Speaker 1: Don't know.
Speaker 2: Every day a waygo click up the Breakfast Club.
Speaker 1: Finish, y'all done?
Speaker 2: Morning.
Speaker 3: Everybody is DJ Envy Jess Hilarious, Chelamage the guy. We
Speaker 3: are to breakfast Club, law l the Roses here as well,
Speaker 3: and we got a special guest in the building. Yes, indeed,
Speaker 3: he has a new book, Retribution from Donald Trump and
Speaker 3: the Campaign that changed America.
Speaker 2: John Call, Ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 1: Hey, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: How would you fail?
Speaker 4: How are you?
Speaker 1: I'm doing it all right, I'm doing it right, crazy times.
Speaker 4: This is your fourth book on Trump?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you like jobbing yourself crazy?
Speaker 4: Huh?
Speaker 1: Oh my god. I I wrote one almost six years ago,
Speaker 1: and I thought that would be the only one. But
Speaker 1: this is fifteen hundred pages on this stuff. But you know,
Speaker 1: I mean I felt like I was watching history unfold
Speaker 1: and I saw people trying to rewrite the history as
Speaker 1: it was happening. And that's why I've you know, I've
Speaker 1: poured my heart and soul into these books.
Speaker 5: Well feels different about this, this this face, this era
Speaker 5: of Trump.
Speaker 1: If anything, if it does feel different, I mean it does.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think what's what we're seeing now is
Speaker 1: as suggested by the subtitle of this book, It's changing
Speaker 1: in America. His first term was chaotic. I mean, the
Speaker 1: attention of the world was on the White House. There
Speaker 1: was all this controversy swirling. But you know, he left
Speaker 1: and it was done. I mean there was nothing, no
Speaker 1: real lasting impact. I mean, now look what he's doing.
Speaker 1: And symbolically you could look at like tearing down the
Speaker 1: East Wing, you know, changing paving over the Rose Garden.
Speaker 1: He's changing the physical layout of the White House. But
Speaker 1: what our country is changing, I mean the use of
Speaker 1: executive power. You have a president that's shown you can
Speaker 1: just basically ignore Congress, get into the precipice of ignoring
Speaker 1: the courts. We're in a totally different phase, I think.
Speaker 3: I think the first term was more of to see
Speaker 3: how far or what he could get away with.
Speaker 2: And then when he came back, he just started.
Speaker 3: I mean he started at first day desk signing all
Speaker 3: types of part is, signing things into play immediately.
Speaker 2: So I think the first time was let me see
Speaker 2: what I can get away with.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know, he he had all these people
Speaker 1: around him in the in the first firm, who had credentials.
Speaker 1: You know, he felt like he almost like trophies on
Speaker 1: a wall his cabinet. You had the four star marine generals,
Speaker 1: you had the CEO of Excellent Mobile, you had the
Speaker 1: retired judge and senator he put in charge of the
Speaker 1: of the Justice Department, and every one of those people.
Speaker 1: You know, you could say, well, you know, Trump has
Speaker 1: no experience in the government, but they do. And he
Speaker 1: felt betrayed by all of them. They all tried to
Speaker 1: keep him, to a degree in line. And now that
Speaker 1: they're all gone, they're all gone.
Speaker 5: You know, you begin the book with an admission, you
Speaker 5: say you believe that Donald trump come back was highly unlikely.
Speaker 5: Like what was the moment or series of moments in
Speaker 5: your reporting when you're when you're thinking shifted.
Speaker 1: You know, the It wasn't really until pretty close to
Speaker 1: the election, when I saw how the Kamala Harris campaign
Speaker 1: was approaching it, and I saw their almost desperation to
Speaker 1: have another debate with Donald Trump. I saw her go
Speaker 1: on Fox News after resisting all kinds of interviews, something
Speaker 1: you had said she should have done a long time ago.
Speaker 1: And I report in the book how she actually her
Speaker 1: campaign actually approached Fox and asked them if they would
Speaker 1: host a debate. This is in the end, you know,
Speaker 1: in October and Trump and Fox said sure, but Trump
Speaker 1: had no interest in doing it again. And that's where
Speaker 1: I saw. She wouldn't have been doing that if they
Speaker 1: didn't see that she was likely to lose.
Speaker 5: When you realized that not only was the comeback possible,
Speaker 5: but that the campaign was built around this idea of
Speaker 5: retrobution in a structural way, when did you realize that?
Speaker 1: Really early on? I mean I I was there in
Speaker 1: mar A Lago when he announced his campaign shortly after
Speaker 1: the midterms in twenty twenty two. It puttered along, It
Speaker 1: was nothing. It was you know, Ron DeSantis was leading
Speaker 1: in the polls, if you remember, double digits by the
Speaker 1: end of twenty twenty two. And then he gave this
Speaker 1: speech at Sea Pack where he used that line. You know,
Speaker 1: he said, I told you I am your voice in
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen. Now I tell you I am your retribution.
Speaker 1: And that gave his his campaign this energy. And then
Speaker 1: you had the the the indictments coming in. You had
Speaker 1: he started his campaign. The first rally of his campaign
Speaker 1: was it Waco, Texas. I mean, I wrote a book
Speaker 1: like thirty years ago this December, I wrote a book
Speaker 1: called The Right to bear arms, the rise of America's
Speaker 1: new militias, about the right wing militia groups, Timothy McVeigh
Speaker 1: and all of that, and you know, the Waco, Texas
Speaker 1: was the rallying cry for those people. It was as
Speaker 1: the symbol of like the government out of control and
Speaker 1: coming after you. And now Trump is going to Waco.
