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The Beat with Ari Melber
Trump DOJ preps John Bolton case after indicting two Trump foes
00:41:50
Donald Trump's retribution campaign escalates as he bears down on yet another perceived enemy, Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton. The news comes one day after Trump's DOJ indicted NY Attorney General Letitia James. MSNBC's Ari Melber reports.
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Ari Melber
Prohibited by law CT and C's 21 plus sponsored by Jamba Casino. I want to welcome everyone to the Beat. I'm Ari Melbert and we begin with the president continuing the retribution campaign. The once secret then exposed orders that he gave are being carried out and now he's bearing down on a former employee, now a perceived enemy. This is breaking news. MSNBC reporting a Maryland grand jury has been now hearing evidence what has been for weeks but breaking tonight is we know about it and they are building apparently a case that is against a Trump perceived enemy and yet one who worked for President Trump, longtime neoconservative foreign policy voice John Bolton. Now the suggestion is they are close to getting where they the Trump DOJ officials want and they're trying to cook up this case to get a grand jury indictment and that could come as soon as next week. The case has sped up. Bolton, of course, was the former national security adviser to President Trump, a top US Official and since leaving office, while he is not a lefty going to no king's protests, he has referred to what he learned in that time and his view based on the evidence about what Donald Trump is doing, you could put him in a category of more of a Mike Pence than a James Comey, one who served loyally to Donald Trump for years and was of course a longtime Republican whose main offense according to Donald Trump is that he has referred to things that Trump is doing that are contrary to law or bolt view of sound policy. MSNBC reporting that the figure who is seen as Trump's retribution czar, Ed Martin, has been meeting with the acting U.S. attorney on the case. That itself is unusual. FBI agents did search Bolton's home in August. We know about that. That's been reported. And Trump, who has continued to vacillate between denying that he's in charge of these revenge prosecutions and then bragging or publicly suggesting that he can do whatever he wants. Well, here's what he said then. No, I don't know about it. I saw it on television this morning. I know nothing about it. I just saw it this morning. They did a raid. I don't want to know about it. It's not necessary. I could know about it. I could be the one starting it. I'm actually the chief law enforcement officer, but I feel that it's better this way. That's the president's sort of public description, balancing what everyone knows, which is that he has been vowing these type of revenge prosecutions. But even Donald Trump also has understood and even learned in the first term about where the limits might be and that you don't necessarily want to admit that you're building revenge political cases that turn on the people rather than the criminal evidence, if there is any. And if it seems like we're ending the week with more news about Donald Trump on a tear, that's because we are. If you're trying to keep it straight or you've been busy and not following every domino. Just this week, the DOJ indicted the top law enforcement official in New York, York, Attorney General Letitia James, who had previously run a civil case. No threat of jail time there, but a civil enforcement action against Trump. Or so now the DOJ has taken formal legal steps, using the criminal investigative powers it has against six people that Donald Trump perceives as foes. You have the indictments. You have the grand jury going forward on Bolden. You have a subpoena for another individual who did oversee a case against Trump. DA Willis, you have the charges, remember, against the New Jersey mayor, which were so weak they were dropped, that case never going to trial. And you have Democratic Congressman McIver, who we heard from on this very program this week. So it's adding up. James and Comey have said they are innocent, and this is no time to be scared.
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This is nothing more than a continuation.
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Sadie German
Of the president's desperate weaponization of our justice system.
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Maurices Advertiser
He is forcing federal law enforcement agencies.
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Sadie German
To do his bidding.
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All because I did my job.
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John Bolton
There are costs to standing up to Donald Trump, but we couldn't imagine ourselves living any other way.
