Speaker 1: Hey, guys, Saga and Crystal here.
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Speaker 1: Good morning, everybody. Are we up? I think we are.
Speaker 3: I'm not exactly sure in terms of what the holding
Speaker 3: screen says here, so I'm just going to talk as
Speaker 3: if we are actually live. It is the first day
Speaker 3: of the Donald Trump administration, I guess, first full day
Speaker 3: here after Donald Trump's inauguration yesterday as the forty seventh
Speaker 3: president of the United States. Later in the day, Crystal,
Speaker 3: he took to both Capital wann Arena and the Oval
Speaker 3: Off to sign hundreds of executive orders. We are expecting
Speaker 3: more executive orders later today as well as a press
Speaker 3: conference around four pm. They say that they're doing a
Speaker 3: big infrastructure project. So for those of you who've been
Speaker 3: in politics for a while, you may remember something called
Speaker 3: Infrastructure Week under Donald Trump back in two thousand and seventeen,
Speaker 3: and I guess the Infrastructure Week is back. It became
Speaker 3: a joke, but maybe it's not a joke anymore, you know,
Speaker 3: maybe it's a maybe it's officially real. But what we're
Speaker 3: going to do here is that we're doing a live
Speaker 3: stream because things are moving very quickly and our ability
Speaker 3: to be able to prepare a show would be dated.
Speaker 1: By the time that we were even able to put out.
Speaker 3: So we're going to react to some of the news
Speaker 3: from yesterday and then just generally be live with all
Speaker 3: of you. Kind of a fun new format here to
Speaker 3: just go through everything with everyone about what's coming in
Speaker 3: and obviously react to the big stories, the big actions.
Speaker 3: We do not have a White House Press secretary scheduled
Speaker 3: for today, but Trump will apparently not only be doing
Speaker 3: a Trump will not only be doing a press conference
Speaker 3: on this infrastruction thing you said, it, will be taking
Speaker 3: questions as well. So we'll hope to see if he
Speaker 3: took a lot of questions yesterday. So what do we
Speaker 3: have today?
Speaker 2: A lot of stuff And by the way, there's something weird,
Speaker 2: a little weird going on with like our monitor.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm not sure what's happening to look confused.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's why we may seem a little like where
Speaker 2: are we and what are we doing?
Speaker 4: But in any case, there are a bunch.
Speaker 2: Of executive orders to go through, a lot of drill,
Speaker 2: baby drill, a lot of immigration. So we'll break some
Speaker 2: of the highlights or low lights, depending on your perspective
Speaker 2: of those down for you. Shelby Talcott is going to
Speaker 2: join us Fantastic reporters. She's going to be taking a
Speaker 2: look at the January sixth pardons, which was quite you know,
Speaker 2: across the board, not just non violent January six offenders,
Speaker 2: but you know, people who were beating cops as well,
Speaker 2: and then there were a few that were a sentence commutations.
Speaker 2: So she's going to break that down for us. She's
Speaker 2: also going to break down for us the news about
Speaker 2: the VIK is officially out. At Doge was the first cut.
Speaker 2: Many people have made the stoke at this point, but
Speaker 2: he was the first one, yes.
Speaker 3: Because he's been banished to the hinterlands, to the provinces
Speaker 3: from the Imperial capital.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so, I mean it's interesting.
Speaker 2: There's a Politico article that suggests Elon Religious was kind
Speaker 2: of like annoyed with him even before the like saved
Speaker 2: by the Bell Boy meets World.
Speaker 4: Yes, screed, so that was the excuse to push him aside.
Speaker 2: But in case, we'll get Shelby's thoughts and what she
Speaker 2: knows about all of that. Update on the what appears
Speaker 2: increasingly to be a temporary ceasefire in Gaza. Trump weighed
Speaker 2: in on this himself and said he has little confidence
Speaker 2: that that ceasefire will be able to hold.
Speaker 4: So we'll take a look at that.
Speaker 2: We're also taking a look at the whole TikTok situation,
Speaker 2: which is interesting. We touched on it a little bit yesterday,
Speaker 2: but wanted to dive into that more because it is
Speaker 2: I mean, it says so much about Trump and Republicans
Speaker 2: and Democrats and who had a wield power in this era,
Speaker 2: et cetera. So we'll take a look at that. We're
Speaker 2: also going to take a look at these Trump and
Speaker 2: Millennia shitcoin. Some pastor who was involved in the inauguration
Speaker 2: decided to also get in on the action and drop
Speaker 2: his own meme coin.
Speaker 4: So wild thing's happening there and.
Speaker 2: A little Elon awkward gesture controversy that has the Internet
Speaker 2: and the media and all the people are talking about this.
Speaker 4: So and I will take a look.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I guess we can debate it because I'm pretty
Speaker 3: sure I know what you're gonna say.
Speaker 1: But okay, all right, I'm pretty sure I know what
Speaker 1: let's go say. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 3: I don't think there's anything that original to say about it,
Speaker 3: but yeah, so be it. I guess that's what the
Speaker 3: people want about Elon and Nazism, et cetera. So everyone
Speaker 3: get ready for a Roman salute history lesson. If that's
Speaker 3: what people want. If we're going to do it, let's
Speaker 3: do it. Let's start off with Donald Jump.
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, I apologie everybody. I just want everybody to
Speaker 1: know this. I got like four hours of sleep last night.
Speaker 3: I was out very very late, and as people know here,
Speaker 3: I'm a baby about my bedtime. Okay, I need my
Speaker 3: eight hours. And so I've got two cups of coffee
Speaker 3: and die coke here. Bear with me with the slips
Speaker 3: and everything.
Speaker 1: Just for live streaming, we can.
Speaker 4: Call Donald dump all you want.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yes, that's right. I'm going to start signding like Kyle,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 3: But anyways, let's go with Donald Trump in the Oval Office. Producers,
Speaker 3: can we please queue up the clip? Just come in
Speaker 3: my ear and tell me whenever it's ready. Trump was
Speaker 3: in the Oval Office for a long time yesterday, actually
Speaker 3: much later than he was originally scheduled to signing multiple
Speaker 3: executive orders, some of them are posturing, some of them
Speaker 3: will take effect immediately. For one of the more high
Speaker 3: profile ones as opposed to January sixth, was this.
Speaker 1: Order on birthright citizenship.
Speaker 3: So let's take a listen if we can to what
Speaker 3: happened in the Oval Office whenever he was signing that.
Speaker 4: This next order relates to the definition of birthright citizenship
Speaker 4: under the fourteenth Amendment of the United States.
Speaker 5: And that's a good one. Birthright, that's a big one.
Speaker 6: What about that one? That one life could.
Speaker 5: Be So you think we have good grounds, but you
Speaker 5: could be right. I mean, you'll.
Speaker 3: Find out.
Speaker 5: Ridiculous with the only country in the world that does
Speaker 5: this with birthright, as you know, and it's just absolutely ridiculous.
Speaker 5: But you know, we'll see. We think we have very
Speaker 5: good grasp.
Speaker 3: All right, So what we have there from Trump was
Speaker 3: one of these birthright citizenship orders.
Speaker 1: It was part of a slate of executive actions.
Speaker 3: Guys, can we go ahead and put the Trump executive
Speaker 3: orders in New York Times tear sheet please up on
Speaker 3: the screen so I can just read through a bunch
Speaker 3: of these. So, for example, one of the more important
Speaker 3: ones on the federal workforce was freezing a federal hiring.
Speaker 3: This is a resumption of a policy that was held
Speaker 3: under the first Trump administration. One of them was to
Speaker 3: grant top security clearances to the White House staff. There
Speaker 3: was also some like I said, some symbolic stuff, stripping
Speaker 3: John Bolton and a few others of their own security clearances.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all the people who signed on to that, like
Speaker 2: Hunter Biden infamous right. Oh, it has the whole marks
Speaker 2: of Russian disinformation, stripped of their security clearance.
Speaker 3: I didn't even know that those people got to keep
Speaker 3: their security clearance, which is ridiculous. Probably should terminate on
Speaker 3: your end of government service whatever. On immigration, we are
Speaker 3: going to quote bar asylum for people or newly arriving
Speaker 3: at the border, move to end birthright citizenship. That's the
Speaker 3: one that we just shows you that is going to
Speaker 3: face constitutional challenge within the hour and will quickly make
Speaker 3: its way to the United States Supreme Court.
Speaker 1: It is actually an interesting question.
Speaker 3: Because the way that the executive order is phrased is
Speaker 3: specifically trying to target people who are in the country illegally.
Speaker 3: So it gets to this question of temporary visa status
Speaker 3: and the citizenship of the people who are born in
Speaker 3: the United States from those parents.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I've talked to a bunch of different lawyers. The odds
Speaker 3: generally seem to be against Trump. It would probably have
Speaker 3: to change a constitutions like the census, you know, the census.
Speaker 3: The way we do the census is ridiculous, but it
Speaker 3: literally says in the Constitution that you have to do
Speaker 3: the census that way.
Speaker 1: Nobody seems like they want to change it. So there's
Speaker 1: that one.
