10/9/26: Abdul and Ossoff Crush Debates, Pape On Trump's 'Gift To Tehran', Will Lawrence Congress Run In Michigan

0:00 Good morning, everybody.

0:01 It is Friday, October 9th here at your Breaking Points Friday shows. We've got Crystal returning, Ryan returning, and me and Emily, you know, no days off. We're grind set hustling always. We're always here. Ryan, how was your show?

0:17 It was delightful. And then kudos to Richmond. Their amphitheater is awesome. Like it looks out over the downtown. One of the buildings even. And I think this was real, had all of this psychedelic stuff going on the building to go along with the show.

0:35 We're not sure if it was real.

0:36 We know there were other breakers there because we sent a lot of photos. If anyone else can confirm if those were real or not in the comments.

0:44 So Ryan, was the show even more enjoyable knowing that it was built on top of Sagar's shame?

0:51 Absolutely.

0:51 Yeah.

0:53 Yeah, Sagar was there in spirit in his shame.

0:56 Although it's almost now empowering because Sager is profiting off of his shame. It's almost, well, I'm not going to say what I was going to say.

1:07 Yeah, he's loving it. I met people there who said they helped me get there, so it was great.

1:13 All right. Well, now that we've.

1:15 Gotten through our incredible opening, we've got a big show today. We have Professor Pate returning champion. He emailed me yesterday demanding to get back on the show because he has some very important slides about the new 2000 troops deployed to the Middle East with Donald Trump saying that he may or may not strike Iran before the midterms. Professor is going to break all that down. We also have Will Lawrence returning to the show as well. We're going to be checking in to see the state of his campaign, talking a little bit about AI. But first, let's get to the main attraction this morning, which is, of course, three different debates that occurred last evening. We have Abdul, Asaf, and Troy Jackson. So why don't we start with reacting

2:01 to a little bit of Abdul and Mike Rogers here.

2:05 Let's take a listen. What he's talking about. A few weeks ago, he said, I will go back and fight every one of the tariffs that have been put in place. Detroit Diesel added a third shift because of those tariffs. We have the Chevy Silverado came back to Michigan. Huge billion dollar investment because of those tariffs.

2:25 We saved.

2:26 Traverse City cherries because of those tariffs. He wants to undo it because he can't see past his own political rhetoric. We didn't change. What we said is things move. We're trying to get it wrapped up. We want a deal on those tariff deals. Dr.

2:43 El-Sayed, 30 seconds. We have to move on.

2:45 Weak, cowardly, won't stand up until his poll numbers drop. This is what you can expect from a guy who's bought.

2:52 Off $ 5.

2:52 Million from corporations to run his previous campaigns. Voted to raise your prescription drug prices or keep them high 19 times. He has the audacity to do an ad looking at the drug prices in Canada, except for he voted four times to keep you from buying the prescription drugs in Canada.

3:08 It's incoherent.

3:09 The only thing he cares about is his power and going back one more time through the revolving door to make, what, $ 14 million you made?

3:15 Listen, I can't let that stand. Let me just tell you this.

3:20 I won't let this stand from a guy who is taking corporate PAC money. He snuck in the back door to Chuck Schumer. That money is raining down on him. Oh, by the way, corporate executive, Pfizer Pharmaceutical.

3:32 Gentlemen, gentlemen, we have to keep this order.

3:36 15 seconds and we're moving on to health care.

3:39 Two yachts made $ 14 million. You guys know what Telefonica is? It's a corporation he advised that was helping Maduro spy on his own people. How much money do you make off of it?

3:48 Can you tell us how much money you made?

3:50 Can you tell me, is this like the deal that you got with Wayne County where you took taxpayers money to run for the United States Senate?

3:57 Oh, and by the way, the woman who replaced him got paid one hundred thousand dollars less.

4:01 We're going to move to health care. All right.

4:06 So that is the general tenor of the entire hour long debate. What do we make of this? Who else is watching?

4:11 Well, one thing I made about not just this debate, but all the debates from last night and some of the other ones that have already occurred is just how much the tariffs come up. And obviously, the Iran war has been a very obvious problem for Trump and for the Republicans and gas prices and all of that. But I do think we've underrated, especially in states, you know, border state like Michigan, in states like Kansas, Iowa, how much the tariffs really have weighed on Republican candidates as well.

4:39 Before the Iran war, we were talking all about how this was something that American people just absolutely hated. And Mike Rogers really hasn't had a coherent position. He's been critical of them at times. He's been supportive at times. There's been audio that's leaked of him being more, you know, more supportive, even though it has been, you know, pretty bad in general for, you know, for consumers, certainly, and for the auto industry, especially, which is why Abdul has brought it up quite a bit. So that was one thing I noted across all three. That was pretty interesting.

5:09 I also, in the spirit of, you know, Sagar being with us in spirit, have to point out the Mike Rogers sneakers on the debate stage, which I know Sagar would be deeply disturbed by.

5:18 I miss that. And just for the background on the 14 million dollars that he made, he became chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. when Republicans took over in the Tea Party wave in 2010, and he served through basically 2014 into 2015, he was under a lot of pressure to depart because he kind of botched the Benghazi hearings.

5:43 And Republicans were actually attacking him for the way that he handled it because his wife is the head of a major security contractor that was doing work in Libya, and they were accusing him of botching hearings.

5:54 But as one is, a normal Michigan mom.

5:56 Exactly.

5:56 Just a Michigan mom who ran a a security contractor company in Libya and also Afghanistan. So he steps down at that point and goes into the private sector. So he had spent all this time as the powerful chair of the House Intel Committee, regulating surveillance and all of these other things. And then he goes and just works for a whole bunch of cybersecurity companies, making $ 14 million, working for the very companies that he was supposed to be regulating. So that's what Al-Sayed's referring to there. And apparently he got a couple of yachts, but not in Florida.

6:29 Like maybe it's flagged in Louisiana or something. I didn't quite understand what its comeback was there.

6:34 Well, I also just.

6:35 My yachts aren't even flagged in Florida.

6:37 Oh, Griffin, actually, speaking of flagged in America, they're Bahamas. What are you talking about?

6:41 Speaking of bad comebacks, Griffin, can we pull up the clip about the house in the UAE that I sent last night? OK, but before I say I also just want to make a point about the tariffs. I think it might be similar because what we saw during Trump's first term tariffs were a little bit less. than they are now in most cases. And what we saw over and over again was farmers saying, we know that there needs to be a dramatic restructuring of this relationship and we're going to be patient with it. And I think what's interesting now is one of the reasons that might explain what Crystal, I think, just rightly observed is that it's sort of like the corruption. When the economy is really bad, it's 200 times harder for Republicans to get

7:15 away with tariffs and Trump corruption and to run in an environment where tariffs and corruption are high because you have $ 4 a gallon gas. And that makes it all way more difficult for people to swallow. And it looks like Republicans in the Trump era, who always pitched themselves as being the working class champions bottom up, makes it look like they're top down, making life harder for people. Anyway, speaking of bad comebacks, I think we should roll this one.

7:39 He can't condemn Hamas. He can't condemn the Muslim Brotherhood. He says his home is Egypt. This is all starting to make sense.

7:46 We are going to move along.

7:47 We can continue this conversation in the second half of the show.

7:51 He does want a home in Florida.

7:52 He took it off the market.

7:53 I don't know why.

7:53 He just took it off his home in the United Arab Emirates.

7:56 We're done. Staying in the Middle East. Congressman Rogers, you pledged.

8:00 He gets a great line delivered to him because Abdul sets him up. He sets himself up when talking about the other home because it's true. His financials, the closures did show the UAE property. And then Mike Rogers snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, saying at least Florida's in the United States.

8:18 That should be the campaign slogan.

8:21 Yeah.

8:21 Mike Rogers.

8:23 At least Florida's in the United States.

8:24 At least Florida's in the United States.

8:27 For now, for now. So we also had a little confrontation or two. I want to play back to back about the war. Let's take a listen.

8:35 He said he thinks the war is going to end. He's got a direct line to the president who's making sure the war.

8:40 Does not end.

8:41 And he's not using it because he's true led this war the entire time.

8:44 And this is not a when it ends. We need to end it.

8:46 That's what you're electing a U.S. senator to do, to stand up to Donald Trump and end the stupid war.

8:50 So we've got that one, and then we've also got another attack on Abdul El-Sayed here about groceries and gas.

8:59 He's talking about what he's trying to tell you, where he wants you to be.

9:02 That's a con man.

9:03 Congressman, we've got to stay on time.

9:05 I just want to respond to this.

9:07 You can respond to me. Remember what I said. He wanted to make this about him or me. But the question is about you. Can you afford your gas? Can you afford your groceries? Under this guy who's going to rubber stamp everything Donald Trump tells him to rubber stamp, you're going to continue to pay way more out the nose because he works for corporations and Donald Trump.

9:24 Quite a performance from Mr. Abdul here.

9:27 Is there a Mike Rogers contingent that is really happy about the war continuing and wants it to continue on? Emily, do you have any sense of in Michigan, if there is a loud minority that's still happy that we're keeping the nukes from the Ayatollah?

