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- [00:00]
Ryan Reynolds
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- [01:32]
Katie Tur
Isn't it interesting that the New York Times has delved into this? There was so much hand wringing over approaching it during the Biden years and they got so much flack for it. And there was a question of when. When is somebody going to really tackle Donald Trump's slowing down? Because you can see it, he is different than he was. He doesn't have the same amount of energy. He's not as coherent as he used to be. He's always been not entirely coherent. But it's different now. He's slower, his speech is slower. You can see him falling asleep sometimes or appearing to fall asleep in the Oval Office.
- [02:09]
Joanna Coles
I'm Joanna Coles. This is the Daily Beast Podcast and today we have the host of Katie Tur Reports. Katie Tur, you will remember, really made her name during the first Trump election. She was assigned to cover him. The assumption was that he was a joke of a candidate. And of course he became president not once but twice. And Katie Tua has reported doggedly throughout the 10 years that Donald Trump has been dominating our political cycles. So let's not waste any more time. Let's get into it. Katie Turr, welcome to the Daily Beast podcast studio.
- [02:48]
Katie Tur
I can't believe I'm. This is the first time that I'm here.
- [02:50]
Joanna Coles
I can't believe it either. And I want you to come back regularly.
- [02:53]
Katie Tur
I would love to.
- [02:54]
Joanna Coles
So, listen, you've been covering Donald Trump since he descended his golden staircase in.
- [03:01]
Katie Tur
Trump Tower, since he was a joke.
- [03:03]
Joanna Coles
Since he was a joke. And now, of course, he's still a joke, but in a different way.
- [03:08]
Katie Tur
He's the President of the United States.
- [03:10]
Joanna Coles
He's the President of the United States. So what difference do you notice now between his current term and when he first started?
- [03:21]
Katie Tur
He's much more. I mean, Donald Trump has always been very much himself, but he really is himself now in a way that feels pure, and I think that's partially age. I think when you get older, you just become much more yourself. You don't care any longer, and you're less willing to. I don't know, to suffer the niceties of the world. So that's part of it. But also, he has surrounded himself now with people who say yes to everything he wants to do, people who compliment and help him with his deepest urges. Whatever he wants to do is right, whatever he thinks is right. He is brilliant. He's like AI chatbot. He's like ChatGPT.
- [04:04]
Joanna Coles
Right?
- [04:04]
Katie Tur
He surrounded himself with people who are ChatGPT. You type in ChatGPT is Katie Tur wonderful. And ChatGPT will tell you, Katie Turr is the most wonderful person who has ever existed. And here are all the reasons why that's what he has surrounding him now.
- [04:15]
Joanna Coles
So he's a bit like a sort of fable in a way. He's sort of mirror, mirror on the wall. Who's the fairest of them all.
- [04:21]
Katie Tur
I think that's a very good description.
- [04:23]
Joanna Coles
Right. And everybody is around him. So let's talk. I mean, in. In his first term, when you were following him, he would frequently single you out. You wrote a fantastic book about this unbelievable. Where it was a memoir of your covering him for what, 515 days.
- [04:41]
Katie Tur
510 days.
- [04:42]
Joanna Coles
510 days, five days off.
- [04:44]
Katie Tur
That's not bad. Every once in a while, I pick it up and I just flip to a random page and it is. It's a good book. It's a really good book about a moment in time that does not still to this day, feel real. And yet here we are, 10 years later.
- [04:59]
Joanna Coles
Here we are 10 years later, he used to pick on you and call you little Katie. Today he's picked on a different Katie. Katie Rogers of the New York Times, who's written or co written a long piece about his flagging energy, I think, and his.
- [05:17]
Katie Tur
Work in the White House.
- [05:18]
Joanna Coles
Is what they've called it, aging in the White House.
- [05:20]
Katie Tur
It's been interesting that the New York Times has delved into this. There was so much hand wringing over approaching it during the Biden years, and they got so much flack for. There was a question of when is somebody going to really tackle Donald Trump's slowing down? Because you can see it, I mean, you could see it during the campaign. Even he, I was talking to Maggie Haberman about this. He is different than he was. He doesn't have the same amount of energy. He's not as coherent as he used to be. He's always been not entirely coherent. But it's different now. He's slower, his speech is slower. You can see him falling asleep sometimes or appearing to fall asleep in the Oval Office or at, I think it was a National Prayer Breakfast or, well.
- [06:03]
Joanna Coles
Some events when Dr. Oz was in the office and the poor man who'd come to talk about GLP1s reducing in price collapsed and literally his legs were up in the air and Donald Trump was sort of standing there in a daze. But earlier in that press conference, there was that.
- [06:19]
Katie Tur
But then earlier in the year, during the beginning of the administration, when he was at the national cathedral in D.C. i forgot what the event was for, but I believe the priest. It was in the National Prayer Breakfast. The priest was admonishing the administration for its treatment of immigrants. Anyway, during that sermon, he appeared to be falling asleep there, too. He's different. I mean, he's what, he's 79 years old.
- [06:42]
Joanna Coles
He's about to be 80.
- [06:44]
Katie Tur
Anybody at that age is going to start slowing down.
- [06:48]
Joanna Coles
So were you surprised that the Times suggested that his day now starts at midday, that it's basically his working hours are midday to 5?
- [06:59]
Katie Tur
No, I mean in the, the first administration, he pushed it back to 10 or even sometimes even later in the afternoon. He had executive time. That became a big point of jokes. What's he doing during his executive time? He's watching television, right? No, he's watching all the networks. I think he has them all in his dining room or in the residence. Remember when Fox and Friends would, could tell he was watching because there was one light on in the White House, they would monitor one window and that one window with the light on they would call him out and say, donald, I know you're watching.
- [07:33]
Joanna Coles
Oh, how can he call in? Know that? And he would call. I remember him calling in.
- [07:36]
Katie Tur
Yeah, but he would be up at those hours calling in. We're not seeing that quite as much. I think part of it is, yes, he is slowing down. Yes, there are questions about his cognitive abilities. Sometimes he slurs his words. Sometimes his speeches make even less sense than they used to.
- [07:53]
Joanna Coles
You.
- [07:54]
Katie Tur
There is a lot of chatter and gossip online over some physical things like the dragging of the leg, the. The bruise on his hand, the swelling of his ankles. I'm not a doctor. I don't know what any of those things add up. But he is 79.
- [08:06]
Joanna Coles
Right. And also, if you saw them in a relative, you would be concerned.
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Katie Tur
I would say, are you okay? Anything going on?
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Joanna Coles
Right.
- [08:12]
Katie Tur
Well, what's up with your hand? Why is it a bruise?
- [08:15]
Joanna Coles
And he claims that the bruises are to do with the fact that she shakes hands so much.
- [08:20]
Katie Tur
And he's on aspirin. And listen, I'm on aspirin every day, and I've got a bruise on my hands.
- [08:24]
Joanna Coles
Why are you on aspirin every day?
- [08:25]
Katie Tur
I've got a family history of heart disease, so I'm on aspirin every day. Okay, but would you like to know more about.
- [08:30]
Joanna Coles
No, but I'm curious, you know, should we all be on aspirin every day?