Speaker 3: There is the declaring migrantcrossing along the US Mexico border
Speaker 3: to be a quote national emergency. The National emergency declaration
Speaker 3: unlocks federal funding kind of in the way that you'll
Speaker 3: do it for a hurricane or something like That could
Speaker 3: also face some constitutional challenge, but because it went through
Speaker 3: last time around, there worked its way through the courts.
Speaker 3: There's some legal precedents considering oh and then designating the
Speaker 3: cartels as foreign terrorist organization, same thing. It opens up
Speaker 3: a lot of sanctions power. And also, as he pointed
Speaker 3: out yesterday, Crystal opens up the AUMF order if they.
Speaker 1: Want to pursue that.
Speaker 3: On DEI, it was terminating DEI programs across the federal
Speaker 3: government recognizing two sex as male and female. I love
Speaker 3: the way to put this, remove protections for transgender people
Speaker 3: in federal prison tariffs. This is actually arguably the most
Speaker 3: important one here for everybody. So this is basically a
Speaker 3: confirmation of what Jeff Stein had previously reported. There is
Speaker 3: no quote day one tariff going into effect. The way
Speaker 3: they are doing this is moving it.
Speaker 1: Through the federal process for a study.
Speaker 3: So what he's effectively said is we're going to carry
Speaker 3: out a full view of the US.
Speaker 1: Industrial and manufacturing base.
Speaker 3: The reason that you have to do that is that legally,
Speaker 3: to be able to impose tariffs, you need a justification.
Speaker 3: So there's some one hundred and eighty day period where
Speaker 3: the government goes out, assesses, does a review, and based
Speaker 3: on that review, you're allowed to then declare a tariff
Speaker 3: based on a national security basis. The reason why you
Speaker 3: need to do the study is to survive legal scrutiny.
Speaker 3: So this is the beginning of the legal process to
Speaker 3: get us to tariffs, but it will not come through
Speaker 3: one hundred percent. Similarly, like this begin an investigation into
Speaker 3: trade practices and trade deficis. This is all legalistic language,
Speaker 3: but is very important for actually getting this stuff done.
Speaker 3: And then finally there were a bunch of executive orders
Speaker 3: withdrawing the US from the Paris Climate Accords, declaring a
Speaker 3: national emergency which could expedite the permitting like to get
Speaker 3: around permitting reform problems for drilling, and yeah.
Speaker 1: I think.
Speaker 3: Oh, and then the last one is TikTok, but we
Speaker 3: will get to that, so there you go.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and he also, like I said, blanket pardons, excuse
Speaker 2: me for the J six people. So we'll talk to
Speaker 2: Shelby about that as well. A couple other things. He
Speaker 2: rescinded a bunch of Biden executive orders. A couple of
Speaker 2: those that are interesting. One of them was aimed at
Speaker 2: reducing prescription drug prices for people are on Medicare and Medicaid.
Speaker 4: That was reversed by Trump.
Speaker 2: Another one that is significant that We can also talk
Speaker 2: about a little bit in the context of the latest
Speaker 2: with regards to the ceasefire is you'll remember Biden put
Speaker 2: into place in executive order allowing them to sanction extreme
Speaker 2: violent Israeli settlers. That has been applied to some roughly
Speaker 2: thirty three people.
Speaker 4: He rolled that back as well.
Speaker 2: And this is consequential right now, in particular because settlers
Speaker 2: are rampaging and rioting like crazy in the West Bank.
Speaker 2: Of course, oftentimes with the backing of the Israeli government,
Speaker 2: that has been rolled back. Two additional things just to
Speaker 2: note here and can get your take onto Sager. So
Speaker 2: Jeff Stein is reporting about the latest indications with regards
Speaker 2: to Trump and the terraff regime.
Speaker 4: So he says, takeaways from Trump's press.
Speaker 2: Or related to the things I cover, and maybe you
Speaker 2: care about twenty five percent tariffs on Mexico and Canada
Speaker 2: could start in ten days. Obviously Trump has been you know,
Speaker 2: I guess, aggressively talking to both the Canadians and the
Speaker 2: Mexican government about what that could look like. You know,
Speaker 2: if that's it across the board tariff, that is insanely consequential.
Speaker 2: It's very consequential for the auto industry. Those auto parts
Speaker 2: as part of the manufacturing process cross back and forth
Speaker 2: over the borders multiple times in the course of putting
Speaker 2: together a vehicle, so that that would be incredibly consequential
Speaker 2: in terms of building materials, in terms of oil, especially Midwest.
Speaker 2: So if there aren't exemptions. But these are all big
Speaker 2: question marks. If you know, we don't have a lot
Speaker 2: of clarity on all of this, So put that one
Speaker 2: to the side. China could be hit with major tariffs
Speaker 2: if they don't sell TikTok suggests one hundred percent as
Speaker 2: a possibility. Could talk more about that in the TikTok section.
Speaker 2: Universal tariff on all countries still on the table. Trump
Speaker 2: thinks russia economy is falling apart, but wouldn't comment on
Speaker 2: if he would keep US sanctions and Elon Musk's doge
Speaker 2: will get a White House office with twenty people. More
Speaker 2: to say about that in a moment as well. To
Speaker 2: go back to the birthright citizenship piece, the reason why
Speaker 2: you're saying it'll be, you know, clearly challenged, and if
Speaker 2: the lawsuit hasn't already been filed, it will be imminently filed.
Speaker 2: The Fourteenth Amendment says, Section one states all persons born
Speaker 2: or naturalized in the US and subject to the jurisdiction
Speaker 2: thereof are citizens of the US and of the state
Speaker 2: wherein they reside. Now, scholars in particular are on the
Speaker 2: right who want to say, no, no, that doesn't mean
Speaker 2: that everybody is born in the US is you know,
Speaker 2: a citizen. They point to that to the subject to
Speaker 2: the jurisdiction thereof, and make the case that potentially some
Speaker 2: of these individuals aren't really subject to the jurisdiction of
Speaker 2: the United States, so they don't count as citizens.
Speaker 4: I think it's.
Speaker 2: Previously been a relatively fringe legal argument that has been made. However,
Speaker 2: you now have you know, Supreme Court that is very
Speaker 2: conservative and so question mark what would happen there?
Speaker 4: And then I think the other question is like, you know,
Speaker 4: how far.
Speaker 2: Does Trump want to push things, because let's just say
Speaker 2: theoretically that this goes through the court system, goes to
Speaker 2: the Supreme Court. Supreme Court's like, no, it's in the constitution.
Speaker 2: You can't just end birthright citizenship with an executive order.
Speaker 2: That's not how this works. There's also a possibility that
Speaker 2: Trump says, as Andrew Jackson said in the past, like okay, well,
Speaker 2: how are you going to enforce that? You and what
Speaker 2: army are going to enforce that. So since you have
Speaker 2: this time around, and this is part of what's different.
Speaker 2: Number One, he has immunity for anything that he does
Speaker 2: in office, so he doesn't have to worry about any
Speaker 2: sort of you know, criminal consequences or whatever.
Speaker 4: That's off the table.
Speaker 2: Number two, And as part of these executive orders, Schedule
Speaker 2: F was instituted. You know, there's been a highly concerted
Speaker 2: and organized effort in the four years when he was
Speaker 2: out of power to make sure that he has loyalists
Speaker 2: in place who will execute on orders even things that
Speaker 2: may not be legal, may not be constitutional. So I
Speaker 2: think you can fully expect the executive branch would go
Speaker 2: along with whatever his interpretation is. So, you know, it
Speaker 2: really does open up, like I said, a question about
Speaker 2: how far is he willing to go on this if
Speaker 2: the court to do what I think most people would
Speaker 2: expect them to do, although there are no guarantees of
Speaker 2: striking down this particular executive order.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right, that's a big question actually for a
Speaker 3: lot of the way the Supreme Court and by the way,
Speaker 3: apparently just as soda my owner, somebody I knew who
Speaker 3: was in the rotunda was not looking too healthy. So
Speaker 3: just people should prepare themselves now that Donald Trump is
Speaker 3: the president.
Speaker 1: Can you believe can you believe she didn't?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 4: I do.
Speaker 1: I know I can believe it too. But it's like,
Speaker 1: after the whole.
Speaker 3: RBG, this is a diabetic seventy year old woman who's
Speaker 3: like borderline OBEs, like do I need to show you
Speaker 3: what a chart looks like?
Speaker 1: And beyond that, why would you want to string.
Speaker 3: It out your last years voting in the minority, you know, yeah,
Speaker 3: and then allegedly being in the servi of some grander ideal.
Speaker 1: It's just the most insan Again, I.
Speaker 2: Think the same thing about our president now. The oldest
Speaker 2: to be sworn into office tables.
Speaker 1: Okay, hey, listen, JD's.
Speaker 4: Age and wait, et cetera.
Speaker 1: And he's sitting right there in the wings.
Speaker 3: Okay, So it's not not the similar situation where literally,
Speaker 3: like I mean imagine like that would mean. It'd be
Speaker 3: like if there's no vice president and you were that
Speaker 3: old and you could have risked it to bring in
Speaker 3: a Democrat, that would be an insane.
Speaker 2: It would like if the person who was going to
Speaker 2: take over for Trump if he's like, yes.
