2/13/26: Epstein Goldman Sachs Lawyer OUT, "Zohran" of North Carolina Primaries Democrat

29:53And speaking of the financial precarity of his audience, have you noticed what kind of ads the band show plays on the war room mostly no uh gold credit plenty of gold um credit card debt consolidation yeah uh you have tax bills that are way overdue you need to fight the irs sulfuric acid um and then of course uh getter which i think to this day is still advertising yeah that you can get charlie kirk's thoughts if you download the getter app it's like yeah Put a new ad in there, guys. Just record another one. Yeah. Yeah. I think you're talking about silver solution, Griffin, not sulfuric acid. What did they ship to the island?

30:37What did they burn the bodies? Oh, I don't know. Sulfuric acid, yeah. Oh, they did? Oh, I thought you were talking about like cringe ad on. I was talking about the gallons they sent, you know, what they put in the tub in like Breaking Bad to burn the body. There you go. There you go. Well, I just want to say I wanted to move on to Cuba next, but I did just want to say we're going to keep on covering all the intricate details of this. And this weekend, I really came to appreciate the work that happens on this show and from DropSite because we were at a media event over the weekend with people that kind of imbibe a little bit more of the mainstream coverage of Epstein.

31:16And when I talk to people at our media table that Epstein potentially was associated with Mossad and former PM Ahud Barak, people looked at me like I was fucking insane. which goes to show you there's really two there's kind of two narratives kind of happening one that's very surface level in the mainstream media and one where you're going to get a lot more of the details and paint a much broader and filled in picture at places like DropSite and what we try to do here so I was proud of the show and very embarrassed at dinner because people thought I was crazy I was trying to think this morning like if we weren't doing the work that we're doing like what the media landscape would look like when it came to the coverage of Jeffrey Epstein.

32:03Not that we are remotely the first one to go down this path. Like Whitney Webb has done terrific work on this for many years at this point. And plenty of others in the independent space have done it. But among those who are kind of read and viewed with a mass audience, if you wanted to tell your aunt or your uncle, no no no seriously there's something to this go read this x news article or go watch this video um that that lays it out without breaking points or drops i'd be like what exactly would you send them that they would be able to read and be like oh okay this is credible and i and i understand this not much twitter threads yeah you know nobody wants twitter threads like because especially twitter like the way that they're putting this stuff out yeah it's not good and people screenshot it and then it's disaggregated from the source and then people make fake ones and like um and now DOJ has taken down like most stuff like they've taken down a ton of zip files just in the last like 24 hours so right now you basically have to go to either jmail or or uh distributed denial of secrets um to see to get like the actual files like you can't even go to DOJ for a lot of it anymore to prove that it's real.

33:23So it's a mess. And, and, and just like offering any of the details from these shows at your, at your dinner table, at your social function, they're almost designed to make you sound like a nut, right? Like the way that if you were to talk about these details. So, uh, you know, uh, to the audience, we've been considering doing a long form, like three, four hour entire, you know, capsulation of everything we've learned about the Epstein thing. And maybe that can be a resource for you to share to your friends and family. So you can look a little less like a kook. So if you think that's a good idea, let us know in the comments.

34:01And we're heavily considering that. But that will bring us to our next topic, Ryan, which is Cuba. What's going on with Cuba right now? We're strangling the island. And it seems like the administration is kind of panicking a little bit. I wanted to put this up on screen. Several sources tell The Economist the United States is considering sending small quantities of fuel to the island, gas for cooking and diesel to keep water infrastructure running. Rubio could easily end up as the public face of an induced humanitarian crisis. it it's really eerie how quickly and seamlessly the u.s moved the gaza policy over to cuba like immediately in fact got the they are still withholding the humanitarian aid life essentials from gaza like they're supposed to be letting in 600 trucks a day into gaza as part of this quote-unquote ceasefire and they're also supposed to stop killing palestinians they've done neither of those things.

35:02They're still restricting aid. They won't even let new tents in. People living in tents that are now two years old and are completely destroyed from the weather. The conditions are absolutely unspeakable. There's this fierce respiratory illness that is rocking through the Gaza Strip at this point. And they haven't even ended that before they now replicate a version of it over in Cuba and cut off everything and then become the power center that's going to like that's going to loosen the choke hold a little bit. So like first you choke them completely to the brink of death. Some people to death.

35:46If you look at childhood cancer fatality rates in Cuba because we're not allowing in the equipment and the supplies that you need to treat cancer, children are dying of cancer at a much higher rate than they were previously. So we're already killing people in the most torturous, kind of gruesome way. But now what they're suggesting, uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh, because somebody just posted an aerial photo of the islands like almost completely black. They're like, oh, we are going to induce like a humanitarian crisis for these 9 million people that used to be like 12 or so before Biden and Trump. smashed the population down to nine, that is going to be horrific.

36:31And we, and like - With the healthy assist from the Cuban government that was beating some of them. Yeah, and it's like, okay, Israel was like October 7th, October 7th, October 7th. What did Cuba do? Like, what on earth are you doing to Cuba for why? Like, did Cuba do, like, 1959? Like, really? Like, and it's also so crazy to be like, to just have finished, and we're not even finished, but over in Israel, it's like 1948, they talk about it a lot and the Israelis will say, it's over, forget about it, 1948 happened, there's no right to return, like we're a state now, get over it. Like we're now the state of Israel, we have a right to defend ourselves, we have a right to exist.

37:13Anybody who is bringing up 1948 is insane. Now over here, like no, 1959, 11 years later, That somehow is a reason to starve millions of people in 2026. Like, can we even, can we get an ounce of consistency in our, in our like barbaric behavior toward, toward people? Apparently not. So putting the U.S. in the position of loosening the chokehold then gives them this power over life and death in Cuba. And the idea is, and you had Mike Hammer, who's a diplomat in Cuba, going around like door to door handing out supplies. So like you starve everybody and you hand out a little bit of stuff that gives you control over their lives.

37:59And then the idea is then you can then replace, you become the government effectively. Like if you're the one that's keeping people alive, you are the government. So it's like a it's like a regime replacement, subtle regime replacement without doing the just don't let them don't even worry about them collapsing, like just completely starve them. And then what are they at that point? And Emily, what's the conservative perspective on this? You know, is is there like a threat from the Cuban government? I mean, this is 90 miles off the shore of America. Like, what is the conservative perspective on the need to do regime change in Cuba?

