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Scott Jennings

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Krystal Ball

Want to drive CarMax? Hey guys, Sager and Krystal here.

Saagar Enjeti

Independent media just played a truly massive role in this election and we are so excited about what that means for the future of the show.

Krystal Ball

This is the only place where you can find honest perspectives from the left and the right that simply does not exist anywhere else.

Saagar Enjeti

So if that is something that's important to you, Please go to BreakingPoints.com Become a member today and you'll get access to our full shows unedited ad free and all put together for you every morning in your inbox.

Krystal Ball

We need your help to build the future of independent news media and we hope to see you@breaking points.com turning now to Brad Parscale, a name some of you may have forgotten at this point, but let's put this up here on the screen. He was of course Donald Trump's campaign manager for years. He raised hundreds of millions of dollars. He himself had quite a bit of controversy at the time. And what has he been doing in his retirement? Well, we've known this for quite some time, but Time magazine really dug into the details. Trump's ex campaign manager Brad Parscale is running an Israeli influence operation targeting the MAGA base. So let me read in case you have not heard of any of this before. Last September, the global ad agency Havas hired Brad Parscale's firm, Clock Tower X, to conduct a digital campaign on behalf of the State of Israel. This is according to the Foreign Agents Registration act filings, which were reviewed by Time magazine. Under Parscale's operation, he would produce 100 original pieces of content each month with he aimed at least 80% for Gen Z audiences across TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and podcasts. In his services agreement, Parscale pledged to amplify the campaign across social media. Integration of narrative messaging into the Salem Media Network properties and aligned distribution channels, which refers to the Christian Conservative Broadcasting and Publishing company where he is the chief Strategy officer. He vowed that the effort would produce at least 50 million digital impressions per month, as well as influence how AI tools such as OpenAI's ChatGPT, Anthropics Cloud and Google's Gemini characterized Israel and the war. For all of this, they agreed to pay some $1.5 million per month. And so what you can see here is that you had a nearly 40 to $50 million ad campaign which has now been running for years in the background exclusively targeted at the MAGA base to keep them from staying on side whenever it comes to the issue of Israel. Now we don't really know who exactly has been ensnared in all of this, but some of the names are at least familiar to those of us on Twitter. So for example, it is not clear how much Brad Parscale has actually paid individual influencers as part of this campaign. Other recent influenceable campaigns have offered them a base payment of 2,250 plus $1 for every 1,000 views up to 2 million, allowing them to earn as much as $4,250 per post. Per post. So let's say and extrapolate this from Twitter. I'll just give people an example. Both of us are Twitter blue. Not by choice, by the way. It's like we were just kind of given it to us and so I can see what my creator output or what for all my tweets in a month we earn and all the funds go to the company. It's like $300 for every tweet that I put out. And I think, I don't. I haven't looked at the average impression or any of that, but I'm sure it probably at least some of them, some of the more viral ones would meet this standard. So they are paying 10 times market value, so to speak, all for pro Israel messaging which is all being used and coordinated by power scale and this influence operation all on behalf of the state of Israel. I will say one noteworthy piece as an Israeli official actually said he didn't even do a good job.

Saagar Enjeti

Yeah, the Israelis are like, look at our approval rating in the US this is not working. Like young people hate us whether they're on the right or the left. So you're not. What are you doing with this money? It's not working right.

Krystal Ball

So at least, you know, one funny karmic thing in here is that the Israelis are bitching that they didn't get enough value for their money and paying. So yeah, I mean, okay, Brad Parscale got really rich. So that's good. Good for. Or buy a couple more mansions in South Florida. But it is still noteworthy because it reveals how there are so many people who. And usually the ones accusing us and others of being Qatari agents who actually are on the payroll. Now I'm not gonna say on the payroll of a foreign government. Cause it's laundered. You know, it's like oh, to an American thing. But ultimately the cash, if you were to trace it back, would be to either the Israeli government or some friends of the Israeli government. And more importantly, it's inorganic like in terms of what they're posting. And usually it's the people who have the most vicious accusations. It's really a confession. The very people who want to accuse Tucker Carlson or our show or other. Yeah, I just had this recently. It's like you're pro terror funded media outlet and you know, I often just want to be like, okay, let's both of us independently audited our tax returns. Let's see who's got money coming from a foreign. Because it ain't me, I can guarantee you that. You know, and oh, they would never put up with any of that.

