Preet Bharara:

From CAFE and the Vox Media Podcast Network, welcome to Stay Tuned. I’m Preet Bharara.

Dan Goldman:

We need to lay a marker down for history. We need to lay a marker down for the interpretation and precedent of what the Constitution means. And it is very important to hold him accountable up to and including impeachment. But I do not believe that on day one we should just drop articles of impeachment for this or for that or for whatever because that just turns it into a sideshow.

Preet Bharara:

Welcome to Stay Tuned. I’m Preet Bharara. My guest this week is my friend and former colleague at the US Attorney’s Office, Congressman Dan Goldman, who represents the 10th District in New York. We spent a lot of time talking about the various scandals coming out of DOJ, some of the indictments that you’ve been reading about and that we’ve been talking about. We also talk about his tough race. That’s coming up. Stay tuned. What should Democrats do if they take back the House? Is yet another impeachment the best form of accountability? Congressman Dan Goldman, welcome back to the show.

Dan Goldman:

Thanks so much, Preet. Great to be back with you.

Preet Bharara:

So we are recording this on the Friday before Memorial Day weekend in the afternoon. We shouldn’t be working. Why are we working on an afternoon before the holiday weekend? We should be buying grilled foods or foods to grill, should we not?

Dan Goldman:

That is what it’s all about, but our work never stops, does it?

Preet Bharara:

Yeah. Well, you have a campaign going on and I’m not sure how many things will change between this moment and next Thursday when this drops. So with that in mind, Dan, let’s talk about this slush fund, $1.776 billion cute, right? That is purportedly for people who had a weaponized justice department go after them. There are no criteria that I can discern. The decisions are supposed to be made by a commission of five, none of whom have been appointed and they’re going to be appointed by, I think, the acting Attorney General, who you and I know, we’ll talk about him also probably in a moment.

They have said, Todd Blanche and others, that there’s no partisan test, that anybody who can show that he or she was a victim of weaponization of justice, the justice system, can get money back. In the day since this has been announced, and it’s only been three or four days, I have seen something that I have very rarely seen, Dan, in the last two terms of the presidency of Donald Trump, and that is some of your friends and colleagues from across the aisle are saying, “Hell no.” What’s the state of play from where you are on the ground on this proposal?

Dan Goldman:

We were all waiting for a very long time to see what the line actually is when Republicans would revolt against Donald Trump. Apparently, this slush fund is the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Preet Bharara:

Why is that, Congressman? Why do you think that is?

Dan Goldman:

I think there are a couple of different reasons. One is Donald Trump is bringing down the entire Republican Party. And my House colleagues are looking at their upcoming races in November and they are realizing that he is making their reelection so much more difficult. On the Senate side, you’ve got Trump who endorsed against Bill Cassidy and then Trump’s endorsed candidate one.

You have Trump who endorsed, out of the blue, Ken Paxton over John Cornyn, which very much upset the Senate Republicans. Now he’s trying to basically take almost $2 billion of taxpayer money from a complete ruse, and we can talk about the bogus case that they’re trying to set this up to be a settlement of, for people who beat police officers and assaulted them on January 6th. And it’s indefensible for them and they clearly have had it.

Preet Bharara:

I think that last point really hits the nail on the head. As you’ve said, now we’re talking about taking taxpayer dollars to pay people, potentially and in all likelihood, who beat officers. Let me ask you a different question, which is a harder question and requires perhaps a armchair degree in psychology, why did Trump and company think, and they still may yet, but why did they think they could get away with this complete nonsense?

Dan Goldman:

Because he has gotten away with every-

Preet Bharara:

Everything else.

Dan Goldman:

… single thing. No, and let’s just focus on January 6th, because I think it’s the best example. Donald Trump has convinced the vast majority of the Republican Party out there in the country that January 6th didn’t happen, that what they saw with their eyes did not actually occur as they saw it and heard it.

I actually think that because he knows that he’s been able to bully them into either actually believing it or going along with it, unclear what it is, that he thinks he can do anything he wants and be able to persuade people that it is the right thing because he did it with the events of January 6th.

To my mind, it is the best example of what has given him this feeling of invisibility, I guess you can add the Supreme Court case, of course, but this idea that he feels now like, “Wow, I can really just convince people of a total lie that they saw with their own eyes, but they believe me. So they’re going to believe me about anything, including the righteousness of this slush fund.”

Preet Bharara:

Do you think that part of it is that Donald Trump is a lame duck and people are moving on in their own political interests or is that not part of it?

Dan Goldman:

I don’t think they think he’s a lame duck because recently his preferred candidates have won. His candidate beat Thomas Massie. His candidate won the Senate Republican primary in Kentucky. Obviously, his candidate won in Louisiana. His endorsement in a Republican primary is gold. It’s basically the decider of what happens in any particular race. So he’s not a lame duck in that regard, but that will eventually dissipate and they have to focus on the general election. And then as much of an ally and help as he is in a primary, he is a real drain and a negative in the general.

