Ronna McDaniel, the former head of the Republican National Committee and a newly minted NBC News contributor, is probably going to get fired today, less than one week after she was hired by the network. In the news this morning, NBC takes one of its new conservative hires and tries to ruin her with an internal pylon from sanctimonious anchors trying to act like they are deeply offended by her. All while hoping no one digs too deeply into their own terrible pasts.
00:01:30.000I want to associate myself with all my colleagues both at MSNBC and at NBC News
00:01:36.000who have voiced loud and principled objections to our company putting on the payroll.
00:01:43.000Someone who hasn't just attacked us as journalists,
00:01:46.000but someone who is part of an ongoing project to get rid of our system of government.
00:01:51.000In this instance, NBC News, either wittingly or unwittingly,
00:01:54.000is teaching election deniers that what they can do stretches well beyond appearing on our air in interviews
00:02:02.000to peddle lies about the sanctity and integrity of our elections.
00:02:06.000We weren't asked our opinion of the hiring, but if we were, we would have strongly objected to it.
00:02:11.000My colleague Chuck Todd went full William McAvoy.
00:02:14.000Is she speaking for herself or is she speaking on behalf of who's paying her?
00:02:18.000When NBC made the decision to give her NBC News' credibility,
00:02:22.000you've got to ask yourself, what does she bring NBC News?
00:02:25.000Not about that. We welcome Republicans. I wish more Republicans.
00:02:29.000I want Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney to get right here and come talk to me.
00:02:32.000The reality is this isn't a difference of opinion.
00:02:35.000She literally backed an illegal scheme to steal an election in the state of Michigan.
00:02:42.000And our democracy is in danger because of the lies that people like Ronna McDaniel have pushed on this country.
00:02:48.000We've also said to election deniers, it's not just they can do that on our airwaves, but that they can do that as one of us,
00:02:54.000as badge-carrying employees of NBC News, as paid contributors to our sacred airwaves.
00:03:01.000Take a minute. Acknowledge that maybe it wasn't the right call.
00:03:05.000It is a sign of strength, not weakness, to acknowledge when you are wrong.
00:03:10.000It is a sign of strength. And our country needs us to be strong right now.
00:03:16.000Oh, my God. OK, so just to be clear, Ronna McDaniel has not done one thing in the past week to bring this on.
00:03:26.000No new information has been imparted to the NBC brass other than its anchors professed horror, horror at the notion of working with an election denier.
00:03:39.000A little bit more here from Nicole Wallace.
00:03:42.000NBC News, either wittingly or unwittingly, is teaching election deniers that what they can do stretches well beyond appearing on our air in interviews to peddle lies about the sanctity and integrity of our elections.
00:03:55.000What we've also said to election deniers is not just they can do that on our airwaves, but that they can do that as one of us, as badge-carrying employees of NBC News, as paid contributors to our sacred airwaves.
00:04:08.000Our sacred airwaves. They must be protected, you see, from liars. After all, over at MSNBC, they are in the business of honesty.
00:04:22.000Now we know that the vaccines work well enough that the virus stops with every vaccinated person.
00:04:29.000Literally, the only people dying are the unvaccinated. And for those of you spreading misinformation, shame on you. Shame on you. Think about it. I don't know how some of you sleep at night.
00:04:39.000Republican voters don't vote that way. They don't vote based on economics. They're voting on race.
00:04:49.000He is actually being prosecuted at the state level and at the federal level for fomenting an actual insurrection that caused a lot of blood, that actually caused the deaths of at least five people.
00:05:00.000The report of special counsel Robert Mueller has finally been submitted. This is the start of something, apparently, not the end of something.
00:05:07.000You don't have a president, as you said, talking about exterminating. Right.
00:05:11.000Latinas. OK. As MSNBC talent spun it yesterday, they could work with a Republican, sure, but not with someone who challenged the results of an election, thereby subverting our democracy. Hard no.
00:05:31.000The public's trust in the integrity of the U.S. Supreme Court is in rapid decline. It just so happens to be a recurring theme in our guest Stacey Abrams' new novel.
