Big Law, Big Tech, Big Business and Trump's Big Government

The more Trump changes, the more he stays the same

Sarah and I have been listening to old episodes of Pantsuit Politics as our ten-year anniversary approaches. It is really something to hear our episodes from 2015 and 2016 and to realize both how far we’ve come and how much the old adage is true: the more things change, the more they stay the same.

I can tell you from all of that listening that today’s episode is just classic Pantsuit Politics. We start with executive orders targeting law firms; we take ourselves to the struggles of modernity. Outside of politics, we start with April Fools’ Day; we take ourselves to loneliness and how hard it is to know when to reach out and when to give people space.

Ten years later, I still like this job because even with my most A-student outlines, I only know where we’ll begin and that we’ll end somewhere that piques my curiosity and challenges me to keep thinking harder. -Beth

Topics Discussed

• Big Law Meets the Trump Administration

• The Resistance Grows Up

• Outside of Politics: April Fools

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Episode Resources

Pantsuit Politics Resources

• Join Sarah and Chelsea Devantes to discuss Careless People Live on 4/2 at 4:00 pm

Fight or Flight with the Trump Administration

• More to Say About Targeting Law Firms (Pantsuit Politics Premium)

• ‘What you’re witnessing is a revolution.’ Making sense of Trump’s head-spinning moves. (Atlantic Council)

• Public Benefit Corporation (Wikipedia)

• Opinion | Rahm Emanuel: How to raise reading and math education standards (The Washington Post)

• Musk gives away two $1 million checks to Wisconsin voters in high profile judicial race (Reuters)

• Big questions surround AOC as insiders ponder the future of progressivism (Politico)

Show Credits

Pantsuit Politics is hosted by Sarah Stewart Holland and Beth Silvers. The show is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. Alise Napp is our Managing Director and Maggie Penton is our Director of Community Engagement.

Our theme music was composed by Xander Singh with inspiration from original work by Dante Lima.

Our show is listener-supported. The community of paid subscribers here on Substack makes everything we do possible. Special thanks to our Executive Producers, some of whose names you hear at the end of each show. To join our community of supporters, become a paid subscriber here on Substack.

To search past episodes of the main show or our premium content, check out our content archive.

This podcast and every episode of it are wholly owned by Pantsuit Politics LLC and are protected by US and international copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property laws. We hope you'll listen to it, love it, and share it with other people, but not with large language models or machines and not for commercial purposes. Thanks for keeping it nuanced with us.

Episode Transcript

Sarah [00:00:29] This is Sarah Stewart Holland.

Beth [00:00:31] And this is Beth Silvers. You're listening to Pantsuit Politics, where today we're going to talk about the stress response that the Trump administration is creating in businesses and universities and law firms. We're also just going to talk about what the problems are as we see them, as we get a little bit clearer and sharper during this administration about what people are unhappy about, what the administration is speaking to and what it is decidedly not speaking to.

Sarah [00:00:55] And where we're seeing some hope.

Beth [00:00:57] Yes. Do we have a better resistance this time, perhaps? What have we learned? What lessons are we integrating? We're going to talk about all of that. And then Outside of Politics is April Fool's Day. We are not pranking you in this episode. And you'll hear a little bit about why in our Outside of Politics section.

Sarah [00:01:12] Before we start, I want to invite you to visit us at pantsuitpoliticshow.com. We would love for all of you to join us as a premium member. Either way, be sure to follow us on Substack. We publish essays, we write about episodes, and we have fun live events that everyone can come to. Like tomorrow, Wednesday, April 2nd. I am going to be sitting down with Chelsea Devantez, the host of Glamorous Trash, and one of our favorite people, to talk about Careless People, Sarah Wynn-Williams bombshell memoir about her time at Facebook. There's probably going to be some screaming. I want to set the tone. Chelsea and I are big mad about this book because there's reason to be. You're going to hear me mention it on this episode. That's how mad I am. I'm just talking about it all the time. And so Chelsea and are going to talk about it tomorrow. It's going to be great. You can join us with a free subscription at pantsuitpoliticshow.com to ask questions and participate in the comments or catch the replay later.

Beth [00:02:08] It says a lot about your personality assessment of our audience that you're like teaser, there will be screaming.

Sarah [00:02:13] There will be screaming.

Beth [00:02:16] Well, we're so glad that you're here today. There won't be screaming in this episode, but we do have a lot to say. And we're still glad that you're here to join us for the conversation. Next up, the Trump administration's creating some stress. Fight or flight. Sarah, I sat down to make an episode of our premium show, More to Say, this week about the executive orders that President Trump has signed targeting certain law firms. And I always am looking for a theme to set those episodes up. And the theme that I settled on is fight or flight, because these executive orders introduce a mass stressor into these law firms. They target not only their top clients, but also their relationship with basically every prospective client who might ever have business with or before the government.

[00:03:13] And I don't know where that list ends. They also say things like you can't enter federal buildings if you being in federal buildings would pose a risk to national security. And a risk national security is defined as, have you ever disagreed with me about anything? And federal buildings include federal courthouses. So it's this unbelievably broad attack on these law firms that really presents that threat to their very survival that we process with the fight or flight stress response. And it occurs to me that that's where we are right now. Acute stressors and everybody sorting out, am I going to fight this or am I going to flee the conflict by cozying up to the administration by just folding, acquiescing, hoping that I can get through the next four years.

Sarah [00:04:04] This is a pattern we've seen in many, many areas, particularly with regards to the business community. And it's not even have you disagreed with me? It's have you worked in opposition to me? One of these law firms was responsible for putting together the Steele dossier. One of the law firms hired Jack Smith. One of this law firms, hired Robert Mueller. It's the web that you could get caught up in of offending or working against or in opposition to Donald Trump is broadly defined. And that's what you see at the beginning with, after the inauguration, the tech companies. This idea of we don't want to get crossways with him in any way, shape or form. It's the NFL taking down the end racism at the end of the football field. I think the fight or flight metaphor is very empathetic because the word I just keep thinking about is cowardice. That it is abundantly clear that what motivates people is their own financial profit.

