Speaker 1: How do you process this moment thirty four days out
Speaker 1: as Trump appears before the national media and basically says, well,
Speaker 1: I got you tamed. They all nod back at him,
Speaker 1: and you got to keep being nice. Gotta be nice,
Speaker 1: nice to Trump? How do you assess the strategic landscape politically?
Speaker 2: I think the question is the right one because one
Speaker 2: of my great mentors is a guy named lescal who
Speaker 2: ran the Council on Form Relations, and he used to say,
Speaker 2: strategy is hard.
Speaker 3: Most people can't do strategy. And I think what you
Speaker 3: see right.
Speaker 2: Now is a landscape that looks like an evolving battlefield, right.
Speaker 2: And you've got a force that's on the offensive and
Speaker 2: is taking ground and got momentum and got energy, and
Speaker 2: you've got a fragment to disorganize, demoralized opposition and series
Speaker 2: of oppositions. And I think for me, I go back
Speaker 2: to being a dad, right, And when I send my
Speaker 2: boys off to school, we have little sayings every day.
Speaker 2: I got two little boys, they're nine and five, and
Speaker 2: we say strong of body, strong of heart, strong of mind, right,
Speaker 2: And that's how I kind of steal them to think
Speaker 2: about how they can be empowered to take on whatever
Speaker 2: is gonna come at their day and I make the
Speaker 2: brothers look at each other, tell them they love them,
Speaker 2: and they go in together. Right, And every day they're
Speaker 2: going into the unknown in New York City public school.
Speaker 2: But when my nine year old was a kindergartener, he
Speaker 2: was going into COVID with a mask and a temperature
Speaker 2: check and I couldn't even go in the room.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: So I kind of bring it all back to that, Steve,
Speaker 2: because I think the most important thing for people, especially Democrats,
Speaker 2: to understand is it's on. It's been on for years
Speaker 2: and now it's fully unfolding. And for these folks that
Speaker 2: are licking their wounds or they're you know, doing with
Speaker 2: what Democrats love to do, which is like a lot
Speaker 2: of listening sessions and roundtables.
Speaker 3: Trump is pushing his advantage very aggressively right now.
Speaker 2: He's not taking Christmas off to handout presents to his grandkids, and.
Speaker 3: He's going to try to run up the score.
Speaker 2: So what's lacking is a strategy to oppose him, right,
Speaker 2: And I think what's also lacking is.
Speaker 3: A strategic leader.
Speaker 2: There is no Churchill, there is no FDR, and no
Speaker 2: one has yet emerged to be that person.
Speaker 3: For the Democrats or for America.
Speaker 2: And I've been talking to folks as I'm sure you have,
Speaker 2: who are trying to figure out what to do next
Speaker 2: to get my read and I say, look, part of
Speaker 2: it is about betting on leaders, whether you're betting on
Speaker 2: Steve Schmidt or you're betting on AOC, or you're betting
Speaker 2: on Dan Osborne who ran as an independent for Senate
Speaker 2: in Nebraska and almost one. It's not a time where
Speaker 2: the existing organizations are nimble, dynamic, or even capable enough
Speaker 2: to respond to this threat.
Speaker 3: And I view it as a threat.
Speaker 2: I still view it as a national security threat more
Speaker 2: than anything else. And the Trump movement now is very
Speaker 2: close to having the keys to the entire castle. But
Speaker 2: none of it is normal. None of it is and
Speaker 2: none of it is inevitable.
Speaker 3: And what we're.
Speaker 2: Lacking because we don't have strategic leaders, and we don't
Speaker 2: have a national strategy or even enclaves of strategies to
Speaker 2: oppose him, is we're lacking priorities, so people don't know
Speaker 2: where to focus. And that's to Trump's advantage. He wants
Speaker 2: to overwhelm the zone.
Speaker 3: He throws.