00:05:41.000I just first have to congratulate you on writing this just exquisitely crafted novel.
00:05:48.000Thank you. Stacey, it's great to have you back on the show and can't wait to talk about the novel. I just want to do a little bit of politics first.
00:05:54.000Brian Kemp and Brad Rapsenberger to undermine access to elections for average Georgians continues to reverberate.
00:06:01.000Abrams has a brand new thriller out tomorrow called Rogue Justice, which follows a Supreme Court law clerk and she unpacks a riveting legal mystery.
00:06:09.000We're going to talk about that in just a moment. I'm excited and cannot wait to make that a summer read for myself.
00:06:14.000On Wednesday, I asked former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton about this fact and how Biden should handle it.
00:06:21.000Do you think you're a private citizen that if he is convicted, he should go to prison?
00:06:25.000You know, I'm not going to substitute my judgment for the judicial system.
00:06:29.000You know, as you say, there are four cases. I think 91 counts.
00:06:35.000What happened to our secret airwaves? I thought we couldn't couldn't have the election deniers on MSNBC, but maybe it just depends which election one is denying.
00:06:48.000Well, look, MSNBC really wants you to know that this has nothing to do with being on the left or the right to those who are saying, hey,
00:06:58.000you had no problem hiring Jen Psaki, who lied for a living for years as an Obama and then a Biden spokesperson.
00:07:06.000What gives? Well, Jen Psaki herself weighed in on that.
00:07:10.000See, that was totally different. She explained because honesty.
00:07:16.000Some mainly in the right wing ecosystem have made the comparison to others who have come from government or politics into the media, including me.
00:07:25.000And that is a comparison I felt like I had to address.
00:07:28.000I got into public service for the same reason that many people do to serve the American people.
00:07:34.000And there are many others who have followed a similar path who I have a great deal of respect for.
00:07:39.000But here's the thing. That kind of experience only matters and only has value to viewers, all of you, if it is paired with honesty and with good faith.
00:07:50.000And our democracy is in danger because of the lies that people like Ronna McDaniel have pushed on this country.
00:07:57.000Is it just me or does she remind you of Dora the Explorer?
00:08:01.000To dance the kitty cat dance, we need to scratch our kitty paws, stomp our feet and wag our kitty tails.
00:08:15.000Just saying. OK. Anyhoo, Jen Psaki did not lie, I guess. OK, she did not lie.
00:08:22.000That's the difference when she was working for Joe Biden.
00:08:25.000So she is totally different from an RNC spokesperson or chair, except for that lie about how the vast majority of illegal immigrants do not intend to stay here, as she told us.
00:08:37.000Or that one about how no one anticipated that the Taliban would take over Afghanistan as quickly as they did, despite the fact that her boss was caught on tape admitting he knew.
00:08:47.000Or that time she tried to dismiss the Hunter Biden laptop as Russian disinformation or when she blamed rising gas prices on the war in Ukraine, not her boss's inflationary policies, which had been driving them up long before that war.
00:09:00.000Remember when she accused Ron DeSantis of not encouraging seniors to get vaccinated in Florida or that time, she said only a tiny number of people who got the vaccine ever got COVID again.
00:09:11.000I could go on. But honesty, look, none of that matters, OK, because according to MSNBC, what's happening here is very dangerous.
00:09:23.000All right. And so these are dangerous times and we have to respond accordingly.
00:09:27.000What's happening here, according to Rachel Maddow, is a long con, you see.
00:09:31.000All right. It's a long con of a national party, the Republican, getting behind a Hitler-esque figure and his claims of a fraudulent election.
00:09:42.000Because what they're trying to do is lower your defenses against his inevitable claim that he, once returned to office, should be allowed to stay there indefinitely.
00:09:56.000She laid it all out last night, explaining why Ronna McDaniel is just that dangerous.
00:10:04.000And in a time like this, it's hard, right? I mean, it's this is a challenging and worrying time.
