← The Joy Reid Show
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- [00:00]
Joy Reid
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- [00:21]
Zorhan Mamdani
Rush has their back.
- [00:22]
Joy Reid
Head to your local Walmart or Target and grab Degree Cool Rush, the fan favorite scent from the world's number one antiperspirant brand.
- [00:35]
Maya Wiley
Okay.
- [00:42]
Joy Reid
Music, you know what time it is. Good evening, everybody. Welcome to the Joy Reid Show. Big up to everybody listening and watching on YouTube, the Stack, wherever you get your podcast, big up to the chats. We can see y' all in there that have been waiting to jump on. Thank you all for being here and sharing some time with us. I almost came on and said, hey, hey, hey. My, my former stage manager, he's called the Big Worm. Don Wormley used to call me Big Cheryl, which I was kind of offended by, but that was kind of funny. So I want to say, hey, hey, hey, y'. All. Thank you for listening. If you are a Team TJRS member, you're extra special. Thank you all for being here. How y' all feeling? How y' all feeling since last night? Pretty good, right? I mean, it was a big night. It's a big night if you are, you know, a Democrat or if your name is not Donald Trump and you're not maga. If you're maga, it might not have been such a good night for you. It was a bad night for Republicans. Democrats literally ran the table. It was a big blue wave nationally from north to south, east to west, pretty much the entire country, all the way down to the Deep South. It was an across the board total victory for Democrats in large races, small races, all the races. So let's get started in the Deep South. Let's start there. Mississippi had elections last night and the results were huge. They were hugely important. Democrats flipped two seats in the Mississippi State Senate, breaking Republican super majority for the first time in years. Now from this Newsweek story, let me read a little bit. There were special elections last night for six state Senate districts and one House district following a federal court's order to redraw legislative maps to increase the number of majority black districts. According to local news to the local news website Magnolia Tribune. Democrats gained two seats in the state Senate, Senate District 2 and Senate District 45 and secured additional House representation with a guy named Justin Crosby winning in District 22. These gains reduced Republicans hold to 34 of the 52 seats in the state Senate, ending their supermajority again. They had 34 out of 52. They didn't have all 52. And here's another important thing for you to know and why I want to start with Mississippi because. Because it speaks to why we need both voting people to get out and vote, but also lawsuits. The redistricting stemmed from a 2022 lawsuit brought by the Mississippi Statewide NAACP alleging that the state had diluted black voting power despite black residents comprising about 40% of the population. That's Medgar Ever's old outfit. Statewide Mississippi NAACP. In April 2025, a panel of federal judges ordered the creation of more minority districts leading to special elections in contested areas. The New York Times reported that the ruling was unanimous and that all three judges were appointed by George W. Bush, Republican President. So you see why we care so much about that Calais vs. Louisiana case and why Republicans are so eager to gerrymander these states to lock black voters out because of stuff like this. It's also your timely reminder that a guy that we introduced you to on this show, Scott Colum, will be running for the United States Senate in Mississippi next year against Cindy Hyde Smith, the lady who said she'd be front page at a front seat at a lynching. That lady. So don't forget that. And don't count out the Deep south, of course, David Jolly, our friend running for governor of Florida. So the south is not done. Let's go to the Atlanta mayor's race where Democratic Mayor Andre Dickens easily won reelection. Unfortunately, he did win. Unfortunately in the Atlanta council race, our pal Rohit Malhotra did not prevail, losing a pretty close race to Marcy Collier Overstreet, who had the mayor's endorsement. Jason just put up Cincinnati. You can put that back up again. That is the Cincinnati race where J.D. vance, John Donald Hamel, whatever his name is, his half brother, lost. Mayor Aftab Purval was re elected as mayor of Cincinnati in a race that was especially humiliating for the regime as Perval, the millennial son of immigrants from Punjab, India and Tibet, defeated John Donald Homan, AKA JD Vance's half brother, Corey Bowman, the one who lost that race, who was trying to unseat him. Here they are together. This is a five. You can see the, you can see the two brothers. There they are together. J.D. vance's brother Corey Bowman tried to unseat the brown guy, did not help. And the endorsement of JD Vance did not help. Let's Go to Detroit, where Mary Sheffield won and became the first woman mayor of the Motor City. The soon to be former Detroit City Council president made history previously in 2022 when she became the youngest person ever elected as council president. She's just 38 years old, a millennial, by the way. She won in a landslide. There is the margin. She got 77% of the vote. But look at the small number of votes that you need to become the mayor of Detroit. 88,239 votes. And you too could be mayor of Detroit. That is how few people turn out for these races. But she won. Let's go to Pittsburgh, where another millennial, 41 year old Democrat Corey O', Connor, won the race for mayor. As the Post Gazette points out, he will lead a city where probably property tax revenues continue to decline, official vehicles are aging and breaking down, and the NFL draft just months away promises significant logistical hurdles to overcome as the overheated national spotlight shines down. Let's go to Pennsylvania, where there was a judicial race where voters elected to retain all three of the liberal Supreme Court justices who Republicans were trying to remove from their seats. Which is good news for the next time Donald Trump or Republicans try to overturn an election in Pennsylvania. As Slate points out, the stakes of Tuesday's election were high. Had Pennsylvanians voted to remove these justices, the court would have gone from a seven member Democratic majority to a four member group with a complete ideological split. The three justices vacant seats would have had to been filled by another election at the end of 2027. Pennsylvania Supreme Court regularly holds these kinds of votes for its justices. The justices are first selected in partisan elections, but then after a 10 year term, voters get to decide whether to extend them or take them out of office. And once in, Justices rarely get voted out. But Republicans campaigned hard this year to remove these three liberals to try to switch the balance of the court. It did not happen, which is very good news for the state of Pennsylvania for all three justices. Voters overwhelmingly said to keep them. Okay, so of course the big news last night, as you know, were these statewide elections in New Jersey and Virginia and the blockbuster win by yet another millennial, 34 year old Zorhan Mamdani of New York city. This is a 10 J's gonna play this promo. This promo is very cute. This was what was on Zorhan's X Twitter account. I don't know. People are still using X Twitter for some reason.
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Judd Legum
Stop.
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Joy Reid
City Hall. Who did it play? Maybe it didn't play. Anyway, it says next stop City Hall. That's what's so cute about it. So we're going to have much, much more on that. We're going to talk a lot tonight about Mamdani, especially in hour two of this program, including a very huge irony that the mainstream media completely missed last night. This was like the biggest story in the country last night, but a lot of the mainstream media missed it and also cast themselves in a weird way to present this news to the people. We're going to talk about that in the next hour. Also later in this hour, a very, a very poignant piece about the personal significance of Madadi's victory in the Trump 2.0 era to a core member of this team, of the TJRS team. So we're going to talk about that and talk to this very special person. But back to the big picture just for a moment. Democrats, like crushed it in Virginia where Abigail spanberger scored nearly 2 million votes and got 57.5% of the vote to flip that state from red to blue by defeating the eccentric. We're going to be nice and say eccentric sitting Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earl Sears, who did, even with all her eccentricities, get 42.3% of the vote. Jason, let me know when we have Abigail Spamberger who gave a little speech at her victory party last.
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Rula Jabril
Tonight. We sent a message.
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Joy Reid
We sent a message to every corner of the commonwealth, a message to our neighbors and our fellow Americans across the, across the country.
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Rula Jabril
We sent a message to the whole.
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Joy Reid
World that in 2025, Virginia chose pragmatism over partisanship. We chose our commonwealth over chaos. You all chose leadership that will focus relentlessly on what matters most, lowering costs, keeping our communities safe and strengthening our economy. For every Virginian leadership, leadership that will.
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Rula Jabril
Focus on problem solving, not stoking division.
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Joy Reid
You chose. We chose leadership that will always put Virginia first. Okay, okay. So we can pull that out of there. Virginia, I cannot. Okay, so she said, I cannot wait to represent you. Very good. So a very sort of Biden esque bipartisan message, pragmatism. And note, she got the getting cost down piece which Zorhan Mamdani has zeroed in on and which every Democrat is trying to also pick up on. Okay, so we'll note that. I want to also note there was some history made in those Virginia races. Ghazala Hashmi, she was elected as lieutenant governor of Virginia, making her the first Muslim statewide elected official in all of US History. As all of US History. Ghazala Hashmi, who was a state senator in, in Virginia, she wins huge race if you're a Muslim American. She made history last night, as did Mamdani. First statewide elected Muslim woman woman in US History. Another victor, Democrat Jay Jones, who was elected Attorney General. It was a slightly longer wait. Those of you who were on with us last night, thank you guys for being who, who who tuned in last night for our live coverage. Big ups to everybody who did that. By the way, did I mention that you should like and subscribe and share? I don't think I said that, but do like subscribe and share. If you were on with us last night, we talked about Jay Jones and we went through the sort of excruciating slow wait for him to get through, but he did. It was a closer race than some of the others because of the sort of text message controversy. But here's Jay Jones giving a little bit of his speech last night. It was a hard fought campaign, but at the end of the day, this election has never been about me or my opponent. It has always been about every single one of us and the future of Virginia and this election. This victory is for you and for every Virginian who is lying awake right now, not because they're following along with these election returns, but because they're worried about their future for themselves and for families just like mine. We have big fights ahead of us. Our commonwealth in our country will continue to be tested. But tonight, I make this pledge to every single Virginian, I will never, ever stop fighting for you. Okay, we can leave that there. And that is going to be important because if you're in Virginia, you now have an Attorney General who's likely to join the lawsuits that other states are engaging in over snap. You know, snap and withholding that SNAP money from the federal government over protect your abortion rights. You know, that's going to now happen. You're going to have somebody who'll do that. And also if you're a federal worker and a lot of federal workers live in Virginia, you will now have an Attorney General who's likely to join the lawsuits preventing you from getting laid off and fired illegally. So that's good news if you're in Virginia. That was very pragmatic to not worry about some silly text message controversies when the other side have group texts where people are saying, I love Hitler, let's go to New Jersey. In a much less close than expected win for Democrat Mikey Sherrell, the military veteran. She, she got 1.8 million votes on her way to a 56.2% romp, beating Maga Mini Trump Republican Jack Cittarelli. Meaning New Jersey will remain in Democratic hands. It will remain a sanctuary state. Here's Mikey Sherrill. A little bit of her.
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Rula Jabril
So thank you to everyone who's joined me in fighting for a better future. I know these are tough times. I know not everyone voted for me, but I'm working for everyone, every single one of you. When we all do better, we all do better. So tomorrow begins a new day. And at each new day in New Jersey, the sun rises over the Statue of Liberty, a daily reminder of her promise. Give me your tired, your poor, your.
