Significant cuts to healthcare, Medicaid, and SNAP benefits and giving tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans. And arming ICE to destroy the people who are in America to make a better life like our forefathers. Discussing why The Big Ugly Bill will be awful for all of us with Congressman Johnny O at Costas Inn in Timonium on the Maryland Crab Cake Tour.
Nestor Aparicio and Congressman Johnny O discuss the negative impacts of the “Big Ugly Bill,” which includes significant cuts to healthcare, Medicaid, and SNAP benefits, and tax breaks for the wealthy. They highlight the hypocrisy of politicians like Murkowski and Hawley who voted for the bill despite initial opposition. The bill is described as the largest healthcare cut in U.S. history, with 14 million losing coverage, including children reliant on Medicaid and CHIP. The conversation also touches on the broader issues of political performance, willful ignorance, and the need for authentic leadership and civic engagement.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Big Ugly Bill, American citizens, healthcare cuts, Medicaid, SNAP benefits, tax brackets, wealth transfer, debt increase, rural hospitals, performative politics, insurrection, social media, political propaganda, affordable housing, workforce opportunities.
SPEAKERS
Johnny Olszewski, Nestor Aparicio
Nestor Aparicio 00:00
Welcome home. We are W, N, S, T am 1570 tasks in Baltimore. We are Baltimore positive, positively. We’re not Dundalk anymore. We’re at the Costas and timoni. We’re here at the racetrack. It’s all brought to you by the Maryland lottery. I have the Back to the Future scratch offs. We will have these again on Thursday, when Steve rouse joins us. I’m getting up early on Tuesday morning, I’m going to be at deepest squales. They got, they got a crab cake there. By the way,
Johnny Olszewski 00:26
you did a crab cake tour. Well, see, I’m
Nestor Aparicio 00:28
bringing the Dundalk goons together here in Timonium tomorrow. I’m bringing the Highland town goons into Kate Canton, because I got Pete Karen, she coming down from Highland town. We’re gonna talk some soccer. I got Nancy Longo coming to talk about cheffing. And speaking of cheffing, it is my 27th anniversary. When you were county executive, Johnny, you came out, did my 25th anniversary on August, 3 two years ago. We did the Costas. And I’m featuring my 27 favorite things to eat in the region in the air. It’s also during Makos. I’m going down to the beach in August. This is going to be one of them. This is, um, this is the spinach dip at Costas. People would say, well, it’s spinach dip. How good can it be? Come and get it. But here in Timonium, they’re doing it with the, I don’t know how to say pita chip in Greek pita chip in Greek, spanico pita, sort of deconstructed spanico pita. And this thing’s delicious, and I’m not going to eat it, because I’ll get green stuff stuck in my teeth. And I’m with the honorable Congressman making his first sitting here since leaving county executor executive ship and trying to write the ship down in DC amidst long odds we did, sort of getting to know you and changing roles and all of that stuff. I really want to get into your little filibuster for me here on the big, ugly bill, and all of the tentacles of how awful this thing is and how it ever got done. And were you ever confident, even at the 11th Hour that this might not happen? As a citizen? I thought this is going to happen because these these Republicans are going to cave because it’s what they do, yeah, to give Murkowski something she wants, and they’re all afraid of going back to their district without whatever’s they need to have to make themselves happy. Well,
Johnny Olszewski 02:08
here’s the most disappointing thing about the whole process, is that Murkowski could have stopped the bill. She was one of several Republican senators who said they have real concerns about what it does to their constituents, to Americans. And she caved for a half hearted carve out for Alaska and Hawaii on some benefits, on SNAP and for Medicaid, temporary, short lived. And after it passed, she said, Oh, well, I really hope, I really hope the house takes this up and fixes it, knowing full well that wasn’t going to happen. That was never really an option, just like people like Josh Hawley, who said he would never vote for a bill that guts rural hospitals. And
Nestor Aparicio 02:56
this Josh Hawley, that would, that’s the one. Yeah, that’s the one. But yet, you know,
Johnny Olszewski 03:01
they hold it, and this has been, at least in my experience, that the model has been to hold out, whether it’s on salt or on Medicaid or whatever the pick an issue, fashion yourself a moderate or someone who’s willing to stand up to frankly, the President, in this case, get a lot of attention, print, social media, cable TV, national television pundits talking about you, and then fold. And it was tried and true the first time around, and it proved true this time around, and
Nestor Aparicio 03:43
that’s whether it’s West Virginia, Alaska, any of the places where you can swing a vote