00:10:17.000Republican officials have to figure out whether they're going to stand up for the American system of government or not.
00:10:25.000Republican politicians, you know, Congress has to decide if it's going to assert its own relevance.
00:10:31.000They're going to assert their own independence, their own role in the government and stand up for our system of government or not.
00:10:38.000Judges and prosecutors have to decide if they're going to be braver than they ever thought they'd have to be in this job.
00:10:45.000They have to decide whether they're going to stand up to the threats and the violence.
00:10:50.000I watched 27 minutes of Rachel Maddow last night. I did it for you. I've never done that before.
00:10:57.000I could not believe the dramatics, the dramatic pauses, looking up the ceiling, the foe wrestling with tears over the state of America.
00:11:14.000I never could have imagined what my story would entail to think about what the American dream can do across just one generation in just one lifetime.
00:11:27.000It's truly breathtaking. But right now, the American dream has turned into a nightmare.
00:11:37.000I can't. I need help. I need smart women to remind us all we're out there.
00:11:45.000We're plentiful. We're everywhere. We are not defined by the Nicole Wallace's or the Jen Psaki's, frankly, the Katie Brits or the Rachel Maddow's with their overly dramatic presentations and their faux tears.
00:11:59.000And they're everywhere. Strong, smart women are everywhere, including my first and only two guests today.
00:12:06.000The EJs are with me. Emily Jashinsky, culture editor at The Federalist and host of The Federalist Radio Hour.
00:12:12.000And Eliana Johnson, who is editor in chief at the Washington Free Beacon and co-host of the Ink Stained Wretches podcast.
00:12:18.000Ladies, so good to have you. Thank you for being. Thank you for being here.
00:12:27.000I don't think you went wrong anywhere. I think actually that was a master class in building up to it, up to the Rachel Maddow point, because that's actually what this is all about.
00:12:37.000It's like histrionics over the single thing, the election denialism that they have decided disqualifies any voice from being on their airwaves, which then to the point that you built up to when you look at all of the different things that they have lied about that they don't consider to be beyond the pale.
00:12:57.000I mean, Nicole Wallace was talking on behalf of the George W. Bush administration during the Iraq War.
00:13:04.000A lot of people would consider that to be pretty beyond the pale in this country, especially with the benefit of hindsight and retrospect in that case.
00:13:12.000But I mean, she was the mouthpiece of the Bush administration during the Iraq War.
00:13:17.000For her then to say, Ronna McDaniel, who is a pretty standard Republican, who did not go as far as Donald Trump.
00:13:26.000She went further than I would have gone on some of the election stuff, but she did not go as far as Donald Trump on the election stuff.
00:13:31.000She's a representative of the Republican base, of a wide swath of Republican voters.
00:13:37.000The point of having people like that on your air, if you're serious about doing journalism, is so that you get the contrast.
00:13:44.000And when Joy Reid, this was such a tell in the clips that you played, Joy Reid said, I want more Republicans.
00:13:49.000I want to talk to Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney all the time.
00:15:03.000However, I'm watching for a couple of things.
00:15:07.000When I saw Chuck Todd, who led the charge on this, go after his own bosses on Meet the Press on Sunday, I was sort of gobsmacked.
00:15:18.000I thought, you know, who rips into their own bosses on national television?
00:15:22.000You know, it's sort of one thing to raise questions privately.
00:15:25.000It's another thing to to rip into them on the on the marquee show of the network.
00:15:32.000And it raised questions that I think we've seen in other areas of journalism, which is who runs these places?
00:15:37.000Is it the employees or the management?
00:15:40.000And so in that regard, I'm curious to see what happens here.
00:15:44.000Is MSNBC going to let their employees, all these folks throwing temper tantrums on the airwaves and telling their bosses how it is and how it should be?
00:16:05.000And the second thing is, you know, I don't have any big beef with with Ronna McDaniel, but it has frustrated me, whether it's CNN or ABC, which signed Reince Priebus and now NBC, which signed Ronna Romney.
00:16:18.000And I got to say, like, I don't think these are the best spokesmen or spokeswomen for the conservative cause.