- [08:35]
Katie Tur
But. So there is validity to that. I can't tell you how it adds up with. Again, I'm not a doctor, but I can't tell you how it adds up with the swelling of the ankles or the dragging of the leg or the falling asleep in the Oval Office. But, you know, this is. It's a new thing for us to have presidents who are this old.
- [08:51]
Joanna Coles
Right.
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Katie Tur
We had Biden, and now we have Trump. Biden was a few years older. He really started to decline in the last few years. He was starting to decline. So what happens with Donald Trump? Is this just the beginning of a precipitous slope down in terms of his health? I don't know, but he, again, he's 79.
- [09:11]
Joanna Coles
Is Trump the new Biden?
- [09:13]
Katie Tur
We're gonna have to see. There was Shane Gillis, the comedian who does truly brilliant Trump impression, was saying on one of the BRO podcasts, that's the best way I can describe them, that I think he used the term Trump has Biden brains, or he's getting close to Biden brain.
- [09:32]
Joanna Coles
He's got Biden brain.
- [09:33]
Katie Tur
Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, the narrative is bubbling.
- [09:38]
Joanna Coles
Well, and also because he's so visible, we can see it all the time. I mean, Biden didn't do as many press conferences. No, Donald Trump loves a press conference. He loves the center of attention. But the trouble is all our attention is on him. So we are watching this micro moment by micro moment.
- [09:54]
Katie Tur
I mean, when he doesn't appear on camera for a day or two days or three days, everybody starts to freak out and wonder if he's died.
- [10:00]
Joanna Coles
Yeah. Remember that earlier this year and he came out and said, I haven't died, I'm still here.
- [10:05]
Katie Tur
But I mean, I think not to be, not to get on the bandwagon, to push back a little bit. He is doing much more than certainly Joe Biden did. He is out there in a way that past presidents haven't even been out there. He does give access. He's constantly on television. So I mean, he might be slowing down for him and slowing down because he's getting up there in age, but he is still very much mobile. I mean, he's, he's doing overseas travel, he's coming back, he's handing out Halloween candy. Sometimes these trips are one day. I mean, he is very much still engaged. He's not doing the same amount of travel that he used to. I mean, the domestic travel has certainly declined. He's not doing those rallies. He's not standing in front of a crowd for an hour, two hours, three hours in, you know, Grand Rapids, Michigan, any longer. And I think that's telling. But there isthis has got to be relative to him and not necessarily relative to Joe Biden. I went to the Christmas party during the Biden years and he came out at like 8 o' clock and he gave a speech to the assembled room of journalists and you could not understand a word he was saying.
- [11:15]
Joanna Coles
Right.
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Katie Tur
It's different.
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Joanna Coles
And do you think that journalists have learned from that moment and are now going to be less afraid of actually covering things that are sort of evident in plain sight?
- [11:28]
Katie Tur
I think so. I think it is still tricky to wade into because again, we're not doctors and it's really difficult to diagnose somebody from afar. And you want to be careful with that. But I do think that there is, we have a job to acknowledge the reality in front of us. And when somebody is behaving different or slowing down or doesn't make sense or is hiding information, I mean, he talked about his mri and we've given you all the information about his mri he says, but doesn't give you actually any information about the mri. I think it's, it's a reporter's duty. I mean, it's part of the job to point out, hey, you got an mri. We don't know why.
- [12:12]
Joanna Coles
Right, right. And it's the second time you've been to Walter Reed this year, I think.
- [12:17]
Katie Tur
Yeah, exactly.
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Joanna Coles
So you've been very.
- [12:19]
Katie Tur
I remember he was very cagey about his Covid diagnosis as well, during the first administration.
- [12:24]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [12:25]
Katie Tur
And how sick he was and the needing of the monoclonal antibodies.
- [12:29]
Joanna Coles
So he's gone after Katie Rogers, who wrote the piece, said she's ugly inside and out. He called you little Katie. He called a Bloomberg reporter recently Piggy. Quiet, Piggy. First of all, I was quite surprised that nobody in thei think it was on the airplane that he called the reporter piggy. I was quite surprised that none of the male correspondentsor perhaps they didn't. I didn't hear it just say, hey, Mr. President, that's not okay. What does it feel like when you are the butt of that angry presidential attention?
- [13:07]
Katie Tur
Oh, my God. It feels like a wave is crashing on you. You try to ignore it. I certainly. It became so routine during the campaign for me, for him to call me out, that you just, you keep going about youryour job. You stand up, you smile, you give your report. I would wave to the crowd because I think if you show any weakness or you show you're offended, it's so much worse.
- [13:30]
Joanna Coles
But didn't you have to have security to get you to your car after he began picking on you?
- [13:35]
Katie Tur
Yeah, the Secret Service walked me to my car after one of the events where it got really ugly, which I think is insane. And then WENBC had security full time with us wherever we went. That was a completely new thing. And at the time, it was a very big deal. What kind of country are we living in where reporters need armed security to go out and do their jobs? This isn't, people would say, this isn't Russia. This isn't some third world country. This is the United States of America. And it shouldn'tyou shouldn't have your life threatened when you're doing the basic job of journalism. And Donald Trump ushered that new era in, and it was scary. And there were a lot of people saying this was not okay. We can't live like this. We can't accept this. But then he was elected president, so all of that now became normalized. So why don't the guys on the plane or the gals on the plane speak up in defense of the reporter? I think it's because it's become normalized.
- [14:33]
Joanna Coles
And does he do it as much after men as he does after women?
- [14:38]
Katie Tur
No. I mean, the administration will say he's an equal opportunity insulter. And there is, I guess, some truth to that. Certainly he does go after men that he doesn't like. Yeah.
- [14:50]
Joanna Coles
I mean, he went after Jonathan Karl recently in a sort of crowd of reporters.
- [14:54]
Katie Tur
Yeah, of course. But the way that he talks about their physical attributes for women, I think is different. Is different.
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Joanna Coles
And what do you think or not.
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Katie Tur
Physical attributes, the way that he puts a woman?
- [15:04]
Joanna Coles
Well, it's the insults.
- [15:05]
Katie Tur
Yeah, yeah. In a physical way.
- [15:07]
Joanna Coles
Right. And what do you think that's about? What is he actually saying there?
- [15:13]
Katie Tur
I think he's saying, you know, you don't matter. Youwhy would you think that you have the authority to question me? He's diminishing them.
- [15:25]
Joanna Coles
Right. And what is thei mean you said when he did it to you just keep on doing your job. There's nothing else you can do.
- [15:31]
Katie Tur
Of course.
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Joanna Coles
What do you think Katie Rogers thought when she saw him sounding off in a fury? Just saying she's an ugly person inside and out.
- [15:42]
Katie Tur
I don't know. But I imagine that she thinks the way everyone does, which is, I'm not looking forward to the flood of threats that are now going to be coming my way. And it's not just angry vitriol online, although that can feel very isolating. It's what comes with it now. It's the personal threats to your safety that anytime he singles you out, you have to or his crowd singles you out, you have to embrace yourself for and then thinking about what you need to do to make sure that, you know, one crazy person in that crowd doesn't act ondoesn't act on trying to silence you.
