6/10/24: Biden And Trump 2024 Polls Tighten, Macron Calls Snap French Elections, Rightwing Surge In Europe, Briahna Joy Gray Fired From The Hill
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Hi, I'm Katie Lowe's and I'm Guillermo Diaz. And we're the hosts of Unpacking the Toolbox, the Scandal Rewatch podcast where we're talking about all the best moments of the show. Mesmerizing. But also we get to hang out with all of our old scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. Well, suit up, gladiators. Grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for even more behind the scenes stories with Unpacking the Toolbox podcast.

Listen to Unpacking the Toolbox on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life in marriage. I just filed for divorce. Whoa. I said the words that I've said like in my head for like 16 years.

Listen to Misspelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Angie Martinez, and on my podcast, I like to talk to everyone from Hall of Fame athletes to iconic musicians about getting real on some of the complications and challenges of real life.

I had the best dad and I had the best memories and the greatest experience. And that's all I want for my kids as long as they can have that. Listen to Angie Martinez IRL on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey guys, Ready or Not 2024 is here and we here at Breaking Points are already thinking of ways we can up our game for this critical election. We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade the studio, add staff, give you guys the best independent coverage that is possible. If you like what we're all about, it just means the absolute world to have your support. But enough with that, let's get to the show.

There's been some movement, I guess, in the polls. Not really, though. At least we're learning a little bit about how people feel about the Trump conviction and how it might impact the election. Let's put this up there on the screen. This is the latest really in-depth one from CBS News. You can see there in the national polls, Trump is actually leading Biden at 50 to 49. But in the battlegrounds, somehow Biden is leading Trump at 50 to 49. This could set us up, Crystal, for

a potential nightmare scenario where Biden somehow wins the electoral college, but Trump wins the popular vote. Can you imagine the stop the steal that will come out of that one? And then the changes in tune on how people feel about the electoral college. I personally would like

and enjoy that one. Let's go to the next one though, for how this actually looks. Trump conviction and its factor in your vote. Important, keep this in mind, this is actual likely voters. 28% say major factor, 17% minor factor, 55% not a factor.

Now, what are the actual major factors? You may ask, let's put this up there on the screen. Well, 81% the economy, 75% inflation, 74% quote unquote state of democracy, then crime, border, gun policy, Trump conviction, a whopping 28% compared to the economy.

of 81%. Let's go to the next part, please, just to show people in terms of the registered voters. Keep in mind, registered are very, very different than likely. And they say here, how would you describe them in terms of the actual, like in terms of the candidates? Tough.

66% say Trump is tough. 28% say Biden is tough. Energetic, 26% say Biden is energetic. Imagine being that 26% who says Biden is energetic. Hey, there's a lot of old people in this country. They're the ones who are saying it. Effective, 38% Biden is effective. 52% say Trump is effective.

Competent, you have 40% on Biden, 49% for Trump. Compassionate, this is the only category where Biden actually beats Trump, 52 to 37. I would note though that that 52 is a lot lower than it used to be, Crystal. It used to be in the high 70s.

in the past and it was actually one of his major strengths. The whole cares about people like me. Yeah. Let's go to the next part please, just to continue a little bit. Biden's executive order on migrants crossing the border, 70% people say they approve. So obviously that shows you why he did it in terms of the policy. And then finally, let's go to the next one and just show everybody. Choice for president, if higher prices have been your hardship this

This is a very important one amongst likely voters 70% nearly 70% 69 say for Donald Trump is their choice if higher prices have been hardship so clearly people who are feeling the economic squeeze want the change candidate and

This fits with why we see movement, younger voters, black, Hispanic voters, particularly young black, Hispanic men, all drifting in the Trump category, mostly because they want change to their major economic conditions. And also it explains, Crystal, why Biden is doing better in battleground states, predominantly whiter and predominantly older. It's the older the voter set, the better off Joe Biden is going to be because they're going to be a lot more insulated from some of the problems that we have in the economy.

I mean, overall, Trump still beats Biden with older voters. But when you look at what was the Biden coalition last time and who's sticking with him, older voters who voted for him last time are sticking with Joe Biden.

younger voters who voted for Joe Biden are not sticking with Joe Biden. And when you look at minorities, that's also where you've seen an erosion. So again, most polls still show Joe Biden with an edge among Latino voters. But when you're talking about where has his coalition that barely got across the finish line last time, where has that erosion occurred? It's young voters, it's diverse voters overwhelmingly. I mean,

Listen, a few things that are interesting here with regards to the Trump conviction. One thing that they do note is that of the people who say they're voting for Joe Biden as like a vote against Trump.

That sentiment has increased post-conviction. So since the Biden team is betting so much on it just being a sort of anti-Trump sentiment out there, in that way, the Trump convictions have bolstered their argument a bit. And people are more viewing the election a bit more through that frame. But it's pretty marginal. It's pretty marginal. And the other issues that seem to be more important

You know, also interesting, Sagar, on the immigration thing. As I think you and I both predicted, yeah, you have high approval rating for it, but people who say immigration is their number one issue, they're still not voting for Joe Biden. Right. It's not like that flipped them over to the Biden camp. So it didn't really gain him anything electorally, even though it was popular. Biden is just all in the margins game at this point. His best hope is that he can keep a little bit of that suburban coalition, win in the battleground states.

