Pod Insights On with Kara Swisher Kamala Harris on Trump, Tech’s Power Grab, and the Fight for Democracy About this episode Former Vice President Kamala Harris joined Kara to talk about her new book, “107 Days,” in front of a packed house at the Warner Theatre in Washington, D. C. They discussed President Trump’s weaponization of the Justice Department, the tech industry’s rightward shift, and how to combat Trump’s march toward autocracy in an age of disinformation, blatant power plays, and political exhaustion.
Want to see Kara and Scott Galloway live during the Pivot Tour November 8th-14th? Get tickets and details at PivotTour.com.
Questions? Comments? Email us at [email protected] or find us on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Threads, and Bluesky @onwithkaraswisher.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Transcript 11,051 words · 6 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:11 Kara Swisher? Hi, everyone. From New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network, this is On with Kara Swisher, and I'm Kara Swisher. My guest today is Vice President Kamala Harris. The former VP recently published a book about her 2024 campaign titled 107 Days. On Thursday, I interviewed her live onstage at the Warner Theater in Washington, DC, and I should note that, as you would expect, it was a very Kamala-friendly crowd. 107 Days is a first-person account of what will probably go down as the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Although the book has gotten mixed reviews, it's also been on the bestseller lists, and it's a fascinating window into what it's
0:51 Kara Swisher? like to get suddenly thrust into an ultra-condensed presidential campaign for the most powerful office in the world against, of all people, Donald Trump. I wanted to talk to Harris about the election, recent news, including the indictment of New York Attorney General Letitia James, the tech industry, her thoughts on how Americans can fight back against Trump's authoritarian tendencies, and what comes next for the country. To me, the most interesting thing about Harris right now is how right she was about the things Donald Trump would do. It's not exactly an "I told you so," but she did tell us. At the same time, she and Democrats are powerless to do anything about it. And this was a great opportunity
1:34 Kara Swisher? to delve into some of the most complex topics facing America with someone who is almost president. Before we get to the interview, I'm doing a live Pivot Tour with my co-host, Scott Galloway. The live tour runs November 8th through 14th, and it hits Toronto, Boston, New York, DC, Chicago, San Francisco, and LA. Tickets are available at pivottour.com. All right, let's get to it. Our expert question comes from another person who ran against Donald Trump, Hillary Rodham Clinton. So stick around.
2:13 Kara Swisher? Support for this show comes from The Guardian and their new show, Stateside, where journalists Kai Wright and Carter Sherman use the entire independent reporting resources of The Guardian to slow down the news and wrestle with the questions we all have about what is actually happening in the world. Join Kai and Carter three times a week as they utilize all the reporting resources The Guardian has across news, international coverage, climate, culture, wellness, and more. And The Guardian's not owned by a billionaire, they fearlessly report the facts without interference. Go to theguardian.com/stateside to learn more and listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch on YouTube. That's theguardian.com/stateside.
2:57 Speaker 01 Ripple has been powering modern finance for a decade. We're leading the charge to bridge the gap between existing financial systems and the future of finance. You can have it all: legacy, stability, and digital innovation. Systems that work with your other systems. Because with the right partner, the question isn't crypto or traditional finance. The question is simply, why choose? A new standard of modern finance. It's happening with Ripple. For informational purposes only, availability of products can vary and may be provided by different Ripple entities.
3:28 Speaker 02 Are you a pet owner? Every six seconds, a pet owner in the US gets hit with a vet bill over $1,000. Always an unwelcome surprise. That's where Fetch comes in. Fetch is the most complete pet insurance for dogs and cats, according to consumeradvocate.org. You get paid back up to 90% of vet bills at any vet in the US and Canada with claims paid back in as little as two days. Go to fetchpet.com/save right now for your free quote. That's fetchpet.com/save.
4:09 Kara Swisher? Thanks for coming on ON. We're doing this for my ON podcast. I really appreciate you. Sure. And we do have lots to talk about. So you've already been asked every possible question there is about former President Biden and his decision to run for reelection. I don't really care at this point. It's because it's about the past. And by the time we finish here, probably nine or 10 crazy shit things are going to happen, like in the next... I had told Vice President about Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s link between circumcision and autism today. And literally, she goes, "What?" Do your reaction again.
4:45 Speaker 03 Well, here's the thing, Kara. I mean, in all seriousness, and many of you know my background, and you also know that I am the daughter of a mother who was a scientist. And my mother had two goals in her life: to raise my sister Maya and me, and to end breast cancer. And my mother, when we were growing up, used to go to this place that Maya and I only knew as mommy is going to this place called Bethesda. Because, you see, my mother was an advisor at NIH. And she would leave us in the Bay Area to go
5:27 Speaker 03 to NIH to work with scientists who have as their goal to alleviate pain and to uplift the human condition. And when I see what these people are doing right now, to end the war on cancer, to deny science and fire scientists, Kara, it's personal for me. It's personal for me. And I can't laugh at it, because, like so many of you who have
6:04 Speaker 03 known people who suffer because of unknown diseases or cancers, for which there are no cures, or there is the beginning of, but more work that needs to be done for the cure? What they are doing to push... Misinformation and lies at the highest level of government? It's criminal. And people will die because of what they're doing.
6:33 Kara Swisher? It's a weird one. It's a, anyway.
6:34 Speaker 03 It's fucked up.
6:35 Kara Swisher? It's fucked up.
6:39 Kara Swisher? During, um, so let's.
6:45 Kara Swisher? Let's, uh, get into that. So during the campaign, you said Trump was unstable, unfit to serve, dangerous and a fascist. He's, he's proven you right in innumerable ways. Um, uh, but since you're a former prosecutor, let's focus on the legal dimensions of what's happening. Um, you know, you did talk about in the book, you don't love saying, I told you so, but a lot of your quotes now are getting replayed.
7:09 Speaker 03 Yeah.
7:10 Kara Swisher? She said that, that's right. Um, he pardoned the J six rioters, he attacked law firms, he's firing lawyers at the DHA, investigating and prosecuting perceived enemies, deploying troops domestically. Uh, he just indicted Letitia James, uh, as you know, just today.
7:29 Speaker 03 After a, a Department of Justice prosecutor who was a Republican reviewed the evidence and decided there was not sufficient evidence to charge her. And is now longer there and he puts his flunky in and to pursue a political vendetta.
7:47 Kara Swisher? Right.
7:47 Speaker 03 And now the Attorney General of the State of New York has been indicted. Think about this.
7:56 Kara Swisher? Yes, exactly. So I'm going to ask you about that. So, so, and he's deploying troops domestically, which is something you said would happen. Um, even Republican Governor Stitt of Oklahoma has objected to sending the National Guard into states against the wishes of the governor. Can our system of justice survive three more years of this? Because even though, okay, well, I want her to answer, not you.
8:20 Speaker 03 But I care about what you have to say.
8:22 Kara Swisher? Because he's, the, the ju, uh, judges have intervened, but he is moving relatively unchecked, one thing after the next.
