MAGA War Chest, Nuclear Subs, and Texas Dems Flee

Summary

Pivot Podcast Summary: "MAGA War Chest, Nuclear Subs, and Texas Dems Flee"

Release Date: August 5, 2025
Hosts: Kara Swisher and Anthony Scaramucci
Guest: Anthony Scaramucci, lawyer, podcaster, founder and managing partner at Skybridge Capital

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1. Democrats Flee Texas to Prevent Redistricting

Kara Swisher opens the discussion by highlighting a significant political maneuver: Democratic members of the Texas House of Representatives have left the state to obstruct Republican efforts to adopt a redrawn congressional map. The Republican-controlled state legislature aims to flip five Democratic congressional districts in their favor.

Anthony Scaramucci criticizes this strategy, labeling it "terrible" and arguing that both parties are engaged in damaging gerrymandering practices:

"Gerrymandering. Everybody is. When the politician picks the voter in a liberal democracy, the voter is supposed to pick the politician. And so these guys have totally corrupted the system." ([06:42])

He emphasizes the need for a constitutional amendment to end gerrymandering, suggesting that artificial intelligence could create more equitable and unbiased district maps.

2. Trump's Interference with the Bureau of Labor Statistics

Following a disappointing jobs report, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics and plans to appoint a new commissioner. This move echoes former President Trump's frequent interventions in federal agencies to align data with his political narrative.

Anthony Scaramucci condemns the action, asserting that it undermines data integrity and transparency:

"The numbers are the numbers. I will say that they can be antiquated, though. Carr, you know the cliché, statistics are lies." ([10:43])

He predicts further manipulation of economic data and calls for improved real-time data sourcing to enhance accuracy and reliability.

3. Trump's Tariffs and Trade Policies

President Trump has initiated a new round of tariffs affecting over 60 U.S. trading partners, with rates ranging from 10% to 40%. Countries like Canada, India, and Switzerland are targeted, leading to significant economic repercussions.

Scaramucci discusses the unsustainability of these tariffs, particularly the 35% tariff on Canada, which threatens various industries:

"The American economy cannot have a 35% reciprocal tariff with Canada. It's not sustainable. You'll knock everybody out of business." ([16:28])

He predicts that most of Trump's high tariff rates will be reduced to more manageable levels (10-15%) as international pressures mount.

4. MAGA Super PAC's $200 Million War Chest

Donald Trump's main super PAC, MAGA Inc., has amassed nearly $200 million, with significant contributions from high-profile figures like Elon Musk, Marc Andreessen, and Jeffrey Yass. This fund raises questions about its intended use—whether to support Republicans in upcoming midterms or to aid Trump’s potential bid for a third term.

Scaramucci takes Trump’s third-term ambitions seriously, despite concerns about his age and health:

"I think you have to take Trump seriously about him wanting a third term... He's a guy that doesn't want to leave power easily." ([29:29])

He speculates that the funds may primarily reinforce Trump's personal political influence rather than support a broader Republican agenda.

5. Epstein Saga and Political Cover-Ups

The conversation shifts to the ongoing Epstein saga, with Ghislaine Maxwell being moved to a minimum-security prison in Texas. Trump and his supporters are accused of orchestrating cover-ups to protect their interests.

Scaramucci suggests that Trump is leveraging such scandals to distract and deflect criticism:

"Trump is gonna survive this too... he's one of the luckiest son of bitches on the planet. Every time he flips the coin, it comes up his way." ([36:30])

He posits that these distractions are part of a broader strategy to entrench Trump's base while obscuring more substantial issues.

6. Impact on Public Institutions

Trump's administration is accused of targeting public institutions, including the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and museums. The CPB is set to wind down operations following a significant federal funding cut, adversely affecting local NPR and PBS stations, especially in rural areas.

Scaramucci condemns these actions as part of Trump's disregard for established norms and civility:

"It's making a coarser society... We were supposed to have some consensus, some compromise, some civility with each other. And Trump doesn't like that." ([47:02])

He warns that dismantling such institutions leads to tangible negative outcomes, beyond mere political distractions.

7. Wins and Fails: Analyzing Key Players

Anthony Scaramucci and Kara Swisher engage in a segment evaluating recent successes and failures in the political and business landscapes.

Scaramucci's Wins:

• Elon Musk: Despite controversies, Musk continues to thrive with his ventures, having granted Tesla shares worth $29 billion.
• Jerome Powell: As Federal Reserve Chair, Powell is praised for maintaining economic stability amidst Trump's criticisms.
• UK Government: Secured a favorable 10% trade deal with the U.S., leveraging Trump's affinity for the British monarchy.

Scaramucci's Fails:

• Vladimir Putin: Considered a failing leader who may soon lose power due to prolonged military setbacks.
• American Car Industry: Struggles to compete against tariffs and foreign manufacturing, leading to economic strain.
• American Congress: Criticized as highly ineffective, failing to check executive overreach and maintain governmental balance.

8. Predictions for the 2028 Presidential Race

Looking ahead, Scaramucci predicts California Governor Gavin Newsom as the Democratic nominee, choosing a Midwestern moderate to appeal to a broader electorate. For the Republican side, he envisions a candidate emerging from established leadership circles, potentially someone like John Thune or Charlie Baker, although he expresses skepticism about their ability to command the MAGA base.

"Trump wants... a white male. I think it's a white male going up against a white male character." ([73:11])

Kara Swisher concurs, emphasizing the challenges Democrats face in uniting diverse ideological factions and appealing to the secular yet socially conservative American populace.

9. Conclusion

The episode delves deep into the tumultuous political maneuvers shaping the U.S. landscape, with a focus on Trump's strategies to maintain influence, the implications of aggressive trade policies, and the erosion of public institutions. Both Swisher and Scaramucci provide incisive analysis, underscored by critical quotes and timely insights, painting a complex picture of America's current and future political trajectory.

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Notable Quotes:

• "Gerrymandering. Everybody is. When the politician picks the voter in a liberal democracy, the voter is supposed to pick the politician. And so these guys have totally corrupted the system." — Anthony Scaramucci ([06:42])

• "The numbers are the numbers. I will say that they can be antiquated, though. Carr, you know the cliché, statistics are lies." — Anthony Scaramucci ([10:43])

• "Trump is gonna survive this too... he's one of the luckiest son of bitches on the planet. Every time he flips the coin, it comes up his way." — Anthony Scaramucci ([36:30])

• "It's making a coarser society... We were supposed to have some consensus, some compromise, some civility with each other. And Trump doesn't like that." — Anthony Scaramucci ([47:02])

• "Gerrymandering. Everybody is. When the politician picks the voter in a liberal democracy, the voter is supposed to pick the politician. And so these guys have totally corrupted the system." — Anthony Scaramucci ([06:42])

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This summary encapsulates the key discussions from the "Pivot" episode, providing listeners with a comprehensive overview of the topics covered, enriched with notable quotes and clear sectioning for ease of understanding.

Transcript

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[Kara Swisher]

Who's smart? Who in that administration? I know you probably are. Not a Lutnick fan would be my guess.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, you mean Howard Butnik? Buttlick? Nutlik. You're allowed to say Nutlik on the Pivot.

[Kara Swisher]

You're allowed whatever. Hi everyone, this is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher and guess what kicks off today?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

God Gree. August.

[Kara Swisher]

That's right. It's the first week of Scot Free August when the dog's away and the jungle cat gets to experiment with a bunch of different co hosts. And today I'm with the one and only Anthony Scaramucci Mooch the Mooch. A lawyer, podcaster, founder and managing partner at Skybridge Capital. And you remember that he did a quick 11 day stint in the White House during President Trump's first term, but that's in the past, Actually, I don't think about that as much in. Anthony, welcome.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

All right, well, I'm very flattered. I appreciate that. You're never invited into my apartment or my kitchen. Kara, you'll have to stay in the living room when you come over. I just want to make sure you know that. Thank you.

[Kara Swisher]

No, I'm going to look through all your things.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

And you guys, by the way, that was incredible. That was a plus trolling Kara Swisher. A plus trolling.

