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Date: 2025-01-08 Page is: DBtxt003.php txt00027815

US POLITICS JAMIE RASKIN (D) Brian Tyler Cohen: MUST-SEE: Jamie Raskin TAKES ON Elon Musk PLAY YOUTUBE VIDEO Original article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEhMCyb_MXw Peter Burgess COMMENTARY Jamie Raskin is a serious competent legislator ... one of my favorites! Peter Burgess
MUST-SEE: Jamie Raskin TAKES ON Elon Musk Brian Tyler Cohen Dec 25, 2024 3.48M subscribers Interviews with Brian Tyler Cohen INTERVIEW: Brian interviews Congressman Jamie Raskin about Elon Musk's takeover of the GOP and his ascent to ranking member of the Judiciary Committee. For more from Brian Tyler Cohen: Order my #1 NYT bestselling book: https://www.harpercollins.com/pages/s... YouTube (español): / @briantylercohenespanol Twitch: / briantylercohen Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/36UvEHs Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0066rKC... Twitter: / briantylercohen Instagram: / briantylercohen Facebook: / briantylercohen TikTok: / briantylercohen Newsletter: https://plus.briantylercohen.com Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/briantylerco... Threads: https://www.threads.net/@briantylercohen Transcript 0:00 I'm joined Now by someone who needs no introduction Congressman Jamie Rasin thanks so much for joining me again well I certainly need no introduction for your audience because you have me on all the time Brian it's always my pleasure it's always a delight to be with you so happy holidays you too you too Congressman um so from your Vantage how do you think Republicans feel about President musk being given full control now over their party well um some of them love it um I think the the most uh Mega inflected of them uh love it um and the others just kind of are borne Along by whatever happens they've made their peace long ago with Trump being the dictator ruler of the GOP and there might be a handful of them who are alarmed by the further degradation of Politics on their side is there any sense of regret at least from your Republican colleagues maybe folks who you've spoken to that they did usher in a billionaire who is now immediately immediately threatening 1:00 to fund primary opponents if they don't fully bend the knee or or to your earlier Point are they just that content to fall in line and kiss the ring I mean I think they're coming to the conclusion that they have created a monster in Donald Trump who's just uncontrollable and encourageable and ungovernable and he just does whatever he wants and that includes bringing in people just like him I mean is it's going to be a cabinet of billionaire oligarchs it will look a lot like Putin and his oligarch so we're talking about people who own significant segments of the American economy and then because of that are granted a place at the table to govern uh that there's a name for that which is oligarchy or plutocracy rule of the wealthy although that makes it sound too diffuse and widespread it's really oligarchy it's the rule of the wealthiest people a handful of them over everybody else talking about a country of hundreds of 2:01 millions of people which is built on the struggle for and the principle of one person one vote well elon's first big move was to demand that the CR the continuing resolution be slimmed down Republicans did that by stripping out certain Provisions like a bunch of healthcare Provisions including Childhood cancer research funding Elon then supported that new bill so is this what we can expect from the new head of the Republican party is this the populism that was promised and that voters voted for well I don't think certainly that was not put on the table specifically as subject matter like let's remove research for Pediatric cancer um let's attack VA benefits um no that wasn't and um I think the Optics of it Were Striking to people that you know you had the wealthiest person in the world demanding the deletion of these programs to benefit um 3:00 poor people and kids and working people so we'll see how long that lasts and you know how long the Pudo populist pose uh will be convincing to people so in the aftermath of these programs being deleted from the initial CR um there was a lot of talk on the right about okay well this you know the the the Gabriella Miller Kids First Act 2.0 was already had already passed the house back in March and it was sitting languishing in the Senate so can you explain why the Senate couldn't simply pass the bill to fund pediatric cancer research since it did pass out of the house previously well for the same reason it's difficult to pass almost anything out of the Senate which is the filibuster and the filibuster means that you need not 51 votes to get something through but 60 votes and the way that's operationalized is that each member can place a so-call a hold on a bill on any legislation going through through their hotline process and if one senator says no they 4:01 can stop it so the way that you get legislation through is as part of a package and a compromise where lots of different things are put together and you don't love X and I don't love Y and Z people are okay with then you put