The Joyce Kaufman Show 8/20/26 - James Braid leaving the White House, Media coverage focused on Meghan and Harry instead of election results, Socialism, The DSA and more

A colossal monster tearing through the streets. A city in ruins. Nowhere to hide. Until he finds a way out behind the wheel of the all-electric Toyota CHR. Instant torque, getaway handling, and immeasurable wow factor. John Cho stars in Escape. Experience the thrill. Test drive Toyota's new all-electric family at your local dealer. Toyota, let's go places. This has been the Joyce Kaufman podcast. Available everywhere you get your podcasts. Whoa, boy, oh boy, oh boy. I don't know about the rest of you, but my head is spinning. And it's not even a major big news story day, but there's just some ekey stories that get you. I mean, obviously by now, people have realized that I was away for a couple of days. And that... was a one of those personal life things that went on and thank goodness for a top notch producer and a great program director you know it was relatively painless it was relatively painless for me anyway and if it was painful for you oh well no just kidding but um so much i actually was out of state for a little bit and The whole country is the only way I could describe it is like we're all disturbed. It's just at what level is any particular community disturbed? You know, is it greatly disturbed? Is it mildly disturbed? Is it moderately disturbed? But everybody is disturbed. People cannot have conversations without feeling like they're, they've got to walk on eggshells with one another. And that's such a shame because one of the great things about this. once upon a time melting pot calls the United States of America was that we would talk about all of the things that were going on around us not just locally but around the world and we all had great opportunities to change our minds or listen to new ideas and these days you almost feel as though you're better off just keeping your opinion to yourself unless you happen to be paid like I am to give your opinion. So I feel that's a... a sad, sad part of the change in my country. Now, of course, the elections on Tuesday, as most of you can imagine, didn't go the way I wanted them to go in many instances. But then again, you know, the beautiful part about living in a republic is that the individuals and the communities in which they live can be different.

and can want different things and can vote different. And we accept that. Sometimes you're on the winning side and sometimes you're not. I was, as you all know, I was rooting for a candidate who I was told had very little chance of prevailing in the Republican primary for the governor's race. But I didn't want to believe that. And I chose to, I don't know, delude myself into thinking that the election would have more closeness and that certainly Paul Renner would have an excellent showing. But the money and the insanity behind the Trump endorsed Byron Donalds's was impossible to overcome. And that's a... That's not a good thing, in my opinion. We don't want kingmakers and we don't want to feel as though at any given time it won't be the best person for the job. It'll just be the person that has the highest name recognition or the person that has the most money to spend. Because that... That's not the way this is supposed to happen, you know. So forgive me once in a while I get disappointed and I don't really want to even talk about it that much. I just want to stew in my juice, as they say. And I will get behind the candidacy of Byron Donalds's because the state of Florida cannot afford to have David Jolly. or any of the other crazy, you know, loony left people in positions of power. Because I see what's happening. And trust me, I think you're going to be very surprised in November that a lot of these so-called, you know, movers and shakers in the DSA, they're not going to be moving and shaking much. Because you cannot make sense of... half of the things that they say, and we're beginning to see you can't make sense of what they're doing. And America is not going to tolerate that. America's not going to say, oh, well, we're going to stand on this side, regardless of the cost to our communities. No, people are going to start pushing back more and more. And I think this whole DSA thing should have been a wake-up call. We'll see if it is, you know. One of the most amazing things I found post-election analysis was I did like a random check on just how much time was being devoted to analyzing the votes and how much time was being devoted to Megan and Harry are moving back to the UK. And I hate to tell you this. but it was two to one, Megan and Harry coverage. And I was trying to reach across, you know, all kinds of platforms. Didn't just look at liberal, didn't just look at conservative, didn't just look at things that I use on a regular basis. I reached out and, boy, I'll tell you, it's almost as if everybody knew what was going to happen before it happened. And maybe that's, maybe that is true.

