E63: Insurrection indictments, human rights in the US and abroad, groundbreaking MS study and more

The prediction described the 2022 midterms as a coming Republican landslide in which Democrats would be “slaughtered” if they kept emphasizing January 6. That outcome did not occur.

Key results:

• U.S. House: Republicans did gain the House, but only narrowly: 222 Republican seats to 213 Democratic seats, a net GOP pickup of 9. Historical midterms commonly see much larger losses for the president’s party, and analysts characterized 2022 as much closer than expected, not a blowout. (en.wikipedia.org)
• U.S. Senate: Democrats not only held the Senate, they gained one seat (net +1, including flipping Pennsylvania), ending with effective control of 51–49. This is the opposite of a Democratic “slaughter.” (en.wikipedia.org)
• Governors and state races: Democrats made a net gain of two governorships and flipped several state legislative chambers, again inconsistent with a nationwide Republican landslide. (en.wikipedia.org)

Across outlets and post‑election analysis, the consensus was that the much‑touted “red wave” or “landslide” did not materialize; instead, Democrats outperformed historical midterm expectations and many pre‑election forecasts. Even Republican and right‑leaning commentators repeatedly noted that the “red wave” failed to happen. (en.wikipedia.org)

Because the actual results were mixed and relatively close—rather than a decisive Republican landslide in which Democrats were “slaughtered”—this prediction is best judged as wrong, regardless of how one interprets the conditional about Democratic messaging on January 6.

The prediction was that the November 2022 U.S. midterm elections would see a landslide “red wave” for Republicans, with even larger GOP gains if Democrats continued to focus on January 6th instead of economic/bread-and-butter issues.

What actually happened in the 2022 midterms:

• U.S. House: Republicans did gain a majority, but only narrowly. They flipped the House with a net gain of about 9 seats (from 212 to 221), far short of the dozens of seats typical of a “wave” or “landslide” election.
• U.S. Senate: Democrats improved their position. They gained a seat overall (winning Pennsylvania while losing no other Democratic-held seats), moving from 50–50 to 51–49 in their favor. This is the opposite of a large GOP surge.
• Governorships and state races: Results were mixed, not a GOP landslide. Democrats flipped several governorships (e.g., in Arizona and Maryland), and performed strongly in many key state-level contests.
• Post-election analysis: Across major U.S. outlets and election analysts, the consensus description was that the expected “red wave” did not materialize, with Republicans underperforming historical midterm patterns despite economic concerns and an unpopular incumbent president.

Because the prediction was for a landslide / even bigger red wave, and the actual results were modest GOP gains in the House, Democratic gains in the Senate, and mixed outcomes elsewhere—widely characterized as a disappointing result for Republicans—the prediction did not come true.

The prediction tied continued Democratic/MSNBC focus on January 6th to an "even bigger" Republican red wave in the November 2022 midterms. In reality, the widely anticipated red wave did not materialize:

• Republicans captured the U.S. House of Representatives but only with a very narrow majority (222–213), far smaller than typical midterm wave elections and below many pre‑election expectations.
• Democrats held the U.S. Senate and even gained a seat (moving from 50–50 with the vice president breaking ties to 51–49 after the 2022 elections), which is inconsistent with a large opposition-wave outcome.
• Post‑election analyses in major outlets broadly concluded that the expected Republican “red wave” failed to appear, stressing the underperformance of GOP candidates relative to historical midterm patterns and polling expectations.

Since the core, testable part of the prediction was that the 2022 midterms would bring an especially large Republican wave, and the eventual outcome was at best a modest Republican advantage in the House and a net Democratic gain in the Senate, the prediction is wrong.

The prediction was that a reform/clarification of the U.S. Electoral Count Act could pass the Senate in the 2021–2023 Congress with at least 60 votes if pursued, i.e., that such a bill could attract substantial bipartisan support.

