Will Ron DeSantis be as popular among the rest of the country as he is in Florida? Charlie Sykes, editor at large at The Bulwark, thinks not. But that isn’t stopping the governor for going for it anyway, it being the 2024 presidency. He tells New Abnormal co-host Andy Levy why in this episode, including a few things that he believes DeSantis is banking on to win. (And why this won’t work). Also in this episode: Jared Yates Sexton, host of The Muckrake Podcast and author of The Midnight Kingdom, has proof that Trump’s religious pandering will lead to violence and tells co-host Danielle Moodie why liberal white Democrats in media are embarrassed of Trump, but just won’t quit him. Plus! Andy and Danielle reflect on Trump’s rally in Waco, and how Trump has gone full “vengeful” old testament. They also discuss the state state of the country after the latest school shooting in Nashville and reminisce on the very recent time Republicans swapped the American flag pins for ones of AR-15s.

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The world of pro wrestling used to be sold as real. Viewers were told that the fights, the rivalries, and the storylines were all real-life, otherwise known as a phenomenon called kayfabe. Then, former World Wrestling Entertainment CEO Vince McMahon turned that on its head. In this episode, author Abraham Josephine Riesman, who recently wrote a biography on McMahon titled Ringmaster: Vince McMahon and the Unmaking of America, tells The New Abnormal co-host Andy Levy how a manipulation strategy McMahon used made WWE what it is today (and help to deregulate it) and how Trump came to use that same technique to keep his fanbase coming back. Also in this episode: Riesman goes deeper into how McMahon’s strategy was able to leak into the world of politics, the history of McMahon and Trump’s friendship, and if there’s truth behind one of the biggest quote from her book: “Vince McMahon is the closest thing to a friend Trump has.” Plus! Andy and co-host Danielle Moodie talk about the Republican war on oat and almond milk and make the case that if TikTok goes down, Meta and Twitter should go with it.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, hosts Andy Levy and Danielle Moddie discuss the latest in Donald Trump’s possible indictment. Plus! The Daily Beast’s Senior Media Reporter, Justin Baragona, joins the show along with Jade Magnus Ogunnaike, the Vice President of Corporate Power at Color of Change.

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MSNBC legal analyst Katie Phang joins the show and gives co-host Danielle Moodie insight into why Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s indictment against Trump for a Stormy Daniels case, and not Jan. 6, is the first one to catch up to him. She also shares why this indictment is the “beginning of the fall” and her prediction for what’s next, or in her words, the indictment that will really “break the dam.” Also on this episode, co-host Andy Levy predicts whether or not Trump will have a perp walk and surmises whether House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in love with Trump, or afraid of him. Plus! Jeff Sharlet, author of The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War, tells Andy what he learned while writing about the post-Trump world—like how right-wing grandmas have nasty things to say about Hillary Clinton—and why he doesn’t actually care about Trump like other Trump-era writers.

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The right and the left seemed to have gotten super worked up about the classified documents found in the private homes of both President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump, but NSA and surveillance writer Kerry Howley, also the author of Bottoms Up and the Devil Laughs: A Journey Through the Deep State, saw the findings differently. She joins Andy Levy on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to talk about what classified docs really mean—the bad and the-not-so-bad but still bad. Plus! She shares with Andy what whistleblowers like Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning have in common and shares the story of a whistleblower named “Reality Winner,” a woman not a horse, whose story will infuriate you. And, as always, Danielle Moodie and Andy listen and make fun of clips of “racist” and really dumb Republicans.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, MSNBC's Mehdi Hasan talk to us about this week’s viral moment surrounding conservative “woke” critic, Bethany Mandel. Plus, New York Times bestselling author and policy advocate Heather McGee talks about the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and how we got here.

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Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY), a congressman representing New York’s 10th district and former lead counsel during Trump impeachment hearings, spells out the link between Trump and the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank—and what frustrates him the most when it comes to the GOP attacks on Hunter Biden. Also on the podcast: Dan Primack, business editor at Axios, breaks down the Silicon Valley bank collapse from a logistical standpoint, including the biggest difference between this SVB situation and the 2008 bank bailout. Plus! Primark shares a Taylor Swift analogy that’ll help you understand what makes bank runs unavoidable.

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Just add Kimberly Guilfoyle to the long list of MAGA Republican grifters. Donald Trump Jr.’s fiance has a grift so bizarre that it’s funny, and hosts of The New Abnormal podcast, Danielle Moodie and Andy Levy, had the pleasure of listening to her pitch the gift in this new episode and they have a lot to say about it. Plus! Don Jr. makes an astronomically hypocritical comment and then, later, things get serious later in this episode when Danielle Campoamor, reporter for Today Parents, tells co-host Danielle how Texas anti-abortion laws are driving women close to death—literally.

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On this episode of The New Abnormal, Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America, Matt Gertz talks about Tucker Carlson and the latest leaks in the Dominion versus Fox News lawsuit. Plus, columnist Kurt Bardella talks about Kevin McCarthy’s role in all this drama.

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It might take a little while longer (it’s already taking a while), but, according to Daily Beast investigations reporter Jose Pagliery on this episode of The New Abnormal podcast, we may be moving closer to former President Trump being held accountable for inciting the Jan. 6 riots. He tells co-host Danielle Moodie why he thinks so along with an explanation of the civil suits against the former president that may also get him indicted. Plus! The Bulwark’s Tim Miller tells co-host Andy Levy what it was like to attend CPAC, in person, what he thought was the most “chilling” part of Trump’s “deranged” speech during the event, and theorizes the likely reason Ron DeSantis avoided Trump and CPAC altogether.

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Former President Jimmy Carter wasn’t the most bubbly member of the government, a bit “prickly,” says Jonathan Alter, author of His Very Best Jimmy Carter, a Life, on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal politics podcast. And while this I-do-what-I-want attitude didn’t make him the most loved at the time, it did allow him to follow his morals—and troll the hell out of white supremacists. Alter joins the show to tell TNA co-host Andy Levy this story along with more of Carter’s most under-appreciated accomplishments. Plus, Andy and co-host Danielle Moodie expose what they think is Ron DeSantis’ biggest kink.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik talks about Rupert Murdoch's recent deposition and the possible repercussions it could have for Fox News going forward. Plus, MSNBC’s Ayman Mohyeldin talks about the recent happenings in Tunisia.

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Fox News’ Tucker Carlson hinted at a new conspiracy theory to explain the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, and Andy Levy and Danielle Moodie, co-hosts of The New Abnormal politics podcast, poke as many holes in it as they can (and with humor to boot). Plus, Shay Khatiri, Senior Policy Analyst at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America, and Danielle debate whether the attacks on Nikki Haley’s name are valid based on Shay’s recent opinion piece for The Daily Beast “Stop Being a Jerk About Nikki Haley’s Name”—one of the first TNA debates. And Jennifer Wright, author of the book Madame Restell: The Life, Death, and Resurrection of Old New York’s Most Fabulous, Fearless, and Infamous Abortionist, tells Andy all about the badass woman from the 1800s who got rich—and infamous—helping women have abortions without killing them in the process.

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TNA hosts Danielle Moodie and Andy Levy listen to a clip of Sean Hannity interviewing with Marjorie Taylor Greene on this Sunday’s episode of the show and have questions. And not just because Greene says that our American forefathers would have wanted a “national divorce,” but because Hannity, a New Yorker, supports it. “Does Sean not realize that he lives and works in New York” asks Andy Levy. “All of Fox News would have to relocate….” The two dissect this clip, and others like it, in this episode, along with comments Trump made while visiting an East Palestine, Ohio McDonald’s that he knows the menu better than anyone. Plus! Writer Bryn Nelson, PhD, and author of Flush: The Remarkable Science of an Unlikely Treasure, explains the underrated source of future cancer cases in East Palestine, Ohio.

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 On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, Adam Frisch, who lost to Lauren Boebert in the 2022 midterms, explains how he will beat her next time. Plus, Balls and strikes editor Jay Willis talks about the Supreme Court's latest case.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, Mini Timmaraju, who is the president of  NARAL Pro-Choice America talks about a court case that has implications for the nation. Plus, The Lever’s Julia Rock gives us some less discussed details of the Ohio train derailment.

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The Daily Beast’s Will Sommer takes Andy Levy from The New Abnormal through how QAnon has managed to evolve from a fringe group to now being more popular than many major religions in the U.S.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, MSNBC legal analyst Glenn Kirschner talks about Trump's latest legal jeopardy. Plus, The Lever’s Julia Rock gives us some less discussed details of the Ohio train derailment.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, Daniel Lippman, a reporter at Politico, tells us all about the ‘CEO of Anti Woke Inc.’, who has his eyes on the presidency. Plus, Dr. Peter Hotez, co-director of the Texas Children's Hospital Center for Vaccine Development, talks to us about the triple threat of illness, anti-science, and anti-Semitism.

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Republicans on Capitol Hill last week were keen to score points against Democrats by pushing the narrative that the federal government was working with Twitter to censor a New York Post story about Hunter Biden’s laptop. Techdirt’s Mike Masnick tells Andy Levy why they conceded a spectacular own goal.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, CNN Analyst and New York Daily News columnist S. E. Cupp describes what she saw at the State of the Union. Plus! The Daily Beast Political Investigations reporter Jose Pagliery talks all of Trump’s latest legal jeopardies.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, David Rothkopf, CEO of the Rothkopf Group and the host of the podcast Deep State Radio talks Trump and Putin. Then, a look at China’s spy balloon and the ensuing hysteria with Spencer Ackerman.

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When former federal and state prosecutor Elie Honig says Donald Trump acts just like a mob boss, he’s not using hyperbole. Honig just released his new book Untouchable: How Powerful People Get Away With It and came out the show to talk to co-host Andy Levy all about it, including the one trick bosses use on those closely involved in their crimes that makes it “harder for those people to flip” and another tactic that has helped the former president avoid charges, at least it did back when Michael Cohen flipped. Plus! He and Andy also talk about the rule that has saved Trump from indictment “over and over” as well as the prosecutor who gave the Trump children, and Harvey Weinstein, a free pass.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, The Daily Beast politics editor Matt Fuller talks to us about what could bring down George Santos, then Judd Legum, who writes the Popular Information Newsletter, tells us what’s going on with Ron DeSantis in the schools.

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Donald Trump and his former Attorney General Bill Barr were, and still are, out for blood, literally. In this episode of The New Abnormal podcast Rolling Stone reporter Asawin “Swin” Suebsaeng talks with co-host Andy Levy about what a bloodlusty Bill Barr told him and his co-writer about his and Trump’s record-setting death row killing spree in his final months in office, and what we can expect from Trump on capital punishment should he become president again in 2024. Also on this episode: Khalil Gibran Muhammad, professor of history, race and public policy at Harvard Kennedy School and co-host of the Pushkin podcast Some of My Best Friends Are…, tells co-host Danielle Moodie the one thing that needs to happen to stop police brutality, and murder, happening once and for all, and it comes down to this group of people. For better or worse. Plus! Andy and Danielle share their thoughts on Fox News’ “disgusting” coverage of the Tyre Nichols murder and Danielle explains why the race of murderous cops really doesn’t matter.

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Can you imagine a Vice President Marjorie Taylor Greene? Hosts of The New Abnormal politics podcast Danielle Moodie and Andy Levy don’t want to, but they give it a shot on the latest episode of the show, addressing hearsay that the Republican may be vying for the position on a President Trump ticket. The two also react to a clip of MTG calling for President Biden’s impeachment over the mishandling of classified documents as well as a clip of Kentucky Republican Rep. James Comer and Fox News’ Sean Hannity totally re-writing the history of Trump’s quid pro quo with Ukraine. Then, The Nation’s Elie Mystal tells Danielle two big reasons that Merrick Garland is a failure, one of which being timing.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, Gloria Pan, the Senior Vice President at Mom's Rising, talks about the recent mass shootings and what comes next. Then Radley Balko, an expert on police militarization in America, talks about the danger of no knock warrants.

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The New Abnormal co-host Danielle Moodie laughed and then cried when she heard about Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy putting Rep. George Santos on the Science Committee. But Andy has a theory for why that happened in the first place. Somehow Mean Girls is mentioned. Also on this episode: Daily Beast politics reporter and Fever Dreams podcast host Will Sommer joins to talk about the latest weird yet highly entertaining infighting going on between conservatives and this time it involves right wing child actor Steven Crowder’s war on The Daily Wire—and the latest on what Silk is saying about Diamond’s cause of death. Plus! Entertainment Critic Nick Schager also joins the show to talk about the new documentary “Justice” which debuted last-minute at the Sundance Film Festival and is about the sexual assault allegations against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. According to Schager, there is one big bombshell to come out of the film involving a witness to one of Kavanaugh’s alleged assaults on a female peer.

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In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, hosts Andy Levy and Danielle Moodie take jabs at Kyrsten Sinema and Ron DeSantis this week after listening to pretty infuriating clips of them talking. Plus! Daily Beast correspondent Anna Nemstova, who reported on Miss Ukraine’s harrowing experience while competing in the Miss Universe pageant, gives Danielle a behind-the-scenes look at what Miss Ukraine experienced during the contest, including a “shocking” interaction with Miss Russia.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, Robert Zimmerman, who lost in the general election to George Santos, describes exactly what happened. Then, Frederick Ingram, secretary-treasurer of the American Federation of Teachers, talks about why Rhon DeSantis is trying to get African studies out of AP classes. Then, Frederick Ingram, secretary-treasurer of the American Federation of Teachers, the nation's second-largest teachers' union, discusses Florida’s ban on an AP African American Studies class.

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Pretty much everyone begged Pete Buttigieg to alleviate airline issues and better regulate the airlines like Southwest. He didn’t. David Sirota, founder and editor-in-chief of The Lever news site, joins this episode of The New Abnormal to share his take on the Department of Transportation Secretary’s inaction, everything he could have done to stop the chaos, and all of the ways he could regulate airlines like Southwest if he wanted to. Also in this episode! Jared Yates Sexton, co-host of the Muckrake podcast and author of The Midnight Kingdom: A History of Power Paranoia and The Coming Crisis, joins the podcast to break down how the right became so powerful, and why we need to get angrier about so-called “normal” Kevin McCarthy and Ron DeSantis—or else. 

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Abraham Riesman, author of Ringmaster: Vince McMahon and the Unmaking of America, finds it totally bonkers that reinstated WWE board member Vince McMahon is so well connected that his business was arguably a national security risk, yet here we are. In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, Riesman walks show co-host, and wrestling newbie, Andy Levy, through some historical context for WWE and McMahon, along with a look back at his relationship with Trump, his own daughter Stephanie, and what can be said regarding a potential deal to sell the business to Saudi Arabia. Plus! Andy and co-host Danielle Moodie listen to clips of more Republicans and right-wingers talking themselves in circles, including Tucker Carlson on his favorite topic: sexy M&Ms. And this time, one might be a (*whispers*) lesbian.

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As 91-year-old Fox News mogul Rupert Murdoch carves his final deals before heading to the big newsroom in the sky, the world’s focus is beginning to turn to his son and heir apparent, Lachlan. And according to The Daily Beast’s Editor At Large Lachlan Cartwright, there’s more to Murdoch junior than meets the eye. He explains on this week’s episode of The New Abnormal: “It's important to note that Lachlan’s politics are far more conservative than his father’s.” Then, Dr. Peter Hotez, co-director of Texas Children's Hospital Center for Vaccine Development and Dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, tells podcast co-host Andy Levy his worries about the future of the House GOP and its “anti-science aggression” while “trying to create a witch hunt—not only against science, but against the scientists.”

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Despite Jair Bolsonaro https://www.thedailybeast.com/jair-bolsonaro-flees-brazil-to-hide-out-in-home-of-mma-fighter-in-florida, the former Brazilian president is not there on vacation or to protest his election loss to the country’s new President Luiz Inácio Lula de Silva, says Ruth Ben-Ghiat, author of Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present. Ruth joined this episode of The New Abnormal podcast to talk to show co-host Danielle Moodie about the Brazilian insurrection, what makes people choose fascism instead of a healthy democracy, and why she is sure Bolsonaro’s trip to the States is nothing but a ploy to avoid legal consequences. Plus! Co-host Andy Levy is back and chats with journalist Jeb Lund, who tells him all about his alma mater New College of Florida and all the ways Gov. Ron DeSantis is trying to “destroy” it.

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The more Daily Beast politics reporter Roger Sollenberger uncovers about “liar” George Santos—the latest being that his employed sister Tiffany Santos is being evicted from her Queens apartment that Santos recently moved into—the more questions he has. Sollenberger joined The New Abnormal co-host Danielle Moodie on this bonus episode of the show to talk about everything he knows so far about Santos and all the things that don’t add up, including his and Tiffany’s sketchy living situation—and why he is calling this saga surrounding the Congressman “an endless story.”

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Kevin McCarthy is being held hostage. Sorta. Kurt Bardella, a Los Angeles Times columnist and former House Oversights Committee staffer on the Republican side, joins this episode of TNA to chat with Danielle Moodie all about the GOP Speaker of the House shit show happening right now, starting with a big question from Danielle: How the hell did we get here? Bardella has some ideas, including very colorful language to describe the “bunch of ass clowns” leading this charge. Plus, Rep. Mondaire Jones also joins the pod to discuss the so-called “Never Kevin-ers” like Matt Gaetz and Lauren Boebert—and the real reason he thinks that Republicans are embarrassed by George Santos.

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This week, The New Abnormal is joined by Mary Trump, the author and podcast host who, yes, also happens to be a family member of the twice-impeached ex-commander-in-chief. She’s been sounding the alarm on the dangers of Donald Trump’s actions for years now—and cautions close watchers of the former president’s legal troubles to not get ahead of themselves when it comes to the cases currently brewing. “Although there is some sense of poetic justice that we seem to have reached, you could call it a tipping point—and I said this a long time ago—it's going to be, and I mean this figuratively of course, death by a thousand lashes,’ Mary Trump said. “So even though it looks bad on paper and isn't really having much of an impact—well, I'm sure it's having a lot of an impact on his mood—but it's not having any impact on his ability to roam free in the world.”

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There are so many examples of revisionist history happening these days, particularly among conservatives, that historian and University of Princeton professor Kevin M. Kruse joins this episode of The New Abnormal politics podcast to set the record straight. He tells co-host Andy Levy about his book Myth America: Historians Take On the Biggest Legends and Lies About Our Past, which is a complication of historians crushing those myths, and shares proof that contrary to Republicans’ denials, the party actively engages in the racist “Southern Strategy.” Plus, Nixon’s role in it all. Also in this episode: TNA co-host Danielle Moodie interviews Jim Freeman, a civil rights lawyer and author of the book, Rich Thanks to Racism: How the Ultra-Wealthy Profit from Racial Injustice, to talk about the Defund the Police movement and the role police unions are playing in stopping it from happening.

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Should Supreme Court justices hang out with extremely partisan figures? Such as a holiday party for instance? That’s what The New Abnormal political podcast host Andy Levy and Jay Willis, Editor-in-Chief of Balls & Strikes, explore after Andy heard “noise” that Justice Kavanaugh attending a Christmas party thrown by big conservative operatives Matt and Mercedes Schlapp. Willis also explains to Andy if there’s something that can be done to stop this behavior, if there should be, and whether or not Justice Amy Coney Barrett is going to forever vote as awfully as the left thinks she will. Plus, TNA Co-host Danielle Moodie interviews Dahlia Lithwick, senior editor at Slate and author of Lady Justice: Women, the Law, and the Battle to Save America, who speaks to Democrats’ biggest blind spot when it comes to white women and abortion.