Saagar Enjeti

Yeah, I mean it is very. It's first of all, what a sleazy guy, like so disgusting. And it really does. You know, we're about to place a JD Vance clip on Joe Rogan. Like it really is aimed at undercutting the negotiations and any sort of potential diplomacy process. Immediately after the MOU was signed, you saw all of these right wing influencers. We don't know technically whether they were all paid or not, but a bunch of them, similar language, attacking the MOU, saying it was a disaster for the U.S. you know, all this very coordinated looking messages coming from the right wing influencer community. But also, you know, I think like this is one very important vector. I need you guys to understand how much of messaging in the right wing media influencer space is paid for. Like there was another incident, remember we covered it when there was all of a sudden this very coordinated messaging around some soda issue. Oh yeah, they talk about this in Time magazine. You'll see things like that pop up where you're like, what? Where did this come from? Or there was this, this coordinated attack on Harley motorcycles that appears to have been funded by their competitor. And you all of a sudden had all of these right wing influencers who were like deeply passionate about how Harley Davidson has gone woke, which was preposterous and like based on literally nothing. But you'll see this. And I'm not gonna say there's none of that on the left, but I can tell you it's not the same. It genuinely isn't. You had a whole scandal about the chorus, you know, influencer community. That was a thing. But I'm telling you, you do not have the same level of expectation that you can just buy people. And this is commonplace, accepted among the right wing media influencer class. We interviewed Kyle and I interviewed Ashley St. Clair, Elon Musk's ex paramore. Yeah, ex Paramount. And she was talking about how, yeah, she'd be in these group chats and this is just how it works. Crazy. So when you had that scandal involving Tim Pool and some other influencers who were like getting the shady, like, what's the problem? Everybody does this. This is just normal. This is how we operate. So I don't know, it's really wild. But people need to understand that what you're seeing on Twitter or the content that's being produced, video content that's being produced, that is not necessarily just coming because of their neutral analysis. Oftentimes there is someone behind the scenes who has a perspective, has an interest, who is paying them to say what they are saying.

Krystal Ball

I have been on the receiving end of this. So somebody called me and said, I know you really are passionate about sports betting. Would you be willing to post against a sports betting piece of legislation? I was like, well I was like, I don't accept money for posts. Just tell me about it and maybe I'll post about it or not. I don't get paid for Twitter for anything, you know, and, and I go, wait, out of curiosity, because I would love to meet this person who is paying to lobby against sports betting legislation. And they said, oh well, we're working for the prediction markets. And I was like, oh, so the prediction markets are paying people to lobby against legal sports betting. So they can be the only option. That's, that's the level of scumbaggery which is happening out there. Of course. I just said, no, I don't want you, I don't want your blood money, basically. I also didn't even end up posting about it, just cuz it's so skeevy and so disgusting. But that's a perfect example. And then you know, the way that they justify this stuff is there's always like, like soda. They're like, oh, who cares? Okay, sure, I'll take a few dollars here and there. At one point I saw there was this whole scandal over India, like the government of India. Somebody had been paying these influence or some firm on their behalf because Indians were under attack by a lot of these like, you know, groiper types. And so a bunch of these right wing accounts started posting on behalf of India and then they got attacked and they deleted and apologized. I mean, I know this all may sound, you know, a little bit Byzantine, but this really does matter in terms of taste making I think on the right.

Saagar Enjeti

Well, especially.

Krystal Ball

And that's why it's important.

Saagar Enjeti

Yes. And especially now you have, you know, it's a wild wild west in terms of, of journalism and media, which in some ways is great. That's why we exist. Right. It's enabled our ability to create the show and reach an audience and all those sorts of things. But don't leave your media analysis behind. Right. We all understand, or viewers of this show, I think understand the way that corporate media is influenced by their advertisers and by access journalism and by the sort of journalists that they even select to be at those organizations. And who's able to succeed and rise to the top. Like we understand all of that in a lot of ways in the quote unquote independent media ecosystem, the incentives are vastly worse because at least at corporate media there was a line between the people who were selling, oh yeah, you're

Krystal Ball

Fired, like at cnn?

Saagar Enjeti

Absolutely, yeah, absolutely. You get caught for taking direct, like corporate money or from any sort of interest and then providing a viewpoint based on that, you would be out the door here. It's just, it's just commonplace. It's just become an accepted part of the ecosystem to have this sort of direction, undisclosed, pay for play. So it was, you know, this is an important story, obviously because of how consequential the decision making around the Iran war is ultimately. And so it was interesting to hear JD Vance talking to Joe Rogan about this. And Vance, of course, was the one who sent out to do the negotiations and was trying to present to Rogan this idea that like, oh yeah, we're bombing them again, but I promise we're getting back to the negotiating table, we'll see if that works out. In any case, he had a lot to say about this foreign influence operation that is being run to undermine the negotiations. Let's take a listen to that.

