Transcription
All right, we are live here, uh, covering the No Kings protest for The Bulwark. Uh, we've been on the ground watching it from afar, uh, reporting on it, observing it, in some cases being there with it. Uh, I'm joined by JVL, Andrew Edgar, Will Salin. I'm Sam Stein. We're all with The Bulwark. Fellas, thanks for doing this. Really appreciate it.
Uh, it's 2 p.m., so not all the protests have actually started. They are underway, and what you see on the right side of your screen is a live stream from the DC rally with Bernie Sanders speaking there. Look, we don't have many facts because, frankly, they're just pouring in. But what we know is 2,700 protests throughout the day in all 50 states. There are, you know, estimates of tens of thousands of people across the country in various cities, but not just cities. Uh, local towns, places like The Villages, Boston, Charlotte, Orlando, Seattle, Scottsdale, everywhere.
Um, before we get to this and what we're seeing, I want to start with JVL because, um, look, we're nine, nine and a half, 10 months in, uh, to this administration. This is the second No Kings protest. This is objectively going to be bigger than the first, and we're just at this incredibly perilous time, uh, for the country. Uh, the government is shut down as a backdrop to to this. Um, just give me, just, I don't know, step back for these last eight months. How do you feel like we've arrived at this point? How perilous is it?
>> So, when Donald Trump was reelected, there were really a couple ways this all could have gone. And one of them was that Trump could have taken office with a very solid Joe Biden economy, and he just could have gone golfing, right? He could be like, "Look at this. I got, I don't have to go to jail. Uh, I'm going to go golfing. I'm gonna just relax while they name stuff after me all over the country and, uh, just let this stuff go on autopilot." And that would have been basically okay. Uh, we would have had a lot of corruption, one assumes, with it. Uh, another way is that he could have been like, really focused on corruption and using the power of the office to enrich himself and his cronies. And then the third way is that he could have gone full fascist in ways that some of us predicted was likely. And, uh, we've, we've got number three. And behind door number three, we are, we are 10 months in, and we have a masked national secret police that conducts itself in ways which are unbelievably unprofessional and antagonistic. We, we are at a place where the Supreme Court has blessed, uh, just racially profiling people and saying that this secret police can detain people just based on how they look or what language they speak. We have a place in which people are now carrying documents with them because they are being detained and asked to show their papers. A place where the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has been fired. The, the JAG corps has been decimated. Uh, and there is a real push to bring the general flag officer corps of the United States military under, basically, to heal. Uh, and at the same time, you've had takeover by Trump cronies of major media institutions and tech platforms, in addition to all the corruption. And I just say that if you took just a, a list of bullet points of where we are right now and showed them to somebody on November 6th, the day after Trump's election, most people, I think, would have said that that is a worst-case scenario. That's a 95th percentile scenario, and, uh, that probably won't be there, but that is where we are, and that's why we have this protest movement because people have counter-freaked out.
>> Counterpoint.
>> Yeah.
>> We got one and two as well as three. He's golfing, man.
>> We got.
>> We got the corruption too.
>> Yeah. And, and a guy running around again, handing out Trump 2028 hats, right? Which is again, a thing that some of us warned about. And, uh, you know, like, it is weird that no, nobody in Republican politics is willing to say, of course, Donald Trump can't be president again. This would be like the easiest statement in the world, and you cannot find somebody in, in the Republican party who is willing to say that.
>> Well, let me, let me kick it to you. I, I was, um, I was just following the stuff online, and there was this tweet that, um, Britt Hume put up. Old Fox, I guess he's currently still Fox, said, "Oh, there's no Kings protesters. You know, they're, they're, they're protesting a guy who ran his third presidential campaign, won the majority vote, got elected, isn't overriding Congress because the government is shut down, and he's not steamrolling anybody. He's just doing things through normal democratic means, yada yada yada." Uh, and people were buying it. They're like, "Yeah, yeah, this is, you know, we voted. I mean, the truth is, we did vote for him." That I'm not going to dispute that we voted for him. Party people did. But what is the No Kings protest about? Uh, why don't you respond to Brit Hume?
>> Okay, so first of all, this claim that Trump is like, he's not intervening in the shutdown and letting Congress do its thing. I'm sorry. Has anyone heard of Russ Vote? I mean, they literally, the executive branch, in the presence of the shutdown, against the law, has taken over the functions of Congress and is unilaterally deciding to get rid of huge parts of the federal workforce selectively. They, the president of the United States, the, the king, literally said that he's going to get rid of Democrat programs that I'm just going to decide to do it because Congress isn't doing his job. So Brit's just objectively wrong on that point. Now, they're right, and I saw Mike Lawler was on TV today responding to the No Kings rallies and saying, uh, that this isn't, this isn't a king because we elected him. Exactly the point that that Brit made. So, but the position, the position of these authoritarians is, once you win an election, and he did win an election, you can do whatever you want. Now, that is democracy, but it is not constitutionalism, and it is in violation of the American Constitution, and it is in violation of the general rule of law. So these people are, what are you, you could call it, uh, Fareed Zakaria called it illiberal democracy. You win one election, and at that point, you no longer have to respect the will of the people or the law.
>> Okay, Andrew, I know you got to go soon, uh, because you're going to go, uh, do something that's totally foreign to you, uh, on the ground reporting. Good luck. Uh, but you've already been, you've already.
>> Just kidding. Andrew's great.
>> You've already been talking to some folks in Franconia. Uh, which, if people don't know Franconia, it's a suburb of DC. It's got its own Metro stop. It's out there. Uh, it's not like bustling, but it's got a lot of people. But I, I saw your videos, and it looked like, you know, first of all, you said the guy who organized it said 800 people were there, which is a big number. People have to understand that Franconia, twice as much as the first time around. Uh, talk to me about what is going on there, what the vibe was like, why they attracted twice as many people, and just sort of general observations.
>> Yeah, sure. Um, so, yeah, I came from from one of these. Basically, what, what these are is you, you have all of these little, kind of like, neighborhood protests sort of dotted all over Northern Virginia. Obviously, we've got, like, the, the, the main event, the, the big tent, uh, up on the screen right there in DC. So, a lot of people from, you know, all around the greater DC area have gone to that one. But there's also been a number of these just sort of like street corner protests. Um, and, and I talked to one of the organizers at one of these out in Fairfax County at Franconia, and, um, and his, his basic take was, first of all, about twice as large as, uh, as their last one back in June. But not just twice as large, um, about half of their total signups for this protest just came in the last week or so. Um, which, which is a little bit understandable because it's been, uh, so much, there, there's been so much discourse in the news sort of like trying to predefine these No Kings protests, and a lot of that has been coming from Republicans, right? I mean, a lot of this talk, uh, has been coming from people like House Speaker Mike Johnson or Majority Whip Tom Emmer or, or, uh, you know, John Barrasso and Steve Daines and Ted Cruz in the Senate. Uh, and, and the basic, uh, narrative that they have been trying to get hold, uh, is that this is a hate America rally, right? This is, this is a bunch of radical leftists and the Democratic Party who love Antifa and love Hamas, um, and, you know, love criminals and terrorists and illegal immigrants who are all coming together, uh, to, to really just have a, a good time commiserating, commiserating about how much they hate the United States of America. And this has been, I think, a galvanizing thing for a lot of people who, who identify with the basic aims of the protest, who might not have come out otherwise, but who are like, "That doesn't, that doesn't describe me in the slightest, you know?" And I talked to a lot of people this morning, you know.