9:42 When even Mike Rogers is flip-flopping on the Iran war, you know that the Iran war is deeply unpopular. By the way, Michelle Tafoya, who's running a shockingly close race with Peggy Flanagan, I'm genuinely surprised by how close those numbers are. Probably still not going to win, but very close. She came out against the Iran war this week after previously being an art defender of it. So interesting, interesting signs happening there.

10:04 Yeah. New poll came out in that race that, you know, who knows? It's one of many, but that had Flanagan opening up a wider lead in Minnesota, which just given, you know, the state, I wouldn't be surprised if it ends up being a pretty comfortable victory for her, but we'll see. I think in those clips you saw some of the dynamics of what the case Abdul was really trying to prosecute throughout the entire night where Mike Rogers was trying to. I mean, there's a ton of dog whistling here. And, oh, he's from Egypt. He's not even from here. He's not really Michigan. You know, he's foreign.

10:37 He loves the Muslim Brotherhood. He can't condemn terrorism, all this kind of nonsense, which fits with. Trump calling him Muhammad for some reason, saying that he loves jihad and just total Islamophobic bullshit is a lot of what is coming from the Republicans against Abdul. And then trying to also just sort of muddy the waters. Abdul has this very strong anti-corruption, anti-corporate PAC money stance. And so trying to sort of muddy things and confuse voters about whether or not Abdul really stands on principle on those things.

11:08 So Abdul, on the other hand, consistently said, hey, this isn't about me. He wants to talk about me. He wants to talk about my mom. He wants to talk about, you know, where where I've lived in my life and my medical degree.

11:18 It's not about me.

11:20 It's about you. It's about your gas prices, about can you get health care? And I think it's a very effective frame. And on the other hand, Mike Rogers and the other piece of Abdul's argument was tying Mike Rogers to Trump constantly. constantly tying him to Trump. And Ossoff did a similar thing, frankly, down in Georgia as well.

11:40 But I think that just shows you how incredibly unpopular Trump is at this moment, that that is a central strategy of saying Mike Rogers is just going to go along with Trump. The only time he breaks from is when it's convenient for him. He sees the poll numbers are dropping and he's desperate. But he's going to be a rubber stamp for Trump. And, you know, I think that's going to it's just a very difficult thing for anyone to run against having myself run during the Tea Party wave when there was a whole rush to try for Democrats to try to distance themselves from Obama.

12:09 Nancy Pelosi crystal over there.

12:11 That's right.

12:11 And I think Emily's right that tariffs policy kind of runs on trust. And so Mike Rogers claim there that, look, you know, the tariffs were actually good for some elements of the economy. is accurate as far as it goes. And that would work to a public that has faith that they're being done in good faith and that there's going to be some kind of reasonable path forward. But I don't think anybody thinks that. I think they just think that Trump is just kind of a tariff lunatic, that it's not even obvious he has the best interest of the country or the state in mind. And if some people benefit from it, that's great. probably just Trump getting lucky. So I think it just puts Mike Rogers on the side of Trump, even when he's defending the

13:00 couple of scenarios where the tariffs actually were beneficial. In general, in Michigan, people are fine with tariffs to the extent that they protect the auto industry, but not as it relates to a massive trade war with the country just to the north.

13:16 Well, not if it's being done in a way that's costing rather than adding, meaning people are betting on other countries and other supply chains.

13:23 Right.

13:24 Yeah.

13:25 I get that cheap road salt.

13:27 Yes, yes.

13:28 And so John Ossoff was mentioned.

13:30 So I'd like us to turn over to Georgia for a second here for a completely separate thrashing of Mike Collins. Let's take a listen to the clip that got shared around the most, which is the Billy Club clip.

13:44 Let's take a listen.

13:45 This question is for both of you.

13:47 Georgia has been at the center of fights over voting rules and election administration.

13:51 What voting rules should be.

13:53 Left to Georgia to decide, and when ever should the federal government step in?

13:58 Editor, 60 seconds.

13:59 Well, look, Georgia has voter ID, and that's good. Mike Collins and Donald Trump, they're still obsessed with overturning the 2020 elections. Mike Collins still believes the 2020 election was stolen. Mike Collins has supported Donald Trump's effort to overturn the election, and he wants to give your tax dollars to the violent thugs and criminals who sacked the US Capitol on January 6th. Mike Collins is attacking your voting rights, but that's not a surprise when you consider who Mike Collins is.

14:31 This is a man who cheered on a group of young men who were mocking a black woman on a college campus with monkey sounds. If John Lewis were marching today from Selma to Montgomery, Mike Collins would be grabbing a billy club. His office has been in cahoots with some of the most notorious white supremacists on the country.

14:53 He himself has amplified neo-Nazi propaganda. He's never apologized for it, and he should tonight.

15:01 All right.

15:01 And that's Mike Collins on the right here, furiously writing notes. Like, what's he writing there? Billy clubs. Billy Club, Billy Club. So, yeah, I mean, from watching the whole Ossoff debate, very impressive, very surgical in how he would break down his arguments. What did you guys make?

15:23 Emily, I'm curious for your take on this, because I know you often take umbrage at unnecessary charges of kind of racism or extremism leveled by Democrats. But Mike Collins is he is quite out there. So I wonder if you're like, you know what?

15:38 This guy.

15:39 He kind of earns it.

15:40 I didn't even know about his son.

15:42 There's a lot for Ossoff to work with with this guy.

15:45 The son-in-law is inexcusable. There's no way that you can... And yeah, I mean, that's true. I really don't like it when we categorically say this person is X, Y, or Z. But in Mike Collins' case, I think he is given Ossoff, as Crystal said. Why would you... His son-in-law lives with him. And there's an earlier clip, I don't know if we want to play it or not, where Ossoff says, There's white supremacist propaganda coming from your home because his son-in-law lives with him. And Collins tries to flip it on Ossoff and say, that's my family you're talking about. And everyone's like, he's a white supremacist.

16:22 And this is partially why I think it's important to be careful with terms, because this dude is a literal white supremacist. Like what he says is like. American history X.

16:30 Like, it is disgusting. He's like, I'm a white supremacist.

16:32 Yes.

16:33 And so Mike Collins has zero answer to that. And Ossoff, who is an enormous political talent, is just absolutely cooking him with it.

16:41 Yeah.

16:41 It's also a sign of what a different Georgia this is from your grandfather's Georgia that, you know, Ossoff really leaned into those attacks on Collins throughout the entire, throughout the night. And he did not hold back. You use the lines that you were indicating, Emily, saying this is coming out of your own household. He said your staff is like in the KKK or something like that.

17:06 I mean, he really went in.

17:07 He said you hired half the Third Reich.

17:10 Well, that's the thing. Half the Third Reich to staff your campaign.

17:13 And....

17:14 You know, I mean, first of all, I think, look, Ossoff looks like he's in really good shape for this, which at the beginning of the election season, right after Trump was elected, I thought he may really be in trouble for his reelect.

17:26 And here he is cruising to victory.

17:27 Republicans have basically pulled out of Georgia and North Carolina is like this is not going to happen for us. So that is, you know, really pretty incredible and testament to his political strength. But you've got a few things here. You've got a large, educated, white, suburban population, and you have a large Black population in the state as well.

17:47 And that is the rising coalition that has really moved Georgia into the Democratic column. So I think these attacks land pretty hard when you talk about all of that.

17:57 Well, that is another thing. Like he has had issues with his staffer. So it's not just the son-in-law. And when you put those two things together, like, again, his son-in-law is not just somebody who disagrees with people on George Floyd. His son-in-law is like an actual racist. And when you combine those two things, it's very difficult for Mike Collins to flip it around and be like, that's my family. How dare you? At one point, he's like, I've told my son-in-law that I think racism is disgusting.

18:19 It's like, oh, sure you have.

18:24 Griffin, do you have the Third Reich one? I have it if you don't have it handy.

18:28 I don't know if we have time because we did need to hit a few other things, but is there anything you wanted to– we can play it.

18:34 Just one minute. Let me– there we go. It is pretty good. It also shows– you described Asaf as surgical, and I think that's quite precise.

18:41 All right. I got it right here.

18:42 First of all, no Georgia family or small business should pay a dime more to subsidize the energy consumption of these data centers. No local community should have these data centers imposed on them. But that same budget bill we've been discussing all night, the one that slashed Medicaid, the one that doubled your health insurance premiums, it also gave $ 70 billion of your money to data center developers. Just think about this, when you are paying more for your health insurance, when a hospital in your community is closing down, Mike Collins voted to take that money out of your pocket and out of your community. and give it instead to data center developers. And that's the problem, Mike. It's not just that you've hired half the Third Reich to

19:29 staff your congressional office and you have promoted neo-Nazi content online. It's that you're robbing your constituents to subsidize your donors. I want to know if you will commit to voting to repeal that data center tax scam that you voted for.

19:42 Brutal.

19:43 Devastating. I mean, how do you respond to that?

19:46 Like, it's not just that you hired half the Third Reich and you're a freaking bigot and a white supremacist. It's also that you are taking money from people's health care and sending it to these tech oligarchs to build these data centers that everybody hates.

20:02 I mean, what more?

20:04 Like, that was masterful. Honestly, putting all that together was quite impressive.

