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The world is buzzing with AI tools, but instead of making things easier, they've made things overwhelming. There's a better way. Meet Superhuman, the AI productivity suite that gives you superpowers so you can outsmart the word chaos with Grammarly, mail and coda. Working together, you get proactive help across your workflow. No matter how you work, experience AI that meets you right where you are. Learn more@superhuman.com podcast that's superhuman.com/podcast. We will start today with the unbelievable tale of my first colonoscopy. It involves Fentanyl, Narcan, and such a perfect score that doctors said, sir, we've never seen anything like this before. We will then more seriously dive into maybe the biggest political disaster for Trump so far. Not the tariffs per se, but the rapidly crumbling middle class. The White House insists everything's great. That didn't work very well as a strategy for Joe Biden, that's for sure. We've also got Gavin Newsom pulling off what might be the quietest but most brutal political checkmate of the year, really outmaneuvering Republicans on the House seats. And then it gets darker as Donald Trump is reportedly planning a revenge campaign over the Epstein files. Why would he do that if he wanted them released? It doesn't really make sense, but we will look at it. And Caroline Levitt is starting to struggle to figure out how to defend all of it in public. And somehow that's not even the most corrupt story of the day. We're also going to talk about Trump caught intervening with Andrew Tate. Yes, that Andrew Tate. The guy I sometimes call Andrew Taint. And Trump is pushing an F35 deal with Saudi Arabia while his kids are negotiating lucrative business deals with with the exact same regime. Angry magazines are back and trying to destroy the show, but we won't let them. But I'll go through some of the email with you. And of course, we are still raising money to feed hungry people up to Thanksgiving Day through the charity Feeding America. Every new membership at join pacman.com every new substack premium subscription at substack.david pakman.com those first payments donated directly to to Feeding America. It's a Friday. Let's do a show. Why not? All right, so some of you noticed the schedule has been a little wonky this week. Producer Pat hosted the bonus show by himself yesterday, and things were just a little off. The reason why is I got my first colonoscopy and I know this will come as a shock to many in the audience. You would say David how could this be? You must have 20, 30 years left until your first colonoscopy. And you know what? I thought the same thing, but there are new screening guidelines, and my dad previously had what are called precancerous polyps. And so because of that, it is now indicated not indicted. Remember the difference? It is now indicated that it was time for me to do it. And I expected it would take two, three, six months to get this scheduled. But I called last week and they said, sir, we've got a perfect appointment for you on Thursday morning if you want it. And so, as someone who has what I like to describe as medical anxiety, I said, do I want to be anxious waiting for this for six months or for a week? So I said, sign me up. Now, I do have to acknowledge I got a perfect score on this thing. I don't know why they did it. I don't know what part of my body they looked at, but they said it was great. And in fact, several doctors came in and they said, we are retiring from the field of gastric enterenterology after this colonoscopy because we've just never seen a better one. For the age, of course, like Donald Trump likes to say, for the age, we've never seen a better colonoscopy. And so we are retiring. I'm kidding, of course. But in all seriousness, with all of the information we have about increased colorectal cancer among younger and younger people, I both wanted the information. Do is, is there anything in there that needs to be dealt with? I wanted the information, and I also didn't want to do the thing that. That I know is easier to do, which is just like, put this off, you know? Yeah, I know the new guidelines say I could go and get screened, but why don't I just wait a few years? So I did it. And one of the wildest things for me was I had been told, we're going to give you propofol. And I said, oh, that's what, you know, Michael Jackson referred to that as his milk. And although it's extremely dangerous to take that at home for sleep, it's quite a safe and. And effective tool for colonoscopy because it basically just. You just miss 30 minutes and then you're back online and you're all good. That's. That's what I was expecting. But I showed up and the very nice nurse who was with me the entire time said, we have you slated here for Versed and Fentanyl. And I immediately said, wait a second, is it fentanyl? Or fentanyl? Because I hear Donald Trump say fentanyl. No. And I said, why? Why the change? And she said, quite frankly, I don't know. This is what we have you lined up for. And so indeed, I received Benadryl first. Then the verse said, which I was given before my world famous appendectomy. And the verse said, is very good stuff. I mean, this will just, it really just relaxes you. And then they dosed me with the fentanyl and they had Narcan on standby, which not because of anything specific about me, needless to say, but I guess it's just standard in case the fentanyl or fentanyl doesn't reverse. They have the Narcan ready, it turns out. And this, I was really chuckling about this. I was looking at the notes after the colonoscopy and it said, patient was conversant throughout. Recommend exclusively propofol for the next colonoscopy. I guess I was talking to them the entire time. And my only memory is at one point saying, that hurts a little. Do you have more drugs? And then I remember nothing until I woke up. But apparently they were dosing me with these drugs to the maximum allowed. And I was just chatting with them, which is, which is just incredible. And it is a very weird experience with the, I guess it's anesthesia or sedation or whatever where I remember all of these vignettes. Like, for example, I had a conversation with the doctor about ultra processed food and lack of fiber in the American diet. I couldn't tell you, was that while the colonoscopy was going on, was that afterwards? I just, I just don't know. But the good news is it really was a perfect colonoscopy. I didn't have any polyps. It is very, very reassuring because you hear all of these things about the American diet and people aren't getting screened and they have benign polyps, precancerous polyps, even, you know, early stage colorectal cancer discovered at the first colonoscopy. And fortunately, you know, I didn't have that. So I can't say that it's a fun experience. I'm not going to, I'm not going to blow smoke up your. Whatever relevant in this context, but they gave me the information. They said it, you're good now. And I get to go back in, in five years now. A couple really weird things that happened. When I got home and went to take my shoes off, one of my shoelaces was just cut. So imagine that if you're wearing sneakers, you've got, you know, about 10 inches of shoelace, and the little plastic thing on the end that's easy to loop through the eyelets on one side of my shoe, it's just cut, like, it's frayed and cut. And there was just like a half inch little nub of shoelace. And I looked at this after the colonoscopy, and I said, how is this possible? And my girlfriend said to me, well, you know, when you came out of the thing, your shoes were untied? And I said, I was. I walked out to the car with my laces untied. She said, yeah, I mentioned it to you, and you said, yeah, I don't know. And so the only thing I can think of is that when I took my shoes off, they said, put them on the. Put them on the ground on the floor, and we'll make sure we put them on the stretcher and get them to the recovery room. I can only imagine that at some point, in the chaos of the fentanyl and the