38:41I mean, I don't agree with the policy prescription, but one of the places where Ryan and I probably disagree is that the Cold War rationale for taking Cuba extremely seriously as a threat is that it's obviously ripe for the picking of a hostile foreign actor to, you know, launch surveillance operations, potentially nuclear weapons. and other types of weapons, like missiles, all those types of things when you're so close to the United States. And there have been incursions or there have been efforts from places like China, obviously still Russia, maybe a little Iran, but who knows what to believe because all of this is from, you know, propaganda.

39:31You don't totally know what's propaganda and what's not. But the potential for it to be co-opted by a hostile foreign actor is there. And obviously the Cuban government works heavily with other countries that haven't been friendly with the United States for various reasons. I'm not saying it's all just because they're, you know, they're inherently bad people and we're just perfectly innocent. But Cuba has a government. I think it's a little bit unlike Gaza in that respect. They do have a government. They have government infrastructure. Yes, it's true. The blockade has been very problematic for them.

40:06But I think it's also that they bear some of the blame. That said, conservatives in my mind are wrong to continue this policy of just blockading, starving, trying to do what Kissinger said to Nixon about Allende in what, 1973, make the economy scream. green, and then you'll be able to do your regime change, has not worked in Cuba for decades, is not currently working in Iran either. I mean, we'll see what happens. But to keep recycling that playbook when you have especially a country like Cuba that is right off of your coast, and that you now have a significant amount of leverage over, and could genuinely try to thaw the relationship with in a way that is better for everyone, is better for the malnourished children, who if you don't want kids, like let's just say you're the most conservative person in the world and you don't want kids starving under socialism.

41:03That's what you see happening in Cuba and you don't want that to happen anymore. There's actually a better way. There's actually a better way. Don't starve them. There's actually a better way. The United States has relationships with all kinds of different countries that have all kinds of different governments. And if you want to stop suffering in Cuba, you at some point probably can do that. And now is a great time, actually, to do that because of the amount of leverage that exists. So to just act like this is a stand against socialism is obviously absurd. And right now there's a pathway to ending suffering or alleviating suffering that's better for both the United States and for the people of Cuba.

41:46I know a lot of conservatives disagree with that. But if if Venezuela is any example, if you want to take the Trump playbook and you want to recycle that, there there might be some way, whatever it looks like if you're conservative. So that's something to think about. Yeah, the Cubans have said they'll what do you want to negotiate? Democracy, human rights, direct foreign investment, tourism. Like what? Like put it on the table. Let's talk. It is very true of what Emily said, that the conservative argument is that Cuba is some sort of a threat. I feel like that's rooted in this like 1960s, 70s understanding of Cuba.

42:24If you look at, say, drug interdiction and migration, like the country that is the most helpful to the United States than any other country in the hemisphere is Cuba. Particularly when it comes to drug interdiction. Like now it's cut off right now because the U.S. is trying to, you know, destroy them. But they've said any, any moment that you want to get back to doing drug interdiction in a normal way, like where we go up to the boat and like search it. And then if it's not carrying drugs, we let it go rather than execute them from the sky. We're happy. We're happy to do it. They're like, we don't, we don't believe in executing people from the sky on a suspicion, but there's like any moment you want to go back to this drug interdiction and, you know, Cuba's well-positioned to do this counter-narcotics work that they've been doing with the U.S.

43:11for many years. I think people don't really understand that. But that's like, the U.S. government will say that out loud, like that nobody's been a better partner on countering drug trafficking than Cuba. So, but then you get this 1970s, 60s era Cuban Missile Crisis thing. It's like, wow, we have to nuke them. Well, I was going to ask, actually, like if there's anybody, so if people are wondering and why this seems so mad. It's similarly with Venezuela. It's that you have people who have poured decades of their life since the Cold War into these movements and are sort of stuck. They would dispute this.

43:48And USAID money. Yeah, exactly. You spend$100 million a year building an industry toward this. And you shouldn't be surprised, yeah. You get stuck in this loop, which is that you have dedicated so much to the ideological goal of total and complete regime change that like the Bay of Pigs, at some point there are enough Cubans to rise up, and obviously it didn't work then, but there are enough Cubans that will rise up top of the regime and bring back the next Batista, and everything will be great and happy. But if ever there was somebody who could break that pattern and shock people out of the loop, it's Trump.

44:23I mean, look at what they did in Venezuela. It was a little baby step in a better direction by, well, I don't know if it'll be better or not, But by keeping Delce Rodriguez like a direction that was not what the hardcore hawks wanted to have happen. So anyone could like shake people out of this loop where Cuba is still 1960. I think on principle, it's still very important that you don't have China getting a foothold in Cuba. That's obviously true. But if anyone could shake people out of the idea that squeezing their economy and their people is the way to prevent China from getting a foothold in Cuba, it would be Donald Trump.

44:57So the time is ripe. And what is Rubio's end goal here? Now, the article seems to state that Rubio is getting nervous that he's going to be the face of a humanitarian crisis. But this does seem to be exactly what he's wanted for a really long time. Maybe you disagree. But is the is the end stage goal here to strangle the island until it becomes like a U.S. colony or what is the final goal here? Yeah, he said a couple weeks ago, we want to see the regime fall. He's like, that's not exactly what we're doing, but we would love to see that. He would love to see that. And he'd love to see it replaced by some Bukele-like right-wing figure.

45:40Right. And now they're just like just like Gaza history repeating itself. There is a flotilla being planned to break the siege, much like there was a flotilla going to Gaza. Now, what are the chances that this flotilla will have a better chance at actually getting to Cuba? Or will it just be like the IDF where America swoops in and stops them in the ocean? Like what is the problem is look like? The problem is that Gaza needed the things that the flotilla was bringing. Now, they need a lot more than the flotilla was bringing, but those were the kinds of things they needed. What Cuba needs is fuel.

