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less than $34. go to deal dash dot com and see how much you can save. >> closed captioning brought to you by book.com. >> if you or a loved one have mesothelioma, we'll send you a free book to answer questions you may have. call now and we'll come to you. >> 881 4000. >> well, good morning to you. you are live in the cnn newsroom. i'm pamela brown in washington. on day one of his presidency, donald trump vowed we should say to terminate many policies of his predecessor. but just 21 days later, the domino effect of that promise. a federal workforce upended and billion-dollar government agencies grinding to a halt. 2 million federal workers will head into this weekend not knowing if they will have a job

come monday. a source tells cnn of the 10,000 usaid personnel stationed at war zones and disaster recovery projects, about 300 only 300 will keep their jobs. all of this at the direction of an unelected billionaire, elon musk, and his critics fear he is just getting started. democrats say none of this is even legal. >> the courts, if they interpret the constitution correctly, are going to stop. musk, are going to stop trump. >> elon musk is running our foreign policy today. he's running his foreign policy in order to enhance his personal financial interests. >> we don't have a fourth branch of government called elon musk. >> so that's what the democrats say. lots of lawsuits are going on right now. meanwhile, tens of thousands of employees at the cia, epa and other agencies were just given an extension to decide whether they will take this so-called buyout from the

administration. more than 65,000 employees have already accepted the offer. a judge paused the deadline at least until monday, when a hearing will be held. the american federation of government employees was part of the lawsuit behind that extension, and it's the largest union for federal workers in the country. joining us now is eric barnes, senior, the national secretary treasurer for the afge. eric, first of all, tell us what's going on with your members. what are they feeling? this must be such an unsettling time for so many. >> our members are confused with this chaos. and what i mean by that. is there's been so many emails coming from the administration, coming from a particular agency, and not giving a clear picture of what this buyout. we don't call it a buyout. um, this program or what they plan to get these employees to take. so they're really confused about. i mean, if you had to make a life decision decision in eight days, determine if you're going to have a job or retire or whatever. it's really not how you run a government.

>> what kind of impact does this judge's decision to delay that decision having? >> well, we're glad for the delay. we welcome delay. that's why we did the lawsuit, okay. because we need to get answers from opm that we have not been able to get. our employees have not been able to get the answers. is this legitimate? okay. or is this going to be similar to what happened in x, where elon musk offered money to these people and they left and didn't pay him? money's not the money for the federal government is only good to march 14th. it has not been extended to continuous resolution as of yet. so there's a lot of legalities, things we need our members to understand. >> so what do you say to that? i believe the last check was 65,000 workers who have accepted the resignation, offer or buyout, whatever you want to call it. >> we have 65,000. if the federal government loses about 10,000 members of employees a month. so some of that's going to be through normal attrition. okay. so again, not knowing

certainty where what their employment is going to be. some of our senior people who have already got 25, 30 years are taking this buyout. some of them are scared. all right. and not not to know what's going to happen. because some of these buyouts are not even they're not being consistent, but they took them okay. because they don't know what's going to happen if they're going to be threatened as a result of cutting this government workforce down to 70%. >> right. because the trump administration has said if you don't take this buyout where you could be paid emphasis on could through september, then you could just be fired. >> correct. right. >> so they want to take that risk. >> right, right. so some of them have taken it. >> so are there any assurances that that musk or the trump administration could give you that? would, you know, make you feel better about all of this? >> well, first we want to know if it's legal, okay. and if we can get a clear definition, understanding what what you're trying to do. first of all, it's already unlawful to have somebody on administrative leave more than ten days. so you're going to you'll be not

