“We have no kings”

Summary

Podcast Summary: Deadline: White House – “We have no kings”

Host: Nicolle Wallace | Date: October 20, 2025

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Episode Overview

This episode centers on the unprecedented, nationwide “No Kings” protests, a massive, bipartisan display of opposition to Donald Trump's increasingly authoritarian administration. Nicolle Wallace and her panel of key analysts—John Heilemann, Eddie Glaude, and protest organizer Hunter Dunn—break down the scale, meaning, and implications of the weekend’s protests, discuss the administration’s extreme responses, and reflect on the broader existential questions for American democracy. Later, the conversation turns toward reporting on mass deportations (including errant citizen detainments), the use of federal force in American cities, and the enduring challenge of building a sustainable resistance movement.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Historic “No Kings” Protests: A Nation Mobilized

[01:10–07:58]

• Unprecedented Scale & Diversity
  • Over 7 million protesters in 2,700+ events worldwide—including small towns, red states, and non-coastal cities.
  • “We had libertarians and Democratic socialists not just at the same protest, but working together to make it happen. That is a massive shift from where we have been as a country over the past couple decades.” – Hunter Dunn [06:00]
  • Protests were peaceful; NYPD reported over 100,000 in NYC and zero arrests.
• Personal Stake and Patriotism
  • U.S. veterans, workers, families, and people of all backgrounds rallied together:
    • “There’s no way I’m bending the only knee I have left for a king here in America.” – U.S. Army veteran at Oklahoma City [03:32]
• Trump’s Troubling Response
  • Trump posted an AI-generated image of himself dumping feces on America, described as “a new low.”
    • “The only thing that Trump said or did this entire time that wasn’t a lie was him shitting on everyday Americans.” – Hunter Dunn [08:44]

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2. Protest as Both Symbol and Strategy

[09:23–14:36]

• Shifting Political Landscape
  • The movement’s strength is its cross-partisan, organic roots. Hunter Dunn notes that even in places known for right-wing activism, turnout was significant and peaceful.
  • John Heilemann recounts seeing protests in conservative and apolitical suburbs:
    • “These are places where that kind of activism is not the norm by any means... And yet people were out in force.” [12:47]
• Protest as Education and Organization
  • Eddie Glaude frames the protests as “dramatic forms of education, which set the stage for the next stage of engagement.” [14:42]
  • Organizers are already planning next steps—a mass organizing call is scheduled for the following day.

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3. The Ongoing Role of Civic Action

[15:34–17:51]

• Citizens, Not Politicians, as the Decisive Force
  • The search for a “perfect opposition candidate” is critiqued:
    • “It is clear now that we are the only people. If we could be saved, it’s up to every one of us.” – John Heilemann [16:18]
  • Glaude adds: “Democracy is not reducible to election cycles. In fact, voting is the last thing you do in a democracy. Civic life is so much more robust than every two, four years.” [16:29]
• Sustained, Local Organizing = Real Power
  • Hunter Dunn emphasizes that this work happens daily:
    • “This isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon... Getting people on the ground gets people connected with those community networks, which gives them the ability to resist against Trump’s regime every single day.” [17:58]

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4. Movement vs. Electoral Politics: Both/And, Not Either/Or

[23:04–27:12]

• Elections as a Means, Not the End
  • John Heilemann and Nicolle Wallace dissect how large social movements both drive and outlast legislative wins.
    • “Elections are just punctuation marks along the way…but also, I think everyone will agree, winning in the midterms is a pretty important thing for anybody who’s on Team Democracy.” – John Heilemann [26:30]
  • Both panelists urge the movement not to fixate on a “savior” figure, but to channel public energy into policy and institutional change.

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5. Building and Sustaining Resistance

[28:41–33:23]

• Existential Stakes & Opportunity for Persuasion
  • Eddie Glaude raises the deep divide between competing visions of America—one inclusive, one exclusionary:
    • “We are seeing the divided soul of the nation… It cuts to the heart of the very nation, the very nature of how the country understands itself.” [29:40]
  • Hunter Dunn argues for a return to persuasion politics:
    • “If I have one criticism of the Democratic Party… they have forgotten the ability to persuade people. You can sit down with people who believe you are a traitor… and you can break bread. You can convince them, you can pull them out of it. I’ve done it personally.” [31:10]
  • Grassroots organizing and pressure campaigns (including corporate boycotts) are critical, especially as other institutional checks weaken.

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6. Escalating Administrative Lawlessness: Immigration & Use of Force

[35:04–41:59]

• DOJ and ICE in Open Defiance of Law
  • DOJ whistleblowers describe lawless conduct: “Felt like a bomb had gone off. Here is the number three official… we may just have to consider disregarding federal court orders.” – DOJ whistleblower (Erez Rouvainy) [35:04]
  • ProPublica’s Nicole Foy documents U.S. citizens unlawfully detained and ICE oversight gutted.
    • “Americans have been dragged, tackled, beaten, tased, and shot by immigration agents… This is not an accident. It is the inevitable result of the way that Donald Trump’s Department of Homeland Security has empowered ICE agents…” – John Heilemann [35:35]
    • “There is a crisis really of the Justice Department’s credibility before the courts because they are so motivated by accomplishing political objectives.” – Liz Oyer [40:49]

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7. Federal Force Against Protest: The Battle Over Portland

[44:13–47:07]

