← The Jim Acosta Show
The Jim Acosta Show
Alex Vindman on Trump-Putin Romance plus Michael Cohen on Trump's enablers making matters worse plus Elise Labbot on the importance of "soft power" in the world.
01:08:10
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- [00:01]
Jim Acosta
All right, welcome, everybody, to the Jim Acosta Show. It is Monday. And don't despair, ladies and gentlemen, because love is in the air. Trump's romance with the Russians continues. Forget the Cold War. It's getting hot in here between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. Steamy, you might say. The Cold War is out. The hot peace is in. A flaming peace, depending on your point of view, I suppose. But the big headline today, the Kremlin says that the Kremlin and the White House are aligned when it comes to policies. As I was just saying, it's a little late for Valentine's Day cards, but Donald Trump basically got one from Vladimir Putin today. As the spokesman for the Kremlin, Dmitry Peskov said the Trump administration's foreign policy quote, and this is a quote largely aligns with our vision. This is what Peskov said, according to Russian state tv. This is Dmitry Peskov. The new administration is rapidly changing all foreign policy configurations. This, this largely aligns with our vision. Those are the words from the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov. All that is left, of course, was for Putin and Trump to get matching charm bracelets after the president's disastrous meeting with Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelensky. Just to run through some headlines, you can see him on screen right there. First of all, that's Alexander Vindman. He's got a new book coming out, the Folly or the. Yes, the Folly of Realism. How the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine. We're going to talk about that in just a moment. Alex, if you could just hang in there. I'm going to run through a couple of headlines on this Trump Putin bromance that continues. This is Donald Trump. According to the Washington Post, he is meeting with officials this afternoon to discuss whether to end military assistance to Ukraine. That is according to a senior administration official who said that to the Washington Post. And Trump continues to go after Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He said this on Truth Social earlier today. This is the worst statement. He's talking about some comments that Zelenskyy made that could have been made by Zelensky. And America will not put up with it for much longer. It is what I was saying. This guy doesn't want there to be peace as long as he has America's backing. And Europe, in the meeting they had with Zelensky, stated flatly that they cannot do the job without the US this is all from a Truth Social post that Trump put out earlier today. Let's discuss with Alexander Vindman you can see him right there. He is the author of the new book, the Folly of How the West Deceived Itself about Russia and Betrayed Ukraine. And Alex, you and I were just chatting a little bit before we got started here, and you were saying that the title of your book could only be off by a couple of letters in terms of what's going on right now. You kind of called it. I mean, this book could not have come out at a better time. You. This, this is, this is what you've been warning about for a while now.
- [02:46]
Alexander Vindman
Yeah, I think I, if I recall correctly, I think you called me Nostradamus.
- [02:51]
Jim Acosta
But Nostradamus is about. Right?
- [02:54]
Alexander Vindman
Yeah, I mean, that's right. I think the subtitle, I would just change it to Deceives Itself About Russia and Betrays Ukraine. That would frankly be because it's continuous. And you know, the only thing that really surprising me thus far is, is I was very confident that Trump would cut Ukraine off immediately. And it's taken only about five weeks now whether he actually follows through because his, you know, the Republicans, there are still Republicans that want to support. Some of them have actually broken, you know, the, the sick offense and been a little bit critical of that Friday meeting. At least three of them, all on the House side, not even on the Senate side, but there. And I think he's getting, you know, Speaker Johnson identified Russia as the villain in Ukraine as, as, as our ally. And I think, you know, while these guys are, do not have, you know, are not going to venture out and criticize Donald Trump publicly or even let anything seek sneak out, Rubio and Waltz must be counseling him that this would be a dangerous move, that this would just, you know, further rupture the relationship within, with our alliance. Last week, just remember what happened last week on Monday, on the anniversary, the third anniversary of the war, Trump sided with Russia. He sided with North Korea against our allies and, and basically undercut the condemnation of Russia as their aggressor. He criticized Zelensky as a dictator. And then on Friday, you know, Zielinski, frankly, probably his biggest mistake was even doing this meeting because, yeah, you know, whiz. I think if, if he was a better judge of, of Trump, he would have known that, you know, this was, he was gonna wade into something that could trigger the worst case scenario. And instead he, you know, he's been very successful, charming other leaders and frankly, connecting with them on security, mutual security interests. It's not that the Europeans are entirely altruistic. They just know that their security at stake. And he tried to make the same point to the Trump administration, and all he did was, you know, basically get attacked. So it was a pretty disgusting turn of events. Now, just to wrap this, this current state of affairs up now, now basically have this situation in which there's a demand for regime change, but it's not the regime change that Biden was saying. You know, Putin's a dictator. He's a. He's looking to kind of destabilize the world. He's attacking US Interests. This is a regime change in which Trump is asking a fellow ally to resign. So I'm going to go ahead and go out on the record right here. I'm going to call it, the Ukrainians and the Europeans can't work with Trump. I'm calling on Donald Trump to resign, and then we can find somebody reasonable for the, for, for our allies to work with. There we go. That's it.
- [05:55]
Jim Acosta
It's out.
- [05:56]
Alexander Vindman
Yeah.
- [05:56]
Jim Acosta
I mean, if, if, if Lindsey Graham can call on Zelensky to resign, why can't Alex Vindman call on Donald Trump to resign? I mean, all's fair and love and war, and there's a lot of love between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. I mean, you know, maybe you could say I was overstating things at the top, but I don't think so. I mean, what's going on here? I mean, that's the thing. I mean, to put this into context, Alex, when the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, who has been at this for a long time, like Vladimir Putin, like Sergei Lavrov, when he puts out a statement like that, he's not doing it to make life better or worse for Donald Trump. I mean, he's just putting it out there. He's just saying the way it is. I mean, it's kind of a remarkable thing to hear from the Russians.
- [06:42]
Alexander Vindman
Sure. So it's amazing. Mask is off. They don't have to be, you know, kind of like, delicate in their support of Donald Trump. Donald Trump is leaning in, you know, hugging the bear and, you know, whether it's as the national. Former National Security Advisor Nikolai Petrushev said, which is that Trump, Trump's election was bought, you know, and therefore Trump is obligated to return the favor. I think that guy's just throwing hand grenades because he knows he could. He could muck around and sew discord. There's something to this, this bromance. And what's shocking is this book is written with a historical view. It's written about their 35 years of relationships between Russia, Ukraine and the U.S. and it starts off with, in 1991, when the Ukrainian, Ukrainians achieve independence in a moment where just months before George Bush is in Ukraine and tells the Ukrainians, chill out. You don't. You want independence? You want, you know, you want your own country. Don't. Not so fast. You know, there's, why don't you, why don't you stay with Russia? There's, you know, be, remain part of the empire. You don't need a race towards independence. Now the Ukrainians blow them off. And it's shocking that the Ukrainians have had the fortitude to go it alone, challenging the, the superpower back then and frankly holding their ground. Now that's what Zelensky did. He held his ground in, in, in spite of lies, in spite of declarations that he was the dictator. The Russians are the good guys. That, you know, he is a warmonger. The Russians are the peacemakers that, you know, Russia, that Ukraine is responsible for the aggression. But that's where it started. Yeah, you, you fast forward through critical moments like denuclearization. The US put, put some of the pressure really on with Russia, on Ukraine to give up its nuclear weapons. It's not until we entice them with some, with some desperately needed funding and support that we got them on board. Hardball does not work with these, these folks, they're, they're, they have fortitude. They're going to stand their ground. Same thing in the Orange Revolution when the Russians were interfering, attempted to buy the election for a pro Russian candidate. The Ukrainians went out on the street in force and held their ground. They held, they had a second revolution in 2014 when, when this same pro Russian character attempted to suppress the, the will of the people to get closer to Europe. They will go out and fight. They are not pushovers. And Donald Trump obviously has no clue about the history. He doesn't understand that the Russians are, are inveterate liars. They've broken every agreement put that they signed and that the Ukrainians are just stating facts that in order to have a lasting peace in, there needs to be some security guarantees.
