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The Jim Acosta Show
American Democracy Under Assault: Congressman Dan Goldman, Barbara Starr and The Atlantic's Tom Nichols
00:56:14
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- [00:00]
A
Back. All right, welcome to the Jim Acosta Show. And Donald Trump has now made his intentions crystal clear. During a speech to the nation's generals earlier in the day, Trump said he plans to use the US Military to go after what he described as, quote, the enemy from within. This comes as Trump has been weaponizing the Justice Department to go after his perceived political enemies. But my big guest this hour to talk about this is Democratic Congressman Dan Goldman of New York. He has just introduced legislation to stop political prosecutions. And, you know, I do want to ask you about that, Congressman. First of all, thanks for joining me. Really appreciate it.
- [00:40]
B
Oh, my pleasure to be with you, Jim.
- [00:42]
A
Yeah. And there's the. There's the announcement right there from your office about this legislation that you're announcing with Senator Blumenthal of Connecticut to go after these political prosecutions. I do want to ask you about that in a second, but we're hours away from the beginning of a government. Government shutdown. Your thoughts on where things stand? I mean, it sounds as though if you look at the, the crazy video that Trump put out, the AI Video that Trump put out about Hakeem Jeffries, Leader Jeffries, and, and Senator Schumer, it sounds like he's in no mood to negotiate and that this shutdown is going to happen.
- [01:17]
B
Yeah. I mean, it first and foremost emphasizes why we need to have statutory regulation of AI that it was obviously completely fabricated, but how many Americans think it's real in addition to just being racist and, and disgusting? We. I'm sitting here in my office in the Capitol, Jim. All of the Democrats are here in Washington, D.C. as we're just a few hours away from a government shutdown. We are here ready to negotiate, ready to discuss the ways that we can keep this government open and that we can make sure that our veterans get the resources they need, that our military, that the military gets the money, that they are deserved. While the generals are chatting about invading American cities, we're here ready to negotiate. And the Republicans are on vacation. And that really does tell you everything you need to know. The Republicans believe that because they are in the majority, they can just do whatever they want. And that's what they did with the big ugly bill. And so they axed health care for more than 17 million Americans. We had. We could do nothing because they're in the majority. We certainly voiced our opposition, but we had no vote. Well, in the appropriations process, you need to get 60 votes in the Senate, which means you need Democratic votes, which means you need a bipartisan piece of legislation. And so why Republicans think that they should just push forward a completely partisan, one sided, non negotiated plan and that we should just roll over after they have spent the entire summer taking away food, nutrition benefits, taking away health care from millions and millions of Americans that we could do nothing about and that now we're just supposed to go along with them. It is preposterous. And they've created a health care crisis around the country buy with these cuts. And let's be clear, it's not just the people who lose their insurance who are going to be impacted. Every American is going to have their costs go up and they've created this crisis and they are unwilling to work with us to resolve it. And so here we are, ready, able, willing to work in a bipartisan way for the American people. And the Republicans are literally, Jim, they're not in Washington, D.C. they are on vacation.
- [04:13]
A
Yeah, I mean, Congressman, we just had a comment come in from one of the viewers saying do not cave, please. I mean, I'm sort of wondering, you know, why Democrats are even talking to the Republicans at this point. I guess you want to be the good government folks that you are, but they're in the majority. They control the White House, they control the Congress. I'm a little perplexed by this narrative, you know, from the Republicans. Why won't the Democrats talk to us? They're in charge.
- [04:40]
B
I mean, they're in charge and we are here. We're ready to talk to them. They're not here. You know, the President had that meeting yesterday with leadership and I, my readout of it is that Leader Schumer and Leader Jeffries laid it out very clearly as to what our position is and why their position makes no sense. But it's there. As we saw with the big ugly bill. They're in total control in Washington. If this government shuts down, it is simply because they let it shut down and they're not even trying. They are not trying. And so it's, look, it's, the reason we're here is because government shutdowns are really serious. They are really bad for the country. And it's not just the federal benefits and the federal payroll. It's so many businesses that depend on our government. Our contracts are who people going to lunch. You know, this is, this is going to hit Americans very hard at a time when inflation has risen, raised costs, when health care costs are going up, when rents are going through the roof, when everybody is struggling more right now than they did when Donald Trump started his presidency. And now we're going to layer on additional struggle and they're in control. So it's on them.
- [06:18]
A
Yeah. I mean, you have other things that you're working on. I, I understand we just mentioned at the beginning of the program that you are working on legislation with Senator Blumenthal of Connecticut to protect the American people from these political prosecutions. There's the announcement right there. Your thoughts on Trump going after James Comey? I mean, you know, you can call an indictment. I mean, it's really, it's the President of the United States going after one of his perceived political enemies and the fact that they had to put In a different U.S. attorney in that very important district. You know, this, this line of work here, the Eastern District of Virginia is a very important part of the U.S. attorney chain. And they put somebody in there who has no experience doing this kind of stuff. And she was leaned on by the Justice Department, by Pam, Bonnie and others to do this. And it's been done. Your thoughts on where this could go from here?
