← The Beat with Ari Melber
The Beat with Ari Melber
In Scathing Ruling, Judge Denies Trump DOJ in Epstein Case
00:41:25
MSNBC’s Jason Johnson reports on how President Trump’s latest effort to dodge accountability for the Epstein files has blown up in federal court.
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- [00:00]
A
Finding the music you love shouldn't be hard. That's why Pandora makes it easy to explore all your favorites and discover new artists and genres you'll love. Enjoy a personalized listening experience simply by selecting any song or album and we'll make a station crafted just for you. Best of all, you can listen for free, download Pandora on the Apple App Store or Google Play and start hearing the soundtrack to your life. Summer's heating up and so is the action with chumba casino and 23xi racing. Whether you're trackside with Bubba, Riley and Tyler or cooling off at home, the fun never stops at Chumba Casino, the online social casino packed with free to play games like slots, bingo, and more. Jump into summer@chumbacasino.com and score your free welcome bonus 2 million free gold coins and 2 free sweeps coins. No purchase necessary. VGW Group Void where prohibited by law. CT&C's 21+ sponsored by Chumba Casino. Welcome to the Beat. I'm Jason Johnson in for Ari Melber. We begin with new heat on Donald Trump amid the Epstein uproar as his latest attempt to slide, slide, sliply, slide away from any accountability blows up in federal court today in a scathing ruling, a judge essentially accusing Trump's DOJ of trying to fool the public with, quote, the illusion of transparency. Hours later, in a sign of how this is absolutely dogging Donald Trump, reporters are pressing him about that ruling. It happened during his press conference at the White House. Thank you all. Thank you all very much.
- [01:32]
B
Appeal the Epstein decision today. Mr.
- [01:37]
A
Did you hear that? Yeah, I didn't hear an answer either. Today's ruling concerned the DOJ's request to unseal grand jury material from probes into Epstein and his accomplice Glean Maxwell. For weeks, legal experts have said this is a red herring. Argu. Most of the information is already known and likely to shed very little light on the situation today. The federal judge who has seen the material echoing those criticisms and going even further, calling out and rebuking the Trump DOJ, quote, the DOJ's entire premise that the Maxwell grand jury materials would bring to light meaningful new information about Epstein and Maxwell's crimes or the government's investigation into them is demonstrably false, adding, quote, a member of the public appreciating that the Maxwell grand jury materials do not contribute anything to public knowledge might conclude that the government's motion for their unsealing was aimed not at transparency, but at diversion and not at the full disclosure. But the illusion of such it's unclear whether the DOJ will appeal. As time goes by, this is certainly getting weirder. Trump veered from calling it a, quote, hoax to saying now the Democrats are hiding something. This weekend, J.D. vance saying Trump wants to be, quote, fully transparent while admitting in the very next breath that the administration is still working on that whole transparency thing. The president has said very clearly, because we've had other meetings about that, is that he wants us to be fully transparent and he wants the credible information out there. So we're working to compile the thousands and thousands of documents that are out there for full transparency. Foreigning me now is Asha Rangappa, former FBI special agent and senior lecturer with Yale University. And Molly Zhang, fast special correspondent with Vanity Fair and an MSNBC political analyst. Thank you so much. Her latest book is how to Lose youe Mother. Asha, we'll start with you. I just want to, I want to make this clear because I think that sometimes people get caught up in the sort of nuances and details of how these judges are ruled one way or another. The judge basically said, look, there's no reason to go through this fight to unseal this information because it's not going to add anything new. Is that common? Right. Is it common for a judge to say that, look, unsealing this isn't going to add anything to the case. You're not going to use me as a distraction. Is that something that, that we see often in these kinds of investigations, or is it just another sign of how desperate Trump is to find some sort of distraction?
- [04:22]
B
I don't hear.
- [04:27]
A
Asha, we're having a little bit of trouble.
- [04:29]
C
Sorry about that. The Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure actually list out the exceptions for being able to release grand jury information, that it is secret unless it meets one of these exceptions. And the reasoning provided by the government here didn't meet any of those exceptions. So to answer your question, yes, yes, it's common. The rules state that these are not released unless they meet certain criteria, which they don't in this case. So I think this was expected from the get go. And it does seem like this was sort of a fait accompli and maybe a way to just blame the judges, like, oh, well, we can't do anything. They didn't release it. And you see the judge sort of taking pains to, you know, make clear that this was a, this was a pointless request to be made in the first place.