[Kara Swisher]

He's referring to a video of me in Scott's apartment looking through his things, which I do constantly. And if I came to your apartment, I'd be right up in your medicine chest, just so you know.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

And you would learn that I have a lot of skin products.

[Kara Swisher]

Uh huh.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Okay. Lots of shrimp, semen.

[Kara Swisher]

What do you have? What is it?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

No, I haven't gone into that yet. I probably should talk to some of the actresses about that. But no, I just said just general stuff. Retin a and things like that. Brnova.

[Kara Swisher]

All right, well, what would be the craziest thing I would find in your closet?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Oh, man, there's too many crazy. I mean, the craziest thing that you would find in my closet is the original hood from Batman in the 1966 television series with Adam West. With Adam West. I purge. I'm a superhero, kid. I grew up with comics and superheroes and was four or five years old when he was on tv and I thought he was hip and cool. I used to own the Batmobile. I owned the Batman Returns Batmobile, the one where Danny DeVito played the Penguin. And Michael Keaton was in the movie with Michelle Pfeiffer. She was the cabinet.

[Kara Swisher]

I know this. What do you mean you owned it? Where did you put it?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You didn't have a story. Well, that was the big issue for many years. It cost a lot of money to store. Lots of expensive.

[Kara Swisher]

What did it cost to buy? What did it cost to buy?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

So that car's probably worth about $3 million now. I bought the car for 150,000. Yeah, 150,000. This is 20 years ago. I sold it for 300. But if I kept would have been a great investment. But you know what? I didn't keep it. And life goes on. But I.

[Kara Swisher]

Did you drive it?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yes, I did. Yeah. It's on an F150 frame. It does not drive well. Fr there's a little propane tank in the back. It's not registered. You can't insure it. It's a Show car. But there is a button that you can click and it shoots the propane flame out of the back.

[Kara Swisher]

That sounds dangerous. That sounds very dangerous.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You know, if you're an overgrown 12 year old, it's one of the funnest things you can own.

[Kara Swisher]

Can I ask you a personal question? Do you put on that outfit, the Adam Weston? Did you get it dry cleaned? Yeah.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I'm gonna bring my wife on the podcast. She'll let you know. I chase her around in the bedroom with the hood and the cape. I actually don't do that, but I wish I did that. But I don't do that.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah. You know what? I love Adam Woods. I like when he used to dance. Remember he used to dance.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Remember the swivel? The swivel.

[Kara Swisher]

When he danced. You didn't buy the Robin outfit? You didn't do that?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I didn't buy the Robin outfit, no. Burt Ward was obviously a very colorful, fun guy, but I identified more with the aloof Batman.

[Kara Swisher]

All right, when I come over, you're putting that thing on and we're having some fun. We're having some fun. I don't know what we're going to do.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Definitely hiding that from you.

[Kara Swisher]

No way. That is, now that I know. Anyway. I'm so thrilled you're here. So much to talk to you about. You are a very canny observer of everything that's happening. But we've got tons to get to, including maga's war chest, which is huge nuclear submarines and the latest on the Epstein saga. I'm excited to hear what you have to say. But first, Democratic members of the Texas House of Representatives have fled the state in an attempt to stop Republicans from adopting a redrawn congressional map. The Republican state legislature has been pushing for a map that flips five Democratic congressional districts in favor of Republicans. Governor Greg Abbott called the departure of the Democrats an abandonment or forfeiture of an elected state office, saying he would take steps to remove the missing Democrats if they don't return. And then, of course, a lot of Democratic governors, including Gavin Newsom, are threatening to do the same in their states. Thoughts on this strategy?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Terrible, terrible strategy. They should get together and declare a detente. Statewide detente. People like you and me, it's very important for us to explain to the American people what they're doing. Okay. Gerrymandering. Everybody is. When the politician picks the voter in a liberal democracy, the voter is supposed to pick the politician. And so these guys have totally corrupted the system. The Republicans did this better than the Democrats. Early on there was something called Operation Red Map, Kara, you probably remember that they went into the state, local legislators, the Koch family was big donors to this and they influenced the local elections to get the local elections to redistrict the congressional districts. Trump is looking at the map and he's thinking to himself, I'm gonna lose the House. I'm not a popular president. He's below 40%. I'm gonna lose the House. He calls up Governor Abbott and says, I need five Republican congressional seats. And this will cause an escalation of complete nonsense. You and I both know that the American leaders were once public servants. We're now in the age of public self servants. They're serving themselves.

[Kara Swisher]

Nice way to put it.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

And they're doing terrible things to the American people. And this is an example of that.

[Kara Swisher]

So what happens here? What is the game? If they do this and they get these Democratic legislators back? They can't take them out of office. Or maybe they can in Texas. They probably can't.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

No, but they'll get them back to force the vote and cause the redistricting, which is legal and is allowable, to cause the redistricting of the districts, which will allow more Republicans on a percentage basis into those districts. And then the Democrats will probably lose those House seats. And so Newsom is saying, okay, I can do that. There's some Republican districts here in California. Let me get the chainsaw out and let me redistrict. And so, I mean, this is something people should know. Very, very bad. We would need a constitutional amendment, frankly, to end gerrymandering. Maybe AI could pick the districts, make the districts flat, make the districts even. It would cut the extremists in the society, but would also end the redundancy of incumbency. Okay, and so that's what's going on.

[Kara Swisher]

Right? So if Abbott does this, should Newsom do the same thing?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, he will do it. No, no. So if Abbott does it, he will definitely do it. And then you'll have an escalation and you'll have a. You'll have an escalating war. You know, you're asking me if he should. In a normative world, they should de. Escalate. They should cut the nonsense they're not serving. But there's something that someday we're all going to have to write about. Maybe you and I won't be here, I don't know. But 50 years from now, someone will write, what the hell? How did this orange spray tanned maniac get a hold of one of these parties? Like this, where everybody is crippled with moral weakness, moral depravity, and just literally allowing him to do whatever the hell he wants. And he laughs at these, by the way. I know the guy. So when they're kissing his ass, Kara, he's laughing at them. You know, he's picking up the phone, he's calling his friend Kara Swisher to say, ha, ha, ha. Can you believe Governor Abbott is actually willing to do this for me? You know he's doing that, right?

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah. Yeah, he loves that. So, speaking of which, he said he planned to appoint a new commissioner for the Bureau of Labor Statistics over the next three or four days. He fired the head of the agency last week following a jobs report that showed weak hiring in July, a major downward revisions to jobs created in May and June. These revisions happen all the time, by the way. The jobs numbers. Phony and rigged. His favorite two words. And offered no evidence except my opinion. His economic adviser, Kevin Hassett, who's quite a minion, defended the move in an interview with Kristen Welker on Meet the Press. Let's listen. Is the president prepared to fire anyone who reports data that he disagrees with?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

No, absolutely not. The president wants his own people there so that when we see the numbers, they're more transparent and more reliable. And if there are big changes and big revisions, we expect more big revisions for the jobs data in September, for example. Then we want to know why. We want people to explain it to us.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, they need to be explained to. We've seen this firing routine from Trump many times, as you well know. But is he taking it to a whole new level here? Your thoughts on this? Because you and your Wall street pals must be freaked out by this one.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah, well, I mean, listen, I mean, I don't think anybody on Wall Street's freaked out anymore. I mean, that was a freak out moment in 2018. In this moment now, you're going to expect anything from Donald Trump. You may remember this. It's sort of obscure now, but Jack Welch, the very high profile CEO of ge, questioned the job reports numbers under the Obama administration once. And so this is a political tactic. I find those statistics, like the CBO to be very nonpartisan. The numbers are the numbers. I will say that they can be antiquated, though. Carr, you know the cliche statistics are lies. There are damn lies and then there are statistics. We can make statistics look any way that we want. And so I don't think it's the right thing to do, to do that. He would be better advised to say, okay, how are we getting this data now? And can this data be sourced better and sourced in real time, given all the great technology we have in the country to make the data a little bit less laggy and a little bit more accurate in real time? And so he's not going do that. But here's the irony, and I push this back to you for a second. This data supports a rate cut, and so he's railing on Jerome Powell. What I don't understand is why didn't he take the data and say, this is purely voracious data, it's absolutely accurate. And this more emphasizes that the Federal Reserve chair and the board there is on the wrong side of where rates are.

