INSANE announcement on Mitch McConnell’s health

0:00 As questions about Mitch McConnell's health and frankly his survival continue to mount, his office has just released a brand new statement. According to the Washington Post, David Pop, who is a McConnell spokesman, said, quote, "The senator continues to meet with staff regarding Senate and Kentucky business, including discussions on defense appropriations, foreign policy, the farm bill, constituent services, and constituent federal grant requests. As the senator continues to improve in rehab, we will be sure to keep you updated." Now, look, this is obviously conjecture on my part, but with Mitch McConnell in the hospital for over 40 days, the notion that he is meeting with staff to discuss foreign policy and constituent services sounds absolutely insane. And here's the thing, this is a

0:45 sitting United States senator whose absence is functionally shifting the balance of power in the US Senate. And the public has every right to know more than a staged photo op is telling us. Which by the way is not something that I should have to say to a political party that spent four years decrying Joe Biden's cognitive function. If anyone should have some modicum of concern for the ability of an elected official to do their job. It is the same Republican party whose entire identity was predicated on their collective concern about the president's cognitive health. Although I got to say there is something so fundamentally Mitch McConnell about the rule suddenly changing for Republicans. Remember McConnell himself would not allow Merrick Garland to be seated on the Supreme Court for a year

1:31 because God forbid a Supreme Court nominee was appointed during the year of an election until of course Amy Coney Barrett was seated while votes were already being cast and the architect of that scheme Mitch McConnell. So the irony is not lost on me that he is yet again at the heart of a scandal where only one side has to operate by any rules. So look, I say this as somebody who is not a doctor and shockingly even in the year 2026 when everybody pretends to be everything, doesn't even claim to know anything about healthcare. But I'm going to go out on a limb and say that far from doing constituent services and delving into the intricacies of foreign policy, I would be surprised if Mitch McConnell is even lucid or capable of surviving on his own. Which raises the

2:16 question, why does this matter? Like why would the GOP or McConnell's office be hiding this? And the answer is that there is a deadline buried in all of this and that's August 3rd. Under Kentucky law, if McConnell's seat becomes vacant before August 3rd, so you know, over the next week or so, the state is required to hold a special election to fill it. After August 3rd, there isn't enough runway to administer that special election before Kucky's already scheduled November election for his seat happens. So instead, the seat would just, you know, sit vacant, unoccupied until whoever wins that November race is sworn in come January. And of course, this is the exact law that Kentucky Republicans just ram through back in 2024. And it wasn't some, you know, good government reform.

3:01 This was a bill written specifically because Republicans looked at their aging, ailing Senate leader and said, "We cannot let risk letting our Democratic governor have any say in who replaces him." So they stripped Andy Basher of the appointment power entirely and mandated a special election instead. All while McConnell was 82 years old and obviously not at peak health. So here's where the truly fitting part of the story comes in. If Mitch McConnell's seat goes vacant before August 3rd, Kentucky has to run a real special election, one where Democrats could theoretically compete in or at a bare minimum where Thomas Massie could run in or somebody else that actually puts up a real fight and, you know, at least costs Republicans a lot of money to defend.

3:46 But if McConnell's office can just keep the lights on, if they can just keep issuing vague little he's recovering nicely statements and run out the clock past August 3rd without an official vacancy, then that seat simply sits empty until January when the already scheduled November race, a race shaped by Kucky's Republicanleaning electorate, decides who gets in. So, no competitive special election variable, no wild card, just a clean handoff to whoever wins November without ever having to really test the seat in an open contest before then. Which means there is now a very real, albeit very cynical incentive for McConnell's team to say as little as possible for as long as possible and just get him or at least the legal

4:32 fiction of his still occupied seat across the August 3rd finish line. Whether or not that's actually what's happening, I can't tell you. Nobody can tell you because that's the whole point. The opacity itself is the problem here. And going back to the double standard here for a second again, if the roles were reversed, if this was, say, an 84year-old Democratic senator who vanished from the capital for 6 weeks after being rushed to the hospital for cardiac arrest with nothing but one single staged photo to show for it, Republicans would be on every cable news channel demanding proof of life. They'd be invoking the 25th Amendment. They'd be accusing Democrats of running a shadow senatorship, of hiding his true condition from voters, of a cover up. Again, we watched them do exactly this

5:17 with Joe Biden for months. But when it's their guy whose actual medical status determines actual Senate math and an actual statutory election deadline, suddenly it's, well, look, let's let's give him privacy because after all, he's working hard from his hospital bed for voters. But I have to say that the most fitting part of all of this, the part that really sums up Mitch McConnell's entire career, is that even now, even from a hospital bed, even six weeks removed from the Senate floor, his presence, or the ambiguity of his presence, is still being used to manipulate the system for partisan advantage. This is a guy whose entire legacy is built on bending institutional rules to squeeze out just one more procedural win. again blocking Merrick

6:03 Garland, ramming through Amy Coney Barrett, rewriting Senate norms whenever it served Republican power. And now, even as his own health hangs in the balance, the mechanics of his own party's law, are potentially being used, deadline and all, to make sure the Kentucky Senate seat stays firmly in Republicans hands no matter what happens to him personally. You could not write a more fitting final chapter for Mitch McConnell if you tried. a man whose defining trait was always outmaneuvering the system for partisan gain. Quite possibly doing it one last time, not through some clever floor maneuver or committee trick, but simply by the silence around his own uh survival being useful enough to run out the clock. That's the legacy. Not what Mitch