it all together and then it goes through and that's the kind of negotiation that works over there but it would have been extremely difficult if not impossible to say well let's just take it out and have the senate pass pass it because anybody you know ran Paul or Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz could have just blocked it and by the way we did see ran Paul blocked this bill and it wasn't until Tim kanaine got him to finally um uh release his hold that he that that this was able to pass with unanimous support but that doesn't mean that it would have passed prior to that and it also doesn't mean that uh that a bunch of the other healthc care Provisions that we had intended to pass including Provisions that would that would impose penalties on on drug companies for not doing the less 5:01 lucrative work of pediatric cancer research funding um that that that you know none of that got attention either and a lot of these failed to pass as the result of this it was it was like thankfully the Gabriella Miller uh Kids First Act 2.0 was able to pass but that's owed in large part to the fact that there was so much pressure on it there isn't that much pressure on the Lesser known Provisions that failed to pass as the result of of elon's meddling in this broader CR um you know Trump had said that anybody who voted for for a clean CR would be primaried cut two 170 Republicans did vote for a clean CR at the end of the day does that suggest that perhaps Trump is has less political Capital than he might think well I think those threats just get diluted over time in terms of their effectiveness I mean they threaten them every day if you don't do exactly what we want to do uh we're going to put up candidates against you elon's going to spend Millions to stop you Trump is going to uh endorse your opponent 6:00 and I mean it's kind of humiliating that you get elected to the United States Congress and you know you constantly have a you know this system of legislative extortion mobilized against you and you know why even do it at that point um so I I do think that their hold is weakening especially since they're constantly kening from one side of the road to the other you know the um the continuing resolution that they blew up was the product of many many weeks of intensive bipartisan negotiation and then Elon sent out his tweet and then the politicians started getting scared and you know the the support was eroding over the course of the day then they asked Trump about it and then Trump had to scramble to catch up with Elon and it was just chaos so then they they scrambled to put together this hodg Podge Bill the next day which was utterly indigestible to us and I think all the Democrats voted against it or 7:00 maybe one person voted for it but then a bunch of Republicans voted against it too I think 37 Republicans opposed it on that day and I mean this very quickly uh triggered memories of the the terrible election of Mike Johnson which went on for more than a week with all of these different ballots you'll remember 2 o'clock in the morning and we realized we're we're being plunged back into the exact same kind of chaos that they started the 118th congress with can you speak on the diffusion of responsibility that Republicans are trying to engage in right now right after that second CR failed where as you mentioned 38 Republicans voted against it Elon took to Twitter and blamed it on speaker Jeff because no de or only a few Democrats had had given support but Democrats aren't in the majority the Republicans are are are the ones that are in the majority and it's not necessarily the rep the democrat's responsibility to bail out the Republicans or to teach them how to govern when again they control the so can you speak on this 8:00 attempted diffusion of responsibility by the Republicans right now on the Democrats who are in the minority in the house well this is a lesson that they just can't seem to learn where they just have to learn it over and over again look they've got a very slender tiny majority um in the house they have no majority in the Senate which means that you've got to negotiate it's got to be bipartisan if um and even in the next Congress where they've got this slenderest of majorities in the house and a slender majority in the Senate and the White House theoretically they could just go ahead and say we're just going to ram everything through but if they can't come together in their own conference then they're going to have to turn to Democrats which is how we've kept the government open it's how we've passed a budget repeatedly with the continuing resolutions but they get dozens of defections from the most meif IED Freedom caucus people um although now there seems to be a split even there I'm not sure I can understand all the convolu politics of it I know that Trump 9:01 has been trashing chip Roy and some of the other Freedom caucus people but in any event they can't get together so then they come to us so then we negotiated A continuing resolution bipartisan compromise we were all set and it got blown up so then they came back and they said they didn't talk to us so there was no negotiation they just said we're just going to