- [09:35]
Jim Acosta
Right?
- [09:35]
Alexander Vindman
There needs to be some. And it's not going to come on the back of accommodation and appeasement, which is exactly what, what Trump is doing. So Trump is what I refer to exercising the poison Kool Aid phase of the folly of realism. Okay? This is a cult now. Highly transactional. And it, and what happens, it's, you know, it ends up being, it doesn't end up well when you're drinking the Kool Aid in a cult. So I think at this point, it's extremely dangerous. And the question is whether cooler heads could prevail or the pressure, because he was. That was a massive mistake. What he did in the White House plays well with a hardcore MAGA base, but it actually is, is creating some significant blowback from our allies and domestically. Now, whether he catches up with him before he makes a declaration tomorrow at this, at this speech in front of the, in front of Congress is unclear. But he's likely to double down on mistakes.
- [10:32]
Jim Acosta
It. It definitely doubles down on his mistakes. And I think you make a great point. I want to hold the book up again because there were some folks who were entering the chat during our conversation saying, what book? It's. It's Alexander Vindman's new book, in case you're just tuning in a little bit late. It's the Folly of Realism, how the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine, the latest great book from Alex Vindman. And you make an excellent point, Alex, about. It's a misreading of the Ukrainians. They have wanted this for some time. They have wanted this, not just independence from Russia, which they have. They want to feel part of Europe. They don't want to feel like they're part of Russia. And Trump and J.D. vance and some of the folks in the MAGA base, they just don't get it. You can ram this down their throats, down the throats of the Ukrainians, they're just not going to want it. Which is why you saw Zelensky surrounding himself with those European leaders over the weekend, essentially saying, well, if I can't get this from the United States, I'll try to get this from the Europeans. And so it's not as though Trump is going to change Zelensky's point of view on all of this. He's not going to suddenly turn, you know, wake up tomorrow and say, oh, yeah, I'd love to be part of Russia. It's just not going to happen.
- [11:41]
Alexander Vindman
What we saw in that room was maximum malice and maximum ignorance. Ignorance is not. No understanding whatsoever of the fact that we've been deceiving ourselves about Russia, that they are getting played, Vance is getting played. Trump is getting played hard. Harder than any US Leader in, you know, in any recent memory, maybe even ever has been played by an adversary.
- [12:02]
Jim Acosta
But what about Rubio, I guess, Alex, what about Marco Rubio, who has been a hawk on Russia for some time now, or at least publicly? He's been that way. And the way he's just sitting on the sofa, like he's looking for the remote control or something to change the channel. I mean, it was, this was just, it was, it was awkward, man. But this is what Trump has done to the Republican Party writ large.
- [12:28]
Alexander Vindman
Yeah, I think so. I think the fact is that he's been emboldened just to finish the. Quickly the thought.
- [12:32]
Jim Acosta
Oh, yeah, sure, yeah, the, the.
- [12:34]
Alexander Vindman
So that's the maximum ignorance, but the maximum malice is that they could care less about Ukraine. They're willing to give away all of Ukraine because they don't, they don't think that it's relevant to US national security when it's absolutely critical. And that is the, that's the malice. They want to normalize relationships to Russia. Now, folks like Rubio and Waltz, the national security advisor, they understand the dangers, but they are cowards. They know that they're going to. They may even know that there's a time clock on their careers in this administration because nobody lasts. There is a massive turnover, but they want to stick around for at least a little while. Maybe they, they promised themselves that they were going to be in there, to be the guardrails against the worst instincts. But guess what? It's happening. It's happening in front of your eyes. I, hopefully you're working hard behind the scenes. And I, I sensed that early on in the previous weeks. We were only like, you know, five weeks in. But I sense that tension because what ended up happening was when Hegseth declared that Ukraine is going to have to give up territory, you know, Trump backed him up. 24 hours later, both Trump and Hex have backpedaled so that they, they had that. Now that's it. They're. They're basically now towing the party line. And the Republicans in general have come out towing the party line. And guess what that does. That does the same thing that happened to Putin. It emboldens him. It, it breeds a sense of impunity, and it means that, you know, he's gonna, he's going to keep following his horrible, horrible instincts and make even more damaging mistakes. You know, God forbid the guy declares that we're withdrawing from NATO tomorrow. That would be one of the worst things that could ever happen to us.
- [14:10]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, and you bring up a great point, because tomorrow evening, Trump is going to have this speech, a joint session of Congress. It's sort of like a State of the Union speech, and he is sort of teasing this idea that he is going to make a big announcement tomorrow on On Ukraine, the Washington Post was reporting earlier today that he was meeting with officials to talk about cutting off military aid altogether. Alex, what would that. I mean, Friday was enough of an earthquake. If he makes a big announcement like that during a speech to a joint session of Congress, I mean, it is going to be something. It is going to be like something we have not seen in years and decades in terms of a new relationship between the United States and Europe.
- [14:54]
Alexander Vindman
I think that's right. So, first of all, the. The folks in the Kremlin will be drunk for days. I mean, the freak. The. The Chinese could run out of vodka. I mean, they'll be like, crack open those plans for Taiwan. The US Is completely unreliable. The Europeans that are deathly afraid, they're scrambling and trying to talk, you know, Zielinski into apologizing, which he can't, by the way. He could maybe apologize, but he can't, like, you know, he can't completely fold. Why? Because his most important relationship is not the US his most important relationship is with his own people. It's with the troops that are fighting. And he needs to look. Continue to look strong for his people, for the morale. So, like this, they could hold their ground. Yeah, he leads to look strong against Putin. It is wrong to think that, you know, the most important thing he has to do is to accommodate Trump. We, in certain ways, have an inflated sense of self. Yes, we helped Ukraine. No question about it. Ukraine would have been in a much, much more difficult situation. But the first six months, we weren't even there. They basically did everything themselves. And guess what? We're three years on. The Ukrainians have a military industrial complex. They have a much more capable military. The Europeans, although they haven't done nearly enough, they've stepped up. And really what the Ukrainians have is they have six months. They have six months of stores, they have six months of supplies in which the Europeans will have to just. Just break glass and do whatever they need to to figure out how to support Ukraine. And they're not going to be able to do it to fill all the gaps of the US Absence. But this does not fold. It just means that in the second half this year, things look more precarious. But if the Europeans do step up in a significant way, then the pressure shifts back to Russia, because Russia does not have endless staying power. It has more troops, it has more material, but it is losing enormous amounts of troops. It might have to do a mass mobilization. It can't call up troops indefinitely. And the material they're relying on Soviet material increasingly on the hardware. So it is completely lopsided view towards Russia and it's not so lopsided. I would absolutely hurt if Trump announces, announces and maybe he is likely to announce that he's going to withdraw tomorrow, but it would be a disaster. And the Europeans would then be like, okay, that's it. We, no more North Atlantic Treaty Organization, no more Euro Atlantic alliance. We're in this by ourselves. And then what we've done is we've undermined our own long term efforts to remain the head of the largest, most important pole in a, in a multipolar world. And we devolve into, you know, regional, you know, much more regionally oriented security apparatus or structures. And that's dangerous for the United States.
