1117: Trump Threatens to Steal the Midterms

24:11It's totally ridiculous. But I do think this is a pretext. and if pretext, like along the ways we talked about. So there is what the federal government can do. And then what can you do if you create this, you know, let's say they find, they make something up, they doctor something, they find one ballot where the signature didn't match, even though they were all matched by hand because of how this went. And they use this to suggest fraud. So then that can lead to a couple of things. That can lead to, not just for pretext for federal government action, it can lead to getting Republican election officials to change how votes are received or counted or certified, to change procedures or laws to limit mail-in voting, early voting, making the signature match that much harder, throwing more ballots out, purging the rolls again, ways to do that.

25:01Now, they are limited in what they can do because a lot of the places, especially a lot of places where the House races will be decided are in states run by Democrats, California, New York, a lot of states in the Midwest. in Pennsylvania, including Pennsylvania and then Pennsylvania. But, you know, the Senate, the path to the Senate runs through red states. Yeah, I was going to say the states with Republican governors that are going to matter in 2026, both in the Senate and in the House to an extent as well. Iowa, Ohio, Texas, Georgia, Florida, Alaska. Yep. And those are the ones. And, you know, like Maine, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Michigan, Minnesota, all Democratic governors.

25:37There's some house seats in Arizona, Democratic governor, Pennsylvania, Democratic governor. But yeah, that's the concern there. And that's where they can really fuck with things. And do they need this fake 2020 ballot thing to do that? Absolutely not. But it would make Trump happy if they found it. And when he talked, the Fulton County thing, it's not necessarily if they find something and make a big deal of it, it's the federal government that can do something. But if the Fulton County Elections Board is now majority MAGA, then they can just get them to, you know, to put in place restrictions, controls, whatever it may be, which they will.

26:13Yeah. And so people understand Fulton County is where Atlanta is. This is where the overwhelming majority of Democratic votes are. And so if you were able to reduce turnout in Atlanta through a series of things that you can do, they can be explicit, like changing voting procedures. It can be, but also as implicit and devious as reducing the number of machines in a certain precincts so that the lines are too long people to vote etc then that would really hurt john john ossoff's chances to win if he can't count on a huge chunk uh the same chunk of votes that he's gotten warnock's gotten and joe biden got in 2020 out of fulton county i've been wondering about the tulsi angle as well why is the director and he's talking about foreign governments in that interview foreign governments there's some cheating interference i hadn't realized because when i I was going down the rabbit hole on the executive order to seize the voting machines from 2020.

27:08I realized that that one of the orders that he was going to use as justification or thought about using as justification to seize the machines is about foreign election interference. And it was basically saying if they if there's, you know, evidence of foreign interference, then a it authorizes him to, you know, levy economic sanctions on the country, but also to somehow seize the voting machines to look at them for national security. security reasons because they have been attacked somehow by foreign governments. So I do think that's the Tulsi angle. Yeah. Once again, not a master plan here in the sense that most of right-wing big lie, stop the steel world is so fucked up in the head that they think Venezuela was involved in this.

27:52They thought Chavez was doing this from the grave at one point. There's a lot of speculation online that Maduro is going to cut a plea agreement by copying to some sort of Venezuelan experience. We know that, even though this is not far in interference, but we know that Tulsi Gabbard was investigating some conspiracy in Puerto Rico connected to Venezuela. Like, we are so far through the looking glass of insanity with the things that is guiding this conversation that it all comes back to this international stuff. And they would love after Russia, Russia, Russia to have some make this argument that, no, it was actually Venezuela or Cuba or some other country that interfered with our elections that cost Trump, you know, the office.

28:37One other on this topic before we go, one other scoop that Crooked Media got, or Matt Berg, again, just crushing it. You know, Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguiar from Nevada. So he talked to Matt and told him that Aguiar and basically all the Secretaries of State got an email from the FBI organizing a call in a couple weeks with all the various agencies in the federal government to talk about election security. And Agriar told Matt, I was just like, this is the strangest thing in the world that the FBI is reaching out to us and trying to coordinate election security. It has never happened in the past.

29:17The casualness with which they did is just beyond crazy. And Matt got a hold of the email and it is just like, Like, hey, everyone. Hey, every secretary of state. This is the FBI reaching out. We're going to do a call soon. What? Like, in this Trump administration, especially in this poorly run FBI, like, that can be one of two things. It could be some fucking doofus organizing a grand conspiracy to steal an election. Or it could be one soon-to-be-fired, well-meaning bureaucrat in the department who wants to actually secure our elections. You just never know. Or both. The person gets fired, and then they're like, wait, I have an idea now.

29:54Yeah, exactly. So, you know, something to keep an eye on. But I think too big for everyone listening, too big to rig. Unless you're a Democratic official, then, you know, make sure that you let... Just start talking tough if you're Democratic official. Yeah. You have some state troopers. You got some National Guard. Fucking use it. All right. Let's talk about the... Just think about that for a second. Oh, well, that's, you know, it's going to be too late once we're in an election and be like, oh, how did the voting machines get stolen and the ballots are gone? Now what are we going to do? Pod Save Blue America, coming to you in 2027 after the Civil War starts.

30:26You know. All right. Let's talk about the latest with Trump's invasion of Minnesota. Borders Are Tom Homan announced this week that 700 Department of Homeland Security officers will be leaving Minneapolis. That leaves about 2 ,000 in place. And the way the White House is thinking about the mass deportation campaign doesn't seem to have changed very much at all. Trump and Tom Yamas of NBC talked about this a lot in the interview. Here's a sampling. I learned that maybe we can use a little bit of a softer touch, but you still have to be tough. I'm not happy with the two incidents. It's not, you know, it's both of them, not one or the other.

31:07He was not an angel and she was not an angel. You know, you look at some tapes from back, but still, I'm not happy with what happened. Nobody could be happy and ICE wasn't happy either. Two people. It's bad. I hate it. I hate even talking about it. Two people out of tens of thousands. OK. And you get bad publicity. Nobody talks about all of the murderers that were taken out of our country. They don't talk about. But it was two Americans. They don't talk about. We have the smallest trucks. As an example, we've been very tough on the waters and soon, you know, pretty much overall. But if you look at the waters where we knock out boats.

31:49think of think of all the people think of all the americans ice agents haven't killed why aren't we getting publicity for that you kill two americans and suddenly everyone's up your ass just complaining about this and that but think of how many boats we've blown up isn't that cool think of how many potentially innocent people we executed on the high seas i went through that same journey with Tom Yamas in real time, which was the waters. The waters. Oh, the waters. Well, you don't know if he's going to talk about how he saved Los Angeles by turning on the water in Northern California so it could come down the map.