Remember, he can still lose Georgia and Arizona and he could still win the presidency. I think at this point it's basically gone in terms of the Sun Belt. But I guess it's theoretically still possible. He's got to hold on to Nevada, though. Nevada is a genuine actual battleground now at this point, and it's a real problem.

because those electoral votes really count to his possibility for winning. Trump just did a rally in Las Vegas, I think it was yesterday, in the middle of a heat wave, by the way, spoke for over, I think, an hour and 40 minutes. Yeah, people were falling out because of the heat.

There were a lot of medical issues. Guys, be careful out there. Yeah, please, please be careful. Bring water if you're ever going to attend an event like that. Let's put this up there on the screen. They say in terms of a systematic review, not just CBS, there's been five national polls now conducted since the Trump conviction, basically showing the race either, quote, unchanged or moving slightly in the Biden direction. The New York Times Siena poll has recontacted registered voters who've taken part, and they found moving it from Trump

Trump up three to Trump up by one. I mean, there's no way to really know exactly what it is, but we have not seen some sort of major shock to the system the way that many people may have wanted to see. I mean, it was eminently predictable given the nature of the charges and more. There was a temporary spike of Google interest in is Trump going to jail, et cetera. That's mostly just died down.

by that point. And I guess we're right back to fundamentals. So, you know, really, I think the nature of the race is basically unchanged. And Biden's got to do something. We're not that far away from Election Day. And he's still in near coin toss territory, although I would personally give the edge to Trump right now.

I think the cope slash hope for Democratic Joe Biden supporters at this point is like maybe Trump will get jail time. Maybe that'll change people's minds Maybe that'll really shift the race and first of all, you know, I don't think you I don't know that it's likely that Trump is getting any sort of prison time certainly before Election Day, but in any case these numbers would indicate you shouldn't be betting on that one other thing that was interesting here is

If you are a voter who sees this election as being a choice between Biden and Trump, Trump has a little bit of an edge. And that's the majority of voters, 51%, see it as a choice between Biden and Trump, which I think is probably the way to see it. Trump has a little small edge there. If you see it as a judgment about Trump, it's overwhelmingly, you're overwhelmingly voting for Joe Biden. If you see it as a judgment about Biden, you're overwhelmingly voting for Trump.

So the Biden people are very invested in making this a referendum on Donald Trump, which is funny because he's not technically an incumbent. So that makes their task a little bit more difficult since he's not in office right now. And obviously for the Trump people, you know, they really want to make it a referendum on Joe Biden. And they're benefiting from the majority of voters who see it as a choice and are feeling like they were better financially under Donald Trump.

Right, exactly. And I think that's really all it comes down to. We don't know for certain exactly how this will all work, but we are watching this. Both sides are acting as if it is a game of margins. Hence, Trump being in Nevada, aggressively courting a lot of these Latino voters. The Trump outreach is

tapping rich people, their traditional donors for as much money as possible, and they're blowing it out in terms of ads. On the Biden side, though, let's put this up there. It's funny. They recognize they have a problem with young voters. So they have recruited Hollywood veterans and Biden alums to launch a super PAC called Won't Pack

down with a budget of $25 million. And they have hired, quote, millennial and Gen Z writers, directors, and producers to help craft pro-Biden content

that is specifically engineered to sell the octogenarian candidate to disillusioned and hard to reach voters who are under 30 years old. These movie industry creatives have credits from Saturday Night Live, Parks and Recreation, to Big Mouth. I don't actually know what Big Mouth is. I don't either. Have been meeting monthly for the last half year in a rented loft in downtown Los Angeles. And they are pitching 30 to 90 second influencer style reels. Mm-hmm.

that could run everywhere to highly produced scripted ads. The group's first ads will appear on social media and streaming platforms expected to drop in July. So everybody can look forward to that. If you don't pay for those premium versus streaming services, folks, now's the time to sign up because I do not want to be subjected to that. I don't know. Could be kind of entertaining for the cringe factor. It's like two extra dollars a month, right? And you don't have to watch any of this stuff.

So anyway, clearly they know they have a problem with voters under 30. You can see very clearly. It's also funny, too, if you read further, they're like their number one mission is to not be cringed. But then they named their organization Wote Pack Down. It's like you failed. You failed on the first count. You had one job. Yeah.

I mean, listen, they think they have a messaging problem, and the truth is they have a reality problem. That's the bottom line. So it's not a mystery what would help ease young people's minds. You know, use your pressure to end the war on Gaza and maybe, like, actually do something like secure housing affordability for young people, which, you know, we covered last week. Gen Z says that's their number one issue. So...

Maybe actually have a plan that's going to deliver for them economically and stop supporting a genocide. And maybe then you might see your poll numbers move, won't pack down with their influencer style TikTok reels. Ugh.

Good luck, guys. Yeah. Trump has also apparently joined TikTok. Let me see. Let's see how many followers that he actually has. He's got about, yeah, 6.7 million. So anyway, he's starting to make head roads, I guess. He apparently, they have a large organization. One of the people who works for him is a guy named Johnny McEntee, who is...