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Conservatives get angry over the darnedest things. From Lizzo playing a Founding Father’s flute to a gay PDA in a Disney movie, 2022 was a year full of right-wing outrage that was so dumb, The New Abnormal politics podcast host Andy Levy and Media Matters’ deputy director of Rapid Response Andrew Lawrence decided to round up the most “offensive” instances in the show’s latest episode. Plus! TNA co-host Danielle Moodie interviews Treva Lindsey, professor at The Ohio State University and author of America, Goddamn: Violence, Black Women, And The Struggle For Justice, to talk about just that, and Brittney Griner specifically: “Obviously she is worth something and worth so much more than even one arms dealer for these individuals…”

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If you’re an avid listener of The New Abnormal, you might have heard co-host Andy Levy ask his comedian guests a question: What do you think of when you hear the term “cancel culture?” Turns out, they all had a lot to say on the subject and as our holiday gift to you, we compiled all of their answers in this bonus episode. Patton Oswalt talks about political violence, Conan sidekick Andy Richter shares why he loves cancel culture, and Modern Family’s Danny Zuker puts Dave Chappelle on blast. Plus! Dr. Mustafa Santiago Ali from the National Wildlife Fund joins show co-host Danielle Moodie at the end of the show to talk about how the climate crisis is impacting communities of color, and by impacting we mean killing, and the one thing that can be done to solve it all.

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Welcome to a special year-end crossover episode between The Daily Beast’s The New Abnormal and The Last Laugh. On this show: Elon Musk is being greeted by crowds with a chorus of boos, and Dave Chappelle seems to have overstayed his welcome. Plus, the latest on Marjorie Taylor Greene and her onetime friend Lauren Boebert ‘s beef.

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There were two moments that stood out to The New Abnormal host Andy Levy the most while watching the last Jan. 6 committee hearing on December 19, which made four scathing criminal referrals against former President Donald Trump for his alleged involvement in what happened that day. He and co-host Danielle Moodie also discuss other evidence presented during the hearings, the smartest thing the Jan. 6 committee ever did (Shonda Rhimes is brought up in this part of the conversation), and Merrick Garland. Also on this episode: Techdirt founder and CEO of The Copia Institute Mike Masnick tries to answer Andy Levy’s burning Elon Musk questions, such as whether or not the Twitter CEO will step down after a “very scientific” poll on the platform. Last, Brooking Institute’s Angela Stent, author of Putin’s World: Russia Against the West and with the Rest, breaks down the weird infatuation Trump’s Republicans have with Russia, why she thinks former marine Paul Whelan is still in Russian custody and the ways the country was mocking the U.S. for the Brittney Griner trade.

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Josh Bivens, director of research at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), joined as a guest on the latest episode of political podcast, The New Abnormal, to give us an answer to the question that is on a lot of people’s minds: Is a recession on the horizon? There’s good news and not-so-good news. Bivens also explains to TNA co-host Danielle Moodie how we got to this point in the first place and why the American worker is the usual scapegoat for when the economy is turning south. Also in this episode: Danielle and co-host Andy Levy talk about Republicans’ obsession with drag queens, the latest obsessor being Kellyanne Conway. Plus, they name who they think is the most “all-right” Trump kid, if such a kid existed in this family.

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The investigative reporter sifting through the unbelievable treasure trove of texts that the January 6th committee obtained from former White House chief of staff Mark Meadow’s phone has detailed what he found inside the 2,319 messages. “There’s just a ton of different people in there,” Hunter Walker, reporter for Talking Points Memo, told host Andy Levy on this week’s episode of political podcast, The New Abnormal. Next up on the podcast, Layshia Clarendon, who is the first openly non-binary player in the WNBA, describes what was going through her mind when she heard that Brittney Griner (BG) was arrested in Russia and taken into custody. “It was like the ground underneath me just fell,” Clarendon tells podcast co-host Danielle Moodie.

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Kyrsten Sinema is no stranger to burning bridges. She’s in the process of doing just that with her former Democratic colleagues now that she officially switched her party to Independent, and according to David Shapira, a former Arizona politician and ex-friend to Sinema, she burned a bridge with him, too. Shapira wrote a now-viral Twitter thread about the ordeal but came on this episode of The New Abnormal to break down exactly what happened—and the half-assed apology she allegedly gave him after—as well as some reasons he believes his “calculated” former pal cares more about “notoriety” than her role as a servant of the public. Also Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Spencer Ackerman, and author of the Forever Wars newsletter, joins the pod to share what he thinks will happen with the Yemen-Saudi ceasefire resolution Bernie Sanders recently proposed, which calls for the United States to stop the residual aid that it’s giving to Saudi Arabia. Plus! Danielle and Andy make an extremely strong case for why Marjorie Taylor Greene needs a mute button after her latest comments on trans kids and Jan. 6, and ponder the idea of Kevin McCarthy retiring. Hey, co-hosts can dream!

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Laura Ingraham is mad. The Fox News host is mad about shadow banning and, in a recent news clip, she disclosed she’s mad about Herschel Walker’s loss and mad at everyone involved but Walker himself. In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal podcast, co-hosts Andy Levy and Danielle Moodie hilariously break down (read: tear apart) her grievances (along with other wild GOP arguments made by conservative darlings John Kennedy and Tucker Carlson). MSNBC columnist and law journalist Chris Geidner also joins this episode to walk Andy through a few important Supreme Court cases, including the one involving a wedding website creator who wants the right to refuse same-sex couples her services. There’s two big problems with her argument from the get-go, says Geidner. 

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Ron DeSantis’ war on public education is going national. At least that’s the fear of Jennifer Jenkins, a member of the Brevard County School Board, one of several Florida school boards that have undergone a rightward shift. The county’s highly accomplished superintendent, Mark Mullins, was essentially pushed out this month after candidates backed by the conservative group Moms for Liberty won election. Also in his episode, Daniel Nichanian, editor-in-chief of Bolts magazine, which focuses on local government and local elections, reveals just how good this past election was for Democrats. And co-host Danielle Moodie breaks down Sen. Raphael Warnock’s victory over scandal-scarred Herschel Walker in the Georgia Senate election. You can listen for yourself, but let’s just say she thinks “the force” was with him.

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Kanye West’s 2024 presidential campaign is extremely unofficial (he hasn’t even filed to run, New Abnormal podcast co-host Danielle Moodie reminds listeners on this episode), but that hasn’t stopped right-wingers from clamoring to be part of his team, and it’s a shit show. Daily Beast reporter Zach Petrizzo, who exclusively reported that right-wing figure Milo Yiannopoulos left Ye’s campaign after infighting, joined the show to tell Danielle all about the drama. Also in this episode: Daily Beast senior editor Andrew Kirell (a former Fox News staffer many lifetimes ago) chats with TNA co-host and fellow former Fox News staffer Andy Levy about how the right-wing media is handling anti-semitic Kanye, including which figures are changing their tune on the rapper. Plus! Danielle and Andy discuss an obvious truth: Conservatives really want to see Hunter Biden’s dick pics.

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 Six years ago Brandon Wolf made a promise after his best friend was shot dead. He tells The New Abnormal’s Danielle Moodie how we can all make that promise a reality

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A group of senators with unlimited sick leave voted down a measure on Thursday which would have given rail workers just seven paid days of sick leave—, a fair rise considering where they currently stand: at zero. It’s a “horrific” decision, according to host Andy Levy on this week’s episode of political podcast, The New Abnormal. “My feeling is this is not a win,” said podcast co-host Danielle Moodie. “I don’t know who this is a win for. We all just went through the heights of a global health pandemic. People lost their jobs, people needed to take off because guess what? We needed to quarantine. So the fact that even after going through this for over three years, that members of Congress could vote to deny people access to sick days, it’s draconian, it’s disgusting.” Also on the podcast, Latosha Brown, co-founder of Black Voters Matter and is founder of Southern Black Girls Consortium tells Moodie about the Georgia runoff race as it finally nears an end. Then, Daily Beast political reporter, Roger Sollenberger, talks to Levy about his story surrounding Republican megadonors Dick and Elizabeth Uihlein.

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Stave Bannon calling out Donald Trump for hosting white nationalist Nick Fuentes at Mar-a-Lago reads as jealousy, according to host Andy Levy on this week’s episode of The New Abnormal. Podcast co-host Danielle Moddy also can’t believe she’s agreeing with Bannon: “Do these people not do any type of Google search on who the fuck is coming into Mar-a-Lago? Is there no background check? Also on the podcast, Jared Holt, senior research manager on U.S. Hate and Extremism for the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, who has a newsletter and podcast called Posting Through It, explains Trump’s intentions for not condemning Fuentes after the meeting. Then, Sarah Kendzior, author of They Knew: How a Culture of Conspiracy Keeps America Complacent and co-host of the podcast, Gaslit Nation, says Elon Musk’s motives for changing Twitter are part of a bigger strategy: control and “possibly the destruction of the public sphere.”

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In today's episode we get to know hosts Danielle Moodie & Andy Levy a bit better by hearing about some of their first political memories and some of their favorite things.

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Attention political history buffs: This episode of The New Abnormal podcast takes us back in time, to the ’50s and ’60s to be exact, as Beverly Gage, author of “G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century,” tells co-host Andy Levy all about the background of the first-ever FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. Andy learns that racist Hoover, infamous for going after Martin Luther King Jr. and committing multiple abuses of power across the board, particularly under the protection of the surveillance program COINTELPRO, didn’t like the Klan and had an interesting relationship with former President Richard Nixon. Author Kal Raustiala also joins the show to tell Andy about his book “The Absolutely Indispensable Man: Ralph Bunche, the United Nations, and the Fight to End Empire” and everything we didn’t know about the famous Black United Nations mediator—including the fact that Nixon told him his son was going to be drafted, and the reason he didn’t stop it from happening.

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Merrick Garland is wasting our time. That’s the sentiment of New Abnormal co-host Andy Levy and the show’s brand new permanent co-host, Danielle Moodie. This is Danielle’s first show as official host and she wasted absolutely no time going in on Republicans, Trump, and even Merrick Garland. The two also talk about Garland’s new appointment and their frustrations with the lack of action on gun control on the heels of another shooting, this time against more LGBTQ people in Colorado. Then Maxwell Frost, who will be the first Gen Z member of Congress, joined the podcast and shares his “morbid” but real take on gun violence in this country, what almost made his quit his campaign, and how he truly feels about his state’s governor “dictator” Ron DeSantis. Plus! Ryan Cooper, the managing editor of the American Prospect, tells Andy why Trump running for president again is the “worst case scenario” for Republicans.

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In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal podcast, co-host Andy Levy talks to Modern Family producer Danny Zucker, who weighs in on the Dave Chapelle SNL monologue that used the same anti-semitic tropes as Kanye West. They also discuss the time that he harassed Donald Trump on Twitter, why he wants to “rage” at Dems, and why the writer’s made Luke’s character “weirdly libertarian.” Plus! A touching story about how the show made a conservative dad less of a bigot.

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Donald Trump’s 2024 announcement may have felt like a flop, but dig deeper and you’ll find the most interesting part. Jose Pagliery, political investigations reporter at The Daily Beast, tells The New Abnormal host Andy Levy that there is no way to look at this announcement “as anything other than an attempt to mar any prosecution as a political persecution of him.” It “could be viewed as him trying to seek further cover so that if he does get indicted for one of the many things that he’s being investigated for right now, he could just say, ‘oh, look at this, they just indicted me because I announced, they were just trying to stop me from winning for you in 2024.’” Speaking of Trump, also on the podcast, former Missouri Secretary of State and the host of the podcast Majority 54, Jason Kander, explains that Trump could be his worst enemy, becoming overexposed in American culture. Also on the podcast, Kat Abughazaleh, who covers Tucker Carlson for Media Matters for America, describes how Carlson has been relatively quiet since Trump’s announcement.

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No one really likes New York State Democratic Party Chair Jay Jacobs, Lindsey Boylan tells host Andy Levy on this episode of The New Abnormal podcast. Boylan was one of the first people to publicly accuse former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment. Now, she feels equally emboldened to call out Jacobs, a remnant of the Cuomo administration, first on TikTok, and now to Andy. According to Boylan, Jacobs is to blame for solidly Democratic parts of New York turning red. Mainly because of his hatred for progressives. Plus! Andy chats midterm fallout with columnist Jeb Lund and both clock all of the lies, sad and hilarious, that Elon Musk has Tweeted (and deleted) on the app. And David Weigel, who covers politics at news site Semafor, explains how Fox News essentially screwed over midterm Republicans and the LGBTQ issue Republicans won’t touch these days.

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Actor and comedian Andy Richter’s take on cancel culture can be summed up in three words: Bring it on. On this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, he tells host Andy Levy why “it’s about time” cancel culture is a thing and shares experiences of seeing it play out in real life. The two Andys also discuss why Richter didn’t vote for Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders, if he regrets that decision now, and why he’s O.K. being referred to as Conan O’Brien’s “sidekick.” Plus! His affection for the Twitter porn bots that spam his account.

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If former President Donald Trump were to go against popular Florida Governor Ron DeSantis today in the race for 2024, Trump would still knock DeSantis out despite the far-right Gov.’s rise in popularity in important states over the last year. That’s according to CNN political commentator and New York Daily News columnist S.E. Cupp, who joins host Andy Levy on this week’s episode of political podcast, The New Abnormal. Elsewhere on this-post election-themed podcast, guest host Sam Brodey, the Daily Beast’s congressional correspondent, reflects on how we underestimated what Democrats were working with regarding what really resonated with voters. Elsewhere on this-post election-themed podcast, guest host Sam Brodey, the Daily Beast’s congressional correspondent, reflects on how we underestimated what Democrats were working with regarding what really resonated with voters. Ari Berman, Mother Jones National Voting Rights correspondent and author of Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America, echoes those thoughts, reminding us that “this was the first time in US history that a constitutional right had been given and taken away.”

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Daily Beast columnist David Rothkopf interviewed over 100 people involved with the Trump White House for his book American Resistance: The Inside Story of How The Deep State Saved the Nation, and according to his sources, it took almost no time for Trump’s staffers to realize what kind of boss he was. He tells New Abnormal host Andy Levy about the ways these staffers had to adapt to Trump’s ineptness as well as obliterating the argument that Republicans are better for the economy (spoiler alert: they’re not and he has proof.) Also on this episode, Defector Media co-owner David Roth joins Andy as co-host and compares Elon Musk (aka Twitter’s new obliterator, er, owner) to a substitute teacher who has lost control of his class and Michael Edison Hayden, investigative reporter at spokesman at the Southern Poverty Law Center, gives the inside scoop on the “hard-right, neo-fascist” billionaire takeover of the publication Newsweek.

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Patton Oswalt has a sneaking suspicion that things are going to get ugly in America and people, like Republicans for example, are pretending otherwise. On this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, he tells host Andy Levy where these feelings are coming from and how he really feels about the comedians crying cancel culture, including that they’re “failed open mic-ers.” Plus! Oswalt unpacks the one issue that he thinks scare Evangelical conservatives the most and gives us a peak inside the life of his middle school-aged child.

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President Biden’s Wednesday speech at Union Station in D.C. where he warned of the perils facing US democracy ahead of next week’s Midterms just wasn’t forceful enough, according to host Andy Levy on this week’s episode of political podcast, The New Abnormal. In his speech, Biden made reference to the hammer attack on Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul last week, warning the country faces escalating threats of political violence. He also criticized ​​Donald Trump over the former president’s refusal “to accept the results of the 2020 election.” But it wasn’t enough, according to Levy and guest host Josie Duffy Rice, who writes about prisons and prosecution at The Unnamed. Also on the podcast, Mike Isaac, a technology correspondent for The New York Times discusses whether Twitter can survive under Elon Musk’s ownership. Then, Matt Gertz, a senior fellow at Media Matters, discusses how Republicans twisted the story of Paul Pelosi’s hammer attack from a crime story to a national conspiracy; that the violent assault was the result of some sort of gay lover’s spat or falling out. 

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The Young Turks’ Cenk Uygur can’t stand Republicans and can’t stand Democrats. So who can he possibly see as a viable progressive presidential option for 2024? asks host Andy Levy in this episode of The New Abnormal podcast. Uygur’s top pick: Jon Stewart. The two chat what that would look like, then Vox’s senior politics correspondent Andrew Prokop shares everything we need to know about far right political blogger Curtis Yarvin. The guy not only wants to replace American democracy with a monarchy, but also has ideas on how to make Jan. 6 better “next time.” Plus! Andy and guest co-host Beast opinion editor Anthony Fisher review the biggest political news of the week: the attack on Paul Pelosi and Don Jr’s “gross” response to it.

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Comedian and On Cinema actor Tim Heidecker wants to make one thing clear: He does not want Joe Rogan canceled. But that doesn’t stop Heidecker from airing his displeasure with the podcaster and his show, which he does without pause on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal. Plus! He and host Andy Levy talk about the event that made Heidecker even more socialist (Betsy DeVos is involved) and what he thinks about the Kanye West elephant in the room: “You can be mentally ill and an idiot, too, right? You can have both of those things going on.”

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Donald Trump will not run for president in 2024, according to his former fixer. Michael Cohen tells host Andy Levy on this week’s episode of The New Abnormal that while Trump’s popularity has plummeted since 2016 and he can’t risk the idea of losing, there are also serious financial implications that could stop Trump from his return to the White House. Also on the podcast, Kali Holloway, a columnist at The Daily Beast and the Nation, who guest hosts with Levy, says that part of the reason why Herschel Walker was hand-picked to run in Georgia by the Republican Party was because “they wanted a Black candidate to run against Warnock. Then, Judd Legum, a journalist who founded and writes an independent newsletter dedicated to accountability journalism, Popular Information, discusses a recent article surrounding Amazon and its statement days after the Jan. 6 Capitol riots where it claimed the company would no longer give money to any member of Congress who had voted to overturn the election.

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There’s GOP in-fighting among Trumpy Republicans when it comes to future House leadership positioning and Fox News host Tucker Carlson made it a whole lot worse. What is going on? New Abnormal podcast co-host Andy Levy and Daily Beast politics editor and guest host Matt Fuller try to figure it out and answer the questions they have about it, in the latest episode. Plus! Dr. Peter Hotez, co-director of Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development, warns Andy about the holiday COVID wave that’s coming and the scary twist that will make it unlike past waves. And Daily Beast politics reporter Will Sommer, also co-host of the podcast Fever Dreams about the shenanigans of the far right, joins to tell Andy all about the racist, sexist alt-right homophobe who raised $1 million for an alt-right superhero movie and promptly lost it in the most hilariously dumb way.

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The excuses that the oppressive Islamic regime has given to explain the violence (and deaths) against protesters—sparked by the death of 22-year-old woman Mahsa Amini in morality police custody—are so “appalling” that it’s “laughable,” says British-Iranian-American journalist Caroline Modarressy-Tehrani. In this week’s bonus episode, host Andy Levy interviews Modarressy-Tehrani on what’s happening with the protests in Iran, including the violence from the Islamic regime and resistence from citizens who are fighting back, especially among Gen Z. Plus! She shares what Iranians actually want from the United States (hint: not intervention.) 

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Marjorie Taylor Greene “came out of nowhere” to become one of the Republican Party’s most influential powerhouses, journalist and author Robert Draper, who writes for the New York Times Magazine, tells host Andy Levy in this week’s episode of The New Abnormal. “Republicans kind of wanted to kick her to the curb immediately,” Draper, author of the new book Weapons of Mass Delusion: When the Republican Party Lost its Mind, said. Then, professor at the University of Florida Michael McDonald, who specializes in American elections and is the author of a new book, From Pandemic to Insurrection: Voting in the 2020 US Presidential Election, says Trump’s refusal to accept that he lost the 2020 election has dramatically altered American politics. Also on the podcast, guest co-host Maura Quint, Tax March co-founder and member of Americans for Tax Fairness, reveals what America could learn from Liz Truss.

