The Dire Plan Trump Really Has for Legacy: Wolff

Summary

Podcast Summary: Inside Trump's Head

Episode: The Dire Plan Trump Really Has for Legacy: Wolff

Date: April 1, 2026
Hosts: Michael Wolff & Joanna Coles

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into Donald Trump’s struggle to define his presidential legacy, focusing on plans for his post-presidential library (or “theme park”), reaction to the ongoing Iran conflict, and the dynamics within MAGA and Trump’s inner circle. Michael Wolff shares a remarkable personal story about possibly inspiring Trump’s theme park-style legacy project, while the hosts dissect the president’s character, real-time decision-making, and the state of his White House as external crises unfold.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Trump Presidential Library: From Horror to Theme Park

• Wolff recounts a 2021 Mar-a-Lago dinner with Trump (00:30, 12:04):
  • When Wolff mentions Trump’s presidential library, Trump reacts with “horror,” signaling deep resistance—he doesn’t envision himself as post-presidency.
  • Quote:
    "He looked at me with horror. And that was, to me, the first indication and the strongest indication that in his mind, he was not at all finished with being president." (12:14, Wolff)
• Wolff, improvising to fill the awkward silence, suggests it could be “a theme park”—sparking immediate interest in Trump (00:30, 14:28).
  • "The look of horror on his face passed, and then a look of… something close to wonder crossed his face." (14:22, Wolff)
• Discussion follows around Eric Trump’s recently released video: A glossy render of a “Trump Presidential Library” that looks like a towering luxury development, with little sign of books—more reminiscent of Dubai than a library (16:01).
  • Commentary on the commercialization of legacy and leveraging the “library” for fundraising and branding, with fundraising tiers starting at $10,000 (17:14).

2. The Character of Donald Trump

• Wolff on Trump’s uniqueness:
  • Trump's decisions are "totally random… there is no intellectual foundation.” (02:38)
• Coles frames the podcast’s purpose:
  • Not traditional policy analysis, but a study in character, because “character is destiny” and “Trump is transparent in a way other politicians aren’t.” (04:37)
  • Notably, Trump is accessible to journalists in an unprecedented way: "You can call Donald Trump, and he will pick up the phone." (05:47, Coles)

3. The Iran War: Fumbling Through a “Traditional” Conflict

• Analysis of Trump’s announcement that the US will withdraw from the Strait of Hormuz, declaring victory even though Iran effectively controls the strait now (22:25).
  • "What the war will have accomplished is to give the Strait of Hormuz to the Iranians. They have control of that. They did not have control of it before, but that's what the war will have accomplished." (22:25, Wolff)
• Critique of Trump’s war strategy: He took the “playbook of the best and the brightest,” only to repeat their mistakes, not understanding technological changes (especially drones) shaped by Ukraine (25:43, 27:11).
  • "Trump’s dumb and dumbest are so dumb as to… imitate the best and the brightest who we have long since understood were in fact dumb and dumbest." (25:47, Wolff)
• Trump’s administration underestimated new forms of warfare and is now stuck between “invading or retreating with no real plan.” (28:41)
  • There’s a fundamental lack of strategic direction: "He just doesn't know." (28:41, Wolff)

4. MAGA’s Reaction and Internal Splits

• MAGA world is split: Some are begrudgingly loyal, others frustrated and seeking post-Trump identity (31:29).
  • At CPAC, base doubled down on MAGA purity, booing establishment figures like Cornyn in favor of extremist Ken Paxton—revealing tensions between Trump’s instincts and his base’s (33:20, 34:09).
  • "So MAGA is certainly a thorn in Donald Trump's side, and I think that will grow." (34:32, Wolff)

5. White House Dynamics: Stephen Miller, Cabinet Silence, and the 14th Amendment

• Cabinet has “gone silent” since the war began (35:13).
• Stephen Miller remains a key policy driver, particularly pushing for an end to birthright citizenship (now before the Supreme Court) and holding “official white supremacist” beliefs at the highest level (35:44, 36:19).
  • "At the highest levels of the White House, there is a kind of official white supremacist… he [Miller] had this theory about the white majority in the US and that that would go away." (36:19, Wolff)
  • The (likely unpassable) push to end birthright citizenship is a major ideological project (38:47, 39:26).
• Confusion over J.D. Vance’s role—possibly being used to “neutralize” MAGA purity in Iran negotiations (40:02).

6. Epstein Diaries: Legacy, Power, and Social Climbing

• Wolff discusses his Substack series recounting his personal experiences with Jeffrey Epstein, focusing this week on Epstein’s “friendship competition” with Trump over Bill Clinton, especially Epstein’s use of his private plane to seduce Clinton’s friendship (41:40).
• Surreal social world: Trump and Epstein competed for proximity to Clinton after his presidency; all sought the currency of publicity pre-social media (43:15–47:49).
  • “It was Epstein who managed to insert himself with his plane… much to Trump's annoyance.” (43:15, Wolff)
• Wolff describes Epstein’s skill at inverting power dynamics in interviews, his craving for notoriety, and how the media environment of the time fostered this kind of behavior (44:32).
• Debate between Wolff and Coles on whether “the women” (abuse victims) are the main story of Epstein, or whether it’s more a story about power and delusion—showcasing different narrative styles and priorities (50:06–53:31).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Trump Library:

  • "I might have played a significant part in this." (15:53, Wolff, joking about seeding the theme park idea)
  • "It feels to me like something you would see in Abu Dhabi or Dubai… and doesn’t look like it would have a single book in it." (16:01, Coles)

• Trump and Legacy:

  • "Do not bring up a presidential library, which means you are finished with your presidency." (12:14, Wolff)

• War in Iran:

  • "What the war will have accomplished is… to let the Iranians control, have absolute control over 20% of the world’s oil… That’s what Donald Trump will have accomplished." (22:25, Wolff)

• On Trump’s Leadership Style:

  • "No pattern, no logic, and certainly no intellectual foundation for what goes through his head." (02:38, Wolff)

• Cabinet & Stephen Miller:

  • "At the highest levels of the White House, there is a kind of official white supremacist." (36:19, Wolff)

• On Epstein’s Media Strategy:

  • "He wanted to be famous. He wanted his moment of notoriety, which was extremely strange if you think about it…" (44:32, Wolff)

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Important Segment Timestamps

• Opening: Trump Presidential Library Theme Park anecdote: 00:30–01:11, 12:04–15:53
• Podcast mission & Trump’s character: 02:28–07:48
• Eric Trump’s video/Trump legacy project: 10:20–16:41
• Trump’s reaction to Iran war, strategy, and consequences: 21:31–30:55
• MAGA internal splits & CPAC analysis: 31:29–34:32
• Cabinet silence, Stephen Miller, birthright citizenship: 35:13–39:26
• Epstein Diaries & power/social circles: 41:00–53:42

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Tone

The episode is sharply candid, often irreverent, blending insider gossip, journalistic skepticism, and deadpan humor. Michael Wolff’s delivery is dry and analytical; Joanna Coles balances this with curiosity, pointed questions, and a penchant for pop culture cross-references.

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For Listeners New to the Podcast

This episode exemplifies Inside Trump’s Head’s strengths: using personal anecdotes, direct access, and cultural analysis to probe the real motivations and the outlandish improvisational style of Donald Trump, his administration, and the characters who define (and deform) American politics. The discussion extends into broader themes of power, media, and legacy in the 21st century, illuminating why understanding Trump’s headspace is a civic duty.

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Key takeaway:
Donald Trump’s approach to legacy, power, and crisis management is not only unique—it may be historically unprecedented, improvised, and deeply dependent on the moment-to-moment vagaries of his own psyche. Understanding it, as the hosts argue, remains critical.

Transcript

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[Michael Wolff]

One of the few questions I managed to get in was asking him about his presidential library. In his horror, he was. He was silent. I rushed in to kind of, kind of apologize or to cover my faux pas. I said, a presidential library, it can be more like. And then out of nowhere, it came to me. I said, a theme park. It could be. It could be the Trump theme park. The look of horror of his on his face passed and then a look of. I would say something close to wonder crossed his face.

[Joanna Coles]

So you might be responsible for this?

[Michael Wolff]

I might. I very well might.

[Joanna Coles]

Michael.

[Michael Wolff]

Joela.

[Joanna Coles]

I wish that we were together in the studio. It's Tuesday and we should be this week. You're coming in on Thursday. That's two weeks in a row that you've messed with our real in person conversation, which I much prefer.

[Michael Wolff]

It's Passover this week. I'm coming in for Passover on tomorrow night. So I will be there on Thursday.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay.

[Michael Wolff]

Passover. Should I explain that to you?

[Joanna Coles]

No, but you could explain what we try and do three times a week. You're Michael Wolff. You've written four books on Donald Trump, two books on Rupert Murdoch. I'm Joanna Coles, the chief content officer of the Daily Beast. I've been a journalist for years and, well, you tell people what we're trying to do and where we're going, but

[Michael Wolff]

just let me know. I still don't know what a Chief Content Officer is. A totally made up title in this, I guess, in this new social media age. I think of you as an editor in chief in old fashioned. The old fashioned way. Boss. Maybe I'll call you boss, as we used to do.

[Joanna Coles]

Boss is good. We have a guy here who's been here since the beginning of the Daily Beast called Michael Daly. He's a very, very good reporter. He calls me boss. I quite like it.

[Michael Wolff]

No, but I think it is important to say once again what we are doing, because I think we are doing something different from virtually what everybody else who is covering Donald Trump and every other journalist everywhere is cover covering Donald Trump and basically only Donald Trump, because he is the story that has Crowded out all other stories. But my feeling has been always, since the beginning, and I've been doing this now for more than 10 years, is that he is the most unique figure ever to take to run the government and to. Or to aspire to run the government and to take our attention. Because he is a man who lives solely in the moment. What he does, what he says, what he decides is all dependent on what is going through his head at any particular moment. And there is no pattern, no logic, and certainly no intellectual foundation for what goes through his head. But nevertheless, this is the thing that is central to all of our lives. So to understand that, to understand that he works in a way and according to a theory, if you will, that no one in a position of this kind of leadership has ever worked. And so to understand that, to be able to say, okay, this is the strange and peculiar thing that is motivating him at any given moment is a kind of a civic duty. And that's what we're doing now.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, I like the idea of it being a civic duty. And I come at it from the point of view of character is destiny. He is a fascinating character. He's astride, as you say, all our lives. And I've always found politics actually quite boring to read about and to listen about, because it's always been about policy. It feels dry. We know that politicians are hypocritical. They don't say what they mean a lot of the time. A lot of the time they're on the take, but it's all sort of going on in the background. And what I find fascinating about Donald Trump is not only that. And when I say we, I don't mean me particularly, but, you know, 70 million voters at the last election still bought the idea that Donald Trump was a successful businessman because that's how he'd been portrayed by Mark Burnett on the reality show the Apprentice. I think it's a hu part of why he got elected, and he's weirdly transparent. I mean, the thing that one has to remember is that, you know, if you ever wanted to get hold of someone in the Biden government, or indeed the president himself, you would have to go through 30 layers of people to get there. A lot of journalists have Donald Trump,

