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- [00:01]
David Pakman
Republicans are starting to tell Donald Trump no, at least some of them. Two Republican senators are going to block every single Trump nominee to the Federal Reserve because of his politicized probe into Jerome Powell. Then we're going to talk about maybe one of the most disturbing things you'll see today, which is Trump's top defense official melting down on stage and then announcing that Elon Musk's Grok AI will be inside the Pentagon network. Could this possibly be a good idea? Caroline Levitt resurfaces with maybe her worst and most humiliating public appearance yet, admits far more than she probably intended to, including threats, smears, and chilling rhetoric. We're also going to look at the slurping. If you don't know what this is about, it's disturbing. Make sure you're not eating during that segment. And finally, Democratic lawmakers are finally going to move forward to try to impeach Kristi Noem after disaster after disaster involving the Department of Homeland Security. All of that and so much more. All right. What a show today. Before I forget, if you live in Lisbon, Portugal, either because that's where you're from or you've moved there, including from the United States or from some other place. I've got some stuff coming up in Lisbon. I would love to connect with some of the folks in the audience who are there. So shoot me an email info@david pakman.com that's Lisbon, Portugal. All right, there are some Republicans starting to tell Democratic Donald Trump no, we have two Republican senators who are now going to block Donald Trump's nominees to the Federal Reserve because the Justice Department, as I told you yesterday, launched this criminal investigation targeting the Fed chairman, Jerome Powell. They are calling it exactly what it is, coercion. First up is Thom Tillis, who, by the way, is not running for reelection. So he's in a position where he can do this. Tillis announced he is now going to oppose every single Trump nominee to the Federal Reserve until that DOJ investigation into Jerome Powell is resolved. We then are also hearing, oh, but I should mention, by the way, Tillis is on the Senate Banking Committee. They control whether Fed nominees even get out of the gate. So this is not a symbolic thing. This is a guy with actual power to screw up Trump's plans for remaking the Federal Reserve in his own image or whatever. All right, next, Lisa Murkowski. She said she personally spoke with Jerome Powell and described this DOJ investigation as nothing more than an attempt at coercion. Those are her words. That's a Republican senator. She Said Thom Tillis blockade is something she's going to get behind. She said that they are right to attempt to freeze every Fed nomination until this is resolved. So what is it that is going on here? As I told you yesterday, Donald Trump's Justice Department is investigating the sitting Fed Reserve Chair. The guy who's responsible for interest rates, in addition to working in concert with the other Fed governors and Republican senators are acknowledging what I said yesterday, which, which is this is Trump trying to intimidate the Fed. This is Trump saying, I didn't get the interest rates I wanted, so now I'm going to try to make your life a living hell. Of course, the Fed is supposed to be independent. The Fed is not supposed to be swayed by the personal wishes and desires and wet dreams of the President of the United States. Now, where it gets interesting is that the Banking Committee, chaired by Thom Tillis, has 13 Republicans and 11 Democrats. If Tillis holds his ground and Democrats vote no, Trump's picks will hit a 12 to 12 deadlock. If it's party lines plus Tillis's vote going with the Democrats, that doesn't automatically kill the nominations, but it would make the process extremely difficult and also politically explosive, where you could end up with Republicans saying, listen, we need Tillis's vote and we're not going to have Tillis's vote if and until the DOJ probe is resolved. So you could end up with the other 12 Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee going to the President and saying, you got to order this investigation to be stopped or ended. Now, according to policy analysts, getting around the deadlock, if they don't simply go to Trump and say end the probe would require some procedural gymnastics, including maybe blowing past the filibuster. So it doesn't appear that without Thom Tillis vote in the Senate Banking Committee, Trump can steamroll this. And Murkowski has a track record here. She voted with Democrats against one of Trump's nominees last year. And so this is not just talk. There are even right wing policy groups and media outlets saying what the DOJ is doing is counterproductive because in the end, it may prevent Donald Trump from getting any of his Fed nominees sworn in. Which is a polite way of saying this is completely backfired. Trump doesn't know what he's doing. Trump wants leverage over the Fed, but he's doing something that is going to take that leverage away. He has united Democrats against his nominees and he is causing some Republicans to peel off. And so this is not a left wing led rebellion. This is Republicans now creating a real problem for Donald Trump. The resistance is coming from his own party. And these are the sorts of cracks that can lead to things breaking. Now, as I told you yesterday, Jerome Powell does not seem to be backing down since I reported on this. On yesterday's show, we learned that Jerome Powell has hired an extremely aggressive law firm whose name escapes me right now. And I should have looked it up. In fact, let me see if I can find it. Jerome Powell hires law firm. What is the law firm he has hired? Williams and call it Connolly. And that is an extremely aggressive firm that knows how to deal with exactly these sorts of investigations. You don't hire them if your plan is to roll over is the point that I am inarticulately trying to make here. So we are going to see how this develops. And then again, I this is so important to remind people of every single time you don't typically see the dumping of interest rates, the decline in interest rates that Trump is demanding if the economy is good. Trump is simultaneously telling us this is a phenomenal economy. Everything is humming along beautifully. But I want the Fed to cut interest rates in the way that they typically only do during massive economic calamities. So they can't both be true. Unless, I guess you were Donald Trump. Powell does not appear to be backing down. Top Trump tool Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense reunited in a beautiful love affair with Elon Musk and denounced, if you can believe this, that GROK AI, the Existence Artificial Intelligence LLM, is going to be allowed inside the Pentagon. Does this sound like a good idea to anybody? Forget about accuracy. Forget about the politics of it. Do we want Elon's AI run by, you know, random 20 year olds that he's put in charge of it inside the sensitive network of the Pentagon? We will get to that in a moment. Here is Pete Hegseth still going with this whole no fat people, no dudes in dresses. We are really revising how the Pentagon is going to work.
