US Supreme Court makes cataclysmic move

23:43And so the narrative about what he was going to do and the narrative about and the reality of what is actually being produced, unfortunately, I think is being felt by a lot of people in Maryland right now that they just feel deeply lied to about what the president said he was going to do. All right.

24:02Brian Tyler Cohen:And finally, let's finish up with this. And I wish I had a more graceful transition from talking about something terrible to talking about something upbeat. But this is it. You are a big football fan. I'm a big football fan. As we're now in training camp season, season starts in a few weeks here. Your prediction for your Baltimore Ravens as we head toward this next football season? I always, so here's the thing. I'm always. And I want your real prediction. I don't want the governor of Maryland prediction. I want your real prediction here no because the thing is is that like i give my real prediction and people think i'm just being a homer but i can back it up it's like it's like i just do not know who legitimately and again it's the start of the season but not just do we win the division yes we win the division like but but i who in the afc is more talented than the baltimore ravens yeah we're not only like literally our football team is like a video game at this point you know i mean like it's like you have Lamar Jackson, who was just universally just the singular most talented player in the NFL.

25:09And please, all my all you Josh Allen fans miss me. Like, Josh Allen is a very good quarterback. Lamar Jackson is a transformational quarterback. There is a difference, you know. So you have Lamar, you have Derrick Henry in the backfield who Derrick Henry cannot be tackled by one person. So you really have to have a tackle by committee in order to take Derrick Henry down. And then, by the way, you got Zay Flowers as your lead receiver. You still have Isaiah Likely and Mark Andrews, two of the best tight ends on the same team on the ends. And we not only had, and we just also added DeAndre Hopkins.

25:51It's actually silly. And by the way, our defense just got remarkably better. We have probably one of the best safeties in the NFL in Kyle Hamilton right now, right? We probably picked up one of the best defensive pickups in the draft in starts. And we just picked up an all-world cornerback in Alexander. Like, this team is solid. And I'm not just saying that as a governor of Maryland. I'm saying it because, please, somebody, give me facts to show me why the Baltimore Ravens are not the best team in the AFC right now.

26:22Brian Tyler Cohen:No, I have beef with your quarterback for two reasons. one is because i'm a job because i'm not a ravens fan it's because i'm a giants fan and so i have beef with every other team in the nfl because we had a rough year a rough year but but my second beef is because i had zay flowers on my fantasy team and and when you have a quarterback as good as yours and you have a receiver like zay flowers you're not going to touch the ball too much and i should have spent the money on derrick henry but i didn't because i thought that i thought that you know i just i thought zay was a big enough a big enough get that i wouldn't need derrick henry but i uh that was it was a rough go when you have somebody as uh that's that's that's that's fair beef i actually i get you on that because zay is zay is remarkable the problem with the ravens and on a fantasy level yeah the problem with the ravens unless you are talking about lamar or unless you were talking about Derrick Henry.

27:20We have so many weapons that it's just difficult for a wide receiver to do really well with the Ravens because you're going to get the ball thrown to you seven times a game, five times a game, because we have so many weapons.

27:36Brian Tyler Cohen:Yeah, I mean, let's be clear. My beef with you is my beef with the Ravens is completely, is 100 % out of jealousy. And that's all it is. but but we'll see i mean we've got you know um um it's it's it's uh it's gonna be a interesting year to watch we've got we've got you know uh russell wilson with the giants so so we'll see what happens on that front hopefully you can get and i love russell wilson like as a human being i think he's like an amazing person um good luck with that um do you play fantasy gov i do play fantasy all right let's let's do top top five picks uh for your fantasy league if you if you if you had to rank your top five who would it be um so again not being a homer um but i think that if i had my druthers i i think you've got to be able to to get derrick henry on there i i think Derrick Henry is just, it's, it's, he's ridiculous.

28:37Um, um, Saquon.

28:39Brian Tyler Cohen:Yeah. It is, is that one hurts too. I want to say, man, I don't know how y 'all sleep right now, man. I don't know how y 'all sleep. Letting this band go to a division rival. Yeah. That's crazy. That's actually crazy. Um, three, three more, three more. Um, well, I mean, you got to go with the points to give you high points so you got to go with quarterbacks and listen and i'm i am i have a a deep seed seeded hatred for patrick mahomes yeah um but if you're playing fantasy he's gonna get you points um just because he is another one who just whips the ball around so well and he just knows how to get into he knows how to get into the end zone so i think that's a smart one um i actually think that you're going to do pretty well uh if you have to go with a uh if you have to go with a tight end you also have to take a look at kelsey um kelsey is another one he's just a big point getter yeah because he just he's a magnet for the ball he gets into the end zone and again not a big fan of him on a football field but if you have him on a fantasy on a fantasy team then you're actually doing pretty well and how many more do i have i that might that might be five i think i I think that's five, unless I'm counting wrong.

29:55Okay. The only one, if I have one more, I would probably give you a wide receiver, so I'd probably go with Jamar Chase.

30:03Brian Tyler Cohen:Yep, that's, yeah. All right. He's a monster. It's actually crazy. They're another one who, if they just had to play on one side of the ball, it'd be a great football team. Agreed. So I would go... At some point, the Bengals defense has to show up. Yeah. I would go all receivers and running backs for the top five, because I think you can get, I think you can get a good enough quarterback later in the draft. So I would go Chase, Bajon Robinson, JJ, Saquon, and CeeDee, I think is going to have a year. Interesting. Now why? I feel like everyone says that every year. But actually, he wasn't bad in fantasy.

30:45Fantasy is a little bit different.

30:46Brian Tyler Cohen:I had CeeDee, was it last season or the season before? And he was top point getter. He is so clutch. Dak loves him as a receiver. And it's just been great. If I had to pick somebody out of those top five, also want Malik Neighbors. That's actually, that's a good call. Yeah, but he's been plagued with some injuries. So now I just got to hope that he holds himself together. So with that said, we'll see. We'll do another one after the season and see how, we'll talk before then, but we'll do one after the season, see who it panned out better for. But something tells me it's probably not going to be me.

31:19Brian Tyler Cohen:So go, bye. You know what's so funny? when you come down to watch a game um people notice like i watch the game because watching what's going on but i also always have a um i always have a tablet and the tablet has two things um on it it has red zone yeah and it has my fantasy so i will literally watch you know oh yeah i'll really watch watch all of it while i'm watching the rabies play it's like your whole bloomberg terminal there so gov i appreciate your time thanks for the work you're doing and we'll talk soon. Absolutely. Appreciate you, man. Thank you. No Lies brought to you by Armor Colostrum.

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32:25Brian Tyler Cohen:That combats bloating and makes me feel lighter. Probiotics are often touted as the gut health solution, but they only address one part of the four-part gut wall, and most products on market are dead before they even reach your gut. Armour Colostrum naturally fortifies your entire gut wall system, optimizing your microbiome and strengthening the gut wall architecture, which can guard against irritants that can trigger symptoms like bloating and constipation. And beyond that, it also strengthens immunity, ignites metabolism, vitalizes hair growth, enhances skin radiance, and fuels performance and recovery.

