Transcript

Local Hour: Meadowlarkers 43 "Brittney Griner" 💥 The Dan Le Batard Show 2022

From The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 46 min · 8,393 words · 49 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "Local Hour: Meadowlarkers 43 "Brittney Griner" 💥 The Dan Le Batard Show 2022", an episode of The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz published August 26, 2022 (46 min, about 8,393 words). It mentions 9 people, works and ideas, including Brittany Griner, T.J. Quinn, Paul Whelan, Victor Boot, ESPN.

What this episode is about

The main topic centers on the ongoing investigation into Brittney Griner's situation, highlighting the efforts of ESPN investigative reporter T.J. Quinn to provide thorough coverage of the story. Key points include the importance of sustained media attention to Griner's case and the unique challenges reporters face when reporting on such sensitive situations.

Key takeaways

  • In a world where quick claims are crucial, Geico's mobile app turns broken windshields into mere inconveniences.
  • Brittany Griner's case highlights the shadowy dance between sports and geopolitics, proving not all courts serve justice.
  • Guilty pleas in Russian courts often double as political theater; is admission really a confession or a survival tactic?
  • The labyrinthine paths of negotiations with Russia remind us: diplomacy is often more unpredictable than a game of chess.
  • Navigating the narrative around Griner shows the media's balance act between urgency and context—timely but nuanced coverage matters.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 5:00: ESPN, Brittany Griner, T.J. Quinn, TASS
  2. – 10:00: Brittany Griner, Donald Trump
  3. – 20:00: Victor Boot, Brittany Griner, Paul Whelan
  4. – 25:00: Brittany Griner, Paul Whelan
  5. – 30:00: Paul Whelan
  6. – 35:00: Brittany Griner, 544 Days
  7. – 40:00: Brittany Griner, Paul Whelan
  8. – 45:00: Brittany Griner

Notable quotes from "Local Hour: Meadowlarkers 43 "Brittney Griner" 💥 The Dan Le Batard Show 2022"

  • Over the last few months check in on the brittany griner story make sure that unlike a lot of media outlets we are trying to like stay on top of it offer our listeners whatever the latest.
    about Brittany Griner · at
  • Involved nobody knew about it until march 5th that's when that time story was and they were writing off of a story from tas this the it's just about to say soviet the russian news agency those of us who grew up in the cold war remember.
    about TASS · at
  • Was it was a very different time you know i'm not getting political but just objectively it's true that donald trump's relationship with putin was very different than joe…
    about Donald Trump · at
  • The white house to cut a deal to bring her home more specifically to do a prisoner swap there's a guy and you guys i'm sure you've discussed them arms dealer named victor boot…
    about Victor Boot · at
  • People are still optimistic she'll come home and we may hear about some kind of swot victor boot maybe somebody going there for brittany grinder and paul whelan but there's a very good chance there will be elements of this we never hear.
    about Paul Whelan · at
  • Unhappy with russia i'm going to pitch a podcast here a separate one than the metal lockers but i listened a couple weeks ago to five 544 days which was jason yeah.
    about 544 Days · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Brittany Griner — Person · Central subject (wrongful detention case) · 12 mentions · first at
    The episode centers on Griner’s detention in Russia, the legal/propaganda dynamics of her trial, and U.S.-Russia negotiations to secure her release.
  • T.J. Quinn — Person · Main guest (investigative reporter) · 1 mention · first at
    Quinn explains how he reported the Griner case, the constraints of reporting on Russia, and the mechanics of prisoner-swap negotiations.
    And i amin is here as well are joined by espion investigative reporter senior writer t.j quinn tj thank you for joining us here on metal archers pleasure thanks for having me so we have we've tried to over the last.
  • Paul Whelan — Person · Referenced detainee (comparative case) · 6 mentions · first at
    Whelan is repeatedly used as a comparison point for timelines, leverage, and the political risk of swapping/returning one detainee but not the other.
  • Victor Boot — Person · Referenced prisoner-swap figure · 3 mentions · first at
    Bout is described as the high-profile Russian arms dealer the U.S. might trade to secure Griner’s (and possibly Whelan’s) release.
  • Donald Trump — Person · Referenced comparator (former U.S. President) · 1 mention · first at
    Trump is referenced to contrast U.S.-Russia dynamics across administrations, framing how the geopolitical environment changed.

Companies & orgs

  • ESPN — Company · Affiliation · 2 mentions · first at
    ESPN is the employer of T.J. Quinn, the investigative reporter discussing the Brittany Griner case.
    Episode here today we are joined amin and i amin is here as well are joined by espion investigative reporter senior writer t.j quinn tj thank you for joining us here on metal archers pleasure thanks for having me so we have we've tried to.
  • TASS — Company · Referenced media · 1 mention · first at
    TASS is mentioned as the Russian news agency that initially reported on Brittany Griner's detention.

