← Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
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- [00:03]
A
This is a Global Player original podcast.
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And I bet you Witkoff wasn't in the back room of the special box calling Putin or even calling Hamas. I am enraged that he was there on the day that Putin ordered for the very first time a strike on Zelensky's presidential and government buildings as the first time during the war. I did actually yell at the screen the. The Alaska summit where he invited Putin indicted by the icc. Exactly. With a red carpet. And he got a big fat zip.
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A
What happens to the hundreds of billions of dollars that have been collected? Will they have to refund it? And he seems to enjoy imposing tariffs on our allies more than imposing tariffs on our enemies. That's what's wrong with Donald Trump.
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B
Stop treating all this as if it's normal. Honestly, it's not. It's not normal. Hello, everyone and welcome to the X Files with me, Christiana Manpour.
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A
And I'm Jamie Rubin, two time senior State Department official under Presidents Clinton and Biden.
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B
And I'm a longtime CNN correspondent in the field. Wars, crises, disasters, all of that. But for the last several years in a studio interviewing world leaders and trying to hold them accountable. And oh yes, we're, we will tell you again, we were married for 20.
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A
Years and, and we've been divorced for about seven years.
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B
About seven years. And hence the X Files. So if you haven't already, make sure that you follow our feed on Global Player or wherever you get your podcasts and also subscribe to our YouTube channel so that you never miss an episode. Let's get. We are going to ask, has Trump just had, and is he having the worst weeks of his presidency at home? He suffered setbacks from the courts and on the world stage, he has been essentially, frankly challenged by China in a very, very obvious way with that summit they all had with the so called axis of Upheaval. We're also going to be showing you this week a new and we hope exciting feature at the end of the podcast, at the end of the episode. So stay with us and you see what our big reveal is. And there's another difference. What's the difference?
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A
We haven't seen each other for two years in person and we're in the studio together for the first time, which.
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B
Is, what is it? Nerve wracking?
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A
Well, I think we're managing.
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B
We're managing well. I was at the gym today and my trainer asked me apropos of just what he asked me, good, you're gonna have a good week, right? I said, yeah. Are you excited about the day and recklessly. I said, yes.
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A
Bold stance you've taken.
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It was a bold stance. And we need a bold stance because we got a lot of bold stu to talk about. First and foremost, Jamie, it really is the. You know, where is Trump going now? To be honest with you, I'd like to start with the US Open. Not because he attended the Carlos Sinner slugfest at the US Open final, but for me, I was shocked when I saw who else was surrounding him. Who was in the box? Steve Witkoff. Who is Steve Witkoff?
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A
Well, he's the de facto Secretary of State. He's the one Trump has deputized to negotiate all the wars. The Gaza war, the Ukraine war, the Iran, Israel, United States conflict. I can't believe he has time to go to the US Open.
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B
Frankly, I was actually furious. I did actually yell at the screen. I said, you should be fixing the horrendous upscale of Russia's attacks on Ukraine. They just attacked for the very first time this week, a government building near the Presidential Palace. Russia has not done that yet. And in Israel, the war against Gaza just gets worse and worse and worse, and the bodies keep piling up.
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A
He's got time to go to the US Open. Not that I think he should be doing everything 24 hours a day, but clearly the United States has not been the peacemaker Trump claims he was gonna be. He was gonna end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours. He was gonna make Gaza the most beautiful French Riviera on the Mediterranean. The Witkoff diplomacy so far has been a dramatic failure across the board.
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B
So we're gonna talk about that in context of the massively obvious challenge that China has posed to the United States. Trump, again, because he does make everything about him. When he saw the summit in Beijing Marking the 80th year since the end of World War II in the Pacific, he said, first, you know, congratulations to all of you as you conspire against me. Then he said, you know, this is all about me. There was an audience of one. They were just doing this all for me. And I had one of his former appointees to the State Department, Matthew Bartlett, on. On my program, and he was saying, that's just so typically schizophrenic. Trump reaction on the one hand, one reaction on the other hand, the other reaction. But what's happening to me, anyway, I don't know how you feel, is that Trump appears to be ceding authority and control. It's almost like a negligence, but a willing negligence of just giving away the.