JD Vance

But I definitely think you have seen this very discreet, extremely well funded campaign to try to derail the negotiation and try to derail the deal. And again, there's this Time article that came out yesterday. A friend sent it to me. It's worth reading because it lists a bunch of people who have quite literally been paid by a former Trump campaign person who was himself paid by certain elements within the Israeli government. And those people are attacking me viciously for quite literally trying to accomplish the negotiation objective that the President set for the country. So what is their position?

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Like?

Krystal Ball

They're attacking you how?

JD Vance

Oh, it's social media posts. They're leaking to reporters. They're attacking me obsessively, saying that we should not be negotiating with Iran, we should just keep the military campaign going indefinitely. Let's say certain elements of the Israeli government want to criticize the deal or have disagreements about the deal. I don't even mind an effort to try to influence, you know, foreign governments try to influence the United States all the time. You know, Israel does it, other countries do it. It's just sort of the nature of the beast. What bothers me is actually when Americans allow, meaning American leadership allows that influence to affect their judgment and to affect what they are advocating for.

Saagar Enjeti

Now, let me just point out that his boss took how much money from Mary Magdalen for his campaign and then you have the audacity to be like the money and the influence. It's like the influencing politicians. That's what's really terrible. I don't know. That's a lot for me to swallow Fair.

Krystal Ball

I will say the reason why, I mean, it's kind of interesting that you would call it out in the first place. The reason why is, I think, is I don't think he would if it weren't actually influential on his ability to negotiate and within the administration. Because I can tell you how this all works. It's all happening right now. Cuz JD basically just said the same stuff on Rogan that he always says about Israel. He's like, look there. I mean, look at that. And this is why it's so tortured and why in my opinion, the pro Israel position just ultimately has to collapse. So you have to twist yourself into knots of like, I don't even mind if they try, as, you know, every other country tries. It's like fucking Estonia is not trying as much. Estonia does not have nearly as much influence. Did you know we have more of a legal responsibility to protect Estonia than we do Israel? Do people even know that? I think both are nuts, just so you know. But you know, just in terms of the level of influence, my point around this is those posts are all you and I know how this works to the extent that I tweet it all, because I really don't much anymore. I only really do it to either put an opinion out there, like for fun, like weed or daylight savings, or to influence a debate in the White House. Because I know that these posts get surfaced and passed around in group chats and others to influence the debate against each other. That's why Laura Loomer does what she does. That's why she's out today attacking Joe Rogan, Mark Levin, Randy Fine. And just to show you all how

Saagar Enjeti

important it's a hyper stuff is, this online administration, it's incredibly, is really like the pinnacle of that online nature. I mean that is really how he developed a lot of his view and became prominent in the right wing media ecosystem. Space.

Krystal Ball

Yeah, so what? I mean, yes, he rode the online space to the Senate and arguably I would say to the Vice Presidency. And largely that's what set him apart from a lot of the other people who were GOP politicians.

Martha Stewart

When Kohler, the global design leader in luxurious kitchen and bath products, came to me and said, Martha, we need an ambassador for our timeless, elegant, durable cast iron products. I said, I'm in now. Let me see the factory. Weeks later, I was suited up in coveralls and work boots, walking through their Kohler Wisconsin cast iron foundry. I stood next to the molten iron furnace, saw the hand applying enamel and touched the gorgeous finished products waiting to be sent out into the world. Since 1883, Kohler cast iron products have been forged and finished by the incredible craftspeople right in Kohler, Wisconsin. I'll tell you, I gained a newfound respect and appreciation for Kohler's cast iron craftsmanship. So now I am lending my discerning stamp of approval to my most beloved Kohler Cast Iron products for their durability, beauty and timelessness. Shop my Kohler Cast Iron favorites curated on Kohler.com bring the warmth, character and enduring style of these timeless products into your kitchens and bathrooms. As the Kohler Cast Iron Ambassador, I say long live Cast Iron.