Media & podcasts

  • 544 Days — Media · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a podcast that details the nuances of hostage situations, similar to Brittany Griner's case.

Sponsors

  • DraftKings — Company · Sponsor · 1 mention · first at
    DraftKings is mentioned as a sponsor of the podcast, offering a special promotion.
    Show with the stupas podcast represented by draftking sportsbook and official sports betting partner of the nfl download the draftking sportsbook app now and use codan for a special offer when you sign up that's codan only.

Full transcript with timestamps

to show you how easy it is to file a claim with geico we hired a nature show host in a native habitat of a suburban driveway the poor victim of a broken windshield is left assessing his vehicle utterly helpless well not true if he's got geico he can file a claim online over the phone or with his handy mobile app but like alone gazelle he'll suddenly be left to fend for himself awaiting his terrible fate nope geico will assign him a designated claims team to help him out too so the gazelle gets his car fixed and everything wow nature is so cool geico great service without all the drama this is the dan levator show with the stupas podcast represented by draftking sportsbook and official sports betting partner of the nfl download the draftking sportsbook app now and use codan for a special offer when you sign up that's codan only at draftkings sportsbook welcome to meadowlarkers 43 the dennis eckersley

episode here today we are joined amin and i amin is here as well are joined by espion investigative reporter senior writer t.j quinn tj thank you for joining us here on metal archers uh pleasure thanks for having me so we have we've tried to over the last few months check in on the brittany griner story make sure that unlike a lot of media outlets we are we are trying to like stay on top of it offer our listeners whatever the latest is whatever the background is and i think since we're ha since we have you on i'm also interested and i don't know if a mean might be as well in addition a lot of the information about brittany i'm just interested in as a reporter how you go about trying to report a story like this which can be very different than some other investigative pursuits previously so but just off the top tj can you can you tell us in february when you you know the new york times i believe broke the original

story but how you started to get involved and kind of get your footing on this yeah no nobody knew about uh i mean outside of the people immediately involved nobody knew about it until uh march 5th that's when that time story was and they were writing off of a story from tas uh this this the it's just about to say soviet the russian news agency those of us who grew up in the cold war remember tas you know from the soviet union um but yeah for some reason it was really quiet up until that point i got involved in it because as far as people in the espn's investigative unit go i was the one who had some experience with russia um so it just kind of fell in my lap um i we had been there four years ago for a story we did about vladimir putin's involvement in international sport and how everything that he does in the sports world the world cup uh the olympics even smaller federation events they're

all part of his geopolitical goals and so we had kind of a head start at least in understanding this issue in the sports world and one of the things that we knew from the start was you know two things are true one is that vladimir putin's government absolutely has a history of framing people uh on drug crimes in particular and we also know that sometimes athletes do dumb things and get caught doing it um so either was possible it's you know we're at a point now where she she pleaded guilty and a number of people in this country have taken that to mean oh that means she definitely did it because why else would she admit guilt sitting here today i don't know for sure that she did just because she told the russian court that she did what she was accused of bringing vape cartridges with hash oil it was a foregone conclusion she was going to be found guilty and the people involved also know there was

no way russia was going to agree to a deal to send her home unless there was an admission of guilt so whether she did it or not in the russian court she was going to be guilty whether she did it or not she had to admit it so is it possible that she did i don't know but the us government decided fairly early on in her case that she was being wrongfully detained and you know that happened i believe that was in may they made that decision so since then everything about the trial was just kind of theater russia kept saying we won't even discuss a deal until the court system is finished um even though the rest of the world and any objective person you know knows uh how ridiculous the the criminal justice system is there russia requires everybody to treat it as though it's real and so when the u.s government talked about maybe making a prisoner swap to get her home russia was adamant no we won't talk about this until it's

over now that it's over the number of people i've spoken to have said we're in a really critical phase this is right now where it's being hashed out it doesn't sound like a deal is imminent but one thing i've learned in this topic over the past five months is you don't hear what's going on until it's over um the people i talk to who are involved say that there's they are optimistic but they also know when you're dealing with russia things could blow up at any second you could have a deal that you think is all set and signed off on and somebody from the kremlin comes in and says no we're not going to do this i want something else and it could all blow up you don't even know always who you're negotiating with in russia you have it's not just the kremlin the fsb um the foreign ministry sometimes it's elements warring factions within those groups um so these things are incredibly tricky it's