00:16:27.000But part of me is frustrated that, like, they can't find anyone better to pay three hundred thousand dollars for, you know, to to represent the cause.
00:16:37.000I sort of think that these people are chosen for a reason, which is because, like, they're the Alan Combs of the right.
00:16:43.000Mm hmm. Yeah. Interesting. Like with all respect, God rest him, Alan Combs.
00:16:48.000But he was not the strongest partner to Sean Hannity, who was very effective in his messaging and very talented.
00:16:53.000I loved Alan, though. But I want to say a couple of things.
00:16:56.000So I was at NBC, as you know, for a year plus.
00:16:59.000And I went on the airwaves one day and I did not criticize my boss, but I did put the lie to a memo he had put out claiming NBC did not have the reporting on Harvey Weinstein.
00:17:12.000And that's why they spoke spiked Ronan Farrow's devastating report on Harvey.
00:18:12.000They didn't want him doing Meet the Press anymore.
00:18:13.000And there are some reports that he's in a contract negotiation or about to leave NBC, that his career there is ending, which may have gave may have given him the temerity to stand out and do what he did, which was directly critical of a decision to hire Ronna McDaniel.
00:18:32.000I don't know whether that's his situation or not.
00:18:36.000But look, for a long time over there at NBC, the executives have come and they've gone.
00:18:42.000I don't even know who these two people are who are running NBC now.
00:18:45.000I don't I don't know these people who brought Ronna in.
00:18:48.000And I will tell you one other thing about Chuck Todd.
00:18:51.000He told me early on in my time at NBC.
00:18:54.000He was wrong in my case, but that he said, you'll outlast most of the executives here because the executives come and they go and they do let the inmates run the asylum over there.
00:19:03.000And it's extraordinary to see them cloak themselves in this highbrow intellectualism, Emily, you know, that we are this other gatekeepers for this vaunted brand.
00:19:15.000And this scumbag can't have anything to do with us without any self-reflection on the sins of that network and its talent.
00:19:25.000I mean, we have seen so little reflection to that point on how badly I mean, NBC News botched the Russia collusion thing from the beginning so egregiously.
00:19:37.000They currently imply employ Ken Delanian, who left the Los Angeles Times because I think it was WikiLeaks showed emails with him going back and forth with the CIA, actually running his stories by his sources at the CIA.
00:19:51.000And they let Ken Delanian basically take the lead on the Russian collusion coverage.
00:19:55.000And we have seen basically no reflection from them on that.
00:19:58.000We've seen no reflection from them on their coverage of trans so-called health care, which honestly, if we're drawing lines in the sand and they want to have a line in the sand as election denialism.
00:20:09.000How about how egregiously they have botched the stories about transgenderism and how they have been in complicit, complicit and actually more than complicit, aggressive in leading so many young women and young people down that devastating path?
00:20:22.000I mean, as long as we're drawing red lines in the sand, how about that?
00:20:37.000I don't know if I agree with that, but I understand it because the people on the right continue to believe, some people, that if they can get their voice or their message or their positions in front of, you know, groups of voters who are not already on the right, then they'll understand us better.
00:20:53.000Maybe they'll vote differently. Right. It's like this.
00:20:56.000I mean, if they could just they could just just, you know, it's like the way, frankly, you are when you have somebody addicted to drugs in your family.
00:21:03.000If I could just get them, if I could just get if we could just and the just game, it doesn't work.
00:21:09.000But I think that's what was in her head. But keep going.
00:21:13.000And in her exchange with Kristen Welker this weekend, that really set Chuck Todd off.
00:21:17.000Kristen Welker asked why she didn't denounce Donald Trump's claims about the 2020 election before.
00:21:22.000And Ronna McDaniel's answer was really telling. It was essentially that, well, you know, you have to take one for the team when you work at the RNC.
00:21:29.000And, you know, that's just kind of how it is. And that's true.
00:21:33.000But that's actually like so like bad to admit.
