesting.
- [35:45]
Glenn Kirschner
This is a recruiting tool by Donald Trump calling all insurrectionists. He's already curried favor with the boots of the insurrection, the foot soldiers, the stormtroopers. So if he needs to call upon them again, he already has them in his pocket. Now he has the suits of the insurrection.
- [36:06]
Jim Acosta
You can get the band back together.
- [36:08]
Glenn Kirschner
The dirty lawyer corps. And he is announcing to them, listen, this is basically Donald Trump posting a job announcement by issuing these pardons to the lawyers, the suits of the insurrection. And in my typically smart alecky New Jersey guy way, this is what I posted on Substack in a written piece earlier today. I said, listen, this is essentially a job announcement that Donald Trump is posting, with the announcement being election interference. Co conspirators, wanted qualifications must be willing to lie about election interference. Must be willing to undermine the expressed will of the American voters, must be willing to destroy American democracy. And if push comes to shove, and I mean that literally, must be willing to attack the United States Capitol in an effort to stop the certification of, of an election. But the benefits include a presidential pardon for any and all crimes committed in the execution of your conspiratorial responsibilities. There's the job announcement Donald Trump posted by virtue of delivering these 77 pardons.
- [37:15]
Jim Acosta
Well, and Glenn, I mean, I'll get, I'll go one further. I'll raise the ante here a little bit. They could try to pull this shit in the upcoming midterms. And then Donald Trump is still the president. So, I mean, there, you know, he has the ability to pardon people right up until January 20, 2029. And so, I mean, there's a lot, there's a lot of Runway to do coup stuff between now and, and 2026 and beyond. And that's what makes, I think, this announcement that you're talking about. You're right. It is no way just a symbolic thing. This is dangerous for our democracy.
- [37:51]
Glenn Kirschner
You're exactly right, Jim. And this pardon is for past crimes. But he, he is signaling that if you come join my conspiratorial team, I'm going to pardon you for future crimes. Future right now. But they won't be future come the last day of this presidential term. So here's what I fear. We're going to see a post from Donald Trump. I don't know precisely what day the midterm elections are being held, but let's just theoretically say November 4th of next year, you know, on November 3rd, he'll say, okay, I've recruited you all by giving you pardons, both the boots and the suits. Now you all need to go not to the Capitol on the day of the midterm elections. You need to go to every polling place in your state and you need to fight like hell or you won't have a country anymore. Now stop the free and fair elections. And he has set that up by pardoning both the boots and the suits of the insurrection. And that's what I fear.
- [38:49]
Jim Acosta
Well, and if folks are, you know, I know people who are watching are probably rightly concerned and, and concerned, but I mean, but, but for folks who might even just have a, just a thought for a moment that this is not serious, I want to show this headline that just popped up today from Stuart Rhodes of the Oath Keepers. Remember him? He announced today or yesterday, I guess I should say, on, on one of these nut job websites. The Gateway pundit Stuart Rhodes announces relaunch of Oath Keepers with the Gateway pundit Glenn. The Oath Keepers, they are the og. Insurrectionists. These are the ones who were locked up, that were violent and were pardoned by Donald Trump. And I've talked to people in Rose's family who are completely mortified and frightened that he would be let out. And now he is announcing he is reconstituting the Oath Keepers. That's a, that is a scary thought.
- [39:47]
Glenn Kirschner
And that comes on the heels of these 77 pardons. This was a recruiting call by Donald Trump. No, it wasn't. Symbolic as the New York Times and NBC News tried to pedal. No, we're almost right back where we.
- [40:02]
Jim Acosta
Were before January 6th.
