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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. Wow, the foreign minister of Tanzania hung up on Razia Iqbal. That's some way for the BBC World Service program to end. We will also be covering Vice President Kamala Harris's trip to Africa on the show as this week goes on, but here's where we start today. Here we are on yet another day when the Manhattan grand jury, considering a Donald Trump indictment, would normally be in session Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays.

Though some reports say they are off today, no point speculating what they will or won't do. Here is something we know. Trump himself publicized the false idea that he would be indicted last Tuesday and immediately began fundraising off that prospect with racist and violent language and imagery aimed at DA Alvin Bragg. Now, a story on the national politics site, Puck News, says Trump is being disappointed by the amount of money that appeal is bringing in.

We'll talk to Tara Palmeri and David Hamby from Puck News in just a minute. At the same time, however, they report that-- Peter. I'm sorry. Peter Hamby. I said "David." At the same time, they report that establishment Democrats are not so enthusiastic about a hush money indictment, seeing this as an old case that's been gathering dust for six years that the Federal Justice Department passed on and offers no new messaging.

We'll start there with some Wednesday morning politics and also touch on a few other things like Washington all scrambled up on TikTok after last week's embarrassing hearing, embarrassing for both sides, I think, with the CEO of TikTok, Shou Chew, and whether the Nashville school shooting might break the gridlock on gun laws in any way. Here's President Biden yesterday trying to figure out how not to just keep repeating the same language as after every other headline mass shooting that leads to the same dead-end, but as you'll hear, he is clearly frustrated.

President Joe Biden: I have gone the full extent of my executive authority to do on my own anything about guns.

[crosstalk]

President Joe Biden: Wait, wait, wait. Wait a minute. Congress has to act. The majority of the American people think having assault weapons is bizarre, it's a crazy idea. They’re against that and so I think Congress should be passing the assault weapons ban. I can't do anything except plead the Congress to act reasonably.

Brian Lehrer: With us now, Tara Palmeri, partner and senior political correspondent with Puck News, and Peter Hamby, a Puck News partner and host of Good Luck America on Snapchat, previously with CNN and Vanity Fair. Tara, welcome back. Peter, welcome to WNYC.

Peter Hamby: Thanks for having us, Brian.

Tara Palmeri: Thanks.

Peter Hamby: First time in a long time.

Tara Palmeri: Happy to be here.

Brian Lehrer: Tara, I'm seeing $150 million raised by Trump since his post about an indictment supposedly coming last week. Is $150 million bad?

Tara Palmeri: No, $1.5 million.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, $1.5 million. Okay, is that bad?

Tara Palmeri: $150 million, that would be a game-changer.

[laughter]

Tara Palmeri: No, $1.5 million. It's okay, but think about this. The day of the Access Hollywood tape dropping, he made $13 million in one day. The Mar-a-Lago raid, he made about $2 million per day over three days. $1.5 million over a whole week, it's just showing that it's starting to lose its power, these legal dramas. They're not moving the grassroots. I also just think the GOP-based donor, small-dollar donor, they're tapped out. There was a lot of spam that went out last cycle.

It's why you're hearing Trump sending cease-and-desist to various campaigns saying, "Stop using my name. Stop writing about me in your fundraising appeals," because there's just not as much money to go around anymore and that's his superpower. It's fundraising off the base. If it's starting to look like it's waning, he's going to have a problem because all the tie-dollar donors are lining up behind DeSantis right now.

Brian Lehrer: Sorry again for misreading the decimal point or the comma in that number. Don't want to give our listeners any misimpression. Yes, $1.5 million is not a lot of money in this context, $150 million would be. How much is his attention-grab on this scrambling the brains of other Republican presidential hopefuls? However, I'm seeing Mike Pence and Ron DeSantis as two leading examples defending Trump on a potential hush money indictment while trying to run against him. Peter?

Peter Hamby: I think you're absolutely right. Scrambling their brains is the right way to describe this. Those two guys specifically are twisted up on this topic because even though they are likely to run against Trump, neither has announced, but Santis has just been in Iowa. Mike Pence was literally in New Hampshire yesterday. They're probably going to run. They understand that higher than a third of the Republican base still supports Donald Trump.

