Speaker 1: Hello there, Happy Friday. Here at the Chuck Podcast. This
Speaker 1: is a bit of a bonus episode. I don't always
Speaker 1: not always going to drop four in a week, but
Speaker 1: this has been one of those weeks, and I know,
Speaker 1: and the Trump era, there's always one of those weeks,
Speaker 1: and that's always a word of warning. Sometimes, right just
Speaker 1: when you think, oh my god, can it get any crazier,
Speaker 1: something else will happen and it will get crazier. But
Speaker 1: I do think trying to understand the most important thing
Speaker 1: on the Trump tariff pullback, right, we all know he blinked.
Speaker 1: I think it's important to figure out how he got there,
Speaker 1: because understanding how he got there will then tell us
Speaker 1: I give us at least a better idea of how
Speaker 1: to be prepared for what is still going to be
Speaker 1: an uncertain economic climate for at least the next three
Speaker 1: months possible if it's as if it's as tumultuous as
Speaker 1: it still looks we're looking at, you know, what's going
Speaker 1: to be just a tumultuous eighteen months until the voters
Speaker 1: decide if they want to have a say here on
Speaker 1: the direction of our economy. But the fact of the
Speaker 1: matter is, while while Trump sort of stopped what was
Speaker 1: turning into the beginnings of a republican revolt on this
Speaker 1: and certainly a major donor revolt on his policies. He
Speaker 1: has staved that off, but it's not as if he
Speaker 1: can go back and slap dash this on and hope
Speaker 1: that he's you know, that the same thing won't happen again.
Speaker 1: So my guest today is Mark Caputo, and I think
Speaker 1: Mark Caputo, of all the Trump beat writers, probably has
Speaker 1: the best insight on how this version of Trump World operates.
Speaker 1: And I say this version because I said it in
Speaker 1: the previous update, and I'll say it again. Which is
Speaker 1: the biggest miss The biggest mistake everybody has made with
Speaker 1: Trump two point zero is assuming Trump one point oh
Speaker 1: was a blueprint or a model. I think it is
Speaker 1: pretty clear now Trump one point oh was. The Mike
Speaker 1: Pence presidency was the right because it was Mike Penson
Speaker 1: Right's previous who built that cabinet, who built that staff,
Speaker 1: who built that team. I'd probably throw Jared Kushner in
Speaker 1: there as sort of the third guy in here.
Speaker 2: That Kushner.
Speaker 1: Previous and Pence were stabilizing forces for conventional economic thinking,
Speaker 1: conventional national security thinking, and conventional day to day governance
Speaker 1: of the larger entity that is the federal government. And
Speaker 1: it's pretty clear that by the time Trump got to
Speaker 1: the end of his first term, he knew exactly what happened. Right,
Speaker 1: He went through four National security advisors because he didn't
Speaker 1: like any of them. He went through four chiefs of
Speaker 1: staff until he got the most compliant one in Mark Meadows, right,
Speaker 1: and so he kept And so when he built Trump
Speaker 1: two point zero, he made sure he wasn't going to
Speaker 1: have somebody that wasn't essentially loyal to his vision, loyal
Speaker 1: to his ideas, and he certainly wasn't going to use
Speaker 1: his running make pick to quote unquote build a bridge
Speaker 1: to another wing.
Speaker 2: Of the party.
Speaker 1: Now, look, he had picked Mike Pence because there was
Speaker 1: he needed to try to heal. He needed to try
Speaker 1: to reach out to a wing of the party that
Speaker 1: was skeptical of him, the evangelical community, and he thought
Speaker 1: Pence would help him with that, as well as mainstream conservatives.
Speaker 1: And then he didn't know anything about how Washington worked,
Speaker 1: and so he delegated a lot of authority to Mike Pence.
Speaker 2: And Mike Pence, I think, you know.
Speaker 1: As the more people are learning about the job he
Speaker 1: did and the things he did that we didn't see
Speaker 1: every day. You know, there's a core competency to Mike Pence.
Speaker 1: You may have some ideological disagreements on certain ideas that
Speaker 1: he had out there, but he had a core competency
Speaker 1: to him and something that came through during COVID, something
Speaker 1: that when you talk to a lot of governor's Democrat
Speaker 1: or Republican that were on those COVID calls, you know,
Speaker 1: the the chaos was Trump's. The the the planning and
Speaker 1: getting you know, getting organized was pens. So the point
Speaker 1: is this is that we have to stop using anything.
Speaker 1: This is one of those things where if I could
Speaker 1: erase everybody's brains of Trump one point oh, don't let
Speaker 1: it make any impact on you on how you think
Speaker 1: Trump two point oh is going to go or is operating.
Speaker 1: It is more different than it is the same. This
Speaker 1: is a brand new style of governing. This is yes,
Speaker 1: he tested the electric fences in the first term and
Speaker 1: found out where vulnerabilities were and where they weren't. But
Speaker 1: it is not lost on me that there's essentially two
Speaker 1: holdovers from his first term. Steven Miller, who is clearly
Speaker 1: now thee the keeper of the grievance list as they
Speaker 1: come up with plans to go get people. This Chris
Speaker 1: the the chilling effect of launching these investigations against anybody
Speaker 1: that was essentially a whistleblower. In his first term, Chris Krebs,
Speaker 1: who was in the cybersecurity uh uh, in the cybersecurity
Speaker 1: space for the federal government, who was the first Trump
Speaker 1: appointed official to say this election was.
Speaker 2: On the up and up.
Speaker 1: We're going to discuss this, and I discussed this with
Speaker 1: Mark Puto in a minute, but I do think that
Speaker 1: you've got to see what this is for the chilling effect,
Speaker 1: that that the that this administration, and it's more orchestrated
Speaker 1: by Steven Miller than it is Trump. You know, one
Speaker 1: thing about Trump is that he has plenty of grievances,
Speaker 1: but he's usually a bit too lazy to execute revenge fantasy.
Speaker 1: You know, he has revenge fantasies, but actually to execute
Speaker 1: the revenges. But Steven Miller has the patients and the
Speaker 1: and the bandwidth to to do all these things and
Speaker 1: these lawsuits, these investigations, sending FBI agents to Chris Krebs's house,
Speaker 1: into miles Taylor's house. Yes, it's about rattling them, and
Speaker 1: it's a little bit about revenge, but it's also about
Speaker 1: sending a message to anybody in the current administration. If
Speaker 1: you're going to speak out, you will you know, you
Speaker 1: might make the list and be careful.
Speaker 2: It's why you know you sit here.
Speaker 1: I saw there's a few lawmakers that would like to
Speaker 1: see an investigation to see if there was any insider trading,
Speaker 1: if Donald Trump was trying to give investors a heads
Speaker 1: up or different people when he when he made his
Speaker 1: what seemed like a vague tweet about this is a
Speaker 1: good time to buy you know, did he already know?
