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The Jim Acosta Show
Trump's Most Corrupt Act Ever? My Discussion with Sharon McMahon, Judd Legum, and Liz Oyer
01:04:55
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- [00:00]
A
Foreign. Welcome to the Jim Acosta show. And it's another day that ends in why in the continued corruption at the Trump White House. Today, the acting Attorney General Todd Blanch tried to convince Republican senators that the government's anti weaponization fund is not just a corrupt taxpayer financed account that will be doled out to Trump allies. And before we get started, a special thanks to our sponsor, Incogni. Identity theft is real. It's happening and they're fighting back. You will find a link in the post for this program or you can scan the QR code on the screen, check it out and use the code. Jim55 Remember, identity theft. It's happening and they're fighting back over at Incogni. But in the meantime, some Republican senators are balking at this new slush fund. Let's discuss with Sharon McMahon. Yes, she's back. She's the author of the very popular substack the Preamble. Sharon, great to see you again.
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B
Nice to see you. Thanks for having me.
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A
Yes, thank you so much. And you're also known as America's civics teacher and government teacher. And I feel like if you were America's civics teacher or government teacher, you would be pulling your hair out right now, especially over this anti weaponization fund. As you and I were getting started, we were talking beforehand, we were mentioning this New York Times House editorial for the newspaper that says there's never been an example of presidential corruption like this. I think that sums it up.
- [01:29]
B
I mean, one of the things that I think is really important to know and if I were in a classroom right now, this is something that I would want to tell students, is that there are objective measures of corruption. This is not partisan. This is not a, like, oh, I just don't like his policies or he sends mean tweets. There are objective definitions of corruption under the law. And it actually is our job, no matter if we vote Republican or Democrat, to point out examples of corruption, because the government works for us. The government is we the people. We have every right to hold government to account. So this is not a matter of like, oh, I just don't care for Donald Trump's methodologies or policies. This is a, this is, these are objective measures of corruption that everyone should be aware of.
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A
Yeah, there's no question about it. And I mean, and we should point out, I mean, the New York Times was just reporting today that Senate Republicans abruptly abandoned plans to take up a filibuster proof bill to fund dhs. And this was in part because of objections among Some of the Republican senators over this weaponization fund. I think they're also upset about the $1 billion ballroom project, which, you know, that's just the beginning. Apparently. That's just for the security aspect of the ballroom, according to what they're saying. And so it seems as though, you know, this is getting so unpopular and you were telling me before we got started, you're hearing from people, too. People have really seized on this. This is, this is broken through. People are paying attention to this. To the extent that Republican senators are saying something, they're standing up to Trump, which that doesn't happen very often in Washington.
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B
True enough. I mean, the, the idea that the fund is 1.76, $776 billion, like the number 1776 is meant to be symbolic. It's meant to be some kind of, you know, nod to America 250. But also the idea that the United States government is not willing to rule out that taxpayer money is going to be going to convicted felons who assault police officers, that the Vice President of the United States refuses to go on TV and rule out the idea that, like, no, if you' assaulting cops, you're not getting any money. And I know you're talking to Liz Oyer later too, who's going to, I'm sure, touch on this, this idea that perhaps members of Congress are eligible to seek reparations.
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A
Yeah, no, it says it, yeah, it says it right in this, they brought some talking points the Justice Department did to those senators today. In the talking points, it says that senators are eligible for the fund. So I guess they're thinking, and this is my characterization, Sharon, that, you know, with nearly $1.8 billion, you can, you can buy off some senators. I, I mean, I guess that's what they're, they're, you know, implying here.
- [04:26]
B
I mean, yeah, it doesn't sit well with the average American who is paying $4 plus a gallon for gas on the brink of the summertime where they're supposed to be going on a nice little week long road trip with their kids. It's just become like an untenable, unaffordable situation. And for what? The average American is not finding themselves materially better off and they're constantly being confronted with new ways that the people at the top are profiting from them. And it's very easy to understand where the discontent is coming from.
- [05:05]
A
No, it's true. I think that this is, I think this is upsetting Republicans as much as it's upsetting Democrats. Maybe not, maybe not quite as much, but I think it is breaking through enough where you have Republican senators saying something now. So they must be getting calls at their offices. They must be seeing something that, that, that is concerning them about their own political skin. But you know, there are other examples that are, I mean, just everywhere right now that Trump is acting as this sort of maximalist, you know, Unitarian president and essentially a dictator wannabe. They are pushing through as fast as they can. Not just the ballroom project, but this arch project, which I'm a native Washingtonian, I've been from this area for a long time. Usually when monuments are built in, in Washington D.C. you know, the Sharon, there's a thoughtful process that goes into it. This is just Donald Trump saying, I want an arch and I want it to be like the one in Paris. And basically about me. And apparently earlier today, the board, the arts board that has some kind of, this is the Commission on Fine Arts, they approved this. And you know, this, this is essentially something that is going to happen, I guess, unless the courts stop it. But the arts panel that approved it is filled with Trump's appointees and they have an advisory role in the design of the project, apparently, but no enforcement power. This is according to press reports. But again, you know, somebody who is a monarch or a dictator can do these things on their own in other countries. And yet we're seeing it happen here. It's not what we. I was taught in government class growing
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B
up, I mean, there's never really been a case where presidents have built monuments to themselves. The press, the, the monuments that we have to, you know, Lincoln and Washington and Jefferson, those were all erected long, long after the fact by, as you mentioned, committees of thoughtful people who thought, who determined where's the best place to put this? What should it say? What should it look like? I mean, even when Harry Truman had to redo the interior of the White House because the White House was literally crumbling, there was no choice he had to of the White House. After World War II, there'd been so much deferred maintenance, the number of committees that went into even choosing a paint color or like which drape should go in this room. The amount of input that again, we the people had on making sure that the buildings that belong to us, these are, these are not buildings that belong to any president. They belong to us. The monuments belong to us. There's never been an example of a time when there has been so little public input and so much self aggrandizement. Even during the last White House remodel which was undertaken during. The funding was appropriated during the George W. Bush administration and, you know, was completed under the Obama administration. That was a very bipartisan effort to say, yeah, we have to upgrade the heating and cooling system in the White House because the heat keeps going off. And this is not a safe situation for our historic, our historic things that belong in the furnishings that belong in the White House. Everyone agreed, let's keep the White House looking good, in tip top shape. This is a sit. But the ballroom is an entirely different scenario that, you know. Yeah. Would it be nice to have more entertaining space in the White House? I'm sure it would. It doesn't have huge entertaining space. I'm sure it's a pain to put up a tent on the grounds. But again, the idea that you're trying to sell to the American public who's struggling to buy groceries right now, the average American who lives paycheck to paycheck, the idea that somehow we need a super fancy place to have fancy dinners and we need monuments to ourselves and we need senators to be able to get money, collect taxpayer money, because somebody asked to see their phone records. These are preposterous ideas at a time when Americans are really feeling especially squeezed by tough economic times.