- [05:20]
A
Right. And Molly, John Crafts, this is the thing about this. After a judge says, hey, there's nothing in here, there's Nothing here. There's nothing in the magic hat. Right. From a legal standpoint, what else does Trump have available to him? I mean, I, I know that they're probably scrambling around trying to find some other distraction, but what's the next thing that they might think of doing? Because if they can't stand on these sort of, you know, unreleased pieces of testimony and, you know, they've already moved Ghislaine Maxwell to a safer prison, what's their next legal strategy? Or are they just going to try to throw as many other things at the wall in hopes that the American people and their own base stop paying attention?
- [05:59]
B
Yeah, look, I think that this is a case where they have all this information. They can just release it. Right? I mean, that's it. So, I mean, this is like, this is not some tricky, you know, new math. Like you have thousands of pages of paper, you have videos, you have. Some of the stuff can't be released because obviously it's pornography. But, like, there's certainly quite a lot that you have. Pam Bondi was bragging about having it on her desk, so maybe there wasn't a client list, but there was certainly something on her desk. The whole plan about putting, you know, this grand jury testimony was going to be much less than what they have, and there's a much higher standard for releasing grand jury testimony. So the knew. I mean, I feel like there was sort of this was a way to try to buy time to keep it going. Right. And then. But the answer is these people still haven't forgotten. They have all these documents. They can just release them. It's just a question of whether or not they want to release them, which, of course, they clearly do not want to release them.
- [07:03]
A
Asha, I want to play this sound from Michael Cohen about what kinds of activities and behaviors Trump might have engaged in with Epstein and get your thoughts on the other side.
- [07:15]
D
As you know, I've made plenty of.
- [07:16]
A
Predictions, and I'm going to make another one here.
- [07:20]
E
Number one, I don't believe that Donald.
- [07:22]
A
Trump was on Epstein's island. Now, is he in the file? Absolutely.
- [07:27]
E
Why?
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A
He's in the black book. He took free flights with Epstein down to Palm Beach.
- [07:33]
D
If he turns around and says that.
- [07:34]
A
He was never on the island, rest assured he's going to use that as.
- [07:39]
E
The basis for why this whole thing.
- [07:41]
A
Again, is a witch hunt against him. He'll. So, Asha, here's the thing. And, and, and, and help me out here, because Michael Cohen certainly has a lot of amazing insight. Let's say Donald Trump comes out and says, yeah, I was never on the island. That's sort of the equivalent of saying, well, I wasn't in the bank when it was robbed, but I help everybody count the money and, and sell all the things from the safe deposit box with a fence. Right. Like, what would be the value of this administration at this point, trying to nitpick and geotrack where Trump is when it's still clear that he had a relationship with Epstein?
- [08:16]
C
Yeah, this is what has puzzled me from the beginning, that he has had a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. We knew that it's pretty obvious that he's going to surface in these files in some way.
- [08:28]
B
Right.
- [08:29]
C
I mean, because this is about activity that's going back into the late 90s. We know, for example, that Ghislaine Maxwell was actually recruiting girls from Mar a Lago. So, I mean, there's, you know, he's going to be in this mix. And so this idea that he was, you know, pushing this, this theory, this conspiracy theory that, and kind of getting people riled up to me never made any sense. Because if you know that you're in it and that's not going to be something you want out there, then why would you have done this? You know, I want to just emphasize, to Molly's point, that the volume of information here is, you know, dealing with evidence and witness interviews, victim interviews that go back to the investigation that happened Southern District of Florida, the investigation that happened into Jeffrey Epstein that resulted in his charges, the investigation that resulted in Glenn Maxwell's indictment and charges, and an internal OPR investigation within the Department of Justice. You know, so they are just sitting on a huge amount of information that this grand jury testimony is just pales in comparison in terms of what they all have, what they have in their possession.
- [09:44]
A
All I want to ask this, I want to play this out a couple weeks, maybe even a couple of months, to the potential end game here. Let's say, fine. The administration finally says, we're going to release some of these files. And we see them and they're so redacted, they look like piano keys on paper. Right. Like, we just, we can't see anything. It's just black lines, black lines, white lines, white lines. Obviously, that brings no justice to the women who were victims. But just politically or legally, does that end it? I mean, does that end anything if they release a large number of highly redacted documents? Because it seems to me that at some point they're going to release something. I just doubt it's going to be anything that the public or any of the victims can actually use.
