How Trump's Big Moment Left Him Exposed: Rothkopf

Summary

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The Daily Beast Podcast: "How Trump's Big Moment Left Him Exposed"

Host: Joanna Coles
Guest: David Rothkopf (Columnist, founder of the DSR Deep State Radio Network)
Date: January 6, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this insightful and often acerbic conversation, Joanna Coles sits down with veteran foreign policy columnist David Rothkopf to dissect the implications of Donald Trump's latest interventionist maneuver: the forcible removal of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro by U.S. forces, and the announced intent to "run" Venezuela and seize its oil assets. The discussion ranges from the chaotic nature of the operation and its underlying mafia-like logic, to the global consequences for America's standing, U.S. democracy, and potential reactions from other world powers. In Rothkopf’s telling, this is a new—and dangerously exposed—moment for Trump, the United States, and the world.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Venezuela Operation: "No Plan Beyond the Helicopter"

• The Operation's Chaos:
  Rothkopf critiques the lack of post-removal strategy after Maduro was extradited (“the minute that Maduro was put on a helicopter and flown out of the country, there was no remaining plan...We don't know who's in charge in Venezuela...” [01:29], [12:42]).

• Lawlessness and Mafia Logic:
  Rothkopf labels the intervention "a giant armed robbery," comparing Trump's approach to "a new kind of Mafia foreign policy"—the “Don Roe Doctrine”—where “the don is going to tell his people what to do and take over” ([03:21]).

• Corruption and Cronyism:
  Trump and his allies are depicted as openly seeking profit:
  “Everything he has done so far in this term of office has, one way or another led to money for his friends...They're doing crypto deals left and right...there is no reason to assume that what happens in Venezuela is going to be any less corrupt” ([06:14]).

2. The Business-First Lens on Foreign Policy

• Coles (Devil’s Advocate):
  Could foreign policy focused on business (jobs, construction) be more effective than endless wars or democracy "building"? ([07:47])

• Rothkopf’s Rebuttal:
  Governments exist for the good of all people, not just billionaires. Prioritizing corporate or elite interests leads to suffering for ordinary people and instability in the long run.
  “Businesses don't really care about the future of the people of Venezuela. Donald Trump doesn't care whether the money is going to go to the people for whom it is the rightful patrimony of their nation. He wants it to go to the United States. He's stealing it... It's not only disgusting, it's also bad foreign policy, because when people are treated that way, unrest ensues.” ([08:56])

3. The (Un-)Justification of the Operation

• Trump’s Stumbling Press Conference:
  Rothkopf mocks Trump's frailty and incoherence:
  “His brain these days seems as if it's floating in an ocean of oatmeal and Xanax” ([12:12]).

• The ‘Law Enforcement’ Excuse:
  Rothkopf calls out the inconsistency of calling the operation a “law enforcement” action while breaking international law:
  “This was an armed robbery, it wasn't a law enforcement operation...Everything that they said about the operation is a lie. And everything that we intend to do following the operation is disturbing on some level.” ([12:42])

4. Aftermath and Power Vacuum in Venezuela

• Dulcie Rodriguez’s Uncertain Leadership:
  Doubts about stability, legitimacy, and loyalty:
  “Zero. I have no confidence. She clearly was not closely consulted with on this. There are other forces in Venezuela that would think they have a claim on the presidency, including the people who legitimately won the last election.” ([16:40])

• Trump’s Petty Motivations:
  Rothkopf recounts reports that the legitimate winner, Machado, was snubbed by Trump for not renouncing her Nobel Prize for him:
  “They said the president decided she was not the right person to run the country because she pissed him off, because she did not renounce her Nobel Prize so he could get his.” ([17:41])

5. Expansionist Fantasies: Threats to Greenland, Mexico, and Beyond

• Global “Spheres of Influence” and the Putinization of Foreign Policy:
  Rothkopf notes that Trump’s aggressive moves mirror a Putin/Xi playbook, breaking the world into “spheres of influence” ([26:04]).

• Greenland as Example:
  Danish leadership’s polite statements are dismissed:
  “It is a big mistake to handle Donald Trump by issuing a Chuck Schumer-esque statement which is, you know, I'm disappointed and this is illegal and he ought to be ashamed of himself”—Trump “doesn’t have shame” or “care about the law . . . he will trample over those people” ([20:13]).

• The Danger of Weak Resistance:
  “Where he stops is people, as I said, stand...the way that you stop Trump is you send a message that the cost is going to be very high if he tries to do what he says he's going to do.” ([21:48])

6. International Implications: Russia, China, and Global Order

• US Following Authoritarian Lead:
  The Venezuela action is seen as buying into “the Vladimir Putin, Putin and Xi Jinping view of the world” of bully states and traded spheres ([26:04], [27:00]).

