← The Jim Acosta Show
The Jim Acosta Show
Rick Wilson and Molly Jong-Fast talk about cuts at FAA and other critical programs... and what people who care about democracy can do plus Ret. Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling on Ukraine and Gaza.
00:55:47
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- [00:00]
Jim Acosta
Beginning this new adventure. And that is asking the question, what the Musk. And I know you know where I'm going with this, but in a new filing in court, I kind of do this thing where I give folks the news and then we talk about it. The Trump administration said in a court filing that Elon Musk is not the administrator in charge of Doge. I'm sure you've seen this. He's a senior advisor to the President per declaration. So, okay, that begs the question, who is minding the store? What the hell is going on? Who is in charge here? We don't seem to know. That's why I ask, is today co President's Day or Shadow President Day? Because I guess that would make Elon Musk sort of like the George Washington of shadow presidents. I mean, I just want to point.
- [00:46]
Molly Jong-Fast
Out that this will make Elon. Elon would have the same title as Anita. Don, you'll remember Anita Dunn as the person who went to different parts of the government and told them to let her and her teenage hackers into different elements of the federal government, right?
- [01:07]
Jim Acosta
Yes. I mean, Rick, I mean, I was under the impression for weeks that Elon Musk was running the show, that he was directing these 20 year old kids to go into various departments and agencies and vacuum up data at the Treasury Department until they were blocked. And over at the Social Security Administration, which has apparently resulted in a top level official there saying, I'm not doing this, I'm not going along with this.
- [01:30]
Rick Wilson
Right.
- [01:30]
Jim Acosta
The White House is trying to make the case, oh no, no, he's not in charge. He's not really in charge. He's sort of in charge, but he's not in charge.
- [01:38]
Rick Wilson
I have a theory of the case here, Jim. Yeah, look, Elon Musk and Donald Trump have decided to split the presidency. Elon is head of government like a prime minister would be and Trump is head of state like a king would be. But I think what's happening here, I interpret this as a little differently. I think this is Susie Wiles making her play to take and I'll tell you why, saying he's not a government employee. And by saying he's not running Doge, there's a much lower degree to which he should have access to any of this confidential and classified information. And I think this may be Susie Wiles being clever and boxing Elon in a little bit on, on, on his role because Elon has had enormous powers in the government so far. He has had the ability of, of life and death over government programs. He's had full access to any kind of information anywhere he wants it. And so I, I, I, I suspect that might be what's happening here. But I, but if it's not, it's a mistake on the part of the White House and their legal people to put Elon out in the wind. Now, now these states attorneys generals are going to say, who's this rando? Nobody that you don't know that isn't running anything. What's he doing going through my Social Security records in these state attorney generals, I think you're going to give Elon a very, a very hearty wake up call.
- [03:00]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And Rick, go ahead, Molly.
- [03:02]
Molly Jong-Fast
I just want to add that like the state attorneys generals, I've interviewed a bunch of them and they were, I interviewed the one from New Mexico in July and he was saying that, you know, they were ready, that they had just been spending all their time focusing on the lawsuits that they would bring. So I think that's a good point that Rick has, if that is how it ends up.
- [03:26]
Jim Acosta
And Rick, I mean the question I wanted to ask you because you were a well known Republican strategist for many years, I thought this was the sort of thing that would irritate the living hell out of any tried and true conservative. This idea that you're your data with the government could be susceptible to being vacuumed up by various nefarious folks inside the government, all run by a tech billionaire. I mean, that just sounds like something that would make the National Review explode on your coffee table.
- [03:57]
Rick Wilson
I can remember back in the day of Obamacare, Republicans were saying, do you want Barack Obama and George Soros to have access to your medical records?
- [04:06]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [04:06]
Rick Wilson
And, and, and it led to Republicans losing their minds over and over and over and over again.
- [04:12]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [04:13]
Rick Wilson
And now it's like, yes, please, Daddy, spank me harder. They don't care about the things they cared about at one point. And this idea that they're going to take away your ability to protect the confidentiality of your Social Security records, your tax records, I mean, Elon's people are trying to get into the IRS as we speak to take control of, of the IRS database that controls audits, collections and tax status of every taxpayer they want in that I can't wait for the delight, the delighted cries on Wall street when Elon Musk calls for a round of funding for something and says, hey, I know you're actually worth this amount.
- [04:57]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [04:57]
Rick Wilson
Or calls a member of Congress and says, how did you get to be worth $20 million, Congressman? I'm going through your tax right now.
- [05:05]
Jim Acosta
Well, in the irony of that is that Donald Trump has not paid his fair share in taxes for years. He has claimed so many times that he's under audit and so on. Now we're going to have Elon Musk, you know, getting your IRS information. I mean, you just can't. It's just boggles the mind.
- [05:20]
Rick Wilson
You can't make it up.
- [05:23]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yeah. And I mean, I would also add, like, Donald Trump's the first president not to release his tax returns in modern presidential history. I mean, and it's sort of. I think what's interesting is they consider. They keep saying, you know, that this is about transparency when clearly it is not about transparency, that this is about democracy, when it's clearly not about democracy, that this is about, you know, that all of the sort of words they use have taken on almost no meaning at this point. You know, they're just sort of using these projections, these vague tropes.
- [05:57]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And I don't know if you guys saw this, but apparently Steve Bannon, the former chief White House strategist, said something in an interview with a British podcaster that Elon Musk is a, quote, parasitic illegal immigrant. He made this comment. He made this comment to a British news site called Unherd, and he said this. He said, quote, musk is a parasitic illegal immigrant. He wants to impose his freak experiments and play act as God without any respect for the country's history, values or traditions. Have I fell down the rabbit hole, Rick and Molly? How is Steve Bannon channeling what I'm thinking?
- [06:38]
Rick Wilson
There aren't many days where you and Molly and I could all go, you know, Steve Bannon has a point there. He has a point. I mean, he's not like, when the.
