Facebook gets into audio, WeWork's SPAC, and Friend of Pivot Preet Bharara

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Kara Swisher: Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.

Scott Galloway: And I'm Scott Galloway.

Kara Swisher: Scott, you're very quiet today. Speak up.

Scott Galloway: Am I? Hello. Hello.

Kara Swisher: All right. Come on. What's going on?

Scott Galloway: What's going on? A little late, a little quiet. What's going on? Yeah, this is one of those days where I've been like 10 minutes late and like two minutes away from losing my keys and just been a crazy morning.

Kara Swisher: Well, I'll be there on Thursday, so this will all be solved.

Scott Galloway: You are. You're coming in.

Kara Swisher: I'm coming in. And it's growing. More and more family are showing up.

Scott Galloway: I know. I'm sorry. I do have children and I cannot leave them behind with just like a snack.

Kara Swisher: Oh, I'm good at that. I'll show you how to do that.

Scott Galloway: Okay, good.

Kara Swisher: All right. We have a lot to talk about, and we will also be taking photos of our lovely time together. But first of all, the Biden administration has officially blamed and sanctioned Russia for its role in the SolarWinds hack that compromised computer systems and multiple government agencies as well as private companies. We had brought on Nicole Pearl Roth, and you really liked talking to her. What do you think about that?

Scott Galloway: You know, this is so strange. I was not, as you know, I was not a supporter of President Biden during the campaign. And I don't know if you feel this way. I feel like every decision he's made, it's like, oh, yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. And it's just such a weird feeling. He's doing a lot. It's such an unusual feeling over the last four years. I'm like, what the fuck? Very busy people. Yeah. And competence is sort of the new, you know, is in vogue again. Yeah. I think the Russians understand strength. What's interesting, or I found interesting about the SolarWinds Act, is supposedly they showed restraint. Supposedly they were worried about causing too much damage for fear of poking the bear too hard. So, look, I think Russia is a failed state. I think once you get outside of Moscow, you see just how economically dire the situation is, the lack of diversification in the economy. And unfortunately, when an economy or a society is backed into a corner, they become more dangerous. I think Russia is turning slowly but surely into a failed state, and their success or ability to rally their people is around kind of foreign, creating foreign adversaries.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, Navalny is going to be interesting. He's on a hunger strike. That is interesting. Day 20, and his wife said he's near death. His daughter said he's near death. And they're trying to force – they fried chicken in front of him, and then they put candy in his prison garb. The whole thing, I think they're really playing fire with this guy. He has really has become something of a figure in terms of pushing back on what's going on. Now, the Biden administration didn't push back on the Russia bounty stuff because there wasn't quite enough evidence yet about that. But there's a number of issues that we have with Russia that I think they're probably behind the scenes pushing back rather significantly on this. And then this SolarWinds thing is really – it's being run by a woman – maybe we'll get her on here, Ann Neuberger, who's really competent, like fixing of it. But it's really massive. This is a massive hack. And there should be reprisals along with these kind of things, these sanctions, backroom reprisals that we don't see.

Scott Galloway: Well, the new proxy wars, whether it was Afghanistan or, I mean, arguably Vietnam was a proxy war where superpowers don't want to directly confront each other because they can spin out of control into nuclear Armageddon. But the new proxy wars are these cyber attacks. And the thing we don't talk about is we're actually pretty good at that. And those don't get as much.

Kara Swisher: Oh, no, we are. Those don't get as much publicity, but it's...

Scott Galloway: They're meant not to get publicity.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, I think that's right. Do them quietly. Yeah. Yeah, what's interesting is I interviewed the head of the CIA's technology division today, and some of the stuff, she's of the physical stuff they're doing, and they're working on drone technology, all kinds of physical stuff, because of the idea of like, you pull out of Afghanistan, you still have to have some eyes on the ground. And so they're working on all kinds of different things. And I think it's going to be a really interesting next year of who's going to dominate both the physical digital space with, you know, sensors, et cetera, and then in the cybers area. And it's certainly going to be the sort of the battleground for hegemony. Of course, the real rival is China in this area, but Russia can make plenty of trouble, and they have.

[Transition]

Kara Swisher: Speaking of our government, NASA announced that it awarded a contract to Elon Musk's company SpaceX for $2.9 billion to take astronauts to the moon for a space landing spot. It's the space race between Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos who is working on this, a moon landing area. They're going to use the moon to be sort of the base to jump off on from. And so this is another win for Elon Musk over Lockheed and other companies too.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, look, there's just no doubt about it. And what would be interesting is everyone credits Elon Musk, but what he clearly is also a genius at is greatness and lunar landers are in the agency of others. You must have an ability to attract incredibly talented engineers. And it's interesting, and I don't know, you know, there's all these articles on the tip of the pyramid below Bezos. You know, who are the 15 most powerful people other than Bezos? You don't see a lot of those articles on Musk. It's all about him, and I wonder if at some point.

Kara Swisher: Well, Gwynne Shotwell is the CEO of SpaceX, and she doesn't go out a lot. I think I've tried to get her to do an interview, and she's like, no, you can talk to Elon. You know what I mean? That's what they basically say to me. I would argue that, you know, Elon strikes me as the kind of person that's like, well, okay, you can go on a remote podcast for your book club. But other than that, it's all about me. I just don't. I get the sense. I get the sense. I mean, Amazon's done a really good job of saying, hey, meet Andy Jassy. Or Jim Dave Clark. Yeah. Yeah. I would argue that Musk has not done. At the same time, he's become a mythical character, which has resulted in incredibly cheap capital. But short term, they're the winner. But long term, I really do think the winner is NASA here because they're taking advantage of this, the mother of all midlife crises, where two guys are sword fighting with their dicks in space. And they keep trying to – NASA is going to put people on the moon for less money than it would cost taxpayers by playing these two off of each other. In the battle of egos, it results in cheap capital for the government. So I think the big winner here is NASA and taxpayers who are going to get space cargo and space hauling at a fraction of the cost that would cost to develop internally at NASA.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, so Bezos' space exploration company is called Blue Origin, and it was also SpaceX beat out Blue Origin, which had been really focused on this. They have different ways of going about it, but it's kind of an interesting thing. And it should be more and more, Musk has won a bunch of defense contracts, you're going to see that his companies wander into lots of spaces, a lot of defense spaces and it's an unusual thing, I talked to him really briefly about it separately the difficulty level of getting into the defense sort of arena and beating out, not Jeff Bezos but it's the bigger sort of Lockheed Martin's types that he was sort of like, you don't get in here This has been an uphill battle to get within this buying area. But they certainly have made the investments. We'll see where it goes. I think SpaceX is the most interesting part of his business. I know Tesla, everybody focuses on that.

Scott Galloway: Well, the analogy I would use is that some of the big players in the early stages of the Internet were the people who figured out a way to move data, basically transported data, broadband, right? The Cisco's of the world, the infrastructure guys, the telco guys. And I would argue that SpaceX to a certain extent is bandwidth and that is the ability to transport atoms into space, which is really difficult, but their Falcon product, if you will, is hauling more stuff into space reliably and cost effectively. And so I think of that as almost kind of the new broadband is your ability to transport things into space, which is really difficult and really expensive. But right now they're kind of the, call it space band winner.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, yeah. It's an interesting area. We should have a space person on. I've had a couple space people on Sway, but I love this idea of, I would love to get Gwen Shotwell on here, but she won't do anybody. She stays low. She stays low. She does not come out.

