The Biden Bump (with AOC!)

Ron DESantis attacks Donald Trump for being too supportive of LGBTQ rights. And congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez joins to talk about reforming the right-wing Supreme Court and lots more. Then, in a special edition of Two Takes and a Fake. We sniff out the made-up reaction from the right over the revelation that lines were crossed and possibly bumped. When someone left their nose candy in the White House, did you write that yourself? I got a lot more.

Where those come from? Dan Yeah, of course, of course. I read it myself. Good, good, that's impressive, good.

But first, over the long weekend, you may have seen an episode of our subscription show Terminally Online pop up in your pod Save America feed. Check it out. If you haven't listened yet, you'll hear me. Dan Elijah and Whatadays Priyanka Arabindy talk about everything from Ron DeSantis and Roseanne to Barbenheim Barbenheimer. Still, it's still. It's a hard one to say. I don't think that's all we talked about.

What else did we talk about? We talked? what was? oh, we talked?

It was a question about when we were all going to run for office and what office it was going to be. We started with Dan in Delaware, which now he has to wait in line because he's just waiting, waiting around for Chris Coons to retire. But anyway, and then I attacked Sacramento. Yeah, I actually.

We're trying all kinds of social media apps these days.

The Supreme Court's right-wing majority celebrated America's birthday with a trio of six to three. Rulings that banned affirmative action in higher education, allowed a business to deny wedding services to LGBTQ couples and struck down President Biden's plan to forgive $10,000 worth of student debt for people earning less than $125,000 a year and $20,000 worth of debt for low-income families. Relief that nearly 26 million borrowers have already applied for. Chief Justice Roberts invoked the so-called major questions doctrine, which was just made up by this court. And it basically says that the president can't take executive actions regarding major political and economic questions that aren't explicitly spelled out by Congress in the legislation they've passed. The Biden administration was clearly prepared for this outcome, which is why the president made this announcement shortly after the ruling. I believe the court's decision to strike down my student debt relief program as a mistake was wrong.

I'm not going to stop fighting to deliver borrowers what they need. I'm announcing today a new path, consistent with today's ruling, to provide student debt relief to as many borrowers as possible. As quickly as possible, we will ground this new approach in a different law than my original plan, the so-called Higher Education Act. That will allow Secretary Cardona, who's with me today, to compromise, waive or release loans under certain circumstances. This new path is legally sound.

It's going to take longer, but in my view, it's the best path that remains to providing for as many borrowers as possible. Second, we know what many borrowers will need to make their hard choices, which their budgets are being strained now when they start to repay their monthly loan payments this fall. That's why we're creating a temporary 12-month, what we're calling on-ramp repayment program. Monthly payments will be due, bills will not go out and interest will be accruing, and during this period, if you can pay your monthly bills, you should.

But if you cannot, if you miss payments. This on-ramp will temporarily remove the threat of default or having your credit harmed, which can hurt borrowers for years to come. So it seems to me that the challenge with this new plan is that it's going to run up against the same Supreme Court. But what do you think? What's your strict scrutiny?

I don't know, I don't know, either way, I have been asking.

I have no idea. In other words, I listened to all the back episodes of strict scrutiny that came out at the end of last week before the holiday weekend. Based on what little I know, and I really want to emphasize, little is. It does seem like there are many people who believe that the Higher Education Act would be a slightly stronger ground on which to offer loan forgiveness.

There is a provision in the Higher Education Act that has been used for loan forgiveness before. It's the foundation for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program, which allows people who do public service to get some of their debt forgiven. It was also used when the Biden administration settled a class action lawsuit involving people who had been misled by for-profit universities. There is precedent there, as you point out the major questions doctrine.

Is this incredibly vague and intentionally vague weapon to be used to strike down the executive actions of Democratic presidents? It's very likely you would end up right back where you are because they can do the exact same thing all over again.

So, even though this one was challenged successfully in court, they point out that other student loan executive actions from the president have not been challenged in court. So I think that's what they're hoping for here. It will take a long time, it'll take maybe a year. Because the Department of Education has to undertake a rule-making process around this that involves policy negotiations and a public comment period. Though, some economists have argued that the administration should skip the rule-making process and see what the court does.