Speaker 3: Was the speaker, and they're like, oh, I'm just going
Speaker 3: to chance it, and you know, maybe a Democrat will
Speaker 3: become the President of the United States. So that's what
Speaker 3: she's decided to do overall with the executive orders. What
Speaker 3: I would say broadly is that this is a result
Speaker 3: really of preparation over the last four years, and made
Speaker 3: this point in our stream yesterday, but I want to
Speaker 3: reiterate it here for people. I think it's really interesting
Speaker 3: to consider that Trump is actually at the absolute apex
Speaker 3: of his powers because he was not in the Oval
Speaker 3: office for the last four years. Both culturally with Joe
Speaker 3: Biden nuking the Democratic Party, I think they have the
Speaker 3: lowest approval rating for the Democratic Party in modern history.
Speaker 3: According to Gallipoling, he wins the popular vote. But more
Speaker 3: importantly is the last four years were a battle test
Speaker 3: of the GOP. Back in twenty twenty, the John McCain's,
Speaker 3: the Jeff Flakes, the Liz Cheney's and all of those
Speaker 3: other people. There was not a ton but there was
Speaker 3: a little bit of consternation ideologically and theoretically about the party.
Speaker 3: But Trump being able to get away with all of
Speaker 3: the things that he has done, still get the nomination
Speaker 3: and still get elected to the White House on top
Speaker 3: of a four year what I would almost describe as
Speaker 3: like a cooling off period for the conservative movement where
Speaker 3: everyone had a fight about DeSantis versus Trump and all that,
Speaker 3: and Trump won. So for the last two years, the
Speaker 3: conservative legal establishment of the Federalist Society, all of these people
Speaker 3: have gotten together, Okay, like we're doing this if we win,
Speaker 3: and this is the way that we're going to do.
Speaker 3: That's so different, I mean monumentally different than twenty seventeen,
Speaker 3: where everything was up for grabs. Half the people who
Speaker 3: worked for Trump they didn't even like Trump. They actually
Speaker 3: voted against him or they denounced him, you know, a
Speaker 3: month before they were working as White House chief of
Speaker 3: staff or whatever like Wright's previous. This time is just
Speaker 3: like totally not the case. And with those loyalists. But
Speaker 3: on top of like the professionalism I would say, of
Speaker 3: a lot of the senior executive service and others who
Speaker 3: will be replacing the current bureaucrats, the lawyer people like
Speaker 3: Will Sharf, the guy who was in that video, who
Speaker 3: the staff secretary. These are you know, Harvard Princeton educated lawyers,
Speaker 3: These are people who like a blue blue pedigree background.
Speaker 3: Stephen Miller and them have been working behind the scenes
Speaker 3: now for years to be able to prepare this. So
Speaker 3: I do think it will look very different this time around.
Speaker 3: In the intro now, there will always be chaos, there
Speaker 3: will always be Mika Brazinski facelift, tweets, truths, you know,
Speaker 3: and all of that, etc. But at an actionable level.
Speaker 3: I expected and see this in such a different from
Speaker 3: last time. I mean, don't you remember that travel ban
Speaker 3: order he put in place in his first week. It
Speaker 3: was reversed ten days later, you know, and it was
Speaker 3: just chaotic, it made no sense. This time around, everything
Speaker 3: like the tariffs, everything is moving through the technical legal
Speaker 3: process to avoid court challenge, to avoid many of the
Speaker 3: things that struck them down and had problems with. So
Speaker 3: that's really what I what I see in the professionalism
Speaker 3: of a lot of the people around Donald Trump. That
Speaker 3: has nothing to do with Trump himself, but it has
Speaker 3: to do with his movement, what people believe in, and
Speaker 3: actually trying to action make actionable many of the things
Speaker 3: he talked about.
Speaker 1: On the campaign.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean the way that I would say that
Speaker 2: is basically they have their ducks in a row and
Speaker 2: there are no breaks left on the car. And he
Speaker 2: doesn't have to he doesn't have to answer to anyone.
Speaker 2: You know, it doesn't get really for reelection again, So
Speaker 2: there's no you know, democratic break, any sort of GOP
Speaker 2: opposition has been vanquished. You know, I mean a lot
Speaker 2: of democratic opposition has been vanquished. See the fact that
Speaker 2: Marco Rubio got approved is like total neocon warmonger. But
Speaker 2: whatever got approved ninety nine to nothing in his Senate
Speaker 2: confirmation hearing yesterday, And it shows you what a great
Speaker 2: fight the Democrats are putting up this time around. And
Speaker 2: I think part of that is, you know, not only yes,
Speaker 2: he won the popular vote, you know by a point
Speaker 2: and a half. Yes, there's this you know, huge sort
Speaker 2: of vibe shift with all the like tech oligarchs backing him,
Speaker 2: and this.
Speaker 4: Like cultural right wing cultural.
Speaker 2: Consensus that has formed, especially in particular sort of at
Speaker 2: elite levels, where this has been embraced as their path
Speaker 2: to make sure that they hold their grip on power,
Speaker 2: et cetera. So you have all of those pieces that
Speaker 2: have come together.
Speaker 4: And then also you know, Trump from a.
Speaker 2: Business perspective, he in his first administration, he his big
Speaker 2: accomplishment was passing a giant tax cut. Some of the
Speaker 2: more like populist direction that he had embraced in twenty sixteen.
Speaker 2: Now he's you know, hanging out with the masters of
Speaker 2: the universe, tech oligarch types. He had like four of
Speaker 2: the five richest people in the world at his inaugurations
Speaker 2: sitting behind him yesterday. And so the business community doesn't
Speaker 2: feel threatened or afraid anymore the way that they did
Speaker 2: the last time. They feel like there's more to be
Speaker 2: gained from collaborating with him than there is to be
Speaker 2: gained from opposing him. So so yeah, I mean, and
Speaker 2: like I said, one of the quiet Okay, so these
Speaker 2: are this whole raft of executive orders. The birthright citizenship
Speaker 2: one is not the only one that is ultimately going
Speaker 2: to be challenged in federal court. And then the question is, okay, well,
Speaker 2: how far is he going to go? Because what we're
Speaker 2: basically relying on at this point is for Donald Trump
Speaker 2: to check himself to say, you know, the court said
Speaker 2: I can't do that, so I'm not going to do
Speaker 2: that because there is no other check in place like
Speaker 2: That's that has been part of the effort of the
Speaker 2: past four years and really consolidated by the Supreme Court
Speaker 2: with the immunity decision. That has been the project for
Speaker 2: the last four years is to make sure there are
Speaker 2: no possible checks in place. And yes, they've been very
Speaker 2: successful at that. So you know, if I have to
Speaker 2: look at these executive orders, I took, I read through
Speaker 2: the whole, the entire you know, thread, listing all of them.
Speaker 2: There are quite a number of them, a lot of
Speaker 2: them in a lot of different directions. You know, there
Speaker 2: were some like woe dei anti dei stuff, the transgender
Speaker 2: there's only two genders one, but I think the bulk
Speaker 2: of them, the impetus is on a really militarized, aggressive
Speaker 2: immigration approach. And then the uh, you know, really opening
Speaker 2: up getting rid of any semblance of concern about climate
Speaker 2: obviously which aren't from the Paris Climate Accords. I mean,
Speaker 2: nobody's been following those anyway, so I don't know how
Speaker 2: consequential that is. But rolling back things like the ev
Speaker 2: tax credits, making sure we're sending any restrictions on where
Speaker 2: you can drill, et cetera. So, you know, from my perspective,
Speaker 2: at a time when we're seeing more and more client
Speaker 2: extreme climate emergencies, including the ones we just saw in
Speaker 2: la I think that's a disastrous direction to go in,
Speaker 2: but those are the two, you know, major pushes here
Speaker 2: in the early days of the Trump Yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean, and that actually gets back to inflation, because
Speaker 3: one of the things that was most effective for Donald
Speaker 3: Trump was gas prices whenever he was president.
Speaker 1: Is one of the things he's talked about the most.
Speaker 3: That's the reason why they're doing it, and that's largely
Speaker 3: it's to actually try and drop the price of gas,
Speaker 3: and more importantly, to actually increase oil export for a
Speaker 3: lot of these people, which is a huge priority of
Speaker 3: the oil and gas companies.
Speaker 2: And the tariffs would potentially cut in the opposite direction.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right. They're actually good yea.
Speaker 2: Although depending on how you know, what the tariffs end
Speaker 2: up being, that's what would determine.
Speaker 3: It would be interesting because it could actually increase net
Speaker 3: export of natural gas and oil if we do terf
Speaker 3: because the we wouldn't be bringing as much or so, Yeah,
Speaker 3: it would decrease our net exports, which is kind of
Speaker 3: the opposite of where the oil companies and all of
Speaker 3: them want to go to. So we're being told we
Speaker 3: do have Shelby Talcott, who was waiting to join us. So,
Speaker 3: Shelby is the White House correspondent for the Semaphore.
Speaker 1: She's a great friend of the show.
Speaker 3: She's going to talk to us about these January sixth
Speaker 3: executive orders. So guys, let's go ahead and bring her
Speaker 3: in and we'll discuss.
Speaker 1: So there she is, Shelby. How are you good?
Speaker 6: How are you?
Speaker 1: We're great? Thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 3: So, guys, can we go ahead and put a tear
Speaker 3: sheet here on the January sixth, pardon Shelby.