Preet Bharara:

It kind of doesn’t make any sense unless you understand what a lot of people have said. I think you’ve said versions of this, that what Donald Trump cares about is revenge. Actually, what Donald Trump cares about is himself with respect to a few things. One, he wants the most attention of anyone on earth. That’s about himself and he wants to gain things. We’ll talk about corruption in a moment. So if you’ve wronged him, that’s more important than maybe what would be more in his interest, which would be to maintain a Republican Senate.

Dan Goldman:

I think he is seeing the writing on the wall to some extent and I don’t-

Preet Bharara:

What’s that writing?

Dan Goldman:

That at least in the House, Republicans are going to lose the majority.

Preet Bharara:

Oh, I see. Right. Okay.

Dan Goldman:

I keep hearing these things, including from Republicans, that he feels like he’s cratering and he’s going to bring everyone down with him, which I don’t know that I fully believe, to be honest. I think that he fully believes in his own victimhood. He genuinely believes that he has been the victim of outrageous conduct against him by Jack Smith or whomever, anybody who’s ever tried to hold him accountable.

Anybody who impeached him or voted to impeach him is a persona non grata to him. And I think part of this is that he really does want to make over the party under his entire control, which is consistent with his desire to remake the presidency as a position for him where he has total control of the government. So this is, I think, much more of a power move along with retribution and revenge.

Preet Bharara:

I want to go back to this fund for a moment and ask you another question about what it’s like on the ground. Is there actual real concrete momentum building towards a bipartisan effort to stop that expenditure and what do you think will happen?

Dan Goldman:

Look, as we were leaving Washington yesterday, Brian Fitzpatrick, a Republican from Pennsylvania, and Tom Suozzi, they introduced a bill that would effectively nullify the slush fund. What is interesting about that, of course, is the majority is so tight in the House that they don’t need a lot of Republican co-sponsors to get to 218.

Now, it may take a while for a discharge petition, but even if you get a few Republicans who sign on to that bill, it sends a message. And frankly, the entire reconciliation process and the Senate blew up because of this. And I’m sure you read about the lunch that the Republicans had where they skewered Todd Blanche.

Preet Bharara:

I want to hear about that. The reporting is that Mr. Blanche presumably thought he would have a friendly audience, a MAGA-friendly Trump-supporting audience, for this great public service of $1.776 billion, coincidentally, the same as the year of the Declaration of Independence 250 years ago because that’s how it works out. There’s not only corruption, but you combine it with cuteness. I don’t know what that combination produces. So he goes in and he is met with fury. Dan, is that what you’re hearing?

Dan Goldman:

Yeah. What I heard is that about half of the Republican senators spoke up in a two-hour lunch, which was much longer than usual and many, many more people speaking and it did not go well for Blanche. There was no good explanation for many of the questions and they basically came out of it and canceled their proposed reconciliation bill because so many of the Republicans were not going to move forward without, at a minimum, putting serious guardrails or handcuffs around this slush fund and perhaps killing it all together.

Preet Bharara:

Have you heard the acting Attorney General’s explanations and defenses of this fund?

Dan Goldman:

I’ve heard a couple. I’m not sure I’ve heard everything.

Preet Bharara:

Do you have a reaction to what you’ve heard?

Dan Goldman:

You and I have talked about this before because we know Todd Blanche from a previous life of his, it seems like, when he worked at the Southern District of New York while you were the US Attorney and I was working under you. This is literally as if somebody is put in a different body. I think he definitely believes that Donald Trump was the victim of a partisan attack, but the fact that he would go along so much with the obvious absurdity that these January 6th defendants who beat cops were victims as well and deserve… The problem I have with everything he does is he knows better. He knows that what he is doing is totally bogus. I don’t think Pam Bondi knew any better, but Todd Blanche knows better and to try to justify this as well, “Yeah, there was weaponization and so people should get remuneration.”

Preet Bharara:

Do you think that any of the January 6th defendants or the other people who they’re trying to shower favor upon have a better claim to having been victims of weaponization than, for example, Jim Comey or Letitia James or a number of others on the other side of the aisle?

Dan Goldman:

This is part of my frustration, you raise the exact point, is this false equivalency is so absurd. First of all, there’s absolutely no evidence that there was any weaponization by Jack Smith or the Justice Department in any way, shape, or form. Second of all, these people all pled guilty or were convicted unanimously by 12 jurors and then were sentenced by an independent judge that is part of a totally separate branch of government. Under these circumstances, they would never ever get any remuneration, any reward for anything. They have no claim at all.

There are so many layers to this, but the idea that there was weaponization under the Biden administration, so therefore we’re justified in weaponizing our government is first of all false. There’s no evidence of weaponization. They allege it, but there are no facts actually that support it. And that is confirmed by the fact that the President’s son was charged by the Department of Justice. Now, the President pardoned him and people can and should wonder whether that was appropriate or not, but the idea that that somehow gives a blank slate for them to go after Jim Comey or Letitia James or any of these people. And it’s not just that, “Oh, it’s obvious they’re his enemies.” He said it.