- [10:23]
B
Well, this is the problem that I think Trump has gotten himself into is it's very hard to get out of this. Like any way you do it, it just makes more questions and more controversy and more content and it remind people that it's going on. The other thing I would add is, you know, they're talking about in having a bunch of people like the Clintons interviewed. Fine, do it. That's fine. I mean, I don't think anyone, you know, we want the people who were in this file to be, you know, everybody. You know, the polling on the Epstein is like 80% of all Americans want the files released. It's like you can't get 80% of Americans to agree on anything. Okay. And, but, but you know, the thing is, if you're going to have the Clintons talk, then you should have Alex Acosta, the guy from Trump's, you know, cabinet who create, who did the sweetheart deal. That was this like ridiculous deal where he was basically on work release. So I do think, look, do it, do full transparency. That's the only way you're going to shut the door on this. And, and I look and I see no reason why you wouldn't do that unless there's something you don't want to be transparent about.
- [11:33]
A
Exactly. Asha, thank you so much for joining us. On our opening block, Molly will be sticking around. Coming up, a jaw dropping new report on how Trump is using the presidency. Shocker to turn a personal profit. And later, Julian Castro on how Democrats are defying the GOP power grab in Texas. But first, our fact check on Trump's new PR stunt in Washington and his bid to federalize the D.C. police force. We're back. Just 90 seconds on the beat.
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He wants to assert more of his authority over D.C. and we are here.
- [13:49]
B
To say he can't have it. Say it with me. He can't have it. Trump can't have it.
- [14:02]
A
Residents of the nation's capital are pushing back against Donald Trump's attempted power grab. The president announcing today the federal government is taking over the D.C. police force and sending in National Guard troops. At least 800 soldiers have been activated and he's threatening to send in the military if needed. Trump invoking a law that allows the president to take control of local police in an emergency. He claims this is in response to rampant crime, but you know, the facts in D.C. of course, don't match this narrative. Overall, violent crime is down in Washington and has fallen faster than crime in the rest of the country. This is just the latest example of government overreach from Trump, who deployed military troops to Los Angeles earlier this year. Critics say it's an escalation of of an alarming authoritarian push.
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C
The president announced that he has called in the National Guard hundreds of those troops that will come to D.C. it's a bit unclear what their role will be. The president didn't even mobilize the National Guard on January 6th.
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A
If you look at the 25 most dangerous cities in the United States, D.C. doesn't appear on that list.
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C
What he announced today is a federal takeover of D.C. police.
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A
He's actually trying to give his base red meat to get them off of the Epstein story.
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C
He even talked about New York, Chicago, trying this out in D.C. and then he might go to other large cities.
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A
Joining Me now is Dr. Niam B. Carter, political science professor at the University of Maryland, College park, and author of American While African Americans Immigration and the Limits of Citizenship. And Molly, John Fass is still with me. Dr. Carter, we'll start with you. Grand scheme of things, we know Trump is an authoritarian. We know he has attempted this before in Los Angeles. Why do you think he is after Washington, D.C. he doesn't care about whatever the local issues happen to be. He doesn't care about concerns in Navy art or anything else like that in the area. Why do you think he's making this move right now in D.C. well, thank.
- [16:05]
F
You for having me, Jason. I think part of it is the fact that this is a majority black city, a majority minority city still with a black woman mayor. And we know Donald Trump does not like women very much. But I also think it's a place where he actually can flex his muscle. Unfortunately, D.C. is not a state, so it's one of the few places where he actually can just send in National Guard troops and do all of these things with little to no repercussion. And we know Congress isn't gonna stop him. So there really is sort of no downside, if you will, for him to do this, especially among his base.
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A
Molly, I wanna play you some sound from Mayor Muriel Bowser at a presser today talking about this takeover attempt and get your thoughts on the other side.
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B
We know that access to our democracy is tenuous. That is why you have heard me and many, many Washingtonians before me advocate for full statehood for the District of Columbia. While this action today is unsettling and unprecedented, I can't say that given some of the rhetoric of the past, that we're totally surprised.