46:21And so unless the flotillas can bring oil tankers, it's good and it's nice to bring lentils and beans and the other food stuff. But if you've got nothing to cook it with, yeah. Yeah, it's an island. like you're going to like people are cooking with wood like you're going to completely deforest that island in a short amount of time and deforestation is insanely difficult to overcome and then you start getting mudslides and like so like if you look at haiti from the air you know it's completely deforested on the haitian side because of this and it's and you look at the other side, you know, still green.

47:05Um, so good, you know, it's good to raise awareness and like put political pressure, but they need fuel.

47:16Um, all right. Well, that will lead us, um, to our congressional candidate, uh, last update from news side, Russia has basically said they're not going to challenge the U S and, and bring fuel. Uh, Mexico has capitulated. China is the only one that is saying they're still going to send as much fuel as they can. So we'll see what kind of conflict that brings. China is also bringing solar panels and they've tried to accelerate the installation of these solar panels. I think they're now up to 20 % of energy from renewables and solar. So wind and solar, so it's nowhere near enough and you can't do it fast enough.

47:54You need fuel to like power this through the transition. But so that's the, that's the state of play. China is like the only one saying they're going to help. We'll see what they actually end up doing. I read that the Mexican Navy sent two boats with some supplies. I'm not sure if there was any oil on that. Yes, lentils, beans, like not oil. They don't want to be, yeah, I mean, this is, Mexico, Ryan, correct me if I'm wrong, Mexico is the largest supplier of fuel to Cuba. And so that's a really, really significant consequence of the American empire, honestly. Yep. Yep.

48:36All right. Ryan, who do we got coming up next? Well, I got Anita Alam, candidate for House in North Carolina running against Valerie Fushi. Is she here? I shall be here in just a moment. We'll just wait for her at this point. And Ryan, maybe you can, while we wait, tee it up. I know we talked about this at the beginning of the episode, But give us some of the backstory in case people are just tuning in for this part about why we're talking to Nita today. Yeah, so Nita Lams is from Durham County. She was a Durham County commissioner. The way she got into politics, though, that some of her friends were the victims of very high profile hate crimes in Durham, Durham County.

49:22And that inspired her to say, I want to get into public office. And she became this Durham County commissioner. And then in 2022, ran for Congress, was very popular locally and was expected to win that race. Instead, APAC came in through their super PAC, spending more than$2 million to try to tear her down and lift up a rival candidate, Valerie Foushey. Foushey ended up winning by something like 4 ,000 votes. and so has been a member of Congress now for a couple of terms. Fushi though, so this is 2022, so it's January of 2023 is when Fushi is sworn in. The combination of anger from her constituents at having gotten in on the back of all this AIPAC money combined with what Israel did after October 7th, 2023, led her to be a little bit more, a little bit critical of Israel.

50:25And probably more critical, and she also took like an AIPAC funded trip, met Netanyahu, like the whole, did the whole thing. So she was probably more critical of Israel than anybody else elected with two million, at least$2 million of AIPAC money. So it's not as if she was out there joining the squad or joining others and like denouncing in a really confident way what Israel was doing, but raising real questions about what they were up to. And then in 2025, spring, she said at a town hall, she's like, I'm not taking AIPAC money. And implied that she had, like she was asked if she had regrets about it.

51:06She said, yes, I took AIPAC money at the time, but I'm not going to take it again. You know, so I want you to trust me on that score. And so now, Alam is running against her again. and so it looks like she's not going to have the APAC support and they end up losing her seat, which, you know, it creates, you know, complicated politics around it because you do want people, right, when they get in office to break with APAC so that they can, you know, present their own vision. Like whatever they think they should do and whatever their voters want them to do, like that's what they should be doing, not like what a special interest is telling them to do.

51:52That's better for democracy than doing what a super PAC tells you to do. And we've got it right here, Ryan, by the way. Yeah. On the other hand, she came in with two-plus billion dollars of AIPAC money, and Nid Alam is a much more progressive candidate in the race, not just when it comes to Israel-Palestine. And she's about to get on stage in just a few minutes to a rally with Bernie Sanders, and she so graciously offered to join right before that rally. Let's welcome her to the show.

52:26Hi. How are you? Welcome to Breaking Points. Yes, I'm good. Thanks so much for having me. So where's the Bernie rally? Is it going to be live streamed? Can people watch it? Yes, so it's going to be on the Bernie's live stream. I think we're also going to be cross-posting it, But we're having it at the convention center in downtown Durham. Yeah. So I don't know if you were able to hear the intro as you're as you're waiting, but it looks like Valerie Fushi is probably not going to get at least a pack outside support. We don't know. We'll see. When is the when when does voting start and when is the election?

53:10early voting started yesterday actually and it's running through the 28th and then election day is march 3rd so we are in the thick of it right now right uh did she get crypto money in 2022 was it because there was a lot of this apac crypto overlap do you remember um was was she one of those she had sam bachman freed she was one of the uh protect our future sam bachman freed got like 1.3.4. Oh man, nothing's going right for Congresswoman Bushi. So he's not coming to the rescue. What are you seeing as the contest plays out? Because you're, like you said, we're just weeks away from the election at this point.

53:51Yeah, I mean, we've been the only campaign that's been out knocking on doors, talking to voters where they're at and also doing relational community organizing. Because what we're seeing right now is that people across this country, they're feeling let down by our political systems. They're feeling like there's no reason for them to vote. What's the purpose? The systems have just failed them in so many ways. So the way that we're doing things differently this race is we're obviously doing the traditional radio, mail, TV program, but also we have our aunties and uncles in their WhatsApp chats talking to each other, reminding each other to vote because Ramadan is going to overlap with the election.

54:30We're organizing the mosques to have iftars to the polls. Holy is right after Election Day, but we're celebrating a little early and going to do like a dole to the polls, have some music and henna and like bringing our community together into this like way that it shows that we're all accepted and we're all fighting for the same like equality and dignity for everyone. And last one for me before and then Emily Griffin might have a question. So last night it was reported that there's a super PAC getting in to support you with almost a$500 ,000 ad buy. It's one of these pop-up super PACs where it won't have to disclose kind of who's funding it until after the election.