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A
Authority, failure to do the job of the President of the United States. Look, I think you have to start from the premise, which I hold, that the United States and China have the most important competition for world leadership. Either we're going to have a Chinese Communist Party led world with Orwellian surveillance and control and denial of freedoms and human rights, where the Chinese model is running the world, or we're going to continue in a world where the United States has been a leading player with Donald Trump's failures. What's happening, what you saw in China was the fact that Trump has alienated our friends and empowered our enemies. They're working together. And the big fulcrum for many of us in this world of world affairs has been the billion and a half people in India. Which way will they go? And to see Modi, Prime Minister of India, insulted by Trump because Trump is trying to win a Nobel Peace Prize. And we can get to that in a minute. But the point is that Modi had been moving closer and closer to the United States. India had been moving closer and closer to the United States. For president after President Clinton, two Bush administrations, two Obama administrations, one Biden administration and the first Trump administration since 2000. So whatever that is, 25 years plus another year, India's been coming closer and closer to the United States. And now we've basically pushed them into the arms of a willing China. And you have India, Iran, the dictator of North Korea, Putin and China sitting there gathering up world leaders to essentially, as Trump admitted, you know, say, we're gonna run the world, not you, Mr. President.
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B
And it's actually really interesting because Trump said that he feels it's about him. They were just challenging him. But it is much more serious than that. It is that China and its so called axis of upheaval, which was coined by, you know, two foreign policy experts a while ago last year. It's not just about one man. He's making it easy, but it's challenging the United States and its, you know, world order that it led after World War II. And as you say, the question is, what does that mean and what does that mean for all of us? But let's talk about how Trump is doing that. Yes, India, he's decided to slap 50 tariffs on India. So apparently because they buy Russian oil. But as you say, others think it's much more personal, much more trivial that because he claimed to have stopped the escalation of the Pakistan India war, Pakistan then praised him, as they know how to do to get on his right side. They wrote a letter proposing him for a Nobel Prize. I mean, this. I can't even believe we're talking about this. But then India refused to do it.
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A
Right? So this is what it's about. Trump does have this positive quality, which I support, which is he wants to be a peacemaker. He wants to use the power of the presidency to promote peace, something that happened, frankly, under Bill Clinton quite a bit. The Nobel Peace Committee, if it receives a nomination from both parties to a dispute, is more likely to consider that person for a Nobel Peace Prize. So when Trump found out that India wasn't going to support him to get a Nobel Peace Prize, Pakistan, as you said, knows how to play the United States very well. I think the head of the army had lunch with Trump in the Oval Office that week, and India refused, refused to falsify the facts, namely that the United States didn't cause the war to stop. The war was. The conflict was slowing down, there was contact between them. And, yes, we probably played a, you know, helpful role, but we weren't decisive or important enough to justify a Nobel Peace Prize. So when Trump took credit for it, demanding credit for stopping a war, because that's what he wants to do, which is fine, I'd love him to stop the war in Gaza. I'd love him to stop the war in Ukraine. So India refuses, and then he uses that personal problem and takes our country down the tubes with him because he's letting India fall into the hands of China. There are a billion and a half people we've worked on. We're the two biggest democracies in the world, the United States and India. We have a great reason to work together to build up India's economy, build up India's role in the world. Instead, he actually, you know, Modi was cheering when Trump was elected. They thought everything was going to be wonderful.
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B
Well, they had a great meeting in. In early days.
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And now the Indian people have united around fury at the United States for these tariffs.
