Michael Steele: A Petty, Punk-Ass President

So you are a professional plumber, yes? But do you have professional website? Hmm, not so much. Try Aionos. It's turbocharged AI power works super far as to bring your WordPress website to life and deliver top-of-the-draw results every time. And it's clever auto updates to all the hard work of maintaining your site. So you can get on with maintaining your business. How's that for nice, nice, nice? Try Aionos, your digital partner at ionos.co.uk Yes, you are running a business so of course you're working hard. But your web hosting isn't working at all, darling. If it can't cope with the visitors, you can't grow the business. Try Aionos. It loads up to three times faster so you get much happier customers at unbeatable price. It is easy, easy way to get hardworking website. That is nice, nice, nice. Try Aionos. Your digital partner at ionos.co.uk Hey, all tickets are officially on sale now for our 2026 live tour kickoff show in Minneapolis on February 19th. We're stoked to be with our friends in the Twin Cities fucking demanded that we be with our friends in the Twin Cities. We're bringing Sarah, JVL, Bill, Sam, me. We'll see who else, maybe some other folks. We're looking forward to being with you. All profits from the show will be donated to second harvest heartland, which is providing food to folks in need in the Twin Cities. Make sure you're also saving the date for when we're heading to Texas. We're there in Dallas for one night March 18th and Austin for one night March 19th. Watch your inbox and the Bork.com size events for more information on how to get tickets to all those shows. We'll be seeing you soon. Hello and welcome to the Bork podcast. I'm your host Tim Miller. He's the co-host of MSNOWs, the weeknight airing every day at 7 p.m. in the east. He's a former chair of the RNC. He was Lieutenant Governor of Maryland. It is Michael Steele, the chairman. How you doing, man? What's up, play-up player? How you doing, Tim? Girl, I know. He was always standing at 10.30 a.m. when we're taping this. We have a new Fed chair who has ties to the Greenland debacle. The Trump is suing the government for $10 billion in his own government. Lindsey Graham might shut down the government if she doesn't get some bribe money. Kelsey is raiding elections off offices. The regime has arrested Don Lemon and we still don't know who killed Alex Preddie. I got a bunch of other stuff. But I'm going to stroke out just going through all those topics. I'm kind of like, you're a host now. Dealers' choice. Which one of those you want to start with? It's Friday. Yeah. So we always talk about living for the weekend. Never met more than it does right now. I love it. All of that's bad. All of that's bad. A resting Don Lemon. For what? Look, the Fed chair and all of that stuff. A lot of this has been in play for a while. The extra stuff, you know, suing the government for $10 billion going after a celebrity host. All of that bullshit is the distraction. And the fact of the matter is it is proving to me that Susie Wiles who was lauded coming in as the adult in the room that she was his muse and she was in his ear and could that she had done me nothing. Because Donald Trump is a thing unto himself. Always has been. Always will be. And this idea that somehow we're going to magically control the dragon. You know, I mean, hell, even in Game of Thrones, there were moments when that dragon looked at, you know, looked at it was sitting on his back out, okay, bitch, you screw up one more time. Yeah. And, you know, the reality is we now, I mean, there's more than ever recognize they're trying to steal the elections for this November. They're trying to, and having in many ways, in put in place an authoritarian state with Donald Trump and sitting on the toilet. And you've got around him the Lindsey Graham's and others who willing to shill because they think there's somehow going to be protected. And so that's our Friday. Yeah. That has been our every day since 2016. And I think that in many respects, particularly in certain parts of Magaverse and I've heard you speak on this, you know, light bulbs may be coming on, but they still are down. Yeah. They are. You know, that's a good thesis statement as we go through all these things because I think we might as well start with Donald and Minnesota because, you know, I mean, we weren't fooled, but we'd go through this BS here in the midweek, where Tom Homan comes into Minneapolis. They got a new boss in charge. They're going to tone things down. Donald Trump's been a little spooked and, you know, they don't like seeing the dead white people in the streets and they might change their policies a little bit. There was nothing. I don't know if it lives in a new cycle, the dragon, you know, sitting on the throne to mix your metaphors, like, sitting on your golden toilet. Like, he's a survivor, right? And he wants more power. And it's like, oh, that thing didn't work. People are mad at me. We're going to do this other thing tomorrow. You know, and like, that's what's happening right now. So let's just start with lemon for people who haven't been following us. He's independent now. He's on YouTube over on a show a few times. He was arrested in relation to this incident where there were a group of anti-ice protesters. They disrupted a service at city's church in St. Paul, I guess. One of the pastors there was also an acting field director for ICE. And so that was the reason for disrupting the church and protesting. I'm not a huge fan of protesting churches. I'll just say this up at the front. But Don Lemon was a journalist covering this. You know, like, he was an independent journalist following the protesters into the church. He was videotaping. He did then go and interview this pastor and like ask him questions, ask him some tough questions. But like, I don't know, I had some asshole on the internet messaging me today. He's like, well, what if that, what would you say if the proud boys had sworn to mosque? And I'd say, well, if they were breaking the law, they should be held to account. But if Fox News sent a journalist to cover it, I wouldn't want the Democrats to go in a rest. Peter Ducey for