32:54Brian Tyler Cohen:We've worked out a special offer for my audience. Receive 15 % off your first order. Go to tryarmra.com slash BTC or enter BTC to get 15 % off your first order. That's T-R-Y-A-R-M-R-A dot com slash BTC. I'm joined now by the governor of Illinois, J.B. Pritzker. Thanks so much for joining me. Hey, Brian, great to be with you. So you had just met this past weekend with a group of Texas legislators. And obviously, Texas is in the news right now because Greg Abbott, listening to the orders of Donald Trump, is seeking to further gerrymander that state's maps. And so there are a few weapons that Democrats have at our disposal where we can finally fight fire with fire.

33:33Brian Tyler Cohen:And we have, and I say this because for so long, we have watched as Republicans have gerrymandered maps in North Carolina, in Utah, in Ohio, in Florida. Now they're looking at Texas. So all across the country, they have been able to wield this weapon against Democrats and it's largely been met with a refusal to actually act. Well, now it's happening in such an egregious way that it may actually be the reason that even in what we expect 2026 to be, which is a wave year, Republicans might be able to actually retain power of the House or retain their majority in the House by virtue of these gerrymanders.

34:08Brian Tyler Cohen:And so from from your vantage, in terms of what you're able to do in Illinois, are you willing to fight fire with fire here and and respond in a commensurate way if indeed we see Greg Abbott engage in a partisan gerrymander in Texas? Well, I appreciate the question. I'll begin my answer by saying I've been on team fight since I first got elected in 2018. I really believe, you know, we have to make choices right now about whether you're going to be on team fight or team cave. And the Republicans are using every, frankly, everything, whether it's cheating, breaking the law, you know, trying to do things that I think are nontraditional.

34:52And we Democrats can't live by the old rules. We've got to live by the rules, but we've also got to react and fight. And so when I think about what they're trying to do in Texas, and by the way, they're also trying to do it next door to me here in Missouri, next to Illinois and other places. I think, you know, historically that's, you know, midstream redistricting was not something that we Democrats would do. But if they force us, we've got to put everything on the table. We've got to make decisions that maybe we wouldn't have made before. And so that's why I'm on the team here. I think that governors across the country that have the ability, maybe it's the ones that where we've got trifectas, we've got to do everything we can to stand up to what Donald Trump and Greg Abbott are trying to do.

35:43I just I'm not going to countenance anymore the idea that we're going to sit around and watch them do it and complain from the sidelines when we have the ability to stop them.

35:54Brian Tyler Cohen:We're kind of in the world of hypotheticals, but the reality is that the special legislative session was already called in Texas. They are meeting right now in Texas. There's no indication, at least as of right now, that they're stepping back. And so if Greg Abbott continues on exactly the path that we're in right now, would it be fair to say, to the extent that you can say definitively, that you would be willing to fight fire with fire and look toward calling, I don't know what the process would be in Illinois, but calling a legislative session to do exactly what they're doing in Texas and what Gavin Newsom has said that he'd be willing to do in California.

36:30Yeah. Like I said, everything's on the table. It's why I've spoken up about it. It's why I met with the Texas legislators. You know, they walked in the door and I know that they were here in Chicago to convince me. But before they opened their mouths, I said, you had me at hello, you know. And so I again, I've been at this fight for a very long time. You know, again, when I got elected in 2018, but also just days after Donald Trump got reelected in last November. You know, I said, you know, if you come for my people, you come through me. And I was saying that to Donald Trump. And I have fought every step of the way and almost been disappointed at how long it's taken many other Democrats who understand what's at stake here, but to get on to team fight.

37:18Brian Tyler Cohen:And can you dig into that a little bit, just this sense of fight? Because, I mean, look, as long as I've been covering democratic politics, there has been a sense of our goal on the left has always been to preserve the institutions. And look, I get it. I'm guilty of it, too. In the lead up to the 2024 election, I thought, perhaps naively now, in retrospect, that just appealing to folks' sense of the preservation of democracy was going to be enough to bring people to the table. Clearly it wasn't. And so that's that's why we're in the position that we're in right now. But just this sense of of where Democrats have been in the past and what you would like to see for Democrats moving forward as you know, we kind of look, it's going to the party has to look differently in 2026 than it did in 2024 by virtue of the fact that we lost the White House, the House and the Senate and, you know, by extension, the Supreme Court.

38:10Brian Tyler Cohen:So we don't control any branch of government here. And so we can either move forward and continue to make the same mistakes that we've made in the past, or we can have a new North Star in the party. And so how does that kind of inform your worldview of the of the party moving forward? Well, you're right, because we don't have control of the Congress, because we don't have control of the presidency and because we've got a cult of personality that's guiding the entire country right now because the Congress won't do anything to stop Donald Trump. The locus of power really has moved to the states.

38:44And that's why I know you've interviewed other governors. I really think governors are the front line of defense right now. Until we can take back the Congress. And I am confident that if we just play fair, if we just have a free and fair election in 2026, and these days that seems like asking for a lot from Republicans, but a free and fair election 2026, I believe we will win the Congress and be able to slow down or stop Donald Trump. But they're trying to cheat now. And so, look, when I think about the obligations that we have, we're going to have to think out of the box as a party. And I've been doing that, too.

39:25And I admitted several months ago when I spoke in New Hampshire that, you know, never before in my life have I called for mass protest for people to get out in the street and make their voices heard. But I do now because I really believe that if we don't do it now, we may never be able to do it again. I built a Holocaust museum. I was involved in that for many years. I am Jewish. I understand what happened in Nazi Germany. And the analogy that I draw is simply that the rights of people in Germany were taken away in a very short period of time. The constitutional republic that was the German republic was diminished and disappeared in 53 days.

40:17So think about what's happened in this country. Nobody could believe, and I said this before many years ago, that nobody could believe me when I said, you know, this could happen in the United States. And I'm not talking about the Holocaust. I'm really talking about specifically the power that a dictator took and then the whims of the dictator, you know, are whatever those are. But we have to be on guard right now as Democrats, not out there. The message about fighting for democracy, it's important. It certainly gets our base moving. But that's not what, you know, you knock on 100 doors and I've knocked on a lot of doors in my life.

40:57And you start to talk to people about democracy going away. People kind of roll their eyes.

41:02Brian Tyler Cohen:Yeah. But you talked about the effects of it, which are, you know, the question of affordability. I mean, do you think tariffs are working? And yet it's one man who's imposing a change, a fundamental change in our economy that's costing you, the taxpayers, to pay more for your goods. That's just one example. But I can go down the line of the things that are being taken away, the rights of people. I think most people are pro-civil rights, whether you're a Democrat or Republican, they believe in civil rights. He's taking those away. And so is the Congress. So I think we, you know, as a party, we need to be out there messaging about affordability, messaging about civil rights, messaging about do you think that Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid should be taken away?