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Ari Melber
We will not live on our knees. Mr. Comey, who has proven controversial for a range of reasons, Striking a note that now may be heard by other Trump allies or former allies like John Bolton, that when you face this kind of crackdown, this kind of alleged selective prosecution, that's one of the arguments they're making to try to get these cases tossed. You have to be strong, not fearful. And for those who think that the president might have stopped just at Comey or just at a Democrat in New York, well, tonight's reporting that he is moving quickly through his DOJ to go at someone who worked in the highest levels of the White House for Donald Trump shows that no one appears to be safe. And that may be exactly the message this president wants to send. I want to get right to our guest tonight, New York Times Magazine legal writer Emily Bazelon and our politics expert, professor and MSNBC analyst Jason Johnson. Jason, I want to go to you first, based on our understanding of what's happening, that this is more of a story about politics or politics infusing the DOJ to a degree that might be unlawful rather than a traditional legal story. Although Emily, I'm sure, will give us some legal analysis on the strength of these cases. Do you, I guess, Jason, agree with that premise? And what do you see here happening politically as Donald Trump is sending a message clearly across the bow, even to his own former aides, John Bolton, the longtime neocon Republican.
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Bubba Wallace
All right. I don't know why anybody should be surprised. I mean, Donald Trump has never been loyal to anyone. He has a list of people that he has taken advantage of, a list of people he's lied to. I mean, he did nothing when people were threatening to kill his vice president. So I don't know why anyone is surprised that a president who said that I'm going to go on revenge is going on revenge. I think the only saving grace here is that while Donald Trump and some of his acolytes, they think he's Tony Soprano, he's more like my cousin Vinnie. Most of these cases don't work. They fall apart fairly quickly. He ends up looking foolish. But the threat of going after these people and making them have to spend money to defend themselves is part of how he's establishing the sort of authoritarian bully pulpit that he's been pushing for since he got back into office.
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Ari Melber
We love him. My cousin Vinnie reference around here. If news wasn't so serious, I would trade favorite lines with you. But we'll save that if not for another day, at least for later in the hour. But before again, I bring in Emily. Jason, I want to Show a lot of things have been so transmuted and sort of completely subverted that we forget who we're talking about. I just want to show, because I see even nonpartisan analysts sometimes say, oh, well, this person's sort of a Trump critic, or this person's sort of anti Trump, which falls into the Trump vector, which is not actually an analysis of ideology or the parties or anything. It's just back to this sort of autocratic lens. And so let's put the President to the side for a moment, however he might feel about that. And just remember John Bolton, who worked in the Bush administration and is a longtime conservative Republican. This is who he is. Take a look.
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John Bolton
I don't think he's fit for office. I don't think he has the confidence to carry out the job. There really isn't any guiding principle that I was able to discern other than what's good for Donald Trump's reelection. What he was capable of was on a daily basis, doing something more and more outrageous than he had done the day before, all to the same end of staying in power. I think when you challenge the Constitution itself, the way Trump has done that is un American.
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Emily Bazelon
Do you agree with Mark Milley that.
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Robbie Myers
Trump is a fascist?
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John Bolton
You know, I don't think he's smart enough to have an ideology.
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Ari Melber
Mr. Bolton's criticisms have to do with what he learned about Donald Trump having worked for him. He himself is a longtime conservative, and so it would appear that is the fault line. Not foreign policy, national security, the things he actually worked on with Trump. All Trump heard was that.
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Bubba Wallace
Right.
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Ari Melber
All right.
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Bubba Wallace
And here's the thing, as he pointed out.
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Ari Melber
Oh, I'm sorry, I'll go to Jason. And then, Emily, that's my bad. Yeah.
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Bubba Wallace
The only criteria seems to be whoever is in Donald Trump's burn book that week. And clearly whether you have problems with him politically or ideologically. I mean, the toughest thing Bolton said is this guy isn't smart enough to be a fascist. I mean, that's a pretty serious insult. But at the end of the day, whether it's Comey or Tish James or anyone else that he has threatened, Donald Trump doesn't care if that person has broken the law. Donald Trump doesn't care if that person has stood in the way of policy. If he just personally dislikes you, he's going to weaponize the entire government. And that is a danger for everyone, not just in his own party, but every American citizen.
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Emily Bazelon
Emily, you know, one of the most striking features of the Trump administration so Far has been how few Republicans have been willing to speak out on the record. Right. I mean, almost no one in Congress has been willing to criticize Trump, except maybe about Jimmy Kimmel a little bit. And so Bolton stands out there as this former Trump official who's willing to go on television and say these critical things. How better to send a message that this is a risky thing to do than to go to a grand jury and ask for an indictment?