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B
And it's not just India. Trump seems to be blundering by pushing allies away and into their own separate sort of coalitions, whether it's the allies of, you know, the axis of resistance, or some people say, upheaval. But, you know, Kim Jong Un, Modi, to an extent, Iran, Putin, China, all of that. And at the same time, he's distancing South Korea, Japan, or the European allies. The people who it said could together as an alliance, confront China and stop it overtaking the US World order, but the US Itself cannot, apparently.
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This is the essential foreign policy question of our time. Will The United States, using the power of persuasion and attraction and the enormous power of the US Economy, the enormous power of the US Military, and the enormous power of American democracy, continue to gather together. Allies in Europe, in Asia, in Latin America. You know, we talk about the, you know, democracy sliding back, but still most of the world is a democracy, and we can work together with our European allies, with our Asian allies, with our allies in Latin America, Africa, the Middle east, that are growing, hopefully more democratic, and join together, and together we will continue to dominate world affairs to the good of everyone.
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B
Together. That's the idea. And that's what he's failing.
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A
And he's failing the alliances. You know, one of the greatest things we did during Biden never happened before because Biden had an ability to work with Asians and Europeans. We brought Europeans and Asians together, so we had a bridge between Europe and Asia on Ukraine. The Asian countries helped us with the war in Ukraine. Similarly, the Europeans began to see China for the threat it is. We educated them with intelligence downgrades and intelligence sharing. Showing them the fact that China is undergoing the largest military buildup of our time and getting Europeans and allies working together was one of our successes. And now that is all crumbling.
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B
So let's get to Russia, because, again, Witkoff, honestly, I am enraged that he was there on the day that Putin ordered for the very first time, a strike on Zelensky's presidential and government buildings, his first time during the war. And I bet you, Witkoff, wasn't it, you know, in the back room of the special box, calling Putin or even calling Hamas. And we are also in the moment here where the Israel Hamas war is just getting worse and worse for the people of Gaza and not resolving anything for the Israeli hostages at all. And Trump is again, it seems, awol. He was asked after this attack on the presidential government buildings in. In Kiev, he was asked, are you, you know, finally ready to take some, you know, take some action against Putin? And he said, yes, I am. Except he keeps saying that first it was sanctions. He said, yes, I will. I'll give them one week, two weeks, three weeks, these endless rolling deadlines where he does absolutely nothing. And I think it's important again to speak about the Alaska summit which preceded this. I'll show you summit in Beijing by the Chinese and the Russians. The Alaska summit where he invited Putin indicted by the icc. Exactly. With a red carpet, with a menu that was leaked with the title dinner luncheon in honor of. In honor of the President of the Russian Federation. And he got a Big fat zip. And not only that, in his car ride with Putin, I think he thinks that's a big element of personal diplomacy. He managed to give away what he, Trump and the European allies and Zelenskyy had agreed was a vital first step, as we all know, a ceasefire. So he handed that away. No, no, we don't need a ceasefire. Putin says we don't need a ceasefire. Well, we now know from, you know, Putin's press secretary and his right hand man, Dmitry Peskov, that Putin doesn't think there's any reason to meet Zelensky, that they haven't moved back from their maximalist goals. So. So the real question here actually is for people who might be wondering, well, Trump has access to Putin, he has access to Netanyahu. He's always on the phone with them. But phone calls don't make it work. They have to have a prepared diplomatic and negotiating plan and a strategy. Witcalfe can't do anything just by going back and forth. And some people say either not understanding or misrepresenting what Putin actually says in their meetings about what he's willing to do and what he's not willing to do. For instance, do you know, Jamie, J.D. vance has said, oh, Putin has told us, and we're sure that he's ready to make some major concessions. That was during the Alaska summit or just after. That's not true, right?
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A
No. Look, there are European officials who are furious at Wyckoff's failure to understand the details. I've been involved in diplomacy my whole life. I need people when I've done my diplomacy, helping me make sure you get the details right. Because words matter in these high stakes diplomatic engagement. And there's a difference between a ceasefire, a withdrawal, a cessation of hostilities, an armistice. These are all words that matter. And what I think Wyckoff misunderstood. He thought Russia was prepared to withdraw from territory if the Ukrainians ceded some other territory in some swap. Not true.
