← Deadline: White House
Deadline: White House
"Breaking news from one of the most high-profile Democrats"
00:43:12
We come on the air with breaking news from one of the most high profile Democrats in this country.
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- [00:01]
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- [00:07]
Angie Hicks
Yeah.
- [00:07]
DSW Advertiser
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- [00:30]
Angie Hicks
Hi, I'm Angie Hicks, co founder of angie From Roof Repair to Emergency Plumbing and more. When you use Angie for your home projects, you know all your jobs will be done well, Angie the one you trust to find the ones you trust. Find a pro for your project@angie.com.
- [00:50]
Nicole Wallace
Hi there everyone. It's four o' clock in the East. We come on the air with some breaking news from one of the most high profile Democrats in our country right now, Pete Buttigieg, the first openly gay confirmed cabinet member in United States history, the former secretary of Transportation, someone who many Democrats hope will be a contender for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2028. He today announced in a post on Substack that he and Chastain and their kids, his family, were the targets of a quote, cruel, politically motivated hoax. That's how he describes it. He goes on to tell the whole story. An anonymous caller called Child Protective Services on his family and made false allegations about him. Buttigieg describes it as akin to swatting. Swatting is when someone calls 911 and makes a fake false report that suggests an imminent threat, like a mass shooting, something that leads law enforcement to swarm or swat someone's home. In Buttigieg's post, he describes what happened to him when a worker with Child Protective Services came to the door. He writes this quote, someone decided to hurt our family this week. I'm furious and I want to share what happened. You've probably heard of swatting. It's a cruel and dangerous kind of hoax. As has started happening more frequently in recent years. Someone anonymously calls 911 with a false report of imminent danger, such as a hostage situation a the home of a public figure. Law enforcement swarms the house, guns drawn, terrifying the unsuspecting homeowner and family and sometimes even leading to deaths or injuries. In the confusion, it's happened to dozens of lawmakers, judges, celebrities and others. When I was in the Cabinet, someone attempted to do this to our home. But fortunately, the hoax was quickly detected. It's become enough of a problem that the FBI now has a dedicated database to track such incidents. Now imagine that same concept, but with Child Protective Services instead of a SWAT team. Hadn't thought of that. Me neither, until a few days ago when a police officer and a CPS worker showed up at our home and politely asked to speak with me. I showed them in, invited them on the deck so that we could hear each other over the barking dog and asked what was going on. They explained that there had been an allegation against me that it concerned our four year old twins and that a forensic interview had been arranged for the children the following day. I could not be present at the children's interview, nor could any family member sit in. Afterwards they would come back and interview me and only then would they tell me anything about the nature of the allegation. I was bewildered and troubled, but I tried to stay calm. I'm used to any number of falsehoods, attacks and serious problems being thrown my way. What I did not understand was what could have led to this kind of visit. Then the Child Protective Services worker told me something that made my stomach turn. I was not to be alone around the children, at least until the interview took place the next day. They asked if I had relatives nearby or could perhaps stay at a hotel for the night. The officer and the CPS worker wanted to see the children. I invited them to stay until Chastain, who was out running errands and preparing to pick the twins up from summer camp for the day, went returned home. When he pulled up in the family jeep, the kids bounded into the house looking curiously at the two guests. They were courteous and professional, inviting the kids to inspect the officer's police car, which fascinated them of course, while the grown ups talked in the driveway, we agreed that the kids would stay at their grandparents house after our family dinner that night and then they left. The 24 hours until they returned are among the darkest hours of my life. I tried to get my head around the idea that I had been accused of something so serious that I couldn't be alone around my own children and had consented to have them interviewed by strangers without my knowing where the accusation had come from or even what it contained. Many times over the years I've been denounced, yelled at, protested, threatened and heckled. I've been through political attacks in office, death threats in public life and rocket attacks and war. But this is the ugliest thing that has happened to me since my career in service began. After spending a sleepless night wondering what the hell was going on and spending half a day anxiously picturing what our children were going through without their parents, I waited until the appointment time for my interview finally came. With the kids back at their grandparents house after their appointment in town and Chasten having been asked to wait upstairs, the officer and CPS worker sat down at our kitchen table with me and my new lawyer. Then for the first time, the officer explained what the allegation actually was. An anonymous caller had contacted cps. The caller said that he had spoken to a woman who claimed to have met me at a conference several years ago in Alabama where she said I told her I had committed unspeakable violent crimes and the caller believed my children were at risk. That was all. The officer had a couple of obvious questions. He asked if I had been to the town where the woman claimed she met