Zohran Mamadani's Stunning Primary Victory in NYC: The Future of Democrat Politics?

And we're live. Welcome back to LOOPcast. It's Tom, Eric, and Josh. Of course, LOOPcast brought to you by The Loop, every American Catholic's favorite morning newsletter. Go ahead and grab it if you haven't already. We've got a full show for you today. There was, I'd say, a pretty stunning victory in the New York City primary election. Josh, you get to get on your hobby horse about ranked choice voting being very annoying, although I don't think it actually played much of a factor here, surprisingly.

It was pretty shocking. A lot of people are saying potentially the future of the Democratic Party. Cuomo ran a very... Tried and true playbook. In that region, it did not pan out, so we're going to get into all the results there. We have updates about the ceasefire, about choice words used to the media. I think I actually internally slacked as any president used F-bomb to the media like that, and so I was like, well, not while there's been TV, Tom. So, I was like, okay, well, now that I remember.

So, we got all the updates there, but of course, with every show, we have good news for you, and then I also have a request that I need some feedback probably from the chat. Also, over email, but in the comment section as well. So, I'll tease that a little bit. We'll get to it later, but welcome to everyone here in the chat. I see we have a Detroiter in there. Awesome. We do this Monday, Wednesday, Friday, 11 a.m. Eastern time, but before we get into that, while we're able to do the show, shout out to Charity Mobile.

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I am absolutely against rent freezing, but I am absolutely for locking in anything in my budget, any item in my own budget. Thank you. I was really tempted to make that joke. Hey, well, I just succumbed to that temptation for you, so you didn't know. I would not like to associate the wonderful people at Charity Mobile with the socialism that is upon us, the impending socialism in New York City, unless the funniest mayor of all time, Eric Adams, somehow pulls something out of the hat here.

But yeah, this was a very interesting... This is kind of a fun election for, say, like, politics nerds, so I'm happy to have Josh here. I was reading some real niche takes on the electorate, rank choice voting, what's going on, but the New York Times provided this map for us to help understand, you know, what just happened in New York City, the primary election. And I'd say a few things really jump out at me here. If you filter by category... So, you have Andrew Cuomo and Zorhan Mamdani.

I am going to get into his background a little bit, but he is 33. He was not born in the country. He was born in Uganda, and then he moved to South Africa, and then he moved to the United States. He became a nationalized citizen in 2018, I believe, two years before he started working in the government. He was an assemblyman, which is funny because, like I said, I have been reading about Theodore Roosevelt, who was an assemblyman. I cannot think of two different.

Two slightly different guys. Two more different individuals. But they're both assemblymen. But what really stuck out to me is, by medium income, lower income went plus 13 for Cuomo, and the middle income and higher income actually went for Mamdani. And if you go Like, precinct to precinct here, Mandani really swept the floor in areas that people like Cuomo should be winning. In majority white areas, in wealthy areas, it was actually a lot of the lower-income areas that were supporting Cuomo, and I think it is...

Why is that surprising to you? It's not shocking at all. Maybe it's not surprising, but I think that speaks to the type of campaign that Mandani ran. He ran on social issues. He focused very... Like, internally on New York City, in terms of cost of living, in terms of making things free, which people always love, and Cuomo ran a much more traditional, you know, got endorsed by the New York Times half-heartedly, he got endorsed by the Clintons, the Jewish groups, you know, Bloomberg, yeah, he went and got very, like, blue chip, and he made it about Trump.

He's like, I'm going to stand up to Trump. I mean, I cannot believe that they ran him again, but this seems to be kind of a A tendency now of the modern establishment Democratic Party to just run insane, scandal-ridden, old candidates, and clearly the message was sent here. I think Mondani was polling as little as 1% in early surveys of the race, pretty much an unknown quantity before this. So, Josh, do you have anything that really jumps to you? Instead of Cuomo, if they would have just gone with a generic, moderate to liberal, by New York City standards, establishment Democrat that didn't have the scandal plague that Andrew Cuomo had, I think such a candidate would have won, would have carried the day.

At the end of the day, the rank choice thing didn't seem to play that much of a factor. I mean, he won a humongous victory. He won by almost 10 points or whatever. I mean, this is astounding. But it just shows you the transformation of Brooklyn. I mean, it used to be, you know, Manhattan was pretty crazy politically, but now Brooklyn, too, and all these people.

It just drives me kind of up the wall crazy. Like, you know, like, no one's more, this is what New York's about than some idiot that moved in from Ohio nine months ago. And so, you get these white liberal progressive, you know, professionals who, you know, work for the, you know, all these corporations, but they're like, their politics are so communist, because they came out of our colleges and stuff like that. And so... Well, I have a stat for you, Josh.

40% of New York City right now is foreign-born. Not, you know, first-generation immigrant or second-generation. It is foreign-born, not born in the country, now live in New York City. Right, so you mix that with upper-middle-class white liberals who moved to New York City that are subsidized by their parents, and you have got an absolute, you know, hellhole of politics, and you elect somebody like this.

Some of the people on Twitter are going, oh, 25 years, less than 25 years after 9-11, you've got this jihadist or whatever elected mayor. It's like, no, no, no, no, no. Yes, he's Muslim, but he's, you know, he's. It cracks me up. Yeah, he's about as pro-queer as you can get. He is communist, though, and he's been very supportive of communist candidates before. This is a legitimate freakout.

Andrew Cuomo might still run. He might still run as an independent. Eric Adams is the current mayor. He's running as an independent. So, who knows what's going to happen in this race? I still feel like, you know, it's a wild card. Ultimately, though, being the Democratic nominee is an advantage.

Massive advantage. And he's got all the momentum, and he's got the buzz, and that is incredible for a candidate. And so, at the end of the day, I think what you might see here is, you know, people are like, well, this is going to be a terrible fallout.

If you're the Republican candidate for governor in New Jersey, you are smiling today. That's right. I mean, come on, dude. He's like, hello, everyone in Staten Island, just come on over. The water's warm, you know? I think one of the promises was to increase the corporate tax rate to New Jersey's level.

Right. So, now, I mean, you know, again, New York City, you know, you wonder if Again, he wants to socialize the grocery stores and the bodegas. I mean, this guy, I don't know how much of his agenda he'll actually be able to enact, but if he does, people like Wall Street should just move to Florida. I mean, just get out.

Horrific, but I mean, because, I mean, my brother's a big businessman. He, you know, does deals with people all the time, and he says, so far, it still makes sense to have. Wall Street in New York, because you've got all these, they're all just centrally located or whatever, but it's not a forever thing. You could imagine a scenario in 20 years where it's like, yeah, New York City is a shell of itself in the financial segment, and if you don't have these corporations there anymore to bleed dry, then yeah.