20:08 Yeah.

20:08 He did that exact form on David Perdue where he was like in this famous line where he's like, it's not just that you're a crook. It's also, you know, that you're making life worse for people in Georgia or whatever it was. But so he throws like eight different things at him. So exactly. How do you respond to that?

20:26 It's like, well, hold on. I want to I want to pick up on the third right point that he made. And then then you don't do the data center part. You don't do the tax part.

20:32 It's like, well, and that was the other thing.

20:34 In addition to tariffs and obviously the Iran war, data centers have come up quite a bit in all of these debates, too. And, you know, Republicans often on the on the defensive with regard to them, because obviously they've become so deeply unpopular. Griffin, probably the last one we should play here that we should get in is one where he's asked about about genocide. Ossoff is asked whether Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. And he really hedges and sort of dodges the question. Let's go and take a look at that one.

21:04 Since the October 7th terror attack in Israel, Israel's response has led to a major divide in your party, with many prominent Democrats accusing Israel of committing genocide. You yourself voted to block a shipment of arms to Israel, seen by many in Atlanta's Jewish community.

21:20 As a betrayal.

21:21 Do you believe Israel is guilty of committing genocide? Are you alarmed by the growing anti-Israel sentiment within your party? And will you vote yes or no on the administration's latest $ 2. 8 billion weapons package for Israel? And you have 60 seconds.

21:37 Thank you, Rick.

21:38 The question of genocide is a question of whether a government has the specific intent to destroy a national or ethnic group. And that is a question for the International Criminal Court. There is no doubt in my mind that Israeli forces prosecuting the war in Gaza violated the law of armed conflict and international humanitarian law. And I care deeply about the security of the Israeli people among whom are members of my family. I also care about innocent Palestinian life and.

22:11 Make no apology for my votes.

22:15 But Congressman Mike Collins wants to sanction and defund the International Criminal Court. His view is that there should not be accountability for crimes against humanity, no matter who commits them.

22:27 All right.

22:28 Yeah. I mean, just so lame. Like, I don't know when these politicians are going to figure out. You can't find some centrist split the baby position on genocide. And so he's trying to be too cute here. I don't know what he really thinks and who he's trying to please here, whether this is genuinely his view. But it's preposterous to imagine that the term genocide is useful if you're waiting for some ICC process to play out that may take years or may not happen at all. The whole idea of international law is to try to prevent the atrocities. So if it's deemed a genocide 30 years down the road, that doesn't help anyone in the near term.

23:05 And obviously, you have basically every international human rights body, including some in Israel, who have looked at this, who say, yes, it's a genocide. So I think this smacks of a cowardly, overly calculated political statement here that was clearly very practiced right out of the briefing book.

23:22 Yeah, and the calculation becomes apparent towards the end of it, where he's saying, like, look, Mike Collins doesn't even believe in the ICC. So at least, like, I'm saying that they should be prosecuted there and see where that goes. I also think, and this is minority opinion, probably. If you're going to have a transformation of U.S. policy towards Israel, somebody like Asaf, who has tried so hard to build credibility with kind of the pro-Israel world and isn't successful at it, could be probably one of the strongest candidates to do that. If you look at the responses to him from the pro-Israel crowd to that answer, they're like done with him. They're like, how dare you?

24:06 How dare you.

24:07 Even bring up the ICC when it comes to Israel? It's confusing to me.

24:11 It's like, you haven't learned at this point that unless you are lockstep with them, then you're dead to them. Like, there's no pleasing them outside of completely 100% towing the line. The minute that you, you know, blocked that shipment or whatever he voted against, it was over.

24:28 It was done.

24:28 So.

24:30 What are you doing?

24:31 I mean, either his genuine view is that he is a Zionist and he's pro-Israel. And so he doesn't want to say genocide, even though this is clearly where the base and where the majority of the American people are at this point. Or he's, you know, stuck in sort of politics of the past, trying to please a group that's already abandoned him.

24:49 And I think it's probably he's just coasting. He's up 10 or whatever.

24:53 Yeah.

24:54 And he's like, I haven't yet called it a genocide. I'm not going to make a news cycle out of calling it a genocide.

24:58 Sure.

24:59 I'm just going to coast to November 3rd, win by my 10 points, and then deal with the problems that Crystal's identifying on November 4th. Because all expectation is that he's going to run for president. And I think you're right. I don't think you can do a primary getting asked at every single event this question. He's going to have to band-aid off. But I think he's thinking, I'm ripping it off on November 4th or whatever, or, you know.

25:27 January of next year.

25:29 Look forward to my take in a couple of months.

25:31 Look forward to my take. I'm just coasting into this Mike Collins defeat.

25:35 He's way too talented to be serving up like Pete Buttigieg 2.0. Like he could be so much more than that, but it feels like he's still kind of in that safety lane.

25:45 Yeah.

25:45 And what you're laying out, Ryan, is basically once it's safe for him and it imposes no political costs and only has political upside, undeniable political upside, that's when he'll actually admit that this is a genocide and agree with the global international consensus. And I don't think that that's going to cut it for people because I think it's very transparent.

26:06 So you easily could have said the same thing, that the definition of genocide is the specific intent to destroy a nationality in whole or in part. And clearly, based on their own statements, that is what is happening in Gaza. Like, just, just, you don't even forget about what has happened, which is obvious.

26:25 But just based on their statements, he could say, that is my assessment. And anybody who thinks that that's not the case hasn't listened to Israeli officials as they've spoken publicly about it. But, you know, I think he just wants to win by 10.

26:41 All right.

26:41 Well, we don't have enough time to get to the Troy Jackson debate because we've got.

26:45 Maybe we can do it after Will.

26:47 Okay.

26:47 Yeah, maybe we can lop it on there if you have any clips, Ryan. But right now, we've got to get over... Professor, welcome back to the show. How are you this Friday morning?

27:02 Oh, I'm great. And thanks for letting me listen in. Crystal, your point is why we've never stopped a genocide since 1944. So I published multiple articles on this in International Security. So this is an area I don't want to talk about it today, but I just want to let you know your point that by the time you define it as a genocide, it's too late. Every genocide that has occurred since the Accords were created has never been stopped for this reason. And the biggest case is Rwanda by the Clinton administration, which comes in saying they're going to stop all the genocides. And then what happened is they debated it for months and months. And Madeleine Albright, none of them could do it. And your point is exactly

27:50 the catch-22. And so the problem is the International Communities Accords are not worth the paper they're written on. The Genocide Accords are worthless. And nobody wants to say that. But the problem is it's been almost 100 years. And your point is always the reason we have never stopped the genocide. All right. I'm not coming at it from the right. I'm not defending genocide.

28:14 No, no, no.

28:15 We get you. We get you. That's a very inspiring start, Professor.

28:19 My job is to doom and gloom you and then you say, no, it's not so bad.

28:26 It's real talk.

28:26 So let's move on to some real talk about the new deployment that you reached out to want to talk about. And you sent me some wonderful slides. You call this Washington's gift to Tehran. So if you could explain a little more of that and I can pull up slides whenever you'd like.

28:42 That's right. So I think it's very important to understand we are in the most dangerous part of the escalation trap that I've been talking about for many months. And it's because the key issue for the trap is President Trump losing political power and becoming Jimmy Carter. And that is what is on offer in the midterm elections. That's what is coming. And that is why I believe, and I've been very concerned about this, and I realize that a lot of people have been on the other side, that as we get to the midterms, President Trump will have tremendous incentives to escalate either just before the midterms or after during the counting of the vote. And what you're seeing just in the last week is strong evidence

29:37 of those preparations. So on September 27th here, which is actually a little more than a week ago, that's when you see the movement of the Roosevelt. But we also now, just in the last couple of days, know that President Trump has given orders for the Pentagon to generate options Now, he's not saying he's made a decision to do it, that presidents never will do that in advance. So what you are seeing is quite serious preparations for major escalation.

30:07 And it's important then now to talk about the consequences. And so what I'd like to do is walk you through this short few slides to explain the window a little more clearly, why we're in this key window. Second is I want to pick just a couple scenarios to show how truly disastrous they would be. And I realize that with what, you know, 75 percent of the public or 70 percent of the public against the war, you might say, well, why go through this? It's because we really are in a position where we need to make sure these consequences are front and center. as President Trump is looking at these plans in the Oval Office. So this is not to persuade the 70%. This is really to try to get ahead of potential really negative consequences.

30:59 So I call it the gift because I'm trying to explain that we have options to escalate. We have options to escalate, but we have no options to escalate advantageously. And that is what's crucial to know. And therefore, what we're doing with these escalations, if we did them, are true gifts to Tehran. They will help Tehran. So I just want to point out, I've just explained the crucial date of November 3rd, but I want to point out the three clocks as they are pushing to this date and how they work. So first, as we all know, the Theodore Roosevelt and another 2,000 Marines that are able to land are moving. And they started on September 27th.