55:15I think you've been backed by Justice Democrats. Is that right? Yes. You have their endorsement. My first guess, I was like, maybe Justice Democrats organized this. Have you heard any rumors about who, because you're not supposed to coordinate, you're not allowed to coordinate, I should say, with super PACs. Have you heard any rumors about where this money is coming from? Were you surprised by it or had you heard, oh, there might be this cavalry coming in? No, I mean, I'm proud to have the endorsements of so many national progressive organizations. And we're actually the first campaign of this cycle to have this coalition of progressive groups all endorse one race of Sunrise, Working Families Party, Justice Democrats, so many more.

55:58And then also Senator Bernie Sanders himself. and I mean for me I'm looking at it I'm like I highly highly doubt there's any sort of right wing billionaire or corporation behind this because I'm not going to be any benefit to them yeah yeah I wonder I'll see if I can do some digging and figure it out I would suspect that it is the coalition of because that coalition Justice Democrats Working Families Party it's like they've done independent expenditures in the past usually they put their name on it because they're not embarrassed like it's not it's not kind of harmful to be supported by them so I don't know there's also this kind of pro-Palestine super PAC that launched maybe they're trying to copy APAC I don't know I think there's we're seeing a lot of progressive energy and excitement especially like post-Saran's victory folks have felt like we were able to overcome 10 million over, yeah, over 10 million dollars of corporate spending in that race.

57:05And then now even more excited from Annalilia Mejia's election. And I'm proud that like with our campaign, we've been running a grassroots race or like our average contribution is like$50 or something. And it's coming from working class folks in this district and across this country who understand that I'm running for the fourth congressional district, but I'm going to be a champion for everyone across this country who wants to live with dignity, which is everyone. You know, that's interesting because one of the things that divides the populace left and right when there's a lot of overlap, because I remember when we were talking to Zoran when he was really early, like right, this was before the election had really taken off, he had just been out talking to Trump voters.

57:48And one of the things they were agreeing on was sort of obvious, like paying your bills, health care costs, all of that. But one of the things that does divide populist left and right is immigration. And I'm curious because to me, it feels like what Obamacare did for the Tea Party movement, those of us on the right, ICE is doing to the progressive movement right now, that it's become this real, like the fuel that is just driving people to organize and get active. So I'm curious how you're thinking about all of that right now. Yeah, and I think, I mean, even in North Carolina, we are seeing, like, obviously, there's going to be folks who are just deeply xenophobic, who don't want immigrants and don't want people who look like me to be in North Carolina.

58:36But if you look at there's a lot of people also in this this district, this state, this country that consider themselves Republicans, but are also deeply disturbed by the actions of ICE and CBP because they're not just going out and actually enforcing immigration of what their agency's title is. They're going out and terrorizing our neighbors and they're targeting everyone. The folks that they've been killing in January have been U.S. citizens. They've been innocent civilians who are protesting or documenting and have been murdered. And that's using our taxpayer dollars. And I think folks across party lines should be and are enraged by that.

59:22What is the issue that you're finding resonate the most? What are you leaning into? I mean, I think one of the overarching issues that we're seeing in this district and across the country is the issue of affordability. And immigration is really deep and top of mind for everyone also right now in this moment. And it's personal to me as a naturalized citizen myself, the daughter of immigrants from India and Pakistan. And when it comes down to the affordability issue, though, that's something to Emily, what you were saying, like being able to talk to Republican voters, unaffiliated Democratic voters.

59:59Like I'm a county commissioner in the bluest district, bluest county in North Carolina, but I've built relationships with Republican county commissioners across our state because when we talk about building our budgets at the county level and the challenges we face of the state not doing their jobs to fund public education and how that creates a greater load on our counties and how we have to balance picking up that load, but also taking care of our residents and making sure that they're able to have, you know, their SNAP benefits, their social welfare programs, all of those things actually reaching them.

1:00:38And so I've built relationships with Republicans by taking away the labels, because so much of the policy that I'm supporting and folks across this country, working class folks want, is common sense. that I'll say with a Republican commissioner, I was actually appointed to the North Carolina Association of County Commissioners, which is our board of all 100 counties across the state. I was appointed by a Republican commissioner to the board of directors because I talked to him about like, he's in Western North Carolina and we found common ground that I want my residents to be able to put food on the table.

1:01:17You want your residents to be able to put food on their tables. You want your residents to keep a roof over their heads? I want that for my residents. And if we talk about these issues at that human level of taking care of one another, the national noise that we hear, it's clouding those conversations, and that's what's hurting our families. And we're able to build relationships and actually lobby for change at the state level together, at the federal level, when we're advocating for the dignity of working class folks. so how's the uh go for oh yeah real quick um how's the ai and the advent of ai um impacting politics in in north carolina because you've got the research triangle so i imagine it's like you know really shaking things up on that front but what and what about the kind of production of the you know the power behind it like are um are the data centers becoming a political issue?

1:02:17Yeah, they absolutely are. We actually have an AI data center that's being considered at the local level in Apex, which is in this district. And residents have been coming out strongly against it because it's going to be built basically like right outside their neighborhoods. And Duke Energy, which essentially has a monopoly on our electricity grid here in North Carolina, they are already negotiating, renegotiating their energy rates with the town of Apex and basically increasing the rates for residents. To take account for the fact that they're going to need an increased load for these AI data centers and infrastructure needs.

1:02:57And so we're already seeing the bill being passed on to our families and neighbors. And that's why I'm actually the only candidate. This came up in a town hall meeting, and I'm the only candidate that's called to support Senator Sanders' national moratorium on AI data centers. And it's not about hindering AI. AI is going to exist in our world. It's not going to go away. But how do we make sure there are proper regulations in place that things like what we're seeing right now with the energy electricity costs being passed on down to the residents, millions of gallons of water being consumed, and folks across the country just to run a data center for one day.

1:03:37And folks across the country are starting to see their taps run dry. And we can't have that happen in our district because, again, who is going to pay for those infrastructure costs? Where are we going to get alternate resources of water? The town of Apex gets their water from Jordan Lake, which is not an indefinite bottomless lake of water. It's a lake. Yeah. Yeah, it's got to be nerve wracking. Go ahead, Griffin. Sorry. I had one more one more ice related question for you. Now, I did some research on on some of your haters online that are calling you the Zoran Mamdani of North Carolina, which I don't know if that's a great attack.