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A
Yes. No question about it. And it bears repeating, he just knocked down the east wing of the White House on his own. So, I mean, I'm old enough to remember I covered the White House during the second Obama administration and the first Trump administration. And they had this problem with the fence jumpers. There were people jumping the White House fence and one actually got inside and it was actually a very scary security situation. There was a whole project that was initiated to, to, you know, make the White House fence taller. And it went through an approval process and it took a long time. And I'm sure it was frustrating to people who wanted to get it done sooner. But the reason why you have that process is because you just don't. You don't want to do something that ends up not being the right thing to do. Sort of like this reflecting pool project right now. They're insisting that it's all going to work out to paint the bottom of it this dark blue. But I'm seeing these folks who are these meteorologists and folks who are saying that's going to cause even more algae to be formed on the reflecting pool. It'll be no time before it's brown and murky again. But this is why you do things through a proper approval process. It's a government of we the people we, we the people get to decide to do this stuff.
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B
Right. They belong to us. That's what I think we're forgetting here. This is not the President's house. This is the house that belongs to the United States that we permit an elected president to live in. So, you know, we're just, we're losing sight of the idea that these are our buildings, our monuments, our public property. They do not belong to a single individual.
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A
Yeah, well, and I'm throwing a lot out at you, but I, I feel like there are three distinct areas that kind of fit under the same umbrella of, you know, Donald Trump acting as if he is an all powerful president in this country right now. The other thing is that, that he has some sort of ability to control which comedians we have and don't have on American television. I guess we should point out tonight is the last night of the Stephen Colbert show. The Late show with Stephen Colbert on cbs. And the Times had a great piece on this. CBS cancels itself, not just Colbert. And CBS insisted this was just a financial decision, it was a programming decision, had nothing to do with Steven's politics or the jokes. And here I was on the show, this was a few years back and, and honestly I'm, I'm with Jon Stewart on this. So little of what Stephen does is political. I mean, yes, he does political jokes and that's what gets a lot of attention and gets under Trump's skin. But he does pretty conventional late night comedy program. But the fact that the President of the United States has the ability, it seems to me, and this is what's happened here to force Colbert off the air. He bragged about in a truth social post earlier this year. I mean that, that again says where we are as a country, it seems to me, I don't. What, what do you think?
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B
I mean the amount of incursion into free speech, freedom of the press, freedom of speech, assembly has been very concerning since Trump has returned to office. This is just one example of Brendan Carr, who's the head of the fcc, trying to weaponize as what to you, to borrow Trump's term, trying to weaponize the levers of power against the American people. Now you can argue that like nobody has the right to be on network TV and the network is certainly allowed to cancel programming that it doesn't see as profitable. But this is, this is not that. Another example of that is restricting the press's ability to cover the Pentagon and saying only these outlets that sign the pledge will be allowed to cover the Pentagon. Only these outlets that Sign the pledge and allow us to chaperone them around the building that they previously had access to, are allowed to cover the Pentagon. That is a blatant violation of freedom of the press. This have anything to do with my own personal opinions about this outlet or that outlet? The principles matter. More than which what is being said about any given party. And it has long been that presidents were forced to tolerate unfavorable coverage because they cared about the principles of freedom more than they cared about making sure that a certain news organization said nice things about them. And it, it does appear that gone are those days.
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A
Yeah, no, it's so true, Sharon. And you and I both remember, you know, when Bill Clinton was in the White House, there were late night jokes every night about Monica Lewinsky and, you know, Whitewater and whatever was going on. And Jay Leno, I mean, it was his, it was like a cottage industry for Jay Leno on the Tonight show to make fun of Bill Clinton on a nightly basis. I mean, it happened all the time. It was on all of the, all of the programs during that era. And it's always been sort of part of the gig of being President, United States, that you are butt of jokes. Gerald Ford stumbling down the stairs. Chevy Chase used to make fun of that on Saturday Night Live. And you know, George W. George H.W. bush. Remember Dana Carvey used to do that great impersonation. We'd say, wouldn't be, wouldn't be prudent. Wouldn't be prudent.
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B
Yes.
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A
And, and all of that, it's just part of the course.
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C
Yes.
