More federal layoffs, healthcare cuts, and blocking the Epstein files: Breaking down the GOP government shutdown

The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible

Maximillian Alvarez:

Seven years ago during Donald Trump’s first presidential term, America endured the longest government shutdown in our history. 35 days Now in October of 2025, in the first year of Donald Trump’s second presidential administration. When Republicans and Republican appointees control all three branches of government, the government is shut down. Again, we don’t know how long this is going to go on, but the real news is going to be here for as long as it takes to get you the information and perspectives you need to act. And our resident inequality watchdogs, Taya Graham and Steven, Janice were on the ground in Washington, DC earlier this week doing just that. And this was just hours before the shutdown actually began. So Taya, Steven, first of all, thank you guys for going back down to DC and all the great reporting you’ve been doing. Thank you for joining us here. Really appreciate it and dying to sort of get updates from y’all to help our listeners navigate this crap, right? So let’s just jump right in and break down the basics for the folks watching. What were you hearing and seeing in DC earlier this week that can help people understand why the government is shut down right now? Again,

Stephen Janis:

Well, just a basic primer. The government is not operating in regular order. What they have is called a continuing resolution that has to be passed to fund the government for just one month. But I think what struck us most about that in the fact that the Democrats and Republicans are kind of jostling for a position is how this has been covered and how different it is for us on the ground there. Because how this is being covered is sort of like a horse race. Who’s going to win? The Republicans are the Democrats from our perspective as reporters. It’s a calamity and a calamity of healthcare with millions of people. Millions of people are right now on the verge of losing access to healthcare Americans. I think both tey and I have been struck by how much this has been covered is just another shutdown showdown between two parties. One that’s vying for power, one that has no power, and the only thing that really matters is how the stakes are handled, how the card game is played. But the truth is, it’s a crisis. And so we were calling this tey and I started calling this the inequality shutdown because the roots of it, and we’ll get to that, we’re not going to that yet are rooted in inequality.

Taya Graham:

And the thing is, eventually every shutdown ends in a deal. The question is how much damage is going to be done until they finally come to that deal. Now, the last shutdown we had actually was in the Trump administration, I think it was 35 days. The longest one in recent history, which is pretty amazing. I think roughly 11 billion was lost from the American GDP. This isn’t something that doesn’t cost the public anything. And as a matter of fact, I think it’s really important to mention some of the public costs. Now there’s wic, which is literally for women, infant and children. There are 7 million women, infants and children that will be affected by this government shutdown that actually won’t receive the food they need, the help they need to have nutritious food, the education they need for breastfeeding. I mean, this is just basic stuff that used to have in a civilized country.

Maximillian Alvarez:

And this is on top of nine months of destruction leading up to this point. I mean, with every government shutdown, you also have tons of federal workers being furloughed. You have other federal workers working without pay, including people like air traffic controllers, I mean people who we want to be paid and well rested so that we all don’t crash when we’re just trying to go see our families. So this is really serious stuff that is and always does impact regular working. Well,

Stephen Janis:

The thing’s really interesting because we’ve been covering Congress for about this entire year, and what’s interesting about the shutdown is it’s kind of just what I would say sort of upping the ante for the Republicans in terms of how they process policy. Remember at the beginning of the year there was a whole Doge thing and it was just totally reckless. And then it imploded. And then it disappeared. And they’re being just as reckless here because they are not saying, we’re going to furlough people. We’re going to take the opportunity to fire people and fire as many people as we can. And JD Vance was asked today about something Trump said where he said he’s going to fire Democrats. They are really fixated more on beating up on liberals or beating up on democratic policies than they are in running government. And that’s coming out from this whole thing is that their whole idea is let’s fire as many people as possible.

Taya Graham:

And President Trump has promised to use this as an opportunity to do more cuts to benefits to the programs that Democrats like. He said, I’m going to be not just furloughing people, I’m going to be firing people. Russell Vote is looking at this as an opportunity to fire and get rid of programs that a lot of Americans rely on.