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Krystal Ball

What I find fascinating, though, is let's put this one up here on the screen from Randy Fine, the senator from. Or the, sorry, the congressman from Tel Aviv, AKA Florida. But here he says Randy Fine has now told White House officials he will vote against every rule on the floor. Which, just so you know, rule on the floor is like how you bring legislation. So this is a major pain in the ass for Mike Johnson and for the gop, because what this means is that they will have much more difficulty advancing legislation, especially when you have such a narrow majority that's in the House of Representatives. What he says is he'll vote it until Trump fires Alex Brucewicz. So Alex Brucewicz, a name some of you may not know, he was kind of the podcast whisperer of the Trump campaign in 2024. He was the one behind the Ovan, Joe Rogan, the Andrew Schultz interview. Like a lot of stuff which, look, you say whatever you want. It obviously worked tremendously to Trump's benefit and kind of set a cultural vibe of Donald Trump ahead of the election. Bruce Lewitz has been one of the people who has been most vociferously attacking the Brad Parr scale, or not even attacking. Pointing out a lot of these pro Israel influencers are all being paid off and saying, you're undermining the administration. How dare you not trust Donald Trump. So Randy Fine finds it so important to fire this person who is just elevating the fact that pro Israel influencers are being paid and that Parscale himself is being paid, that he is going to vote against every piece of legislation until Brucewicz is fired by Trump as an advisor. We don't know how long and how far this is going to go. But I just do think that this is incredibly noteworthy for how he sees the. You know, how Randy himself, of course, one of the most pro Israel peace, you know, one of the most pro Israel politicians in the gop. He sees this as vital to his influence operation. And this has now been endorsed by Mark Levin, who's like, great job. You know, Randy Fine. So you can see how for them, they find Twitter and like the battle of ideas there that takes place as well as here in podcasts. So important, because what they need is to elevate this and show that there's actually more backlash against diplomacy than there actually is. Cause if you were to actually ask the American people, do you support diplomatic efforts, they're like, yes, of course. No question. Right. And for Trump, because he's such a blank slate, they always try to. They attack JD Whenever they can attack Trump, or they use Trump to attack JD and this is all part of what's going on right now. So it's very noteworthy.

Saagar Enjeti

This is a separate issue. I think Fox News is a big problem for diplomacy, too, because they're still beating the drums of war. It's like the one thing that they'll be critical of Trump on. But I also want people to understand it's not just like Twitter influencers. Brad Parscale is the chief strategy officer for Salem Media, which has all sorts of properties. They have a whole radio network, they fund a podcast network, they fund Town Hall, Red State, Hot Air, PJ Media. They've got all this Christian content. They even fund some financial publications. So it's a large conservative media network that Parscale is the chief strategy officer for. And overtly in his contract, he says he pledged to amplify the campaign across social media and through integration of narrative messaging into Salem Media Network properties and aligned distribution channels, referring to the Christian Conservative Broadcasting and Publishing company where he serves as chief strategy officer. It will not surprise you that our own Ryan Grim confronted Scott Jennings, who is part of this Salem Media Network, over the foreign Israeli ties and how that might influence his commentary that he offers on his show. Let's go ahead. And this is E2. Let's go ahead and take a listen to that.

Scott Jennings

As a student, be as critical as you want, really, of the United States. You just can't be critical of Israel. And also, and this is not personal, but there is so much kind of money pouring in to push us in that direction. Even Salem Media, where you do your show, right. Brad Parscale, who is the chief strategy officer there, is a registered foreign agent for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Like, this is an American. I think it's American, right, Salem? Yeah, it's an American media company whose chief strategy officer is a foreign agent registered for the state of Israel.

JD Vance

Let's.

Scott Jennings

And 30% of this company is owned by Lara Trump and Don Trump Jr. Like, what. So before we're talking about, like, who, you know, what is America?

Sarah Boem

Who.

Saagar Enjeti

Yeah.

Scott Jennings

Who should be an American? It's like. Or can we as Americans discuss this?

Krystal Ball

Let's get Scott's response.

Sarah Boem

Yeah.

Krystal Ball

So you, you seem to have some issue with Israel having a presence in the United States or even on. Even on. Even on American.

Scott Jennings

I think we should be sanctioning even Israel. Yes.

Krystal Ball

Even on American universities.

Scott Jennings

I think they should be sanctioned. Yes.

JD Vance

Do you?

Scott Jennings

I think it should be. I think. I think it. I think it should be criminal for an American media company to take money from the Israeli Ministry of Foreign affairs because I think they should be under sanctions for what they did in Gaza.

