The silver lining here is that we all got to witness Katie Leavitt's first day on Earth yesterday, and I'm excited to see day two.
Hi everyone, this is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.
Scott, I have a new date. Did you notice?
I know you're cheating on me.
Talk about the ultimate co-host upgrade.
I know. I know. I know it's true. It was striking.
I mean, look, I didn't even mind. It's like I'm the worst kid on the Bad News Bears, and A-Rod shows up. I'm like, play second base. I'm like, okay, I get it. I get it.
It's true because like once one thing, it's like sometimes we talk about political or national issues and like we're talking about the execution thing, and then she's like, 'But you know, we were in the room when we killed Osama bin Laden, and this is what we did when we had to deal with issues of whether to show his picture or not.' And you're like, 'Oh, she was in the room.' And then somewhere else she's like, 'When we were dealing with that on this issue,' and I was like, 'Scott does not have this background.' She's like, 'Zelik.'
I'm like, when I was in the fraternity, I was drinking and saw it go by on television or whatever it is. Oh god. Um, she was great. She's, she was, it's racing up the charts. I got to tell you, it's racing. I knew it would.
What's really unusual about it is for you to talk about the success of something you're working on. So that's really unusual, and just making money for the Vox Media Podcast Network. That is.
They got to pay the bills. Got to pay the bills.
All kidding aside, I think people are dying for substance. I really, truly do. I think they're tired of this like clown car of a Trump administration, and intelligence is making its way back. You talk about that a lot.
She has a newfound affection because I think people appreciate intelligence, and also she does hit it kind of straight down the middle. I don't think people—Fox essentially turned their sights on her for four years and tried to convince America she was like this incandescent blue candidate. She's actually pretty centrist.
But yeah, I don't, you know, I don't like to listen to your work, but I forced myself to listen to that one.
Well, she's good. You can listen to her and then just go fast forward through me. I decided I needed a piece of media with a woman who's been underestimated by men for 50 years and a woman who spent 50 years telling them they're wrong.
Well, it's working. It's working. Uh, it's working. I also got to spend the day with Keri Russell the other day, so my whole week has been really fantastic.
I like her and her husband.
I know. Well, her husband was there. It was the cast of The Diplomat. Anyway, um, lot of strong badass ladies. Um, but we've got a lot to get into today. There is so much. Give some dating advice.
Um, speaking of strong ladies, um, the best advice that I've heard from a woman on dating, and I want you to pass this by the secretary.
Okay.
Lure them in with the titties, feed them bacon, and then let the mental illnesses present themselves.
What did you just like drag women?
Oh my god, Shane. Kill us.
Just a little contrast. Just want to make sure you know you're on Pivot with Scott Galloway, not with the secretary. Bounce that one off the secretary. See if that makes her book tour.
Smart. I'm not saying a word to her. She likes you inexplicably.
She's got a sense of humor. There's no way she's not a little—she's a little salty. No way.
She is. She's really funny. We're going to do whiskey on the show at one point. She likes a good whiskey, I'll say.
Feed them bacon and then reveal the mental illnesses.
Oh my god. And you said the word titties. Are you 12? You're 12. You are absolutely—oh my god, I got to go back to Hillary Clinton and Keri Russell. I need to rush to the classy dames that I am used to. Anyway, I'm going to get—and you know, soon I'll be interviewing Rachel Maddow and it'll just...
What did you think of Shane Gillis's SNL thing?
Here's the thing. They like to get like all mad about, 'Oh my god, he called women [__].' Like what? That's like another Tuesday for that idiot here. It's not funny. He wasn't funny. It was like such a lame joke told by a guy who essentially is the last person you dated before you become a lesbian, that guy. And he's just not funny. It was like such an old—and I do think it's part of the same thing I'm talking about, is people are just sick of this just like dumb, dumb, dumb misogyny. I don't know what else to say. It's just like things are too serious for this like subpar humor. And it wasn't funny. I don't think it was funny. And that's the real crime.
I think you're absolutely right. I think it would have been funny. People would have—Bill Burr and...
Look, there is a line of humor around—I get it—around wokeness going too far and being irreverent. Comedians deserve a wide berth. This isn't dramatic social commentary that requires everyone to have their hair on fire. In my view, the sin was it wasn't funny. You can get away, you know, there's...
I agree. I agree. We should laugh a lot more. I agree. But I do also think this anti-woke thing is done. Like everyone's like, 'Okay, we got it, but now you're annoying.' Like essentially, you know, everyone's changing the tune. Joe Rogan all of a sudden is against the war. Trump keeps trying to pardon people. Like he said, he literally sounded like a San Francisco lesbian on his last show. Um, I think people are just tired of like the anti-woke stuff is over. It's done, I think. And I think everyone's learned their lesson, including the people who are being too like woke. Absolutely.