8:32 Speaker 03 Every day, every day, every day, something is coming out of this White House. Every day.
8:42 Speaker 03 The point you made about the Secretary of Health and Human Services this afternoon indicting the Attorney General of New York every single day. And I will be very candid with all the friends here. I don't know that it won't get worse before it gets better. And I said that yesterday in Atlanta, and then this happened today. Now, I'm serious. I said it yesterday, I said it the day before, been on this book tour. And every single day, something happens, Kara. And part of my dilemma, if you will, that I know is shared,
9:26 Speaker 03 I don't have the solution right now to how it stops before the end of his term. But I know that we have to fight. We have to fight, we have to stand strong. We cannot get used to this. We cannot be overwhelmed, we cannot be silenced. I was talking to, there's a young man here who is a senior in high school. I'm not going to call you out, but get your college applications in like we discussed. He's here with his father, who is a former member of our administration.
10:10 Speaker 03 And I said to him, he said that he grew up as a high school senior really only being aware of a Trump as president. But the three and a half months of our campaign, the 107 days, gave him a sense of hope. And it inspired him in a way that he had not been before, about what could happen through our government for our country. And here's what I would say to him and to all of us. One of the reasons I wrote this book is to hopefully remind us of how those 107 days felt, to remind us of the sense of optimism, possibility,
10:56 Speaker 03 and dare I say, joy, that we feel that everyone brought to it. It's inside of us.
11:05 Speaker 03 And that light that is inside of us, especially in this moment of darkness, we cannot allow it to be extinguished. We have to see it in each other and let that guide us during this darkness to get through this without giving up. We cannot let that light be extinguished. And Kara, I'm out here talking to a lot of people.
11:27 Kara Swisher? Right.
11:28 Speaker 03 And I cannot tell you the number of people who come up to me crying.
11:33 Speaker 03 It is a regular experience that I have because there are people are in so much pain about what's happening in our country right now and on edge. And part of what I hope this book does and these conversations do is just allow us all to see the community in which we gather today and remind ourselves that we're all in this. We feel the same way. I know I said something the other day that apparently went viral about we're not crazy.
12:08 Speaker 03 But we have to remember that because to your point, three years, we have three more years of this and we can't lose sight of our fight.
12:15 Kara Swisher? I want you to though put your legal hat in. I know you said, I don't know what to do, but you've been in jams, you've been in legal. The courts are the things that are pushing back the most. I mean, even if they don't feel effective.
12:27 Speaker 03 Except the Supreme Court.
12:28 Kara Swisher? Except the, I'm going to get to the Supreme Court. It's the last guard rail.
12:31 Speaker 03 And certain federal judges, but at a local level, I mean, at the lowest level in terms of federal courts and where state courts have jurisdiction, yes, but the guard rails are failing to a great extent. And I did predict that.
12:50 Speaker 03 To your point, I predicted almost all of this, except I did not predict the capitulation.
12:56 Speaker 03 I did not predict that, you know, the titans of industry, I thought at some point, I mean, I say this as a devout public servant, I thought at some point they would kick in if push came to shove.
13:12 Speaker 03 And no, they're just bending knee at the foot of a tyrant. And so, yes, the courts to some extent are. But, you know, there's a, there's a agenda at play here. What we are experiencing in terms of what this administration is doing is, is the culmination of decades of work. Part of the mistake that I think we are making is we're so overwhelmed by this because it feels chaotic, when in fact, what we are witnessing is a high-velocity event that is about the swift implementation of a plan that has been decades in the making. The Federalist Society, the Heritage Foundation.
13:55 Speaker 03 Project 2025 didn't just fall out of the air. It is the product of decades of work. And the people around this president are very much as culpable as he is for facilitating an implementation of this plan that includes years of work gerrymandering the states and, and building it up so that we would have the Supreme Court we now have.
14:20 Kara Swisher? So, when you say you don't have a solution, and it hurts you that you don't have a solution, there is nothing, as someone who's an experienced prosecutor, a senator, you know, an AG, thinks about. Like, you, you mentioned the Supreme Court. Give it, give us your judgment of how, what it's doing right now. And, and do you think it'll ever rein in the excesses? Or not at all? They've given him an expansive view of executive power.
14:46 Speaker 03 I mean, listen, I, I, we talked about it in those 107 days, when the Supreme Court basically told the President of the United States he would be immune as President of the United States for any misconduct while in office. That happened before the election. We talked about it at rallies. We knew this would happen. We knew this would happen. And so, the question, when I say I don't have a solution,
15:16 Speaker 03 the point is that the guardrails have failed, for the most part, except one guardrail, which is the people. And the power of the people. To organize and not give up and pay attention to how we got here. See where we are now and think about where we are headed, both in terms of whatever we can do to determine our destiny, but also to not repeat where we've been. And part of that requires that we understand the solution is not going to be the next election necessarily. It'll be part of it. We got to take back the House. We have to take back the House. We have to take back the Senate. But it's going to be more than that.
15:59 Speaker 03 And the solutions that we need are going to have to be about, yes, the immediate term, but also a reconstruction of how we've been thinking about how we end up in a place like this and understanding it's about what happens at the local level, the statewide level, as well as what happens here in DC.
16:15 Kara Swisher? Have you yourself felt with Letitia James being targeted? There's many others. Have you felt that you could be targeted, worried about being indicted?
16:24 Speaker 03 Sure, of course.
16:32 Speaker 03 For the people that are watching this on radio.
16:37 Speaker 03 See what I just did there? Yes, of course. I just raised my hand.
16:41 Kara Swisher? So, so right now in this moment, if the Supreme Court isn't a guardrail, which it isn't, it hasn't been so far, what is in this moment, from a legal point of view, the guardrail that you see? Just the people?
16:57 Speaker 03 Well, no, it's the courts, of course. From the legal perspective, it's the courts. But when we talk about an overall system, it is not only the courts, especially when we know that if it goes to the highest court, which most of this litigation will.
17:10 Kara Swisher? Right.
17:11 Speaker 03 We can count on this court basically telling this president, he can do whatever he wants as the leader of the executive branch. So what can we do? We can, we can reinvest in the three co-equal branches of government and hope that, that where the courts fail, if it goes to the highest court, that we at least at the, at another branch have a Congress. But we can also see that we've had complicit legislators who are Republicans and know what is wrong about this and are not stepping up.
17:44 Speaker 03 You know, I do believe there are a lot of people who know what's wrong with this, don't agree with it even though they vote a certain way. But they are living in fear of retribution and more invested in their own political survival than speaking up and taking the hits that might come.
18:03 Kara Swisher? Do they say that to you? Do people say that to you? You were colleagues with a lot of the people in the Senate, for example.
18:09 Speaker 03 Well, you know, I look right now at what my former colleagues in the Senate are doing, and I praise them for having the ability to say that we are not going to compromise affordable healthcare for the American people.
18:22 Kara Swisher? What about the Republicans?
