How MAGA Took Over Congress with NYT’s Annie Karni and Luke Broadwater
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From KQED in San Francisco, this is Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Intelligence officials Tulsi Gabbard and John Ratcliffe are facing questions from a House Intelligence Committee today on how a journalist was accidentally texted military strike plans. This as additional messages from that group chat come to light. Meantime, the president escalates a showdown with a federal judge.

The chaos and outrages of Trump's MAGA administration are consistent with the story of the 118th or first MAGA-controlled Congress, a story New York Times reporters Luke Broadwater and Annie Carney tell in their new book, Madhouse. We look at the similarities after this news.

Welcome to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Some security analysts, columnists have used the words clownish and amateurish to describe how top Trump administration officials shared attack plans in Yemen with a journalist in a group text chat.

Similar words have been used to describe the 118th Congress, by Republicans about their fellow Republicans, as New York Times correspondents Annie Carney and Luke Broadwater document in their new book on the 2023 MAGA takeover of Congress. The dysfunction of that period, the ousting of a speaker from their own party, the attempts to impeach Biden, the inability to pass legislation in cementing their allegiance to Donald Trump—

It tells us a lot about what we're seeing in this current moment. The book is called Madhouse, How Donald Trump, MAGA Mean Girls, a former used car salesman, a Florida Nepo baby, and a man with rats in his walls...

broke Congress. Annie Carney and Luke Broadwater join me now. Annie Carney is congressional correspondent for the New York Times. Annie, welcome to Forum. Thank you so much for having me. Glad to have you. Luke Broadwater is a White House correspondent for the New York Times. Luke, glad to have you as well. Hi, nice to meet you. Yeah, same here. So before

Before we dive into the book, I do want to start with some of the latest news and the most recent stories you've been covering. So Annie, Monday is when we all learn from the Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg that he was told the targets and timing of a military strike in Yemen when he was accidentally invited to a text chat on a commercial app. So today, Goldberg has released more information about that group chat. What was it?

What has he shared? Okay, so on Monday he revealed that he had been on a group text where top Trump administration officials were sharing war plans. He actually held back the war plans, like out of an abundance of caution, out of being a responsible journalist, held back the details of the strike that they were discussing on this chain. And more of the story was just about how

mind-boggling was that he got added to this, that they're discussing this on signal outside of a secure location or secure communications, but he held back the details of the strike. What followed was kind of a challenge from the Trump administration. Carolyn Levitt, the White House press secretary, said there was no classified information shared. That was kind of the party line, and in addition to attacking the reporter and accusing him of somehow

sliding into this group, getting into this room by some nefarious purposes when he was added by the Trump officials. So then I guess that puts the question back on the Atlantic. They're saying it wasn't classified information in an attempt to

undermine this reporting. And it looks like the Atlantic today came to the conclusion that it was not a national security risk after the fact to share what they originally held back. So what he shared today was the details that Pete Hegseth dropped into that chat hours before the attack that

you know, looks like would have warned the enemy of what was to come if someone besides Jeff Goldberg had been on this. And now, like in the story they posted today, Jeff Goldberg and his colleague Shane Harris write, you know, we thought it was

Given that they're putting it in doubt, we thought we should share it so readers can decide for themselves and officials can say, like, is this classified or not? You can see for yourself what was shared and whether this was appropriate. Yeah. And is this changing the tune of the administration at all? Or Pete Hegseth, who said there were no war plans that were shared? Yeah.

Well, it seems that they are doubling down and digging in on this issue. Every time a new revelation comes out about it, they come up with essentially a new excuse for why it wasn't a problem, why, you know...

They're blaming the Biden administration for Signal being on phones. They're blaming the journalist for being in the chat room. They seem to be blaming – they're suggesting maybe there was some nefarious infiltration of the chat. They're also making a semantic argument. They're saying this proves – this was not a war plan.

And this was a timeline of a pending attack, but it's very detailed. And like if you're going to call it an attack plan or a war plan,

is really a distinction without a difference. But they're focusing on this idea that the original headline said war plan. And technically, maybe this is not a war plan. But it's not likely that that's going to, you know, really clear Hegseth of having like breached protocol in a fundamental way. And Trump has described it sort of like

like high school boys who made a mistake. Like, well, you know, he's a good guy and he learned his lesson, right? It's a very interesting approach that they're taking. But the one thing they are sort of have decided, it seems to me there'll be no one punished, no fallout here. And if anyone's going to be attacked, it won't be a member of their administration. It will be the press. Yeah. This...

sort of attempt to make a semantic argument and also this sort of parsing. Luke, it reminds me actually of the justification that the Trump administration has been given in terms of not returning the deportation planes of the Venezuelan immigrants. And that's been something that you have been reporting on. And I'm wondering if you could also just take us back to that and remind us quickly where things are. Yeah.