Krystal Ball

Do you believe that American universities should be taking money from, say, Cutter, if

Scott Jennings

we want to do a broad actioning around human rights?

Krystal Ball

You seem to have singled out one country because they committed, by the way, is an ally of the United States.

Scott Jennings

They committed a genocide, Cutter.

Sarah Boem

Some.

Scott Jennings

A lot of human rights problems there.

Krystal Ball

Uae, Saudi Arabia, universities, all this country do take Qatari money. I'm asking you, does your. Does your concern about internationalism exist beyond Israel?

Scott Jennings

I'd be okay with banning that too.

Saagar Enjeti

They always think it's a gotcha in beast mode. I know they always think the left isn't gonna be willing to condemn Saudi Arabia. It's like we're the only people who cared about the genocide they were committing in Yemen. Go look at the content that we do about UAE and Sudan. But they always think that they only care about Israel. Because I think they buy the nonsense that it's based on anti Semitism and not any sort of principled view around. Hey, we don't want our tax dollars going to a genocide. We don't want to see genocide committed, period.

Krystal Ball

I've had this hit so many times, they're like, qatar must be paying him. The Qatari government hates me. Roll the footage from our show during the World cup where we were talking about all of the abuse of their migrant laborers and how corrupt they were. I was afraid I might get arrested whenever I had to do when I had to transit through Doha. But, yeah, they're gonna pay me some money. To what? To speak out against Israel. It's a joke. It's just. I don't know. That's all these people have, you know, it's all they ever will. Last thing, we're just gonna do a small shout out here to Eyal y

Saagar Enjeti

friend of the show.

Krystal Ball

Yeah, let's put him up here on the screen. E4. He is one of the people who was named in this article.

Saagar Enjeti

In fact, I think he's the only one that was specifically like, this one guy is definitely on the take.

Krystal Ball

So he got very upset with Time magazine because he disputed that he had been paid by influenceable to combat anti Semitism. But he does confirm he has worked on influenceable campaigns. According to a company official, Yacobi did not say that he was paid to combat anti Semitism. He did, however, say that he had not posted anything that he didn't already believe. However, as you and I both know, even simply being paid to post opinions is a way to basically prop them up inorganically. Ours are completely and totally funded by a mass audience of millions of people. So, yeah, I mean, sometimes you say things that people don't agree with, et cetera. People can cancel the members if they want. Prefer you don't, but if you want to, I guess you can. But it's not a direct. Like nobody. And this is my favorite. And they're like, oh, he's posting against weed. Pharma's paying him. I'm like, oh, yeah, for sure. I would venture to say the weed stuff has probably cost us more money in the long run than anybody who's ever signed up for it. I don't give a shit. But that's my point. Just, we are paid and supported by the show. Cause people believe in the mission. They are being directly paid inorganically outside of any real market force by either the government, the companies or whatever. And that's fundamentally is undemocratic because it makes them more overrepresented in political discourse than they actually deserve to be. And this is. Why does this matter? It's not just about influencers. They set the tone for the GOP members of Congress and for all of these other people who are in the White House, in the administration, others, to make them think this is a much more popular position than it actually is.

Saagar Enjeti

Yeah. And like if you're being paid for something, then you.

Krystal Ball

And you should disclose it.

Saagar Enjeti

Right? You should absolutely disclose it. But just in terms of the way that works, because I believe him that he genuinely had horrific genocidal views. I actually believe him in that. I don't know if you guys remember, he's the one who came to fame as like a college student crying about anti Semitism and demanding a safe space and really helped to launch the anti Semitism woke turn on the Republican. Right. But in any case, I believe him that he genuinely and sincerely holds those views. But you know, if you're being paid to post, then maybe you're gonna post at a time when you wouldn't have otherwise. Maybe you're going to go further than you would have otherwise. So you can get that engage so you can get a larger paycheck. Even with someone who has those views, it distorts and changes their incentives and it also creates a situation. People can talk themselves in all kinds of things if their paycheck depends on it. So maybe things that him or another influencer wouldn't have justified they can talk themselves into because it's financially beneficial to them. So it's sick, it's sleazy, and it's far, far too common. So appreciate Time magazine digging into and exposing at least this one node and then the fact that it's Trump's former campaign chief who is now directly, at times, at least depending on whether Trump is in a pro peace or a pro war mood that day, but is at times directly undermining what Trump is trying to do.

Krystal Ball

I agree. All right. Oh, I haven't done this in a while. Crystal, what are you taking a look at?