Speaker 1: So I saw and then sitting through that trial in
Speaker 1: New York, the hush money trial, and I could just
Speaker 1: see the seething resentment that he had that he had
Speaker 1: to go to that court room every day, four days
Speaker 1: a week. You've been down, there's one hundred centers. He
Speaker 1: is a dingy dark you know, dirty. I mean I
Speaker 1: described when I because I went down and sat through
Speaker 1: several days down there, and you go through the front
Speaker 1: door of the courthouse. The first thing I notice is
Speaker 1: this big rat traps inside, you know, I mean, And
Speaker 1: and he's got to be there, and he can't leave
Speaker 1: even like during the lunch breaks. He's got to be
Speaker 1: there in some dark, cold room. And he just you
Speaker 1: could see he was plotting, I am going to get
Speaker 1: even with all of these people if I get back
Speaker 1: into power.
Speaker 6: Do you feel like there will ever actually be like
Speaker 6: retribution that he thinks because there's always something new that
Speaker 6: he feels like he has to like get back. I mean,
Speaker 6: he's getting people back, but like, is there a place
Speaker 6: where it stops, Like where he gets to the point
Speaker 6: where he's like, yo, I didn't got yaut and did enough?
Speaker 1: No? No, no, I mean you think, first of all,
Speaker 1: you would think that the guy he got back to
Speaker 1: the White House and he won, you would think that
Speaker 1: maybe at that point you'd be like, Okay, you know,
Speaker 1: I've proved everybody wrong. I'm here, I'm in power again. No,
Speaker 1: he's going to keep going. And here's the thing. It's
Speaker 1: not just political opponents. It's not just the Democrats, it's
Speaker 1: not just the prosecutors. It's not just the people that
Speaker 1: literally went after him. I think that the thing that
Speaker 1: motivates him the most is getting back at Republicans who
Speaker 1: he believes didn't sufficiently support him. Really yeah, I mean yeah.
Speaker 1: The other day Steve Bannon said something. Steve Bannon said
Speaker 1: that that Bill Barr belongs in prison. Bill Barr. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is like, you know, and his bars sin was
Speaker 1: that he didn't back Trump on the efforts to overthrow
Speaker 1: the twenty twenty election. And you know, I mean, so
Speaker 1: his first motivation, that the beginning of the retribution campaign
Speaker 1: actually begins in the days after he leaves the White House,
Speaker 1: he goes to mar A Lago. He's really seen as
Speaker 1: a pria even by most of the Republican leadership. He's
Speaker 1: banned on Facebook and Instagram and Twitter and all of that.
Speaker 1: Corporations are saying they're not going to give money to
Speaker 1: Republicans that backed him in overturning the election. And he's
Speaker 1: in a very dark place. I mean, I described this,
Speaker 1: you know, pretty graphically in my previous book about his
Speaker 1: exile down there. But what is the first project he has?
Speaker 1: His polster gives him a membo that shows him that
Speaker 1: Liz Cheney can be beat in Wyoming, Liz Cheney who
Speaker 1: voted to impeach him, and that is the beginning. He
Speaker 1: is now focused on, first time, going to go after
Speaker 1: those damn those ten Republicans that voted to impeach me
Speaker 1: in the House. They're gone, and he defeats Liz Cheney.
Speaker 1: So he you know, I mean, he expects Democrats to
Speaker 1: be his opponents. He knows prosecutors do what prosecutors do.
Speaker 1: It's those Republicans So.
Speaker 5: Is that to put fear in the team that's around
Speaker 5: him now, to let y'all know, y'all better always go
Speaker 5: along with me, because if y'all get out of line,
Speaker 5: then it'll be retribution against y'all too.
Speaker 1: That's a huge factor, and it's pretty damn effective. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is the other thing to talk about. What's different
Speaker 1: from the first time. The first time you had Paul
Speaker 1: Ryan and Mitch McConnell as the leaders in the Congress,
Speaker 1: neither one of them had any loyalty whatsoever personal loyalty
Speaker 1: to Trump, and in fact had opposed him strongly in
Speaker 1: the case actually in both cases in twenty sixteen in
Speaker 1: the Republican primary. And now you have I mean, Fune
Speaker 1: has a degree of independence. But like I mean, like Johnson,
Speaker 1: the Speaker of the House, he's almost behaves like he's
Speaker 1: a member of the of the Trump's staff. I mean
Speaker 1: that the House is there to do the will of
Speaker 1: the White House.
Speaker 3: I mean, you didn't have that before when you were
Speaker 3: writing this book and you spoke to a lot of people.
Speaker 3: Would do in this book was did anybody not want
Speaker 3: to do it or was scared to talk with you?
Speaker 4: Speak with you?
Speaker 2: Because they said he might come back for me.
Speaker 1: You definitely, It's always always and yet you know, and
Speaker 1: what I really tried to do with this book was
Speaker 1: to get people who would talk to me on the record.
Speaker 1: And I succeeded in some of the big you know,
Speaker 1: some of the key players I mentioned Steve Bannon, I
Speaker 1: mean hours of conversations with this guy. Bobby Kennedy was
Speaker 1: somebody I was talking to throughout the campaign. On the
Speaker 1: other side, Hunter Biden like really opened up to me.
Speaker 1: And what I did with with with some of these
Speaker 1: people is I said, Okay, talk to me, tell me
Speaker 1: the story. I am not this is for a book.