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Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s hateful rhetoric isn’t a joke; she wants to start a war, proclaims podcaster Danielle Moodie on the latest episode of The New abnormal podcast. Moodie, who joined the show again as guest co-host alongside host Andy Levy, tore into Greene after she and Andy listened to a recent clip of the Republican Congresswoman making Democrats out to be child predators. Also on this episode: The Intercept investigative reporter Ken Klippenstein explains where the United States currently stands with the Trump and Putin-friendly Saudis and the Crown Prince, including that they’re gearing up to screw President Joe Biden over, big time. And for good measure, Klippenstein shares all the ways we could fuck over the Saudi Crown Prince without war, if we wanted to. Plus! Daily Beast media editor and editor of the media newsletter Confider, Andrew Kirell, joins to give Andy the inside scoop on how Fox News is handling the deranged Kayne West clips that were cut from his segment on Tucker Carlson’s show and then subsequently leaked. Kirell thinks he has an idea of who the leaker could be and him and Andy talk theories.

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Comedian Andy Kindler has very strong opinions on cancel culture, specifically regarding Louis C.K.’s so-called “cancellation” and comeback after sexual misconduct allegations. Lucky for New Abnormal podcast listeners, the “Bobs Burgers” and “Everybody Loves Raymond” actor decided to share all of them with host Andy Levy on this bonus episode.

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The odds of Donald Trump actually showing up to testify under oath at the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attacks are not great, according to Andy Levy on this week’s episode of political podcast The New Abnormal. “Less than zero,” says cohost Kali Holloway, a columnist at The Daily Beast and The Nation. “I think that the panel’s probably aware that he’s not gonna show up, but I think this is the kind of thing that they have to do just to sort of, for lack of a better phrase, show they mean business.” Matt Fuller, senior politics editor at The Daily Beast echoes concerns Trump won’t show up.“He probably won’t do anything with [the subpoena], and I can’t imagine he’s going to sit down for the January 6th committee,” he said. “It could be a court fight, but more likely than not, it’ll just be a nothing burger.” Also on the podcast, Justin Baragona, media reporter at The Daily Beast, reveals how Fox News management and Tucker Carlson are very interested in finding out who leaked the deleted Kanye West interview footage to Vice. “They definitely want to know who it is and, and there will be repercussions, is what I would assume,” Baragona said.

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Amie Parnes, senior correspondent for The Hill newspaper, covering the Biden White House and national politics, joined The New Abnormal podcast to talk with host Andy Levy through the list of Democratic contenders who could become the next Bernie Sanders—why they would or wouldn’t be fit for the job, and why New York Congresswoman AOC made the list, with a grain of salt. We're also joined by freelance journalist, Eve Peyser who weighs in on the latest with Ye & Donald Trump's poor decision-making. Then, filmmaker Andy Ostroy, who hosts the podcast The Back Room, joins the pod and plays a little game of Sophie’s Choice with Andy Levy: Would people rather see Trump in jail for the rest of his life or see Fox News shut down forever? Plus, he shares what it felt like to interview the killer of his deceased wife, actress Adrienne Shelly, who was murdered in her apartment in 2006, as well as his take on said killer being an undocumented immigrant. It’s not what you expect.

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Writer and trans activist Parker Molloy joins host Andy Levy on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal pod to talk about Tucker Carlson’s awful obsession with making trans people look absolutely batshit—and the serious implications of that which are already happening around us. Plus! Molloy and Andy discuss the GOP’s hypocrisy when it comes to anti-trans legislation, why the right’s outrage with pronouns is “fake,” and the latest in the Elon Musk Twitter saga.

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The Daily Beast reporter who broke the story of Herschel Walker paying for a girlfriend’s abortion has provided behind-the-scenes details and thoughts on the case. Politics reporter Roger Sollenberger pointed to the key detail in the cobweb of Walker stories to host Andy Levy on this week’s episode of political podcast The New Abnormal: the woman behind the allegations. Speaking of the potential political ramifications for Walker, guest podcast host Josie Duffy Rice, who writes about prisons and prosecution at The Unnamed, told Levy that while the abortion bombshell could swing the vote, it is unlikely to make Republicans switch. Then, Mark Joseph Stern, senior writer at Slate Magazine who covers court and law, describes how the Supreme Court is blowing up Law School too. “The court has become, in many ways, corrupted by the political process and so just delivers these decisions that fall perfectly in line with the platform,” he says.

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Trump can hold a grudge, Daily Beast reporter Corbin Bolies tells Andy Levy on this episode of The New Abnormal podcast, and he’s not wrong. “Donald Trump knows how to hold a grudge and he will, and we've seen that continue throughout the last year and a half, because Donald Trump has consistently attacked Mitch McConnell,” Bolies says, discussing the most recent verbal harassment levied at the former Majority Leader’s wife, Elaine Chao, in the form of blatantly racist name-calling on his Truth Social platform. Also on this episode: Hannah Gais, a senior research analyst at the Southern Poverty Law Center, joins this episode to co-host with Andy, touching upon the intense violent threats against Dems and Marjorie Taylor Green’s try-hard effort to get Republicans to think the threats are for them. Plus! Daily Beast far-right reporter and Fever Dreams podcast co-host Kelly Weill breaks down a huge schism happening within the libertarian party, including how the old Libertarians totally over these new Libertarians’ toxicity. Like, beyond Trumpy toxic.

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HuffPost reporter Andy Campbell and author of the brand new book on the group called We Are Proud Boys joins New Abnormal host Andy Levy for a riveting interview about what the far-right group is up to these days after many members have been charged with sedition for Jan. 6, how Trump and GOP officials came to know about the group, and back them, and what we have to fear about these guys the most. Plus! In this episode, actor Paul F. Tompkins explains why he stays away from politics in comedy and that the MAGA-aligned actors who complain about being blackmailed aren’t being shut out, they just suck.

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Is Tucker Carlson really a true believer in the MAGA world? Has he taken a dive too deep in the Republican rabbit hole? Or is this all just a performance for the ratings? For the money? For the clout? It’s a vexing question, according to host Andy Levy on this week’s episode of political podcast The New Abnormal. “We’ve had many conversations about the performative aspect of this and trying to figure out who we think are true believers,” Levy says to guest, the author and CNN political commentator S.E. Cupp. Also on the podcast, Levy talks to guest podcast host Maura Quint, co-founder of Tax March and the campaign director for Americans for Tax Fairness, about a recent Gallup poll finding that trust in the Supreme Court is at a record low. Then Levy tells Daily Beast politics reporter Zachary Petrizzo that the only surprising part of that New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman’s new Trump book was that Trump aides were apparently taken aback by his crude, transphobic behavior.

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It’s a new era for The New Abnormal! But things are still pretty abnormal. Co-host Andy Levy is back with guest co-host Danielle Moodie, co-host the Democrayish podcast, to hilariously unpack the last few days’ worth of politics news, including the “terrifying” and fascist woman who won Italy’s election and what that means for us here in the United States. Hint: Nothing good. Also, their joint hope that New York AG Leticia James will finally be able to “burst” Trump’s billionaire bubble. Then! Mississippi Today reporter Anna Wolfe breaks down for Andy the Brett Favre Mississippi welfare scheme, in which Favre and other state officials are accused of funneling $77 million worth of welfare funds to their own personal projects—none of which had anything to do with where the funds needed to go. But a former WWE wrestler is now getting in the mix with major allegations that Wolfe shares with Andy. Plus, Daily Beast reporter Jake Lahut, who focuses on Republican campaigns, joins to talk what he’s seeing in the field, and the time he cornered J.D. Vance with a question about abortion.

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Jan. 6 may not be the last time people get violent over an election. Election experts CBS Chief Washington Correspondent Major Garrett and David Becker, co-authors of the new book The Big Truth: Upholding Democracy and the Age of the Big Lie, came on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to share their biggest fear when it comes to the upcoming midterm elections: political violence. They also share what poll workers have been dealing with since 2020—spoiler alert: a whole lot—and what, if anything, we can do about it. Plus! Hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast mark Molly’s last ever TNA episode as host with a round of Tucker Carlson and Trump clips.

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 New Abnormal hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy reveal who is really taking on Trump and talk to politics reporter Asawin Suebsaeng for the scoop on Dr. Oz’s latest fight. Despite continued allegations of fraud and obstruction of justice claims against Donald Trump, somehow, there are still only two people continuing to call the former president out—and neither on is a man. Also on the podcast, Matt Fuller, senior politics editor at The Daily Beast, explains how Democrats have something to push voters to the polls: abortion. “That’s the big animating factor for Democrats,” Fuller says. 

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MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell was going through a Hardee’s drive-thru after ordering a burger and chocolate shake when he was approached by the FBI. That’s according to Daily Beast politics reporter Zachary Petrizzo, who has more details of the FBI’s seizure of Lindell’s phone while he was at a Hardee’s restaurant last week. “I had heard from Mike that he ended up ordering a Swiss burger with a chocolate shake,” Petrizzo tells hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy on this episode of political podcast The New Abnormal. Also on the podcast, Iuliia Mendel, former press secretary to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and author of the new book The Fight of Our Lives, discusses what it was like meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin for the first time.

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In the ‘80s Justine Bateman was one of TVs most recognizable faces thanks to her role on Family Ties. Now, she tells The New Abnormal’s Molly Jong-Fast how online chatter about her looks left her reeling.

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As his legal woes pile up, it’s no secret that former President Donald Trump has employed more than a handful of lawyers in his time. David Enrich, a business investigations editor at The New York Times and author of the new book, Servants of the Damned: Giant Law Firms, Donald Trump, and the Corruption of Justice, tells hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy on this episode of The New Abnormal that it’s certainly a pattern. Also on the podcast, G. Elliot Morris, data-driven journalist and author of the book, Strength in Numbers: How Polls Work and Why We Need Them, describes the “pretty complex” world of polling and sampling.

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Just when you thought Donald Trump couldn’t get any worse, new revelations prove Trump was even worse than we thought, according to hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy on this episode of The New Abnormal. Also on the podcast, Michael Tomasky, editor of The New Republic as well as Democracy Journal and author of the new book, The Middle Out: The Rise of Progressive Economics and a Return to Shared Prosperity, talks about how the Democrats can shape their message around progressive politics to win. (Tomasky is also a former special correspondent and editor at the Daily Beast.) Then, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV) talks about her reelection bid and her wacky opponent, Adam Laxalt.

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Donald Trump often gets credit for his Rumpelstiltskin-like ability to spin the most demented parts of the American psyche into political gold. But in his new book, American Psychosis: A Historical Investigation of How The Republican Party Went Crazy, David Corn traces the lineage of the GOP’s love of lunatics all the way back to the 1950s and says Trump is just the latest in a long line of morally bankrupt politicians willing to use the chaotic crazy generated by the darkest parts of society to fuel their ambitions. “Far Right extremism, including paranoia, racism, tribalism, conspiracy theories, … what we’ve seen under Donald Trump is nothing new. It might be the culmination, it’s not an aberration,” Corn said. Corn, a veteran journalist, author and Washington bureau chief of Mother Jones, joined the political podcast The New Abnormal to explain just how American brains became so broken.

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Queen Elizabeth is an important cultural mascot in a way that Americans can’t understand and her death will have more implications for Great Britain and the world than simply who will take over the monarchy.

That’s according to Ian Dunt, columnist at the ‘i’ newspaper and host of the podcasts, Oh God, What Now? and Origin Story, who tells hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy on this episode of political podcast The New Abnormal that the country faces multiple crises as it deals with the queen’s death. Also on the podcast Douglas Rushkoff, author of the new book, Survival of the Richest: Escape Fantasies of the Tech Billionaires, describes his experience talking to some very rich people about the “event.” 

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Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani’s buddy-buddy, and complicated, relationship goes way back according to writer Andrew Kirtzman. Kirtzman covered Giuliani’s political career for over 30 years and is also the author of Giuliani: The Rise and Tragic Fall of America’s Mayor. He came on this episode of The New Abnormal to give us an insight into New York’s fallen angel and his pal Trump—from anecdotes that one of his ex-wives told him to why Trump felt he was too much of a “liability” to be his Secretary of State. Plus! Fever Dreams podcast host Will Sommer, who is the expert on all things far-right, joins this podcast episode to talk about the up-and-coming ultra-conservative, QAnon-type candidates a la Marjorie Taylor Green and Lauren Boebert running in the midterms. And also, what the Proud Boys think of their founder Gavin McInnes and his fake arrest prank.

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Donald Trump’s way of speaking is hard to mistake for anyone else’s. On this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, video essayist Evan Puschak, owner of the 3M subscriber YouTube channel Nerdwriter1 and author of “Escape Into Meaning”, joins Molly Jong-Fast to break down how the former president and reality show star came to speak how he does, and the one thing that he doesn’t do while speaking that makes the way he talks so effective. Plus! Molly and Evan discuss whether or not Trump is intentionally speaking this way to manipulate.

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 In this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss Trump’s legal jeopardy with George Conway and whether he will ever be sent to prison, and then check in to discuss the infamous Mar-a-Lago carpet documents. The ultimate question remains, according to Jong-Fast; will Trump ever go to jail? “I can’t guarantee it, but there’s a reasonable likelihood of it,” Washington Post contributing columnist George Conway told Jong-Fast. Then, Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger (D-VA) , who represents Virginia's seventh congressional district and who is a former CIA case officer, delves into the image of Mar-a-Lago carpet documents. “I can’t make predictions on what comes next, but certainly as a former Intel officer, I can say that if anyone I ever worked with had a collection of documents like this at their home, there’s no question of what would've happened to them.”

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Lindsay Graham said on Sunday that if former President Trump is prosecuted there will be “riots in the streets.” Some call it a prediction. New Abnormal podcast host Andy Levy is calling it a threat. In this latest TNA episode, Andy uses some more descriptive language to describe how he really feels to co-host Molly Jong-Fast who has her own theory for diehard Trump apologists, which includes a spaghetti reference. Then Maxwell Alejandro Frost, the 25-year–old running for Florida’s 10th Congressional District, joins the show. He fills Molly in on why age is nothing but an asset to him—“I went through more mass shooting drills than fire drills. That perspective is important in Congress”—and why you should not ever compare him to Madison Cawthorn. Plus! Rhode Island Congressman David Cicilline, author of House on Fire: Fighting for Democracy in the Age of Political Arson, gets real with Molly on the reason that rich white guys have gotten away with criming for so long—and the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg-sized elephant in the room.

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Florida Governor went full on Donald Trump during his “Keep Florida Free Tour” last week after saying he wants to “chuck” the “little elf” Dr. Anthony Fauci across the Potomac. Will it help him gain traction ahead for a 2024 presidential run? The New Abnormal co-host Andy Levy shares his hot take on how well this is gonna work for DeSantis on this episode. And this conversation is before he and MollyJong-Fast listen to a clip of DeSantis talking about the woke crowd. Plus! NBC’s Capitol Hill Correspondent Ali Vitali joins to share some of the reporting she writes about in her new book, Electable: Why America Hasn’t Put a Woman in the White House . . . Yet, including why Everyone Hates Kamala. 

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The upcoming midterms will depend on the voices and votes of those in the suburbs, according to hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy on this episode of The New Abnormal. After a key win for Democrats in New York’s 19th Congressional District, where Pat Ryan defeated Republican Marc Molinaro in Tuesday’s special election, Levy says that despite the bad news for the party, the Dems still need the suburban vote to get them across the line. Then, Dahlia Lithwick, who writes about the courts and the law for Slate and hosts the podcast Amicus, talks former President Donald Trump’s little dust-up with the National Archives. This week, Politico revealed that the Archives had recovered more than 700 pages of classified documents from Mar-a-Lago in January and that federal investigators were concerned “by Trump’s resistance to sharing them with the FBI.” Also, Max Fisher, who writes The Interpreter column for The New York Times and is the author of The Chaos Machine: The Inside Story of How Social Media Rewired Our Minds and Our World, discusses how social media “is distorting you in ways that you are probably not quite aware of.”

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Dr. Oz is failing the unofficial Twitter war against PA Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, the loss coming after Fetterman dunked on Oz for using the term crudite in an April video. But his campaign has a problem that goes deeper than veggie platters and NBC’s Jonathan Allen joins the pod to explain why (and tells host Molly Jong-Fast about his encounter with Dennis Rodman in a cigar lounge.) Plus! Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA), frequent flyer on the pod, joins this episode to talk midterm candidates he’s excited about in California and holds no punches when it comes to calling out MAGA Republicans. Of course, hosts Andy Levy and Molly also discuss a very interesting (and bad, in Molly’s opinion) take that involves some sort of bargain where President Biden pardons Trump with the caveat he never runs for president again.

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Author and war veteran Elliot Ackerman holds a very unpopular opinion about the draft: he supports it, but only because he thinks it could be a good thing for Americans. He joins this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to explain why he holds this take and how he sees it ultimately helping create more peace and less war. Plus, he shares his experience trying to evacuate people, including the Afghan girls’ robotics team, out of Afghanistan and what his new book The Fifth Act: America’s End in Afghanistan is all about.

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As the polls closed in Wyoming, the focus over Rep. Liz Cheney became not if she would win the Republican primary for Wyoming’s sole congressional seat, but by how much she would lose. And that loss was colossal. On this episode of The New Abnormal, hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss whether the left loves Cheney and why she has no chance at becoming president. Then, Jeet Heer, a national affairs correspondent for The Nation magazine and host of the Time of Monsters podcast, joins the discussion to explain why he thinks we need more Republicans like Cheney. Also, Cristina Tzintzun Ramirez, executive director of NextGen America, the country’s largest organization mobilizing young voters, discusses how she’s inspiring the next generation to get involved.

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Democratic strategist James Carville has a message for people who are doubting Merrick Garland: Just wait. On this episode of The New Abnormal, he explains why Dems should have more faith in Merrick Garland—and also shares the long list of GOP candidates across the country that makes Molly Jong-Fast crack up. Then, Matt Castelli, a former CIA officer and Director for Counterterrorism at the National Security Council who is currently running for Congress against Trumpy Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), joins the pod to share his plan for taking Stefanik down and calls her an opportunist. Plus! Hosts Andy Levy and Molly dissect Trump’s latest Truth Social admissions, including that he has multiple passports.

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The seed of cruelty that the GOP has fully adopted, and nurtured, had been planted long before Trump took office, says Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank. Instead, he says on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, someone else is to blame: Newt Gringrich. He explains why to co-host Molly Jong-Fast, along with more reporting on the GOP’s evolution that’s included in his new book, The Destructionists: The Twenty-Five Year Crack-Up of the Republican Party. Plus! Co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly listen to more clips of politicians saying dumb things, this time starring Fox News’ Jesse Watters and sad son Eric Trump.

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As former President Donald Trump endured one of his worst weeks yet, Republicans have been on our TV screens taking aim at everyone else—but themselves. On this episode of The New Abnormal, hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy talk Trump and the sentence Republicans need to stop repeating. Then, Tim O’Brien, senior executive editor of opinion at Bloomberg, joins the show and reveals what he finds most compelling in the “ridiculous sideshow” that’s emerged in the wake of the search: “which is that he’s being unfairly targeted and that this is political. Also, Dr. Iman Alsaden, chief medical officer for Planned Parenthood Great Plains, talks about what it’s like in post-Roe America.

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Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer got fellow Senator Joe Manchin to do something few have done before: convinced him to vote along Democratic party lines. Some are calling it The Manchin-Schumer bill, and even Schumer wasn’t sure it would happen until the end. Chuck tells Molly how he made it happen on the latest episode of The New Abnormal as well as why his flip phone is his secret weapon, how he is the opposite of Sen. Mitch McConnell, and his plans to bring back an insulin cap bill in September. Plus! Daily Beast Politics Editor Matt Fuller also breaks down the new “Dark Brandon” meme about Joe Biden that the White House has even embraced. Plus! Molly and co-host Andy Levy go after Republicans like Marjorie Taylor Greene for crying about Alex Jones being a victim and why the current behavior of former President Donald Trump is actually pretty scary.

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Actor and former White House adviser Kal Penn recalls the moment he spectacularly failed to outsmart the former president and how he was humiliated in front of the first lady.