[Kara Swisher]

So why didn't he?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You know, it's an interesting question because I think his knee jerk reaction was, oh, shit, the economy's doing way worse than it did under Joe Biden. And of course, I can't let my minions, because these people will believe anything I say. Can shoot people on Fifth Avenue, deny them on the Epstein list. I can do all these different things. And so let me keep the narrative going that there's another conspiracy afoot and that they're lying about the statistics because it's an Obama Biden legacy appointee and their group in there doing the statistics. But he would have been better served actually to say, hey, this is accurate. Where is Jerome Powell? Why is he not cutting rates? Cuz Trump clearly wants a rate cut for various different reasons. So that's the irony there. I'm surprised he didn't go in that direction.

[Kara Swisher]

Who could he appoint here that would satis. Will Wall street freak out about this or not at all?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I don't think so. I think Wall street has said to themselves, and this is the weird thing about Wall Street, Wall street says that this guy's gone in three and a half years, but I submit back to Wall Street. Do you know anybody that builds a $200 million ballroom onto their house and then moves out in three and a half years? I'm just pointing that out to people. The guy's making expansive renovations to the White House. Doesn't smell like a guy that wants to leave anytime soon. So I think we're gonna be up for a potential fight there. But I think Wall street looks at this and says, okay, this guy's leaving in three and a half years. There'll be a cleanup on aisle seven. He's breaking all the pickle jars at the local supermarket. There'll be a cleanup. There'll either be a in or a non personality cult member, because I do believe this is a personality cult. And it will die off with Trump. Someone else will come in and be a little bit more normal. Won't be able to get away with the nonsense that Trump is getting away with. And so Wall Street's like, okay, we can live with this for three and a half years. Tariffs are ridiculous. Guys like Jamie Dimon are saying, so far, so good. But you know, they're mumbling in the back room saying, what a disaster. Jason Furman actually had a great piece in the New York Times over the weekend describing that the tariffs are not going to cause a Great Recession or a potential depression, but they are slowing down the economy and they are slowing down capital allocation decisions in the economy. And it's frankly starting to show up in the data. So again, the MAGA narrative is hopefully, ho ho, still got a strong economy despite our tariffs, but the real narrative should be, no, the tariffs haven't fully kicked in yet.

[Kara Swisher]

Right. So speaking of that, he's continuing his mission to upend global trade. He launched a new round of tariffs targeting over 60 US trading partners and set take effect August 7th. They keep moving these dates. These tariffs range from about 10% to 40%. Canada is at 35%, India is at 25%, which Trump says he's going to increase because India is buying oil from Russia. And somewhat inexplicably, Switzerland is at 39% already signaling more tariffs to come, including pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, and critical minerals. The markets initially fell on the tariff news as well as in the jobs report. They seem to have rebounded as Monday morning. As you say, they're just sort of a wait and see kind of thing. Or is Wall street actually concerned, even if they're trashing them behind the scenes?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, I think Wall street thinks that all of this stuff ends up at about 10%, possibly 15, but terrible, but tolerable. I think that's how Wall street looks at it. I don't think that 39% number that you're referencing in Switzerland is going to stick. I think that's a remnant number from April 2nd. You remember when he came down?

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, that crazy.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

No, he's like Orange Moses coming down from Mount Evil with the tablet. He's like walking in, no one knows what the hell he's talking about. I think that's one of those things that's left over the 39% and I think that's gonna get reversed. I know the Swiss government is frantic about getting that reverse or working on it right now. And I think that will, I think these things settle out 10 to 15. The person that's handled Trump better than anybody, my opinion, is Mark Carney. Mark Carney's held the ground there. There's no way that the American economy can have a 35% reciprocal tariff with Canada. It's not sustainable. You'll knock everybody out of business. You have lobstermen that are buying, they're catching lobster in US waters, but they're sending it across the border to have it processed in Canadian processing fans and then sent back. So you'll knock the price up 70% in terms of the way the tariffs work. You'll put everybody out of business. You hurt the restaurant industry, which most.

[Kara Swisher]

Businesses have been absorbing until now, Right? They've been sort of.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah, look at the GM print. GM lost a billion dollars by absorbing the cost. But you know who isn't absorbing it? Car is Las Vegas. Las Vegas is not absorbing it because they've lost the Canadian tourists, they've lost the UK Tourists, they've lost the guys coming in from Australia that used to gamble and go crazy. In Las Vegas, you have no tax on tips, but you have a 50% reduction in revenue for the people that are receiving the tips. So Trump's nonsense, his rhetoric has really hurt tourism. I mean, there's an estimate of about 80 to, to $90 billion of tourist revenues that have been lost in the U.S. and so rhetoric matters when you're the president. These tariffs though Wall street again, saying 10 to 15%, somebody smart will come in and revise these things.

[Kara Swisher]

Who's smart? Who in that administration? I know you probably are not a Lutnick fan would be my guess.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, I mean, Howard, but lick Nutlik. You're allowed to say Nutlik on the pit.

[Kara Swisher]

You're allowed whatever.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Coward. Nutlik. Is that what you're talking about?

[Kara Swisher]

Is that who we're talk, who I'm talking about?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I mean, you know, the guy's unbelievable. I mean, I know Howard a long time.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, I bet.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

But Howard, if you said to me there's a picture in the dictionary of Potomac Fever, okay, it would be Howard Ludnick. Okay? Potomac Fever. I'm in the mix. I'm driving around in the Secret Service van.

[Kara Swisher]

I'm an important guy.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I'm an important guy. The phone calls are coming in and I'm going to have this very smug, arrogant, jerk off smile on television every time I'm talking. I'm gonna be pedantic and I'm gonna be demeaning to the interviewers. I mean, come on, Howard, I don't know what you took the wrong pill. The side effects of Potomac Fever are career ruining and he's heading in that direction. He should really calm down and get a grounding wire up his ass and calm himself down a little bit.

[Kara Swisher]

Who do you like there? Who do you think? Besson.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Kevin's a good guy. Hastert's a very smart, he's a reasonable guy. He steered the president away from some of the really bad things. Besant or however you pronounce his name. I know Scott a long time. I think he is a person. If you talk to the Wall street guys that really know him, he's blocked Trump on a few things even to the point where I think he said I can't do this and so you may have to find somebody else. Of course Trump capitulates when you tell him that particularly somebody like Bessant where he needs him him remember something about Treasury. Trump doesn't give a shit about Treasury. Trump wants the trains to run on time. He wants the bills for the American government to be paid and he wants the taxes collected. The places he really cares about are justice. That's a place he really cares about. Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense. Okay. So it's very important to him that he has full on sycophants in those roles. But Bessant, he's smart enough to know that he needs somebody that Wall street going to accept. And of course it's been reported. So it's worth talking about. Jamie Dimon is now in direct conversations with the president and he's a very moderate guy and he's trying to guide the president towards doing things that are less stupid. Frankly.

[Kara Swisher]

That's what he's there for. Yeah, that was an interesting. I was like, oh, I see.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I like Jamie. He's probably the smartest of all of us.

[Kara Swisher]

He's probably giving very good advice to him. And Trump probably looks up to him in a weird way or in some level has not respect but just probably thinks he's smarter than him and so we'll listen to him. So one of the things though that doesn't feel too smart. Speaking of State Department, he's ordered two US nuclear subs to reposition near Russia just in case. That move was in response to a series of fiery social media posts from former Russian President Medvedev. Medvedev warned in one post that each new ultimatum Trump issues over the Ukraine is a threat and a step toward war. And the Kremlin has responded to Trump's move saying we believe everyone should be very careful about nuclear rhetoric. I would agree with that. Trump is also threatening sanctions unless Russia ends the war by August 8, which is the end of this week. But Putin has dismissed pressure for a ceasefire. Talk about what he's doing here from your perspective.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, I mean, saber rattling, I don't think it's a much ado about nothing. I think it's a good, good news story. It shows his base that he has some muscularity. I think the Iranian hit showed some muscularity. His base likes that.