41:49Because that is what they're aiming to do. And even Republicans who used to be believers in those are just going along because they're afraid of Donald Trump.

41:58Brian Tyler Cohen:Right. To that point of the impacts that, yes, Donald Trump as an authoritarian could have, but the actual impacts on regular people, you brought up the tariffs. You've signed an executive order in your state to push back against exactly that. Can you give some insight into what that would do and its effectiveness? Yeah, what we're trying to do is first to make clear what the costs really are, because I don't think most people understand what the tariffs are doing. They see it just, you know, in general as inflation and something natural. It's not. When you break out what's happening to the economy as a result of tariffs, we're talking about serious imposition of cost increases for people.

42:39You just heard today that he's imposing a 15 percent tariff on everything from Europe. Yeah. The number of things that you buy, they're our largest trading partner, Europe. And the number of things that you and I and everybody else buys that are from Europe, from Canada and Mexico, too, our best neighbors, our closest neighbors, our friends and the imposition of tariffs on them. But these tariffs are really bringing down our economy slowly but surely. There's uncertainty associated with them and then the tax. It doesn't get paid by foreigners. It doesn't get paid by other countries. It gets paid by American consumers.

43:20And so I just think we've got to make sure, and that's what we're doing here in Illinois, we're making sure people understand the cost of government is going up because of tariffs. And so our aim here is to first highlight it and then address it as best we can. You know, I've tried very hard to work with the Canadians and the Mexicans. You know, there are two largest trading partners here in Illinois. And what I've tried to do with them is to remind them that any retaliatory tariffs, they need to take into account that we're not imposing these tariffs in Illinois. Indeed, we don't want the tariffs and they should be aiming those retaliatory tariffs elsewhere on the states where the congressmen and senators are going along with President Trump.

44:06Brian Tyler Cohen:And have they been receptive to that idea? We saw a little bit of that when the trade war first broke out between the U.S. and Canada. And we had heard, I can't remember if it was if it was Carney or Trudeau or another member of parliament or whoever it may be, did come out and say that we're going to focus our attention on the states and the governors who are actually empowering Donald Trump to do what he's doing right now. And so have they been receptive to that idea? They indeed have. And I've had private conversations. I won't talk about the details of them or with whom, but I suffice to say that I've reached out to government officials, to diplomats representing Canada.

44:44And indeed, that is what they have said, that they're going to try to to do their best to focus this. They understand politics, democratic, little d democratic politics, just as well as anybody here in the United States. So I believe that they will do as you just described.

45:01Brian Tyler Cohen:Do you think that other Democratic governors in this country should follow your lead and and talk to international trading partners and say, hey, recognize that we are on the same side as you all. We also don't want these tariffs. We also understand the negative impacts that it's going to have on the economy and on trade. And so if you want to retaliate against what the United States is doing on behalf of Donald Trump, target your ire to the people who are actually emboldening and supporting him. Yeah. And remember, yes, I think other governors should be doing that. Remember that what we're talking about is this isn't about punishing some, not others.

45:38It is about, you know, affecting policy. That's what matters to the Canadians. It's what matters to the Europeans. Right. It's about changing attitudes in those states that have representation that is standing with Donald Trump and against the American consumer. Right. So they understand that. And again, most European countries, in fact, all the European countries are part of the European Union, are democracies. And so their voices, you know, they understand how our democracy works. And so they believe that they can help to shape American opinion.

46:15Brian Tyler Cohen:So I want to switch gears a little bit here to a different topic, certainly one that's kind of taken hold of our body politic for the last three and a half weeks, and that is the issue of Epstein. Can I have your reaction to the fact that, I mean, the most recent comment by Donald Trump was that he didn't, he finally came out and said that he didn't have the privilege of going to Epstein's Island, which was an interesting choice of words. But just this general, a general response to the fact that, you know, this was plaguing him for several weeks, finally had the opportunity to run overseas. Do you think that his international trip was a way to offer up something of a distraction so that for the fourth week in a row, he wouldn't have to talk about the issue that's been dogging him that he doesn't want to talk about?

46:57We don't know whether he's been to Epstein Island or not, just because he says that he didn't have the privilege. We don't really know. What we know is that Donald Trump promised his supporters that he would release this information and then went through the charade in the first several months in office as if, oh, yeah, we're going to go do that. And then I'm not sure what happened, right? Somebody must have told him something about information that would be released that made him change his mind. And so I think it's very suspicious that he didn't just say it during the campaign. He kept saying it while he was in office in the first several months.

47:36And then all of a sudden he's not going to do what he said he was going to do. I just now I really want to know before, you know, really. I mean, before I was like, I, you know, I'm not sure what to think about all of it. Now, I think I, you know, agree with a whole bunch of his supporters that why don't you just tell us what you know and what the Justice Department has. He's tried to point at the courts, of course, and blame judges for not releasing it. I mean, they have legal obligations to do the right thing. But the real question, I guess I have to ask is, what is he hiding? Do you have any concern that, you know, look, if Trump wanted transparency on this issue, he would release the files.

48:20Brian Tyler Cohen:They're in his possession. They're in the DOJ's possession. he's Pam Bondi is an appendage of Donald Trump. If he says to release them, she'll release them. He, of course, to your exact point, goes off to try and release some grand jury testimonies that he knew full well, the judges don't have the authority to release. And so he's trying to point our attention in different directions. But if he really wanted transparency, he would just release the files. With that said, he then sends Todd Blanche, his second in command at the DOJ, to sprint down to the courthouse in Florida to meet with Ghislaine Maxwell, who is the only living person who might have information that could or could not incriminate Donald Trump himself.

48:55Brian Tyler Cohen:And so do you have some concern that the fact that, you know, under the guise of transparency, which, again, is complete bullshit because if they wanted transparency, they would just release the files that they have. But under the guise of transparency, that they might offer something of a pardon or reduced sentence for Ghislaine Maxwell in return for her saying something that would absolve Donald Trump in the public sphere. I think we should all be deeply concerned about that because we've seen Donald Trump offer deals to people to benefit himself personally. Right. So, I mean, why would you think this is any different?

49:29And then add to that the cash Patel, who has got to be one of the biggest conspiracy theorists, you know, out there, one of the leading advocates for, you know, release the files, release the files for I don't know how long before Donald Trump got elected. Now he's the FBI director and said that the FBI has these files and they're in the control of the director of the FBI and that they should be really. He's now the director of the FBI. Why is he not? And not only that, but he's come out and said, oh, there's nothing there. Like there are no files. And Bondi, who said they're sitting on my desk.

50:07Oh, now there are no files. Right. I mean, I'm sorry, but it just doesn't match up with reality. I think we've got to not only ask questions, but demand answers.

