Pay Pals: How Billionaires Influence Elections

Summary

Summary of "Pay Pals: How Billionaires Influence Elections"

Podcast Information:

• Title: The Weekly Show with Jon Stewart
• Host: Jon Stewart
• Episode: Pay Pals: How Billionaires Influence Elections
• Release Date: October 25, 2024

Introduction

In the episode titled "Pay Pals: How Billionaires Influence Elections," Jon Stewart delves deep into the pervasive influence of billionaires on the American electoral process. Hosted by Jon Stewart and featuring insightful conversations with New York Times reporters Teddy Schleifer and Ken Vogel, the discussion sheds light on the intricate mechanisms through which immense wealth shapes political outcomes and threatens democratic integrity.

The Oligarchic Landscape of Modern Elections

Jon Stewart opens the conversation by highlighting the surreal and often absurd narratives circulating in the media as the nation approaches a pivotal election. He humorously references the "Fellini era" of politics, where outrageous claims and celebrity endorsements blur the lines of political discourse. Stewart sets the stage for a serious examination of how money, particularly from billionaires, dominates the electoral landscape.

Mechanisms of Influence: Super PACs and Dark Money

[04:49] Jon Stewart: "Are we the oligarchy that we fear?"

Teddy Schleifer responds by outlining the escalating amounts of money in political races, emphasizing a shift towards larger donations from a shrinking pool of ultra-wealthy donors. This concentration of wealth raises significant concerns about transparency and accountability, as many donations flow through avenues that obscure their origins, such as Super PACs and nonprofit entities.

Quid Pro Quo and the Challenges of Corruption

[05:24] Jon Stewart: "Do we have a sense of what these billionaires expect as a return on investment?"

Schleifer discusses the difficulty in proving quid pro quo arrangements, especially when donations are funneled through complex structures. Ryan Reynolds adds that even when intentions appear philanthropic, the underlying motivations often align with the donors' self-interests, further complicating efforts to discern genuine altruism from strategic influence.

Billionaires Across the Political Spectrum

[09:32] Jon Stewart: "Only Soros corrupts the system. Is that the general tenor of the public?"

The conversation shifts to the bipartisan nature of billionaire influence. Schleifer counters the notion that only liberal billionaires like George Soros wield significant power, pointing out that Republican donors such as the Koch brothers and Ken Griffin also exert substantial influence. This bipartisan dominance underscores the systemic challenges in curbing billionaire sway over politics.

Corporate Influence and Soft Power

[30:49] Jon Stewart: "Is that so different than what it's been since then?"

Reynolds introduces the concept of corporate philanthropy as a form of soft power, where billionaires like Sergey Brin influence societal priorities through targeted donations. This method allows wealthy individuals to shape public policy and research agendas without overt political maneuvering, raising questions about the role of private wealth in public decision-making.

The Illusion of Small Donors as a Counterbalance

[21:06] Jon Stewart: "But as we see that. Does that do anything?"

Reynolds expresses skepticism about the efficacy of small donors in offsetting the influence of billionaires. While small-dollar contributions offer a semblance of grassroots support, they often fuel extreme partisanship rather than fostering meaningful political reform. Schleifer echoes this sentiment, noting that polarization diminishes the potential of small donors to act as a true check against big money.

Implications for Democracy and Policy Making

[43:00] Teddy Schleifer: "I mean, there are a lot of examples."

The discourse underscores a looming threat to democratic institutions, where billionaires possess disproportionate leverage over electoral outcomes and policy directions. This imbalance fosters an environment where elected officials may prioritize the interests of wealthy donors over those of the general populace, perpetuating systemic inequities.

The Futility of Regulatory Reforms

[27:07] Jon Stewart: "Can you make the case… if you're unable to restrict the money… what if we restrict time?"

Stewart and his guests explore potential reforms, such as limiting campaign durations or enhancing disclosure requirements. However, Schleifer and Reynolds remain pessimistic, arguing that legal and structural barriers, reinforced by Supreme Court precedents like Citizens United, render meaningful reform unlikely. The conversation suggests that without significant judicial or legislative shifts, the status quo of billionaire dominance in politics will persist.

Notable Quotes:

• Jon Stewart (04:49): "Are we the oligarchy that we fear?"
• Teddy Schleifer (05:24): "Every cycle we've seen an increase in the amount of money that gets spent on politics."
• Ryan Reynolds (07:15): "Is it a quid pro quo if, you know, you genuinely believe that free markets are the antidote to American poverty."
• Jon Stewart (09:32): "Only Soros corrupts the system. Is that the general tenor of the public?"
• Teddy Schleifer (11:34): "And what I'm trying to say is that the system has benefited every single person who's in elected office."
• Ryan Reynolds (21:06): "I think the direction here is pretty clear toward greater and greater amount of money."
• Teddy Schleifer (43:01): "I'm not optimistic that there is a correcting force."

Conclusion

The episode "Pay Pals: How Billionaires Influence Elections" offers a compelling examination of the entrenched power dynamics between immense wealth and political influence. Through candid discussions and expert insights, Jon Stewart and his guests illuminate the systemic challenges that allow billionaires to shape elections and policies to their advantage. The lack of effective regulatory measures and the bipartisan nature of big-money influence paint a concerning picture for the future of democratic governance. As the nation inches closer to a critical election, the episode serves as a wake-up call about the urgent need to address the corrosive effects of wealth in politics.

Transcript

[Ryan Reynolds]

Ryan Reynolds here for I guess my hundredth mint commercial.

[Jon Stewart]

No, no, no, no, no, no, don't.

[Teddy Schleifer]

No, no, no.

[Ryan Reynolds]

I mean, honestly, when I started this.

[Teddy Schleifer]

I thought I'd only have to do.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Like four of these. I mean, it's unlimited to Premium Wireless for $15 a month. How are there still people paying two or three times that much? I'm sorry, I shouldn't be victim blaming. Here, give it a [e-mail] save whenever you're ready.

[Ken Vogel]

$45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three month plan only. Taxes and fees, extra speed slower above 40 gigabyte. CD tails.

[Jon Stewart]

The 2025 Ford Explorer ST has a 400 horsepower engine. It's up to you what you do with that power. The 2025 Ford Explorer, it's all in the name.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Horsepower and torque ratings based on premium fuel per SAEJ 1349 standard. Your results may vary.