1:04:16Seems like people like that guy. But they were simply saying because you have helped citizens in North Carolina with Ice Watch, alerting people to ice presence and things like that. And there's currently this funding battle in Congress over the DHS, over how they're going to fund it. If you were in Congress, what are like the clear demands that you would make to say we're not funding DHS until these things happen? Look, ICE as an agency was created in the Bush era in 2003 in a post 9-11 world to target my community, the Muslim community. It was an agency that was created to dehumanize us, to target us, to surveil us.

1:05:00And now we're seeing it pushed to another level of extreme under Trump's administration to murder innocent civilians in broad daylight. And I'm seeing even in our incumbent in this seat is saying that she's calling for reform of ICE as an agency that body cameras and unmasking them will somehow keep them in check. they're already being live streamed, murdering innocent people in broad daylight. A body camera is not going to save our neighbors. And so I am clear in my stance that ICE needs to be abolished. It's not an agency that's actually making our community safer, that the way that we tackle and address the issue of immigration is through investment in safe and clear legal passageways for immigration, opening up our visa programs and green cards.

1:05:52I'm a naturalized citizen myself. Most people who come to this country are either refugees who are seeking refuge from, honestly, most of the times, disasters that we, the United States government, has funded and created, or they're coming here like my parents did to achieve the American dream, to raise me and my sisters to be able to seek opportunity and to dream big.

1:06:21last one for me. I've started to see a lot of Democrats when it comes to the question of immigration say, you know what, we actually, we made a mistake by letting ourselves be labeled as open border Democrats that we don't care. Everybody can come in. It led to Trump getting elected and it led to then this draconian kind of reaction to it. We need to focus on beating back ICE, abolishing ICE, rolling back CBPs, abuses, and focusing on the way that immigration enforcement is done internally, but we have to kind of concede some ground on the border. Are you seeing that, and where do you fall down on that compromise, I guess you would call it, that Democrats seem to be making?

1:07:10Or is it like, no, no, no, actually Biden's border policy is something that should be supported? I honestly don't think that immigration has been the issue that has cost us elections. I do sincerely believe that it is issues around affordability. And it's not just the issue of affordability in this district. It's across the country. It's that working class folks want to hear what their elected officials are going to do for them. Most people in this country are unaffiliated voters. And so they just want to see how are you going to fight for them? How are you going to lower their cost of living?

1:07:45And I think that as Democrats, we haven't done a good job of talking to every demographic and talking to every voter because even in states like North Carolina where we're labeled red, but we're truly purple. We're a pretty 50-50 state. You know, Trump may have won the presidential here, but we've elected a Democratic governor in the past three elections. And so what we need to be doing is going into these areas and these congressional districts that we take for granted and say that they're red and talking to the everyday folks and having conversations with them at that human level of like, we know that you're struggling to make ends meet, that your wages have stayed stagnant.

1:08:26North Carolina's minimum wage has not changed in over 20 years. It's been stuck at$7.25. The cost of living here is$24 an hour. And this is how we as Democrats or just we as your elected leaders are going to fight for you to raise the minimum wage so that you can that you'll only have to work one job to take care of your family. This is how passing Medicare for all is going to guarantee health care for you so that you don't have to worry about going to the doctor or paying your rent. And having those conversations with folks face to face through community town halls, through relational organizing, that's what we've struggled and failed with, I believe, as a Democratic Party, is that we've taken these votes for granted that they're red, they're going to vote red.

1:09:15There's no point in us reaching out. But these aren't, we can't label our counties and our districts as red or blue when it's all working class folks. Awesome. Well, we got we got anything else before we let her go on to her very busy day with that rally. Big day. Big day. We're watching. Yeah, we'll be watching. We'll be tuning in. We'll include a link to your website in the description. Any any final words before we send you off? No, just thank you, Ryan, Griffin, Emily, so much for this opportunity. I think this election, you know, it's the first primary alongside Texas. And we have the opportunity to show that not only can progressives win, they can win in the South.

1:10:00And we're going to be able to prove that come March 3rd. Yeah. All right. All right. Thanks so much. Yeah. Thank you so much. Thanks. Talk to you soon. All right. That'll do it for the first half of the show. And we'll see you back here in just a moment. All right. We are back in the second half of the show here. We're going to release the full show altogether publicly for everyone today. And, you know, we just talked about it. It's a little tease to see what you get with the premium subscription. Sometimes we act as business people and we have business strategies. Oh, that's so adorable. Wow.

1:10:40So we were looking at a certain race in the South and North Carolina, but I had to turn our attention momentarily to another race in the South. I'm talking, of course, about the Florida governor race with one James Fishback. Have you all been keeping track of the Fishback news? The guy got suspended from Twitter? Is that what happened? He got suspended from Twitter. He got suspended from Tinder. What do you have to do to get suspended from Twitter? My God. Well, even worse, he got suspended from Tinder, which is even more challenging. That's far, far more challenging. Let me tell you. Didn't he say he was harvesting votes on Tinder?

1:11:16I guess that could be a term of service violation, right? He was reaching out to women. Yeah, he was reaching out to female voters on Tinder is what he said. Doesn't he have a girlfriend that he brings around with him? Well, he wasn't trying to just try and get their votes. That's all. I have seen people on dating apps like now post that they're like plumbers and stuff. Like people are just posting jobs like on them now being like, hey, I can fix your I can fix your sink or whatever. Literally. Oh, they're combining like TaskRabbit with Tinder. Yeah, it's it's so yeah. So look, if you're looking for love, well, maybe while you have a plumber.