never as obvious as the swap that people you know in the general public think are being discussed but right now from what i've heard the fact that it's very quiet um we're not hearing any bluster from the two governments that's a really good sign for brittany griner tj what are the complications in reporting a story like this you know that takes place in russia and how has that changed from the story that you did four years ago well it's i mean russia has changed dramatically since then right i mean it was it was a very different time uh you know i'm not getting political but just objectively it's true that uh donald trump's relationship with putin was very different than joe biden's uh we went over there i mean look even when we went we we got pretty good warnings about how to conduct ourselves don't bring your own phone don't bring your own laptop bring burners because as soon as you open something there it will be infected

when you bring it back don't even turn it on hand it to your i.t so they can wipe it we were warned you will be surveilled don't try to detect it and try to avoid it because if you do they'll see that as tradecraft and they'll treat you like a spy again there's people in u.s intelligence committee community we spoke to who said all their journalists are spies so they think all our journalists are spies but as long as you don't act like one they won't treat you like one but you should have seen me checking you know my bag before i went over every any prescription medication anything i had because they will grab people um now of course with with the war in ukraine it's it's completely different we did briefly talk about going over there and it was made clear that was it was described to me as a spectacularly bad idea um so that that idea came and went quickly but the the biggest thing is you can't go over

there yourself you can't try to talk to her you can't just go talk to the lawyers that she has over there you don't really have access to the government so all the information that you're getting that we're getting is really through people in this country whether it's the state department the white house um you know anybody who's around brittany griner no matter they may be right on every point but they still have a vested interest in this and whether you know brittany griner is is being wrongfully detained or not i need to keep in mind with every one of these people i talk to they do have an agenda most people may agree with it maybe just but when i hear like when i ask how is she doing over there i'm hearing what they i'm what they want me to hear i have no way to objectively confirm that and the fact is it is in her supporters interest to not pay too dramatic a picture they can't say she's being horribly treated

because that could create a whole you know another level of problems i don't want to say she's doing great i mean i can't imagine she is prison system in this country isn't exactly a spa and russia is a lot rougher than that so you don't really know you're limited in who you can talk to but there's also another level to it like any other investigation that i work on you get as much as you can you go with it you judge the news value but here you've got a whole other level of especially early on are you repeating russian propaganda points are you doing something that could potentially put her in in danger in the sports world we may act like everything is an issue of national security this is literally an issue of national security we act like it's life and death this one actually affects you know the life of a woman who's been over there for six months you always have to make decisions with that in mind

when you went over four years ago and it sounds like tj i assume you're talking about the espn security that is telling you about you know the threats of various countries um no that was actually that was actually u.s intelligence uh we had reached out to people at a number of agencies um i mean we we did of course consult with espn because they won't let you go anywhere i mean you know they won't let you go anywhere i had to have a bodyguard in vegas which was to this day you don't understand um but anyway yeah they don't mess around but we went to the intelligence community for advice about what to do yeah i mean i i'm sort of in retrospect feeling exposed about when i went over there in 2017. i mean nobody tried to stop me nobody told me not to bring my own phone nobody gave me any pointers really they were just like good luck and that was the year i went over to actually caterinburg which was the team

that brittany and at the time diana trozzi were playing for ummc and so when in early march as you said earlier when we first heard that brittany was detained and subsequently you know deemed on you know unlawfully my main question on the table was is her team her russian team going to be able to step in before this escalates to where it has gotten when you were in the early stages did you have any intel i mean i know one of her uh teammates at ummc and one of the administrators on her team was at her trial but was there ever a phase where there was going to be a point where maybe her team could could step in and keep this from escalating i think that's what they were hoping for early on because if you remember until the u.s you know state department made that declaration she was wrongfully detained they were trying really hard to keep this low key and you know they reached out to us and pretty much

anybody in the media saying please we're trying not to make too much of this because even though look we're all aware of what russia's history with this is and what she faced over there and the dangers she faced there if the thought of the time from both the state department and from her supporters was i mean the people around her family um her agents if there is any chance to get her out without turning this into an international event or a hostage situation then they wanted to try to do it once it was clear that no they're looking to deal her then okay everything changed and they said let the let the hounds you know release the hounds and put as much pressure on the white house as you could so i think they were waiting to see what could the team do but more particularly the oligarch who owned the team because all the years that she was going over there if you're going over there and she's been going