32:27Or the shower heads. Yeah, and the shower heads. There's a lot of waters. The toilet sit wouldn't flush. You just don't know. This is a man focused on water. He's been very tough on the waters. But, you know, what he's trying to do there, of course, is the message, and you see this from Stephen Miller and J.D. Vance and all the rest of them on Twitter, all they do is they're like, Like, well, you know, we don't hear the Democrats showing any sympathy or remembering the people that undocumented immigrants have murdered. What? What the fuck does that? What does that have to do with anything? Yes, people who murder other people should be arrested.

32:59And if eligible for deportation, deported. And if not, thrown in jail after a trial. That's America. Welcome. them yeah like it's totally unconnected to ice agents shooting two american citizens in the street and then the administration lying about the incidents for the world to see you think that uh you think trump's trump's answer there that's the right messaging for a national tv audience that will be watching the full interview during the super bowl yeah are they gonna air the full interview well everyone kept saying it's the super bowl is it is it like during the super bowl is it before it's it is i mean john we only did this for eight years it is it airs in the pregame long before the super bowl usually before people's even right this is the one that you advised joe biden not to do i was just thinking that it had been two years since that debate two years since that and i guess no one did one last year because well i guess trump did trump do one last year i don't remember no idea who knows time but this year if you tune in before the super bowl begins if you're just milling about you're filling out your super bowl squares you are uh you know wait in line to get access to the six foot sub or the wings and do you just hear trump say that two people who were murdered who the vast majority of americans think were unjustly killed were no angels no angels in fairness they were no angels i hate i hate that they died but think of all the people think of all the people who weren't murdered in fairness to who yeah right yeah just oh my god um trump also said on thursday that he's definitely not going to fire Kristi Noem and Republicans in Congress don't seem very open to even modest reforms to rein in DHS and ICE.

34:39Democrats sent Republicans a list of 10 demands this week that include banning masking, racial profiling, military style weapons and raids near schools and daycare centers. They also want to require body cams and ensure better conditions and congressional oversight at detention facilities. They also want to ensure, you know, that you that you go find a warrant before you arrest someone. Wild idea. Or before you break into someone's home. Usually they think that's a crazy extremist idea from the Democrats. But then again, lead negotiator for the Senate Republicans, Katie Britt, called the letter, quote, political posturing and, quote, a ridiculous Christmas list of demands for the press.

35:22A reminder that there's a two-week clock on these negotiations before the Department of Homeland Security either shuts down or gets funded at current levels. What's the best play for Democrats here? Democrats have to recognize that the American people are on their side here. And it's not just Democrats. It's not just independents. You have a quarter of Republicans who believe in a recent Data for Progress poll that ICE should not be funded without real guardrails on what ICE is doing. And so I do think they have to narrow that list. And so one, recognize that you have the political high ground here.

35:57You have limited legislative leverage, like we should be very clear, but you do have the political high ground. And I think that you should narrow that list to three, maybe four very popular, easy to understand very substantial guardrails. I would, on that list, I would include no masks, body cams. I know Chrissy Noem said she was going to put in body cams, but let's have a law about it. And that law should contain, as Janet Mill said to me in our interview, like requirements to make sure that footage is saved for transparency. Number three, independent, transparent investigations into the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretty.

36:35And number four is warrants. Warrants. A judicial warrant. Warrants is at the very top of the list for me. Really, this is asking. Way more than masks. Yeah. And I guess the fifth thing, if I was going to do a fifth thing, is to ensure that ICE and CBP have to operate with the same use of force and other standards as the rest of federal law enforcement, including the FBI. Yeah. Those are very simple, very popular things that would make a difference. They're not going to solve all of the problems with ICE. Far from it. It's not going to abolish ICE or anything like that. But if you could get those or some of those, it would make a difference.

37:10And that is a position of strength to argue from. Yeah, I think if you're going for something that every American understands, banning warrantless arrests, I think that'll get people going. Because, you know, John Thune today, he basically agreed with Katie Britt that like, oh, these demands aren't serious. And he's like, well, if, you know, the Department of Homeland Security shuts down, then that means TSA will shut down and we could have some of those travel problems. And it's like, you know, if you want to tell people your plane is delayed, your flight is canceled because Donald Trump refuses to require ICE agents to get a warrant before they arrest you or break into your home.

37:51I think you could probably win that battle. I will be bringing this up to you in about a week when we're flying home from Australia to see how you feel if our flight is canceled. You know, there's just extra time in Australia. I mean, I do think like at some point that's going to happen, right? They're not going to agree to this shit. Yeah. They're just not. And so we're going to head to a shutdown and then it's going to be who is who feels more pressure about the fact that there are flight delays. Right. Is that where we're heading? Yeah. I mean, the Republicans did like the fact that they agreed to this in the first place suggests that they feel real political vulnerability here.

38:29Now, the attention is starting to focus elsewhere. There's less attention on Minnesota. They sort of pulled the we're de-escalating bullshit, and attention turned. The narrative switched a little bit. But they're still in a really bad place here on immigration and ICE. It's a huge vulnerability for them. Both sides are talking tough right now. The question is – nothing is getting resolved in the next however many days we have left here. of the question is, can you do another short-term extension to keep negotiating another couple of weeks? I think that would be a very reasonable thing for Democrats to do.

39:04These are big changes and just to think that you're going to get them done in 10 days is hard to imagine, but maybe you get another short-term extension. I'm not sure the Republicans want this fight as much as they like Democrats that think they want this fight. I think that's true. I wonder if Democrats have the stomach and are ready strategically when the shutdown happens, if and when the shutdown happens, to go out there and stick with the fight. Because I just, you got to, like, you know, we're right back to ACA subsidies, which by the way, negotiations over the ACA extensions are over. Yeah.

39:41So there will be no ACA extension at all. Even though the Republicans felt like maybe they, you know, felt a little pressure. But once again, news moved on. And so they feel like they can get away with it. I mean, news moved on. The American people did not move on. Correct. So they will pay a stiff price for this one in the fall. I think the question is not, do Democrats – like, we can say, do Democrats have the right communications plan? Are they going to be able to do all the right things? I think they did a pretty good job during the last shutdown. The question is, are those Democrats who reopened the government, what's their stomach?

40:14Yeah. Right? Like, that is the question. Because I think the vast majority of Democrats will go up in the House, definitely in the House, and certainly in the Senate, will go to the mattresses on this. It's that last group there that you have to worry about. And I just don't know where they will come down on this since they were so willing to fold back in December or November, I guess that was. Just to give everyone an idea of what a nightmare DHS is right now, there's a story that caught our eye this week about DHS lawyer Julie Lee, who had been detailed to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Minnesota from the Department of Homeland Security.