me. I have not. The officer made clear that he believed this was politically motivated and I said it would not and he said it would not be referred to a prosecutor. Nothing in the forensic interview with the children, which was conducted by trained personnel, had led to concerns. After the officer spoke. The CPS worker likewise indicated she had not found anything to substantiate the allegation, though her process would take a bit longer to be formally completed. I no longer needed to avoid being around my children unsupervised. Chasten was invited to come back downstairs and hear the same information that had been shared with me. Then, per standard procedure, she verified that there was adequate food in our kitchen and asked to take a look in the kids bedroom. After the officer, the CPS worker and the lawyers all left, Chasten and I hugged each other as tightly as we have any time since the day our son was put on life support as a critically ill infant. Just weeks after the adoption, we went to get the kids, had dinner with them and their grandparents, brought them home and gave them the most normal bedtime we could with a few more bedtime books than usual. Then we went and sat under the light at our kitchen table trying to begin to process our feelings. Buttigieg goes on to say that the police officer he encountered made it clear as we read from the passage that it was politically motivated and that any allegations against him would not be referred to a prosecutor for investigation. He adds this quote, I don't know who did this or exactly what prompted them to try. It's not lost on me that this happened soon after we shared photos of our family on social media for Father's Day, or that this occurred during a month meant to make Families like ours feel welcome and safe. We're used to nasty, hateful and sometimes violent things being said about us and even about our family. But this is the first time someone managed to invade our lives like this and drag our children into it. Meanwhile, we'll continue to do our work supporting and speaking out for causes we believe in according to our values. I will continue to stand up against the cruelty and corruption of the people in power today. And I'll keep making the case for a better future in our country through a better kind of politics. We cannot let American politics keep going in this direction, and we must not all go on as if it's acceptable for this kind of thing to be part of the cost of entering public service. I want to bring into our conversation and our coverage former assistant special agent in charge at the FBI, national security and intelligence analyst Michael Feinberg. Also joining us, co founder and executive director of Protect Democracy, Ian Bassin is here and political analyst, host of the Bulwark podcast, Tim Miller joins us. Tim, I read this with a feeling of this could be any of us. This is a tactic. And their tactics are never sort of customized for any one of their political enemies. They are usually rolled out and scaled to all of their political enemies. And I think what Pete and Chasten decided to do by publishing this today is maybe put it under such a bright klieg light that people know this is happening to people like Pete and Chastain. But what a horrific, horrific experience for their kids and their family.
- [09:33]
Tim Miller
Hard to imagine. I have this rage boiling inside of me having to listen to you read that for the last few minutes. I'm trying to gather my thoughts, but just I thinking about the idea of being separated from your young child for a night by the government because a cruel, insane person called the police and said you're a monster. And then to think about having to have the police come and interview your 4 year old. My child's 8 now, but I'm just trying to think about that and ask these invasive personal questions because you are a person that is in the public eye because you committed to public service. This is the punishment. You have to deal with that in a free country and it's totally unacceptable. You mentioned twice the comment about how this isn't being referred to a prosecutor. Maybe there's something else that just wasn't included in Pete's update there, but I think it should be referred to a prosecutor to prosecute the I was about to cuss to prosecute the person that made the phone call like that Is there's a hopefully that is ongoing. I just wanted to raise that as what I think should be the appropriate response to this, which is to prosecute the person that inflicted this on their family. And you know, you hate to go to politics and hypocrisy on this, but it does. The thing that just came to mind listening to all this and having been a former Republican is there was this big movement a few years ago going after families like Pete's and mine called Moms for Liberty. And it was this parents rights movement talking about how they didn't want their kids to have to learn about gay people in schools. And that's how they framed it, that this was about liberty, this was about parents rights. We shouldn't have things that we don't want forced upon our kids by the government. And a biggest picture, there's nothing wrong with that sentiment. A lot of their tactics were gross. What an example of an infringement upon liberty is this. And I'm not holding my breath, but you would hope that there would be bipartisan condemnation of this. Like think about the infringement on the liberty of their family and their children, that the government would come in and separate them from their four year old twins and invade their kitchen and ask personal questions to their children without them around just because one sicko made a phone call. I mean, it's totally, totally against how things should work in a free country. And I'm happy that Pete spoke out. And like you said, there should be real concerns about copycats here. The swatting thing is something that I hadn't heard about before 2015, and I know a lot of people who've been swatted. And so you do worry that this is something that expands.
