Christine Romans (2:32)

Hi, Brian.

Brian Chung (2:32)

Okay, so it is a busy Friday here. Let's start off with Canada. They put out this ad and then Trump late last night Says, you know what, all talks are off. Where were we with Canada going into that Truth Social?

Christine Romans (2:46)

Well, you know, it felt like the temperature had started to cool a little bit with that testy relationship. But now we're right back where we started here. Remember, these two countries have major, major issues to work out in terms of the usmca, the President's own trade agreement that he, when he jettisoned NAFTA in his first term, made a new trade agreement. Now, he doesn't like a lot of parts of that trade agreement. And so they've got a lot of work to do. And the President says they're not even talking.

Brian Chung (3:14)

Okay, so let's talk about this ad now, because that seemed to be the trigger for the President saying all conversations, all negotiations are off with Prime Minister Mark Carney and the Canadians. What was it about this ad that got the President so worked up?

Christine Romans (3:28)

I mean, you would think that Ronald Reagan, who is a conservative icon, having his words somehow turned against the current policies of this administration, was infuriating for this President. And what the White House is saying is that it was a fake ad. It's not fake. Ronald Reagan said these words, but it was edited and didn't include any of the details about how at that time the United States was in a kind of a fight, really a trade fight with Japan. And the President was actually advocating for some tariffs against Japan because Japan had been flooding the US Market with semiconductors. So there's a whole backstory there that's not in this ad that the White House is using to just discredit the ad altogether.

Brian Chung (4:07)

But yeah, again, to be clear, because I feel like we have to say this in 2025. It's not AI. No, Ronald Reagan did say that in the speech, but the White House is taking issue with the way that it was edited together.

Christine Romans (4:18)

And I would encourage Everybody in 2025, it's about a five minute speech, go watch it. I mean, the Reagan library has it on YouTube. You can go watch the whole thing yourself and see what you think.

Brian Chung (4:29)

Five minutes is a lot in the TikTok era where people used to.

Christine Romans (4:32)

I still believe in America that you can watch something for five minutes and make a good determination.

Brian Chung (4:36)

Okay, so we talked about Canada, but let's talk about China because it's Canada today, but next Friday it's going to be China. Ahead of this November 1st date that the President has floated on Truth Social as the day that he will put into effect another hundred percent tariffs on China. There's supposed to be this big meeting with President Xi Jinping. Is that gonna be kind of the. The key date event on whether or not those tariffs happen next week?

Christine Romans (5:03)

It's so interesting. This White House negotiates differently than any other White House I've covered, and they're proud of that. They say that's on purpose because they try to keep their opponents off guard. Usually you have all of the aides and decision makers papering everything up until the very moment when you have the leaders, have the, have the press come to the meeting. But this time we do it backwards. Trump likes to have these big meetings and then tell everybody, well, this is what we agreed on. Now go figure it out. And so that's where we are, I think, on this. We've had three or four rounds of talks with the Chinese overall, and I'm not quite sure what they've actually promised to do yet. They've promised to keep talking in every iteration. And correct me if you think, if you have a different interpretation, but the Chinese have still put export license restrictions on rare earths, even though two rounds ago we were told that that had been fixed. White House furious about that. By the way, the Treasury Secretary told me last week, if they don't allow more of those rare earth export licenses, then there will be 100% tariffs on Nove 1.

Brian Chung (6:06)

Yeah, well, I mean, to your question, I think that the story with China is that the Overton window keeps, keeps switching because we were freaking out at the beginning of this administration over the prospect of 10, then 20, then 30% tariffs on China. And then you remember when it went up to 145% and that moved the goalposts, because then it was like, you know what, maybe 30% doesn't sound so bad. And so when you talk about the 100% coming back, it just gives me deja vu of the spring when you.

Christine Romans (6:35)

Think about another hundred percent tariffs. Like, what does that mean for people, maybe the American consumer who's just exhausted by all this tariff back and forth? I mean, that would be essentially a trade embargo with, with China. I mean, that would. That could really affect, I think, consumers and especially small businesses that import anything. And I had talked to a senior administration official maybe about a month ago when tariffs had settled out to their current rate with China. And he had told me, this is where we want to be. This is maximum pressure on China without hurting us. Now you've got the president threatening another hundred. So clearly that's a big, I think, a negotiating tool that they're using.

Brian Chung (7:09)

And I think you're right about the embargo because I remember talking to a toy maker, they make Tonka trucks, and they were saying that at 145%, you might as well make the tariff rate 3,000% because I'm not ordering anything from China. Exactly. And so when he threatens 100% tariff, that's effectively saying I'm cutting things off. So let's talk. And they're talking. So we'll see what comes out of those talks. Now, let's talk about inflation data. We got new data this morning, which is unusual because the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which publishes it, is supposed to be closed during the shutdown. What do those numbers tell us about what inflation looks like in America? And do the tariffs look like they're coming through in those numbers?

