Paul Hunter (1:58)

Man, to hear her drawing that line. You know, I learned a long time ago in the age of Trump never to over interpret anything that is said by any politician. But holy cow, that was a stunner. Yeah.

Willie Lowry (2:09)

Her evolution over the last six months, call it hard to comprehend. She was the picture of this movement, and then all of a sudden, she's out.

Katie Simpson (2:21)

Yeah. And while it might just be one person, it could also be far more representative of a broader split within the MAGA movement. It really does prompt questions about the strength of maga, its future. And that's exactly what we're going to chat about. Today, I'm Katie Simpson. I'm a senior correspondent here in Washington.

Paul Hunter (2:43)

I'm Paul Hunter. I'm also senior correspondent here for the cbc.

Willie Lowry (2:46)

In Washington, I'm Willy Lowry. I'm still not a senior correspondent one day, Willie, but I am a correspondent and reporter.

Paul Hunter (2:53)

You'll be senior before too long.

Katie Simpson (2:54)

All right, let's go. For Canadians who might not know the significance of Marjorie Taylor Greene or her defection, she is a prominent Republican congresswoman from Georgia who really was a recognizable face within the MAGA movement. She'd been very close with Trump, an outspoken ally. I remember when Donald Trump was arraigned in New York City at one of his criminal trials, she showed up with a bullhorn and was shouting things about Joe Biden, lots of expletives, saying this is the weaponization of justice there to defend him. And so all of it sort of makes this break from Trump even more significant.

Paul Hunter (3:37)

Yeah. And I would just say another thing. For those who, you know, who've seen her or heard the name, she came up out of nowhere in a weird kind of way. Right. And I remember going to Georgia, where she's from, covering the Herschel Walker campaign. Former football star. Right. And I was at this rally that Herschel Walker was going to have, and it was full of football fans. Right. And then in walked Marjorie Taylor Greene, and it was like the star had arrived and people flocked to her. And that was when I had this realization, yeah, she's got something. And, you know, she's branded on MAGA and she's America first, and she's all these things that Trump has been about. But she has power, star power, and lots of it at maga.

Willie Lowry (4:19)

Absolutely. I was actually at the arraignment in New York City. It's not just that she attracts a crowd.

Paul Hunter (4:26)

Right.

Willie Lowry (4:26)

She's pugnacious.

Paul Hunter (4:27)

She.

Willie Lowry (4:28)

And this is, I think, what makes her evolution over the last really month so dramatic. She never backed down from a fight. And now all of the sudden, she's basically telling America that she is somewhat apologetic for the rhetoric that we've seen over the last several years and that she thinks everything needs to be toned. And she puts a lot of the blame on the person that she was not just a supporter of. She was, you know, directly tied to. Directly tied to. And perhaps the principal evangelical kind of preacher of.

Katie Simpson (5:01)

Yeah, she's cementing her break from the MAGA movement and from Trump. And it might seem sudden, it's sort of come together in the last month or so. But when did we start to really See that. Okay. There might be some divisions here, I think.

Willie Lowry (5:15)

I mean, if you look at her congressional record, she's voted 98% of the time with. But I think it dates back to late spring, early summer. There was talk of her potentially entering the Georgia Senate race. And she kind of took to social media, as so many people in American politics do these days, and wrote a long diatribe, basically against the Republican Party. She didn't single out or mention President Trump yet. But I think it, if you look back, it kind of marks the beginning of this fissure between her and the party and her and perhaps the MAGA movement. Fast forward to, of course, the Epstein files. I mean, I think that was the catalyst.

Paul Hunter (6:00)

Or is the fissure a recognition from her perspective that Donald Trump and MAGA are two different things. Right. I don't want to read too much into what Greene is doing here, but that maybe Trump isn't all he was made out to be.

Willie Lowry (6:15)

Right.

Paul Hunter (6:16)

Maybe what she's saying is that he's the wizard of Oz. Right. And the curtain has gone up and he is not that guy. He is not what maga, which came out of the Tea Party, if we want to go back in history, which is less government, more money in our pockets, all that kind of stuff. Right. That Trump, in the end, isn't him.

Willie Lowry (6:34)

I really like the wizard of Oz reference as someone who's been forced to sit through that movie many times in the last few months. It's so good, and it's really. But I think it's spot on. But I think this is. We're at this moment, where is MAGA Trump, or is Trump maga? And I think that's what we're kind of going to find out.

Katie Simpson (6:53)

And I think that gets us to this bigger picture question about MAGA and the Epstein files and how that has sort of created a larger fracture within this movement. You know, in the 60 minutes. Peace, Paul, we heard her talk about the Epstein files and how that was a straw that broke the camel's back. How has this divided the MAGA movement?

