3/5/25: Krystal and Saagar REACT To Trump State Of The Union
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Hello, everybody. We are officially done with the first joint address slash State of the Union. According to our research, if it was a State of the Union, which can we all agree that it is, it would be the longest State of the Union ever delivered by an American president, beating significantly President Clinton's record in the year 2000, which was an hour and 28 minutes. This one, by my rough back of the napkin math, is roughly around an hour and 43. And yeah, it was long. It was long.

Could have used an edit on that one, you know? Could have used a few more. Kind of reminded, remember, God, I'm trying to think of the first, one of the first ones we covered here where Biden was just like literally a laundry list. I think we were all watching it. It's very common. It's very common, yeah. I mean, let's not say that they're- They all have their like constituencies they gotta check the box on, whatever. But yeah, it needed a good edit.

It was long. It was long. So we're trying to call some of the best takeaways for all of you. I would say the biggest one was no new policy announcement on Ukraine, but there were some significant domestic policy events that are –

that definitely bear registration. But the thing is, is that we should probably start with the Democratic protests by Congressman Al Green, who opened the remarks. There was some initial booing that was happening from the Democratic side. Congressman Green was standing for the duration of the first couple of minutes before he was kicked out. Anyone want to say anything before we play this off? Before we make people, subject people to more clips from the very long speech that we just won. Let's just get on top of the, like, the

Top of mind thoughts. I mean, to me, the big takeaways were the actually lack of new policy specifics with regard to tariffs in Ukraine in particular, where I think, you know, that's certainly where we perked up and we're listening. Like, is he going to say, are the tariffs on or the tariffs off? Still don't know, which I think probably indicates that the signaling that they might be rolled back could be the case.

because he certainly wasn't touting the Canada and Mexico 25% across the board. He was focusing on, oh, we did this with China, with steel. Oh, we're looking at, we're doing these reciprocal tariffs. April 2nd. April 2nd down the road. He mentioned Canada and Mexico, but he did not specifically tout the tariffs that just went into effect.

Which, you know, if I'm reading in between the lines, I feel like, OK, well, that's probably an indication that it is. Letnick was right. They are probably rolling back or diminish something. Ukraine, I kind of feel the same way. You know, he talked about the letter that he got from Zelensky that we talked about earlier. That is already public. He talked about the desire to make a deal and, you know, moving forward. So I think probably the reporting about them continuing to work on this rare earth mineral deal is also probable.

That's a good point. I mean, it seems like based on what he's saying. But he did not confirm any of those pieces. Yeah, it is actually kind of surprising that there was no new major initiative either on the tariffs, on Ukraine, especially because they were hyping that from news level. A lot of the speech was basically messaging. So I was clocking the time. So statistically, most people turn off around 10 p.m. Just they watch the first like 30 to 45 minutes. Yeah.

The first 30 to 45 minutes of this was basically just a campaign speech. It was like we won the election, historic landslide, mandate. That's where the Al Green protests and all of that happened. There was a lot of culture war stuff there during that time period, a lot of DEI, trans, CRT, basically all the greatest hits from Trump. We eventually then started to get to the economy, Doge, and Social Security. And we're going to play some of that for you. But any other thoughts? Why don't you guys give us your summary too before we play?

I mean, on the terrorist front, at least he described why he was going to do them.

Like with the Canada and Mexico ones, he's just been telling us they've been ripping us off and we subsidize Canada and that's ridiculous. He was quite light on those, though. That was my thing. He went back to the old school. Because those tariffs. If you don't have steel, you don't have a country. We're going to make steel. Right. And so we're going to do these targeted tariffs on steel and aluminum. So at least there was some ethos behind it. Like a vision. Back to the...

oh, that's the thing about tariffs. You're trying to actually build up industry inside the country rather than we've been suffering through this fiction about these tariffs being fentanyl related. I mean, he did mention the fentanyl there too, though. Yeah, he did mention fentanyl. A minuscule amount comes from Canada. I can either agree with it or disagree with it. I'm sorry, Ryan. Sorry, you're going to live in the ambiguity.

for a while now. Emily? You know, I think we've spent almost a decade now always potentially anticipating, I don't mean we so much, I mean the media more broadly, some new version of Donald Trump. Like he doesn't have to run for re-election now. He felt like he was coasting on these high approval ratings as his administration started. He's got Elon Musk by his side. And what he did was give a very like classic Trump impression

riffing, very partisan. He ribbed Pocahontas in front of her face. Like Elizabeth Warren, he called her Pocahontas during the speech to her face. Yeah, what did she do? She must have done something. Something about the war. No, but did she hold something up? I'm saying, what was the impetus? I saw her scrolling on her phone at one point.

point, but I didn't even see her like participating in the protests or whatever. But I mean, I don't know that she necessarily had to do it. He just has like animus, like, you know, whatever. I thought it was funny. He doesn't change. He doesn't change. Yes and no. The style of the speech, yes, typical Trump, you know, going through his greatest hits in terms of his grand election victory and, you know, calling Democrats out to their family, like, you would never clap for me no matter what, you know, putting them on a block like that. And it's so sad.

It's so sad. It's so sad. No matter how I did, what I did, it wouldn't be enough for you people. And then, you know, at the end, of course, he's got to, he goes back to retell the story of the assassination attempt and how he was saved by God to save the country, which...

It makes me very uncomfortable when people start putting themselves in those sort of messianic terms. But, you know, again, classic Trump. Right. Stop that. But, you know, on the economic policy front, as I'm just listening to the actual policies, I'm like, this is a freaking Paul Ryan speech. Like, we're talking about deregulation. We're talking about Social Security. We're talking about tax cuts. I mean, it was very—I was like, this is a Koch network thing.

policy agenda. Yeah, but with 25% tariffs. He did. It's a little different. But again, that he's like, I mean, we're not even clear on what that is. But the piece that he front loaded with was all the just like standard conventional Republican stuff that he ran so hard against and positioned himself so hard against back in 2015. Now, we all know the record of the actual Trump administration the first time around where their biggest accomplishment was a giant tax cut for the rich.