They still think a lot of the investigations against him, even though there are different varying legal levels and happening in different parts of the country, are just part and parcel of the media and the left attacking him. They have to do this little tiptoe dance around this possible indictment. DeSantis, the way he talked about was sort of interesting, I thought, where he said out loud that the Manhattan DA case is about paying off a porn star to keep her quiet, but I don't think that's a witch hunt, et cetera, et cetera.

He is like winking at one set of his voters, the Republican establishment, and in his mind down the line, the kind of suburban women that you need to win a general election while also saying that they shouldn't pursue this. It's a two-step that DeSantis has played on this. Pence is even more of a twisted spot because not only does he have to answer for this, and we'll talk about this later, but he also has to talk about the Justice Department investigation into January 6th and maybe the investigation in Georgia around trying to overturn that election as well because he's actually in the executive branch.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, let's talk about that now. For people who haven't heard, there was a court order yesterday that Mike Pence does have to testify before the January 6th special counsel grand jury. Pence has been unambiguous, saying Trump was wrong on that day and put Pence in personal danger, but he's still resisting testifying in the criminal probe. Peter, since you set this up, you want to stay on this? How do you see the legal and political aspects of Pence being on both sides of that?

Peter Hamby: The political aspects are what I was talking about. First of all, there's not a huge appetite politically in the Republican Party for Mike Pence at the moment. I think that's evident based on interviews with voters and early states, but also polls. Mike Pence was just in New Hampshire yesterday as it's also pulling it 1% in New Hampshire. He has always been seen as someone who is almost lucky to be there with Donald Trump.

He certainly sealed up the evangelical base for Donald Trump in a way when he was picked as his vice president back in 2016. He's a man without much of an identity beyond his appeal to the conservative base, which has always been the bedrock of his brand. Legally, his team is saying, and Pence has said this publicly in New Hampshire yesterday, that this is unconstitutional, unprecedented, and he's trying to refuse to testify here.

We do know though that his top aides and many Trump aides have already testified before this very grand jury, including his aide, Marc Short, and his attorney, Greg Jacob. They have said, I guess, under oath at this point that Trump and Trump's team tried to pressure Pence to overturn the election. All that being said, not to oversimplify here, Donald Trump said this publicly [chuckles] at the rally on January 6th that Mike Pence needed to do the right thing.

We'll see if he testifies. I just think that if he somehow avoids being able to testify and the judge who made the ruling here said that there are certain things that because he was vice president because of speech and debate issues, he doesn't have to say everything. He was obviously presiding over the counting of the vote when the riot was unfolding, but he is privy to information that we might not have about Donald Trump. We know from the January 6th committee that Trump called Pence a wimp. We'll see. Tara, what do you think?

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead, Tara.

Tara Palmeri: I just want to jump in on that for a second because I also think the decision by Pence to not testify, he really has been trying to resist this subpoena, is a political play. He knows that the MAGA base is furious with him for actually certifying the election. [chuckles] They see him as a traitor. He shows up at places. There are rioters and they're rioting because of his lack of loyalty to Trump.

For him to resist the subpoena, say, executive privilege, yada-yada-yada, that plays well for him with a group of people that are already pretty furious that he needs to win in order to actually be a nominee because he is a part of the shadow 2024 race. I think they played it this way where they resist and then finally give in. Also, his messaging has changed.

Now, he's all of a sudden talking about January 6th publicly as if to condemn Trump. It's convenient timing. Now, he's being compelled to testify. He can say, "I didn't want to. I tried to resist, and then I had to, but also, this was a terrible day," which he's obviously willing to cop up to now. I just think the whole resist was very political in that decision. I don't think there was really much anything else behind it. Legally, I'm not sure that there's any reason to resist.

Brian Lehrer: Pence and DeSantis are playing both sides. I see Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor, is making some news today speaking aggressively against Trump as Christie considers running himself, and telling Axios that he won't ever vote for Trump again even if Trump is the Republican nominee next year. Tara, do you see a Chris Christie-Ron strategy shaping up here?