[Kara Swisher]

Why he is threatening them when he spent his almost both administrations sucking up to them is really interesting to me. Why now? Why here?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, he doesn't have a choice. Well, okay, well, I can answer that. So what's happening to Trump is that the lame duck clock is ticking. He's 18 months away from being a full on lame duck. And there's a little bit of flex by some of the conservative Republicans that are for Democratic freedoms. And there's also some institutional memory in the Congress, particularly the Senate, related to the security guarantees that President Clinton signed in 1994. The Ukraine government gave up their nukes in exchange for these security guarantees. So there are a group of institutional systems and McConnells, the thunes that have gone to Trump and said, hey, you're not being tough enough. You've got to help these guys more. We can have a defeated Ukraine government at this point. And so Trump is under the gun. He's afraid of Putin. I think we have to state that publicly. I always tell people, if the window's open, Kara, and you hear clippity clop, it's a horse, it's not a zebra. You got to look at the obvious. They've got something on him that scares the living shit out of him and he won't move against Putin. And you have to say to yourself, well, Putin's got a declining country. His GDP now is 14% smaller than Italy. He's got a failed Defense Department or War Department. Just look at what's going on there. And so how could a very rich man, which Trump is, who runs the largest military and arguably one of the most powerful nations in the history of the world, be kowtowing to Vladimir Putin? And the answer is they got something on him and they got something on them that scares the living daylights out of them.

[Kara Swisher]

And yet he rattles the sabers here. Why? Just for.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Because he has to. Because I know Trump's personality. So he's a great compartmentalist. He's got pressure on him from these congressional leaders. And so he has to do something, but he never does the thing thing. He'll say 50 days, he'll say 10 days, he'll say 22 days. But he never, never does it because he's so afraid of Putin. He could bitch slap Putin super hard. He could send those himars. He could send more Patriot batteries, He could get permission to launch a few ICBMs into Russia from Ukraine territory. He could do all those things and it would probably collapse the Putin government and it would probably cause a replacement of Vladimir Putin. Of course, we'd have to worry about that. From an intelligence perspective, there could be harder, right? Radicals, maybe. We don't want Putin necessarily replace as much as we want him contained. But there's a lot of things that Trump could do. He's not willing to do them because he's scared shit of Vladimir Putin.

[Kara Swisher]

Okay, Anthony, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump's super PAC rakes in the cash. And we'll talk Epstein as well.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well.

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[Kara Swisher]

Support for this show comes from Deleteme. Even if you haven't personally been a victim of identity theft, harassment or doxy, you probably know someone who has. We're all online all the time and we've all unfortunately left a breadcrumb trail for data brokers. Those people who compile your personal information and sell it. But DeleteMe makes it easy, quick and safe to remove your personal data online. At a time when surveillance and data breaches are common enough to make everyone vulnerable. I think it's really important for people to do this. I am a huge privacy person around my stuff and I have been shocked by the stuff that I found on DeleteMe, especially as they assemble stuff about me in in like old addresses, all these things, addresses I've forgotten. And it just sort of creates a profile of me that is actually pretty accurate and also is wrong in many ways. So take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for Deleteme now at a special discount for our listeners. Get 20% off your Delete Me plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com pivot and use the promo code Pivot at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to JoinDeleteMe.com pivot and and enter the code PIVOT at checkout. That's JoinDeleteMe.com pivot CodePivot Support for Pivot comes from LinkedIn. From talking about sports, discussing the latest movies, everyone is looking for a real connection to the people around them. But it's not just person to person, it's the same connection that's needed in business. And it can be the hardest part about B2B marketing finding the right people, making the right connection connections. But instead of spending hours and hours scavenging social media feeds, you can just tap LinkedIn ads to reach the right professionals. According to LinkedIn, they have grown to a network of over 1 billion professionals, making it stand apart from other ad buys. You can target your buyers by job title, industry, company role, seniority, skills and company revenue, giving you all the professionals you need to reach in one place. So you can stop wasting budget on the wrong audience and start targeting the right professionals only on LinkedIn. LinkedIn will even give you a hundred dollar credit on your next campaign, so you can try it for yourself. Just go to LinkedIn.com pivotpod that's LinkedIn.com pivotpod terms and conditions apply only on LinkedIn ads. Anthony we're back. Maga Inc. Donald Trump's main super PAC is currently sitting on a war chest of nearly $200 million, according to FEC filing. Donors include Elon Musk, who gave $15 million to MAGA and the other GOP PACs just weeks after his spat with Trump. Venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, who's always creepily around the basket and TikTok investor Jeffrey Yass. Contributions also came in from crypto executives, an energy, which makes sense to me, an energy company and a mother seeking a pardon for her son who got one. A spokeswoman for MAGA Inc. Rejected claims that the donations were exchanged for accessing trust. Trump, quote, cannot be bought and works toward the best interest of the country. It feels pay to play to me. New York Times had a pretty devastating piece about that. But does the money go towards helping Republicans in the midterms or is Trump really considering that third term which you referenced just a second ago?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, I think you have to take Trump seriously about him wanting a third term and I think you have to take Steve Bannon seriously about him running for a third term. Now up against that, he'll be 82 years old. It looks like he does have some vascular issues. I mean, they've reported that. So let's say that that's probably true and he's got an unsteady gait and he's getting older. But I don't think a guy like him leaves power easily. I just don't think that. And so I hope that, and I hope that my buddies who are institutionalists in Washington say that that's the last stand for them, that they'll fight that tooth and nail. Those are Republicans saying that who I'm still a donor to several of these Republican senators, but I don' I don't know. You have to take him literally and seriously when he's thinking about these things. I don't think that money goes to lots of people in the midterms. Trump is for Trump. He's not for other people. He doesn't give a shit. And so I think this is something very smart that he's done though. And I think people should understand this. He's not a traditional politician. A traditional politician, an Obama, a George W. Bush stops raising money in their second term for their own PACs. He didn't do that. That and I think he's now setting a precedent for future politicians to not do that because that will give him, let's say he was a normal politician. He'd go, I got leverage now in the system long after I'm lame ducked and I can pick and choose who I'm going to give this money to in different congressional races. I don't think Trump's going to do that. Trump will figure out a way to use that money. I think the pardons are going up now, probably $100 million now for a pardon I think they started at the 3 to 5 million dollars level, and Trump should just put out a retail price list, you know, say, look, here's the list for all the shit that you can get from me. You know, you want to come have dinner with me? You're a crypto guy. 5 million. You want a pardon, now it's gotta be 100 million.

[Kara Swisher]

Because you didn't go to that dinner, did you? Did you go to that dinner?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

No, I haven't seen or been around Trump. You want to know the last time I talked to Trump?

[Kara Swisher]

When?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

It was April. It was Easter Sunday, April of 2019. He called me. I thought he was calling me to wish me a Happy Easter, but he wasn't. He was calling me to lay into me, because I had written an article that said that it was an open letter to the President. The press is not the enemy of the people. Stop saying that. The press is there to protect the people, but it's also the font of our financial innovation. You and I have talked about this, being able to speak freely in a society. You teach second grade children that they can speak freely. They go on and become Kara Swisher, or they create a Facebook or they create an iPhone. Other countries that don't do that, they have to steal our technology. Trump got really pissed at me, laid into me, and he told me that I was a deep stater and some other shit that he said, and that was the last time he spoke. So, no, I haven't been around Trump since then.

[Kara Swisher]

Happy Easter.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah, Happy Easter.

[Kara Swisher]

What do you say when someone says that?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Okay, I disagree, and I think you're being wrong. I think you're wrong. I think history is going to judge what I'm saying. To be more right than you.

[Kara Swisher]

Right.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

And then he more or less abruptly hung up the phone. But I got in the Happy Easter, by the way, he did. He did derisively say Happy Easter back to me. Yeah, he's a miserable dude. You know? He's a miserable dude. Let me give a news flash to every pivot listener, okay?

[Kara Swisher]

Okay.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Anybody close to Trump hates his guts. Okay?

[Kara Swisher]

Okay.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

If you're in Trump's orbit, you're in the first electron orbit.

[Kara Swisher]

Lor Lumer seems to like him.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Who does?

[Kara Swisher]

Laura Loomer. Yeah.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You know, I think Laura's not in the. I don't think she's in the first electron orbit.