I guess he would be the head of their personnel office. He's like an enforcer, Trump-style enforcer, who would be the major personnel decider. He's got like 1.4 million followers on Instagram, and he just makes a bunch of pro-conservative reels. So they actually, I'm not going to say they're winning per se, but they're competing, I guess, in the- I saw something about Trump content does well on TikTok. Apparently it does very well. Downperforms Biden, but that might be really low bar. Is it pro-Trump content or is it like Trump meme content?

right? There are so many Trump means out there. The whole like, oh, what you're telling me for the first time or I am the chosen one. I mean, he has all these hilarious, like he has all these hilarious riffs from the past. Would you classify that as pro Trump? Like not really. Most of the time it's being used as even Biden. I think I was telling you there's a lot of memes that splice like his old man moments as a meme being like me whenever I hear about McDonald's deal. It's like drunk

Biden creepily turning to the camera. It doesn't have anything to do with them. It's just, you know, he's like the subject or part of the meme. Yeah, I mean, in a way, it's kind of mocking. Yeah, exactly. It mocks both of them. Yeah, would you classify that as part? That's true. And it comes, obviously, on the heels of that report we brought you before about how they're hiring a quote-unquote meme manager over on the Biden camp to also try to deal with their

problems with young voters. I mean, I just, I don't think they get it or they're not willing to get it or whatever. Like they, they really think like, oh, if we just package it better, if we just do a larger ad spend or whatever, it's going to turn it around. And I don't think that they are correct about that, but I guess we're going to find out.

Hi, I'm Katie Lowe's and I'm Guillermo Diaz. And now we're back with another season of our podcast, unpacking the toolbox where Guillermo and I will be rewatching the show to officially unpack season three of scandal. Unpredictable. You don't see it coming. It's a wild, wild ride. The twists and turns in season three mesmerizing, but

Also, we get to hang out with all of our old scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. So many people. Even more shocking assassinations from Papa and Mama Pope. And yes, Katie and I's famous teeth pulling scene that kicks off a romance. And it was peak TV. This is new scandal.

content for your eyes, for your ears, for your hearts, for your minds. Well, suit up, gladiators. Grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for even more behind the scenes. Listen to Unpacking the Toolbox on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life and marriage. I don't think he knew how big it would be, how big the life I was given and live is.

I think he was like, oh, yeah, things come and go. But with me, it never came and went. Is she Donna Martin or a down-and-out divorcee? Is she living in Beverly Hills or a trailer park? In a town where the lines are blurred, Tori is finally going to clear the air in the podcast Misspelling. When a woman has nothing to lose, she has everything to gain. I just filed for divorce. Whoa, I said the words.

That I've said like in my head for like 16 years. Wild. Listen to Misspelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Cheaters and Backstabbers. I'm Shadi Diaz. And I'm Kate Robards. And we are New York City stand-up comedians and best friends. And we love a good cheating and backstabbing story. Welcome.

So this is a series where our guests reveal their most shocking cheating stories. Join us as we learn how to avoid getting our hearts broken or our backs slashed. Listen to Cheaters and Backstabbers on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

This is a really interesting story. I was telling Crystal right before the show started, it really could be a precursor of what's to come here. So let's go ahead and put this up there on the screen. The right-wing parties all across Europe made major victories in the European Parliament elections, specifically for the European Union, the EU representatives. Now, the EU Parliament, it doesn't have a lot of power, but it's usually a symbolic

kind of way that we can tell how the national votes are gonna go in the eventual presidential election. So just to read this off, the right-wing parties in Germany and France have both won big, big in the overall elections. And France, so much so that it has scrambled the overall national race. And this is a really fascinating development that we can put up on the screen, please. What you can see in front of you

is that the exit polls show that they are on course to win almost a quarter of the 720 seats, a historic first for any of these major right-wing parties. A lot of it being swept into favor as a result of

of inflation. Remember, inflation is an even bigger problem in Europe. Energy prices, don't forget about that. The lack of Russian gas decimated the German economy. They've decided to fire up coal instead of build nuclear power plants. In France, they have all kinds of problems, major debates around immigration. But the major change that has happened really is, let's put the next one please up on the screen just so people can see exactly. Look at

the amount of victory for the right wing parties all across France. Now, keep in mind, France is a very densely, not densely populated country, as in the vast majority of the population lives in Paris. And so clearly, the Social Democrats and others did well in the major populated areas.

But you can also see, if you just spread it out, how popular the right-wing parties are in France and all across the more rural areas. And this is very traditional in terms of French politics. This has led Emmanuel Macron, the president, to call for an early election, which we can put the next part. This is a really interesting move.

because what he has announced is that he is dissolving the National Assembly, calling for national elections. This will decide who will run the country. This is exactly, basically the same move as what Rishi Sunak has done in the UK. Now, the reason why this matters is that the general election was not supposed to happen until 2027, according to their timeline of every five years. By calling for this new election,

Macron has a multiple different things that he could be going for. I wonder what you think. Yeah. The first scenario is that Le Pen is very, very popular, right wing popular, very popular. So what he wants is because they've never governed before and he predicts that it will be a shit show. He's like, well, maybe they will beat me, but then they would only be in power for two years. And then I can make a comeback with like my centrist Jupiterian legacy and

and win five years in power. The other option is that every single time it's been Macron versus Le Pen, Macron has always won all of the disaffected voters, the socialists and others through the runoff system. And at the same time, the National Assembly has been a mess right now because Macron doesn't have a big enough majority in the parliament to actually get anything done. So he predicts, basically, you coalesce all the protest votes against the right wing, even though they win a big enough block. That's their traditional move. But

It's a gutsy call because what are we setting ourselves up for?