Maybe they are broadcasting or forecasting things to us in a way that then makes us fulfill it, which would be really the height of news speak. Then you know you're living. in a time that you never thought would actually happen. We thought it would just be novels. You know, 1984, Animal Farm, they were just going to be novels. And instead we wake up and realize, I don't know, this is actually, things are happening the way that it was predicted in those books. So, you know, I... I remain very concerned. I'm on heightened alert, let's say that, about what is going to happen to this country in the next, certainly in the next two and a half years and then in the next 20 years, because it is no longer unpredictable. We're beginning to see some... some signs and you're beginning to hear a lot of the left pushing back or a lot of the middle the median middle pushing back i mean uh jo rogan had a brutal prediction for what happens when socialists actually get their way You know, he referred to some of these candidates who prevailed in elections as no-nothing Democrat socialists. And he was stunned that they could be so ignorant about the realities of Marxism. And, you know, you can't, you can't be that we're seeing happening has been. you know, in the offing for a long time. And people like me have been clanging the bell and trying to get people to pay attention. But when you see young people, particularly young people, who are really, you know, saying stupid things like, oh, maybe being socialist is cool. You know, this is like being driven by social media 100%. It's not natural that people are sitting around reading call marks and going, what a great idea. Let's do this. That's not what's happening. Very few of those so-called Marxists that you find on social media are even aware of the consequences. They have not examined the historical consequences of these strategies and what it ultimately leads to. And when you got guys like Joe Rogan summing up how so-called democratic socialism actually works, maybe more than just people on talk radio are sounding the alarm. And maybe there will be a turnaround. It's like checkers, he said. I thought this was a great analogy. He said, it's like real simple. You're going to have a military that controls everything you do.

As soon as you give up everything to the state, well, the state has the guns and you have nothing. And then they tell you what to do. And, you know, Steve Hilton was talking with Joe Rogan in this particular segment that I watched. And he pointed to Mayor's Zohran Mamdani there in New York with these publicly run grocery stores. And, you know, he said, well, we had that when I was a kid. I literally went to stores like that in Hungary. It was a communist state. There was only state-run grocery stores. I saw them. There's like one at the end of every block where my grandma lived, and I would go there in the morning to get whatever it was, and it's just terrible. And look, Joe Rogan brought up an excellent point. Capitalism can be brutal as well. which unfortunately too many capitalists are unwilling to even talk about it or make an argument for it. And the answer to what might be wrong with capitalism is not let's bring on socialism. I would like to have safety nets. We all would. But they shouldn't encourage people to be lazy. You know, an example of a valid social safety net is that a woman who has children and her husband dies and she doesn't have an income should have help feeding her children. That's the kind of safety net that all of us agree should be in place. The problem is that some of these social safety nets have turned into safety hammocks. And people rely on them and have zero ambition. And these were remarks that Joe Rogan said recently this week. But a couple of weeks ago, he slammed the Democratic Socialists. He said, look, they may have good intentions, but they don't have a clue. It doesn't matter if the idea comes from a good place. He says, I know that in their heart of hearts, they think they're being kind, they think they're doing the right thing. They really do. They think they're being inclusive. They want to write the wrongs of the past. And they think that maybe democratic socialism is a really good idea. Because there are things you can point to that work, you know, like a fire department. The problem with enforcing any of this stuff is that they don't understand that it always comes down to power. You have to have massive authority, and that usually requires guns because you can't just steal people's money. They're not going to let you. They're not going to let you come in and decide, hey, we devised a new tax where everybody who makes more than half a million dollars a year, everything over that, you have to give 100% of it to the state. People aren't going to go for that. And he continued by saying that you're making an already awful government even more powerful. And that doesn't seem like a good idea to him or me. Problem and these programs that you have in place that take the taxes and then disseminate them is flawed and it's corrupt. It's full of waste. And we know that.

