Trump Pick Caught in Unearthed Footage That Could Sink Plan

0:00This episode is brought to you by Claude by Anthropic. Claude is the AI for minds that don't stop at good enough. It's the collaborator that actually understands your entire workflow and thinks with you. Whether you're debugging code at midnight or strategizing your next business move, Claude extends your thinking to tackle the problems that matter and finds connections you might have missed. For problems worth solving, get started at claude.ai slash Spotify. Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Now, I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited premium wireless for$15 a month is back.

0:38So I thought it would be fun if we made$15 bills. But it turns out, that's very illegal. So there goes my big idea for the commercial. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. Upfront payment of$45 for three months,$90 for six months, or$180 for 12-month plan required. $15 per month equivalent. Taxes and fees extra. Initial plan term only. Greater than 50 gigabytes may slow when network is busy.

0:59Michael Popok:You hear that hammering sound? That's potentially the sound of E.J. and Tony, the MAGA MAGA right wing, quote unquote, self-proclaimed economist and his nomination to be Donald Trump's nonpartisan head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics to start cooking the books to generate job numbers that Donald Trump likes. Why is the coffin being nailed shut? Well, not only is there a group of conservative, that usually means Republican economists, that say that he's unholy qualified, he's obscenely unqualified to be running the 2 ,000 economists that crank out the job reports that we need to manage our economy.

1:39Michael Popok:but he was a participant in the Jan 6th insurrection. Sure, he wasn't charged but when you're a tall, lanky fellow that's prone to wearing three-piece suits you're sort of easy to spot in a crowd and NBC News has found E.J. Antony insurrectionist roaming the grounds during that beautiful, non-violent attack on our Capitol. I'm Michael Popok. You're on the Midas Touch Network. let's get to the new reporting. I've been following the E.G. and Tony story for a while now over on Legal AF, the YouTube channel. Let's start with the Jan 6th participation. Whenever you have a sentence that I need to form that says, let's start with the Jan 6th insurrection part and work backwards, you know that this candidacy is on life support.

2:33Michael Popok:So Donald Trump fires the head, the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, who was bipartisanly, almost unanimously confirmed by the Senate. This person had worked as an economist for the Census Bureau for years for Republican and Democratic administrations. But the job numbers get revised. Oh my, the job numbers got revised. They get revised every month, up and down. I'll talk about that in a minute. And the reason for it, didn't like it. Oh, maybe look bad. Fire them. and put in a partisan right-wing E.J. Antony. So bad that the Wall Street Journal that's already embroiled in a defamation case brought by Donald Trump because they don't like their Epstein reporting against Trump, $20 billion defamation case in Miami, who cares?

3:20Michael Popok:We're going to tell the American public that E.J. Antony is not qualified to be running the Bureau of Labor Statistics. And now NBC News says, why don't we go through that footage? You know that footage that the Trump administration and MAGA Congress wanted to release to everybody in Tucker Carlson. Let's go through it with a, I don't know what this is supposed to be. Let's go through it with a fine tooth comb or binoculars. And oh, there he is. And here, let's put up the picture. E.J. and Tony. Yeah, right. Because you, let me just give the credentials of the prototypical head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics responsible for providing some of the most valuable and critical job and other economic data to allow the financial markets, global economy, U.S.

4:08Michael Popok:manufacturers, U.S. employers, the government to run their day-to-day operations. It's the gold standard, or it was. Everybody that's ever had that role has been bipartisan, has been nonpartisan. E.J. Antony just went on Fox News, his propaganda outlet of choice, and said just the hours before he was picked that William Beach, who had been the commissioner that Trump had appointed, had been fired by Joe Biden. It's always Joe Biden. And that's false. His term expired. He was not fired by Biden. He was inherited from Trump by Biden. He was kept in place. He was an arch conservative, but he did his job and it was reliable.

4:51Michael Popok:There's a reason things go up and down with the jobs reports based on surveys and statistical data. I'll talk about that in a minute. But this guy, I always had a bad feeling about E.J. Antone. He worked at some Texas Freedom Foundation as the chief economist. I think he created it himself in the basement, his grandma's basement. He's the chief economist for the Heritage Foundation. Okay, the guy just got his college degree about eight or nine years ago. He just got his PhD like four years ago. You know, he's self-proclaimed. And at best, at best, he's not that kind of economist. In order to do the labor statistics, you need to be, A, it would be good to be a statistician.