• Potential for Global Domino Effects:
  Rothkopf worries Trump's permissiveness and distraction-seeking may embolden Xi to move on Taiwan:
  “Everybody in the world needs to think about what that clock looks like to bad actors around the world who say, well, Trump's not going to respond. So we now have three years and the clock is ticking…It makes the period of the next couple of years considerably more dangerous than any period we faced in the recent past.” ([31:50])

7. Erosion of American Democratic Norms

• Congressional Exclusion = “A Coup”:
  Bypassing Congress in the Venezuela decision is equated to a coup:
  “If the Congress is supposed to control war and peace, if the Constitution is supposed to control who can be a citizen or not, and all those things are essentially erased...that's a coup. And so bypassing the Congress on this is effectively the same thing as sending a mob of violent people to attack the building.” ([33:17])

• Lack of Effective Congressional Pushback:
  Rothkopf is pessimistic about Congress fighting back:
  “It's not super encouraging...there are a few people in Congress who stand up and say the right thing...but there are even bigger number who will either support Trump or who are taking this middle ground...MAGA voters didn't want Trump to do this either. It's the very opposite of America first.” ([35:21])

8. The Coming Year & Trump’s Isolation

• No Legislative Agenda, Distraction as Strategy:
  Trump is expected to double down on foreign adventures as distractions from legal and political troubles:
  “They're looking for some kind of things that can help him win the election later this year, which looks bad...And so that's the horse Trump rode in on, and I expect that's the horse Trump will be riding for the rest of this year.” ([39:38])

• Internal White House Dynamics:
  Stephen Miller, though not ostensibly in charge of foreign policy, is described as “the puppet master for the dark side of Donald Trump . . . sitting there rubbing his hands together, going, Trump needs me.” ([39:38])

• Vice President JD Vance's Absence:
  The conspicuous absence of VP JD Vance from the press conference is noted, with speculation: Is Vance already looking beyond Trump? “We're going to have to see. One of the big stories of this year is going to be when the rest of the Republican Party accepts the idea that Donald Trump is a lame duck and how they respond to that.” ([42:41])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Rothkopf on Trump's Foreign Policy:
  “We have a new kind of Mafia foreign policy. This is our territory. The don is going to tell his people what to do and take over. And like the Mafia, we're gonna use the fact that we have muscle and we don't care about the law to do whatever we want in our neighborhood.” ([03:21])

• On Business Interests Driving Policy:
  “Business has driven foreign policy for a long time. We've had wars in the Americas for banana companies in the course of our history. We've had plenty of wars for oil companies...It’s actually more often than not that economic interest ends up driving national security actions. And who suffers? The victims in the war.” ([08:56])

• On Trump’s Press Performance:
  “He was kind of lurching to one side. He could barely read the words in front of him. His brain these days seems as if it's floating in an ocean of oatmeal and Xanax.” ([12:12])

• On the Absence of Planning:
  “There is no aspect of this operation that seems to be well planned. There are no aspects of what comes next that they seem to have the slightest clue about. Everything that they said about the operation is a lie.” ([12:42])

• On Congressional Marginalization as Coup:
  “Bypassing the Congress on this is effectively the same thing as sending a mob of violent people to attack the building. It's an attack on our institutions and it takes away from the freedom of the people to choose who's really making the decisions that affect their futures as American citizens.” ([33:17])

• Coles on the Future:
  “It's the very opposite of America first.” ([36:19])

• Rothkopf’s Final Words:
  “We live in ominous times, there is no question about it. This is a very dark turn...because this one is much less well planned and the guy in charge is not fully with it and the people around him have pretty malevolent intentions...” ([45:54])

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Venezuela operation chaos, mafia doctrine: 01:29, 03:21
• Discussion of business and foreign policy: 07:47–11:41
• Trump’s press conference, lack of plan: 12:12–16:06
• Venezuelan succession and legitimacy: 16:40–19:33
• Spheres of Influence, Russia/China parallels: 26:04–27:59
• Implications for Taiwan/China: 31:50–33:02
• Congressional exclusion; is this a ‘coup’: 33:17–35:02
• What Congress can or will do: 35:21–36:38
• Predictions for 2026, White House dynamics: 39:07–43:30
• JD Vance’s absence, party dynamics: 42:41–45:09
• Final reflections: 45:54

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Tone & Language

• Candid, irreverent, often humorous but acutely critical
• Frequent analogies to mafia, old banana republics, and Gilded Age politics
• Blunt assessments of Trump's motives, cognition, and the riskiness of current U.S. foreign policy

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This episode provides an unflinching analysis of the dangers, hypocrisies, and staggering uncertainties opened up by the latest U.S. intervention in Venezuela. If you want to understand the high-level stakes—and the human consequences—of this "new era" in U.S. foreign policy, you won't want to miss David Rothkopf's searing insights.

Transcript

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[David Rothkopf]

As exquisitely planned as the military operation was, the minute that Maduro was put on a helicopter and flown out of the country, there was no remaining plan. We don't know who's in charge in Venezuela. We don't know who's on our side in Venezuela. We don't know what we're going to do next in Venezuela. We don't know how we're going to control the oil in Venezuela. We don't know which oil companies are going to participate in this in Venezuela. Frankly, I don't even think they're going to understand really how the Maduro trial is going to play out. Because a lot of what they're accusing him of isn't actually true.