- [06:49]
Jim Acosta
Spectrum bends around and, right, the horseshoe has met.
- [06:53]
Rick Wilson
Right. But he's not wrong that this is a really dark moment brought to us by a guy who came into this country allegedly on an education visa, maybe legally, maybe not, maybe with some emerald shoved up his backside for his dad, maybe not.
- [07:14]
Jim Acosta
And.
- [07:15]
Rick Wilson
And it's just so murky. And he is a guy who is the welfare queen of all welfare queens.
- [07:22]
Molly Jong-Fast
Right. I mean, I think, look, Elon got here from government subsidies for climate change, right? That's how he got here. Electric cars have government subsidies. But I would add Bannon. And look, a lot of stuff Bannon says, and I do not agree by any stretch of the imagination, but Bannon is a populist, and Bannon sees that a lot of these policies. Right. I mean, Look, Elon is about to try to take away, to take a sledgehammer to Social Security and Medicare. And, and I think Bannon understands that those are Trump voters that he is punishing. And if Republicans want to win elections, taking away entitlements, which wildly unpopular is going to be a real problem for them.
- [08:07]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [08:08]
Rick Wilson
You know, Jim, I think Bannon made a point the other day. He said a lot of our voters are on Medicaid.
- [08:14]
Jim Acosta
Yes.
- [08:14]
Rick Wilson
A lot of our voters are on Medicare. A lot of their voters are also on Social Security, disability, snap, tanf. A lot of them receive farm income from USAID programs that no longer exist. The farmers in Wisconsin who voted for Trump 90 to 10 learned this week, dairy farmers, that USAID were the people that were buying a ton of their cheese every year.
- [08:41]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [08:42]
Rick Wilson
Now they're stuck with millions of tons of cheese because it's not going to go overseas. Now all the finding out is going on across the board.
- [08:52]
Jim Acosta
And speaking of that finding out, I mean I do want to pass this along to folks and get you guys to weigh in. The Washington Post reporting that many federal government employees dismissed over the weekend were chatting and texting with one another. They dubbed the error ridden run of firings. This is according to the Washington post as the St. Valentine's Day Mass. This according to the Washington Post, the Federal Aviation Administration let go of hundreds of technicians and engineers just weeks after a mid air collision a few miles from the White House killed 67 people. This is also according to the Washington Post. FEMA, which handles the nation's natural disasters is preparing to fire hundreds of probationary employees according to four people familiar with the situation. I mean this is with the agency already stretched in then after the wildfires in California and the floods in Kentucky and the list goes on and on and on. The cdc, the nih, National Science foundation apparently today. But to me, the one that typifies it the most is the Federal Aviation Administration. Guys. What they're doing at the FAA as these incidents have been happening, I mean it just boggles.
- [10:03]
Mark Hertling
It's.
- [10:05]
Molly Jong-Fast
But the one thing I would say why it shouldn't boggle the mind is because this was everything they talked about in Project 2025. Right. This was the idea of dismantling the federal government, getting away, getting rid of, right. Getting rid of weather services, privatizing everything that can be privatized. Like this is like the whole style stripping of the American government. What I think is the most ironic and the thing that really sticks in my brain is here's the richest man in the world who is doing this. So like think of the Carnegie's. I mean, this is like reverse philanthropy to the, you know, the worst way, by the way. Yeah. Just speaking of the nukes for one second.
- [10:41]
Jim Acosta
The nukes?
- [10:42]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yeah, you saw that comment 10 hours this weekend. They had fired the people who were in charge of the nukes. I guess they rehired some of them. But imagine the like level of care that is going into this. Zero, right? Like literally zero.
- [10:57]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, go ahead, Rick.
- [10:59]
Rick Wilson
I'm sorry. I spoke to someone at a federal agency yesterday who told me that when the Doge people came in, they, they did the whole like, what is your job? Pregame questionnaire. They couldn't understand what the people were doing, so they just said, we'll take every third person on the list.
- [11:16]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yeah.
- [11:17]
Mark Hertling
Wow.
- [11:17]
Rick Wilson
I mean it is so random and so sloppy and, and, and yeah, you know what, you might want to cut government spending, but the people that keep our nuclear weapons from getting either A, the wrong hands or B, going off accidentally, I think we keep those people on board. Just call me crazy, but yeah, I.
- [11:35]
Molly Jong-Fast
Think that might be a good call. But I also think, I mean, one of the things I'm just reading this chat and I just want to say is that the women, you know, we're seeing run for something. I know you guys know her. She was talking about how so many of these federal employees who are getting fired are going to run for office. So the good news is that these people know that they are important to how the federal government runs and that they. We will not. We have not seen the last of a lot of these people.
- [12:03]
Jim Acosta
Well, and you remember Trump's raking the forest. What about ravaging the Forest Service? NBC fired thousands of Forest Service employees. That's right. And this is, according to NBC News, a freeze on the hiring and onboarding of thousands of federal firefighters could have deadly consequences as the national wildfire response operates as a, or at a diminished capacity. This is according to a federal firefighting captain who spoke with NBC News. I mean, guys, this, this is going to give folks, I think, an appreciation for what the federal government does in so many different ways. And one of the things that I've been thinking about is we're worried about the economy. And Trump was talking about during the campaign, no taxes on tips and so on. There are so many federal workers, they're not just here in Washington D.C. they're in all of these far flung places from here to Timbuktu. And you talk about waiters and waitresses, bartenders baristas, people who work in hotels, all of those kinds of jobs are gonna be affected if you have thousands, hundreds of thousands of federal workers laid off, not going on government trips, not doing the work that they do, worried about the kind of money that they're spending.
- [13:10]
Rick Wilson
I think that's so right, Jim. And look, this idea is like Doge says, they've saved $100 billion already, but they won't specify what it is. And they, and they don't have justifications for the cost to America. Look, I could say I saved $5,000 this month because I didn't pay my mortgage, right? That has bad consequences. So these people aren't paying for things that the country that our taxpayers have decided and through Congress, we have decided that we are going to invest in as a country. And so the danger of that is they just don't know what they, they don't know what they don't know.