- [16:20]
Joanna Coles
Right. So let's talk about another theory, which I didn't know about and which is referenced in Katie's piece today about Trump believing that we are basically human beings are like batteries and that we have a finite amount of energy.
- [16:36]
Katie Tur
I can't believe you only just learned about this.
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Joanna Coles
I can't believe it either. I mean, it's like hearing about a theory from Victorian England. This is literally what the Victorians used to think, that we were like batteries. We had a finite amount of energy. And this is the reason why he doesn't exercise.
- [16:52]
Katie Tur
He also puts leeches on his body at night in order to suck out the bad blood. No, he doesn't. I'm joking.
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Joanna Coles
No, no, I know, but I was going to say there's probably quite a lot of work for the leeches to do. Can you explain this theory? You knew all about it when I referenced it to you. Oh, yes.
- [17:07]
Katie Tur
This is one of the weird theories that Donald Trump has about health. He's been talking about it for a long time. Part of it was, why is the president of the United States not exercising? You know, Obama exercised, Clinton exercised. You saw him jogging.
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Joanna Coles
Remember George W. Bush exercised.
- [17:24]
Katie Tur
George W. Bush exercised. But why is Donald Trump not exercising? It looks like he needed to exercise or that's what doctors would say. And his pushback to that was I move my arms a lot on stage.
- [17:36]
Joanna Coles
When he's doing that.
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Katie Tur
Yeah, when he's doing that, when he's giving rally speeches. But also, I don't need to exercise because exercise is actually bad for you because your body is like a battery and you have only a certain amount of energy in a battery the way you do in your body or your body the way you do in a battery. And when that energy runs out, you're dead. You're gone. So why expend extra energy running a triathlon or playing physical sports or lifting weights? You're just hastening yourself to the end, right?
- [18:07]
Joanna Coles
Well, he's clearly got very good DNA because he eats McDonald's. He eats steak. He doesn't appear to eat.
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Katie Tur
I know. It's so funny. My cardiologist says if you eat a hamburger more than once a year, you're going to drop dead. And yet I'm looking at the President of the United States.
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Joanna Coles
I don't think so.
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Katie Tur
Housing McDonald's.
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Joanna Coles
Yeah. Yeah. It's remarkable. So this is not a great time for him. I mean, you made the point that he's surrounded by yes people, but he's got Marjorie Taylor Greene, who was one of his biggest fans, is leaving. His polls are bad, really bad. Even though he keeps saying they're great. Grocery prices are high despite the fact he keeps saying they're low. And there's clearly a buildup of steam about the health premiums, which are going to, in some cases, double or triple.
- [18:55]
Katie Tur
For people or quadruple or quintuple, in fact.
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Joanna Coles
Geez. Ok, so that's even worse.
- [19:01]
Katie Tur
We highlighted a couple in Oregon, Eugene, Oregon, yesterday, who pay around $400 a month. Now they're retirees for their health insurance. It's going to go up to $2,400 a month in order for them to pay for their health care. That's unaffordable.
- [19:19]
Joanna Coles
Well, it's unaffordable and also it's so foolish politically, I would think, because this impacts people in every state. It's not just a blue state.
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Katie Tur
Thank you for saying that. It is so confusing to me. I do not understand the basis by which Republicans do not want to give Americans health care.
- [19:39]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [19:39]
Katie Tur
Do not want to fund health care. It doesn't make sense for the economy because just getting people sick and forcing them onto the health care system becomes a drain on it. But then also the people who use the Obamacare subsidies, most are in deep red states. We have a map that we show every time we talk about this and it's kind of become tired, but I want to show it every time because the deepest red places are the places where the subsidies are used most. So you see Texas, lots of people on the Obamacare subsidy in Texas, but Republicans in Texas, by and large, don't want to extend it. It doesn't make any sense because your electorate wants it and you're there to represent your electorate. You're there to make sure that your electorate gets taken care of. And yet this is an arena where you say, no, I'm going to ignore the needs of my voters and I'm going to instead prioritize the needs of. Who is it? The special interests. What is it?
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Joanna Coles
Well, it's as a consequence of the big beautiful bill. Right. And it's about giving the ultra rich a tax break. So they get a huge tax break. And the way they finance the tax break is by not continuing with the health care subsidies.
- [20:54]
Katie Tur
But again, that is not representing their constituents.
- [20:58]
Joanna Coles
I mean, I think that's why Marjorie Taylor Greene says there's going to be a Democratic win of the House in the midterms. Right.
- [21:06]
Katie Tur
Been kryptonite for Republicans. The last time the Republicans were swept out of the majority was during Donald Trump's first term, midway through. And it was because of Obamacare.
- [21:16]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [21:16]
Katie Tur
They tried to repeal Obamacare. They said they had a plan to replace it. They never had a plan to replace it. They were not successful in doing that. And the Democrats ran on that. They ran on Republicans trying to take away your health care, and they lost.
- [21:28]
Joanna Coles
And this looks like it's going to be a repeat of that. I mean, he totally, he campaigned saying, oh, I have a concept for healthcare, but we haven't seen the concept.
- [21:37]
Katie Tur
Well, there was going to be an outline the other day. They went from a concept to an outline, but never revealed it. After a big GOP revolt, Speaker Mike Johnson calling the White House and saying, nobody wants this. That being said, there is reporting out there from A number of outlets that say that what we're going to see in this next year in Congress are going to be a number of discharge petitions, including ones on health care from Republicans.
- [22:03]
Joanna Coles
What is a discharge petition?
- [22:05]
Katie Tur
It's what happened with the Epstein file. So in the House, you need the leadership to. Or even in the Senate, you need the leadership to bring a bill to the floor.
- [22:14]
Joanna Coles
Okay.
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Katie Tur
They've got to put it on the agenda in order to circumvent that. You can get a majority of House members signing off on a petition to force the bill to the floor.
- [22:24]
Joanna Coles
Which is what happened with the Epstein order. Yeah.
- [22:26]
Katie Tur
In order for Epstein, the Epstein bill to get to the floor, they needed all of the Democrats and I think four or five Republicans.
- [22:34]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [22:35]
Katie Tur
And they got that. And that's why it ultimately went to a vote. So we could be seeing more of those on health care, Democrats getting on board with it. And then are there going to be five Republicans, six Republicans or even more signing on to say, no, we think this is important, we need to extend those subsidies. It's not just Marjorie Taylor Greene who's worried about it. There are Republicans in Congress who do see the tidal wave coming and do understand that these subsidies, without them, people are going to get very upset. Life is already unaffordable. It will become even more unaffordable, acutely so, when these subsidies go away in January.
- [23:12]
Joanna Coles
Well, I can't imagine any of them will get reelected because it' sand also, this is a payment that people make every single month. And if your healthcare premiums are going up, as you said with a couple in Oregon that you talk to 4x, that's literal money out of your account every single month. This isn't like a one off payment that you kind of cringe for and then, you know, you forget about it for a year. This is every single month.
- [23:38]
Katie Tur
Or you just don't get health care.
- [23:40]
Joanna Coles
Or you don't get health care.
- [23:41]
Katie Tur
And then you're just hoping that for this year without health care, you're going to be okay.