[Joanna Coles]

I'm Joanna Coles. This is the Daily Beast Podcast. Happy New Year. If this is your first podcast of the year, though, I urge you to listen to all the ones that We've dropped since January 1st. This is our first, however, with our favorite columnist and the founder of the dsr Deep State radio network. David Rothkopf. His columns about Venezuela this weekend have been unsurpassable. And he's here from his hotel room in Paris where he's on holiday with his wife, to tell us exactly what's going on. David Rothkopf, you're in Europe. Happily, you're not stuck in St. Barts. What hell, what fresh hell to be stuck in St. Barts, to move because of what's happening in Venezuela and the airspace is closed. What else? What else should I be worrying about, David Rothkoff? Is the world coming to an end?

[David Rothkopf]

I don't think anything else is more important than the billionaire. Jeff Bezos was trapped. And, and, and, you know, I think Leonardo DiCaprio had a bad, hard time getting to the Critics Choice Award.

[Joanna Coles]

He barely made it. He barely made it.

[David Rothkopf]

Barely made it. I mean, yes, the United States had a sixth of its navy not too invading another country illegally to snatch up, or as Trump likes to say, kidnap, he apparently approves of that term, kidnap its leader and bring him back to the United States and then assert that we will be running the country and stealing all of its oil, despite the fact that there is no grounds under international law to do that. So that's a little worrisome. And of course, in the course of announcing that, Trump and his little henchmen who were standing behind him on the stage also threatened the president of Colombia, said he needs to watch his ass, threatened the government of Cuba, have since threatened several times to take over Greenland. And immediately before he went on stage, he threatened Mexico, saying that the president of Mexico was not really the president, the cartels were running Mexico, and we needed to go in and clean that up. So basically, it looks like we're in for a whole new era in US Foreign policy. Trump likes to call it the Don Roe Doctrine, and he seems to be proud of that. But essentially what it means is, you know, and I wrote a piece for you, which will be up shortly, I think, which essentially is we have a new kind of Mafia foreign policy. This is our territory. The don is going to tell his people what to do and take over. And like the Mafia, we're gonna use the fact that we have muscle and we don't care about the law to do whatever we want in our neighborhood. And so that's where we are. And frankly, if you were sitting right now in St. Barts, I would say, go get another Negroni, go back to the beach and stay right where you are.

[Joanna Coles]

It sounds fantastic. Why don't I ever get stuck in Saint Barts? I always get stuck upstate somewhere. I never get stuck in Saint Barts.

[David Rothkopf]

Your life is a living hell, Joanna.

[Joanna Coles]

So, David, from your Parisian hotel room.

[David Rothkopf]

I feel the dig that was in there. Okay, go on. Ok, come on. Come right at me. I'm right out there. I got like one week of vacation this year. It's zero degrees outside, it's snowing, it's icy. And I'm here talking about Donald Trump and a war in Venezuela. So I'm feeling super lux right at the moment.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay, but it's snowing in Paris. Come on. It doesn't get better than that. It's the world's most romantic city. You're gonna have a fabulous time with your lovely wife Carla, who's an opera sing. There's nothing to fear, David, but is this really just now a gangster foreign policy? Is this also about Trump going in and making some money, yet more money for him and his friends?

[David Rothkopf]

Look, everything he has done so far in this term of office has, one way or another led to money for his friends. His chief negotiator is another real estate guy, Steve Witkoff, who goes into places like the Middle east and works on the basis of deals that exist with the Trump company, or Wyckoff's company or Witkoff's kids companies, or Commerce Secretary Lutnick's kids companies. Don Jr. And Eric in Qatar, you know, they're talking about building casinos in Gaza. They've talked about other kinds of developments around the world. That's what's important. They're doing crypto deals left and right. And you know, there is no reason to assume that what happens in Venezuela is going to be any less corrupt. And in fact, you know, the president said, we're going to go in and we're going to take the oil and it's going to go to these big American oil companies who will run it. And of course, you may recall during the campaign that he got a bunch of oil executives together and said, look, if you give me a billion dollars in campaign donations, I'll do whatever you want. I mean, that was roughly the deal that he struck. And here we are, Donald Trump, America first. No more oil wars, no more foreign interventions, intervening for oil, because they gave him the money and he's giving them the money.

[Joanna Coles]

So, David, is there an argument to be made here? I mean, you are editor of Foreign Policy magazine. You worked for the Clinton administration. This is something you understand. Well, is there an argument that actually looking at foreign affairs or foreign policy through the lens of business might actually be more effective? Than what we've done up until recently. I mean, I know it sounds absurd, but, you know, when you see images of the Gaza Strip with hotels and casinos, what if it turns out that business and creating jobs in places like that is actually just as effective as having conversations at high level about, you know, whether or not a company is going to be Democrat, whether or not a country is going to be Democratic? I mean, is. Is there an argument for business deals? Because it's not like America's had a run of success in the Middle East.

