← Deadline: White House
Deadline: White House
"Ethical red flags"
00:43:28
Nicolle Wallace on Trump's potential 230 million dollar shakedown of the American public, as he demands compensation for Justice Department investigations into him.
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- [00:01]
A
Hey, this is Jeff Lewis from Radio Andy Live and uncensored. Catch me talking with my friends about my latest obsessions, relationship issues and bodily ailments. With that kind of drama that seems to follow me, you never know what's going to happen.
- [00:13]
B
You can listen to Jeff Lewis Live at home or anywhere you are. Download the SiriusXM app for over 425 channels of AD, free music, sports, entertainment and more. Subscribe now and get 3 months free offer details apply.
- [00:31]
C
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- [01:10]
B
Hi everyone. It's four o'clock in New York. We come on the air with breaking news of a potential $230 million shakedown of the American taxpayer by one Donald J. Trump. Brand new reporting in the New York Times reveals that Donald Trump is demanding $230 million from the taxp as compensation for investigations into him by the Department of Justice. People familiar with the matter tell the Times this quote Trump submitted complaints through an administrative claim process that often is the precursor to lawsuits. The first claim, lodged in late 2023, seeks damages for a number of purported violations of his rights, including the FBI and special counsel investigation into Russian election tampering and possible connections to the 2016 Trump campaign. The second complaint, filed in the summer of 2024, accuses the FBI of violating Trump's privacy by searching Mar a Lago, that's his club and residence in Florida in 2022 for classified documents. The mountain of ethical red flags surrounding Donald Trump now demanding $230 million from the government he leads, with his own attorney general set to sign off on any settlement with him are so obvious even Trump appears to be capable of grasping it. Here's what he said on this last week.
- [02:35]
A
I have a lawsuit that was doing very well and when I became president, I said I'm sort of suing myself. I don't know what. How do you settle the lawsuit? I'll say give me X dollars, right?
- [02:47]
B
Yeah. So now we know X is 230 million buckaroos from us, the taxpayers. New York Times goes on to report it will be paid by taxpayers if his former defense Lawyers turned top tier leaders of the Justice Department sign off on it. The settlement's approved. We'll be paying Trump for two investigations that remain on solid factual ground, even according to people still in good standing in the MAGAverse. One is a probe that led to 37 indictments, seven guilty pleas or convictions, including those of Donald Trump's campaign manager, two other aides, his personal lawyer and a close ally. An investigation whose origins were investigated by Marco Rubio and special counsel John Durham. John Durham, of course, was appointed by Trump's handpicked Attorney General, Bill Barr. Durham found no criminal wrongdoing on the part of the investigators. Neither did Marco. The other is a probe that found Donald Trump hiding classified information in boxes that we have pictures of, we can see with our own eyes, boxes upon boxes upon boxes. Trump was storing documents, classified documents, national defense information, including nuclear secrets, in his pay for members private club. That's a criminal case. It never went to court. Only because Donald Trump won the election before it had a chance to make it to court. Breaking news on Trump demanding $230 million from the government he leads for his own grievances is where we start today. Former top official, the Department of Justice. MSNBC legal analyst Andrew Weissman's here. Also joining us, New York Times investigative reporter Mike Schmidt is here. Mike, this looks like a story that Trump may have helped surface by talking about it last week. Just take us through what your colleagues are reporting.
- [04:44]
D
Well, look, I mean, even Trump, in the quote that you were reading, thought that this was a little ridiculous. And the rest of the quote is actually just as stunning. He says, it sort of looks bad, I'm suing myself. Right. So I don't know. But that was a lawsuit that was very strong, very powerful. So in essence, to what you played and what he says in the rest of it, he can sense the highly unusual nature of this and the ethical questions that come in on this. In many ways, it's a dream for him to be on both sides of a lawsuit at the end of the day. Day, I don't know what stands in the way of this happening. It's because he controls the department and these are his political appointees and they have shown their fealty to him. It's hard to imagine that he will not get what he wants in this case. And that's just remarkable. And I'm sure Andrew will have a lot of thoughts on this, given, you know, the work that he did on the special counsel's investigation. But, I mean, at the end of the day, in some ways, the department kind of leaned his way on the special counsel's investigation. Remember, you know, the Mueller team did not even make a determination about whether he broke the law that allowed for the Attorney General, Bill Barr, to sculpt the results of the investigation without them before they actually became public. Trump claimed that he was exonerated in the entire thing. I understand that he believes there was a cloud over him because of the Russia investigation. But look, he himself on the campaign trail asked for that help. So, you know, I realized that the Russia hoax that he claims is this massive grievance, and it's a talking point and a campaign line and something he talks about on the stump. But at the end of the day, he kind of got off easy in the Russia investigation.