Johnny Olszewski 03:47
and and there are places where votes should have swung, because we saw in Nebraska, there was a rural hospital the day before the vote who said, in anticipation of these cuts, we are going to close. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. And what we’ll get into the filibuster, but but the lack of courage of people who wrote letters, who issued statements, who were on TV, who were happy to step forward and take the attention, what we’re talking about earlier just this, this ecosystem of attention seeking and wanting to be, you know, the thing I don’t, and I don’t mind that, like, I get it, I’m in politics, like, attention is good if it’s authentic. And I think what really, what really stung are people that I had deep conversations with who know this was bad for their district, who told me that they didn’t
Nestor Aparicio 04:44
personally, everybody knows Donald Trump’s a criminal. They voted for him anyway, and ultimately that’s
Johnny Olszewski 04:49
it is like that people decided that they wanted to worship at the altar of Donald Trump more than they wanted to protect their constituents from the bad boy. Parts of this bill, and that that’s just the sad reality of what we saw and experience firsthand.
Nestor Aparicio 05:06
The amazing thing for me is, in all of the corruption with this criminal, this felon who wants to be king, was that I woke up after this thing was passed in the middle of the night, four o’clock in the morning, I’m getting an email from Social Security that if Martin O’Malley, you can like Martin or not like Martin, but he’s running it this, this kind of thing, this kind of propaganda. I’m assuming every American who has a social security number got what is absolute bullshit. I mean, just absolute garbage propaganda from a puppet Social Security leader employed by Elon Musk and Donald Trump. No Elon sale unopposed the bill. But that was better to send me that my social security isn’t good, that this is a good thing to try to get Americans to send propaganda in the middle of the night to vulnerable Americans, thinking that the government did something in their benefit, when nothing could be further from the truth. Well,
Johnny Olszewski 06:13
here’s the thing. Is that for some people, there will be a tax offset, especially for seniors on Social Security, they will see their benefits slightly increase because they’ll be there’ll be a tax write off again, something that I could have supported as a standalone bill. I don’t think it’s appropriate for government agencies to be become political propaganda machines for either party. So like what they did was wrong, the net effect of this bill in this space was something I supported. But once you take away the fact that actually for middle income and especially lower income families, the tax brackets are actually changing in a way that people will pay more, the ultra wealthy will pay less, and then as you get more and more down the economic spectrum, you pay more, which is like reverse Robin Hood. You couple that with the loss of health benefits for people who rely on Medicaid and for some people Medicare, there were also cuts to Medicare. People who rely
Nestor Aparicio 07:10
my 90 year old mother, people who lived to be 98 needed all of that to continue her life, to come into Costas on Mother’s Day, people
Johnny Olszewski 07:16
who rely on SNAP, but even people who have private insurance, are going to see their premiums go up. Whether you’re on the Affordable Care Act, the ACA, or you’re on private insurance, your premiums are going to go up because there is less money supporting the health care system. There are fewer people who are covered by insurance at all. You’re going to see more uncompensated care go to hospitals, which is why hospitals are going to close. You’re going to see more uncompensated care. There’s not going to be supports for nursing homes. Nursing homes are going to close, you’re going to see it be harder to get quality health care and access to health care as it costs you
Nestor Aparicio 07:54
more to do it. Robert Kennedy was put in front of this, and I’m sure he’ll come in and he’ll fix it all. Fix it all. I mean, we’re going to have more sick people than we’ve ever had because of how we’ve cared about this, in a general sense, doesn’t take long to figure out that when you turn satellites off and you turn FEMA off and you turn no a off and storms are coming. I mean, the lunatic in your wing of the of the house down there was talking about shooting things into the sky to make hurricanes happen over red states. I don’t even know how to respond to that. Yeah, I don’t even know what would tether anything to that to the truth, but people believe it. Johnny, yeah,
Johnny Olszewski 08:39
people have gotten detached from what is, like, truthful and real
Nestor Aparicio 08:43
or even possible, scientifically or otherwise, I would say, right, literally,
Johnny Olszewski 08:49
yeah, no. I mean literally, yeah. If you could just tell my wife I’m doing a podcast. Oh yeah, yeah.
