7/8/24: Biden Refuses To Drop Out, Dems Plot Revolt, Kamala To Replace Biden, BlueAnon Conspiracies, Disney Heiress Donor Speaks Out
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Hi, I'm Katie Lowe's and I'm Guillermo Diaz. And we're the hosts of Unpacking the Toolbox, the Scandal Rewatch podcast where we're talking about all the best moments of the show. Mesmerizing. But also we get to hang out with all of our old scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. Well, suit up, gladiators. Grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for even more behind the scenes stories with Unpacking the Toolbox podcast.

Listen to Unpacking the Toolbox on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life in marriage. I just filed for divorce. Whoa. I said the words that I've said like in my head for like 16 years.

Listen to Misspelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Angie Martinez, and on my podcast, I like to talk to everyone from Hall of Fame athletes to iconic musicians about getting real on some of the complications and challenges of real life.

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Good morning, everybody. Happy Monday. We have an amazing show for everybody today. Extra amazing. We have all three back at the desk. So what do we have today, Crystal? We thought we'd give you some backup this week, Sagar, after leaving you on your own last week. Well, I'm leaving you guys in a little bit, so you guys can carry the fort while I'm gone. Payback. Well, we decided to do a little bit of a special this morning. We actually even made a graphic. That's how special it is. President in crisis.

Because as you guys, I'm sure realize this is an incredibly consequential week, certainly for Joe Biden, for the presidency, for the future of the country, for how this election is gonna go. There are a lot of moving pieces, so we wanted to focus the entire show on what is going on with the president, following from the interview. We're gonna take a look at that, where the poll numbers are.

Increasing Capitol Hill fallout from the Democratic Party. We have some major senior Democrats now defecting. The case being made for Kamala Harris and how things could unfold if Biden were to drop out of the race or be forced out of the race.

We're gonna take a look at the media's role in all of this, including just recently these two radio hosts who were part of the Biden comeback tour last week. Who just literally took the questions that the White House gave them and admitted to that, so an incredible story there. We're also gonna have a little fun with the Blue Anon conspiracy theories that have taken over and some of the cope from the Biden defenders, take a look at that.

And we're very fortunate to be joined this morning by a major Democratic donor, Abigail Disney, who is one of the donors leading the revolt

against Biden. And we can contrast that with Ryan just had an interview with Demetri Malhorn, who is probably the most prominent donor advisor, who is on the other side of that equation. He's one of the donors who's leading the charge to keep Biden on the ticket. So there's a lot to get into this morning. Before we get to any of that, though, first things first, we have some important breaking points family news, which is Ryan is launching this morning DropSite. We've got a graphic for that.

Go ahead and tell us, Ryan, what you were up to here and what was the cause of this new venture? The headline here is that Jeremy Scahill, who you see up on the screen here, and I are leaving the Intercept. There'll be some other Intercept veterans who are joining us at this new venture. That's dropsitenews.com. You can find it over there. Any names you can tell us yet? Naska Renner, who is a deputy editor, she'll be joining us. She's

The others still have to tell The Intercept. Okay, so we'll let them play out that process. We'll be rolling those out in the next couple of weeks. But you guys followed this as I was kind of running you through the whole saga, but it's been reported that there was a staff revolt about the direction that the new board and management were taking. The Intercept, and as part of that, it was also reported that Jeremy and I tried to take The Intercept over. And in hindsight, it was kind of a crazy idea because we went to the board

And we said, look, we've got funding. We've got a vision for the intercept. And we propose that all of you on the board resign, go away and turn it over to the journalists. Yeah. Boards don't normally agree to things like that. Got a little bit of experience in most situations. I think I understand. Yeah. I'm not sure we even got a second for that motion, but in any event, they said, no, thank you. And we, but we realized at that point,

We could do it here then we can do it elsewhere and to me it's extremely important especially for the independent media ecosystem That's something like the intercept exists that you have to have an independent investigative news outlet that is able to punch above its weight Yeah, there's able to push back not just against politicians and expose what they're doing But also the MSM the New York Times New York Times is so dominant now. They got rid of their ombudsman. Yeah, and

The post is barely competition at this point. There's nobody to check them. When I was reporting on some of their propaganda around October 7th, I was talking to a New York Times reporter who was like, who's gonna check us? Like she had nowhere to go internally anymore. Even when they did Jason Blair, when there was that massive scandal, they investigated it, a bunch of people got fired. It was a real problem. They cared.

- Was that Caliphate? Which scandal was that? - Jason Blair was the guy who, there was Caliphate. But each successive scandal, like with the weapons of mass destruction, there were some consequences for people at the time. With Jason Blair, who was fabricating stuff, consequences. Caliphate, fewer consequences. - She still works there. - This time around, they got rid of a stringer. But publicly, you can still change narratives, even if the Times is gonna dig in

Like, there's enough weight in independent media now that you can kind of push back in a serious way. So we're building this as kind of a new intercept. And you and Jeremy have such a track record and so much credibility. That's part of why I know this venture is going to be extremely successful. And you're so right because, and I hope you guys will go to, what is it, DropSiteNews.com and support this venture because...

It is more difficult to do investigative journalism in the independent media space and have that work as a business model. Because, you know, sometimes you're engaged in an investigation and it doesn't work out. And then all of that work that you've done is for naught.

And so you need people who are invested in that long-term project of media, corporate, political accountability. And as I said, you and Jeremy certainly have the track record to back all of that up. That's right. Yeah, it's not commercially viable unless people support it as a cause, unless people want it to exist. The topic of today's show is why you need...

drop sign. I mean, to your point about the New York Times, we're going to go through some of the media coverage. That's such a great point. If you've been disappointed with the coverage as you watch, you reflect on what happened in the debate, that's why you need Ryan Gray. It's been great out there. They were

totally up front with everybody. Fantastic. And I love the name, the homage, you know, the idea, the spy, like a drop site giving information that actually gets back to the roots of the Intercept. So we are very encouraged to actually see something like that. You'll see a lot of our reporting right here. Going back to what it really should be. Exactly. And we're happy to have that in the Breaking Points family. So thank you, Ryan. DropSiteNews.com. Everybody go and subscribe. I'll have a link down in the description for premium subscribers. I'll have a link in the email as well. And you're going to be hearing about it, I think, quite a bit over the next couple of months.

Yes, indeed. Congratulations, Ryan. We're very happy for you.

Also, we get to hang out with all of our old scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. So many people. Even more shocking assassinations from Papa and Mama Pope. And yes, Katie and I's famous teeth pulling scene that kicks off a romance.

And it was Peak TV. This is new scandal content for your eyes, for your ears, for your hearts, for your minds. Well, suit up, gladiators. Grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for even more behind the scenes. Listen to Unpacking the Toolbox on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life and marriage. I don't think he knew how big it would be, how big the life I was given and live is.

I think he was like, oh, yeah, things come and go. But with me, it never came and went. Is she Donna Martin or a down-and-out divorcee? Is she living in Beverly Hills or a trailer park? In a town where the lines are blurred, Tori is finally going to clear the air in the podcast Misspelling. When a woman has nothing to lose, she has everything to gain. I just filed for divorce. Whoa, I said the words. Yeah.

That I've said like in my head for like 16 years. Wild. Listen to Misspelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Cheaters and Backstabbers. I'm Shadi Diaz. And I'm Kate Robards. And we are New York City stand-up comedians and best friends. And we love a good cheating and backstabbing story. Oops.

So this is a series where our guests reveal their most shocking cheating stories. Join us as we learn how to avoid getting our hearts broken or our backs slashed. Listen to Cheaters and Backstabbers on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Let's go ahead and get to the presidency in crisis. Brought to everybody the breakdown of President Biden's interview. There was a moment that I played for everybody over the weekend, but we all need to ruminate and to discuss, which was the final one which displayed Joe Biden's real arrogance after his disastrous

debate performance. George Stephanopoulos asked, how are you going to feel if you continue to stay in this race and Donald Trump beats you in the election? He basically said, well, it's all about me. And that's the only thing that matters. Here's what he had to say. Mr. President, I've never seen a president at 36% approval get reelected. Well, I don't believe that's my approval rate. That's not what our polls show. And if you stay in and Trump is elected and everything you're warning about comes to pass, how will you feel in January?

I feel as long as I gave it my all and I did the goodest job as I know I can do, that's what this is about. We're worried that if you stay in the race, we're going to lose the House and the Senate. How will you respond? I go into detail with them. I've spoken to all of them in detail, including Jim Clyburn, every one of them. They all said I should stay in the race. Stay in the race. No one said, none of the people said I should leave. But if they do? Well, it's like they're not going to do that.

You sure? Yeah, I'm sure. Look, I mean, if the Lord Almighty came out and said, Joe, get out of the race, I'd get out of the race. The Lord Almighty's not coming down. I mean, these hypotheticals, George. If, I mean, if all- But it's not that hypothetical anymore. Okay, so the Lord Almighty is basically the only person who can convince Biden whenever he does eventually meet him. And as long as he says, I, at the end, give all

the goodest job I know I could do, then I'll be totally content. So it's not about the voters, it's not about the policy, it's not about any of that. It is about Joe Biden and is it about his family? And his goodest job. And his goodest job. So let's actually pause on this goodest question because Maureen Dowd reported that after she posted a column on, that included reference to goodest.

T.J. Ducklow, a Biden campaign spokesman, she wrote, emailed me to, quote, flag that ABC News had updated its transcript to read, quote, I'll feel as long as I gave it my all and I did the good as job as I know I can do. What does that mean? That actually is not really better. Ducklow asked if I could, quote, tweak the column and change the word goodest to make my piece, quote, consistent with the corrected transcript, even though the revised version was also gobbledygook. That's what we're doing. So I had seen this cope.

on Democrat. Well, you didn't say good as I listened to this clip like four times. It's good as he said, good as yeah. And that is not any better, by the way. But I mean, good as job as. Yeah. Yeah.

But also, I mean, more to the point here, this particular comment right in the moment when Sagar was doing his response and all the immediate reaction, it didn't get as much attention. But I think as things have worn on, this is actually, and Ryan, you can tell me what your sources are telling you. This has become an even bigger issue for him.