Yeah, no, that's a very good point you bring up. You know, as you know, the Trump administration, in its rush to deport as many people from the United States as possible, has invoked a 17th century wartime law to basically get Venezuela –

alleged gang members out of the country into prisons in El Salvador without a hearing. And they did so very quickly. The ACLU rushed into court to try to stop it. And the ACLU was able to convince a judge to order them to halt the

these planes full of the migrants and to order them turned around. And the Trump administration didn't do that. But even as they didn't do it, they went into court the next day and argued that they had complied using legalistic and technical language about a written order versus an oral order, what the meaning of certain orders actually was or wasn't.

And so they were able to do what they always wanted to do, essentially defy the judge's order, but say they hadn't.

Right. Basically saying because he said turn the planes around verbally but then didn't include it in the written order that they weren't really defying the order because the written order is, I guess, more official than the verbal order. I don't know.

You know, a lot of legal experts will tell you that the order applies to the administration and they have to follow whether or not the plane the administration has ordered flown is is over international waters or not. Yeah. But Annie, in the meantime, they're also saying that this judge should be impeached while they're trying to convince this judge that they didn't defy him. Can you talk about that?

Yeah, I mean, look, we're in a moment where a Republican-controlled Congress has become completely compliant to Donald Trump. There's few guardrails left to stop him from just enacting his agenda. And one of them is the court system. So, of course, that's the next line of attack. And we've seen some House Republicans introduce impeachment articles recently.

against judges who are standing in the way of the agenda. We've seen Elon Musk max out in terms of campaign donations to those Republicans who have done that, indicating that they will be rewarded for doing this. So far, they haven't actually brought that to the floor or taken those votes, but this is just an attack on the court system that is one of the last bulwarks actually standing in the way and blocking

Trump's actions. And so, Luke, as they muddy sort of the waters around whether or not they've defied this judge's order, if they are found to have defied the judge's order, what kind of recourse do we have here? Because wouldn't that be squarely in the Congress that Annie just described as having become completely compliant to Donald Trump?

Right. So, you know, obviously in the American system, we have three co-equal branches of government. And one check supposedly in this system is the legislative branch on the executive branch. And the constitutional duties of the legislative branch are oversight and potential impeachment of executive branch officials. So if you have a...

you know, in theory, a lawless executive branch that's defying judicial orders and the judges can't stop them because they don't have, you know, an army or a police force to go in there and arrest people, the Congress could impeach executive branch officials. But in this case, because Congress has been so consumed by Donald Trump and now is so subservient,

uh... they're actually trying to teach the judges the executive branch so you it's sort of flipped their traditional constitutional order on its head and you know donald trump faces no check from congress and the only people that are checking him are the federal judges there's about my cow about fifteen different judges that have blocked or halted different trouble ministration orders

And, you know, sooner or later, these cases will get up to the Supreme Court. At least some of them might. And then we're really going to have the ultimate constitutional question about if the Supreme Court orders the Trump administration to stop something, will they do it? Well, we are going to get into how this Congress works.

Thank you.

What does congressional dysfunction signal to you? What questions or observations do you have about the impact of that? You can email your questions and comments to forum at kqed.org. Find us on our social channels, Blue Sky Facebook, Instagram, and Threads at KQED Forum. You can call us at 866-733-6786, 866-733-6786.

Noelle on Discord writes, the congressional dysfunction shows that a dangerous minority disdains our democracy in pursuit of raw power. I blame Newt Gingrich for starting this slide. Well, we'll focus on a little more recent than Newt Gingrich. But yes, there are a lot of people who go back a long ways to say that this is where we find ourselves and the reasons that we find ourselves here. We'll have more with you, our listeners, and with Annie Carney and Luke Broadwater after the break. Stay with us. I'm Mina Kim.