• Ninth Circuit Authorizes National Guard Deployment
  • Majority (Trump-appointed) court allows Trump’s deployment in Oregon, over a strong dissent warning against “eroding core constitutional principles.”
  • “It erodes core constitutional principles, including sovereign states' control over their state’s militias and the people’s First Amendment rights to assemble and to object to the government’s policies and actions. I strenuously dissent.” – Dissenting judge [44:45]
• Imperial Presidency Fears
  • “There are no limits to what this man can do, and there are no limits to what he thinks he can do… He wants us to see him exercising that power on a daily basis so that we feel helpless in the face of it.” – Eddie Glaude [46:24]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On American Identity:
  “In this country we have no kings, period.”
  – Eddie Glaude [05:17]
• On Protest as a Response to Oppression:
  “This is the most American thing you can do: protest and speak for what you believe in.”
  – Protester (via John Heilemann) [04:55]
• On Sustained Resistance:
  “The strength of this movement, the ultimate effect… is only going to be achieved through repetition.”
  – John Heilemann [14:00]
• On Persuasion and Breaking Divides:
  “You can sit down with people who believe you are a traitor... You can convince them, you can pull them out of it. I’ve done it personally.”
  – Hunter Dunn [31:10]
• On Trump’s Response:
  “The only thing that Trump said or did this entire time that wasn’t a lie was him shitting on everyday Americans.”
  – Hunter Dunn [08:44]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Opening Contrasts: Bush, Obama, and the Authoritarian Turn | [01:10–02:04]
• Personal Voices from No Kings Protests | [03:28–05:17]
• Scope & Impact: Protest Organizers Recap | [06:15–07:58]
• City-by-City, Suburban Mobilization & Movement Growth | [09:23–14:36]
• Reflection on Protest’s Role in Democracy | [15:34–17:51]
• Grassroots Organizing, Boycotts, & Persuasion | [31:10–33:23]
• Whistleblowers and ICE Lawlessness | [35:04–41:59]
• National Guard in Portland & Judicial Dissent | [44:13–47:07]

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Conclusion

This episode paints a portrait of a society at a crossroads: where grassroots action and community organizing stand as renewed bulwarks against encroaching authoritarianism, and where the question of what it means to be American is being fiercely debated in the streets, courts, communities, and airwaves. The hosts underscore that this is bigger than one person or one protest—it’s a fight for the soul and future of the republic, to be waged not only at the ballot box but every day, in every community.

Transcript

[Nicole Wallace]

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[John Heilman]

Hi there everyone. Happy Monday. It's 4 o' clock in New York. We begin with a study. In contrast, here are Presidents George W. Bush and President Barack Obama when confronted by public opposition to their policies.

[Hunter Dunn]

Democracy is a beautiful thing and that.

[Eddie Glaude]

People are allowed to express their opinion.

[Nicole Wallace]

I welcome people's right to say what they believe. I've listened to you.

[Hunter Dunn]

I heard you.

[Nicole Wallace]

I heard you. I heard you.

[Hunter Dunn]

All right.

[Eddie Glaude]

Now I've been respectful. I'll let you holler. All right, so let me. Just let me. Nobody is removing you. I've heard you, but you've got to listen to me too.

[John Heilman]

Believe me. No president likes to see the public turn out in large numbers against them and their agenda. But when it does happen, as you saw there, every one of them understands that it is the people's right to exercise free speech and to criticize their elected leaders at the top of their lungs. And that that very thing is what makes America great. That is what makes America America. It's what makes us special. All around the world until right now, Donald Trump showed the world what he thinks of the American people by literally broadcasting an image of himself pouring feces all over America and the American people. The no Kings protests clearly getting deep under Donald Trump's skin over the weekend. But more importantly, the protests show the contours of a new opposition in America, one led by the people. According to the organizers, 7 million people came out to protest Donald Trump on Saturday. More than 100,000 people marched in New York City. In Chicago, the march at one point stretched 22 blocks. But the protests were hardly confined to big cities in blue states. Here is what the no Kings protest looked like in Anchorage, Alaska. Thousands of people taking to the streets and the protests included people protesting from all walks of life. Here's what a US army veteran told a reporter at a protest in Oklahoma City.

[Hunter Dunn]

I was willing to die and lost.

[Nicole Wallace]

A leg in a foreign country fighting for their rights. There's no way I'm bending the only.

[Hunter Dunn]

Knee I have left for a king here in America. I can't sit idly by. Why rights are trampled on and ignored and people are pushed and treated like second class citizens.

[John Heilman]

Washington Post reports that efforts by Republicans in the last week to smear the protests ahead of the protests fell flat. Quote Ezra Levin, co founder of the liberal grassroots movement Indivisible that has co organized the no Kings rallies, said that RSVPs had skyrocketed. He credited the increased interest in part to the Republicans rhetoric about the rallies. Protesters told MSNBC in every city we covered that they felt an urgent need to stand up to the Trump administration.

[Hunter Dunn]

They're not going to intimidate us with tyrant talk. We are out here to stand up for this democracy.

[Nicole Wallace]

Do not co to the fascism and.

[Eddie Glaude]

The threats that are coming from D.C. that's what they want us to do. And they will only be successful in that if we remain silent.

[John Heilman]

I am very much opposed to all of the policies of Donald Trump. I don't think we need a king. We definitely don't need a dictatorship.

[Hunter Dunn]

And it's time for him to go.