And so what this is looking like is government by extortion, okay, this is what’s occurring. They’re essentially saying, we’re going to put people out of work. We’re going to take away programs that help women and infants and children unless you do what we want. And the thing is, what are the Democrats asking for? It’s really straightforward for the A credits to be extended. That’s it. And if they’re not extended in 2026, people are going to be literally paying double their premiums an increase of like 116%. So going from $888 to like $1,119. I mean, most families can’t handle something like that. Excuse me, $1,900. It’s a doubling. Most families can’t handle something like that.

Stephen Janis:

I can’t. And just be clear, max, that aca, a credits were passed during COVID by the Biden administration to give people tax credits who qualify. They expanded the amount of people who qualify for credits and make their healthcare cheaper. So not only are they going to lose these credits, 2.2 million people will probably lose their healthcare because they say, I can’t afford it anymore. And then you have the 10 million people for Medicaid. I mean, that’s why we’re calling it an inequality crisis because it is a crisis for working people. It’s not a crisis for the people up on Capitol Hill and not really acting like it, but it is a crisis for people who literally won’t be able to go to a doctor because of this.

Maximillian Alvarez:

Well, and just to dive even a little deeper there, because this connects to the rest of the inequality reporting that y’all have been doing throughout this year, as you both said, right? I mean, and we’re talking about the impacts of that big beautiful bill that are still rippling throughout this country, the mass layoffs or voluntary resignations that you mentioned earlier, and the ripple effects there that we’ve been trying to cover, talking to federal workers and agencies who say they can’t function anymore. So that’s what we mean for y’all watching that this is chaos piled on top of chaos here. But in terms of the policy battle and the centrality of the A CA, I wanted to ask if you could just say a little more about that and how committed are the Democrats actually to remaining steadfast in defending that?

Stephen Janis:

Well, it’s a great question. Number one, remember the whole root of all these cuts were to have tax breaks for billionaires, for the wealthiest in our society.

And so the Republicans couldn’t find a way to finance those tax breaks. So they went first to Medicaid and then they went to the A CA, and by cutting the subsidies and by cutting Medicaid, they saved hundreds of billions of dollars, which is now transferring in the pockets of wealthy people. So it’s insane. But let me just give you an example of how insane it is. There is a editorial in the Wall Street Journal just recently about what they were kind of like saying the A CA is fraud. Now what had happened is the A CA, when they raised the tax credits and the threshold people who made 100% of the poverty line, in other words, earning the poverty and a little bit over, got free healthcare in the sense that they didn’t have to pay premiums. And the Wall Street Journal was railing saying Republicans are exposing the fact that those people are technically, according to the law, supposed to avail themselves of health insurance that comes through their jobs.

But a lot of them chose not to do that because the a c was free. These are people making 18 to $23,000 a year, and the Wall Street Journal is focusing on them as if they were doing something wrong. I mean, max, you interview working people all the time. You know how hard it is on $23,000 just to pay for your rent, your heat. And these people are saying, Hey, I got free healthcare, thank God, and the Wall Street Journal, and the Republicans are beating up on people for that. And worse yet, they are saying now, and Vance said this again, that somehow, and I don’t want to take you if you want to do this part of the myth, but the mythology that somehow the reason Democrats, they want to just give healthcare to aliens or people that come in, immigrants who immigrate to our country. You

Taya Graham:

Were literally reading my mind because as you’re sitting there discussing that, I was thinking about, and I have to put it in the starkest terms possible, the big GOP lie, and that is that the A CA and Medicaid is being used to give money and healthcare to undocumented folks or people who they call illegal immigrants. That’s not how Medicaid works. There is literally a federal law prohibiting anyone who is undocumented or what they might call an illegal alien from receiving these benefits. And for the record, Medicaid does not hand you a check if you’re getting Medicaid. What that means is if you’re injured, you can go into a hospital and get healthcare or it means that you can get a checkup because you’re having bronchitis this winter. It does not mean you’re being handed some sort of wonderful check. Okay, that’s not how it works. It’s just healthcare. And they’re digging into this lie and it’s just so hard to keep pushing back against it. And they’re using what they’ve created a fear of immigrants to push this.