Speaker 1: Donald Trump.
Speaker 3: One of the big executive orders that he signed yesterday
Speaker 3: was commuting the sentences of the crowd Boy and Oathkeeper leaders,
Speaker 3: along with some over one thousand other January sixth Capital rioters.
Speaker 3: Just talk to us about some of the background that
Speaker 3: went into us. There was a big question mark as
Speaker 3: to who exactly would get commutations and pardons.
Speaker 1: Jd.
Speaker 3: Vance, the Vice President, was on television about nine days
Speaker 3: ago and had indicated that it would be less sweeping.
Speaker 1: I guess than.
Speaker 3: Currently, how do they come that decision and what's the
Speaker 3: end result?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think everybody thought that it was going to
Speaker 7: be less sweeping because we heard from so many Trump
Speaker 7: allies and even Donald Trump himself over the past two
Speaker 7: years who sort of said that it would be on
Speaker 7: a case by case basis. And there were a lot
Speaker 7: of people who told me that they would be doing
Speaker 7: it on a case by case basis.
Speaker 6: And like JD.
Speaker 7: Van said, if you, for example, beat up a police officer,
Speaker 7: then you deserve to go to prison. But that's not
Speaker 7: what will ultimately happen. And I think what's really interesting
Speaker 7: here is the backstory. I've done a lot of reporting
Speaker 7: over the last two years on this situation. And remember
Speaker 7: right after January sixth, Donald Trump never really wanted to
Speaker 7: bring that up. He condemned the situation, even if it
Speaker 7: was a little bit forced, and then he really didn't
Speaker 7: want to bring it up. He never mentioned it on
Speaker 7: the campaign trail. But there was an outside effort from
Speaker 7: allies of these defendants to get him on board, and
Speaker 7: so they started sort of petitioning people in his orbit.
Speaker 7: And then Donald Trump tapped an individual to oversee the
Speaker 7: January sixth defendants and their supporters and they started started
Speaker 7: coming to mar A Lago, and they started meeting with
Speaker 7: Donald Trump and sort of petitioning him, and over the
Speaker 7: course of two years, we've seen how his opinion of
Speaker 7: these defendants has changed drastically, and it ultimately ended up
Speaker 7: that he just gave a sweeping pardon, which I think
Speaker 7: people in his orbit didn't even anticipate.
Speaker 2: Interesting talk about some of the specifics of the people
Speaker 2: who were pardon I think there were some like fourteen
Speaker 2: or sixteen something like that who had their sentences commuted,
Speaker 2: and Trump said, we can look into them further, maybe
Speaker 2: they also deserve a full pardon. But by and large, everybody,
Speaker 2: whether they you know, just sort of wandered in and
Speaker 2: didn't know what they were doing allegedly, or whether they
Speaker 2: were involved in violently assaulting police officers, by and large,
Speaker 2: they were all set free pardon, full and complete, pardon,
Speaker 2: et cetera. So give us some of the specifics of
Speaker 2: some of the people that were talking about here and
Speaker 2: what they were convicted for doing.
Speaker 7: On January side, So, one of the people who did
Speaker 7: get a pardon is Enriquetario.
Speaker 6: He used to head up the Proud Boys.
Speaker 7: He was serving twenty two years in prison for seditious conspiracy.
Speaker 7: And then there were also five other I believe Proud
Speaker 7: Boys who had their sentences commuted and there were fourteen
Speaker 7: in total sentences that were commuted, and Donald Trump said
Speaker 7: that they're going to be taking a look and seeing
Speaker 7: if they could potentially go even even farther with that.
Speaker 7: But then there were other people who were sentenced for
Speaker 7: various crimes for you know, breaking and entering, for violence
Speaker 7: against the police officer. We had a wide array of
Speaker 7: crimes in this January sixth with these January sixth defendants,
Speaker 7: and everybody has essentially been pardoned or commuted.
Speaker 3: One of the things I'm always curious about, Shelby, is
Speaker 3: how these things happen. And with Trump, we know that
Speaker 3: there are always, you know, various side characters and pressures
Speaker 3: and other things happening. What since you wrote the story
Speaker 3: about this, what's your assessment Like the activists and others
Speaker 3: who've been involved. I know of some people like Julie
Speaker 3: Kelly and Lara Logan for example, who really made this
Speaker 3: into a cause over the last couple of years. Was
Speaker 3: it their media pressure? Was it lawmakers? Just talk to
Speaker 3: us about that.
Speaker 7: I don't think it was media pressure, because the vast
Speaker 7: majority of the media was covering this really from one
Speaker 7: side of things.
Speaker 6: I think it was this.
Speaker 7: You have to remember Also Cash Ptel, who is very
Speaker 7: close to Donald Trump and going to be presumably in
Speaker 7: his administration, was also involved in this. He had a
Speaker 7: sort of I think it was a nonprofit where he
Speaker 7: raised money for some of the Junior sixth defendants.
Speaker 6: When I spoke to him about this last year.
Speaker 7: He said that it was on a case by case
Speaker 7: basis and that none of the money was going to
Speaker 7: violent offenders. I didn't get any details about what that
Speaker 7: those investigations looked like to determine who got the money
Speaker 7: or not, but he's been involved, and so these were
Speaker 7: people really close to Donald Trump. And so what happened
Speaker 7: was these outside figures like Julie Kelly, like the lawyers
Speaker 7: for at the January sixth defendants, started petitioning these folks
Speaker 7: and then these folks who were in Donald Trump's orbit
Speaker 7: helped bring them into mar A Lago and helped have events.
Speaker 7: Donald Trump had events for January sixth defendants at mar
Speaker 7: A Lago over the past two years, and it sort
Speaker 7: of all was a slow leak.
Speaker 6: Towards the big Boss, Donald Trump.
Speaker 7: And eventually, as he sat down and talked with these folks,
Speaker 7: he was convinced, as Donald Trump often does, right he
Speaker 7: talks to people all the time. He always wants people's advice,
Speaker 7: and I think over the past two years, the other
Speaker 7: thing to note is a lot of people.
Speaker 6: In Donald Trump's orbit.
Speaker 7: As these defendants continued to get charged, and as Donald
Speaker 7: Trump himself was facing legal issues, all of that affected
Speaker 7: his decision and how ultimately became a January sixth supporter
Speaker 7: of these defendants. He saw what the Junior sixth defendants
Speaker 7: were going through and said, I'm going through the same thing.
Speaker 1: That makes sense.
Speaker 2: I think it's worth remembering. You know, on the day
Speaker 2: of January sixth, and in the immediate aftermath, there was
Speaker 2: almost universal horror, you know, both at sort of conservative
Speaker 2: media outlets, places like Fox News were horrified. Many Republicans
Speaker 2: in the immediate aftermath, Republican elected officials were horrified. The
Speaker 2: public continues to be horrified.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 2: Taking this action is tremendously unpopular. So talk to us
Speaker 2: about the you know, the kind of what it says
Speaker 2: about the Republican Party and how it's moved over this
Speaker 2: past number of years. That now, I mean, I don't know,
Speaker 2: maybe maybe I'll be wrong, but I don't expect anybody
Speaker 2: really to pipe up and be like this is wrong,
Speaker 2: they assaulted police officers on the Republican side, like he
Speaker 2: shouldn't have done this. They're just gonna go along with
Speaker 2: it at this point, which is tremendously different from the
Speaker 2: immediate reaction in the aftermath of that day.
Speaker 7: I think it shows that Donald Trump is fully in
Speaker 7: charge of the Republican Party. And I've, to be clear,
Speaker 7: heard from a lot of folks who are close to
Speaker 7: Donald Trump who were a little bit unsettled by this decision.
Speaker 6: But will they come out and say it publicly.
Speaker 7: Probably not, because their feeling is Donald Trump is in
Speaker 7: charge and this is what he has decided. But I
Speaker 7: know a lot of people in the Republican Party are
Speaker 7: a little bit uncomfortable by this. I think that they
Speaker 7: would have been far more comfortable if it had been
Speaker 7: done by a case by case basis, and if those
Speaker 7: individuals who did.
Speaker 6: Do more violent crimes were not.
Speaker 4: Released and shelby.
Speaker 2: What do you think it says about this Trump administration
Speaker 2: coming into that. You know, as you pointed out just
Speaker 2: weeks ago, his own vice president was like, well, of
Speaker 2: course the violent ones should be in prison and deserve
Speaker 2: to serve time. And now here we are weeks later,
Speaker 2: and it's like no blanket. Basically across the board, they're
Speaker 2: all no problem, good to go. So it is just conspiracy.
Speaker 2: Beating a cop doesn't matter. You're set free. What does
Speaker 2: it say about how he's approaching this four year term.
Speaker 6: He makes all the decisions. And I also think, you know.
Speaker 7: When Donald Trump comes to a decision on something, he
Speaker 7: takes the advice of a lot of people, but ultimately,
Speaker 7: everybody in his orbit has always told me, you can
Speaker 7: give Donald Trump all the advice you want, but at
Speaker 7: the end of the day, he makes the decision based
Speaker 7: on what he wants to do, and he'll take your
Speaker 7: advice oftentimes and he'll keep it in mind, but he
Speaker 7: is the ultimate decision maker. And I think this is
Speaker 7: also another example of pick your battles right. Susie Wilds,
Speaker 7: for example, his chief of staff has been in his
Speaker 7: orbit and survived in his orbit for a really long
Speaker 7: time when a lot of other people have not, and
Speaker 7: that is partially because she's learned when to pick her battle.