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Ari Melber
Yeah, Emily, this is what Bolton said when it came up that these threats were looming.
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Ty Cobb
You're obviously on his enemies list, at least Kash Patel's enemies list. Are you worried that they're going to come after you in some way? I mean, he's hinted at it before.
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John Bolton
Well, I think he's already come after me and several others in withdrawing the protection that we had for from the Iranians for the attack on Qasem Soleimani. So I think, and I said in the new forward to the paperback edition of my book, I think it is a retribution presidency, Emily.
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Emily Bazelon
Right. And Bolton is a good vehicle for sending a message to other Republicans about the problem of being on this enemies list, which, you know, it looks like the Justice Department is kind of ticking through. We should also say that when Bolton's home was searched, there were some reports from the Biden Justice Department or former officials that they had also been looking at this question of whether Bolton had a classified information information. So, you know, it's possible there will be more to this case. We don't know yet. But you look at how flimsy and weak the evidence appears to be against Leticia James and James Comey, and there is, you know, a lot to wonder about here in those cases. We know that prosecutors who were instructed to investigate basically told it would be really good for them to find something. They passed on those cases. You know, former acting U.S. attorney in Virginia Eric Siebert, he was forced to resign rather than go ahead with those prosecutions. So those cases, it just seems really stark what we know about them. I think it's a little less clear at this point about the case against Bolton. And obviously, if there is an indictment from the grand jury, we'll know a little bit more.
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Ari Melber
We'll look at the faces as you mentioned, Emily, because you're saying there's the larger pattern. Any individual case can be sort of debated, but when you see all these up, you have this strong pattern. As I mentioned, the case against the mayor was so weak, it fell apart, but they wanted to charge it. And in the still pending Mciver case. The, the video evidence shows federal officials saying turn off your body cameras, which is suspicious. They didn't want a record. And this comes at the order of the, of the deputy attorney general themselves, who was a former Trump defense attorney. All of that is bad for those cases. What you're saying with Bolton lower left grand jury there, for folks looking at all the cases, Emily, is that apart from this pattern, if they have this kind of evidence and these documents cases come down to where the classified material is, you're saying that they might have separate from the pattern some more evidence to go on. I mean, Emily, folks, remember the president himself was previously brought up on a, a documents case, although there was a lot of obstruction evidence and evidence that he clearly knew he had him and wouldn't give him back. But you're saying if the right documents are there, that strengthens the DOJ's hand.
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Emily Bazelon
I mean, I'm speculating because we don't know yet. And I find the speculating to be frustrating because also we're sort of focusing on what Trump wants us to focus on, which is whether there's any wrongdoing here from John Bolton as opposed to this pattern in the just department. We are obviously also talking about that, but I find this part of the process frustrating because people get accused and then we spend time sifting through the accusations. We're supposed to do that. But in the end, if the cases fall apart, then all of that is wounding to their reputations. No good reason.
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Ari Melber
Well, I think you're saying something important and insightful while also being responsible, which is what we've come to expect from you. Emily Bazelon. It's why I started the segment with Jason. It's not to sully Jason as only politics, but I think Jason and I agree this thing looks like a political McCarthyistic autocratic crackdown, and that's what it looks like. And if we find other evidence, I've told viewers we'll always report it out. But because it looks that way, we try to cover it for what it is while also following the perversion of justice, which is these cases go to arraignment and then they go to pretrial motions and if they're not tossed, they go to trial. And obviously you're going to cover the trial of these high profile figures as well. So it is a balance. Jason, I want to also get you in on where Trump is losing because there's been so many shows of force and intimidation, but a judge just trimmed his sails on the effort to keep using troops that's been mixed in the courts. I'm curious to get both of your reactions to that when we come back in 90 seconds.
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Bubba Wallace
In the coastal apocalyptic wastelands of Chicago.
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Ari Melber
And Washington and Memphis and Portland to show us their hell holes. You can see that the carnage here on the streets is amazing.
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Robbie Myers
It's so scary here that the dogs need protective eyewear.
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Ari Melber
Let's look at Portland at night this week.
