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- [00:01]
Harry Littman
Fox News is now streaming live on Fox 1. When it matters most, turn to the voices you trust. We go beyond the headlines, bringing you the stories you won't hear anywhere else. Live coverage, sharp analysis, real perspective at
- [00:19]
Glenn Thrush
home or on the go.
- [00:20]
Harry Littman
Stay connected when it counts.
- [00:23]
Glenn Thrush
Stream Fox News on Fox 1.
- [00:26]
Harry Littman
Download today. Welcome to Talking Feds, a roundtable that brings together prominent former federal officials and special guests for a dynamic discussion of the most important political and legal topics of the day. I'm Harry Littman. A bombshell New York Times story capped a week of ugly news about Maine Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner putting his own battle with Susan Collins and the whole Democratic fight to retake the Senate in peril. Meanwhile, California is counting votes from its primaries at the state's usual snail's pace. That prompted Trump to lob meritless claims of election theft, a reminder of the likelihood of more mischief and bogus charges to come. And as the midterms approach, back in D.C. even as Blanche promised the president had given up his slush fund, the deal looked hardly as dead and buried as the DOJ claimed. Democrats tried hard to deal at a death blow, but a group of newly rebellious Republicans proved strangely reluctant to bury it all together. And worse, the mind boggling shield against future IRS audits for Trump, his family and his companies seems to be escaping Republican scrutiny altogether. But in some ways, the week's most frightening news was Trump's move to appoint Bill Pulte, a political attack dog that some have dubbed mini Trump, to head the agency that oversees all U.S. intelligence services, to discuss a week that shook up the midterms landscape and saw both houses of Congress rebel in a fashion against Trump, though fail to totally rip up his ugly slush fund. I'm really pleased to welcome three great legal and political analysts, and they are Senator Barbara boxer, a former U.S. congresswoman and senator from California who represented the state in Washington from 1983 to 2017. Before her work there, she served in state positions in Marin County Board of Supervisors, where she was the board's first female president. She's been kind of a regular on Talking Feds, I'm happy to say. Senator, welcome as always.
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Charlie Sykes
Thank you.
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Harry Littman
Charlie Sykes, a founder and former editor in chief of the Bulwark. His substack to the contrary, is, I gotta say, indispensable. I don't use that term very often and I'm really pleased to be a regular guest on it. It's got terrific analysis and conversations in defense of our democracy. Charlie, thanks so much for being here.
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Senator Barbara Boxer
Good to be back.
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Harry Littman
And Glenn Thrush. Glenn covers the Justice Department for the New York Times, where he has spent nearly a decade on a number of key beats. He was previously a chief political correspondent at Politico. Glenn, very good to see you.
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Glenn Thrush
Good to see you, too.
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Harry Littman
All right, so let's start with the primaries that took place last week in the kind of political landscape California's gubernatorial primary, Senator, it seems still up in the air. It's going to include the November election under California's somewhat idiosyncratic rules. Two out of three of Trump choice Steve Hilton, a Republican former congressman and Biden official Xavier Becerra, who seems the favorite, and progressive billionaire Tom Steyer. The constant refrain over the course of this race was that voters felt unimpressed with their choices. Overall, all do you think that's fair? And if so, why did a state with such rich political talent yield a kind of prosaic field?
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Charlie Sykes
Well, it's happened before. I mean, you don't always have superstars. And you know, it's interesting because as I talk to folks, some people just want calm. They're just so sick of the chaos and all of the personalities, the hot personalities. So, you know, it's going to be interesting. And I think it looks like Hilton, we don't know yet, will be in the finals against Becerra. But it could be that Steyer overtakes Hilton. So we don't know. But if you think there's still a
- [05:18]
Harry Littman
real fighting chance there, he's very behind. But the votes to come in are from Democratic strongholds.
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Charlie Sykes
Well, I just looked at all the counties. You know, we've got 58 counties and each county is responsible for sending the votes. And most of them that are out there are from Democratic strongholds. But I think it's probably from what I gathered talking to some experts is a long that Steyer could do that. But if it's Hilton, I could just simply say where. Trump's endorsement, of course, helped him enormously in the primary. It's a kiss of death in the general in our state.
- [05:51]
Harry Littman
Let's follow up there. So he not only anointed him as the Trump endorsed candidate, but he's taken to the media now to say in California, the Democrats, to quote him right before our very eyes, are stealing the vote. So it's a reminder that the election denier and Trump is alive and well. Glenn, could I ask you, do you see any possible role for the Department of Justice to try to make mischief in California or more generally, what's the state of these Election interference efforts in the department.
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Glenn Thrush
Well, first I want to give a shout out to the fact that Senator Boxer and I are both Brooklyn College graduates. Oh, it's a rare occasion that you get the double header for us.
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Charlie Sykes
I just want to say give a shout out back. It's. I'm thrilled to know we did that. That was a free four year education and I think we did okay for ourselves.
- [06:51]
Glenn Thrush
Glenn, you did okay. I, I, I. And I, I.
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Charlie Sykes
So did you.
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Glenn Thrush
I paid $750 a semester, plus the $50 student activity.
- [06:59]
Charlie Sykes
That was a lot. That was a lot. I got, I had. I remember my dad saying it's $14 a semester. Oh, my God, honey, you're expensive.
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Harry Littman
Oh, my gosh.
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Glenn Thrush
Yeah. On to election interference.