31:49 It will take about five weeks before they're fully in position. And that is, and I'm showing you on the clock where we are roughly today. But it's important to know that the Roosevelt will be within firing range before the five weeks are up. So as we get closer here, this really is a very important clock for capability. The second clock is the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. And this is, we have run down our cushion. This is why we can't simply open the spigots now to reduce the price of gasoline and diesel in the United States. the way the president might want to do. It's because we've run down to the point where we're still doing a trickle out, but if we were to have gushers come out, we could actually collapse the walls. And what that means is

32:39 Trump doesn't have the option to improve his prospects here And Iran may well increase the pressure. And just in the last seven days, Iran has struck more ships in the Strait of Hormuz than in any seven-day period since the beginning of the war seven and a half months ago. So this is a major clock weighing, I'm sure, on the president. The third clock is a clock of opportunity that I suspect is weighing on the president. which is what are the economic costs inside of Iran right now? Now, as you know, I've studied blockades, economic sanctions for 30 years, not just air power for 30 years. And it is the case that our blockade is having truly important economic pressure inside of Iran. We have increased the inflation rate

33:29 inside of Iran to 89%, nearly 100%. But it is not yet producing political concessions. So it's very easy to imagine if you're sitting there with power that, oh, I'll have the capability and the reason to do what? Hit Iran now to drive up that inflation to 150 percent, 200 percent. That is find the breaking point. And you've heard President Trump use those terms. So now I want to talk about the consequences of what are likely the options coming on the desk in the Oval Office. So I want to just pick two options, which anybody, I mean, somebody, I'm just saying. So the first option is going to be hitting oil refineries in Iran. and why oil refineries exactly will be an option. The reason is because what

34:27 most people don't know, they all know Iran exports oil. What most people don't know is two-thirds of Iran's oil is used, consumed domestically. They don't export all of their oil, and that's why inside of Iran, gasoline costs pennies, literally pennies. Now, if you knock out the refineries under those conditions, We've already blockaded the oil, so that's not the issue. The issue is driving up the economic costs inside of Iran.

34:58 So this will be the incentive as you're looking at these refineries. The problem here is Iran has escalation dominance. It's not just a tit for tat, I want to point out, that there is a very clear target. It's already been hit on the edges just in the last week. and that is Abqaiq. What Abqaiq is, is the largest oil facility in the world. It is a Saudi oil facility that handles 7 million barrels a day. That's over 5% of the world's energy consumption in one facility. So that amount of oil They separate there, by the way, the sulfur from the oil. It's what makes it called sweeter.

35:52 That amount of oil, 7 million, is three times the export of Iran's exports on its best days in the last two years. So Iran doesn't just have tit for tat. Iran can literally, with probably 20 drone and missile combination that we cannot shoot down and you cannot bury that target, here, they can knock out 5% of that oil, and then we won't be worrying about the East-West Pipeline, because that's what goes to the East-West Pipeline. We won't be worrying about Yanbu, and we will truly be in a very different world when it comes to The price of gasoline and diesel and also our treasury rates. If we drive up, if we do this, our treasury rates could easily, certainly the 30-year bond, could easily go over 6%. And now

36:47 we're in not just recession territory. but deep economic territory. This is a gift to Iran. Iran is so angry at us right now. I think there are people, right now, Arachi, the foreign minister, is in deep trouble for even talking about a deal in New York, if you're following this inside Iran. And what you are seeing is, I think that there are large parts of the Iranian government itching to wreck the American economy. So the biggest gift to Iran would be the ground options. And I've been warning about these for months. And I realize you folks have pushed back on me. Oh, we couldn't possibly do this here.

37:29 I just want to point out why and what the incentive would be to do it. What is the actual incentive? So the key thing you need to know is that Iran's drones and missiles require targeting locations separately from the sensor on the drone and the missile. It's called, in the military, the kill chain. That kill chain comes from spotters that zero in to a location for the ship that's supposed to be targeted that allows then the sensor on the missile or drone to do the final work of hitting the target. And that's what the main spotters have been radars. So the reason we've been hitting radars over the last few months is to knock out the most obvious spotters by Iran, which are the radars. That's not working, though. And that is what has been happening

38:26 just in the last week. So many people have been saying, well, does Iran have the capability to hit ships? They've had the capability. And now it's clear they have the capability. So what's the incentive? The incentive would be go the next step. and actually take the territory those raiders are on. And that's Larrick Island, that's Hormuz Island, that is some of the coastal areas of Iran. That's what the issue actually is. And I'm bringing it up now because it's now time to talk about clearly what the incentive would be. Now, the problem here, and the reason this is a bad idea, is because Iran doesn't need those specific pieces of territory, Larrick, Chabahar or Bandar Abbas or Hormuz Island in order to spot.

39:15 It has other options. First of all, it has mobile radars. Second, those fast boats, you might say, well, what do they want those fast boats for anyway? What's that doing with Iran? They're spotters. They are, and also fishing boats, by the way, and they are able through eyeball contact to see a ship and then radio it in with enough location for the, and these could be coming from dozens of inlets here.

39:42 And then the third issue is, third option for Iran is mines, which don't need spotters. And that is something that, and what I'm pointing out is that the trade here is we might try to do this because of the military incentive. I'm pointing out that's what CENTCOM is going to be reporting to President Trump. Here's the incentive. The problem is that this will not be very effective in shutting down the operational capability of the drones and missiles.

40:11 And Iran gets American fixed targets. They get to shoot the fish in the barrel, and the terrain on all of these areas has no cover. No cover. So what does Iran get here with these rungs on the escalation ladder? Gifts. And what are the gifts in one word? Targets. And the biggest thing to be aware of, the opportunity for preemption.

40:43 You see, even moving the Roosevelt and the Marines in this area is creating the spiral dynamics of the escalation trap. That's why I've been calling on my escalation trap substack for them to return home. Not good enough for President Trump just, oh, I'm not necessarily going to use them. This is creating the incentive for Iran for preemptions. Now, just imagine if we in America saw Chinese vessels and troops and naval ships coming to our coasts in Florida.

41:25 Are we really going to take Xi's word? He's not going to use them. We're just going to come and we're just coming for a port visit.

41:33 No.

41:34 Think of Iran going through this. So the danger zone I'm pointing out is not simply will Trump have an itchy trigger figure. I'm saying that the real set of incentives is that plus Trump. Iran preemption, which I'm going to be talking more about here in the coming weeks, because this is how you get into these wicked spiral phases of an escalation trap. And this is what I want to talk about and why the real policy here should be, Roosevelt, go home.

42:08 So, Professor, one theory that I've seen laid out by others is that perhaps in advance of the midterms, there may be a coinciding of logic from the Iranian side and from the U.S. side that would incentivize some sort of a deal before the midterms. From the Iranian side, the thought would be Trump is under tons of pressure now.

42:29 because of the midterms, but after the midterms are over, maybe we won't have so much leverage. So maybe we can get a better deal now while he's feeling the pain. The logic from Trump would be, I'm about to get blown out. I need to do something about this Iran war. Let me have some sort of a deal so I can announce mission accomplished and hopefully gas prices can go down a little bit and I won't have quite as bad of a result as I would.

42:54 What do you think of that theory?

42:56 I'll make two points. Number one, if there was any real substance to that, Arachi would not be now at risk of his life. So this is not a small thing that's happening to Arachi. And it doesn't have to be simply the government who might penalize him. Him being he when he went through the Supreme Leader's funeral, there were people calling for his death into his face. So number one here is that. Number two, Crystal, and this is the real problem, there's no firm set point for a deal. So this whole idea of a deal is really by people who say, well, wait a minute, war is bad, war is costly. Can't we just solve this with a deal without all the debt? Well, if that were true, Crystal, we wouldn't have had World War I,

43:43 World War II, all of the wars in history. So the problem here is not that these are not well-meaning people who are coming up with these ideas. And I'm not surprised that you have people who come from business who say, you know what? Blood is costly. Let's just do this like the godfather.

43:59 Right.

44:00 And the problem is that this is not the real world. The real world is there's no set point. Even if there was a deal struck, as there was on June 17th with the MOU, it would likely collapse within days, just as the MOU did, because there's no set point here. Both sides are trying to gain power over the other.

44:22 And until you would have acceptance by both sides of what the new power is, a balance of power, you won't have an end to the war. And I don't believe Iran will truly accept surrendering its power in Hormuz. And I don't believe Trump will truly accept giving Iran the power of Hormuz. Because what that's about is not money.

44:48 It's about Iran becoming the fourth center of world power. No state in history has truly wanted to abandon power. And this is what you're at. This is what we're asking. So I like the idea of a deal. I would love there to be a deal. Some of the people advocating for a deal are people I highly respect, not just journalists. And the problem is this doesn't work. It's also why, by the way, Joe Kent and others call me for just walking away. Notice they're not walking away.

45:23 And as I've talked many times to Joe about, it's not that I disagree with his policy so much. It's not realistic politically. You're just not going to get President Trump to accept he will become Jimmy Carter without quite a fight here. And that's what you're seeing.

