From MAGA Influencer to Elon Musk Baby Mama (w/ Ashley St. Clair & Cam Kasky) | Bulwark Podcast

Do you guys have like a support network now?

You know, I wish the I I I wish the Harum would unionize honestly, but at this point, but you know, he's quite the union buster.

Hello and welcome to the Bward Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Uh, we have a double header for you today of former child activists or youth youth activists in politics. Uh, in segment two, it's my old buddy Cam Casy off the campaign trail. He's he's working on a bill in Congress I want to talk to him about. Um, but up first, uh, she was a former right-wing influencer with TPUSA and others and a writer. She's also the mother of one of Elon Musk's children. It's Ashley St. Claire and who apparently watches the Bullwork Podcast and uh, you know, we're we're meeting now. This is our first meet. We've been DMing. How's it going, Ashley?

It's going. We're My mother is also a big fan of the Bull Work Podcast.

Oh, really?

Yes, she is. So, I appreciate you guys holding space for the more moderate.

Where does she live? Where are you guys? Where are you from? I don't actually even know.

She's in Colorado now, but we are not from Colorado, but a lot of my family is out there. my people. Yeah, we're all transplants.

She'll be seeing Erica Kirk visiting the Air Force Academy.

Oh lord. Okay. Well, much to get into on TP USA. For people who don't know, who are like, "Oh my god, I I just heard that introduction. I've never heard Ashley Sinclair's name." And we have viewers and listeners who are not on social media, you know, who are not following the influencer wars on the right. And so for those folks, like give us the first date. What what what how did you emerge? What is your what's your villain origin story?

My my villain origin story is I started really on campus with these campus groups like Young Americans for Liberty as soon as I got into college freshly 18 and then I got involved with Turning Point and I was tweeting and it just kind of snowballed from there. It was within a few months that I was invited to my first Turning Point event, that I was meeting Charlie Kirk, that I was doing events in Colorado, and then it just snowballed.

It snowballed. So, where were you on campus?

I was in Colorado, University of Colorado in Colorado Springs.

So, it was a smaller campus and there was, you know, some appeal to the provocator nature of rolling a free speech ball around campus.

Is that a lib campus? Colorado. It's Colorado Springs. Colorado Springs is kind of conservative.

More conservative, but the campus was definitely more liberal. Like all of the heads of the philosophy department when I first came there were uh petitioning for Donald Trump to not speak on campus, which you know, in retrospect, uh, they were probably correct about. But in that moment, I was like, "This is philosophy. We're supposed to hold court for all opinions."

So, yeah. So, that was what appealed to you. kind of like contrarianism and you know sticking your finger in the eye of the you know professors that wanted to tell you to follow various woke pieties or or what or there's some other was there something else?

Yeah, it was you know you're the token conservative in the class which I found engaging.

To to some respect but it was also you're young and 18 and you get a lot of attention on social media by being provocative in some sense. So like how did that start? Like you started posting and then TP USA would like just from like a process standpoint because there's a lot of discussion about this particularly on the left and I when I la when I went to the last I didn't go this past year to America Fest cuz given after Charlie's killed and everything it just was too much for me to take. Um, but the year before I went to the Turning Point Festival at the end of the year and I'd been going every year and I wrote like a pretty mean assessment of the substance of what I was hearing at the festival.

Was it mean or accurate?

Accurate. Mean and accurate. You know, accurately mean about uh the just hateful [ __ ] that was coming from the stage. But before I did that, I I started by saying like you do have to give credit where due like like this there is no version of this on the left. Um, it it kind of emerged from nothing. Like it emerged from the ether like they you know during the Obama era when I you know and and the Bush era when I was on campus like was just a very lefty space. the college Republicans were very dorky and a very minority part of the campus like um and TJA changed that and like they brought a lot of people there to the festival like the crowd is huge there are people there that aren't particularly political who are young who they had engaged like as far as just their mission was concerned it was a success just looking at it as like a political organizing tool so but one thing I don't have like visibility into is like how they like recruited ambassadors like you like what was that process Like was it organic or

So I was just kind of [ __ ] posting online on Twitter and then Mike Cernovvic actually found me and him and Jack Pobic started sharing my tweets, my Periscopes, my lives and it just there there was no Twitter was very ripe for reply guy um bullying in a way. So, you know, you're replying to AOC and replying to Elizabeth Warren and it just kind of blows up in a way that you don't expect because you're 18 and nobody's listening to you and suddenly you have 10,000 40,000. You remember when you hit those milestones, you're and envisioning that many people in a room, you're like, "Oh my goodness, all of these people are liking my things. They think I'm important. They think I'm smart." Um, and especially when you're just getting a sense of identity in your youth, like freshly 18, that was formative for me.

So, like, were you monetizing it like when you're in college?

Not particularly. Eventually, I got into, oh, I'll sell a t-shirt or this or that, but I didn't really monetize it in um the same mode that a lot of other people did. I worked behind the scenes. So I also worked on campaigns at 18 and door knockocking and you know cleaning up the door knockocking data and donor events that sort of thing. So primarily my mode of income was a bit different than most influencers. I kept normal jobs.

As opposed to doing a podcast. So, I was looking at some of your early material. Um, and uh, it's a lot of nut-picking, you know. I mean, there's some nutty leftists, okay, don't get me wrong, but you know, it's a lot of like Ashley Stlair confronts deranged leftist, you know, that's like a lot of what it was. Like, when you were doing that, was it like how much of it were you like, I really believe this stuff? How much of it was like WWE?

I think it's very circular, too, because you're you're told that these things exist and that there's this caricature of the left and that they're all crazy and they're all deranged and they all have the purple hair and whatever. And then when you see it, you're like, I found it. It is real. Look guys, it's real. Um, so I I think there's that where it kind of feeds into itself where you wanted to find it to show everyone that it's real. Um, and then there is, you know, you have veterans who are coming up to you saying like, "Good job, patriot." And that makes you feel a bit more important or like you're doing um,

Some real on the ground soldier work there.

People are thanking you. Mostly men, I mean, are thanking you.

Yes.

Older men with vet hats on.

Yeah. Are thanking you. Yeah. So, I could see how you would take that as like, wow, like I am doing important work.

Yes. Actually,

Yes. And the work in question is tweeting.

Also some YouTubes. You did some videos, you know, on man on the street stuff.

Uh, you know, I think I've I've put that away.

Never happened. I watched some of them and some of the leftists that were yelling at you were deranged, but I don't know what you were saying off camera. So anyway, um,

I was very nice in person.

So then you drop out of school.

Yes. This is like the classic conundrum of Charlie the whole Charlie Kirk thing is he was a college dropout also then he's organizing on college campuses and then now it's like all the red states want to build statues to him on college campuses and it's kind of like see what you want about Charlie like nice or otherwise like the school part of it wasn't really the part that was being fostered.

Sort of um and I do have regrets that I repeated those talking points that people shouldn't go to school because I'm back in school now. Um, and I have two kids. So, it's it's a lot more difficult to do after you have children. But there's also something that's very, um, similar to when you're in a relationship and the guy tells you, you know, quit your job and don't do this, but then if you want to leave, you don't have any mode uh to make income. You don't have the same ability. Um, and I think that's really similar on the right where they tell these kids, you know, you don't need to do that. you can make money in right-wing politics or start your own show or sell your own merch, but then if they leave, that source of income is is gone. So, it kind of keeps people within that um cycle more than it would if they had a career or education outside of it.

So, that's what you did after you dropped out. It was just full-time influencer stuff.