[00:05:18] Now if you're a corporation, you are legally obligated to turn a profit for your shareholders. And that's fine. That's not a thing I love about corporations, but I accept and try to see clearly at all times that that's their motivation. Even in 2020 that was their motivation. It wasn't any overarching concern with racial equality, okay? It was profit. It's always been profit. Now what I've noticed in my own pattern in taking in these stories, as the vengeance tour continues and we see the people coming to bend the knee and pay tribute, is there's this flurry of outrage. The headlines hit social media, people are mad, people are disgusted. And then my immediate reaction is always like, no, wait, I want to hold up. This seems bad, but I want the deeply reported stuff. Because that's actually where I wish people would reserve their outrage. It's once we give it a week or two for people to speak off the record to all these reporters so we can actually find out how this rolled out.

[00:06:31] Because you had Perkins Coie, this one major law firm in Seattle, fight it, get a judicial order, and then Trump continued to issue executive orders against other law firms. And that's when everybody panicked, particularly Paul Weiss, that massive law firm. But then you also get people saying they would have made it. Would have their profits as partners would have been down to two million instead of 10 million? They could have made it. They could have pushed through. If the values of the firm as this historical example of sticking up for civil rights and other, the legal system in general, right? Because this isn't a corporation. I understand that they have a profit motivation, but in theory, a law firm should be concerned with the legal systems and protecting it. And they weren't. They were terrified the law firm would cease to exist. And what if it did? Is that worse or better than our legal system ceasing to exist?

Beth [00:07:36] I used to do some business coaching, and at the end of the year we would always talk about where are you going next year? What are your goals? And a question that I included in that review every year is what are you willing to change? And I think that that's important as we think about the spider flight response. What are you to change? What are willing to risk? What are willing lose? I don't know the client list at Paul Weiss well enough to say they would have made it or they wouldn't have. Because that's a lot of what this comes down to. It doesn't surprise me that WilmerHale, which has worked for the DNC, which has work for the Clinton campaign, the Harris campaigns, the Biden campaigns, firms that have a strong, well-resourced client list that will help them get through these times, that will stick with them through these executive orders, are differently positioned than firms that don't.

Sarah [00:08:29] Well, this was a former partner who said this. So in theory, they would have a good insight into how they could have survived or not.

Beth [00:08:36] I just want to be open about the fact that what the law firms do will often reflect what their big clients are saying they should do or what they anticipate their big client will do in response. And who is calling you when this executive order comes out? Who stops taking your call when this executive order comes out. There are a lot of dynamics here that I think it's important to understand the law firms don't stand alone. And that's the whole economy. That is why, to me, the inauguration was so significant because you had from the get-go a very strong statement that the tech world, which did provide some guardrails on the first Trump administration will not this time.

Sarah [00:09:21] Yeah, again, it's those patterns that you see, particularly when you give these stories time to be really told, are what's so disturbing to me. Again, this is just a royal court where everyone is using their own personal power and influence. Be it a Republican representative who's trying to protect their district from the government cuts, or it be the head partner in Paul Weiss who calls up his buddy, the owner of the New England Patriots, and says, "Can you call the president and get a meeting and make a deal with me?" Now, look, I'm not naive. I understand that elite people have elite networks and connections that have always and will always be how a lot of governance and lobbying and power takes place in this country, okay?

[00:10:13] But the transparent nature that it has taken in the Trump administration of I'm mad at you and if you could say something nice to me and if can give me a gift, if you can, as the Prime Minister of Britain, bring me a fancy letter from the King, then we can talk, then we could do a deal. And the deal is for you. Again, the government works for Donald Trump, not for the American people right now. Every single one of these executive orders, every single time, either a university or a law firm, or a foreign nation's leader comes and flatters him and tries to cut their own deal around tariffs or executive orders or foreign aid, it's just abundantly clear that this is about what either makes him feel better or makes him more money or makes him look cool than it is about anything with regards to the American people.

Beth [00:11:12] I was reading the lawsuits filed against these executive orders by Jenner and Block and WilmerHale and Perkins Coie, and the sentence that jumped out at me most, I think it was in WilmerHaile's complaint, is that usually you need some discovery to show retaliatory intent of an action by the government, but you don't hear because the executive orders on their face say I'm doing this because you worked for Hillary Clinton. I'm doing this because you worked for the DNC. I'm doing this because you have opposed voter ID laws in court. It's just right there in the plain text. And I think what is going to change for a lot of these high-flying folks is that they can make the deal and get their faces smeared in it anyway. I don't think that the managing partner at Paul Weiss probably anticipated a second executive order memorializing for all of history that he came into the Oval Office and begged and agreed to this remarkable turnaround as the president phrased it.

[00:12:17] I think this is why Donald Trump is so mad at Putin and Zelensky right now, because he thinks that this is how everything works. I've kind of decided that he was thinking about Ukraine and Gaza as just real estate deals, that he could come in and use his normal real estate tactics, and I'm doing you a favor here and you're doing me a solid there and we're going to get to something that we can both brag about on the other side. And it's just falling really flat because some things are about more than just the finances. And those two situations certainly are pretty much all parties involved. And he can't hang in that kind of environment.

Sarah [00:12:59] Or Iran saying, no, we're not going to negotiate. Continue to threaten, no. Or Canada saying, no, enough. We don't want this. You're bullying us and you're just making us angry. Again, the idea that everything is a transparent either financial exchange or power exchange does even in many ways, morally bankrupt, modern age, run up against actual principles. Sometimes it's Thomas Massey for the love of God. Sometimes if I can't just threaten you or Elon can't threaten you enough with the primary, then I'll just get on the phone and scream at you. Or I'll say I going to bomb you, I'm going to rain thunder down on you. He has two modes. It's either threatening-- I guess it's just one mode, right? It's just threat. There's a lot of action using the power of the government to back up those threats for sure. But even when he succeeds, it's all in service of scaring everyone into acquiescence. That's the goal. That's it. It's not in pursuit of any greater visions. Even I think the tariffs really are falling apart under this rubric.

[00:14:23] Because really it's just I want another way to threaten or cajole in pursuit of what? It's just us being better and more powerful. In pursuit of what? To make America great again. There's this great moment in one of those business books I've been reading, The Lean Startup, and they call it the five whys. Why? You just keep asking why five times. Okay we're doing this, why? Okay, why? He wouldn't make it through two. He couldn't get to three why's. He doesn't have them. That's why the tariffs are so confusing. That's the why the budget negotiations, as we're going to see play out again across this week, are becoming another word I can't think of but weird. It's because there's no why except for me. I am the why.