[David Rothkopf]

No, look, there are probably 10 different ways that I can blow up that argument. So you may need to give me a little bit of time.

[Joanna Coles]

But first of all, let's start with.

[David Rothkopf]

The reason that governments exist. Okay? The reason that governments exist is to provide peace and prosperity for the people within those societies. Not just the rich people, not just the corporate leaders, but everybody. And if you prioritize the needs of billionaires and corporations over everybody else, you get what we've got. Donald Trump building a Golden palace in the White House and people in the United States having to pay three, four, and five times as much for their health care. You know, businesses don't really care about the future of the people of Venezuela. Donald Trump doesn't care whether the money is going to go to the people for whom it is the rightful patrimony of their nation. He wants it to go to the United States. He's stealing it. And US Companies are going to get a lot of it, and some of his friends are going to get some of it, and the people of Venezuela aren't going to get any of it. In fact, Joanna, the reality is that a lot of business has driven foreign policy for a long time. We've had wars in the Americas for banana companies in the course of our history. We've had plenty of wars for oil companies. We've had wars over shipping routes. It's actually more often than not that economic interest ends up driving national security actions. And who suffers? The victims in the war? You know, there are 70 or 80 or 90 or 100,000 innocent people dead in Gaza for whom the argument that maybe someday we'll build a casino is no solace and in fact, is not justice. And enabling some billionaires to cash in on some waterfront property at the expense of the lives of a couple of million innocent people in Gaza is not only disgusting, it's also bad foreign policy, because when people are treated that way, unrest ensues. And, you know, so it doesn't work on any level level from justice to stability. And I think that's why over time people have, you know, said let's not do that anymore. But Donald Trump doesn't know it. He thinks he's William McKinley. He thinks he's living in the late 19th century in some gilded age that he doesn't understand. And he's perfectly willing to do what works for his friends at the expense of every single friggin other human being on the planet, of which there are 8 billion of.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay, so I'm going to stop playing devil's advocate. Let's get into what did you think of his explanation for why we had done this? You saw the press conference. You must have watched him standing, what frankly looked as if he was asleep, swaying. I literally thought at one point, oh my goodness, he's going to fall over. What did you think of his justification for why we were doing this? And then let's come onto the complexities of America, in theory, running Venezuela.

[David Rothkopf]

Well, first of all, you're absolutely right. Looking at him, he was kind of lurching to one side. He could barely read the words in front of him. His brain these days seems as if it's floating in an ocean of oatmeal and Xanax. You know, it just, he, I don't.

[Joanna Coles]

Think he's ever eaten oatmeal.

[David Rothkopf]

Well, I think it's used as a medium in this case as opposed to a food. Although frankly, at his age. Well, never mind, let's not get into the regularity of the President.

[Joanna Coles]

But.

[David Rothkopf]

The reality is that, you know, the first explanation is we were doing this as a law enforcement operation. Are we doing this as a law enforcement operation if what we are doing is illegal, if we are illegally kidnapping the leader of a country, if we are illegally stealing the resources of a company? This, this was an armed robbery, it wasn't a law enforcement operation. And his justification doesn't hold water. He said, we are initially whether we're doing this as a law enforcement operation, but of course, how could it be a law enforcement operation of what we doing was illegally intervening in a country to illegally kidnap the leader of another country and then essentially conduct what is a giant armed robbery where we're going to steal the world's largest oil reserves from that country and put them to our own purposes. So what we are doing actually is a crime, it's not a law enforcement operation. He also then said we're going to run the country. And you could literally see Marco Rubio, tiny little guy that he is, shrink further as he said that because he knew on who that would fall. And in the days since, he's like, well, we don't really mean we're going to run it. You know, we're going to influence their behavior and they better do what we tell them to do because we have the military there and we can cut off their oil supplies. But there is no plan to run it. And that was the other thing that really came through loud and clear as a result of this. I mean, you had Pete Hegseth there pounding his check about pratches about brave Americans. But as exquisitely planned as the military operation was, the minute that Maduro was put on a helicopter and flown out of the country, there was no remaining plan. We don't know who's in charge in Venezuela. We don't know who's on our side in Venezuela. We don't know what we're going to do next in Venezuela. We don't know how we're going to control the oil in Venezuela. We don't know which oil companies are going to participate in this in Venezuela. Frankly, I don't even think there understand really how the Maduro trial is going to play out, because a lot of what they're accusing him of isn't actually true. They're saying he's the head of a cartel called the Cartel de la Los Soles. And it's not really a cartel. It's a name they've given to a bunch of people doing a bunch of activities, a little like antifa, which is not really a thing. They just make it up to be a thing. Well, that's interesting when you're doing a press conference, but. But in a court of law, that may not hold water. So there is no aspect of this operation that seems to be well planned. There are no aspects of what comes next that they seem to have the slightest clue about. Everything that they said about the operation is a lie. And everything that we intend to do following the operation is disturbing on some level, whether it's a current crime, future crime, or threat against another country undermining America's standing, or if we go after Greenland, as you know, Trump and Stephen Miller's wife have said in the past 48 hours, we could actually end up attacking NATO. Think about that. And that's like in the cards. That's like A follows B in the minds of these people.

