2/26/26: Trump Humiliates MAHA RFK Jr, Hakeem Caught Funneling AIPAC Money, AI Midterm Wars Breakout

12:14David Dayen:This was like just a lightning bolt to the Maha movement to put up D3 here. One of the chief objections that the Maha crowd has is to round up, is to this carcinogenic pesticide, herbicide, that is used extraordinarily liberally on American crops. I mean, on American crops. And that a lot of research suggests is carcinogenic at certain levels. Uh, it's one thing for that, you know, and in fact, RFK Jr., you know, successfully won a multi hundred million dollar lawsuit, you know, against Monsanto, which is now owned by Bayer, um, for, you know, the way that it was using and disclosing the risks around, uh, around Roundup and glyphosate.

13:05David Dayen:Along comes the Trump administration and says, not only are we not going to kind of go to war against Roundup and glyphosate, but we are going to use the Defense Production Act, which is a kind of 1950s era law that allows the Pentagon to legally mandate that a business produce something. A Hegseth is threatening to use the Defense Production Act on Anthropic to legally mandate them to allow the Pentagon to use Claude for its autonomous armed drones and for mass surveillance. Like they're trying to use this DPA on Claude. But they did use the DPA on Bayer and told Bayer, you must produce this product that the Mahamams think is killing people.

14:03David Dayen:And because they are mandating that you produce it, then you're going to have some level of legal immunity.

14:11Ryan Grim:That's right.

14:12David Dayen:For the production of this. So not only are you not kind of going to war against it, you are actively siding with them. This came after, you know, the EPA named chemical lobbyists to one of its top positions. And there were a number of other glaring sirens that the old industry was actually still in place here. But this one has people absolutely freaking out. The Times quotes a turning point USA. Amaha podcaster saying like, I'm done. Like, I can't, I can't persuade these women to vote for Republicans in the midterms when you're, when you're doing stuff like this. So that's my take. Like, I think they'd be willing to look past all of the garbage and the corruption and the, oh, there's lead in this vitamin that she was pushing.

15:01David Dayen:It's like, yeah, it happens. But to do this, on top of all that, like, I'm sure it's check please for a lot of these women. What, what, What do you think?

15:12Ryan Grim:Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, I will say I think you're correct that they would be willing to overlook or just not dig into and just feel like, oh, this is just a smear campaign against her because she's trying to overturn the system. I will say as someone who is in the overturn the system camp that one thing I have learned is that you actually have to hold your people to a higher standard because you can't expect that the media is going to be even handed when it comes to insiders versus outsiders. So, you know, there may be a legitimate critique there that, you know, previous people who had various compromised interests with the pharmaceutical industry or whatever, they didn't get the same level of scrutiny.

15:45Ryan Grim:I'm not saying that's the case or not, but I would certainly be open to that argument. But I think if you are going to understand what is required to actually make change to entrenched interests, whether it's, you know, big food or big chemicals or big pharma, you are going to have to be. Yes, you're going to have to hold yourself to a higher standard. You are going to have to meet a higher bar. You are going to have to be perfect, just as Nora and Momtani in the way that they're like, you know, trying to turn a snowball fight into a scandal in New York City, how aggressively they will come at you.

16:15Ryan Grim:But putting that aside, you know, on this specific issue of glyphosate, it kind of reminds me of like the it's like the Epstein Files moment for the podcast bros. It's sort of like that for the Baja moms where it's just like I can't come up with a colorable rationale that's not just the same old standard issue industry corruption. And then all of your heroes who five seconds ago before they were actually RFK Jr., I think there was a report that even came out during this administration sounding the alarm about glyphosate. But then the moment that Trump says, no, we're doing this, they're like, OK, well, we we understand and we get it and we support it.

16:51Ryan Grim:We stand by it. She got asked. Casey Means got asked in this hearing, I think by Tim Kaine specifically about this issue. And her answer was effectively like, well, it's complicated. And, you know, I don't think that's going to satisfy anyone. It's very clear what's going on here. You want the job. You want the access. You want the power. You want whatever else that entails. And so whatever principles you had previously, like many before you, like Tulsi Gabbard before you, you're willing to say, well, you know, I see it differently now. Now it's before it was clear. Now it's cloudy. Now it's complicated.

17:24David Dayen:to make um casey means and rfk jr defend roundup um is tantamount to when he made rfk jr like eat mcdonald's on the on the airplane it's like a gang initiation the only thing that could be worse would like literally spraying roundup on the mcdonald's

17:43Ryan Grim:wasn't he very involved in like hudson river cleanups and then weren't you talking about

17:47David Dayen:river keepers a tremendous way the roundup yeah on the mcdonald's and throw it in the hudson river

17:53Ryan Grim:and you can bet RFK Jr. would be there to be like, I understand why. Yeah, I support this now. This is fine. It's just no principle. And this is the way that a lot of people in D.C. think because they view it like, OK, but if I don't play the game and like do this thing, then whatever other plans Casey Means has or RFK Jr. has or whatever, I'm not going to have a chance to do those. And ultimately, it's just a road, especially under Trump, who seems to delight in finding highly specific ways to humiliate his underlings and force them to abandon any core principles that they ever claim to hold that would give them some sort of independence from him.

18:32Ryan Grim:That is, I think, something that he very strategically attempts to do. He will identify, okay, what is this person's, if they have some sort of principle they're trying to hold on to, how do I destroy that so that then they're just nothing but a loyalist to me because that's all he wants.

18:48David Dayen:And also it's useless and illegal to use the Defense Production Act for this purpose. He claimed that it's an emergency, like a national security emergency because we don't have enough food in the United States. That that and that this is to protect the food supplies. Are you serious? We're starving here. We don't have enough food. We're okay. Like, you didn't actually have to do this.

19:12Ryan Grim:That's not one of them. Yeah. Now, the quality of the food we could talk about, the price of the food we could certainly talk about. but the just the quantity of it i does not initially they they and congress republican

19:23David Dayen:congress is trying to push through legislation that would give fair immunity around these rfk junior kind of led um challenges that got pushed back by environmental groups they're now trying to put it into the farm bill like this is like this is crazy this is crazy like and so the environmental groups to the maha mom is like what did you expect like this is like this is who they are like but you know rfk jr he literally sued them i don't blame them for believing that this guy who sued them over this and one actually would fight for it

19:59Ryan Grim:yeah i mean i think a lot of this really coalesced around the covid and vaccines and you know that's where the that energy really coalesced this movement and moved it very quickly from you know Well, it used to be that anti-vax sentiment was more located on the left. And, you know, that was some particular like left wing crankery around like like hippies and, you know, wealthy liberals in L.A. and stuff like that. And yeah, now they because of covid that all realigned like that cranky crank part of the the liberal movement realigned into the right. And so now I'd say they're kind of like, I guess they're up for grabs, you know, and probably just kind of nihilistic at this point, to be honest with you.

20:47Ryan Grim:But I think there's an opening. If you had a candidate on the Democratic side who was embracing, you know, Medicare for all and truly embracing changes to our food system and made that a priority and health and fitness, because it's not that there's no point there. even with regard to like medical autonomy it's not that there's no point there whatsoever you know i think obviously there's a bunch of junk science around vaccines that's just uttering complete nonsense it's like like you said on like measles and stuff i mean it's just utterly destructive and we're beginning to see the devastating impact of more and more people opting out of taking any of these vaccines but so i guess there's you know there's an opening there we'll see we'll see if anyone's able to uh with a more legitimate program capture their imagination in the future.

21:34David Dayen:Right. And also, so we went a little bit long. We're going to save the SAVE Act, the Make American Elections Great Again explainer. Maybe we'll hopefully get to that tomorrow. But up next, we've got Dave Dayen and David Hogg to talk about this incredible story of a candidate, a Democratic candidate in North Carolina who swore off APAC money and yet is getting APAC money anyway will explain the various loops and loopholes that we're able to track this money through and getting into the race, which now is Nidalam versus Valérie Foucher. The election is on Tuesday in North Carolina, so stick around for that.

