Republicans' Trump Problem

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1:03Good evening. It is Thursday, October 1st, and it is 33 days until the midterm elections. Republicans are doomed to spend every single one of those days caught in the political catch-22 that is belonging to a party led by Donald Trump. You can't be elected as a Republican on November 3rd unless you demonstrate full and public feel-tied Donald Trump at all times in all matters. That's the rule of the cult. But in a lot of places in America, you also can't get elected if you're standing next to the guy who's losing an illegal war of choice to Iran while gas prices skyrocket and mortgage rates go up and healthcare gets cut. Betray Trump, though, and you're out. Stand beside him, and you're also probably out. In a new AP Nork poll that was released today, Trump faces 69% disapproval, a record for him, across both terms. But this is the other big problem for Republicans. Trump will not acknowledge this reality. 65% of Americans say higher prices are

2:08because of Trump's policies and they're right. 69% of Americans, including 52% of Republicans, say Trump's handling of the cost of living has been worse than expected. It's been bad. I don't know worse than expected. What did you expect from this guy? We've known him for a long time. These numbers are bad. They're not bad at all. They're toxic. So Republicans are trying to discreetly distance themselves from the president. One Florida Republican edited his website's answer to an age-old campaign question, right? Why run for public office? Earlier this summer, Mike Beltran's site said he wanted to, quote, stand with President Trump to finish making America great again, according to The Washington Post. Now, the website reads that Beltran felt called to public service and is running to be a champion for lower costs, lower taxes, and increased healthcare access. Trump's gone from the website. One senior Republican involved in a house battle ground race told Politico the White House, quote, called me four times now to see if we want Trump

3:08to come. And I've said no. Even the White House understands Trump's toxicity. One talk says that he won White House official told MSNOW that Trump was visiting a swing district. If he were visiting a swing district, it would be, quote, a net negative for the candidate there. The close to the race, the more the Republican candidate is trying to break from President Trump. This is actually quite a normal political dynamic. The president's party almost always loses seats in the midterms and most presidents understand that dynamic. But Donald Trump doesn't. And therein lies the catch. Trump wants this election in which he is not on the ballot to be all about him. So what I really want you to do is pretend please that I'm on the ballot. Just come and vote it so important. Now, in a political environment where Republicans need the president to be low key, he simply can't help himself. Last month, Trump's solution to lagging GOP enthusiasm was a never before scene midterm convention, which the Republican party willfully

4:13called a Trump appalooza was held in Texas with Republicans there facing tougher election odds than usual in the race for both governor and Senate. Trump said the convention helped the Senate candidate can Pakistan a lot. How does Putin, Pakistan feel about it? Well, according to audio, leaked from the New York Times, Paxton said at a fundraiser shortly after the convention, quote, to be honest with you, the numbers, when we did that convention, it dropped our numbers. Everybody's numbers dropped right now. Yeah, not good. And quote, can Paxton, and this is quite a story when Ken Paxton doesn't want Donald Trump campaigning with him, you know something's wrong. The problem is the big guy doesn't do numbers. When Trump was asked about his low poll numbers in an interview with Time Magazine, he responded, quote, their fake numbers. I would beat anyone running today by 20 points. Your numbers you have are fake. The posters are corrupt. End quote. Of course, the posters are corrupt. The posters are corrupt. Your numbers are fake. 20 points.

5:14Joining me now is John Hartwood. He's a political columnist for Zateo and a former White House correspondent and an old friend of mine. You have to talk a little bit here, buddy, because I don't even understand anymore. I don't know what to say. It's wild. Donald Trump is delusional. And the whole, the point here is that presidents understand that in a midterm election, some candidates might want you there and a lot would rather you not be there. He doesn't care. He's going to just come in and rain on anybody's parade. The problem, Ali, is that Donald Trump is trapped in a fantasy world in which he is doing a great job. He's fantastic. The economy's great. So at a time when people, as you just showed, by way more than two to one, disapprove of his presidency, disapprove of his handling of the economy, you know, on that approved disapprove, the number of people who strongly disapprove of Donald Trump is more than three times the number of people who strongly approve him. That is a toxic number. But his psychological disfigurement will not allow him to feel the voter's pain,