- [07:11]
Senator Barbara Boxer
Yeah.
- [07:11]
Glenn Thrush
Well, Senator Boxer is well acquainted with a woman by the name of Harmeet Dillon, who was a significant figure in the Republican Party of California, and she is now currently the head of the Civil Rights Division in the Department of Justice. And Harmeet Dhillon is the person behind this push in terms of seeking to seize voting rolls from various states. Red states have cooperated. Blue and purple states have not. She has not done very well in terms of obtaining these voter rolls. The purposes for which she wants to obtain them nominally are to find out if there are duplicative or undocumented immigrants. But in general, the feeling from Democrats and critics of the Justice Department are that these interventions are intended to intimidate. We saw this with the SAVE act in the Senate. Also, interestingly, flop again, I believe, as an amendment to this reconciliation bill. But there are a lot of efforts afoot to inject skepticism into an electoral process that has proven to be one of actually the least corrupt and most efficient systems in American life. I wish my banking worked as well as the election system does. I don't know what the figures are right now, but it was less than 1/10 of 1% instances of fraud. There are obviously significant irregularities throughout the system, but there has never been a large scale proven case of election fraud in the modern era, as far as I could tell. And in fact, more than 50% of the isolated cases that have been prosecuted have involved Trump voters, not Democrats. So that is the backdrop. This is more of a political argument. I think we are seeing some enormously unusual and irregular activity. The point is the California dynamic, getting back to that, the fact that California takes so long on these elections, the fact that it is such a fragmented system, creates a petri dish for conspiracy theories to grow. And while, again, I came from New York, I covered New York elections There's enough, to use a term again, that the senator will know. There's a lot of Michigan in those elections, too.
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Harry Littman
I think all three, four of us know that.
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Senator Barbara Boxer
Yeah, Right.
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Glenn Thrush
But California is on a national. It is its own country, and it's on a national scale. So going back to that, highly unlikely, unless something has changed radically for there to be significant enough irregularities for the Department of Justice to intervene in an impactful way. But the system itself is so dysfunctional and confounds so many people, I think it will be used very fruitfully as a means of seeding further both discontent and skepticism about the electoral system nationally.
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Senator Barbara Boxer
Yeah.
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Harry Littman
And if I could just add a lawyer's note here. They've asserted a right to have voter rolls everywhere. In Fulton county, they got lucky with a search warrant that doesn't seem to have established probable cause. They got it anyway. In others, they have just had friendly officials give up the keys to the kingdom. But they've gone to court now in many places, and they are.048, because what they're trying to do plainly cuts directly against the constitutional rolls for the state rather than the feds.
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Charlie Sykes
But can I just say this? I agree with Glenn. We have to make this faster. And there are really ways to do it. One issue is we allow people to vote on Election Day via mail, and that slows stuff up. But I do want to make one quick point. So many races have already been called. It's very clear. So many congressionals, except we've got 56 congresspeople. Most of those races are called, except a handful. And a lot of Republicans won their prime. I don't hear Trump complaining. He only complains when his people don't win. So it's the biggest phony deal ever.
- [11:16]
Harry Littman
I mean, the definition of vote fraud, Republican loses. The definition of weaponization, Republican is a target, you know, and they go no farther than that. Okay. I'll just note in passing this past Tuesday. Well, Charlie, can I ask you quickly if you had any reaction?
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Senator Barbara Boxer
You're talking about Trump's record in Republican primaries. His candidate for governor in Iowa lost.
- [11:38]
Harry Littman
Right.
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Senator Barbara Boxer
The record is still pretty overwhelming that the Republican Party is completely controlled by Donald Trump. He's got a death grip on this, on this shrinking party. And I don't know that that one election fundamentally changes that. You know, on the other hand, we're in kind of this transitional period where we're seeing Republicans, bizarrely enough, more willing to break with. With Trump than we've seen him before. I think that after, you know, the purge In Indiana, I think a lot of people thought that all Republican dissent would be quashed. Instead, we're seeing a mini revolt in the House of Representatives. We're seeing more senators expressing skepticism, although they did not drive a stake through the heart of his slush fund. So I did think that that was interesting. Can I go back to something that Glenn said, though? Because I think this is really important about, about the California race. I mean, two things are true at the same time. Number one, California's vote count is just absurdly slow. It is an embarrassment. The second thought, though, is that it is not evidence of fraud. But as Glenn pointed out, it will contribute to this global skepticism about elections which Donald Trump has, you know, so aggressively pushed. And the fact that since 2020, one of the most extraordinary things we've seen has been his ability in turning the facts and reality on its head and convincing so many people that there was massive fraud, that there was questioning. So is he softening up the ground for questioning the results in the midterm or 2028? Absolutely. And unfortunately, California's extremely idiosyncratic system will add to that. So I think it's really important to sort of keep a track on what he has done to Republican public opinion there. So the primary elections in Iowa, you had a Trump endorsed candidate go down to a Maha endorsed candidate. So I'm not exactly seeing the light at the end of the tunnel there.
- [13:30]
Harry Littman
Okay, fair enough. And he's softening the ground, I should just add, with much stronger tools than he brought to bear much in Trump 1.0. And of course, as happened in the 2020 election in California, the late breaking votes are likely to be Democratic. And isn't that a good germ for the petri dish to start growing? All right, I want to move to the other high profile political story of the week, which is in Maine, where you know, there's been a steady drumbeat of new reports, many of them from Glenn's paper, about Democratic Senate hopeful Graham Platner. Glenn, could I ask you, what did your colleagues at the Times find out about Platner? And maybe I'll serve it up to everyone as to, you know, how much he is on the ropes now.