Speaker 7: So my thinking of this situation is his mind was
Speaker 7: so made up, probably in part because he himself had
Speaker 7: gone through all of these legal issues that he felt
Speaker 7: were unjust that it was not worth that fight, and
Speaker 7: so that's how a lot of people in Donald Trump's
Speaker 7: orbit are looking at it as Yeah, I don't love this,
Speaker 7: but it's just not worth the fight.
Speaker 3: Also, we wanted to talk to you about Doge in
Speaker 3: vivike Ramaswami. Guys, can we go ahead and put this
Speaker 3: up there on the screen. The news is out and
Speaker 3: its official one hundred percent. Vivike Ramaswami will be exiting
Speaker 3: Doge before it even really gets a chance to begin,
Speaker 3: they write, everyone wants him out. How Musk helped boot
Speaker 3: Ramaswami from Doge. Can you give us some of the
Speaker 3: backstory here? I know that I've heard this probably same
Speaker 3: to you as tension in mar A Lago, etc. Not
Speaker 3: sure I realized the extent to which Elon Musk had
Speaker 3: turned on Vivike actually even earlier and prior to his
Speaker 3: tweet about American culture. So what do you first give
Speaker 3: us some of the backstory and then give us some
Speaker 3: of what you think about what it portends for the
Speaker 3: future Trump administration.
Speaker 7: There's a lot of stories going around, right you hear
Speaker 7: from vi vike Ramaswami allies who say, no, no, this
Speaker 7: is all just because he wants to.
Speaker 6: Run for governor.
Speaker 7: Probably a little bit of it, but certainly there were
Speaker 7: tentions that I think none of us really realized, and
Speaker 7: I think it came down to from what I've been
Speaker 7: told by some people.
Speaker 6: Another version of the story is that there wasn't.
Speaker 7: Enough work being done by the VAKE and that that
Speaker 7: h one b visa debate where he came out and
Speaker 7: supported it and kind of trashed American culture was another
Speaker 7: big reason, sort of the nail in the coffin to
Speaker 7: get rid of him.
Speaker 6: But there are a lot of stories going around.
Speaker 7: Some people have said that he was annoying Donald Trump
Speaker 7: in addition to Elon Musk, But ultimately the run for governor,
Speaker 7: the impending run for governor sort of gave them an
Speaker 7: easy out to I think push him out sooner, because
Speaker 7: I know as recently as last week I was talking
Speaker 7: to people close to the VAC who were telling me, yes,
Speaker 7: his plan has always been all along, du doge for
Speaker 7: nine months and then run for governor, And certainly it
Speaker 7: has not been nine months.
Speaker 2: So are we like he just was annoying, like they
Speaker 2: just didn't like working with them.
Speaker 4: Is that basically what it came down to.
Speaker 2: And then they're like, oh, the same by the bell thing,
Speaker 2: this is our ticket to push this guy on entirely.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I haven't.
Speaker 7: I honestly have not heard anything, you know, any specific
Speaker 7: instance or a specific blow up fight. It was just,
Speaker 7: for my understanding, a bunch of different small things combined
Speaker 7: with some people.
Speaker 2: Some people's personalities just don't just don't work.
Speaker 7: Exactly the new with the new Donald Trump also signed
Speaker 7: an executive order, uh, sort of solidifying dogs within the
Speaker 7: US government might have been difficult for Vivig Gramos want
Speaker 7: me to do that while also running for Ohio governor.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I wanted to ask you about that. So the
Speaker 2: Executive Order people are flagging.
Speaker 4: All it really did was change with the.
Speaker 2: Digital IT Service Deportment that like, yeah, there were some
Speaker 2: already existing digital modernization thing that was created actually by Obama,
Speaker 2: and they're like, we're just renaming this DOGE and so
Speaker 2: it The way the Executive Order is written at least
Speaker 2: doesn't have this broad reaching like slash regulations and cut
Speaker 2: personnel and do all of these things. It's the Executive
Speaker 2: Order is pretty narrowly focused on it, which you know
Speaker 2: Suber saying like, oh, well, that would be a great
Speaker 2: way for you to give yourself and your friends a
Speaker 2: lot of tech contracts. But what is your reading of
Speaker 2: the specifics of that executive order and whether that has
Speaker 2: any bearing on what the ultimate mandate of DOGE is
Speaker 2: going to be.
Speaker 7: So from my understanding, the DOGE will get a White
Speaker 7: House office with about twenty people, and then each agency.
Speaker 7: This executive order directs each agency to implement sort of
Speaker 7: their own DOGE team, and so that is sort of
Speaker 7: how they're going to go about it.
Speaker 6: But you're right, a lot of it is directed.
Speaker 7: On boosting the technology capabilities which we already have. So
Speaker 7: you know, I don't think we know the answer of
Speaker 7: how effective it's going to be. And the other question
Speaker 7: that I have that I don't have the answer to
Speaker 7: is with these teams, with these interagency teams, is there
Speaker 7: also going to be an out of agency over arching
Speaker 7: team that sort of oversees all of it and directs
Speaker 7: each agency into here's what we want you to do
Speaker 7: for the agency, Here's how much money we want you
Speaker 7: to cut. Or is it going to be up to
Speaker 7: each individual team to try to, you know, get a
Speaker 7: combined one trillion dollars?
Speaker 1: Yeah, very very important.
Speaker 2: Are you seeing any there's been a lot of speculation like, oh,
Speaker 2: Trump is certainly at some point going to fall out
Speaker 2: with Elon Musk and be upset that he's dealing the spotlight,
Speaker 2: blah blah. I don't really see any signs of it.
Speaker 4: But what do I know.
Speaker 2: I'm like totally on the outside. Have there been any
Speaker 2: indications of that? As best as you can tell, Shelby.
Speaker 6: I haven't seen it.
Speaker 7: And again, you know, when I ask people about this,
Speaker 7: they there have been people in Trump's orbit who are
Speaker 7: close to Trump who don't love Elon Musk. Right Steve Bannon,
Speaker 7: for example, has not made it a secret that he
Speaker 7: has issues with Elon Musk. But Elon Musk has a
Speaker 7: lot of money, and Donald Trump likes people who have
Speaker 7: a lot of money, and so Elon Musk also really
Speaker 7: helped Donald Trump win the election, and so for now,
Speaker 7: especially with Donald Trump in office, I think actually that
Speaker 7: helps because it was one thing to be at mar
Speaker 7: a Lago, where Elon Musk, even though mar Lago is
Speaker 7: a private club, could get in pretty easily and be
Speaker 7: very close to Donald Trump day in and day out.
Speaker 7: Once he's in the oval office, it's going to be
Speaker 7: more difficult. And I think that helps Elon Musk because
Speaker 7: he won't be around every single day.
Speaker 1: Interesting, Yeah, that is a really good point.
Speaker 2: Well oh sorry, oh well, before I let you go, Shelby,
Speaker 2: I had to pick your brain on tennis if you
Speaker 2: had any time to watch the Australian Open. This way
Speaker 2: for people who don't know, Shelby was a pro tennis player.
Speaker 4: Which is crazy. I didn't even unbelievably impressive.
Speaker 1: For eight years.
Speaker 2: I don't even know that I am in a lot
Speaker 2: of that. But have you had any time to watch?
Speaker 2: There have been some incredible matches. I saw Djokovic took
Speaker 2: out an Alkaraz early this morning or last night or
Speaker 2: something like that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I'm a big Djokovic fan, are you?
Speaker 5: Lely?
Speaker 7: I have not gotten to watch a ton of tennis
Speaker 7: because I've been so busy, but my mom watches it NonStop,
Speaker 7: so I always hear about it from her and she
Speaker 7: always text me as if I have it on you know,
Speaker 7: the screen twenty four hours and him watching it. But
Speaker 7: I know a lot of the girls who who were
Speaker 7: compete in it, so I also see it like on
Speaker 7: my Instagram.
Speaker 4: But I that's your favorite? Who do you cheer for?
Speaker 4: Female tennis player? Who's your favorite?
Speaker 6: You know, I haven't watched it.
Speaker 7: I haven't really been in tune for years going on.
Speaker 7: Are like the oldies from like, you know, eight or
Speaker 7: ten years ago. So like the rain break, I took
Speaker 7: a break. I was like a little I was a
Speaker 7: little washed up. I needed I needed a break from it.
Speaker 7: So date that.
Speaker 2: I relate to that, I relate to that having I didn't.
Speaker 2: I never achieved the athletic prowess that you did. But
Speaker 2: being a former swimmer and people are like, oh, do
Speaker 2: you still swim? Nope, not unless I'm just like, you know,
Speaker 2: hanging out lounge and whatever. So Shelby, in any case,
Speaker 2: you're a pro and a star reporter that we always appreciate.
Speaker 2: So thank you so much for helping some shed some
Speaker 2: light on these early actions in the Trump administration.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Shelby. We appreciate it anytime.