6:20which, as Bill Clinton once said, he can't acknowledge that things are going bad and he's going to fix them. He has to pretend that he has fixed them. And it's a very, very bad situation for Republicans. You know, when I interviewed him, Ali, in 2015, and he was saying then all sorts of ridiculous things that were obviously not true, didn't, didn't stop him from winning the presidency. But I asked him in that interview, I said, what are you going to do when voters pull back the curtain as they did in the Wizard of Oz and say, there is no Wizard of Oz behind that curtain. There's just a guy talking into a microphone and he says, I'll never let that happen. Well, it's happening right now, big time. So, John, one of the things, I mean, DC right now, and unlike Los Angeles or Minneapolis, Donald Trump deployed a military national guard here on the pretext that crime was a problem. And now he talks about the fact that there's zero crime in Washington. In the Time Magazine article, he said something that was interesting. The journalist asked him, would you rule out declaring

7:20a state of emergency in the lead up to the midterms unless there was widespread violence in the streets? Trump says, I don't rule anything out or in. We'll see. You mean the Insurrection Act? Journalists, yeah. Trump, no, I've never used it. I could use it. A lot of people think I use it, I should use it sometimes. And then he goes on to talk about the amount of crime that has come down by him using the military. So, you know, he's conflating two things here. Well, of course, and the very idea that he would invoke the Insurrection Act is absurd. There's no conceivable conditions for that. But when he says, as he said to the Time Magazine reporters, yes, I could do that. He thinks he could do anything. And he's constantly putting on the table a preposterous idea as saying, well, I could do that if I wanted to. This is a very, it's actually a dangerous situation for the country because the president of the United States is

8:21not in touch with reality. And yet he's the president of the United States with the nuclear button and all that goes with it. So, Democrats are feeling very, very good right now. They've got the prospect of winning both the House and the Senate. The polls indicate that both of those things are likely. But this is a president who you can't rule out him taking extreme actions to try to protect himself because he's compelled to try to do that. So, there are things he can do. Obviously, there's the intimidation factor of either FBI agents or DHS agents being in polling places, which they might justify on the basis of there being, you know, criminal violations or immigration violations. But that serves to be an intimidation tactic. So, that can we can turn out in the elections. There are, there's a fact that Trump will make allegations on in various states non-citizens voted, which as you know is really not much of an issue in America. The worry now is that, and Mike Johnson has demonstrated this before with Adelaide Grahava in Arizona when she

9:26won her election and he delayed her swearing in because it was going to end up giving, creating that Epstein problem for them. There's some speculation that Mike Johnson might do that. He might say, well, you know, there's dispute about the outcome of the elections. It's not certified and not seek this new Congress. Is it theoretically possible that Mike Johnson could do that? Yes. Could he make it stick? I do not think so. I think when you're talking about a president with a 31% approval rating, the public opinion, the American public would not allow things to happen. He has less clout with the business community. He's got less clout with the courts. The Supreme Court watches election returns too and they're only going to go so far and protecting a guy who is acting way, way outside the norms and the will of the American public. So I think his capacity to interfere with the election is less than he thinks it is. You know, we saw a court stop some of the intimidation tactics in 2024 and in 2020 as well. You know, could he try to do it again?

10:34Could he send ice to the polling stations and try to deter Hispanic voters from turning out? Yes, he could try to do that, but I don't think it's going to stick. You know, he's in a position right now, Ali, where he's defending territory in Oklahoma, Texas, Florida, Alaska, Kansas. Democrats have real shots of winning in South Carolina in Nebraska. This is an election where the bottom is falling out for Republicans. He can't stop it from falling out. He doesn't have credibility anymore. People don't outside the sort of hardcore cult, which is reflected in that 31%. Donald Trump has no credibility anymore. And so he can talk. He can curse at the time magazine reporters and say, well, you all you've asked me is hostile questions and you haven't asked me this and you haven't asked me that. But he's just culminating and I don't think that there's a mechanism for him to