Because it's one thing if you realize you've got a problem, you realize it's, as they're all saying, existential and democracy's on the ballot, etc., etc. It's another thing if you are, as Biden appears to be,

utterly delusional. Don't believe any poll that says anything even potentially negative, lying about your approval rating, etc. And feel like, well, as long as I did my goodest and Trump wins, what are you gonna do? That's what it's, and he goes on to say, that's what it's all about. It's all about me doing my best. Everyone gets a trophy. This election is really about the friends that we make along the way. That's right.

You're right that that infuriated members of Congress in particular, I think more than almost anything, because like, what are you talking about? Right. No, what matters is actually winning here because the reason that you're seeing them start to come out is because of the ad, for instance, that they've already started running against Bob Casey. And the title of the ad is Bob Casey New. Yes, I played it for everybody last week. Exactly, yeah. It just plays the Biden debate performance and it plays...

Biden saying nice things about Casey Casey saying nice things about Biden and says he's a giant liar Yeah, you if you can't trust him on this, how can you trust him on anything else? So they are asking themselves. Well, how bad is this going to be for my reelection? And then binds as well as long as you do your goodest job That's all that really matters and it does go back to this question of ego and arrogance and bitterness and what I've heard from some people is the speculation that well

He thinks that if he loses, then the American people deserve Trump. Yes. Because he put himself out there. He's a good, honest man. They rejected him.

Well, I guess they get what they deserve. Right. No, and that's actually exactly what it is because it's all about him. He said multiple times through, I believe I am the best candidate. I understand I am the best candidate. I know that I'm the person to be in this race. All throughout that, and people have been asked, well, you guys were all gone. People kept asking so many questions. Do you really think he's going to drop out? Do you think he's going to drop out? I said the same thing I did on debate night.

Never bet against the arrogance of Joe Biden. He is one of the most arrogant men in politics. I think I said that night he will go down as one of the most selfish men in American history. I stand by that. I think, I mean, really, when the Oxford history of 2100 is written, how else can we be like, well, the delusional arrogance of an 81-year-old man carried the Democratic Party to devastating defeat, one which probably could have gone at least

a narrower, different election if he refused to or if he decided to get out of the race. And it's funny too, to put him up against other people in history. I mean, we think of Lyndon Johnson as one of the most egotistical, power hungry people in all of the history of the American presidency. Even he was like, the jig is up and it's time for me to go. Well, you know, even Nixon. Yeah, I mean, Nixon too. Nixon even resigned. If he were to step aside at this point or be basically pushed aside, which is what it

clear as would be required at this point. People will forget about this era. Yeah, I agree. And he'll be rehabbed. And I think the genocide he enabled will be a bigger stain on him than this period. And it will be admirable that he stepped aside and passed the torch and all of those things. So there is still a chance for him to reshape the

that viewpoint on him. But I also was thinking about listening to that, you know, oh, well, as long as I did my goodest job, then it's all fine and that's what it's all about. Like, imagine if like a Bernie Sanders had said that. Oh, yeah.

It got me thinking. That's right. And people will be like, what are you talking about? Beating Trump is mission number one. And the people who said it's mission number one are Joe Biden and his team and his supporters. So in a lot of ways I've been thinking about, you live by the sword, you die by the sword. The political parameters that he established in 2020 is that

Vision doesn't, the only thing that matters is your electability, that's it. And number two, that this is not gonna be a grassroots movement. This is gonna be decided by the donor class. By the oligarchy. The very donor class that is now by and large, revolting against him with a few notable holdouts. But the reporting is that the overwhelming majority of them

are wanting to go in a different direction. And it makes sense because they're the only ones who've had any access to him. So they're the ones who have seen up close like, oh my God, he's reading off a teleprompter in my living room and can still only speak for six minutes and doesn't take anything.

any questions, which I've been to my fair share of political fundraisers. That is not the way these things go. These people expect to be able to shake hands with this man and ask him their questions and get on the phone with him and all of those sorts of things. So they're the ones who have had access to him, who have seen up close this decline. That has effectively been waved off by his team. And the Washington Post article we're gonna get to later in this

in the show indicates that they had a sort of tacit deal of,

Yeah, we know it's not great. We know what you're saying. But when it comes to the State of the Union and these debates and these key moments, he will rise to the occasion and it will all be okay. And so that's why you see such a revolt. But to go back to the original point, you live by the sword, you die by the sword. The system he set up is it's all about electability and it's all about the donor class. And those things are now failing him very clearly. I just want to make a quick point on that.

George Stephanopoulos, I think, enabled that perspective because the vast majority of that interview, even when he was asking questions about Biden's health, it was in the context of electability. Not entirely, but for the most part. And that, I think, really reflected where the concerns of the donor class are right now. It's like oligarch on oligarch violence as they try to scrap over who's going to win out.

with this Joe Biden question and it's pathetic. No, you're right. And just to get to Crystal's point about the decline, I mean, we have here a clip just from four years ago, guys, during a 60 Minutes interview. And you can spot for yourself the difference of when Biden was already an old man with questions around his age of what he looked like then versus now. Let's take a listen. Nobody making less than $400,000

will pay a penny more in tax under my proposal. That's a promise. That's a guarantee, a promise. I give you my word as a Biden. That's an absolute guarantee. And you think it's a good idea to raise taxes when the economy's in dire straits?

Depending who you're raising them on. Look, if you're raising somebody who's making a billion dollars a year, it's not a problem that they pay 39.6 percent, which everybody should pay, raise another 90 billion dollars. So there you go. You can see it very clear as day. And we're also hearing from one of Biden's former press secretaries, Jen Psaki, on MSNBC. Even she, the best she can muster, is saying he didn't do a particularly good job and still asking questions about his candidacy. Let's take a listen to that.

He also seemed at moments a little bit in denial about the state of the race. And maybe confidence was a strategy going to this, project confidence about the path forward. But it's also not ideal for people watching and looking for a sign that he recognized the difficulty of the path ahead.

I mean, overall, when the interview ended, it left us all in this sort of purgatory for the moment. I mean, it was better than debate, not a home run at all. And even if it was a home run, one interview definitely doesn't have the capacity to change the perception out there of 72 percent of voters, according to a CBS poll, who do not believe that Biden has the mental or cognitive health to serve.

That's as kind as it can get, I think, from them about how he didn't exactly allay concerns. Not a home run. Not a home run, right? Have you seen the abuse she's taken? Of course. Oh, really? Yeah, well, we'll get to some of this with the media and the Blue Anon stuff because the level of delusion also from the Blue MAGA crowd is something else.

to behold. But empirically, it is obvious that the debate, the subsequent fallout, the hiding campaign and all that has not really done anything to allay voters concerns. And if anything, most of the data is pointing in a totally different direction. Let's put this up there on the screen for example, we have from the New York Times in

their latest poll that came out after the debate, Trump is widening the lead after the debate debacle. The likely voters are now going 49% Trump to 43% Biden. I mean, even within the margin of error, Biden is decisively losing to Trump. That likely voter number is very significant because those are the people, again, likely to show up to the election.

amongst registered voters just means like in general how people are feeling about him. You've got 49% Trump basically at the same number and Biden actually drops to 41. So you can see a little bit of overperformance with him with people who are likely to vote which are disproportionately gonna be more Democrat, affluent white suburbanites. Just you can see their post debate, Trump is up by six points in the time Sienna poll amongst likely voters nine points amongst the registered voters and in the polling average maintains a Trump

plus three advantage. That was only the second poll to show that. What we see here from the Wall Street Journal is expanding the lead over Biden as his age worries grow. And we consistently see a significant amount of voters who are very worried about Biden's age.

some 80% of voters saying that the incumbent is too old to run. So with all of this data, we have more you guys can reference, Crystal. I mean, the data here is generally overwhelming. There are some contraindications that the Biden campaign is trying to point to, but I don't wanna be in the business of pointing out to one out of 25 different polls to show about why I may still have a chance in the race. One of the things that I think it's Nate Cohn has been pointing out is

you could look at these polls and, oh, well, it only moved three points. But what's really happened is that they were already losing. Now they're losing worse. And there's a realization among Democrats that they don't have a plan or an ability to mount a comeback.

This goes back to the Biden denialism in that manifest in that interview where he waves away. He gets the numbers wrong too. He's like, oh, well, the New York Times, they had me down by nine before the debate. These same people, he says, these are not exactly his words, but these same people, they had me losing to Trump last time. No, they didn't. No, they didn't. I mean, you remember we were-

Biden was ahead sometimes by double digits. 17 points in Wisconsin. In these polls, goes on to dramatically underperform the polls, narrowly eke out a victory. So what land were you living in there? Because the rest of us were looking at polls that showed he was gonna wallop Trump across the Midwest, across the country, etc. Instead, it was coming down to the wire on election night. We didn't know which way it was gonna go. So the polls are

over, showed too good of a picture for Biden last time around. These same people were saying you're gonna win in a landslide and it ended up being extremely close. So Trump has never in any of his campaigns held this kind of, he has never held this kind of a lead. This is creeping into McCain Obama territory actually. I have the historical margins posted, I pulled them up right here. This is not something we've seen in a long time. Well, and Emily and Ryan, you guys were both

mentioning that there's reporting now, we're looking at the decline between this interview and the interview just in 2020. When again, there were already questions from Julian Castro on the stage saying, hey, do you even remember what you just said to me? And there were big questions about his age and ability then. But how much more with he was in his physical appearance? There's now reports that there was a Parkinson's

Yeah. Who came along with his personal physician to the White House. And this is according to the White House visitor logs, what, 10 times in the past couple of years? Yeah, about 10 times since 2022, several times just in the last about six months. A Parkinson's specialist, Alex Berenson, I think, first had this on his sub stack, but it's been confirmed by other news outlets since. The New York Post had it first. But a Parkinson's specialist at Walter Reed has been visiting Biden's personal physician, Kevin O'Connor, at the White House. A

looks like 9, 10 times since 2022 alone. Yeah, and Ryan, speak a little bit to what that means. Because I think it's one thing, it's still wildly inexcusable if they just have their heads buried in the sand. They think he's fine, more or less. They don't know that there's an actual diagnosis versus if they do know there's a diagnosis.

And they're hiding it from the American people. That level of scandal is world historic. And at minimum, it would suggest that they knew there was at least enough symptomatic expression that there was concern. Well, if you never diagnose it, there's nothing to report. Yes. Right? Yeah. Apparently, it's not the kind of thing that there's apparently one skin test or something that Johns Hopkins does, but it's not a very widely used at this point. And who knows how reliable it is.