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Glenn Thrush
Well, they did a weeks long investigation into Platner's relationships with, with women and essentially determined that he had had some very tempestuous relationships that involved accusations of verbal abuse. But the most disturbing allegation made in the story, and notably it was made by somebody on the record, was that he had grabbed someone's shoulders, shaken them Violently, and at one point barred their departure from a room, closed the door and blocked the door. So while they, at least, prima facie, don't necessarily constitute anything that would have unless she had made a complaint at the time, prima facie don't constitute what appears to be a criminal violation. They are certainly extraordinarily serious. And as anyone who has covered or dealt with or experienced domestic abuse, this must have been a terrifying situation for this particular woman. I should say the Platner has denied this, and I think his allies have questioned her credibility, as happens frequently in this case. But this woman has taken to social media this morning, defended herself and made the point that she went public and used her own name, which is not always the most common thing in these cases. And obviously, this changes the dynamics of the race. There was a poll that came out earlier today that showed him neck and neck with Susan Collins. That came out after a prior set of stories about his relationships with women, sexting, having affairs on his wife. It came out before our story came out yesterday, Charlie.
- [16:00]
Harry Littman
I saw the defenses of him as, oh, Maine doesn't care about that, et cetera. But, you know, there's no doubt that he's not being able to talk about the price of gas and the like. And if you just sort of. I sometimes think it's useful to just turn the sound off and kind of watch. And he does seem like a candidate on the ropes. And I think it's a state that most people believe the Dems kind of have to win to retake the Senate. What's your sort of prognosis of the state of crisis here?
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Senator Barbara Boxer
Well, it's a real dilemma for Democrats. Right? I mean, they have to decide, you know, how much they want to win that Senate seat. No, I still suffer from ptsd, by the way, remembering all of the ways in which Donald Trump's character and his treatment of women were rationalized by Republicans back in 2016. And I gotta say that many of the Democrats and progressives sound, you know, remarkably similar to that saying it is because it's an existential crisis and we must win, that we need to rally around Platner, who, you know, this one story is not disqualifying necessarily, but the cumulative weight of it is pretty troubling. Look, you know, I have great deal of sympathy for somebody who's gone through, you know, what he's gone through, you know, recovering from his various problems, but I'm not sure that the United States Senate is the place to work out those problems. Got a drinking problem some of these issues were years ago. Some of them were extremely recent. I personally think that, you know, walking around with an SS Nazi tattoo is disqualifying, but that's just me. You would think that the sexting would have been, you know, more of a problem. This should have been a layup. This should have been a gimme. Maine is a, you know, generally a Democratic state. I don't think that a Republican has won since 1988 in the presidential election.
- [17:43]
Harry Littman
In the presidential. Right.
- [17:44]
Senator Barbara Boxer
Susan Collins is ripe for the picking. All you needed was somebody who would be able to get the people who voted for Biden and for Kamala Harris to vote for the Senate candidate, and you would have a pickup and a real plausible chance for Democrats to take control of the Senate. So it is incredibly, incredibly, incredibly risky now to run with, you know, Graham Platner, a guy who has, you know, all of these known and unknown demons. We don't know how much else there is out there. So the Democrats have this. This huge problem, but then they also have to decide whether or not they're going to follow Republicans down the road of saying, we don't care about personal character, we don't care about the treatment of women. You know, winning power is more important than anything. So I, you know, again, what are. What is their plan B? I don't know. There is a primary on Tuesday. Janet Mills dropped out of that race. She's still on the ballot. I think there's, you know, slim chance that she could get back on. But there's. There's no way that Democrats do not have a real problem at the worst possible moment. I mean, I think that after some of the primary elections, it felt like they were so close to having a real plausible chance of taking control of the Senate, which is so crucial for the Supreme Court and Trump's agenda. And. And then this guy who. And I'm sorry, I just. There's. There's so much about Graham Platner that is phony. He is not who he appears. You know, every week we get another story about him. What are we gonna hear next week? What are we gonna see the next week? It's kind of a disaster, to be quite honest.
- [19:14]
Harry Littman
Senator, your ear is still very much on the. To the ground of what Democrats are thinking. Is there a feasible alternative at this point to going with him, do you think?
- [19:25]
Charlie Sykes
Look, Mainers are going to make this decision? And listen, I agree with everything that's been said in terms of how offensive this is, how disturbing it is, how sad it is for those of Us who were counting on this. But I still think it's a strange thing, you know, that this guy has some kind of rapport with the voters because he's been out there from day one. Now you may. Charlie thinks he's a phony. He said right away, I'm flawed. I had horrible ptsd. I did, you know. So I don't know if he's a phony or if he's real. I don't know him. But I will say this. Several years ago, if this happened, it would be. That would be the end of it. We wouldn't care if we won or lost. But given where we are as a country, given the threat that we have of losing our democracy, of people being in prison just because they have dark skinned, you know, of a president who wants to put his name on everything while people suffer, this is a whole different world. And I could go on a war without Congress. So it is an exceptionally different time. So I will close, as I always said, on the Senate floor, because people get scared that I won't ever stop talking. So I will close with this in a way. There are two flawed candidates in very different ways. Susan Collins, personally, I liked her, I always did. But she broke my heart time and time again. We had an expression in the cloakroom, Susan Collins, always there when you don't need her. You know, she broke our heart. She voted with Trump 94, 95% of the time. She said she'd never overturn Roe v. Wade. She supported members of the judiciary who would do just that. Yeah, Kavanaugh and all the others. So bottom line, I think they're going to deal with two situations. Am I willing to go with a guy who is personally flawed even though the President was actually found liable by a jury of his peers? Okay, fine, he got away with it. Maybe this guy doesn't get away with his personal life or about their lives. Who's going to support what they need? So to me, the jury's out. I don't think anyone's toast or not toast at this point.