22:16Ryan Grim:In 2023, a story gripped the UK, evoking horror and disbelief. The nurse who should have been in charge of caring for tiny babies is now the most prolific child killer in modern British history. Everyone thought they knew how it ended. A verdict, a villain, a nurse named Lucy Letby.

22:38Nida Allam:Lucy Letby has been found guilty.

22:40Ryan Grim:But what if we didn't get the whole story?

22:43Nida Allam:The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapses.

22:46Ryan Grim:I'm Amanda Knox, and in the new podcast, Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, we follow the evidence and hear from the people that lived it to ask what really happened when the world decided who Lucy Letby was. No voicing of any skepticism or doubt.

23:03Krystal Ball:It'll cause so much harm at every single level of the British establishment of this is wrong.

23:08Ryan Grim:Listen to Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, this is Jo Winterstein, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life. And I just sat down with a mini driver.

23:28David Dayen:The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men.

23:34Ryan Grim:Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic Aquarian visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom loving and different perspectives. And I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius like are misunderstood. A sun and Venus in Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership. He really has taught me

23:55David Dayen:to embrace people sleeping in different rooms on different houses in different places,

23:59Ryan Grim:but just an embracing

24:00David Dayen:of the isness of it all.

24:02Ryan Grim:If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chart side view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity and real life, this episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

24:22David Dayen:I'm Clayton Eckerd, and in 2022, I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor.

24:28Ryan Grim:Unfortunately, it didn't go according to plan. He became the first Bachelor to ever have his final rose rejected. The internet turned on him.

24:36David Dayen:If I could press a button and rewind it, all I would.

24:39Ryan Grim:But what happened to Clayton after the show made even bigger headlines. It began as a one-night stand and ended in a courtroom, with Clayton at the center of a very strange paternity scandal. The media is here. This case has gone viral. The dating contract. Agree to date me, but I'm also suing you. Please search warrant. This is unlike anything I've ever seen before. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. This season, an epic battle of he said, she said, and the search for accountability in a sea of lies. I have done nothing except get pregnant by the f***ing bachelor. Listen to Love Trapped on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

25:30David Dayen:AIPAC and AI are both swamping House elections as we head into. Next week will be the first, next Tuesday will be the first kind of primary of the 2026 season. To talk about that, we're going to be joined by two Davids, David Dayen and David Hogg. David Dayen is the executive editor of the American Prospect. David Hogg is the head of Leaders We Deserve, which is participating in a lot of these primaries around the country. And let's put A2 up there, because David Dayen and I have been doing a bunch of reporting on the kind of secret APAC primary effort going on in Illinois. And we'll talk about that kind of on the back half of this program.

26:14David Dayen:We're also going to be joined by Nita Alam, who I interviewed. I pre-taped an interview yesterday with her, and we'll attach that to the end of this project. So I want to start with actually Nita, because it's an incredible case here. Let's start with you, David Hogg, because you guys have endorsed Nita Alam. So she ran in 2022 against Valerie Fushi. How do you, do you say it Fushi or Fushier? Fushi. Fushi, okay. I've been doing Fushi. It's tough. So she ran against Fushi in 2022. More than$2 million of APAC money comes into that race. And a bunch of crypto money as well, I think, from Sam Bankman Freed.

26:54David Dayen:Right. And she wins the race. Kind of close, but I think nine points or something.

26:59Krystal Ball:There's a nine point margin.

27:00David Dayen:With a crowded field. A crowded field. Since then, there's been a little redistricting. So it's actually a little bit more progressive. And my understanding is that if that 2022 race were run in this new district, she actually wins. And also, Fushi has done very little fundraising. I was checking it last night. I think she raised less than$550 ,000 for this cycle, which is for an incumbent. She was outraised by Nid Alam, who just launched her race in December.

27:29Saagar Enjeti:I mean, Fushi is freaking out so much. I got a text, a screenshotted text from Fushi to another member of Congress who's a friend of mine where she's saying this group of leaders we deserve is coming after me. Please, you know, help me out. Send me money. And of course, that member wasn't going to. But that was literally less than a week ago that she is currently texting members of Congress freaking out. And I think it shows the weakness that some of these incumbents are in. When you're propped up by APAC, you don't actually have to be that strong of a campaigner to win a lot of the time, especially if it's a crowded primary and you don't need to win by that much.

27:59Saagar Enjeti:In this case, we're dealing with a different district that also has had some of the most doge cuts of any congressional district in the country with a much more significant— This is Durham area.

28:08David Dayen:Yeah, it's the Raleigh-Durham-like area.

28:10Saagar Enjeti:And on top of that, the district, because of the redistricting, as you mentioned, is significantly more South Asian than it was previously as well. And we're dealing with an electorate that is incredibly fed up with the state of the party right now.

28:23David Dayen:That's interesting that she is going for members of Congress because that's like low-hanging fruit. Less than two weeks before her election.

28:30Krystal Ball:Well, it wasn't his members. It was publicly. So, you know, Fushi, like many candidates, particularly ones who are desirous of super PAC money, has a red box. And you know what a red box is. That's a section of their website where they sort of – Also with a literal red box around it. Yeah, where they sort of soft coordinate with super PACs and say, here's what voters need to know in this district. And she changed the language on her red box right before all this money came in. And previously, it just had sort of a generic message. And then you could almost see the four alarm fire in the red box.

29:10Krystal Ball:It was voters need to immediately hear that.

29:14David Dayen:Stop waiting.

29:15Krystal Ball:That Nida Alam is getting a million dollars from dark money and Valerie Boucher won't be bought. Hilarious. Yeah, it was it was like such an urgent message. And now what we've seen in the week since is that those super PACs have delivered

29:32David Dayen:Valerie Fusci won't be bought. Please dump millions of dollars into this.

29:36Krystal Ball:Please spend this money to tell people that I won't be bought

29:39David Dayen:So we put up we can put up E1 here. This is a tweet from Dave Dave Day and Where you talk where you kind of spell out the how How badly she was actually getting outspent which is extremely unusual for an incumbent until this AI safety super PAC, which is funded by Anthropic, came in. They've now dropped$1.3 million into the room. 1.6. Up to 1.6. It just keeps going. $1.6 million. And there's another PAC that is called the Article I PAC that has come in. And it looks like so far they've publicly said that they're going to do$600 ,000, might be more if they can make it work. And so I wanted to talk about this PAC because this is an incredible one.

30:31So Fushi, so she got the$2 million in AIPAC money.

30:36David Dayen:She then takes a bit of a turn after the genocide starts in Gaza and says that she endorses the Block the Bombs Act, which is kind of the Progressive Caucus's kind of more mild version of conditioning aid to Israel. And then Liz Sommer said she's not going to take AIPAC money. Yeah.

30:57Krystal Ball:I would not necessarily call it taking a turn as I would being turned. So there was a lot of grassroots pressure in the district. And the impetus for her saying, I reject this money, was a town hall in the district where she was confronted over meeting with Netanyahu on a congressional delegation and also the previous support for AIPAC money in 2022. and she said, well, look, I'm not doing that anymore. And I even heard behind the scenes that she was discouraging AIPAC from doing unbranded fundraisers for her. Like she actually was, at least for a time, probably when she thought she wasn't going to have a primary candidate, she for a time was really, seemed sort of committed to this.

31:45Krystal Ball:And now, might you take us to where we are today?

31:48David Dayen:Well, before we do the reveal of how the APAC money is getting into the district now. Why did you guys get in? Like, what made you get into this particular race? Because as you're mapping out the limited resources that you have, you know, it's sizable, but it's not infinite. What made you pick this one? Because I've heard the argument from some people that like, hey, Fushi, because she was able to be pressured at the grassroots level and she got better, like we should reward that by reelecting her And so that it tells other candidates, come our way and we'll welcome you rather than, you know what, we're going to take you out anyway.