fentanyl and all of it, um, the wheel from the stretcher ended up on my shoelace. And then when the nurse picked up my shoes, it must have just snapped a shoelace. But I couldn't tell you. I couldn't tell you what, how this happened or anything about it. So, needless to say, I'm really glad that it is over. I'm really glad I got the information, and I have now experienced fentanyl, and I really can't remember much about it. To give you any info, but only in a controlled medical environment would I recommend availing yourself of any of these substances. So that's my story. Hopefully no more news about it forthcoming. All right, the middle class. The middle class is starting to show some signs of collapse under Donald Trump. And the most remarkable part of this is that the White House continues to act like nothing's wrong, which is particularly unusual given that when the Biden White House insisted everything's fine, it didn't really work out well for Biden and ultimately for Kamala Harris and for Democrats. And what we've learned is that continuing to tell people that the economy is great, when families don't feel that that's the case, and families are saying, how do I pay for groceries? How do I pay for rent? How do I pay for an unexpected $400 car repair or something like that, we are not talking about a small bump in prices. We are now talking about. And this is. This is bigger than politics. This is bigger than Trump, this is bigger than Biden. We are talking about many years, dating back to Covid and beyond, of rising prices. Now, it is normal that prices go up insofar as 2 to 3% inflation is considered expected, good and healthy for an economy. But the Trump administration promised prices would come down. They promise deflation and it's not happening. Put aside that deflation is often bad for the economy. It's what they promised and it's not happening. Coffee is up, beef is up, car repairs are up, life is more expensive. Across the board. People are feeling it. The data says that that is what is going on. And so middle income Americans. So these are how, these are not my definitions. These are households making between 66k a year and, and 200k a year, typically with two people working. So it's two people together making between 66 and 200k, which includes, you know, households with teachers, office workers, nurses, plumbers. These are not folks living an extravagant lifestyle. These are folks who are budgeting and hunting for bargains and cutting back on vacations. And can we turn off the lights or set the thermostat a little bit differently in order to save some money? And they feel like they're falling behind. This includes people. There's. There was a story in an article I read about a household that makes 115k in Connecticut, where they often will just sit in the dark with LED string lights on because they consume almost no electricity whatsoever. Stories of medical debt, stories of people buying homes and seeing property taxes jump and home insurance jump. And so skipping dental insurance or skipping a dental cleaning and all of this stuff. Some of these people voted for Kamala Harris. Some of these people voted for Donald Trump. But the point is that regardless of politics, we have a message which is families are saying everything's getting more expensive, it is getting more expensive. And people in the White House are saying everything is awesome, everything's just great. Especially going into the Q4 holiday shopping period, the level of consumer anxiety is extremely high. People are skipping purchases. They are trading down from wherever you would normally shop to the next cheapest thing. Right. You know, you can kind of imagine what that is in your area. And retailers are openly saying to investors, shoppers are afraid of what comes next, which are more tariff driven price hikes. Unless something changes, that'll hit toys for the holiday season, that'll hit electronics and appliances and whatever else. And so Trump's tariffs are a part of this. Not exactly the genius master plan that he told us they would work out to be. The, the Fact that even if inflation remains between 2 and a half and 3%, which is where it's been for a couple of years, that still means prices are going up. And so Trump is out there saying affordability is up, prices are down, everything's good. And the evidence simply doesn't comport with that. The emergency cushion that maybe there was due to a higher savings rate during COVID remember, during COVID the savings rate went up for the country, created a little bit of a cushion at the macro level doesn't mean everybody saved. But as a country, there was more savings. That's gone. The wages exceeding inflation gains that we briefly saw, that is starting to shrink, shrink, shrink. And so the White House insists on, trust me, bro, give it time. It's all good. We're going to deal with beef, we're going to deal with coffee. But it's not really working well for people. Insurance companies aren't saying to people, wait on paying your premium. We understand it's fine. Grocery stores aren't saying we'll keep prices down and eat the increased supplier cost. For now, nobody's saying that. And so we have a situation where the middle class is getting squeezed and squeezed and squeezed. In a sense, as much of a fiasco as the Epstein files are for Trump, as much of a fiasco as foreign policy is for Trump, as much all of it. Right. You can't tweet your way out of racing, rent increases, car repairs you can't afford and all of that. So this is a middle class crack that is happening right now. Trump has no idea how to stop it. The people working for Trump have no ideas other than to say everything is fine and or it's going to be much better next year. And this is increasingly a problem not only for the affordability just for day to day life of people who work, but it's also building into being a political disaster for the Republican Party in 2026. And we are going to get back to that. But we've got to talk about what Gavin Newsom may have pulled off here. Here's my question. Did Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, just pull off the move that Trump and Republicans wish they were smart enough to execute? Here's what happened and why it matters so much more than people realize. We talked previously on the show about Texas blowing up its congressional map by decree in order to get more seats for Republicans in 2026. They have been dragged to court and a court has stepped in and said this is unconstitutional. Now, meanwhile, as Texas was redrawing its Maps. But before losing the legal challenge, Gavin Newsom in California did Proposition 50. And what Proposition 50 did is propose something similar to what Texas is doing, except the maps would not be drawn on racial lines and it would be put critically to the vote of the people of California. And so what California said is, we will redo our maps only if the voters want it. And the voters did. But crucially, you might remember that initially the idea was there will be a trigger here. We will only do this if Texas does the same thing. If Texas decides we're not going to do our maps, California won't do their maps either. Okay, so far, that's the way it was all set up. The Texas seats were struck down, at least for now. And so when I reported on that to you, I said, I wonder now, do California's maps stay or go? Because they were contingent on Texas doing it originally, but now California voters said, we want it. So do the California maps stay or go? This is unbelievable. California removed the trigger language from the final version of the bill. It's not there. Okay. The condition that California will only redraw if Texas does it is gone from what voters actually approved. And Paul Mitchell, who worked, not the. Not the Vidal Sassoon guy, Paul, Different. Paul Mitchell, who worked on the team that drafted the maps, posted to Twitter, quote, since everyone is asking, no, this meaning the Texas decision undoing their maps, this doesn't undo Proposition 50. The trigger language was removed in the