We just had Modi get reelected. Yes, not, you know, the same level of popularity, but that was a precursor to Trump. Brexit, that we're having a general election in the UK. Two weeks later now, we're going to have an election in France. That could set the tides for a real narrative shift right before our elections that happened in November. Yeah. I mean, there's a lot going on here. So in terms of the overall EU results, most of the gains for the far right were in two countries, Germany and France. Which, I mean, the big powers of Germany.

Very significant, no doubt about it. And if you look at the map of Germany, it's also remarkable because the former communist East Germany was overwhelmingly went right wing. And I mean, there still is huge economic disparity between the East and the West. And that has fomented a lot of upset.

in East Germany. So that's also very interesting from a Germany perspective. You put a Daniel's tweet thread back there up on the screen cuz I'm not gonna pretend like I know French politics better than Daniel Nishanian, who is the founder of Bolts Magazine and follows French politics very closely. So he says, number one, obvious this comes after disastrous election results for Macron.

France currently has a hung parliament due to weak results by Macron's party in 2022. So without having control of the National Assembly, Macron really can't do a lot. So he's been really hamstrung. Let's put the next piece up on the screen. Additional analysis here, he says downside by contrast is if he's called these elections, it's possible he loses all control. France has a hybrid system. The

His party controls the National Assembly, but if an opposing party controls it, they pretty much run the country. The president becomes a figurehead. He says what Macron may be betting is who could possibly win a majority instead of him. Election rules make it very hard for Le Pen's party. It's a two-round system in each district. That's what Sagar was referring to. The bet for Macron is basically like, you know, it's one thing when you have all the parties and they do better. They get their, you know, 30% of the vote.

But he's thinking that in a two-run system, then everybody else basically coalesces against the hard right. And he's able to prevail. Can a divided left possibly coalesce in mere weeks is another question. And by the way, traditional conservatives got just 7% today, which is also wild. So I don't know. We'll see. We'll see how it all unfolds. It is interesting. You know, this bet

It makes more sense to me that I need to get somebody from Owen Jones or somebody to explain to me the Rishi Sunak bet because that one I really don't understand. Like, I don't know what he's betting on. He's so unpopular. It looks like labor is just going to absolutely destroy them. So I don't know. You know, I don't really understand the dynamics here. But this one at least makes some kind of sense to me.

The other thing I wanted to mention because it is relevant to the US domestic political context is, Sagar, you rightly set up, there's a lot of issues in France right now. They have high inflation. They had a huge farmer protest movement because Macron was trying to take away some of the very neoliberal like, you know, subsidy reform or whatever, huge backlash from that. And then you have the far right parties which ran very hard on immigration and crime, against immigration and crime.

Macron had previously tried to pull a political move very similar to what Biden is trying to pull right now on immigration. He passed through a immigration reform bill that was such a shift to the right that actually Marine Le Pen came out and said, hey, I embrace this. This was an ideological victory for me.

Quite a few members of Macron's own party wouldn't support it and wouldn't back it. And, you know, it was an attempt to like he could see the writing on the wall. This is a potent issue. The right is killing me on it. Let me try to move to the right.

And I'm not going to say that was like the only issue or that that was even determinative, but you can see that it didn't work because the people who are immigration hardliners were still going to vote for Le Pen's party. Le Pen has been, I mean, this is their thing. This is the number one thing. Also, if you think we have immigration problems here, go live in France. Like that is a whole other level. Just because...

And I'm not, it's funny too, because I could see it from both ways. The French complain about it and everything. They're also some of the most racist people in all of Europe. Don't ask me, go ask anybody who's not white in France. They are of a very like interesting view, I think, of what it means to be French. And then at the same time, their French empire was one in which all of their colonial subjects were considered explicitly French.

And thus, we're able to move to the country. So not exactly working out for them in that way. And they have all kinds of issues in terms of how they look at who really is a citizen, etc. The other problem, I think, that's overlaying all this is Ukraine. Is that, let's not forget that Germany and France are two of the most hawkish nations today. I mean-

outside of Britain and the United States, but broadly have been part of the very pro-NATO position against Ukraine, especially lately, and with France. Well, Le Pen and the AFD in Germany have a very different view of the conflict. A lot of the stuff that we've been talking about here, about how their economies are getting decimated. I mean, especially if you're German, you have paid probably a 20, 25% tax.

just because of Ukraine in terms of the overall inflation. Another thing people don't really know is that here in the United States, we have 30-year fixed rate mortgages. So inflation, central bank rates don't affect our housing as much. In Europe, it's actually not common at all. You have like five-year adjustable rate mortgages. And a lot of people's mortgages have stopped

spiked recently because of the central bank increasing their interest rates. So in the UK, for example, you have some people who are paying almost double or triple. And the same thing is happening in Germany and I believe in France as well. So massive high inflation, housing costs, the explicit effects of the Ukraine thing are being felt much more deeply. And a lot of it is also a protest vote against Brussels and against the way that they are handling it. Yeah, that's right. You saw the celebration of this result

by Viktor Orban last night in Hungary. He's like, this is a direct message to the European Union. He's like, you guys need to stop this. So I do think this will really fracture, regardless of, you know, they could stay in power, Scholz and Macron. But the pressures that they're feeling now, it's going to constrain their future ability to move in the directions that they wanted to. There's also an increasing divide between the

the French political elite and German political elite and their orientation with regard to Israel. I was just looking at a poll where the German public, and Germany has been a very staunch supporter of Israel, and the censorship crackdown in Germany has been insane for anyone who is remotely pro-Palestine.