45:40 So the one thing I'd ask is on the logic of Iran needing to preempt this, the counter argument would be we're looking at, we're approaching 6%, you know, on the 10-year and the two-year treasury as it is. Yesterday, mortgage rates were at 7.4%, oil over $ 100. The West and the U.S. in particular are bleeding badly, and it's not existential for the U.S., So yes, Iran is suffering, but it's existential for them. So therefore, just by definition, they're willing to take more pain. At the same time, every day that there's not a hot conflict, they're able to build more ballistic missiles, more drones, import more missiles and drones from Russia or China, wherever they're getting them, and prepare better for whenever the confrontation comes again. So

46:34 that would be the counterargument to say that actually, Iran is in better shape letting us bleed and letting themselves build up while they wait next time. What do you make of that?

46:45 So one real point here, Ryan, which is if you were Iran, what would it take for you to be persuaded that America has learned its lesson? What would it really take? And let me posit what might be a credible thing, which is, number one, the Democrats take both houses of Congress. And number two, they passed a veto-proof resolution through Congress that ends money for the war. So if you got both of those things and you're in Tehran, you're probably saying, OK, I'm not sure the Democrats might bail on this. But if I get the Democrats in power and I get veto-proof resolution to end the war, that's what happened in 1974, how we actually ended the Vietnam War. Now I think you're talking. Short of that, Ryan,

47:35 this is just smoke and mirrors. There's no there there. There's nothing to actually bet on if you're in Tehran. And keep in mind, for Iran, for them to take the risk, this is the risk at their life. So you're asking, not you personally, but that position is asking Iran to take a sucker deal. Hey, we're going to promise to give you the money. Let me give you the IOU, and then we'll promise to pay you in installments over the next few years. But you give me everything I want up front right now. That's the whole problem here.

48:10 Well, it wouldn't be that they would take a deal. It would be that they just would continue the status quo. It's still the same thing.

48:16 Until the U.S. busted it open. I'm sorry to interrupt, but whether the deal is written or not, it's still the same idea. OK, so in my world of international politics, it doesn't matter whether the deal is actually written down or not here. It's still the same thing. And what their incentive is, Ryan, is to drive up the costs on America through the first week in January. And that is through when you might not. It's not just the vote.

48:44 It's the counting of the vote. ceding of the new representatives, because it's not clear. We've had January 6th. If you're in Iran, you know there was a January 6th. The president is still the same president. So you're going to wait until you see, will the Democrats actually be able to take power? And then the second thing is, once they take power, can they actually do anything with that power that's meaningful? And if not, then it's the imperial president.

49:11 He's just going to be able to do what he's going to do. And you're missing your opportunity here. And so the way to handle this, if you're Iran, the incentive structure is to ramp up the costs. And by the way, Ryan, this is what I said starting June 15th, that they would ramp up the costs. They are ramping up the costs. So that position you laid out is exactly the debate we had on June 17th. And the problem is Iran is following their incentives. It It's not a weird set of incentives. These are not perverse incentives.

49:47 They are driving a hard bargain. This is what it looks like. This is what the hard bargaining actually looks like in international politics.

49:55 Professor Pape, how would any of this change or not change if President Trump were to authorize U.S. involvement, well, more direct U.S. involvement with the Houthis right now?

50:06 What that would do is speed up the preemption incentives here for Iran. So if we get involved in the Houthi situation at all, whether it's bombing, whether we move the Marines over, et cetera, et cetera, it doesn't really matter what the option is. All of those just add to the possible pressure because then you have Pakistan possibly coming in. You start with that. So all of that means, um, Iran's window for preemption, um, uh, intensifies, and I wouldn't want to be an ab cake, uh, here, um, when that happens. So this is, and it's not just ab cake as a facility, uh, here. Um, it really is important to understand that if ab cake goes down MBS, the government, uh, is fragile. And so if I, if, if, um,

51:02 If I'm MBS, I better have some really good real estate in New York, Paris, and London, because this war that's escalating in Yemen is escalating in the wrong way. And this is not the way to handle this if you're MBS. So again, this is getting into the issue of MBS. So I'm about to talk about this on Sunday on Professor Pate. What's happening is they're in their own escalation trap, MBS is. And he's making the same mistakes that Trump is making, that Putin made in his escalation trap. Now MBS is making the same mistakes. The problem is MBS is weaker than Russia and weaker than the United States. So when MBS makes these mistakes, you better get those good real estate deals now. I'm sorry to make it a little, I mean, it's such a

51:54 serious situation. We've got to let off some of the some of the tension. But honestly, I mean, this is literally what I would be saying in meetings with the kingdom. I mean, I'm not, there would be no real, maybe a little more detail on how the escalation dynamics would actually play out. But in terms of the incentive structure, they're going down, they're handling this the wrong way. All right.

52:18 Well, we hope the kingdom is watching. This was informative as always, Professor. And of course, All of this and more is broken down weekly on your sub stack, which we will be linking in the description.

52:32 How did I do as your TA today, professor? Did I do okay?

52:36 I'll tell you if you ever need another job, Griffin, you just let me know. And I've got my YouTube channel. Okay. The problem is the guy who's helping me with my YouTube channel is working 40 hours a week. He's doing it for free. So you're probably not free. I am not. You might think I'm making all this money. I just had a giant wedding with my daughter. Until we get to your stage of the breaking points, there's no money, as you probably know.

53:08 I'll take paid exposure. Professor, thank you as always. And we'll be checking back in with you again soon.

53:15 Thank you very much. Thank you for all you're doing here. It's so important. And I so appreciate. I really honestly don't put this online. OK, but I really having spent 30 years member advising every White House and dot, dot, dot. This was this is a critical few days. And that's why I pushed on this here. Now, I'm not inside.

53:38 I can't say absolutely as an insider. I'm just telling you, when you see these atmospherics here, now is the time real decisions and expectations are being set. And it's very important to do this. And you have just a lot of the right people watching you.

53:56 Yeah, absolutely.

53:57 You know what?

53:58 That was a great compliment. I'm putting that online, Professor.

54:00 Sorry. Okay, you put that online. You put that on. But it's very important because we don't understand that these decision makers are human beings. I have had a chance to see them before the decisions are actually taken. So I get a chance to see this without the cameras on. And I'm not saying that they follow the things I'm saying. No, that's not it at all. And they do the pushback very much like you guys do. And so the issue here, though, is not understanding. We're so cynical about our politics. We're saying, oh, there's nothing I can do. There's nothing I can do.

54:33 That's what leads to political violence. But yes, there is stuff we can do. And it's really important. And I've seen this. A really good example was Barack Obama was hours away from launching 100 cruise missiles into Syria in 2013. And that would have sucked us in to a wider forever war. So you think the forever war in Iraq was bad. Man, you get sucked into Syria. You're in deep, deep trouble. Well, what happened is I argued very, very vigorously with that I don't care what the red lines are.

55:07 President Obama is the strongest person on the planet. And if this is a mistake, it's a mistake. Don't do this simply because you said you would. And thank goodness he didn't do it because Syria went on for a decade. I mean, just think about this. We're never going to get out of that. Right, right.

55:28 And Syria is looking really great right now. Professor, we have another guest, so we got to jump. Thank you, as always.

55:32 We'll see you very soon.

55:36 All right.

55:36 Another returning champion to breaking points. We have William Lawrence, who's running for Congress for Michigan's 7th District. Welcome back to Breaking Points, Will.

55:46 Thank you. Glad to be here. One of the best.

55:48 Backdrops I think we've seen from a candidate, too, I have to say.

55:51 Those look handmade. It doesn't look like you had AI make those. Those look human-made.

55:58 It's got the human touch.

56:00 It does.

56:00 Incredible.

56:01 And speaking of AI, I did want to get you to react first to this story that came across our desk this morning. Scoop from Axios top executives at Anthropic. OpenAI and other AI companies are privately gaming out scenarios for a public and political revolt after a catastrophic AI event. Those events that they are considering include a shutdown of financial systems and even of water and electricity.

56:29 William, what do you make of that?

56:31 Well, it's very alarming. You know, I've been a leader here in Michigan, standing with residents fighting back against data centers for the last year. And here's how it's gone when the A.I. lawyers and PR agents come to town. They say, basically, we're here to come suck up all your water, use all your energy, more than the city of Detroit.

56:53 We're going to ruin your home values.

56:55 But if everything goes well, we're going to put 20 million people out of work. But if we mess up, We might kill everybody by accident.

57:06 I don't know.

57:06 It just hasn't been very persuasive. And this is another example of the question people are asking. Why is it that we're building these data centers when they're saying that it may be used to shut down the entire financial system or create a bioweapon?

57:19 The costs simply outweigh the benefits.

57:23 And you made that case most recently in your debate against Mr.

57:27 Barrett here. So I did want to play a little bit.

57:30 From that debate specifically about AI to see what your opponent has to say about all this.

57:36 Let's take a listen.

57:37 My record on this is clear. I have a record that is clear for it.

57:45 It's a completely different issue.

57:47 You've been running these ads celebrating your voting data centers. This is completely different from the fight that we're fighting now, which is against hyperscale data centers, these behemoths that are threatening to destroy everything about the communities we love. You voted last year to prevent local control, local regulation of AI or data centers for the next 10 years. That means that if a school district didn't want AI in the classrooms, they would not be allowed to do so.

58:12 If we wanted to say that AI could not be used to deny medical claims, they would not be allowed to make that regulation.

58:19 All right.

58:19 So it does seem like a.