- [06:44]
B
Well, Andrew, it's all those things. It's also an active investigation into officials that serve former President Barack Obama. There's an active investigation into former Director of the CIA John Brennan and others. There's a document that purports, at least according to John Ratcliffe, to call into question some of the assessment about 2016, Russia's 2016 attack on the American elections. I mean, this is all those things in terms of what it was at the time. It's also part of a very nefarious effort to criminalize career and political appointees from President Obama's administration.
- [07:28]
E
That's absolutely true. But let's just start with the fact that we essentially have the President of the United States is now the extortionist in chief. We saw it with abc, we saw it with cbs, we saw it with law firms. And now he might as well just go ahead and rob Fort Knox and take the gold out. You know, in any normal time, what would happen was that the senior leadership of the Department of Justice, that has a conflict here, having their former role being counsel to him, they would step aside and there would be independent counsel. And you know what would happen? There would be a hearing. The last thing that Donald Trump wants, let's have a hearing on the Russia case. Let's have a hearing on Mar A Lago. All of the things that he has tried to avoid. Remember, he always said in the Russia case, oh, I'm happy to testify. Yeah. No, he wasn't. He never happened. The Mar A Lago case, he tried to put that off. Let's have a hearing so he can have his day in court to show why he actually had the. Has the right side of this and let the independent people at the department show why he's wrong. That, of course, will be the last thing on God's green earth that he wants. But that is what would normally happen. So you don't have this kind of extortion going on. And to me, it just is, you know, he pardoned Santos and it was like, I can do that, and who's going to stop me here? As Mike said, it's like, I can do this and who's going to stop me? And there really does need to be a sort of political cost to him when this is coming at the expense of our taxpayer money. As you noted at the outset, this is not something that is free. This is something that we would be paying for needlessly. And we're going to have people who are completely conflicted making that decision.
- [09:45]
B
Let me ask you something basic about this, Andrew Weissman. I mean, what is in the system to protect the institutions from an extortionist, to use your word.
- [10:00]
E
Yeah. So I think what there is, is the people could try to sue and say that Pam Bondi and Todd Blanche and political appointees should not be the ones to make this decision and that there needs to be an independent person who's making the decision. I personally don't think that Trump is right that these were strong cases and that he has a good argument. But you know what? He wants to file his claim and it's, you know, can be heard. Let him do that. Because the last thing he will want, as I mentioned, is a hearing and a trial. He has tried to avoid that. And so I really think it is the only thing that couldn't in this unusual situation, to say the least, is to have, essentially, it's sort of a taxpayer lawsuit. There are many, many difficulties to that. But taxpayers will be saying, look, I'm harmed because this is my money and it's being decided by somebody who's conflicted. You can also have bar associations that get into the act because they can say that Pam Bondi and Todd Blanche should not be deciding this, that it's not. It's completely antithetical to their oaths of office. They're not his personal counsel anymore, and they have a conflict because they have a duty of loyalty to their prior client, but they now are supposed to have a duty solely to the United States. So that, I mean, it's so obvious that it hardly means saying that there is that kind of problem. If, however, just to be clear, there is a route, if they were to step down and say, you know what, this is going to be decided by people who are not Trump appointees, then Trump could Have his day in court, which I think he doesn't want, and the American people would be protected by an independent determination, and it would go on its course like any other case, which would clearly, just to be clear, this would clearly lack merit. But, you know, he would be able to have his day in court to show why he's right. I suspect he would lose.
- [12:15]
B
I mean, Andrew, just to play the devil's advocate of Todd Blanche is going and visiting with Ghislaine Maxwell and Lizzie Halligan is indicting people after Trump tweets at them. Do you really think they're going to recuse themselves from a settlement negotiation?
- [12:30]
E
There's not a snowball's chance that it's gonna happen. You know, I, you know, of course not.
- [12:37]
B
But you're just telling me what would happen if we were in a normal time.
- [12:44]
E
Yes, exactly. You know, it's hard, but I, I know, yes. I hope that Todd Blanche has some part of him says, I have a. Like some. I cannot take that extra step. And this has to be that moment.