- [17:19]
A
Now, Molly, as Dr. Carter mentioned, you know, there's no state to sort of protect Washington, D.C. it's a lot easier for President Trump to do this sort of thing. But, you know, he's all but said he's going to try to do this in multiple blue cities. Right. You never hear him talking about Houston, you never hear him talking about Atlanta. You never hear him talking about any of the states that he actually won in the last presidential election. My question for you is, what are the options sort of legally, if anything, that these cities can do when these kind of takeovers happen? Can they simply push back and say, hey, look, legally you can't, you can't do this, or you can't take these people over, you have to get this sort of judges ruling? Or are most cities basically incapable of fighting back against these kinds of takeovers.
- [18:03]
B
Well, we've seen this, right? We saw this in Los Angeles. We, and we saw, you know, there was some amount of pushback. In the end, they left. I mean, I think the larger question is more like this is meant to scare people, right? This is an intimidation tactic. It's meant for people to be afraid. It's meant for him to show his base that he has so much power. And so much of what Trump's done since he's been in office this time is these shows of force, you know, these things to sort of get his base excited or to get the rest of us worried. And I think that's what this is and that's why it's from an authoritarian playbook. You know, it's this kind of really intimidation tactic, which is, you know, it's not necessary. It's really about pageantry. And that's why he wants things like military parades. And that's why he wants, you know, it's that the, all the, it's, it's all part of the same playbook.
- [19:02]
A
Dr. Carter, to that point, when Trump sent in federal troops and everything else like that, you know, sending the Marines to try and take over Los Angeles. Los Angeles is a huge city. People were still having brunch and didn't know what was happening in downtown. Washington, D.C. is a lot more compact. I'm getting texts and Instagram pictures and everything else like that from people today talking about teenagers being, you know, yanked off the streets for, you know, for playing their music too loud, or people being arrested and handled roughly for just smoking marijuana, which they're allowed to do in certain parts of the city. What do you think could be the long term impact on this? Because to me, I think if you do this in Washington, D.C. there's a lot of powerful people in that city who aren't going to like this. And the pushback might be louder and closer than attempting to do this across the country when it did in Los Angeles.
- [19:49]
F
Well, certainly, I mean, look, I think this is Donald Trump's sort of opening salvo to see how far he can push this. I mean, the thing about DC is for a long time, young people in this city who are not very many, they're about 6% of 6 to 10% ish of the population, are more represented in the justice system than anybody else right in this city. And the only thing we can believe from that is kids are more likely to commit crimes, which isn't true, but they are people more likely to be caught and be surveilled and be singled out. And I think people need to be very careful here. One of the things that DC does not have is a prison system. So you start getting these younger people in the criminal justice system sooner, you're going to more likely see these people be charged as adults, which he said he wanted juveniles to be charged as adults, and they're going to be sent further away from the District. And we know this is gonna have all kinds of effects like congressional representation for the states that take these young people. But more importantly, I think we have to remember DC has been a political football for a really long time, right? Going back to like Vincent Gray's days in the 90s, right, when there was a DC control board. I mean, I think this is an attempt to do something more severe than that and put D.C. into almost a kind of receivership and really maintain control not just of the laws of the city and the people of the city, but also the coffers of the city, which are quite full right now. And I think that's something we cannot forget, that D.C. commands billions of dollars for a city its size. And so that has to be attractive on some dimension to this federal government.
- [21:22]
A
Molly, to follow up on that, the Financial Times has this write up on the Trump's administration is shaking down Nvidia, right? Nvidia and AMD are paying 15% on a China chip sale revenues directly. The US government. Look, at this point, if we look six, seven months in the Trump administration, Banana Republic is no longer just a store in the 90s, right? It is clearly how this country is being run. And from what Dr. Carter says, you know, this presidency might be looking to, to take money from the city of Washington D.C. they're clearly just getting direct bribes from other countries. When we look at the impact this is going to have on, on lower parties and lower parts of states, how can we stop this sort of growing corruption? Because if you have the top of the chain, if you have the top of the administration basically saying, I'm going to hit up companies for money, I'm going to hit up cities for money, how can we stop then mayors from doing that? How can we stop governors from doing that if the President has said it's open season on corruption?
- [22:19]
B
Well, I wanna say two things. One, Nvidia, that's a tax, right? He's getting taxed, he's taxing corporations. Now, it's ironic to me because Republicans told me that they weren't for taxes of corporations. But you know, all of this, I mean, even the tariffs, Right. That's just a flat tax on everything you buy.