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On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, Levy, along with host Molly Jong-Fast, discuss the conservative state’s rejection of the anti-abortion measure after nearly 60 per cent of voters dismissed the move. Then, Angelo Carusone, president and CEO of Media Matters, debunks a study by Nielsen media research claiming that the top rated news show among Democrats between 25 and 54 is Tucker Carlson. The study says that in total debut viewership, Fox news grabs 42% of Democrats. Also, The Daily Beast’s congressional reporter Sam Brodey discusses how the Senate and Congressional map is changing to a more optimistic map for Dems.

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Missouri Senate candidate Lucas Kunce is not going to knock on a voter’s door and ask them to vote for him because he will lower the cost of prescription drugs. But the former Marine tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast what he will do in this episode of The New Abnormal—including being completely blunt when it comes to calling BS on Republicans. Speaking of which, Rep. Eric Swalwell also joins the pod and talks about the major wins Democrats have had lately and why he thinks the GOP “clowns” don’t stand a chance in taking the House in the midterms. Plus! Molly and co-host Andy Levy talk more about that burn pit bill and pose a major Jan 6 question: Where in the world are those missing text messages?

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The New Yorker’s Ken Auletta tells Molly Jong-Fast about the conversation he had with Ronan Farrow ahead of his bombshell piece and shares stories about Harvey Weinstein’s enablers that are in his new book, Hollywood Ending: Harvey Weinstein and the Culture of Silence, which paints an even more detailed picture of Weinstein, and the enablers around him.

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If you’ve surfed the internet over the course of the last few years, there’s no doubt you may have stumbled across at least one viral clip of U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg on Fox News. For Buttigieg, going on Fox News is “a no-brainer", Lis Smith, author of Any Given Tuesday: A Political Love Story, and senior advisor for Buttigieg's 2020 presidential campaign, told Molly Jong-Fast on this week’s episode of The New Abnormal. Then, Olivia Julianna, a 19-year-old activist and strategist for Gen Z For Change, reflects on her work as a fundraising powerhouse and her reaction to Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz’s attempts to humiliate her after arguing that overweight and unattractive women don't need to worry about getting pregnant or needing abortions.

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Is Ron DeSantis going to run for president in 2024? If he is, New Abnormal co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast are of the opinion that he’ll be a scarier candidate than Donald Trump if the former president chooses to run again. Then, New York Governor Kathy Hochul talks to Molly about what she and her administration are doing to prevent ugly fallout from the Supreme Court ruling on guns in the state and her opinion on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg not prosecuting Trump. Plus! James Obergefell, the plaintiff in the historic Obergefell v Hodges Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage, shares the events that led to his case and why he’s “disgusted” today.

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Aftershock directors Tonya Lewis Lee and Paula Eiselt talk to Molly Jong-Fast about why Black women are more likely to die than their white counterparts after giving birth.

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The news from Thursday night’s Jan. 6 committee hearing that really struck Molly Jong-Fast was that instead of trying to stop the violence, Trump wanted to call senators and pressure them to throw out the election results or delay the certification. And of course he talked to Rudy Giuliani.“Rudy's always the first call you make because you gotta get the bad ideas from someone,” says co-host Andy Levy.

“I would not let Rudy Giuliani pick a pair of shoelaces for me. And this, the president of the United States, is turning to him for advice on elections.” Also on the show NBC's senior reporter Jon Allen & Mark Lobovitch on his new book Thank You For Your Servitude: Donald Trump's Washington and the Price of Submission.

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After four years of Donald Trump and the ultimate hangover that ensued, has the Republican Party learned from its mistakes? Far from it, Molly Jong-Fast says on this episode of The New Abnormal podcast. “Trump definitely did something in the Republican Party. Right?” Molly asks. “They were always bad. They would do terrible things, but they would pretend not to be terrible. And now there’s like an incentive to be terrible. Like the people who are terrible actually raise the most money.” Still, Democratic Rep. Mondaire Jones, who represents New York’s 17th District, says that while he faces an uphill battle against the Republicans and despite the disappointments of recent events, including the repeal of Roe v. Wade, there is hope on the horizon. Then, Tim Miller, MSNBC analyst and the author of Why We Did It: A Travelogue from the Republican Road to Hell, reflects on what he learned about the Republican Party.

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Filmmakers behind the new documentary “Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down,” Julie Cohen and Betsy West, tell New Abnormal co-host Molly Jong-Fast in this bonus episode about the former Congresswoman’s RBG socks, music she loves, and what she’s up to now—including some of the things Gabby has taken up recently, like playing the French horn, as well as the adorable scenes in the documentary that show Gabby support her husband, Mark Kelly, and how she has worked to overcome her aphasia to give nearly flawless speeches. Plus! Molly and Andy Levy listen to clips of more dumb Republicans like “walking Facebook post” Sarah Palin and John Bolton, who recently told on himself in a CNN clip.

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It's been a big week in politics with revelations galore from the Jan. 6 House committee. Former President Donald Trump's attempts at stopping the peaceful transfer of power has been the talk of the town and this week's admissions at the committee are a "pretty big deal", notes Molly Jong-Fast on this episode of The New Abnormal podcast. But it's not all bad news. Speaking with Jong-Fast, former presidential candidate and independent candidate for the Utah Senate, Evan McMullin, reveals that he is seeing "a weakening in Trump support across the country". Then, Mary Trump, host of the Mary Trump show and the author of Too Much and Never Enough, revealed she found the revelations surrounding the "vast web of people" covering for her Uncle...."at times difficult to process".

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Things are going super over in the United Kingdom, jokes Molly Jong-Fast to British journalist Ian Dunt on this episode of The New Abnormal podcast. Dunt broke down the events that led to the U.K. Prime Minister’s resignation as well as whether or not he thinks Boris Johnson will still hold the title by the fall and the state of U.K. politics—and whether there’s a chance to actually reverse Brexit. Then, CNBC Fast Money contributor Dan Nathan explains why a recession might actually be a good thing, and that it’s what the federal government likely wants. “Sadly they need the economy almost to go in a recession for inflation to come down meaningfully,” he says. Plus! Molly and co-host Andy Levy shoot the shit about Elon Musk hurting Trump’s feelings, Biden’s dumb move to swing “left,” and the one thing that’ll actually maybe get Steve Bannon to testify in front of the Jan. 6 committee.

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Former Secretary of State of Missouri Jason Kander, and author of Invisible Storm: A Soldier’s Memoir of Politics and PTSD, talks to TNA co-host Andy Levy about living with PTSD, his post-traumatic growth phase when it comes to trauma and how others can get there, too—and a VA tale to beat all VA tales. Plus! Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss McCarthy’s huge Jan. 6 mistake, which they’re so thankful for.

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Gretchen Carlson joins The New Abnormal along with her Lift Our Voices co-founder Julie Roginsky to talk about her lawsuit against former Fox CEO and Chairman Roger Ailes and the work she’s doing to fix predatory NDAs. Then Mike Collier, the Democrat running for Lieutenant Governor of Texas against Dan Patrick, breaks down the true issues with the Texas power grid, including that it was designed by Enron, and the other ticking time bomb in the state: water. Plus! Hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy do a Q&A speed round, sharing who they think are the best and worst accounts on Twitter, what the next QAnon level conspiracy is, and a definitive ranking of the Supreme Court judges from the worst to mildly idiotic.

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As the Supreme Court limits the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, David Roberts, author of climate newsletter, Volts, tells Molly Jong-Fast why America is about to see a rise in “green fascism.” Also on this episode: Climate change writer and author Kate Aronoff explores why politicians are unwilling to act on global warming despite a majority of Americans being in favor of action.

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Author Jerry Stahl didn’t know what his experience visiting Auschwitz would be like, but taking selfies with teenage strangers who had mistaken him for actor Michael Richards, who played Cosmo ‘Kramer’ on Seinfeld, was definitely not on the list. On this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, the writer tells Molly Jong-Fast about the trip, and his conflicting thoughts while there, which are also part of his new book “Nein, Nein, Nein: One Man’s Tale of Depression, Psychic Torment and a Bus Tour of the Holocaust.” Plus! The one person Stahl has spent his life trying not to become.

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The time for being squeamish about abortion is over. That’s what pro-choice advocate and author Ilyse Hogue tells The New Abnormal’s intrepid co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy: “Roe is actually a fire-alarm fire,” and it’s time to “talk loudly and proudly about what we stand for.” (That goes for you, too, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland—Levy knows you’re listening, and he dares you to prosecute someone based on the explosive testimony coming out of the Jan. 6 hearings.) Speaking of which: what does the testimony of Cassidy Hutchinson, who for the current moment has “brought Trumpworld to its knees,” as Jong-Fast puts it, mean for where the Jan. 6 Committee is heading? What’s left to prove? That assessment comes courtesy of the Daily Beast’s hometown hero, politics editor Matt Fuller.

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In this episode of The New Abnormal, Leah Litman, an assistant professor at Michigan law school, breaks down one of AOC post-Roe ideas and co-host Andy Levy tears into Nancy Pelosi and her poem. Plus, Robin Marty, director of operations for West Alabama Women’s Center, tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast what she’s already seeing in her state, including reports that hospitals are already refusing to treat women whose lives are in danger, and are bleeding out, because they admitted they had an abortion.

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On this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, actor David Duchovny talks about his book, The Reservoir, what it was like playing a jerk version of himself alongside Sandra Oh in Netflix’s ‘The Chair’, and discloses a solid theory on aliens. Plus! Co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy listen to more bizarre clips of GOP politicians, including “single biggest asshole’ in America, Ted Cruz, and everyone’s favorite Fox News host, Tucker Carlson, who is still obsessed with testicles.

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The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade on Friday, June 24, 2024, eliminating the decades-long protected right to an abortion. New Abnormal co-host Molly Jong-Fast could not wait until the next episode to address this far-reaching decision, so she recorded an “emergency” episode and interviewed Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold. Secretary Griswold explains to Molly and listeners what it would take to impeach a Supreme Court Justice, why she believes the conservative justices lied under oath and what states can do ASAP to protect the women there.

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Former President Donald Trump was not lacking in pardon requests in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 riots, according to new information revealed during the hearings on Thursday. Among those who asked for pardons: Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and Mo Brooks (R-AL). That in itself proves that Brooks knew Trump’s “Big Lie” was a load of BS, says New Abnormal co-host Andy Levy on the latest post-hearing episode. Also in this episode, Jay Willis, editor in chief of Balls & Strikes, breaks down two Supreme Court rulings, including the rejection of gun control legislation in New York, loudly proclaimed in an opinion by Justice Clarence Thomas. “Thomas’ opinion basically freezes firearm regulation as it existed [in the Constitution],” Willis says of Thomas’ mind-boggling explanation. Last but not least, Greg Sargent, author of The Washington Post’s The Plum Line blog, makes the case that the Jan. 6 hearings are absolutely making an impact.

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Princeton University Professor of African American studies Eddie Glaude tells The New Abnormal’s Molly Jong-Fast why he warned the U.S. President that democracy could die unless he is willing to “go big”. Also on this episode: Journalist Francisco Alvarado takes us inside his reporting on how Nebraska’s voter ID proposal has become mired amid claims of fraud and big money coming from someone very close to the state’s governor.

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Haters love to attribute Katy Tur’s success to her former partner, commentator Keith Olbermann. But she’s over it. In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal podcast, Tur tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast how that early connection to the broadcaster has impacted her life since and recounts some anecdotes about her “violent” childhood from her new memoir, Rough Draft.

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The New Abnormal hosts recorded late, after the Jan. 6 committee's latest blockbuster hearing, where, co-host Andy Levy says, “We found out today that the mob in the capital came within 40 feet of [Vice President Pence] at one point while they were transporting him to the secure location. That sounds pretty terrifying considering, we have to remember, this is the mob that was chanting “Hang Mike Pence.’”

Later, co-host Molly Jong Fast says,”I feel like the top line is when did the president know and what did he know it? He knew it, and he still tried to do it.” Indeed, says senior NBC News politics reporter and co-author of Lucky: How Joe Biden Barely Won the Presidency, “I think that it may be a mistake to look at anything that happened as particularly accidental. I'm always sort of torn a little bit when I talk to voters who are kind of like Jan. 6 deniers, because I think most of them aren't denying that Trump was trying to hold power. I think they're denying that it was bad.”

Plus, Daily Beast and New York Magazine contributing writer Jay Michaelson breaks down the Ginni Thomas-John Eastman mess: “If this is not an impeachable offense for a Supreme court justice if what we've come out in evidence is true” then what would be? “This is the most impeachable offense I've ever seen in my entire life. I mean, this is not a gray area case. This is unbelievable.… John Eastman, one of the somewhat more crazy lawyers who tried to overturn the 2020 election said at one point that there seems to be a heated fight underway among the justices. And that's interesting. I don't know how he actually knew that, but now it seems that he knew that from actually being in touch with Ginni Thomas, the wife of one of the justices,” Clarence Thomas, “who is also a well-known conservative activist.” And, “if true, disclosing secret, confidential, and to put it mildly, highly sensitive deliberations of the Supreme Court justices to somebody who he knows—his wife—is closely involved with the effort to overturn the election. And it's fine that they have separate careers and they have separate lives. That's fine. But you know, Molly, if I disclose this to you, we don't have to be married for me to realize that that would probably be a problem, right? That disclosing to somebody with a close degree of not just interest but actual active participation in this effort, which is overturning an election, right, which is trying to mount some sort of a coup. So even if this was some boring insurance transaction that we were involved in, this would be a massive violation of judicial ethics. And the fact that it took place in the context of Jan. 6 is beyond shocking.”

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On this episode of The New Abnormal, Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy debate which Republicans testifying at the Jan. 6 hearings can be considered ‘good guys.’ Spoiler alert, not Bill Barr according to Andy. Molly also breaks down the ‘psychology’ of Jared Kushner based on his performance testifying. Plus! The Nation columnist Jeet Heer explains to Molly why Democrats shouldn’t trust Liz Cheney and CNN national security reporter Zachary Cohen points out one of big question marks on the Jan. 6 timeline that the committee is trying to piece together: What happened when Donald Trump was in the dining room?

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Author James Patterson joins this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to tell co-host Molly Jong-Fast about his new biography titled James Patterson by James Patterson: The Story of My Life. He also tells stories about some old friends, including the Clintons and Dolly Parton. Also in this episode: Molly and co-host Andy Levy listen to some funny clips of Republicans saying “dumb” things, including Jesse Watters, who Molly dubs the “stupidest anchor on Fox News.”

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The Jan. 6 hearing was everything it had to be, The New Abnormal co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy agreed—and Republicans knew it. Liz Cheney, said Molly, in a conversation recorded just after the prime-time hearing ended, “is an extremely good speaker you can tell will follow Donald J. Trump to the gates of Hell.” So as the damning case was laid out, the MAGA set did their best to pretend it simply wasn’t happening. Plus: Pod Save America co-host Dan Pfeiffer talks about “why Democrats keep losing the messaging war,” his new book Battling the Big Lie: How Fox, Facebook and the MAGA Media Are Destroying America and the “decades-long billionaire funded plan to build up an alternate information bubble,” and Ian Bremmer, author of The Power of Crisis: How Three Threats – and Our Response – Will Change the World explains that there are four now: the pandemic, global climate change, “the proliferation of disruptive and dangerous technologies, and now you have the Russians invading Ukraine and a war in Europe.”

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Is Donald J. Trump losing his impenetrable grip on the Republican party? Co-host of The New Abnormal podcast Molly Jong-Fast thinks so. She shares her theory with co-host Andy Levy on today’s episode. Also, the two attempt to answer this question: Who is a scarier Republican candidate? Ron DeSantis or Donald Trump? Plus! Daily Beast politics editor Matt Fuller gives Molly the cold-hard truth on gun legislation that’s bubbling up in the House and Senate and who—and who won’t—vote for it. Plus! British columnist & host of The OriginIanory Podcast, Dunt explains why Brits will have “an absolute psychological breakdown” when the Queen is no longer the Queen. He also shares why England Prime Minister Boris Johnson isn’t very secure in his position.

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Parkland dad Fred Guttenberg details the day his daughter Jaime was killed at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School as well as what he thinks needs to change to get solid gun reform policy. Plus, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy unpack GOP clips, including one of Lauren Boebert calling Trump a ‘family man’ because he shared popcorn with her son. Plus! Andy shares a very interesting metaphor in which he compares Hunter Biden’s name to cat nip.

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“The problem is there are so many mass shootings that they are now pushing other mass shootings out of the news” and Republicans just want to change the subject each time, co-host Molly Jong-Fast says to kick off the latest episode of The New Abnormal. But the cold comfort is that “there are so many shootings that we're going to be talking about it, even though Republicans want to run out the clock, they're never gonna be able to run out.” Plus, We’re Not Broken author and MSNBC columnist Eric Garcia joins the pod to tell Molly about his reporting on autism in America while having autism, and Strict Scrutiny co-host and ABC Supreme Court contributor Katie Shaw explains how politicians hide behind the Supreme Court’s 2008 gun decision to pretend they’re powerless now, and about what’s looming when the Court issues it’s first big gun decision since then any day now.

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Is former President Donald Trump’s hold on his Republican base waning? Vice’s Senior Political Reporter Cameron Joseph thinks so. “Trump is slipping. [He] doesn’t have the grip over the GOP that he once did,” Joseph tells Molly Jong-Fast in this episode of The New Abnormal. Later on this episode, historian Jon Meacham, who is host of the new “Reflections of History” podcast gives Molly a preview of some of the juicy tid-bits from history he covers on his show, like how NATO was an unpopular opinion when it began and that New York Times’ Sunday magazine passed on publishing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s letter from Birmingham jail. Oh, yeah, Meacham also happens to be an unofficial adviser of President Biden and Molly does not let the interview end without pressing him on that.

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Kelly Carlin, daughter of the late comedian George Carlin, is mystified that Donald Trump followers and right-wingers have tried to claim her dad as one of their own. She came on the pod with comedian and director Judd Apatow to talk to hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast about her dad, how they think he’d feel about Republicans today and about Apatow’s upcoming George Carlin documentary on HBO, which Apatow says “terrified” him at first.

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In this episode of The New Abnormal, hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy call out Republicans for avoiding the gun conversation at all costs, including Texas Gov. Greg Abbott for his insane mental health hypocrisy. Plus! New York mag correspondent Gabriel Debenedetti tackles the Biden elephant in room: What happens if Joe Biden can’t run for reelection? There are a few people that may be backups for the party, he says. And last up, Pennsylvania Rep. Chrissy Houlahan shares what she thinks are the root causes of the gun violence epidemic—and that the entire Republican party “needs to be cured and cleansed.”

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Kellyanne Conway’s new book makes very clear the people she has a grudge against, and the ones she doesn’t, according to Daily Beast media reporter Zach Petrizzo. He read the former Trump aide’s book and tells The New Abnormal podcast host Molly Jong-Fast that there are two people she goes after the most—Jared Kushner and her husband, George Conway III. Plus, Washington Post political enterprise reporter Robert Samuels talks about his new book with co-author Toluse Olorunnipa, ‘His Name is George Floyd’ and Molly and co-host Andy Levy analyze the right-wingers who attended CPAC in Hungary and why they (jokingly) think the Twitter user retweeted by Trump, ‘MAGA King Thanos’, will lead the next civil war.

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Nazi Billionaires author David de Jong joins this bonus episode The New Abnormal to discuss the findings from his book, including the ugly, anti-semitic history of German oligarchs, including the family who owns the German car brand BMW. Plus, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss Kevin McCarthy’s latest witch hunt that somehow involves Nancy Pelosi and Peloton and roast George W. Bush and Justice Clarence Thomas for being really bad at telling jokes.

