Transcript
Unknown Speaker (Planned Parenthood Advocate) (0:01)
Here's something you should know. While headlines shift constantly, Planned Parenthood continues its vital work without flinching. The assault on reproductive health isn't random. It's strategic and persistent. But Planned Parenthood, they remain steadfast, ensuring everyone can access quality health care. That's a story that deserves attention and your support. Donate now@plannedparenthood.org.
Roman Mars (0:30)
Hi, I'm Roman Mars, host of the podcast 99% Invisible. Design is everywhere in our lives, but it's easy to not notice or take it for granted. 99% Invisible is a weekly exploration of the process and power of design and architecture. It's stories of who we are through the lens of the things we build. Like have you ever wondered why we use the 1kHz bleep sound to cover up inappropriate words on radio and TV? Or what aspects of infrastructure allow 5 year olds in JAP to run errands by themselves while kids in the US are completely dependent on their parents or their parents cars? Or why the historic flag of South Vietnam shows up at right wing protests all the time? Or why people are obsessed with houseplants? And when did we start bringing plants from halfway around the world into our homes to begin with? 99% Invisible will explore all of that and more every Tuesday. Follow and listen to 99% invisible wherever you get your podcasts.
Rachel Maddow (1:30)
Very happy to have you here. The capital of Vermont is the beautiful city of Montpelier. This was yesterday at the State Capitol in Montpelier. Protesters outside rallying on the steps of the State Capitol. They also marched outside. They ended up protesting inside, including with some state legislators among them, all to show support for Mohsen Madawi, a Vermonter and one of the international students, also a legal permanent resident who Donald Trump has arrested even though he's not accused of any crime. This was yesterday at the State Capitol in Montpelier. This was early this morning in Burlington, Vermont. People turning out about an hour away from Montpelier in Burlington because Burlington is where the federal courthouse is. And they turned out there early this morning after rallying at the State House yesterday. They turned out there early this morning while a federal judge held a hearing on Mr. Madawi's case. And at that hearing, the judge ruled that Mohsen Madawi cannot be moved out of Vermont. The Trump administration cannot move him to some immigration prison in Louisiana or somewhere else all the way across the country. The judge says he needs to stay where he is. His lawyers say they are going to be back before this same judge next week and they will be seeking Mr. Madawi's immediate release. Today, two of the law firms that are fighting in court against Trump's efforts to target them had federal court hearings. The judges in both of those hearings appeared to favor the arguments from the law firms against the Trump administration, as they have in every hearing thus far involving these cases. But I will tell you, there was a little bit of a logistical complication in trying to get that reporting from those two court hearings today. Because in both of those court hearings today, the courtrooms were packed to the rafters, every seat full and then some, which made it hard for some reporters to get in. Stakes are very high. People want to be there to witness it. People are showing up. Last night as the car company Tesla held its earnings call to discuss that company's catastrophic decline in Fortune this year, folks in Seattle held a party at a local bar to listen to the sound of the call and to cheer their guts out when Elon Musk announced that he would be scaling back his time in Washington to instead try to salvage his flailing company. People all over the country, including in Seattle, have made this strategic decision to protest Tesla, to protest Elon Musk Musk's role in the destruction of the federal government by focusing on that company, which of course, is the source of his wealth and therefore his power. The company's nosedive, which was announced and conceded formally by the company in that call last night, the company nosediving has been the whole point of those protests, which have succeeded in their aim. And the damage to Tesla may very well be irrevocable, but so is much of the damage that Elon Musk and Don Trump have done together in Washington. The only thing successful here is the focus on Tesla strategy, which has apparently succeeded in pushing Elon Musk out of the bizarre, unprecedented, unelected government role he took in Washington after paying for Donald Trump's presidential campaign. It worked. Pushback doesn't always work, but not pushing back never works. And sometimes when you do push back, you win. So this is my last week of doing this show. Five nights a week. I said around inauguration time that I would be here for the first hundred days of Trump's term in office. That hundred days is up a week from tonight. And so a week from tonight will be my last night of this five day a week thing. I will stop doing five nights a week. Next week I will go back to just doing Mondays. I'm not going away. I'm going to be here every Monday. And the great Jen Psaki is going to be here at 9:00 Eastern Time, Tuesday to Friday. You're going to love it. Don't worry, it's all going to be fine. But as we get to this benchmark, which is is going to be a transition for me, I've been thinking about what we've been through this past 90 plus days as we're heading toward the 100 day benchmark. And I realized that at least the way that I have come to understand what we're going through, it's got kind of, I guess it's got like three sides to it. I mean, yes, this is a story of Trump's extremism, right? We really are without