Trump Goes to China, Gets Nothing, Comes Back to Iran Crisis

Summary

Bulwark Takes Podcast Summary

Episode: Trump Goes to China, Gets Nothing, Comes Back to Iran Crisis
Date: May 16, 2026
Hosts: Tim Miller, Nicole Heileman
Special Guests Mentioned: Michael Crowley, Tom Nichols
Theme:
This episode critically examines President Trump’s recent diplomatic summit in China amid the ongoing Iran crisis, dissecting the administration’s lack of achievements, the ramifications for U.S. foreign policy, and the concerning domestic repercussions—including alleged bribery and political grift. The panel highlights the media response, conservative base reactions, and broader worries about leadership, competence, and corruption.

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Main Theme & Purpose

The episode takes a deep dive into President Trump's China summit: its context (the escalating war in Iran), its embarrassment for American diplomacy, and its utter lack of substantive results—contrasted with mounting domestic scandals like a $1.7 billion “slush fund” for Trump’s allies and insurrectionists. The Bulwark team unpacks the implications for national security, American standing, and the ongoing erosion of accountability on the right.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The “Joey from Fen” China Summit: No Achievements, Just Photo Ops

• The episode opens with incredulity at the summit’s futility.
• Tim Miller (01:20):

  “It was embarrassing, incompetent, humiliating, weak in any other moment. But in this moment, in the middle of the Iran war, it’s just mind boggling… fly to the other side of the world to see our greatest geopolitical foe and just come away with nothing.”

• Trump is described as seeking the optics of diplomacy but not advancing U.S. interests, failing to apply real pressure regarding China’s alignment with Iran—despite “complimenting the cut of xi’s jib.”
• The Wall Street Journal’s summit takeaways are discussed:
  • Official communiqués present platitudes (end the Iran war, reopen Hormuz, prevent a nuclear Iran), but China’s response shifts blame to the U.S. for starting the conflict.
• Contrast: The hosts note that if a Democrat were this ineffectual, bipartisan outrage would be relentless, yet conservative media ignores or spins Trump’s performance.

2. Geopolitical Naïveté and the “Chinese Restaurants” Moment

• Nicole (06:40) references President Xi’s Thucydides Trap warning—a nuanced historic analogy.
• Tim Miller (06:48), mocking Trump’s vapid response:

  “Damn it, Xi, you're going to hit President Trump with a Thucydides trap. Now you're making his brain go up a flight of stairs… He gives a summit speech like a third grader who got assigned China for his geography project. 'In conclusion, China is a land of contrast. And I brought Panda Express for everyone.'”

• This sets the tone for a critique of Trump’s simplistic, unserious approach to high-stakes diplomacy.

3. Weakness Abroad and Mounting Casualties

• Nicole (07:40):

  “…his ignorance of geopolitical dynamics and his weakness on the world stage has led, has cost the lives of 13 American service members in a war in Iran for which there is no explanation, no articulated endgame, and gas is going up by the day.”

• The hosts emphasize that with the Iran war ongoing and Chinese support for Iran, the summit’s failure is even more damning.
• Tim Miller (08:24) calls it a “total disaster class… exposing us as being very ineffectual on the world stage.”

4. Conservative Media’s Passivity and Base Betrayal

• Nicole (10:35):

  “...right wing conservative media is so flaccid right now, that this thing that it’s cared about since you and I have been alive… has just kind of shrugged… It’s such a sign of the hollowness and the stupidity that they think their own base is sort of permanently wrapped up in the idea that their voters aren’t going to see through.”

• They discuss conservative media’s lack of pushback—even on pet issues like China, immigration, and economic policy—leaving the base “disassociated and a loss of momentum for a presidency that doesn’t really have any juice right now, but unfortunately has a lot of power.” (Tim Miller, 12:56)

5. The $1.7 Billion Slush Fund for Allies & Insurrectionists

• Nicole (13:36):

  “...when the economy is something that causes a vast majority of Americans anxiety and despair... $1.7 billion more from the government after all the other things he’s taken feels like sort of the other bookend to the first story we talked about… this is again stealing from the taxpayers to enrich himself and his allies.”

• Tim Miller (14:31):

  “It is hard to find the words… it’s theft and it’s bribery and it’s grift, but it’s coming from us… They are taking money from people that work hard for a living and… creating a billion dollar slush fund. 1.7 billion… And they’re going to hand it out to their friends, criminal friends. They’re going to hand it out to people that beat cops at the Capitol and hand it out to people that storm the Capitol.”