- [13:03]
B
Okay. I don't think that that moment will ever come, but we'll go along with that. Mike, let me read you this part. So here's what's normal. The Times actually takes us through this in the story. What's normal. Actually, the Times reports out what the Justice Department manual says is normal. Quote, according to the Justice Department manual, settlements of claims against the department for more than $4 million. This is $230 million, quote, must be approved by the Deputy Attorney General or Associate Attorney General, meaning the person who oversees the agency's civil division, quote, the current Deputy Attorney General, Todd Blanche, served as Trump's lead criminal defense lawyer and said at his confirmation hearing in February that his attorney client privilege with the President continues. The chief of the department's civil division, Stanley Woodward Jr. Represented Trump's co defendant, Walt Nauta in the classified documents case. Mr. Woodward has also represented a number of other Trump aides, including Mr. Patel, in investigations related to Trump or the capitol riot on January 6, 2021. Just sort of working our way backward to the stunning event of Donald Trump seeming to be aware of how. Let me actually quote someone in this article. Outlandish is what one of your ethics experts says to the New York Times. This all is. Does anyone, any one of the three of us doubt, as I think you've already said, Mike, that this will be one more $230 million of taxpayer money that Donald Trump will pocket?
- [14:36]
D
Look, in this country, we're all taught from a very young age, about the three branches about checks and balances and the sort of special sauce nature of them that makes our democracy the democracy that is. And that really sets it apart. And the uniqueness of the Trump second term is the ability to see a true testing of that, something we've all been taught and seeing. Okay, how do checks and balances in the three branches hold up? And this is a situation that, you know, at least to me, that the non lawyer shows one of those tests and, and there is no sort of natural remedy for it. You have a Congress that is compliant with Trump. You can't see them standing up for anything. These are, it's a Congress run by folks that don't want to spend the government's money or believe in small government. But they would never say anything about this $200 million. Andrew lays out a situation in which taxpayers could try and bring a lawsuit to try to stop something like that. And like, sure, maybe something like that works. But if you think about the way that checks and balances are supposed to work, this seems to pierce right through it because he controls the presidency, he controls the Justice Department, and he's found a way through that to do what in many ways dating back to his time in New York in the 70s and 80s is essentially adjudicate his own lawsuits. And I don't know, you know, obviously this is not something that the founders thought through, but it sure shows a stress on the checks and balance system that, you know, when you ask someone with a great legal mind like Andrew about it, he the best he can come up with is a taxpayer brought lawsuit. And like, I don't know what the chances of that are, but my guess is that they're probably not very high.
- [16:37]
B
Well, I also think we sometimes reach around for examples of what happens in this country when the rule of law is dead. And a lot of it is what we've been covering together that Don, Donald Trump is able to find someone, anyone, he has to work his way down to the least experienced person that we've heard of so far, Lindsey Halligan, to indict his enemies. But the other side of it is at a time when record numbers of Americans are missing car payments and turning in their cars at a number when a moment when food banks are running out of food on the shelves is a combination of the shutdown and the ailing economy, at a time when people have record low confidence in their personal finances, the end of the rule of law means Donald Trump can grab $230 million from the American taxpayer. Andrew what is the way to sort of explain that the end of the rule of law hurts everybody?
- [17:32]
E
Yeah. Well, let's just remember we are not that far away from seven or so million people protesting in a no kings peaceful demonstration. And this is exhibit, I would like to say exhibit A, but it's at this point, it's exhibit AA to someone who's acting like a king, as Mike said, is on both sides of this issue. We also are in a government shutdown where you have public servants who are going to work and not getting paid. You have others who are being furloughed who are not getting paid. And then you have the modeling of this gross behavior where somebody with what appears by all accounts to be a frivolous lawsuit, not a strong lawsuit, a frivolous lawsuit saying, I want $230 million. So the timing of this just could not be more salient for people to understand what is going on. That you have somebody who basically is going, you know what? Until somebody stops me, I am going to everything. And I mean, it really even was not being facetious by saying that. He could just say, you know what? I'm just going to take everything out of the treasury and Fort Knox. And to just be, to quip, I mean, this is checks and balances, but it's bank checks and bank balances that he is thinking about, not actually checks and balances on power where the framers supposed to, they were supposed to. And the system is to divide power better to preserve liberty. That is why we have checks and balances, because we. The idea was that no one branch should have this kind of control. And we're on both sides of a lawsuit. This is handing, I think, the Democrats such a, such a weapon to sort of tell people what is going on, where the victim is the American people. I mean, they are the ones who will be out the $230 million.