32:27Saagar Enjeti:Ultimately, NIDA is going to be here for the long haul, a lot longer than FUSHI. NIDA also in this district, what we saw was that for us, it's not just a matter of whether or not somebody is taking money from APAC. Of course, we're going to support candidates who are against that, like NIDA. But it's also the fact that FUSHI was taking ridiculous amounts of corporate money as well.

32:44David Dayen:The crypto stuff.

32:45Saagar Enjeti:And what happened here was when Fushi was pressured on taking that corporate money, you know what her defense of it was? Was, well, these are corporations that are in my district, so I'm happy to take it. Which is an absurd, you know, logic to use here. Like, let's press this further. Let's say that there is an ICE detention center that CoreCivic or GeoGroup, you know, runs in Fushi's district. Is she going to start taking money from private prisons?

33:09David Dayen:Yeah.

33:10Saagar Enjeti:Let's say that there is that Smith and Wesson. Let's say that Smith and Wesson is the same. Let's say that Smith & Wesson, the same company that manufactured the AR-15 used in Parkland, moves to her district. The same AR-15s that are used around the country by mass shooters. If they're in her district, does that mean she's going to start taking money from Smith & Wesson? Like, where do you draw the line here? Because if it's all of a sudden saying, well, you know, I'm not going to take money from APAC, but I'm fine taking it from Lockheed Martin, for example. The people that are helping to make the arms that are being used against children in Gaza.

33:39Saagar Enjeti:Is it really that much different in the first place?

33:42Krystal Ball:Can I say a quick thing about the AI aspect of this before we go into the APEC part? So NIDA Alam gets into the race in December. Right. December 9th. Very late. We started working through July, by the way. A March primary, right? But almost at the exact same time, there is this commission that Hakeem Jeffries puts together on AI and the innovation economy. That was December 11th. Yeah. Yeah. Almost the exact same time that I think December 11th, she launched December 9th. He puts her on the commission, but it was already it's already people knew that she was going to that she was going to get it.

34:20Krystal Ball:And Jeffries appoints Fushi as one of the co-chairs. Just three.

34:24Saagar Enjeti:Do you think it's because of her expertise in technology?

34:27Krystal Ball:Well, she she represents the research triangle. It's clearly a high tech area and innovation heavy area. But wait, so then she's bumping along and she, you know, there are these packs that come out, you know, people, grassroots packs like Leaders We Deserve, but also this pack called American Priorities, which we revealed is specifically designed to counter APAC influence in a bunch of races. They put in almost$800 ,000 into this race. Backing Knitted Alum. Backing Knitted Alum. but last week when fushu is being outspent 10 to 1 there's a poll that goes into the district public policy polling which is based in north carolina puts this poll out i've seen the screenshots of it it does head-to-head uh alarm versus fushu and those functionally are the only two candidates in this in this primary but it also asks attitudes towards ai in the among members of district.

35:26Krystal Ball:And we don't know who spent and it has not been released. And I've asked public policy polling many times if they're going to release this poll. But clearly the amount of money being poured in, which has nothing to do with AI, these ads, of course, shows two things. Number one, that poll probably showed some bad news for Valerie Fushi. And number two, it probably showed some bad news on attitudes toward AI or otherwise they would have elevated that she's the head of the AI commission. Right.

35:57David Dayen:And this is a good how Washington works story for people. Like the House Financial Services Committee is referred to internally as a money committee, for instance, because you put people on there who are in vulnerable races and need to raise a lot of money. And because you're now regulating the banks and the private equity and hedge funds, you can then go to the banks and shake them down for money. And so what Hakeem Jeffries did here is he created a task force that's going to write democratic policy on AI, puts her on it, also put Josh Gottheimer on it, who's a voracious, like historic fundraiser.

36:34Krystal Ball:Who has also gotten money from the same AI-based hat.

36:36David Dayen:And is a Microsoft executive, so has those links. So it's a signal, like give money to this person. And I think you guys have been vindicated in your analysis here by the two plus million dollars that she's already taken. Because people were like, no, she's doing better now. Like, leave her alone.

36:56Saagar Enjeti:The real test of somebody's values is when they're under pressure. And we knew that if she was willing to accept this money when she was running in her first race, when she came under pressure, that there would be more super PACs. Specifically, these super PACs like the AI one, you know, this Article 1 stuff, everything like that, that came in and supported her. that if she really was committed to that, she wouldn't be taking that money and she wouldn't be facing such ferocious attacks that wouldn't be landing as much because it wouldn't be true.

37:22Krystal Ball:One other thing on that is that there's actually a live fight in the district around AI and specifically around an AI data center in a city, a small town called Apex, that would use as much electricity as the entire town. and there's been a pretty vociferous pushback on that and in other parts of the district where there's actually a moratorium in a place called Chatham County. But in APEX, hundreds of constituents sent an open letter to both candidates saying, will you oppose this data center, number one? And number two, will you not take any money from AI? And NIDA Alam signed that and Valerie Fushi did not.

38:06Krystal Ball:And so I think there is a potential for backlash here, at least among people in Apex who are very agitated about the placement of this data center.

38:17David Dayen:Do you have a sense of how much this data center controversy in the district is playing in the race so far?

38:22Saagar Enjeti:I'm sure it plays a significant role. Obviously, when we did our own polling in the race, we didn't specifically ask about AI. We were trying to see, like, what is the pathway to victory? Because for leaders we deserve, we don't have an infinite amount of resources. We rely on 240 ,000 individual donors so that our candidates don't have to take corporate money so that we can truly back them and not have them unilaterally disarmed. We saw a pathway for NIDA. We didn't ask about AI. But what I will tell you I think is probably having just as much, if not a bigger, impact is the fact that you simultaneously are dealing with a district where it has had some of the most doge cuts of any district in the country.

38:57Saagar Enjeti:And it has a very high number. It's one of the youngest congressional districts in the country. It has a very high number of recent college grads that we know right now have an unemployment rate of around 45 percent. That feel like, and I'm sure that an AI data center is not going to jive well with them. Or the people who have their kids living at home right now after they graduate from UNC or whatever other schools are in the district because of automation and AI.

39:21Krystal Ball:Interesting data point on that. In 2022, they moved the primary to May. It was after colleges had let out for the summer. This time it's in March. the college students will be there and likely be voting.

39:33Saagar Enjeti:And that was one of our first questions when we were looking at NIDA back in June and July of 2025 was how do we time this so that nobody else gets in the race so that we don't have another situation where the field is fractured and then it's way harder to have a pathway to victory. So it's just NIDA. And on top of that, are the college students actually going to be there? Because we've seen districts where, you know, in the past I've seen polling where a candidate looks like they're going to win because we account for a lot of college students turning out. And then it turns out, oh, they're on spring break.

40:02Saagar Enjeti:Or, oh, you know, it's summer break. And then they don't turn out and then the candidate loses. In this case, we looked at the polling, we looked at the redistricting, and we saw a huge opportunity to show and send a shockwave through the electoral system that if Nitto wins here, I think will really send a chill down the spine of a lot of people in the establishment who historically have relied on corporations, relied on APAC, and thought that they were safe because of that. And ironically, the thing that used to keep them the most safe is now the thing that makes them most vulnerable. We at Leaders We Deserve, our friends over at Justice Democrats, the Sunrise Movement, and other groups, and obviously you all too, are working to make the biggest asset these groups have, which is their money, their biggest liability.