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You're listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. We're talking about the latest political news and about how MAGA took over Congress and how those things are connected. Annie Carney is a congressional correspondent at New York Times. Luke Broadwater is a White House correspondent at the New York Times. And they are co-authors of the book Madhouse, how Donald Trump, MAGA mean girls, a former used car salesman, a Florida Nepo baby, and a man with rats in his walls broke news.

Congress. And here's an excerpt. The long simmering dysfunction of Congress reached its boiling point in 2023 and 2024 when House Republicans divided against themselves, made all kinds of embarrassing history, ousting their own speaker and then seven months later trying to oust his replacement.

promising and failing to come up with any plausible reason to impeach Joe Biden, unapologetically allowing Trump to dictate policy from the campaign trail and acting as his first line of defense against a court system closing in on him and regularly blocking their own party's bills from coming to the floor for a vote. I want to go over some of that history, and you, our listeners, are invited to share questions or comments about it at 866-733-6786, at forum at kqed.org, or on our social channels at kqedforum.org.

One of the things that is so fascinating, Annie, is the fact that they had control of Congress. It was a GOP-controlled House. But it really was the margin, right, the slim margin that they had that you feel like contributed to a lot of the dysfunction? Yeah.

Yes. So they technically had a majority in the House, but it was so small, I think down to at some point with the retirees and people leaving early, it was down to a one seat majority. And this dynamic really meant that any one member who wanted to feel important and be a deciding vote and have to be won over could throw themselves into the

fray and just be the decider of whether something could pass or not. And it also gave... And what that dynamic did is it gave these...

This cohort, this group of, they called themselves the 20, which is not a very clever group name for a group of 20 people, but that was their name, the 20. These are a group of far-right members who opposed McCarthy, who don't believe in voting for any spending bills, who a lot of them want the government to not really work. It gave them outsized power because they as a bloc could just

turn off the House floor, which they did at times, voting against a rule, which is what you need to pass to bring a bill to the floor at all. So it created this strange dynamic where the House was actually much further right than the country is even because these far-right members pulled the strings and McCarthy, in order to get power, gave them more power because he needed their support. Yeah, let's talk about McCarthy's

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, McCarthy got his start in business by flipping cars. He would buy old cars, used cars, fix them up, flip them, and make money off of them in the process. He also owned a sandwich shop, and he was really sort of a hustler and an entrepreneur who really wanted to make something of himself in life. And at some point, you know,

He goes from the college Republicans to getting his sights set on becoming speaker of the House. And that becomes an all-consuming desire for him. And he almost gets it once but fails. And so this last Congress was his second chance once.

to be successful. And in his desire to become the speaker, he ended up agreeing to so many rules changes that he essentially made governing almost impossible. And one of his weaknesses was...

Everyone knew how much McCarthy wanted to be speaker. We interviewed a former McCarthy aide after he won the speakership, and we asked him, like, what would be McCarthy's definition of success? And the answer was still being speaker. Like, the goal was to get there and to hold on to it. And

When people know what you want, like another character in the book is Patrick McHenry, who was a congressman that he was the interim speaker for a while when they couldn't elect anyone. And his theory of how Congress worked for him was that he never wanted anything. And when you don't want anything, no one can have leverage over you. Like he never actually wanted to be speaker, so he doesn't have power.

to give away his power and mccarthy everyone knew so they had leverage over him because they knew that he would do pretty much anything to get that job

Yeah. And then, you know, you also write this line in your book where you say McCarthy cemented himself as a national symbol of Republican leaders in the Trump era, politicians willing to put aside any allegiance to higher principles or the substance of what the party had ever stood for in order to kowtow. This was in response to the January 6th attack and him going to Mar-a-Lago, of course. But as you were also noting earlier, Annie, he also invited sort of MAGA in Marjorie Taylor Greene, right? He had a friendship with her. Yeah. So...

He started that out of...

you know, this theory of the case that, you know, keep your enemies close, bring them into the tent. If the Jim Jordans and the Marjorie Taylor Greene's are at the table, then they can't be throwing stones at you. And so, and Marjorie Taylor Greene was on his side when like Matt Gaetz was trying to make him never be the speaker. Greene was a very loyal friend and he was very loyal back and he treated her like a serious

policy advisor. He treated her as someone who really had her finger on the pulse of the MAGA base and could help him understand that. And because he did, it really elevated her position in Congress. The last Congress, she was treated as a pariah by her own Republican colleagues who didn't want anything to do with her. And McCarthy kind of made her acceptable. And so she would fundraise for other