[John Heilman]

I am against everything that he says and does.

[Hunter Dunn]

This is the most American thing that you can do.

[John Heilman]

Protest and speak for what you believe in.

[Liz Oyer]

The people who come out here and.

[John Heilman]

Fight and who want to resist. Those are the people who make change.

[Liz Oyer]

Those are the people who make history.

[John Heilman]

And there are way more, like I said, there are way more of us than there are of them. We have a constitution for a reason.

[Hunter Dunn]

It provides us inalienable rights that we.

[Liz Oyer]

Have to adhere to.

[Eddie Glaude]

And in this country we have no kings, period.

[John Heilman]

Millions of Americans rising up to protest Donald Trump is where we start today. Hunter Dunn is back. He's the spokesperson and national press coordinator for the 5051 movement, the organization behind the no Kings protest this weekend. Also joining us, chief FL political columnist, host of the podcast in Politic for Puck. MSNBC national affairs analyst John Heilman is back. And joining me at the table, Princeton University professor MSNBC political analyst Eddie Glad is here. Hunter, I start with you. You and John and I actually spoke around this time Friday ahead of the protest. Tell Me what you saw, if anyone was, I don't know where you had to be this weekend to miss them. They were literally in every town, in every corner, and coverage has been everywhere. But just, just give me a summary of what we saw in America over the weekend and tell me if it exceeded your expectations or projections.

[Hunter Dunn]

Yeah, I was hosting, helping organize the protest in downtown Los Angeles where we had, based on drone footage, well over 100,000 people gathered together and hundreds of thousands more around the county and around the state of California. We saw over 7 million people protest at over 2700 events around the world, world in peaceful dissent against Trump's authoritarian power grab, against his regime, against the ICE deportations, against the rise of fascism in this country. And I'm just going to tell you this. I've never seen a coalition this big. We had libertarians and Democratic socialists not just at the same protest, but working together to make it happen. And that is a massive shift from where we have been as a country over the past couple decades.

[John Heilman]

Hunter, were there any, was there any footage that came in as the day went on from any corners or towns that surprised you?

[Hunter Dunn]

Yeah, well, first off, I was surprised by where we kicked off. It wasn't actually in the US it started in South Korea because their October 18th is earlier than ours. But I saw small protests around the country. So I grew up in Orange county and amazing place that I saw was Huntington Beach, California, which is an incredibly red area. I've seen straight up basically Nazi rallies there. So to see a no kings protest, to see a large turnout of people left, right and center regime, that is a massive shift in what we're saying. And we saw that in small towns around all 50 states, whether it's a red state or a blue state, a red state or blue city, whether it's rural or urban, we saw a coalition that I don't think we've seen in Since World War 200 I.

[John Heilman]

We have some reporting here from the NYPD. They tweeted, quote, the majority of the no Kings protests have been dispersed at this time. All traffic closures have been lifted. We had more than 100,000 people across all five boroughs peacefully exercising the First Amendment rights. And the NYPD made zero protest related arrests. The story was the same in New York, Austin, San Diego, Charlotte, Portland. According to the police departments, Donald Trump's response was to post an image of himself. Thankfully AI generated, but we won't rule anything out at this hour in an aircraft dumping feces across America and Americans, even for him, it seemed like a New low. Any response to his reaction to the success of the no Kings protest?

[Hunter Dunn]

Well, first off, I don't know what was worse, that video or him actually detonating a shell over the i5. But just a quick recap. There was a ton of different GOP lies about no Kings, right? Democrats will end the shutdown post no Kings. That hasn't happened. Protesters are wildly violent, as you covered. That wasn't true. Protesters are paid. No, they're not. Soros checks are not coming in, I can tell you that much. And no one showed up. That was absolutely not true. We saw over 7 million people come out across the world. The only thing that Trump said or did this entire time that wasn't a lie was him shitting on everyday Americans. And he's been doing that since long before he gained political office.

[John Heilman]

Heilman, it's time for your take on what everything that happened after we talked. Of course there was Shohei's incredible night. But you are in la. We'll get to Shohei in a minute. It's all that I could talk about until I saw the images of Americans exercising their First Amendment rights all over this country. And I was just as emotional over that. But you're in la. La, the first city where Donald Trump sort of beta tested the deployment of National Guard and active duty troops on the streets of an American city. A city living every single day with racial profiling thanks to the United States Supreme Court's decision on that. And a city living with what feels like a new permanent presence of ice. A city that very much came out in force on Saturday for no Kings.

[Nicole Wallace]