40:40Saagar Enjeti:That gets harder with the shell packs, obviously. But what I don't think people like Hakeem Jeffries or Chuck Schumer realize is that Gen Z and millennials are increasingly, we're almost a majority of the electorate at this point. we i don't think they understand how much we vehemently hate politicians that take corporate money and appear to engage in insider trading as a generation we we feel like the entire system has been bought and sold out from underneath us and when these politicians take corporate money i think for a lot of them like valerie fushi they're like what they're in my district it's totally fine they don't understand what that tells voters which is that you are effectively being bribed

41:15Krystal Ball:by these corporations you should talk about the article one thing yeah and i mentioned that she

41:20David Dayen:raised$550 ,000. More than$250 ,000 of that was PACs, mostly corporate PACs, but some labor PACs as well. FUSHI. Yeah. So yes, to your point, even the tiny amount of money she raised, most of it was from corporate PACs. But yeah, so let's get the reveal on this article one thing, because this is incredible. Because we've reported in the past, 2024, APAC was using, APAC used a pro-science pack, 314 Action, to like, in Illinois, as Dan and I reported, they created these two fake packs, brand new packs. Elect Chicago women. Elect Chicago women. Big concern for APAC is gender parity. And affordable Chicago now.

42:06David Dayen:Like, APAC literally biting off of Mom Donnie's affordability. That's how unapologetic they are. They have to hide where their money's coming.

42:12Krystal Ball:And then they were coordinating donors through these unbranded fundraisers. And if you looked at the candidates they were supporting in these Illinois races, Laura Fine in Illinois 9, Donna Miller in Illinois 2, and Melissa Bean in Illinois 8, they were sharing hundreds of donors. Hundreds of donors. Who had also donated in the past to APAC.

42:37Saagar Enjeti:It's just a coincidence then.

42:38David Dayen:So that's how you can figure out in Chicago and the Illinois area, you know, that APAC is actually the one that's behind this. Right. They say they're unapologetic about their participation. It's just completely hiding it, which it's, you know, it's totally legal to participate in the political process. All we're asking is just, you know, do it with your chest out, like stand behind what you believe in. So that gets us to this Article 1 PAC. So its first spending was in New Jersey 11, which is the one that people probably remember. This is Ana Lilia Mejia and Tom Malinowski and the lieutenant governor of New Jersey, Tehesha Way.

43:13David Dayen:AIPAC was behind Way. And so AIPAC spent millions tearing down Malinowski. And as you know from watching the show, they accidentally elected Mejia. Article 1 came in boosting Way. And people are like, what is this Article 1 PAC? This is odd. So the second time it has ever spent any money is this$600 ,000 on behalf of Fushi. Now, I've been told by sources, some with direct knowledge of this, that this is a Hakeem Jeffries pack, that Hakeem is guiding this.

43:51Krystal Ball:And there were some signals of that during the New Jersey race. If you look back at what how this Article one PAC was formed and who it's associated with, a thing called Article one victory that has ties to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which is a leadership organization, essentially. Right. And ties to a bunch of swing district members of Congress who are the type of people who the DCCC supports.

44:18Ryan Grim:Hi, this is Jo Winterstein, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life. And I just sat down with a mini driver. The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men. Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic Aquarian visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom loving and different perspectives. and I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius like are misunderstood. A sun and Venus in Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership.

44:55David Dayen:He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms, on different houses, in different places, but just an embracing of the is-ness of it all.

45:04Ryan Grim:If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chart-side view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity, and real life, This episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. In 2023, a story gripped the UK, evoking horror and disbelief. The nurse who should have been in charge of caring for tiny babies is now the most prolific child killer in modern British history. Everyone thought they knew how it ended. A verdict? A villain? A nurse named Lucy Letby.

45:46Nida Allam:Lucy Letby has been found guilty.

45:48Ryan Grim:But what if we didn't get the whole story? The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapses. I'm Amanda Knox, and in the new podcast, Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, we follow the evidence and hear from the people that lived it to ask what really happened when the world decided who Lucy Letby was. No voicing of any skepticism or doubt.

46:11Krystal Ball:It'll cause so much harm at every single level if the British establishment of this is wrong.

46:16Ryan Grim:Listen to Doubt, The Case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

46:24David Dayen:I'm Clayton Eckerd, and in 2022, I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor.

46:31Ryan Grim:Unfortunately, it didn't go according to plan. He became the first Bachelor to ever have his final rose rejected. The internet turned on him.

46:38David Dayen:If I could press a button and rewind it all, I would.

46:41Ryan Grim:But what happened to Clayton after the show made even bigger headlines. It began as a one-night stand and ended in a courtroom with Clayton at the center of a very strange paternity scandal. The media is here. This case has gone viral. The dating contract. Agree to date me, but I'm also suing you. Please search for it. This is unlike anything I've ever seen before. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. This season, an epic battle of he said, she said, and the search for accountability in a sea of lies. I have done nothing except get pregnant by the f***ing bachelor! Listen to Love Trapped on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

47:32David Dayen:Now, I've also been told by a source with knowledge of this that it is funneling APAC money. So instead of using these elect Chicago women PACs, Hakeem Jeffries is setting up a vehicle that is allowing APAC money to come through. And we know how they're doing it thanks to Matthew Eadie's reporting out of Chicago. So we can put up E3 here. And so let's follow along because this is fun to unpack. So ED obtained two emails that were privately sent by APAC on August 21st and then again on September 15th. And what they were doing is they were raising money for Laura Fine, who's running in this Illinois 09, this kind of Chicago area district.

48:16David Dayen:And so the emails said, please support Laura Fine. So now we know it's APAC because APAC is saying, please support Laura Fine and do it through this hidden web page that's called the, quote, Pro-Israel Network. So it's a link that you can't really find unless APAC sends you directly there. So then we put up this next, put up E4 here. So basically, here are the emails. They run through. So this is him obtaining the actual emails if you didn't believe him the first time. And so put up E5 here. And so then you go through the FEC filings. And he found that more than 150 of fines donations, which are$300 ,000, it worked.

49:09David Dayen:They funnel the money to APAC.

49:12Krystal Ball:Often it's on the same day all this money comes in because it's a virtual fundraiser. And often, you know, Fine and other candidates are bundled in these emails. And you see the same amount of money going to the same candidates on the same day.

49:27David Dayen:And so they're using, and so you can put up the next element. So using this thing called Democracy Engine LLC, which sometimes shows up in the FEC to funnel the money through.

49:44Krystal Ball:And I've seen these too, by the way, and there are dozens of these virtual fundraisers. So what this is generally being done for individual donations to the candidate itself. What you're saying is that this is a similar mechanism that's being used for a super PAC.

49:59David Dayen:And we'll add this one in post because I didn't put it into the rundown. And so what they're doing is they're they also APAC also sent directly to Hakeem Jeffries through this same process and using this democracy engine. So they funnel. So we have then we'll put it up. We'll put it up here. The Jeffries Victory Fund. APAC sends directly through this process to the Jeffries Victory Fund.

50:28Krystal Ball:right so then it raises and then jeffries gives to article one pack and an article one pack gives you know donates or there could be there could be even another intermediary before it gets well there is because i mean what we know is uh the 350 000 that went to tahisha ray's race was raised from something called the guzman foundation which no one's ever heard of and no one knows anything about so it could be the that could be the fourth link in the chain right So it's a fundraiser that goes to Jeffries. Jeffries then gives the Guzman Foundation or something, some other shell. That gives to Article 1 PAC, and then that Article 1 PAC raises the money for the ads or does the ads.

51:12Saagar Enjeti:It's a really dumb way of going about it. Like so overcomplicated and convoluted in general.

51:17Krystal Ball:But it makes it hard to track and hard for people like us to understand where the money is actually coming from. Absolutely.

51:24Saagar Enjeti:I mean that's the whole point. One thing to note, too, that I think people should understand about why APAC can have such an effect as well when they bundle money for candidates as they're doing across Illinois. And I got to say, Illinois 9 is getting a lot of attention, obviously. The cat's amazing. But there's also Robert Peters, who's getting massively attacked on all sides by all special interests. He's got the trifecta of hell coming after him, basically.

51:49Krystal Ball:That's in Illinois 2. In Illinois 2.