Martha Stewart

Well, when Kohler, the global design leader in luxurious kitchen and bath products, came to me and said, martha, we need an ambassador for our timeless, elegant, durable cast iron products. I said, I'm in now. Let me see the factory. Weeks later, I was suited up in coveralls and work boots, walking through their Kohler Wisconsin cast iron foundry. I stood next to the molten iron furnace, saw the hand applying enamel, and touched the gorgeous finished products waiting to be sent out into the world. Since 1883, Kohler cast iron products have been forged and finished by the incredible craftspeople right in Kohler, Wisconsin. I'll tell you, I gained a newfound respect and appreciation for Kohler's cast iron craftsmanship. So now I'm lending my discerning staff of approval to my most beloved Kohler Cast Iron products for their durability, beauty and timelessness. Shop my Kohler Cast Iron favorites curated on Kohler.com bring the warmth, character and enduring style of these timeless products into your kitchens and bathrooms. As the Kohler Cast Iron Ambassador, I say long live Cast Iron.

Podcast Advertiser

Capture your favorite summer feeling with Pandora Jewelry. Discover a collection inspired by the sunshine, freedom and moments that make the season unforgettable. From sun kissed metals to personalized pieces ready to be engraved with your summer mantra, each design moves with you from beach days to golden nights and every memory in between. Shop Pandora Jewelry's new summer collection in store or online@pandora.net and let your summer unfold.

Orderly Meds Advertiser

Summer is here, which means we all want to look and feel our best. A GLP1 may be right for you. Visit orderlymeds.com to learn more about which GLP1 you could be eligible for. Getting started is fast, easy and happens virtually through telemedicine from licensed professionals. Check it out for yourself. Go to orderlymeds.com podcast that's orderlymeds.com podcast. Taking care of yourself feels great. Compounded medications are not FDA approved, eligibility required and determined by a licensed provider. Individual results may vary. See website for details.

Saagar Enjeti

Taco Bell is now being investigated for potentially contributing to the horrifying spread of the Cyclospora parasite, which has caused a surge in explosive diarrhe. That illness can drag on for weeks. It has already put dozens of people in hospital. Here's a report on that investigation, they say. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday that investigators have identified a likely epidemiological link among cyclosporiasis cases in at least four Midwestern states Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia and Kentucky, marking the agency's clearest public indication yet that many of the illnesses are connected by a common source. Cases have been identified in at least 34 states and additional confirmed illnesses could continue to increase through the end of August, according to officials. For their part, Taco Bell has voluntarily pulled some ingredients like lettuce, cilantro and guacamole from the menu in certain hard hit locations as the search for the source of the parasitic spread is investigated. Now, some people afflicted with cyclosporiasis say they never ate a Taco Bell and the report does acknowledge that no specific Taco Bell next to has been identified. So honestly, who knows? So far though, states are reporting roughly 7,000 cases with a particularly severe concentration in the Midwest. Federal reporting is way behind the state totals. For a sense of the scale of the outbreak, though Michigan typically reports 40 to 50 cases for an entire year, this year they've already identified more than 3,700. Nationally, the CDC logged 2,700 cases in all of 2025. We have more than doubled that in its only mid July. State data suggests we've already blown past the previous all time high of about 4,700 cases set in 2019. What's more, all of these numbers are likely a significant undercount because plenty of people seek care at home, never report it to the authorities, and also because testing for cyclospora is actually more difficult than other pathogens. One confirmed patient described weeks of gastrointestinal hell in which she was so severely afflicted at times she could not move from the confines of the bathroom.

Sarah Boem

No, it was pretty bad. It was bad. It's embarrassing how bad it was. It was really bad. There were moments where I was literally just camped out in the bathroom and I don't care, I'm just gonna lay on this floor. And there was like one night and I'm not a vomiter. One night I did have an episode of just like it was. That was actually the turning point where I was like, the next morning I'm like, okay, we're going to the emergency room. Because I remember calling and my baby came in and she's like, what do you need? I was like, something for me to get this out in. So she's bringing me a trash can and it was pretty bad. It was bad. It's not for the week, I'll tell you that.