legislative process as it was clear that Texas was redistricting. So even if their map is invalidated or Postponed, the Prop 50 maps stay in place. So now we have to ask a very simple but a very interesting question. Is it possible, Just consider this. Is it possible that Gavin Newsom and his team suspected that the Texas maps wouldn't hold up legally? So think about the sequence. Texas announces, we've got this aggressive new map. Newsom says, great, we're going to do Prop 50 and see if our voters, if our residents want to do something similar. California prepares its changes to the maps. And then, because Texas did do the Maps While Prop 50 was. Was being sort of lobbied for by those for and against it leading up to the election in November, California says, well, listen, they did their maps, so we're going to remove the trigger language, meaning that if the Texas maps are struck down in court, which happened, California still gets its extra seats, likely Democratic seats. If that is intentional, Gavin Newsom basically said, texas, thank you for your service. We will take our seats. Now, was Gavin Newsom actually playing the kind of 4D chess that Maga constantly insists Trump is playing but never is actually playing. Because right now the scoreboard reads Texas seats demolished in court, subject to appeal Republicans scrambling to defend an indefensible map in Texas Trump furious and powerless and California Democrats quietly securing more representation in the context of the upcoming 2026 midterms, with Gavin Newsom walking away with an incredible win. So this is either the most incredible outmaneuvering of the Republican Party in a way that Trump could never do, like the masterstroke of the year, or just a coincidence that really hurts Republicans and benefits Democrats. By chance, what do you think? Did Newsom expect that exactly this would happen and remove the trigger language for exactly this reason? Let me know in a comment. Let me know in an email info@david pakman.com if you regularly deal with PDFs, you've probably asked yourself, why are the big name tools so complicated, complicated and expensive? Why do I need a monthly subscription? Our sponsor UPF gives you every PDF and AI feature you need. Faster, easier and for a fraction of the price of the big name software. No subscription needed. With updf, you can edit text, images and layouts directly in your PDF. No learning curve. You can highlight comment. You can annotate reports or proposals, convert to Word, PowerPoint, Excel or images in seconds. The formatting stays perfect if you need to scan something up built in OCR turns it into editable text instantly. You can merge, split, organize or compress. It is all built in and UPDF's AI assistant will take it further, enabling you to summarize long reports, translate entire PDFs while keeping the formatting, compare versions side by side, turn a dense document into clear mind maps. One lifetime license covers up to four devices Windows, Mac, iOS and Android. And this Black Friday it is 50% off when you go to David pakman.com/updf. The link is in the description Every year there's that one person in the family who somehow gives the perfect gift. Our sponsor, Aura, is basically the hack for becoming that person. A couple of years ago, I preloaded an aura frame for my mom with baby pictures. She loved it. It was one of those gifts that really stole the moment. Everybody stops what they're doing to look at the photos. It's still there in my mom's living room after all these years. She loves it. You can preload photos onto the frame before gifting it. Even if you have Aura send the frame directly to the recipient. It's easy for everybody. And then you and the recipient can Keep adding photos from anywhere using Aura's app. Every frame comes in a premium gift box. It feels like a polished, thoughtful gift, whether you're handing it over in person or having Aura ship it directly. And you'll get $45 off the best selling Aura Carver mat frame. When you go to aura frames.com and use the code Pacman at checkout, it's Aura's best sale of the year. And. And the link is in the description. Well, the Epstein scandal is blowing up in Donald Trump's face. And instead of calming things down, the White House is now preparing a full blown revenge campaign. This is not a policy response. This is not accountability. This is not a statement that we are finally going to make sure that the victims get the justice they deserve. It's revenge, it's retaliation. And it is the weaponization of the release of the Epstein files to go after Democrats. This is exactly what Trump does when he is cornered. And quite frankly, it's what he does even when he doesn't feel cornered. Now, you might say to yourself, if Trump wanted the Epstein files released, and why would he need to go scorched earth and get revenge? And it's because Trump had no choice but to come out and say, yes, release the Epstein files, but he didn't want them released. Now, they still haven't been. We now have Pam Bondi saying, well, there's an ongoing investigation. We're going to deal with that separately. But, but the point here is you wouldn't need to seek revenge. You wouldn't be inclined to seek revenge if it was something that you wanted, the release of the Epstein files. Now, we know that Trump is probably the most vindictive political figure in modern American history. This entire second term has been retribution and settling scores and all of that. So it shouldn't surprise us that Trump is primarily focused on revenge. But that's what makes everything so absurd. Trump spent months trying to block the release. He attacked the bill seeking to release the Epstein files. He mocked people who wanted the files going. There's no story here. It's a hoax. He told people in his inner circle, I don't want the files out. And now he's pretending he wanted them released all along, but saying he's going to seek revenge because of the vote to release it. You can't have it both ways. If you're preparing a political hit job because the files are coming out, it means you didn't want them out, which is obviously the simple truth. Trump fought transparency because he thought it would hurt him. And Then he gave his blessing to House Republicans when the cost politically, of blocking the files became higher than the potential cost of letting them out. Even though it's very clear they have some idea, either redactions or scrubbing Trump's name or saying, you know, we can't release him now because of this investigation, they have some plan. So what we know is that the public wants transparency. Trump didn't. He lost the fight. And according to Politico, he's going to, quote, make Democrats regret it. Democrats are going to come to regret. This is the, quote, that's a threat. And Trump loves threatening people. He's threatening some people with death. We'll actually get to that in a bit. So White House officials are naming targets. They want to go after Bill Clinton, Hakeem Jeffries, Larry Summers, Reid Hoffman, anyone who, who knew Epstein is going to become collateral in Trump's punishment campaign. And none of this is justice. This is Trump doing what Trump always does, turning government power into a vengeance machine. Block the files, fail, look for payback. The administration is already directing the Justice Department to investigate Epstein's ties to Democrats, to financial institutions, but not to Donald Trump. He's not doing this because he believes in accountability. He's doing this because he sees a political opportunity to take attention off of himself. And meanwhile, they're trying to rewrite history. Trump and others are pretending he always wanted the release of the files. That's not true. If you believe Trump always wanted the files out, explain why he's now threatening retribution for the files coming out. It doesn't add up, and it's not meant to add up. This is grievance politics, which the light, the right loves to say is what the left is about. Oh, you guys on the left are all about grievances and trying to address and