Beth [00:15:16] I think that he might land on strength to have a generous interpretation of the why that ultimately he thinks it's best. There will be a bully. So you might as well be the bully because then you hold the cards. That's a phrase that he uses sometimes. And that's what it is with the tariffs. All this reporting where people are painstakingly trying to say diplomatic things like the details are sketchy or we're not sure yet. I think it's the same as he wants you to come to school every day and wonder if someone's going to take your lunch money and shove you into a locker. Maybe they will, maybe they won't, but the threat that they might give them a lot of power over you. And I think that's who he wants America to be on the world stage and domestically.

Sarah [00:16:00] It's not even people outside the country; he wants people inside the country to feel that way.

Beth [00:16:05] I think that's right. Now, when I try to hang on to myself and not just be angry and disgusted, I feel a little bit of empathy. I've realized about myself over the past couple of months navigating a few difficult situations that I put a lot of pressure on myself to have the spellbook that when things get hard, I should know how to solve them. I should be able to open the spellbook and know exactly what to do and then do that and produce exactly the results I want. And I think that's how he lives his life. And that is an incredible amount of stress and pressure. I think he's probably motivated by different things than I am, but I think he believes that he should have the spellbook. I do think that that's why he gets so angry when things start to spiral away from him a little bit. Like the pissed off at Putin was pretty significant, I thought, and that feels to me like the stress of someone who's running out of pages in his own spellbook. So I'm sorry that he feels that way.

[00:17:07] I don't think this is a helpful mode to be in, geopolitically, especially as you do seem to have other leaders figuring it out. I think the new prime minister of Canada was very smart to just say, we're done. I'm not going to keep trying to preserve this special friendship. It's over. You're not a reliable partner anymore. I think Macron is about there. I was reading an essay from the President of the Atlantic Council over the weekend, and he said that a European diplomat told him that they got the message over there. They understand that this administration's view is that Europe is woke, weak, and freeloading. And they're going to have to plan accordingly. And I think that's smart, because at some point, if you look at the bully and say, "You're just a bully and you're just threatening to take my lunch money and shove me in a locker," then you can start to deal on real terms with what's happening.

Sarah [00:18:00] Because I think that what you described, that he feels like he's-- I mean, that's what he articulates, right? I am the solution to everything. I alone can fix it. Which is why he would invite the top partner at Paul Weiss to the White House. Which, again, in some ways is deeply confusing to me. If I want to crush you because you wronged me, then I want to crush you because you wronged me. I don't want to make a deal. No, you cannot have a meeting at the White House. That part is in some ways confusing, but in some way not if you've ever read any history of a royal court or a king. I'm deep, deep in the Wolf Hall trilogy right now, okay? And there are so many analogies, so many, to a king who both recognizes and relishes his own power and is constantly confronted with the limits of it. And so I guess the deal is really it's not about you. This was never about you. You made me feel a certain way about myself and so I can't invite you here because then I get to feel better about myself. Because I don't really care about you. It's about how you made feel. And I think that's true with the tariffs.

[00:19:23] I think President Schoenbaum of Mexico is doing a really good job of seeing that this is about how Donald Trump feels about himself. And how can I make him feel a certain way about himself? Doesn't really matter what we do, it's how he feels about himself. And it will be interesting to see how the tariffs and the reciprocal nature of the tariffs over God knows how many countries plays out. Like if he feels powerful or weakened really. That's the break in the gas of this entire administration. And I think right now he feels weakened, I think, between the signal controversy. He hasn't ended the conflict in Gaza. He hasn't ended the war in Ukraine. Like I said, Iran is refusing to negotiate. He's getting bad news politically. The stock market and the entire economy is flashing red.

[00:20:20] So he's getting a lot of things, like you said, that he can't fix, that are not in his spellbook. And so in some ways it's really not surprising that the one place he still feels strong, where people are still exhibiting what I would describe as cowardice, particularly with regards to the business community-- and I'm going to put universities under the umbrella of businesses because I think that's what they've shown. They care about their businesses, not about their purpose and the pursuit of learning. Obviously, I'm not talking about all of higher ed, but I'm talking about Columbia University, I'm talking about the university he's specifically targeting. That's why he's leaning into that because that's where he can still see my strength is working, my strength is crushing people and making them scared. And then they want to talk about how great I am. So it's not surprising to me that he's rolling out more and more of this.

Beth [00:21:16] To the negotiation side and your point that it's a little bit confusing because you think he just want to crush them, I think he knows that if you crush someone you only get to do it once and then it's over. But if you say, no, I'll let you continue, but only on my terms until I decide to mess with you again, that's more powerful.

Sarah [00:21:37] Like with Canada and Mexico and the tariffs.

Beth [00:21:40] I think that's the whole strategy here. I think that's going to be the strategy with the university. What I keep thinking about is how will they move the goalpost? They have to. You can't keep your base motivated unless there's something to be mad about. What are you going to do when you've gotten rid of woke? When all the DEI is over, which we're getting really close to, there are very few companies even trying to fight the good fight on DEI. Maybe that's what a lot of people wanted to do anyway, to your point, that there was a falseness, a hollowness in a lot what happened in 2020. But what are they going to do when that's over? We don't cancel anybody anymore. You can be the Secretary of Defense and have the longest list. So where will the goalposts go next? And that's part of what concerns me so much about these blatant attempts to retaliate based on speech. Because it tells you that they don't care about process at all. They seem to be itching for a fight with the court. What happens when they decide we need a new issue to take up? And what's that issue going to be and how are they going to pursue that?

Sarah [00:22:54] Well, half of these offenses are made up in lies; so we can never discount that strategy of just continuing to make up offenses and lie about them. I was reading about the university revenge tour and a ton of these schools, like 40/50 percent of the schools in this list had complaints that they settled and closed with the Department of Justice. They had seen issues. They had addressed them. Some of them had fired professors they felt were actively targeting Jewish students. And then they showed up in this list. The list was just sloppy. Again, so they wanted a long list. So it's like they just picked any school that had had a complaint filed against it or schools that had been criticized immensely but had no complaints aren't on the list. So it's just a sloppy pursuit because it's not really about that. And so that's what I think I'm so furious with big law, with these big universities. Look, I just have a critical eye towards universities because my kid is about to start applying. So I'm paying close attention here right now, okay?