- [13:46]
Molly Jong-Fast
Right. And there are, look, with Project 2025, which is the template for this, there were intended consequences, right, like getting rid of the Department of Education. But then there are unintended consequences. Like if you look at the first of Trump's admins, that ended, right. How did that end? That ended with a pandemic. Now, obviously that was not the pandemic, was not his fault, but the inability to handle it, and the million, you know, probably more people died because of it, that kind of thing. So I do think we're going to see unintended consequences and it feels like we're hurtling towards something right now. You know, just sort of willy nilly cutting the federal government never seems like a good plan.
- [14:27]
Jim Acosta
Now, Rick, I'm so glad that you're here because I know you did all that work with the Lincoln Project. You know, you, you guys were very instrumental in 2020. Donald Trump won in 2024. What is the answer? What is how, how should folks respond to this? How should Democrats respond to this? How should Republicans who are sick and tired of Trump and have been sick and tired of Trump for eight years, 10 years, whatever it is. I mean, I talked to James Carville the other day. He was saying, no folks should just sit back, let Trump fall on his face. I'm a little worried about what happens between now and then. What's your sense of it, Rick?
- [15:03]
Rick Wilson
Well, look, I think in terms of communication about what Trump is doing, you can't just sit back and let it play. You have to constantly keep up a line of pressure on Trump and his allies. You have to keep seeking to Divide. Trump and Musk, Trump and Wiles, Trump and Miller, all the people that are inside that world. It is like a, it is like a bunch of rabid cats in a bag full of meat. And they're all fighting each other for power and position. So the more you divide them, the more you, the more you wedge them, the harder it is for Trump to execute on some of the worst of these ideas.
- [15:40]
Molly Jong-Fast
But, and you, you've got, you also need to narrate.
- [15:43]
Rick Wilson
Yeah. Yes. You've got to do the legal side. And when you combine the legal, the messaging and the political.
- [15:51]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [15:53]
Rick Wilson
You end up with something that can be a countervailing strategy. I don't think that it works to have the geriatric rapid response team from the House going out every day with a five paragraph press release. I think it needs to be on social. I think it needs to be faster, lighter, funnier, younger, sharper, edgier. And I think all these messages have to not only talk to the Democratic base, it needs to talk to Republicans. Now, we at Lincoln, we never wanted to talk to the MAGA group because we're like, they're not movable. But now he's moving them for us. He's hurting them. So the message from Democrats and from center right movement people and from, from, from pro democracy people needs to be over and over again. They are hurting you. You are the sucker in the deal. Trump is doing things that are going to hurt your life, your career, your stability, your money, your family.
- [16:44]
Jim Acosta
Well, and I wrote a substack about this the other day and I started with America, you've been had, because this just in, you know, Trump out on the campaign trail said on day one, we're going to start lowering prices. Has not happened on day one. He said we're going to end the war in Ukraine. That has not happened. Talking to Mark Hertling in a little bit on the program, but I mean, time and again, and we all know, I mean, this is the guy who said that Haitian immigrants are eating cats and dogs. We know he's full of shit a lot. But at the same time, there was a messaging problem during that campaign and it seems as though that is in the process of being corrected.
- [17:24]
Molly Jong-Fast
So I want to talk about the messaging thing because I think this is a real issue. Part of the problem is that Democrats, and this is, I think, a problem with consultants, the consultant class had made Democrats afraid of their own shadows. And so they are terrified of fucking up. So you have Democrats who are so passive and don't necessarily volunteer. You Know, they sort of run from interviews and then you have people like Trump who's on everything all the time and it doesn't matter and like what you saw with Biden World. And I would say this to them again and again and again because Biden had a lot of good policy, very popular, but because they refused and they did this thing where they were aggressively boring for the first two years and nobody would cover them and they'd be like, haha, we got you. Yeah, well here's what happened. Donald Trump ran for president for four fucking years and Democrats disappeared. They didn't even know Biden was president. And it turns out you can't do that. And even like the day you remember those Google searches, the day of the election where people were like, is Joe Biden still on the ticket? You can't do that. And I keep saying to them, it doesn't matter if you're not out there 24 7, no one gives a fuck. It'll just. They will drown you out and they'll.
- [18:39]
Rick Wilson
Flood the zone and you will drown.
- [18:43]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, no, and I, this is the.
- [18:44]
Molly Jong-Fast
Problem with our governor right now. So I live in New York and we have a governor who is very polite and who can, who does not do interviews and who is not a very good orator. And she's fine, she's certainly fine. But the reality is she's setting it up for the Republican to eat her lunch. And you know, we have this big problem with the mayor. The mayor is clearly, if anyone watched that Fox and Friends interview where insane. Does anyone want to talk about the Fox and Friends interview?
- [19:16]
Jim Acosta
As I like to say, saying the riot part out loud. I mean, this was, you know, for folks who need to be caught up to speed. A lot of our folks are engaged and very informed. But basically Tom Homan, the border czar for Donald Trump, was on Fox and Friends, essentially saying to Eric Adams, who is there sitting with him on Fox and Friends, I'm going to be, quote up your butt or something like along those lines. Vulgar. Along those lines, if you don't help us with this, I guess it's a quid pro quo, we're going to get you off the hook with this corruption, alleged corruption stuff in exchange for helping us rounding up migrants in New York City, you know, the home of the Statue of Liberty. It was repugnant to watch. Absolutely disgusting.
- [20:02]
Molly Jong-Fast
Shocking. Yeah, you guys should look it up. Shocking. And at the end it became clear, anyone who watched that knew that Hallman was saying, we have stuff on you and you're going to do what we want. And so now we have a moment where our governor has an opportunity to do the right thing and to take a risk. And I don't know that she will, but I certainly hope that she does. And I think that, again, one of the things Democrats can learn from Trump, and again, nobody is a fan of Trump's here, but they can be strong and they can project strength and they can do things and not worry.