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B
The impressions of Al Gore, you know, put it, put Social Security in a lockbox.
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A
Right.
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B
On the impressions of George Jebbia with his strategy. You know, now George W. Bush, the George W. Bush Bush Presidential center has a podcast called Strategery.
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A
Right.
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B
They understood that even though George W. Didn't really use strategy, it was just like a funny impression of him, you know? Yes. Even Ronald Reagan constantly made fun of himself, laughed at jokes about himself, you know, was like, yeah, you know, I'm, I'm not going to tolerate any jokes about old people. Only I could make jokes about old people. Like the, the idea was, yeah, we're all in on it together. And, you know, maybe I don't love being the butt of jokes, but like, it's better to laugh along than to try to use dictatorial powers to squash it. And, you know, it seems as though Trump is, Trump is free to make fun of anybody that he wants to bestow nicknames upon anybody. He Wishes tweet during one evening on Truth Social. But the second somebody, you know says something that he doesn't agree with, he's going to use the levers of his power to try to get them removed from the airwaves.
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A
Yeah, maybe Stephen Colbert should apply for the anti weaponization fund. I don't know, I don't know if you know this, Sharon, but I wrote a sub stack earlier today saying I'm applying for the anti Weaponization fund. Yes, there it is right there. It was on the sub stack earlier today. And I'm going to talk about this at the end of the show. You mentioned Liz lawyer. We'll talk about her. I talked to her about the weaponization fund.
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B
I think ask for a lot of money, Jim. You should ask for like $50 million because, you know, like if you shoot for the moon, you're going to land in the stars, land amongst you. What do you have to lose?
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A
Might as well. And I, as I say, and I'll repeat this at the end of the show, as I say, Donald Trump can think of himself as a paid subscriber if he decides to go ahead and, and if I get some money out of this weaponization. But my guess is, is that I'm not going to be approved for the money.
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B
I just get approved. Weird.
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D
They're not, I don't know.
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B
But JD Vance said they take it on a case by case basis. So you never know.
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A
You never know. I think I, I think I might try
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B
to a good cause like an arch, like building the arch.
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A
I'll build my own arch. I'll have the Acosta Arch.
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B
Yes.
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A
And my little dog Duke will be able to live in it and, and so on and so forth. Sharon, great to see you as always. Thank you so much. Really appreciate your time.
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B
Yes. Good to see you, Jim.
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A
All right, good to see you, too. Make sure you check out Sharon's substack, the preamble. It's fantastic. It's indispensable. And that's why she is known as America's government teacher, America's civics teacher. She's always great. As I mentioned, we've been, it's been all week that we've been talking about Donald Trump's corruption. It's the, it's sort of the theme of the week. It's, it's been the theme of the last year and a half, I think, but probably the theme of this week perhaps more than any other. And you know, it's not just this government weaponization fund, as outrageous as it is I talked about this yesterday with Mike Fanon and Harry Dunn how outrageous it is that January 6th rioters and insurrectionists can somehow apply for this money. It's absolutely disgusting and astounding. But at the same time, there are other ways in which Donald Trump is demonstrating how thoroughly corrupt he is and how thoroughly corrupt this new administration is. He has been on a stock trading binge or it seems over the last several months. And somebody who has been tracking this is another great person on Substack, Judd Legum. He runs the very popular Popular Information substack. It's terrific. And I had a chance to talk to Judd about his investigation into all of Donald Trump's stock trades, which have been totally nuts and out of control. And it seems to be, I think, tied a little bit to this weaponization fund. Anyway, here's, here's what CHUD and I talked about with respect to all of Trump's stock trades. Take a look. And joining us now is Judd Legum. He is the author, the founder of Popular Information on Substack, a terrific substack. And Judd has been tracking Donald Trump's stock trades, which has been, they've just been going through the roof. And Judd, welcome, welcome back. Thanks for coming on.
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D
Thanks for having me.
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A
Yeah. And I guess we should show a couple of things. I guess first of all, you, you put out a story just a few days ago on all of this and on Popular Information, which is terrific, by the way. And you know, you, you talk about how on March 11, Trump took a tour of a manufacturing facility in Ohio owned by Thermo Fisher Scientific, a medical supply company. He tr, he lavished praise on the company when he was there, you know, asked one of the executives to share some great information about this incredible company. And then you wrote this. Trump did not mention that the same day of the tour, March 11, he purchased between 15,000 and 50,000 of Thermo Fisher stock. Trump did not publicly disclose the purchase until May 14th. It was listed on page 38 of a 113 page document cataloging Trump's stock purchases in 2026. How, I mean, how, I guess a couple of questions. How big is this and how undercovered is this? Because it seems to me it's just woefully undercovered.
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D
Well, I think it's a very significant story to somebody who's followed politics for a number of decades now. I think if any other president was involved in even one of the sort of examples that I talk about in my story, and there's, there's other Examples that have been brought about in, brought out in, you know, by other reporters. It would be a presidency defining scandal. You know, here you have a president who is actively trading stocks. That alone is something that we really haven't seen. You know, you've, we've either had presidents use the blind trust so that they don't know what assets to have, or, you know, Obama took this route and others, you just go into index funds and that's it. And there's no active trading. You just have the fund and it just goes up and down with the market. Here we have a president who's just involved in very hyperactive trading. And the process that has been set up by the federal government to try to insulate any of this kind of activity from conflicts of interest, completely ignored. It's just in a trust controlled by Donald Trump Jr. Which is sort of the opposite of what these trusts are supposed to be, which is controlled by somebody independent. I mean, it's literally his son, who, you know, I don't know how often they talk, but I'm sure it's pretty regularly.