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B
They want, just to be clear, Putin wants territory that they haven't even controlled.
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A
And isn't prepared to withdraw. So Ukraine is the most important single issue of our time. A major power with hundreds of thousands of troops has invaded and gobbled up and trying to gobble up its neighbor. If we can't stop that, and we have these axis of authority sectarians, I call them, gathered together, you know, the world is going to be even more dangerous. What if Xi Jinping decides to swallow up Taiwan, which is a very real possibility in the next year or two, and we need to show him, the Chinese leader, that the price will be far too high if he tries to take Taiwan. And that's why Ukraine is important to Asia and to the world, but obviously it's important to Europe because to have a large European country invading its neighbor in 2020, 2025, is simply unthinkable in a Europe that is otherwise peaceful and thriving.
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B
And the Europeans, as you say, are getting pretty upset and just sort of trying to, to do what they can around Trump. Yeah, and. And trying to be a solid coalition. It's hard about China. I just want to read this because it's, it's quite ominous. So this is from the ft. They quote an expert who was talking about the Russian playwright Chekhov. He once advised. This is Chekhov, quote, if in the first act you've hung a pistol on the, then in the following one, it should be fired. So what he was talking about was, here's Xi showing Trump who's in charge and who has a coalition and who has allies and who wants to actually organize themselves to, to challenge the US but make a world order that's more friendly to them and not just to the US and the rest of the fear.
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Act three is going to be the invasion of Taiwan.
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Yeah, well, act two hasn't even happened yet. They haven't fired it yet. You know, they've hung it on the.
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A
Invasion of Taiwan that the world will not be sufficiently willing to stand up to, and that'll be leading to this. What I suspect is Trump's long term vision. And maybe we can talk about this in a minute, but let me just state it very simply. I fear that what he wants is to have control over the Latin American Western hemisphere, allow Putin control in Europe and the Middle east to a degree, and allow Asia to be led by China. And that he's divided up the world and that's where we're heading, given the way he's been.
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Yeah, but it would be one thing, not a good thing, if that was organized. To me, it just seems like a whole bunch of throwing chaff and seeing where it lands.
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It's the world of the bully. Imagine a Communist Party led China ruling the world. I don't want that.
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Talking about bullies, I was again shocked by the whole U.S. open thing. It's been reported that ahead of President Trump's appearance at the U.S. open. And frankly, I never knew he was a tennis fan. Golf, yes, tennis. I don't know why he's there other than to bask in the aura of that unbelievable matchup between sinner And Alcatraz. But the usta, the tennis organization, sent an email instructing all the official broadcasters to censor any protests or reaction to his appearance. Now, there was one moment when they put his him up there on the screen and it was reported that there were many, many more boos than cheers. So they didn't put him up again, which he probably hated because he likes to be the center of attention. But this is really unbelievable to send an email to broadcasters.
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Fear. It's about fear in our one thing, Donald Trump, what bullies do is they make people afraid. And if you don't stand up to bullies, they're going to keep bullying you.