- [07:10]
B
Well, I can tell you one thing is it is not going to go to a conviction.
- [07:16]
A
Yeah.
- [07:18]
B
One way or another, this case is a dead ass loser. It will probably be thrown out before it even gets to trial. But certainly if it gets to trial, there's almost, there's no way any 12 unanimous, any 12 jurors will unanimously decide that it that he is guilty. That to me is important, but secondary. It's important because it just re emphasizes the obvious brazen and naked politicization and weaponization of this prosecution. If it were a legitimate case, you know, if there was a lot of evidence laid out and if the grand jury had fully supported it unanimously, which they did not. And that's only a probable cause standard. That's not even beyond a reasonable doubt. Like you would have a trial. You know, then we would just be having a conversation about Donald Trump directing the Department of Justice to indict one of his adversaries. But because there is no case here, we now have seen laid bare how weaponized and politicized this Department of Justice is because the career and respected U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia refused to charge this case.
- [08:45]
A
Right.
- [08:46]
B
Recognizing that there is absolutely no merit to the case. So Trump fired him. And then Trump directed Pam Bondi to put in his place one of Trump's personal lawyers, an insurance lawyer with almost no law legal experience and none related to anything related to criminal law.
- [09:11]
A
Right.
- [09:12]
B
In directs Pambani to put her in that same seat for one purpose and one person only to charge James Comey. And I mean, it was almost a comedy of errors when you read the transcript of her talking to the judge after the grand jury had rejected one count altogether, which, Jim. I mean, I know this gets inside baseball. I. I was a prosecutor for 10 years. To have a rejection of a indictment that's presented only by the prosecutor, only by prosecution witnesses with a probable cause standard is almost unheard of. I mean, the. The joke, of course, everybody knows is you can indict a ham sandwich. I guess you can indict a ham sandwich, except for barely. Jim Comey.
- [10:01]
C
Right.
- [10:02]
B
So she took it in solely because she is. She was put there as a political hack. And the reason why Senator Blumenthal and I got together to work on this bill over the weekend is because this is simply a bridge too far. We have really gone over, over the deep end now. And certainly it was something I never expected to see when Donald Trump signed executive orders directing the Department of Justice to investigate some of his political adversaries. But when you are now seeing the actual justice system used so obviously for political purposes, we are now a banana republic. I mean, we're not even close to a democracy. This is what we go around the world telling other countries, yeah, do not do this. And you cannot have a country based on the rule of law that. That allows for corruption, like political corruption, like this. And so what I'm trying to emphasize to people and what Senator Blumenthal and I are trying to do is we are trying to put the brakes on this, not just because of the Jim Comey case and not even if it becomes Letitia James, who also, clearly, there's no case there. Adam Schiff. I mean, all of these would just be blatant political prosecutions.
- [11:27]
A
Yeah.
- [11:28]
B
Undermines every single investigation and prosecution that the FBI and the Department of Justice does, because no one can be sure that the reason that case is investigated is purely based on the facts and the evidence and the law. And that is so important for our rule of law, for our system of equal justice under the law. And this indictment and any other future ones that similarly follow this pattern will undermine our entire criminal justice system.
- [12:04]
A
Yeah. And I mean, if anybody needs a reminder at home that things are not normal right now and that we're moving in an authoritarian direction. I mean, you had the President, United States down at Quantico today talking to the nation's generals. They brought in these generals from all over the world. And I have to get your reaction to some of what. What Trump said earlier today, Congressman, because he was basically calling on these generals to go along with his plans to invade American cities, Democratic cities, and, and sort of take over from a law enforcement standpoint. And he was referring to people as the enemy from within. Let's listen to a little bit of that and I'll get you to comment. And on the other side, they've done.
- [12:43]
D
To San Francisco, Chicago, New York, Los Angeles. They're very unsafe places, and we're going to straighten them out one by one. And this is going to be a major part for some of the people in this room. That's a war, too. It's a war from within. Controlling the physical territory of our border is essential to national security. We can't let these people in.
- [13:06]
A
Yeah, I mean, Congressman, to hear the president, United States, talking about places like New York City, you know, you're, that's where your district is as being part of a war zone that Trump has set his sights on. I mean, your response to that, it.