And, you know, they actually developed like they're actually still pretty close. Like that actually turned into a real alliance. But it was that was the McCarthy way of governing. Like you. This is where the party is. So that's where I'm going to meet them. But ultimately, you know, his speakership tanks because he works with Democrats to pass the debt ceiling bill. And then we all are witness to that.

these many rounds of trying to elect a new speaker because it seems like, you know, the MAGA or Matt Gaetz really led this charge, really wanted to see him out, but hadn't really thought about the steps after that. Can you talk about that moment in our history? And what do you think it signaled not just to the rest of our country, right, the people of our country, but also elsewhere? Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, those were three weeks of extreme dysfunction. The House essentially ceased to function as an entity. And it's, you know, right at the time that October 7th happens. And so we have an international crisis breaking out in Israel. We also have an international crisis in Ukraine. And the American government was rendered feckless, uh,

For three weeks House Republicans tried and failed to elect a speaker They put up candidate after candidate, but each one was shot down like a circular firing squad and finally the the man who is up for it right before Mike Johnson the current speaker gets it is Tom Emmer and he is essentially killed by tweet by

Donald Trump himself and so Mike Johnson has Donald Trump to thank for his speakership He is speaker because of Donald Trump. He knows that very well He knows all his power comes from Donald Trump and so that's sort of the Sets the stage for what we're seeing right now in the country where just as we talked about earlier in the broadcast where the house has become subservient to the executive branch and

And, you know, Donald Trump, Mike Johnson views himself as sort of a loyal soldier to Donald Trump and not someone who's going to check him or try to hold him accountable. A listener on Blue Sky writes, only one of the eight Republicans who voted to take the speakership from Kevin McCarthy was a freshman and only Matt Gaetz was a firm Trump supporter. Do you have a response? I don't.

I don't think that's true, that only Matt Gaetz was a firm Trump supporter. Yeah, that's a crew of...

Mostly it's members on the hard right. There may have been some mix in there among those eight, various people who didn't like Kevin McCarthy personally, like Nancy Mace. Obviously, you talked about Matt Gaetz. They had personal beef with him. Eli Crane was the freshman, but he's a Trump guy. So no, that's not true that Gaetz was the only Trumpist, but it was...

What's interesting about it is, like Luke was saying, that this happens at a pretty serious time in the world. And

A lot of what happens in Congress, a lot of what happens in our book is what we realize is, like, people claim to be taking stances for, like, policy reasons. Like, they claim that they can't support a short-term government spending bill. But, like, really what's driving them is, like, personal feuds between, like, people they just hate. Because, like, they...

Austin McCarthy, allegedly because of the spending deal, they just voted for the exact same thing because Trump wanted them to. That's why we're not in a government shutdown right now. So these like deeply held beliefs are not really what's driving them. What's what's driving a lot of the action in Congress is democracy.

petty, like, hatreds. And that has serious consequences. Like, a lot of our book is, like, almost juicy gossip about, like, this person hates this person. But it matters because it's having an effect on people

on like the actual functionality of Congress. Yeah. And as you have described them fully embracing, you know, the hostility in this, in the stagecraft as well in the, in the chaos that we see of this current administration. And, and of course, as we know,

There was an attempt to oust Speaker Mike Johnson for working with Democrats on a funding bill as well. Marjorie Taylor Greene led that charge. I do want to ask you about her. She and Lauren Boebert are the MAGA mean girls in your book. And of course, Marjorie Taylor Greene today is leading the House Subcommittee hearing on NPR and PBS, getting government funding called anti-American airwaves.

airwaves. What can you tell us about her? What did you learn about her through really going deep on this 118th Congress?

Yeah, I mean, Marjorie Taylor Greene, through the course of this Congress, goes from a pariah to, in some ways, a kingmaker. She is, when she first comes into Congress, she is ostracized by her own party. Democrats attack her. Few Republicans come to her aid. She is kicked off of committees. You know, she is seen as sort of a weirdo, a QAnon follower, an extremist person.

And over time, she learns how to navigate and she realizes that she has her own power because she is popular with the right wing base. And Kevin McCarthy sees that as well. And so he makes an alliance with her and elevates her and he sort of brings her into his inner circle.