58:22 Opponents, especially on the Republican side, are trying to stake out some sort of territory on this issue, but it seems a little flimsy. He said that that's not true, that he passed a bill with a 10-year ban on AI laws.

58:38 Could you explain that a little bit more?

58:39 And Will, can you also just tacking on to that, can you tell us a little bit what you're hearing on the ground from voters when you talk to them? Does this matter? Is this like abstract beltway conversation or do people really care about this too?

58:49 People really care about it.

58:51 People started caring about it because the data centers were, you know, just plopping down or proposing to plop down in their backyards and they weren't happy about it. But the AI conversation has always been in the background. People are saying, you know, for the sake of what? I mean, here in Michigan, you know, this is an industrial state.

59:08 We build things. We build cars. If you're talking about an auto plant that is going to create thousands of good jobs and actually build things that.

59:17 People agree we need, you know, that's one thing.

59:20 But if you're talking about a data center that's only creating a couple of dozen of permanent jobs, And then the upshot of it is that we're going to have the risk of some sort of runaway AI that is.

59:32 Also going to put us out of work. It just is not persuasive.

59:35 And so I'm really thrilled that the conversation about data centers and AI safety have now seemingly arrived at the same station. Finally, there was a lot of months where it was sort of simmering under the surface. And I'm really glad that we're having this conversation all in one now. But you saw Tom Barrett, my opponent, buffering there when he was trying to recall what his incredibly clear position on data centers actually is. Because the fact of the matter is, data center developers spent nearly a million dollars to get him elected in the last cycle.

1:00:07 Then he turned.

1:00:08 Around and gave them $ 80 billion in tax breaks through the big bill. He also voted, as I noted, to prevent any local or state regulation of AI in data centers for the next 10 years. That thank God, did not pass. No thanks to him. But it was because the United States Senate took that provision out of the final bill that actually passed. If it had passed, I mean, think about how radical and reckless this was. House Republicans voted to ban any municipal or state regulation of AI or data centers for the next 10 years. That's what they did last year in their infinite wisdom. It would be catastrophic if that had happened. I mean, look at where we are now, the conversations we're having now. They wanted to tie our hands behind our back before this

1:00:56 conversation around AI safety could really even get started. So thankfully, cooler heads prevailed in that case. But, you know, Barrett voted the wrong way. And then, you know, he got the same memo as a lot of other people about six weeks ago where, you know, they said, oh boy.

1:01:11 This is really unpopular. Yeah, let me ask you about that. He alludes in that clip I think it was about two weeks after you won the primary, largely on running on opposition to data centers. He says, well, now I sponsored a good bill, which seems similar to his kind of turnaround on the war. But what is that good bill that he's referring to that he recently co-sponsored?

1:01:37 He keeps going back to it. He's struggling to get it right.

1:01:41 First, he sponsored a bill that, to hear him tell it, banned nondisclosure agreements for data center developers. But then when we went and we read the text of the bill, it said NDAs are banned for members of Congress, but state and municipal officials can continue to sign NDAs. that's been the problem. The rub hasn't been Congress members. I mean, maybe he knows something I don't. Maybe he has an NDA.

1:02:09 Every accusation is a confession, as we say. But, you know, it's the local officials that have been the issue that people have been really pissed about here in the district. And his bill did nothing to deal with that. Now, he got called out because that bill did nothing. And now he's introduced another bill or co-sponsored another bill that probably isn't going to go anywhere.

1:02:29 That goes farther on the NDAs.

1:02:31 So I give him that modicum of credit that he is a co-sponsor now on a bill that would ban NDAs. He's introduced or co-sponsored some other bills that are, there's a lot of bills. I think there are a lot of congressmen and women around the country right now who are trying to give the appearance of doing something when it comes to the question of AI and data centers because of just how hot it's gotten over the last few weeks. So he's co-sponsored a few of these, but people can see that he's scrambling and trying to cover his butt because he was on the wrong side of this, decidedly so, for the first 18 months of his term in office.

1:03:08 And where are you on whether Hakeem Jeffries should maintain his position? Should you be elected? How would you handle the question of getting or keeping Hakeem Jeffries in the position of leadership or finding new leadership for the caucus?

1:03:21 Yeah.

1:03:22 I've been on the record that I support Hakeem to be the next Speaker of the House because we need unity among the Democratic caucus moving into January to be able to focus on reversing the damage that the Trump administration has done over the last two years, as well as having a full accountability agenda so Hegseth and Trump and the rest of them can really be put under the scrutiny that they deserve for their brazen corruption. beginning in January, rather than, you know, having a knockdown drag out fight within the Democratic caucus that wouldn't serve our interests of holding the current powers that be accountable.

1:04:03 Is there unity in the Democratic leadership on this AI issue? Is Hakeem Jeffries and others aligned with your takes? I mean, what I hear from a lot of other Democrats is that they're scared to be as out and out on this issue as you are because the amount of money that could pour into their own races for opponents against them.

1:04:26 So what is your sense of Democratic leadership? And are people like Hakeem Jeffries going to go along with bills like the Bernie bill that is causing calling for a pause on all AI development?

1:04:38 I haven't had that conversation yet with leadership, so that's something we'll take up on November 4th. But it does seem like there's a moment right now where people really are waking up in a sincere way to the threats that are coming from AI. I mean, the scenarios you just described, that the labs are scenario planning. I think there is an opportunity, not just among the Democrats, but I think there may be some genuine opportunity for even a modest degree of bipartisanship to move on some of these issues in January. Now, maybe that's optimistic. We'll have to see. But the reason for my optimism there comes from the fact that I am seeing complete bipartisanship here in the district among Republicans and independents and Democrats who

1:05:25 have been united in large numbers in fighting against data centers and now are catching up to the conversation around AI safety if they weren't already there. So if we can translate that spirit you know, to DC, I think there may be a possibility of getting something real done in the early parts of next year. You know, I've introduced my stop tech overreach plan, which would put an immediate pause on new data centers and advanced AI development for the sake of then brokering an AI benefits compact that ensures, you know, as we, you know, move forward with this world-changing technology, how can we ensure that it actually, you know, helps everybody rather than entrenching the power, you know, the power of a few. How is it that we're

1:06:07 going to maintain human literacy and critical thinking rather than allowing AI to take over our entire educational system? How is it we're going to ensure that humanity remains at the center even as we continue to use these tools, which is, you know, we're tool using animals. So I'm not somebody who says we should swear it off entirely, but we do need to make sure that it is within our control and we keep our humanity and human values at the center. Just as an aside, I think the Pope is one of the people who has been doing some of the boldest and most consistent communication on this, thinking about the kind of values that we need to be keeping in mind as we navigate this world with this new AI technology.

1:06:50 So Congress has passed a war powers resolution kind of ordering an end to the Iran war. Trump has kind of flagrantly ignored that and continues to prosecute the war. He's sending a bunch more you know, assets to the region as we speak, would you commit to voting against any spending for the war? In other words, deploying Congress's, you know, power of the purse to kind of force an end, even if it means kind of a showdown with your own leadership or even potentially a shutdown. Because I can imagine a world where Republicans are just refusing to vote for any Democratic budget, meaning that Jeffries or whoever's in leadership would need 218 Democrats to get something across the board, which would give a handful of House

1:07:37 Democrats leverage to say, I'm not voting for anything unless it bars any money for the Iran war. I was elected to end this war. We're going to end the war.

1:07:45 Yep.

1:07:47 Yes, Ryan.

1:07:48 Actually, saying no to war and setting our national priorities straight, bringing our money home and investing in the American people has been a core plank of my campaign from the very beginning. It's one of the reasons why I got into this race was to fight for a reevaluation of our national priorities to put in check the out-of-control war budget and make different choices with where we put our precious time and creativity and resources. So there is no fight that I'm more eager for than that fight to ensure that we end this war in Iran and we put a check on the out-of-control war budget, which is now climbing up.

1:08:31 To $ 1.

1:08:31 4 trillion on the back of trillions of dollars over the last 25 years to fight forever wars, which we can all see have made us less safe and less prosperous as a nation, contrary to all the promises that were made.

1:08:48 So I host a show where we get callers, and I got a guy named Robin Michigan who called a couple weeks ago. He drives a diesel pickup for his business, And there was also that SuperVowel clip of the MSNOW host having that focus group just a couple of days ago, Michigan voters who were uncertain Trump voters, who some of them said they were voting for Abdul El-Sayed. And so my question to you, Will, is, As somebody who comes really from like the left flank of the Democratic Party, how are you talking to people who are desperate, who are disillusioned with Trump, maybe disillusioned with Republicans in general, but are a little nervous about voting for somebody who they consider to be like radical socialist? That's their opinion.

1:09:33 I'm putting that in their mouths, not in mine necessarily. Well, what does that mean for you to have those conversations and how are you having those conversations?

1:09:43 You know, I really do believe that it's our politics are more about, you know, top versus bottom than left versus right. It's been said many times. I have found it to be true on this campaign. And there are, you know, multi-time Trump voters who will be voting for me, who already voted for me in some cases in the primary, because they've seen me at their town hall meetings fighting back against data centers. There are Trump voters who will be voting for me because they are farmers who are putting diesel in their combines for $ 7 a gallon, $ 1, 000 or more every day from some of the farmers I've heard.