Speaker 1: Was he already giving insider trading? Do you expect do
Speaker 1: we think that the current iteration of the SEC is
Speaker 1: going to investigate? I mean, I would argue that there's
Speaker 1: a lot of shenanigans that take place now. Part of
Speaker 1: the difficulty with trying to figure out is Donald Trump
Speaker 1: doing insider information or is he just simply being Donald
Speaker 1: Trump overly telegraphing every movie makes right. He is also
Speaker 1: somebody who happens to overly telegraph everything he does. And
Speaker 1: there's you know when you if you know? And I'm sure,
Speaker 1: there are people that simply speak trump Ism and just
Speaker 1: used his used his Twitter feed or his ex feed
Speaker 1: or his truth social feed, whatever whatever we're promoting these
Speaker 1: days as the guide post to this. So look, you know,
Speaker 1: I don't think you're going to get investigations and you're
Speaker 1: not going to get many whistleblowers because I think Donald
Speaker 1: Trump has come to the conclusion that whistleblowers and internal
Speaker 1: watchdogs were some of the biggest sources of his political
Speaker 1: problems in his first term, and he wants to eliminate as.
Speaker 2: As much of that friction as you can.
Speaker 1: But ultimately, the reason I'm dropping this special pod is
Speaker 1: because I think Marco Puto is going to be able
Speaker 1: to paint a picture for you and to understand who's
Speaker 1: you know, who's on the end, Who's who's got his
Speaker 1: ear in the moment, who doesn't have his ear in
Speaker 1: the moment?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: Who got benched in this? I'm looking at you, Peter Navarro.
Speaker 1: What is the status of Howard Lutnick?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: Does he have a cell by date? Well, everybody in
Speaker 1: Trump world is a sell by date. We just don't
Speaker 1: always know what date what dates on the milk carton.
Speaker 1: But is it sooner or is it later? All these
Speaker 1: things you're going to learn in this interview, But I
Speaker 1: do think it's helpful to understand we're all trying to
Speaker 1: figure out what guardrails were working with him, and there
Speaker 1: was a moment where it didn't look like there's going
Speaker 1: to be any guardrails on these tariffs, but it turns
Speaker 1: out there is. Is it rich people calling him and
Speaker 1: they all have his cell phone number? Is it them
Speaker 1: that did it? Is it the bond market that did it?
Speaker 1: Is it members of Congress? Whatever it was, the combination
Speaker 1: of all of it did serve as a temporary guardrail
Speaker 1: here on, at least pulling back on the most catastrophic
Speaker 1: parts of this tariff policy. We're not out of the woods,
Speaker 1: and by no means is this a healthy economy right now.
Speaker 1: And I'll be honest with you, I don't see how
Speaker 1: this gets better for him. I don't see how in
Speaker 1: this moment he's going to be talking country companies into
Speaker 1: putting shovels into the ground and building factories in this
Speaker 1: uncertain business climate. So how does he incentivize that for
Speaker 1: this tariff policy idea to work? And I'm skeptical it's
Speaker 1: going to work, because again I equate it to trying
Speaker 1: to rescue the ice block industry. Refrigeration is what works now.
Speaker 1: We don't use blocks of ice. I know you're not
Speaker 1: going to stop the global economy.
Speaker 2: You can't.
Speaker 1: You can't just somehow stop it in its tracks, rebuild
Speaker 1: it somewhere else without having massive, massive, catastrophic.
Speaker 2: Collateral damage.
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you one other thing that I want
Speaker 1: to leave you with that the tariffs are are already
Speaker 1: leading to, is that there's already been some business surveys
Speaker 1: out there that I've gotten my hands on that there
Speaker 1: is already an uptick in anti Americanism and it's going
Speaker 1: to impact companies that are associated with America. So already
Speaker 1: I know some fortune five hundred companies who have gotten
Speaker 1: some data where they're being told, hey, be prepared for this.
Speaker 1: If you sell products in Europe, if you sell products
Speaker 1: in the free parts of Asia, don't be surprised if
Speaker 1: you see some you know, form some boycotts things like this,
Speaker 1: because there's a lot of anger at America right now
Speaker 1: over these tariffs. And that's the thing that I think
Speaker 1: is being undersold to this. You know, this may he
Speaker 1: may believe this is going to help Americans, but if
Speaker 1: it ends up incentivizing American hate around the world and
Speaker 1: American hate of our companies and our economy, that doesn't
Speaker 1: lead to good outcomes for the long term security of
Speaker 1: the United States. So on that uplifting note on this Friday,
Speaker 1: particularly this Friday before Pats over, I'm gonna sneak in
Speaker 1: a break here and when you come back, my buddy
Speaker 1: from Miami, one of the most plugged in reporters that
Speaker 1: understands how this Trump White House currently works, and who's
Speaker 1: closest to the game of thrones.
Speaker 2: Who's the hand to the king these days? It is
Speaker 2: mister Mark Caputo.
Speaker 1: So joining me now is the person who I think
Speaker 1: has the best pulse on the Trump White House. It's
Speaker 1: not an easy thing, and we're going to discuss how
Speaker 1: do you know when to take a Trump source at
Speaker 1: their word, which is one of the great sort of
Speaker 1: enigmas trying to that that Washington produces these days. But
Speaker 1: Mark Caputo of Axios, the beat writer, uh for Trump,
Speaker 1: I guess you're what's your official title for Axios?
Speaker 2: Let me get it right, white House is Trump White
Speaker 2: House reporter?
Speaker 3: Uh?
Speaker 2: National political reporter some sort of.
Speaker 4: You are.
Speaker 1: Just to give a little bit of your credentials for
Speaker 1: those don't realize that one of the reasons you're on
Speaker 1: this beat. You're sort of the king of Florida reporting.
Speaker 1: I've known for so long political reporting, and the Trump
Speaker 1: white House is now basically the Florida produced by Florida
Speaker 1: power brokers. Donald Trump became a Floridian of sorts and
Speaker 1: became the Florida Florida man.
Speaker 2: Let's speak clear.
Speaker 1: Yeah he is now I know hundred percent from New York.
Speaker 1: But you are the first sort of beat writer not
Speaker 1: based in Washington for the White House. You are actually
Speaker 1: based in Miami. You come up a lot, don't get
Speaker 1: me wrong. You uh were kind enough to speak to
Speaker 1: my us C class a couple of weeks ago.
Speaker 2: Uh and that was very fat. But here you are.
Speaker 1: And I guess the number one question I have after
Speaker 1: the the gyrations of the week with trade and tariff
Speaker 1: is we know Donald Trump never makes a mistake, So
Speaker 1: the question is who takes the fall. It appears Peter
Speaker 1: Navarro has been benched for a while. Now we know
Speaker 1: you can be benched. It doesn't mean you're ostracized. There's
Speaker 1: a difference. There's ostracizing there's Benching, and then there's still
Speaker 1: in the inner circle. Howard Lutnik is the first person
Speaker 1: I want to ask about, because if the next after Navarro,
Speaker 1: he is the person seen as the architect of this
Speaker 1: disaster who's getting blamed.
Speaker 3: Here, I think you've probably hit it on the head.
Speaker 3: The interesting thing about Lutnik is that he's got so
Speaker 3: many critics in the administration, and I think a lot
Speaker 3: of it just.
Speaker 2: Boils down to his style. He is this outer Burrow
Speaker 2: be like, hey.
Speaker 3: I gotta tell you something, And he's got the He's
Speaker 3: got a lot of these Trumpet qualities where like like,
Speaker 3: no one knows finance better than I. Now, don't get
Speaker 3: me wrong or me uh, I mean, he's a billionaire,
Speaker 3: self made man.
Speaker 2: Et cetera.