[00:24:10] And the universities to me I feel such fury at the way a place like Columbia has just looked at their foreign students and said, "You're on your own, don't say anything that would hurt his feelings." For decades you've heard there's not a debate of ideas. You're silencing people. You're not hiring enough professors of alternative viewpoints. And I'm not a psychic. I can't paint an alternative timeline where if universities had responded, particularly the Ivies, to these critiques. If the Trump administration would have come to power, and if they had, would they be using foreign students in this horrific way to silence and intimidate people? But there's a part of me that wonders you brought these students here; you've fostered a certain environment at your universities that had been criticized. I was looking back at our 10 years of shows in 2015, and we were doing shows on Missoula and student protests back in 2015.

Beth [00:25:25] Our third episode.

Sarah [00:25:27] This was our third that there were silencing anyone who had a conflict within this worldview, this very, very liberal worldview. And they ignored it because they weren't in it at the top echelons in the pursuit of learning. My personal opinion, they're in the pursuit of massive endowments that they, for some reason, can't draw on at this moment. Why do you have these endowments if not to fight a moment like this? Or they're basically hospital and research institutions and that's what they're here for. It's not for the students. It's for the pursuit of learning. You can tell it's not for the students because where are they as these foreign students are being treated this way? Except for saying button it up, we can't protect you. It's heinous. It's cowardice. From places that are supposed to be about something else, but they're not. The reason that big law and some of these universities have caved the way business has, it's because they're businesses and that's it. They're in the pursuit of profit and protecting their own bottom lines- not the legal system, not freedom of speech, not pursuit of learning. It's infuriating to me.

Beth [00:26:38] I worry about the ramifications for these individual students who are being disappeared by their government from the streets and taken to centers for detention that are miles and miles from anyone who knows or cares about them, denied access to basic medical treatment, to counsel. It's horrifying. I also worry about the long-term consequences of fewer people wanting to study in the United States. I worry about the research at these institutions, which while it often undermines the undergrad student experience or can, fulfills an enormously important societal function. And we have been at the top of science in this country because of immigration and because of our research universities and because the tech community's willingness to advocate with the government for the best and brightest minds from all over the world to get into this country and study and stay. It just feels like in every way we are cutting off our nose to spite our face with these policies and doing it as aggressively as possible, hoping that almost everybody bleeds out in the process.

Sarah [00:28:04] I thought these people are supposed to be smart. Do you not see that this is not how it works? Go talk to some business owners in authoritarian countries. See if they have the stability to really turn a long-term profit, to really grow their businesses. In Russia right now you have the actual oligarchs, the people we all model and we call, Elon Musk, but you have Vladimir Putin coming in being like this is mine again, we're taking it away. It doesn't work. Like you said, the target will just shift. You can't depend on a word he says. What do you think you're achieving? You think you are going to reorient the Middle East studies department and you're going to make him happy? What is this? You think you'll be able to say enough nice things about him? Good on Canada going, "Uh-uh, you're not dependable. No, absolutely not. We're not doing this." And I hope Europe gets the same lesson. I think there is a lesson to be learned here. There will be people who are looking for how people behaved in this moment, how institutions, how organizations, how businesses behaved in this moment. And I don't mean just being Democrat. I'm not looking for a 2020 rewrite, okay? Let me say something controversial. I'm not even all the way opposed to some of the changes they've made at the Washington Post, okay? Do I believe Jeff Bezos is motivated by some sort of protection of free speech? I do not. But I'm not saying I want you to do everything I want to do. Do it for a reason that's not covering your own ass. That's all I'm asking. That's really all am looking for.

Beth [00:29:51] When I think about what I focused on and what I missed in connection with the recent election, the 2024 election, I dramatically missed the effect of Elon Musk's money as a steadying force for Trump down the line. Because he is behaving really differently now than he did in the first term. And I think that's why some people are choosing flight instead of fighting this time. What do you do when Elon Musk is willing to spend millions of dollars in a state Supreme Court election? What do do when you Elon Musk doesn't seem to care that Tesla is going way, way down globally? The numbers on Tesla's being sold worldwide are shocking to me right now, especially because I have felt it's a pretty good product. The charging system is a very good product. And here we are in a totally different landscape and he doesn't seem to care. He has the money to not care. And when Trump said this past week about the tariffs and coming liberation day tomorrow that he doesn't care if cars get a lot more expensive, I thought this is a new dynamic. And I think Elon Musk underwriting it is a fundamental factor that I missed.

Sarah [00:31:22] Well, I don't think it's just Elon Musk. I think he's just richer. I think some of this is the crypto. I think some of this is he just feels like he's got enough money, too. He doesn't have to worry about Letitia James claiming his assets. He doesn’t' have to worried about any of that. He's just got enough money. I do think if we want to pivot to talking about some places where I see fight and hope, there's a related threat here. So he is saying maybe cars should cost more. Scott Bessent saying we don't just need cheap TVs. And, look, you know what? I've said that. I agree with that. I don't think that everything in American life should be treated, numbed with a sea of cheap goods. That is a consistent critique I've had since we started the show. We've spent a lot of time on the show talking about consumerism and how it has degraded civic life and our spirits and souls for what it's worth.

[00:32:36] I've said on this show that I think things should cost more. They cost more to make. They cost more to exist. The problem with this administration, and I think where you start to see real glimmers of hope out there in the streets, is that they're not making the stuff that really is too expensive, that shouldn't cost so much like housing and health insurance and education any cheaper or affordable. Yeah, I don't care if people pay more for a TV. And they don't either, but they're only doing that to make themselves feel better that they are still in a rental. And if you don't fix that, that's where the bubbling discontent and rage is just going to grow. And I think these Tesla protests-- also, can I just get a side? I need a moment. Did you see where Elon Musk was like who's paying these people? As he's up on a stage in Wisconsin handing out million dollar checks.

Beth [00:33:33] It's all projection.

Sarah [00:33:35] Oh my god!

Beth [00:33:36] It's all projection. When you read the executive orders, every bit of the language is the language that has been used against the Trump administration, now deployed at their service. And so, of course, Elon Musk looks at the world and thinks, who's financing this? Because that's the only tool that he has. He finances action and action happens, and he thinks that's the way the rest of the world works too.

