AOC vs. Bezos

19:06And it did take the time. It did. At first I was like, oh no, oh no, my wedding. I'm back. Nutrafol is offering our listeners$10 off for your first month's subscription and free shipping when you visit Nutrafol.com and hit your promo code crooked. That's Nutrafol.com spelled N-U-T-R-A-F-O-L.com promo code crooked. Pod Save America is brought to you by Rocket Money. What ridiculous subscription did you discover you were paying for any embarrassing doubles? Yeah, a ton of them all the time. There was a time where I was trying to find like a, like a good workout app, like gives you some workouts to do.

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20:34Let Rocket Money help you reach your financial goals faster. Join at rocketmoney.com slash cricket. That's rocketmoney.com slash cricket. Rocketmoney.com slash cricket. Good news, though, for all you drivers wondering if we're ever going to see$3 a gallon gas again. Trump said Monday he's considering suspending the federal gas tax. Do it. Which is currently about 18 cents a gallon for gasoline and 24 cents a gallon for diesel. The president said he'd suspend the tax for as long as it takes, which seems like not that long if you believe Kevin Hassett, which of course you should, who just said oil prices will drop quickly before the midterms once, quote, the gusher opens.

21:09Where is the gusher? I guess in the straight? Chuck Schumer's office, now they'd heard about the gas tax bill. Because he excites him. Sorry. Just because he loves it, you know, he does a press conference. Yeah, no, for sure, for sure. Suspending the gas tax, good idea or great idea?

21:25Jon Favreau:Yeah, suspend the gas tax, release all the strategic petroleum reserve, get rid of all the sanctions on Iran and maybe Russia while you're at it. Just go nuts. Prices will stay high, but now we won't be able to pay for highways or mass transit. It's a great idea. Let's do it. Yeah, we already can't pay for those things anyway. And over the last sort of half century, more and more of our roads are paid for without the gas. The gas tax is supplemental, but we still pay for it ourselves. I mean, having a gas tax is a good idea. The politics of suspending it are great. Just do it. this is said said like someone who was on uh hillary clinton's primary campaign in 2008 was she i don't even remember we were forced you guys yeah i had to think about that too because it's like the mandate fight who was no you guys when we did the indiana and north carolina primaries hillary was uh saying we should suspend the gas tax and and obama was saying that's just a that's just a gimmick and it's bad and we shouldn't do it and it's just it's not really going to affect your prices that much.

22:18Jon Favreau:Is that when John McCain sent tire gauges to us? That's something different. That was when we were going to solve. That was when we were making, we wanted people to check. He just suggested people check their tires. They're like, you fucking piece of shit. We like running on these soft tires. Cushy. It's cushy. We're not going to fill up my tires, communist bastard. But the, yeah, look. But the point of it is it doesn't actually bring down the price. No, it's, what is it? 18, 20, 16 to 18 cents a gallon and then it's a little bit more for diesel. I mean, it's a bigger deal for truck drivers, commercial.

22:48Like, it does make a big difference for people like that, but... It's also ridiculous that Trump said he would do this. Can't do it without Congress. There's some bipartisan legislation that was floating around. It might get a little more lift now that he said it, but he can't do it on his own, or I guess he's not supposed to do it on his own. Who knows? He can try anyway. And yeah, of course, it robs the government of, you know, revenue it can't afford to lose because we have a lot of big-ticket items that we need to pay for, like bombing Iran and building a ballroom. And now apparently painting the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool American flag blue, which along with some other repairs is apparently going to cost$13.1 million, according to David Fahrenthold at the Times.

23:31This is an apparently it's an 88 % jump in the cost of what it's going to take to repaint the reflecting pool. And you know why it jumped so high? because Donald Trump decided to give a no-bid contract to the guy who did all his pools at Bedminster.

23:46Jon Favreau:Which is Rudy Giuliani. Hope he feels better. They're trying to sue it to stop it. It was funny, the guy that was suing, he was like, look, it's a process thing, but also we just think they chose a bad color, which you know they did. You know it's going to be the tackiest fucking thing. The tackiest blue. Like, come on, it doesn't need to look like a goddamn like Splash Mountain thing. The best blue is North Carolina, Carolina blue. Let's just do that. UNC colors. That'd be pretty bright in the reflecting pool. I don't know. I'm just making this up. Why does Kevin Hassett always, he looks like Dennis the Menace just took down the biggest nitrous balloon you've ever seen.

24:23Jon Favreau:Then he just spouts like economic bullshit on CNBC. It's like he spouts the best. Yeah, he's the best. Get him out there. Get him out there. $13 million for the reflecting pool. They're voting on the ballroom this week. Remember, that's a billion dollars. that they want to add in security. That's just a lot of security. Did you see what... What are we doing to that thing? Speaking of your boy, Chuck Schumer, he coined a new term for Republicans because of the ballroom. Did you see what it was? Oh, I didn't. No. Ballroom Republicans. He's calling them ball... He's calling the party ballroom Republicans.