- [22:39]
G
Right.
- [22:39]
B
Unless it's eaten by the company. The other thing, I just want to say one last thing about D.C. statehood is like if it were not for Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin, D.C. would be a state. Okay? So if you want, you know, there were Democrats who decided that D.C. should not have statehood and they are no longer in Congress anymore and they believed that they knew better. And I just wanna say, like, you know, we saw this coming, right? And this could have been avoided and it should have been avoided. And this completely lays at the feet of both Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin.
- [23:18]
A
That's an Excellent point. Dr. Nyambi Carter. Molly, John Fast, thank you so much for joining us this evening.
- [23:24]
F
Thanks, Steve.
- [23:26]
A
Later. Trump is fuming after a Republican official switched parties. Former Georgia Lieutenant Governor Jeff Duncan is now a Democrat and he'll be here live. Also tonight, special guest on the GOP rage in Texas, lobbing new threats as Democrats thwart MAGA's gerrymandering power grab scheme. And I'll talk to Pulitzer Prize winning journalist David K. John Constant on staggering revelations about Trump's second term grift. We come back on the beat. The fantasy footballers are on Sirius xm.
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As of tonight, Texas Democrats are succeeding and fending off GOP efforts to ram through what critics and anyone who cares about democracy would call MAGA gerrymandering and a power grab in Texas. Earlier today, Texas Republicans reconvening a special session. But once again they are denied quorum as dozens of Democrats remain out of state. That is preventing Republicans from redrawing congressional districts in a Trump backed effort to keep control of the House after next year's midterms. There is real power at stake here, which might be why Texas GOP Governor Greg Abbott sounds so desperate. This could literally last years because in Texas, I'm authorized to call a special session every 30 days. It lasts 30 days and as soon as this one is over, I'm going to call another one, then another one, then another one, then another one. If they show back up in the state of Texas, they will be arrested and taken to the Capitol. Democrats are fighting back. This week, former Obama Attorney General Eric Holder is set to meet with House Democrats about how to counter GOP gerrymandering. And California Governor Newsom writing in a new letter to Trump, quote, if you will not stand down, I will be forced to lead an effort to redraw the maps in California to offset the rigging of maps in red states. But if the other states call off their redistricting efforts, we will happily do the same and American democracy will be better for it. Joining me now to discuss all of this is Julian Castro, former Housing and Urban Development Secretary under President Obama. He's now an MSNBC political analyst. Julian, it's always great to talk to you. I have so many questions. But I want to start with this because I think there's a humanity part to what is happening right now that a lot of the audience and a lot of the country may not understand. If you are a legislator in Texas, you only get paid like 600 bucks a month and it's a part time job. So these legislators who have left, they aren't just missing out on, you know, the 600 paycheck, but many of them have left jobs, families and sick relatives in order to fight against this redistricting. Is that something else that's, that's very much weighing on these people as they've left the state?
- [27:40]
G
Well, absolutely, Jason, you're right. This is a part of it that you don't Hear. You know, we often think of politicians and we think of them almost in this cardboardy two dimensional way. But I talked to one of the representatives that's out there in Illinois just last night and he said that he was going to be missing his young daughter's first day of school this coming week. And that's just one example. He also said some folks have sick relatives that they'd like to visit back in Texas. Others have other family concerns. Since this is a part time legislature, Many of them have jobs like real other jobs that they have to do and that they've just taken off from. And so they're depending on the understanding of employers. That's also part of the pressure that continues to mount on these legislators about staying out versus coming back. And it's, I think, something that Greg Abbott and Ken Paxton and others are counting on. In addition to sicing the FBI on them and the attorney general going after groups that are supporting them, they're also trying to put as much personal pressure on these legislators as possible. And I hope that everybody takes a step back and just kind of lifts them up and recognizing that there is a sacrifice that they're making.
- [28:59]
A
I want to play some sound from Governor Kathy Hochul in New York talking about what she might do and get your thoughts on the other side.
- [29:07]
C
These times call for fighting fire with fire. We didn't ask for this fight. You know, I'm busy governing the state of New York, focusing on public safety and affordability. But why are we here today? Because Donald Trump looked at the polls for next year, just Texas, knock it off. We'll knock it off. Let's get back to governing. But you want to play these games. We're not going to sit on the sidelines. We're New Yorkers. We fight back.