11:35make positive things happen between now and election day. The one thing voters know is that, you know, with our economy, Ali, it's not objectively terrible. We're not in a recession, but everybody in America can see that it's worse because of things that Donald Trump has done. They're directly tied to him. The tariffs, the Iran war, the chaos that's going on, and they see that he's not trying to address their economic problems at a time when he is raking in as much money as he can. The personal corruption is off the charts. This is just a nightmare situation for the Republican Party. John, nice to see you, my friend. Thank you for being with me tonight. John Harwood is a political columnist for Zotero and he's a former White House correspondent. All right, coming up. The race on our radar is a seat that's been held by a Republican for nearly 20 years. I'm going to tell you why it is suddenly in play. And you may have noticed certain similarities between Donald Trump and another disgraced US president. It turns out the Trump administration has noticed it too and you're not going to believe

12:37what they have decided to do about it. I just bought a new automobile the same way they did in the 1900s when movies were silent. Well, I just got this Jeep from Flexcar. Oh, my smacker rules go to paying off the hefty value. This little gas buggy lost the second I chugged out of the dealership to toot. Okay, well, Flexcar includes maintenance and insurance and I can switch to an F-150 or Mercedes anytime. What are you high on giggle jizz? Buying a car is supposed to be the bum deal. You pretend as the bison's berries. I have no idea what you're saying. The first and only month to month Carly's Flexcar you drive everything. Your pet gives you unconditional love every day. So when they're not feeling quite like themselves, you want to do everything you can to support them. For over 25 years, pet parents around the world have turned to NHV's veterinarian formulated herbal supplements for gentle support with joints, digestion, immune health, and overall wellness. And when you're not sure where to begin, our pet experts are here to help guide you towards supplements that may support your pets

13:39individual needs. Because caring for their health means more happy, healthy moments together. Learn more at NHVNaturalPetProducts.com. What just happened? It's my new BMO-LAFC debit mastercard. Every time I use it, it taps me into the game. Okay, maybe don't do it again. Ooh, these socks are nice. I'm gonna go ahead and So sorry. The BMO-LAFC debit mastercard. Tap into the game. A counter-subject to approval and I provide in the United States by BMO Banking Act. Remember at the IC. BMO! Tonight's race on our radars, Virginia's first congressional district. It's in the eastern part of the state. It includes the suburbs of the capital of Richmond, as well as the historic triangle of Jamestown, Williamsburg, and Yorktown. In the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump won the first district by five points. But in 2025, the Democratic governor Abigail Spanberger won it by two points.

14:44The seat is currently held by a 10-term Republican incumbent. His name is Rob Whitman, who was first elected to the seat in 2006. Known as a conservative Republican, Whitman is staunchly against abortion and the Affordable Care Act and voted against certifying the 2020 election. Trump has endorsed Whitman's re-election bid, calling him a champion of the America First Agenda. In his last two election bids, 2024 in 2022, he won by around 13 points each time. Now, the Democrat, hoping to end Whitman's winning streak next month is Shannon Taylor. Taylor has been the commonwealth's attorney for Enrico County since 2012. Her campaign has emphasized her record as a prosecutor and her support for abortion rights. She's hammered Whitman for his votes against ending Trump's war in Iran. And Taylor's gone after Whitman for the millions of dollars she said Whitman has made trading stocks while serving in Congress. She says she would support a ban on members of Congress

15:44owning or trading stocks. Now, here's the thing. Remember I told you he won this by 13 points last couple of times? A new poll out today from the Washington Post shows Taylor up by four points, 50% for Taylor, 46% for Whitman. Now, that is within the polls margin of error, but far cry from 13 points. It also shows that a long time congressman with a history of big wins is facing a real challenge. Right now, MS now rates this race as a toss up. It'll be one of the earliest ones we'll probably learn about on election night on November 3rd. Keep an eye on that for how the country's going to go. Joining me now is Shannon Taylor. She's the Democratic nominee for Congress in Virginia's first congressional district. Welcome to the show. Thank you for being with us. But thank you so much for having me. We have a lot of stuff to cover here, but I want to start with a stock trading thing because I'm hearing this from an increasing number of challengers that this is one of the first things they want to do because it really sort of plays into the public's distrust for politicians. And I will say stock trading that would get you and me as non-members

