Rick Wilson & Ed Fitzgerald

**Molly Jong-Fast** (0:00)
Hi, I'm Molly JongFast, and this is Fast Politics, where we discuss the top political headlines with some of today's best minds. And JD Vance is now the most unpopular vice president in the history of Poland. That's pretty fun. We have such a great show for you today. The Lincoln Project's Rick Wilson joins us to discuss Trump blocking the Straits of Hormuz and other strategic blunders. Then we'll talk to Ed FitzGerald about his run for Ohio's 7th District against Congressman Max Miller. But first the news.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:35)
So Molly, we are seeing inflation, we are seeing gas prices cause it. And Mr. Trump is going to be here to the rescue. Oh, wait, no, he's not. Here he is talking to the money hunting Maria Bartiromo. And she looks horrified as he says this.

**Molly Jong-Fast** (0:51)
Oh, I love a clip. Let's go.

**SPEAKER_3** (0:53)
They all said we agree.

**SPEAKER_4** (0:55)
So do you believe the price of oil and gas will be lower before the midterm elections?

**SPEAKER_3** (1:00)
I hope so. I mean, I think so. It could be or the same or maybe a little bit higher. But the same I think won't be longer. Yeah, they're wiped out.

**Molly Jong-Fast** (1:11)
All she wants is for him to say it'll be lower.

**SPEAKER_2** (1:15)
It's so funny because her eyes just bug out her head like, no, you idiot. I was trying to let you lie and you didn't.

**Molly Jong-Fast** (1:23)
If you have a little time, go on the internet and search that interview with Maria Bartiroma because it's like a masterclass in him cycling through various anxieties. At one point, he's like, you know, the Iranians had nukes. We knew they were gonna blow us all up. He goes into a whole like they were gonna blow us all up thing. Which is something, it's clear, his levels of desperation, of anxiety, of, you know, it just isn't a truly insane bit of everything bad. It's absolutely worth listening to.

**SPEAKER_2** (2:01)
I'm gonna admit I was wrong about something on this podcast.

**Molly Jong-Fast** (2:03)
What? We never learn from our mistakes here at Fast Politics. Continue.

**SPEAKER_2** (2:08)
When I see politicians like JB. Raskin say Trump needs a head exam, I'm like, I hate this kind of performative nonsense, like distractions. When I watched that interview, I was like, all right, I'll put T. Braskin here. This guy's insane.

**Molly Jong-Fast** (2:20)
Well, you know, he's 79 years old. And like, that is old. I mean, you know, there are some 79 year olds who are sharp as a tack. My man is not one of them.

**SPEAKER_2** (2:30)
Yeah. Okay. So let's talk about some real ugliness in our Congress. So as we learned this weekend, that Eric Swalwell has been having a few affairs here and there, it seems.

**Molly Jong-Fast** (2:42)
At best, he's been having affairs. Yeah. Well, at worst, it's something much darker, right?

**SPEAKER_2** (2:49)
Yes. So it looks like in Congress, the compromise is that there's been a lot of people whose behavior has not been so good. We've had, you know, other Congress people who have bad ethics.

**Molly Jong-Fast** (2:59)
Tony Gonzalez, who sexually harassed staffers, and one of them set themselves on fire and killed herself. I'm going to need to step on the soapbox here for a minute about Eric. You know, Eric Swalwell and I have been friendly over the last couple of years. I did not know that he was capable of this kind of thing. And I'm telling you, this all has to be investigated. He needs to step down and these women need to have, be listened to. I have a number of thoughts about this. The biggest thing in my mind is that there are multiple women. The allegations range from the distasteful to the illegal. And they all need to be listened to. I was really heartened to see that Alvin Bragg, who is really, I have to say, I got to talk to him recently and I just thought this guy is really a good egg. That Alvin Bragg is taking this really seriously and that he's not going to do partisan hackery, that he is going to, despite the letter next to his name, investigate these allegations. Look, we give up the moral high ground the minute we dismiss stuff like this. It leads us to a place that none of us want to be. And there is a lot of these members of Congress are given all sorts of, you know, second chances. And this is not that. This is a person who needs to be investigated. This is behavior that is not okay. And I'm really glad to see Democrats taking this very seriously. You can't be the good guys if you enable stuff like this.