Paul Hunter (7:18)

When I think about the Epstein effect on Trump, I go back to Trump 1.0 and a rally with Trump in Houston, and I was chatting with three nice ladies and I was asking about Stormy Daniels and the Hollywood access tapes and like, so why do you still support him? And their answer was they just shoved it off. Right. It's just locker room talk. And Trump seemed. It was another example of how at that time, Trump seemed like omnipotent in the eyes of his. So called base. So when I think about Epstein now, I think is that it's as if MAGA sees Trump for someone who made promises about Epstein and now he's not. And so the old, well, if you've got nothing to hide, what are you, you know, why are you changing your line on this? And I think back to the wizard of Oz. Is there a realization that he isn't what he said he was? Tack on his foreign policy and America first is out the window and now it's world first. Tack on affordability. He says prices have come down. Well, they haven't really. It seems to be the sense of a lot of people and there's a lot of data to support that they haven't come down that things are more expensive. Again, it's hard to read too much into Marjorie Taylor Greene. But there is others, as you note, Katie, this slow motion realization that maybe we gotta look somewhere else, that he doesn't represent us.

Willie Lowry (8:54)

I think that's definitely the case for sure. But there's also the fact that this is a movement that, for lack of a better term, has a propensity towards conspiracy theories. Right. And the Epstein files and Jeffrey Epstein occupied a huge space within that movement. And they were obsessed for whatever reason with these documents. And Trump on countless occasions fomented that obsession and, you know, essentially said he would call for their release. Back to your point. And now he's in office and he didn't just not call for their release, you know, he actively tried to prevent them from essentially being released. You know, calling Marjorie Taylor Greene into the White House and basically trying to pressure against voting for it.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (9:41)

Standing up for American women who were raped at 14 years old, trafficked and used by rich, powerful men should not result in me being called a traitor and threatened by the President of the United States, whom I fought for.

Katie Simpson (9:56)

Yeah. You know, Donald Trump surrounded himself with people like Cash Patel, Dan Boingino, who now have prominent roles at the FBI, and they were some of the loudest cheerleaders demanding the release of documents. And so by putting these people in those places of authority, those positions of authority, it spoke to those conspiracy minded folks saying, hey, these guys, they're your guys and we're gonna move forward on this. And so when Trump actually comes back into office and Pam Bondi, the Attorney General, goes on Fox News and says, I've got the Epstein list on my desk and we're gonna get it out there, I'm just going over it and all these promises are made and, and then all of a sudden it doesn't happen. There's no list to release. And not only that, the FBI releases a memo saying, okay, well, there's nothing to see here. We're not gonna release any more information. And there are so many conspiracy theories related to Jeffrey Epstein, but there is something to remember here, that there were very real crimes, there are very real victims. But because this has been something where the truth and accurate information has been hidden from the public so long, you know, conspiracies fill the void. And so many people within that MAGA movement, or a significant chunk of them, wanted to see that be made public. And now we're in this situation where that part of the base is not satisfied and they're vocal.

Paul Hunter (11:18)

Except up until now, if Trump were to say, there's nothing there, they'd say, okay, right? That's the difference. If he calls it a hoax, it's a hoax. It's a Democrat hoax, it's a Democrat hoax. But the difference now is that people aren't willing to. To believe him. And to me, that's remarkable because that has been his calling card throughout his whole rise to the White House, twice is that people believe whatever he says. He'll make America great again, whatever it is. But not now.

Katie Simpson (11:49)

Okay, Paul Wheely, There's a lot more to talk about, but first I want to do a shout out to anyone who is listening today on Spotify. If you're so inclined, leave us a note in the comments section and tell us what. What you'd like to hear us talk about in 2026.

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Katie Simpson (12:32)

Okay, so promises made on the Epstein file, some in mag. In the MAGA world, they do not think Donald Trump has lived up to his promises. They have not released the full documents. Things are in the works now. But another area that Marjorie Taylor Greene also specifically cites, that she thinks that Donald Trump has not lived up to his promises to the American people has to do with foreign policy. Specifically this promise to not get America entangled into any more foreign wars.

Willie Lowry (12:58)

Venezuela, anyone?

Donald Trump (12:59)

Yeah, exactly.

Katie Simpson (13:00)

Exactly.

Willie Lowry (13:01)

Yeah. Well, I think it was really interesting just how much of a focus that Marjorie Taylor Greene made on foreign policy, not just in her interview on 60 Minutes, but in her Kind of call it a resignation speech on Instagram a few weeks ago.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (13:15)

Americans hard earned tax dollars always fund foreign wars, foreign aid and foreign interest. And the spending power of the dollar.