Now, obviously, he gets thrown out and a new speaker comes in. And when Mike Johnson is, she doesn't have that relationship at first. And she tries she tries to lead the charge to throw out Mike Johnson. That ultimately fails. But she begins to ingratiate herself. We have we have this scene in the book where her and Mike Johnson go toe to toe over Ukraine funding and a very heated debate in in private.

But since that time, Johnson has, like McCarthy, decided that it's better to empower Marjorie Taylor Greene than to work against her. And he has given her this committee, this so-called Doge Committee, where she will be in charge of –

sort of auditing the government and trying to cut spending and implementing the cuts that Elon Musk so desires. And that's what this hearing is about. So you have seen in very short time someone go from being seen as an outcast, a QAnon follower, and now she is a chairwoman. I mean, she's a chairwoman. Yeah, and I think that, like, the rise of Marjorie Taylor Greene is indicative that, like, this MAGA Congress, like, it's beyond...

Her power is her own. It's not just for her association with Trump. She is very much her own brand that is kind of unstoppable, very popular in her red district in Georgia. She will be enhanced.

She's not vulnerable. She will be in Congress for as long as she chooses to be in Congress. No one can challenge her in that district. I would say also, even in that talking about the small majorities, some of my favorite scenes in our book are inside the room when Marjorie Taylor Greene and Mike Johnson are sitting together and he's trying to convince her not to oust him over his wanting to bring

bring a bill to the floor to send money to Ukraine. And she's just telling him that like anyone in the intel space is part of the quote deep state. And he's saying to her like, Marjorie, have you ever been to Europe? And she says, no. And he says like, have you ever served in the military? And she says, no. And he's like, but you want me to take your word for this against our generals, like Trump generals, four-star generals. And she's like,

the American people know it's all deep state and you would know if you weren't such a P word. And like, even the fact that she took, they had two one hour long meetings where I was standing outside the speaker's office with hundreds of my colleagues. Like she was swarmed by the media when she comes out of that meeting, like what happened in there? And we like for the book, we were able to reconstruct that meeting, but like that gives her power, right? Like he had to entertain her. He had to do this with her for hours because she,

He like because he had to because she had the power to go to the floor and oust him and he had to be saved by Democrats. So like this is the power like in this tiny majorities. He had to entertain these conversations with her when even Mike Johnson's eyes are rolling to the back of his head. Like, are you kidding me with this? You know, it just underscores how the MAGA movement is.

bigger and more powerful than Donald Trump. You know, some people believe that MAGA is Trump and Trump is MAGA. But at this point, every one of these right-wing lawmakers that we interviewed for this book has taken MAGA, made it their own version of the movement. And in some cases, they're even a more extreme version than Donald Trump. And so they have their own power centers. They have their own populist movements.

leanings with their base and You know, I think that once Donald Trump leaves office there will still be a very active MAGA movement And it's it's there are no shortage of people willing to carry it out. I

Listener Andrew writes, it baffles me that thinking, working, responsible adults are okay with their representation, not representing them and the greater good anymore. These members are ego-driven, selfish, and literally for sale. They represent their own pocketbooks, not the current or future of our wonderful country. You know, as you say that, though, and recount the Mike Johnson, Marjorie Taylor Greene conversations, which also just for our listeners give us

I'm glad you mentioned that because it really gives us an insight in how you reported this book. It has so many sort of behind the scenes or even closed door moments that you're able to get information about, you know, text messages, documents of violence between representatives and, of course, incredibly...

just tasteful language and so on. So, but I'm just thinking about the 180 that Johnson has done on Ukraine. And I mean, that's really because of what you mentioned earlier in terms of just, he owes Trump his speakership. I mean, look, last Congress, kind of Mike Johnson's finest moment, I would say, was the,

this moment where he, yes, he risked losing his job to do what he was convinced by the intelligence he reviewed was the right thing to do. And it was like actually a pretty good moment when he, you know, said, I'd rather send money that bullets than boys, because he was convinced that if we didn't aid Ukraine, Putin would like march to Poland and then we'd be in a war.

So in the same way that Mike Pence did something honorable in terms of literally just doing his job on January 6th, that was sort of the Mike Johnson moment last Congress.

No longer. He is like fully backing Trump's embrace of Russia. He is kind of defending, absolutely not bringing any more funding to Ukraine. And the only reason he defends what he did last year was to say, I set Trump up to end this war on his terms.