>> How many were Antifa?
>> Uh, I, I bumped into zero Antifa people, zero self. But they walk among us, you know. You don't always know. Um, no. I, I talked to a lot of people who had like pocket constitutions and American flags and, you know, like First Amendment swag, you know, the most.
>> Exactly.
>> I mean, yeah. Like, it's, it's, it's, unless you're out in it, it is like sort of hard to like get your mind around just how sort of star-spangled and, and like, sort of deliberately claim, like laying claim to, like America as a concept as, like, as an inheritance for, like, you know, that they, they see themselves as sort of like the, the genuine sons and daughters of, of the American project out here. And that's, that's a big part of the programming. is a big part of what, what they're here to say is, especially it's interesting, like, kind of coming out of, you know, a number of years in which, sort of, the Republican party was, was, you know, wrapping itself more and more in the American flag and trying to lay claim to that, and I think it's sort of like, "No, no, you guys are the ones who are betraying the, the, the principles that, that this flag stands for and that this constitution, um, you know, put in codified and everything, and, and we are the ones who are standing up to say, you know, no, we oppose this, not just as Democrats, but as Americans."
>> Uh, just so everyone's know, we, we have a chat going on, uh, with this live feed. I'm, I'm trying my best to monitor it. So if you guys have any questions or just want to share some thoughts, please participate in that. Uh, maybe, uh, if we get some opportunity, I'll, I'll grab one from there and post it to the, the panel here.
>> Um, JVL, like, marinate on what Andrew was talking about with respect to the Republican pushback, Antifa, pro-terrorists, pro-hate. I mean, why? They don't need to do that. I actually think it was stupid of them to do that. But why do it? It's just because, I don't know, everything looks like a nail when you're a hammer, type thing.
>> I mean, there, there are a couple possible answers. We don't know. The, the one answer is like, uh, it's just stupid, right? They're just trying to reframe things.
>> Um.
>> Another answer is that they're trying to move the, the window on how dissent can be criminalized. Um, saying it is Antifa, uh, is a different thing today than it was four months ago, because today an executive order has been signed by the president of the United States declaring that Antifa is a domestic terrorist organization. Uh, so now saying that somebody is Antifa is no longer like saying this is a bad person I don't like. Now it is saying that they are a domestic terrorist, which is that they're a criminal. If the people are domestic terrorists, then they should be arrested. Right? I mean, if, if these were ISIS protests and they were being organized by ISIS and the leaders of them were members of ISIS, then one would hope that the FBI's counterterrorism units would be on hand in all these protests arresting those members of ISIS because that's a terrorist organization. They're members of Al-Qaeda, right? And so I, you know, I mean, I, I'm always the guy looking at tail risk, but I think this is, it is easy for us to say, look how stupid this is now because everything has gone okay. But if there were to be an incident, either provoked or unprovoked, or what, I mean, look, you know, 340 million people in this country, there are a bunch of big, there are a lot of crazy ass people, right? And it is not impossible that you could wind up with a crazy person, uh, doing something violent or terrible at a protest. It's not, it, it is not impossible that the type of law enforcement that we've seen from ICE would not show up and just sort of attack a protest, right? These, and so I think it looks to me like laying the predicate to eventually attempt to criminalize dissent. That's, that's what I think it is. I am nervous that one solitary incident will just be a predicate for something, um, pretty harsh from the administrative state.
>> Andrew, I know you got to jump. Um, Bill Crystal's in the wings, coming in. Little morning shot swap here. Uh, come back when you're done surveying the scene. I want to know what it's like, uh, on the ground. Uh, but any quick last parting thoughts before we lose you.
>> No, I'm, uh, I'm going to head to the Alexandria one now and I'll see you guys in a little bit. Love the minivan, buddy. Great choice of vehicle.
>> All right, Bill Crystal is going to join us soon. Uh, Will, what do you think of that? I mean,
>> Well, actually, well, let me ask you another question because back, back to the old, sort of the idea of what, what we are actually protesting. I mean, obviously, there's a whole number of policies that have been authoritarian in nature. Um, but what's, what's been referenced a little bit, uh, at the, uh, among the speakers and then in this chat specifically is ICE. Um, and, and just the way they've gone about immigration enforcement in this country. Um, it's hard to rank, like, what do you think is the worst, most authoritarian impulsive, uh, policy they've pursued? But, uh, do you think that's sort of like the main thrust of this, or is there something more to it?
>> So, I think it's broader than that, and I think the Republicans would like it to just be about ICE because they would like it to be about, you know, them, the illegal immigrants. But I think the administration has broadened it because they have, you know, because they're sending the National Guard and backup troops into American cities, and that's a, and explicitly from Trump to deal with domestic crime, just, just crime in general. So this is against American citizens, American cities, and I think that broadens the context, and I think that's helpful in making the case that this is authoritarian. I wanted to pick up on a couple of points. One,
>> Sure.
>> From Andrew about the hate America stuff that we're getting from the House Republicans. It's about hate America. So, as, as you guys have discussed, the, all of the imagery from these, from these protests, it's very patriotic. It's just about the authoritarianism. So the position of the Republicans is, if you object to the Trump administration's authoritarian tactics, you hate America. They're equating Trump with America. Now, that is, that is a monarchic mentality, right? It's, "L'état, c'est moi." The old, the old French saying. Trump is the state. You, if you hate him, or if you object to him, you don't like America. So they're kind of coping to the authoritarianism and the, and the kings thing, the whole kings thing. And in fact, we have the Trump War Room account today posting not one, but two tweets just going with the whole monarchy thing, putting Trump in, in the, the royal, in the crown. Uh, and there's a second one where he's like overseeing people. So they're, they're really going with this. They love it. They think it's funny.
>> And I think it's a real contrast between the people who take this seriously and the people who think it's a joke.
>> Bill, good to have you, buddy.
>> Good to be with you, though. Right. Come on. It's this kind of gloomy, you know, worried incident. I, I am here. I am moved. And you think it was going to be, I'm putting JVL's thoughts out of my mind for at least half an hour. And, um, I mean, big turnout here. I'm in this.
>> Tell, tell people where you were.
>> MLAN, Virginia, when I, I went.
>> Center of the resistance, MLAN.