51:51Saagar Enjeti:And in that district, what we see is that the polling there that – it's really interesting because you have Illinois' 9 with an electorate with way more people with masters and PhDs. It's like Evanston, Illinois. Exactly. And then you have the second district that is a lot lower income. Southside Chicago. Less higher rates of education. And the polling there moves much faster after AIPAC comes in and spends than it does in Illinois' 9th congressional district. But the point that I wanted to get at is that this bundling of money that they do, the reason it can have so much of an impact is because candidates, when they're spending on TV, get candidate rate.

52:28Saagar Enjeti:That is legally required to be the lowest rate. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's my understanding. That's right. It has to be the lowest rate of any activity.

52:35Krystal Ball:Sometimes 10 times as much for a super PAC.

52:38Saagar Enjeti:But if it's a super PAC where somebody says, okay, I'm going to give you$100 ,000 to United for Democracy Project, whatever, that money, those ads cost twice as much if it's an independent expenditure on broadcast or on TV a lot of the time. So that's why it has so much of an impact with that bundling of money. And it gives the candidates the plausible deniability to be like, oh, I didn't know that this was APAC, which is obviously bullshit. But it gives them that ability because it's not APAC directly giving them that money.

53:05David Dayen:But it goes even further. It also puts a dollar value on the secrecy that APAC cherishes because what they could have done is use Democracy Engine to send money directly to Valerie Fushi, for instance. And then she needed the money. And then she could have gotten the preferential ad rates and done exactly how she wanted to do. But she had pledged not to take APAC money.

53:29Krystal Ball:And these are these kinds of unbranded fundraisers are the exact things that she apparently rejected. She said don't do that. That's what I was told. So instead – Because she was mindful of the backlash. Right. So instead they sent it to Jeffries.

53:42David Dayen:That's right. Who then loops it back around to Article 1.

53:44Krystal Ball:And so it's less impactful because it's more expensive to run those ads. But it allows to keep this wall of deniability up.

53:54Saagar Enjeti:It's important to note too to think about what this means from Jeffries' position as well. This is, you know, I think, of course, there's the APAC role here, as there is in so many of these races around the country. But you also got to put yourself in Jeffrey's shoes. His job is to try to protect his members so that he can keep his majority that he needs to be able to get to continue to, you know, be Speaker of the House. And I think in combination with the attacks on all of these incumbents, what he's trying to do in this race, what's fascinating to me about it is how late the spending is right now.

54:23Saagar Enjeti:It came in so late. It didn't come in a month ago when it could have actually had, I think, way more of an impact. It started coming in way later when presumably they saw Paul in that show that Fushi was toast.

54:32Krystal Ball:We're talking about$2.2 million in the final 11 days of the race. That's$200 ,000 a day.

54:39David Dayen:Nothing but these ads on TV.

54:41Saagar Enjeti:I think what we're seeing here is Jeffrey is trying to show his other members, look, I'm going to back you so that even if Fushi does lose, they feel like, well, I still want to vote for him because he's going to help protect me. because once you're in, theoretically, he wants to protect you if you're going to vote for him. What's interesting about this whole dynamic, though, is if there are so many people that end up getting defeated by these incumbent challengers, every one of our incumbent challengers at Leaders We Deserve is supporting, outraced their opponent last quarter. And Justin Pearson outraced his opponent, I think it was nine to one, against Steve Cohen.

55:11Saagar Enjeti:So that is obviously getting their attention. But what will be interesting to see out is two things. One, of these incumbents who win, how does Jeffries try to reconcile with them, right? Because he obviously wants to continue being speaker. And how can they use that potentially to try to fend off future primary challenges from groups like APAC? Obviously, there's a trade to be made there. But on top of that, it's also a question of, with the VRA coming up, with that whole, you know, Supreme Court case, how does that end up changing Jeffries' coalition if a lot of these districts that were created by the Voting Rights Act no longer exist anymore?

55:44Krystal Ball:I just think the, this is what makes the alum race so important because there's now a coalition i mean alum in 2022 got zero dollars in outside spending from independent groups uh this time she's got 1.5 million and it's sort of cobbled together with a bunch of different organizations in there coalition's coming together yeah working families party justice democrats this american priorities group leaders we deserve how much you drop in a couple of days do you think um so i'm on the hard

56:13Saagar Enjeti:side, but last I checked in, there was about 250 ,000.

56:16Krystal Ball:Right. So, you know, there's parity here. There's some competitiveness here that we did not see in the last two cycles. There really, it was just sort of, you know, lambs to the slaughter, if you're talking about these organizations. And there was an attempt to do political education around this money is coming from APAC and this is what it means, or this money is coming from crypto. But now it's, There's still that, but there's also, and we've got your back with some actual firepower here. So that's why I think this race is so important. And if Alam still prevails despite this last-minute rush, it really does change the understanding and the conception of what these races are going to look like going forward.

57:00Saagar Enjeti:Massively. I mean, it's, I think that the sense that these incumbents have such a sense of entitlement, I think it's actually a huge asset for the progressive movement, ironically. of these challengers because they are so self-absorbed and obsessed with themselves that they tell themselves i'm so great at being a member of congress i can't be defeated that's why that's what then results in them getting cocky and not fundraising yeah that's the results that's what results in them going out there and being like oh it's fine like these challengers i don't really need to worry about them and then all of a sudden people like valerie fushi have a oh shit moment you know two weeks before the election or texting it's a joe crowley kind of situation exactly and And what we're seeing, too, is because they're so focused on themselves, we've seen people like Steve Cohen compare Justin Pearson's challenge of him to Pearl Harbor, for example.

57:48Saagar Enjeti:Then we go out there and we see somebody like Stephen Lynch go out there at a doge protest talking about all the doge cuts against VA. Theoretically a good thing, right? When somebody heckles him and says that you need to do more to fight back against Donald Trump, he says, I'm the member of Congress, not you, me. If you want to make that decision, you run for Congress. Leaders We Deserve is happy to answer that call and light a fire under the asses of the Democratic establishment to force our party to be better. And the great thing about this moment is, unlike in 2018, when the progressive movement was much more spread out, it was much less coordinated, in many of these races, we are in lockstep.

58:24Saagar Enjeti:And we have managed to grow enough small dollar support from the movement. And when we do come together, when Justice Dems comes in, when Leaders comes in, when American Priorities comes in, when all these other groups come together and we carefully select these races, we're not setting the precedent like, oh, progressives can't win. We're setting the precedent that when we come together, we win and we are a real serious threat. So you better not take corporate money. You better not take support for APAC or you're going to have a hell of a primary season ahead of you.

58:51David Dayen:It's going to be an interesting race on Tuesday. That's for sure. Last thing I wanted to ask you guys about is this news that apparently the reason that the Democratic National Committee doesn't want to release this autopsy that they did of the 2024 election is that it found that the Democratic support for the genocide in Gaza had a net negative effect. We don't know, though, whether or not that was considered to be decisive by this autopsy or not because they're not revealing it. So we actually, breaking points and drops, I will put it together. A petition will put it down at the bottom of the show notes here.

59:28David Dayen:Just calling on the DNC, just release this thing. Like, let us see it. Like, we're not telling you what to think about it, but let us see the autopsy. Preferably leak it to us first, but just make it public. Have you had any meetings with the DNC about this issue or this autopsy? And what can you tell us about what you understand about this analysis and why they're keeping it private? it?

59:49Saagar Enjeti:Well, what I can tell you is two things. One, Ken Martin campaigned on releasing this.

59:54David Dayen:Yeah, and you were his. And I was the vice chair to him.

59:57Saagar Enjeti:Like, I know that because I heard him say it a million times at all of the million forums that we had to do when we were running his vice chairs and chairs and everything like that. So this is not something where it's like Ken said, I'm going to do, by the way, they always refuse to call it an autopsy report because we're not dead yet is what they would say. They called it an after action report. Fine. Give us the after So that's one thing. It's not like Chair Martin went out there and said, I'm going to do this thing, but it's going to be kept private. He actually said, I'm going to release this and we're going to know why we lost.

1:00:24So release it.

