← Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
Q&A: Will it be safe to travel to America for next year's World Cup?
00:23:57
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- [00:03]
Jamie Rubin
This is a Global Player original podcast.
- [00:09]
Christiane Amanpour
Hello, and welcome to the bonus episode of Christiane Amanpour presenting the X Files with Jamie Rubin.
- [00:16]
Jamie Rubin
Who are you? I'm Jamie Rubin and I'm the X in the X Files.
- [00:21]
Christiane Amanpour
You are, and this is the Q and A episode where we are answering your questions. And we want to thank everybody for sending in so many really interesting, thoughtful, and varied questions. And we're really actually kind of excited to see how deeply you've got into this subject matter and how interested you are and what good questions you have to try to keep moving this ball forward. So please do keep sending them in. You can find us on social media. Our handle is Manpurpod. Or you can email us@amanpurpodlobal.com so Georgina on email is asking. I've been looking forward to the next football World cup for years and plan to travel for a month to Texas to enjoy the festivities next year. But I own dual nationality, Nigerian and British. I'm beginning to have second thoughts. With the US Set to host an event that draws people from all over the world. What are your thoughts on how the country will manage the influx, especially in light of ongoing immigration rhetoric and security concerns? So it is, you know, a long question, including how will us reconcile the spirit of a global celebration like the World cup with rising nationalism and restrictions on people from certain regions? Georgina's asked a very good question from all aspects. So all I'm going to say is this. President Trump himself and his immigration people have said, yeah, yeah, we want you all to come enjoy, spend here during the World cup, but just don't stay too long. That's how I summed it up. Jamie.
- [01:52]
Jamie Rubin
Yeah, I think this is a fundamental challenge for the Trump administration because as I said, I think the most powerful individual official in that administration is Stephen Miller, the deputy chief of staff, who's made anti immigration the fundamental premise of Trump's basic politics. And so he's created, as we talked about recently, a Bureau of Re Migration in the State Department to get people out of the United States. Never happened before in the history of our country. It's gonna be a challenge. My best hope and gu, is that because President Trump loves events and he loves, you know, celebrations and he loves big, dramatic showcases for the United States that they will make an exception, that they will actually change their attitude for the weeks and months before the World cup and during the World cup to try to make America the place that I've grown up in, that I've believed in my whole life. That's an America that welcomes visitors and immigrants to legally immigrants. And the people coming to this event will be legal visitors. And hopefully they can get over their ridiculous weaponization of government to, to scare people so that this event is a success. And if it isn't a success, we'll know why.
- [03:11]
Christiane Amanpour
And of course, then you've got in 2028, you've got the next Olympics happening in, in the United States, in LA as we speak, which is undergoing its own Trump National Guard immigration issue right now, as everybody can see in the news. But Jamie, how about Yvette in Auckland? She asks in an email, do you think the average American realizes that so many people in the rest of the Western world are incredulous about the state of US Politics, about how absolutely bonkers it is? Do Americans realize how far the country has fallen in the eyes of so many people in other countries? Do they even care? I think a load of good questions. I'm just going to say that tourism is way down. Apparently Americans looking to come to Britain is way up. And that might, you know, be the case for, for other countries as well. But I will say one thing. There is a lot of upsetness in the rest of the world, if I can use that word, about what's happening in the United States, particularly dissing the rest of the world and the people from the rest of the world. But I was at the women's singles finals at Roland Garros, the French Tennis Open, and the American Coco Golf won, and they raised the Stars and Stripes. They played the Star Spangled Banner, the national anthem, and there were no boos, no jeers, no nothing, Just a whole load of claps. So I think that people can separate when it's necessary. But there are many people who are very, very worried about basically the unfriendly politics of this United States right now towards anyone else in the rest of the world. Jamie?
- [04:48]
Jamie Rubin
I think the short answer is no. Not enough Americans realize how far the country has fallen in terms of perceptions. And I think if people in the United States cared about that sort of thing, I don't think they would have voted for Donald Trump, frankly, because that's what he's made his signature attitude to be dissing foreigners, to be bullying friends, to be friendly with adversaries, alienating allies. So that's Donald Trump's style. The majority of our country voted for him. I considered it tragic at the time. It's still tragic. The only thing you can hope is that over time, the cumulative effect of all of these policies will become clear. To a larger group of Americans, the middle group, the group that decides elections. Remember, there's always about 40% Democrat, 40% Republican, and we fight over the 20% in the middle. And if that 20% sees how damaging Donald Trump's policies are without any benefit, remember, the ridiculousness of this is that none of these benefits that he always talks about ever come to fruition. He didn't stop the war in Ukraine. He didn't stop the war in Gaza. He didn't make the beautiful deals with all these countries to make everything great again. Instead, he's damaged our economy, damaged our reputation, damaged our alliances, and made America worse. If that sinks in, we can hope that more Americans will care, more Americans will realize how far the country has fallen and more Americans will turn away from Trump and the Republican Party. And we'll know for sure in 18 months when there's a midterm election.
