House Passes Potential TikTok Ban & Tesla Recalls Almost 4,000 Cybertrucks

This episode focuses on the U.S. House's decision to potentially ban TikTok and the recall of nearly 4,000 Tesla Cybertrucks due to a manufacturing defect.

1. The U.S. House has passed a bill that could force TikTok to be sold or banned within a year, citing national security concerns.
2. TikTok's potential ban is part of larger geopolitical tensions between the U.S. and China, with significant impacts on information control and technology trade.
3. Tesla has recalled nearly 4,000 Cybertrucks due to a defect in the accelerator pedal, posing serious safety risks and timing poorly with other company challenges.
4. The episode examines the broader impact of these issues on U.S. legislation, technological competition, and consumer safety.
5. Hosts discuss other relevant economic indicators, such as the strength of the U.S. dollar and its implications for international travel and global markets.

1: TikTok Ban Overview

An in-depth analysis of the potential U.S. ban on TikTok, including legislative details, national security concerns, and broader international effects. Neil Freyman: "The bill is expected to get through the Senate as soon as this week and will almost certainly be signed into law by President Biden."

2: Tesla's Troubles

Exploration of Tesla's recent Cybertruck recall due to a flaw with the accelerator pedals, compounded by broader company layoffs and strategic shifts. Neil Freyman: "This recall comes at a really bad time for Tesla in general."

3: Economic Implications

Discussion on the current strength of the U.S. dollar and its effects on international trade, travel costs, and global economic dynamics. Toby Howell: "The US dollar is absolutely surging right now, meaning American money will go farther in foreign countries."

1. Stay informed about data privacy and cybersecurity, especially concerning apps like TikTok.
2. For Tesla owners, promptly respond to recall notices to ensure vehicle safety.
3. Consider the impact of geopolitical events on personal investments, particularly in tech stocks.
4. Evaluate the potential benefits of international travel based on currency strengths.
5. Regularly update and audit personal data shared on social media platforms for security.

Episode 306: Neal and Toby dive into the House of Representatives’ overwhelming vote to ban TikTok and now it’s moved onto the Senate. Then, Tesla recalls all of its Cybertrucks due to a faulty accelerator pedal cover that could seriously harm people. Next, those who betted against the U.S. Dollar is feeling the pain as it hits record highs. Also, the UAW and chess champion Tunde Onakoya are the weekend’s winners. Meanwhile, Wall Street doesn’t seem like itself as its iconic bank closes shop. Lastly, what’s coming ahead to get your Monday started.

People

Neil Freyman, Toby Howell

Companies

Tesla, ByteDance

Content Warnings:

None

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With discover limitations apply. See terms creditcard good morning, beer daily show. I'm Neil Freiman. And I'm Toby Howell. Today you better get acquainted with Instagram reels because TikTok is on very thin ice in the US.

Toby Howell
Then the US dollar is stronger than ever. We'll tell you what that means for the global economy and your summer vacation plans. It's Monday, April 22. Let's ride.

Neil Freyman
Happy Earth Day, everyone. Toby, what is your favorite, favorite earth fact? My favorite earth fact is more of a geometry fact. Say you have a piece of rope that fits snugly around the earth, all 24,900 miles of it, but then you want to raise that rope off the ground by 1 meter. So you go around, put 1 meter high sticks holding the rope up around the equator.

Toby Howell
How much longer would the rope need to be to make ends meet? And the answer is just two times PI meters. Just 6.3 meters. That is it. It's an insane fact.

Me, I don't get it. It's just a matter of geometry. It doesn't actually matter how big the sphere or the circle is that you're putting the rope around as long. It could be the size of an atom or the size of the earth. As long as it is a circle and you raise it 1 meter, it's always going to be two times 5 meters that it's just stuck with me.

Neil Freyman
Yeah. What's your favorite fact? My favorite fact is just how old the earth is and how new animals are. So the earth is 4.5 billion years old. Dinosaurs didn't show up on Earth until maybe about 240 million years ago.