- [17:38]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, it really is. And I just want to emphasize again, the book from Alex Vindman just came out. It is the Folly of Realism, how the West Deceived Itself About Russia and Betrayed Ukraine. Alex Vindman has already written one Keeper of a Book. Here's another one. Alex, great to talk to you. Good luck with the book. I know you're doing this book tour thing, but I mean, my goodness, all of this news happening just as it's coming out, it just makes the book all the more relevant and your voice all the more relevant right now. Really appreciate the time. Always good to talk to you.
- [18:08]
Alexander Vindman
Thanks, Jim. And I want to congratulate you on, on your, on your, you know, making sure that you still have a voice. We got 6,300 people on this sucker. I don't know if that's a record for you. It's a record for me.
- [18:22]
Jim Acosta
Great.
- [18:22]
Alexander Vindman
Keep up the fire and looking forward to being on with you again.
- [18:26]
Jim Acosta
Sounds good. Now I'll bring you back over and over again and appreciate it very much. And next time, I'm just going to have some sports bets coming your way. You know, who do you have in the NBA March Madness? Alex is the new Nostradamus. No question about it. Alex, great to see you. Thanks a lot. Thanks.
- [18:43]
Alexander Vindman
Appreciate it.
- [18:43]
Jim Acosta
All right, all right. Appreciate it. It's a heavy time. You got to have a little levity. And that's why I was saying at the beginning of all this, you know, it is, it is like Love is in the Air with, with Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin. It's just, it's, there's just the damnedest thing. Also on the show this hour, I've got it's. We're back at Michael Monday. Michael Cohen joins me in just a moment here. I'm gonna bring him into the discussion in just a few seconds. And then a little bit later on in the program, want to bring in Elise labet, who is a veteran foreign affairs correspondent here in Washington, a former colleague of mine. You're really gonna love to hear from Elise labitt. She is just a sharp journalist and has a lot of great things to say. But in the meantime, let's go ahead and bring in Michael Cohen. I understand he's ready to go. It is Michael Monday, and I think this is already becoming a thing. I know we've done this a couple of times now. And you know what's, what's great about it is everybody has just embraced this. They've just said, okay, yeah, bring it on Michael Monday. And we've got a lot to talk about, honestly, because. And there he is right there. Real Michael Cohen, as he's known here on Substack.
- [19:55]
Michael Cohen
Tim, how are you?
- [19:57]
Jim Acosta
I'm doing great. I'm doing great. Hey, thanks. Thanks for doing this, as always. You know, one of the things that.
- [20:01]
Michael Cohen
I want to say, Michael Monday, is my brother, Michael Mondays.
- [20:03]
Jim Acosta
Michael Mondays. And I do want to talk about Ukraine because I know you have some thoughts on this. But the other thing that we need to get into at some point is Trump is apparently going to go through with these tariffs and the stock market is taking a huge hit this afternoon. One of the reasons why Donald Trump got elected is because of his promises on the economy. So I want to get to all that. I want to talk about that. And the way he's, you know, these Republican town halls that have turned rowdy and fiery, he's blaming that on paid troublemakers. And so I want to talk about all that. Let's get but first, let's get your take, because I just talked to Alex Vindman a few moments ago, was just talking about his new book. You've written a lot of successful books. What were your thoughts when you saw that debacle go down in the Oval Office on Friday? And then we'll get into some of these other topics in the news, because I know you get a lot to say.
- [20:52]
Michael Cohen
Well, to begin, very saddened for our country, saddened for Ukrainian Americans, saddened for Ukrainians. I'm saddened for the world where you have the United States ditching our ally for the benefit of an adversary. It's so un American in so many ways. But as I was watching this debacle unfold, I was taking notes for my substack, and I ultimately wrote a piece which I entitled the Art of the Deal, Ukrainian Style. And what I truly believe is that it's very simple to understand Trump if you do an analysis, a profile analysis on him where, you know it's all about his ego. You know that if you don't stroke the ego, that there will be a temper tantrum. And as a direct result, I believe that President Zelensky went in knowing that he was not going to capitulate to Trump's demands. And I wrote my whole substack on it, whereby I believe Zelensky played Trump knowing that he was going to get angry. J.D. vance jumped in, made it easy for Trump to express it further, his anger about the appreciation, despite the thousands of times that Zelensky. I also wrote another thing, I wrote another substack that friends don't ask friends for thank yous. Yeah, you don't.
- [22:32]
Jim Acosta
That's right, exactly.
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Michael Cohen
It's just, it's weird.
- [22:35]
Jim Acosta
That's a great point.
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Michael Cohen
You say it once and then enough is enough. If you're friends, if you are allies, you, you don't need constant reassurance or constant thank you.
- [22:45]
Jim Acosta
And it's a friggin war. It's a friggin war. So I mean, you know, do we, do we thank one another when you hand over more ammo? I mean, you just don't do that. It's a war. I mean, how many they're fighting for their survival times.
- [22:57]
Michael Cohen
Are you going to thank me for coming on to the show with you? How many times does it have to be every minute, the 20 minutes or so that we're going to be on together.
- [23:05]
Jim Acosta
You say it, but you know Donald Trump. But, but Michael, you know Donald Trump and you're absolutely right, he needs that constant stroking. What is it about him that he needs? I wrote about this on my substack. You know, it was sort of like a break glass stroke, POTUS moment right after the whole thing was over, you know, they put out all these calculated, coordinated tweets from Marco Rubio and Christi Dohman and also the same thing. Thank you, Donald Trump.
- [23:29]
Michael Cohen
Yeah, but it didn't work. That's the problem. And Zelensky that then went on knowing that he was going to meet with the Prime Minister Starmer of England, of the uk and they offered him like two and a half billion for immediate funding to purchase munitions. On top of that, all of Europe combined together have pledged like $20 billion. He's good for. Now when it comes to funding, question is, what will they be able to provide the armaments that they're talking about? But at the end of the day, he now has. He has now brought in all of Europe on his side. And that's not going to ignore to the benefit of this Trump administration. And I'll tell you, as much as people will be surprised to hear me say this, I don't believe that this is Donald Trump's fault. And he's saying, well, how could it not be?
- [24:27]
Jim Acosta
He.
- [24:28]
Michael Cohen
Right. Even he acknowledges that at the, you know, at the helm, you take all. It's all of the sycophants and all of the.
- [24:37]
Jim Acosta
Well, that's true, yes.
- [24:38]
Michael Cohen
Sitting around him. Nobody. There's nobody there. Like the way I used to do it and say, Mr. Trump, that's a terrible idea. Let me explain to you why. Doesn't mean he's going to change his mind. But at least you have somebody.
- [24:53]
Jim Acosta
They're trying to slow him down.
- [24:55]
Michael Cohen
He's hearing it, and he will do something to change. There's nobody there anymore. When you see a Marco Rubio or Lindsey Graham or a Tulsi Gabbard, they're all stepping up and they're all like, well, first of all, thank you, Mr. President, for your incredible leadership. And you are showing the world. What are you showing the world? You're showing the world that we don't care about our allies, that we partner up with our adversaries. Why are you showing them that America can't be trusted.
