The Bulwark Podcast – Episode Summary

Episode: "Ryan Grim: An Unconscionable Reaction to a Summary Execution"

Date: January 8, 2026

Host: Tim Miller

Guest: Ryan Grim (Reporter, co-founder of Dropsite News)

Main Theme and Purpose

This episode centers on the recent shooting of Renee Good, an unarmed American citizen, by ICE agents in Minneapolis, exploring the facts of the incident, the government’s reaction, the disturbing public discourse surrounding it, and the broader political and cultural patterns such responses reveal. The conversation branches into analysis of US foreign policy (with a focus on Venezuela), right-wing "populist" foreign policy contradictions, Epstein revelations’ impact on political factions, evolving identity politics, and intra-left/Democratic Party disagreements.

Key Segments & Discussion Points

1. ICE Shooting of Renee Good: What Happened? (01:40–07:23)

The Incident

• Tim introduces the tragic shooting: Renee Good, a 37-year-old mother, was killed by an ICE agent while sitting in her Honda Pilot, leaving behind three children—including a six-year-old who is now orphaned (01:40).
• Grim details how the incident fits a familiar pattern from his years reporting on police shootings: “You have a situation where a person is trying to comply, but tense, nervous and angry officers are shouting contradictory orders at them. This happens, unfortunately, way too often.” – Ryan Grim (02:37)
• Both note the chilling detail that the agent who shot her was filming or scrolling on his phone with his non-shooting hand during the incident. “There’s no training manual that would say, oh, and also you should have your iPhone out in the other hand. Just absolute rank amateur nonsense.” – Ryan Grim (04:37)

Systemic Critique

• Both Tim and Ryan forcefully reject any justification for the ICE agents’ actions, noting Renee was not a criminal suspect and her car was stationary, not threatening officers: “Frame by frame analysis is a trap because it almost acknowledges the legitimacy of what they're doing to begin with. They have no business confronting an American citizen on an American road just going about her business. Leave her alone.” – Ryan Grim (06:53)

2. Political & Media Reaction (07:23–15:25)

Right-Wing and Administration Response

• Trump’s and other administration officials’ statements falsely depicted Good as “deranged,” “violent,” and a domestic terrorist, despite clear video evidence to the contrary (07:23–08:33).
  • “That’s just a totally hallucinated story. Like that isn’t even anything resembling what happened.” – Tim Miller (08:33)
• Noem and others falsely assert ICE officers were "attacked," twisting facts to fit a law-and-order narrative.
• Grim notes: “If this was like 2004 or something and there was no video of this… [people] would be like, wow, I guess… in such a situation, we know there are such things as car rammings… Then you see the actual video. It’s like, no, it’s a traffic jam these idiots created that she’s trying to get out of. And then they murdered her.” (09:35)

Broader Societal Concerns

• Tim highlights how quickly many citizens defend summary execution if an order isn’t followed: “It’s been pretty… jarring to me that there are a lot of our citizens out there… who basically think the punishment for not listening to a cop's orders in a stressful situation is that you should be summarily executed.” – Tim Miller (13:21)
• Ryan adds, “When you're defending something that most police officers won’t defend, you’ve taken a wrong turn… They hate those people so much that they don’t care.” (14:32)

Notable Quote

• “Fuckery is an expression of your power, the power imbalance. That I can say this completely outrageous thing and all you can do is just like spit and rage about it.” – Ryan Grim (12:05) [On officials knowingly lying]

3. Escalation and Political Risks (15:25–16:17)

• Both express concerns that such an incident could lead to further violence, protester backlash, and increased government crackdowns, as in recent years. Grim: “We’re early 2026 now… This is a dark moment.” (15:25)

4. U.S. Policy in Venezuela: Motives and Contradictions (18:08–25:34)

Administration Moves

• Ryan details the administration’s confusing handling of Venezuelan oil: “It’s a really bizarre situation… It’s not a regime change operation. It's a president change operation… What he's doing now with the oil is so bizarre and in some ways very, very Trumpian.” (18:08)
• U.S. actions are no longer couched even in the language of democracy—just overt resource extraction: “This is just gangster stuff.” (19:07)