The public is not on board with this anymore. They've completely flipped who they feel more sympathetic towards, and it's been an astonishing reversal over the course of this war. So there's also a divide between how the public feels and how the political class has had unconditional support for Israel's assault on Gaza.

There's there's a lot brewing here, but there's no doubt that voters You know meant this as a rebuke on I think a wide variety of issues both economic foreign policy domestic immigration, etc and

Listen, sometimes these things are one-offs. Sometimes they're not really indicative of something that's going on in our political, our domestic political affairs here. You could look at other, you could look at, you know, AMLO's popularity on the left and then Claudia Scheinbaum coming in and, you know, his...

basically who he wanted to succeed him in the same party, whatever. And that was a sort of vote in favor of continuity. And it was a strong showing for the left, although more of a much more populist left, not the neoliberal Macron version. So there are other contradictory signals, but this is an earthquake in France and one definitely that's worth watching. Yeah, exactly. I mean, it's one of those where I think it's just,

Because of France and Germany, the German one in particular may honestly be even bigger shock because as you said, they have one of the most insane censorship industrial complexes in all of Europe. For example, the head of the AFD, they said like the term everyone for Germany because it was once used by stormtroopers in the Nazi era. They explicitly

explicitly like outlawed and fined him for the ability to, which only made it more popular, you know, in East Germany. So their regime that they have there right now is really collapsing because it all was based on cheap Russian gas that was fueling their economy. And now that they're actually contracting the deal that the neoliberals had, uh,

in the future and the deal that they had with the East Germans and with others for why they should remain in that has been completely imploded. Immigration also on top of that, which has been a major problem for them since 2015. So it sets themselves up for, you know, the eventuality. But regardless, I mean, the real reason we're paying attention is, A, it's going to have huge geopolitical consequences, whoever wins, especially the French election. But then also it could be a precursor when we combine and look at what happened with Modi for here in the United States. So

It's going to be interesting. Europe could look three weeks from now or what? Yeah, three weeks from now, we could have a totally different Europe between the UK and between France and Germany. Just stunning. Hi, I'm Katie Lowe's and I'm Guillermo Diaz. And now we're back with another season of our podcast, Unpacking the Toolbox, where Guillermo and I will be rewatching the show to officially unpack season three of Scandal. Unpredictable. You don't see it coming. It's a wild, wild ride. The twists and turns in season three mesmerizing, but also

Also, we get to hang out with all of our old Scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. So many people. Even more shocking assassinations from Papa and Mama Pope. And yes, Katie and I's famous teeth pulling scene that kicks off a romance. And it was peak TV. This is new Scandal KCBQ.

content for your eyes, for your ears, for your hearts, for your minds. Well, suit up gladiators, grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for even more behind the scenes. Listen to unpacking the toolbox on the I heart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life and marriage. I don't think he knew how big it would be, how big the life I was given and live is.

I think he was like, oh, yeah, things come and go. But with me, it never came and went. Is she Donna Martin or a down-and-out divorcee? Is she living in Beverly Hills or a trailer park? In a town where the lines are blurred, Tori is finally going to clear the air in the podcast Misspelling. When a woman has nothing to lose, she has everything to gain. I just filed for divorce. Whoa, I said the words.

that I've said like in my head for like 16 years. Wild. Listen to Misspelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

I'm Angie Martinez. Check out my podcast where I talk to some of the biggest athletes, musicians, actors in the world. We go beyond the headlines and the soundbites to have real conversations about real life, death, love, and everything in between. This life right here, just finding myself, just relaxation, just not feeling stressed, just not feeling pressed. This is what I'm most proud of. I'm proud of Mary because I've been through hell and some horrible things.

That feeling that I had of inadequacy is gone. You're going to die being you. So you got to constantly work on who you are to make sure that the stars align correctly.

Life ain't easy and it's getting harder and harder. So if you have a story to tell, if you've come through some trials, you need to share it because you're going to inspire someone. You're going to you're going to give somebody the motivation to not give up, to not quit. Listen to Angie Martinez IRL on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Speaking of censorship, let's get to what happened over at the Hill. Put this up on the screen.

Brianna Joy Gray, her contract terminated at The Hill. She writes, it finally happened. The Hill has fired me. There should be no doubt that at Rising at The Hill has a clear pattern of suppressing speech, particularly when it's critical of the state of Israel. This is why they fired Katie Halper. It was only a matter of time before they fired me. She also shared the email she received. Now, she was not officially an employee. She was under contract there, which was her choice.

to maintain her own flexibility, as my understanding in any way. They say, dear Brianna Joy, which they misspelled her name, but anyway, let's put that aside. This is 30 days written notice that your consulting services agreement is being terminated pursuant to the provisions of section 5.3 for convenience. Thank you for your contributions and we wish you the best in your future endeavors. Sincerely yours, Nextar Media Incorporated.

You guys all know the backstory. We started rising. We were at the hill. We left for a variety of reasons that you can go back and watch and took our show independent and have been extremely happy with that choice. Worth mentioning as well that it's under different ownership than when we were there. So we only have so much insight into the workings over there at the hill at this point. That being said, it's important what she refers to there, Sagar, which is that

Katie Halper had previously, starting under when we were there at Rising, she'd been a contributor to the show. We had her on every week and that continued for some time after we left. She delivered a monologue prior, this is way prior to October 7th, that was critical of Israel, called it an apartheid state, and her contract was terminated.