I think we all know what the court will do.

Some folks on the left directed their very understandable frustration with the decision towards President Biden and Democrats in Congress. Can you think of anything they could have done differently to achieve a better outcome? Here? I cannot, but I don't know if I'm missing anything.

There is no different way in which the Biden administration could have written the rule. There is no strategy that I can see. Whether they could have passed a law that would have been immune from this specific court challenge. This is the reality we have of the Congress we had with this court. I understand why people are angry.

That anger should be directed at Republicans at the court and channeled into trying to regain the House. And expand our Senate majority so that we can eliminate the filibuster and ensure that we have 50 Senate Democrats who are willing to support forgiving student debt. I realize we sound like a broken.

They are immune to pressure on this issue. That's what we have to do is focus on, like you said, electing a Senate majority that is willing to get rid of the filibuster. For a host of reasons. There's also been a lot of pressure on Biden and Democrats to support more aggressive judicial reforms, particularly around expanding the court. Here's what the president had to say about that during an interview on Friday with MSNBC's Nicole.

But we heard from White House communications director Ben Lebolt on last week's episode that Biden has not yet endorsed any specific ethics reforms, either. What do you?

The first is Joe Biden is naturally more reticent on aggressive political reforms than you. And I are probably a lot of people who listen to this podcast are. It took him a long time on the filibuster. He was in the Senate for decades, He was the chair of the Judiciary Committee. He has real concerns, not ones I necessarily agree with, but about delegitimizing the court.

That may be one reason why he's hesitant, I think the and I think that's the only thing that's why he's hesitant. Or opposed on bigger issues like expansion and term limits. On ethics reform, I have a suspicion that the White House did not want to come out with a position on ethics reform. While the court, this right-wing court, was making decisions on these huge cases that matter a lot to them. The one about discrimination against the LGBTQ community, the one about student loans, and the one about the independent state legislature theory.

You'll remember this that when the Supreme Court was making a decision on Obamacare in Obama's first term, it was seen that Judge Anthony Kennedy was the deciding vote. Obama, because he likes being funny, was on the stump in interviews, making a joke about how he would mow Anthony Kennedy's lawn and offer to do his laundry. One day, the White House counsel came down and told us that they had heard from people who know Kennedy, that Kennedy probably doesn't like that joke. So you should stop making it while access to affordable healthcare for millions of people is at stake. And we immediately shut up. I can definitely see the White House counsel saying,-.

That would definitely take place after the Supreme Court term was over, so we'll see what happens, but I think that may be what's happening there.

The guy is a creature of the Senate for decades and an institutionalist. And so, of course, he was going to support the filibuster for a long time. And the fact that at this age as president, he changed his mind is, I think, a good sign. And it tells you to keep up the pressure on him for that. But I will also say, if Biden came out tomorrow in favor of adding justices to the Supreme Court, do you think it would change the political dynamic in any way?

And so nothing is going to change in the short term. I wish Biden was for expansion, because I don't think expansion is going to happen in his first term, certainly, maybe not even a second term. But if we actually want to solve this problem, and I believe pass real court reform, it's going to require prominent Democrats to support. But that's not where Joe Biden is now, and, as you say, if he were to change his mind tomorrow, it's not going to expand the court.

We still don't have the power to do it, and it's not going to forgive anyone's student debt. Like simply saying it, it does not change where we are.

So, yeah, I think that could help. But it's also possible that you build support. By, you know, starting to ask Senate Democrats how they feel about it, starting to ask people who are running for the Senate. Like, you know, Ruben Gallego is trying to, you know, run against Kyrsten Sinema and whoever the Republican is in Arizona, and, you know. So people like you start, you start building support that way, and I do think that's that's good to do.

But I don't think that Joe Biden coming out for court reform tomorrow, or had he come out for court reform a year ago, two years ago, would have led to a different outcome. Correct? Well, what do we know about how voters feel about court reform?