40:50On Tuesday, a judge pressed her on why ICE violates so many court orders. And according to courtroom transcripts, Lee responded, the system sucks. This job sucks. And I'm trying with every breath that I have so that I can get you what you need. Sometimes I wish you would just hold me in contempt, your honor, so that I can have a full 24 hours of sleep. She also said, quote, I am not white, as you can see, and my family's at risk as any other people that might get picked up. Her family came from Vietnam. Lee told the judge she'd already tried to quit, but that they can't find a replacement for her, and that she'd even taken to emailing ICE officials in 24-point font to try to get their attention, mostly unsuccessfully.

41:35Lee has now reportedly been taken off the Minnesota assignment and is back at DHS headquarters in Washington. Wild story. It also comes from there was a Politico story about how overwhelmed prosecutors are everywhere, but especially in Minnesota, trying to deal with the legal fallout from what ICE is doing. particularly basically everyone that DHS picks up, rounds up, whether you're a legal resident, whether you're an asylum seeker who is legally supposed to be here, whether you are an undocumented immigrant, they all they file habeas petitions. You have the right to file a habeas petition, meaning like, why have you put me in jail?

42:13And you've got, you know, the government has to like have a reason. And every one of these habeas petitions then goes to trial or at least has some kind of a hearing, not a trial, but a hearing. And there's just too many. There's too many for the courts. There's too many for the prosecutors that they have. There's just too many. And so all these prosecutors, paralegals, everyone working around the clock, and ICE is so irresponsible that they are just, they're not responding. They're not cooperating. They're not doing anything. They're just a fucking rogue agency. That's what they are. Yeah, it seems suboptimal.

42:48The system is not set up for this level of mass deportation. even if ICE was doing everything right, they were crossing the I's, dotting the T's, then just processing this number of people, having this number of hearings would stress the system. But the fact that you have an incompetent rogue agency, that it's just sweeping up people because of their accent, because of the color of their skin, because they looked at an officer the wrong way, means you get a lot of people who are being detained who shouldn't be detained. And the court put, for good reason, puts tremendous pressure on the government to respond to these habeas petitions because there is a person in a detention center who maybe shouldn't be there.

43:28And this is what the courts are for. And it can't operate with this level of incompetence and disregard for the law and human decency that you're seeing from ICE. And by the way, it's probably incompetence as you get sort of down the food chain there to to like random ICE agents at DHS. But it is also a pretty intentional strategy on behalf of Stephen Miller and the people who are running the show because what they're doing is they're rounding people up, they're putting them in these detention centers, which are just under horrific conditions. Many of the detention centers they put you in if you're rounded up are not in your home state or your city, but in Texas or somewhere far, far away.

44:10And what they're telling people once they get them there is, yeah, you can file your habeas petition and you can wait for your hearing in this horrific detention center under these awful conditions, or you can sign this piece of paper right now and we'll just deport you. And you can waive your right to a hearing. And so for a lot of these folks, they don't know if they're going to be successful at their hearing and maybe they need medical care. Maybe they want to be back with their families. Maybe they have young children. And so they feel this pressure to sign the document to then be deported as opposed to waiting for the habeas hearing.

44:41And this is like Miller's strategy to try to get as many people deported as possible. Yeah. I mean, this has always been true of Trump and the people around him, which is it is a stunning combination of incompetence and malevolence. Did you check out that Wall Street Journal story about Stephen Miller? Did a big profile of Stephen Miller? I did. I did. I was going to send it to you, but I was like, there's just no way John hasn't read this yet. I mean, there's a couple points that first of all, it's interesting that Donald Trump is maybe starting to realize that Stephen Miller is causing him some political problems.

45:16It says in one paragraph, Trump told advisors he isn't comfortable with how far Miller has gone on some fronts. He's mad that business officials were calling to complain about getting their workers rounded up. And then at one point he sees Miller on TV talking about Venezuela and Trump talked to aides nearby and he said, why is he on TV? He doesn't do foreign policy. Why is he talking? He doesn't talk about foreign policy. So Trump, there's a little, you know, maybe Stephen Miller is going too far. But like some of the stories about that guy and that and these are all from White House officials there who are sourced in the story that he basically decided to label Rene Good domestic terrorist and Alex Preddy an assassin without any approval or review from anyone else in the administration.

46:02after Alex Pareddy was murdered. Stephen Miller was just texting directly with border patrol agents on the ground. And then it went from the text from the border patrol agents to Miller to Twitter calling him an assassin. That's it. That was the whole process. Not a good process, apparently. He was the one who suggested the Insurrection Act, apparently, in Minneapolis. He was the one... So apparently, after Renee Good was killed, there was this debate in the white house like should we just withdraw from minnesota at least draw down the agents there because like things are getting out of control and miller was like no we got to send in more we got to double down he's he's the fucking cancer at the heart of the administration in the country he really is like he's a deeply dangerous individual who is obviously a huge narcissist but also a megalomaniac with very very I don't even know if disturbing is a strong enough word.

47:01He has a set of odious views about the world that are as white nationalists as it could possibly be. He has a very explicit project about making this country whiter. Yep. That is what he wants to do. And look, none of that is going to convince Donald Trump ever to get rid of him. But Republicans do poorly in the midterms. Stephen Miller's fault. everyone it is it donald trump can look around and realize that he lost congress or lost one or both houses of congress if that happens it is stephen miller stephen miller is probably more responsible for that than anyone else around him i would say and you know who will get fired christy noem yeah maybe maybe i there is i mean this is like such nerdy old people political talk but there is a lot of, like these are imperfect historical analogies.

47:56I don't stipulate that. But immigration is becoming to Trump in 2026. Immigration to ICE in particular is becoming to Trump in 2026, what Iraq was to George W. Bush in 2006. And people were telling him - Exactly. Like that is exactly right, which is they refuse to fire the people responsible, or at least make a firing to acknowledge that even if it's just purely symbolic, that something is going to change and they don't do it until afterwards because they're so afraid of admitting failure or weakness that they make their political problems much worse. Yeah.

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51:14One last thing on immigration here. J.D. Vance did an interview with the Daily Mail, not sure why, where he got this question. Have you apologized? Did you plan to apologize to the family of Alex Breddy? For what? For, you know, labeling him in a sash and with ill intent. Well, again, I just described to you what I said about Alex Breddy, which is that he's a guy who showed up with ill intent to an ICE protest. No, but if it is determined that his civil rights were violated by this FBI investigation, will you apologize? So if this hypothetical leads to that hypothetical leads to another hypothetical, will I do a thing?