Now, at the time, Breonna was faced with a real sort of crisis of conscience. Like, do I stay at this place? I've been told I can say what I want. Do I stay at this place or do I say, you know, this crosses an ethical line for me? She delivered a monologue at the time and said, listen, they've said I can say what I want and we're about to find out.

And it took a while, but we did indeed find out. Brianna has been a fierce critic of Israel and what she and I and many others see as the genocide they're committing against the Palestinians.

And there had been a real effort that I'm sure you saw online too, Sagar. Anything that she said that could be clipped and used to make her look bad, there was a real sort of concerted effort to make her a problem for Nexstar. And ultimately, they were successful. Yeah, it all comes down to a clip.

Okay, I'll say this about Brianna. She also embraced the fight. Let's be real. She enjoyed hitting back at them, and they've all been toiling now for quite some time. Her critics in particular focused in on this clip where you had a family member of an Israeli hostage

where Brianna and her got into a disagreement during an interview that happened on Rising. Now, I wanna be clear, based upon our review of this, they had clipped out the video to show at the end Brianna getting frustrated and kind of rolling her eyes after being prompted

about a disagreement that they had. When you watch the full clip, you could see that it was a pretty combative exchange and it's a little bit more understandable exactly why Breonna's disposition was the way it was. So let's watch the full thing together and you can decide for yourself. - If the world won't help us, we will see 9/11 a second time in the US as well. But we can already see in the United States, in Michigan, rallies that's calling death to America.

Not condemning terror organizations in Israel or any other place, in fact, is reflecting to your country as well. I'm just going to push back against the implication that in Michigan, which has the largest Muslim and Arab population in America, that there is any threat of terrorism from our own people. And I would like to clarify also that one of the rationale that was presented for 9-11 was disinformation.

disgust with America's support of Israel's continued occupation of Palestine. So that's neither here nor there. I really do hope that Netanyahu agrees and Israel agrees to the ceasefire deal that could bring all the hostages, including your sister, home. And I'm sure many people watching are praying for her safety. Thank you. Me too. And I really hope

that you specifically will believe women when they say that they got hurt. All right. Thanks for joining. Stick around. More Rising coming up next. So I watched the entire interview was like 20 minutes long and I watched all of it so I could see like, okay, how was this going? And

Brianna also spoke to Glenn Greenwald and talked about how her moment of frustration at the end there was much more directed towards her producers who booked this interview and put Brianna in what was really kind of an impossible situation. Because on the one hand,

this is a sister of a hostage, like on a human level, obviously you empathize and Brianna does throughout the interview and empathize with what she's going through. On the other hand, you know, she made a lot of claims that just weren't accurate.

And so Breonna's left with three choices. One, she can sit down at the interview and then people are going to make a lot of that. Like, oh, you won't even talk to, you know, the sister of a hostage. How dare you? Number two, she just sits there and lets a lot of misinformation be spread on this platform with, you know, with no corrections and no pushback.

Or number three, she tries to engage as she does and is accused of being insensitive to a hostage family member. And so she really was put in a totally impossible situation here, which ends up with that very last part where there's like a half eye roll when the hostage sister says, I hope you believe women. That comes with its whole, I'll get into that in a second. That is a whole can of worms in and of itself.

They clip out just that point to make it look like Brianna was being just outrageously insensitive to someone who is clearly going through a very traumatic experience. There was a whole online campaign. I really think they were trying to spin up like an advertiser boycott and it's right after this that Brianna is fired. And the bottom line is that the Nexstar Media Group was not comfortable with her views and her critique. I mean, she was hired

to be an analyst, and to give her opinion.

but they didn't like her opinion. And so that was a bridge too far for them. Another update from Brie that we can put up on the screen here. So apparently there's now a coordinated campaign. She says hundreds of Zionists have spammed the Bad Faith account, apparently thinking it's Patreon, trying to get me deplatformed from the app. Again, a foreign country targeting American journalists with the goal of making it impossible to earn an income if you criticize Israel. And you can see scrolling on the screen hundreds of emails saying,

sent into the bad faith account, all with the same headline, concerns regarding Brianna Joy Gray's platform on Patreon, dear Patreon, blah, blah, blah. So there's clearly some sort of a coordinated effort to now get her taken off of Patreon and cancel her there as well. And so as she moves, and I have no doubt Brianna is gonna be successful. She's already successful in independent media, right?

but now there's an effort to go after her ability to earn an income in independent media as well. And we can't say that that ultimately won't be successful. I mean, you were saying that Patreon's a big company. They're going to be watching out for their bottom line too. I would be worried. Uh,

The only reason is that Patreon, this is a little bit in the weeds, but stick with me. You don't get the same payment ownership of your business in the same way that a supercast, which we previously on or the locals that we currently on. The business relationship between us and our customers is one that Breaking Points owns, whereas the companies that we would use facilitate those transactions themselves.

Patreon, I believe, is different in terms of the credit card processing and all that. So if they kick you off, you don't necessarily retain a lot of your customer data. So that's number one. That's something I would be afraid of. But two, here's the real lesson, too, in terms about independent media and others. There ain't no producer over here forcing me to do anything I don't want to do.