Domestic Political Drivers

• Tim and Ryan discuss how South Florida’s Cuban/Venezuelan diaspora and Marco Rubio’s ambitions are influencing U.S. policy more than national interest.
  • “You're, you and Rubio are trying to use the American government to settle your own scores over in Venezuela and Cuba… not something the American people are on board for.” – Ryan Grim (21:05)

Economic Irony

• Trump’s pressure to expand oil supply is devastating the domestic oil industry, despite rhetoric of protecting U.S. energy (22:22).
• “I don’t think he’s trying to destroy American manufacturing… but that’s the consequence of his policies.” – Ryan Grim (22:48)

Macro Perspective

• U.S. is retreating from global hegemony, focusing on “our backyard,” which Ryan finds problematic: “It’s such a weird term. It’s not our backyard. These are our neighbors.” (25:34)

5. Populist Right, Machismo Foreign Policy & Contradictions (25:55–32:21)

Horseshoe Theory & Non-Interventionism

• Tim notes how some right-wing populists sounded like “the left” on foreign engagement, but fold fast when military action is “successful” or jingoistic: “With the Matt Walsh strain… there's a macho element to his politics that is going to dominate over whatever claims he has to non interventionism.” – Ryan Grim (28:45)
• “That's not a principle. That's just being a thug.” (29:33)
• Consistent isolationist voices, like The American Conservative, tend not to have real power once the right governs; their figureheads, like JD Vance, become “defanged” (32:10).

6. Epstein Files, Conspiracies, and Political Fallout (32:21–48:08)

Disillusionment with Trump

• Grim explains how the “manosphere-podcast” world, which includes figures like Tim Dillon and Joe Rogan, is disappointed not by lack of economic populism, but by Trump’s cover-up of Epstein-related files: “What that means is that giving us the Epstein stuff… that's what they want… you can actually do that.” (33:11)
• “To see him become an obstacle to that, I think is extremely demoralizing… radicalizing.” (35:27)

What Did We Learn from New Epstein Documents?

• Confirm the “gray area” conventional wisdom: Epstein operated with links to U.S. and Israeli intel, serving multiple personal and institutional interests, not as a pure “puppet” for a single agency (37:10–43:14).
• “What people need to understand… he was able to deliver material benefits to his allies that were not raping young girls… If you wanted… a million-dollar retainer with [an oligarch], Epstein got you that deal… He was making these people rich and getting them meetings.“ – Ryan Grim (41:47)
• Trump’s motivations to keep files secret are self-serving and/or under pressure from powerful interests, but Trump is hard to embarrass due to his own public history of predatory behavior and shamelessness (46:44).
  • "He's very hard to shame… What more is going to embarrass him?" – Ryan Grim (47:02)

7. White Identity Politics and the Left’s Reckoning (49:32–59:46)

White Solidarity on the Right

• Elon Musk’s embrace of explicit white-identity rhetoric alarms both hosts: “White solidarity is the only way to survive” – Elon Musk (read by Tim, 49:59).
• Grim: “It's 1850s Southern white… ‘we should end slavery, but if we do, they’ll kill us all.’ That level of fear and projection.” (50:44)

Left’s Dabbling with Anti-White Rhetoric

• Viral controversy aids the right’s narrative: Tim lists tweets from lower-level Democratic figures making blanket anti-white statements, prompting concern about left-wing identity excesses fueling right-wing backlash.