complying with the regulations of opm. how do you get around that? okay. is this a true buyout? we got one employee who had actually resigned and said he wanted to take the buyout. come. the agency came back and said, well, we accept your resignation, but at this point in time, we're not going to offer you the buyout. so clearly, there's misunderstanding of what's going on. but they took that employees resignation. >> oh, really? >> yes, they did. >> federal department leaders received this memo. it was yesterday asking for details on all workers who received less than, quote, fully successful performance ratings over the last three years. okay. what do you say to that? >> well, that's the first time i'm just hearing it. okay. all right. um, well, i would think they would probably use that as a tool to probably say what employees they wanted to get rid of. okay. um, so this is brand new news to me that you're going to go back three years to find out who received the unsustainable. but even with the unsustainable performance rating, what happened in three years? have they improved their

performance since then? because normally you get put on a pip and you get opportunity to work with management to address those deficiencies, you have to better improve yourself and your job performance. >> just just as we wrap up, you know, look, trump in large part ran he ran on many things. and one of them was government efficiency and so forth. right. and elon musk made that clear. he's head of doge there. they basically have sent this message out about the federal workforce. you know, some of that messaging federal workers i've talked to feel like is is, you know, trying to indicate that they're lazy or they're not doing their jobs or they're just not useful. what do you say to that? >> well, that's a lie. okay. basically we have a dedicated patriotic workforce that's been understaffed, trying to provide services to to the american citizens just in va. at one point in time, we had 50,000 doctors and nurses who were not able to hire. we're trying to provide the best services with the resources we have. so, you know, the point of him trying to say they're lazy. this whole thing is a privatization move.

if he can't provide the service to the residents, then you want to come back and say, we want to privatize this thing. and with improvization, it always costs us more to do privatization of this job than it does for the government. >> all right, eric bowen, thank you. thank you. appreciate it. well, the fbi is giving the trump justice department the names of thousands of employees who worked on cases related to january 6th. and that includes investigations of not only the attack on the capitol, but those related to president trump. and it ends days of back and forth between fbi and justice leadership over protecting staff identities. cnn chief law enforcement and intelligence analyst john miller joins us now. so, john, with those names now in the hands of the doj, what happens next? >> well, that is the question. remember, pam, this is where the fbi was asked to provide this information instead of providing names because they were concerned about what would occur with these identities, they

provided the unique employee identification numbers so that if there was some matter that made them want to need a specific name, that number could be run. but now, now that they've turned over the names, the question is what does happen next? in other words, the executive order for ending weaponization of the government says that this information is supposed to be gathered, processed and sent to the deputy chief of staff at the white house, not the attorney general, not the inspector general of the justice department. so from a political standpoint, what are their operators going to do with it? are they going to run the names of 5000 fbi employees against voter registration records to figure out who's a republican, who's a democrat? are they going to use those names to search social media to figure out what someone said within their first amendment rights in a post? nobody knows the answer to that. but to be fired or to have sanctions taken against them in their jobs, that

has to go through a process which they have delineated none of. so that is the question. >> and the justice department, for its part, has said that it will not fire agents who acted in, quote, an unethical manner. but clearly the fear of retaliation hangs over thousands of employees. i want to share an open letter from an anonymous fbi agent. cnn just obtained it, and we've added the voice to that agent's words currently, there is an effort to call a significant number of career special agents from the federal bureau of investigation. >> this is an unthinkable action that will gravely undermine the security of the nation, well beyond what many of our citizens are aware. something else about me i was assigned to investigate a potential crime. like all previous cases, i have investigated, this one met every legal standard of predication and procedure without bias. i upheld my oath to this country and the constitution and collected the facts. i collected the facts in a manner to neither

prove innocence nor guilt, but to arrive at resolution. i am now sitting in my home, listening to my children play and laugh in the backyard, oblivious to the prospect that their father may be fired in a few days, fired for conducting a legally authorized investigation, fired for doing the job that he was hired to do. i have to wonder when i am gone, who will do the quiet work that is behind the facade of your average neighbor? >> wow. you can't help but feel the sense of betrayal there. >> well, and you can't. but let's look at that from the human standpoint, which is these people showed up to work every day. a lot of these people are lawyers, have master's degrees and so on. they could probably be making more and doing more in any other field of life. but they came to the fbi to provide a service. they were assigned to these jobs. they carried them out within the domestic intelligence operations guide, the doj guidelines, the law. how do we know that? we know that because cases were brought to grand juries who found probable cause a crime was committed,