But to me, that combined with he was, you know, trying to get applause lines on, oh, we're going to get rid of the budget deficit and then reading down the list of all the wasteful government programs. Transgender mice. Like the transgender mice, you know, all of those things like.

I used to do a lot of Fox News hits back in the post-2011 timeframe. That was the sweet spot. And yeah, it was every day. It was like, oh my God, they spent $10 per muffin at this conference. Lobster dinners. They're always having lobster dinners. And so I'm like, oh, this is such a throwback.

To the Paul Ryan talking points just delivered through a Trump, you know, Trumpian panache. All that chaos and all we get is like different lies about Social Security. He's out there saying that like 160 year olds are getting Social Security and it's like...

Even Fox News actually debunks that talking point. Okay, let's save that commentary. So do you want to just do the Social Security thing now? Yeah, let's go ahead and queue up Social Security. Let me see, what number is this? Number five. Number five, guys, if you can queue this up, where he starts talking about Social Security and he's reiterating the lies that Elon spread.

about the people who are supposedly 300 years old or whatever and still getting Social Security. We know none of this is true, but it doesn't matter. It's still in the president's speech. If we've got that, let's go ahead and roll it. We're also identifying shocking levels of incompetence and probable fraud in the Social Security program for our seniors and that our seniors and people that we love rely on. Believe it or not, government databases list 4.7 million Social Security members

from people aged 100 to 109 years old. I mean, make no mistake when you're setting up, and this is why it was significant that Trump brought it up. When you were bringing this up, you were creating a pretext to cut the program. And again, totally counter to the way Trump has always positioned himself. And he'll use these lies about alleged fraud to

to justify the cuts. And we already see, you know, Doge is gutting the Social Security Administration. There's actually a warning from Martin O'Malley, who was previously Social Security Administrator, that it cannot, the system cannot handle that level of cuts and that people should start saving their money in anticipation that the program could face disruption just from not having enough staff. The hotline, you know, people who answer the hotlines are being cut.

Offices across the country are being cut. So to me, when the word social security came out of his mouth in the context of like, oh, there's all this giant fraud, et cetera, et cetera, that is a huge indication of the direction he's going in. That was the most important political moment of the speech to me. I think I said that to you guys at the time. I was like, that is very important. Not only is it Donald Trump's

endorsing the Elon strategy around that, but he's taking ownership of what is very likely to be extremely unpopular. And this gets to the way that this will all happen. So it's very unlikely to see a top line cross the board cut of Social Security, right? Passed by the Congress in the next tax bill, even in terms of entitlement reform or whatever.

But there may be at least elements to like chip away at the program or at the very least like reduce its accessibility now currently. Regardless, I mean you've got your hand basically right there on the rail of like the most potent political weapon. I mean I remember being with the four of you guys talking when Biden had that moment where he's like, hey. He's like, okay, we are all agreeing. We're not going to cut Social Security. So the –

The problem that they have is even if they pursue no cuts is that even tampering with the program is going to have tremendous blowback from a lot of people. But last thing on this, they may be able to get around it because they also said during the speech that no tax on Social Security, which we all know will be extremely popular with a lot of seniors. I mean how much – I'm thinking if you're 100 percent reliant on Social Security, that's probably what? Almost 10, 15, 25 percent of your income that's going –

back to tax. I've said before, I think it's crazy. Like why does the government give you money if just to take it back? It actually is very inefficient. It doesn't make sense. - The Reagan compromise brought that in. - Which is what, to have income tax on social security? - Yeah, it didn't used to be taxed. - Yeah, it makes no sense. It's like, why would you give you a lump sum of money and then take a portion of it back and expect you to file it and then we'll take it back 45 days later or whatever it is.

There's only one interesting thing other than everything you guys have said that I noticed on this point is his line about Social Security as he started this conversation. He is slightly new framing from the old Republican talking point. He says, quote, We are also identifying shocking levels of incompetence and probable fraud in the Social Security program. Our seniors rely on. Yeah.

Which is interesting because Republicans used to just demonize Social Security. And in this, he's trying to frame it as saying, I'm saving our seniors from the fraud that is dragging down Social Security. To Ryan's point about you're just dressing up the same old talking points about Social Security in different language. That's basically the best example of it. He's saying all of this Tea Party talking points or all this Tea Party rhetoric

if you tweak it to say we're doing this to save the program. Paul Ryan too was saying he was going to save Social Security by privatizing it. He was like, we're going to raise the retirement age. Yeah, but the idea is always, the way it's always framed is, oh my God, this program is going bad.

I care so much about is going bankrupt and we have to save it. Like that's the way it's always framed. We've been trying to end since the 1930s. Right. We really love so much, but we're just really interested in the best interest of this program. That's what these cuts are all about. So, but it is a little bit of a twist on that, but it's not that far from the way that it was portrayed in the Paul Ryan era. But it's not, it's not. Yeah. I think that's the thing. Like overall it did sound like 2012. Yeah.

Yeah. Look, at this point, anyone who's surprised by that, like, I don't know what to say. It was like we had a whole first term, didn't we? Like, where all of this went through. He said he won't touch Social Security or Medicare. He probably won't at the top line in the way that Paul Ryan and all those other folks will. This chipping away and all of that, like...

I'm not yet sure how far they're going to go or if they're really that stupid. Like, are you really so stupid that you would actually ask, what, 75% of the SSA offices or privatize it or whatever? It's like, good luck. See how it happened to George W. Bush in 2005. A project led by $2 billion.

