← Deadline: White House
Deadline: White House
"A heartbreaking snapshot"
00:44:21
Nicolle Wallace on an impending economic disaster for Americans, as SNAP benefits expire due to the continued government shutdown.
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- [00:01]
Gabe Liedman
If you could hear love, what would it sound like? Son, can we talk about your drinking? Yeah, Dad, I think we should helping those closest to you think about their excessive drinking. Maybe that's what love sounds like. More@rethinkthedrink.com an OHA initiative.
- [00:30]
Nicole
Hi, I'm Jenny Slate and believe it.
- [00:32]
Gabe Liedman
Or not, someone is allowing us to have a podcast. I'm Gabe Wiedman.
- [00:36]
Max Silvestri
I'm Max Silvestri and we've been friends for 20 years and we like to reach out to kind of get advice on how to live our lives.
- [00:43]
Eddie Glad
It's called I need you'd Guys.
- [00:45]
Max Silvestri
Should I give my baby fresh vegetables?
- [00:48]
Nicole
Can I drink the water at the hospital?
- [00:50]
Eddie Glad
My landlord plays the trombone and I can't ask him to stop.
- [00:54]
Nicole
You should make sure that you subscribe.
- [00:57]
Gabe Liedman
So that you never miss an episode.
- [00:58]
Pete Souza
I need you guys.
- [01:12]
Nicole
I'm afraid because as it is, my Social Security is very minimal. I'm afraid that I won't be able to afford those so called lower grocery prices that he promised. I'm afraid for others, I am afraid for the children, I am afraid for seniors who are older than me. He's the President. He's supposed to be in it for the good of the people, not for him and his oligarchs. Hi there everyone. It's now 5 o' clock in New York. It is a rather devastating indictment and snapshot of life in Donald Trump's America as a government shutdown in Donald Trump's policies put additional financial pressure. Pressure on Americans already stretched too thin and for those who voted for Trump, promised lower costing groceries, among other things. The USDA has announced that come Saturday, the 42 million Americans who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, it's often referred to as snap, will be forced to go without benefits. That'll run out, Trump's USDA writes in a statement. This quote, the well has run dry. It comes after Trump cut approximately $500 million in aid for food banks earlier this year. And it's not the only way that life is about to get a lot more difficult for a lot more Americans. The government shut down and Americans out of work over the Republicans refusal to extend Obamacare subsidies. The Washington Post is reporting that people are going to see their premiums go up 30%. The post writes this quote, the higher premiums, along with the likely expiration of pandemic era subsidies, mean millions of people will see their health insurance payments double or even triple in 2026. And if that isn't enough already, these additional financial pressures Come as the New York Times reports that almost everything is about to get more expensive as companies finally start passing along the cost of Donald Trump's tariffs to the American consumer. Amid the growing hunger and affordability crisis in America, blue state governors are expressing outrage over Donald Trump's lack of action.
- [03:22]
Gabe Liedman
We are fast tracking an $80 million investment. We're front loading it to get them to food banks.
- [03:27]
Pete Souza
I'm very worried about 5 million people in a matter of days losing food stamp, losing their SNAP benefits and entering in a grocery store with Donald Trump's tariffs and inflation.
- [03:41]
Gabe Liedman
They're paying contractors to tear down the east wing, but they're not putting money into the food bank that they're setting on. So if there's a sense of frustration in America, it's very real. They are choosing not to fund these programs. They are choosing to prioritize. And when the White House press secretary said the top priority is the ballroom, we could not disagree more. Our top priority is the well being of the Minnesotans, especially around food security.
- [04:08]
Nicole
To Governor Waltz's point about priorities, that $300 million that Donald Trump is spending on making a gold ballroom where the East Wing once stood and the $230 million he's trying to get us, the American taxpayers, to reimburse him for being under criminal investigation, they add up to roughly the same amount of money he has cut from America's food banks. Hmm. That's where we start the hour. Some of our favorite experts and friends. David Frum is back. He's a staff writer at the Atlantic, host of the video podcast the David Show. Also joining us, MSNBC political analyst, host of the Bulwark podcast, Tim Miller is here. And joining me at the table, Princeton University professor, MSNBC political analyst, Eddie Glad. Eddie, it's a deeply disturbing portrait of America right now. The images of Donald Trump destroying, with an actual wrecking ball, the actual East Wing of the White House while Americans are about to go without food stamps is a snapshot of America that will live forever. It is awful when anyone in America goes hungry. And it is a choice. It's Donald Trump's choice. Do you think that we are at a fever snapping moment or do you see this moment on a continuum?