since 2014 if you're under the protection of an oligarch it's like walking into a neighborhood in this country where a mob boss or a gang leader says you're okay if you've got the protection and the okay of that person you can go safely and i don't know what efforts there were if that particular oligarch and i can't believe i'm blanking on his name right now but he owns the mining companies over there estimated worth at least three and a half billion dollars um once the war started which was one week after she was detained remember the the reaction of western nations and including the us and and in the uk was to freeze assets of all those oligarchs that's that that's if you want to understand the power system in russia it's all about the relationship between putin and the oligarchs he keeps himself in power because they keep him in power he keeps them happy by funneling money to them it

is essentially a criminal operation and that's why the us was seizing yachts and properties all over the world so i don't know if there were efforts to reach out to him directly but i know that if anybody could have stepped in historically and said no no she's with me that's who it would have been but suddenly their assets are frozen i don't know particularly what what's happened with his but i think that that's really what they were waiting for and like you said the you know her one of her teammates and the the gm of the team appeared at her trial on her behalf that's her guts i mean that's when the government has said you know somebody's guilty of something and two people who have to live there come out on her behalf look maybe they have some assurances um that they'll be okay but that i mean that was really gutsy thing to do tj obviously there's a lot of frustration about her situation desire to get her

back i see that frustration boil over a lot on social media and even in newscasts where people are demanding that the white house and president biden do something what it is what is it exactly do they expect to be done when when dealing with you know a nation that is a rival nation a a frosty relationship and a nuclear power you know among other things what is it that people expect the white house or the u.s government to do that and it's a great question it's you know when people were talking about pro testing in the beginning um i think some were thinking they were protesting against vladimir putin vladimir putin does not care what anybody in this country thinks about brittany grein or anybody else if he even knows her name um he's got a lot bigger things to deal with at the moment than than one basketball player um the protests were about pressuring the white house to cut a deal to bring

her home more specifically to do a prisoner swap there's a guy and you guys i'm sure you've discussed them uh arms dealer named victor boot who is doing a 25-year sentence in this country he was you know one of the things he was convicted of was you know uh conspiring to take the lives of americans it's it's not like you know he was busted with less than an ounce of weed it's not exactly a an equal trade on the other hand he has spent 14 years in custody already the u.s picked him up in thailand 14 years ago the the thought behind that and behind former u.s ambassador to the united united nations bill richardson and his organization they you know he richardson has worked for years to get people like brittany greiner home and his organization is engaged on this as well their point is you're not going to create more incentive to kidnap americans abroad by trading to get them home just get them

home um now there's a fascinating piece that was just published in the journal foreign uh foreign affairs today by uh professor danny gilbert who we've interviewed a number of times she's kind of i would say the foremost expert on state-sponsored hostage-taking making the case that yeah actually it does create incentive uh but that doesn't mean you don't do it it means that the efforts should be put into preventing nations from doing it in the first place disincentivizing it and making sure that you punish people who are involved now the white house announced um executive action uh i believe it was in july uh by president biden to to do it was august whatever um it all blends together uh essentially to do that uh to designate russia as a country where people could be illegally detained tools to let them go after anybody who was involved in the illegal detention of an american um there are a number of

steps i'd encourage anybody to find danny gilbert's piece in foreign policy but um excuse me foreign affairs and um you know that when you talk to people in the government they say look we get it the families are frustrated they want us to make a deal at any cost if you're brittany griner's wife if you're her family or a sibling or anybody in her life you're you don't care about u.s foreign policy or geopolitical goals or what this does to nato or yeah you want to get them home so they understand that but there's also you hear frustration from them saying hey you know we're just as invested as any other person in trying to get americans back we want to do this people overlook the fact that you're dealing with russia which is not exactly the most reasonable uh negotiating partner they're the ones who have her they're the ones who are setting terms they're the ones holding her and that the u.s

can't just do this at any cost one of the one of the stories that came out i forget who who was that broke it might have been cnn was that russia had asked in return for a russian national who's imprisoned in germany right now for a murder he was convicted of in belgium the u.s has no say over that and the reaction from the u.s state department was well that's not a serious response and when i talked to people who live in this world they said their theory was russia knew we wouldn't agree to that but it's a way to put a wedge between the us and germany anything to destabilize relationships so there are probably things that are going on that we don't hear about and may never hear about people are still optimistic she'll come home and we may hear about some kind of swot victor boot maybe somebody going there for brittany grinder and paul whelan but there's a very good chance there will be elements of this we never hear

about what's your best guess for russia's motivation behind all of this um i mean with a huge caveat that i i couldn't begin to get inside the mind of vladimir putin or anybody who works for him what we know from their history is it is they are purely transactional there's a guy they want this is a way to get it so i mean there are multiple goals really one is they've wanted victor boot for a long time he's become kind of a folk hero over there and and from what i understand he there's artwork that he's done that's that's displayed around moscow somebody is really interested in getting him home i don't know who it is or why but they want them but on the other hand it's also one more way to make joe biden look ineffective and weak which is absolutely a goal of putin's anything to destabilize this country and to stir up political unrest one of the calculations in this you've got paul whelan who is a white