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Bubba Wallace
This is JB Pritzker reporting from war torn Chicago.
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Ari Melber
As you can see, there's utter mayhem.
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Bubba Wallace
We've seen people being forced to eat hot dogs with ketchup on them.
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Ari Melber
And we're back with Emily and Jason. Some of that is a real world reaction, some of it, of course, joking about Donald Trump's claims which are legally relevant to whether or not he can use the troops this way. And Emily, it's been mixed in court, but we have seen, for example, just here at the end of the week, one judge at least paused this for two weeks saying they can't send more troops into Illinois when the baseline facts, which was the punchline of those jokes, don't meet the standards for the kind of mayhem or disaster that would allow the guard.
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Emily Bazelon
Yeah, I think it's been a kind of relief to a Lot of us to see judges looking at the facts and saying that the statements, the claims the administration is making both in court and through Trump's social media posts are just untethered to the facts, was the way Judge Immergut in Oregon put it. She's, by the way, a Trump appointee. There's just this feeling that, okay, well, the courts are taking a look at this. There's some law happening here, some analysis of the factual patterns, which, you know, I have to say, all summer, as the Supreme Court was issuing emergency order after emergency order with zero reasoning or explanation, that was really lacking. So I think the lower courts here are doing their job and, you know, we'll see whether they get upheld on the law on appeal. But there is a kind of reality check happening here from these judges.
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Ari Melber
Jason, I'm curious what you think about the way this is getting out to the country. Some people have tuned out. I get it. Some people are despondent. The Democrats have to balance, looking like they take this seriously and fighting hard, but also doing something that I thought those videos showed more than some other past iterations we've seen, which is instead of only being outraged about everything and only amplifying the losses, boosting your Ls, as Emily would say, sometimes you gotta update people and remind them that some of the steps are working and maybe it's not enough and people are upset, but it's certainly working. That groups, including some of the Democratic governors, are slowing this down in the courts. No.
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Bubba Wallace
Yeah, Ari, but I don't think it's enough. I don't think these politicians are making it clear enough to the people, to people outside the states, how dangerous this is, how children and moms and dads being dragged out of their houses at 2 o' clock in the morning and being zip tied, people being put into ice facilities and shipped back to Iran and Russia as political dissidents. This is dangerous. This is just another stress test. And I know that these court rulings are good and we feel like, hey, we, we've gone through the darkness. Everything is opalite.
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Ari Melber
Yes.
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Bubba Wallace
No, no. This is just one good legal result right now. The Democrats have to actually go on the offense and start suing ICE and suing this administration in advance and not waiting for these attacks.
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Ari Melber
Hmm. Emily.
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Emily Bazelon
I am not sure about proactive lawsuits, but I think, Jason, you're absolutely right that what is happening so far is not going to stop the Trump administration. And in the end, I think the answer lies in politics. Right? I mean, it's the voters who are going to decide the fate of this administration. The courts have a role to play for sure. But in the end, it's people and how they respond and what they do in the next elections and how they react generally. Generally that really shapes the behavior of politicians, including Donald Trump. We haven't seen his approval ratings really sink in a consistent way yet. And, and to the extent they have, it hasn't been clear that these kinds of issues of rule of law and the democracy are the cause of the problems he's having. If that started to really become clear, I think that would actually have an effect on the administration's conduct. And, you know, that's kind of developing. We'll see.