Academic Jargon, Reckoning, and Organizational Dysfunction

• Grim explains how academic language about “whiteness” as a sociological structure led to reckless or literal attacks on actual white people (53:02).
• “The left took several wrong turns to find themselves in this place… You probably need to retrace your steps at that point and figure out how you got there.” – Ryan Grim (53:02)
• Tim: “We should just judge people as individuals.” (54:33)
• Grim confirms there’s been little explicit reckoning or sufficient pushback from the left: “There's been a homer quietly walking back into the hedges.” (58:36)
• Both hosts agree on not “giving scalps” over youthful social-media excess—“We all said a lot of crazy things and we're not going to eliminate everybody from public life who said crazy things during late teens and early 20s. Because that's the entire left. Everyone, for the most part.” (55:14)

8. Intra-Dem/Liberal vs. Populist Progressive Discourse: The Liz Cheney Example (60:07–end)

The Kamala Harris Campaign and Left Discontent

• Tim vents frustration that Never Trumpers and figures like Liz Cheney were blamed for Trump’s win, even though the left didn’t fully support Harris due to her Gaza policy, while the interventionist wing supported her despite disagreements (60:09–62:47).
  • "Liz Cheney was like, I support Kamala Harris... All the folks that came from more of an interventionist side recognized Trump for the threat that he was, opposed him, tried to help. And a lot of people on the left spent the whole campaign pissing in the tent. And then at the end of the campaign, they're like, fucking Liz Cheney's fault." – Tim Miller (62:47)
• Grim presents the left’s view: it needed actual concessions or symbolic support (such as a DNC speaking slot for a Palestinian-American lawmaker) to mobilize turnout, but Harris offered nothing (62:47–67:47).
  • “They have said this publicly, we cannot deliver these left anti war votes just by virtue of our charisma… we need something to tell them… and they decided to give nothing.” – Ryan Grim (62:47)
• Miller responds with pragmatic frustration about the double standard of demands on Dems’ center-right vs. the left.

The Limits of Influence

• Grim emphasizes: “Even if Hasan Piker is out there begging people to vote for Kamala… it wouldn’t have landed. If you don’t give Hasan anything to tell his audience… he then stops being the person that’s going to influence them. Now you need other, more radical people to do what you want them to do. There’s a reality to these people’s views that aren’t going to be changed by influencers.” (70:55)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Fuckery is an expression of your power…” – Ryan Grim (12:05)
• “When you’re defending something that most police officers won’t defend, you’ve taken a wrong turn.” – Ryan Grim (13:43)
• “White solidarity is the only way to survive.” – Elon Musk (quoted, 49:59)
• “The left took several wrong turns to find themselves in this place where they're attacking 11-year-old white children. You probably need to retrace your steps at that point and figure out how you got there.” – Ryan Grim (53:02)
• “[Epstein] was making these people rich and getting them meetings… You don’t even need blackmail to explain a huge amount of what he was able to accomplish.” – Ryan Grim (41:47)
• “That is how you feel. And throughout history there are… people who do not fit in that category. There always will be. And you can't hector them to be otherwise.” – Ryan Grim (69:10)

Timestamps for Major Segments

• 01:40 — Breakdown of the ICE shooting
• 04:37 — Analysis of officer’s use of phone during deadly encounter
• 07:23 — Dissection of political, administrative, and right-wing reaction
• 13:21 — Public psychological response to summary execution
• 15:25 — Concern about escalation and societal tension
• 18:08 — Venezuela US policy deep-dive
• 28:45 — Populist right, “machismo” foreign policy, and hypocrisy
• 32:21 — Trump, Epstein, and the podcast “manosphere” world
• 37:10 — Epstein files: What we actually learned (vs. conspiracy theories)
• 49:32 — Identity politics, Musk’s white solidarity tweet, left-wing anti-white rhetoric
• 60:07 — Democratic infighting: Liz Cheney, Kamala Harris, and left/progressive frustration

Closing

The episode is a rich, unflinching interrogation of both right- and left-wing failures and excesses—showcasing the dangers of authoritarianism, the moral perils of law enforcement impunity, the contradictions of both populist right and left, and the ongoing struggle for moral and strategic clarity in U.S. politics.