51:50And again, like I said, we're going to let the investigation determine. We're going to let the actual law come to the surface and figure out what happened. For what? For what? What I said about Alex Prady is that he showed up with an intent. First of all, no, he didn't. Second of all, you can't know what his intent was. Third of all, you called him an assassin. Or Stephen Miller called him an assassin. You retweeted Stephen Miller. Still up on your Twitter feed. You called Rene Good a domestic terrorist. You called Rene Good a domestic terrorist. No. So maybe you apologize for that. I don't know.

52:26I thought you were a Catholic. No, no. Don't feel as a Christian that perhaps sometimes you make mistakes, that you're fallible. he's so fucking smug. It's the smugness that just takes it to a whole new level for me with him. He is the most obnoxious high school debate nerd you could ever possibly meet. Oh, so this hypothetical to that hypothetical, the way he just uses nonsense logic to run circles around these reporters, or at least get out of answering questions is incredibly frustrating. But he is missing something fundamentally human. Donald Trump is also missing it. But he just – he can't – like, there is no shame.

53:11There is no guilt. Like you said, he's Catholic. He certainly didn't get the guilt part that comes with that. There is no inherent decency. I couldn't – like, I just can't imagine saying something like that about someone and feeling no obligation to the family, to yourself, to your family, to correct that publicly. Instead of just to stand by it, because you've been convinced that to admit failure or to admit being wrong is weakness and treason in MAGA world. And that is just a really, that is stupid politically, but it's a really toxic way to go through life. Yeah, he really combines the smugness of the most annoying coastal elite you know with the soul of Stephen Miller with the charisma of a shoe.

54:02That is J.D. Vance, presidential candidate from 2028. A shoe has neutral charisma. It is something much worse than that. You know, everyone missed Trump in 16. Trump could never be president, but people thought Trump could never be president because they thought, oh, he was too offensive for America. It's not that J.D. Vance is too offensive or too extreme. It is that he is so fucking smug, And just devoid of charisma. Like, I don't know, man. Who knows? Who knows in this country? But he does not have what Trump had. No, of course not. Like, not even close. I don't even think he has. I think Ron DeSantis looks better than him.

54:45Maybe. Right? That's a lot. That's a tough one. I think he probably is a little more deaf than Ron DeSantis. But I think he's more odious. Yeah, more repulsive for sure. Yeah, more repulsive. Look, I have a lot of thoughts about this. This is coming, maybe next week, depending on how my long flights go, but it's coming in MessageBox soon. I have a lot of thoughts about J.D. Vance, what we should be doing right now to frame J.D. Vance, because we have this advantage as Democrats. I feel like we're trying every week here, Dan. We are. We are. I'm trying to take what we're doing here and move it out to the rest of the world and also maybe focus what we're doing.

55:24Good, good. Maybe be motivated by strategy, not just pure, unadulterated rage. But J.D. Vance is going to be the Republican nominee. There's almost no history of a sitting vice president not getting the nomination. Will he have to fight for it? Will he get a primary? Probably. But he's almost only going to be the nominee. So we have another three years to shape his public image. And Republicans did this very successfully with Al Gore from 1996 to 2000, by the point where everyone thought that Al Gore, this famous Boy Scout, was now this inveterate liar who made up things about inventing the internet and was corrupt in all these ways.

55:59J.D. Vance, we just have to let people see who he is. But he does not have any of the charisma or cool factor. I know that that's gross to say about Trump. But Trump has something that powered his rise that J.D. Vance does not have, and we can be weaponized against him. He's a smug weirdo who probably only appeals to incels. How's that? Test that one. If I hear... That, John, that's a stage direction. No one better come down from the top of the mountain. That's a stage direction. I don't want to hear someone coming down from the top of the mountain with the tablet saying, the message says that J.D.

56:31Vance is in line with the oligarchs and he's going to hurt working people. I don't want to hear that shit. It's to really kill the living shit out of him. He's fucking smug and weird. He's an odious individual. That's the message. All the other stuff is right, but that is the message. He's out there doing a bunch of media. He also did a sit down with Megyn Kelly, speaking of people we love, where he brought up Trump's attack on Caitlin Collins earlier in the week. We will play that for you first in case you haven't seen the Trump attack on Caitlin Collins. Let's watch. You know, she's a young woman.

57:05I don't think I've ever seen you smile. I've known you for 10 years. I don't think I've ever seen a smile on your face. You know why? You know why you're not smiling? Because you know you're not telling the truth. No, as she was trying to say, she wasn't smiling because she was asking about survivors of Jeffrey Epstein's sexual abuse of underage girls. That's what she was asking about a couple times when he did that. But here's what the vice president had to say about it. She's asking a question. The president says, why don't you ever smile? Yeah. And it's actually like so perceptive. even if you're asking a tough question even if you take your job very seriously like why does it always have to be so antagonistic well i laugh because i saw online everybody's calling him sexist for saying that and i literally said the same thing about caitlin collins a year ago on my show she never smiles every once in a while you have to smile roger ailes used to tell us that every once in a while you can remember smile i bet he did i bet he i bet roger ailes did tell them to smile and a whole bunch of other things that they have alleged in court documents i mean This goes back to the earlier point, but to understand J.D.

58:10Vance is understanding him as someone who is an empty vessel for ambition. He just wants power, and he'll do anything. If he has to be against Trump, he'll be against Trump. He has to be for Trump. He'll be for Trump. You and I have debated about how much he actually believes this stuff. I think he does, but it's not here nor there. But I think the lesson he's taken from Trump is that the path to political power in America is to be an unapologetic asshole. And maybe you can get away – Trump has gotten away with that, but Trump has like a showman-like – appeal, right, that works for him that J.D.

58:39Vance does not have. So he's just an asshole. He's not a funny asshole. But again, once again, right there, he added the smugness, too, of the most annoying pundit because he did punditry about Trump. It wasn't just like, I agree with what Trump said, right, which would have been bad enough. It was like, and if you actually look, it's so perceptive. It was so perceptive to just scream at a female reporter that she should smile more while she's asking about victims of sexual abuse. So perceptive.

59:12he's like he sucks he sucks yeah his approval rating is not great he's like they were asking call it young college Republicans who are like, you know, as extreme as they get these days, college Republicans. And he's like 18 points underwater with college Republicans. These are supposed to, you know, he's supposed to be like the young next generation leader of the party. Not doing so well. I saw that in Puck. He's not going to appeal to young people. I mean, Sarah Longwell has put it out in multiplication, just how poorly he does in focus groups with young Republicans. And also she said on Twitter recently that in focus groups of women, J.D.