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Ari Melber
Emily and Jason on more than one topic tonight. Appreciate your time. I wish you guys a, a good weekend. I want to tell folks what's coming up because I mentioned we might get lighter by the end of the hour. We do that sometimes. We'll be looking at the magazine covers that have changed the country. That should be interesting. Some politics and culture in that by the end of the hour. I also want to share what a former Trump White House lawyer says is the line crossed. Warning of Trump tyranny and the National Guard's abuse. He says we could see elections stolen. You will hear that tonight on the Beat and why it matters. Meanwhile, Trump's own moves have leaked some of the worst incriminating evidence against him in the revenge prosecutions. Big, big scoop in the Wall Street Journal. The reporter who broke it. President Trump has named his enemies list in the past few weeks. The DOJ has been on a tear against them. We followed several indictments and now there's a grand jury impaneled looking at charges against John Bolton, a former Trump aide. Trump has basically tried to turn the DOJ into a sort of selective prosecution operation. That of course is unlawful if defense counsel has the evidence that Trump was basically ordering these cases regardless of the facts and that the facts don't support the charges. Well, on that score, the Trump side has gotten a blow by his own admissions and confessions because he directed the DOJ to target named opponents in public. This is the larger list that we've shown you some versions of this. You can see how many people have already faced DOJ actions. But as for the public call, which of course hurts Trump's case, well, it turns out that was an accident. He wanted to keep at least certain orders secret. Wall Street Journal had this bombshell about how he's taken control of the prosecutions that he has been pushing. Attorney General Pam Bondi traveling together. And while she does try to avoid discussing cases directly with Trump, they report she does still regularly visit the White House. Trump continues to complain about the pace of cases to aids. And even after that rather thin and now controversial indictment of the former FBI Director James Comey, he still says Bondi's moving too slow. Other prosecutors are investigating the former CIA director John Brennan and the very FBI director that Donald Trump picked to replace James Comey, Christopher Wray. As we reported earlier this week, drawing on the Journal, Donald Trump's infamous demand that Pam Bondi investigate and finish these charges against now two of the three people that were charged, Comey and James, with Schiff being the other named. Well, the Journal reported he meant that to be a secret directive, a private message, but accidentally posted it on the Internet. We're joined by Justice Department reporter from the Wall Street Journal, Sadie German. Welcome.
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Sadie German
Thank you for having me.
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Ari Melber
What is the significance of what you found from your reporting and sources that Donald Trump is calling these shots, breaking rules, and I guess in some cases, accidentally leaking or telling on himself?
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Sadie German
Yes. Well, what I think is very interesting is that, you know, Trump hasn't really changed over the years. I've covered doj. I've seen him call upon his attorneys general time and time again to go after his rivals, show leniency to his allies. And what's different now is the leadership of doj. In the first term, you had people who would, you know, we had people who would, had a shared sense of where the ethical lines and the norm stood. And they knew that if they use the legal system in a way that could be perceived as weaponized, that that could come back and hurt them once, you know, the opposing party takes office again. So they, they thought that that would become a cycle, and they managed to placate Trump. But in this term, that doesn't seem to be happening quite as much.
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Ari Melber
You mentioned a cycle. Some of them may have honestly believed that the DOJ is not supposed to work that way. And as an attorney, if there isn't good evidence in a case, you have an ethical obligation not to bring it.
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Sadie German
That's right. And what we've seen in this term so far is in addition to dozens of prosecutors being fired for their work on investigations involving Trump, we also see many resigning, you know, voluntarily because they're concerned that they'll be asked to do something that's unethical and they could be disbarred.
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Ari Melber
When Trump did post online this message that said Pam, referring to Attorney General Pam Bondi, and then his demand for these prosecutions. When you started to get the clues or the indication from your reporting that this was a mistake, what did you think? Did you say, oh, wow, we got a big story here. And of course, you do your best to verify it. Walk us through that. Because it seemed very damning.
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Sadie German
Right. Well, I mean, there were some early indications that this might have been a misfire, including the fact that the post started, you know, was directed to her. It was started with Pam, and it was a message to her. And so in addition to being concerned about a president and the attorney general communicating on direct messages about important investigations, it just, it was just kind of incredible that, you know, we've seen him make these public calls so many times for investigations that he actually intended to. For this one to be private was significant.
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Ari Melber
You report that AG Bondi was very concerned about that message, that she called the White House, which is still, of course, they're the boss, but to voice her concerns. Tell us about that.
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Sadie German
So after, after that happened, Trump was surprised to learn that the message was actually public. And then Bondi started calling the White House, calling aides. She was upset. And at some point, Trump agreed to issue a second message publicly saying that Pam Bondi is doing a great job.
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Ari Melber
And she was upset just because it affected her standing. Or also, she is a former state ag she does have some experience that if we put aside the question of whether these are valid charges, she certainly knows, perhaps better than others, that having a public political call to charge them before doing it makes it harder to win those cases.