Mhm.

Yeah. And and I guess one other thing on that and and then um we'll get to the more fun topic and then we'll get to talk about polit you know current day politics like so then during that part were you like actually making money like you know through your own content or were like rich people like subsidizing it?

It was decent money but I again I wasn't making much money from my content. I was just working behind the scenes. So I worked on campaigns, I worked in fundraising, I worked uh in production doing Republican ads. Um, so it was always I always had a decent salaried job that I was primarily making income from.

But that is a thing out there, right? Like there are some of these right influencers are like kind of subsidized by, you know,

Very wealthy donors and um where you can't really track the money. There's a lot of dark money groups on the right as well and influencer apparatuses where they um will pay you just to put out messaging and there's no rules right now to even put notification that it's an ad because it's just messaging. So there's a large portion of the right-wing influencer space is paid in one way or another for whether it's opinions or pushing certain uh cabinet picks, they make money for all of it.

Can I say this is going to be the story of the 2028 campaign by the way. It's like paid influencers and AI influencers and that is happening on the and the right is way ahead on that but this is happening now on the left too. Um, I talked to Cam about the Illinois primary in the second segment, but I saw like, you know, some influencer, it's like the woke ginger or something is like getting paid to support some candidate and it's not disclosed, you know, in the primary. And I get people sending me all the time like random influencers who are saying this and saying that and like people have to be really careful out there with like if you're just following a random person with an Instagram account,

Like maybe that person is is just earnest and viral or like maybe not. Back during the election, I was offered money to promote like Rick Grenell for Secretary of State. I mean, they they do all of this. I was like, "No, thank you." Um, but this was this was very much a thing. And they were offering a lot of money, Tim. This was

To promote Rick Grenell for Secretary of State.

Yes. And as I'm given this offer, I see all of a sudden these people pushing Rick Grenell for Secretary of State. I'm like, you're paid. You're paid. You're paid. Um, but this happens all the time with everything from support for certain bills to support for cabinet picks. And there is a lot of money that is difficult for many people to turn down.

Pretty delicious that people are trying to pay to get Rick Grenellan Secretary of State and instead he got stereotyped and put as the gay in charge of the theater and then he was fired from the theater for being too mean, too big of a dick. That's that's a that's a shame. That's that's quite a negative trajectory for Rick Grenell. Um, so let's do the Elon origin story. Uh, and I guess I should say before we get to this, you have an ongoing custody battle with the richest guy in the world or the second richest whatever he is now. And I I obviously don't want to do anything that puts that in any jeopardy. Um, and so anything that you can't say, please, no stress. Your original encounter with Elon though according to this article was based on a gay best friend who was showing you a lot of rocket videos and uh I don't know I think having a rocket gay as a friend was maybe your first mistake. Um, but tell us about what happened.

Loved the launches, the SpaceX launches, and you know, you're kind of exposed to them like throughout cuz he was a very big larger than life figure Elon. So, I was exposed through little things like that. And obviously, I had friends who liked Tesla and my rocket gay loved showing me launch videos.

We're not going to get into the psychology there. We're just going to move forward.

No. So, but besides that, I didn't really have much interest in what he was doing until he was buying Twitter and I was like, "Yes, free speech." Cuz I hated Jack Dorsey um at the time.

And so, like, how does one go about meeting Elon Musk? Like, I'm trying to think to myself, like, I don't even know how I would do that. Like, if I were to say a gay that like Peter Teal instead of thinking that he was the Antichrist, I'm not exactly sure how I would how I would go about that. like so like like what how does that happen?

He uh had reached out and you know asked if I was ever in San Francisco or Austin and I had told him you know I'm in Austin quite a bit but I'm supposed to be in San Francisco whenever you get back to Seth at the time was my boss from the Babylon about an interview date at Twitter headquarters and within like a couple minutes I'm getting a text from Seth saying Elon got back about the interview can we're going to go to San Francisco in like 48 hours so That's how I ended up meeting him.

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So like, how much time did you all spend together during that period?

A decent amount of times.

Okay. And so there's a lot of discussion out there right now. Megan Kelly talking about Mark Leven's micro penis. And I'm just wondering if there's any, you know, how we compare and contrast.

I don't know anything about Mark Leavvin's penis.

So you can't compare and contrast.

I can't compare and contrast.

I guess I'm just like what is it like like putting like let's just put aside the politics for a second. Like he's constantly tweeting. I don't know. He's just this figure over here for me. Like I interviewed Walter Isacson about this and it's kind of like it doesn't seem like he sleeps. He's like tweeting all night. He He's very manic. He has 13 children, uh, multiple ex-wives. Like I don't understand like how he like what is it like to be in his orbit?

I you know when I first met him I thought he was very interesting especially I was 23 24 at the time and guys my age are not talking about uh philosophy or schopenhau or the great

He's talking about Schopenhau.

Yes. Um to a degree. So, you know, finding someone who could speak about something and at the time you think this individual is a part of something so much bigger than themselves and they're fighting the good fight, you know, that's very intoxicating to a young girl who's

Does not have a fully developed prefrontal cortex um at the time. So, I think there's there's been a difference in my view since I've

Developed that. And at some point during that, you had to be like, I'm in too deep on this thing.

Yeah. You're kind of like, I have girl bossed way too close to the sun. Um, and you start recognizing things. Again, I can't uh speak too much about anything because there will be there's probably four attorneys paid two grand an hour to watch this. But it's you see the red flags that you're like, "Uh-oh,

I'm uh I should probably protect myself." And it's also there's red flags that you see that are not just personal relationship red flags, but red flags where you're like, "This could harm a lot of people. Um, this is a lot bigger than myself. these red flags um are indicative of greater harm to a lot of people in the country, a lot of people in the world. So, I think that was also an internal battle in my head where I'm like, am I reading too much into this or is this genuinely uh dangerous?

Sure. He is posting all night. Like that's really him.

Yes, it's all him. All his posts are written by him. You you didn't get to ghost any of them during your moments.

I didn't get to ghost them.

Ghost any tweets? Like you didn't you didn't get to take your

There were a couple There were a couple that came out of my mouth and he was laughing and then typing them down. So So he does have muses for some of his late night.

Do you guys have like a support network now?

You know, I wish the I I I wish the Harum would unionize honestly, but at this point, but you know, he's quite the union buster. I do I I feel deeply for Claire and um Grimes, but I I do love her music as well. Okay, maybe we can get them all together if you're out there, Grimes. Um, she talks about Chopan hour. I think I want to go forward to kind of the the news around what's happening on X and all that, but as it stands now, obviously because I can't talk about the details, but like you guys are still embroiled in a in a lawsuit where he's trying to

Fight. Yeah. Multiple multiple lawsuits.

That's tough. That's got I guess putting aside the perspective of the Elon thing like that's like how do you like deal with that mentally like it's got to be tough to think like think about all of the assets and resources and friends that he has. I don't know that's got to be intimidating.

It is. But I also think uh people need to fight back. I think it's very important to have that endurance especially when it comes to legal fights. Half of the battle with a legal fight is just an endurance test. They try to run you out with these attorneys, but you too can read the laws in which they cite to you and half of the time they're incorrect. So, I don't take them as seriously as they would like to be taken, which I think is is helpful.

And you're in law school now, right? Or

I I will be starting in the fall.

Starting in the fall. Congrats.

So, you can go through the briefs yourself.