Nestor Aparicio 08:58
Johnny, always here. We’re cautious. I’ve already we’re doing overtime. So other things in this bill that you do not like,
Johnny Olszewski 09:04
oh yeah. So look on health care, in addition to the 14 million people who will lose coverage, people like Amir rich, who’s a little kid who was born just two pounds, he was in the hospital for 450 days. His mother was a correctional specialist for 16 years, Medicaid is the only reason he was able to survive. He relied on chip, the Children’s Health Insurance Program. 50% of all American children are covered because of chip, and so children like Amir will lose
Nestor Aparicio 09:35
anyone on the fringe, any anyone that’s not normal and healthy and
Johnny Olszewski 09:39
but that’s people who have Medicare or Medicaid, exactly, especially medic Medicaid. But like I was saying earlier, this will affect everybody. This is the largest cut to health care in our country’s history, and for what they will get more expensive and harder to find for the benefit of billionaires and the ultra wealthy, this is the largest. Wealth transfer in our country’s run away from that where people who know where people who are relying on the government, are going to see their taxes go up. People who have been working hard, the working class, will see their their money shift to billionaires, and they don’t call it trickle down anymore. Oh, by the way, as we fund the biggest wealth transfer in our country’s history, we’re gonna see the biggest debt increase in our country’s history. So now, the four to $5 trillion that we just authorized in debt increase, we’re doing that to fund health care cuts, tax breaks for billionaires, food benefit cuts. Think we’re doing things like we eliminated 100 year old provision that had an excise fee on silencers, so now you can get your silencer without any extra fee. So it’s cheaper to buy silencers. As our deficit goes up, so our communities are less safe. Our deficit is going up. There was a long standing tanning bed excise tax. We’re gonna get rid of that too, because that’s really important for our funding purposes. The president is getting his garden of heroes, funded to the tune of almost $50 million in this budget, things that are not essential, that we’re ballooning our debt, we’re mortgaging our children’s future, and people are going to get hurt. I don’t know other way to say it, and so, you know, it’s incumbent upon me and other people to tell the story. So I appreciate you having me on because I’m going on every platform possible. I’ve been on Fox News, I’ve been on CNN, I’ve been on podcasts. I’ve been in local press, because I cannot stand by and watch what happened and not tell the people both that I represent, but also the American people. I have an obligation to all Americans now to let them know what’s going on. And we talked earlier like I am a nice guy. I want us to work together. We have to get back to that place. But I also have an obligation when wrong is wrong, to say this is this. Shit is wrong, right? It is. This is not okay. This is not okay. And getting us back to a place where we can have decency and and that compassion and that care that we talked about in the first, the first episode, or the first part here, yeah,
Nestor Aparicio 12:14
I talked so much to you about the county, you know, through the years of busting your chops about schools and crime and all that stuff locally, but I didn’t talk about what was really going on with the country, with this shift of performance politics that you talked about, and the notion that Josh Hawley, an educated man, would not know better, and what an insurrection. Looked him up before he ran Jamie was just
Johnny Olszewski 12:42
like he built just like he pumped up his opposition to Medicaid before he voted to cut it. It’s, it’s, it’s performative at its worst, because it’s in like, it’s, it’s so it’s like, built on lies. It’s not even real. And that’s the thing is, like, I can handle people. January 6 was real. I got really happy. That’s right. I can handle people who, like, get a platform because they perform and it’s like things they believe in. But like, what burns me up are the Josh Hollies of the world who are so inauthentic. Well,
Nestor Aparicio 13:16
Marco Rubio is the king of like, to me, I think the most authentic thing Said About Trump was during the 16 elect election period, where there were 15 candidates on stage, and she’s bleeding from her like all of that stuff was going on. Bush. Jeb Bush said he’s a chaos candidate. He would be a chaos president. There was nothing about my life between 16 and 20, including the mask and COVID. That was not chaotic this first six month period, the amount of chaos that is self inflicted, including tweets in the middle of the night that were dropping bombs on Iran. I mean, just without congressional authority. By the way, I was going to go through that with you being that you are a congressional authority at this point the the unending chaos, chaos being the key word, and I don’t mean get smarts chaos, although that just shows you how smart Mel Brooks was 60 years ago, whatever it was, but chaos, just in a general sense, is you handed your phone to your assistant, and I’m like, what did he do now? I mean, like, literally, because we are laughing.