When we generally talk about court reform.

We've seen polls that show north of 60 of voters supporting that, which makes complete sense. It would probably in fact, be the most important if you could get it to be constitutionally acceptable. Which is tough because the Supreme Court is the one who would make that choice. It would be a complete game changer, both in terms of the balance of the court. I think it would mean that each and every one of these appointments would not be this cataclysmic, apocalyptic battle. Where you have to find the youngest, healthiest person possible to conserve the longest. I think it would just be better across the board for the court.

Expansion is much less popular. How you word the question matters a lot, but in general, it is far below 50 right now in support for it. When you package them all together, I've seen it do better, but expansion is by far the least popular part. Only 60 of Democrats support it in a bunch of polls. Now, to the Biden point, if Biden were to come out for it, that number would go up, not to 100 of Democrats. But it would go up. But it would not get it to majority support in this country.

Republicans obviously don't like it. Independents are particularly skeptical of it thus far, but also no one is making the case for it either.

This would be expanding the court to 13 justices, which is legislation that some Democrats have introduced. You're right, it's underwater, with Independents 42 46 and then Republicans, it's 28 62. No surprise there. It's getting more popular, but you're right, it's not majority support yet.

It's plurality in some polls, and some polls it's different. You're right that the ethics reform is by far the most popular. I also would argue that it will be the least effective of the options. It solves a different problem.

Solves a different problem. I think it's a connected problem. But I think that if you had a very stringent code of conduct and really significant ethics reforms, you would still have a bunch of ideological zealots on the court. Who, even if they weren't flying on private planes with Harlan Crow and getting their mom's house paid for, like Clarence, Thomas, would still make horrible decisions. Just because they like to make horrible decisions based on their right-wing ideology, I think it's still important, we should still do it. I do think term limits is probably the one that is both popular and would be effective. That Democrats should feel more confident running on, including Joe Biden, because I think that you're right.

You actually start limiting the amount of time that justices sit on the bench, then that's going to have a real effect. And it is quite popular. In the meantime, you try to get court reform and expansion more popular by actually advocating for it. That's what I would do. All right, let's talk about the knuckleheads trying to replace Joe Biden.

Most of the Republican candidates spent the weekend on the trail at 4th of July parades and barbecues. Donald Trump held a rally in South Carolina where he was introduced by Lindsey Graham, who was loudly and repeatedly booed throughout the event. That's fun. Mike Pence marched in an Iowa parade where the crowd started chanting Trump, Trump, Trump, which I guess is an improvement over Hang Mike Pence.

You take the wins where you can get them. Ron DESantis campaign released a video to mark the end of Pride Month. That begins by attacking Donald Trump for pledging to protect LGBTQ Americans during his 2016 convention. Speech then shows a series of headlines that say DeSantis signed the most extreme anti-trans law ever. And is, quote, evil? All while flashing pictures of shirtless dudes and Patrick Bateman, the serial killer from American Psycho, the video managed to be both homophobic and homoerotic.

It was widely condemned by Democrats and Republicans, including some Desantis curious pundits. But the best response was from Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

And what public policy problems do you get up in the morning thinking about how to solve?

They're not in it for the sincerity, they're in it for the strength. And it's not going to work, it has never worked in the past, it's not going to work now.

You're not going to convince people that Donald Trump is insufficiently MAGA, you might be able to convince people that he is ineffective at the MAGA agenda. But it's not like everyone's running around thinking Donald Trump is an honest, sincere human being. And if you only were to show this footage, to show that he is not as bigoted and homophobic as his speeches would suggest, they're all going to leave him. There is no evidence for that to work, and it's particularly stupid, like much of what Ron DESantis campaign does.

Republican voters just lived through four years of his presidency, and, judging by his approval ratings among those same Republican voters and even evangelical voters. They don't think he governed in a way that was too supportive of LGBTQ rights. Or if they do, they don't care. They just got four years of it and they're all in. So now, instead of hitting him for what he did or didn't do during his presidency, you're going to go back before the presidency to. When he was running Miss Universe pageants and complaining that he let transgender Americans compete in the beauty pageants, or that he said that he didn't care where Caitlyn Jenner went. The bathroom, which those two bits were also in the Desantis video. I mean, it is so nuts and so stupid, and it wasn't...