Christine Romans (7:47)

So I think the number I've heard. Sorry, the word I have heard more today is stubborn. That's the word I've heard from former Fed officials, from economists. It's just inflation is stubborn, but it's not as bad as many people had thought. There is not some blaring warning about tariffs inside these numbers. I mean, they're higher than the Fed would like. 3% inflation is higher than you'd like. Some of these individual categories, like beef, are just kind of like eye popping. You know, some of these parts of the inflation picture are still a struggle and affordability is still a major issue for American families. But Wall street sure is happy because these numbers aren't bad enough that they think the Fed won't cut rates next week. Right. So Wall Street's just kind of drunk on the idea of another couple of another couple of rate cuts and all this AI spending. So there's a party happening over here. Where? On Main Street. I wouldn't say the 3% inflation feels like much of a party.

Brian Chung (8:38)

Christine Romans, thank you. One quick note here. After our conversation, the premiere of Ontario, Doug Ford said his province would stop playing the Ronald Reagan ad we talked about at the beginning of our conversation with Christine. That's effective Monday. That means it will run through the weekend. Playing during the first two games of the World Series between the LA Dodgers and the Toronto Blue Jays. Ford wrote on X, our intention was always to initiate a conversation about the kind of economy that Americans want to build and the impact of tariffs on workers and businesses. We've achieved our goal. Having reached US Audiences at the highest levels. We're going to take a quick break and when we're back, talk about the cards being stacked against you. Card reading, contact lenses, X ray poker tables and the tech allegedly used in those rigged poker games linked to the mob and the NBA. We'll be right back.

Rob Weil (9:30)

You're a guy who just wants to look nice. The kind of nights where you might.

Brian Chung (9:33)

Get a nice compliment on the niceness of your nice new outfit. Good thing Men's Wearhouse has everything from.

Rob Weil (9:38)

Polos to jeans and yes, suits.

Brian Chung (9:40)

Plus a team to help you find the perfect fit to make sure you look nice.

Rob Weil (9:43)

Nice.

Brian Chung (9:43)

Love the way you look. Men's Wearhouse.

Christine Romans (9:46)

Who's ready for some football all season?

Brian Chung (9:49)

The TODAY show takes you inside the game.

Christine Romans (9:51)

We are going to get this party started.

Brian Chung (9:53)

Join us every week as we go behind the scenes with your favorite NFL teams for the biggest stories on and off the field.

Rob Weil (10:00)

Big game tonight.

Brian Chung (10:01)

Plus game day recipes that dial up your tailgate. Football food soup to nuts. From stadium lights to game day bites, the TODAY show is your home for all things football every morning on NBC. And we're back with here's the scoop from NBC News. While we're still reeling from those NBA gambling scandals, federal officials announced charges yesterday and the indictments read like a Martin Scorsese film straight out of Goodfellas. I'm funny how?

Christine Romans (10:31)

I mean, funny like I'm a clown.

Brian Chung (10:33)

I amuse you.

Christine Romans (10:34)

I make you laugh.

Brian Chung (10:35)

But the allegations here are no joke. Prosecutors allege victims were cheated out of millions of dollars. There were two indictments yesterday. The first case was dubbed Operation Nothing But Bet, where prosecutors accused six defendants of participating in an insider sports betting scheme. The second case was dubbed Operation Royal Flush. Prosecutors there accused 31 defendants, including hall of famer and current head coach of the Portland Trailblazers, Chauncey Billups, of a plot to rig an underground poker game. The games were allegedly backed by four high profile organized crime families, including the Gambinos, that have long ruled the New York area in order to swindle their victims at the poker tables. Authorities say the players, quote, were at the mercy of concealed technology, including rigged shuffling machines and specially designed contacts, lenses and sunglasses to read the backs of playing cards. RNBC News breaking business news reporter Rob Weil joins me now. Rob, this is like James Bond, like tech that they were using here. Tell us about what types of things this scheme employed to swindle these people for money.

Rob Weil (11:42)

This is straight out of a Hollywood studio, it sounds like, but we're talking about an x ray table that could read the cards that people had, a poker chip tray analyzer that contained hidden cameras that could also read what people were holding, specialty glasses or contact lenses that could Also, look at the back of a card that was specially marked and you could tell what someone was holding. And then the biggest one was these industrial shuffling machines that were completely reprogrammed to instantly predict in advance actually how the cards were going to turn out on the flop.