redress, seeking redress for those grievances. The grievance politics have really been coming from MAGA for a very long time now. And even in the lead up to Trump's second term, when he said, I will be your retribution, that is promising to be an administration about grievances. That's, that's plain and simple what it is. Whether it's investigators, special prosecutors, journalists, critics, anyone who ever not even crossed Trump, but just sought to cover him critically. This is the context that people need to understand, which is the Epstein file release isn't just a scandal in and of itself. It's a chance for Trump to again weaponize the federal government into an extension of his personal anger. And he told the country that this is what his second term would be about, and he is trying to do it. That's the mission statement. So I'm hoping the files come out again. At this point, I don't believe Pam Bondi is just going to go, here are the files, the unredacted full files. I think they're going to doctor them or try to suppress them based on an ongoing investigation. Pam Bondi has already said that's what they're going to do. We covered it yesterday. The question here is whether Trump is going to succeed in his revenge tour, because that's all he knows how to do. And it's, it's even going beyond the Epstein files, as Donald Trump is now kind of setting his sights on a group of Democratic lawmakers, members of the House and members of the Senate who dared to suggest that the military should be prepared not to follow unlawful orders. Did you hear about this? It's revenge all the way down. And I want to talk about that next. Donald Trump is now calling for Democratic lawmakers to be killed. Is Donald Trump a school shooter type? Because Trump has many times before said if he was ever near a school shooting, he would be the first person running in to save the children. None of us believe that. We believed he'd be the guy running away. But is it more accurate to say Trump is more the school shooter type? Let me explain what I mean. Trump is now calling for Democrats to be executed. Not censured, not defeated, not voted out, killed. Okay. And it all started with this video of Democrats, including veterans, warning U.S. service members, you should be prepared not to follow an unlawful order from Donald Trump. Not ignore anything Trump says. Okay? This is like a critical thing. Not. Not ignore anything Trump says. If there is an unlawful order, you should be prepared not to follow it. Here's what they had to say.
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I'm Senator Alyssa Slotkin.
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Senator Mark Kelly. Representative Chris d'. Aluzio.
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Congresswoman Maggie Goodlander. Representative Chrissy Houlihan.
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Congressman Jason Crow. I was a captain in the United States Navy, former CIA officer, former Navy, former paratrooper and Army Ranger, former intelligence.
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Officer, former Air Force.
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We want to speak directly to members of the military and the intelligence community who take risks each day to keep Americans safe.
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We know you are under enormous stress and pressure right now. Americans trust their military, but that trust is at risk.
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This administration is pitting our uniform military and intelligence capture community professionals against American citizens like us. You all swore an oath to protect.
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And defend this Constitution.
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Right now, the threats to our Constitution aren't just coming from abroad, but from right here at home, our laws are clear. You can refuse illegal orders.
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You can refuse illegal orders.
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You must refuse illegal orders.
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No one has to carry out orders that violate the law or our Constitution.
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We know this is hard and that it's a difficult time to be a public servant.
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But whether you're serving in the CIA.
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The army, or Navy, the Air Force, your vigilance is critical.
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And know that we have your back. Because now, more than ever, the American people need you. We need you to stand up for.
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Our laws, our Constitution, and who we are as Americans. Don't give up. Don't give up. Don't give up.
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Don't give up the ship.
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This is the message, the direct message from these members of Congress that set Trump off in the following way. Trump posting to Truth Social in response to this message, quote, this is really bad and dangerous to our country. Their words cannot be allowed to stand. Seditious behavior from traitors, Lock them up. And then Trump following that up with another post. Seditious behavior punishable by death. Now, not that the facts really matter to a lot of these people, but the maximum punishment under the actual sedition statute is 20 years. It doesn't actually include death, but who cares? The more important part is that these Democrats are correct. Members of the military are legally required to refuse certain orders. If you look at Article 92 of the UCMJ, the Code of Military justice, and longstanding military law, they must not obey orders that, number one, clearly violate U.S. law or the Constitution. For example, if the President says to the troops, start massacring civilians, or orders summary executions, or orders the military to overturn an election, those are clearly illegal orders. And the Code of Military justice says those orders should not be followed, These lawmakers are correct. Trump is wrong. If the President makes an order that is outside of his or her authority, like commanding state National Guard units without proper federalization, by the way Trump has done it, or ordering the military to violate Posse comitatus Commentatis, they're supposed to say no. If the President orders troops to violate international law, for example, something that violates the Geneva Convention or the War Crimes act or the international law of armed conflict, they are supposed to say no. And one of the things that we now understand is that service members who obey unlawful orders can be criminally liable. Courts for decades, especially after Nuremberg, have said, I was simply following orders is not a defense for war crimes and for certain other crimes. So the Democrats who said, do not follow illegal orders are not being seditious. They are telling us what is the law, and that is the law. Trump hears it and fantasizes about the execution of, of these members of the House and Senate. Forget about. This is a normal political response. This is not a normal human response. And by the way, check out MAGA Mike Johnson's shriveled, flaccid, cowardly response when confronted about this.
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What I read was he was defining the crime of sedition. Okay, I don't. That is, that is a, that is a factual statement. But obviously attorneys have to parse the language and determine all that.
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What I'm saying, what I understand that Mike Johnson is saying, well, lawyers would have to look at whether we could put these lawmakers to death. Trump was just stating what the lies. Of course, Trump was misstating it. But of course, lawmakers saying you must not follow unlawful orders is not seditious.