- [13:22]
B
Is absolutely preposterous, of course, And I think anybody who's right thinking knows that. So the question becomes, why is he doing this? Because none of these cities need federal intervention. None of the governors have asked for it. And are, is, are, is there crime in some of these cities? Yes, frankly, less crime than in a lot of Republican districts and states around the country, if you actually look at the data. But yes, of course, we have to address public safety. But the idea of him using this as a pretext, and it's not even pretextual, he's actually saying that this is the enemy, this is a war. Who's, what's the, who's the war with? New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles? Like, what's the war? Is the war Republicans against Democrats? Is that what he's trying to say? And to me, it is. It's, of course, a distraction from his terrible policies, costs going up and certainly things like the Epstein files. And don't think for a second that part of the reason the Republicans are not here today is so they could avoid swearing in. Adelita Grijalva.
- [14:41]
A
Right.
- [14:42]
B
Who would be the 218th and final signature on the discharge petition that would force the release of all of the Epstein files documents, not just the ones that Trump is trying to pick and choose, that don't include his name or his buddy's names. But it's, it's also, I think, really dangerous because it is trying to manufacture a crisis so that Donald Trump can continue to take more and more authoritarian actions and so that he can usurp more and more power and Ultimately, my view is that he is looking ahead to 2028 where he will say that for cockamamie made up reasons like he's talking to these generals about that. Well, look, we're being invaded from within, from the enemy within, and we've got to keep our borders safe. And that's what our focus has to be. We can't possibly have an election under these circumstances.
- [15:49]
A
You really think that could happen?
- [15:51]
B
Yeah, I think that's where a lot of this is heading towards. I think that's why he's floating a third term. I think that's why he's talking about this language of a war of enemy within, of invasions, of securing our border. Our border is cure.
- [16:05]
A
Yeah.
- [16:06]
B
And frankly, he deserves credit for that. But there's no invasion, there's no war. This is all manufactured and made up by him to usurp more power for himself.
- [16:22]
A
Yeah.
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B
And the sad part, Jim, is that you have congressional Republicans who are just sitting there silently as.
- [16:32]
A
And I'm trying to think of what the reaction would be if Barack Obama or Joe Biden had said, we're generals, we need you to send the military into Republican cities to go after the enemy from within. I mean, can you just. Boggles the mind.
- [16:47]
B
Of course, you know, we know exactly that this Republican Party in part has a, a secret power. I have come to conclude it's not that they're invisible, it's not that they can fly. It is that they have no shame. There is not an ounce of shame in any of them that they would realize what they are complicit in doing is really the, the undoing of the democracy that we know what comes after that and what comes from here. I don't know.
- [17:27]
A
And so do you dig in your heels. I mean, to me I kind of wonder what the playbook is when we go into shutdown mode because, you know, I kind of wonder, and I've asked the question, why fund what he's up to? Why give him a blank check? Why give him a checkbook to do this kind of stuff?
- [17:44]
B
You mean during if there is a shutdown?
- [17:47]
A
If there is a shutdown, you know, to come back out of a shutdown and he needs your help, why not say, you know, we need more than just assurances on healthcare. We need you to stop doing what you're doing on a whole host of things.
- [17:58]
C
But yeah, well, I mean there, to.
- [17:59]
B
Be clear, there, there is more that is involved in these negotiations, I think. Yeah, it gets a little inside baseball process oriented, you know, when we're Talking about rescissions and impoundment and what is really just Donald Trump signing a bipartisan law and then turning around and undermining that law, like literally just undoing parts of it, because he can do that with only 50 senators, not 60. So you can bet that's a part of this.
- [18:34]
A
Yeah.
- [18:34]
B
But know, part of the reason why I think it's important to focus a little bit on more on the Republicans even than Donald Trump is. You know, we're often asked, you know, what are you doing? Like, stop it, stop him. And the reality is, and I warned about it, many of us warned about it, we saw this coming. And he still won the election and the Republicans still won both the House and the Senate. In the House, as you know, we literally cannot do anything in the minority that includes putting legislation on the floor. It includes subpoenas and compelling testimony or compelling documents. This discharge petition that we're talking about, about the Epstein files has four Republicans on it because we need Republican help. And so part of what we are doing is trying to educate the American public and trying to join together to oppose this, because Donald Trump may not care what I think or frankly what, you know, people in red districts, in purple districts can think because it's not going to affect his reelection. But Republican members of Congress do care. And part of this that we have to recognize is it's not just the Supreme Court that has to be called upon to restore order and democracy. Congress has its own independent obligation to uphold the Constitution, to obey. We take an oath. And with Democrats in the minority and Republicans in the majority, the Republicans are the ones who need to stand up for democracy. We will be calling it out, we will be yelling. I, I filed a lawsuit in a particular case where we can. But most of the time, Democrats cannot file a lawsuit on behalf of Congress because Congress is viewed as one body, one entity, majority controlled again. And so it really is we, the people that are going to have to unify and speak out and make it known that this is not okay. And make it known to those vulnerable Republicans in the Senate and the House, because ultimately, if enough of them feel like their seat is in more jeopardy in a general election against a Democrat than in a primary against a Trump backed primary opponent, they will change their tune.