So dinosaurs, from dinosaurs to now is only 5% of the earth's entire time span. So there was so much time on earth that was just literally nothing. There were volcanoes going, nothing much was happening. Maybe there were a few microbes or whatever, but we are just so new. Uh, even humans, I mean, have not been around for a long time at all.

So just in the earth's time span, we are just so, we're just fresh people here learning about what this is all about. Happy Earth day, everyone. Now let's hear a word from our friends over at Robinhood. Not to get all introspective on a Monday, but Neil, have you put any thought towards retirement? Toby, I'm never retiring.

We talked about this. We're riding morning brew daily till our. Bodies give out, and I'll be right here beside you. But in the meantime, you can at least start planning for the future. And what better way to do that than with an IRA?

Toby Howell
Robinhood is a great place to set up an IRA whether you're traditionally employed or not. Robinhood has a whole host of ETF's that you can pick from based on your risk tolerance and sector preference, or. You can pick out all your own stocks for the long haul as well. And as a Robinhood gold subscriber, my retirement contributions get 3% match. To learn more about the Robinhood app in the App Store or Google Play Store disclosures investing is risky.

Neil Freyman
Investors should consider the investment objectives, risks, and charges and expenses of any ETF carefully before investing. Be sure to review a prospectus before investing limitations applied to the retirement match. More information in the description of this podcast well, the tick tock ban just got very real. Over the weekend. The House passed a bill that would require a for sale or ban of tick tock in the US within a year.

The bill is expected to get through the Senate as soon as this week and will almost certainly be signed into law by President Biden. So tick tock days could very well be numbered here in the states if its chinese parent, ByteDance, doesn't sell the app. And that will have major ramifications for TikTok's 170 million users, its american social media competitors, and the tense relationship between us and China. Here's why lawmakers on both sides of the aisle want to ensure TikTok has an american owner. They fear that us user data could wind up in the hands of the chinese government, which has a law that can compel private companies to fork over information.

There's also concern that Beijing could put its thumb on Tick Tock's algorithm to promote its interests and influence american public opinion. Tick Tock says it has never sent user us user data the chinese government and wouldn't do so if it was requested. Still, Toby, this tick tock ban has been floating around for years now, and it looks finally like it could happen. Yeah, let's dig into why we're finally saying this tick tock band has the legs to actually make it through the Senate this time around. It's because it's not just a standalone bill, it's almost like a russian nesting doll of other bills, it's part of a bill related to sanctions on foreign advocacy like Russia, as well as bills to provide aid to Ukraine, Taiwan, Israel, Gaza.

Toby Howell
So it makes it more likely to pass the Senate. Also, they relax the timeline a little bit. Remember the previous incarnation of this bill, required by dance to find a buyer within six months, with a lot of people said that's a little unrealistic. So this one relaxes that deadline to nine months and it can extend all the way up to a year. So that is why this time we're putting our necks out on the line and saying we do think that this ban will make it through the Senate.

Neil Freyman
It does. But whether tick tock will actually not appear on your phone is still a major question. Question China. For China, tick tock is its most successful international app. It's never had anything like this.

It's not going to allow Bytedance to divest easily. In, in previous months, it signaled that it's not going to allow this sale to go through. Meanwhile, on the tick tock side, it is preparing to challenge this bill legally. It might sue the US over this ban, trampling free spree traits. And interestingly enough, Elon Musk, who owns a rival platform, essentially in x, came out in support of tick Tock and against this ban, saying that he, he would like tick Tock to remain in the US over free speech concerns.

So it appears that there will be some legal wrangling that could extend the timeline that tick tock exists here. And then lawmakers who do support the pill are trying to frame it as, listen, this is not a ban, it's a divestment. We really don't want TikTok to go away. We just don't want ByteDance and Beijing to have so much control over it. But again, a divestment is not an easy thing to orchestrate whatsoever.