I had to check, by the way, because I think in the outline, you said it was from the never back down pack. No, no, no, no, no. The video was made by someone else, by some other group, they posted it. oh, they also posted it.

But Desantis campaign posted it, not the Pack. The campaign also posted it. And then and then Ron DeSantis was asked in an interview about the video, and he defended it. He said I think identifying Donald Trump as really being a pioneer in injecting gender ideology into the mainstream, where he was having men compete against women. I think that's totally fair game.

It's so stupid, it's so stupid. So I guess that brings us to the second question Why is Ron DESantis campaign so fucking weird? Because the fish rots from the head, John.

No campaign in history has needed to go touch grass more than Ron DESantis campaign. They are the most online campaign I think I have ever seen. Like, you have to have a fucking degree in 4Chan to understand what was going on in that video, the music, the images, like, you know you've seen, people have, like, dissected it.

Who know this stuff?

The crowd went wild, and then after the crowd goes wild, Trump stops and he says, It's amazing how strong people feel about that. I talk about cutting taxes and you all go like this, and then he did like, a, you know, and he goes, I talk about transgender, everyone goes crazy.

Five years ago, you didn't even know what the hell it was. Which is just a completely true statement from Donald Trump. And a very sharp bit of political analysis, yeah, and an honest bit of political analysis. He winks, and he nods at the people who.

Trump is attacking DESantis for being too far right on issues like, uh, wanting to privatize and cut Medicare and Social Security. How much does it worry you that this may make Trump seem more moderate and thus electable to a general electorate? Uh, if he's the nominee. I don't want to overstate the case, because in times.

You're going to have a lot of people in there who are paying zero attention to this primary. They're just kind of like surfing the news, they're seeing the headlines. And there is a chance that some of them watching this coverage will get the impression from how Ron, particularly how Ron DeSantis, is running his campaign. That Donald Trump is more economically populist than the rest of his party, and slightly more moderate on some cultural issues than the furthest extremes of his party. And that could be decisive on the margins.

And as we know, this presidential election is likely to be decided on the margins. The way I've been trying to explain how close this is going to be is that if it's anything like 16 and 20. The election will be decided by fewer people than attended the most recent Taylor Swift concert. So it does take a lot of people to get that impression to do it, because it's not like people who are like, lifelong. Democrats are going to all of a sudden change their mind, or Republicans are going to change their mind. They're going to be people who voted for Trump in 16, Biden in 20, and might possibly be available to Trump again in 24..

And those are the sort of people who could get that impression, people who voted, maybe people who voted Trump in 20, but then voted for a Democrat for Congress in 2022. Because they thought these other Republicans were such maga lunatic extremists that they might see Trump as slightly different. If he's out there protecting Social Security and Medicare and getting hammered by a bunch of his opponents for being not insufficiently extreme on abortion?

So I do think that it's probably smart of Democrats to start reminding people of that. To counter what DESantis is doing here. But you could see DESantis running if DESantis campaign actually picks up, if DESantis is still around in the fall and the winter....

So what happens if they don't?

Joining us today to talk about the Supreme Court and much more. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Congresswoman, Welcome back to the pod.

And remember, we are proceeding with an alternative plan here, which means there are millions of people out there. That would potentially be paying interest on loans, on loan balances that are going to get forgiven if all goes according to plan. And so I really do believe that suspending interest is, you know, the move to make right now, especially as people start to, you know, get acclimated. A lot of people don't even know who their student loan servicers are anymore because there were a.

On what to do about the court, I see a two-track approach here. There can be hearings and investigations into ethics and potentially legal violations, and hopefully some kind of ethics legislation. And then there are broad structural reforms like court expansion and term limits that can help rebalance. The extreme right turn the court has taken in terms of the ethics investigations. Who makes the decision on whether Senate Democrats issue subpoenas, which has only been tried under justice once in the past? Is that Schumer?