Yep. The spigot's going to be turned off if they leave, and there won't be. Ron DeSantis is laughing. He's like, come on. Let's go. Ron DeSantis gave a press conference after it was announced. I think it was just this morning he got up, and he was like, well, we're here, and it's going to be great for Florida. He even joked he thought West Palm Beach rent was expensive before today. Right. There were people from Florida who were on there posting like, Our real estate market is already crazy.

You just made it worse. But I do think we're going to see an exit. Sorry, I'm just going to jump in for a second. I do think that we are going to, because Josh, as you pointed out, the Democratic candidate for mayor of New York City, it's kind of a shoo-in. And not only that, but if you have, not always, not driver's seat, but not only that, you have Eric Adams and Andrew Cuomo possibly splitting any opposition to Mamdami if they can't.

One of them should drop out and just put everyone behind the other, or find someone else for heaven's sake. But I think that anyone in New York who has the means to do so, move your business. They're going to move their business out if they can before November, and before this just hits the fan. It's unbelievable. Yeah, we're looking at... My favorite, of course, are the government-run grocery stores, because we not only have... We have so many examples of how this is...

So bad. I mean, people are going to be taking trips to New Jersey grocery stores and being like Boris Yeltsin when he visited American grocery stores, and it was like, oh, look at all the vegetables. Yeah, this is like animation here. This is what could be going.

Grocery prices are out of control. The cost of eggs and milk has skyrocketed. Some stores are even using dynamic pricing, jacking up the cost over the course of a day, depending on what they can get away with. It doesn't need to be this way. I'm Zahram Mandani, and as mayor, I will create a network of city-owned groceries. It's like a public option for produce. We will redirect city funds from corporate supermarkets to city-owned grocery stores, whose mission is lower prices, not price gouging.

These stores will operate without a profit motive or having to pay property taxes or rent, and we'll pass on those savings to you. Nobody operates without a profit motive. That is just human condition, 101. Oh, my gosh. And everyone works with incentives. Like, that is the idea. So, non-profit still operates with incentives. Governments operate with incentives. Like, this idea that, oh, we are just doing this out of the goodness of our heart. Yeah, Mother Teresa does, but everyone else can shut up.

But here is the thing. I like to quote that from Garry Kasparov. Socialism is like polio. It comes back when people forget. The horrible damage it did last time. That is absolutely true. So, some of the other crazy, I mean, the platform is nuts. I think the average person looks at this and is like, okay, so immediate rent freeze for rent-stabilized tenants covering 1 million New Yorkers, transportation, free city buses, increased subway service, improved public transit, universal childcare, city-owned grocery stores, as we said, $30 an hour minimum wage by 2030, 2% tax on residents earning over a million annually, raising the corporate tax rate to 11.5, that matches New Jersey's rate.

Those would require state approval. The least problematic, yeah. Right. So, Department of Community Safety, for those curious what that is, that is abolished NYPD, basically. I think he's publicly called for that. 800% increase in the city's anti-hate crime budget, investments in mental health programs. I believe he's called for not cooperating with ICE as well, so Trump-proofing New York City, supporting LGBTQ rights, including access to what's called reproductive health care, including... Gender affirming care, gender mutilation surgeries for children as well. I mean, it is like the craziest stuff you've ever heard, but I do think there's a bigger message here.

I think Andrew Cuomo was a bad candidate. There's no question about it. No doubt. However, to me, I think it was really smart of this guy to focus on cost of living issues. And the campaign that he run was clearly very organic. He's very well-spoken. If you just go Google a sample speech, extremely charismatic. Josh, we talked about this, like the AOC, he's backed by AOC, the initiative by Democrats to go find young, charismatic, well-spoken, essentially actors, for lack of a better word, even if they don't have the traditional blue chip experience.

And he is literally an actor. He literally was a rapper. Right, like he's a rapper. And he made fun of it, but Reagan was an actor before him. I actually... Donald Trump. Exactly. I think the lesson here, actually, is I don't know if Democrats have the will to exercise this out of their party. Clearly, they're still operating under the very unsatisfying to the public... Here's the thing. What their understanding is... Politics, a critical component of politics is communicating through mass media and through social media to a large segment of voters, whereas if you are an average Republican and you get elected to the legislature and then maybe Congress or something like that, you are basically just going to the chicken dinner circuit, and you are meeting with all the nice little guy, you know, grandmas and all the dudes that are like, you know.

Running the local parties and making sure, oh, yeah, I'll make sure I care about the wetlands legislation. Okay, yeah, you know, the DNR, yeah, yeah, okay. And you're just, you know, you're doing those talking points or whatever, and then you go to the general election and, you know, a lot of these districts.

Where Republicans run, or Democrats run, are, you know, once you win the primary, you're going to win the general, likely. And so, you don't, a lot of Republican candidates don't have the chops to handle, like, media. And so, they just get elected, and they're, like, going through the motions, and it's sort of like, it sort of reminds me of, like, athletes.

If you ever mention Bull Durham, and the guy gets out there, and the reporter asks him a question. This is Tim Robbins' character, and he just says what he feels like, and the truth, and the reporter goes, what? And it becomes like a big splash. Teammates are upset. The other players are, and then crash the Kevin Costner's candidate. It's like, dude, what are you doing? You don't tell him that. You just say, we're all working together as a club. This is great.

All these nothingness. Bland words, the reporter has nothing to use, because you don't want it. They want to stir up controversy, right? And so, you get these risk-averse athletes. Well, we have risk-averse Republican politicians who are just like, they don't know what to do. They just, oh, I'm just going to, and they say nothing. So, this AOC, that organization that came and brought her up, was like, let's find people who are energetic, who are passionate, and you can give them some talking points, and they're...

I think AOC's policies are horrible. Right. You want people who can actually express what they're saying. So, to your point, Tom, this candidate for mayor of New York City, what's his name again? Zoran Mamdani. Mouthful. At least extremely energetic. He knows how to communicate, and he focused on, as you say, pocketbook issues, people that cost a living stuff. Of course, his ideas are… Like rat poison. Right, but at least... Absolutely horrible. Right. But I feel like they're being hurt. Yeah. But yes, but voters responded because they thought this guy, hey, at least he's got, he's talking about what matters, and he's coming up with some ideas.

Now, I think, again, I think his ideas are rat poison, but... Kudos for at least trying to get out there and talk about it. Yeah, lessons here, though. I think lessons here for Republicans of the future, who just want to go back to the way it was before pre-Trump.