male former military in his 50s brittany griner who is a black lesbian who has been very active there is absolutely a political recognition that if you bring one home you're going to set off a a firestorm if you don't bring home the other and russia has a media ecosystem and its use of social media that is designed to inflame those us divisions um i mean it's there's the record is so clear and so substantial through every election i can tell you know anytime i tweet anything about this these bots start coming they you can see it's like almost like there's a shift change in moscow where all these accounts that were created in the last month um with two followers and both of those are porn sites suddenly repeating all the same talking points and they get in in your feed and they just try to stir it up so that's always a motivation for what russia is doing just just to mess up u.s politics i mean to that point you know

when when this topic comes up just in like out to dinner with people conversations over the last few months there's like this default thing that people are saying which is well if it was lebron james detained over there we'd be talking about it non-stop and i'm like if lebron james was detained over there russia would be asking for us to like resurrect bin laden or something you know i mean there would be there would be some astronomical cost associated with it i i just think you can almost see the machinations of what russia is trying to do work in the us as we start not that i don't think that there's things that play about the reason why britney was over there there being inequity in the sports world et cetera et cetera that's separate from how we're actually dealing with it right now and trying to get brittany greiner home i don't sense and i have not been you know reporting this story over the last few

months i don't sense there's disinterest in the u.s government because she's a female athlete um i don't know whether as you've been reporting at t.j there seems to be any sort of i guess lesser motivation because of that that you have noticed no if there's i mean look there's certainly less attention and if lebron james had been grabbed it's hard to imagine three weeks could have gone by before anybody noticed right that's just the difference in in the level of celebrity each of them is um you know and and you know okay you're absolutely right i mean you know anyone i've spoken to has said if if they had lebron they'd be asking for the moon they would be it would be way more valuable to them because of the amount of pressure it would create for the biden white house i'm not relying so much on my conversations with people you know directly in the u.s government because i mean what are they going to

tell me that they're disinterested no i mean they seem to be motivated but you have to go by actions what i can tell you is that her case is moving more quickly than similar cases have gone paul whelan has been there for four years almost four years he he was not declared he was in pre-trial of attention for 18 months and it wasn't until after he was convicted that he was declared wrongfully detained same with trevor reed uh who was you know former marine who came home in late april um so her hers has actually gone more quickly what i'm relying on though are the people around in in brittany griner's world and other independent people who are experts on this and what they tell me is they believe that the government is engaged they believe that the state department has a priority now they may disagree with some things like you know the timing you hear some impatience i mean one day in a russian jail would be too

much much less six months um but when you when you talk to them what they say is they really feel like our government is working in good faith and they they understand you know it's when i hear people in the state department saying you know look we know why they want to put pressure on the president but it doesn't help anything we're motivated to do this but when i talk to paul whelan's siblings for example they're like no we we get why people do that it's if biden is the guy who has to sign off on the deal wouldn't you do absolutely everything you could to put pressure on him i can't say if the pressure is helped or not but you know there's there's also a sense in those people that i talked to that yeah maybe it has pushed it and maybe if it was lebron james there would be such a continued outcry and every member of congress or at least half the members of congress would be screaming to get him

home half would be screaming to keep him there but there would be a lot more pressure on him and maybe they make a deal more quickly i don't know but like i said the people around brittany griner seem to feel they're they're they're operating in good faith when you mentioned at the outset that part of the reason you got um tapped to cover this story was because i assume it was for the world cup in in 2018 that you did a piece on russia and russian sport and putin did you learn anything in the process of of reporting that four years ago that has at least influenced how you think about what is happening now oh absolutely um i think there's a natural tendency when you don't understand a subject to do a little bit of both side-ism simply because you're not confident enough in the topic i am not an expert on russia or you know us russian foreign policy but i've talked to a lot of people who are

and i think the advantage you know to me of having done that before was to come into this with with a little more of a clear-eyed view than i might have had otherwise about the way the russian system works you know it was it was a long time on that story understanding yes putin operates as a criminal you cannot there are people who even say why do you call him president the guy is a dictator he murders political opponents he has people whacked in other countries so it frames the way you talk about it from the beginning and i did see some reporting i've seen reporting throughout when something happens in a russian court you see american press react to it as though it's a normal u.s trial we can go into you know all the all the issues of the us judicial system you know um other countries love to point out the flaws but the fact is there's no difference you know there's really no comparison between the flaws in our