18:28 Speaker 03 I know there are plenty of Republicans who know this is wrong, but they're not stepping up. It's like these CEOs who know it is wrong. I don't believe that the people who are flattering Donald Trump, who are offering him favors, necessarily believe in what he is doing or believe it is right. But they want power. And that's part of what we are dealing with right now. They want power and they're not willing to compromise their power or access to power for the sake of the Constitution and our democracy. They are feckless and they are self-interested.
19:10 Speaker 03 Because, understand, so many of, for example, those heads of industry who are doing it, they know what is wrong, but they want that merger to go through. Or they don't want to be investigated. Or they want to hold on to, not that they're going to lose that house in the Hamptons and that yacht, but it's about power. And that's why I have always said and do believe that ultimately the power rests with the people. Look, for example, at what happened around, and by the way, did you see that Donald Trump just said, yeah, he's basically getting rid of free speech? He said it. He said a lot of things that he meant, including just that most recently. But here's what happened.
19:55 Speaker 03 When he, as thin-skinned as he is, could not take the criticism of a political satirist...
20:06 Speaker 03 The people spoke with the power of the purse and Jimmy Kimmel is back on that stage.
20:20 Kara Swisher? We'll be back in a minute.
20:27 Kara Swisher? Support for this show comes from The Guardian. Trying to locate news sources that reliably separate fact from fiction can seem like looking for a needle in a haystack these days. Social media feeds, cable news, and subscription-based news outlets might be able to give you one version of the news, but not in the way that you need. You want news fast, but slow enough to actually absorb the information. Stateside with Kai Wright and Carter Sherman is here to do just that. The podcast tries to slow down the news and wrestle with the questions regarding the world at large at your own pace. Three times a week, hosts Kai Wright and Carter Sherman bring their expertise together to showcase different and engaging perspectives regarding the world today. They will use their collective knowledge to discuss the news, international affairs,
21:11 Kara Swisher? climate, culture, sports, lifestyle, fashion, and wellness. Plus, The Guardian wants to emphasize they're not billionaire-owned, meaning they're free to report the whole picture without interference. Go to theguardian.com/stateside to learn more and listen wherever you get your podcasts, or watch on YouTube starting May 13. Support for this show comes from Delete Me. Have you ever Googled yourself and found your home address, phone number, or the name of a family member? It's unsettling. Here's what you do to clean up your online data footprint. Go to joindelete.me/kara and enter the code Kara. You get 20% off Delete Me. Delete Me removes your personal information that's being sold online.
21:53 Kara Swisher? Delete Me was named the top pick for data removal services by Wirecutter, so you know you're in good hands. I really like Delete Me. I use it all the time. It's always surprising how much data people have about me. I am very privacy forward, and I still find so much stuff of mine online, some of which is incorrect, some of which is compiled in a really disturbing way, and you have to sort of control it like we Take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for Delete Me. Now, at a special discount for our listeners, get 20% off your Delete Me plan when you go to joindelete.me/kara and use the promo code Kara at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to joindelete.me/kara and enter the code Kara at checkout.
22:36 Kara Swisher? That's joindelete.me/kara code Kara.
22:45 Kara Swisher? Support for this show comes from Hers. Losing weight on your own can often feel like a fight you never win. Luckily, weight loss by Hers offers access to the FDA-approved Wegovy pill and the Wegovy pen. Wegovy is the first-ever GLP-1 weight loss medication available in a pill, but also comes as a pen, so you've got options. With Wegovy, you can lose up to 20% of your body weight. People lost an average of 14% body weight at 64 weeks in a clinical trial of Wegovy alongside diet and exercise. To get started with Wegovy, just go to forhers.com and complete an online consultation with a licensed provider who will determine if your prescription is appropriate. And Hers doesn't stop there. Nutrition and lifestyle guidance are part of the plan, along with access to 24/7 messaging
23:30 Kara Swisher? with your care team, so support is always in reach. Ready to reach your goals? Visit forhers.com/kara to access personalized, affordable care for weight loss, hair, menopause, and more. That's forhers.com/kara. Individual results may vary, and stopping treatment may result in weight regain.
23:53 Kara Swisher? So, we're going to get to the corporate, especially the tech executives, who you and I both know really well from being in California and especially San Francisco. But I want to, something from the book. You faced unique challenges simply because of who you are, in many ways, besides the speed of what you had to do. I want you to talk a little bit about what you thought was the most complex part of running for president. Was it the time? Was it being a woman? Was it being a woman of color? What, from your perspective, was the most difficult parts of those 107 days?
24:26 Speaker 03 Well, I've always been a woman.
24:28 Kara Swisher? Yes.
24:29 Speaker 03 And a woman of color, so that kind of is... But it's the ti... It's the ti... I think that one of the biggest... The thing that I was most acutely aware of was the time.
24:42 Speaker 03 And that's why I named the book 107 Days. And for those of you who have not yet read it, I basically wrote it like a journal. Not every single of the 107 days, but many of them. So it's by date and what happened on particular days. And I was acutely aware, as I have talked about. My prayer every night was, God, please let me have done everything I could possibly do in this one day. I mean, I traveled several states in a day. I couldn't do enough. And that was probably the most-
25:18 Kara Swisher? The time constraint.
25:19 Speaker 03 Yeah.
25:20 Kara Swisher? In doing what? Didn't people not getting to know you enough? Not what?
25:24 Speaker 03 No, it's not that simple. I mean, it's about, it's about, yes, getting to know me and my background and what I've done and the fact that I was elected district attorney for two terms as the first woman elected attorney general of the state of California, ran the second largest Department of Justice in the United States, second only to the United States Department of Justice. I was a United States senator, second black woman elected in the history of the United States senate, and I was the first woman vice president of the United States. So there are those things that I needed to make sure that people knew.
25:59 Kara Swisher? That is a decent, that is a decent resume, but go ahead.
26:02 Speaker 03 But there, well, some people have actually said I was the most qualified candidate ever to run for president.
26:13 Kara Swisher? I like the some people say, very nice, but go ahead.
26:18 Speaker 03 I'm just speaking fact.
26:20 Kara Swisher? Yeah.
26:22 Speaker 03 But, but for example, I discuss in the timeline, we had policy work to do that was about letting people know where I stood on the fact that I wanted to make sure that, for example, it was my intention, and I know there are a lot of beautiful public servants here today, some of who are not, have been let go over the last several months, and some of who are furloughed, and I thank you all for your service and everything that you do. And if we can just applaud those who are here.
27:01 Speaker 03 But for example, one of the things that I intended to do was as the president, we then have the largest workforce, right, is the federal government. And I intended to figure out a way to reclassify job descriptions by skill, not just by college degree. And then to challenge the private sector to do the same. Because I do believe, as we think about the future of work, that is how we should think. And not just think that only someone with a college degree has the skills to perform the job in a way that adds value to all of us.
27:43 Speaker 03 The work that we wanted to do around $25,000 down payment assistance for first time home buyers, and I could go on and on.
27:51 Kara Swisher? Right.