Yeah, and I think, too, I was digging in addition to the social media campaign, which was super effective, and like you said, he has the riz, as the kids say. But Olivia Rheingold over at Free Press, who called this back in March because she's been following it, so just shout out to Olivia. But he also had an incredible grassroots ground campaign going on at the same time. So, he built, it says in her coverage, she says, he built an army of volunteers that grew to over 50,000 people, and they knocked on 1.5 million doors throughout New York City, steamrolling Cuomo, whose campaign had virtually no field operation until just a few weeks ago, when Fix the City, a super PAC, began to put together a team of paid and unpaid canvassers.

Like, he just blew out of the water on the boots on the ground work. As well, and I think that the youthful energy has a lot to do with that. Now, I wanted to ask Josh about this, though. So, some people are saying, they're like analyzing what went down, and they're projecting forward into Democrat campaigns over the next few years, saying that this win from Mamdani, especially if he actually becomes mayor of New York City in November, that this will basically end.

End the establishment Democrats. Like, it's going to end Gavin Newsom as any recognizable names, and it's just going to elevate that far left. So, this New York City race, because of his success, somehow it's going to, like, shift the Overton window again. I don't know. What are your thoughts on that? Does this say anything about Senate races, midterms, or presidential in 28? It doesn't give us a whole lot to go with. I mean, the idea that it's going to destroy establishment.

Democrats, you know, I think is a foolhardy response. The one thing I would say about this is that if you're Chuck Schumer, you're scared to death. Because this is just, AOC is like, well, I should run for, you know, I'm thinking, if I'm hurt, run for Senate against Chuck Schumer, take him out, because there's a big appetite for drastic political change for a lot of Democrats in New York.

So, if it moves the Democratic Party further to the left in the city of New York and in the state of New York, it opens up several opportunities. I think there is an opportunity for a Republican to get elected governor in New York. Again, it's not a slam dunk. It's still going to be tough, because a lot of Republicans in New York left and moved to Florida.

Yeah. But New York City is not San Francisco. It's not, you know, it actually is more conservative, quote unquote, than many of the large cities in the country. I mean, I said, I thought that in all throughout the... 90s and up until about 10 10 years ago but the influx over the last 10 years into brooklyn by all these lefties is pretty significant so um if cuomo could have staved off and pulled off a victory i wouldn't might have agreed with you but this is this is pretty this is a pretty radical candidate and he got 40 what three percent 44 percent of the vote is pretty resounding victory so You know, yes, New York City used to be like that, but I don't know if that New York isn't around anymore.

Yeah. Remains to be seen. Eric Adams is doing his best, making his favorite cocktail, the tap water in New York City. That was hilarious. Oh, my God. He posted the equivalent of rise and grind to his story after this victory, which is just, he's the funniest man, I think, in politics, outside of Trump, probably. Well, Eric Adams, you know, his chances went up because I think it was Cuomo, Cuomo wins easy. Yeah. But now Eric Adams can say, you don't want this psychopath.

Yeah. And the next thing he should do tomorrow is offer Kurt. Is Siwa, I think, like a position in the cabinet? Like, hey, come on. No, it's not really needs to. I don't think it needs to. I mean, look, Curtis Silva's done a lot of good things, but I just don't see him getting any traction. So, it's really.

You know, if Eric Adams' play here is to try to do what it takes to convince Cuomo not to run, so that he's got the bulwark of the non-communist vote. Right. Yeah. It's going to be wild. It will be interesting to see. So, we got some updates. Trump's actually at a NATO summit today, and we had a ceasefire deal. So, a lot of this is happening so fast. Since the last time we were all together here at the LOOPcast, we left off with...

Some people didn't like our thoughts on that, too, by the way. You know what? I'll push back. I had some really nice... I think people might disagree, but I think they appreciate that we are approaching it really authentically, and maybe disagree on some things, but I think it's very clear that we're just being honest about what we know and don't know at this point, and so I'd like to continue to provide that coverage. So, I want to encourage you guys a little bit.

I did get some going. Of course, I got some crazies, but I got some really nice feedback. So, since we last met... So, we had hit Iran. We had just detailed Operation Midnight Hammer, I believe was the name of it. Right. And right after recording, Iran apparently coordinated strikes against the U.S. base in Qatar with the Qatar government, a.k.a. with the United States. So, basically, you know, there was no casualty intentionally done that way. And so, that kind of left us off.

See, so then I think, hold on, I think we should explain that to some of our listeners because I think, you know, like I explained that to my wife and she said, I don't, what, that doesn't make any sense. Sure. Iran wanted to be able to show, hey, we're bombing this base, this U.S. base in Qatar, like to their own people. Retaliation. We're going to retaliate. We're not just going to take the attack, you know, we need to respond. But they, yeah, but they telegraphed it to Qatar and they said, hey, we're going to do this.

Which they did the same thing after Soleimani was taken out in 2020. Exactly. And Qatar tells the U.S., hey, by the way, they're doing this. And so, like, 13 missiles flew over. We took out 12 of them, and one landed, and it didn't do any damage, really. Right. And just following that attack, Trump immediately posts on Truth Social that Iran has, quote, gotten it out of their system now, and there will hopefully be no further hate. And also thanked Iran for providing early notice of the attack.

And. It's just, it was a very strange sort of sequence of events Monday afternoon. Okay, so that's where we are, Erika. I think Trump needed to say that to make sure his hardcore base wasn't like, why do they attack us? We need to level them. Like, no, no, no. Well, no, they still said that, by the way. I know some of them did, but Trump was kind of calming the temperature, which was good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so that's where we left off, Erika.

Now, where do we go? Okay, so then we get this. We get this amazing true social post from the president. Congratulations to everyone, all caps. It has been fully agreed by and between Israel and Iran that there will be a complete and total ceasefire, all caps, in approximately six hours from now. And he goes into the details for 12 hours, at which point the war will be considered ended, all caps. Officially, Iran will start the ceasefire, and upon the 12th hour, Israel will start the ceasefire.

And then he goes, more details, more details. During the ceasefire, the other side will remain peaceful and respectful on the assumption that everything works as it should, which it will. I would like to congratulate both countries, Iran and Israel, on having the capital stamina, courage, and intelligence to end what should be called the 12-day war.

And then he just goes, I mean, God bless Israel, God bless Iran, God bless the Middle East, God bless the United States of America, and all caps, God. Bless the world. I saw this, and I was like, what is happening? Because I tried to take the day off yesterday, and Todd's like, did you see this? The ceasefire? And I'm like, last I knew, Iran was bombing our troops. So, here are the details.