1:11:50So in Florida, and I did want to offer me a culpa because a few episodes ago, I said that James Fishback had no motion. And I was wrong. And I'm here here on the show. There is some type of motion happening. And I'm not sure if this adds up to a successful political campaign. But I did want to play a few clips here where James Fishback seems to be generating some level of an organic movement of young men down in Florida. And I specifically wanted to highlight this clip where he referred to cafeteria food as goyslop. So let's take a listen to that. My view is our high school cafeterias should be run by great local businesses, small business restaurants that have local labor that use Florida cattle, Florida produce, Florida fruit and yes Florida orange juice they should take over our cafeterias what's with the pop-tarts in the Broward County Public Schools in the cafeterias I'm not saying that the test scores are a result of the pop-tarts but if you wanted kids to fail if you wanted to set up our kids for failure you would feed them the absolute boy slop in our cafeterias

1:13:13and for those just listening he put his hand over his heart at the end of that they're um emotional all right as an old person like what what on earth does he mean by goy slap it also implies the existence of of of michelin star goy like like a high class goy food as well um uh you know it means it well it means it's like i mean isn't isn't you never heard you this is not part of your vernacular ryan i'm not i need i need a little bit of education on this okay reddit confused about goyslop i'm gonna read a thread while you guys discuss no no no please please elucidate the entire audience i want the i want the webster definition uh let's see for well it's like dog food the food made for a dog goy slop slop for a goy for the goya us and okay so this it i see so it's it's it's like playing into anti-semitic tropes that like they're saying that the jewish people only feed non-Jewish people dog food?

1:14:23Is that what the... Essentially. Yes, essentially. And that's what got the pop from these young Republican kids here. Now, listen, I mean, outside of the vernacular usage, it is hard to debate the fact that we do feed absolute dog food garbage to our children, and we do not invest in the future of our kids. And when Michelle Obama tried to change that, she was presented as this was Mao Zedong coming back from the grave. So forgive me if I don't have the most amount of patience for this argument coming from the right. What was wrong with Michelle saying it? Michelle needed more anti-Semitism in her presentation in order for it to be acceptable to universalist and non-bigoted.

1:15:22potentially so we can get good food for the kids but only if we like lace it with bigotry yes right now it's laced with preservatives and additives but it could use a little bit more of the anti-semitism and you know you gotta raise taxes property taxes are gonna have to go up income tax in Florida and I don't think he's suggested that right it's more expensive to have a local business make the food with than it is to have Cisco come in and feed them slop. Like, that's just a fact. I think that that'd be a good thing. I'm for it. But I'd like to hear how Fishback is going to pay for that. I guess he'd say he's going to use the Israeli bonds.

1:16:08Yeah, potentially. And, you know, it seems... It's kind of illiterate, but whatever. Outside of the specifics of the cafeteria food, which, you know, Ryan, I know you have kids. I'm not sure what the food's like at their schools, but just overall... They like pizza day. Pizza day, sure. Chocolate milk day. The chili is good, they said, which is kind of disturbing. Okay, all right. So the chili's not goyslop, but everything else is. But outside of the specific vernacular, the larger picture here seems to be that James Fishback is a new type of young Republican that is activating young Republican voters by becoming the far-right meme come to life.

1:16:48I've got more footage here like being straight up anti-Semitic. Yes. But he's memeing in all sorts of ways. You know, it's not just the anti-Semitism stuff. He claimed that someone tried to burn down his home. So he came out with an AR-15 gun. If you threaten our campaign, if you lay hands on a single one of our volunteers, if you come back to this home and our staff, our volunteers are working hard. we're not waiting for the police. We're going to shoot you with an AR-15 sight unseen, 556. Yeah! That's what we're going to do. So he does that, and he also got into a very heated debate over Don Lemon recently with Tara Palmieri that I just wanted to share a quick moment of as well to give you a full flavor of this guy.

1:17:45If I had to go into a cave to interview the Taliban, am I a co-conspirator to interview them? If there's a fire inside of a church and I'm in there covering it, am I a co-conspirator? Am I the arsonist because I'm in there? Tara, if the 9-11 hijackers gave you a heads up and you boarded the plane to cover the 9-11 hijacking, then yes, you and anyone else involved should be publicly executed. oh my gosh why would i get into a plane that's about to that so listen it's not just anti-semitism it's a little bit of everything ryan her point is uh a fair one that she's got bigger problems if she gets onto the onto the 9-11 plane yeah yeah i think sort those charges out later um you know that he's he's polling in the double digits and how he was at like two percent um Yeah, and I saw a poll that's had him at like 20 % with his opponent Byron at like 35 % or what have you.

1:18:48The latest poll is Donald's up 15%. I don't think it's a very reputable poll, but previous polls, there's a Mason-Dixon poll, which is more credible, that has Donald's at 37 % and Fishback at 3%. And that's a January poll. So I like that's much more credible than this Patriot polling that people are people are circulating. It's like a and Ryan, I've also heard rumors and I haven't been able to confirm this yet, but there are rumors that he's not even eligible to run in Florida because he has not lived in a Florida residence for seven years. There are apparently, allegedly, some records that show that he had a D.C.-based home up to 2025, which wouldn't even make him eligible technically.

1:19:34Yeah, I'm looking at these other, these are Byron Donald's internal polls, but still, like, they have, you know, Donald's 47, Fishback 5. I think ultimately what I'm seeing from this fishback thing, whether this is a real race or not, is is I guess the question, the larger question for me is, is this a lens into the future of activating young Republican voters to pull the memes? It's interesting. In real life. So far, it's not translating on the ground into votes. but it is translated into these viral uh videos these these crowd clips right there's a disconnect there yeah which i think republicans should pay close attention to like this isn't doing it for you unless you're just trying to grow an audience on the internet which a lot of people are but if you're trying to win elections win over the electorate it's not happening yeah uh well that was my James Fishback update just wanted to keep everyone ahead of what's going on over there there is another race that we've been looking at for a little bit Mr.

1:20:44James Tallarico versus Jasmine Crockett Ryan what is going on with this Tallarico Crockett race we've talked a little bit behind the scenes about it but but what do you make of this and and who would you say has the the better chance here between the two if you were if you were voting in texas you want to pull some polling up let's see we got the in the in the polling um i'll play this video while uh while we look for some polling here um because talarico you know does seem to be imbibing some of the new democratic energy around the oligarchy he's been talking um a lot about class warfare and the such let's take a listen.