Preet Bharara:

He posted it. He sure did. Look, there is a mechanism and an allowance in the law for people who are, in fact, victims of, quote unquote, malicious prosecution to be made whole or to get some recompense. That’s a thing in the law, right? It’s difficult. It’s a high burden for good reason because a lot of frivolous suits can be brought, but we already have that mechanism. Do you know what they say when asked the question, “Why isn’t that sufficient? Why do you have to have a standard-free separate tribunal handpicked by the handpicked attorney general, former personal lawyer to the President, Todd Blanche, to do justice in a circumstance where there are already mechanisms to do it?”

Dan Goldman:

One thing about Todd Blanche is he’s not stupid. He knows that there would be no legitimate claim. So if they went through the normal processes, he could not accomplish what the President wants him to accomplish. And Todd Blanche’s only objective right now is to effectively execute whatever Donald Trump wants him to do.

Preet Bharara:

Let me ask you this question, and it segues into the future of how to deal with Trump and increasingly brazen conduct, which is saying something after a lot of years because I’ve heard some people say the following: is the setup of this fund, the $1.8 billion fund, an impeachable act?

Dan Goldman:

Yes. It’s such a gross abuse of the power of his office because he… This gets into the details. The lawsuit was absurd to begin with. It was about to be thrown out. So the settlement wasn’t even a settlement of the lawsuit. The settlement was completely independent of the lawsuit because they withdrew the lawsuit. It never went in front of the judge because they obviously didn’t want the judge to have to opine on it. I think it is probably, yes, an impeachable offense, but I am very concerned about one thing as it relates to this. Donald Trump has committed numerous impeachable offenses, but it’s too easy to, I think, just start trying to list the number of impeachable offenses and say, “Okay, well, we’re going to impeach him for this. We’re going to impeach him for that.”

My view is impeachment’s very important, when we take back the House, the most important thing for us to do is the investigations, to uncover the real facts, to display and disclose for the public what actually happened. We know some of it, but there’s always a lot more. And if it ultimately leads to impeachment, then we should absolutely go forward with impeachment, but also, it’s really the conduct that is important for the people to know, it’s not the fact of impeachment. We need to lay a marker down for history. We need to lay a marker down for the interpretation and precedent of what the Constitution means going forward. And it is very important to hold him accountable in whatever way he deserves to be and that up to and including impeachment.

But I do not believe that on day one we should just drop articles of impeachment for this or for that or for whatever because that just turns it into a sideshow. And what we really want to be focused on is the corruption and exposing the rank corruption in ways that have never, ever been seen before. And we know some of it because he’s very open about it, but there’s a lot more that we don’t know.

Preet Bharara:

The record seems to suggest that when these kinds of actions are taken against Donald Trump, even when he’s on the wane politically, it revives him. And some people would say, who are 100% all on board of holding him accountable, “Boy, he’s on his way out, he’s cratering, maybe don’t impeach even if there’s evidence to do so because politically you’re going to give him life.” What do you say to that argument?

Dan Goldman:

I point back to the impeachment that I led in 2019 as the reason why I believe what I just said. We proved the case against him, that he abused the power of his office for his personal gain. And that’s not just me saying it. Mitt Romney voted for conviction. He was the first ever senator to vote to convict a president of his own party, but many of the other senators who voted to acquit acknowledged that we proved the case, but they just said, “Let’s let the people decide in the election in eight months.” And in that election in eight months he lost. So it’s impossible to tell how much of that matter.

Preet Bharara:

That is a correct and fair chronological argument. It is.

Dan Goldman:

We proved the case and it was done in a way that a lot of the American public understood what happened. And that is the example I think that I rely on because he has been very good at taking one case, the district attorney indictment in New York, and turning that into this mass conspiracy against him and he’s the victim of all these tacts. So-

Preet Bharara:

But that revived him politically also, probably more than any other thing, right?

Dan Goldman:

No-

Preet Bharara:

That’s your point.

Dan Goldman:

… I am, I guess, agreeing with you that it did help him because he was able to flip that around. And I think if we just went forward with impeachment on day one, that would give him a lot of ammunition to do that again, but if we actually did the investigations and we brought out the evidence and we brought out the facts, then it’s a lot harder for him to claim that this is purely partisan because there would be a factual and evidentiary trail to support it.

Preet Bharara:

I think I can say without unduly flattering you that you would be, in the next Congress, one of the few chief investigative talents in the Congress. I don’t know if you’ll have a chairmanship or not or a gavel or not, but given that you’ll be in the room, as far as we know today, because new revelations come about all the time, but based on what we know up to today, what would be the top investigative priorities of a Democratic House?