[Michael Wolff]

and then there would be no there,

[Joanna Coles]

and he picks up right? There would be no there there. But Donald Trump calls reporters. You can call Donald Trump, and he will pick up the phone if he's not in the middle of bombing Iran, and perhaps he would even pick it up if he was in the middle of bombing Iran. So that's what makes him so much more fascinating to cover. And the people around him are interesting, too, because as you're frequently pointing out, none of them would get a job in any kind of regular cabinet. This is not a regular time. And the entire world right now is enthralled to what he will do next. And he doesn't seem to know what he's going to do next. Anyway, for those of you who haven't listened or watched the podcast before, that's what we're trying to do here. We're not trying to cover it in a New York Times or Wall Street Journal way, though. We, though obviously we read them and we appreciate what they do.

[Michael Wolff]

Appreciate what they do. Quite the opposite.

[Joanna Coles]

You were going to say that.

[Michael Wolff]

I think we're partly in this mess because the New York Times does not have the wherewithal and specifically does not have the language to call a moron a moron. And so it continuously weaves an essential rationale for what he's doing when there is no rationale. So that's what we're here to remind everybody that this has happened. This enormous historical moment has happened on a totally random basis. What's going to happen? What's going to happen today in Iran or tomorrow in Iran? Random. No rhyme nor reason. So the New York Times can't have a headline no rhyme nor reason in the White House. President is nuts. I mean, all of these kinds of things. Which would be more accurate than what the New York Times says they can't say just because they don't have that language.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, and the New York Times, I think, never took his campaign as seriously as they should have done. And they seemed astonished both times when he won. Anyway, we don't need to worry about the New York Times. I need to make a huge apology for something I got wrong last week when we were discussing Michelle Pfeiffer and you said, where's she come back from? What do you remember her from? I foolishly said Casino. And I think we probably got 2000 comments pointing out that of course she wasn't in Casino. That was Sharon Stone. Michelle Pfeiffer was actually in Scarface, another Mafia movie I've not seen. Scarface, I'm assuming, is a mafia movie. What can I say? All blondes. They look alike.

[Michael Wolff]

No, Scarface is not a mafia movie. You're going to.

[Joanna Coles]

What is Scarface about? What is Scarface about? I don't watch violent movies. I don't watch violent movies.

[Michael Wolff]

Oh, my God. I'M not even going to address this. This is.

[Joanna Coles]

What is it about?

[Michael Wolff]

Well, it's about cocaine dealers in Florida.

[Joanna Coles]

Oh, it's about. I didn't know that. I thought it was. It sounded to me like it was about the mafia.

[Michael Wolff]

I mean, in Miami. It's the great. It's the great Miami drug film.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay, well, I haven't seen it. I have seen Casino. I totally got Sharon Stone confused.

[Michael Wolff]

Brian De Palma, by the way, who I know happen to know is a faithful listener.

[Joanna Coles]

A faithful listener of Inside Trump's Head.

[Michael Wolff]

Yes.

[Joanna Coles]

Oh, good. Well, shout out to Brian and Brian. I'm sorry, he lives.

[Michael Wolff]

He lives down the street.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay, cool. Well, there you go. So anyway, I'm sorry, I got that wrong. And I have seen Michelle Pfeiffer in lots of things. I hesitate to say the Witches of Eastwick because that wasn't a great movie, but she was in that with Cher and Susan Sarandon.

[Michael Wolff]

Have you, are you sure? Have you checked this?

[Joanna Coles]

I actually did watch that. I watched it like 40 years ago though, I think. Anyway, I apologize and thank you to everybody that pointed it out was a lot of people. And just to say forget, we are independent media. So we appreciate your support. Feel free to press the subscription button on your wherever you get your podcasts because we're hopefully we're about to hit 600,000 subscribers actually possibly by the end of the week and I think the week after next, Michael, we hit our 100th episode of Inside Trump's Head. So I feel like we should do something special for it. Do you have any ideas? If anybody has any ideas, please suggest it could be some more limericks, some more poems.

[Michael Wolff]

You would have think in a hundred episodes we would have gotten to the heart of this man. Well, maybe we have and it makes no difference.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, there isn't a heart. Maybe there isn't a heart. But I tell you what we are going to do. We are going to now play and this is complicated for the people who are listening, although you will get a blast of music. So last night Eric Trump released a video which he says he has spent the last six months putting his heart and soul into this project. So please, let's take it away, Oh magnificent music, which in fact we discovered is called Limitless. It's by Aleko Romeo and it's a royalty free song.

[Michael Wolff]

You know. You know, I. I'm not sure anybody has spent enough time on the effect of everybody in the world being able to make a cheesy video. The whole world is just cheesy videos. Everywhere.