- [25:23]
Alexander Vindman
Yeah.
- [25:23]
Jim Acosta
And that image of Marco Rubio on the sofa, you know, it's sort of.
- [25:27]
Michael Cohen
Like he was catatonic.
- [25:30]
Jim Acosta
That's the way I look when my commanders lose on Sunday. You know, I'm kind of like, you.
- [25:33]
Michael Cohen
Know, get used to it.
- [25:35]
Jim Acosta
You know, pass, pass me another beer. You know, drown my sorrows. But I mean, this is somebody who was on the Intelligence Committee in the United States Senate. He understands the threat, he understands what's going on here. And I just, to me, it's, you're absolutely right there. You don't have the John Kelly's anymore. You don't have the Jeff Sessions, the Gym Mattis types. And they were all run off the first time around because of the way he is. But, but, Michael, you and I've talked about this before. What is it about the Russia thing, you know, Donald Trump? Because one of the things that he went off on during that whole temper tantrum that he had, he was talking about Russia, Russia, Russia, which is his code word for the Russia investigation. As I tell people all the time, Donald Trump Jr. Met with a Russian attorney at Trump tower during that 2016 campaign, as did Paul Manafort, as did Jared Kushner, you know, there was some level of attempted collusion going on at that time.
- [26:33]
Michael Cohen
No, no, no, that's. And that's what bothers him the most.
- [26:37]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [26:38]
Michael Cohen
What ended up happening there is they thought that they were going to get dirt on Hillary Clinton, on the emails and so on. It bothers him because there really was not the Russian collusion that mainstream or cable news television were putting out there that he was having them. What he would do is he would say, russia. If you're listening, I remember that. You can get that. He wasn't asking Vladimir Putin to do it, though. He was asking Vladimir Putin to do it. He wanted to see those emails, but they weren't reaching out and calling. You know, I got into trouble because I called the Kremlin and I was grilled on this by Congress, by. I think it was hipc. It was either hipsy or sipsy that went ahead and grilled me on it. Well, how did you get the phone number to the Kremlin?
- [27:34]
Jim Acosta
Right, right.
- [27:35]
Michael Cohen
You must have got. I Googled it.
- [27:37]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [27:37]
Michael Cohen
In fact, if you Google the Kremlin, it will give you the number. And so I called, and they asked me, what were you calling for? To set up a meeting between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. I remember that when Obama said to him he would not meet with him during the United Nations General Assembly, I said, clearly, he'll have a few minutes. He goes, maybe he'd like to try a Mar A Lago burger and meet with Mr. Trump. And I just thought it was fun. Funny. Now, mind you, I did it at Donald's. At Donald's request. So then they said to me, well, it doesn't meet with protocol. We won't be able to do it. I said, okay, but if by chance you do, Mr. Mr. Trump would love to have a chance to shake hand and say hello.
- [28:20]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, but he's just. He's just caught up on this, and he won't let it go. And, you know, to me, it's like there's just something going. There's just something weird there.
- [28:30]
Michael Cohen
What Trump likes, Jim, what Trump likes is the tough man sort of machismo.
- [28:37]
Jim Acosta
That it's who he wants to be.
- [28:39]
Michael Cohen
Yes. You know, think about it this way. There's pictures of Putin allegedly wrestling a bear. There's photos and photos and photos of Vladimir Putin, who is allegedly a black belt in samba, which is a martial arts form. And I know that he's pretty damn good, because I know the guy who instructs him. He used to fight, actually for Trump's MMA company called Affliction. His name was Fedor Emelianenko. He fought for us. I started that company for Trump. And Fedor Emelianenko is like the number one heavyweight in all of mma. He is a samba expert and he fights and teaches Vladimir Putin. We've watched as Vladimir Putin was playing with the Russian national hockey team. And of course, he scored 12 goals, more than anybody in, in history. Right? Yeah. Nobody checked them, nobody stopped them. And yeah, somebody shoots the puck, you better let it go through.
- [29:40]
Jim Acosta
You better let it go through. Yeah. Off to Siberia. Trump wants, yeah, he just wants constant fawning. He wants the Dear leader treatment. There's no question about it. Michael, let's talk about. I want to talk about a couple of other things because you've seen these fiery town halls that these Republican lawmakers have had. Trump put out a truth social today. He said that paid troublemakers are attending Republican town hall meetings. It's all part of the game for Democrats. But just like our big landslide election, which was not a landslide election, it's not going to work for them. And Politico wrote this, that Trump's truth social post came after a new round of Republican hosted town halls grew heated in recent days with Congressman Keith Self, Senator Roger Marshall among those who faced angry constituents. You got, I mean, what is going. There's no, there's no evidence, Politico says, to suggest that they've been paying the Democrats, been paying people to attend. It sounds as though Trump doesn't want to deal with the reality of the situation, that his first few weeks of his new administration are not going over well with the American people and not going over well in red Republican districts and in red states.
- [30:44]
Michael Cohen
Think about it this way. Tom Suozzi out in Long Island.
- [30:47]
Jim Acosta
That's right.
- [30:48]
Michael Cohen
Lost five plus, plus six for Trump during the election. Tom Suozzi got up there and he lambasted Trump for doing what he did with Vladimir Zelinsky. The crowd went crazy. Then again, on cnn, you listen to. I always forget what his name is. The, the Republican that's always fighting late night.
- [31:11]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [31:12]
Michael Cohen
Whatever his name is.
- [31:13]
Jim Acosta
Whatever his name is.
- [31:14]
Michael Cohen
Suffice it to say he is continuing to parrot the same lie over and over and over again because they're only playing to a party of one. They're playing to one man's ego. And the more that you stroke the guys, he's got Jennings. Right. The more that you stroke the guy's ego, the longer your sustainability is. It's why you listen to The Lindsey Grahams. Why you listen to Marco Rubio, who did a 180. He did a 180 on Vladimir Putin in 24 hours.
- [31:47]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, but, you know, it says to me that, you know, they thought they were a little too clever here and that they were just going to, you know, put these Doge cuts through. They were going to do things like they're doing with Zelensky right now, and that the base would just go along with it. But it sounds as though there are Republicans who, I mean, you, you know, we're hearing reports about veterans who were losing their job jobs at FEMA and places like that, places where they hire veterans to work in the federal government, which is actually a really nice thing to do for veterans who need a job.
- [32:21]
Michael Cohen
I actually know one, and he is livid. He did two tours in Iraq, I think one in Afghanistan. He just started like six months or seven months ago after a whole slew of physical rehab and whatever it might have been. And he was, remained in the service, and now he had that job and he got the notification. He is, by the way, he's a Republican, a lifelong Republican. In fact, he voted for Trump both times. All right. And so he's like, I just don't get it. I don't understand. But you know what? This is going to be a real issue for Republicans because they are not laying off Democrats, not laying off Independents, not. They're laying off Republicans, too. And what happens? How do you break out of the cult? Right. Which. How do you break out of the cult? You know how you have nothing in your pocket, you have no food on the table, you have no money for rent. And you say, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on one second. What about, I'm going to make your life better? The campaign promises. What happened to the 24 hours? I'm going to bring egg prices and milk prices and bacon prices?