Speaker 2: So we wanted to talk a little bit about the
Speaker 2: latest with regard to this what I think we can
Speaker 2: now pretty clearly call a temporary ceasefire in Gaza, which
Speaker 2: went into effect shortly before Trump took office. Mac, let's
Speaker 2: go and pull up just so people can see, you know,
Speaker 2: as now Palestinians and Gaza are starting to return home.
Speaker 2: We're getting more and more images of some of the
Speaker 2: devastation here Mac if you can pull up the Gaza devastation,
Speaker 2: then also this image of Chibalia that we have here
Speaker 2: in the rundown. You know, I mean, the level of
Speaker 2: destruction is just nearly complete, especially in northern Gaza. It's
Speaker 2: absolutely insane. What it looks like you can see is
Speaker 2: just I don't even know what that is. That looks
Speaker 2: like an ambulance at one point. You can see images
Speaker 2: of vehicles, trucks that are crushed rubble everywhere. People have
Speaker 2: been reporting that as they've been returning to their destroyed homes,
Speaker 2: horrific reports of relatives remains that they're finding in some
Speaker 2: instances with sniper wounds having been shot in the head.
Speaker 2: There have been some reaches by the way too already
Speaker 2: of the ceasefire by the Israelis in the Gaza strips.
Speaker 4: So it has been largely calm, but not one hundred
Speaker 4: percent calm. And then Trump.
Speaker 2: Actually was asked yesterday if we can prepare the Trump
Speaker 2: ceasefire side. Trump was actually asked yesterday, in the context
Speaker 2: of signing all of these executive orders, how confident he
Speaker 2: was that they would be able to maintain the calm
Speaker 2: in Gaza. Let's go ahead. When you guys are ready
Speaker 2: for that and take a listen to that.
Speaker 4: Then are the new sur president that you can keep
Speaker 4: the ceasefire in Gaza and include the tree phases of heal.
Speaker 5: I'm not convenent. That's not our words. There were, but
Speaker 5: I'm not convenent, but I think they're very weakened. On
Speaker 5: the other side, guys, I looked at a picture of Gaza.
Speaker 5: Gaz is is like a massive demolition site that places.
Speaker 5: It's really got to be rebuilt in a different way.
Speaker 6: The Mental health reviewsing Kaza my mind.
Speaker 5: You know, Gas is interesting. It's a phenomenal location on
Speaker 5: the sea, best weather, you know, everything's good. It's like
Speaker 5: some beautiful things could be done with it. But it's
Speaker 5: very interesting. But some fantastic things could be done with Gas.
Speaker 4: How do you see the future governance for.
Speaker 5: Dozen, Well, it depends. I can't imagine you could have.
Speaker 5: We certainly can't have. The people that were there, most
Speaker 5: of them are did so.
Speaker 2: He says there he's not confident at all that this
Speaker 2: will continue. And you know, Sagarth, this of course comports
Speaker 2: with some of what Bibe Nina who has been saying
Speaker 2: as well, and Bezilil Smochridge. So I think Shelle when
Speaker 2: we had him on later out pretty pretty clearly that basically,
Speaker 2: you know, as part of Bebe's coalition, he had Ben Gavier,
Speaker 2: who is now actually exited the coalition because he's upset
Speaker 2: about this deal, and he has Smotrich Church extracted a promise.
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know that BB was like really
Speaker 2: opposed to this, but that they would go back to
Speaker 2: the war once Phase one was complete. And this has
Speaker 2: now been reported by many Israeli sources. BB himself came
Speaker 2: out and said effectively the same thing. He said that
Speaker 2: he got promises both from Biden and from Trump that
Speaker 2: they would be able to return to the war after
Speaker 2: Phase one was complete. And so when you see Trump here,
Speaker 2: two of his executive actions too, by the way, and
Speaker 2: I'll get to that in just a moment, had to
Speaker 2: do with Israel. But when you see him here, honestly
Speaker 2: just like yeah, whatever, I'm not confident it's going to continue,
Speaker 2: not seeming to really care whether it continues or not.
Speaker 2: I think it's a very negative indication of where this
Speaker 2: is potentially heading.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean, look, I mean I think I was modestly
Speaker 3: I was modestly optimistic that something would happen because I
Speaker 3: thought that the Israeli government might fall, not because of
Speaker 3: what pressure would happen on the Trump side. And I
Speaker 3: don't know, maybe I still am an idiot it, but
Speaker 3: I mean, Israeli is do you really want to keep
Speaker 3: this shit going?
Speaker 1: Like you're losing a lot of money?
Speaker 3: Five hundred year soldiers were killed as a result of
Speaker 3: the same Seaspire deal being on the table. I mean,
Speaker 3: I know, baby, the government may not care about the hostages,
Speaker 3: but I know all of you care about the hostages.
Speaker 1: There's still a lot of hostages who are being left.
Speaker 3: Like, you know, is this really the course of action
Speaker 3: that you want to take. We've had a resurgence and
Speaker 3: or recruitment of a number of Hamas people. If you
Speaker 3: want to continue the war, this will take I mean,
Speaker 3: how long has it been since October seven? It's been
Speaker 3: almost eighteen months, right, so if you think about it
Speaker 3: in Iraq context, we're roughly in the five mark and like,
Speaker 3: guess what happened to somebody else's country when they fought
Speaker 3: a similar type war in five It was a nightmare.
Speaker 3: It was a nightmare for years going forward. That's effectively
Speaker 3: what you were committing yourself to. So I'm maybe I'm dumb.
Speaker 3: I just think that I still have like commdest confidence
Speaker 3: like there's some democratic input or something going on in
Speaker 3: that country.
Speaker 1: I have no idea.
Speaker 2: Look because America, I think what they would say obviously
Speaker 2: widely disagree with this, but they would say is it's
Speaker 2: sort of analogous to when we withdrew from Afghanistan. Then
Speaker 2: you have to reckon with this what did we do
Speaker 2: all these years?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 2: The Taliban is just right back in power, Like what
Speaker 2: were we doing all what did we spend all this
Speaker 2: money for? What do we lose all these lives for?
Speaker 2: What did we destroy this entire country? Were like, what
Speaker 2: were we doing? And it's a similar thing here like already,
Speaker 2: you know, Hamas is out in the streets and they're
Speaker 2: happy that the you know, ceasefire is in place and
Speaker 2: there is no other because you know, these reallys weren't
Speaker 2: interested actually in some sort of like peaceful solution that
Speaker 2: would lead to a better of governance. B Because always
Speaker 2: enjoyed the fact that Hamas was in power in Gaza,
Speaker 2: so he could point to them and say, I don't
Speaker 2: have a partner for peace, Like those dynamics haven't changed,
Speaker 2: and so they don't want to have a reckoning with
Speaker 2: the fact that, yes, they killed a lot of civilians. Yes,
Speaker 2: Gaza is rubble, Yes they have inflicted mass pain, suffering, starvation, illness, death,
Speaker 2: et cetera.
Speaker 4: But you did not destroy him us. And so I think.
Speaker 2: There's a desire to not reckon with that reality that
Speaker 2: pushes not all, but a large part of Israeli society
Speaker 2: towards no, we just need to keep killing more.
Speaker 4: We just need to keep this war going.
Speaker 2: And you know, certainly within the like Bebi's coalition's that's
Speaker 2: the majority, I would say, sentiment is in that direction.
Speaker 2: So you know, again there was some hope that like,
Speaker 2: maybe this would be important to Trump because he would
Speaker 2: think it would be embarrassing if they just went back
Speaker 2: to the fighting. But certainly the indications from that sod
Speaker 2: are he's.
Speaker 4: Just like, it's their war.
Speaker 1: Whatever.
Speaker 4: I don't think it'll really hold, but we'll see.
Speaker 1: I think you're right.
Speaker 3: I mean, look, let's also be honest, like Trump is
Speaker 3: the most pro Israel president to literally ever take office,
Speaker 3: not in terms of his background, but in terms of
Speaker 3: the concrete promises he made and the.
Speaker 2: People he's put in place. And yeah, Miriam Madison was
Speaker 2: sitting right there in.
Speaker 3: The inauguration, as you said, I've tried to prepare people
Speaker 3: for reality. The reality is Israel is going to annex
Speaker 3: West Bank.
Speaker 1: Okay, get over it.
Speaker 3: And if you were with Trump, like, that's just part
Speaker 3: of the things you're gonna have to think.
Speaker 1: If you care a lot about.
Speaker 3: It, you shouldn't have voted for mem I don't know
Speaker 3: what to tell you if you didn't want if you
Speaker 3: want them to cut weapons off to Israel, it will
Speaker 3: never happen. In the current political context, the issue has
Speaker 3: become totally polarized left and right. There is zero what
Speaker 3: reward mechanism in the Republican Party for Why would you
Speaker 3: do it?
Speaker 5: You know?
Speaker 1: I mean I can't. You don't even want to know.
Speaker 1: Maybe one day I'll.
Speaker 3: Tell everybody the stories here about what even my modest
Speaker 3: commentary I would think maybe you would disagree on. The
Speaker 3: Israel issue has cost me in terms of my personal life,
Speaker 3: in terms of ties, cut et cetera, and bullshit smears,
Speaker 3: you know, being pushed behind the scenes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I should do it. One day.