Speaker 2: Hegseth at you right after Gates and here comes Tulca
Speaker 2: Gabbard and RFK Junior, and nobody's even paying attention to
Speaker 2: the fact that he nominated a guy for Secretary of
Speaker 2: the Navy who's never served in the Navy, or that
Speaker 2: he's got a very radical pick at the Department of
Speaker 2: Veterans Affairs that's way below the radar and getting no
Speaker 2: coverage or even oversight. So that the strategy is to
Speaker 2: overwhelm the country, overwhelm the press, overwhelm the government, and
Speaker 2: get as much ground as he can so that the
Speaker 2: midterms become irrelevant. Right people are stacking their chips for
Speaker 2: the midterms or for four years from now. I'm saying
Speaker 2: it's about the next thirty five days, and right now,
Speaker 2: I think the most urgent priority is heagset because he
Speaker 2: is the biggest move at the biggest agency in the
Speaker 2: federal government.
Speaker 3: He's not inevitable.
Speaker 2: We saw that with Gates, and I think Hegseth is
Speaker 2: the same situation. But if you're Trump and you're going
Speaker 2: for your breaking into the house, okay, whether it was
Speaker 2: your house or someone else's house, the first thing you
Speaker 2: go for is the gun closet. You go for the
Speaker 2: gun closet because it's the most dangerous, it's the most valuable,
Speaker 2: it's got all the symbolic reasons, right, and he knows
Speaker 2: that the Pentagon stopped him last time, so he's taken
Speaker 2: a long shot.
Speaker 3: He's picking the most political, the.
Speaker 2: Most extreme, the most not just unqualified but disqualified person
Speaker 2: to take over the largest federal agency in the government,
Speaker 2: not just because it has and the most significant, not
Speaker 2: just because it has two point seven million employees and
Speaker 2: a seven hundred billion dollar budget, but because it's the
Speaker 2: most powerful thing that stopped him last time. Right, So,
Speaker 2: if you want to talk about things like federalizing the
Speaker 2: National Guard to rip migrant kids out of schools, if
Speaker 2: you want to talk about owning the military leadership so
Speaker 2: they don't oppose you, when you want to do any
Speaker 2: number of crazy things, the first thing you do is
Speaker 2: hit the Pentagon. And that's what he's doing. Pete Hegseth
Speaker 2: is like a political nuke strike. And if he goes through,
Speaker 2: which I don't think is gonna happen, everything else is.
Speaker 3: Easy, right, va is cake education no problem.
Speaker 2: You can even you know, even if he does go down,
Speaker 2: you can put up somebody like DeSantis and he sails through.
Speaker 2: So I really think it's important that people understand that
Speaker 2: Pete Hegseth was built for this moment. He was built
Speaker 2: as a culture warrior, funded by the Koch Brothers, empowered
Speaker 2: with a spot on Fox News, and we never thought
Speaker 2: that he would actually get nominated because we knew his
Speaker 2: personal life was messy. I figured he was going to
Speaker 2: be cheap of staff or maybe press secretary.
Speaker 3: But Trump is literally saying, and he's saying you, He's
Speaker 3: I'm gonna roll you. I'm gonna put this guy up.
Speaker 2: And he is a culture warrior, and he's got, you know,
Speaker 2: tattoos that might be associated white nationalism, and he's got
Speaker 2: three divorces, and he's openly talked about, you know, having
Speaker 2: sex with other people's wives. I mean, this is all
Speaker 2: out in the open. And if he can get heag
Speaker 2: set through, then the Democrats are going to just get rolled.
Speaker 2: And I really think that's why, you know, I continue
Speaker 2: to bring focus towards strategic leaders that aren't political, someone
Speaker 2: like Admiral Straviti's or maybe it's a retired Chairman of
Speaker 2: the Joint Chiefs like Mike Mullen.
Speaker 3: Maybe someone else will emerge. I don't have an answer
Speaker 3: for you.
Speaker 2: But I do think that independent Americans, especially people who
Speaker 2: do put country first, people who took off the uniform,
Speaker 2: especially veterans who want to continue to serve but don't
Speaker 2: necessarily want to get in politics. This is a time
Speaker 2: for true patriots to step up and defend our values.
Speaker 2: Whether you're a school teacher that has to represent yourself
Speaker 2: at the school board, or you're somebody who's been thinking
Speaker 2: about running for Senate, you know, maybe this is your time.