50:18Brian Tyler Cohen:All right. Well, we will leave it there. Governor Pritzker, I appreciate your time and thank you for fighting as hard as you are. Great to talk to you, Brian.

50:28Brian Tyler Cohen:I'm joined by the governor of New York, Kathy Hochul. Thank you so much for taking the time. Thanks for having me, Brian. So we have watched right now as we are in the midst of a redistricting process in Texas that has really spilled out over, you know, onto the whole country. we've heard Gavin Newsom come out and offer to fight fire with fire. I spoke with Governor Pritzker from Illinois just a couple of days ago, and he offered to do the same thing in the event that this extreme partisan gerrymander, a gerrymander in Texas that goes even further than the already existing gerrymander in Texas goes.

51:00Brian Tyler Cohen:And so I ask this because we have sat idly by and watched Republicans gerrymander North Carolina, Wisconsin, Utah, Florida, Texas, states all across the country with no response from Democrats, because I think Democrats have been trying to practice good governance in hopes that it will be reciprocated by Republicans. Not only is it not being reciprocated, but they're weaponizing it even further. And so we only have a few states that could serve as weapons for Democrats to push back against what Republicans are doing. You're the governor of one of those states. And so what are you able to do? What could you commit to doing if this Texas gerrymander goes through?

51:40I will use every power I have to push back against this blatant abuse of power. It has gone on too far, as you said. We have a strong advocacy group of good government people in our state. They want independent redistricting. They want all this. It's an ideal world. But when we have our combatants, the other side cheating, rigging the system, like we can't sit on the sidelines. So I'm saying I will do what I can, partially looking at our constitution, because unlike other states, constitution, let me just say this, I think California does not have the same constraints that I have with my constitution.

52:23Mine says I cannot do anything for 10 years. Now, knowing that, guess what I'm planning to do? Push the legislature to change our Constitution. It takes two cycles of Congress. We'd have to pass in 2026, again in 2027, go on the ballot in the fall of 2027. But the earliest we could see a change would be for 2028. But I'll tell you why that's better than the status quo. Otherwise, we can't do anything until 2032. So I'll take four years ahead of the time. I wish I could do more for 2026. But our hands are tied with how we have to use the process to amend the Constitution. But I was sick and tired of this.

53:04They abuse us. We sit on the sidelines as a party. And I'm all about fighting back and fighting back hard and making them regret that they even tried to do this.

53:15Brian Tyler Cohen:Is there a world in which Democrats can go forward with a map immediately and wait for it to be challenged in court. I mean, oftentimes Republicans, and they've abused this process before, but they will move forward with litigation knowing that by the time it gets resolved, the Purcell doctrine kicks in, which is that it's too close to an election to change anything. And so when I say fight fire with fire, these are not novel theories. It's theories that have been used by the other party. And so is there any indication, is there any appetite to do something like that? Listen, Brian, I like where you're going, okay?

53:51The extreme times call for extreme measures. But I also know our court system in New York, they struck down, our Court of Appeals in New York State struck down the last redistricting, a plan that was favorable to Democrats. It was written to help Democrats. I assure you, it was written to help Democrats. And they struck it down immediately. So we can go through the exercise, but it also may create false expectations that we have any chance of being successful when just a couple of years ago, we lost trying to do the same thing. So that's something to talk about. I'll talk to our leaders. I'll talk to the legislature.

54:30I'm not averse to moves like that, but that is more messaging as opposed to any likelihood of success based on what we just went through and we tried it.

54:39Brian Tyler Cohen:What does it say that Democrats have largely relied on these independent redistricting commissions? And do you see a world in which there are, after a few years from now, any independent redistricting commissions left in Democratic states? Well, there certainly is an awakening, isn't it? I think for a long time, people thought that this was the right outcome. You want to make sure that citizens are involved, that you don't have people getting their political hands into this. But you know what? We get screwed in the process. We have to have people look out for our interests, which is making sure we save democracy, number one.

55:11That's rather important, particularly with this administration. But also, I happen to think more Democrats is better for our state. I want to have, unlike the seven Republicans that we have in New York who just voted to harm their own constituents with this horrific bill. So that's the outcome. I think more people hear about that. We need the good government groups who have enormous clout in this state to step back and say, you know what, we get it. We understand that was a nice reform, but not all of them make sense in the world we're living in today. These are different times.

55:45Brian Tyler Cohen:I understand that you're bound by certain laws in your state. There are other democratic states where, you know, California being one of them, obviously, which has different rules than yours. Again, I spoke to Governor Pritzker about what he's able to do in Illinois. We have Westmore down in Maryland. What would your advice be to other states where Democrats are in control, either in the legislature or the governor's office, where they might have a little bit more leeway than New York has in terms of redistricting? Don't sit on the sidelines. This is a battle for the ages. What Donald Trump has done by literally drawing out five Democratic elected members of Congress out of existence, disenfranchising particularly communities of color, this is beyond the pale.

56:32So I want everyone who has any ounce of power in their state and third Democrat or Democratic majorities, stand up because this is the moment when your country relies on you to show some courage.

56:45Brian Tyler Cohen:You know, you had mentioned the budget bill that was passed with the help of those Republicans who are in these close districts in New York. What kind of an impact is that going to have on their constituents as those effects start to kick in? Nearly 2 million New Yorkers will lose Medicaid, including 750 ,000 children. 300 ,000 families will lose the ability to put food on their table. I mean, those are just the most immediate. And I'm going to make sure that in the 2026 elections in those districts, all of those constituents, and most of them are in rural areas or suburban areas, they've got a lot of people who take advantage of this.

57:25There's a lot of rural poverty in New York, districts like Elise Stefanik's in the North Country. We have five hospitals that are on the verge of closing. This could push them over the edge. So we have plenty to message on. It is a shame that people have to suffer in order to get people to think about the consequences of elections, but they need to know who owns this. We'll do the best we can to help lift them up. But my gosh, they ought to have an awakening that someone that they trusted and believed in with their vote has turned their back and betrayed them.

57:59Brian Tyler Cohen:How do you navigate this issue knowing full well that they purposefully time this out so that the worst impacts, especially as they relate to food assistance and health care, Medicaid, won't take effect until after the midterm election. So they wanted to exact the most amount of pain with the least amount of political consequences. And so, you know, there's a difference between being able to say this is what's happening right now, which is where Republicans often are, versus what is going to happen in the future, namely in this instance, right after midterms, which is often where Democrats are.

58:33Brian Tyler Cohen:So how do you exploit the reality of the situation knowing that it was scientifically engineered to make it so that they wouldn't face consequences in this upcoming election? Well, they're conniving without a doubt. They knew exactly what they were doing. As you said, inflict the pain, but delay the consequences till after the election. That's why my job and the job of every Democratic governor is to, from the rooftops, go to their districts. I've already gone to three congressional districts. I have another one on Monday that I'm going to. I'm telling the constituents of these Republicans what is in store for them.