We're talking with Andy Carney, congressional correspondent for The New York Times, Luke Broadwater, White House correspondent for The New York Times. Now, the congressional correspondent earlier, they've both written the book Madhouse, a book about the 118th Congress from 2023 to January of 25. And we'll have more with them and with you after the break. You are listening to Forum. I'm Nina Kim. With the Venmo debit card, you can turn the mini golf outing your co-workers paid you back for.

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This is Forum. I'm Mina Kim. New York Times correspondents Luke Broadwater and Annie Carney have written a new book about the 118th Congress called Madhouse, How Donald Trump, MAGA Mean Girls, a former used car salesman, a Florida Nepo baby, and a man with rats in his walls broke Congress. Listeners, do you remember the 118th Congress and the...

failed attempts at trying to elect a speaker or the many attempts that it required, the efforts to impeach Biden, more and more and more that we're sharing in today's conversation.

What does congressional dysfunction signal to you? What questions or concerns do you have about the impact of this, the impact of this Congress on the kinds of things that we're seeing today? 866-733-6786 is the number and the email address is forum at kqed.org.

We're on Blue Sky Facebook, Instagram, and threads at KQED Forum. This listener writes,

Craig writes, Mike Johnson threatening to defund or close district courts that don't agree with the Trump administration is about as authoritarian as it gets. I think the media and people like Chuck Schumer are trivializing the crisis we are in. It's not a question of whether or not we're in a constitutional crisis. We are in one.

Well, first, let me unpack that comment from our listener, Craig. So first of all, Annie, you did some recent reporting on the fallout that Chuck Schumer is experiencing as a result of supporting the funding bill. Can you just talk about where that stands right now and how he's doing? Yeah, I mean, so Chuck Schumer...

as we know now time is a flat circle i guess a week ago long ago uh voted with republicans to keep the government open yeah um now the the anger from democrats across the country just erupted on him he had to pull down events across the country for his scheduled book tour that was supposed to be last week because they you know they were citing security concerns but it was going to just be very

heated, all of the anger. People just want our Democratic leaders to stand up to Trump. And this looked like a moment, one of the rare moments in the Congress when Democrats hold no power, that they just actually had the power to stand up to him and they caved. On the merits of what Chuck Schumer did, he has a decent argument that you can agree with or disagree with, but it makes logical sense. He says,

A shutdown would have been much worse. It could have gone on for nine months to a year or longer. Donald Trump and Elon Musk actually want a shutdown. It would allow them to cut more programs with no court check. So you can disagree or agree with him on the merits, but politically, this backfired on them. On one day, he said he was going to

block it and the next day he looks like he caved. So I think what happened here was any groundwork to kind of like prep the groups, the outside groups and prep people to understand that there wasn't a lot of leverage here for Democrats in reality. That this was two horrible options that

That wasn't made clear in advance. So it looks just like Chuck Schumer is not standing up to Donald Trump. I think he is. Obviously, there's a ton of frustration generally about what are Democratic leaders doing in this moment? And it was a slow start. Like, unlike, there was no women's march on the first day of Trump's term this time. Like, it was a muted response. And

I think we're seeing, we don't know who's going to be the leaders for the Democratic opposition, but we're seeing various lawmakers in Congress kind of try. Chris Murphy has emerged as like a pretty strong,

He's breaking through with videos kind of explaining very clearly why you should be mad and care about what the Trump administration is doing. We saw Bernie Sanders and AOC hold massive rallies over the past few days. I just did a story recently on a group of House Democrats who want to make the party's brand economic populism.

lawmakers I talked to in Congress agreed that the Democratic brand is broken. It needs to be rethought. And for a lot of people, Chuck Schumer represents that old brand. In our book, actually, he gave us an interview where he predicted ahead of the election when the Republican Party, quote unquote, expels the turd that is Donald Trump, it will go back to being the old Republican Party. And I think that that is just not...