Toby Howell
One tick tock is a very valuable business. So there's only a very short list of companies that could even afford it. And those companies are the names that you'd expect, the big tech names, like the googles of the world, like the metas of the world. But those companies would have no chance of buying it because us antitrust regulators would say, listen, meta, there's no chance you're going to be able to own Instagram as well as TikTok. So then you have, maybe Oracle has been thrown around, but they just went on a big buying spree.

They have a bunch of corporate debt, so there's not really a good company that can step forward. There's been some rumblings that former treasury secretary secretary Steve Mnuchin is putting together a bid or maybe ex activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick. So there are rumblings, but that's where it gets really murky going forward. According to Axio Stan Primack, the most logical buyers for tick tock would be the non ByteDance investors, those large institutional shareholders, General Atlantic, which is a PE firm's sequoia Capital, or Susquehanna International Group. So these are these very wealthy major institutional investors that could perhaps have the money to, to buy tick tock.

Neil Freyman
But I'm going to put you on the spot one year from now, April 22, 2025. What is the TikTok story? What is going on? I'm saying it's, it's still on our phones. I just think that at least with the legal side of things, it's going to be wrapped up for a long time.

Toby Howell
So one year from now, I'm still going to be scrolling. Last week you heard us mention that Tesla suspended customer deliveries of its cybertruck. And just before the weekend, the news hit that it decided to issue a recall for the nearly 4000 trucks it sold so far. There's an issue with the accelerator pedals in the cars. Tesla put this metal cover on the pedals to match the exterior appearance of the car.

But at some point in the process, some soap that they use in the manufacturing got in between the metal pad and the accelerator pedal, causing it to slide off if you press it too hard. Also due to some unlucky geometry, if the piece slides off, it results in the pedal becoming stuck in the fully down position, which is obviously incredibly dangerous. It's pedal to the metal. Taken literally, this recall comes at a really bad time for Tesla in general. It's laying off more than 10% of its workforce while slashing prices on three of its five models in the US due to tepid demand.

On top of all of that, the company is trying to figure out a compensation plan for Elon that would likely end up being the biggest in corporate history. So, Neil, this recall could not have come at a more inconvenient time? No. Can we just recap Tesla's last week? So it started the week off by laying off 10% of its workforce, 14,000 people.

Neil Freyman
And there were reports over the weekend that that's going to grow to 20,000 people. So the biggest layoffs in its history. Then it had this compensation package proposal that it wants to give Elon back the 56 billion that was denied him by the Delaware judge. And then we had the Cybertruck chaos, the recall here, which was. Which was all of its cybertrucks.

Like, every single one has to go under recall. And then the final thing was these sweeping price cuts, not just in the US, but across China and Germany as well, because there just isn't a lot of demand for Tesla right now. And it's fighting, especially in China, very extreme competition, where there's a price war going on. You need to constantly cut your prices to make it in the market. Its market share has gone down in China from 10.5% at the beginning of 2023 to just 6.7% now.

So you can. All you have to do is look at that number to see just how. How major these headwinds are for Tesla and China and in the US. Yeah, it's been rough all the way around. I do want to zoom in on the recall specifically a little bit.

Toby Howell
One of the big difference between this recall and other Tesla recalls we've seen in the past is in the past they've been able to ship an over the Air software fix that you can just download on your Tesla to fix something small with the software. This is not that whatsoever. This is a physical issue with the brake pedals or the accelerator pedal sliding off. I've seen the Fix in action, though. A lot of people are just going to a Tesla dealership or Tesla service center and just screwing in a screw.

That's all it took. They just got a little too fancy with how they applied it. So it is interesting that it is both a simple fix that you do have to do it in person. So it's not like former TEsla recalls in the past, but, yeah, it's just been rough in general, sledding for. For Tesla.