1:00:25Saagar Enjeti:Don't go out there and claim we're going to do one thing and then not do it. The second thing is, I will tell you, at our first meeting in the building of the DNC with all of the officers who were elected and everything, we're going through basically some of the most preliminary findings of why we lost the election, common sense things, as you can imagine, that we're in there. And one thing that I brought up in there was like, I said, look, I know that you guys don't want to talk about this, almost certainly, but we have to acknowledge what happened with Gaza and the fact that tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of people, especially young people on college campuses, were losing their minds incredibly, understandably, over what was happening.

1:01:02Saagar Enjeti:And I know you don't want to talk about it, but we have to. And I have to believe that if they're actually writing an autopsy report, right, they have to talk about that. There has to be some part of it, and they should release it to have transparency. I mean, we're at rock bottom right now. We just lost to Donald Trump for the second time. What else do we have to lose? We might as well give the transparency to our voters of what actually happened here. But here's the problem. Our party is addicted to losing. Our party, and what I mean by that in particular, is that people like Hakeem Jeffries, people like Chuck Schumer, people I would argue like Ken Martin as well, would much rather keep basically everything as similar as possible to keep themselves in their own positions of power, whether it's in the Senate or in the House or the DNC or whatever else it is, instead of actually addressing who we are as a party to get us into a governing majority.

1:01:53Saagar Enjeti:Because if we want to win back the White House, if we want to win back the House, if we want to win back the Senate, there is no pathway to doing that without winning back young Americans that historically have voted for Democrats. And if we don't offer them something new and don't just change our messaging, but change who we are and address our courage problem as a party where we're just constantly afraid of our own shadow, we're not going to change that.

1:02:12Krystal Ball:I mean, you're talking about the iron law of institutions where, you know, your status within the institution is more important than the status of the institution within the broader ecosystem. You know, I think that the Democratic Party weirdly discounts authenticity and honesty as a virtue and a value that voters might respond to. And this is a perfect example of just we don't want to be honest with ourselves, let alone honest with the rest of the electorate about our own failings. And it just breeds this notion that you have something to hide. And it becomes a bigger problem than if you just rip the Band-Aid off and say, yes, this is why we had a problem and we need to be honest about this.

1:03:03Saagar Enjeti:Yeah, I mean just release the damn report. Who knows how much of an impact it really will even have to begin with. But if you're going to say you're going to release it and we know we have a trust problem in the party, just release it. We're already at rock bottom. Just show us what happened. How much worse can it get? Like how much worse can it get? The only way upward from here.

1:03:18Krystal Ball:Well, but the obvious problem is that, you know, we have the presume if Democrats win in November, speaker of the House laundering money through a bunch of donors who don't want that report released. Also, that's what's going on.

1:03:33David Dayen:A bunch of Republican billionaire donors, too. Right. That's incredible. Exactly. Yeah.

1:03:36Krystal Ball:That's a lot of the APAC. There's a fascinating moment in the Laura Fine race where she was at a campaign forum and they asked the question, did you have you taken money from Trump donors? And of course, everybody in the race, a very busy field, said no. And Laura Fine very sheepishly goes, yes. She didn't lie.

1:03:57David Dayen:Yeah. Good for her. Yeah.

1:03:58Krystal Ball:Honesty. Right.

1:03:59David Dayen:All right, David. It's great to have you guys by. David Dayen, executive editor of American Prospect, David Hogg with Leaders We Deserve and former ousted vice chair of DNC. I'm coming back with a vengeance. You sure are. Excellent. Well, great to have you guys both here. All right.

1:04:13Krystal Ball:Thanks.

1:04:14Ryan Grim:Hi, this is Jo Winterstein, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life. And I just sat down with a mini driver. The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men. Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic Aquarian visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom loving and different perspectives. and I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius like are misunderstood. A sun and Venus in Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership.

1:04:52David Dayen:He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms, on different houses, in different places,

1:04:57Ryan Grim:but just an embracing of the is-ness of it all. If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chart-side view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity, and real life, This episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. In 2023, a story gripped the UK, evoking horror and disbelief. A nurse who should have been in charge of caring for tiny babies is now the most prolific child killer in modern British history. Everyone thought they knew how it ended.

1:05:37Ryan Grim:A verdict? A villain? A nurse named Lucy Letby.

1:05:42Nida Allam:Lucy Letby has been found guilty.

1:05:44Ryan Grim:But what if we didn't get the whole story?

1:05:47Nida Allam:The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapses.

1:05:49Ryan Grim:I'm Amanda Knox, and in the new podcast, Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, we follow the evidence and hear from the people that lived it to ask what really happened when the world decided who Lucy Letby was. No voicing of any skepticism or doubt.

1:06:07Krystal Ball:It'll cause so much harm at every single level if the British establishment of this is wrong.

1:06:12Ryan Grim:Listen to Doubt, The Case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:06:20David Dayen:I'm Clayton Eckerd, and in 2022, I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor.

1:06:27Ryan Grim:Unfortunately, it didn't go according to plan. He became the first Bachelor to ever have his final rose rejected. The internet turned on him.

1:06:35David Dayen:If I could press a button and rewind it, all I would.

1:06:37Ryan Grim:But what happened to Clayton after the show made even bigger headlines. It began as a one-night stand and ended in a courtroom, with Clayton at the center of a very strange paternity scandal. The media is here. This case has gone viral. The dating contract. Agree to date me, but I'm also suing you. Please search warrant. This is unlike anything I've ever seen before. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. This season, an epic battle of he said, she said, and the search for accountability in a sea of lies. I have done nothing except get pregnant by the f***ing bachelor! Listen to Love Trapped on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:07:28Ryan Grim:So, Ryan, that's sort of a perfect setup for your interview with the candidate herself.

1:07:33David Dayen:Yes. So if you're just coming to this fresh, there's a good conversation that we just had with David Dayen and David Hogg about this race and the dynamics around it and others throughout the country. You can also just listen to this interview. We taped it yesterday. Since we recorded this interview, I actually did a lot of more reporting about the money that we talk about in this conversation. But the gist of it is here. This is Nita Alam running in North Carolina's 4th District. The election is this coming Tuesday. Joining us to discuss more of this is Nita Alam, a Durham County commissioner, who is up for election in North Carolina's 4th District this coming Tuesday, if I'm not mistaken.

1:08:16David Dayen:Nita, welcome to Breaking Points. Thanks for joining us.

1:08:20Nida Allam:Yeah. Thank you so much for having me back, Ryan.

1:08:22David Dayen:Yeah. So for folks who missed our conversation last time we spoke about, you've jumped into a second race against Valerie Fushi, who's now the incumbent. You and her squared off in 2022. In that election, AIPAC threw, I don't remember if they did, I think they did it through their main super PAC, United Democracy Project, put more than$2 million into the race. and they ended up pushing Valerie Fushi past you by about four points or something like so. Very, very close race. How much?

1:08:58Nida Allam:Nine.

1:08:59David Dayen:Oh, nine points. I remember it being a little bit closer. Nine points is still pretty close for getting more than$2 million dropped on your head down the stretch of the election now. So recently, Fushi has been named to this three-person Democratic task force that is charged with crafting what House Democratic policy is supposed to look like when it comes to artificial intelligence. And the way that these kinds of things work is that when a new issue arises, you kind of go outside of the committee system. I don't know why they even still have committees. Maybe you can tell me if you get back to Congress, if you get to Congress, you can tell me what committees even do.

1:09:40David Dayen:Because whenever anything comes up, they create a new committee, even though they've got ones that have been operating, you know, semi-continuously for hundreds of years at this point. And so the three members on that committee are Fushi and they were appointed by Hakeem Jeffries, just unilaterally. So it would be Fushi, Ted Lieu, who's a progressive in California. Almost every California Democrat is pretty friendly to the AI industry. And Josh Gottheimer, who is a New Jersey Democrat, who is kind of notorious for being friendly to whatever industry it is that he's regulating. Whether he's on the Financial Services Committee, he's taking more money from banks, hedge funds and private equity than anybody else.

