• An American Airlines flight from Wichita, Kansas, and an Army helicopter on a routine training flight collided over the Potomac River late Wednesday night. While investigators spent Thursday trying to piece together what happened, President Donald Trump took the opportunity to blame the tragedy on… Democrats and D.E.I. It was the latest outrage in too many to count since Trump took office not even two weeks ago. Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin joins us to talk about what Democrats can do to counter Trump’s onslaught of horrifying nonsense.
• Later in the show, Crooked Idea’s climate correspondent Anya Zoledziowski shares some good news about Trump’s anti-climate orders.
• And in headlines, Tulsi Gabbard and Kash Patel got their chance to flail in front of senators during their respective confirmation hearings, Secretary of State Marco Rubio says he’s headed to Panama amid Trump’s threats to retake the Panama Canal, and a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas continues to hold.

• Checkout Anya’s work: Subscribe to the What A Day Newsletter – https://tinyurl.com/3kk4nyz8
• Support victims of the fire – votesaveamerica.com/relief
• What A Day – YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/@whatadaypodcast

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TRANSCRIPT

Jane Coaston: It’s Friday, January 31st. I’m Jane Coaston and this is What a Day, the show asking god, the universe, Beyonce, whatever might be out there to deliver us from these Trump administration confirmation hearings. [music break] On today’s show, Tulsi Gabbard and Kash Patel get their chance to flail in front of senators during their respective confirmation hearings and Secretary of state little Marco says he’s headed to Panama. But let’s start with the deadly plane collision between an Army helicopter and an American Airlines flight from Wichita, Kansas, late Wednesday night. The passenger plane was descending into Reagan International Airport outside Washington, D.C. when it collided with a helicopter on a routine training flight over the Potomac River. At the time of our recording Thursday night, all 67 people on the two aircraft are reportedly dead. The recovery mission in the icy Potomac is ongoing. President Donald Trump held a press conference Thursday morning to offer the obligatory thoughts and prayers speech. But then he immediately pivoted to blame the tragedy on Democrats and diversity, equity and inclusion programs. He doubled down when reporters pressed him on his claims. 

[clip of unnamed reporter] I’m trying to figure out how you can come to the conclusion right now that diversity had something to do with this crash? 

[clip of President Donald Trump] Because I have common sense. Okay. And unfortunately, a lot of people don’t. We want brilliant people doing this. This is a major chess game at the highest level. 

Jane Coaston: It’s not common sense. He has a hammer and saw a nail. To be clear, there is not a shred of evidence that DEI had anything to do with this. Investigators do not yet know what happened, but never one to let available facts get in the way of a racist tantrum. Trump signed an executive order later in the day demanding a review of all hiring decisions and safety protocol changes under President Biden. He was also sure to cite, quote, “likely illegal decisions during the Obama and Biden administrations that minimized merit and competence in the Federal Aviation Administration.” The subtext, of course, being that if anyone other than a white, straight able bodied man has a job these days, they surely don’t deserve it unless maybe it’s one of those Black jobs or Hispanic jobs Trump talked about so much on the campaign trail. When asked if he will visit the crash site, the president had a crass response. 

[clip of unnamed reporter 2] Do you have a plan to go visit the site or meet with any of the first responders? 

[clip of President Donald Trump] I have a I have a plan to visit, not the site, because uh what it you tell me, what’s the site? The water? 

[clip of unnamed reporter 2] Or to meet with the–

[clip of President Donald Trump] You want me to go swimming? 

[clip of unnamed reporter 2] –first responders down there? 

[clip of President Donald Trump] Uh. I don’t have a plan to do that. But I will be meeting with some people that were very badly hurt with their family member, obviously. But I’ll be meeting with some of the families. 

Jane Coaston: Families are still grieving the loss of their loved ones. There were children on that American Airlines flight, and the president of the United States is joking about going swimming and essentially blaming this tragedy on nonwhite people having jobs, a class act. It’s the latest insult in um too many to count since Trump took office not even two weeks ago. Democrats in Congress seem just as stunned and confused as the rest of us, especially as they confront two major problems. First, Republicans control Congress. And second, the Democratic brand has seen better days. According to new polling from Quinnipiac University, 57% of American adults have a negative opinion of the Democratic Party. 45% have a negative opinion of the Republican Party. So to find out what Democrats are going to do next to counter this horrifying nonsense, I called up Representative Jamie Raskin, who represents the good people of Maryland’s eighth Congressional District. Congressman Raskin, welcome back to What a Day. 

