On today's Thought Crime Thursday, Jack, Blake, and Tyler break down the latest news and reaction to the announcement of Matt Gaetz as the new nominee for Attorney General of the United States. They also discuss why they think he is the best choice for the position.
00:04:46.340And we saw people doing the interviews.
00:04:48.520And Matt Gaetz's name was not on any of those lists.
00:04:51.060This was a total out of right field surprise pick.
00:04:55.860It was something that took D.C. by absolute storm.
00:04:59.180It was something that took, I think, Trump world by absolute storm.
00:05:02.300And you saw everybody line up behind it because we said, you know what?
00:05:05.520This is the kind of guy who's a pit bull.
00:05:07.900This is the kind of guy who absolutely can do the job, knows what needs to be done, has the guts to do so.
00:05:14.000But I do think that there was that question in the back of all of our minds, that voice in the back of our minds saying, wait a minute, guys, we have to live in reality.
00:05:24.440And we know, look, OK, we've got a bunch of really, really good senators elected.
00:05:43.720But as it turns out, it turned out and I figured those three would be Alaska, Maine and Utah.
00:05:49.280The, you know, the Mitt Romney clone who just got elected in Utah.
00:05:53.320But as it turns out, it was for the magic number we need.
00:05:57.620It was three, but we ended up with four because Mitch McConnell was a hard no, which came out in Jonathan Swan and a bunch of people.
00:06:05.480And Charlie, you had tweeted about this as well.
00:06:07.960So the idea being that, you know, for people who have been in D.C. for a long time, for people who have been in the business or people who, by the way, have been in the MAGA movement for a long time.
00:06:15.760We know that things don't just magically appear for us.
00:06:23.840And so essentially it's like, OK, that's where we are.
00:06:26.740But we're in a much better position than we were beforehand because now we've already gone through the process.
00:06:34.860Now we've already seen, you know, where the where the where the sleeping snakes are in the in the field.
00:06:42.020And we can determine which way to go forward.
00:06:44.460And by the way, I know for a fact, and Charlie, I know, you know, as well, that these are these are all discussions and thoughts that President Trump himself and his team have had all along while looking at this.
00:06:56.620Yeah. And so the question is, who's next?
00:06:58.300And there's a lot of names being floated there.
00:06:59.960I do want to say, though, that the the deputy attorney general that has been nominated, Todd Blanche, is terrific.
00:07:06.980This guy, when he represented Donald Trump personally, remember, in the civil trial, Todd Blanche left his very, very high white shoe law firm, you could say.
00:07:19.740Is that is that the right way to word it?
00:08:07.260He said, I wanted to represent Donald Trump.
00:08:08.880And so following the May 30th conviction on 34 felony accounts, Blanche stated that to Trump's defense team, obviously plans to appeal the verdict.
00:08:21.020So he has demonstrated that he is loyal to the president.
00:08:23.200And what he wants to do with the attorney general's office, we shall see.
00:08:29.300But I think that's a very important name to consider.
00:08:32.300And you've got to give like Matt Gates made this decision himself.
00:09:01.400And for sure, I think this was going to be one of the first confirmation processes.
00:09:08.240Usually, I think AG would probably be up there.
00:09:11.820So I'm wondering if a little bit of strategy changed a little bit within Trump world and thinking that this may have impact on other confirmations.
00:09:22.500And so maybe you never know what kind of horse trading is going on in the background with some of these things.
00:09:28.100It's likely that there is some significant horse trading going on, which is good for other appointments, cabinet appointments here.
00:09:37.620And I'm sure that that's part of the process was like, hey, look, if you pull out now, figure it out, we'll sail some of these others through, which is good.
00:09:49.700But at the same time, we just put up at Turning Point Action, Charlie, and you know this, and we're going to be going very hard on this.
00:09:58.100It's tpaction.com slash no excuse, which gives all of the voting records for every single one of the Republicans who voted to confirm all of Biden's appointees.
00:10:10.020And so it's just good for the general public to know the more educated that the public is on these issues, on specifically which appointments that were approved by Republicans in your own home state.