Willie Lowry (13:23)

Continues to decline, essentially suggesting that she's America first and that Trump is pursuing a foreign policy that is not necessarily America first, but perhaps Trump first. One of the big schisms is around the war in Gaza. Marjorie Taylor Greene really doing a kind of an about face over the last six months, coming down really hard against Israel, calling it a genocide. And she's not the only person within that MAGA movement. There's a fracturing going on as we speak with half the movement kind of more traditionally Republican supporting Israel and another half, and it tends to be a younger portion of the group being surprisingly anti Israel. But it's not just in the Middle East. You know, Trump is showing to have a bit of a propensity for interventionalism, which is something he kind of campaigned against. What we're seeing right now in Venezuela, essentially, we're on the brink of the precipice of armed conflict with that country. This is not something that is wanted by the MAGA base and I would suggest is probably where you see his administration because it's not entirely maga. Right. I think Venezuela is the influence of Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who's more traditionally hawkish. And you're seeing this kind of the hawks in the party and the more MAGA kind of butting heads. And both are getting their own little victories, but neither being fully satisfied.

Paul Hunter (14:55)

I wonder too if it's, if it's fair comment to say that his messaging has been failing. Because if you think about Ukraine, well, we don't want to spend our money over there. So that's kind of a way of saying America first. When you look at Venezuela as well, drugs are coming up, but you toss in Gaza, you toss in entertaining the Saudis here and other things. And the feeling is that he's paying more attention to the world than he is to America. And I think that's one of the problems with maga. And you're starting to hear not only, I think, anyway, not only the Marjorie Taylor Greene's of the world, but, you know, not that she doesn't vote, but I'll say actual voters seem to be whispering the same things that you hear occasionally at rallies and such.

Katie Simpson (15:34)

You know, questions like, why are these operations abroad taking place? Why are American tax dollars going in that space when I'm having so much problem at home? It's sort of, that's been a theme of that people within the MAGA movement has bonded them together. They question, you know, why are we being the world's policemen? Why is that our responsibility and our role, when I am worried that my kids are not gonna be able to live a better life than I'm living? And it also speaks to this next challenge, which is the cost of living and affordability. Donald Trump's campaign, his 2024 campaign, the winning message that really resonated. There were two of them, really. One on immigration. Americans really like that. And they believed him when he went out on the campaign trail and said, I am going to make your life more affordable. And, you know, Paul, that. And really, that is really presenting a massive challenge for him.

Willie Lowry (16:27)

Yeah, I think we're at the classic point in the administration where campaign promises are meeting the reality. And he can tell people that the economy is strong and that he given himself. What was it? An A. But the people don't feel that way. Right. And when you go to the grocery store and your wallet is hurting, it doesn't matter what the President says.

Katie Simpson (16:52)

And I think Trump and his team, they know that it's a problem. He held a rally in Pennsylvania earlier this week. He stood in front of supporters holding signs that read, you know, lower prices and bigger paychecks. And he talked about crushing inflation and the soaring stock market.

Donald Trump (17:07)

Our economy is unbelievable. There's never been anything but the Democrats go out. Prices are too high. Yeah, they're too high because they caused them to be too high. But now they're coming down. One of the most important ways we're defeating inflation is by unleashing American energy, including oil, gas, and clean, beautiful coal right here in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Willie Lowry (17:34)

So I would just say a year into this, and he's still blaming the Biden administration.

Paul Hunter (17:38)

You can only blame. I mean, this is true for any politician in any party in any country. You've got a little bit of time when you come in, but at a certain point, and maybe it's a year, maybe it's longer, but I think we're seeing evidence that for a lot of voters, it's. You own this now. Right. And my wallet is not full because the price of eggs or beef or whatever it is. The fact is, he can say stuff, but the data. Inflation is 3%, which is what it was, by the way, when he took office. Prices haven't gone down. That's a whole different kettle of fish.

Willie Lowry (18:11)

Beef is up to over $6.

Paul Hunter (18:12)

Paul, thanks for that.

Willie Lowry (18:16)

Willie would be great.

Paul Hunter (18:17)

Just a fun fact not so fun fact, but that's what matters to voters. It's the economy. Stupid, right? It's the oldest line in politics. But he's paying the price for it. And that's again, the reason we're having this conversation is because Donald Trump, the guy who has survived everything and anything from all directions until now, maybe has somehow managed to deflect all that. And it's coming back to bite him, it would seem.