Speaker 3: But you know, in the Trump White House, it's like highlander, right,
Speaker 3: there can only be one.
Speaker 2: There only can be one.
Speaker 1: But that's the thing, Like, it is always funny to
Speaker 1: me to watch Republican members of Congress who is giving
Speaker 1: him this bad advice? Who is telling him to do
Speaker 1: these things? And you're like, wow, you know you you
Speaker 1: know it can't be, dear leader, We know this, So
Speaker 1: who's the bad whisperer? Here right, like, so, I.
Speaker 3: Mean Donald Trump, Donald Trump's wanted to do that. Let's
Speaker 3: just be clear. Donald Trump is wanted to do this.
Speaker 2: For thirty years or whatever it was when we first.
Speaker 3: Talked about running. The reason he had Peter Navarro there
Speaker 3: was to cook up a formula. And the formula you
Speaker 3: cooked up, according to every analyst who knows what they're
Speaker 3: talking about, was just absurd.
Speaker 2: The columns were wrong.
Speaker 3: But Dave Trump what he needed, and so Navarro sort
Speaker 3: of served his purpose. But I want to be clear
Speaker 3: about Lutnik is, while I understand all the reporting that's
Speaker 3: been done about people being annoyed with him and oh
Speaker 3: he went off script and oh we did this. Yeah,
Speaker 3: as of now, and this could change in five minutes
Speaker 3: between when you post it, as of now, Howard Lutnik
Speaker 3: is in good stead. I mean, it's basically like him
Speaker 3: the Commerce Secretary and the Treasury Secretary Scott besson't and Besting'
Speaker 3: is crew of the leader. But they're operating sort of
Speaker 3: in tandem.
Speaker 2: And if if.
Speaker 3: Lutnick was really on the outs this way, he wouldn't
Speaker 3: be on television all the time.
Speaker 2: And he's on telephone.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I take that, and I but I tell you
Speaker 1: what wreaked of desperation of him when he wanted to
Speaker 1: let everybody know he was in the White House at
Speaker 1: the moment giving that tweet out, And that told me
Speaker 1: he clearly wanted to send the message I'm not on
Speaker 1: the outs, I've not been I'm not the I'm not
Speaker 1: getting blamed here, I'm sitting with your leader, right And
Speaker 1: it was like it it really was sort of a
Speaker 1: proof of life right the way he worded that tweet.
Speaker 1: So it told me he certainly was worried he was
Speaker 1: going to get scapegoatd How's that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well, he knows and his people know that there
Speaker 3: are multiple people in and around the administration that don't
Speaker 3: like him. And even though he's a billionaire, he bought
Speaker 3: a thirty million dollar house in the DC area, and
Speaker 3: he wants to be able to live in it for
Speaker 3: more than a few months before he kind of has to.
Speaker 2: Go back home.
Speaker 1: By the way, the high end real estate market in DC,
Speaker 1: my goodness, Stryt, Mark Zuckerberg, Howard Lutnick. I mean, the
Speaker 1: first administration, it was really just Wilbur Ross that truly
Speaker 1: planted some expensive stakes into this boy. This is another
Speaker 1: level there does feel as if a lot of people
Speaker 1: feel the need that to get close to deer leader,
Speaker 1: you've got to live You've got to live here, You've
Speaker 1: got to have a house here.
Speaker 3: One of the you're talking about the sort of the
Speaker 3: deer leader dynamic. There's a really good his treat book
Speaker 3: called The World by Simon Sebeg montafy Or, and at
Speaker 3: the very beginning of it he points out how potentates
Speaker 3: throughout history have courts that are characterized by the closeness
Speaker 3: to power is equals the more power you have.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm glad you just used that phrase. That's exactly
Speaker 1: this is. This is his core totally right. You know,
Speaker 1: he has certain people that he wants in it to
Speaker 1: play with until he's tired of them, right, I mean,
Speaker 1: and he's by the way, and he'll get tired of them.
Speaker 2: We know this.
Speaker 1: We just don't know who get in what order do
Speaker 1: they get ostracized and replaced?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, not to engage too much in the
Speaker 3: sort of the Trump world survivor, but yeah, I guess
Speaker 3: it's sort of down. The betting markets are probably down.
Speaker 3: Are are most likely to forecast either WHATNIK departing or NSA.
Speaker 3: The National Security advisor Mike Waalts, who.
Speaker 2: Oh to which one? Which one? Yeah? Yeah? So I
Speaker 2: mean if you're if you're a betting man, you know.
Speaker 1: All right, But let's talk about because I think the
Speaker 1: biggest fear many many folks had, including myself, was what
Speaker 1: if you know, we all look, I think we all
Speaker 1: assume the markets were going to be a guardrail with
Speaker 1: Trump on these policies and it for the entire weekend.
Speaker 1: You're like, oh no, what if this is Thelman Luise?
Speaker 1: What if he's like, you know what, I ain't running again.
Speaker 1: I always wanted to do this. I believe in it,
Speaker 1: and I don't. I'm never going to be poor? What
Speaker 1: do I care? Let's go right? And then he did
Speaker 1: finally change course. What did it?
Speaker 2: Is it?
Speaker 1: Who spooked him? Who scared him? Who had the ear?
Speaker 1: Who is the real guardrail?
Speaker 2: Here?
Speaker 3: Is it? Best from my reporting which I wrote, is
Speaker 3: there were basically three factors that combined to have Trump
Speaker 3: change his mind. Number One, he was hearing from every
Speaker 3: possible CEO, so E Susie Wilder.
Speaker 1: And they all have him at speed down, don't they correct?
Speaker 1: Or between him and her, they all have these two
Speaker 1: cell phones, so they were getting direct agitated calls.
Speaker 2: So you get correct and that that's there.
Speaker 3: But but the three factors bottom line were besn't and
Speaker 3: and Lutnik went in there certainly with the hope of
Speaker 3: getting a pause, and so their pitch was, hey, we
Speaker 3: got seventy five countries that want to make a deal now,
Speaker 3: and we don't have the time and staff to do this. Like,
Speaker 3: let's sort of like, how do you And they didn't say,
Speaker 3: let's do this. Apparently they said, what do you want
Speaker 3: to do? Right, like, because you don't tell Donald Trump
Speaker 3: what to do with you present the.
Speaker 2: Hockey choice, right, you know. So so that was one.
Speaker 3: The second one that was part of it was China is, hey,
Speaker 3: China came out and disrespected you with raising the tariffs,
Speaker 3: and now you have this goal and opportunity of doing
Speaker 3: a pause, making a deal with everyone and isolating China
Speaker 3: and putting a ring around China. And then the third one,
Speaker 3: and this is probably not in order if you think
Speaker 3: about it, it's just the bond market and the stock market.
Speaker 3: But really, like the bond traders are still that's still
Speaker 3: the spine of the being of the vertebrate of the
Speaker 3: United States and perhaps global financial markets and it is gold.
Speaker 2: It is the gold bar.
Speaker 1: Of the twenty first century. Gold bars are great, Treasury bonds.
Speaker 2: Are greater, are greater.
Speaker 3: So so it was sort of those three factors. It
Speaker 3: was not just sort of one person. And though it
Speaker 3: wasn't as only Bill Ackman out there pounding away on
Speaker 3: Twitter like oh please.