Jamie Raskin: I’m delighted to be with you guys. 

Jane Coaston: First of all, how are you doing? 

Jamie Raskin: Well, you’re kind to ask. Um. Today is the birthday of my son, Tommy Raskin, who we lost several years ago. So we’ve been um thinking a lot about Tommy and um remembering what a joyful, beautiful boy he was. 

Jane Coaston: I’m so sorry. 

Jamie Raskin: Well, that’s all right. It’s tough times all over. And um we’re also um obviously mourning the deaths of all the people who were in the terrible crash last night. 

Jane Coaston: Now, the president would love us to believe that former President Biden and DEI are responsible for what happened. Every president faces tragedies, but it’s so clear that Trump’s instinct is to just immediately politicize them and blame them on his enemies. What do you do to counter the absolute stupidity and absurdity of those kind of statements? 

Jamie Raskin: Well, a lot of them just kind of condemn themselves. You know, when the president says without even any attempt to assemble any facts that DEI is responsible for a collision between an airplane and a military helicopter. People just have to chalk it up to his basic racism or efforts to polarize and divide the population. You know, DEI has now become the all purpose excuse for everything. I heard from one of my constituents who works for the FDA, and her job is to assemble pools of patients for cancer drug trials. And um you know, one sentence in her two page job description is to do outreach to minority communities to make sure that minorities are included in the testing of the cancer drugs. And she was fired, put into administrative leave and set up to be rifted permanently, fired permanently because she is allegedly a DEI person. But in any event, and I’ve been hearing a lot of my constituents who are in racial or ethnic minority groups have been reporting to me that they’ve been sacked, even though they don’t do they don’t have anything to do with hiring. 

Jane Coaston: I want to talk, actually, about your constituents, because you’re someone who represents the great people of the eighth Congressional District in Maryland, which contains a lot of people who work for the federal government. And I know that the White House has rescinded the memo that called for a blanket funding pause for government grants and loans, and it plunged so many people into chaos. But as someone who represents a lot of those people, what have you been hearing from them? 

Jamie Raskin: Well, my constituents have been buffeted by just dozens of executive orders and policy changes, dismissals, firings, involuntary reassignments. Um. There’s a lot going on. I have 50,000 federal workers who live in my district. And so they all got this Godfather offer memo with uh the title Fork in the Road, borrowed from the same memo that Elon Musk sent to the workers at Twitter when he bought that company. But basically it says, you know, take eight or nine months off, you can be paid and then uh you’re gone. Then we’re getting rid of you. Or you can stay at your own risk. But understand, we’re imposing new loyalty tests and we’re going to be scrutinizing everybody’s behavior to make sure they’re loyal, they didn’t say loyal to whom. But presumably they mean Donald Trump. They don’t mean to the American people or to the Constitution. So there’s a lot of anxiety about that. I have a lot of people that live in my district who work at the Department of Justice, and there’s been an absolute purge there of the top leadership in the Natural Resources and Land division, the National Security division, the Criminal division, the head of the Office of Public Integrity, all of the top, most senior and experienced prosecutors heading up all of these divisions have been forced out of their jobs and involuntarily reassigned to a new Sanctuary cities task force, which, as far as I can tell, doesn’t exist yet. But the promise or the threat is if they decide to stick around, they’re going to be spending all of their time prosecuting or bringing litigation against allegedly recalcitrant local officials who are standing in the way of the anti-immigrant executive orders, which, of course is a whole other front that is affecting people who live in my district. So it doesn’t end. I mean, you know, this is undoubtedly the effectuation of Steve Bannon’s vision of just flooding the zone. So people are so buffeted and hammered by the news and by public policy changes that they can barely respond to it. 

Jane Coaston: You are a constitutional law professor. With these firings, these pay out offers, the funding freeze, do you think the administration is trying to bait lawsuits in the hopes that the Supreme Court will keep giving the office of the president, the executive branch, and therefore Donald Trump more power? 