>> You know, everyone, that joke. But, you know, what this is, like, 60-40, 40% of a claim is for Trump, 50% for Ynan. Not that liberal. It's, it's Virginia, right? I mean, plenty of, plenty of concern. Plenty of my neighbors are, are Trump, and a lot of them actually ex-Trump Republicans. I posted a sign, I think it's The Bulwark thing about, uh, "I'm an ex." She was the woman who had hosted me, I didn't remember, 20 years before at a Republican Northern Virginia Republican event. She was the chair of the local county organization, and now she's showing up at No Kings. But I got to say, the mood was, uh, it was inspiring. And I, I have one serious point to make, but I'll first just say it really was moving people. Of course, all the anti-American stuff's ludicrous. Lots of mixture of, I'd say, ages, veterans, people wearing caps, you know, from the, the VFW kind of caps and so forth. Um, and very, and I do think actually the assault, the attack, the Antifa, they hate America, their terrorists attack in the last week motivated a lot of people to come. People just told me that, you know, they were busy. They were going to, they were taking their kids to a baseball game, uh, middle, you know, Little League baseball game, but they wanted to go first to to this for half an hour. They were so offended by that. I really do wonder if that backfired. The other thing I would. So anyway, it's very moving. I think the photos are amazing. I'm told by the organizers, they're being very cautious. They were last time responsible. Uh, I, I think this could be twice the size of the, of the June event. So it could be more like.
>> That was several million people.
>> Yeah, it could be six million people, not three. And even the three people thought was a little low. So this event here in MLAN was more than five times, I'd say five times larger than the event. And we're talking, you know, 150 to 750 where this false place, but, but, uh, many events elsewhere in Northern Virginia, Andrew's been driving around to some of those. People think New York could be up into the, you know, high hundreds of thousands or a million. Those photos, I know I grew up in New York. Those photos are unbelievable there. Um, but also in rural areas and Trumpy areas. I think I would say at some point, you worry about the incident being used as a provocation and then becoming the main news story. You worry just about the bubbles people are in, which God knows is true in terms of media and stuff. At some point, I'm sure people have studied this. I really, I haven't. Uh, if you get to five, six, seven million people, it gets big enough that it breaks through the bubbles. I should think. I mean, at some point, it's people know people. I mean, your neighbor, you know, wherever you are in the country, at some point, not literally many, many places in the country, not just, you know, here in North Virginia or New York, you'll know people. People will run into people who went, people's kids went, people's, uh, relatives went, people's, you know, parents of other kids in their school went or at the church. And I do think at that point, if it becomes big enough, and it does seem like maybe it has, the, the protest becomes genuinely can start changing people's, maybe not their minds entirely, but a little bit their attitude. The notion that, gee, there is something to worry about here, and people are not going to flip overnight. I understand 180 degrees politically, but I think this is, this could end up being a pretty important moment.
>> I guess I guess I'm, I don't know. I, I guard, I hope that's right. Uh, but I, I do wonder and push back on me if you want, like, is this too cloistered? Is it this, are we talking about, like, you know, just kind of urban centers in their, in their suburbs, right? Like, it's New York, Boston. Huge video out of Chicago just came through my feed, you know? Yes, I, I know Tim had Tim Miller had some video from The Villages, which looked insane to me, but like, how do you know if it's breaking through?
>> So, we don't know. They went out of their way. The organizers of this were extremely impressive, I would say, just having watched people try to do these things over the years, decades. Uh, they went out of their way to try to have events everywhere in rural communities and Trump states and Trump areas, and we'll see. I mean, we'll start seeing photos of that, and we'll see how many are from there. And obviously, most of them aren't going to be ne people. Most of the biggest cities that have these events are going to be presumably not Trump areas, and almost no very big cities are, including in red states, but, um, I, I don't know. I feel like they've tried as hard as they can in terms of both the messaging, the, the incredible repetition and care they tried to take to prevent, you know, to, to have deescalating. Uh, they, they trained 250,000 people were trained or at least to some degree, at least alerted to and, and, and got information on deescalation tactics in case anything happened. So they really went out of their way to try to not provide grip for the Trump mill. They really went out of their way to encourage everyone to be patriotic, to sing American patriotic songs, to bring, you know, patriotic, uh, uh, placards and so forth. So, we'll see how much it penetrates. I agree. It's for Sam.
>> Well, JVL, I mean, question, but I, I've got to say, they did everything they could to push against the, it's the left-wing bubble now. It doesn't feel to me like what was the march right at the beginning of Trump won? I mean, the, the, the DC march, uh, Women's March, women, it doesn't feel to me like that. If I could just.
>> Yeah, let me just quickly ask you. Let me quickly ask you because I guess it gets to the, my concern I want to say is like.
>> We all care about authoritarianism. We care about the future of our institutions and liberal democracy. We care about the Constitution. Do regular voters care about this stuff? Like, do they? I don't know.
>> I honestly don't know.
>> Okay, so one thing, just to close the loop on this. I mean, most of America lives within 50 miles of a major metropolitan area. So like, you know, to say like, oh, is it just confined to cities and close in? Well, that's most of the country.
>> Fair enough.
>> That's, that is the vast majority of America lives like within as anime. Um, here's the thing that I find interesting. You have, uh, on the one hand, this movement, which is a mass movement that is able to bring people out of their, out of their houses on a weekend to gather and, you know, in some cases get shouted at by Trump voters as they drive past them or whatnot. And this is devoid of all politics except for democracy. There is nothing in here about tariffs. There is nothing in here about, uh, Doge or anything like that. It's, it's pure, this is democracy, and there's a tremendous amount of energy. And then at the same time, you have Mikey Cheryll and Abigail Spanberger running the most important gubernatorial races in the country right now, basically not saying anything about this, just talking about cost of living. And I, I am interested in that because, like, these are not cost of living protests, right? This is, these are not the, "Oh, the rent is too damn high" protests. And I, maybe that makes sense, like, maybe, maybe that when you're running to be governor of a state, it's not a national office, it's not really about democracy, you should be focusing on like, real things that matter to your voters, I guess. But on the other hand, like, Spanberger and Cheryll aren't blowing people out of the water in polling, you know, and, like, I'm actually a little bit worried about Mikey Cheryll in Jersey. Uh, I think the race is, the race seems to be closer than it should, and, you know, I think ultimately she winds up winning that race, but probably not to the, with the margin she could have. And, uh, I don't know, like, it does make, I, I wonder, and I just, I don't understand, like, you know, like, I don't think you could get a mass protest movement like this based around kitchen table issues. And yet the people who are running for office to oppose this stuff seem like very reticent to embrace democracy talk and instead want to talk about like, "Well, we got to get the prices down."
>> I don't know.
>> This is the perennial debate, man. This is, this is what, this is what Harris was having to deal with, uh, in 2024. It's, and I don't know, I'm not the smartest guy in the world on this, so I'm.