[Joanna Coles]

Can you just explain what Eric Trump has spent the last six months and his heart and soul on for people who didn't see it? Because it's. Yeah, well, it's the trifle.

[Michael Wolff]

This is a model. I mean, what you see in the video is a tower. It actually kind of looks like the Fruit Freedom Tower in New York City that replaced the World Trade Center. But this building does not exist. This is just a model of the prospective Trump Presidential Library or the Trump post presidential Library. So in a way, that is good news, which is to say that it does. There is an acknowledgement here on the part of the Trump family that there will be a post presidency. There will not be an eternal Trump presidency. In other words, he leaves office and he will do what other presidents have done is to build a library. And I actually have a story about this. After he was defeated in 2020, in the spring of 2021, when Trump, for reasons that will always astound me and Bewild, invited me to have dinner with him in Mar? A Lago, I went down, and before dinner, we had a long conversation, very long, like three hours. Some typical Trump couldn't shut up, kept going. And at one point, one of the few questions I managed to get in was asking him about his presidential library. Remember, he's out of office. He is no longer the president. He's in. In this moment of post presidency when presidents, former presidents, turned to thinking about their legacy and their library. So I brought this up, and he looked at me with horror. And that was, to me, the first indication and the strongest indication that in his mind, he was not at all finished with being president. So do not bring up a presidential library, which means you are finished with your presidency. But there I suddenly, in his horror, he was silent, which was really rare.

[Joanna Coles]

Oh, that's really unusual.

[Michael Wolff]

And I was kind of discombobulated. And then I. And so I rushed in to kind of. Kind of apologize or to cover my faux pas about the library and saying, you know, a presidential library doesn't have to be a library. Because suddenly it stuck in my head that that's what he was objecting to, library books. I said, a presidential library, it can be more like. And then out of nowhere, it came to me. I said, a theme park. It could be the Trump theme park with all kinds of, you know, they can experience the Trump world. And the look of horror on his face passed. And then a look of. I would say something close to wonder crossed his face.

[Joanna Coles]

So you might be responsible for his structure.

[Michael Wolff]

I might. I Very well might. And then we had certainly a five or six minute conversation about what a Trump theme park might be like. Restaurants, hotels. It was a casinos.

[Joanna Coles]

Yes.

[Michael Wolff]

It was a vision.

[Joanna Coles]

Things going bankrupt. Trump steaks, Trump wine, Trump champagne, Trump University.

[Michael Wolff]

On your way out, what they are building, I might have played a significant part in this.

[Joanna Coles]

Michael Wolf, it's sort of a remarkable building. I'm assuming it's as they say, a mix of residential and office units. And it's got those funny little people that architects videos always have now imagining people using this space. There's a big garden, there's a huge American flag that's rolling down the front of it. Enormous Trump name it. It feels to me like something you would see in Abu Dhabi or Dubai, very tall, towering over the Miami skyline. And well, it doesn't look like it would have a single book in it.

[Michael Wolff]

No, but it will be. And I'm sure that this is part that there is whatever is going on here, whatever the legacy proportions of this are. I'm sure they are also attentive to the, to the, to the Trump family money making opportunities.

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[Joanna Coles]

Of course, because they've immediately opened the Trump Library, Presidential library fund people can, I think the lowest number that you could give was 10,000. And I'm sure there will be plenty of sponsorship opportunities. I almost wonder if we should avail ourselves of a sponsorship opportunity and do the inside Trump's headroom.

[Michael Wolff]

Okay.

[Joanna Coles]

From there when it's built, I mean, who knows? It's going to be built faster, I'm sure than the Obama Library, which opens this summer and has been a hideous journey for the Obamas and frankly is not a very attractive building.

[Michael Wolff]

You know, I would like to see some reporting on that. What happened here?

[Joanna Coles]

Well, the swamp has done a lot of reporting on it. David Gardner, our chief Washington correspondent's done a lot of reporting on it, actually.

[Michael Wolff]

Well, tell me.

[Joanna Coles]

I mean it's been, well, it's been delayed.

[Michael Wolff]

Well, what are the delays have been caused by construction, by construction issues, by lawsuits issues.

[Joanna Coles]

Inevitably. It's complicated. I now of course can't remember the details because my head's full of what's happening in the war in Iran. But I will find the details and we can discuss on Thursday. But it's not been by any means an easy process for them. And eight years on it should have been over.

[Michael Wolff]

They've settled on a phenomenally ugly structure.

[Joanna Coles]

I don't know. I think it was supposed to look modern. You know, it was supposed to represent the digital age as opposed to a library stuffed full of old moldering books.

[Michael Wolff]

Maybe in the end, the Obamas turned out not to have any taste either.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, that's possible, actually. Anyway, let me come back to you with that because it's an interesting story, the Obama library, but it does, in theory, eventually open this, this summer, but it's been wrought with lawsuits, as I'm sure Trump's will be, too.

[Michael Wolff]

And dare I say, because it's not exactly on the horizon, the Bush and Clinton libraries, where are they? Do they exist?

[Joanna Coles]

The Clinton libraries in Arkansas, in Little Hope?

[Michael Wolff]

Is it a big building? Is it a. I don't know.

[Joanna Coles]

It's a great question. I've never been. I haven't knowingly been to Arkansas. And I'm sure you probably went there with Bobby Kennedy, didn't you, back in the day? No, no, I know you went to Alabama.