27:52 Speaker 03 It took time for people to hear those things. One of the things that was very popular, and we knew that in every day it was gaining around people knowing about my policy, was around having Medicare cover home health care. It was very popular when people learned about it, because when my mother was sick, I helped take care of her. And I was blessed and fortunate enough to have a job where I could leave work to do that and get paid. But there are so many families, especially if you're in the sandwich generation, raising young children and taking care of an elder relative, that you just can't afford to do it. And my policy was to have Medicare cover it.
28:36 Kara Swisher? Sure, yeah.
28:37 Speaker 03 The more people found out about that, the more they understood that it related to an immediate need of theirs.
28:44 Kara Swisher? Right.
28:45 Speaker 03 But there just wasn't enough time. You know, as many people have heard, people need to hear the same thing at least three times before it sinks in.
28:53 Kara Swisher? Mm-hmm.
28:54 Speaker 03 That's about time.
28:55 Kara Swisher? I'm curious, did you think a primary would have done that, if they had done a primary and you weren't?
28:59 Speaker 03 It depends on when the primary would have been.
29:01 Kara Swisher? Right.
29:02 Speaker 03 But no, not with 107 days. When were you going to do a primary?
29:06 Kara Swisher? Right.
29:07 Speaker 03 I invite, listen, I go through, on July 21st, when I got the call from Joe Biden, and just to set the scene for those of you who haven't yet read it, I was in my sweats.
29:18 Speaker 03 On a carpet on the floor with my baby nieces, six and eight, doing a puzzle.
29:24 Speaker 03 Having just made pancakes. And I promised them lots of bacon and sausage. For Sunday brunch, I had been the night before in Provincetown, P-Town, which they named VP-Town. For a fundraiser for the Biden-Harris ticket. And I got in late that night and I'd promised the kids who were staying with us. My niece and her husband and their children. That I would do pancakes the next morning. And so we did. And that's where I was with the kids. When I got Joe Biden's call. And. The challenge that we had from that day forward was having enough time.
30:06 Kara Swisher? Sure, and you noted that because you wanted them to endorse you immediately. You had that discussion with Steve Rochetti.
30:13 Speaker 03 But I told all those people I called, I talked to over 100 people that day.
30:18 Speaker 03 And I told. Everyone who wanted to know if you want to have, if you want to have some process, this is the process. I'm calling everybody to ask for their support. Anybody else who wants to jump in, come on in. And nobody did.
30:33 Kara Swisher? So do you, when you think, you're noting time is the issue. One of the, one of the things you talked about was also media and the social media and getting out there and getting these messages out there, which Trump is very good at. He really is quite good at those things. You and I talked about it and I think at the time I said, you need to be promiscuous, the ways Trump is on social media. In other ways, possibly too, but. But you wrote in the book, which I was, which I noted, that you wanted the first interview to be flawless. Talk about that, that in getting out these messages. Were you too cautious? Had you, do you wish you, what did you wish you had done differently? Or perhaps not at all? I mean, I know a lot was made of the Rogan thing.
31:17 Kara Swisher? I think he played you, honestly.
31:21 Kara Swisher? When you think about what you did. What would, is flawless better or maybe not so flawless?
31:30 Speaker 03 Well, I talk about this in the book, as you know.
31:33 Kara Swisher? Yeah, exactly.
31:34 Speaker 03 And I talk about what I thought I could have done differently.
31:36 Kara Swisher? Yeah.
31:37 Speaker 03 But, listen, my standard for myself has always been that I have to be flawless.
31:45 Speaker 03 I won't always be, and I know that. But I'm very clear about what my standard for myself has to be.
31:51 Kara Swisher? Right. It was a great word, too.
31:52 Speaker 03 Let me finish.
31:53 Kara Swisher? All right.
31:53 Speaker 03 And I know...
31:54 Kara Swisher? Let me finish. Oh, you did that. Good.
31:55 Speaker 03 And I know the standard by which I will be judged.
31:59 Kara Swisher? Right.
32:00 Speaker 03 So, you know, this connects to the question you asked me earlier. I'm very clear about that, and I'm sure it's a shared experience for many people here. Which is, we know the standard by which we will be judged, and just clear-eyed about that. So, yeah, that's the standard I hold myself to. I know I am not flawless, and I certainly am not perfect.
32:22 Kara Swisher? Can you talk a little bit more about that, in terms of why you feel that? When so much of politics isn't that. No, I'm just curious. When you think about doing that, and politics has degenerated, is that... Have things changed, from your perspective?
32:41 Speaker 03 No.
32:42 Kara Swisher? Okay.
32:42 Speaker 03 No, no, no.
32:45 Kara Swisher? That's her answer.
32:47 Speaker 03 No. There are... I mean, things have definitely degenerated. I agree with that. And, I mean, the floor has just... I don't know that there is a floor right now.
32:58 Kara Swisher? Yeah.
32:59 Speaker 03 Part of what I have thought about and discussed is, again, when we look at where we are now, it did not just happen overnight. Part of what I discuss is that if you look at a pattern that was starting to set in... Think of it in terms of Ronald Reagan's celebrity. Newt Gingrich's base level of discourse. Pat Buchanan's nativism. And then look at where we are now. So there are connections to be seen that one can argue pointed out to us had we at
33:40 Speaker 03 least more clarity around it from hindsight, that this is where it was going.
33:47 Kara Swisher? Mm-hmm.
33:48 Speaker 03 And this is where we are. And it is. It has been reduced to a level where there's really apparently no desire to have real discourse or debate based on merit and fact. Not to mention, as you and I have discussed extensively, the rampant amount of misinformation.
34:07 Kara Swisher? Right.
34:08 Speaker 03 That is so very difficult to get in front of. Part of what I would offer all of us is to really reflect on the fact that we, there are many disagreements to be had by people that voted differently than us in that last election, but let's please not make an assumption that we're working with the same set of facts. And that's something that we need to grapple with. And again, when we go back to what are the solutions?
34:36 Kara Swisher? Mm-hmm.
34:37 Speaker 03 Well, that is, that won't end what's happening right now out of the White House, but it is part of the solution going forward, is to reflect on what is the power of the people, of each one of us, to really be intentional and conscious about the rampant amount of misinformation. And with the, with the, with the facts that we know, how can we engage our neighbors, our family members, our friends in a way that is productive to make sure that we're all working with the same set of facts? Because that's going to be, that is part of what I believe is our undoing and will be a continuing source of our vulnerability as a nation, if we don't all participate in addressing that issue of misinformation.
35:22 Kara Swisher? Which is something we've talked about a lot, is the prevalence of misinformation. And now with the tech executives sort of sucking, not sort of sucking up to Trump rather egregiously.
35:31 Speaker 03 Mm-hmm.
35:32 Kara Swisher? I want to get to them in a second, because you and I have talked about that a lot. I remember one of the last discussions we had when you were at the White House was when you were headed for the AI summit in Britain.
35:40 Speaker 03 Right.