- [23:46]
Joanna Coles
Right. And you wake up at three in the morning every night hoping that you're not going to get ill. And then you're worrying that the worrying is going to cause stress and you're going to get some sort of illness from that.
- [23:55]
Katie Tur
Of course. Of course.
- [23:56]
Joanna Coles
It's shocking. It's just such a shocking state of affairs. So look, you speak to tons of people. You speak to Republicans, you speak to Democrats. What are you hearing among the Republicans about how they manage Trump?
- [24:12]
Katie Tur
It's flattery Flattery. It's always been flattery. Tell him he's great. Tell him his poll numbers are wonderful.
- [24:18]
Joanna Coles
Right?
- [24:19]
Katie Tur
Tell him he solved and stopped eight wars, that he deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. It's always that.
- [24:26]
Joanna Coles
So when he says out loud, my poll numbers are the best they've ever been, they're absolutely fantastic. When we know that all the recent polls have had him at his lowest, does he actually believe they're good?
- [24:39]
Katie Tur
He's always been shown selective polls. You know, during the first campaign when.
- [24:43]
Joanna Coles
He watches television all the time and lots of stuff over there he's shown.
- [24:47]
Katie Tur
Like Erasmus and Pole poll or some other poll that shows the numbers are different or internal polls that are cherry picked. I mean, he's shown different information. He sees what we're reporting on television. That's why he calls us fake news.
- [25:02]
Joanna Coles
So he literally lives in his own information bubble. And he's not just saying in a sort of denial way.
- [25:10]
Katie Tur
That's generally how it's tended to be. You know, I don't have a full insight into exactly what's put in front of him on his desk, but that has been the standard operating procedure with Donald Trump now for many years. So he might be getting some bad looking polls. And you do see him acknowledge it to a degree because he's talking about affordability more.
- [25:30]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [25:30]
Katie Tur
He's now trying to claim the Democrats made up this word affordability. Nobody, nobody even talked about affordability right before the Democrats brought it up. But no, everything actually is great. So he's trying to will the country out of this feeling they have or the reality they have that prices are up by saying, no, they're not. Everything's wonderful. And he has had that power in the past to impose his own reality on everybody else. He has been successful at it. There are real questions about whether this time is going to be different because people are still very upset. They do feel like their lives have gotten more expensive and their wages have not matched that. There was a really interesting analysis of the poverty line by an economist and I'm going to be interviewing him soon. But he talks about the hangover from COVID and the reason why everybody felt better about their finances in Covid is because they weren't paying for transportation. They weren't paying for childcare too. The biggest expenses that we experienced in daily life, right? So suddenly, you know, they had an extra $30,000 because they weren't paying for daycare. They had an extra $20,000 because they weren't driving. You know, they weren't, they weren't commuting and their $80,000 salary, their $100,000, $220,000 salary, felt flush. Flush. And now that we're back after Covid, all of those prices have come back. All those costs have come back. Health care, healthcare is going up, but also childcare and transportation is back. And with food prices going up, you don't feel flush any longer. You feel angry about how everything has gotten more expensive and how you can no longer keep up with it. So you had a moment where you felt good. And the taking back of that power, that financial power, that ability to save, the ripping it out of your hands, really makes you pissed off, right? And that's why Biden had to deal with it. And Trump is facing the same headwinds.
- [27:28]
Joanna Coles
That is interesting. And also, people shopped less because you couldn't go out to the shop. I mean, there was just like, there's.
- [27:34]
Katie Tur
A lot of online shopping.
- [27:35]
Joanna Coles
There was a lot of online shopping, but it's a lot of online shopping.
- [27:37]
Katie Tur
For slippers and robes and sweatpants.
- [27:40]
Joanna Coles
Well, that's true. And also people doing up their homes. So there was a boom in the kind of home industry. I'm on the board of Sonos, and everybody was re equipping their homes with better sound systems. But you didn't have that incidental shopping in the way that you do now. Now things are back and we're all out and about. And also, people weren't spending on travel. They weren't spending on restaurants. So all of that sort of extra spending, and you see a lot of spending on that now, too. And that's all gone up because food's gone up. Revenge travel. Revenge travel. That's a great term. Ok, so the other thing that's going on with Trump and that it keeps coming back despite all his efforts to distract, is the Epstein files. What do you have any sense of what even are the Epstein files?
- [28:31]
Katie Tur
I mean, the Epstein files are all of the investigative material that the FBI and DOJ collected when they were looking into Jeffrey Epstein and his alleged crimes. There's an idea out there among crazy conspiracy theorists, but also among a lot of regular people who are, you know, not totally looped into the conspiracy world that there's got to be more there. This is a guy who was exceedingly wealthy. I can't really explain how he got so wealthy, who had a ton of powerful friends, was friends with presidents, was friends with royalty, was friends with billionaires, every, you know, the who's who of the 90s and the early 2000s and at the same time, he was friends with all these folks. He had his own private island where he was abusing girls. And everyone, everyone seemed to know about it.
- [29:19]
Joanna Coles
And he was Donald Trump's best friend for 10 years before they sort of had a falling out over a piece of property in, I think, 2004.
- [29:27]
Katie Tur
And there's a ton of video of the. Of them together, partying, dancing at Mar a Lago. He was at Donald Trump's weddings, like they were very close. And this idea that everyone kind of understood what Epstein was doing, and some of them may have even taken part. And when he got arrested for it initially and then got that sweetheart deal, well, why did he get a sweetheart deal? Who did he know and what did he have were there? Was he. Did he make some sort of backroom deal on information, or did he have leverage over some big, powerful people that really didn't want to see him fully punished because they were worried about what he might reveal about them? So there are these questions that have been festering now for a long time. And when Donald Trump came into office, he appointed his labor secretary, a man named Alex Acosta, who was the prosecutor in Florida, who gave him that sweetheart deal. And then all of a sudden, the Epstein stuff started to explode again, and the appointment of Alex Acosta came under scrutiny, and Donald Trump ousted him and tried to separate himself from Epstein and did so successfully. So much so that the belief among the MAGA world was that Donald Trump was actually the one who exposed Epstein. He was the whistleblower on Epstein, and he was going to unravel this. This disgusting pedophilia ring that was operating in the highest levels of government, the highest levels of society, and Epstein was a part of it. And Donald Trump was going to reveal it. That's why we have to elect him again in 2024, because he's finally going to get to the bottom of it, right? And then he didn't. And then he came in and his DOJ said, yeah, we have the files. We're going to release them. And then didn't handed over a bunch of binders full of nothing to a bunch of these conspiracy theorists who had been chomping at the bit. And then there were renewed questions. Why exactly are they not revealing the information that they promised? And does Donald Trump know about this? He must not know about this. He's always been insulated from it, which I find to be fascinating, totally fascinating, because there's all these images of Epstein and Donald Trump together, and he has the power, the unilateral Power. Power to release all the information if he wanted to, yet he's not going to do it. So I think the natural question is, what is in there? Is there more incriminating emails, more embarrassing emails? Are there financial transactions? What I mean, the girls by and large have said that they didn't see Donald Trump behave badly. There's one that has that says that she was groped or assaulted by Donald Trump. He's denied this. But if it is reallyif there's nothing there about Trump, but if it really is all about the Democrats, why hasn't Donald Trump released it?