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Can I stand up to myself? I just, I know again Alcatraz, and I'm a big Alcaraz fan. But hey, what can I tell you? I heard it. Listen, talk of bullies. He had a bad week at home. We're going to talk about domestic fallout to some of his more extreme edits and operations on the home front. We're also this week introducing an interesting new feature towards the end of the podcast that's in section three. We're going to section two next. Look, we're back. Trump suffered quite a few defeats inside the United States. And you know, it's important because whither the US Goes, often the rest goes and we've got some issues here in Europe, too, with the rise of the right with increasing authoritarianism and people looking at the United States and thinking, well, if the US can do it, we can do it with impunity. So it's a problem. However, let's discuss some of the setbacks. So for me, one of the most and this was, you know, a week or more ago, a judge decided while this plane was on the tarmac ready to take listen to this unaccompanied Guatemalan children out and to deport them back home. Unaccompanied children to deport them back home. And Trump wanted to do it. The plane was ready to take off and the judge said no, recalled the plane, told the kids they needed to get off and, you know, be accompanied off. And I don't know where it's going to go. But that was one thing. Harvard, it won a little bit of a court case. Important, but again, we don't know how it's going to play out with appeals and this but ruled that Trump illegally took away funds for their research and other such thing. All these billions of dollars that he's threatening. And on it goes. So it's interesting what's happening in The United States right now, there is some pushback, even if not by the usual suspects.
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A
It is. No, I think it's very important. Look, we are a nation of laws was one of the first concepts that the United States helped establish in the world through our revolution and through 250 odd years of American support for the rule of law. Now, I know a lot of cynics somehow think Trump will just ignore the judges and this and that. The world doesn't work that way because whether it's deportations, whether it's funding for Harvard, whether it's tariffs, and we can get to that in a minute. Trump doesn't just decide things and do. There has to be a whole system of government to collect tariffs, to actually deport these people, to run the prisons, to provide funding for research. All of that involves thousands and thousands of individuals. And they would have to decide to violate the law if these rulings are upheld. And so the rule of law matters. And as you've seen, Trump's people, they all think they're doing the right thing, as crazy as it may be to some of us. And so they don't want to act illegally. And remember, the conservatives have always said that they're the ones who believe in the rule of law and want to prevent liberals from changing things by violating laws. So I think the rule of law is crucial. I'd like to spend our time on tariffs for a moment because I think it's really interesting.
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B
So just to set the scene, Trump claims, and many economic journalists seem to have fallen into the same, you know, Lane, that he's made a huge, huge killing, essentially windfalls, billions of dollars, tens of billions of dollars on these tariffs. And now they're saying that this is a huge political win for him. So take it from there. Political win, but maybe not an economic win.
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A
So in order to impose these tariffs, he's interpreted a law in a way nobody's ever done before, claiming emergency powers when there's no emergency and failing to do the due diligence to prove any particular action by any particular country. So he keeps losing, and he's lost in all these court cases where judges, many of whom have been appointed by Republican presidents, Bush or Trump himself, and some going back to George Bush Sr. All of them are saying he doesn't have the power to impose these tariffs because a simple reason, the Constitution says it's the Congress that can decide on tariffs.
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B
But what if the Congress just doesn't want to do anything?
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A
As we've seen what the Trump lawyers claim, that Congress is allowing this to happen. And the constitutional scholars call it the invitation to struggle. Where there's gray areas between the powers of Congress and the power of the President, there's a so called invitation to struggle. This isn't a gray area. The Constitution is clear. It's the power of Congress to impose tariffs. So most senior court in the country before the Supreme Court has ruled them illegal. However, being careful, they're not changing the tariff rules policy right now they're saying it's illegal, but the Supreme Court will have to decide. I think the Supreme Court will rule them illegal.
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B
Do you? Because so far it's given in to.
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A
At least most of this one is so clear that I don't think they can and call themselves conservatives ever again because conservatives supposedly believe in the original written Constitution. Well, it's clear in the Constitution Congress has the power to regulate economic interaction between countries. So here's the fun part. When and if I believe the Supreme Court makes that ruling, what happens to the hundreds of billions of dollars that have been collected?
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B
So could Trump.