There's scammers all over the place. You got $24 billion missing in just the homeless programs in California. And then they veto the audits when people are just trying to figure out, well, what happened to the money? So then you turn to the people and you say, well, give us more of your money, more taxes is going to fix this. Nobody believes that. So it's fascinating to watch. You know, liberals and Democrats try and figure out how to, you know, get rid of the unhinged DSA. And good luck with that. Here in Florida, the DSA candidates didn't do very well, with one exception. This Angie Nixon character. We'll talk about that. Let me take a break. Don't forget to download the 850 app. Put on your laptop, your cell phone, any media device that you want to put it on. You can get breaking news that way. You can listen to all the podcasts. It's a good app. And if you're afraid of more apps on your devices, then just visit our website, 850WFDL.com. Quick break. I'll be right back. Guided by a shared purpose and a spirit of collaboration, Emory University students push each other to think creatively and work cooperatively, knowing that different perspectives lead to new ideas. What makes Emory special is that it has very rigorous academics, but a community that is willing to support each other. People are always willing to study together and work hard together. Learn more at emory.edu. So one of the stories that I think is fascinating and not getting covered at all. I think I saw it in maybe one or two platforms. I think maybe I saw it on the blaze and on OAN is the fact that one of the longest serving director of legislative affairs for President Trump is leaving the administration.

You know, the White House needs someone who can fight hard battles. Who, when they're, you know, when you have like a knife's edge majority in both chambers, which is where we are, as well as a number of senior senators in particular who don't even like the president and therefore have no loyalty to his priorities. You have to have somebody who can talk to them, work with them, and get things done. And James Braid was that person. In spite of, really, when you think about all the obstacles in his way, you know, you had the entire Democratic coalition, and then you had parts of the Republican Party itself. And yet James Brade and his team, they got a lot of legislation passed. Taxes, energy, the border, spending in the one big beautiful bill act. You know, even after the shootings, the ICE shootings, they were still able to get enough Senate support. And they did some amazing things. They got a regulatory framework for the cryptocurrency. And they managed to claw back something like $9 billion in overspending with the Rescisions Act. And fentanyl trafficking is down. Revenge porn. They had the Halt and Take It Down Act got through. And so even when you have the president duking it out with Congress, if you have a great legislative affairs team, then you can get some victories. You know, the Lake and Riley Act was another one. And that is all. directly because of James Brade and his team. And so when I heard that he was leaving, I thought, oh, there'll be a lot of articles about this. And a lot of people are going to be, you know, really wondering why. And can this administration get anything done in the last two years without him? And I barely see your mention. You know, the guy that was able to form enough coalitions and just grease enough tracks for the 21st century road to housing bill? That was the most populous reform bill of the past two years, lowering housing prices and protecting American families by, you know, they took on the private equity interests that have been buying up all these entry-level homes and these fast-growing markets, which they would get to Florida. And, you know, they were paying cash, and then they were converting these starter neighborhoods into permanent rental communities. And the...

The vote ended up passing nearly unanimously, but it was a battle to just get it out of committees. Because the people who were heading those committees were Republicans who were best friends with corporations. And then they had people who were just not willing to work with the left with the liberal Democrats. And they did some incredible work getting these nominations through the hostile Senate. You know, nobody thought they were going to, you know, get Pete Hegseth confirmed or Robert F. Kennedy Jr.. Kevin Warsh, we knew they could do that. But even Attorney General Todd Blanche now, Braden, his team are the ones who got those people in. And Todd Blanche's confirmation came after President Trump targeted two of the people on that committee, two of the senators on the committee in their primary campaigns. And, you know, Matt Bill Gates and Elise Stefanik, who withdrew their nominations. I want you to hear me when I say this because you're not going to hear it anywhere else. Well, maybe you might hear it somewhere else, but you're not going to hear it on any of the major outlets. The administration, this administration, has never lost a confirmation vote. Did you think that? Did you know that? Because I knew it, but even I was like, is that so? And I had to go right down the list. So, Braid leaving is huge? He played a very big role. And that's why this morning on Trump, in Truth Social. He got credit from the president. He said James has played a critical role in our many accomplishments with Congress, including the one big beautiful bill, beating the Democrats in two shut down showdowns, passing the Genius Act, defeating a record number of war powers resolutions. That's right. I forgot about that. And in the confirmation of my cabinet at the fastest rate in decades. He's been on Capitol Hill forever. And he actually joined the campaign as the LD for J.D. Van, the legislative director for the VP for JD Vance when he was a senator, you know, a brand new freshman. James Braid had one of the toughest jobs in the entire administration, okay? And he delivered at every turn. He played a critical role in all of their achievements. Largest tax cut ever. I don't know what to tell you. It's going to be a big difference. And I'm surprised that more people aren't talking about it. That's all. He had said, James Braid said, I'm profoundly grateful to President Trump and Vice President JD Vance for the opportunity to be a part of this extraordinary team and to serve in an administration that has worked with the Congress to deliver the largest tax relief in American history.