59:09And some counties and hospitals are already making cuts in anticipation of this. And while someone's stomach may not be growling in 2026, it's deferred until 2027 without the food assistance. I'm going to tell them it's coming. So I will do my best. It's not, you know, again, they're masters at this game of deceit.

59:29Brian Tyler Cohen:Yeah. And they may have won this round, but it doesn't mean I have to sit there and take it without fighting back. Can you talk about the impacts on rural hospitals? Because that's an especially pronounced phenomenon that's going to hit areas that are predominantly Republican voting. That's right. That's right. That's why this is so short-sighted. Anyhow, our healthcare system is going to take a$13.5 billion hit. About 3 billion direct assistance taken away from our hospitals. And what does that mean? hospitals will close. Now, I want to get the message out to all these constituents in those districts.

1:00:04It's not only the people on Medicaid who will be denied health care if the hospital's gone or they have to scale back on their services and providers leave. Everybody's going to be affected. People are expecting babies, someone injured in a traffic accident. They're not going to have coverage. They're going to go to a place that was once open and now it's going to be closed. so they'll have to travel great distance. I was just up in the most rural areas of our state. When I was a member of Congress, I won in the most Republican rural district we had. I fought hard because this is when Republicans were trying to take away Medicare.

1:00:39That was a lightning rod issue and I weaponized it against Republicans and no one thought I'd win this race in 2011. And I did because I've learned that if you hit people where their pocketbook is, their livelihood is, or their healthcare is, they will respond. So I take encouragement from that outcome to what we're going to be doing already are doing now to make them wear this. They have to be known. It has to be known who did this to them.

1:01:07Brian Tyler Cohen:And finally, let's finish off with this. And I want to go back to what we were speaking about at the top. Are you able to commit for this legislative session that we're in right now to have that first vote since we need to before there's any change to to the redistricting process? Are we able to do that right now? We don't need to do it right now because the session goes from this year into next year. So our members are out of session right now. Otherwise, I would be doing exactly what you're suggesting. But I can't speed up the process. Next year would be the same as this year. We still have to wait till 2027 for the second round.

1:01:45Brian Tyler Cohen:Is there an avenue in New York to call a special legislative session in very much the same way that Texas is doing? We could do it, but it won't make a difference. because we still have to get this. The legislative session is 2025 and 2026. So whether it's done in 2025 or 2026, it won't make a difference. I have examined every angle of this. I'm trying to get the advantage because I cannot stand the fact that they're going to put us at a disadvantage, harm our country, and harm our democratic values. So we're fighting back, but the process I outlined is viewed as money as extreme to change the Constitution and get this advantage.

1:02:25Brian Tyler Cohen:Extreme times call for extreme measures. And to be clear, it's not the Democrats who engaged in this process, but it certainly shouldn't be the Democrats who are going to lay down and allow them to have their way without any pushback. I understand how gerrymandering can be viewed as a race to the bottom, but the reality is we're already in that race. And so at this point, you can either unilaterally disarm or you can push back. We're fighting back. We're fighting back, Brian. Don't worry about that. I'm ready for this. We'll leave it there. Governor Hochul, I appreciate your time. All right. Thank you.

1:03:23Brian Tyler Cohen:timeline doesn't work out is because he said that he understood that Jeffrey Epstein took her from the spa at Mar-a-Lago. She worked for the spa at Mar-a-Lago around 2000. We know that she was trafficked and abused by Jeffrey Epstein in 2001. And then Donald Trump gave a quote to New York Magazine in 2002 saying that Jeffrey Epstein is a terrific guy, that he loves women almost as much as he does. And many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it. Jeffrey loves his social life. And so in terms of the potency with his base, with these people who voted on him, you know, focused on this idea that he's going to release these files, how damaging do you think this is?

1:04:05I mean, I don't know, but it's like there's not a lot of good explanations for the way the timeline works and what Donald Trump claims to have known and not known and said, because there is a scenario where you could imagine Donald Trump said, oh, I had no idea that it happened when it happened. Right. But then I found out through court filings much later that, oh, it was an employee of mine, blah, blah. But the reason that that can't be true is because Trump says that when it happened, he said to Epstein, don't poach my people. Right. And then said it again to him. So he is revealing that at the time he knew that he poached this girl when she was 16 years old.

1:04:49My question there is, one, why was Donald Trump involved in sort of the the HR goings on at Mar-a-Lago?

1:05:01Brian Tyler Cohen:How did he how did he know about this employee? One random employee amid thousands, maybe at some at his spa in one property. Did he did it was he under the false impression that Jeffrey Epstein operated a competing spa and that he was hiring this girl for that? Yeah. Did he not think it was weird that Jeffrey Epstein was hiring a 16 year old girl to be his personal masseuse and then told him to knock it off? It's unbelievable. So at the very least, best case scenario, Donald Trump knew that Jeffrey Epstein hired a 16 year old girl away from Mar-a-Lago and told him to knock it off and then said that Jeffrey Epstein was great.

1:05:36That's the best case.

1:05:38Brian Tyler Cohen:Right. What do you think then about the prospect of Ghislaine Maxwell speaking with the House Oversight Committee? Because they voted to force that deposition. So that's going to happen on August 11th. But Todd Blanche already met with her. They had a two day meeting. Look, the Trump administration has been dragging its feet on everything related to Epstein. They got Trump's pet, Mike Johnson, to literally kick Congress out of session so that we didn't have to have this thing come to a head. but they knew that the House Oversight Committee had voted this motion out of the Oversight Committee to compel the release of the files and to compel deposition from Ghislaine Maxwell.

1:06:12Brian Tyler Cohen:And so even though they've been dragging their feet on everything, they did find time to get Todd Blanche down to that Florida prison immediately so that he could talk to her. So how much of what we find out from Ghislaine Maxwell when we see that deposition do you put any stock in? Well, it may not happen now because now that she's met with Todd Blanche, her lawyers are saying she doesn't want to testify before Congress unless she gets full immunity. And now Congress, the Republicans in the House Oversight Committee are saying, well, no, no full immunity. And so, you know, who knows whether it's going to happen or not.

1:06:47But you could imagine a scenario where she talks to Todd Blanche and he's like, well, don't go testify before Congress if you can avoid it. Right. So I don't know if we're going to hear from her or not. And if we do hear from her, what is she going to share? What's she not going to share? Right. She was granted partial immunity, we know now, by Todd Blanche. For what?

1:07:05Brian Tyler Cohen:Well, the way I think about it, and this is, I always feel myself sounding conspiratorial, but if you're Todd Blanche and Ghislaine Maxwell, and you've already promised her a pardon, let's say, which Trump has shown to be fully willing to abuse, I would also want to just say, be transparent about what I did offer so that nobody would think that I was hiding anything else. And look, the immunity stuff while he's talking to her, like, what do they call it? queen for a day or just this partial temporary immunity um that that is bad enough it's it's inappropriate enough for you know an accused pedophile and sex trafficker bad enough of on its own that if we saw that we would say wow that's that's really shitty they must be revealing it they must be telling the truth because otherwise why would they even say it but it's so that they can say look we we're being fully transparent even this thing that's pretty shitty we're letting you know, but I would guess that it's so that if there was a pardon offered, we would think we've already gotten full transparency on the immunity thing.