Parkinson's is the kind of thing where it's kind of a symptomatic diagnosis. You look at it and you say, okay, you've got these six things. Yeah. I declare that you have it. Like, there's no, like, it's not a blood test where the two lines turn up and you're like, oh, Parkinson's. It's more like...

appears you have this, we're going to treat it the way we would treat it and see if you respond. Exactly. And all of the Parkinson's specialists who've spoken publicly have said the symptoms that he's expressing are the kinds where you would go for that further kind of testing and treatment. So it appears like that is what happened unless there's some extraordinary coincidence that has this

Parkinson's specialists going to the White House meeting multiple times. Maybe he's just very interested in donating to Parkinson's research. I mean, look, it's obvious. They didn't just pass a Parkinson's bill last week. The way that this always goes down is that they never officially diagnose it. They have the two-step removed where the physician is with Biden and then the physician consults with the specialist. And then because of the way that laws, HIPAA and all that other stuff works, unless he allows a over...

like a different report than whatever currently comes out and shows like the medical notes, which they never will allow to come out, then we're not actually going to know about what the physical symptoms are looking like. They have gone hard into denying it. You're right. To Crystal's point, the overlaying scandal would be the medical report that does go into detail about Parkinson's and it...

expressly rules it out. - Quote, no findings which would be consistent with Parkinson's. - Right, but these again can be rigged in very different ways and different notes if you have a concern. This, what, you think the doctor's not an idiot? Like he knows, he's like, well, if I don't write it down, it doesn't exist.

So, but you know, maybe I'll have a conversation with my buddy, have him over here because he at the same time is concerned about, well, hopefully concerned about the state of the nation. But Crystal, you're right. I mean, that would be one of the biggest health scandals in the history of the American president. Probably the biggest since Woodrow Wilson and Edith, who I think Jill Biden is the modern Edith Wilson. What a villain. What a villain. I mean, and that really as a wife and a mother and, you know, someone who also has elderly parents are watching it like,

She doesn't care about this man. Yeah, obviously. Because why would you...

Imagine putting your loved one out there on the debate stage to be humiliated the way she and Hunter and whoever else are the close Biden aide, Donilon and these people are. They like running the country. Right now, they are running the country. And they like that. And they don't want that to change. So they will prop him up. They will deny. They will cover up. They will keep him shielded as they have been. And we'll get to the press's complicity here in a moment because-

All the red flags were there that he's not doing interviews. He's not doing press conferences. He goes to meet with the G7 leaders and they're like, oh, my God, this is a disaster. The donors are telling you he can't speak on his own without a teleprompter, even for six minutes. And yet they're still all the cheap fake videos and they're being altered. And this is a right wing narrative, et cetera, et cetera.

extraordinary, absolutely extraordinary, the way that we were gaslit by the press and the tight grip that his aides want to hold on to power. Because again, nobody voted for them to be in office. And yet, outside of foreign policy, where I think Biden does unfortunately stubbornly hold on to the reins with utterly disastrous results,

on domestic policy they are running the country and they do not want to let that power go to that point let's get to the washington post story hi i'm katie lowes and i'm guillermo diaz and now we're back with another season of our podcast unpacking the toolbox where guillermo and i will be re-watching the show to officially unpack season three of scandal unpredictable you don't see it coming it's a wild wild ride the twists and turns in season three mesmerizing but

Also, we get to hang out with all of our old scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. So many people. Even more shocking assassinations from Papa and Mama Pope. And yes, Katie and I's famous teeth-pulling scene that kicks off a romance.

And it was Peak TV. This is new scandal content for your eyes, for your ears, for your hearts, for your minds. Well, suit up, gladiators. Grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for even more behind the scenes. Listen to Unpacking the Toolbox on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life and marriage. I don't think he knew how big it would be, how big the life I was given and live is.

I think he was like, oh, yeah, things come and go. But with me, it never came and went. Is she Donna Martin or a down-and-out divorcee? Is she living in Beverly Hills or a trailer park? In a town where the lines are blurred, Tori is finally going to clear the air in the podcast Misspelling. When a woman has nothing to lose, she has everything to gain. I just filed for divorce. Whoa. I said the words. Yeah.

That I've said like in my head for like 16 years. Wild. Listen to Miss Spelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Cheaters and Backstabbers. I'm Shadi Diaz. And I'm Kate Robards. And we are New York City stand-up comedians and best friends. And we love a good cheating and backstabbing story.

So this is a series where our guests reveal their most shocking cheating stories. Join us as we learn how to avoid getting our hearts broken or our backs slashed. Listen to Cheaters and Backstabbers on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. So potentially the most consequential story that we are all watching to see how it unfolds this week is Congress is going to be back. And there has been a significant uptick in the number of Biden Democratic defections.

Even someone like Adam Schiff, who has been a staunch ally of leadership and certainly of President Biden sounding some alarms over the weekend. Let's take a listen to that. The performance on the debate stage, I think rightfully raised questions among the American people about whether the president has the vigor to defeat Donald Trump. And this is an existential race. Given Joe Biden's incredible record, given Donald Trump's terrible record,

He should be mopping the floor with Donald Trump. Joe Biden is running against a criminal. It should not be even close. And there's only one reason it is close. And that's the president's age. And what I would say, Kristen, what I would advise the president is seek out the opinions of people you trust. He's obviously talked to his family about this. And that's important.

But he should seek out people with some distance and objectivity. He should seek out pollsters who are not his own pollsters. He should take a moment to make the best informed judgment. And if the judgment is run, then run hard and beat that SOB. Very noteworthy comments there. We're fortunate to be joined this morning by Dave Weigel. He is a reporter for Semaphore to talk about whether the Democratic dam is going to break this week. Great to see you, Dave.

Good to be here. Thank you. So what are your expectations as we move into this consequential week? Well, in the next few hours, House Democrats and House Republicans are going to come back to work. They're going to be in hallways with reporters looking for them, and they're going to be asked what they think of Biden. I think you're actually going to get a mix of opinion. That's been clear over the last few weeks. And I talked to a couple Democrats who were at home while recess. Some were traveling, some were at home. And they said...

There was a discrepancy when they were in more affluent parts of their district. This is not universal, it's just a couple people. When they're more affluent parts of their district, they were hearing Biden needs to go. When they were in more working class parts of their district, they were hearing stand with Biden. I think that was a little bit probably self-serving, what I heard from Democrats, but I heard it from a few. And that's clearly what Biden's trying to do right now is campaign in black communities, black churches, look to the...

the sort of Democratic voters that gave him the nomination and recast this as a, so as to lead effort to get him off the ballot that is not supported by the bulk of the party. Dave, I want to ask you about that because Cedric Richmond actually outright racialized this just in the last 24, 48 hours saying he found it interesting that no black house Democrats had called for Biden to step down. Can you just speak to a little bit about how,

How cynical is that versus how real is that? Is this really a very cynical way for Biden to sort of maintain his grip on power? Or is there perhaps truth, especially when you combine it with the class dynamics that you just mentioned, we're hearing from some Biden defenders recently as well? Well, it's cynical, but it's taking an opportunity presented by some of the more pie-in-the-sky donors who have the ear of journalists and are proposing

proposing a blitz convention or a mini-convent, coming up with different ways to say, we want Biden gone, but we don't want the black female vice president to take over. That would be, it'd be awkward for Richmond to say what he was saying in a context where everyone agreed that next in line is Kamala Harris, who Biden has said is ready, what, complied by a pick-and-pick, ready for the job.

And instead, you can see what they're doing is recasting this as a bunch of people who don't understand Democratic Party politics trying to impose their will on the black, non-white voter base of the party. It is a little cynical. It's also that's not how Biden won in 2020. He ran as a broadcast candidate.

who appeal to the whole party and as much of the country as possible, not as a candidate of the faction of the Democratic Party. So it is a little cynical. And you have not seen that. Look at the makeup of the CBC. Look at even progressives in the CBC. One thing, and probably Ryan, not to put him on the spot, knows more about this,

But there has been some reluctance by elected progressives to go after Biden to make it look like they polarized. I have an ideological right with the guy we always have. Bernie Sanders has been very supportive of Biden running, and my interview with him and then his interview was on Sunday.

So they're really trying to isolate different facts from the party they don't like, and some of them are going along with it strategically. Yeah, Dave, we have some interesting new reporting, multiple news outlets. We can put this one up there on the screen. CNN had a pretty detailed write-up here of Hakeem Jeffries convening a call yesterday where we had some four Democrats—

who actually vocally opposed Joe Biden, including Mark Takano, Adam Smith, Jim Hines, Joe Morrell, Jerry Nadler, and Susan Wild. Jerry Nadler, I believe one of the highest ranking folks, or at least more well-known, especially amongst Democrats, actually vocally opposed him in this call. How do you expect that to play out this week on Capitol Hill? Are they going to come out with statements like we've seen from some members? Are they going to keep it behind the scenes like it appears Representative Don Beyer did? How do you think that's going to happen?

Well, you saw the buyer statement is really telling because buyer on the call and I'll be able to describe what he said verbatim. I confirmed it on

on the call was very nervous about Biden when this was brought out in public. Sorry, Dave, we can put those comments up on the screen since you're referencing. Put B5 up, guys, just while you're talking. We can take a look at those. Because on the call, he said he's very, very fragile. His handshake is firm, but he really has trouble putting two sentences together. I believe Kamala's in a great position to win.

better position than Joe. My perfect world is Joe steps aside now, lets Kamala run as the incumbent. But once these comments came out, then he ran away from them at a million miles per hour. Yeah, you could hear the flop sweat splashing off of the cleanup comment. I don't think many Democrats want to embarrass themselves that way. You saw what happened with Mark Warner's meeting. It was leaked that he was going to meet with senators about this. And then that meeting is not going to happen. That doesn't mean a different kind of meeting won't happen. But

uh, but there's not the confidence. I think what people, what people who wanted Biden gone were trying to will into the existence was a new version of the sort of Watergate mythos where Republican senators went to Nixon and told him his position was untenable. Remember Nixon's position being untenable in a democratic majority house and Senate was different with the one Democrats face now. Uh,

that happens a lot with Democratic elites. So they say, well, this, I saw this in a history book or I saw this in the West wing. Um, that effort, it doesn't matter if Biden himself is convinced that his family is convinced that he is still in the position to win. And the way, the way he framed things in his ABC news interview was, uh, look at my record. No one else, no one else could have beat Trump. No one else could have done this. He's just not leaving any room, uh, to be helpful to the vice president. Uh,

And I really think the conversation should focus on the vice president. The rest of this clearly has been, I wouldn't say a strategic error because I didn't see much strategy behind it, but the idea of just replacing Biden with TBD popular candidate, I do think that has been helpful to Biden, making it look like a bunch of elites who don't know the party are trying to make something up. It's a version of what happened in 2019 where Mike Bloomberg and Tom Steyer decide they know it better than everybody else up in the race. But what are you going to hear from congressional Democrats? It will be a mix. And so...