- [33:34]
Jim Acosta
He didn't do it. He didn't do it. And now the stock market is tanking. It tanked today because of these tariffs that are supposed to go into effect tomorrow. 25% on products coming in from Canada and Mexico. And, you know, Trump has said this is what he's going to do. The market doesn't like it. You know, people are going to start looking nervously at their 401k plans here in the coming days because of all of this. And you know, the thing that's happening with these town halls, though, it's an interesting situation, Michael, because this is where the Dear Leader thing bites them in the rear end. Donald Trump expects The Dear Leader treatment. No matter what, if they're yelling at you at the town hall, you still have to give them the Dear Leader treatment and you know, or else you're going to get primaried in the next election cycle. And so you can see a situation where this is really going to eat at Republican poll numbers. It's really going to cause a lot of problems for some of these members of Congress and, and senators who were swing states to get reelected. And, you know, tell me how much Donald Trump cares about all that. He doesn't care one bit.
- [34:40]
Michael Cohen
And neither do the billionaire class that is surrounding him. You think they give a shit if the eggs are $10 a dozen or $100 a dozen? They have so much money that they can't spend it in 10 lifetimes, in 50 lifetimes. So it doesn't, but it doesn't mean anything to them. But you know what means, you know, it means something to the average American.
- [35:04]
Jim Acosta
Right.
- [35:05]
Michael Cohen
That's who it means something to. And now on top of everything, you have gasoline prices going up. I thought we would drill, baby, drill. What happened to that was what happened to it is the question.
- [35:17]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, and it's because, I mean, you know, he, let's be honest with ready Donald Trump wrote a wave of bullshit back into the White House. You know, he said things, you know, like drill, baby, drill and making these empty promises about lowering prices at the grocery store and so on. And he doesn't really have the first clue how to do any of those things. I mean, he just doesn't. And, you know, and so folks are finding out it's sort of an FAFO kind of situation.
- [35:43]
Michael Cohen
Which goes, by the way, Jim, to what I was saying before, that I truly don't hold Donald accountable for this. And again, people will think that's crazy. Why?
- [35:55]
Jim Acosta
Well, I hold them accountable, but I, I. Your point is correct.
- [35:58]
Michael Cohen
Every president has the right to come in with their agenda, whether we agree with it or we don't. In fact, much of what he comes in with I don't agree with. There are some things I do agree with, but there are things that most of the things I don't agree with or the manner to which he intends to put them forward. It's why the people around him need to balance him out. They need to be able to, like what I used to do on a regular basis, say, no, boss, no good. That's not going to, nor to your benefit. And explain to him why he has the right to come in with his own agenda. People didn't like Barack Obama's agenda. People didn't like Bill Clinton's agenda. They didn't like Trump's first agenda. They didn't like, you know, they just. They didn't like Biden's agenda.
- [36:48]
Jim Acosta
Well, but you.
- [36:50]
Michael Cohen
They. He has the right to bring in his own agenda. But there comes a point in time that you need balance in that administration. There is no balance.
- [36:59]
Jim Acosta
But he doesn't want it. He doesn't want it. This.
- [37:01]
Michael Cohen
He sees the test.
- [37:04]
Jim Acosta
He sees the problem with this first administration was that he listened to too many people from the establishment of the Republican Party who said, oh, you need this person in there. You need that person in there to sort of calm things down in D.C. he's not interested in doing that this time around. He's filled his cabinet with sycophants. The one person who did sail through the confirmation process, Marco Rubio, who a lot of people in Washington had a lot of faith and confidence in, was just sitting there on that sofa looking pathetic. That's the Secretary of State of the United States, just looking pathetic. And, you know, I don't think he's. And so that's where I do assignments the blame directly over Donald Trump's head, because he is the one who wants this. And it's because of his fragile psyche, his fragile ego, that he needs the strokers there. He needs the enablers there constantly. And it just makes me wonder, Enabler.
- [37:56]
Michael Cohen
Jim should be able to say to him, look, you and I are friends.
- [38:01]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [38:01]
Michael Cohen
Right. And, you know, I will agree with you, it's your show, whatever. But I will come back if you turn around and you want to say, you know, abc, that is so outlandish. I would say to you on the side, hey, Jim, it's probably not a good thing for you to say. It's not going to ignore to your benefit. Now, you do whatever you want. It's almost like, you know, friends don't let friends drive drunk. Right.
- [38:27]
Jim Acosta
It's the same thing.
- [38:28]
Michael Cohen
And it's why MAGA needs to change its name. It's like make America gullible again.
- [38:33]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, I saw you.
- [38:34]
Michael Cohen
Right. He actually sold a line of bullshit to the American people and rode that wave straight back into the White House.
- [38:43]
Jim Acosta
And it goes to this issue with the tariffs, which I'm sure he's going to tout tomorrow night. I mean, it's, it's timed where these tariffs are going to go into effect. It sounds on the same day that he's going to address this joint session of Congress, a la State of the Union. Speech. He thinks about things in simplistic terms in a sort of childlike way. I can wave a magic wand and I can do tariffs. I can wave a magic wand and I could do this on Ukraine. I could wave a magic wand and do this on immigration. And it just. In the real, in these Doge cuts and in the real world, you just can't do that sort of thing. Just doesn't work. I mean, the Washington Post, this is what people need to be bracing themselves for. The Washington Post reporting tomatoes, T shirts, oil cars, among the things that could get more expensive with the new tariffs. If you're pissed off about gas prices right now, wait till you.
- [39:32]
Michael Cohen
Guacamole or your guacamole. Avocado.
- [39:36]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. I mean, just in time for Cinco de Mayo. I mean, you know, listen, we're, you know, within the next couple of months, people are going to be feeling the pain from these cuts, and that's why the stock market went down today. People might say, I don't really give a crap about what happens on the stock market, but the financial markets are responding to what they think could be coming. I mean, there are some talk. I saw Mark Zandi, respected economist, was saying today that the Atlanta Fed was forecasting basically the GDP to go down by two and a half to 3%.
- [40:08]
Michael Cohen
Which is crazy over the next 40. It's crazy numbers. But I'll go one step further. I'll go one step further. Even when it hits you in your pocket, there's still so many MAGA that will not step away from the guy. They will not step away.
- [40:21]
Jim Acosta
They won't do it. That's true.
- [40:22]
Michael Cohen
But you know when they will and you know when all of America is going to really say, I've had enough, look at what Pete Hegseth just did, where he now dismantled, he disbanded with the stroke of a pen, the oversight for the Russian hacking that entire division. Think about what we're talking about here. What happens now with. When they do hack in to our systems and they disrupt everything, they're not stopping because Donald Trump is in the open.
- [40:52]
Jim Acosta
Cybersecurity. It's cybersecurity. You're lowering our defenses with an adversary. I mean, I got the dogs barking here because they can't handle this. This is pissing them off, too. I mean, but this is what people voted for. And you and I have talked about this before, Michael, to some extent, and you were talking about Tom Suazi town hall the other day. People are going to have to absorb what they have voted for. And perhaps in time, it will bring people back to their senses. I mean, I just don't think I agree with you that there are a lot of folks who are never going to give up on Donald Trump. They are ride or die with Donald Trump. But that's not the totality of the American voting public.
- [41:34]
Michael Cohen
Then they shall die because you don't lose, lower your force field. You don't lower your shield.
- [41:42]
Jim Acosta
Right.
- [41:43]
Michael Cohen
When the other guy is swinging an ax. Right. That's what he did. He took the shield, he threw it away and he said, here I am.
- [41:53]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, right.
- [41:54]
Michael Cohen
Because Putin fears him, that he's telling his people, do not dare, dare try to do anything to America. Right, right. Because Donald Trump is in the Oval Office if anybody wants to believe that bullshit. Right. You need to see a psychiatrist.