There's no producer getting booked on this or guests on this show, you know, that's forcing me to work in an environment where it's like somebody's setting you up, like you said, to fail and you're just showing up. I mean, that's a very, very odd dynamic. Ultimately, too, why a show like that, again, no offense, I have nothing against the people who are there. But when you don't have total 100 percent ownership and control, then it's like a battle and it's a war.

between you and the people who are working for, that is a very, very toxic dynamic one, which we can attest to a little bit having previously worked over there. So I think structurally, it shows a lot of the issues with corporate media and or any media organization where talent is literally just the talent. It also just business advice to the people who are running it. You know, what do you think is going to happen over there? I mean, it took them years

years to recover their subscribership and views from whenever you and I left over at the Hill. Brianna has been hosting there now for years as well. So, I mean, how do you think this is going to work in terms of the trust in your audience? You're not cable. You don't have a

built-in contract, you know, which keeps your profits locked in regardless of whether Tucker's on your show or not. This is a pure algorithmic audience-based business. Like that's a very different sensation. So anyway, this is where you don't know the market that you're working in.

Yeah, well, they've cultivated this. I remember they also fired Kim Iverson. I don't remember her name. No, she was fired, too. She was fired, too. I forget. What did she do? Or what was it, allegedly? She was forced out of a fallacy. See, that's another thing, though. She was a host on the show, and she's kept off of a freaking interview. It's like, how is that even possible? Here's the thing. It's like, you know, because of the way we designed Rising. Yeah.

the audience was very independent. You know, even though it's under a corporate umbrella, it was positioned as like an independent news show. And there's always, there's always been tension over that. And obviously, like I said, it's new management, it's new ownership. So it is different. But I think that fundamental dynamic, I know enough to say, is the same. And so at a certain point, you're like, you know, I don't think this show makes a lot of money for them overall, if it makes money at all. I don't, yeah, that's it. Business-wise, I don't know how the hell that

If you hate your own orientation and audience, then just cancel the show. What are we doing here? That's what's always confusing to me as well. But, you know, Breonna's firing here. Katie Halper's firing. Mehdi Hasan. I mean, how many people have we seen at this point in particular in media? Nathan J. Robinson lost his Guardian column.

who have lost their jobs specifically because they are Israel critics. Very consistent. And, you know, again, Glenn talks about this ad nauseam, but I think it's worth pointing out, a lot of people made a lot of money pretending they were free speech warriors and always, and it's just very obvious now, had a giant Israel carve-out exception. So, Breonna here ultimately, you know, ultimately fired for her point of view.

Hi, I'm Katie Lowes. And I'm Guillermo Diaz. And now we're back with another season of our podcast, Unpacking the Toolbox, where Guillermo and I will be rewatching the show. To officially unpack season three of Scandal. Unpredictable. You don't see it coming. It's a wild, wild ride. The twists and turns in season three. Mesmerizing. But also,

Also, we get to hang out with all of our old Scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. So many people. Even more shocking assassinations from Papa and Mama Pope. And yes, Katie and I's famous teeth pulling scene that kicks off a romance. And it was peak TV. This is new Scandal content.

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Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life and marriage. I don't think he knew how big it would be, how big the life I was given and live is.

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that I've said like in my head for like 16 years. Wild. Listen to Misspelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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One thing I just wanted to take note of is that probably the most controversial thing that Brianna has talked about is the narrative pushed by the Israeli government and picked up by President Joe Biden and by all mainstream anchors, basically, is the narrative of the rape used system.

systematically as a weapon of war on October 7th. And we now have a new report from the Times of London, which backs up Breonna, backs up those who have said, listen, maybe, but we need to see evidence and there hasn't been evidence offered yet. Let's put this up on the screen. They really dug in to what evidence there is at this point.

And obviously this is as sensitive and as political an issue as there possibly could be. Their headline here, Israel says Hamas weaponized rape. Does the evidence add up? They talk about the patent report from the UN, which was not meant to be a full investigation. In fact, she called for there to be a full investigation. Israel has denied that request.

They write here, "Patten made it clear there was sufficient evidence of acts of sexual violence to merit full and proper investigation and expressed her shock at the brutality of the violence." The report also confirmed Israeli authorities were unable to provide much of the evidence that political leaders had insisted existed. In all the Hamas video footage Patton's team had watched and all the photographs they had seen, there were no depictions of rape.

We hired a leading Israeli dark web researcher, patented, to look for evidence of those images, including footage deleted from public sources. None could be found. With regard to October 7th specifically, there hasn't been, and this is again confirmed in this Times of London report, there hasn't been a single image

First hand, I witnessed there has been not one survivor who has come forward. Now, perhaps that's because many people who could have been raped on that day, they're dead. So they're not there to come forward. But the claim from the Israeli government was directly made to Pat and herself that there were hundreds or thousands of instances. And yet they weren't able to provide a single piece of forensic or visual video evidence

You know, at this point you have to say that is quite remarkable and, you know, clearly the initial claims are not supported by the evidence.

That's the point that Brianna's been making, very controversial. It's a point I've been making, very controversial, because no one wants to be in the position of nitpicking the atrocities that happened on that day. But to go back to the eye roll video from Brianna, part of when the sister of the hostage says, I want you to believe women, part of why there's an exasperation there is because there's a lot that is behind that. And in fact,

They interviewed a woman who's the head of a rape crisis center in Israel. And she said, I did not think that it was sensible for the Israeli government to go forward with this online hashtag campaign that was hashtag BelieveIsraeliWomen.