Speaker 1: It's not going to affect anything. Just talk to me,
Speaker 1: and it's for history. And that kind of draws them out.
Speaker 1: But there are and then there were some people that
Speaker 1: just didn't want to don't want to be seen with
Speaker 1: me or with a reporter because then they might be like, aha,
Speaker 1: he saw this. Like you know, there was a Todd
Speaker 1: blanche you know now obviously at the Justice Department, but
Speaker 1: was the lead on his defense cases during the transition.
Speaker 1: Somebody took a picture of him meeting with a CNN
Speaker 1: reporter and like put it all out of one of
Speaker 1: the is if this was like proof he's not sufficiently
Speaker 1: on the team.
Speaker 6: I saw Hunter Biden told you that he was really
Speaker 6: upset when Obama led Biden off the state in that
Speaker 6: viral video. So when you are talking to people about
Speaker 6: these moments, that will bring these moments back up again,
Speaker 6: Like he's upset it when viral in the first place,
Speaker 6: He's upset Obama did it. But then he sits down
Speaker 6: and talks to you, which brings it back.
Speaker 1: Up again, right, exactly what is.
Speaker 6: The conversation I guess after the book comes out and
Speaker 6: people pick that up because that was the main folks
Speaker 6: of the news conversation.
Speaker 1: Now you're seeing it again exactly.
Speaker 6: So does Hunter Biden then call you back and be
Speaker 6: like we need to do another interview where like how
Speaker 6: do you handle the not the backlash, but the conversation
Speaker 6: that comes back up because of your book from these
Speaker 6: people that you sit down with.
Speaker 1: By the way, that was such an interesting conversation with
Speaker 1: Hunter Biden. So I talked to him over the phone
Speaker 1: a lot during the course of the campaign, including when
Speaker 1: you know there was that big effort to get his
Speaker 1: father to drop out, and he was like one of
Speaker 1: the few people actually talking to President Biden every day.
Speaker 1: I mean even like his top aides were, you know,
Speaker 1: many of them were isolated. I mean the chief of staff,
Speaker 1: Jeff Science. When Biden had the final meeting where he
Speaker 1: decides he's not going on again, the chief of Staff's
Speaker 1: not even there. He's not even part of the meeting.
Speaker 1: He gets called later, by the way, I decided I'm
Speaker 1: not going to run. But Hunter was so passionate in
Speaker 1: his anger towards Obama. He said he was there at
Speaker 1: that fundraiser, went for that viral moment, and he wanted
Speaker 1: to jump up on the stage and say, you don't
Speaker 1: touch the President of the United States. And then he
Speaker 1: also is angry about the George Clooney op ed, which
Speaker 1: he blames Obama for. He's also saying, I guess we
Speaker 1: just have it. We Biden's have a different idea of
Speaker 1: what it means to be a friend.
Speaker 5: So you're mad at George Clooney for telling the truth,
Speaker 5: shouldn't you be kind of mad at your father for
Speaker 5: running again for a second term. He probably wasn't gonna
Speaker 5: be in the best condition to.
Speaker 6: And then throws Obama in the mix.
Speaker 2: Obama's not Obama.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, Obama, who's not didn't write the thing.
Speaker 4: So Obamas, you just got him wandering around the stage.
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean it is first of all, a
Speaker 1: few of those people really close and tight around Obama
Speaker 1: are I mean Biden are still absolutely convinced that he
Speaker 1: could have won and that this was a tragedy that
Speaker 1: the Democrats forced him out.
Speaker 5: I mean, we should never talk through those people that
Speaker 5: I'm not even joking. We should leave those people in
Speaker 5: the past like they should be out the pastors.
Speaker 1: Just like, here's the thing, I this sometimes the biggest
Speaker 1: news and is what didn't happen. The most consequential decision
Speaker 1: of Joe Biden's life professional life was the decision to
Speaker 1: run again. I mean it the race is virtually everything
Speaker 1: that he did as president. And they never had a
Speaker 1: meeting on it. They never sat down and said, what
Speaker 1: are the pros and cons running again? Not running again?
Speaker 1: What does it look like? I mean, Hunter himself said,
Speaker 1: the machinery just went. We never really discussed should we
Speaker 1: And then that's that is the biggest decision.
Speaker 5: That's one of the biggest you know, that's one of
Speaker 5: the most glaring things from the Vice President's BOK one
Speaker 5: hundred and seven days that.
Speaker 4: I feel like people didn't discuss enough.
Speaker 5: When she said that the Bidy shouldn't have been able
Speaker 5: to make that decision alone.
Speaker 4: I think I'm para for them a little bit.
Speaker 5: It was reckless for him to make that decision on
Speaker 5: his own, And I'm like, why would that ever be
Speaker 5: a decision?
Speaker 4: Let him make one?
Speaker 1: Yeah, and all the you know, it's not just the
Speaker 1: it's not just the party. It's not just the White
Speaker 1: House leadership, the vice president. It's the whole democratic apparatus.
Speaker 1: I mean, nobody going in and saying, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: let's think about this.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And I you know, that's to me, that's a
Speaker 5: whole other book. But at some point somebody's gonna have
Speaker 5: to sit down and talk about how that decision and
Speaker 5: the decision to hire Merrit Garland is why we ended
Speaker 5: up where we currently.
Speaker 4: Are right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: And in the book, you describe how a new team
Speaker 5: was formed around Trump with the goal of a of
Speaker 5: a new world order.
Speaker 4: Can you walk us.
Speaker 5: Through like one or two behind the scenes organizational, our
Speaker 5: strategic decisions that reveal how his team, how this team
Speaker 5: operated differently than previous politically.