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It’s another week chock full of Republican fuckery, and The New Abnormal is all over it, including a tough interview with Bryan Jones the Republican trying to take down creepy Matt Gaetz in Florida’s first Congressional District, and starting with a conversation between co-hosts Molly Jong Fast and Andy Levy about how Republicans seem more interested in capitalizing on the baby formula shortage to score points against Biden than they are in fixing it and, you know, making sure babies can get fed. Then Jay Willis, the editor in chief of Balls and Strikes warns Molly that the looming Roe reversal its just the start, and that “a lot of the backlash to this opinion has also dealt with not only the disastrous consequences for women, folks who may become pregnant but also for its really unnerving hints about where the Court could go in the future. Roe is not enough for Samuel Alito, who’s got all kinds of accumulated culture war grievances to air.”

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Congresswoman Elise Stefanik has the “worst luck in American retail politics ever,” declares host Molly Jong-Fast on this episode of The New Abnormal. Stefanik’s past “replacement theory” rhetoric has resurfaced after the “screed” of the Topps shooter Payton Gendron had been reported to contain the same kind of views. Somehow she thinks she’s the victim—and Molly and Andy Levy dive into that on this episode. Plus! Democratic strategist Adrienne Elrod gives Molly the low-down on the Pennsylvania candidates running in Tuesday’s election, including Dr. Oz and Kathy Barnette, who is “even too Trumpy for Trump.” And Shannon Watts, founder of anti-gun violence group Mom’s Demand Action, explains the loophole that allowed the Topps shooter to get his gun, and how the NRA is linked to what drove him to kill.

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Hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast listen to audio clips of unhinged Republicans, including one of Donald Trump crapping on Mitch McConnell’s popularity, and they agreed with him, sorta. Plus! Molly and Andy ask important questions about Dinesh D’Souza’s election-fraud conspiracy film, “2000 Mules,” and Karen Elson, model and fashion activist, tells Molly about her work to unionize models in the fashion industry and the hazards they do face at work.

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“Despite being the richest man in the world,” Elon Musk doesn’t have enough cash to buy Twitter for $43 billion, podcaster and CNBC contributor Dan Nathan tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast, so he’s selling Tesla stock to get some of that cash in hand and then bringing in private equity and venture capital to cover the difference. Plus, Molly and co-host Andy Levy go in on another week full of conservative fuckery, and Daily Beast senior editor Matt Fuller explains how “the abortion landscape really has changed” after the leak of the draft opinion doing away with Roe.

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Media Matters president and CEO Angelo Carusone came on The New Abnormal to talk Elon Musk’s questionable desire to buy and become CEO of Twitter, Tucker Carlson’s reaction to the New York Times’ pieces on him and what’s next for Fox News (it doesn’t look good.) Plus! Co-host Andy Levy has his own theory for why Tucker is horrible. And Robin Marty, Communications Director for the West Alabama Women’s Center, makes predictions on what’s next when it comes to abortion bans in the U.S. (Hint: lots of felony charges).

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A new book by New York Times journalists Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns has gotten lots of attention for its revelations about Donald Trump and the Republican Party. And they get into that on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, but they also tell Molly juicy nuggets about Democratic dysfunction, including texts calling Nancy Pelosi “terrible” and Biden’s struggle with Manchin and Sinema.

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It is a truth universally acknowledged that the podcaster is fated to release an episode right as the news cycle renders them hopelessly out-of-date. That’s the worst thing to come from the revelation that the Supreme Court is essentially set to overturn Roe v. Wade, obviously. Aghast and mind-blown, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy attempt to break down this “new, new, new abnormal” we all find ourselves in as the country teeters on the edge of becoming a post-Roe democracy. How did we get here—and, more importantly, what happens now? That, plus: Daily Beast legal affairs columnist and former Supreme Court clerk Jay Michaelson discusses how Justice Samuel Alito cultivates his Scalia-esque brand on the bench and how the abortion’s writing has been on the wall for “years, if not decades.” And Valerie Biden Owens, the president’s sister and former campaign manager, talks about running the 1972 “children’s crusade” that catapulted her brother into elected office for the first time—and why she now lovingly refers to him as “the ass.” Finally: don’t believe the Christian right used to trumpet that life began at birth? Read this, and get back to us.

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According to New Abnormal podcast host Andy Levy, literally, nobody cares about what Jared Kushner has to say. On this episode, Andy and co-host Molly Jong-Fast break down the latest GOP book announcements, Jared’s included, and The Nation columnist Jeet Heer tells Molly why he thinks the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is a bad idea. For one, this dinner was the start of Trump’s villain origin story, he jokes. Plus! If you’ve ever wondered how a person like Trump was elected in the first place, University of Minnesota’s Dr. Larry Jacobs has an answer and explains why primary elections will be the ruin of us all.

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Michigan State Senator Mallory McMorrow’s scathing speech on the floor in response to being called a “groomer” by a conservative colleague went viral. She joins as special guest on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to tell co-host Molly Jong-Fast how it all went down and what she wants people who are non-marginalized to know. Plus Molly and co-host Andy Levy listen to Fox News proclaim that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is a liberal puppet and Ben Shapiro gets skewered for his “Twitter” advice to Elon Musk.

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nathan Kott, who worked for Joe Manchin for seven-and-a-half years, joins The New Abnormal, and co-host Molly Jong-Fast gets right to the point: "Are you surprised by what you're seeing right now" from the West Virginia Senator?"No," says Kott. "He's the exact same person he's always been. It's just he's getting more attention in the last year than I think he had before." Plus, Molly and co-host Andy Levy run through even more Republican fuckery, starting with Trump's fear of fruit. "If you're that worried about tomatoes, I guess you just assume that everything is very dangerous and you might as well give everyone guns' jokes Molly.

Finally, Marc Caputo of NBC explains what's happening in the great state of Florida, where "conservatives are a lot more Trumpy "now. "In 2016 when Donald Trump won people thought it was a fluke. And then in 2018, when Ron DeSantis won by less than half a point, they're like, 'okay, Andrew Gillum, his gubernatorial opponent was a flawed opponent. And then in 2020, Donald Trump won so big here by a bigger margin than Obama did in 2008 and that kind of got conservatives or Republicans to realize, 'there is nothing to fear from Democrats anymore in Florida, let's keep pushing the envelope.' And so that's where we are. We're in some serious envelope pushing."

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There’s only text sent by former First Daughter Ivanka Trump among the 2,319 CNN-obtained text messages between Trump’s inner circle from the days after the 2020 election and something about that feels peculiar to The New Abnormal podcast co-host Andy Levy. He and co-host Molly Jong-Fast tackle those in this episode along with special guests Congressman Ro Khanna (D-CA), who shares his thoughts on Elon Musk buying Twitter, and Amanda Litman, Co-Founder & Co-Executive Director of Run for Something.

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Hawaii senator Sen. Brian Schatz joins the show to explain why he let Josh Hawley have it on the Senate floor this month and what he thinks his colleague Joe Manchin will do, or not do, about climate change. Plus, Molly and co-host Andy discuss Dr. Oz, listen to clips of Tucker Carlson saying that the “Libs of TikTok” account is real journalism and break down Fox News star Jesse Watters’ creepy meet-cute with his wife.

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In another jam-packed week of GOP fuckery, The New Abnormal co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy looks at look at the party’s profiles in cowardice, starting with the new revelations about House Minority “Leader” Kevin McCarthy cozying back up to Donald Trump and then shifting to Ron DeSantis’ anti-Disney jihad and what Molly calls the party’s new brand of “unpopular populism.”

No one is crying for Disney or its special tax status, says Andy, but it’s still nuts that “the government of Florida is now basically telling businesses, ‘just shut up and don't take any, you know, even the most milquetoast of stands” or we’re going to punish you even if you’re a company that brings the state billions in revenue a year. Then the Daily Beast’s Roger Sollenberger comes in to break down his recent reporting on the Maga Goon Squad’s new money woes, as Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, Madison Cawthorn, and Matt Gaetz collectively spent $275,000 more than they took in the first quarter of 2022. Plus, Gisele Barreto Fetterman, the second lady of Pennsylvania whose husband, John, is now running for the Senate, and the founder of the Free Story in Braddock, “actually the first free store in the country,” tells Molly how that came from “this idea that some of us have so much and some have so little and there's so much excess, and how can we bring all those worlds together to do good. I really believe in mutual aid and having people connect who maybe would otherwise think they don't have anything in common and the free store was a place where all of that could happen.”

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Tucker Carlson’s constant pushing of junk science on his Fox News show reached an apex this week when he discussed “testicle tanning” with Kid Rock. Of course, The New Abnormal hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy had to break down that video immediately. Also on the show: Democratic strategist James Carville, co-host of the Politics War Room podcast, holds no punches blaming the Democrats for Biden’s approval rating and Ruy Teixeira, a senior fellow at American Progress, explains why a handful of Hispanic voters voted for Trump last election despite the awful things he’s said about them.

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‘Freezing Order’ author Bill Browder, one of Moscow’s most wanted, joins this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to talk about “evil” Putin and why the former American banker still chooses to speak out against the Russian president despite being targeted and followed for it. Plus, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy react to a few very bizarre clips of Republicans and a rap about Matt Gaetz.

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the focus on The New Abnormal this week is on Donald Trump Junior, as CNN reporter Zachary Cohen breaks down his reporting on the namesake’s post-election text messages to White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows scheming on how to steal the election: “We either have a vote WE control and WE win OR it gets kicked to Congress 6 January 2021.” Plus University of California Law professor Rick Hasen, the co-director of the university’s Fair Elections and Free Speech Center and the author of Cheap Speech: How Disinformation Poisons Our Politics—and How to Cure It, explains how “if we had the same polarized politics of today, but the technology of the 1950s, we likely wouldn't have had Jan.  6 and the insurrection and millions of people believing the false claim that the 2020 election was stolen.”

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Rep. Eric Swalwell joins this episode of The New Abnormal to weigh in on the Don Jr. texts and explain what he calls the Costco Effect—and how it relates to the Trumps. Plus, Jodi Hicks, Planned Parenthood California’s President and CEO, explains what happened with the Texas woman who was held on $500K bail for having an abortion. Naturally, co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast have a lot to say about all of the above, and more.

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J. David McSwane, author of Pandemic, Inc. shares his reporting on some of the fraudsters who got their hands on PPE contracts during the pandemic. Plus, a fun segment in which co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast listen and respond to the wildest GOP clips from this week—including one in which Josh Mandel tells MLK Jr’s daughter she needs a history lesson

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It’s “a sea of performative moronics” ahead of the mid-terms, says New Abnormal Molly Jong-Fast, and we’re all drowning in it. Just look at “the cruelty, the stupidity and the racism” coming out of Texas right now, where Gov. Greg Abbott seems more interested in getting booked on Fox News than getting anything done. Then Jan. 6 committee member Jamie Raskin joins the pod to explain how Republicans transitioned from the party of Lincoln to the party of Trump, “a minority party, a shrinking minority party” that nonetheless “wants to get rid of Liz Cheney, who represents pretty big parts of the conservative Republican establishment. They want to get rid of Adam Kinzinger and Mitt Romney and so on because they don't follow the leader in the way that they're supposed to.”

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You know who’s telling on themselves? The American conservatives cheering about Putin pal and proto-fascist Viktor Orban’s big re-election win in Hungary.  “It’s a pretty good litmus test,” says The New Abnormal co-host Molly Jong. “If you are celebrating that, you're probably a bad guy, like the people who are still support Putin.” Speaking of people telling on themselves, Washington Post investigative reporter Michael Kranish joins the pod to run down his reporting on MAGA mutts Madison Cawthorn, Mo Brooks and the inimitably awful Ted Cruz, who somehow managed to escape much scrutiny for months into his pivotal role in pushing Trump’s big lie, and doing everything he could to stop Joe Biden from taking office. Plus, Press Run founder and editor Eric Boehlert explains to Molly why “the coverage of the Biden economy is unlike anything I’ve ever seen” as the press coverage “reeks of both sides.”  

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On this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, Majority Minority author Justin Guest, a George Mason University professor, breaks down a sociological experiment he conducted to see if Hannity could make his viewers liberal with surprising results.

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Madison Cawthorn has Republican leaders like Kevin McCarthy deathly afraid that people in his district will start asking him questions using words like “orgy” and “key bump.” Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy, The New Abnormal’s unflappable (seriously—they’re being forced to picture a debaucherous Louie Gohmert and Newt Gingrich) hosts, are ready to parse whether it’s better or worse for him if Cawthorn’s telling the truth. Also on this episode: George Conway, a lawyer and Washington Post contributor, explains why the 7-hour gap in Trump’s White House phone logs may not be so much a conspiracy as good old-fashioned incompetence; and Jena Griswold, Colorado’s secretary of state, breaks down the legislation she’s pushing to keep election security tight—and why it’s so “frightening” when the call, when it comes to voter fraud, comes from inside the house.

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Charles Bethea of the New Yorker joins to break down his reporting on all that, and to break down his recent scoop about the very unlikely ballot cast in 2020 by former Trump Chief of Staff and still Big Lie enthusiast Mark Meadows:

“He had recently sold in 2020 his and his wife’s house in the state, and as the election neared I think he wanted to vote in North Carolina, partly because he was thinking about and talking about running for Senate and you want to have a record of voting in the state where you run and he didn't own a property. So it looks like he did something that's still sort of inexplicable, but, and he hasn't given us a reason–” Plus New Lines Magazine editor and Daily Beast contributing editor rejoins the pod to explain what’s happening in Ukraine now, and why this refugee crisis has electrified the West in a way that the Syrian refugee crisis never quite did — including when Putin militarily intervened there.

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 Kid Rock of all damn people is boasting about how Donald Trump would call him up after Sarah Palin introduced him and Ted Nugest to the president, and ask things like “What do you think we could do about North Korea?” “I’m like, What? I don't think I'm qualified to answer this.” Then again, it could always be worse with this set. As Molly asks, “Do you think Kid Rock is stupider than Junior?” And, notes Andy, at least Kid Rock “was self-aware enough to know that he shouldn't be talking, giving advice about North Korea.” Plus, Florida Agriculture Commissioner and gubernatorial candidate Nikki Fried — who went to high school with Judge Jackson — joins to explain how she won office in a red state and her bid to become its first female governor. She says the party needs to “follow my lead” to win again in the Sunshine State:

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It’s the 200th episode of The New Abnormal, starting with a wild “flashback” to the very “first” episode in the summer of 1998, when co-host Molly Jong-Fast foresaw a future of “racist babies,” with Molly wishing “if only there was a senator with a ridiculous mustache” to being the issue to light. Jump ahead to 2022, and co-host Andy Levy says Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson “really missed a chance there” when that senator with the ‘stache, Ted Cruz, asked her to define what a woman is. Jackson could have said, joked Levy: “Yes, senator, I define a woman as someone you marry and then defend them when someone else calls them ugly,” like Trump did to Cruz’s wife—who didn’t think that, or Trump saying his dad had killed JFK, was reason enough to stop sucking up to The Donald. Later in the episode, the Beast’s Matthew Fuller joins the party to break down the fuckery of the Jackson hearing and its “straight racism, just the full-flavored version." Plus, Buzzfeed’s Christopher Miller, who’s been reporting from the Ukraine for years, considers the first month of the Russian invasion—“When Putin announced his invasion, I was in the Eastern city of Kramatorsk, near the front lines of the longer simmering war in Eastern Ukraine and (was) awoken by an airstrike on an airfield that was about 2000 feet away from me, which is definitely 2000 feet too close—and the history that led to this moment. 

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Josh Hawley is attacking Biden’s Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson and is using the word “pedophilia” to do it. Naturally, The New Abnormal hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy have choice words, and a new title, for him. Also on this episode: NBC News political analyst Susan Del Percio has a very scary midterm prediction involving Jim Jordan and Danielle Carnival, head of Biden’s White House Cancer Moonshot program, breaks down how exactly her team plans to meet the president’s goal of decreasing cancer by 50% in 25 years.

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The war in Ukraine has made Vladimir Putin one of the most hated figures in the world. But any attempt to remove him from office could unleash more violence inside Russia. Moisés Naím, author of The Revenge of Power: How Autocrats Are Reinventing Politics for the 21st Century, tells Molly what that could look like in this bonus episode of The New Abnormal. Plus, Molly and co-host Andy Levy listen to a clip of Trump trying to “teach” Joe Biden about nuclear weapons, and they break down Sean Hannity’s “hard-on” for Ronald Reagan.

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Author Francis Fukayama thinks Zelensky’s communication-style, and his creative team, will be one of the main factors in overcoming Russian forces. Both he and former ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch joined this episode The New Abnormal to talk about the Ukrainian president’s transformation from comedian to hero and what they each think will be the outcome of the war (hint: it doesn’t look good for Russia.) Yovanovitch also details what she was told the night Trump ordered her to be removed from her position. Plus, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss the Russian social media influencers who are very mad at Putin because of his Instagram ban and attempt to answer a vital question: Does Kyrsten Sinema understand Daylight Savings Time?

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Putin may not realize how poorly the war is going for him, but his troops do. Ukrainian diplomat Olexander Scherba joins the pod to explain what he’s hearing from soldiers on the ground, including stories of them refusing to fight. Plus, The Nation’s Elie Mystal pleads with Biden to say the word “abortion” and hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss whether Tucker Carlson can feel embarrassment and Molly actually sorta defends Mitt Romney when it comes to Tulsi Gabbard.

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Retired NYPD sergeant Valarie Carey joins today’s bonus episode along with Adell Coleman, co-host and executive producer of the podcast Say Their Name, to talk about her sister Miriam Carey, who was shot by law enforcement 26 times when she drove into a restricted zone outside of the U.S. Capitol. Plus, co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy talk about why Ted Cruz is full of crap about vaccines—no one is hugging him as much as he says they are—and listen to clips of Don Jr. defending his dad, whom he weirdly calls “Trump.”

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In a jam-packed new episode of The New Abormal, co-host Molly Jong-Fast rips into the “contingent of very stupid Republican Congresspeople” who don’t want the U.S. aiding Ukraine before building a border wall here, which makes sense since “the country of Mexico is shelling, Texas and they're using cluster bombs and stud missiles—Oh wait… There is no war at our Southern border, but no one has told Rep. Doug Collins.” Plus, Melissa Moss of the 65 Project explains how that was “set up to protect democracy; by holding accountable lawyers who bring bogus lawsuits to overturn legitimate election results” to account, and breaks down the three sorts of lawyers her group is going after. And the Atlantic’s Tom Nichols considers Putin: "This guy is not a good strategist. He blunders into things… and bluffs his way out, or tries to murder his way out. I don't know how this ends, if he were the strategist that everybody thinks he is, he would find an off-ramp.”

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Nearly two weeks into Russia’s invasion, News Lines news director and Daily Beast editor at large Michael Weiss joins the pod to explain how and why the Ukranians have defied everyone’s expectations except their own. Plus, Steven Brill of NewsGuard looks back at his group’s conversations with Facebook.

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On this bonus episode of the New Abnormal, Kyiv-based film producer Egor Olesov— an executive producer at FilmUA, one of the largest film studios in Ukraine, where we worked extensively with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during his acting career — calls in from Lviv. Olesov—in a conversation also joined by John Wynn, a Vietnamese-American filmmaker who worked with Egor on the film The Rising Hawk, which was shot in Ukraine in 2019 and 2019—tells host Molly Jong-Fast that “We came back and right now we are doing what we can do as much as possible to support our people, to defend our country and to show to the world the truth about this crazy Russian invasion in Ukraine. It’s like horror dream. It's a really crazy situation. It's a big war in the center of the Europe.” Plus Andrew Rice, New York Magazine Contributing Editor and the author of the Year That Broke America, explains how “I came to the conclusion that the seeds of the future were sewn in 2000 in the election between Bush and Gore (as) all the things that we now see coming to fruition in distressing form in our society were sort of just starting to come into being at that time and in one place, in Florida. which I call the unlikely crucible of the future” — one where “at the time the recount was going on, the 9/11 pilots were training in Florida, sort of serenely flying above it”—just after Trump ran for the reform party nomination that year in his first presidential campaign and “all these stories I sort of brought together in the book tell this sort of ribald, picaresque and ultimately sort of tragic story of how America took a wrong turn.”