Yeah, that's right. I mean, the optics of it would be insane, especially if it happened at the very same time that you passed a massive tax cut and extension for the rich, which they are all on record. They're going to do it. Like, the only question is if they also include the no tax on tips. I will say, I do think that the tips and Social Security thing could potentially, I wouldn't say it saved them, but make it more of a wash than the last time. 2017 was just so naked.

in terms of what the actual policy was. But the tips thing, I mean, we all know it's going to be very popular and they're going to message the hell out of it. And same with the no tax on Social Security. I could see that being like some sort of counterbalance and all that. But I mean, look, they're playing with fire. They're playing with the same fire they're playing with under Rick Scott.

Like it just never ends. I don't know why they're addicted to it. There's also no guarantees that those policies make it in. I mean, it's not spelled out in the Republican budget. And actually the- Yeah, they don't want to do it. The numbers as they exist, you know, and what they have said that they're working with in terms of the amount that they've allocated for tax cuts would not be sufficient to include-

No tax on tips and no tax on, we know the $4 trillion tax cut, like that part is locked in. The rest of it, and then you also have to throw in there the SALT tax situation. Yeah, they got to go to 20%. That's billions. And that's, yeah, that's expensive. So there's also just like no guarantee that any of that actually happens. And like I said, it was not actually in the Republican budget that passed the House that Trump had backed.

The ideal is we all just stop all this fakery on the debt and we just include all those things. It's like it actually puts some of the good stuff in there at the very least. Ready to celebrate the magic of live music? South by Southwest Music Festival returns to Austin, Texas this March 10th through the 15th with a fresh lineup of legendary and rising talent. Join a global community of music lovers, artists, industry professionals, and creatives at the 2025 South by Southwest Music Festival.

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So we talked about Social Security. We should definitely talk about Doge as well. Yeah. So we've got number four, guys, if you could cue that up. So Elon got a huge shout-out from Donald Trump. Donald Trump may have slipped up a little bit here, though, because in this acknowledgment, he not only acknowledges Elon, he actually says Elon is the head of Doge, which is the opposite of what his government is currently arguing in court. But nonetheless, it was important because not only— Was Amy Gleeson there to get her round of applause as well? No, she's in South America.

She's in South America. She's the one they're claiming is in charge of Joe's. She's 175 years old. No, she's a 300, she's a 326-year-old woman in South America. So Elon got a shout-out. This was important just for, I mean, look, like MAGA is now like equals Elon. And you really see this where Trump acknowledges him. He gets the entire Republican Party. The optics of this are wild, who are on the floor of the House of Representatives to look up and to clap.

at Elon as Elon stands. He did wear a suit though. So apparently the guy does. Oh, one number four guys, let's take a listen. And to that end, I have created the brand new department of government efficiency. Perhaps you've heard of it, which is headed by Elon Musk, who is in the gallery tonight.

So there you go. Not only a huge Elon shout-out, but then subsequently talking about there was a good, I would say, what do you guys think, like five, seven-minute period of just listing Doge stuff? Yeah. That's where the transmised thing comes from. So that I thought was pretty important just in terms of not only not backing away from Doge, openly endorsing it, making Elon a central part of the State of the Union, talking here about the Social Security. So on the economic front, this is the one where this...

They don't yet seem to sense that they perceive any danger. I think the only sign of it maybe is on the egg price line that he did deliver. But that's all I really saw. How he kind of opened the economic piece. But yeah, I was just trying to look back up the tweet. But Portnoy had tweeted something about like Trump had a line that was, you know, we'll no longer be ruled by unelected bureaucrats.

And Portnoy really was like, well, that's kind of a tough thing to make stick when Elon is out there running the entire government as co-president. So that is ruled by unelected bureaucrats. You know why Dave's mad? It's because there's a crypto recession right now. He's got shit coins that he still needs to sell to the people. He's working through some things, but still interesting to see the Portnoy response there. That's true. I mean, listen, it's,

This is the most significant difference between Trump 2.0 and Trump 1.0 is Elon. And, you know, you see it in the way that Trump has shifted his ideology. I mean, always some of his populist beliefs

and approach was fakery given the commitment to tax cuts for the rich. But the austerity framing, like spending all of these minutes going through these quote-unquote wasteful programs, which they frame as fraud, and that always irritates me because it's really just like spending that you don't like. Ryan Grimm here is the one who has found the most fraud of anyone. I did not get credit from the podium. It was outrageous.

I gave you credit. No, but I wanted it from Trump. They're the ones that found the $400 million armored Tesla thing that actually was, it looks like, they cooked the books to be like, oh, we could flip this in and no one will notice. Wrong, Ryan Grim will notice. So I think Jeremy Scahill called it the Department of Grim efficiency. That's pretty good. I like it. That's good. Department of Grim efficiency. That's a doge I could get behind.

He should have been like, and $400 million for armored Teslas? Who needs an armored Tesla? It would go over a speed bump and lose an axle. He could have just said electric vehicles. And then it would be like, you know, very lip-coded. Get away with it. All right, we have the egg price, guys. Number three, can you cue that up? So this was an important line for Trump. It's kind of how it began, the economic section. But it was an acknowledgment of being elected with...

a mandate on inflation and trying to address it. So let's go ahead and put it up there on the screen and play it for everyone just to give everyone a taste. Joe Biden especially let the price of eggs get out of control. The egg price is out of control and we're working hard to get it back down. Secretary, do a good job on that. You inherited a total mess from the previous administration. Do a good job.