cases were taken to trial, 1600 investigations for january 6th alone were a thousand people ended up pleading guilty in rough numbers. so the process was carried out in a very legal way. here's one of the great ironies of this, which is the deputy attorney general, the acting deputy attorney general of the united states of america, who is supposedly one of the top people in an independent justice department, is pressuring the fbi for names of people who did what. and if you look at the questionnaire, did you provide analytical support? did you did you approve documents? did you participate in arrests, or were you on an arrest team? were you assigned as the case, as a supervisor? emil bove the acting deputy attorney general, who is the driver in the justice department being pushed by the driver in the white house, was the deputy chief of the national security branch in the southern district of new york. when i was working on the new york joint terrorism task force after the january 6th case, and my

detectives and the fbi agents working with us went across the street to the prosecutors to get search warrants, subpoenas, court orders. emil bove was the deputy chief of the section that was actually approving all of those. so his name should be somewhere on that list, too. and i don't think a lot of people know that. >> that's really interesting, actually. and he was the one that sent that initial request with the subject line termination. right. >> exactly. >> yeah. john miller, thanks so much. in california, thousands of homeowners faced with a difficult choice in the wake of those devastating wildfires. and some of you may have heard my interview with governor newsom yesterday. we're going to follow up on that. these residents who are there, they're questioning whether to stay and rebuild or leave the state. i'll speak with a man who is navigating the unknown. you're in the cnn newsroom. >> it's the news. welcome back. but it's also kind of not the

news. >> watch all the information on this show. so terrible. >> have i got news for you returns february 15th on c. okay, everyone. >> our mission is to provide complete, balanced nutrition for strength and energy. >> ensure with 27 vitamins and minerals, nutrients for immune health and ensure complete with 30g of protein. >> the itch and rash of moderate. >> to severe eczema disrupts my skin night and day. despite treatment, it's still not under control. but now i have rinvoq. rinvoq is a once daily pill that reduces the itch and helps clear the rash of eczema fast. some taking rinvoq felt significant itch relief as early as two days, and some achieved dramatic skin clearance as early as two weeks. many saw clear or almost clear skin. >> rinvoq can lower ability to fight infections before treatment, tests for tb and do blood work. serious infections, blood clots, some fatal cancers including lymphoma and skin. serious allergic reactions, gi

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entire communities to piles of ash and forcing homeowners to reconsider their futures. one of them is chris wilson, and he joins us now. he and his wife lost their altadena home in the wildfire that killed at least 17 people and burned thousands of structures before officials declared it fully contained last week. chris, thank you for coming on, and i believe your wife is pregnant, right. so you're like having. >> yeah, yeah. she's. she's going to be excited to know that god announced on cnn. yeah. she's six and a half months right now. >> sorry, sorry. >> no, no it's okay i. >> i read it in an ap article. so about this. so i figured that that would be okay to say because it was already out there publicly. but i think that's important because it's like you're, you know, about to welcome a child into the world and you're just you don't even have a home right now, and you're trying to figure out where you're going to go next. you bought your home in altadena five years ago. tell us a little bit about why you chose the area over others, and what your

experience has been like in terms of insurance. >> um, so in 2019, um, actually, even before we were married, uh, we decided that we should get a home together. the opportunity was right. um, i had been living in altadena since 2011 as a renter, and i just love the town. i'm a mountain biker and my work is in altadena. and so, you know, i could ride my bike into the mountains. she really liked it. and, um, in looking around, we found this, like, really cute jayne's cottage that had like a surprisingly long backyard where you could, you know, have a garden and stuff, which actually really helped out during the pandemic. uh, we had spatially distanced, you know, little group groupings back there sometimes with people. um, and yeah, it was nestled right in the foothills. it's kind of like a one of the rare, like, middle class communities, i think in l.a., where you feel like you have a little space and it's quiet. i guess compared to some of the

