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A
All right, we are live. It's Thursday, which means it's time for Mega Mondays. I'm Sam Stein here with Will Summer. There's a Reddit page I. It was brought to our attention that someone was like, super psyched about there being a MAGA Mondays on Thursday. And then the first comment was, wait, why is it on a Thursday? And I'll just, I'll, I'll, I'll reveal why. It's because Monday was Memorial Day.
B
Yes. But, you know, we decided, you know, as the week went on, you know, there's so much to discuss, and of course, we love the MAGA Monday audience. You know, why not just do a special bonus MAGA Thursday?
A
Well, there's a lot going on too, and Will's got his newsletter coming out in like, I don't know, a couple minutes. False flag. And it's a really good one. We're gonna get to that in a second. But we're gonna start with the latest bill that Trump wants to put his face on. This is. How many things is this man putting his face on? The Washington Post is report that Trump has had officials at the Treasury Department try to get some copies of a $250 bill with his mug right on there. There. You can see it. Look at it. It's always the same look. Yeah, like menacing glare.
B
That's part of it as the, the scowl. I think if he had like a big smile, like, he's like, you know, maybe it wouldn't be so bad.
A
Yeah, what if he just went with like, it's me 250. No, this is crazy. He. I mean, among the other things that he's put his face on are the coin, obviously. We have the passport, which we broke. We have parking passes for the NAT or passes for the national parks, I should say. And then there's these, what the green cards that he wants to do. They have Trump gold card. They're calling, I guess, for like a million dollars, you can get free citizenship or not free. You can get citizenship in America. And, and, well, I just, it just leading me to this question of do you think there's someone in the administration whose job is strictly to come up with things to put Trump's face on,
B
to think of things like, you know what? There's no rule. You can't put a face on a stop sign or, you know, whatever? Yeah, I mean, it seems like that, right? I mean, it seems like sort of like how. It seems like there's people in the demonstration who are like, how can we think of Ways to like screw liberals or you know, pursue, you know, oh, we got a new idea, you know, go after the law firms, the university. So in this case, I mean, it's pretty crazy. I do think that putting him on the money, I feel like will maybe cross a line for people. I mean, among other things, it is.
A
Oh yeah, that, that's the line that they, that finally. Well, I mean, not this, not the $1.8 billion slushman. This is too much.
B
I mean, I do think it's a bigger deal than like the national park parking pass or something. Like I, I think people, you know, there is this precedent of not putting people on money, living people on money. I was interested in the Post story to read that. I guess back in the 19th century,
A
like this is the best part.
B
A mid level treasury official put himself on a coin and people were like, wait a minute, we can't have this.
A
That was the best part of the story. I had no idea that that's what caused the law to be passed. But the idea that some bureaucrat and treasurer is like, you know what? No one's stopping me from putting my face on this coin. I'm going to go do it. And, and they're like, okay, maybe we need a law saying this never occurred to me that that would be why they did it. $250. Obviously it's for the 250th anniversary of this, of this nation, but like, do you think there's like any sort of shame or self awareness? It's like, you know, maybe that's a little bit too gauche to like do something like that or Trump just doesn't give a shit.
B
I think it's the latter. Yeah, I mean I, I, I think, you know, it is like pretty crazy to be saying, you know, for president. I mean these are like Obama, you know, Obama's not on, on money. Even a lot of, you know, jfk, FDR is maybe, I don't know, some of these guys might be, but like,
A
you know, sorry, I should have done our research.
B
Yeah, row back there. But you know, it is like you got to be a pretty good president to be on the money is the idea. It's not even just like every dead president gets on it, much less in a living one.
A
It would be. It's such a old game now at this point to do this. But like imagine if Obama had done something. Imagine if Obama was like, you know what? I'm going to put my, my, my face out there on 150 a new $150 bill, it's going to have Obama's face on it. People would lose their minds. Like, you know, absolutely.
B
You know, I think a lot about when Obama was president and like, on talk radio, they would go through every time he said I or me in a speech, and they'd be like, he said I like, 15 times. This guy's like a raging narcissist. Meanwhile, you have Trump who's like, my face is on the money. We're actually going to make a new denomination. A new denomination. The biggest one.
A
And he's getting away. Well, I think he's just absolutely milking the 250th anniversary to just do this. Right. He's like, well, it's for the. It's to celebrate, you know, the nation, therefore I have to put my name on it. It's to celebrate the nation, therefore I have to re, you know, paint the reflecting pool and build an arch. And so he's. He's kind of lucked out that his presidency has fallen on this anniversary.
B
Yeah, I mean, that's a great point. I mean, he definitely, I think, is clearly really excited about it. And, you know, the other thing I wanted to note here about the 250 is, I mean, like, the point of, like, the hundred dollar bill, the reason we don't have, like a $10,000 denomination is it's like fighting money laundering, you know, drug trafficking. You can only carry around so much money, hoard so much money. But, you know, so I think it's appropriate for this administration, which has, you know, had such a loose line on white collar crime, to say, you know, what? You know, go hog wild.
A
Speaking of the anniversary, have you seen the. The photos? And maybe while we're talking about this, we can try to pull up a photo of what's happening on the White House South Lawn in the East Wing. Have you seen these, like, cage match.
B
Yes.
A
Arches and things like that?
B
Oh, I'm all over it. Yeah.
A
What do you. What do you think of it? It looks great.
B
Yeah, I think it looks very dignified, you know. Yeah. I mean, you know, people have said it looks like they're building like a Six Flags or something. You know what's also crazy?
A
You know what it looks like. Do you know, do you remember? And I look, I was. I was intrigued by this. Do you remember the movie Contact with Jodie Foster?
B
Yes. Oh, love that movie. Yeah.
A
And they have to build this elaborate sort of space portal ship, and it's like a bunch of things moving around like that, and it's out in some sort of gulf and in Mexico or something like that. It looks like that. No, that's not it. There it is. All right, look.
B
It does. Trump needs to meet with the aliens, and this is the excuse they found.
A
If you can find that. That space portal ship from contact with Jodie Foster, find it and put it up, if you can, because it looks just like that. And if you spin out like, they are tearing up. They are tearing up the grounds. They have this stupid cage match set up. And then right next, so you can't see it in this shot is the East Wing, which is still just a hole in the ground. And it's. It's totally insane that they have. Basically, this is, like his little play zone, and this is the White House grounds. It's quite. It's crazy.
B
Yeah. I mean, it's starting to remind me of, like, when my kids, like, they'll pull out a bucket of toys and then they'll play with it for, like, one minute.
A
There it is. There it is.
B
It actually looks very similar, but, you know, it is this idea just sort of. That he's like, I don't know. The East Wing funding's tied up. You know, what's my. What's my next toy gonna be?
A
The other thing that is in the news on the 250 anniversary, and this is. This will be our last bit on this before we get to your story is they had. And I couldn't tell how real this was, but I think it was the Caller. Daily Caller. Someone reported on the musical acts that they were going to have.
B
Yeah, I mean, this was. They put out a graphic and everything. So, I mean, this was very.
A
Was that a legitimate graphic?
B
Yeah, that was a legit graphic, like from the America250 account, which is crazy because it was. I mean, it looked like some. Someone just slapped it together who was on it.
A
So some of the worst musical artists you could possibly cobble together were on it.
B
Some great, great American heroes like Milli Vanilli. I mean, if you had said trump's gonna have Milli Vanilli at the concert, you know, that would have been too on the nose. But, yeah, Milli Vanilli.
A
It is. It is a remarkable metaphor, right?
B
Yeah. It's like great fraudsters.
A
Great fraudsters. One of the great fraudsters in music history will celebrate with.
B
And they're not even American.
A
Oh, here it is. Okay. Yeah. This is not a murderer's row. Vanilla Ice. Milli. Vanilla. Young mc. We're going to get into Young MC in a Little bit. Bret Michaels, Florida, some other folks in here. Cnc, Music Factory.
B
Yeah, this is bleak. I mean, you know, someone pointed out that back in 2014 they had. There was like another concert on the mall. And it got like. I mean, like Taylor Swift level people. I mean, like real, like, names that we'd be like, oh, whoa, that's cool. But, you know, look. And now we have the Commodores.
A
The Commodores, yeah. Young MC says he is actually not participating in this. He. He clarified that he's not going to be part of it. And someone else said they weren't going to be part of it too. I forget who it was. It's not going over particularly great in the mag universe. I think one, they recognize how. Oh, Morris Day said he's not going to be part of this. They recognize how ridiculous this slate of entertainers is. And I think they're kind of embarrassed by it. And I think some probably are wondering why Kid Rock's not on it, because doesn't he do everything? And I'm kind of curious about that myself. Matt Walsh wrote this about the slate. I'm begging conservatives to let go of this quote, cling on to literally any famous people who give us the time of day mentality. That strategy has officially led us to rock bottom in the form of concert that features. And this somehow is not a joke. Milli Vanilli and Vanilla Ice. I think Matt's got a point there also. And. And maybe I don't know, my Milli Vanilli. Milli. Vanilla, I thought was two people. And I think Vanilli is. Isn't Vanilli dead? I. Maybe.
B
Yeah, one of them. One of them is dead. If I remember, I love, the 80s correctly.
A
Okay.
B
You know. Yeah. And. And yeah, I don't know. Millie is still with us and Vanilla Ice is obviously still, still alive.
A
Yeah, it is.
B
You know, Matt Walsh was right, though. I mean, this is even like kind of scraping the bottom of the barrel of, like, conservative celebrities. Like, I feel like for, you know, like the TPUSA halftime show and stuff, they got people who were. Whose names I didn't recognize but had like millions of Spotify listens and stuff. I mean.
A
Yeah. Where is the country music artists who, like Trump? Where's that guy? Richmond. Rich man north of Richmond.
B
Oh, well, he's kind of woke now, so really, he's. Well, it's kind of a. He got divorced and his wife took a lot of the money, and so he's.
A
He's.
B
So. He's kind of a family court guy. Now, so that's kind of right wing coded, but he sort of fell out of the movement.
A
I did not know that he's. Has he recorded anything else since Rich man North of Richmond?
B
Yeah, but. But nothing. Nothing hits quite like, what was it like eating chubby snacks in the aisle on the EBT card or whatever.
A
Remember when that was like the first debate? It was like during a debate and like it was like the first thing that was asked during the debate was
B
like about that song Eating Fudge Rounds was the.
A
Yeah, the commenters are lovely communities throwing up obvious names that could have been invited but haven't been. Nicki Minaj. I mean, she's magified. Lee Greenwood. That dude's all over the place.
B
Jason Aldean.
A
Yeah. What's going on here?
B
They should do more Giado blow Trump's name.
A
Oh, Andra Pavels brings up an incredibly salient point. What about Cash's girlfriend?
B
Yes. Alexis Wilkins? I mean, you know, it is, I feel like, like I was about to say, like, you know, the nepotism there might have been a bit too much, but it's. Nothing has been too much for this.
A
Laura Trump's. Laura Trump does some recordings herself. Why didn't they get her?
B
This, this has a real. This is like who you see it like, like a water park or like a casino by the highway kind of kind of operation. I mean, this is not even like, like I said, it's not like the, like if you do some arms, like, where is Kid Rock? I mean, we're doing like Apache, like the military does like Apache flybys of his mansion. But he can't bother to do this even.
A
He probably was like, this is too much. All right, we're gonna have actually a lot more on the concert. JVL and Sonny I know are going to be doing a video about this, so I don't want to do too much more. Let's move to your. Your piece, which I'm not sure if it's up. Hold on one second. Checking our slack. It is up.
B
Okay, let's go.
A
It's called James Fishback's Very Weird Griper Wedding. What's going on?
B
Yeah. So over the weekend, James Fishback, of course, the, the racist far right guy running for Florida governor and doing a lot better than one would like to like him to, given his politics. There it is. There it is. Look at him. Handsome guy, the happy groom. So he got married over the weekend and people were a little surprised by this because this was not the same woman that he had been Kind of trotting around as the future first lady of Florida that he was saying he was on Patrick Beth David show, and he said, this is my wife, you know, which she definitely was not. This is a totally different blonde woman and one who has been kind of mysterious. And so, for me, I mean, literally, like, he didn't reveal her name for several days after this. Like, I was messaging former Fishback campaign staffers and saying, like, wait, wait, wait,
A
wait, wait, wait, wait. He posted this picture and didn't reveal her name?
B
Yeah, I mean, I don't think he revealed her name till, like, yesterday, like, Wednesday. So it was, like, five days of mystery. I had to get it from, like, Desantis World. They. They were like, yeah, we know. We know her name. So. So her name is Valeria. And as James messaged me, basically, supposedly they met at a Miami bookstore. He's a guy who spends a lot of time in bookstores, I'm sure.
A
Which bookstore do we know?
B
Well, I didn't have a chance to ask him. He. The Miami New Times had the same interch exchange with him, and he refused to say which bookstore.
A
So do you think James Fishback is hanging out at bookstores, perusing the aisles of fiction and nonfiction?
B
Oh. Oh, hello. You know, you look lovely.
A
Let's get married.
B
So basically, what's going on here is I think the previous girlfriend was this woman named Francesca, Frankie Raine. And she's kind of. She sort of appeared out of nowhere, too, and started dating James in, like, December, early December. And he. Like I said, she. She was. She was kind of striking. She kind of, like, had this Instagram look. And as it turned out, as Laura Loomer was delighted to tell everyone, because Laura Loomer hates Fishback, she had this past as kind of like a crypto babe. Her name was, like, Crypto Barbie. She sold NFTs of herself, like, scantily clad. And it seems as though James was like, you know what? I don't know if this is going to work in the governor's mansion. And kind of kicked her to the curb. He finds this gal who seems like a bit gripified herself, and then meanwhile, Frankie, the first girlfriend, has been crashing out on Twitter and posting pictures of herself in a wedding dress. How could James get married on my birthday weekend? You know, I'm gonna reveal all about you, James, so we'll have to see how it goes.
A
Just to put this in the proper context, this bride of his, they met like, what, a couple months ago, tops.
B
Yeah. He claims they've been dating for three months. I think that might be a little, A little long for versus the reality. But yeah.
A
And. And they got married. That's legit. Do we have proof or is this so.
B
It's a good question. So I was talking to the court clerk down there who handles the marriage licenses.
A
Okay.
B
And basically he did. He got married in like a legit Catholic church that's a real priest. They still have a few days to return the marriage license, but apparently he has applied for it. So, I mean. And you know, based on the video. He put out a video with like of wedding. It's interesting. One of the people in it is Alex Mungia, who's like his crony who did all the various schemes with him about like kind of trying to trick the hedge fund and stuff.
A
So it's like, oh, is that the college kid who.
B
College kid who would be like, Fishback would be like, you need to defend me on Twitter. And he'd be like, didn't he try
A
to get his dad to get his dad's money for Fishback? At some point he gets like, I don't know if I should do this.
B
He said, you need to have your dad impersonate an investor. And he was like, I don't think my dad will do that.
A
This is the most insane campaign I've ever seen, bar none. Like the levels of, I don't know, there's like a Truman show quality almost to it. Like, he obviously, I mean, who knows, maybe they fell in love over a book at the bookstore. But the idea that you would get married on the fly in two months, all for obviously the purposes of what to like say, hey, I'm a married candidate?
B
Well, well, let's say, let's, let's wonder about this. Why would a guy get married so suddenly? Well, on one hand he is like kind of a trad guy. He's trying to talk about starting families and.
A
Sure. But no one's pressuring him to get married before campaigns.
B
Well, it might also be a good way to get by your allegations. Right. So he of course has allegations about, you know, having this sexual relationship with a high school student who was in his anti woke high school debate program. He was not charged, we have to say. But you know, and that by the way, also ended up in an engagement that I guess didn't go anywhere. So, you know, potentially trying to get.
A
Let's not just move on from that. So he was just to recap, he was doing this program where he was teaching high school kids how to debate the Wokesters and allegedly started having a romantic relationship with one of these high school kids in that class. That's right. And then he. And then he got engaged to the high schooler. But she was out of high school at that time.
B
Well, she. Yeah, she graduated from high school and then sort of continued working for his debate program. And then as an adult, she got engaged to him.
A
And then. And what happened to the relationship?
B
Well, according to the restraining order she filed against him, basically, I believe she broke off the engagement, and then he got really mad and then filed a counter restraining order against her dad. And then ultimately the judge said, look, you know, this doesn't quite rise to the level of a restraining order, but I will say this guy is certainly very odd.
A
Certainly. All right, so he's almost been engaged once, didn't work out, restraining order followed, and then goes on and launches this insane campaign as people as he's in a lot of legal trouble with his old employer trying to repossess a bunch of his property, including a watch he wears in his cars and things like that. And he's, like, making up the fact that he's getting kicked out of IHOPs and Waffle Houses and like that. And he's all while trying to create this image of himself as a trad dad or trad family values guy, and so he feels compelled to find a wife before the primary vote. This is all. I mean, it's coming in my mouth, and I'm actually like, this is. This is serious.
Podcast Summary: The Bulwark – "Trump Wants To Put His OWN Face on a $250 Bill | MAGA Thursdays LIVE"
Date: May 28, 2026
Hosts: Sam Stein (A), Will Sommer (B)
This episode dives deep into recent headline-grabbing moves by Donald Trump as he seeks to put his face on a newly proposed $250 bill in honor of America’s 250th anniversary. The hosts dissect the ongoing spectacle of Trump-branded iconography, the over-the-top plans for the anniversary festivities on the White House grounds, and the embarrassing slate of musical performers. They also unpack the bizarre and scandal-laden wedding of far-right Florida gubernatorial candidate James Fishback, highlighting the performative and turbulent nature of contemporary MAGA politics.
Trump’s Obsession with Branding
Historical and Ethical Context
Perspective on Presidential Ego
Over-the-Top White House Decorations
Embarrassing Musical Lineup for the Celebration
Rejection from the MAGA Sphere
Background
The Saga of the Ex-Girlfriend
Marriage: Political Optics or Romance?
Fishback’s Legal Troubles
On Trump and the $250 Bill:
"If he had like a big smile—it’s me, 250!—maybe it wouldn’t be so bad."
– Sam Stein ([01:20])
“You got to be a pretty good president to be on the money is the idea… It's not even just like every dead president gets on it, much less a living one.”
– Will Sommer ([03:57])
On the Anniversary Festivities:
“It looks like they’re building like a Six Flags or something.”
– Will Sommer ([06:00])
“They are tearing up the grounds. They have this stupid cage match set up… It’s totally insane that they have… this is like his little play zone.”
– Sam Stein ([06:34])
On the Musical Lineup:
“Great fraudsters. One of the great fraudsters in music history will celebrate with… [Trump]. And they're not even American.”
– Sam Stein and Will Sommer ([08:14]–[08:22])
“This… has a real—this is like who you see at a water park or like a casino by the highway kind of operation.”
– Will Sommer ([11:59])
On Fishback’s Wedding:
On Fishback’s Legal Problems:
The episode maintains a lively, sarcastic, and slightly incredulous tone throughout. The hosts balance humor, sharp political analysis, and a sense of disbelief at the ongoing absurdities in MAGA-world and the broader right-wing movement. This tone is reflected in playful banter, mockery of Trump’s ego, and head-shaking amusement at the theatricality and dysfunction on display.
For listeners: This episode is a must-listen if you want sharp, witty, real-time commentary on the latest surreal moves in MAGA politics, a primer on the increasingly spectacle-oriented 250th anniversary plans, and a dive into the scandalous, performative world of right-wing insurgent candidates.