- [08:16]
Pete Hegseth
First is we're reviving the warrior ethos. We want to get rid of the distractions and the debris. No more dei, no more dudes in dress. No more climate change worship and social justice and political correctness. We're done with that. We're unleashing the war fighter to be ready, trained, disciplined, accountable and lethal. When you allow them to do that, they're incredibly good at their job, as the world has seen. And as a indicted criminal in Venezuela found out about a week ago.
- [08:58]
David Pakman
Yeah, you know, I would never use phrases like this because it's just. It's just not me. But I got about a dozen emails from people in the audience characterizing this video the exact same way, which is that Hegseth is a little bitch. Now, I would never say that. I think that those terms are unproductive. It's unbecoming of a program like this. But I'm just mentioning to you, many in the audience wrote to me and said that now I want to do a little. This is not a thought experiment. This is a practical question. Think very carefully here. Does this approach. We are going to get rid of our dudes and dresses and no more DEI and all of this stuff. If you are living in Milwaukee or Des Moines or Oklahoma City or, or Fort Lauderdale and you are struggling to feed your family, struggling to make rent, struggling to afford replacing a flat tire on your car, and you hear that Trump has proposed increasing the military budget from 960 billion to 1.5 trillion. And the guy in charge of a lot of this is Pete Hegseth, who goes, we're going to get dudes in dresses out of the military. Do you hear that? They are working for you. Does it sound like your stress about not being able to replace that spare tire or having to choose between paying your now doubled health care premiums and food is a choice that now is not going to be one because Trump is going to fix it for you. Does it sound like they are bringing solutions to those problems when you hear this? I think the answer is very obviously no. Pete Hegseth indicating that there haven't been a lot of boats sunk lately because they can't find any boats to sink. They got them all, I guess is the implication waters.
- [10:54]
Pete Hegseth
We will target your drug boats and we will sink them. There haven't been many boats sunk recently because we can't find boats to sink because no one wants to get in an ARCO boat, which is the whole point. Stop sending your drugs to our country and poisoning the American people.
- [11:20]
David Pakman
And it's not just you. His delivery and his whole demeanor on stage is very, very strange. Now then we get to the really big, toxic, disgusting, horrifying announcement that has been made, which is that Elon Musk is now once again being greeted as a hero after a little period of time during which things were a little rough between the Trump administration and Elon Musk and Pete Hegseth announces the AI chat bot grok, controlled by the former Twitter, now X will be joining the AI engine operating inside the US Pentagon. This seems like a very, very bad Idea. Thank you.
- [12:11]
Interviewer or Reporter
Thank you very much.
- [12:12]
Pete Hegseth
Today we're excited to announce the next frontier AI model company to join Genai. And that is GROK from xai, which will go live later this month. Very soon we will have the world's leading AI models on every unclassified and classified network what? Throughout our department. Long overdue. And we will not employ AI models that won't allow you to fight wars. We will judge AI models on this standard alone. Factually accurate, mission relevant, without ideological constraints that limit lawful military applications. Department of War AI will not be woke. It will work for us.
- [12:57]
David Pakman
It will not generate images of dudes in dresses.
- [13:00]
Pete Hegseth
We're building war ready weapons and systems, not chat bots for an Ivy League faculty lounge.
- [13:06]
David Pakman
Yeah. One of the things GROK does and does regularly is it will make non consensual artificial intelligence created nude and sexually explicit images of people in the public eye. That is exactly what we need. Inside the Pentagon, this seems like a disastrous idea. They did give Elon Musk a chance to see speak and he said, we want to make Starfleet Academy real. We want to make Star Trek real. And the always articulate and dynamic Elon Musk bringing his gravitas to this.
- [13:40]
Elon Musk
And I'll tell you a little bit just about the purpose of Space X. Like we want to make Star Trek real.
- [13:52]
David Pakman
Okay?
- [13:53]
Elon Musk
We want to make Starfleet Academy real so that it's not always science fiction, but one day the science fiction turns to science fact. And we have spaceships going through space, big spaceships with people going to other planets, going to the moon, and ultimately going beyond our star system to other star systems where we may meet aliens or discover long dead alien civilizations.
- [14:29]
David Pakman
I don't know.
- [14:30]
Elon Musk
But we want to go and we want to see what's happening. And we want to have epic futuristic spaceships with lots of people in them traveling to places we've never been to before.
- [14:44]
David Pakman
It's really, it's really, really cool. Now listen, I'm the first to say I think space exploration is a valuable use of money and resources and we learn so much about ourselves and develop technologies. And I'm all for it. It's the combination of Elon being so involved in both the administration and also in the technology that is being allowed in. And meanwhile, as people are struggling, he was meant to find the waste, fraud and abuse and get rid of it. Turns out they couldn't really find it. Still not a single person charged with any of the fraud that supposedly took place. And then he is being given the hero's welcome to Talk About Making Starfleet Academy Real. So my skepticism is not about the worthiness of space exploration. My skepticism is about putting Elon Musk in charge of any of this stuff. We're going to take a break. After the break, Caroline Levitt has resurfaced. It's not so good, I'll tell you that. One challenge in covering politics today is that even when outlets are reporting the same facts, they often are framing the stories really differently. And our sponsor, Ground News, is a website and app that makes those differences easy to see. What Ground News does is gather coverage of the same story from across the political spectrum and shows you where the reporting is coming from. You can see which outlets lean left, right or center, and you can also see how reliable they are and who owns them. What I find most useful is the side by side headline comparison. You're looking at the same underlying facts, but it's clear how different outlets will emphasize one angle or a narrative or another. Ground News gives you a transparent way to understand bias without being told what to think think. They also offer a blind spot feed which will highlight stories underreported by one side of the political spectrum and that helps surface items that I might otherwise otherwise miss or not even hear about. You can also personalize your feed by interest and that makes it easier to follow issues you personally care about. Go to Ground News slash pacman to get 40% off the ground News Vantage plan and you can also gift a subscription to a friend. The link is in the description the David Pakman show continues to be made possible primarily by our audience through the membership program. We do an extra show for our members. We provide commercial free audio and video feeds of the show and I want to say a big thank you to our two newest members, Charles Roberson and Greg Norris. Appreciate both of you. Invite you to sign up@join pacman.com and a week from today Next Tuesday we will be doing a one day membership drive 365 days into Donald Trump's first year of his second term. It'll be the biggest discount of the year. If you want to partake, just get on my newsletter. Two ways to do it email info@david pakman.com and say hey David, get me on that newsletter. Or you can sign yourself up@substack.david pakman.com Caroline Levitt resurfaced Donald Trump's White House press secretary. She appeared on Fox News and then she spoke directly to reporters in what is called a scrum. When she appeared on Fox News, she said Maybe one of the most disgusting and dishonest things she has ever said. And that takes a lot because she lies every single time she speaks to the media. She referred to the deceased, 37 year old Renee Goode, killed by the ICE officer as a deranged lunatic and says there's lots of evidence that she struck the ICE officer with her vehicle. That is not what any of the video suggests. But let's listen to what she had.