>> It's hard to, it's hard. I mean, I'm, I would slightly just prefer a little more. I mean, I think, I guess actually Spanberger does some of that a little more than maybe Cheryll. Dustin, I don't know. I think Spanberger is going to win easily. But, um, but it also may be that she's got, they've got all those voters. They're all showing up spontaneously, six millions of them, to this event, and therefore, um, you know, that the marginal voters aren't, and that, and they're speaking to them. It's, I, it's not quite to my taste, I guess I would say, but, but I'm open to the proposition that it's a reasonable, you know, tactic and strategy. Maybe overthinking a, a little bit too. I just come back to the millions. I mean, people don't really, I mean, they do understand, I think six, let's just say it's six million, it could be a lot more incidentally, that's a lot of people. I don't know how many people are going to vote in, in, in, uh, in an off year, you know, I mean, it's, it's obviously much more. But anyway, I just, it's a big number.
>> 8% of all the people who voted for Kla Harris.
>> Right.
>> Came out on a Saturday, middle of the day. Let me just give a shout out to Matt in Key West who says Ripley County, Indiana had a couple hundred people. He's trying to, you know, push back villages there. Speaking of.
>> Key West.
>> We already, we, we talked the villages already with Tim Miller's video. And then JM Flynn says Lee Summit, Missouri. I, you know, I'm a big Lee Summit guy, so he said there's good turnout there. So, keep, keep, uh, the comments coming.
>> Um.
>> JVL, I know you got to go in five. Uh, so, just before we, before we lose you, um, how do you build off this? What do you do to build off this? Uh, or can you build off this? And, and one more question for for JVL. Was Shohei Ohtani's performance last night the greatest ever by a baseball player in one game?
>> Yeah, I mean, the greatest performance in a, certainly in a playoff game ever. And yeah, it was unbelievable. Uh, how do you build off this? I mean, the question for me is much more the timing of building off something like this because that, I think, is the hard part, right? It is, it would be easy to capitalize on this stuff quickly and to build and peak very fast, but I'm not sure how useful that is, right? I mean, all of this has to eventually culminate in November of 2026, and so you have to slowly build the case and build the mass of people, and you have to be judicious in how they are mobilized. I think you have to really, I really do believe, and I've written about this, that you have to think about the frame should be as a dissident movement and not as a political movement in the American context because I don't think we exist in that world anymore. You know, this is not, this is not like building, like, you know, the anti-Vietnam War or the Tea Party or any other, you know, any other movement that you've ever had in, certainly modern American politics. It's much more like color revolutions in, uh, in, in Eastern Europe. And, uh, I think that is uncomfortable for Americans to sit with. And maybe it's wrong. I mean, it's also possible. I'm just wrong about this. But the way I think of this in then is you're going to sort of gather strength and slowly build to the point where eventually, like in the summer of 2026, you are pushing enormous rallies that are focused on New York and Washington DC, where you try to put a million or two million people in the streets in Washington or in New York, which makes this a statement that simply can't be ignored. I forgot who said it, so I apologize for stealing the idea, but someone was saying, you know, this is obviously an act of protest and, um, against Trump, but really what this is today is a prelude to sort of the mass mobilizing shutdown of society that might have to come if this.
>> General strike.
>> Yeah, general strike. That's, that's what, because that's what ultimately putting a million or two million people in the nation's capital or the, the business capital of the country. What that really is, is a statement that we could do a general strike if we wanted to, right? And that's, that's the signal that that is, is supposed to send to all the institutions. Um, but I don't know. I mean, we'll, we'll see. Am I crazy?
>> Is this wrong? You're, you're shaking.
>> Hop to it. I see Joe's in there, so you can get him on. And, but I would say one thing that struck me at this thing with, at this, just chatting with neighbors, some of whom I knew, some of whom I didn't really. And, uh, is they are where The Bulwark is, if I can put it that way. They, where we are on degree of alarm. This was not a kind of, "This is going to turn it around. This protest, it's now we've shown and they're going to change their ways." This was sort of a, "They are using the levers of power. They're going to keep using them. It's going to get worse before it gets better. This is only one step." I was a pretty, it was, it was high-spirited because there were lots of funny signs and people, you know, were happy to see each other and it was a nice day here in Northern Virginia, but, um, there was a real sobriety about the moment that I thought was, you know, was, was appropriate.
>> Uh, JVL, good luck. Hey, uh, have fun out there. Stay safe out there. Report back to us. Okay.
>> I will. Thanks, guys.
>> All right, we're gonna bring in Joe Perticone soon. Um, but Will, we haven't heard from you in a little bit. Um, I want to talk about this because Timothy Snyder, and there's Joe. Joe, we'll get to you in a second. Joe's live in the capital, but Timothy Snyder, the American historian, uh, Bill had a nice conversation with him. I wouldn't call it nice, actually. Pretty dark. It was very dark. Uh, but to borrow, because we, we mentioned Shohei Ohtani, Bill and Timothy were talking, and Timothy Snyder said something that kind of stuck with me, which is like, we tend to view these things as a baseball game in which, you know, there's two teams, and then when one side is just breaking the rules, one team is saying, "Why aren't the umpires, you know, calling the strikes? Why are they calling them out? What are the, why are the umpires not doing their job?" And Snyder's point was, the people are the umpires. They have to get their head around the idea that the institutions, the referees, don't exist anymore. The guardrails are gone. The courts aren't going to do the job they're supposed to do. There aren't the guardrails in, in Congress. There's little opposition, but the people need to understand that they are the umpires in this kind of hackneyed metaphor. Um, but it, it kind of, it did resonate with me, I have to say, in that this is one of the few remaining guardrails.
>> Uh, that the administration might have to respect.
>> Yeah. I mean, the, the institutions that we, the passive citizenry expect to step in haven't stepped in, and, you know, so we have to step in. Is there the live question of how much we care about this stuff? I think part of the function of these rallies is to just put together the picture. I don't begrudge just responding to what JVL said. I don't begrudge Cheryl and Spanberger and other Democratic candidates focusing on kitchen table issues, and I believe that the Democrats were right to make the shutdown about a kitchen table issue about healthcare. The job, it, it's not either or. We're, we're doing both. And these rallies are about the other part of the picture, the authoritarianism. And what we're doing is we're pulling together stuff that ordinary people in their daily lives, they, they hear about it, but they don't really put it together. The, you know, corrupt prosecutions, the firing of prosecutors who don't prosecute the president's enemies, the corrupt pardons of the president's friends. We just had another one, George Santos. Uh, the sending troops into American cities, the defying of courts, um, the usurpation by the executive of congressional authority. All this stuff, these are all process things. And part of our job is to put it together in this picture of monarchy, authoritarianism. It is what is happening. And it is as simple, Sam, as what you just said. There is a man at the center of this who will take, who is taking as much power as he can take from other people until he is stopped. And no one is stopping him. You don't have to like, come up with some fancy, you know, seminar language about what that is. It is a seizure of power that is only stopped by other people standing in his way. And so this is an attempt by the citizenry to begin to stand up. We had a lot of people stand up in the last, uh, No Kings. More this time. Uh, if we get to Bill's point about, you know, the, uh, how many people show up, millions and millions. There will be, I'm sure there already are on Fox News and Newsmax, and the House Republicans will have video of this. There will be some crackpots out there, some Antifa types. There will be somebody with some Hamas type of stuff. And the right will try to make that the story. And part of our job is to overwhelm that little tiny numerator that the right wants to focus on with the massive denominator of ordinary people, patriots, who are showing up at these rallies.