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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has become an icon around the world for his bravery and leadership since the Russian invasion began—and New Abnormal co-host Molly Jong-Fast herself has a special place in her heart for him. Zelensky “is my age and a Jewish comedian, so I feel very connected to him,” she says on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. “My generation, we’ve had a tough time of it. We’ve never really had our moment. So this may be as close as we ever get to our moment.” Later on the episode, Face the Nation moderator and CBS News chief foreign affairs correspondent Margaret Brennan joins to talk about the conflict in Ukraine and the exodus of a million Ukrainians. Finally, former presidential candidate Evan McMullin, who’s now running as an independent to unseat Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), comes on talk about his race and the Russia-Ukraine war.

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The attack on Ukraine isn’t going how Russian President Vladimir Putin thought it would, co-host Molly Jong-Fast posits in today’s episode of The New Abnormal. Vladimir Ashurkov, a colleague of anti-Putin opposition leader Alexei Navalny, joins the pod to explain what’s next for Putin—whether he wins or loses the war. Then, NBC News’ Jonathan Allen talks about what he saw at CPAC (the The Conservative Political Action Conference), including a screaming match at a bar where two men argued about Ukraine and one called the other a “shrill for the Queen.” Plus, co-host Andy Levy has a message for Marjorie Taylor Greene: “It’s OK to cancel Nazis.”

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Barbara McQuade, a former Michigan prosecutor, joins the first unlocked bonus episode of The New Abnormal to explain how Trump’s big lie is a provable crime. Plus, Andy Levy makes his Sunday episode debut, just in time to listen to clips of Josh Mandel sounding stupid and to unpack Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott’s criminalization of trans kids. It’s a move Andy calls “full-on fascist.”

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Biden is not doing much with Russian sanctions as they now stand, says PBS NewsHour Special Correspondent and documentary filmmaker Simon Ostrovsky, who is also Russian-American. He came on this episode to share what he thinks Biden really needs to bring to the negotiating table with Putin. Speaking of Putin, co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast discuss all the ways they’re sure the dictator turns on right-wingers like Tucker Carlson and Ben Shapiro. Plus, Charlie Sykes, editor-at-large at The Bulwark, tries to understand what broke Sen. Ron Johnson’s brain and made it…Trumpy.

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Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse is not pleased with Mitch McConnell’s handling of dark money. He came on the pod to explain why he’s pinning the lack of dark money legislation on McConnell as well as what’s happening with climate change legislation. Plus, author Wes Moore tells TNA co-host Molly-Jong-Fast why he’s running for Governor of Maryland and what he wants to change.

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Gal Beckerman, editor at The Atlantic, explains why places like Twitter are no longer cutting it when it comes to social movements and makes the case with a story from the Black Lives Matter movement.

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Donald Trump is closer to wearing an orange jumpsuit than he’s ever been. That’s what TrumpNation author Tim O’Brien thinks anyway. He came on this episode of The New Abnormal to share why he thinks this Trump Org investigation is going south for Trump. Plus, Molly asks former Biden White House Senior Advisor Andy Slavitt if COVID will ever go away, what the new Pfizer COVID-19 pills will be able to do, and if we should try to stay cautious or just live as normally as possible. And Daily Beast politics reporter Ursula Perano breaks down the restrictive Texas voting law, SB1, that’s ironically hurting rural districts, including red ones with Republican politicians. 

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Truckers part of the so-called “Freedom Convoy” have co-opted a conspiracy theory about Justin Trudeau’s biological father, which Canadian author and frequent New Abnormal guest Jeet Heer tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast all about on Tuesday’s episode. Plus, Molly and co-host Andy Levy run down the “terrifying” political candidates who billionaire Peter Thiel is backing and Imani Perry, author of South to America: A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation, makes the case that the South should be a source of inspiration.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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The first thing Donald Trump noticed about Sarah Palin was her looks according to New York Times reporter Jeremy Peters, the author of Insurgency: How Republicans Lost Their Party and Got Everything They Ever Wanted. That’s not all that caught his attention, though, and Peters fills co-host Molly Jong-Fast in on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal. Plus, Peters tells Molly about the time he interviewed the former president in Mar-a-Lago a few weeks after the Jan. 6 insurrection and he weighs in on whether he thinks Trump will run again in 2024.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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The TNA crew considers who in the GOP is really a moron and who’s just playing one. Plus, former Rep. Max Rose previews his rematch with Trump-loving Nicole Malliotakis, and the Beast’s Zachary Petrizzo explains what it means to be in “Facebook jail.” 

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this episode of The New Abnormal, Rep. Ilhan Omar breaks down the toxic ‘high school’ cliques in Congress, defends progressives, and explains why she’s so disappointed in President Joe Biden. Plus, Jared Bernstein, Economic Policy Advisor for the Biden Administration, breaks down how the Biden admin is trying to fix inflation and makes an admission about student loan forgiveness.

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Writer and filmmaker Rupert Russell and author of PRICE WARS explains how a move by longtime former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan to deregulate the commodity markets in 1998 has caused decades of market trouble and sparked a “butterfly effect” of problems around the world.

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There were rumors just a year ago that Jeff Zucker was going to run for mayor of New York, and now the chief who was “in some ways the voice to the network” and “the guru for a lot of the top anchors” is out. 

Daily Beast media editor Andrew Kirell breaks it all down with The New Abnormal crew, as co-host (and former CNN guy) Andy Levy says “pretty much everyone knew that the two of them were in a relationship for a long time. I mean, I knew it and I couldn't have been lower on the totem pole at CNN. I heard people talk, nobody seemed upset by it, particularly, but it was just like, it was just known. It wasn't even an open secret cuz it really wasn't even a secret.” Then co-host Molly Jong-Fast talks with New York Magazine's David Wallace-Wells of New York Magazine about the biq questions: whether or not the virus is endemic already or still a pandemic, and if the environment has already passed a point of no return. Plus, the gang rips into conservative cuckold Jerry Falwell, and former Missouri Secretary of State Jason Kander explains what it is that the coasts don’t get about politics in the middle of the country, and why the key to winning there isn’t about being in the political middle.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Joe Rogan might be a moron. But at least he’s an honest moron. On Tuesday’s episode of The New Abnormal, Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast discuss the nuance of podcaster Joe Rogan on the heels of his Spotify misinformation apology. Plus, Margaret Sullivan, a media columnist at The Washington Post and author of Ghosting the News, joins the show to discuss “four billion dollars worth of defamation lawsuits” including Sarah Palin’s against the New York Times and Dominion Voting against Fox News, and Adam Jentleson, a former Harry Reid staffer and the author of Kill Switch, explains why we don’t have a “Democratic Harry Reid,” and how student loan forgiveness being the thing that could save Joe Biden.

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Garry Kasparov is one of the great strategists and a longtime critic of Putin, so naturally, in this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, Molly Jong-Fast asked the chess Grandmaster how he thinks the current crisis in Ukraine and Vlad’s stronghold on Russia will end. He shares a few theories that could checkmate Putin once and for all—and details how Biden’s presidency is part of the endgame.

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“They are literally killing their viewers. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that,” says The New Abnormal co-host Andy Levy. “It was really interesting to see actual correlations between Trump voting counties and Fox News viewership and rates of death from COVID. It’s just amazing what they're doing." “Fox News has one job, right?” says Molly. “Get Republicans in power, keep them in power. So it's worth branching out into the idea that like Tucker Carlson is the kind of the spiritual leader of the GOP these days.” Andy says. Speaking of Fox hosts, The New Abnormal producer Jesse Cannon notices that in the midst of testing positive for COVID and then continuing to dine out in New York, Jesse Waters made sure to interview Sarah Palin from her hotel room, even though they’re in the city. Whatever the network says about COVID, its strict protocols for its own talent and building shows what they really think. Plus, Washington Post columnist Greg Sargent talks about how Glenn Youngkin managed to convince Virginians that school board members trying to follow the law were “power-mad bureaucrats who are trampling on the rights of virtuous parents,” and Stanford Prof. Michael Rosenfeld, the author of The Rainbow After the Storm: Marriage Equality and Social Change in the U.S , explains how America went from 11% support for marriage equality in 1988 to about 70% now.

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George Conway joins this episode of The New Abnormal to address the possibility of a Mark Meadows indictment from Merrick Garland’s DOJ, co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast talk about why Newt Gingrich is ‘minutes away’ from becoming the next Rudy Giuliani and Johann Hari, aka the guy who gave a viral TED Talk on rats and addiction, talks about his new book Stolen Focus and how getting stoned during work is actually more productive than answering emails during a task.

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Angelo Carusone, president and CEO of Media Matters for America, joins this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to break down the fall of One America News Network, also known as OAN, and how the channel is trying to save itself.

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“He’s essentially persona non grata in the royal family, and you know, the royal family survives because – it may look like this sort of a constitutional structure made entirely of cobwebs, but in fact it's got a really kind of canny PR operation behind it,” says Dunt. “And they know when to cut their losses. It’s a family, kind of, but it's not a family like any other kind of family. And when you got a bad (one) in there, you are gonna cut your losses and that's pretty much what they've done. ”The no-longer royal highness may not have regular people money worries, says Dunt, but “maybe more of a struggle is the complete reputational collapse that he's experienced over this period. And that goes quite deep. I mean, it's more, even than the moral outrage, it's also that he is now a very regular figure of mockery. If you saw the interview where he said that he was incapable of physically sweating, that has never gone away. Pretty much anytime anyone in conversation mentions the subject of sweat… that is the joke that will follow.” Plus, Dunt tells Americans what Boris Johnson’s friends call him (it isn’t Boris), co-host Andy Levy considers the civil case against the Trumps and lets the world know that, just like Letitia James, he won’t be running for governor of New York, and New York Times reporter Peter S. Goodman discusses his new book, Davos Man, about how billionaires devoured the world.

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Preet Bharara, former Southern District of New York Attorney General and Justice Is…, is very concerned that Merrick Garland has likely not yet investigated Trump in relation to the Jan. 6 riots. He tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast why on this episode of The New Abnormal. Then, CNBC’s Fast Money panelist Dan Nathan joins to explain what’s happening with inflation in the U.S. and the Biden administration’s potential plan to fix it. But not before co-host Andy Levy and Molly discuss Paul Gosar’s intelligence, or lack thereof, and whether Ron DeSantis is more dangerous than Trump? Or will his boring personality be his 2024 kryptonite?

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Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein joined co-host Molly Jong-Fast on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to talk about his book Chasing History: A Kid in the Newsroom and what a journo who has seen it all thinks about today’s distrust of the media, outlets like Fox News and today’s Republicans, or as Bernstein calls them, “a party of sedition.”

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The “Joe Rogan” experience is off the cuff, unedited, and very often entirely off the rails. Alex Patterson of Media Matters says the podcast is “a bastion of toxic masculinity… that leads listeners further down rightwing rabbit holes,” and notes that Rogan’s “dedicated listeners are mostly young men… listening to all three hours and taking in completely unfounded conspiracy theories without any of the fact-checking that would come for a more traditional journalistic enterprise.” Plus, Samuel Woolley, the author of The Reality Game: How the Next Wave of Technology Will Break the Truth and the director of the Propaganda Lab at the University of Austin’s Center for Media Engagement, explains why “the right is a lot better than the left at leveraging the internet and leveraging both organic engagement and inorganic engagement to megaphone out their content,” including by using networked propaganda, where “what begins on social media as a quote unquote organic phenomenon, which is oftentimes not organic, then ends up on cable news, then back on social media and so on and so forth until it's really unclear where it came from.”

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Co-hosts Andy Levy and Molly Jong-Fast parse out whether Jim Jordan is telling the truth about his Jan. 6 knowledge, Jared Holt, a fellow at AtlanticCouncil’s Digital Forensic Research Lab, explains two big tactics far-right kingpins like Steve Bannon are using to take over democracy and Nandini Jammi and Claire Atkin of Check My Ads join the pod to explain how to play a role in bankrupting people like Charlie Kirk, Dan Bongino and other notorious disinfo machines.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Canadian author Stephen Marche, whose new book The Next Civil War: Dispatches from the American Future chronicles what he saw while reporting in far-right Ohio aka Oathkeepers’ Country, came on The New Abnormal to share the troubling stories with host Molly Jong-Fast, including dreams of a Civil War, and explains how one little Trump decision could destroy an entire city.

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Watching Florida’s governor offer a long-awaited update on his state’s coronavirus response this week, Molly Jong-Fast noticed something disturbing. “He’s really struggling to breathe,” she says on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. Also on the show John Heilemann of Showtime’s The Circus, The Recount, and the podcast Hell and High Water talks about Jan. 6 and the moment the GOP decided to choose Trumpism over democracy. Finally, Rep. Jake Auchincloss, who represents Massachusetts’ 4th District, explains why he declared on the morning of Jan. 6, 2021.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss some new nicknames for the former first daughter, including Ivanka “I Tried” Trump, as well as the reason Trump won’t ever diss the vaccines. Plus, vaccine expert Dr. Peter Hotez tries to answer Molly’s COVID-19 questions, including what the CDC was thinking when it made that 5-day rule and if Omicron will go away and The Nation columnist Jeet Heer confirms that Canadians are in fact prepping for America to become a fascist state.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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The pause on federal student loans, which about 46 million Americans have, is set to lift on January 31, 2022 and, despite advocates best efforts, Sen. Chuck Schumer included, President Joe Biden doesn’t seem to have any intention to stop it or forgive them. Melissa Byrne, the founder of Project Springboard and former Bernie Sanders campaign staffer, tells Molly Jong-Fast on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal why it would be so easy for him to do so, a theory why he won’t, and has strong responses to every argument people can make against it.

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Anne Applebaum, The Atlantic writer and author Twilight of Democracy makes the case for Liz Cheney or Mitch McConnell being the white knights of democracy, Siva Vaidhyanathan, host of the Democracy in Danger podcast, tries to help Molly Jong-Fast figure out why the right thinks other countries’ questionable governing style is the golden standard for the U.S., and finally, Frank Vogl, author of The Enablers How the West Supports Kleptocrats and Corruption, leaves us with two big questions: Is Putin hiding his dirty money in art or real estate? And will congress’ new kleptocrat caucus stop corruption in its tracks? 

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Is Ron Johnson the worst Senator? That’s what The New Abnormal co-host Molly Jong-Fast wants to know. Naturally, she asks Mandela Barnes, the Lieutenant Governor of Wisconsin and Johnson’s opponent in next year’s Senate election, who shares his plan of attack if he wins the seat. Then co-founder of Run for Something Amanda Litman reveals the GOP’s plan to take over politics for good and Obama’s former Education Secretary John King talks about the two biggest ways Republicans fuck over our education system.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Andy Levy has officially joined The Daily Beast podcast family as the new co-host for The New Abnormal, alongside Twitter sweetheart Molly Jong-Fast. We know that he likes to chat politics (duh) and that he used to work for Fox and actually liked Tucker Carlson back then (true story, but he doesn’t anymore.) But we wanted our listeners to get to know the guy gracing their favorite podcast even more. So in this post-Christmas bonus episode of TNA, Molly and producer Jesse Cannon ask Andy 20 random, interesting, and stupid questions, and his answers did not disappoint.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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The Last Laugh podcast host Matt Wilstein joins The New Abnormal co-host Molly Jong-Fast and producer Jesse Cannon in a crossover episode to talk about some of the best political comedy performances this year—from tidbits about SNL’s Biden and Trump actors to the best scene in this season of ‘Succession.’

For more great political comedy, listen to The Daily Beast's The Last Laugh podcast.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Dr. Eric Topol tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast how big of a game-changer Pfizer’s upcoming COVID pill pack could be, if Omicron will be the dominant strain, and how we’ll know this pandemic is over. Plus! Co-host Andy Levy explains why he thinks Nancy Pelosi needs to go and Daily Beast media reporter Zach Petrizzo shares reporting about Turning Point USA’s Arizona festival, aka the new CPAC.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Tony Messenger, and author of “Profit and Punishment: How America Criminalizes the Poor in the Name of Justice,” joins this bonus episode of TNA to tell Molly Jong-Fast what people get wrong about cash bail, the only two things the Koch Bros. and the left agree on and why Dems are scaredy cats when it comes to criminal justice reforms.

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Molly and Andy talk about what Gavin Newsom is hoping to accomplish, past lulz, by using Texas’s crazy anti-abortion vigilante law as the basis for his own law targeting guns in California, former Spy editor Kurt Andersen looks at how “America has always had a weakness for exciting falsehoods and conspiracy theories,” and New Yorker writer looks back on “the last few years of this Democratic crisis in the United States as a rolling series of the impossible not only becoming possible but happening.”

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Andy Levy discuss a new conspiracy theory—Ben Shapiro and his little sister may be secret boomers— as well as the Republican pundit exodus from Fox News to CNN, and why Ted Cruz is content as a dumb podcaster. Then, Molly has heart-wrenching interviews with two Planned Parenthood abortion providers who describe what’s happening with patients in Texas and surrounding state

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Russia would love to see American democracy dissipate, and they desperately want Donald Trump back in office to do it, says Daily Beast columnist Julia Davis, founder of Russian Media Monitor. She explains on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal how Tucker Carlson could already be leading the charge in this effort, explains why Russian media would love to see a U.S. civil war and shares that the Kremlin has no plans to stop its disinformation warfare.

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It sure looks like Pence, on the advice of Dan Quayle, tuned out to be the nutjob we needed somehow. Plus Rep. Ritchie Torres and WaPo writer Greg Sargent join Molly and Andy. 

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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The New Abnormal has a new co-host: political commentator Andy Levy! He joins Molly Jong-Fast in his first hosted episode of The New Abnormal to talk about a new Cuomo TV pitch for director Ryan Murphy and the only thing Kevin McCarthy is good at. Plus! New York DA candidate (and former Andrew Cuomo opponent) Zephyr Teachout recounts the ways that she experienced the “scary” part of Cuomo’s leadership style and WaPo’s Dana Milbank explains that very depressing media report about Biden vs Trump coverage.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Balls & Strikes Editor-in-Chief Jay Willis is a white man, however, he is also an expert in topics related to the Supreme Court. He joins The New Abnormal host Molly Jong-Fast on this bonus episode to talk about the conservative justices and some of the wild things they’ve said about abortion rights.

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Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance breaks down the Supreme Court’s bad intentions on abortion, filmmaker Alex Gibney talks about the jaw-dropping reckless of the CIA’s torture program and NPR’s Tim Mak explains WTF happened to the NRA.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Dr. Peter Hotez explains what we have to worry about when it comes to the new Omicron variant, James Carville breaks down the comms strategy that would give Biden and the Dems an edge in the media (and maybe on Fox News) and Daily Beast media reporter Zach Petrizzo explains why My Pillow Guy Mike Lindell staged a protest against Fox and why right-wingers like Sebastian Gorka and Charlie Kirk have a bone to pick with him.

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Filmmaker and Emmy Award-winning director Geeta Gambhir’s latest documentary, HBO’s “Black and Missing,” is unfortunately very timely, in large part because of the Gabby Petito case. She tells Molly Jong-Fast about why missing children cases involving Black kids are often ignored, the role cops play in the phenomenon, and details about the case of a missing Black 8-year-old that haunts her.

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Attorney General of Pennsylvania Josh Shapiro knows how to win elections, run elections, and keep them safe and fair. In this episode of The New Abnormal, he tells Molly Jong-Fast how he and the democrats in his state oversaw at least 40 cases of alleged voter fraud brought against the state after President Joe Biden rightfully won the 2020 election and former President Trump didn’t—and won them all. Plus, former California mayor Michael Tubbs, author of The Deeper the Roots: A Memoir of Hope and Home, shares the fatal flaw that cost him his seat in office.