other towns around l.a. >> and now we're looking at. >> pictures that. >> you gave us of. it's just reduced to. >> rubble. >> yeah, yeah, yeah. just, you know, because i was reading in this ap article that you basically couldn't get private insurance or you had it, but they wouldn't re-up it. but your neighbor did have private insurance and got tons of money, you know, to help rebuild after the fires. it's just been such a different experience and that you've had some trouble getting through with the fair plan. >> yeah, it's it's a really i'm starting to get the whole picture now. it took weeks to really figure out because everything was so chaotic. um, yeah. we had private insurance up until last may. um, and then we were non-renewed for what i believe is spurious reasons. so, um, i feel like they're just looking for an excuse to to get out of california and get rid of homeowners. and, you know, we searched and searched for

private insurance and tried to, you know, all the different major carriers. and everyone had different reasons why they couldn't insure us. and so we were forced onto the fair plan because we have a mortgage, you have to have some insurance. and then that's only for fire. so you had to actually have a secondary insurance for everything else. and our insurance rates tripled, um, at that point. so our premiums went up by three times. and in the ap article it highlights how, um, i got a basically about a third of the coverage in terms of things for like loss of use and personal property compared to my neighbor, um, who has the exact same house. both our houses were are identical. they were built in 1925 and um, and. yeah, and the fair plan, not only is it, you know, the coverage isn't great, but it took me two weeks before i even heard anything from them. um, the emails that people had given me, uh, they bounced back. they didn't work their, their phone number, which was just to a customer service. um, you know, didn't provide

anything i had to if it wasn't for the california insurance commission having kind of this fair, um, at a college, i don't know if i even would have any information from them now, at this point, like, i was able to find a fair plan employee at this fair. sorry to keep using the word fair, but but, um, but yeah. it's called. it was where i found them there to even get any information at that point. >> i actually had governor newsom on the show yesterday, and i asked him about this and some of the issues that people like yourself are having with it. let's listen to what he said. it's really confusing. well. >> fair is not a state plan. it's not a taxpayer funded plan. it's a syndicate pool run by the insurance market itself. and it's the insurer of last resort. and it's existed back to ronald reagan in 1968. uh, as it relates to that plan and their exposure, they have reinsurance, significant amount of reinsurance. we feel strongly at this moment. and again, this is this changes in real time that the plan will be able to absorb

the losses ultimately. now, as it relates to the larger issue of the insurance market, not unique to california by any stretch of the imagination. what's happening with insurance? and this is the reality, the new reality of extremes. >> so what do you think about what he said? and given that reality and given your struggles with insurance, with your your past home, do you want to rebuild where you were or are you all considering going elsewhere? >> i do want to rebuild. if i can get private insurance. um, my my understanding is that the insurers were leaving because there was caps. they weren't allowed to raise rates to reflect the true nature of the the risk that they were taking. um, you know, i would gladly have paid more in premiums to stay on a private insurance plan. um, and i was already paying more in premiums just for the fair plan to get a lot less coverage. it also doesn't provide the same amount of rebuild coverage that other

plans do. other plans have something called replacement cost, which is basically the price to rebuild where in the fair plan it provides, uh, what's called actual cash value, which is the price the dwelling was worth minus depreciation at the time it burned down. and so it just not being able to reach them and then not being sure about if i'm even covered to rebuild or if the other thing is, do i have enough money to actually pay rent for the entire rebuild process? right. um, you know, my current calculations are i have enough to get me through, like one year, eight months maybe, and stuff. and people are saying anywhere from 2 to 4 years. so, i mean, i love the town. i do want to rebuild, but it's it's tricky. yeah. i don't know. there's going to have to be you know, we're going to, you know, i'm trying to use my personal property coverage to pay for my rent or have it have it like kind of in, in, in the bank if we have to stay here longer than