1:21:28And how is that not just like pushing for class warfare? We already have class warfare in this country. It's the billionaires waging war against the rest of us. And right now the billionaires are winning. They've been winning for 50 years. Trickle down economics is not a theory, it is theft. For 50 years, for 50 years, the billionaires have been stealing from the American people, stealing the wealth that we created. It's why everyone is so angry right now. It's why no matter how hard you work, you can't seem to get ahead. The American people are not asking for a

1:22:20a house big enough to raise the family in, and a little left over so we can go on vacation every once in a while. That is a lot harder than it should be. Harder than it should be in America. So I'm not fighting for class warfare. I'm fighting for the American dream. So that is Tallarico fighting for the American dream. And that does seem to be like what he has been kind of pushing over and over again, Whereas the Jasmine Crockett side seems to be solely around. I'm going to fight Donald Trump. I pissed. I triggered Donald Trump and I'm, I'm the one that triggers Donald Trump the most. Yeah. That was the first clip of his.

1:22:59I saw circulating where I'm like, okay, this guy's like, all right, I'm listening now. Okay. Okay. Let's, let's hear what else you got. I still think he's got the problem that he kind of looks like he's 17. Not to be shallow, but like, you know, vote, that matters to voters. So I'm looking here at the time summary. There's been three polls that are not internal polls in January. Two of them have Crockett Up, University of Houston. The School of Public Policy there has Crockett Up 8. Slingshot Strategies poll, Texas Public Opinion Research, has Crockett Up 1. And then Emerson College is a good pollster sponsored by Nexstar, which is the News Nation and local news conglomerate has Tallarico up nine over Crockett.

1:23:50So it feels like the polling is basically tilting Crockett's way a little bit, but not in a way that you would say that this race is anywhere near over. And this is after there was, you know, two weeks ago and we cover on the show here, what was supposed to be sort of like an identity politics kill shot on Tallarico where they said, oh, he called Colin Allred a mediocre black man or whatever, you know, which potentially maybe back in 2018, that might have been it. But it doesn't really seem to have fully put the, you know, the holes in his tires. I think he also denied, you know, he denied it.

1:24:29And then Allred and Crockett, you know, came in for some significant criticism from National Democrats for kind of going in on it. So, yeah, that that that is a different state of affairs than would have existed a couple of years ago. And, you know, Tallarico seems to be, you know, he's catching the wave of the anti oligarchy. People are mad at the billionaires or what have you. And and he says the billionaires are are what's wrong. But I just I did a little bit of research and I had to flag this political article. Dem darling Tallarico showered with Miriam Adelson linked money. A group funded by Adelson was the biggest donor to James Tallarico's campaign last year.

1:25:17His like state legislative campaign. And so his defense of this has been, it's kind of a funny defense. It's like, this was not about Israel. This was about gambling. Perfect. He was for this casino that the Adelson empire wanted to build in Texas. So it's like, okay.

1:25:43All right, well, it's the best we can do, I guess. One's got to go, Israel or gambling. It's your pick, Ryan. You can't have both. Well, I mean, one of them is committing a genocide. The other is, you know, utterly cutting, like, entire, like, finances of country. I would get rid of the one doing the genocide well not get rid of but like have them end their genocide okay so that's us we're pro gambling now as long as we can end the genocide I feel really good about that you could also just say I'm not taking any super PAC money or any Adelson money no matter what the cause is I do think it's a sign that there obviously she's not giving him money for a senate campaign either right but this is kind of a sign that there's going to be a lot more centrist Dems that are like, I get it, yo, like whatever Bernie's saying, anti-oligarchy, sure, whatever, just don't look into like any of my past and like, we're good.

1:26:47So we'll see how that strategy works. And if the Dem base is cognizant enough or shrewd enough to pick apart the, I don't know, the conflict or the the hypocrisies laden within some of these candidates. I think that leads us nicely to the end, where we'll answer just a few of your AMA questions from the audience. And Emily did not, I just want to tell, Emily left. She didn't leave because she was scared of the fishback conversation, she tells me. She says her power went out. Coincidence, huh? I was hoping for a virulent defense of fishback from Emily. I guess we'll never know. I don't think we're going to get that.

1:27:33Yeah. I guess we'll never know what she would have said there. But let's get to some of these AMA questions. First off, someone asked, what was your experience on the Piers Morgan show yesterday, Ryan? How did that go? Well, it was usually when Piers Morgan's reaching out, you're like, oh, God. Like, so, like, it's going to be some, you know, shout fest. Whoever can shout earliest and loudest. But they were like, no, no, no. We just want you to come on and talk about your reporting when it comes to Epstein and also Netanyahu's visit to D.C. We didn't end up having time for the Netanyahu visit to D.C.

1:28:14And then I left. I did my piece. And then Dershowitz and Basim Yusef just kind of go at each other for however long they went at each other. So that's actually kind of a nice, ideal situation to be in. I like sharing the reporting. and then the other folks can hash it out. I was in the trailer listening to Dershowitz as I'm leaving. I'm like, oh, I kind of wish I was on for some of this nonsense. But I also don't want to be there for that either. Like, I'm very much torn in both directions.

1:28:51Yeah, they got to institute some sort of mute button or something. But they like the crosstalk, so I'm not sure. But listen, I'm not going to tell the professionals what to do over there. They seem to have a good thing going. This next one is from Jack Viedbeck. He says, would you guys bring on Michael Tracy to debate Epstein stuff? I always liked him and thought he was a good faith actor, even when I disagree with him. But his takes on Epstein have been absolutely batshit. And I would like to, before Ryan responds, say we did do this already about four months ago, before this new tranche of emails came out between Sagar and Tracy.

1:29:30So we've already had one struggle session over this, but is it time for a Michael Tracy return? Definitely not. We also had him on, didn't we have him on a Friday show? Probably. He was arguing with... No, maybe it was a CounterPoints debate show back in the day. Yeah, CounterPoints Friday, we had him on arguing with something now. Yeah, last night he was also defending Jean-Luc Brunel, a notorious sex trafficker who was getting accused of RAP going all the way back to 1980s. Like a documentary about it, 1988. And then he continued abusing women for decades. And now you're also defending him? this associate of Epstein's like no so yeah I don't know it's a lot to unpack with that gentleman I'll say that as well someone here asks SWZ says can we get a good news by Griffin weekly roundup I think it'd be a great addition to the Friday show and he's the one silly enough to deliver the endorphin boost amidst his bleak weekly gestures at everything it is kind of tough like there was that show that John Krasinski did during COVID that was like some good news.