6:49 McConnell stood for, just what he was willing to bend in order to win. You're watching the No Lie podcast. Next up are my interviews with Jamie Rascin, Yasminsari, and Peter Hamby. No lie is brought to you by Simply Safe. In the United States, there is a break-in every 26 seconds. That means somewhere right now, an intruder is getting closer. The problem is that most security systems only alert you after break-ins already started, and at that point, it's too late. That's why I chose Simply Safe to secure my home. Using the Outdoor Camera Series 2 and advanced AI alerts, Simply Safe's US-based live agents identify threats on your property and help deter them, stopping crime before it even starts. That's real peace of mind. It has been a gamecher for me, especially in a world that is sadly increasingly dangerous. Having that peace of mind is

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9:53 because he followed the law and he followed the facts and he did his job. So, he's always looking for a way to get at him. This one is comical, Brian, because the House Republicans have referred Jack Smith to the Department of Justice for perjury because they asked him questions. He answered the questions perfectly truthfully, but then they wish they had asked him other questions, which they didn't ask him. And he of course didn't answer questions they didn't ask him. And so the whole thing is absolutely ludicrous. They will be laughed out of court. They they claim that when they asked Jack Smith whether he had subpoenaed the not just the toll records for telephone calls, which are

10:38 the records that all of us have for the numbers we called, but also the actual content of the conversations. He said no because he did not subpoena them. Um they did not ask whether he received them not through a subpoena but just directly from the archives because the president's records are given to the archives and they they are routinely then turned over for this purpose. So they were turned over not through a subpoena um and you know not from the subpoenas that were issued to any of the telephone companies but they were turned over to uh Jack Smith by the archives and the Republicans just forgot. I

11:25 assume they forgot or they didn't know or I mean who knows what happened but they did they failed to register the fact that um a president's records are turned over to the archives including emails and so if there were emails that went from Republicans to President Trump were back and forth they would be turned over. Now, certainly the White House and the Trump people knew all about it because they turned them over to the archives and they were also given to them in the course of this process. So, essentially, um, the House Republicans are upset that Jack Smith didn't answer a question they never posed to him, which is, "Did you receive those from the archives or did you receive them

12:10 from any other source?" Um, he certainly did not lie when they asked him whether he subpoenaed the actual conversations uh or email conversations or text conversations that took place between Republican members and the president. It's not perjury for him to correctly answer the question that is posed to him. And so he may be telegenic, but he's not telepathic. He can't read the minds of the questioners in the future as to what they're going to wish they had once asked him. >> Well, look, this DOJ is so often just operating under the principle of they have a conclusion in search of evidence. And if the House Republicans are going to give a criminal referral, is there

12:56 any concern that that's going to be enough for this DOJ that's looking for even the thinnest pretense of being able to say, you know, uh, he's done something wrong. let's move ahead with prosecution. Certainly, they've prosecuted people for less. And so, do you have any concern that this is all that they'll need, thin though it may be, to move forward with some prosecution against Jack Smith? >> Well, remember, they got to go to a grand jury. The grand juries are now routinely uh repudiating and rebuffing the administration. Hundreds of judges around the country are lambasting uh the Department of Justice under Todd Blanch because they're lying in court routinely. they are disobeying court orders and so on. So this happens all the time. Just you know just this week um it was uh the the department of

13:44 justice was forced to uh withdraw the subpoenas they'd rendered against New York Times reporters uh who had gone out to report about the illegal $400 million Qatari jet, the foreign emalument that Donald Trump had taken. But you know Trump doesn't care. He doesn't mind if they just start these indictments or processes and they'll take it as long as they can go. It could be against James Comey. It could be against Leticia James. It could be against my colleague Jason Crowe or Maggie Goodlander. They don't care. They'll go as far as they can go. Harass people and then move on. And the federal courts have now said there's no longer a so-called presumption of regularity in the statements of the government. They don't believe them anymore. It used to be that

14:30 government statements were presumed to be true unless you could prove that they were not in some way. Now they don't presume them to be true. And good for the federal judiciary because they're far more likely to be based on a tissue of lies and misrepresentations. >> Is there no irony in the fact that Jim Jordan once chaired the subcommittee on the weaponization of government and is now directly responsible for perpetuating this idea of uh vindictive prosecutions against the political opponents of this government? Yeah, there there is no little bit of irony, but there's also a lot of um strategic self-exposure. By which I mean they knew they were going to do this, that they were going to use the government not just constantly but

15:16 almost exclusively for the purposes of attacking the designated political foes of the president. And so um in you know classic authoritarian uh posture they laid out the the critique against the other side um as to inoculate themselves for the onslaught to come. Um and you know I mean think about things like Hunter Biden was actually prosecuted and convicted. Can you imagine uh any of the Trump sons being prosecuted during the Trump administration? >> No. for anything and convicted for anything. It just would never happen. I mean, the Biden administration did not politicize the Justice Department and weaponize it.