Is it, like a majority on the judiciary? What's the process there?

And they were often a combination of consultation within our overall caucus conversation as a committee. But, you know, much of that at the time was a lot of. That decision weighed very heavily on then chairman of Oversight Elijah Cummings, as well as discussions with House leadership. And so I would expect that there would kind of be a mirror dynamic. And so that would mean that Durbin would have an enormous amount of input on that, as well as other, you know, major figures as well, Sheldon Whitehouse has been doing an enormous amount of work regarding this issue.

And, of course, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer.

And it does leave open a question of, in addition to what we already know, have there been even other kind of developments out there that we don't know about? That have potentially swayed or had significant impacts on decisions that may have already occurred? And is there a righting of a wrong on that? I think that ultimately is what this is about, is that, you know, as much as these justices, of course, conveniently want to say, Oh, this has nothing to do with this. They are surpassed even what members of Congress are allowed to do, and Congress regulates itself, and people have seen what members of Congress have gotten away with, frankly.

And what the Supreme Court has done, what certain members of the court have done, has even put that to shame. And so I really do believe that what we need is not just ethics reform, which is very necessary. But we do need a thorough accounting and investigation of what the court has frankly been withholding. We cannot allow this lack of disclosure. Just like a convenient, you know, people like Clarence Thomas or Samuel Alito, just conveniently leaving off lavish gifts and vacations from billionaires that have interest before the court. And just say, Oh, you know, that's a mulligan, you know? That, I think, is profoundly disturbing. And these are the kinds of conflicts of interest that even the most basic, low-level, entry-level judges would know that this is a no-no. Even basic. Government employees are not allowed to receive this kind of favoring.

And that needs to be taken seriously, and I do think that there needs to be an account on what has fully occurred on court reform. You've.

When the court begins to expand and abuse its power far beyond what it has, that is them expanding their judicial review. As we saw, even with Elena Kagan's dissent, she is saying this court, the call is coming from inside the house. In her dissent, she's saying this court is getting out of control. They are assuming the power of a legislature.

This is, we are going far beyond our jurisdiction.

We are seeing members of the court themselves really allude to this. I believe that in our system of checks and balances, it is up to Congress. It is also up to the president to begin to push back on the scope of the Supreme Court's judicial review. They are calling into question laws and rights that have been established for 50 plus years in this country. In their overturning of jobs, in their overturning of basic protections and equality protections for LGBTQ Americans. Even in their Supreme Court decision around student loans, them just basically saying, the president doesn't have the authority to do something this big, but we won't say how big.

They're really calling in an enormous amount of power into themselves that, frankly, they don't have and that the Constitution does not give them. And so, you know, I do believe that really honing in on the court's judicial review and the scope of that is important. And again, I do believe that. Listen, I mean, some folks may disagree with me, but I believe that the Supreme Court is fully politicized. I think this is a group of political actors and they respond to political pressure.

And maybe that's not the eye in the sky way we'd like to think of our court. Maybe that's not what the court is supposed to be, but that's the court that we're working with today. And I think that proper oversight, I do believe that investigations and subpoenas, and potentially law-breaking behavior. We have a Supreme Court justice that refused to recuse himself from a case in which his wife was directly implicated. That was Clarence Thomas and his wife's involvement on January 6th. And not only that, but he was the only judge, if not one of the only two, to vote against allowing full disclosure of materials with respect to that.

And so, you know, I do believe that investigations subpoenas if Chief Justice Roberts will not comply with Senate investigations, as he has not. He has refused to come before Congress around this issue, and the Supreme Court does not have that luxury. They are not above investigations, they are human, and they are just as susceptible to corruption as any other government entity. And we have a responsibility to conduct the strongest oversight for them. Because at least with the legislature, the presidency, we have elections and the people can always hold us accountable by not voting for us again.

And that is one of many layers. But the Supreme Court. These are lifetime appointments, at least they are for now, and that means that the responsibility for oversight on them is that much.