24:53It's not... I know it's one of those... I'm like, it's definitely... Definitely not using a scalpel there. More of a sledgehammer. But maybe he throws out ballroom Republicans and then everyone... It's like a signal and everyone says it in a better way but everyone knows what the message is because he shot me shots me at this point last week that because this billion dollars is in the budget they're all gonna have to vote on it and i think that's great it's a yes or no yeah on the fucking ballroom terrific terrific the idea that they're saying oh it's security security secret service needs it well would they need it if you didn't have the fucking ballroom probably not hey but well it's like you knocked down the east wing and you got to rebuild it did you did you not was it a different america in which there wasn't security yeah when you knock down a building that line item in the budget when you were doing up the budget for the new ballroom you knew what the thing was going to fucking cost.

25:34It's like it now it's like every fucking now it's like a football stadium where, you know, there's these donors are going to go to the big unveiling because they're the ones responsible. But the vast majority of the cost of the taxpayers, because building the if the actual kind of construction is 300 million, but securing the facility is a billion dollars costs that were inevitable and required in order to ever use it. It's a taxpayer ballroom. Just 100 percent. Just trying to add it up here. We got there's the ballroom. There's the Trump Kennedy Center. There's the arch. We haven't even started building the arch yet.

26:03well get going we got the and now the reflecting pool um they're also that that ufc fight that's gonna that's gonna take some doing to put up that and take it down on the white house lawn now some of this is like privately funded landscaping it is of course the it's the it's the worst of all worlds for trump best of all worlds for us in the politics but it's like some of it's being funded by major donors corporate donors who now get special access to trump because of their donation and then the rest is the taxpayers foot the bill so it's like a good mix of shady influence of uh corporate allies of trump and just you know good old-fashioned uh

26:39Jon Favreau:just you know uh corruption the reflecting pool brought to you by raytheon so when you're reflecting on your life you like to think about the drones like hey we got really the reflecting pool wasn't a problem no i'm open to the possibility that they could use a ballroom i don't think it would The painting pool was just doing its thing. It was just sitting there. It's not the wrong color. It looks great. It's classic. I do think, listen, I've said this before. No offense to Steven Spielberg. I think that that World War II Memorial. Oh yeah. This is my position, which I think is, I don't want it.

27:13I don't want the final design.

27:16Jon Favreau:Trickle down ballroom. Did Steven Spielberg design it? No, he was part of the, because it was part of the post saving private Ryan Tom. It was in the, it was part, he was helped raise money for it. It was kind of a big booster of it. I don't know exactly what his direct involved. He's not the designer of it, but he was a big face of getting it done. So Democrat takes over. We're going to bulldoze the ballroom. Yeah. Bulldoze the World War II Memorial. No, no, no, no, no, no. I don't want that. Listen, it stands. Paint the reflecting. What are we painting the reflecting pool? Is that where Jenny and Forrest Gump are united?

27:43Jon Favreau:Was that in the reflecting pool? Yes. It is. It is. Don't mess with that, Lamar. Look, painting the reflecting pool, kind of undoing that, that's an easy one. Also, all the gold on the White House. That's coming off. That's easy. The writing on the outside of the oval, that's like cursive gold writing oval this way. Why do you think this house needs a fucking name tag? Everyone knows what it is. That's the whole idea of it. It'd be funny if they did a big gold, like in this house, we believe, kind of like. The Mar-a-Lago, au bon-pon umbrellas, the yellow umbrellas, those are all going. Those drive me crazy.

28:16Jon Favreau:It looks just like Mar-a-Lago. Yeah, that's the silly color. It's a long list. Well, if suspending the gas tax doesn't work and the gusher of oil doesn't open, Trump does have one other. Stop saying gusher. Gusher, gusher, gusher. Begging you. It's a snack. Gusher. It is a snack. Yes, Tommy. Trump does have one other trick up his sleeve. President told Fox on Monday that he is, quote, seriously considering making Venezuela the 51st U.S. state because there's, quote,$40 trillion in oil there. And, quote, Venezuela loves Trump. Isn't this the MAGA fever dream? Isn't he president because Joe Biden let in too many people from Venezuela in prisons?

28:55Jon Favreau:Where is Stephen Miller on this one? I don't understand. Like, I'm pretty sure. Every person in a Venezuelan prison would become an American. Right. He would actually make an unprecedented number of Venezuelan prisoners. That's quite an amnesty. Every person in the asylum, the worst people in Venezuela would all become Americans. It's a good question. Uh-huh. But I wonder if, just to play this out, if this administration, Stephen Miller, would make sure that they are second-class citizens who have to stay in Venezuela. We know how they treat the citizens of Puerto Rico right now. Donald Maduro's advocate here.

29:27Well, they're not a member. They don't have statehood. This is 51st state. Well, also, it doesn't matter if Trump's considering it. You need Congress. Exactly. It doesn't matter if he's considering it. Oh, you're considering it? So am I. You also need, I mean, I know that we don't care about international law or the UN anymore, but it's a flagrant violation of international law. The people of Venezuela would have to, of course, vote on this. It'll only be a flagrant violation of international law if the Venezuelans don't choose to do it. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, yeah. Presumably you'd have to have some sort of vote on it.