- [19:48]
B
Yeah. At a time when people are really starting to feel the consequences of his policies and his shutdown. Andrew, Mike, stick around because when we come back, there's a stunning, stunning new piece of reporting. It's an example of the incompetence we've been talking about from one of Trump's handpicked top prosecutors brought in to carry out his campaign of retribution. How a 33 hour text exchange with a journalist could jeopardize some of those weaponized cases that she brought. Plus, bowing down is not an option. Our old friend Steve Schmidt joins us on the opposition to Donald Trump and why one national day of demonstrations against what's happening in this country is not enough. Later in the show, more fallout from the wrecking ball that the administration is literally taking to the actual building that is the White House. A remaking of the government in his image, and now a remaking of the people's house into Trump's ballroom. All those stories and more when Deadly White House continues. After a quick break. Don't go anywhere.
- [20:51]
C
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- [21:04]
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- [22:04]
B
As he seeks to smash and grab 230 million bucks. Donald Trump's reckless campaign to wreck the rule of law with his prosecutions is today wobbling a bit like a Jenga tower that got a little too tall today in two jurisdictions in the Eastern District of Virginia and in New Jersey, Trump's handpicked prosecutors, both with zero experience as prosecutors but totally down with going after Trump's critics, regardless of the facts in the cases, are both facing challenges to their appointments, to the legality of them. Politico is reporting that judges appeared skeptical of Alina Habba's appointment to be the acting U.S. attorney in New Jersey. And whatever happens in Alina Habba's case could have an impact on a challenge to the appointment of Lindsey Halligan. Over in the Eastern District of Virginia, former director of the FBI Comey has filed a motion claiming that Halligan's appointment was unlawful since US Attorneys are only allowed to serve without senate confirmation for 120 days and the previous US attorney in the job had already served a full 120 day stint. That would be Eric Siebert, who we have covered here. He was fired for refusing to bring the cases against Jim Comey and New York Attorney General Tish James because there wasn't enough evidence. If the court rules in Comey's favor and finds that Halligan was improperly appointed, Comey's case could be tossed out, as could the case against Tish James. These, of course, are two pillars of Trump's retribution campaign that would collapse because the Trump administration hastily put inexperienced loyalists in the positions of U.S. attorneys without any regard for the law. But the cases against Comey and James might be in danger even before any court rules on Halligan's appointment. A reporter named Anna Bauer from the news outlet Lawfare is reporting that Halligan started a bizarre 33 hour text exchange with her on signal. Bower writes this, quote, she initiated a conversation with me, a reporter she barely knew, to discuss an ongoing prosecution that she is personally handling. She mostly criticized my reporting, or more precisely, my summary of someone else's reporting. But several of her messages contained language that touched on grand jury matters, even as she insisted that she could not reveal such information, which is protected from disclosure by prosecutors under federal law. Not once during their conversation did Lindsey Halligan say that their conversation was off the record. Here's what happened when Bauer, the journalist, reached out for comment from the Justice Department, quote, halligan texted me, quote, by the way, everything I ever sent you is off the record. You're not a journalist. So it's weird saying that, but just letting you know. I responded, I'm sorry, but that is not how this works. You don't get to say that. In retrospect, Halligan was unpersuaded. Yeah, I do. Off record, I am really sorry. I would have been happy to speak with you on an off the record basis had you asked. I said, but you didn't ask. And I still haven't agreed to speak with you on that basis. Do you have any further comment for the story? To my surprise, Halligan kept going, quote, it's obvious the whole convo's off record. There's disappearing messages and it's on signal. What's your story? You never told me about a story. I didn't respond. It was time to publish my story. I'll text it to her. We're back with Andrew and Mike, I don't know whether to deal with the legal issues or the stupidity first, but the stupidity is just unbelievable here. Now, you could, I guess, legitimately not understand that texting a journalist not about her own reporting, but about her summaries about someone else's reporting is something if you don't want to see in print, you should ask the conditions. But to be sharing grand jury information, to me seems like something that even in this bizarre Earth 2 world could get Lindsey Halligan called into the principal's office. Andrew.