- [18:35]
Caroline Levitt
To say about this case from the very beginning. And they have had to change their story and their narrative because at first you heard Democrats, including the mayor of Minneapolis, saying that the car never struck the officer and the lethal force was unjustified. Now, of course, there is plentiful video evidence to show that the officer was struck by the car, that this deranged lunatic woman was trying to ram him over with her vehicle and was using that vehicle as a weapon, which justifies domestic terrorism. And unfortunately, we are seeing these instances play out in American communities across the country where you have these organized paid antagonists who are part of these groups that are actively unlawfully justify impeding lawful law enforcement operations. They are harassing and targeting ICE agents, trying to make it impossible again for them to carry out their duties. That's what was happening in this case. That officer used his training. I understand that he's been on the force and he's been protecting American communities for many, many years. He's an experienced and brave individual who unfortunately had to make a very tough decision and was put in that position by these paid agitators who have been doing this all over the country.
- [19:51]
David Pakman
Carol, of course, no evidence that any of that took place. And when she says there is plentiful video evidence that Renee Goode struck the officer with her car, does she mean there is no evidence whatsoever? And this is the problem. When you get into this web of lies. When you jump the gun and you get out ahead of your skis and you call the officer a hero and Renee Goode a domestic terrorist and all this stuff, you can't back off of it. They end up in a situation where they cannot constitutionally, and I don't mean like capital C, like the Constitution, in terms of their makeup, what makes them them? They are unable to just come out and say, we got out ahead of the facts a little bit and it turns out that it's different. They can't do it, they won't do it. We now have. Okay, I have a lot of these clips here to go through. She was then asked about whether Donald Trump believes The actions of the ICE officer were justified. And she says, of course his actions were justified. Of course they were.
- [20:54]
Interviewer or Reporter
In terms of what happened last Wednesday and the officer who was involved in the shooting, does the president stand fully behind that officer, that agent? Does the president believe his actions were justified?
- [21:05]
Caroline Levitt
Absolutely. And I think the more evidence that comes out shows the officer was justified. And President Trump was right about this all along. And who was wrong? The Democrat Party and the mainstream media, who despicably have been lying about this officer and about this case from the very beginning. And they have had to change their story and their narrative because at first you heard Democrats, including the mayor of Minneapolis, saying that the car never struck the officer and the lethal force was unjustified. Now, of course, there is plentiful video evidence to show that the officer was struck by the car.
- [21:41]
David Pakman
All right, so now we get into the part that we looked at before. Listen, I, I don't expect. Let me put it this way. I don't expect a fulsome and complete robust investigation of the incident because federal authorities are already blocking state authorities from carrying that out. And I don't expect that we will ever hear this administration simply say, hey, we were wrong about this. If. And this is a huge if, and at this point, not a particularly, not a particularly likely one, if indeed we see some authority decide we are going to charge the ICE officer and if the evidence is not so good in terms of the ICE officer's actions, in other words, if this starts to go south for the perspective of the administration, I assume that they will do what they never actually do, which is to back away and go, listen, we're not putting our thumb on the scale one way or the other. They're going to just kind of back off and they will never say we were wrong about it. Now remember, if there were to be charges and they are federal, Trump can just pardon the guy. And so that's another sort of framework that's important to keep in mind with regard to if. With the importance of this being a state investigation. I'm with Tim Walls, the governor of Minnesota, who said he doesn't believe there is going to be a complete investigation because that is being blocked right now by federal authorities. I think he is completely right. Finally, Caroline Levitt asked, does this is now switching gears during this Fox interview. This is about the investigation of Jerome Powell. Does the president believe in the independence of the Federal Reserve? And listen very carefully to Caroline Levitt's answer.
- [23:30]
Interviewer or Reporter
Final question on the independence of the Fed. There are some concerned at this Moment. Based on the new actions by the Fed heads to open a probe into the Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, President Trump has made it very clear how he feels about the Federal Reserve chair and his actions while chairing the Fed. Can you assure independence of the Federal Reserve? And where will this be going next, this probe?
- [23:56]
Caroline Levitt
Well, look, as for the criminal probe, you'll have to ask the Department of Justice about that. They are in charge. I do know one thing is for sure, Jerome podcast Powell has proven he's not very good at his job.
- [24:06]
David Pakman
And of course not being good at your job is not a crime and it would not justify a completely partizan investigation of Jerome Powell. But this is Trump world that we are living in. Caroline Levitt may be the most dishonest press secretary, but also arguably effective because she has no scruples or limits to the lies that she is willing to tell. It was a little different when she was in a scrum with reporters. Let's talk about that. Caroline Levitt went out there and participated in a scrum with reporters outside of the White House. And she says that this is an administration that is steadfastly, wholeheartedly and in a committed way standing behind the. The American people. No, the officers of ice, that is. That's who needs the support of this administration the most right now, according to Caroline.
- [25:06]
Caroline Levitt
Homeland security. But our national security and this administration will continue to stand wholeheartedly by the brave men and women of ice, including that officer in Minneapolis who was absolutely justified in using self defense against a lunatic who was part of a group, an organized group to interject and to impede on law enforcement operations.