- [06:27]
Christiane Amanpour
Said as a proud Democrat, now, that's you, not me.
- [06:31]
Jamie Rubin
That's me.
- [06:33]
Christiane Amanpour
Let's go to questions about the Middle east, because these keep coming in. And it is so relevant. And every day it appears a new frontier of horror is breached. So Meral on Facebook asks, in this day and age, it is so easy to access information online. How is it possible that Israeli citizens were unaware of what's been going on in Gaza until now? Jamie, do you want to take a stab at that?
- [06:58]
Jamie Rubin
Yes, I think I can begin to understand it. I traveled to Israel a couple of times with Secretary Blinken during the period after the attacks of October 7th. And what I observed was a country traumatized in the same way that New Yorkers and many Americans were traumatized after 9 11, traumatized by this incredible breakdown of security where over 1000 Israelis were brutally murdered the way several thousand Americans were killed in the 911 attacks. And that created a traumatic response, which was to blame the Palestinians in general by too many Israelis. And the Israeli media made a decision to focus its attention on the effect of the October 7 attacks on Israelis and not the effect of the Israeli response on the Palestinians. And so for many, many, many months, if not years, the Israeli media put the effect of the Israeli military action in Gaza way down on their priority list. It wasn't on television. It wasn't on the radio. It wasn't in the major newspapers. Rather, they focused on the the war, the effect on Israelis, the effect of October 7th. I think now that is changing. And I think more and more Israelis are becoming aware of the horrifying ways in which the Israeli military is being used by the Netanyahu government in a war that is breaking war crimes, breaking the rules of war, that is using food as a weapon, that is targeting innocent civilians too often, or not taking into account the effect on innocent civilians sufficiently. And so that those war crimes are becoming clear, as you mentioned in our last episode, to the point that the former Prime Minister E.W. dolmert laid it all out there in just that way.
- [08:52]
Christiane Amanpour
He did. He said, yes, Israel is committing war crimes. And furthermore, he's sort of center right in the more liberal area. Yair Golan is one of the other leaders. He has said Israel is on the way to becoming a pariah state like South Africa was if we don't return to acting like a sane country. A sane country does not fight against civilians and, and does not set itself the aim of expelling populations. So what's happening is this is now a mounting view, at least in some quarters, at least in the officialdom in Israel. And I've talked to several Israeli friends, to be fair, they're the artists, they're more the cultural people. Well, and Jerusalem, they just are not in government and they're not ultra right wing nationalists, they're not settlers and they're not extremists. And they're very concerned. And one or two have said to me, we're very concerned that our country is losing its ethical soul essentially. Now, some people might say, you know, this has been going on now for the better part of the last 20 months. But the, the killings around basic food right now, CNN just did an investigation which shows that the IDF fired into these, you know, were responsible for the deaths of so many of these poor starving Palestinians who have been held collectively to blame for what happened on October 7th. It's collective punishment and collective blame. And this is now really taking on a very, very important turning point where Israel's allies also are talking about war crimes and insisting that this war stop just very quickly. Is Trump going to do anything to make that happen? Jamie?
- [10:37]
Jamie Rubin
I don't expect Donald Trump to be very successful in his Middle east diplomacy. And the tragedy here is that Israel is responsible as a government for war crimes in Gaza. The tragedy, however, is that blame belongs to the leaders of both communities. It's the Hamas leadership that consciously, purposely and intentionally launched the October 7 attacks and expected a mass slaughter of Palestinians and wanted that to turn the world against Israel. And Israel fell into that trap. It is the Hamas leaders that actually put their leadership compounds under hospitals. There's a story in today's New York Times about an actual leadership compound where Muhammad Sinwar was under the only functioning hospital in the Gaza area. So that doesn't excuse the Israelis using force against civilians or using force against hospitals. But it shows me that the blame belongs to the leaders of Hamas and the leaders of the Israeli government. And it tells me again that until Israelis understand the suffering that Palestinians have gone through, and until the Arab world and Palestinians understand how Israel will respond in extreme ways because of the Holocaust, because anytime they feel their future existence is threatened, they are never again gonna walk defensive into the ovens of the criminals of the Holocaust under the German Nazi regime. That image is still in Israeli heads. Similarly, the Israelis need to see what their military is doing in their name to innocent men, women and children in the Palestinian territories. Until those things happen, we're gonna be talking about this bloody thing for the rest of our lives.