16:46of Congress jailed is routinely practiced by Democrats and Republicans in Congress. That's right. And certainly when I'm out there campaigning across this district, whether it's the suburbs of my county or like you said, the historic triangle area up into the northern neck, it's the same. People are terrified about the cost of living going up. It's the housing, it's the food, the gas, the electricity. And they're also mad as hell about this corruption in DC that they see both parties participating in it. And we are prosecuting the case. I'm a prosecutor, as you noted, and bringing this evidence to the voters, they can see that the corruption is the reason why their costs are going up. So as I bring the evidence here to the people in the first congressional district, and I demonstrate and show that evidence of Rob Whitman's net worth going up

17:46up to 40 times since he's been in Congress, trading over two and a half million dollars worth of stock. And when he voted for the beautiful bill, not just giving the tax break to the billionaires, but giving himself a tax break, up to $60,000, which by the way is more than some people in this district earn a year. That's what people are mad about. That's what they want to see change. And I'm bringing that hope for change. Now your opponent says, he posted on X today, here's the truth. I never bought, sold, or timed a single stock trade independent professionals manage my investments. I've never been found to have engaged in insider trading. I don't believe members in Congress should get rich on insider information. That's why I voted to ban congressional stock trading. Catherine, I still live in the same Montrose home that we bought in 1985, and I still drive myself to Washington in my Toyota. What do you make of that? Look, Ali, the proof is there. Two and a half million dollars worth of stock that he has traded. He traded even weeks before casting that

18:52vogue for what he wants to claim now is his ban on stock trading. We are bringing the evidence to the people here in the first congressional district. He doesn't get a pass for this. He has been trading stock period, and he needs to own up to that when I'm bringing this to the attention of the voters here in the first congressional district. Talk to me about, I've just been in your state in Loudon County, which is data center Ali talking about data centers. This is a big, big issue in your state because not only are there more data centers here than there are anywhere else on earth, but it does affect your electricity prices in this state, which in an affordability crisis. If nothing else were going up, if your gas wasn't going up, your food wasn't going up, and all of that, you might, this might be a single issue thing, but on top of everything else is going up, your energy prices are going up because of data centers. That's right. That's right. And we know that the data centers are not regulated. And what we are seeing is that

19:55in Virginia, Virginians should not be paying one dime more for the energy or the water that is being used by these data centers. And they need to pay their way. They need to engage in renewable energy tactics to cut down on the energy stress that Virginians are having to pay for every day. And certainly when you look to see what Rob Whitman has done in the Serena, he gave the data centers a $70 billion tax break. He wanted to have a 10 year ban on localities regulating these data centers. And he is making money off the companies that are profiting off of data centers. So we can't count on Rob Whitman to do the regulations. Yeah, I don't understand the tax break apart. I don't understand why the literally the people involved in AI, this is the wealthiest industry in the history of the world. Right? Like I mean, they make the Robert Barron's blush. Why are they getting tax breaks at all? I would almost argue, I don't think it should have a penalty

21:00tax, but she'd come in if you're going to come into our neighborhoods, build schools and housing and make the whole thing a better place and pay your full taxes. That's right. And that of course, as you know, Ali has been an issue that's been debated in the Commonwealth here with our state legislature. And certainly, I want to make sure that we take whatever action we can that's going to help Virginians get their costs down. Nice to see you. Thank you for joining us tonight. Thank you so much for having me. Shannon Taylor is the Democratic nominee for Congress in Virginia's first congressional district. We're going to watch that very closely on election night. All right, coming up, we've seen a lot of sketchy investigations come out of the second first, the second Donald Trump term and his justice department, but there is new reporting tonight on a DOJ project that I will admit. I didn't see coming. I just bought a new automobile the same way they did in the 1900s when movies were silent. Wow. Well, I just got this Jeep from Flexcar. All my smack of rules go to paying off the hefty

22:03value. This little gas buggy lost the second I chugged out of the dealership to toot. Okay, well, Flexcar includes maintenance and insurance and I can switch to an F-150 or Mercedes anytime. What are you high on, Giggle Jizz? Buying a car supposed to be the bum deal. You pretend as the bison's berries. I have no idea what you're saying. The first and only month to month Carly's Flexcar, you drive everything. Your pet gives you unconditional love every day. So, when they're not feeling quite like themselves, you want to do everything you can to support them. For over 25 years, pet parents around the world have turned to NHV's veterinarian formulated herbal supplements for gentle support with joints, digestion, immune health, and overall wellness. And when you're not sure where to begin, our pet experts are here to help guide you towards supplements that may support your pet's individual needs. Because caring for their health means more happy, healthy moments together. Learn more at NHVNaturalPetProducts.com. What just happened? It's my new BMO-LAFC debit mastercard. Every time I use it, it taps me into the game.