[Kara Swisher]

Right?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I'm talking about you gotta be in the first electron orbit. You're Melania Trump. You move out of the goddamn White House. You know, you Gotta get. If you're Ivanka and Jared, you gotta stay away. Cause he eviscerated Jared after the Abraham Accord thing. And so you gotta get out of his electron orbit. But if you're in the vortex of the orbit. General Kelly HR McMaster, you pick the person. They hate the guy's guts because they see how malevolent of a guy is. They see how dishonest and how ruthless he is. And that shit rubs off on you. Kara Swisher. If you're sitting around it too long, it's toxic.

[Kara Swisher]

Sounds like it.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah. You start to stink like it.

[Kara Swisher]

Speaking of toxic, let's do a quick rundown of latest happenings with the Epstein saga, which I predicted would continue. And it is. Charlemagne Lagarde suggested the Trump administration's handling of the Epstein information is causing a political coup among Republicans. On Fox News, Trump reacted to On Truth Social, saying the radio host knows nothing. Ghislaine Maxwell has been moved to a minimum security prison camp in Texas against sexual offenders aren't allowed there, but she has been allowed. And Republicans are still split on which side to take. As polling shows, almost 80% of Trump voters in favor of releasing the files. I have not talked to you about this. Thoughts on what's happening and how long it lasts because everyone felt it was a distraction. I never did. Because it's at the core of QAnon. It's at the core of the deep state stuff. And he himself has fed these toxic creatures for far too long for them to just give up.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I think he's gonna survive this too. I mean, maybe I'm on the other side of this trade than you. I think he survives.

[Kara Swisher]

Oh, I think he survives it. I just think it's damaging.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

That's what I'm. Yeah, well, I think it's damaging. And maybe Charlemagne's right. It sets up a 26 divergence, meaning there could be conservative Republicans that say, I'm Maga Lite, or I'm a little less Maga. I'm MAGA without pedestrian.

[Kara Swisher]

You see Margaret Taylor GRE doing it constantly.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah, maybe I'm MAGA without pedophilia. I don't. That could be a good bumper sticker. I don't. You know, I'm. I'm. You know, I'm. I'm 18 plus. I'm not 14 and below these disgusting sons of bitches. But. But Trump is, you know, he's. Where there's smoke, there's fire. Okay? You can't see him with Epstein. You can't. There's smoke. There's fire there. The letter has got Trump so crazed. Because the letter, plus the doodling on the letter, is implying something that Trump does not want out there in the marketplace, which is why he's put a $10 billion speed bump together against Rupert Murdoch and a News Corp. But Rupert doesn't give a shit. Rupert hates Trump like everybody else, and his attitude is. I'm 94. Have at it. Let me drop a few more bombs on you. We have the bombs. Okay? So now, now, again, you have to tell me if there's something unthinkably nefarious. I'm not going to say what it is, but you know what it is, and your viewers and listeners know what it is. If that comes out and it's incontrovertible, it's not AI generated, it's not any of that. It's incontrovertible evidence of something unthinkably nefarious. Is that enough to remove Trump? I think you think it is. Oh, the McCain thing's gonna ruin him. Doesn't ruin Trump him. Oh, we're gonna grab him by the. You know what, in the. In the bus with Billy Bush. No, it doesn't. Nothing hurts Trump. It could damage him.

[Kara Swisher]

The insurrection.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

The insurrection. I mean, the people are dying. He fomented the violence. They have him on tape doing it. They had his former chief of staff, basically, was gonna be their key witness. He wins the election. I think we should stipulate for the pivot people. He's one of the luckiest son of a bitches on the planet. Every time he flips the coin, it comes up his way. So I don't think he gets knocked out by this, but I do think that just Ghislaine thing is interesting. See? So the Ghislaine thing is like, okay, let me send my lawyer, who I trust. Hey, let me knock on the. Ghislaine, are you there? Hello? Are you there? Okay, listen, listen. I know you know a lot of bad stuff. Keep your mouth shut, we're gonna move you to a minimum security prison. We're gonna make it easier for you. You listening? And then in about six months, when this blows over, we're gonna commute your sentence, or we're gonna give you work relief, or we're gonna do something for you. But you gotta keep your mouth shut. It's a great mob move. They're doing it right out in the open, like the way the KGB would do it.

[Kara Swisher]

So it's keep your mouth shut. Cause if she starts to just tell on Democrats That's a problem, too, correct?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

No, no, no. You got to keep your mouth shut. You got to keep your mouth shut.

[Kara Swisher]

Because Omerta, as us Italians, you and.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Me know, you gotta keep your mouth shut. That's like a full on Sicilian move, the code of silence. And by the way, with Omerta, you keep your mouth shut. We're gonna take. Remember when a mobster went to jail? Keep your mouth shut. We're gonna take care of your family. And they're gonna get vig from our operations to take care of your sons and daughters and your wife. And when you come out of jail, we're gonna get you, Jeff. Now, you can end up like Sylvester Stallone in Oklahoma, but you're going to get a job, right? And so that's what it is. And that's what Trump and Todd Blanche are trying to do. I think that's pretty obvious. But this is the thing that makes me laugh. John Thune, you're an American jellyfish. I mean, you should write. You write such great books, like Burn Book and shit like that. You should write the American Jellyfish starring John thune and Mitch McConnell starring, starting the American Jellyfishes. What are you guys doing? You're really this big of cowards. You got a guy that's morally depraved. He's bringing down your party. He's a millstone on the morality of the American people. When you and I were growing up, we like to think of America in our patriotism as benevolent and generous and good natured America that was going to help. Help other nations. And now we have this morally depraved lunatic in the White House that's stealing our thunder and is reducing our soft power all over the world, which is never a good thing for a superpower, by the way. You can go throughout 5,000 years of history and know that's never a good thing. And yet he's doing that. We're allowing him to do that because we got a bunch of bozos that are supposed to check him. The American Jellyfishes. What are you guys doing? And the answer is no. No. We're gonna wait Trump out. Wait him out. We're so afraid of him and we're afraid of his MAGA base.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah. So why, when do they turn? Is there?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, yeah, the midterm. That's why Trump has got all that money in the war chest. He knows they're coming for him in the midterms. You remember that scene in the wizard of Oz where the witch gets accidentally hit by the water bucket? And she starts melting, right? It's actually like an orange witch, though. He's not really like the green witch, but he's like an orange wicked witch of the West Wing. The water's about to hit Trump, okay? And that's like a November 2026 water hit. And as he starts to melt, these guys are going, oh, you know, we didn't mean this, or, oh, we didn't realize this, or, oh, we're sorry about this.

[Kara Swisher]

If he melts, if in fact, water hits.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Let me say this to you, and I want you to really think about this, okay? They're running around saying they're going to arrest Clinton, Hillary Clinton. They're going to arrest Barack Obama, okay? It's all contraindicated from an intelligence report that the head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Marco Rubio, signed off on, which was irrefutable, that everything that they're saying is not true. Why are they doing that? They're doing that to distract you. They're doing that to rev up the MAGA base. They're doing that to say, don't look at the man behind the curtain that's flapping behind the curtain. Focus on this, which is important to you. Obama is bad. There's underlying racism to that, by the way. I think you know that. So I think.

[Kara Swisher]

Obviously, I just don't think it works. I don't think it works. I think the Epstein stuff is such strong.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

No, it hasn't worked yet. He's tried with the Washington Redskin commanders and the Cleveland Guardian Indians. He's now going at it with. With the young woman who was in the Gene commercial. I think her name was Sydney Sweeney. And, yeah, so he's definitely trying stuff. Remember, he's the Napoleon of the culture war. The best thing that Trump has going for him are the Democrats, because he knows how to drop a bomb on the battlefield and they run towards it. And then he's doing something over here. He's master of deflection.