- [25:27]
David Pakman
And yeah, how about standing behind the American people? How about declaring that opinions and speech are not valid reasons to be roughed up, pepper balled, sprayed and even killed by federal officers. Wouldn't that maybe be the more appropriate and courageous position to take? Caroline Levitt was asked about Kristi Noem who is about to get impeached, the Secretary of Homeland Security. And not surprisingly, Caroline Levitt goes she is doing such a great job.
- [26:01]
Pete Hegseth
Secretary Kristi Noem has been front and.
- [26:04]
David Pakman
Center in response to this video.
- [26:06]
Pete Hegseth
Is the President satisfied with her efforts there?
- [26:10]
David Pakman
By the way, the context is that there are a lot of reports that Trump is about to fire and all.
- [26:15]
Caroline Levitt
Of her media interviews, yes, 100%. President Trump and I actually spoke about this last night and how Secretary Noem is doing a phenomenal job, not just securing the border, which she and the President did together in record time, but also in defense of the brave men and Women of ICE who put on a law enforcement uniform every single day to protect our communities and to protect all of you and every American, regardless if they are Democrat or Republican. ICE is due doing a very important job to remove illegal alien criminals from our communities. And I think it's very striking that all weekend long you had agitators and violent American citizens out in the streets of Minneapolis protesting. Protesting what exactly? Apparently they are protesting the removal of heinous murderers and rapists and criminals from a city. That I can guarantee you when you look at the list of the illegal criminals that ICE is removing from our communities every day, not.
- [27:14]
David Pakman
You know, I have still not heard from a single leftist who says individuals who have been credibly accused or have committed crimes, not just being here illegally, which is of course a civil and infraction. I have not heard anybody on the left in my circles, which I admit include a lot of the common sense leftists. I've not heard anybody die on the Hill of those folks should simply be allowed to stay in the United States. What people are protesting and what we are activating against are the number one potentially unconstitutional methods that are being applied here, the door to door stuff and all of these other things. And also the fact that we were told one thing by this administration at the start of this entire process and they are just going, they're going to Home Depots and just wrapping up workers, people just looking to work and earn a day's, a day's wage. They are not doing what even they said they were going to do. And yes, it does seem that there are constitutional and legal violations here of all sorts as well. Now, in terms of Trump having full confidence in Kristi Noem, well, we will see. It seems that she is about to get impeached. And also there are rumors that Donald Trump is about to fire her. Caroline Levitt asked about the Democratic response and she said the following about who really wants to protect pedophiles. Now, I just want to remind you they still have not released the full Epstein file.
- [28:40]
Caroline Levitt
The left. And I think that it just shows you where the modern day Democrat Party stands today in protecting illegal alien pedophiles and rapists and murderers over law abiding American citizens and our brave men and women who serve in law enforcement.
- [28:57]
David Pakman
All right. And then she dumps a thinly veiled three threat here, a very thinly veiled threat with regard to Greenland and says, you know, it's in Greenland's interests to be part of the United States. Nice little country, you've got Here would really be a shame if something were to happen to it.
- [29:17]
Caroline Levitt
Does the president have a date? No, he has not set a timeline, but it's definitely a priority.
- [29:26]
David Pakman
She.
- [29:26]
Caroline Levitt
She's asking about Greenland. And I think the president was very clear last night. He said that he wants to see the United States acquire Greenland because he feels that if we do not, then it will eventually be acquired or even perhaps hostilely taken over by either China or Russia.
- [29:41]
David Pakman
Someone else is going to steal it, so we're going to steal it ourselves.
- [29:44]
Caroline Levitt
First is not a good thing for the United States or for Europe or for Greenland as well. Let's not forget, it would not just be in the best interest of the United States States, but perhaps it would be in the best interest of Greenland as well to be parted part of the United States.
- [29:58]
David Pakman
Greenland doesn't even know it, but they would be much better off as part of the United States. Finally, Levitt says that airstrikes on Iran are on the table. More bombs from the antiwar president. The rightful winner of the FIFA Peace.
- [30:13]
Caroline Levitt
Prize strikes off the table in Iran. And does he believe there's a potential path to end the protest there without military, military action? Well, I think one thing President Trump is very good at is always keeping all of his options on the table. And airstrikes would be one of the many, many options that are on the table for the commander in Chief. Diplomacy is always the first option for the president. He told all of you last night that what you're hearing publicly from the Iranian regime is quite different from the messages the administration is receiving privately. And I think the president has an interest in exploring the those messages. However, with that said, the president has shown he's unafraid to use military options if and when he deems necessary. And nobody knows that better than Iraq.
- [30:54]
David Pakman
And of course, the peace president seems to be deeming it necessary a lot of the time. Caroline Levitt, she really just can't help herself anymore. Donald Trump has been known for sniffing when he speaks for a long time, but now he's slurping. Donald Trump has a new symptom, and it's raising a lot of red flags. Now, let me explain. For a long time, people have noticed that Donald Trump sniffs strangely when speaking. We even made a compilation of this from one of Donald Trump's recent speeches. Remember this?
- [31:25]
Interviewer or Reporter
Good evening, America.
- [31:38]
David Pakman
All right. And I apologize if people are eating. That is very, very disgusting stuff. So Trump has been known for that sniffing noise for a very long time. He is now doing something new. Trump is slurping instead of sniffing. Now, you hear it at the start of this video. Take a listen. That. And there are a lot of examples of this. We go, for example, to Trump's recent interview with Sean Hannity. Take a listen to this. This is, this is. And again, I. This is disgusting stuff to our country.
- [32:08]
Interviewer or Reporter
Nobody did anything about it.
- [32:10]
David Pakman
You hear that? And we have another one.
- [32:13]
Interviewer or Reporter
But the cartels are running and they're killing 250, 300,000 people.
- [32:18]
David Pakman
There you go. We've got another one.