[Michael Wolff]

We were in Mississippi.

[Joanna Coles]

Oh, I thought you were in Alabama.

[Michael Wolff]

Oh, maybe it was Alabama. No muscle show. No, it was Mississippi, actually.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay. I promise you, you said Alabama.

[Michael Wolff]

I might have anyway.

[Joanna Coles]

But the other thing I forgot. Okay, the other thing I forgot to mention is that Will, of course, it was Alabama.

[Michael Wolff]

Birmingham, Alabama. Yes, thank you.

[Joanna Coles]

Thank you. But I will. I know close, close observers of this podcast would remember that, I think, but the other thing that the Trump library will have is a golden statue of Donald Trump waving at people. So a bit like, do you remember those huge statues of Saddam Hussein that got pulled down very early in the American invasion of Iraq? It sort of reminded me of one of those hand sort of waving.

[Michael Wolff]

You know, I'm going to propose a different outcome here because I think it is possible, certainly as possible, that we are now in the midst of things going incredibly wrong for Donald Trump, that when he exits this presidency, which he will exit, it will be in some form of disgrace and of massive unpopularity, which will surely limit his. The post presidential awe that he is expecting.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay, well, that leads me to read his Trump Truth Social, which he fired off this morning in a sort of weird schoolboy rage. And this is obviously about the Strait of Hormuz, which is still closed. And the Americans are, as we understand it, trying to decide whether or not to call victory, pull out, but leave the Strait of Hormuz in an uncertainty position. Okay. And this is him sort of tweeting out, I think, to the European countries Build up some delayed courage, go to the Strait and just take it. You'll have to start learning how to fight for yourself. The USA won't be there to help you anymore. Just like you weren't there for us. Iran has been essentially decimated. The hard part is done. Go get your own oil.

[Michael Wolff]

Okay? So actually, the key thing that is obviously wrong here is that the hard part is not done. The easy part is done. And what he is saying and what they are now laying out is that we will declare victory and go home, and we will leave the Strait of Hormuz under control of the Iranians. Now, that is understand the Iranians have now claimed this as part of their territory, which is entirely new. That did not exist before the war. So what the war will have accomplished is to give the Strait of Hormuz to the Iranians. They have control of that. They did not have control of it before, but that's what the war will have accomplished. To let the Iranians control, have absolute control over 20% of the world's oil, to keep the world in effectively a stranglehold. That's what Donald Trump will have accomplished.

[Joanna Coles]

And just to remind people, 20% of the world's oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz, which, of course, most people had never even heard of before the Americans started bombing five and a half weeks ago. So, Michael, what's going on inside Donald Trump's head as he looks out over this thing? He's alternately said he wants the Iranians to declare unconditional surrender, which they're clearly not going to do. He's already declaring it a victory. Pete Hegseth is going around flapping his pecs, saying it's all marvelous. What actually is happening in Donald Trump's head?

[Michael Wolff]

Well, you know, I mean, I think that he went into this with, I was gonna say the best of intentions, but that seems weird. The best of military intentions. That is to say, Donald Trump, the asymmetric president, is now waging a perfectly traditional war. So he is doing. There was a famous book written about the Vietnam War called the Best and the Brightest. And essentially what that said is that all these smarty pants guys, these Harvard guys and these corporate chief kind of, kind of guys were unable to fight this functionally ragtag band of guerrillas from North Vietnam. And ever since, basically we've understood that war had significantly changed the idea of. Of bombing your way to victory, of bombing your way to victory, of bringing heavy troops in to clear the field ahead of you was a way that didn't necessarily work. Anymore. So Donald Trump's dumb and dumbest are so dumb as to, I love the

[Joanna Coles]

juxtaposition of dumb and dumbest and the

[Michael Wolff]

brightest as to imitate the best and the brightest who we have long since understood were in fact dumb and dumbest. So the cycle here is kind of extraordinary.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, and I think that's what gave Donald Trump the confidence to go in and bomb as he kept saying the hell out of people, because brighter people had made plans before. We saw this in Baghdad and it

[Michael Wolff]

didn't work again and again. So they are just doing what doesn't work. And now there's this other added thing here that no one had told Donald Trump about, partly because he didn't pay attention to the war in Ukraine. I mean, he kept brushing this off. I'm going to solve it in a day. Pay no attention, not interested. And I think from a, from a distant perspective, we will look back and say what was the important event of our time? And one of those important events will be the war in Ukraine, because it changed the nature of war. It's suddenly the war in Ukraine began, inaugurated the age of drones, cheap drones.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, we've used drones in Afghanistan.

[Michael Wolff]

Well, not remotely at the level that they are being used in, in Ukraine, and not remotely in the way that they can be assembled by almost anybody. I mean, this is entirely a new factor in waging war. I mean, a factor so great that is destabilizing the very nature of the power of the US Military against an enemy which has no power except cheap drones, which the Iranians do, in which they have clearly paid attention to what the Ukrainians have done. So in this situation, in the paradigm here, we are Russia and the Iranians are Ukrainians, are Ukraine.

[Joanna Coles]

So we underestimated the enemy. And Trump is now trying to figure out what to do. And he probably, as you say, he may just sort of move from moment to moment without any clear.