what we can afford that is a tough reality. it. yeah. >> very tough reality. >> listen, i. >> go ahead. >> i was going to say it's, you know, it's better than having nothing. but the fair plan is it was it's basically there to basically, you know, to satisfy your mortgage, uh, requirement. and it's not really meant to be used. and there's a lot of people, people after the ap article are reaching out to me, and there's a lot of people in pretty bad situations, um, who are on the fair plan that i've been hearing from. >> well, chris, i'm sorry that you've had to go through all of this with your wife, and we just wish you the best on your journey, and we'll continue to check in with you as well. thank you so much, chris. >> okay. thank you very much. >> and still ahead, how are americans viewing what is happening here in washington as both president trump and elon musk attempt to remake the government? we sit down with two radio hosts in a new series

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>> so gary doesn't miss. >> a meeting. >> and can regain his lunch break. >> try now. >> for free. >> visit otter.ai. >> or download the. >> app. >> lockerbie. february 16th on cnn. >> happening now. we are launching a new series on this show called your voice. every week we'll check in with talk radio hosts across the country to hear what americans are thinking and saying about what's going on here in washington. we're getting out of the washington bubble. today, we're joined by progressive talk show host thom hartmann in portland, oregon, and center right talk show host jeff angelo in des moines, iowa. i'm so glad

you all are both here and we're doing this. i think it's so important to sort of take the pulse of the country, and you all listen and hear what people have to say every single day for your job. so, thom, i want to kick it off with you. what are your listeners saying about these first few weeks of president trump's second term and elon musk's role in it? >> i think one of the biggest. >> things, pamela, and thanks for having us is why, you know, obviously we see what's going on, but is this being done to. are they trying to gut our government in order to fund tax cuts for billionaires? are they doing this as a way of of trump paying back elon musk for the $270 million that made him president? a tesla was being investigated by the justice department. starlink was being investigated by usaid. that got shut down. spacex was being investigated by the head of the faa. he got fired. or are they doing this to help putin and xi? i mean, they're the major beneficiaries of shutting down usaid. so there's just a lot of

confusion and concern. >> so these are the questions your listeners are asking. they're asking why is elon musk doing this? is there something behind this other than just government efficiency? yeah, there hasn't been there, frankly. i mean, for our viewers, we haven't been getting much transparency at all. a lot of what we know is coming from reporting. jeff, i'm curious your take. you know, as i said, your center, right. i imagine a lot of your listeners are a lot of people calling in. are are they as worried about how much power elon musk wields here in washington? >> no. >> what they're. >> basically focused on is outcome and results. they know iowa elected trump by an overwhelming margin, and he did campaign side by side with elon musk and say he was going to work with him to make government more efficient. so what the listeners are focused on is not so much who the people are, but exactly where their money is going. what's it being spent

for? how many employees do we have in the government? do we need that much that many employees? so it's very outcome based on my end and overall focusing on is government as efficient as it could be? is it serving the people as well as it could be? >> and so, have they had any reaction yet to some of what's come out about, you know, where their money is going yeah, obviously if you are the trump administration or you're the republicans in general, what you do is you spotlight the most egregious examples. >> you also talk about, of course, iowa is home to senator joni ernst, who's part of the doge caucus in the in the u.s. senate. and she's spotlighting federal employees who have been working from home and are not in their offices. and for working class people, they're asking like, well, i have to go back to the office. what's going on? why are these taxpayer funded jobs? why don't they require their employees to go back to the office? so there are a lot of

