It’s Casual Friday! Sam and Emma speak with Ryan Grim, D.C. Bureau Chief at The Intercept and co-host of Counter Points, to round up the week in news. First, Sam and Emma react to some of the new developments in Trump’s hush money trial, including the appearance of…someone different to advocate for Trump outside the courthouse: Florida Sen. Rick Scott. The MR Crew, and reporters speaking to Sen. Scott, speculate that, due to Trump’s gag order, Trump may be calling in some surrogates who are less…inhibited than Trump is at the moment. Then, after not being able to figure out his laptop, Ryan Grim joins the program by phone, and he, Sam, and Emma start off by recapping the calamitous end of Kristi Noem’s book tour, with the last stop on Stuart Varney’s Fox Business show looking like the breaking point. They then discuss how AIPAC has been slightly neutralized in the election cycle this year, and, per Ryan’s reporting and analysis, the fear some in the organization are feeling that they don’t possess the same sway over Biden given his decision to withhold some aid to Israel over the prospect of a Rafah invasion, AND that they haven’t been as impactful or decisive in Democratic primaries, specifically against Squad members. Ryan outlines some of the equivocating that Bidenworld has done after Biden’s comments on withholding aid, and Grim zeroes in on the cleavage between the Biden administration officials responsible for military and intelligence actions (Defense Secretary Austin & CIA Director Burns) who are in negotiations with Israel & Palestine, compared to that of the diplomatic and political actors (Secretary of State Blinken & Biden’s Chief of Staff Jeff Zients) who have been much more deferential both publicly and privately towards Israel. They then discuss the terrible implications for the U.S., Palestinians, and even Israeli soldiers in terms of casualties and damage if a large scale ground invasion of Rafah occurs, and how, even if Biden and Netanyahu may understand those implications, they may be too involved ideologically to try and put a real stop to it. Grim then updates Sam and Emma on some of the other AIPAC machinations going on, including their infusion in an Oregon congressional primary to stop Rep. Pramila Jayapal’s sister, Susheela, from winning. They then finally discuss what political implications this may have for President Biden in November, and how, if voters who would actually be championing Biden (activists, politically engaged young voters) weren’t so disgusted with Biden’s conduct in Israel, they’d be endorsing and highlighting some serious policy victories that Biden’s engaged in (banning natural gas export terminals, for example). Instead, the connotation with Biden due to his support of Israel is inevitably clouded for some in his key voter bases.

And in the Fun Half, Sam, Emma, and Bradley react to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu speaking with Dr. Phil in Jerusalem (???) about how Israel will fight even with his fingernails if they have (and, Netanyahu qualifies, that they do have more to fight with than fingernails. Thanks for clarifying!) Afterwards, they take a look at Israel’s UN representative, Gilad Erdan, getting in some prop work at the General Assembly meeting, claiming that the body is shredding its charter by admitting Palestine into the body further with more privileges (he literally shredded a tiny copy of the UN charter.) They then react to some of the right wing fearmongering over anti-Semitism (something they’ve always really cared about, seemingly), with Florida Rep. Aaron Bean warning a House subcommittee that…2nd graders are trafficking in Nazi propaganda. Then the MR Crew gets through the jump scare of watching Katie Britt talk (hasn’t gotten over the State of the Union response cadence, seemingly) about Jewish college students being treated like civil rights activists in the 1960’s, Trump’s appeal to Jewish voters outside the courthouse (they should be ashamed of themselves if they’ve supported Biden), as well as Trump being totally normal and not concerned about RFK siphoning votes away from him. He just needed to make a 4+ minute long video about how he’s more anti-vax than RFK is. He’s not worried! Plus, your calls & IM’s!

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