All right, so you could also see some of the Democrats that were leaving there with the resist t-shirts that were on. I think that was Jasmine Crocker. Yes, it was. Do we want to clown on some of the Democrats? What do you think? Well, first let me clown on the egg thing. Well, it's just, I mean, hard to really make this case on a day when you announce 25% across the board tariffs with Canada and Mexico. And he has said,

said that he does not really think that inflation is the reason that people voted for him and that has certainly been reflective in the lack of any sort of an approach to dealing with inflation and So to me it was really noteworthy that this was kind of the first he did a bunch of culture war stuff and a lot of like patting himself on the back for his an election victory and trying to own the libs and of the Dems of whatever and then the first economic piece he gets to is eggs, so

It did indicate to me like, okay, the administration, whoever wrote the speech and Trump himself feel like they've got a bit of a problem here. And the polls have reflected that if you ask people, do you feel like they are doing enough on prices?

Pretty overwhelmingly, people are like, no, I do not feel like they're doing enough on prices. And that is one of the political challenges and warning signs for them. Also, as we played in that Harry Enten thought before we got into this, you know, his numbers, his economic numbers in terms of the approval of his handling of the economy are really low. And that's always been a strong suit for him.

So I do feel like they were trying to play a little bit of cleanup on the egg prices thing, blame it on Biden, say, well, I promise we're working really hard on it, et cetera. And that was noteworthy to me. Yeah, it could work for now. Like I said, you have a little bit of runway. But after two, three months, the runway is going to be over, especially if they feel all this Doge stuff. This is my greatest – I mean, I still can't get away from this. It's almost 50 days in.

to the Trump administration almost halfway of the first hundred days, the most consequential part. And what? It's just been Doge, Elon. There's been almost nothing else. I haven't even seen deportation take, you know, like that was, I saw, I think it was Joe Weisenthal said that. He's like, the only thing that's,

really surprised me other than Doge is the fact that deportation has not taken such a center stage. Like they've had Tom Homan on, they've had a few like high profile ladies. Well, Christy's been out there in her jacket. They're trying to, you know, I was watching Fox News at home, not by choice because the whole Ukraine thing, I was trying to watch it live. And I got an ad from Kirstie Noem telling illegal immigrants to go home. I'm like, are they watching Fox News? I was like, what is this for? There's some waste that they cut. I was like, what is this? I was shocked by it. I was like,

uh, this is like the most inefficient use of money. These are a bunch of like 70 year old white boomers who are watching this right now during daytime Fox as well. So anyway, he did the Guantanamo things because it's a spectacle. Yeah. But it was just a numbers. Right. He needs a spectacle. But that's my point on that is that even with that, I mean, as far as I know, uh,

All of that hasn't been a particularly large number. They haven't necessarily been prioritizing criminals as opposed to just whoever they happen to round up. There's never been any transparency around it. They haven't released the daily figures the way that they have. Instead, they're trying to make these flash-like spectacle things like you guys –

I'm saying, but like empirically, I mean, you can just look at the number and you can say this is not impressive whatsoever. I mean, look, you know, give credit where due, I guess, on the border crossings. But that's not the same thing as opposed to kind of what was promised. So if you look at, you know, on the inflation and the immigration point where the two things I would say is probably the most responsible for getting him elected, you have not seen the vast majority of the energy getting focused on that.

He is hoping, and this speech really did crystallize a lot of, like, the Trump victory to me, is, look, I mean, he, if you listen to the first 45 minutes of this, which statistically most people are watching, what was it? It was culture war all day long, right? Gulf of America. He believes, it wasn't just that. But it was that too. Yeah, it was that, but it was, like, trans. It was the greatest hits, like, of all time.

all the Republican culture war importance. It was our country will be woke no longer. There you go. Our country will be woke no longer. Also, free speech is back on a day that he, you know, when they're announcing their crackdown on. That requires people to actually read the news. Interestingly, he went on vaccines as well. When? Like this was a lot of culture war talking points. He was actually talking about how, I can pull this up here. The autism book?

Yeah. Well, he didn't say that. He didn't tie a drug on the vaccine. Bobby Kennedy's looking into it. We're going to find out why and Bobby Kennedy's going to figure it out. Bobby Kennedy's looking into it. Well, maybe he should look into it. He said, this is the quote, he said, we have, he said, not at the end, but that was much later on, but.

Right, but it's like the culture war thing. He said since 1975, rates of child cancer have increased more than 40%. Reversing this trend is one of the top priorities of our new presidential commission to make America healthy again. Chair Brian Neal, Secretary of HHS, RFK Jr. Our goal is to get toxins out of our environment, poisons out of our food supply, and keep our children healthy and strong. As an example, not long ago, 1 in 10,000 children had autism. Now it's 1 in 36. So the first part of that makes me so irritated because, first of all, obviously they just cut—

a bunch of funding for research, including into cancer. And in addition, they have spent the first period in office rolling back some of the restrictions on chemicals like PFAS. So yeah, it's just so, I don't know, to me, it's just so cynical. - He ended that section of his speech by saying something is wrong and we're gonna find out what it is. - Something is wrong. - Something is wrong. - Something's definitely wrong.

Yeah, yeah. The subtext of that is RFK Jr.'s looking into the vaccines. I don't know. He has ideas. I mean, if you want it, if you want that, you could take that from it, but I don't know.

I don't know. I didn't see it necessarily signaling. That was good signaling. I mean, he was obviously signaling it for the people who want to hear that, but it's also on an empirical basis when people hear that, they're like, oh, that's crazy. I'm not against that, right? But it's red meat. I mean, my point around it all was I was like, he believes that that cult is the most important reason why he won.