[Jon Stewart]

Hello, everybody. Welcome once again to the weekly show podcast. My name is Jon Stewart and we have a week to go. About a little bit, a little bit less, a little bit more, I guess, than a week. And I, I gotta say, I just, I feel great. I just, I feel fucking great. I think, how could you not a week to go before one of the most consequential elections of our lifetime. And I have no idea, no idea what's going to happen. And we've entered the phase of the election that I like to call the Fellini era, the surreal fever dream where I just turned on CNN and it was all about if Donald Trump actually does like Hitler. And that's always comforting in the run up to an election is when one of the candidates is because his general, John Kelly, I'm sure you all understand, his former chief of staff was out like, yeah, the guy really, really thought Hitler did a lot of good things. And I was thinking, well, you know, he was a vegetarian, but it's not really what he was known for, I guess is what I'm saying. So that's. And we're in that form right now where it's just a model. Just came out and said Trump groped me with Epstein. And somebody else came out and said Doug Emhoff hit me. And Elon's on stage just handing out a million dollar oversized check. And by the way, and I say this with all due respect, the check that he is handing out has picked an in between. It is not the giant novelty check of the Jerry Lewis telethon, but it is also not the useful check that you might use at A bank. It is a mid sized check and generally the person's name is written on the line that you would put the dollar amount. So really, what are we doing? Can you then put that into the atm? But the point is, cash rules everything around me. Dollar, dollar bills, y'all. To quote it all really comes down to rza. It always comes down to the Wu Tang because Wu Tang is for the children. And if there's anything that I can impress upon you in this election, it is that Wu Tang is for the children. And to that point, we are going to talk about cash ruling everything around us. That would not have been a good song. Crew Crew C R E U no, that's just fucking stupid. That's why I was never allowed in Wu Tang. But let's get right to it. We're going to talk money. Billionaires. Let's do this thing. All right, ladies and gentlemen, so let's just. We're going to get right to it. This is, this episode is going to be the Billionaire Boys Club. And we are happy to welcome into our Billionaire Boys club Teddy Schleifer, politics reporter for the New York Times. Ken Vogel, also a reporter for the New York Times. I'm assuming that this counts towards getting me a kind of a discount on the subscription, is that if I do, if I do two New York Times reporters, if I do eight more and I get a sandwich, what is the bonus that I'm going to get?

[Ryan Reynolds]

So some equity.

[Teddy Schleifer]

You get the bundle, I think you get the wordle and the cooking app.

[Jon Stewart]

I can't even tell you how excited I am that the New York Times just keeps adding more and more bizarre games where now it's just like draw a line to letters and see if you can spell eight words. Gentlemen, let's, let's stop the niceties. Are we in oligarchy yet? I'm going to start with you, Ken Vogel. Are we, is the amount of money. If we're concerned about inflation in this country, inflation in politics, I mean, it makes us look like Argentina and Venezuelan combine. The amount of money in these races. Are we the oligarchy that we fear?

[Teddy Schleifer]

I mean, every cycle we've seen an increase in the amount of money that gets spent on politics. What we've seen more recently is a change in the type of money, the type of donations, you know, increasingly larger proportions coming from a smaller and smaller group of super rich donors and coming in new ways that in some cases make it more difficult to track and increase concerns about the influence of money in politics and big Donors in politics because you can't even see who's giving the money makes a lot harder to assess the effect of it on the candidates.

[Jon Stewart]

Teddy, do we have a sense of what these billionaires expect as a return on investment? You know, what is. Obviously, the Supreme Court, through certain decisions, has lessened the idea of corruption. It has to be explicitly quid pro quo, and it has to be done prior to the act. Now the person can do the act and you can pay them afterwards. So, Teddy, what is the expectation from all these billionaires?

[Ryan Reynolds]

Proving the quid pro quo is really hard. I mean, the. The. If, you know, we don't even know the money that's going in, it's even harder to figure out what they're getting out of it. I mean, require requires kind of piercing the world of what exactly happened in that Oval Office meeting? You know, what exactly did that billionaire mega donor say to the politician behind closed doors? I mean, look, there. There are some donors where the quid pro quo is completely in front of the camera. Like, if you think about, you know, a lobbying group or an interest group that is donating, you know, let's say the crypto. The crypto industry is a big player in 2024. There's no. There's no big scoop about, you know, what the crypto industry wants out of their donations to various politicians. They want looser regulations on crypto and, you know, like.

[Jon Stewart]

Or no regulations on crypto.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Well, if true, I mean, there is no there. There is no. There is no scandal. I mean, I think that the harder kind of edge cases to prove, at least as reporters are, you know, like, are the times when a donor could. Could. And let's, let's, you know, play the violin for the lowly billionaire here. But some of these mega donors, as partisan and ideological as they may be, legitimately think that they're giving, is capital P philanthropy. You know, like, if you talk.

[Jon Stewart]

Really?

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, I mean, I mean, we can. We can debate if that's true or not. I mean, at a technical level, oftentimes it's not because these are not donations to, you know, the Red cross, to a 501C3. But is it a quid pro quo if, you know, you genuinely believe that free markets are the antidote to American poverty and that if only we had more tax cuts, we would lift millions of people out of, you know, the poverty system? And you believe that and if it.

[Jon Stewart]

Happens to benefit you as well. It kind of happens.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Right? Sure. And, you know, obviously to liberals, like, they would never see know what Charles and David Koch did as philanthropy. But you know, you talk to some of those donors and you know, as reporters, you do like they genuinely do. And frankly, on the right, you know, if you are watching a liberal donor give charitable money that just so happens to register black voters in Detroit, Philadelphia and Milwaukee, like a liberal donor might say, hey, I'm just helping people vote. Right? If you're a Republican, you see that and you're like, that is not philanthropy, that is bs. So those are the quid pro quotypes that are really hard to prove.

[Jon Stewart]

Right. Well, we're so, you know, it's so accustomed to this idea. You know, if you think about the Illuminati fever dream, that is, you know, what people think about money and politics. And the general, from what I have seen, is this idea that George Soros is the only billionaire in the world who puts money into politics and pulls strings. And then you step back to realize, I mean, for God's sakes, on the right, it's shocking to me how much more Trump's campaign is aligned with billionaire donors. I mean, he's, from what I can reckon through some of the weave that he does, he's the populist. And Kamala Harris has raised from sort of the lower donors far more money. But in popular opinion, it's as though right wing billionaires don't count or aren't doing this, or Mellon and Adelson and now Musk like that. That's not, that's not corrupting the system. Only Soros corrupts the system. Is that the general tenor of the public?

[Teddy Schleifer]

I mean, certainly Republicans have made a great effort over the years to sort of vilify Soros and other liberal donors. And I should say that Democrats have done a pretty effective job at vilifying some of the Republican donors Teddy mentioned, the Koch brothers, Charles Koch and his now deceased brother David Koch.

[Jon Stewart]

Koch brothers are probably the ones that I know and I would consider them probably more libertarian even at this point.