The ceasefire was scheduled to begin at 12 a.m. Eastern, so mid-morning of the 25th Iran time. Until then, Israel and Iran were allowed, or Trump allows them to complete any final military missions that were already in progress, and this is where it gets a little bit dicey, right? So, Iran had to do a ceasefire for 12 hours. Israel would then join the ceasefire for 12 hours, and after the full 24-hour ceasefire, They would declare peace at 12 a.m. Eastern, 626. Then we get this from Israel.

Netanyahu's office releases a statement. The ceasefire was set to begin at 7 a.m. this morning. At 3 a.m., Israel forcefully attacked the heart of Tehran. They struck regime targets, eliminated security force personnel. They said these were missions they'd already had in place. Shortly after the ceasefire took effect, Iran then launched a barrage of missiles, one of which took the lives of four of our Israeli citizens. The ceasefire then took effect at 7 a.m. At 7.06, Iran launched a missile at Israeli territory, and two more at 10.25.

These missiles were intercepted, fell to the ground, no casualties, damages. So, that was from Israel. According to Reuters, take it or leave it, Iran fired at least six missile barrages at Israel in the hours leading up to the ceasefire and six minutes after the ceasefire. As Netanyahu said, multiple casualties were reported. Israel then launched planes, which were flying towards Iran with, we assume, a payload. So, we get the president back on Truth Social.

Let's see what the president said. This is crazy. This is international relations in 2020. Israel is not going to attack Iran. All planes will turn around and head home while doing a friendly plane wave to Iran. That's awesome. Nobody will be hurt. The ceasefire is in effect. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Donald J. Trump, president of the United States, all caps. This is how we do global order now.

Two minutes later, we get all caps. Two minutes later, we get all caps. Israel, do not drop those bombs. If you do, it is a major violation. Bring your pilots home now. Donald J. Trump, President of the United States.

This was how we did it, and they did. They turned the planes around. There was no bombing of Iran after the ceasefire. So, as of this moment, I expect we will get off of this broadcast. We will go onto Twitter and realize that everything got blown out of the water. Wait a minute. It's almost like Israel doesn't control the U.S. government, as all conspiracy theorists say. We're the ones telling the Israeli government to stop. So, it turns out we could have told them the entire time, apparently, but you do get this very contentious.

Oh, my gosh. I'm not... Like, at this point, if you haven't seen this, I don't know what to tell you. Maybe cover the kids' ears or something. But this is straight off C-SPAN, as you see, 43.8... We're not censoring this, so plug your ears if you... Right, plug your ears if you're... I mean, it's the President of the United States on C-SPAN. He is mad. This is bigly mad.

Yeah, I do. They violated, but Israel violated it, too. Israel, as soon as we made the deal, they came out and they dropped a load of bombs, the likes of which I've never seen before. The biggest load that we've seen. I'm not happy with Israel. You know, when I say, OK, now you have 12 hours, you don't go out in the first hour and just drop everything you have on them. So, I'm not happy with them. I'm not happy with Iran either.

But I'm really unhappy if Israel is going out this morning because of one rocket that didn't land, that was shot. Perhaps by mistake, that didn't land. I'm not happy about that. You know what? We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don't know what the f*** they're doing. Do you understand that?

He's so mad. I saw people on Twitter, like, he wasn't even this mad after he got shot. Yeah, really. That's true. Well, because he knew he was going to get reelected after that. Okay, so this is where we're at. That's where we're at. As of time of recording, ceasefire is out, correct?

As of the time we got on this episode, the ceasefire is holding at the moment. Again, I fully expect something else to happen this afternoon, but right now, we seem to have done what Rubio and Vance were saying Trump wanted to do. We went in, we hit three targets, everything's blowing up, people are like, oh my gosh, World War III, here we go, it's the end of everything, and then we get a ceasefire. Now, J.D. Vance.

J.D. Vance was at a dinner in Ohio, and he basically says that Trump's response to this was what, this is Vance, what I call the Trump doctrine. It's quite simple. Number one, you articulate a clear American interest, and that's, in this case, that Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. Number two, you try to aggressively, diplomatically solve that problem. And number three, when you can't solve it diplomatically, you use overwhelming military power to solve it, and then you get the hell out of there before it becomes a protracted conflict.

That position. is frankly very popular with the American people, I would imagine. And J.D. Vance, because everyone was like, okay, so J.D. Vance, you're the Marine, you served in Iraq, you were so upset with the neocons, and now you're defending Trump's military actions. J.D. Vance could not be happier than the way this is going so far, that it so far has not involved or protracted. You know, effort, and if this piece holds, Vance will feel vindicated, like, yes, this is what we want.

We want to strike, get the job done, and then don't get into a 2003. Iraq quagmire, or 2001 Afghan quagmire. Right, and if this holds, I mean, Trump will have done what no president has been able to do since, I mean, since the Ayatollahs took over, right? Like, you think of Jimmy Carter, you think of H.W., you think of...

The Iraq war with W. Bush, Obama, right? I mean, every time we've gone over into the Middle East, it's turned into an absolute mess. Whereas, if in fact, we take out the nuclear program and get out, and there's a ceasefire, I mean, this could be, yeah, this is, it's amazing. It's amazing. The question, of course, that the media has is, well, did we actually take out the nuclear program that, you know, until five minutes ago, we were reporting didn't actually exist, because there's no way Iran's near a nuclear weapon.

Well, the only question would be, I mean. We take out the nuclear facilities. It is an open question whether those nuclear facilities were being rich for weapons, but the IAEA said that they were about 60%. The question then is, were they destroyed? Yeah, and so there was leaked intelligence, I guess, that got on CNN, and I think the press secretary confirmed that, I think they said like a low-level loser leaked it to the press or something, but they are saying that early...

...assessment of the battle damage was it didn't maybe damage it to the extent that they were hoping, but the administration pretty quickly shot back, like, okay, this is early. It's one of those things where we're not going to know immediately, certainly not immediately, but that just takes intelligence over time. So, I don't know, that whole debate was... I guess not as interesting to me, per se, because I'm just like, there's so few we can know right now, but the interesting thing you said, too, was I believe it was the Secretary General of NATO texted Trump, and he posted to his true social, and the text was so funny.

Gosh, it's like you laugh or you cry, man. It's just insane, and then I think, didn't he say, like, Daddy Trump? He's like... That's on video. That's on video. You're at the NATO conference, and it's the Assistant Secretary General. The president of the UN is sitting next to Trump, and he's explaining what's going on from his point of view. Oh, here we go. Can we just play it? I mean, what an unbelievable thing. You have to have a little bit of levity in these stories, because it's super heavy.