To me, that's what, and there's no other reason why you would start 45 minutes of your speech off this way. It's obvious. So he thinks that this alone is going to be enough to coast him. And by the way, I think he could be right. I mean, there's a huge, you know, the whole message

MAGA universe online and all this, all the transgender, like the woman who's standing up who was hit by a woman by the volleyball thing. That's what they live for, right? That's the reason Ben Shapiro and Matt Walsh are in the audience. But it's also to get a contrast with Democrats not applauding those lines. It's very intentional. I think it's powerful.

I read it a little different. You won't be surprised to hear. I mean, listen, it's the exact thing that Democrats do when they want to cover for their lack of an agenda that delivers for working class people. They fix it on identity and cultural issues. And it's the same shit. It's just from Trump. Because, you know, people aren't happy with how the economy is going. They feel that it's getting worse and it already wasn't great. Right.

You know, obviously today the stock market fell off a cliff and you've got, as we were saying before, the consumer sentiment, consumer spending down, and there's warnings in the manufacturing sector. You've got this warning from the Atlanta Fed. Like, people are not satisfied with that direction. And he really isn't offering anything in the near term that you can point to. I mean, maybe no tax on tips. Maybe. But...

But so instead, what do you do? You usher in an agenda that's been really good for people like Elon Musk and other oligarchs by saying, oh, this is about DEI. This is about woke. Woke is over. Don't you feel great? So that's how I read the reason why it was front loaded with culture war. The same reason that, you know, that Democrats who weren't delivering for working class people also would lead into culture war.

I'm not disagreeing with a word you're saying. Yeah. I mean, I do think it's still obviously very politically powerful, unfortunately. I mean, this is the hold that Trump has. Oh, yeah. Guys, please remind me on a future show. A listener of our show who works for the DOD, who voted for Trump, sent me a very long email about why he –

voted for Republicans, even though he works within the DOD. And his reasoning, it reminds me of all this, 'cause it was for cultural reasons, specifically talking about Doge. - It was Pete Hester. - If you will recall, I made that comment. I was like, anyone who voted for Trump and you work for the federal government, I was like, I don't really know what to tell you. I was like, you're kind of an idiot if you didn't think that something like this

was gonna happen to me. He sent me a very long justification for why he did it. I actually think it bears discussion with all of us, but that's a tease for the future. - Does he regret it or now he's still like, "Yeah, I did the right thing." - No, he does not regret it. He's voted for Trump for three times. He voted for Trump because Democrats could not define what a woman is, but he is upset about the Doge cuts. And in the logic of the email, it really hit home for me why I still think that this is very politically,

very politically strong territory for Trump. Now, how long he can ride on it, I have no idea, right? America, they'll give you the runway and this will, you know, this will keep people feeling as if things are very different. It's still, you know, only a month or so into the new administration, but how long until it gets old? And that's when I think it starts to become a problem.

this is what I don't think Republicans are doing this on purpose, but I do think one of the big lessons for Democrats should be that if you are asked to choose between Trump and Republicans, red meat, culture, warfare, and Democrats for many voters, Republicans still come out on top, even if they don't like the way that Donald Trump talks. Yeah. And yeah, exactly. And so that's where I know we're going to talk about Al Green. We teased it a little bit earlier and the like,

The resist T-shirt walkout, the paddle signs that looked like, as some people were joking, Fogo de Chau. Bring me my meat signs. It's the green. And so, again, for a lot of voters, the Democrats are like it's I get it. Like Trump's Trump went for an hour and 40 minutes and extremely partisan speech and said some wild stuff and called the senator Pocahontas to her face. But then they look at the Democrats. They're like, you guys deserve it.

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Win the tech search for business PCs at Lenovo.com. So let's start with the Al Green thing. What is that, number one? So this was the first Democratic protest. I thought there were going to be a lot more, actually. I was surprised that there weren't. They got off to a raucous start. Yeah, they got off to a very raucous start and then became extremely lame. So Al Green here being escorted out of the House chamber. He was literally shaking his cane.

Donald Trump. Not since Charles Sumner, right, Ryan? Not since Charles Sumner has a cane so loudly been felt on the floor of the United States Congress. Let's take a listen. Finding that members continue to engage in willful and concerted disruption of proper decorum, the chair now directs the sergeant at arms to restore order. Remove this gentleman from the chamber.

All right, so that was Al Green, congressman getting escorted out. He said he was shouting at him, you have no mandate to cut Medicaid. Let's also put number two. Oh, is that what he was saying? Apparently. That's what he claims he was saying. Apparently people only heard you have no mandate.

Let's go to the number two, please, the screenshot. Can you guys put that up while I talk? This is the one that's going pretty viral when people are saying it's lame. Some of the, what are these, like placards? What would you call it? They're being held up. Signs. Bingo signs. Small round bingo-like signs being held up by Democrats include Musk steals. That's a lie. That's from Rashida Tlaib. She has a whiteboard. False, false. Musk steals. Save Medicaid. Musk steals. Some false statements.

They should have all said save Medicaid. Seriously. Yeah, I agree. I was like, save Medicaid. That is probably the most powerful one. You, Crystal, sent this from The Daily Show. Fun fact, Democrats are wearing pink tonight as a symbolic protest against people who want them to do something meaningful. So that is pretty damn funny. They were protesting me. Yeah. Yeah.

It's so personal. I mean, clearly, like, they are getting the message that people want them to do more, but they just have no idea what that actually looks like. I will say, I thought Ro Khanna and Tim Walz had a really good idea, which is all these Republicans are like, oh, we're not going to do town halls anymore. And they're like, oh.

We'll come to your district. We'll do a town hall. Yeah, that is smart. You know, that's smart. And I think we'll play really well and, you know, put pressure on Republicans like, oh, shit, this guy's doing a town hall in my district. I guess I need to show up or at least it's sort of shameful to them to not show up. Bernie Sanders, obviously, he's also, I think, delivering a response along with Alyssa Slotkin.