[Transition]

Kara Swisher: But let's go on to our big stories. We've got two of them today. And also a wonderful friend of Pivot, as you know, is coming on. So Facebook is pushing into the audio space. The company plans to announce a host of new audio products, including Clubhouse competitor, apparently, who knows when, and a podcast discovery apparatus in partnership with Spotify. Now, listen, it's done stuff like this before, which is called frictionless sharing and things like that. It's not clear what they're doing on Spotify. It'll probably just surface their podcast onto Spotify and vice versa, I guess. They're reportedly looking into an audio-only version of Rooms, which launched as a competitor Zoom, has not set the world on fire necessarily. But this is sort of a lift from Clubhouse. And obviously Twitter is in this space. Spotify is going to be in here. Discord. You know, there's all kinds of players in this audio social space. What think you of this? Another copy by Facebook or what? And Mark's going all out today talking to everybody but us about this. Is that because of me?

Scott Galloway: Is that what you're saying? No, I think it's me.

Kara Swisher: You think it's you?

Scott Galloway: It's not you. It's me. It's not about me. It's about you for once. This one is me, I think. But go ahead. Go ahead. Offensive and more offensive. Yes, right. Look, I think there's what I call an NPS or an emotional arbitrage. And that is, if you can find categories that people become emotionally wedded to that aren't that expensive, there's an NPS arbitrage. So Amazon could only get so much goodwill delivering your Nespresso pods within 48 hours and 45 hours. But if they can hook you into a TV program, you start feeling very emotionally connected to Prime, whether it's through Transparent or The Marvelous Mrs. Mizell. So there's kind of what I call, for lack of a better term, an NPS arbitrage. And it's just very hard to get a high NPS score around e-commerce or broadband or, you know, delivery. Where you get the high NPS is in entertainment. And even within entertainment, the NPS arbitrage, and we've been talking about this for a year. Yeah. You know, when people come up to either you or me and they're friends with us, you know they've listened to a podcast. Yes. People don't come up and start talking to me as if they're my friend when they read something they've done or they've seen me on TV. They do not. They're like, oh, my God, we know each other. We talk for an hour. You're their friend. So this NPS arbitrage around podcasting is enormous. In addition, when Andreessen Horowitz, I think of Clubhouse as almost like when a VC decides they're also an operator. I think they've done most of the rounds in that $4 billion most recent valuation. $100 million, billion, $4 billion. Again, I think that number is a bit of a head fake because we want to maintain momentum. And my understanding is I've never been on Clubhouse, but some of the people I follow who are on Clubhouse are saying that it's losing some of its mojo. But at the same time, if you look at the numbers, they're amazing.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, but the numbers, the download numbers are down. I think I'm worried. For them, I'd be worried about the end of the pandemic, that people are not doing this thing. They don't have enough of a hook into people. And obviously, people like you and I don't go there because there's no monetization. There's no, like, why bring a new interest graph, build it for them there? I feel like, why am I building a house over in, like, whatever, Kansas? People all the time call me. I'm not exaggerating. Every day, I want you to room on Clubhouse. I'm like, why the fuck am I going to make Marc Andreessen rich? Right. Yeah, I do think that way, too. I mean, I get all, you know, I get these. Oh, I bet they want you on there. But it's just sort of, okay, and then Twitter comes in. Have you been on Spaces?

Scott Galloway: I did Spaces.

Kara Swisher: Yes, I've been doing them every week. I find them really interesting. And it's really good. I think the technology is really-

Scott Galloway: It's fine. There's some glitches, but they'll figure it out.

Kara Swisher: You know, interesting. Kayvon, who runs product there, is on every week to watch it. Because I think I get lots of, I mean, pretty good numbers. And so it's improving. It's not perfect, but it's not bad. And my interest graph is there. My interest graph is there. But this is what I think is going on in the boardroom of Clubhouse right now, which is essentially, I think, the Monday morning partners meeting at Andreessen. I think that they probably are getting a little bit of humility. And they're probably going to say, we need to get out while the getting is good. And supposedly Twitter made a $4 billion acquisition offer for them. I wouldn't be surprised. This would have been my prediction on Friday. I think Clubhouse is acquired in the next six months as they start to recognize.

Scott Galloway: By whom though? Because look, Mark is on the board of Facebook, Mark Andreessen, and he also does Clubhouse and Substack too. What do you imagine? Who would buy it? Because I think Facebook would not pay $4 billion for it.

Kara Swisher: Oh, I don't think they're going to. I think they're going to have to come up with an elegant way to not disclose the terms. Yeah. But look, Clubhouse has some momentum. It has a following. And this space is heating up because of the intimacy or the NPS arbitrage of voice and audio, which is really interesting. That's kind of reinventing itself. But one of the bigger players. I think Clubhouse has attracted, just the way Tesla has attracted a bunch of sharks because all of a sudden the automobile market has grown from $100 billion in value to a trillion in value on the backs of a $600 or $700 billion increase in value of Tesla. The fact that Clubhouse supposedly gets a $4.5 billion valuation, which I think is a bit of a head fake, has kind of made the audio space overnight worth twice as much as it was just six months ago. And then Twitter and Facebook, who are all looking for more hooks, as you said, or more affinity, say, okay, voice, let's take our – Facebook says, let's take my 100 engineers. And Twitter says, okay, let's take my one engineer and start innovating around this. And I just wonder if Andreessen Horowitz goes, okay, some bigger sharks are showing up. We're going to find the record. I do think this is a feature. It's a really interesting feature, but I think it's a feature. And so, you know, you wonder if it's Instagram again or if it's something like, you know, Yo.

Kara Swisher: I don't think it's Instagram. And I also don't think any of these companies do media very well as much as, you know, there's these big articles touting Andreessen Horowitz for doing their own media. I think it's just PR. It's just very dressed up PR is what they're doing. I think it's worth it. I think it's rich old white guys who don't like the press, so they want to control the press. I actually think there's a really uncomfortable element to it. Yeah. When people are like, I don't like our coverage, so I'm going to create our own coverage, which I guess is kind of content marketing. Yeah. Or maybe I'm just jealous that they have their own podcast. They've got more on there than that. That's the thing. The really powerful stuff isn't that noise. It's actually some of the other spaces. But we'll see where it goes. I mean, because there's a lot of multi-level marketing. There's a lot of cleaning up. I just – it'll be interesting. Interestingly enough, I had the CEO coming on to Sway this week, and he canceled, saying he's really busy. They pitched me. We agreed. Everything was confirmed. And then they said they were busy. I suspect their funders were like, don't get near Kara Swisher or something. But they canceled. That is actually very telling.

Scott Galloway: You know what that is? Well, it was highly unprofessional. I can tell you that. It was really weird. More than that, this is in my view what's happening. Our numbers suck. She's about to find out that our numbers suck. And we don't want those questions.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, I guess. It was really, like, I have to say, I was looking forward to it and I wanted to talk about it. Just, you know, the sub-set guy had the cojones to go on. Like, you know what I mean? Like, this was like so unprofessional the way they did it. And, you know, whatever. They can talk to whoever they want and make their choices. But you don't pitch someone and then cancel at the last minute. You don't pitch to Jungle Cat and then not show up in a tree with an antelope. No, but Friday, my staff spent time getting ready for it. Like, this is bullshit. I was pretty pissed. I think it was completely Andreessen Horowitz generated. Anyway, we'll see what happens to them. I think it's a good product, but they have a lot of competitors.

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Kara Swisher: All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. We'll be back to talk about WeWork SPAC and our friend of Pivot and new colleague, Preet. Let's practice that. Barara. You got it? Barara. Got it? Carrara. No. Barrara. No, it's Carrara. Anyway, let's talk about WeWork when we get back. Okay.

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[Transition]

Kara Swisher: Okay, we are back. Let's talk about WeWork. Coming back, it's coming out with a SPAC. As we talked about, it could happen. This is a company we were very nice to for a long time. And now after disastrous IPO, which we pointed out, I think, as a public service, especially you, Scott. In 2019, WeWork was attempting a new debut with a SPAC, which gives the company more leeway than a traditional IPO. The shared office provider is expected to merge with a SPAC called Bow Exquisition Corp. The SPAC values we work at $9 billion, including debt, which I think is the number you had talked about originally, oddly enough. What think you of this? We've talked about this. What do you think?