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Joy Reid
Huddled masses yearning to breathe free. All right, let's leave that there. That is the message with a nod toward immigration. Very important, because New Jersey is one of those states where private prisons are said, set up shop to throw people into mass detention. And that state will continue now to fight that. And its police force will not have to cooperate with ice because that's one of the things that Chitarelli had said. What happened? All right, let's go to the West Coast. All the way to the West. California overwhelmingly, overwhelmingly approved Governor Gavin Newsom's Prop 50 proposal. The Associated Press calling the race literally shortly after polls closed like, polls closed at 8, and they called it at like 8. 10. Early returns showed short early returns show that the measure led with like 65% of the votes. It was a huge win. And the maps that were approved in Prop 50 means that it's likely that five of California's Republican held congressional seats could flip to Democrat in the next midterm elections, which would would essentially wipe out the gains Trump was getting from Texas, if, in fact, this all even goes the way he thinks it's going to go. Those five Democratic seats likely to be picked up in overwhelmingly Democratic California would negate the five seats that were that Donald Trump demanded that he get in Texas. So that is hugely important. The California Republican Party, by the way, already suing, already filing a lawsuit saying we're going to sue over Gavin Newsom doing in California exactly what Donald Trump ordered Texas, Missouri, South Carolina and other red states to do. Okay, good luck with that. Let's go to Maryland really quickly, where West Moore is now having to do a redistricting commission after Democratic state Senate leaders, people in his own party, defeated a measure to redraw districts in that state to also put push back on what Texas did. So sometimes it be your own people. So Governor Westmore is going to have to get creative about trying to do that. In, in the state of Maryland, there are far fewer, fewer Republicans to remove from office. But every Democratic governor is trying to jump in and do the same thing. But regardless of that, last night was a thorough, total national rebuke of Republicans and Donald Trump, who literally went into deep denial. If we can find his Tweet. This is a18. He literally tweeted. Nope, had nothing to do with me. He tweeted. I don't know what you're talking about. Trump wasn't on the ballot. This wasn't about me. It wasn't about me at all. There it is. Trump wasn't on the ballot and shut down with the threesomes that Republicans lost elections, according to pollsters. No, all caps. Doesn't mean that what you're saying isn't a lie, Donald, because literally the exit poll showed that Donald Trump was the biggest single factor in the results of these elections. People were literally saying no to Donald Trump personally. Let's see how the House speaker responded. Trump's little buddy decided that he too would like to respond to what happened in the elections last night. Of course, you have to remember that the Christian nationalist who was the leading sponsor of the attempts to overturn the 2020 election. Mike Johnson. Mike Johnson from the state receiving some of the largest number of SNAP benefits in the country. One of the poorest states in the union. That guy has said, we're not going to really worry that much about the election because we have a plan to make sure that there's never going to be another free and fair election. Jason, whenever you're ready, you can throw that one.
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Judd Legum
They've assaulted ICE officers. They have spurred on political violence, and they closed down the government, which is their most basic duty and responsibility. I think the American people are smart. I think they will understand this. And I think the midterm is going to be a great one for us. We had a demographic shift in 2024. We have a very favorable election map on the Republican side, and it will be even more favorable once all the redistricting stuff is settled down. We have Democrats who are flailing. They have no leader. Their national leader now, as we've noted, is Mandami. He's a communist. Good luck with that.
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Joy Reid
At a certain point, Zora Mamdani is going to start suing people for defamation. He's not a communist. And they can say that every day and it still won't make it true. But good luck with that. Speaker Johnson, he essentially said, don't worry, we're going to gerrymander it so that they'll never be able to win elections. We'll just make sure that they never get to win again. Let's see how. Let's see how J.D. vance, aka James David Vance, John Donald Hamel, whatever his name is right now. Let's see how he responded to what is happening. He decided to tweet about his issues, to tweet about his problems, to tweet about the fact that the Republicans lost. Let me know, Jason, if you're ready about it. And he posted a tweet in which he attempted to say, we don't have to really worry about this. It's not as big of a deal as you might think. We're not going to respond. We're not going to have a problem with it. We're actually going to just pretend that it is a okay, there's the tweet. He says in his tweet, I think it's idiotic to overreact to a couple of elections in blue states. But a few thoughts. Scott Pressler at Turning Point usa Note that Turning Point USA is a main part of the Republican electoral strategy. It is what they used to get the young white folks to vote for Trump last time. By the way, they're all on campuses turning out the vote for Republicans. But he says Scott Press of Turning Point USA and a bunch of others have been working hard to register voters. I said it in 2022 and I've said it repeatedly since our coalition is lower propensity, meaning they don't come out to vote. And that means we have to do better at turning out voters than we have in the past. We need to focus on the home front. The president has done a lot of and that has already paid off. And lower interest rates and lower inflation. That's not true. Inflation is up. But then he goes on to try to blame Joe Biden and say that it's his fault the economy was bad, Rome wasn't built in a day, blah, blah, blah. We're going to keep working, yada, yada, yada. Stop with the infighting. The infighting is stupid. I care about my fellow citizens, particularly young Americans, being able to afford a decent life. I care about immigration and our sovereignty and I care about establishing peace overseas so our resources can be focused at home. If you care about those things too, let's work together, okay? J.D. john, Donald, James, David, whatever your name is, because you keep changing it. How does what you just said explain the fact that Donald Trump is doing the opposite? The opposite of attempting to make sure that ordinary Americans can afford their lives. The opposite of making sure that Americans at least feel that he cares about, about their lives. He's not doing anything to exhibit empathy toward the people who are losing their SNAP benefits. He's not doing anything to demonstrate any empathy toward those who are getting fired at his direction in the federal government who are now joining the unemployed. 300,000 black women laid off. All of the companies that give him money. All of the big businesses that are his donors are laying off other people. Amazon Bezos gave him a bunch of money for his inaugural. Laying a bunch of people off all of his friends. He's not encouraging them to keep Americans working. He's looking the other way and taking their donations for his ballroom while they lay people off. So I'm really not sure how the things Donald Trump is doing, which are also raising prices, which are also making things more expensive. How is what he's doing helping any American? And how does it help anyone that Donald Trump decided he wanted to throw himself, himself a big party on Halloween, A Great Gatsby themed party in which they were flowing champagne and having a woman sitting in a martini glass, a giant martini. I'm sorry, how does any of that show Americans that he cares about them? Let's go to a 22, which is the other thing that he's doing. He's building himself a beautiful marble in themed ballroom. You see that? That is what Donald Trump is doing. Instead of showing that he cares about the American people and their struggles. JD Vance said all he's doing is thinking about the American people. No, he's thinking about that. You see this new Lincoln bathroom? It's the tackiest thing ever. And he's also, of course, doing this ballroom, this fabulous ballroom for himself with his Fuhrer bunker underneath in which the people who are donating the money, the money to build the ballroom also have business before his government. What's left of the Washington Post reports that more than half of the companies who are donating to the $300 million waste of money ballroom are dealing with federal law enforcement on actions including unfair labor practices, environmental infractions and deceiving consumers. The the companies, including Nvidia, Google, Comcast, Lockheed Martin, they have received more than $279 billion in government contracts over the past five years with a B. So I'm sorry, how does that help with affordability? JD Vance, or whatever your name is today, how does any of that help? How does it help? And we're not going to play it, but how does it help that Donald Trump came out today and said his answer to what happened in the midterms is that Republicans should nuke the filibuster so that. No, so that he can pass whatever he wants. We don't have to play it. So that he can pass whatever he wants and Democrats can't stop. And how does that help the American people? How does it help. We won't play this either, but we won't play it right now. But he also came out and said that he would like his cabinet to treat him like Xi Jinping, the Communist dictator of China. And that is what he wants for his cabinet to do, treat him like a communist dictator. I'm sorry, how does that help anyone? Do we have our guest ready? I believe. Joining us now is one of the journalists who's digging deepest into this regime's insane corruption, Judd Legum, who publishes Popular Info. Let me know when he is ready. Oh, okay. We're going to wait till he comes on. All right. So everybody's talking to me off screen. And I am trying to do my best to listen to everyone talking to me in my ear and also talk to you guys.
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Nidha Khan
So.
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Joy Reid
So the reality that we're dealing with right now is that Donald Trump is exhibiting none of the behaviors that would be normal if a president actually cared about the American people, if they actually cared about the American people's finances just ahead of Thanksgiving, if they actually cared. If he actually cared about people being able to afford groceries, to afford gas, to afford their rent, their mortgages. He's not exhibiting that behavior. What he's exhibiting is. I'm sorry, what? What? Jason, go ahead. You have to. You tell me. What are we saying? Okay, let's bring in Judd Legum. He publishes popular info, which all of you should be subscribing to on Substack. Judd, welcome.
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Judd Legum
Thanks for having me. Joy.
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Joy Reid
So let's talk about. I'm going to. We're going to put up, if we can, your home, the homepage of popular info. This826. Whenever Jason has that ready. You are covering a ton of stuff. There's just a lot going on. I didn't even know where to begin. And I decided rather than choose one of the corrupt, sort of insane things that Donald Trump and his regime are doing, I would just let you go and tell me what you think are the most significant elements of corruption that we should be thinking about today on the day after the election.
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Judd Legum
Yeah, there's a lot to choose from. That's absolutely correct. I think they all have a common thread, which is you're taking the power of the presidency, the power of the United States government, which ultimately derives from the people of the United States. And you're using that for personal and political gain. One of the stories that I covered earlier this week that I think deserves more attention is, you know, there's this, these companies that are selling these extremely expensive bandages, wound care, essentially, and you know, this is becoming a huge, huge source of Medicaid spending. It went from essentially zero in 2018 to $15 billion is the latest estimate for this year. I mean, we're spending more on these bandages than we are on ambulances in Medicaid. Like, this is a huge, huge expense. And there's actually versions of these that are not that expensive, but there's these very complex kickback schemes where these companies are selling bandages at $10,000 or more per square inch and then sending it back to the doc, sending some of that money back to the doctors so that they use those, those bandages. In any event, there was a rule, it was supposed to go in place into February that would have stopped this practice. It would have saved billions of dollars from Medicaid. Just a few days before that rule was scheduled to go into effect, one of the companies behind this, called extremity care, donates $5 million to the Trump super PAC. So that was a story that we did back in, I believe it was April when the, when it was first disclosed, or it might have been July when it was first disclosed. But just this week we learned that the Same company donated $2.5 million. So now that was successful. The, the rule that was supposed to go into place to stop these extremely expensive bandages from draining Medicaid money was, was delayed. So they're continuing, the cash is continuing to flow in. Now we just learn that there's a 2.5 million dollar secret donation to the Trump Ballroom by the same company. And we also know that the CEO of this company was invited to a special dinner. Not even the ballroom dinner, this was a special dinner with all of his top donors to the White House, you know, and had an audience with President Trump. So this is the kind of thing, you know, this isn't even one of the top 10 scandals that people are talking about, but when you dig into it, it's really incredible because one of the things that supposedly this is all about is waste, fraud and abuse. And let's get out of Medicaid. Let's save money. You know, here's something where, hey, this is, we've actually found, we found the waste. Here it is. You're paying $10,000 for a bandage when you could pay $70. So there's, there's almost $10,000 worth of waste for one bandit, one square inch of a bandage. And, but yet essentially what we're seeing is in exchange for this large amounts of political money, not sure exactly what he's going to be doing with this super PAC money that he's got. I assume that it's going to be deployed in the midterms in, in an effort to kind of, you know, retain control of the House or the Senate or both. But, you know, we see it being traded. So that, that, that's something that kind.
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Joy Reid
Of.
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Judd Legum
Definitely it got me worked up a bit.
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Joy Reid
Or Donald Trump is just gonna put it in his pocket. Like, you know, supposedly the money that he bribed CBS for is gonna go to his presidential library, which means it's gonna go to Donald Trump. I mean, I don't believe that Donald Trump is gonna do anything to help Republicans. He's gonna expect them to separately raise money for the midterms. I just assume he's pocketing all the money. Let me go through. This is just me saying that I have no reporting to back that up. You've got a story here. I mean, everything on your homepage right now is infuriating. The idea that they're even charging inmates more for phone calls, they're jacking up the cost of that. Donald Trump pardoning this guy. Let's talk about the crypto pardon for just a moment. Donald Trump in this shameful 60 Minutes interview, which clearly was a pay for play, meaning you bribe CBS, Paramount gives him $16 million. Clearly somewhere in that transaction there was a promise of an hour plus long interview. He did 73 minutes. They cut it down to 28 minutes. That they then chopped up to put voiceovers to make him seem sane and keep out the parts where he crashed out. They didn't show us that they kept all that out. Then of course, they put the transcript up and that's how they got caught. But one of the parts of that interview that actually was revelatory, there was one piece of news that was made was that Donald Trump said he does not know who this crypto billionaire is, who he pardoned, who happens to be enriching his sons. But he says, I don't know, which indicates that either he too is using an auto pen, which is a thing Republicans have said all of Joe Biden's pardons should be negated over. So either he just doesn't know he's pardoning and he's using an auto pen, or he lied can you talk a little bit about this crypto pardon and what Donald Trump is getting out of it?