1:08:02I think his plan going in there was probably to just first find out what she knows and what she could say. Yeah. And he also then has to figure out if he's, you know, if he's playing games here, he has to figure out, okay, uh, what she said, if she, if she decides to say, okay, I won't say anything about Trump in exchange for a pardon. He's also got to make sure that what she knows isn't memorialized anywhere else and that no one else can say that because then they're in even bigger trouble.

1:08:30Brian Tyler Cohen:Well, yeah. I mean, there is the risk of if he does give her a pardon. First of all, it wouldn't happen until January 19th, 2029. But the reality is, like, if that was promised, the damage is already done and we wouldn't know for years still. And what she admits when she's speaking with Congress will be just as important as what she actually says. I will say this, though. Donald Trump gives Glenn Maxwell a pardon. I do not think that is going to solve his problems with his base. Yeah, because people thought that they were voting for Trump so he could release the Epstein files and said he released his co-conspirator.

1:09:07Brian Tyler Cohen:But will it matter if it happens in January of twenty twenty nine, the day before he leaves, leaves office? You know, I don't I don't even know that he'll wait that long. I guess he could wait that long. Yeah. But he could also say. I certainly wouldn't. I certainly wouldn't want to see that news. If he waits that long, then people are going to be like, well, what's what's going on with Ghislaine Maxwell? Yeah. Why? Why don't we know more? What's going on with the Epstein file? So he's he really is. I don't know. I think he's a little stuck. Not to get too meta on this, but, you know, this has been a topic of conversation for almost a month now, which is an extraordinary amount of time for anything.

1:09:37Brian Tyler Cohen:Unless you're a Republican talking about Hunter Biden, then you have an insatiable appetite for this. But I'm curious what you think the potency of something like this is as more and more time goes on. And, you know, obviously other issues are coming into the zeitgeist. How could we how could we miss this Sidney Sweeney scandal that's enveloping this country? I certainly didn't. But but how how how are you thinking about this in terms of keeping it in the zeitgeist and continuing to talk about it? I think this is part of a larger story about Donald Trump that he so far in his six months in office has spent a lot of time protecting and helping fellow elites and not a lot of time doing what he promised people he would do, which is lower their costs.

1:10:19Yeah. And so if you look at Donald Trump over the last six months, we're paying for paying a billion dollars for him to retrofit a jet from Qatar that he got that he gets to take with him as a keepsake. He had today. He announced that he's a building 200 million dollar ballroom in the White House because he thinks that not what he promised the voters in Michigan because he likes a ballroom. Uh, he, you know, he's, he's making money hand over fist from crypto. Uh, he was yelling at Josh Hawley because of, uh, there, Josh Hawley was trying to work with Democrats to pass a ban on stock trading by members of Congress and the vice president and the president.

1:10:54And Trump thought that, uh, it was gonna, it was gonna force him to sell off Mar-a-Lago because it's gonna require people to divest of their assets if they're in office, even though they carved out an exception to make sure it doesn't apply to Trump. The Republicans did. Yeah. So like, he's doing great. He's protecting his friends. He's helping his friends. And everyone else who was hoping that there'd be lower prices, you know, the tariff rates just went out and we're all going to be paying more money for all the shit we buy from overseas. Yeah. Permanently. 10, 15 to 50 % tax on shit.

1:11:25Brian Tyler Cohen:Yeah. Which, by the way, they're still bizarrely framing as some win. I mean, when they announce a 15 % tariff on the EU, that is a consumption tax on Americans. That means we pay 15%. Like, like, I don't know how these people continue to frame it as a win when they're just showing us how money they how much money they are taxing Americans that on a tax that did not exist before. But I think you're exactly right. This is a small part of a larger whole. Donald Trump has promised his supporters in his first term that he was going to usher in some manufacturing renaissance that never materialized and a jobs boom that never materialized and an infrastructure law and health care plan that was more comprehensive and and more affordable.

1:12:03Brian Tyler Cohen:None of that happened. All he did was spend his political capital on tax cut for millionaires and billionaires. Did the same thing this term. Promised his supporters that he felt their pain on grocery prices, that bizarre term groceries, on eggs, on rent, on housing. And what did he do when he got into office? Besides start a trade war that sent the prices of all of those things fucking up, he also passed another tax cut for millionaires and billionaires. Rendered his tax cut permanent for those same people. So he will say whatever he needs to say on the campaign trail, including that he's going to be the guy that's going to go after this deep state cabal of people who are completely unaccountable to live on a second tier of justice that allows them to commit these crimes with impunity.

1:12:45Brian Tyler Cohen:And far from doing that, far from exposing these people, he's entrenching the very system he promised to take down because these are the people that he's looking to help, not the people he's looking to expose. No, he cares about himself and maybe he cares about people around him only to the extent that they can help him. Right, right. Okay, so I want to switch gears a little bit here and talk about Kamala Harris's decision not to run for governor of California. I think that we're probably both in agreement, without even having spoken about this before, that that means that she likely wants to run for president of the United States.

1:13:17Brian Tyler Cohen:Curious about your thoughts on that? No, I don't think. I think that this might be it for her. Really? I do. But I don't know. I mean, the presidency is possible for sure. But I was not surprised by her decision on governor for this reason. We, being here in Los Angeles and California, we've really been in the mix in the last six months in the national news. We've been in Trump sites on a lot of things. And there were a lot of opportunities Kamala Harris had to speak out. And she definitely put out statements and stuff like that. But having seen her sort of stay out of the limelight in these last months, it made me think that she just didn't really want to run for governor, which is totally her right.

1:14:00Because I think if she wanted to run for governor, I even think if she wants to run for president, like, you're out there, you're talking, you're fighting, you're doing all this stuff. And, like, obviously she was writing a book during this time, and after an election like that, you get a lot of time to just chill out, right? but it seemed to me that the lack of appearances or the minimal appearances meant that her heart was not in the race at least the governor's race because that's 2026 um i'm going to be interested to see when she does this book tour she's got a book coming out she's gonna that's in september she's on colbert um how she talks about the book and how she talks about everything that happened because if it's backward looking if it's what she learned stuff like that then i feel like maybe she doesn't want to run again if she jumps right in and starts talking about Donald Trump and 2020 and all this kind of stuff, then maybe.

1:14:47But I do think that everyone else who might run in 2028 has been out there a lot.