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We'll say unequivocally, that was a wildly inappropriate thing for so called leaders in Congress to do to encourage young troops to disobey orders. I mean, think of what the threat that is to our national security and what it means to our institutions.
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Now, notice that MAGA Mike is missing a word there. He says, telling our troops to ignore orders, which is not what those Democrats were saying. Those Democrats were saying, you not only should, but are required not to follow unlawful orders. And that is the law. And I suspect that MAGA Mike Johnson.
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Knows that we have got to raise the bar in Congress. This is out of control and is wildly inappropriate. And for a senator like Mark Kelly or any member of Congress in the House or Senate to be engaged in that kind of talk is, is to me just so beyond the pale.
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These people are truly pathetic. The lawmakers were correctly communicating the law. Trump was not. Trump was issuing extrajudicial threats. And the speaker of the House of Representatives doesn't even have the gall and the audacity and the strength to just say, you know, sedition is not punishable by death and troops do have a responsibility not to follow unlawful orders. He can't even do that because he's pathetic. Caroline Levitt is the White House press secretary and she is quickly getting to her final and ultimate humiliation. She is so desperate to suck up to Trump that there is nothing she will not defend. When she was asked, what did the President mean when he called that reporter piggy? Here is how she answered the question.
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What did the President mean when he called reporter piggy? Look, the President is very frank and honest with everyone in this room. You've all seen it yourself. You've all experienced it yourselves. And I think it's one of the many reasons that the American people reelected this president, because of his frankness. And he calls out fake news when he sees it. He gets frustrated with reporters when you lie about him, when you spread fake news about him and his administration. But he also is the most transparent president in history. And he gives all of you in this room, room, as you all know, unprecedented access. You are in the Oval Office almost every day asking the president questions. And so I think the president being frank and open and honest to your faces rather than hiding behind your backs, is frankly, a lot more respectful than what you saw in the last administration.
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Where Trump is respecting reporters by just saying it like it is. The reporter was fat. I guess that's what she means. If, if, I guess what Caroline Levitt means here. If Trump is simply frank and honest and that's a sign of respect, we should respect Trump for simply saying that reporter is fat. That's why he called her piggy. There is nothing, there is nothing that this woman will not defend. Here are some mob tactics where Levitt goes. You know, the South African president was running his mouth a little bit. That is not appreciated by the president. Thank you.
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Two questions for you. The New York Times is reporting that the, that the administration is now sending a US official to the G20. They are sending Mark Dillard. Can you just, can you confirm if that is true and then also explain the shift? And I'd be happy to explain because there is not a shift. The United States is not participating in official talks at the G20 in South Africa. I saw the South African president running his mouth a little bit against the United States and the president of the United States earlier today. And that language is not appreciated by the president or his team. The ambassador or the representative of the embassy in South Africa is simply there to recognize that the United States will be the host of the G20. They are receiving that send off at the end of the, of the event. They are not there to participate in official talks, despite what the South African president is falsely claiming.
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They, they should better be careful. They better be careful running their mouth. Is that language appropriate for the official spokesperson for the President of the United States? We noticed the foreign leader running their mouth a little bit, especially given all the lies that Donald Trump has told about what's going on in South Africa. You know, these are mob tactics. At the end of the day, they, they are disappearing American citizens, bombing people in boats off the coast of Venezuela, making threats. You bet they're running their mouths they better be careful. This is where we are. And it's really an embarrassing, embarrassing moment for the United States. Caroline Levitt sort of repelled an attempt to answer a question about how the Coast Guard is no longer classifying swastikas as hate symbols. She really didn't want to answer this one.
- [39:00]
B
Yes, the Washington Post just reported that the Coast Guard has fallen on Bloomberg. Go ahead.
- [39:07]
A
Thank you.
- [39:08]
B
Two questions.
- [39:08]
A
She did not want the swastika question. And indeed, the Coast Guard is now saying, we are no longer considering a swastika a symbol of hate. I guess if Coast Guard members have swastika tattoos, then it's no longer actionable. It's just cool. And then finally, Caroline Levitt asked about the video in which Democratic lawmakers say, you don't have to follow unlawful orders. And she tries to go, you can't encourage service members not to follow lawful orders. And the reporter clarifies, they're talking about unlawful orders. And Caroline Levitt gives it away. She goes, any order that comes from the president is lawful. This is 2025 version of Nixon's if the president does it, it's not illegal.
- [39:50]
B
They are literally saying to 1.3 million active duty service members not to, to defy the chain of command, not to follow lawful orders, every single refuse an illegal order. But they're suggesting, they're suggesting, Nancy, that the president has given illegal orders, which he has not. Every single order that is given to this United States military by this commander in chief and through this command chain of command through the Secretary of War is lawful. And the courts have proven that this administration has an unparalleled record at the Supreme Court because we are following the laws. We don't defy court orders. We do things by the books. And to suggest and encourage that active duty service members defy the chain of command is a very dangerous thing for citizens.