Speaker 1: Well, I spent a great deal of time describing what
Speaker 1: was actually happening at mar A Lago. And if you remember,
Speaker 1: there was some political commentary at the time saying, man, Trump,
Speaker 1: this time arounds got it more together. There's less drama
Speaker 1: surrounding the transition. They're putting out their nominees and a
Speaker 1: quicker pace. It I mean no, uh, it was. It
Speaker 1: was total chaos. Yes, you had, you had you, I
Speaker 1: mean you had. The campaign transition office was actually a
Speaker 1: couple miles away in West Palm Beach where the campaign
Speaker 1: it was the old campaign office became the transition office.
Speaker 1: Mar A Lague was actually a pretty small place. There's
Speaker 1: only one office, which is Trump's office. And but so
Speaker 1: you had you had all these transition people working two
Speaker 1: miles away, but none of it mattered. They were preparing
Speaker 1: lists and interviewing potential candidates and and doing their vetting.
Speaker 1: And then it was like Trump deciding on his own
Speaker 1: and surprising the people that were running his transition. So
Speaker 1: you know, Pete Hegseth I described the mar A Laga.
Speaker 1: There's a place called the living room. It's really the lobby,
Speaker 1: and people would go and wait for their their meetings,
Speaker 1: either with Lutnik and the transition team or upstairs to
Speaker 1: go and have their big meeting with Trump. And there's
Speaker 1: a scene where there's a candidate for attorney general sitting
Speaker 1: on the couch next to a candidate for for Energy secretary.
Speaker 1: You know, Matt Gates is running around. He's not even
Speaker 1: considered an attorney general candidate. He's just considered, you know,
Speaker 1: a guy that's helping out. And Pete Hegseth shows up
Speaker 1: and they all think he's there to interview Trump because
Speaker 1: he's the Fox weekend guy. And so Trump didn't even
Speaker 1: like talk to his like people about this. It was like,
Speaker 1: Pete's the man, We'll just do him. So, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's really the way it was all centered around
Speaker 1: Trump and and and and his whim and what he wanted.
Speaker 1: It was, you know, you didn't have anybody and actually,
Speaker 1: let me let me back up a second. The one
Speaker 1: thing that is very different is that, first of all,
Speaker 1: he knew his way around, so he didn't think he
Speaker 1: needed to rely on anybody for advice. But you also
Speaker 1: had some of the people that had been with him
Speaker 1: all along had been preparing for what they would do
Speaker 1: if he got back into office. Stephen Miller started a
Speaker 1: group called America First Legal, and they'd worked for three
Speaker 1: plus years thinking about executive orders that they would do
Speaker 1: if Trump got back in preparing drafts.
Speaker 4: One of these things.
Speaker 1: This even this predates Project twenty twenty five, but yeah,
Speaker 1: absolutely project twenty twenty five. So they were ready with
Speaker 1: an agenda, and it's ultimately Trump's agenda, but they were
Speaker 1: ready with here's the roadmap. Here is how you're really
Speaker 1: going to do it.
Speaker 5: What surprises you most about how I guess American presidential
Speaker 5: campaigns and governance, Yeah, are changing.
Speaker 1: It's the absolute power that we're seeing vested in the executive.
Speaker 1: I mean, we have a system of checks and balances
Speaker 1: in this country. You know, it's I mean, that's the idea.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's a great question. Do we still have that?
Speaker 1: It is very much putter. I mean, the House of
Speaker 1: Representatives has just been out of session for fifty four
Speaker 1: days and did it matter?
Speaker 4: Nope?
Speaker 1: I mean, was there anything different? To quote Bannon again,
Speaker 1: he called and I don't know if he was being
Speaker 1: complimentary or not, he called the Congress the equivalent of
Speaker 1: the Russian Duma, which is just like, I mean, not
Speaker 1: even a rubber stamp. You don't even need to be stamped.
Speaker 1: So Trump this flurry of executive orders tariffs, I mean,
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court case will be the most interesting thing
Speaker 1: to watch in this term of the Supreme Court. I
Speaker 1: mean the fact that the idea that a president can
Speaker 1: come out and impose tariffs on virtually every country in
Speaker 1: the world. The Constitution makes it clear that Congress controls
Speaker 1: the power to tax and imposed duties. And I mean,
Speaker 1: I think about my life covering politics. The debates over
Speaker 1: trade are big debates. You know, NAFTA, the US Mexico
Speaker 1: Free Trade Agreement TPP, all these things that are negotiated
Speaker 1: and then Congress needs to ratify them and if they don't,
Speaker 1: they don't go into effect. And Trump just holds a
Speaker 1: press conference in the Rose Garden and suddenly you have
Speaker 1: these mass tariffs. So we'll see if that gets knocked down.
Speaker 1: I mean, the Supreme Court seemed pretty damn skeptical of it,
Speaker 1: but you know, he has I mean pushed. It's not
Speaker 1: enough to say push the bounds of the power of
Speaker 1: the executive, but beyond anything we've ever seen, why do.
Speaker 5: We even still believe in the Supreme Court, Like the
Speaker 5: Supreme Court had not been a legitimate institution for a
Speaker 5: long time.
Speaker 1: Well let's see what they do on this.
Speaker 5: We say that about every single time, but they have
Speaker 5: proven where their loyalty lies.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I mean, I mean there's no question
Speaker 1: that that conservative majority has served Trump very well, especially
Speaker 1: in terms of knocking down or freezing the rulings of
Speaker 1: all those low courts.