being there and documenting the fact that it happened. So anyway, just one more thing for context here. I fully get you're taken at multiple judges have already smacked this down. They tried to bring it in Minneapolis to the judge who got rid of it with prejudice dismissed it. Our colleagues at MSNOW are reporting that multiple career DOJ prosecutors in Minnesota and Los Angeles refused to be involved in this. Pam Bondy when it was announced said that this indictment was, quote, at my direction. So that's where we are right now. The attorney general is demanding that an independent journalist get arrested over the objections of prosecutors and judges. And that has been the will of Donald Trump. And Pam Bondy is the worst kind of hack there is in the job. She is useless in that role except to the extent that she services Donald Trump. And you can take that however you want. And the reality of it is that at the end of the day, he is a firebrand. And he is a damn good journalist. And he was in a position to document the excesses across the board. I mean, whatever you want to say, like you said, I'm not a fan and do not advocate going into a church service and protesting. Wait till the service is over, grab the pastor, have a conversation. They wanted the blame and they wanted the firecracker moment. They got it. And here's what happens when you play with stupid fire. It will not only burn you but it will burn everyone else into the vicinity. And so making an example of Don Lemon is what this game is. And still in fear in the American press corps is what this is. To getting folks like you and me to suddenly, but more importantly, you know, the corporatignities that we work for, to go soft. To, oh, well, I don't know if we should, we've got to be careful. We don't need Trump mad at us. And there's two words that sum up what I feel about this administration and particularly this president in this moment. And I think a lot more Americans are coming to those feelings. And I think actions like this further those feelings in a way that I think, look, I looked at the 2026 elections in 2025 and in late 2024 and said the Democrats are in a position then to pick up 35 to 40. And I thought the Senate was marginally in play by the time I got to the end of 2025. It was at least 40 seats in the house and the Senate is in play. As we turn the corner into the cycle, my friend, if I'm a Republican on a ballot, 2006 will look like a kitty party compared to what's going to happen potentially. If voters take the attitudes that are beginning to form and stew within them about how this administration is behaving, it is not addressing their core concerns about the economy is not addressing their core concerns about jobs because a lot of folks have lost their jobs, particularly if you were a federal employee and are still unemployed and you were the only person who was bringing money into that household. These are the realities that are happening across the country at kitchen tables every day. And this administration is more sucked up on building a damn monstrosity of a friggin ballroom or having the president go to some bitch ads premiere. On a black carpet, whatever the hell that shit is, right, instead of governing the country, Republican stopped governing a long time ago. And they've allowed someone at the helm sitting behind the resolute desk who has zero interest in it, except for how much he can grift from the system, enrich his kids and his own personal coffers. Tell me how the president makes a billion dollars in a year people. Well, the government, I give it to him in a second. We're gonna get back to that. I gotta sit on this down, lemon. Thanks. There's a couple other elements of it that are pissing me off that I think that we need to talk about last time I was on your show. You were talking about the 10th amendment. I want to focus on two amendments right now, the first in the 10th. And these fuckers, okay. These fuckers, I spent the last six years or longer talking about how old the Democrats are trying to do this. That's are trying to cancel us are trying to silence us like the assault on free speech is too much. That's what supposedly radicalized Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg to get on board. That's what supposedly radicalized these comedian guys to get on board. And it's like, are any of them going to stand up for Don Lemon today? I'm not holding my breath because I drive down past the smoothie king center here in New Orleans. And I've seen several times people on the on the marquee there with my uncanceled tour. You can't cancel me. I'm speaking the truth on all these fucking contrarians who are out there saying that, oh, the woke left and Joe Biden was trying to cancel us. And I want to and it's important that we get Donald Trump in there to protect free speech because I want to say the R word and I want to call people pussy. This was a cross society that there are a ton of influential rich men who were saying that they couldn't say what they wanted. And so they had to get on board with Donald Trump. Here we have today like legal punishment, the Department of Justice, the directed by Donald Trump, the president and the attorney general have arrested somebody for exercising his first amendment right as a journalist. And like whether or not you like what he did or thought it was appropriate. It's like that's the whole fucking point in the first amendment. People can say dumb shit, people can do dumb shit, people can report, people can comment. And that's what we get to do in a free country. And they arrested him for his speech. This is state tyranny going after Don Lemon. What was the crime? He went into the church with a video camera or his phone and just document it. What was happening? Where was the crime? They're going to say it's the face act, whatever it was that like there's some you know protection of church in these you know religious freedom places or Don Lemon did not disrupt the service. Right. Exactly. Don Lemon did nothing to inject himself into that moment. And that America, please take your head off your asses. I know some of y'all sitting around you. Whatever you sitting around thinking, oh okay, they got Don