[Teddy Schleifer]

Yeah, 100%. And it's also a good example of like, you know, they would say, and there's, there's maybe like a little bit of a discordance or a divergence between how they would characterize their donations and, and how an outsider looking in or a reporter trying to assess the impact of their donations would see them. Teddy's right. They would say, like, well, we're in favor of small government and lower regulation, and there is a delta between that and their bottom line interests. That said, I don't doubt, having talked to people around them for years that they genuinely do believe that in sort of libertarian, small government, low taxation, low regulation principles. And Soros believes in, you know, in sort of a more robust social safety net. Soros has been perhaps, you know, Soros and the Koch stand out as, like, among the more effective donors on either side as far as, like, really systematically giving their money to build particular capabilities on their respective sides to help to help their sides win both elections and also, you know, policy debates. As to the irony, I guess, of Trump, this populist who claims to be trying to disassemble the system, getting all this money from people who benefit from the system. I mean, it is a great irony. And initially, when he ran in 2016, most of these folks, the billionaires on the right, the traditional Republican donor class, were pretty leery of him and kept their distance from him. And it's not like he's necessarily like, I mean, the thing that he's done that really suited their interests were the tax cuts.

[Jon Stewart]

Right.

[Teddy Schleifer]

And it's been interesting to watch some of the folks who had, like, different justifications for, like, okay, I'm not going to give to him, but I'll give to some of the outside groups on the right that support congressional candidates.

[Jon Stewart]

That's right. A guy like Ken Griffin, that might not. Ken Griffin of Citadel, he might not give directly to Trump, but he'll throw $100 million into these down ballot rates and things like that.

[Teddy Schleifer]

That's a great example.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Or I reported earlier, earlier this fall that, for instance, Peter Thiel, who has pledged to not get involved in the presidential election and has pledged to not support, give, to give to Trump super pac, and he has serious misgivings about Trump. Peter Thiel did manage to donate to a pro Trump legal group that is sort of helping, you know, justify or helping Trump push back against, you know, what they see as lawfare. And you can kind of twist yourself into a pretzel to sort of find ways to justify being involved. Because I think one thing from Ken and I, both of our reporting over the years is like, there's nothing people hate more than being irrelevant, right? Like, if you, if you want to be, if you want to be a Republican player, like, to be clear, like, the Republican Party is about Donald Trump and like, sure, you can go donate $20 million to help Larry Hogan in Maryland.

[Jon Stewart]

Do you have to say it like that, Teddy?

[Ryan Reynolds]

But I just think that, like, you know, I think it's going to be if Trump is to win, like, I think, you know, a storyline that's always fun is like, who funds the inaugurations? Because all those contributions are just penance. It's like, well, I did not help Trump in, you know, and he won anyway. Now it's time to make a tax deductible, often donation to some sort of, you know, pro Trump.

[Jon Stewart]

I will give them all the shrimp they can eat for the inauguration. It is true, you said, you know, the one thing they hate is not to be irrelevant. The other thing that they seem to hate is to be known. It's sort of this weird dichotomy. I guess they want to be relevant within the circles of the power brokers, but, boy, are they allergic to being named and having a light shown on just how much fucking money they're pouring into these races.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah. And I'll say, John, I think you were talking about kind of the way that the left, mega donors are different than the right. I do think liberal givers and liberal billionaires have gotten better over the last, like, four years at hiding their giving. And like, it's funny because, you know, there's every couple of days now, frankly, there's Federal Election Commission filings. Right. Which show they're supposed to be the sunlight everyone's waiting for.

[Jon Stewart]

You can see democracy dies in darkness. Teddy.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Right. That's not the other paper. Yes, but, but, but you expect, you'll see, you know, oh, here's all the money that comes in. And you know, for instance, the main Democratic super PAC this cycle is called Future Forward. And it's. They've spent hundreds of millions of dollars to elect Kamala Harris. And actually, the biggest donor to Future Forward is not, you know, George Soros or Tom Steyer or any other liberal billionaire any listeners heard of. It's actually a nonprofit entity that is also run by Future Forward, which in turn does not disclose its donors.

[Jon Stewart]

So what?

[Ryan Reynolds]

So it's sort of like. And yes, Future Forward is nonprofit, has real people that donated money, but you'll never know who those people.

[Teddy Schleifer]

And they could be George Soros.

[Ryan Reynolds]

It could be George Soros.

[Teddy Schleifer]

Right. To Teddy's boy. We'll never know. And, you know, just piggyback on that. You know, Teddy and I and other reporters spend a lot of time trying to pierce this veil. And the fact of the matter is, if you have good lawyers and discreet operatives, there are ways to structure these giving arrangements, these dark money giving arrangements such that we will never be able to find out. And sometimes some of it leaks out years later. I remember there was a Koch brothers case where one of the key Koch brothers operatives was getting, was in, engaged in like, a contentious divorce. And his wife, in the divorce filings, ended up disclosing a bunch of stuff that allowed us to piece some things together. Or, you know, years later, we were able to determine that a lot of money was coming into sort of the extra party infrastructure of the left and the Democratic Party from this Swiss billionaire named Hans Jorguis. And it was because a memo showed up in a WikiLeaks leak years ago that allowed us to put some of this together. But again, without sort of anomalous incidents like that, there's no reason that we.

[Jon Stewart]

Would ever know how incredible in a divorce case would be. One of the filings is who gets custody of our democracy? Which one of them will get custody over the Senate? Or something along those lines. But it's interesting, you guys bring up a point. We talk about the populism of Trump, yet billionaires dominate. Let's talk a little bit about the way that the left, everybody that I've ever spoken with on the left is money is ruining politics. We have to get money out of politics. And by way of anecdote, I think we had Nancy Pelosi on the Daily show. This was maybe 10 years ago, 12, 14. It was a long time ago, and still got to get money out of politics, all that. And I don't know if she was the speaker at that time or maybe the minority leader or maybe the majority, that I don't recall. But in talking about having to get money out of politics, I said, well, that's, you know, it's funny, you mentioned that you raised $32 million in the last quarter. And she said, well, you can't, you know, you gotta fight fire with fire. You can't just disarm unilaterally. And I said, right, but if the point is money corrupts politics, even if you have to play along, how does that corrupt you or the left? And her answer, I thought was revealing. She said it doesn't. She said, no, it corrupts the right. But we have somehow managed through, I don't know what it is, sheer will perhaps, not to be corrupted by it. And is that the attitude that you've seen from the left? They decry Citizens United, they decrypted the McDonnell case in Virginia that sort of dumbed down corruption and bribery laws and money in politics. But there seems to be no will. And the money that they get apparently has no effect.

[Teddy Schleifer]

That's 100% the argument. And I would even take it a step further. They say we need to participate in this corrupt system so that we can win and then change the system, which the fact of the matter is exactly, the system has benefited. Every single person who's in elected office has been able to navig the system effectively. And so there's really no incentive for them electorally, just from a crass electoral perspective to change a system that worked for them. And in fact, there are impediments to so doing. In some cases, they would anger their donors. And so short of like a major scandal, which tends to be what prompts these cycles of reform, it's, you're not really going to see something. You're not really going to see the political will for reform. And then you have to ask yourself the question, well, what is a major scandal if not like a billion dollars of dark money being spent to influence, you know, elections? That should be a scandal right in and of itself, but it's just simply not.