Procedurally, not many members were in town last week. The letter quarters were texting the same people. They were being cautious. They wanted to stay off the record. Who is willing to go in front of a camera today or face Manu Raju in the halls or the many Manu Rajus in the Capitol and say the same thing? I think what you're going to see is a mix of opinion and Democrats dueling in the White House. Actually, it's the White House, but Biden and his circle are

pointing to the people who were defending them. And Richmond previewed it, pointing to the people who are not elite...

members of Congress from, I think Schiff's going to be a senator, but if a member of Congress from a very kind of elite Tony part of LA, they're going to point to the members from more working class districts and say, after all that, here's some sound of people defending Joe Biden. Because that's what you're missing is just weren't getting members on camera saying, I defend this president. So I think there'll be a mix of opinion and the White House in a good position to accentuate the pro-Biden opinion. Yeah.

What's your sense of where the Washington conventional wisdom needle is at on whether or not Biden's going to drop out? End of last week, it was like a death watch. Everybody seemed convinced that any minute you were going to get that news alert that the guy said he's dropping out. That needle, from my sense, seems to have moved back a little bit. But from the people that you're talking to,

what do they think is going to happen? Not what do they want to happen, but what is their expectation of how this is going to go? They're getting more worried that Biden is going to stick in, how they should couch their opinions, their takes based on that. There is some looking toward his next public appearances. Look, there's going to be reporting around

this NATO summit of how Biden looks at media. Because a part of this that's, I think, harder for domestic reporters to report, just because it's not their beat, is what the world thinks of Joe Biden in this moment. What do foreign leaders think of Biden? So I think some of the most damaging reporting of the previous week were people going back to sources who met Biden in Europe

before the debate and were saying, well, in retrospect, he looked a little slippery. He looked like he lost it in this moment. I was worried about it in this moment. What is going to come out of that meeting? But nothing might be as devastating as the debate itself. And part of what they're betting on here is just the normal half-life of people's opinion of a bad event. As people get further from the debate, what are they watching? The other part of this is that the Trump campaign is not taking advantage, if it did,

I think that, I don't know what the impact would be, but the Trump campaign put out a couple of video ads. Trump himself has put out true statements, sorry, true social statements and not said anything. You don't have Republicans previewing how they're going to blitz

with the video of him looking lost. We have it from their ads, but they've very smartly taken themselves out of the conversation because they think the best scenario here is a weakened Joe Biden running with the nomination and losing. His debate is comorbidable, et cetera, et cetera. But,

But no, talking to Republicans, they really think it's good for them if Democrats are stuck with Biden in an agonizing way where a bunch of them went on the record saying they wish they won. And so that's helped the conventional wisdom, too, move towards Biden. The fact that Republicans are not blowing this and manhandling it and polarizing Democrats in one direction. They're just letting – they're giving Biden space to regain control of the party.

which if you're a strategic, cynical Democrat, makes you think we should get rid of him. And if you're a member of Congress, just paying attention to the news and your constituents, yeah, you're not hearing as many people say the guy needs to go.

So, Dave, as someone who really understands how stuff actually works in D.C., you know, two of the words that I hear quite often are Biden's position are unsustainable. It's untenable, especially if you do have sort of the floodgates open this week and we have a lot more high ranking Democrats of the sort that, you know, the ranking members who were telling Hakeem Jeffries privately or even Hakeem Jeffries himself.

who has so far stayed completely mum in terms of his view of the situation. You could certainly imagine a scenario where after taking the temperature of his caucus via those ranking members on that call and seeing that more of them than not want Biden off the ticket, you could certainly imagine him coming out with that position saying, hey, this is the will of my caucus.

If you do have that sort of a situation, does it become untenable? Does it become impossible for Biden to hang on to the nomination? Or is there a scenario where you do have the floodgates open? You do have a number of high-level Democrats saying, I really want to see Kamala Harris in there instead of Joe Biden. And he still decides he's going to hang in there and gets the nomination and goes on to November.

Well, untenable is a tricky word because if you don't resign and you're not impeached, you're not removed from office, you're not removed from the ticket, then you have it. I remember...

I don't know, 15 incidents in 2016 where Donald Trump's position was clearly untenable and there was going to be a challenge to the convention. I remember Mike Lee, who's now about as grumpy as it gets in the Senate, going on Facebook Live to demand Trump leave the ticket in October when it just would have meant conceding the election to Hillary Clinton. Nothing's untenable if you just grind it out. And that's what Biden has done in the past. Everyone who talks to his circle or has covered him knows that the self-reliance

mythos of Joe Biden that he always gets up, he always gets up when people count him out, the elites always count him out and they're always wrong. That is more powerful than the opinion of a lot of people who fit into that category. Every column being written, every, I think I've only seen one of them, but every, well, two, I've seen two fake speeches written by colonists that Biden should give to give up the nomination. That clearly is going to have the opposite effect on

him. So, you know, nothing's there. There are rules of the party. If it was the old smoke filled room days of the 1920s, when delegates of the convention were totally unbound and interested in self-interest or other factions, would he be in trouble? But he has a delegate pool that are democratic regulars. Some of them have gone on the record saying they're worried about him, but they're

What would it take for 2,000 Democratic delegates to say, I was elected to support Joe Biden and I don't anymore? That's a lot. That's actually a big task even for anyone with the AP. They can call these delegates up. What would it take for him to say, my position is unsustainable and I can't win again versus...

my position looks unsustainable, but everyone who ever thought that about me is wrong. And that's where his head is at. So there's not a tool or process beyond just the Trump campaign. I don't want to get too much into tangents, but I remember being with people who had been around Washington a long time and assumed Trump would have to go over firing Comey or over the Ukraine call. If you just stay in power, you're a

you're fine. And the difference between Trump and Biden with regard to their parties is that it really is just the majority of the Democratic elected party supports Joe Biden. It's not 99% like support Donald Trump. So you, you'd never get count Republicans who said, I'm worried about Donald Trump's conviction. He needs to leave the tickets. None, none who were in elected office. He had to go to Liz Cheney or something. That's the main, they, he has less control over his party, but he has the same mechanics, which are like no way to get him off the ballot unless he says he wants off the ballot.

Yeah, I mean, the two differences with regard to Biden and Trump and their position with the party is both that there's a lower approval rating, lower commitment to him. And also there's just a lower level of enthusiasm. Like even the people who are like, yeah, I think Biden should stay.

there isn't the same level of like, I will follow this man through the gates of hell. He can shoot someone on Fifth Avenue. There isn't that same level of Biden commitment as you see in the Republican Party side. But I think your quote there, nothing is unsustainable if you grind it out. That's true. That's kind of what we're living through here. Dave, thank you so much for your insights this morning. We're really grateful for your time. Thanks for your time, Dave. Thanks for taking time. I appreciate it. Yeah, of course.

Hi, I'm Katie Lowes. And I'm Guillermo Diaz. And now we're back with another season of our podcast, Unpacking the Toolbox, where Guillermo and I will be rewatching the show. To officially unpack season three of Scandal. Unpredictable. You don't see it coming. It's a wild, wild ride. The twists and turns in season three. Mesmerizing. But also,

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Okay, so the discussion, of course, turns to if not Biden, then who? And the person who seems like the most likely candidate at this point is Kamala Harris. You had Jim Clyburn, who was very influential in both getting Biden the nomination last time and also getting Kamala Harris to be vice president, has put his thumb on the scales in favor of Kamala Harris very clearly if Biden were to abdicate the throne. Let's take a listen to what Clyburn had to say.

How would you feel if there is a decision for him to step down, if he decides that and he has to decide that, or if the party pressures him to do that? How would you feel if they worked around and tried to go around Kamala Harris because of her lack of high poll numbers and popularity and broadly based? Do you think it's hers to have if it is not his?

I will support her if he were to step aside. But I want to support her going forward at some time in the future. I want this ticket to continue to be Biden-Harris. And then we'll see what happens after the next election.

No, this party should not in any way do anything to work around Ms. Harris. We should do everything we can to bolster her, whether it's in second place or at the top of the ticket. The process is already in place to make it a mini primary, and I would support that. Absolutely.

We can't close that down and wish to open up everything for the general election. And I think that Kamala Harris would acquit herself very well in that kind of a process. So floating there, a mini primary, I don't know exactly how that would look. At the same time, there have been some anonymous Democratic operatives who've been circulating this now viral quote unquote case for Kamala. I can put a little bit of this up on the screen. There are a number of news outlets that got a hold of this.

The headline here, unburdened by what has been the case for Kamala. We have one goal, defeat Trump, like it or not, we have one realistic path. Kamala, they lay out the things that we know about her weaknesses and also what they perceive to be some of her strengths. And Ryan, there's an interesting and totally unexpected coalition forming online between former Bernie bros and the K-Hive, which is one of the most surprising things I've ever seen in my entire life.

But you have basically people like Jim Clyburn making common cause with some lefties who have decided basically, look, it's most likely to be Kamala and we may as well just accept it and get behind it at this point. I wonder what you make of that and also what you think of this conversation of effectively inevitability if Biden were to step aside or be pushed aside.

The Kamala, what they call Coke being coconut-pilled support is... You say they, but you mean you and your friend. Not me. I have not participated in the coconut-pilling, but I have witnessed it and been amused by it. Producer Mac. Exactly. What I think is going on here is that it was pretty hard for these ironic...

kind of hipsters to get invested in politics at all. And they really put their heart and soul into the Bernie Sanders movement and then what came after it, and they feel burned by it.

