transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:00] Hey, everybody, it's me, Sam Stein, managing editor of the Bulwark here with Will Sommer, author of the False Flag newsletter, which you should be subscribing to, as well as subscribing to this YouTube feed. We're going to be talking about Kash Patel crashing out at a press conference, some good video there, as well as why is Will not being investigated by the FBI? He's a little bit disappointed. We're trying to prompt an investigation, but it is sort of a clout thing, and he's feeling a little bit like he's being mocked. But before we get into that, we have two events that we need to plug coming up. They're both in California live shows, which are an effing blast. If you haven't been to one yet, they are so fun. We got San Diego coming up on Wednesday, May 20th. We got Los Angeles on Thursday, May 21st. You should absolutely get tickets if you are in and around the area. Great night out. You can go to thebulwark.com/events, bulwark.com, thebulwark.com/events for tickets to those shows. See you there. I will be at both of them. All right, well, yesterday was a big day for the DOJ. They had this big announcement. There's going to be a press conference in the afternoon. Todd Blanchard, acting attorney general is going to be there. Kash Patel is going to make an appearance at the press conference. They were like, well, what is this about? Because there's all these rumors flying that he might be on the outs, and he's got a lot of drama always around Kash, and there's this whole Lanik article about whether he's drinking on the job and things like that. Turns out, they were there to announce that they have indicted the Southern Poverty Law Center for bank and ryer fraud. We'll get to that in a second, but as they're doing this press conference, it seems like all the reporters just want to get Kash to talk about that Lanik article about him being unable to log in to the computer system and fearing he was fired, and maybe drinking a little bit too much on the job, and so on and so forth, and it produced insane exchanges that you don't normally see at a DOJ press conference. Let's play one in featuring my old colleague, Ryan Reilly now at NBC pressing Kash on those revelations. Did you communicate with anyone that you thought you were fired after you were unable to log in to the computer?

Speaker 2:
[02:06] The problem with you and your report, don't cut me off. You asked a question.

Speaker 1:
[02:10] Straightforward question.

Speaker 2:
[02:11] The problem with you and your baseless reporting is that is an absolute lie. It was never said, it never happened, and I will serve in this administration as long as the president and attorney general want me to do so. Every time you guys report false lies, every time you guys raise baseless questions, when we are here to talk about the Southern Poverty Law Center's $3 million decade-long scheme to fraudulently fleece Americans, you are off topic.

Speaker 1:
[02:39] It's a simple, straightforward question. Did you talk to anybody about whether you thought you were fired?

Speaker 2:
[02:43] The simple answer to your question is, you are lying, and every time you do so, I've answered your question. It's simply as follows. I was never locked out of my systems. Anybody who says, anyone that says the opposite is lying. Thank you.

Speaker 1:
[03:04] You're being extraordinarily rude. I know maybe that's part of your profession, but please just stop. If you ask a question, he can answer it, and then now you're interrupting me. Oh, my God. It's so good. I'll just say Ryan is not a rude person. He's a weirdo.

Speaker 3:
[03:20] It is a part of the profession, but it is part of the profession. Not one he dabbles in much.

Speaker 1:
[03:25] Yeah. Also, he's right though. In the lawsuit, Kash says he's locked out. I mean, that's part of the suit that they're filing against the Atlantic, but it is in the lawsuit. He said he was locked out. It was really make of Kash.

Speaker 3:
[03:38] I mean, I'm glad they knocked down the door with the battering ram to pull them out for the press conference. It's an allocation made in the Atlantic article. Kash is kind of the master of this. Not that he always does it so deftly, but this is really something we see whenever someone from the Trump administration is in the hot seat. We saw it with Pam Bondi, too, where you just kind of go, whether it's a hearing or a press conference, and you just go like, how dare you, you scumbag? He's doing the non-denial denial, but in such an offensive way of saying, my answer is, you're a liar. And it's like, well, okay. And Ryan, to his credit, is trying to narrow that down and just get him to say yes or no. And Kash, obviously, is not willing to do that.

Speaker 1:
[04:17] Yeah, it is a classic non-denial. You're a liar. About what? I make up a lie, Ryan. I think I just want to know about this one thing.

Speaker 3:
[04:23] Well, it's built on that. I mean, he says at one point, he's like, your reporting is a lie, essentially.

Speaker 1:
[04:27] Not even his reporting.

Speaker 3:
[04:28] And Ryan is saying, well, it's not my, I'm asking about this Atlantic story. So, you know, Kash is sort of a savvy linguistic operator in that way.