Another big piece of news that dropped was that Elon Musk is postponing a visit. He had planned to go to India. India is a BIg presence, and it's going to be a huge factor in TEsla going forward. They're going to spend a couple billion dollars, two to $3 billion, on a factory in India. So the fact that he's delaying that visit means that he's kind of entering wartime CEO mode.

It's not about what's going on in the futUre. It's about what's happening right now. And there's a lot happening. A Morgan Stanley analyst who is a very big Tesla bullet. I said, maybe it's time for Elon to start sleeping on the factory floor, as he did when they were ramping up model three production.

Neil Freyman
And there was manufacturing hell, according to Elon, this. This analyst also floated that maybe Tesla, this is crazy to think about, is going to exit the traditional ev business in general. Like, it's not going to bank its future on making cars. It's going to work mostly on automation and robo taxis and self driving software. And Elon.

Elon Musk himself has said they're going balls to the wall with autonomy. So maybe that is the future that Elon is plotting and. And maybe they're not going to focus on actually making cars anymore, which is crazy to think about. But it feels like everything we're seeing that might be the ultimate endgame for Tesla. Wow.

If you were debating whether to travel abroad this summer or stay in the US, here's one variable that may tip the scale. The US dollar is absolutely surging right now, meaning american money will go farther in foreign countries and make for a cheaper vacation overall. Here are the numbers. The dollar index, which measures the dollar against six major advanced economy currencies, is up 5% from its low in December. The euro is down 3.7% against the dollar this year.

And recently the dollar hit a 34 year high against the japanese yen. So why is the dollar doing so? Well, not to be glib, but the main reason the dollar is getting stronger is because there is more demand for dollars, and that is a direct result of the US lapping everyone else in terms of economic growth. Put another way, think of the US economy as the Celtics and everyone else as the heat. Last week, the IMF predicted that the US GDP would grow 2.7% this year, which is more than twice the rate of any other country in the g seven group of advanced economies.

Throw in other factors like heightened geopolitical risk, the Fed holding off on interest rate cuts, and a strong us stock market. And all the ingredients are there for a dollar surge, which could spell pain for the rest of the world. Yeah, a very popular narrative and a very popular trade at the beginning of the year was that the US was dollar was going to fall in relation to other currencies. So at the start of the year, remember, the markets were pricing in at least as many as six rate cuts from the Fed. That in theory should weaken the US dollar since it would make it less attractive for foreigners to buy bonds in the US.

Toby Howell
But then what happened actually, was that trade totally backfired due to the surprising strength of the US economy. We've just weathered high interest rates really, really well. Retail sales are up. Employees are in the midst of a very strong hiring boom. Inflation has come in hotter than expected.

So everything kind of went into opposite land for a little bit, which threw off a lot of these exchanges. And like, the bank of Japan was supposed to raise their interest rates and the US was supposed to lower them. And that was going to be a really popular trade. Hasn't gone well overall. And it just has been a historically strong year for the dollar in a year where a lot of people didn't expect that.

Neil Freyman
Yeah. So what is, when the dollar is strong, what does that mean for you? What does it mean for the rest of the world? Who are the winners and losers? The winners are generally us consumers because our imports get a lot cheaper due to the strong dollar.

And then when we go abroad, everything is also cheaper. Your dollar goes further. You're, you're paying at a, you know, a british restaurant, you're like, damn, that's not so bad. If you go to Canada too, like I did a few months ago, you're like, damn, this is pretty, this is pretty cheap, these beers. But it is bad for really emerging markets where they have a lot of debt in US denominated dollars.

So their, their debt gets a lot more expensive to service and the imports that they take in are also more expensive due to the strong dollar. So that is seen as inflationary. So there is a warning sign for emerging markets specifically when the dollar gets stronger. It's also not great for american manufacturers because I just said imports in other countries get more pricey. That makes us manufacturing a little less competitive on the global landscape, then, you know, it might be more cheaper to import products than to, than to buy what Americans are producing.