- [32:19]
Interviewer or Reporter
To live in their home every day. People are knocking on their door every hour. And it's, it's just a great honor to be involved with it. The ICE and Border Patrol and all of the people have been so good. Tom Holmes and Kristi Noem, you hear it. Trillions of dollars. But we're going to be there till we.
- [32:39]
David Pakman
Another slurp there. And one more for you. All right, so what is this about? A lot of you have written to me about this. There are two hypotheses here. Okay? The first is this is a breathing issue. Before, Trump struggled to breathe, but he still could through his nose, but it was loud. Now, as maybe he has diminishing strength for these breaths through the nose, he's taking these extra breaths through his mouth, and if there's any saliva in there, it makes noise. And it could be that. But there's another aspect to this that a lot of medical professionals have started to weigh in on. The thought is that what is taking place is that Donald Trump is losing his passive swallow reflex. This is a natural reflex. Most of us aren't controlling when we blink. Now that I mentioned it, I'm thinking very much about my blinking, but normally we aren't thinking about that. We normally don't even control, like, when we are breathing. And now that I'm saying it, I realize that between phrases, I will sometimes take a breath, as I did right there. But it's normally something that just happens naturally. Similarly, the swallow reflex, that passive swallow reflex while you're sleeping, while you are just hanging out, you don't even notice. Now, I noticed I just swallowed because I mentioned it and I'm paying attention to it. But the point here is, if you start to lose that reflex, saliva starts to build up in your mouth. You've got to either swallow it or suck it back in. If you are in the middle of a speech or being interviewed, maybe as you start to think about it, it becomes hard to swallow, so you suck in when you would normally just be breathing. Now, you could say all right, so he's sucking saliva. I don't get what's that. What's the reason that this is notable? The reason it's notable is again, as we have a total lack of transparency about what's going on with Donald Trump's possible cognitive decline, neurological conditions, etc. That loss or diminishing of the passive swallow reflex is associated with a whole bunch of of neurological conditions, including many that are progressive diseases that get worse over time. The sniffing has become slurping and you can find now there's on social media copious medical professionals who are explaining exactly what Trump is doing with the slurping there. Man, that is a, I apologize, that is a disgusting sound there. What, what he is doing with that and the relevance, given the concerns about Trump with regard to cognitive decline, Alzheimer's, dementia and other conditions, whether he has had a stroke. So this is, again, we are left to speculate because there is a complete and total lack of transparency. If they were just honest about what was going. They spent two months describing an MRI to us that Trump never got because he had a CAT scan. Think of that for a moment. Slurping Trump. What do you make of it? Leave a comment, let me know. Info@david pakman.com Scams and identity theft rarely start with a hacked password. They usually start when your personal information is easy to find online. Your address, phone number, relatives, employment history. That information lives on countless data broker sites on the Internet, accessible to almost anyone unless you actively remove it. Our sponsor, Incogni, is a service that handles that for you. Incogni doesn't just focus on one category of sites. It works to take down your personal data wherever it appears online, reducing the raw material scammers used to impersonate you or target your family. Incogni will automatically handle removals across hundreds of known sites. But the most powerful feature is custom removals, which is included with the unlimited plan. If you find your info anywhere, even in obscure gear, directory, a business database, something new, you paste the link into Incogni, their team will work to get it removed. That level of coverage really matters. Even a single exposed profile can lead to fraud, harassment, identity theft. Incogni removal process is independently verified by Deloitte and you can get 60% off when you go to incogni.com/pacman and use the code PACMAN. Today we welcome to the program for the first time. Governor Janet Mills, Governor of Maine, also now running in the Democratic primary to represent the state in the U.S. senate. Governor, really appreciate your time today. Thanks for being here.
- [37:17]
Janet Mills
Thank you.
- [37:18]
David Pakman
David, I want to first talk a little bit about this viral moment you had when you went to this governor's meeting at the White House and you got into an exchange with President Trump, which sort of ended as far as we saw on camera with Trump saying that he's going to see you in court. Can you talk to us a little bit about the aftermath of that? And if, when, you know, I'm curious about when these things happen. Is there any follow up? Are there? Do you ever hear again from the President of the United States?
- [37:49]
Janet Mills
Oh, well, gosh, yeah. He tweeted, blasted me all over social media and insisting that I bend to his will. There was some nastier language than that, but oh, yeah, he came up one morning when he was in a foul mood and blasted me again. And I thought I just ignored it because I don't get engaged with the President. United States, United States. On tweet and social media. What, you know, don't. My mother always said, don't get into a pissing match with a skunk. Right. So didn't. But, you know, that exchange was really strange. It was jaw dropping for me because when the President of the United States, no matter what the issue is, when he says to you, I, we are the federal law, you go, no, no. I mean, I'm, I'm an American citizen and I'm a lawyer and I read the Constitution. You are not the law. The Constitution says that you have to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, not invented, created, or amended by tweet or executive order or press release. You're not the law. So it was jaw dropping to me. And when I said, well, he said, are you going to follow my executive order? I said, I'm going to comply with state and federal law. When he said, I am the law, I said what any American citizen would say. I'll see you in court. And so a little while after that, he told his Department of Agriculture to stop funding main schools, which meant 176, 170,000 school kids would go without the school lunch program. I thought, well, that doesn't make any sense. So we went to court and a Republican appointed judge, a federal judge appointed by a Republican president, gave us a ruling that said, no, you can't do that. You can't just stop funding school lunch programs because you disagree with state policy on transgender athletes. Didn't make any sense. So we took them to court and we won.
- [39:43]
David Pakman
What a, what a situation. I mean, it does seem as though this is an administration that sees federal funding as like a personal compliance tool where it's just a tool to be wielded based on personal grievances and preferences. At the end of the day, do you think that there needs to be some kind of formal check on the ability of the President to do that? Put, put in place? Because it seems extraordinarily dangerous.