- [26:07]
E
So to be fair, she does say in her text, I can't go further because I can't go into grand jury information. But on the other hand, she does confirm information by saying, essentially, yes, that happened in the grand jury, but I can't go further. So just because the New York Times is reporting something, which is Anna Bauer was summarizing that it hasn't been confirmed by the government one way or the other. So the government is not supposed to be saying that that did or did not happen in the grand jury. But I view this as even more nefarious. I mean, yes, there is stupidity here and clumsiness. But just so it's clear, Anna Bauer, who writes for Lawfare and is a wonderful, wonderful reporter, I read her material all the time because she's so good, so smart, she was pointing out what appeared to be serious legal laws in the Letitia James case. And what was happening was she got a call from Lindsey Halligan saying, basically, you need to change all of that. You got it wrong. And Anna Bauer correctly said, well, tell me what I got wrong. I don't want to report something wrong. What's wrong with it? And Lindsey Hallon would say just essentially change it, you're a bad reporter, but never said what was wrong with it. So of course, Anna Bauer wasn't going to change it. But there was this effort to basically get the press to be positive about something and sort of have a sort of a threat. Remember, this is Lindsey Halligan, who was brought to would appear to be, in my view, sort of baseless lawsuits, calling a reporter saying, change it, you've got it wrong, but never revealing what exactly is wrong with it. Just wants to have good press, which is very much like what Donald Trump was convicted of in Manhattan, which was getting the National Enquirer to kill negative stories about Donald Trump and to plant fake stories about his opponents. And so this is sort of she's learned from the master. And what she was, I see her doing with Anna Bauer.
- [28:36]
B
Well, I think, Mike, what's revelatory is that even privately, the facts are totally a distant second to the press they garner. Let me read the section that Andrew's talking about. So this is Ana Anna's writing. I explained my thinking to Halligan in my next response. Writing this text quote, I read the New York Times report as saying that her niece testified that she lived in the house for years without paying rent. Though the indictment says there were thousands of dollars of rent paid at one point, I don't see that as inconsistent with her testimony. As reported by the New York Times, Tish James ethics disclosures report between 1,000 and $5,000 in rent back in 2020. After that, she didn't disclose additional income. I'm still not sure I understand what's incorrect about the Times account or my summary of it. So again, Anna Bauer has sort of subtweeted or posted screenshots of a New York Times report, and she specifically says these are the facts I posted. What is your issue? Halligan? The prosecutor writes back to Ana the reporter. Ana, you're biased. Your reporting isn't accurate. I'm the one handling the case and I'm telling you that if you want to twist and torture the facts that fit your narrative, there's nothing I can do waste to even give you heads up. Again, she's the only one who presented to the grand jury, as we understand, and she's saying that these facts aren't accurate. But again, not setting the record straight and coming out with a pretty nasty tone here with the journalists. Mike, how much of this is par for the course and how much of this is unique to a prosecutor who just brought two of the most political indictments that have happened in the second Trump term to be tweeting at someone or messaging with someone on signal to simply posting another journalist reporting.
- [30:30]
D
This gets to one of the big questions that I think is so unanswered of the Trump presidency that I would, you know, I think we'll have an answer to someday, but we don't really have now. And that is they spend their time on a lot of stuff that really doesn't matter or is hollow or is, you know, is superficial. Like in this instance, you know, Halligan's upset about a tweet about a New York Times story, a tweet summarizing a.
- [30:57]
E
New York Times story.
- [30:58]
D
And I just find it like we have seen administration after administration try and run the government over the past few decades and see how difficult it is when they try with, you know, very smart, accomplished people that had been there for a long time to do execute on a day to day basis. And I'm still dumbfounded by what seems to be an enormous amount of time and energy that goes into the frivolous and to things that don't cut to the necessary heart of it, whether it's a New York Times story, whether it's a tweet about it, there are much more serious things going on in this case, you know, that are, that are consequential in that matter. But this administration with the president, you know, look, people follow their boss. They follow how their boss behaves. And this is something that Trump would have picked a fight about, you know, a tweet about something that really isn't, isn't that consequential, that really bothered him that he, you know, came by with his bullhorn and wanted to fight about. The thing I'm interested to see is that will this ever have any ramifications, you know, outside of how Democrats view Trump? You know, obviously Democrats don't like anything Trump's doing. That, that, that hasn't changed. But is this obsession and the amount of time that they spend on retribution and litigating matters that don't necessarily cut to the heart of that or to the heart of their, you know, a larger traditional mission of an administration does, does that, does that ever come home.