Scott Galloway: So look, when the facts change, I change my mind. And you have one, you have a company whose valuation has been cut by 80%. So I don't like, you know, I don't like Tesla at this price. But if Tesla went to $70 from $600 or whatever it is, I might change my tune. And the fact that the valuation here has been cut by 80 percent. And also, they have the winds of COVID at their back. And that is, in pulse marketing, it's dangerous. But I'm very involved in two small businesses. Yeah. And we, at one place, we had beautiful office space, five-year lease, 80 bucks a foot. Got rid of it. Pandemic came and I said, I stroked a check for about a million bucks to the landlord to get out of it. Yeah. And when we go back, I'm going back for, I want a few things. I want flexibility. I want less space. Yeah. But I want that space to be more communal and quite frankly, more aspirational and just more fun because it's the young people who really want to get back and find mentors and friends. And all of that feeds into WeWork, who, by the way, a lot of their competitors, whether it's Notel or Regis or whoever, are impaired. So, like I said, and also I'm a fan of the CEO, Sandeep Matrani. So, we've said this before, I'm bullish on WeWork and bearish on Compass in terms of real estate. So, I think WeWork is sort of the rises from the ashes here.

Kara Swisher: Masio Shison, speaking of rising, and the Vision Fund. They had a big valuation on this mother. Look, they've had big wins with Open Door. Less, you know, obviously not as good with Compass. They just invested in a company I'm an investor in called Better. You know, you got to give Masa's due. He's like, you know, he's got cojones the size of Korea. I mean, he just doesn't, he was not cowed by this failure. And the thing that will go down in history with WeWork is you had arguably the greatest negotiator in the history of private markets exploiting the situation, recognizing that Masayoshi needed to save face. They needed to get him out of there. I mean, effectively, you had one man, Adam Neumann, garner a $1.6 billion commission for losing $11 billion of other people's money. No one has ever been able to pull that off before. People get angry that, okay, you're the CEO and you've increased stakeholder value by a billion dollars and you pay yourself $50 million. Oh, my God, a 5% commission. They get outraged. This is a, what, a 20% commission on money lost? Yeah. I mean, we've just never seen anything like it. And Adam Newman is the person that comes out of here is the smartest person in the room. As far as I know, he didn't do anything illegal.

Kara Swisher: Indeed. I don't think he behaved rather well. It's a great story. You were in a recently popular Hulu documentary about the WeWork fail. Go on. Tell us about it.

Scott Galloway: Go on. Tell us about it.

Kara Swisher: I haven't seen it yet. I'm going to see it with you this weekend probably. You'll make me watch it. But go ahead.

Scott Galloway: Over and over and over. It's my screensaver. My son will like it. Alex loves this kind of stuff. Yeah, I did it about six months ago. And it was in the midst of COVID. And I was a total prima donna. They're like, come to our New Jersey studio. And I'm like, I have one hour and you come to my place or I'm not doing this bullshit. I was total Beyonce. But she's probably nicer than that. Anyways, so they came over and they did this thing. They just asked me a bunch of questions and I ended up in this documentary. And what's most interesting is, you know what I got the most comments on after the documentary was, oh, that was insightful comments. Everyone wanted to know about my bar cart. And everybody zeroed in on the alcohol I drink. All the comments are on my rolling bar cart and how it was like literally right next to me.

Kara Swisher: What was your takeaway if it was six months ago? It was like this was a disaster. You did the backward looking thing. What was your takeaway?

Scott Galloway: I just think this is, I think it all comes down to kind of instinct. And I think he had a guy, again, I believe if you tell a 30-something-year-old guy with long hair that he's Jesus, he's inclined to believe you. And I think this guy genuinely thought he was going to be president of the world and that he deserved to be a trillionaire.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, he did. I think his wife was kind of awful. Yeah. And the notion that we should have voter class rights that give our kids the right to this, even if they don't own any stock, it's just a level of narcissism and weirdness. And then you have Masayoshi Son, who I think the biggest virus that infects successful people is believing that their success is their fault. Yeah. And Masayoshi Son made the greatest investment in the history of the private markets, put $50 million into Alibaba and got $100 billion back. And that has created this belief that his craziness is –

Scott Galloway: Not always crazy. Yeah.

Kara Swisher: That is genius. The craziness is sometimes crazy. There's just no regulators there. And I don't know if you've seen his deck on the singularity. It's literally like when I'm on edibles, I sound rational compared to this deck. I thought this thing was from the onion. He's a character. He was planning – do you realize? Leading up to the IPO, he was planning to put another $10 or $12 billion into WeWork.

Scott Galloway: Yep. And his limited partners, I think it was the Mubalaba Fund or PIF, basically sat him down and said, we don't know where you're smoking over there, but we don't have access to the same hallucinogens. And we need you to sober up.

Kara Swisher: Let me just do an update on the Vision Fund and its results. Some of them have been okay. Some of them have been less than okay. They've had some wins. I think they did. What did they do? They did slack. But not the kind of – they were throwing money. I remember all the Silicon Valley people who competed with them were like, this guy is just throwing money around, like stupid, stupid money. He's an interesting guy. I've spent a lot of time with him. I really enjoy it.

Scott Galloway: What's he like?

Kara Swisher: Crazy. Just like that. He was talking about committing Harry Carey on the stage of All Things D Once, which was interesting. He's just – he's really interesting and energetic, and you can see why he attracts such attention. He seems earnest. He seems like a decent man. In a way, yeah. You know, he and Jack Ma are sort of similar in their – different but similar people. And we'll talk about Jack Ma on Thursday because what's happened to him is really – there was a great – I think if Jack Ma was 6'2 and white, he'd be the most famous business person in the world. I think Jack Ma is hugely underrated as a thinker. Son has instincts that are hard. Anyway, it'll be interesting to see what happens.

[Transition]

Kara Swisher: All right, last question. Then we're going to bring on our incredible friend at Pivot, Preet Bharara. And one of the things I want to ask, where is WeWork stock going to be? It comes out at $9 billion. What do you think?

Scott Galloway: I don't know how people are going to respond to the SPAC because it's got such an overhang on it. But I think WeWork is a good stock to own for the next couple of years if you can get it at $9 billion. Because you have growth, you have a differentiated offering, and they've gone from a messiah to a manager, which is an accretive move for shareholders. So I like it. Good management, growth story, differentiated product. Market that's probably open to it in a lot of ways for the next couple of years, at least. The disruption in office space, I believe, plays to their strengths. Yeah, absolutely. So I might, anyways, I'm cautiously optimistic.

Kara Swisher: What do you think? I agree. I think they're in a good position and it's much better. It's still a lot of money, what it's worth, but we'll see how they do. And well-managed? Sure. Why not?

[Transition]

Kara Swisher: Anyway, Let's bring in our friend of Pivot and a new colleague who's here to class up the joint.

Scott Galloway: I'm here to class up the joint.

Kara Swisher: My new close friend.

Scott Galloway: My new close. He doesn't know this yet. Let him speak. Let him speak.

Kara Swisher: I know because I have a transcript. Okay. Uh-oh. That has been prepared by my staff of your last podcast.

Preet Bharara: Oh, no. Wherein Kara learned how to pronounce my name.

Kara Swisher: I did. Very well done. Thank you. I think you mispronounced it when I was on your podcast, too, but I'm so polite.

Preet Bharara: I know. And you seem so lovely and I want it to be your friend.