Tara Palmeri: Yes, it's interesting. I've written about this. I've talked to people in Christie's orbit who, a month or so ago, were saying, "Yes, Christie could be the guy to come in there and jump in later on in the race after the first debate in August, September, and do the one-two punch, and just take out whoever is still standing in the Trump-DeSantis mudslinging bloodbath that's about to happen." They saw him as a person who could be the man to come in as a great Dark Horse savior that Republican voters are hoping for after that. They've always believed that Chris Christie was the original Trump. He was the brash fighter.

Brian Lehrer: In your face.

Tara Palmeri: Yes, exactly. This is something they've always believed. I just don't see the momentum for Chris Christie. I think he's got more to lose and he's got a contributor contract with ABC News. I'm sure it's pretty lucrative. If he wants to run for president, he's going to have to give that up. He's just not polling. I don't know how he does in Iowa. Maybe he does okay in New Hampshire. He's definitely differentiating himself from the rest of the pack by actually taking Trump on head-on.

If that's really what the Republican base wants who's a fighter, I don't know that they want a guy who's fighting against Trump because they're pretty in for him. I just don't see his lane right now or ever. The late entry is possible, but he just doesn't have the money. He hasn't been raising money. I don't even think he has a Super PAC right now. It's hard. You can only really do that late in the game if you can sell funds or you have the money.

I know Glenn Youngkin is considering that, but that guy's worth $500 million or something like that. You know what I mean? He could probably self-fund if he wants to jump in late, plus he knows all the hedge funders, et cetera, et cetera. I just don't see it for Chris Christie. I think he said it publicly. He's going to make a decision in the next 40 days whether he runs or not. I think he's just testing the waters right now. He's sticking his whole foot in instead of his toe though. [chuckles]

Brian Lehrer: We're talking Wednesday morning politics with Peter Hamby and Tara Palmeri from Puck News. Listeners, any questions or comments, political journalists Tara Palmeri and Peter Hamby, our guests here on topics regarding the law or, mostly, the politics really around potential Donald Trump indictments. We'll get to ones other than in Manhattan. Other GOP hopefuls, any Chris Christie fans left in New Jersey, or the gun law debate after the latest school shooting, or life after last week's TikTok hearing, which we'll also get to, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the aisle, as you also report, establishment Democrats are not so enthusiastic about a hush money indictment. Seeing this is an old case that's been gathering dust for six years that the federal Justice Department passed on and offers no new messaging, some of your language from Puck News. Now, I didn't see named sources in that one, Peter. As much as you can say, who's saying what among the Democrats about the possibility of this charge coming from the Manhattan grand jury?

Peter Hamby: Well, that was Tara's conversation, so I will let her talk about it.

Brian Lehrer: You want to take that, Tara? Yes.

Tara Palmeri: Yes, I spoke to people. If you want to know, people on the Hill in Congress, people who would be normally commenting on this thing. Here's the thing. Have you heard really anything from Hakeem Jeffries? Have you heard anything from Majority Leader Schumer? Have you heard anything really from the White House? No. We don't comment on ongoing investigations, right?

You heard a little bit from Hakeem Jeffries. For the most part, Democratic leadership has been very quiet about this. Privately, they just don't think it's the best case to be bringing against Trump. They would never say that publicly. I think in the long run, the indictment just furthers the messaging to independent voters, women, swing voters in the suburbs, that he's just politically toxic.

They're tired of the drama, but it definitely enthuses his base. It makes him the nominee probably, or at least helps make him the GOP nominee, which is probably a good thing for Biden because he's already beaten the guy before. He has a track record of losing and everyone's tired of the drama, at least the independents are. In the meantime, Democrats are like, "Really? This case does not do anything for us. There's no messaging."

Also, as we know, adultery is a bipartisan issue [chuckles] and that's the crux of the case. This is a six-year-old case for all the reasons that you mentioned and it just doesn't offer any messaging. They would have rather seen the Georgia case come forward because that's about democracy. It's about January 6th, stuff they like to talk about, and they would have taken it on. You're not hearing anyone talk about this case and that is why.