- [12:18]
Nicole Wallace
Tim, you're right about where the crime may have happened and Pete addresses that. So let me read that part of it. Pete Buttigieg writes this quote, to be clear, making a false report of this kind is a crime. That's as it should be. Both to protect the innocent from false accusations and to preserve the integrity of a process designed to protect children from harm. I don't know how much we can do about it, but so help me God, if there is any way to press civil or criminal charges over this, we will, not just for our own sakes, but to draw a line that I thought everybody already recognized. Do not mess with with someone's kids. Michael Feinberg, your thoughts?
- [12:59]
Michael Feinberg
Yeah, this is horrific on a few levels. The most important and most basic level, of course, is what happened to Mr. Buteja and his family. Pete Chasten their kids should have never been put through this. Unfortunately, once that call was made, the die is sort of cast. In most municipalities and in most states, police do not have the discretion not to follow up an allegation of child abuse without a forensic interview. It sounds here like the police knew this was BS from the start and acted with as much kid gloves as they could in the situation. But the family never should have been put in this situation. And that leads to what makes it horrific on a different level, which is our society is now at a point where this is just something that happens. You can support a political position on which there is a wide diversity of views, whatever that position is. And there are entire swaths of the population that think it's okay in response to disagreeing with you, to call a SWAT team onto your house at the middle of the night or to make egregiously false accusations about how you treat the most vulnerable members of your family. This is disgusting. It is sick. And it undermines the very premise of our democracy, that people can have a plurality of opinions on different issues without having to worry that their opponents are going to resort to violence, violence or aggression. And I think we've crossed that Rubicon. You know, one of Tim's colleagues published a piece yesterday talking about a large portion of the electorate that now statistically has shown it doesn't believe in democracy, it doesn't believe that people should have differing views. And when you start to sacrifice the belief in the underlying rules of society, the sort of live and let live, laissez faire attitude we have traditionally taken to each other, it becomes a lot easier for you to then violate with impunity the rules of that society. And I very much fear, because I have zero hope that any Republicans are going to speak out against this. I very much fear that this is going to become the new normal.
- [15:41]
Nicole Wallace
I just want to read and be really specific about where the political motives were identified. They came from law enforcement. And Pete Buttigieg is our writes about this. He says, quote, the officer made clear that he believed this was politically motivated. So that's what. What Pete Buttigieg is passing along in Bassin. So law enforcement that has to make this horrible visit, separate parents from their kids, subject 24 year olds to an invasive interview session away from their parents and any adults they know says to the target of the this effort that he, quote, believes it was politically motivated.
- [16:36]
Ian Bassin
Yeah, I mean, first my heart goes out to Pete and Chastain and their family. I've known Pete probably almost 20 years and you'd be hard pressed to find a more thoughtful and kind public minded person. And I think it's not surprising that he speaks to the tragedy that has happened to his family here, but also to the broader implications when he gets to the point at the end about this shouldn't be the consequence for were raising your hand and wanting to serve the public. And that's the real danger here, is that we're gonna get to a place where sensible people don't wanna step up and serve the public because these are the costs. And that would be horrific for all of us. And I think the other thing that's horrific for all of us is what this says about the direction we're heading as a country. The person who bears primary responsibility for this is the person who made that call that sounds like it was probably criminal in nature and should, as Tim says, be prosecuted. But there's also a sickness that this is indicative of that has been pervading our society for which we all, for better or worse, have to be the antibodies. It's going to take all of us to take the temperature down and to turn the direction around because as we know, an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind. And while it is rage inducing for sure if we continue on a race to the bottom in this direction, it is going to be worse off for the entire society. And we would ideally be living in a country in a moment where we would have a leader and leaders in the country who as head of state would steer us nationally in a better direction. Unfortunately we don't have that right now. And so it's up to us. We have to be the leaders who steer us in a better direction. And knowing Pete, I think that's what he would probably call on us to do too.