Jamie Raskin: Yeah, I think there’s something to that theory. Um. The lower courts, the district courts and the appeals courts um will overwhelmingly reject and repudiate uh all of these assaults on the rule of law, both at the constitutional level and also the statutory level, because they’re blatantly violating the rights of workers. I mean, when they sacked all of the inspectors general, for example, which is a way to pave the way for corruption in all of these federal departments, they just blatantly violated the plain language of the statute, which says that uh the Congress has to be given 30 days notice and there has to be a specific, substantive statement of explanation for why the uh IGs are being fired. And they just completely ignored that. They’re even admitting they ignored that. So there’s some thought that, okay, they’re going to lose in the district courts, they’re going to lose in the appeals courts. But their ace in the hole is the U.S. Supreme Court. When you get up to, you know, Clarence Thomas and Sam Alito land uh where there is a six to three majority tilting in Trump’s direction and they are asserting the most sweeping expansion of executive powers to say that there is a unitary executive and within the executive branch, the president must be able to control everything. That’s why the President has sacked the Democratic members of independent agencies and boards already. They would like to be sued, I think. To try to get it up to the Supreme Court so they can test the proposition that the president controls everything. But in any event, we have every interest in vindicating the civil service and congressional legislation to define the administrative agency’s and the board’s. Against this monarchical kind of claim that Trump’s got. 

Jane Coaston: Now, I know a lot of us have been stunned by all that Trump has done. Even for those of us who have been reporting on this, people have been talking about Project 2025 for two years, and yet it’s wild to see it happen. I know Trump won the popular vote and there’s a delicate needle to thread here for Democrats, but he didn’t win with the kind of mandate he claims he did. So what can Democrats do to meaningfully push back? And what are Democrats doing to push back? Have they’ve been caught flat footed here? 

Jamie Raskin: No, not at all. Um. First, let’s start with this. He certainly has no mandate to implement everything in 2025 because we said that was his plan and he repeatedly disavowed it, saying he didn’t even know what was in Project 2025. A lot of this stuff was stupid. He didn’t like it. And so on. He can’t run around now and say, this is what the people voted for when he specifically disavowed and repudiated Project 2025. That’s number one. What he does arguably have a mandate for is to lower grocery prices, is to lower rent, to lower the costs of living in America. And if they roll their eyes now and say, well, everybody knows that there’s no way we could do that, then they’re liars because they said that’s what they were going to do. But they don’t have a mandate. No to go out and to destroy Headstart or Meals on Wheels. I didn’t hear them ever campaign on that. In any event, when we say we’re going to stand up for what we think is the pro-choice, pro-environment, pro common good majority in the country, they say, oh you can’t do that. We have a mandate. Guess what? We’ve got a mandate, too. I got elected in the same election. Donald Trump got elected in and and so did everybody who’s opposing him. Almost every authoritarian government that has ever existed, whether you’re talking about Mussolini or Pinochet or worse, started within the electoral frame and then went in and dismantled the democratic institutions of government. It’s what’s going on with Putin. It’s what’s going on with Orban. So, no, we’re not going to say because he was able to torture out a slender victory, not even a 50% of the vote that we’re going to bow down to his authoritarianism. 

Jane Coaston: Representative Raskin, thank you so much for joining me. 

Jamie Raskin: Thanks so much for having me. Hang tough. 

Jane Coaston: That was my conversation with Maryland’s Congressman Jamie Raskin. We’ll get to more of the news in a moment. But if you like the show, make sure to subscribe. Leave a five star review on Apple Podcasts. Watch us on YouTube and share with your friends. More to come after some ads. [music break]

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Jane Coaston: Here’s what else we’re following today. 

[sung] Headlines. 

[clip of Tulsi Gabbard] I want to warn the American people who are watching at home. You may hear lies and smears in this hearing that will challenge my loyalty to and my love for our country. 

Jane Coaston: The Senate held more confirmation hearings on Trump’s nominees on Thursday. Director of National Intelligence nominee Tulsi Gabbard was up first. Lawmakers had a lot of questions about the former Hawaii congresswoman’s relationship with authoritarian world leaders, like former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. 

[clip of Tulsi Gabbard] I have no love for Assad or Gadhafi or any dictator. I just hate al-Qaeda. 

Jane Coaston: Despite what you just heard, Gabbard has long been criticized for meeting with Assad privately when he was still in power. To this day, she has not revealed what they discussed. Not a good look for someone who wants to be in charge of the nation’s secrets. Gabbard was also asked about her defense of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Democratic Senator Michael Bennet of Colorado brought up a tweet Gabbard made in 2022 on the day the war began attacking Biden and NATO. 

[clip of Senator Michael Bennet] You basically said that Putin was justified in rolling over the peaceful border of Ukraine, the first time since World War Two that a free nation had been invaded by a totalitarian state. And you were there at 11:30 p.m. that night to say that you were with them, not us. 

Jane Coaston: Damn Michael Bennet, someone had his Celcius. The Senate also held a confirmation hearing for FBI director nominee Kash Patel on Thursday. Dems focused on whether or not Patel would use the FBI to go after Trump’s political enemies if confirmed. They pointed to a list from Patel’s book, a list of people he believes are part of the so-called Deep State. Democratic Senator Mazie Hirono of Hawaii asked Patel if he would investigate them if confirmed. And Patel didn’t exactly say no. 