16:01 And that is all that Donald Trump is doing with the Department of Justice. He's turned the entire thing into an instrument of his uh vengeance or his favor. And to prop up his schemes of self-enrichment, like the $1.8 8 billion slush fund uh for him to pass out to his friends and allies and foot soldiers in his private militia um or to use the government to uh attack his political opponents. So yeah, that they injected that phrase weaponization into the air as much as they could in anticipation of what they were going to do. >> On that point of the$ 1.776 billion slush fund, we have some new news on that. Can you explain what that news is? Well, um, all 212

16:48 Democrats in the House of Representatives, our entire caucus has signed on to the discharge petition that would force this to the floor of the House of Representatives for a vote if we can get six Republicans to join us in defense of the rule of law. Remember, Trump wanted to create this $ 1.776 billion dollar political slush fund to hand out to Proud Boys oathkeepers other convicted January 6 felons who beat up police officers and smashed them in the face and uh destroyed federal property, chanted, "Hang Mike Pence, uh had a rampage in the capital, all for the purposes of overturning an election or what they described as stopping this

17:34 deal." So, um, he would like to pay all those people. It's like, who wants to be a megaillionaire? Step right up, tell us your story, and we'll give you actually 1.25 million looks like it's the going rate. That's the money that they already gave out of the judgment fund at the Department of Justice to Michael Flynn, his disgraced former national security adviser, um, after Flynn already lost on his charges in court. So he went to court to say it was a malicious prosecution. He lost on it and then they settled with him to give him $1.25 million. They settled with Carter Page to give him $1.25 million. And it looks like that's what their ambition is. So we got to shut it down because it's not just the militarization fund. They will use the judgment fund in the same way if

18:19 we don't stop it. We've got to make sure that no money is to be used for this purpose. And if people don't understand how sinister and dangerous it is to allow him to pay off his private militia army, uh maybe people will be convinced by the fact that it's unconstitutional. It's right there in the 14th amendment which says that no state shall pay or reimburse anyone for the cost of insurrection against the union. >> Is there any indication that there's going to be Republicans who sign on to this discharge petition? >> Well, it's a tough one. I mean, what we had going for us um in the Epstein files was that the Trump administration and campaign had been railing about the Epstein files and they had been talking about, you know, an international child

19:05 sex uh ring and pedophiles and so on. He was hoisted on his own petard essentially. He did everything he could to stop it. And then when a number of Republican women hung tough like uh Nancy Mace and Marjorie Taylor Green and Lauren Boowbert and they said, "No, we're going to go through with this." At that point, the whole Republican party signed up. Um, and Donald Trump then, you know, ran out to get in front of the parade and say, "Oh, I wasn't trying to stop this. I've been for this from the beginning." Even though then they proceeded to try to sweep everything under the rug and block the release of all the materials. But in any event, they they couldn't really stop that one here. I've had a I had conversations with four different Republicans today and a couple of them have said, "Well, if you can get some other Republicans on it, then I would seriously consider

19:52 joining you." But right now, there's nothing that Trump takes more seriously than his control over federal money and his slush funds. And remember, it's not also just about the slush fund. This was also the so-called agreement which one federal judge has described as collusive and essentially a fraud on the court and therefore an anticipated fraud on the country. But it's also about this self-pardon that is Trump. Neither Trump nor his family nor his businesses can be sued in any way civily for tax fraud or any other offenses, nor can they be prosecuted for any offenses committed up until this point. And this is probably even more important to them, Brian, than

20:39 the political slush fund because after all, most of that, not all of it, they'll probably keep a couple hundred million for themselves, but um most of that money is going to be used for other people. But this fraud pro, you know, uh, protection against fraud prosecution, this self-immunity, self-pardon is something that goes right to their own interest. And so, a number of the Republican members said this is going to be tough for us to sign. On the other hand, a bunch of Republicans have spoken out against it forcefully. And Todd Blanch himself said, remember Todd Blanch when questioned about it said, "It's not moving forward. It's moot." and they said, "Will you put that in writing?" And he said, "No, I won't." And [laughter] then the very next day, Donald Trump said, "I love the idea. I want to move forward with it." So, you

21:25 can see where they're where they're going with it. But he did say under heavy questioning over on the Senate side, he said, "Look, you guys could just go ahead and codify it, legislate it, and that's exactly what we're saying. We're going to legislate it. We're going to make this happen." So, I think that um there are a number of Republicans who will be tempted by it because they know it's the right thing to do, but they're going to be terrified of going up against Trump here and you know how they zero in on people. But >> we've got one great thing in our advantage right now, which is the election is coming up. And so we need people all over the country to be demanding that their representative attach their name to the discharge petition so we can cement into law a block against either the slush fund for

22:13 nearly $1.8 billion or the self-pardon applying not just to Donald Trump but all members of his family and all businesses on any charges that have nothing to do with any of this stuff. you know, they are all being given um a preemptive pardon against any prosecutions that could relate to things they've already done. >> I presume if there's not already a lawsuit, there's going to be a lawsuit against both the self-pardon and the 1.8 billion slush fund. So, is this kind of a belt and suspenders approach where, you know, you're attacking this thing legislatively while also expecting anticipating there to be a case against this in the courts? Well, there are two cases that are presently uh against it and uh Judge Williams in Florida has