The only—I don't mind—I think it's funny. I think you give comedians a wide berth. They're supposed to be irreverent. They're supposed to have a wide berth. Fine. That's fine. I think misogyny is overused. I think misandry is underused, quite frankly. I think the majority of female-driven podcasts are basically, let's just talk about how incompetent and irredeemable men are for an hour.
The what I do see—misogyny, Clinton, but go ahead.
Anyways, where I do find—I don't want to call it misogyny, but it gets the hairs up on my back. I find this group of broligarch comedians that are all like in that kind of—Gillis, Rogan. I forget the other guy called Andrew. Not even—I think I actually think the Ovon has a song.
He has a new show coming out, I think, on Netflix.
I forget the other guy who called Puerto Rico trash or whatever.
Oh, that guy. That guy. Yeah.
What? You know, I think actually they're funny. Have at it. Get your own audience. The thing that really rattles me is when they go after female comedians. They have this agreement not to go after each other, but it's open season on Chelsea Handler.
Yeah. Although she does take them down.
The right basically tried to drive—who I think the best comedian of our age right now is—Michelle Wolf. I find what I don't like is male comedians going after female comedians.
And there just seems to be a different standard for women who are successful on a comedic tour in a reverend. It's like open season among the broligarchy and amongst comedians. They all deserve the right to say really irreverent things. And if you don't, it's like—I love the statement you made. You don't like Chick-fil-A, don't eat at Chick-fil-A. By the way, the CEO threw up all over himself this past weekend. I'm jumping around a lot. When he was asked about the LGBT community, you didn't see that?
Oh my god, he missed a layup. He just should have said, 'We believe in equal rights for anyone. Anyone of any chicken [__] sandwich?' Oh, we love everyone. We have gay employees. We have non-white employees. Gays eat chicken sandwiches is how it should be. We love you. We promise you the same dignity and respect as anyone else. You've missed a [__] layup.
I know. It's really stupid. Like every—I do think we are at a moment where people are like, 'Okay, enough with the woke stuff. Enough with the—you know, everyone's learned an idea. Let's meet in the middle, Kara.'
Yes. No, not in the middle. It's like everybody [__] relax. But there are some people with really bad intent, and those people need to go away. They're just mean and nasty, you know, like an Elon, for example. All right. Speaking of Elon, he's denying responsibility for limiting Ukraine's access to Star Shield, the military version of Starlink. He says the system is controlled by the US government and the restrictions are decided by the military and ultimately President Trump. Ukraine lost critical access to Star Shield this week, disrupting drone attacks and air defense operations. Service has reportedly been restored. This follows Trump calling on Ukraine to stop striking Russian oil refineries and saying President Zelensky should be replaced. Zelensky is pushing back, telling the Financial Times he's done with Trump's energy ceasefire, and Ukraine will resume refinery strikes. He's also hitting data centers more. He said the Star Shield disruption was, quote, 'not a technical problem. It was the will.' In this case, you know, the problem Elon had is he went at Zelensky, and then it suddenly shut down. And so I do think it is unfair to put this on him. It is run by the government. The decision was made by Trump. That said, he was right in there, you know, slagging Zelensky, and so not a surprise that—and the way he sort of acts, you know, peacocks around like he's the shadow president. People are going to assume it's him. And a lot of people reached out to him. I suspect he probably called Trump and said, 'Turn it back on,' would be my guess. But I don't know. What do you think?
This is unusual. I'm usually the one defending Musk, and you're the one going after him.
I think this is another example of how Musk, in concert with Trump, are the genus and Khan being traitors to the West.
Well, that shutting it off is insane. It should never have happened.
But first off, Musk hides behind the notion of 'I don't control Star Shield.' So, Starlink is the commercial venture. Star Shield is built on Starlink technology and is now the contract with the Defense Department. I think what's happened here—and I don't know this, this is my speculation—but Hanlon's razor, the obvious explanation is usually the right one. You have the Bad News Bears of geopolitical strategy, Kushner and Witkoff, go over and say to Zelensky, 'We'd like you to surrender.' They're not asking for peace. They're asking for surrender.