[clip of Kash Patel] No one–

[clip of Senator Mazie Hirono] Yes or no. 

[clip of Kash Patel] –that did not break The law will be investigated. 

Jane Coaston: Huh. Patel was also grilled about his ties to right wing conspiracy theorist Stew Peters. Peters is a conservative podcaster known for his Christian nationalist, neo-Nazi and homophobic views. Patel denied knowing who he was. But senators quickly pointed out that Patel has appeared on Peters’ show not once, but eight times. Roll the clip. 

[clip of Stew Peters] I got to go Kash, thank you so much for being here. We really appreciate it. Uh.

[clip of Kash Patel] Thanks Stew. 

[clip of Stew Peters] Up against a hard break here. Thank you so much for being here. We appreciate it. 

[clip of Kash Patel] Thanks so much. Appreciate it Stew. 

[clip of Stew Peters] Kash Patel. Thank you so much for being here. We appreciate it. 

[clip of Kash Patel] Thanks so much Stew. Appreciate it. You’ve got a great show. 

Jane Coaston: You’ve got a great show, indeed. Lying under oath. Those are the kinds of qualities we’re looking for to lead the FBI. And director of health and human services nominee Robert F. Kennedy Jr sat for his second confirmation hearing Thursday. Lawmakers continue to question him about crazy things he said in the past. At one point, Democratic Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia pointed to a tweet Kennedy made last year while running for president, where he said, well, I’ll let the senator say it. 

[clip of Senator Tim Kaine] You go on to say I won’t take sides as president. I won’t take sides on 9/11. Wow. 

Jane Coaston: Wow. [clip of Panamanian president José Raúl Mulino speaking in Spanish plays] Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino made it clear Thursday that ownership of the Panama Canal is not up for negotiation. That’s despite President Trump’s fixation on taking the canal back. Mulino’s comments come ahead of Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s diplomatic visit to the country this weekend. Trump’s focus on the Panama Canal intensified in December when he accused China of taking control of the waterway. His obsession even leaked into his inauguration speech. 

[clip of President Donald Trump] China is operating the Panama Canal, and we didn’t give it to China. We gave it to Panama and we’re taking it back. 

Jane Coaston: For the record, China does not control the Panama Canal. The U.S. built the canal in the early 1900s. It was given to Panama by former President Jimmy Carter after the signing of two treaties in 1977. Panama took full control of the waterway in 1999. On Thursday, Mulino reiterated the territory is neutral. The canal is now managed by an independent government agency, the Panama Canal Authority. Mulino said he expects to meet with Rubio on Sunday. Israel and Hamas continue to honor the conditions of their cease fire deal on Thursday. Hamas released eight hostages from Gaza. Israel released 110 Palestinian prisoners in exchange. A key condition of the cease fire requires Israel to make way for more humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip. That could get complicated in the coming days. Israel’s ban on the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees known as Unwra went into effect on Thursday. Unwra has been a critical source of relief for Gazans since the start of the war in 2023. Israel passed a law last year ordering Unwra to shut down all operations in Jerusalem. Accusing its members of taking part in the October 7th attack. Enforcing the ban could potentially violate the cease fire deal and restart the war. The civilian death toll of Israel’s war with Hamas has exceeded 47,000. 

[clip of unnamed person] Today’s spacewalk includes two NASA crewmembers, Expedition 72 commander, who you see on the right side of your screen, NASA astronaut Suni Williams and Expedition 72 flight engineer Butch Wilmore. 

Jane Coaston: Remember those two NASA astronauts we talked about earlier this week? The ones Elon Musk pledged to save from the International Space Station. Well, on Thursday, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore took their first spacewalk together after being stuck at the space station for nearly eight months. 

[clip of unnamed person] This is the 274th spacewalk in support of International Space Station’s assembly maintenance and upgrades. 

Jane Coaston: And did I mention Williams performed a spacewalk with another astronaut just two weeks ago? Thursday’s spacewalk was Williams’s ninth. She broke a record among female astronauts, the most time spent spacewalking over a career. 

[clip of unnamed person] Suni Williams just broke a record while completing the tasks on today’s spacewalk. 

[clip of Suni Williams] Holy moly. [?]