the resources necessary to secure the border and build the wall across two reconciliation bills, the fastest confirmation of the cabinet in 20 years, and defeating two democratic showdowns. He had to toot his own harm because nobody else is doing it. Well, the president and the VP are, but amazing to me that the bulk of the media is not interested in this story. I, maybe. Maybe I'm just not understanding why the public would tolerate a lack of enthusiasm on the part of the media to cover the important stories. I just don't get it. But maybe I never will. When you come back, I want to talk a little bit about. Barack Obama, the president, former president, because he never ceases to amaze me. That whole, you know, Obama mentality, I find it stunning. I never supported the guy, and believe me, it was difficult to not support what was... the possibility, the chance of America having its first biracial president. I'm not going to say black president because he's biracial and that's the truth. But, you know, that transformation that he promised back in 2008, it is happening. It's still happening. And he's okay with letting other people finish it. So I want to talk a little bit about that. Please stay right where you are. I'll be right back. Okay, so, you know, remember when President Obama delivered a line that we ran with for a long time when he said, you didn't build that. And today, the Democrat Party is actually saying to Barack Obama, you didn't build

I think that it's really, there's a fascinating story that's not being told. And that I'd like to know why it's not being told. Because it's a great story. You would think that every major media outlet would want to talk about what's happening to the Democrat Party in terms of. the great hero of that party, Barack Obama, and where he is and what he's doing. Because he still, look, Bill Clinton has no political footprint anymore. Hillary Clinton, none. John Kerry, none. It's Barack Obama. He's the only one that's got any, first of all, he's got media savvy. And he has always. He's always used it very well. Never wasted it is what I'm going to say. Because a lot of people have that and then they waste it. He didn't do that. So I was looking at the fact, what was it that he promised, right? He promised to transform America. And he had talent. He was smart. He had ambition. But it was the Democratic Party that made anything possible. They had the donors like George Soros that were supplying big bucks. They had their convention supplied him an audience. And then the voters. took this relatively little-known Illinois politician and put him on a global stage where he did really well. But now that institution that helped build Obama can't seem to figure out what it believes. You know, Barack Obama turned 65 just this month. He's... He's four years younger than Donald Trump was when Trump came down the escalator and literally began remaking the Republican Party. And whatever you think of Donald Trump, the Republican Party did not build him. He had his own celebrity, his own audience, his own brand, his own money. And he captured the party, even though the establishment Republican Party didn't want anything to do with it. And that's the exact opposite of President Obama. In 2000, Barack Obama couldn't even get a floor credential at the DNC at the convention. Four years later, just four years later in 2004, they put him behind the lectern. And four years after that, he was their nominee for president. They didn't just nominate him. They introduced him to America. And for over a decade, we hate Trump gave Democrats something that they could call a governing philosophy, you know, because rage generates money and it generates turnout and unity.