- [40:37]
A
You know what? It's the law, Caroline. It's just the law. This is how authoritarianism gets laundered. They say every command is legal by default. If it's a command that comes from the president, it is by default legal. And anyone who questions it, we are going to attack. The problem for them is that those Democratic lawmakers are right. The law actually says troops must not follow and must not carry out illegal orders. It's in black and white. Caroline Levitt and Donald Trump's assessment of the law exists only in their heads and in the authoritarian wet dreams of this administration. The law actually reflects what those lawmakers said. Illegal orders must not be followed. And saying I was just following orders is not going to cut it. What an embarrassment. And I don't know how she calls herself a Christian. Donald Trump has already packed his second term cabinet with loyalists. He's threatened deportation as political punishment. He's expanded executive authority in ways we have not seen in modern history. These are real changes that are happening right now. And what's even more alarming is that a lot of the media is either glossing over the worst of it or they're reframing it. So it all sounds a little more palatable. And that is why I use Ground News. This is a news comparison tool. It doesn't just feed you headlines, it shows you, here's how different outlets, left, right, center, are covering the same story. And this is one of the few tools I know of that can really help you detect the political spin, the bias catch stories that your usual sources might downplay or not cover at all on everything from immigration policy to economic shifts. If you want to get a bigger picture, a broader picture of what's being reported, Ground News is an invaluable source of to keep you informed. And Ground News is offering my audience 40% off their top tier vantage plan. You'll only pay five bucks a month. Go to Ground News, slash Pacman or enter the code Pacman in the app to get started. The link is in the description. We have a blockbuster story for you today that even for this administration is outrageous. And we've come to expect a lot of corruption, cronyism and nepotism from this administration. Now the headline alone is the sort of thing you'd think is from like a satire site, but there has been a serious investigation done by ProPublica. It's about Donald Trump, the White House and a globally infamous figure named Andrew Tate, the alleged sex trafficker and self proclaimed misogynist. Now Here is what ProPublica's reporting reveals. When Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan landed in Fort Lauderdale, Florida back in February, they were immediately detained by Customs and Border Protection and all of their electronic devices were seized. Now keep in mind, these were two individuals facing allegations of sex trafficking women in three different countries, including Romania, where they've been indicted. So federal authorities, as a standard in these cases, they were preparing to look at the contents of their devices, totally normal and expected, but they hit a wall. And I know many of you already know where this is going. Behind the scenes, the Trump White House got involved to help him, a White House official instructed senior Department of Homeland Security officials to give him back their devices. They the official who delivered this message was Paul Ingrazia. Paul Ingrazia is a lawyer who, before joining the administration as the DHS liaison, previously represented the Tate brothers. You can probably tell where this is going. A White House lawyer who's a former attorney for Andrew Tate told federal law enforcement, back off, give them their devices, give them the evidence back. And that that directive was coming from the White House itself. Now, according to ProPublica's investigation and interviews and records that have been reviewed in Gracia reportedly criticized authorities for seizing the devices in the first place, saying, why are you doing this? This isn't a good use of time, this isn't a good use of resources. And so the message was very clear. It was really not a request, it was kind of a demand. This is coming from the top. This is Trump getting involved. Now, the reaction from the law enforcement officials was that they were disgusted by the request's brazenness and the high handed expectation that, of course you're going to comply. Another quote, it was so offensive to what we're all here to do, to uphold the law and protect the American people. Law enforcement experts have been asked about this and they said, yeah, that's, that's really unusual, it's irregular, it's odd. A retired assistant director for Homeland Security Investigations, John Tobin, said, I've never heard of anything like that in my 30 years working. He said, it's an intimidation tactic from the White House. So this is not a matter of foreign policy, it's not a matter of national security. This is the White House saying this specific investigation into an accused sex trafficker who just so happens, just, just so happens to be a friend of Trump's, we are getting involved in that, and that alone. It is the politicization of law enforcement to benefit a political ally. So then we get to the cronyism. Andrew Tate has been a very vocal Trump supporter, part of this manosphere, this group of influencers who kind of help, really, in a way help deliver young male voters to the former president. Trump has been called by Tate, or rather Tate has said, trump is the President, the Tates will be free, and Trump is the president. As some kind of sort of like victorious rallying cry. The good old days are back. And so Tate is a fan of Trump's, and all of a sudden the Trump administration gets involved in this case that involves allegations of sex trafficking. Now, we've seen Trump urge the Justice Department before to go after particular foes and certainly to pardon political allies. And now we see the administration trying to interfere with A specific investigation of someone who is, at the end of the day, kind of like a cultural ally of Trump, a political ally as well. Now, if the name Paul Ingracia rings a bell, that's because he previously was nominated by Trump to lead the Office of Special Counsel. That nomination collapsed when there were reports of Ingrassia's racist text messages where he said he has a Nazi streak about himself. He said that about himself. That imploded. So now he got another job. The White House and DHS were asked about this. They declined to answer questions in Gracia, denied the intervention, said nothing happened. That's just a flat denial. Nothing happened. So the bottom line remains, White House official intervenes on behalf of an alleged sex trafficker who's also a high profile political ally with a huge following of Donald Trump's. And it's a very obvious abuse of power. It's a clear violation of government ethics. It's another piece of evidence that this administration sees the DOJ and DHS as bodies of political favor and political retribution, depending on what they want to do. So it's that it's not really about Tate. It's not specifically about him. It could be about anybody. It just so happens to be that this is an administration that is not casually or indifferently horrible. It's proactively disgusting what they are doing. And somehow, somehow 38% of the country still supports it. A very low number as far as presidential approval is concerned, but a very high number. When you say, how could anyone see this and still support it? Corruption, corruption, corruption. This one is corrupt. Even for Donald Trump, this rivals the multibillion dollar crypto grift that Trump is running. It's not entirely unpredictable, but the brazenness of what I'm about to tell you is really something. Donald Trump has declared that he intends to authorize the sale of F35 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia. These are some of the most advanced top tier weapons in the world. The announcement comes just as the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salman, the very man who US Intelligence agencies say directed the horrific murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, arrives in the United States for a White House meeting. And Donald Trump says the following when asked, Are you going to sell them the F35 you're hosting Saudi Arabia?
- [49:50]
B
Are you planning to sell F35 to Saudi Arabia? And also, are you looking at doing a similar security agreement like you did with.