- [21:42]
Harry Littman
Fair enough. And I'll make two banal observations. The first is we're in the eye of the hurricane. Five months is a while if they get back to talking about issues. And then second, even if these are not legitimate charges or it's a lie or whatever, there is the distinct feel that if there's another shoe that drops, even a unmeritorious one that on its own wouldn't have much impact, it could be fatal. But we'll see. And as everyone Agrees. Man, oh, man, what an important race. Okay, Charlie, you mentioned that I wanted to move to this. The whole slush fund imbroglio. This week, Trump and Blanche backpedaled on the slush fund. Blanche promises it's not moving ahead. He won't put it in writing. Trump still says he likes it, but it really. When you talk about the pushback that we've seen from some Republicans, it was noteworthy, but I think you referred to this Senator. We've had these initial procedural moves in the vote a rama and opportunities to get majority votes of opposition to the fund. And in fact, they narrowly failed, including with the votes of senators who might have been thought to go the other way because Trump has recently taken them down. Down. Why is that? Or how do you see the dynamic now after the. The flexing of muscles by some Republican senators as things move forward with the Blanche nomination, with the slush fund? And what I'd really like to talk about most, the IRS amnesty from audits.
- [23:23]
Senator Barbara Boxer
This bargain, this corrupt bargain, this. This goon squad slush fund was. Was too much for even Republicans who've swallowed so much of the corruption. It was interesting that Todd Blanche was forced to back off, but he wouldn't put it in writing. I do wonder why the Senate, when it had a chance to drive a stake through the heart, did not do that. Because if they don't, my guess is there's a possibility that Trump will want a workaround of some kind, some other way to get the money to his people. And then, of course, you have the irs, this immunity forever for Donald Trump, for his family, for his entities, which is, again, I'm not the lawyer here, but I just cannot imagine how that's going to withstand any kind of scrutiny. But I guess I'd like to hear, you know, Glenn's take on what is the future of this slush fund. The Senate had a chance to drive, you know, ban it forever. Blanche's statement, fine, But I'm not sure that it's completely dispositive. I mean, am I right to be skeptical about this thing living on like some sort of a zombie?
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Glenn Thrush
We've got no explanation for Blanche's decision not to put this in writing. I should just say. And he had this exchange, I think it was, with Rosa DeLauro, in which he just repeatedly refused to say he'd put it in writing. And at the end, he kind of flippantly said he would take it under advisement. Look, this thing has been weird from jump. Myself and my colleagues last week put together a Pretty exhaustive. We call them tiktoks of the decision making process in this. And what's amazing about the slush fund, or whatever you want to call it, I don't want to call it a slush fund. It is technically the anti weaponization compensation fund, even though Republicans are also calling it a slush fund. It's essentially the best of all, was, essentially, believe it or not, the best of all possible worlds for the Justice Department and Todd Blanche. The origins of this were Trump's $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS for the leaking of his tax returns by a contractor to us, the New York Times. And they were faced by they, I mean, both the White House and the Justice Department and officials on both sides of the ball realized that the possibility of the President paying himself, his government paying him a substantial penalty to just go into his bank account was an ethical, legal, political minefield that they couldn't risk going into. You know, my general sense was each of the individual actors in this, from Blanche on down, were taking personal stock in what their liability might be if they had gone with that decision. So what really happened? And the thing about the Trump administration, when you start doing these, these sort of investigative reconstructions, the thing that always strikes me is it's much more serendipitous and disorganized than you'd think it was. You enter these investigative stories with a theory of the case, and it always winds up being far more eccentric. Right. So the key player in this entire. The two key players in this entire saga were Boris Epstein, who is. How does one describe Boris Epstein? Boris Epstein is Donald Trump's, quote, unquote, legal advisor. He wears three piece suits, he's from New Jersey, and he's a fixer. That's what he is. And he was essentially the President's emissary through another lawyer in this negotiation. On the other side was Blanche. Now, Blanche, for reasons that are known only to Blanche, essentially outsourced it to his number two. And this is a man whose name people should focus on. His name is Trent McCotter. His previous claim to fame, believe it or not, is he's a baseball saber matrician. And he found discrepancies in box scores that made Babe Ruth's official baseball statistics change. That was kind of his claim to fame before all of this. And Trent McCotter is now essentially Blanche's operative. He's playing a role that had previously been occupied by Emile Beauvais, who was sort of, we described him as the strong, armed enforcer of the first six months of the Trump administration. But anyway, McCarter came up with this idea himself, essentially as a way of diverting Trump's vengeance energy, his desire to see somebody get paid to his followers. And he was able to do this. They got an opinion from their office of Legal Counsel that said it is kosher legally and it was based on a settlement for Native American ranchers and farmers, poor Native American ranchers and farmers who had been given a settlement by the Justice Department of the Obama administration because they had been screwed out of federal money that they'd been entitled to because of racism. So this was the construct. And McCarter came up with this Frankenstein monster idea. And it was McCotter's idea to make it the fund putatively $1.776 billion, so that it slipped right into the slipstream of Donald Trump's 250th anniversary of the United States extravaganza. So he essentially came up with this idea. Now, as Charlie said, arguably the more important and the more durable part of this is this agreement to essentially shield Trump from any tax liability pertaining to previous audits and investigations. Our staff determined that that is in and of itself worth $100 million to Donald Trump, his family and his associated companies.