Brian Chung (12:14)

Okay, so can we talk about this table? Because I think a lot of people are wondering what the heck is an X ray poker table? How is it possible that a table could read what card it is if it's face down on top?

Rob Weil (12:28)

Yeah, so this was the one that the couple folks that I spoke with, they'd never really seen anything like this. You can find these on a couple of different sites.

Brian Chung (12:35)

You can buy these online, they're listed.

Rob Weil (12:37)

To advertise on sale online, but you have to get them from China. There's a site that is linked to a Chinese web address called pokerdeceit.com that sells these devices. And there's another one, they're not exactly falling off the shelf at your local retail store. They were sitting at a table that could basically read through just basic X ray technology. It would just send a inverse image of what was being dealt with in a sort of livestream format to someone at an off site location and could be relayed back to the dealer.

Brian Chung (13:10)

Yeah, there was an image, I believe, from one of the defendant's icloud accounts that shows this X ray table able to scan the bottoms of these cards when the people playing think they're face down on the table, but someone is getting a scan that says, oh, that's actually six of spades. The contact lenses and the sunglasses caught my attention too.

Rob Weil (13:31)

In this case, what we think is the likely scenario is the cards had an RFID chip, which is like a radio chip. The lens would pick up on how the cards was marked, just basically a microchip in the card.

Brian Chung (13:42)

So, Rob, tell me about these industrial card shufflers, because that was a big part of it in and of themselves. It's not necessarily a problem because these so called Deckmate brand machines are used in real casinos. But in this case they were hacked.

Rob Weil (13:54)

The versions of these machines that were in use contain USB ports, which basically allows anyone with a thumb drive to plug in some malicious code into these shuffling machines and reprogram them to simultaneously transmit the information of what's about to be dealt to someone off site, who then relays it to someone on site at the table in anticipation of what's going to be dealt in a given hand. And someone I spoke with, one of the sources said that that was Actually, the most impressive aspect of this, which is being able to sort of coordinate the entire scheme flawlessly without tipping anyone off.

Brian Chung (14:27)

I think a lot of people might be looking at this story and thinking of Casino with Robert De Niro, where they're the two guys that are rigging the poker game with the kind of, like, tap with a device underneath the guy's pants. And then they take them to the back room when they find out the pit bosses, and they. I think they. They break the guy's hand or they cut a finger off.

Rob Weil (14:46)

And that's just what these hustlers look for.

Christine Romans (14:48)

They cruise from casino to casino looking for weak dealers the way lions look for weak antelope.

Brian Chung (14:53)

But what's different about this case is it's the casino that's in on this whole thing. I mean, to some degree, casinos are always in favor with a lot of these table games. But in this case, it was really tipped in their favor.

Rob Weil (15:06)

Yeah. So basically, anyone who walked into these poker games, the only thing they had to sort of trust their environment was just whatever relationship they had with the people that brought them in. It seems that they were sort of starstruck by some of the players and coaches that were also involved and implicated in this.

Brian Chung (15:22)

And so, Rob, the personalities that were involved in this were so critical, too. Why was it significant for this scheme to involve the likes of Chauncey Billups? You know, legendary hall of Fame. Who could forget his performance in that Detroit Pistons final series? But the Detroit Pistons have just shocked.

Christine Romans (15:39)

The Los Angeles Lakers.

Brian Chung (15:41)

Why did he need to be part of this to pull it all off?

Rob Weil (15:45)

Yeah. So prosecutors described these guys, especially Chauncey Billups, who's actually literally a current active coach in the NBA, as the face cards these guys would be used to bring in these unsuspecting victims. And they were as important, if not more so, than all the crazy technology that was being used basically to disarm people if they had any doubts about the games they were entering into.

Brian Chung (16:05)

It's about the psychology of how they pulled all of this off. Tell me about the situation where in the court documents, it was suggested that there were some hot hands that were too hot, that they actually had to cool them down to keep the fish, who were essentially the targets in this scheme to stay at the table.

Rob Weil (16:21)

If you look at the charging documents, you can see verbatim transcripts of what they were saying to each other. But basically, they had signals going for, okay, if this guy is too far ahead, tap this ship. So that they couldn't figure out what was going on, if it was becoming too obvious that maybe something, a foul was occurring in the background and maybe they were getting wise to it, but they had that level of sort of detailed communication going on where they could, you know, say to each other in real time, hey, cool off for a minute to make sure that, that these, the victims weren't, were realizing what was going on, you know, right under their noses.

Brian Chung (16:55)

Rob Wild, thanks so much.

Rob Weil (16:57)

Thanks, guys.

Brian Chung (17:00)

All right, well, let's get to some.

Christine Romans (17:01)

Headlines, but this is not about me. This is about all of us and about a justice system which has been weaponized, a justice system which has been used as a tool of revenge.