- Yeah, she's speaking right now. - Oh, we're missing this. - She's speaking right now. - The official Deep State response. - I'm monitoring the quotes. - Yeah, the Deep State is responding by Alyssa Slotkin. - She currently says Reagan is rolling in his grave. - Is she wearing pink? - Affirmatively talking about Reagan. Let's see what else here.

But I also think, you know, the Bernie Sanders oligarchy tour going to specifically swing Republican districts where, you know, the Republican House, they need every single vote to be able to do anything. And so he's recognized that as a pressure point. I think that's also very intelligent. But yeah, I mean, these things just read as like sort of.

The only indication that Democrats would be getting the message would be if they'd have said, you know what, Bernie, you do the response. Yes. Because that would at least be surprising to people. So instead they picked a CIA spook from Michigan who actually says, no guardrails on what they do. We need more efficient government. You want to cut waste? I'll help you do it. But change doesn't need to be chaotic or make us less safe.

Yeah, I mean, she's one of the ones that she's voted for a bunch of Trump picks. She voted for the Lincoln-Riley Act. Like, you know, that's who she is. And it also speaks to, okay, not just would it indicate they're getting it from a sort of like policy perspective if they had Bernie Sanders respond, but people...

But people would actually watch. Right, yeah. Bernie is racking up- And it would go viral. Tens of millions of views on everything he does. I mean, he is an absolute TikTok sensation. And these town halls were getting insane views. Like everything he says and does is going viral. Wow.

So why wouldn't you be like, maybe that guy should be the one. Or Roe. You know, or Roe. Or listen, the whole thing about giving the oversight ranking committee member to Jerry Connolly instead of AOC, like, what are you thinking?

One of these people knows how to communicate and understands the attention economy and is on it and understands the online, like, attention ecosystem. But the other one earned it, Crystal. And the other one, he's been waiting for this. He's in line. Follow.

Follow the rules. It's just total insanity. If the Dems get a tea party, how big was a tea party blowout in 2010? It was like 55 seats? They picked up like 60-some seats. It was genuine. 62, I want to say, something like that. If that happened to the Dems, would that happen? Like the Jerry Connolly stuff still happen? Would Hakeem get to keep his seat? Oh, Hakeem is. Yeah.

Oh, bro. That is the latest guy I've ever seen. The Democrats. If they get a Republican-style Tea Party blowout win in the House of Representatives. And Democrats take control? And Democrats take control. Oh, then definitely. I mean, Hakeem is the blowout. So you think he'll stay, even though they don't like him?

Oh, yeah. I don't know. It depends on the kind. Because remember, the Tea Party got rid of Biden. Yeah, it depends on the kind of characters who win. And it depends on if that dumb Tea Party also consists of not just winning in Republican seats, but primarying people that they're, you know, disgusted with. Oh, that's good. And I've mentioned this before, but I went back and looked at the Tea Party era polling for Republican-based voters, how they felt about

Republican congressional leaders. And it is very similar to the way that Democratic voters feel right now about Democratic leadership. Democratic leaders are underwater by like nine points in the last poll that we saw. This is so different from 2016. You guys know Pelosi's shift. Like they felt, oh, these people are doing the thing we want them to do. These are our heroes, et cetera. It is not like that anymore. And so, you know, if you had

some of these people who have been the most disappointing getting primaried and you have a more sort of like forceful, radical,

that comes in that doesn't owe their seats to the party establishment, then you could end up with some different dynamics. And I think the other thing that opens up that possibility is that liberals are also completely disenchanted with their media outlets. And so that creates a really different dynamic as well. So there's a lot of ifs here about how this will all go down. But I will say, I think the indications are very much in the direction of you're probably going to have a blowout year, blue wave year for Democrats.

Just, you know, if you look at history and backlash to parties that have complete power, if you look at we're so early and there's already this level of sentiment and Republicans who are hiding and worried and Elon is just doing his thing and they're going after Social Security and the economy is on the brink.

I think you could be setting up quite a catastrophe for the Republicans in terms of midterms. It could be peaking early. I mean, it could phase out because the Tea Party peaked in what? Oh, nine, right around nine months in. That's when the Obamacare stuff was really happened. And then it especially was right there at the tail of the...

of 09 into 10 and then going into the midterm elections. Well, I guess, I mean, I would say maybe, honestly, I would put it through the Senate, what did Obama call it, the route or whatever he said in 2014? The shellacking. Yeah, the shellacking. The shellacking in 2014. I would extend it through that. Yeah, no, no, no, absolutely. I was just thinking in terms of timing. So if the Democratic, whatever, Coffee Party. Oh, I see what you mean. Oh, okay. If the Coffee Party peaks like 30 days in to the Trump administration, it could still, you know, it could still like, uh,

it could still actually phase out or, you know, who knows? So much depends on what Trump's policies do to the economy, I think. Yeah, I think you're right. Because it

He could back off. He could say, you know, it's just kidding on these tariffs. Federal workers are allowed back in with a federal judge. And then he could say, we're going to fire them all in September. And then he doesn't actually fire them in September because things are struggling then. And you get a little downturn and then it comes back up. Right. Or you could get this full on Trump thing where he's like, no, we're really we're doing some major transition. Like in his speech tonight, he's alluding to.

Real difficulties ahead. Yeah. He said to the farmers, he said, there'll be a little bit of adjustment. But we're okay with that. Which, you know, Elon also promised like hardship, temporary hardship on the campaign trail. He's trying to do a thing that politicians have done many times over the generations, bring people together in times of hardships that we collectively can then get to a better place. Except he also wants to do it while...

dismissing, attacking and calling the other half the country a bunch of traitors and losers. So FDR had 60 plus seats in the Senate and one massive mandate so he could say, all right. - We're all doing this together. - We're all doing this together. We're rowing together. And it's just the bankers that are against us.