Dan Goldman:

Well, I do expect to have a gavel of a subcommittee of the judiciary committee, the oversight subcommittee, which is the investigative committee.

Preet Bharara:

That’s a good one.

Dan Goldman:

Yeah. As you know, it’s the subcommittee that is specifically charged with doing oversight and investigations. So I will be able to initiate investigations and work.

Preet Bharara:

Chairman Goldman, on day one, you don’t impeach. So on day one, who are you issuing subpoenas to? Who are you calling to come testify? Whose cages are you rattling?

Dan Goldman:

The list is far and wide and I certainly would start with multiple investigations. I think the grifting out of the presidency is essential for us to uncover. And that would include the President’s sons. That would include the whole network of his crypto world. That would include investigating the various quid pro quos with other foreign countries that then turned around and either gave him a plane or invested in one of his crypto companies. That would include pardons for people who gave him money, just outright invested in his family’s companies.

I think we really need to uncover that. Then there is all the more typical public corruption, which is either exchanging things of value for benefits outside of the public interest, which range quite broadly and certainly would include other pardons as just by one thing. And there are a host of things that I think we would have to do. And what I would do is spread the net wide and then start to narrow it as we see what we get back and follow the trail of the strongest evidence.

Preet Bharara:

I’ll be right back with Dan Goldman after this. I want to talk about your race a little bit. Unlike some, you have a primary challenger, a significant one. The primary is coming up. Let me ask you this question because I know there are a lot of issues that have arisen, but one is what your political ideology is, like where you put yourself. How do you describe where you are in the spectrum of liberal to conservative?

Dan Goldman:

It’s interesting because I think all those terms have lost their meaning now. I am a member of the Progressive Caucus. My policy objectives I think very clearly are very progressive. I support universal-

Preet Bharara:

How’s your voting record? My understanding is your voting record is quite progressive.

Dan Goldman:

My voting record is quite, quite progressive.

Preet Bharara:

Is there a metric by which we can gauge that?

Dan Goldman:

Yeah, there’s a metric that I am probably within the 50 or 60 most progressive members of Congress based on voting record. I think some of the calculation of that is not entirely accurate. For example, I’ll give you an example of cryptocurrency. There’s a lot of opposition to laws that regulate the crypto industry in the Democratic Party. There have been two bills that have come through that are bills that create regulatory frameworks in an industry that otherwise does not have them. My view, as working for you doing securities and commodities fraud enforcement and prosecutions, is that it is very important with new industries, with new technology, with new innovation, that we continue as a country to lead growth and innovation around the world and be the leader in new technology, but that we do that correctly not by just eliminating a whole industry, which, first of all, doesn’t work, but also is counterproductive, but we regulate it.

My view is that’s actually quite a progressive approach, which is rather than to keep it the Wild, Wild West and let all of this crypto corruption happen, let’s start regulating it so we can limit that. And now Donald Trump has thrown this all up in the air because he is so outrageously abusing the power of his office to benefit in this crypto world. But one of the bills, the GENIUS Act, actually puts serious restrictions on one of his own crypto businesses, and has created settled rules and regulations that people can now react to. And it’s actually about stablecoin, which is something that is actually a tremendous benefit for equity around the world. It gives access to someone living in the Amazon effectively $2 without having to go through Western Union and pay a 15% fee and have it be a week to get there, you can do it instantaneously with almost no fee.

So there are a lot of real benefits more broadly to some of this technology. There unquestionably are some really bad actors and that’s why regulation is so important is to make sure that those bad actors are weeded out. So that’s viewed as, I guess, an anti-progressive approach, but I actually think that is quite a-

Preet Bharara:

Well, because it’s no longer the case that being pro-regulation on everything means you are deemed to be progressive on everything because people have different views depending on the context, which is a complicating factor. You have said a few times the following, we just want to understand what you mean, I think I know what you mean, but just to amplify, quote, “My approach to the job is to get results, not revolutions.” That’s an interesting phrase and one might wonder who’s the revolutionary that is being called out or are you not doing that? I was just struck by the phrase.

Dan Goldman:

No, what I mean by that is I think it is easy to have hyper-aggressive policy proposals. It is easy to say, “Every housing construction project should be 100% affordable. And if it’s not 100% affordable, we should not build it.” Now, I fully agree we need a tremendous amount of affordable housing, but it is impossible in our system for a whole host of reasons to actually be able to build the amount of housing we need at 100% affordable. So if you are going to say, “We need to revolutionize the housing market by making everything 100% affordable,” you have the right ideals, but it is practically impossible. So I like to take the ideological similarities that I have with the far left, as an example, but I want to try to find practical solutions that can actually yield results and that can make a difference.