Scott Galloway: Oh, don't. By the way, Preet, don't believe that it doesn't raise your blood pressure to hear that the former head of the Southern District has a transcript of what you said.

Preet Bharara: It's very relaxing. Thank you. Way to put us at ease.

Scott Galloway: I'll mark it as Vox Exhibit 1.

Kara Swisher: Okay, that's true in the lawsuit. Multiple people, including on our team, friends of the family. In real time as you were having a discussion, my phone was lighting up. And why was it lighting up, might you ask? It's because-

Preet Bharara: Gentle lover?

Preet Bharara: Professor, yeah, he says, I think he being me would be a very gentle lover, which I don't quarrel with that. But you went on to say, I imagine him— My heart is literally at 210 beats. Bad voice after a bout of lovemaking, about lovemaking. That's how lawyers roll. We are so not classy. Honey, honey, I'll make some Hot Pockets and break out the Lancer's wine. That's good.

Scott Galloway: So that's where I got to lodge some complaint. I don't know if it's with the FCC.

Preet Bharara: You're not going to find that at Clubhouse.

Scott Galloway: HR now. You're not going to find that at Clubhouse. That's HR. That's HR.

Kara Swisher: Right. HR.

Scott Galloway: That would be such a great case. This is what we do. Don't tell Bankoff. We do a fake sexual...

Preet Bharara: I thought you were serious people.

Scott Galloway: No, we do a fake sexual harassment lawsuit. Oh, you thought wrong, my brother. You thought wrong. And then we get all the money and then we split it. What do you think?

Kara Swisher: I just want to be serious for a moment, now that you're part of the family. Whether you want this or not, you are now my one call. And you know what I mean by my one call?

Preet Bharara: No, oh no.

Kara Swisher: You know when you get arrested and they say, this is your one call? So dude, I need your cell phone because that is like, oh, guess who daddy's using his one call for?

Scott Galloway: You might want to call a lawyer who's practicing as opposed to a podcast. Just so you know, listen. You're comforting. You're comforting. Hush Scott Galloway.

Kara Swisher: Now listen, Preet is a former U.S. attorney for the Southern District, very famously, hosted the *Stay Tuned with Preet* podcast and best-selling author of *Doing Justice*. So we have so many things to talk about. Tell me why you came to Vox, and then we'll talk about other things. This is going to be a long one.

Preet Bharara: To be with you.

Kara Swisher: No, you didn't. No, what were you doing? You get fired by Donald Trump. Tell me what happened after that, how you got to where we are right now.

Preet Bharara: So I decided to write a book. I did not want to immediately return to the practice of law. And I'm not sure that law firm life was my immediate preference.

Kara Swisher: Sure.

Preet Bharara: And I started teaching at NYU Law School. And in the course of things, my brother who had a media company at the time and a brand called Cafe, which is kind of fledgling. He said, why don't you come and take that over and do something called a podcast, which I thought was going to be kind of a part-time, on-the-side thing. But we were very successful.

Kara Swisher: Yeah. Explain who your brother is. Are you taking a selfie of the screen?

Scott Galloway: Yes, I am. I'm going to put it up on the internets. Go ahead.

Preet Bharara: Oh, OK. I was just noticing that your name here on Squadcast is Gentle Lover. That is so good. And here's what's funny. He really can't kill us at this point. That's just evidence.

Kara Swisher: Kara says, fair-minded moonwalker. I didn't know that. And then I look over to Galloway, thinking he's going to have some clever little appellation, and it's Scott. Scott. You know, Squadcast gives them to you. All right, go back. So you did this thing with your brother.

Preet Bharara: So my brother is also a trained lawyer. Columbia Law School, went to the same law school. And he practiced for a little while and became a business person. He started a company called Diapers.com, which he sold to— I tell very famously, I would often begin speeches comparing him to me.

Kara Swisher: Yeah.

Preet Bharara: When I became U.S. attorney, I thought I was the big deal, and I was the sort of the winner in the competitive family sweepstakes.

Scott Galloway: So a family of underachievers.

Preet Bharara: My brother then, yes, he sold Diapers.com, which by the way, he sold under the slogan, "We're number one in number two." So imagine how proud my parents were.

Scott Galloway: That's good.

Preet Bharara: Then he sells it to Amazon for $540 million, which is basically his way of saying, hey, bro, I see your whole US attorney thing and I raise you $540 million.

Kara Swisher: So you start this tech company and start doing podcasts, right?

Preet Bharara: Correct. And we have a newsletter and then we have a subscriber option also. And it just grew and grew and it became much more of my time. And then we started adding contributors and adding podcasts about the law, about national security, about cyber, about all sorts of things. And a bunch of people came calling, thinking that there was real value. And that's the most gratifying thing about this— doing the work that we recognize and we have a large listenership and they recognize. I don't know if it's the most gratifying thing but it's interesting to see the market appreciate and validate that too.

Scott Galloway: It's an interesting time with all this. Do you want to know what really happened? I mean, that's okay, that's the press release. Bankoff decided he wanted more perceived class and so he overpaid for your whatever you're doing. Dude, you're literally like a bow tie turned into a bow tie. Bankoff overpaid for you just to try and class out.

Preet Bharara: But then it's not an overpayment. That's right. Exactly. Isn't that worth something? That shows how much he needs.

Kara Swisher: I have a real question.

Scott Galloway: All right. Ask a real question.

Kara Swisher: Should I put all my Vox money into WeWork?

Scott Galloway: Was that what I was hearing? Yes, that's right. WeWork and Alibaba. That's where you go.

Kara Swisher: All right. Yeah. So look, very serious question. The over-under, I would like to get the percentage likelihood that President Trump ends up in jail.

Preet Bharara: Oh, okay. Go right there. I don't do those percentages.

Kara Swisher: Okay. Ratios? Where does he stand?

Preet Bharara: I think—

Scott Galloway: You're at Vox. This is no longer a place to be measured and responsible. I would say it's 41.9%.

Preet Bharara: No. People talk about all these places where he has jeopardy. And they sometimes conflate the civil cases with the criminal cases. There's not that much criminal activity. There's some people looking at stuff based on the election interference in Georgia. I don't know that that's going to go anywhere. There's some people who are musing about whether or not the insurrection will cause them to have liability. That's a little bit interesting given there was already impeachment on that. I don't know that that would be the Department of Justice. I don't know if they have the will to do that. But the thing that most people have been talking about for the longest period of time is the business of Cy Vance and the Manhattan DA's office.

Kara Swisher: Right, the taxes.

Preet Bharara: Cy Vance is a pretty cautious person when it comes to bringing cases. Some have argued too cautious. He argues otherwise. And he's done a couple of things that draw attention. He's hired somebody, Mark Pomerantz, a very noted lawyer in New York for a long time, to sort of have an independent flavor. They've hired an outside forensic accounting firm. And given that he's in his last months of office, he's not seeking re-election, there's a primary in that race in just a couple of months. It seems like he's making efforts to make a final decision. The likelihood of a charge before the DA's election in November, or at least before the new DA is sworn in next year— no guarantee of that. They could have a change of heart. But the way I read the tea leaves, it looks like they have a feeling there's going to be a charge. And he wants to make sure that every T is crossed and I is dotted. Scott's question about whether or not Trump will oversee jail time— there's got to be a conviction and there's got to be a sentencing. We're getting a little bit ahead of ourselves. But I think you're likely to see a charge from the Manhattan DA.

Kara Swisher: But let me pause at this because my impression is people say, well, he's had the oxygen and his platform's taken away from him and he's gone quiet. My sense is, and you advise these people, my sense is a defense attorney has said to him, dude, tone it down for a while. There's too many people trying to put you in jail. That's not your sense— you're shaking your head.