And the terms that Kushner and Witkoff want Zelensky to sign up for, where they basically say, 'Give him what he wants.' They think that's peace. That's not a peace. That's scheduling the next war such that Putin can rearm and then decide if and when he's invading Finland, Poland. I mean, this is—Poland's been particularly irritating to Russia, I think. Well, let's sideline that for a second, but basically Zelensky said, 'No, I'm not surrendering.' And then I believe what's happened here is fairly obvious. Trump and Musk got on the phone and said, 'Let's throttle back Starlink and send a message to Zelensky that if he doesn't come to the table, he's going to lose the war.' This is a decision, in my view, between Trump and Musk that reflects something very dangerous—that a man who is addicted to ketamine is now deciding geopolitical strategy and who gets to invade Europe or not.
I am in violent agreement with you on that. I have said that a long time. I mean that he's really—what is this person doing in the middle of this? And he's not like the head of Lockheed, but he is consulting with the president. And the head of Lockheed, they sell the missiles and move along, right? Essentially, they're not on the phone on where and when it should deploy. And he's far too involved in everything we do. 100%. And speaking of which, related, Elon Musk said back in 2025 that in terms of political spending, 'I'm going to do a lot less in the future.' Well, so much for that. He's poured over $276 million into Republican groups and his own super PAC since July, making him the largest known donor of the midterms, and that's just the money that's been publicly disclosed. His donations include $158 million to the main super PAC backing Republican Senate candidates, one of the largest political donations in American history. It's also as much as the Democrats have raised from everybody. So, one single person is responsible. Another big chunk has gone to Ken Paxton. You know, the question is, will he get his money's worth around this time? He's not only trying to influence the midterms with his money, he's spreading disinformation on X, like the story that James Talarico was in a mental hospital. I mean, this guy is like—all his dirty fingers are everywhere in some fashion. Another thing that was in the news was these drone strikes that Ukraine did on three data centers operated by Yandex, which is essentially Russia's Google. Ukraine's president Zelensky suggested these Yandex strikes led to a drop in bot activity with less hate online, particularly on X, but experts say there's no evidence of that and that the drop in bots appears to be tied to Yandex's web crawlers, automated tools that index websites. It would be nice to get rid of Russian bots. That called attention to the problem with Russian bots, which I think is great, and they should continue to hit Russian data centers. But again, also linked with Musk because his platform is the one spewing out a lot of the information out there.
With respect to Elon and political spending, are we comfortable with an individual who controls battlefield technology now and can spend a quarter of a billion dollars and potentially get people elected or keep certain seats in America? I mean, is that what we want? I now believe that taxes—a progressive tax rate—protect us from corruption, and that is power corrupts. Absolute power absolutely corrupts. We need protection from the uber-wealthy nation states or individuals cosplaying nation states. And the way you do that is with taxation. We need a—whether it's concentration of power amongst companies such that they raise the rent, such that your chicken and your pharmaceuticals go up faster in price than inflation. Whether it's having a check on government so no narcissist can overrun Congress or the judicial branch. Whether it's someone worth a trillion dollars who can, sweat off his brow, put a quarter of a billion dollars into races. When you combine money with distribution, what you have is the most dangerous combination in politics. And that's what we have here. Also, I do not buy any of this misinformation pushback on what was obvious when the Yandex server facilities were bombed by Ukraine. Tucker Carlson's engagement fell 72%.
A lot of conservatives' engagement just fell off a cliff. Do the math, folks. I mean, this is—I've noticed it. The number of times people use the word genocide in my comments has dropped in the last week.
Right. But a lot of people who are experts said it's not the same thing. You may think it, but the bots—the bot traffic was not affected. Just—I mean, there's been a lot of very good reporting on this, but it does suggest that this is maybe a good place to push on this. This is a good place to push on the wound, essentially.
They would be stupid not to be doing this. They can't afford to beat us economically. They can't afford to beat us kinetically. For a small amount of money, they can take advantage of the fact that we have porous platforms who will cash anybody's check. Using AI, you can spin up bots.
I mean, haven't you seen it? Look at the most vile comments in your feed.
They're people with three followers.
Yes. And you think about the bot problem, and it's largely right-wing. That's because this is Russia or...
I want to go the other way. When I say something like—when I just put out a thread or something on social that says '25th Amendment,' that's me saying that the president is incompetent and should be removed from office. I get thousands of likes because the AI from an adversary says, 'That's dividing them. Let's elevate that. Let's retweet it.' They don't care what's said. So it works both ways. And then what happens to you as a person? Your incentives are, 'Oh, people like me when I say this divisive thing should be removed. So I'm going to do more of that.' And the more angry and incendiary I get, the more people like me.