Brian Lehrer: Could that Democratic ambivalence or lack of enthusiasm have anything to do with the reporting today in various New York media that the Trump grand jury is not scheduled to take up the Trump case again for the rest of this week? One report says maybe not even next week. I got to wonder if DA Bragg is trying to lie low for a bit to see if the Fulton County, Georgia grand jury, where the DA has said a decision is imminent, will go first on the more serious possible charge of election tampering.

Tara Palmeri: I got to think that as well. Also, it's interesting because you're actually hearing two Democrats start to criticize Bragg of it and say, "Crime is up in New York City. Why is he focused on this old case?" It's kind of--

Brian Lehrer: That's a Republican talking point that--

Tara Palmeri: No, you're hearing it from Democrats too privately. I'm telling you. I talk to Democrats and Republicans all day long and Democrats are saying that. Republicans will say it publicly. That memo that he put out right after he took office saying he wasn't going to prosecute looting, et cetera, Democrats are talking about that too. Eric Adams came out against it. There's just a feeling of, "Why this case? Why now? Are you really the right messenger?" They would rather have Georgia.

To them, it's a potential blue state one day. They'd rather have it all worked out down there. They can all talk about it. It's just not good messaging. Then Republicans can say, "This is a witch hunt, right?" They have no response. Georgia, that's more opportunity. I wonder if you're right if there's coordination going on, but I don't have any reporting to suggest that. It's an interesting observation.

Brian Lehrer: Right. Of course, there is an answer. It doesn't change the politics and the public perception, but there is an answer that the Manhattan DA could give, which is fighting street crime and fighting hush money and campaign finance violations and cover-ups are not mutually exclusive. You can do both things at the same time and do your job.

Tara Palmeri: That's true, but there's also issues with-- I guess people are saying that's fair, but how are you doing on the other hand in terms of fighting street crime and looting, et cetera? Right now, numbers are not looking great in New York City.

Brian Lehrer: Well, again, I don't want to get bogged down in the local stuff, but they can talk about shootings, murders, subway crime all going down right now. If Trump's "poor me, I only paid hush money" campaign isn't raising much money, you just said it is solidifying his popularity among Republican base primary voters and might actually help him secure the nomination. Is the specter of standing trial for hush money to a porn star and covering up that it was campaign spending and then threatening Alvin Bragg with a photo of Trump with a baseball bat and standing next to Bragg and threatening all of America with death and destruction actually making him more popular on the political right, Peter?

Peter Hamby: Tara and I have gone back and forth about this on our podcast. I think that there are tactical points to be scored around various scandals with Donald Trump. I think that the fear among Democrats that this will help Trump and make him more powerful because he gets to point to all the attacks on him, sure, those things happen in waves. We saw this after the raid on Mar-a-Lago.

He solidified his support for a little while and got to talk about it. It pushed DeSantis out of the news cycle when he was having a moment, but then that dipped down again. Time moves on. I do think that, and polls show this, that a majority of Americans support generally all of these investigations into Donald Trump. 51% of independents in an NBC poll that came out last week or, sorry, on a Marist Poll that came out last week support possible criminal investigations into Donald Trump.

All of this, I think, actually really ends up helping someone like Ron DeSantis more than Donald Trump because he gets to say what he's been hinting at for the last several months, which is that, "I can govern like a real conservative. I can do what Donald Trump did without the baggage in a more methodical way. More to the point, I can win." Chris Christie said a couple of months ago, the reason Republicans have been losing is specifically Donald Trump, Donald Trump, Donald Trump. I agree with Tara that it can help Donald Trump make the story about him. Again, this is all political. This is not legal. I think in the long run, it's just another reminder that a lot of voters are fine with this these prosecutions.

Brian Lehrer: Tara?

Tara Palmeri: Sorry, I don't mean to jump in, but I just want to weigh one counterpoint, which I agree with Peter on all of this when talking about the general election. The primary base voter, many of which are pretty much devoted to Donald Trump, they don't care about electability. Polling shows that. It's just not as important to them. That's the problem. They choose the nominee, but they don't really care if they win.