Johnny Olszewski 14:23
But no, no, I last time this airs on Friday, I laughed because it’s so true, and it is.
Nestor Aparicio 14:30
Today was Epstein. By the way, today Epstein was in the news, right? Because about like we’re removed from three weeks ago.
Johnny Olszewski 14:38
By the way, there’s no way. There’s not a list of there’s no way. And also, and if there’s not, then they’ve been lying to us for years,
Nestor Aparicio 14:48
which is possible, because they lie a lot. Well, well, that that. But it goes back to Russian
Johnny Olszewski 14:53
information. At what point, at what point do police do people out there say you’re lying? You’re a liar.
Nestor Aparicio 14:59
There. They don’t apparently, we’re nine years into this, man. I mean, like, I don’t know what else to say. There was an insurrection. Dutch told me about it,
Johnny Olszewski 15:09
yeah, and I talked to colleagues now, who are there, and it’s hard to listen to like, you think about the fact that, like, you’re locked in the chamber that I serve in now, and people are beating it down with, you know, flagpoles and their feet and just stomping doors in. I mean, it’s it’s crazy, just overwhelming.
Nestor Aparicio 15:33
The craziest part is that half of the country thinks it never happened, or is willing to think that it wasn’t a big deal
Johnny Olszewski 15:39
well, because they’re told it’s not a big deal. They’re told it they were told it was peaceful by the President. The peaceful. The president said it’s peaceful. It’s a lie. It’s not true. Yeah, and we don’t even talk about the fact that he pardoned people who attacked police officers who were convicted by a jury of their peers, Republicans and Democrats, independents, moderates, conservatives, liberals. That’s what juries are. They were convicted of doing like there was enough evidence to indict them to convict them in the President said, That’s okay. That’s this is the country we’re living in right now. But it’s, it’s incumbent on all of us that if we want something different,
Nestor Aparicio 16:22
I attended a no kings rally in Patterson Park. What good are those things? I mean, I know you want people like me to run around and do that and and that would be part of the Civic disobedience and the general course of trying to commit the change. But I didn’t think I was going to live through that era again, of the marches and things that I saw on television. Oh,
Johnny Olszewski 16:43
my friend, we are in the era of Marches plus. And the thing is, one rally or protest by itself ain’t gonna cut it. I ask everybody to commit to one thing, maybe sad to be there that can issue. Really did pick an issue you’re passionate about, whether it’s the immigration stuff or the health care or the food benefits environment. I mean, we even talked about how they’re gutting how cost of how your cost of energy is going to go up because of this, this bill that passed. But passionate about sensible leadership, well, but then do one what I tell people is do one thing every day. And maybe it’s you write a member or call a member of Congress. Maybe it’s you go to a rally or a protest. Maybe it’s you post on social media, but people have to create this drum beat where popular will is undeniable, and all of that is leading up to voting in the midterms and voting in every future election. And we have an obligation as a society, I think, to pick leaders who can unite us again in a way that lets us heal and get back to acknowledging that there’s, there’s some real hurt and pain and anger and frustration behind people who give the president and extreme Republicans the latitude to do what they do in Congress. There, there’s, there’s something there that we have to acknowledge.