[Michael Wolff]

Well, right at this moment, I mean, he has, I mean, he has this, you know, there is his deadline which people keep coming back to, although the guy has never stuck to any deadlines ever of four to six weeks. We are now at week four or slightly more than week three.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, Saturday will be week six.

[Michael Wolff]

That would have been six weeks. So we come up to the deadline. What is he going to do? Now, remember, at the same time, we are amassing all kinds of troops in the region. What is he going to do with them? The truth is he has no idea. He just doesn't know. But he does, I think, increasingly have an Idea that this is a significant problem for him. How does he solve this problem? Well, he only has really two alternatives. Alternatives, More or less. And we don't know. Everybody can sort of shrug at this point. What will he do? Will we invade the country or will we retreat from the country? But in any event, if we retreat from the country, we leave the Iranians in. In a. You know, in a. In a. In. You know, I'm trying to. I mean, it's a complicated position that we lead them because. Leave them because obviously the leadership has been decimated, the infrastructure, 11,000 targets that we have that we have bombed. But at the same time, the leadership stays in place and they now have this lock on the world's oil. So what have we accomplished? I mean, that is going to be the question afterwards. And the question Donald Trump, one would hope, is gonna have to answer.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, and perhaps because it's an existential fight for the Iranians, they also seem to have figured out that Donald Trump says a lot, doesn't always mean a lot. You can push back on him. And every time he says, well, we're negotiating with the Iranians and it's going, they issue a statement saying, no, we're not negotiating and it's not going well, which is also pretty amusing. And nobody seems to know who we are negotiating with. Nobody knows who's in charge.

[Michael Wolff]

Yeah. So what happens? I mean, the larger question is, what price does Donald Trump pay for this? This is obviously a mistake to have waged this war. Having made that mistake, the war is obvious, obviously not producing, not achieving the goals that he outlined for it to achieve. And we are still yet on the abyss of not knowing what to do, which way to go.

[Joanna Coles]

So how is this, Michael? How is this impacting maga? When you talk to people from the MAGA world, what are they saying? Because I'm hearing two things. One is that MAGA is coming round to this, this. And one is that MAGA is splitting over this.

[Michael Wolff]

I'm trying to see if I can reconcile those two things. MAGA does not have any place else to go. So there's a certain kind of necessary begrudging acceptance. At the same time, MAGA is going to have to find someplace else to go because Donald Trump is not going to be here forever. So you have a significant group, MAGA group that is positioning itself against. For the future. And I think that was one of the things you saw at cpac, enormous disgruntlement with. With what's going on and in great uncertainty about how to handle it. But also a great deal of doubling down on the MAGA of it all. So there was an interesting thing at cpacs, where Paxton, who's running for the Senate in. In Texas, and as a real. Who would be the candidate, the Republican candidate most easy to beat for the Democrats, and he is running against a much more traditional Republican, a, you know, a Rhino type. And John.

[Joanna Coles]

John Cornyn.

[Michael Wolff]

Right. And. And who. Who Trump has basically concluded he ought to back because the seat otherwise may well be imperiled. But the MAGA people, the MAGA base, are insisting on Paxton and booing Cornyn. Really. So again, it's doubled down. We are maga. We are pure. We have a future beyond Donald Trump. And.

[Joanna Coles]

And it should be pointed out that Ken Paxton is almost more MAGA than Trump. I mean, he's a crazy candidate. No normal person, I think, would vote for him, which is why Trump finds himself in the position of having to probably support John Cornyn, because otherwise they could lose the Senate.

[Michael Wolff]

Right. And he cannot now do this because the MAGA people are lined up. So they are so dedicated in their opposition to Cornyn and for Ken Paxton.

[Joanna Coles]

Yeah, it's a really interesting world.

[Michael Wolff]

So MAGA is certainly a thorn in Donald Trump's side, and I think that will grow. I mean, we're. You know, and it will. You know, I mean, there are two things there. I mean, the war is not helping things, but also the fact that Donald Trump is a lame duck. And if MAGA is going to have a future beyond this administration, and I tend to believe they will not have a future beyond this administration, but they certainly recognize that in order to have this future, they have to double down on their own purity.

[Joanna Coles]

So we had a very good story in the Beast, pointing out that almost no member of the Cabinet had been on television recently. Recently. We know that this is a Cabinet that loves to talk to the press and berate the press and attack the media and say everything's the media's fault. But they've been missing in action since the beginning of the war. What's happening with Stephen Miller? We've got a new head of Homeland Security in Mark Wayne Mullen. Stephen Miller seems to have gone quiet.

[Michael Wolff]

You know, I mean, I think Stephen Miller is just taking cover under the war. I don't see any indication that there is less Stephen Miller in what's going on in this White House. And in fact, the push against birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment is being led by Stephen Miller, and that is now before the Supreme Court. I think this week Yeah, I think

[Joanna Coles]

we get a decision tomorrow, so we can discuss it more in full, hopefully on Thursday.