Saagar Enjeti

Not for the week. Contemplating this horrifying fate, all for the crime of indulging in a crunch wrap, you may be asking yourself, why has God forsaken us? Well, turns out the fault lies not in the stars, but in ourselves. Or at least in the wretched government we decided to elect. For some reason, in their enthusiasm for government destruction, the Trump administration decided it would be a great idea to just stop requiring active surveillance for cyclospora, along with a host of other foodborne illnesses like listeria. In fact, now monitoring is only required for two pathogens. That's salmonella and E. Coli. Let's consider the irony here we are devoting endless resources to building the human tracking panopticon. But when it comes time to surveil and track explosive diarrhea causing pathogens, suddenly, apparently, we don't have the fun. This is all unfolding too, amidst the backdrop of massive workforce cuts at the CDC and across all of Health and Human Services. The CDC alone has lost about a quarter of its workforce under Trump 2.0, including key experts among the agency's disease detectives. Maintaining the previous surveillance regime would not likely have stopped the outbreak. But the fact that it's spreading unchecked, that the federal data is lagging way behind the state data, and that no source of still has been identified, that all speaks to the detrimental impact of all of these cuts. Former CDC communications staffer Sarah Boem. She was terminated in the first wave of Doge firings back in February 2025. She described the toll here as generational. The harm that's going to come to people that don't even know what CDC was protecting them from. But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Lettuce. Sorry, couldn't resist that one. How would you also like little flesh eating bacteria? Maybe malarial reintroduction? How about a screwworm infestation? Or an unmitigated Ebola catastrophe? Did you vote for explosive diarrhea and a resurgence of the measles? Because also impacted by the pathogen surveillance cuts was a little guy called Vibrio. Vibrio is a flesh eating bacteria causing serious illness, ICU hospitalization, limb amputation and even death in one of five cases. It is spreading more widely now due to the impacts of the climate crisis at the same time that the Trump admin is undercutting our ability to track and to study it. In fact, the National SC began dismantling the Deep Ocean Monitoring Network, critical for predicting the sorts of conditions in which Vibrio thrives. The program was explicitly targeted by Project 2025, claiming that the data was fueling climate alarmism. Now let me ask you, do you think it's climate alarmism to want to know a little something about flesh eating bacteria? Fortunately, outcry from Congress did lead them to reverse those original plans. But moving on from the cdc, we got a significant screwworm spread, causing chaos in the cattle industry. This parasitic blowfly had been eradicated. Now it's back. And unfortunately for beef enjoyers, the USDA unit responsible for fighting it, the Animal and Plant Health inspection service, lost 2,009 employees under DOGE. That is 23% of the entire service. USDA overall shed roughly 20,000 workers in a single year. Now, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rolling, she claims that the idea Doge caused this could not be further from the truth. She instead blames Biden and illegal immigration. She has, however, failed to provide any evidence of this claim. USDA's own report, though, estimates a Texas outbreak could cost the state $1.8 billion. Meanwhile, if we look overseas, we can see the impact of our global aid cuts on disease prevention around the world. There is, for example, a particularly bad outbreak of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It's one of the worst in history. In fact, experts say that has been worsened by USAID cuts and US Withdrawal from the World Health Organization. Quote, without the same amount of funding from usaid, the International Rescue Committee, which partners to deliver frontline health surveillance outbreak preparedness activities in Congo, curtailed its programs. Funding cuts have left the region dangerously exposed, heather Riach Kerr, IRC's country director for Congo, said in a statement. We are now here monitoring airports, make sure we don't end up with an Ebola outbreak here at home. Let's hope that all works out. Meanwhile, experts are also warning that those same global health cuts could lead to a reintroduction of malaria on US soil. After eradicating that back in 1951, the CDC issued updated guidance warning we are susceptible to reintroduction, which is not hard to predict when you slash the programs that contain malaria abroad. We've already had a local outbreak of malaria, which was contained back in 2023, so this risk is in fact very real. Turns out, guys, you can't just run around with a chainsaw axing programs you don't know about and don't understand without some potential negative consequences. You can't make it your stated goal to make life so miserable for government workers that they all retire without losing a few genuine experts who really actually mattered may have been also particularly irreplaceable. It will take years just to assess the damage that was done in the government destruction feeding frenzy. It turns out all those people our tax dollars were paying for, all those programs we knew nothing about that were just running in the background, tracking, researching, coordinating, preventing. Some of those, at least, were really pretty important, at least to those of us who prefer to order their food without having to play what one Twitter user described as poo poo release lied. Let's consider the irony here, though. In public health, the actual technical term for tracking pathogens is disease surveillance. That's what FoodNet was, the program they cut. And it turns out that's the one and only kind of surveillance this government has ever wanted less of. Endless money for watching you. And not a dime to watch the parasite. So, Sagar, that is. That is my take. Tragic. Yeah.