Yeah, here we go. In the private chat. We're going to do papers. I don't even know if you need them. They're not going to be fighting each other. They've had it. They've had a big fight, like two kids in a schoolyard. You know, they fight like hell. You can't stop them. Let them fight for about two or three minutes, then it's easier to stop them. And then Daddy has to sometimes use strong language. Yeah, strong language. Every once in a while, you have to use a certain word.

I think we have to join the house. Oh, man, this is going on in here. Daddy sometimes uses strong language. I mean, is this, I mean, my thought is that the Secretary General, is he trying to get more money out of Trump? Like, why is he, you know? He wants to make friends. Yeah, I mean, he's stroking his ego, I mean. What is, like, the classic Dave Chappelle skit is like, oh, NATO, you should sanction me. You and what army?

Don't have one. I mean, Trump walked into that NATO conference. He had just swung a very big stick in Iran. He walks in and he got exactly what he wanted. And they're about to sign today. They're going to sign. This agreement that the NATO countries are now going to spend 5% of their GDP on defense, instead of just relying on the United States to fund all of this. I mean, this is what he wanted to achieve, and it probably helped that he walked in having just, you know, dropped the payload down the chute in an Iranian nuclear facility.

Yeah. Every show, I say this at time of recording, of course, but at time of recording, don't be a panicking. In the words of a lesson continually learned, we'll see at time of live, hopefully nothing goes bad. But yeah, I mean, who knows what's going to happen next, but I will say it is hilarious to see foreign relations happen over true social in all caps. I'm signing off on his name, and I did see a trend online. Like, I texted my wife, who knows nothing about politics, the way that Trump communicates over truce, like, signed by what?

Wait, you texted your wife? In Trump-linked? Oh, yeah, let's go with that with the audience, dude. Okay, yeah, so I saw this trend of someone communicating with their significant other over text in the language of Trump, so I can pull up... As if they're Trump, yeah, that's good. Yeah, and so I pulled up, let me pull up my communication. So, I copied this trend, I can't take credit for it. And it was like, okay, you need to sign something when you get home.

It's on the fridge, and I said, in all caps, fantastic news, period. I will sign when I get home. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Thomas Pogacic, host of the LOOPcast. How'd that go? She just emphasized it. Very Gen Z of her. And you didn't sleep on the couch, so. No. She was happy that I was enthusiastic to sign whatever I had to sign on the fridge.

And funny, I still haven't done it yet, so I need to go home and do that stuff. But, yeah, that's where we're at today. So, okay, let's keep it moving here. We've got to go into the good news. Erika, what do you got? All right, so my good news, I always love to highlight when a bishop is just being awesome here in the United States, and the Awesome Bishop Award this week goes to Bishop James Conley. Sweet. And, yeah, he had this great thread on Twitter, and it comes from a very dark story.

Sometimes the best news... The light shines in the darkness and all that. So, there was a recent report that the University of Nebraska, there was a doctoral student who, to get the PhD, orchestrated a drag performance mocking the Catholic mass that is both disturbing and appalling, as the good bishop says. I mean, he just goes right out there. He's like, this is a blatant public display of faith-based discrimination. It led to the student earning a doctorate degree, and it reflects Poorly on the University of Nebraska, where Conley is the primate.

So, it's not just like, you know, spouting off on some random thing. It's faculty in our community. Our Nebraska community is better than that. There is no redeeming value in such a display of ignorance. Such discrimination would not be tolerated if directed at other religions. Why is it tolerated if the target is the Catholic faith? Then he talks about education should be about the good, the true, the beautiful, not lies, evil, and... Ugliness. So, and it just goes on. He came out swinging, and I love that it was a thread on X, because use the media.

That's where the people are. Communication is key. Shout out to our good shepherd, Bishop Conley. Many years, long life. We just asked for this. We asked for leadership from the bishops. There you go. Love to see you communicate it. It's all we need. Awesome.

Yeah, we have someone from Nebraska in the chat. Shout out, Nick. Very cool. Contacted state senator over at state senator and governor. Good for you, man. That's what the money is. It's a publicly funded university. Absolutely. You have every right to contact your representatives.

Josh. Well, I think it's good news. Riley Gaines is reporting that the Department of Education has found California in violation of Title IX for letting males compete in girls' sports. So, apparently, the California agencies have to restore records, titles, and awards to female athletes and send apology letters. Yes. Every girl robbed by this discrimination, this is fantastic news. So, I agree, Riley. Good job. Yep. Good job, Riley. Yeah, I saw Education Secretary McMahon there on, it was one of the morning talk shows, and she was talking about this, and the journalist asked her, well, what happens if they don't?

She goes, well, we'll just refer them to the DOJ, and they can take it from there. As they should. Sounds like the Department of Justice's job. As they should. Okay, my good news, a little personal. My parents celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary yesterday. Congratulations. Congratulations to my parents. They've been a wonderful example of marriage to me, and I'm super grateful for it. I've never known a world in which both my parents weren't in love and together, and I just really...

It was foundational to everything that I became today, and I have so much love and appreciation for them. So, shout out to my parents. I think that is some good news. That is great. So, I figured I would use my time to thank them for that. Okay, and then on the culture front, actually, I think you actually might be in the chat today. We got a great email. I want to read it. I sponsor and listen to the LOOPcast on Apple Podcasts for every show.

On extremely rare occasions, I get to the live show. I've had so many thoughts and comments over the years. I've even started emails that I never finish. As much as I love the LOOPcast and the three hosts, my commentary, concurrence, and disagreements just aren't that high on the priority list. Before you take that personally, understand I have a job, a small homestead, and serve in the Army National Guard, help homeschool our four kids, and number five. Number five is due any day now.

Congratulations. Hey, congratulations. So, yes, totally fair. I appreciate that you're using your time judiciously. All that being said, something that was important enough for this email. I finally had something that I felt must be discussed. The LOOPcast is one of the best shows I listen to, and it's also a great Catholic show. However, where is the prayer? I know we ask for the blessings at the end of every show, but as Catholic Podcast, I feel like you could help everyone with their daily habit of prayer by opening and or closing in a more robust way.

Prayer. I feel like I know the three of you well enough to assume that this conversation has already been had. Yes, it already has confirmed, but as a practicing Catholic, I feel like it would be a failure for me to have this personal revelation and not share it with you, so I'm taking this idea and throwing it to you. Feel free to take it and run or throw it right back. Nick. So, shout out to Nick. Thank you for this. Yes, this has been thought about on the show.