put this on the floor so of course we're not going to vote for after the Hat a job they did on the original bill it was terrible and then you know and then Elon who really doesn't understand the process and fairness to him said well the Democrats didn't support it well of course we wouldn't support it we weren't part of the dialogue that led to it so then um there was legislation that was not what we' originally agreed to but we understand the situation they'd been put into and that they have a very difficult time governing and so we just went with it because we were not prepared to shut down the government but Mike Johnson has lost all credibility as a negotiating partner people kept saying well wait who are we negotiating with is it Mike 10:01 Johnson is it the freedom caucus is it Donald Trump is it Elon Musk who's never been elected to anything like who who do we negotiate with and it's just a very crazy way to try to run a railroad well Congressman isn't the that the exact issue that led to Kevin McCarthy's ouster because he had lost the he had lost um the the ability of the Democrats to actually trust who they were negotiating with and he lost the the trust of his own of his own conference that sounds an awful lot like what's happening with Mike Johnson right now uh um right and we're heading right back into January 3rd where we're all going to be sworn in and the speaker's got to be elected but on January 6th this time we also have to meet in joint session under the 12th Amendment to uh receive the Electoral College votes um and either there will be a speaker or there won't be a speaker but it's never happened before in American history that we have this kind of flux and uncertainty heading into you know the 11:00 January 6th receipt of the Electoral College votes so I want I want to switch gears to some good news here and that is that you were elevated to the ranking spot on Judiciary the house Judiciary Committee why was it important to upend normal procedure and and make a run at sitting at top that committee well actually it is the normal procedure that we elect people every two years I mean what was unusual about it was just that there's a presumption that you go with the most senior person and I'm not the most senior person I'm just still in my fourth term in office so I've been in the house for eight years which is not a long time for you know some people will be in the house for 30 40 years something like that but look I I just felt that we're in the fight of our lives and uh I have devoted my career so far uh centrally to the defense of democratic political institutions um against all of the fraud and the cheating and the violence and so on and the Judiciary Committee is going 12:01 to be uh the front lines of the assault on the Department of Justice the uh continuing erosion of Ethics in the Judiciary the attack on immigrants the attack on Reproductive Rights and uh the oversight Committee of course is essential too um but I felt um after I was prevailed upon by lots of colleagues on the Judiciary Committee and in other parts of the house to run for it and uh and it worked out well and so I will be with the new ranking member on oversight who's Jerry Conley from Virginia and I want to talk about that um while again your Ascension to the top of Judiciary was was beyond welcome news AOC lost her run to lead oversight which um would have given one of the most effective communicators in the Democratic party the ability to have a bigger megaphone um and and look there I I think that we should be under no delusions about how difficult it is to Garner attention in 13:01 the attention economy AOC has a singular ability to be able to do that so can you speak on that decision by the party more broadly so this is where the power of seniority really did kick in um AOC is even more Junior than me she came in the term after me so she's only been in for three terms she's only been in Congress for six years and uh Jerry Conley's been in Congress for more than 20 years um uh Alex has been my vice ranking member on oversight so she has had a very intensive two-year tutorial in the management and running of a committee and has worked very closely with a lot of our members and has done a fantastic job at it um but Jerry connley um you know exceeds her in terms of his experience with dealing with the manifold issues of the oversight committee including the man agement of all these different um government 14:01 departments um and so I think um it was amazing that she came as close as she did really because a lot of people were saying you know Jerry Conley is um perfectly able uh to do the job and he's you know he's smart on his feet and he knows the issues really well but there's a lot of love for AOC and as you're saying she speaks to the outside world and to the country in a way that none of us do I mean she's got millions and millions of followers in the social media and you know I have colleagues uh more senior colleagues who don't really don't even understand the social media channels that she's an absolute master of so that's something that I think the the Democrats in the house and in the Senate Congress generally are going to have to deal