35:41 Kara Swisher? But let's talk a little bit about this because the person who is the most pernicious purveyor of this is, has been President Trump, leading up, and you're right, to go from, especially Pat Buchanan, Newt Gingrich, it just, it moves its way up. But we'll start with an expert question from someone who has a very unique insight into, into President Trump, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Yeah, take a look. Oh.
36:06 Speaker 04 Hello, Kamala.
36:07 Kara Swisher? Oh, wow.
36:08 Speaker 04 Well, I know that you're on stage with Kara Swisher, and she invited me to ask you a question. So, really, I want to know this. I debated Trump three times. You debated him once. He wouldn't debate you again. We beat him four times. Do you think we're the reason he is so unhinged today?
36:28 Kara Swisher? Oh, all right. She enjoyed doing that.
36:39 Speaker 03 I talk about Hillary in the book, too.
36:42 Kara Swisher? You do.
36:43 Speaker 03 And with great admiration and, and, and love and respect. Yeah, I mean, he, he is, no doubt, he is unhinged. And, and I, and Secretary Clinton did the work in her debates of, of demonstrating that, as I attempted to do in my debate with him. We have, in this president, the most, not one of, the most callous, corrupt, and incompetent individuals that has ever occupied that White House.
37:26 Speaker 03 And unhinged is the least of the concerns that I have, but it, it, it ranks right up there. And, you know, the debate, look, I mean, okay, so part of it is, so what happened was...
37:49 Speaker 03 So, so, debate camp, which was really intense. And then, we get to Philly, and my team, and it's Kirsten Allen, who many people here may know, and Brian Fallon, and they're getting me ready, and they're like, "Hey, boss." So, we saw Donald Trump coming off the plane, coming to the debate, and Laura Lumer was on the plane with him.
38:15 Kara Swisher? Oh.
38:16 Speaker 03 And so, they basically say to me, "We didn't tell you, but she's been talking about people eating cats and dogs."
38:25 Kara Swisher? Mm-hmm.
38:26 Speaker 03 And I was like, "What?" And they said, "We think we need to tell you, because his propensity is to say the last thing he heard."
38:36 Kara Swisher? Oh.
38:39 Speaker 03 And sure enough, on the debate stage, he said it. He said it!
38:46 Kara Swisher? And we were ready.
38:48 Speaker 03 I was prepped, but not really.
38:55 Speaker 03 Unhinged.
38:57 Kara Swisher? Okay. Now, one of the things you do write in the book is about the appealing side of him. You sort of, you turn it over, like, "What is it?"
39:05 Speaker 03 Yeah.
39:06 Kara Swisher? Talk about what you think that is, and then, the change, because there's been, well, he's always been awful, but, is there been a change from your perspective? Because you do talk about it.
39:17 Speaker 03 I just share facts. Look, I don't, I don't know the man more than anybody else here. I debated him. I shook his hand at the debate, because I always shake somebody's hand when I first meet them. But I do talk about the conversations that he and I had, and I talk about Jekyll and Hyde.
39:38 Kara Swisher? Yeah, you said you had to remind yourself that he was a con man.
39:42 Speaker 03 Because during this brief conversation, he sounded very normal.
39:55 Speaker 03 Right, I mean, so it's, I don't, yeah, that's what con men do. I mean, look, so when I first got in the race after July 21st, we had to go at least about two weeks without any polling, right? So it was just my gut about what we should do. And so I started giving this speech that I came up with. And Adam Frankel is here, has always been part of my team and helping me get my thoughts together. And basically, I said, you know, I've been a DA, so I have prosecuted these kinds of things. And when I was Attorney General, I took on fraud.
40:35 Speaker 03 And I said, so basically, so all of those qualifications, so I know his type. So I do know his type. And therefore, I know that he is not unlike a con man, that he can turn it on and he can turn it off. But whatever he's doing is for his own well-being and to take care of himself. Let's be clear about that. Let's be clear about what he is doing to monetize this presidency for himself. Let's be clear about the fact that he is, in many ways, compromising national security when he is taking a plane from a foreign government.
41:15 Speaker 03 I call it, you know, you might call it a luxury jet, I call it a Trojan horse. It's, so that's what con men do. But this con man happens to be President of the United States, making decisions that are, in such a tremendous way, injuring the people of our nation and our standing around the world.
41:43 Kara Swisher? Have you noticed a change more recently, or in this administration? Obviously, there's a difference between the administrations, but have you noticed that or not? Or it's the same administration, just more explicitly corrupt?
41:56 Speaker 03 I think it's more experienced to know the levers.
42:01 Speaker 03 And that is part of what we are witnessing. And then, but, but again, to your earlier point, compounded by the Supreme Court telling him he could do whatever he wants. So there's no, this is part of what we talked about in 107 days and, and, and everywhere, including on the ellipse that night, which is, everything is basically suggesting there will be no accountability for anything he does in office. That's why Mike Pence wasn't running with him and he got this other guy who would rubber stamp everything he does and hope that he'll be the successor. You've got a court that has said you can do anything and get away with it.
42:45 Speaker 03 You have a Congress that is bending the knee. And, and so they came in, unlike, you know, before, there was a vice president who stood up. There was a, a chief of staff in Kelly, Mark Milley, there, who would have, I'm sure, said, "You cannot turn the United States military on the streets of America like what they're doing right now in Chicago with Blackhawks in the cities of America." There were guardrails within the administration and external to the administration.
43:20 Kara Swisher? Right.
43:21 Speaker 03 All gone.
43:22 Kara Swisher? These are people who know the lever. Now, the administration is obviously stacked, staffed by sycophants. It feels very sycophantic. Some of them, like Russell, vote, very effective. Others, Pam Bondi, Brandon Carr, Stephen Miller, seem unhinged. Carr seems to have overstepped with Kimmel and has moved back slightly. Bondi is getting pushed back over Epstein. Miller, I don't know what to say. Is there a way for Democrats to publicize their hackery and fanaticism and use it strategically? Is that, or, or is it just they know the levers and can, and he's found people willing to pull them, like in Virginia with Letitia James?
44:05 Speaker 03 We have to continue to highlight the corruption and the, literally the violation of rule of law and all the, and all of the, the essence and spirit behind rule of law and the Constitution of the United States. Free speech, free association, just freedom, period.
44:27 Speaker 03 But we have to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time.
44:31 Kara Swisher? Right.
44:33 Speaker 03 Part of how I think about it is, we do have to understand that there are, I think, a fair number of people that voted for Donald Trump.
44:44 Speaker 03 Because they believed him when he said he'd bring down prices. They believed him. He lied. Which is why the cost of groceries is up, unemployment is up. And part of then chewing and walking gum and chewing at the same time is, as Democrats, we also have to emphasize what our plan is immediately for bringing down the cost of everyday life. And all of those things have to happen at the same time.
45:15 Kara Swisher? We'll be back in a minute.