- [40:08]
Janet Mills
It is dangerous and we're seeing that every day. Unchecked weaponization of the Department of Justice and the FBI and the courts not standing up to him and the US Senate not standing up to him. And that was, that's what bothers me most right now, that the Senate and the Congress have given up their authority. They're ceding to him the authority to the will to issue taxes and tariffs and whipsaw the economy, which is dangerous to everybody. It's, it's hurting our people, hurting our economy. The authority to just undermine health care. Undercut, undercut women's rights to reproductive health care, those kinds of things. And then to just sort of take a military action in another country in Venezuela and take out the leader and, and not explain why you're there, why you're there and what your plan is to, to run another country. That's insane. And I've called upon Susan Collins to hold hearings. You know, she's the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, the all powerful Senate Appropriations Committee. So hold hearings, find out what the game plan is. Find out how they plan to run another country. Even the oil company said we don't. We're not going to invest there. It's too risky. So what's the plan? You know, taking these dramatic and risky actions without consulting Congress, as he should have, without consulting the American people about a dangerous action and sending ICE agents into American cities and harming people in these cities, giving them quotas to make arrests, handing them a dark outfit and a gun and a mask and setting them loose on the American people. Getting is unchecked power in the Congress has to stand up to this.
- [41:59]
David Pakman
I want to now talk about the Senate as you brought it up. You are in the middle of this Democratic Senate primary. There's some interesting data in the polling, including that there's a pretty significant generational divide between you and your, your sort of chief primary opponent, Graham Platner. We've invited your opponent on the program. He has not yet accepted as of this moment, but of course we're glad to hear from him as well. I'm curious on some of the policies that he proposes. A twenty five dollar minimum wage as an example or canceling all student debt. What is your. What do you think about some of these ideas? Maybe those two specifically.
- [42:34]
Janet Mills
Well, listen, I think actions speak louder than words. I've been in a position to write legislation, to negotiate legislation, get stuff done. It's fancy words that matter. It's deeds, it's results, getting results. And so, you know, in the area of minimum wage, for instance, I've been there and drafted minimum wage legislation for farm workers, for instance, and been there on prevailing wage legislation for working people giving them prevailing wages on construction, publicly funded construction jobs and things like that. I've had to make decisions. And when you're in public office, you do have to make decisions, and not just utter platitudes or talk policy in the general sense without backing it up with action. So I think, you know, regardless of age, you look at what somebody's done, what have they accomplished? How have their acts portrayed their deeds, portrayed their philosophy and their positions? And I think my act as governor, for instance, delivering progress for many people on healthcare on day one, I expanded Medicaid health care to 100,000 people. I expanded school lunch programs, free school lunch to all public school kids. We created free community college for all recent high school grads. Very popular with younger people. I've invested hundreds of millions of dollars in housing. Look, I have grandsons who are in their early 20s and getting married or planning to get married, start a family. Good jobs they have, but they can't afford a house in Maine. And so I want to help that generation, too. Child care. We've, we've created another 6,000 plus child care slots in Maine through my actions. And we, we keep moving along that line, making.
- [44:25]
David Pakman
But, Governor, I apologize on those two things I mentioned. Is it that I'm trying to read between the lines. Is it that you don't support a $25 minimum wage or that you think it's an unrealistic thing to promise?
- [44:36]
Janet Mills
Look, I think it's worthy of debate. And I plan to go to the Senate to talk about what the minimum wage should be. It darn well shouldn't be 725. That's insane. And many states still go by the federal minimum wage, including, I think, New Hampshire. That's insane. Our minimum wage today is like $15.10. It just went up. We have a graduated minimum wage increase. And maybe that should be on the federal level, too. Maybe it should be geared to the CPI or something. You know, geared to a, an objective criteria so you don't have to go back to Congress every few years, 20 years, for crying out loud and say, what is, what should it be today? What is the price of living? But we also have to bring prices down. I truly think that affordability is not just a talking point in a campaign. It's a moral imperative that includes the cost of health care, the cost of car repairs, the cost of groceries. And this president has done nothing but damage the economy and bring up the price of goods. When he campaigned over a little over a year ago saying he was going to bring down prices and not have any foreign, foreign wars or foreign military actions, well, that's B.S. as we know now. So I'm going to fight in the US Senate to bring down prices, bring down the cost of health care and get rid of those crazy whipsawing tariffs that, you know, uncontrollable tariffs that are affecting the cost of housing when it comes to housing.
- [46:00]
David Pakman
I've looked at your housing grant, which would be basically $15,000 to first time buyers. Your primary opponent, Platner, wants to ban corporate landlords entirely. I'm curious as to what you think about that and a market based solution. And just as a little bit of context for this, couple months ago we had the governor of Colorado on the show and I asked him about the fact that I forget the exact percentage, but there's a surprisingly high percentage of apartment rental units in Colorado that are owned by private equity. And he really didn't want to criticize that in any way. He just kind of said, you know, there's different landlords of all kinds. And my audience, which I think is a fair representation of where the Democratic primary vote is right now, was really repelled by that answer from, from Governor Polis. And so I'm interested in hearing from you, especially since you're in a Democratic primary for the time being. The fifteen thousand dollar grant is really a market based solution, which is okay if that's what one supports. And banning corporate landlords is like a systemic solution about who can own property. How did you, where are you on this issue, I guess?
- [47:09]
Janet Mills
Well, I haven't heard his specific proposal on banning corporate landlords.
- [47:13]
David Pakman
Okay.
- [47:13]
Janet Mills
New to me. And nor has he ever presented that to the legislature. And I've worked with the main legislature members of both parties for years now to create solutions to the housing problem. One interesting thing we've done, for instance, was to put money towards mobile home parks, which is one eighth of our housing in Maine, mobile home parks. And the people who live in them, many of them have lived there for decades and decades. And when these corporate Interests come in from out of state and want to buy up a mobile home park and turn it into condoized housing units or something different. I've been there to protect the people in those mobile home parks and help them buy their own park with some ingenuity, with some creative financing and with some state money. We've done that three times. So that's the kind of creative thinking I do. Working with the legislature to solve or address the housing problem. It's not just landlord tenant, it's keeping the big equity firms out of our mobile home parks too and turning our properties into, you know, mini malls and fancy condos for rich people.