And just by virtue of the strong dollar. Yeah. The issue, or non issue if you're an american is that the US GDP is a runaway freight train at this point. There is not a lot of signs that it's going to slow down anytime soon, which means that there's not a lot of signs that the dollar is going to get any less strong anytime soon as well. So get your passport.

Toby Howell
Get your passport. Up next, you've got our winners of the weekend segment coming your way.

Hey, Neil, what's your favorite part of a road trip? Hmm, that's a tough one. Probably queuing up the perfect playlist before I hit the wide open road. What about you? Honestly, I like to kick back and play a video game as a passenger, of course.

Neil Freyman
Really? Doesn't it get all glitchy and laggy? It can, but with at and t in car wifi, there's no worry about that. Basically, at and t hooks up your car with unlimited wifi so you can stay connected, stream video, blast that streaming playlist, or even catch up on work. Oh, nice.

Does it work in rural stretches? For sure. At and t actually covers more roads than any other carrier based on independent third party data. It even powers features like real time gps and voice assistant. And it works outside your car, too, if you wanna get a little tailgate action going or something.

Sounds awesome. So where can I go to add some wifi to my wheels? Head over to att.com incarwifi. That's att.com forward slash incarwifi. Some of the most common STD's can often be symptomless, which means carriers don't always know that they're infected.

Toby Howell
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Neil Freyman
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Toby Howell
It's Monday, which means it's time to take a look back on the weekend to see what news stories you may have missed since morning brew daily looks on the bright side. We found two winners of the weekend to share with you. Neil, you won the pre show cook off. I should have known it was ramp season, so you're up first. Who's your winner of the weekend?

Neil Freyman
Weekend is me, because I made this gorgeous ramp butter. I should have brought it in for you anyway. But my actual winner is the United Autoworkers because they went to the land of Waffle House and smothered and covered their way to a historic victory. On Friday, workers at a Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, overwhelmingly voted to join the union, marking the first time a non union auto plant in the south has linked up with the UAW. While two previous union votes at the same factory failed in 2014 and 2019, the UAW was able to drum up more support this time, in large part because of the major pay gains it secured last year at Detroit's big three automakers.

The UAW is hoping to take this pitch that worked at VW and cause more dominoes to fall in the south, a region typically unfriendly to organized labor. It's going to be an uphill battle, starting with its next test, a union vote at a Mercedes Benz plant outside Tuscaloosa, Alabama, coming mid May. Toby, the UAW is on a Damien Lillard level hot streak right now. There's a lot of. You're on an NBA reference hot streak right now.

I watch a lot of basketball. Yeah, I think this does, like, Sean Fain is obviously framing this as, look it, we've done great work for the Detroit automakers. We got historic gains there. Like, let's bring this to the south. I also think, though, that the other narrative that this is showing is that the outsize effect that the Inflation Reduction act is having on unions.

Toby Howell
Remember, this inflation reduction act is this big, sweeping legislation that adds a lot of different incentives to electric car manufacturers. And so when the, when the Energy Department is doing stuff like offering $12 billion in subsidies to plants who are using union labor, factories are saying, like, wait a second, we can offset some of the rising costs of becoming a unionized plant with these subsidies we're getting from the government. And so you kind of saw this, there was a lot less opposition from VW this time around. You mentioned those two previous failed votes. This time they were like, all right, there is enough subsidies out there that we can think we can make this work.

So even though Sean Fein is definitely saying, like, hey, it's because of the historic wins that we got with the Detroit automakers, I think there's other pressure here that led this union vote to happen. Speaker one and Sean Fein is the, the leader of the UAW who's, who's doing really, he's backing up his words with actions right now. But I said it's going to be an uphill battle because the south is just very hostile to unions. Like, the union membership rate nationally is 10%. Then when you go to these states and look at the stats, two point the union membership rate is 2.3% in South Carolina, 4.6% in Georgia, and 6% in Tennessee.