Thank you. I'm trying to think about a way to fit it in organically. And I thought the best question for this, because we talked about it internally, everyone loved the idea, and even when there's topics that we feel conflicted on or angry about, it gets kind of heated, we love ending with the blessing, and what we can always provide is opportunity for prayer. So, I wanted to shout out to everyone, especially there's a lot of people that have been listening for years now, which is crazy to say, who know the show really well, they know us very well, they know Catholic Votes Mission really well.

So, if you have suggestions for a prayer, I'm going to put a time limit on it, it can't be like insanely long, we can't do the vest. at the end of the show, but if you have good suggestions for what you feel like is very like LOOPcast, prayer that you think other people in the audience would appreciate, think we would appreciate, I'd like to start ending the show with that prayer. I'm open to even like changing it, but I think it'd be great to get one that is a suggestion, feels right, fits.

So, I'm going to throw that out there. Shoot me an email, LOOPcast at CatholicVote.org. You can leave it in the comments of this episode, wherever you are, YouTube, Spotify, etc. And then you can leave it in the live chat, too. Actually, I'll say save it and email it, because the live chat kind of comes and goes.

Yeah, I think it's a fantastic idea. I want to make that a thing. St. Michael's already getting a lot of votes. St. Michael's can't love. He is pretty awesome. Hard to argue with that. Family favorite. So, I'll throw it out there, and appreciate the question. So, moving on now to the church corner, we actually, I'm not sure if this is original Catholicville reporting, but I'll throw up. I was one of our writers here. I'll throw it up. So, the Department of Justice is suing Washington State over the law forcing priests to break the seal of confession.

Which is fantastic news. We covered this on an earlier show, and I've actually had a couple people ask for updates on this, and so it looks like we have our update here. The U.S. Department of Justice announced on Monday it filed legal action against the state of Washington challenging a controversial law that forces Catholic priests to violate the sacred confidentiality of the confessional. This bill, Senate Bill 5375 earlier this year, that requires clergy to report suspected child abuse even if such information is revealed solely during sacramental confession.

Canon law demands absolute silence regarding anything heard in the confessional, and violating that seal results in automatic excommunication. Obviously, putting priests in an impossible situation here. So, the Department of Justice is going to challenge this law, seeking to intervene in an ongoing case, Etienne v. Ferguson, arguing that the law violates both the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and I feel like this needs to be said. I thought this was implied.

The DOJ clarified that this is not challenging the inclusion of priests as mandatory reporters per se, but takes issue with any requirement that would compel priests. To report what is revealed exclusively during confession. Right. Guys, do you have any thoughts on this one?

Well, this is what I voted for, because a year ago, the DOJ was being weaponized against Catholics, and the Biden administration was using its fourth arm of government to try and force Catholics to violate their consciences, everything from participating in abortions if you were an emergency room doctor, to losing your job if you posted on X something that the government didn't like.

And this is a welcome change to see the DOJ doing its job to actually protect our First Amendment rights as Catholics. I am devastated that they have to do this, that we even have this come to pass, but this is something that states try and do regularly. And Josh, we've talked about this. They've tried this in Vermont. Bishop Coyne there fought it in Vermont. They've tried it in, I believe, Maryland was another one that was very recent. Washington, Oregon. This bill actually passed into law.

The governor was like, yay, I'm going to sign this. Catholic, supposedly. Yeah, supposedly Catholic. And, in fact, he said, it's because I'm Catholic, I'm signing. Oh, yes, of course. My Catholic faith compels me to sign this that would force Catholic priests to reveal what's seen in the confessional. And can I lay this up here? Because I actually had someone email in being like, I'm actually all for this. Like, if someone says that they abused a child in the confessional, that they should be punished, and that, you know, I'm fine with this law.

Like, what would you say back to? Well, first of all, if the person was not repentant, the priest is not. ...required to absolve them of their sins. So, just so we understand that, but it is so important that everyone know you can go to a priest and confess any sin. So, abusing children is horrific. Murdering somebody is even worse, I would think, but maybe you say they're equally evil, but no one's talking about that. Like, if you go to a priest and say, oh yeah, I murdered somebody.

He's not required to tell the authorities about it, precisely because we are worried about the soul, and that soul's eternal salvation. We don't want that person to burn in hell. We want them to be liberated from their sins. We need to know that everyone has the freedom to come to the priest and say anything and everything, and get it out of their system, and repent.

And confess every last one of their sins, you know, and of course, the priest would, you know, would try to get the penitent to not only, you know, repent truly of the horrific nature of it, but he's going to also try to encourage the person to give themselves up to authorities. Right. Precisely because, you know, like...

It's helpful, but it can't be that you would be worried going into the confessional that anything you say would be used against you in a court of law. That would be horrific, because then a lot fewer people would confess their crimes, and so then if fewer people are confessing their crimes because they're worried someone's going to spill the beans, then that's why this law doesn't work anyway, because the moment you start realizing, well, I'm not free to confess any of my sins because the guy's just going to turn around and tell everyone, then you're not going to get anyone to tell you anything.

So, it is like a cash 22 anyway. Exactly, and they know it does not work. This was clearly targeting Catholics and religion in that state because they still exempt the lawyer-client privilege, and they still exempt the doctor-patient privilege if an abuser speaks to a therapist or speaks to a doctor about it. They are still protected, so you know that the law is not about, oh my gosh, we have to save children here, because if it really, really was, they would, across the board, say that there is no privileged conversation, but they maintain privileged conversations for these people.

And I'm reading right now, I'm rereading Robert Royal's Catholic Martyrs of the 20th Century, and I'm in the chapters on Albania, Romania, these countries that were behind the Iron Curtain, where absolutely the Soviet communist governments. ...did not respect the seal of the confessional, and priests died for this. They would start off saying something like, well, we need you to break the seal of confessionals so we can catch these really bad criminals. Very shortly thereafter, it starts being like, well, we need you to break the seal of the confessional so you can rat out the granny next door who doesn't like Stalin, right?

It goes very quickly to everything else. It's not about the... The children. It is about targeting religion. It is about power. It is about power and manipulation and control. I know, B. So, go, DOJ. Let us do it.

And Francis in the chat makes up a good point. Like, if it was not clear what I said, yeah, the seal of confession would apply, even if you are not given absolution. So, I just want to make sure you are clear on that.

Sweet. Josh, you are first up for the Twilight Zone. Yeah, I mean, there's this lawmaker who's making it a point. She was advocating that we should have proxy votes for pregnant, for women, for young mothers, Brittany Pedersen. She's also, by the way, super pro-abortion, but she got other, some Republicans to sign off on her plan. But here she is, she's questioning the chairman of the Federal Reserve, and she's got her, like, you know, Toddler baby right there with her as she's asking questions.