- [49:59]
A
Yeah, no, I am planning on doing that. You're going to buy a great ally. They've got to like US very much. Look at the Iran situation. What we did in terms of obliterating, you know, there. We obliterated their nuclear capability. Yeah. I will say that we will be doing that. Wow. Now, it's difficult to see this and not think about the billions that Saudi Arabia invested in Trump's son in law, Jared Kushner's fund. It's hard not to be thinking about that. But that's not even the only thing that's going on. The Trump Organization, run by Trump's sons, is reportedly in talks for a massive deal to build. You all know where. Do I even have to tell you to build a luxury property in a massive government owned Saudi real estate development? It's like it's all so obvious what's going on. And that is a project that the Crown Prince himself is overseeing. The entire tenure of Trump has been defined by the merger of his business interests with American foreign policy. The Saudi deal is an example. But there's a bigger story here. Remember the Saudi slush fund from Trump's first term? During his first term and even after leaving office, the Trump family and associates have been showered with cash and contracts from the Saudi regime and its derivative affiliates, which sometimes are not even really, you know, they're just like on paper, derivatives. It's really the Saudi sovereign wealth fund. You then have the Khashoggi cover up. Trump famously shielding Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince, from any consequences internationally after the murder of Khashoggi, saying, hey, this is a relationship we prioritize. We want to keep doing arms sales. We don't care about the human rights issues. We just don't care about the killing of the American journalist enough to actually do something about it. And then you've got this history when it comes to Trump and the Saudis of just blending business and diplomacy. The reports of foreign delegations spending millions at Trump's D.C. hotel, which has now closed, I believe the donations to Trump's inaugural fund. Now it's the donations to the stupid ballroom that Trump is building. But the F35 sale really takes corruption to a new level for three reasons. The corruption of, you know, Trump's kids doing a business real estate deal with MBS, again, that's corrupt. But the F35 have a national security implication as well, because Pentagon officials themselves are concerned that if we were to sell the F35 to the Saudis, it could expose the technology of it to China. Given that Saudi Arabia and Beijing are increasingly in cahoots, Trump is overriding that, going, I don't care we're going to sell it to him. Number two, it is impossible to ignore timing. That looks like an explicit quid pro quo. It's not even a hidden quid pro quo. Multibillion dollar arms deal for the Saudi government, followed by huge real estate deal for Trump's family business. Could it be more obvious and corrupt? And then, number three, of course it's Trump just loves autocrats. He loves dictators. He loves authoritarians. We are increasingly distant from Canada. We're increasingly distant from the uk, From France, from Germany. Trump doesn't even talk about Germany anymore. One of our post World War II democratic allies. And all of a sudden, Trump, on top of being enamored with Putin and whoever else, is, as Bernie Sanders said it, rewarding a dictator who had a US Columnist murdered, suggesting that Trump overtly prefers the Saudi model, which is an autocracy run by a trillionaire family, over democracy. Now, if you've been listening to this podcast, you would have seen the groundwork for this being laid years ago. The pay to play pattern, the normalization of complex conflicts of interest. Oh, I'm putting all of my assets into a blind trust. Yeah. One which your kids run and you talk to them about and you still make money from. Oh, wow. What. What an incredibly courageous and honest thing to do. It's all been to enrich his family. Now, what we need to ask now is, is how high a price are you and I going to pay American taxpayers who funded the F35 program through our taxes? Huge boon for defense contractors. And now we're going to sell our most sensitive military technology, which we subsidized over the objection of experts, to a regime with a monstrous human rights record. While Trump's family business is closing a little, little deal for a luxury resort on the side, it is a complete and total security risk. They're disguising it as a business transaction. Why wouldn't we take their money? But it is dangerous and it is corrupt, and it is obvious that it was going to come to this. Let's be honest, when it is hot outside, the way it's been, bad underwear makes it really much worse. Our sponsor, Sheath Underwear, has completely rethought how men's underwear should function in the heat. 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You can always email info@david pakman.com Sometimes we'll feature Spotify comments, YouTube comments, messages that come in on substack, anything's fair game sub Reddit posts. We start today with a Spotify comment, which is unfortunately more common than I like to admit. Joe Biggins said I would rate this show Negative Stars if I could. Well, you know what Joe? You can't. And as I mentioned, there is a concerted campaign to downrate the the podcast on Apple podcasts and on Spotify. I'll be honest, if enough people did that, it would hurt the discoverability of the show. It's just like I I don't think it's working because not enough of these people are doing it. But if they did a concerted effort to downrate my podcast on Apple and Spotify, it would hurt us. The good news is that when I went to my audience with tears in my eyes and said Sirs and ma', ams, there are people trying to hurt the podcast. They hurt me. Would you please go and rate the podcast what you believe it deserves? If it's five stars, great. OK, on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, about 3,000 of you did it and it was a huge help. And it made it so that Joe Bo Biggins his desire to rate the show Negative Stars ended up impotent. Totally impotent. Okay, a poity tread point 1, 2, 3 says David. You start your show telling how you will give subscriptions to help buy food for those in society without but then say again how you aren't a socialist. Surely a contradiction. Only if you have no idea what socialism is. The fact that I have a for profit business and and believe I should be allowed to doesn't mean I think people should go hungry in one of the wealthiest countries on earth. In fact, it is a form of capitalism practiced in Denmark, in Sweden, in Norway, in Finland, in Iceland and other places. It is a form of capitalism that you have private businesses that are allowed to make money, but that they are taxed and that the tax money is used to ensure that people don't have basic needs that are unmet. That's a form of capitalism. It's called social democracy. Some, I was told a couple of weeks ago, call it social capitalism. There is no contradiction. The the my view is completely consistent with I have a for profit company, I pay my taxes and sometimes I will do fundraisers and donate. It's a beautiful thing. That's how it works. Thank you Poi you read from the subreddit Burn down the Forest made a post called if the Dems ended the shutdown in order to release the Epstein emails, then I take back all the negative things I've said. Getting snapback, paying our federal workers and getting to refocus the country on Epstein after a month focused on the GOP ruining health care is well played in my opinion. Yeah, you know last week I said sometimes the facts change and then you change your view. I don't know whether the entire End the shutdown. These eight Democrats vote to end it. Suddenly the Epstein emails drop, Trump's in a panic, snap is back up. I don't know whether that was planned and calculated by Chuck Schumer. I don't have evidence to tell me that it was, but it might have been. And while my take on the shutdown was if Democrats knew they weren't going to be able to get the health care subsidies and they should have known that, why subject