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Co-hosts Jared Yates Sexton and Nick Hauselman begin the show discussing Trump's indictment and what it means to the country before moving on to the ridiculously punitive measures the Tennessee legislature took against a member of their congress for engaging in protest over gun legislation. They finish with the spicy meatball of a story regarding Clarence Thomas's unfathomable corruption.
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I have a cold beer, which is needed after this week.
We are here.
We have so much to talk about.
I know this is going to shock everybody.
Clarence Thomas is corrupted.
I don't know how to break that to people.
We've got states checking children's genitals in order to stave off trans panic.
We've got states throwing representatives out of their bodies.
We have to address that.
We have so much to talk about.
But listen, this is what the people came for.
My friend Nick Halseman.
Never, ever underestimate his abilities.
He took care of the show on Tuesday.
He then, when Donald Trump was indicted and surrendered himself, did a special live show in order to cover it in my absence.
Hats off to you.
Thank you, as always, my friend.
Oh, it was not a problem at all.
You had bigger and better things that you were busy doing.
I didn't want to get in the way with that.
So we we did it.
It wasn't perhaps as salacious as we would have hoped.
You know, there's always that that that that promise of that with Trump and live stuff.
But it was actually really good.
And we got a great Paul Wasserman broke it down.
You should check it out.
And we've got a much deeper understanding of how these proceedings work and what we should expect.
It was good.
And I gotta tell you, we're gonna talk about the indictment here in just a second, but if you want to get up to date on the biggest breaking news stories, and by the way, Nick, am I wrong here?
We are entering into prime muckrake political campaign season, are we not?
Oh yeah, and that's why everyone's gotta check out the Patreon.
That's why you have to go to patreon.com slash monkragpodcast.
Again, I got another two emails from people who said, Jared Yates Sexton, this is my apology.
You have been telling me to sign up for this.
I don't know why I didn't.
It is only $5 a month.
What was I thinking?
I pay more for that for streaming services that I do not use.
Please accept my apologies.
There's patreon.com slash mccraig podcast keeps the show independent keeps it without ads as the way it should be.
And by the way, it's going to allow you access to live shows after my god, we do a live show after almost every debate.
We do a live show after almost every single primary or caucus during the political campaign season.
We are the hardest working show in the political business patreon.com slash mccraig podcast.
And if you're listening to this, don't feel like we're singling you out at all.
There are thousands of you out there every Friday that listen to it.
Thousands!
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Come and join us.
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Let's get to the main event, Nick.
I've been champing at the bit to talk about this for days.
Let's go ahead and set the table so we can have this discussion.
Donald John Trump.
I'm told he was the 45th president of the United States of America.
He was indicted in the state of New York on 34 counts of falsifying business records, multiple hush payments to God knows how many people, employees.
We're not even sure at this point, totally.
He surrendered himself on Tuesday to the state of New York.
We got some amazing visuals of him going into this courthouse.
We got a picture of him sitting there and just basically just brooding as he had to face a judge.
The judge told him to tamp it down on the rhetoric, and I gotta tell you, Nick, he did not listen to that judge.
And you have a little sample of a speech that he gave once he got back to Mar-a-Lago and put down a super well-done hamburger.
And now this massive election interference at a scale never seen before in our country, beginning with the radical left George Soros-backed prosecutor Alvin Bragg of New York.
Who campaigned on the fact that he would get President Trump.
I'm going to get him.
I'm going to get him.
This is a guy campaigning.
You want to get President Trump at any cost and this before he knew anything about me, didn't know a thing about me.
He was campaigning.
As it turns out, virtually everybody that has looked at this case, including rhinos and even hardcore Democrats, say there is no crime.
And that it should never have been brought.
Never have been brought.
Everybody.
By the way, Nick, every time he or a Republican or a Fox News media member says Soros back district attorney, we just need to stop immediately and say black attorney controlled by George Soros.
That's what he is saying.
That is the code word.
All of it.
He did not listen to this judge.
He attacked the judge.
He attacked the judge's family.
There's a whole lot to go over here.
But what are your initial reactions to all of this?
Well, I discovered recently on Twitter there's a place that will transcribe everything that Trump says because people literally cannot hear his voice.
They cannot stand to hear his voice.
So it's out there.
Look for it.
I forgot what it's called.
But that's actually a great idea because who wants to actually hear that voice and hear him say anything?
But of course, of course, they need a gag order.
They talked about not wanting to appear political.
See, that's the thing is everyone's gonna walk on eggshells not wanting to appear political and they're gonna let him walk all over these proceedings, it looks like.
And so, you know, the initial response I have is he's not gonna go to prison for this.
I just don't see jail time for this, which is fine.
Fine him whatever.
He'll raise money from his whatever they're called.
What are we calling them now?