Yeah, Nicole. And we'll put Shohei Otan to the side for the moment, although only for the moment, because my mind is still blown by what I witnessed that night. I'm not sure I'll ever recover, I decided when we talked on Friday. I rattled off a bunch of places where there were no Kings protests taking place in Southern California, in places that you wouldn't expect, in places in Orange county that I described on Friday. These are long standing Republican strongholds. Placid, suburban, had never seen a protest or a rally before. I didn't want to go to Orange county because Orange county is a bridge too far for me as a Los Angeleno. But I went up back to my old stomping grounds, which is almost as. Not as Republican, but almost as placid and certainly was a. The San Fernando Valley is a suburban. It's a lot like Long island, right? It's a moderate. What used to be Thought of as moderate Republican or moderate Democrat kind of place. And I saw a no Kings rally outside the Sherman Oaks Galleria, home of the Valley Girl and Fast Times, Ridgemont High, where they shot a lot of that movie and then noted that there was a rally up in Simi Valley, which people who don't know the area very well is a very Republican area. It was where Rodney King got beaten all those years ago. Both of those two protests were. There were two of, I think, about 15 or 16 marches, rallies around no Kings in the San Fernando Valley alone, All of them drawing nothing like the kind of crowd that was in downtown Los Angeles, but robust crowds and robust. And all the things that people have been saying all day, suburban, normal Americans, many of them, kind of almost an atmosphere of kind of jubilant. They're trying to show resolve, but also trying to show that they were not anything like what Donald Trump had caricatured them as, utterly peaceful, completely chill, and also very firm in their resolve and feeling as though they were taking place in a very. Taking part in a very American tradition of protest. And that is true. It is a very American tradition. But I will say, as someone who grew up in the same Fernando Valley, San Fernando Valley, never seen things like this before. I mean, this is not a place where political activism really happens. And I don't want to be. There's probably some San Fernando Valley historian who's going to tell me that there was a protest around something that Cesar Chavez did many, many years ago. I'm not trying to claim that I absolutely know there's never been a protest of any kind in the San Fernando Valley. But having grown up there, that was not a common occurrence and certainly not anything I can remember from the years that I spent there as a kid. And I think it's not changed very much over time. These are places where that kind of activism is not. Is not the norm by any means, and are certainly not liberal enclaves. And yet people were out in force on Saturday and they showed the best of what this movement can be, and I would say as a challenge to the people who are involved in organizing it, what it has to continue to be. Because the question now going forward is how to keep this momentum going and how to continue to flex this muscle, which 7 million people is an incredibly impressive number. It's incredibly impressive. And it clearly, as you said, got under Donald Trump's skin and got the administration agitated and made him behave in a way that's, if you can believe it, even more vulgar than his usual self with that AI generated image. But the strength of this movement, the ultimate effect of this movement, is going to only be achieved through repetition. And that's what we know about the big social movements in America, whether it was the war against the movement, against the war in Vietnam or the civil rights movement. These are not things that are. These are not one by one rally. They're not one by. No matter how impressive that rally is, the work goes on. And so then the challenge to be consistent and continue to, if not necessarily on this scale, but in every instance, continue to show the best side, the most idealistic side, the most peaceful side, the most determined side, that is, it's a high bar. I don't have any reason to think that these organizers can't continue to do it, but they're going to have to if they want to have the kind of impact that they clearly want to have.

[John Heilman]

Well, Eddie, actually first, your thoughts to seeing these images all across every corner of our country?

[Eddie Glaude]

Well, I thought it was really important for Americans across the ideological spectrum to not feel helpless, to actually have an opportunity to express their genuine disdain in some instances for Trump's policies and overreach. I think as a march or rally, you know, they have to be understood not as the end of politics, but as dramatic forms of education, which sets the stage for the next stage of the engagement. And so I think, you know, I know no kings, they have an organizing call for schedule for tomorrow. And so there's something else coming. There's something else that will follow. This is part of the effort to organize because. Because politicians aren't going to save this country everyday. Ordinary folks are. And that was a great sign this weekend.

[John Heilman]

Yeah. I mean, and just to pick up on your point, I think there's been for nine years now an effort to send out the search party looking for the perfect opposition candidate to Donald Trump. And it first happens in 2015 in the Republican primary. Right. What about Jeb Bush? What about Margaret? You know, in hindsight, it's like I can barely keep a straight face saying those things, but. So that's where it starts. And then the effort to stop him is around the Democratic candidate, the opposition secretary, Hillary Clinton. And then Joe Biden does stop him for four years, but he comes roaring back. But all of the conversations that we've had as a country have been about finding the politician to stop him. It seems that some of what shows up in the polls as dissatisfaction with Democrats may or may not be around an agenda. I'm not sure I'd have to look more Deeply. But it is clear now that we are the only people. If we could be saved, it's up to every one of us.

[Eddie Glaude]

Well, absolutely. I mean, democracy is not reducible to election cycles. In fact, voting is the last thing you do in a democracy. Civic life is so much more robust than every two, four years. And it seems that part of what we have done over the last 40 to 50 years in some ways, is outsource our civic responsibility to election cycles. We vote or we don't, and we get about our business. Well, we can't do that under current circumstances. And so there's a question around ICE in our communities. There's a question around health care, governmental shutdown, question around deployment of National National Guard, the extrajudicial killings across the. All across the board. We are facing the implications of the Trump administration, the implications of folk who really hold a view of America that run counter. That runs counter to what many of us hold as our view of America. And so you can't wait to the midterms to respond to that. And it can't be the object of the organizing, because if it's the object of the organizing, once the midterms happen, then you demobilize the energy. You see what I mean? So once the elections happen, people think they've done their job. No, the elections are not the end. The end is the fundamental transformation of how we conceive of the very ways in which Americans function.

[John Heilman]

Hunter, since you're here, can you jump in on what Eddie's talking about? The call scheduled for tomorrow?