22:58 said that she rejects this so-called settlement and that the fact that they brought the case in the first place appears to be a fraud on the court because that's when Todd Blanch himself was referred to bar counsel. >> Yes, exactly. Uh all the lawyers have been referred to bar counsel under rule 11 which is sanctions for dishonesty or other um departures from the rules of professional responsibility. But she said nobody ever had any intention of bringing this case. The whole thing was a setup in basically Trump versus Trump. And you know who wins that? Trump does and the public loses. And the idea was Trump sues the government for $10 billion. The Department of Justice does not defend the case. They defended the exact same case against lots of other

23:45 plaintiffs who were saying they wanted to get paid by the IRS, too. And the Department of Justice brought a very aggressive defense, saying the statute of limitations has run, which it certainly has run in Donald Trump's case. And uh they said you can't get liability because of the actions of a third party contractor. And that guy's already been sent to jail for leaking thousands and thousands of people's IRS information. But Trump says, "No, I'm going to sue for $10 billion." Then Todd Blanch and the DOJ don't defend it. They don't write the exact same brief that they filed in all these other cases. They sit down and then they negotiate uh $1.8 billion uh to Donald Trump uh without the showing of any damages at all. Um after

24:32 all, Trump said he was going to release all of his taxes like all the other presidents have done and so on. But in any event, he get $1.8 8 billion and then they say we're going to give it to, you know, to the January 6 people and other people who've been the victims of weaponization and we're not going to use the courts to do it. We're going to set up uh five people appointed by Blanch and Trump within the administration who can be fired at any time by them if Trump doesn't like what they're doing and they will decide where the money goes. That's what due process looks like in America now. That's what justice looks like in America now. We've got to shut that down. But it's remember it's not just the weaponization fund because they've already taken millions of dollars out of the judgment fund to do exactly what they want to do with all these other people. They did it uh with

25:19 Carter Page and they did it with Michael Flynn. They just want to use the taxpayers money to pay off their friends. >> Yeah. Well, I'm sure they're going to be completely understanding uh if this is the president they establish and the next Democratic administration wants to pay off billions of dollars to their political opponents. I'm sure that we'll see not a single word of push back uh from Fox News and these Republicans who are right now conspicuously silent in the face of Trump doing it. Uh with that said, >> look, they know that the Democrats uh have respect for the rule of law and the Constitution. Yeah. >> Um they understand that and that's what authoritarians do. They abuse the good faith and the trust that the rest of the society operates on. and they try to get away with everything they can, which is why we've got to be out there every day fighting this corruption, this malice,

26:04 this authoritarianism. And I thank you for what you're doing always to get the word out about each of these schemes and scams against the American people. >> Congressman, we'll leave it there. Thanks so much for taking the time. >> You bet. >> We have watched as Don Jr. and Eric have kind of ingratiated themselves into the federal government, using their dad's position of power to enrich themselves. We now have possibly another Trump kid, Baron Trump, who is doing the same thing as it relates to two of the more reprehensible figures in politics, the Tate brothers. I'm joined now by Congresswoman Yasmin, sorry. Congresswoman, you've been especially focused on this and I've just decided to take action on this issue. Can you explain what the new news is? >> Hey, yeah, thanks for having me. So, um, you know, there have we've long heard about the Tape brothers and their

26:49 association with the Trump Orbit and and their open support of the Trump administration. Obviously, these two brothers are uh serious criminals. They have, I think, 50 charges combined against them just from the UK government for child sex trafficking, rape, um, you know, exploitation of minors, etc. and they had been allowed to come to the United States even though they were being charged in countries like Romania and the United Kingdom. Now, there's been reporting. I've been following this for number of years because I actually was really alarmed about five years ago when a couple younger family members of mine who were teenagers at the time were talking about Andrew Tate and his whole Hustlers University uh platform and and

27:35 I realized like how serious the influence of these two like absolute criminals are on young people in this country. And um it turns out, you know, thanks to really great reporting by the New York Times and the Financial Times, etc., that they have long cultivated relationships with Trump's family, including with Donald Trump Jr. and Baron Trump. With Baron, it's always been less talked about. Granted, there's less reporting on it, and I think it's that's why it's something that's worth being investigated. So given the latest news around the extradition or the potential extradition to the United Kingdom, the fact that uh we know that um the the Tape brothers met with

28:20 Republican members of Congress on the Hill last week, I learned this thanks to reporting. I have sent a letter to James Comr who's the chairman of the oversight committee which I serve on to open an investigation into the broader issue here into you know the communications that Trump White House officials may have had with the Romanian government into what you know Baron Trump has been doing whether he has been in touch with the tape brothers whether he has used his influence with the administration all of these things I think are worthy of being investigated ated more deeply and I think Baron Trump should come before the oversight committee as well as Donald Trump Jr. to answer these questions. >> In the event that Democrats are able to retake control in the aftermath of

29:06 midterms, is this something that you think the committee should expend political capital on on issuing a subpoena for like for example to Don Jr. or Baron? >> Well, with both of them, it's more than just this, right? The corruption with both of those kids, with all of the Trump kids is staggering. The self-deing, the the ways that they have used their influence in the White House to make record profits. I think so, you know, they've made hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars, Don Jr. in particular. So, I think we need to look holistically at all of the uh the issues that they have had and all of the ways that they may be held accountable or held criminally liable and and we need to look at it in in that way. >> Can you speak a little bit about the

29:52 fact that, you know, a a major theme of this administration on the campaign trail was holding these kind of people to account? these, you know, that there is that there is an an echelon of people who can operate and commit criminal acts with impunity, especially as it relates to sex trafficking. And that was something they promised with regards to the Epstein files. Obviously, they haven't been released and in fact, Trump has put in place people that are expressly going to suppress these files. And now we have the Tape brothers who are accused of engaging in similar activity and again, it looks like the Trump administration is bending over backwards to help those people. So, can you speak on that that chasm between what these people said on the campaign trail versus how they're actually using their power and governing?