59:47Vance consistently gives them the ick, Sarah's words. He has real - And then people like Clavicular think that Gavin Newsom mogs him. Yes. He's very moggable. Yes. That's his problem. Is that the way to use it? I have no idea. I honestly have no idea. Austin's shaking his head. No. Anyway, while we're talking about the assault on the free press, we should mention what Jeff Bezos, another person we love, did to the Washington Post this week. On Wednesday, the Post laid off about a third of its employees. The sports and book sections were eliminated. The Metro section and international coverage were also hit hard.

1:00:28A lot of incredible journalists, including guests we've had across all of our crooked pods, lost their jobs. Adding insult to injury, neither Bezos or Will Lewis, the publisher Bezos appointed in 2023, had the balls to log on to the Zoom where the layoffs were announced. This is according to Ashley Parker, our pal Ashley, who's a former Post journalist now at The Atlantic. Meanwhile, this is what Jeff Bezos has been up to lately. On Monday, he welcomed Pete Hegseth at his Blue Origin rocket facility. Afterwards, writing to Hegseth on Twitter, Huge honor to have you at Blue Origin today. Lovely.

1:01:03And of course, Amazon also sank around$75 million into the Melania dock. That's$40 million for the licensing rights,$35 million for marketing. which you know they're they're they hit eight million so far so so close to making that money back um i know you wrote about all this uh uh what happened with the post this week in thursday's message box so the floor is yours dan i'm gonna rant for a minute so i'm gonna apologize to everyone in advance but we talk all the time i write all the time about the declining relevance of legacy media institutions and how the economics of big media have gotten so hard.

1:01:44And so things like this should not feel unexpected, but I think this is an absolute tragedy. It did not need to happen. On the day in which The Post announced these layoffs, the New York Times announced that they had gained more than a million digital subscribers in 2025 and their revenue was up 10 % year over year, the Wall Street Journal remains strong. They've been growing. They've been adding subscribers. The Post is our other national newspaper. They could have had a very similar path. Maybe they couldn't be the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, who have very specific business models, but they absolutely could have succeeded.

1:02:20And they didn't succeed for two reasons. The first is that Jeff Bezos hired Will Lewis, who is an absolute doofus. He came from the British tabloids. He immediately showed up. He was enmeshed in the phone hacking scandal in the UK, lied about it, lost the newsroom, never had a plan, didn't seem particularly interested in executing a plan, had no real attempt to actually save the paper, did not seem to care about the paper. But the biggest reason is Jeff Bezos, because when he bought it in 2013 for$250 million, which is fucking couch cushion money for him, he was heralded as like a savior of a great journalistic institution.

1:02:58He put money into it. He was treated as a savior and someone who, who like one of the old media barons, like who would, through their generosity, was supporting this important institution in the fourth state and all of that. And then around 2024, he realized that owning the Washington Post, a paper that Donald Trump hated was now going to be bad for business for him. It was going to make him less filthy rich, slightly less filthy rich. It would make his companies, huge successful companies, slightly less successful. And so he made a couple of decisions that basically torpedoed the paper. The first was he canceled, personally canceled the papers, planned endorsement of Kamala Harris in 2024.

1:03:36That caused thousands and thousands and tens of thousands of people to cancel their subscriptions. And then in 2025, he announced that the Washington Post editorial page was no longer, was going to change in a way to make it less likely to anger Trump. It was going to stop doing politics. The whole thing was just ridiculous. It was a naked ploy. And in doing those things, they lost hundreds of thousands of subscribers they could not afford to lose. And it completely lit on fire the trust, the paper, had built over many, many decades with their audience. And it is absolutely a tragedy. I care about this a lot because I went to college in DC.

1:04:13I've read the Post forever. It is not just a great political newspaper that covers Washington, although they do a great job of that. It had one of the all-time great sports sections in any paper ever, right? Tony Kornheiser, Michael Wilbon, Sally Jenkins wrote there, covered everything. The Metro section, People don't remember this, but that Watergate started as a metro section story. Like the way that – because I lived in D.C. for a very long time. There is the town of D.C., head tip Mark Leibovitch, which is the political stuff. And there's the city, right? But everything else that's happening there, what's happening in the government, what's happening in the suburbs, and the metro section cover that.

1:04:49The style section was incredible. You remember the profiles done of politicians by our friend Mark Leibovitch and Dana Milbank and others who wrote those. the you know there were great columnists the political reporters there like dan balls and david broder and people like that and that was all destroyed because a man worth a quarter trillion dollars couldn't be bothered to try to save the paper and thought it would be better to for himself to let it die on a vine and what's left like maybe they can bring it back in some way shape or form but right now what's left is the rotting husk of a great journalistic institution and everyone Everyone in D.C.

1:05:28and in the country are poor because of it. Everyone accepts Jeff Bezos. And look, some of it definitely is just, I don't want to piss Trump off. And Amazon has contracts with the government. And if Trump turns on Bezos, what's going to happen? All that bullshit. Some of it's also, I think, with Jeff Bezos is like, he's just another fucking rich guy that thinks his niche political views and the views of the people he surrounds himself with are the views of most Americans. And so you get this sort of like center-right, Wall Street-y, Silicon Valley kind of sensibility that sort of took over the paper, at least in the editorial section.

1:06:12And it's just, you know, these fucking billionaires. They think that they're told, yes, they're surrounded by people who share their views. They all bitch about this and that and politics. And they are rich enough to buy these toys and then treat them like toys and break them and not really care. And I saw some people say, like, well, you know, all these subscribers that quit after the canceled editorial endorsement of Kamala Harris, like, bear some responsibility as well. like why do you stop your subscription when there's so much other great reporting? Who cares about the editorial board? And like, I get that.

1:06:51But it's also like the end of the day, you're selling a product to the customer. And if you piss the customer off and they don't buy the product anymore, that's your fault. Yes, 100%. Like you can blame the customer for sure. But like, you're the one who caused them to leave with your decision. I think to the extent there is a larger lesson here. It is, you know, we have talked for a long time about the absolute essential need of building up a progressive pro-democracy media ecosystem. And over the many years, and I have been to one gazillion meetings, you know, fundraising meetings, pitches about this with everyone in the Democratic Party.

1:07:31And a lot of what you hear is, we need our billionaires to come in and support progressive media. And you do need that. Like, you need support to do it. But what a billionaire can give, they can also take away. And so what you need here is that we're not going to be able to build up a competing ecosystem to Fox News and Breitbart and Daily Wire and all the rest simply by a handful of Democratic billionaires giving money to progressive content creators and media people. You have to build sustainable businesses. That's the only way that independent media will work. And you know this. You are running a large media company.