Speaker 1:
[04:37] You think he's savvy?

Speaker 3:
[04:38] Well, no, not. I mean, you know, we can see through what he's doing, right? But I think, I mean, I did see, like, in the comments, the reaction in right wing media world was like, who was that rude man Todd Blanch had to put in his place?

Speaker 1:
[04:50] Yeah, that's true. It's I guess it's always worth just sort of remarking and stepping back a little bit. Like, in no universe prior to this, would an FBI director be involved in a scene like that? It makes no sense whatsoever. They're not involved in these scandalous stories, at least. Well, they are involved in scandals, but not like this. And then to engage like that with a reporter, we've just really debased ourselves all, all in all. But they were there to talk about the Southern Poverty Law Center indictment, which you dug into. Just take the floor a little bit, because I don't think people know what actually the Southern Poverty Law Center is necessarily and why they were indicted.

Speaker 3:
[05:26] Yeah, I mean, I'm glad to, because I think this is a really important case in terms of the Justice Department pursuit of Democratic groups. And I think it's one to watch. And so the Southern Poverty Law Center is this really kind of sprawling, very well resourced liberal organization, non-profit, that started in the early 70s, defending minority groups against groups like the Ku Klux Klan, Neo-Nazis. They won a lot of lawsuits. Basically, to give you an example, a Nazi group might beat up a minority man. And then there would be the Southern Poverty Law Center would help them file a lawsuit. They would get a huge judgment. And some of these groups would have to give up their compounds. These are often violent groups. And as part of that work, they would do what they would call the intelligence report. They had a blog called Hate Watch, where they would monitor these groups and write about them. And I have to say, they were a big inspiration for me to start covering this stuff. Because the way they would know ins and outs of these random neo-Nazis groups, often that were killing people, committing other crimes, they were, I would say, a real thorn in the side, both to extremist groups, but also to the right in general, because they started covering groups like Focus on the Family, or these other right-wing conservative groups that the Trump movement really did not like them.

Speaker 1:
[06:36] Right. I mean, the common criticism from conservatives about the Southern Poverty Law Center is that they lumped in too many people as extremists and neo-Nazis, in that they basically were censoring speech by over-policing it, right? Was that true in your estimation?

Speaker 3:
[06:54] I think the right was correct that it was a very powerful tool. I mean, they have the extremist files. And I think, to give some credit here, is it fair to have one big list that includes someone like James Lindsay, who's like a Twitter commentator, who's a sort of anti-DEI activist, with someone who's the exalted cyclops of a KU Klusk Klan chapter? Probably not. And I think that was sort of a structural advantage the Southern Poverty Law Center provided against these groups, because then you would have advertisers, you would have big corporations, who would say, oh my gosh, this guy's in Hate Watch. We don't want anything to do with them.

Speaker 1:
[07:29] Yeah. And so, because of that, they had become this kind of point of fixation for conservatives and the MAGA right, who basically have been looking for ways to go after them over many years. And as your piece noted, they kind of lost a bit of the relevancy and their funding over the past couple of years. But then yesterday brought about this indictment, which is a whole other bag for the organization. What does the indictment actually say?

Speaker 3:
[08:00] So the indictment is for wire fraud and bank fraud primarily, as well as making false statements. But basically kind of the core allegation here is that the Southern Poverty Law Center was paying informants who were either already racist in these groups or they were paying people to infiltrate these groups. There's kind of this implication, but the Justice Department doesn't really bear it out, at least so far, that then this money was going to prop up these extremist groups. And so the Southern Poverty Law Center in their argument, and there's a bit of a leap of logic here, but that this money was being spent to further extremist activity. And so the Southern Poverty Law Center was defrauding its donors who were donating because they hated racists, let's say, and they wanted this group to disrupt them and to hinder their activities.

Speaker 1:
[08:41] It's a bit of a logical leap, right? I mean, like, I'm just going to try to articulate it. One example they use, for instance, is the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, right? So that's the famous Charlottesville rally. Trump infamously says, good people on both sides. According to the indictment, the Southern Poverty Law Center had an informant who was participating in organizing the rally. And this person basically, among other things we don't know, was involved in some chat groups and then also helped transport people to the rally. The allegation, as I understand, is that because the money the Southern Poverty Law Center sent to this informant, who then went and helped organize the rally by transporting people there, because of that, the Southern Poverty Law Center financed part of the rally. That's how I'm reading it.