Speaker 5: And I think it's ridiculous when people say things about
Speaker 5: Trump and they'd be like, you know, he's committing crimes.
Speaker 5: Actually he's not because of the Supreme Court presidential immunity.
Speaker 1: I mean, this was the amazing thing about this election
Speaker 1: is that for Trump himself, he faced like two possible outcomes.
Speaker 1: He loses and he might go to prison. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's a really decent chance he's gonna go to prison,
Speaker 1: or he's gonna spend the rest of his life fighting
Speaker 1: to stay out of prison. Or he wins. He doesn't
Speaker 1: just become president again, he becomes the most powerful president
Speaker 1: of our time because the Supreme Court says, basically, you
Speaker 1: can do anything you want as long as it's tied
Speaker 1: in some way to your job. You have immunity. So
Speaker 1: the one place that the Supreme Court did defy him,
Speaker 1: and there have been a couple of instances, but one
Speaker 1: big one in recent years was he really thought the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court was going to ride to the rescue and
Speaker 1: nullify the election in twenty twenty, and they refused. So
Speaker 1: we'll see. I think the tariffs thing will be a
Speaker 1: big test because you know, you talk to conservatives, judicial conservatives.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's no way that a president has the
Speaker 1: power to unilaterally impose tax you know, tariff's taxes on
Speaker 1: the rest of the world. So what do they do
Speaker 1: on this? And Trump is trying to pressure on them,
Speaker 1: me saying if we don't, you know, if they rule
Speaker 1: the wrong way, we want to have a country anymore,
Speaker 1: et cetera, et cetera. But let's see. I actually think
Speaker 1: that they're going to slap them down on this.
Speaker 5: But we'll say, what legacy do you think this will
Speaker 5: have on like future campaigns, future governance, because I feel
Speaker 5: like this this only.
Speaker 4: Works for Trump.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, I mean there's no Republican that I can
Speaker 1: see that would just suddenly inherit the movement and everybody
Speaker 1: would do what they've done for him, which is total
Speaker 1: loyalty even when they disagree with him. Well, we don't
Speaker 1: disagree with him anymore. I mean J. D. Vance doesn't
Speaker 1: command that kind of power. Marco Rubio doesn't command that
Speaker 1: kind of power. But I do think that the rules
Speaker 1: of the game have changed, and I think the next
Speaker 1: Democrat president. I mean, you see what Gavin Newsom did
Speaker 1: on the on the redistricting, and he's quite clear about it.
Speaker 1: It's like we can sit here and talk about our
Speaker 1: good government stuff that we but no, they've they've fought
Speaker 1: dirty and basically saying we have to fight dirty back.
Speaker 1: So this, this governing by executive order, you know, is
Speaker 1: something and we'll see how much of it gets knocked down.
Speaker 1: But I mean, I think this is part of the
Speaker 1: part of what's going to happen now. So you don't
Speaker 1: see a third term. You don't see him trying for what.
Speaker 5: I don't even like that conversation. Yeah, like we shouldn't
Speaker 5: even be having that conversation.
Speaker 1: Twenty second Amendment says it is. It just can't happen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's so many things that they said that can't
Speaker 3: happen that he does that happens.
Speaker 1: You know. I had a conversation with John Kelly shortly
Speaker 1: after he left the White House as chief of Staff.
Speaker 1: So Trump was still in power, and I was having
Speaker 1: its kind of it's amazing to think back at it,
Speaker 1: but I was. I was just wondering. I was beginning
Speaker 1: to write my very first book on all of this,
Speaker 1: and I was just what happens if Trump doesn't leave office?
Speaker 1: This is first term, you know, way before January sixth
Speaker 1: and all that, and I was just like, what what happens?
Speaker 1: So I asked Kelly this again, retired four star marine general,
Speaker 1: you know, a guy who's seen a lot. And he said,
Speaker 1: oh no, no, he's gonna leave. Trust me, he's going
Speaker 1: to leave. And and and then he paused and he said,
Speaker 1: and you know, and if he doesn't want to, he
Speaker 1: could chain himself to the resolute desk and there will
Speaker 1: be people will quietly go into the Oval office and
Speaker 1: cut the chains and take him out. So, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's you know, I thought there
Speaker 1: was just such a vivid image that we do have
Speaker 1: a system. But you know, he has he has installed
Speaker 1: loyalists everywhere, and I think it's going to be very
Speaker 1: hard for him to leave office. But he can't run again.
Speaker 1: According unless you make our constitution doesn't mean anything.
Speaker 4: I mean, I mean, they kind of treating like I
Speaker 4: don't mean anything.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 5: I want to ask you, did you talk to any
Speaker 5: of those generals and admirals who went to that meeting
Speaker 5: a couple months ago where they basically was trying to
Speaker 5: get them the pledge allegiance to them.
Speaker 4: That's what it felt like to me.
Speaker 5: It felt like they were trying to get th old
Speaker 5: general and the pledget leaders to them and not the Constitutes.