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Judd Legum
Yeah, I mean this is just that fact to say, oh, I pardoned this person who by the way was convicted or pled guilty to violating anti money laundering laws. And the Department of Justice said as a result, willfully doing so and a result money was going to terrorists, to child exploitation. This was a very serious issue. He did spend four months in jail. He also had to step, you know, and that's really what this is about. He had to step down as CEO of this crypto platform finance. So that's where he was. And he wasn't going to be able to be the CEO. He wasn't going to be able to operate in the United States. He moved to Dubai. What. But what we saw subsequently was that Trump started one of several crypto companies that he started, World Liberty Financial. They start a, what's known as a stable coin where you have a cryptocurrency, but it's supposed to be worth $1 all the time. So you can just move it around. Who knows why you need these things, but you have what they, they made one and you know, people make cryptocurrencies all the time. But what happened was that Binance agreed to accept or actually requested a 2 billion dollar investment to be made in this new Trump backed stablecoin into their own business by a Dubai, you know, essentially a state sovereign wealth fund, state connected investment fund in, in Abu Dhabi. And you know, that was hugely valuable. I mean this is going to be generating, probably already has generated tens of millions of dollars, could generate hundreds of million dollars because essentially you just have to keep this money in reserve. You know, they pay you $2 billion for these stable coins. Trump, then Trump's company World Liberty Financial gets to keep that in an account. They can invest it, you can put it in a money market, you can do whatever, who knows what they're doing with it. So, but you make money off of that $2 billion you have. And they also make money anytime these coins are traded. And so anyway, after that happens, now all of a sudden Trump issues this pardon. I mean these were, these were things that did not happen, you know, with a huge amount of time in between them. Now Trump says, oh, people are telling me, people are telling me that this guy was set up. Well, you know, he's in this crypto business, as he mentioned, he's in this crypto business with his sons, his sons, Don, Don Jr. Eric, a close friend of Don Jr. Was hired to be the lobbyist for CZ, the crypto executive who got a pardon. And about a week before this pardon was issued, or wasn't too long ago, I believe it was at the, the ceremony that they had at the White House that was, you know, in, in sort of memorial of Charlie Kirk.
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Joy Reid
So.
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Judd Legum
Right. So it wasn't that long ago he was spotted. Both Don Jr. And this lobbyist were spotted at the White House. So when he says, people are telling me it's basically the lobbyist who was hired at the advice of his son and his son are telling him that this guy was set up at the same time that this, that this person is making this multi billion dollar transaction with the stable coin. And there's, there's other things that I won't get into details here about that they're doing with this, with that Binance is doing. But it is a really, I mean, this is tens of millions, probably by the time this is all said and done, hundreds of million dollars directly into Trump's pocket in exchange for a pardon, which he claims he doesn't know anything about, doesn't even know who this person is. So just saying that should be a schedule in itself. But when you start peeling back what this guy actually did for Trump, it's really outrageous.
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Joy Reid
So what we're seeing is a president enriching himself and his family to a degree we've never seen. Forget Teapot Dome and other previous presidential scandals, there's never been anything like this kind of self enrichment. And Donald Trump is doing this while his administration, and again the executive branch has control of this, is refusing to release the full emergency snap fund so that people can buy food ahead of Thanksgiving. I don't know how much more Marie Antoinette you get than that.
- [36:56]
Judd Legum
Well, I guess you could hold a Great Gatsby party at your, at your mansion in Mar a Lago. That might be a little, that might be one other thing you could do. But, but yes, I mean, I think it's, it's the use of, of power, the use of the, of resources, which are not Trump's resources. He has control of them. It's a public trust.
- [37:20]
Joy Reid
Yeah.
- [37:20]
Judd Legum
And, but they're not being deployed in a way that is going to help people there be deployed in the way that helps him personally. And because there's so much else going on because, you know, we're, we're bombing, well, you know, boats in, you know, on the open water and we're talking about detonating nuclear weapons and we're talking about getting rid of the filibusters so that they could get.
- [37:52]
Joy Reid
Invading Nigeria.
- [37:54]
Maya Wiley
Yeah.
- [37:54]
Judd Legum
Because there's so much else going on.
- [37:56]
Joy Reid
Yeah.
- [37:57]
Judd Legum
The corruption is not the, the main, one of the main narratives that are really that of, of Trump's second term. But in any other presidency, any one of these things would be a dominant story. And we've seen in the past, I mean, if you just think about, you know, you don't have to go back too far, but you think about, you know, the, the Clinton Gore fundraisers with potential chai, you know, Chinese, and there wasn't ever any, any evidence or proof that any money was ever exchanged that personally benefited anyone or that, that Gore or Clinton knew anything about it. But it was still.
- [38:37]
Joy Reid
Forget that. What about. Do you remember. Are you old enough to remember the haircut scandal of Bill Clinton getting inexpensive haircuts? It was weeks and weeks and weeks of our lives where the mainstream media obsessed over this. Yeah.
- [38:51]
Judd Legum
So just the hint of it, the hint of, of potentially something that was some marginal financial benefit would occupy weeks of, of coverage. And now we have really, you don't even need. It's, you don't need to uncover it because it's happening in the open. You know, there's press releases that are being sent out about isn't. It isn't treated. Isn't treated that way. So I think it's, I think it's something, you know, we, you know, we saw, you know, in the, in the returns yesterday, though, that, you know, maybe. I think it's easy to think that nobody is absorbing any of this, but maybe people are sort of figuring out that actually some of the folks in power might not have our best interests at heart.
- [39:40]
Joy Reid
Yeah, I think, I think people are figuring out when you throw the Great Gatsby Party and the pictures get out and the video gets out of you all laughing in the faces of Americans who are literally starving, I think it kind of gets out. Exit question to you, Judd Legum. Your main story, one of the biggest stories that you've got on popular information right now is about Speaker Johnson, who we played a little while ago, saying not to worry, Republicans. We're just going to gerrymander ourselves into permanent power. So don't worry. We've got this. We'll just gerrymander to make sure no one can vote us out. The fact that he is refusing to return to work, even some Republicans are criticizing him for forcing his members to stay out, to stay out of Washington. It's been more than a month. They haven't worked. They're still getting their Paychecks. How much of this in your reporting is about him not wanting to have Congresswoman elect Grijalva sworn in because he fears that the Epstein files will then be released because she will vote for that discharge petition. And then what I call the Epstein Ballroom. That's why I call it the Epstein Ballroom. All the billionaires, the big ticket folks who hang out at Gatsby parties and do fun things like own 18 private jets or whatever, whoever those people were that were hanging out with Epstein, that all that will come out.
- [40:54]
Judd Legum
Yeah, well, I think that what he's done is successfully delayed this until after the election. I mean, I don't think it necessarily had any, any kind of impact. But if that was the goal, they've, they've achieved that. You know, that was this, that was the subject of my newsletter today. And I went through all the different, other alternative explanations that he's put out there and they don't make, you know, any sense. They said, oh, well, you know, we're following the precedent that you have to be, you know, in legislative session in order to swear someone in. Of course he's cancel, as you mentioned, he's canceling all the legislative sessions. But even if you accept that earlier this year in April, less than 24 hours after two Republicans won a special election, he had them sworn in in pro forma sessions. So it doesn't. And there's. And that was probably his best excuse. You know, the other ones don't make even less sense. So by process of elimination, you get down to these, these Epstein files and is it something where he believes or knows that this is going to be damaging? Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't. But what we do know is that Trump, for whatever reason, does not want these files out. And anytime there's an inkling that they're going to get out, he goes ballistic. So he. Obviously that's a big priority for Johnson and that's why we have a member who was elected 43 days ago, longer than any other member has ever waited after a special election and is still not sworn in.
- [42:30]
Joy Reid
The site is popular.info you can subscribe. You can head right over there. Hit that subscribe button. It is a substack based, very, very informative and important newsletter. One of my favorite subscriptions, very important stuff. Judd Lecom, thank you very much. We appreciate you.
- [42:45]
Judd Legum
Thanks so much, Joy.
- [42:46]
Joy Reid
Thank you very much. All right, we're gonna take an ad break now. You guys have been asking folks in the chat, keep asking, we wanna see the whole 120Life launch because you guys found out my starting blood pressure rate, but you want Jason's as well, so here we go. Let's play the promo. Hey, Joy. So you're gonna try your 120 life now? I'm gonna try my 120 life. I have to get a starting point for my blood pressure. Okay. And then I'm gonna take the drink, and then we'll check back in about two weeks to see what is. I'm going to continue taking my medication in the process, and let's see if that gets it down even lower. So here I go. Here we go. 150 over 102.
- [43:32]
Nidha Khan
All right, well, it's a little high.
- [43:34]
Joy Reid
It's a little high.
- [43:34]
Nidha Khan
It's a little high. All right, well, we're going to check.
- [43:36]
Joy Reid
Back in two weeks, but first, let's go and retrieve the drink. Let's get it. We got our 120 life here. All right, there we go. I'm going to get two, because I'm going to have one, too. All right, we got it. All right, here we go. Let's see how this tastes. That's an interesting taste. It doesn't taste half bad. Hmm. I can get used to this. Boom. All right, we'll check back with you in two weeks. We're gonna take it every day, and we'll see how it goes. All right, guys. All right, so now you know all that. You need to know. We've got all our starting blood pressure. We're gonna. We've been taking it now for over a week. I've been taking mine first thing in the morning. I really like it. I think it tastes really good. It's got, like, a nice, like, berry kind of beet kind of flavor. But what's most important is the fact that it is healthy, and it actually helps not just with blood pressure, but also beneficial for people with diabetes and also just good for your overall health. It's got a really great fruity flavor. And the most important thing, though, is that we've got to really get at this blood pressure situation. It's one of the biggest cases killers of Americans. So right now, you've got an opportunity to give this a try and just see how it goes. It is risk free, because if you don't like it, if it doesn't work for you, you can get your money back. There's a money back guarantee. Health professionals love this stuff, and you can benefit from it, if for nothing else than to just get your health together and do something healthy for yourself. I take it in the morning with my vitamins. And right now for a limited time, you can get 20% off if you just use the code Joy. Doing Joy for the ladies. J O Y or read R E ID for the gents who want to follow Jason. Do that at checkout@120life.com and again, take advantage of that risk free trial. Full refund if you do not see lower numbers in two weeks. We're going to check back with you after our full two weeks is over and tell you what our updated blood pressure numbers are. So don't Forget to go to 120life.com use joy if you're one of the ladies. Read if you're one of the gents. Save 20% off today. Remember, you got to use that code to get the special offer. Want to note these statements have not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. But give it a shot. All right, that is us paying the bills. Let's get back to the show. Now. I want to show you guys, if we could, some scenes from Zor from outside of Zorhan Mamdani's very difficult to get into victory party on last night. It was pretty raucous in the city of New York on last night. There it is. Here it goes. A lot of happy New Yorkers. You can see them. And the crowds were just as big inside. It was tough to get into. We were trying to get Jennifer Welch on the special last night, but it took her so long to get in that we were already off the air by the time that she got in. But I want to show you from inside of the victory party the moment when New York City got a chance to meet its new first couple, who are quite a lovely couple, Zorham Mamdani and his lovely wife. And here's that.