[Kara Swisher]

All right, we're gonna get to that next. Actually, we're gonna go on a quick break. When we come back, we're gonna talk about the Corporation for Public Broadcasting as it wind operations, because there are very real repercussions to everything he's doing with these distractions. Support for the show comes from Chevrolet. These days, people everywhere are looking for ways to cut back on spending and keep a bit of green in their wallets. It's time to check out The Chevy Equinox EV. The Equinox EV. LT is America's most affordable EV. To boast over 315 miles of range and an EPA estimate estimated 319 mile range on a full charge with front wheel drive. Based on a comparison of MSRPs and starting around $34,995. Equinox EV is a steal, offering you a value you can count on. With its bold, commanding presence and athletic styling, you're sure to move ahead with confidence While a massive 17 inch diagonal center touchscreen helps you stay connected along the way with styl tech and great value value, the Equinox EV is the smart choice. Learn [e-mail] Equinox EV the manufacturer's suggested retail price excludes tax, title, license, dealer fees and optional equipment dealer sets final price support for the show comes from Framer. Kids today, they never understand what we went through back in the day. Building a website, for instance, used to be a lot of time and a lot of money, so you only did it if you could afford the overhead and really needed it. Nowadays there are incredible tools like Framer that can build the website of your dreams fast. No coding required. Framer is a design first, no code website builder that lets anyone ship a product ready site in minutes. That means you have the freedom to build a website that is professional, polished and uniquely yours. No code and no compromises. Built in AI will handle ahead heavy lifting. By generating starter layouts and then coding behind the scenes, you'll be able to a b test your design, set up funnels, see exactly where people click, all from one place. Ready to build a site that looks hand coded without hiring a developer? Launch your site for [e-mail] and use the code pivot to get your first month of pro on the house. That's framert.com promo code pivot framert.com promo code pivot rules and restrictions apply.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Buy.

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[Kara Swisher]

Anthony we're back with more news. The corporation Republic Broadcasting says it will begin winding down operations following an over $1 billion cut in federal funding. The move it's not very big. It's about 100 people. The move will what they do is they distribute funds out to local stations, a lot of them rural. By the way, the move will severely impact local operations of PBS and npr. Both NPR and PBS say they're committed to maintaining service after the closure. The CPB told employees most positions will be eliminated on Sept. This is a loss of local news in rural communities. This is a closing not of the big NPR stations or not PBS stations, but the small ones which provide all kinds of news and other things like that in places that don't have them. And I'm gonna link it with institutions worried about losing funding. The Smithsonian will restore information about President Trump's impeachments after removing a placard on the topic in July. This was reported by the Washington Post. The museum says the placard was removed after a review of legacy content, which was demanded by the Trump administration, was meant to be a temporary addition to a 25 year exhibition. The exhibition in question notes that only three presidents have seriously faced removal Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton. It's not true, pearson, familiar with the plans, told the Washington Post. The content review took place following this pressure from the White House to remove an art museum director. So museums altering history, closing down of long institutions, which is something Republicans have wanted for a while, but it will actually affect the small local news and rural communities more than anybody else. This is more than a distraction. Cause it actually Things happen. Things actually happen.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I mean this is Trump. Look, there were certain rules in Washington. The sacred cow of the left was the public broadcasters. Ronald Reagan railed on it, but he never did anything. Remember Ronald Reagan railed on Roe v. Wade but never did anything. And Trump has come into town and he's basically now saying, hey, those sacred rules where we rail on, you're on the left and you rail on something on the right and you don't do anything and vice versa, we're ending that. And again, I think it makes for a coarser society if you're asking me practically, will the society survive the end of that? It will. Does it suck for those rural areas? It does. But it will survive it. Okay, and could something else creep up or could there be a publicly funded or non publicly funded, a charitably funded replacement? It's all very possible, but I think to me it's more about the rules, Kara. It's more about, okay, we're going to smash people. We don't want any civility to our government. We don't want anybody having lunch in the cloak room or the cafeteria. They can barely work, apparently. They can barely work out with each other in the gym now they're in separate areas of the gym. And it's just bad for America. That's not how we got here. The idea was that we were gonna have some consensus, we're gonna have some compromise and we're gonna have some civility with each other. And Trump doesn't like that because remember, there's nobody that Trump hates more than himself. Nobody. Which is why he's always got three things of a self hater. Humiliation rituals for people that you're insecure around. That's every world leader, he tries to bring them into the White House and ensnare them in some type of humiliation ritual.

[Kara Swisher]

Public humiliation or.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah, or he'll bring them to Scotland. Catlin, even though he's the head of state, Keir Starmer, he's showing up as a guest in his own country to be humiliated where Trump is railing on the London mayor. And so what self haters do is they create and foment hatred. They excoriate and try to humiliate through humiliation rituals. And then the third thing they do is they want to leave a stain and legacy of the that they want people to be turned on each other because it makes them feel better. They get satisfaction out of seeing people turn on each other. Trump gets off on the idea that we're going after each other. He likes it. So those are the things he's a lot of weird things about the guy. He's like a weirdo. But the self hatred thing, do not underestimate the self hatred. You know, it could be the side effects of all the orange shit that's going into his bloodstream. You know what I mean?

[Kara Swisher]

Everyone talks about. These are distractions. You've said it several times. These are actual things that happen now. Like we're changing things in museums, we're closing down this. And so I was at a book fair this weekend and Jeff Goldberg, who has had some good licks in on Trump at the Atlantic was saying that he does all these distractions. And I almost got him and said, well, here's six things that actually happened because of the distractions. They weren't. They're not minor. We use that term a lot, but they're actually distractions with results. Right. Like this is something that the right has been trying to close down PBS for years, or the corporation for this. Years. Decades.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Okay, but let me just take the line. Think about what I'm saying, though. We're going to close down pbs, but because it's going to make people soar and it's a sacred cow that the Republicans always talked about but never did anything about. So now we're gonna drop a bomb here to widen the divide between us.

[Kara Swisher]

I see.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

And Trump wants to do that. So you have to understand that, yes, there are distractions, but there's also, I wanna leave a legacy of disrepair and hatred. And I want you guys to hate each other after I leave. Cause by the way, Jackie O f her, I'm going to pave over her Rose Garden. Okay? Because why am I going to do that? Because you're going to get triggered and pissed about that. And I want you triggered and pissed because I hate myself so much that I want hatred to be an exponential force from my personality. Monroe had a doctrine, stay out of the Western Hemisphere. Truman had a doctrine, we're going to contain communism to try. Trump doctrine is a manifestation of his own self hatred. And once you see that prism clearly and you see, oh, okay, he hates himself, so this is what he's gonna do. Oh, wow, he's really afraid of Putin. Putin must really have something on him that's scaring the living daylights out of him, which is why he's immobile and paralyzed against a guy that's running a failed state with a declining population and high alcohol in. But I'm going to go in that direction. But everything is through the prism of self hatred. So if he can hurt Yukara, he will. If he can humiliate you, he will. If he can put J.D. vance in a meme where he looks like a big fat Cabbage Patch doll riding in a separate clown car from him as they're chasing Obama on the freeway in the OJ Bronco, he will. And by the way, JD says, ha ha, this was funny. He's crying on the inside. He's crying on the inside.

[Kara Swisher]

That's another episode.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

No, but, Carrie, you have to understand, because Trump is gonna put him through. You remember that scene in Fargo where the Guy's going through the wood chipper. That's J.D. vance. Okay? TRUMP is gonna throw him so definitively into the wood chipper because he doesn't want a younger guy replacing him when he leaves. No, he wants there to be a total fiasco. It's civil war.

[Kara Swisher]

Who does he want? Just very briefly, who does he want? If you had a guess, who would he pick?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Nobody. No. Remember when he fired that blonde girl, can't remember her name. The plan woman from the first season of Apprentice. He replaced her with Ivanka. Remember, she got a few speaking gigs. It pissed him off. Right. And so then he put Ivanka. So Ivanka and Don Jr are not replacing him or Eric not replacing him. Nobody. You know, Remember? Remember what? Remember what it. I know. I'm not comparing Trump to his. But just remember this piece of history. When they told Hitler he was losing, he said, okay, great flood the coal mines, bring down the electrical grid in the country. And they looked at him and said, what? Yeah, well, if there's not going to be a thousand year Reich, let's destroy the whole thing.