1:10:24David Dayen:He's known as an almost comically voracious fundraiser. So two industry folks plus then a kind of what you would call, I guess, a normal Democrat, Valerie Fushi. So all of a sudden, Fushi started getting upwards of$700 ,000 in support from this super PAC that is backed by Anthropic, which presents itself as the AI safety super PAC, which kind of goes against, I guess, the AI danger companies, the ones who are a little bit more reckless. Because Anthropic, whenever you hear anything in the AI world about some of the dangers, it's usually because Anthropic said, hey, look, be careful. Like our AI just did this terrible thing, whereas the other AIs do the terrible thing and don't tell you about it.

1:11:08David Dayen:Gottheimer himself used to work for, used to be a Microsoft executive. But there's also a data center fight going on in North Carolina. So can you tell us first about that? Who is trying to put this data center in the district? What is the status of it and how relevant and how kind of resonant of an issue is this right now in the district for your voters, both the county commission level, but also in this race?

1:11:36Nida Allam:Yeah, absolutely. And before I answer that, I also just want to note that Anthropic is also known for its collaboration with Palantir on government contracts with ICE and CBP and even in the United States illegal invasion into Venezuela. It was anthropology that was used. Right.

1:11:57David Dayen:And they they recently asked a question to the Pentagon about whether or not their technology was used and appears it was in the in the kidnapping of Maduro. And they hinted that they they don't like that. And now the Pentagon is saying that they might call Anthropic a supply chain risk and not allow it to be used because Anthropic is saying we don't want our technology to be used for autonomous weaponized drones. But they're already partners with Palantir, which is one of the most, I don't know, whatever word you want to use for what Palantir does. So it's kind of late to be drawing lines, perhaps, but maybe they're saying it's not.

1:12:41David Dayen:But anyway, exactly. So they're close with Palantir. But go ahead. There's so much background here that we have to unpack.

1:12:47Nida Allam:Yeah. And also the fact that two members of this AI task force that was just created in December and Arvizan Fushi was appointed like literally right at the same time that we launched our campaign. And now. That is very interesting. Was it before or after? I think it was like a day or two before.

1:13:06David Dayen:Right. But people knew you were running. Yeah. At that point. So that's.

1:13:10Nida Allam:And we.

1:13:12David Dayen:Just to tell people why that's interesting, the reason people often get put on these committees is because they're in need of fundraising help. And if you put them, say, on the Financial Services Committee, then banks and hedge funds and private equity, they're going to shower them with money. So they always put the vulnerable freshmen and sophomores kind of on that committee. You put somebody on the task force, they become a magnet then for AI money. So if they're – Fushi raised very little of her own money, so if she needed help in a re-election, putting her on this committee would be an excellent way to signal to the AI world, you need to come in with hundreds of thousands of dollars and shower her down the stretch.

1:13:50David Dayen:So go ahead. That's interesting timing. And like this lobby and this super PAC jobs and democracy were truly about regulation and protecting the individual consumer and individual person from the dangers of AI.

1:14:05Nida Allam:then why would they not be supporting the candidate in this race myself, who has actually been clear about my stance on national moratorium on AI data centers until we have proper regulations in place so that we don't have this uncontrolled growth that's only benefiting tech billionaires bottom line at the expense of our residents. And like you mentioned, there's one in this district itself in Apex that is being considered and brought forward to the Apex Town Council. And we don't even know which company, which tech company it is that is going to be running this. The way that they come in is that they have this other company name as the developer.

1:14:46Nida Allam:And then they try to get their permits, try to get the approvals, everything. And then after it's built, the tech company, the tech giant comes in because they know it's going to be a lot harder. for, you know, meta Google to be coming in and saying like, hey, we're going to have this massive data center that's going to be the size of like multiple super Walmarts coming into your backyard. And residents are terrified. They're coming out and they're speaking up against it. They're saying they don't want this in their backyard. And for our current representative to ignore those voices and in response, take hundreds of thousands of dollars from the very same industry that her constituents and residents are rallying against is extremely disappointing to them.

1:15:32And we see residents across the district concerned about multiple factors of this data center.

1:15:37Nida Allam:We're being told by Meta that's spending millions of dollars to convince us that these AI data centers are going to create jobs. We know that's false. AI is killing thousands of jobs across the country. We're seeing the amount of water usage. They're spending millions of gallons of water every single year, every single day. Not even here, every single day to cool these systems. And then Duke Energy is already renegotiating and hiking up our electricity prices as consumers, as residents, to accommodate the infrastructure needs and capacity for these data centers. Why are those costs, why are residents having to pay an AI tax?

1:16:15David Dayen:You're a week away from the election, basically. And at least 700 ,000 is coming from the AI company. There'll be some other super PACs we can talk about in a moment. I'm throwing down again. It's like a repeat of 2022. How do you get the messages that I've seen so far from this AI super PAC are not in the democratic line of like, hey, here's why it would be good if we have a data center here. And here's why we need good regulations on and federal regulations on AI. And this is why Valerie Fushi is good for us and good for you. Like that would be one thing if they were making the case on behalf of their own industry.

1:16:54David Dayen:They're actually, the ads just seem to be saying nice things about Valerie Fushi. So far, it doesn't seem like they've gone negative on you, but they're saying, vote for Valerie Fushi because she's a good, you know, she'll be a good member of Congress. Just kind of raising her popularity and her name identification and not, but not telling you that it's an AI company, an AI coalition that is behind her. So how are you doing in getting the message out to people that says, and how do you do this as a candidate in this era that says, okay, this is AI money. like this is like whatever they're saying is that's nice and interesting but they have their own agenda and interests here are you able to get that message out are people following the race close enough that they're picking up what the ai coalition is kind of putting down here yeah

1:17:40Nida Allam:absolutely and we see this happening in with super PAC spending all across the country is that they never actually run their ads on the issue that they're lobbying for because they know that their issue is unpopular with the average person. We saw this in 2022 with AIPAC and DMFI. They didn't run any ads about Israel or Palestine because they know that this is not kitchen table issues that folks are like, yeah, we want more taxpayer dollars to be going to fund war. Just like residents now are not going to say, yes, we want to pay an AI tax to support these data centers. So they have to put messaging out there to just promote candidates that they know are going to be softer and easier on them or be supportive of their causes, even though it's against what their residents want.

1:18:28Nida Allam:And the way that we're counteracting this is by we had a press conference on Saturday to call it out. And we actually had one of the leaders of the community members at Apex who came out and spoke at the press conference. And because there were over 300 residents of Wake County that signed on to a letter calling on all us candidates in this district, Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, everyone, to take a pledge to not accept money from the AI lobby. And I'm the only candidate in this race that has taken that pledge. And in response to over 300 residents, Representative Fushi's response has been, hey, I want to take hundreds of thousands of dollars from them.

1:19:10Nida Allam:And they said very clearly at the press conference. She said, if you take this money, we are not going to forget. And residents, even if, you know, hopefully she doesn't, but if Representative Fushi is victorious in this election, her residents, she's not listening to them. She is going completely against what they are asking for right now. And so we are messaging, making sure that residents know how this AI data center is going to impact them, what the AI tax means, how a moratorium is going to help make sure that there's proper regulations put in place on big tech.

1:19:45David Dayen:And so you have a fairly engaged district, right? I mean, you have a lot of people who are paying close attention. So maybe it will get out. Like maybe people are engaged enough. Last night, President Trump raised the salience of the issue again. He talked about this in the State of the Union. He seems to recognize the political peril that he's in with the amount of money that he's shoveled at AI and the backlash to data centers. And he said, I promise you from now on, you know, these data centers are going to produce their own power. But to me, if you're in a rural area and somebody tells you, hey, there's, we're going to put this gigantic data center in your backyard, people are like, I don't know about that.

1:20:26David Dayen:And you say, oh, but wait, we're going to make it even better. We're going to put a power plant right next to it. People are going to be like, well, I mean, okay, I'm glad that doesn't sound better. I don't want a power plant also.