Maximillian Alvarez:

Yeah. And sadly, it’s kind of like “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” If the culture war, like scapegoating of immigrants first, but they’re also saying the Democrats want transgender for everyone. I mean, this is another culture war scapegoat that they’re using to try to convince people that the a CA is bad for them. But these are not just political scapegoats. This also contributes to a political climate of violence against immigrants, trans people and poor and working people across the board. We’re seeing it all over the damn country. We’re reporting on it, you’re reporting on it every single week. So this culture war crap has real consequences. And for the MAGA GOP, they have seen time and time again that if they just keep pushing that

That’s apparently enough to get what they want. And I want to talk about what they want for a second, right? Because there’s some real mixed messages coming here, often coming from the same people from Trump himself or Speaker Mike Johnson telling the cameras one thing and then saying another in front of the same cameras. And like you guys mentioned, we’ve been interviewing workers all throughout this year. I just interviewed two whistleblowers from the Department of Housing and Urban Development who were fired for their whistle blowing. So naturally doing my due diligence, I went to the HUD website and this was the popup that filled my entire screen earlier this week. You go to the HUD website, this thing fills up your screen saying quote, the radical left are going to shut down the government and inflict massive pain on the American people unless they get their 1.5 trillion wishlist of demands. The Trump administration wants to keep the government open for the American people. Now, I wanted to ask you guys how you unpack this because you mentioned that Trump Russell vote, the administration is seemingly also frothing at the mouth to use this opportunity to get more of its policy wishlist.

Stephen Janis:

Newsflash, the Republicans are bad at policy, and that’s something that we have seen up close. The only thing they care about is defeating liberalism in some way or defeating, but unfortunately, the Democrats are not always the best red rhetoricians and able to respond. I think we can run a clip here when I ask Democrats specifically, because are you going to die on this hill of healthcare? Not to use a bad term, but how important is this a no-go for you. And we can just listen. We have also Brooks, if we could queue that up.

Maximillian Alvarez:

Yeah, cam, let’s run that clip.

Stephen Janis:

Senator, is there any deal without reauthorization of the ACA tax credits? Will you make a deal with the Republicans if they do not reauthorize them?

Senator Angela Alsobrooks:

Well, I’m not at the table right now. Our leaders are there negotiating with the White House. We’re waiting to see what the result of those negotiations will be.

Maximillian Alvarez:

Okay, so that was you, Steve Janis, asking Senator Alsobrooks if Democrats are going to draw a line in the sand here.

Stephen Janis:

Absolutely.

Maximillian Alvarez:

That was not a very convincing answer

Stephen Janis:

Max, you’re a master of understatement. And this here in lies the problem. And now the Republicans have been able to take, I think, the rhetorical advantage by saying, oh, we’re just trying to fund healthcare for immigrants. And the Democrats should respond forcefully. They should say, are you going to punish working people because an immigrant illegally migrates here and gets healthcare. You’re going to punish 2.2 million Americans. You’re going to punish 10 million Americans because of that, because the innocent Americans don’t matter. But instead they give answers like we saw there, which as you point out, was less than inspiring. So I mean, I don’t know how TE felt about that, but

Taya Graham:

Yeah, I have to say that was a bit disappointing and that the Democrats did absolutely stand on the fact there’s 24 million Americans that are enrolled in the A marketplace, and they are in big trouble. And one of the reasons I think that these Democrats are making the stand now is that November 1st is open enrollment. If they don’t get these a CA credits straightened up right now, November 1st, it’s going to be a big problem for a lot of people.

Stephen Janis:

That’s a good point.

Taya Graham:

So there is actually an impetus behind this, but something I thought was interesting, like you mentioned, the Republicans have to find money to support these tax cuts. I think that’s one of the reasons why they’re going at the A CA, why they’re going at Medicare. And really the Democrats are asking for something very small. I honestly think the Democrats would be asking for more, but all they’re saying is, let’s just make sure that these subsidies don’t sunset. That’s it. That’s not much to ask for. And so what’s interesting is that this will actually affect a lot of Republican constituents. And so we spoke to representative Steny Hoyer, and he said something really interesting that he called the Cheney syndrome, and he mentioned that they’re Republicans, and this guy’s been on the hill for a while. He’s 86 years old, OK? He’s been on that hill for a while, and he’s worked with a lot of Republicans doing bipartisan work. And he says they’re afraid. And he described what happened to Liz Cheney. He said that she had great constituents in Wyoming who loved her, who knew her, who knew her family, who supported to politics for years. But when she publicly disagreed with Trump’s behavior, she didn’t change anything about her platform or anything about her policies, just disagreed with the president’s comportment. The president said, I’m going to make sure you’re voted out of office. And what happened, she was, so he said he really believes, there are a lot of Republicans who are afraid that if they don’t hold the line and stand in line with whatever President Trump wants, that it’s the end of their political career completely. And that’s for whether or not it’s going to hurt their constituents in relation to losing their healthcare. Or even Republicans who want to see the Epstein files actually released.

Stephen Janis:

And that’s authoritarian politics basically right there in a nutshell.

Maximillian Alvarez:

Well, let’s talk about that last point really quick because then we will wrap up. And I know you guys have tons of stories that you got to be covering. Again, I really appreciate you taking a minute to sit down with me and help our listeners unpack this. And again, to all of you watching and listening, we’re going to stay on this. We’re going to keep trying to get you the information and the voices that you need to hear right now from within and outside of the federal government. But you guys mentioned another critical story that you’ve also been reporting on this summer and going to dc, like going to these hearings. You have been also covering the battle in Congress to release the Epstein files.

Stephen Janis:

Absolutely.

Maximillian Alvarez:

I’m sure a lot of people out there are thinking the same thing. They’re asking it of us on the YouTube channel, on our social media. Like how is Epstein and the potential complicity of Donald Trump in the Epstein scandal, how is that tied into all of this?

Stephen Janis:

Well, there are two stories that are rooted in inequality and Jeffrey Epstein’s treatment. And when we attended the press conference where his victims came forward and spoke for the first time, it was clear that the justice system served him and served the meritocracy that actually was friends with him and that his power transcended any sort of idea that there’s a rule of law in this country, and that is all inequality infecting the justice system. It’s interesting when James Comey was indicted, everyone’s their hair’s on fire saying there’s no rule of law. Well, what we witnessed today, and I think you can talk about this, was that there was no rule of law when Jeffrey Epstein was molesting and raping young girls. There was no rule of law. And that is the same thing you’re seeing here. You’ve got a Republican Congress that is in power that can pass a tax break for billionaires and kick people off their house killer. And then you’ve got a child predator who can work for basically 20 years unimpeded by law enforcement. And that is also a result of inequality. These are the impacts and effects of inequality. They are real. It’s not just a theoretical, there’s a bunch of trillionaires and there’s a bunch of poor people. It is truly affects, and our entire system, and I think Epstein and you can talk on that was really evident of that.

Taya Graham:

I mean, just one small example of this in Florida in the same area, I believe it was Jean Elis who was convicted of soliciting prostitution from a minor. It was tried federally and he received 30 years in prison, Epstein for soliciting prostitution from a minor and securing sex with a minor, had 13 months where he was allowed to go out during the day to his office where it was alleged that he had women were sent to that office during the day he would go back to prison at night. It was absolutely exceptional. The treatment he got as well as even though he actually was given access, his defense team was given access to the names of all the victims…

Stephen Janis:

Who—they were not prosecuting. People who just had complained…

Taya Graham:

People who just complained, giving him the ability to harass, intimidate, and God knows what else. A man with incredible power. And I can tell you when I was there listening to the survivors, there was a Stanwell survivors rally, and then there was a general press conference. And these were all women who had never spoken publicly before Virginia. Dre spoke publicly and she unfortunately committed suicide. Carolyn Adriano, she spoke publicly. She allegedly died from a drug overdose. And Lee Sky, Patrick also spoke publicly, and she allegedly died from a drug overdose. There’s are three women who spoke publicly that allegedly died self-inflicted injuries. Now with this in mind, these women came forward together, I believe safety and numbers coming forward to speak publicly. I got to be literally just feet away from them, just two feet away speaking to them. And I looked into their eyes, and I can tell you if these women were lying, they’re the best actors in the world.