If I have to be in court for this long, I might as well make sure 18 of them are with ESQ after my name. So,

I love that. Um, one of your suits not related to um your kid is uh about uh what is happening on X with regards to porn. This is news also breaking this morning. There are multiple additional lawsuits from teen girls who were I guess they had pictures of themselves in clothes posted on social media and Grock took off their clothes and made it seem like they were nude. Pictures of them that happened to you as well. like talk about what what's happening with those suits and and the the status.

So, back in late December, Grock was unleashed onto the public with a new image generation manipulation feature in which it was able to undress women and children and anybody really, but uh primarily women and children were targeted by this. And so, myself, I found countless photos of me undressed, bent over, covered in white fluids. Um, a and real life aspects of my life were in these photos as well. It had my real face. It had my real kids uh items in the background. It had my home. Um, and the only thing that was different was my clothes being removed or bent over or covered in whatever. So, we're suing XAI now in New York for a variety of different issues. One is product liability because they shouldn't have released this product onto the public. Chat GBT is not doing this. I've not been victimized by Chat Beauty or Claude undressing me. Um, and as you mentioned, now there's three teens suing. Uh, in in that suit, they cite that one of the girls, two of them are under 18 and one of them had their yearbook photo taken and undressed and Grock undressed this minor. It happened to me as well in some of these photos. I was 14 years old and they undressed me. For everyone else, it needs to be stopped. But what I want people to understand is right now within our lawsuit against XAI first they they tried saying that we are bound by the X terms of service and that if we want to sue we have to go to this one rinky dink court in Bumble [ __ ] Texas where the only judge owns text Tesla stocks. That didn't quite work. So now they're trying to hold me to the X terms of service. So, if anybody has an ex account, you need to know that they you may be jeopardizing your chances at holding this company or any of its affiliates accountable um because this is the game that they play. I have not used X since this lawsuit.

Explain that. Why why would that jeopardize you?

So they claim within their very laborious terms of service on X, they say that if you want to take action against X or any of its affiliates, which could be Elon Musk himself, it could be Tesla, it could be SpaceX, who knows at this point, Doge, what have you. Your claims are limited to, I believe, $100 and you have to take it in the Northern District of Texas. Um, so use of this platform, they're trying to claim that me even viewing the terms of service page is ascension to the terms of service. Um, and there's, you know, like eight Harvard trained attorneys trying to make this argument.

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So, anyone who has an X account really needs to know what they're signing up for here. and that if they want to take action, one, you should do it as a Jane Doe, and two, you should be deleting your account.

And is this still h like it's ongoing? Has Grock fixed this? Are people

To my knowledge, it's still happening. Um, it's still happening, especially on the standalone Grock app and website. They have not fixed these parameters to my knowledge and there's still images of me circulating, but there's not really any good way for me to find every image that they have unless

First of all, I can't go on the platform because they're suing me for $75,000 minimum. But it's how do you even find them? Well, there's other porn on X, you know, and like Elon is branding the Grock as, you know, the AI that isn't going to be woke or whatever, you know, and so it it doesn't seem like it's an accident. I guess this is hopefully something we learned in your discovery, but it doesn't, you know, this doesn't seem like an oversight situation to me.

No, because they could have again around when Linda Yakarina, the former CEO of X, resigned, uh she amidst within the 24 to 48 hours that she resigned, she was the victim of rape fantasy. So was Will Stansel uh by Grock and they didn't do anything and this was just textbased. So they were aware that these things were happening and they did they did nothing. Additionally, during this time, XAI has an issue because nobody really wanted to play with Grock. It was, you know, the odd kid on the playground that nobody really wanted to hang out with. Everyone else was surpassing XAI um in terms of the AI race. And now all of a sudden during this funding round, they have this uh this feature unleashed in which usage spikes uh astronomically. And within the scandal, they raised, I think it was 20 billion dollars from their their funding round as this was happening with the collateral of women and children being undressed.

Is there like a class now or are these all happening individually?

I believe there's a class action in California happening right now. Mine is I'm the only plaintiff because this was for us the most effective way to go about it because it was, you know, me personally who's being defamed. And I've been at the end of uh rather intense targeted harassment on X for a variety of reasons, including the owner.

I mean, this is that's [ __ ] brutal. And um I appreciate that. Like it's just like on all this stuff, you don't you don't have to be doing this. you could have disappeared and uh taken the alimony. So, I appreciate that you're out there doing this. Um I want to talk a little bit more about your kind of evolution. I went through this um having been a Republican, wrote about this a lot. Uh people came to me and asked me to write a burn book. I'm sure you've gotten that request as well. I ended up writing like a half a burn book. I decided um you know I was like I was only going to do the burnbook part um if I talked about myself first and like my trajectory and my evolution and like what I thought I missed and why I got wrapped up in it like what could be learned from that. Um so I'm wondering like what how you kind of feel now like looking back on that.

I think it was very helpful for me to get off the internet for a while. There's a lot of echo chambers that everyone kind of ends up in there and your access to information and frankly lived reality is really important for having views outside of these things. While I was within MAGA, I certainly had doubts. There were moments of free thinking that I had, but you're so wrapped up in it and your your whole identity is this. your whole source of income, your career, your, you know, especially when you have kids, you're like, what am I going to do if I blow up my life and attack these people who are uh not exactly stable?

Yeah.

Um, but again, I got involved very young. It was this sense of belonging and then I dropped out of college and I I was in it. Uh, but I think especially recently, there's no way that you can watch what's happening and not say something because it's so egregious. I think there's a lot of people there's some people within my own family who voted for Trump and said, "What is happening?" You know, we did not vote for this. We did not anticipate this. And some people might call those who say those things, you know, stupid or, you know, we tried to warn you. But um there is also a mass manipulation campaign going on and I I don't think that should be downplayed. I think people are being really manipulated and deceived on social media as well. And as we know there's more and more of these tech bros buying up our our media platforms because it's so valuable to hold your attention and hold the keys to to perception.

What of the administration so far like when you say what's happening is so egregious like what are some examples of things that you find to be agreeable?

I think especially with ICE. I think what's happening with the economy with foreign policy that you know we're promised no new wars and they are gleefully blowing up capturing foreign leaders um using our tax dollars and having these tech bros at the White House. The average everyday person has been left behind. There's um you know we're having people who cared about immigration and we have Trump gold cards and um normal people are being rounded up and sent to Al Salvador. It it's disgusting. We have American citizens being shot on the streets by ICE and I I'm not quite sure how even people that I knew can can watch this and not think that this is going to come for them as well. Um, as it relates to free speech, you have Brendan Carr threatening to revoke broadcaster licensing over what people say. That's not what any of these people that I knew supposedly signed up for. We're supposed to care about free speech. were supposed to care about um the sovereign rights of of citizens. Uh and and that to me has been very difficult to watch because I I feel like I played a role in

Having that come to fruition and I'm not quite sure the the best way to help except you know speaking out now and saying this is wrong and it shouldn't happen.

I think some people say, particularly on the immigration thing, I think it's interesting you started with that with ICE that like I don't know the Trump first term had Steven Miller, there was child separation. Like isn't that kind of what people signed up for? At least in the ICE part of it.

I did not. You know, there's also behind the scenes there's these asurances like that would never happen. You know, of course, we're just going to get the criminals out. And you heard Trump repeat this over and over again. We're just going after the criminals. um which you know obviously is a very small percentage of the population uh of immigrants that are here, but also just the cruelty of it is uh really difficult to watch. And I've always been very against uh the feds and law enforcement and uh authority in a way, but I I can't understand why the Republicans think it's okay to say, "Well, you know, if you don't follow the law, you're going to get shot." Um, but I I do suppose we were warned about that in BLM while we were making fun of all those people.