29:51That's what I'm saying. That's quite a presumption.

29:53Jon Favreau:Also, boy, it creates a bunch of new interesting borders that presumably would also need walls for Mexico to pay for, I guess. Yeah, yeah. Also, he said that they love Trump. And I did look at some polling on this. It was in the Miami Herald, actually, a couple of weeks ago. They did a big poll in Venezuela. In January, 92 % of Venezuelans said they felt grateful to Trump for capturing Maduro. That was like a couple of days after the capture. And a few weeks ago, it's down to 47%. 89 % of Venezuelans reject Trump's continued backing. of Rodriguez and 78 % think the country's on the wrong track under her.

30:27So I guess - Honestly, him losing support for deposing Maduro that quickly, it's actually very American to me. It's like, wow, what have you done for me lately, bitch?

30:35Jon Favreau:I'm 100 % sure that we've now officially thought about this longer and deeper than Donald Trump has, but certainly there's an easier way to just steal all their oil than to make them another state. Yeah. That's the end game. By the way, all the oil - Are we doing that now? Are we doing that now already? The oil's not just like, it's like in the Amazon. It's like very hard to access, actually. It's a real pain. I know. I was flirting with not talking about this at all, but we saw what happened with Greenland. There's, you know, NATO had exercises, military exercises in Greenland. So we got pretty close on that one.

31:04Jon Favreau:Raphael Lemkin just wanted to shout at us about international law over here. Yeah. Like a Maul Clooney over there. Maul Clooney. I didn't get the first one first, did you? No, it was very, very, yeah. Save that shit for Ben.

31:18Jon Favreau:Take it to the world, Oats. Yeah. Okay.

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34:32All right. So Trump, staying on this subject, Trump's about to spend some quality time this week with fellow imperialist Xi Jinping when he takes his first trip to China since 2017. Naturally, Trump will be rolling a few billionaires deep. Elon Musk and Tim Cook are joining among others, probably because of their diplomatic skills.

34:49Jon Favreau:Can we pause on that? Hey, Tim, you're resigning. You don't have to do this anymore, Tim Cook. You know what? I think Tim Cook just likes Donald Trump. I think he's in. I really do. I think anyone who thought Tim Cook was just like, I think Tim Cook's just a fan of Donald Trump. I figured he just liked fucking screens. No, fuck Tim Cook. He sucks. Wow. Hope your iPhone. All right. Hope your Apple cares. Yeah. See you at Pride, Tim, I guess.

35:14Jon Favreau:Okay. Anyway, so Tommy, an Asian diplomat in DC told Politico they're worried that China might offer to help reopen the strait in exchange for American concessions on Taiwan, which I'm sure if Trump read that would be like, good idea. How big of a deal would that be? How concerned are you? I mean, I first of all, I'm just skeptical that China could actually force Iran to reopen the strait and kind of go back to the before times. Because if you're like, China buys 90 % of Iran's oil. But still, if you're around, you're thinking, look, we got a couple million worth of Bitcoin after every boat that goes by.

35:45Jon Favreau:We find a new buyer for that oil. Like, I don't know. I'm skeptical. I asked a China expert friend about this quote in Politico and his take was like, it would likely be more like, how can you expect me to help you with the Stratto Hormuz and not sell my Iranian friends any more weapons when you're selling weapons to the Taiwanese and giving them diplomatic cover? That could certainly happen. And Trump, I think, basically said today that that Taiwan arms sales are up for negotiation, which is a huge deviation from traditional foreign policy, where that's just not a thing that is discussed with the Chinese.

36:19Jon Favreau:It's, you know, congressionally mandated law. Which he signed, like, right? Yeah, well, this is an interesting thing, is like, I've always assumed Trump could give a shit about Taiwan. He cares insofar as losing access to their semiconductors would be an economic calamity, right? And it would be a historic ego wound. Yeah, but like, he doesn't give a shit about freedom, democracy, human rights, religious freedom, hating communism, all the traditional like things that once animated Republicans on this. So I assume he would trade away Taiwan in a heartbeat for a good trade deal. But even but Xi Jinping, like he doesn't need Trump to be to make some historic shift, even rhetorically.

36:57Jon Favreau:Like, I think if he gets what he if he hears what he wants to hear behind the scenes, that's more than enough. Like, yeah, you do what you got to do. I'm not going to go after you. I mean, so we'll see. Like all that said, the Trump administration has greenlit huge arms sales packages to Taiwan. Now, the rub here is that those haven't been delivered yet. They're like 20 billion behind in the delivery of those weapons. But people like Marco Rubio is making sure that the packages get authorized. So I don't know. And then they're going to be talking about AI a lot as well. Apparently, it seems like a good outcome on AI seems like it could be there's reports that they may open a channel of communication to make sure that like Cold War style with like nuclear weapons, like make sure there's not.