Lemon. They comment for you, motherfucker. They comment for you next. Trust me because when you take out, when you take out the pinnacle example of free speech in this country, which is our press folks, they're the only industry, the only business, the only career, the only job that is written into the damn constitution. Not coal miners, right? Not electricians, not waitresses and waiters. Not tech CEOs. Right. Not tech CEOs. Elon Musk. Data center management. Right. None of that. The press. And so this idea that you know you're going to sit by and just watch this happen. It's crazy because you are next you are you are the menu. It's not being on it. You are it. And that's the reality of this moment. And I think you're exactly right about raising up those two pieces because why the first and 10th go together. Because the first speaks to the very thing that Don Lemon represents in this moment. And the 10th represents the very thing that the states have always represented since the founding. And that is the independence to act and perform and to do whatever they want to do. If you don't like it, they're people want them to do. If the people of Minnesota want their city or their state to be a sanctuary city or sanctuary state, that's their business. Texas done some fucked up shit. Ain't nobody running into Texas telling them, I'm sorry, you can't do that. We're shutting you down. We're going to send in the army. To Joe Biden sending the troops when they pass that bounty act, you know, the left people sue women if they were having abortion to Joe Biden, you know, to Joe Biden sending the troops to Florida when they said teachers had to hide the picture of them in their gay spouse. Like no, it won't send in the fucking control. Can we just stop with the both side ism until your first point about the Elon Musk in the base those and all these all these broke culture bastards. Right? Who somehow fell victim to the idea of the weaponization that they're coming after. If I can billionaire, ain't nobody coming after your ass. Stop it. If you lined yourself with Donald Trump, you did it for two reasons. One, you liked the shit he was doing and you believed in it or two, you felt or realized you can make some money off of it. Likely both of those things are true. So don't come in and act all of a sudden like, oh, geez, you know, you know, I watched Joe Biden and weaponized the Department of Justice and it just made me realize, bitch, please. It's stopping. You're a grown ass man. If you're a billionaire, presumably you had the brains to build a business. You hadn't had the brains to figure out that you were getting punk by Donald Trump. No, you wanted to be punk because you saw the money in it. You got you got, you got, you got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You got you. You in the first amount of part of it is, like they arrested Remesa Ostark for signing an op-ed, and they've arrested Dunn, lemon, for committing an act of journalism. Like, this is as clear as that. Like, this is government tyranny going after people for either their opinions or for the type of journalism they're doing. And like, that is a straight assault on freedom of speech. And if you were a free speech warrior who is upset because the Biden administration was like working with YouTube to flag stories that did misinformation, I kind of didn't love that either, but that was like middle management making some requests of tech companies. So the tech companies could have said no to. Dunn, lemon didn't get to say no to the guy who showed up with the guns today and say, sorry, I know thank you. I'm gonna keep doing my job. They handcuffed him, I assume, and jailed him. Took him in. So we'll learn more as the day goes on. Raise your hand if you've been putting off a dental cleaning annual checkup or honestly, any type of doctor's appointment. That always my hand up, I literally have a text right now from my doctor telling me I need to come back. Nothing big, don't worry, get worried about me. But I didn't want to deal with that. All right, so I didn't know this hand was coming and already my hand is up. And so if that's you, you need to make getting that doctor appointment easy. Start doing things differently. We're finding doctors we love and booking appointments with Zoc Doc. Zoc Doc is a free app and website that helps you find a book high quality in network doctors so you can find someone you love. Whether you're looking for dermatology, dentistry, primary care, eye care, or one of the other 200 plus specialties offered on Zoc Doc, you can easily search, especially or symptom to build the care team that is right for you. I gotta tell you, I checked this out and as I've ever mentioned, I need this to be as easy as possible. And luckily I haven't needed to use Zoc Doc yet, but looks very simple. And you know what, now that I mention it, here live in the ad read, I'm just realizing I do need to need this for the dentist because my dentist is out of network now. Right? And I need an in network dentist. All right, it's time. So I'll report back, but it looked very easy. Stop putting out those doctor's appointments and go to Zoc Doc.com, slash the bulwark to find an instantly book a doctor you love today. That's Zoc, D-O-C, dot com slash the bulwark. Zoc Doc.com slash the bulwark. Thanks to Zoc Doc for sponsoring this message. It's on that 10th one more thing, back to these states. And I'll talk a little bit more about what's happened in Minnesota. Here's what we are right now. Based on reports from people on the ground, folks have been following their doing journalism in Minneapolis and we appreciate them. Doesn't seem like the number of agents in the streets has dissipated. You know, the Minneapolis star tribune was saying they saw the same amount of cars go out from the Wipple building they always do. When we still don't know, I just, I have to obsess over this. I talked to Tim Walls on Tuesday and I asked him, who killed your citizen? Who killed Alex Freddie? Do you know? And he said, I don't know because the Feds know because they first sent those, the people, the perps to another city in state. They told us that Greg Bavino told us that. And then subsequently