questions. and if you focus on what makes people annoyed about how their taxpayer dollars are being used, i think that's a winning strategy for the republicans. >> so. >> tom, to bring you in on this conversation, you know, just overall, there has just been this onslaught of news lately since president trump took office. it's hard to keep up. are your listeners overwhelmed? what are they saying about this? >> yeah, no doubt about it. and very concerned that, you know, elon musk and his merry band of teenagers and 20 somethings now have their social security numbers, have all of their medical records from medicare, medicaid, have their banking account information. um, i mean, how is this information being used? how is it being shared with, um, they apparently now have, you know, the names of all of our spies, for example. you know, again, is this being fed to putin and xi? is it being handled in a way. >> that recent. yeah. those who were recently hired by the cia believe in the last couple of

years. that list was emailed. yeah, right. the federal payroll. okay. >> so, you know, i think there's a real concern here. >> and i wonder, tom, are you getting any of that concern at all from your listeners about. oh, they have all this information. they're unelected. what are they going to do with this information? have you heard that at all? >> i'm getting a lot of calls from people. first off, i'm getting because we're on sirius xm. i'm getting calls from. in fact, i've gotten calls from iowa saying, you know, we produce a lot of the agricultural goods that usaid was shipping to starving people overseas. and we've got farmers who are freaked out. number one, i'm also getting calls from people concerned. i mean, like, they're they're regularly checking their social security or medicare accounts to see if they're going to get bounced out or people on medicaid. um, it's there's just a general concern broadly that our government does an awful lot for us. it's roughly 20% of our entire economy, and it's being gutted very, very rapidly. nobody is sure exactly why or exactly how and for sure

there's a big concern about whether this is even legal. >> well, so, jeff, are you getting any of those concerns from from your listeners? just about, you know, these unelected people having all this access and how these services and programs may no longer be available to to some of the people who listen to, to you. and, and frankly, i mean, there's a lot of government jobs, federal government jobs all across the country, including in iowa. i'm just wondering if those concerns are coming into you at all. >> no, not really. and i think because people get tired after a while of the focus in politics on personality. well, i don't like this person. and this person may be corrupt. and in the end, there's a lot of frustration over how unaccountable washington, d.c. has been in regard to spending our tax dollars. exactly. what is it being used for? um, senator joni ernst has been on the program, talking to me and talking to the listeners about, uh, the usaid threatened to sue her and her staff when she tried

to pursue how the money was being used. so the focus for my listeners has been on accountability. how is the money being spent? is it being spent on something and items and programs that they favor? are these things that they are against? is the government being transparent about how it's spending that money? do we need all of these employees in the modern technological age in which we live? a lot of offices are becoming more efficient. downsizing. we don't like it, but the federal government probably needs to do that as well. so we're this is more of an outcome based discussion for my listeners than it is focusing on the people that are involved. >> thank you both. i could i could do this all hour. i didn't even get to the question of prices at the grocery store and the concerns about that. but we're going to do that next week. we'll have we'll carry on that conversation next week. thank you both, tom and jeff. we do appreciate it. >> thanks. >> thank you so much. >> coming up next, we're bringing on political

heavyweights van jones and david axelrod. they were listening to that conversation. we want their take on what they just heard on your voice, and how that squares with what they're hearing from inside d.c. >> my parents worked. >> hard for everything. >> we had. they taught me the value of a dollar and how to use it wisely. those lessons are forever, and today i share them with all our employees. it's why i team up with vanguard for our company's 401 k plan. because everyone deserves to have someone look out for their financial well-being. >> vanguard 50 years of helping investors be well on their. >> way. >> i don't play for money before my mom passed, she told me to play big play for something bigger than myself. now my ambition is to play so i can help and inspire others.