[Jon Stewart]

And if money corrupts, it corrupts you too. Okay, gotta take a quick break. We'll be right back. All right, folks, we got people that are gonna help pay for the podcast through the art of advertising. And this one is a necessity. Like for instance, do you have a sandwich business? And you're like, this is a ciabatta business. And then you hire people and they're like, I only make wraps, man. And it's just, it's a, it's a poor fit. But thankfully there's a place you can go to help you for this. Zip recruiter can make hiring fast and easy. You can try it for free, which is a Rare [e-mail] ZipWeekly their smart technology identifies the top talent, not the people that only want to make wraps. 4 out of 5 employers who post on zip recruiter get a quality candidate within the first day. Try it for free at this exclusive web ziprecruiter.com ZipWeekly I'll say it again, because I was a poor hire. ZipRecruiter.com ZipWeekly do it now.

[Ken Vogel]

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[Jon Stewart]

We're back. Teddy, what are Your thoughts on that?

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, I mean, to be frank, I mean, I think this debate is over. Like, I mean, like they're, they're, they're. Teddy, there, there will be super PACs until the day we die. I mean, or whatever. Super, super pac. I mean, what I think the direction here is, is going is pretty clear toward greater and greater amount of money. I mean, obviously capitalism is continuing its course and you know, fortunes are only going to get, only going to get bigger. I think some of the more interesting reforms that I think are plausible. I think you could see some reforms around disclosure, like more disclosure or faster disclosure.

[Jon Stewart]

But as we see that. Does that do anything? I mean, no. Yeah, but now that you know their names, like, what does that do?

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, Ken has done a lot of reporting on kind of foreign money specifically. I mean, I think you can see some reforms around that. But I think the general, you know, the way that the tide is going here is like, I think wealthy people are going to have more influence. I think actually the one, the one possible and counter veiling force here is sort of, is the power of small donors. And that power is not all good. But you know, there's, there's some interesting incentives that have been presented by sort of the digital fundraising and technology boom over the last couple of years that, that might be the antidote to the power of big donors. Is the power of small donors. Though, frankly, like, I think there's a good intellectual debate that we can have if we want about like which kind of America we would prefer, like a oligarchy run by big donors or sort of a direct democracy where small donors who are well meaning people but have, you know, the same problems as any human being used to, whether we want that America, because that America has drawbacks also.

[Jon Stewart]

Well, if you're looking for a good intellectual debate, Teddy, I'm afraid you're on the wrong podcast.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Crap.

[Jon Stewart]

So you're gonna have to, we're gonna have to switch things up. But it does remind me, you know, I remember McCain, Feingold. You remember the days of McCain, Feingold, Feingold the progressive, McCain, the, you know, conservative, classic conservative. And they restricted this idea of campaign contributions. And it reminds me of the days of prohibition. Like they, the temperance movement came in and they did prohibition. And then people tried that for like a month and we're like, no. And then it was just the roaring twenties and we're in the roaring twenties. So is there an argument to be made that if we're unable to restrict the money, which I think we can't do, especially given unless these Supreme Court decisions are overturned, and we all know how they value precedent. I don't think the Supreme Court would ever go against precedent. But if you can't do that, what's the only other thing we can restrict? That's time. What if we restrict time and made this more like England, where you get eight weeks, throw everything you can at it. But we can't do that fire hose all the time. Does that do anything?

[Teddy Schleifer]

I don't think that would work, damn it. Because we've already seen sort of the establishment of, like, a permanent campaign. And even when there's not a campaign, an actual campaign being run, there are groups funded by major donors that are spending money to try to lay the groundwork for the next campaign or lay the groundwork for the. For the actual, like, current policy fight.

[Jon Stewart]

Or influence the legislative session. Yeah, that. Yeah. No, you're. You're probably right. Ken, Teddy, do you think that has any viability?

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, I mean, we kind of saw this this year, right? We saw a snap election where Kamala Harris took over in July of 2024, and, in fact, it unleashed more money into the system. And the other thing that I keep in mind here is so much of the money in politics really comes at the end. Like, right now. Like, if you look at, you know, how much super PACs raise in, like, October, you know, or. Or frankly, just campaigns from small donors who are, you know, nervous or anxious or, you know, energized about the election and donate at the very end. So, in fact, like, some of the early money in a presidential race is, like. Is the peanuts. I mean, are the peanuts there? I mean, we. We. We really see a lot of the big contributions come at the end. So there's always going to be. There's always going to be a lot of money that's spent at the end. And, and frankly, like to make a, you know, argument for the billionaires. If I'm playing that role here on this podcast.

[Jon Stewart]

Please, please, like, you don't have to play it, but go ahead.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Elections are important. Like, I mean, this is a very basic point here, very much. And the system is what it is. And, you know, frankly, I talk with lots of wealthy people or their advisors, and they say, like, like, why not spend more, right? I mean, if you believe that, you know, abortion access is extraordinarily important, and, you know, you're 80 years old, you can't die with the money. Like, why not donate a billion dollars to an abortion ballot measure in Your home state.

[Jon Stewart]

Well, everybody loves their billionaire. You know, I think the question is, you know, when they talk about money is speech. A billionaire is tweeting in all caps, whereas, you know, so many other people aren't. And so it speaks to why is the billionaire. Because there have been a lot of studies that have been done that show that the more access rich people have to the system, the more what they want is what flows through legislative bodies in process.

[Teddy Schleifer]

I mean, that's sort of the idea and that is.

[Jon Stewart]

But it shows they're getting a return on that investment, which tells me, oh, they are. The system is corrupted.

[Teddy Schleifer]

I think in a lot of cases they are getting a return. And sometimes it's more concrete and acute and you do see something specific. I mean, Trump famously told oil and gas donors that if they gave to him, he'd further deregulate. Like the oil and gas industry. Oftentimes it's not quite so overt. But yeah, it affects the system over time. Even if you, you know, even if you put in place specific reforms or restrictions that are intended to either reduce the amount of money or reduce the ways in which it can be spent, it's going to have an effect. And I'm even less bullish than Ted. I'm more pessimistic that there will be any kind of move to reform. I actually see it going more the other way. You see a continued chipping away through court cases, through advisory opinions from the Federal Election Commission that are weakening some of the last rules that we have in place restricting how money can be.

[Jon Stewart]

Spent on almost everything that we regulate. Yeah, I mean, not just in that, but couldn't you make the case, guys? And Teddy, I'll ask you this. If you're going to stand in for our billionaires that, you know, the money that came into this system, maybe it's responsible for this turn to supply side economics that we've faced since Reagan, that, you know, once a lot of this money came in there. Hasn't that influenced the philosophy even at government level? Like we talk, we can talk about individual policies, but on a much broader macro scale.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Sure.

[Jon Stewart]

The whole idea of supply side economics is really kind of a fever dream of the wealthy. Oh, you know, where you should really stimulate the economy to us and then we will, we will trickle it down. Keynesian feels like a more populist sentiment.