45:25 Kara Swisher? Support for this show comes from Indeed. When the pressure's on and you need to hire the right person for the job, Indeed Sponsored Jobs has got your back. Instead of forcing you to spend tons of time searching, Indeed Sponsored Jobs matches you with quality candidates, fast. According to their data, sponsored jobs posted directly on Indeed are 95% more likely to report a hire than non-sponsored jobs. Join the 3.3 million employers worldwide that use Indeed to connect with quality talent that fits their needs. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Less stress, less time, more results. When you need the right person to cut through the chaos, this is the job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs.
46:06 Kara Swisher? And listeners to this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to help get your job the premium status it deserves at indeed.com/podcast. Just go to indeed.com/podcast right now and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. That's indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need the right hire fast? Then this is the job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs.
46:36 Speaker 05 Ask yourself, what are your best people spending their time on right now? Expense reports, receipt chasing, month end close that takes weeks. You've become what you spend on, and that's not what you're building toward. Brex is the intelligent finance platform that eliminates that work before it starts. AI agents that handle the manual stuff automatically so your team can spend their time on what actually compounds. It's time to get Brex AF. Learn more at brex.com/AF.
47:13 Speaker 05 If you're looking to hire, you need Indeed. With Indeed Sponsored Jobs, you can spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Less stress, less time, more results. And listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to help your job get the premium status it deserves at indeed.com/podcast. Just go to indeed.com/podcast right now and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? This is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs.
47:57 Kara Swisher? So, one of the groups that has been effective and heinous at the same time is the tech moguls. They were in the front row of the inauguration in front of the cabinet itself, in front of legislators and elected officials. Elon Musk has said Trump wouldn't have won without him, and you say it's entirely possible his money was a deciding factor. You also wrote, quote, "Our democracy shouldn't belong to the world's richest man." Unfortunately, they are quite influential now, and they're right there and getting all the juicy bits, right down to the recent TikTok deal, which they got at a massive discount. How do you stop these tech billionaires from deciding future elections? Because now they're starting to buy into all the media, they certainly control the
48:42 Kara Swisher? algorithm, et cetera, et cetera.
48:45 Speaker 03 We can't, and I say this with all due respect to my former colleagues in the United States Congress, I believe at this point, whatever guardrails there are on the abuse of technology, it will not come out of Congress. You know, we've been talking forever about Section 230, it ain't going nowhere. It's just not. We keep talking about it, it's going nowhere. Yep. And if we can't expect the guardrails on the abuse to come from the industry itself, although I must say that there are plenty of people, you and I both know this, within
49:27 Speaker 03 the industry who do agree with you and I and all of us that there should be guardrails. Right. But those at the highest level, if they are unwilling, and they clearly are, to self-impose any requirement that they actually pay attention to the truth and do anything about reducing the amount of misinformation that is being spread, then we have to think about what other power centers are there. If it's not going to come from Congress, if it's not going to come from the courts, especially because what are the courts going to enforce if the laws aren't there? Doesn't come from the industry. I say, and as a former Attorney General in particular, having had two jobs, I was the
50:09 Speaker 03 top cop of the biggest state, and I was also the primary protector of consumers, the other place of power, the center of power, I do believe are the consumers. Okay. Just again, back to the Kimmel example, people voting with their pocketbook. The challenge there, Kara, around the consumers putting their foot down and saying, enough, this has to stop, you need to change, is we have work to do, all of us here, to help increase the amount of information that is available about the connection between the abuses and the harm to everyday folks. Mm-hmm. And that's the work that needs to be done.
50:51 Speaker 03 The work that needs to be done is is something that any parent or anyone who is parenting a child knows around the the harm of social media to our children.
51:02 Kara Swisher? And AI going forward.
51:04 Speaker 03 And AI going forward, right. You know, I I spent a lot, the majority of my career as a courtroom prosecutor focused on abuse of children. And and what we're seeing now in terms of the use of of social media and technology is is is being applied to something that has happened always, and we need to deal with the fact that social media is just making it easier. And we need to figure out how we're going to help inform the public about how social media can be used in a way that harms our children, so that we can, as consumers, say we're not going to buy your product, or we're going to put pressure on you to conform to
51:48 Speaker 03 what we know is in the best interest of the safety of our children.
51:50 Kara Swisher? The problem is, you have to use it for work. It is also the communication system, now the media system, and it's addictive. I think that's the difficulty of getting off of it, right? Because you're now so stuck in. Let me ask you, as a former--
52:03 Speaker 03 Yeah, but that that's the same thing somebody said about tobacco.
52:06 Kara Swisher? Yeah, exactly.
52:07 Speaker 03 Right? But at at some point, it is, so it's, we're not going to rely on the people who are doing the harm to tell us, oh, you're addicted. It's about us saying that we know the addiction can occur, and we're going to require you to stop pushing stuff--
52:21 Kara Swisher? Yeah.
52:22 Speaker 03 --that harms the people, and in particular, our children, in particular, our children.
52:27 Kara Swisher? As a former senator from California, you have a, you have a lot of, had had a lot of relations with tech leaders and spent most of your life in the Bay Area, and so you had a window into these people. Were you surprised by this heel turn toward Trump, this sharp heel turn? Even Bill Gates, who gave $50 million to a nonprofit backing your campaign, said the election was unprecedented significance, recently thanked Trump on camera for his incredible leadership. You saw that dinner, didn't you?
52:52 Speaker 03 But I I was, to answer your question directly, I was, I was surprised, and and the speed with which they did it. I was surprised. And people are showing themselves to be blatantly and unapologetically transactional.
53:13 Kara Swisher? Who have you been most surprised by of all those leaders?
53:17 Speaker 03 All of them.
53:18 Kara Swisher? Every one of them.
53:18 Speaker 03 All of them, all of them who, again, I go back to my point. I do believe, they're not unintelligent.
53:28 Speaker 03 They are not uneducated. So they do know about our, what, the principles and the values that we have in terms of free speech and everything else that's about a democracy. And they can see what all of us are seeing every day. They're not blind. They're transactional.
53:49 Kara Swisher? They're transactional. You know, during, at one point when I was talking to one of them and I said, if Kamala Harris had become president, you would have suddenly called yourself they/them, or whatever it took. They will do whatever it takes to get what they want.
54:06 Speaker 03 I wouldn't have required them to do that.
54:08 Kara Swisher? Of course you wouldn't.
54:08 Speaker 03 And, but, I mean, here is the thing, is that, and that's, and that's too bad.
54:14 Kara Swisher? Right.
54:15 Speaker 03 That we are existing in a world where some of the most powerful people in the world are not understanding that what you do matters.
54:30 Kara Swisher? Right. I've always asserted that it's because they've never felt unsafe a day in their lives.
54:36 Speaker 03 A lot of them, right. And, and.
54:37 Kara Swisher? And they will, they aren't unsafe even now in a lot of ways, or they're protecting themselves to be so.
54:44 Speaker 03 I mean, define safety.
54:45 Kara Swisher? Right.
54:46 Speaker 03 Right.
54:48 Speaker 03 Here's part of this, this dynamic that you, you raise is also a dynamic where they, meaning, okay, talk about they/them, are, are, they're gaslighting and scapegoating.