Trump's like, we're all in this together, except like half the country, the universities, the doctors. Every federal government worker. Someone's got to stand up for the universities, Ryan. All the teachers, the Capitol Police. But everyone else, yeah, we're in it. I don't know how you do both of those things because—

He wants to ask for shared sacrifice without sharing any common value. Or sharing the sacrifice among people like Elon Musk, who are getting, you know, just hand out after hand. Musk wants to be joyful about what he's doing to people rather than, like,

read people in and say, this is why we're doing it. I think your point, though, about if they back off after a catastrophic three months, or not even catastrophic, bad three months, I mean, that's long enough time. That's almost, what, several months to go to the midterms. You could at least see some sort of change. The problem is that right now we have no indication that that's going to happen.

Elon's getting his shout out to the State of the Union. Doge is getting lists getting read off. You've got the Social Security fraud thing, and we're going whole hog on the tariffs. So it's like, okay, well, that's all we can really go off. And the tax cut. Right now, yeah, the tax cut, that's the thing. The tax cut is in a separate category. That's going to happen. That's not changing at all. Oh, I see. Yeah, yeah. The other stuff might change, but the tax cut is happening. You add on top of that likely Medicaid cuts.

- In the same way that social security would be. - If they actually do flub some social security checks, like-- - Oh, people will lose it. I agree with you.

And they should lose it. That's crazy. They're flirting with that. I mean, flirting with that, they're flirting with another plane crash that really can be laid at their feet. Oh, I left that out. You're exactly right, which is that if there's a major natural disaster, if there's a major hurricane after they've been cutting all these NOAA things and they can't properly call a Category 4 or a Category 5 and some people die, even if it's not their fault, doesn't matter. You're getting the blame. Or they've gutted FEMA and they can't properly respond. Yeah.

Responding to a natural disaster, even with the best of government funding levels, is difficult. You've got a potential shutdown coming up. I mean, there's just disaster around every corner and an economy that's already starting to turn south. So I think, you know, it would take a lot at this point to recover from the trajectory that they've already set things on. And, you know, to see Elon there, it's just...

This is the part that I could not have predicted is how much of the presidency he would cede to Elon. Like, I just could not have seen that coming. Oh, nobody would have. And it's, the thing is, is it goes against everything that we know about Donald Trump. Why would he ever cede

I still don't understand it. Why would you ever cede so much, not control, what does Trump care about? Attention, media. Every probably American at this point who's even tangentially aware of the Trump news could tell you about Elon. Could be a good thing, could be a bad thing.

Why would you want that? Why would you want your presidency to be defined by this guy with 15 kids and all this other baggage and weird shit that he does all the time? He's really tied his brand to one of the most eccentric and polarizing people in the world. And he could actually be having Russ vote, like out there doing doge. You know what I mean? It would not even be a headline. First of all, it would be done properly.

Second of all, it would be – or at the very least like legally or in terms of – it would be much more within the line of like traditional Washington process and they could fight it out in the institutions and the norms. And I mean it seems to be – that seems why Vivek –

ultimately leftos was really over beefs on something like this. His white people tweet aside. But yeah, just putting it together, I mean, that's just the most shocking part about all of this is like he's playing with fire. And I think that's a theme that I've really come away from the State of the Union. I think there was a ton of red meat. If you're MAGA, you'll love it. And of course you'll love it.

You're going to love it. You're going to love anything the guy says. There's lots of culture war stuff and all that. But for us, when we look at the dangers of natural disaster, social security, economic problems, and then just chaotic nature, people feeling as if things are not in control, those are all very, very dangerous places to be. I also think that the—

The amount of gutting of like white-collar police that they've done is a risk. It's like gutting the CFPB. That's a risk. And gutting the SEC enforcement. I mean you've just got – it's such like outright corrupt. You guys see this story about people paying a million or $5 million to have – $5 million. $5 million. To have a one-on-one dinner with Trump. With Trump. That's another thing. He doesn't even need the money.

It's for a campaign fund. Well, not with the meme coin. No, but it's for, no, it's not personal. It's to a campaign fund. Why do you need $5 million for a campaign fund? I mean, you've got that. You've got the crypto dude who gave him, you know, $75 million into his meme coin. And then, oh, SEC dropped enforcement. I saw that. And so when you put all of these together, it's like, this is just,

Like, Elon and his billionaire buddies, like, they're just robbing and plundering the government. I mean, the picture adds up. It doesn't take a genius political messenger. Even this lame-ass Democratic Party can put those pieces together to say, like, this administration is about the rich.

And but, you know, to go back to the Trump and Elon point, like even just to see the spotlight of his State of the Union address. I know. For standing ovation to Elon. I don't think any of us could have anticipated that. And it really does ask some questions about like what the hell is going on here? Does he care? Is there some sort of a deal? What has made it so that he is just really seeded his propaganda?

Yeah. And to your point about immigration, like, I'm glad he's not making good on this particular problem. Yeah, but it'd be nice for some of us. The deportation levels are the same as Joe, but are actually lower than... Yeah.