- [05:30]
Eddie Glad
It varies, I think. First of all, you're absolutely right that it's a choice. Some days I see it as a kind of inflection point. Other days I see it as a continuum. We've always talked about this tension within the, within the Trump kind of coalition between the Elon Musk wing and the Steve Bannon wing. And when he was having his little tiff with Musk, we were like, who's going to win out? But this is the Bannon side. This is the populist side. The fact that people who are going to have difficulty putting food on the table, folk who have the view that billionaires have overtaken or overrun the government, they are going to see Trump in relation to that kind of complaint, as it seems to me. So I think this is an inflection point within his coalition. But we have made the choice consistently to be the richest country in the history of the world, to have some of our citizens not eat.
- [06:27]
Nicole
Tim, we were just talking about Steve Bannon with John Carl, who has a great new book out, and there's an anecdote about his influence ahead of the meeting with Zelensky. But I think if you look at the policy debacle, his influence is nowhere to be seen in the flagrant extravagance of the crypto corruption, the flagrant extravagance of the gold leafed Oval Office, the flagrant extravagant of a Russian style ballroom, the hurting. He used to call them the Magas. You know, the magas who are on Medicaid, I think he's talked about on his podcast. I mean, he's going about 0410 if you look at all the policies that will hurt the parts of the coalition he used to publicly speak out for, who is disinterested or I guess is this all Donald Trump? I mean, what is your theory about how we got to this point right now?
- [07:19]
Max Silvestri
My theory about how we got to this point right now is that Donald Trump is responsive to anybody that will suck up to him. And in the second term, the richest, most powerful people in the country have decided that they're going to suck up to him in the way that they didn't the first time. And so you can see this in foreign policy or in domestic policy. And so when you have Bannon, for all of my complaints about him or out of anybody's complaints about him, he was the one who was saying this year during the tax bill that they should include include a tax increase on the richest Americans. He was advocating for that publicly and privately. As best I can tell, they didn't do that. The MAGA movement, I'll add one element to your list, was talking in 2016 about draining the swamp and going after these special interests in D.C. a lot of that was always smoke and mirrors, but it's particularly so this time when you look at this ballroom. Who is funding it? It's the most entrenched interests in Washington. It's the military industrial complex, it's the big tech CEOs, it's the big companies, all of these companies that we're not going to donate to. Donald Trump after January 6th, not going to donate to any Republicans after January 6th, have now all bent the knee. And what is revealed is that Donald Trump wasn't actually interested in fighting the status quo, wasn't actually interested in fighting for the forgotten man. What he was interested was respect for himself. It was a Rodney Dangerfield thing. And now that all the richest people in the world have said, okay, yes, sir, Mr. President, sir, I'm gonna bring you this trophy like Tim Cook did, he no longer is interested in fighting them. And so I do think that's a real obviously change away from kind of the pure ID of what we saw from Maga in 2016.
- [09:05]
Nicole
David from Food Insecurity, it's a weird thing. It's wrapped up in probably the only crisis maybe a person could endure with more shame interbreeded or interconnected is some sort of domestic abuse. But food insecurity is people with cars and jobs who can't afford food for their families. And so they show up at food banks. Sometimes if shame is a hurdle, a food bank will open early or late to let a family come in and shop off the shelves. Food banks are a bridge sometimes to keep families through job insecurity. You know, maybe not someone totally out of work, but not with steady jobs. Sometimes military families show up at food banks, especially when their salaries don't come through. Food insecurity in America is a lot more common than anybody can imagine. And it knows no party affiliation, it does not care who you voted for. And the fact that Trump and all the Republicans in Congress are opting into this tragedy, this sort of shameful thing in America in 2025 should be front page news all over the place. What is your sense of the degree of numbness in our country right now?