- [40:05]
Glenn Kirschner
Exactly. And we see how it played out. We see how it played out on January 6th. Fortunately, they couldn't stop the certification. But look at how much damage they did to so many people, police officers, not to mention our American democracy in the process. And I fear that we're about to see it all over again come the midterms and Maybe even come 2028, if Donald Trump decides he wants to run for a third term. Or even if he doesn't. Jim. Whoever the anointed Republican heir apparent to King Donald might be, Donald Trump has just positioned things so he can deploy people to the Capitol all over again, because he has created this battalion, if not division, of insurrectionists, both the boots and the suits. Right. The muscle and the brains. If, if I'm going to give Rudy Giuliani, I guess I shouldn't include him in the. In the brains part of the gang. He's been disbarred twice. And these people that he just pardoned, some of them, the good news is, are still pending criminal charges in state court in Georgia, in Arizona. So this presidential pardon will not impact those cases. That's small consolation from where we sit. But, you know, these people, some of them have been criminally have pleaded guilty to being part of Donald Trump's dirty efforts to undermine, for example, the 2020 presidential results in Georgia. He just pardoned Kenneth Chesbrough and Jenna Ellis. Both of them pleaded guilty to be part of Donald Trump's criminal scheme.
- [41:42]
Jim Acosta
And they just, she crying and in tears and everything. She.
- [41:45]
Glenn Kirschner
Yeah, now maybe. Now maybe she's reformed. I believe in redemption. Redemption is an important part of, I think, what we value in America. But, you know, I'll believe that those folks are redeemed when I see some evidence of it.
- [41:58]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And the other thing, too, that needs to be pointed out, you know, is that, you know, next time around, it may be J.D. vance, you know, who is going to be, you know, in that position, in that catbird seat as Bike Pence was, and have the ability to sway this one way or the other.
- [42:13]
Glenn Kirschner
And J.D.
- [42:14]
Jim Acosta
Vance may very well be the person who's running at the top of the tick next time. I mean, the layers here are. Are disturbing, and they. They're just getting exponentially worse by the day. But I totally agree with you, Glenn, and I'm glad that you came on, because these pardons are a signal right now that, that it's on it's on for next year. It's on for 2028. And these are the people who are willing to do it for them. Yeah, that's what's, that's what's wrong about this.
- [42:42]
Glenn Kirschner
And here's what I Hope happens come 2028, if the rule of law has come back into the light, we have a Democrat president and an administration, a cabinet that abides by the Constitution. We're going to have to attack these corruptly delivered pardons. I know it's going to be hard because the Supreme Court said core constitutional function, very hard to go behind it. But let me leave your viewers with this, Jim. Don't forget that even Bill Barr, of all people, rarely do I quote him on anything. He testified before Congress that Donald Trump can't deliver pardons to co conspirators who could implicate him in crimes that would be unlawful. That's Bill Barr. You know, if Bill Barr has announced previously, this is not kosher, this is not acceptable. The DOJ attorneys will, moving forward, once we come back into the light of day, they will have to attack these corruptly delivered pardons and fight that fight in court. Win, lose or draw. There's no shame in taking a righteous case to trial and losing it. There's nothing but shame in refusing to take a righteous case to trial for fear you will lose it. So this is a battle that will outlast Donald Trump.
- [43:52]
Jim Acosta
Absolutely. He is the poster child for pardon reform in this country. I mean, it's just unreal what he's done. Glenn Kirschner, always great to talk to you. Thank you, Glenn, very much.
- [44:02]
Glenn Kirschner
Great being with you, Jim.