yesterday, they told us now that they put them on administrative leave. I don't want them on administrative leave. I want them back in Minnesota, testifying about what they did. And to me, it is crazy that the Feds can go into a state. They can kill a citizen of Minneapolis. And then they can hide from the local officials. Like who perpetrated it? They can hide evidence from them. They can cover it up. And it is totally insane that that continues to happen as we're taping this right now. Well, it continues to happen because no one's stopping it. Outside of the Democratic members of Congress and the Democratic officials in the state, where are the Republican members? Where are the Republicans? Well, Susan Collins got him out of her state. She got ice out of her state. That's what I'm talking about. That's what I'm talking about. I mean, but at the end of the day, they probably got full on the lobster and they can't go anywhere. I mean, I don't care if you are Republican or whatever you consider yourself. You, if you're serving in the United States Congress, you should be concerned about what the government is doing for all of these Republicans for Eons, who lived in this space where they talked about government overreach and they talked about, again, weaponization because it was Democratic administrations. All the things that they said was happening then that never happened is happening now under a Republican president and you're silent and you've got the class clown in various senators running around, you know, standing on the plane. Yeah, we're gonna do, yeah. Instead of leading and instead of trying to get this president to back up because this folks does not end well for anybody. None of this ends well. It just doesn't. We've seen this. History is continuity as my friend Simone likes to say. Say, and with respect to Minnesota and Mr. Prattie's gun, again, as my colleague Simone says, where's the phone? Right? Because the phone will tell you exactly because he was filming. He was filming the officer and it was probably more than likely still running when they were beating the crap out of them before they shot him 10 times. Where's that? The individuals who were involved. Literally. Literally, where is it? Why don't Tim Walls and Jacob Prina where it is? Is there a fucking city? Because the government won't tell them. Won't tell. They don't want them a part of the investigation. So you have to ask yourself why? Why was something that happened in a state not involve state officials who have the jurisdiction? They were on a public street. They were on federal property when this happened. They were on a public street. And so this is the jurisdiction of the state and the city. And yet this government has said, screw you, we get to control here. And that's not how the 10th Amendment works. That's not how the process within the administration of government and the administration of justice works. Yet here we are. I guess the only thing other I can say is, I don't want the names of the individuals who killed Mr. Pretti. I want the names. I want the faces. I want to see their faces. I want to be able to look them in the eye. And I think of the American people who are owed that. I think the Pretti family is owed that. And I think the government has a responsibility here that it is shirking because the men in control, the Republican leaders in the House and the Senate don't want to do anything. Because they're more afraid of Donald Trump than they are the family of Mr. Pretti, the people who live in the state of Minnesota, or the American people. We pay them, the killers, by the way. We pay them. They work for us. Trump's posted like 2,000 bleats in the past 48 hours. So it's hard to kind of go through all of them, but there's one I should mention. He writes this, Agitator and possibly insurrectionist, Alex Pretti's stock has gone way down. It was quite a display of abuse and anger for all to see. He's referencing a video of Pretti from 11 days prior to when he was killed where he's kicking a cop car. Agitator and possibly insurrectionist, Alex Pretti's stock has gone way down. Like how fucking deranged do you have to be to post that about a guy that got murdered? His stock is down? He's dead. Your goons killed him. Yeah, yeah. With no insult intended to 10 year olds, but that's basically that is the most childish thinking in the world. It is immature. He's a 70-on-year-old man with obvious health issues, obvious mental concerns. And he is in a position where he says stuff like that and people just go out of his trough. But it's an indication of just how bad it is. I mean, that's how he values the life of an American citizen. His stock has gone down after we killed him. Hey, Array for our side. What the fuck? I noticed he didn't post about how his stock went up and he showed videos of him like serving veterans at the VA or when the son of a veteran played a video of him giving a tribute to his dad. Like there's no stock doesn't go up. No, not going down with him. Just goes down. You kill him and then you spit on him. That's the best. That's what's happening. And you've seen this movie before and this is what Trump does. And I'm just telling people, there will be more of this as we move out of this very harsh winter into what will likely be a very hot summer. There's more of this to come. Remember the end game here. The end game is the Insurrection Act. That's the end game because the moment he can see a situation in which he feels justified and invoking it, it starts a domino effect of other things that will lead to martial law and the suspension of the 2026 elections. That's the end game. They're doing what they can to corrupt the system on the ground. I give you Georgia. Right. What the fuck is it? Are we doing in Georgia? Let's talk about that. Tulsi Gabbard was there. She's the director of national intelligence. Thank you. Why was she on the ground at Georgia for a alleged supposed fake law enforcement observation where they seized ballots? They went to an elections that are seized ballots. Tulsi's on the ground for that. That's pretty alarming, especially when you tie it to the fact that earlier this year, I guess it would be last year