[Hunter Dunn]

Yeah, I'll actually be speaking at the mass call tomorrow. And to the point about the opposition and trying to find a perfect candidate. We haven't been able to find one. It's a shame, Mom, Donnie can't run, but because he can't, we, the people, have to be the opposition. Right? We're seeing a peaceful opposition against Trump, the likes that the world, the likes that our country hasn't seen in a long time. And it's infuriating him. He's threatening to potentially deploy the National Guard into San Francisco, which is why things like no Kings are so important, because this isn't a sprint, it's a marathon. And getting people on the ground gets people connected with those community networks, which gives them the ability to resist against Trump's regime every single day. And more importantly, it gives people the courage to stand up. There was a poll that went out that four of five U.S. troops understand their duty to disobey illegal orders. Using the military to crush peaceful dissension dissent. Using the National Guard to crush peaceful dissent is illegal. It's fascist. It's what Trump wants to do. It's what he already did in la and it's what he's trying to do in Chicago and Portland, in Memphis and in D.C. and what he's going to try to do in San Francisco. And things like no Kings give both elected officials and potentially pillars of this regime, people like the military, people like civil service employees, the courage to stand up, to risk their own jobs and livelihoods because they know that we the people are backing them and that together we can stop this regime before it harms and destroys our entire country.

[John Heilman]

It's a really interesting moment. I want to show all of you the politicians who were they didn't take these over. They didn't try to overshadow the people, but they did attend. And I want to show all of you some of the messages coming from top Democrats in our country. Much more on all of this. On the other side of a break will get back to Friday night's other big story, the baseball game. Also ahead for us, new reporting on the scores of US Citizens who have been rounded up by immigration agents carrying out Donald Trump's campaign of mass deportation. The reporter with the violin on an incredible piece of reporting on that story will join us. And later in the broadcast, Donald Trump's rogue and lethal military strikes on boats in the Caribbean Sea. The campaign has escalated the already tense for the relationship between the US and one of its closest allies in the region. We'll show you that reporting and much more when Deadline White House continues after a quick break. Don't go anywhere.

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[Nicole Wallace]

Americans are saying loudly and proudly that we are a free people. We are not a people that can be ruled. Our government. Government is not for sale. History will judge us by where we chose to stand right now. Today. Future generations will ask, what did we do when fellow human beings faced persecution.

[Hunter Dunn]

When our rights were being abridged, when.

[Nicole Wallace]

Our constitution was under attack? They'll want to know whether we stood up or we stayed silent.

[John Heilman]

Hunter, John and Eddie are all back. So Jon, Chris Murphy and J.B. pritzker are definitely people involved in. I know you want to draw a distinction between movements and elections. They're definitely, I think, seen as two of the leaders of a movement that has risen up in opposition to Donald Trump. I think the other piece, though, that you and I talk about a lot, and sometimes separately, but I want to put them together for the purposes of this conversation is what worked in Jimmy Kimmel. And there's so few examples that we can just stick with. That one was an action, a threat, a consumer reaction, a putting the toothpaste back in the tube. I wonder if you think the next step that has to be considered is scaling that example.

[Nicole Wallace]

Well, I think that's. I'll start at the end of what you said, Nicole. I think obviously there's a lot to learn from the Kimmel thing, including the power of figures and culture and the power of the marketplace, because we know that some reasonable part of the reason why Jimmy Kimmel ended up back on the air was Disney looking at the churn on their Hulu subscribers and people bailing out of Disney and Hulu and looking at that and seeing the economic consequences of it. So there's definitely things to learn from that. But of course, that is also just a defensive, a new way to kind of beat back the worst abuses of, of the Trump 2.0 era. And I think the thing that I, when I was listening to you and Eddie talk about this movement.

[Hunter Dunn]

I don't.

[Nicole Wallace]

Think you guys, you guys don't generally engage in false binaries, but the notion that it's either or, either we can have a robust movement or we can be looking for a candidate. And of course, the notion of the knight in white satin on the steed, who's going to come, the perfect candidate, who's going to come and save us. That is a mistake that people made during Trump 1.0. I would point out that it wasn't just politicians, but people did that to Bob Mueller, too. Mueller will save us. You know, it's Mueller time was another example of that, the way we try to personify things rather than think about them in a broader sense. But Eddie is 100% right that elections are not the end of politics and that the project of making America a better, fairer, more egalitarian, more democratic place that lives up to the ideals that are laid out in the Constitution, that is an ongoing effort. And elections are just punctuation marks along the way. But I think it's important to be thinking about the fact that elections really matter a lot, as we've learned. And I know you guys aren't saying the opposite, but looking for a savior is wrong. The American people are the only people who can save themselves. But it's also the case that the civil rights movement cared a lot about getting the Voting Rights act passed. They cared a lot about getting the Civil Rights act passed. They cared a lot about having, about putting pressure on the political process so that legislation that would help change the country was implemented. Did that mean the civil rights movement was over once those two laws were passed? It did not. Not by a long shot. But that doesn't. I don't want to minimize those, nor do I want to minimize how important it is for this movement to harness energy. Some of it to stop bad things from happening, some of it to think about the better America that we want to try to build. But also, I think everyone will agree, winning in the midterms is a pretty important thing for Anybody who's on Team Democracy, let's put it that way, not necessarily a member of the Democratic Party, but someone who wants to be on Team Democracy, getting back some power in Washington matters a ton in terms of both stopping Trump and in terms of building anything positive going forward. And the 2028 presidential election is going to matter a lot, too. And I think this movement needs to be thinking about how it can work its will over those processes, rather than understanding that it has an independent force, but that those processes do exist. And there needs to be, when the time is right, this energy needs to be channeled in a constructive way towards accomplishing some political ends, too.