1:30:59And I don't, it, those always came off as like a little, a little, I don't know, unnecessary. I'm not sure. Like, should we fit in a nugget of optimism? I mean, we try to, I mean, sometimes it's candidates that come on here. They give a little bit of optimism, like we had one on today. I mean, but I mean, what do you, what do you make Ryan? Should we be doing more good news on the show? If you want to do it, you go for it. I think we're covering the news. If it's good, we'll cover it. Unfortunately, there isn't much of it. Ryan, what do you make of the El Paso shooting? There's multiple people asking here about that.

1:31:39The El Paso air shut down and what is now the official story that CBP has laser beams and shot down a birthday balloon. I know Sagar is pretty suspicious of that and his UFO radar is going off. The idea that DHS would be given a laser gun and immediately deploy it in a deeply irresponsible way is something I find very credible. And maybe they're exploiting CBP and DHS's low brand among the public. The whole public right now is like, oh, these idiots were acting recklessly? Yeah, that tracks. So maybe we're like the victims of a PSYOP because they know that we have the lowest possible opinion of the goons at CBP and ICE.

1:32:36So we'll believe anything. Oh, I like that theory. Kind of like, oh, blame it all on them. But I also just totally believe it. Yeah. Yeah, and it is, I mean, I believe it too that there was a misuse of a weapon by CBP is the daily story. But I think what is scarier about that to me is guys that could not get a job being the mall security cop have laser beams. Yeah, that's not ideal. Not ideal at all. Powerful enough to panic the FAA into shutting down the airspace for 10 freaking days. Yeah, and honestly, I was talking to Crystal about this. The people from the FFA, they probably just had to scramble.

1:33:22Like, what the hell is going on over here? And okay, screw it. We're shutting down the airspace for 10 days. So I believe they were the adults in the room on this one, actually. But yeah, so look forward to more laser-related incidents in the future, I guess, with these laser beams. Now, what's a laser beam weapon? Is this like, have you ever heard of this before? They exist. Yeah, they exist. It's just like Star Wars, or is this something a little bit more? Yeah. Cool. You can find demonstration videos of them, like on YouTube or something, from different companies that are trying to sell them.

1:34:07So I can get a laser gun as a system? I think you would need a serious license. A license for that? Yeah. Israel is talking about moving to these laser defenses because the current missile defense system costs us billions. And so every time they get into a conflict with Iran, they have to spend billions launching these missiles to knock down the Iranian missiles. And so they're trying to develop and claim that they have made serious strides in developing a laser system that costs very little for each shot. incredible, incredible things happening over there. All right, well, now I want to shoot a later.

1:34:51If the CBP guys are getting to do it, I want to do it. Our final question is from LeMVP. They ask, breaking points, Kyle Kalinske is the dark woke commander. Hassan Piker, the Ayatollah of woke. What are the titles of Crystal Ball and Ryan Grimm in the reawokening? I'm still asleep. um crystal's uh what um what kind of woke is she just i don't know let's i don't know what do you think well i think you're i think you're professor woke perhaps or um and for her i mean something maybe queen chancellor we'd have to come up with it i've had it ladies are obviously their own chairwoman woke dark woke as well um so yeah i mean people really liked when kyle went on the pierce morgan show and was very rude to one um daily wire correspondent and people seem to get a lot out of that and sunglasses on right he did have sunglasses on which is more conservative coded i think using some of their visual language and aesthetic taking that back from them which i like uh but do you do you think that dark woke is the future to be to be rude and crude on the side of on the side of woke is that an effective measure maybe for a little while i don't know i think things are changing rapidly nothing nothing is stable so it doesn't work later i do already sense in the entertainment industry and beyond.

1:36:32There are podcasters and others who are starting to put their fingers into the wind and feel things changing. So it seems like Woke was dead for about eight months. And now we've got Piers Morgan debating Megyn Kelly about the Bad Bunny thing. And Piers Morgan is taking the Bad Bunny side. So it does seem like they had a very, very quick run on the Woke is dead thing. And Woke may be returning very soon. So is that some good news? I don't know. Sure, there you go. Previous questioner. There's your good news. Woke returns. There wasn't as much latent bigotry as the MAGA world, that wing of the MAGA world expected there would be.

1:37:14Because they got that. We now have permission to be bigoted. Everyone's going to be bigoted. And they look around like, oh, a lot of people are just not, don't want to do that. And I think that Elon buying Twitter was actually like a poison pill for the sort of reality distortion of the cultural conservatism because conservatives went on to X now and they see, oh, everyone agrees with me. Everyone thinks it's hilarious when the DHS gov posts an ASMR of an immigrant in chains. And that's something that everyone likes. Love it. So this is this is really going to resonate with the public. And they're at the top of the feed and they're getting tons of, quote unquote, engagement and views.

1:37:59So surely this must be the feeling of the nation. And so we're going to stack our White House communications with that energy. And most people have found that kind of revolting, including many of my young MAGA friends. You know, I've talked to many of my young MAGA friends that voted for Trump and they go, man, like I didn't think I was voting for like, you know, ripping a mom out of her car. Like, I don't know what they thought they were voting for, but it wasn't that. Right. Yeah. No, I think that's right. So that's something. All right. And that's another good news story. We'll do them all in the AMAs.

1:38:39That's going to do it for us this week. Again, thank you so much, everyone, for supporting us at BreakingPoints.com with a membership. Just to peek a little bit behind the curtains here, these have been some of the biggest weeks on the show with our very intensive breakdowns of Epstein news. And you'll see our clips are getting way bigger views than normal. But I'll also let you know that many of them are getting demonetized. So we are not able to survive off of doing the news off of YouTube ad revenue. The only way that we are able to get these stories out on DropSite and for Ryan to come on here, for Sagar to come on here and have the time to break all of that down.

1:39:22That's because of our supporters at BreakingPoints.com and the membership. And we really can't thank you enough. As we said earlier, if you were to just watch the mainstream media on these issues, you would be getting such a fractional surface view at what's going on here. And the reason that we can do more is because of you guys. So thank you so much. And if you can afford a membership, we've got monthly memberships at BreakingPoints.com. And on that note, that'll do it for us here Friday. We all hope you have a great weekend and we'll see you back in the studio on Monday. See ya. This is an iHeart Podcast.

1:39:58Guaranteed human.