30:39 The Trump family has absolutely turned its back on Americans as it pertains to what they promised on the campaign trail in every regard. But as as it relates to corruption and going after criminals, I think that they they they always knew they were lying. you know, they they wanted to win an election. They lied to Americans in every single way possible. And the truth of the matter is that at the end of the day, they care about who is loyal to them, who will help them get elected, who will help them make money, and who will help them build their influence. The Tape brothers are prime examples of that. Andrew Tate has been working for years to cultivate his relationship with the Trumps. He's openly um supported Donald Trump when he was running in 2024. He he urged his his

31:26 platform which he has he has a lot of influence unfortunately a lot of followers across the country and the world he urged them to support Donald Trump and so he's been working on overdrive to make sure that when the time comes he has access to this administration so that he can you know maneuver around all of the criminal charges that are uh coming at him from multiple different countries at this point this uh administration and especially the Trump family also is using the White House to make as much money as possible. And if you know, let's say if we were going to talk about the Epstein files, we know that in the Epstein files, there are many rich and powerful people, some of whom are Trump donors or Trump supporters who, as

32:13 Donald Trump said himself to former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green, my friends would get hurt. And so they are not serious about the Epstein files. They never have been. They have been leading the most egregious cover up I believe in American history. They have Donald Trump's former personal attorney, Todd Blanch, at the helm of it all. And they're trying to now make him the attorney general of the United States of America, after he docks survivors to try to silence them and to try to get them to back down. I mean, I could talk about this for hours because the the level of corruption and cover up and self-deing is so staggering and it happens every

32:59 single day, many times a day in broad daylight. And they're doing it in a way where people are it's hard not to become numb to it because it's happening so frequently and and so brazenly that um I think that we can't we can't forget about this. You know, there's a lot of talk obviously about when Democrats take back the house and hopefully the presidency in 2028. Is it about kind of restoring normaly and restoring the way things were or do we need to be aggressive to go after these people? And I think we need to be as aggressive as we possibly can because Americans need to see that you cannot be at the highest levels of our government committing crimes of this magnitude and then you lose an election and then everybody moves on. Absolutely not. Some of these

33:44 people need to go to jail. >> Yeah, I I I could not agree more. I just spent the last week on a book tour saying exactly this. And you know, frankly, the corruption that we're seeing right now is not happening in a vacuum. It's happening in my opinion as the direct response to the fact that they were not held accountable by Merrick Garland's DOJ that this DOJ or that DOJ decided to prevent the optics of politicization, give a clear runway to Trump to to engage in the criminality that he's engaging in right now. And him seeing that there's no deterrent effect put him in a position where he said, "Well, what if nothing's going to happen to me? Let's just go balls to the wall." And so this again doesn't happen in a vacuum. it happens as the result of an absence of any enforcement action uh from from the federal government. So, if

34:31 you have a government that's not going to take this stuff seriously, then of course you're going to be uh ushering in an era where people are just going to, you know, operate uh uh you know to to enrich themselves. And and at this point, you don't even know if the federal government is acting in the best interest of America or acting in the best interest of Trump and World Liberty Financial and his foreign real estate deals and, you know, exchanging better tariff rates for uh for crypto or memecoin funding, whatever it may be. But that that only happens if you have a federal government that isn't going to take on this stuff as soon as they have the opportunity to do so. >> Yeah, I I agree with you 100%. And I look, I think I think there are, you know, things that we can applaud the

35:18 Biden administration for as it pertains to policy and infrastructure and climate and and really delivering results in that sense. But they did have an old school mentality about what it means to, you know, win an election and take power after the opposite party. And and they did, you know, want to just kind of like move on and and I think, you know, naively thought that it was over, that the Trump era was over. there's no way we're going to ever have Donald Trump again. That was just a little blip in time and and therefore didn't hold people accountable. And and you're right. I mean, Trump 2.0 has been like I I knew it was going to be bad, but I couldn't have like designed or come up with these schemes that this administration has pulled in my like

36:05 wildest imagination, right? Like it is just so crazy what happened. The amount of absurd, horrific things that they've done in just a year and a half is decades worth of damage to this country. And um yeah, I mean that many many many people need to go to jail for it. >> What does day one of oversight committee look like? Um, if Democrats are able to retake control of Congress, >> o day one is going to be a laundry list of subpoenas. We are going through a process right now looking at, you know, what should, you know, it's it's kind of nerdy, but like what are the subcommittees going to be of the oversight committee in the new term? What are the issu what are the main

36:51 buckets and focus areas that we need to be prioritizing? And I think I think that if you have acted in a way that is corrupt through the Trump administration, whether you're in the administration or whether you're a company, like whether you're, you know, a major corporation that has acted in a corrupt manner as it pertains to, you know, government contracts, if you're a CEO, if you are, you know, the head of some news network that has been corrupt, you should be scared. like you will be held accountable by this oversight committee. You will have to come forward under oath in front of the American people. No more of this, you know, behind closed doors, no cameras, you know, just a little transcribed interview. Those days will be over. And