Speaker 3:
[09:36] Yeah, and it's not as though they, according to the DOJ, they didn't say they cut a check and said, buy a couple Amtrak tickets for your buddies to help you get in, even. It's just that this person was getting the money, and then we don't even know what coordinate transportation means. Did it say, I know a guy who's driving and let me give you his phone number? And again, these organizer chats, as I talk about, there were dozens of people in some of these examples where we've seen the leaks. I think this has kind of created a sort of side issue, which is a lot of people are accusing their rivals of being the Charlottesville informants. People will say, Nick Fuentes did it or Jason Kessler, who got the permit, did it. But I think, given, as we may talk about, the indictment kind of outs a lot of these informants. I think if there was more material that could be provided, like it was like this person was the chief organizer, what have you, I think DOJ would have put that in there. And so it suggests to me that this was a very minor figure.

Speaker 1:
[10:28] They're saying it's wire fraud, bank fraud. And you rightfully know, like, the people who are defrauded in this allegation are the donors to the Southern Poverty Law Center. But we don't know if they actually feel defrauded, right? They could be like, yeah, we think this money was usefully spent because it's meant to take down extremist groups.

Speaker 3:
[10:46] Yeah. I mean, look, Adam Klotzfeld, another legal commentator, he pointed out shortly after the newsletter ran, I wish I had included it, Southern Poverty Law Center made a huge amount of money every year. And so the amount we're talking about over 10 years is something like 0.3 percent.

Speaker 1:
[10:59] Made money or got donors?

Speaker 3:
[11:00] It received a huge amount of donations and it had a huge operating budget. So the amount of money the DOJ is talking about is something like in a year, like 0.3 percent of the donations they received. So, you know, this is a really small percentage. And, you know, the average donor, as you said, I mean, if you told them, hey, we're using this money to pay an informant to monitor these hateful groups. By the way, one of the people at this rally killed someone. Do you think that was a good use of our money to have someone on the inside? I think they'd say, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[11:28] Yeah, I guess it all takes one donor who would say, I feel defrauded. And then the larger question, but not a legal one, I suppose, is should you be able to pay informants? Is it legal to do that if you're not, let's say, a law enforcement agency? And the truth is, people do this. I mean, it's not widespread, but there's PIs, for instance, less reputable journalistic institutions do pay sources, like TMZ, like the National Enquirer. Michael Cohen, Trump's old hand, wrote checks for Stormy Daniels. I mean, that was the whole basis of that saga. So it's not like this doesn't happen. I know that's not the legal question, but I just want to iterate that this is not a totally abnormal practice.

Speaker 3:
[12:14] Exactly. I mean, look, part of the reason, as journalists, we don't do it, is because not only the ethical and what incentives are you creating, but it also just gets, I think, financially pretty complex. And so another part of this indictment is that the Southern Poverty Law Center created sort of these shell corporations, like a used bookstore, perhaps, and they would make a bank account, presumably because they're paying someone, let's say they're in the Klan, and then the head Klansman says, hey, I want to see your bank account to make sure you're not an informant. This guy says, oh, look, I just sold some used books. That's what I got this $1,000 from, which I think is, you know, the Justice Department is saying this is wire fraud or bank fraud because you told the bank this was a real business. When one of these banks got concerned about it, the SPLC wrote a thing that said, oh, yeah, these are our front organizations. And so clearly, they weren't really trying to conceal it. Now that letter is being used as evidence against them in the case. So I think it's on one hand, they may have opened themselves up to this legal issue. On the other hand, SPLC was working with the FBI for decades up until Kash Patel cut that off. They may have, you know, in retrospect, foolishly thought the FBI won't mind. They won't pursue us for going after neo-Nazis. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[13:23] Yeah, the ending of your piece was actually kind of chilling, right? Like you basically were able to identify four or five people because of the indictment.

Speaker 3:
[13:31] Yeah, I mean, I'm not someone who's like super familiar with these really kind of splinter clan groups or whatever, but prosecutors in this indictment, they put in, this guy was an exalted cyclops and he sued to get to sponsor a section of highway for the clan. Okay, well, that's one guy. You know, I mean, it's really easy using just a couple SPLC articles and this indictment to figure out who these people are. And this is a world where, you know, clansmen, neo-Nazis, they'll murder each other. And so, you know, it's kind of shocking to me that, I mean, it almost, you know, I hate to suggest the FBI would want to do this or the DOJ, but it really, you know, I think would put a chilling effect on anyone who might want to inform on one of these organizations, whether it's to a nonprofit like the SPLC or to the FBI themselves.