They’re the best actors in the world. These women were sharing deep trauma that was inflicted upon them when they were at their most vulnerable, 14 years old, 16 years old girls who needed money, who needed help, who maybe didn’t have a family support system. And he took advantage of them and he brutalized them. And then for the most recent hearing where Cash Patel is in front of Congress saying on record that there is no credible evidence that Jeffrey Epstein trafficked women and girls to anyone but himself when there’s allegedly up to a thousand victims and he trafficked them all to himself. This is what’s coming from our FBI. This is what’s coming from the FBI director. The coverup is so horrifying.

Stephen Janis:

And the coverup continues because as we noted in our reporting right now, there’s a discharge petition. A discharge petition would force a vote on a subpoena for the Epstein files. And there are 217, they need 218. And Congresswoman Alita Alva, right? Did I say she just won a special election? And Mike Johnson, the speaker of the house, is refusing to swear her in and we ask the congressman why he thought that was happening. If we can just play that clip quickly, you can just see how much the cover up, how deep it is.

Maximillian Alvarez:

And which congressman was this Wain Shaw

Stephen Janis:

Walkinshaw, yes. Sorry.

Maximillian Alvarez:

Yeah, cam, let’s play that clip up.

Stephen Janis:

Do you have any idea why he’s doing this? Why he’s delaying this swearing in?

Representative James Walkinshaw:

Well, I was the 217th signature on the discharge petition to force a vote to release the Epstein files. I think it’s quite obvious he knows she would be the 218th signature and given the half a deck that he’s playing with respect to the funding discussions right now, I think he doesn’t want that added complication.

Maximillian Alvarez:

All right. Well, that sounds pretty damn fishy. And I am going to ask the question that I know folks in our YouTube comments are going to be asking, is this whole government shutdown about just stopping the Epstein files?

Stephen Janis:

Oh wow.

Maximillian Alvarez:

Jesus man. But it looks so damn suspicious, and we’re trying to give folks the information that we’ve got, but there you’ve got a congressman sort of laying it out plainly that like, yeah, this is fishy. If it looks and smells fishy, it is.

Stephen Janis:

Well, the thing is, a discharge petition is only necessary if Congress can’t have a vote on something, right? So Speaker Mike Johnson is literally playing coverup for Trump, Epstein, any of his co-conspirators because he won’t even allow a vote. So the reason we have to have a discharge petition is just to make a vote. And he doesn’t want anyone on the record voting for that because they know the wrath of Trump will come down him. So you’ve got the entire Congress kind of bottled up to really protect a serial predator and his, like I said, co-conspirator,

Taya Graham:

Right? I think Mike Johnson is also trying to buy time because there have been a few Congress people who have come forward, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Nancy Mace, I think maybe there’s four who are willing to say that they would

Stephen Janis:

Republicans,

Taya Graham:

Republicans that are willing to sign the discharge petition

Stephen Janis:

They already have.

Taya Graham:

So I think it’s going to buy some time to maybe twist some arms in order to be able to ensure that this vote won’t go through. But I think Republicans don’t want to see this happen because there are a lot of Republicans who don’t want to go on the record saying, I voted against the release of this information. Because you have to ask why are you protecting these powerful predators?

Stephen Janis:

And Max, we wrote a story about this, about why Trump can’t escape this, but I think Trump is for once very distinctly tied to the massive inequality in our country, even though he is a purveyor of it and has been a cheerleader for it and an instrumentalist in it. But he now can’t really escape this, and this is going to consume him, I think. And I think there will be the 218 signature, and I think eventually there will be a vote and it’s going to be catastrophic.

Maximillian Alvarez:

Well, and when that happens, I know you guys are going to be, we be there, there covering it.

Taya Graham:

We’re going to stay on the hill.

Stephen Janis:

Yeah, we’re out

Taya Graham:

To shut down

Stephen Janis:

Getting on the train and walking up to Capitol Hill and doing our best. Because I do think as we point out, we discussed the mainstream media covers this like a horse race. It is calamitous for the working class. what’s about to transpire on Capitol Hill.