Yeah, we have today like just this morning right before you came on, I think the first person to quit the administration and protest over one of these issues. It's over the Iran war, Joe Kent. He posts this. Uh, after much reflection, I've decided to resign from my position as director of the National Counterterrorism Center effective today. I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation and it's clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby. I don't know. I look at that and I'm kind of two minds about it. Like on the one hand it's it's it's well all those things you just listed like it is true that Trump has betrayed his his base in a lot of things and I think on foreign policy most clearly. On the other hand, you look at Joe Kent and he's somebody who's like done a lot of groper stuff and you're wonder and you see the Israel stuff in the statement and it's like well that's why Marco's statement kind of complicates all this. It's like like Marco kind of said that this was what happened. But like on the other hand, it's like is is Joe Kent quitting because he's because, you know, his conspiracy theory view about Jews and it's like I I don't know how to assess that. But, you know, so it's it's good that I guess some people are are seeing that Trump has betrayed them. Whether their motivations for that might be suspect though, I don't know. What did you make of Joe Kent?

Whatever his motivations are, I think there's a lot of people I think it's more of a bipartisan issue on both the left and the right. this support for Israel at all cost and that we're going to get involved in any war. We're going to uh do whatever is in the best interest of Israel while there's people in America who can't don't have healthcare. They don't have affordable housing. whether it was Israel or or any other nation that we had a comparable relationship with to where you know the American people are being impacted by what this foreign nation wants. People are feeling that and they're not happy about it on both the left and the right and there's there's going to be some intersect and just because there are fringe characters who uh correctly identify the issue I don't know that it it should be discarded especially going into the midterms.

I want to talk a little bit about how hard this is um to do what you're doing and maybe to a lesser extent what Joe Kent's doing. Um I was listening this weekend to Tim Dylan. He's a comedian. It's like sort of a nationalist comedian um that I think he had dinner with JD Vance, got kind of sucked into that kind of world like a lot of manosphere guys did. He's very sympathetic to kind of the America first worldview. Um, and he was talking about the rally that Trump had in Kentucky, uh, and how sad it was. And I want to play a little bit from that.

I I I don't know what any of them are getting out of it. I don't know what any of these people are getting out of it anymore. They elected this guy and then this guy is basically letting Jared Kushner and BB Netanyahu just carve out the Middle East, do whatever the hell they want, just make deals. And and it's it's tough because I know it's really really hard to admit you got you got God got God. It's really difficult to admit that almost no one can admit uh it's very hard to admit you've been taken advantage of by someone that you respected by someone that you liked and respected. This is actually a very difficult thing to do. It's easy to say you got scammed by some stranger, but someone that you trusted, respected, liked, and a lot of these people here, you know, in the back of their head, they can't admit it to themselves yet, but they feel like they've been taken advantage of. This is not about them anymore. It's dawned on them. They go, "It's not really about us."

Started to be kind of hard. I was listening to that thinking about talking to you on Tuesday. Like, how how hard was that for you?

It it's difficult, but I I also am hopeful that there's more humility within the right and the left for anyone who was wrong about certain issues because it's it's okay to be wrong. We have this weird dichotomy in the internet where it's um you have kind of this permanent fixture of identity and you're never allowed to change your opinion because you're always fixed to past versions of yourself. But it's actually a good thing to grow and say I was I was really wrong and I'm sorry and let's all try to have a clearer picture of what's happening right now. So I I think Tim's spot on. They got God and they were deceived and none of this is anything that he campaigned on whether it's from the Epstein files to Israel to, you know, the big beautiful ballroom. This is all atrocious and it's the American people who are suffering.

I assume you hear from people um like do you hear from people that you knew from TPS USA or Babylon B days or MAGA days? Like what what what do they think about all this?

I do. And there's people that have espoused to me that they they feel stuck. They know what's wrong and they feel stuck. And I will tell you that the right has a a big issue uh with what's festering underneath in terms of the sentiment against women. There are a a lot of women from the right who still keep in communication with me and they see what's happening and especially as it it relates to the rhetoric against women on the right. They're not just turning a blind eye to this and it's going to impact them whether in the midterms or you know 2028. They're waking up to the fact that they've also been had that they've been used as pawns within this uh fringe movement.

How would you recommend people from the left or from the just broad anti-Trump movement like talk to women like that?

I'd communicate with them and try to find common ground with them because I do think that um I assume the natural impulse of many listeners of myself to that it's like oh oh you you're just waking up to the fact that the MAGA movement hates women are you? It's like uh you got, you know, you're part of a cult for a man that was like has sexually assaulted multiple women and had three wives and called into the New York Post to talk about how great his sex with his mistress was. And it's like I talked about grabbing women by the [ __ ] It's like you're just seeing this now. And so that's the instinct, but we want to put that instinct aside over here in the box for a second and think about like where are areas of common ground? Like what are ways to communicate that are useful?

It is a cult. And what you have to understand is in any abusive relationship, right? Your access to other people, you're very isolated. Your access to information is cut off. Your access to people who might uh have, you know, rational thoughts about what you're involved in, you're cut off from that as well. So, what you have to understand is these people, you know, they're told it's fake news. Uh, all of this is fake news. The only thing you can trust is Twitter and Truth Social. And for better or worse, they actually believe that to an extent. They believe that these um esteemed outlets are lying to them that nothing they put out can be true. Um, so I I think just little by little showing them that there's still space for them. It's not easy to do what I did and apologize for all of the things that I said and really, you know, I'm on Matt Bernstein's podcast and all of these words that I had said which were incredibly hurtful are put up on the screen and read back to you and that's really hard to do. But I I think as long as there's space for these people to come back and say, "Hey, we understand that this is a whole new uh world in social media and the internet and these cults can grab you in on your phone and nobody can ever see you again." I think that's um the best way to to do it is to be compassionate to some of these people even if they're not being very compassionate themselves right now.

Maybe this is your job. I listened to that podcast that you're on with Matt, who's a nice guy, really left guy, and a lot of the conversation was about like how you could make amends with the trans community and the LGBT community and all this. I don't know. How much value is there to having you put on your hair shirt and go and put up the put up the rainbow flag? It's fine. You can do all that. As a gay, I can be like, it's fine. I don't know. I kind of feel like your penants should be talking to the trap girls and communicating to them because they're not going to listen to Matt Bernstein. Like they're not gonna listen to Matt Bernstein. They're probably not gonna listen to me and maybe they would listen to you.

I think it's also very important to hold that space where you do hold accountability because what I've realized leaving is that to to ignore the issues from these, you know, the the communities that the woke fixated on a while for a while. These issues come back and affect all of us. Okay. the way in which uh the trans community is scapegoed that impacts women and everyone else as well. The way in which BLM was scapegoed and demonized, they were warning about a lot of the issues that we're now facing with ICE right now. And so I do think it's also important to say, "Hey, here's what I missed and here's why we should listen to those individuals and if you don't, it's going to come for you next." I think it's really important to hold space for uh how very small percentages of the population are used by political parties.

I guess I

I think that space is being held for those communities, though. I think it's your job to go down to the [ __ ] Deep USA events and and be go up to the girls and be like, "Are you sure you want to be here? Are you sure? Are you sure from white doing with this middle-aged? Are you sure that you want to do this? I think that's a better use of your skills. One man's opinion."