- [10:23]
Gabe Liedman
I don't think Americans are numb. There's a hostage taking going on and the hostages certainly pay attention to it. I'm speaking to you from Toronto. I flew here via Dulles Airport. On my way out of Dulles Airport, I got into conversation with the person who was checking the computer and shampoo in my carry on bag. And he talked to me about his feeling, about his fear that his salary would be stopped and that he and his family would be under pressure. Now, I assume we're paying much more than living wage to that kind of Skilled worker. But he's worried. Everyone's worried. The tens of millions of people are worried. And here's why. The worries will only intensify in the 30 years since. In the past 30 plus years, there have been major shutdowns in 1994, 2013, one over the winter of 2018, 2019, and now this one. This is now the second longest on its way to being probably in the end, the longest in all those previous cases. The shutdowns were about many, many different issues of. They were tests of strength, who's more popular. They often happen quite close to a recent election, and there's a test of strength, who's got the upper hand. But there's always kind of an exit ramp. So in 1994, when Newt Gingrich and Bill Clinton faced off, the exit ramp was Medicare. Basically, the Republicans climbed down, Bill Clinton got a win. Exit ramp. In 2018, 2019, the exit ramp was Donald Trump's demand for a border wall. $5 billion for a bo wall. He eventually dropped that demand. Exit ramp. Where's the exit ramp now? Yes, this fight is about the subsidies for the Affordable Care act, but there's a bigger problem, which is what this fight really, I think, is about is the Constitution awards Congress power over taxing and spending. And Donald Trump has challenged that power in a very fundamental way. He is taxing, without Congress, 30 plus billion dollars a month in tariff revenue, and he is spending without Congress. He's getting other forms of revenue than taxes. The reason the ballroom story is so important, it's not just the vandalism of an historical monument. It's not just the gaudy bad taste of this ballroom. It is being funded not by taxes, but by gifts from people who have business before the government. So he's bypassing Congress as a source of revenue, and he's bypassing Congress's control of spending, and he's claiming the authority to refuse to spend money that Congress has appropriated and that he signed. So how do you do business with someone like that who says, okay, we need to make a deal? But I just want you to understand before we sit down to this deal, whatever deal, we agree. It doesn't bind me, it only binds you. How do you do business with that person?
- [12:53]
Nicole
Well, then how does it end?
- [12:58]
Gabe Liedman
That's. I think it will eventually end with some kind of Republican concession on the Obamacare subsidy. So that that probably is the exit ramp. And because there are a lot of Republican constituencies who care about those subsidies, I think that is the exit ramp. But I'm not Sure. It ends in that same way. Because the fundamental problem this, this crisis is about, which is will Donald Trump accept that Article 1 puts Congress, not him, in charge of taxing and spending. That won't go away.
- [13:27]
Nicole
But I think, David, from you just put your finger on a new phenomenon for all of us to cover. And some of what makes it tricky. Right. And I guess wondering if people are numb is wondering how much pain a Republican member of Congress or Republican senators constituents have to be in. Because you're right, the people of this country aren't numb, but their representatives are because there's a direct line between their conduct and their abdication of their role in Congress and their own constituents pain. Josh Hawley has spoken to it in the big beautiful bill. He voted for it, but he's not for it somehow. What is your sense of how much pain Republicans will allow?
- [14:10]
Gabe Liedman
There's a lot of poverty and hunger in poor, white, rural America. There are a lot of people on food stamps in poor, white, rural America. I think a lot of the people in Trump sort of gaudy circle assume that they can use food stamps and other things to squeeze the Democrats because the Democrats are the poor people's party. But that is not exactly true anymore, that one of Donald Trump's achievements was to change the class basis of American politics. There are a lot more educated and affluent people in the Democratic coalition. There are a lot more poor and rural people in the Republican coalition. And so when you take away food stamps and other kinds of benefits like that, there are a lot, maybe they're going to drop out of the coalition. But if, if you're planning on running up the electoral score in North Carolina, for example, many of the people the Republicans are counting on to make their gerrymander in North Carolina work may be on food stamps.
- [15:02]
Nicole
Yeah. Let me show you, Tim Miller, what Scott Besant had to say about the plight of soybean farmers. China has been boycotting American soybeans and American farmers have really suffered. Do you see a real light at the end of the tunnel there? May allow soybeans again.
- [15:27]
Eddie Glad
Well, Martha, in case you don't know.
- [15:28]
Max Silvestri
It, I'm actually a soybean farmer. So I have felt this pain, too.
- [15:35]
Nicole
Oh, he's actually not a farmer. He's at best a landlord to soybean farmers. The Hill reports this quote, according to his public financial disclosure filed in January, he owns corn and soybean farmland in North Dakota worth between $5 million and $25 million. So this quote, I'm actually a soybean farmer. To be generous is a stretch. But again, why are they incapable of showing any empathy for people who are actually in pain, people who are actually hungry or losing their farms?