It didn't expel Donald Trump. But even if it had, like our characters, like what we're talking about, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz is like these people have made it all their own. There's no evidence that there's any returning to an old Republican Party. That just is not in line with reality. Well, what were Democrats doing during the 118th Congress? Right. And after what they saw happened?

are they changing their tactics or are they at least more informed, I guess, about what they need to oppose? Well, you know, Democrats...

are in their own struggle, right? I mean, in the book, we document the dysfunction in the Republican Party very much so, but we also dedicate a good amount of time to the dysfunction within the Democratic Party. And, you know, obviously, the big question in the last Congress was, what are Democrats going to do as they saw Joe Biden's policies

poll numbers go lower and lower and lower and As it became clear to them they he did not have a good chance to beat Donald Trump and You know in one of the you know extraordinary chapters in the book Details how Chuck Schumer goes and confronts Joe Biden at his house and really in like

you know, a powerful and emotional speech convinces him to drop out of the race. And, you know, not long after, you know, you can say what you want about that decision, but he is a person who stood up finally and tried to get that done. You know, in the book, we document how for months and months, Democrats had similar concerns about whether Biden could win and

but but failed to act on that and so they had their own dysfunction as a party and they're still trying to figure out they really do not know who is the leader of the Democratic Party and that's the big question going forward so in many cases the 118th Congress really sets the stage for both parties coming into the current moment let me go to Carla Charles and Rona Park I Charles you're on

Hi. Good morning. Thank you. Very, very fascinating discussion. My question centers around what Senator Schumer said after he voted for the CR. He said if Donald Trump is the only person in control, if the government shuts down,

in a lot of trouble. And I think in light of the Goldberg, uh, Atlantic revelations, I think that's going to prove that it's very true. And, uh,

At least we still have a seat at the investigative table to drill down on the Goldberg stuff and prove how ineffectual and unqualified the various department and the cabinet people are, which is so dangerous. On the Schumer issue, I agree. I think that the anger at him was emotional. People want to...

They just want to stand up and they felt like he didn't. But in reality, what he said was like he was taking the bullets for a lot of senators in his caucus. There is a large contingent of senators, Democratic senators, who were vote no, hope yes, which is like they wanted to vote against it to take a stand.

But they also acknowledge that, like, being in a shutdown that could go on for a long time and give Donald Trump more power would be horrible. So, like, they're not so upset that actually we're not in a shutdown right now. Like, that's actually the good outcome. Oh, yeah. A lot of the outrage from Democrats in Congress is somewhat performative, obviously.

Almost all of them know secretly a shutdown would have been very very bad and would have empowered Trump much more And so even though a lot of them are trashing Schumer publicly, I think privately they're secretly thanking him. I interviewed Schumer like right at that day and you know, he his view is like This is what a leader does you take you take the hits for people you shield them from the bad votes and you do what you got to do I do think that like this subsequent

and having to pull down the book tour. Like, I think that it was bigger than he may have anticipated, the emotion. Absolutely. The party wants a leader. They want someone who's going to fight. The base really wants that. They see how the Republicans fight. You know, the Republicans fight tooth and nail. They do not care at all. And they want to see the same thing out of Democrats. Well, the Cisner writes, besides Representative David Valadao and Senator Susan Collins, how many other Republicans in Congress are showing some independence attitude

From Trump. You have a comment? Like, no, they don't. I mean, the one person that people should look up and is just a total character, it's Thomas Massey of Kentucky. He's a hard right fiscal conservative in the House. And he...

actually is a principled guy. Like, as I said, like I said earlier, that a lot of these people who claim to be acting on principle are acting on, like, petty grievances. Thomas Massey, like, believes what he believes, and he will not be shook from it. He is the sole Republican who voted against the CR in the House, even though Trump's threatened him with a primary challenge. His brand...

is so strongly hard right in his district that Trump has actually tried two cycles to primary him and failed. So Massey's like not scared of Trump. And he's the only one who's really not scared. The other ones, I mean, like mostly are rolling over. I don't see a lot of, I mean, Murkowski has taken some independent stands for sure. Collins at times. McConnell. McConnell.

Yeah, you're right. McConnell's retired. So another place to look is like, who's retiring? Who doesn't have to care about a political future? That's where you might see a little independence. Yeah, but your caller's right that the larger trend is one by one, those who speak up against Trump quickly lose their jobs. And yes, there may be someone here or there who's able to withstand it, but...

The larger trend is very much in a complete takeover of the party by Trump. Let me remind listeners, you're listening to Forum. I'm Mina Kim. Well, Greg writes, are we sure the Congress hasn't always been a greasy soap opera since the days of George Washington? Was there ever a golden age of Congress? No. Another listener wants to know, can your guests say more about the drunken caucus? Yes, please. Yeah. So was there ever a golden age of Congress? You do address this.