Speaker 2: Really, Bill Ackman's tweets didn't have an impact up shot,
Speaker 2: they did not.
Speaker 3: You're talking about It's like coffee plantation or something like
Speaker 3: a heart goes out to you.
Speaker 2: But you know Trump.
Speaker 3: What's always interesting about Trump, especially the more time you
Speaker 3: give him, is while he is not known for telling
Speaker 3: the truth, is that there is a sodium pentathl quality
Speaker 3: about Trump.
Speaker 2: He always tells you.
Speaker 3: Correct, you've just got to content figure out that yesterday
Speaker 3: He's like the ball.
Speaker 1: Market, Yeah yeah, and and and yet, dear leader. Yet
Speaker 1: you know Levitt, the bag dad Bob. God, what is
Speaker 1: she doing.
Speaker 2: She's doing what she's supposed to do with That's her job,
Speaker 2: I guess.
Speaker 1: But it really does feel like bagdad Bob has met
Speaker 1: North Korea. Between that and these and these reports about
Speaker 1: his golfing, I mean.
Speaker 2: I don't know, man, I mean, you know.
Speaker 3: What I found interesting over the past week, and I,
Speaker 3: of all weeks to take off, I took last week
Speaker 3: off because I had a some personal things.
Speaker 2: Please.
Speaker 1: I used to tell this of people that, you know,
Speaker 1: I told this to my friend Kristen Walker. What's who
Speaker 1: was paranoid that she was going to miss something at
Speaker 1: first Tart, But I'm like, first of all, yes, you're
Speaker 1: going to miss something, but I promise you, literally, the
Speaker 1: day you get back, there'll be seven new developments that
Speaker 1: will make it irrelevant that you missed something. Mark, I
Speaker 1: say the same thing to you, Sure you really actually
Speaker 1: did miss a thing?
Speaker 3: Well, I'm you know, it's always kind of good to
Speaker 3: be in the flow. But what was notable for me
Speaker 3: throughout the process here was that this is a team
Speaker 3: that he has assembled that believes in him, and they
Speaker 3: weren't sending the words like oh my god. Because if
Speaker 3: this or Trump number one, like the Trump one point
Speaker 3: zero Trump forty five White House, there would have been
Speaker 3: all these reports about.
Speaker 2: This guy's crazy, this guy's mad. Jared Kushner.
Speaker 1: What if Jared Kushner would have done their leak and
Speaker 1: their official leaky, right, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 3: Clearly when your I'd be like you sure you guys
Speaker 3: aren't nervous, like, well, you know, but you know, this
Speaker 3: is what he campaigned on, they said, which is not
Speaker 3: fully true. Donald Trump didn't campaign in the idea like, hey.
Speaker 2: Uh, trade war, trade war with the entire world.
Speaker 3: With the entire world, and by the way, you're gonna
Speaker 3: have to swallow some you know, some pain here, right.
Speaker 4: He didn't talk about the toughness the opposite, right prices,
Speaker 4: I mean, my my, I remember, you know, it was
Speaker 4: sort of like Kamala equals high prices, Trump equals low prices, right,
Speaker 4: Like that.
Speaker 1: Was the They were putting out yard signs that said that.
Speaker 1: Towards the end, I mean, you talked.
Speaker 3: About the Kamala crash. Just everything, hold on for half
Speaker 3: a second. I gotta plug in my computer if you
Speaker 3: don't mind, just so that we don't lose power. All right, fantastic,
Speaker 3: We're back. Yeah, that's a good edit there. People will
Speaker 3: not even know we were missing.
Speaker 1: So it's interesting comparing Trump one and Trump two because
Speaker 1: I the morn you know, there was a whole group
Speaker 1: of voters who told us, well, you know, they thought
Speaker 1: that a Trump one wasn't so bad, right, And it
Speaker 1: turns out, well, Trump one was an entirely different administration
Speaker 1: Trump one was the Mike Pence Writ's previous administration. Those
Speaker 1: two basically filled the cabinet, filled the White House staff
Speaker 1: for the first year, and in some ways it it
Speaker 1: ended up populating in parts for the entire four years.
Speaker 1: And it was a series of essentially professional conservatives who
Speaker 1: were guardrails on Donald Trump's crazy Donald Trump figured that
Speaker 1: out by a year or two into his first term
Speaker 1: and wasn't going to let that happen again.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: The people who are out him now are either the
Speaker 3: unconventional picture, or true loyalists, or people who became true
Speaker 3: allies who knew what they were getting. Into the latter category,
Speaker 3: Marco Rubiyat.
Speaker 1: Who decided they wanted the accent that they were willing
Speaker 1: to trade their potential reputation. You know, by the way,
Speaker 1: what do you make of you said that there wasn't
Speaker 1: many leaks. There was there was somebody friendly to Bessant
Speaker 1: who was leaking. Oh he wants And you and I
Speaker 1: both know Trump isn't going to like that. No, And
Speaker 1: I wonder how much rope, how much leeway Besson's going
Speaker 1: to get, or if he better, he better fix that
Speaker 1: at some point.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't want to name names, but I'm pretty
Speaker 3: sure I know who leaked that story to Politico about
Speaker 3: bessent't flying back with Trump flying down there. What was
Speaker 3: totally left out of the story was that Howard Ludnick
Speaker 3: was there at mar A Lago with Donald Trump and
Speaker 3: flew back with Bessett and was basically saying the same thing.
Speaker 2: But you often find this.
Speaker 3: In politics, where the lieutenants of the principle right where
Speaker 3: the cardinals around their little pope hate the other pope
Speaker 3: so much more than you know, the kind of the
Speaker 3: rival popes would sort of hate each other, dislike each other.
Speaker 3: And in that case, though it is true that Bessont
Speaker 3: has essentially been elevated more by Trump to be the
Speaker 3: tariff guy, I think Lutnik is a little too trumpy
Speaker 3: for Trump's taste, and Trump wants more of a cerebral, calm, cool,
Speaker 3: collective chess player instead of the sort of more wild man,
Speaker 3: you know, crazy trader that Trey Durr, not Trey Torr,
Speaker 3: by the way, that.
Speaker 2: You know the.
Speaker 1: By coincidence before Trump made his announcement, Owen Cass who
Speaker 1: is sort of more of an ideological guy who's been
Speaker 1: sort of works at one of the think tanks that
Speaker 1: are trying to create intellectual and intellectual argument for trump Ism.
Speaker 1: You know, we can debate, you know, some of these,
Speaker 1: but he at least laid out a way you could
Speaker 1: have done all this. Yes, that would have given some
Speaker 1: certainty to be given the business community time to absorb,
Speaker 1: given trading partners time to negotiate.
Speaker 2: Should we look at that as the model?
Speaker 3: Now?
Speaker 1: Are they now going, okay, let's try to be more
Speaker 1: orderly about this, And should we expect something a bit
Speaker 1: more orderly going forward?
Speaker 2: Or is Trump going to get impatient again? Yes? And yes,
Speaker 2: I think so.
Speaker 3: I think there's more of an orderly process. One of
Speaker 3: the things I made sure to avoid in the story
Speaker 3: that I wrote about what sort of led up to
Speaker 3: Trump putting the pause was, you know, the everyone administration
Speaker 3: was like, oh my god, Donald Trump, are of the
Speaker 3: deal Grand strategists like, no, folks, this is Donald Trump
Speaker 3: sort of trial and error and experimenting with things in
Speaker 3: real time.