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A
Will they have to refund it? Will it they go into the, you know, to escrow accounts, Will it be given back to the companies that if it's gone under, frankly, because that's traditionally what law does. They make it retroactive. These were all illegally imposed, they paid them. But it's now. So I don't think this is gonna end up being the political victory he thinks it is. I think it's gonna be one. It's destroyed economic stability because countries don't and companies don't know how to operate in this crazy world of tariffs changing here and there, changing for different countries. And now I expect to be declared illegal. That's not the business climate companies need. And if this thing happens, I think the economy is really going to take over time, real impact. And Trump's economy will be his and it'll be his fault. Whatever happens, it's already slowing down. No question about that. And these tariffs were a terrible mistake, not just for economic reasons. Think about it. We had a normal relationship with all our allies and he seems to enjoy imposing tariffs on our allies more than imposing tariffs on our enemies. That's what's wrong with Donald Trump.
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B
Still no sanctions on Russia.
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A
Exactly.
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B
Here's a question. And those tariffs were his way of doing whatever he wants to do. But also he kept saying that this is a way to avoid people paying taxes so we can get income from tariffs as opposed to from income tax. So I don't know politically that's going to Be a problem for him, too. And also, it is the second weak jobs report that's just come in. And that undercuts his question about this roaring economy. And some are saying that a lot of the flak that he's throwing around in the air is not subject. Yeah, but. And not from Epstein, but from, from the economy and from inflation, which is not doing what he said it would do when he was running for election.
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A
So what was that other legal issue you wanted to bring?
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B
I want to. This is hilarious. Not hilarious, actually, but it's really quite troubling because it goes back to. First of all, he's posted a meme on truth social reimagining Francis Ford's Coppola, as you know, Apocalypse now, the dystopian Vietnam War story. He's, it's put. And he, the White House. And his meme has put his face. Trump's face over Robert Duvall's face. Yeah.
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A
During the famous.
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B
Yeah. And on one side of this thing that they've just, they've done, military helicopters are flying over what, the Chicago skyline. And on the other side, there's raging explosion. That was the, that was the music. But he's saying this is, you know, they've changed the Pentagon to the Department of War. So he's now saying our next war is coming to Chicago. And he's saying on this meme, I love the smell of deportations in the morning.
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A
He was blind. Robert Duval. I love the smell of napalm. Napalm in the morning. It smells like victory. That was the phrase by Robert Duval. But this is so, look, look, there is a domestic conflict brewing because what President Trump has done is taken National Guard from red states, clearly Republican supporting states and deploying them, forced them to deploy in blue states like Washington, D.C. will he do it in Chicago? Will he do it in other blue states?
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B
Well, he did it in California and.
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A
He did it in California. And so here's what I worry about. If somebody wants something to worry about, here it is. There's going to be an election in a year, a big one. Trump, I believe, is going to lose that election big time. The signs are already there that the public, the midterms, the midterm elections, and our elections are run by states. Those states will control the ballot boxes and he will deny the legitimacy of those elections and call on his red state. This is a hypothetical scenario. Call on his red state militias to gather these ballot boxes and take control of them so he can prove that it's a phony election. The blue State, the country where the state where the ballot boxes will be will have its National Guard and listening to its governor in Illinois, in California, in New York, in many other states. And that's where you see the real prospect, the possibility that blue state National Guard will be defending their ballot boxes against red state National Guard trying to seize them. If there's a civil war that breaks out in the United States. I'm not predicting this. I'm just describing where we're heading because of his behavior. This is how it could happen.
- [29:20]
B
It's actually, it's incredibly scary. And I think there is, you know, been an exhortation, stop treating all this as if it's normal. Honestly, it's not. It's not normal. And there's too many people who are hiding under the, you know, taking cover and just don't want to rock the apple cart. And they're afraid. And it's all about money.