In reality, during the 117th Congress, the Electoral Count Reform and Presidential Transition Improvement Act of 2022—which specifically reforms and clarifies the 1887 Electoral Count Act—was introduced on a bipartisan basis and folded into the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023. It passed the Senate on December 22, 2022, by a 68–29 vote, well above the 60‑vote threshold, and was signed into law by President Biden on December 29, 2022. (en.wikipedia.org)

Since a substantive Electoral Count Act reform did in fact receive 60+ votes in the Senate within that Congress, the core feasibility claim in the prediction—that such a reform could get 60 votes—was borne out by subsequent events. The counterfactual element about Biden “prioritizing” it is not directly testable, but the observed outcome confirms that the vote count threshold was realistically achievable, so the prediction is best classified as right.

In the 117th Congress (Jan 2021–Jan 2023), several bills were introduced to ban or sharply restrict stock trading by members of Congress, but none received a floor vote in either chamber, so we never observe whether they would have drawn a “huge bipartisan majority.”

Key facts:

• Senator Jon Ossoff introduced the Ban Congressional Stock Trading Act (S.3494) on January 12, 2022. It was referred to the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and never moved beyond committee; tracking sites describe it as a partisan Democratic bill with Democratic-only cosponsors. (congress.gov)
• Senator Elizabeth Warren and Senator Steve Daines co‑sponsored the Bipartisan Ban on Congressional Stock Ownership Act of 2022 (S.3631) with both Republican and Democratic cosponsors. The bill received a hearing but remained at “Introduced” status and did not receive a Senate floor vote. (congress.gov)
• A House companion, H.R. 6678, also titled the Bipartisan Ban on Congressional Stock Ownership Act of 2022, likewise had cosponsors from both parties but was referred to committees and never brought to a House floor vote. (congress.gov)
• Contemporary ethics analyses note that over half of members of Congress owned individual stocks and many engaged in significant trading, with dozens violating the STOCK Act’s disclosure rules during the 117th Congress, indicating that many members had personal financial exposure to such a ban. (campaignlegal.org) That context makes strong resistance plausible, but it still doesn’t tell us definitively how a full roll‑call vote would have gone.

Because no comprehensive ban or severe restriction on congressional stock trading came to an actual up‑or‑down vote in the 117th Congress, we have no empirical record of whether it would have obtained a “huge bipartisan majority.” The existence of a few bipartisan bills with relatively modest numbers of cosponsors suggests some cross‑party support but does not establish overwhelming, chamber‑wide backing. Therefore, the prediction that such a bill would get a huge bipartisan majority in that specific Congress remains a counterfactual that cannot be verified or falsified from the available legislative record, making the outcome ambiguous rather than clearly right or wrong.

Evidence shows that the core, falsifiable part of Chamath’s prediction came true:

• In the 2022 U.S. midterm elections, Republicans won a narrow House majority, 222–212 over Democrats, ending Democratic control of the chamber. ​citeturn1search1turn1search12
• On November 17, 2022, after it became clear Democrats had lost the House, Nancy Pelosi announced she would step down from her leadership role and would not seek reelection as House Democratic leader in the next Congress, explicitly marking the end of her speakership once the new Congress began in January 2023. ​citeturn0search1turn0search4turn0search5
• In January 2023, when the 118th Congress convened, Republican Kevin McCarthy was elected Speaker of the House after multiple ballots, confirming that Pelosi had indeed lost the speakership and her position as the top power in the House. ​citeturn1search0turn1search12turn1search17

Chamath’s additional, more speculative rationale (that this would give President Biden political room to oppose Pelosi on issues like an insider-trading ban) is harder to test cleanly, but the concrete prediction about Pelosi losing her position of power after the 2022 elections was fulfilled. Therefore the prediction is right regarding its main outcome (Democrats losing the House majority and Pelosi ceasing to be Speaker).