Speaker 2: And I think he.
Speaker 3: Had to touch the hot stove a few times to
Speaker 3: realize like, oh wow, it really burns.
Speaker 2: But conversely, he also realized that the.
Speaker 1: Market's getting as we're talking now the market. You know,
Speaker 1: it was a one day reprieve. Right, about half of
Speaker 1: it's been given back because we are in a full
Speaker 1: on trade war with China.
Speaker 2: And then that's the real thing they don't like.
Speaker 3: Generally speaking, this is where Trump perhaps is directionally right,
Speaker 3: is that, Yeah, the stock market is a global financial
Speaker 3: correct issue.
Speaker 2: This is the globalists.
Speaker 3: And when you try to do it America first. I'm
Speaker 3: putting it in air quotes as much as scare quotes.
Speaker 3: When you do an America first policy to import job
Speaker 3: or grow your domestic manufacturing and change the United States economy,
Speaker 3: the globalists sort of punish you for.
Speaker 1: You know, the biggest problem Donald Trump has right now is,
Speaker 1: you know, one of the things that I would look
Speaker 1: I think if he wanted to do this, he should
Speaker 1: have done his tax cut first. And by the way,
Speaker 1: let me ask about that. Is there any regret that
Speaker 1: they misordered this because he could have essentially given people
Speaker 1: their tax cut, given the business community what they wanted,
Speaker 1: certainty on that, and then done this, you know, a
Speaker 1: carrot and stick approach I think is I think this
Speaker 1: tax cut is going to get harder and harder to get.
Speaker 1: I think we're seeing right now the more uncertainty and
Speaker 1: the actual economy, the more you're going to have resistance
Speaker 1: trying to do this Republican alone with there is there
Speaker 1: anybody in that West wing right now that wonders if
Speaker 1: they basically misordered their agenda.
Speaker 3: I think the answer to that is yes, but they're
Speaker 3: not telling me, so you can sort of hear it
Speaker 3: in their voice, which is this like, oh, you know,
Speaker 3: it is what it is.
Speaker 2: That's sort of the guiding principle.
Speaker 1: I mean, the tax guid Even if they get it now,
Speaker 1: it's not gonna have any people aren't going to feel
Speaker 1: like it had any impact on their lives, not whatsoever,
Speaker 1: because you're going to have this inflationary period.
Speaker 3: That's possibly true, but Trump feels really strongly about wanting
Speaker 3: to do this, and you hear when he talks like
Speaker 3: no other president could do this or would do this,
Speaker 3: Like yeah, part of the reason all the president would
Speaker 3: do this is you saw what happened with the stock market.
Speaker 3: But this is the reality is is he is, he's
Speaker 3: the captain of this ship.
Speaker 1: As that. But here's the other thing they gave up, Mark,
Speaker 1: is they gave up the ability to blame Biden for
Speaker 1: the economy. Now this is now all Donald Trump's economy,
Speaker 1: like like he created this shakiness now for better or
Speaker 1: for worse. Obviously, if it works, he gets a bunch
Speaker 1: of credit. But right now, you know, and you're being
Speaker 1: it in the you know. Look it's YouGov and Quinnipiac,
Speaker 1: both of whom I could have methodological arguments about why
Speaker 1: I don't like, I don't trust. I think both poles
Speaker 1: can over exaggerate the moment, but directionally they're in the
Speaker 1: same place. His numbers approval on the economy look as
Speaker 1: bad as Biben.
Speaker 3: They're not looking good, and I'm not sure it's going
Speaker 3: to get much better because in the end, if you
Speaker 3: want to change the United States in no more of
Speaker 3: a manufacturing society, you have to have manufacturing plants, and
Speaker 3: we really don't have them.
Speaker 1: And where's the shovel. Where's any shovel going into the
Speaker 1: ground on a new factory. Like if I were Donald Trump,
Speaker 1: I'd be desperate for that symbol right now. I'd go
Speaker 1: to the opening if I could find some company to
Speaker 1: break ground on some T shirt factory that is moving
Speaker 1: from Vietnam, right Like, you know, A one thing I
Speaker 1: thought Trump was usually smart about was was sort of
Speaker 1: showman symbolistic showmanship, and they don't even have that.
Speaker 2: They don't have that. And you know, on a more
Speaker 2: granular level, a good example is wood. Right. You know
Speaker 2: they're talking about the we have tariffs on Canada. Now
Speaker 2: you know I live. I live in the southeast.
Speaker 3: A lot of the construction tubuy forst we use here
Speaker 3: made out of Southern yellow pine. But the Canadian pine
Speaker 3: is superior wood. And the reality is Tenni's got a
Speaker 3: lot more forests and a lot more pine the United
Speaker 3: States does. So if you want to kind of grow
Speaker 3: the United States timber industry, you need to grow treaties.
Speaker 3: But you can't grow pine trees in three years.
Speaker 2: You're not doing it overnight.
Speaker 3: Anything with building, manufacturing plants just doesn't happen.
Speaker 1: I want to ask you about the Chris Krebs thing
Speaker 1: in the Miles Taylor thing, because it does seem as
Speaker 1: if is there a list Is he going down a
Speaker 1: list of like, Okay, I'm going to get my revenge?
Speaker 1: Is it Stephen Miller? Is there somebody that's the keeper
Speaker 1: of this? Because Donald Trump forgets half the enemies that
Speaker 1: he has, So I don't know.
Speaker 2: I don't know if he does about that.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, but I am curious, is this is this
Speaker 1: It's just Miller and just assisting in executing.
Speaker 2: The plan or is Hee the keeper of the flame
Speaker 2: on this stuff.
Speaker 3: Don Trobe is surrounded by people who do maybe dear
Speaker 3: to your point, who are.
Speaker 2: Are sort of the bearer of his.
Speaker 3: Grudges, and they do remind him of who wronged him
Speaker 3: and so who reminded him.
Speaker 2: He didn't even really know who Chris Krebs was.
Speaker 3: About Chris Krebs, I think he sort of knew who
Speaker 3: Miles Taylor was, but Crebs is sort of a lesser character.
Speaker 3: But yes, there are people around him who say those
Speaker 3: sorts of things and sort of remind him. There is
Speaker 3: always the ongoing effort among his advisors to try to
Speaker 3: minimize the encounters he has where he has to spend
Speaker 3: time on grieving stuff, and he kind of focuses more
Speaker 3: on his day job. What I wonder about the investigations
Speaker 3: that he essentially authorizer called for of Krebs and and
Speaker 3: Taylor is how serious it's gonna be. I know Pam
Speaker 3: BONDI known her for a number of years as she
Speaker 3: used to be the Florida Attorney General. I that's not
Speaker 3: really her style. But then again, this is cash Ptel,
Speaker 3: a name of someone who did keep an enemy's list,
Speaker 3: who would be in charge or is going to be
Speaker 3: in charge of investigating this. So how wholehearted this is
Speaker 3: going to be is an open question. I don't know
Speaker 3: what they're gonna find.
Speaker 1: Well, what's the you know, are they really doing an
Speaker 1: investigation or are they sending a message to any potential
Speaker 1: whistleblower in Trump two point zero.