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A
Let's talk about this honestly. Christiane. I was born in 1960 and I always wondered what it would have been like to live through the McCarthy period, the 50s, when people were accused of being communists and their lives were ruined. Professors, writers, people in all walks of life faced the House UN American Activities Committee, the Army, all of these people. And what it really was about is the word fear. And how do people behave when they fear the government. And unfortunately, a lot of powerful institutions in our country, the media primarily among them, the government, you know, the corporate owned media particularly, are afraid of the Trump administration and act in ways to avoid controversy, conflict. Harvard stood up. Some law firms have stood up, some individuals have stood up. But too many people are afraid. And that's the way I hark back to the 50s. And we have to remember that anyone who's seen the show the Apprentice, Roy Cohn, the instigator of the McCarthy period, the lawyer for Joe McCarthy, is the person who trained Donald Trump how to behave. So the link is not just, you know, in my mind or in an argument, he taught people, he taught Trump how to make people afraid of you by being a bully.
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B
And guess what? It was the press that started to stand up against McCarthy and eventually denied him the oxygen that he needed to thrive.
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A
Absolutely.
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B
And it is true that there's a lot of fear right now. Some media is doing. Unbelievable, unbelievable.
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A
I agree with that. So I mentioned the 50s because in our next segment, there's something about that I want to bring up.
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B
Okay, well, that's because in the next segment we're going to introduce a new feature. Hopefully you'll find it interesting and compelling. And we're going to give you our recommendations. It could be a book, a movie, a play, a piece of philosophy. It could be anything, anything, anything. So stand by and we'll be back with our recommendations for this week. Okay, so we're back and we want to introduce this new feature, our recommendations, and we really hope you find them interesting. It's going to be about the stuff that we talk about, but in perhaps different format or maybe even something to distract you and to inspire you and to get your mind away from some of the more difficult subjects that we're exploring here. So this is going to be our first week of doing this. Jamie, you're give your first recommendation.
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A
Well, I mentioned the 50s in the previous segment because I was born in 1960, and I always wondered what it was like for people who actually reached adulthood or in teenagers in the 60s, the famous Woodstock and Vietnam era and the time when rock and roll and politics and culture really came to the fore in a unified way and changed the world.
- [32:54]
B
It was a protest movement, the likes.
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A
Of which we don't have now exact, but bringing in music and culture and politics in a way that was really dramatic, that changed the world, arguably. There's a great book by a man named Paul Auster, who's a fiction writer, and it's called 4321. And what it does beautifully is describe what that period of American life was in the 50s, but mostly the 60s and a little bit of the 70s. But what the 4321 signifies is we've all thought about moments in our life where what if we walked in a different path? What if something slightly different happened? 4,000, 321 are the four different variations of this man Ferguson's life during the 50s, 60s and 70s.
- [33:40]
B
And it's a beautiful book and I love Paul Auster. He wrote the famous New York trilogy. I've read a lot of his stuff, so that's a good recommendation. My first recommendation for today is the following, and I'm going to read the exact title so people can find it on their podcast. It's called Trump Is Building His Own Paramilitary Force. It's on the Ezra Klein show on the New York Times podcast, and it's about ice, the Customs and Border Protection force that Trump has been using to do just about everything, deporting people, getting people off the streets, et cetera. And he talks to Radley Balco, who's a journalist who's been really investigating this whole idea of a paramilitary force and this is the kind of stuff we associate, Jamie, with so many foreign countries. But you can see the way Trump is using ice, and particularly Stephen Miller, who I think he said something like, every day there's not a mass deportation is a bad day. I'm paraphrasing, but that's his point of view. And so I think it's really important to read about the systematic grooming of this force and what might be the end result in this. And also just a reminder, given what you were saying about the McCarthy era, every time we talk about that and every time we talk about fear, I think about moral courage, which the real Robert F. Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, brother of President Kennedy, not the, you know, the wannabe who's destroying America's health right now as Secretary of Health. The real Robert Kennedy in South Africa during apartheid, basically talked about how moral courage is greater and takes a greater effort even than physical courage. So I think that's really something.