- [28:54]
Harry Littman
Paid by the taxpayers. Of course.
- [28:56]
Glenn Thrush
Paid by the taxpayers. Blanche has said that is non negotiable. It's not on the table. And here's what I think is interesting, and the Senator knows this better than anyone, the issue of the day in the Senate, the thing that these five, six, seven, eight Republican senators stood for, was demanding that Blanche get rid of this compensation fund. They have said virtually nothing about the irs. So in a sense, what is going on here is they are doing just enough to cover themselves without addressing this issue of the IRS self payment. I believe as somebody to put back on my politics hat as somebody who covered politics for 25 years, I think the IRS thing is, if anything, equally or more damning electorally to Republicans than the company.
- [29:42]
Senator Barbara Boxer
Completely agree. Completely agree.
- [29:45]
Charlie Sykes
I was just gonna say, Glenn. That was so. I haven't heard anyone really say it as clearly as you did, because it's like, look over here, look over here, and then back here is where the real damage is done, which is a gift to him, a gift that nobody should ever get. And I would just say what we're seeing is in this administration over and over again are corruption and chaos and high costs for the people. And this corruption is so despicable, I think it's driving down Trump's numbers as Much as anything else. And there's lots of other stuff. So I would just say this. Whether it's, you know, no competitive contracting, where Trump gets to pay off his buddies, whether it's his kids, right, Getting a position in a foreign firm, and then we give our American taxpayer dollars to give him a contract. And then this thing where the left hand says to the right hand, you could do it like a puppet show. Hey, left hand, I need to have some more money, and I need to be covered for my future tax liabilities. And the other hand goes, you're so good. I agree. The whole thing is so outrage, and that's what we're dealing with. And it's corruption on a grand scale and in plain sight.
- [31:00]
Senator Barbara Boxer
But also, I think that the public is catching on to all of this. And, you know, if Democrats have any political skill whatsoever, you can really connect the dots between the economic problems that Americans are having, you know, the kitchen table issues, and the fact that you may be struggling while Trump and his family and his billionaire trillionaire cronies are enriching themselves beyond the dreams of avarice. People have cited what happened in Hungary, how the corruption issue took down Viktor Orban. Of course, the corruption, I think, was a little bit more global in Hungary. But I do think that this is one of those years in which it is the economy, it is corruption. And it goes to this question of fairness, of whether the system is rigged, the markets are rigged, whether or not the American dream is alive. There is tremendous economic anxiety out there, and Trump has made it very, very clear that he is indifferent to many of those problems. You know, we were told he was going to make this big affordability tour, which has not happened. Instead, he comes out and he says, no, I don't really think about America's financial situation. I don't care about the midterms. He's much more interested in everything else. So I think that this is one of those moments where the optics are almost too much on the nose, where you have, you know, a soaring price of gas, soaring price of groceries, job markets, not terrible. But here's a president who's obsessed with his arch and his ballroom and his reflecting pond and finding ways to slip cash into his own pocket, into the pocket of his. Of his other friends. I mean, look, income inequality has always been a huge problem, but has never been anything remotely like what we're seeing right now. And I think that in many ways, this. This corruption story, and the senator listed some of them. These are easy to understand. Grant. This is not like in the 1990s, trying to explain the Whitewater scandal to somebody, which I tried for years and never succeeded. This is just, it's so blatant, it's so in the open. And I think it's going to be a potent issue in the midterms.
- [33:03]
Glenn Thrush
Look, Trump is. Let's put a big disclaimer in front of what I'm about to say and what Charlie said, which is like, Trump is a the luckiest politician I've ever caught. Can you guys agree with this? He's the luckiest politician I've ever encountered in my life. He has a lot of talent. I've said this before. You know, a lot of people can read the music. He can hear the music. He can hear the rhythm. Trump has a great ear. One of the first politicians I ever covered was Ed Koch. He could do that, too. They could hear the music. But a couple of things are happening. The country isn't just turning 250. Donald Trump's about to turn 80. With all due respect to the senator, by the way, Trump's vitality and his entertainment value is a key source of his endurance. His popularity, but also his endurance. He's funny. Even people who have in the past detested him are entertained by his resiliency and by his capacity to roll with the punches.
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Harry Littman
Right?