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A
Yeah, I'm assuming that this is not a, a blind arrangement between Trump and his son. And, and I mean, the Financial Times did a, did a graphic just the other day showing just how these things have shot through the roof. It's just astounding to look at. And I'm just kind of curious, you know, do we even know how he's doing this? I, I guess we don't know if he's, if he's on his phone, Mar a Lago and he's, he's just like on e trade or something, just, you know, day trading, like a day trader who, I guess we don't know.
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D
I mean, they have said that there's someone doing this on his behalf. And you think there have to be, you know, one or more people involved because we're talking about that. This is a, the filing that you kind of referenced in the introduction. This only covers January through March. There's thousands of trades. So this is somebody who's doing trades. You know, the trading is going on many, many times per day. Only 90. It's only covered. The whole thing only covers 90 days and there's over 3, 800 trades. So that's going on. But we don't know, there could be multiple ways. You know, there could be some automated trading. There could be, you know, I think what, what I tried to show in my report, when you have something where the President is at a location at talking about a particular company and buying stuff the same day. It's hard to believe that he's not involved. And it's not the only instance where that occurred. You know, with another thing I talk about in the piece on Monday is he bought an even larger amount of Micron stock and then calls into Fox the next day, says that he has just met with the Micron CEO and calls it one of the hottest companies. So, you know, the coincidences kind of add up and I think that's really the question that needs to be answered is what is going on? How are these trades being made, on what, what criteria is being used? And why does Trump keep talking about the companies that he is investing in right around the time that he's invested in?
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A
Yeah, I mean, it sounds like almost, you know, a, a grand pump and dump kind of situation or something similar to that. Or, you know, pump and buy. I don't know what you would call it. But I mean, he did this with Palantir. We can show the truth. Social post he is, he's just like, he's like Jim Kramer now. He's just, he does this on his true social. Palantir Technologies has proven to have great war fighting capabilities and equipment just to ask our enemies. And he's doing this as, I guess, you know, he's waging war and so on. JUDD But I mean, it sounds as though he's using the office of the presidency to enrich himself. I know that sounds like a simplistic way of describing it and Captain Obvious, but that's what it is, basically.
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D
Yes. I mean, I think he's, he's trying to take advantage of the increase in certain companies, you know, and what I talked about in my piece were these very specific incidents. But the broader, you know, landscape here is he's deregulating the sale, for instance, of these GPL tube drugs that are very popular and help a lot of people. And I don't know if there's anything necessarily wrong with it, but at the same time, he's buying up the company, you know, he's front running that process and buying up company stock in companies that make those drugs and are benefiting from his policies. This is why, of course, other presidents did not do this. And what's interesting is the other presidents that did not do this include Donald Trump himself during the first term he announced or we didn't find out about, I think until December after he, you know, won the 2016 election, but in June of that year liquidated all of his stocks, you know, and, and obviously that's I don't think he came out and said it, but there was sort of implicit understanding of, okay, I am going to be president, so I cannot own and trade all of these individual stocks that I'm going to have influence over, you know, and so, so there's been an evolution, I think, in even, even for himself, of how this has been handled.
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A
Yeah. And that may stem from, I mean, there's sort of first term Trump versus second term Trump, first term Trump. They were, there were more professional people around him. You know, they may be hardcore conservatives, but they sort of were for the, from the more normal establishment wing of the Republican Party and people who were, of course, almost his same stature and were willing to push back on him. People like John Kelly, I mean, you can go down the list and on. So maybe he felt more constrained at that point. And so he was playing by those rules to some extent, but now he doesn't really have any of those people and he has sort of this, you know, sort of mentality that he can just do whatever he wants now, obviously, and perhaps that is playing a part in this. I, I don't, I mean, I'm just completely speculating.
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D
I think, I think that's right, Jim. And because also if you look at sort of across all of his hold buildings, you know, he actually now has a lot of stock that isn't actually something that he's done a lot of in his sort of investing career. He's never been a big stock guy, but the main sort of vehicle was the Trump Organization real estate. And you see the same shift there, right, in the first term. Now, he didn't set this up in a way that meets any other presidential standard, but he did have an ethics policy that said we are not going to do any new foreign deals while I am president. You know, it's not much. Right. But it's, it's something. It was not gonna.
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B
He's.
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D
It's something. But now on this, they're signing up people, they're signing up new towers all over the Middle east, all over Europe, in, in some cases, you know, in on land owned by government using funds from sovereign wealth funds, or sometimes there's these investment vehicles that are basically have no separation from the government itself. So that's all been thrown out. So I do think that there is a real difference, you know, and then you kind of take their stock denials, which is, oh, well, Trump didn't have anything to do with this. This is just turned over by an independent manager. It's not really. But you know, it's interesting. Eric Trump, who's obviously essentially leading the Trump Organization in Donald Trump's stead while he is president, you know, came out and said, well, everything's in a blind trust, and it's only in, you know, invested in index funds, you know, so it's clear that they're not, you know, you can just look at the document it's posted. There is not index funds on here. You know, these are all stocks. I mean, it's listed 3800. You can go through the. I spent a lot of time with this document, so I know the. You know, what was going on. And so I think you have to look back at that and say, well, can we take these denials very seriously when the head of the company that is making them will just say, seems to be willing to say anything about, you know, the nature of Trump's stock trades?
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A
Yeah. And I guess, you know, I mean, just to show how massive this is, even the people at CNBC had their, you know, their breath was taken away by this. We should play this because it is kind of an amazing canary in the coal mine kind of moment that, you know, they. I think they were just sort of blown away by this. Let's. If we could play that US Government
- [29:21]
D
got in, it could sell it.