And so they are now returning to an ironic detachment. And I saw somebody-- - That's their comfort level. - That's their comfort level. And so I saw somebody on Twitter saying, "I can't actually decide and figure out which of my friends actually supports Kamala Harris and which ones ironically support Kamala Harris at this point." And the way to signal to the world

that you are ironically detached, that you don't care about anything, is to support the most ridiculous candidate you can possibly think of, and that would be Kamala Harris. And so, I think that's where that's coming from. At the same time, the kind of Bernie left

doesn't have a dog in this current fight around Biden because none of the potential replacements for him are ideologically any different. In fact, they're domestically ideologically worse than Biden, at least on foreign policy. They don't have the same kind of stain, but it's not like they necessarily disagree with him. There's a possibility they may be somewhat better on Israel's side.

It's remotely possible. That she was a little bit dissenting in the administration. We're hanging our hat on a lot of that. But that's not the stuff of like open change. Maybe she's slightly less bad on genocide. And so as a result, they're just dispassionately saying like, look, if you want to beat Trump, you got to do somebody else. Mm-hmm.

Figure it out, but this is not the guy right now. Well, with Kamala too, we've seen her. I mean, she behind the scenes at the very least has been supporting Joe Biden. She's also been coming out publicly. She had an event where she spoke to that and said, well, what about Donald Trump and all of his convictions and his felonies? Let's take a listen to that. Sadly, the press has not been covering it as much as they should in proportion to the seriousness of what just happened when the United States Supreme Court

essentially told this individual who has been convicted of 34 felonies that he will be immune from essentially the activity he has told us he is prepared to engage in if he gets back into the White House. Understand what we all know.

In 122 days, we each have the power to decide what kind of country we want to live in, understand what we know. When there has been a full-on

on intentional attack against hard-fought, hard-won freedoms and rights. When I talk about the family that raised me, yes, they took me in a stroller as they were marching and shouting for justice, knowing that justice will not be achieved unless we are prepared to march and shout and fight for it. And one of the ways we do that is through our vote.

Right, so of course, that's the infamous freedom story about Kamala Harris. Those who know will know. They're also behind the scenes reportedly, let's put this up there on the screen. In her meeting with these Democratic governors, Crystal, she said, quote, this is about saving our effing democracy.

democracy in trying to get all of them on the line. What's hilarious is that three of the governors subsequently leaked those comments to the press. Although all of them, at least for now, have stuck with Joe Biden, I believe, except for, what is it, the governor of Massachusetts? She is the only one who's even opened the door slightly. But Gavin Newsom, Gretchen Whitmer, any of the potentials, all of them have been brought into line and

they're not even floating Kamala, they're straight up like, no, I'm supporting Joe Biden. So the meeting appears to have worked. I don't know. There's a lot of behind the scenes expressing concerns, but clearly no one has had the balls to tell them to his face. That's very clear at this point. With regards to that Kamala clip, the reason that was making the rounds online is because now viewing how addled Biden is, looking at her just make some normal ass political points, people are like,

This is amazing. Yeah. Like she's looks energetic. She's youthful. She looks fantastic in that blue suit. She's talking about Donald Trump in a way that is coherent. And she didn't lose her train of thought from the beginning of the sentence to the end of her sentence. We'll take it. Although she does sometimes.

I was going to say, is that the bar that we're all sticking with? That's where we're at. Did we miss the BET, I'm on these streets interview? It doesn't seem like she has a touch more swagger right now. There's something in her that's flipping. Yeah, she is feeling it. And to your point, Crystal, about biopsy,

and not even being exposed to some of the bad news, I think that's important. One of the things we said on debate night itself was, does he even have the cognitive ability to make a sound judgment on what he's doing, on whether Kamala Harris, and this is a key question, he thinks he's the only person that could beat Donald Trump. Well-

When you look at Kamala Harris and you juxtapose it with Joe Biden on George Stephanopoulos, you realize that is patently false. And it's not as though Kamala Harris is like an amazing candidate. Obviously, she had to drop out before Iowa after spending a lot of money and getting a lot of donations from the Hamptons. She was doing great with the oligarchs and didn't even make it to Iowa. So she's not like the perfect candidate. But this man is ailing in front of us. He's got the vacant stare.

- I mean, I think she would lose. I think she would probably lose, but I think she probably still at least has a better shot than Joe Biden now. I think Biden is so cooked that at this point it's basically a foregone conclusion. I mean, look, I could be wrong. - You never know. - You can roll this in my face if you want to. You know, like maybe he gets, whatever. Maybe somebody dies, like there's a, maybe there's a war,

Whatever. There's many mitigating circumstances up until the election. As things stand right now, I would probably bet on Kamala more, especially, like you said, if she can at least make a point. I mean, I think she would still be a bad candidate. There would definitely be a lot of work for Trump. He would still likely be in the winning position. But you have to shift things around a little bit because right now you're riding so high on just look at the man.

I mean, that is the best you can possibly get. That's right. When you're Donald Trump. And every single speech interaction, everything from Biden will be scrutinized from here on out. And you have all of these clips of like, you know, Adam Schiff and all of these people saying basically he's too old. Right. This is, you know, this is outrageous. He really needs to think hard. And that seems very difficult to recover from from a political perspective. Ryan, how could this all play out?

And one of the things that, you know, the Biden defenders are saying is like, well, we had a democratic process. Millions of voters chose Joe Biden. Of course, they leave out the fact that there was no democratic process. They would not agree to any debates with the candidates who did run against Joe Biden. In certain states, they just literally

canceled the primary altogether. So it's a bit rich for them at this point to fall back on that democratic process. But do you think that it is inevitable that it would be Kamala? How would an open convention play out or the mini primary that Jim Clyburn is floating out? What are some alternative ways that this could unfold? It does feel inevitable just because of the

cowardice and power of the party establishment. But the way it could unfold is that if Biden said, look, I'm stepping down and I think that there should be an open convention, then his delegates are now released. The second question though, is if any of the candidates have the courage to actually put their names in. Like Newsom, Whitmer, all these others were afraid to challenge Biden when he was eminently beatable because they're worried that

A, they challenge him, come up short, and then they're nuked when it comes to party loyalty. Or they beat him, but they're so damaged at that point that they lose to Trump, then they're also nuked. So for a variety of different reasons, all of them took a pass at that.

They might take the same pass with Kamala Harris because they might say, look, I probably can't beat Kamala because so many people are rallying behind her so quickly. And if I do beat her, I might lose to Trump, in which case I'm toast. So from their cynical perspective. And she is probably likely to lose. And she's probably likely to lose. So they could bet on 2028. That would be their perspective. Maybe a better spot for me. Right. On the one hand, if Trump wins, there'll never be another presidential election ever in the history of America. All right, Ryan.

But, no, no, from their perspective. From their perspective. But this is what's interesting, is they're saying both things. If Trump wins, there'll never be another election. Meanwhile, I think we're going to wait until 2028. It's like, so you don't actually make it look like bullshit. As usual, by the way, for these people. Let's put, see,

five up on the screen. This was some, this is a Democratic pollster that I believe does polling either for Biden campaign or a Biden super PAC. So it is very like in the firmament of the Democratic elite, this pollster, this got leaked. And they did the trial heats with different potential Biden replacements. This particular poll does have Harris

narrowly outperforming him in the polls. And I think also going for her is the fact that she could actually campaign and like formulate a coherent sentence from here on out. And the conversation wouldn't just exclusively be about how old she is. But she is the weakest of the potential replacements. Actually, the person who comes in the strongest in these

good old Pete Buttigieg. Gretchen Whitmer is right there alongside of him and she has the advantage of Michigan, I think, would pretty much be a lock for her. She's very popular there. Um, uh,

for whatever reason. I genuinely am not really sure what the reason is. I just haven't followed it that closely. I mean, this isn't a like, I'm not trying to be snarky. In any case, I think she would do very well in Michigan and probably other Midwestern states as well. That makes her a strong contender. Newsom also does a little bit better than Kamala based on these trial heats.

you know, this is all very highly theoretical. You never know how the slings and arrows of a campaign are going to go. One of the things, Emily, that they point out in that Case for Harris memo is that she's a known quantity. She's been vetted. They know there's no surprises. They know what the weaknesses are. They also know, you know, what they could bolster her with and what potential strengths would be. In my opinion, though, that cuts both ways because there's really no element of surprise there.

For the Trump campaign, they know how to take on Kamala Harris. They've been thinking about how to take on Kamala Harris. They have all the opposition research on Kamala Harris. They know exactly what to do there. Whereas if you end up with a

Tim Walz, who's the governor of Minnesota, and Andy Beshear, who is the very popular Democratic governor of Kentucky. If you end up with someone who's a lesser known quantity, on the one hand, you take a risk because they haven't been as nationally vetted. On the other hand, you kind of have an element of surprise where it may be more difficult for the Trump campaign to be able to cope with.

Yeah, I totally agree with that. Go ahead. Yeah. You have to scramble and expend significant resources doing all of that background and oppo and trying to figure out your strategy. Yeah, I think that's absolutely true. On the other hand, Kamala Harris benefits from being the actual vice president. I mean, it's kind of easy to gloss over that because she's been somewhat laughable in her position as vice president. But she's the vice president of the United States, which when you're going around and talking to people, you can talk about your experiences with foreign leaders. You can talk about your experience in

having been in the Oval Office and been right next to the president. It makes it easier for people to imagine you in the commander in chief role. Then on the other hand, it also implicates her in this potential cover up. That's exactly what I was going to say. We were talking about the burgeoning potential Parkinson's scandal. If that starts to bubble to the surface more than it has so far, that is really, really tough for Kamala Harris. I think what the best thing, here's the other thing too, we are all living in

la la land with this idea that just because it's July that it's too early. No, for basically our entire history up until the 1980s, the candidates were not known until like a couple of months before the election. It is fine. It's normal. I'm not saying it's the best. I'd probably like the idea of getting to know people over a two-year period. But we're

reverting back to that open convention strategy, that's plenty of time. The vast majority of Americans do not pay attention to the election until three weeks before election day. That's it. It's really only a month, the IRL election. For most people who are walking around and they go, okay, how am I actually...

going to vote here. There's nothing wrong with having an open contested convention. I think the biggest mistake that either Gretchen Whitmer or Gavin Newsom made, and it's likely to your calculus, Ryan, that they would still lose and they can just wait for 2028, is they should have said, Biden, I'll see you in Chicago. I'm going for the nomination. I mean, imagine that.