1:10:21 And they're wondering if they're going to break even at all on this year's harvest because it's just so damn expensive to put the fuel in the combine. And they know that the war is the reason for it. Another big issue that is really pissing people off all over Michigan is is the tariffs because tariffs are supposed to be part of industrial and trade policy strategy for the sake of putting American workers and business and consumers first.

1:10:50 And I'm someone who believes that tariffs can be important when they're applied strategically and consistently. But what everybody wants from the economy is some kind of clarity. You want to know what the prices are going to be next month so you can plan your budget. If you're an investor, you need to know what the business conditions are going to be next year so you can make your investment decisions.

1:11:11 When Trump wakes up in the morning and he sets the tariff rate 525 or 55 percent based on, I guess, how his mood is that day or whoever had his ear last, that is the opposite of reliable business and market conditions. And Congress had the opportunity to take a vote to restrain the president from continuing to set these tariffs because he's so obviously unfit. And Tom Barrett voted to allow the president to do whatever he's doing. And he can't answer for that vote to this day. I mean, he's made a lot of reversals on a lot of things, but he stands by that vote to this day. He thinks the president should continue to set the tariffs based on Lord knows what. And so that's a huge issue that has been impacting people. And a lot of Republicans,

1:11:55 a lot of Democrats, people in rural areas, anybody who puts diesel in a piece of equipment understands that. you know, that the war has been catastrophic. And anybody who works in business or has a small business or works in industry understands that the tariffs have been catastrophic, especially here in Michigan, because of our close integration with our neighbors in Canada.

1:12:15 And I've got one more debate clip, unless you have one.

1:12:17 I had the tariff one, but he kind of he kind of just did it unless you have a different one.

1:12:22 Let me see what I got here. Oh, I got the one where you kind of flip the script on the Who is responsible for the deficit, Democrats or Republicans? Let me find this one.

1:12:33 So the top 1% of Americans after the reforms that we took on to the tax code are actually paying a higher percentage of the federal taxes in our country. Meanwhile, working families are paying less. If you're a family of four making $ 73, 000 a year or less in income, you are paying nothing in federal tax liability.

1:12:53 That is because of the efforts we took on.

1:12:55 And now the top 1% are actually paying more.

1:12:58 And their income tax rate wasn't driven down by the tax cuts that we passed. We put more money in the hands of working families. We do need to address our debt and our deficit, but there is not enough billionaires out there to pay for the deficit.

1:13:11 Mr.

1:13:12 Lawrence, you have 30 seconds to respond.

1:13:14 Tom Barrett voted to give tax breaks to billionaires. He voted to cut your health care. He voted to make your gas and groceries more expensive. And he's voted to increase the national debt. He is running from his record because he knows he has repeatedly voted over the last few years to make your life more expensive while making our country weaker. He has no answers for his record or that of his failed president.

1:13:41 It seems like the beginning of that is about a tax on billionaires. You talk about this kind of flipping the script where it's, you know, traditionally it's Democrats who are blamed for driving up the debt. But that might not be working anymore.

1:13:55 No.

1:13:56 The question from the moderators was about the debt, and that's what we were responding to directly while speaking about the economy at large. But Trump is responsible for 30 percent of the national debt, and the Republicans have voted in lockstep for that, including my opponent Tom Barrett. They voted to give trillions of dollars in tax breaks to the wealthiest 1 percent, and most of that goes to the wealthiest 1 percent of the 1 percent. So they just have no leg to stand on in this country. And, you know, this is the thing that we need to remember.

1:14:33 They are destroying everything that people love about this country. The economic security, the social safety net, the political order that is based on checks and balances and peaceful transition of power. I mean, it's easy to take for granted, or it was for much of our life, that regardless of how you think things are going, right direction, wrong direction, you know, in two years or in four years, there's going to be another election. There's going to be a peaceful transition of power. There's going to be an opportunity to have a change, to change course, and to get it right. That does a lot for your peace of mind when there's somebody you don't like up there in Congress or in the Oval Office. Now, we lack that

1:15:12 peace of mind because it's clear that they don't have any respect for checks and balances or the peaceful transition of power whatsoever. I mean, Donald Trump and Tom Barrett and the whole faction of which they are a part is responsible for destroying that which has been best about our country. And I don't think we can say that too many times. All of this fear-mongering and mudslinging that they want to cast against Democrats, against progressives, against whoever, saying that we are the ones who would sow chaos, it just is not credible when people can see that we are living in a world of chaos. And the lion's share of that is the responsibility of the man currently sitting in the White House and his lackeys in

1:15:59 Congress like Tom Barrett.

1:16:01 All right.

1:16:02 Well, Will, it's always a pleasure to talk to you. You've got just a couple weeks left in your big race here. Where can people find more? And if they do want to support you, where can they support you?

1:16:15 Go to wewill2026. com.

1:16:19 You can donate, you can sign up to make phone calls, you can sign up to knock doors here in the district. We're knocking more doors than any house campaign in the country, or so I'm told. We've got an amazing people-powered movement here in mid-Michigan. It is going to be a very, very close election, and I just want to make that clear.

1:16:38 All of the polling we've seen has been within the margin of error. It's going to come right down to the wire. And it could be decided just by a few hundred votes. And by helping out our campaign here in the 7th District, you also help our shared efforts to elect Abdul El-Sayed for United States Senate, another critical race for reasons we all know. And I'm proud to be on the ticket with Abdul. And I'm excited to go win this thing on November 3rd with your help.

1:17:04 We're not taking any corporate money. So it's a people-powered campaign, both with the small donations and with all of the hours that people are putting in thousands of volunteers, both here in mid-Michigan and supporters around the country who are ready for change. So thank you for having me on and let's go get it done.

1:17:21 All right.

1:17:22 Well, we will be watching. See you soon.

1:17:25 Thank you, Griffin.

1:17:26 Yeah.

1:17:26 We apologize for Griffin, Will.

1:17:28 Hey, this is the vocal stim in the office. Once you hear it, you can't stop hearing it.

1:17:39 All right.

1:17:40 That was a jam-packed Friday show. But, of course, it would not be complete without some questions from the AMA audience. If you want to ask a question, of course, you can sign up yourself at BreakingPoints.com to get a free trial and submit written questions for Friday or interact with our weekly live AMA. But first, let's start with an accusation from Patrick Robles. Good morning, Friday crew. Could you help me steel man the argument that breaking points is actually an elaborate CIA sigh.

1:18:12 Off?

1:18:14 All right.

1:18:14 Sagar and Emily, their college is an assembly line for the deep state.

1:18:19 Is this the question or is that you?

1:18:20 True fact.

1:18:22 True fact.

1:18:23 This is the MA question?

1:18:25 It's more Georgetown than GW, but fine.

1:18:28 Well, Sager did his master's at Georgetown, so it's pretty bad. But yeah, no, I was a lowly political science creative writing student. So that's a tough one.

1:18:39 Now, this user also says the issue is with Ryan. I can't figure out where he fits into all this. But I think Ryan is another obvious one.

1:18:48 Ryan is the king.

1:18:50 The Forrest Gump of politics.

1:18:54 He's been in a bar with everyone.

1:18:56 I think Ryan actually gets that accusation the most, too. Like if I'm reading comments, I feel like it's because Ryan does so much reporting on the CIA, which inevitably, if you do, people will call you CIA. It's a total lose-lose situation.

1:19:11 I guess the question would be what would the purpose it would be to channel the righteous anger at the system away from revolution toward electoralism which then gets dissipated by the duopoly.

1:19:34 That's right that's the leftist accusation And what's the Crystal connection here?

1:19:39 I guess Crystal's from Northern Virginia.

1:19:40 Yeah, what did he say about Crystal? How did he explain that one?

1:19:43 Something about recruited for her swim team. I don't know. I don't know.

1:19:49 She is from Virginia, which is, you know, just saying that's where the CIA is.

1:19:54 Crystal trains the CIA attack dolphins. That's what I heard.

1:19:58 She blew up the Nord Stream pipeline. She didn't even need the tank. She just held her breath and went down there.

1:20:06 I've I just think we're all simply too lazy to, to also be moonlighting another thing.

1:20:13 I think we're doing too many things.

1:20:14 That is the thing.

1:20:15 Yeah.

1:20:16 Um, and, uh, but, but there.

1:20:18 Are people in our industry that some of them, you know, raise an eyebrow at where they get their connections. I mean, uh, just look at the guest list for, for Joe Rogan. It's quite an interesting who's who of spies, former and current. Um, it's incredible program over there.

1:20:34 Uh, all right.

1:20:36 So this next one is an, Another accusation for us from Haki. Zoran isn't smiling anymore. His wife isn't posing with him anymore. The Hitler of our time insulted her. And what did he do? Not arrest him. He protected Hakeem from Osei. Have you seen Hakeem's Zionist appointments? Zoran still has Zio Jessica Tisch as NYC police commissioner. Why is breaking points complicit in our silence?

1:21:06 Silence of what?

1:21:07 Wait, hold on. Start at the beginning of the question again.