- [21:20]
A
I think you're right. All right, well, I guess fasten your seatbelts, I guess, is where we are right now. But Congressman Dan Goldman, thanks very much for your time, really appreciate it and keep us posted on that very important legislation. I mean, the President should not just be able to throw people, you know, throw indictments at people that he considers his enemy. But Congressman, thanks. Really, really appreciate the time.
- [21:41]
B
You got it, Jim. And you hit the nail on the head. That's the most important part of the legislation which prohibits the president or anyone in the White House from making directions or instructions or suggestions about individual criminal cases. And that's ultimately what.
- [21:59]
A
All right, thanks, Congressman. Yeah, really appreciate it. All right, good to see you. That's Congressman Dan Goldman of New York. And I want to go to one of my longtime colleagues, Barbara Starr, who is standing by because, Barbara, you know, I thought about you today as I was watching both the Defense secretary, or do they call him the war secretary now? I don't know what you call him. Pete Hegseth and, and Donald Trump down at Quantico in what was an absolutely surreal scene. It must have been an incredibly surreal scene for you, given all of your years covering the Pentagon and watching this unfold. It's just absolutely bananas. But you're, that's my technical term for it. What's your term for it?
- [22:40]
E
Yeah, a lot of fruit involved in all of this. You know, I gotta tell you, my, my texts were blowing up from friends and colleagues like, can you believe it? Look, I mean, let's start with Hegseth. I thought it was really unfortunate that once again, he is the Secretary of Defense and he engaged in personal insults against specific retired generals. Unnecessary, very undignified and completely unnecessary. If he thinks it makes him look tough. I think he should consider the fact that many people in that audience were very dismayed by it and thought it made him look downright silly. His solution is to repeat his message points. No more woke, no more diversity. Fitness standards will be maintained. Great. The fitness standards will be male fitness standards. He seems to continue to believe that women qualified for combat jobs under different, more lenient combat standards. They most certainly did not. But then you transitioned to the president coming on and it was the same general theme and this theme of literally weaponizing the US Military against people in this country you had were under invasion from within. I think it was the president that talked about using American cities as military training grounds.
- [24:17]
A
Right, right.
- [24:18]
E
What on earth are people, as the congressman just said, exactly. Who's the enemy here that they're fighting against? I find it baffling. I find it concerning as a citizen. But most of all, I think it's unfortunate for the US Military. And you know, the younger people who are joining today may not be of the same bipartisan, non political persuasion as the military has been for so many decades. But they're about to find out what the president and the Defense secretary think they should be doing.
- [24:56]
A
Yeah. And I understand Tom Nichols is joining me as well. Staff writer for the Atlantic, trusted voice writer on defense issues. We can bring in Tom whenever he's ready. But, Barbara, I, I guess, you know, I, I was playing a little bit of the sound. I think I have one other piece of sound that we can play. Let's, let's play that. And, and let's talk about on the other side, one more piece of sound from Trump talking about the enemy from within with the generals and started yet.
- [25:25]
D
Last month, I signed an executive order to provide training for Quick Reaction Force that can help quell civil disturbances. This is going to be a big thing for the people in this room because it's the enemy from within and we have to handle it before it gets out of control. It won't get out of control once you get involved at all. They all joke, they say, oh, this is not good.
- [25:53]
A
And I think Tom's getting his, his camera ready. But, Barbara, I mean, my question is, is that, my understanding is because of Posse Comitatus, the Posse Comitatus act, you're not supposed to use the military for domestic law enforcement reasons. And the, Trump is clearly saying that's what he thinks he's going to do here. That's, that's what he's asking the military to do here. And at some point, doesn't, I mean, don't these generals have to tell Trump no? And I guess that is when the rubber meets the road and whether they lose their jobs as a result of defying illegal, what they deem to be illegal orders.
- [26:29]
E
Yeah. So here's what we're talking about. Right? Number one, the US Military in this country is not permitted, except in extraordinary circumstances where certain declarations, certain laws have been met about insurrection, not permitted to conduct military operations in American cities. Their job in the United States. Think back to Katrina several years ago. Emergency response, assisting people, helping out. When local government and state government and the National Guard is overwhelmed in the event of a crisis, that's when they move in. That's when they help local police departments, local fire departments, and they assist, they do not engage in operations against American citizens, against people on the street. So this is going to be an issue, and I think it's going to land squarely in the lap. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Dan Kane, he is the one who is going to have to discuss with the president sooner than later what is legal and what is not because US Troops are not permitted to follow illegal orders. Let me just not get too far in the weeds, but what's a legal order in any military operation? Even in a war zone, a commander has a legal finding from a military lawyer that it's a legal operation. So what does that mean? It means you have a determined target, that you have proportional force against that target, that it is ethical to engage it and that it meets U.S. law. All of those things are going to have to happen. And if all of those things don't happen, that's not a legal order, and the US Military cannot follow it. They will have to stand up.