- [20:38]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, go ahead, Rick.
- [20:40]
Rick Wilson
Democrats learn to need to learn the power of assertion. Say what something is. Say what something must do. Say that Eric Adams must resign. And Governor Hochul does not want to do this because, as Molly said, she's fine, but she's not confrontational and doesn't want to upset this like careful Jenga tower of various people in New York who have political ambitions or what have you. But Eric Adams is now a Trump person, a MAGA person. He is in bed with the devil.
- [21:13]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yes.
- [21:13]
Rick Wilson
Take him out. Deputy mayors resigned, you know, worked in the mayor's office as a senior advisor to Giuliani back in the dawn of time. If four deputy mayors walked out the door back then, it would have been a nuclear explosion. Nothing else would have been covered in New York for weeks on end.
- [21:31]
Jim Acosta
That's right.
- [21:31]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yeah.
- [21:31]
Rick Wilson
This is a guy who is corrupt, and now he's made a corrupt deal with a corrupt administration. Kathy Hochul could do America a great service by removing him. That takes away something of power that Trump has. It's insane that they do it.
- [21:46]
Molly Jong-Fast
And also the other thing is, even if she doesn't remove him, which I think she should, she should be every day out there like, this guy should resign. You should watch the Fox and Friends. You know, all of this, like, clarity, no mealy mouse mouth stuff. Just like he should resign to the point clear. This is what's going on. America does America. New York City deserves a real mayor who isn't in the tank for Trump.
- [22:10]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And. And New Yorkers want toughness. They don't want this. Well, you know, let me stick my finger in the wind and figure this out and I'll get back to you in a week. But the thing that really riles me up and pisses me off more than anything about this, and it gets back to a larger issue, and that is, you know, the Justice Department going after FBI agents if you worked on the January six case, or Justice Department officials going after prosecut leaders if you were involved in the Donald Trump criminal prosecutions. That is not America. And I've said it before, and I will Say it again. That is not the American way of life. And if we are going to abandon the idea and the principle of equal justice under the law, that nobody is above the law, there is a slippery slope that we may go down that we're not going to be able to recite from. And that is the thing that scares me. And letting Eric Adams off the hook because he's going to help out with ice and Dr. Phil's going to be out there and all of this other shit. That's not America, for Christ's sake. And I just.
- [23:07]
Rick Wilson
It's giving third world kleptocracy vibes.
- [23:10]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, yeah.
- [23:11]
Molly Jong-Fast
But it is also important to mention that the FBI, known liberals at the FBI. All Republicans. Yes.
- [23:20]
Rick Wilson
All those Soros deep staters.
- [23:22]
Mark Hertling
Right.
- [23:23]
Molly Jong-Fast
I mean, if. Can you imagine if, if, like, if, if George Soros did a 15th of what Elon Musk does on a daily basis?
- [23:33]
Jim Acosta
Obama and Eric Holder, for example, I mean, my God, it would be pitchfork and torch time in Washington D.C. rick.
- [23:41]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yes.
- [23:41]
Jim Acosta
Where are the Republicans in the House and in the Senate?
- [23:46]
Rick Wilson
In the House, they are basically now, because of redistricting in the states over the last 10 years, they're all insane. Every district in the country with a handful of maybe eight or nine districts. They are so MAGA that it doesn't matter. They're going to be all Trump all in or worse than Trump, which is actually a slight advantage. But in the Senate, they are convinced that they're saving their tough votes for later, which I don't know if you can vote for. Rfk, Tulsi Gabbard, Pete Hegseth and the rest of this clown car of lunatics. When is your tough vote gonna happen? Molly and I were on a stage with Karl Rove last week or week four, last, I guess. And they're saving their votes for later when it counts. I'm like, when? Yeah, the ones that are up for reelection are all afraid of a MAGA primary. And unfortunately for all of them, they're never going to cast a tough vote. They're always going to be ready. You know, maybe they'll cast a tough vote if it happens after their state filing deadline.
- [24:54]
Molly Jong-Fast
Right. So the good news is they're all compromised. There are two Senate seats to pick up here, and I think that that should be the top line. Which is. Which is Collins in Maine. She may not even be running again. We've talked about this again. She talked about this before. She hasn't raised a ton of money. Susan Collins in Maine and then also in North Carolina. And I think that it's worth talking about this for a minute because that North Carolina seat, while North Carolina is a sort of swingy state, if this is the same kind of midterm as it was in 2018 when Democrats were able to really deliver and perform. And you can run against an Elon Musk. And that's why I think, like, what. And again, I like Carville. He's my buddy. But it's worth remembering, like, there is no mainstream media. Right. It is dead. And I take no pleasure to say this because I personally am a part of it. But so Democrats are gonna have to narrate what's going on, and otherwise people will not know. Right. Otherwise Elon will say, I mean, we saw this today with Sean Duffy. Sean Duffy blaming Mayor Pete for the plane crashes that happened under his watch. So Democrats have, like, two jobs. One is to keep democracy, protect norms and institutions, and the other is to narrate what's happening in a way that's clear and concise. And we've talked about this a lot. So those are two pickup opportunities. I also think there are other seats. I mean, we can. But it's a tough map. It's not a great Senate map for Democrats.
- [26:31]
Jim Acosta
And you already have some Senate Democrats announcing that they may not run for reelection. Correct.
- [26:36]
Molly Jong-Fast
You have Gary Peters.
- [26:37]
Jim Acosta
Gary Peters, yeah. And Tina Smith. I believe in Minnesota as well.
- [26:41]
Molly Jong-Fast
Tina Smith. But that, But Gary Peters. And I say this with all the love in the world for Gary Peters. The people that will run for that seat are much more exciting than Gary Peters.
- [26:50]
Rick Wilson
Yeah.
- [26:51]
Jim Acosta
Could you get a people to jet?