Speaker 4: Did you talk to anybody?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've I've I've kept in touch with a number
Speaker 1: of our senior military leaders who will privately say that
Speaker 1: they were horrified by what happened and horrified what happened
Speaker 1: earlier in the year at Fort Bragg. Do you remember
Speaker 1: this one when Trump went to give a speech at
Speaker 1: Fort Bragg and they actually somebody brought in onto the base, Uh,
Speaker 1: these these tents to sell merchandise, Trump campaign merchandise. The
Speaker 1: troops cheered him on as he gave a very political speech,
Speaker 1: attacking Gavin Newsom, attacking the mayor of Los Angeles, attacking
Speaker 1: the Democrats in the Senate, and it looked like a
Speaker 1: campaign rally, and there was a It turned out that
Speaker 1: there was a memo that they went out to some
Speaker 1: of the troops at Fort Bragg saying basically saying, if
Speaker 1: you don't you agree with Trump, you don't have to
Speaker 1: come to this and have people that are going to
Speaker 1: be fully supportive. And you know, the military is a
Speaker 1: is a non partisan institution. It has to be. It
Speaker 1: has to be for our country to you know, for
Speaker 1: our democracy to mean anything. And and those senior military
Speaker 1: officers for the most part take that really seriously. And
Speaker 1: that's why I think when you know, when hegseeth brings
Speaker 1: them in to do that and gives that speech and
Speaker 1: you see them not respond. They weren't clapping and cheering.
Speaker 1: They were, you know, there they have to follow the orders,
Speaker 1: and they come and they look, but they were not
Speaker 1: going to be political props.
Speaker 4: That's good, That's refreshing.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Okay, let's talk about the media side of it, right,
Speaker 6: because we all know that Trump has his thing with
Speaker 6: the media that he likes and he dislikes. So there
Speaker 6: was the question that you asked him about the hate speech. Yeah,
Speaker 6: after Charlie Kirk's death right, and he verbatim said to you,
Speaker 6: you asked, what will happen you?
Speaker 1: I asked him, I said, Pam Bond. He says she's
Speaker 1: going to go after hate speech. Some of your own
Speaker 1: allies say, hate speech is free speech.
Speaker 6: Yes, And he says that she'll probably go after people
Speaker 6: like you because you treat me so unfairly, you have
Speaker 6: a lot of hate in your heart. Maybe they'll come
Speaker 6: after ABC. ABC paid me sixteen million dollars recently for
Speaker 6: a form of hate speech. Your company paid me sixteen
Speaker 6: million for a form of hate speech. You'll maybe they'll
Speaker 6: have to go after you. Yeah, direct back and forth
Speaker 6: like that. Yeah, you're still out here asking these questions
Speaker 6: and covering. People are very scared at their jobs right
Speaker 6: now in the media space, behind the scenes. What's the
Speaker 6: feeling of like, what does media even look like six
Speaker 6: months from now if Trump is able to do and
Speaker 6: say things like this and then we actually see action.
Speaker 1: How do you feel after he said that? Well, I'll
Speaker 1: tell you that was that was intense because I was
Speaker 1: you know, you don't get surprised much anymore of anything,
Speaker 1: he says. But when he said that, maybe she'll go
Speaker 1: after people like you, like personally, and then he goes
Speaker 1: on and he says, you know, because you've been unfair
Speaker 1: to me, So you're saying that the First Amendment doesn't
Speaker 1: apply to a journalist who the president thinks hasn't been fair.
Speaker 1: I mean, that was that was intense as matter. He said,
Speaker 1: you have a lot of hate in your heart. I
Speaker 1: have to tell you that this is a strange thing.
Speaker 1: I was so taken aback by the notion that the
Speaker 1: President the United States was suggesting that it would because
Speaker 1: hate speech is one He's actually going way further than
Speaker 1: what Pam BONDI said. He's saying, you know, maybe the
Speaker 1: Justice Department will go after reporters who I don't think
Speaker 1: are fair. To me that I didn't even like process.
Speaker 1: The next thing he said, which you have a lot
Speaker 1: of hate in your heart, I didn't even like. I
Speaker 1: don't know something. It's just it just I mean he did.
Speaker 2: He's saying, as you next.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it went by me. So when when the whole
Speaker 1: thing ended, one of the photographers behind me said, man,
Speaker 1: do you have hate in your heart? I didn't know
Speaker 1: what he was talking about. I look almost like so,
Speaker 1: I you know, he's he says, he's look, he's taunted.
Speaker 1: He's uh, he attacks journalists. Uh, he attacks journalists. And
Speaker 1: then he takes phone calls from reporters. You know, I
Speaker 1: mean at shortly after he said that it was actually
Speaker 1: in response to the same question, because he went on
Speaker 1: and on and on. He started going off about how Washington,
Speaker 1: d C. Is safe again now that we have the
Speaker 1: National Guard, and you should take your beautiful wife out
Speaker 1: to dinner tonight after you just told me I might,
Speaker 1: maybe I should go next. Yeah, And later in the
Speaker 1: day he he had an event in the Oval Office
Speaker 1: and he turned it into one of these like long
Speaker 1: press conferences, and I continued my questioning about free speech,
Speaker 1: and he got very irritated with me, and he said, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, and you you you think you're a wonderful person.
Speaker 1: You're not a wonderful person. You are a terrible reporter.