Sarah [00:33:59] So, to me, I don't necessarily think I missed the rage at how much things cost. I was all about Kamala, whether it was effective or not, starting to get on this affordable housing platform. I think you and I both talked about that. I think that is real. Now I might miss some of it because I didn't expect the celebration in the death of a health insurance CEO to come as quickly on the heels of the election. But the rage at what I would describe is not just the expense of American life, but the cost. Do you know what I'm saying?

Beth [00:34:42] I do.

Sarah [00:34:42] That to me is what I still haven't quite heard people, particularly politicians, name. It's not just expense. It's the cost. I'm in such a state over careless people in the Facebook memoir. And I think you see this with the way people can direct rage at Elon that they don't direct at Trump. I think the way technology and the consumption fueled by technology has rotted out our existences in so many levels of American life, like that's why people I think can get in a real place with Elon, even conservative people. He's on this PR tour for a reason. He's out here doing all these interviews with Tucker Carlson and Fox News because I think they must understand or be seen some pulling somewhere that people do not like Elon.

Beth [00:35:49] It's interesting when Donald Trump is defending Elon Musk's morality. And we're seeing that more and more. I think you're right about the cost versus the expense. I think that's a really good framing that I would like to hear more people talking about. A couple of things just filled my brain as you were saying that. One was that my very good friend, Maggie, did a seminar. She just became a financial advisor. So I went to a business launch party for her. And they were talking about investments and how much time everyone spends on our phones every day and how that skews our perception of the market and skews our financial decision-making. But the hours, the number of times we pick up our phone every day on average and the hours that we're spending on phones, it's more than half the day that most of us are staring at our phone. It was really shocking to me. Even though I knew it, it was still shocking to see it so cut and dry.

[00:36:50] This morning Chad turned on our television and showed me this view where you can have nine news channels simultaneously on your TV. And I said don't ever do that again. I don't want to see that again. But I do think that part of this soul-level unhappiness is that we know so much. And because we know so much, there is no path forward at all for any of us just today or as a big picture plan. What I feel really encouraged about in the midst of all of that is that I do think people are, for the most part, responding to this in a smarter way than we had in the past. I am happy to see people saying the protests were a thing, but that is a fleeting movement. You've really got to hold your power on a protest. Taking to the streets takes a lot of energy. It can wear people out. It carries a lot risk. We've done it a lot. The town halls are a different beast. That is the sustainable work of self-governance.

[00:38:12] So to see more people signing up to run for office, these training programs for candidates are full up. It seems like people are saying, I guess we have to do this for the long haul. Let's do it. And I am bothered by the, well, the resistance is dead tone in a lot of punditries right now. Because that's not what I see. What I see is the resistance growing up and seeing that the conservative project for decades has been pursuing power in state houses, and in Congress, and in think tanks. They have been building, building, building. Donald Trump is a culmination of a long-term, quiet political project. And now I think we're seeing maybe the beginning of the building of a long term political project with a different worldview. Sorting out what that worldview is, it's hard and it's messy and it does look like disarray often. But people really showing up for these meetings gives me a lot of hope.

Sarah [00:39:22] I have a lot of hope right now. I think the special elections today, both in Wisconsin and Florida, are going to give us a lot hope whatever the results are. I think when you see people focused in on something like this in the way that they are and the way they're using it to express a communal, like, enough. Enough. And I think on the Democratic side I'm seeing a lot a hope because we're remembering that just because we had this decade-long love affair with Silicon Valley, that corporate interests are not in the American people's interests almost ever. Because, again, they are legally obligated to pursue profit for their shareholders. That's their job. And I think we just fell for it. I fell for. I worked for Facebook for free for years of my life. It makes me tear up when I think about it. I think I just worked for them for free because they tricked me. And I think they tricked so many of us.

[00:40:31] And I think people are seeing social media is nothing but extracting things from me for profit. That's what it's for. It's extracting my attention for profit, not for checking if you voted or turn out to vote. It's not in pursuit of any great political or civically minded purpose. It was to make a buck off of all of us and it still is and don't let anybody tell you any different. And so when I see AOC and Bernie in front of crowds of thousands on a Fight the Oligarchy tour, I'm here for it. I'm feeling my 21-year-old Sarah self in college being like, oh right, yeah, we knew who to fight. We knew who to fight. It was the corporate elites who don't want regulation, who don't want anything but to turn a profit, to extract. I was thinking about what we've been articulating so much on this show. Like what's next? Whoever can articulate what's next, not just what's wrong, but what's next? And I thought, I don't want to just go back to college and just damn the man kind of thing. So I thought what's the next innovation of this? And I though, isn't the problem that no one is ever responsible for their externalities.

[00:42:03] Who can show me a way for someone for corporate interest, for tech companies, particularly as we talk about artificial intelligence to say, "We are done with you offloading your externalities onto us. We are down with you exploiting the environment and then we have to suffer the consequences. We're done with your driving up the price of everything and forcing us to pay. We're done with your fracking our attention and our children's attention until they are zombies in a classroom who can't focus for more than five minutes at a time and then saying, whoopsies. The new vision of corporations, because we want everyone to participate in the economy, is you are responsible for the externalities you force on the rest of us. Instead of waiting for us to all suffer in it and then ask the government to come in and clean it up, which is us, you're still asking us to clean it. And you're asking that institution to shoulder the burden and the externalities of cleaning it up. People are mad at the government because they're having to come in and clean up the messes. And so they're the ones having to shoulder people's discontent because you didn't sign up and you weren't forced to shoulder your own externalities from the beginning. And I feel like we're getting somewhere with that. I feel we're like getting somewhere with like, no, you can't just treat us like a natural resource to extract. You can't conquer us. Take what you want and leave whatever waste is left behind.

Beth [00:43:44] I think we have some answers for that, too. So I'm not in a fight the power kind of space. I am thinking though along similar lines. How can we just get to the root of some of these issues instead of our politics being a forever primal scream of both sides and who can scream louder and who get to what we're all suffering from more. What is healing here? And I think you're totally right about owning your externalities. And I think that's where public benefit corporations have an answer for us. I think most Americans still support capitalism, still want to make money. The kind of eat the rich falls apart for a lot of people because they would like to be rich, too. We both loathe and admire. That kind of status is complicated. It's complicated to figure out when you are resentful of people who make a lot of money and when you just find them really inspiring. So I love the public benefit corporation model where you say be a corporation and make money. And also alongside your obligation to make money for shareholders is your obligation to do social good, to exist in the interest of the public. So you can sit in a board meeting and weigh the consequences of your actions alongside what your next quarter is going to look like for your shareholders. Give people that permission and obligation to do good and do well at the same time.