- [18:20]
Nicole Wallace
Tim, I'll give you the last word on this.
- [18:23]
Tim Miller
I was just sitting there thinking about how I appreciate Ian calling for the turn to the better angels right now. Because that's not my initial instinct to say the least, based in hearing the response to the story. But he's right, look. And fundamentally this is, I think people sometimes roll their eyes when you talk about these high minded democratic notions about things like pluralism. But this is what it means living in a pluralistic society. This is what is beautiful about our country, is that you get to live out the life that you so choose and have the beliefs that you choose as long as you're not harming anyone. And if you're contributing the community and you can go to whatever church you want or have whatever silly politics you want or have whatever interest you want. And this type of action tears at that. It says that, oh no, we're going to intimidate you and we're going to use the power of the state to intimidate you if you live a certain way, if you're gay or if your political views are wrong or if you're practice of faith I don't like. And there's a lot of places in the world that that's how life that guys come to the door and bang on your door and intimidate you if you're not doing things right. And I think that's a very scary place to go. And that's particularly unfortunate in this case.
- [19:46]
Nicole Wallace
This broke right before we came on the air. So thank you all for scrambling the jets and helping us cover it. Michael Feinberg, you'll be back in the next hour. Tim and Ann, you stick around. We have our our other top story of the day, which is truly insane. It's a new level of whitewashing, if that even applies, coming from the Trump White House looking to normalize and launder their unprecedented levels of corruption. We'll show you how JD Vance tried to spin Nixon and lower the bar for himself and his administration. Plus, more reaction to the Supreme Court ruling yesterday that has allowed many on the right to let their true racist flags fly, I guess is how we'll describe it. We'll let you see it and decide for yourself. And later in the broadcast, we're getting some new clues this week as to what Donald Trump and his cronies have up their sleeves in their obsession with rigging the midterm elections. All those stories and much more when Deadline White House continues after a quick break. Don't go anywhere
- [20:50]
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- [20:56]
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- [21:23]
Angie Hicks
Hi, I'm Angie Hicks, co founder of Angie. One thing I've learned is that you buy a house, but you make it a home. For decades, Angie's helped millions of homeowners hire skilled pros for their projects that matter. Angie, the one you trust to find the ones you trust. Find a pro for your project@angie.com you
- [21:39]
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- [21:45]
Angie Hicks
Yeah.
- [21:45]
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- [22:14]
Nicole Wallace
We are officially at the you can't make this bleep stuff up phase of the Donald Trump story. For Trump and his band of sycophants, projection has become one of the core governing philosophies. Accuse everyone in Washington of being corrupt and criminal, and then when the evidence points back at your conduct being corrupt and criminal, or worse, try to rewrite the standard itself. That's what happened when J.D. vance attempted to lower the bar of corruption last night, whitewashing one of the biggest political scandals in our country's history.
- [22:48]
Unidentified Political Commentator
I'm actually fascinated by Nixon as a character in history. I think that his historical legacy is enjoying a bit of a renaissance, but I think deservedly so. As I joked with Robert backstage, if Watergate happened tomorrow, it would be like a 12 hour news story.
- [23:07]
Ian Bassin
Like, the idea that it would have
- [23:08]
Unidentified Political Commentator
taken down a presidency is crazy. And by the way, if you look at the story of how the deep state took down Richard Nixon, it's not all that different from what the same groups of people, the same institutions tried to do to Donald Trump and the first Trump administration. There is a parallel.
- [23:32]
Nicole Wallace
For a smart guy, that's not at all how Nixon falls. He falls because members, members of his own party aren't immune from facts and evidence and reality. But the scandal here, the story here, the news, is that J.D. vance actually said that out loud and thinks it's funny, called it a joke. But the point he's making isn't the point he thinks he's making. Richard Nixon resigning after being investigated for obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress. Being a 12 hour news story says less about the gravity of Nixon's conduct in crimes and more about how overwhelming the current volume of corruption and criminality and weaponization we're seeing out of the White House today dwarfs it. And there's a reason they want to lower the bar so that no one thinks that Nixon would be held Accountable in today's White House. There's a reason they want to normalize Nixon's conduct and theirs. Trump's relentless campaign to use the Department of Justice to target his perceived political enemies, his autocratic power grab, trying to undermine our democracy by taking over elections so he can cheat. And, of course, the blatant exploitation of the White House by the Trump family for their personal financial gain. Trump's children have profited millions and millions from the crypto deals. They benefited from federal contracts. And Trump himself is cashing in on the presidency like no president before him, profiting millions from stock trades, his family businesses, and gifts from political donors. So, sure, JD Richard Nixon's conduct really does pale in comparison to what we see Donald Trump doing. We're back with the executive director of Protect Democracy, Ian Bassin, and the host of the Bulwark Podcast, political analyst Tim Miller. Ian, your thoughts about this little peek behind the curtain of J.D. vance's inner monologue?