Yeah. No, it absolutely is creating. Years ago, I think I told you this, when I was looking at some bots, I interviewed a bot person. They were showing me how when Roseanne Barr insulted Valerie Jarrett, suddenly it got to be a big online thing. And then a week later, Samantha Bee called Ivanka, 'See you next Tuesday.' That's what she [__]—she said, 'Cunt.' And it was all the same bots that were doing the anger around it. Bots started, you know, 'Oh my god, Roseanne's the best. Oh my god, Roseanne's the worst.' They were on all sides of the game. And then people got attracted to it. It's like a traffic—it's like a digital traffic accident that they create in order to create people. The TikTok algorithm—if you want to gain, okay, so you take the top 10 best-selling authors who are quote-unquote thought leaders any week, go on TikTok and do a video saying Andrew Huberman or Mel Robbins or Jay Shetty is a fraud—hundreds of thousands of views. So, anything that's incendiary and calls out people and dunks on people, it immediately—and then if you say something mean about it, anything that divides us. I actually think one of the reasons it's so important that people spend more time out of the house and we demand that our kids basically get out—I've said to my kids, 'Join a gang, shoplift, I don't care, as long as it's out of the house.' You need to get out and see how wonderful people are, because if you're in your room on your phone, you're going to think the whole world sucks. You're going to think everyone is awful.
Because the incentives are—I love the statement—we're actually not that divided. We're being divided.
100%. But I do think it's because people stay on these platforms, right? And you know, I've been having beefs this week by all these dudes that are going back, both Casey and what's his name—Casey who left Substack because he was offended and now he's going back to Twitter. That Casey Newton. And then he left because he was offended by Elon and now he's back. I know. And the same thing happened with Gruber. What's his name? John Gruber, who's another—they're like, 'Well, the tech discussion's here. Who got on Twitter first? Who got on Twitter first?'
You did. I just deleted all my tweets, by the way, this week, which I was like, you know...
I don't. Some of those are comedy gold.
No, they're not. I downloaded them all. I have them. I have an archive of them. And...
No, no, I meant mine, not yours.
No, I know. You can archive them to yourself and then not have them up. I'm just not painting this asshole's fence. But, you know, everyone's like, 'Why are you so mad about it?' I'm like, 'Because it's like for the tiny con—it's soul-sucking, and you are helping someone who is very bad.' Like there are few things you can stand up in life, and I don't think it helps you that much for a bit for your business because you're in on the conversation of a small group of AI people or like, 'Oh, it's not so bad in my area.' That's like saying, 'I'm living in the good part of this country, but over on the other side of town they're beating up on black people.' Like, are you kidding me? Like it just—I just can't take it. Look, I believe generally speaking, you should separate the person from the politics. I don't like boycotts generally speaking. I think unless there's—you think you're going to have some real effect, if you think big tech is out of control, I get it. I think consumers should be made aware of their options as a capitalist. When you are on Twitter, when you own a Tesla, when you use Starlink—and I got to be honest, I'm guilty of this. I love Starlink and I use it. But I sold my Tesla. I got off Twitter because when you are on Twitter or when you are on Starlink or when you are using any of his platforms, you have decided to paint the fence—your term—of someone who cut funding for HIV-positive mothers in Africa, who is turning off and on battlefield technology for Ukraine that is literally trying to defend Europe, who is being sued concurrently by two women when he denies and disavows his daughter, his own blood, because this young woman went through transition. That is who you're supporting. At some point there probably should be—and everyone has to make their own choices.
And also, I don't have moral clarity on this. I use Starlink and I love it.
But I'll tell you, if you don't have much choice, right? And that's really—in this case, it's a complex thing. But please don't flounce out and then slink back in. That's my—I'm like, enough of you. But if you slink back in, at least be honest. 'I'm going back on because I need to be back on. I'm an addict.' Let me just feel for Casey. Casey is a great journalist trying to build a business. He's younger than us. He doesn't have the following of Kara Swisher. He's decided he needs to be back on Twitter because that's where a lot of the action is for him. I get it. But just be honest about it and don't try and pretzel yourself into some sort of...
He was—he's embarrassed. He's appropriately embarrassed about it. But I just...
I get it. He's a young guy trying to make a living. I guess, although I was like, 'Oh my, I haven't raised my kids properly.' That's how I feel about Casey.
You're out of the carriage house.
Oh, no. He has his own place.
And then saying—but you asked. I don't think he's going to get this. People call this a blue wave, right? You can't buy your way out of the price of eggs, and everyone's saying this is a blue wave. It's not a blue wave. It's a red riptide. And it's not that the Democrats are doing anything right. It's that the Republicans literally have the mother of all own goals. That's like Kara Swisher saying she's not going to text Scott late at night with nasty.
I haven't this weekend. Not going to happen.