judicial system and the way russia's operates russia's is a purely transactional system it is built entirely to convict people fewer than one percent of of all cases and an acquittal judges are hired uh and trained to convict public if you get a public defender over there the public defender works with the prosecutor um the system is so completely stacked if you're the regular you know russian citizen much less an american who's you know of some value to them so i think that experience helped a lot and and also just being able to reach out to those sources right away um who i talked to before who were able to quickly get me up to speed on the russian legal system you know the one point i kept trying to hammer through our reporting during the trial was you can't treat this like a normal trial it's theater it's a foregone conclusion this is just to stir up division and try to give the whole process a sheen of

legitimacy and if i've seen a mistake in the u.s press i think it's it's not contextualizing it that way hey everyone we always say support the people who support the show visible is wireless powered by verizon and they've come on board as a new sponsor of the dan levitar show with stu gods and we want to make sure you show them some of that infamous lubitard love stu god's army cody cavalry guillermo mafia get ready to show your support visible starts at just 30 a month for a single line plan and that includes taxes and fees no family plan needed now your family can move over and you can become an official member of our family you get unlimited data talk text and hotspot with 5g included so anywhere life takes you a lacrosse mitzvah a last-minute trip to canton ohio visible has you covered and now visible has a new plan that includes 5g ultra wideband and global calling to set yourself up for a

wireless win switch today at visible.com that's v i s i b l e dot com 5g ultra wideband available only on the visible plus plan for data management practices learn more at visible.com additional terms apply where do we go from here i mean she's she's in in russian prison you said that probably the silence on both sides is a good sign that that means negotiation is happening but beyond that is this just i mean are we looking at waiting out nine and a half years or whatever her sentence is i mean yeah it's a nine year sentence it's um i mean the people i talk to say with confidence it's not going to be that long does that mean a week two weeks does that mean six months um it's hard to say like i said you know trevor reed was there more than two and a half years paul whelan has been there for almost almost four um you know they they wanted to come home too um it's i mean there's no way to put a date

on it um right now she's she's still in a russian jail well everything of course is russia whatever she's in a jail in moscow um while she has filed an appeal as expected um what people on this side of the ocean the atmosphere the globe are hoping is that she doesn't end up getting sent to the penal colony that she's been sentenced to because that's a whole other ballgame um that's a there's a real chance for i mean these are work camps i mean they're they're prehistoric they're uh um and it's also a place where you know being a six foot nine you know uh black woman uh who's a lesbian in the country that is you know incredibly intolerant legally officially of the lgbtq plus community that's where her identity and her celebrity could make her a real risk for abuse so right now if she's in a russian if she's in a jail instead of that penal colony she's she's in a much better position you know the people i talk to

they seem fairly impatient but they get that look this is what needs to happen um you know it's at some point what you'd expect i mean usually you don't hear anything until somebody's on a plane and out of russian airspace and suddenly the word goes out brittany griner's been released in this case the sense i get is that if there is not progress or if the u.s government feels the russian government is not dealing in good faith we're likely to hear something from the state department again i mean when secretary of state anthony blanken spoke up last month admitting that there had actually been an offer from the u.s that was completely unprecedented and it sounded like it was because they were just frustrated with what they were getting back from the russians so the next thing you hear will either be you know she's on her way home or that the u.s is throwing up its hands and unhappy with russia i'm going to pitch a

podcast here a separate one than the metal lockers but i i listened a couple weeks ago to five 544 days which was jason yeah yeah um in detained in tehran for whatever that amounts to almost two years and it was similar to what you've been articulating today tj just did you listen to that i'm i i have and i've had the good fortune to talk to jason a couple of times um about his there as well and and his book which is a fantastic breed and just the the the nuances of the last minute hang-ups that can come up in an ex in some sort of swap or exchange that he details in 544 of like no you're you know your wife can't get on the plane with you and it holds up the whole deal and i mean just down to the last minute of these things it being up in the air but i also i wanted to follow up on the appeal process because i think maybe all of us or at least i know i am projecting mapping like an american

appeal process on to the russian judicial system of appeals can take years and maybe it's a good thing for britney if it does take years because if she's not transferred to transfer to the penal colony until the appeal is over then that's probably good but like what is how does how do appeals play out they well the first thing about russian appeals is they are almost uniformly unsuccessful right so i mean again it's a foregone conclusion it's more theater and from their standpoint it's their way of saying hey she's getting a fair shake over here from the u.s government standpoint it's a way of knowing that she's in a secure place until this is this is finished um i've talked to people who said that their big fear is that that somebody in russia says to hell with this put her in the penal colony anyway you know that would be incredibly upsetting to to the u.s government what could they actually