- [16:13]
Max Silvestri
Well, Scott Besant is a stuffed shirt who I don't think has ever felt any pain. So I think he's incapable of feeling empathy. That might be a unique quality to him as the TR Treasury Secretary. You could see on his face his little smirk when he says that, as if he like his little Cheshire cat smiles if he got one over. It's just like, dude, you are in a deep, thick bubble if you think that you felt some pain here. And I wonder if he actually has, as you point out, like, he's essentially a landlord. So he has gets rent payments on the farms. I'd be interested in one of the reporters covering the Treasury Department to ask if he's given any of the people doing the actual farm work that have dirt underneath their fingernails to ask him if he's given them a discount on their rent over the last few months while the administration that he works for starts one of the stupidest trade war in history and prevents these farmers from being able to sell their soybean products to willing customers abroad. So there's that that is endemic within this administration. We'll see if there's an actual impact in farm country and whether there's some pushback on this. I think it's the one area of the country where there really is tangible negative economic consequences. So far this year, and for a lot of people, things were already expensive and they haven't gotten che. The economy in Iowa, South Dakota is really starting to suffer if you look at economic data. One last thing also, when you look at these states and just going off what David Frum was saying, when you look at what is going to happen with SNAP next week if the shutdown continues, there are a lot of blue states that are going to find creative solutions for ensuring that folks on food stamps in their states are getting money. Jared Polis is doing this in Colorado, finding a creative solution to make sure that people don't lose their food stamps. That's not gonna happen in red states. So it's actually even more acute than it seems.
- [17:59]
Eric Swalwell
Right.
- [17:59]
Max Silvestri
Like, it is true that there are a lot of MAGA voters who are going to suffer if they're not able to get this food aid, but it's gonna be disproportionately so in states that have Republican governors that aren't doing what Jared Polis is doing and trying to.
- [18:17]
Nicole
Find a solution to just feels Eddie, like there will be signs everywhere. It will be inescapable, the cont between each party's belief about what our neighbors, what fellow humans should endure in this moment. Right.
- [18:32]
Eddie Glad
We've all said over and over again that budgets are a reflection of values. And we know that in certain circles, among certain people, empathy is actually sin for some of these folk. So you keep appealing to empathy when they think that's a liberal cudgel to beat folk over the head. That's one thing we need to say. Another thing is that we need to talk about the great grift, right? That if we're really going to stop the steal for real, we need to look at what these folk are doing, right? Oh, they can make tax cuts to the reach that were not permanent. Permanent. But they can't. Right. Solve health care. They can let babies, not just. But babies, go hungry. All of this is a reflection of a set of values that these folk are really committed to just simply fill in their pockets. It's greed, it's corrupt, and they're. In so many ways, Nicole. It's running up against the historic representational problem for many Americans. SNAP is black and brown. Welfare is something that is these people, these undeserved, these lazy people, undeserving folk getting things from government that they didn't work for. It's often been represented, as J.D.
- [19:45]
Nicole
Vance writes. I mean, is hillbilly. Is it hillbilly? I mean, that's not true.
- [19:49]
Eddie Glad
Of course not. But then there it was. What was so funny is that when you read Charles Murray and even J.D. vance, they were beginning to map on the culture of pathology, work onto working, working poor white folk. And so they were going to demonize the pathologize them. And so you get this kind of moment where they can play the culture war on a certain level, but when it comes to actual living. Right, these folk are going to catch hell.
- [20:16]
Nicole
All right. No one's going anywhere. When we come back, we'll bring Congressman Eric Swalwell into our conversation. Also ahead for us, the demolition of the east wing is also a massive destruction of decades of history. Erasing it, really. Pete Souza witnessed that history. He captured many historic moments while working as White House photographer. He is now the keeper of things that no longer exist. And he will be our guest later in the hour. Then, White House continues after a quick break. Don't go anywhere. Hi, I'm Jenny Slate, and believe it.
- [20:50]
Gabe Liedman
Or not, someone is allowing us to have a podcast. I'm Gabe Liedman.
- [20:54]
Max Silvestri
I'm Max Silvestri. And we've been friends for 20 years and we like to reach out to kind of get advice on how to live our lives.
- [21:01]
Eddie Glad
It's called I need you guys.
- [21:03]
Max Silvestri
Should I give my baby fresh vegetables?
- [21:06]
Nicole
Can I drink the water at the hospital?
- [21:08]
Eddie Glad
My landlord plays the trombone and I can't ask him to stop.
- [21:12]
Nicole
You should make sure that you subscribe.
- [21:14]
Gabe Liedman
So that you never miss an episode.
- [21:16]
Pete Souza
I need you guys.
- [21:26]
Gabe Liedman
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- [21:29]
Max Silvestri
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Gabe Liedman
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- [21:41]
Nicole
To the People not sure if you have the experience to start your dream job. Good news these days, it's the skills that count.
- [21:49]
Pete Souza
Udemy can help you get those in demand. Skills.
- [21:52]
Nicole
Want to be an AI mastermind? Learn with us Game developer. We've got you covered. AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner. We can help you prep. You'll learn from real world experts who.
- [22:04]
Pete Souza
Love what they do so that you can love what you do.
- [22:07]
Nicole
Go to udemy.com for the skills to get you started and get set for your dream job. We're back. David Frum Let me show you an ad that made Donald Trump so mad he suspended trade talks with Canada.