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D
Yeah.
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A
And Barbara, I mean, I heard Pete Hegseth, you know, going after retired generals by name. He mentioned Mark Milley by name. And, you know, you know this all too well. I mean, you can't miss the context here if you read between the lines. I mean, Milley is somebody who defied Trump. He is, he is one of several former military who defied Trump during the first administration. And I, I assume the reason why he's being namechecked in this setting is to say to the generals who were assembled today, don't be like this or we're going to come after you, too. You're going to be deemed Persona non grata by this administration. Was that your read of it? What was your sense of it?
- [29:09]
E
Well, my sense of it is Milley would tell President Trump in his first term, and remember, Millie retired a scheduled retirement before Trump took office on the second term. But in the first term, he told Trump things that Trump did not want to hear, but he considered it his responsibility. And every chairman of the Joint Chiefs that I've personally known for the last couple of decades has done the same thing. General Kane, the current chairman, will have to come to that point in the road where, where he decides that he is going to do that. I don't think Pete Hegseth is going to ever tell. We have no track record. Let me be very clear. There is no track record that Pete Hegseth is ever going to do anything but say to Donald Trump, you bet. Yes, sir. That is Hegses makeup. He's given no indication. Maybe he'll change, but he's certainly not signaling to anyone, publicly or privately, that he will do anything other than agree with the president. So illegal orders simply cannot be followed. And all of this really should be stopped before it gets to that crisis point. That's really, the value of the senior US Military, the. Their whole aim is stability in operations, stability in the national security and defense of the country. They want this all stopped before it gets to a crisis point.
- [30:42]
A
Right. And I think Tom Nichols is standing by. Now, Tom can join us, a trusted voice on a lot of these issues. Tom. I mean, I guess we're past the point where I should say, Tom, were you surprised by what you heard Donald Trump say today and Pete Hegseth say today? But what are the implications of what he said today? Because it was very disturbing to hear him. He's. He's just out, out and out saying it right to the, to the general's faces. We want you to send the military into American cities to go after the enemy from within.
- [31:13]
C
Yeah. I mean, part of the problem is that the only really coherent part of the speech was that which he almost added as kind of a trollish sort of, you know, afterthought. I mean, clearly is enthusiastic about sending troops into American cities, and then added that bit about, well, I told Pete maybe we ought to use them for training. I mean, talking about using American cities, American civilians, as a training exercise. You know, I'll just point out that the. The same people that support President Trump now were completely manic about conspiracy theories like Jade Helm, where they were worried that the military was going to invade them and do exactly all the kind of things that Trump's talking about. The other problem I think here is that the generals who may never have watched the Trump rally, maybe they've never been to one, they may not have watched much tv, but they found themselves right in the middle of one, and they got a full, you know, 40 minutes or so of 100 proof, undiluted Trump.
- [32:21]
A
Yeah.
- [32:22]
C
And I had to wonder if they walked out of there thinking, you know, the commander in chief is not okay, that there's something, you know, wrong. This is not the way a normal person speaks, and certainly not in that venue. It's one thing to say, well, he goes to a rally, he doesn't really mean it. He says things, he kind of shoots his mouth off. It's another thing entirely to go to before America's top generals and admirals and, you know, talk about the Gulf of America and, you know, the auto pen and Barack Obama and why I deserve a Nobel Prize. I mean, it really was bonkers stuff. And, you know, I have to wonder how many people in that audience really. I mean, I've always been concerned about the president's emotional and mental instability. I just wonder how many people in that room were starting to see the same thing because they don't watch him every day. In the same way they, they live in a world of things being on paper. They live in a world of, you know, memos and emails. But this was, I think for many of them the first time they actually sat there and got a, you know, full, a full helping of undiluted Donald Trump.
- [33:32]
B
Right.
- [33:32]
A
And, and I mean the point of having an apolitical or non political military is that we don't have to worry about the military being used for political reasons in this country. And Trump is just out and out saying that that's what he wants to do. And I guess, Tom, the other question is, and Barbara, I'm curious to get your thoughts as well. When Pete Hegseth goes out there and makes it sound as though our military is incompetent or not up to snuff anymore because of wokeism and so on, I find that to be, and I'm just going to use a technical term here, a crock of shit. I mean, I just, that, that to me is, is just so laughable. Our military is still by leaps and bounds the most powerful military in the world. And Tom, I guess you first your thoughts on this. It just, it's, it just sort of spinning a yarn out of nothing, it seems to me. And it's just talking points for a Fox News audience.
- [34:26]
C
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of what Hegseth and Trump did today, they did for an audience that wasn't actually in that room.
- [34:32]
A
Yeah.