37:38She gives them a chatbot. this is me i talked like you want i i want those two going deep on ai i don't know no shit but i would i would like our country cooperating with china on uh on making sure that uh we are keeping a line open on ai when it gets kind of scary yeah i talked to bernie about it was it last week feels like time flies but uh like there's obviously a space between like hamstringing whatever advantage we think we have and allowing to sort of unfettered development like there clearly would be some kind there's a way to have an agreement about some kind of limits to prevent sort of catastrophic outcomes with AI.

38:11And like, that seems like exactly what we would want them to be working towards. And they said they were going to talk about it. So I do think that's genuinely good. I'm sure they'll end up playing.

38:17Jon Favreau:It's not AI the nukes, the nuclear decision-making process. No AI on that. And they have both agreed so far to split that off. But there's a lot more. There's plenty of other problems that could end the world. You know, bioweapons and the rest of it. All right. We haven't had a chance to talk about the shitty news we got on Friday. about Virginia, where the state Supreme Court overturned the referendum that voters just passed to create new congressional maps ahead of the midterms. Tommy and Dan covered the news when it broke on the PSA YouTube channel. I have to say we crushed it. That's why you should go subscribe for free.

38:48Jon Favreau:Subscribe to Potts of America on YouTube. Free. If you want to see Dan looking spicy on a Friday. Okay. He does most of the YouTubes. He pops the top. Oh, he does. Topless YouTube. Is that Friday? Yeah, for Friday. And then under the table camera, that's for the subscribers. That's for the subs. talk about a polar coaster you're a dom you want to be a

39:11nice anyway nobody put this in the comments on message box that's the only way dan will know this happened everybody be fucking cool fucking narcs oh anyway what was i gonna say oh yeah there's been some more developments on the potential redistricting fallout in virginia and other states ahead of the midterms uh here's glass half empty Nate Cohn, of course, calculated that Republicans could now lose the popular vote by more than two points and still keep control of the House. Then there's glass half full. Jonathan Martin is out with a column arguing that Republicans still might lose many of the newly drawn districts, which by definition will be more competitive.

39:50Amy Walter at Cook Political basically said the same thing. I think you guys probably talked about that on Friday. I think she thinks that when all is said and done, the realistic game is probably like five seats in a good scenario. Yeah, they could net like 11 or 12, but probably won't. Right. That's her take. And that's because of the Democrats still winning those tough districts, not because they would still get to redraw them. And Jay Mart argues that they're handing Democrats a generational opportunity to mobilize outraged black voters. Case in point, Republican Representative Ralph Norman said on Monday about the state's lone Democratic Congressman Jim Clyburn, who's one of the longest serving black members in the House, quote, I like him personally, but he does not represent the rest of South Carolina.

40:30Wow. Well, that's, you know. That is part of the point of representing one district in a state, is you represent some people in the state and not all the people in the state. How are you guys processing the news generally, and specifically on the question of whether this is all as bad as people think? And on that point, some breaking news while we were recording this. The U.S. Supreme Court did rule. They lifted the injunction on Alabama that they had in place before, now allowing them to pursue their new maps.

40:59Jon Favreau:Shocking. So those dickheads, they voted forward their new map proposal in the middle of a tornado warning. They just kept going. They're supposed to evacuate. They're like, no, no, no. Stripping away black people's voting rights is more important to us. So what do you guys think? How bad? So I've seen a couple of different numbers. But basically, even with these new maps, if we have, you know, if we went by, let's say, 4 % nationally, the house margin is 4%, then we still win the house. That's an important one. just to put an exclamation point on that, because that was if Louisiana, Alabama, and South Carolina all go, which now seems like we are definitely headed toward that scenario.

41:39And they say if we won the popular vote by four in that scenario, Democrats still win the House. Right, and so I'm all for doing like a round of worry and recrimination, but I would say that in this political environment, the deeper problem would be not having confidence that against a president with this approval rating, with both kind of on the politics and on the policy has been as bad a president as you could ever imagine, as destructive a force as you can ever imagine, enabled directly by Republicans who deserve to be held responsible for this president's misadventures, we ought to be able to beat that 4%.

42:13We should focus on that. Because if we do that, then not only do we overcome their advantages in the gerrymander, we can win those Virginia seats that on the old map. And we can actually prove that some of their maps were drawn to aggressively and make them more nervous the next time they look at doing this to try to redraw the maps because the Republican incumbents will start to think, oh, if there's even a slight wave, I could lose my seat. Yeah. I mean, Democrats won the House popular vote by eight in 2018. So if we're thinking and hoping and expecting this cycle to be better than even 2018, then we should have no problem in the House.

42:49And look, if we're not winning by eight, if we're only winning by four, then something else went wrong. Exactly. More than redistricting. if we're if if like you said if after all this democrats win by four or five or six in this kind of year and so worse than we did in 2018 maybe they like the ballroom maybe they like the ballroom maybe they like five dollar gas yeah maybe people were like upset they had so much money left over after they filled up their tank yeah people hate it they hate having all the options with what to do with the money but yeah the one and i would also say if also this does galvanize people and we are able to win the house suddenly you have people showing up uh in these senate races that might not have otherwise.