- [22:22]
Gabe Liedman
When someone says let's impose tariffs on foreign imports, it looks like they're doing the patriotic thing by protecting American products and jobs. And sometimes for a short while. It works, but only for a short time. But over the long run, such trade barriers hurt every American worker and consumer. High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliation by foreign countries and the triggering of fierce trade wars. Then the worst happens. Markets shrink and collapse, business and industries shut down, and millions of people lose their jobs throughout the world. There's a growing realization that the way to prosperity for all nations is rejecting protectionist legislation and promoting fair and free competition. America's jobs and growth are at stake.
- [23:18]
Nicole
So that's Ronald Reagan. That's who the Republican Party used to be. Reflect. That's real. That ran during the World Series. And Donald Trump lost his mind. Why? I mean, if he's in such a bubble, why does he care?
- [23:37]
Gabe Liedman
Well, he may be afraid that he is about to lose his tariff action at the Supreme Court and then he's going to have a $30 billion a month hole in his fiscal plans. But it also reminds people something that's important of how the story you did before the break. Links with the story after the break. Hunger and trade. If those people at the food bank, or depending on snap, if they're not buying very expensive handmade Italian pasta, the pasta they're buying for their macaroni, it's probably made from Canadian wheat, that Canada exports a lot of hard wheat to the United States. If they're buying bacon or pork shoulder or Spam, they're probably buying a pork that has spent at least some of its life in Canada. If they're buying sodas, the aluminum in the aluminum can is made out of Canadian sheets of aluminum, probably. And all of those things are now more expensive. So what the province of Ontario was there doing was reminding Americans, you know, it's very injurious to Canada, it's very injurious to the world trade system, these tariffs. But the person who pays is the person who's paying more for pasta made from Canadian wheat, more for pork made from Canadian pork products, animals more for soda drunk from Canadian aluminum cans.
- [24:45]
Nicole
Congressman Swalwell has joined us. Is he here? Congressman, what are you seeing in this fight that is breaking through in your district in Northern California? Is it a blur? Are people just tell us what you're hearing from your constituents.
- [25:05]
Eric Swalwell
People are hungry. People are struggling to pay bills. Nicole. I found that one of the hardest things for anybody to tell another person is that they're broke or that they can't pay for their family's bills that month. And the number of people who have told me that in just the last week and a half, as the reality of the government shutdown and missing a paycheck has become a reality, as the reality of SNAP benefits going away and having to find other ways to feed your family have become a reality. It's crushing to hear that just today I'm in D.C. today I'll be back on the west coast when we're, when it's obvious we're not going to be voting. But a federal officer pulled me aside today and said, when are we getting paid? And I could just tell that that was not a comfortable thing for a federal officer to do, to ask me that. But people are hurting. And the president's tariff policy is leading to the pain. The president's refusal to negotiate and get us out of the shutdown is leading to the pain. And the president's refusal to put back in place the Obamacare subsidies that'll keep health insurance costs down. That's gonna be even more pain when people find out on November 1st what their insurance is going to cost next year. People are hurting, Congressman.
- [26:24]
Nicole
If Donald Trump isn't interested in stopping the shutdown and Mike Johnson isn't interested in convening the House of Representatives for whatever reason, the votes on the discharge petition to release Epstein files or because Trump doesn't want him to, how does the shutdown end? I mean, what did you say to the federal officer?
- [26:43]
Eric Swalwell
I told her. I'm sorry. I told her I'm also rejecting my own paycheck because I don't think it's right that people are not being paid. And then I'm gonna keep showing up in Washington to try and find a deal. And by the way, Nicole, what we are doing as Democrats is we're giving Republicans the answer to the test. We are telling them that the way to get out of the shutdown is to lower the health insurance costs that people are going to pay next year, which by the way, on November 1st, if we're not out of the shutdown, you are going to be the ones that are blamed for that. And they are so hell bent on dismantling Obamacare, they've tried it over and over and over and they have failed. And so I do believe the reality is going to be on November 1st, that sticker shock is going to come to their doorstep and they're going to have to make a move and hopefully reopen government. But to me, I just don't know how you could look people in the eye who are not being paid, who are still working, and then the rest of Americans who are going to pay a lot more next year, 200, 300% more for their health insurance.
- [27:50]
Nicole
So your theory of the case is that Republicans will wake up with empathy when Americans have, have health care costs that make them go without health care for their sick kids or their sick spouses or their families. Is that your, is that the Democratic theory of the case, that the Republicans will change and they will care about that?