- [47:06]
Zorhan Mamdani
Thank you.
- [47:08]
Joy Reid
And his whole family, by the way. Watch where the beat kicks in. What I love is that eventually mama and baba came up. You know, his mom and dad actually come up as well. It was actually a really great scene inside and also out there. There you go. You can see the, the hug there. A beautiful couple and a lot of mom. I'm going to play a little bit of Mamdani's first speech as mayor elect in which what I loved about it is that he was truly unapologetic about who he is. He said, this is who I am. I'm your new mayor. Get used to it.
- [48:15]
Zorhan Mamdani
Here's that after all the conventional wisdom would tell you that I am far from the perfect candidate. I am young, despite my best efforts to grow older. I am Muslim. I am a democratic socialist. And most damning of all, I refuse to apologize for any of this.
- [48:48]
Joy Reid
I love that unapologetic about who he is. Doesn't play those games. Now this election was especially significant in New York, where as a very smart person who I know wrote in a piece entitled the Making the Meaning, I'm sorry, the Meaning of Mamdani, which is a really terrific piece which you can read on my substack and this is what she wrote. 24 years ago, New York City suffered the most horrific terrorist attack, killing nearly 3,000 innocent souls. It was one of the worst periods in the city's history and for the nation as a whole. People from every age range, every demographic possible, from various countries comprising a multitude of ethnicities and yes, religions perished when those towers were struck and came crashing down. Included among the casualties were many Muslims, a key fact often overlooked and dismissed in coverage of 9 11, even decades later. In fact, Salman Hamdani, a Pakistani American first responder who rushed to the scene to help and was killed that day, was first presumed to be one of the attackers rather than a victim. For most Muslims, it was guilty till proven innocent. In the days, weeks and months following those unimaginable attacks, hundreds of Muslim men were rounded up and detained. Countless Muslims were placed on watch lists and do not fly lists, and the NYPD built an entire surveillance unit to spy on the community that extended beyond the city. Mosques were vandalized, Muslim women had their hijabs ripped off their heads. Many families placed American flags on their vehicles and outside their homes to prevent attacks. And sadly, incidents of hate crimes skyrocketed. There were assaults, beatings, acts of vandalism, and even murder because racists aren't the brightest apple in the bunch. They even mustuk Sikh men wearing turbans as Muslim and therefore hate crimes against that community increased tremendously as well. I, this writer writes, remembers remember interviewing a grieving Sikh wife for a local paper in New Jersey whose husband was murdered because he wore a turban. I sometimes think about what happened to their daughter, who was only a small child at the time. For Muslims and those perceived to be Muslim, there was a sense of constant fear, either for yourself or your loved ones. It's what Mamdani addressed himself when he spoke of his aunt, who, yes, he called aunt, because that is what we call elders who may or may not even be related to us. Following 9 11, our loyalty and patriotism were constantly questioned. When people speak speak of the great unity that emerged following that tragic day. They clearly never listened to the Muslim community, which experienced a completely different response. I myself recall someone spitting on the ground towards me. This writer writes in the days following the attack, someone yelling, go back to where you come from on the 6 train going uptown, employers hanging up the phone on me when I said my name, various glares and stares as people tried to figure out where I was from, and an overall climate of unease and tension. Many Muslims and immigrants were constantly looking over their shoulders, worried about family and friends and yes, even fearful of riding the train. And in this New York City mayoral election, that kind of gross Islamophobia continued, even flourished. I want to show you just a few of the really disgusting posts that were posted against Mamdani ahead of the election. Jason, if you have C5, look at this one. This was Laura Loomer and Andy Ogles vile posts, essentially calling Mamdani a terrorist. And Laura Loomer saying that the bomb threats that were called in on election day probably came from Mamdani and his terrorist friends. And showing the rubble of 9 11. Here's another one. This is a Randisley. We like to call him a Randisley who posted when you vote tomorrow, remember 9 11. Classy. Even celebrities. Deborah Messing. This one hurt my heart. She's an actress I actually used to enjoy. I'm talking about in Judaism and Christianity were commanded to speak the truth. In Islam, they're commanded to lie if it means spreading them. Do not disregard this fundamental ideological difference. Now take a look at Mamdani. Apply that basic rule. Listen to his words and watch his actions. He's revealing their goal. Mass conflict version. These are two opposing civilizations that cannot exist. Pretty horrible. She got a lot of flack for that one. Elder and even Larry Elder, who's supposedly an intellectual, look at this. He puts a hashtag socialism and puts my city in an area. This is the tackiest, most horrible thing ever. And again, Laura Loomer making light of the bomb threats that actually literally happened in New Jersey and in New York on the day of the election, mainly in Democratic precincts. Two schools had to actually shut down their voting for a while in order to let people vote. So that's the atmosphere that led to the election of Zora Mandani. And you know what? He won. Anyway. Joining us now is the Joy Reid show, one of our incredible booking producers, Nidha Khan. Nidha is a key and wonderful member of our team and she wrote, she's the brilliant writer who wrote that wonderful piece on the sub stack. Nidha, thank you so much for getting on camera so people can see you.
- [54:06]
Maya Wiley
Hello.
- [54:07]
Nidha Khan
Hello. Yes, I have emerged from behind the curtain. Thank you so much for having me. And you know, it's been amazing to work with you, Joy. You've always been one of my favorite people in this business. And I just want to take this moment to say that you've also, for everybody watching, you've also been the most supportive and in terms of inclusivity and giving people a platform that. Giving them a voice. And you have been consistent from the beginning. You know, people don't even know. I'm sure most people don't know that. When you were at the Grio, I used to contribute pieces and you were my editor. And even all the way back, this was. It must have been the Boston Marathon bombing.
- [54:43]
Joy Reid
Yeah.
- [54:43]
Nidha Khan
What was that? 2013. As usual, I was getting the right wing hate. And, you know, all the idiots were in my mention saying that I'm sure you did the Boston Marathon bombing. And you reached out to me and said, do you want to write a piece? Do you want to respond to some of this? Do you want to talk about it? And you gave me the opportunity to do that. So thank you for always being consistent and not only with me, with so many people. And you're the best, and I'm so.
- [55:08]
Joy Reid
Happy working with you. Unsolicited kindness. Thank you, Nidha. I appreciate you. But talk about your piece was so great, and I wanted yours to be the first voice people read on the substack at Joy's house rather than mine. Because, you know, you and I were tweeting, texting, not tweeting. We're texting about this pretty much all night until, like, very late in the. In the early in the morning about just how significant this was for you as a young Muslim woman. Just talk about that. The victory of Mamdani and Hashmi, too.
- [55:37]
Nidha Khan
Yes, absolutely. And, well, I don't know if I would call myself young anymore. I had this realization last night that I'm actually older than the mayor of New York City, which is.
- [55:46]
Joy Reid
Oh, my God. I'm like, when did this happen?
- [55:48]
Nidha Khan
I'm like the old auntie now. I guess I'm his auntie. Maybe not that old, but I'm definitely older than him. It was just a remarkable moment. You know, you. I love the way you read those. Those words for my piece. I'm gonna always have you do all the VO's for all my articles from now on. But you know, it was a very visceral time when 911 happened, obviously for the innocent souls that were killed. But then also in the aftermath of that, as you were reading parts of my piece, and not only in the days and weeks immediately following, but this went on for years and years, years. You know, the Islamophobia and anti Muslim sentiment was what was weaponized for everything. From going into Iraq, from doing covert actions, from taking away so much of our civil liberties, doing things like the Patriot Act, NSA surveillance. I mean you did a whole great show, you know, a couple weeks ago about how Trump was a continuation of Bush and a lot of this stuff, you know, we've talked about this so many times ice, Homeland Security, all this stuff came to fruition under the guise of quote, unquote, fight fighting terror. And a of that happened only by demonizing the Muslim community, by lumping them all in together into the category of being terrorists and then taking that to get all of this stuff done, including elections, including things like the Ground Zero Mosque, which I talked about in that piece and I covered in 2010, you know, I had a piece, I think it was titled Islamophobia Weapon of Choice for the Midterm Elections. And that was in 2010, 15 years ago. So we're talking about various election cycles, various activities, actions overseas where this has been done over and over again. And what was beautiful about yesterday was the fact that it did not work, that New York City said, no, not in our name, we are not going to allow this to happen. And we are going to elect the first ever Muslim mayor of New York City who is of South Asian descent like I am. And it was just, honestly I had tears in my eyes, like I never thought I would see this day. And I did get a little emotional because I was like, I wish my dad were alive to see this moment. You know, he sadly was actually not to get into a very sad topic, but he was killed 20 years ago when he was hit by a car. And there was a lot of like anti Muslim sentiment at that time and racism that contributed to his death, including like police and EMTs that did not even think that he was really seriously injured. And while my dad was struggling to talk, they thought that he had a language barrier and sent him to a non trauma hospital. And meanwhile he was hemorrhaging and had trauma and was trying to basically communicate and say what was happening and he fell into a coma three hours later and. No, I'm sorry. He fell into a coma five hours later and he died Three days later.
- [58:30]
Joy Reid
Wow.
- [58:31]
Nidha Khan
You know, so I. And I wrote a piece about that too. I've written about everything at this point. But, you know, and that, that was a very difficult one. But just about how all of this anti Muslim sentiment, it's not only the overt actions of, you know, the assaults and vandalisms and killings that happened to the community and so many other people, but also how this seeped into people's minds and psyche for years and years and years contributed to real life consequences, including, I'm 1000% sure, to my father's death as well.
- [59:01]
Joy Reid
Yeah. And I think those kinds of traumas, I think as you said, it makes you emotional when, I'm sure when, you know, you feel the embrace of an entire city, especially a city as big and diverse as New York, that is embracing this person who, as you said, it reflects you. I think that's how people felt when Barack Obama won. Black people felt. It's funny because what's her name? Winsome. Sears thinks that just him being black is what got black folks. No, it was the fact that he represented blackness in such an incredible positive way that he had positive agenda for all Americans. And specifically black people felt like he was going to carry us. And I know that, I mean, just from texting with you and texting with other friends who are Muslim and having Dean Obidallah, thank God he was available to be on with us live when this happened. You were behind the scenes and he was on camera.
- [59:48]
Nidha Khan
He was right on time.
- [59:49]
Joy Reid
He was right on. He came right on time. This is. We were calling the race, but I want to. Can I play really quickly? This is another piece of video. This is people outside the venue chanting after the election. This is C10. If we could throw that up, Jason. Okay, so there we go. Now that is significant because a lot of the attacks on Zorhan Mamdani came because he supports the Palestinian people, the idea of a Palestinian state. And he refused to succumb to the bullying of the Bill Ackman's of the world, who by the way, has bent the knee. He bent that. He bent the knee today. Bill Ackman.
- [60:41]
Nidha Khan
No time. He sent that tweet out like literally right after he clinched. And one, you know, it was like, oh, I'd love to meet with you and work with you.
- [60:48]
Joy Reid
I was like, wow. Yeah, they're not leaving New York, by the way. Wall street, rich people like him, they're not leaving. They're not going nowhere. They're going to bend the knee. But talk about if you could the significance of people who are pro Palestine feeling seen and heard by Mamdani as well? Yeah, exactly.