If we had a single rallying candidate who's not part of the administration, boom, the establishment breaks wide open. Adam Schiff and everybody else the day after the convention can coalesce around this single person. The donors be like, we have our candidate. We are going to Chicago. All the uncommitted people, how much money you want? All right.

Let's go. You guys are all going behind this person. And then that's it. We action out a process. Now, quashing the Mark Warner meeting, Kamala's implicated. Her polling's not that great. It's like, fine, enough. I think we're on a coasting thing. Already, by the way, while we were all talking, Biden just sent a letter to all members of the House Democrats. And on the primaries, he said, do we now just say that the process didn't matter, that the voters didn't have their say? Holy.

Right. But this is the shroud. This is the shroud that they will hide behind. They're shameless and disgusting, but that's what they do. Race and democracy. Race and democracy. Small d democracy. That's all they know. And he didn't say goodest. This is like another level of desperation. Yeah, and he didn't say goodest.

Two things I wanna just point out about the Kamala Harris piece. There's been a lot of discussion online. Number one, that the Biden war chest could only go to Kamala Harris, which is like $236 million, something like that, nothing to sneeze at. On the one hand, you already have a donor who's like, I'll raise $100 million for whoever the alternative is. There will be plenty of money for the Democratic nominee, I promise you. And also, I saw some reporting that that's not even true. So

That's one of the things that's being used to bolster her case, and I don't think that that's a particularly strong point. The other thing that's being used to bolster that, well, we gotta go with Biden, is just complete and utter nonsense, which is the idea that Biden is already on the ballots and there's no changing it. He hasn't even been officially nominated yet. Of course, that's not true. And the one state where there was an issue with that, Ohio, and David Dayen did great reporting on this, and we talked about it on the show as well. Yeah.

already passed legislation to change their deadlines for their ballot. So that's all completely bunk in terms of those talking points. Right. They've already changed that.

But they're not going to keep a candidate off the Ohio ballot. They're just not. Also, they're not going to win Ohio. They could run a write-in campaign and run it on the indignity and the undemocratic nature of them keeping us off the campaign. And people would go out angry, write in whoever's name, and then they'd vote for Sherrod Brown at the same time. Right, the financial question is not serious either.

At very worst, what the campaign would have to do is return some money to major donors who would then just cut the money again. Like that happens. That happens in campaigns when people swap out or swap from state to federal or whatever. And then the rest, if they can just move it over to the DNC. They're just making up excuses at this point. France called an election, put together a coalition,

Ran the election. Two weeks. Voted. They put together the equivalent of the Bernie Bros A-Hive coalition. And had to vote and count them in less time than it takes us to count just the votes from Philadelphia. France's population is 67 million. So can we do it in what? Four weeks. We'll do it in six. This is America. Joe Biden tells me this is the land of possibility. My dad always said, Joey. And then insert fake story there.

Hi, I'm Katie Lowe's. And I'm Guillermo Diaz. And now we're back with another season of our podcast, Unpacking the Toolbox, where Guillermo and I will be rewatching the show. To officially unpack season three of Scandal. Unpredictable. You don't see it coming. It's a wild, wild ride. The twists and turns in season three. Mesmerizing. But also,

Also, we get to hang out with all of our old Scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. So many people. Even more shocking assassinations from Papa and Mama Pope. And yes, Katie and I's famous teeth pulling scene that kicks off a romance. And it was peak TV. This is new Scandal KCBQ.

content for your eyes, for your ears, for your hearts, for your minds. Well, suit up gladiators, grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for even more behind the scenes. Listen to unpacking the toolbox on the I heart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life and marriage. I don't think he knew how big it would be, how big the life I was given and live is.

I think he was like, oh, yeah, things come and go. But with me, it never came and went. Is she Donna Martin or a down-and-out divorcee? Is she living in Beverly Hills or a trailer park? In a town where the lines are blurred, Tori is finally going to clear the air in the podcast Misspelling.

When a woman has nothing to lose, she has everything to gain. I just filed for divorce. Whoa. I said the words that I've said like in my head for like 16 years. Wild. Listen to Miss Spelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome to Cheaters and Backstabbers. I'm Shadi Diaz. And I'm Kate Robards. And we are New York City stand-up comedians and best friends. And we love a good cheating and backstabbing story. So this is a series where our guests reveal their most shocking cheating stories. Join us as we learn how to avoid getting our hearts broken or our backs slashed. Listen to Cheaters and Backstabbers on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Let's talk about the media. This is a fantastic scandal that has erupted. You guys will recall last week I said Joe Biden is actually doing two interviews with two black radio hosts. And they didn't even bring you anything from them because they were useless and boring. It turns out, though, that the White House actually fed the questions to those reporters ahead of time. And this was called out and revealed in a CNN interview. Let's take a listen.

Something I listen to both of them. And there's something that's similar here. You each were you asked four questions and maybe that's what you were allowed to ask by the campaign or the White House. But they were essentially the same questions, both interviews about accomplishments, progress in your respective state. What's at stake in the election? What he has to say about his debate performance and what he would say to voters who think their vote doesn't matter or might sit this election out.

Were those questions given to you by the White House or did you have or the campaign or did you have to submit questions ahead of this interview? The questions were sent to me for approval. I approved them. OK, so the White House sent the questions to you ahead of the interview.

Yes. I got several questions, eight of them, and the four that were chosen were the ones that I approved. OK. And the reason I ask is not a criticism of either view. It's just that if the White House is trying now to prove the vim, vigor, acuity of the president, I don't know how they do that by sending questions first and...

before the interview so that the president knows what's coming. I'm not sure what's worse is taking questions from the White House, asking them straight up, approving those questions, asking those questions and then admitting it. Or you should have just been straight up not admitted it because-

This is totally crazy. This is not standard operating procedure. Even behind the scenes, I can tell you the Trump White House asked me plenty of times what I was gonna ask Trump and I never gave them the answer. But even they did not have the audacity to say, here are some questions that you should ask Trump. And that was the Trump people. So Ryan, have you ever confronted anything like this in your entire journalism career? I've never had anybody try to suggest questions. Yeah. I

To actually like pre-script questions. Like maybe topics. I've definitely had people reach out and say, hey, so-and-so is going to introduce a bill on Thursday. Would you like to do an interview on that? Maybe. And then the ground rules are always you can ask whatever you want. Right.

But like, you know, ask about the bill. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, there's an understanding that you'll throw them a question or two about whatever thing, their book or their bill or whatever. But then if you have any shred of integrity, you're not going to just, you're not even going to accept just we'll stay to this topic. Right, right.

Let alone, I'm going to ask you your prescripted questions. And then, I mean, obviously the more important, by the way, that host has now lost her position. We have that. We can put that on the screen, please. And the other one went on to admit that he also received the questions in advance and approved the same four questions, which is just insane. Obviously, the more consequential thing here, Emily, you know, apart from these two quote unquote journalists, is this.

This is where we're at with my like even these short radio interviews where they clearly picked hosts that we're gonna be super friendly and the thing about a radio interview is You don't have to get the visual and you can have an aide right there passing you notes You can have your talking points in front of you So it is the easiest possible interview you can do and even then they didn't think he could handle it unless he had Prescripted questions with pre scripted answers. I mean, it's horrible. I

It's just, he's supposed to be doing a press conference later this week, right? Yeah, allegedly, we'll see. If that actually goes- The NATO summit. Yeah, there's the NATO summit. This is a huge, this week in particular, Playbook reported this morning that some House Democrats behind the scenes are saying they're giving it until Friday. This is the week where Biden tests himself. They're all back here in DC after the 4th of July. He's already failed the test so clearly, so clearly. Yeah.

the George Stephanopoulos interview, which apparently wasn't edited. It was about 20 minutes long. He looked, I was going to say it was a vacant stare, but it's not. It's confused. He looks confused. He's whispering oddly. And now they have to stage manage the easiest possible thing for a politician with a 50 year career. Yeah. Joe Biden. Look, we would not even accept this type of conduct from a city council member.

let alone the sitting president of the United States. It's absolutely nuts. We also can show you a few other instances of people covering themselves in glory. We've got Joe Scarborough here, a little bit of what it was like before, what it was like then afterwards and how it suddenly one can change their tune. Let's take a listen. And he needs to answer the question, is he capable of moving forward? And he knows he needs to answer that question.

He needs to answer it in interviews. He needs to answer it in press conferences. He needs to answer it at the NATO summit. He needs to answer it in everything that he does. That's for the rest of us. And that's Democrats. That's independents. That's Republicans of good faith. Let's be smart. Let's take a deep breath. And let's understand it's only July the 5th.

Such an historic decision should not be made in haste. Such a historic decision should not be made in haste. And this man has now changed his story three separate times. First, Biden was the most cogent president of all time. Then maybe he needed to go. And now there is haste. There's actually a Twitter user that cut all of this together. Let's take a listen to all three. But I undersold him when I said he was cogent. He's far beyond cogent.

In fact, I think he's better than he's ever been. This is a battle for the future of American democracy. And now is a good time in June. Thank God in June and not October in June. This is the last chance for Democrats to decide whether this man we've known and loved for a very long time is up to the task. That's for the rest of us. And that's Democrats. That's independents.

That's Republicans of good faith. Let's be smart. Let's take a deep breath. Let's understand it's only July the 5th. Such an historic decision should not be made in haste. All right.

All right, so what do we think, folks? Can I say, it's worth pointing out in that first clip, it was an extended brag about how he had just spent time with Joe Biden. So he was speaking from his personal experience, having spent, I think it was four hours with Joe Biden just several months ago. So recently, Joe Scarborough went on the show the next day to brag about how he had just spent all this personal time with Joe Biden. And he's more than cogent, he's the most cogent he's ever been. He's the best he's ever been.

The only one of those comments that were not actively run by the White House before coming out of his mouth was the second one where he's like, listen, the clock is ticking. This is existential. We got to pull this guy from the ticket. And then the next one was very, very important. He couldn't walk that all the way back. But this is the White House plan is run out the clock. So for Scarborough to come out there, it's just July. Yeah.

We got plenty of time. We gotta think about this carefully. That's exactly, that's what the White House wants right now. That's why the NATO summit press conferencing is until Thursday, right? Let another week go by where Democrats are still twiddling their thumbs and going, gee, I don't know whether we should pull the plug or not. We gotta think more about it. We gotta see more interactions from him. That's why these things have dribbled out so slowly because that's precisely what they want. That's pretty cynical. But right, after Thursday, then they'll spend the weekend-

debating whether or not he said, you know, that we have the goodest relationship with NATO or a good-ass relationship with NATO. And then it's Monday as good as. And then it's Monday and he schedules something for like the next Monday. Right. And then there's a Republican convention. Right.