• A disturbing anecdote: An insurrectionist pardoned by Trump, subsequently convicted of sexual assault, was planning to use part of this public fund as hush money, showcasing the real human toll and the moral depravity the hosts see at play.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the summit’s emptiness:
  “Very cuckolded summit for Trump. It’s shameful for America and did nothing to advance America’s interests.” (Tim Miller, 02:47)
• On conservative media:
  “If you put this exact state of affairs, you replace Trump with Jimmy Carter or Barack Obama or Joe Biden… the entire bipartisan blob national security elite would talk about just how embarrassingly weak the Democratic president is… Fox News, Republicans… are going to pretend like he’s a tough guy even though he’s like talking about Chairman Xi like he’s an OnlyFans model.” (Tim Miller, 02:10)
• On the loss of faith in leadership:
  “This is a presidency in sort of a political death spiral that is now bleeding into hurting America’s standing on the world stage.” (Nicole Heileman, 10:35)
• On using taxpayer dollars as political payoff:
  “Donald Trump is giving those people, the people that are criminals that charged the Capitol, beat up Michael Fanon, that went and subsequently molested kids, and they're gonna get a payoff with our money… It is really, I think maybe the biggest affront of all so far in a really long list of corrupt acts.” (Tim Miller, 15:30)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:55 — Tim Miller lays out the show’s rundown: summit failure, the Iran war, and the slush fund.
• 01:20 — Dissecting the futility and embarrassment of the China trip.
• 06:40 — Xi’s “Thucydides Trap” reference; Miller lampoons Trump’s shallow response.
• 07:40 — Nicole critiques Trump’s ignorance and the costs of U.S. military involvement in Iran.
• 08:24 — Miller calls the summit a “disaster class,” connecting Iran and China crises.
• 10:35 — Nicole criticizes conservative media for its lack of opposition or scrutiny.
• 11:37 — Miller observes the broken contract with the MAGA base and a loss of momentum.
• 13:36 — Discussion of the $1.7 billion slush fund as a symbol of elite corruption.
• 14:31 — Miller shares the story of an insurrectionist exploiting the slush fund.

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Overall Tone & Delivery

• Highly critical, blunt, and sardonic—especially from Tim Miller.
• Relentlessly focused on accountability, with a backdrop of frustration and disbelief at mainstream and conservative media passivity.
• Mixes policy critique with punchy, meme-like commentary (“fat Elvis territory,” “OnlyFans model,” “Panda Express for everyone”).

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Conclusion

The episode presents a scathing indictment of Trump’s China diplomacy and interwoven Iran crisis: an administration adrift, unchallenged by right-wing media, reckless with taxpayer dollars, and increasingly corrosive to U.S. credibility and the rule of law. The panel urges listeners to recognize both the immediate and structural dangers of unchecked incompetence—and prepares them for more “outrage and humiliation” in the news cycle ahead.

Transcript

[Tim Miller]

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Call 888-add-D Dish or visit dish.com today. Hey everybody. Tim Miller from the Bulwark here was on with Nicole and John Heileman and Michael Crowley. Michael Feinberg on Deadline White House today. Man, these Friday and Today Deadline White Houses get to you. These weeks are long. What is it? How's it go? The years are long and the days are short. The weeks are fucking long. And there's just so much outrage out there about what Trump is doing. But on the other hand, I guess there's some hope in just how incompetent and humiliating it is. And so we discuss over the course of this hour more on the $1.7 billion slush fund for insurrectionists that's coming and other Trump allies. And we discussed the end of the China summit. Now the summit has ended. I think Tom Nichols had Trump's number on the pod on Thursday where he called this the Joey from Fen Summit. Hey, how you doing? How you doing? Nope, it wasn't just checking in like we don't really have anything to do. It was embarrassing, incompetent, humiliating, weak in any other moment. But in this moment, in the middle of the Iran war, it's just mind boggling that they could go fly to the other side of the world to see our greatest geopolitical foe and just come away with nothing. Just come away. Complimenting the cut of xi's jib and the war Non war decrease fire in Iran presses on. I was pulling out the Wall Street Journal's five takeaways from the summit and their second bullet is a seeking alignment on Iran. Trump said that the US And China agreed that the war in Iran should end, that ship traffic through Hormuz should be free and that Iran should not get a nuclear weapon. Weapon. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang released a statement saying that the US should never have started the war in the first place. He turned it to the Chinese, but agree with them on that one. Wang was later quoted saying that Beijing advocates for a quick reopening of the Strait. Well, same but like what do you do? I mean, China associates influence with Iran. They're allies. Trump doesn't even pressure them. Trump does nothing to bring any pressure to bear. Xi's bringing pressure to bear on Trump on a hypothetical future war in Taiwan. But Trump does nothing to try to use China to get to a result in Iran. And so here we are. Trump's saying they agree. The Chinese are saying you don't know what the fuck you're doing. And you know, now they're giving each other flowers or whatever. That's it. Trump's talking about how many Chinese restaurants there are in America. So if you and I mentioned this on the, on the segment, if you, if you put this exact state of affairs, you replace Trump with Jimmy Carter or Barack Obama or Joe Biden, the entire bipartisan blob national security elite would talk about just how embarrassingly weak the Democratic president is, how just humiliating it is for the country. You know, Fox News, Republicans, they're not going to do that for Trump. They're going to pretend like he's a tough guy even though he's like talking about Chairman Xi like he's an only fans model. So I don't know. It's a very cuckolded summit for Trump. It's shameful for America and did nothing to advance America's interests. And now this non war presses forward in Iran. No end in sight, no exit plan, no strategy, just you paying more. And as a bonus, he's stealing your money too and giving it to his buddies. So that's what's happening in the country. Happy Friday. Have a great weekend. Stick around for Nicole Heilman, the rest of us. And we'll be seeing you this weekend if there's any news. I kind of doubt there will be. There'll probably be some crazy bleeds. Open up the straight, Iran. Open up the straight or else. This time I'm serious, we might get one of those. But anyway, if serious news happens, I'll be back. Subscribe. Bye.