55:08 Speaker 03 They're gaslighting the American people to suggest that your predicament is, that your predicament is to blame on the powerless instead of the powerful.
55:20 Kara Swisher? Right.
55:21 Speaker 03 Look at what they're doing. They're basically saying to folks, you have less because of people who have even less than you.
55:31 Speaker 03 That's what they're doing.
55:33 Kara Swisher? Right.
55:34 Speaker 03 And part of, again, communicating with our friends and our neighbors to at least help us all see what's happening and how we're being manipulated is to see just that, that they're deflecting from the responsibility of the powerful by pointing fingers and blaming people who are relatively powerless. All these attacks on immigrants, these D I attacks, all of that. And, and that's part of the truth telling that we all have to do right now is to point out that there are a whole lot of very powerful people that actually could do something.
56:14 Kara Swisher? Mm-hmm. Which they won't, just in case you're interested.
56:17 Speaker 03 Who aren't.
56:18 Kara Swisher? They will not. They, they love to cheer for the overdog, as they say. What's ahead for the country's future and especially the Democratic Party's role in it? Talk a little bit about that, what we were talking about, the idea of where, you, you keep talking about consumers being the strength, voters being the strength. You're seeing it, as a prosecutor, you're seeing juries not, or not convicting people.
56:40 Speaker 03 Yeah.
56:40 Kara Swisher? You know, here in DC, it happened several times.
56:43 Speaker 03 Right, the grand juries, yeah. So what I'm seeing is, um, a lot of people on edge. What I'm seeing is that we're nine months in and folks are rested, plenty of us, I will speak for myself, stopped watching cable news for quite some time. And are now rested and, um, and ready to get back in the streets. That folks are, you know, the people I'm talking with who, for example, have read
57:27 Speaker 03 the book are, are remembering and are talking with each other about, let's get back that thing that we had because it, it's still in us. You know, in terms of how people are thinking about the Democratic Party, look, I think part of, um, what is frustrating about some of the punditry about it all and the future of the Democratic Party is this whole savior complex. I'm kind of bored with it. This idea that there will be one savior who will come down.
58:04 Kara Swisher? To rally regular people.
58:05 Speaker 03 And we will all be saved. That person's not on earth right now.
58:15 Speaker 03 You know what I'm saying? And, but, but, but more importantly, I must say, we have so many stars in the party. We have so many stars. And let's focus on that instead of who is the one to the point that it's just a circular conversation. Instead of seeing the, at a local, mayors, to attorneys general, to governors, to members of congress.
58:44 Kara Swisher? Well, name some of those stars. What do you see? It's not a singular person.
58:48 Speaker 03 The mayor of Baltimore is here right now.
58:51 Speaker 03 He's one of them. Where is he? Wait, is, where?
58:58 Speaker 03 Where? He's here. I can't see him.
59:04 Speaker 03 Where are? There he is.
59:11 Speaker 03 Yeah. Jasmine Crockett.
59:17 Speaker 03 Robert Garcia. I could go through the list of all the Democratic governors right now. I just talked to JB Pritzker. Right? My governor Gavin Newsom. I mean, there are so many who are doing great things. And so, let's, let's share the, the, the understanding that we are not without fighters. We're not without fighters.
59:44 Kara Swisher? What, what, what do those people share that you just named? Is it fighting? Is it, what, what do you think is necessary going forward?
59:51 Speaker 03 I think they are in it for the right reasons.
59:58 Speaker 03 They're not, they're not just looking in the mirror every day. They're for the people and looking out for the people.
1:00:08 Kara Swisher? When you think about the most critical element of those things, looking out for the people would be the number one thing. If you don't mind, I'm going to ask you to assess some of the Republicans, just briefly. I'm going to go through a quick list. J.D. Vance, I want one or two words.
1:00:22 Speaker 03 I don't do that.
1:00:23 Kara Swisher? You don't do it? All right, okay, all right.
1:00:27 Kara Swisher? All right, okay. Well, talk about your own goals going forward. The inevitable, are you running for president in 2028?
1:00:37 Speaker 03 Maybe, maybe not.
1:00:41 Kara Swisher? Maybe, maybe not?
1:00:42 Speaker 03 Correct.
1:00:43 Kara Swisher? Maybe, maybe not, okay. Let's do a thought experiment. It's January 2029, you've just been inaugurated as president.
1:00:57 Kara Swisher? You knew, you knew I'd get you on this one. What are your top priorities and the first? I want to talk about two things. The policies you'd undo and actually what you would do.
1:01:09 Speaker 03 It's much too early to have that conversation, Kara. I literally yesterday would not have known that this Department of Justice would have indicted the New York Attorney General.
1:01:22 Speaker 03 But, but I'll go back to an earlier point. I do believe that part of the responsibility right now for the Democratic Party
1:01:33 Speaker 03 is we really do have to deal with the immediate needs of the American people. I actually, in reflection, one of the things I would have done differently, and I talk about a few things, but one of them on this topic. I really do think we should have done the families piece of Build Back Better before we did the infrastructure and the CHIPS Act. It was good, good work. That was good work, the infrastructure. The CHIPS Act, all was very good work, but it didn't address immediate needs. In the family care piece of it, it was the extension of the child tax credit. It was affordable childcare. It was paid leave. And...
1:02:20 Speaker 03 I think we have to just be clear-eyed about the fact that we need to deal with the immediate and long-term issues, both of which are the climate crisis, for example. And we have to really prioritize immediate needs. Because I think that is one of the main issues on which people vote. So let's just be clear-eyed and practical about that.
1:02:49 Kara Swisher? So you wrote this about your concession speech. "While I would concede this election, while I would engage in the peaceful transfer of power that distinguishes democracy from monarchy or tyranny, I would not concede the fight that fueled my campaign."
1:03:02 Speaker 03 Right.
1:03:03 Kara Swisher? So I'd like to hear you talk about that fight to end this. And what does it look like for you? And mostly, what can Americans do to push back this march towards autocracy? I think we're already in it, but that's the phrase people use, this march towards autocracy. And there was a question that came in online when I asked what I should ask you. What does that look like for your nieces in their 30s?
1:03:30 Speaker 03 Yeah, I think about that all the time.
1:03:33 Kara Swisher? Right. So talk about that fight.
1:03:36 Speaker 03 So, one, it's about elections. And that means focusing on, part of this administration and what it's highlighted is what has been a longstanding issue about how they will weaponize law enforcement even at the local level. So that's about sheriff's elections, that's about DA's elections, state's attorney's elections, attorney's general elections, governor's elections. We have two governor's races happening right now. Let's all put our resources and time into that. And take nothing for granted. No matter how good our candidates are, take nothing for granted. And put our resources into it. So it's about elections.
1:04:20 Speaker 03 It's about, one of the issues, again, that we are seeing happen every day, that we have some power over, they want to threaten with lawsuits our nonprofit organizations. Right? They're going after them. They're literally suggesting that...