1:08:07In MessageBox, I'm running a much smaller little media company. But that is it. If you are depending on what are equivalently charitable donations from foundations to individuals, that can last you for a while, but one day that's going to go away. Yep. Either because the billionaire changes their mind, the economy changes, or whatever it is. And so it has to be a sustainable business, which is why at the beginning of this podcast, you made the request that people subscribe to Friends of the Pod because that is one of the ways in which we make Crooked Media a sustainable business. is one of the reasons why I'm constantly bothering people to subscribe to MessageBox because it's one of the ways in which I can continue to do it because I'm not depending on anything other.

1:08:45We're trying to build products that people want and will pay for so that we can make more of those products, which we believe is good for democracy and good for our messaging. That's exactly right. It's because it's not just to sustain us now, but it's to grow. It's because we want to make sure, how many fucking journalists are out of a job right now, right? And we desperately need more reporting. And I'm not even like just – it's not even about opinion reporting at this point or opinion journalism or punditry or analysis. Like, we just need people out there doing reporting. I mean, some of the people that were laid off from the Post, they were in war zones in Ukraine.

1:09:19They fired the Post reporter while she was in a war zone. I mean, it's like we are heading into this - By email. They fired her by email. Be very clear. We've been dealing with, you know, misinformation and this, like, difficulty in figuring out, like, a shared reality. we are now it's going to be supercharged by artificial intelligence and it is if it is not the time to have less reporting you know because pretty pretty soon people aren't going to know what to believe at all um and and reporting helps us do that so i you know i i i know that some people are like that you see some a lot of right-wingers and and maga people and just like annoying pundits are like oh it's a business and a business failed and you know you don't need to cry over it, blah, blah.

1:10:04It's like, fine, whatever. But like you need, journalism is valuable for democracy. Reporting is valuable for a democracy. If we want to live in a world where we have good information, we know what's going on and we can make decisions based on good information about how we live together, like you need journalism for that. So. It is true that some media businesses are doomed to fail because of changing economics. And we can talk for a long time about what has happened with social media platforms and advertising and now AI. But the Washington Post was not one of those. The Washington Post had a clear path to sustainability, and they did not go down that path because Jeff Bezos did not take them down that path.

1:10:40That's right. That's right. All right. When we come back, you'll hear Dan's interview with Maine Governor Janet Mills.

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1:13:11Joining us now is the governor of Maine and a candidate for US Senate, Janet Mills. Governor Mills, welcome to the podcast. Thank you. Good to see you. Good to be here. Okay. So there has been in recent weeks, so much attention, understandably so on what's been happening with ICE in Minnesota, but at the same time, ICE has been in your state. And I've seen some of the videos and they seem quite terrifying to lots of your residents. Can you tell us what that experience was like with ICE in your state and what's happening with ICE right now in Maine? Sure. Thanks for the question. Listen, we heard three weeks ago that ICE was looking for a staging area.

1:13:44So we got word, they might be coming, the cavalry coming. And we started preparing. And I said, I made a public announcement that, listen, if they're sending ICE agents with those provocative and violent behaviors that they showed us in Minneapolis and elsewhere, that they weren't welcome here. Well, they came and we kept an eye on things. We worked with local law enforcement and state law enforcement and with local organizations to keep track of what they were doing and where they were doing it. And so for about a full week, they began, well, first of all, they announced they were making this operation and calling it Catch of the Day, Operation Catch of the Day, which is about as insulting as you get.

1:14:24I mean, it was not a fishing derby. It involved real human beings being taken violently from their cars, taken from workplaces and schools and from their families and homes, and taken God knows where, one state to another state to another state. and they said they had a target of 1 ,400 people they wanted to take into custody. 1 ,400 people? Well, these aren't the worst of the worst, let me tell you right now. And what we saw happening on the streets of Portland and Lewiston and Bitterhood, Maine, was not anything to do with the worst of the worst. We saw people with no criminal backgrounds, no criminal charges, being hauled from cars, being hauled from their homes, and taken into custody and kind of disappearing.

1:15:09Disappearing. And that included a civil engineer who was here at a construction job. It included two law enforcement agents, two corrections officers in two different counties who were snatched from their cars and their cars left running in the streets. So the local sheriff said, this is a botched operation. This is Bush League policing, Bush League law enforcement. So that's what we saw. Has it subsided? Well, we've heard a couple more reports yesterday of people being taken by unidentified officers, unidentified people. That's disturbing. Susan Collins made an announcement that the enhanced ICE operation had ceased.

1:15:54We have yet to have confirmed the confirmation of that. But the point is, why did it happen in the first place? Seriously, catch of the day? why did she not know it was coming in the first place? Why didn't she stop it in the first place? Stop people with no criminal charges being taken from their families, snatched from the state of Maine. And so now I'm working with local authorities and organizations to identify exactly who has been disappeared. They claim they took 206 people. Who are they? Where are they now? Under what legal status are they now? What warrants were used? We haven't seen any yet.

1:16:32and identify how people can be reunited with their families and get back to work and contribute to their communities. As you point out, Susan Collins announced on Twitter, I think, that the operation was over and claimed credit for it. This is, I imagine, sort of how she's going to run for re-election in the state to try to show independence of some kind from Trump or show influence with Trump. But you say you have no evidence that the operation has, that these extra ice officers have left or anything like that. Is that correct? Yeah. Fewer reports of kidnappings and whatnot. Fewer reports of people disappearing from their cars and homes.

1:17:10That's true. But who knows? Would it restart tomorrow? They gave us very little warning that it was happening in the first place. And we demanded answers. The attorney general and I wrote a letter last Friday to Christine Ohm and insisted on answers about who the people are, where they are, and their legal status and whatnot. So Susan Collins has the ability to control this behavior if she wanted to. She has that ability. But she's been playing these political games for a long time. And she has voted with Trump, as you know, like 94 % of the time. 94 % of the time. She's not fooling anybody here by claiming a victory lap.

1:17:48It's like they came in. Why did they come in in the first place? Why didn't you stop them if you had that power? And she's a person who supported, voted to confirm Kristi Noem. Kristi Noem, who has no law enforcement ability or experience, who shouldn't be heading up this agency to begin with. And where did the orders come from? Where did they get these 1 ,400 targets? How? We need answers. So there's a larger conversation about what's going to happen with ICE. And I think there's two parts of that conversation. There's what can be done right now, short term, while Trump is president. And then there's a question of what happens when a Democrat is president and hopefully has a Senate congressional majority.

1:18:29Let's start with the first part here. So over the next week or so, Congress is negotiating over the funding for the Department of Homeland Security bill. Democrats want some set of guardrails in exchange for their votes to fund that apartment. You're running for Senate. Seems like a fair question to ask. What would it take if you were in the Senate right now? What sort of guardrails would you need for your vote to keep the department funded? Well, first of all, there shouldn't be$1 more additional funding for ICE and for DHS without concrete controls, substantive controls and reforms to account for the behavior they've already conducted, already engaged in, and to prevent such behavior in the future.