1:21:10 Essentially, there's an accusation from the left that Zoran has capitulated to Zionists. You know, there was protests yesterday where people are very upset. Maybe it was on October 7th. People were very upset. And they're saying that because we're not covering that, we're complicit in our silence.

1:21:29 Hassan said he supported the pressure campaign.

1:21:34 Also, we've covered his decision to keep Tish on.

1:21:37 Yeah, Fuller. I've asked him about it in my interview with him.

1:21:42 Yeah, they want us to cover the WOL protest on October 7th. I don't know. I guess that was yesterday, so that's on Sager and Emily.

1:21:54 No, Crystal.

1:21:55 Sager and Crystal.

1:21:56 Sager and Crystal, yeah. I mean, you're always going to have, like, whatever.

1:22:00 Anyway.

1:22:01 Well, let's open this up. What are your thoughts on this? All these protesters protesting Zoran?

1:22:07 I personally, I kind of always eye roll when like the entire topic of conversation on social media is what like 20 protesters said, because you can find 20 crazy people in any large group who are going to be yelling and screaming stuff. And also like as New York mayor, you're you're supposed to get screamed at constantly it's actually shocking that he's gone this far without being screamed.

1:22:34 At yeah no yeah that's that's right i think yeah i mean you're always going to have some people protesting um you know i people are upset that he has you know made too much i think of a rhetorical emphasis around anti-semitism and when he rolled out his um this new spending against like discrimination and hate around the city.

1:22:58 He led with the fact that it was all going towards like anti-Semitism.

1:23:04 When it had a broader scope.

1:23:05 When it actually was a broader scope. And so then it, and then, and then they, and then, you know, I pointed out it's actually going everywhere, but I understand why people think that he's kind of, there are a lot of different communities in New York City and people are under the impression that That's his primary concern at this point.

1:23:27 While he gets criticized relentlessly by the pro-Israel crowd, but a lot of the things that they're demanding of him aren't really things within his control.

1:23:45 By the way, there also has to be priorities. The people who have much more control over awful Israeli policy in Gaza and American policy there on a fundamental, important, immediate, urgent level. Are there things the mayor of New York City can do? Yes, but he also has to be the mayor of New York City. And so I don't know.

1:24:06 This stuff doesn't bother me because I see it as a part of the ecosystem. It doesn't bother me that people are protesting, and it doesn't necessarily bother me that the mayor of New York City would have different priorities at this moment in his mayorality. Because it is all a necessary part of the ecosystem. You're going to have people who apply pressure regardless, and it's going to be irrational and unreasonable because it's their job, basically, to be activists on a particular issue. On the other side, he has a job to do, too. And so it's just a natural part of how things go. I do like...

1:24:38 if you're not a single issue person, um, or if you're not, that's not like your particular cause, particular pet cause, like on the right, we have different causes where you see, like, there are a lot of anti-abortion people who do this thing that will never, there's like, nothing is ever good enough.

1:24:52 And it frustrates a lot of anti-abortion people because they'll get protested no matter what they do. Um, but it's a part of the ecosystem. Like it's some people's most important issue. So let them say what they want to say.

1:25:03 And it probably also helps them, um, because it makes him look more kind of moderate to have, you know, left-wing protesters out yelling at him.

1:25:14 I have a friend.

1:25:14 So people are like, oh, I guess he's not that radical.

1:25:17 I have a friend from home who texted me this week being like, what's up with Zorah Mamdani? He seems so normal and hot. And it was because I think they saw him on TheoVon. So normal and hot.

1:25:28 He's good at being normal. It's a rare, rare skill among leftists.

1:25:34 So true. I agree with that.

1:25:37 I guess the argument would be, yeah, he could probably get rid of Jessica Tisch, but some larger NYPD reforms would probably consume his entire morality.

1:25:50 I've laid out the case for why he didn't, is my understanding. And also just think about the game theory here. If you get rid of Jessica Tisch, and as expected, the cops go on some kind of strike against you, and crime goes up, People are going to blame you for doing that. And your entire career is cooked. And that has happened to many mayors who have fought with the police.

1:26:17 It happened to de Blasio, right? Didn't they like quiet quit or something?

1:26:21 Yeah.

1:26:21 So then if, however, you leave Tisch in place and crime goes up, that's Tisch's fault. You get rid of Tisch. If you leave Tisch in place, crime stays the same or goes down, then you can focus on the things you care about, which is affordability. So just from a game theory perspective, the smart politics there is to keep Tish in place. Also, people are like, oh, she's tied.

1:26:46 You lose all your political capital. Okay, what does the New York Police Department really have to do with Israel? Not that much. And then secondly, people need to have a more material understanding of the relationship between the mayor and police departments. And that's not just New York City, but it's around the world. They are a powerful, independent, reactionary force. that represents, for the most part, the richest power centers in the city. They're not under the thumb of the mayor. They are a force. Now, you can jockey with them in a political contest, but you can't just dictate to them. People think you can just dictate to the police. That's not the material world we live in.

1:27:27 You're living in an idealistic world if you think that that's the case. And if you operate from a place of idealism and reality blows up in your face, then the things that you ran on, you can't actually execute on.

1:27:41 This next one.

1:27:42 Comes from AJ Mira, and they say, referring to Emily here, MJ is not a conservative. She is a Catholic socialist, parentheses, which I can get behind. Change my mind. Okay, so she's wrong on both counts.

1:28:00 My dad's Catholic. I've never been Catholic. My dad's family's not Catholic, but nor am I a socialist. But I don't really see much.

1:28:08 Where do you think they're getting that from?

1:28:09 Well, because, like, for example, we just had Will on and we've had Zoran on. We've had a lot of democratic socialists on. Like, I'm very anti-unfettered capitalism. I think, you know, markets are a tool for the good of the country, the good of the community, the good of the family.

1:28:26 And that means.

1:28:27 they're not a good in and of themselves. A market is not a virtue in and of itself, but it's a tool for the good of the country, the family, and the community. Anyway, all this to say, I'm very with you guys on antitrust stuff. I think there's way too much financialization. I think there's way too much concentration, monopolization.

1:28:47 I think most conservatives are way too supportive of unfettered capitalism because if you're conservative, you should be skeptical of concentrated power, whether it's in the government or in the business community. And Anyway, all that is to say, like, I don't see too much point in like grilling people like Will Lawrence or, you know, a newly running Zoran Mamdani on like the evils of the Soviet Union, which I think a lot of people would want me to do because I don't have a lot of arguments with them on the fundamental underlying question of whether or not the economy is broken, whether or not we're overly financialized, whether or not power is too concentrated. Like that's We actually that's part of why Sagar and I agree with

1:29:32 you guys on a lot of these like fundamental questions right now. Our diet, our prescriptions are different, but our diagnoses are similar.

1:29:41 So take that Catholic socialism.

1:29:45 All right.

1:29:46 And for the most part, yeah, all that matters is a diagnosis. Like what you want to do is kind of immaterial.

1:29:51 Especially for journalists. I'm not purporting to be a policy wizard that's going to come in and have all of the solutions. But when you're asking questions of candidates, if we agree on the diagnosis, then anyway. Also, I'm a non-denominational. I'm as far from a Catholic as.

1:30:06 You could possibly be.

1:30:10 Okay.

1:30:11 And finally, this is from Nicholas Brannon. Hi for Sagar and Griffin. Why do you think Sager would hate Diggers with Tom Cruise? I feel like this movie is just anti-oil, which Sager would argue that in a value-neutral world, nuclear would come out on top. Also, the theme about how we caricature politicians so we can accept the horrible choices they caused.

1:30:29 Have any of y'all seen Diggers yet?

1:30:32 Not yet.

1:30:32 I want to see it, though.

1:30:34 I recommend seeing it.

1:30:36 I'm saying that I am joining the war on Diggers on the side of Diggers. I think it is a movie that is a little exhausting.

1:30:47 I'll say that.

1:30:48 A little bizarre. Very meta. But I haven't stopped thinking about it. And it is two hours of Tom Cruise. Without spoiling anything, I do think it is the filmmaker is critiquing other people that make movies about climate change, sort of Hollywood elites that make movies about climate change and then pat themselves on the back for that. And there's a sort of critique of if any of that is moving the needle at all, while the oligarchs have already destroyed the world around us and we're just there making art about it. I disagree with that take. And I think that art is an important element. tip of the spear and changing people's minds so I did find the movie to be quite nihilistic and elitist on its

1:31:35 in its own self uh sort of elitist an elitist critique of elites um because I don't I do believe that art is more valuable uh than I think the movie is implying but it's two hours of Tom Cruise go check it out in the movies it's it's it's a gorgeous film it's quite exhausting it's something That's my recommendation.

1:31:59 That was a hell of a recommendation.

1:32:01 Yeah.

1:32:05 And that will do it for us this Friday, October 9th. Midterms are coming up. We're gearing up for quite a very big month of all sorts of October surprises. Of course, BreakingPoints.com if you want to see it all. ad-free in addition to engaging with our AMAs and other extra stuff we do along the way. Anything else that we want to plug on our way out, folks?

1:32:32 No, sir. All right.

1:32:34 That'll do it for us. And we'll see you on Monday.

1:32:36 Bye-bye.