Speaker 1:
[14:14] So you're saying basically some of these informants to the SPLC may have had their identities revealed.

Speaker 3:
[14:20] Oh yeah, I mean, look, Elon Musk was posting one of these guys' names just today. He was saying, look at this guy. So, I mean, I think it's very public.

Speaker 1:
[14:27] Oh boy, not great. Well, back to Kash. So he comes out and he reveals this thing. He seems pretty, you know, happy with the results. And it's playing on the right, right?

Speaker 3:
[14:40] Oh yeah, absolutely. I mean, this has been a huge deal on the right, not just because on one hand, they're so excited to go after the SPLC. They've seen this as long enemy. They want to use so much of the new right represented by JD Vance is about using the power of the state to crush your enemies. And so this very much fits within that. But also, I mean, they see it, Charlottesville in particular here has long been a thorn in the side of the right because the very fine people thing made them so mad that the left kept bringing that up. And so like Scott Adams, the Dilbert creator, his whole thing was saying, well, actually, you kind of have to parse the language, Trump is innocent there. So for them, they get to say Charlottesville was all fake. The SBLC, they were the puppet master behind it all. And that's not even in the indictment. I mean, it's a real exaggeration there. Just briefly, there is kind of like a funny sideline here, which is that the people who were at Charlottesville and like the real race haters, people like Richard Spencer, this guy named Augustus Invictus, they're all saying, I was on the front lines here and now you're making me have to be a SBLC plant. And so they're mad about that.

Speaker 1:
[15:40] And they're upset.

Speaker 3:
[15:41] Yeah, they're like, we're the real race warriors.

Speaker 1:
[15:44] I'm actually real. Okay. I'm a real racist. Don't clip that. That shit's going to end up on line. All right. Back to Kash. So there's multiple threads going on here. He's doing this SBLC thing. He's tweaking out at Ryan Riley. And then a story emerges last night afternoon from the New York Times. Title FBI said to have investigated the Times reporter after article on Patel's girlfriend. Long story short is that Elizabeth Williamson wrote about Kash Patel's girlfriend, who you have covered extensively, Alexis Wilkins. We call her a country music sensation, right?

Speaker 3:
[16:26] Yes. Well, those are Kash's words.

Speaker 1:
[16:28] Kash, we adopt Kash's words too.

Speaker 3:
[16:30] She's sang at a couple more wrestling matches since last week's talk.

Speaker 1:
[16:32] Since our last talk?

Speaker 3:
[16:33] Wow.

Speaker 1:
[16:34] Okay.

Speaker 3:
[16:34] Good for her.

Speaker 1:
[16:35] What were they trying to find? How aggressive her reporting techniques were? Were they across the lines of stalking? That seems weird.

Speaker 3:
[16:42] Yeah. So the Times reporting is that basically FBI agents were tasked with looking into whether this reporter, who, by the way, is like, needless to say, a very serious, respected reporter. So she published an article about Alexis Wilkins' use of FBI resources, in particular, her use of the security detail Kash has granted her to protect her. Because, you know, and this is kind of a key thing here is Alexis Wilkins has been a focus of eye-er from the right for almost a year now, because ever since Kash tried to close the FBI investigation in Jeffrey Epstein, they started saying, oh, she's a side agent, you know, all this stuff.

Speaker 1:
[17:17] There's no evidence of that, but yes.

Speaker 3:
[17:18] Exactly. And so she's suing various right wing commentators, and she's gotten threats over it. So she now has this FBI security detail, essentially a SWAT team. Elizabeth Williamson wrote about how, you know, this is pulling FBI resources. She went to some of Alexis' events where you see kind of the FBI guys in SWAT gear with the big guns walking around. And so, you know, on one hand, apparently, supposedly, this New York Times article prompted another threat towards Alexis Wilkins, which is awful, from some random person. The FBI is claiming after this article came out, well, we were just investigating that threat. This wasn't aimed at the Times reporter. But the reality is, number one, Alexis Wilkins, before this article ran for months, has been saying, I'm being stalked by this Times reporter. What she's describing is just totally normal reporting, like she was contacting the people who are hosting Alexis Wilkins events and saying, oh, what do you make of her? You know, why did you want to have her sing at your event? So I think this is something Alexis Wilkins likes to do a lot, I think, with help from Kash, which is to portray sort of any kind of scrutiny of their pretty extensive between the jet and the security detail, pretty extensive use of FBI resources on personal time as kind of an invasion of privacy or a security risk.