So maybe we don’t build every building 100% affordable, but maybe what happens is we can build a lot more buildings at 40% affordable. That is something that we can do, that you can allow for government to be a catalyst to address these problems in a way that is scaled to the degree of the problem. The best example of this, I think, is a bill that I introduced last fall that tackles what I believe to be the number one problem in our country, which is wealth inequality. What we have seen over the last 20 years, or 30 years, is that if you have assets of any kind, stocks or real estate or something along those lines, your wealth has generally skyrocketed. And if you are a wage earner, your wealth on a relative basis has plateaued.

So we now have this billionaire class that Donald Trump has given a tremendous amount of power to, politically as well. Our campaign finance system has given a tremendous amount of power to them and they are acting in their own interest in order to promote themselves, which has a terrible, terrible impact on the vast, vast majority of Americans. The reality is that a lot of the proposed solutions are not going to happen in a body like Congress that does require some bipartisanship. And what I try to do is figure out, “All right, how can we find a solution that tackles the problem but has a good chance of actually getting signed by the president?” And that’s why this bill that I have that targets billionaires who avoid paying tax because their monies and assets, they don’t sell their assets, they don’t sell their stock to take capital gains, they just borrow against their stock. They pay no tax on those loans.

That’s why Jeff Bezos pays a federal true tax rate of 0.98%, which is absurd. People have different theories about it, but this is a targeted way that has gotten interest from Republican colleagues of mine. So it would generate $30 billion of revenue per year, which can pay for universal childcare entirely and have money left over. I think most Democrats agree ideologically with what the problems are, there’s just a different approach to what the solutions are. And I am focused on using the skills that I learned under you of having to convince a judge by addressing the arguments of the other side, not just continuing to repeat my own arguments. And I’m trying to do that and figure out a way to get Republicans to agree so that we can make a difference for the people who need the assistance.

Preet Bharara:

Do you have a view on New York City Mayor Mamdani’s proposals for taxation on the wealthy?

Dan Goldman:

I don’t think it should be done at the city or the state level. I think we’re already at a comparative disadvantage to other states, which is why we have seen a reduction in our population and we’re going to lose congressional seats certainly at this rate in 2030 and the southern states in Texas and Florida are going to gain seats because they’ve gained population. And part of that is people are willing to pay more taxes to live in New York City, but only to a point.

If we do things more city or statewide, we are at an increasing comparative disadvantage. I really think it needs to be done federally and that’s why I really have been focusing on this Robinhood Act because I think we can get it done. I think we can get it done in divided government where we’re going to want to generate revenue and the Republicans recognize that wealth inequality is a huge issue and rather than necessarily making this an emotional or moral issue, let’s just make it a pragmatic one where we can get something done and actually make a difference for people and lower costs.

Preet Bharara:

Do people view you differently as a messenger on these issues given that you are not poor yourself?

Dan Goldman:

Yeah. Well, this bill would increase my taxes. So I am proposing a solution that would impact me and would make me pay more tax. And it’s part of-

Preet Bharara:

Vote against interest has heft?

Dan Goldman:

Well, I think that it adds some credibility to my views and my approach. And what that stems from is that I am incredibly lucky and I recognize that. And I’m incredibly grateful for the opportunities that this country has given me. My grandmother escaped antisemitism from Russia, came from the pogroms through Ellis Island. Her brother set up a fruit and vegetable wholesale business and ascent his five siblings through college. And then on the other side, obviously, it goes back generations, a very successful jeans business. So this country has offered my family such tremendous opportunity and success and I’m grateful for that. I think this country is incredible because of that opportunity. And what I am seeing and have seen for too long is that that opportunity is just not available to too many people. So I am in public service because I want everybody to get that same access that my family benefited from.

And I think we are better off as a party if we’re building broad coalitions of people from very different backgrounds who are trying to achieve a common goal. I think I bring a different perspective and credibility from a different side that broadens a coalition of people with working families with the people who are not getting access to that opportunity and deserve it. I think the future for the Democratic Party is to recognize that we don’t have to fight within ourselves. We don’t have to be divisive. We don’t have to attack one another. What we should be doing is trying to unify around ways of helping people who deserve to have a higher floor so that they can achieve the American Dream.

Preet Bharara:

There’s another issue that appears to have been looming significantly in your race that goes beyond our borders, but it’s a very important issue given the population of New York City and your district, and that is Israel and Gaza. And it has been reported that one of your challenges is that some people believe your views, to the extent they have or have not evolved, are at variance with many of your constituents. Could you speak to them and to the listenership as a whole and explain what your views are of the conflict, what your views are that have been challenged, and how they have evolved, if at all?

Dan Goldman:

My view consistently from long before I got into Congress is that Israel has a right to not only exist as a Jewish state, but to defend itself and that I am very supportive of it being the only Jewish country in the world, but that it must be both Jewish and a democracy. And the only way to do that is to have some sort of two-state solution where the Palestinians have self-determination, can have a country of their own, where they have all of the rights and abilities and freedoms and security that Israelis do. Ultimately, I am very focused on peace. I desperately want peace in the region. It’s a much more complicated dynamic than many people believe. I support Israel, but I have a lot of issues, a lot of problems with this Israeli government.