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A
And filings. The president's been trading some intel in the quarter. Yeah. Yeah. Got nothing to say.
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D
Yeah, yeah.
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A
All right.
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C
Don't worry.
- [29:41]
A
We're not having technical difficulties here, everybody. But we gotta go. Yeah. That strange things are afoot. Judd, When. When those guys are doing. Doing that, they're. It's sort of whistling past the graveyard, sort of nervously chuckling about what looks like just out and out corruption that's happening.
- [29:57]
D
Yeah. I mean, I think it is so, you know, insane. Bloomberg and sort of the Stead Financial Press has gone out and talked to investment managers about Trump's activity, and they're. It's like, this is crazy. We have no idea what could possibly be going on. Even one trade in these kinds of companies would be notable. And he's doing it every day, you know, multiple times. And I don't think he's sitting behind the desk doing these individual trades. It's just impossible to believe. But I think, like, with everything, there's probably multiple aspects to this story, and he clearly believes that there's money to be made here. Otherwise, why go through the whole process of all of this if you didn't think there was. There was something you could. You could really take advantage of?
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A
Right. And you made the point and we can show your post on this that the corporate media, they really have not been covering this. And I mean, this is the number of stories about Trump buying and selling hundreds of millions of dollars in stocks in the first three months of 2026, CBS 0, CNN 0, Fox News 0, NPR. I mean, the list goes on and on. That's your major mainstream press right there. And I, you know, it is stunning. And, and the other thing that I have a question about in all this, Judd, is, you know, Trump just got sort of a get out of jail free card from the IRS the other day as part of this anti weaponization fund announcement from the Department of Justice. And you know, I wonder if it's because Donald Trump doesn't want to pay any taxes on all this money that he's making, you know, and in the crypto stuff, in the stock trading stuff. And he doesn't want to be investigated, doesn't want to be audited, doesn't want to pay taxes. And so that, I mean, could these things be connected? I don't know. It's a question.
- [31:58]
D
Well, I think that that deal that he struck, you know, if it kind of holds up, which I think there's some, some serious questions about, although it's another thing about whether you can establish standing to challenge them. But when you say, okay, no audits on any of our, my past taxes, that also really makes it pretty much impossible to do audits on your future taxes because when you're wealthy like this, you're always carrying forward different kinds of deductions. So in order to investigate, you know, if you were really to audit Trump's taxes, even in, let's say 2028, you're going to have to go back and look at 2023, 2024, because it's all connected. So there is this broader effort to insulate himself from scrutiny.
- [32:53]
A
Yeah. And it seems to me, you know, moving forward and there, there's going to have to be a whole raft of new laws, anti corruption laws if and when Donald Trump leaves the scene, as people leave the scene. And I think this is going to have to be one of them. And this is sort of what infuriates people about the stock trading that goes up on Capitol Hill. People have access to insider information in government. They just do. And Trump is sort of the poster child for this now, maybe more so than Nancy Pelosi, who got a lot of dings for it.
- [33:25]
D
Right. For sure. And this is something, and I've written about this like extensively, you know, long before this story, talking about Democrats and Republicans, you know, this is kind of a bipartisan thing in Congress, selling stock in companies that have business before their committee or might be influenced by, you know, the bills that are going through, you know, the funding bills or anything else. And what was, what's interesting about this is just in the State of the Union this year, Trump himself called for a ban on congressional stock trading. And so you have to wonder like, what's going on? Because if Congress shouldn't do it, well, why should the President do it? I mean, the President's access and the ability of him to influence the companies, especially this president who's cutting deals with individual companies, taking stakes in a company like intel and, and others flying Nvidia
- [34:28]
A
around on an Air Force One and that sort of thing too. Yeah, yeah.
- [34:31]
D
But Vance, interestingly, when Vance was asked about this, he's been going into the press room because the press secretary is on maternity leave and he didn't grapple with this at all. You know, he basically said, hey, come on man, what Trump is doing is fine. And yes, we are both huge supporters of banning congressional stock trading. And it's sort of like, well, what's, what's happening here? Like, why are you not connecting these two? Very similar things.
- [35:01]
A
Yeah. And it seems to me at the end of all this, Judd, you're going to need some investigating into these future markets, the, you know, the betting markets, and whether or not there was insider information going on being passed along where some of these Trump administration officials dumb enough, they probably weren't dumb enough to email each other about this or anything that's documented. But you know, texts, signals, you know, I, I guess those are disappearing messages, I, I suppose. But there's got to be some kind of paper trail. I would think at some point that's going to establish whether or not there was a real pattern of insider trading and corruption going on in all of these markets, both on Wall street and in the, this wild west of prediction markets.
- [35:45]
D
Yeah, that's a topic I'm really interested in. There was a studying report on 60 Minutes over the weekend showing, you know, they don't know exactly who it is, but a wallet, you know, coming on with a 98 success rate in these sort of war related markets they have making millions of dollars. So who, you know, this is somebody who clearly knows how these markets are going to resolve. And you know, we don't know. Is it somebody in the White House, Is it somebody in the Pentagon? You know, you don't really know based on that. Yet I'm not an expert in it. I do know that there's some ways that you can kind of figure out, okay, well, here's where they created the wallet. And, and sometimes the weak link can be when they transfer the money from a more traditional at some point somebody has to transfer some money from a more traditional financial institution into one of these wallets. You know, can you do a subpoena there or figure out, you know, how did the money get in? Maybe that gets you to a real person because they have to know your customer laws. So yeah, maybe they can track it down. But absolutely, I mean that's, that's a whole, whole other can of worms but something that's really important.