Sarah Boem

Your.

Saagar Enjeti

Your thoughts on the potential Taco Bell next this year? It's pretty weak. I just want to say in fairness to Taco Bell, they are looking into it, but some of the people who got sick didn't eat a Taco Bell.

Krystal Ball

Literally, just yesterday, my wife was gonna make a salad. She's like, should I make this salad? I'm like, make the salad. I'm like, let's go.

Saagar Enjeti

Are you that kind of a guy?

Krystal Ball

Yeah. I mean, look, I've got an iron stomach. I've spent a lot of time in Asia. I think I'll be all right. But. So I ate the salad. We'll see if it works out. I mean, from the Doge thing, I think it's been so long since we even talked about Doge. Ultimately, it came down to. It's the same Republican trap of all, all time. We want to cut spending, we don't want to touch the military, and we don't want to touch entitlements. There's 7% of the federal budget left. Most of it is stuff that most of us like. Like the NOAA hurricane guys who fly into the middle of a hurricane, or

Saagar Enjeti

air traffic controllers, maybe.

Krystal Ball

Yeah, Air traffic control. Nonetheless, we still want to cut X billion, so we gotta cut something. So, yeah, this is the type of stuff that you end up cutting and you have no real idea. That's kind of a sledgehammer hammer approach to the government. And meanwhile, every saving of Doge would be wiped out if the Trump administration simply passed the requested NDAA budget, which would increase the budget to 1.5 trillion.

Saagar Enjeti

Yeah.

Krystal Ball

Every dollar that was allegedly saved will go to funding some BS weapons manufacturing company. So ultimately, yeah, this will be their legacy. And actually, we warned about it at the time with air traffic control. I remember. I go, if you haven't even a single airplane crash, I'm like, you literally, you're on the hook for it. So congratulations. And, you know. Yeah, I think you're not even the first person to draw this conclusion. I've seen it spread across social media about how people are upset by these types of things. In fact, this is the type of stuff people want to see their government do and not increase their military budget by 1.5 billion.

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Saagar Enjeti

Well, here's the thing is, you know, we joked about this on a Friday show when we're talking about the Screwworm. Like it sounds like studying the mating habits of the Mexican screw worm or New World screwworm, I think is what it's called.

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Saagar Enjeti

Sounds like a caricature of the sort of wasteful government spending that Fox News would be like, this is ridiculous. Why are we doing this? And then lo and behold, you actually dig one layer deeper and you're like, you know, that was kind of important. We should have probably kept doing that because now the entire beef industry, the cattle industry in Texas is genuinely at risk. We talked to an expert on Texas politics who really emphasized to us how much, because we're talking about the Texas Senate race, how much the screw arm situation is like a genuine wild card in terms of what could happen in that Senate race because the economic impact is massive and then the cultural impact is massive too. We are a beef eating country. We already have beef prices that have skyrocketed. If you start having genuine shortages, which is a possibility that's going to really hit Texans very hard. So in any case, it would have been nice, I'm sure. There is government waste, fraud and abuse which could be cut. Sagar, it's all in the Pentagon. If you cross the river, as Steve Bannon said, go to the Pentagon. You could find some. Throw a rock and find some. Even in terms of Medicare fraud, we've got members of the Senate who could tell you all about that.

Krystal Ball

What about legalized fraud, like literal legal fraud in Medicare? The fact that they can't negotiate drug prices beyond the top 10?

Saagar Enjeti

Great point.

Krystal Ball

Yeah, that's fraud. That actually is. Every time I see my fight and I think about that, it fills me with rage. The fact that we're overpaying for drugs, you know, for no reason, it's literally anyway.

Saagar Enjeti

But I think we're, you know, we're just at the beginning of the process of finding out what were the things that they destroyed that actually were useful and were preventing genuine harms. So in any case, a lot of learning things the hard way in this country at this point, apparently.

Krystal Ball

Yep. All right. Thank you guys so much for watching. We appreciate it. The Friday show for everybody tomorrow. So they'll see. See you then. Big transfer news today. Who's moving me to the couch with Domino's? Best deal ever since they just added stuffed crust.

JD Vance

Any pizza?

Krystal Ball

The in toppings now with stuffed crust for 9.99. It's a long term contract with no Release clause. Only 9.99.

Scott Jennings

Yeah, that sounds like the move. I'm heading straight to Dom.

Krystal Ball

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