[John Heilman]

Well, I mean, Eddie, to John's point, of course, both. And you didn't mean to suggest otherwise. I actually think this is more basic. I think if you look at the emotional journey of the coalition that opposed Donald Trump really over the last nine years, but especially over the last four, this display on Saturday, where everyone saw themselves in everyone. And who was out at no Kings? Everyone. Grandmas, kids, babies, toddlers, black people, brown people, white people. It was everybody. Military. Tons and tons of military. I think it broadens. One, it deals with and addresses the idea that people are checked out. People are not checked out. They're paying a lot of attention. They may not be watching shows like this anymore, but they know what's happening. They know exactly what is happening. A lot of people getting their information from podcasts, a lot of people taking in the news in ways and through people that. A lot of people listening to Colbert. And if that's all you listen to, you know, everything going on, so you're good. But I, I think we knocked down this side of the idea that, one, people aren't paying attention. Two, that the opposition to Donald Trump is what the Republicans say it is. It is not. It is everyone, and it is everywhere and it is growing. And three, that Donald Trump doesn't know this, too. We see his fear in his responses and in his efforts to rig, to John's point, the midterms.

[Eddie Glaude]

Well, yeah, absolutely. All that is right. And of course, John is right in this instance. So. So the question becomes then, given that reality, what will evidence itself in the coming days, in the coming weeks, in the coming months and the like. And I'm not sure what that will look like. How do we scale up? How do we scale up the resistance? How do we begin to impact the way in which the Trump administration is governing? Because whatever Trump is thinking, all the trains are running right now. Yeah, the Voting Rights act is going to get gutted. That's coming. We know what's happened to the Department of Education. We know what's happened to usaid. We know what's happening to student loans. We can go down the line. The trains are running. And so even though we see this action, this activity, and of course, the midterms are coming, and the only thing I'm trying to suggest is that if we, if we can't see elections as the end of our activism, because if we win, we demobilize. If we lose, we're deflated. We have to think of the movement in a much broader and a more expansive way.

[John Heilman]

So the question, I mean, that's what happens last November.

[Eddie Glaude]

That's what happened last November. So how, how do we scale up? And what we're seeing here, in a very clear way, I think with Trump telling us what he thinks about these Americans, we're seeing the divided soul of the nation. And what I mean by that is something very America imagines itself at once as a beacon of freedom and as a white republic. And those who imagine America as a white republic, there's nothing I can do. There's nothing those who join those white people who join that march can do to prove to those people that they're not traitors. They do not love America. When they say they hate America, they're saying they hate us. That's what J.D. vance said. That's what Trump said in July 3rd. July 2nd, they hate us. So when they're saying that we hate them, the America that they imagine doesn't include all of those 7 million folk out there. So how do we intervene at that level? Because the battle is not only political, Nicole, as you know, it's existential. It cuts to the heart of the very nation, the very nature of how the country understands itself.

[John Heilman]

So, so, Hunter, how do you. One, how do you build something that is sustainable and that continues to grow? And, and two, you know, your, your reaction to anything John or, or Eddie have said about all that we need this movement to be.

[Nicole Wallace]

Well, there's a lot.

[Hunter Dunn]

Because a lot was just covered. And they both did great jobs at covering it. One thing is that this battle is more than just political. It's more than just existential. It's also personal.

[Eddie Glaude]

Personal.

[Hunter Dunn]

We do have an amazing ability to persuade. And if I have one criticism of the Democratic Party, besides being beholden to, like, corporate billionaires, the number one thing is that they have forgotten the ability to persuade people. And we're seeing younger candidates do that. We're seeing more progressive candidates doing that. We're seeing the no Kings Coalition doing that. But you can sit down with people who believe that you are a traitor, who hates America, who believe that I am the leader of Antifa, even though Antifa is not an organization. Right. You can sit down with those people and you can break bread. You can convince them, you can pull them out of it. I've done it personally. I've seen it happen. I went to a borderline Christian nationalist university. And there's still an amazing way to reach people if you know what they care about, if you can access their empathy. Another thing is, again, this is not a sprint. I wouldn't even call it a marathon. It's more of like a relay race. There's different steps to this. Mass mobilizations are just one step in a broader strategy. And the next step involves community level organizing. That is the most important thing you can be doing right now. There's other stuff going on too. I know some of my friends at 5051, some of my friends at the Working Families Party are working on boycott toolkits. Like they did an amazing job boycotting Disney to get Jimmy Kimmel back on it there. They're trying to do the same thing to Home Depot and other companies are supporting the Trump regime. Those pillars upholding this regime. We can shake them and we can crush them. Another thing is voting is necessary. It's incredibly important to vote. But just because we don't have a perfect candidate doesn't mean we shouldn't be looking for better candidates. And I'm sorry, that's on the Democratic Party. They need to stop running people like Haley Stevens and they need to start running people like Cat, people like Mandani, people like Brad Lander, people who are willing to fight, people who are young, people who are willing to come out there and not be beholden to the corporate billionaires that put Trump in office, but are beholden to the people because we need a government that is by and for the people. We need a government that is putting the people of this country first and putting the interests of all of humanity before we put the interest of profit in. In the interest of corporation.

[John Heilman]

Hunter Dunn, I really appreciate your insights and your thoughts. Congratulations on Saturday. John Heilman. Let's do our version of what you saw Friday night ahead of the first game of the World Series. So we'll make a date. We'll do it before Friday night. It was amazing. I cried. It was. The second home run was my favorite. The one over center field in middle of. Incredible. Incredible. Night.