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to have a target that they can all rally against elon musk. the party is trying to coordinate rallies and proposing legislation against what they're calling an elected billionaire. and this comes as musk and his so-called department of government efficiency have worked to dismantle global aid, gain access to government payment systems, and talk federal workers out of their jobs. so let's discuss more now with cnn's senior political commentator, david axelrod and van jones. van, i just want to start with you. you were listening to that conversation from the radio host. what do you think about how americans are viewing all of this from the right and the left? >> well, i mean, it's a tale of two countries. some people are cheerleading. somebody is finally doing something. the government is terrible. it's been up to all these abuses. and somebody is finally going in there and do something. the problem is who is doing it and why are they doing it, and how are they doing it? it does not hold up under scrutiny. and i think for democrats who are more suspicious in the first place,

this is a very disturbing set of moves on the part of elon musk. opm controls all the people. he's got direct access to all the people in the federal government. treasury controls all the money. he's got direct access to that, and he's got direct access. access? not through anyone who's been vetted, not through any. not through normal officials. through a bunch of kids whose only qualification is that they're loyal to elon musk. this is not a good way for even if you agree with the policy agenda of the trump administration, which i don't, but many do, doing it this way, where you essentially have an inside job takeover of unvetted unqualified people sets a very dangerous precedent. if you have president aoc in four years doing the same thing with a bunch of young progressives, i think people on the right would be in the streets, in the streets. so this is a this is a this is a very disturbing development. and i think people on the right are cheerleading because they want the policy

outcomes. they're not thinking about what it does to the american system of government permanently. >> i want to bring you in on this, david, and we're going to get back to the point you just made. but what do you think, david? you heard from the radio host in iowa who said, look, my listeners are really focused on the outcome here, and they're liking what they're seeing so far. and you actually think from what i read, you know, some of the the stuff that's been done in terms of usaid, it's sort of it could be a losing issue for democrats to maybe step in on. right. >> well, let me make what i think. >> clear on that. i am appalled by what happened at usaid, and i think it's not just a blow to humanitarian causes and democratic causes around the world, but it's a stupid move for our own national security, and it creates a tremendous opening for china and russia and foes of our country who want to fill the breach that we leave in a lurch here. but, you know, i was listening to tom. i guess his name was jeff, the guy from.

>> jeff from iowa. >> and he said, you know, people, people, you know, they hear about all this spending and there's no transparency, and they want more transparency. that is understandable. but there also is no transparency about how this money is being cut. and and it is more radical than any spending that i've seen. you know, elon musk and his band of musketeers who are rampaging through government know they know the, the, the price of everything and the cost of nothing. and they're making cuts indiscriminately without evaluating what the impacts of those are. so when we talk about outcomes, we may not know the outcomes right away, but those outcomes may be felt in people's lives. and ultimately the people who are out there in our country are living their lives every day, and they will evaluate ultimately how their lives are affected by these things. and it could be

profoundly bad because of the reckless and careless and unaccountable way that it's being done right now. >> but if you could quickly, david, to follow up with you, then i'll get to you. van. you know, i think there's a real question about where is the opposition from the democrats, these sort of organized opposition messaging from the democrats that you would typically see. do you feel like they're missing the boat right now, or what do you think? >> well, you know what? i think that there is there's a challenge in that they are flooding the zone and doing so many things at once that it's like sensory overload. and where do you go and what do you do? but there's a larger issue that i think unifies all of this, which is this notion of unaccountability, of defiance of the law, of shredding, constitutional separation of powers. so there's no check. there's no check on on elon musk. there's no check on what trump is doing. and van is right. the thing that people out there, whether they support

trump or not, should consider, is they may love what donald trump wants to do or is doing. the question is, what about the next president? if you shred all of these sources of accountability, if you take if to, to borrow a phrase from elon musk, if you put the first amendment of the first article, one of the constitution that guarantees congress certain rights through a wood chipper, what happens when the next president comes? and it may not be someone who you have that kind of faith in? it's very it's very, very dangerous. i think one other point, pam. if i can quickly while all of this was going on, there was a four hour meeting in the white house yesterday about how to cut taxes by some, you know, some vast sum, uh, which will advantage the elon musks of the world and what they need to cut to make that work. and, you know, things like medicaid were on the chopping block. we have no visibility into that either. right? i think that when those things start happening, i think the outcomes of that are going