- [25:28]
Ian Bassin
Well, the first thing I couldn't help noticing is he's praising Richard Nixon right in front of a wall that says he's the Richard Nixon Foundation. Which just reminded me that this guy is like the greatest suck up to whoever he's in front of in history. I mean, I think if he sat down with Flip Morris, he'd basically say, oh, I really feel like Backo gets a bad rap. You know, one day he's going to probably be the devil himself and say, you know, I always really like the smell of sulphur and skites are really cool tools. I mean, so I had to sort of chuckle at just how good he is at sucking up to his audience. But here's the thing. I think what it reveals is that one of the most sophisticated and dangerous maneuvers that Donald Trump and now JD Vance have pulled off is dismantling the check that scandal has historically played in our politics. They've been very systematic about doing it. The way that scandal has historically worked is first step one is there's discovery, right? Some entrepreneurial newspaper journalist, Woodward and Bernstein discover something that's hidden and reveal it, and that becomes the shock. And they've dismantled that by simply doing all the corrupt shut in the open. The second move is after there's a reveal, then there's the narrative is told and explained to the electorate, to the American people, through a news media that had some shared reality, shared narrative, and that was trusted. But Trump has attacked the news media, called it fake news. It's also been completely fragmented in the modern era. And so the second step has Basically been dismantled. And the third step after there was a reveal and a narrative, was that political actors were incentivized to hold the person committing the scandal accountable. But Trump has wielded power over the Republican Party with such mob boss efficiency, and they have been so cowardly and capitulating that that third step isn't working. And so having dismantled the scandal.
- [27:20]
Unidentified Political Commentator
Check.
- [27:20]
Ian Bassin
You know, it reminds me of when the Ewoks in Return of the Jedi dismantle the shield so that they can attack Death Star. Except in this case, it's the bad guys who are the Ewoks. And, you know, Vance isn't as cute as an Ewok, but once the shield was down, then they can engage in rampant grafted corruption, which is what we're seeing. And that's really the most dangerous thing that this, this really was just a victory lap over how successful they've been at dismantling the shield.
- [27:45]
Nicole Wallace
But I think what is perceived in the moment as strength is, with the public, the ultimate weakness. I mean, I think this is. I mean, ask Viktor Orban how long you can sustain such brazen, gleeful public corruption. I mean, isn't this the fastest way to destroying the whole coalition?
- [28:04]
Ian Bassin
Well, this is the good news, Nicole. Normally, I'm coming here to tell you, here's the good news. The good news is it's not ultimately working right. It's not ultimately working right. And the greatest example of it is JD Vance himself, who signed onto the, you know, hitched his cart to this horse thinking it was gonna be a ride into the promised land. And what he doesn't realize is he's like the Bruce Willis character in the Sixth Sense. He's already dead. He just doesn't know it yet. He's politically dead. His political star is nowhere. He has no political future. It's just not gonna be revealed to him until the last scene of the movie when he tries to run in 2028. Because at the end of the day, you're right. The Trump political project has ultimately failed and he is sinking in popularity. But, you know, disapproval is climbing by the day and largely on the backs of these scandals. I think we all wish that there were a more immediate due ex machina, where someone this corrupt, this unpopular, faced, you know, immediate consequence. Right. People say, can he just be impeached and removed? We know that's been tried multiple times. It hasn'. It, unfortunately, is going to be a much slower recalibration of our system and accountability than we wanted. But accountability is coming. It's coming in November, it's coming after that. The Trump political project is dead. JD Vance just doesn't know it yet.