- [34:01]
Glenn Thrush
That capacity is clearly being diminished. The thing that he had in the first term. There's a big difference between Donald Trump first term and second term. I don't think people talk about this enough. I'll get whammed for saying this, but there was a sort of a playful quality about the first term. There was a lot of stuff that was, that was pitch black dark. But Trump himself wore it lightly. Trump is not wearing this term lightly. There is a vengeance trip aspect of this. It's very much kind of dark Night Rises vibe, right? And Trump captured a certain ambient negativity in the country that took me by surprise as somebody who grew up on the, on the morning in America message of Ronald Reagan, for instance. But I think he's going in a direction now that I think most people are not, are not comfortable with. And the self enrichment, the cash grabs, all the putting, slapping his Ozymandias, slapping his name on stuff does not go over well. He's got, look, he's got a very firm floor in polling. He hasn't yet really broken through 35. There are some polls that still show him in the low 40s, but he's clearly testing his basement here. So I think the midterms Almost regardless of outcome, are going to result in a diminished Trump presidency one way or another. Because even if, let's say, the Republicans run the table and they keep both houses, they are still going to be looking forward and having to deal with the issue set, which is a lousy issue set, that Trump has left them. And they're going to be looking beyond Trump. So what we are looking at, really, in the next five months, five, six, seven months, is I think he was at the apogee of his presidency, probably in the fall, and we are now going down the long slope. Whether or not we go down it precipitously or slowly is the question. Trump seems to be intent on. On jumping off a cliff sometimes.
- [35:50]
Charlie Sykes
If I could just jump in and say, you know, you can take a narcissist for just so long, you know, and if. If the guy is putting his name on everything and it's all about him, and he sits in front of Gold and he tears down the East Wing, that was such a symbol. And people are looking at that and they're going, really? And you were going to fix it with your own money, and now you don't have your own money. So if you're doing okay, you can take your uncle who's always sitting at the table saying, he's the greatest thing, but all of a sudden, you're going to fill up your car. And here it's worse than anywhere. But this is hard for people. At the same time, he's canceling clean energy projects, spending a billion dollars of our money. Nobody talks about that. To cancel a clean energy project. A billion dollars it cost us for this. He's using all of our money for himself. And I do agree you begin to lose your luster. Last point. What I think has always kept him popular, I don't like to say this is. He's filled with prejudice, racism, hate. And unfortunately, too many people fall for that because they want to blame others, perhaps for something that's not going well, that's not playing well anymore because now they're hurting, too. It's not a nice thing to talk about or analyze, but I think that was part of his appeal. And now they're looking at, how is it making my life better when you're torturing people in these prisons? It's not helping me. So it's an ugly, ugly time. And I think it is turning against him. He's lashing out instead of hunkering down and understanding why his poll numbers are in the 30s. He doesn't want to hear it.
- [37:41]
Senator Barbara Boxer
What Glenn said about hearing the music, I, I've described it differently. I, I do think that Trump has always had what I've described as kind of this, you know, reptilian instinct for public opinion and what, what works. He feels, you know, increasingly tone deaf. So there is a real shift there. But also, you know, all of the problems that he's experiencing right now are self inflicted, you know, are, you know, results of his arrogance and his id. We've gone this long without even mentioning the war in Iran.
- [38:07]
Glenn Thrush
Yes.
- [38:08]
Senator Barbara Boxer
Which is still going on here. I mean, now think about that and think what that has done to his base, to his standing. You want to talk about, you know, an own goal, that this was a war of choice, a war of his whim, you know, after promising no endless wars. But also at the moment when, you know, everyone in politics was saying we have an affordability problem, what does he do? He goes and starts a war which exacerbates inflation and the price of just about everything. Almost every single problem that you can mention is the result not of some outside event that has happened to him, but has been a decision of his own. His obsession with tariffs, his obsession with revenge, all of that. I still think that pushed against the wall, he will go back to what the Senator was talking about, you know, finding scapegoats, finding, you know, the, you know, the. What really bonds him to his base in many ways is he hates the right people and he encourages them to hate the right people and go after them. He's still gonna try to play that card. But I also sense that one of the key things he had, and I keep coming back to that one ad he used so effectively against Kamala Harris. But that phrase, and Glenn might remember it more accurately, you know, she is for they and them. Donald Trump is for you. And all the things we've been talking about, is that Donald Trump does not act like a guy who is for you, for the average person. And I think, and you turn on talk radio or you listen to conservative media in that right wing ecosystem, there is a real different tone and reaction to him now than I've ever heard before. A lot of it has to do with Iran, but a lot of it also has to do with that, this kind of weird disconnect, like, what are you focusing on these days? Why are you not reacting?
- [39:55]
Glenn Thrush
One of the things that really struck me in 2016, I did it when I was at Politico, I had a podcast, and I did a really fascinating hour with Michael Che and Colin Yost at Saturday Night Live. I went up there, big thrill. But basically what I wanted to do was ask them about Trump. And they gave me an insight into Trump that has really stuck with me. And they said Donald Trump was the only guest on the show that they could remember that was in there every day of the week before his appearance. Mostly people showed up for once or twice for pictures and for rehearsal. Trump was there every day sitting in the makeup room with a printed out bunch of newspaper stories. And he would talk to anyone who walked in the room. He would just like a random person, just like you've seen him do this a million times. I saw this when he was in the Oval in 2017. You'd walk in, he'd just talk to you like mid conversation. He'd be asking you questions, he'd be seeking feedback. The thing that Trump was constantly doing is he's always dipping the toe in the vox populi. Right. My sense now is he is way bunkered.
- [40:58]
Senator Barbara Boxer
Yes.