[Michael Wolff]

I mean, but Stephen Miller is one of the, if not the leading, well, certainly one of the leading voices in this White House. And it's an interesting thing because, I mean, let's characterize this. I think that you can. Can safely, without fear of much contradiction, say that at the highest levels of the White House, there is a kind of official white supremacist. And one of the things I remember, especially in the first administration, but still going on, is that he had this. He would go around and really nobody wanted to quite listen to this. He had this theory. About the white majority in the US and that that would go away. And then he had a kind of numbers matrix of what would have to happen in order to white people to still remain the majority in America. And that was a combination of. Of immigrants, of immigration that had to be stopped, and of the level of deportations that had to happen. And it was a kind of weird math that disguised what one person in the White House described to me as Stephen's masturbatory white race fantasies. So this is still, this is, this is. Who is the person who is at the, you know, one of, certainly one of the most significant voices in this administration. And that goes to all. Birthright citizenship is a major thing. I mean, they do, they do see that now. This is something that the country is. Is overwhelmingly in favor of. It's a fact of life that we have lived with for.

[Joanna Coles]

150 years.

[Michael Wolff]

It is what so many people, a significant portion of the American population, has, in fact, counted on. And, and now these people are talking about getting rid of it, gone. And one would think that, I mean, the language, the constitutional language is so clear that one would think the Supreme Court would say, yeah, yeah, fuck you, but this is Donald Trump's court.

[Joanna Coles]

Yeah. Although they all have their own immigration stories, too, I still don't understand how J.D. vance, who's married to Usha Vance, whose parents came from India and who has three children with Usha and has another on the way, can sit at the same table as Stephen Miller. What has happened to J.D. vance? He seems to have just vanished, you know?

[Michael Wolff]

Well, I think that he has. I mean, apparently he's going to take a role in the negotiation with the Iranians, if there is a negotiation.

[Joanna Coles]

But isn't that only because the Iranians have said that they don't want to discuss anything with Jared and Steve Whitman?

[Michael Wolff]

Well, who knows? But I think it's. I think it's actually, I think it has a more political basis here. I mean, Vance represents the maga, no Forever wars view. So best to put him into this situation to theoretically represent MAGA and also to, from Marco Rubio's point of view, involve him in this, make him complicit, this word that is frequently used in what's going on there. So they don't want J.D. vance out on his own as representing MAGA. Purity.

[Joanna Coles]

Okay, so let's talk about your part two of your Epstein diaries, which I really enjoyed reading. You're getting lots of comments on them, lots of people really engage with them. And this is where you talk about his trip to Africa with Bill Clinton and his decision brilliantly using his plane as bait for Bill Clinton to become one of Clinton's post office, post presidential friends, which actually Donald Trump is furious about because he wanted to become the dominant friend of interest.

[Michael Wolff]

No, it's a kind of interesting thing. I mean, one of the things and this will be. So anyway, this is a series that I am doing on substack on a weekly basis telling the story of what I know about Jeffrey Epstein from the beginning, when I first met him in 2000, through to his death in 2019. And I'm going to be doing this on a weekly basis like an old 19th century form. I'm Trollope or Dickens.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, it's a cliffhanger. It's a cliffhanger series.

[Michael Wolff]

But one of the interesting things is the incredible competition between Trump and Epstein, I mean, beginning in the late 80s and running through to 2004. But part of this was this competition they had over who would be best friends with Clinton. I mean, they both had a big crush on the guy. He was both because of his incredible political talents and because of flying so near the sun. This was their kind of guy. And it was Epstein who managed to insert himself with his plane in the Clinton entourage. And much to Trump's annoyance.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, and you have the trip to Africa with Jeffrey Epstein, Bill Clinton and Kevin Spacey again, another man that's lived very close to the, I wouldn't say son, but certainly close to the edge, repeatedly accused of all sorts of things that he's never been found guilty of, we should say. And then your own visit to Epstein's house and your and Epstein's, it should be said, apparent seduction of you because he just talks to you about yourself for an hour and you leave a journalist who a man who asks questions all the time. And I've certainly sat in many rooms where you ask a question and the room goes silent. And then everybody feels obligated to answer and give you stories. But you leave his house the first time thinking, gosh, I haven't asked him a single question. And then it becomes apparent a year later when he's trying to figure out how to get people to write about him in the way that he wants to be written about. So in New York magazine and Vanity Fair, that he really is trying to solicit your advice to get the best possible kind of profile about himself, and he's pretending he doesn't want press.

[Michael Wolff]

Yeah, well, I mean, that was the interesting thing, because it was like these report, you know, because he's suddenly. It's because of the Clinton flight that he suddenly becomes noticed. The New York Post writes a story about him. Who's this guy we never heard of with a big plane ferrying Bill Clinton around? And then other, because the presses are lemmings. So suddenly Vanity Fair and New York magazine are saying, okay, this guy must be important. Let's. So let's write about him. And so he calls me up and this is, you know, this was sort of. I mean, he had called me up once after the trip that I talk about in the first chapter. He had taken a group of people out to a tech conference in California. And then he had called me up after that for a cup of tea, for a reason I couldn't quite figure out except to ask me about what I did and to talk, talk about the media. And then about a year later, calls me up again for advice. So what should I. The media is calling me. I don't want to be in the media. What do I do? And I gave him the advice that I always give everybody who says they don't want to be in the media, which is to say, don't return the media's calls. But of course, he did return their calls. And precisely what he wanted was to be in the media. He wanted to be famous. He wanted his moment of notoriety, which was extremely strange if you think about it, because here's a guy who lived a shadow business life and a nefarious sexual life. So he was just effectively exposing himself. But I think at that moment in time, and this would have been in 2002,

[Joanna Coles]

so before he'd done any jail time in Florida.