>> Joe, what's the situation on the Hill? Why the hell are you there?
>> So, I came up.
>> They're not there.
>> I came up here because it's my home away from home and the Wi-Fi is better and it's just up the hill from the actual protest. Um, but I spent the whole week and a half listening to Speaker of the House, Republican senator say that this was going to be a pro-terrorism, pro-Hamas, hate America rally. And like, I saw more babies in strollers than I did Palestinian flags. Um, lots of like people of all ages, and it was just tons and tons of people clearly from the area, a lot from maybe outside the area, um, attending the satellite rallies that we've seen everywhere else. Um, but it was really massive. I don't think I've ever seen a protest this big here, and I've seen, you know, the 2020 summer, uh, protest that turned into riots and.
>> Can't be bigger than the Women's March. That was massive. That that was really big.
>> Um, but this is pretty, this is pretty close, and, and the fact that they, they figured out their location better. The Women's March was like everyone kind of swarmed in this. I got up on the press riser and I could not see the end of it.
>> Where were, where were you, Joe? You were at one end of the Mall, just if people.
>> I was like, right at the stage. Um, so right by the Capitol, and then you could see like all the way down to what used to be called the museum. Uh.
>> Just so, just so, just so people are aware, just so the, the MAGA folks who are watching this are aware, that's the part you guys stormed on January 6th. That's the one where you were climbing on, and then you, you knocked down the windows, just to get your bearings.
>> Yeah.
>> I haven't seen any counterprotesters either, which I was sort of half expecting. Um, in addition to that, the security's been very chill. Lots of free movement everywhere. Capitol Police, many of them who are not supposed to be working this weekend, aren't being paid because of the shutdown, are out there, and they're just kind of chilled. Like, they, I think they understood it in the ways that the speaker said this could be violent.
>> Capitol Police didn't buy that, and you can tell by their demeanor because they've seen violent rallies like January 6th, and so they're all just chill, leaning.
>> What about the lawmakers?
>> What about who, like, yeah. What elected officials are there? I want to want to get on that for a second. Chris Murphy was one of the first speakers. Um, talked to him for a bit, and then Adam Schiff was down there, but I don't think he was speaking. He was doing some crowd work and some YouTube stuff with himself and some random creators. Um, and then Bernie was the final one. In between that, though, this was somewhat surprising, if I can be critical, is that there was a lot of talk post-2024 of not listening to the groups, and every single person up there is like a part of some group. And so there's kind of had that classic Democratic organizing feel to it. Um, but amongst the crowd, it is, it is not that it is.
>> Know if I could just add one, one point to what I was saying.
>> In the, I think the five or six biggest rallies, they felt they had to have speakers and stages, and so they had to, as you say, and I do think that always falls into the trap of, well, you got to have this person, and then it looks more like a Democratic convention sort of outdoors or something like the Democratic National Convention. They made a conscious decision at almost all the others, though, including here, for example, not to have speakers. So it was all people standing at this big intersection, big-ish intersection of, in this case, uh, Dolly Madison and Old Dominion, waving signs, milling around, people honking at the people, people then from got bigger, so people on both sides of the street and then spilling over, you know, further, and it was really that feeling of a party picnic or whatever you want to say, not listening to speeches. And I asked one of the people involved in the organizing, well, and of course, we had an ex-Barbara Ksttock, an ex-Republican member of Congress, who is now Never Trump. Uh, there were other people here who would, you know, recognizable types and people from groups, and you could have had a roster of speakers, and they purposely chose not to. So I think from at least at the.
>> Some speakers, Murphy was there.
>> Yeah. Well.
>> I'm saying, I'm saying DC and New York and Boston had that kind of, you know, big rally speaker feel. But I give them credit for not doing that.
>> You know what they should have done? You know who they should have had speak?
>> Marjorie Taylor Greene. She's got her whole turn. Turn.
>> I overheard some, I heard overheard some Marjorie Taylor Greene conversations. There were a handful of people just like, they were just like, "Have you, have you seen what she's been up to?" And they were like, "I don't really trust it, but I like it." And I was just like, "That's very funny. That's a good anecdote." But for example, like, yes, there's a stage down here. Yes, there are speakers, but that's actually the least kind of attended zone, right? Um, there are all of these little satellite, speaking of like random people, people dancing, and so people have their own setups. It's just kind of this giant area, and obviously the stage is the focal point, but there are people, you know, it's like an ocean of people, and so it's very different. And I'm like, like, I said, members of Congress telling me that it was going to be this, you know, pro-Hamas hate rally, and it's like, everybody there is either a family or an old person. I saw like 30 different types of dogs. Corgis, greyhounds, you name it. Not George's corgi, another one. And so like, it, it had the real feel of like when you guys were talking about kitchen table issues, like these are normal people who would normally care about kitchen table issues but were showing up for this kind of thing.
>> Well, uh, I'm going to let you go in a second because Mo is coming on, but, um, I, I want to noodle on this a little bit about, you know, how elected officials should be, uh, leaning into this or who's doing a good job handling this. Kind of curious for your thoughts on that.
>> You know, I, I think everyone is spooked by the fact that Kamala Harris in the last two weeks of the presidential campaign tried, she, you know, there was the whole tour with Liz Cheney, there was the whole, you know, "This is about authoritarianism." There was the speech on the Mall, and it didn't work. You know, you, and I think a lot of people just feel like there isn't.
>> I think there is a legitimate concern that authoritarianism starts out as a process concern. It's like, well, what does that mean to me? Uh, Donald Trump is offering to control crime. And, you know, Trump's whole message is, "I got people in Chicago who don't care who does it. They don't care if it's the troops. They don't care if it's the cops. They don't care if it's the president. They just want to control crime." So his bet is Americans don't care about process, about that kind of thing. And it is a challenge to make people understand that this is a material thing to them. But I think to go back to a point that I think Bill and JVL made, what, what ultimately makes the sale is the administration itself. It is their steady encroachment to the point where people feel it. They start out with, "It's just ICE. It's just illegal aliens. You, Mr. and Mrs. America, don't need to worry about it." And pretty soon, it's federal troops in your streets policing you. They're in your life. And, and that's, that's kind of the message.
>> All right, I'm kicking you out, buddy, cuz we got Mona.
>> I prefer Mona at this point. I've had.
>> Finally, we got a woman on here. We got all the guys sitting. I got, I'm going to get out, too, but I got to.
>> No, no, wait one second. We're going to swap you in in one second. You're going to talk to Mona, and then we got Edgar swapping in with you, chilling in the green. You know, Edgar's eager to give you his shoe leather shoe reporting, Sam. You know.