- [61:03]
Nidha Khan
And first let me shout out my friend who shot that video, because he would kill me if I don't. DJ Magic Mike, thank you for getting that video. He was calling me at like 1am and I was very jealous that I was not there. But, you know, I think for, well, not only the Muslim community, but specifically for Palestinians to be seen and to be heard, you know, in this moment is so extraordinary. Somebody that actually believes in their humanity, in a real two state solution, in equality for both Jewish people and for Palestinians and Muslims to be equal, to be human. And he, you know, has not shied away from it. He's gotten attacks and left and right, people have gone, thrown everything at him, you know, tried to grill him, say, are you going to denounce this? Are you going to do that? And so many people also tried to link him with statements that he never made. He's never himself uttered anything anti Semitic. In fact, he's met with many, many members of the Jewish community. He's gone to synagogues. He's all about inclusivity. He's literally campaigned everywhere and that's essentially why he won. And you know, and a big part of we've talked about this, that the Democrats never talk about why they lost so many young voters, especially and progressives in 2024, was because of this issue, because this is the Democratic Party. It's not the Republican Party. They don't want to co sign murder, war. That's not this side. So if your closing argument is going out with the warmonger's daughter, you know, Liz Cheney, and being like, vote for me, that's not going to work. That is not the clothes you want. I'm sorry. And that is something that, is something that they never talk about and they don't want to acknowledge. So here you had a candidate that, that stayed true to his principles. He spoke to the issues. He met with everybody. He was campaigning. I think the night before the election, he was in a LGBTQ club. He was literally everywhere. I was like, oh my God, he's all over the place. I don't know where the energy comes from. And it's remarkable. And that's why people gravitated towards him because he did not change his stance. And he brought everybody into the fold. And he talked about issues that they cared about, about affordability, about livable wages, how to fix this city. And it's amazing, and I'm so proud of Yorkers to have finally done this. And you know, and even for immigrant communities, I wrote about this in the piece as well, to see him as a representation and older ones, too. You know, people talked about older voters coming out. They did not focus on the older brown voters, the older black voters and older immigrant voters who in Brooklyn and Queens, who a lot of them did vote for Zoran, you know, they were left out. It was just assumed that older voters are going to go right, which was not true. So he did a remarkable job, a remarkable campaign, and I felt hope and optimism. But also at the same time, I'm very cognizant of the fact that sadly, this is just the beginning because all ugly vitriol and the anti Muslim attacks are only going to ratchet up now that he is in fact, the mayor elect and they're going to throw everything at him. And of course from the administration, too. It's going to come from the top down and from all of these folks on all over the place. So it's important for people to stand with him and to push back against his stuff as he proceeds so that he can actually execute his plan and make New York City better.
- [64:13]
Joy Reid
He can handle it. I think he can handle it. It is an Obama moment for Muslim Americans. I'm very proud of New York City as well, my little home city. I'm so proud of y' all for doing this great thing.
- [64:25]
Nidha Khan
That song Duma Chala, it's like, I think it's like 20 years old from a Bollywood movie. And I was like, wow, I never thought I would see that.
- [64:33]
Joy Reid
Somebody posted it and said, this is a real life bollyw movie. Really was.
- [64:38]
Nidha Khan
I was like, is this really happening?
- [64:39]
Joy Reid
A real Bollywood movie. Niva Khan, you will be seeing her from time to time. We appreciate it because she actually is somebody you might recognize from being on air with me over at Miss now back in the day. Niva Khan, thank you so much. One of our wonderful producers.
- [64:51]
Nidha Khan
Thank you for having me and proposing my piece. I love it.
- [64:54]
Joy Reid
Yes. And you guys can read the piece in full. It is really, really good and worth reading. And I wanted the first voice you heard you read on Joann Reid.com at Joy's House to be from a Muslim voice. So I thought that was really important representation. We're going to talk about that in a minute because that didn't happen on all the networks near the comm.
- [65:10]
Rula Jabril
Thank you very much.
- [65:11]
Nidha Khan
Thank you. Thank you, Joy. I appreciate it.
- [65:13]
Joy Reid
Thank you. So y' all go to Joann Reid.com to read the piece. It's right in the middle. You can just go on and you do not have to pay to read it. I do not believe in paywalls. You can just click on it. There's going to be a thing on that says subscribe, but if you just subscribe, it is free. You don't have to pay to subscribe. The only time you have to pay to subscribe over@joann reid.com is if you want to comment because I don't want trolls over there when we do chats@joy.com I want it to be troll free. So that is the only way. But you can look at it for free. I don't believe in paywalls. All right, so welcome to our two of the Joy Reid Show. Big ups, everybody in the chats. And we have Amy Diaz saying, I'm a proud Zoran Mamdani voter. His Spanish won my mom and aunts over. I'm ready for the change. Amy Diaz said that he, he did that. He got the espanol and got you excited. We have Gmail saying, joy, thank you for raising awareness. Love your channel with a 4.99 tip. Appreciate that. That might be in pounds. I'm not even sure I'm linked. That little sale looks like it was in British pounds. Thank you all for being here. We're going to dig deeper into the representation challenge in the second hour of Joy Reacho. If you've not hit like and subscribe, now would be a great time to do that. Go ahead. Like and subscribe. Also hit that share. Let's get those likes going so that we can make sure the algorithm is fed. You have to feed the algorithm. We have a thank you Niva on the screen. Nubian Queen 6391 and yes, go Zorhan. And we love the fact that we can show some of your comments right on the screen. So this is a very exciting day in the Joy Reid show land. So here's the story that I want to tell you guys. This is a story that the networks will not tell you and frankly are not staffed to tell you. In an era when these major networks are de diversifying and firing basically most of the folks who aren't white. And also at a time when literal ideological Zionists are buying up our media to block out criticism of Israel and its genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza and also the International Court of Justice adjudicated apartheid system in the occupied west bank, there is a media landscape saying that, you know what if we can't make People stop caring about it. We'll just buy on the media and make it harder for that to happen and just get those stories out of here. Well, last night in the city of Donald Trump's birth, of President Donald Trump's birth, New York City, Mamdani won. Zorhan Mamdani, an African born South Asian, a South Asian Muslim, was elected mayor. And not just on any day. Not just on any day. Mamdani was elected on the very same day that we learned that Dick Cheney, the architect of the Iraq war, passed away. I think Spencer Ackerman in the nation had the most accurate headline on this. His headline was his works completed. Dick Cheney mass murderer of Iraqis and American democracy dies same day as mom dying to get elected. The Iraq war, which was foisted on the American people using CIA produced lies and cooked up intelligence by the George W. Bush Dick Chain administration to feed off of America's rage and terror over the 911 attacks on New York City and on the Pentagon in 2001 when Mamdani, by the way, was 10 years old. The attack on the Twin Towers was the closing argument. Despite that history, that was the closing argument for Mamdani's opponents. They literally put images of the Twin Towers or of Mandani literally in front of the Twin Towers and claimed that he would bring terrorism to New York if elected. As Spencer Ackerman again with a second winning headline, pointed out on foreverwars.com the closing argument from Mandani's opponents was 911 and he gets elected on the day that the person who twisted 911 into a false justification for invading Iraq died. And by the way, Mamdani didn't just beat back those Islamophobic attacks and a barrage of money poured into Super PACs by every billionaire you can think of, including viciously anti diversity, anti equity and inclusion zealot billionaires like Bill Ackman and the architect of stop and frisk policing in New York City, former Mayor Bloomberg. He beat the former governor whose father was one of the most quintessential legendary New York governors, Mario Cuomo. The Cuomos are as endemic to New York as Donald Trump is. He beat him. Beat him. And by the way, those who were saying that the guy with the hat guy was a spoiler, nope, Mamdani beat his two opponents by more than the two of them had combined. He had more votes than they had combined. So it wouldn't have mattered if Curtis Lee would dropped out. That's how big his victory was. And he didn't just Beat all those guys, like, by a little bit. He won by more votes than any New York mayoral candidate since John Lindsay. More than 2 million New Yorkers voted. And by the way, John Lindsay was mayor in 1966. That's nearly. He got nearly double the number of people who voted for Eric Adams when Eric Adams got elected mayor. Think about that for a moment. This guy was elected by more votes than anyone since John Lindsay was mayor in 1966-1973. That is wild, right? And that is counting before they got the full numbers in. When the full numbers come in, he's well over a million votes. That is a remarkable, historic thing. You would think. This guy was born in Uganda. He is an Asian American Muslim. And look at that chart. There's the chart. This is the largest turnout since the 80s, at least the era when 9, 11 happened. That's amazing. And he did that at a time when Donald Trump, who's from New York as well, was threatening to go to war with Nigeria, bombing boats in the Caribbean, halting all immigration to the United States, unless it's white South Africans or white Europeans, threatening war not just against Venezuela and Nigeria. But remember, he still also said he was going to go to war, put troops on the ground to get the Panama Canal, to get Greenland. Talk about president of peace. All of that was the atmospherics around this election. At a time when the Trump regime is projecting this image of America as what you see on the screen as this pristinely white country. He won against that imagery.
- [71:58]
Rula Jabril
At a.
- [71:59]
Joy Reid
Time when, I guess JD And Erica are supposed to be the quintessential image of American manhood and womanhood. Not saying they're in a relationship, because I think you're just cynical. And all of it is power grabs. But this is supposed to be two of the sort of quintessential Americans right now. But in that America, Mamdani still won. And it wasn't just Sorahan Mamdani. Virginia elected a full Democratic slate. Abigail Spanberger as governor, Jay Jones, African American as attorney general, and an Indian American state senator named Ghassala Hashmi, who becomes the first Muslim woman to win statewide office in U.S. history. She's going to be the lieutenant governor. And she won by a little, not by a lot. There she is, 55% to 44% for John. Well, he had. He shares my last name, but we won't claim him. She won big. Americans also reelected the Indian American mayor of Cincinnati in J.D. vance's own home state, beating J.D. vance's half brother. This is Like a big historical night. But you wouldn't know it from the largely all white panels that you saw on mainstream media where only one Muslim that we've been able to confirm was allowed to comment on the night. Ali Velshi, my good friend Ali Velshi from msnow, who appeared remotely on their election night. Panelists with Empire Muslim Political Affairs Committee. That was it. Other representation of Muslim people, network coverage, cable or broadcast, come and comment on the biggest story in America last night. The biggest story was not the two sort of Biden esque liberal Democrats that won in New Jersey and in Virginia. Those are big stories. They're very important statewide elections. But you're talking about in the financial capital of this country where Wall street is on the same day the architect of the Iraq war passes away, this Muslim immigrant from Uganda who's Muslim and Asian American, Southeast Asian, wins the mayor's ship, the mayoralty. He wins, he becomes mayor. It's a huge story. He's going to directly be in conflict with, with the other New Yorker, Donald Trump, whose claims he's going to defund New York State, which he's not. I mean, Wall Street's there. Let me play a little bit of Zorhan Momdani, because he recognized who his opponent is. Yeah, he's mayor of the city and Donald Trump is president, but he understands what that relationship looks like. Trump, here it is.
- [74:41]
Zorhan Mamdani
Since I know you're watching, I have four words for you tonight. Turn the volume up. We will hold back landlords to account because the Donald Trumps of our city have grown far too comfortable taking advantage of their tenants. We will put an end to the culture of corruption that has allowed billionaires like Trump to evade taxation and exploit tax breaks. We will stand alongside unions and expectations, labor protections, because we know, just as Donald Trump does, that when working people have ironclad rights, the bosses who seek to extort them become very small indeed. New York will remain a city of immigrants. A city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants, and as of tonight, led by an immigrant. So hear me, President Trump, when I say this, to get to any of us, you will have to get through all of us. When we enter City hall in 58 days, expectations will be high. We will meet them. A great, a great New Yorker once said that while you campaign in poetry, you govern in prose. If that must be true, let the prose we write still rhyme. And let us build a shining city for all. And we must chart a new path as bold as the one we have already traveled. After all, the conventional wisdom would tell you that I am far from the perfect candidate. I am young, despite my best efforts to grow older. I am Muslim. I am a democratic socialist. And most damning of all, I refuse to apologize for any of this.