1:14:51Brian Tyler Cohen:Yeah. But but I actually I got a different read of it. And I thought that the reason that she was and I still think the reason that she's staying out of the spotlight right now is to kind of keep her powder dry and not let herself get overexposed in the same way that a lot of politicians do. Thinking that, you know, look, Barack Obama doesn't speak often. And when he does, it's a big deal. And it usually gets gets quite a bit of coverage. And so I think that I think that she may be trying to go that avenue where, you know, OK, I'm only going to make a few comments. And when I do, it'll be big and splashy as opposed to getting too overexposed in this media environment.

1:15:23Brian Tyler Cohen:And that'll kind of give her a feeling of gravitas when she does speak that everybody listens. I think and this goes for everyone in democratic politics. I don't think there's such a thing as overexposure anymore. I think that after, for better or for worse, mostly worse, after Donald Trump's first term, American people have come to expect that their leaders and their presidents and other people who represent them are going to talk all the time and communicate to them all the time. And it's just it's an expectation we have partly because of the information environment we're in. We're on our feeds all the time.

1:15:58And so, like, if someone's not in our face, we forget about them. And, yes, that's right about Obama. Obama's also not running for anything anymore. And I would argue that I think Obama could talk more and it wouldn't make his voice less powerful. Like, I think he could be out there more if he wanted. But again, he's not running. And I do think for all the candidates who might run in 2028, I think the expectation in today's information environment is that in this political crisis that we're in right now, in this emergency that we're in with Trump, that you're going to be out there and you're going to be fighting and talking.

1:16:34and you know I don't think it's too late for her to do that if she wants to run in 2028 I started thinking it was too late for governor yeah but I don't think it's too late for 2028 but I do think if if she wants to run in 2028 like just like everyone else and look this goes for like I haven't seen Josh Shapiro out there a lot and he's probably gonna run in 2028 and then there are people like Newsom and Pritzker and and other folks who are out there a lot Pete and yeah yeah yeah and they're out there a lot right now and I I think and that may have been the right strategy years ago to like keep your powder dry.

1:17:03I think in this environment, you got to be out there as much as possible.

1:17:06Brian Tyler Cohen:Okay. And finally, let's finish off with this. As we are looking at kind of the evolution of the Democratic Party, we just spoke about, you know, who this, you know, next slate of 2028 candidates might be. Although we'll talk more about the horse race stuff covered, you know, horse race stuff as we get closer to it. Some, a bit of a sea change that we're seeing in the Democratic Party is there was the Bernie Sanders amendment to block the sale of weapons to Israel, and we had a record number of Democrats vote in favor of it. Ultimately, the amendment failed. But I'm curious how you think that this issue is impacting the Democratic Party moving forward, given what we saw out of the Senate.

1:17:41So Gallup had a new polling this week. 32 % of Americans support Israeli military action in Gaza right now. That's the lowest it's ever been. That was a 10 point drop from just this September, last September. And when you break that down by party, only 8 % of Democrats, 8 % of Democrats support Israeli military action. And Netanyahu is at his worst approval that's ever been recorded by Gallup in that poll as well. And I think that the reason that so many Democrats and so many Americans have turned against this is because of the images that we're all seeing on our TV. I think that just based on what's actually happening there, you know, there were 500, 600 aid trucks coming into Gaza before the ceasefire was broken in late May.

1:18:30And then they instituted a blockade for all food and aid. And they set up four sites for two million people so people could get food. Over a thousand people have been shot trying to get food. It's very difficult to go and get food when there's only four sites and there's basically no food allowed in. except for this GHF, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, so people are starving. Two million people right now are on the brink of starvation. And when you see that and you think, okay, well yes, Hamas should of course release the hostages. Hamas is at fault for the horrific massacre on October 7th. Hamas, Israel has a right to retaliate, to try to eliminate Hamas, for sure.

1:19:12But how many more kids are going to die? How many more kids have to die before we say, Okay, this is a country where our tax dollars are funding Netanyahu's military campaign. They are funding, so we are sending them bombs and guns, but they, and according to the Geneva Convention, if you are at war and you are the country that is occupying a place that you fought in a war, you are responsible for feeding and caring for that population. That is, and Israel is a signatory to the Geneva Conventions. They're not doing that. Okay? And they can say, we're trying, it's not happening. People are starving.

1:19:51And that's real. And so I think Americans are seeing that. I think Democrats are seeing that. I think the Democratic senators who voted that way saw it. There's 27 senators voted with Bernie. And Slotkin was on Colbert, so she couldn't vote. But she just released a statement saying that she would have voted to block it as well. These are senior establishment Democrats, moderate Democrats, Democrats who have been very strong supporters of Israel for a long, long time. So this is not like lefties, you know, and I just think it's because of what we're seeing.

1:20:22Brian Tyler Cohen:Yeah, I completely agree. I mean, watching all of that unfold is beyond – I mean, it's one of the most horrific things that I've ever seen. And I think the most egregious part of this is watching Benjamin Netanyahu come forward and just in a very Trumpian way start to suggest that all of the things that we're seeing with our own eyes are not happening, that they're not blocking any of the food, that there's no starvation. I mean, there was a point where he said that they're not starving, that there's no starvation happening. How do you square those two things? How do you look at the images that you're seeing that are just sweeping across the Internet, sweeping across television as well, and square the fact that what he says is not happening is very clearly happening?

1:21:09I mean, I've never seen sort of denial of reality in this severe. I mean, the thing that will stick with me forever is, you know, the New York Times ran this picture of a mother holding her 18-month-old who, you know, just looks starving, ribs protruding, horrifying.

1:21:29Brian Tyler Cohen:I didn't think it was real when I saw it. And a bunch of people said, well, they have neglected to mention in the article that the kid was born with a preexisting condition that made him look like this. but that doesn't mean he wasn't he isn't also being starved yeah right so they got a correction in the new york times for this right that the kid was born with a pre-existing condition but then the reporting that says the kid is still starving right is upheld yeah and no one is challenging that reporting right and i'm like so your gotcha on this is that hey it wasn't just a picture of a starving kid it was a picture of a starving disabled kid right i just i don't understand.

1:22:11So, you know, it's sad to me. It's infuriating, too, that people can't just see that maybe your pre-existing notions of what's going on, maybe they might be wrong. Maybe just let a little doubt into your thoughts on what's happening in Israel. Even if you've been a strong supporter of Israel, it's okay. But just let that doubt creep in.

1:22:31Brian Tyler Cohen:Yeah. And I think one thing that really that really obsessed me about all of this is the way where it's so unapologetically to the benefit of Bibi to continue perpetuating this crisis so that nobody else is focusing on any of his other legal issues. When in reality, I mean, look, as an American Jew, Jews have obviously always faced some degree of anti-Semitism and discrimination. But if Bibi thinks that this is helping the Jewish cause by doing what he's doing and taking a hard line against all this stuff and perpetuating the starvation of these kids. Like all it's doing is, I mean, if you want to talk about eliminating the goodwill that the world had for Israel after October 7th, that is like, that is baked into the cake to the nth degree.