>> We got two shoe leather reporters coming on. We got Mona, who was at a rally. I don't know. Mona, which rally were you at? That's what I need to know. Oh, you're muted. You're muted. No. No. Mona. Okay, let's get. We're gonna, we're gonna work on the audio. Until then, Bill, do you have any final thoughts while we bring.
>> I think, and this is.
Joe's point too. I I I I don't know what it was like at all. The I talked to the text of someone at the New York City stuff, and there's a couple of speakers, but it's so massive, you can't hear them most places. And people are it's more like a party than a convent than a political convention, I'd say, certainly out here. And there, as people are chatting about kids and grandchildren and dogs, all this stuff, they're not like obsessively focused on the their occasional chants. There's a lot of sign waving, a lot of honking from people. So I feel like that for me makes it more impressive and maybe more meaningful, actually, something that people will enjoy, have enjoyed being at. It wasn't, I say, most people here probably came out of a sense of duty, but I think when they were there, felt a sense of, uh, really enjoyment and satisfaction at at being there. So that, that I thought that was nice.
Yeah. No, I I I think that's right. I think people just really want to release. Honestly, I think people are just like freaked out, fed up, anxious, and there's not been much by the way of collective positivity. Uh, and and this is why I was kind of asking Will and and maybe Joe, you can pick this up while we swap in. Hopefully, Mona's audio. I just don't think anyone's been able to channel um that kind of positive agenda or at least a reason for people to get up and excited. And so that's why these sporadic events like this do have um, I don't know, they get people out in the streets. It's it's helpful. Uh, Bill, we we'll see you later, man. Thank you. We're gonna swap. Andrew Edgar.
Thanks.
Mona, I don't know if your volume is working now.
How's now? Can you hear me?
Perfect.
Hi Mona, where were you?
I was in DC at the big one.
At the big one. So, I was at uh close to where the stage was, but too far away to actually hear the speakers. Um, the very first thing that happened was my husband and I were walking to the rally and my husband was wearing a Bullwork t-shirt and a lovely couple said, "You're from the Bullwork." You know, and they gave us big high five. So, that was like our first introduction to the uh the note king.
That's awesome.
That was great. And um the okay, so I didn't hear everything that everyone else has said, but I'll just report that the um, you know, there is this sense in the country that so many people feel and that we hear, I think a lot from our audience at the board too, which is, what can we do? We are beside ourselves. What can an individual do? And I have got to tell you, there are millions, millions of those people who now feel like they are at least being heard, that they this is something to do in this moment. And you know, where it goes from here, I don't know, but it is very just psychically healthy that people got a chance to make a feel like they're doing something to express that terrible grief and fear that they have about the direction of the country.
Yeah, that's what I was just saying. I feel like there is a collective desire for just some constructive outlet, right?
Yeah.
Can bang your head, you can bang your head all day, you can doom scroll all night.
Uh, and just feels like there's not much to be
Uh, happy about. And when you have an event like this, it at least allows you to channel that. Well, we got uh undercover Antifa agent himself, uh, Andrew Edgar.
Live from. Is that. Are you still in Franconia? Are you somewhere else now?
Uh, I'm in Oldtown Alexandria now, where there's, as you can tell, they've kind of just gotten some programming going behind me here in the last few minutes. I'm uh I'm trying not to be like, you know, rude, hollering over it all, but uh, but yeah, I don't know how well you can even see the crowd behind me. It's a good turnout here. Looks like about. I mean, I'm I've always been horrible at estimating crowd sizes. Looks like north of a thousand people would be my guess. Um, but uh, but you know, it's it's all in this this uh, you know, this park downtown in Oldtown. And uh, and like I said, people are it just kicked off here about 15 minutes ago, so people are still sort of streaming in.
Yeah, we've been getting in the in the comments section. Um, it's just kind of remarkable how many separate towns are each having their own satellite protest. So like, woman from Bismar said there were 600 or so in Bismar, North Dakota. We have Dayton, Ohio.
Uh, Bend, Oregon. I'm just.
David City, Nebraska. Uh, never heard of the place. Brighton, Michigan. Wow. I mean, the like there's places all over the country. Uh, I I gotta admit, I was like a little bit anxious and skeptical that this was going to be. I knew there was a lot of anticipation for this. I was a little anxious and skeptical it was going to be a big deal, but to me, at least at this point, 2:45 p.m., it seems like huge turnouts across the country.
Um, Joe, let me just go quickly back to you because Mona raised a a logical follow-up question, which is, okay, well, people need to know that people want to savor something positive. Tomorrow, they're going to wake up, the government's still going to be shut down. Democrats are still going to have to figure out what to do around that. They're still going to, you know, be pushing for the Obamacare subsidies, things like that. You know, you talk to these people all day long. What do they take from demonstrations like this? I think Democrats are obviously still dealing with a big brand problem electorally, but I think they're going to be very heartened by what they've seen because, you know, seeing a mass opposition can indicate and a lot and like we said, a lot of these people may not be your typical reliable blue voter. Um, that can be really inspiring for them as they head into the midterm elections, but as far as like Mike Johnson can expect, like why weren't these violent? And I haven't really seen much chatter about like little dustups because there can always be dustups at any protest, but
You know, the idea that he they were branding this as, you know, this could be, you know, the liberal version of January 6th, and it just hasn't been that. And
Well, let's get, let's get some photos here because I I have to I have to push back. We have some photos of violent demonstration and at least one Antifa member. Uh, if you can see. Oh, there's the violent demonstration there on. Oh, look. Lot of inflatable people. Uh.
Lot of inflatable people. And we have one of a, you know, can we get the Antifa? The actual Antifa? We did find someone. There it is. Look, it's the shirt. He says, "I am in."
What is he doing with the B? The shirt's fine. That's one thing. But the bandana around the neck.
There was something about you should wear yellow to the protest to identify with other global protests around the world against autocracy.
They they explained that at the beginning that at the press tent, yellow is the color of the rally. It's considered peaceful color. That's why the press badges had yellow on them.
Got it.
Gotcha. Well, you know, George's shirt uh is is a choice. And um.
Sam, I talked to I talked to one.
Go ahead.
Sorry. I talked to one older lady at at the protest here in Oldtown just now who was carrying a a a sign with a frog on it that said Amphi and she told me it was in solidarity with all of the inflatable costume uh, you know, rabble rousers up in Portland. I mean, like the the goofiness is like a real thing, right? But I mean like like I've seen a number of people in those same sorts of like inflatable whole body, you know, cartoon character costumes and things like that and it it is very much like uh like they're all kind of just clowning on the notion that, you know, they're they're sort of violent gang members in any respect. But also but also, you know, like it's it I shouldn't just clown on George, right? It like it takes a certain amount of hutzah to wear that shirt to this protest when when they are actively being termed a domestic terrorist organization by the White House. That's not that's not nothing, right? One other thing on that one other thing on that front, which is like I've talked to a couple of federal employees out here who were a little skittish to be on video, you know what I mean? Like they were like, I don't really want my face like out there because I'm worried I'd be fired from my job just for attending this protest. And I mean, like that's just such a striking sort of indicator of where we are as well at this point. I mean, like the the the chilling effect has been real. And it's it's it's striking that the that the protests are again just sort of this dramatically well attended even given sort of that that chilling effect and that that fear that's out there. I think it really is sort of a a blowback against that that culture of beer that they're trying to instill.