Katie Simpson (18:46)

And I think that there is the tone, the way he's talking about it. It is very Trump. He seems to sort of be mocking the idea of affordability. And people across the United States, largely, you know, middle and lower income people, are experiencing extreme challenges when it comes to the cost of living. When, you know, Americans, I think, are understanding that tariffs are having a cost. You know, as time has passed and Americans have seen certain goods, the price of certain goods grow, look at coffee, coffee, bananas, things that you don't make in America. And so I think that this is another one of those things that gets back to the point you're making, Paul, is that, you know, Donald Trump is not lowering prices like he said he would. And the MAGA base has for so long given him grace and believed him, even when things have not presented in the same way.

Paul Hunter (19:40)

But if I could say something else, and I'm not here to write Donald Trump's obituary, right, he has proven everybody wrong time after time after time. But the thing is, the lesson here, if you ask me, and this is applicable in Canada, is that this stuff matters, right? And you know, if you come in on a promise, you have to kind of keep it. And the stuff that matters most, the stuff that matters to disaffected Americans, the people in the Rust Belt, the people that grew into the Tea Party, that grew into maga, that say, I'm left out of the process, my life isn't what it was promised to me, that I thought I was gonna get. And I wanna blame those dirty rotten people in Washington or Ottawa or wherever, right? If you ignore the grievances, said Paul with air quotes, if you ignore the circumstances that have made so many millions of people in this country angry at the way government has worked for them, and right now them is maga, it's at your peril. And are we at the time when it is coming back to Donald Trump and will he realize that and will he act on it and change? Who knows?

Willie Lowry (20:53)

And to bring it back to Canada, I think it would be a huge mistake for Canadians. Obviously, MAGA is an American movement, but these the undercurrents, that sense of dissatisfaction that you are speaking of, those are universal. They are felt in Canada. You look at the freedom convoy that we had back in. Was it 2022? It would be a mistake for Canadians and Canadian politicians to assume this can only happen here.

Paul Hunter (21:22)

And, you know, a factor with Hillary Clinton going back to that time was Democrats didn't have an answer. Trump did. He may or may not have been right or wrong, but Democrats did not have an acceptable answer. Right. And that same circumstance, and the tens of millions of American voters feel the same way, and they're looking for answers. Marjorie Taylor Greene is saying, maybe he ain't the guy.

Willie Lowry (21:46)

Yeah. I guess the question for me is, does the movement persist without him, or does it, you know, for lack of a better word, die? And does something else replace it?

Katie Simpson (21:57)

Looking forward, I wonder, does the splintering matter? Is the splintering gonna have an impact on Donald Trump and the power he holds within the MAGA movement? Or are we going to see prominent people within conservative politics in the United States maybe, perhaps try to make some moves? And I think that the next year is gonna be crucial around that.

Paul Hunter (22:18)

Agreed.

Katie Simpson (22:19)

Heading into the midterm elections, and I have a feeling we're gonna be talking about the midterm elections quite a bit over the next 12 months or so, that if Donald Trump can retain the base, the MAGA base and the splintering is just minimal and going forward and Republicans do okay, and in the midterm elections, what are we gonna see in terms of who is taking the torch next? And do they want the same kind of MAGA conservative politics that Donald Trump is embracing? Because works.

Willie Lowry (22:49)

It works.

Katie Simpson (22:49)

It works, right?

Willie Lowry (22:50)

Or do we see Whoever runs in 2028 runs off of this America first.

Katie Simpson (22:55)

Does it splinter? Does MAGA splinter? And, you know, someone like Marjorie Taylor Greene, someone like someone else within that sort of movement, MAGA movement or the Trump circle, do they say, okay, you know what? MAGA had a base of ideas that we really like, but here's how we can focus them more domestically and continues on with the Trump style of politics, but perhaps picks up on some of the lessons from this moment.

Paul Hunter (23:21)

I'll say one more thing. Here we are having this conversation. He still has three years left in his term. Point number one and point number two, I'll just reiterate. Let's not count him out.

Katie Simpson (23:32)

Never.

Willie Lowry (23:32)

Yeah.

Paul Hunter (23:32)

Never ever count him out.

Willie Lowry (23:34)

That's how you get mud on your face, Paul.

Paul Hunter (23:36)

It doesn't feel good.

Katie Simpson (23:38)

All right, I think that's a pretty good spot where we should wrap this up. We, of course, are gonna keep on reporting about this issue and many others from here in Washington. And we look forward to having more of these conversations in the new year. So stay tuned for our brand new podcast coming in January.

Paul Hunter (23:54)

Can't wait.

Willie Lowry (23:55)

Oh, yeah.

Katie Simpson (23:57)

You sound like the Kool Aid Man.

Willie Lowry (23:58)

Oh, yeah.

Katie Simpson (23:59)

Through the wall.

Willie Lowry (24:02)

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