00:21:38.000It's absolutely true. But now you're auditioning for a three hundred thousand dollar a year corporate media gig.
00:21:44.000And you're like, well, I just took one for the team. That's the way that Washington works.
00:21:47.000And that's actually where there are big audiences for shows like this one, because people are so sick of it.
00:21:54.000NBC actually, if they were outside of their bubble, they dismiss everybody to the right of Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney as basically like in a kooky MAGA bubble, not just normal people who are upset about lies on Russia, on COVID and all of that stuff.
00:22:10.000So they don't understand that there's this huge appetite in the country for a real contrast and for people who disagree with each other.
00:22:17.000So they should have actually gone further than Ronna McDaniel if they really wanted to do the work of showing that contrast and of bringing new voices in and challenging their own preconceptions, which have led them down dangerous paths.
00:22:31.000For example, we can keep talking about Russia. We can keep talking about the border.
00:22:34.000There's so many different times that they have screwed this up.
00:22:37.000So, I mean, they should have they should have hired someone who is actually even more pro-Trump than Ronna McDaniel, who wasn't just going to squish out when Kristen Welker is like, hey, and she's like, well, I was taking one for the team the last eight years.
00:22:48.000I mean, it's just look how often this kind of thing has failed. Right.
00:22:53.000I'm thinking of Kevin Williamson down at the Atlantic when he tried to go there from National Review and think about even Tom Cotton over at the New York Times, that op ed and James Bennett, the editor who ran it.
00:23:04.640Barry Weiss leaving like Khaleesi from The New York Times because she sent her left, but she she was too right for them.
00:23:13.380We could keep going. My God, there's just so many who have been MK Ham pushed out of CNN MK Ham.
00:23:19.100Like, she's not some fire breathing MAGA acolyte. Right.
00:23:22.300Even Jeffrey Lord, who was a Trump supporter, he was true MAGA when Trump was running the first time.
00:23:26.660He was too crazy for CNN. Right. It's like they've they've tried it.
00:23:30.520They've tried to have some people who are, you know, on the right at these networks.
00:23:35.860They can't stand them. They can't stand them.
00:23:39.380They keep trying only to be horrified when they find out they actually are conservatives and they don't share the views of the lefties.
00:23:48.760And they're not Adam Kinzinger, whatever his name. And they're not a Liz Cheney, who is a conservative, Eliana.
00:23:55.240I mean, I'll give her that. She's she hates Trump. But like that's the only way you can get on there.
00:24:00.420Right. Like you could be a conservative who hates Donald Trump, you know, but eventually they start migrating.
00:24:06.040I bet you it's a matter of time before Liz Cheney declares herself an independent like Scarborough.
00:24:10.560Nicole Wallace is a Democrat now. She used to pretend to be a Republican or maybe she actually was.
00:24:15.080I don't know whatever she is now. She's hard left anyway that they're not interested in getting a true conservative who's going to espouse conservative ideas and actually potentially defend Donald Trump on their airwaves.
00:24:29.160Yeah, I think it's the defending Donald Trump part, and it's not Trump proper, but saying like, look, we have two choices in this election.
00:24:37.240We have Trump and we have Biden and I'm going to choose Trump.
00:24:40.120That is not I don't think that's an acceptable view that you can take on the air at these networks.
00:24:45.560And they very much want to put that view beyond the pale.
00:24:52.460One of the other things, by the way, that they have labeled beyond the pale and that they criticized Ronna McDaniel for was her criticism, her criticisms of the media, which they put in the endangering democracy category.
00:25:06.360And that I found more far more objectionable than their criticism of her for denying the 2020 election, which was ridiculous.
00:25:16.940And she did not have quit herself well in that regard in her interview with Kristen Walker.
00:25:21.140However, when they say that, oh, she vilified the media and how could we have her on air?
00:25:27.160They have a lot to account for and their unwillingness to have anybody on their airwaves who has any criticism of them for the things that they got wrong, I think explains entirely why so many people have written off the mainstream media and are tuning in to the Megyn Kelly podcast and alternative forms of media.