1:19:10Basic training would be a good thing. Sure, body cams, they've been talking about body cams, but you've got to tell them to turn them on and save the tapes, for instance. You know, our police officers in Maine, they know how to do that. They've been trained. It's sort of simple, stupid. De-escalation techniques, of course. It sounds like this group has been trained to escalate, not to de-escalate. And, of course, there's no need to be anonymous and unidentified. If you're a trained police officer under basic standards, you shouldn't have any problem identifying yourself before you make an arrest, stop somebody on the street, or tear into somebody's home or car.

1:19:48It's basic police procedure. Identify yourself. And so there are a lot of other concrete things you could do, but not a dollar more in funding until you account for what's happening. Have independent investigations into what's already happened. The people have no confidence in the suggestion that there might be an investigation into the killing of Alex Preddy or Rene Good. This is not happening. There should be a transparent and independent investigation. We know how to do that. I was attorney general for eight years in Maine. We did independent investigations into the police use of deadly force.

1:20:28It's by law and by good public policy in our state and most every state. We know good law enforcement in this state. We train them up for 18 weeks minimum in Maine. And I helped teach the courses on constitutional law, Fourth Amendment and such. They know better than to do what the ICE agents have been doing in Maine and other states in recent months. And our law enforcement agents, they don't have to wear masks. They know better. And they don't go out and do a sweep of whole communities based on some artificial quota set by some political figurehead for no good reason. Would you require a ban on masks in exchange for your vote?

1:21:09Sure. I mean, it's sort of simple, fundamental. Why would any law enforcement agency need to wear masks for fear of retaliation? Well, what would there be retaliation about if you weren't doing some bad stuff, right? Yeah. I mean, that's sort of the point, right? That's the point of the accountability. Don't do it in the first place. You won't worry about retaliation. All right, Let's talk long term or medium term, I guess. Your primary opponent, Graham Plattner, has called for abolishing ICE. In a CNN interview, you didn't go that far. Can you tell me what you would – what would you want to see if you were in the Senate, how to change ICE if I'm correcting that you're not for abolishing it?

1:21:48What does a new reformed ICE look like? It could end up being abolished. But first of all, you've got to have accountability, as I mentioned, investigations into what's going on so far. And how do you prevent that from happening again? And for goodness sakes, when bad things do happen, you have to coordinate with local and state officials to investigate bad stuff like the killings of two people in Minneapolis. We investigate killings here in Maine. We know how to do that. And you don't just abscond with the car, the body, the evidence, and not let local enforcement who know what they're doing investigate bad behavior like that and violent acts by ICE.

1:22:33So require independent investigations into these actions and prepare for investigations coordinated with state and local officials if things continue to happen like that. That's sort of basic. basic. Retraining the people who've been hired with these amazing recruitment bonuses from the big bad bill of last summer. Retrain them if they've been trained in the first place. Teach them de-escalation. It seems like these people have been trained in escalation, not de-escalation. Make sure they're accountable and obviously identifying themselves. A lot of A lot of nitty-gritty things that would have to be reworked to hold ICE accountable for what they've done and let them continue operating in any sense of the word, but not$1 more in funding.

1:23:23And look, then there's the money they've gotten from last summer to build these detention centers in states across the country. That's pretty scary, too, and that ought to stop. At the beginning of your answer, you said it could be abolished. What do you mean by that? Well, if they can't make these basic concrete reforms, these changes, they can't let them go on doing what they're doing, terrorizing neighborhoods and communities and whole cities, terrorizing the public safety and people's fundamental constitutional rights, civil rights. So abolishing ICE is on the table. Or sometimes I hesitate to just use the slogan, but moving enforcement to a different part of the government.

1:24:07But the problem is, the problem is if you change the name, this administration will just create another agency with a different name with the same mission, a very dangerous, violent mission. You have to stop the violence in whoever's name it's done. And it's the people giving the orders from above that are the threat to our country. Right. And theoretically, under this scenario, it's a Democratic president doing this. I don't have any hope or idea that this would happen under Trump, but I'm sort of thinking of 2029, you're in the Senate and a Senate majority, potentially. We have a Democratic House.

1:24:46We have President, pick your candidate of choice. And so it's like, what can Democrats do there where it's not just Trump just not renaming it? It's a Democratic decision about how to enforce immigration law and whether ICE as currently constituted would be part of that. that's a question yeah or suggestion well that's what that's i guess that's my i guess i was just surprised to hear you say abolishing ice was on the table so i just wanted to get to some clarity on that if there's no other way to change what's going on right now but first and foremost the congress right this minute has the power to withhold further funding and the senate has the power to stand up with this administration and demand concrete answers concrete reforms, changes, and accountability.

1:25:33And that's what must happen. I think the American people are insisting on that. Even the Republicans are hearing that voice back home, that things have got to change. Things have got to change. And you know what? It can't just be, oh, let's wait 10 days, another two weeks, kick the can down the road like Washington tends to do anyway. Look at the ACA. And let's say, oh, let's start a task force and look at this, a commission, a blue ribbon, pink ribbon, green ribbon commission. No way. Okay? People know what's happened. We don't need to reexamine things, but let's get answers to the questions that were raised just the other day, and those hearings from the brothers of Renee Good, from other victims of the Minneapolis rampage.

1:26:21Get answers for what happened then and how we can stop it from continuing, first and foremost. And until that happens, not one dollar more. In the last couple of days, Trump has said that he wants to federalize elections that the federal government take over. He has doubled and tripled and now quadrupled down on that in recent days. Steve Bannon said that he declared that ICE would be showing up at polling places on election day. We have the director of national intelligence seizing ballots in Fulton County. Have you begun thinking about how to secure elections in Maine from federal interference this November?

1:26:59Sure. I mean, these are dangerous, dangerous words, dangerous talk, dangerous thoughts, dangerous threats to our democracy. And as governor of this state, I will stand firm. And as a state that has repeatedly large turnout, a large turnout of voters every election year, one of the highest turnouts in the country. We will protect every individual's right to vote this November and take every action necessary to secure the polls and secure absentee ballots. We just fought a battle with Republicans this past November where they tried to take away absentee ballots, put a measure on the ballot to take away balloting, and we defeated it by a huge margin because people don't want to do that.

1:27:50They hold dear their right to vote. It is sacrosanct, not just in this state, but every state. And we will make every effort to make sure that the polls are not violated by some agency like ICE. The Constitution says the states have authority over elections, and we will assert that authority under my governorship and in this state, make sure that people are able to vote safely, without intimidation, without deprivation of rights. When you announced that you were running for Senate, it appeared they came after significantly long deliberation. You thought long and hard about it, and you decided that you were the best person to do it.