Evidence points in two different directions:

1. Agencies did use January 6 as a justification to seek more power and resources.

• The Biden administration’s National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism (June 2021) was explicitly “galvanized” by the January 6 attack and frames domestic extremism—especially white supremacist and anti‑government extremists—as the country’s most urgent terrorism threat, calling for enhanced analysis and information‑sharing across agencies. (csis.org)
• DHS responded by expanding its monitoring of online activity and creating a new domestic‑terrorism intelligence branch to track platforms and “narratives known to provoke violence,” steps civil‑liberties groups describe as expanded surveillance after January 6. (theguardian.com)
• DOJ’s National Security Division announced a new domestic‑terrorism unit in a January 2022 Senate hearing titled “The Domestic Terrorism Threat One Year After Jan. 6,” focused on racially/ethnically motivated and anti‑government/anti‑authority extremists—again, explicitly tied to the Capitol attack. (congress.gov)
• In Congress, the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act of 2022 (DTPA), introduced shortly after January 6 and passed by the House, would have authorized dedicated domestic‑terrorism offices within DHS, DOJ, and FBI to monitor, analyze, investigate, and prosecute domestic terrorism. It advanced politically in direct response to domestic extremism concerns, including January 6. (en.wikipedia.org) Civil‑liberties organizations warned lawmakers not to use the Capitol assault as a pretext to expand surveillance authorities or create a new “domestic terrorism” crime. (brennancenter.org) All of this supports the “used the hysteria to demand more powers” part of the prediction.

2. But major new statutory surveillance/charging powers were not actually enacted.

• The DTPA failed in the Senate; it never became law, so the new domestic‑terrorism offices and explicit monitoring/analysis mandates it contained were not codified as additional authorities. (cbsnews.com)
• Congressional and CRS analyses note that, even after January 6, there is still no standalone federal domestic‑terrorism offense; the FBI and DOJ charge domestic extremists (including January 6 defendants) under existing criminal statutes rather than any new domestic‑terrorism law. (everycrsreport.com) This contrasts with the post‑9/11 period, when Congress enacted sweeping new surveillance and terrorism authorities.
• Civil‑rights coalitions repeatedly urged Congress not to expand surveillance powers in response to January 6, explicitly warning against using the attack as justification for broader domestic‑terrorism authorities. Their lobbying, combined with Senate opposition, helped prevent major new statutory powers from passing. (brennancenter.org)

How this maps to the prediction:

• The prediction (normalized) has two key elements: (a) use public/political hysteria around January 6 to justify demands for expanded law‑enforcement/surveillance powers, and (b) obtain such expanded powers over U.S. citizens.
• Element (a) is well supported: January 6 is repeatedly invoked in official strategies, hearings, and proposed legislation as the central rationale for more domestic‑terrorism focus, new units, and broader online monitoring.
• Element (b) is only partially true: agencies have expanded programs, reoriented resources, and built new analytic/surveillance units under existing law, but there has been no major, clearly new statutory grant of surveillance or domestic‑terrorism authority akin to the post‑9/11 Patriot Act. The biggest legislative vehicle (DTPA) failed.

Because the prediction ties those two parts together—asserting both that hysteria would be exploited and that this would lead to actually obtaining expanded powers over citizens—the outcome is mixed. Agencies clearly used January 6 to push for more authority and infrastructure, and they did expand some practices within existing law, but they have not secured the kind of sweeping new legal surveillance powers the wording implies.

Given that tension, the fairest overall judgment is ambiguous rather than clearly right or clearly wrong.

Evidence since early 2022 shows that some parts of the prediction happened (EBV‑targeted MS trials did expand), but the key elements Friedberg described did not.

1. What the prediction implied

   • On the pod, Friedberg talks specifically about giving people a T‑cell therapy to eliminate EBV so they can stop all future need for MS treatment, and says “that’s the clinical trials that will start now.” The normalized version summarizes this as new EBV‑targeted trials in MS, including T‑cell therapies, to see if clearing/suppressing EBV removes the need for ongoing MS drugs.