- [77:54]
Joy Reid
I'm sorry. If that's not the biggest political story in America right now, I don't know what is. I don't know how anyone's news judgment could say that two relatively conventional Democrats winning in Virginia, which is a state that does flip back and forth, which is very important. I'm not saying those stories aren't important. I think it's very important. We need fighters in every state and in New Jersey. But you're telling me that that isn't the most charismatic political figure in our politics right now and that that man becoming the mayor of New York City is not the top political story in the country and that it might not be, I don't know, a good idea to maybe have a Muslim or two around to discuss that. Maybe on air, maybe on camera, mainstream media, maybe one or two who could just opine on why that's important and on that representation. Just my thought. But I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. Joining me now, our amazing Wednesday panel award winning international journal author and foreign policy Rula Jabril. She's an international best selling author. Oh, we're waiting for Rula. Well, she's going to come. Moment. Well, an associate whose works have been translated into more than 14 languages at the University of Miami where she teaches communication. Move on to our wonderful guests who we see right now good sorrow. Maya Wiley, lawyer, professor, civil rights activist, former candidate for New York. She has served as president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights since May of 2022 and served as counsel to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, chairing the Civilian Complaint review board from 2016 to 2017. And now that I see my dear friend Rula, I'm going to add the last bit of her bio because she has served on the advisory board of the US Middle East Project and she's fluent. I love saying this in Italian, English, Hebrew and Arabic, but she's promised not to flip languages in mid interview because I can't keep up with any of that. But Rula, I'm so glad that you are here because I want you to start because I was annoyed as I tried to after we did our live coverage. Thank God Dean Obeidallah was able to join us because I felt like this was an Obama moment for American Muslims and I flipped around we went and flipped around to see if that is the way it felt on mainstream media. We just flipped through some channels after we finished our live, and that's not the way it looked. What do you make of the fact that this moment did not include Muslim voices on most of mainstream media to comment on it?
- [80:27]
Rula Jabril
Joy, it's so good to be with you and Maya. I just want to tell both of you, it's, you know, you're my favorite sister, my favorite Afro American sisters. I just got back from Italy, where I spoke at the parliament and I could be included in a conversation at the Italian parliament as a Muslim, as a Palestinian, as a black woman, as an Afro Palestinian woman. Yet I arrived 24 hours ago and I was stunned that there is no Muslim, there's no Arab included in the conversation about the first Asian, African Muslim man who's married to a Syrian woman. There's nobody to talk about him except those who smeared him, those who put him down, those who criticized him, our media. And this is why it hurts so badly that you are not anymore on msnbc, Joy, because you are the only one. The only one including those voices and those stories and that narrative that is fundamental for the American story. What happened last night is a seismic shift. I never seen any shift like this one since Obama, and by far he's better than Obama when it comes to communication, with all due respect to President Obama. But what we've seen even this morning, where you have the head of ADL who basically been invited immediately to smear this guy and depict him as anti Semite, as a threat to the Jews, to the Jewish community in America, trying actually to manipulate the conversation where he, you know, where he went on to say that he opened some kind of, you know, communication with the Jewish community. If they feel threatened by this man, they should immediately call him and communicate with, with him. I was like, what are you doing? What are you doing? This is the same guy that in July this year went and testified at the Israeli parliament and said, and I want to quote him directly, where he said, we need the kind of genius badger attacks between parentheses. These were a terrorist attack where hundreds of people died. He said, we need this kind of genius attacks on US Campuses. He was lobbying a foreign nation to attack American students if they dare to criticize Israel. What happened this morning was not about security for the Jewish community in America who voted for Mamdani, by the way.
- [83:02]
Joy Reid
Yeah.
- [83:03]
Rula Jabril
Yes, I was there last night in New York, in Brooklyn with a group of American Jews, including Naomi Klein, including actually Peter Beinhardt and Simon San and so many others who voted for him. Jewish Voices for Peace. And then you have the ADL guy who only wants to use the issue of anti Semitism to demand, to demand impunity for Israel. He doesn't understand even that the $30 billion given to Israel in the last two years, year and a half, is one of the reasons why Mamdani won. Because Americans cannot afford their rent, cannot afford to go to a hospital, cannot afford food for their children. Yet there's money to slaughter children in Gaza and to bomb children in Gaza and to harass Palestinian farmers who only want to live on their own land and harvest their olives. He doesn't understand in this moment that he, that that kind of, you know, Iron Dome in the media to protect Israel, a state that is on trial for genocide, ethnic cleansing and war crimes. He doesn't understand that this Iron Dome backfired. That's why we have Mamdani. That's why people are abhorred and don't want to establishment anymore. And yet the establishment in the media insist on exclusion, insist on Islamophobia and above all, insist to lecture the millions of Americans who voted. Maybe, maybe you're confused. I'm like, I couldn't believe it. I almost shocked on my own drink when I was on my own coffee this morning when I was listening to this guy. And to hear also to see on the panels in the evening, not even one Muslim voice to make them understand how for many years as Muslim, we felt underrepresented, discriminated, collectively blamed for an attack that we had nothing to do with. And then finally America is telling the world and telling, you know, the establishment in both parties, we can coexist. We can actually thrive together in this incredible multi ethnic, multiracial democracy, sending a message to Israel, an ethno state that instead of colonization, you actually can coexist. You just need to respect each person, dignity, right and freedom.
- [85:32]
Joy Reid
It is remarkable, Maya, to bring you into this. And I just want to note one more thing before I bring you in, Maya. That, and this is a post that the Anti Defamation League, they have launched a tracker, they've announced a tracking initiative to track and monitor policies and personnel appointments of the incoming Mamdani administration and protect Jewish residents across the five boroughs, treating it as if there was some sort of invasion and occupation of New York City. The Anti Defamation League. I'm stay with you just one moment, Rula. It used to be about civil rights and protecting people's civil rights across different ethnicities. But this is chilling. They have announced a tip line building on decades of incident response in New York City and across the country. ADL is establishing a dedicated New York City antisemitism tip line. This is the Democratic nominee, Mayor, Incoming mayor of New York. Why would ADL need to launch a tracker to track his policies and a tip line?
- [86:43]
Rula Jabril
Simply because they are not defending American democracy. Their priority is not to defend the security of American Jews. They said nothing. When American Jews actually were killed in Israel, they said nothing. Yet we have David Adler, who was tortured. An American Jewish citizen was tortured a month ago in an Israeli jail because he wanted to deliver aid to kids in Gaza. Torture. Literally torture. He told us he was tortured. He wrote about it. The ADL never mentioned anything because for them, they're only interested in defending Israel. Impunity and impunity and this unconditional support so they could continue to commit war crimes after war crimes. And you can see joy. You know, Jonathan went to the Israeli Parliament on multiple occasions, but he was lobbying them, lobbying them literally to attack American students. Lobbying them to take over TikTok and American media because the narrative is somehow shifting from them. What happened last night is not only a generational shift. What happened last night is a political tsunami. And if they don't understand that this political tsunami is because the overwhelming majority of people who voted and the people who didn't vote are disgusted by these policies. Literally disgusted by this policy. So the more censorship and more repression will produce more Mamdanis. I don't know how you don't understand political communication and don't understand popular will. I mean, this is, for me what happened during the Arab Spring. They kept pushing and pushing and pushing until there was a political revolution. Last night was a political revolution. And I fear for Mamdani because I think the hardest job starts today. They're going after him because, yes, he won the elections, but they will fear his success politically because that means it will undermine and show how failure, the failure that they are.
- [88:49]
Joy Reid
Let me bring you in, Maya, because you and I can just say that all our kids that lived in New York voted for you when you ran for mayor, which would have also been a place political earthquake if we'd had the first black woman mayor of New York City. And you would have been phenomenal. What was your reaction to this? Because it definitely felt to me like the biggest story in America with due respect to the gubernatorial races. It is an earthquake, right?
- [89:12]
Maya Wiley
Oh, yeah. But it's. Well, I want to use a different metaphor because people are Afraid of earthquakes. This is a very, very good story for America. This is a very, very good thing for the state city of New York. This is something that should be paid attention to and picked up by, by the Democratic Party. And I was there last night as well. And, you know, full disclosure, I endorse Zoran Kwame Mumdani.
- [89:38]
Joy Reid
We love that his middle name is Kwame, by the way, and that he's African. I'm claiming him because he's African. Okay, so look, we go ahead and. Go ahead and play him. Go on.
- [89:46]
Maya Wiley
And those of us who have the good fortune to spend time in Africa know there are a lot of Muslims in Africa, a lot of South Asians in Africa that are African.
- [89:56]
Joy Reid
Yes.
- [89:57]
Maya Wiley
They're not Afrikaners, which that's a whole.
- [90:00]
Joy Reid
That's why they can't immigrate here, because Trump said, no, only the whites, only the white Africanas can come.
- [90:07]
Maya Wiley
But, but, you know, one of the things that Zoran is. And, you know, I'll never forget actually the day that I endorsed him. We were standing outside and I had to run off after my endorsement. Anyway, the point wasn't my endorsement is for the press to be able to ask him more questions about his run for New York City mayor. But he was asked about his identity. And I remember at one point being asked, you know, what advice do you give him? And I said, he doesn't need my advice. He doesn't need my advice. And then I looked at him, I said, but if you want my advice, just keeping yourself. Just keeping yourself. And you showed that clip. I mean, part of what is so fantastic about Zoram Dani is that he. It's not only that he is charismatic, it's that he's a human being. He's you. You meet him and you know that he's sincere and he cares, he listens. He doesn't come with arrogance, but he doesn't come afraid to be honest and authentic about who he is. And so many voters in this country are looking for, I mean, I think, to Rula's point, looking for people who are going to be bold, people who are going to understand that tinkering is not going to change the calculus in their lives. And that calculus is about what's in their pocketbooks and what expenses it covers. But he was able to do more than that, and he was able to really show that you can be who he is and not back away from it. That actually had resonance for a whole bunch of us. I mean, I used to say on my campaign, been Black all my life, because I wanted to. I was like, this is not going to be a campaign by any means necessary. But that's what people want. They want authenticity, but they want authenticity that's also going to stick to a bold vision for not just, I'm going to promise you your prices are going to come down, but I'm going to promise you that I'm going to unite people. I mean, one of the things that he did so effectively was he went out and met with black leaders. He went out and met with Jewish leaders. He met anybody who wasn't sure if he was going to care about their communities. He actually went out and engaged them. He asked questions. And if he thought he had it wrong or if there was something he didn't understand, he was adult enough to say, I learned something, I learned something. And there's something I will do differently. Now, who doesn't want that kind of.
- [92:39]
Joy Reid
Leader to really quickly stay with you for a second, Maya, because you've worked in municipal government, you know how difficult it is because you know the trick now. And Dean Omaidala made this point last night, is now implementing these very ambitious plans. There were a bunch of ballot measures. And this is D12. There were a bunch of ballot measures. There were six on the ballot. Four of them passed. Weirdly enough, the one that didn't pass was the one that would have put municipal elections the same year as presidential elections. I'm not sure why that didn't pass, but one of them would expand ski trails. There was one that was supposed to be about expanding ski trails in the Olympic sports complex In Essex County, N.Y. there was one that would create new processes to fast track affordable housing. This is the one that I really wanted to zero in on and get your comment on. So this one passed it's ballot proposal 2. This is one Mayor Adams was opposed to. There's a. There's a third one. There was two, three and four, the ones that passed, that was about creating a faster review process for land use projects, like smaller projects, to change how land is used and prepare for extreme weather. And then there was a third one. There was a proposal to change the land review process to make affordable housing easier to build. Basically, how significant is it that it seems that the people of New York said, we don't just want this guy, we want his policies specifically on affordable housing.