- [48:26]
David Pakman
So would you be up for keeping them out with legislation? No.
- [48:31]
Janet Mills
Another thing we've done is to encourage first homebuyers and this is a key need for young people in Maine. So we up the tax on the real estate transfers because so many people coming to me and buying houses for over a million dollars. So we increase the tax on those sales of over a million dollars and put that into a home fund that helps renters get out of renting an apartment and, and get to buy their own home. And that's the kind of creative progress we've been making in Maine.
- [49:01]
David Pakman
So more market based solutions that are positioning people to be able to make these choices on their own. It sounds like.
- [49:09]
Janet Mills
Sure. And we put money towards encouraging lower interest rates from mortgage mortgages and obviously we put money into shelters and temporary housing as well and encouraging businesses in Maine to provide interim housing and transitional housing with some state funding as well. There's a, it's a multifaceted problem. You can't just address it by saying we're going to get rid of or something. But it's a lot of, lot of avenues to address this. We have some great people working on housing in Maine.
- [49:43]
David Pakman
Governor, you've pledged, if elected to the Senate that you would serve only, only one term. Talk to me about that decision.
- [49:49]
Janet Mills
Sure. Then going back on corporations, obviously I'm not taking corporate PACs. So there aren't any corporate landlords or something that are supporting my campaign. Not taking any corporate packs the age, you know, I know how old I am and the people that may know how old I am and they know my background, they know what I can get done, they know I will get done things on day one in the U.S. senate. That's important to remember. And that's why I said I, I'm not going, I'm not going into this thinking I got to have a career ladder to climb or build A resume, been there, done that. Okay. I just want to get stuff done for the main people. That's why I'm running for one term or one term only because I'm not going to be down there on day two picking up the phone and dialing for dollars. Okay. I don't want to be down there running for re election six years from now when I'm Bernie Sanders age, frankly. I just want to be there and start making progress immediately. And I've got the background and the commitment and courage to do that. And that's why I'm running for one term only. We have a younger bench coming up. We have some great people who are in the legislature, who are leaders in the legislature, who are running for governor and other things and looking forward to their progress as well and, and helping mentor them too.
- [51:08]
David Pakman
We've been speaking with Maine Governor Janet Mills, currently running in the Democratic primary to represent the state in the Senate. Governor, I really appreciate your time. This is a very important race and we're going to be watching it closely. Thank you so much.
- [51:23]
Janet Mills
It is indeed an important, important race because I think that taking control of the Senate goes through Maine and I'm the person who can unseat Susan Collins, help turn the Senate blue and stand up to Donald Trump. I'm the only one in this race who's actually done that and I'll do it again.
- [51:40]
David Pakman
The US Senate, the David Pakman show is an audience supported program and the best, most direct way to support the show is by becoming a member. @join pacman.com you'll get the daily bonus show, the daily commercial free show and plenty of other great membership perks. Get the full experience by signing up@join pacman.com this is what it looks like when the President is unwell. You will notice real contrasts to prior presidents, both Democrats and Republicans. This near psychotic break took place on social media. It included messages posted overnight and very early this morning. Let's get right into it because there is a lot of consequence here. Donald Trump, starting quote quote the actual numbers that we would have to pay back if for any reason the Supreme Court were to rule against the USA on tariffs would be many hundreds of billions of dollars. And that doesn't include the amount of payback that countries and companies would require for the investments they are making on building plants, factories and equipment for the purpose of being able to avoid the payment of tariffs, blah, blah, blah. I won't even read the entire thing to you, but what the President here is arguing is that it would be really complicated to fix his total screw up of blanket tariffs on everything and everyone. And so the Supreme Court should just forget about what the law is, forget about interpreting the Constitution and the presidential powers, and just say everything Trump did is fine. Because at the end of the day, it would be really inconvenient to have to change anything and give the tariff money back. Not a very convincing argument for keeping tariffs if they are otherwise unconstitutional or exceed the power of the presidency. Not a great argument, but maybe it's the best one that Donald Trump has. Trump continuing in another post. Effective immediately, any country doing business with the Islamic Republic of Iran will pay a tariff of 25% on any and all business being done with the United States of America. This order is final and conclusive. Thank you for your attention to this matter. What I love about this is even with executive orders, Trump seems to think that an executive order is a law. An executive order is sort of a note from the boss which tells someone to do something. And what you're asking them to do might be legal. Legal, or it might not be. It might be doable or it might not be. But this is not even an executive order. This is just opposed to truth, social. And Trump seems to think that by saying this order is final and conclusive, it just makes it so. Now, of course, Donald Trump has a mechanism for putting a 25% tariff on anybody, I guess, doing business with Iran. We could discuss the politics of whether that's good idea, who that, who that really hurts. If the Supreme Court is sort of looking at the constitutionality of it. But the idea that the line, the order is final and conclusive, it's sort of like if I am here and I go, I declare, and then I think that that has any value. Listen, I said I declared it. I don't know what else I could really do. Childish. Childish in every way then. And Trump is just racking up the L's here. On the topic of congestion pricing in Manhattan, Donald Trump says, quote, congestion pricing in Manhattan is a disaster for New York. It's got to be ended immediately. It's never worked before and it will never work now. I love New York and hate to see it being destroyed so rapidly with such obviously foolish policy. You know, I, I kind of like the congestion pricing, I have to tell you. But, But, David, it's more expensive to drive into lower Manhattan. Yeah, I know. And so fewer people are doing it. It's so funny. Most of the time that I'm in lower Manhattan, I've taken the subway because it is actually faster and more convenient. However, if I need to be down there and having the car is more convenient, I think it's like seven bucks or something like that. And because the congestion pricing has dissuaded a lot of people from driving their cars into that area, just the other day I parked near the, the stock exchange area, which is part, it's, it's part of the congestion pricing area. There was no traffic. It was a time where in the past there would be a ton of