- [28:09]
Eric Swalwell
No, the theory is that they are going to actually see those numbers on November 1st when every American is hit with those numbers for open enrollment or the marketplace. On November 4th, they're going to suffer a mini Democratic wave. We're going to win Prop 50 in California, we're going to win the Democratic governor's seats in New Jersey and Virginia, and we're going to retain the Supreme Court justices in Pennsylvania. And so they're going to see that a wave is coming the following year and hopefully that, you know, brings them to the table. And the President's Achilles heel, as we've seen with the Taco meme is that he wants to be liked and he's going to find out in the first couple days of November that he is not very well liked. His party is not very well liked, and insurance costs that have us pay 200 to 300% more is not going to be very well liked. And if that doesn't bring them to the negotiating table, Nicole, I don't know what will.
- [29:01]
Nicole
Tim Miller, your thoughts on that scenario playing out as the congressman describes?
- [29:08]
Max Silvestri
I hope so.
- [29:09]
Nicole
I don't know.
- [29:12]
Max Silvestri
Response to what I predict. Yeah, we don't have a ton of evidence that the Republicans are responsive to people's pain, but you never know. There's a first time for everything. The thing that I think is probably more likely that just real talk that I was about to say that worries me. I don't know if it worries me. I just think that it's more likely is that eventually you already had the union of government employees come out today and say let's just kick the can on this and have a continuing resolution. And you could have some of the older, more established members of the Senate who are more used to regular action on the Democratic side decide that they don't want to be part of this fight anymore and let the Republicans go around to filibuster on this. Now we're getting into kind of wonky Hill talk, but to me I think that seems like a more likely off ramp to this just because I don't see any evidence that the Republicans on the Hill are going to be responsive to people's needs. They haven't been for 10 years now and they haven't suffered for it. So why would they change their actions now?
- [30:18]
Nicole
I mean, Congressman David from made the point earlier that past government shutdowns had an intensity and a pressure cooker dynamic. I mean, do you feel that the Republicans feel a pressure toward the negotiating table?
- [30:31]
Eric Swalwell
Well, they're being blamed for it. Every poll has shown that because they own the White House, the Senate and the House, they're being blamed for it. They refuse to negotiate. They've kept Congress closed, which I think contributes to why they're being blamed for it. But I think this dynamic changes a lot. The first air traffic control paycheck is going to be missed this week. The open enrollment health insurance costs are gonna be known by the end of this week. And then you're gonna have the Tuesday night elections. And so I think the cascading effect of all three of those is going to change the dynamic. And again, I am saying all this and it's very frustrating because we are giving them the answers to the test. We are helping them do something that helps their constituents. In fact, they have a pollster who Tony Fabrizio, Donald Trump's pollster, has circulated a memo to House Republicans that have said that says if you don't put these insurance subsidies back in place, you are going to get creamed district by district in the midterm. So we're helping them solve problems with their constituents. It's just maddening that it's taking them so long to figure it out.
- [31:34]
Nicole
And with so many humans and American families suffering the consequences of their antics. Congressman, please come back. Keep us posted. David From Tim Miller, thank you for starting us off this hour. Eddie sticks around a little bit longer. When we come back, so many years of history gone, literally bulldozed because of Donald Trump and his actual wrecking ball and other equipment. Pete Souza, the beloved photographer who captured so many iconic moments at the White House, will be our guest after a very short break. Don't go anywhere. Hi, I'm Jenny Slate and believe it.
- [32:15]
Gabe Liedman
Or not, someone is allowing us to have a podcast.
- [32:18]
Eddie Glad
I'm Gabe Liedman.
- [32:19]
Max Silvestri
I'm Max Silvestri and we've been friends for 20 years and we like to reach out to kind of get advice on how to live our lives.
- [32:26]
Eddie Glad
It's called I need you guys.
- [32:28]
Max Silvestri
Should I give my baby fresh vegetables?
- [32:30]
Nicole
Can I drink the water at the hospital?
- [32:33]
Eddie Glad
My landlord plays the trombone and I can't ask him to stop.
- [32:37]
Nicole
You should make sure that you subscribe.
- [32:39]
Gabe Liedman
So that you never miss an episode.
- [32:41]
Pete Souza
I need you.