Jane Coaston: And that’s the news. [music break] One more thing. Let’s end this week with some not so bad news about Trump’s executive orders. Now, if you’re like me, the idea of Donald Trump’s picks being in charge of climate policy makes you feel not great. And as expected, a lot of Trump’s first days in office were partially occupied with efforts to overturn pretty much everything President Biden did on climate, which was a lot of stuff from infrastructure to new energy initiatives. Trump has tried to reverse pretty much all of it, but it turns out that might be much harder than he thinks and for some pretty surprising reasons. So to recap what Trump has done so far with climate policy, I called up Crooked climate correspondent Anya Zoledziowski. Anya, welcome to What a Day. 

Anya Zoledziowski: Hello. Great to be here. 

Jane Coaston: So Trump signed so, so, so many executive orders since taking office last week. His administration’s attacks on immigration, LGBTQ plus rights, DEI, those have been the bigger headlines. But can you recap what orders the Trump administration has made on climate and energy policy so far? 

Anya Zoledziowski: You know, the tldr version is that he really is waging war on Joe Biden’s climate legacy. You know, a big headline maker was the fact that he declared the national energy emergency, which basically gives the government special powers to speed up permits for fossil fuel projects while also circumventing any sort of environmental protections. He also signed an executive order that specifically goes after wind, like he’s really fixated on wind. Um. He’s called it ugly. He’s famously said he hates it. That order that basically pauses leasing and permitting for wind on federal lands and waters. He’s also trying to ax efforts that support electrical vehicles and any sort of transition there. He calls for a freeze on government funds that promote a transition to clean energy. He’s going after funds that are specifically in one of Joe Biden’s like landmark pieces of legislation. And it’s the Inflation Reduction Act. And so it’s actually got billions included in investments in clean energy, and it was approved by Congress. And then the final big thing that Trump did with his executive orders was mostly symbolic removing the US from the Paris climate Accord. Experts are saying that really what he effectively did is just took the US away from the table like they no longer have a seat at the table when it comes to global climate action. That’s like the macro view of everything he’s done so far. 

Jane Coaston: And when it comes to those funds, Trump wants to freeze, I have to ask you the same question we’ve been asking pretty much every day since Trump took office. Can he actually do that? Like, does the executive branch have the power to freeze funds from the Inflation Reduction Act that have already been allocated by Congress? 

Anya Zoledziowski: You’d certainly think he cannot. Legal experts are saying that the move is illegal. Um. The good news is that a lot of the money has already been disbursed and so there are no take backsies on that one. But when it comes to anything that’s still awaiting, we have seen projects paused. So time will tell. But certainly experts are saying he shouldn’t be able to do it because Congress did approve the Inflation Reduction Act. 

Jane Coaston: And beyond the politics of it all, how seriously should we take Trump’s threats to environmental policy right now? Should we be panicking hearing all of this? Or is this yet another case of him just saying stuff? 

Anya Zoledziowski: So far, a lot of what was included in the executive orders really rings hollow. Um. One expert called it just vibes, which I thought was pretty good. For example, with Drill, baby, drill. Just because he’s creating room to drill doesn’t mean that oil and gas companies want to just pump a ton of oil and gas into the market that actually would harm their own bottom line. And when it comes to clean energy and renewables, you know, a lot of companies that like are already committed to that transition and they don’t want to hit rewind on that either. They want the U.S. to be competitive. And recent federal investments that have already gone out the door in the green economy. They amount to more than $422 billion and have created more than 400,000 jobs. And that’s mostly in red states. So that’s not going away. So I want to say there’s room to be optimistic while also paying attention because this will be a hard administration on climate. 

Jane Coaston: Anya, thank you so much for joining me. 

Anya Zoledziowski: Thank you so much. It was great to be here. 

Jane Coaston: That was my conversation with Crooked climate correspondent Anya Zoledziowski. This segment was supported by our nonprofit partner, Crooked Ideas. [music break]

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Jane Coaston: That’s all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe. Leave a review. Take a break this weekend and do some stretching. And tell your friends to listen. And if you’re into reading and not just about how doomscrolling is not going to do it this time. Nope. Like me, What a Day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at Crooked.com/subscribe. I’m Jane Coaston and go for a walk and drink some water. [music break] What a Day is a production of Crooked Media. It’s recorded and mixed by Desmond Taylor. Our associate producers are Raven Yamamoto and Emily Fohr. Our producer is Michell Eloy. We had production help today from Johanna Case, Joseph Dutra, Greg Walters and Julia Claire. Our senior producer is Erica Morrison and our executive producer is Adriene Hill. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kashaka. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East. [music break]

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