- [34:33]
C
So let's just put accept that every time, especially Hegseth, every time he opens his mouth, he's either talking to Trump or he's talking to Fox. But you know, it's also insulting because when the President comes out and says, you know, a year ago we were a dead country and our military is the worst and you know, things were terrible. These are people that have been in the military for 25 years, 30 years. When you say, you know, our military 10 years ago was just terrible. Well, you're talking to somebody who was maybe a colonel or a captain.
- [35:05]
A
Right.
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C
You know, or brigadier general ten years ago.
- [35:08]
A
I mean, you know, we took out bin Laden.
- [35:09]
C
You did this, right?
- [35:12]
A
Yeah, yeah. And Barbara, you're, I mean, we took out, I mean the U.S. military took out bin Laden. I mean they took 10 or 11 years. But it, there have been successful U.S. military missions or I mean, you're, I'm probably taking this off on a tangent, but your thoughts on just this, this crazy Trump.
- [35:31]
E
Yeah, do we have a couple hours for me to say everything? I think I. I'm. I'm just. I'm gonna say it. I'm appalled. I covered the US military for the last 30 years. So let me start with this. All this business I rebuilt, whether it's Hickseth or Trump, I don't care. I rebuilt the military. It was failed. It was falling apart. It was full of decay. I heard that today. Really? You rebuilt. You rebuilt it in eight months. You saved it? I don't think so. You know, I get. We now have the best weapons. Any weapons that are in the field. And eight months into a Trump presidency were planned, funded, and built under a Biden administration, if not the first Trump presidency under the Biden administration. The recruiting business, a lot of internal initiatives were begun under the Biden administration that helped turn recruiting around. So, you know, I find this ridiculous in its sort of grammar school simplicity. And if they think it works with. I agree with Tom. This was for a different audience, but let's just say, you know, they're trying to gin up support from this audience, and the likelihood is they want them to go out and also deliver these message points to the troops. The bottom line is the audience that Donald Trump and Pete Hegseth talked to today, these men and some women, but mostly men, they have more combat experience in the last 20 to 25 years than Pete Hegseth can even fathom. This is a group of officers that have grown up in, if not the first Gulf War, the war against Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, the conflicts of the last several years, Syria, Yemen, the unrest in the Middle east, the concern about North Korea's ballistic missile programs. These guys have all seen serious military operations, and many of them have stood at gravesides burying young Americans in cemeteries across this country. So they don't need to really hear about the warrior ethos. They have buried American troops in cemeteries that lived and died under the warrior ethos. So I have very little patience for all this.
- [38:09]
A
Yeah. And, Tom, I mean, I think Hegseth and Trump know deep down that they don't really have the respect of the generals in that room. And so that's what makes this even more disturbing and unsettling, is that Hegseth and Trump were basically delivering a message today. It seemed to me that they're being warned in advance. Either you go along or your job's in jeopardy. I mean, Trump was saying to the cameras on his way to Quantico earlier today, if I don't like the looks on some of these generals, I Might fire them right on the spot. I mean, he's making it clear they're going to be gone if they don't. If they don't do what he says. But I don't know, maybe it's just all performative bs.
- [38:55]
C
I mean, Trump. Trump always talks about firing people on the spot, but historically, he can't even bring himself to do it. He gets other people to do it, or he does it in a tweet. It's pretty rare that Trump's ever walked in and, you know, really done the Apprentice thing where he says, you're, you know, you're fired. I think, you know what was interesting about what Hegseth did? You're right, Jim. I think Hegseth called this meeting because he knows they're rolling their eyes at him. He knows they're laughing at him. And he said, okay, I'm going to get you all in a room, and. And by sheer force of my personality, I'm going to stare you all down, and I'm going to make you respect me as the Secretary of Defense. And of course, that what we saw today is that blew up in his face. He looked. He looked silly. I'm sure most of the men and some of the women, as Barbara said, probably a few women, but mostly men, most of the people in that audience just shook their heads and said, I had to go travel halfway around the world to be told that, know, Pete Hegseth doesn't like seeing fat people in the hallway. You know, that this is really. It was juvenile. It was amateurish. And I think Trump actually became part of this. And this is just a guess on my part. You know, Barbara knows the ins and outs of the Pentagon far better than I ever will. But it. It looks like from the scheduling that he called this and he kind of heard stuff that, like, you know, generals and admirals are saying, why am I getting. What, you know, who's Pete? Eggs that drag me, you know, into.
- [40:22]
A
Right.
- [40:22]
C
Pep talk. And they said, maybe we better get the President because that's. That's a little more firepower. That's a little more star power. And at least they can say, well, I had to sit. I'm, you know, the. It's one thing to say, I don't care much. Repeat, exit sec does come and go. But. But in the military, the president is, you know, a revered figure. The office is a revered office. And so I guess they said, you know, get the President in here to give them a talk. And I think it was short notice and it showed because you know, so many people have always put it out that Donald Trump always sounds like he's giving a book report of a book he hasn't read.