I have strongly opposed the West Bank settlements and the expansion of them and the violence in the West Bank for forever. And in fact, Senator Cory Booker and I wrote a letter a month after October 7th criticizing the violence in the West Bank and urging President Biden to clamp down on it. And then he did and I supported that and I support sanctions against people in the West Bank who are extending those settlements. I think that much of the policies of this government, especially those that are designed to undermine a two-state solution are very, very detrimental, not only to Palestinian self-determination, which I strongly believe in, but also to Israel. And I believe very strongly in human rights and in making sure everybody has opportunities as we talked about in the United States.

And the way to do that is to make sure that we are using the same values we have here, similar to how Donald Trump, in my view, is not synonymous with the United States. I think most Democrats oppose and dislike Donald Trump, but don’t think that the United States should not exist. And that’s how I view Israel. I oppose this Israeli government. They’re going to have an election in October and hopefully they will make the right decision in their election, just like we’re going to have an election in November and we’re going to try to take power away from Donald Trump. The problem I have is not the criticism of the Israeli government, not the criticism of how they executed the war, not certainly the criticisms of the West Bank and the rhetoric and the humanitarian aid, all of which I have vocally and strongly opposed.

My issue is that that should not bleed over into a outright opposition to the existence of the State of Israel and it certainly should not be applied and directed towards American Jews who have nothing to do with Israeli government policy but are on the receiving end of harassment and antisemitism because of the conduct of the Israeli government. And that’s just hate and that’s not right. So I am strongly opposed to that.

Preet Bharara:

There is significant polling that suggests, alarmingly for a lot of folks, that American public sentiment in support of Israel has waned fairly dramatically in the last two years. A, do you believe that’s true? B, do you think that’s fair? And C, what do you think the future holds and how can that be turned around?

Dan Goldman:

I do. It obviously is true. And I think the reason is because people don’t draw a distinction between the Israeli government and the State of Israel. A lot of times I don’t like how these questions are asked because even the question conflates and merges the Israeli government with the State of Israel.

Preet Bharara:

Right. But if the question has always conflated those things, it’s still giving you a relative shift.

Dan Goldman:

Yeah. No, that’s right. It is, but I think we need to deconflate it, if that’s a word. And I think we need to recognize that Israel is a democracy. They are a very important ally of ours in a region without any other democracies that has enemies that not only want to kill and erase and eliminate Israel and Jews in Israel, but they are against Western democracy and they want to eliminate the United States and all democracy. Iran, their regime calls Israel the Little Satan and the United States the Big Satan. This is not just geared towards Israel. This is a much broader attack on democracy that is coming from that region.

And Israel is an essential ally of ours in that region, but Israel has to abide by and the Israeli government has to follow human rights law and international law. We have our laws that apply to any military aid that we provide to Israel and every other country that requires those countries to abide by human rights law if they are receiving assistance from us for military or security. And I think it’s very important that those laws be enforced and that’s got to come from Donald Trump. That’s got to come from this administration. And it’s incredibly frustrating because Joe Biden did it.

Joe Biden applied those laws at least five times that I’m aware of because I was working with the State Department on that and closely monitoring it, but Donald Trump doesn’t care. Once again, we are left with, “Well, we have these laws, but our government is not implementing and enforcing them. So what can we do?” And I really do understand that conundrum and it’s incredibly difficult and it’s incredibly trying and emotional for very many right now.

Preet Bharara:

There are people who use a word, and people use a lot of different words, but you have colleagues in the House, there’s one I know of in particular on the West Coast, and there are probably others, who use the word Holocaust in connection with Israel’s conduct of the war. How do you react to that?

Dan Goldman:

There’s escalating rhetoric that equates Israel with Nazis. And I think for me personally, as an American Jew, it is really, really difficult to process that because Nazi Germany murdered six million Jews, six million solely because they were Jewish. They had an assembly line of death and they tried to take over the world. Israel hasn’t done anything remotely approximating that, and you can certainly disagree and believe their military has been excessive, which I do as well. I do. I think they really went overboard.

And I think what has happened in Gaza, especially the destruction of almost the entire country, has been absolutely horrific. It has been awful. And Israel and the United States needs to make sure and double down and do a lot more to get humanitarian aid into those people who have been displaced. So you can absolutely believe that, as I do, but to equate that with Nazi Germany, the worst genocide in history, is really offensive and it’s very difficult to hear for a lot of Jews, including myself.

Preet Bharara:

Do you have these debates in Congress with your colleagues who use genocide and Holocaust?

Dan Goldman:

I have had conversations with some and certainly we try. I try. I find myself sort of in the middle of the party on this issue in some ways. And I do think a lot of my colleagues agree that the real problem they have with Israel is the Israeli government. It is not the State of Israel, but that gets somewhat lost in a lot of the rhetoric.