They're so grievance-based. They're so personality-driven. They're so cult of personality-focused that they're not as focused on ability to execute the policies that they want. I'm not even sure they know the policies that they want. They just want the messenger. I think that's why you see Trump still having one in three basically primary voters behind him. I don't think there's any logic to it, to be honest. Yes, if you want to put forth electability, that works in a general election, but the primary voters don't care.

Brian Lehrer: Robert in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with Tara Palmeri and Peter Hamby from Puck News. Hi, Robert.

Robert: Hey, Brian. Thanks for taking my call. I always wondered. I don't really know anybody. I've never spoken to anybody. I watched the news who thinks Haley or Pence or Christie have any chance, any chance at all.

Brian Lehrer: You didn't say DeSantis.

Robert: I just was thinking about it. Who knows yet, right?

Tara Palmeri: Their moms do. Stop.

[laughter]

Robert: Well, that's my question. When Mike Pence lays down at night with his mother, do they really look at each other and think, "I can do this. This can happen. We can get Trump's voters."

Brian Lehrer: Be careful what you're implying there.

Robert: I'm sorry.

Brian Lehrer: I'm sorry. Go ahead.

Robert: No, his wife, and do they really think the staff, the leading staff, do they ever privately say to you, "We know this is a waste of time and a waste of money, but that's our job-"

Tara Palmeri: No.

Robert: "-is to continue this."

Peter Hamby: I don't think they say that.

Robert: They really believe it.

Peter Hamby: Tara, can I jump in on this?

Tara Palmeri: It's like a genetic defect. Yes, go for it.

[laughter]

Peter Hamby: That's actually a good point. It is baked into the DNA of someone like Chris Christie. I was going to bring up Nikki Haley earlier when we're talking about Christie. I'm glad you did. These are politicians who were very, very, very famous back in 2009, 2010, 2011 all the way through 2012 when their endorsement was courted by Mitt Romney aggressively. They both ended up endorsing Mitt Romney. If you are a young-- and they were young-ish at the time, young politician, and you get so close to the sun and then it fades over time, just think about the human behavior here of a lot of elected officials.

Not only is that something that's a buzz that you're always chasing, it's also a lifeline to your bank account. Nikki Haley published three bestselling books when she was peaking back in the day and even after she became UN ambassador under Donald Trump. It gets you speaking fees. It gets you, as Tara mentioned, like an ABC News contributor contract. Not only do people like Christie and Haley feel like they're from a slightly another time before Trump, that whole Tea Party era, it just feels like there's not much of an appetite for their candidacies outside of the Acela corridor or their staffers.

I will say to the caller, their current staffers might not say this stuff, but I do think former staffers who have worked for politicians like this roll their eyes and they're like, "Oh my God. I can't believe she's actually running and thinks she's going to win." I do think a lot of-- I don't know. I think a lot of people that work officially in politics too, outside of those two candidates at least, think that as well.

Brian Lehrer: You two have also discussed what you call rising national doubts even about DeSantis, including the possibility that he might not actually run for president next year, even though most people assume he is the strongest competitor to Trump. Do you have a DeSantis-doesn't-run scenario?

Tara Palmeri: Yes, so I'm actually in Florida right now doing a reporting trip. I was talking to some senior Republicans who work closely with DeSantis. He's definitely been urged by even donors to stand down and wait till 2028 because Trump can only run for one term, right? Not run, he can only serve one term. DeSantis would be at the end of his term in, I think, four years. He would have two more years just to run for president.

He's still young, but politics is all about timing, right? He's in the sun right now. He's popular. He's polling so well nationally. There's also the risk that if you wait and you're not a governor for two years, then you don't have the momentum because he has the bully pulpit of Florida. He's got seven media markets focusing on him. It's going nationally everywhere. He makes the news every single day.

He's got a fawning press corps, even antagonistic, but that still works for him. He's got so much momentum right now. There's a risk of waiting, but there's a real concern that this might not be his moment because of what's about to ensue, which is the bloodbath against Trump. He's got about two more months before he actually announces that he's running because he needs to get the legislature to allow him to be governor and run, yada-yada-yada.