Yeah, I think it's important, but it's >> or the girl or the women inside the White House. I don't know. I the women inside this administration, >> some of the women within the White House hold a degree of psychopathy that I'm not sure there's anything I could say that would would be helpful. Um, obviously at times I've lacked empathy when uh in being in politics and the things I've said, but the women within the White House uh really scare me to be honest.

So you you sort of go through this transformation, you have this personal crisis that kind of precipitates it. Some of the views from your time in that world you have to maintain, right? Or have to still have some resonance with you or do you look back at it and think that God I was just caught up in this and and it was all a lie. Um, or are there some things I don't know? I was like peeking at your Twitter and it seemed like right before you you left X and it felt like there were still you still had some views you were you had some USA ID views that I disagreed with that you were sharing. I don't know. Do you have other do you have other are there MAGA elements that you think still resonate with you?

I would say no because, you know, my first instinct is to say yes because there's constitutional values that I hold, but that's not MAGA. That's just American. Um,

So what are some of those though?

Free speech, especially um especially with AI, I think we're really there's a lot of people who are going to be forgotten as like our general consciousness is aggregated and stolen from us. People will say, "I made such a pivot because, you know, XYZ or I'm grifting." But they don't consider what it's like to see the underbelly of such power and how up close I saw it and saw such immense wealth and such immense power that it really kind of radicalizes you the other way because you know to to be in the rooms with the wealthiest people in the world and they're talking about socialism being handouts is um as a normal person whose mom didn't want to go to the hospital when she was having a heart attack because she wasn't insured.

That's kind of flips a switch in you where you're like, "Oh, you guys all actually really suck."

Um, you might be ontologically evil. And so, yeah, I've had a hard flip the other way, especially as it relates to my views on uh capitalism. I saw something very ugly.

When you see that they're evil, it's hard to say, well, I do have to hand it to him on the Jones Act, you know, and like I I deal with this as well. Um, but how how about maybe looking at from this perspective rather than complimenting them if you're talking to Democrats just practically speaking as somebody who like lived in that world and who you know had friends there like is there something that Democrats are doing that is blocking them from being able to reach those people? Are there things that you wish that they would do?

Yes, they are incredibly lukewarm. Like the Democratic party is very lukewarm. I don't think they're speaking to any real issues that people are facing. People need healthcare. People need housing. They need a lot more than what the the Democrat party is saying that they support now and Gavin Newsome going out and saying, "We went too far with the trans stuff. Why even address it at all? This is a a non-issue." So, I I do believe like old woke is dead now, but it's these very lukewarm candidates who aren't offering accountability for the corporations and big tech and all of these people and entities that have pillaged America. There's nobody talking about uh AI governance whatsoever. And and I think that's that's really harmful. I think if the Democrats want some sort of future, they do need to to take a hard look and start offering more social programs in conjunction with really holding these corporations accountable.

I want you to let the dog out a little bit more. I I'm I'm giving you I don't know. Were you Catholic? Where'd you grow up? What was your >> evangelical Jewish? Okay. Well, we I So, I don't know. Maybe producer Katie can tell me what Jewish people do in this situation. The Catholics, you know, I give you I give you penance. You do 10 Hail Marys and 10 Our Fathers, and then you get to move forward. I want to give that to you in the Catholic spirit because you did this tweet right before you went dark and uh Ruben Ggo wrote, "Trump wants to invade Panama, Greenland, and now Gaza. Trump is a war monger." Credit to Reuben. He was right about that. You replied, "Your mom named you after a sandwich." That's funny. He was right. You were wrong. But I want you to use that skill set for good. That's what I want you to He was right that his mom named him after a sandwich.

And it's funny.

Look, there's there's no foreign policy take there whatsoever.

Okay.

One last try. Do you do you want to comment on El's Elon's microfus or like just draw a picture of something?

I am not at liberty to discuss that. Uh Connor's pants tried getting me on that as well, but

The greatest journalist of our time by the way.

Conor Pants, I can't compete with him. Is there anything like just little, you know, like something in his like in his bedtime drawer? He's got a little binky, you know. Is there a little something? Does he sleep with a sleep with a teddy bear or something? There's nothing. Not one.

I will I will respect his privacy in that regard.

Okay. Lastly, give me a little kid talk. You got two kids now. That's got I mean I obviously want to respect their privacy, but just give us something about being a mom that's been a blessing.

Well, my older son is today is St. Patrick's Day. So, he's dressed as a leprechaun in the full get up. He's very excited.

That is so cute.

Um, they are the best parts of my life and it's all I focus on. You know, that's why I am I'm I go more dark now because they are so incredible and I hope everyone at at some point gets to experience that joy of parenthood. But it really makes you reflect on what your beliefs are as you have to explain the world to these little little beings who are going to grow into their own. And I don't know, I I hope that my my motherhood will live forever through them and through their kids. And I hope that it's impactful and meaningful and that I can make them proud. But they are I love them both so much.

I hope you can, too. You're doing the right thing. You're doing really well. I appreciate it. My daughter came downstairs today in the little little green hat that has the thing where you press the button and the ears go up as well as a shamrock necklace and she looked at my husband and said, "Is this too much?" I was like, "No,

It's never too much. That's the right amount. That's the right amount for

My son has said that he has crabs in his pocket that he will throw at people if they're not wearing green." So, the crabs are doing the pinching. He's outsourced the pinching to his minion crabs.

All right. Well, send me some kid pictures on the gram. I appreciate you so much, Ashley. Thanks for coming on the show and uh take off the hair shirt and just go forth and do the right thing. All right, girl.

Of course. Thanks, Tim.

I appreciate you so much. Up next, my buddy Cam Casky. We are back. Uh he's my mini me. We used to do a podcast together. He was also a candidate for New York's 12th Congressional District and co-founder of March for Our Lives. He left the campaign to focus on a uh piece of human rights legislation that he's working on with Roana because he's he's a person who cares. He's person that does things and cares. It's Cam Cowsky. What's up, brother?

The [ __ ] is up, gang? We're back.

How you been?

I'm good. You know I'm good. How are you?

Are you vaping? You vaping?

No, I did hookah recently. It had been years since I had done nicotine, but then I was in an ancient city called Sebastia. It's like a 3,000-y old city.

And the mayor offered me a hit of his hookah.

And I was like, "What am I going to do? Say no." But I hadn't eaten in like two days. So, and it had been >> I didn't puke, but I was like it was like I just on crack. Like my entire body was buzzing. I could I couldn't sit still. It was so It was so I hadn't slept. I was overseas. is I had never been overseas before, so I didn't really know what jet lag actually was. Jet lag to me was like going to LA and it's like, "Oh, you woke up an hour earlier this morning." So, it's just a [ __ ] mess. But anyway,

Wait a minute. Your your trip to Israel and the West Bank was your first time ever leaving America?

Yeah.

Like, you've never been to like Cancun?

No. Um, no. I haven't been to Tulum. I haven't been I haven't been anywhere.

Montreal. No, I don't.

That is fascinating. That kind of makes you more like the median American than I realized.

I'm I am the median American. Are you kidding me? Like I don't have any culture. My family history is like, "Oh, we moved to Florida in 1997." Like that's that's what I got.

I was going to talk to you about Ashley Sinclair. We'll save that for the end. We'll save that for dessert. Um we'll talk about the serious stuff first. The trip where you hookah in the ancient city, your first trip abroad. I guess this legislation came out of that. So talk to us about your trip and what you saw.