- [40:58]
A
Yes.
- [40:59]
C
And today you really saw that he sort of got a. Stood up and said, wow, hi. And, you know, he was an inch away from saying, I don't really know what I'm, why I'm here, but okay, I'll start doing the greatest hits. You know, Joe Biden, Barack Obama, the Gulf of America, you know, the Nobel Prize. And, And I think that was, I think the whole thing was a hot mess that came about because Pete Hegseth, and in this, I suspect Hegseth is a lot like Cash Patel, you know, leads a, an organization full of professionals that they know are laughing at them and don't respect them.
- [41:33]
A
Yeah, no, I mean, my thought, Barbara, was, was, did Donald Trump glom onto this thing? He saw, oh, they got all the generals to come from around the world, and then Trump wanted in on the action because he thought, you know, this is an audience he would like to speak to. But, I mean, you were saying earlier when we got started on this conversation that your, your phone was blowing up. I'm just kind of curious, you know, to the best of your ability to keep sources and methods as private as possible, what was the general sense of what you were hearing from. From that building?
- [42:06]
E
You know, I think that if a text could somehow show someone rolling their eyeballs, I guess there's emojis that do that. Right. I think that's, that's what you would have seen today. I, I want to make a couple, a couple of additional points. The military is glad, happy that there's some additional funding for some key programs that are important to them. So they see President Trump supporting them in that. So, for example, shipbuilding. I think there's a general assessment that more money needed to be put in the US Navy for shipbuilding. But then you see Trump today talking about essentially that he wants pretty warships, that he's an aesthetic person, and he wants stealth warships that look nice, and the ones he's got don't look nice. He doesn't care if they do the job, they don't look nice. So, you know, this is the problem for the U.S. military. They, they want the modern weapons. They want additional stealth fighter aircraft. One of the things I think we heard maybe nothing about today, in the middle of all of this sort of macho firepower, lethality weapons against enemies, et cetera, et cetera, being very physically fit. You didn't hear a lot about modern Intelligence. You didn't hear about putting the need for the most modern advanced intelligence gathering, some discussion of space force, but not advanced satellites, radars, and very advanced artificial intelligence, the tools that the military needs that have really very little to do with lethality, but enable lethality on the battlefield. So I thought the whole thing was somewhat stuck, you know, in 1972 rather than in 2025. The, the two of them could have used a heavy dose of learning about modern warfare.
- [44:20]
A
Yeah, well, I mean, and part of it, Tom, is they just don't. Let's just say they don't. And this is my view, they don't belong in that room. They don't belong in front of that audience. I mean, to hear the President talk the way he did today, I think should send a chill down the spine of every American. I mean, we were just talking to Congressman Dan Goldman about this. The fact that, I mean, we sit from the fire hose of authoritarianism on a daily basis now, to hear the President, United States, talking about sending troops into New York, San Francisco, he's just naming off Democratic cities. It's. It's staggering. It's stunning. I don't know what the generals do about this, honestly, if they come, if, if Trump comes to them and says, we're doing this.
- [45:04]
C
Well, the problem is that in the military, the, the presumption has to be that orders are lawful. And it's pretty, you know, the requirement that officers not follow unlawful orders is really meant to deal with unlawful orders that come from other officers or other parts of the military. No one's really thought through what happens if the president gives you a directly unlawful order, and how would you show that it's unlawful? I think the military has always. One of the blessings of the American civil military relationship is the US Military could always rely on the system, the constitutional system around the president to prevent orders like that from getting too far out of the gate and too close to them, and they can't count on that anymore. I mean, when, you know, when Jim Mattis was Secretary of Defense and Trump would call up and said, we're going to whack Assad, or Mattis would say, well, okay, and hang up the phone and say, well, we're not going to do that and kind of let the idea die, there's nobody to do that anymore. And I think Trump revels in doing things that he thinks are transgressive, doesn't care about the Constitution, doesn't care about.
- [46:14]
B
The rule of law.
- [46:15]
C
I think the only bright spot is that so many of These things fall apart when he actually tries to move them forward, like going to Chicago. Then he backed off and then Portland, and now that's been scaled back because he doesn't quite understand what's going on there either. But I don't know how senior officers deal with that. There has to be somebody in the room who says, Mr. President, that's a bad idea. And, you know, we're not going to do that. You know, we don't, we don't go in and start shooting at American citizens, you know, as Trump wanted to do in 2020. So I think this is, I think we're in a, in a civil military crisis. We have been for a while, and I think today really brought that to a head. Jim, you said, you know, those two people don't belong there. Trump belongs there simply by virtue of having been elected.
- [47:03]
A
Right.