Nestor Aparicio 18:03
It’s just built on such dishonesty 100%
Johnny Olszewski 18:06
but it’s never, but it’s never gonna change until we it’s
Nestor Aparicio 18:10
exploitative of ignorance is really what it is. And when I say that who you call an ignorant look up the word just means you don’t know, and it means you don’t care to know. And the willful ignorance that I have seen and I see every day. I mean, you’re my Facebook page, man. You know, every day I see it, I feel it. But
Johnny Olszewski 18:29
we have to get enough people engaged to sort of help point out the ways in which individuals are being manipulated, are being fed lies, to get them to see the truth, so that that come future elections, come future bills, that they’re going to be on the side of decency. I
Nestor Aparicio 18:46
always try to preach to the humanity of people. That’s what that America thing and the Neil Diamond thing. I mean that that that is why, that’s what brought us all together. Polish people, Hispanic people. My family, you know, came from Scranton, Pennsylvania, like Irish background. That’s what brought us all together, was this, we’re all in it, you know, Costas was open to everybody here, you know? I mean, it’s a place where people come together and become family. America, you know. I mean, no one’s checking your
Johnny Olszewski 19:13
political card when you walk into this restaurant. We didn’t check your political card when we asked if you needed to have your road resurfaced or your school built. We just take care of each other. That’s,
Nestor Aparicio 19:21
by the way, you know the county executive. I do have a trash issue. I need to used to be Johnny, always here. He’s our congressman. It’s all brought to you by the Maryland lottery. Have Back to the Future scratch ups. I’ll give you a parting shot on anything you want. I mean, I guess we’ve kind of gone back and forth on all sorts of things. And I haven’t talked to you much about the county because it’s not your gig anymore, but you still live here and you’re still around. And one thing I would ask you, you said something a minute ago about write your congressman. You are my congressman. And I say, what do they write you? I mean, when I hear like I’m mad as hell, and I’m not gonna take it, I’m gonna write to Chris Van. I could text Chris. I mean, I don’t know what he’s gonna do that he’s not already doing other than Atta boy. Go get him. Keep going. Adam John, like, I don’t really need that.
Johnny Olszewski 20:02
Yes, the atta boys are great, and they’re so appreciated. So I can tell you, we’ve got a staff that takes calls and emails and letters all day. They love hearing from constituents who are like, thank you for
Nestor Aparicio 20:12
what you’re doing. And it can be honest with you, man, I don’t feel like that. That’s what I do. We track it,
Johnny Olszewski 20:17
we report it, we do polls, we do surveys like and we we push that information out, and it really helps us be better at our job. Because what I don’t want to do is hear people just say, you’re doing a terrible job. I disagree. I want to hear with Pete from people who agree with us too.
Nestor Aparicio 20:32
What can the Democrats do that would be more effective, better if you’re, you’re made democratic God. If you’re, Wes Moore gonna be president. What would you I will speak
Johnny Olszewski 20:42
for this Democrat? Please. We should do a better job of having an affirmative strategy and policy agenda around workforce opportunities, creating jobs, making housing more affordable, making childcare more affordable, and just putting food on the table. It’s the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, if we are not helping people put food on the table and afford a house they live in, all the other issues don’t matter, and the Democrats have been so good at fighting for those issues, but we’ve really gotten away from communicating that to the public, and we have to get back to that bread and butter, literally and figuratively. All right,
Nestor Aparicio 21:18
I’ll let you get back to the bread and butter of Costas. What’s your favorite thing? It cost us you have, like, a side dish that I don’t know about. So I’m spinach dip guys. Let everybody know.
Johnny Olszewski 21:26
Obviously, don’t ever sleep on the crabs. The crabs are amazing, only in Dundalk. But what I will say is, I think it’s still on the menu here. And there is John’s jambalaya. The jambalaya. He told me about the jambalaya. Pete did the jambalaya? See? I’ve never had the job not coordinate. So, like, it’s only in Dundalk if you’re looking for a sneaky good that’s, that’s your winner right there. And it’s, I’ve always taken a bunch home with me as a to go. So
Nestor Aparicio 21:51
a couple things have happened in my time at cost. About five years ago, I saw fried shrimp come out of the kitchen. I’m like, I don’t even know you had fried shrimp. I never thought about it. Never looked on the menu, because you don’t always look all through the menu to know that they have a hot roast beef open face sandwich here, whatever,
Johnny Olszewski 22:07
right? You get to your go to. I had some wings tonight. That’s your go to. That’s what
Nestor Aparicio 22:12
you did, right? So a couple five years ago, I saw these shrimp, and they came out. I’m like, they look good. Give me those. Pete. Pete brought him over, I took one bite. I’m like, this is the Acme Oyster House in New Orleans. His recipe. It was always the first thing I would do when I go to New Orleans was go there, because I love the shrimp. Costas has had those shrimp for all these years. The other thing I hadn’t had a crab Imperial. Even though I want to be king, I hadn’t had a crab Imperial, probably 15 years and a couple years ago, I ordered a crab Imperial dish at Costas, and I’m like, now I never not get the mushroom caps, because the mushroom capsule crab Imperial. So that would be my thing to tell
Johnny Olszewski 22:51
you. Don’t snooze on the mushroom caps with the Imperial come to
Nestor Aparicio 22:56
Timonium. Feel like a king. You can’t get crabs here at Casa, but you get crab Imperial. Is that good? Close enough, close enough to being a congressman. Johnny, always here, here’s our congressman. And write him, yell at him, tell him he’s doing good, tell him he’s doing bad. Do that right? Yeah, just tell us. When people tell you doing bad, what do they tell you? What’s I like? How could you get better, Johnny?