- [29:32]
A
Julian, I've been talking about this for the last 48 hours. I have, I have said that this is, this is Gavin and Kathy's end game. If Gavin snaps and says, hey, look, we're going to completely gerrymander all of California, then we are in basically a gerrymandering arms race with major blue states that have a lot more room to gerrymander out Republicans than Democrats, I mean, than Republicans do in red states. My question is, what do you think it will take? Do you think that, you know, there's any chance of Abbott backing off of this? Do you think that Republicans in California and in New York or in, you know, Illinois are calling him right now saying, look, I don't want to lose my job because you're Trying to show how tough you are down here. Is there any chance that he backs off, or do you think we're heading towards the end game with blue state governors doing the same thing, and then we're off?
- [30:23]
G
Well, right now, it looks like we're in a race to the bottom, and this is a race that Democrats never wanted in the first place. They didn't start this, but they're trying to be responsible and reacting to it. But, yeah, I mean, I think if there's a chance for it to go in the opposite direction, for it to be stopped, that it's probably congressional members, whether it's in California, New York, Illinois, other places that recognize, hey, you're gonna lose your seat. Okay, you're gonna lose your job. If this continues in Texas and a couple of other red states, them putting pressure on House leadership and Senate leadership and especially on Donald Trump, maybe. But Jason, when have they stood up to him this entire term? Maybe when their job is finally at stake, they would do that, but I wouldn't hold my breath.
- [31:13]
A
Julian Castro, thank you so much for your insight and thanks for being part of the fight in Texas.
- [31:17]
E
Thank you.
- [31:19]
A
Still ahead, some Republicans actually leaving the party as MAGA takes over. A former GOP official speaking out right here on the beat. But first, a new report on the depths of Trump's grifting and how much he stands to profit off the presidency. We're back on the beat. Don and Eric are going to be running the company. They are going to be running it in a very professional manner. They're not going to discuss it with me.
- [31:55]
C
He is not exploiting the office of.
- [31:57]
B
The presidency for his personal benefit.
- [32:02]
A
That was Donald Trump and his lawyer way back in 2017 declaring that he'd never exploit the office of the presidency for his own financial gain. Well, we know how that promise played out. For years, Trump has hawked merchandise with his own name as a brand. When it comes to great stakes, I've just raised the stakes. My new game is Trump the game. The God bless the USA Bible. @ Trump University, we teach success. That's what it's all about. That's the real deal. That's the real deal. Today we're here to introduce Trump Mobile. We are announcing the launch of Trump Coins, a true symbol of American greatness. America, we've essentially elected a QVC person to the White House. Trump has been leveraging his political power for personal gain. And with an unprecedented push on crypto, media and foreign deals, The New Yorker tallying up all of the profit, Trump is estimated to have made since his time in office and it is staggering, $3.4 billion across his two terms. Here to break it all down with me is David K. Johnston, Pulitzer Prize winning investigative journalist, author of numerous books on Trump, including the Big Cheat, How Donald Trump Fleeced America and Enriched Himself and His Family. David, I am always happy to talk to you because you're the only person who seems to look at these things with the level of cynicism that I often do. I just want to start with this. Just, just give us the scope of this, give us the scope of the graph that we're dealing with. Lots of presidents may have had a brother or a cousin or a son make money off their name, but we've never actually seen a president personally enrich themselves. Even Dick Cheney with Blackbird. We've never seen a president do what Trump is doing now, right?
- [33:56]
D
Nothing in a million miles. And remember, Jimmy Carter sold his peanut warehouse so that people wouldn't think he was doing something corrupt. Two bit business. Donald Trump has, through most of his career claimed fantastic wealth he never had. Back in 1990, I revealed that his, his net worth wasn't anywhere near what it was because I got a hold of his net worth statement and his bankers valued his net worth at negative 300 million plus. Which means you and I were richer than Donald Trump. But now, oh, I think this New Yorker article by David Kirkpatrick, who I worked with at the New York Times is spot on. It's very well done. It's understandable. You don't have to know finance to get it. And you'll see how the grift, particularly with these crypto and meme coins, that's where people take real money to buy fake money, are making Trump a multi billionaire. And he's just getting started.