Mona, go ahead. You were you trying to get.
Yeah, the pe the people that that we encountered today, everyone was um incredibly upbeat. Everybody was happy to see what a huge turnout. I mean, it was it was we were packed in like sardines on Pennsylvania Avenue. Um, and but I, you know, it was an unbelievably friendly and clever crowd. I have to say, I took photos of a bunch of signs that I thought were great. Like some, you know, these just little homemade signs. Remember they said that all the signs were going to be like industrially, you know, produced and all that. There were.
Wait, hold on. Hold on one second.
Yes. You didn't George Soros didn't give you your individual sign because I got.
He did and I forgot. I left it in the pocket. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but uh, but you know, the.
I interrupted your thought.
No, it's okay.
This idea that George Soros is out there handing out signs to everybody. It was always hilarious.
It was uh, but my favorite sign was a gal who put um a picture of Trump and it said, "Does this ass make my country look small?" which is really good. Uh, but in any event, um, I I do think look, you you can't talk about these rallies though without acknowledging that because it's an anti-Trump rally, it also brought in a lot of left-wing activists. There were a lot of uh Palestinian flags. There were a lot of, you know, kafias being worn at where I was anyway. Um, I I believe that in these protests, you really shouldn't have any flag except US flag or anti-Trump flags or whatever, but um, so I I think that detracts and it's not great. But and there were really a lot of Palestinian flags. Um.
But um, but that much having been said, I I think that was um definitely a minority. Um, people were from every different age group, every different uh, you know, demographic group and uh, there was a real feeling of solidarity. Was the most cheerful day that I've had in quite a long time.
Um, yeah. No, and I think that's what happens. You know, it's one thing to uh have a demonstration when Trump is not in power and the diversity of the coalition can become hard to manage, but when Trump is in power, you're going to have a lot of people come together under that umbrella of we don't want to deal with this. We don't want to.
Yeah.
Have to deal with this. Um, I'm just going to give a shout out to people who have been chiming in uh in our chats quickly uh saying they've attended a variety of different protests. Rio Rancho, New Mexico, uh Carrollton, Texas, right in California. Booneville, Indiana, Birmingham, Alabama, Littleton, Colorado. I mean, God, there are protests like all across the country. Is incredible. Incredible.
Can I say one other thing? um which is.
That um so, you know, I mentioned there were maybe too many Palestinian flags for my liking, but there were also like unbelievable numbers of people dressed in patriotic costumes, dressed as the Statue of Liberty, dressed as Uncle Sam, all of that. There was one guy who had a huge placard that was a Lincoln quote. I took a photo of that. Um, you know, that it is it was a a sort of reassuring display of traditional American patriotism. There were a lot, there were people handing out pocket constitutions. Um, you know, it was it was uh there were a lot of signs about, you know, the that this is lawless, that this is what he's doing is unamerican. So it was uh there was there were jokes of course, and there were bad, you know, a and you know, hilarious things, but there were also there was a serious, really sort of sober recognition of the moment in a lot of those signs, I would say.
Uh, Joe, I'm going to let you go in a second because I want you to head back out and talk to some folks there. But um, final thoughts from the capital. What's it like there? I mean, it's just massive. And one thing I've noticed that Mona made me think of in the describing the costumes is that like, you know, you have a very serious political movement on your hands when people are dressed up like the founding fathers. That only happens like once a decade. And I saw a bunch of people in pantaloons and tricorn hats.
Pantaloons.
And you know, that's that's what indicates it. So yeah.
Are you wearing pantaloons right now? We just. We can only see from uh.
I'm wearing some World War II military chinos.
You're gonna go back out there. Good. Good for you. All right, Joe. Thanks a bunch, man. Looking forward to seeing what you got in his go-to newsletter press pass. Everyone should be, you know, I should have mentioned this. Why didn't I mention this? Joe, you can head out. Uh, subscribe to the Bullwork, folks. Um, I just want to give a plug while we get JVL back in. Subscribe to the Bullwork because we're doing stuff like this. We're sending people out to the rallies. We're doing reporting. We're doing analysis. We're doing it on YouTube. We're doing it on Substack. We're doing it on podcast. We're doing it on video. Uh, we are writing newsletters for you. It's incredible, fun, informative, important work. Uh, and it really depends on people like you to help us sustain this mission. So if you get the chance, if you have it in you, if you want to support a democracy-oriented institution of independent journalism, do uh subscribe to the Bullwork. We genuinely appreciate it. Uh, all right, JVL, give us a lowdown. Where are you?
So I'm in Denville, New Jersey, and uh this is a very very small town in suburban North Jersey. Uh, I expected it's a one of these places with a like a little two-block main street and an ice cream shop and all that. I I frankly expected this to be like 25 people. And uh this is not even like the most prominent place in town. Instead of being on Main Street, it's like tucked away off of Main Street by the library. And I thought there was going to be 20 people. There's got to be a thousand people. I am I am genuinely stunned.
Danville, Denville, New Jersey. And they are. I don't know if you can hear because the mic is using my AirPod mic, but it's just cowbells and.
Shouting and chanting and all the cars that drive past honking. And I again, I couldn't be more surprised. I thought I was going to, you know, I was on the show with you guys for 30 minutes. I thought I'd come down here, hang for 15 minutes, and then come back. Uh, again, just just gobsmacked. Never imagined you would get this many people in a town this small in a place which is frankly not very democratic. Like this is a this is kind of a red spot in uh in New Jersey. So it's it's wild. I mean, not super red. I don't want to give it the wrong wrong impression, but this is a just, you know, I would say probably a 50/50 town uh split-wise. And.
Have you talked to anyone? Have you talked to anyone about uh why they came out?
Talking to people. No, I haven't done that, Sam. I That's I'm sorry. You're misunderstanding my role.
That's not what I do. Uh, no. I I was I was here for like five five minutes and I had one guy come up to me like, "Hey, JBL, how are you?" I didn't.
Well, you are wearing the hat, man. You got the hat. The blaring blue.
Yeah. Yeah. Wearing my my blue Bullwork hat, which everybody loves. Um.
I love it.
Yeah. Can you guys hear the the audio from behind me or.
No. No. It's nuts. I mean, it really it sounds like you're at a sporting event or something.
Just constant honking, people yelling, the cowbells.
Uh, it's wild.
It's wild.
Yeah.