[Ryan Reynolds]

I feel like the best. I mean, you're sure what you're sort of getting at is like to what extent donors can play the long game and just sort of change the paradigm of kind of, that everyone thinks of politics, and that's not showing up in FEC disclosures. Like, I think the best, the best issue on this is abortion, where over the last, you know, since Roe was made the law, conservative and Christian donors waged a very, very long campaign. It wasn't always kind of, you know, drawn up this way. But I think in totality and retrospect, we can consider it a campaign to use their money to set up interest groups that would vet and offer pedigrees to conservative judges. And then, you know, that conservative judge could have a, you know, a protege who has a protege, who has a protege. And suddenly on the court and suddenly there's, you know, Trump's elected and there's people to overturn Roe and like, that's, that's how kind of change happens slowly.

[Jon Stewart]

And they've got their billionaires. It's, that's an interesting point, Teddy, because it is, you know, we're talking more broadly about, like, oh, it's these super PACs and they're running these commercials. But each of these issues has, in some ways, their own patron saints. You've got Leonard Leo and Harlan Crowe, who are, you know, billionaires on the right who are, you know, taking judges out to shoot quail in tiny boxes and then getting them on the court. It brings up an interesting point, like, what are the ways that billionaires influence. Right. That aren't so obvious to us. The example would be Harlan Crowe, Leonard Leo, but also Rupert Murdoch. You know, Donald Trump has said, like.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Or Elon Musk.

[Jon Stewart]

Right, Or Elon Musk. Sure, sure.

[Ryan Reynolds]

So, Right.

[Jon Stewart]

What do you see on that realm, kind of those, the things that billionaires and money do to the system that we don't think about as directly.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, I mean, I think there's a lot of good examples of this in the world of philanthropy, which I write, I write about also, you know, having a lot of money and spending a lot of money even on charitable causes is a form of kind of soft power. And a good example of this is, let's take Sergey Brin, who's the one of the co founders of Google. Sergey Brin had a family member who had Parkinson's. So Sergey Brin has spent and I think has become one of the largest individual donors of research to cure Parkinson's, a worthy cause. Yada, yada, yada. A critic might say, why is Sergey Brin, with his, you know, $100 billion fortune, getting to decide what disease it's being spent on? Who said Parkinson's? Why not Alzheimer's, why not skin cancer, why not breast cancer? And that these kind of public policy questions about how we as a society decide which disease we go after, which is like a public, you know, health question, are being decided by private philanthropists.

[Jon Stewart]

Let me ask you a question, Teddy, because just to clarify this for myself, but he's not. Is he dictating to the government that our tax money goes to Parkinson's or is he himself funding this through his largesse? Because I do think those are two separate questions. And one that I would feel very differently about. One or the other, I think.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Well, I think it's the latter. It's through his private giving. But is Sergey Brin out there? I mean, this is an exact question I'm not going to know the answer to. But is Sergey Brin out there right now calling for, you know, his taxes to be raised because we need to have more federal government spending against Parkinson's, or is he kind of fine with him being, you know, in charge of Parkinson's research for the United States government? I'm exaggerating, but only a bit. Like they're kind of the question is, is the private power that wealthy people have, is that at odds with kind of a strong federal government that, you know, takes care of everybody? And frankly, he's also, he's also accountable to voters. Like, no one can unelect Sergey Brin from Parkinson's research. He can do whatever he wants.

[Jon Stewart]

Right? Listen, and I think you've brought up a really interesting point. And in some ways, hasn't that been the dynamic that we fought against for the entirety of our history? And Ken, I'll throw this to you. You know, think about when, when the government and I think the 20s was failing and they went to JP Morgan directly like their idea. This is before FDIC and before a social safety net is in place. And you've got, you know, we need money. And so what do they do? They turn to a banker and go, hey man, you don't have like a billion dollars lying around, do you? And so we put in place all these measures of the government so that we're not reliant on this kind of largess. But are we kidding ourselves? Are we kidding? I mean, we all know of the robber baron era and the excesses and the undemocratic and anti worker results of that era. And we put in all these different checkpoints. Are we kidding ourselves that it's any different than what it's been since then?

[Teddy Schleifer]

I mean, certainly there has been a sort of deregulatory impulse and a deregulatory push, particularly from the right, but also from, like, major corporations that you don't. That are very careful to not align themselves with one side or the other, even if some executives might, to sort of break down the regulatory regime surrounding their businesses, whether they be finance or whether they be fossil fuels or whether they be tech. Tech is the big fight that's happening now. And, you know, and you. You see some of the people who are the biggest players in the industries assuming roles either with a campaign as an informal advisor or as a major donor and sort of inserting themselves into the process in a way that does call into question the government's ability to sort of control, to have the upper hand when it comes to the type of regulation. There's an example now, there are a number of donors on the left in the tech space. Teddy's written about some of them. Reid Hoffman is one, the LinkedIn founder, who are, like, openly supporting Harris to the tune of, you know, millions of dollars and are openly calling for her to fire Lina Khan, the chair of the ftc.

[Jon Stewart]

That's right.

[Teddy Schleifer]

In some cases, the FTC is investigating some of the firms with which these donors are associated.

[Jon Stewart]

And breaking up big tech is sort of the thing. That's why guys on the left like, like Cuban, when you talk about Lena Khan, are calling for that. And guys like J.D. vance are like, ah, she's pretty good.

[Teddy Schleifer]

Yeah. And that's a little bit of a realignment. But it gets to this question that you're raising about, like, whether the government's ability to regulate these industries that have a huge sway over our society is compromised by funding that is coming from individuals in those industries. And these individuals taking informal or sometimes formal roles with the candidates and the campaigns and maybe even with the government. I mean, you hear Trump talking about making Elon Musk the efficiencies are or whatever it is. And that raises a lot of questions, because Elon Musk companies have contracts, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars in. Right.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Contracts with the US Government and tons of federal investigations.

[Jon Stewart]

Turns out his have no waste, fraud and abuse. Right, exactly. And turns out his contracts, they're all good. They're fine. Okay, got to take a quick break. We'll be right back.

[Lauren Walker]

This episode is brought to you by Allstate. Some people just know they could save hundreds on car insurance by checking Allstate first. Like, you know, to check the date of the big game first before you accidentally buy tickets on your 20th wedding anniversary and have to spend the next 20 years of your marriage making up for it. Yeah, checking first is smart. So check Allstate first for a quote that could save you hundreds. You're in good hands with Allstate Savings. Vary terms apply. Allstate Fire and Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates, Northbrook, Illinois.

[Brittany Medic]

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[Jon Stewart]

We're back. Teddy, what do you think of that idea?

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, sure. I mean, look, I think there's actually not a ton of attention that's paid on kind of corporate influence. I think we, frankly, we get kind of sucked in by the big names. And this is a. I'm a part of the problem here as much as anybody.