Preet Bharara: No, because I don't think that any defense attorney is capable of advising him in a way to... I mean, the most important time for him to have kept his mouth shut was during the Mueller investigation, during the first impeachment, during the second impeachment, when he was literally the president of the United States. And not just defense lawyers but also advisors probably telling him that because you get yourself in hot water.

Kara Swisher: If he just kept his mouth shut in the days leading up to the inauguration, he wouldn't have been impeached again and he wouldn't be off Twitter. So I don't know that anybody can advise him. I mean, this is one of the reasons he can't get a good lawyer— because he doesn't pay them, number one. And number two, he doesn't listen to them.

Preet Bharara: But he seems to have been doing okay. He's still not in jail.

Kara Swisher: So let me shift to another thing. You're known for aggressively taking down corruption on Wall Street. If you were still in practice, how would you look at the Reddit GameStop situation and what's going on on Wall Street? Because there's so much activity now with all these companies. Things are changing there, obviously.

Preet Bharara: Some of that fear has quieted down. And I understand how there are people on different sides— the people who hate the hedge funds and the people who love the hedge funds. I'm sort of quizzical about why people put so much money in hedge funds given their record. When it was very much in the news and I was thinking about it on a more regular basis, I'm not sure what criminal activity you could charge anybody with. People are allowed to say what they want, generally speaking. People are allowed to trade as they want, generally speaking. Maybe there's some rulemaking that the new SEC chair can engage in, but I didn't, and in talking to people sort of off the record, I didn't see any immediate criminal penalty for any side of that in GameStop. So I could be wrong. I don't think so.

Kara Swisher: Let me ask you another question. Tech companies, all these lawsuits. How do you think the Southern District is taking on tech companies? There's a Justice Department lawsuit. There's an FTC antitrust.

Preet Bharara: So it's the one area that the Southern District doesn't do— that local U.S. Attorney's Office doesn't do. They don't do antitrust. It's local. That's handled by the U.S. Department of Justice that have field offices that do antitrust.

Kara Swisher: It's interesting. I haven't finished reading it, but I'm interviewing Amy Klobuchar, Senator Klobuchar, her book. Giant book. It's very long. Antitrust. I did an interview with her.

Preet Bharara: Can you send me your notes?

Kara Swisher: You can kill a poodle with it is what I told her. Say that to her. She didn't get the memo that the political memoir is supposed to be thin and hopeful and not say a whole lot.

Preet Bharara: It's a lot.

Scott Galloway: Let me just say, I had two delivered to my house. I have a lot of package to use in my neighborhood. They stole both of them and then threw them back into my lawn. But go ahead.

Kara Swisher: The interesting thing about the Google lawsuit is there's something for conservatives and liberals there. But I also think there's a little bit of an aura of politicization around things that the Trump administration did because Trump couldn't keep his mouth shut. So when Trump talks about the politics of conservatives getting their voice heard or not heard, and then something is done, action is taken that seems to be consistent with what Trump would want, you worry a little bit about what people think of that.

Preet Bharara: But it seems to have been adopted and carried forward, and it didn't have to be, by the Biden administration. So we'll see. It's hard for prosecutors to do much in criminal law. We talk about the ways in which you can go after companies for things. The criminal law is a big blunt instrument. And you have to show a beyond a reasonable doubt provable violation of a particular statute. And much of what the debate is that you guys talk about a lot, and that you and I have talked about, Kara, has to do with regulation. It has to do with Congress taking action, whether it's on Section 230 or something else. I don't think there's a lot for criminal prosecutors to bash people over the heads given the things we're talking about.

Scott Galloway: I'm just curious. Have we reached a point, though, where it feels to me like there's certain individuals who feel that they're above the SEC and to a certain extent above the law, specifically some people who try to put men on Mars and they feel like they can basically announce private equity buyouts that are essentially proven false. And the SEC fines them $10 million. I guess what I'm saying, is there a different set of standards legally and in terms of enforcement for a certain Jesus Christ of the internet?

Preet Bharara: I don't know who you're talking about. There shouldn't be. And there's no double... The way I thought about this when you're talking about really prominent, powerful people is, naturally, human beings want to get things right. And naturally, when you're going to go after somebody who has a lot of resources, and quite frankly, as a matter of fairness and justice, you want to be right because you can destroy someone's reputation and destroy their pocketbook because they have a certain reputation in the community and in the business world. And you want to be careful about that. You want to be careful about that when you investigate and prosecute politicians and don't undo duly elected officials' time in office. So I think you take a lot of care and you make sure that you're not being overly creative. And so I don't know the particular things that the SEC might do with respect to that individual who has big problems otherwise because of the car accident that I guess happened. But I'd like to think, and certainly I think under Gary Gensler and this administration, no one's going to get a buy just because they have a lot of money. I'm almost by definition the kinds of people and institutions that the SEC regulates are powerful, moneyed, wealthy entities and people. And I certainly never thought that way when I was in office.

Kara Swisher: So can I ask you a question about where law is going? I mean, if you were in office right now, what are the things that—

Preet Bharara: Law is going. Law is going. Big law.

Kara Swisher: But if you were running the Southern District, what are the areas of interest for agencies like yours? Or broadly speaking, what are the big important areas?

Preet Bharara: So I'll name two areas. Again, I'm not as close to it. I don't get the threat matrix stuff anymore like I used to. One thing is something that became a huge issue, a developing issue when I started 12 years ago, and I think we're having another wave of it, and that's all things related to cyber threats, whether it's coming from the hacktivists or it's coming from random individuals who are trying to make money and steal your bank accounts, or I think most importantly, nation states. And a lot of this goes on behind the scenes, but there are very deeply involved agencies, not just the FBI, the Secret Service, and the intel agencies who care about and think about what a cyber war could look like. And then second, in a completely different direction, although not fully different, still harm to infrastructure here in the country, is domestic terrorism. When I took office in 2009, the Southern District had a long and storied history of going after organized international terrorism. I was a few months on the job when Faisal Shahzad tried to blow up Times Square. We tried Ahmed Ghailani, the last person who was tried, who was taken at Guantanamo Bay. That case sort of put an end to that. But now you have people in this sort of right wing universe, and not just in the right wing universe, but in other places as well, who are not as organized, who you can't find evidence that they trained in Afghanistan. They don't have the same tripwires that send messages to law enforcement. There's debate about a domestic terrorism statute. So I think, and you hear people like Joe Biden and others talk about this, we really need to think about a way to keep folks safe in the country because you're having individuals who are getting radicalized and it's harder to make a conspiracy case against them. And then most recently, the rise in hate crimes. I think there's a big worry about that. So the insurrection, I think, has awakened a lot of people to this. So those would be two of my priorities if I was in office.

Kara Swisher: You saw that Oathkeeper was on 60 Minutes.

Preet Bharara: I did. It was terrifying.

Kara Swisher: I missed the interview, though.

Preet Bharara: It's terrifying. And it's sort of like, law enforcement's helping us. This is— who knows what he's saying is true or not. But you suspect, looking at the donations to Kyle Rittenhouse from legitimate police officers, what's going on here in terms of worry about that.

Kara Swisher: So those are the areas you would look into.

Preet Bharara: And also, maybe the spirit of your question was not about this too. We have a big criminal justice reform issue. We have a policing issue. I have my television to my left is paused on the summation of the defense lawyer in the Derek Chauvin trial. And I don't think we'll have a verdict by the time this airs, but pretty soon thereafter, probably this week. And it's going to say a lot about people's confidence in policing, in prosecution, in the nature of the laws that relate to police discretion. And I think we've seen a year of reckoning. And now you have a moment of actual decision on the thing that caused appropriately millions of Americans to protest and make their voices heard last year. Now you're going to get literally a verdict on it.

Kara Swisher: What do you think? How do you think they did?