[Kara Swisher]

If you had to pick one of the kids that he would pick to run, which one would it be?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Well, Ivanka's very smart. She's very talented, she's capable. Eric is a very smart guy. When I listen to Eric talk about things like the blockchain, he understands. Okay. But the heartbeat of MAGA is Donald Trump Jr. Okay. They like him. Okay. And so I don't know which of those three, but I think Trump would be happy with all three. But they're three different flavors. Ivanka's basically a Democrat, Right? So probably no on her. Eric is not politically motivated, but he's probably smarter than most people think. But it would have to be Don Jr. Don Jr. Is beloved by the base. If you ever see him with the base, you'll know they hold him in very high regard.

[Kara Swisher]

And do you.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Okay, so I have a peace agreement with those guys. When I got into the fight with Trump, I always got along with them. And my agreement with them was, don't say anything bad about me on Twitter. I won't say anything bad about you. Kara Swisher's gonna ask you about me on the Pivot podcast five years from now. Don't say anything bad about me. And I have lived up to that agreement, and they have lived up to that agreement. So I'll simply. I get on with those guys. Eric wanted to come to my bitcoin conference in Wyoming. I invited him. No problem. I think they know that their father wants to pick fights with lots and lots of people. And I don't think they want to be fighting with all the people that their father wants them to fight with.

[Kara Swisher]

Got that? Makes sense. All right, Anthony, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails.

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[Anthony Scaramucci]

We have to help on a humanitarian basis before we do anything. We have to get the kids fed.

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[Anthony Scaramucci]

This.

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[Kara Swisher]

Investigate a drive by shooting.

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Everything they did was recorded by a.

[Kara Swisher]

Camera crew for a TV show. Those camera people are allowed to ride around in police vehicles. They're allowed to be on the scene of crime scenes that are very active, that, you know, things have just happened, people have just died. Years later, the attorney general's office would.

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[Kara Swisher]

Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Hey, this is Peter Kafka, the host of Channels, a show about media and tech and what happens when they collide. And this may be hard to remember, but not very long ago, magazines were, were a really big deal. And the most important magazines were owned by Conde Nast, the glitzy publishing empire that's the focus of a new book by New York Times reporter Michael Grinbaum.

[Advertisement Speaker]

The way Conde Nast elevated its editors.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

The way they paid for their mortgages so they could live in beautiful homes.

[Kara Swisher]

There was a logic to it, which.

[Advertisement Speaker]

Was that Conde Nast itself became seen.

[Kara Swisher]

As this kind of enchanted land.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You can hear the rest of our country chat on channels wherever you listen to your favorite media podcast.

[Kara Swisher]

Okay, Anthony, let's hear some wins and fails. You go first.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Okay. So, so, so wins. I'm going to say this, you're probably not gonna like this, but I, I think Elon Musk is winning. I think he's backed into business. I think he raised a lot of money on Xai I participated in that. I will fully disclose that I'm an investor. But I think Elon Musk is winning and I think so much so. And I think Donald Trump is so afraid of Elon Musk.

[Kara Swisher]

He must be, that he started. He started the Epstein thing.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

He started the Epstein thing and he tweeted out, oh, I love Elon, I'm not coming after his businesses, you know, blah, blah. Okay? So I think Elon Musk is winning. So that's a big win he got.

[Kara Swisher]

He just. So people know, Tesla just granted shares to elon worth of $29 billion. Describing his.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah, so that's another big. That's another big win. Less than the 55 billion.

[Kara Swisher]

That's correct. I was like, it's a half, but.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You know, that's also a win. But I think Elon's winning, whether people like that or not. I think that's a definitive, objective win.

[Kara Swisher]

So you invested in Xai. You think that's a winner or. I think he's a real behind. He's really quite behind in the race compared to Google or ChatGPT.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You think he's behind? I don't know. I put $300 a month into Super Grok. I think the thing is phenomenal. Okay. And I think it's distinctive. But again, that's me. I'm not an AI expert. I'm just. I used it for different things. I'm a classic cloud. Claude, I guess is called subscriber, a chat. GBT subscriber.

[Kara Swisher]

You use them all. Use them all.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I, I do. I do spend a lot of time.

[Kara Swisher]

If Elon goes and does his businesses, he's better off, that's for sure. But I do think he is quite involved. He was the one that started the Epstein stuff. So he. That was a warning to Trump.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

So I'm. I'm going to tell you. I'm going to tell you another winner. I'll give you three winners and I'll give you three losers. Okay? Another big winner with controversial Jerome Pennsylvania Powell. Because Sean Powell's legacy is intact. Okay? The guy's done a decent job. Not perfect. He got transitory inflation wrong. It was more secular. But he's done a decent job. He's a good human being and he's one of the few guys that have stuck it to Trump a little bit. And he started in a very diplomatic way with some level of aplomb, and I think people need to learn about it that way. And then the third winner, believe it or not, is actually the UK government related to The US because they got the deal. They moved first, took advantage of Trump's love affair with the monarchy and the Anglophile nature of Trump and his mom from Scotland, and they got a 10% trade deal done before anybody else. And I think they're a winner. I think the three failures are Vladimir Putin, huge failure. He's coming to the end here. Vladimir Putin. I don't think Vladimir Putin will survive what's coming, because you can't do what he did. Declare war on Ukraine, lose the war and stay in power in Russia. And you say, well, he hasn't lost the war, but he also hasn't won the war. And it's three years into it. And he may be able to stalemate this because of the compromise he has on Trump till 28. But I think you'll see Putin out to the great surprise of people. So he's a failure. Another big failure is the American car industry is going to be slammed around by these tariffs. They won't be able to absorb all the prices. They're making good cars, but they're not making great cars. The tariffs on the European cars are not going to overly help them, frankly, because a lot of Mercedes and BMW are being made in the country now. And so I think there's a problem there for the American car company. I think that's on the side side of failure. And last but not least, the biggest failure that I've seen in the five years, what I would say if you put out the yard markers and said, okay, last five, there's been 10 years of Trump, who's been the greatest failure in the last five years? That's the American Congress. The American Congress had a responsibility to check and balance the American system. And to use an Italian expression, they did ugats. They did ugats. Okay? And your viewers and listeners could look up ugatz means, but they've really done nothing. And they're gonna be judged very poorly by history. So those are the three winners. Those are three failures.

[Kara Swisher]

All right, I'm gonna do mine. I'm gonna do just two failures, actually, that were really striking in two different places. One, the Israeli government just votes to remove the attorney general, who's a Netanyahu critic. I think they have done more to diminish their standing, especially among young people. And they have only themselves to blame, especially with what's happening in Gaza. More and more people are calling it a genocide. We can see with our eyes what's happening there. And so I think this government is hurtling towards illegality. You Know what I mean? In the things they're doing. And I think the thing that holds up a country is the country of laws. And you believe in the. You believe in the laws, you believe in the courts. And I think he's going to see a lot of pushback from people in that country at some point. And I think they've done it to themselves. They have lost a generation of young people who would have been supportive of Israel. So I think that's especially this voting to remove the attorney general, which is, I think, at the heart of things like that, because he's a Netanyahu critic. And Netanyahu sucked up into corruption. That is so obvious. And he's bad at it, by the way. Trump is quite good at corruption, and Netanyahu's bad at it. The other thing is Nancy Mace running for governor of South Carolina. I think I've never seen a politician just sort of run herself into a wall on so many things. Someone who seemed promising for sure has become really a joke to everybody in Congress that I talk to. I think she's looking for her exit to try to run for governor. She'll certainly be ahead in the beginning because of her name recognition and the antics that she pulls. But I think she's probably like. A lot of men can do it a little better, but they're not necessarily. And I think she has ruined what could have been a really interesting political career. But I think she's got a lot of personal problems that are on top of that. If I have to say I agree with you about Elon, if he gets back to business, I think Trump should be. Everyone was talking about him being he should be scared of Trump. I think Trump should be scared of him. That's my feeling. I think he is. He's not Omarosa, like I say, he's not Omarosa. And he is the first person who mentioned the Epstein stuff. He has enormous power around the world. And so I think if he gets back to business and focuses there, he has a lot of levers to pull.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Not to interrupt, but just remember this one tweet which was very insightful. Elon Musk said, you're going to be around for three and a half years. I'm going to be around for the next 40.