00:10:21.100That gives you the wherewithal to call them, to talk to them, to create a hubbub, to get on X and other places and talk a lot more about this because it is without reason to approve some of these like Mayorkas, for example, but not be in the saddle for Donald Trump's appointment.
00:10:43.020Tyler, can you pull some of those up, by the way?
00:10:45.320So what Tyler's talking about is going to be one of the most ambitious grassroots efforts that we've ever done at Turning Point Action, and it's not an election-focused one.
00:10:53.280It's about confirmation, which, by the way, 501c4 exists to help do lobbying of officials, and we are going to be directly lobbying people from senators from Idaho,
00:11:03.500senators from South Dakota, senators from Arkansas, senators from Mississippi, senators from Kansas.
00:11:08.940We are going to be involving the grassroots in holding these senators accountable.
00:11:15.200So, Tyler, let's drop some of these votes.
00:21:57.940RFK was banished from the Democrat circles because of the amount of, there's one thing that you can do that will tick off the Democrats more than anything else, based off of their infrastructure that they have.
00:22:12.660And the new Soros arrangement with everything else, with Arabella.
00:22:18.180And that is to fundraise away from other Democrats.
00:22:22.420And so I actually think that there is the largest axe to grind and there's the most hatred and vitriol out of anybody, including Matt Gaetz, is actually for RFK.
00:22:34.000So getting him across the finish line would be massive, would be huge, because the Democrats are being told from the people who hold their purse strings that RFK is public enemy number one and this should have never happened.
00:22:56.540Well, one thing I'd like to throw out is, you know, do we think, and sort of a question for the bunch, do we think that someone like Tulsi or RFK, who Tulsi was Democrat until five minutes ago, RFK is currently a card-carrying Democrat, do we think there's any possibility of Democrat votes coming over for them?
00:23:18.260You know, you look at something like a Bernie Sanders, who Tulsi was instrumental towards in 2016.
00:23:25.200You look at someone like a John Ossoff, who's in a state that Trump won decisively and he's up for re-election in 26.
00:23:31.920Or even someone like John Fetterman, who's trying to play this game of like, oh, I'm a moderate, I'm based Fetterman or whatever.
00:23:37.960I'm not saying that I think it's going to happen, but I also think, why not target three or four and see what happens?
00:23:47.140My belief, my belief is this, I think Tulsi is by far the hardest, and hear me out, that Bobby Kennedy's going to be tough, however, he is so well-liked by the base.
00:24:00.220Tulsi is too, but Bobby will get like fever pitch support from the base.
00:24:04.260I think Tyler agrees that there's Bobby energy that doesn't exist of all the other three.
00:24:10.600Secondly, with HHS, it's going to be a fight.
00:24:14.200There is a ton of money there, but of the three, I'm not going to say it's going to be easy.
00:24:19.840Of the three, the keeper of secrets, Tulsi Gabbard, is going to be the biggest fight.
00:25:38.300What Tulsi could do at the head of DNI, we're talking about fulfilling the promise of the JFK files.
00:25:44.280We're talking about finding out potential foreign involvement in 9-11 beyond what we know, like Saudi intelligence, etc., which, Jack, I know you've been very interested in throughout the years.
00:25:55.580We're talking about getting to the baseline of the origins of COVID.
00:26:00.480We're talking about the origins of Russiagate.
00:26:03.420The keeper of secrets, if I had to say where they're going to fight the highest, is the intel community.
00:26:09.700Does anybody disagree with that assessment?
00:26:11.660I'm not saying anyone is easy, but I think the easiest will actually be Pete, and the hardest will be Tulsi.
00:26:19.660Well, and it would be fitting, too, if Tulsi got through, that the former congresswoman who looks most like an X-Men would release all the information about aliens.
00:26:58.720Here's a piece of it that I'd love to throw out, by the way, though, which, and I'd love to get into that later.
00:27:04.520But, you know, Charlie, not only would she declassify that, she would declassify the wiretapping that's going on currently in the U.S. government.
00:27:15.300Or, by the way, the wiretapping that goes on.
00:27:51.920Remember what they did to Carter Page and George Papadopoulos.