[Jon Stewart]

That's why we called you here today, Teddy. This is an intervention to atone.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Teddy. Cover more corporate giving and less billionaire giving. Thanks, John. Look, I mean, it's hard to give myself an out here. It's hard. Like companies are good at this. You know, they're sending, you know, a staff member in a personal capacity to a retreat in Jackson Hole. And like, you know, they're. They're giving through a C3.

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah, you're not allowed to accept like a book or a ticket, but you are allowed to go on a ski trip with 10 of your best friends from Raytheon. And yeah, I mean, it's crazy.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, it's hard.

[Teddy Schleifer]

Or they're funding think tanks which are putting out white papers that influence the debate on the issues that affect them most. Or they're paying lobbyists, an army of lobbyists to go in and shop these white papers. And so that, yeah, the corporations are more careful. They're sort of allergic to controversy. They don't want to be seen as siding with one side or the other, but they are currying influence in a more systematic, long term way. That gets at some of the stuff that you're talking about, John, about like just shaping the debate gradually over time such that they in some ways, you know, from an outside perspective appear to be like dictating the terms of the regulations that affect their industry.

[Jon Stewart]

And as we tighten down into this election, Window. You know, the decisions seem to be coming fast and furious from the candidates directly. Donald Trump, I'm going to ban TikTok. Chinese influence and spies. And then his big donor is like, I'm investor in TikTok. It's like, I love TikTok. I love dancing. You should see me do the dance with the arms. I'll put it on TikTok. Kamala Harris. Same thing with crypto. You know, EVs now Musk is on board and Trump is like, I gotta tell you. Yeah, you know, the ev. So it now it almost seems the shame of it is gone.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, I kind of find it almost. There's an element of it that I find gratifying, or at least I don't want to say charming, but affirming of kind of your preconceived narrative. So that's always enjoyable. Or Trump, Trump, let's take him at least. You know, he has been remarkably candid, I guess you could say, or explicit about sort of the transactionalism. You know, Ken mentioned that, that dinner where he offered, you know, a gajillion dollars to oil executives if they.

[Jon Stewart]

Right.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Gave him a gajillion dollars or, you know, EVs, or, you know, Trump on crypto as well, frankly. You know, he like, typically there's this like game that's played right, where, you know, you don't appoint somebody to a position because somebody, you know, gave you a bunch of money and, you know, they have influence. But like, Trump is just like, no puritis. Here's, here's the quid pro quo.

[Teddy Schleifer]

And by the way, from the very beginning, when he first ran in 2015 and people were calling out his donations to Democrats as well as Republicans and.

[Ryan Reynolds]

He just admit, he would admit it.

[Teddy Schleifer]

I give to them because they do what I want. And so he's now he's the one who's doing what they want.

[Jon Stewart]

And by the way, was brilliant. You know, when he first came out, I thought it was so interesting is what he did, is he exposed the reality of the transactional nature of our government. The system is rigged against you. I know, I helped rig it, I benefit from it. I do that. Not now to his discredit. He didn't dismantle that rigged system, he just rigged it more for him. And this has been really helpful, guys, by the way. And maybe this is the broader question then, and I think Teddy just referenced it when he was talking about sort of corporate influence. We think a lot about the structure of our government and its checks and balances and the founders, in their genius, designed a system that would not allow any kind of section of the government to garner more power than another. And that balance would keep. The executive, judicial, and legislative would keep in there. But there's this fourth tent post, this fourth leg of the chair that is corporations and corporate power. And there is no grand design by the founders over how to check their influence, how to balance their influence. But their influence is vast. And it gets us into globalization, which hollows out the infrastructure and manufacturing in the country. It gets us into a financial disaster in 2008. How do we effectively counter. And all we've really done is just said, okay, they're people and they have. And all their money is a right to free speech. But what is in the system to balance and check that? And is government maybe the only entity on earth that has the size and power to effectively balance it?

[Ryan Reynolds]

I'm pretty pessimistic. I mean. No, Teddy, you know, I just think the. I think the only saving grace here is kind of small dollar donors. And I mean, there are. Look, there are examples, I'll say, especially in primaries, of politicians who are backed by big corporations and the ultra rich who lose because they are just fundamentally out of touch with their district. And they lose in part because that opponent has lots of small dollar donors who can, you know, at times, frankly, outrage candidates who are backed by wealthy people, even if you include super PACs.

[Jon Stewart]

But it's an unusual. It generally, it's. That's a pretty unusual.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Yeah, it's not happening in a presidential race. You know, I think, you know, the. The Mike Bloomberg campaign of 2020 is something that people reference all the time on this. Right. Where, you know, it was a Democratic primary, to be clear. But, you know, Bloomberg was one of the richest people in the world and spent $1 billion of his own money and got absolutely screamed. And that's an example of money and corporate power not buying influence. Right. And look, I mean, sometimes it's hard to tell which. You know, we're kind of painting a dichotomy here of, like, the populists and the, you know, corporate candidates. Like, I don't. Like, where do you Put Joe Biden 2020, who was supported by some wealthy donors, but not a ton, and had populist rhetoric, but not entirely. Like, it's tough to categorize people. But there are. There are examples of money not succeeding.

[Teddy Schleifer]

I mean, there are a lot of examples.

[Ryan Reynolds]

I mean, a lot. Sure.

[Teddy Schleifer]

That's the hope.

[Ryan Reynolds]

That's what keeps us employed.

[Jon Stewart]

Hillary Clinton's campaign Was, was better funded than Trump 100.

[Teddy Schleifer]

And you know, Bernie Sanders gave her a scare with, with like small donors. So I mean that's the sort of, that's the ultimate check is the voters and the voters ability to say, I don't care how much money you're spending, I don't care which billionaire is behind you. I don't care what your ads say. Like, I'm going to be an informed voter and do the research myself. I'm not necessarily like super optimistic of that either. And I think that part like polarization has sort of diminished the ability for that to be a check. And I do think that the small donors are also not necessarily the answer is Teddy sort of hinted at like small donors. They give and they sort of reward the extreme partisans on either side. They're sort of tribal in a way that like maybe big donors in sort of a perverse sense are a little bit of a moderating influence.

[Jon Stewart]

Not as nihilistic.

[Teddy Schleifer]

Well, it's this proverbial like smokey back room that like these big donors getting together might actually arrive at a more moderate centrist candidate if that's your cup of tea, than the small donors getting behind a flamethrower like a Marjorie Taylor Greene on the right or a real populous like an AOC on the left. And is that what we want? I don't know the answer. I'm just not, not optimistic that there is a correcting force.