I did not think that was sensible, she says, because they didn't mean believe Israeli women. They meant believe Israel. Again, this is the head of an Israeli rape crisis center, someone who takes allegations of sexual assault very seriously, who had a major issue with this because it wasn't ultimately about believing Israeli women. It was about believing Israel. And so that is the context that

that when Breonna is tried, like you believe Israeli women, well, there hasn't been an Israeli woman who has come forward to claim that she was a victim of sexual assault on that day. So I thought it was important to mention that as well, that on the, you know, I think the day after her firing, she was really vindicated by a mainstream publication that looked into this and said, you know, so far, at least the evidence of rape as a systemic tool, weapon of war used by Hamas on October 7th, it just doesn't exist.

I mean, in terms of how this is all played out, I think it's ridiculous. I actually think this has been an important

event, I hope, at least in terms of how people who can be skeptical of Israel can see how this always, I think, should apply to a lot of these public adjudications. And I do think it's really gross watching this woke acceptance of believe Israeli women. It's like, first of all, what does that even mean? And then second, like you said, there's reams of evidence now at this point that at the very least of the claim of use of war and all that is obviously exaggerated, if not outright, completely false.

And is being used as part of a campaign to basically justify to be able to kill whomever you want. Because then it turns into some sort of medieval conflict as opposed to one in the 21st century. Yeah, that's right. Look, I think Brianna, like I said, Brianna enjoys the fight. Let's see them back down. Yeah, she certainly engages in it with a lot of these people. And they are certainly rising to the occasion as well.

But I mean, in this particular case, when you watch it, in a certain sense, you gotta put, just as a host, I can put myself in her shoe. If you have a guest on who's goading me, at a certain point, I'm just gonna be like, all right, dude, get the fuck out of here. No matter who you are, and I'm gonna try my best to be sensitive and all that, but...

That also is like poor form in terms of how the other person is conducting herself regardless of how sympathetic she should be. The outset from the conversation in that relationship should be one of mutual respect, et cetera. And if she's not goading her, then there's no reason for her to do the same thing. But then to weaponize your identity, which is basically what happened. People said, oh, look at her. She's disrespecting the hot sister or whatever. That's bullshit when you watch the full thing. It's not right.

So, no, she shouldn't have been fired. You know, speak up. Robbie, her co-host, apparently disagreed with the decision. I haven't seen what he had to say. But it's true. Yeah, he disagreed with that. And they, man, they get into it on his real too. I can empathize. I get it, Robbie. Staying consistent with his free speech position. He's sticking to his guns. But this is,

It's irreconcilable, folks. Anybody who is out there who is working in corporate, this is going to happen. It may be Israel. It could be something else. You never know. So if you're taking a check from somebody with a 10-figure bottom line or something like that, this is basically inevitable. Or you work for the man, and you better know that about yourself. Yeah, I don't think that it's wrong for people who are independent-minded to—

to work in a mainstream space. You just have to, like, you need to know there's going to be an expiration date. If you remain true to yourself, there's going to be an expiration date. So, like, you know, I can see the case for, yeah, but I want for as long as possible my views to be heard in a mainstream context. I understand that, right? I think that's a reasonable rationale. I think it's, I actually agree with some of that rationale, but...

There will come a limit. And this is one of the lines that you are not allowed to cross. The last thing I'll say again is I think Breonna, you know, she's fantastically intelligent, talented, etc. Already has a large following. She's going to be fine. And we'll certainly support her here in whatever her next endeavors look like.

But for people who aren't as established as her. Yeah, that's the fear. And also don't have the, like Breonna has the type of constitution where she can take these attacks. She's been taking these attacks. She handles them very well. She doesn't back down. If you don't have that type of constitution too.

like it does have a chilling effect where people, they, you know, they don't want to talk about that. They don't want to talk about the Times of London report. They don't want to talk about getting to the truth of, you know, things that happened and didn't happen on October 7th or sorting through IDF fact from fiction, et cetera. These are very sensitive, difficult topics. And they'll look at this as yet another example and cautionary tale of, you know what, I'm just going to keep my mouth shut.

So that's the chilling effect. That is very, very true. And that is one where you should worry about people who are like 21, 22 years old going to go take a, you know, work in the business and get established. You learn the rules of how to get ahead very quickly. Anybody who works in an office, you guys know what we're talking about.

talking about. You see somebody get fired for something, you're like, okay, better not do that. So that is a lesson and that has downstream overall effects. That's what Noam Chomsky really talks about in the way that the media is totally rigged. So there you go. All right. Thank you guys so much for watching. We really appreciate it. Like we said, we've got a big Ryan story that's coming up later in the day. So stay tuned for that and we'll see you all later.

Hi, I'm Katie Lowes. And I'm Guillermo Diaz. And we're the hosts of Unpacking the Toolbox, the Scandal Rewatch podcast where we're talking about all the best moments of the show. Mesmerizing. But also, we get to hang out with all of our old Scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. Well, suit up, gladiators. Grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for an even more behind-the-scenes Scandal.

stories with Unpacking the Toolbox. Listen to Unpacking the Toolbox on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life in marriage. I just filed for divorce. Whoa. I said the words that I've said like in my head for like 16 years.

Listen to Misspelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Angie Martinez, and on my podcast, I like to talk to everyone from Hall of Fame athletes to iconic musicians about getting real on some of the complications and challenges of real life.

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