37:39 so I think people, you know, at least in the next year and a half should be very careful in how they're operating because this is not permanent. Trump is not permanent. This era is not permanent. new day will come and the new generation of leaders who are in Congress and running for Congress or in the Senate or running for Senate are very different than the old guard. >> Perfectly put. We'll leave it there, Congresswoman. Thanks so much for taking the time. >> Thank you. >> We now have some new JD Vance news that may signal some trouble for the Trump administration. I'm joined now by the chief national correspondent at Puck News, Peter Hamby. Peter, I'm going to throw right here on the screen a headline from MS Now and uh and then we'll talk about it in a moment. So, this headline is after months of

38:25 privately weighing his vice president against Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the president has begun openly rooting for JD Vanch. Five people familiar with his commentary said. So, we've got the White House that is kind of putting its finger on the scale, throwing its weight behind JD Vance, but there is also some news that signals a rough rocky road ahead for Vance. So, can you talk about that? Yeah. No. Um I have I have questions about this story. By the way, we should I want to dig into whether Trump and Vance actually like each other, but um I think Vance has been in some trouble with Republicans nationally for some time. We There's an Emerson College poll, national poll of Republicans that came out. That's a story you're referencing. Vance has fallen. Let's actually I'll pull this up here from just a few months ago in August of 2025.

39:11 Shoot, almost last year, he was at 50% in the Republican horse race for 2028. JD Vance today he's at 36. So he's tumbled like almost 20 points. And then Marco Rubio you just mentioned is up at 35. So basically the headline from this Emerson poll is that JD Vance is now tied with Marco Rubio in national polling for 2028 which is a really big shift. And I've gone back and watched this trend uh since March. Really it it goes back to the war in Iran. I mean that has made Trump unpopular. JD Vance has bear hugged Donald Trump. he put himself out there as the frontman for the memorandum of understanding that has clearly fallen apart over and over and over again. Whereas Rubio has more smoothly kind of managed the Iran war. He's obviously been at Trump's side. He's obviously part of the

39:56 administration. Um but he hasn't really been out front in the way JD Vance has. Vance can't help himself, Brian. I mean Vance says yes to every camera. He loves to play with everybody. He's like our first podcaster take uh vice president and would wants to be our first podcaster president. He just can't shut up. Um the one thing I will say though is that his numbers are still really strong among MAGA Republicans whereas Rubio's numbers are stronger among more traditionally identifying Republicans to the extent they still exist. So that's an interesting trend worth unpacking. Well, you know, you know, um it's not like Vance didn't see this coming because all this time, even from the very beginning, Vance has been planting stories or his team has been planting stories in Politico, for example. Uh there was another article, if I'm not

40:42 mistaken, in the Wall Street Journal where Vance keeps positioning himself as the lone skeptic in the room that he's he's out there trying to trying to dissuade the president from engaging in interventionism. Uh and and of course, you know, when it does happen, that's that's uh that's not thanks to his efforts. That's in spite of his best efforts to get Trump to back off. So, I think the fact that we're that we saw all of this groundwork laid in the very beginning, like right off the bat, goes to show that Vance knew that this was going to be a problem for him uh politically. And I think that's bearing itself out right now. >> Yeah. Look, just stepping back, being vice president is very hard for anyone's political ambitions in either party. And we saw this with Kla Harris earlier in the Biden years when she was given the

41:28 portfolio dealing with uh southern border migration, you know, and she went to Central America and said do not come uh and she said she hadn't been to the border, whatever, different time. But, you know, you always have to answer for the president's policies. And Donald Trump's policies are unpopular across the board. He's underwater on trade. He's underwater on immigration. He's underwater on foreign policy. He's underwater the Iran war. He's underwater most importantly on inflation, the cost of living, and the economy. And so, no matter how many inside baseball stories you plant in Politico or the Wall Street Journal or the Washington Post, the American public at large is not sort of parsing those stories apart. They see a spokesman for an unpopular administration. Full stop. And look,

42:14 again, I I've always questioned JD Vance's political instincts. Like, I just think Marco Rubio has grown to have better political instincts on a national and international stage, whereas JD Vance has just shown himself to, you know, genuleed Donald Trump at every turn. Um, another angle to this I think is interesting, you know, with that MS Now story, you know, I can see Trump, by the way, rooting for a, you know, boxing match in 2028 in the Republican primary between his two guys. And even though he's going to leave the White House, if he leaves the White House, he's going to want to sort of weigh in and play them against each other. He loves being the ring master. We know that about Trump. So, there's that. And that the second thing is that Donald Trump, you know,

43:01 kind of I think uses JD Vance as a bit of a heat shield. I I'm not sure everyone on Trump's team, uh, you know, in the Oval Office thinks that JD Vance is the most adept political player, that he's not, you know, a a great political athlete. And they like having him out there as the face of an unpopular war. you know, he will go on Rogan and he will go on any network and he will go on any podcast and he will travel around the world and give speeches defending Donald Trump. And the flip side of that is that's JD Vance's political bet and it's not a dumb one actually. If you are just competing for the Republican nomination in 2028, it's a very simple bet. You know, you can either like try to play all these play be really cute and try to gesture toward mainstream

43:48 Republicans and independents and then be ma over here or you can just go all in on Donald Trump. And that's just the bet that JD Vance has been making since he ran for Senate in Ohio, you know, six years ago. And it's not a dumb bet in that sense. It's not popular with most Americans, but with Republicans who are going to be voting in the in the nomination process in 2028, it's not a stupid play. >> Totally. I mean, look, he's the sitting vice president of the United States right now. There there is also, and this is kind of a the really cynical perception of this. There is also a world in which something like this gets leaked. This idea that the administration is throwing its full weight behind JD Vance which only further emboldens JD Vance to keep being the front guy for this administration for to keep being a heat shield for all of the unpopular policies it sets out.