23:07Okay, maybe don't do it again. Ooh, these socks are nice. I'm gonna go ahead and so sorry. The BMO-LAFC debit mastercard. Tap them to the game. Account your subject to approval and I provide in the United States by BMO Bank and Act. Remember at the IC. BMO! 50-year-old Christa Pike was scheduled to be executed by the state of Tennessee at 10am central time yesterday. Pike has been on death row for three decades for the murder of a fellow student when she was 18 years old. Pike was set to become the first woman executed in Tennessee in more than 200 years. And if there's something more barbaric than the death penalty, it's what happened to Christa Pike yesterday. After a court initially delayed the execution, she was eventually wheeled into the execution chamber and strapped to a gurney in the early evening. According to her lawyer, she was given a dose of Pento Barbatol which failed to kill her. She was then administered

24:09another dose of the deadly drug that also failed to kill her. Here's how Tari Guestner, a local reporter and witness at the execution described it. When we got inside, I think it was around 641, we got into the witness chamber. We were waiting there for almost an hour which is unusual. Normally it's 10, 15 minutes and then things get underway. We could hear like a little crying and whimpering at times. At one point at 734, she said, my arm feels like it's about to burst open. Then she smiles really big. Then she starts talking about that one spot on her arm. Does this happen like that? The one spot I didn't hear the rest and then her advisor says, relax and she says, I'm trying. Yeah, she's talking throughout this. Then starts breathing, moaning, snoring. The curtains close at first at 746 and she was clearly still alive. She was clearly still breathing and snoring. We could audibly hear that.

25:13Tonight, her lawyers say that Pike is alive, but in critical condition. Pike and her lawyers have stated beforehand that Pike had a medical condition that made it difficult for her to access her veins. They fought the execution on grounds that said so, but they were denied. Here's how one of her attorneys Randy Spivey described what happened. Last night, the execution team attempted to establish an IV line for an hour. I counted at least seven needles used in her left arm alone, one of which appeared to be bent when it was pulled from her arm after a unsuccessful attempt. The state continued its efforts despite the very complications that we had warned about in court months earlier. The Tennessee Department of Corrections says it followed every step of its approved protocol, adding that it does not allow for additional procedures. Notably, Pike is now the second Tennessee inmate this year to experience a botched execution. Now, Tennessee Governor Bill

26:15Lee says he's pausing all executions in the state for the rest of the year and ordering an independent review of what happened. Joining me is Brian Stevenson. He's the founder and the executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative. Brian, good to see you. Thank you for being with us. I was following all of this in great detail last night because a failed execution occurred very close to when we were alive on air. I have a visceral reaction every time we get the news of another execution, but this was something else. It's 2026, right? I don't think the state should be killing people, but gosh, if you're going to, can you at least do it right? Yeah, I think what's particularly tragic about this is that we have known for a very long time that executing people through lethal injection is not reliable. There have been many botched executions over the last several years in Oklahoma and Arizona and Alabama and Tennessee. Yet the court continues to allow

27:17the states to try to carry out these executions. That Tennessee had a failed execution just a few months ago. It says something about the way in which we're just not responding to the inhumanity of subjecting people to torture and cruelty in this way. I think it is really tragic. We had an execution cylinder of this one in Alabama. A man named Kenneth Smith where they poked in product him for several hours. They couldn't access his veins. They ultimately maneuvered the gurney until he was in a reverse crucifixion position so they could access the veins in his neck. They still could not carry it out. And he went back to his cell traumatized, bloodied, and beaten. I've often argued that the death penalty is not an issue we should think about by asking whether people deserve to die for the crimes they commit. I think the threshold question is do we deserve to kill when we have a process, a system that is so flawed and so unreliable. And I think what happened in Tennessee last night adds to the argument that we just shouldn't