2. EBV‑specific T‑cell therapy in MS was already in trials before 2022

   • Autologous EBV‑specific T‑cell therapy in progressive MS was reported in small phase I studies years earlier (e.g., Khanna group), showing safety and some sustained clinical improvements. (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)
   • Atara’s allogeneic EBV‑specific T‑cell product ATA188 and its Phase 2 EMBOLD trial in progressive MS began well before 2022 (the EMBOLD study launched in 2017 and was already enrolling and analyzing data by 2021–early 2022). (multiplesclerosisnewstoday.com)
   • In November 2023, Atara announced EMBOLD failed its primary endpoint and indicated it anticipated stopping the study, rather than expanding into new T‑cell trials. (neurologylive.com)
   • I find no evidence of any new EBV‑specific T‑cell clinical trial in MS being initiated after the January 2022 EBV–MS paper; existing T‑cell programs either pre‑dated the paper or are still at preclinical/"intention to study" stage (e.g., Tevogen Bio’s 2022 announcement of plans to develop EBV‑specific CD8+ T cells for MS, without a registered MS trial). (tevogen.com)

3. What did start after 2022: antivirals and vaccines, not new T‑cell trials

   • Several new EBV‑targeted trials in MS have been initiated or registered since 2023–2025, but they use antivirals or vaccines, not T‑cell therapies:
     • STOP‑MS: a Phase III multi‑arm, multi‑stage trial in progressive MS testing repurposed antivirals spironolactone and famciclovir as anti‑EBV therapies, explicitly designed to reduce EBV activity and then test impact on disability progression. It is listed as recruiting as of mid‑2025. (mstrials.org.au)
     • FIRMS‑EBV: a Phase 3 trial in relapsing‑remitting MS testing tenofovir alafenamide vs spironolactone vs placebo for fatigue, specifically targeting lytic EBV; prospectively registered in April 2024 with recruitment planned for 2025. (anzctr.org.au)
     • Horizon trial (Moderna): a Phase 2 trial in recently diagnosed MS patients using an EBV vaccine to modulate EBV and assess effects on new MS disease activity/relapses; recruiting in the UK. (annerowlingclinic.org)
   • These clearly show that the 2022 Science paper strengthening EBV–MS causality was followed by new EBV‑targeted MS trials, but they are not new T‑cell therapy trials.

4. Trials are not testing “eliminate MS treatment” the way he described

   • In FIRMS‑EBV, both antivirals are explicitly given as an add‑on to participants’ usual disease‑modifying therapies (DMTs), which they continue taking as prescribed; the endpoint is improvement in fatigue, not withdrawal of MS drugs. (anzctr.org.au)
   • STOP‑MS similarly adds antivirals on top of standard care to see if reducing EBV activity slows progressive disability; its design does not center on stopping all other MS treatment. (mstrials.org.au)
   • The Horizon vaccine trial tests whether vaccination against EBV reduces new MS disease activity, again as an additional intervention rather than a protocolized replacement for existing MS therapies. (annerowlingclinic.org)
   • No current EBV‑targeted trial in MS is designed around the scenario Friedberg sketched—clearing EBV with T‑cell therapy and then discontinuing all MS medications to see if they’re no longer needed.

5. Why this makes the prediction wrong overall

   • The core, differentiating part of Friedberg’s prediction is that new clinical trials of EBV‑targeted T‑cell therapies in MS would start soon after the EBV–MS causality paper, specifically to test whether clearing EBV could let patients stop MS drugs.
   • What we actually see by late 2025 is:
     • New EBV‑focused MS trials with antivirals and vaccines, yes.
     • No new EBV‑specific T‑cell MS trials launched in this period; existing T‑cell trial programs were already underway and one major program (ATA188) is being wound down after a negative Phase 2 result. (neurologylive.com)
     • None of the new EBV‑targeted trials are structured to test discontinuation of all other MS therapy.
   • Nearly four years have passed since the January 2022 paper, so this is not a "too early to tell" issue; the clinical development path has clearly favored antivirals/vaccines rather than new T‑cell trials in MS.