- [26:53]
Rick Wilson
Good guy. Good guy. But, yeah, good communicators getting into that race.
- [27:00]
Molly Jong-Fast
And Tina Smith is Minnesota. And that there's a real open question about whether or not we see the governor Tim Walls runs, whether we see. I mean, there's a lot of good people running in that situation.
- [27:17]
Rick Wilson
And they're also trying to get the right. Is trying to get Ilhan Omar to run.
- [27:22]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, well, good luck with that. Yeah. And the damnedest thing, Rick, you were talking about these votes for people like Tulsi Gabbard and RFK Jr. And so on. And where are we in the universe when Mitch McConnell is sort of becoming like the John McCain? And again, I'm not going to make an equal comparison there. That would be unfair.
- [27:48]
Molly Jong-Fast
Not yet, anyway.
- [27:50]
Jim Acosta
McConnell is kind of emerging as the guy who might be a bit of a maverick from time to time. As somebody saying right now. Too late, Mitch, I, I 100% agree with you. There's a there's a whole what's past his prologue for sure.
- [28:04]
Rick Wilson
Yeah. No forgiveness for Mitch for taking the advice of a guy named Josh Holmes who runs a podcast. Now what was Mitch's senior adviser who just before the Senate trial on Trump's second impeachment for a launching a terrorist attack on the Capitol said well we need to keep Trump happy so we can keep a permanent governing coalition of working class voters. And McConnell took the bait and told his people don't, don't do it. Yeah, McConnell could have easily rallied the Senate to impeach Trump that we would not be where we are right now.
- [28:38]
Jim Acosta
So not forgiving that he would have.
- [28:40]
Rick Wilson
Bought 10% I will say this.
- [28:41]
Molly Jong-Fast
He did steal a Supreme Court seat from Barack Obama so well there's that.
- [28:47]
Rick Wilson
I mean look what it could have, should have but but I will say this. McConnell has the is one of the few people left who really did believe in the rules based international order who really did believe in and as much as he is a hard political player and Harry Reid one time told me that there are three masters of the Senate in our lifetimes. Harry Reid was one of them, Lyndon Johnson was one of them and Mitch McConnell was one of them. He said Mitch could do more in the minority than we could do in the majority. He understands how the institution works. I wish he had more gumption before this. I will take him being a bit of a disruptor right now. I'll take what I can get because otherwise we're going to have the Senate roll over for Trump every single time. And at some point if we can engender a fight between the Thune faction which is the plural I'll call it a plurality of the Republicans versus the crazier Trump faction which is only nine or ten people. Rick Scott, Sidney Smith, Tommy Tuberville, the weirdos. I think that there's a world where, where Mitch can become semi a center of gravity in that I did recommend in an article last week on Substack I said the funniest thing ever would be if McConnell, Murkowski and Collins all caucuses independence they would gain all that power that Joe Manchin used to have by being, by being votes that you had to go and lobby and work.
- [30:24]
Molly Jong-Fast
So, yeah two things about McConnell I think are that are important. One is he is very rich. Two is he is very old and he's probably not running again. Now do I think McConnell has a moral compass? No, certainly not. He cares about power. But is he how we got here? Absolutely right. This is how we got here Mitch McConnell. So I do think, look, you know, he, there was, you know, there were reporting and, and there was a theory of the case that Hegseth was not going to get through. And it was Tillis who was this wavering vote and then went and voted. There's a really good piece in the Washington. He, he changed his mind at the last minute. Who knows why? Who knows?
- [31:08]
Rick Wilson
But I know, I know why. Elon Musk called him and said, I'm going to spend $100 million in a primary against you if you don't do that. What I want.
- [31:16]
Jim Acosta
He's the new banner. He's the new band, right?
- [31:18]
Rick Wilson
Yeah, but with real money.
- [31:21]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yeah, but Tillis is a real pickup opportunity that Democrats should not sleep on.
- [31:26]
Rick Wilson
Don't sleep on North Carolina.
- [31:28]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yeah, North Carolina.
- [31:29]
Jim Acosta
I agree. Well, guys, I hope we can do this over and over and over again.
- [31:34]
Rick Wilson
Delighted.
- [31:34]
Jim Acosta
We don't even have to get on substack. We could just call each other and we can talk.
- [31:39]
Rick Wilson
But you know what? I kind of like the hearts.
- [31:42]
Jim Acosta
I like the hearts.
- [31:43]
Molly Jong-Fast
I like the hearts. And somebody said, I look much younger here than I do on television. So I'll take it, man.
- [31:49]
Jim Acosta
You guys have gotten tons of compliments here, and I think we should make this a regular thing, so long as I'm not annoying the hell out of you.
- [31:56]
Rick Wilson
But both, no, we love Captain.
- [31:58]
Molly Jong-Fast
Yeah.
- [31:59]
Jim Acosta
Long overdue, guys. Thank you so much.
- [32:01]
Rick Wilson
Congratulations on everything. This is amazing. Thanks for the, thanks for the opportunity today, Jim. All right. And Molly, I'll talk to you later.
- [32:08]
Molly Jong-Fast
Okay, Bye.
- [32:10]
Jim Acosta
Really appreciate it. Great stuff. Rick Wilson, Molly, John, Fast. I mean, it doesn't get better than that in terms of a combo. They were just absolutely fantastic. I'm going to try to get General Mark Hertling into the conversation right now. Retired Lieutenant General Mark Hertling. He and I have had so many great conversations over the years, and he is just such a wonderful resource in all of this. I'm going to talk to him in just a moment, and let's, let's get him up and running because there's a lot to talk about, especially when it comes to what is happening in Ukraine right now. That is, you know, we're seeing, we're starting to see President Zelensky of Ukraine basically say, I don't like being cut out of the conversation, guys. He was making some statements about that to the, to that extent today. I'm bringing Mark Hertling into the conversation right now. And just FYI, everybody, this was in the Washington Post earlier today. The Trump administration concluded initial talks with Russia over the war in Ukraine on Tuesday. That's the, of course, turning point in Washington's handling of Europe's most destructive conflict in decades. There's General Hertling right there. General, we're going to turn, if we can turn the phone, that away. There we go. Perfect. You're looking good. Great to see you, as always, and, you know, great to have you on this program. Thanks for doing this.