00:25:45.800Barry Weiss's sub stack. We're reading the Free Beacon who are reading the Federalist.
00:25:49.940It is why media is balkanized, because they do not allow dissenting voices on their airwaves.
00:25:55.060And this is not just MSNBC, which came out of the gate early and said, we're not booking her at all that we're talking about.
00:26:01.160This is the mainstream outlets in New York Times, NBC News, you know, the big players.
00:26:07.360Find me a Republican, Eliana, right, who hasn't criticized the media.
00:26:12.360Like, if that's a deal breaker for MSNBC, they'll never get a Republican on their airwaves.
00:26:18.600That's most of us. I'm not a Republican, but I'm definitely more conservative in my thinking.
00:26:24.020Most of us wake up thinking about the latest way we hate the media, the latest sin the media is committed.
00:26:31.600How like you how often do you see those posts on X as much as you hate the media?
00:26:36.940It's not enough. And you get another example. Like, I think everyone who's center or right of center hates the media.
00:26:43.600And yet you can't you get hired, I guess, as an NBC contributor if you've said negative things about them.
00:26:51.160Yeah, that view is beyond the pale, not allowed.
00:26:53.840And they have to put it in the you're endangering democracy bucket because they have to cast themselves.
00:27:02.420It's Jim Costa syndrome. You know, we're the heroes and the heroes in our own stories.
00:27:07.740You saw a lot of that, which, by the way, I mean, this is not doesn't follow logically from anything I was saying.
00:27:13.820But it wasn't that long ago that Joy Reid's blog was hacked with, you know, quote, unquote, hacked homophobic slurs and that the investigative or whatever.
00:27:25.060She's still looking for the real killer with O.J., the real hacker of the blog.
00:27:32.740And, you know, Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski on their show says we weren't consulted about this.
00:27:40.780It's as if, you know, the executives over there are supposed to consult them about every move they make in managing the company.
00:27:45.440And they sit there with Al Sharpton every day, who not so long ago was ginning up race riots in Crown Heights.
00:27:54.440I mean, there is, of course, there is, of course, a grotesque double standard here that you could point out.
00:28:03.580Well. Having criticisms of both sides of this equation, but the double standard is appalling.
00:28:10.780Yeah. And Emily, the notion that, like, we're not putting election deniers on our airs, our wave.
00:28:17.640All right. We're not. That's not us. We won't do it.
00:28:20.560And meanwhile, you know, I showed you just the clips of them the number of times we just found in a quick search of them having on Stacey Abrams and Hillary Clinton.
00:28:29.940The OGs on election denialism. But it's not just them. Like, the Democrats have been we have a little reminder, little sot montage of the Democrats denying election results that didn't go their way.
00:28:44.180So spare me the false indignation. Here's a bit.
00:28:48.660One thing that Trump is fearful of when it comes to his being president is that finally we will see how illegitimate his victory actually was.
00:29:30.640Al Gore won the election nationwide and also in Florida, but the Supreme Court ruled the other way.
00:29:36.180Al Gore got more votes, but not enough to stay out of the Supreme Court where President Bush was elected five to four.
00:29:41.480Bush versus Gore, a court took away a presidency.
00:29:47.360Emily, I'm sorry. It just brings it home.
00:29:52.260Like, they're so full of it. Half those clips that was put together by the RNC are of those Democrats on MSNBC denying the election results.
00:30:03.000It's basically an apples to apples, and that's what's valuable about it.
00:30:06.900We have such a good apples to apples with 2016.
00:30:09.640Jamie Raskin, I believe, objected to the certification of the electors back in 2016, which is basically an apples to apples with what happened in 2020.
00:30:16.740And Jamie Raskin, he has been all over MSNBC for years, as has Stacey Abrams, who, by the way, I once were a piece, read all of Stacey Abrams' romance novels, which were written under the non-diplume Selina Montgomery.
00:30:49.780And she's, like, just outright, like, a radical fringe person who has been treated as mainstream by the same places that now want to treat Ronna McDaniel as a radical fringe person.