[00:45:23] I really respect that that's how Mark Cuban set up his pharmaceutical company. He is saying they aren't making money yet. And he has said, it's fine, I got enough money. I don't have to make money. But when we do, we'll reinvest it because we are set up in a format that gives us room to consider our net impact on our country. And for businesses, small business is beloved because that's how they function. As a small business, when you're not in a corporate form, you can say there is no reason for us to sponsor the tee-ball team, but we're going to because we want to, because we love this community that we're part of. You and I do things all the time that do not make any business sense, but we do them because we think they're either the right thing to do or there's some good attached to them. And we can because nobody's looking over our shoulder to contest that. And I would love to see us as a country really lean into, yes, we love and celebrate abundance and wealth here. It's part of who we are. It can be part of who we without being all that we are. And I really do have to think that people seeing Elon Musk basically trying to write checks and win elections in such a direct format, they're not even hiding it. They're not hiding anything. So it is all out in the light right now. And I think it opens up space for us to talk about how we can live differently.

Sarah [00:46:47] And, look, I'm seeing a lot of Democrats starting to articulate that. I think Rahm Emanuel is saying some really great things about public education. This consumes me. I have a kid in elementary school, in middle school, in high school, and one thinking about college. Again, you can hear the emotion in my voice. There's a problem. There's problem, a big one. And the first Democrat who can start to speak on the problem-- which I think Rahm Emanuel has begun to do in a really convincing way to say, like, I see it; I see what you see; this is not working-- is going to be fired. I think there's one story after another about AOC and whether she's going to run for president, not just because she polls as high as any basically elected official, but because she's so good at articulating exactly what we were just talking about. It's not just the expense, it's the cost. She's so good at that because she knows. Because talk about somebody who's gone from one end to the other, I don't think she's massively wealthy and I don' think she wants to be, which I think is what something people read as very authentic with her and that's what they like about her. They believe her. Because that's what's frustrating to me.

[00:48:09] In some ways I totally agree with you people still want to be rich and it's complicated. And sometimes it's so simple and I know that because I had that conversation with my 15-year-old where we were talking about that level of wealth that Elon Musk has it's a toxin. And Griffin was like, "Yeah, dah! money doesn't make you happy." He said, "Money makes you happy if you have the kind of problems that money can solve." That's what my 15-year-old said. And you know what? He's right. If you can't pay your bills and then you make enough money to pay your bill, then guess what, you're happy. But then past that point, you turn into our friend Victoria on the White Lotus where you're like, oh, I don't know. Does anybody on that show seem happy to you? They're not. And the people making those shows are that rich. So what does that tell you? They're unhappy. It's a toxin.

[00:49:05] And I wish we could talk about that. I think the that corporate structure is beautiful and wonderful. But I also would like to have a conversation like if you're a top lawyer, partner at a law firm, do you need to make $15 million? That's why people like AOC-- because she's like, you don't need to make that much money. Period. There's being successful and then there's just a point where what are we even doing? We're talking about so much money you couldn't even spend it. We have to find a way to-- and I think that's why oligarchy is a good way to talk about it. We're not talking about anybody being rich. We're taking about a level of wealth that means you can try to buy the presidency, control other countries, exploit our kids and turn them into suicidal messes just to turn your profit.

Beth [00:50:01] I definitely agree that we have a lot of room to discuss contentment. And at what point do we feel we can just say I have enough and I'm really content in my life. And there are very few-- even in popular culture, we don't have a a lot examples of people expressing a sense of contentment. Ambition is like core to who we are as well. So that's all really complex cultural work. When I think about issues like education and where we can go with issues like education, I think it's going to be interesting to see who's willing to take some risks in talking about that. I have convinced myself over the past few months where I've really been focusing on education and my own research and trying to read every education story-- I don't skip education anymore. If I see something, I'm going there. I've convinced myself in a lot of ways that educators need some space. I think we maybe have regulated education to death. I think we have put so many metrics around schools and so many assessments of those metrics around schools that we've not allowed schools to do their best for students.

Sarah [00:51:20] They're testing, not teaching. And it's not the teacher's fault.

Beth [00:51:23] It's not the teacher's fault. And even when it's not just testing in the purest form, you still get a sense that everything is so restricted. It's like we've been trying to perfect it to the point that we've lost it. I don't know that we could pass the five whys in education right now in a lot of different spheres. Notwithstanding the fact that we have some incredibly talented educators who are leaving it on the field every single day. It's the system itself that I think fails that checkpoint. If Democrats are willing to open a conversation about that and to have a conversation that counters Republicans who just want to tear it up and who think the solution is like everybody goes to Catholic school or homeschools, I'm for it. I would like to have that discussion. I'm trying to find hope in those places, too.

[00:52:20] I have spent a lot of time since the election talking about messaging and how Democrats can be as effective in getting attention and getting a message across as the Trump administration. I feel myself transitioning into I really want to put some meat on the bones now. What are we trying to create and how are we willing to create it? And what are we willing to shed in the process? Because to circle back to where we started, there are some businesses that are probably going to end over the next four years regardless of Donald Trump and his tariffs. We're in a time of incredible transition, politically, technologically, economically, culturally. I think there's so much opportunity in that if we will push past the fear around it and the clinging to the status quo to look for a society that isn't so depleting. That even if it's still expensive, maybe cost us less.

Sarah [00:53:13] So you've been talking about how there's a liberal or maybe there's liberal version of Project 2025 for Project 2029. And I was struck by Ezra Klein saying, "Cool, but don't talk about it." Because that was really impactful politically for them. And I think that's right. I want the political messaging to be hyper-focused on the problem. And I want all the think tanks in the world to keep all this policy making a secret. I don't want to spend any political capital selling ideals we're not empowered to put into place to begin with. Do you know what I mean? The messaging needs to be, like, you can trust us because we understand the problem. Not because we have a perfect solution. We don't, and we probably won't because you have to get in there and start trying things in that risk mindset before you can figure out. But people will trust you if they feel like you understand the problem. That's why I think Democrats who stand up and talk about public education, Democrats who standing up and talk about social media, what I would love to see a Democrat say is, hey, you guys get off Facebook, you're outraged about the wrong things.