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Sadie German
Right. And what our reporting showed is that Bondi has really walked a delicate line with Trump. You know, she travels with him. She goes to the White House multiple times during the week. But she has been careful. She's been intentionally not trying to talk to him about investigations. And it's interesting that she's pointing out, she's pointed out to him that most of the decision making in prosecutions is left to the deputy attorney general. So she's kind of taking herself out of the equation and still fulfilling that role as the attorney general, who is a cabinet member who is advancing the president's agenda.
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Ari Melber
Finally, Donald Trump has gone after a lot of different independent news outlets in different ways. He is suing the Wall Street Journal. Does that affect how you approach your job, your reporting?
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Sadie German
No, it doesn't. Simply put.
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Ari Melber
Sometimes the answer is simple. Journalist with the Journal, Sadie German. Thanks for your time tonight.
- [28:56]
Sadie German
Thanks. Thanks for having me.
- [28:59]
Ari Melber
Appreciate it. When we come back later tonight, we are going to go through some of These moments, culture, politics, civil rights across, how we understand our shared community. Magazine covers have been a big part of that. We have something interesting on that. But first, I'm going to show you a Trump White House lawyer warning. He does think Donald Trump will be trying to use the military to steal elections. His warning and what you can do about it. Do you ever look around with what's happening in America in this still first year of the second Trump term and say, is everyone okay with this? And if you watch this program, I don't mean that in an ideological or partisan way. We've had a long, long stretch in America where we debate ideas, ideology, policies, and you have to come together after elections, win or lose, and keep going. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the autocratic crackdown on the First Amendment, on voting rights, on the ability for people to walk around their own community without troops in the streets for what judges say is sometimes no reason or unlawful reasons, that stuff. And so sometimes you say the people who've always opposed Trump will, of course, probably give him less of a break on these big things. So that's almost covered. But you look at everybody else, including people who might agree with him on plenty of stuff, and it's fine to agree with Donald Trump or Republicans on plenty of policy stuff. Again, that's the American debate. So right now, I want to show you what we just heard from someone who worked in Trump's White House in the first term and defended him against parts of the Mueller probe. And everyone deserves their defense. But this individual, an acclaimed lawyer and former prosecutor, Ty Cobb, is sounding the alarm now about what he calls the autocratic tyranny, the threat and the warning against the abuse of troops. We just sat down with him, and I want to play this for you right now. What is your view of what's happening?
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Ty Cobb
What we're seeing is authoritarianism and tyranny that we're now under and the disintegration of the rule of law under Pam Bondi stewardship. Comey, as we all know, now has many detractors. He's controversial. But this indictment is so unworthy of the Justice Department. The president feels unleashed. You know, it clearly is his belief that he's entitled to do whatever it is he wants. Pam Bondi delivered Comey and now has delivered James. That's not really what the country was supposed to be about. The White House is very serious about using any lever of government that, you know, inflates Trump's sense of his power. It will be difficult to stop his occupation of America. It may go toward his ultimate desire, perhaps not in 2026, but in 2028, you know, to ensure that power passes to his chosen successor as opposed to the free and fair elections. I don't think anybody ever anticipated the rule of law would disintegrate as rap as it has under Trump and Bondi. We're suffering, suffering now because of that, now that we have an enemies list in the Justice Department.
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Ari Melber
That is the voice of a former Trump White House attorney and a former prosecutor in DOJ who clearly cares about the rules there and says there's an enemy's list. He says Pam Bondi's out of control and most importantly for the future, he this Trump lawyer, veteran, former lawyer for Trump, is concerned the abuse of the military will be used to hijack the peaceful transfer of power at the end of this final Trump term. It is an alert we should take seriously from someone on the inside. I wanted to share that with you here as we end the week. When we come back, we will look at some of the magazine covers that have defined our times from this recent one about the very issue I just mentioned to some others that give us hope and uplift about the prospect for change. That's next.