He doesn't want to jump in, but I don't know if he can wait that long because Trump is attacking him head-on. He's turning his back. The poll numbers are dropping every single day. Trump is telling his base that DeSantis is not one of them. It seems to be working. DeSantis is not firing back, which is making donors concerned. They're like, "Does he really have it?" He's so untested. We know what we're getting with Trump, but do we know what we're getting with DeSantis? Not really.

He comes off a bit, in some ways, disingenuous. That laugh with Piers Morgan during the interview. Also, why are you only doing Murdoch foreign press? It's time to face the actual press. I think there's just doubts about him. The Ukraine wobble not really-- He doesn't seem to be coming off with the kind of confidence and so it just has people wondering like, "Is this really his moment? Is it really his time?"

If there's ever a moment to back out now, it's now. Then again, he just hired all these, the A-team of Republican consultants. He's got all the big donors behind him. He's going to piss all of them off. If he thinks he's going to run again in 2028, they might not be there anymore. Yes, exactly. They might just be like, "This guy is [unintelligible 00:28:06]. He just teases us and then never comes through." [chuckles] I got a lot to think about.

Peter Hamby: Tara, I think the Ukraine--

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead.

Peter Hamby: The Ukraine wobble as you put it, I think, was a really telling moment for him that it showed a couple of things. One, foreign policy is not his strong suit. Two, he was trying to square the circle between appealing to traditional Republicans, who would be standing up for Ukraine probably, the Bush-era neocon types, while also gesturing toward the Trump base, which is isolationist and skeptical of all foreign intervention. Trump has obviously said many things positive about Russia.

It showed for the first time to me and I think to a lot of big Republican donors, who I do think are more in that traditional Mitch McConnell wing of the Republican Party, that he wasn't going on offense. His instincts aren't all there when he was outside of his comfort zone of Florida and talking about culture wars and education. I don't know. It was his first misstep. I don't think it was necessarily a deal-breaker for him. I think he probably, because he flip-flopped on this Ukraine answer, got some pressure from a lot of the people who want to support him, who want him to stop Donald Trump, the Republican "establishment" if that still exists, and the donors who are lining up behind him.

If you think about the never-Trump Republican types, the Bill Kristol types out there in the Republican Party, and many of them are actually just Democrats at this point, they would like some Republican to come along and derail Donald Trump, but they are also dyed-in-the-wall hawks about Ukraine and Russia. This, I'm sure, made a lot of people roll their eyes inside the Republican Party and inside money circles.

Brian Lehrer: Well, you did give me an idea for a poll that somebody could do. Which candidate, Pence, Christie, or Mike Pompeo, is most like Connor Roy from Succession? The 1% candidate--

[laughter]

Brian Lehrer: 1% in the polls, but all right, that's for another day. We'll continue in a minute with Peter Hamby and Tara Palmeri from Puck News and turn the page to some other things they're covering. Puck News, by the way, if you don't know it, is a subscription site. People have to pay to see most of your content, although you have some free newsletters and you have some podcasts, I see, but I'm curious. Why Puck? Puck in Greek mythology was like the court jester, right? Why Puck News?

Tara Palmeri: It's a reference to the character in A Midsummer Night's Dream, the Shakespeare play. It's a devilish character with a little reverent, the messenger. I think that's our vibe. We're not AP wire. You're getting the news in a way that's sophisticated, insider information. Our readers are the people we write about too. It's one step closer to the heart of the conversation. It's the story behind the story. I'll let Peter keep going because I could keep going for hours and I'm sure he has other takes. [laughs]

Peter Hamby: Brian, I think one thing that sets us apart, one is the business model. We believe that journalists should be paid appropriately for their work and also be partners in the enterprise. A lot of large-scale news organizations don't work this way. We have hired some of the best journalists in each of the important sectors in American life, Silicon Valley, Hollywood, Wall Street, and Washington, where Tara is based sometimes when she's not traveling covering this stuff.