Preet Bharara: I think the prosecution did a really, really good job.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, me too. And I don't always think that.

Preet Bharara: I can be critical. I thought the opening was particularly great. The summation this morning, I thought it was very, very good. I don't think it was perfect. I think it could have been tighter and more focused. But the prosecution has a lot to work with. And I sometimes say to students and to people who ask me the question, sometimes prosecutors win because they just have the evidence. And you can be the best defense lawyer in the world. But if you have a video of a guy shooting a guy and your client wants to go to trial, there's not a lot you're going to be able to do about it. And here you don't have a guy shooting a guy, but you have a guy, Derek Chauvin, with his knee in the back of the neck of George Floyd for nine and a half minutes. Every bit of that is incredibly powerful. And you have the medical testimony and the experts going back and forth. But as the prosecutors have done a great job of that. But as they say, the bottom line is, even before you get to any of that, you can decide this case basically on the video. And that's what they have on their side. So I expect a conviction on at least the manslaughter and the murder three, maybe the murder two. I mean, one of the reasons you know the prosecutors are a little bit worried about murder two is that the murder three had been eliminated from the trial and the prosecutors fought really hard to get this lesser count put back in, because you want to give the jury a menu of things they can convict on. But I think they've done a great job.

Scott Galloway: So first, I just want to acknowledge, I thought your answer around what individuals you decide to devote prosecutorial resources to, I thought that was one of the more thoughtful answers. And it's heartening that people in your position weigh the potential downside and damage and don't take lightly going after someone. I heard that and I thought, what the fuck are you doing at Vox? You should be running for Senate.

Kara Swisher: He's not the guy on *Billions*, Scott.

Scott Galloway: Anyways, I would love to hear your voiceover on whether you believe there's criminal activity or if it'll ever come to trial on Representative Gaetz.

Preet Bharara: Oh, it's a very frustrating thing to be on this side of the fence. I don't have any access to FBI 302s or interviews.

Scott Galloway: What's a 302? Calling all cars.

Preet Bharara: It's the name of the form. I'm trying to show that I used to actually have that kind of job.

Kara Swisher: So 302, what is that?

Preet Bharara: That's just the form that FBI agents fill out when they do an interview or there's a development in a case so that they keep track of the investigation. So on Matt Gaetz, there's a lot going on there. There are a lot of leaks. There are a lot of people talking smack about Matt Gaetz.

Kara Swisher: Including himself.

Preet Bharara: Including himself. And that's a sign because all those people are potential witnesses and maybe they kept quiet before and maybe they're not going to keep quiet now. Not just with the press but with the FBI and with prosecutors. But most importantly, you have an actual guy in the form of Mr. Greenberg who has been charged and looks like he's going to plead guilty. And one of the reasons you think it's going to be very bad for Matt Gaetz is his lawyer— Greenberg's lawyer basically taunted from behind microphones after a proceeding last week, taunted Matt Gaetz. He said something like, he shouldn't be very comfortable right now.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, basically saying my guy is flipping and is going to help himself and is going to testify against you.

Preet Bharara: And there's a lot of particularity to the charges against Greenberg and there's a lot of particularity in some of the reporting, particularly out of the *New York Times*, about the kinds of things that Greenberg was doing with Matt Gaetz. So ordinarily I'm more circumspect in predicting things here. It seems a charge— I'm not gonna give a number, a charge seems quite likely. Also in combination with just my general observation of Mr. Gaetz, which is that he's not a careful man.

Kara Swisher: No.

Preet Bharara: And there's a lot of track record. I mean, if you believe the reporting, there are Venmo records, there are probably texting records, there are videos. He's sloppy. And I think he talks to a lot of people. He has no business being in Congress. And the other thing he has going against him is the fact— and I think this is not insignificant if the reporting is to be believed— the investigation was begun when Bill Barr, who I have no love for or affection for, was the attorney general. And he didn't see anything there that caused him to want to quash the investigation, apparently, even though on other occasions there are things that Bill Barr seems to have done that favored supporters of the president.

Kara Swisher: So his move is to attack Greenberg, right? That's what he'll do.

Preet Bharara: That's what they'll do. I mean, the way I've described Michael Cohen, right? In some ways I've suggested before that Trump is kind of brilliant because the kind of people he surrounded himself with are liars and scoundrels. And then one day when the liars and scoundrels decide they're going to flip on Donald Trump, as some of them maybe have contemplated, the defense is, "What are you talking about? Those are liars and scoundrels. You can't believe anything that they say." So you always attack the cooperator because it is true— one challenge is going to be how slimy a guy is Greenberg, and how is he going to appear? Look, that's part one of the problems with Michael Cohen. Michael Cohen never got a cooperation agreement from my old office. And is it because he wasn't fully truthful? Maybe. Is it because he was being selective about who he wanted to cooperate against? Maybe. Is it because they thought jurors wouldn't really like him and believe him because he's lied? It's not great when one of your witnesses actually has lied, and that's one of the charges he pled guilty to— is lying. The cross is very formidable.

Scott Galloway: One of the things he pled guilty to was lying, right? In a formal situation, right? Just like this one, right?

Preet Bharara: Right. That's tough.

Scott Galloway: Would resignation from Congress be considered currency? Would a prosecutor see if Representative Gaetz said, "Okay, I'm in trouble here," is resigning or the offer to resign currency that potentially cauterizes or staves off a more aggressive prosecution? Or do prosecutors just not care— like, this is the law, we don't care if you resign or not?

Preet Bharara: That is a profoundly excellent question, and I don't know that there's a solid answer. The way I thought about it— we investigated and prosecuted a lot of state representatives when I was in office, and we didn't really link the two. If you're guilty of a crime, you're guilty of a crime, and you don't get a get out of jail free card if you resign. It may be something that, I think appropriately depending on the circumstances, affects a plea deal and what the recommendation of sentencing would be, because part of sentencing is contrition and acceptance of responsibility. And leaving office arguably is a sign of that. I teach law at NYU Law School, and I've been reading people's papers this week. One of the proposed topics that I gave students that they wrote about was whether the Southern District should have prosecuted Eliot Spitzer after he was technically guilty of a violation of the Mann Act, which relates to prostitution. And my predecessor made the decision not to prosecute him because the general policy was in the office that we didn't prosecute johns and we didn't prosecute the sex workers, only the people who engaged in the traffic and if there was coercion. And a number of students addressed this very issue of what was the relevance of Spitzer's decision to resign. And I don't know what it was because it wasn't my decision to make, but I think it can factor in at the margins on sentencing. But otherwise, you shouldn't be able to— if you're a teacher and you commit a crime and you quit, depending on the seriousness of the crime, I don't think you get a bye.

Kara Swisher: Oh, Scott, you're in trouble then.

Scott Galloway: Oh, sorry. Not anymore. My one call. Have you seen who my one call is? He's not going to answer that call. He's not going to. He's too classy.

Preet Bharara: Who talks on the phone?

Scott Galloway: I'm your one text. One text. I'll take it. Don't Venmo. Don't Venmo anyone, Scott.

Kara Swisher: I have another question. I'm going to steal your thunder to our case. All right, last question. Then we're going to find out what next for Preet at Vox Media. But go ahead, Scott.

Scott Galloway: I want to ask the same question but I want to go more meta. Let's be honest, you're a pretty impressive cat, right? You had this crazy career where it sort of— the question is what you're going to do, the question is what you're not going to do. I would love, if you can, a non-answer here. Where do you want to be in five years? Do you want to be in office?

Preet Bharara: I got to consult my contract.

Scott Galloway: Do you want to be— yeah, we're stuck in two. You strike me as a guy, as a man with a plan. Like five years, where do you want to be?