Supporters.
The people he's bilking.
Yes.
You know, cult members, whatever they are.
And so he won't even pay that, and that'll probably be illegal too, but nonetheless, I think it's just the beginning of something.
There's no destination when we're talking about this case.
Well, I'm going to comment on the charges and the case here in a second, but I want to go ahead and say something, which is something that should be said on every podcast, every broadcast, every article that's ever written about this.
It is impossible for this not to be political.
Of course it's political.
He has been charged with these crimes as part of his run for the presidency of the United States of America.
He is being charged with these crimes because he is a political and public figure.
I did an interview the other day and somebody said to me, they said, what do you say to people who say that this has a political bent to it?
Of course it does!
How could it not?
The man is the former president and he is running for president again.
And they said, well, do you think he's being prosecuted because he's running for president?
And I've said to you on this podcast, I've said it on this show multiple times, he probably would not be charged with this if he simply would have gone away.
You know, if you are a public figure, if you continue to show your face, if you continue to try and pursue the presidency, these types of things are going to come up.
There are plenty of things about Donald Trump that you and I and the people who listen to this show would have no idea about if he had never run for President of the United States of America.
That being said, Nick, I gotta tell you, I think a lot of different things can be true at once.
One, was it enjoyable watching Donald Trump walk into a courthouse in order to be indicted?
Yeah, yeah, it absolutely was.
Was it satisfying?
Absolutely it was.
Did it make for some interesting Twitter moments?
Did it make for some interesting media moments?
Absolutely it did.
But let me tell you, I think a lot of this is weak sauce.
I really, truly do.
I mean, listen.
Did he commit crimes?
Yeah, he obviously committed crimes.
And do you know how I know that?
Because Michael Cohen, his lawyer, has already pled guilty to committing those crimes.
He committed a bunch of misdemeanors.
And what has happened in this is that they've been stacked together, and on top of that, they've gone ahead and added a little bit of secret sauce to say that he did it to defraud the public for an election.
Is that true?
Yes, it is.
Do I think he'll be convicted?
Maybe.
And if he is, he'll be assessed a fine.
I don't think he's going to jail.
I don't think this is getting Capone for his taxes.
I don't think this is whatever.
I said on Discord the other day that it's like charging Godzilla with trespassing.
This is not going to be the thing that puts him away.
It has to be one of the other major crimes if they're going to get him legally.
But this isn't going to get rid of Donald Trump.
It's not going to get rid of the crisis that we're dealing with.
But I have to tell you, it probably felt good to a lot of people, and it probably gave them a lot of hope that goes along with a lot of the hope that we've seen over the past few years.
Well, my guest on Wednesday, or was it yesterday, what is time, when we did our live show, was a defense attorney.
And he laid out how he would do it.
And I told him at the end of the show, I'm like, listen, if I were the jury, and that was the case, and that's how you presented it as Trump's lawyer, I would acquit him.
Because here's the thing, you know, They can say that it was, you know, you wanted to pay off Stormy Daniels in service of your campaign so it doesn't come out and doesn't hurt your campaign.
He could just turn around and say, no, I didn't want my wife to find out that I cheated on her and that was a horrible thing because she had just had a kid and that, you know, would have been a terrible thing.
I don't want anyone to know about that.
That's pretty compelling.
That doesn't have anything to do with the campaign.
We know that's what they're going to say.
Perhaps there's tapes, Lordy, because we know Michael Cohen already taped him on the McDougal stuff, which is the reason why we have to believe at least some of what Cohen said, because they're going to also rip him a new a-hole by trying to make him seem like the biggest liar felon that we've ever seen.
And that would would not be dishonest.
He is a felon.
Now he did serve time in prison, but the bottom line is this might be a case where he'll be able to, to defend himself.
And Alvin Bragg will, will that might end his career by if he, if it ends that way and he, you know, it doesn't mount a good enough case.
You know what I mean?
Well, and by the way, I mean, listen, you know, the, the whole thing it's Bragg isn't doing this because he has links to George Soros or he's being controlled by George Soros.
He is a district attorney.
Donald Trump is a career criminal.
A career criminal.
The first time that he came into the public eye was in the 1970s for being part of a systematic discriminatory housing system.
He has consistently broken the crime, broken the law, and consistently, basically walked through a rainstorm without getting wet.
At some point or another, somebody had to throw the book at this guy.
He should have brought counts against him.
But we have to stop doing this thing where we keep expecting our institutions to stop this.
Like, he's not going to be back in court until December.
And by the way, you and I both know the political season, the primary season, is going to be going by December.
It's not going to be done by December.
This court system, particularly when dealing with white wealthy men, this thing will stretch on and on and on and on.
We have no idea what this is going to do for the primary season.
I'm hoping still.