Sure. So you know I was running for Congress in New York 12 which everybody at the bull work is doing these days and um I Palestine was a huge issue of mine. So a lot of people in my district were saying well if you care so much about the people over in Palestine, why don't you go over there and see how they feel about you Jewish boy? So I went over there and it turns out they like me way more than they like me in my congressional district. It isn't even close. Like I would have a much better chance.

I if there was a I would I would have a much better chance winning over there than I would in New York 12.

I disagree. I think I think your chance in New York 12 was better than you thought, but we'll save that for we'll save that for another day.

I mean, we'll see. Listen, there was a poll that got leaked to Jewish Insider in an article where they were trying to rat [ __ ] me and it was like, yeah, Kasy's unpromising polling showed him at 8% with nobody over 20. And I was like, you you know that that's like a dramatic overperformance, right? Like I would not have >> guessed that at all. I would have put myself maybe >> 8% with nobody over 20

Better than Jeb.

Well, you know, not it's not a competition. Uh it's a different situation. But no, I was so point I go overseas again. I'd never been there before. I have to make up a fake reason that I'm going to get through Israeli customs because if you tell the Israeli airport that you're going to the occupied West Bank, they'll interrogate you. They might just turn you away. In 2022, a law got passed where Israel can just not let you in if they don't want to. There doesn't need to be any sort of alignment between you and any violent rhetoric or language or groups or they it's just like they could just not like your vibe and be like, "Okay, get the [ __ ] out." Because it's the only democracy in the Middle East. Um, so I put together this elaborate plan to get through customs. Got through customs, went right to the West Bank. I went to Bates Sahur, which is the city where, uh, the shepherds found out about the birth of Jesus. And then they went over to Bethlehem, uh, which I also went to. I went to the Church of Nativity, and I did that thing where you get on your knees like right where Jesus was born, and you do a little prayer. And I was like, I mean, I've read Revelations, so I've got that going for me in the Christmas.

Crazy. What was the vibe like at the Church of the Nativity?

It was It was It was Christmas week. Um, I was in Bethlehem on Christmas Eve. So, it was kind of crazy. I was like, "Whoa, I'm leading a peace march in Bethlehem on on Christmas Eve." Like, if I were Christian, this would probably be the coolest thing in the world. But again, almost everything I know about the Bible is the book of Revelations. And the book of Revelations is wild.

It's like it makes Genesis look like a children's book. It it's like a bunch the Bible is these allegories and these stories about temptation and and the human nature. And then Revelations is like, "All right, guys. There's going to be a giant snake made out of fire that's going to eat the entire world." I digress. Um, I go around the West Bank and it's a very interesting situation because I'm in all these different sorts of uh life. I'm in these urban population centers and then these Bedwin villages and these more suburban areas and everything and the life that they experience there. There's all these different sorts of struggle that they go through because in some places you see these military checkpoints where people cannot walk home because they just get turned away by the Israeli army and what should be a 7-minute walk back to their house ends up taking them 90 plus minutes. And then there's other places where settler militias will just raid villages and shoot people point blank in broad daylight. This happened to my friend's husband who was murdered last year by a guy named Yinon Levy who not only faced no criminal consequences, he also regularly comes back to the village to harass people to this day. And it's just all these different things. Like in Gaza, you have this very clear picture of this war and this bombing and this constant barrage of drone strikes and bullets. In the West Bank, it's very much death by a thousand cuts. And it's a slower, more meticulous process that involves going after the water sources, energy grids, all all these different things. Economic, collective punishment. It's a very complex situation. Um, and and you know, I'm a [ __ ] layman. I'd never left the country before, so it was just a weird experience for me.

How long were you there?

I was there for a week. Uh, I would have stayed longer if I weren't, you know, running a congressional campaign.

What about the playing with the kids? Talk to me about shooting hoops.

Oh my. Well, the kids were so cute. Um, you know, I there was one little girl who I scared. She was probably about four years old and I was going up to her brothers in Hibbron to play football with them. That's what they call it, football. It's this word for soccer that people use. and she saw me and she kind of jumped for a second and I realized this girl is probably like 3 or 4 years old. The tourism industry in the West Bank, which is like what keeps the West Bank alive, has just disappeared since October 7th. I I might have been the first white person she has ever seen that was not a settler trying to harass her family.

Um, and then I just gave her candy and she was chill. The kids, they go crazy for candy. And I went to this village called Umar where I brought bags of candy. My friend Jasper who's a journalist told me to do it. And the kids would just swarm me. Um but then when I ran out of candy, I did not know the Arabic to tell them that I didn't have candy.

So they they thought that I was just like playing a game with them >> and they were they kept on being like candy candy. I was like guys I I actually don't have anymore. I'm sorry. I was like going over to different villagers who spoke English. was like, "Can you guys tell them in Arabic that I don't have candy anymore?"

Universal experience. The kid will love you until the second that you don't give them exactly what they're hoping for, and then all of a sudden, you're worthless. Totally totally useless.

Yeah.

So, you come back, you decide to get out of the race. We'll get to that in a sec. You're um you you go down to DC, you talk to Row, Connor, and others about doing some legislation. What What are you guys asking for?

I mean, everything that happens in the West Bank, we fund. And a lot of people in the um you know liberal Zionist world who are ultimately supportive of Israel agree that the West Bank operation is something that is uh that must be stopped at all costs. Like e even people who will totally defend Israel um and and are ultimately they consider themselves allies of Israel, they're against the West Bank stuff. Um, but there's this big misunderstanding that the Westbank settlements are something that happen in spite of Israeli policy and not as the direct result of Israeli policy. But there is a guy named Bezel Smotrich, the finance minister of Israel who Netanyahu is placed in charge of the occupied West Bank. Smotrich was a wanted terrorist in Israel. He was somebody that even the Israeli government said, "We need to put this guy behind bars only maybe, let's say, 20 years ago. Now he's in charge of the West Bank and since October 7th under the cover of Gaza, um the West Bank settler violence, settlement expansions, it is all just um it's been on fast forward. I mean, right when I got back, like the day my flight landed, and we'll talk about the girl who docks to me in the airport. I don't know if you saw that.

Oh, yeah.

Um the day that I landed, 19 new settlements just got approved and they're choking these people out. So I said to Ro, we can't just, you know, talk about how the settler violence is bad. We can't just demand investigations into the killings of American citizens who are killed in the West Bank. I mean, just stop and think about that for a second. American citizens are killed by Israelis in the West Bank.

Yeah. There's somebody from Philadelphia a couple weeks ago.

Yeah. And of course, John Federman didn't have a word to say about it. Um, but we we can't just look at the settler violence as if the settlements themselves are not the reason this is happening and as if the state of Israel itself is not allowing these settlements to happen. I mean, again, people will act like the settlements are like acne and they just kind of pop up out of nowhere. Um, but it's the Israeli military that accompanies the settlers to go kill these people. And it's not just the Israeli military, it's also the Palestinian Authority. Palestinian Authority that governs the West Bank will just stand there while an Israeli military officer or an Israeli settler kills a Palestinian and the PA just sits there and does nothing if not actively participates. So, it's this very complex situation. And what I said to Ro was we need a resolution that is going to shine a light on all the different tactics that Israel is using in the West Bank because every area you go to, they're doing different things. They're placing demolition orders on community centers. They are in Sebastia, for example, the place I hit the hookah, they are using archaeology as an excuse to steal land from Palestinians. So, uh, Israeli officials will basically submit a picture of like broken clay pots and say, "Oh, this is actually an archaeological site. We need to make sure Palestinians can't build anything here. Uh, we need to confiscate it for ourselves, actually." So, they'll obviously burn down all the Palestinians olive groves. Then you go to Jerusalem where you have the E1 situation and and and again everywhere you go you could point to all these different things and that and that and and if you look at the the bill that the the resolution that Ro introduced that we worked very hard on you can see we cover a lot of different things from a lot of different angles because the West Bank operation is very complex.