- [42:11]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And don't forget Donald Trump, not good when it comes to a midterm election. Yes, he can win presidential election. And contrary to what he said in that true social post, he did not win by a landslide. He won by a couple of million votes in the popular vote and just by a very slim margin from a percentage point of view in that regard. And so, you know, I covered him in the 2018 midterms when he got his clock clean. Then Democrats took control of the Congress in 2022, people took a whiff of what all those election deniers are doing trying to run for political office here and there. Got his clock clean there. And I suspect the way things are moving in the direction of right now, 2026, not looking good for him.
- [42:53]
Michael Cohen
Well, I don't even want to try to look ahead because I don't have the crystal ball. I'm concerned right now about the dismantling of our government agencies, about Elon Musk running around, jumping around.
- [43:07]
Jim Acosta
Well, that's true.
- [43:08]
Michael Cohen
Saturday Night Live hit it perfect on that Oval Office skit. Right. The only thing we were missing out of the lunacy that was going on, there was Elon Musk in the background holding a chainsaw.
- [43:19]
Jim Acosta
It's incredible. Well, and I'm glad you brought this up, because the last thing I want to talk to you about, Michael, about, is some great reporting in the New York Times. David Fernhold and his team, his colleagues at the New York Times, have a great story about these dodgy doge cuts, as I'm calling them. They're not all that they're cracked up to be. This is what the New York Times is saying. Elon Musk, Department of Government Efficiency has deleted hundreds more claims from its mistake plagued wall of receipts erasing $4 billion in additional savings that the group said it had made for US Taxpayers last week is, according to the Times, Elon Musk's government cost slashing initiative posted an online quote, wall of receipts celebrating how much money it has saved by canceling federal contracts. But guess what? Now the organization has deleted all of the five biggest savings on that original list, that wall of receipts, after the New York Times and other media outlets pointed out that they were riddled with errors. Here are some of the errors that they made. They said that they cut $8 billion over at ICE. The actual contract in question was worth $8 million. So they said it was $8 billion that they cut, but the contract in question was $8 million. This is, according to the New York Times, three $655 billion cuts at the USAID. This was actually a single cut that was erroneously counted three times as reported by CBS News, and a $232 million cut at the Social Security Administration here. According to the New York Times, Doge appeared to have mistakenly believed that the agency had canceled a huge information technology contract when it had only canceled about a tiny piece of it worth $560,000.
- [44:56]
Michael Cohen
Jim Kim, you're a nasty, outrageous. Jim, you're a nasty guy. And that's all fake news. That's all fake news.
- [45:04]
Jim Acosta
Thank you. I appreciate that. But I, and I, I'm sorry to bore everybody, bore the pants off everybody reading from the New York Times, but my God, you know, Elon Musk gets up there. It's a lot of smoke and mirrors and bullshit. And I think that's what Trump likes in Elon Musk. He gets up there, weighs a chainsaw around, wears this Occupy Mars T shirt. You're giving Zelensky crap for what he wears in the Oval Office, but yet Elon Musk is wearing goofy outfits in the Oval Office. And the cuts that they're claiming that they're making at Doge are bullshit. They're not, they're not making. They're sure they're making some cuts. They're happening here and there. Absolutely. But the ones that they're saying that they're the biggest ones that they're claiming aren't what they're cracked up to be.
- [45:48]
Elise Labott
No.
- [45:48]
Michael Cohen
And then they make all sorts of mistakes from the condoms in Gaza, which was really Gaza province in Mozambique, $50 million, which it amounts to a billion condoms. The whole thing is a lie. I mean, there's so many things that are inaccurate because they're rushing. That's the whole thing. One thing that Trump doesn't appreciate is that government is complex, that you don't want, as the President of the United States or as the secretary of one of the departments, you are obligated to provide correct information. I personally don't even know. And I read all day long, every newspaper. I read everything. Reports, I read it all. I don't know what Doge is. And I had a Republican who came on my. My, my podcast, right? Not my. My TikTok life. I had this Republican come on and say, that's because you stupid Doge's Department of Government Efficiency. I said, no, you schmuck. What I'm asking you, is it a department, is it an agency, or is it a program? Because there are very serious distinctions between those three words. One, you need somebody who's going to be appointed and confirmed by the Senate. Another one is a position appointed by the President. The other one doesn't exist. There is none. It is an advisory role. I don't even know what Doge is. And now we finally learned who's really leading it, but she says she's really not. She just learned that she is. They forget that government is complex. It requires a lot. And they think that they can do it with 25 loyalists, and that's really what they're looking to do, dismantle everything.
- [47:41]
Jim Acosta
And they can cause a lot of pain. There's no question about it. I mean, some of these cuts are real. When you're eliminating most of the usaid, you're causing a great deal of pain and suffering. And places like Africa, where they rely on USAID to provide critical services like HIV medication and so on. And. And so, you know, it's. It's sort of like, you know, Elon Musk is this guy with the chainsaw, but he is. He's sort of like the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. He's just going through there like a psychopath and cutting stuff that, you know, honestly, it's just going to hurt a lot of people.
- [48:20]
Michael Cohen
But you have to acknowledge something, too. Everybody was fearful of RFK Jr. Meanwhile, he stood up, right? Texas is undergoing now that measles scenario. And he turned around and he said, no, I want people to get vaccinated with the mmr, measles, mumps, rubella vaccine and so on. Finally, good. Good for him for standing up and for doing what we all know is right. But I tell you where I could never forgive Trump on. I can't forgive him onto it when he allowed them to start cutting from nih Cancer research.
- [48:57]
Jim Acosta
Cancer research for children what are you doing for children?
- [49:00]
Michael Cohen
What are you doing? Is there anything more precious in this world than children? And of course, it depends on who you ask that question. Right. You know, Trump may say, yeah, gold's more precious than my kids. Right. I, and I'm just being sarcastic now. There is nothing more important than the future of the world and the future. Our children.
- [49:22]
Jim Acosta
That's right.
- [49:23]
Michael Cohen
Children's children. So there's something that we can do to spare a child.
- [49:29]
Jim Acosta
That's right. Absolutely.
- [49:31]
Michael Cohen
How do you. This is.
- [49:33]
Jim Acosta
You got to have heart. You got to have heart, man. You can't, you can't be completely heartless. And when you bring in the world's richest band. He didn't become the world's richest man by having a lot of heart. I'm sorry, it just doesn't sound that way. It sounds like, you know, to accomplish whatever crazy cockamamie goal he has in his head, he will do just about anything. And I, I don't, I personally, I don't trust him. I don't trust him.
- [49:55]
Michael Cohen
I don't trust anybody that doesn't, that doesn't believe in children or.
- [49:59]
Jim Acosta
I, I agree with you 100%. And somebody. And cutting people at the, our nuclear security installation, Medicaid, Medicare or snap people.
- [50:11]
Michael Cohen
Yeah, people live thanks to snap, thanks to the food stamps and so on. And now, because it's not fitting into your doge ideology, you're going to tell people who are not capable of sustenance without snap, without the food stamps, that you're now going to tell them that you don't deserve to eat either.