Because the specific forecast about new T‑cell therapy trials starting to test whether clearing EBV can replace ongoing MS treatment has not materialized, even though broader EBV‑targeted MS trials have, the prediction is best classified as wrong overall.

Evidence since early 2022 shows a clear increase in both public and private investment into EBV‑related vaccines and therapeutics, often explicitly motivated by the new epidemiological data linking EBV to MS.

Key points:

• Baseline was very low: When NIH launched its gp350–ferritin EBV vaccine Phase 1 trial in May 2022, it described it as “one of only two studies to test an investigational EBV vaccine in more than a decade,” highlighting how little investment there had been historically in EBV vaccines. (niaid.nih.gov)

• Big pharma and biotech have since entered or expanded the space:

  • In March 2023 Merck paid $50M upfront (plus up to $872.5M in milestones) for ModeX’s EBV vaccine rights, in an article that directly notes that a paper published the prior year showed EBV infection greatly increases MS risk—clearly tying the deal rationale to the recent EBV–MS epidemiology. (fiercebiotech.com)
  • The Merck/ModeX candidate then moved into Phase 1 in 2025 with milestone payments to ModeX, further reflecting substantial ongoing investment. (biospace.com)
  • Multiple new vaccine players appeared post‑2022, including EBViously (a Helmholtz Munich spin‑off developing EBV‑001, with first‑in‑human trials planned from 2024) (multiplesclerosisnewstoday.com) and SpyBiotech’s 2024 sponsored research collaboration with the University of Oxford to develop three EBV vaccine candidates through Phase 1, justified in part by EBV’s links to cancers and MS and citing recent EBV–MS work. (spybiotech.com)

• Public and non‑profit funding into EBV–MS mechanisms has ramped up:

  • NIH’s February 2022 summary of the Bjornevik et al. Science paper on EBV and MS explicitly frames EBV vaccines as a way to prevent MS, signalling federal priority for EBV‑targeted prevention work. (nih.gov)
  • In 2023 Australia’s Medical Research Future Fund awarded a AU$2M grant for a 5‑year nationwide study on how EBV increases MS risk, explicitly citing the ~32‑fold increased MS risk after EBV infection from the new epidemiological data. (monashhealth.org)
  • A 2023 EU‑funded initiative announced by the European Multiple Sclerosis Platform focuses on “targeting Epstein‑Barr virus to treat and prevent MS” and describes itself as building on the recent breakthrough evidence implicating EBV as the MS trigger, with goals that include testing antiviral approaches. (emsp.org)
  • NexImmune’s 2022 collaboration with NINDS/NIH to develop EBV‑targeted cell therapies for neurological immune diseases (including MS‑related mechanisms) reflects further public‑private spending directly on EBV therapeutics in this context. (multiplesclerosisnewstoday.com)

• Scientific reviews post‑2022 explicitly argue for EBV‑targeted drugs and vaccines for MS: Major reviews in 2023 describe the 2022 longitudinal data as compelling evidence that EBV is a leading cause of MS and explicitly call for antivirals, EBV‑specific immunotherapies, and vaccines as rational treatment and prevention strategies, reinforcing why funders and companies are now backing EBV programs. (scholars.mssm.edu)

Taken together, the field moved from almost no active EBV vaccine trials and a relatively small number of EBV‑targeted programs before 2022 to: multiple big‑pharma deals, several new vaccine pipelines (Moderna, NIH, Merck/ModeX, EBViously, SpyBiotech/Oxford), and new multi‑million‑dollar public grants and EU initiatives explicitly tied to the recent EBV–MS epidemiological breakthroughs. That constitutes exactly the “noticeable increase in investment into EBV‑related therapeutics and vaccines over the subsequent few years” that Friedberg predicted, so the prediction is best assessed as right.