Speaker 3: But my point is just like that's and I'm an idiot.
Speaker 3: I'm nobody, just a commentator over here. Now imagine being
Speaker 3: in power somebody who's a congressman or a senator. Their
Speaker 3: roar mechanism doesn't exist here. Again, the truth Israel will
Speaker 3: never be cut off. That what really happens is up
Speaker 3: to them. They will annex the West Bank. Our ambassador
Speaker 3: at Israel, Mike Huckabee, said he doesn't believe in a
Speaker 3: two state solution, which basically means that's US government policy.
Speaker 3: The best thing that you should all hope for, if
Speaker 3: you're pro Palestine or anti war, whatever is you should
Speaker 3: hope that the chaos over there is so out of
Speaker 3: control and so affects domestic politics and or energy prices
Speaker 3: here at home, that they'll do something about it, Which
Speaker 3: is the main impetus right for a lot of this
Speaker 3: is he loves the peacemaker, the image. He doesn't care
Speaker 3: about the issue. By the way, who cares how we
Speaker 3: get it done? If and you know, I gave advice
Speaker 3: to people, send the people in Godza Maga hats like
Speaker 3: if you really want this to happen, like you need
Speaker 3: to make it politically convenient interesting for Trump to posture,
Speaker 3: like for example, he remember that article that we put
Speaker 3: up on our show Arab officials from the Times of Israel.
Speaker 3: Trump pressured net and Yahoo more in one meeting than
Speaker 3: anyone else. Guess what he posted that on his truth
Speaker 3: social because all he cares about is his own ego.
Speaker 3: Apparently the Israelis are now attacking Steve Witkoff. They've been
Speaker 3: leaking and being like he's a Katari owned asset or
Speaker 3: what the Las Vegas Jewish billionaires.
Speaker 1: Of course a Katari owned asset.
Speaker 3: They hate it because he pressured them to take this
Speaker 3: ceasefire deal.
Speaker 1: So stuff like that. If you get it to Trump.
Speaker 3: He's you know, an egotistical person, so to the extent
Speaker 3: that if you guys all want to play the game,
Speaker 3: that's the only way this is all going to happen.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but even that, like I mean, Hegsath and Hugby
Speaker 2: are both in times like stell it. You know, the
Speaker 2: administration has already been staffed in the way that Miriam
Speaker 2: Maddilson wanted it to be staff That's true. And so
Speaker 2: you know, to your point about the West pank, which
Speaker 2: I will not personally be getting over, but I know
Speaker 2: what you're saying, just like that's the reality.
Speaker 1: Q Trump.
Speaker 3: I'm saying, Look, I'm being totally honest. I had to
Speaker 3: reconcile myself for this. I'm like, all right, this is Look,
Speaker 3: we have two choices. It's binary.
Speaker 1: It's not easy. What do we choose.
Speaker 3: We choose probably in the same way that you used
Speaker 3: to think about Biden before Gaza or like I like
Speaker 3: the Iri task credit, so I like Lena Kahan, right,
Speaker 3: You're like at the end of the day, Look, I mean,
Speaker 3: people know my worldview. I don't give a shit about
Speaker 3: most other countries. I mostly care about what's happening here
Speaker 3: to the extent I care about what's happening abroad is
Speaker 3: to the extent that it's affecting us here at home.
Speaker 3: That's probably the decision I had to make. That's probably
Speaker 3: millions of people had to make that type of decision.
Speaker 1: And I don't progrets.
Speaker 2: Well, but I do think that there was a lot
Speaker 2: of like fake wish casting.
Speaker 1: About that was not like campaign No.
Speaker 2: I know, but I'm just saying, like, you may have
Speaker 2: been in touch with that reality, but I don't. I
Speaker 2: think there were many people who weren't, and honestly aren't still.
Speaker 2: But you know, I mentioned two executive orders from Trump
Speaker 2: relevant to Israel. One of them was I mentioned before
Speaker 2: Biden put in place. I mean, it's just it's like
Speaker 2: the most tiny slap on the risk sort of thing
Speaker 2: that Biden could have done. But sanctioning some of the
Speaker 2: violent settlers, pretending like they're not like fully backed by
Speaker 2: the Israeli government. But in any case, there were something
Speaker 2: like thirty three individuals who we're sanctioned through these methods.
Speaker 2: Trump rolled that back, and he also rolled back some
Speaker 2: limitations that have been put in place on shipping two
Speaker 2: thousand pound bombs, which I didn't even know there were
Speaker 2: any limitations on any arm shipments from the Biden administration.
Speaker 4: But in any case, that's a supply thing.
Speaker 3: It's not because of morality. Yes, it's to keep them
Speaker 3: for ourself, that's the reason.
Speaker 2: So in any case, those restrictions have been lifted under
Speaker 2: Trump as well, just to give you a sense of
Speaker 2: where things are headed. And then you know, in addition
Speaker 2: to I think very likely after phase one, you know,
Speaker 2: bombings continue in Gaza and they go right back to
Speaker 2: the fight. The West Bank is under increasing attack. You
Speaker 2: can put this up on the screen. Jeremy Skhill and
Speaker 2: drop site News and R and Ryan Graham have course
Speaker 2: been doing a great job of covering what's going on there.
Speaker 2: One thing that they did is they announced this quote
Speaker 2: unquote counter terror operation in the occupied West Bank. They
Speaker 2: shut down all kinds of roads. I mean, Palestinian movement
Speaker 2: in the West Bank is already extremely limited, and now
Speaker 2: it's even more so. And then you have settlers that
Speaker 2: have just been violently rampaging in a number of Palestinian villages,
Speaker 2: in some instances overtly backed by Israeli forces that are now,
Speaker 2: as Jeremy reports, invading and attacking parts of Ganine. In addition,
Speaker 2: there was actually an incident where settlers were setting fires
Speaker 2: and attacking this village and Israeli police thought the settlers
Speaker 2: were Palestinians and shot them. And now this is like,
Speaker 2: this is a big story in Israel because of Turnau.
Speaker 2: What's they weren't Palestinians who we don't care about killing.
Speaker 2: They were actually settlers, Jewish settlers. So there's you know,
Speaker 2: this is sort of an explicit plan that all right,
Speaker 2: while we're having this calm in Gaza, temporarily we're going
Speaker 2: to move on the West Bank. This will be also
Speaker 2: a pretext that's used in addition to, you know, to
Speaker 2: return to the war as well. So that's the latest
Speaker 2: that we have coming out of the Middle East, and
Speaker 2: none of it is particularly good news.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Look, I my only optimism for a cease fire for
Speaker 3: any of this was the at least credit. By the way,
Speaker 3: if another reason way that you would want this happen
Speaker 3: is you should have the Nobel Foundation award Trump the
Speaker 3: Nobel Peace Prize. They should come out and do that
Speaker 3: immediately to give him more of an incentive.
Speaker 1: People think I'm kidding. I'm not kidding.
Speaker 3: This is if you got to if you guys play Washington,
Speaker 3: if you look, you could care about one thing. You
Speaker 3: could care about posturing, or you can care about getting
Speaker 3: shit done. I can guarantee you the people who would
Speaker 3: be alive from you know, influencing Donald Trump, they don't
Speaker 3: care how you accomplish this. So if you are the
Speaker 3: Irish government or any of these other people were taking
Speaker 3: a little bit of a dissonance you know, policy or
Speaker 3: whatever towards Israel, that's how you should get it done.
Speaker 3: That's the only way is you have to feed him.
Speaker 3: You have to feed his ego. That's how it's gonna work.
Speaker 3: By the way, I'm already prepping for myself on Ukraine,
Speaker 3: just to give people the background, like there is a
Speaker 3: titan fight behind the scenes going on right now over Ukraine,
Speaker 3: because you have people like Mike Waltz and others who
Speaker 3: have completely different historical pass on the Ukraine issue and
Speaker 3: are willing to come along, but they're not going to
Speaker 3: do the work right. Some of the people who are
Speaker 3: actually going to be in charge of this policy, Keith
Speaker 3: Kellogg and a few others, are true believers, but you
Speaker 3: have to work your way through the bureaucracy to get
Speaker 3: that up. And then when I turn on Fox and Friends,
Speaker 3: the dumbest program on cable television, which Donald Trump watches
Speaker 3: every day is Brian Kilmead, who is a Ukraine fanatic.
Speaker 1: Right is like, still is absolutely I mean, he's not
Speaker 1: going to say it, but.
Speaker 3: I'm listen, some of us haven't forgotten on their ideology, Brian.
Speaker 3: Some of us have not forgotten, he says, old school
Speaker 3: neo khon Republican.
Speaker 1: He's worked at Fox News for twenty years and he's
Speaker 1: a brain.
Speaker 2: Just stopped calling themselves neo cons but did not change
Speaker 2: their ideology even in a sliver. You know, they just
Speaker 2: realize that the term has a negative connotation.
Speaker 4: Now, so oh, I'm not that, but I totally support
Speaker 4: every war that's ever existed.
Speaker 3: Right, So that's the thing about But my point is
Speaker 3: about the media environment. Right, So the media environment that
Speaker 3: Trump needs to consume is one which actually has some
Speaker 3: dissonance in it. Now that's helped a little bit because
Speaker 3: of Tucker being no longer at Fox News, and he's
Speaker 3: in his ear on Ukraine and on Iran.