- [32:42]
Gabe Liedman
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Nicole
The east wing of the White House was the pillar of the White House structure. It served as the First Lady's domain. It represented the social side, the soft powers of a president and a White House. It was where tourists and school groups, lots of movie scenes were filmed around that entrance. That history ended abruptly and in a literal ash heap of dust and rubble when Donald Trump took a wrecking ball without permission, without plans shared with the public or the Congress to knock down all that history, to destroy a house that is not his, to destroy and make room for his privately funded $300 million gilded ballroom. Gone is this hallway where President Barack Obama is pictured running along with his family dog, Beau. It is the hallway where visitors, members of the public, entered the White House when they began their White House tours. Gone, too, is the family theater. The family theater was in the East Wing. It was a place where presidents practiced, rehearsed their most important speeches. It was a place for a president to watch a movie, to get a sense of what Americans were watching in movie theaters, I guess, these days, streaming. Here are the Obamas pictured there watching a 3D commercial during the 2009 Super Bowl. Also gone is the Jacqueline Kennedy Garden that was collateral damage to the East Wing's first phase of demolition. Here it is pictured in 2016, the morning after a snowstorm. As our next guest says, Donald Trump's demolition of those spaces is, quote, a symbol of what his administration is doing to our country, tearing it down. I want to bring in Pete Souza, the former chief official White House photographer for presidents of the United States, including Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama, and the former director of the White House photography office. Eddie Glad is still here. Pete, I'm so happy to see you. I'm so, so sad that it's such a sad occasion. Just tell me your, your personal feelings when you watched some pretty extraordinary photos and live images of the destruction and demolition of the East Wing.
- [36:09]
Pete Souza
Oh, Nicole, it was so hard to see you display some of my photographs just now. It brought back how I felt. Last week, I was. I was in Northern Michigan without any Internet or very little cell coverage. So I, it was hard to keep up with what was going on. And when I saw the image of the wrecking ball taking down the East Wing, I just, I, the, The emotions just came, you know, just. I was overwhelmed. I mean, I talked to a friend of mine this weekend. I got back home and I called her, somebody that worked in the East Wing, and she answered the phone and I said, hey, it's Pete. And she just started crying. Like, I, we didn't she didn't even, like, say anything. She just started crying. And I think a lot of people are feeling that way. Just the. The. The fact. I mean, President Reagan used to say, we have temporary custody of the White House. The president does not own the White House. And if you're going to take down a building, there needs to be a process. I think that's what I was thinking the most, is how dare he rip this historic building down with no process, just one man making a decision on his own.
- [37:42]
Nicole
One of the things I thought of was that of all the things to destroy and remake in your image, this was the part that on a daily basis, the public shared. There are parts of it that the public doesn't have a lot of walkthrough access to, but the East Wing wasn't one of those parts. This was the part of it that the public entered. This was where events had guests enter. This was during COVID where the COVID testing was so people could enter safely and not get each other sick. And John Heilman made the point, this wasn't his house to knock down. It wasn't his. What does it say? Or what does it mean that he doesn't try to pretend anymore that the state isn't his possession?
- [38:39]
Pete Souza
I don't know how I answer that question, Nicole. I mean, I look at it from historic point. I spent, what, almost 14 years working as an official White House photographer for President Reagan, and all eight years of President Obama. The hallway that tourists do enter the White House on a public tour, there's always been historic photographs of past presidents framed along that wall, including some of mine. I mean, my picture of Princess Diana dancing with John Travolta from the Reagan administration was there. And now, just to think. I mean, White House tours now are canceled indefinitely because there's no entry point anymore for people to go on the White House tour and stop in that East Garden where you see President Obama with some kids and showing David Cameron, the Prime minister of the UK that very area that I was just talking about. I don't know how to answer your question, to be honest with you.
- [39:56]
Nicole
What do you think about people feeling so magnetically drawn to your images because they're now all that people have left. Right? I mean, I was looking through some of the books, and I got to practice speeches for President Bush in the theater, and there was always, like, a veritable peanut gallery. It was State of the Union, and then the funny ones that he would practice in the family theater. And just the idea that all that is left of any of those sessions is the photos.
- [40:35]
Pete Souza
I mean, I think it gives people. I've gotten a lot of comments and reactions from people on some of the photographs that I've posted the last few days in a very positive way. But also people I think are, are pissed when they see the photographs and know that, that it's gone. The, the, the. That snow covered tree is gone forever. The hallway where President Obama first met Beau, that was the first time that he had met Beau. And running down that hallway, that hallway is gone. That Lincoln bust in the background has been moved. My sources tell me it's now on the colonnade outside the White House, but it's gone from that area. The offices the other day I mentioned, because I think people, they're not up to speed on the details of the White House like you and I are, since we work there. And there's confusion of the East Room and the East Wing, and the East Room is not in the East Wing. So I find myself educating people too about what's been gone and trying to describe some of the offices. The social office, the military aides had their office there. The military office is there. The first lady's office, obviously the deputy chief of staff for the first lady, the chief of staff for the first lady. You know, I could go on the visitor's office and I mistakenly, in one of my captions, left out that the Legislative affairs also has an office in the East Wing. You know, so I publicly apologize, apologize to them now that I forgot that. And I just talked to actually one of my friends from that office yesterday. So a lot of, there's, there's a lot of emotion right now. And I think it's, it's more that we were not warned this was going to happen. That the ballroom itself, I mean, you've been talking about that the last couple days is one thing, but to just like knock down East Wing with no warning and, you know, and lie to people about it, say that it wouldn't be touched and then do it. I think it's just, just, it's gut wrenching to. Especially the people that worked in that wing.