- [12:29]
Christiane Amanpour
That is true. And I'm just gonna say, clearly, I also grew up in the aftermath of Never Again. I took that historically and humanly very, very seriously in my coverage of what happened in Bosnia, the genocide committed by the Bosnian Serbs against the Bosnian Muslims. And I could not believe that this was actually happening. And because you can hold 2 thoughts in your head at one time, if you talk to the highest level judges, human rights lawyers, the icrc, which is the keeper of the Geneva Conventions, the which says even wars have rules, this is literally to all of their minds, gone out of control, even while understanding the trauma of what happened and the context of the trauma of what happened on October 7th. So, in the words of this Israeli leader, we're going to have to do something different or Israeli political leader, if we're not going to be a pariah country like South Africa was at the height of apartheid. Amanda on X asks, what do you enjoy reading, watching, or listening to as a form of escapism from reality? Jamie?
- [13:49]
Jamie Rubin
Well, it's pretty tough to escape the modern world these days, I guess. I read a lot of fiction and a lot of biographies of past times. I'm reading a book about a family that went through the Algeria civil war by a woman named Claire Massoud. As a piece of fiction that I enjoy. I do still pass the TV set. And if anything related to the Lord of the Rings comes up, I can be quickly sucked into it.
- [14:17]
Christiane Amanpour
All right.
- [14:17]
Jamie Rubin
Same with Game of Thrones. So fantasy escape. Yeah, you need to do that sometimes. Cause the world doesn't offer much escape right now if you're following the news and doing the jobs that we do like on tv.
- [14:29]
Christiane Amanpour
I like comedies, I like Ted Lasso, I Like shrinking. There's certainly many, many films that I just love to go. All the big films that come out, I just love going to a variety because, you know, you just get all these different perspectives and it's always escapism. When you go to a cinema and you sit there with other people and the lights go down and the lights of the, you know, screen come up, it really, you're in another. In a whole nother world. What I'm reading right now is also a biography. It's a biography of Pamela Digby. Churchill was Winston Churchill's daughter in law and went on to become one of the most powerful women in American politics and was rewarded with being U.S. ambassador to Paris in the 1990s under President Clinton. It is a fascinating read. It's by Sonia Purnell and it's called Kingmaker. I highly recommend it. And just another one. Personally, if you are able to do something other than your current or prior careers, what would you choose to do instead? Jamie?
- [15:31]
Jamie Rubin
I guess I would want to be never having to work in government, but always being able to comment on world events. In other words, my career has been spent mostly feeling like I needed to explain the US Government, justify the US Government even when I hated the president in power or opposed the president in power. If I could do it again, I'd probably get rid of that burden and be able to sit back like my friend Tom Friedman or others and just say what I think is right without needing to defend the Democratic Party or the Democratic Party.
- [16:07]
Christiane Amanpour
Oh, my God, you really are at the end of your tether then. You love being in government.
- [16:12]
Jamie Rubin
I did, and I do. But if I could do it again as an alternative, I'd like to be able to not have the burden of defending things that are very frustrating and probably, you know, more of a commentator than a.
- [16:26]
Christiane Amanpour
Okay, so, like, what? Give me one thing recently that you didn't want to defend.
- [16:31]
Jamie Rubin
Oh, the whole Biden political thing where he was not choosing to step down the way he promised and we had to explain why, despite him being an elderly gentleman, that his policies on foreign policy still made sense. It was a very painful exercise. I still believe we had good policies, but it was hard to defend their decision to keep him running again until he was forced out.
- [16:57]
Christiane Amanpour
Okay, well, I would have liked to have been a singer. There you go. A singer. I'd have liked to have been Donna Summer. That's what I'd have liked to have been. Or without the hard work that these crazies put themselves through now and beat up Their bodies a tennis champ. Okay, another one on current events. Erica in Bogota sent an email asking. I'm interested in your views on the dismantling of usaid. How can a government get away with publicly stating without any evidence that the agency was corrupt and criminal, that its staff members were radical lunatics? And close an agency that was created by Congress, and therefore only Congress was entitled to close it? Beyond killing its most effective soft diplomacy body, isn't the government shooting itself in the foot? Jamie, I know you have strong views on this.