But rage is fuel. It's not a destination. And Democrats are discovering that when you take Trump out of the sentence, they don't know what else to say. The parties rising left contingent, the DSA, they've now captured Michigan's Democratic Senate nomination. They got Abdul El-Sayed. He was backed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders and Hasan Piker. And, you know, after he won, Obama was supposed, they say, called him and said they had a really warm conversation. Which leads me to ask this question. Is the DSA guys and gals? the party's left, does that represent a rogue kind of renegade part of the party, or is it actually becoming the party's center of gravity? Because they talk endlessly about, oh, we got a big tent, it's a big tent. But a big tent has to have a center pole. Otherwise, it's just a tarp. And the only person that has enough stature to supply that, is Barack Obama. And he does endorse some candidates and he gives some speeches. And I know that he meets privately with some lawmakers. And maybe that helps individual candidates. But it doesn't provide a direction for a party that doesn't look like he knows where it wants to go. This was a, you know, Barack Obama once was the guy who had the power to name where to take the country. Hope and change, right? Millions of Americans. Hope and change was all they needed. It gave them, you know, the power to imagine a country that would be different than the one they were living in. So where is Barack Obama asking the Democrat Party to go now? Because he could tell the Democrats what they should hold on to and what they should not allow the DSA or the progressives, whatever you want to call people on the far, far left. They should not be allowed to tear down and try to replace and what the party will refuse to tolerate. Unless, of course, that is the destination. What are Democrats for when they're not against Donald Trump? Endorsing candidates spends celebrity. Leadership spends political capital. Democrats call Donald Trump an existential threat who's going to destroy the American democracy. And yet, President Obama... confines himself to making endorsements and private conversations and carefully measured speeches. So either the danger is as horrifying as Democrats insist, in which case him being so restrained makes me confused, be difficult to defend, right? Or the rhetoric is exaggerated.

In which case, his restraint makes sense, right? And if the parties left threatens traditional liberalism, why won't he confront it? Or if it represents the party's future, why doesn't he just say so? And then, you know, after saying he had a warm conversation with Abdul El-Sayed, maybe there's a third possibility. That maybe the transformation that he promised in 2008 is still underway. And he's just content to let others finish it. Maybe he thinks he did his duty. And maybe the party has moved somewhere he doesn't want to go. Maybe he wants influence without having to own the negative consequences that we all know are coming. Or maybe the Democratic Party was always way more useful to Barack Obama than Barack Obama was useful to the party. You know, he once told anybody who had any success in America that they had benefited from institutions they did not create. And he was right about at least one America, the Democratic Party that built Barack Obama. And now that party needs rebuilding. You know, John F. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pointed to the moon. Reagan pointed to a certain wall that he wanted torn down. Trump came down an escalator pointing towards a wall that he wanted to build. Where is Barack Obama pointing the Democratic Party? That's the question. Peter Rosenberger, who has his own radio program, posed that question. And I think it's legit. And I'm really curious as to why it's not getting more coverage. Because it makes no sense to me. You know, it's a great story. I wish I had some more insight into it. But I know a good story when I see it. Anyway, don't forget coming up after me is Guy Benson, followed by Will Kane, then it's Joe Peggs and Lars Larson, the overnight guys until 6 a.m. tomorrow tomorrow, we're going to lead you right into the weekend. Boy, it's going to be a very short week for me, come to think of it. But that's okay. I needed a little bit of rest, but although I didn't get any rest, I did need just a moment to decompress a little bit. Anyway, let me take the last break. We have one segment left in this today's show. Please stay right where you are. And then, you know, a story that is just, for me, it's a difficult story to talk about, you know, we talked about that surrogate mother who wanted to. save a pregnancy that she was she was carrying the baby for a couple and even though there was an indication that there was some health concerns she felt that the baby should not be terminated that she should not be forced to have an abortion so that was a story that concerned me but then i saw this uh massachusetts story for the last two weeks i've been following it right