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Reporter Jon Karl, ABC’s News Chief and Washington correspondent, as well as the author of the book Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show, has quite a few tales from both Mar-a-Lago and the White House, but one stands out to New Abnormal host Molly Jong-Fast: the time Trump practically begged for an invite to the annual White House Correspondents' Dinner. He dishes on that story, and others, in this episode along with Danielle Moodie, host of the podcast WokeAF and Democracyish, who does not hold back when asked about the Kyle Rittenhouse verdict and Daily Beast reporter Matt Fuller, who breaks down what’s in, and what the Senate will likely slash, from the Build Back Better Act.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Economist Austan Goolsbee, who also served on the council of economic advisors for president Barack Obama, explains why Everyone Hates Biden over the economy, what it’ll take to fix this inflation issue (clue: Trump tariffs?) and why subsidizing green energy like oil all comes back to Joe Manchin.

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Nick Offerman talks with Molly about what playing Ron Swanson taught him about libertarianism, and about Pam and Tommy’s sex tape and what things were like before the internet. Plus, The Intercept’s Ken Klipperstein explains how the murder of Jamal Khashoggi helps account for rising gas prices now, and the Washington Post’s Dan Diamond breaks down what we’re just learning now about how the Trump administration tampered with the CDC.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this episode of The New Abnormal, host Molly Jong-Fast asks Mary Trump what she thinks about Biden’s low approval ratings and what her uncle is brewing. She tells Molly that “there’s still hope” of Biden being re-elected, in spite of what the polls, or Republicans, say. But she has changed her mind regarding her uncle Donald’s chances of running for president again. Plus, David Pell, author of the NextDraft newsletter and the book Please Scream Inside Your Heart, shares a chilling prediction his dad, a Holocaust survivor, told him about Trump. Plus! Hamilton Nolan, labor reporter for In These Times, explains why the Democratic party’s fate is with the future of organized labor.

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Huma Abedin, former Vice-Chair of Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign for President as well as Deputy Chief of Staff during her time as Secretary of State and Anthony Weiner’s ex-wife, has had a front-row seat to some of the biggest, and most tragic, political stories in recent history. She joined Molly Jong-Fast on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to talk about those experiences in detail as well as the stories in her new book Both/And: A Life in Many Worlds.

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If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Brian Klaas, author of Corruptible: Who Gets Power and How It Changes Us, tells Molly Jong-Fast how to prevent Lauren Boeberts of the world from turning the country into a full-fledged totalitarian regime, Recount’s Slade Sohmer joins the podcast and roasts Sen. Ted Cruz—and Sen. John Kennedy—real good and Arizona Rep. Ruben Gallego leaves Molly speechless after he shares war stories from his book They Called Us Lucky.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, lawyer Linda Hirschman, author of “Red State,” tells Molly Jong-Fast about the 1850 law that is “chillingly” similar to the Texas anti-abortion law—and why the Supreme Court’s ego might just stop it. 

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Eric Boehlert talking with Molly Jong-Fast about how the press, and the Dems, are needlessly freaking out as “everything has to be a churning drama” now. Plus, Lawrence Lessig says “I don’t like to gloat”—but things are “a thousand times worse” than he warned that they could get a decade ago, and HEATED writer explains why the Glasgow climate summit “should’ve been covered like insurrection”—and why “it’s super-not.” Maybe when we’re all in our boats they’ll start connecting the dots?

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this election day episode of The New Abnormal, Rand Paul challenger and former Kentucky Congressman Charles Booker explains why the senator’s exit is long overdue, and why he’s the one to take his seat. Plus, The Nation columnist Jeet Heer breaks down America’s anti-vaccine sentiment compared to other countries and Sam Wang, who is part of the Princeton Gerrymandering Project team, explains the Virginia governor race and how likely it is for former Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe to defeat Trump-backed Republican Glenn Youngkin.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz, who published what’s now known as the Facebook Files, thanks to Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, tells Molly how he was able to get her to share those documents with him—and what he thinks Facebook’s next move is.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz, who published what’s now known as the Facebook Files, thanks to Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, tells Molly how he was able to get her to share those documents with him—and what he thinks Facebook’s next move is. 

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Adam Schiff talks with Molly Jong-Fast about the Big Lie and the cult of Trump, and Molly has some thoughts about Tucker Carlson’s new “Patriot Purge” special: He basically runs the network now, and he’s promoting a civil war: “He’s obviously doing this for the fish sticks. I mean, that’s the only thing that makes sense. No! I mean the whole thing is a complete and utter total nightmare!”

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Paul Gosar has been basically caught red-handed when it comes to Jan. 6 meddling. So what’s next? Reporter Hunter Walker, who authored the bombshell report about Gosar promising rioters “pardons,” came on the podcast to talk about how he got his big scoops and the worst thing that could happen to Gosar. Plus, David Pepper, author of “Laboratories of Autocracy: A Wake Up Call from Behind the Lines” tells Molly how Republicans in state houses (like his home state of Ohio) are all slowly burning our democracy to the ground. But not if we do this first.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, Joseph Weisberg explains how his time in the CIA made him see the KGB and Russia in an entirely new light (“They weren't like evil, cold-blooded killers.”) Plus, he tells Molly Jong-Fast all about his new show that’s about a serial killer and his therapist, who happens to be Steve Carell.

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Walter Shaub, former director of the United States Office of Government Ethics under the Obama and Trump administration shares “the most horrifying ethical lapse” of the Trump admin that he witnessed—and why he’s annoyed at Biden. Plus, Esquire’s politics blog editor Charles P. Pierce joins to discuss the Ronald Reagan administration’s economic ignorance and how the “the conservative media octopus” made people so anti-vax that they’re actually unAmerican.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Army veteran Marcus Flowers is running against Marjorie Taylor Greene as a Democrat in Georgia’s 14th district and tells Molly Jong-Fast why he chose to run against the MAGA maniac and the reason death threats from QAnoners don’t scare him. Plus, David Drucker, senior political correspondent at Vanity Fair and author of the forthcoming book In Trump's Shadow, reveals dirt on Tom Cotton (that makes him look good?) and the author of The Cruelty is the Point, Adam Serwer, answers an important question: Would Ron DeSantis be a crappier president than Trump?

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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This week on The New Abnormal, our bonus episode takes you inside the fight against two men producer Jesse Cannon calls “the GOP’s worst congressmen.” 

Cannon and host Molly Jong-Fast interview Charles Graham, who is running as a Democratic challenger in North Carolina’s ninth congressional district against Rep. Dan Bishop (R-NC), and Matthew Diemer, who is running against Max Miller in Ohio’s sixteenth district.

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On the latest episode of The New Abnormal, Molly sits down with Adam Jentleson to talk about the wayward Arizona senator. Jentleson, former deputy chief of staff to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and author of Kill Switch: The Rise of the Modern Senate and the Crippling of American Democracy, says Sinema gallivanting off to Europe for fundraising and Boston for the marathon instead of legislating isn’t just her “pissing off the left.” Also on the episode, Ryan Busse, a former firearms executive and author of Gunfight: My Battle Against the Industry That Radicalized America, talks about how the NRA and the firearms industry developed the kind of modern radicalization that we now see in our politics and HuffPost senior justice reporter Ryan J. Reilly, who talks about how he got started in his extensive reporting on the foot soldiers of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and where the investigations are headed.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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James Carville talks with Molly Jong-Fast about how to stop the GOP before they “come back in power in 2024 (and) you can kiss this democracy’s ass goodbye.” Plus Alec Ross talks about the Raging 2020s and Ryan Hampton rips apart the Sackler’s great deal in the Purdue settlement: “this whole thing was a set up from day one” in which “victims were sidelined every step of the way.”

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Fiona Hill, former U.S. national security council specializing in Russia and U.S. relations and author of There's Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century, has examples that show the way Putin could have manipulated Trump in front of the world. Plus, she talks about poisoned Russian lawyer Alexei Navalny, the aftermath of her Trump impeachment testimony and who she says is flushing American values ““down the toilet.”

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Over at Fox News, they’re marking a very important milestone. 

“It’s a big day for them,” says Angelo Carusone, president and CEO of Media Matters for America. “They’re very very proud of themselves. They’re very excited.” Yes, it’s been 25 years since Fox News came on the air—25 years of “refracting the absolute most absurd and destructive and deadly disinformation and misinformation from the right wing fever swamps,” Carusone tells co-hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Jesse Cannon on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. Also on the episode, Farah Stockman, member of the New York Times editorial board and author of American Made: What Happens to People When Work Disappears, talks about following the lives of three workers after they lost their factory jobs. Finally, Planned Parenthood president Alexis McGill Johnson offers her reaction to a federal judge’s pause on the Texas abortion ban.

Come to The New Abnormal Election Eve Party https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-new-abnormals-nyc-election-eve-party-tickets-177538832427 or visit caveat.nyc

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Author Max Chavkin, whose latest book Contrarian is all about Peter Thiel, tells Molly Jong-Fast alleged details from the 2019 meeting that the billionaire had with Mark Zuckerberg, the Trumps and the Kushners that people don’t know. Plus, Congressman Mondaire Jones has some words for Senators Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin and historian Dr. Timothy Snyder explains how we’re “slow-rolling” into a civil war.

Come to The New Abnormal Election Eve Party https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-new-abnormals-nyc-election-eve-party-tickets-177538832427 or visit caveat.nyc

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Keith Boykin, author of Race Against Time: The Politics of a Darkening America and one of the journalists thrown in jail by the NYPD during the 2020 George Floyd protests, argues that the biggest boogeyman to Americans is race, and how that fear of Black people is driving the right, and lots of white people, to do everything in their power to, keep the status quo.

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J.D. Durkin tells talks to Molly Jong-Fast about how Democrats brought a stuffed animal to a knife fight, Dr. Peter Hotez joins to break down why MRNA vaccines won’t say save the world, and what might, and Leonid Volkov, chief of staff to imprisoned Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny, explains why Russia was never a democracy.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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New York Times tech columnist Kevin Roose explains why Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook just can’t seem to let its high-performing conservative talking heads go, NBC News Reporter John Allen breaks down President Biden’s infrastructure plan for normal people, and USC law professor Franita Tolson retells how she avoided a Ted Cruz “gotcha” moment.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Comedian, author, and “2 Dope Queens” actress Phoebe Robinson tells white people how they can step away from the “white savior” mentality (and the Instagram posts that come with it) and do things that will actually help Black people.

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Mary Trump explains to Molly Jong-Fast why she just might send Donald flowers to thank him for suing her. Crooked Media’s Brian Beutler looks at what Dems can do to deal with the Trumpy Supreme Court. And linguist George Lakoff breaks down how the party’s “false theory of reason and communication” holds it back.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Jeet Heer tells Molly Jong-Fast about a candidate from the Canadian presidential race whose big issue was dairy control management. Will Sommer and Swin Suebsaeng, Daily Beast reporters and hosts of the Fever Dreams podcast, discuss the ways that outlets like Fox News and Breitbart are approaching vaccinations with their stubborn audiences. And Congressman Ro Khanna from California joins to discuss the state’s recall results and gets cornered by Molly about Dianne Feinstein.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Washington Post columnist Karen Atiah came on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to fill Molly Jong-Fast in on what’s going on in her home state since the public learned the bill was passed. And it’s not good, for women or for men. Plus, she shares her thoughts on her late colleague Jamal Khashoggi.

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Dr. Scott Gottlieb, author of ‘Uncontrolled Spread’ and a member of Pfizer’s Board of Directors, updates Molly Jong-Fast on the status of “COVID pills” and child-approved vaccinations in the works, Eric Boehlert, founder and editor of press run.media, calls out the media’s obsession with Trump's voters and not Biden’s, and The 19th editor Emily Ramshaw paints a grim picture of the “abortion tourism” set to ramp up in states around Texas.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Lee Papa, author of The Rude Pundit, discusses with Molly Jong-Fast the chances of Kellyanne Conway joining George W. Bush as a resistance hero, Washington Post’s national health reporter Dan Diamond sheds light on the big COVID booster debate happening amongst top health leaders, and Mike Duncan, host of The Revolutions podcast, tells us why our current state of U.S. politics looks a lot like Ancient Rome, minus a Newt-icus Gingri-ticus.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, documentarian Ken Burns talks about his new film on Muhammad Ali: how making it has taught him so much more about the late boxer and why one of the greatest athletes of all time is more relevant than ever in “a post-Trumpian, COVID world that has Black Lives Matter.”

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What the hell is Joe Manchin doing?! Max Rose, who served in Afghanistan and won a term in Congress as a Democrat representing a red district in Staten Island and Brooklyn, explains where Manchin is coming from given that “there’s not another Democrat who could win that seat”—and without it Mitch McConnell is running the Senate. Then Molly has a great talk with American Crime Story: Impeachment producer Sarah Burgess about “a really profound story about power dynamics and what emotions can lead us to,” whether anything’s really changed since what boiled down to “an incredibly uncomfortable story about basically a sexual coercion” with Paula Jones, and looks back on “the cheap attacks on (Monica Lewinsky) from older women who are quote unquote feminist that were just beyond the pale.” And finally, Molly talks with Arizona Secretary of State and candidate for governor Katie Hobbs about Arizona’s insane cyber ninja election audit.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Elie Mystal, Editor-at-Large at The Nation, has a wild, but potentially effective idea to help women impacted by the new Texas abortion law—if President Biden can make it happen. And Congressman Ruben Gallego defends Biden’s decision to pull out of Afghanistan (and the idea that Madison Cawthorne is too dumb to lead a GOP revolution.) And then Elizabeth Shackleford talks her own experience pulling out of a war-torn country.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Tom Nichols, author of Our Own Worst Enemy, says Americans should stop blaming each other and making excuses for democracy crumbling when it’s their own damn fault—before James Madison rolls over in his grave (if the Founding Father hasn’t already).

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But the lawyer doesn’t regret his role in the Clinton impeachment saga. Also on the latest New Abnormal, whether Texas spells the end of Roe, where Georgia is headed, and more. Later in the episode, Washington Post reporter Craig Whitlock, author of The Afghanistan Papers, talks about American officials’ doublespeak on Afghanistan over 20 years. He also shares with Molly his take on how Michael Flynn went from respected, level-headed three-star general to QAnon crank. Finally, Georgia state Sen. Jen Jordan, who’s running for attorney general, talks about how gerrymandering is likely to produce more Marjorie Taylor Greenes, whether how Texas’ abortion ban will inspire Republicans to replicate it in Georgia.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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MSNBC political analyst Tim Miller joins Molly Jong-Fast on this episode of The New Abnormal to discuss Biden’s weird, new callousness with Afghanistan and Matt Gaetz’ troll-y brother-in-law. Plus, Dr. Howard Dean, former governor of Vermont and former head of the DNC, has some strong words for the judge who is making people take horse medicine.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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This week on a bonus episode of The New Abnormal, Soledad O’Brien joins Molly Jong-Fast to discuss trust in the media, Fox News, coronavirus vaccines, and Afghanistan coverage. “Misinformation is an amazing tool to get people to not trust in their leadership or in the government. And I think the government and the media, too, have done a very poor job in making people trust them.” 

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“What is your Afghanistan hot take? Go.”“My number one hot take is that I don’t like occupation. I don’t feel like we should be permanently defending ‘democracy’ in any given country. If they are not ready for democracy or to be run in the way that we want them to, we cannot use military power to force them to have a democracy,” said Touré, one of this week’s guests on The New Abnormal, former MSNBC host, current host of an eponymous podcast, Toure Show and author of I Would Die 4 U: Why Prince Became an Icon. Hosts Molly Jong-Fast and Jesse Cannon are also joined by Jonathan Allen, a senior political reporter for NBC, and Noga Tarnopolsky, a Daily Beast contributor based in Jerusalem. In their regular “F**k That Guy” segment, the hosts raise their middle fingers to one Kristi Noem and South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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“The fact that everything collapsed so quickly to me vindicates Biden’s decision,” Jeet Heer says on this week’s second episode of The New Abnormal. “If you read the Afghanistan Papers, none of what’s happening is shocking. One of the big things that comes out of [the story] is the weakness of the Afghan government, which is really a pumpkin government,” he tells Molly Jong-Fast and Jesse Cannon. “Like it’s like a bunch of guys with a phony-baloney jobs and offices and big sacks of money.” Then they are joined by supermodel Carré Otis, who earlier this month filed a lawsuit accusing former Elite Model Management executive Gerald Marie of sexually assaulting her multiple times in the 1980s. Also joining the podcast is The Washington Post’s Greg Sargent, who in large part agreed with Heer. “This is kind of a real disastrous mess, but I think it probably was inevitable given all the failures that have led up to this point,” Sargent says. “And there’s probably no neat and tidy way to do this. And in the end that, you know, it had to be done. That would be where a good chunk of mainstream Americans ends up landing.” 

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Daily Beast reporter Diana Falzone reached out to a few different female reporters in Afghanistan to get their perspective on what is happening and what she heard from them is terrifying—from the Taliban beating people in the streets, including children, to allegedly going into homes in the middle of the night to shoot others. She relays their stories to Molly Jong-Fast on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal.

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The coronavirus pandemic, a fraught election, an attempted insurrection, more of the coronavirus pandemic...the United States is suffering from the mental version of long COVID, says Mary Trump.

The psychologist and niece of former president Donald Trump joins The New Abnormal this week. Margaret Sullivan, media critic for The Washington Post, joins to discuss shortcomings in coverage of U.S. military’s withdrawal from Afghanistan and the ensuing Taliban takeover. Jong-Fast also interviews Jason Kander, the former Missouri Secretary of State and a former U.S. Army intelligence officer deployed to Afghanistan. They talk about the disaster unfolding in Kabul and beyond.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this episode of The New Abnormal, former war correspondent, staff writer at the New Yorker and CNN global affairs analyst Susan Glasser explains how the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan is everyone’s damn fault, even Biden’s. Plus, Texas Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia rips into Gov. Greg Abbot and then Adam Harris, author of The State Must Provide, breaks down “racism hush money” that some states with HBCUs are getting from the federal government.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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We’re enduring our current crush of COVID-19 cases in large part thanks to Republican governors like Texas’ Greg Abbott and Florida’s Ron DeSantis, who has instituted statewide bans on vaccine and mask mandates as the state’s healthcare system is being crushed under a new surge of cases, according to Andy Slavitt, the former head of coronavirus response in Joe Biden’s White House.

Slavitt said of DeSantis, “He’s saying, ‘Hey, I’m going to throw you in the water. I’m going to tell you, Hey, feel free to swim. You have the freedom to swim, but I’m going to bind your hands or put a gag in your mouth. I’m going to cover your eyes. I’m going to tie your ankles, but go ahead and swim.’”

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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We’re enduring our current crush of COVID-19 cases in large part thanks to Republican governors like Texas’ Greg Abbott and Florida’s Ron DeSantis, who has instituted statewide bans on vaccine and mask mandates as the state’s healthcare system is being crushed under a new surge of cases, according to Andy Slavitt, the former head of coronavirus response in Joe Biden’s White House.

Slavitt said of DeSantis, “He’s saying, ‘Hey, I’m going to throw you in the water. I’m going to tell you, Hey, feel free to swim. You have the freedom to swim, but I’m going to bind your hands or put a gag in your mouth. I’m going to cover your eyes. I’m going to tie your ankles, but go ahead and swim.’”