Speaker 2: I think it's a little bit of both.
Speaker 3: But I do think they're going to get visited by
Speaker 3: by agents there and they're gonna have to lawyer up
Speaker 3: a person I know, or some people I know from
Speaker 3: Trump one point zero who got hauled before Congress, who
Speaker 3: had to hire lawyers, right and.
Speaker 2: We're never charged, are so.
Speaker 3: Bitter at what happened that even though what Trump is
Speaker 3: now doing with crabs who really had nothing to do
Speaker 3: with the Russia stuff.
Speaker 1: Yeah, all he did was say, hey, the election wasn't stolen,
Speaker 1: say the truth. Yeah yeah, And there was a faction.
Speaker 2: In Trump world.
Speaker 3: There are some legitimately aggrieved people who are just out
Speaker 3: for blood, and that also populates sort of the broader
Speaker 3: Trump chorus.
Speaker 1: Is that the role Todd Blanche is supposed to play
Speaker 1: at the oj that he's there to to sort of
Speaker 1: make make other people's lives miserable. I think that's probably
Speaker 1: more cash. Buttell the keeper of the investigations. But it
Speaker 1: seems like Blanches, Yeah, those are just people. Remember Donald
Speaker 1: Trump wanted the loyalist and people he could trust, and
Speaker 1: Todd Blanch, the Deputytory General, really burned the ships to
Speaker 1: come work for Trump. He left, he had to leave
Speaker 1: a job from another law firm because law firms would
Speaker 1: not let their lawyers work for Donald Trump. He basically
Speaker 1: sold everything, moved to Florida.
Speaker 3: He was all in, and so blance has also sort
Speaker 3: of internalized that same thing of it's us versus.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Again, I'm not just as of this total.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, That's what I was curious, like, how much
Speaker 1: of this is a piece of paper more to threaten
Speaker 1: the current? You know, mid level staffers who who might get,
Speaker 1: you know, ideas in their head that hey, I work
Speaker 1: for the taxpayers. Maybe I don't tell the truth right
Speaker 1: that that happens for a lot of even political appointees.
Speaker 1: They sort of they can feel the weight and they
Speaker 1: start to you know, waiver.
Speaker 2: So I think it's more like.
Speaker 3: I think I think it's more revenge rather than foresight.
Speaker 2: You really think it's right, I just do.
Speaker 3: It's like whoever's around, Uh, we're and yes, it does.
Speaker 2: Sort of slippery slope stock it is. Yeah, and I
Speaker 2: think it sends a message.
Speaker 3: Uh. And in addition to that, remember they're not particularly
Speaker 3: worried in the broader Trump orbit here about whistleblowers and
Speaker 3: future lawsuits, because when this president leaves office, every single
Speaker 3: person who worked for him, whom he likes, is going
Speaker 3: to get a full and complete pardon for everything. Ever
Speaker 3: from now until the beginning.
Speaker 1: Of time, every single person will get a pardon if
Speaker 1: they think it. I was just going to say, so
Speaker 1: if you if you turn on him at all or
Speaker 1: you cause him in his head political harm, he may
Speaker 1: not give you that part.
Speaker 2: Oh totally. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think everyone who decided to get in get on
Speaker 3: board the the USS. Donald Trump knew the score.
Speaker 1: So I'm going to take advantage of something I learned
Speaker 1: from you when we last saw each other about a
Speaker 1: week or so ago about HHS. And what's intriguing to
Speaker 1: me is look lost in all of the tariff, the
Speaker 1: liberation from Our Savings Day that took place last week
Speaker 1: was the fact that Bobby Kennedy Junior said that the
Speaker 1: measles vaccine was the best way to prevent measles. He
Speaker 1: shows up in the community that doesn't seem like a
Speaker 1: decision Bobby Kennedy Junior made on his own. Is that
Speaker 1: what is happening here and is he is this? Is
Speaker 1: this becoming a West Wing project to try to minimize
Speaker 1: the damage Bobby Kennedy Junior is doing to them almost
Speaker 1: on a daily basis in this world.
Speaker 3: Well, I did a story a few weeks ago about
Speaker 3: how the White White House has had to open up
Speaker 3: a parallel press shop to handle messaging from HHS because
Speaker 3: it's been such a mess under Kennedy. And that's largely
Speaker 3: because he has this loyalist who's been within this entire time,
Speaker 3: who has insisted on controlling all things about his messaging
Speaker 3: and his press. And she's bad at the messaging. Name
Speaker 3: is Stephane Spear, and she has terrible press relations. Her
Speaker 3: press relations are to not talk to the press, and
Speaker 3: so the White House has in many respects taken over.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 3: I don't have any insight into how the measles evolution occurred,
Speaker 3: but it's pretty clear that over time what started to
Speaker 3: cause real problems with the White House was just the
Speaker 3: bad way in which his administration didn't publicly respond to
Speaker 3: the measles outbreak like these are generally kind of pretty
Speaker 3: easy thing to do, disasters are, and he didn't really
Speaker 3: follow it. And so the short answer your question is
Speaker 3: is yes, they are sort of taking the reins a
Speaker 3: little more. And what's interesting with Kennedy is some of
Speaker 3: his base from the anti vax and vaccine I saw.
Speaker 2: That they got him. How dare you recommend a vaccine
Speaker 2: that might save lives?
Speaker 3: They are and it's not just that, uh Weldon, Congressman Weldon,
Speaker 3: the former congressman.
Speaker 2: From Florida, was up to be the head of CDC
Speaker 2: and and they yanked him.
Speaker 3: There are there are competing stories as to who called
Speaker 3: for the yanking, by the way, because it is after all,
Speaker 3: Trump world.
Speaker 1: But that really kind of I thought you thought it.
Speaker 1: I thought it was a Florida connection.
Speaker 3: There.
Speaker 2: I can't really tell who's telling the truth.
Speaker 1: But right we are speaking a little in code, not
Speaker 1: to mess with sourcing, but.
Speaker 3: But you know, one person led me to believe that
Speaker 3: the official narrative that, oh, some members of the Senate
Speaker 3: don't want weld in there. I was led to believe
Speaker 3: that that's not the full story and it's.
Speaker 2: Much more sort of complicated than that. Interesting.
Speaker 1: Well, that's always one of those you're like, God, there's
Speaker 1: so much else going on sometimes that boy, you'd love
Speaker 1: to go down that rabbit hole, but is it really
Speaker 1: worth your time when you've got to deal with day
Speaker 1: to day? And that actually leads me to sort of
Speaker 1: the difficulty. You know, I think as a reporter, there's
Speaker 1: no better beat than Trump right now because it's so fascinating.
Speaker 2: There's so much going on.
Speaker 1: However, it's so hard to source up because you don't
Speaker 1: know how you know, most of your sources are bsing you.
Speaker 1: But you've got but there's an art to it, and
Speaker 1: if you can decipher it, you actually can find the truth.
Speaker 2: But it takes time.
Speaker 1: Like I feel like it's studying Trump, and you know,
Speaker 1: I think I know how to decipher some of him,
Speaker 1: but you know, I think you.
Speaker 2: Do a lot more. But how do you.
Speaker 1: How do you decide what the truth looks like when
Speaker 1: you deal with Trump.