- [40:59]
Glenn Thrush
And he had surrounded himself in the sense that he made a totally catastrophic misread of his reelection. People were bummed out about Biden's age. People were dissatisfied with the economy and terrified. He was an alternative. To reparaphrase Joe Biden, Donald Trump thinks he was the Almighty, but he was really the alternative. Right. And he also took it as a mandate to get rid of anybody who would push back. Susie Wiles, chief of staff, she has said over and over again that she believes her job is to stop leaks and quell dissensions so that Trump can get a decision that he wants. That is a recipe for disaster. The reason why you have advisors around, the reason why you have people to give you contrary advice is to keep you safe. You are not being self protected when all you have are yes, people around you.
- [41:50]
Harry Littman
And it's also a recipe for just raw self dealing. I think it's been a kind of theme of all of you guys. It's what brought down the slush fund. I think it was so plainly a Trump to Trump kind of transaction. I just want to make a quick legal point about the amnesty IRS pledge because it properly understood, I don't think it's so hard, it's just as bad or worse. I detect a kind of consensus here that it's even worse. And here's why that's true. Legally, either it's tethered in some way to the settlement agreement, we're giving up a claim worth nothing, that's unconstitutional, that they fought successfully before for the hundred million dollars or more that the New York Times has said, and that's what he's trying to capitalize on when he says this is typical or they're giving up on that and it's just a raw, breathtaking act of corruption, which is here. I love you, Mr. President. Here's $100 million. And, and they're going to have to Fisher, cut beta on, on this or this. When they have to file a brief next week. I think they'll try to wriggle out of it. But if that point is driven home, it's, it really is even more raw self dealing. One more quick point. We've got too much baseball in this thing. But I had to tell Glenn about the Babe Ruth point. I used to do the box scores like I'm 23, 24. We thought nothing of it. But if it's late at night and two in the morning, you know, we might well say, you know, I'm buddy buddy with Charlie Sykes might well put Pinch Runner Sykes C000. There are official box scores that are in there. So that mischief could happen in the previous world. All right, it is now time for a spirited debate brought to you by our sponsor, Total Wine and more. Each episode you'll be hearing an expert talk about the pros and cons of a particular issue in the world of wine, spirit and beverages.
- [44:02]
Total Wine and More Announcer
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- [45:31]
Harry Littman
Thanks to our friends at Total Wine and More for today's A spirited debate. Let's take a few minutes to move to more about Blanche and the new acting Director of National Intelligence, Bill Pulte, who seems very much in the model of Trump. Know nothing loyalists, Cornyn said. I don't see any evidence of any qualification for the job. Can I just ask Glenn, because you've written about it, who is this guy? Why does Trump want him for this important job of all things?
- [46:08]
Glenn Thrush
Well, Bill Pulte more than anything else is is just a guy who tells Donald Trump what he wants to hear. Pulte is head of the the Housing Finance Agency, which is an obscure but important position. And Pulte is the scion of a real estate family. He was not an especially exceptional executive is my general sense of this, but he got very involved in Republican politics and he buddied up to Donald Trump. And Trump, as you know, loves guys with money and loves guy particularly loves guys with money who made their money in real estate so he can talk the lingua franca with Trump about real estate, which is super important. Anyway, Pulte's one of those guys, probably down to a dozen now who are on the phone with Trump constantly. And Pulte has made common cause with this character Ed Martin, who has loomed large in all of our lives, who is the former weaponization czar at the Justice Department now is the pardon attorney. He is a far right lawyer from Missouri. Spoiler alert. He's really from Brooklyn. He wears a trench coat because his uncle tried out for the role of Colombo. True story. But Ed Martin is a guy who has pushed for the Letitia James James Comey prosecutions and Pulte is the guy who has come up with the theory of the case on these mortgage fraud cases against Lisa Page, Comey and James, which have been viewed by career officials, and also Blanche and Pam Bondi as being meritless. But they went ahead with it anyway. Long story short, Pulte played a not insignificant role in ousting Pam Bondi. He's an election denialist. He's a conspiracy theorist. He is an opportunist. He's a rising man in Trump world. And so it is not any surprise that Trump would put him in this position. Trump said yesterday he said incredibly contradictory things about this. First, Trump said yesterday that he was looking for a permanent guy to replace Pulte, but Pulte was going to do election stuff at odni, which gets back to this weird Tulsi Gabbard thing. And then today he said no. The reason I have him there is he's going to fire everybody at odni.
- [48:14]
Harry Littman
And odni, just to be clear, I mean, this is a guy who doesn't even have a security clearance yet, and he's going to have absolute control to all the national security secrets.
- [48:24]
Glenn Thrush
Harry, there's no question in my mind, and I say this all due sincerity, you would be vastly more qualified to be the head of odn.
- [48:31]
Senator Barbara Boxer
Not even close.
- [48:32]
Charlie Sykes
Can I say this is the scariest thing since Matt Gaetz, and I mean it, because this guy, as we've all said, zero qualifications. His only qualification is that he'll do anything Trump says. To me, it's terrifying. And I just, you know, hope and pray that some of these senators who have been brutalized by Trump, such as Cornyn and Tilsie, you know who they are, stand up. Stand up. And Collins, because she's so scared of her reelect against this guy. That's all I could say. This is scary stuff.
- [49:11]
Senator Barbara Boxer
It is. So can I just make something up and I may back off on it later?