Speaker 1:
[18:31] Yeah, it's absurd, generally disregarding what reporters are supposed to do. I will just quote from the FBI spokesperson, Ms. Wilkins was interviewed by FBI agents in relation to a death threat in Bossam, which specifically referenced an article published by Williamson the previous day. During this questioning, the agents inquired about the related reporting. While investigators were concerned about how the aggressive reporting techniques crossed lines of stalking, no further action regarding Williamson or the reporting was ever pursued by the FBI. So even in the statement that they put out into the public, they are kind of implicitly acknowledging that they viewed the reporting as crossing the lines into stalking, which is crazy. Patel went on handily last night and he was asked about this. Let's play what he said.

Speaker 4:
[19:20] But it was such a blatant line. I'm reading that they're going after you, that you use the FBI because you didn't like a story about your girlfriend. And is there any truth to that? Because I've known you a long time. It just doesn't sound like you.

Speaker 2:
[19:34] Absolutely not. The reality is, and thanks, Sean, is that this same reporter delivered a baseless story which caused a direct threat of life to my girlfriend. And that's not me saying. This individual has been charged, arrested, and is in court. And he said as a direct result of the New York Times reporting, he wanted to take a rifle and canoe my girlfriend's face. We are going to protect not only me and my loved ones, but every American that is threatened. And the baseless New York Times came in over the top today and tried to delete that past reporting, refused to accept our comments, and refused to turn the attention to the actual court pleadings and the myriad of threats that have resulted to me and mine based on this baseless reporting. But here's the thing. Me and mine are like you and President Trump. We're as tough as they come. We're not going to stand down. We're not going to take a knee on this one or anything.

Speaker 3:
[20:20] Me and mine. He had that one ready to go. Me and mine.

Speaker 1:
[20:24] Me and mine. I'll just say the Times did include the full quote. I don't know what he's talking about. Obviously, it's serious that she's getting death threats. No one should make light of that. But some of that stuff that Patel is saying there is just not factually true.

Speaker 3:
[20:42] It's just a weird legal theory that unfortunately, the reality of our current world is that people in the public eye often get threats. I think they should be investigated by law enforcement. But typically, you don't then go to the person who wrote about them or you look up somehow, is there some secondary stocking charge we can bring? Just because we're talking about Fox News here. When Tucker Carlson was a Fox News host and he would target journalists or other people, those people would often get very serious threats. I mean, it would be like your life would be taken over for a few days. Was the FBI looking into Tucker Carlson for a stocking charge? I don't think so. And I think the other aspect here is what's very interesting to me, again, that Alexis Wilkins was accusing Liz Williamson of stocking back in January. You have to wonder, did this come from Alexis to say, we should bring her up on a stocking charge? And my final point is, this is not the first time we've seen Kash sort of use the FBI to pursue his personal enemies. We know that an FBI agent filed a lawsuit against the FBI saying that Kash urged him to sue Kyle Seraphine, who's a former FBI agent who's like a trenchant Kash critic. So the idea of Kash saying, hey, maybe we should go after this person, whether through the FBI or the legal system, using an FBI agent isn't the first time.

Speaker 1:
[21:56] Time supports that the FBI spokesperson did not respond to questions about whether Mr. Patel was aware of the inquiry into Ms. Williamson or whether he condoned the use of government resources to examine routine news gathering activities. So they are not answering that specific question. Maybe Ryan Riley can lob that one to Kash next time they're in there. All right. So are you feeling a little bit left out?

Speaker 3:
[22:15] Yeah, I am. I mean, I wrote about the jet, broke some news there, which in another example, you can't find the jet information anymore out of safety purposes. So I've written critically about Kash and Liz Williamson gets the FBI name pulled up.

Speaker 1:
[22:33] I'm fine with it. I'm fine with it. Let's not invite it. Well, we're good. We're good, Kash. We're just doing videos. This isn't stalking.

Speaker 3:
[22:43] Hey, you can hang out with the hockey team and drink as many breads as you want, man.

Speaker 1:
[22:46] I won't play some hockey. I've been locked out of my computer and wondering if I was fired too. I understand it happens. I'm not judging you. Let's hope that clears this. Will, my man, thank you so much. Everyone should be subscribed to False Flag and to our YouTube channel. Get great conversations, great stories like this. As a reminder, we got those two events out in California, San Diego, LA, live, me, Tim, Sarah Longwell, it's going to be a blast. Join us, go to thebulwark.com/events for tickets. Get them soon folks, it's coming up in a month. Talk to you soon.