- [32:19]
Joanna Coles
Well, and why also? And by the way, that was one of the best explanations of the Epstein files and the whole story of Epstein that I have heard, concise, chronological, very clear. What do you make of the fact that? Fact that Trump's former personal lawyer, Todd Blanche, who's now the number two at the Justice Department, personally went down to meet Jeffrey Epstein's former partner in crime, who was sentenced Ghislaine Maxwell, obviously I'm talking about who was sentenced to 20 years for sex trafficking and then moved her from her jail in Tallahassee to a prison camp in Dexbury.
- [33:02]
Katie Tur
What the point of that was? What was the point of it? What are you getting out of Ghislaine Maxwell that you haven't already got out of Ghislaine Maxwell? What do you want, maybe is a better question out of Ghislaine Maxwell. And they released a transcript, and in it she exonerates Trump. She says how nice he was and how she never remembers him doing anything. She doesn't even remember him much, really, in relation to Epstein or showing up at the various properties. But that's contradicted by the emails that she's sending to Epstein.
- [33:33]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [33:33]
Katie Tur
The ones that were released by the estate.
- [33:35]
Joanna Coles
Right. The one in 2011 where he says Trump is the dog that hasn't barked. And she says, I was thinking about that. And then he says, Virginia Giuffre. It's redacted in the email. But then the Republicans say it was Virginia Giuffre. Trump spent hours with Virginia at my house.
- [33:51]
Katie Tur
Yeah. And this was pointed out, and Todd Blanche responded that, you know, it was George Conway. I think you don't really know how to be a prosecutor. You don't know what you're talking about. But yeah, she was moved to a minimum security or lower security prison, Club Fed, as they call it. A place where it's white collar crimes. It's not sex trafficking. You don't go there if you're a sex trafficker.
- [34:15]
Joanna Coles
Right. She's in there with Elizabeth Holmes, who was the. Yeah, you're a founder, the fraudster behind Theranos.
- [34:21]
Katie Tur
But you're not, you know, you weren't.
- [34:24]
Joanna Coles
Weren'T sex trafficking girls.
- [34:24]
Katie Tur
You weren't sex trafficking girls. Yeah, exactly. So why? Why? I mean, I think those are all really big questions and they do cast just another dark shadow over Donald Trump's involvement and over his reluctance to release the information.
- [34:47]
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Katie, hold on one second. We're just going to take some action.
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- [36:56]
Joanna Coles
And I'm back with Katie Turr discussing really well, it's a masterclass on Trump's second term. Why do you think he finally said release the Epstein files?
- [37:06]
Katie Tur
He was trying to lead the parade. He saw the parade. He saw a mob coming after him.
- [37:11]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [37:11]
Katie Tur
And instead of allowing the mob to overtake him, he turned around and led the mob out like he was leading the parade. You had a jailbreak.
- [37:18]
Joanna Coles
Fantastic analogy.
- [37:20]
Katie Tur
You had a jailbreak. I can't take credit for it. I heard it a few times from a few people.
- [37:26]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [37:27]
Katie Tur
But it is great. That's why. That's why I used it.
- [37:29]
Joanna Coles
He saw the mob coming and decided to lead them.
- [37:32]
Katie Tur
Exactly.
- [37:33]
Joanna Coles
Fantastic. Yeah.
- [37:37]
Katie Tur
What happened in Congress was you had Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie just being completely headstrong about the Epstein files and standing with the victims and refusing to back down on it, refusing to succumb to the pressure of the President of the United States. Marjorie Taylor Greene now is Marjorie Traitor Greene. Donald Trump is going after Massie, going after his marriage, making fun of him, and Massey's laughing it off. He calls the White House, called Lauren Boebert into the Situation Room. Why not into, like, just some office in the West Wing? Into the Situation Room in order to pressure her to try to take her name off the discharge petition. He kept calling Nancy Mace. The President of the United States was playing phone tag with Nancy Mace, who, by the way, wants to be governor of South Carolina. He couldn't get her on the phone to get her to take her name off the discharge petition. So when the.
- [38:32]
Joanna Coles
Imagine being Nancy Mace and having Donald Trump call you and what's she doing? What's she saying to her assistant, oh, I'm not here. Tell him I'm not here. Tell him you can't find me. Tell me you don't know where I am.
- [38:43]
Katie Tur
Exactly.
- [38:43]
Joanna Coles
What a nightmare.
- [38:45]
Katie Tur
Can you imagine that? Dodging a phone call from the President of the United States?
- [38:48]
Joanna Coles
Well, I can if it's Donald Trump, but.
- [38:50]
Katie Tur
Yeah, but if you're a Republican and you need him, especially if you need him to endorse you if you want to run for governor in South Carolina, that takes some real guts. So when the Arizona rep got finally seated after her special election, Grijalva, the discharge petition has enough votes to go to the floor. And, you know, I had Don Bacon on. I asked him, is this thing going to pass? And he said, absolutely. There's going to be a jailbreak of Republicans, maybe 100 Republicans who are going.
- [39:18]
Joanna Coles
To vote for this, because a jailbreak, because that's what it feels like being, well, being imprisoned by Donald Trump's personality.
- [39:28]
Katie Tur
A jailbreak of Republicans coming out and voting yes because they don't, they understand their constituents and they don't want to be the ones saying no to releasing files about a pedophile.
- [39:39]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [39:40]
Katie Tur
And then when they. It was obvious it was going to be a flood of Republicans. Donald Trump, over the weekend, suddenly reversed himself after all of this pressure, after months of, of calling anybody who wanted the information a loser and saying he didn't want their support anyway, he suddenly says, no, I think we should all, we should all see the files. And I encourage all the Republicans to get behind this. And so not only did you have all but one of the Republicans in the House, you had every single Republican senator as well, saying yes to this. He had no choice.
- [40:12]
Joanna Coles
Right. It slightly reminds me of that episode of Seinfeld, which, I don't know if you remember, where George, George pretends that he has a house in the Hamptons, and all his friends know it's not true. And so he hires a car and he says, right, we're going out to my house in the Hamptons. And all along the drive out there, you're trying to figure out how is he going to get out of this? Because at the end, we know that he doesn't have a house. And there's very much a feeling of that with Donald Trump here, that we know he's in them. We've seen that he's in them. Elon Musk said that he was in them. He tweeted that he was in them when they were having their spike, and he then deleted the tweet. So it's just very curious to know what we're going to find. And also odd for Kash Patel, who's the head of the FBI, and his number two, Dan Bongino, who, before they joined the FBI, were constantly stirring the conspiracy of the Epstein files, which now doesn't even feel like a conspiracy anymore.
- [41:10]
Katie Tur
No. And that's true. We had reporting yesterday from Kendallaney and Carol Lening and I believe, Laura Baron Lopez, about Kash Patel's future and how the President was thinking of replacing him and doing so soon.
- [41:23]
Joanna Coles
Right. So let's talk about Kash Patel, because obviously, one of the things he used to do before he came in, he was a T shirt salesman, but he was also very active on X. Constantly going after Christopher Wray, who was then.
- [41:36]
Katie Tur
He's a former FBI. No, he's a former DOJ prosecutor.
- [41:40]
Joanna Coles
Right, right. But going after him for misuse of the government jet, which you have to take at a certain point because it's about your own security. He's now come under enormous pressure himself because he's got a girlfriend who's a country singer and the government jet appears to be ferrying her.
- [41:56]
Katie Tur
And she's got a SWAT team protecting her, by the way, as well, which.
- [42:00]
Joanna Coles
He is concerned isn't doing good enough job. Right.
- [42:03]
Katie Tur
I know that he says that she gets threats, and that's why he justifies a SWAT team protecting her, which is extraordinary and not normal for a girlfriend to get for a girlfriend of the FBI director. Listen, during the first administration, when we saw turnover in the Cabinet, it often was tied to misuse of government funds using a private plane that took a few of the Cabinet members down the first time. So it wouldn't be surprising if Kash Patel's misuse of funds, you know, using that jet, giving her a SWAT team escort, if that's what did him in. There's a history there of Donald Trump saying, you can't. This is. This bounty is not for you. This bounty's for me, not for you. You can't use it the way that I use it. You don't have that same authority. That being said, after we reported that the White House put out a. Or Caroline Levitt claims she showed the reporting to the President, the president laughed, called it fake, and then happened to have Kash Patel in the Oval Office and said, let's take a photo to show them that everything's great. And so there's a photo of them that she released to try to push back on the reporting. But Kandelanean said that even amid that, after the reporting came out, he got a number of texts from his sources within the FBI saying that it was true and that the rumblings were there and they were getting louder and perhaps his position was under threat and would come to an end soon. But, you know, when Donald Trump feels like he's being pressured to do something, or when he feels like it's been, you know, released, the information that he wants to get somebody out has been released, he'll backtrack and support the person in order to prove that the reports were false.
- [43:48]
Joanna Coles
Right. And that he doesn't want to do what the press is pushing him into doing. Exactly. And yet at the same time, you know that a presidential hand around the shoulder, offering Support is worth nothing.
- [43:59]
Katie Tur
Nothing. I mean, he would remember, he would say, got full confidence.
- [44:03]
Joanna Coles
Yeah. The words you never want to hear about yourself. Someone saying, oh, I have full confidence in them. Because you're like, ugh, the end is near.
- [44:09]
Katie Tur
The end is near.
- [44:10]
Joanna Coles
It's just a weird signaling. So the other thing that has laid Donald Trump a bit low and you saw him sort of slumping off, and poor Melania in her wonderful high heels kind of trying to stay upright on the lawn as they go to Marine Force One.
- [44:25]
Katie Tur
Espadrilles were made for, by the way.
- [44:27]
Joanna Coles
Exactly. Although I suddenly thought, oh, that that's why they've ripped up Jackie Kennedy's rose lawn and paved it so Melania can trot around in her very high heels, which she does admirably. Actually, I can't do that any longer. Anyway, the point I was getting to was Lindsay Halligan's failure to nail James Comey and Tish James.
- [44:49]
Katie Tur
Yeah. I explored this yesterday on my show and whether the failures in court, including the Comey James thing, will damage him in Congress. This idea that he's invincible, this infallibility, this inevitability that Donald Trump has, that he's all powerful, that he has full control over every aspect of government and is marching us toward authoritarianism that for the first nine months of the administration has, you know, scared people and lots of folks have gotten in line. You look at all the business leaders who have showed up at the White House House bearing gifts. But the way in which Republicans haven't set a peep about losing their authorities, like the power of the purse or the power to tariff and the fear that's been pulsing through doj. Go against Donald Trump, you're going to get fired. These embarrassing moments in court, these embarrassing failures in court, as evidenced by the Lindsey Halligan thing, doesn't it just kind of show that they're a bit bumbling and that they really don't have control.
- [45:58]
Joanna Coles
And that they are incompetent?
- [45:59]
Katie Tur
That they're incompetent and they can't get people to really. They can say they want somebody prosecuted. They can say that they're a crook. They can say that they're disgusting and should be in jail. But you need to present evidence in a court of law. You need to follow procedure in a court of law. And when you can't get somebody who is qualified enough to do the basics, that does kind of prove a measure of weakness.
- [46:27]
Joanna Coles
Well, she has fantastic hair. I don't think that Donald Trump is going to call Lindsey Halligan, who was a runner up in Miss Colorado. Ugly or little or any of theor. Piggy. He's definitely not going to call her Piggy. But she turned out to be pretty damn incompetent in the courtroom. Courtroom.
- [46:46]
Katie Tur
Yeah. I mean, she didn't know how to get an indictment. It's so bad, in fact, that they may never be able to bring the Comey case again because the judge dismissed it without prejudice. I'm not a lawyer, but I think that means that you're allowed to bring the case again. But in the case of Comey, there's a footnote in the ruling that says you can't just bring a indictment against somebody to stop the statute of limitations. And it was about to run out on Comey.
- [47:13]
Joanna Coles
Yeah, it was. I think there was five days. And so now, because the case has gone ahead the five day, they've run out the clock.
- [47:20]
Katie Tur
They were trying to. And there's usually a grace period if somebody gets thrown out. But because the indictment was, I guess, not real, not valid, he's saying, you've already. You've lost. You've lost your time. It's up, it's over. And there are now questions about whether the government would be successful if they did try to bring the Comey case again. They can bring the James case again. Again. But if they lose the ability to bring the Comey case again because Lindsey Halligan messed up, because she didn't understand how indictments work. Because. But that's not even what they ruled on. They ruled on her not being legally appointed.
- [47:52]
Joanna Coles
Yeah.
- [47:53]
Katie Tur
Because Donald Trump put somebody into that position who. Who was not allowed to be in that position.
- [47:58]
Joanna Coles
Right. And was taking that would be second interim attorney, which shouldn't have happened.
- [48:03]
Katie Tur
It's all very legally complicated. But essentially, essentially, he's got to nominate somebody. And that nomination has to get through the Senate.
- [48:10]
Joanna Coles
Yep.
- [48:10]
Katie Tur
It's got to get through in Virginia, a couple of Democratic senators who are not just going to rubber stamp somebody with no qualifications or somebody who seems like a hatchetman, hatchet man for Donald Trump, or it's got to be appointed by. I think it's judges. Again, it's like it's very legally complicated. Regardless, she was not legal. She couldn't even bring the indictment if she wanted to. Somebody else would have needed to sign their name. But again, they couldn't get anybody else in the office to sign their name to this indictment because they didn't think that the crimes Comey was accused of were actually prosecutable. They didn't believe that they could get a conviction. And when you are a lawyer in doj, if you don't believe you can get a conviction because the evidence is not there, you don't bring the case.
- [48:57]
Joanna Coles
And it seems to me, you know, we talk a lot about Donald Trump being a brilliant television producer, and this is the sort of episode where he is forcing his will onto the doj. And in a television show, that would be very dramatic, but in real life, there are consequences. It doesn't make sense. That's not how it works. And it's been thrown out. So actually, it's a good example of the institution holding. We're constantly told, oh, the institutions are folding, there's no gatekeepers, there's no guardrails. But actually, that's exactly what happened.