Neil Freyman
So this is a, this won't be easy. The, the Chattanooga, Tennessee, is obviously a great momentum boost. And you, they say unionization is contagious, that it does create this domino effect. But I'm not sure that the UAW will have the success that it had in Tennessee all across the south, but we'll see. My winner of the weekend is the nigerian chess master Tunde Onokoya.

Toby Howell
While you were sleeping, eating and living life over the past handful of days, Tunde was playing chess in the middle of Times Square for a long time. He played for 60 hours straight, setting the Guinness World Record for the longest chess marathon in the process. He embarked on the challenge in order to support the millions of children across Africa without access to education, raising money throughout his attempt. As for the logistics, he played against Shawn Martinez, an East Harlem american chess player, throughout the entire time period. Because the way Guinness World Records guidelines work is that you have to set the record by two players playing continuously.

In total, Tunde played 197 matches. But I'm sad to report we don't know his official win loss record. No. Well, I can't believe somebody played chess for 60 hours. What's the longest you've ever played chess?

Neil Freyman
I mean, a ten minute game feels a little bit long to me. Yeah, no, it's definitely a lot of people were misunderstanding it at first and thought that it was just one game that he played for a really long time in between moves. But no, he was playing, playing multiple games. One of the funniest details is that he said the attempt to get off to a rocky start on Thursday because he actually drank a coffee with milk in it, despite his lactose intolerance. So he was kind of sick right from the beginning, but he fought through it.

Toby Howell
And I do have to give a shout out to Sean Martinez as well, because it takes two to tango here. You do need the same person to play against you. I can't believe they didn't keep track of who won, though, because that would be. They're probably delirious. I mean, just spending 60 hours in Times Square is a feat in of itself.

Neil Freyman
That should be a Guinness world record. There's not even a lot of bathrooms there, so I don't know what they did about that. But interesting fact about Nigeria and games and sports, Nigerians are really good at. At one particular game. Like, they're the best in the world, Scrabble.

Toby Howell
Oh, they're really great. 33 out of the top 100 scrabble players in the world are nigerian, all right. And that's because they treat it as a sport and not a game. It's just so massive there. So maybe we should get a nigerian Guinness world record going in Times Square, too.

Neil Freyman
Yeah, it's just a crazy stat. They're. They're so good at scrap. I'm trying to think of a really long word, adjective to describe that surprising fact, but I got nothing right now. Exotic.

Toby Howell
Yeah, exotic. All right, let's move on. Wall street isn't just a substitute word for the US financial system. It's also a physical place in New York, a place that is slowly losing its actual relevance to the financial world. JPMorgan Chase officially closed its branch on 45 Wall street, marking the end of its 150 year presence on the famous street, and signaling the growing trend of financial institutions relocating away from Wall street is only accelerating.

JP Morgan has deep, deep ties to the area. Morgan and his family transformed Wall street, and with it, New York and America, into the center of the global financial system. So it's almost unthinkable that it would vacate the block completely. But today, a Wall street bank is more of a moniker and less an actual locale. The move is a reflection of the broader trend of financial institutions moving away from Wall street that started after the 911 attacks and, and was supercharged by the pandemic.

Neil, you and I were just down there that past few days. You can kind of just tell from the vibe in the eye test that it's more of a tourist attraction than a financial hub at this point. It's not. I mean, the New York Stock Exchange is still there, and that first JP Morgan building was right across from it on Broad and Wall street. And they did it on purpose because there's this term called cornering the market, and that was an allusion to that by, by occupying there.

Neil Freyman
But no, it's not a, you know, it's not a financial hub anymore. The New York stock Exchange is not really, it's mostly a tv studio on the floor there. It's not really a lot of trading going on. Computers and algorithms have taken over the financial system. A lot of these banks have moved away from Wall street decades ago.