do about it i don't know this isn't you know this isn't like you know people i've talked to who are held in places like syria or somalia where you can send seal team six in to get them out this is you know i mean i mean like you were saying this is a nuclear power you can't just you know send in the commandos um you are at their mercy to some extent but the fact is russia's motivated as well they want to get these guys you know it was interesting the whole thing last week with uh over the weekend with dennis rodman saying he was going i haven't seen any evidence that that's actually true but i spoke to a number of people said they could absolutely see a scenario where if he did get involved vladimir putin would want to make it look like rodman was the one who got him and got her out because it would you know it would make it would make brighton look foolish yeah and then it would be you know and

then you give the whole social media monster in this country something to chew over and they just sit back and crack up while the u.s tears itself apart so uh the u.s government you know state department was pretty quick to put out a statement saying this would not be helpful they can't put the our government cannot prevent him from going and it's up to the u.s you know there's a do not travel order but it's not enforced if he did go over there and met with people who are being sanctioned or uh by the us government he could potentially be prosecuted but i mean that would be a hell of a political move to try to prosecute somebody for trying to get somebody home whatever but just i mean case like you said all these all these wild cards that could come down to the last second um you you it's it's i mean it's it's it's incredibly tense how does this impact the future uh relations between the united states and

russia is it i mean i guess is this just another kind of uh piece of antagonism and a long list of antagonisms that have happened and that are going to happen or will we remember this will this be memorialized in history books says this was where things really got ugly well i mean it's i mean it's a really interesting question because you've got you know there's a war going on and the us is is behind ukraine and russia is not happy about it and the two governments are at as hostile a place as they've been since the cold war um you know and so the invasion of ukraine obviously is a lot bigger than the detention of of one basketball player but what was interesting is the fact that there are channels at all when trevor reed was sent home in late april that was the best news that brittany griner's supporters could have gotten because it meant there is a diplomatic channel open and there's a

history of that um you know with other conflicts where two countries can be at war but they still have some diplomatic communications in some cases it's not existent it's not like we're dealing with isis necessarily um but even with the taliban what you know we're at war with there were still discussions between those countries um so the tricky part right now for the us government is can they manage this to bring brittany griner and paul whelan home right now while this is going on and or is russia going to shut things down because they'll demand that the u.s do something like lift sanctions or agree not to arm ukraine or something we haven't heard anything to that effect but that could be like if there's a danger out there even if it's remote that's one of them that russia russia suddenly changes the terms of the discussion to make it about the war and then you could be completely stuck

so it is kind of fascinating that yeah this is a major break in these points and you can't see the two governments ever reconciling it while vladimir putin is in power um but they can at least conduct business which is kind of fascinating so every time that there's been a moment in the case where you know brittany is brought out and we we have pictures of her and we have a quick video of her the last few times that has happened she gets put it you know behind in the little cage inside the courtroom right this is my limited russian judiciary system knowledge but the last few times she's been holding up photos that of things that have happened in the u.s like for example there was she at one point she was holding up a photo of the wnba all-star game when they you know were wearing her number and my mind starts churning about like why was she given these photos like what is the manipulations that's

supposed to be happening with me right now because what my emotional reaction to it was wow britney is in a rush in jail but she's seeing that the u.s still cares about her but then somebody in russia gave her that photo so like what when i don't know how much you have like thought about this like why are they giving her i mean it's essentially kind of propaganda like what's the purpose of that no it's it's it's a fascinating thing um when she gets that those are printouts that her lawyers in russia give her um she has a legal team there that is from everyone i've spoken to as good a team as you can have frankly they work for her not for the government and of course there are limitations to them you know to what they can do because of the system and the fact they have to live there but early on i think one of the first times she was brought out for a hearing her people over here saw that she was

able to carry something with her and recognize that as a potential way for her to send a message home and so that's really what she's doing it's sort of a shout out to people here hey i know you're there um you know particular her wife sherelle you know she was she's got information she's gotten letters from people that her lawyers are able to bring to her it's all it's all heavily monitored and she was able to she's been able to write notes back which has been a big deal to them to my understanding she's still not been able to speak to anybody and then of course there was a letter that she wrote that was delivered to president biden on july 4th she sent through her lawyers and then was was delivered here so that that's really been her way of sending a message home saying you know i'm i'm okay i'm thinking about you i know about the support it's just really hard because like you said everything's monitored everything has to