- [33:38]
Mark Hertling
Hey, Jim, I was just listening to you and Rick and Molly Zhang, and I think I'm into this substack thing now. It was kind of fascinating to hear the. The three of you going wild. I'll try and calm things down a little bit, although you'll probably get me fired up.
- [33:52]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, no, absolutely. And whatever you can do, you know, we're happy to have it. Just. Just be you. And, I mean, I've just so enjoyed our conversations over the years, Mark, because, you know, you tell it like it is, and that's. That's what I like about it. And I'm concerned about what is taking place. What did take place in Riyadh over the last 24 hours. We had the Americans and the Russians, and it is important for us to. I mean, Reagan talked to Gorbachev, no question about it. Obviously, the US has to talk to the Russians, but the Americans and the Russians sitting at the bargaining table without the Ukrainians there trying to work out the future of Ukraine. It just feels like this is going in a bad direction. And I have to think, and we saw this earlier today from Zelensky, the Ukrainians are getting pretty upset about this.
- [34:44]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, there's no doubt about it. And so are the Europeans, Jim. I mean, they're trying to do some contingency planning to work around it. But truthfully, I mean, it's a bad look, not just for the negotiations, but it's a bad look for the United States. We shouldn't do things like this. You know, you're talking about dealing with a guy who is obviously a war criminal, and that's Putin, as well as some of his minions like Lavrov, who was sitting at the table, who is known by everybody in Europe to not only be a key diplomat, and he's been in diplomacy and as the Minister of foreign affairs since 2004, but he's also a damn liar. I mean, you can't trust anything he says. So he's the main guy at the table across from Secretary Rubio. And that, to me, is extremely concerning, because truthfully, Jim, I mean, I hate to say it this way. But I've seen, having spent 12 years of my career in Europe at different negotiations for a variety of different things from what was going on in the Balkans to what was going on in Romania and Moldova. You see American, I'll call them American diplomats, not so much the ambassadors because they have a feel. But you would have a congressional delegation, a code L come over and they would have on the happy face and slapping people on the back and thinking it's a political entity. That's not how you negotiate. And when you're talking about putting Secretary Rubio and Michael Waltz, the NSA up against Lavrov in a room that doesn't have the Europeans or the Ukrainians, it's not going to end well, truthfully, and it appears not to have, based on the after action press reports that occurred this morning.
- [36:28]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And the French president, Emmanuel Macron apparently put out a statement earlier today saying essentially that Europe needs to start thinking about its own security in a different way, that it has to think about it in a way that doesn't really rely as much on the United States of America anymore. And that's a scary prospect. And I wonder, General, can you talk about that a little bit? Because I mean, the concerning part is, and you and I have covered this in and talked about this so many times, the courageous and valiant way that the Ukrainians have defended their country, to think that the United States could have a hand in any way whatsoever in undermining that in the next couple of years, to me, I just think it not only invites a human tragedy which may very well take place, but it just will forever stain the legacy of this country from a foreign policy standpoint, if we have any role in that kind of undermining of the Ukrainian and what they've been trying to do.
- [37:28]
Mark Hertling
Well, right. And what I I'd go back a little bit more to Jim and say not only what happened at the negotiating table this morning, but what happened in Mons, what happened at the Munich Security Conference, what happened in Stuttgart and the NATO headquarters with Secretary Hegseth and with the Munich Security Conference, which I've attended multiple times during my career and know who's accepted and who's not. And the only person that I've ever seen during my time at the MSC that was not accepted and was almost heartily booed as much as the vice president was, was once again Lavrov when he spoke there and basically told a bunch of lies to an entire audience that knew he was lying. So you've got going back to your question about what does this do for Europe? We have an 80 year history of really taking good partnerships and good alliances and building upon them. And as I said at a conference at West Point last week, you don't deploy trust. You build trust by being there. You can't just put forces in a region. And I'm very concerned knowing the intricacies of The NATO Article 5 and Article 4 processes of. There seems to be indicators that even those won't be followed by the United States based on transactional relationships. So all of these things together really concern me going to your point about what the Ukrainians have delivered, as you know, because I sent it to you, the bulwark piece that just came out this morning. What I tried to do in that piece, first of all was talk about the inequality of the negotiations between Secretary Rubio and Minister Lavrov. But what I also try to portray that over three years the Ukrainians have been masterful in countering every single Russian move. Now, they haven't won the fight, that's for sure. And there are some people that will say they're caught up in a stalemate. But this is a country that has a connection between their military, their government and their people. And that's what Clausewitz calls the, the great triangle. You know, when those three things are in balance, then you can do international relations really well and you can conduct warfare in a good manner. So this balance occurs and you've got the people supporting the military, the, the President Zelensky supporting the people and the military. And you've got now an insertion by the United States that seems to be disrupting that relationship. And that scares the bejesus out of me.
- [40:18]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And if it scares the bejesus out of you, it scares the bejesus out of all of us.
- [40:24]
Mark Hertling
You mentioned Jim, please call me Mark. Okay. We had to keep the formality on cnn. We don't have to do that anymore.
- [40:31]
Jim Acosta
Well, my mom smacks me upside the head if I, if I don't, if I just lose that Virginia gentleman that she tried to instill in me. It didn't always work. But Mark, you mentioned Secretary Hegseth when he goes to Brussels and communicates just right off the bat without any kind of negotiations or anything, that Ukraine probably should not count on full membership in NATO and all the other things that he said when you had the Vice President JD Vance going to the Munich Security Conference and lecturing the Europeans about free speech and saying, why are you not letting this ultra right wing party into your politics in Germany and so on, it Just seems like they just want to be bulls in a china shop without any kind of strategic considerations whatsoever. And that means they're going to have to own the consequences. Because if Russia decides to go into one of the Baltic states, if it decides after, you know, settling things over Ukraine, that they want to poke and prod and see where else they can find vulnerabilities, that's on Donald Trump. That's on his watch. And it's a result of his policies.