- [34:57]
A
David, I want to put out here all the different kind of products that Trump is hawking. He's got sneakers, he's got watches, he's got a gold phone. I mean, again, he's some sort of combination between CVS and Walmart and Target and, and he's in the White House. Here's the other question that I have. I guess if I was attempting to defend any of this graft and this grift, I could say, well, maybe he's putting people to work. But most of these companies, a lot of them, they produce their products abroad. They're not. He's not even putting Americans to work with this grift, is he?
- [35:31]
D
I should have gotten my MAGA hat which says made in Bangladesh. No Donald is. There's no connection between honesty and truth and Donald except occasionally and accidentally. And that applies to many of the people around him. But Donald's also brazenly violating the emoluments clause here. The president of the United States is not to receive any money from foreign governments or powers or even from the states. And city and counties are creatures of each state government. And yet, as in the first term, he's reeling in money from these. Now, the problem is we've discovered that the courts take the position that it's an unenforceable section of the Constitution. The people who tried to bring litigation were told you have no standing and standing is the right to bring a suit. So Donald is going to continue running what in my view is the most powerful and profitable extortion racket in the history of the world. And this goes with what I've said about Donald many times. He is the third generation head of a four generation white collar crime family. And the Trumps are not the only white collar crime family. These people don't kill you, they don't break legs, they don't bomb your business, they cheat with abuse of power, refusing to pay you something Trump is notorious for, and other things done with the pen and the help of corrupt lawyers.
- [37:03]
A
You know, Sarah Kendzior often talks about how he's part of sort of a transnational crime syndicate and you have all of this money sort of flowing from these different kinds of families all over the country, all over the world. David, I want to jump ahead a bit. I'm not one of those people that traffics in, well, what do we do after Trump? Because I think that the, the corrosion that allowed him to get into office is going to continue. But what my concern is whether he would get reelected again or some other Republican follows him. What's the long term damage to this kind of corruption on the American system? What's possible now that we didn't think was possible under Obama, under Clinton, that now any president, if they feel so morally or immorally inclined, thinks they can.
- [37:46]
D
Get away with, you know, the Constitution talks about, and I teach my students at Rochester Institute of Technology about being a position of trust and honor. Well, Donald has no honor. He never has had any honor and he certainly is not one to be trusted. So what we've done is opened up a future in which we will all be poorer and we'll be worse off. If you can't trust the government statistics and you're a business owner, you can't plan for what you're going to invest or not invest what you're going to agree to in contracts and the like. If the president of the United States is making deals based on what will enrich himself or his family or his cronies, then you're not going to have the trust in the system. The US Stock market has superior returns to Europe and Japan and other places because we got the rules better, not perfect, but better than anybody else in terms of accounting and accountability. Donald doesn't want to be accountability, doesn't want any accountability. And if we get through this, and I don't think it's certain that we will, if Donald, who has declared himself dictator back on February 26th and who I believe is our dictator, he's just consolidating remaining power. If he eventually leaves office without a designated second dictator, then we will, I think, Jason, have to and as a political scientist, I'm sure, you know, go into the Constitution and amend it to deal with the provisions that have proven to be unenforceable, the provisions that don't designate accountability like in the 14th amendment, and create a new and better Constitution, a more perfect union right to avoid.
- [39:30]
A
These kinds of shakedowns ever happening again. David K. Johnston, thank you so much. It's always a pleasure to have you on THE beat.
- [39:37]
D
Thank you.
- [39:39]
A
Up next, a special guest who stood up to Trump when it mattered most. When we return ON THE beat. Magus playbook is driving some Republicans out of the party, including my next guest, former Georgia Lt. Gov. Jeff Duncan, a longtime Republican who became a staunch critic when Trump tried to steal the 2020 election in his home state.
- [40:08]
E
The president have just decided to use the misinformation and the election fraud, you know, conspiracy theories as an excuse at a certain point.
- [40:17]
A
Does this disgust you?
- [40:20]
E
Oh, absolutely, it disgusts me. Donald Trump needs to get beat. We need to move on as a party.
- [40:25]
A
Former Republican Lieutenant Governor Jeff Duncan giving his endorsement tonight from VP Harris.
- [40:30]
E
Donald Trump has destroyed it and created a cult.