1:20:41Nida Allam:And these centers are using these backup diesel generators that are emitting toxic fumes that are polluting our water and airways. And they're happening not just in rural communities. The one in Apex is literally in the backyard of our residents. Oh, wow. So there are family members that they're scared of how it's going to impact the air quality for their children. How's it going to impact the water quality that is coming into their taps?

1:21:07David Dayen:And so what about AIPAC? So Valerie Fouchi, she, after getting that two plus million dollars, has been critical of Israel. She endorsed the Back the Bombs Act, which is the Progressive Caucuses bill that still allows a significant amount of weapons to go to Israel, but does block. Did I say back the bombs? Block the bombs. until it does block some weapons and is something of a red line for AIPAC. AIPAC is not somebody who comes in and is okay with some nuance on the question. They say they want unconditional aid, and they mean it. And if you don't support unconditional aid, they'll come after you.

1:21:47David Dayen:Tom Malinowski, former member of Congress, who said there should be some modest conditions on some aid, some military aid to Israel. They spent millions of dollars in New Jersey against him and accidentally or perhaps elected a progressive, Analyria Mejia. Instead, it seems like that same super PAC is interested in your race now. Is there enough time for them to impact the race? And what are you seeing from this shadowy super PAC?

1:22:16Nida Allam:Now, we're seeing that money is starting to drop in at the last minute. And it's showing what we've known is that this race is going to be very close. and quite frankly the establishment and the status quo is scared because they see that the electorate is sick and tired of being told to wait for change to wait for relief they're being they're sick and tired of their taxpayer dollars being used to fund endless wars to have to pay an ai tax this district is working families just like a majority vast vast majority of this country is And so these super PACs are dumping in the last minute money because it's a desperate Hail Mary to try to save the seat for the establishment.

1:22:58Nida Allam:And we're countering that by making sure that, you know, people know who is behind this money that is coming in, making sure that folks know that the only reason this money is coming in is because they're scared of us. as working families, as individuals stepping up and having our voices be heard and taking on these corporate interests and taking on the big tech, the war machine. And unfortunately, we're seeing the same entities and the shady tactics that were used in New Jersey. They were they're being used in Illinois, coming into this district, the safest blue seat in North Carolina.

1:23:38David Dayen:and are they going negative on you or are they boosting valerie at this point that the new jersey

1:23:44Nida Allam:apac looking super pack so none of the packs have gone negative on me unfortunately uh representative fushi herself her campaign ran a negative attack ad yesterday that we had to actually issue our own

1:23:57David Dayen:cease and desist and they took it down which is extremely unusual yes cbs 17 took it down uh i

1:24:03Nida Allam:don't believe the other i'm not sure if the other stations have taken it down yet the representative of who she still has her messaging, false messaging attacking me on her website as last time I checked it. And it was a weird false message.

1:24:17David Dayen:The false message was claiming you didn't file a financial disclosure when you did. So it's like it's a strange.

1:24:24Nida Allam:It's also it goes to show that there's not much that they can or anything they can use against me.

1:24:30David Dayen:And she didn't do her paperwork properly. Oh, wait, actually, she did. Yeah.

1:24:33Nida Allam:And if you look at my paperwork, what's terrifying about it is something that's terrifying to all residents. It's full of student debt. And that's what most people in this country are dealing with. And if you are looking at my generation and the next, we are more likely to be living with student debt for the rest of our lives than we are to be able to have a mortgage, to be able to achieve the American dream that we were raised was possible for us.

1:24:59David Dayen:Especially Durham, I would suspect. Now, on the flip side, what makes this race unusual is that you have a shadowy super PAC that launched on your side. It appears from the reporting I've been able to do that this is a kind of Bernie Sanders adjacent. It's not from Bernie Sanders himself, but people in the Bernie Sanders kind of AOC wing of the party have raised millions of dollars to do their own super PACs to come in and try to defend people. who are getting hit by super PACs from the other direction. The last I saw that they had spent half a million or were planning to spend half a million in the race.

1:25:37David Dayen:I don't know if they've come in with any more since then, but is that help? Have you gotten much of a word on who that is, what they want? And is it having an effect on the ground? Are you noticing that having that cavalry come in and defend you on the other side is changing people's understanding of the race?

1:25:58Nida Allam:Yeah, I mean, I don't know who the individual members are since we don't collaborate with these IE groups, but I've seen the same reporting that you have that they released, I believe it was like last Thursday, that said that these were individuals who are coming up and supporting candidates who are against endless funding of wars, who stand up and want to take a stance because they're sick and tired of seeing corporations and right wing special interest groups like AIPAC. buying seats and electing people who are just going to be yes men for war and corporate tax breaks and cuts instead of for the average working people.

1:26:38Nida Allam:And so and these are groups and donors who, from what I've seen from the reporting, have supported progressive candidates all across the country. And, you know, I'm grateful for the organizations like Justice Democrats, Working Families Party, Leaders We Deserve, Sunrise Movement, who have been leading the charge and lifting up progressive voices. And it's sad that we unfortunately live in this political system that endless amounts of money have to be spent. And it's sad that in the safest blue seat, our representative is taking money from the same folks who fund Trump. You know, she's running this campaign saying that she's going to take on Trump and his authoritarianism.

1:27:17Nida Allam:How are you going to do that when you're accepting and cashing checks from the very same people who put him into office? If we truly want to hold Trump accountable, then we need to hold the corporations and these right-wing billionaires and these right-wing special interest groups that put them into office accountable and get them out of our political systems. Because as long as they have us and our U.S. government in a chokehold, Trump is not going to be the end of our nightmare. That's just the first step for them. All right.

1:27:45David Dayen:Well, Nidolam County Commissioner running in North Carolina's fourth district. Mail-in voting has already started. The election will be next Tuesday. Is that March 1st?

1:27:54Nida Allam:is that march 4th 3rd so early voting ends saturday on the 28th and then election day is on march 3rd

1:28:02David Dayen:all right um well we'll we'll we'll be following this and um uh we'll be back in touch on uh on election day or the day after um but thank you so much for for joining us i appreciate it right

1:28:12Ryan Grim:all right that does it for us um we will be back tomorrow for i think it's going to be yet another commie takeover tomorrow because emily is unavailable soccer is unavailable so um so So prepare yourselves, comrades.

1:28:24David Dayen:People come here for both sides. You're going to get the Bolshevik side and the Menshevik side. And we're going to be totally fair. Yeah.

1:28:34Ryan Grim:All right, guys. Have a great day. We'll see you then.

1:28:36David Dayen:See you.

1:28:55Ryan Grim:Hi, it's Joe Interstein, host of the Spirit Daughter Podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life. And today I'm talking with my dear friend, Krista Williams. It can change you in the best way possible. Dance with the change, dance with the breakdowns. The embodiment of Pisces intuition with Capricorn power moves. So I'm like delusionally proud of my chart. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. I'm Amanda Knox, and in the new podcast, Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, we unpack the story of an unimaginable tragedy that gripped the UK in 2023.

1:29:41Ryan Grim:But what if we didn't get the whole story?

1:29:43David Dayen:I've just been made to fit.

1:29:45Nida Allam:The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapsed.

1:29:47Ryan Grim:What if the truth was disguised by a story we chose to believe? Oh my God, I think she might be innocent. Listen to Doubt, The Case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:30:01David Dayen:I'm Clayton Eckerd. In 2022, I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor.

1:30:06Ryan Grim:But here's the thing. Bachelor fans hated him.

1:30:09Nida Allam:If I could press a button and rewind it all, I would.

1:30:12Ryan Grim:That's when his life took a disturbing turn. A one-night stand would end in a courtroom. The media is here. this case has gone viral. The dating contract. Agree to date me, but I'm also suing you. This is unlike anything I've ever seen before. I'm Stephanie Young. Listen to Love Trapped on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an iHeart Podcast. Guaranteed human.