Preet Bharara: So this is a non-bullshit answer that will surprise you. I don't really have a plan. The funny thing is, the only thing I ever planned that I definitely absolutely wanted to do was become a line prosecutor at SDNY. I knew that in law school. I knew that when I was in private practice, I changed firms to work with alumni of the Southern District so that I could impress them and they would write me good letters of recommendation. That was very intentional. And that's what I did. And five years into that job, that's the best job I'll ever have. Then there's this weird opportunity to go work in the Senate. And I hadn't fully, I think, made my bones as a prosecutor. I would have tried more cases. I want to do different kinds of things. And this opportunity came along. And I took it because I got to work on the Senate Judiciary Committee, being chief counsel to Chuck Schumer, at the beginning of '05, when everyone predicted there were going to be at least one, if not more, Supreme Court vacancies. There hadn't been one in 11 years. Stable court from 1994 to 2005. And Senator O'Connor stepped down. And this idea— and it was not a plan. I thought, what could be more fascinating than to go work on the Hill on Supreme Court confirmations?

Preet Bharara: Yeah. And so I did that. But now it turns, so people try to reverse engineer my career. It turns out that going to the Senate, working for Senator Schumer, staying there until the Democrats won back the Senate, and then this unknown individual, Barack Obama, becomes president, I'm now in the right place at the right time. Senator Schumer, based on his trust in me and experience with me, recommended me to become the US Attorney. I never would have predicted it. People think I had a plan, like that's what he was doing, he was trying to become the US Attorney. I wasn't. I had no plan. I mean, I have a plan. My plan is always to do a thing that is interesting and that uses your brain and then crush it. My plan is success.

Scott Galloway: And maybe that sounds so... bigger podcasts, newsletters focus on legal...

Preet Bharara: Well, yeah, no, I don't know because we just entered this marriage with Vox. But I think over the next few years, there's a lot of opportunity to educate people, to inform people, to entertain folks, maybe in ways that haven't been done before. Not just in sound. When there's a lot of audiovisual or documentary possibilities. It's only been four days, but all of those things are on the table. And all of those things, I think, can happen. And then in the future, yeah, if there are leadership opportunities, of course I'm open to them.

Kara Swisher: Oh, interesting.

Preet Bharara: But what I've been focusing on for the last few years, once we saw the impact you can have, even from just podcasting, our followers are very loyal. And I think they appreciate calls to action to make the country better. We grew a business and I want to make it successful. And Jim Bancroft thought it was worth doing, and Marty Mo thought it was worth doing. So for right now, my focus is on this.

Kara Swisher: Would you go back to prosecuting?

Preet Bharara: I mean, look, right now they're considering making the Supreme Court bigger, which I think is never going to happen.

Kara Swisher: No, I don't think so. Would you ever consider going back into politics or something like that?

Preet Bharara: Look, I was 17 years in public service, 17 and a half years. And I was so into being in public service that even when an odious man was elected president, when he asked me to stay on and remain in public service, I said yes. It was Donald Trump. He changed his mind. He fired me. So I always have a love for public service. And in fact, a number of our podcast hosts have been called back to public service because it's important work. I don't see that for some time because I got this and I want to build this and I want to do right by our listeners and our followers. But I'm not that old. So someday in the future, I'm open to it.

Kara Swisher: When you're president, Cara, you can appoint me.

Preet Bharara: I'm not going to be president.

Scott Galloway: That's a thought. I'm sorry. I just got us one more question.

Kara Swisher: I got us one more question. All right. Go for it.

Scott Galloway: Go for it. Look at this. It's now the Preet and Scott show from NYU. But go ahead.

Preet Bharara: Do we plug? Stay tuned with Preet.

Kara Swisher: Stay tuned with Preet. Yes.

Preet Bharara: Stay tuned with Preet. It's part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Kara Swisher: We're going to do that. Okay. All right. We're going to let you do the whole show meal. Snoozerama. You're like, the bosses are going to listen to this. It's like, oh my God. He's running for office tomorrow. We give them plenty. Okay. Go ahead, Scott.

Scott Galloway: Three answers. Advice to your 25-year-old self.

Preet Bharara: Oh.

Scott Galloway: Advice to younger men and women, just out of school or not out of school. Like, where would you – one or two things that changed your life for the better. What advice do you have for young people?

Preet Bharara: Yeah. So, it's a little bit what I just said. Don't plan so much. Once when I was in the Senate, there was this young group. I can't remember if they were like Harvard or Yale law students. They all wanted to be masters of the universe. And one of those young people asked me the question because they saw where I was. They thought I had a big deal job. I was chief counsel to a significant senator. And they said, "How do we do that? How do I become powerful?" And I gave them a whole speech about how I didn't come to the Hill. I was old for the Hill, like in my mid to late 30s. But one of the reasons I got to be successful at the Hill is I learned some craft. Like I learned how to practice law. I learned how to try cases. And then it just fell into my lap when the Justice Department under Bush was misbehaving and there was a whole investigation into the politicization of the Justice Department back in 2007.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, quite times.

Preet Bharara: I was one of the only people in the entire committee, and it's very impressive lawyers, but one of the very few people who could take a deposition, right? And who could do an investigation because I had learned some craft. So this is advice, generally, but specific to highly ambitious people. And there's nothing wrong with being ambitious. But learn a trade. Learn how to do something. We have too many people in power who have never done anything except be on the path to power without learning how to paint or to code or to try a case or to build something. And I think the more leaders we have who actually have done something, who've learned a craft or a trade, the better off we will be and the better off those people will be. I think it opens up opportunities.

Kara Swisher: Very one thing, classy answer. Scott Warner Craft. Classing up the joint.

Scott Galloway: Classing up the joint. You already did. It's like by 150%. This is so good for us, Scott.

Kara Swisher: Come on. That's how we think of everything, Preet, just so you know. Is it good for Scott and Kara? And this is good for Scott and Kara. I think so.

Scott Galloway: Should we pivot?

Kara Swisher: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I literally... Oh, you made a little joke about our name. I couldn't believe it when I read it. Oh, my gosh. You'll be doing tequila shots with us soon enough. Don't worry. Don't worry about it. Anyway, Preet, we're very excited you're here. I'm going to plug your things. Thank you so much. Yes. We have Stay Tuned with Preet podcast. And what other podcast? Name whatever you want to say.

Preet Bharara: We have the Cafe Insider.

Kara Swisher: Okay. So cafe.com slash insider to sign up. It's great stuff.

Preet Bharara: We're announcing a new co-host today or tomorrow. I think I can't say yet.

Kara Swisher: Oh, good heavens. This doesn't come out till tomorrow. Tomorrow, yeah, tell us.

Preet Bharara: I think I can tell you. Go ahead. So Ann Milgram has been nominated to be the next DEA administrator.

Kara Swisher: Oh, wow.

Preet Bharara: And the new co-host will be lawyer extraordinaire, classing up my joint, Joyce Vance.

Kara Swisher: Oh, wow. You may know Joyce from commentating and other things.

Preet Bharara: Sure do. She's brilliant and great and she's going to make me look good.

Kara Swisher: Okay. This is going to be fantastic. This is going to be great. We're very excited for you to be here. Besides classing up the joint, this area of legal and sort of the intersection.

Preet Bharara: Oh, and Third Degree with Ellie Honig. That's another podcast we have. We have a whole bunch and doing justice based on... we got a whole bunch.

Kara Swisher: Yeah. All right. That's why we're here. Thank you, Preet. You're the best.

Preet Bharara: Thanks, folks. We really appreciate it. And we'll be getting you better internet.

Kara Swisher: Welcome to the family. Welcome to the family. And you always return the family's phone calls from prison. All right, Scott. He may be a gentle lover. I don't know. But he's certainly a gentle colleague. Don't you think? I noticed you changed your name.