Speaker 1: You know it, I know it. Everybody knows it. And
Speaker 1: he goes on and again, this is the President of
Speaker 1: the United States is a reporter. You're not usually in
Speaker 1: a you don't think you're gonna you're gonna have this
Speaker 1: kind of a situation. I what I've done, what I've
Speaker 1: always done, is is I ignore the taunts because it
Speaker 1: doesn't matter. I don't want to make it about me,
Speaker 1: so I don't. I just don't. I just get back
Speaker 1: to you know, the subject, free speech. But when when
Speaker 1: it ended and they tell the press to get out
Speaker 1: of the Oval office because the photo op is over,
Speaker 1: he motioned to me to come towards the resolute desk
Speaker 1: and he motioned like this, and he said, ye know,
Speaker 1: we're okay, We're okay. And I was like, you were
Speaker 1: you were tough there, and he's like, no, no, you
Speaker 1: were tough. And he starts laughing and then says thank you,
Speaker 1: thank you. As I'm walking out, thank you, John, thank
Speaker 1: you John. So it's like it's like a it's a
Speaker 1: it's a performance. But so and I my one of
Speaker 1: my daughters, uh as I'm get this book's coming out
Speaker 1: and uh just did a quick little I guess at
Speaker 1: Google search. But but to compile some of the things
Speaker 1: that Trump has said about me over the years, it's
Speaker 1: a really long list. But you know, I I to me,
Speaker 1: it's like, I don't care, it doesn't matter, and just
Speaker 1: do my job. And I don't now if he follows
Speaker 1: through with that, and I like, you know, he starts,
Speaker 1: you know, jailing reporters or trying to jail reporters because
Speaker 1: he doesn't like the reporting. You know, we're in a
Speaker 1: whole different place. But you know, to me, A lot
Speaker 1: of it is He's just it's a bit of a game.
Speaker 1: And he does get angry and he does get pissed off.
Speaker 1: He thinks that everybody should be talking about how wonderful
Speaker 1: he is at all times. But you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna do that. And I'm also not going
Speaker 1: to sit there and get like my backup because he
Speaker 1: calls me a name.
Speaker 6: So no real fear, there's no I'm asking. I mean,
Speaker 6: is there real fear that people have because we on
Speaker 6: this side it looks like and it feels like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I think that some for some people, yes,
Speaker 1: But I can just speak for myself and for my colleagues.
Speaker 1: I mean, another one of my colleagues, Rachel Scott, has
Speaker 1: come under withering attacks from Donald Trump. I mean just
Speaker 1: just relentless. Uh. And she's and by the way, she's
Speaker 1: like ridiculously young. And I don't know where the the
Speaker 1: poise and the you know, I mean, I've been true
Speaker 1: so much of this, but Rachel has got I mean,
Speaker 1: her heartbeat doesn't rise. She just keeps focused on the issue.
Speaker 1: And you know, I mean, does it bother people? Yeah,
Speaker 1: But you do what Rachel does or what I've tried
Speaker 1: to do, which is just stay focused on what you're
Speaker 1: trying to ask and you can't be intimidated.
Speaker 5: Yeah, there is a normalization that I feel continues to
Speaker 5: happen with Trump, not just from the media, but from
Speaker 5: like other politicians, especially Democrats. It's like people for some
Speaker 5: reason continue to act like this is just politics as usual.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's not.
Speaker 4: No, And I even saw that with the government shut down.
Speaker 5: I'm like, why are y'all talking like y'all can actually
Speaker 5: negotiate with MAGA on this issue? Like they got everything
Speaker 5: they want in the big beautiful bility. They have no
Speaker 5: reason to make concessions when you continue to act like
Speaker 5: these are the reasonable politicians who are going to say,
Speaker 5: you know what we do care about you know, people's
Speaker 5: health care benefits, Like now you know they're not, so
Speaker 5: why do you keep acting like that and even trying
Speaker 5: to sell that to the people.
Speaker 1: You know that this was the shutdown? I mean, my god.
Speaker 1: So the Democrats realized they had zero leverage except for
Speaker 1: being able to, you know, withhold their votes for keeping
Speaker 1: the government open, and that's the only leverage they had.
Speaker 1: Otherwise the Republicans can just you know, push all this
Speaker 1: even with I mean, the Republican majority is really small,
Speaker 1: It's tiny. I mean it's like it's incredible what's what's
Speaker 1: gone through the House when you consider that, you know,
Speaker 1: they have this this majority that it's almost tied. I mean,
Speaker 1: they can only lose a couple of votes on a
Speaker 1: couple of Republicans on any one issue. But look, they
Speaker 1: so they use the leverage, and you know, in a
Speaker 1: normal world you would think, yeah, I mean, like there's
Speaker 1: so much pain. Look at the Look what's happening to
Speaker 1: the airports. Look what's happening.
Speaker 7: Funeral workers that haven't been paid in forty yeah, yeah,
Speaker 7: forty million plus people you know, rely on these snap benefits,
Speaker 7: and not only are they not as the White House
Speaker 7: not doesn't seem concerned about that, they.
Speaker 1: Actually fight efforts by the court, by by by the
Speaker 1: States YEA to continue funding the the snap benefits and
Speaker 1: take it all the way to the Supreme Court, for
Speaker 1: God's sake to try to stop it. So I think
Speaker 1: what what the Democrats saw quite vividly is the pressure
Speaker 1: is not going to work this because when when you're
Speaker 1: playing with somebody that doesn't care.
Speaker 4: Well, why did they think it would to begin with?
Speaker 5: It's like we've been watching ten years in so right, Yeah,
Speaker 5: like what made them think it would work to begin with?
Speaker 5: That's what I mean when I say the normalization of it,
Speaker 5: because but whatever reason, people haven't adjusted their brains to
Speaker 5: realize this. Ain't your grandparents Republicans, Joe. Yeah, if you
Speaker 5: can't use words like authoritarian and fascism and not treat
Speaker 5: them as such.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, so what they will. The way the Democrats
Speaker 1: think that this is ultimately played out is they didn't
Speaker 1: succeed obviously in dealing with the health with healthcare, you know,
Speaker 1: the Obamaca. They'll get their vote, it's not going to
Speaker 1: succeed even if it succeeds in the center. They're not
Speaker 1: going to vote on it in the House. Even if
Speaker 1: they somehow voted on in the House. Trump's not going
Speaker 1: to sign it into law. I mean, there's they're not
Speaker 1: going to get it. They're just not going to get it.