I mean, UBS is on 6th Avenue. Bank of America is on 42nd street in midtown. Goldman Sachs and Citigroup are now in Tribeca, against the water. Uh, I think a lot of these banks really want to be next to either Penn Station or Grand Central because a lot of their execs live in New Jersey or Connecticut, and they want to be able to get an on the train and then walk maybe five minutes to the office. And the financial district is just not a great location for that, has a lot of old buildings.

So right now, I think it's. They've done a good job in revitalizing the financial district to become, yes, a tourist hub, but also a lot of people live there. The number of residents has tripled over the past few years. So they've done a good job post 911 of offering incentives for real estate developers to come in and transform these office buildings that once house banked into a residential neighborhood. Yeah, imagine so weird down there, though.

Toby Howell
Your bathroom. Your bathroom is like JP Morgan's old corner office. But that's like, truly a situation that people find themselves in. And I think you're right. Part of the reason is not just that the execs wanted easier commutes, but also big banks just got too big.

Those buildings cannot house the expansive trading operations that you need to, to run a big international bank at this point. So it is still, go down there. Go, go rub the bowl. Go take it in. It does have a nice vibe to it, but I do think it is more residential and tourists at this point than financial.

Neil Freyman
All right, finally, here's what you can expect in the week ahead. It's an earnings bonanza. 178 companies in the S and P 500 will report their Q one financials this week, including magnificent seven members, Microsoft, Meta Alphabet, and Tesla. And regular blue chips like GM, Boeing, IBM, and Pepsi. This is an opportunity to turn around the stock market, which is, which has been a disaster lately.

The S and P is coming off its worst week in more than a year, and the tech focus Nasdaq is on a four week losing streak. What the heck is going on? Yeah, vibes aren't great right now. If you look at the trading day following the release of the companies that have reported quarterly results so far, if you beat expectation, stocks on average have jumped 0.8% in the next trading session. That's a little bit lower than the 0.9% average from the last two years.

Toby Howell
But if you miss on earnings, stocks are falling 5.8% in the next trading day, compared to a usual 3.1% decline we've seen over the past year. So we're seeing less upside when you do well and then a lot more downside if you don't do well, which just shows we're in a little bit of a nervy time, right? Yeah. And you'll definitely hear us talk about all of those earnings this week, especially the big tech ones. Donald Trump's criminal hush money trial enters its second week after an eventful first week of jury selection down at the courthouse.

Neil Freyman
The final jurors were seated on Friday and opening statements in Trump's in the trial will begin today. The first, the first witness who is expected to be called David Pecker, the former chairman of National Enquirers parent company. Yeah, it's crazy that we've had this much drama. Just with the jury selection, we haven't really kicked things off yet. It's only going to get more drama.

Toby Howell
There's so much media attention around it already. So once these arguments started to be heard, we're going to hear about it even more. And finally, a happy Passover to everyone celebrating tonight. Here's an interesting business tidbit about the holiday. Maxwell House coffee has been making Haggadah's, which is the book used during the Seder since 1932, and it remains the longest running promotion of any major brand in the US.

Neil Freyman
They wanted to, they did it back in the thirties to show that you could drink coffee. It was kosher for Passover. So they did it as this marketing play, and it just continued. It's been used by presidents and, yeah, the company, Kraft Heinz, which is its parent company, says it's the longest running promotion of any major brand ever in the history of the United States. And here I was thinking $5 footlongs were the longest running promotion of all time.

All right, let's wrap it up there. Thanks so much for listening and have a wonderful start to the week. If you have any thoughts on the show or just want to procrastinate on work, give us a shout at our email. Morning Brew Daily@morningbrew.com let's roll the credits. Emily Milliron is our executive producer.

Raymond Liu is our producer. Yuchenua Ogu is our technical director. Billy Menino is on audio. Hair and makeup has a dollar and a dream. Devin Emery is our chief content officer, and our show is a production of Morning Brew.

Toby Howell
Great show today, Neil. Let's run it back tomorrow.