- [49:17]
Harry Littman
This is a episode with a lot of cool trivia and confabulation. Definitely.
- [49:22]
Senator Barbara Boxer
Well, okay, so in many ways, Poldi's got like a. We were talking about Trump 1.0 and Trump 2.0. Poldie is kind of like the third world wave Trump appointees. You know, in the first administration, he had, like, he had some actually real people and, you know, and grownups. Trump 2.0 is the hardcore chemical loyalists, right? I mean, those people who, you know, are just completely bonded with, you know, maga. This third wave is kind of like Ken Paxton and Pulte, that they're not just loyalists. They are willing to break the law, abuse the powers of government to go after the enemies. Even some of the loyalists might have drawn the line at some of the most corrupt things that Trump is doing. Or quite frankly, if Trump ever tries to overturn a future election. The thing about Ken Paxton and Pulte, these guys are the whole package. They will go along with Trump no matter what. And so there is that breed that is almost separate from these super loyalists in the way that, like Pam Bondi, we thought. I mean, Pam Bondi is about as loyal as you can get. And yet, you know, she was not willing to give him all of the heads on a plate that he wanted. So who does he get? He gets Todd Blanche, who's willing to do anything Pulte feels like almost beyond that. And so it's not just that he's not qualified, and it's not just that he will never say no to Donald Trump. You know, he will fire anybody. He will pull any string. I mean, you know, Tulsi, going back to this Tulsi Gabbard actually showing up at Fulton county for the voting booth. You know, I think we can't emphasize how deplorable that was that the Director of National Intelligence is signaling she might interfere in local elections. And yet Tulsi is not in Pulte's league of what Pulte might be prepared to do with the resources of the national intelligence community. So, yes, to the senator's point, how scary this is. We think that we've seen the worst. Well, it can't get any worse than that. And Trump is basically saying, now hold my beer. I have people who are even more willing to be accomplices in my criming than before and do it with a
- [51:33]
Harry Littman
kind of chest beating brio that he really loves. All right, we are almost out of time. I do want to just quickly go around the horn and ask for any thoughts about whether Blanche. Is he gonna have a genuine rocky path to confirmation, or will Trump be able to make it smooth sailing? Any thoughts on that?
- [51:55]
Charlie Sykes
I think it's gonna be super rocky. Super rocky, and I'll tell you why. Epstein, Epstein, Epstein, Epstein. We didn't talk about it today. It's another thing Trump's been doing. He has a scandal a day. We don't remember that scandal. But I will tell you this. Pam Bondi did not help him when she basically pinned the COVID up of Epstein on him. And if I'm on that committee, man, I'm gonna go after that last point. He's the one who sent that horrible woman who was guilty of sex crimes, Ghislaine Maxwell, to a cushy prison. That alone is enough to disqualify the dude.
- [52:38]
Harry Littman
Yeah, look, his fingerprints are on everything in the last 15 months. So there's a lot to be said. All right, we'll talk about that much more. We're out of time. It's been a really good. And I should say a lot, a lot of good trivia here. We want to close with our five words or fewer question and we're publishing Monday, the Knicks are hosting the spurs. So Trump will be there. What special welcome should the Knicks prepare for the president? Anybody? Five words or fewer.
- [53:11]
Charlie Sykes
A video of Obama library, basketball court
- [53:16]
Harry Littman
or just maybe that shot that incredible from the from 25ft.
- [53:20]
Senator Barbara Boxer
Yeah, okay, this may be a deep dive here, but I think that the Knicks should welcome Donald Trump to the game by featuring Milli Vanilli at halftime. Okay. Milli Vanilli, who was like, was beneath his dignity to show up at the 250. Okay, you know what I'm getting at there?
- [53:40]
Harry Littman
Yeah, very good, Mr. New York Glenn. Brooklyn born Glenn Thresh.
- [53:45]
Glenn Thrush
Let me see here. Charles Oakley, Bear hug. Only four.
- [53:50]
Harry Littman
I got an extra word to use. Okay, I'm going with seat next to Spike Lee. Thank you so much, Senator Boxer, Glenn and Charlie. And thank you very much, listeners for tuning in to Talking Feds. If you like what you've heard, please tell a friend to subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts or wherever they get their podcasts. And please take a moment to rate and review the show. Check us out on substack@harrylittman.substack.com where I'll be posting two or three bulletins a week breaking down the various threats to constitutional norms and the rule of law. Paid Substack subscribers can now get Talking Feds episodes completely ad free. You can also subscribe to us on YouTube, where we are posting full episodes and my daily takes on top of legal stories. Talking Feds has joined forces with the Contrarian. I'm a founding contributor to this bold new media venture committed to reviving the diversity of opinion that feels increasingly rare in today's news landscape, where legacy media seems to be tacking toward Trump for business reasons rather than editorial ones. Find out more@contrarian.substack.com thanks for tuning in. And don't worry, as long as you need answers, the Feds will keep talking. Talking Feds is produced by Luke Cregan and Katie Upshaw, associate producer Becca Haveian, sound Engineering by Matt McArdle, Rosie Dawn Griffin, David Lieberman, Hansama Hadrenathan, Emma Maynard, and Hallie Necker are our concerns. Contributing writers and production assistants by Akshay Turbailu. Our music, as ever, is by the amazing Philip Glass. Talking Feds is a production of Deledo llc. I'm Harry Littman. Talk to you later.