43:25And it's sort of, you know, Republicans can be hoisted by their own petards. Yeah. Nate Cohen points out the challenge is the median district, House district now in the country will have voted for Trump by five and a half points. Sweet. So that means to win back the majority, you're winning a lot of not all, but you're happy to win some significant amount of seats that, you know, Trump won by five, five and a half points. Look, it's a - Which we've

43:54Jon Favreau:Specials have been like, on average, I think 13 points. These are base elections. Democrats are already more motivated. Hopefully they will all learn about this, be angry about it, be even more motivated to turn out. And the good thing about Trump is he just, things are as bad as they've ever been for him politically. And he's like, give me a shovel. I'm not done digging. Billion dollar ballroom, 1.5 trillion dollar Pentagon budget. Let me drive my stupid car on a fountain for some reason. He's just like wasting his time on stupid shit. And look, the bigger long term problem here that will outlast Trump is the concentrated power of the state legislatures in red states, which they have because they have gerrymandered their state legislative districts in such a crazy fashion.

44:35And in many cases, like in North Carolina, know that if the full state elects a Democrat as governor, which happens in places like North Carolina, Wisconsin, then the state legislature, which never has to worry about competitive elections or Republicans losing, just takes all the power away from the governor. So like at some point, whatever Project 2029, whatever long term thing we're doing, like we have to figure out a way to win back power in some of these state legislatures in some of these southern states and other heavily Republican states that have gerrymandered themselves on a state level.

45:05Forget about the federal level into such a point. And we know from the Constitution, right, that it, you know, endows state legislatures with a lot of power when it comes with elections.

45:15Jon Favreau:Certain male-eatable rights like life. Like that. Yeah. But that is, you know. And on that note, if Democrats do control Virginia, I don't know if you guys saw the mini news cycle about Virginia Democrats considering whether to. It was a mini news cycle. Yeah, it's over. It's like a mini war. We talked about this morning. It's already over. Anyway, they were considering whether to change the retirement age for state Supreme Court justices. So to bring it down in order to get rid of all the state Supreme Court justices on the Virginia Supreme Court and appoint new ones in time to change the maps.

45:48and then have the new democratically appointed, Democratic Party appointed state Supreme Court justices approve the new maps and in time for the midterms. First of all. First, they'd have to get a bunch of new, they'd have to replace those justices because they'd been retired by the government at the age of, I think, in decrepit 54.

46:09Jon Favreau:I mean, first of all, shout out for creative, points for creativity. Points for creativity. Local news, some local news outlet in Virginia floated this idea and all of a sudden we're talking about it uh it's real dog another thing says a golden retriever can't be speaker of the house situation it is without a doubt undemocratic terrible precedent the kind of thing that voters would absolutely despise in this climate absolutely would do it 100 appropriate you know the governor of louisiana is just talking about on tv how he's like throwing out ballots and he's like it's not my fault it's the supreme court's fault you did cancel an election do we really think abigail spanberger governor spanberger would have wanted to you know kind of hemorrhage all the political capital she'd built up with independent republican voters doing this early on i doubt it i bet she has other things she wants did you see greg sergeant's piece in the new republic on this one when it when it the reason they're not doing it so may 12th which is the day you're listening to this that is the deadline set by the department of elections for having congressional maps in the system in time for early voting in june ahead of the august primary so they couldn't pass the law to lower the retirement age to get rid of all the judges to appoint all the new judges to reach on the maps to send it back to court because the technology because because the technology is so old it takes a lot of time to input new districts into the computers i don't know what that meant the computers if we lose are we putting like are we putting the maps like are we like feed it like a fax machine yeah is it punch cards like i don't know what we're doing like how big is it is it a room does it overheat like i don't understand can you get claude but the idea that we could potentially lose the house because the computers can you help in virginia the computers if called upon virginia the virginia government's computers are too slow to be a democracy.

47:41That's where the potential.

47:42Jon Favreau:Did Greg Sargent just call an old person by accident, like a Luddite who doesn't know? I think it was like the guy that runs the state Senate. He was the one that was saying the deadline. Yeah, I think, no, no. He got a real guy on the phone. I don't think Greg Sargent got got by AI or anything. He was talking to a real person. But that guy was like, hey, listen. It was Grock. Yeah, love the idea. It was Grock. Damn it, Grock. Love your idea. Yeah, I mean, look, my take on it was, okay. Grock's drawing bikinis on all the state legislation. On all the districts. All the districts have just magnificent Yavos.

48:13Look at these cannons. Look at these cannons. Virginia State Senate Majority Leader Scott Surveld.

48:20Jon Favreau:Yeah, I just meant was he old and doesn't know computers. No, no, no. That's fair, but I just want to give him a shout out. I'm calling him the Jim Comey of fucking Virginia. No, I don't think that's fair. No, look, the thing about it is. 86, that idea. The guy, he's the one who picked up the phone. He called, he picked up the phone. Yeah, never, don't make that much sense. Could have been Spanberger. She didn't pick up the phone. Yeah, well. No, smart. I guess that's why she's governor. Yeah, I'm not taking that fucking call. Oh, the crazy, we'll get rid of all the judges because of democracy?