[Kara Swisher]

Correct, correct.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

And I think Elon, whatever his weaknesses are, and I'm sure we all have strengths and weaknesses.

[Kara Swisher]

He's got a lot of weaknesses.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Okay.

[Kara Swisher]

But you're very kind to him.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I think we have to stipulate that he's a smart guy.

[Kara Swisher]

Absolutely.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

And he sees. He sees the egg. He sees the hair on the egg. Particularly as it relates, by the way, I told his buddies he was going to get blown out of there. Elon lasted 12 Scaramucci. He did okay, 12 times longer, by the way. It was exactly 11.8, but I'm the official scorer. Scaramucci. I think I should be. And I'm a generous guy. I round up. So he lasted 12 Scaramucci, and that was 12 times longer than me. But here's the thing. Elon has seen the malevolence. Because you don't write, you're on the list. If that's a code for you're a really bad fg, you're a really bad fg.

[Kara Swisher]

Yep, I agree with you. I think he's someone who's going to endure. And if he clean himself up, I mean, a lot of what he's done is unforgivable. But he will be forgiven, especially if he creates economic value and he will be around a lot longer. I don't think that's necessarily a win, but I think he definitely is in much more of a commanding position than Trump really realizes. And I think he was wrong to fight to do what they did to him. I think there would have been a nicer way to part, but you can't.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Do that with Trump.

[Kara Swisher]

You can't do that. You can't do it. That's right. I would see Trump maybe embracing him again anyway. I don't know if Elon will embrace Trump, though. I think he's moved on. We wanna hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com pivot submit a question for the show or call 85551, pivot over on on with Kara Swisher. This week I spoke with former Labor Secretary Robert why Democrats are struggling right now. Let's listen to a clip.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

The reason Democrats are so unpopular is they don't have a coherent and authentic message that translates to average people as authentic and real. Because the corporate Democrats, the financial Democrats, the Wall Street Democrats, don't allow them to. You know, a lot of Democrats I know are scared. They don't want to bite the hands that feed them.

[Kara Swisher]

I think you'll probably agree with that, Anthony.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I agree. He is a former professor of mine. I have an enormous amount of respect for him. But he also gave an interview in one of the Sunday news magazines. I can't remember if it was the New York Times or the ft, but I read the interview and he's calling for the mondamis and he's calling for these sort of harder left people to coalesce the party. I think that'll be a 1972 McGovern like nightmare for the Democrats. And I think it's a big mistake because it's a center right country. We have religious orthodoxy in this country. You and I might be secular. I'm not saying you are. But I'm more secular than the religious orthodox. But I think that Europeans in general don't understand this because they by and large now the majority of the population is secular. But this country has a lot of religious ferocity to it still. And I think the Democrats have really missed the mark on that. You know what Trump once said to me? This is an important thing to tell your viewers. Trump said to me on the campaign plane, he says, you know, you're an idiot. I said, yes, I know I'm an idiot, but why am I an idiot? He said, well, you're a Wall street guy. You're fiscally conservative and you're socially liberal. Am I right? I said, yes, I'm fiscally conservative, socially liberal. He says, my base, Anthony, my base fiscally. My base, Anthony, fiscally liberal, socially conservative.

[Kara Swisher]

He's correct. That is. Actually, I just was talking to Kristen Saltis Anderson. She said that. Exactly. It is true. That is true.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah. By the way, he said that to me in 2016, the Democrats. Wake up, wake up, wake up. He understands his base and believe it or not, a lot of his face used to vote for you. Okay. And so wake up and get in the middle before it's too late.

[Kara Swisher]

Well, I have a different take on this. I think everybody should be who they are and authentic of where they are. If you're Abby Spanberger, you're a centrist, right. In Virginia or Mickey Sheryl in New Jersey. And if you're Mamdani, be mom, be yourself. I think be yourself is. And it may be different across the country and I'm not sure any. Anyone should stand for anything with the Democrats. I think they should stand for a lot of things. And I know that sounds crazy, but if you're genuine to who you are, I think you do well where you are. We're always looking for someone who represents everybody, and that's impossible in this day and age.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I think it's well said, but I just think if you're going to go hard left in this country right now, particularly with the wokeism ending, go hard left, you're going to lose elections. That's what I. You may win in New York and you may win in Minnesota, you may win the mayor's race in Minnesota, Minnesota, Minneapolis. But you're gonna lose the general, big general election and it's gonna be very.

[Kara Swisher]

Big if you're not for the general election for the larger country. That's absolutely true, but we'll see, we'll see where it goes. Can I ask you one last question, please? Right now I wanna do a prediction. Who are the two presidential flights in 2028?

[Anthony Scaramucci]

So I think Newsom is gonna be the nominee for the Democrats. I think he'll pick a Midwestern moderate. He'll probably pick a white guy. I know that sounds crazy, but I think he probably will. It'll end the virtue signaling that's going on on the left and you'll get the same policies and they'll be more acceptable to some of the anti woke moderates that are out there. So I think it's Newsom, not Westmore. Not Westmore. No, I don't think so. I don't think so. I mean, I don't know how honest you want me to be on this podcast, but I think.

[Kara Swisher]

No, I want you to lie.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

But I think Obama has hurt the ability for an African American to get the nomination. I don't think people realize the existential damage that Obama did. Van Jones called it a white lash. That was the apotheosis of Donald Trump. And so I think the way Obama handled the presidency has hurt that. If I'm just being brutally honest, I'm not a fan. And I think the last two women that were the nominees for the Democrats have hurt the women standing in the party for now. And people could be very mad at me for saying this. I'm talking about this as a realist, as an analyst, not a normative thing of what ought or should be. I'm just talking about what actually is. I think Newsom gets it. Newsom has shown some muscularity. Newsom did a good job in LA in terms of the way they defended themselves against Trump's brown shirted lunatics. And Newsom is standing up on the gerrymandering and loosen, is putting a finger in Trump's eye and he's doing a better job trolling him in social media. He's doing a great job and I think he wins it. And by the way, I was on Gavin's podcast and I read to Gavin.

[Kara Swisher]

All he's gotten to every white guy. But go ahead, I joke with him. I'm like another white guy today. How interesting.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

The other Thing I would tell you just quickly is that it will not be. It will not be Marco Rubio, it will not be J.D. vance. But I think there'll be a candidate that comes out of the woodwork that surprises people.

[Kara Swisher]

People.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I know this is crazy. It could be a Charlie Baker who's now running the ncaa. He was the former governor of Massachusetts. It could be a John Thune. Okay. Although I think he's a jellyfish. I think he's a well regarded president.

[Kara Swisher]

Jellyfish to you. Go ahead.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Yeah, President jellyfish to me. But I think he's a guy that could help the Republicans get back to something that's more normal to their principles and their philosophy. Philosophy. But I don't think it's going to be Vance. And I don't think, remember, the MAGA ends with Trump. It's a personality cult. The people have more or less accepted that even though they don't like pedophilia. They're holding their noses, lots of them. But they won't be able. Vance won't be able to command that or Rubio. And so I think it's like a Thune Baker sort of a guy going up against Newsom. It'll be white male.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, White males as far as you could see.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Going up against white males characters.

[Kara Swisher]

The males are as high as an elephant's eye.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

I can hear the derision in your voice, but I just think that's what's going to happen.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, I agree with you. I have to say, I do agree with you, although I'm not sure it's Newsom, but there's a number of choices in that regard. Okay. That is the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot and be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. Anthony, as usual. Thank you for joining.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

Appreciate being on. Give my regards to Scott.

[Kara Swisher]

I will. And thank you so much. I will. Read us out. Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus Taylor Griffin and Kevin Oliver. Ernie Enderdot engineered this episode. Nishat Kirwa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcast. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the [e-mail] we'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. And Anthony, I'll be right over to look in your closet and put on your Batman outfit. Thank you.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You could fit in my Batman outfit, you know. You have the same facial structure as me.

[Kara Swisher]

Goodbye.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

You, me, and Adam west have a lot to do.

[Kara Swisher]

Goodbye, Mooch. Talk to you later.

[Anthony Scaramucci]

All right, see you.

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[Kara Swisher]

Let's go.