Brian Chung (17:18)

That was New York Attorney General Letitia James after her appearance in federal court today. She's the latest Trump adversary to face indictment. James pleaded not guilty to one charge of bank fraud and one charge of making false statements to a financial institution. A grand jury in Virginia indicted James, a Democrat, earlier this month, just weeks after Trump posted untruth social media, urging Attorney General Pam Bondi to take action against her and others, including California Senator Adam Schiff. According to the indictment, James falsely claimed that a home in Norfolk, Virginia, was her second residence, allowing her to secure more favorable loan terms. Prosecutors alleged she actually rented the property to a family of three. With that lower mortgage rate saving about $50 a month in the process, she faces up to 30 years in prison and a potential $1 million fine if convicted. After she was charged, James called the allegations baseless, accusing Trump of political retribution at any cost. Meanwhile, four people familiar with the investigation tell NBC News that federal prosecutors in Maryland have so far failed to gather enough evidence to charge California Senator Adam Schiff in a separate mortgage fraud probe. A trial date of January 26, 2026, has been set for James. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth says US Forces struck a boat allegedly carrying drugs in the Caribbean Sea, the third such strike just this week. Hegseth wrote on X that intelligence identified the vessel as part of a known narco trafficking route linked to the Trenda Aragua gang, a group the Trump administration has labeled a terrorist organization. Hegseth said six men aboard were killed in the nighttime operation conducted in international waters. No U.S. forces were hurt. The Pentagon says it's carried out 10 similar strikes since early September, killing 43 suspected traffickers, eight in the Caribbean and two in the Eastern Pacific. And signs now that the administration isn't close to letting up, as the Pentagon will now deploy the Navy's largest aircraft carrier to southcom. That's the region covering Latin America and the Caribbean, all to, quote, disrupt illicit actors. President Trump has defended the broad campaign of these quick attacks on boats, saying each strike, quote, saves 25,000American lives. And asked whether he'll seek congressional authorization for the ongoing operations. The president said, well, I don't think.

Christine Romans (19:37)

We'Re going to necessarily ask for a declaration of war.

Brian Chung (19:40)

I think we're just going to kill.

Christine Romans (19:42)

People that are bringing drugs into our country.

Rob Weil (19:45)

Okay, we're going to kill them. You know, they're going to be like dead.

Brian Chung (19:48)

Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle are getting frustrated by the lack of information from the administration on these strikes. That's according to six sources who spoke with NBC News.

Rob Weil (19:58)

Hey, take me out to the ball game. Take me out with the crowd.

Brian Chung (20:05)

Game 1 of the 2025 World Series kicks off tonight at 8pm Eastern, and there's a lot on the line. The Dodgers have bulldozed their way through October, sweeping the Reds, the Phillies and the brewers to punch their ticket to the Fall Classic. With league's highest payroll north of $350 million, they're playing like every penny counts. Specifically, superstar shohei Ohtani, whose three homers and 10 strikeouts in one game of their sweep of the brewers was hailed as the best postseason performance in baseball history. So are the Toronto Blue Jays, who haven't held the Fall classic trophy since 1993, in trouble? They've got a slugger in the form of Vladimir Guerrero Jr. As well as home field advantage for the first two games. And maybe, just maybe, that'll be enough to cool off baseball's hottest team. It's astounding.

Rob Weil (20:57)

Time is fleeting. Madness takes its toll.

Christine Romans (21:06)

But listen closely.

Brian Chung (21:08)

The Rocky Horror Picture show is turning 50 and its fans are still doing the time warp like it's 1975 with your hands on your hips. The cult classic that once bombed at the box office has become a midnight movie legend, packing theaters across the country over the next few weeks for anniversary screenings. What started as a flop found new life in the glow of late night madness, where fishnets toast and audience shout backs turned it into a full blown cultural ritual. And while die hard fans have kept it alive for decades, a new generation admits it was glee that first put Rocky Horror on their radar. Half a century later, Rocky Horror is still proof that some cults only get stronger with age and a little eyeliner. That's going to do it for us at Here's a scoop from NBC News. Signing off for the weekend, I'm Brian Chung. We'll see you on Monday. And if you like what you heard. Like us Back wherever you get your podcasts, It's Cybersecurity awareness month and LifeLock is here with tips to help protect your identity. Use strong passwords, set up multi factor authentication and report phishing scams. And for comprehensive identity protection, LifeLock is your best choice. LifeLock alerts you to suspicious uses of your personal information and also fixes identity theft. Guaranteed or your money back. Stay smart, stay safe and stay protected with a 30 day free trial@lifelock.com Specialoffer terms apply.