48:47They're waiting for judges. To save democracy, I've gotten rid of all the judges. They're worse than us. Everybody get behind me. We're going, come on. Gavin Newsom's breathing down her neck. Yeah, Gavin Newsom. We could have all Democratic deaths. He's like, I put him on a raft and send him off to fucking Hawaii. That fucking institutional fucking fag. We could have had all Democratic districts, all Democratic districts. What kind of coward was he? Why is Gavin Newsom such a coward? Put that out there. No, but that's just kidding. I'm just kidding. Governor. If you told me right now that we there's no time.

49:19We don't know what the future holds. We can still win the House. We should fight to win the House. Yes, this made it harder. But the idea that if we knew with certainty that our only path to having some check on Trump was doing this. Was updating the machines. Was updating the machines. Was buying a new laptop. Was Tim Cook's software update. Updating the fucking updating. He's not going to give me now. Updating to see era 15.2 so we can upload the map so the new judges that are young and vital, just the 32-year-old new Democratic judges could approve the map. I'd be like, OK, I get it. Maybe it's worth the risk.

49:49Second year layoffs. But everything can get worse. And look, I believe Republicans are leading us down all these escalatory paths all along the way, every step of the way. But this would be a new one and it would be on us. Yeah, big deal. They're expanding courts. They are expanding courts. Here's where I'm going to be excited about Democrats is any it's it is clear that any state where Democrats have control either of the governorship or the governorship and ideally the state legislature. If we do not act to maximize the number of seats that we win between now and 28, because the cycle is already passed.

50:22Which Virginia will have a chance to do. Right. Which we have to do. If you decide to take a pass on that. Yeah. Then you're fucked. But like I expect New York, Virginia and Colorado better get in the act. Minnesota can, I believe, Wisconsin can, Maryland can squeeze out another one at Illinois.

50:38Jon Favreau:But J.B. Pritzker probably won't be bulldozing the courthouses, you know? I'm guessing that's not going to be part of the point. The problem is the Virginia State Constitution, Commonwealth, that gives, you know, the legislature the authority to appoint the judges and gives them certain terms so that you get a bunch of Republicans. It's actually probably fair for democracy. It's probably great for the country. But they can't they can expand from seven to 11 seats is you need actually like a big super majority in the legislature, I think, to prevent exactly this exact. Sounds like a good model for America, actually.

51:10Yeah. Yeah. One would think. But again, we have to do things as a country. Yeah. And not as individual states, which is why you need to eliminate gerrymandering as a country. Back in this quarter, what? I was about to say the U.S. Constitution does not require any specifics on expanding the number of justices on the Supreme Court. And that is just a custom. Now, have we ever, did the Biden administration ever finish that report on whether we should do it? Where were we on that? Good Paul.

51:35Jon Favreau:Hey, where were we on that report? Yeah, you know. I think they did put it out. It's on Merrick Garland's to-do list. Oh, okay. Yeah.

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52:56All right. Anyway, why worry about 2026 when we can speculate about 2028? Nice. AOC made some news over the weekend when she sat down with our pal David Axelrod at the University of Chicago Institute of Politics. Boy, was there an event that was just designed for us? Yeah. Axe at the IOP interviewing AOC. Good times.

53:13Jon Favreau:We reviewed the IOP tape and I'll tell you all about it. No? Yeah, pretty good. 2017 joke. Where she provided the terminally online among us, plenty of content to engage with, as people have been over the last couple of days. There was one response in particular she gave to the age old question of whether she's planning on running for president or Senate in 2028. We should talk about in which she answered by pivoting to a Washington Post editorial last week going after her for saying that it's impossible to become a billionaire without breaking rules and abusing workers or paying them not what they're worth.

53:45Take a listen. It was very clear this was a veiled threat, right? So the elite saying, if you want this job, you just stepped out of line. They assume that my ambition is positional. They assume that my ambition is a title or a seat. And my ambition is way bigger than that. My ambition is to change this country. presidents come and go senate house seats elected officials come and go but single-payer health care is forever a living wage is forever workers rights are forever women's rights all of that which this president would come and go a little faster yeah what do you guys think i thought it was a um in terms of non-answers to questions about are you going to run for president that's one of the They went to the crowd to a guy named Shuck Chumer, who is like, answer the question.

54:51Jon Favreau:Yeah, we've all heard a million politicians duck that question. And usually it's some version of like, I'm not thinking about that right now. My priorities are on the state of Virginia. My calendar. It's like she made it bigger. She made it about what she wanted to do, the people she wanted to help. I thought that was nice. It was well done. now uh the nitpicking response that we kind of hinted at is legislative accomplishments are more durable but not they're not forever the supreme court overturned roe versus wade but i think that's a little too literal yeah uh we all know i feel like we would have written the line forever and then and then like the policy nerds or the lawyers would have been like more durable is more more accurate which is correct it would have been more accurate to say that yeah almost ac is still hanging on nearly for yeah yeah by the skin of its teeth that's right i did think it was completely wild to have a washington post editorial not a column but an entire editorial from the ed board owned by jeff bezos being like hey stop picking on billionaires it's so funny well he's like i'm gonna read you the editorial board so that it focuses on free markets and and uh uh like you know not attacking success it's like you know promises made promises kept i guess on what that editorial board would do yeah uh i watched the whole thing though i'd never heard her talk about the specific experience of going from candidate to overnight celebrity that was a really interesting story um uh and how just like head spinning and insane that was and then the part about what did you hear the story about why she didn't go to med school like her dad got sick passed away actually and her mom started working on these jobs i mean it's not just like the the bartending story that makes her feel like more of a human being than any other politician it's the very recent past and economic hardship.