I mean, in Georgia, he was caught, like, dead to rights trying to steal an election and trying to pressure an election official to steal the election.
That's a no-brainer.
The classified documents thing is a no-brainer.
This is an instance where Bragg did this out of political courage.
He did this understanding he was going to get shellacked for it.
He did this understanding that him and his family were going to be put in incredible danger for it.
He was going to be put in the public eye and dissected consistently.
But you have to do it!
You have to charge a person for the crimes that they have committed.
That being said, as always, this is not a silver bullet.
And people who are looking for it to be a silver bullet are going to be terribly, terribly disappointed, and we're going to continue to kick this can down the road, and it's going to get worse and worse and worse.
Well, you mentioned a book a second ago, by the book, whatever the phrase was.
And it reminds me that, you know, Mark Pomerantz, who worked for Alvin Bragg, who quit because he wouldn't prosecute Trump on the tax stuff, is now being called by Jim Jordan in front of Congress because they think this is some sort of smoking gun that they bring Mark Pomerantz in, who says, I quit is now being called by Jim Jordan in front of Congress because they think this is some And then that put pressure on him to bring this case, which is maybe even weaker.
Ipso facto ergo, it is now political.
See, again, I don't even know if there's a law against bringing a case as a political thing, right?
Like it's not even... Brad could just shrug and he won't even appear in front of him anyway.
But I think it just shows you the incredibly inept intellectual ability that Jim Jordan possesses because I think that at the very least, Pomerantz would go on there and say that Trump is guilty, you know, in that case.
And that's not going to reflect well.
And if he really wants to give this guy an opportunity to say that in front of Congress under oath, I guess that's his prerogative, but it makes no sense to me.
It makes no sense.
And by the way, I love that we've reached this point, which Jim Jordan is somehow or another supposed to be the intelligent Republican member.
You know what I mean?
Like, if you get to that point, you've already lost.
And they're going to play a bunch of games with this.
And the Republican Party has already, you know, just absolutely tried to circle their wagons and do all kinds of things with this.
It is disgusting.
And we've said before, and we'll say it again, and I want to point it out.
Nick, if we found out If any Democrat had committed crimes, you and I would both say, hey, they should be investigated and they should be prosecuted.
Doesn't matter who it is.
Doesn't matter what the crime is.
We would agree on that front.
This is such a hypocritically dangerous thing.
And I want to point out, it would not be a complete conversation about this if we didn't take a detour down to the Sunshine State, where Nick likes to go on vacation every now and then, for the record.
Where Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, in the middle of this, before Trump was going to surrender himself, and by the way, the reports out of Florida, and what I have heard from my sources have confirmed this left and right, they were so excited about him getting indicted.
I mean, it was basically like a cartoon with, like, the dollar signs in their eyes.
They knew they were going to raise millions of dollars.
They were absolutely drooling over the possibility of there being a mugshot.
And by the way, Dick, they weren't going to just tweet out that mugshot.
They were going to put it on shirts, sweatshirts, hats, coffee mugs.
They wanted it so bad that they actually photoshopped their own version of it.
Meanwhile, Ron DeSantis finds himself in a situation where his biggest chief political rival is getting ready to be indicted for felonies.
And what does he decide to do?
What does this brain genius decide to do?
He decides to get on his Twitter machine and announce, guess what?
Quote, Florida will not assist in an extradition request given the questionable circumstances at issue with the Soros backed Manhattan prosecutor Jewish-controlled black lawyer and his political agenda.
He literally came out and basically said he was going to carry out a nullification crisis.
He basically came out and said, we're getting ready for Civil War Part 2 for a guy that I can't stand and I want to beat in an election.
What the hell was this?
You know, I'm mad because I predicted that he would do it and he would just say, hey, my hands are tied.
It's the law.
I didn't really want to get my chief rival out of, you know, into a prison.
But hey, what can I do?
But it's a calculation.
He's smart.
He wants to.
He wants that base.
He wants those people.
And I'm assuming he'll just figure that once he's incapacitated with legal issues into the 2024 race, then Santis can step into that void and then assume all of those followers.
I don't think they're going to go to him.
I want you to imagine, Nick, and listen, I'm just putting us in like a quick little imaginary situation, right?
Let's do a little bit of role play.
You and I are a couple of overpaid political consultants and strategists.
We're hanging out in Tallahassee, by the way.
It's a balmy 98 degrees with 150% humidity, right?
We just found out that the chief political rival of the guy who's paying us millions of dollars is getting ready to be indicted for felonies.
We're not climbing over one another to defend him!
That's not what we're doing!
He's being indicted for paying off, illegally, a porn star?
And what we're doing is we're gonna go ahead and say, guess what, we were for him before we were against him.
What in the hell?
Why would anybody think that this is good strategy?
It is so stupid.
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