- [40:34]
A
Now Duncan says he is joining the Democratic Party, writing in a new op ed. His decision was centered around his daily struggle to, quote, love my neighbor. As a Republican, Jeff Duncan joins me now, the former Georgia lieutenant governor who is now a Democrat, that former governor, it is great to talk to you as a former resident of your state. I have, I have many, many thoughts. First, I, I have to ask this because whenever there's a party switch, not that it hasn't happened in Georgia before, whenever there's a party switch, just briefly for audience, tell us why you made the decision. What finally made you say, look, I want to be a Democrat. What, what did it.
- [41:14]
E
I got into politics a little over 10 years ago and this is a family event. Your family gets involved in politics when you do something this, this big. We got into it to solve people's problems and the Republican Party has completely stopped wanting to solve problems and simply just wants to call people names. So I wake up as a Democrat now this week refreshed, to be able to dream big, to think big, to really dig deep into some tough situations around gun safety. You know, how many people in Georgia are one prescription away from being able to hold a full time job or one roof over their head, from being able to get their family together or one degree or certificate away from being able to launch a career? This is the creativity that I now have as a Democrat. And to be honest, I think the Democrats have a perfect opportunity to get back into the idea business, not just here in Georgia, but across the country, to live their political lives outside of the extremes and to meet Americans and Georgians right where they're at.
- [42:10]
A
So we have to look back over your resume. When you were a Republican, you were in support of six week abortion bans. You didn't necessarily push through policy to expand Medicaid. There were all sorts of investigations by the GBA in Georgia into voting rights groups like the New Georgia Project and everything else like that. Now that you are a Democrat, are you repudiating the positions that you once held as a Republican or are you simply saying that you are adopting new positions as a Democrat?
- [42:39]
E
I think neither. I think it's better perspective. Let's just tackle the tough issue of abortion. For me, my personal decision is around a faith driven decision, but I don't believe that has to be the mandate or the law of the land for all of Georgia. I think Georgia's ripe for a conversation to be able to talk about what a consensus looks like of opinion. You know, six weeks, most folks don't even know that they're pregnant. And that might be okay in my household, but that doesn't seem to be okay in a majority of Georgian's households. I think Georgia's ready for a conversation to talk about where, where the law should sit. And I think there's another important issue to clear up on this. When Roe v. Wade was overturned, there was a number of ambiguities in the law. And we've seen this unfortunately play out in Georgia. Georgia with, you know, unclear answers as to where doctors should be able to, to make decisions, where women should be able to make decisions based on their health. So I think there's a lot to do on the law. But no, I certainly think perspective means, means more. That's what loving your neighbor is all about, quite honestly. And that's, that's, that's really what the progression's been in my world.
- [43:39]
A
So after you endorsed Kamala Harris For President in 2024, you were expelled from the Georgia Republican Party. So you were, you weren't a man without a country, but you were a man without specific party. Now that you have announced that you're becoming a Democrat, have you reached out to prominent Democrats in Georgia? Have you reached out to Senator John Ossoff, Raphael Warnock, Stacey Abrams? Have you made any contact with them about how you can actually work with the party moving forward?
- [44:03]
E
I think that's the most unique thing about this journey. And this isn't for me just about the last week. This has been happening over a series of years where I've built relationships and had great conversations. I was on the campaign trail with Raphael Warren Warnock in Pennsylvania looking for votes to try to help Kamala Harris win that election. I've worked with Jon Ossoff a number of times on constituent services. I served with Stacey Abrams in the House of Representatives when I was in the state House. But this has been about Democrats, independents and even some Republicans reaching out to me, encouraging me to continue to do the right thing here, continuing to talk about my ideas, continuing to look for opportunities to build consensus. If we don't figure out how to fix this in this window of time, we're going to lose this great thing called a democracy. Right? We've got to turn chaos into conversations. And I believe I'm part of that solution, but not all of that solution.
- [44:56]
A
Former Georgia Lieutenant Governor Jeff Duncan, thank you so much for your candor and for your admissions that there are new things that you can do in the party. We'll be right back after this break. That does it for me. Thanks for watching the Beat tonight. It's Stephen A. Smith here. You want sports? SiriusXM's got it all, every game, every team, all season long. Debates, rants, hot takes and no filter whatsoever. Trust and believe. You don't want to miss what I have to say this week on the Stephen A. Smith show, only on SiriusXM.