[Jon Stewart]

No, I get that. And in some respects it's the difference between weather and climate. And we're talking about the weather when it comes to elections and the money and all that. And I guess the larger macro view would be, well then what's the climate that occurs after that? And is that 50 years of supply side economics or the ability to offshore, you know, all the things that come downstream from the weather, which is the elections, versus that larger picture of all those policies that end up really changing the dynamics of the global economy in profound kinds of ways. And I think we're seeing it in some ways with AI now we have all these things that are introduced, globalization and all that. We see how disruptive they are. And yet AI comes along and once again it's like, no, it'll be fine, we'll be, we'll be good. And it's because the people who, you know, are running it are these billionaire donors. And what would be an effective check on that?

[Teddy Schleifer]

I mean, you know, government tends to move more, more slowly than the private sector analog. And, and so yeah, and some of these like emerging Fields like, you know, like the combination of the sort of like puzzling nature of some of these new fields to government that they're just not like. I mean, it's the. I forget who that was it. Chuck Grassley was one of the Republican senators who famously referred to the Internet as like a ser. Oh, Ted Stevens.

[Jon Stewart]

Ted Stevens, yeah.

[Teddy Schleifer]

You went after this, John.

[Jon Stewart]

I recall it's a series of tubes.

[Teddy Schleifer]

A series of tubes, right. So they don't understand it. And the entities that are sort of pushing it, the corporations and the people around it do understand it and they have a lot of money to spend, influencing it. And they sort of try to get out front and say, look, we got this. We're going to self regulate. We're going to tell you what the proper regulation should look like. And oftentimes just by definition, because they're moving faster, they're able to outpace the government. Of course, by the time that the government is able to sort of gather itself and figure out how they're going to approach it, it's already too late. Maybe that's what's happening a little bit with AI.

[Jon Stewart]

There was a great. Sam Altman was testifying in front of. And I can't remember the Senate or Congress or a joint session or anything like that. And it was very clear that everybody up there, like, they have no fucking idea what he's talking about. And at the end of it, one of the senators, like, well, Mr. Altman, it's obviously a very challenging time and if you could help us with this, we'd really appreciate. You were just like, you know, he's running it. I don't. Yeah, that's, that's kind of not how you want. I mean, even. Look, Elon Musk understands this system. He's throwing $1 million to like, he's doing all these creative things with the money. And like all the Democrats can do is like, you know, we're going to have to look into this, right? Years from now, we are going to look back on this and say, hey, that wasn't cool. So we really are, you know, how they catch up. Final thoughts on where you guys kind of see this going and whether or not the red flags are being raised. Sort of. Is this a panic that I'm instigating or is it truly something that we need to address?

[Teddy Schleifer]

Yeah, money, money. There's just more and more money is going to be spent on these elections. And as I said, I am not optimistic there will be any significant, meaningful reforms. In fact, I see the pendulum swinging in the other direction. It's already swinging in the other direction. We see that the rules that are restricting the amount of money that can be spent and what it can be spent on being chipped away at. And we see, I mean, Teddy mentioned disclosure. Disclosure is great. We load as journalists, we want to be able to inform our readers, like, how this money is flowing and what the donors want. But I actually even see on the right a move to chip away at disclosure rules. Like, that's the next front in this. And we see some of the groups in the, you know, in the sort of Leonard Leo type of firmament who are looking at disclosure as the next frontier and chipping away at it. And Republicans used to say, like, that was Mitch McConnell's thing, was like, you know, as much money should be in the system as possible as long as it's disclosed. And I think we see a shift away from that now. And that is going to make it even harder to even make sense of this, let alone staunch the flow.

[Jon Stewart]

Right.

[Ryan Reynolds]

I always wonder here, as, you know, we wrap up on election season. I always wonder what we don't know. You know, the here's, here's, here's a, here's a fun piece of information for listeners who are hearing this right now. Any money that's donated after October 15th through election day is undisclosed until after election day. So I always wonder, you know, you always wonder what you don't know, like, is there some entity that's going to be started tomorrow that some billionaire is going to put in $500 million, going to start, you know, doing some interesting hijinks in a swing state and you're never going to know about until after the election or frankly, maybe someone started to see for a 5:1 C4 dark money organization that will never be public really in any meaningful way until, you know, next year or maybe ever, and you'll never know about it. And as a reporter, you know, that's like the, that's the nightmare scenario. And to some extent, I think as democracy, maybe that's the nightmare scenario of just like you never really knowing and it just being totally unknowable until someone's, you know, in a grave and feels gratified they pulled a fast one on everybody else. I mean, that's like, that's kind of a possibility. And yes, there are watchdogs and there are good reporters and there's investigators, but it always feels like the, the world of the wealthy is like a step ahead here. And it's sad to be playing a losing hand, but I kind of feel like it's.

[Jon Stewart]

Well, listen, man, maybe inevitable. I appreciate, though, you guys being there. And if there are two people who are out there fighting against the tide and fighting for disclosure and things like that, it's you two. Teddy Schleifer, politics reporter, New York Times. Ken Vogel, also of the New York Times. Thank you guys very much for the discussion. Very illuminating, not particularly comforting.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Leaks are welcome for people who are listening to this. That's if you, if you work for someone or you want to know what you can do, you can find my contact information.

[Jon Stewart]

So that's what LinkedIn is for. I had. I always wondered. Thanks very much for joining us, guys.

[Ryan Reynolds]

You bet.

[Teddy Schleifer]

It was a pleasure, John.

[Jon Stewart]

Ah, okay. We are. We are back. We, as always, are with our terrific production team. And I used to say erstwhile until somebody told me what erstwhile means. And now I say great or terrific or fantastic. Lauren Walker, Brittany Medic, and Gillian Speer. And we were having a discussion with those two New York Times reporters, and it was very factual, very matter of fact. And then at the end, they sort of dropped a bombshell, like, it will never get better, it will get worse, and we will have no idea who's dropping any. And I was just like, wait, what?

[Gillian Speer]

Yeah, I feel great. I feel totally calm right now.

[Jon Stewart]

Did you, did you expect any of that?

[Unknown]

No. It's so unfortunate that as it was presented, money is both the problem and the solution. Like when it came out a few days ago that Bill Gates had donated all this money, I saw all of these pro Harris accounts, really elated, reacting positively and with joy to this news. And I think that's fair because they exist in the context, as it were.

[Jon Stewart]

Right. The context being the money in politics is bad unless it's our money. And then, of course, whether you view it as a necessary evil or, hey, it's free speech, it kind of doesn't matter. It just has to be in the system.

[Unknown]

Yeah, we've all become so acclimated to it that we're mistaking billionaires acting in their own self interest for generosity. Like, they're going to save us all.

[Jon Stewart]

Bars, Jillian Spear, bars.

[Unknown]

And what's worse is what Teddy was saying. That my small dollar donations are the solution.

[Jon Stewart]

No, he was saying it's the problem.

[Unknown]

Don't make me fight this fight.