- [29:21]
Nicole Wallace
Tim,
- [29:23]
Tim Miller
I'll have whatever he's having. I don't know what Ian's been doing today, but I'm down for some for this weekend. I'm less bullish than him, which is nice. It's in my nature to be more rain, cloudy and we'll see. I don't know what the future holds of JD I do have a few nitpicks if I can. It's, I mean about what JD Was saying about Nixon. I don't believe that Nixon is experiencing a renaissance. So just to be a fact checker on that, I don't, I don't think that that's actually happening out there. Number two, I don't know that J.D. vance actually knows what happened in Watergate and I think that might be limiting his comments there. Somehow this idea that the deep state took Nixon down, I guess I need to hear more what he means by that. Because the deep state was working with Nixon on the crimes. The CIA helped Nixon. Nixon asked the CIA and the Nixon White House has the ciao to help them create a cocktail lie that their attempt to break into the DNC and spy on their political opponents was some intelligence operation. So the CIA, part of the deep state was on board. The Justice Department was on board. The Attorney General ended up going to jail. So I don't know who in the deep state was taking Nixon down. But it was the point of Watergate that was that it was the entire, it was many figures throughout the government that were working together on this crime and on this cover up. That's why it was such a big story that lasted longer than 12 hours. Many people went to jail and were convicted of it. And as you mentioned in the lead in, the people that took him down were members of their own party who had actual courage and were able to have standards and say something is wrong and like what we've seen from this Republican Party. So the thing for me, and I think the most notable thing is just the blunt fact that the Vice President of the United States went on a stage yesterday and said, you know what guys? Politicians doing crimes is not a big deal anymore. Not a big deal. People don't care about that. Like the President and the Vice President. We can do whatever crimes we want. We're in a new era. It's not like the old days where people got all worried where their politicians were corrupt. We've moved on from that. In the Trump world, we're making America great again on our 250th anniversary. Now it's all good. We can do as many crimes as we want. Nobody will care. It's an interesting bet. It's interesting that he's saying that just that bluntly, but like that is what he said. Like, you know, he basically said that there were all these crimes that Nixon committed that wouldn't be a big story anymore. I guess, you know, at some level we've seen that was somewhat true with Trump's election in 2024, but it seems like they're going to continue to test that prospect.
- [31:52]
Nicole Wallace
Okay, I have a million follow up theories, so I think that the I have to sit in a break, but I think that the deep state that he was attacking was the sore right deep throat. Like I think he's obsessed with the fact that there was a leap. But let's pull this thread because I love this. I've just taken a break. Well, I'll be back on the other side with J.D. vance's twisted Nixon renaissance. That's next. Don't go anywhere.
- [32:29]
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Angie Hicks
I thought it was safe.
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- [33:27]
Angie Hicks
Why have we asked our contractor we
- [33:28]
Nicole Wallace
found on Angie.com to be our kid's legal guardian because he took such good care when redoing our basement that we knew we could trust him to care for our kids.
- [33:35]
Tim Miller
We only met a month ago.
- [33:37]
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Ian Bassin
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- [33:46]
Unidentified Political Commentator
Over the last year and a Half our president Donald Trump has turned the White house into a 24, 7 corruption operation. This is a national crisis and we should start acting like it. The president's goal is to engage in so much corruption, so much self, enrichment, to hand out so many favors to his friends, his family and his political allies that it just becomes the best a pitter patter of rain. It's normal, it's constant, it's never ending. Trump's bet is that if there's a new story of corruption, of self dealing every few days, that the press will stop covering it or the public will just stop paying attention. This moment is exceptional. It is a one of one moment. And if it becomes normal, if people stop being outraged at what he is doing to enrich himself, then I fear there is no going back. The White House will just become a place to get rich.
- [34:53]
Nicole Wallace
We're back with Ian and Tim. So Ian, just picking up on where we left off before the break. I think that the deep state is this White House's obsession with leaks and leakers and there's a lot of scuttle that they're super agitated and looking over each other's shoulders with the new Maggie Swan or Jonathan Swan Maggie Haverman book that is out. I don't know that J.D. vance sees himself anywhere other than sort of as a reflection in right wing media. And he seems like someone who goes back and watches all of his clips and his interviews. But the Chris Murphy point is to me where the friction with the Trump coalition is and the public. And you see a lot of the ascendant Democrats like Ossoff and Warnock making the point about corruption and the economy and morality. Ossoff detailing all of the individual schemes to get rich. And then you see how the corruption fails in terms of the incompetence of the reflecting pool. That was a corrupt no big contract that turned the reflecting pool algae green, not American flag blue. I mean, where do you see the opportunities in countries in positions like ours sort of careening toward autocracy but saying, oh, maybe this won't work out well for me and my family. Where are we sort of in that? I don't know. It feels like being in the car with someone intoxicated. But where are we on that ride?