Did our editor write in with the Trump caucus question? I mean, you don't have to look too far to see a Congress that functioned really well, and that was the 117th. I mean, they passed all sorts of laws. You know, the first two years of Joe Biden were –

record-breaking in terms of or at least you know in modern history in terms of the amount of legislation that got passed really sweeping stuff but I'll let I'll let Danny talk about the draw I mean yeah I mean both just quickly like Congress has always been like an incredibly unpopular institution it's like faceless you don't really know who all these people are

It's just like government sucks and people don't like it. But this was a new level. And this cast of characters that we are the characters of our book, actually we argue in the book that they are the ones that actually break the institution for good. The Drunk Caucus. This is a detail that we put in the book, which at the time,

A lot of votes get out of control and hearings go off the rails when they happen in the evening. Leadership has long been wary of scheduling votes after six o'clock because, like,

It's a given that anything that happens in the evening, like a large percentage of members will be drunk. Like drinking is a huge problem. And some in the Republican conference, they, a lot of them referred, there's like a little group that like is a really heavy drinking group that their colleagues refer to as the drunk caucus. So like we saw physical fights break out on the House floor during the McCarthy 15 rounds to get the speakership. We saw,

what's called the oversight after dark hearing where Jasmine Marjorie Taylor Greene attacks Jasmine Crockett about her eyelashes these things are happening at night and you have to and like a lot of people and at least on the floor for the McCarthy vote like people were acting under the influence at times yeah

But even though this Congress, it's sort of been normalized that that's how they behave after a certain time and all that kind of thing. And even if Congress has been a deeply unpopular body, that's often had a lot of dysfunction in it. What you're both really saying is there is something really different and really dangerous about Congress now, right? That you were able to see in the last couple of years? Yeah, I mean, I think if you look at

what takes place in the book. Time and time again, when a Republican does something wrong,

arguably responsible they're thrown out of office or they have to leave this this happens we detail in in great detail the negotiations over the debt ceiling and this was unpopular to to raise the debt ceiling to pay the nation's debt and to pay the bills but it was necessary to prevent an economic calamity and you know a recession or even worse

But every single person who negotiates this deal is out of Congress now on the Republican side. They basically had to do it but then had to fall on their swords because they would be consumed by the party over it.

And so that's dangerous in its own regard. And then when you consider that this Congress moving into the current day has ceded its power as an oversight body and not holding up its constitutional responsibilities, well, now that's dangerous in a new way. So, you know –

Yes, there's a lot of funny stuff in this book. Yes, there are petty squabbles and fights and juicy details. But there is a larger, more important point, and that is as Congress becomes more dysfunctional, less able to do its job, the nation as a whole is in deeper trouble. But also as it

also becomes basically an extension of the executive branch, right? Not a check anymore. You know, the last part of the earlier comment by the listener, Craig, was it's not a question of whether or not we're in a constitutional crisis. We are in one. Would you say we are in one when you have what was supposed to be a co-equal branch of government, you know, acting basically subservient to the executive branch? I mean, I don't, I'm not like a,

I don't want to personally declare it, but I mean, my colleague Adam Liptak has written stories where he's interviewed like legal experts who have said, yes, we are in a constitutional crisis. Like it's like, you know, when you see it and yeah, like a lot of experts have agreed with that listener that we're not, it's not if we get there, we are in one. And if the judicial branch, I mean, I guess that's who we have left, right? And if that fails, what are we as a country, Luke?

Yeah, I know a lot of people are rightfully concerned and there's good reason for it. If the legislative branch is not a check on the executive branch and the judicial branch isn't listened to, you know, it may still be a democracy. It may still be a country where you independently elect your leader, but it's not the democracy the Constitution dictates.

came up with. It's not a democracy of co-equal branches. If the executive is more powerful than the other two, doesn't have to listen to them and wields authority over them, well, you know, that is, that's far from the democracy we learned about in school. So what are you hoping we just have 30 seconds? This book will do, you know, at least in

In giving us this insight, you know, I don't know if there's sort of an act. I mean, I don't, we came to this book as just like the sheer joy of reporting on these people and telling the fuller story of what we saw as like an incredible story that was in front of us as we covered it day to day last year. We loved writing this book. We hope that the excitement we brought to it is like clear if you read it. And it'll just give you like a deeper understanding of how these people make decisions and like who these people are.

Annie Carney and Luke Broadwater, New York Times correspondents. The book is Madhouse. Thank you. Thank you, Caroline Smith, for producing this segment. And thank you, listeners. I'm Mina Kim.

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