be greenlit by somebody with more nefarious motives than her lawyers so you're constantly thinking well why did they let her write a letter to president biden what and and i guess at that point you just assumed that they wanted to stay in the media to some degree they want to continue to have her value be high i mean i just assume that these are the reasons why anything at all is allowed i think that's exactly right it's it's all those things the more we talk about it over here the more pressure there is on the white house to make a deal that russia's happy with um if this was all really quiet the biden white house could be as patient as it wanted to be uh i mean again i'm not saying they're they're trying to slow roll it at all but just they have in mind what they think is reasonable and what isn't um the more pressure there is the more likelihood that the president picks up the phone and says get this done so

russia has the same motivation that they do uh that that supporters of brittany griner do create pressure on the white house to make a deal earlier you talked about how at least to this point what's happening with brittany grener has not been directly entangled with what's happening with the incursion in ukraine just it was just announced that the us's agreed sent three billion dollars worth of arms to the ukraine how does that impact brittany's situation i mean the the short honest answer is i don't know um the the people i've talked to have said that they recognize that any one particular you know step by the u.s could lead to russia responding saying you know that's it the deal's off um and they also recognize that russia may just decide to milk it a little longer for whatever motivation somebody might have um it's that the potential is there to make it more complicated the people i've spoken to have said that

so far the conversations have really been on a separate channel um which to them was a relief now again there may be other requests and i'm not saying no one has suggested this is the case just talking to people they've said these are possible things that russia could ask for some oligarch wants his yacht back somebody wants the property that was seasoned london back somebody wants to get their kid into an american schools who knows right um you know but those are the kinds of things we don't know about um and so the u.s is just sort of at this place where you proceed as best you can understanding that you're not dealing with somebody who deals in good faith wow yeah just that i mean you know you see these things on tv or in shows where it's like the shadowy world of how so and so got into this school and this and you know and now you're seeing it kind of not that we're seeing it intimately but you're kind of

getting the bird's eye view of how this actually plays out tj before we let you go just back to that the journalism piece of this what have you learned as an investigative journalist throughout this process oh man um that is a really interesting question i mean it's been kind of fascinating like i've been at this for a while right i've done you know i've been in journalism for 30 years i've done investigative reporting for 20. um you know it's it's weird to have a party involved in the story that you just have zero access to i cannot make open records requests or freedom of information act requests for russian documents um there is no freedom of information act in russia i can't go over there and knock on doors um i can't reach out to people so you have to i think it's been a reminder about remembering i may have my own personal feelings about brittany griner and whether or not you know she should come home but they

have nothing to do with my job and i have to remind myself that i'm not an advocate um i'm not a participant i am an observer my job is to tell this story as accurately as possible to bear in mind constantly that i don't know what i don't know if anything it's been another great lesson in humility i need to know that just because i did one story four years ago in russia i am not an expert um i need to know that just because one expert returns my phone calls it doesn't mean he or she is a final authority on that topic you know you have to really kind of keep that professional distance but at the same time you know to me what's been crucial is so much of what's wrong with the press in this country right now is the inability to to call something for what it is um there's an express you know in our country there's a journalism tradition of saying if your mother says she loves you check it out there's an

expression that i've come to like even more that i think is british um somebody attributed to some editor if one person says it's raining and one person says it's not my job isn't to write what both said it's to open the effing window and look for myself and this is a case where the media in this country need to understand sometimes you just have to open the effing window and look yourself and that's you can talk about the way russia operates and not be an agent of the us government you can talk about the way russia operates and not uh you know not be anti-russian it's simply calling calling something for what it is tj quinn thank you so much for joining us anytime guys thanks for having me

too

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "Local Hour: Meadowlarkers 43 "Brittney Griner" 💥 The Dan Le Batard Show 2022"?

Dan Le Batard (Host), Stugotz (Host), T.J. Quinn (Guest), Amin Elhassan (Guest).

What is "Local Hour: Meadowlarkers 43 "Brittney Griner" 💥 The Dan Le Batard Show 2022" about?

The main topic centers on the ongoing investigation into Brittney Griner's situation, highlighting the efforts of ESPN investigative reporter T.J. Quinn to provide thorough coverage of the story. Key points include the importance of sustained media attention to Griner's case and the unique challenges reporters face when reporting on such sensitive situations.

What is mentioned in this The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz episode?

9 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Brittany Griner, T.J. Quinn, Paul Whelan, Victor Boot, ESPN, Donald Trump. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "Local Hour: Meadowlarkers 43 "Brittney Griner" 💥 The Dan Le Batard Show 2022"?

The episode runs 46 min; the transcript is about 8,393 words in 49 timestamped sections.

More from The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated January 24, 2026.