- [44:03]
Jim Acosta
Great to be with you. Thank you. And I mean, Glenn is absolutely right. Our democracy is, is, is teetering right now, ladies and gentlemen. It is, it is on its knees. It's a bit wobbly right now. It is, it is not standing strong. And that is why this capitulation that we've seen from some of these Senate Democrats going along and making this deal with the devil, it is so deeply disturbing and disappointing that, you know, you have to step back for a moment and, and take it all in and understand and recognize the moment that we're in right now, the moment that we're in right now, it is going to take something along the lines of a revolution inside the Democratic Party. It seems to me, it seems to me that there are just some in the Senate and it's always been called the cooling saucer of democracy, but this is, this is an arctic chill. And it seems to Me that there are just some in the Democratic Party who are just, I mean, it doesn't matter what Donald Trump does at this point. He can do anything. We know that he can do anything. And Republicans will go along with it. We know he can do anything. And Republicans will stand there and do nothing. But the reason why you have an opposition party in this country, ladies and gentlemen, is that, that you're the opposition party and you were winning. You came out of last week winning. Donald Trump was getting booed at an NFL game on Sunday. And then in that same evening, these Senate Democrats come out of the woodwork and say, oh, you know, we weren't winning. We weren't really standing up to Donald Trump. Standing up to Donald Trump didn't work. As Angus King said, come on, it was working until you backed out of it, until you backed down. It was working until you caved, man. And so I just, to me, I understand that there are some, you know, so called experts and establishment types and smart people who are saying, oh, well, the Democrats will be glad that they took this deal and they did, and they'll look good and in the long run because the American people will see that they stood up for these Obamacare subsidies and the Republicans will have to be put on the spot. I mean, maybe, if it all works out that way. But who are we dealing with? We're dealing with the hostage taker in chief. We're dealing with somebody who bulldozed the east wing of the White House, didn't check in with anybody. We're talking about somebody who, even if, even when he had a court telling him to release the SNAP benefits, was refusing to do so and going to the Supreme Court to avoid paying those SNAP benefits. He was taking SNAP benefits, food assistance hostage. He was taking federal employees hostage. He was taking Obamacare hostage, your health care hostage. And now you're going to trust him? Now you're going to trust the Republicans who will do anything he says. Come on, wake up. Wake the fuck up. In what world are you living? Donald Trump will take more hostages. Donald Trump will play chicken again. And now he has a clip to put in every campaign ad between now and, and the 2026 elections. Standing up to Donald Trump didn't work. The worst thing I've heard from a Democrat in a really long time, and I hate to pick, pick on somebody who maybe might want that moment back. I mean, if I, if I were him, I would want that moment back. If there's somebody, if there's anybody who has ever existed in American history, Who has ever sat in the Oval Office inside the White House, who deserves to be stood up to, it's this guy. Do I need to show the video? I, I, I think I should show the video again of the little girl. There's a little kid, one year old in Illinois. This happened over the weekend. Father's driving the car out of a sanding our children. This, this van full of, or SUV full of federal agents from ICE or CBP or DHS or wherever the they are are spraying pepper spray into this man's car and hits his little girl, a one year old in the face. That is America right now. That is America 2025. If there's anything in the name of God that is worth standing up to, it is the abuse of little children in our country by our government. So my God, man, my God, Angus King, for the love of God, yes, standing up to Donald Trump does work. Did you see the no Kings protests? Did you see what happened last week in these elections across the country? It works. It works. What happened in 2020, standing up to him. It worked. And you were winning, you were winning this thing and you stashed defeat from the jaws of victory. And it just seems to me that the lesson just isn't learned. It just isn't learned. And so I don't understand, I, I just don't understand how one could convince themselves that, oh yeah, we'll, we'll just have a vote in a month from now and they'll go along with it and everything will be fine and Donald Trump will go along with this and he won't want to that one up too and hold more hostages. It's Donald Trump holding hostages is what he does. Driving this thing off the cliff is what he does. It's what he did last time. It's what he's going to do again. And I just, it seems to me what the Democratic Party needs is a revolution. It needs a revolution. It needs a movement that sends a message to the rest of the party that there can't be any more Democrats who say standing up to Donald Trump doesn't work. That should be, that, that should be an instant. You're, you're out of here, man. That, that like retirement. What are you doing? Just leave. Go. They, Some of these guys just don't get it. Some of these guys just don't get it. And it's time to make sure they do get it. It's high time. It's well past time to make sure they do get it. My thanks to Joaquin Castro. My thanks to Ezra Levin. My thanks to Glenn Kershner. My thanks to all of you. Really appreciate it. Thanks for tolerating me having a little day off on Friday. That did help quite a bit. So thank you so much for being patient with that. And we're going to continue to do some more reporting all week long. Lots to discuss, lots of maybe some surprises coming up between now and the end of the week. So stay tuned. Got some good stuff coming down the pike. So hang in there. We've got some we've got some real treats for you coming up here in the next several days. But in the meantime, still reporting from Washington, Aja mcosta. Please don't give up on standing up. Don't give up. And I won't, either. I'll see you next time.