56:28Jon Favreau:It's a very compelling event. It was worth watching the full hour, I think. I will say that the whole conversation about should billionaires exist to me is not the most productive use of time on either side of the debate because it's like, here's the thing about billionaires. I just want to make sure that they are taxed appropriately. I want to make sure that they can't use their influence and power to change the laws and have a bigger megaphone than everyone else in the country just because they're rich. but like go it seems like an academic dorm room debate to be like should they exist should they not exist if they exist does that mean that they broke the law or not broke the law like i don't know why we need to be debating that so i feel like it's um i was thinking there was something about the online debate that was very frustrating to me because there's a lot of people talking there's a few there's a few aspects of the online debate that we can get into but we'll start with the billionaires one and and i and i was trying to figure out what was bugging me about it.

57:18And it is, I think, because you end up in this conversation in which the terms are moral and fuzzy, terms like earned, legitimate, deserved. And those are because moral language. And I actually think the debate over the kind of morality of who can amass vast sums of wealth and how they do it is not like, I don't think it's, I think it's more than academic. I think the way we have it is academic. But what was interesting to me is the response. Like it is absurd that jeff bezos's paper is writing a defensive yeah of billionaires and and what was interesting about the defense is that they always land on celebrities like taylor swift and seinfeld and and and people like people well like old people and people that like you know nobody had to pee in a bottle for taylor swift to write the music right like nobody had to sew sneakers with their little hands right so like they see that documentary about the air store how many how many how many children were working those gears it seems like she had to pee in a few bottles.

58:14Maybe she did. Maybe she did. Scooter Braun pissed himself a couple times.

58:17Jon Favreau:That girl. But like, but then, so it's like, oh, because they really earned it. And what the kind of underlying defense of it is like, well, Taylor Swift, by dint of talent without exploitation, created more than a billion dollars worth of value. And like, I think I largely agree with that. But where I kind of, what they are talking past the deeper argument, which is a system in which one person can accrue all that wealth. Like even Taylor Swift, like she's protected by intellectual property law. She's been able to take her vehicles on the roads and all the rest. And it's not about like the righteousness or the morality to me.

58:53Like that's just not what I care about. I think it matters a lot in politics. It's like a system in which those benefits accrue so much is both wrong on the front end and the back end, the incentive structure and power structure of the economy and then the tax structure on the back end. And so whether billionaires should or should not exist if a lot of them do it is because something is fundamentally broken in the system and they have the ability to exploit that wealth that has kind of also wrecked our politics and like that to me is what makes it worth having yeah and and for me that brings us to like all right so what are the policy considerations here what are we going to what rules and laws are we going to put into place to make sure that the system is more fair how do we tax

59:34Jon Favreau:wealth. That retax wealth. And it goes into regulations and lobbying and all the corruption stuff as well. There's all that. And I also think, I think about Ruben Gallego and what he would always say after the 2024 election is that Democrats with Latino voters failed the big ass truck test and that people in this country want to be rich. Working class people want to be rich. And do they all want to be billionaires? Do they think they can be billionaires? No, but they want to be wealthy and what they just want is to like have a you know fair playing field whatever you want to call it whatever cliche you want to bring out but like people want to make a lot of money and they also want to make sure that people who are absurdly rich like pay their fair share in taxes and don't have more power and influence than everyone else yeah and but i think like democrats end up focusing on the tax side of it and not as much on like the deeper kind of like structures that mean individuals, like whether they have whether they have a union or not, whether they have other protections, like let's say non-competes and things like that, all of which like kind of mean and as like more like all the productivity gains are sort of going up to the top, which means the individual has less negotiating and bargaining power than they used to.

1:00:46And their dollar doesn't go as far because of all of our failures across housing and all the rest. And to me, like those are the questions that I think Democrats struggle the most to answer. We have the least compelling answer on like upriver from the taxes. One last thing we have to talk about. Gas prices may be$4.50 a gallon, but Transportation Secretary and Road Rules All-Stars veteran Sean Duffy really wants you to get out and take a road trip. So much so that he and his wife and nine children have been apparently doing their own road trip over the last several months, which they've documented in a Ghazi documentary series premiering soon on YouTube.

1:01:18Duffy's wife, Fox News host and fellow Real World and Road Rules star Rachel Campos Duffy, that's where they met, described the project as really wholesome, good family stuff that's an antidote to the quote, Pornhub world we're living in. What kind of road trip did she go? Well, she was on Real World, I can never say Real World Road Rules Challenge. Yeah, it's hard. Yeah, anyway. Here's a clip. What a beautiful family. Hi, can I say hi to Mr. President? Can I say to the President Trump? We're inviting you along with our family on the Great American Road Trip. The Duffies, they've got tons of kids.