now, Tulsi cut the group within the intelligence operations that job it was to look at foreign interference and elections. Right. Fired those people. The element that she has of control over elections, the only purview she has is making sure that foreign countries don't fuck with our elections. She cut the group that was doing that and now she's on the ground following up insane Trump conspiracy theories. You know what, Kristi, no one thing. Put the cap on. Do the cause play. I'm important. I'm serious. No, you're not. You are a tool like everybody else for Donald Trump. And what makes matter worse, you're an incompetent tool in the process. You have no business there. And the fact of the matter is you made it very clear. You don't care if the Russians or other foreign governments have find ways to interfere in our elections. What you're concerned about is going and grabbing ballots, taking them from a secured location and putting them in some place we don't know. We don't know what's happening to those ballots. There's no accounting for those ballots. There was no receipt given to the board of elections when the ballots were taken, which is the typical thing to do. Here's a receipt, a documentation of exactly what we're taking here, the number, et cetera. None of that, right? So she's cause playing. She's a tool. She's doing exactly what Donald Trump wants to do. Donald Trump wants a couple of things. One, he wants to ram down our throats to the point where he forces us to believe the bullshit in his head that he actually won the 2020 election. That will be the litigation for him until he can definitively prove that case, right? It'll never be proven because it didn't happen. He lost. The second thing, though, is again, showing how they can get control of boards of elections. What they can do, I want to know the judge. I want to see that warrant. I want to know what was written on the paper because I firmly believe, my opinion only, that they lied. Now, we have evidence that Department of Justice is lied on warrants before, right? They lied to this judge about what it was they were getting and what the crime was. I want to see that because that will tell you everything you need to know about how the judge signed off on this thing. Unless the judge is another one like the one we got in Florida who's holding the phone. Yeah, I mentioned this day, Edgar yesterday, Andrew Edgar, who had some morning news that are like, who's reviewing all these ballots? So you bring him back and what we're, we're using FBI agents like mid-level, like federal law enforcement agents are now going to be using their time that should be used looking after bad guys. I'm trying to do it. A bunch of election officials have already done in a state that it's run by Republicans, by the way. It's totally insane. I mean, they've already lost civil losses. Rudy Giuliani had to pay out, you know, Ruby Freeman and Shay Moss, like these accusations have already been adjudicated multiple times and it's Republicans over running the state when it happened. Did you know you can save up to 70% on the best brands just by shopping at frumreble.com? We're talking about strollers, car seats, high chairs, espresso machines, cookware, everything you need for way less. Here's how it works. Every single day, Rebels drops thousands of new products on the site for up to 70% off. It is a constant stream of endless deals from top brands, like Upper Baby, Nuna, Baby Bjorn, Breville, Nespresso, Kitchen Aid, Lucrosay, and more. But you have to act fast because every deal is one of a kind. So if you see something you love, make sure you add to cart fast. So stop paying full price when you don't have to. Whether it's Baby Gear, Kitchen Upgrades, or a treasure for your home, you didn't know you needed. Rebels has it for way less, up to 70% less. Shop from rebel.com and save big. Ryan Reynolds here from int mobile. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same premium wireless for $15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistance assistance to switch you to Mint Mobile today. I'm told it's super easy to do at MintMobile.com slash switch. Upfront payment of $45 for three month plan equivalent to $15 per month required. Intro rate first three months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra, default terms at MintMobile.com. I want to go back to Graham. At this house of funding negotiations going on. This is ongoing. You know, like I said, this is the morning so there could be some developments in the afternoon, but it's just even if he he backs down, this is like so fucking gross that we just have to address it. I can it cannot go. It cannot be ignored. So the Senate had struck a deal. The Republicans, the Democrats had struck a deal last night. The deal is essentially that the appropriations bills, the funding bills for everything else besides the DHS would be agreed upon, right? And push forward. And there'd be a two week, you know, extension of the DHS funding to buy both sides some time to negotiate on, you know, creating some new rules around, you know, what the DHS enforcement agencies are allowed to do and the wake of the two killings. Graham, like before this keynote vote, said that he refused to go along with it and was putting a hold on it, unless they put back in the provision that would allow senators to receive cash payouts if they had phone records seized by Jack Smith. You remember the senators put that in to the last budget bill where they were going to be able to get payouts. They're going to be able to get cold hard cash because they felt like their privacy was attacked because they were involved in the insurrection and Jack Smith was looking into their phone records. The House stripped that out after there was a bunch of outrage among a bunch of House Democrats who flagged that scooting Sue Haas Submarine and shot out to him. Graham now is saying he will shut down the government basically unless he can get a cash payout. That's Lindsey Graham's stated position during the negotiations as he taped this right now. What is that? I mean, I guess it's in line with Trump. So we just lump him together. Here's the other story. Trump has a lawsuit right now