I'm not sure if the video is going to play, but... Yeah, but I mean, again, it's like... Now, if you think about your time as a congressman, there are times where, you know, maybe you're in your office, and you're fielding phone calls or whatever, and you could maybe, you know, work with, you know, while you're with your baby or something like that. But when you're, there are other times where, you know, you set it aside. I mean, like, Erika has a young child, right?

And she's... Young children are not with me right now, you know. She's not with the kid out there in the Lucas. It's like... You know, you're at a hearing where the final chair. Yeah, I don't know what I'm going to do. Yeah.

Correct. I'm sorry, could you just briefly restate your question there? I apologize. Yes, I'm going to do this the best I can with Sam here. With our having to address inflation, as we've started to see it. You were able to decrease the rates. We were starting to go down a little bit. We were seeing that our economy was finally in a solid place. We're starting to see that you had to hold steady, whereas everyone was projecting before this administration came in with these changes that it was going to continue to go down.

Kids like spinning. Okay, so here's the thing about this. No one says you can't be a congressman. You can be a congressman. You can represent your district. Now, I would think if you have a kid this young, maybe you should have not, you know, take a beat, you know, resign, and take care of your kid for a couple years, and then come back. But even then, Congress has 18 hours a day daycare. Like, you can drop them off for a couple hours, do the hearing, and then come back, and then bring them to your office or whatever.

It's not like you, but again, it's because she wants to use him as a prop, and I'm sorry. Babies are ridiculously cute. Yeah. How can you concentrate? She's having a hard time concentrating on the question, and the Fed chairman's looking at this cute kid. I mean, the kid's cute. How could you not? Can you repeat the question? I was distracted, right? Yeah, well, of course, she was distracted, because I want to come up. I want to give the kid a hug.

So, again, I just think this is a vanity in politics. Can I ask what she was lobbying for, and then did she get it? Okay, so the other piece of this, why this is ridiculous, is that she's brought the kid there as a statement because she was lobbying for absentee voting in Congress, because she's like, I was postpartum, I couldn't get there for the votes, and you should have just let me vote from far away in my state so that I could do this.

And so now she brings the baby with her every time to just be like, see, we should have absentee voting. I have a baby. It's really hard to work. And you're like, no, like Josh said, we've made the accommodations. You have probably excellent child care there as part of your job provided for you. There's no reason you need to bring a baby to a two-hour hearing. I'm sorry. Right. I mean, we're already accommodating enough, and so I just think it's... Again, it's look at me, politics, you know, like somebody, you know, especially, you know, again, the mayoral candidate in New York City, too, like showing up at different events and screaming and yelling and stuff like that.

The Democrats have become sort of like the Savannah Bananas baseball team. They're just jumping around and all this performance and stuff like that, but they're not as entertaining. Oh, it's not exclusive to Democrats, Josh. Yeah, well, they're taking it to another level, and there's no question. It's not exclusive. I would say at the federal level, there are politicians that love- There's always showboats, but this is kind of ridiculous. Yeah. No, I agree in this instance, for sure. This is ridiculous. And then it makes you have to take the unpopular, like, oh, you're going to tell me I can't be with my baby?

It can't be whatever. You can just do your job. It was last time. All we ask you to do is show up and vote. And that was too much? If that's too much, what are we doing here? Really? I have to show up to my job every day, right? I pay you to show up to do this, to represent me, and you only do that half the time.

So, all right, I blew up there at the end. Erika? Angry populace, Tom. I'm torn, guys. Are we going to do Hamilton Guerrilla Theater, or are we going to do Bernie on Joe Rogan? I'm taking whatever one you don't have, because I actually don't have one today. Oh, okay, great. All right, well, then I'll do the Guerrilla Theater, because you probably didn't. I didn't see this one, but here we go. As many people might be aware, because I'm sure you follow Lin-Manuel Miranda assiduously.

I do not. Hashtag great and stunning. I've got to get out in front of that. I do not. The Hamilton 10th anniversary cast declined to appear at the Kennedy Center in the official performance of Hamilton for the 10th anniversary this summer because Trump, right? Trump is bad, evil, and he's the head of the board now.

But they figured out a way to do their show anyway. With Broadway tunes, this is from the New York Times this morning, Democrats protest Trump's takeover of Kennedy Center by going to the Kennedy Center and having a performance. This was hosted by five senators, one of whom my favorite, Pocahontas, during Pride Month. Oh, I thought you were going to say Chris Murphy. Oh, gosh. I don't know if he was there. I just saw Pocahontas and I got excited. Directed by the lead producer of Hamilton, an altered set of- Les Miserables, special lyrics.

Do you know what the lyrics were? Jumping on Trump. Yeah, the brave and stunning lyrics were, they did One Day More as the closing song, and they changed the lyrics to Folk Fun of the President, including the line, Why is this his favorite show?

It wasn't even funny. It wasn't even like, what? Stunning and brave. You know what? I mean, I love Les Miserables. It's probably my favorite musical. Right. Well, so the five senators, of course, they like, hashtag brave stunning, they had to contact the head of the Kennedy Center, the acting head of the Kennedy Center, Grinnell, Mr. Grinnell, to explain to him why they were doing what they were doing, because they just show up, and they said, we're going to do a talent show, and it ended up being this big, like, pride fest show.

The 90-minute concert was called Love is Love. A slogan used by the gay rights movement, in case you didn't know, and quoted by Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda when his show won the Tony Awards in 2016. So, the show included numbers from Hamilton, of course. They also had an appearance by the star and writer of I Am Harvey Milk, a new musical celebrating the life and legacy of Harvey Milk.

Pedophile. So, they contact Richard Grinnell, whom Trump installed as president. President of the Kennedy Center, and who has defended the administration's approach that June is no longer Pride Month. It's just like, let's just do art here. Mr. Grinnell is actually one of the most prominent gay appointees serving on the Trump administration.

Wait, is that Scott Besantz? No, it's just a different gay guy. It's just, the whole thing is just so infantile and dumb, but it's such brave. It's called Guerrilla Theater. I mean, do we have to say, like, the entire pride, like, whatever just possessed the White House for the last four was infantile and dumb? Like, there are gay people that work in the Trump administration, and yet somehow managed to not make that their entire identity, the reason that they're there. I deeply respect Scott Bessette.

I think he's a very intelligent man, and I've liked a lot of the things that he's been doing. I've heard once, maybe, that he was gay, and I didn't see him parading around the White House lawn during June saying that this is the greatest thing ever. It's like, oh, I actually just do my job.