44:35 Giving him this idea that if he does it, he's got, you know, the um he's got the the seal of approval from from Trump himself. and they don't have to abide by that. Like a story in MS now where somebody in the administration leaked that JD Vance is their guy and so just keep doing what you're doing kid. It's going to it's going to work out in the end. Like that's not binding. And so there's a world in which this could be just the administration um giving Vance the fuel he needs to continue uh uh you know landing in this for Trump. >> Yeah. And I think you're exactly right. This administration, a lot of administrations are like this. They care about winning news cycles. Donald Trump in particular only cares about the last good headline or the last bad headline or the last person to talk to him in the

45:20 room or the last poll number he just saw. And you know before the memorandum of understanding was signed with Iran uh or negotiated rather you know remember like a couple weeks ago every single day Donald Trump would wake up call a reporter and say uh we're going to fix the war by tonight you know and the markets would go up and the price of oil would go down and you know then we would bomber on again after the markets closed and [laughter] then we would do it all over again the next day. And so yeah, look, these people, politicians, not everyone, but a lot of them, they are just addicted to the game. And if Donald Trump just keeps feeding uh, you know, JD Vance little breadcrumbs every single day, in Trump's mind, you know, Trump's

46:06 like, "Okay, send him out there. We're going to war every single day. We got to win news cycles." And then if you're JD Vance, >> you're like, "Thank you, sir. May I have another?" Because you're just an addict and you want to be the next president of the United States. will do whatever he says. >> Yeah, I think that's exactly right. Um to that end on this idea of being the next president of the United States, let's talk about the other side of the aisle, Democrats are engaged in um choosing early primary states right now at the DNC. Give give us a lay of the land of where that lies and what the implications are of the states that have been chosen. So yeah, for people watching and listening, this this sounds like inside baseball, but for years, the first two states in both the Republican side and the Democratic side were Iowa and New

46:51 Hampshire. And they were flawed for many reasons. And and New Hampshire is still in the mix. And I'll tell you who who the first four states are going to be in a moment. But, you know, for Democrats, the problem there was one, Iowa, and we saw this in 2020 was a caucus. And so you only had the most highly engaged people showing up and it was easy to kind of game the room. I mean Brian like you've been out there you go in a caucus room and you like in a high school gym or a church basement and you sort of haggle with people to come to your corner. It's just like a very weird process. And in 2020 it was mismanaged and no one knew for days who won. And what you need in these early states is momentum. You need to show a win. Barack Obama and Iowa in 2008, great example. Um the states are also very white. And look, Democrats do need to win back white voters in flyover country, rural

47:37 voters, non-olh white voters, but inside the Democratic party, you know, black voters, uh, Latinos are extremely important. And so the DNC right now is reorganizing the early state calendar and granting windows to certain states to go first. Now, New Hampshire is still there, but they're not going to be the first in the nation primary anymore. Even though they have a law on the books in New Hampshire that says they have to go first, they have this very precious little law that they abide by and it pisses off everyone else in the DNC every year. They're like, "No, no, no. We get to go first and everyone hates New Hampshire." But they do have that little small retail aspect of the state, which is which is pretty valuable. Hand-to-hand combat retail politics, town halls, tough questions. There's value there. And importantly, it's cheap

48:24 to run in New Hampshire. you don't have to have a bajillion dollars to spend on TV ads like you would in a big state. So anyway, the DNC uh on Thursday and Friday began ratifying a new calendar. Um the first four states are going to be either Nevada and South Carolina going first and then New Hampshire and Michigan. They're also talking about adding two more states for a total of six. And it sounds like as of now when we're recording this on Friday, uh, New Mexico and Virginia will be added to that first window, which is interesting. Um, New Mexico obviously border state Latinos, but the real competition um, at least heading into the weekend was which one, Nevada or South Carolina? I think South Carolina is going to end up being first. Biden after he won, uh, asked

49:11 Jamie Harrison, the chairman of the DNC, to put South Carolina first instead of Iowa. partly because South Carolina ratified Biden's victory in 2020. The majority of primary voters in that state are black and uh it's in the wake of the Klay ruling which really, you know, gutted the voting rights act. All these southern states are trying to redistrict and uh eliminate black political participation. It's a really hard look for the DNC to take away uh the first state uh being a black majority voting state. take it away from South Carolina, but Nevada also in the mix. >> All right. So, I I I this go this question goes against everything I stand for because people will ask me, "What do you think about 2028?" And and the answer that I give and the answer that I believe is like we