1:04:39 Speaker 03 Human rights organizations, civil rights organizations should be the subject of litigation and prosecution. Let's go and volunteer at those organizations. Right now, they are so strapped, whether it be an organization that is doing civil rights work, immigrants' rights work, tenants' rights work, working on climate. They're so strapped right now. That's the kind of work we need to do so we can build back up those advocacy organizations that when we get back in power will be part of our version of Project 2025. It is the work that we need to do, and I cannot stress this enough,
1:05:22 Speaker 03 run for school board and encourage people to do that. How they have weaponized, and this has been, again, years in the making, the Santas in Florida, we saw it happening. And now they're trying to get rid of the Department of Education and Head Start and free lunches? Let's get parents who understand, yes, parents' rights to say what's happening and to enforce, putting resources into our public schools and teaching children history as it occurred, instead of this revisionist. You know, so there is that kind of work that needs to happen. I go back to the point about consumers' rights.
1:06:07 Speaker 03 Let's pay attention to which corporation and which industry are, you know, doing things that we don't like and figure out how we vote with our pocketbook in those areas. Run for office. Encourage people that you know who want to do something based on a solution to a problem to run for office. There are these things that we can do that include another issue. We have a massive amount of distrust in our country right now.
1:06:42 Speaker 03 A distrust that the people have in our government and our systems, I think largely fueled by also the distrust that so many people rightly had after the pandemic about the system just failing them. And but we also have an extraordinary amount of distrust right now between the American people.
1:07:10 Speaker 03 Americans don't trust each other right now.
1:07:14 Speaker 03 And it's it's more than I don't I'm gonna lock my door at night.
1:07:19 Speaker 03 Americans don't trust that someone else is not out to harm them,
1:07:28 Speaker 03 that someone else is not out to threaten their very existence.
1:07:35 Speaker 03 And that's real. And we have some deep work to do. That's about building back up to that trust between the people and between the people and our government and our systems. And part of the responsibility for the government is we actually need to do a better job.
1:07:55 Speaker 03 There's gonna be a lot of debris when this administration is done.
1:08:00 Kara Swisher? Yeah.
1:08:01 Speaker 03 There's gonna be a lot of broken stuff. And part of what I write about is when it comes time then to be about rebuilding and hopefully transformation, let's not be too nostalgic.
1:08:18 Speaker 03 Because it's not like what we had before was that perfect either.
1:08:24 Speaker 03 And a lot of it was broken and needs to be fixed. Right?
1:08:29 Kara Swisher? So both
1:08:33 Kara Swisher? both rebuild and
1:08:35 Speaker 03 and and and reform and reinvent, yeah.
1:08:40 Kara Swisher? Yeah, not reinvent, invent.
1:08:41 Speaker 03 Yeah, and invent, yes.
1:08:43 Kara Swisher? You called yourself a joyful warrior in your in your campaign. How would you describe yourself right now?
1:08:51 Speaker 03 I'm still a joyful warrior.
1:08:56 Kara Swisher? Would you add anything else?
1:09:00 Speaker 03 No, I I am, you know, emphasis on warrior.
1:09:08 Speaker 03 But, no, listen, I think that we, we fight for something. More than anything, we are fighting for something. And we are not going to do it in a way that we don't allow ourselves a moment to have a good laugh, or sing a song, or dance, or love, or enjoy, anything that brings that enjoyment. These things are consistent with one another. The fight is consistent with allowing yourself something that feeds your heart and your soul and your spirit. That's what the fight is. I'll, I'll end it with this.
1:09:49 Speaker 03 I, I ended every rally with the call and response, when we fight, we win. And on, and Adam was with me, Kirsten, everybody was with me. So we know the outcome of the election, and it was an awful night. And every, there were so many people that were at Howard that night. We all thought we were going to have a victory speech. And we asked everybody to come back the next day, and I needed to give a different speech. And I had to reconcile in my head, and for everyone who would be there, how do I reconcile that I kept saying, especially to our young people, I kept saying, when we fight, we win.
1:10:30 Speaker 03 How do I help them understand that this is not as trite as, oh, you win some, you lose some? And then on the way to Howard, I actually wrote in, but the fight takes a while sometimes. And that's it. Sometimes the fight takes a while. So knowing that we have to have that level of endurance, and we need some sustenance, let's allow ourselves to be joyful and to fight. Knowing that we can make a difference, knowing that we're not going to let any one election
1:11:10 Speaker 03 or circumstance or individual dampen our spirit and our sense of optimism. They cannot defeat our spirit if we don't let them. If they do, they're winning, and they're not winning if we don't let them.
1:11:28 Kara Swisher? Today's show was produced by Christian Castro-Rossell, Kateri Yokum, Michelle Aloy, Megan Burney, Kalen Lynch, and Devon Schwartz. Nishat Kurwa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcasts. Special thanks to Rosemary Ho and Catherine Barner. This episode was engineered by Aaliyah Jackson, and our theme music is by Trakademics. If you're already following the show, you don't have to worry about your circumcision. If not, then you get to hang out with J.D. Vance on the couch. Go wherever you listen to podcasts, search for On with Kara Swisher, and hit follow. You can also find us on YouTube and all socials at On with Kara Swisher. Thanks for listening to On with Kara Swisher from Podium Media, New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network, and us.
1:12:13 Kara Swisher? We'll be back on Thursday with more.
1:12:21 Speaker 05 Support for the show comes from Jira by Atlassian. Your work lives in scattered places, and it's not only your team searching for context. Your AI agents need it too. Jira taps Atlassian's teamwork graph to bring that context together across Jira, Confluence, Slack, GitHub, and more, and makes it easy to share with the agents you already use, like Claude, Purser, and GitHub Copilot. Assign them work directly or connect your agents through MCP. Spend less time hunting for context, less time asking, "Wait, what did we decide?" and more time actually shipping with Jira. Learn more at jira.com. That's J-I-R-A dot com.
1:13:09 Speaker 02 Are you a pet owner? Every six seconds, a pet owner in the US gets hit with a vet bill over $1,000. Always an unwelcome surprise. That's where Fetch comes in. Fetch is the most complete pet insurance for dogs and cats, according to consumeradvocate.org. You get paid back up to 90% of vet bills at any vet in the US and Canada with claims paid back in as little as two days. Go to fetchpet.com/save right now for your free quote. That's fetchpet.com/save.
1:13:48 Kara Swisher? Support for the show comes from Engine. Running a small business means every dollar has to work hard. But if your team is still booking travel the old way, it's costing you more than you think. Engine is the fastest growing travel and spend platform in the country, built specifically for businesses like yours. Book a trip in as little as two and a half minutes, earn up to 10% back on hotels. And in 2025, Engine customers save more than $300 million on travel with zero booking fees, no contracts, and no BS. More than 1,000 businesses join Engine every month. Join them and get $500 when your business signs up and starts traveling at engine.com/box.
Previous Brené Brown on the State of Leadership in America Today Next How AI Will Impact the Future of Work Page updated November 1, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated