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- [00:02]
Adam Kinzinger
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Tim Miller
Buy the Craftsman V22 pack battery kit.
- [00:12]
Adam Kinzinger
Whether it's the backyard, the bathroom, or beyond, Craftsman has the tools to help you power through and get the project done right because diying is unpredictable. But your tools shouldn't be. Shop Craftsman at Lowe's today. Valid through 618. Wall supplies last selection varies by location.
- [00:44]
Tim Miller
Hello, and welcome to the Bull Work podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Good to be here live in Chicago. I wish I could say it's a pleasure to be in Chicago. It is not. It was. Sorry. It was. It was. I got out of the airport, and I was like, holy shit. I needed to wear a parka. And then I'm driving in the Uber here, and we drive by the big building that says Trump on it. And then I had to turn on a fireplace when I got to the hotel. Thank you to the Waldorf for hosting us. There's a nice fireplace in the room, so it's okay. It's fine. I've been, you know, whatever. The lunch was pretty good. I haven't been able to get to the beef yet.
- [01:28]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, yeah, look, by the way, he's got to get some thicker skin, man. I mean, this is awesome. Chicago summers are awesome. Today's awesome. Like, I get it.
- [01:37]
Tim Miller
Saturdays in the park. Saturdays in the park. We'll see how you're. We'll see what you're saying after a couple years in Texas.
- [01:43]
Adam Kinzinger
That's true.
- [01:43]
Tim Miller
All right, I want to start here. How many people here remember the guest today? Who's Adam Kinzinger, by the way? Huh? Give me a hoot if you remember Tea Party out of Kinzinger. How many of you remember from exurban Illinois? Did you ever think you'd pay 80. Do you ever think you'd pay $87 to see tea Party out of Kinzinger? It's been kind of a weird decade, wouldn't you say? Back when he was repealing Obamacare. Okay, sorry. I'm not gonna go through your whole voting record just saying, what a dick. Do you have any. Do you have any memories from your people? What's the Chicago highlight for you?
- [02:32]
Adam Kinzinger
Look, man, I just. You know, coming up here is always awesome, so I actually go to New York a lot, and nothing against New York, but you just realize how awesome Chicago is when you go to New York and it's, like, it's extremely clean. It's got a cool, you know, cool Waterway, great bars. I love it here. So it's great. Now the winters are rough and you've got to have. You definitely have to wear your coat in the winters, but summers are amazing.
- [02:56]
Tim Miller
All right, Go Bears.
- [02:57]
Adam Kinzinger
It's going to be the Bears year this year.
- [02:59]
Tim Miller
I think I was. I did have one memorable night in Chicago in 2016 when the Cubs were. The Cubs did something good in 2016.
- [03:10]
Adam Kinzinger
They did that for a while.
- [03:12]
Tim Miller
Things didn't go well the next week. All right, so it was a hit or miss fall. Earlier today in the Oval Office, it was an interesting exchange between the President and a Wall Street Journal reporter. The reporter said, Mr. President, Wall street analysts have coined a new term called the taco trade. Trump always chickens out. And Trump replied and was like, what did you say? I always kick out. And they're like, no, Mr. President, chicken out. He got very upset with the reporter in the room. But it's a real thing, I guess. And it seems to be a pretty telling exchange today.
- [03:54]
Adam Kinzinger
Look, and he, the crazy thing, if you go through that whole clip, like, he ends up a minute, I think into that, his response, he's talking about how this country was stone cold dead six months ago. And it's like, what, like, what planet does he live on? But in his mind, you know, everything is, he's gotta make it all the worst. But the taco thing is perfect. And I think, look, you know, they always, he's always really good at, like, labeling people with stuff. This one may stick with him. And by the way, it's not just tariffs, it's not just the economy. It's not just Wall Street. You can look at international politics, and this has been the case in his first term and it's certainly the case in his second term.
- [04:30]
Tim Miller
We'll get to international. Do you know about the taco emoji?
- [04:33]
Adam Kinzinger
No.
- [04:34]
Tim Miller
Okay. We'll save this there a long while for that. The, the trade thing. I do. Is there any part of you that kind of wishes taco wasn't true? That, like, he would actually just be, like, sticking through it so people can feel the pain? I do worry a little bit. Like, we've seen his numbers start to drift back up. And I worry a little bit that, like, people aren't getting the pain that is going to be required to cleanse ourselves of this horribleness?
- [05:02]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah. And I mean, look, you never want to obviously root for pain, but there's a point at which you look at, you might not. Right?
- [05:09]
Tim Miller
Jbl.
- [05:10]
Adam Kinzinger
I would never say it right. But. No, but there's There's a point at which you have to look and say, like, how many times, how many times is he gonna threaten things and are people gonna vote for it and then never experience it? And then he can pretend that he did exactly what he said he was gonna do, that he actually never did. And that's, and that's actually kind of his superpower. He can be like, look, we came in, we did this, we knocked this, and he never actually does it. And so, yeah, I mean, I think to an extent, people have to understand, they have to feel that pain a little bit. But yeah, I mean, look, this is what he does. This is just what he's always done. He has no actual leadership. He just. It's all an entertainment, it's all a show for him.
- [05:49]
Tim Miller
I do think that while, like the market has remained resilient, like there are going to be real kind of like under the hood economic consequences from the Taco economic policy, and it's going to take a little bit, it's like a little less satisfying. Like, we can just be honest. Okay, I don't, I know what you guys like. I see the numbers, all right, on the YouTube clips and the people like it when it's like, stock market tanks 800 points because Trump sucks. And that's nice when that happens because it just happened a couple of times. But like, there is a more kind of serious, like long term, you know, a little bit less of the immediate gratification element to this that I think maybe they don't quite appreciate, kind of like what the. What is coming down the pike.
- [06:36]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, that's right. So if you think about the stock market is all emotional, right? So that's just, you make, you and I make bets. Everybody here makes bets on the stock market every day based on what you kind of think is going to happen. And that's where, you know, news changes. Obviously the market reacts to that. But the back end stuff that's coming and you know, the point is if we go into recession, Trump will own that. But just, you know, what can you prove never happened? Right. If it doesn't happen. And so if you're all of a sudden a company, let's say you're IBM or whatever, and you're looking at building a factory, and let's say you were even gonna build a factory in the United States, you have no idea now whether you can build it in the United States, whether you should build it overseas. If you're gonna build it overseas, you don't know what to do. So you basically hold onto your money. And as we know how the economy works, anytime you reduce velocity of money, the times it's being spent, that's how you go into a recession. The other thing is this, though, and I think, frankly, Democrats need to be making this case a lot more, which is, I wonder what Donald Trump's friends are making every time the market goes down and goes up. Because he signals it. I guarantee you, I guarantee you, with as corrupt as this guy is, and this is stunning corruption, there literally has never been a President of the United States with even a fifth of the corruption that we're seeing, I guarantee you he is calling his friends up or through somebody saying, look, the President's going to announce 50% tariffs. Now, if I had access to that information, if you all did, I would take my entire net worth in cash, put it in the market, or take it out of the market, based on what the President was going to decide. Now, imagine his friends that are worth half a billion dollars or $2 billion or $3 billion making decisions on that and screwing not just the little guy, but every American in the process. I guarantee you that's happening.
- [08:24]
Tim Miller
It's definitely happening. And, you know, I've talked to reporters who are working on this, who have it on pretty good authority that it' and then in addition to that, like, you know, and I think this is a good. The Democrats can tie this message into the corruption, you know, because it also. Look, the Wall street guys, sorry, if there's some Wall street guys in here, are a pretty good boogeyman as well. They also do quite well. I've got some, you know, hedge fund buddies who are like, they kind of like the high volatility, you know, within a band type of the economy, because they're faster than you are, right? Like, Trump puts out the bleat and they can get in on it, like, get like big money in, big money out. And so those guys are all making money, right? Like, the people that are making money in this right now so far in this administration are bitcoin people, private prison operators, market timers, and like the Trump family. Those are the key industries.
- [09:18]
Adam Kinzinger
And what is it I saw recently, like, of the however many thousand people own this garbage Trump meme coin, only like 20 of the people have actually made money on it at the cost of the other 19,000. And the weird thing about it is this. And this is where I think we have to try to have. And it's tough to do, I know it, but we have to try to have some compassion for people that have fallen into this trap, that truly think Trump is their savior. They think he's their guy on a white horse and he's taking that trust they have, and he's basically pulling all their money from them. He's abusing them. He's destroying their family. How many of you have lost family members and friends over this asshole? And, like. And so while we. While everybody should be held accountable for their own beliefs, like, because we believe in that, I think we also have to recognize that he is abusing half of this country. I mean, he's using the whole country, but half of the country in their trust every day.
- [10:11]
Tim Miller
Are any of the Kinzinger family members that wrote you that letter about how you've lost your soul to the devil in the audience tonight? Please stand up, please. Yeah, we're bringing out. Yeah, no, isn't that crazy?
- [10:23]
Adam Kinzinger
I mean, you know the crazy thing about the letter? You're talking about the letter that ended up in the New York Times. I didn't really. The family, and it's my dad's cousin, so it's not like my immediate family. They sent me a letter disowning me, calling me a member of the deaf devil's army, and said, donald Trump is a Christian, Adam. And then I remembered. I remember when Donald Trump said he never had to ask God for forgiveness. And I'm like, wait, I thought that was kind of like a basic tenet. But anyway, they sent it to the New York Times because they thought it would be popular with the American people, and they wanted me to be.
- [10:57]
Tim Miller
They showed it to the fake news.
- [10:59]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, they showed it to the fake news. Yeah.
- [11:01]
Tim Miller
All right.
- [11:01]
Adam Kinzinger
You know what? I haven't reconciled with them, and I don't intend to. To be honest with you.
- [11:05]
Tim Miller
There' There's a Devil's army down in Boys Town I'm going to be introducing you to later tonight. I'm sorry. I had to. All right. I'm sorry about that one.
- [11:24]
Adam Kinzinger
Do I have to wear a half shirt like you?
- [11:26]
Tim Miller
You do. You have to wear a belly shirt? I bought two. That was bad. Okay, one more. A boring economy question. We have to do one more. Just because I know you've been tickled by it as well. I love that. I think that Donald Trump and these guys are gonna negatively polarize the Democrats into caring a lot about the debt, which I'm very excited about. And nobody's more excited than Sarah Longwell about that, by the way, because, again, to the economic issue we have in front of us, like, these guys, like you did some deficit spending. We were in there and there was some deficit spending during the Bush days, obviously. But at that time, like, we were at a point where even though, you know, some people were like, we're going to be Greece tomorrow, like, we weren't really going to be Greece tomorrow, but we kind of are on the precipice of that now where there are going to be real consequences if they continue down this path, combining the tariffs with the big, big beautiful turd.
- [12:31]
Adam Kinzinger
And this is, this is what's, this is what's amazing about it. Because, look, I've come to believe that on economic theory, I think both kind of the Democrats theory of the case and the Republican, the old Republican theory of the case are both right at specific times. So if you have an economy that's stagnant, so 1979, high interest rate, stagnant economy, I think it was important to put an influx of money into the people that are going to spend money to get the economy moving. I think, you know, frankly, in 17, we were coming off still the Great Recession. I think it was the right thing to do. But when you end up where we are now, and you've talked about this a lot on other episodes where we're 38 trillion in debt, which is, I mean, it's really an unthinkable number, we're spending more in interest on the debt than the entire US Military, okay? So people say, like, well, we got to cut spending in the military. We're spending more in interest than on the entire national defense of the United States. And so, you know, if, if, if you look at a $38 trillion debt, you look at an economy that's struggling, that, that is dealing with high interest rates, is dealing with inflation, this is absolutely the wrong thing to do. And the problem is tax cuts have become a religion to the Republican Party and not like good economic policy. And I'm going to tell you about half the people that voted for this thing know that it's not the right thing to do, but they couldn't tell Donald Trump no. I mean, I know these folks. I know what they're saying behind closed doors. They can't tell them no.
- [13:53]
Tim Miller
My other favorite fun fact about the bill is that the farmer bailout is going to cost more than, like, I forget if it's definitely all of usaid, but it might be the entire Department of State. I think it's actually the entire Department of State costs less than the farmer bailout that we're going to give them.
- [14:11]
Adam Kinzinger
By the way, if you look at how much the Department of State, which prevents wars, and usaid, which prevents wars and creates allies, costs. It's less than 1/2% of the budget. And so what they're talking about doing to bail out farmers. I have a lot of family members that are farmers from Bloomington, Illinois rural area, central Illinois, and go redbirds. But none of them and none of the farmers that were in my district when I was in Congress told me that they were excited about a government bailout. Because you've got to think that farmers are just lazy. If their idea is I would just love to get a government check. No, they want to go out, they want to produce something, they want to feel useful. And what Donald Trump is telling them is I'll just pat you on the head to make sure you survive. And but they'll still go vote for him.
- [14:59]
Tim Miller
You know, who the hell knows what's going to happen these days, who's going to get pardoned, what the newest Taco time is going to be at the White House. With so much out of our control, the future can feel overwhelming. You can regain control of some things with a life insurance policy found just for you by the licensed insurance agents at Selectquote. They can protect your financial legacy. Whether you need $500,000 or $50 million in coverage, selectquote can find you the perfect policy. Selectquote is one of America's leading insurance brokers with nearly 40 years of experience helping over 2 million customers find over $700 billion in coverage since 1985. Other life insurance brokers offer impersonal one size fits all policies that may cost you more and cover you less. While Selectquote's licensed insurance agents work for you to tailor a life insurance policy for your individual needs in as little as 15 minutes. Have you ever worried about getting coverage of the pre existing health condition? Selectquote partners with carriers that provide policies for a variety of high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease, no problem, or if you don't have any major health issues. They work with carriers that can get you same day coverage with no medical exam required. Head to selectquote.com and a licensed insurance agent will call you right away with the right policy for your life and your budget. Selectquote they shop, you save, get the right life insurance for you for less@selectquote.com bulwark that's selectquote.com bulwark today to get started. That's selectquote.com bulwark all right, you referenced it earlier. Let's go to the taco policy and foreign policy. I wasn't quite the tacoization of foreign policy. I guess we'll start first with Putin and Ukraine. Trump had a very big revelation over the weekend, which is that Putin has gone crazy and people might not want to stop the war after all, and he's not going to do anything about it. But he's upset. I don't know. What do you make of the latest?
- [16:53]
Adam Kinzinger
So I want to give you guys a quick 30 second how Russia is losing this war. Now, imagine when we invaded Iraq in 2003. Imagine if three years into that war, we only occupied 20% of Iraq and we had lost a million people in that process. Would there be a single person in the world that said we were winning that war? No, everybody would say we were losing. That's exactly where Russia is in Ukraine right now. The day they initiated the full scale invasion of Ukraine, they occupied 32% of Ukraine. Today, that number is 19%. And there's been a million young Russian men either killed, captured or wounded in this conflict. So the idea that Russia is inevitably the victor is insane. That's just totally not the case. And so. And Donald Trump has made it his mission to bail out Vladimir Putin. We can get it into all the reasons why. Does he have kompromat on him? Maybe we can get into all the reasons why. But Donald Trump is constantly trying to impugn good, pure, solid motives onto Vladimir Putin. And so the reality is this. Donald Trump threatens sanctions. How many times he's threatened sanctions against Russia? Maybe once or twice. He's never said Putin's name, by the way, in any negative connotation. He's threatened it and then he always backs out. And one hour before I came here tonight, I saw that a reporter asked Donald Trump, okay, you're mad at Vladimir Putin. Are you going to finally increase sanctions? And he's like, no, because that'll affect the peace talks with Vladimir Putin. Of course he isn't. And then you look at Iran, right? He started out, regardless of your opinion on this, he started out saying, we're going to bomb Iran. And then he's now negotiating JCPOA too. He was a big ally of Israel, now he's against Israel. Remember when he loved Kim Jong un and then he hated him and then he loved him again. Like, this guy has no moral principles, he has no center. He has no view of what the world should be. It is all emotional, driven, and it's cost, it will cost Americans their lives because somebody's gonna call his bluff. And we're Gonna end up in a war.
- [18:52]
Tim Miller
Well, it seems like Putin's gone. His bluff. And your point that he said that before. The other thing he's been doing is, you know, we'll, we'll see how things go in two weeks. Like there's somebody in a catalog of how, how many times he said, we'll see how things look in two weeks with the Russia, Ukraine negotiations. So we're at the beginning of another two week cycle. We'll see what we'll see.
- [19:10]
Adam Kinzinger
And by the way, we have tariffed Ukraine 10%, Russia has no tariffs, and.
- [19:15]
Tim Miller
Then we're robbing Ukraine of their rare earth minerals.
- [19:18]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, exactly.
- [19:18]
Tim Miller
Part of the deal.
- [19:19]
Adam Kinzinger
And then one of the guys was asked like, well, why, how come you haven't put tariffs on Russia? And he said, well, because there's peace negotiations. We don't want to affect that yet we did it to Ukraine. I mean, this is the insanity of it.
- [19:30]
Tim Miller
They're not part of the peace negotiations.
- [19:32]
Adam Kinzinger
No, they aren't actually. Which is another problem in and of itself.
- [19:35]
Tim Miller
So, like, eventually, you know, after probably four more two week cycles of kind of kicking the can down the road, like, you get to a point where it's where I guess one of two things is going to happen, right. Where Trump is just going to do what J.D. vance threatened to do a couple of weeks ago, a week ago maybe, which is basically say, all right, good luck, we're going to wash our hands of this and we're getting out of here. Either that'll happen, or, you know, some of the tiny number of remaining better angels around him are going to convince them that they do some kind of sanctions, some kind of support for Ukraine, It'll be really half assed. Right. Like, what happens at that point? Do you think there ever gets to a point where the Republicans that support Ukraine in Congress and John Thune try to force his hand on this? Or do you think that's never gonna happen?
- [20:23]
Adam Kinzinger
I don't think so. And this is like, if you think back to, remember, the aid package, it was stalled like six months or whatever it was. The one reason I was saying it's like, the only reason I wish I was in Congress at that time is because I would have gone down, you know, it was a tight majority and I would have threatened to vote against everything, every procedural motion until this was brought up. And that's what, you know, look, I love Don Bacon. Right. That's what people like Don Bacon could do right now.
- [20:46]
Tim Miller
Yeah.
- [20:47]
Adam Kinzinger
Is say if only three of them.
- [20:48]
Tim Miller
They only passed the reconciliation thing by one vote. These guys have leverage.
- [20:51]
Adam Kinzinger
Yes, you could have had that leverage. Even if you say, like, I know the last. The last aid bill was 70 billion. Let's do 10 billion. Okay, just 10 billion. Buy a little bit of. You could have threatened it and they would have put it in there. But, you know, the problem, and I learned this as a moderate in D.C. is the. The moderates tend to want to get along. They tend to support teamwork. The problem is now they're playing on a pretty stupid team. And I think the other big thing, Tim, is like, we need to get back to. And whoever is making the case as the next potential president of the United States, the next candidate has got to go back to ground zero and basically remind people of why America has the foreign policy we have. The reality of it is the post World War II orders. We're a great nation, we mean to do good things, but it was not created to be nice to everybody else. We created the post World War II order to benefit us. Because if 1950 we had an explosion of manufacturing in this country. Why? Because all the manufacturing in Europe and Asia was destroyed. We inherited that. We made a decision to be the sole defender of the navigation of seaways and waterways. Why? Because that allowed us to write the rules of trade that allows us to get priority through the Suez Canal, through Panama. That has really been beneficial to our economy. And so when JD Vance and Hegseth say, well, Europe isn't doing their part to defend the waterways, two things. First off, the Brits and French were right there with us at that moment that he sent that text. Secondly, we told Europe that we will be the ones to do the. To protect the waterways. We said, don't worry about it. This is our job. And I think Americans have to realize again, and it's got to be sold again, that the post World War II order was not built out of our good heart. It's better for the world, but it was built for us, benefit us. And it has.
- [22:42]
Tim Miller
Do you. I don't know. My buddy John Lovett. We're doing a live show next week, June 6, in Washington D.C. to support the. The lawyers who are fighting for the Guatemala.
- [22:55]
Adam Kinzinger
I'll be there for a rally too on the 6th. The veterans thing.
- [22:58]
Tim Miller
Oh, yes, come on by. You want to come by?
- [23:01]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, I'll come by.
- [23:02]
Tim Miller
Yeah, it'll be a little gayer than this crowd, but I want to get into El Salvador next. But before that, I just want to go back to your World War II order thing because I'm Stealing a line that Levitt likes to use, which is like, sometimes you go through a door and the door closes and locks behind you and it's over. And you can figure out another way out of the room in this analogy, but you can't go back through the door. And I do wonder if that, that is an apt metaphor here when it comes to the post World War II order. I don't know if even if the 2028 candidate, which we're going to get to the very end, makes a compelling case for that is even possible. Is Europe going to ride with us still? Is anybody going to trust us to do that still? Will China be too strong by then, having reoriented things? Do you worry about that?
- [23:51]
Adam Kinzinger
I do worry, and I think it's going to take real damage control on our end. I think the next president of the United States, let's say this person, is very pro NATO, pro Europe, pro cooperation. It will take probably their entire first term to rebuild that trust. Meanwhile, the Europeans are going to kind of be sitting back going, well, let's see who gets. If he gets real, he or she gets reelected or not, right? And, and so right now, they see us as very volatile. I remember growing up, I was always, I loved the country of Germany. My family came from Germany in the 1850s, like half of people in Illinois, by the way. And, and so I learned German and I went to Germany. And I just remember all the Germans were telling me, like, dude, Repub. Republicans and Democrats are the exact same because from their perspective, our variances were just a little bit right. But we all believed in the post World War II order and stuff. So I think that's going to take some work. What I really worry about, Tim, is China. And because we have been. Remember, everybody was predicting, I think like, 2020, China was going to overtake the United States, and it didn't. We were actually able to accelerate. China's kind of flatline. The other thing is, you know, we had a robust immigration system which allowed our population to grow at the rate it needs to grow to have a healthy. What Donald Trump, what Trump is doing now is isolating us from the very allies we need to compete with China. And he's emboldening China. China's now trying to create trade deals with our partners, and it's going to be the fastest way to flip that script on its head. And everybody around him knows that except him. And nobody will tell him that because, of course, he's the God King.
- [25:28]
Tim Miller
Hey, guys, it's Tim and Sarah. We're here with my frenemy, John Lovett from Love it or Leave It.
- [25:32]
Adam Kinzinger
We're bringing you guys all a special crossover collab with the Bulwark and Crooked.
- [25:37]
Tim Miller
Media, the Never Trump Rhinos. Meet the self important podcast bros. You are definitely the fucking self important one. June is Pride Month, and we're gonna be live in D.C. on June 6 for World Pride for a very special live show FundRaiser featuring the three of us, plus some gay special guests. This one's a little different. Proceeds from tickets will be donated to support Andre Romero, the makeup artist who.
- [26:00]
Adam Kinzinger
The Trump administration wrongly disappeared to El Salvador and who is currently being held in Sakat. Crooked and the Bulwark will be donating the proceeds from this fundraiser to the Immigrant Defenders Law Center. Tickets on sale now@crooked.com events. These are going fast, so get yours before they're gone. Go to. To crooked.com events and we will see you all on June 6th.
- [26:25]
Tim Miller
All right, speaking of uplifting topics, back to El Salvador. Your wife is El Salvadoran. We were talking backstage, man. Time's becoming a flat circle for me. I forget who. I was asking about this. Oh, I was asking Pete about this yesterday. Do you guys like him? Pete Buttigieg? He's. All right. We're gonna talk. We're gonna talk more about Pete in the next level. But I was asking Pete about. This is like, you know, obviously Trump and, you know, Bukele is like his little, you know, whatever, mini me, like Zara autocrats or whatever, with his adult braces. And, you know, so that's going to benefit Bukele for a little while. And the little bitcoin surge, Bitcoin treasury scam is going to benefit them for a little while. And yet it's a small country, right? Like, it needs trade. It needs to be part of the world community. Like, El Salvador does not want to become the next Venezuela. Like, should Democrats, Should Europe, should Canada be like, actually throwing down right now and saying no, like, this is unacceptable?
- [27:22]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, I think what needs to happen. So, like, El Salvador, one of its. I mean, it's. It actually has made some amazing gains from a security perspective. But how did that happen? Well, basically, they threw anybody they suspected of being a gang member in prison without a trial. I mean, if you're in El Salvador and a cop makes a decision that you're a gang member, you get nobody else to hear that. You literally go right to Sukkot and that's it. You'll never be heard from again. And the thing is, is, by the.
- [27:46]
Tim Miller
Way, that's like, that's right. And you can speak to that. Your wife's El Salvador. And like, because it was horrible. There was El Salvadoran refugees in Oakland. I was like part of a thing that I was doing where mentoring. And it was like the stories they told were horrible. So, like, there's some element of it that it was useful, I guess that was practical. And I think I was thinking, I.
- [28:04]
Adam Kinzinger
Think I recognize that.
- [28:05]
Tim Miller
Eyes open.
- [28:06]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, you have to recognize that. But you also recognize that every person that comes to be a dictator on the back of security right now, if you live. Because I've talked to many Salvadorians, again, friends of my wife, who are like, well, look, you know, we can now go downtown and eat dinner. You know, last time I was in El Salvador was a couple years ago. And we were very limited to where we could go because of the security situation. We're going to go back soon and, you know, it's going to be interesting to see. And so that's a thing. But here's the deal. It is imperative for, I'll say Democrats, actually all Americans, Republicans too. But granted that they won't do it, it's imperative for Democrats to make it clear to El Salv, look, your guys internal politics is your deal. But when you start housing American prisoners that you know, have been denied due process, that, by the way, has been required by the Constitution and by the.
- [28:56]
Tim Miller
Supreme Court and by Internet, they're part.
- [28:58]
Adam Kinzinger
Of international agreements, international agreements and everything else. When you do that, you may have a free ride on this for the next three and a half years. Qatar, you want to give us a bribe and a jet. You may be able to get away from it, get away with it for three and a half years. But to the American people, if you put us in charge, and by the way, to Qatar and El Salvador, if we become in charge, we're gonna make sure that cost you and we're gonna make sure that that is not forgotten. That's how I think, Tim, that's how you make the case to the American people of what your agenda's gonna be. And I think it also puts into these autocrats kind of a catch where they start to think, maybe I shouldn't do this, because three and a half years goes by pretty quickly.
- [29:42]
Tim Miller
It does. And I think that manipulatable than Trump. Right? And so here's the thing. Like, you know, you're never handing it to Trump on the Bulwark podcast, but he does like to talk about how I have the cards and we'll punish you and the US has the cards and you. Like that is actually true in the El Salvador situation in the way that it's not like where he tries to throw that at Zelensky or China or whatever. It's like El Salvador fucking needs us. Like, if the next president comes in and says, we are going to throw a full embargo on El Salvador like that and treat you like Cuba or Venezuela, that's not gonna hurt the US at all. Your wife, it'll hurt El Salvadorans in America. But besides that, that's not gonna hurt us at all. That will fucking ruin them.
- [30:24]
Adam Kinzinger
It will.
- [30:25]
Tim Miller
Right. And so I think there is maybe some value in having a little bit of that bluster right now instead of kind of doing the, you know, the pansy foot kind of thing that we're talking.
- [30:37]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, I agree. And I think it's important to have that and also have a carrot approach. For instance, there's a free enterprise zone in El Salvador where. And they're not taxed, but they basically hire Salvadorian labor. Right. It's a great deal for everybody. We started to see after Covid, which is the whole thing that pisses me off about the tariffs. We were seeing the supply chain correct itself anyway. We were seeing, you know, pretty serious things, whether it's penicillin or whatever. Come back either to the United States or nearshore to Mexico, to Canada, in some cases, El Salvador, Honduras. And I think you can also use a carrot approach. This could either be really good for you or really bad for you. And the really good means we could actually, actually help develop your economy, and that would be beneficial to everybody.
- [31:19]
Tim Miller
I've got a couple of topics closer to home, unless you have anywhere else in here. Where in the world is carbon? San Diego. Do you have any other foreign countries you want to rant about?
- [31:27]
Adam Kinzinger
No.
- [31:27]
Tim Miller
Before we come back here.
- [31:28]
Adam Kinzinger
No, it's good.
- [31:30]
Tim Miller
I want to talk a little bit about the threats here. And we did this a little bit on the last podcast, but the last time I had you on. But things have deteriorated. We've seen the direction executive order going after Chris Krebs. We've seen the ridiculous stuff going after Comey for his live laugh Love like Beach Seashell meme. You know, we've seen the increased pressure on Harvard, and it's not crazy to think that you are in the target line of something like that. So I'm just wondering kind of how your process and all that, what we're seeing right now.
- [32:12]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah, I mean, look, by the way, he's suspended my security Clearance three different times. I didn't even still have it. So nonexistent security clearance. I retired from the military and I'm out of Congress. So, like, anyway, so good one. Trump handed over.
- [32:26]
Tim Miller
Right now, I'd like to take your security clearance and.
- [32:29]
Adam Kinzinger
But look, I mean, here's the thing. Do I want to have to live through this? No. I would much rather the country not be going through this, and I would much rather me not. But at the same time, screw him. Like, here's the thing, the one thing, and we talk about this, in calling him Taco. The one thing about Donald Trump is if he's confronted, he backs down. He backs down. And I have talked to people that you guys would know their names, that are scared to death, that have gone quiet, that are going underground because they're worried that Trump's gonna come after him. I'm like, look, I have a family, too. If Trump comes after me, guess what? Will I love it? No, but you know what? From jail, I'll be three times more effective against him, and I will make him rue the day he does that. And I think if everybody. Look, and I think if everybody that he went after did that and said, you know what? Bring it, because you have nothing to file charges on me from unless you make something to. I still believe the court system is going to clear me and history is going to clear me and you're going to look terrible, then guess what? They'll back down. They back down every fricking time. And if they don't, we beat them, period.
- [33:46]
Tim Miller
They do. We have a first. They are pussies. And we can say that. We can say the P word again in this country. Thank God, because we still have a First Amendment. We can do seashell memes and we can say pussy if we want to. You are right, though. And look, I just wanna say I appreciate that you say that. And it's not just bluster. It is not just bravado or whatever. There are people that are not saying what they wanna say right now. They're really, like, across the board. I get texts from people that are like, should I be worried about this? And I'm like, no, we have a First Amendment in this country. Was it ridiculous that Jim Comey had to be perp walked into the Secret Service to talk about his weird Z shell post on Instagram. Yeah, it was ridiculous.
- [34:38]
Adam Kinzinger
But it's over.
- [34:39]
Tim Miller
But it's over, you know, and so do it. Like, post. Show up to that veterans protest. Show up to your protests. And, you know, I Mean, I think that it's different if you have a kid that's on a student visa. I do really worry. I think it really sucks the way they're targeting, like, people on student visas. You know, if I had somebody who called me, we have listeners and viewers from all over and they're like, you know, I live in the UK and my kid was supposed to go to whatever. I would be like, I don't know, I'd think about it. There are good schools in uk, you know, so I think there are people that have to make legitimate choices right now. But it's not like privileged upper class commentators or professors at universities or universities, you know, presidents or any of us. Like, we're, we're, we need to be the ones that are on the front of the line.
- [35:28]
Adam Kinzinger
I mean, look, this is the thing, guys, is we're, we're kind of a victim of Hollywood in a way that, you know, we've always seen these stories where at the end, when things get bad, there's always a dude that rides in on a white horse and saves us, right? And so it's in the, it's always been in the back of my mind still that, like, something going to happen, right? Somebody's going to come in and change. Obviously, it's not. It is us. Literally, we are the guy and girl on a white horse. And so we really have two choices here. We either look, 250 years. I'm going to get emotional talking about this. 250 years of American history is leading to a moment like right now, okay, all the generations of people, all of them that fought for this. My grandfather, you know, faced down the Nazis, like, you know, my generation, post 9, 11 in the war, the Vietnam guys that got spit on, when they come back, you think about all that general, all that sacrifice, it leads to a finite moment in time, which is right now. And it comes to our generations, okay, I'll just call it generically our generation, our moment. And we have three choices. We either flee this, we either acquiesce, or we fight. That is it. You either flee, fight, or acquiesce. And I think the more of us that choose fight will win. Because look, when you have the greatest generation that lost so many people and sacrificed so much in World War II, and you look at all the sacrifice, I mean, like the fricking Revolutionary War, these people had families and farms and everything, and they made a decision. And even some of their neighbors were loyal to the crown. Nobody's calling for violence. I want to be clear about that. But it is important for us to recognize that now this moment comes to where we are. Our sacrifice that we have to make actually will pale in comparison to what other generations have had to make. So, yes, we can be upset. We can lick our wounds a little bit, but we also need to smile and go out and kick their ass. Really.