- [32:34]
E
To roost for them?
- [32:35]
D
Is that a risk? Are they putting themselves out there by investing so much in things that at the end of the day, sure, may matter in a, in a short blip, but in the larger scheme of things are not that consequential.
- [32:51]
B
It's also a window into their vanity. I mean, you just, you have to be really. Yes. Focused on the micro. Yes. Following your boss's lead by obsessing about your coverage. Yes. Walking right up to the line of destroying a case. But you also have to be really, really obsessed with your reflection, not just in the New York Times, but in a person's characterization of a New York Times story of something you're doing. Andrew Weissman and Mike Schmidt, thank you for starting us off on these two big stories today. Up next for us after this weekend's massive no Kings protest, Steve Schmidt joins us on what the Democratic opposition should do next. Quick break. We'll be right back.
- [33:32]
E
Foreign.
- [33:37]
D
Hey, everybody, it's Rob Lowe here. If you haven't heard, I have a podcast that's called Literally with Rob Lowe. And basically it's conversations I've had that really make you feel like you're pulling up a chair at an intimate dinner between myself and people that I admire, like Aaron Sorkin or Tiffany Haddish, Demi Moore, Chris Pratt, Michael J. Fox. There are new episodes out every Thursday, so subscribe, please and listen wherever you get your podcasts.
- [34:12]
F
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- [35:12]
B
As more than 7 million Americans came together over the weekend to stand defiantly against Donald Trump and his attempts to shred our democracy, to send a message loud and clear that a president who wants to be a king is un American. At a no Kings rally in Durham, North Carolina, the Reverend William Barber, the co chair of the Poor People's Campaign and the creator of moral protests, urging us that in order to defeat Trumpism, this kind of unity is just the beginning. Take a listen.
- [35:42]
H
When it comes to the need to stand up for the Constitution over a ruler who would ignore the courts, we must be indivisible. We must be indivisible when it comes to our commitment that no child should go hungry in the midst of the richest nation in the history of the world, we must be indivisible. When it comes to the essential role of government to serve the people rather than serve a person and a king, we must be united and indivisible. And we will not stop. We will not stop nonviolent protests. We will not stop voting until one day the history books will write that we stood up and thought that this nation would be one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. It's time to stand.
- [36:46]
B
Joining us at the table, Steve Schmidt. He's the co founder of the Save America Movement. He serves on the steering committee alongside the Reverend Dr. William Barber. He's also the host of the podcast the Warning. Also back with us, the Reverend Al Sharpton, president of the National Action Network, host of Politics Nation on msnbc. Steve, this is what you've been up to. I know a million people are going to say, what have you been up to? This is what you've been up to. Tell us, though, how you see this moment right now after Saturday's success of no Kings. But still in this uncomfortable gap, we just covered two stories about a clear destruction of the rule of law. There's an actual wrecking ball slamming against the actual physical White House right now. And a lot of people are feeling like the Democrats that are speaking out, people like AOC and Bernie and Chris Murphy are saying the right thing. But a lot of people are feeling exasperated that there isn't an organized opposition.
- [37:41]
A
The events this weekend were of enormous importance because they're an antidote to cynicism. And they say to people, you're not alone. Do not be afraid. And 7 million Americans marching is a powerful force. And there are more of us than there are of Maga fascists. Trump, his popularity is collapsing while he is growing more powerful by asserting powers he doesn't have. And there's a momentum in the coverage that pulls us always in a current towards what will happen next as opposed to what is happening now. And what's going to happen next is more of what has been happening and what is happening in the year 2025. As was obvious, if you could hear the words and you could understand the intent is the collapse of the American republic. The checks and balances aren't collapsing. They are effectively collapsed. The Supreme Court is corrupt and it is distrusted. The institutions that asserted themselves as bearers of integrity, like the bar associations, are hollow. We have seen capitulations. We have seen bending of the knees. And the wealthier the madam or the gentleman may be, the faster they are to capitulate. The higher you are on the billionaire ladder, the quicker you get on your knees. But ordinary Americans will not get on their knees. And that is obvious. And why so many people have become involved in the saveamericamovement.org, why so many people marched. And in the end, I think it's very important for everyone to understand the fascist Kristi Noem, the fascist Pam Bondi, the fascist Stephen Miller. They will live their lives for many, many more years in the deepest of shame, feeling the Contempt of the American people for what they did to the American Republican, to the American republic. Then they will hold their fleeting power. They will be wiped out in 2026, demolished in the same fashion they have demolished that beautiful building behind you.