- [47:03]
C
I mean, he's not fit to be president. You know, you may feel that, I may feel American people chose him. He's legally the president. Secretary Hegseth has no business being there and can be removed at any time. And the problem here is that nobody is stepping forward to say, look, you know, including Republicans in Congress stepping forward and saying, well, the president elected by the people, but this guy has got to go. This is, we made a mistake. We shouldn't have, you know, we shouldn't have nominated him. I mean, these, these people are out of control because they feel that they have cowed any possible source of opposition or legal opposition. And I think, I think they're going to find out that's not true. But in the meantime, you know, the damage being done to our norms, to our values, to our traditions and to the rule of law is, is just astounding.
- [47:54]
A
Yeah. Well, Tom and Barbara really appreciate the thoughts, as always. I'm glad I had you here for your insights, because my insights that can only go for long. But both of you really appreciate the time and the expertise. Thank you so much.
- [48:07]
E
Good to be with you.
- [48:09]
A
Thanks a lot. Really appreciate it. Gosh, Matt, can we put what was the comment that just popped up on the screen? Do Republicans want the military to shoot citizens? That's a comment from one of our question from one of our subscribers. Do Republicans want the military to shoot citizens? That's. That is the question. That is the question. This evening. The president of the United States went before the nation's military, the generals who were brought in from all over the world, and he has directed them, he has, he has informed them that he will be directing them to send the US Military into the streets of American cities to go after what Trump calls the enemy from within? I would love it if one of my colleagues over at the White House press corps would ask Trump this question. Who is the enemy from within? Who are they? Is it us? Is it Democrats? Is it progressives? Is it people to the left of center who have occasionally voted Democrat in this country? Are they independents? Who, maybe they voted for Trump once, but maybe they voted for Barack Obama back in 2008? Precisely. Who is the enemy from within? And if we are gathering in these cities and taking to the streets and using our God given American right to pursue a redress of grievances against our government, to speak out against our government, are we to confront, are we to be face to face with the men and women of the uniform of the American military? Is that, is that what is coming next? Are we to follow their orders to cease with our protesting, to cease with our demonstrating, to cease with speaking out? Because the dear leader doesn't want us doing that? Because he can't handle criticism, because he can't stomach dissent, which is a patriotic thing to do in this country. And again with that, with that viewer, with that subscriber just asked the question, do Republicans want the military to shoot citizens? Because that is the scenario that Donald Trump constructed earlier today. That is the scenario that Donald Trump laid out before the American people, laid out before our US Military generals earlier today. Does Donald Trump want a civil war in this country? Does somebody want to ask him that question? It seems to me somebody needs to start asking some of these questions. And here we are just hours before going into a government shutdown. A government shutdown, by the way, which will result in members of the military not getting paid until the shutdown is over. That's a part of this. Air traffic controllers not getting paid until the shutdown is over. Government employees not getting paid until the shutdown is over. How, how does Trump get off directing the military to go after American citizens when he, he won't even pay their damn paycheck after we go into a shutdown. He's not even going to pay their, their paycheck. He's not going to put money in their bank accounts while he's telling them to go after the enemy from within, when he's telling them that you're going to have to invade American cities to go after the enemy from within. Just the other day he was talking about invading Portland, Oregon, where crime has plummeted. I looked it up. Crime has plummeted during the first half of 2025 in Portland, Oregon. But he's watching some video on Fox or some ass wipe on social media pop off on Portland. And so he gets it in his head that it's now time to go after Portland. And I just want to ask the question there's there, there are two questions I want to ask. One is to the president of the United States, who is the enemy from within? And you might say I take this a bit personally. He has referred to me, he has referred to yours truly, this reporter as the enemy of the people. But I would like to know, besides the press, who does he view as the enemy from within? And to Republican lawmakers, the question should be asked precisely what that viewer was asking earlier, what that subscriber was asking earlier. Do Republicans want the military to shoot US Citizens? Maybe I'll go up to Capitol Hill and ask that question. Because, folks, we don't have to go down this road. We don't have to go down this road of a brother versus brother, sister versus sister, Democrat versus Republican. Trump is fantasizing about wanting to start a civil war in this country. The generals were there sitting stone faced, listening to this bile, listening to this hatefulness, listening to this poison. And it seems to me somebody needs to start asking these hard questions of Donald Trump. Not, oh, what are you going to do about a shutdown? Oh, you know, why won't you negotiate with Schumer and Jeff? I mean, enough of that, enough of that. Somebody needs to go to the president of the United States and ask him that question. Who is the enemy from within? Donald Trump? Who is the enemy from within laid out for us. We want to hear. You want to do the weave, do the weave on that. Explain who the enemy from within is. The American people want it. They want an answer to that question. They're demanding answers. My thanks to Congressman Dan Goldman of New York. My thanks to Barbara Star. My thanks to Tom Nichols of the Atlantic, and thanks to all of you for watching. Really appreciate it. Still reporting from Washington, I'm Jim Acosta. Have a good evening. I'll see you next time.