1:01:57I think they have like 11 kids. Nine. Nine or 11 something. Is there a difference? Before Kid Rock became Kid Rock, you're traveling all over the country. Oh, yeah. Basically an AeroStar van. Dad's real world house. If I never lived in this house, none of you would be here. Was that... That looks so boring. Was that antidote to Pornhub or no? Uh... well I mean

1:02:19Jon Favreau:he's got a lot of kids so something's working alright that's so many first of all you can't road trip with nine kids what are we driving is it a school bus because that looked like a little car so we're just leaving them behind also bullshit that they're really driving around the country they're flying places and then driving around and filming it right we assume yes you think the moon landing was fake no you might be wondering who paid for this massive boondoggle 501c4 called the great american road trip Inc. which says it fully funds its own efforts to celebrate and share America's story and whose sponsors happen to be industries with businesses in front of the Department of Transportation.

1:02:56So that's helpful. And the department later confirmed that taxpayer dollars paid for the secretary's travel to a bunch of the stops but not his family's and the whole thing is official business anyway because he's the transportation secretary and he was doing some transportation there I guess.

1:03:09Jon Favreau:Your job is driving. Dude remember when the planes were all crashing and like Sean Duffy was the guy who was going to fix it well i just watched a guy get hit on the runway in denver the other day i don't know maybe don't road trip around so much look you know this first of all this would bug me less if a they didn't have a bunch of uh sponsors who have business in front of the department of transportation that's and if they were democrats right john well no i was gonna say i was actually gonna say classic uh you know you know who fucking wouldn't stop talking about pete buddhage and criticizing pete and chaston rachel campos duffy rachel campos duffy when they spent two months when pete took two months paternity leave because the twins were in the NICU.

1:03:47Yeah, they were. And she criticized him for that. And so it's like, okay, and now you're going to go do this?

1:03:52Jon Favreau:It's crazy to film a seven-month reality show. What are we doing? They said that he, like, popped in for a day here and a day there. But it's like, whatever, if he wants to do it on his days off, none of these people are fucking doing a good job anyway in the cabinet. It's all a grift. I would say, though, he's one guy. Not my Sean. Yeah, he's one guy where it's like, dude, like, you got like real legitimate ongoing like management problems at your department yeah and if and if butt rocket duffy can't fix it who can you know that's what his nickname was in the in the real world um but rocket why was it that because he uh would run around the house streaking and mooning people there's there's there's the rocket i remember he did a front moon i think too out a window in one of the episodes but rocket also on the show cyrus rachel rachel was yeah Rachel Campos is Boston's a pretty good series I don't begrudge him his youth I don't either there's too much reality TV Butt Rocket's a great name Butt Rocket sure Trump Sean Duffy Spencer Pratt torturing us in the mayoral race here like all these annoying reality people just popping back up and ruining the 2026 Sean Duffy I defended you as one of the lesser offenses in terms of actual cabinet performance so far and that remains the case because the bar is so low but there's a rough this is tough i also look as a rule like if someone's producing their own reality show it's just more boring that's just how it goes you got the only reality shows like oh it's wholesome like what would you think that's why people go to bravo con no they want to watch these throw shit you know and get into it he was also a lumberjack yeah we're gonna chop some wood that part of the thing he was a lumberjack oh yeah wow i didn't know that that was a part of the real world Boston thing.

1:05:35Huh. That's right. That was his shtick. That and Butt Rocket.

1:05:39Jon Favreau:I don't remember Butt Rocket. I'll send you the video. I was going to... All of these episodes. I thought that was an old joke that was going to be like, I've said it too many times. Also, flagging that he was briefly NASA administrator. You guys remember that? Yeah. He wanted to keep the job. Get some other rockets up there. You know? He's got the expertise. He has a history. He's worked with all kinds of rockets.

1:06:02Anyway, is that it? that's it that's our show for today everyone yeah it was a good one was it it was a gusher of a show Dan and I are going to be back with a new show on Friday if you want to check that out I think we're starting this is a new ending this is a new end segment of Pots of America I want to apologize for calling Gavin Newsom a woke I want to apologize for suggesting that removing the gas tax would cause Chuck Schumer to come I think I regret saying that or implying it now I regret saying it oh it was ass rocket sorry oh Same thing. I was just being family friendly. Just to pick up.

1:06:37Took us rocket. Unlike me. Took us rocket. A real rump rocket.

1:06:45That's something different. Speaking of Tim Cook going to China. What? Oh, fuck. End the show. We're out. Credits. Pods of America is a Crooked Media production. Our show is produced by Austin Fisher, Saul Rubin, McKenna Roberts and Farrah Safari with Ree Cherlin, Elijah Cohn and Adrian Hill Our team includes Matt DeGroat, Ben Hethcote Jordan Cantor, Charlotte Landis, Kirill Pellaviv David Tolles, Mia Kelman, Ryan Young and Naomi Singel Our staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East