- [50:36]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, it's, it's enough to get you pissed off on a Monday. And I think we've done that. Michael, good to see, as always, really appreciate it. We could go on and on like this, but we'll save. We got to save something for next time. Exactly. Michael. Monday sounds good. All right, see you. Michael. Great to see you, buddy. Thanks a lot. Appreciate it. Always, Always great to see Michael Cohen. I'm going to bring in Elise Labet now because. And Elise hasn't been on the show yet, but she and I go way back. She's a friend of mine. We have been colleagues before in the past. And I want to go back to this conversation on Russia and Zelensky and wrap things up a little bit at the end with the story that Michael was alluding to there a few moments ago. And that was on RFK Jr. And his vaccine. Flip flop. But there's Elise Labett right there. My old colleague Elise Lavitt Great to.
- [51:28]
Elise Labott
Be with you, Jim. Congratulations on just kind of going it. I think this is really where you need to be. And. And I think this is something about your show. Yeah, yeah. You need some. We need, Jim. Unplugged.
- [51:40]
Jim Acosta
Oh, thank you. I mean, I used to say the word bullshit from time to time, but I was a bit more judicious about it.
- [51:46]
Elise Labott
I said it once. I said it once.
- [51:47]
Michael Cohen
I remember.
- [51:48]
Jim Acosta
You did, too. Yes, you did, too. But here you could just say bullshit all the time, and it's totally fine.
- [51:52]
Elise Labott
Especially on a Monday and it's applicable.
- [51:55]
Jim Acosta
And on that note, let me just ask you this, Elise, because I was talking about this with Alex Vinamin at the top of the show. Talk about. But you have been there in the trenches as a reporter. You've covered the world. You've been all over the world with secretaries of state, you know, the foreign policy and security posture of the United States that we've had going back decades. What is happening right now, in your view, to all of that, given what we're seeing right now? I mean, Trump does not sound like he's backing off of these threats as they relate to Ukraine and Zelenskyy, and it sounds like he may pull the plug on American military assistance to Ukraine in this speech tomorrow.
- [52:40]
Elise Labott
All right, well, we'll break it down. I mean, look, you know, on my substack Cosmopolitics, I wrote Trump's pivot to Putin. I did it right at Friday. I wrote it Wednesday, right when. When Keir Stammer was coming. And it was all about, like, what's going on here? And, you know, Friday just kind of, you know, amplified it even more. But I think it. What we're seeing, it's not just about Ukraine. It's not just about one awkward conversation. Right. It's this kind of public unveiling of America's new alignment with, you know, an authoritarian power, I. E. Russia, over democratic allies. And we can talk about how happy Putin is, everything. I think it was Ben Rhodes that said on tv, like, you know, everything Putin ever wanted since the fall of the Soviet Union came full circle this week. And, you know, it didn't happen overnight, as we know, Trump has shown this affection for Putin. But, you know, when this reporter said to Putin, to Trump, or, you know, how. How are you gonna. What would do if Russia violated the ceasefire agreement? And Trump was like, they trust me. They trust me. And then he went on to talk about the whole hoax. Yeah, okay. He feels that a kinship with Putin, this is an emotional attachment he has to the guy. And it's not just about Putin. It's about this rules. And we've talked about it so much, and I know we're gonna talk about it more over the weeks and months to come, but it's this whole idea of The World Post World 2 Order, the foundation of American prosperity and security for generations, kind of going kaput. And it's. And what Putin is, what Trump is saying is, you know, Europe, Ukraine, little countries, they're not going to decide what happens in world affairs. It's big men, it's me, it's Putin, it's Xi.
- [54:31]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And it's disturbing. You know, I don't think he's fully thought this through, and he's not a fully thinking things through kind of person. Obviously, you can think through a scenario where, okay, Putin gets everything that he wants. Trump cuts off military assistance, the Europeans can't backfill, Putin decides to launch a big offensive and Ukraine possibly falls. And one just has to think, and at least you tell us, one has to think that Putin is not gonna be satisfied there. He's going to want to continue to do this. You and I both reported on this. One of Putin's goals has been to reconstitute the Russian empire, to some extent the Soviet Union, and that means bringing back those satellite states that used to exist during the Cold War. And that just. He's not gonna stop with Ukraine if he wants to satisfy that vision.
- [55:26]
Elise Labott
Well, he's not gonna stop, but I do wanna kind of inject a little bit of optimism into it.
- [55:34]
Jim Acosta
Do it. Yeah.
- [55:36]
Elise Labott
I don't think it's gonna just all go like that for a couple of reasons. First of all, let's say Trump really wanted that deal. He wanted it for America and the mineral wealth and all the things we've been talking about. But he also wanted to see that he was, you know, he was making the deal. And I heard that, you know, he was so excited going into the White House, into the Oval Office meeting. He was going to be the savior. And obviously it went south. Zelensky reigns on his parade. Doesn't mean that it's completely over. And I don't think Trump is going to wholesale cutoff assistance. Even if he said he'll say something dramatic tomorrow. We know he can't help himself. But I don't think he's going to cut off Ukraine aid wholesale because he doesn't want an Afghanistan on his watch gym. He doesn't want it. And so he'll do. He wants to be seen as doing the most while actually doing the least. And I think that he does believe that, you know, maybe in his heart of hearts that he's doing the right thing. I don't think he's like, let me screw Ukraine as much as I can and help Russia as most as I can, but the way he feels about Putin and the way he's organized, orienting this, obviously that's what's happening.
- [56:57]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And, but what do you make of when we saw over the weekend Zelenskyy meeting with the Brits, the French, you know, basically much of the NATO alliance without the United States standing there with Zelenskyy, can the Europeans really pick up the slack and do for Ukraine what the United States might not do anymore? Or was that kind of just a show there of support for Zelenskyy? What do you think?
- [57:21]
Elise Labott
I think it's a little bit of both. Obviously they can't do what the US can do with those big sophisticated weapons systems.
- [57:28]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [57:29]
Elise Labott
But they can do a lot. And you might have seen last week, I think it was Sir Alex Younger, he's the former head of MI6, and he did this very popular interview on BBC and he's like, listen, it would be hard, but we can do it. And so I think what you're seeing is a few things. I thought the British Prime Minister coming in last week handled Trump beautifully. He came in, he said, Europe wants a seat at the table and we're willing to pay for it. We wanna put in troops, we wanna help carry our share. And so I think, and then you saw like all these European leaders over the last few days saying we're gonna need to go it alone. Maybe he could say, yeah, Europe, go it alone. Does America want to be isolated with just Putin? I don't think so. So I think if the Europeans can be, if the UK even could be a bridge between Zelensky Europe, the United States, I think this French plan that's coming out, which would be a one month ceasefire and then we'll talk about the rest. It could be a face saving way for everybody.
- [58:36]
Jim Acosta
Interesting. And then I, you know, these tariffs may go into effect, it sounds tomorrow. And it sounds, it sounds like it's coinciding with Trump's big speech before Congress again. Talk about the twilight zone. Bizarro world. We're slapping tariffs on products coming in from our two biggest, two of our biggest allies, Canada. I mean, it doesn't get bigger than that. I mean, there are next door, our next door neighbors. So are the Mexicans, of course There's a little bit more of a complicated relationship because of the border, border issues and so on. The Canadians are so hopping pissed off at us right now. I mean, we're at a time when we're detaching ourselves to some extent from Europe. It doesn't sound like a great time to do the same thing with the Canadians. It just, you know, what do you make of this?