[Nicole Wallace]

Well, that one still hasn't. That one is still orbiting the Earth, Nicole. I'll only say that when we just were talking about the kind of candidates we need and should we really be looking for the perfect candidate? I mean, I know the Constitution and all, and the guy was born in Japan and everything, but you watch that game the other night when he walked off the mound at the end, they played Jesus Christ Superstar, and everyone in the building was like, yeah, that's about right.

[Hunter Dunn]

That's about right.

[Nicole Wallace]

You know, Shohei. If it weren't for the Constitution, I'd be like, shohei for president.

[John Heilman]

Yeah. No, I. It was an incredible night. Incredible night. I'm happy you were there to see it, my friend. Hellman, thank you for starting us off today. Eddie sticks around a little bit longer. Coming up for us, we hear from a fire Justice Department lawyer who's blowing the whistle of the Trump administration's open defiance of the court, along with new reporting on the consequences of Donald Trump's disregard for the rule of law. Stay with us. Over the weekend, DOJ whistleblower Erez Revenue, who was inside the Trump Justice Department, pulled back the curtain on what it looks like inside and the Trump administration's open defiance of the courts in order to maximize mass deportations. Take a look.

[Eddie Glaude]

Felt like a bomb had gone off. Here is the number three official using expletives to tell career attorneys that we may just have to consider disregarding federal court orders.

[John Heilman]

And then it really hit me.

[Hunter Dunn]

It's like, we really did tell the courts.

[Nicole Wallace]

Screw you.

[Hunter Dunn]

We really did just tell the courts. We don't care about your order.

[Eddie Glaude]

You can't tell us what to do.

[Hunter Dunn]

That was just a real gut punch.

[John Heilman]

And it's not just immigrants who have been caught up in the Trump administration's lawlessness. Stunning new reporting by ProPublica finds that at least 170 U.S. citizens have been caught up in the Trump campaign. Trump's campaign of mass deportation. ProPublica reports this quote. Americans have been dragged, tackled, beaten, tased, and shot by immigration agents. They've had their necks kneeled on. They've been held outside in the rain while in their underwear. At least three citizens were pregnant when agents detained them. One of those women had already had the door of her home blown off while Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem watched. Among the citizens detained are nearly 20 children, including two who have cancer. That includes four who were held for weeks with their undocumented mother and without access to their family's attorney until a congresswoman intervened this is not an accident. It is the inevitable result of the way that Donald Trump's Department of Homeland Security has empowered ICE agents and one that puts us that much closer to an autocracy. ProPublica reports this, quote. Current and former national security officials described the legions of masked immigration officers operating in near total anonymity on the orders of the President as the crossing of a line that had long set the United States apart from the world's most repressive regimes. One former senior DHS official who was involved in oversight said that what is happening on American streets today, quote, gives me goosebumps. We are at an inflection point in history right now and it is frightening. Joining us now is Nicole Foy. She's ProPublica's Ansel Payne fellow covering immigration and labor. She's bylined on that report reporting about more than 170 US citizens detained by immigration agents. Also joining us, former Department of Justice pardon lawyer Liz Oyer. And Eddie Glad is still with me. ProPublica has been amazing, always amazing, but especially ProPublica's reporting and journalism on this time. This feels like the first draft of history. And at a human level, I don't want to separate out American citizens from the brutality, but I do want to understand why learning that people are American citizens doesn't put any pause in the system for ice.

[Liz Oyer]

Yeah, I think one of the things that we tried to point out in this story is that it's kind of similar to what you just said. This is an entirely predictable consequence of this rush and all of these resources being thrown towards deportations and as many immigration arrests as possible. When that happens, you not only get the collateral arrest that we see of many people who have been in the country for 30, 40 years, have no criminal record, but you also are going to make mistakes. You are also going to end up arresting citizens who immigration agents have no question about their citizenship, but they are accused of obstructing or assaulting officers because they are trying to stop some of these arrests in their community because they see it happening to their loved ones or their neighbors.

[John Heilman]

What is your, what is it like, first of all, covering ice, what is it like?

[Liz Oyer]

Well, I think right now it's very overwhelming. And I think that's one of the reasons why we wanted to do this story is because many people have probably seen at least one report or something in their community. There was a lot of attention on this issue, particularly in LA this summer when several US Citizens were detained, whether because they doubted their citizenship or not, and, but it's very overwhelming. I think most people, and I'm definitely one of them, can be really just not sure where to start. But I've been tracking citizens detained or held by ICE since the beginning and it became very clear that people didn't understand the score we'd racked up at this point.

[John Heilman]

And one of the reasons we put these stories together is because ICE is, it would appear from the outside viewing Donald Trump's takeover of DOJ as an accelerant. And so I wonder why there aren't. I mean, are there lawyers embedded in ice? No one seems slowed or concerned about denying US Citizens their due process rights.

[Liz Oyer]

I think it's important to understand that, yeah, at the same time that there's been this massive push for deportations, there's also been a gutting of several internal oversight agencies that are supposed to oversee things like detention center standards and whether officers are following the rules of engagement. They've been gutted. There are very few people in those offices who are supposed to be doing these jobs and responding to complaints that, for example, citizens have filed alleging wrongful arrest. There's not as many people looking at this anymore.