- [41:33]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, well, it's not just the policies too, Jim, what I would say it's the messaging campaign. You know, the whole thing before the election and right after the election was shock and awe. And I tried to knock that down in another piece I wrote saying, hey, shock and awe didn't work so well for the military. Yeah, there was the initial shock and awe when bombs were going off in Baghdad. But for the next 12 years, we were fixing all the things to help the citizens of Iraq get back to normal. What you're seeing is the same kind of shock and awe, the chainsaw approach, where you're not thinking about the second and third order effects. So it's great for Secretary Hegseth to go into Stuttgart, the headquarters of US European Command, and the dual hatted location for General Cavelli and talk about dei. But, man, dude, you're on the world stage now. You've got to do other things than this craziness, and you've got to think about the repercussions of the kinds of things you say. The same thing with Vice President Vance at the Munich Security Conference. The same thing with Secretary Rubio in a meeting in Saudi Arabia. You know, you not only have the original messaging, you actually have to do something afterwards to really follow up on some type of plan. And what we're seeing in many areas, not just international relations, but here in the United States, is there's a lot of proclamations and then people who are proclaiming things are finding out, ooh, stuff isn't going so well. We've fired a bunch of people that run our nuclear weapons and our nuclear devices, and we're firing the FAA folks who run our airplanes. You know, that's not a good look.
- [43:18]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, yeah. Life is on a Fox News set. And I think that that's what they're trying to do is just, you know, go out there and spew these talking points without any regard for what comes next. And speaking of that, Mark, I also wanted to talk to you about Gaza because you and I haven't spoken for several weeks. You had the president of the United States saying that he wants to turn Gaza into the Riviera of the Middle East. He was talking about the he still talks about the US Taking over Gaza, although he's ruling out the possibility, or it sounds like he's ruling out the possibility of putting US Boots on the ground. You and I both know he's probably never going to do that. But again, the messaging creates chaos and it begs the question, what is going on here? I don't remember having a conversation during the campaign about the United States taking over Gaza. And as you were talking about with Iraq earlier, these kinds of missions of occupation don't end well.
- [44:12]
Mark Hertling
Yeah. You know, the Gaza. When you start doing just back of the napkin analysis, Jim, Gaza is and I've been outside of Gaza, in Israel with the Israeli Gazan division commander, and he's talked about the issue Gaza, the location itself, the geography of it. It's six times larger than Manhattan in New York, and it has 170,000 structures that have been destroyed and there's rubble all over it. So when you're talking about a reconstruction effort, this ain't one building that you're trying to renovate. This isn't House Hunters. This is, I mean, this is a place that's pretty big and it's going to cost a lot of money. And as we've seen the last couple of days when hostages have been released by Hamas, Hamas ain't dead yet. You know, they're still pretty prevalent in the area. So when you're talking about putting my sisters and brothers that are wearing the uniform in that kind of an area to allegedly reconstruct or turn it into a Mediterranean, you also have a Mar a Lago in the Mediterranean. You also have to have security forces and you're also going to be fighting terrorists because this is a bad neighborhood and there's a lot more that goes into it. Again, I go back to it's great to do these proclamations, but has anyone thought about the implications and the planning that's connected with all of this?
- [45:41]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And Mark, because of your history with your counterparts, military counterparts, with other countries, strong US Allies and so on, I can only imagine what some of them are saying right now. When you hear the president of the United States talking about taking over Greenland, taking over the Panama Canal, wanting to make Canada the 51st state, I mean, all of it just sounds so ridiculous. I was talking to some of the folks in the diplomatic community here in Washington over the last couple weeks, and they were basically laughing at all of this it reminded me of when Trump was in front of the UN and people were starting to laugh at him at the U.N. you know, the word of the President of the United States has to mean something or else we're in big trouble.
- [46:24]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, it does. And you know, there's. I had a chance to go to the War College when I was a colonel, Jim, and you know, after a years long look at strategy, I had an instructor at the end that said there are four things you have to remember about this year long course regarding international relations and strategy. Number one is always take the high ground. And what he meant by that was not the Civil War high ground. It was the moral, the physical, the emotional high ground. Number two was words are important, so you better be precise when you give directions. Number three, personalities matter. You know, when you're dealing with different people, you have to understand their motivations. And the fourth piece was logistics are important. They determine the art of the possible. All of these things are being ignored right now by a lot of people in the administration. Going back to the comment we had about earlier, just to get to the messaging to sound tough and be great and, you know, be the hard guy and be the alpha male.
- [47:27]
Jim Acosta
Yeah.
- [47:27]
Mark Hertling
You know, international relationships and good alliances depend on a lot more than being the tough guy.
- [47:34]
Jim Acosta
Yeah. And just to let the viewers know who are tuning in and we appreciate all the comments and everything. Mark is writing about this on Substack. Mark's writing about this in the Atlantic. And one of the other things I know you've been paying attention to is what's been going on over at the Pentagon and these pronouncements about, coming from Pete Hegseth about women serving in the military and so on. Can you talk a little bit about the culture over at the Pentagon and why our military does derive a good deal of strength from all of the walks of life that come into the Pentagon. People go after terms like DEI and diversity and that sort of thing. I don't. I think that those are important terms. Terms. But another way to look at it is it's all of us coming together in this wonderful military, this wonderful armed services that we have.