- [59:25]
Elise Labott
Or the Australians or anybody? I mean, look, couple of things here. First of all, if Trump wants to get out of Europe, if he wants to get out of the Middle east, if he wants to get out of everywhere, doesn't he realize that allies can help him? That's a lot of things that they can do. They're good for business. He doesn't realize the strength of allies like America first, but doesn't mean America alone. And then the other thing is, and I think we should talk more about this another time, and you were talking about it with Michael a little bit about usaid. What does the US have? Not just military might, but soft power.
- [60:01]
Jim Acosta
Right.
- [60:02]
Elise Labott
And by, you know, giving up usaid, which is like the biggest piece of soft power the US has, by, by sanctioning our allies with tariffs, it's just kind of giving away the store without getting anything in return. And I mean, we don't have the industrial base now to like build everything American. We're going to need those products. And Americans who voted for Trump. You already talked about it with Michael, you already talked about it with Alex. Like, yeah, you know, people are getting fed up. They don't, this is not what they voted for.
- [60:31]
Jim Acosta
It's a great point. Yeah, it's a great point. And you know this all too well from traveling to all these different countries. If you want a country in Africa to be on our side versus the side of the Chinese, the best thing that you have going for you is USAID and those programs that do so much good in countries that, that just need the help. And we pulling our people out of those parts of the world, pulling our resources out of the parts of the. It just sounds self defeating as hell.
- [60:58]
Elise Labott
And I'll tell you one other thing, Jim. You know, people that know Africa pretty well and our old colleague Zane Virgie is doing a lot of great stuff in this space. There's a lot of growth, there's a lot of innovation.
- [61:11]
Jim Acosta
That's true.
- [61:11]
Elise Labott
There are a lot of young people. And if Trump was like this forward looking businessman, he'd look at Africa and he'd see that's where the future is. And you Know who sees that? Xi Jinping.
- [61:22]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, it does.
- [61:23]
Elise Labott
And that's why China is like, eating up. Is eating up Africa. That's why the Saudis are looking into Africa, the Gulf is looking into Africa, to kind of, you know, retreat from Africa, you know, not exactly a good business move, I'd say.
- [61:39]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. Well, Elise, it was great reuniting with you. It's great. Sort of like being at the water cooler again.
- [61:45]
Elise Labott
Yes.
- [61:46]
Jim Acosta
Let's do it again. And the substack is cosmopolitics.
- [61:49]
Elise Labott
That's right.
- [61:49]
Jim Acosta
And it's Elise labitt, one of the best diplomatic reporters in Washington. It's so good to see you and.
- [61:55]
Elise Labott
Great being with you. Look forward to doing it again.
- [61:58]
Jim Acosta
We'll do it again. We'll do it again and again and again. Great to see you. Thanks a lot.
- [62:02]
Elise Labott
Thanks for having me.
- [62:03]
Jim Acosta
Thanks for. Thanks for coming on. It is great. It's. One of the great things about this show is like last week when I had April Ryan on, I just, you know, it's like, I. I got my friends here. You know what I mean? And Elise is just one of those people. Whenever you run into Elise, you know, around town in D.C. you just strike up a conversation with her, and she's. She's just as warm as you saw right there and so knowledgeable and. And, you know, when she disagrees with me, she says, you know, Jim, let me just think about it a different way. She doesn't say, you dummy, this is how it really is. Which is I, I do appreciate that. I do want to thank Alex Vindman for coming on the show today. His new book, the Folly of Realism, is out right now. He's terrific. Michael Cohen of Michael Monday. If it's a Manic Monday and a Michael Monday, my thanks to Michael and my thanks to Elise Labett as well. And I do want to leave us with this. And I, you know, I'm gonna. I'm do some hard thinking about this. I hope everybody else does, too. I suppose if you're Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. A great time to embrace vaccines is when you're the HHS Secretary. So we do appreciate RFK Jr doing this, but I do want to leave you with this because it's sort of an oh, really moment. I talk about the Dear Leader moments. This is sort of an oh, really moment. RFK Jr doing a vaccine flip flop. CBS News reporting that the HHS Secretary, Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. A noted vaccine skeptic, voiced support for the measles vaccine on Sunday amid a deadly outbreak in the Southwest Mainly in Texas. This has been very worrisome to me. An unvaccinated child who died in late February. Texas was the first US Fatality from the highly contagious disease in a decade. Talking about measles, of course, recently confirmed as HHS secretary, Kennedy has previously made numerous false and misleading claims. CBS reporting about the safety of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine, the MMR vaccine, and had downplayed the growing outbreak, saying annual outbreaks were not unusual. But on Sunday, Kennedy said he was deeply concerned about the recent measles outbreak in an op ed on fox. So, I mean, you know, people might say, oh, Fox and roll your eyes. It's probably a good place to put that op ed because we need people to go out there and get their vaccines. And I see somebody saying he didn't completely backtrack that much. I agree. Now you're not going to hear me say, throw a ticker tape parade for RFK Jr. The amount of damage he has done to this country is astounding. The way he has, he has undermined American confidence in vaccines is astounding. And you know, this is not really making up for any of that. But if he can to some small extent convince all of the people out there who buy into this nonsense and BS about vaccines, if, if they can be told like, hey, yes, please have your kids get the MMR vaccine, this would definitely do some small piece of good. And I just want to leave it with that. I, I, I'm not giving him a pass. I'm not doing any of those things. It is horrifying that he's the HHS secretary. But it is interesting, isn't it, when you get in the job, when you get in the job and you find out that the real world is not in line with your cockamamie conspiracy theory ideas. And I just wonder out there, what, what are all the other vaccine skeptic folks in that community thinking about this right now? That one of their leaders, RFK Jr. Is putting this out there, what it tells me, and this goes a little bit to what Michael Cohen and I were talking about earlier in our conversation. I'm going a little bit over. When you work for the government, when you work here in Washington, lives are at stake. Lives of people, of Americans are at stake. Children's lives are at stake. And I, you know, we don't know the circumstances of this little kid and why he was not vaccinated. I don't know the answer to that question. Question. I hope and pray it has nothing to do with the vaccine nonsense coming from people like RFK Jr. Who is now finding it important enough to put an op ed on Fox that maybe you ought to go out and get your MMR vaccine. This is the kind of stuff we all did as kids for years in this country until Covid came along and there was an industry, there was a grift for people to raise concerns and questions and so on about vaccines. And it's shameful. It's absolutely shameful. But I will say there might be just some small bit of good that that he's done in all this. And I, you know, I did want to leave it with that. It's sort of an oh, really? Moment. Oh, really? RFK Jr. Now? Now you're okay with vaccines? Gee, thanks. It would have been nice if you had said that for years. But it just goes to show you, when people's lives are at stake, maybe some of these conspiracy theories can go out the window. Out the window? I just saw somebody say, what about the flu vaccine? I get my flu vaccine every year. Like, what is the big deal? You know, somebody chiming a nice flip flop. Rfk. Absolutely. A total flip flop.
- [67:39]
Alexander Vindman
All right.
- [67:40]
Jim Acosta
Again, I went a little over there, a little bit longer show today. But everybody, thanks so much for tuning in. I really appreciate it. Somebody's saying bring on Fauci. I would love to bring on Dr. Fauci. He is. He's a terrific American. But in the meantime, thanks, everybody for watching. Still reporting from Washington, I'm Jim Acosta. Duke is around the corner over here. I got to go take him for a walk. He's. He's been giving me that look. We got to go. Have a good evening, everybody. We'll talk to you tomorrow. Take care.
- [68:06]
Michael Cohen
Bye.