5:33Michael Popok:He's not. It would be good to have a degree in things about labor employment. He doesn't have that. He's just a drive-by TV economist who puts on a three-piece suit and a big fat tie because he's trying to look older than he really is, you know, until he gets the gray hair that inevitably I got from the Trump administration. And he just does these drive-by, whoa, Donald Trump is really amazing in foreign trade and his tariffs are great and everything is great in his world, in his Trump heaven that he resides in. Except it's not great down here on earth. So I always got a sneaking suspicion that there was something up with him.

6:16Michael Popok:And even the Wall Street Journal said, he's MAGA. He's not qualified. There's a reason we don't trust the numbers coming out of the Chinese government because they're not reliable. And the same thing is going to happen with Antony running the Bureau of Labor Statistics. There's also reporting that the 2 ,000 economists that he's going to be running are not going to bend the knee for E.J. Antony and start changing their statistical models and how they approach job reports. But the fact that he is, he participated in the attack on the Capitol. Donald Trump wants to make it, oh, it was a day of peace and love, day of peace and love.

6:56Michael Popok:Donald Trump wasn't there. He infamously did not go to the Capitol after he said he was going to, and he was driven back to the White House. But those that were there, the Metro Police, the Capitol Police that were on the front lines of the pitched battle, hand-to-hand combat to save the Capitol, they have a different report. Many of them retired, are on disability, saw things that they've never seen before except when they were in war zone in the military. Some committed suicide. It was so bad. That walk in the park was so great, people took their own life and retired and or retired from the military.

7:36Michael Popok:So much blood on the Capitol steps that one Metro police officer, she testified, that reminded her of when she was in Fallujah and the fighting there. And E.J. and Tony just wandering around, walking around. I'm not here to tell you he broke into the Capitol. I don't know what he was chanting. I don't know what he was saying. But I assure you, he was not there handing out leaflets and pamphlets and putting daisies in the barrels of weapons. And the takeaway is, He's so partisan. He's so rabid MAGA that he actually went there for this. And now he's going to be the independent, nonpartisan leader of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

8:19Michael Popok:Look, Donald Trump's been trying to cook the books because he knew his economy and his economic policies were only going to be one sided and only help the super ultra rich. I mean, that's what the Congressional Budget Office report just issued. that the bottom 10 % of America, mainly MAGA supporters of Donald Trump, are going to be negative$1 ,200 from their household budget this year because if Donald Trump's cut in benefits and in programs like Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, you can't, where they think the$2 trillion being sucked out of the benefits for Americans was, where do you think that was going to land?

8:58Michael Popok:On them. And the top 10%, their income's going up, $14 ,000 a household because of the tax cuts. So you have that. So we knew from the beginning, he needed to cook the books. Howard Lutnick, the head of the Commerce Department that runs a lot of these statistical agencies for the government, said when he first got in, I don't like the way gross domestic product is measured. I'm going to change it. I was like, I'm sorry, you're going to do what? We're going to back out the government's involvement in the economy. I'm like, what a pinhead. Seriously. Oh, and then Commerce Department, through Doge and other things, defunded all of the economic statistical modeling agencies that work in bureaus that work in the government.

9:40Michael Popok:And he totally eliminated, I mean, he put a gone fishing sign on the door of an advisory committee that supervised all of these statistical agencies like the Bureau of Labor Statistics, defunded them, put them out of business as of February the 28th. So we knew they were cooking the books. And now they're publicly cooking the books. There's new reporting that they're running around the White House. You just saw Carolyn LeVette. We need new means and methods, says the press secretary, to measure the economy. That's what they're doing. They're trying to figure out how to cook the books and lie to the American people about the disastrous impact of their economic policies.

10:19Michael Popok:You know, one of my favorite summer memories was this spontaneous road trip with friends. No plans, just good vibes and endless sunshine. Honestly, that's what I love most about the summer. The freedom to either plan or just go with the flow. But no matter what I'm doing, whether I'm hitting the gym, heading to work, or going out for a night adventure, I want clothes that keep me comfortable and looking sharp. That's why I'm all about Mack Weldon's new tech linen line. It's the perfect blend of classic linen style and cool Mack's technology that keeps you cool and breathable no matter how hot it gets.