- [94:04]
Maya Wiley
Yeah, they put a lot of trust in him by not just voting for him, but when they voted for these ballot measures, because what they were saying is, we believe you believe in Affordability, we believe, you know, he made housing policy one of his central planks. Not the only one, but one of them. And, you know, one of the things that New Yorkers know is if you're the mayor, you have to focus. It is a hard, you know, there's so many great agencies and so many public servants. Donald Trump could learn a lesson from this. Who really do know how to keep the city rolling. But when you want to make change, when you want to do things that are actually doing something new and different, that's when the job gets hard. Zoram Hamdani is not coming in as a status quo candidate. He's coming in as a change maker. But it does mean he needs tools to make sure he can make that change. So I think that's the connection point, right? New Yorkers said, let's make it easier, let's do something. And for all of those New Yorkers who voted for those ballot initiatives and actually filled in a bubble for Zoram Kwame Mandani, they were saying, yeah, we trust you to do that.
- [95:15]
Joy Reid
Yeah. Rula, let's talk about. Just a minute. The sort of national politics of it. Donald Trump claimed that this was not a referendum on him. But the exit polls beg to differ across these elections. Whether it was in Virginia or New Jersey or in New York City or in California. You can see from this chart, I mean, everyone said basically deep disapproval of him, his policies, his policies on immigration across the board. He was the driving sort of force behind it. But Democrats also, I think, should have gotten a message. And I don't know if you agree with me on this as well, because Zoran Mamdani did not have the support of Chuck Schumer. Even at the very end. The Senate Majority Leader would not endorse him and wouldn't even say who we voted for. A lot of Democrats who did endorse him did it very reluctantly. They sort of seemed like they were dragging, kicking and screaming. And he, one of the things he did in the debates is when he was told to essentially bully to say, when you get into Israel, he was like, well, I'm going to the Bronx, I'm going to Queens. Like, I gotta, I gotta, I work for New York. I don't work for a foreign country Democrat. And he didn't take money from aipac, which I've got a lot of people in the comments, a lot of people constantly saying, this is the real message. This is a guy who stiff armed aipac. And the Democrats are terrified about that. But doesn't he prove that this is a winning strategy, focus on America affordability and not on embracing this, another country's agenda.
- [96:37]
Rula Jabril
Joy, you and I and Maya, probably even during the presidential election, we're trying to tell Democrats, don't listen to your donor. Don't let donors dictate your agenda. You're going to lose. Kamala Harris raised $1 billion, a lot of money, yet she lost the elections and lost the elections for multiple reasons. But one of the reasons is it was obvious. They were terrified to listen to the base. They were terrified to put a Palestinian woman on the stage to speak. They were terrified to even say we would comply with international law or we would comply with America's law, the Leahy Law. When it comes to the use of starvation and sending weapons to a country that is using starvation, which is in violation of America's own law. I mean, it was obvious they were terrified. It was obvious. Donors. I mean, some of the donors told me directly if she would dare to put on the stage a Palestinian woman, we're never going to vote for her. She's not going to get our money. I was told by somebody very close actually to Chuck Schumer that they were threatened by donors. If you endorse this guy, we will cut the checks. And then we discovered yesterday that $2 million were basically used by multiple families. I want to make some names. Bloomberg, the Tisch family, the Hesses, and then Ackman, Bill Ackman. Okay, so they put $22 million to defeat this guy, and they lost. And this is the biggest message. The biggest message is money doesn't matter, really, as much as the message. As much as Maya said authenticity and as much as relating to the voters. I mean, when I went to Brooklyn last night, I was stunned. When I was taking the subway, there was like homeless people wearing Mamdani's. Homeless people, people who are like starving people who probably live in the streets that he represent them. Listen, I want to tell you something. I was in Cairo when Obama gave the speech in 2009. And I will never forget the impact of that speech. I was taking a cab every day to a studio because I worked in Cairo at the time, 2009. And I remember my driver every day was the same driver. He was always listening to the same speech over and over again. And I said to him, and his name is Mahmoud, which is Mamdani's father name. I said to him, mahmoud, why are you keep listening to the same speech? I heard the same speech eight times already. He said, ma', am, this guy Is black like me. This guy. Father was Muslim like me. This guy can be president of the most powerful country on earth. And I cannot vote, and I'm not allowed to vote. And I always think of that story as, you know, very emblematic and symbolical of what America represent in the eyes of the world. Yesterday, Mamdani story restored in the eyes of the world the credibility of the United States. Yes, you can vote for an orange dictator wannabe king, whatever. But then if you're disappointed, you have a system that can elect the Obamas and Mamdanis and hopefully Maya in the future.
- [99:48]
Joy Reid
I 100% agree. And this is why I think, Maya, that this really was the most important story last night. This and the Hashmi. You know, her becoming the first former state senator, Hashmi becoming the lieutenant governor of Virginia, first statewide elected Muslim woman. This country has been a hellscape for immigrants since January 20th. It has been citizens either and for citizens, right? For anyone Brown, any brown person has been, you know, subject to terrorism by Donald Trump's regime. The attempt to ethnically cleanse the United States to create this all white pristine country of these ads that they're putting out that look like fascist ads. From the 30s, it's been a hellscape for Muslims. Both times Trump said Trump has been in need a Muslim ban first. It was his first act. That was Stephen Miller's little project. There's been this idea of trying to de Americanize Muslims, and New York is the centerpiece of that. For this to be the city, New York to be the city that elects a Muslim man as mayor, an immigrant at that, from Africa at that. With Kwame as a middle name, it's giving Barack Hussein Obama.
- [100:55]
Judd Legum
Right.
- [100:55]
Joy Reid
I feel like it has all the things and to rule his point, because he is also such a superstar. He is a real. He has a rare gift. There are about five of these politicians that come along in your lifetime, maybe if you're lucky, like Bill Clinton was one. Barack Obama was clearly one. This is that guy. Right? I mean, he was. He. If he was born in the US he could be president. I mean, he's that good.
- [101:18]
Maya Wiley
Listen, remember, nobody knew who he was.
- [101:21]
Joy Reid
No.
- [101:22]
Rula Jabril
Yeah.
- [101:22]
Maya Wiley
Nobody knew. You could. He could pass you on the street and say, hi, I'm Zoram Donnie. And he'd be like that. That could happen in his district in Astoria. My. My nephews live in Astoria, Queens.
- [101:33]
Joy Reid
Right.
- [101:34]
Maya Wiley
You know, a lot of people. I can't say this is true of my nephews. I think they're very well informed. But My point is, a lot of people don't even know who their assembly member is, even if they represent their district. But it's also a very small part of the city to New York City to be an assembly representative. So I'm saying that to say he was a literal stranger to New York voters. So to be young, to be Muslim, to be who he is, look the way he looks, and be unapologetic about his affiliations, like the dsa. And to catch fire, you know, I had people telling me, you got to check this guy out, like, early, early, early on. Like, there's something about this guy. You got to check him out. But I think, like, he did the work. I don't know that people. And, you know, we three know this, and anyone else who's listening, who's either been in a campaign, worked for a campaign, been close to campaign, knows how hard it is. And it's hard even if you're a Kamala Harris who's a vice president, but to be unknown, to knit together and build from the ground up from literally virtually nothing. I don't. Not to disrespect the. The dsa. I'm just saying, like, the kind of base.
- [102:53]
Joy Reid
And the Working Families Party give them their flowers, too. They grew last night, by the way.
- [102:57]
Maya Wiley
And the Working Families Party. But critical. Critical support. But I. I'm. I'm only saying that, though, because you still. Look, I tried to win the Working Families Party support when I ran. They put you through it, you know, like, it's not like you just get a pass and a label because you have a label. You just got the endorsement. He. He did the work. And, you know, we knew in the early. And during early voting, 47,000 volunteers.
- [103:23]
Rula Jabril
Yes.
- [103:24]
Maya Wiley
What does that tell you? You know, when Donald. What Donald Trump did was really incentivize and excite people who could vote who had not been voting. We saw 3 million white voters who had been sitting elections out show up because Donald Trump excited them. Let's put aside why, but he excited them. That's what Zoran Mamdani did in New York City. And it wasn't just people who were already affiliated with the DSA or you won the election. What he did was he got people to go, huh? I like what I'm hearing. I like. I try. And the more people investigated him and the more he built and did the work, did the work to be known, to be seen to put his feet in people's streets, and he put his feet in anybody's streets, and everybody's Streets and then to build, build, build was astounding. It was astounding to watch. It was humbling to watch. And by the end of it, I think everyone in America has seen. If they weren't seeing it before last night, and if you were, if you were physically there and I was there last night, I'm not. Not for the speech. There were folks outside, cars passing by, horns honking, people screaming out of the car. People who couldn't get into the venue because they didn't have a ticket, but they stayed outside. And it was diverse and it was amazing. And so all I can say is, you cannot nobody.
- [104:55]
Joy Reid
I don't even know the race.
- [104:56]
Maya Wiley
You could replicate what he did as an unknown with like next to zero name recognition, next to zero money, some little bit of support, and turn it into a tidal wave. Didn't just win, he spanked.
- [105:13]
Joy Reid
He did. And by the way, for those who are saying Curtis Lewa was a spoiler, we did the math. He won more votes than Curtis Lewa and Andrew Cuomo combined. So even if Curtis Lewa weren't there and you gave all those votes to Cuomo, he still would have lost. I'm gonna give you the last word on this. Good sister Rula, because Nidha Khan, in our last hour, our wonderful producer gave her personal feelings, just as a Muslim woman, to have this happen. I wanna give you the same opportunity to have the last word on how it impacted you personally to see this happen in this moment, particularly this moment we're in.
- [105:49]
Rula Jabril
Thank you, Joy. Thank you, Maya. I. Listen. My father was a Muslim imam. And he was, you know, a humble man who took care, who was. Started his life as a guard in the most important mosque in Jerusalem, the Aqsa Mosque. Then, as he aged, he became a gardener. And in between, he was an imam for the early morning prayer. And I seen his trees being cut down and burned by the settlers. And it really hurt me because they were sacred trees. And for a long time, he was an African, he was black, he was Palestinian, and he was lived under occupation all of his lives. But in our home, there was a picture on the walls, and I didn't know who the man. I thought he was a relative. That was Frederick Douglass. In our home, that was that picture of this elegant, eloquent man. My father didn't know how to read and write, but he knew who Frederick Douglass was. Last night, I thought of my father's story and the humiliation he endured as a black Muslim man, especially by the soldiers who would stop him, take his id, drop it on the floor because they wanted to see him on his knees. This morning, when I exited the house and I saw all these halal shops and they were distributing small gifts, whether it's sweets or bread and other things, I remembered my father and I thought, you know, he never lived to see that dream. His daughter can. And I think we need to continue to work so the Democratic Party can understand that the only path, the only path to winning and to getting back into improving people's lives is through understanding, simple understanding, that they need to be committed not to their donors again and not to the financiers and not to the lobbyists, but to be committed to bigger ideals that that ideal speak to millions, billions of people around the world. You don't have to be an American to believe in Frederick Douglass or to read Frederick Douglass or to feel the story of slavery in this country. And millions of people, billions of people feel that story. And Zoran Mamdani actually tells the rest of this to tell the rest of the world a different story about America that is not slavery, not white supremacy, and not Donald Trump. And Stephen Miller tells a story of hope and optimism. And I think that story needs to be protected and told and included. That's why it hurts not to see you on these mainstream television, Joy. It hurts deeply. At the same time, I think that story has a long arch, and I think that story will continue for a long time because people like you who write this letter resist. This is a resistance not only to fascism, it's a resistance to something bigger, bigger than us. It's a resistance in the name of the next generation, because what we're doing is to preserve that ideal of America for our children and grandchildren.