of $10 billion Trump suing the IRS, Trump and his kids and his organization suing the IRS because his tax records leaked. He suing them for $10 billion. So Trump wants a, so Graham is small potatoes compared to Trump. Graham's just trying to shut down the government to get a few millies for himself. Trump wants $10 billion. This is what's happening. I don't know how America tolerates this bullshit. I honest to God don't know at this stage how South Carolinians of which my family originates on my mama side tolerate this very petty insignificant little man who is the imp at Donald Trump's heels and has been told to go out and they found something. Now, if you weren't making phone calls on January 6th, you weren't getting text messages on January 6th and there was no need to be concerned about anything that wasn't. I mean, if people who were involved in the insurrection had your phone number and were texting you, I'm sorry, that may be of some national interest. And by the way, we already been reading the text. We were just seeing if they were texting you. That's all it was. Were you texting with the people trying to overthrow the government? Right, right. So now this bitch wants to get paid millions of dollars for what? What are we paying you for again? So can I talk about the brothers that the government spied on their phones and took their text messages? Should they be lining up and getting a little piece of something to something? I mean, when do we start paying criminals for crime? And I mean, that's, I'm sorry. That's crazy to me. If you're a part of an investigation, you're part of the investigation. I don't care if you're a senior senator or not. You shouldn't have been doing the shit. It just shouldn't happen that way. But it has and here we are. And so now Lindsay is saying, I'm really to shut down the government unless I've been able to put a provision back in that's going to pay me millions of dollars they wanted to look at my cell phone. I'm going to shut the government down. So you won't be able to get your services till I get my cash. So South Carolina, take note because this is your senator. At this point, having two former Republicans talk about how fiscal responsibility is dead is like the biggest dog by its man's story in the world. But I just, I sometimes I just can't help myself. And we're together. I just want to combine these stories. So Trump wants 10 billion of my money. Trump wants the Trump corporation and his kids to get 10 billion dollars of our money, our taxpayer money. And he wants to do some inside deal where his people and the administration negotiate with his people and his company. And one side writes, uses our money to give the other side a payout. That's what Trump wants to do. 10 billion. Lindsay Graham wants to pay out because he doesn't like that the justice department was doing his job. Meanwhile, here's this other CBO. CBO has been gutted, but every once in a while there's still a couple of people working in there. And here's what they estimated on the National Guard deployments, 500 million last year. Cost us half a billion for these guys to go and be Disney characters in the city. Like that was the result of this. They antagonized the citizens. They did some selfies. One of them got killed. We had a casualty. Right. And they achieved no goals. Like there was nothing accomplished. So they spent 500 million of our money to invade our cities and it results in one tragic casualty. And there's nothing to show for it. Like you'd think that there'd be somebody over there that would be like, what are we doing with everybody's money? It's OPB, baby. What are you talking about? It's OPB. Other people's money. Come on, the help. What? I mean, what though? Nothing. It's so stupid. But here we are. Look, Donald Trump is estimated to already including the $1 billion that we know of estimated to have already made $3 billion. So he really, you've gotten three of the 10 already. So we really only talking about $7 billion so we'll have your people negotiate with our people over our money and we'll give you $7 billion. That's basically what it's saying. Lindsay, I know you feel put upon and I feel bad for your brother. So let's just give you several million dollars to make you feel good because your phone got caught up and something that shouldn't have been caught up and because you were texted with people you shouldn't have been texting with, but that's irrelevant. Let's just give you a million dollars. And then the half a billion dollars that we spent to send our national guard into harm's way and to make a mockery of them. That too is money that, you know, we just write that off. That's just the cost of doing business. And so we have an administration led by a man who failed at running a casino. So what the hell do you think he's gonna do with your money? He had no regards for his own money. Who loses money running a casino on old Trump? We're 40 minutes in. I haven't even got to talk to a new Fed chair. Kevin Warsh has went, do you ever deal with Kevin Warsh? This guy, he's DC Creature. He's one of these old style traditional Republicans that's like a little bit was like just greasy enough to keep playing the game, you know? And so it's interesting because he's got a lot of statements on the record that are contrary to what Trump wants. And that's just not for there. I just thought that's wholly irrelevant. Well, it's only relevant in any situation because we know anyone signing up for Trump is gonna do what he wants. But it's particularly relevant in this situation because let me tell you a little fun fact about Kevin Warsh. His father-in-law is Ron Louder. Ron Louder is Trump's friend from college. Ron Louder was the guy that put the idea in Trump's head that we should take Greenland because they have rare earth minerals. Ron Louder is currently doing a lithium deal with a government backed company. One of these companies that the government invested in because we're China now. They're doing a lithium deal together in Ukraine. So they're essentially stealing from our alleged allies in Ukraine. And he also just is a little icing on the cake. He also is in the Epstein emails. Epstein talks about how they hung