Speaker 3: Officials generally speaking, And I say this at my peril
Speaker 3: is you know, for the stories that I have done.
Speaker 3: I don't think I have been as lied to as
Speaker 3: perhaps other people, in part because I haven't put.
Speaker 2: Maybe you know who to talk to. That's part of it.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: You just have to also understand there are certain people
Speaker 3: if you put them in a position, and this is
Speaker 3: not limited to this administration. Yeah, certain people you put
Speaker 3: in a position to lie to you, they're going.
Speaker 2: To lie to you. So correct, That is very true.
Speaker 3: The ultimate problem in covering Trump is that is Trump is.
Speaker 3: You can talk to the top people who just spoke
Speaker 3: to him and they will tell you, hey, look I've
Speaker 3: heard X, Y and Z, and an hour later you
Speaker 3: can call back and say, well, from what I'm gathering,
Speaker 3: it's not X Y and Z.
Speaker 2: A, B and c.
Speaker 3: And then they will say, well, yeah, maybe that's true.
Speaker 1: You know, Oh oh I had that. I've had that
Speaker 1: experience a bunch of times. I've never had Trump. Well,
Speaker 1: you may have talked to somebody who's talked to him since,
Speaker 1: which is like because so many of these guys have
Speaker 1: been burned themselves before, so they don't.
Speaker 3: Just look over the weekend. Is it over the weekend?
Speaker 3: Like Donald Trump was like, look, no deal, no negotiation,
Speaker 3: no pause. In one of the kind of great meta
Speaker 3: examples of the relationship between Trump, the truth, reality, and
Speaker 3: the media is.
Speaker 2: There was a.
Speaker 3: Social media rumor or a Twitter post that got sort
Speaker 3: of misconstru rude on Monday that Trump was gonna.
Speaker 1: Walter Bloomberg, the Walter Bloomberg, I'm Chuck Reuters, by the way,
Speaker 1: nice to meet you.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm Mark Mark Political. Yeah, exactly, Mark Political.
Speaker 3: Ye. But the the they reported that there was going
Speaker 3: to be a ninety dight pause, Ruders picked it up.
Speaker 1: Just by the way, Is that now do we now
Speaker 1: go back and say, hey, Walter Bloomberg was right.
Speaker 3: And that's the thing with Donald Trump and the Trump administration,
Speaker 3: like things can be simultaneously true and untrue, and it's
Speaker 3: just so there's just sort of a lot of approximate
Speaker 3: approximation and this is what these folks are saying. This
Speaker 3: is what these folks are saying, And so you have
Speaker 3: to do the kind of the synthesis between the thesis
Speaker 3: and the antithesis.
Speaker 1: All right, let me uh, I'm basically asking you to
Speaker 1: give me the internal temperature check. And certain individuals here
Speaker 1: we've been doing, Howard Luttney, we did Bobby Kennedy Junior.
Speaker 2: So let me ask you, Ques. Yeah, I think Musk.
Speaker 2: Remember Musk his standing right now, I mean it's still
Speaker 2: pretty good.
Speaker 3: But you know, the Cabint meeting that just ended, Trump
Speaker 3: made sure to go out of his way to praise
Speaker 3: how great Elon Musk is. But number one, like the
Speaker 3: major charge of his work is done, which was to
Speaker 3: go in there cause hell people fired and shake things down.
Speaker 3: And then secondly, he's a special government employee. His charge
Speaker 3: is supposed to end after one hundred and twenty days.
Speaker 3: And you know his I think his time has come,
Speaker 3: and he's for this coming series.
Speaker 2: Of episodes in the Trump Show. In this season, I.
Speaker 3: Think he's going to go out, But that does not
Speaker 3: mean he's gone from The Trump Show.
Speaker 2: I think he's gonna he's going to be a reappearing character.
Speaker 1: Well, it's interesting. There were certainly a lot of congressional Republicans.
Speaker 1: I certainly talked to a couple of them who were
Speaker 1: rooting for the Democrats to do really well in that
Speaker 1: Wisconsin Supreme Court race. If the fallout was minimizing and
Speaker 1: and distancing themselves from Musk.
Speaker 3: Uh, Yeah, one of the smart things or maybe it
Speaker 3: was one of the honest things that Musk's folks had done.
Speaker 3: I wrote the story at the time. Is about ten
Speaker 3: days before that election. They put out a memo saying
Speaker 3: if if the Shimmel I think is his name, the
Speaker 3: candidate for the Wisconsin Supreme Court was more trumpy and
Speaker 3: if we got out the Trump voters, then he would win.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so they created so they were setting up the
Speaker 1: explanation for the loss. Right.
Speaker 3: It wasn't Musk, I mean, but the Democrats have been
Speaker 3: bad on a lot of messaging. But one thing they'd
Speaker 3: made sure to do is really kind of go after Musk,
Speaker 3: and Musk himself is just you know, he's picking fights
Speaker 3: with Peter Navarro, calling him Peter Ritardo on social media.
Speaker 3: Not a typical thing that I haven't talked to the
Speaker 3: Chief of staff, Susie Oz about that, But that's not
Speaker 3: the kind of thing that she would necessarily like she was.
Speaker 2: That was the one thing she tried to minimize was
Speaker 2: staff on staff crime. Correct.
Speaker 3: But you know, Elon Musk is a different character, and
Speaker 3: when you talk to the rest of the staff about it,
Speaker 3: they'd be like, hey, walking to Trump World, this is
Speaker 3: how we play.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you had let me ask you Marco Rubio, uh, rising, falling,
Speaker 1: staying the same.
Speaker 3: I notably in the Wednesday I'm not sure when this
Speaker 3: runs cabinet meeting, Marc Rubio is seated at the right
Speaker 3: hand of the father, so he's well.
Speaker 2: It is secretary of State.
Speaker 1: It's usually you know, it is the it is the
Speaker 1: cabinet post, the first cabinet post that becomes president, by
Speaker 1: the way.
Speaker 3: And so the two guys that Donald Trump is in
Speaker 3: the White House are thrilled with is Rubio and Vance.
Speaker 3: And they have very similar just.
Speaker 2: For their media performance.
Speaker 3: They both have the same quality of being able to
Speaker 3: be able to describe very conservative, very Republican, very maga
Speaker 3: things which if other people's had said it would sound horrifying, and.
Speaker 2: Deliver it in a way.
Speaker 3: So both of them are in good stead. That having
Speaker 3: been said, there is because it's Trump World. A faction
Speaker 3: not in the White House, outside of the White House
Speaker 3: that doesn't like Marco.
Speaker 2: Rubio, that calls him a neo khon and a war pig.
Speaker 1: Is that Laura is that Laura Lumer and her oppo
Speaker 1: research team.
Speaker 3: I would I think it's fair to say that Laura
Speaker 3: is probably more allied with the people who who would
Speaker 3: like to see someone else in that position?
Speaker 2: Correct?
Speaker 3: Yes, And what's notable is that some of the firings
Speaker 3: and the purgings that happened at the National Security Council
Speaker 3: under Waltz all had ties to Rubio.
Speaker 2: Oh that note, Well, I've heard another name that there
Speaker 2: is that is toxic inside Nssay, that is, if you
Speaker 2: have any ties to Tom Cotton, that could be too.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know Rubio and Cotton, certainly in the
Speaker 3: past we were really.