Johnny Olszewski 23:18
I think our team is great, but you can always be better look. Actually, we just finished the Fourth of July parades, which is why I’m wearing my my hat today. But it was interesting. I had her I had a red golf Callaway USA hat on, and it was red intentionally, in the same way that we all, we all share the flag, we all share patriotism. And there were a couple of folks who had Maga hats. They were like, Johnny, you got the wrong I’m like, no, no. Like, I like my hat better, but like, I respect your right to wear it. And I was like, and what’s great is about this country is that, like, we can disagree and still love our country, and I don’t love it any less than you do
Nestor Aparicio 23:53
when Republicans don’t like you wouldn’t happy. Fourth, what do they yell about when, when they come up to you, and what are they mad at you about about the fact that you’re a Democrat, I
Johnny Olszewski 24:03
think that I just don’t agree with a lot of their policy positions. I think it’s, I hope it’s not personal, because I don’t ever take it personally.
Nestor Aparicio 24:12
Sometimes I don’t go down that road, like when I run into Johnny Ray I just, I’m pleasant, I like him, but I don’t think I could sit here and have a real conversation about Donald Trump with him. I just don’t think I could.
Johnny Olszewski 24:23
I don’t think I would work. That is an episode I would listen to.
Nestor Aparicio 24:27
You should do it well, his side would be fiction, and that would really, that would frustrate me. I don’t like putting ask Wes Moore and Craig Thompson. I don’t like putting lies on the radio. I just, I don’t, I don’t lie for anybody or anything. So Johnny always here. I want to feed him and get him and get him out of here. My thanks to Jamie, your team, your wife, your children, for allowing you to come out here. Always great to be wanted to come here. I told Jamie that. I said he’s gonna want to come to Costa centimonium. It’s going to be a big deal for him. And I love the fact that you hadn’t been here yet that lived. You literally. You go in with the eyes of a child, literally, right? You. Yep, and I’ll be back. All right, signing off from Costas momentarily, because Steve rouse will be here in about five minutes, and letter Raskin is also dropping by on Thursday. Come by and see us on Thursday. On Tuesday, we’ll be at Deepa squalis. Next week. We’re doing, I gotta remember every place I’m doing next week we are in Eldersburg in in beautiful Carroll County. I’m gonna be at 1623, I want to get my times right on all times right on all this to make sure I’m promoting it properly. That is on the 16th, we’re going to be in the afternoon. Oh, and then the 18th. This is a big one. We’re going to be over at Zeke’s coffee. I have everybody who has been fired or released from the Baltimore Sun for being a Democrat joining me over at Zeke’s coffee. So Cal is going to be there. Cartoonist Cal, Dan Rodricks is going to be with us. And tira patilla could not be with us. He’s in the Bahamas, which is better for him anyway. And receive will be by so we’re doing coffee at Zeke’s next Friday. It is all brought to you by the Maryland lottery. My thanks to Pete and to Christine. Also to Nick, although he was not here, mixologist John and Maggie and everybody here for making it great. Signing off for Costas in Timonium, in the land of Johnny oh and the United States of America. We are wnst am 1570 Taos in Baltimore, still believing in democracy. Stay with it. You.