Speaker 2: But at the end of the day, he wants to
Speaker 2: roll everybody. And I think that's the most important point
Speaker 2: about December twenty twenty four going into January, is he
Speaker 2: wants to come out with a.
Speaker 3: Head of steam. This is like a blitzkree. He's putting
Speaker 3: it all up front.
Speaker 2: He wants to push it through because once he gets
Speaker 2: the keys to not just the gun closet at the
Speaker 2: kitchen and the security system and everything else, then everything
Speaker 2: else becomes easier. So I think it's really important that
Speaker 2: you lay out that landscape where we can't count on
Speaker 2: the Democrats. I've never been been counting on the Democrats.
Speaker 2: I don't think you have either, But I think it's
Speaker 2: kind of a wake up moment for America to go, hey,
Speaker 2: they're not going to fucking save you here, and we
Speaker 2: have to look to other leaders and other structures and
Speaker 2: other tactics and to have a strategy on a very
Speaker 2: basic level to defend our values, defend our constitution.
Speaker 3: And let's start with defending our.
Speaker 2: Military from a guy who says he doesn't want women
Speaker 2: in combat when we've got two hundred thousand women in
Speaker 2: combat and.
Speaker 3: Has all this other shit.
Speaker 2: Let's start with focusing on Pete hagg Seth and not
Speaker 2: all the other shiny stuff, because this is a very
Speaker 2: important fight, and it's the fight that is right in
Speaker 2: front of us, and we'll dictate I think the pace
Speaker 2: for everything else for years to come.
Speaker 3: I want to talk about Pete Hagsath. That was a
Speaker 3: lot to throw at you when we start.
Speaker 1: No, no, indeed, and I agree, I agree, I agree
Speaker 1: with you. Obviously, he is unfit at such a profound
Speaker 1: and deep level. It's tough to find the words. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna do my best as we get, as we get,
Speaker 1: as we get into it. But but I want to
Speaker 1: I want to play Devil's advocate to you about something
Speaker 1: that I think is fundamental that we we got to
Speaker 1: put on the table and talk about more in the country,
Speaker 1: which is an honest reckoning about how we have arrived
Speaker 1: at this situation. In the military, as you as you know,
Speaker 1: after every action there's gonna be an after action review. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's important to have an appreciation right of how it
Speaker 1: is they arrived at whatever situation one finds oneself in
Speaker 1: in order to get out of it, right and and
Speaker 1: and so in that sense, let me ask you a
Speaker 1: couple a couple things. Is it possible that Pete Hegseth
Speaker 1: could be worse in that position than Donald Rumsfeld and
Speaker 1: Robert McNamara were.
Speaker 2: Thousand percent yes, okay, absolutely, totally and completely. How because
Speaker 2: on a very basic level you may have disagreed with
Speaker 2: McNamara or Rumsfeld on policy right like whether.
Speaker 3: To bomb Cambodia, whether to stay in Iraq.
Speaker 2: This is compromising the entire integrity of the establishment. It's
Speaker 2: it's making it a political wing of Trump's agenda. And
Speaker 2: I think that's why this is very important, right because
Speaker 2: everything that Trump wants to get done on everything from
Speaker 2: migrants to banning trans people, right the entire spectrum of
Speaker 2: his agenda will start with Pete Hegseth at the Pentagon. Right,
Speaker 2: So let's use an example that that is maybe you know,
Speaker 2: maybe not a great one, but maybe like trans people's rights.
Speaker 2: Right day one, at the Pentagon, they flip the switch,
Speaker 2: there's a trans band. Anybody who's trans gets pulled out
Speaker 2: of a unit, you get kicked out of the military,
Speaker 2: you get processed out, and we start there.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: It is going to be easier at the Pentagon than
Speaker 2: the Department of Justice or the Department.
Speaker 3: Of Labor, or at education or at home.
Speaker 2: The Depentagon is going to be the fulcrum for everything
Speaker 2: because it will be present presented as a position on
Speaker 2: national security. If we don't do this, the Chinese will
Speaker 2: have an advantage. If we don't do this, our enemies
Speaker 2: will be at an advantage. Right, And that's going to
Speaker 2: be true for trans bands, that's going to be true
Speaker 2: for activating the national card.