out. And that's Ken Warsh's father-in-law. It's not Kevin. It's not very clear, but his father-in-law's Trump's oldest friend behind the Greenland scam stealing from Ukraine in the Epstein files. Seems like some conflicts. It's important that the Fed is independent. So if I was one of the senators, I'd be like, you know what, Kevin, even if you are on the up and up, the appearance of corruption here seems pretty high. Given that Trump is saying that you're gonna do what he wants and that your father-in-law's is bestie. Well, I just stopped at the first point because remember back in the conceit of Senate hearings over many, many years, you have the nominee of Phil and the Blank and they sit down and they tell you how righteous and how upstanding and how independent and how this and that they would be. And then they would just go on and they would rule to overturn Roe vs. Wade and they would rule to strip civil rights and they would go on and run agencies into the ground and make it more expensive for us to deal in our own personal economies. Well, Trump said to hell with that shit, I'm just telling you straight up, I told him, the only way he gets this job is when he gets in there, he lowers interest rates. So when you ask him in a Senate hearing, did Donald Trump tell you to do X and X? He's going to lie and say no. But he already has his marching orders because trust me within the first three months of the job if not the first four weeks, that's what he's gonna do. He's in the job because he's already agreed to do what Trump wants him to do. He's not an independent actor, he has no respect for the, I don't give a fuck who his father-in-law is at this point. Because at the end of the day, he's the guy who's going to ruin the economy. Because he's going to do what Donald Trump wants personally done. There is no more independence if this man is put in the job. Again, I think every Republican in office right now is accountable for every piece of shit that's happened since January of this year. Every last one of you, it's happening. Your name, it happened on your watch, it happened with your approval. This will be no different from that. This is such a good point. I did not agree with you that it kind of doesn't matter who his father-in-law is, but I'm obsessed with it. I'm gonna bring it up every time I mention him anyway. But you're right. Even if his father-in-law wasn't Trump's college for a best friend, your point would still be valid. I'm gonna keep bringing it up. But on these Republicans owning it, this is something that bugged me this week. And the ones that have a little bit of shame still, your Dave Macormick types, your John Curtis's out of Utah, they put out some of these Susan Collins as statements of concern. These guys are going a little too far, et cetera, et cetera. And on the one hand, it's like, okay, you kind of appreciate that. They're like, wow, at least there are some signs that maybe eventually things will be too much. Eventually, there might reach enough dead people in the street that they'll find a backbone. Fuck, on the other hand, it pisses me off because it was so predictable, man. Like we all did all that. Like they funded it. Like when you gave this like Kristi Nome, you know, cart blanche and a budget that's bigger than the US Marine Corps. A budget that's bigger than US Marine Corps. And you gave it to her and you're like, hey, go hire a bunch of people, go into the interior of the country and start roughing people up and getting out immigrants. Like what did you think was gonna happen? And we all said it and we warned it. And by the way, it wasn't just us, JD Vance back in 2015 when he was using his brain, did a big long post about this, about how stupid the deportation plan was because conservatives who recognize that government makes mistakes like also can recognize that the government can't execute a mass deportation within the interior of the country without making mistakes. Like it was obvious and it happened. And now these senators wanna be like, well, you know, if only we had just had a different figure head at the top of it, you know. It's only our rhetoric, our tone was a little better. And it's like, no, man, you funded it. And this is where we're at now. Is this where we are because this is where Republicans have led us. And the very chilling and telling part is there were many exits along the way that they could have taken. Many exit ramps they could have taken. Mitch McConnell could have ended all of this shit if he just corralled the Senate around his speech that he gave on January sixth and seventh. And voted to not just to impeach which the House did, but to convict. All of this, we could have avoided all of this. There's so many moments along the way where folks like you and me and many of our friends were throwing up the flares, putting up the warning signs screaming, no, no, no, don't go down this road. No, danger will rob us in danger, danger, right? And they ploughed us right through to this moment. That's why I say they own every inch of this shit. And this November, it is time to account. And if I'm a Democrat, if I'm an independent, if I'm a like-minded Republican, in every race, I'm holding up the list of things that they rocked. And I'm reminding those voters, this Congressman, this Senator stood by silently when this happened, voted for these things to happen. Look the other way, gave soft platitudes in the face of horrific moments. Didn't say shit when a horrific moment happened, right? Why should we send them back to Washington? What value do they have to us? Our communities, we are struggling, we've lost employment, we are kitchen table is cracked because of the weight of the economics that we're now dealing with. Our kids are undereducated because of the Department of Education is doing crazy shit, we're burning books with the cultural and social fabric of the country's been torn. And it's all because these guys follow one man. And so we'd like a leader to follow us. What about just the more acute crisis right now, which is a lot of people in a lot of parts of the country are dealing with major like weather issues and electricity issues, right? Like people are out of their