- [49:32]
Katie Tur
But don't hold your breath, because if it goes to the Supreme Court, who.
- [49:35]
Joanna Coles
Knows, who knows, who knows? So, final question, because I feel like we've been very thorough on everything that's going on right now is, has there been. And certainly it feels as if there has, but I know you're watching it it much more closely than I am. More grift in this second term.
- [49:57]
Katie Tur
Because I took notes, Joanna.
- [49:59]
Joanna Coles
Oh, you excellent took notes on this.
- [50:01]
Katie Tur
There's been a lot of alleged grift. I'll be careful and I'll say alleged grift.
- [50:06]
Joanna Coles
Alleged grift.
- [50:07]
Katie Tur
Okay. So look, Donald Trump has crypto behind him right now. The family has made $800 million from crypto sales in the first half of this year. Wow. This is a man that's embraced crypto in a way no president has before.
- [50:21]
Joanna Coles
Well, I'm not sure any. I'm not sure Biden would have understood what cricket.
- [50:25]
Katie Tur
I don't know if Donald Trump understands.
- [50:26]
Joanna Coles
What crypto is either, but he understands it enough to make a hundred billion.
- [50:30]
Katie Tur
Do you remember the Virginia golf course auction earlier in the term?
- [50:34]
Joanna Coles
I do not.
- [50:34]
Katie Tur
So Donald Trump held, or his family held, an auction for holders of his meme coin again. Meme coin, Right. Yeah. It's a thing that's digital and you can buy it. It's like, who. Whatever.
- [50:47]
Joanna Coles
Right. And it's sounding like an nft. I'm hearing echoes of nft.
- [50:51]
Katie Tur
The highest bidder. Highest bidders would get tickets to this event at his Virginia golf course where he was going to make an appearance. The highest of highest bidders would get access to the president. You know, I think that in past presidencies, we might lose our minds over that.
- [51:09]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [51:09]
Katie Tur
I mean, I think we'd lost our minds over that when with The Trump Hotel during the first term and talked about the emoluments clause and gave everybody a crash course in a very archaic term from the 1700s that nobody had thought about for 250 years. But not now. Now this is a two day news story and then it goes away. The winners, by the way, went to the golf course. I think he made $148 million off this.
- [51:38]
Joanna Coles
Wow.
- [51:39]
Katie Tur
Winners went to the golf course and were let down by the access that they got to the President. So it has Trump University, the stench of Trump University all over it.
- [51:47]
Joanna Coles
Of course it does.
- [51:48]
Katie Tur
There's the ballroom. There's the ballroom. $300 million raised for this ballroom. Ripping down the East Wing and building this ostentatious gold and marble ballroom at the White House.
- [52:01]
Joanna Coles
And have the plans even been certified and approved?
- [52:05]
Katie Tur
I don't think he cares.
- [52:07]
Joanna Coles
Well, do you think he's actually going to build something there?
- [52:10]
Katie Tur
Yes. Well, he has to. There's a hole in the property.
- [52:15]
Joanna Coles
I know there's a hole there, but I mean, have we seen the beginnings of any building?
- [52:21]
Katie Tur
I think they're still in the demolition stage, but I'd have to go in and see what we can find. People at the treasury were told not to take pictures and you only get a bit of a smush view from, from the positions that reporters can see at the White House. So I'd have to go see what the updated images are. But again, $300 million, it's raised by private donors. But a lot of these private donors have business with the federal government or have business with Donald Trump or want to get close to them. There are crypto billionaires, there are sports teams, owners, they're financiers, tech bros, the tobacco companies, media companies, Comcast, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Google. All these people who have business or have business that the federal government needs to sanction.
- [53:07]
Joanna Coles
Right. So it's pay to play.
- [53:09]
Katie Tur
It's pay to play. There's that, the pardons, you know the pardon, the Binance guy. There's a Qatari plane, $400 million, which, you know it's going to cost a ton of money in order to make safe for a President of the United States to fly in. I think. God, by the way, that's a hundred times more, 100 times more than every foreign gift given to the United States since 2001.
- [53:32]
Joanna Coles
Wow. 100 times more.
- [53:35]
Katie Tur
Yeah, he got a gold crown from the leader of South Korea, which felt very on the nose. And then there's, I think, what is most egregious and makes no sense politically. Donald Trump talking especially he didn't. He did this during the shutdown when people were in breadlines, when they were at food pantries, when they were not getting their paychecks. He talked about how he deserved and might sue his DOJ for $230 million as recompense or restitution for the investigations that Jack Smith launched against him. And by the way, the Senate snuck in during the shutdown bill to end the government shutdown, a little provision that would allow senators to also sue the DOJ for having their phone records seized legally, by the way, by Jack Smith during his investigations, which just smacks of self dealing. It potentially could be hundreds of million dollars that the DOJ, which by the way categorically believes that the 2020 election was stolen. That's what you have to believe to be at the head of the DOJ and so categorically believe believes that these investigations were a hoax.
- [54:44]
Joanna Coles
Right. I have missed that detail about the senators wanting compensation.
- [54:49]
Katie Tur
They would be in charge of saying yes or no to paying Donald Trump and these senators. And that money, Joanna, comes from us. It comes from taxpayers.
- [54:56]
Joanna Coles
I'm just thinking of how much tax I pay and I do not want it to go to Donald Trump's compensation fund. Yeah, so it's how they can't have.
- [55:04]
Katie Tur
Health care, but they can have hundreds of millions of dollars.
- [55:07]
Joanna Coles
Katie, let's take a break for our sponsors.
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Katie Tur
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Katie Tur
Yeah.
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Katie Tur
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- [57:14]
Joanna Coles
And I'm back with Katie Turr. In theory, Katie, the Democrats should be romping home with this.
- [57:20]
Katie Tur
In theory.
- [57:21]
Joanna Coles
In theory. Do you feel they, they are on top of all this in the way that you've just laid it out?
- [57:28]
Katie Tur
I think you see glimmers of it. I think they have been better at marshaling a response lately on health care in particular. They were very good on getting on message during the shutdown. And even though they were the ones that signed on to ending the shutdown without the subsidy, when you look at the polling, broadly Americans are blaming Republicans for the shutdown. And broadly Americans are blaming Republicans for affordability issues which include or Trump, which include health care. So they've been better at it lately. They are still trying to figure out exactly how to go after Donald Trump in terms of the term oligarchy. I know Bernie Sanders wants to use it all the time. AOC uses it. Mamdani has, has been very successful in just hammering affordability. Affordability, affordability. But I don't know, I think there's still quite a bit of time. And who knows, Democrats are they have a tendency toto chase the bouncing ball or the next sparkly thing. And Donald Trump, part of his success is that he floods the zone.
- [58:34]
Joanna Coles
Right. And just scandal the narrative moving forward. I mean, I'd forgotten about him trying to pay himself $250 million a quarter. Well, a quarter of a billion dollars for compensation for something that everybody's forgotten.
- [58:50]
Katie Tur
Yeah, exactly. So when you have that much information coming at you, a fire hose of information coming at you every single day. It can be hard to remember, right.