That's why I'm here. But everything is through the lens of that identity politics, right? It's like, oh, we need to do gay economics. We have to have gay warfare. We have to have gay music. We have to have gay theater. You're like, no, let's just do the thing. We don't have to put a label on it.

Was it a Babylon Bee headline when they, they're like, okay, we dropped, it was Nikki Haley is progressive for dropping rainbow bombs. Like, it was like the bombs had fry loaves on them and she was like, oh my gosh. I love that slogan, though. Love is love. And I saw a good response that shows this photograph of two people. Kneeling down with straws into a toilet. Water is water.

Oh my gosh. Yeah, pretty quickly picked apart. Okay, I did catch a little bit of our boy Bernie on Rogan. I'm curious to see what you picked out, Erika. Yeah, so you're going to have to, this is for you, Pogo. We've got Bernie explaining why it's bad that Trump is suing CBS over the Kamala Harris interview, and Rogan just does a great job here. You got to go to 530. 532, to get that. 532. Yeah, go for it.

...saying was factually incorrect about the results of one of Trump's trials. All right, guess what? If I were to sue everybody who said things that were factually incorrect about me, I'd be suing people zillions of times. Right, but... But, Joe, what you're saying is, look, is, does media get it wrong sometimes? Absolutely.

Should you have the most powerful person in America suing media? What is the impact of that? The impact is clearly intimidation. He wants to defund public broadcasting. NPR. Why is that? Well, because they also run critical stories of them. This is part, in my view, without getting into any one case, it is part of a pattern that says, hey, I got the power, don't you criticize me. You criticize me, I am going to sue you. So, it is not whether this show was right or wrong.

There are shows every day, they get it wrong. It is whether you... You know, you respect you and other media people to do the best that you can, and if I don't like what you're doing, I'll go someplace else, but I don't- You know, Bernie's got a real point here. You know, why it is bad that he sues, the preferable method is to actually work with them behind the scenes with the FBI and the Department of Justice to take down true stories and intimidate them that way, instead of, I don't know, doing the publicly suing.

Was he asleep for the last- Oh, my gosh. And Rogan's great because he just lets him talk, and then he goes, but I don't think that's what was happening with the CBS Camelot interview. They actually edited it deceptively, and Bernie's like, I don't know any of the details of that case.

And Rogan's like, well, it seems kind of important. And Bernie's just like, well, you have to look at the big picture. You have to look at all the picture. And Rogan's like, no, I think individual cases are important. They deceptively edited it.

Yeah, hopefully the impact of this lawsuit is that you stop lying. That you stop promoting falsehoods. That would be hopefully the impact. And the whole, like, oh, it's beneath the dignity of the President of the United States to bring a lawsuit. I'm like, are you serious? This is what the entire Biden administration was predicated on, was like using the courts to weaponize against Donald Trump. 34 convictions, 92 cases. You drove it to the courts, you ding-dong. Well, and again, the deceptive editing thing, I mean, you know, they asked Kamala Harris a question.

And as they broadcast it live, it was like she, like within a second, gave a really, you know, concise answer. It's like, well, first of all, she was like, um, um, um, um, um, um, and then she didn't, she gave this long, meandering answer. They took a different answer. I mean, it's an absolute deception.

Right. Like absolute lying through deception. And so, there is absolutely a case to be made, like this is, this is disgusting. So. Do you think I just fell out of a coconut tree, Josh? Oh. Probably. You're just a little monkey. What are your thoughts about Bernie Sanders?

Here's the thing. Joe Rogan used to respect Bernie Sanders a ton. He was like a Bernie bro, and then all of a sudden, Joe Rogan realized, well, the rest of the Democratic Party absolutely despises white men. And maybe they're not as good as they're cracked up to be. I think Joe Rogan has realized through alternative media sources, and he's certainly one of the, he's probably the biggest, that we see these deceptions. You know, like, my good friend Steve Cortez was the one that put...

Burst the bubble of the good people hoax, like what President Trump had talked about out of Charlottesville, you know, good people on both sides or whatever, and the media, fine people, the media used that deception for years, and Joe Biden, you know, partially got elected to office because of it, and Joe Biden said white supremacy was the number one problem, terrorist problem in the United States. He said that's why he ran. He said he ran because of it. It's why he ran.

It's why he authorized the spying on traditional... Catholic churches through the FBI, and Steve Cortez just put out the greatest video on this, just five minutes ago, destroyed this hoax, and it's now, you know, Joe Rogan mentioned it. He's like, wow, this is amazing, and people are starting to find out, you know, the truth. That was huge. So, he's, you know, again, I think Joe Rogan has, as the kids would say, he woke up away from the fever. He's like the real woke.

He is awake, not woke, to quote Noel Mearing. There, that is good. I like it. There you go. All right, gang, good episode. I expect a full inbox with suggestions from prayers. It seems like early polling suggests. It is very popular, but yes, we will be adding prayer to the show in some way, shape, or form. But if you want to help us out, leave a review, subscribe over on YouTube. We have another great Erika Deep Dive coming tomorrow that we have cooking in the kitchen.

That is going to be great. So, if you want to see those, go over and subscribe on YouTube. That is where you can get them. People are loving them. The people are talking. They're talking about it. The people are talking about the people. Can't get enough, Erika. Oh, boy. Our blossoming multimedia star. Listen, I will say, I'm now a star in the eyes of my in-laws, because I was on Relevant Radio. Oh. They love it. That might be, to them, the most impressive career accomplishment of my life, because Relevant Radio, truly, an institution.

It's established, yeah. Right. My parents grew up listening to it, all that. That was very cool. Shout out to Morning Air that had me on to talk about the… The Why Pride Month disappeared video. So, also, YouTube. This is where we got the stuff. It's funny you say that, though, because for Tom McCluskey, our good co-worker here at CatholicVote, he says, I could be quoted in the New York Times, Washington Post, no one cares, but then I get mentioned in the loop, and everyone, oh my gosh, this is great.

You see her in the loop. You have arrived. Yeah, exactly. Oh, man, yeah, good times, good times. But yeah, and then, so you can email us, loopcasts.CatholicVote.org, join the Champions Club. It's the best way to support us. CatholicVote.org slash champions. Thank you. Thank you so much to all of our champions. I think the guy who sent in the email about the prayer was a champion. I mean, they are the lifeblood. Nick, shout out Nick. They are the lifeblood of what we do.

Check out Charity Mobile if you want to effortlessly support causes you believe in. And pray for us. We're praying for you. St. Thomas, St. Fidelis, Our Lady of Guadalupe. Pray for us. Have a great day. Don't be a panicking, and we will see you guys in the next episode. Peace.