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Ari Melber
Now we turn to a way to make sense of everything that's happened in history. And now it involves politics, but also culture and even space. If you look at some of the political controversies we're dealing with, say this week, you have the music stars from Bad Bunny to Taylor mixed up in our larger national debates. But as we look at those kind of stories, you might see them on your phone with algorithms or other sort of tech math trying to get everyone upset or debate things. And so it's easy to forget that while depending on who you are, you might have a lot of info about Bad Bunny only or Taylor only or MAGA only. It wasn't that long ago that our nation experienced these kind of stories nationally with more of a shared lens, what they sometimes called a monoculture. There was evening news, a lot fewer channels than now. And there were of course, the iconic major magazine covers which were just a huge deal. The New York Times has just ranked the top most influential covers of all time, including 1990 Madonna on the COVID of Interview in a very provocative pose, something that today might have turned less heads, but was a big deal then. Her public expression of sexuality, her brand of feminism shocked many. Also on the list, the Time cover with Ellen. Yep, I'm gay as her sitcom character made history.
- [36:04]
Robbie Myers
Has there ever been anyone you felt you clicked with?
- [36:09]
Ari Melber
And what was his name?
- [36:12]
Emily Bazelon
Susan. I'm so afraid to tell people. I mean, I just. Susan, I'm gay.
- [36:23]
Ari Melber
You know, a lot of networks wouldn't take the risk. Walt Disney must be turning over his grave. Major corporate sponsors have withdrawn. I hope this is the setting of a precedent.
- [36:34]
Emily Bazelon
Someday people are going to get it.
- [36:38]
Ari Melber
The show was a big deal if you were watching. But remember, there wasn't an Internet to necessarily go get every social media meme reaction that Time cover was part of the cultural sea change. So while there is much discussion of going after legacy media, challenging the way we do media, and much change can be welcomed digitally. These magazines can show us, as the Times list reminds us about something that may be lost that we still need when we share a common experience. For our discussion tonight, we are joined by Robbie Myers, who was the longest serving editor in chief in the history of Elle magazine. She also worked under the aforementioned interview with Andy Warhol and a veteran of 17, InStyle and Rolling Stone. Robbie, you can see why we picked you. Thanks for doing this.
- [37:25]
Robbie Myers
Well, thanks. I mean, you know, I love looking at these covers. I looked at all of them. I read all the briefs beneath them. And you know, I have to say, print is dead. Long live print. I don't think it's really done right. But you know, one thing that you said, I mean, importantly, when you look at a magazine, I want to believe that they are all fact checked. Those are real stories. Right. And that's a very different thing from meantime.
- [37:54]
Ari Melber
Yeah. Right. It's a different experience than the atomized Internet. I'm going to show you a few that I think viewers may recall. Here are two from politics when there were new people on the scene. The Fresh Start. We'll take this in full. The Fresh Start. Ronald Reagan tapped into something and came roaring into the 80s. And this ebony cover is actually quite remembered before Obama won. Your thoughts?
- [38:23]
Robbie Myers
Well, I mean, I think they're both pretty straightforward. And you know, listen, there's a job that the COVID is supposed to do and you know, I love looking at the covers, but what they really are is a way to get into the magazine and read something that you don't know yet. And I think that, you know, these are artful and they belong, you know, in all kinds of places as simply as art. And I think that's a lot what the Times was doing when they did the 25 best magazine covers ever. But you know, we live in the context of our time and it was, what was interesting to me is some of the older things. You know, I would love for my children to read them, but they're too busy reading.
- [39:06]
Ari Melber
Well, let me show you another one. Yeah, here's Demi. Do you remember this one?
- [39:12]
Robbie Myers
Very well. And you know, this was scandalous to a lot of people, but I have to say, I mean, it's not. I mean, you see her body, but what you really see is, is her very pregnant belly with a child inside, which I don't know. I mean, I think it's pretty beautiful in a lot of ways. And you know, there was a lot of talk about this and people were angry about it. But the truth is, you know, that I think a lot of people really loved seeing her this way because they have families or whatever the reason, you know, and if you look at media right now, right. I feel like this, this cover is about an inch away from what young girls are wearing on the street, which is skims.