10:52Michael Popok:I got a couple of their shirts and shorts, and honestly, they feel like a vacation every time I put them on. The fit is just right, not too tight, not sloppy, and the style is clean and effortless. I get that confidence boost knowing I look good without even trying. Mack Weldon nails that balance between classic style and modern comfort. Their tech linen pieces plus breathable air knit underwear and even t-shirts and polos and air knit keep you dry and comfy all day long. and their ace collection sweatpants, shorts, even blazers that are crazy comfortable, but still look elevated. If you want breathable clothes that feel great all summer, go to MackWeldon.com and get 25 % off your first order of$125 or more with promo code LEGALAF.

11:34Michael Popok:That's M-A-C-K-W-E-L-D-O-N.com, promo code LEGALAF. Let me take a minute. Now that you've recovered from EJ and Tony was a Jan 6th insurrectionist, effectively, although not charged. I'll give you that. Let's talk about the job report for a minute because there's so much misinformation out there. I want to end the hot take on this. The job report is a compilation of voluntary surveys, 60 ,000 monthly surveys that go out to households and 120 ,000 surveys that go out to businesses, including some of the larger businesses in America. It is a sample. It is like a poll. I think Donald Trump believes that the job report is actually like a census, like we're counting every job going door to door to every house and going to every business in America every 30 days.

12:34Michael Popok:He's defunded the organization. He's gotten rid of major employees. He's laid them off. How did he think they were doing all of that? They were never doing that. Every administration has to live by the same job report and the statistical model. So they send out the surveys. And since COVID, they're not getting them all back. It's voluntary. What are you going to put a gun? I mean, Donald Trump would put a gun to their head. He'd use the US military, I guess, if he could, to get back the surveys. It's down to 43 % to 45 % return rate. Okay, so increase the return rate. Give them$10 a household.

13:05Michael Popok:I don't know. But then those survey results come back. 50 % of them come back. And they then use statistical modeling to come up with a job number. And then as time goes on, from month to month to quarter to quarter, they get more and more accurate data and they update the numbers. That's it. It's not rigging the system. and everybody's under the same system. Every presidency, his job numbers went up and down during the first term. Joe Biden's went up and down, including way down right before the election. But that's it. I now think that Carolyn LeVette and the economic minds such as they are, that's doing a heavy lift in that sentence, and Donald Trump's administration, think they were actually physically counting jobs.

13:50Michael Popok:So unless you change the survey, return rate by incentivizing, I don't know, what do you want to do? You want to give him a dollar? You want Elon Musk to hand out money for the return of surveys? There's nothing you can do with the modeling. The modeling is the modeling. And the economists aren't going to go with E.J. and Tony's made up model to try to rig the system. There's a reason we don't want the executive branch in charge, the presidency in charge of the Federal Reserve, the central bank, and its numbers. Because they'll cook the books for their own election success. That's what China does.

14:30Michael Popok:That's what Russia does. That's what North Korea does. They cook the books. They lower their interest rates on Federal Reserve to increase spending in order to pump up artificially the economy. They then report on that in the numbers. So you don't want them in control of the numbers and of the central bank. You don't want monetary policy, which is at the central bank, about the money and the interest rates related to money to be set and captured by the same entity, the presidency, that's running fiscal policy, which is their economic policy. You see why? They just turn it up. It was 10. They turn it up to 11.

15:11Michael Popok:Pump the money into the system. Now the elections happen. Midterms happen. Boom, we crash. and it's that kind of boom and bust and that kind of manipulation of the economy that we hate and is terrible for Americans and Donald Trump's trying to hide it by also taking control of the statistics and the reporting and we're doing our reporting right here on Midas Touch Network and on Legal AF I'm Michael Popok anything Legal AF you can find me on Legal AF the YouTube channel Legal AF MTN that I do with the Midas Touch Network 12 new videos every day and then Legal AF the podcast Wednesdays and Saturdays at 8 p.m.

15:47Michael Popok:Eastern Time. Great news. We just found out today we're top 16, one six of all podcasts on YouTube, Legal AF. It's amazing. It's all because of our fervent support of our Legal AFers in Midas Mighty. So until my next report, I'm Michael Popak. Can't get your fill of Legal AF? Me neither. That's why we formed the Legal AF Substack. Every time we mention something in a hot take, whether it's a court filing or a oral argument, come over to the Substack. You'll find the court filing and the oral argument there, including a daily roundup that I do call. Wait for it. Morning AF. What else? All the other contributors from Legal AF are there as well.

16:23Michael Popok:We got some new reporting. We got interviews. We got ad free versions of the podcast and hot takes where Legal AF on Substack. Come over now to free subscribe.