[Joanna Coles]

So just to go back to Venezuela a second, Dulcie Rodriguez, the former vice president to Nicolas Maduro, was sworn in over the weekend. We were assured that she was on side then. She gave very Hostile comments which may or may not be performative. But now it looks like she sort of settled down into the business of running it internally in Venezuela. How confident are you that she will have the support she needs to be able to deliver for what Donald Trump needs?

[David Rothkopf]

I mean, zero. I have no confidence.

[Joanna Coles]

Right.

[David Rothkopf]

She clearly was not closely consulted with on this. There are other forces in Venezuela that would think they have a claim on the presidency, including the people who legitimately won the last election. Remember, she's the right hand person of Maduro. She's part of the regime that we were ostensibly throwing out. When Trump was asked about Machado, the winner of the Nobel Prize, and whether she should be the leader, the White House leaked a little story which was as cringeworthy as any story you'll see out of this cringe machine that is the White House. And they said the president decided she was not the right person to run the country because she pissed him off, because she did not renounce her Nobel Prize so he could get his.

[Joanna Coles]

I missed that. That's actually the story that they put out.

[David Rothkopf]

The reason that she was leaked out over the weekend, that he has a bone to pick with her, because she didn't say, oh, no, no, no, I couldn't accept the Nobel Prize. You really should have given it to him. And by the way, I'll remind you that what she did say was, I honor Donald Trump. I dedicate this prize to him. He's doing the right thing. So she was really kind of bending the knee, but he's not going in the direction of democracy. And when asked about democracy on the Sunday morning shows, Marco Rubio gave that classic kind of comment, which is, this is very complicated. This may be a little too complicated to get into democracy right away. You've also got other forces, though, that are close to Maduro, like the defense minister who stood up and said, you know, we are a Bolivarian nation and we have the right to control our future and we will maintain our sovereignty. And what we have not seen here, what we have not seen from anybody here, is somebody standing up and punching Trump in the nose. You know, somebody standing up and saying, no, I'm not going along with it. I am not going to be intimidated. I don't know whether that's going to happen in Venezuela or in Colombia. Lord knows, if Donald Trump goes after the cartels in Mexico, he is going to have a different kind of experience because they have a long history of dealing with politicians they don't like, and he won't like it one bit. Will NATO pull together to defend Greenland? Will that cause the kind of pushback that he doesn't like? Don't know. But they do call him Taco Trump for a reason. And you know, when people stand up to him, he does chicken out. So I don't know. Is that going to happen in Venezuela? Nobody knows for sure because we don't know what our next move is.

[Joanna Coles]

So the premier of Greenland put out a statement saying it would be illegal to seize Greenland and America already has plenty of rights and access to Greenland. It felt very Danish and a little higgah and probably would have not very much impact on the President. Do you actually think that they would try and go into or try and annex Greenland? I mean, there's zero reason to because we already have full access to Greenland, don't we?

[David Rothkopf]

Well, what do you mean by full access? We have an air base there. We can go in and out of the air base anytime we want. Greenland is part of NATO. From a security perspective, it's doing its purposes. But if we want to go in there, find rare earth minerals, dig them out and have that money go to Donald Trump's friends, I don't know that that access exists and that's what that would be about. You know, I think it's a big mistake for the premier of Greenland or anybody in Europe. And by the way, there were a bunch of people who issued statements like this in Europe. Keir Starmer comes to mind. But there were a bunch of bunch the EU officials. It is a big mistake to handle Donald Trump by issuing a Chuck Schumer esque statement which is, you know, I'm disappointed and this is illegal and he ought to be ashamed of himself. Trump doesn't have shame. He doesn't care about the law. He thinks the law is fiddle people. And as a consequence, what Donald Trump will do is trample over those people. Where he stops is people, as I said, stand. I don't know how that's going to play out in Greenland. If he thinks he can just barge in, send the navy, send a bunch of troops, use the air base and say Greenland is now ours. And the response of, you know, the Danes is to send their HIGA patrols.

[Joanna Coles]

To send some cozy blankets and some herrings.

[David Rothkopf]

Yeah, well, exactly. To send some warm Danish sweaters and herring. That's not going to stop him. And I think that's what he's looking at. He looks at the world and he says, where can I flex my muscles and get what I want at a very low cost? And I think sooner or later. Somebody's going to have to realize that the way that you stop Trump is you send a message that the cost is going to be very high if he tries to do what he says he's going to do.

[Joanna Coles]

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[Joanna Coles]

And David Rothkopf and I are back discussing what else? Venezuela. So, David, if you're Xi Jinping or you're Vladimir Putin, how are you looking at this latest U.S. maneuver into Venezuela?

[David Rothkopf]

Well, I think you're looking at it that essentially Trump is buying into the Vladimir Putin, Putin and Xi Jinping view of the world. In fact, I wrote a column for you guys a couple of days ago in which I call it the Putinization of US Foreign policy, which is to break the world into spheres of influence. And Russia can have Europe and it's near abroad, and the US can have the Americas. And by extension, Xi Jinping may be able to have Taiwan and neighboring countries in Asia. Fiona Hill, you remember, member of the former National Security Council, expert on Russia, said that the Russians thought that the natural deal with Trump would be to say, well, look, we'll give up protecting Venezuela in exchange for the United States giving up on protecting Ukraine. You can have Venezuela, we'll have Ukraine. This is how we divide up the world.

[Joanna Coles]

Right? She wrote this. When did she write 2019. Right.

[David Rothkopf]

Right. Yeah. What was. It was during the last, the last Trump administration. And, and you know, I think that's always been the way Putin has viewed the world. It's always been the way bullies have viewed the world. It was kind of the way Genghis Khan viewed the world, which is, you know, I get what I can attack and hold and you know, you don't. And you know, this, this kind of a condominium where we have a world of bully states and each one of the bully states has some territory. And so long as they don't get into each other's territory, they're perfectly happy to let the others do what they want in their neighborhood is a real formula for eventual unrest and conflict. And it seems to be where Donald Trump wants things headed. Even in official documents like the National Security Strategy which they issued, this idea of spheres of influence was embraced.

[Joanna Coles]

But it's all very well to have a sphere of influence until the country you're trying to influence fights back. Right. So we have the endless war that's going on now between Ukraine and Russia. Turned out it wasn't so easy to just annex Ukraine. They have Volodymyr Zelensky fighting back and a country that doesn't want to be turned over to Russia. So do you suspect that there will be similar, do you think there will be similar resistance from Venezuelans?

[David Rothkopf]

I don't know if there will be in Venezuela. I don't know what the deal that they get. Maduro was running the country and stealing it blind and was doing a very bad job running the oil companies. If American oil companies went in, increased production activity from the oil fields a lot and gave a little bit more of the money back to the people of Venezuela, you know, there might be a short term agreement. You know, are the people of Mexico or the people of Colombia or the people of Greenland and NATO going to all go along with this? Trump's eye view of the world? I don't think so. Somebody is going to push back someplace. And you know, sometimes what it, you know, these attacks do is they trigger resistance from people who know they will be next. That's what happened in Ukraine. In Ukraine, the United States, but also the EU said, no, we're going to back you, Ukraine, because you're fighting this war for us, in effect. And if the nations of the Americas got together and said, whoa, this guy is out of control, we're going to enter into a pact where if he goes after one of us, all of us step up and help and we're going to actually do something about it. Or we're going to say, hey, you know, China, we love your investment here and we don't like US Investment anymore and we're going to block US Investment. I mean, China's already the number one investor in Latin America and the number one trading partner of most of Latin America. But if they all said US is now sanctioned because of what they're doing and, and it starts hitting Trump's buddies, that could work, you know, and that, by the way, is a very effective strategy. I recall as a slight digression during the war that was fought in the former Yugoslavia during the Clinton administration, they were bombing a lot of things and nothing was really going on with Milosevic. And somebody got the bright idea in the Clinton administration to say, well, why don't we bomb the factories own owned by Milosevic's friends? And so they went in, they bombed the factories owned by Milosevic's friends. And Milosevic started getting phone calls like, hey, buddy, stop doing this. It's costing me money. And, you know, that's how you've got to, you know, get to Trump. You've got to go to those people who are the big donors whose approval he's seeking, and you got to make them pay the price. You've got to say, no, there will be no Google in some South America. No, there will be no Palantir in South America. There will be no Microsoft or Meta in South America. And if they start feeling the squeeze, if nobody's allowed to buy a Tesla in South America, then Elon Musk is going to start calling up Trump. And so that's another way that they can push back.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, significantly, Elon Musk was back at Mar a Lago, I think on the third. There were, you know, videos being sent out by people. But there are a lot of online pundits saying that this will give license to Xi Jinping of China to go in and extract the president of Taiwan. Is that on the cards, do you think?

[David Rothkopf]

Well, look, Xi Jinping has said for a long time, the people of China have said for a long time that Taiwan is part of China, China. And they have said that they are one of. They seek the reunification and they seek it sooner rather than later. The Chinese are very pragmatic about these things and they have been willing to play the somewhat long game on all of this, although there's increasing naval activity around Taiwan. But they're going to also look at the clock and they're going to say, are the next few years of Donald Trump in office our best shot at doing this? And I think, by the way, everybody in the world needs to think about what that clock looks like to bad actors around the world who say, well, Trump's not going to respond. So we now have three years and the clock is ticking. And so if we want to do something where this administration will let us get away with it in a future one might push back, let's move now. And it makes the period of the next couple of years considerably more dangerous than any period we faced in the recent past.

[Joanna Coles]

And how significant is it that Congress, or at least the Group of Eight within Congress weren't informed about what happened in Venezuela? I mean, is there any argument super duper significant?

[David Rothkopf]

Right. Because the Congress is the part of the government, per the Constitution, that has the right to declare war. And not only did they not consult with the Congress based on a preposterous argument that Rubio made that this was a law enforcement operation so they didn't have to. But Trump also said, well, you know, you can't tell the Congress anything because they'll leak it.

[Joanna Coles]

Right?

[David Rothkopf]

And if, you know, he's allowed to use that argument saying, well, I don't have to follow the Constitution, if I don't think the Constitution is going to produce a good outcome, then, you know, the Congress has cut out of it. And, you know, I would say, you know, a lot of people were like outraged on January 6, 2021, when, you know, army armed mobs stormed the Capitol because they saw it as an attempted coup. Well, I'll tell you what a coup looks like. If the Congress is supposed to control taxation, if the Congress is supposed to control the power of the purse and where we spend our money, if the Congress is supposed to control war and peace, if the Constitution is supposed to control who can be a citizen or who cannot be a citizen, and all of those things are essentially erased by the administration, that's a coup. And so bypassing the Congress on this is effectively the same thing as sending a mob of violent people to attack the building. It's an attack on our institutions and it takes away from the freedom of the people to choose who's really making the decisions that affect, affect their futures as American citizens.

[Joanna Coles]

So we've got the, it's five year anniversary of January 6th tomorrow. We've got Congress back after their holiday break today. Do you expect any pushback from Congress? I mean, what can they do?

[David Rothkopf]

Well, you know, it's not super encouraging. Right. There are a few people in Congress Congress who stand up and say the right thing and do it in unvarnished terms. Mostly those are Democrats, although there are a couple of Republicans, Massie and mtg.

[Joanna Coles]

And Don Bacon, I think, and Don Bacon.

[David Rothkopf]

But they're just a handful that'll stand up and say that they don't approve of this. But there are even bigger number who will either support Trump Trump or who are taking this middle ground. You know, there's a bunch of centrist Democrats who are like, well, it will look weak if we stand up to Trump. Of course, what looks weak is not standing up to Trump. Opinion polls say the American people don't like what happened in Venezuela. And this, this kind of view of centrists, well, how are we ever going to win? MAGA voters doesn't understand that MAGA voters didn't want to Trump to do this either.

[Joanna Coles]

Right. It's the very opposite of America first.

[David Rothkopf]

It is, it's the opposite of everything they said. But you know, that's because Trump lies to get ahead all the time and betrays the people that supported him all the time, whether they're his wife, there's kids, there's business partners, or there's political allies.

[Joanna Coles]

David we're taking a quick break for some ads.

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[Joanna Coles]

And David Rothkopf and I are back discussing Donald Trump's foreign policy, or as he calls it, the Dunro Doctrine. So 2026 is supposed to be the year of the horse in the Chinese calendar. What are your predictions for how this plays out over the next few months?

[David Rothkopf]

Well, I'm afraid Chinese astrology is not really in my wheelhouse. So I can't tell you the difference between the year of the snake and the year of the horse and what that all means.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, I think the snake clears the pathway in the year of, of the horse means you move forward. Did you not hear that?

[David Rothkopf]

I didn't know this about you. No, I heard it. I just, I didn't know that you were a Chinese astrologer.

[Joanna Coles]

Many things.

[David Rothkopf]

No. You contain multitudes.

[Joanna Coles]

I wish I could do multitude.

[David Rothkopf]

Who's going to move forward? I think Trump is going to try to move forward with this very aggressive agenda because, you know, you have to remember, first of all, all, he has no legislative agenda. They're looking for some kind of things that can help him win the election later this year, which looks bad for him. And, oh, Epstein. Oh, Jack Smith, you know, I mean, just a couple of days ago, Jack Smith, it turns out, went into the Congress and they were just a couple days ago released the results in which he said, oh, no, we had Trump dead to rights, we would have convicted him in any court of the land of having violated the law. And all of a sudden, you know, we're invading someplace. And the same is true with the Epstein, you know, those things are not going away. So Trump's going to have to keep looking for distractions. And the people around Trump know how to manipulate that. I mean, you know, for example, I, you know, some people around Trump are trying to take advantage of this. Stephen Miller is a perfect example. Stephen Miller is the deputy White House chief of staff for domestic policy, and yet he's now in charge of China policy. And yet there he was on Saturday, standing next to Trump, involved in this issue. Was the White House chief of staff there? No. Were there other White House staffers there? No, just Stephen Miller. Stephen Miller clearly seems to be the puppet master for the dark side of Donald Trump. And you know, whether that has to do with putting troops in the streets in the US or putting troops in the streets in Caracas or violating the constitutional rights of Americans, this little strange man who looks like, as I said in the article that I wrote for you, he would rather be in a room someplace pulling the legs off of insects, is sitting there rubbing his hands together, going, trump needs me. The only way Trump can distract from abstain is and distract from Jack Smith and distract from the election is if he does what I say and he goes, go after immigrants and go after people of color and go after women and go after the Constitution. And so that's the horse Trump rode in on, and I expect that's the horse Trump will be riding for the rest of this year.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay, great use of the, the image of the horse there. Thank you. I appreciate you staying with my Chinese astrology theme. JD Vance was very clearly missing from the press conference on Saturday. We had Pete Hegseth, who read and didn't go a word off script. We had Trump who only went off script, apparently, including surprising the team up there that we're going to run Venezuela. And then Marco Rubio seemed at least, least to speak off the cuff confidently about what was going on. How significant do you think the absence of J.D. vance was to not have the vice president there? Is that good for Vance, bad for Vance?