00:31:01.140It is just outrageous. It's outrageous.
00:31:03.720Their hypocrisy, their, again, sanctimony, self-aggrandizement, it's been obvious for a long time, but it's rare that it hits you on every hour of MSNBC, from every anchor at NBC as well, so acutely, right?
00:31:25.720And now she's definitely going to get fired. Does anyone disagree that she's about to get fired?
00:31:35.040I mean, it's bad, like, it's such, I do trust you, because, I mean, and also, it's such bad business, is what I was going to say, and I really do trust them to be very bad at business.
00:31:44.060You know what, though? She's the luckiest woman in the world. They're going to have to pay out this contract, and she's going to get to sit at home instead of going on, you know, whatever, at 9 o'clock at night.
00:31:56.480Like, I'm tempted to say yes to you, Eliana, but I don't think so, because what I'm, this is, you know, I started the show with Trigger, right?
00:32:06.180Because I know these people and how disgusting and dirty they are, and what I see them trying to do right now, all these anchors, all these people are millionaires, you know, right?
00:32:16.960Okay, they're trying to ruin her. It's not just a matter of disassociating, you know, from her professionally at NBC.
00:32:24.080They're trying to ruin her. What is Ronna McDaniel going to do now? Like, what job is she going to take now?
00:32:30.660She's been forced out of the RNC, because I guess she wasn't, well, all sorts of reasons, right? But she's not a beloved figure on the right.
00:32:37.960She's the one Vivek Ramaswamy stood up and, you know, attacked at that debate that we were at.
00:32:42.840Well, the one before us, which was hosted by NBC, but he's always been ripping on her.
00:32:47.480And then she's probably going to do, like, a corporate board. I don't, you know, what do these people do when they leave these positions?
00:32:53.100No more. No way. They're toxifying her to the point where she will be unemployable.
00:32:59.420Trigger. It's what they do. It's what they're great at. They have absolutely no, no caring, no compunction, no, just no empathy for the one that they are ruining.
00:33:13.780And what did she do? Yes, she did flirt with election denialism.
00:33:17.220As you point out, nowhere near as bad as Trump's core circle and nowhere near as bad as Hillary Clinton, who they would put on every day of the week and give a show to if she would only agree to it.
00:33:30.120Right. So it's to me, it's just there's a level of cruelty happening here.
00:33:35.020And I'm sure Ronna McDaniel's going through it, Eliana.
00:33:36.880Yeah, it's a good point. And the power of the talent is quite interesting if they do drop her to see over the ostensible managers of the network.
00:33:56.540I don't want to speak too soon, but but I trust your judgment on what will actually happen.
00:34:02.020It's quite interesting to see who is actually in charge of these of these networks.
00:34:10.040I feel for I feel for the underlings over there who are just trying to do news.
00:34:14.340You're at the wrong place. First of all, that should be apparent by now.
00:34:17.700So good luck. OK, there's so much more to get to.
00:34:21.380We haven't like I was on vacation when the thing all the news broke about Don Lamont last week and his insane demands of Elon Musk.
00:34:29.340He wanted to be. Oh, you missed a good one in space and his demands to control the editorial on X.
00:34:35.680I mean, it's so there's standby. OK, there's a lot more to get to. Don't go anywhere.
00:34:39.880So, ladies, I wasn't here when the news about Don Lamont and his insane contract demands to Elon Musk broke.
00:34:53.480But what appears to be happening here is that X and Elon are fighting back against the narrative that they pulled his X deal simply because Elon didn't like that interview.
00:35:03.440It sounds like that was just the final straw that, you know, Elon was starting to realize what he had hired, what kind of a diva he was dealing with, talentless diva and sat down across from him and thought, oh, my God, what have I gotten myself into?
00:35:19.080Like all the things I've been getting told by my staff are true.
00:35:22.700And they include, according to The New York Post and The Daily Mail, it's interesting because Don Lamont, through his agent, is denying this.
00:35:32.240But both publications say they have the demand document from Jay Sherez, his his agent.