- [17:43]
Jamie Rubin
Yeah, look, Elon Musk, a truly arrogant billionaire, said he wanted to take a chainsaw to the Agency for International Development. This is a man who doesn't understand the most simple things about the way the world works. Not everyone grows up as rich and powerful as he did or gets to make billions of dollars and tell everybody what to do. Some people live in Africa and they face diseases like aids. They face diseases like tuberculosis. And agencies like the AID help save people's lives. I mean, what could be more important in our world than to be able to save people's lives? And here was a program that I love to promot, Republican program. George W. Bush started it. Pepfar. It saved millions of lives. And there's Elon Musk with his chainsaw and his arrogant attitude. Just because he's a billionaire and as you say, he's a genius on technology, to me, he's a net negative just by what he's done on aid. It will be part of his obituary. He will always be remembered as a callous, arrogant man who didn't know what he was doing and harmed America for a long time to come. Remember, it took decades to build up this reputation as a country that cared about the people of Africa and saving their lives. And with one wave of his bloody chainsaw, Elon Musk destroyed that soft power.
- [19:10]
Christiane Amanpour
And I was just at Harvard, as I discussed in the last episode, and of course, it was at the Kennedy School of Government and who created usaid, but President John F. Kennedy. And he had done that. Partly, of course, it was at the height of the Cold War. Having read this novel, apparently is a political thriller. Jamie, you probably read it yourself, called the Ugly American.
- [19:31]
Jamie Rubin
Correct.
- [19:32]
Christiane Amanpour
It was talking about America as a sort of an imperialistic, capitalistic kind of rapacious great power that was doing more harm than good in the world and that the Soviet Union was actually able to win more hearts and minds. And Kennedy read this and is like, holy, we need to do something to, you know, peel people away from that idea of America. And show our magnanimous and humanitarian side as well as our hard power and soft power for him was a win, win situation. And it in his view, and I think in all the decades since, has really gone to prove that America is not just a military superpower, but also had that humanitarian arm. Miloto, I think that's how he pronounces it. Or she on X asks, hello from Bulgaria, from your perspectives, how strong do you think Russia's influence is on Eastern European countries? Well, Jamie, since you've just come back from Bulgaria, you're perfectly positioned to answer that one.
- [20:33]
Jamie Rubin
It's true. Hello, Bulgaria. I just left 48 hours ago. I spent a couple of days in Sofia and I was part of a conference of the Euro American Institute. And look, Bulgarians speak Russian. Russian media penetrates into Bulgaria and often is successful in raising questions about basic facts and truths. We've spent the last podcast and discussions about how Donald Trump has harmed the reputation of the United States. Let's remember that Russia's leadership regards its job when they wake up in the morning as harming the reputation of the United States. And so they use information warfare through countries like Bulgaria, where people speak Russian, to tell the lies and the conspiracy theories that damage the reputation of the United States. And the real tragedy now is all those Russian disinformation experts have to do is use Donald Trump's own words to damage the reputation of the United States. And since, does it damage countries? Absolutely, because it's giving them a false perception of what their future might be. Bulgarians want to join the eu. They want to be. Well, they are. They're part of the European Union. They want to be part of Western institutions led by the United States. And when the United States casts doubt on that leadership, it makes people confused. And that's what the Russians play on. They have too much influence in Eastern Europe. They're doing what they can to promote their policies of war and disinformation through Bulgaria. And the Bulgarian government has to fight back. And they're trying. But everyone is confused in Eastern Europe about what to do about the Trump administration. Will the rules of the Trump Inc. Where you have the son in law coming for a visit or the sons coming for a visit, do you do diplomacy that way or do you do it through the normal channels of an ambassador in the State Department? All of those questions are filling the minds of people in Bulgaria and Eastern Europe and there are no obvious answers because the Trump administration has so personalized the government of the United States.
- [22:43]
Christiane Amanpour
And yet, and yet in Eastern Europe, fully paid up, member of NATO and the eu. Hungary just loves it. They are MAGA in Eastern Europe, so he has his fans out there as well. Jamie that's all we have time for this bonus episode. We'll ask and answer more questions next time. So thanks for listening. It is the X Files with Christiane Amanpour and Jamie Rubin. And if you have a question that you want us to answer about something in the news or something else, whatever it is, you can find us on all the major social media platforms. Our handle is @amanpourpod. Or email us. We're amanpourpodlobal.com Our next episode is out on Tuesday, wherever you get your podcasts. And remember, you can listen for free on Global Player. You can download that from the App Store or go to globalplayer.com you need a a better WI fi connection for next time. But we're only going to be able to use me on the video this time. And they won't get to see you this time, but they will next time.
- [23:49]
Jamie Rubin
Pick a good picture, will you, please? This is a Global Player original podcast.