[David Rothkopf]

I just don't know. You know, could he have been someplace else? Yeah, it was over the holidays, after all, and, and so forth. He's certainly been very visible. He's been talking about all of these things. Might it be that Trump is getting a little uncomfortable that JD Vance has clear the heir apparent and, you know, there's already, you know, Erica Kirk and all those other kinds of people are like, yeah, we're behind Vance and, you know, they're already moving on to 2028 and leaving Trump for dead. Yeah, he may be uncomfortable about that, but frankly, the counterbalance to Vance is Rubio, and Rubio was there. You know, I don't know how to.

[Joanna Coles]

But is that Donald trump playing with J.D. vance? I mean, it felt like Rubio came out with a current advantage.

[David Rothkopf]

Could be. But I also think, you know, I mean, you talked earlier about Trump lurching to one side and falling asleep. He always falls asleep when Rubio's talking. I don't know if you remember the Cabinet beating a couple of of weeks ago. He literally cannot stay awake when words come out of Marco Rubio's mouth. And I think that's because he just doesn't think he's important. And he knows Rubio will do whatever he wants to do. I don't know. I mean, we're going to have to see. You know, one of the big stories of this year is going to be when the rest of the Republican Party accepts the idea that Donald Trump is a lame duck and how they respond to that. Do they go to Vance? Do they split off like Marjorie Taylor Greene, you know, I think this is going to be a very big story of the coming year. I also think a big story of the coming year is going to be when the penny drops on all of this for a lot of the companies that have been in there kissing Trump's butt, who are then going to say, oh, what if the Democrats win the House? What's going to happen then? Are they going to do anything? Investigations? What if a Democrat wins in 2028 and we're seen as a company that was in Trump's profit profiting off of Trump and there is going to be this real existential anxiety and it's going to push them away from Trump a little bit and it's going to make Trump feel a little more isolated, and I think that's going to make him a little more dangerous and desperate because, you know, you can't hold MAGA together on the promise of Donald Trump's energy in action much longer.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay, David Rothkopf, it's time for you to go. Skipping back into the snowy streets of Paris. Thank you very much for sharing your wisdom with us this morning and also totally referring people to your columns in the Daily Beast. I wanted to read one bit from your column yesterday that said we need to keep our eye on the bigger picture as well. What does the naked US Aggression in Venezuela suggest our next moves in the hemisphere will be, and what does it suggest for how we will implement more spheres of influence and might makes right foreign policy going forward? Ominous. Ominous.

[David Rothkopf]

We live in ominous times, there is no question about it. This is a very dark turn that took place over the weekend. It is not just business as usual, even as it echoes with past misadventures of the United States because this one is much less well planned and the guy in charge is not fully with it and the people around him have pretty malevolent intentions and he's collaborating with dangerous actors around the world. So, you know, this, this can be the worst kind of slippery slope and I think we all need to be on alert.

[Joanna Coles]

David, thank you for that. We will be on alert at the Daily Beast. We are always on alert. You can sign up and leave a comment for David on YouTube. Please do and subscribe to the podcast. We're independent media, so we appreciate your support and a special thank you for all your comments which we do read and especially those from our bebeast level members. Yvette Johnson, me thinks Betsy o' Farrell Mills and Lynn Shelby, Max Qubit, David Sherry, Tom Thomas Moore, Maria Voltain, D. Cuir Watts, Sinja Lund John H. Overocker, Deb K. Ostrander, Sandra Clark Travels With Carl, Andrew Beaver Capinator, Harry Clark, Dawn McCarthy, Daniel dog lover M. Griner, Dice Stone, Fulvia Orlando, Herbie, Andrew Mellor Tattnall, Val Love, Francisco, Will Hutchison, Andrea Hodel Bocock, D.C. sharon Shipley, Connie Rutherford, Karen White and Heidi Reilly. And of course, a big thank you to our production team, who this morning is Devon Rogerino and Ryan Murray.

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