[00:54:26] Like, uh-uh, you fall for it every time. Since I've been pretty much fully off social media, I can inside about five to 10 minutes if someone I'm talking to is basically getting all their news off social medias by what they're outraged about and how they talk to me about it. And I would love to see some Democrats talk about that. I think we have to get really good on making people feel hurt. I don't want your kids to be on their phones at school all day. That's a problem. We all know it is. Let's talk about it. I think that articulation doesn't have to be rage-filled and it does not have to a primal scream. It has to be I see what you see and it's wrong. I see what you see and it's wrong. And, look, that's where they got so much road out of RFK and Make America Healthy Again. Because they articulated a lot of things across the political spectrum that people felt about why they felt bad in their bodies in modern America. They just feel crappy in their bodies. And there's just an enormous amount of political resonance in that when you just say, "I see what you and it is unacceptable."

Beth [00:55:38] I think that's right. I think I'm probably, in a matter of degrees, less committed to that than you are because I'm less of a Democrat than you. And I am looking for anybody to do politics a different way. Following the social media thread, it disgusted me that the administration supported and signed the TikTok ban into law and then the Biden campaign rolls out its TikTok account. I think that's disgusting. If you are going to take an unpopular position, take it and then make your argument, make your case. You can't make a case that way. You can't tell people this is bad for you, but the stakes of this election are really high so we're going to do it for right now, but then it's going to go back to being bad for your maybe unless we really like it. You know what I mean? And that t to me is such a salient example of how it has all felt and why the nihilism that you hear from the Trump administration connects with people.

[00:56:33] Nobody really means it. Nobody's really serious about anything. Everybody's transactional. Everybody can be bought. And I just want to move out of that. And I don't really care who has the solution or who has a different way. I'm open. I'm just open-minded right now. I want something new. I want someone to speak into this moment with a vision. I don't mean it in as a gimmicky a way as I think a lot of people do, but I do the idea of sitting down as a personal exercise and saying, "What am I about?" That's what I think the value of Project 2025 was. It was terrible politically during the campaign. It has also turned out to be pretty much the blueprint that the administration is following. And I think it's good to have a moment where you make some hard choices and you say, yeah, this is what I'm about. These are the arguments I'm willing to make. This is the flag I'm going to carry. And I hope there's a constituency for it.

Sarah [00:57:30] Well, it reminds me of Habits of the Heart. That's a lot of what the first part of the book is. They're sitting down with Americans in 1984 and going, "What are you about? What is America about?".

Beth [00:57:41] What makes a good life?

Sarah [00:57:42] And the answers were not great in 1984 before we had social media. And so I think we have some work to do. And anybody who's willing to show up and do it and say like-- like one of the most encouraging things I read about AOC is basically a lot her close advisors were like, look, she is not aiming to do this, but if no one else will, she will. Because she understands. I think what you see on her face-- my husband was like she looks tired to me in a way she hasn't since the beginning. Because she had to live out that level of zero to nothing fame that running for president does. She sort of did that, right? She was a bartender and then she became this national figure in such a short time. So she understands the cost. Talk about someone who gets the costs probably in her bones, like understands what that's like. And so the reality that she'll articulate that and say, "I don't know if I can do it again, but I will if no one else will. I'll take it for the team." Again, that's what people connect with in her. That's what people want to see. Are people that will say, okay. Not I'll acquiesce to the King and bend the knee. They want to say, all right, I'll make some sacrifices because it's time. It's time for us to lay some stuff on the altar for the greater good.

Beth [00:59:04] And I think that that is a place that we can all be in our own spheres. I'm generally content in my life. I am open to places where I can contribute. I know that I don't have to contribute alone in those places. That's what I keep thinking about. If I could help Donald Trump through his spellbook addiction, that's what I would tell him. That what I kept learning over and over again, sometimes in really hard ways, is the beauty of life is not that you get past a place where you need the spells, it is that you find that you don't have to do any of this alone. And that the solutions are shared solutions held by a whole lot of people. And if you can get a whole lot of people together who adopt that mentality I'm open to what is needed from me; I will give what is need from me; I'm willing to risk some things and lose some things in the process; that to me is the mature resistance that this moment requires. And that's more than resistance. That is a foundation for vision and for building something better on the other side of all of this.

Sarah [01:00:08] Because the people who have a lot to lose are not going to step up because they're scared. So it's going to take a lot of people with a little less to lose, because we're not elites, to step into the streets, even if it's at a Tesla dealership, I don't even care, and say enough. Or stand in the streets and run for office and knock doors. Or go to a town hall or go a school board meeting. Like that's why that's what's going to work because no one else is left standing. The elites are acquiescing.

Beth [01:00:39] Yeah. I will say I'm not for the vandalism of the Teslas or the dealerships or the harassment of the people who are just trying to make their living working there. But I do think saying, okay, I'm going to support this company with my dollars is a fair place to be. And more than that, political protests through the channels of politics where there is actual power, where you are a citizen showing up and saying to your representative, here's what I see, these are answers that I want to have. Going to meetings, writing letters, that kind of long-term sustainable action makes me feel really hopeful. We are going to talk about Liberation Day on Friday. Hopefully, we have a little bit more information about what that means, about the tariffs, about what else business is going to be needing to do in our next episode. But for now, we're going to take the exhale of the episode and talk about what's on our minds Outside of Politics. It's April Fool's Day, Sarah. Have you pranked anyone today?

Sarah [01:01:39] No. Because we're recording the day before.

Beth [01:01:44] I was really trying to stay in the fourth wall or whatever it is.

Sarah [01:01:48] April Fools. It's not April Fool's to us, but it is to you as you're listening, which I don't think has happened to us that many times over 10 years. I don' know.

Beth [01:01:57] I haven't looked at the calendar.

Sarah [01:01:58] That's a question for ChatGPT. I'm thinking about it. Because here's the thing, it's almost like I've circled back around to my kids with the like physical pranks, because any sort of psychological prank they are onto. The second I try to be, like, oh my gosh, you're not going to believe what happened. They're like, yeah, April Fool's.