- [36:19]
Ian Bassin
Well, I mean the tyrant's favorite tool since antiquity is to pit people against each other on the basis of religion or race or sexual orientation, to distract people by pinning blame on immigrants or the deep state so that people are distracted while the tyrant is picking their pockets of money and power. And I think Senator Murphy detailed very well there how what's really going on behind all of the wild hand waving and absurdities that you hear from Donald Trump and J.D. vance and now the U.S. supreme Court is that the American people are getting bilked of money and of power. And the good news that I tried to allude to before the break, and I love trying to convince Tim to be more upbeat, so I'm going to try it here, is that the American people are catching on. Right. I mean, the irony of J.D. vance talking about how Watergate was nothing was that it was the post Watergate 1974 election that saw the party out of power pick up a net gain of 48 seats. And I think we are heading towards something like that in November. You know, the Democratic generic ballot advantage right now is about somewhere between 6 and 7%. That's about where it was in 2018 when the Democrats picked up a net gain of 40 seats. Except this time, Donald Trump is twice as unpopular as he was in 2018. If you look at the Democrats generic ballot advantage right now, the closest analogues in recent memory are 2006, 2008, 2018 and 2020, all years in which the Democrats did exceedingly well. So I think the Trump Vance CR corruption is finally having the effect of stepping on the political rake that is about to hit them in the face. Which is why you see Donald Trump pivoting so hard to trying to rig the election, because he knows that if the election is held on a free and fair basis, he and his party are toast. And so you're seeing now the efforts to try to tilt the playing field on the election. And here too, I think the good news is that the Hungarian showed that even with an autocrat tilting the playing field for 18 years, if you expose their corruption enough, you can win. Donald Trump hasn't been rigging it for 18 years. I think the American people see the corruption and I think they're going to answer it in November.
- [38:25]
Nicole Wallace
Yeah, I mean, looking around the world, it seems that if you're going to do the corruption, you have to keep the crime secret. And if you're going to do the crimes in public, you have to keep the corruption secret and their mistake. If they have any sort of autocracy, autop, you know, I don't know if they look back at where they went wrong, if they are held accountable. It seems that trying to do the crime, the criminal conduct and the enriching themselves in public in place of growing the economy or maintaining world peace may be where they went wrong. Is that a fair read, Ian?
- [39:06]
Ian Bassin
Yeah. I mean, you know, Trump ultimately had to consolidate power before becoming unpopular. That was the race. If he consolidated power before becoming unpopular, then he could hold onto power illegitimately. That's what autocrats do. There's a reason autocrats are autocrats, because if they were doing things that were legitimately popular, they wouldn't need to be autocrats.
- [39:23]
Tim Miller
Right.
- [39:24]
Ian Bassin
But they're doing things to enrich themselves that are not in the public interest. So they've gotta consolidate power before they become unpopular, because once they become unpopular, it becomes harder to consolidate power. And Donald Trump has become unpopular before he finished consolidating power. Now, I don't wanna suggest that this is all automatic at all. I don't wanna suggest that the threats to the election aren't real. There's enormous work to be done, work that groups like ours, that protect democracy and many of our allies in the democracy field are doing to make sure that Trump cannot tilt the playing field, to make sure that our election is free and fair and that voters get to cast their ballots and have their will honored. There's a lot of work that we all need to do to do that. It's not automatic, but the field right now looks good for the pro democracy forces if we do our jobs.