- [37:03]
A
Absolutely. Well, John, always great to talk to you. The there he is on substack at Jug Leggum and of course the always popular Popular Information substack. Very I mean it's a, it's an invaluable resource on subsec is why I love substack and I love independent media because we have folks like you there just, you know, lighting stuff on fire, man. Really appreciate it.
- [37:25]
D
Thanks for having me.
- [37:28]
A
Yeah, great work there from Judd. And the folks at Popular Information, they really are doing a public service over there. I also somebody else is doing a public service is my friend Liz Oyer who runs the lawyer or social media sensation that she's been presiding over. And she and I had a great conversation earlier today about how ridiculous Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general has been throughout all of this. Here's, here's our conversation from earlier today. And joining us now is the former pardon attorney at the Department of Justice lawyer or your Liz Oyer. Liz, great to see you.
- [38:03]
E
Hey, Jim, good to see you too.
- [38:05]
A
Good to see you too. And let's keep talking about this anti weaponization fund that they, you know, pulled out of th and they created and they've given Trump an addendum to it that says that he can't be prosecuted, he can't be audited, nothing bad can happen to him from here until kingdom come. Let's talk about this. I guess just today, Todd Blanch, the acting attorney general and still very much current it seems defense attorney for Donald Trump was up on Capitol Hill meeting with senators, trying to smooth all of this over. And the fine folks over at pbs, they obtained a document of what is being presented to lawmakers. And there's a part of this that says that even senators can apply for funds from this or I mean, it's just this stuff is getting crazier by the minute.
- [38:54]
B
Yeah.
- [38:55]
E
Blanche seems to have realized that he needs to cut the members of Congress in on the deal in order to try to shore up their support. Congress really is the one entity that can and should and must to shut this down. The Constitution gives Congress the exclusive power to appropriate money. This settlement agreement is an end run around Congress's appropriation power. It is an attempt to create something that really lawfully should only be created by Congress. So Congress is in a position to step up here and very easily undo this were they just to do their jobs. And Blanche seems to have realized that there is some pressure now on Republican members of Congress to as well as Democrats to intervene and stop this plainly illegal settlement fund from moving forward. Some Republicans have publicly expressed concerns about the settlement fund. So Blanche has gone up to the Hill today. He's meeting behind closed doors with Republican senators. He has distributed this set of talking points. And it's pretty extraordinary because the talking points actually seem to encourage members of Congress to bring claims, and they encourage Republicans to bring claims. There is nothing in the settlement agreement whatsoever that talks about claims to the fund by members of Congress. But here there's a reference specifically to senators whose phone records were collected. That's a reference to the senators who had their phone records reviewed by the FBI in connection with the special counsel investigation of January 6th. A lot of those senators made a big think about it, were up in arms demanding compensation. Lindsey Graham was one among others. And so those people now are being told by Todd Blanche, look, if you support this, if you don't interfere, you can get a cut of the money, which is just an attempt to spread the corruption around further outside of the executive branch and into Congress. It's really quite extraordinary.
- [40:49]
A
Yeah, with $1.8 billion, you can buy some senators with that kind of money. There's no question about it. We'll see who lines up. Lindsey Graham is always begging for money on Fox. I don't know, maybe he will be the first to apply. We'll see. But the other thing is that there are some Republican senators even on the, on the GOP side who are saying no thanks. Now, of course, these are some of the ones who are retiring and that sort of thing have been primaried out. And so all of a sudden we have a backbone now. But here's Thom Tillis from North Carolina and here's what he had to say, but on stilts.
- [41:20]
C
Why? Because it will invariably put us in a position where your taxpayer dollars and my taxpayer dollars could potentially compensate someone who assaulted a police Officer admitted their guilt, got convicted, got pardoned, and now we're going to pay them for that. That's absurd. The American people are going to reject this out of hand. When you take money from me to give to a purpose that I vehemently disagree with, that's tyranny and that's what
- [41:51]
A
that account is, tyranny. But I mean, Tom Tillis makes a good point and I guess this is something that maybe you and I have not talked about it. It doesn't get a lot of discussion is a lot of these January Sixers who I guess would be eligible for this in this crazy world that we live in now. A lot of them admitted their own guilt. They, they admitted that they did it. They admitted they did bad things.
- [42:15]
E
Yeah, there are, There are many January 6th defendants who pleaded guilty and were convicted of crimes and sentenced and then had their sentences undone, their convictions undone by Donald Trump's pardons. So they already got that, that one benefit. And now the President and his attorney general are trying to go a step further and pay them for their troubles. And Todd Blanche has been on television defending this. He did an interview with CNN in which he talked about how this really isn't even unusual and he believes that the American people understand that these people ought to be able to recover money that they spend on lawyers and be compensated for their trou. Seems to be totally out of touch with reality in suggesting that the American people are going to completely understand and support this. I have yet to speak with anyone who understands or supports this. Blanche also said something to the effect that he really had no concerns about the idea that people who had assaulted police officers could be paid money out of this fund. He said that happens all the time. I have no idea. Talking about. I don't know what he is referring to when he says it happens all the time, that people who attack police officers get government payments.
- [43:24]
A
Yeah, no, I think this has become a game now of how, how low will Todd Blanche go? I mean, it seems like he, he will go as low as he possibly can to get the job of permanent Attorney General. And then. But it's not just Todd Blanche. The other, other members of the administration are getting the talking points. And there was the Southern District Attorney, U.S. attorney on CNBC, I think this morning, and he was defending. And I guess we could play that. I wish we just take all this in, I guess, but that's what I Pretend it's not the president.