And Abraham, you know? And Lincoln disregarded the outcome of Dred Scott when he signed the emancipation Proclamation. And they said, there are certain things that are inalienable, and citizenship for Black Americans and the formerly enslaved was one of those inalienable rights. And you know, I know it is a third rail in politics to discuss this, but frankly, this is where we are as a country and it is sad and scary. But, you know, the idea of having a panel of unelected individuals who have demonstrated financial entanglement and whose reasoning is increasingly straying from precedent? There has to be a line.

And we have to ask ourselves and prepare ourselves. We are seeing the Supreme Court. They stripped rights, basic inalienable rights, inalienable rights from women and non-binary people last year. With the overturning of Dobbs, they are now stripping certain inalienable rights from LGBTQ Americans. And we have to ask ourselves.

If they can do this, what can't they do? What is the line in terms of that pushback? And so, you know, I think when it comes to legislation, there's a potential. There's a possibility there. That too, could be challenged in court. But it can also be done through other ways as well. And you know, I know that that makes folks uncomfortable, but there is a history and a precedent for this in American history.

In general, how do you think President Biden has handled his job over the last four years? You know, I think he's done quite well. Given the limitations that we have, I do think that there are ebbs and flows as there are in any.

Presidency, you know, there are areas that I think were quite strong when he came right out of the gate with the American Rescue Plan.

And, of course, the Inflation Reduction Act was a massive step in terms of our climate agenda. But, you know, there are also areas that I think could have gone better. The president, and I think the Democratic Party in general continues to struggle with immigration. We don't want to own this issue. We talk a big game when we're in the minority and we're trying to win an election. But I don't feel like we are there when it comes to what we actually passed.

The Dream Act is now over 20 years old and it's still not passed. And a lot of you know there's plenty of other issues as well, even with what is happening with asylees, you know, the ability to get grant people basic work authorization so that they can work while they are going through their legal processing. There is an enormous amount of political resistance to that, and we want to make sure that we are expanding that fight and working for the coalition that elects this party. So, you know, I do think, of course, there's so much more that we could do, so much more that we should do.

We have major structural issues in this country. And I think it starts with the United States Senate. And I think that until we have senators that are willing to stand up and stare the filibuster in the eye and stare a lot of structural issues about the Senate in the eye, the United States Senate will be what holds back this country from an enormous amount of progress. And I think that we need to have a real conversation about that, not just in the structure, but also in the culture, the culture of the United States Senate is. There is so much deference to this kind of like, polite society, but oftentimes that runs up against some people's basic rights. And we need to have that conversation.

These are very important things for us to talk about when we talk about universal health care in the United States, and we talk about Medicare for all. There are very real powers and forces that prevent the Democratic Party from really advancing in these issues. And I think that it's very healthy for us to have those kinds of conversations and to kind of zoom out into an overall critique of our political system. That doesn't, you know, that isn't obliged in this logic of American exceptionalism. So I think, you know, I appreciate when there are people who raise those voices and have a history of that.

And again, it's not just to say no labels. But we have to be very concerned because the risk of fascism in this country is here. It is real.

And we cannot risk it, especially in critical electoral college states that are decided by tens of thousands of votes. We need to be very, very careful. I believe about that. This is, you know, the United States has a winner-take-all system. Whether we like that or not, we have to live with that reality. And the risk of just a fascist erosion that is really quite there.

It's real, and I think every single one of us, no matter where you are on the political spectrum, whether you consider yourself moderate or whether you consider yourself, as you know, far left. As can be, we have to contend with a very real material risk of people being harmed.

And that's why I think it's really important to accelerate that timeline, you know? Cutting interest is a material benefit that people can experience now while we figure out and work out the Higher Education Act path to student loan forgiveness. And so I think material changes are the best case that we can make, where we can look at what we've done. We've brought insulin down.

We've capped the price of insulin to $35.

We have invested and created 9 million dignified high-paying jobs to work on climate with the Inflation Reduction Act alone. During Covid, we did have that child tax credit that we were able to implement. And if we get those seats back, then we can see if we can extend it or make it permanent and bring it back again. Really, talking in the language of what everyday people actually felt, you know, that child tax credit people felt that.