- [40:10]
Nicole Wallace
All right, I'm asking both of you to stick around. Tim had the clap back of the day. I'll show it to you. On the other side of a break, Following yesterday's decision by the Supreme Court that was described in scathing terms by the liberal justices who dissented, who argued that the evidence was everywhere that Trump's policies were racially motivated. That decision now basically allows the Trump administration to end temporary legal protections, which is what allows people from Haiti and Syria to be here. There was a flood of surprising but not shockingly racist react from the right. Stephen Miller's wife got in on the action. Her name's Katie Miller. She celebrated the ruling, reviving a conversation conspiracy theory that Haitian immigrants were eating people's pets in parts of Ohio. And Megan Kelly really outdid herself on her podcast, telling Haitians who would lose their temporary protected status to, quote, go home, get out. We know our country's better than yours, Tim. Your clapback won the Internet won my heart. And I, I, I wonder if you think she's just enraptured by the permission structure the Supreme Court gives her to say these racist things or if this is who she always was or if she's ignorant to all the contributions. I mean, Just wanted you to react to it here.
- [41:46]
Tim Miller
It's hard to get in her head because, you know, some people just want to be nasty. And it's fun to be nasty. It's fun to be mean. You know, we're all human. We all get it. I get a little thrill out of attacking Donald Trump's man boobs. You know, like, people like it. There's something. There's a dark part of all of us. And so maybe she just has fully given way to her dark soul and is using it to target helpless Haitians who came to the country because their country was in chaos and came here and worked and went to church and tried to make a life for themselves and their kids. And she wants to take out all her rage on them. I don't know. We do know it's at least somewhat performative, though, because she had a job at NBC where she was a completely different character just a few years ago, where she had a morning show where she had Fran's Kids on and talked about the importance of diversity and all this stuff. So we know it's a character. I don't know exactly what motivates it or what is true, but the Haitians, this stuff really gets to me. I live in New Orleans, and it was part of the clapback you referenced. Her ramp goes on way longer than what you played. And one of the things she talks about is how Haitians brought nothing to the culture that we built. I don't know what Megyn Kelly is adding to the culture. They're lasting. I don't know who the we is in that, but Haitians have added a lot to the culture. And New Orleans is only. We only have New Orleans because of Creole culture. Like, New Orleans would be Mobile or Jackson or some other just perfectly fine city in the south on the Gulf coast. That is like a lot of other cities in the country. But because of that Creole culture, it is like one of the most special places in the country. I could go down the list of all the ways that Basquiat or other Haitians have enriched us. And you don't have to be Basquiat. The person that's working at their job in Springfield, working hard, wanting to come to this country, wanting to give a life to their kids, like, that person deserves dignity, too. And these guys, for no reason, no purpose, except for their own hatred, are now going to send them all back, try to ruin their lives, and they're going to rub their faces in the dirt while they do it. And it's sick. It's Just sick.
- [43:49]
Nicole Wallace
You know, I, I noted after the 2016 Trump win that these people are the worst winners in the history of human contests, Right? Like there's no sporting event, there's no political contest, there's no award ceremony where the winners biggest jerks on the field. But the Trump coalition, they are the worst winners the world over. Like, the worst seriously. And the hate almost spews more fully when they win something like, if you believe what the Trump people believe you won yesterday, why act like such? I'm always in this position where I don't have a word I can say on tv. But why act the way they act? Ian Bassin, Tim Miller, thank you. I think I've said it eight times, though. Thank you for spending some time with us today on all these stories. We really appreciate both of you. After the break. Billionaire and Jeffrey Epstein associate Leon Black walked out of an oversight hearing after refusing to answer questions about his NDAs with women. We'll tell you about that next. A dramatic escalation to tell you about on Capitol Hill today as part of the Jeffrey Epstein investigation. After refusing to answer questions, billionaire Leon Black, Jeffrey Epstein's primary client, stormed out of his voluntary closed door. Transcribed interview with the House Oversight Committee. Republican Chairman James Comer called Black the witness that could have the, quote, most groundbreaking deposition today. He issued Black two new subpoenas, including one for a deposition to take place under oath on July 16 and another for NDAs that Comer says he's, quote, pretty confident that Leon Black signed with young women. In a statement today, Democratic ranking member Robert Garcia said this quote, leon Black had a chance to do the right thing and help us bring justice to the survivors. He has now been subpoenaed and must provide real answers to the committee. He will be held accountable if he does not comply with our investigation. After the break, how the Trump administration continues to search high and low for new ways to rig the midterm elections despite multiple rulings from federal judges against them. We'll tell you about those developments next.
- [46:23]
Angie Hicks
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- [46:32]
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- [46:35]
Ian Bassin
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