We believe that in an era of clickbait, in an era that's awash in feeds and algorithms, people are really craving smart journalists who are plugged in and can write pretty authoritatively about these topics and just call balls and strikes and not necessarily just play to the crowd and just tell you what's really happening out there. That's the bargain that you get with Puck.

Brian Lehrer: You two have also been writing about TikTok after the hearing last week with their CEO. You seem focused largely on those few Democrats, especially AOC and Congressman Jamaal Bowman from New York, who have somewhat come to TikTok's defense. I think, Peter, this is more your bailiwick. Did I see correctly that you called it-- or Tara, maybe this was you. You guys sort it out. Somebody called it a cynical play to Gen Z on AOC's part.

Peter Hamby: I will not necessarily take credit for that line, but I do think it was pragmatic, at least on their part. More than anything else, I thought that AOC and Jamaal Bowman stepping up for TikTok was just curious. These are disciples of Bernie Sanders. Their base are young progressives who are married to the idea that giant multi-billion-dollar corporations are something you should be skeptical of. Here, you saw two members of the squad step out while most of their Democratic colleagues in the House and the Senate on the intelligence committee were raising alarms about this gigantic company and they were stepping up for it.

I thought it was perhaps cynical that this was a naked play for their voting base and fundraising base, young progressives. This strikes me as curious. Even Bernie Sanders didn't come out and say that and defend TikTok. Look, I think there is a notion going around in the mainstream press and in certain corners of the left that if it finally gets to the point-- and by the way, this could take a very long time given the courts and the CFIUS negotiation with TikTok.

If it comes to a ban that Democrats will lose young voters forever, well, there's not really any evidence to support that, Brian. In fact, there's evidence to the contrary. John Della Volpe, who runs the Harvard Youth Poll in a polling firm called SocialSphere that looks into youth voting trends, found that, right now, a majority of millennials support banning TikTok. While only a plurality of Gen Z supports banning Tiktok--

Brian Lehrer: Oh, millennials are old now.

Peter Hamby: Well, they are. I'm a millennial. I'm 40.

Tara Palmeri: Speak for yourself.

Peter Hamby: The user base of TikTok and Snapchat where I work is like 13 to 34. It's like Gen Z and millennials. Gen Z actually supports a TikTok ban. If you do a good job informing them of the national security implications here, which, by the way, is not just privacy, which is what AOC and Jamaal Bowman are saying and some people on the left, it's also foreign influence.

That's a huge issue that I think isn't talked about as much as the privacy and mental health aspects of TikTok. It's that if this company was based in Russia, I think there'd be a different conversation around it. I think there are legitimate concerns. I thought the hearing itself, well, there were a few bozo congressmen who clearly don't know how the internet worked. I thought plenty of the questions were actually pretty methodical and based in reality having watched all five hours of that hearing.

Brian Lehrer: To AOC and Bowman or on their side, here's a clip of Bowman on MSNBC last week saying we should have a broader conversation than the one they had at that hearing. Listen.

Congressman Jamaal Bowman: Our data right now on Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter, Instagram, our data right now is available for purchase, for sale, for trading, and it is currently being shared with foreign governments and foreign companies without our consent, without our knowledge. Let's talk about all social media companies, what the harms are, and then write federal legislation to deal with those issues instead of scapegoating TikTok.

Brian Lehrer: Is Congressman Bowman wrong there? Either of you take this, but is our data any more protected from sale to China or other foreign governments on Facebook, et cetera? Isn't Congress letting the US-based social media companies run roughshod over our culture and mental health and privacy by making this so narrowly about TikTok?

[crosstalk]

Peter Hamby: Sure, sure, sure. I should say, again, I work at Snapchat. I don't want to get ahead of what our policy team might say about this, but what Bowman is saying is true. There are data concerns and privacy concerns across all of these platforms. That's the same line that TikTok and TikTok CEO want you to say. [laughs] I just don't think that the committee did a necessarily bad job of raising the full spectrum of concerns here.

The influence of an authoritarian country directly into the minds of 150 million Americans every single day feels like something worth discussing. This is not just some Republican crusade. I know Donald Trump tried to ban TikTok and that made a lot of people on the left think that it was a crazy idea. Again, Mark Warner and Michael Bennet on the intelligence committee are extremely concerned about the ability of the--

Brian Lehrer: Democrats.