- [37:28]
Tim Miller
We. We do have the worst president of all those generations. I guess I will say we do have to deal with the worst president.
- [37:34]
Adam Kinzinger
We got the biggest psycho. Yeah.
- [37:37]
Tim Miller
All right, so I have three data points I want to bring to you to close to get to my final topic. Number one, you are currently speaking with more passion and intensity than I think I've ever heard you speak. And I've been hearing you speak for a long time now. You introduced Jeb at some events when we met nine years ago, back when we had hope and you were okay. You've improved a lot since then. When it comes to the speaking part, I will say. And then. So that's data point one. I don't know for any NBA fans. I'm doing a Brian Windhorst thing right now. If there's any people out there. Data point two is you decide to wear a suit to this event, which I think is kind of interesting. Data point three is I was on a substack live with Katie Couric today, which is kind of a humble brag. I don't. It's very. It's a weird world I live in right now. I'm like, how is this my life? She was cussing at me. I felt like I was talking to an AI kind of. I was like, how is this real? But on that. On that substack live, do you know this yet? Have you heard about this? Okay. She said to me that she thinks that Adam Kinzinger is going to run for president. And I was like, president of what? I didn't tell her that I was like, president of his Rotary Club. But I don't know, man. Seems like you're sounding candidate ish to me. I talk to a lot of candidates on the pod that are sounding a lot less candid ish than you, frankly. So I don't know. What do you got plans? You have anything you want to talk about?
- [39:12]
Adam Kinzinger
I don't know. Listen, I'll honestly say this. This is like, the thing. Thanks. The thing I'll say is this. Like, the reason I think you can feel more passion for me is because I don't. There's no filter anymore. And I don't mean that, like, in an inappropriate way, I'm just like, I'm not gonna hide, like, what I feel and what I'm telling people because, like.
- [39:33]
Tim Miller
That'S what people want.
- [39:35]
Adam Kinzinger
That's what they want.
- [39:36]
Tim Miller
So it's kind of an accident. Like, by being a non politician, you're kind of acting more like an effective politician in a weird way. Right. It's a conundrum a little bit.
- [39:45]
Adam Kinzinger
Look, I, I will say this like I'm not ruling anything out.
- [39:49]
Tim Miller
Okay, now you're sounding like a politician.
- [39:52]
Adam Kinzinger
I'm not, I, I, I would not run as a Republican for president because the party is gone. And, But I don't know, I mean, that's a decision. That's something, you know, my, my wife and I, and obviously kid would have to go through and deal with. And that's not a decision I would make for a year. But, yeah, it's not, it's not out of my mind. And I think, because the thing is, I really think America needs. So if somebody comes along and does this, great, they need a truth teller. They need somebody who's probably kind of more centrist, that can bring people together and that can give people a vision. And so we'll see what that looks like.
- [40:26]
Tim Miller
A lot of ideas coming from the casino gallery. All right, so you're, we're thinking about it. We're, we're praying.
- [40:34]
Adam Kinzinger
I'm thinking and think, you know, a little bit.
- [40:36]
Tim Miller
Options. I mean, I think that you could. I think you'd be a good Texas Democrat, too. There are Texas things out there. They've been running some, you know, they've had some, some losses lately in Texas.
- [40:48]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah. They have to promise you all, I will never run in the House of Representatives again. I did 12 years. Thank you to my former constituents in here for that opportunity, but I'm done.
- [40:59]
Tim Miller
Yeah. Thank you to the people that voted against you.
- [41:02]
Adam Kinzinger
Yeah.
- [41:02]
Tim Miller
In the room. All right. It says, you know, you're finding your moment. Okay. That's Adam Kinzinger, everybody. I appreciate y' all supporting.
- [41:08]
Adam Kinzinger
Thank you guys.
- [41:11]
Tim Miller
And my man, I appreciate you so much. I really do. I appreciate your friendship. Thank you for coming. All right.
- [41:26]
C
Dreamed about killing you again last night and it felt all right to me dying on the banks of Embarcadero skies I sat in one watch dearly buried you alive in a fireworks display raining down on me Your cold hard blood ran away from me to the sea I printed my name on the back of a leaf and I watched it float away the hope I had in a notebook full of wide dry pages was all I tried to say.
- [42:48]
Adam Kinzinger
But.
- [42:48]
C
The wind blew me back via Chicago in the middle of the night and all without flight at the crush of veil in starlight you turn on your TV to watch A man with a face like mine he chased down a busy street when he gets caught I won't get up and I won't go to sleep I'm coming home, Home, I'm coming home he is Chicago.
- [44:17]
Tim Miller
The Bulwark Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.