- [43:54]
C
Pretend it's me. Yeah. Why? And let's say you thought that I was a Tax cheat. Why would you. I'm not saying you. I. That he was a tax cheat. I'm just saying, let's say you thought that I owed the government money.
- [44:10]
A
Wouldn't you want me to pay the money?
- [44:13]
C
Why would the government not want me to pay.
- [44:14]
A
Pay the money?
- [44:15]
C
And we have two things going on here. We intentionally leak your tax returns to embarrass you in the public. You have a claim against us. There's an audit that we don't know whether there's money owed or not owed. To resolve that, we say, you know what, Andrew, we're going to drop the audit. We're going to move on, and you're going to drop your claim against us for trying to name and shame you. That's a deal. I think that, you know, is actually a pretty good deal for the government. If the government intentionally leaked somebody's tax returns.
- [44:46]
A
Yeah. And Liz, it's not true. I mean, it was. It was a contractor who leaked it, not the government. It was not the IRS that leaked it. And he's trying to. He's trying to lump everybody in there together. But the other aspect of this that is so infuriating is this sort of get out of jail free card that it seems like this. When Todd Blanche announced this the first time, it wasn't good enough for Trump because it didn't give him this sort of blanket protection that he wants from here on out that also should be infuriating to Americans.
- [45:15]
E
Yeah. I want to make sure people understand that there are two separate components to this settlement, each one of which is independently, extraordinarily corrupt. One is the settlement money, which is basically an illegal appropriation of taxpayer dollars to distribute to Donald Trump's friends and supporters, as this anonymous group of people sees fit. And the other is the release of claims by the United States against Donald Trump. It is an extremely broad provision. It is a separate provision of the settlement agreement signed by Todd Blanche that says that the United States is agreeing not to investigate, audit, or sue Donald Trump, the individual, any of his companies, or any member of his family in perpetuity for the future. Todd Blanche has signed away the rights of the United States to seek any compensation from Donald Trump in the future, including taxes that he might owe, including damages that he might owe to the American people, including disgorgement of unjust gains that he got by abusing the office of the President. All of this out the window. Any civil liability for the foreseeable future. For the future. Even after. After Blanche and Trump are out of office, this purports to apply. That is just completely corrupt. Todd Blanch has sold the interests of the American people down the river and is acting solely for the benefit of Donald Trump. As the acting Attorney General, he has a fiduciary duty to the American people. He has a duty to protect our interests, including our tax dollars, to defend against frivolous lawsuits like this one. And he has done exactly the opposite. It is the most staggeringly corrupt action by any attorney general that we have ever seen in history.
- [47:12]
A
Yeah. And the New York Times has described it as such. I mean, they have a House editorial today that there's never been this level of corruption that we've ever seen in this country's history.
- [47:26]
C
And.
- [47:26]
A
And I. I think that's very true.
- [47:29]
C
And.
- [47:29]
A
And it seems to me, and correct me if I'm wrong, Liz, it almost seems as though that Trump knows that there may be some. Some issues with the amount of money he and his family have made since coming back into the White House, and they don't want to pay taxes on it. And so this is sort of almost like a get out of paying your taxes card, too. It's almost like he can just not pay taxes ever again, according to this, and the government can't do anything about it. It's sort of like the best thing that could ever happen to a tax cheat.
- [47:59]
E
Yeah. I mean, there's been an analogy drawn between this and a pardon. They're sort of saying like, this is almost like Donald Trump pardoning himself. But this actually goes beyond the scope of a pardon because it not only forgives any potential criminal conduct, it also puts Trump off the hook for any civil liability. A pardon applies only to criminal acts. It doesn't you. From IRS audits and paying back taxes and being charged money that you might owe to the taxpayers. And this does all of that. This is the whole package. Donald Trump can do essentially whatever he wants for the rest of his life. It's a get out of jail free card in perpetuity, signed, sealed, and delivered by Todd Blanche, who we know is actually just Donald Trump's personal attorney. He is not acting in the interests of the American people at all.
- [48:51]
A
Right. But my question is, and I've raised this already this week, and I'll raise it with you, is that. Couldn't a Democratic president come into office and take the same maximalist view and say, I don't care what Todd Blanche and Donald Trump worked out when they were in office. This is a new administration and using my executive authority, which is sweeping and cannot be Questioned. As far as I'm. As far as I'm concerned, I'm tearing this up, and I'm ordering the Justice Department to investigate Donald Trump and prosecute. I mean, I just. I don't know where this ends. I know that that's not an appropriate way for a president to act, but I'm just saying that if they take. If the Democrats were to take the same approach, they could. They could conceivably do that and shield themselves. And where does it end?
- [49:37]
E
Yeah, yeah. On the question of this particular agreement between Blanche and Trump, I'm not sure that it would hold up in court if a future president decided to go ahead and investigate Donald Trump. Donald Trump would come forward and say, look, I have this agreement. You can't do this. And ultimately, a court would decide whether it was a valid release of claims against Trump. And as a lawyer, I read it, and it looks pretty fishy. I think there are some real questions about whether it's a legitimate contract or whether it is just collusion between Trump and his attorney general, slash, personal attorney. It might not hold up in court, but you're right that it does sort of invite this cycle of, well, I did whatever I want as president, so the next guy going to do the same thing. It really. Where does it end? Is a great question.