with but uh AOC is not going anywhere but up I mean I think uh I've encouraged her to stay on the 15:00 oversight committee because I think uh her future is very bright there and we work together on a whole bunch of different projects in the house and in the country to uh communicate uh a very strong um true blue Progressive democracy message in the country including you know our democracy summer project that we do in the summer and I work with her and Maxwell Frost and a bunch of the other junior members uh on so there is you know an important generational Dimension to American politics like all politics and this is a generation that is really coming of age and we need them badly right now is there some um is there some I guess to assuage some concerns because it does feel like when you have somebody who is a unique talent within the Democratic party who fails to to Ascent up to the ranking member role who which would again give her a bigger MEAP is there an understanding or an 16:01 acknowledgement within the Democratic party that there does need to be changes in terms of how the Democrats um um reach out to people in the in the broader media ecosystem the evolving media ecosystem right now given what happened in November it's something that's very much on my mind I certainly believe it and I've been making an effort despite the fact that you know I'm uh you know I was like the big Rebel of the Season before Alex's run and I'm you know I was a 61-year-old grandfather when I you know captured that position but that was seen as scandalous enough so I think it was just a bridge too far to go with you know go with AOC as a ranking member at this point but look um you know her legislative skills are fantastic um and as you're saying her communication skills are really surpassing um and um I I think people uh know that and there will be lots of different ways for that to be expressed 17:01 and represented I mean for example one of the things I've thought about is they're creating this uh new Doge committee the department of governmental efficiency although it's not a department um in the house in the oversight committee it's just a legislative subcommittee even in the administration it's not a department um I think they wanted to call it that just so it mirrored the the Bitcoin that uh the Elon Scott but in any event um they're appointing um margorie Taylor green to be the head of that subcommittee she's going to be the head of it well I mean one way to put that whole thing away very quickly is to make AOC the ranking member on that and put AFC up against uh MTG uh that will be a top ranked show but I think that that the the intellectual substance and the Insight that that uh Alex brings to it 18:01 will shine through you know and that I think that will be a meaningful that would be one meaningful demonstration of what we're talking about but there's lots of opportunities and we will see that there will be a proliferation of opportunities for Alex and not just Alex by the way I mean you know Melanie stanbury from New Mexico Greg casar from Texas Maxwell Frost from Florida um Jared mosz from Florida Dan Goldman from New York I mean we've got an extraordinary junior team and that's not even talking about the freshmen who are coming in right now like Maggie goodlander um from New Hampshire and uh Julie Johnson from Texas I mean extraordinary people are getting elected because they understand the stakes of the times and they're running and we've got to figure out a way to use them in the house in the Congress and out in the country in the Democratic party and um 19:01 you know one thing I've noticed uh Brian is that you know when when things are going all right when we're winning elections or we do things well then people talk about yeah we're we're doing well and then when something happens that disappoints us then we say well you Democrats better do this and you Democrats better do that and I I I wish that people would use the the third person singular is it the that we Ed the we form to describe it because um we can make these things happen and You know despite the fact that Jerry Conley won that's not a disaster or anything I mean Jerry connley is himself a great uh an effective legislative leader he just is comes from a different generation so he doesn't have all of the amazing skills that Alex has in terms of communication through all of the channels that other members are just getting acquainted with now well you had you had mentioned you know the importance of the times and to quote somebody who you like quoting quite often Thomas Payne said the times have found us and so I'm glad that in 20:00 this time right now we do have you a top Judiciary to do the work that you do so well and like nobody else can do so Congressman thanks for taking the time today happy holidays and looking forward to seeing what you do in the New Year it's always a pleasure we're going be fighting hard for strong democracy and freedom and the rule of law in the new year and we need you thank you for everything you do Brian and uh send happy holidays to your family and to all of your great uh listeners out there [Music]

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