Speaker 1: I want to say that as a political argument, Okay,
Speaker 1: if you lead with we have to protect national security
Speaker 1: by opposing Trump's trans band on day one, right, this
Speaker 1: is this is the first thing we're running at.
Speaker 2: I'm using that as an example because it's because it's
Speaker 2: the easiest one for him, right, and it's what he
Speaker 2: ran on, right, it's what he ran on, it's what
Speaker 2: he weaponized, it's what he used as as kind of
Speaker 2: a boogeyman.
Speaker 1: Right to me, Right, you Trump is going to impose
Speaker 1: a ban on all transgender service members. They're going to
Speaker 1: be honorably discharged. And there's nothing not honorably not anybody
Speaker 1: can do to stop that. Well, they'll be generally generally discharged.
Speaker 2: They'll probably be dishonorably discharge or at least general discharge.
Speaker 2: They probably won't get benefits. And this is why it's important,
Speaker 2: right because in some ways you could argue that trans
Speaker 2: people are the most vulnerable, or the weakest or the
Speaker 2: most politicized. Right, so you you start with them, right,
Speaker 2: And so when you want to do something like take
Speaker 2: women out of combat, which which is bigger than it seems,
Speaker 2: because what it is is it's saying women are not equal. Right,
Speaker 2: women are not equally that's the bottom line. You can't
Speaker 2: do the same things that we do, and therefore you
Speaker 2: will not have this same opportunities, rights, etc. So if
Speaker 2: you succeed in achieving a lack of equality for women
Speaker 2: at depentagon, abortion rights, everything else is a downhill slide
Speaker 2: from there. So when you ask me, is he more
Speaker 2: dangerous than McNamara or Rumsfeld? You know, yes, because the
Speaker 2: agenda is much more extreme. I would argue that you
Speaker 2: could at least count on Rumsfeld on some levels to
Speaker 2: put country over party.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: He may have agreed with his allegiances or his politics,
Speaker 2: but I think on a basic level there was some
Speaker 2: kind of integrity there around the institution and the world
Speaker 2: wasn't as dangerous Steve. I mean, we've got, you know,
Speaker 2: a land war in Eastern Europe. We've got the Chinese
Speaker 2: threat of Taiwan. We've got all these other threats that
Speaker 2: are real but also in a position to be exaggerated,
Speaker 2: not just by Trump but by Hegseth, who I think
Speaker 2: too many Democrats dismissed these people. Hegseth is a masterful communicator.
Speaker 2: He is brilliant at doing this, at selling, at communicating,
Speaker 2: at motivating people. And he's a multi sport athlete who
Speaker 2: can go on Joe Rogan, but can host a show
Speaker 2: on Fox and also entangle with the reporters on Capitol
Speaker 2: Hill and spin a weakness into his strength. And that's
Speaker 2: why this is the playbook for the rest of the administration. Right,
Speaker 2: It's the same kind of skill set Tulsey Gabbert has.
Speaker 2: You could argue it's the same kind of skill set
Speaker 2: other people in the cabinet, how even like someone like
Speaker 2: a Christy Nome.
Speaker 3: But they're good on TV.
Speaker 2: They're able to communicate to people, you know, foreign and domestic, and.
Speaker 3: They're good at this. They're good at this thing. You
Speaker 3: may not like the thing, but they are very very
Speaker 3: good at it.
Speaker 2: And if you have a pete Hegsev controlling everything from
Speaker 2: our nukes to who gets to join right, that drives
Speaker 2: the culture for the entire country. So if you don't
Speaker 2: understand why Joe Rogan is important, you probably don't understand
Speaker 2: why the Pentagon's so important. And that's the parallel that
Speaker 2: I think democrats and many liberals in this country are
Speaker 2: really failing to understand.
Speaker 3: It's much bigger than about politics.
Speaker 2: It's about culture and manipulating American pagetriotism into something much
Speaker 2: more nefarious.
Speaker 1: I'm Steve Schmidt. This is the warning, and I invite
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