Speaker 1: But what they believe that they have done is they
Speaker 1: have succeeded in making it vividly clear to the world,
Speaker 1: to the country that he is going to do nothing
Speaker 1: for the twenty plus million Americans that are going to
Speaker 1: see their health insurance skyrocket on January first, that he
Speaker 1: would do nothing to help the forty plus million who
Speaker 1: were losing access to snap benefits that make it possible
Speaker 1: to feed their families.
Speaker 4: To go create.
Speaker 1: So, I mean, they've been promising a healthcare bill for
Speaker 1: what is it, like eight eight plus year I mean
Speaker 1: a healthcare plan. It's a secret plan, Like it's like
Speaker 1: Nixon's a secret plan to the Vietnam War.
Speaker 5: What do you see as the greatest risk to American
Speaker 5: democratic institutions in the coming years.
Speaker 1: I think that the greatest risk to our institutions is
Speaker 1: the erosion of the idea of truth. I think this
Speaker 1: is more beyond any single policy thing, beyond even Trump himself.
Speaker 1: Is we now live in a world where you know,
Speaker 1: you can ask someone are you gonna believe me? Or
Speaker 1: your own lion eyes? And it's unclear what they're going
Speaker 1: to believe. It's if you can't agree on what the
Speaker 1: facts are, how do you overcome divisions? How do you
Speaker 1: get anything done? And you know it's Trump has accelerated this.
Speaker 1: He didn't start it. He has accelerated this. And now
Speaker 1: throw into the mix artificial intelligence. I mean it's like
Speaker 1: we are in an we are in a crazy land.
Speaker 1: And by the way, I see it on the left
Speaker 1: as well, where you know the crazy conspiracy theories you know,
Speaker 1: of late have been the province of the of the right,
Speaker 1: all the wacky conspiracy theories around twenty twenty and you
Speaker 1: know Sydney Powell saying the dead Venezuelans rigged voting machines,
Speaker 1: or voting machines were controlled by spy satellites. I mean,
Speaker 1: the crazy, crazy stuff. And now I mean I can't
Speaker 1: tell you many people, I'll come and tell you that
Speaker 1: you know, Trump brigged the twenty twenty four election, and
Speaker 1: it was Elon Musk and it was Starlink and they
Speaker 1: controlled the voting sheets. It's like the same conspiracies. It's like,
Speaker 1: can we just try to establish facts? And that's the
Speaker 1: business that I am in, and I'm desperately trying. That's
Speaker 1: why I wanted to write these books again because I
Speaker 1: wanted to. First of all, I felt I had the
Speaker 1: access and I had the vantage point I to be
Speaker 1: able to shed new light on the events that were
Speaker 1: going through. But I also wanted to make sure that
Speaker 1: people don't rewrite it and pretend things that happened that
Speaker 1: didn't happen.
Speaker 5: Yeah, right, So that means all your books are getting banned,
Speaker 5: so yeah, soon whether they're done. If you were looking back,
Speaker 5: this is my last question, if you were looking back
Speaker 5: in ten to twenty years at this campaign, what will
Speaker 5: historians say it did to the Republican Party, What would
Speaker 5: they say it did.
Speaker 4: To the presidency and the media.
Speaker 5: And what do you hope your legacy will be as
Speaker 5: a chronicler of this era.
Speaker 1: I think that it utterly it completed the utter transformation
Speaker 1: of the Republican Party from the Republican Party to the
Speaker 1: Trump Party. It started before the campaign, but it was
Speaker 1: absolutely solidified. This is not Reagan's Republican Party. It's not
Speaker 1: Bush's Republican Party. It's not Paul Ryan's, it's not Mitt Romney's.
Speaker 1: This is an entirely different Republican Party, both substantly, substantly
Speaker 1: in terms of policy and just in terms of the
Speaker 1: the force of the personality of Trump. How long that lasts,
Speaker 1: what it means after there is no longer a Donald
Speaker 1: Trump remains to be seen. But I don't think you
Speaker 1: suddenly go back to the old Republican Party that's gone
Speaker 1: the country. I think it it just solidified that division
Speaker 1: in our country. That is not going to be overcome
Speaker 1: after Trump is gone. I mean, we are in a
Speaker 1: we are in a place where we have a we
Speaker 1: have a political and cultural divide in the country that
Speaker 1: I don't think is going to go away. And you know,
Speaker 1: in terms of my legacy on this or I don't
Speaker 1: know if I even look at it that way. But
Speaker 1: what I hope people will say is, look, fifty years
Speaker 1: from now, one hundred years from now, people are going
Speaker 1: to want to ask what the hell was that all about?
Speaker 1: And I hope that these books, especially this one, somebody
Speaker 1: can say, read this and you'll get a sense of
Speaker 1: what it was like and how it happened.
Speaker 3: All right, get it before his ban j'all's resolution down
Speaker 3: Trump in the campaign that changed America.
Speaker 2: Jonathan Coll Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining us.
Speaker 1: Hey, it's awesome to be with the Breakfast Club. Thank you.
Speaker 2: It's this club.
Speaker 1: Good morning.
Speaker 5: Hold up every day I wake up, click your glass
Speaker 5: up the breakfast clubs.
Speaker 4: You're dumb, h