28:18be in the business of trying to kill people to show that killing is wrong. Yeah, I'm with you on that. That said, the proponents of the death penalty wouldn't you think in order to bolster their argument? They would get together and figure this out as 2026. I mean, all sorts of remarkable technological advances are out. And we're still struggling to do this. I mean, because this really does help the counter-argument, right? It helps people who do not want to see the death penalty by saying you don't even do it right. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think it's more complicated than I think people assume it is. I mean, you know, we're asking the state to kill an otherwise healthy human being in a way that doesn't seem like it's murder, doesn't seem like it's killing. And so we go through a lot of protocols and procedures to try to create the pretence that what we're doing is humane and just. And I think it's really hard to accomplish what the state says it wants to accomplish. I mean, one of the reasons why most people would say we should not torture people

29:21who have tortured. Most people would say we should not rape people who have been raped. It's because we can't imagine imposing that kind of comparable punishment in a way that is humane in a way that's decent and just. And so we struggled. We had the electric chair and people called on fire. We've used nitrogen in some places and people were literally suffocating and writhing and agony. Lethal injection has proved to be an unreliable method hanging. All of these other mechanisms are violent and and and go test. And so I think the challenge frankly is that we want to kind of create this image that when we're executing people, we're not really killing them. We're not doing something violent. We're not doing something that seems in humane. And that's the tension. That is the challenge. And I think the proponents of the death penalty have to grapple with. I know this isn't central to the argument you make about this. But in a country and in an election period where everybody's thinking about the cost of everything and the cost of living, this woman was on death row for 31 years from the age of 18. Still is.

30:28There is a remarkable cost to doing this because death row is something people spend a lot of time on. It's a lot of horrible time because you're constantly thinking that the end of this is your death. But it is definitely not a good return on our investment, even if you thought that executing people was something we should do morally. No, I think that's absolutely right. I mean, we're spending tens of millions of dollars in some of these states, hundreds of millions of dollars across the country to carry out this kind of notion that we have to execute people to show that there is justice. The states that don't have the death penalty and that list is getting longer and longer each year. In the last decade, we've had eight more states abolish the death penalty. And when the maximum punishment is life imprisonment without parole, you just don't engage in this prolonged agonizing pursuit of death. I actually think for family members of victims, for people who want to get to closure, it's also a cruel and abusive process to carry people along this journey and offer them

31:36some finality that never comes. But yes, the economic consequences are devastating as well as the collateral consequences. You know, those correctional officers who were involved in this execution last night, they're going to be burdened by this too. They're going to be traumatized by this. No one walks away from this thing uninjured, unburdened by the spectacle of trying to kill someone in a just way. Brian, it's always an honor to speak to you. Thank you for joining us. We appreciate it. Brian Stevenson is the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative. All right, coming up, Vice President Jenny Vance once said that if Watergate happened today, it would be quote, like a 12 hour news story, end quote, which might be true if only because the brazen corruption of the Trumpet era has flooded every news cycle with a fresh scandal. But there is brand new reporting that the Trump administration is not just downplaying Watergate. They're actually doing something about it. That story is next. Well, teams of the President Trump's attempt to rewrite the history of the January 6th

32:51insurrection and his own other scandals and alleged crimes is no longer enough to amuse him. He's now apparently intent on rewriting the history and legacy of another scandal plagued President Richard Nixon. The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump's DOJ is quote, reviewing whether the special prosecutors office that investigated the famed Watergate break-in committed misconduct according to the people familiar with the matter, more than half a century after that scandal led to Nixon's resignation. Jeff Shepherd, a former Nixon aid, turned Watergate historian and revisionist recently gave a two hour presentation at Justice Department headquarters that laid out his theory that the deep state took Nixon down. The title of his 78 page slide deck, Watergate as law fair, end quote. Again, something I wasn't expecting to read, even out of this administration. That presentation was given to the DOJ's Office of Professional Responsibility, which is an