- [48:31]
Mark Hertling
Yeah. You know, Jim, it's interesting because my last job in the army was commanding US Forces in Europe. My second to last job in the army, which nobody knows about, was for two years I was commanding basic training across the United States. And what I saw every year we were bringing in about 160,000 soldiers every year into the army, taking them from civilians to soldiers. And what I saw is they were coming from every one of our states, every one of our territories. And there were also quite a few immigrants who weren't even citizens that wanted to join up and serve. So when you take the individuals, the key requirement of a professional military is to take the individual and help them build teams. In order to build teams, you have to understand the men and women next to you. You have to really know the cultural differences, and you have to have an intellectual curiosity about what makes Jim Acosta. Jim Acosta, what's his background? What's his character like? So that when we're out somewhere fighting together, you can rely on that individual. And I got to tell you, I've said multiple times, and I've been slandered for, for this, I'm the wokest guy you ever want to meet. Because I got to tell you, after 40 years in the. In the military, I loved every one of the soldiers, even the ones that committed some bad things. I loved them all because they were there to raise their hand and to serve something bigger than themselves. And they all came together. The young woman from Mississippi and the young man from Bronx, New York, were on the same team together. Doesn't matter their colors. But in order to get there, they got to. They got to learn about each other. And unfortunately, we seem to have a bunch of people who don't understand that.
- [50:17]
Jim Acosta
That's a really important point. And I've covered military over the years and gone to various bases and talked about issues like multiple deployments that we saw during the war on terror and the war in Iraq and so on. And if anybody wants to see the real America, go to a military base of the United States of America. You will find all walks of life. You will find people who came from broken homes, from homes led by single mothers. You will find interracial marriages. You'll find husbands and wives living together on these military bases, trying to make ends meet, not making a lot of money. I mean, you name it. As you said, folks who have been part of the immigrant experience of this country, perhaps they're documented, but Mom's not documented. I mean, you name it. And it just. I think it's a beautiful thing about our military. And it. And it. When they go off and serve overseas, it's a reminder of this amazing thing that they're fighting for, that they're defending.
- [51:15]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, there was a. There was a guy that once wrote a book, a guy named Andrew Bacevich, who wrote a book called Diplomat and Khaki. And what he talked about was all of the soldiers who were wearing khaki overseas at the time were really the true diplomats and the representation for the American way of life. Having spent time, a lot of time in Germany, the Germans remember a couple things. They remember the candy bomber from the Berlin Airlift. The guy that would not only deliver plane, you know, equipment to Berlin, the free Berlin when the Russians were there, but when he was coming back to Wiesbaden, he would throw Hershey bars out the window to the kids near the airfield. They know about those kind of legends. And you know, I got to tell you one more story, Jim. I was at West Point two weeks ago when the DEI requirement came out from the Pentagon about getting rid of clubs. And you couldn't have, you know, the Black Engineer club or the Hispanic American Club. And what really bothered me about that was I had just spent a couple of days with some of the best and the brightest young people from all walks of life, from all political persuasions. They were the smartest. I came out of there fired up. And the last day I was there, I see, you know, someone who knows nothing about the military academy saying, hey, get rid of all the DEI stuff because we don't want, you know, we don't want that kind of thing as part of our history. Hell, I mean, the. One of my classmates from West Point was, is Lloyd Austin, the former Secretary of Defense. When he came in in 1971, when we first entered, there weren't a whole lot of other black cadets there. So he was not a, you know, he was not a DEI hire at West Point. He was a guy that made the grade and actually came through and had a great career as a four star general and then as a Secretary of defense. So that's the kind of thing we're talking about.
- [53:04]
Jim Acosta
And, and you know, Mark, you know, what you said there is just, I think it's a great way to end the discussion. And you and I in the past have talked about, you know, maybe I could have you come on from time to time as my military analyst and my. In my go to. I hope I can do that. I would love to be able to do that because I have a feeling we're talking so much about what's happening with the federal workforce and things that are happening domestically right now. I just, I get this feeling that the world stage is going to be a huge, huge story here in the coming days, whether it's Ukraine, Gaza, you name it.
- [53:40]
Mark Hertling
Yeah, I, I'd agree with you, Jim. And I'd also say it's going to be a little bit Sporty on the world stage, as we use that expression without hyperbole in the military, it's going to get sporty. And we got to have some good people stepping forward and saying, here's what America stands for. Here are our values. Here's what we believe in. And they should be driving our policies. But right now they're not.
- [54:03]
Jim Acosta
Yeah, there are some who say might makes right. You know, in many ways, right makes might. And I, I'm not coming up with that myself. Others have used that expression in the past, but it very much is about what the American experience is all about, very much about what the United States of America is all about. And Mark, you're a shining example of that as well. I'm going to call you General Hertling one last time. General Herling, thank you very much for coming on the Jim Acosta show. Hope we can do this again over and over.
- [54:28]
Mark Hertling
I hope so, too. Thank you, Mr. Acosta. It's a pleasure being with you.
- [54:32]
Jim Acosta
Nobody calls me that. Nobody calls my dad that either. So you got to go back several generations to find Mr. Akaza. But thanks, Mark. Good to talk.
- [54:39]
Mark Hertling
You got it, Jim. Thank you.
- [54:40]
Jim Acosta
All right, take care. And I, you know, General Hurtling, you just hit the nail on the head. You know, it is what it is, what makes America special. And it goes back to the conversation I was having with Molly and Rick earlier. And that is the American way of life. And I know I sound like a broken record. I talked about this last week. I'm going to talk about it again this week. I'm going to keep talking about it. You know, that is something worth defending. That is something worth preserving and protecting. And you can hear Duke, and you can hear that right on cue, let out a little bark there. And you know, all of that is, is precious and valuable, and it is something that we need to talk about and keep the conversation going about here in the coming days. But thank you, all of you, for joining me on this program. My thanks again to Molly, John Fast, Rick Wilson, and General Mark Hurling. Even though he doesn't want me to call him General, I'll call him that while he's not on the program. Thanks, everybody, for watching. Still reporting from Washington, I'm Jim Acosta. Have a great evening, everybody. Good to talk to you.
- [55:45]
Rick Wilson
Bye.