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The American public is being misled about the coronavirus vaccines, and it needs to stop now. That’s what Dr. Eric Topol, head of the Scripps Institute, tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast on the sobering latest episode of The New Abnormal. Fully vaccinated folks are walking around thinking they’re 95 percent protected from the virus, but with the Delta variant raging across the country, that number is actually more like 50 percent, Topol says.Next on the show, Daily Beast contributing editor Spencer Ackerman joins co-host Jesse Cannon to talk about his amazing new book, Reign of Terror: How the 9/11 Era Destabilized America and Produced Trump. All the explanations for Donald Trump becoming president “seem to just sort of gloss over the fact that for the past 20 years, this country has been continuously at war,” Ackerman tells Jesse. That enemy was never precisely defined, though it ultimately was radical Islam or even Islam itself— ”which opened the door for a really broad series of authoritarian possibilities." Finally, Jesse gifts Molly a very special early birthday present—a special message from a certain former mayor and cigar fan.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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New Jersey governor Phil Murphy shares his thoughts on the sexual harassment allegations and report against fellow Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) and whether he foresees another COVID lockdown. Plus, Congressman Eric Swalwell (D-CA) and author of the new expanded edition of Endgame: Inside the Impeachments of Donald J. Trump dunks on Republican colleague Mo Brooks and Atlantic writer Anna Applebaum, author of Twilight of Democracy, explains how Hungary’s horrible Trump-y prime minister paved the way for Tucker Carlson.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this bonus episode of TNA, journalists Carol D. Leonnig and Philip Rucker, authors of I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump's Catastrophic Final Year, talk about Jared Kushner’s role during the early stages of COVID, why Trump’s whistleblowers stayed so long by his side and rumors from inside the Pentagon about Trump using the military to stay in power.

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“We are in a crisis and this governor is raising money off of anti-Fauci merch and going to other states to do fundraisers,” Florida Agricultural Commissioner Nikki Fried says of Ron DeSantis. Also in the episode, Ian Dunt—editor-at-large of Politics.co.uk, host of the Oh God, What Now? podcast, author of How to Be a Liberal—talks about Boris Johnson’s COVID fiasco in Britain, where he hosted a reopening celebration just as the Delta variant spiked. Dunt goes deep on the Tory government’s creeping authoritarianism and the U.K.’s new Fox News-on-the-cheap, GB News. Finally, Molly and co-host Jesse Cannon are joined by veteran New York Democratic guru Hank Sheinkopf, who explains why there’ll be even more chaos if Gov. Andrew Cuomo is removed from office over his harassment allegations—and whether AG Tish James can succeed him as governor.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Dr. Peter Hotez has been battling vaccine disinformation for years. But he was still shocked to see United States senators like Ron Johnson peddling anti-vaxxer agitprop. “Historically, this is what the authoritarian regimes do,” Hotez tells Molly Jong-Fast on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. The anti-vaccine anti science aggression has extended to the individual scientists,” he adds. “They did this in China [where scientists who tried to raise the alarm about COVID were brutally repressed] … and this is what's going on right now by elected members of the United States Congress. And we've got to do something about it.” Plus: NBC’s Jon Allen talks about how the realtors’ lobby is pushing to kill the eviction moratorium. And James Carville practically salivates at the thought of Val Demmings running against “slippery little prick” Marco Rubio. 

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal Elie Honig, CNN legal analyst and author of the new book about Bill Barr called Hatchet Man, talks about all the ways that Barr failed as AG, how Merrick Garland is sitting on his ass and whether he thinks Donald Trump will go to jail.

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In this episode of The New Abnormal, Kathryn Kolbert and Julie F. Kay, authors of CONTROLLING WOMEN: What We Must Do Now to Save Reproductive Freedom, tell Molly-Jong-Fast not to trust John Roberts and why Roe isn’t enough to protect abortion rights in this country—something much bigger is.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this episode of The New Abnormal, Noah Hurowitz, author of El Chapo: The Untold Story of the World's Most Infamous Drug Lord, tells Molly Jong-Fast how Chapo was found naked, the reason he and his wife had matching jackets during his trial, and why he believes the Kingpin isn’t as evil as people assume.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, Julie K. Brown, the reporter who pursued the Jeffrey Epstein story at the Miami Herald and author of Perversion of Justice, explains the four reasons she doesn’t believe the convicted pedophile died by suicide. Plus, she has some thoughts about Alan Dershowitz, Ghislaine Maxwell and what is next for this case.

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Imagine if Fox News host Tucker Carlson went from “just asking questions” about the COVID-19 vaccine in primetime every night to showing a photo of himself taking the shot and telling his viewers to do the same.

Would we be “looking at a very different country right now?” co-host Molly Jong-Fast asks on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. Next on the show, David Wallace-Wells, a writer at New York magazine and the author of The Uninhabitable, Earth joins Molly to share his insight on the Delta variant and the extreme climate events we’ve been seeing recently. Finally, on the episode, Media Matters’ Angelo Carusone decodes the mystery of conservative pundit Ben Shapiro’s “genius” weaponization of Facebook. It all comes down to three things, Carusone says money (Shapiro’s spent an eye-popping $11 MILLION this year so far), content, and some good old-fashioned cheating.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Did Donald Trump REALLY defend Hitler at a World War memorial? On the latest episode of The New Abnormal, a look at the latest post-presidency books. One of the most outrageous claims from the deluge of new Trump books hitting the shelves this month is that the then-president lavished praise on Adolf Hitler at a memorial for World War One. Michael Bender, the author of Frankly, We Did Win This Election says on the latest episode of The New Abnormal that the Hitler incident was just one shocking example of people in Trump’s orbit belatedly coming to realize how dangerous the president was.

The next guest, former Trump attorney Michael Cohen, says he’s feeling pretty let down by the offerings in the latest string of Trump books.

“Most of these people don’t have information firsthand,” he says. “They’re getting it from somebody else. And a lot of it is the same reconstituted bullshit that we’ve heard before, but just by somebody else.”

However, he adds: “I think that the books are still important. I think it’s just another example of how this orange crusted bloviated asshole took advantage of this country, especially the Justice Department.”

Cohen cautions people to take a look at who is trying to mend their tarnished reputations through the books now that the Trump years are over, saying: “I think it’s very disingenuous when they come out afterward and it’s, you know, through a book.” Finally, Peter Sagal host of NPR's Wait Wait Don't Tell Me joins the crew to "call-in" with a hot take.

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If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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On this special episode of The New Abnormal host Molly Jong-Fast and The Daily Beast's Diana Falzone talk to Bill O’Reilly accuser Andrea Mackris about the forces that protected the Fox News host from her sexual harassment accusations for 17 years, her "forced" NDA and why she doesn't care about the financial consequences of breaching it.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Did you know that there was a female version of the Tiger King in New Jersey? “Orchid Thief” author Susan Orlean did and wrote about it. She joins Molly Jong-Fast on this bonus episode of The New Abnormal to talk about the weird stories she loves to pursue, from a New Jersey Tiger Queen and an orchid thief to show dogs. Plus, she explains how dogs might actually solve our country’s divisiveness.

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“There has been no detail that has come out that has been different than the four years we saw him do in office,” Slade Sohmer, editor in chief of The Recount, says on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. But no one knows image rehabilitation better than Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner—in fact, they’ve been doing it for years, Sohmer says. “‘Sources close to Jared and Ivanka say’ was the most used phrase in print of the Trump administration,” he adds. Next guest Michael Wolff, the author of the new book Landslide, his third about Trump, says it’s clear that some Trumpworld figures are trying to redeem themselves in the new Trump books. “I don't think that anybody is pleased,” he says of their post-Trump prospects. “I don't think anyone finds themselves where they would otherwise have hoped they would be after working in a senior job in the White House.” Last on the show is Sen. Jeff Merkley, who breaks down the chances for the massive infrastructure bill, whether the filibuster will survive, and more.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Daily Beast political investigations reporter Jose Pagliery explains how the divorce of Jennifer Weisselberg and Barry Weisselberg was the match that lit the Trump Organization on fire and why Trump is in more trouble than we think. Plus! Bloomberg opinion columnist Robert A. George tells Molly Jong-Fast how Sen. Ron DeSantis’ COVID response set up mind traps for progressives and Heather Cox Richardson, historian and host of the podcast Now and Then, shares what the TV show Lost and QAnon have in common.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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A lobbyist for a giant oil company admitted in a video that the industry spreads disinfo to stop efforts to combat climate change and no one really talked about it. Molly Jong-Fast had Emily Atkin, climate reporter and author of the daily climate newsletter, HEATED, come on this bonus episode The New Abnormal to find out why: “The fuckery is immense.”

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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A lobbyist for a giant oil company admitted in a video that the industry spreads disinfo to stop efforts to combat climate change and no one really talked about it. Molly Jong-Fast had Emily Atkins, climate reporter and author of the daily climate newsletter, HEATED, come on this bonus episode The New Abnormal to find out why: “The fuckery is immense.”

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Substacker and The Nation columnist Jeet Heer explains with no hesitation why Capitol insurrectionist Ashli Babbitt’s death is on Trump, Rep. Cori Bush (MO-D) sends a clear message to Majorie Taylor Green and gets real about defunding the police and Shannon Watts of Moms Demand Action reveals a gun crime stat that would freak out conservatives.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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The Trump Organization is now feeling the heat, with its CFO under indictment for grand larceny. Prosecutors are clearing to get that money man, Allen Weisselberg, to flip on his boss. But one interested observer says there may be another member of the Trump crew who’s even more likely to turn on the Don: his daughter, Ivanka. Both Ivanka and Weisselberg benefitted from a similar perk, if that indictment by Manhattan prosecutors and reporting from the New York Times are to be believed. Both were officers of the Trump Organization and simultaneously were consultants for the company, too. It’s an arrangement that appears designed to shield all parties involved from paying taxes—and could open Ivanka up to tax fraud charges, just like her dad’s CFO. “She's much less likely to stay loyal than Allen Weisselberg,” says Mary Trump, the member of the family who has famously turned on the clan. Next up, Brian Beutler, editor-in-chief of Crooked Media, shares his big idea for getting a new voting rights bill passed in the Senate—without Republican votes. And climate specialist David Roberts explains how the hell part of the Gulf of Mexico caught on fire.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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New York City mayoral candidate Eric Adams, Black anti-racist, pro-cop former cop, is a walking anomaly. “There's an entire group of voters who aren't being represented here. And I think Eric Adams kind of represents what they want,” data scientist David Shor tells Molly Jong-Fast on this episode of The New Abnormal. Plus, the two also discuss how Dems can keep their majority in the House, and why this state election may actually be a good indicator if they’ll be able to pull it off.

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So House Majority Kevin McCarthy says he’ll strip committee assignments from any Republican who deigns to serve on Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Jan. 6 select commission. The New Abnormal co-host Molly Jong-Fast wants to know: Can he actually do that? Not by himself, says NBC News reporter Jonathan Allen. “In order for Kevin McCarthy to make good on this threat, Nancy Pelosi would have to allow a House floor vote on whether to take Liz Cheney off of her committees, as punishment for joining Pelosi’s select committee on Jan. 6.” Also on the show, comedian Andy Levy joins Molly and co-host Jesse Cannon to talk about Meghan McCain’s exit from The View—“a victory for passive-aggressive hairstylists”—and where she’ll go next. Finally on the episode, lawyer Daniel Goldman, who served as general counsel for former President Trump’s impeachment trial, weighs in on the new charges for Trump Organization CFO Allen Weiselberg and what it means for Trump and the rule of law.

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Washington Post reporters Yasmine Abutaleb and Damien Paletta join to discuss all the juicy and terrifying details from their book, Nightmare Scenario, which recounts how the Trump administration responded during COVID. Plus! Dr. Peter Hotez goes over the effectiveness of the vaccines against the variants and Reason’s Editor at Large Nick Gillespie tries to explain why Trump is the right’s God and Biden is the enemy of drug lovers, including himself.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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In this bonus episode of The New Abnormal, historian Kevin Kruse makes the case that Republicans might actually agree with Critical Race Theory if they actually knew what it was. Oh, and those angry parents protesting it just might be plants.

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Would you be willing to be arrested for something if you didn’t know what it was? Would you vote against it? Would you stake your party’s chances in the 2022 midterms on it? This week in Loudoun County, Virginia, a furious man was arrested for trespassing following a raucous school board meeting that erupted into protests against critical race theory and a policy on transgender students. “These people are willing to get arrested, to protest something that isn’t being taught to their kids and that they couldn’t define if their lives depended on it,” Medhi Hasan tells co-host Molly Jong-Fast and producer Jesse Cannon on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. Then, The Washington Post’s economics reporter Jeff Stein joins the episode to talk about the new bipartisan infrastructure bill that actually looks like it just might pass.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Not if, but when. “By this time next year, we will be talking about which way the Supreme Court chose to functionally end abortion rights in which states. That's going to be the conversation a year from now,” Elie Mystal, The Nation’s justice correspondent, tells Molly Jong-Fast on the latest edition of The New Abnormal. “That is just what's going to happen.”But here’s the thing. The Court’s conservative majority won’t come out and say that’s what they’re doing. They’ll be sneaky about it. Then, Anne Nelson joins the show to talk about her book Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right. And Andrew Zimmern talks about how he and his fellow star chefs helped convince Washington to rescue the restaurant business when the pandemic threatened to end it.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes it's just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Brian Stelter, CNN media reporter and author of Hoax, knows way too much about Fox News. He joins Molly Jong-Fast in this bonus episode to tell her how the network has changed since the election and Jan. 6, the battle with Newsmax for viewers and news about Fox’s Decision Desk Director that may or may not be public yet.

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The president’s adviser is falling all over himself to kiss his boss’ ass. “Mr. President, we’re all so proud to work for you. You’re saving the world!” It sounds like something you could imagine Jared Kushner would say to Donald Trump. But the groveler in question is none other than Henry Kissinger, and the occupant of the White House is Richard Nixon. Yes, Trump is a descendent of Nixon’s, says former Spy magazine editor and Studio 360 host Kurt Andersen, whose new podcast is called Nixon at War. Also on the episode, New Yorker writer Susan Glasser joins Molly and co-host Jesse Cannon to dissect President Biden’s trip to Europe and summit with Vladimir Putin, and whether Democrats’ hopes for their Senate majority were all foolishness. Finally, on the episode, hilarious viral phenomenon Crackhead Barney and Drew Rosenthal join Jesse and Molly to break down their approach to MAGA rallies, how she was committed to a psych ward in Staten Island, why they think they’re going to get beat up one day, why they want to interview Thomas Markle, and how the Proud Boys greeted them.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Attorney General Merrick Garland has been busy lately. In this episode of The New Abnormal, Molly Jong-Fast chats with FBI agent Peter Strzok about “Watergate on crack” aka these Trump DOJ subpoenas. Plus! Journalist Francesca Fiorentini takes on America’s hypocrisy and Sen. Alex Padilla (CA-D) drops the mic about the immigration debate.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Former Biden Coronavirus advisor Andy Slavitt joins this week’s bonus episode guest on The New Abnormal to talk about the people who are vaccine-hesitant, but not exactly anti-vax, what Biden’s next steps are, and what we can do to make sure we don’t face global pandemic again.

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“Everything’s a question mark, because we no longer live in a democracy. We live under the tyranny of Joe Manchin,” says Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) of the current state of Congress. The congressman, who represents “America’s most impoverished district,” New York’s 15th, joins Molly Jong-Fast on the latest episode of The New Abnormal to talk about why making President Biden’s child tax credit permanent could be his administration’s greatest legacy. But it all rests in the hands of a single—tyrannical—senator. Also on the show, Andy Slavitt, Biden’s outgoing coronavirus adviser and author of the new book Preventable, says it would be “healthy for us to try to hold to account not just the president, but ourselves, each other” after 600,000 COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. Former Missouri secretary of state and Majority 54 podcast host Jason Kander also goes in-depth with Molly—who asks how Democrats can possibly take back red states “if we can’t get people like you to run? No pressure.” Tune in for his response and what we can learn from Georgia.

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It was unhinged, even by Trumpworld standards. In the dying days of the Donald’s administration, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows asked the Justice Department to investigate a bizarre conspiracy theory, that an Italian defense contractor somehow swung the election to Joe Biden. Emails between Meadows and the DOJ were uncovered over the weekend. And there’s likely to be more to come. This is only “tip of the iceberg of all the crazy stuff that went on this winter,” George Conway tells Molly Jong-Fast on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. “These guys were doing some wild, wild stuff. And it wasn't just the campaign and the kooky campaign hangers-on, and the lawyers who were working on the campaign, like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell. This stuff was going on in the White House.” Plus! Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel talks about the militia movement, which has become so alarmingly potent in her state. And Dallas high school valedictorian Paxton Smith describes the reaction to her instantly-viral speech against Texas’ new anti-abortion law.

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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You know those lawn signs that say things like “Hate has no home here” or “Water is life?” Well, Thomas Frank, author of The People, No: A Brief History of Anti-Populism cannot stand those signs. In this bonus episode of TNA, he tells Molly Jong-Fast about how liberalism is going in the wrong direction—and what we can do to actually get sh*t done.

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What does Joe Manchin want? That’s what Molly Jong-Fast, co-host of The New Abnormal, wants to know—along with “what the fuck is wrong” with him. Because of the West Virginia senator, Democrats can’t say they have the majority in the Senate. “Unfortunately, that’s the way they have to look at it,” she says. “It’s totally screwy. We are in this weird conundrum of our own Democratic making. End the filibuster to push through top Democratic legislative priorities? Forget about it, because Manchin doesn’t want to do it. The Daily Beast’s congressional reporter, Sam Brodey, joins the podcast’s latest episode to offer insight on what makes the senator tick—and what might possibly move him on the all-important filibuster. Also on the show, comedian Andy Levy laments the passing of Donald Trump’s blog and says the former commander in chief was undone by the “media he hates so much,” with reporters tweeting about his posts and thereby robbing him of vital traffic. Later in the episode, writer Sasha Issenberg talks about how same-sex marriage was “the dominant culture war issue for a long period of time. And now I think we look back at it as the most significant civil rights breakthrough of this millennium.”

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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Mike Lindell, the MyPillow CEO and Trumpist conspiracy-peddler, flew his private jet to the Republican Governors’ Association meeting the other day. The guvs promptly threw him out. But the incident got Molly Jong-Fast thinking: does the MyPillow CEO think he’s already a governor or something? Lindell claims he wouldn’t “run to be a dogcatcher right now,” because he doesn’t trust the voting machines. Plus! Politico’s Tara Palmeri talks about her search to find Liz Cheney supporters in Wyoming. And Battle for the Soul author Edward-Isaac Dovere gives us a peek into how Biden sees the political landscape.If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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It’s “the most serious threat to the core underlying principles of American democracy since at least the Civil War.” And Joe Biden is barely doing a thing to stop it. “We are seeing a threat to the integrity of the 2022 and 2024 elections—and the ability of Americans to cast a vote—that is unfolding across multiple dimensions,” The Atlantic’s Ron Brownstein tells Molly Jong-Fast on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. “Amid all of this, you've heard very, very little from Biden presenting this as a threat to democracy.”

If you haven't heard, every single week The New Abnormal does a special bonus episode for Beast Inside, the Daily Beast’s membership program. where Sometimes we interview Senators like Cory Booker or the folks who explain our world in media like Jim Acosta or Soledad O’Brien. Sometimes we just have fun and talk to our favorite comedians and actors like Busy Phillips or Billy Eichner and sometimes its just discussing the fuckery. You can get all of our episodes in your favorite podcast app of choice by becoming a Beast Inside member where you’ll support The Beast’s fearless journalism. Plus! You’ll also get full access to podcasts and articles. To become a member head to newabnormal.thedailybeast.com

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It’s “the most serious threat to the core underlying principles of American democracy since at least the Civil War.” And Joe Biden is barely doing a thing to stop it. “We are seeing a threat to the integrity of the 2022 and 2024 elections—and the ability of Americans to cast a vote—that is unfolding across multiple dimensions,” The Atlantic’s Ron Brownstein tells Molly Jong-Fast on the latest episode of The New Abnormal. “Amid all of this, you've heard very, very little from Biden presenting this as a threat to democracy.”

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