Incredible. You know, it's really heartening to see this. Uh, honestly, again, it's funny. My whole disposition has kind of changed from the beginning of this live stream to now where I I signed on. I was like, "Okay, this is nice." Like I'm glad people are coming out, but everything seems so damn hopeless and like, you know what? But now as I I'm watching this channel, I mean again, I'm just going through names. People are dropping their location in our channel.
Monticello, Arkansas. I never heard of Monticello. Uh Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Toledo, Ohio, Westbrook, Massachusetts. I mean, they're all over the country. Palm Springs, Palm Desert. It is unreal how many locations there are. And it is actually. Some of there there were protests over in Europe.
Early morning time, right? I mean, in Nice, France.
Yeah. Amazing. Amazing.
As if they don't even have their own troubles. But anyway.
Yeah, there's a lot of Canadians in our chat. I I love you, Canada. Just can apologize again.
Uh, but they they seem to be sending mostly we're so sorry this is happening to you uh responses, but I appreciate it. Trinity, Florida, Torrance, California, Monterey, California, Lincoln, Nebraska, Raleigh, Heathville. Geez, Lake Oswego, Oregon. There's just constant constant constant stream of places. Go ahead, Mona.
At the risk of getting carried away with optimism and JVL is right there. So, I he'll rein me in in two seconds if I get too optimistic here. But um, but you know, sometimes um uh leaders come along uh because uh, you know, and and and torque a society in a direction they want to go, and other times the leader sees where the people are and says, "There go my people, I need to get at the head of this parade," because it's out there and I am wondering if one of the effects of what we're seeing today is that some up-and-coming leader is going to say, you know what, it's this country is not inert. The people are not, you know, hopeless, and they there's an appetite for a different kind of leadership in a different direction, and I'm going to get in. I'm going to get ahead of this. I'm going to lead it.
Yeah. I hope you're right. I honestly hope you're right. I'm uh I haven't seen anyone take the reins yet, honestly.
No, that's true. But the opportunity is sitting there.
The opportunity is sitting there. Andrew Edgar is back with us. Andrew, where'd you go, buddy?
Uh, I wasn't sure whether you guys still wanted me and people were starting to give me some dirty looks in terms of having like my phone on talking a lot while there's programming happening and everything. So, I I moved a little bit away. We'll see whether we'll see whether I am I'm still committing a social php of some kind.
Not at all. Well, we're So, we're we're actually going to be closing up this live stream uh in a little bit. just a few minutes because we've hit an hour. I'm not going to foreclose the possibility of doing more video today. Let's see what happens. Uh, but Andrew, just give us your last thoughts from being on the ground. And then JVL, I'll same to you after he's done.
Yeah, I mean, I've just been I've just been struck by the size. Um, and uh, and I think that has been the most important thing about today. Obviously, you know, today ends and everybody goes home and Trump and the Republicans still have all the power and nothing has like materially changed, right? But I mean, size really is its own argument in terms of something like this, right? And and there have been a lot of attempts to sort of diminish this to say all these people are, you know, paid agitators and, you know, belong to different organizations. Like there's there is not a a like left-wing benefactor in the world rich enough to pay however many million people all across America, you know, day laborer wages to come out and and and do this protest today. Um, and I think that that's what we're seeing in in again, all over the DC area, but not just all over the DC area, all over the country. Um, and it's been a really interesting and remarkable thing to see.
Excellent. All right, JVL, give us some closing thoughts. Uh, hopefully not just uh, you know, hopefully there's some a little some optimism in there. Hopefully.
I mean, I I'll give you this. What I'm seeing here is a lot of people who on a Saturday afternoon, look, everybody's got yard work to do. They've got shopping to do. They've got their kids' sports ball games and whatnot. These people showed up. They took time. They took, you know, will wind up being basically half of a quarter of their weekend, right, to to do this when you put it all together, the time. But then I'm looking at all the signs and like I would say probably half the people here have signs with them and uh the signs are overwhelmingly handmade and that is another piece of time that goes into it. Like to to make a sign, you got to go to Michaels, you got to get the poster board. You got to sit down with your markers, right? I mean, this if you're looking at intensity, one of the metrics for intensity is how much of people's time are they willing to give to something. And between the signs and the costumes and again, I mean, this sounds like this is a very gauzy, touchy-feely stuff, but if you're trying to gauge the the what is that that minimum of effort needed to get somebody into being engaged and active, right? Going to a protest like this, anking a sign, having a costume, those things are all investments of time and energy that are required. And I'm pretty impressed by what this turnout here says about the activation level. It's pretty it's pretty interesting and hopeful. God help me. God help me for being hopeful. Sam, look what you did.
Oh my god, this is insane.
Look what you made me do.
I made I made JVL hopeful. Crazy. Uh, never thought I'd see the day. All right, Mona, what are your last thoughts and then I'm gonna close the show with my last thoughts.
You know what my last thought is? My last thought is that JVL, who says he doesn't like to interact with people and he's basically shy and all that, every time he goes to an event where there are a lot of people, he comes back unbelievably energized, less pessimistic, you know, feeling better, feeling hopeful. It never fails. Just wanted to say more people, JVL, more people.
More people.
I'll take it under advisement.
All right, this is what I'm gonna do to close this out. Um, five minutes ago, I was commenting on how um amazed I was at how widespread these protests seem to be. And I was just listing a few um locations. As I was doing that, I was watching our chat and it went absolutely ballistic with locations. Arlington, Texas, Lincoln, Nebraska, uh Washington, Pennsylvania, New Zealand. Wow. Okay. New Orleans, obviously. San Jose, Great Falls, Montana, Pottstown, Pennsylvania. About a thousand folks, says Terry Sturgis, came out in a small town. Denville, we just talked about Denville with JVL. Woodstock, Georgia, Shorewood, Wisconsin, Round Rock, Texas. I don't know if these places are made up. It's possible. Toledo, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Canada, Canada, Canada, Vancouver Island, Tacoma, Washington, Arvada, Colorado, Harrisonburg, Virginia. I could go on and on and on. Two things. One, uh, it does get to how incredible uh, the protests are today, but two is it gets to how incredible our community is, uh, that people from all over uh, the country and the globe are tuning into this little live stream with us on the grounds and in our living rooms, watching collectively this protest and trying to find some sort of commonality and a little bit of thread of optimism in what is a remarkably distressing time. And I said it earlier, but I'll say it again. Uh, one of the great benefits I've had in my career is getting JVL to hire me and latching on to this community so I can be part of this journey with everyone from all those towns uh, that I just read and that I can do things like this that are meaningful and that matter. Uh, and so I hope as you watch this and as you uh listen to JVL, Andrew, Mona, and everyone else who joined the live stream, uh, that you find this helpful, that you find this important, and that you become a subscriber uh, to this mission. And it is a mission. It's not just journalism, it's a mission. So JVL, Mona, Andrew, thank you guys for doing this. Really appreciate it. To everyone who is watching,
Hi everyone.
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