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[Nicole Heileman]

hoped the two countries could avoid the so called Thucydides trap. It's a historic reference about a great power being threatened by the rise of another.

[Tim Miller]

Damn it, G, you're going to hit President Trump with a Thucydides trap. Now you're making his brain go up a flight of stairs. Come on. All right, President Trump, don't let this guy history Mog. You show him you can communicate in equally sophisticated terms. Chinese restaurants in America today outnumber the five largest fast food chains in the United States all combined. That's a pretty big statement. Yeah, that's my president putting his understanding of geopolitics into fast food terms. He gives a summit speech like a third grader who got assigned China for his geography project. In conclusion, China is a land of contrast. And I brought Panda Express for everyone.

[Nicole Heileman]

So, Tim Miller, I think before Donald Trump started a war for which 9 to 17% of Americans feel supportive and enthusiastic about, these could be read as, as sort of elite things that Trump doesn't, doesn't know anything. I think that now that his ignorance of geopolitical dynamics and his weakness on the world stage has led, has cost the lives of 13American service members in a war in Iran for which there is no explanation, no articulated endgame, and gas is going up by the day. I think his weakness on the world stage is a different political calculation. How do you see this trip sort of fitting into an increasingly troubling narrative

[Tim Miller]

for him and Nicole? We're singing from the same hymn book like usual today, because that's exactly where I was going to go with this. I think that the, because of what is happening in Iran, like the, the, the whatever you want to call this confab, the summit, the non result of the summit is actually worse than what we just laid out. Right? Like in a. And like you removed Iran from the equation, it would have still been a pretty humiliating summit. I mean, Trump ran on being a China hawk. He's got a lot of alleged China hawks around him like Mike waltz and Rubio, etc. As Michael Crowley pointed out. And instead he goes there and just basically lies prostrate before Xi and talks about how hot and strong he is. Like, honestly, you can imagine what Fox would do if any Democratic president would talk about this or just minute by minute it would just be about how weak and humiliating and embarrassing the President is. And that's what our president is. He's extremely weak in the face of this negotiation. And so like that would be one thing if we're talking about like big picture, long term geopolitical concerns, Thucydides trap, what happens with Taiwan in the future. But like we have this acute crisis right now and Iran is simultaneous, excuse me, China is simultaneously helping Iran somewhat in that crisis. They're also providing assistance to some of our putative allies in the region that now are dealing with shortages, you know, in gas and other, you know, other products such as that because of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. There have been multiple articles by Mike's colleagues at the Times and the Wall Street Journal and others about experts about how China is taking this moment of our demonstrated weakness in Iran to kind of increase its footprint around the globe. And so like Trump goes there for this summit with kind of like the Iran war with no clear objective, doesn't get anything out of it. And it happens amidst an ongoing conflict that we started that is exposing us as being very ineffectual on the world stage and on top of that as harming people in our country and abroad. So it's just a total disaster class as far as I'm concerned.