homes. I got friends who are not in their apartments across Mississippi, Tennessee, because this cold front that came in, you know, an ice storm, people are ready for it. And so do you know who has accountability for that in the federal government, the DHS? FEMA is under DHS. So while these guys are spinning about a murder, when they should be helping people, they're real people, red state people that need help right now. And they're distracted doing all this shit in Minnesota and Maine and everywhere else. Tim, FEMA hasn't even done what it's supposed to do for North Carolina from the weather storms that they had over a year ago. FEMA, I mean, the fact of the matter is Donald Trump has distracted the government in such a way that it is doing everything but what it's supposed to do. And so FEMA isn't FEMA-ing, right? It is not taking care of and helping cities that are ravaged by the winter weather, let alone those that are still recovering from fire. I mean, in certain states, Donald Trump has told him not to do anything. Now, lifting a finger to help California on the deal. Colorado. Yeah, he told them not to go into Colorado because he's mad about Tina Peters, who is his little minion who got jailed for messing with the voting machine. Right, so you got a punk-ass petty president who's sitting there telling, well, I'm sorry, we're just not, your city got burnt out too bad. Your city got flooded too bad, you know, because I don't like your politics. Yeah. I mean, that should tell you something that he's concentrating his eye or against his political opponents, who, and that has real life consequences in how people are recovering from natural devastations like floods and fires. And it has real consequences of how people are going to move forward when, when they look out their window and they have to keep their kids indoors because their ice age is probably the neighborhood to grab up U.S. citizens. I'm done yelling for the podcast. It's been a lot of yelling. I have one more thing I've just been dying to ask you about though, that we have us here or just get to get your take on because it's your closer to it. What do you, you're a Lieutenant Governor of Maryland? One of the names gets thrown around for 2028 is Westmore. So Governor of Maryland right now, what do you make of that guy? I like West. He's a good guy, you know, he's got some challenges here in the state of Maryland. He's got some holes, he's got to figure out how to fill in the state's budget. His own party to some extent is not happening with some of the decisions he's made. But you know, that's not saying much since the Democrats control the state government two to one. So it's all on them. But this goes to what I was saying before about the realities of our economies have direct impact at the state level. And it goes to our conversations about the power of the states to make certain decisions that are left to it under the 10th amendment. But I think, you know, look, he's going to be a name and a voice that's going to be mentioned. I remember when he got into office, we had a conversation. I told him I said, ignore the conversations about the presidency, just do your damn job. You are the governor, do the, do the governing thing. And if the opportunity affords itself later, you consider it. But I think the countries in a very different place it will be looking at a candidate like Westmore very differently in 2028. As a differently wise, because he's an African-American. And I don't see a whole lot of love for people. I mean, look, we had a black woman. They said, no, the black man who made it, they said he was from, you know, Africa and the Muslim. And a lot of people bought that shit. So I think we need to see an attitude change. Can I be shallow for a second? Please. He's got a great smile and muscles, though. Sometimes I look back at all this and I'm like, you know, maybe the Democrats just need to like the hot guy. And Gavin, Gavin also has handsome. But like, West has a little less baggage, has a little less baggage, you know, than Gavin. I don't know. Maybe a handsome guy with muscles is just it. I don't know if you've seen the collicular thing where he talks about JD Vance as recessed side profile and how he's obese and subhuman. Maybe it's as simple as that. I wish it was heavier. I wish it was serious. I wish we were in a serious country. Maybe we're not. Well, I'm looking, some respects I think we've proved. We're not because we've elected Trump on place. So that's kind of a, that's kind of like damning with faint praise. And it's like, you know what, West, you can win in a country that's elected Donald Trump twice. I didn't mean it like that. No, I think West, if he's looking at it and I hear that there are folks in his orbit who are for him, whether he is or not, look, he's going to be a name on the table. The Democrats have, I think, a very good box to look into to level up candidates. I think that there is something to your point though about how people will ultimately look at the next president. And I think they're going to be judging along some very, very different lines than we may have seen in the past. And so the muskals may prevail in the end. All right, Michael Steele, the chairman. This was a sandwich week for the podcast. Me and Bill Crystal on Monday just screamed, like I just ran to it. It was like, and another thing, and fuck these guys, and another thing. And then we had three very serious people, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, for very serious conversations. And then me and Michael Steele on Friday, just ran to it at these guys and at these guys. So it's nice. We give, it's a little balance for everybody for the week. I appreciate you very much coming on the show. We'll see you soon, all right? I appreciate you, man. Love you, brother. All right, everybody, we'll be back here on Monday. See y'all then, peace. Hey, bad bitches wanna be my bitch. Hey, come in there, like C-I-A. Hey, I'm gonna try to see my face. Hey, want me to be the like C-I-K. Oh, hey, look, it's here to them, be my bitch. Hey, and bad for leaving, it's gonna be outrageous. Hey, hey, niggas can't believe my race. Hey, no round bouncing, no round bouncing.