- [43:16]
Nicole
I haven't visited it. I've heard from a lot of people who only saw it on school tours or field trips, and that's all that they saw. Pete, we're asking you to stick around. We'll bring Eddie into the conversation about erasing our history. After a short break. We'll be right back. We are back with Pete Souza and Eddie Glad, I mean, Eddie, the whole conversation of the Whole hour, actually the whole two hours is not just about remaking the country in service of Donald Trump's retribution and revenge, which sounded petty at the beginning. It's now all consuming, but now it is like a fire burning through the actual structure of the White House.
- [44:01]
Eddie Glad
Oh, absolutely, absolutely. You know what Jonathan Karl said last hour? He said that Donald Trump's revenge list is made up of folk who tried to cancel him. And by building this 90,000 square foot ballroom, you can't cancel that. He's going to imprint his revenge on the People's House. He's going to imprint himself on the bureaucratic infrastructure of the country. He's going to remake government in the image of himself. And, and interestingly enough, it will take generations for us to undo it. So the folk who tried to cancel, they will not take another breath before it's undone. And so, you know, we face a moral choice with political implication in this country. We have for over a decade and we have not chosen well. And we're dealing with the consequence day in and day out.
- [44:52]
Nicole
When you say the generation, I mean, I think of that it's very hard to cover a baby dying of measles. Right. And I think about how our babies will eradicate measles a second time or polio or whatever else the anti vax movement usher in sustainable on the vaccine front. But I think this story broadens out the generational work of undoing the damage to an actual structure.
- [45:16]
Eric Swalwell
Right.
- [45:16]
Eddie Glad
It's what happens in the interim, the period between the end of Reconstruction and Brown v. Board. Think of all the carnage, all the loss. So what we have to deal with whenever the fever dream spikes, and even though time has been compressed over these last few decades, but whenever the fever dream spikes, it takes us a while to get up from the bed. And so I don't know what happens in the interim. Our babies will do what they do, but what will happen between now and then, we must brace ourselves.
- [45:49]
Nicole
Pete Sousa, you get the last word.
- [45:54]
Pete Souza
I think one of the poignant memories I have you talked about the family theater was when they, President Obama screened the film Lincoln in that theater. And to watch that, I got to stay and watch it. And Daniel Day Lewis was in the family theater that day. He was Abraham Lincoln. And after the film, President Obama invited some of the cast members up to the White House residence and they walked into the Lincoln bedroom and at one point, Daniel Day Lewis went and looked at the Gettysburg Address. Boy, that was a chilling, chilling moment that I will never forget.
- [46:57]
Nicole
A lot of memories and moments that you've captured for all of us through multiple presidents of multiple parties. And those memories in those moments, more precious now than ever before. Pete Sousa, thank you. Thank you for joining us today. Eddie. God, thank you for spending the hour with me. One more break. We'll be right back with news that Donald Trump has ordered the Department of Justice to, quote, unquote, monitor next week's elections in New York, in New Jersey and California. This warning is worth paying attention to.
- [47:28]
Gabe Liedman
I believe that what he's trying to do is interfere with the 2026 elections using the military. And so I think he needs to prove otherwise because at the moment, he's.
- [47:38]
Eddie Glad
Following precisely a kind of Playbo book.
- [47:40]
Gabe Liedman
That we've seen throughout history, but also each of the items that would lead to the military standing outside of our polling places or seizing the ballot boxes if he doesn't like the results of the election. All the pieces of that are seemingly in place. And the more he says, every time.
- [48:00]
Eddie Glad
He opens his mouth, he seems to.
- [48:01]
Gabe Liedman
Prove that all of our worst fears are rooted in in truth and in reality.
- [48:10]
Nicole
Of course, that's Illinois Governor JB Pritzker. He's been an unwavering and potent critic of the Trump administration's conduct. He is my guest on this week's episode of the Best People podcast. Scan the QR code on your screen to listen or download. Wherever you get your podcasts, take a listen and let me know what you think of this one. Another break. We'll be right back. Thank you so much for letting us into your home homes tonight. We are grateful.
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