For dummies like me just the nuts of it the nuts of the resolution is what like they ask is what

Demanding an end to uh a lifting of the demolition orders on uh buildings in and then we list all the different villages where that's happening. Um an end to the archaeological land confiscation in places like Sebastia. There's a lot of roads that are getting built that are cutting Palestinian villages off from one another. Um because they will like be building infrastructure for Israeli settlements and in doing so just cut off Palestinians ability to reach their water supply, to reach their electricity.

Um and just a lot of different things like that. We're working on something in the near future to look at the fact that we are offering US embassy services in the occupied West Bank, which by the way, according to the Oslo Accords, according to the agreed upon international law, the Israeli settlements in the West Bank are a huge human rights violation. I I say this to people pretty frequently. Even if you just completely took Gaza out of the equation, even if you acted as though there was absolutely nothing going on there, the West Bank occupation is still one of the biggest human rights violations happening in the world right now. But there's a difference between the West Bank and Sudan and the gang wars in Haiti and Ukraine. There there's a very important distinction to make here, which is that the American taxpayer is not subsidizing the RSF in Sudan. I mean, I think we need to be placing harder sanctions on the United Arab Emirates who are arming.

Yeah, we're doing deals with the UAE that's subsidizing them. So, it's, you know, a little bit of a bank shop, but yeah.

Sure. But like every single bullet that is being fired by Israeli forces, whether that's children in Lebanon, whether that that's all we're all chipping into that, you know, and and I can't say the same thing about Barbcu's gang in Porto Prince.

I want to move on and talk about the primary stuff since you were in a primary race. We got a primary tonight. That wasn't a primary race you could do.

The um Illinois uh there's a bunch of races in Illinois. Senate race has been interesting. Um I think the lieutenant governor there uh strategy

Is the Senate race close?

It is. Yeah. Yeah. It's the it's a lot of these races like the degree to which Apac has played such a big role in all these races is like pretty insane actually because um like the rhetoric like in the in the Senate race in Illinois it's like everybody's accusing everybody else of being the Apac candidates and like like that's the thing that I'm seeing the most. It's like it's like [ __ ] wild. But Juliana Stratton's lieutenant governor, she was losing the polls. Raja, I don't want to butcher his name. Congressman Raja uh was winning the polls. But uh uh Stratton seems to have the momentum. We'll see how it we'll see how it shakes out um tonight. But then there are a bunch of congressional races including the one that's gotten the most attention is one one of our former FY podcast Cat Abigazale who's like the kind of lefty online candidate uh against Daniel Bis who's more of like a I guess liberal left uh traditional candidate. Uh and then there is an actual Apac candidate in that race. Then I think there's another leftist candidate. It's kind of a four-way race. Cat and Bis seem to be the two most likely to win. Um, I mean, you've been monitoring that. You got you have any hot takes on it? I've seen some tweets from you on that race.

It'll be very interesting to see. I mean, you're right to say it's going to be Bis or Cat. Um, and either way, I mean, the way that I put it is like if Cat comes in third place, that is still a dramatic overperformance considering like

Her youth, her narcolepsy,

Like,

You know, her radical left positions.

Well, she again, she's not even the the radical leftist in the in the race. There's a there's a girl who's running against her from the left. So, this is this is how weird the Apac world has gotten. This is how strange the puzzle of like Apac science has gotten. There's a candidate named Bushra who is to the left of Cat and has a lot of community ties that are sort of, you know, people around her who are telling her, "No, you can actually win. No, you can actually win."

Um, I've noticed from my experience as a candidate that that's something that happens a lot with candidates. Like a lot of the candidates who stay in races, and I'm sure you've seen this a million times,

A lot of the candidates where you're like, "Oh, the only reason they're staying in is because they're trying to make a point or because, you know, they there's some sort of endgame here. It's so hard to believe that some people can actually be convinced that somehow even though they're polling at 0.05%, they can make it happen." No, a lot of these people are just surrounded by enough people being like, "No, no, no, no, you got it. No, you got it."

You had to experience this. Was it weird being a candidate? Did people treat you different like when you were a candidate for a couple months? Did you notice people being like a little nicer to you or a little bit more excited to see you or buttering you up a little more?

Yeah, I guess. Um I don't know. Oh, I just I I very deliberately surround myself with a specific type of person generally speaking because, you know, the way my brain works, I just constantly need to be around people who are telling me that I'm full of [ __ ] I definitely had some people around me from my team, maybe not on the higher levels of my team, but you know, in in sort of like the middle management side of my team, who just thought I could do no wrong and everything. And I was like, "Okay, calm down." Like, hey, hey, I'm not even professing to be as smart as you're treating me right now. Like, I'm running as a [ __ ] layman. I'm just running as a

You do get a lot of people telling you they're for you, you know, which makes you feel like you could win. This is like the the anecdote. People come to you be like, "Yeah, I'm for you." It's like, "Are you even in my district?" Like,

Yeah. Oh, that's that's one of the big things. Yeah. It's like, "Oh my god, I would have been so much more effective as a national candidate than as a than as a New York 12 candidate. I could have gone to Wisconsin and talked about my [ __ ] baseball team the whole time and immediately won the state. But I think Yeah, with the cat race. So, you've got Bushra and she's running to the left of cat and Apac through one of their many shell companies has been releasing pro Bushra ads to explain why Bushra is actually the the right choice over Katabuga. And and I'm like

They did this in New Jersey and in New Jersey they ended up with like a leftist congressperson beat Tom Malinowski. Yeah. Who's more of like a like a bullwork Democrat and because Malinowski like had criticized Israel and so like now they ended up with like a squad member. This happened.

The other thing is like Daniel Bis who I don't think is is like bad by the way. I don't like I I prefer Cap, but I don't I don't think Bis is like some some rotten piece of [ __ ] But um Daniel Bis from what I understand tried to get the Apac endorsement, didn't get the Apac endorsement, and is now like, "I'm not bought off by Apac." And it's like, "Yeah, they didn't want you, bro." Like, "Sorry." Yeah.

Um but no, so so Apac chess has just gotten so complex now that they're spending money on candidates that were that candidate someone who actually has a shot, they would be doing everything they possibly can to stop. Um and it's just very strange. But then you saw there was a report and MSNBC, I think they they're the ones who broke this. Um there were influencers getting paid $1,500 per post to [ __ ] talk cat. Yeah.

And it's not just APAC. There's a fuckload of crypto and AI money.

Y

Um in in Illinois as well. Like the amount of

This is happening in your race too. There's like a proi candidate.

They're trying to destroy Alex Boris. The two guys like

Who were the traditional New York candidates here cuz you know George Conway is a special case. Jack Schllober is a special case. Alex Bores and Michael Lasher are like

The expected guys here. The machine from a I mean Alex Bor is literally because AI is his primary focus but um Alex and Micah from a policy perspective are almost indistinguishable from one another but AI is spending millions already to stop Alex for like some fairly regular AI takes like my AI take is basically destroy every AI data center

Unplug the server.