- [35:21]
A
What's your second one to lead into that? I always use this quote because I'm one of these people who doesn't just go along and get along in life. I try to, you know, know, deal with issues. So I quote Robert F. Kennedy, who has this, I think a brilliant quote. It comes from the Greeks, and that's going to reflect what I'm about to recommend. But it is the sentence, if there's no one in your way, you're not going anywhere. And it's very important. It's about your moral choices of whether you're causing confrontation or confusion or discussion or change, as opposed to just going along and being afraid of the Trump era. Second recommendation. And it's also about immigration. So it fits very well. And this is the selected works of Cicero, the famous Roman orator and lawyer. But here's what he said. Imagine this more than 2000 years ago about immigration. I'm just going to read a couple sentences wrong. Is likewise done by those who ban and eject foreigners from their cities. Noncitizens are not entitled to the rights of citizens. And we have legislation to that effect, quote. But the exclusion of aliens from the city's amenities, I.e. normal services, is completely opposed to natural human relations. So more than 2,000 years ago, Roman Empire had immigration problems, and there were problems. And there is an immigration problem in the United States. But to respond to it by denying human beings natural human relations. Think of how beautiful that sentence is. That's on page 176 of Cicero's selected works. I recommend it.
- [37:11]
B
It's actually interesting we did not plan this at all. And our recommendations are dovetailing.
- [37:17]
A
We did just share them over lunch. We did, but we didn't plan it.
- [37:20]
B
We just asked what we were going to do. And so mine is going now, my last one, going further back even than Cicero to millions of years. And it's a phenomenal production, originally on the BBC called Human. And it is going to air on PBS in the United States starting next week as a five part series about the origin of our species. Now, I know that people say, oh my God, there's so many of them, but this one is really standout in that it is so compelling at a time when we actually need reinforcement about the power of Homo sapiens and about the, when I say power, I don't mean just brute force. I mean the, you know, the incredible inventions and discoveries and movements and survival and, and great values that Homo sapiens, you know, brought. All of that is being challenged right now, or at least a lot given, given who's running the world. And I thought this was a really wonderful, you know, balancing program to be, to be watching right now. Yeah. So those are our, those are our recommendations and we encourage you to hopefully go for them and then tell us what you think and see what else you might, what other ideas you might have for us. That actually is the end of our podcast this week, the end of this episode, but next week we're going to do something else while you're still in Europe. Tell us why you're in Europe.
- [38:40]
A
So I'm in Europe because next week I'm testifying in the special tribunal for war crimes in Kosovo. And as someone who was helpful to Madeleine Albright in creating the original war crimes tribunal, this is, is me coming full circle. And I have more to say about that next week.
- [38:57]
B
And of course, I covered it all during the Bosnia war and the fallout and Rwanda. So something that's really on both of our, you know, plates and wheelhouses. So. Okay, that'll be us next week. Thank you for listening to this week. Make sure you're following our feed so you never miss an episode. Remember, you can watch our episodes on YouTube as well by searching for Christiana Monpour presents the X Files on YouTube and subscribing to our channel. And you can listen for free on Global Player, download it from the App Store or go to globalplayer.com. so we'll also see you on Thursday for our bonus Q and A episode. And this week we're changing that up too because you can now watch that on YouTube as well as the regular episodes. So keep your questions coming. We'd like to hear from you. Email us at amanpur pod@global.com or find find us on social media. Amanpourpod. That's it for this week.
- [39:50]
A
We don't have to say bye bye now. We can say just bye bye to the cameras. Say bye bye to each other.
- [39:55]
B
Yeah, exactly. We're in the same room. We managed.
- [39:59]
A
Yeah. As I hope you all know, I was a State Department official of the senior level in two administrations. Donna, you've forgotten.
- [40:15]
B
No, go ahead. We're gonna let it roll. Cause you were like, I hope you all know, go on.
- [40:20]
A
Under President Clinton and President Biden. Yeah. Yeah.
- [40:22]
B
You're not suffering from any memory loss.
- [40:24]
A
I want to keep my flubs when I make a flub worth keeping them in. This is a global Player original podcast.