[Jon Stewart]

Gillian, they were actually blaming you. We didn't use your name specifically. We were going to. We were actually going to bring it up. But that's what they. What they were saying is, well, we have to really decide what kind of democracy we want. Do we want this oligarchy where the billionaires are doing it, or do you really want the mob to be able to give you $5 out of their wallets and then fucking decide? You don't want them to decide either?

[Unknown]

The electorate? Why would we want them to decide?

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah, they already get a vote. How much more can you expect them to have?

[Unknown]

They're getting greedy now.

[Jon Stewart]

That's what I'm talking about. What Jeopardy. Why won't you let Gillian Speer on your show?

[Unknown]

No response. Can you believe that?

Deafening, deafening.

[Jon Stewart]

Zero response.

[Unknown]

Yeah, I check my spam folder, I.

[Jon Stewart]

Call upon Ken Jennings and all that is holy to respond to this woman's audition for. For God's sakes, Lauren. Being someone who has been in journalism for so long and been around all that, their demeanor was very like people that almost like war correspondents. Like there was a certain, like an inevitability.

[Gillian Speer]

Well, I think outside of even the topic that they're covering, the world they exist in is also dealing with billionaire buy ups. And something that was in the news this morning or I think yesterday was that the LA Times owner wasn't going to allow the paper to endorse Kamala Harris. He's a billionaire who bought up the paper. You know, it's just they're journalists are getting it from all ends at this moment.

[Jon Stewart]

Right, right, right. And then I think their editor resigned. Yes. Based on that. Is that.

[Gillian Speer]

Oh yes. Over it.

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah, yeah, but you're right, it's a vexing problem. But I'm telling you, man, one or two more podcasts and I think we'll fix it.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Gillian Speer]

Something, you know, I think really illuminated things for me. Just how much has changed is that Obama brought in 750 million for his 2008 presidential campaign.

[Jon Stewart]

Is that total?

[Gillian Speer]

Yeah, at the time that was a record amount that exceeded what all the candidates combined collected in private donations in the previous races for the White House. And then for comparison, this week we learned Harris sets the record for the biggest fundraising quarter ever. Three months, raising 1 billion in three months.

[Jon Stewart]

Three months. And that's not including all the dark money and all the other shit that's going on. And it is, as we say, we talk about inflation, but man eggs got nothing on politics, that's for fucking sure. Yeah.

[Unknown]

Can I just say, according to my inbox, Harris has exactly zero dollars, right?

Yes, they are poppers.

[Jon Stewart]

So yeah, it is. You are being constantly hit with that, like, oh my God, I don't have any money. And I need to get home.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

Can you send me $2?

[Unknown]

Correct.

[Jon Stewart]

Well, this has been fabulous as always, guys. Phenomenal job on the research and on the organization and allowing me to at least hold a cogent conversation with those experts and all that. What do the listeners got for us this week there?

[Unknown]

All right, we've got two questions this week. John, bring it. Okay. If you could portrait an ideal candidate for presidency, which three qualities would you list as indispensable? There's nothing ideal in the world, but I'd love to hear your perspective on what matters the most to you.

[Jon Stewart]

Humility. Tenacity. Dick. Like Arnold Palmer. So three. There'd be three metaphorical. I'm trying to think of this. I went to the. The joke one, but, you know, and courage. I think those are. Character is destiny. And I've always felt that way. And I think that you're not always going to get the right outcome with those kinds of qualities, obviously. But more often than not, your process will get you a better product. And I'm hoping that that means something. But we'll see. That's a good one, though. That's a really. That's a good question there. What else? What's the next one? I'm a little scared now about the next one.

[Unknown]

Me, too. For HR purposes, I'd like to clarify that this question is from a listener.

[Jon Stewart]

No. This is terrible.

[Unknown]

Yeah.

[Jon Stewart]

Do we even have hr? I don't even know.

[Unknown]

I think it's you, honestly.

[Jon Stewart]

Oh, fair enough.

[Unknown]

You've been promoted.

[Jon Stewart]

Yeah.

[Unknown]

Is John aware he is a certified dilf?

[Jon Stewart]

I'll address that question. First of all, I don't know the board that certifies that, and I have not been contacted by that organization. But I will tell you this. When I spoke earlier about humility, I'm going to have to disagree. I'm going to have to. I don't even shower naked anymore for that very reason. So it is a much appreciated boost. But unfortunately, knowing what I know, I vehemently disagree. But that's lovely. But keep the damn questions and things coming on and the insights. Brittany. How would they do that?

[Unknown]

Yeah, we actually got a question. Somebody said, how do they ask us questions?

[Jon Stewart]

Oh, great.

[Unknown]

So they can comment on our YouTube, Instagram posts. Tweet, spoiler. We read all of your comments.

[Jon Stewart]

Oh, okay. Very good.

[Unknown]

Twitter.

[Jon Stewart]

We. Sorry.

[Unknown]

Clearly. Yeah, Twitter. We are weekly show pod. Instagram threads and TikTok. We are weekly show podcast. And please like and subscribe our YouTube channel, the weekly show with Jon Stewart.

[Jon Stewart]

Boom. Thank you guys very much. Again. Lead producer Lauren Walker. Producer Brittany Momic. Video editor and engineer Sam Reed. Standing in for Rob Vitola, who is on a paternity leave with a new baby. So deliciously cute. Audio editor and engineer Nicole Boyce. Researcher and associate producer Gillian Speier. Executive producers Chris McShane, Katie Gray, thanks so much. So we will see you guys next week for our final episode before the election. And appropriately enough, it's around Halloween, which what's scarier than that? So, all right, guys, see you next time. The weekly show with Jon Stewart is a comedy central podcast. It's produced by Paramount Audio and Busboy Productions.

[Ken Vogel]

Now streaming on Paramount.

[Teddy Schleifer]

Survivors ready?

[Jon Stewart]

Go.

[Teddy Schleifer]

It's a mental test.

[Jon Stewart]

Who knows what's about to happen? Here we go.

[Ken Vogel]

It's time to gather your tribe.

[Teddy Schleifer]

This is your community.

[Ken Vogel]

Survivors. My mom's and I sing.

[Jon Stewart]

That's how you do it on Survivor. Right there.

[Ken Vogel]

Survivor new season now streaming on Paramount. All new episodes CBS Wednesday, 8, 7 Central.

[Jon Stewart]

Hey, Coulter, we have a job for you.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Send me the info.

[Ken Vogel]

Now Streaming on Paramount.

[Jon Stewart]

Mr. Shaw, I know the reward. It's not much.

[Ryan Reynolds]

I'm gonna help you.

[Ken Vogel]

Justin Hartley is America's number one new hero.

[Jon Stewart]

Thank you. I'm here to help. If there were any one of us.

[Ken Vogel]

Out there, he wouldn't hesitate.

[Ryan Reynolds]

I'm gonna do everything I can.

[Ken Vogel]

Tracker new season streaming on Paramount. New episodes CBS Sunday at 8, 7 Central.

[Jon Stewart]

Paramount podcasts.