Joe Biden. Or this golden visa. And that was the part that, you know, in terms of one of the promises to working class people, again, I don't, this isn't accurate in my view and I don't think that a mass deportation would help. I think that would further hurt the economy. But that was like the pledge to working class people was that

This is the thing that's really going to help you. And because it's not a priority of Elon, it's the part that's actually not really getting done. Again, I'm glad about that. But it is noteworthy to me that the part that has been so central to Trump but is not really particularly a priority to Elon outside of him currying favor with MAGA, that part has kind of fallen by the wayside. Right, on top of the golden visa thing, which is like a Silicon Valley wet dream where they get to just buy their citizenship. Yeah, NH1B, which he sided with Elon on. Yeah, and he even mentioned that.

in this. He's actually trying to fuse Golden Visa with the H-1B program, if you heard there. It's like, at any of these universities, Facebook can pay $5 million. It's like, yeah, Facebook can pay $5 million for a coder. Or they'll just keep the H-1B system. Well,

What? That's like that made you think meme. Anyway, all right, we've been talking for long enough. You guys got any last things you want to say? Yeah, actually, all I was going to say is Democrats were sitting there with their stupid paddle signs. And so, I mean, I don't disagree with everything that we've all said. I just think the big takeaway to the extent that Americans pay attention to this, I think Donald Trump successfully baited Democrats into a complete public relations disaster for themselves. Disaster. They like, yeah.

They're not the center of the show here. They're voters wanting to do something. I wouldn't say it's a disaster. I don't know. I think I disagree on that. Nicole Wallace is already saying that little kid DJ was like the highlight. Republicans, Democrats all find a good human story in every state of the union. This was the one from that. He's already saying- Bush's spokesperson? Nicole Wallace? Yeah, Nicole Wallace. What did she say? She's already out on-

the MSNBC airwaves saying, I hope he has a long life as a law enforcement officer, but I hope he never has to defend the United States Capitol against Donald Trump supporters. And if he does, I hope he isn't one of the six who loses his life to suicide. I don't know. I just, you know, it's like, I don't disagree that it's cringe, but I wouldn't call it a relations disaster. They're not the, I mean, they're just, the memes are, they're not the center of the evening. Yeah, I think, I mean,

That's the main reason. I don't know. I think it was so bad that those... I think those optics were so bad with them with the paddle signs. They were just like perfect meme fodder. I think that was so, so bad. That idea was so bad. Maybe right. I don't know. Al Green waving the cane and the paddle signs. I think it was so bad that it will... A lot of people will see that. I think... You could be right. I see a lot of right-wing like...

oh, they didn't even clap for this and this. That I'm not concerned about. I'm like, are people really watching this clapping? No, they aren't. I just don't think so. No, they aren't. And also, it was a 100-minute speech. It's long. I don't think any of this. How many people who watch this? Here's one of the things that I would point to, Emily, is I was looking at some of the polling around this, and the approval rating of Democrats and the Democratic Party and congressional Democrats is in the tank. Yes. And yet, when you ask people who do you prefer on a generic congressional ballot,

Democrats. What's the... The latest one was by five, which is significant. Yeah, that's a good sign. I mean, listen, you take them with a grain of salt, whatever. Right. But...

You shouldn't look at the fact that their approval, like when people are like, do you like these people? And they're like, no. But do you like them better than these other people? They're like, yeah, kind of. Yeah, I think it's a big deal. You know, because, and that's, that is a natural ebb and flow to politics, but also Republicans are truly enacting an agenda, and Trump in particular, that is polls, that is really unpopular. I mean, the Greenland stuff is unpopular. Gaza is unpopular. The

Even the Gulf of America thing, which I thought people might eat up, even that's unpopular. Yeah, it has been. A lot of these pieces, and Doge is unpopular, and Elon's unpopular, and cutting Social Security, and cutting Medicaid, and giving taxes, all of these things are really, really unpopular. And so when you put that together, and it's like, hey, do you want maybe a check on that? Even if these people are kind of lame, they're like, yeah, probably not to mention. Yeah.

Democrats have the benefit now of the coalition that previously used to benefit Republicans in midterms, which is their people freaking show up. Yeah, that's true. And in the midterm election, that matters a lot. So that's why I listen to Lock and Hab between now and then, blah, blah, blah, caveats, et cetera. But I think we're probably headed in the direction of a major political correction, even if the Democrats continue to be freaking lame. If Trump does blow things up, then people will remember, oh, yeah, they shook the cane at him. They didn't like this stuff.

You know what they were right about with those paddles? They were right. They were vindicated. I genuinely think that State of the Unionists don't make a big difference. I should have prefaced it with that anyway in terms of electoral outcomes. Although, again, I don't know why. People love the State of the Union. People watch it.

It's always the only political event in the top 100 newscasts or broadcasts of the entire country. I think it really, honestly, it's boring. No, yeah. People like us who watch politics, like the debates are way more important, you know, stuff like that. And they're fun. Oh, obviously they're fun. Even just a regular old Trump presser is like a lot more...

Oh, yeah. There's way more shit. A lot more riz than that. Actually going to happen. Riz. People like the show, so whatever. Aspiration for this being a country. That's true. Aspiration for this being a real country. Like, this is a serious thing and I need to tune in and

hear what my president has to say. You're right. I should take my scolding away. Everyone should keep watching. If nonetheless, just because we always cover it. Rituals are important. It's a fun thing that we enjoy doing here. It's an annual tradition. Ryan and I will be doing a special show for everybody tomorrow that will be dropping somewhere around midday. And then Crystal and I will be back for a normal show on Thursday. So we will see you guys. We're also going to have, by the way, Adam Hamilway very briefly. He was Bonnie Watson Coleman's

guest at the State of the Union. She'll join as well. She's a Democrat from New Jersey. He's the doctor.

who saved Tammy Duckworth's life and was then stuck in Gaza twice. So he was in the audience. See what he thought about that. Awesome. Not a lot. He's on before you get on. Not a lot on the Middle East. Looking forward to it. Really? Yeah, zero. Just the hostages. He's tirelessly working. Working tirelessly. Yeah, working tirelessly. Working tirelessly. Working tirelessly. We need to retire that one from Washington. All right. We'll see you guys later.

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