Beth [01:02:16] It also hard to not be mean with the psychological pranks. The most effective April Fool's pranks Chad and I have ever done is one year we pretended to just be speaking a nonsense language to each other and two of the girls and they looked at us like we were crazy and we did it a long time. Like we kept it up for quite some time and it went past funny into Jane being really, really upset about it.

Sarah [01:02:41] Oh no!

Beth [01:02:43] And so this year I am putting googly eyes on everything in the refrigerator. And it's just going to be fun and silly here. That's what we're doing.

Sarah [01:02:51] Well, my best and worst one was when you froze the cereal. Remember that one? You'd like freeze their cereal. And they loved it and they laughed. And then they wanted a real bowl of the cereal and that was the last bowl of the cereal that had been frozen. And then I cried. So that was not the best time. I did get Nicholas one time. I called him and convinced him that I had been arrested because I didn't know that I had an outstanding speeding ticket and that was a warrant for my arrest, and I was at the jail. And I got him. He thought I was in jail.

Beth [01:03:23] Was he relieved or upset on the other side of that prank? Because I know that he is a worrier and that's a lot for him.

Sarah [01:03:27] Well, yeah, that's why it was a mean exploitation of his Enneagram six nature, which I don't even think I knew about Enneagram six at the time. But he was mad. He was like, oh my God, can't believe you did that to me. But now I can't get him either because you can get somebody like that one time and then they're on to you. But Felix is like really, really excited and really into it. And so I kind of want to get him. I just got to think about how. He's really into his tennis shoes. That would be funny. I bet I could just tie them in a tennis shoe garland. He has several pairs.

Beth [01:04:10] Okay, I like that.

Sarah [01:04:11] I could just tie every shoelace together.

Beth [01:04:13] Not mean.

Sarah [01:04:14] Not mean.

Beth [01:04:15] Has kind of a wacky Wednesday feel.

Sarah [01:04:17] Maybe I'll do that.

Beth [01:04:18] I think that's a good plan.

Sarah [01:04:19] That could be fun.

Beth [01:04:20] It's so hard to not be mean with it. Even when your good intentions are there, it's just like what kind of state-- I'm in a state right now where I don't want to be pranked. I'm just going to put it out there. I'm a little soft right now. I don't want to pranked. There are other times when I could handle it better. But you don't always know, right? You don't always know the recipient where they're going to be.

Sarah [01:04:38] I watched a lot of, what was that show? Punk'd. It was for the audience. The prank is for the other people. It's not for the person participating. It's for the people around going like, oh my gosh. There's a lot of those shows though on YouTube now. My kids watch a lot that stuff where people do wild stuff and break stuff and see how people respond and all that kind of...

Beth [01:05:00] I cannot believe how much our kids enjoy America's Funniest Home Videos still. How is that still working for people? I guess the slapstick just never ends.

Sarah [01:05:09] Yeah, I think that's like a monkey brain situation. I feel pretty confident that if you did like an MRI on people watching America's Funniest Home videos it would not be like your prefrontal cortex is all fired up. You know I'm saying?

Beth [01:05:22] Yeah, I'm sure that's true.

Sarah [01:05:23] Yeah. I laugh. Listen, I laugh. Sometimes it's funny.

Beth [01:05:29] It's okay. I'm not mad at anybody for laughing. I'm just surprised. I'm surprised at the staying power. Ellen also loves What Would You Do? Which I can't believe is still on with John Quinones. The situations where they said-- again, also kind of mean, kind of traumatizing if you think about that show.

Sarah [01:05:42] Now, I do like those because that really gets to my Enneagram One nature. Like, I would definitely do it. I really would like to get caught with him. And I don't think about John Quinones, but that is how my brain works. Like if somebody is in distress, like every cell in my brain is like, you can't be the one that walks by. You can't be the one that walks by, you have to help this person. Even though my husband's never the ones that wants to stop and help. We drove by this poor woman who had her car door open. Had pulled off a pretty narrow road and was just vomiting profusely out the side of the door. And I was like, "Should we stop?" And he's like, "And do what?" And I'm like, "I don't know. Say, are you okay?"

Beth [01:06:20] Give her some water.

Sarah [01:06:21] Give her water. Like dang.

Beth [01:06:25] We have made it so difficult to know what each other want in situations like that. I'm really struggling with like if somebody hasn't been to church in a while, I want to reach out and be like, I miss you. I also don't want to pressure people. And so many people have all this church baggage where it feels like recruiting or culty or something. I never really know when and how to step in in situations like that. And then in public, if somebody's struggling, I don't want to embarrass them by making a big thing over something. But I also want everybody to know that we are each other's business. We're in this together.

Sarah [01:07:00] I think you text. Everybody's lonely, so I think you always lean at the reaching out end of the spectrum for sure. We've gotten a little far from pranks, but that's probably why we're responding to pranks. Is this what America needs right now?

Beth [01:07:16] I think that's a good question. Curious how you all are approaching April Fool's Day this year. Is that what your homes need?

Sarah [01:07:21] I think it's mainly, back to our previous conversation like a month or so ago, like any April Fool's that leans on the whimsy, not the prank. Do you see what I'm saying?

Beth [01:07:32] I do. So the googly eyes are the whimsy, right? That's just fun and silly. Yeah.

Sarah [01:07:36] Yes.

Beth [01:07:37] That's what I'm looking for right now. We fixed it. Fun and silly. I care enough about you to go out of my way. To make you laugh. To make your giggle for a second.

Sarah [01:07:45] Yeah, that's it. I like that one. I already fixed it.

Beth [01:07:50] We fixed it. Thank goodness we can fix at least one thing. We really appreciate you being here with us. Don't forget to come on over to Pansuitpoliticsshow.com where you can become a member of the Spice Cabinet or simply sign up for our free subscription to get new episodes sent straight to your inbox along with the ability to watch some lives and read our weekly essays. And because the treats will get us through, you can watch Sarah tomorrow with Chelsea Devantez is one of our favorites, the host of Glamorous Trash, talking more about careless people. So you got an appetizer. Today and you can see more tomorrow. You only need a free subscription to see that and to participate in the comments So we hope you'll do that. We'll be back in your ears with a new episode on Friday until then have the best most whimsical we go