- [39:59]
Ari Melber
I mean, that's, that's funny when you put it like that. And as you, as you mentioned the fact that this was considered scandalous perhaps for sexist reasons when pregnancy and having children is the oldest thing by definition. And yet to see it in her choice to how she wanted to share it bothered people. I want to show you Muhammad Ali reimagining a persecution. And today we'll bring this up. Yet we've got CEOs and powerful people buckling. He was facing what he viewed as a persecution because he was fighting the U.S. government.
- [40:36]
Robbie Myers
Absolutely. I mean, I think that this is probably one of the most important covers that I've ever seen. I mean, it's an old cover, but it lives today in a very real way. And, you know, this man was a person who had ideas, and he didn't want to go to Vietnam. He said, I don't have any beef with those people over there. Why would I do that? I mean, you know, and he wasn't allowed to box for a certain amount of time. And, you know, I think that those arrows represent a lot. But I also think Muhammad Ali represents in some ways, the world.
- [41:21]
Ari Melber
And again, it just resonates today because we see what little people are willing to do or sacrifice or risk and how much he was, as you mentioned, his whole career and ultimately his liberty. I want to play a little bit of the reaction to one of the covers you worked on. This was people we know. Well, Serena Williams. Let's take a look at this sound.
- [41:43]
Sadie German
The tennis phenom on the July cover.
- [41:46]
Emily Bazelon
Who would you want to be like?
- [41:49]
John Bolton
Well, I like other people to be like me.
- [41:51]
Ari Melber
She posed for the COVID of New.
- [41:53]
Riley Herbst
York magazine's fashion issue.
- [41:55]
Emily Bazelon
Serena Williams is the first female athlete to appear on her own on the front cover of Sports Illustrated for more than three decades.
- [42:06]
Ari Melber
I'll let you respond. I want to show. We have the sisters on Elle, where you, of course, were editor and also one you mentioned from 1985, another Elle cover. Tell us about. About these.
- [42:19]
Robbie Myers
Well, I mean, I love seeing all of those. I love seeing everything about them and what they do, you know, and the thing is, is one of the covers that is talked about in the Times story was about Brandi Chastain, who, you know, it was a. It's a picture of a woman who feels glorious because she won a match. I mean, their team won a match in a soccer. In soccer. Okay. And it's like, great. I'm glad that she's there. But, you know, importantly, I really was thinking, like, what about Serena? I mean, these are athletes, you know, we can go all the way back to Billie Jean King. Right. And, you know, I sort of feel. And this was not in the group of magazine Covers that were displayed as some of the best ever. Right? And I just think it was, it was really important and it was, you know, I think people needed to get to know who they were. I mean, Serena is, I mean, one of the, you know, most famous and great athletes in the world. And Venus too, I mean, you know, and it, but also there's, it's about a lot of other things too.
- [43:36]
Ari Melber
Well, and it's something we, we actually share and, and you, you take it in. I want to show two more and give you the final word on why you say don't count. Print out the. The so called man on the moon time 1969. There wasn't a phone to look down at. People, of course, watch the moon landing in many ways, but the COVID seemed to mean something. And all the way back to 1968. A problem we have today. Time also pushing the conversation with the gun in America pointed outward. And we think about the gun violence we live with today there in a Lichtenstein style visage. You get 30 seconds on the future of print. And then these covers, well, I mean.
- [44:20]
Robbie Myers
I love them both, I have to say, you know, the man on the moon, the thing that's so great about that is I think that it brought Americans together and it was something to be really happy about. And you know, we all supported them. And you know, I just think that's important for the United States. Of course, there were other places and countries that were fighting to get there too. And you know, you're right. I mean, and also, I mean, the thing about the gun is, you know, it's, it's a lot of people are really terrified right now and that's not news. I mean, you know, I know a lot of people think that and they're not wrong, but, but I think it's a conversation that we need to really keep having.
- [45:04]
Ari Melber
Yeah, yeah. And it can sound hackish when we talk about, or politicians say, the national conversation. But then when you miss it, when we're atomized and we don't have one, people are in their corners. You say, wait, we actually do need that about gun violence, about what you just said. Can we unite over anything? And what Muhammad Ali did. How do we confront tyranny? Robbie Myers, thanks for ending the week on this note. I appreciate it.
- [45:27]
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