Massachusetts now has a, they call it the prioritizing patient access to care act, which allows for abortions up until birth. According to the... To one of the OBGYNs and the CEO of one of the pro-life OBGYN groups, Christina Francis, she said if a woman's life is in danger, if she's facing a pregnancy complication beyond 24 weeks, we simply deliver her. And in fact, delivery is much more expedient than a later in pregnancy abortion procedure. Because then there are lots of dangers. Third trimester abortions can lead to a ton of complications for the mother. And they're medically unnecessary because scientific evidence tells us that fetuses can feel pain much earlier in pregnancy than we thought. So, you know, this bill. that claims that they are protecting women in actuality, they're not. They're doing exactly the opposite. When a mother is facing a medical emergency, and we're talking about late in pregnancy, they're There should be safe and acceptable methodologies that you look at and examine. But they're misleading women by telling them that these late-term abortions are safe. They're not. Not to mention what I believe are even worse aspects, the trauma of it all. And I... I was stunned because when a mother's facing a medical emergency late in pregnancy, she deserves the fastest and the safest care possible. Not an abortion procedure that can take days and expose her to all these dangerous complications when her baby could simply be delivered. These women are being lied to and they deserve more than politicians. who are using, you know, this health argument as a cover to basically eliminate protection for unborn children. Protecting a mother and protecting her child are not, shouldn't be competing interests. And Massachusetts should be advancing policies that value both lives, not putting one at risk to end the other. So I'm going to be talking a lot more about that. And not just from the legality standpoint. Because I think it's this, the law is problematic anyway. But that's in a sort of apathetic way of having this debate. I think it's time for people to actually have the discussion.

about what the American public think is right. And they seem afraid to do that. I've never been afraid to do that. And then I have to accept. I had to accept the fact that the majority of people in this country were pro-abortion. You know, turns out not as pro as they told us. But whatever, you know, you live with the results as long as the people are the ones making these decisions. And that's amazing. Instead of always talking about, well, you know, what does the redistricting in Louisiana mean? And believe me, I want to talk about that stuff too. Sometimes you've got to talk about what's going on in the American psyche. You know, what have we. become so tolerant of that we're actually leading future generations down a very dark path because that's what you know when people come to me and say well what causes school shootings and they have all these you know why did the knife at the track meet and you know they asked me these questions i go but we've made life seem so irrelevant you know that it's not all that important And then you ask young people who have no judgment, not their fault, no life experience yet. Then you ask them to choose wisely. The results are not going to be good, right? So we need to start having these serious conversations. If we really want to leave a country that not just survives but thrives, not so sure that politicians are interested in that, but we the people are. Anyway, but speaking about Louisiana, the Missouri judge just cleared the way for, well, I'm not speaking about Louisiana, but they just, this is interesting. They just cleared the way for the new U.S. House districts that the president has been backing to be used in the midterm elections in November. Cole County Circuit Judge Daniel Green threw out an effort to force a statewide referendum on the Republican-drawn map, which is a big win for Republicans because they have a very slim majority in the House. The districts already appeared on August primary ballots as the Secretary of State, who is a Republican, had turned away a petition. that had thousands of signatures on it and sought a November vote on the boundaries. And Denny Hoskins said the state constitution does not permit a referendum on congressional redistricting. And this judge agreed with that interpretation. The Missouri Constitution does not supply any statement, let alone a clear one, reallocating authority over congressional redistricting away from the General Assembly. Well, good. That gives me a little hope because I'm looking, I'm starting to crunch numbers.

It's looking real shaky out there. Thank you for your time this time until next time. My plan is to be back here tomorrow at three, if it be his will, and he delays his coming, what lies behind us, and what lies ahead of us are so tiny matters compared to what lies within us. So wherever you are, be yourself. Everybody else is taken. And then may God bless you. May God bless Israel. And may God bless the USA. See you tomorrow. This has been the Joyce Kaufman podcast, available everywhere you get your podcasts.