1:23:24Brian Tyler Cohen:But he, I mean, he's just, he's making it so that any Jew around the world, like to have to defend this. I mean, the reality is, unfortunate though it may be, is that what happens in Israel in some kind of tangential way reflects on Jews across the world. And when we see that, that doesn't help the Jewish cause. It explodes anti-Semitism across the world. And so you think that you're doing something good by taking a hard line in terms of what's happening in Gaza, when in reality, I mean, you've eviscerated any goodwill that the world had for Israel. And we've seen now that France has announced that it will recognize statehood for Palestine.

1:24:07Brian Tyler Cohen:Canada will do the same thing. And so what is the benefit here? And I mean, I'm asking, you know, we'll finish with this question, but like, what is the benefit here as far as Benjamin Netanyahu is concerned, aside from offering up some distraction to benefit Benjamin Netanyahu. Yeah, even if you take the view that Israel's actions here should be helping Israel, it's still, by that standard, it is still a failure. Because there are kids, there are people who are just kids when October 7th happened now, who are now in the IDF, who are fighting and dying, There's Israeli soldiers that are still there.

1:24:47The thinking from Netanyahu was, oh, if we do this blockade, it'll squeeze Hamas and Hamas will release the hostages. There's one hostage that has been released since the blockade of food in late May. And that was due to a it's an Israeli American. And that was due to a side deal between Hamas and the Trump administration. So Bibi has not negotiated the release of any hostages since then. Hamas is still, you know, I think they've said like 25 % of Hamas has been destroyed. And so they're still in the tunnels. He hasn't, he has not achieved that objective. So he hasn't, he hasn't eliminated Hamas.

1:25:24He hasn't released the hostages. And the IDF, Israeli soldiers are still fighting and dying. And 2 million people are on the brink of starvation. And 60 ,000 plus have died. And hundreds of thousands are wounded.

1:25:38Brian Tyler Cohen:Israel's reputation is in tatters. So it was like, I don't know how this has helped Israel in any way. Yeah. Yeah. How much of a sea change do you think that this is going to usher in? You had mentioned that even these pro-Israel Democrats are starting to vote for this stuff. How much of a sea change do you think that this will kind of usher in as we look ahead? I mean, this is unless, you know, Bibi relents, this is only going to get worse. It can only get worse. Nothing gets better as people continue to starve. And so as you look forward into the Democratic caucus and the Senate and in the House, how do you think this is going to change things?

1:26:19Yeah, I mean, it very much, I think, depends on what happens with the war, right? And so we don't know how the war is going to go, when's it going to end, if it's going to end, how much more damage is going to be caused. But I will say, if Bibi Netanyahu is in power and this thing is continuing, then I think in 26 and 28, I think you're going to see more Democrats say enough is enough. and just because Israel is an ally and a close ally, they have a right-wing government led by a corrupt individual, Bibi Netanyahu, some much worse ministers in the government and continuing to use U.S. tax dollars to fund this military campaign that is killing people, starving people.

1:27:07I think you're going to have more Democrats say, no, we don't want to do that. We're going to condition aid or we're going to vote to block weapons sales like they did.

1:27:13Brian Tyler Cohen:So, OK, so that's that's the moral argument. I want to ask one last political question here, and that is that, you know, for a long time, Jews have been a larger base of support for Democrats than even evangelicals have been for Republicans. I can't remember if it was the Pew polling from 2022 that said like something like 78 percent of Jews voted for Democrats, which was a higher number than even evangelicals who had voted for Republicans. So this is the base of support. There are going to be a lot of American Jews for whom their allegiance to Israel is important enough that notwithstanding what's happening, they're still going to try to find a home in a political party that supports Israel.

1:27:52Brian Tyler Cohen:And so could this be an instance where Republicans want this sea change to happen, politically speaking, so that they can say, hey, there's a there's a big swath of American Jews out there who used to identify as Democrats. Now, because they see Democrats erring on the side of of, you know, solving what's happening in Gaza. Now, now there's political upside for us because these people are now gettable. How do you think about that? I think when you get to approval of what Israel is doing down to 8 % among Democrats, that is not just the Jewish population. In fact, I think if you did a cross-section of who that 8 % is, it's probably people from all walks of life.

1:28:39Yeah. And so I don't. And on the Republican side, you're already seeing sort of a split there where a lot of the younger MAGA types and, you know, everyone from Marjorie Taylor Greene to Steve Bannon to Tucker Carlson, all these to Theo Vaughn. Yet they are all very, they are starting to oppose what Israel is doing.

1:29:00Brian Tyler Cohen:And so you have, you know, the Dan Pfeiffer school of talk about issues that unite your party and divide the other party. And in fact, this falls pretty neatly into that bucket. If you have only 8 % of Democrats who are supportive of what's going on and you see splintering on the other side, then this is an issue that actually won't redound to the Republicans' benefit. Politically speaking, it's actually more advantageous on the left. Yes, but I do think, and I think back to the debate around Iraq, and it is always tempting to figure out where you're going to stand on these issues based on, at least partially, public opinion.

1:29:37Yeah. And and I think at the end of the day, this is about war and peace. This is life and death. And you've got to decide what you as you're seeing this. These images unfold. You know, the facts on the ground with all the information you have. I think if you're an elected official, you've got to decide how you feel about this. and if you feel a way about it that is different than your constituents, you've got to do the best job you can explaining why you feel that a different way. But I think it never, ask all the Democrats who voted for the authorization to fight in Iraq how they feel about voting for that authorization now.

1:30:14Looking back on it, because at the time, if you didn't vote for it, you were with the terrorists or you were weak. and you know you were so I think that it is important to do what you believe is right as always but especially when it comes to issues of war and peace

1:30:29Brian Tyler Cohen:yeah well highly recommend for everybody who's watching right now if you are not yet subscribed to Pod Save America's YouTube channel go ahead and subscribe I'm going to put the link right here on the screen and also in the post description if you're listening on the podcast I'll put it in the show notes doesn't cost you anything to subscribe but it's very important to help build up this progressive media ecosystem so that when somebody new comes online is looking for content they're not automatically sorted into right-wing content. And as we know, right-wingers have a much bigger advantage than the left does in terms of getting their content out there.

1:30:58Brian Tyler Cohen:If you go online, you start scrolling, eventually you will fall into a right-wing rabbit hole. So we're trying to push back against that. So again, I'm going to put that link on the screen and also in the post description. Favs, appreciate your time. Thanks, Brian. Thanks again to Wes Moore, J.B. Pritzker, Kathy Hochul, and Jon Favs. That's it for this episode. Talk to you next week. You've been listening to No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen Produced by Sam Graber, music by Wellesley and interviews edited for YouTube by Nicholas Nicotera If you want to support the show, please subscribe on your preferred podcast app and leave a 5-star rating and a review And as always, you can find me at Brian Tyler Cohen on all of my other channels or you can go to briantylercohen.com to learn more