Insulin caps. People feel that not having to pay rent in a student loan payment, people really feel that and that I think is our best case. I do think that, yeah, and I think that that is the case that the president can make. But I also think that there are some Senate Democrats that should reflect on some of their positions on things. And see, you know, are they willing to be more vocal on these issues?

Are they willing to fight more on these issues so that we can actually get some of this stuff done? Because what I don't want to happen is for people to say, Oh, you know, the Biden administration, or certain, you know, or the Senate, or the House, or whatever, promised all of these things just to get elected. And then they don't deliver on them. And so I think it's important to remind folks of the material changes that we've made. But also really discuss the felt reality of what people are seeing, hearing, breathing and paying for.

All right, Barbie Oppenheimer.

C.

So I've been a little zelda-less for the last few years.

I have to stay focused.

They're scared, they're embarrassed. It's just you and that person. What do you tell them?

Listen, there's no shame. We need to de-stigmatize drug use. it's a public health issue. End the war on drugs.

Let's mint the coin and be legends.

Congresswoman, Thank you so much for coming back on Pod Save America. We really appreciate it and we'll talk to you soon.

I was excited about that. We're actually going to play two takes in. A fake with the skipped up reactions from Republicans to the news that a dime sized bag of cocaine was found near the ground floor entrance to the West Wing. In a place where visitors are asked to leave their cell phones before taking a tour. The cubbies can also be used by staff who can't bring their phones into a Skiff or sensitive compartmented information facility where classified materials are handled. Dan I remember those cubbies. I don't remember visitors being required to leave their cell phones there before taking a tour.

Am I forgetting or do you think that's a new policy?

When you left, and when I left in the end of the Obama presidency, a lot more.

Anti-surveillance measures about where you could take your phones were more strictly enforced, but it seems now like anyone bringing their phone in has to leave it there.

And so you're right. Like, a ton of people go through that entrance. And they said they're going to look at surveillance footage, but I don't know that surveillance footage is going to show. Like, who left, what and what? Cubby, because no one is taking out the cocaine and like, waving it in front of the camera and then putting it in the cubby, right?

So that's going to be, it's going to be hard to look for the surveillance footage. And also they're doing like DNA testing and fingerprint stuff. But like, people's fingerprints are like all over those cubbies. Because all the people are putting their phones in there. So I don't know how that's going to work either.

Anyway, I heard that we have a clip that we're supposed to throw to that, some kind of a surprise here. I'm scared to find out what this is. John Fife dog, it's Joe Biden.

Look, I've got a little problem and I could really use your help. Last week, I invited my friend Mitch over to the White House to watch the new season of Marvelous Miss Maisel. That Rachel Brosnahan razzes our berries. And you guys know, Mitch, that prankster, loves Gallagher and prop comedy, so he brings this little Beatnik baggie with him for a cheap yuck because he's cocaine, Mitch.

Ha ha, and now I got the cops on my ass. It's a bunch of applesauce, man. So here's the deal, Dan, you need to take the fall.

You look like you know your way around the booger sugar, so these Fox News folks will believe it. Mitch says he'll send some earmarks to Delaware if you do him a solid made in the shade man. We got a deal, Danny boy.

That is the closest we'll ever get to having Joe Biden on this podcast.

Is Joe Biden saying, huh?

It just knew it okay, now we have a game. I think Elijah is going to join us for this. Elijah, are you there? I am?

Here he is.

Here are three Republican reactions to the cocaine story. Two of them are real, one of them is fake. John and Dan, are you ready?

Well, well, well. It looks like Joe Biden's crime wave has finally come to his doorstep, and the White House is now less secure than the southern border. So guys, which is the fake?

And the third one is either fake or you decided to do all three that are real.

Has deranged Jack Smith, the crazy, Trump-hating special prosecutor, been seen in the area of the cocaine? He looks like a crackhead to me.

Used, or at least been aware of the it's just ground-up aspirin excuse?

We did it blow.

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