traffic. I just drove right to the garage that I needed, I needed to bring some stuff and that I think that it's been a great success, both because I'm personally benefiting from the convenience of fewer cars when I need to be down there with a car. But also from a pollution standpoint, it is keeping a bunch of cars out of lower Manhattan. By what nature, by what metric Trump says it has failed, I don't really know. Ok, Trump then unleashing on Biden. It's just every single one of these posts, Trump is just wrong about everything he's saying. Quote, under sleepy Joe Biden and the radical left Democrats, the average American household's monthly utility bills went up massively over 30%. I never want Americans to pay higher electricity bills because of data centers. Therefore, my administration is working with major American technology companies to secure their commitment to the American people. And we will have much to announce in the coming weeks. Okay, and then he goes and he mentions a bunch of different companies. Couple of thoughts on this. Number one, electricity is up under Trump more than 10%. And so the idea that rising utility rates were only a problem under Biden, it's happening under Trump as well. But maybe more importantly, a lot of people have jumped on this whole data center, electricity use, a water use and, and all of this different stuff. These things are concerns, but you also need to think about them in context. Like just as an example, the AI water use one. I just read a very good study, mostly debunking it, like, yes, there is some water use associated with AI, but it's quite modest really, particularly compared to all of the other sources of water use. And it's like Trump just hears a little kernel of something and then is like, I don't know, that sounds pretty good. And then finally, just hours ago, Donald Trump unleashing on Minnesota, where he says, quote, do the people of Minnesota really want to live in a community in which there are thousands of already convicted murderers, drug dealers and addicts, rapists, violent, released and escaped prisoners, dangerous people from foreign mental institutions and insane asylums and other deadly criminals too dangerous to even mention. All the patriots of ICE want to do is remove them from your neighborhood and send them back to the prisons and mental institutions from where they came most in foreign countries who illegally entered the USA through Sleepy Joe's horrible open border policy. Okay? And then he goes on and on and on and he closes with fear. Not great. People of Minnesota, the day of reckoning and retribution is coming. As usual, total confusion about what this is really about. First of all, ICE would only have jurisdiction with regard to undocumented immigrants. And arguably in cases where they are trying to denaturalize or whatever. The vast majority of convicted individuals anywhere are not undocumented immigrants. They are just natural born Americans which are outside of the mandate and scope of ice. And it's funny how, of course Minnesotans want to live in peace, but the vast majority of the chaos is being caused by ICE and by the raids. Think about the level of uncertainty that is being brought to the streets by the very presence of Donald Trump's ICE goon. So Trump could turn that off overnight and it would all of a sudden be a much better environment for Minnesotans. The guy doesn't know what's going on. He is desperate, he is cornered and he is grasping at straws. Kristi Noem is getting impeached, or at least the impeachment effort is going to move forward. Democratic lawmakers are now saying we're going to impeach Kristi Noem, Donald Trump's Secretary of Homeland Security. This is after federal ICE agents. One federal ICE agent shot and killed an American citizen in Minneapolis. 37 year old Renee Goode. She was a mother of three. She was born in the United States. No. No serious criminal history, no violent record. And yet within hours, the Department of Homeland Security said she's a domestic terrorist. And of course, that label came before any of the facts were known. It came before the footage was reviewed. It came before an independent investigation, which, by the way, they are blocking. Representative Angie Craig went on Ms. Now and said, we are going to move forward to impeach Christi Noem. Another Democrat, Robin Kelly, has already introduced articles of impeachment. Those are very serious articles. They accused Noem, number one, of abusing her office for personal benefit, of obstructing congressional oversight of withholding funds that Congress already appropriated. And this is a big one of compromising public safety and violating the constitutional rights of American citizens. This is not about the rhetoric of Cristineo. This is about oversight of ICE and the use of deadly force. Now, we've already talked about what happened in Minnesota. Videos show Renee Goode attempting to drive away when she was shot. DHS says she used her car as a weapon. Local officials say that's not what it looks like at all. The mayor of Minneapolis, Jacob Fry, said that those are bullshit claims and told ICE to get the F out of his city. And then things really escalated protests, not just in Minneapolis, but nationally. Federal law enforcement kills a civilian, leadership rushes to justify it and the victim ends up smeared. And accountability is optional here. I don't think we're really going to do a full investigation. We're certainly not going to let state officials do it. Now the claim from the administration is the ICE officers are really in danger here. They are facing assaults. But of course, it is ICE that is carrying out the assaults, including on American citizens, which were so supposedly outside of the purview of ice. Now, I think it's always good to be upfront. Will impeachment succeed at removing Kristi Noem? No. Republicans control the House, Republicans control the Senate, at least for now. And Donald Trump is not exactly known for supporting accountability. But that's not the only point of the impeachment. As I've said before, impeachment is a duty of Congress, of the House of Representatives. And impeachment can also force facts into the open because you get hearings, you get sworn testimony and you get a lot of information gathering ability. And so it puts decisions under the microscope. If indeed the feds are going to impede an investigation at the state level. Well, maybe the impeachment of Kristine Ohm will bring that fact to light. If a cabinet secretary can get away with labeling an American citizen a domestic terrorist after they are shot dead by a federal agent before the facts are known, it is a terrifying amount of power. Kristi Noem has snatched a lot of power and it is very far from law and order. It's all narrative control. So I don't believe that this effort is silly. I believe that this effort is dramatically overdue. We are going to be furthering our discussion of this on the bonus show today as the Minnesota Hilton has canceled ICE agents hotel reservations after what happened. And there are people furious on all sides of this. We'll talk about the latest with Ellen. We'll talk about Trump's call for a 10% cap on credit card interest rates, all of it and more on the bonus show. You can sign up@join pacman.com and remember that Tuesday, January 20th, we will be doing a one day membership drive it'll be 365 days into this first year of Donald Trump's second term. I would love for you to partake, get a membership at this record low rate. Just make sure you're on my mailing list. Substack.david pakman.com See you on the bonus show.