- [108:53]
Joy Reid
Amen. My dear sisters, this is a miraculous and beautiful panel, the perfect duo to talk about this historic moment. I love each of these women madly, and there's nothing they can do about it. Rula, Jibril, Maya Wiley, thank you both very much. Love y'. All.
- [109:11]
Maya Wiley
Love you.
- [109:12]
Rula Jabril
Thank you. We love you.
- [109:13]
Joy Reid
Thank you so much. Listen, we got sisterhood. We got a great election. Thank you to you both. I want to get into a little bit of the numbers here, because the numbers are actually pretty remarkable. Let's go through them. We're going to start with D14. Jason, when you got that up, because when you go through the exit polls, one of the things that's actually really fascinating is. And I just broke that, I'm going to do a deeper thing on Substack about this, but I wanted just to show you guys this if you look at white voters versus voters of color, and we're going to start with Virginia, when somerseals won white voters, she got 52% of white voters, non white voters. And I don't know if I've told, if you've watched me for a long time, I'll tell you about the 4080 rule which Barack Obama's brilliant campaign team brought forth in the 2008 election. And the 4080 rule is that for Democrats to win, they don't need a majority of white voters, they need 4 out of 10 white voters and 8 out of 10 voters of color. If you slip under that 80% of voters of color, you're going to lose just the numbers of white versus non white people in America. You can actually win elections. And Barack Obama did it twice. He never won a majority of white voters neither time that he ran for office in 0, 8 and 12. But he got 42% which was a high water mark for 46%, I believe of white voters in his first elected, about 42%. The second time Hillary Clinton slipped just under 40% is why she lost Kamala Harris as well. You slip in those 30s, you're going to lose. In this case, white voters went majority for winsome Earl sears and the 80 plus voters went for Spamberger. But if you then break it down by race and gender, the only group of voters that winsome Earl Sears got a majority of were white men, 60% of white men. When you break it down by age, Spanberger won everything. So again, the entire race for winsome Earl Sears were white men who were 34% of the electorate. Let's now go to New Jersey and you're going to see a very similar. You're going to see something very similar happen. This is D15. Okay, so we're going to now do the same game. Now we're going to look in New Jersey. You see that one little red dot in New Jersey that voted for Cittarelli. It's only white guys who are about 34% of the electorate. But they were outvoted by white women, white women in a majority and every other group. Brown folks, Asian Americans, Latinas, Latinos, all other voters, black women strongly. I mean, black voters punch above our weight every single time. Black voters are in like the. Not black men, black men. 92% black men punching way above their weight. And we want to make sure we let y' all know black men punched way above their weight. 92%. That's huge. Voting for Mikey Cheryl. Black voters punching Way above their weight. White men again, being the only group who voted in a majority for Chitterelli. All age groups, all the young, the old, everybody, majority went for Cheryl.
- [112:29]
Judd Legum
Same.
- [112:29]
Joy Reid
Let's go now to New York City, you know, back to New York City. Same dynamic. You're going to see there. You're going to start to see this as a trend. I want to do a much deeper dive into this. But if you look at the New York City race, you get the exact same dynamic again with Zorhan Momdani overperforming with every age group, particularly the younger age groups who really perform for him. The weakest link inside the Democratic coalition, unfortunately, is Gen X and older millennials. But in New York City, it was pretty clear that Mamdani won everything. But his weakest performance is among white males. But in this case, he was pretty much across the board. Nobody wanted these other guys. Everybody, pretty much. New York was the. Was the least, you know, reminiscent of this strategy in New York City. I was like, yeah, we don't want, we don't want Cuomo, nobody. He didn't get a majority of anybody. Cuomo got a majority of nothing. But then go to California and we kind of, you know, it's similar, but California was a little bit more like New York. California was just emphatically yes on redistricting. One of the interesting things that's also in the exit polls in California, which was across the board, you see it all blue. It's just pretty much everyone was like, no, even voters. A majority of California voters said in the exit polls that they oppose partisan gerrymandering, they oppose redistricting for partisan purposes. But even people who say they are dead set against it voted yes. Because what voters in California said is that in this instance, we're in favor of it. But I think this is interesting for Democrats to take some lessons from this instance election. You had two sort of doctrinaire liberals win. Two women elected statewide in Virginia and New Jersey were pretty much like Biden liberal, sort of bipartisan, Biden liberal, doctrinaire people, which made me a little concerned, particularly in New Jersey, that it was going to be hard to get over a Trumper with that. But it worked. I mean, they both won decisively. Jay Jones also winning, not decisively, but he wins in, you know, pragmatic. In, in Virginia, very pragmatic. But demographically, you're seeing that Democrats are. They are eating into the white vote. But it's mainly women. It's mainly white women. This is the reason why the right wants to end abortion rights. This is the reason why the right wants to chase white women back into the home and make them into tradwives. Because they understand on the right that the more liberated white women become, the more they begin to vote like black women, Asian women and Latinas. And the other piece is the other thing you got to note here. We did by gender, too. Latinos didn't go for the Okie doke this time. The right is losing Latinos. I'm going to go back to what the speaker of the House said. He said, don't worry, we had some demographic shifts in 2024 and we're going to gerrymander. But you're assuming the demographic shifts in 2024 are permanent Republicans. You're assuming that you're always going to be able to avail yourself of Latinos. But who are you tackling in these streets the most? Latinos. Who are you abusing the most gratuitously? Latinos. You're getting those Latinas too. But you're really hurting Latinos if you think that none of them are going to find out about it. Because Sinclair Broadcasting buys up all the local stations and you keep it off the local news, which they're doing in most of the country. Those people still have TikTok. Those people still have Instagram. They see what you're doing or they're being kidnapped, too. Their family members are disappearing. What Democrats need to understand is that the immigration issue is in the, in the exit polls. It's cutting against Trump. Trump is unpopular. The main issue, including for Latinos and Latinos, is the economy. Everyone is saying they can't afford things. Trump did not come through on making groceries cheaper. Rent is too high, the rent's too down. People are freaked out about the economy. They're freaked out about the layoffs. They're unhappy with the tariffs that are making things expensive. And they are against him. Immigration enforcement has gone too far. The Republicans got too comfortable thinking that they could abuse non white people in these streets and still hold onto Latino men in future elections. Those were soft voters who were economic voters or cultural voters who got caught up in that trans kids playing sports thing. But right now, you ain't thinking about trans kids playing sports. When you can't afford food. When your snap gets cut off, it clarifies the mind. Democrats need to understand that affordability. Ramaswamy did a whole thing where he's like, we got to talk about no more culture wars. Her whole thing is culture wars. Patel flying around on a, on a luxury jet to go See his girlfriend play. What do you. What'd you say there, Jason? Okay, well, let's play Cash Patel. Oh, well, we don't have a lot of time. No, that's okay. We don't have to play it today. We're gonna play it today. We're gonna play it right now. Vivek Ramaswamy, same name as A.J. evans's son, saying we need to focus on affordability. No, no, you did culture wars, buddy. You all decided you guys wanted to do right wing culture wars. And by the way, all of you Indian American Republicans, Cash Patel, all of y' all are getting attacked by your own base because then you got them hopped up on racism. But white women are the. Especially white women with a college degree. If you go through these exit polls, white men, you even can get, you know, 30 to 40% of them. On a good day, you got 30% of the spicy white men. They all come with you, too. But you only need, like, 30, 40% of white voters. If you get 80% of non white voters, that is the formula. Barack Obama established it. Zoran Mamdani perfected it. Obama perfected it, too. But anyway, that's just something I just want to dig into, you guys. So you guys just find out about that. All right, guys. And somebody's saying here, I'm freaked out about the layoffs, and I'm very unhappy about the tariffs. We are entrepreneurs and a home business, says jbsr.cc forever33. Yes, it is the economy, stupid. The economy is not working for a majority of Americans. Donald Trump is losing on the economy, losing on immigrations, losing on tariffs, and nobody's happy watching him throw a Great Gatsby party, building a Golden Ballroom for $300 million and making a tacky bathroom in the White House that looks like the shitty Mar? A Lago design structure. These are the things. This let them eat cake kingdom he's building while people are starving and while he himself, his administration, is refusing to release the food. Meaning, snap. If Republicans think they can gerrymander their way out of that, I want to wish them the best of luck. Let's have our moment of joy. Our moment of joy is a good friend who caught this incredible moment outside of the Mamdani party. It's a beautiful thing. And this is our moment of joy. We're inside of a bar. Sorry. That was the moment inside of a bar. Sorry. In New York City, when Mamdani's victory was announced, I think everyone was joyful. Everybody's got great videos like this, but, yes, we're going to be doing more. You guys let us know if you want more of the insider minutiae about these exit polls. I'm thinking about doing a live that will go really in depth in these exit polls because they're actually fascinating and I am a poll geek and I really love it. If you guys, if that's something that you want, put it in comments. Let me know if you guys would be interested in a deep dive on the exit polls because I love to give you guys game. Because look, when you work, when you've been a political journalist for a long time, you find out a lot of the insights into the way this policy stuff works. And I don't know if you guys like to geek out on this stuff, but this is the important stuff. The Democrats are going to miss the boat. Y' all need to stop taking money from aipac. You can with your full chest say Israel is committing genocide. This dude did all those things. He said he was not going to Israel, he was going to the Bronx and he won. He told Wall street to kiss off and he won. He said he was going to raise rich people's taxes. And Bill Ackman put a tweet out today and bent the knee. If there's anything you can do, I'm here for you. Bill Ackman said. Are you now you trying to think you can get in his pockets, Bill? You think you can woo him over? Well, tell your friends at the ADL to have to take away the tracker list and the snitch line. Y' all think you're gonna. You're gonna intimidate him? He's the mayor of New York. New York metro area has a bigger GDP than Canada. He's an important figure. I was gonna have to reckon with him. And he ain't scared. Thank you all for watching. Please be sure to hit like and subscribe. Share if you guys are interested, a deep dive on the exit polls. Would love to do that. We can geek out together. It's apparently a big yes. Everybody wants to that up. We're going to do that very soon because I think you guys need to understand the inside game of how politics works and how Democrats could literally win in any state in the union, all 50 if they just understood the data. If they understood where the voters are and how to go get them. If you understand where the voters are and how to go get them and the little dirty secret, I'll give you one last little piece of knowledge and game before I let you go. What Republicans admitted and what they seem to think they've figured out they got low propensity voters out in the last election. People who don't watch the news, don't pay attention. And who voted on vibes or on this issue, like trans kids in sports, that just bothered them, but they didn't really even experience it. And they were. But they voted on vibes or they voted thinking Trump was going to put money in their pocket. A lot of Latinos voted. You know, Latinos number one issue is not immigration, it's the economy. And so they voted on vibes. Those are light voters and they're usually loosely affiliated with voting. A third of people vote republican, a third of people vote democrat, and a third of people don't vote. And if you can figure out how to get those third to come out, and that's what Trump did. He got some of those people who don't vote to come out. Are they going to stick with him when they're losing their snap and losing their farms and losing their jobs? See you on the next the joy Reid show. If you're picking up merch, be sure to hashtag readers or hashtag wearing Joy, we appreciate you. See you on the next one. Like and subscribe. Okay. Yeah. The holidays mean more travel, more shopping, more time online and more personal info in more places that could expose you more to identity theft. But lifelock monitors millions of data points per second. If your identity is stolen, our u. S. Based restoration specialists will fix it, guaranteed or your money back. Don't face the drained accounts, fraudulent loans or financial losses alone. Get more holiday fun and less holiday worry with lifelock. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit lifelock.com podcast terms apply.