people to losing pay, losing food stamps, causing chaos at our airports, etc. In order to then end the shutdown with nothing. Didn't really make sense to me. This individual says imagine if it was all carefully calibrated and orchestrated to do exactly what it is that happened, which is put all of the attention back on Epstein. I don't know. You tell me whether you think that's possible. Also from the subreddit faithless faithlessness abject7 says David is dead wrong about health care economics. This is from a segment last week. He states that you cannot improve quality without raising costs or reducing access. This is a gross oversimplification. He makes no mention of how increased spending in preventative early intervention care massively decreases costs and improves access for chronic condition treatment. Further, the connection between improved access and improved quality is well established through economies of scale, cheaper procurement of medicine and better training. He makes a correct point about administrative costs, but fails to mention how these costs are largely dedicated to the ridiculous regulation that overcomplicates U.S. health care, massive oversimplification, and he makes it sound so black and white. Disappointing. Well, listen, criticize me for things that I actually did, but in that segment, I explain without changing anything structural. You're basically picking a point on a triangle balancing cost, access, and quality. What the left wants to do is do structural changes that will expand the triangle exactly the way that this person writes. I also pointed out Republicans are philosophically against all of those ideas. So I don't know if this person simply wrote this post before seeing the entire segment, but I said exactly the very things that you accused me of not saying. Criticize me for things I've done. Please. That's not. That's my only request. Bad andy 328 writes, the turtlenecks have got to go. I've been watching. I don't know if this is a joke or for real, but I actually think it's for real. I've been watching the show for over a year now, and I have been holding back on saying anything about it. But after seeing David in a turtleneck in his most recent episode, I can't stay quiet any longer. This guy needs some serious help with his fashion choices. Does his wife actually let him walk out of the house in these outfits knowing he's about to show off his whole torso on YouTube for thousands to see every day? Listen, when it came to the ridiculous ads complaining about flimsy tortilla chips, I can just pay for a membership. I no longer have to wonder what kind of madman gets croissants mailed to them versus going to the bakery. And he gets my support for the show. It's a win, win. But seeing my man fight for the people exposing Trump's absurdity while wearing a turtleneck, David, you got to invest some of that bonus show money on a wardrobe stylist. I know it may seem like wasteful spending, but trust me, people will thank you for it. Love the show. Get rid of the turtlenecks. Listen, as I've said before, sometimes I will get fashion advice. Let me see how I can say this politely. I'll get fashion advice from people in the audience and then, like, we'll look them up and see what they look like on Facebook. And these are not people I should be taking fashion advice from. I like the occasional turtleneck. I get complimented on it in the real world. When it gets blustery, the turtleneck is. Is nice. It, you know, makes it so you don't need to wear a scarf necessarily. And as I've said before, the turtlenecks are going to continue until the morale improves, so get ready for it. A jiggity 40 writes, why are the Obamacare premiums going up so much? Were we going to subsidize them forever? I'm with the Democrats trying to prevent people from getting killed by the premiums going up. But why are they going up to the point where we had to shut the government down to try to get the taxpayers to subsidize them? Did Obama create a plan that was destined to be unaffordable? I understood the reason for Covid era help for people, but without that help now the premiums are thousands of dollars. Why is the Affordable Care act system so unaffordable? Folks, subsidizing health care indefinitely is not a radical thing. It's like it's yes, the idea was subsidize it indefinitely. Trump came in and was like, ok, I can't get rid of Obamacare. I'll just try to stop the funding for it, which will make it not function well. But many countries, capitalist countries with a strong social safety net, they subsidize health care indefinitely. Sometimes they subsidize it directly from the government in a single payer system. Sometimes they subsidize subsidize it in a way more similar to Obamacare with premium credits. Yes, that's exactly the idea is subsidize it indefinitely. Is that so crazy? Monte Cristo666 says love show Skip Interviews I've been a daily listener of the David Pakman show for nearly 13 for nearly 10 years. I've been a member for at least five, but I skip his interviews every time. They are boring, lower quality than the rest of the program, and I guess I just think he's not that great of an interviewer. Also, mostly random uninteresting guests. Anyone else in this club? Well, listen, one of the things that has always been the case I get emails from people who go I only like the interviews. That's it. This other stuff I don't care about or I hate the interviews or I only like interviews with lawmakers, or I only like interviews with non lawmakers. If I'm a bad interviewer that I apologize for, that would only be my fault. But the great thing about the show is anyone is free to watch or not watch any specific parts that are interesting to them. And that is all I can offer. Midnight Moonrise wrote on the subreddit that the eight Democratic senator defectors did the right thing because the shutdown had to end and says, I understand Dems got nothing. I understand the subsidy extensions are never going to survive the House, but the shutdown needed to end and right, I'm going to summarize that friends and family were federal employees going without pay. It was getting bleak. Cost of living is all time high. People are facing foreclosure and eviction, essentially just making the point that they didn't cave. They needed to represent their constituents and that means getting government open to save people. And the final paragraph says this seems like a classic sunk cost fallacy where too many progressives online want the shutdown to keep going because the Dems didn't get any concessions yet and we're 40 days in. There is no good option, just the least bad. At the end of the day, more expensive health care is better than millions of people losing everything. Listen, I don't disagree with a lot of the assessment, but the outcome is so predictable that it was known from the start that it would end like this. And so at the start of Friday Feedback today we had this idea. What if this was a brilliant maneuvering meant exactly to dump the Epstein files at the worst possible time? Okay, that's a possibility. But beyond that, the outcome is completely predictable. So my problem isn't Democrats realizing we've got no leverage. It's that they should have known they didn't have it at the beginning. Let me know what you think. Great bonus show today. Sign up@join pacman.com and make sure you're getting my daily newsletter on substack@substack.davidpakman.com Marketing.
- [67:56]
D
Is hard, but I'll tell you a little secret. It doesn't have to be. Let me point something out. You're listening to a podcast right now and it's great. You love the host. You seek it out and download it. You listen to it while driving, working out, cooking, even going to the bathroom. Podcasts are a pretty close companion. And this is a podcast ad. Did I get your attention? You can reach great listeners like yourself with podcast advertising from Libsyn Ads. Choose from hundreds of top podcasts offering host endorsements or run a pre produced ad like this one across thousands of shows. To reach your target audience in their favorite podcasts with Libsyn ads, go to Libsynads.com that's L, I B S Y N ads.com today.