a doubt going through a kind of attempted authoritarian takeover of our country. And that has included destroying as much of the government as possible and using the government in every way they can to try to hurt people in the country who the President wants targeted. They are having government attempted takeovers of huge swaths of civil society, including the legal profession and education and even like museums. They are banning books. They are policing what words people are allowed to use in bizarre and authoritarian ways. They are using terror tactics and secret police tactics against people they are targeting, including secret detention and sending people to foreign gulags. They are reversing our alliances with the countries of the free world and aligning us with the dictatorships. Instead, they have freaking redecorated the White House with cheesy looking gold gewgaws. So it looks like a cheap budget hotel version of the Kremlin. I mean, like, we are. We are there. The authoritarian project is definitely here. It is what we are up against. Everybody who warned against that before the election was correct. No question. That's part of it. Right? The second part of what we're going through is the country loudly and roundly saying no to that. People protesting against him in every single state in the country. In blue states, in red states, in big cities, in small towns, in Washington and everywhere else. I mean, every single fricking day. This was yesterday in Detroit and yesterday in San Diego, people protesting, saying hands off the epa. This was Tyler, Texas, yesterday. People absolutely reaming out their Republican Congressman Nathaniel Moran at a town hall in his district in Tyler, Texas. This was North Carolina, earlier this week. People in Republican Congressman Ted Budd's district holding an empty chair, town hall there for him, to which he refused to show up. They packed the house anyway without him. Pomona, California, yesterday, people turned out to protest at a Home Depot parking lot after Trump's immigration agents came there earlier that day and arrested. People from that parking lot community turned out in response. This was 40 minutes away in Anaheim, outside the offices of Republican Congressman Young Kim. People protesting against the Trump cades to Medicaid, which will be absolutely devastating in Kim's district and in most places around the country. And everywhere, this just, you know, like snapshot headlines today. Everywhere, every state, people turning out and saying no every way they can. That has been part of the story, too, and one that we've tried to keep in focus here on this show. But I said there's kind of, I think, three parts to this story. It's Trump's extremism, people saying no. But there then is this third thing which has been the undercurrent to all of it. And to me, I think it is the real lesson of the first hundred days. I mean, I know the first hundred days is like an artificial benchmark, but it's a benchmark that we are using. And if there is something to learn about what Trump in power is gonna be like, I think the first hundred days have given us one very clear lesson, right? We know he's trying for the whole dictator thing. You know, no elections, no courts, no resistance, rule by terror. Right? We know that. We know the people of this country aren't having it. But I think what we should also, what we have just lived through in this first 90 plus days thus far is him screwing up. It's him absolutely blowing it. I mean, it is one thing to understand the gravity of his intentions, but I think it is equally important to recognize that he's really bad at everything he tries to do. I don't know if he's bad at good stuff he tries to do because he's not trying to do much that seems good, but the bad stuff he's trying to do, he's been real bad at that. I mean, it hasn't been funny exactly. It's too disgusting for that. But it has been the proverbial comedy of errors. Let me show you what I mean. Do you remember the first big surprise? Destroy the government thing that he did right after the inauguration? He sent out a White House memo ordering the freezing of all federal funding, all federal grants. And then less than 48 hours. Oops, had to take that back. Headline, Trump White House rescinds memo freezing federal grants. After widespread confusion and legal challenges, quote, President Donald Trump's budget office on Wednesday rescinded a memo freezing spending on federal grants less than two days after it sparked widespread confusion and legal challenges across the country. The Monday evening Memo from the White House Office of Management and Budget sparked uncertainty and left the White House scrambling to explain what would and wouldn't be subject to a pause in funding. So it was kind of the first big thing he did, and then they immediately had to take that back. Did we say freeze federal funding? We didn't. We're just gonna. That's rescinded. We'll try that again right out of the gate. And then right on the heels of that, you remember this one, when they accidentally put somebody in charge of the FBI who they didn't mean to quote, White House officials goofed on the White House website. You don't see the word goofed in the Wall Street Journal all that often. White House officials goofed on the White House website and the wrong man in charge of the FBI, people familiar with the matter said instead of correcting the error, White House officials let it stand, and the two men traded temporary titles at the FBI. So they, Oops. Accidentally put the wrong person as the acting head of the FBI. Mixed up the names. We didn't mean to put you in there. Oh, oh, well, who cares? We'll just let the other guy we didn't mean to put in charge of the FBI be in charge of the FBI. What could possibly go wrong immediately after that?