Preet Bharara:

Do you like being a congressman? It’s a sincere question.

Dan Goldman:

Look, I don’t like when my district office gets vandalized. I don’t like when my wife gets death threats. I don’t like that in this day and age with escalating political violence, I worry about the safety of my family. I don’t love the fact that people seem to feel like they can speak however they want to elected officials as if, “Well, you’re elected, so therefore I can speak incredibly disrespectfully and aggressively.” But I would like to have the conversations and I really do like trying to push forward and make a significant difference with the goals that I have, which is really to make the American Dream accessible to everyone. That is a driver that motivates me and that I enjoy.

And I like coming up with the ideas and I like trying to fashion solutions that can make a difference and the idea of making a difference. And that can range from laws that are passed to work that I’m doing here in the district on immigration where we have built out a triage center in my district office where every time there’s someone who’s arrested at 26th Federal Plaza or 290 Broadway, their family is brought over to our office and we run a whole intake process and we get them lawyers and make sure that they have shelter and healthcare and I’ve been in to bring medicine into them and we freed 37 people through that process. So there’s the top, top line where you’re trying to pass legislation. But then a lot of the work I really do enjoy is that on the groundwork where I’m making a difference in people’s lives.

Preet Bharara:

Congressman Dan Goldman, we wish you the best of luck. Thanks for spending all this time. I know you have a lot on your mind and on your plate. Really appreciate it. Thank you, sir.

Dan Goldman:

Thank you, Preet.

Preet Bharara:

My conversation with Dan Goldman continues from members of the Insider community. In the exclusive bonus content, Dan and I take on the impossible challenge of choosing what he thinks are DOJ’s worst offenses yet. To try out the membership, head to cafe.com/insider. Again, that’s cafe.com/insider. After the break, I’ll answer your questions about the commutation of Tina Peters’ sentence in Colorado and about the original meaning of Memorial Day.

Heads up, folks. Stay Tuned is going live. I’ll be speaking with my friend and colleague, former US Attorney Barb McQuade at the 92nd Street Y in New York City this Sunday, May 31st. We’ll be talking about her new book, The Fix: Saving America from the Corruption of a Mob-Style Government. To get in-person or virtual tickets, head to cafe.com/barb. That’s cafe.com/barb. I hope to see you there.

Now let’s get to your questions. This question came as an email from John. John writes, “Colorado governor, Jared Polis, recently commuted the sentence of Tina Peters, the former Mesa County clerk convicted in connection with a breach of Colorado election equipment. The move clearly angered many people. Why would Polis issue a commutation, especially when the state appeals court had already ordered a new sentencing hearing?”

John, thank you for the question. The short answer, but we’ll give some background first, but the short answer is we don’t really know why he did so. As you mentioned, a couple of weeks ago, the governor made the controversial decision, controversial may be an understatement as far as local politics in Colorado goes, to commute Tina Peters’ sentence. As you pointed out, Peters was the Mesa County clerk who became a prominent election denier after Trump lost the 2020 election. She was then charged and convicted for her role in a scheme to copy her county’s election computer system.

She went to trial and at trial, prosecutors showed that Peters allowed an outside computer expert, an associate of MyPillow CEO, Mike Lindell, to access secure election equipment and make a copy of the county’s Dominion voting system’s server. It’s quite a violation. So therefore, in 2024, a Mesa County jury found Peters guilty on seven of 10 counts related to the breach. Then the judge sentenced her to nearly nine years in prison, which is a pretty long time. Since returning to the presidency, Donald Trump has publicly championed Peters’ cause. He’s posted on social media attacking Governor Polis calling him, quote, “A scumbag governor,” and saying, “I wish them only the worst, may they rot in hell.”

Trump also issued a pardon for Peters, even though a presidential pardon doesn’t apply here because she was convicted in state court. Presidents, as you know by now, can only pardon federal crimes. Meanwhile, in April, a Colorado appeals court upheld Peters’ convictions but ordered a new sentencing hearing. The court ruled that the trial judge improperly considered her public statements about election fraud when determining her sentence, meaning the conviction stood, but the punishment had to be reconsidered with obviously the strong suggestion that she had been oversentenced.

At the same time Peters was appealing her sentence, she also applied for clemency from the governor, Jared Polis. In Colorado, an executive clemency advisory board reviews those petitions and makes recommendations, kind of like the partner attorney at the Department of Justice. According to reporting, the board advised against granting clemency in Peters’ case, but as is the case in the federal system, no board or partner attorney’s recommendation is binding on the chief executive. So Governor Polis decided to commute the sentence anyway. Here’s what he said. He said that in reviewing clemency applications during his tenure, Peters’ nine-year sentence struck him as an obvious outlier and characterized it as harsh.

