Epstein Files Blocked, Trump Cancelled Colbert? & Zohran's Chances in NYC with Ezra Klein

Andrew Schulz's Flagrant with Akaash Singh

Comedy

4.6 • 6K Ratings

🗓️ 24 July 2025

⏱️ 178 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

YERRR – this one’s a political rollercoaster with Ezra Klein in the building, and nothing’s off limits. From Mike Johnson shutting down the Epstein vote to Trump’s sketchy second‑term plans, Ezra helps the boys connect the dots on conspiracies, power grabs, and why reform feels impossible. They get deep into Project 2025, the rising cost of education, polarization, and why the Democratic Party might need a full rebuild. Plus: social mobility, Mamdani’s policies, and why forming real coalitions is harder than anyone admits. And of course—Colbert getting axed, CBS’s mess, and keeping the pressure on those Epstein files. All that and more on this week’s episode of FLAGRANT. INDULGE. 00:00 Mike Johnson stops Epstein vote + conspiracy 6:45 Trump loves to draw, Panic mode + He knew 12:28 Trump's Watergate? Don't get distracted 17:52 2nd term = all Trump's appointees 23:33 Dems are not reformers + Need for open primaries 31:49 Polarization on institutions + Opportunity for Dems 39:55 Dems keeping their distance + Defined by Mamdani 46:54 Project 2025 + Curtailing colleges 57:30 Need to look at institutions 1:02:26 Rising cost of education + What is it for? 1:13:31 Social mobility & Mamdani 1:19:49 Poirier Holloway was great 1:25:48 de Blasio + Other Mamdani's policies 1:33:06 Free and plentiful + Abundance 1:44:23 Horseshoe Theory + Forming coalitions are hard 2:03:44 Have to acknowledge own failings + Trump trust 2:12:12 My bad with Dave Portnoy 2:17:50 What the new Democratic Party needs to be? 2:31:45 Colbert cancelled + CBS merger 2:47:44 Trump's potential dangerous distractions 2:52:51 Mahmoud Khalil + Weaponization of speech 2:56:33 Keep pressure on Epstein files Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	What's up everybody? Welcome to Flagrith. And today we are joined by New York Times best-selling author. I think it's been, do we say 16 weeks now? Is it something like that? Longer? I think I don't want to get it wrong. I don't want to get it wrong. I don't want to get it wrong. It's a lot of weeks. It's a lot of weeks. Okay. The author, the co-author, I should say. Let's give Derek some credit of abundance, which I think addresses with amazing accuracy, a lot of the issues that are going on today. I implore you guys all to go read this. Obviously, New York Times bestsellers, so many people have. But please go listen. You could listen to it. That's what I did. You can listen to it right now. On Spotify, listen to it. But we're here with Ezra Klein, everybody. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, Ezra's got good insider information. He knows exactly why Mike Johnson shut down Congress. So he's going to tell us, this is not opinion. There's 100% fact. Go for it, Ezra. Yeah, so we started on the easy one, huh? Yeah, yeah. So I listened to you all in Epstein.
0:55.3	And it had been in my head when I just did an Epstein show.
0:59.0	And I read all the Epstein coverage and went back and talked to people and knew more about it than I did.
1:04.5	And I come to the view that you could explain away most of it.
1:09.5	And then Mike Johnson recessed Congress rather than even allow a vote on
1:15.0	it. And it's really hard to believe there isn't something weird when the people with power
1:22.5	are acting that weirdly. Can you explain what that means to recess Congress?
1:28.3	Yeah, so he used his power of speaker to send Congress home.
1:32.3	Congress has a schedule.
1:33.3	They can be recessed.
1:35.3	There were enough Republicans breaking with the Trump administration to force a vote alongside
1:39.3	Democrats.
1:40.3	I think you guys had Rokana on, right?
1:42.3	Yeah.
1:43.3	To force a vote with Democrats to release the files, much more of the files.
1:49.1	And if you, so I read, do you guys read the FBI, the FBI DOJ memo?
1:53.8	I write nothing ever.
1:55.4	So the FBI DOJ memo says why it's not going to release the files.
1:58.3	And it says that the files are braided together with information about women and girls.
2:04.4	And it doesn't want to, like, their priority is not re-traumatizing people, re-victimizing the girls.
2:10.2	Even though they're begging for justice.
2:12.3	Have we asked the girls at all?
	...

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