[Michael Wolff]

Yes. So this would have been. And I think that there was this moment in time when all of these guys when, when media currency was among the highest publicity was the currency of the time. And I think he wanted that, like they all did.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, and of Course, it was pre social media, so you have more control over the media. And a piece in Vanity Fair or a piece in New York magazine meant something and wasn't likely to be torn apart and distributed clip by clip all over social media. I think people are much more aware, wary about it now. But back then, as you say, it was a currency of the time and something that Donald Trump had really mastered. It's always slightly depressing seeing who presidents hang out with when they leave office, isn't it? I mean, I remember being slightly disappointed when the Obamas left the White House and then the next thing you knew they were kite surfing in Necker with Richard Branson.

[Michael Wolff]

Well, you know, I mean, really, it's a kind of. I mean, first. Yeah, yeah. I mean, all of these guys together seem always unseemly, but I'm trying to think it is now at this moment in time where I think that is much more of the case. I think then there was still. We still lived in an age of reflected glamour that has gone away entirely. Actually quite the opposite, in which everybody who, you know, of everybody whose head is above ground level is tainted and suspect. And it is entirely new, unexpected, and in the situation that still, I think people in public life have not come to grips with. And a situation obviously affecting people who go into public life.

[Joanna Coles]

Right. Tainted and suspect. Well, tainted and suspect. I found it a very good read and I can't wait for next week. And I like the cliffhanger. It's a bit like sort of HBO releasing its shows once a week.

[Michael Wolff]

Yeah, well, you know, the interesting is to be able to write this from. From inside, to tell this as a story and not look at this as a set of revelations. I mean, this is. I mean, Jeffrey Epstein happened to be a real person living a real life, as disreputable as it might have been. It is in that 19th century Trollope, Dickens kind of way. A life in the city, a life of power. A life among other people who are also grasping for power. I mean, ultimately a story about. About. About ambition and successful ambition and thwarted ambition.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, and about sex and about an industrial sized network of young women.

[Michael Wolff]

It is a very. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, that's what everybody. That's just the obligatory thing that you have to say.

[Joanna Coles]

No, that's the undercurrent of the whole thing. I mean, that's.

[Michael Wolff]

I don't think it's the undercurrent of the whole thing. I think the undercurrency. The undercurrent of the whole thing. Is power a moment in time when power was being seized by a whole new set of people? I think our world was being remade at this time. And yes, Jeffrey Epstein was doing all kinds of nefarious things on the side, but in the main, he was trying to make himself part of this new world of power. I mean, there's a kind of thing even in this thing. He talks to me as he's telling me about. At one point, he's criticizing Trump's media strategy and says he has no message. And I say to him, asking the obvious question, and your message is. And then he brings up a book, and he has the book there. It's a book by Walter Isaacson, and it's about a set of people after the Second World War, super establishment people in and out of government from important families who basically made, remade, or helped remake the world order after the Second World War. And it was suddenly like, whoa. He sees himself as this kind of person, this kind of person operating in sort of the back rooms. So it was a time also of, it turns out, incredible delusion. Are you still there?

[Joanna Coles]

Yeah, yeah, I'm still here. I'm still thinking. I don't like the way you dismiss the whole women thing. I think the women thing is much bigger than you realize. And it's also how Ian, he baited a lot of guys, a lot of rich men who would come to his house. And Jeffrey.

[Michael Wolff]

No, totally. I am just trying to see this story in much broader terms, and I'm trying to see it from inside, from, in a sense, the way he saw it. So it's not to at all, at all downplay the women and the women who have been victimized in this situation, but to offer a different way of seeing this, we don't have to see one story the same way. And there's enormous amount of pressure, of course, not enormous amount of pressure to see this story the way from a particular political or ideological or. Or. The social. Social media sees this in one way, I'm able to see it in a different way, and that's just the contribution I'm making. Better or worse, a different view.

[Joanna Coles]

Right. And I find your version incredibly interesting and incredibly readable, and I urge everybody listening and watching to read it because it really is good. And I noticed you were number one on subst.

[Michael Wolff]

I don't think they're enjoying it. Epstein is getting away with anything in my version. I think it actually probably explains. Helps explain why he did what he did in a way that I think has been difficult to understand.

[Joanna Coles]

Well, And I think another way of looking at his life is the Virginia Giuffre book that gave me insight into into him and into Maxwell, who's gone quiet now. I mean, who knows what's going to happen to her whether or not she serves her sentence in her prison camp in Texas, where she was removed after or where she was moved to after Todd Blanche, as we've talked about, went to interview her for two days last summer. Anyway, I think if you read the Virginia Giuffre book and you read your excellent excerpts or your cliffhangers side by side, you get an interesting perspective on a very strange guy. But I can't wait to read next week's. And if you have been, thank you for joining us. Don't forget to subscribe to the Daily Beast. We're independent media, so we really appreciate your support. Feel free to leave us a comment on your favorite part of this conversation. What do you think Trump is going to do in Iraq? I wonder if we should have a. We should crowdsource some solutions for him.

[Michael Wolff]

Michael, I think he has no. There are no solutions.

[Joanna Coles]

There are no solutions. All right. Well, we will be back on Thursday. You'll be in the studio. Hooray. So the good news is we have so many Bee Beast tier members now there are too many names to read out. And we really appreciate your support. Thanks to our production team, Devon Rogerino, Ryan Murray, Rachel Passer, Heather Passaro, Neil Rosenhaus.