49:56 don't have the luxury of being able to pretend that this is politics as usual. You know, we have an election that Trump and Republicans are trying to undermine right now. We've seen the extent to which they're trying to >> This is the theme. This is a big theme for you. You're very consistent. >> Yeah. and like and I believe it and like I I know that they're going to try to interfere in the election. There's no empirical evidence that would suggest that Donald Trump does not want to interfere in this election, but I have to ask because we're talking about the primaries uh and we've got you. And so, what do you think the implications are for specific candidates? Who does this benefit the most and who does this hurt the most ahead of 2028? >> Um, this came up a lot in my reporting this week for Puck. I was calling around to members of the DNC who were involved in the voting process. The final fight for the first slot, you

50:43 know, was between Nevada and South Carolina, which was sort of, you know, imagined as a fight between black political power in South Carolina and Latino voting power in Nevada. Now, that's pretty simplistic in a couple ways. Um, you know, Nevada is also a huge labor state. I think like 10% of the electorate is black in Nevada. They have a a you know, black party chair. Um, likely their next governor will be black. So, it's not like purely, you know, black brown. Um, but because of labor and because of its, uh, you know, large Latino population, a lot of DNC members thought that, you know, if AOC runs, Nevada would be a very good state for her. Now, that spooked the more sort

51:29 of moderate traditional old heads on the DNC who never liked Bernie, don't like DNC or sorry, DSA style progressives. And so their thinking is South Carolina should go first because as we know uh you know black political power in the south is where the sort of Bernie movement the Bernie style of politics ran into a wall twice because you know it's had it's had a hard time expanding into um uh black communities or Bernie Bernie never caught on with them. And so that's sort of the thinking. And then again with New Hampshire, you know, Mayor Pete, um, who's good at the small town town hall, he's been polling very well in New Hampshire, but so is AOC, by the way. And so I think this gets to your point, Brian. It's so hard to game out right now if there's like a purely

52:15 like just pick two people. Um, >> you know, Josh Shapiro and AOC like like you could game this out, but you can't. You can't. And another one more wild card that I think is important is that Michigan is replacing Iowa in the Midwest because everyone's done with Iowa and [laughter] all their screw-ups. Michigan I think is a good state because you've got uh black voters in Detroit. You've also got the sort of Reagan Democrats outside in and around Detroit that Democrats need to win back right from the from the Trump era. You've got rural voters. Um you can drive across the state. It's a it's it's a good state. But you've also got this Gaza Israel debate which obviously is a huge issue in the Democratic party and DNC members that I talked to um you know including Debbie Dingle were like

53:01 Democrats need to not run away from these debates. They need to learn how to talk to these voters, find consensus and figure out how to win there. And so, um, you know, if you are, if you've heard Josh Shapiro, by the way, or Rahm Emanuel, you know, more more slightly more pro-Israel than other Democrats, like that could be Michigan could be tough for them with the huge Arab and Muslim population in and around Detroit. And remember, like I think 10 11% of the vote went to uncommitted against Biden uh back in 2024, uh, you know, as Gaza was flaring. So, but again, I think rather than hide from it, Democrats need to just go into those communities and have tough conversations. And that's why I think the DNC put Michigan up up there too. >> Last question here, Hamby, and that is uh that is talk to us about you getting

53:48 the scoop of uh the scoop of the year over at Puck because [laughter] we have some new news on the on the NBA scene. Talk about that for a sec. >> Yeah. Uh, speaking of Josh Shapiro, I reported uh, gosh, would have been like 10 days ago that Shapiro bumped into LeBron James at a at a at a dinner in New York. And I, by the way, I'm proud of this scoop because it came from more of an NBA person than a political person. But LeBron James, free agent, as you know, signed with the Sixers on Friday. And I reported several days ago that Josh Shapiro like privately was like wooing uh, LeBron to come to Philly. And we know Shapiro is a huge sports fan. He goes on Philly talk radio to talk about the Eagles. Like he gets sports. He's a he's a real junkie for this stuff. So, uh, LeBron signs with Philly, signs with the Sixers on Friday.

54:35 And uh, Shapiro is not really taking a victory with victory lap, but he did declare uh, LeBron James Day in Philadelphia. And everyone on everyone everyone on Twitter and X is like, "Oh my god, he's he's up for re-election this year. He's going to win by 60 points." Like, people are hyped. like it's a big he's not again he's not taking credit for it um but he can wink at people who are giving him credit and you know it's a it's a >> W he's attached himself to this pretty uh pretty loudly I think um well look I think for for anybody who wants to uh to get these kind of scoops not just in the basketball world but also the political analysis [laughter] which is second to none please make sure to subscribe uh uh to Puck I'm going to put the link to I'm going to put the link to Puck itself in the post description of this video or if

55:20 you're listening on the podcast in the show notes, but I'm also going to put a link to uh Ham's YouTube show right here on the screen and in the post description as well. So, if you're not yet subscribed, please go ahead and subscribe, Peter. Appreciate your time, man. >> Thanks, buddy. I really appreciate it. Yeah, everyone subscribed to the Powers that be podcast on YouTube. I appreciate your help. Thanks, Brian. >> You're watching the No Live podcast. To listen to the audio version of this episode, click the link right here on the screen. And please make sure to subscribe. And to see more video content, that subscribe button's on the screen as well. >> [music]