And then it's like, well, you know what? Actually, guys, we just nominated him in a Zoom session. Don't worry about it. We're done. It's all good. This is good. That's how we get things done. These people are shameless. We've also got this example from The New York Times. Let's put this up there on the screen. They are now admitting and they say Biden lapses are said to be increasingly common and worrisome. When months ago they published this quote, for Joe Biden, what seems like age might instead be style.

I'll tell you also, what drove me crazy about this Biden lapses are said to be increasingly common and worrisome is they cite the very clips, Crystal, that we played here on this show a mere, what, three weeks ago? Which their own newspaper said Biden dogged by unfairly edited videos and interviews. So they cite the videos in the

story videos of him shown wandering around which they allegedly had debunked a mere two weeks before that yeah and followed the bite how the white house line so they're shameless i mean the way that they're able to turn on a dime in a certain sense like i you know i'm like well okay it's at least it's glad to have you it's glad to welcome to the party right like we've been here for five years

But, you know, welcome here. So at least I don't feel like I've been crazy this entire time. But in another sense, I mean, the damage that they did previously in a certain way, I feel bad for the normie Democrat who has just been reading the New York Times. I'm like, he's fine. These videos.

But they didn't even buy it. I mean, what do you have 80% of the electorate who says it's too old? He said he was too old. So it's not like the propaganda really worked that well. Fair enough. But they were like, well, he's with it ish. You know, Matt Iglesias is out with a new column this morning and he's like, I was wrong about Biden. And he has that famous photo where it's like, I saw, I saw the rabbit while everyone saw the duck, but now I see the duck. And it's like, it's like, okay. I mean, I,

"Great, I'm glad you're here. You did spend a lot of time attacking and going out." He even admits- - Aggressively, yeah. - He even admits in his column, "I thought that all of the videos were unfairly edited." And I think that is where like the brain of everything I'm seeing is propaganda and not being honest and at least doing a little bit of a deep dive yourself. Like, "Okay, maybe it was cut off. Let's watch the full video."

Full video is actually way worse, folks. It turns out to be worse than what we originally saw. But the cheap fake cope was the shiny object. And it was what it was comfortable to go with. And it was anti-Republican. It was anti-conservative. So it was just an easy, comfortable thing to go with. And it's not going to be a lesson. Matt Iglesias is not going to change five years from now when there's a similar thing. It's just easy to do it now. It's only happening because everybody saw it on the debate stage. It's the same with John Fetterman. What...

What was it, Dasha Burns did that tough interview with John Fetterman.

for doing that. That's right. Yeah, that was outrageous. That was outrageous. You know, I noticed the same thing as you though, Sagar. It's like now that the lens has clicked into place, one of the articles, I don't remember if it was that New York Times one or the Washington Post one or one of the other ones that brought up the where's Jackie moment that we were playing at our live shows. Was that two years ago? But that's the landscape he's in now. And I don't think there's any going back

from that because they do feel embarrassed and tricked and lied to, etc. But the writing was on the wall. I mean, Ezra Klein, to his credit, one of the things he pointed out in his piece, making the case for why Biden should step aside, why Democrats should push for another nominee, was he's like, look,

Not only do we have these public instances of issues, but he's not doing much. And that's a red flag. The Super Bowl interview being a primary case in point of if this guy is so sharp, better than he's ever been, as Joe Scarborough is trying to make us believe.

then why don't you put him out to the public and prove that? And the answer to that has always been blazingly obvious if you cared to use your brain for five seconds to think about it. Yeah. Last thoughts, Ryan, before we move on? Yeah, he's screwed because of that exact dynamic.

Yeah. It just- You can't unsee it. You can't get out of it. All right, we had to put this in there, a little bit of blue and on action. If you thought that MAGA and other folks were deranged previously, they are giving them a run for their money recently. There's a new conspiracy about how ABC News has been intentionally sabotaging Joe Biden. Let's go ahead and put this up there.

on the screen. This specifically has to do with their audio. So we're gonna play one part of the interview and then another, and then the tweet will be up there explaining it. Let's take a listen to that. The heart of your case against Donald Trump is that he's only out for himself, putting his personal interests ahead of the national interest. How do you respond to critics who say that by staying in the race, you're doing the same thing? Come on. I don't think those critics know what they're talking about.

They're just wrong. It's wrong. Look, Trump is a pathological liar. Trump is, he is, have you ever seen anything Trump did that benefited somebody else, not him? You can't answer, I know. I've questioned him and his allies as persistently as any journalist has. I know you have, I'm not being critical. Yeah. I'm not being critical. But look, I mean, the man is a congenital liar.

As I said, they pointed out in that debate, he lied 27, 28 times the times or whatever number over 20 times. Talk about how good his economy was, how he brought down. You know, the heart of your case against Donald Trump is that he's only out for himself, putting his personal interests ahead of the national interest. How do you respond to critics who say that by staying in the race, you're doing the same thing? Oh, come on. Well, I don't think those critics know what they're talking about.

They're just wrong? They're just wrong. Look, Trump is a pathological liar. Trump is, he is, have you ever seen anything Trump did that benefited somebody else, not him? You can't answer, I know. I've questioned him and his allies as persistently as any journalist has. Oh, I know you have. I'm not being critical. I'm not being critical. But look, I mean, the man is a congenital liar.

As I said, they pointed out in that debate, he lied 27, 28 times the times or whatever number over 20 times. All right. So to get into the specifics of the conspiracy, they say, if you want definitive proof, ABC destroyed the audio in the Biden interview. Here you go. Left is the original audio. Right is the denoise audio. Biden's mic was, quote, EQ to pick up as much low end and high end ambient noise as possible, which is why his voice sounds so much more distorted than

than George Stephanopoulos, even with audio removal or with noise removal, the audio is beyond salvaging. You can listen for yourself. Biden team, if you're listening, never do another network interview or speech unless your own audio engineers get to set up the equipment. This has over 10,000

thousand retweets. However, our own audio engineer, our own expert who runs this show and who is an absolute professional says this, it appears it is a common location recording setup with two mics into a simple field audio mixer. With an extremely soft-spoken speaker like Biden is here, his mic level actually has to be raised up dramatically, which in turn brings up

all the ambient noise source in the room. Perhaps a video could have done a better job in post-processing to reduce that noise before broadcast, but the bottom line is I see nothing conspiratorial going on here. That is from our very own audio engineer in the control room right now. They said similar things about the debate.

Yes, they did. That's right. It's really important to note that Biden is going from a whisper to a shout. He was completely going from an extreme to another extreme. That's right. So God bless the audio engineers. Yeah, no, it's actually very difficult. Also, I love the idea that the only issue was that his voice was off. Not the content of the, we finally beat Medicare. No, that wasn't the problem. It was the mics. That was the issue here, Ryan. Yeah.

Ryan, we've been watching this now all week. The level of conspiracy is insane. One of them in particular, Aaron Ruppar, let's put this up there. Glenn Greenwald, I believe, dubbed him the Twitter dunce. He says, Biden's age and poor debate showing is obviously a legit story. But what we've seen over the last week is a hysterical feeding frenzy aimed at

at the combination of self-indication, settling old scores, claiming a scalp, the desire of some in the media to have Trump back in power. If Biden can't campaign, he should consider passing the torch, but the elite press and especially the New York Times is desperately trying to will this into existence and it's really gross. So now it's the media's fault for covering the story accurately for the very first time, Ryan. - And what you're seeing from people like Rupar is pressure that's coming from two directions. One is the obvious,

that, you know, access to the White House, to being an influencer, like that's Rupar's thing at this point. But there is also this diehard, dedicated blue MAGA band of supporters of Biden who are in Rupar's feed kind of cheering him on. Like anybody who is

engaging with Blue MAGA like Rupar is now, is seeing upticks in support, in donations, in like engagement. Exactly. All of the things. And so if that's also potentially beneficial to you when it comes to access to the White House,

- Everything's aligned. - Everything's aligned. - The audience capture and the desire to continue to be invited to the White House Christmas party, it all goes together. - Except it's still incredibly embarrassing. - It's not even nice. - I don't know. - It's not even that great. - Yeah, but it's still terribly embarrassing. And so you've seen people like Rupar start to make a turn recently where they've been saying, okay,

Biden is great and I am correct, but the media is so hostile toward him that that has created an objective condition where Biden can't win. And so despite the fact that Biden is right and I am right, actually Biden should step aside. Because of the, but not because of the mean media. Because of the mean media.

is degraded. It's because the media. You just have to bend the knee to the media. I saw these things too where people were like, look at how many articles they're doing on Biden, blah, blah, blah. It's like,

This is a really important story on every level, right? Who is running the country right now? That's important to know. This man has the nuclear codes. That seems kind of significant. We have, you know, what's being framed, but as an existential election coming up, who's going to be the nominee? Was there a gigantic coverup? Was he diagnosed with Parkinson's or something else that they kept from the American people? Like,

It's hard to think of something in the political realm that could possibly be a bigger story than this. Yeah. So to be like, you're covering this story a lot. It's like, yes. Yes.

Finally, they should have been covering the story a lot the whole time. It comes from this place of like fundamentally not wanting to admit as Chuck Todd almost did. You almost did it. He said the Biden we saw in the debate looked like the Republican caricatures. Yes. And so for the root parts of the world, it fundamentally comes from this instinct to say that anything that was coming from conservative media Republicans is wrong.

categorically wrong and disgusting. Right. Or the left, by the way. Well, yeah, of course. Yeah, absolutely. So that we cannot possibly validate it because it means we were wrong for years. Yeah. No, you're exactly right. I mean, the entire thing is just completely insane. And you're going to keep watching it, guys. This is going to just...

continue. Biden is clinging as hard as he can. Tomorrow, while we were on the show, Biden called into Morning Joe and went off again about why he's going to remain in the race. He's not letting go. And the Rupars and all of them of the world, they will continue this. They will say it's the media's fault. And already, the vicious attacks have began on the

Brian Stelters of the world and others who again are just beginning to wake up and do their jobs for the first time in five years. That's it. Yeah, Jen Psaki. They're going after her. Jen Psaki. She's not slavish enough. She's not sufficiently loyal enough. Yeah, and she's not even like aggressively calling for him to step down. She's just saying like, you know, I'm not so sure about this. I didn't think it was great. No, no, no.