to be profoundly bad. and people will recognize that very, very quickly. >> yeah, we shall see. van jones really quick to you because you were the target right, when you worked for president obama. you were a target from the right for your job as sort of an advisor. um, and, and i'm just wondering what your perspective is on this because you resigned after what you called a smear campaign against you. so what do you make of the reaction to musk? now? >> i'm not quite sure how those two things relate to each other, but what i will say is that. >> well, i think it's well, i'll tell you how, because you're seeing the reaction right now of people on the right who are backing up elon musk. he's unelected and he is saying, they're saying, oh, this is great what he's doing. right. and he's he's in the agencies. but when you were in the role that you were in back then, they were making all kinds of hay. and i believe we actually have sound about you being an unelected advisor. that's the point.

>> well, i, i it seems like sometimes these things that are political seem like they're kind of political. so i guess when obama was in office, they went after the advisors, called us czars, et cetera. and made a bunch of hay about that. but but what i think is going on here is a little bit different in that i was just a kid off the streets of oakland that, you know, axelrod and other people gave a chance to. elon musk is a billionaire who brought in his own shock troops, which is something that, you know, i was lucky to have an intern. i had a good intern, but i'd like to have an intern. so what i would say is this google some terms dark enlightenment is a term i would google. this is not there's a philosophy behind this that is very, very scary. google in this is not a fascist movement. this is a fascist takeover. it's not. it's a neo reactionary takeover. that's a special term. neoreactionary in our x, there is a movement in

silicon valley of billionaires who have a very coherent philosophy that is about dictatorship. they want a ceo monarch to run the country. they do not believe in democracy. so it's not just elon musk. there's a whole coterie of billionaires that have a philosophy called neo reactionary called nrx, and they are implementing a plan. and so i want people to understand this is not the same as obama having some czars they didn't like. this is this is billionaires with a plan. google the term dark enlightenment. google the term nrx. this is a much more serious problem. >> van jones david axelrod. thank you so much. hope you have a great weekend. we'll be right back. >> thanks, pam. >> welcome back. >> have i got news for you returns february 15th on cnn. >> maya knows. >> how. >> quality care can bring out a. >> smile. >> but it's been a few. >> dog years. >> since she was able to enjoy a smile of her own. good thing aspen dental offers affordable, complete care all in one place,

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champions. sunday, march 2nd at eight. >> in just two days, super bowl 59 kicks off in new orleans. cnn's coy wire joins us now from new orleans. what are you watching for? coy? >> i am watching for excitement, for hype entertainment. this is the nfl fan experience here. people from all over the country, around the world come here. they can run the 40. they can do bench press. i e if i still got it later. but the other thing they got to do last night was watch the nfl honors, where they named all sorts of awards. one of them nfl mvp, and the winner this year, josh allen, the all world quarterback for the buffalo bills. he went from a zero star recruit in high school, meaning nobody wanted him to. now the league's mvp, 27 first place votes, the runner up, lamar jackson, the superstar quarterback for the ravens, did 23 first place votes, was the closest final vote in nearly a decade. he thanked his mom and dad, who were in tears over that moment. he thanked them for all their sacrifice of time and

money to help their son achieve his dream. so we have we have a lot more coming up all week long from here, especially the nfl experience. i got to eat some beignets, i got to eat some gumbo, i got to eat some etouffée. i got to eat, eat, eat, eat, soak it all in. >> eat some for me too. i'm so jealous. i'm not down there with you eating all that coy wire in new orleans. thank you. and thank you all for joining us. i'm pamela brown. follow me on instagram, tiktok, and x at pamela brown, cnn. stay with us. inside politics with dana bash starts after a short break kick off in new orleans is brought to you by clearchoice dental implant centers. >> visit clearchoice. com today. >> dear doctor. >> k, i used to think i was never meant to be beautiful. i was teased because of my teeth. i didn't like the person looking back at me in the mirror. i never thought i could afford dental implants. you and your team work within my budget and help me feel confident in the plan we made together. i

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