Scott Galloway: Oh, he's a colleague. Colleague. He's a colleague. He's a colleague. You saw what I changed my screen name to?

Kara Swisher: Yes, Preet's close friend.

Scott Galloway: Good luck with that.

Kara Swisher: We are close. Okay, we'll see how that works out.

Scott Galloway: We are close.

Kara Swisher: Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails.

[AD BREAK]

Kara Swisher: Okay, Scott, wins and fails. That was a win with Preet. I think Preet's a win, don't you think?

Scott Galloway: Yeah. If you listen to your interview with Senator Klobuchar, if you listen to our interview with Andy Slavitt, and you listen to that interview, you think, wow. Distinct of the cartoon that's been made. Quality of public servants. They continued, government continues to attract the best and brightest. That guy is, I mean, he just reeks of credibility and thoughtfulness.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, I always, when people say government's good, I'm like, that's not true. There's some bad people in government, just like at every workplace. But there's a lot of highly competent people. That guy is crazy impressive. Crazy impressive. I hope, and I really do hope he, I mean, as much as I'm excited about the Vox Media Podcast Network and the impact we're going to have on the world, I would really like to see him re-engage in public service at some point.

Scott Galloway: Me too. Me too. It would be interesting. It's interesting he didn't go into the Biden administration.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, he strikes me as someone who sooner rather than later gets the call, right?

Scott Galloway: Yep, yep, probably. Anyway, wins and fails. My wins and fail are about the same thing. The vaccine, now I think it's one in two American adults have had their first shot. I think it's fantastic. We're making real progress against vaccine hesitancy. But my fail is all the attention and noise and what I would call really damaging exploitation of the news around the clots. We can lose 140 people in three months to mass shootings but if we lose one person to a blood clot, that's unacceptable. It just strikes me that no one wants to look at the data and that when J&J seizes distribution because of the blood clots, it's really a testament to the safety of these things and the protocols and just the standards are so high around vaccines. If we had a fraction of the same safety standards around the rest of parts of our lives, it'd be a much better place. And I see it as a strong signal that vaccines are incredibly safe. And when they aren't.

Kara Swisher: I agree. My lovely wife, Amanda, got the J&J vaccine and actually has a blood clotting disorder. And so she was more of essays saying she'd take it again. She'd take it again. You know what the word is? My sister just summarized it perfectly for me. She's in San Francisco, and she got her first. And I said, how do you feel? And she said, it's freeing. And my message to everybody is I can't tell you how good, how strong, how empathetic, how patriotic you'll feel if you haven't already gotten this thing. I think it's one of the most – and I don't know how you felt, but I felt great. I haven't felt that good about everything. Hopefully. Then after that, yeah, hope, hope, freeing.

Scott Galloway: My son's got it. I find my son's got it this weekend, got it this weekend.

Kara Swisher: Oh, they did?

Scott Galloway: And so, yeah, because it's now eligible to all, everyone over 16. So it was great. They got the Pfizer because the younger kids are getting the Pfizer vaccine and I feel great. The only one that doesn't have it is my baby because you're not giving it to babies yet. So that's the only, but they don't tend to get it. In any case, it does feel freeing. That is a good win. What is your fail?

Kara Swisher: Oh, my fail is, and I got something stuck in my craw about this, is I'm just, I rate over the notion that Coinbase pretends it's not a broken IPO. I just, I can't, it's literally, arguably one of the worst performing IPOs year to date.

Scott Galloway: Yeah, it's getting slapped around on the financial Twitter.

Kara Swisher: Well, it's just this whole idea of let's pretend there's an illusory thing called a reference price so we can claim that our IPO is a success. And someone also, I want to point out, someone on Twitter pointed out that I talked about how institutional clients who get the pop in a traditional IPO are getting – one of the positives there is that retail investors benefit because of institutional buyers of those funds represent unions. And someone on Twitter pointed out correctly that venture capitalist institutional investors also benefit the same people. And they're absolutely right. But the transfer, it's just a transfer of what I'll call that pop from the institutional clients of investment bankers to the institutional clients of VCs who want to capture. Which is, you could make an argument that's neither here nor there, it just is. But it really, it bothers me that the media has taken the bait here and is not calling this what it is, and that is a broken IPO.

Scott Galloway: All right. That's a good call. That's a good call. And I think a lot of people are noticing that, too.

Kara Swisher: Just my win is there's yet another. You know, I love Fast and Furious, as you know.

Scott Galloway: Oh, here we go.

Kara Swisher: I'm going to go see F9. But now there's another one, which is Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is coming out in September. That's my first theater going, I think. I'm very excited about it. It's going to have Aquafina in it. There's this guy named Simu, I think it's Liu, he's in it. Just go look at the trailer, it's fantastic. I'm so excited. It's all big noisy movies in a theater. And you know, I've been hard on theaters but nonetheless I want to see these things in a big theater.

Scott Galloway: You know what's more exciting? I believe is the Amazon 450 million dollars on... is it's not the Tolkien series, it's the what are they doing? They're spending half a billion dollars. Whatever. That's great. I'm glad they're taking Jeff Bezos' money and doing that.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, yeah. And, you know, I just feel like, even though I do think theaters are really troubled, and we talked about your experience at the Cinerama Dome, I think, I don't know what to think about this. This is my fail, but I don't think it's a fail. I can't decide, which is Apple is letting Parler back into the App Store following moderation improvements. A lot of people do not feel good about this because they think Parler shouldn't be allowed back at all, but I can't decide whether it's a win or fail. I think it's both. I think it makes me worry that these platforms get to exist at the same time. I feel okay about it. I don't know. What do you think?

Scott Galloway: You know, I think it's— Tim Cook told this to me in the interview we did. But what do you think about that? By the way, it's another one. Knives Out is supposed to land contracts to do two sequels. Yay. I think if you really have a thoughtful, measured conversation and put your politics aside, it's hard to not end up in an uncomfortable place where you're banning stuff. So probably a positive.

Kara Swisher: Yeah, I think it is probably a positive. I didn't react badly about it. And, you know, of course, as usual, the things are being mad at Apple for taking them off in the first place. Glenn Greenwald has a stupid tweet once and again. But the fact is they're coming back on and we'll see what happens there. Interestingly enough, while we're talking Reddit is previewing Reddit Talk, a clubhouse-like social audio feature for subreddit. So coming to iOS and Android. So everyone's in the space, Scott. It's time for us to jump in. We already talk every week. But anyway, there's a lot going on. Okay, Scott, that's the show. That was an exciting show. That was a lot.

Scott Galloway: That was a lot.

Kara Swisher: We'll be back for more on Friday, though. At the same time, there'll be plenty to talk about. There's so much news. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit your question for the Pivot podcast. The link is also in our show notes. Read us out.

Scott Galloway: Today's show is produced by Rebecca Sonanas. Ernie Andrew Todd engineered this episode. Thanks also to Hannah Rosen and Drew Burrows. Make sure you're subscribed to the show on Apple Podcasts or if you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you like the show, please recommend it to a friend. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business.

Kara Swisher: Aren't we blessed to live in a country that continues to attract the best and brightest to be thoughtful and measured around the connective tissue of the greatest nation and the greatest tensile strength and muscle in history, and that is U.S. government.

Scott Galloway: He's still not going to call you back when you're in jail.

Kara Swisher: He's my call. He's my call.

Scott Galloway: He's not going to call you. He's just literally, he's going to be with me having drinks. You could hear it in his voice.

Kara Swisher: We're close. And we're going to say, let it go. You could hear it in his voice. Let it go. Let's not get involved. Let's move along.

Scott Galloway: This show is now called Pivot with Kara Swisher and Preet's close friend, Scott Galloway.

Kara Swisher: That is absolutely true. He's correct, Rebecca. See you on Friday.