Like destroy it all build affordable housing over them Um, Alex Bores is like, "Make sure that you know your children aren't making child porn on AI." Just like very basic things like that. Um, and apparently he's just like this huge [ __ ] threat to them. But I said privately to Alex like, "Dude, you need to keep reminding people that it's the worst people in the world who are trying to stop you. That's your best weapon here. Judge me by my enemies." Like that. You know those AI execs who tweet things like I want to destroy the world and like you know immigrants are destroying the country and I want to use AI to purify our nation. Yeah. All those guys are spending against Boris. So and it's interesting because you've got Apac which is this big new boogeyman and then you've got AI packs and it can get a little confusing. Um, I don't know if those are the two interest groups we want to making choices in Democratic primaries, but that's where we're at right now. That's maybe a conversation for a longer day. I've won other uh primary Have you endorsed anybody actually in your old race yet? Have you endorsed anybody?

No, I don't. Maybe I will, maybe I won't. I'm not sure.

We're monitoring that. I'm You made my life a lot easier because I'm for George. I'd only donated to you, I will say, but I'm now I get to be for George. I I haven't I haven't actually wrote the checkbook yet. Hopefully, he's not listening to the podcast. going to get a text after this asking for my contribution.

You had publicly endorsed me on our last FY pod episode and you had said I endorsed Cam. You couldn't take it back and I was going to make an endorsement section of our website and it was ju it was just going to be you and Miss Rachel.

It was going to be endorsed by Tim Miller and Miss Rachel.

I'm I'm [ __ ] pissed at you you didn't do that. Um there's an ad out today from Janet Mills um attacking Graham Platner uh on on this. The ad is women looking at an iPad reading his Reddit posts where he says that women who get assaulted should act like adults and they should not get so [ __ ] up. I got to just say this is the thing you're not supposed to say as a podcast or as a commentator on all this. I have no idea whether that will work. Like I truly don't. Like I think that in some like in a different world, I think those are some pretty bad Reddit posts and Democratic primary voters who are very metooriented and and friendly would reject a male, white male straight that had posted stuff like that. In this day and age, after the Biden thing, after just the disappointment with the establishment, I don't know. I think I'm not sure it's going to work. What? I'm curious. You're you're just more in touch with the, you know, progressive id than me. So, I was I was interested in what you thought about that.

I think the progressive id I I I said this about me recently because um I had I had made some comments in the past that were by really any measure just outright Islamophobic. Um, and I was talking to people about it because it was being called into question the sincerity of the dedication that I have to to human rights in the Middle East North Africa region. And I said, you know, it's kind of one of the most classic themes in a story of all time is can a man change? Like I if you go through all of literature um fables, tales dating back to ancient times, one of the most common themes you'll see is can a man change? And you'll notice that all of the happy stories end with the answer yes. And all of the tragedies end with no. And I think that a lot of people want to believe in the redemptive power of the human spirit. And a lot of people also recognize that it's not like this was someone who was a business leader posting this [ __ ] uh from his sea suite, you know, executive uh first class airplane seat. This was somebody who had just come back from war. This is somebody who just came back from, by the way, the same type of war that everybody is outraged about right now. And these the people see these comments as something that were that were being made by um by somebody who was dejected and had felt like the American experiment politically and socially had left him behind. And now what is he doing with his life? Is he continuing to stew about in the dark or is he trying to do something to help people? So, I think that this would have been a very different story if Graham Platner was running against uh John Oaf or Raphael Waro, but he's running against an extremely weak candidate.

Um I think Oaf and Waro or or Elizabeth Warren even somebody with some juice, it would be a different story.

Yeah.

But Janet Mills doesn't have any juice.

It's really powerful what you said there about the fables and the redemptive spirit. It's tied to what we talked about in the first segment, you know, like talked about this with Ashley and how she's obviously grappling with this. Um, and you know, what she needs to do to like redeem herself, which is kind of a crazy thing to grapple with as a 26-year-old single mother of two, but like that's where that's what she has to kind of think about like what is valuable for her to do.

She's 26.

Yeah, we talked about single.

Yeah. With two kids. We could we could really speedrun your trip to parenthood.

I was going to say it's put us in a group text.

Okay, we'll put you in a group text after this. Also not blind. The other thing that we were talking about was Joe Kent on on that show. Joe Kent resigned today and it's like Joe Kent did a bunch of anti-semitic [ __ ] in the past and he resigned over the Iran war and it's like well did he resign over the Iran war cuz he's anti-semitic or did he resign over the resign over the Iran war because it's like corrupt and wrong and it goes against like what he believed as a former soldier who thought that we weren't going to get into stupid wars anymore and it's like I and this same thing with Platner and it's like I think people assess all these people whether it be like Ashley or Joe or Platner um and are like like or me for that matter and and like try to decide like am I being snowed by this person, you know, or is this person demonstrating that they are redeemable and that they want to be redeemed and that they that they're earnest. And it might be different in different of those cases, but like all my view on the platner thing is like all you can do is judge them by what they're doing now. And and maybe you end up getting snowed sometimes, but you can judge them by what they're saying and doing now. And um and I would rather someone try to redeem themselves um and be imperfect than the opportunity.

If we were if we were all defined by our lowest moments that we would not be in good positions, right? Like we anybody listening to this can think of the worst decisions that you've ever made, the worst beliefs you've ever had, the worst things you've ever said. And and if somebody tried to say that's you, that's who you are, you would say absolutely not.

Or maybe kind of or maybe it's part of who I am and it's what I'm grappling with. It's like everybody has demons, you know, or you know what I mean? Like that's also part of

No, I don't know what you're talking about. I don't have any demons.

You have no demons. Well,

You'll have to if you go into my brain, it's just angels floating around with harps.

We all got demons, baby. Um, yeah, I don't know. I always go back to the old Hillary thing. Everybody obsessed over her saying that the mag were deplorable, and I was like, that wasn't the problem. Is that she said they were irredeemable. I don't know. We'll see. Um, if anybody if these people if any of these people earn earn their redemption. Cam, we were supposed to talk about looks maxing. We're like an hour over the length of how long this podcast is going to be. So, we're gonna do like this very quick. We're gonna brag on this. Everybody's talking about clvicular now. Clavvicular won't come on the bull work because he doesn't think it's mogable, which is wrong.

It's not muggable.

Cameron and I podcast one go to the fi pod archives. It wasn't even really the first episode. It was a trial to see if this project could work. Oops. Um, and it was about [ __ ] looks maxing. We are ahead of the game.

We're doing this [ __ ] over a year ago.

We're ahead of the game.

Get mogged, everybody.

Get mogged. That's Cameron Cowsky. I appreciate the work you're doing, brother. Let's stay in touch. All right.

What do you mean let's stay in touch? We We [ __ ] We talk

Every day. All right. We do talk a lot.

Yeah, let's stay in touch. Email me.

Yeah, you're right. What What the [ __ ] was I saying? I don't know, man. I just was like I I was just like, "Talk to me, babe. Talk to me. I just want your attention." Sorry.

I'll see you at the [ __ ] wedding that we're going to together. at the wedding. I'm Cameron plus one for a wedding soon. Everybody, thank you Ashley Sor. Thank you to Cameron up tomorrow. We have another friend of Cameron's I think who's going to be on the pod. Um and uh this is a little teaser for that. So, we'll see you back here then. We'll see you in Texas. Come to the Austin events way up in the balcony. There are a couple seats left. You'll be able to see me with your binoculars. If you buy tickets right now the bor.com/events and uh we'll see all y'all soon. Bye Cameron. Whatever.