Speaker 2: Fellow travelers, more symbiotic. I remember.
Speaker 3: And was it in twenty ten or was it twenty
Speaker 3: fourteen whenn't Cotton first win?
Speaker 1: No, it would have been twenty twelve. Cotton won in
Speaker 1: twenty House in twenty twelve, Senate twenty fourteen.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, so I remember, I remember Cotton.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Rubio is leading.
Speaker 3: Around Miami actually for his his initial Senate right, so
Speaker 3: there they were very similar at the time.
Speaker 2: But yeah, Rubio looked very strong.
Speaker 3: He he shot out of the gate with a lot
Speaker 3: of wins and also implemented that catch and revoke program
Speaker 3: of finding the homosniks in quotes.
Speaker 2: And I tell you that again is some border. I
Speaker 2: that's uh.
Speaker 1: I thought the Constitution applied to anybody in the United States. Yeah, anyway,
Speaker 1: that's going to be That's an interesting This is this
Speaker 1: idea that hey, we're going to monitor the social media feeds.
Speaker 3: They're using AI to do it too.
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, this is this is big brother shit. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean this is yeah. I'm I I don't I
Speaker 1: don't think this is going to pass muster in court.
Speaker 2: But maybe they don't care. I don't know. Somebody's losing
Speaker 2: in court they think is good PR with.
Speaker 3: The mood Khalil case, maybe because he's a citizen or
Speaker 3: not a citizen because he had legal permanent residency. But
Speaker 3: for students here on student visas, I think the I
Speaker 3: think the law is a little more on the administration
Speaker 3: side where they can start canceling pete.
Speaker 2: That could be.
Speaker 1: It just depends on your definition of of I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, just that's thought anyway, borderline thought police stuff.
Speaker 2: It's not borderline thoughtfully stuff. It's very thoughtfully stuff, like
Speaker 2: very thoughtful.
Speaker 1: Well, and that's the case. I don't think it's I
Speaker 1: just don't think it's constitutional.
Speaker 2: There's a there's an interesting one. I'm sorry to even
Speaker 2: though you'll cut it out.
Speaker 3: There's a really interesting case of a Spanish official who
Speaker 3: stopped in Miami in like I don't know when Reno
Speaker 3: was the Attorney General under Clinton, and he had like
Speaker 3: fifteen thousand dollars in undeclared cash and they didn't know
Speaker 3: what to do with this guy. And soas Mexican actually
Speaker 3: was on his way to Spain, and so Reno or
Speaker 3: the Secretary of State at the time, exercise their authority
Speaker 3: to remove his ability to be in the United States.
Speaker 3: And Rubio's using that sort of case to hang his
Speaker 3: hat on his ability to have these these powers.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Miami. It does it just, you know, to
Speaker 2: see him do stuff like this.
Speaker 1: I know there's a version of Marco Rubio that criticized
Speaker 1: the Cuban government for doing.
Speaker 2: Stuff like this. Oh much, undred percent.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, Like that's that's what makes it so alarming
Speaker 1: to me, because he's executing orders that he would have
Speaker 1: criticized another country, particularly that country, Cuba, from doing that.
Speaker 1: Not to not to bring it all back to Miami,
Speaker 1: but there's that last one. And then I'm gonna let
Speaker 1: you go because it's Florida and I care about Florida politics.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Byron Donald. Oh yeah, this thing is this
Speaker 1: thing is turning into a juggernaut.
Speaker 3: The case no the Casey DeSantis story, if everyone needs
Speaker 3: to go, read the Miami Herald stories, the Tampa Bay
Speaker 3: Time stories. Casey Desantus is probably going to run for
Speaker 3: governor and her husband, the governor, had with her had
Speaker 3: established something called Hope Florida, which was a charity. And
Speaker 3: it turns out they got a a They got a
Speaker 3: medicaid company of healthcare company that had run a foul
Speaker 3: of the law or overbuild the state to settle with
Speaker 3: the state, and they diverted ten million dollars and send
Speaker 3: it to Casey DeSantis' charity and they can't account for
Speaker 3: the money there. It's a nonprofit. There's no nine to
Speaker 3: nineties that's the tax form you have to have. There's
Speaker 3: no evidence of where the money went. So it's just
Speaker 3: ten million gone. And Casey DeSantis, if she runs, and
Speaker 3: it looks like she will, was going to run on
Speaker 3: two things, that she's a mom and a cancer survivor,
Speaker 3: and that she ran this Hope Florida thing that helped people,
Speaker 3: and that that one issue is now starting to really
Speaker 3: hurt her because for the first time her husband is
Speaker 3: facing a Republican legislature, which is like, uh, oh, not
Speaker 3: so fast, what happened?
Speaker 2: I was with, where's the data?
Speaker 3: Where are the nine nineties? Where are the forms? It's interesting.
Speaker 1: I was with a with a longtime veteran of Florida
Speaker 1: Republican politics about a week or so ago, and he goes, hey,
Speaker 1: it's really funny the way Rond de Santis thinks he's governor.
Speaker 1: Still this was the line he gave to me. I went, wow,
Speaker 1: is it that bad in Tallahassee? He goes, oh, he
Speaker 1: goes to me, can't he can't get any you know, well,
Speaker 1: look you rode the tiger and he thought he won
Speaker 1: and he wound up inside he didn't. That's right, yep, No,
Speaker 1: it is. It is what it is, Mark Apudo. I
Speaker 1: hope you are a regular unofficial cast member.
Speaker 2: I would love to.
Speaker 1: It's a cameos on the Chuck Todgy. You know, like
Speaker 1: I said, nobody understands the game of throne that is
Speaker 1: Trump World, like you.
Speaker 3: Well, I appreciate. I think there's some other people, but
Speaker 3: I'll take the compliment.
Speaker 2: No, there is there is, but you're my favorite narrator.
Speaker 2: I'll take it.
Speaker 1: Thank you, all right, Yeah, the art George R. R.
Speaker 1: Martin of this generation for this administration. See you, my friends.
Speaker 1: All right, that's it for this edition of the Chuck Podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna keep this, keep this a bit short. I
Speaker 1: got a satyr to prepare for. I love, I love
Speaker 1: Passover Jewish Thanksgiving. UH it's it's my second favorite holiday
Speaker 1: after American Thanksgiving. So for those of you that celebrate that,
Speaker 1: I hope you have a nice satyr. If you're not
Speaker 1: Jewish and have and you have been invited to a
Speaker 1: satyor go it's it. The most satyrs are are entertaining
Speaker 1: a lot of fun and you might accidentally learn something
Speaker 1: too when you're that. But if you if you ever
Speaker 1: get invited to one, UH take you should take the
Speaker 1: invite up.
Speaker 2: It's a it's a it's a it's an interesting thing
Speaker 2: to UH to to observe and participate in.
Speaker 1: So with that, for those of you that celebrate that holiday,
Speaker 1: and I know we're preparing for uh many of the
Speaker 1: Christian holidays coming up at the end of the end
Speaker 1: of next week with Good Friday and Easter. So with that,
Speaker 1: I hope you UH travel safely if you're traveling, enjoy
Speaker 1: time with your family, and I will see you on
Speaker 1: all of these channels again soon until we upload again.
Speaker 3: H