33:51internal watchdog that investigates allegations of misconduct and which ironically came out because of Watergate. Vice President J.D. Vance seemed to preview this rehabilitation attempt of Nixon's legacy and an appearance at the Nixon Library back in June. If Watergate happened tomorrow, it would be like a 12 hour news story. The idea that it would have taken down a presidency is crazy. By the way, if you look at the story of how the deep state took down Richard Nixon, it's not all that different from what the same groups of people, the same institutions tried to do to Donald Trump and the first Trump administration. There is a parallel. That's bananas. But I'm going to bring in a couple of people to set the record straight on the Nixon administration. After a very quick break, I will be joined by the former Congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman, who is a member of the judiciary committee during the Watergate scandal and the former

34:52Watergate prosecutor Jill Weinbanks. Joining me now is the former Congresswoman from New York, Elizabeth Holtzman. She was a member of the judiciary committee during the Watergate scandal and is since served as a prosecutor. She's also the author several important books, including 2019, the case for impeaching Trump. Also with me is Jill Weinbanks. She served as a Watergate prosecutor and as a co-host of the famed Sisters in Law podcast. She's also the author of The Watergate Girl, my fight for truth and justice against a criminal president. Friends, it is nice to see both of you back again. It's a bit of a chuckle-worthy story. I mean, let's be clear. I'm a little, I thought this Trump administration was busy enough with its own scandals. But let me, I want to just examine this deep state thing because you're both involved in Watergate in very different situations. Elizabeth, I'm going to start with you. You were a member of the judiciary committee. You were in Congress. You were a Democrat, but there were Republicans who were also supportive of

35:54a finding justice in this particular case. Where would the deep state have been hiding in this particular case? I don't know. We'd need to have a whole army of people to search for it because, you know, when we started the impeachment proceeding, nobody even knew necessarily, I certainly didn't. And I got to Harvard Law School. What the grounds were for impeachment, what the history of impeachment was, what the basis for impeachment was. And we didn't even know what the evidence was. It was like preparing a case for trial. We had to get the facts. We had to get the evidence. We had to find out what the law set and put it all together. So when we started, I'm not sure that anybody really 100% knew what was going to happen. And it turned out that it was a very fair and thorough process just to give you an idea. Even though the Democrats had the majority, we picked or the chair picked a Republican lawyer to head the impeachment inquiry. And the Republicans picked the Republican lawyers. So there were two Republicans running the

36:56impeachment inquiry. Peter Rodino, our chair, gave the Republicans on the committee the witnesses that they wanted. He never said no to them on procedures. So there were no fights over that. And actually more than a third of the Republicans supported the process and the American people could see it all in the end and decide for themselves. And they overwhelmingly approved it. So what are we talking about now? It sounds like Stalin or Hitler or somebody trying to rewrite history. This and to desecrate what was an important point in our history where under the Constitution and according to the Constitution, we held a president accountable who had violated the law. This is, Jill, this is a very important thing. When you look at countries around the world who have prosecuted or held their leaders accountable, in some cases they've gone to jail, they tend to think the governance of those countries actually gets stronger. When you have a Constitution, it's tested and you follow it and your processes work, you actually, in theory,

37:58get stronger for it. But the whole thing is there's an allegation here, not just of a deep state, but of prosecutorial misconduct in the investigation of Richard Nixon. Obviously you were part of this. What do you make of it? I think that the facts are quite the contrary. This is an allegation that there were secret meetings between Leon Joworsky who was the special prosecutor after the Saturday night massacre led to the firing of Archie Cox and Judge Serica. There are no criminality, no unethical behaviors involved in the prosecutors meeting with a judge for administrative matters to schedule things. When you're about to indict the top aides to the president and name the president an unundited co-conspirator, you need to notify the chief judge who will have to schedule courtrooms and have things available. He was also in charge of the grand jury that was returning the indictment. He had to be notified that there was going to also be in addition to the

39:03indictment, a report that would give evidence to the House Judiciary Committee that was looking into the impeachment. Those who were administrative matters, they were clearly within the exceptions to the bar against prosecutors meeting with the judge. It was no different than, for example, when the White House lawyers went to judge Serica on their own and said, you have to call the prosecutors to come to court because we've just discovered an 18 and a half minute gap in a tape. We were then called to court to be informed in the same way that an open hearing ensued, which returned the indictment and the briefcase of documents that led to the impeachment that eventually happened. This guy, Jeff Shefford, the Nixon historian and revisionist historian, went and gave this presentation as to our presentation at the Department of Justice. DOJ spoke to him and told the Wall Street Journal that Shefford's presentation quote does not