1:28:39This was the time to go. You know, my sort of, I, I intuited from that, that you believe that you're the best person to beat, uh, Susan Collins. Uh, do you think you're the only person to beat Susan Collins? Look right now, I am, uh, the issue is electability right now in this. And we have run people against Susan Collins before, wonderful people, but we've run people who are not tested. I have run and won two statewide elections. I had a seven-way primary the first time, and I won. I had a four-way general election, and I won. I have been up and down this state. People know me, whether they agree with everything I say or not.

1:29:26They know me, and they know that what you see is what you get. I'm a person in this primary who has done that, who's won two statewide elections by 13 points last time, increasing margins. I'm the only person in this primary who's delivered progress for main people when it comes to health care, reproductive rights, education, climate action, all those things. And I'm the only person in this primary who's actually stood up to Donald Trump. and I'll do it again as a U.S. Senator. So I put my record up of electability. This is a crucial state, as you well know. Control of the U.S. Senate, I believe, goes through Maine.

1:30:09It has to. The Republican machinery is already promised. They've already committed$42 million to an advertising campaign this coming fall. They've already had Susan Collins up on TV saturating the airwaves since last fall, saying all these good things about her and trying to build up her image and trying to get behind the fact that she voted. She gave the critical vote. She cast the critical vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh. She cast votes for Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. She cast the vote for Kristi Noem. She cast the votes for Linda McMahon. All these decisions and her 94 % voting rate with Donald Trump.

1:30:52And this is the woman who said just a couple years ago, Donald Trump, I think he's learned his lesson, quote unquote. You know, I'll take her on. I'll take her on because it'll be a hyper-local campaign. What have you done for Maine? What have you done for Maine? and I can go toe-to-toe with Susan Collins on that basis and I can win. One of the concerns, as you know, and has been brought up in every interview that you've done, has been about your age. And so you have, you know, I've appreciated that you've taken that on directly in a lot of ways, but one way in which you took it on is that you have made a pledge to serve one term.

1:31:36Can you talk to me about why you made that pledge and whether some people's fears that this just means we're going to have another open seat race in Maine in six years is a concern. What's really critical to me is the next couple years. The more I see what's happening in Washington, you brought up just a few minutes ago, the threat to our elections this year. That's not going to stop. And if we don't take control of our country in the next couple years, I worry we may not have a country. And that is why I'm running, because we need to take back control of the U.S. Senate. We need to stand up to Donald Trump.

1:32:17We need to push forward on things like universal health care. And I have the ability and the experience to start on day one getting stuff done, making these changes, standing up for the rights of people, standing up for a better economy, affordability, and progress for people and health care and education and otherwise. I have the ability to do that on day one. And I'm not going to start on day two dialing for dollars and running for re-election. I want my whole focus, and my whole focus will be, on getting the job done as soon as I get there. We have a young bench behind me, and the office would be open another six years.

1:33:04God forbid we still have a country, we still have elections. There will be other people behind me, and I've always been pleased to mentor young people and younger Democratic Party candidates, and I'll continue to do that as well. But I'm giving it my all. I'm not running because I need a position or a platform or resume builder. I don't need that. I need to be down there. And I think people say, well, we won't have seniority. Really? If I'm proud of taking back the U.S. Senate, my voice will be heard and it will be heard loudly. Last question for you. You have said that you were undecided on how you would vote for Senator Schumer as leader.

1:33:49My understanding, at least, is that Senator Schumer spent a lot of time and energy recruiting you to run for Senate. I've been on the other end of some of Senator Schumer's phone calls over the years, so I can imagine what that was like. The DSCC is supporting you. Is that an awkward position to be in? And how would you decide whether to support Senator Schumer or not? What is making you undecided on that point. Let me back up a second. Before I decided to run in mid-October, I had had exactly one conversation with Chuck Schumer. Oh, interesting. Okay, that's good to know. January or February of last year, he was not pushy.

1:34:23He simply said, we think you're the candidate who can win, who can beat Susan Collins. And I gave it a lot of thought in the meantime. It was I who decided to run. Nobody else. Anybody who knows me knows that I'm not beholden to anybody. I have made no commitment to Chuck Schumer. Nobody in Washington, you know, pulls my chain, yanks my chain. Whether it's Chuck Schumer or Bernie Sanders or Donald Trump, people know that. I stand up and speak my mind. And the question I will ask anybody running for majority leader next year, year from now, would be, what can you do to help me do the best job I can for Maine people.

1:35:04How can you help me help Maine people? And I've had conversations with other senators who well may be in the running for a majority lead. I don't know. But I've held an open door to them as well and happy to hear from them on all accounts. So, you know, I have no commitment. I appreciate that the DSC thinks I'm the best candidate. I think I'm the best candidate also. So I happen to agree with that. And that's why I'm running. And let me be clear. I would be running for this seat because I feel so strongly that we have got to stand up for our country, especially in the next few months, in the next few years.

1:35:44I would be running for this whether Chuck Schumer were in office or anybody else in that office. I chose to run. and I am running with a commitment and a passion to help turn things around in a broken Washington, D.C., in a government that is not simply not doing the right things but is doing all the wrong things, a government that is taking a wrecking ball not just to the White House but to the Constitution, to our economy, to the rights of American people. I can't stand for that anymore. My work isn't finished here. With everything I've done at the state level, I'm very anxious to go on to the federal level and continue the work I've done at the state level, but also stand up to an abuse of power the likes of which we have never seen before because I think these times are most urgent, most urgent dangerous times that we've seen since the Civil War.

1:36:49that's what I feel and that's why I'm running Governor Mills thank you so much for joining us good luck on the campaign trail and we will be we will talk to you again before your primary I hope hope so thank you very much

1:37:05that's our show for today thanks to Janet Mills for coming on Tommy's going to be back on the feed on Super Bowl Sunday he's going to be interviewing sports journalist Pablo Torre bye everyone bye everyone if you want to listen to Pod Save America ad free and get access to exclusive podcasts, go to crooked.com slash friends to subscribe on Supercast, Substack, YouTube, or Apple Podcasts. Also, please consider leaving us a review that helps boost this episode and everything we do here at Crooked. Pod Save America is a Crooked Media production. Our producer is Saul Rubin. Our associate producer is Farrah Safari.

1:37:36Austin Fisher is our senior producer. Reed Churlin is our executive editor. Adrian Hill is our head of news and politics. The show is mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Jordan Cantor is our sound engineer with audio support from Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis. Matt DeGroat is our head of production. Naomi Sengel is our executive assistant. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Haley Jones, Ben Hefcoat, Mia Kelman, Carol Pellaviv, David Tolles, and Ryan Young. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.