Russia's sake. Right. I mean, this is as bad as MAGA. So everyone talks about the cult. This is it. You're in a straight up cult if you're one of these people. Good luck and we'll see how it goes. All right, we've got Abigail Disney standing by for an interview. Let's get to it.

Hi, I'm Katie Lowe's and I'm Guillermo Diaz. And now we're back with another season of our podcast, unpacking the toolbox where Guillermo and I will be rewatching the show to officially unpack season three of scandal. Unpredictable. You don't see it coming. It's a wild, wild ride. The twists and turns in season three mesmerizing, but

Also, we get to hang out with all of our old Scandal friends like Bellamy Young, Scott Foley, Tony Goldwyn, Debbie Allen, Kerry Washington. So many people. Even more shocking assassinations from Papa and Mama Pope. And yes, Katie and I's famous teeth-pulling scene that kicks off a romance. And it was peak TV. This is new Scandal.

Well, suit up, gladiators. Grab your big old glass of wine and prepare yourselves for even more behind the scenes. Listen to Unpacking the Toolbox on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Meet the real woman behind the tabloid headlines in a personal podcast that delves into the life of the notorious Tori Spelling, as she takes us through the ups and downs of her sometimes glamorous, sometimes chaotic life and marriage. I don't think he knew how big it would be, how big the life I was given and live is.

I think he was like, oh, yeah, things come and go. But with me, it never came and went. Is she Donna Martin or a down-and-out divorcee? Is she living in Beverly Hills or a trailer park? In a town where the lines are blurred, Tori is finally going to clear the air in the podcast Misspelling. When a woman has nothing to lose, she has everything to gain. I just filed for divorce. Whoa, I said the words. Yeah.

that I've said like in my head for like 16 years. Wild. Listen to Miss Spelling on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Angie Martinez. Check out my podcast where I talk to some of the biggest athletes, musicians, actors in the world. We go beyond the headlines and the soundbites to have real conversations about real life, death, love, and everything in between.

This life right here, just finding myself, just this relaxation, this not feeling stressed, this not feeling pressed. This is what I'm most proud of. I'm proud of Mary because I've been through hell and some horrible things. That feeling that I had of inadequacy is gone. You're going to die being you. So you got to constantly work on who you are to make sure that the stars align correctly.

Life ain't easy and it's getting harder and harder. So if you have a story to tell, if you've come through some trials, you need to share it because you're going to inspire someone. You're going to give somebody the motivation to not give up, to not quit. Listen to Angie Martinez IRL on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

So Joe Biden has never had a huge grassroots fundraising base. He has had to rely much more on large donors. So as we think about what his political future may be, very important to consider what those donors think about what his political future should be. Let's go and put this up on the screen from CNBC. This is very noteworthy. Disney heiress, wealthy Democratic donors say they won't

finance the party until Joe Biden drops out. They go on to indicate that Abigail Disney, who is the granddaughter of Roy Disney, who co-founded Walt Disney Company, told CNBC on Thursday she plans to withhold donations to the party she has funded for years until President Biden drops out of the race. And we are very fortunate to be joined this morning by Abigail Disney herself. Great to see you, Abigail. Great to see you. So just tell us what you are doing and what has brought you to this point.

Well, obviously, Biden's debate performance was incredibly upsetting. And it just, you know, part of the reason that this whole reaction has been so swift and so extreme is that the

The debate just confirmed the concerns we were already trying to look past. So it just seemed like we'd passed a point of no return. And most of America felt the same way. I hate that the party is trying to convince us that we didn't see what we plainly saw.

Had you had any personal interactions with him at fundraisers or anything like that that had caused you concern initially? Because some of the reporting we've seen is other donors say he only speaks off the teleprompter. It's only for six minutes. It's difficult to hear him, et cetera, et cetera. Those concerns were pushed aside by aides, and now they're sort of undeniable that there's a larger problem there.

Right, right. Well, this isn't based on any personal interactions I've had with him. I haven't, not since he was a senator. But I will say that just watching him walk from point A to point B, you know, when he's going out to the helicopter, I can see in his gait that it's not a healthy gait. You know, we've all had aging parents. You know, I know what the signs are. And this is not to say that in this very distinct moment today...

Is he incapable of being president? He's asking for a four-year job. And that's what we're talking about, and that's why we're so concerned.

Yeah. Abigail, the last time that we spoke, we talked a lot about just like the impact of generational wealth and all of that. But I am curious because that appears now to be turned against you by President Biden and his White House. Let's put this up there on the screen from Ron Klain. He's the former chief of staff at the White House. He says, we are the Democratic Party. These people

he's referring to major Democratic donors, don't get to decide to oust a pro-labor, pro-people president, almost framing this as some sort of class conflict. How do you see that? Because I know you're very conscientious about these things.

Yeah, it's rich, actually, for coming from the very middle center of the mainstream Democratic Party, because we know that big donors have played just as big a role in that party as they have in the Republican Party. I don't like it that as one person, I can express my opinion on a phone call

and have a phone call leaked and then have this much of a hoopla thrown around the fact that I, just one person, have decided what I've decided. No single donor or no group of donors should ever have this kind of power. And we should all take away from this lesson about you need to get the money out of politics. But as long as I have a platform, whether it's earned or not, I'm going to use it because I feel as walking into a terrible, terrible election.

- Well, Abigail, speaking of donors who probably have too much power, I recently interviewed Dimitri Melhorns, who I'm sure you're quite familiar with. And he privately and also publicly in our interview is one of the most steadfast defenders of Biden staying in the race. I wanted to play a little clip from that interview and get your reaction to it. Let's roll F4 here. - Joe Biden is haunted by the fact that in 2016,

He listened to these arguments. And he's right. We were all wrong. If he'd run in 2016, we would not be here. A lot of people, not us as much this time, but a lot of people made those same arguments to him in 2020. He stubbornly, stubbornly resisted all of them. And he saved us. I mean, it is very plausible, given how close that was, that anybody else, if our theory of Biden's brand is correct, that was it.

So all of these arguments came at him in 16. He listened. The world suffered grievously. All of these arguments came at him in 2020. He refused to listen. The world benefited tremendously. America now has the strongest economy of the world. We are powering the world economy. We are leading the free world against Russian aggression because he refused to listen to these arguments. So right now, who is he going to listen to?

I believe that fundamentally he is going to listen to voters. What he goes on to say is that if the polls plummet, then maybe he'll drop out. But as long as the polls are within the margin of error, three to four points, that he's going to stick around. How common is the view that Dimitri just shared kind of among donors at this point? Is he in the wilderness? Right.

But I haven't heard many donors express that point of view. I mean, what I'm hearing is almost unanimous. I do have to say, all I could think while I was watching him talk was, I wish we could all have such a high opinion of ourselves that we could take that long to express not a very complicated set of ideas. Yeah.

You know, the fact is that he's got too much of a platform. I've got too much of a platform. You know, there's no question these last four years have been great and we're really pleased with him. But this is not the same, for instance, as some faux pas or some gaffe at a debate. This is a problem that gets worse every single day. You know, if we were accusing him of being a...

12-legged squid. He could come out tomorrow and prove that he's not a 12-legged squid, right? But he can't come out and say, I'm not getting older because obviously that's just what happens with the passage of time. And so if he is displaying weakness now today, if he is really looking that weak in comparison to the opponent, I don't think that time is on his side. I do think it is

I'm sorry, but this extreme high opinion, white powerful men tend to have of themselves that keeps him in the running here. And I would suggest he go read King Lear. Well, one final question for me, at least, is, you know, this is sort of hypothetical, but we're hearing more and more potentially about a Parkinson's situation or something like that. And the name on everybody's mind is Kamala Harris.

What would, you know, what is your calculation in terms of where your money goes if it turns out that people like Kamala Harris, other high-level Democrats, but let's just specifically talk about Kamala Harris, knew something? Does that still, you know, do you continue to say, you know, I cannot donate to a campaign that is headed by a candidate, for instance, Kamala Harris, who knew about this and just went along with it? How would that factor into your decision for the rest of the cycle?

Look, I admire Kamala Harris today more than I did even last week. And I've always admired her greatly because I think she has demonstrated courage

what a team player she is and how she's not going to go public against her own president. Good for her. And she's articulated an incredible defense of the president based on the facts at hand. I don't think there's a cover-up because the fact is he's just aging right out there. And whether it's Parkinson's or anything else, it doesn't happen overnight.

So we know that this is a process of deterioration that we're watching. We know that the people closest to him are very protective of him, in part because he's a lovely man. He's a very nice, decent man. But unfortunately, you know, it was hard for me to get the car keys away from my mother when she had Alzheimer's. You know, it broke everybody's heart. But, you know, this is too important. The stakes are just too high.

Abigail, are you coordinating with others or is this just you out there on your own? And how do you see this process ultimately playing out? I am really out here on my own. There are other donors I talk to privately, but I actually think just I'm just going to express myself and use my platform the way I can and hope that it contributes to what seems to be a growing chorus.

of voices. And I hope and I pray that the Democratic Party is going to see fit to do the right thing. Part of me wonders if maybe what they're doing at the White House actually is buying a little time to create a bit of a smoother, smoother hand.

But, you know, what I'm really heartened by is the election in Paris or in France yesterday, because, I mean, that's what the Democratic Party has to do. There's a common enemy. The common enemy is terrifying. And we have to recognize that no matter what in November, we have to get behind it.

Blocking the common enemy and making sure the Democrats, whoever it is, wins the election this time. And I lied, I do have one final question, which is, sorry. Are there politicians, elected politicians that you have spoken with who have similarly expressed concerns?

I have not. I have not. I'm kind of deliberately not doing that because I do. I think I get this crazy platform. I haven't earned it, but I'll just use it to speak publicly in my own mind. I'm not using it to try to quietly influence anybody behind the scenes. Got it. Well, Abigail, certainly grateful for your time this morning and for your using your platform to speak out. So thank you so much for joining us. Great to see you. Thank you, Abigail.

Bye. Thank you, everybody, for watching. We really appreciate it. It was a fun special here. Chris Longby back at the desk tomorrow. Wednesday, you'll have counterpoints and we will see you all later.