00:27:54.220If you think that that kind of stuff, inserting people, people being inserted from the deep state into the administration or having the FBI run these operations on people inside the White House itself, if you think that they just stopped and they went away, like, is it your first day here?
00:28:49.740And I think, bigger picture, Trump does care, kind of in this very direct businessman way, about delivering on overt promises that he made.
00:28:58.880And, you know, he very much considered that a priority with his first admin.
00:29:02.560Like, you know, really saying, promises made, promises kept.
00:29:04.880Here's how I delivered on all the things that I said I would do when I was running.
00:29:08.660And I think he probably views this RFK thing the same way.
00:29:11.820You know, he had a businessman's deal.
00:29:13.880If you endorse me, I will let you take charge on this specific agenda.
00:29:19.960And I've talked to people who are just like, oh, well, RFK is served.
00:29:58.440I just, I personally wonder, will that be enough?
00:30:02.260Will you just run into that brick wall where you're going to have, you know, 15 Republican senators who say, sorry, Pfizer says it's a no-go.
00:30:22.720I think that actually could go a little bit of a ways where you'll have a few of those voices who will say, wait, guys, this Russian asset thing people say is dumb.
00:30:31.640She is literally a serving member of the United States Armed Forces right now.
00:30:36.760Like, if you think she's a Russian spy, why isn't she being investigated?
00:30:40.480Why isn't she undergoing a court martial?
00:32:15.020I mean, and I could be totally wrong here.
00:32:17.320I could, you know, here's, again, this is where I just always look to, like, where are the purse strings?
00:32:23.680And who poses the greatest threat to the purse strings within the Democratic state?
00:32:29.940This is the reason why Bernie endorsed Hillary, ultimately.
00:32:33.480And this is why Bernie endorsed Joe Biden.
00:32:35.420And this is why Bernie endorsed Kamala.
00:32:37.160I mean, it was a little easier for him with Kamala, but is that ultimately his access to the left's data and money pool, and, you know, specifically Act Blue and all of that, even though he may not, you know, subscribe to every element of it, is dependent upon his willingness to play ball on these things.
00:32:56.200And, again, you know, that's why I think all these are going to be difficult with Democrats.
00:33:00.900The real question is Republicans and see if we can overcome and who can't get bought off by, you know, the center-left joint in D.C.
00:33:14.040And, by the way, you know, just to say, Chelsea is personally my favorite pick out of any of the cabinet thus far.
00:33:19.820And just, as I say, as a guy who was in the intel community and understands how much reform is actually needed there, and I don't know anybody else on the scene that's actually going to be able to do anything like she would.
00:33:32.600I mean, go in there and actually start shaking things up in the 18 agencies.
00:33:36.880That being said, yeah, no, Tyler, what you were saying as well about the way it's being managed.
00:33:41.740I mean, Tulsi is someone who, what is the main thing that, beyond her service and beyond her record, what is the main thing that people know about her, is she is fantastic on camera.
00:36:54.740So, the way these things are looking, it's very close.
00:36:58.760But assuming he doesn't go back to the House, some people have brought up he could be appointed to the Senate vacancy, but you would need DeSantis to go along with that.
00:37:08.420But, and it's, there might be a lot of people who want that Senate seat, and he also just might not want himself.
00:37:24.180So, we can give it right to campaigning.
00:37:25.820By the way, but if DeSantis, but if DeSantis gave, and they've had a good relationship, they've always maintained a good relationship, even with the primary being notwithstanding, that if DeSantis appointed Gates to the Senate seat, then that would clear the governor's seat for the 26 race.
00:37:44.440So, DeSantis could kind of, could then maybe maneuver to get one of his people over there.
00:37:51.700Of course, a common sense, yeah, is the reason he would want the Senate seat to be open is that DeSantis himself would want to get into it.
00:37:59.840Some people have even said he might, you know, appoint his wife, Casey, and, you know, there's like, it's like Star Wars.
00:38:06.860Only like five families are allowed to hold offices.
00:38:09.240The biggest sign that you know that Matt's not going back to Congress, you want to know what it is?
00:38:14.540Ginger posted on Instagram the end of it.