00:35:39.300So it's in writing. It would be extraordinary for The Post or The Mail to say that if it weren't true.
00:35:46.000You're just begging to get sued and no lawsuits been filed.
00:35:50.540But it went through how he wanted to have the first podcast in space, how he wanted to have editorial control over news decisions or changes that would be made on X with respect to policy or shows like he was going to be in charge of news in some way.
00:36:08.940OK, you know that in addition to I think it was eight million dollars a year, he wanted a five million dollar signing bonus.
00:36:15.940This guy, this guy, are you going to be kidding me? He's fired his careers in tatters.
00:36:21.140He's in no position to be making these demands.
00:36:24.360And he wanted to go out to Vegas for some, you know, ad conference or something that X suggested he go to to promote X and demanded reportedly that he be able to bring his fiance.
00:36:36.340I don't know if they're married, that he that they pay for their massages, their day drinking and that he get one of those Tesla SUVs that Kim Kardashian drives so he could tool around Las Vegas.
00:36:49.200I'm dying. I'm dying. I'm dying. Is there any doubt in your mind why all of that leading up to him sitting across from Elon and being Elon being questioned about how Twitter's racist?
00:37:01.840It causes mass shootings and you're on drugs and are no person to be running a company of this size led to the man having his deal pulled.
00:37:13.580That wasn't even the worst part as far as I'm concerned.
00:37:16.920If Don Lemon was amazing, I mean, give him the moon and the stars and the truck and take him to space and all that.
00:37:24.320But, you know, Elon is not a media guy. He doesn't come from media.
00:37:30.100He can be sort of clumsy about these things. But what must he have thought when he sat across from Don Lemon and Don Lemon challenged his contention that CNN is liberal?
00:37:42.400He said, why do you think that? Then Don Lemon challenged his contention that Don Lemon is liberal.
00:37:54.320And Elon must have really thought, OK, we made a mistake here.
00:37:59.340And not only that, like, I take this guy to space on my rocket.
00:38:07.340I mean, the guy, the guy was gaslighting him.
00:38:11.460Then you cut that little extension cord. Bye bye.
00:38:13.860Yeah, the guy was gaslighting him in the whole interview.
00:38:18.040It was absurd and sort of fascinating to watch because Lemon comes across as totally untethered from reality and unwilling to concede things that any person with common sense would concede and would be able to discuss.
00:38:35.540He comes across like a total, total jerk.
00:38:40.560And so to me, it's like the demands in the contract were totally beside the point and just underscore the fact that he is a totally out of touch.
00:38:50.960Yes. And, you know, if you make a deal with Don Lemon, it appears that there's a very good chance he will sue you no matter how it lands, because he got pushed out of CNN over his misogyny and repeated stupid statements and sure enough, got a lawyer and got paid out.
00:39:07.580And before any of that happened, he reminded everybody on the air, I'm gay and I'm black, black and gay, black and gay, black and gay.
00:39:14.380Just in case you forgot, I'm black and I'm a gay man.
00:39:17.380And not past my prime, like Nikki Haley.
01:16:15.580It's what is leading a lot of Trump milquetoast supporters to say, I will pull the lever for him.
01:16:25.400I will make sure that this is not that before and after moment for the country where somebody's kept out of office because of lawfare, something we've never done before.
01:16:33.540Ladies, I've got to tell you that this just in scoop from Puck News, Phil and Byers, NBC News plans to drop ex-RNC chair, Ronna McDaniel.
01:34:34.020The evidence that he is absolutely a scumbag is already pretty overwhelming.
01:34:38.300But I think this could be the tip of the iceberg in terms of the Diddy story that we could be learning a lot that's endemic in the industry
01:34:44.700in a sort of way that harkens back to the early days of Me Too.
01:34:49.000And unlike, I don't know, certain other figures in the music business or celebrities who speak out,
01:34:55.480you mentioned Aaron Rodgers shortly ago, Eliana, this isn't about politics with this guy.
01:35:00.220This guy, he's had multiple allegations against him.