I'm texting Hillary late at night now. That's my new text. But I'm always like, 'Great job, girl. Well done, Secretary. Breath of fresh air you are.' Oh my god. I did. I wrote her that. I did.
Oh my god. What a breath of fresh air. Like a warm summer breeze.
Oh, you're the best. You're so fantastic. That suit, that fuchsia suit. Fantastic. Anyway, one of us has knocked on doors for the Secretary.
You should wear more fuchsia for me. That's all I have to say. Okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump's new press secretary makes an awkward debut.
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Scott, we're back with more news. You had a lot of fun with this this week, I noticed online. I do still pay attention to you. Trump's new White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, held her first briefing on Tuesday, which lasted a total of 14 horrible, awkward, terrible minutes. She read nervously from the script and answered just three questions from reporters, all of whom were in the tank for the Trump administration. When asked whether the US had stopped sharing intel with Ukraine, Leavitt said, 'I'll have to get back to you on that.' Let's listen to this particularly awkward moment from the briefing.
The idea of not spending evenings with my kids is completely unacceptable. So my president—excuse me, my husband. That's a good one. My husband is out here for the week. Oh my. The former True Social adviser—which is also, by the way, True Social's falling off a cliff—has faced questions about her legal credentials, with no record of being licensed to practice law in the US despite Trump describing her as an attorney. Leavitt reportedly failed the California bar, and according to the Wall Street Journal, when she was asked where she did pass, told reporters, 'When I moved to China,' though she now says she misheard the question. She did not. It was very loud and it was by Sean McCarrick. I heard it. You may be thinking to yourself, how many Scaramuccis is she going to last? So, we asked the man we've all been waiting to hear from on this to send us his take, Anthony Scaramucci, the Mooch, who served as White House communications director for a record-breaking 11 days. Let's hear it.
I am totally biased. You know, I really want her to make it because I would like this record to stand. It's been nine years and I have milked this thing like a dairy farmer. And so I obviously want her to make it longer than me, longer than the lettuce from Liz Truss. But here's what I think is going to happen. If he's keeping her, they're going to put her in a lockbox and give her media training and then bring somebody like Vance out or Rubio to do the press conference with her so she has a crutch. If he's not keeping her, I think he's going to blow her out very quickly, which would put my tenure, my record tenure, in jeopardy. So, let's see what happens. But I'm betting he's going to keep her.
Yeah, I would agree. I think I said that too. She seems to be settling in as well. Seen with special assistant to the president, Natalie Harp. Natalie gave her seal of approval, joining President Trump on Marine One. And now there's rumor he's trying to ace out someone who's actually competent, even if she's sort of a quisling, Susie Wiles. This is the most important job in an administration—one of the most important jobs—is the communications. And so talk a little bit about this. Can you name a worse bullpen rotation?
Well, something that's been helpful to me is I call my son every night, who's a freshman in college, and I know way too much about his life right now, and I know he has a biology test today, and I texted him last night. I'm like, 'Are you ready for your biology test?' And he sent me a picture of Karoline Leavitt.
Like, does any of this matter?
I didn't have a job as—and my favorite, I think I saw somewhere on Threads, someone said someone needs to tell George W. Bush that it would appear that Karoline Leavitt was left behind.
Oh, I love that. No Child Left Behind.
You had a good time with this. Yeah, for some reason. I absolutely...
You like it more than the Kelly Clarkson animatronic bird in Brooklyn thing.
I absolutely love her. I think first off, I like hot people. She's hot. I think she's really, really attractive.
Okay. Kind of way, but okay.
I've been putting out all night. 'When I moved to China.' Any question, I guess, 'When I moved to China.' When did you pass the bar? 'When I went to—when I moved to China.'
Scott, what is this? Does it matter? Because Trump is his own spokesman at this point.
Who cares? I don't know. And to be fair, she did graduate with honors from the Derek Zoolander Center for Kids Who Can't Read Good and Who Want to Learn to Do Other Stuff Good, Too.
There's a great Atlantic piece—a comedy piece—about that. She hates the alphabet.
She attended the Four Seasons Law School. I mean, this is—
She looked like a newborn baby giraffe taking its first steps.
Yeah, she did. I mean, she's just—
But does it matter? Like, let's ground you in. We can make fun of her all day long, but is it going to hurt him? I don't know.
Well, although a lot of people said the past two press secretaries look like Churchill compared to her, but—and they're all blonde ladies, just to be clear. I was like, Scott Jennings, where are you? Like, she's what you get when you scrap DEI programs. It is like—
That's true.
I'm speechless. I'm here for it. I hope she survives. It's going to make press briefings fun again. It's going to make press briefings great again. I just can't wait. I hope they keep her.