Peter Hamby: Yes, Democrats on the intelligence committee are concerned about the ability of the Chinese government to, one, harvest whatever they want via ByteDance and, two, narrowly, even modestly tweak an algorithm in a swing state and change voting behavior. One thing that a Democrat on the House Commerce Committee brought up is that TikTok was rife with misinformation about guns, about abortion, about voting laws. All of that disinformation and all of that junk news was being sent directly to the very young people that Jamaal Bowman and AOC stand up for.

Brian Lehrer: I guess the pushback question there would be, wouldn't China or Russia or any other purveyor of disinformation have plenty of access to all the other social media sites as we saw in 2016 to spread all those things and Republicans will defend their right to do it as otherwise woke censorship when the focus on TikTok and the particular threat of China doing that particular thing misses the larger picture?

Peter Hamby: Look, Facebook is, by the way, not a perfect actor in any way on this stuff. Russia exploited their algorithms to try to sway not just the 2016 elections but the 2018 elections. They can use other platforms to do that sort of thing, but the issue is that Facebook is just more-- they can be pressured more directly by the US government to change their behavior.

By the way, Twitter before Elon Musk also put in more content controls, more trust and safety controls, more advertising restrictions because they are US companies that are more responsive to the US government. They just are. That's not saying they have to follow the letter of whatever member of Congress tells them to do here in the United States, but they're far more responsive to the pressure of American government than China.

Brian Lehrer: They want things from Washington, so they'll play some ball. One more topic. Gun control. After the Nashville school shooting, does anything change after this, Tara? Here's a shooter who is being described as having been under care for an emotional disorder but was able to buy seven weapons legally, including the three that were used in the shooting. Tara?

Tara Palmeri: Oh, yes, I'm sorry. I thought you were going to play a clip. Yes, I don't think so and I hate to be so cynical about it. I wonder what could the President do by executive order because, right now, you've got a Republican Congress, which means nothing is happening. Consider this. Right now, Ron DeSantis in Florida is considering whether to pass concealed carry without permit. Okay, that's part of our country.

The conversation on the right is so far apart from the conversation on the left right now. We have a divided Congress that I only think that the possibility is through executive order. I don't know if Biden wants to go there ahead of an election year. He's definitely moving to the middle right now. He obviously doesn't have any primary challenger, so he's starting to make decisions to be a more moderate president. It's really a political choice. It's up to him.

I don't know what legally they can do via executive order, but I'm always doubtful because this has been a problem forever. If it was really something that he wanted to do day one, if there was anything he could do by executive order, he would've done it when there was a Democratic Congress, Democratic Senate, and his power in the White House. I don't see what gets past this Congress. They couldn't even select their own--

Brian Lehrer: He did say in the clip that we played, and I know the sound quality wasn't very good, but I think the listeners could make it out, that he's used all the executive orders that are at his disposal on guns. He's got nothing left and so it's up to Congress.

Tara Palmeri: Then there's nothing.

Brian Lehrer: Do you think he's downplaying and there is more he could do, but he doesn't want to be there politically?

Tara Palmeri: Maybe. Honestly, I don't know. I'm not an expert on this topic. I know that if he's saying that, I'm sure there is something. I don't know what it is, but there's nothing that's going to get through Congress. That's where we're at. That's the reality of the situation.

Brian Lehrer: Tara Palmeri and Peter Hamby from Puck News. Peter is also on Snapchat as he was describing, hosting-- Is that a podcast, Good Luck America? What is that feature? You can plug it.

Peter Hamby: Sure, I appreciate that, Brian. Snapchat has content. I have two-and-a-half million people who watch my show on Snapchat. We have media partners from ESPN to The Wall Street Journal to The Washington Post. Millions of young people are getting news every day from Snapchat. We are almost twice as big as Twitter, Brian. I feel like not enough people know that. We are a big platform out there still.

Brian Lehrer: Thanks a lot, Tara. Thanks, Peter.

Peter Hamby: Thanks.

 

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