- [59:01]
Joanna Coles
What to focus on, what to focus on. Right. Except that the health care premiums doubling, trebling, quadrupling should give them the perfect opportunity to head into the midterms. You would think, with a real subject that's impacting real people and will already be nine months in by that point, it kicks in in January.
- [59:25]
Katie Tur
There are lessons to learn from. There are a few lessons the Democrats I think should learn from the last election going into this one. And one of them is that voters didn't see them as caring about them broadly. They thought Democrats were more focused on things like pronouns, small cultural issues that didn't necessarily affect them. And because of that, they weren't focused on affordability. They weren't focused on quality of life. They weren't focused on the needs of voters. That's what they said. That's what voters said in focus groups. That's what voters said in exit polls. It's what voters said about the Democratic Party. They would say they're weak and they're out of touch. So Democrats need to focus on things people care about right now, which is their grocery prices. If they're going to take the polls and less on the cultural issues, do they take that message? Because what the Democrats have always had a hard time doing is separating out the Twitter class, the loud voices on Twitter.
- [60:20]
Joanna Coles
Right.
- [60:20]
Katie Tur
The cultural class from everybody else believing that Twitter isand the bubble that you.
- [60:26]
Joanna Coles
Might live in is a real conversation.
- [60:29]
Katie Tur
Is where the country is broadly.
- [60:31]
Joanna Coles
Well, and I thought it was very interesting to see the report that came out this last week that said that a large percentage of political commentary going on on social media platforms was in fact from foreign agents.
- [60:45]
Katie Tur
Oh, yeah, that's interesting. How much of that is real and how much of it is not. Also, you know, I have Yair Rosenberg coming on today to talk about that and he says don't under underestimate it. Don't just say because these accounts are from overseas that the rise in anti Semitism for instance, is not real here, that it's all being fed and fostered by just bad actors. These accounts are being followed, they're being retweeted. This information, this sentiment is being disseminated broadly. And his argument is that it is a real despite where they are located, what they're tapping into is real.
- [61:21]
Joanna Coles
But I think what happens often is that they see small bonfires on social media started by Americans and then immediately throw fuel on it to make it a larger conversation.
- [61:34]
Katie Tur
They're trying to Disrupt us.
- [61:35]
Joanna Coles
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they're being incredibly effective.
- [61:38]
Katie Tur
Yeah, Yeah, I think so. I think you're right about that. Although sometimes I wonder if we just all got offline and started talking to people again, whether we would. Whether we'd feel those divisions as acutely as we do. Gallup had an interesting that showed broadly Americans agree on some core Democratic values. Very broadly. Well. And I think 80% of Americans believe violence is not the answer to solving your political issues.
- [62:00]
Joanna Coles
Right. Well. And I think, you see, whenever there's a crisis in America, I'm always sort of mindful of how neighbors immediately pitch in. You know, you're flooded. I mean, there was a great report on NPR this morning about the impacts of the floods in Texas and how the neighbors had all just pulled together to help each other. And actually, one of the guys was saying, actually, we're a better off as a community now than we were before because we all talk to each other similarly with the fires in la. Neighbors helping neighbors in a way. And yet we're living at a point where we think everything is in crisis. We all hate each other. And I'm sure that's driven by foreign access.
- [62:36]
Katie Tur
I'm sure.
- [62:37]
Joanna Coles
Well, Katie, what are you doing for Thanksgiving? Are you cooking?
- [62:40]
Katie Tur
I have 23 people coming to my house.
- [62:42]
Joanna Coles
23 people? 23. Wow. Okay. And are you cooking or is Tony cooking?
- [62:46]
Katie Tur
I did my cooking already. I made. I made 50 spanakopita triangles. I'm Greek, so.
- [62:52]
Joanna Coles
Okay, that's impressive.
- [62:53]
Katie Tur
And then Tony and some other of the dads and the grandmas are cooking the rest.
- [62:57]
Joanna Coles
Fantastic.
- [62:58]
Katie Tur
I'm gonna have a glass of wine and lay up on the couch and chill.
- [63:01]
Joanna Coles
So you're not broadcasting on Thanksgiving?
- [63:03]
Katie Tur
No. Gosh, I think it's the first time in 15 years that I'm not working Thanksgiving.
- [63:08]
Joanna Coles
Well, you deserve the rest. Enjoy the rest. And then please get at it. And. And then quick question about Ms. Now. Does it feel different that you're no longer working for msnbc? You're working for ms? I love it.
- [63:20]
Katie Tur
I'm happy. I'm really. I feel. We feel there's a real community spirit to the company now. We're all in the same space in our new location. It's nice. The studios are great. I've seen people. 30 Rock is a wonderful place, but everyone feels very siloed because it's a really old building, and there's just pockets of newsrooms or news gatherings. In this new iteration, we are all together. I've seen people I haven't seen in 10 years when there is a breaking news story, like say the judge dismisses the Comey case, you can hear everybody talking about it in the newsroom, which I love. I miss that about a newsroom. So I feel great about it. I feel like we're breaking news. I like the new graphics package. I'm surprised at how easy Ms. Now rolls off the tongue. I was worried about that, but I'm happy.
- [64:09]
Joanna Coles
All right, well, we can take that sentiment and roll into Thanksgiving with it.
- [64:12]
Katie Tur
It's going to be great.
- [64:13]
Joanna Coles
Okay, Katie, to thank you very much.
- [64:16]
Katie Tur
I love being here with you.
- [64:18]
Joanna Coles
Good. Well, I want you to come back. Well, it's very clear that Katie tour pays extraordinary attention to what's going on. That felt like a deep dive into Donald Trump's first 10 months. And we've still got got two more months to go before he calls it a year. Anyway, happy Thanksgiving. We'll be back tomorrow with Michael Wolff. We're doing a special episode of Inside Trump's Head where we talk about Donald Trump and his food and what his love of burgers actually says about him. And if you're looking for some holiday entertaining, you can look no further than the Comic Relief gala which is being held to help hungry children throughout America. It's on December 10th where you will hear John Oliver, Trevor Noah and a host of hilarious comedians. December 10th, go to comicrelief.org and book your tickets now. It's at New York's Carnegie hall and it will be a very special evening. Have a great Thanksgiving with your family, with your friends, on your own, whatever you're choosing to do. And don't forget, be beast. And thank you To Our Beast YouTube members, Herbie, Andrew, Mellor, Fulvia, Orlando, Laz Conde, Sandra Clark, Karen White Bocock, D.C. val Love, Francisco Bonzo, M. Griner, Heidi Riley, Andrea Hodel, Sharon Shipley and Connie Rutherford. And what are you waiting for? Join the BB tier of memberships. You get tons of extra content and you get a name read out at the end of the podcast. Special thanks to our hard working Devon Rogerino, Anna Von Ersen and our editor Jesse Millwood.
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Katie Tur
Can we sleep cooler?
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Katie Tur
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Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast the Last Laugh and our Star Studded the Daily Beast podcast@thedailybeast.com podcasts if you enjoyed this.
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Katie Tur
Episode, consider becoming a Daily Beast subscriber. Subscribing is the best way to feed the beast and subscribe. Support all of your podcasts as we cover what might become the darkest timeline. Head to thedailybeast.com membership podcast and sign up today.