He cut the sentence of nine years to about four and a half and made her eligible for parole on June 1. So didn’t wipe out the conviction, she has served time, but he slashed that time. By the time of her eligibility for parole, she will have spent about 600 days in prison with any remaining time served under parole. President Trump, for his part, seemed happy. He celebrated the news by posting Free Tina on social media. But there are a lot of critics too. They pushed back on the governor’s reasoning, noting that Peters faced a potential maximum sentence of 20 years and that nine years fell within the lower end of the sentencing range.

Colorado Senator John Hickenlooper, who was the governor himself once upon a time, issued a statement that said, quote, “Tina Peters is guilty as sin and a disgrace to Colorado. She tried to undermine Colorado’s free and fair election system. When she was caught red-handed, she was prosecuted by a Republican district attorney and rightfully convicted by a jury of her peers.” End quote. Pretty harsh statement. The Colorado Democratic Party, as a whole, put out their own statement, quote, “Reducing her sentence now under pressure from Donald Trump is not justice. It sends a message to future bad actors that election tampering has consequences unless you’re friends with the president. That’s a dangerous and disappointing precedent to set.” End quote.

The Colorado Democratic Party, Polis’s own party, even voted to censure him, effectively barring him from participating in party sponsored events. So in answer to your question, I don’t really have an answer. We don’t know Governor Polis’s precise reasoning. He says he was correcting what he viewed as an unjustly harsh sentence. His critics argue that he was bending to pressure from the White House. On the one hand, you could look at it as something that was done based on his conscience and against his own local political partisan interests and that’s a good thing. Or you can look at it as caving, bending the knee to Donald Trump for various reasons as a bad thing. But it seems to me that whatever the motivation, the timing is a bidding question. It’s fair to ask, “Why not allow the new sentencing hearing to proceed and let the judicial process play out before stepping in the way he did?”

This question comes in an email from Laura, who, like a few of you, wanted to understand the original purpose behind making Memorial Day a national holiday. What are the origins, what was the thinking, and how did it become formalized? I hope everyone had a good Memorial Day weekend, but obviously, the holiday is much more weighty and important than simply having a three-day weekend and firing up the grill. Although today we observed the holiday as an occasion to commemorate all Americans who died in all US wars, that’s not how it began. The origins of Memorial Day go back to the aftermath of the Civil War. By the time that war ended in 1865, the country had suffered staggering losses both in the North and the South.

More than 620,000 soldiers had died, roughly 2% of the entire US population at the time. Almost every family in every town had been touched by the war. In the years immediately following, communities held springtime ceremonies to honor fallen Union soldiers. People would gather in cemeteries and decorate the graves with flowers. That practice caught the attention of General John A. Logan, who was the Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, a Union veterans’ organization. So in May of 1868, Logan issued an order designating May 30th, 1868 as the day for the, quote, “strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion.” End quote.

So that annual observance became known as Decoration Day. In 1873, my state, New York, became the first state to officially recognize it as a holiday. But by 1890, every former Union state had adopted it. Over time, the meaning of the day broadened significantly. By the late 19th century, the name Memorial Day began to replace Decoration Day. And then after World War I, the holiday evolved from honoring only Civil War dead to commemorating all Americans who died in all US wars, as I mentioned. Then in 1950, Congress added another layer of meaning. It passed a joint resolution asking President Harry Truman to proclaim Memorial Day as, quote, “A day of prayer for permanent peace.” End quote.

President Truman agreed with a joint resolution and issued a proclamation which read as follows: “I, Harry S. Truman, President of the United States, do hereby proclaim Memorial Day as a day of prayer for permanent peace in which all our people may unite in prayer each in accordance with his own religious faith for divine aid in bringing enduring peace to a troubled world.” 76 years later, the world is still, to put it mildly, troubled, but the aspiration remains the same. Memorial Day is not only about honoring sacrifice, it’s also about recommitting ourselves, especially our leaders but citizens too, to the work of preventing future wars and striving for enduring peace.

Well, that’s it for this episode of Stay Tuned. Thanks again to my guest, Congressman Dan Goldman. If you like what we do, rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. Every positive review helps new listeners find the show. Send me your questions about news, politics, and justice. You can reach me on Twitter or Bluesky @PreetBharara with the hashtag #AskPreet. You can also call and leave me a message at 833-997-7338. That’s 833-99-PREET, or you can send an email to letters@cafe.com. Stay Tuned is now on Substack. Head to staytuned.substack.com to watch live streams, get updates about new podcast episodes, and more. That’s staytuned.substack.com.

Stay Tuned is presented by CAFE and the Vox Media Podcast Network. The executive producer is Tamara Sepper. The deputy editor is Celine Rohr. The supervising producer is Jake Kaplan. The lead editorial producer is Jennifer Indig. The associate producer is Claudia Hernández. The audio and video producer is Nat Weiner. The senior audio producer is Matthew Billy. And the marketing manager is Liana Greenway. Our music is by Andrew Dost. Special thanks to Torrey Paquette and Adam Harris. I’m your host, Preet Bharara. As always, stay tuned.