[John Heilman]

Liz, I want to bring you in on the legal piece of this. What is your sense of what I guess your one time colleague is talking about there about a willingness slash enthusiasm to ignore the courts?

[Liz Oyer]

What Aris Rovadi is talking about is not an isolated incident. He is talking about a pattern by this current leadership of the Justice Department of disregarding court orders and disobeying the direct of judges and misrepresenting information to the courts. There's actually a group called Just Security, which is a nonpartisan group that has studied the level of misrepresentations that have been made by Justice Department lawyers during this administration. And they've found more than 60 instances in which Justice Department attorneys have gone into court and made representations that courts have found to be either defiant of court orders or making factual misrepresentations or intentionally misleading the court there. There is a crisis really of the Justice Department's credibility before the courts because they are so motivated by accomplishing political objectives. As this whistleblower, Mr. Rouvainy, said, their directions to achieve the political goal at all costs and things like due process are becoming viewed as an obstacle to overcome, not as a shared value that the Justice Department is entrusted with upholding.

[John Heilman]

Right everyone sticks to around. On the other side of the break, the National Guard is being given the green light this afternoon to move into another city that Donald Trump has said is quote the enemy within. We'll tell you about that decision next.

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[Liz Oyer]

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[John Heilman]

Moments ago, the Ninth Circuit Appeals Court ruled that Donald Trump can deploy the National Guard into the state of Oregon. It was a 2:1 ruling with two Trump appointed judges ruling for the administration. In a blistering rebuke, the dissenting judge writes this quote Given Portland protesters well known penchant for wearing chicken suits, inflatable frog costumes, or nothing at all when expressing their disagreement with the methods employed by ice, observers may be tempted to view the majority's ruling, which accepts the government's characterization of Portland as a war zone, is merely absurd. But today's decision is not merely absurd. It erodes core constitutional principles, including sovereign states control over their state's militias and the people's First Amendment rights to assemble and to object to the government's policies and actions. I strenuously dissent. We're back with Nicole, Liz and Eddie. Liz, I come to you first for reaction.

[Liz Oyer]

Yeah, I'm not sure that this decision is going to carry the day. There will be an appeal to the en banc court, which is is the full 9th Circuit Court of this split decision among three Circuit Court judges and the court below. The district court judge, who's actually a Trump appointee, notably during his first administration, made a very detailed, factual ruling that there was not a factual basis on the ground in court in Portland for the National Guard to be deployed. I think that the full en banc court could easily look at her ruling and find that the actual circumstances that she outlined don't justify the deployment of the National Guard and reverse the decision of this panel of three judges. So that that may not be the final word on the situation in Portland.

[John Heilman]

Eddie, if you were trying to make sure that in every corner of this country, the things that are most controversial, Donald Trump's approval rating on immigration is in the mid to low 30s, you would keep doing these things to the earlier conversation and then this one. Donald Trump is almost seems intent on making sure that everyone's paying close attention.

[Eddie Glaude]

Absolutely. And, you know, one of the things that I worry about in terms of this, this particular ruling is what happens in the process in the interim.

[Nicole Wallace]

Right.

[Eddie Glaude]

We might end up seeing the Portland frog hemmed up by National Guards, Guardsmen and women or something. But I think it's really important for us to understand why folk were saying no key, because these sorts of decisions reflect a view of the imperial presidency, where there's no boundaries on Trump's exercise of authority. There are no limits to what this man can do, and there are no limits to what he thinks he can do. And that, for me, he wants us to see him exercising that power on a daily basis so that we feel helpless in the face of it, you know, in so many ways. So here we are. Here we are. And we have to bear witness to it in some ways.

[John Heilman]

Sometimes that's all we get to do.

[Eddie Glaude]

That's all we can do.

[John Heilman]

Thank you for your reporting. Please come back. It's an incredible body of reporting. Liz, thank you for being part of our coverage today. Eddie, thank you for being at the table for the hour. We're going to sneak in one more break. We'll be right back. In just the last hour, former FBI Director Jim Comey's team has filed motions to disqualify Acting U.S. attorney Lindsey Halligan and a motion to toss the case entirely because of vindictive and selective prosecution. Halligan was handpicked by Donald Trump after serving as his personal lawyer, but lacks any experience working as a prosecutor. Comey's team argues this quote, the president and attorney general violated a congressionally mandated appointment procedure so that they could orchestrate the indictment of a perceived political opponent. That is exactly the kind of executive aggrandizement that the appointments clause was designed to prevent. This comes as federal prosecutors signaled last night that they may try to oust Comey's lead attorney, with prosecutors suggesting that Patrick Fitzgerald has a conflict of interest and was involved in media leaks after Comey's 2017 firing. We'll keep you updated on all those developments after the break. For us, the president of Colombia has accused Donald Trump of murder, the very latest in a very tense situation with one of our allies in Latin America. Don't Deadline White House continues after a quick break.

[Commercial Announcer]

Did you know? 39% of teen drivers admit to texting while driving. Even scarier, those who text are more likely to speed and run red lights. Shockingly, 94% know it's dangerous, but do it anyway. As a parent, you can't always be in the car, but you can stay connected to their safety with Greenlight Infinity's driving reports. Monitor their driving habits, see if they're using their phone, speeding and more. These reports provide real data for meaningful conversations about safety. Plus, with weekly updates, you can track their progress over time. Help keep your teens safe. Sign up for Greenlight [e-mail] podcast.