40:05constitute an investigation. But who knows in this administration? You're right. If the government really thought that there was something wrong with the Nixon investigation and the hearings, then put together a real bipartisan commission to figure it out or an independent commission or whatever the case is. Some rando goes in and gives the Department of Justice a two-hour PowerPoint about this whole thing and we're actually talking about it and the Department of Justice has wasted two hours of its time talking about this. Then we have to call the so-called Department of Justice. That's why. Let me just say one thing. To say that we have that there's some problem with the Nixon impeachment process suggests that a law and order tough right wing conservative Republican judge was duped. That every single member of the House Judiciary Committee was duped Republicans and Democrats because unanimously they supported the impeachment of Nixon.

41:06That the entire Supreme Court of the United States was duped because all of them supported the release of the of the Nixon of the special tape that showed that Nixon was involved with the Watergate cover-up from the get-go. So if everybody's duped but if this guy knows the truth, who's not believe me? It's nonsense. Jill the irony is that the investigation, the investigative body that this guy went to the Department of Justice to talk to came out of the Watergate investigation. It exists because of the Watergate investigation. Absolutely and of course it was a one-sided presentation. No evidence could have possibly supported it. I have reviewed the documents that Jeff Shepherd supposedly has that show this corrupt meetings between Leandroorsky and Judge Serica and they do not indicate that at all.

42:09You just have to read those documents. They're available online and you will see that this low level lawyer in the Watergate case for the White House has made a living out of making these accusations that have no foundation and yet he's now found a home in the Trump administration that will listen to anything and that it's just we need the facts to get out to the public. I can only say that if Liz and I are part of the deep state and this week we saw Jack Smith being interrogated. If I am to be subpoenaed and interrogated, I only hope that I could act with the same grace and dignity and calm that Jack Smith displayed in the face of hostile unfounded questioning and accusations that fell apart in real time. Did you see that Liz? The Jack Smith stuff exchange with Eric it was wild. Jack Smith clearly a very smart guy who's prosecuted war crimes. He knows a lot

43:11about a lot. That was utter confusion on his face when Eric Smith was trying to tell me you were in Atlanta at a Hawks game and then you're meeting with Fanny Willis and all this and he's like I know I didn't I wasn't there. What are you talking about? I was at a women's basketball game in Maryland. But that's the nonsense. That's the nonsense that goes out. This was in the United States Senate, a hearing in which a United States senator said this to Jack Smith. This is the BS world we're in right now Liz. The only thing I can say is that it serves them right if Trump wants to tie himself tightly to Nixon so much the better because they're exactly the same. One crook. That is quite something. I thought it was interesting that Vance has claimed about the next that he made at the Nixon Library about if Watergate happened tomorrow it would be like a 12-hour news story. There's part of me that wants to believe that because Donald Trump throws so much stuff at us that it's entirely possible that we'd have moved on to another news story because they have renamed another lake or another country or something of that nature. It is wonderful to see

44:13you both. Thank you so much for oh wait what I would like oh no I do have to go. It's the almost the end of the show. I almost nothing. I had a couple extra bonus minutes with you but no the show has to finish. Thank you to both of you the former US Congressman Elizabeth Holtzman and Jill Weinbanks the former Watergate prosecutor. Well thank you for being with us tonight. As you can see I'm in DC I've been covering a really interesting story about the rise of data centers. Right near us here is an area called data center alley. It has the highest concentration of data centers on earth. There are more than 200 in Loudon County, Virginia and another couple hundred on the way or something more than a hundred on the way. It's affecting electricity. It's affecting electrical consumption. It's affecting electrical prices. It's affecting pollution. It's giving people noise in their neighborhoods and is one of the very few bipartisan issues in this election coming up on November 3rd. So you'll see that on TV pretty soon. Tonight's 11th hour is done. Tomorrow starts right now.

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