- [40:43]
B
Rev, we talked on Friday about whether it is better to have a movement where the politicians are following the people. What do you make of how far ahead the people seem to be in this moment? That. And again, I'm not painting Democrats as a broad brush, but, you know, we can name them, we can count them on one hand because it is just a handful of them that seem to be keeping up with the public's intensity to stand up and take to the streets.
- [41:10]
I
The most successful movements in this country were not led by politicians. They were led by ordinary people from different extremes. Last week when all of us in the civil rights community supported those faith leaders and union leaders. And all around this march, you must remember when I was a kid and joined Dr. King's movement the year he died here in the North, I was 13. The March on Washington. They told me no politician was allowed to even speak. Martin Luther King and the head of the acp, they were not allowed to speak at the March on Washington, Just civil rights leaders and labor leaders. The anti war movement was not led by politicians. Eugene McCarthy, who ran against Lyndon Johnson in the New Hampshire primary, became an outlier in politics. So it's never been the politicians that led the movements. There's always been a groundswell, and I think that's what has happened. When we see these no King movements. This is the second March. When you see other movements that move around the country with our march on Wall street, this is coming from people. It is not coming by the politicians. But the politicians ought to beware because that is where they can become reelected or unelected.
- [42:28]
B
Yeah. I want to ask both of you about the impact of the economic downturn, people defaulting on car loans, people showing up at food banks who've never been there before, while at the same time the power grab seems to be escalating. To sneak in a quick break. We'll be back with Steve and the Rev on the other side. Steve, say more about the psychological importance that people, one, feel connected to one another, two, they see that there is something they can do. That's the question I get most often. But talk about the levers of power that can still be pulled by folks like Gavin Newsom and J.B. pritzker and others.
- [43:05]
A
Well, one of the things that's very important if you're in The California legislature is to appreciate the power of the California legislature to hold hearings to investigate the same in Illinois. The blue states can form legal interstate compacts. And they should come to a position, if you're a Democratic governor, at this moment of maximum abuse of power demands 100% of the time, in 100% of the instances, the maximum use of your legal power. If you hear, and there are way too many Democratic leaders in Washington who say this will all just go back to normal when Trump is gone, that person is a fool and deluded, and that person absolutely should not be in a position of responsibility in the opposition party. This is a moment of deep, deep, deep danger for the American republic. The amount of armaments being bought by ice. What Trump is declaring is, I'm king, I'm law. Why not 500 million? As he demolishes the White House in an act of corruption paid for by billionaire oligarchs and companies. Facebook demolished the White House. Google demolished the White House. Sam Altman demolished the White House. And the politics of this moment, as the American people face economic misery ahead, will demand not going back to something that's gone, but imagining something that's new, that prevents any of this from ever happening again in the United States of America. We owe that to our children to heal our sick society from the sick and twisted presidency of the fascist Donald Trump.
- [45:27]
B
All right, we're just sneaking a break. We'll give the rev the last word on the other side. Rev, you've got a foot in both worlds, right? How do you get the people that some of the folks Steve's talking about, the elites and the people who are either capitulating or standing on the sidelines, how do you get them into the game?
- [45:47]
I
I think that when the ground floor and the basements of society move, the penthouse has to move because they are standing on them. And I'd like to see the congressional committees, even the minorities. When we were trying to make police brutality an issue in New York, we got congressional committees to come without their chairman to hold congressional hearings. Go and have the farmers testify before the Democrats about how the soybeans are being destroyed by what Donald Trump is doing. Dramatize this. Have governors convene things as Steve's talking about. We can't let him be the only one writing the narrative. You have to go out there and meet him on the ground and fight him. We're looking at a day where a man he pardoned for being part of the January 6 riot is arrested for threatening the life of Hakeem Jeffries, a minority leader. We are past a nice respectful conversation. We're dealing with political hoodlums and you've got to deal with them that way like you would anyone else. And that's to have them apprehended and exposed.
- [46:55]
B
Steve Schmidt, the Reverend Al Sharpton, thank you for having this conversation. To be continued, I'm sure after the break for us, the Trump administration is scrambling to hide something very large, a very large demolition site happening at the White House right now. We'll bring you that reporting next.
- [47:16]
A
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