[Nicole Heileman]

The idea that the American people, including Trump's own voters, are being fed this sort of slop. This is, you know, a presidency in sort of a political death spiral that is now bleeding into hurting America's standing on the world stage. And the idea that right wing conservative media is so flaccid right now, that this thing that it's cared about since you and I have been alive, since you and I have been alive, conservative media has cared a lot about America's posture toward China. The idea that most of them sort of just shrugged, that Hannity just sat there and didn't say, whoa, wait a minute, what are you saying? Like, of course this stuff matters is such a sign of sort of the hollowness and the stupidity that they think their own base is sort of permanently wrapped up in the idea that their voters aren't going to see through. This is embarrassing for their voters.

[Tim Miller]

It is. And just shout out to Michael Crowley, we need some diplomacy on the panel, 100%. We are discussing a summit. We're discussing a diplomatic summit, after all. But it is humiliating. And you're, and you're right, Nicole, that the conservative media has been so flaccid and pushing back on it. But even like the small little bits of pushback that we've seen, a lot of this has come from the conservative media, like this. The. For example, that story about the 500,000 visas for Chinese students. I do believe it was a Daily Caller reporter a couple of months ago now that was really pressing him about this in the Oval Office. And I'm kind of surprised he didn't fold on it. To me, it shows, like, he is totally out of touch. This is a piece of what we're talking about a lot about on the economic issues where he doesn't care about Americans financial concerns. And he seems to have kind of given up caring about the specifics of this stuff. And the specifics that he does care about are what kind of marble is going to be in the ballroom? Because. And you can see in Hannity there, he did not push back. It was not a strong interview. It's not a real interview as agitprop. But he's trying to push him there. He's trying to be like, this is a little bit strange that we're letting the Chinese nationals have all this land and bring all these students in when you're not allowing any other immigrants in except for the white South African. And it's like Trump just goes back into his Obama shtick. You know, we're in fat Elvis territory where he's like giving the same talking points he was giving 10 years ago. And you know, I do think that like there's this comp. But there's this escalating element of things, of betrayals to the MAGA base. And I think that, that the response, you know, I think a lot of us wish it would be anger and rage and betrayal and winding, but instead I think it's of kind, kind of like this disassociation and a loss of momentum for a presidency that doesn't really have any juice right now, but unfortunately has a lot of power.

[Nicole Heileman]

Tim, there's been a thing with Trump where the amounts of money he's sought to grift and pocket have been so massive that you can't get your brain around it. You know, like 1.7 billion with a B. They're like Austin Powers numbers, right? They, what does it mean? But at a time when, when the economy is something that causes a vast majority, majority of Americans anxiety and despair, at a time when people are foregoing health care, when people are choosing between rent and groceries, $1.7 billion more from the government after all the other things he's taken feels like sort of the other bookend to the first story we talked about that maybe if people were feeling like they were thriving economically, this wouldn't bother them so much. But this is again stealing from the taxpayers to enrich himself and his allies.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, the political part of this question is can this break through, you know, that thick media bubble? You know, we showed Sean Hannity interviewing him in the last. I don't know if John Hannity is asking him about this or interview, you know, questioning him about this, but it's, it's truly mind boggling. It is hard to find the words for it because it is, it's theft and it's bribery and it's grift, but it's coming from us. And that is the craziest thing about this. Nicole, we still have enough kind of vague memories of being in Republican communications shops. Think about all the time that we talk about waste, fraud and abuse, protecting taxpayers dollars, how people work hard to earn their money and how it shouldn't be wasted by the government. They are taking money from people that are, that work hard for a living and taking their taxpayer dollars and creating a billion dollar slush fund. 1.7 billion, like more money than rich, rich people have. 1.7 billion. And they're going to hand it out to their friends, criminal friends. They're going to hand it out to people that beat cops at the Capitol and hand it out to people that storm the Capitol. And there's this horrible story I to really just take this to a personal place of a guy who was one of the insurrectionists. He climbs into the building of the Capitol Capitol. He gets pardoned and then in March two months ago, he gets arrested or he gets, excuse me, convicted of a crime of sexual assault of two minors. And he told the minors he tried to bribe them to not talk to the police because he said I'm going to get this payoff from the government. And he was probably, he would have been right had he not been convicted of this. Donald Trump is giving those people, the people that are criminals that charged the Capitol, beat up Michael Fanon that went and subsequently molested kids and they're gonna get a payoff with our money. It's one thing if it was a payoff with whatever stupid maga donors money, but it's our money. It's tax our tax dollars. It's such an. It is really, I think maybe the biggest affront of all so far in a really long list of corrupt acts. What's up baby? It's Bretzky and I'm here to tell you that spirit spinquest.com is giving out free sweeps coins. All you gotta do is purchase a $10 coin pack and guess what? They're gonna give you the coins from a $30 coin pack that lets you play all your favorite games like blackjack,

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