Speaker 1: And a few other things that he can do. But
Speaker 1: he's just one man.
Speaker 3: I mean, you can't ultimately, you know, truly affect everything
Speaker 3: through just being on the internet. We're dealing with what
Speaker 3: seventy nine year old man here at the end of
Speaker 3: the day. So yeah, look, I'm being very transparent, Like
Speaker 3: that's the one thing I'm gonna peg myself to is
Speaker 3: trying to end this war.
Speaker 1: I think it will be one of the biggest.
Speaker 3: Fights in the history of Washington because Afghanistan is nothing
Speaker 3: compared to the Cash Cow and the ideology around this,
Speaker 3: Like remember you know how Biden worshiped at the feet
Speaker 3: of NATO, Like that's.
Speaker 1: A real thing.
Speaker 3: Like people the Atlantic Council, the Carne.
Speaker 4: Every August viggers here with mile.
Speaker 3: That these people religiously pray to the god of NATO.
Speaker 1: There are people in my neighborhood who have NATO flags.
Speaker 1: Where do you even get a NATO flag? It's unbelievad.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's still like Cold War hangovers quality, and
Speaker 2: it is wild how much that still really dominates the
Speaker 2: foreign policy blog in this town. I mean, I took
Speaker 2: very close note. Maybe in some of the later speeches
Speaker 2: in the day, Trump brought up Ukraine, but considering how
Speaker 2: much a focus it was among Republicans, how much of
Speaker 2: I mean, he talked a lot about it on the
Speaker 2: campaign trail. I think partly he didn't really bring it
Speaker 2: up because, I mean, he repeatedly promised, like it's going
Speaker 2: to be solid before I even get into office day one,
Speaker 2: we're going to have a deal. Obviously that didn't happen. So,
Speaker 2: you know, I think it's an acknowledgment that even if
Speaker 2: he wants to end it, it's not like you can
Speaker 2: just this isn't one Israel. You could actually just snap
Speaker 2: your fingers and be like, we're not supplying these weapons anymore.
Speaker 2: You're gonna stop. We're not doing this like you could
Speaker 2: actually do that with Israel, Ukraine and Russia. It is
Speaker 2: a little different because you have to figet down to
Speaker 2: get that's.
Speaker 4: The table you got to, you know.
Speaker 2: I mean, obviously there's a lot we could do, but
Speaker 2: it's not a simple of a fix and it does
Speaker 2: require like real ideological consistency of sort that Donald Trump
Speaker 2: is frankly not particularly known for. And he has a
Speaker 2: soft spot for Zelensky too, and he's always likes the lens.
Speaker 3: So that's another thing I highly encourage people. Lex Friedman
Speaker 3: in his latest podcast did a breakdown of his Zelenski interview,
Speaker 3: and I don't think you would mind saying this to
Speaker 3: spend a lot of time with him this weekend, and
Speaker 3: because he said it publicly, so I'll just repeat what
Speaker 3: he said, what he was telling me and what he
Speaker 3: also said publicly was His big takeaway from his Zelenski
Speaker 3: interview was it's.
Speaker 1: Not a show.
Speaker 3: He believes it, and he does not care about peace.
Speaker 3: He has no interest in peace. So Lex asked multiple
Speaker 3: iterations of peace questions to Zelensky. Zelensky has drank his
Speaker 3: own kool aid to the extent that he believes he
Speaker 3: is like Winston Churchill. And the policy which will Choir
Speaker 3: to force a political settlement on Zelenski, which is now
Speaker 3: the only option to achieve peace in Ukraine, is either
Speaker 3: we'd have to support a coup in Ukraine, which I
Speaker 3: don't think is a good idea, or I mean, maybe
Speaker 3: they could have their own elections. That's something Zelenski's not
Speaker 3: going to allow that to happen. We have there's the
Speaker 3: only option here basically is a return to some like
Speaker 3: you know, treaties from the eighteen hundreds, where Trump and
Speaker 3: Putin will sit across a desk from each other and
Speaker 3: just be like, here's the line of control. That's it,
Speaker 3: and then you go to the Ukraine and be like,
Speaker 3: this is what's happening. And I mean, as you know,
Speaker 3: and we were just discussing, do you know the political
Speaker 3: fallout from the freakout of the media here in Washington
Speaker 3: of forcing a political settlement on Tim. I don't think
Speaker 3: Zelenski will ever play ball based on what Lex told me.
Speaker 1: I could be wrong.
Speaker 3: I mean, at the end of the days a client state, right,
Speaker 3: He'd rather be alive than be you know, like be
Speaker 3: defeated and humiliated on the battlefield.
Speaker 1: But equally Trump would want to.
Speaker 3: Avoid that at all costs because look, even if Ukraine
Speaker 3: got taken over, I mean, I still wouldn't think it'd
Speaker 3: be worth going to nuclear war for it over. But
Speaker 3: as we all learn from Afghanistan, if you broadcast Cities
Speaker 3: Kiev twenty four to seven and turn this into a
Speaker 3: cause celeb it can go like this in public opinion.
Speaker 3: Public opinion is still not, in my opinion, great on Ukraine,
Speaker 3: and it's still number three issue that people rate Biden's
Speaker 3: effectiveness on it. There's a Boomer mentality about Russia that
Speaker 3: lives deep in the American mind.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean it was really sold as like a values proposition,
Speaker 2: and I think a lot of people and I mean,
Speaker 2: and there is a value proposition there, Like that's not
Speaker 2: like our country doesn't have really the credibility to frame
Speaker 2: it as a values proposition. But this idea of like, no,
Speaker 2: we have this established order that you don't get to
Speaker 2: just push your weight around because you're the larger country,
Speaker 2: like Russia invading Ukraine was genuinely bad and wrong. But
Speaker 2: then you have to ask, like, Okay, given where we are,
Speaker 2: what is the best and most reasonable path forward?
Speaker 4: And the Ukrainians would have gotten a.
Speaker 2: Much better deal if instead of being interested in continuing
Speaker 2: this war, if we had been interested in negotiating a
Speaker 2: peaceful settlement. And that was really the massiveness opportunity, so
Speaker 2: many lives, so much destruction between then and now, only
Speaker 2: for Ukraine to be in a worst position, worst position
Speaker 2: in terms of what they're going to end up getting
Speaker 2: here at the end of the day, whenever this thing
Speaker 2: burns out. So I don't know if I don't know
Speaker 2: if I read the mediate landscape the same way you do,
Speaker 2: because I feel like there's a lot of Ukraine fatigue
Speaker 2: and also just less willingness to resist Trump's liketics than
Speaker 2: any particular direction.
Speaker 1: Jake tappergily wrote a book.
Speaker 2: No I expected the Afghanistan withdrawal or reaction.
Speaker 4: I definitely expected that.
Speaker 2: But with regards to Ukraine, I don't know. I think
Speaker 2: there is an increasing mainstream media acknowledgment that Ukrainians are
Speaker 2: not winning, that it's going to be impossible for them
Speaker 2: to get all of their territory back, and something is
Speaker 2: going to have to be figured out.
Speaker 1: I would nobody would like that more than me.
Speaker 3: Whether it actually happens, I don't know, I still think
Speaker 3: that these people have religious connections to Ukraine. They think
Speaker 3: Kiev is the fifty first state. It's crazy, like you know,
Speaker 3: the way that they think about the issue. And if
Speaker 3: there were ever, like if there was ever like real
Speaker 3: Afghanistan type images that came out, I do think it
Speaker 3: actually would cause a big problem for Trump. And at
Speaker 3: the end, like what is my theme of all my
Speaker 3: commentary here with Trump? Trump is a transactional, bigger and
Speaker 3: Afghanistan influence.
Speaker 2: The Afghanistan example is instructive because he knew it was
Speaker 2: popular in theory to gain out of Afghanistan. But there's
Speaker 2: a reason why he didn't pull the trigger because when
Speaker 2: you end a war, guess what, then you had to
Speaker 2: actually grapple with the reality of what was accomplished and
Speaker 2: failed in all of those things over those years. And
Speaker 2: so it wouldn't be quite the same event as Afghanistan
Speaker 2: because obviously we didn't have troops directly there, it was
Speaker 2: a shorter time period, et cetera.
Speaker 4: But you know, Biden that he was popular.
Speaker 2: Biden was up until the Afghan WITHDRAWALKEM and it did
Speaker 2: NUKEM and he never recovered. And obviously there were other
Speaker 2: things that contributed to that negative sentiment towards him. But
Speaker 2: that really was kind of the beginning of the end
Speaker 2: of his presidency, unfortunately, because it's one of the best
Speaker 2: things that he actually did and one of the more
Speaker 2: courageous things that.
Speaker 4: He actually did.
Speaker 2: But nothing will form a bipartisan consensus faster than you know,
Speaker 2: trying to not be in a war. They will unite
Speaker 2: against you, Fox and CNN and MSNBC. Man, they will
Speaker 2: all be seeing in the exact same tune the minute
Speaker 2: that you try to exit or avoid a potential war.
Speaker 2: And yeah, I do think that Trump is quite aware
Speaker 2: of that.