- [50:21]
A
Yeah. And that's not what good government is. And I think people have gotten so jaded and cynical. Maybe they just assume, well, this is. This always happens. This is not. No, this is not what always happens. Donald Trump has brought about in this second term a sort of corruption bonanza. And I think this sort of crystallizes and illustrates it almost better than anything else that we've seen up until this point. It does make him like a king, it does make him like a dictator, in that there's no recourse if he gets completely out of control and breaks the law or tries to enrich himself off the presidency.
- [50:58]
E
Yeah, yeah, you're right, Jim. I mean, he. He's just the type of person that our system was not built for, our system of laws, our constitutional order was not built to sustain or to withstand a person who is willing to put their own personal interests consistently over and ahead of the interests of the American people. And it's been challenging for us to respond to this moment because I don't believe that the framers of our Constitution ever imagine that someone like Donald Trump would occupy the role of presidency and push the limits so far. But the real problem that we have right now is the unwillingness of Congress to step up and do the job that was given to them by the Constitution. Congress could shut down this corrupt settlement fund in a second. They have the power of the purse. The Constitution gives Congress the of exception, exclusive power to appropriate funds. Todd Blanche is claiming that he can use something called the settlement fund, which is funds that have been appropriated by Congress to the Justice Department to settle legitimate lawsuits in order to create this $1.8 billion slush fund. It's questionable whether he really can do that, but to the extent there's any doubt, Congress could step in and say, no, this is not what we had in mind. We are not approving this use of these funds over. But they've been unwilling to do that thus far. And really, it is only Congress that clearly has the power to do that. We saw a lawsuit filed yesterday by some of the police officers who were at the Capitol on January 6th who are trying to block the fund. I hope they're successful. But there are real challenges in this legal doctrine called standing, as to whether they will actually be deemed to be appropriate plaintiffs to bring this lawsuit and seek this type of relief. So, you know, Congress is. They're the ones that clearly have the authority to shut this down, and I am hopeful that they will step up and do that before we suffer just an irreparable blow to the structure and order of our democracy.
- [53:01]
A
Absolutely. And I mean, and just to give the members of Congress an indication as to what Trump is trying to do here with Todd Blanche is that it's says that they would create a commission for administering this, and it says that they will choose the members of the commission. One. One of the members. One of the five members would be done in consultation with the Congress. That the. The Congress doesn't even get to put a person on the board. They get to consult with the administration. And so this is set up. So it's admin. It's sort of like the, you know, these councils that are approving rubber stamping Trump's monuments that he wants to put everywhere. This is another. This is a commission designed to be a rubber stamp.
- [53:41]
B
Yeah.
- [53:41]
E
And the President can fire the commissioners for any reason. If he doesn't like the decisions they're making, he can fire them. That aspect of it is very troubling. And the other aspect of it that's extremely troubling is the secrecy piece of it. There is no transparency built into this arrangement. And in fact, the settlement agreement explicitly states that these five members of this commission can make their own rules, and they do not have to share the rules with the public. So the public has no right to know how the decisions are being made, what standards are being applied, what rules the committee is applying to itself and the decisions themselves are considered confidential. There is a requirement that the members make a quarterly report to the attorney general, but the agreement specifically states that that report, report is to be held confidential. So we, the taxpayers who are funding this whole endeavor, do not even have the right to know who is getting our money, how much they're getting and why.
- [54:40]
A
Yeah, this is rotten to the core. No question about it. Well, Liz, always great to have you on. Really appreciate you helping us break this down. Great to see you again.
- [54:49]
E
Thanks, Jim. Thanks for having me on.
- [54:52]
A
Always great to have Liz Oyer on the program. And I mean, this flows very nicely, too. I mean, I have written a substack that, that says I would like to apply for the anti weaponization fund. It sounds as though I don't have much of a chance based on what Liz was just saying that Donald Trump controls who's on this weaponization fund board. But hey, you know, why not give it a shot? Let's take a shot here and see what happens. You know, I, I am, I am being a bit tongue in cheek about this, but I, I will say if we're going to open up the floor to weaponization claims, Donald Trump, you did. And Sarah Huckabee Sanders, when you're press secretary, you did take my press pass back in 2018. That was the government being weaponized to come after me, a member of the free press in this country. And I had to go to a federal judge, a Trump appointed federal judge, to get that press passed back. And if that wasn't enough, Donald Trump earlier this year, as we would, we talked about on this show, took credit for the fact that he ousted me from my job at my former employer. And he, he did this to a variety of other television anchors and hosts. And so I don't know, maybe, maybe there's some other, you know, other interested parties here and joining, joining with me to apply to the government's anti weaponization fund. It sounds as though when they hatch this little idea that this would only apply to Republicans and people in MAGA and Jan Sixers and stuff like that. But Donald Trump has done a lot of government weaponization. He's kind of, he's kind of the king of government weaponization. He's, he is, he's practicing it in real time as we speak. And you know, one example, of course, is what's taking place tonight on National Television on cbs. It is Stephen Colbert's final show as the host of the Late show with Stephen Colbert. He was forced out by Donald Trump. That is, that is where we are as a country right now. Donald Trump, because he can't take a joke, he can't take reporting. So he comes after me, can't take a joke. So he goes after Stephen Colbert, uses the FCC to put pressure on Paramount and CBS and, and gets Colbert fired by cbs even though he was doing a stellar job as the Late show host. And I mean, this is near and dear to my heart a little bit because I had a chance to be on the Late show with Stephen Colbert. This was back and I think it was 2018 there, there I am backstage, going out there and Colbert asked me about these free press issues and had a chance to talk about.
- [57:23]
C
And
- [57:27]
A
today he was with me in New York the day that we went, that was a lot of fun. Some good memories there. But that there, there we are in front of the marquee of the Ed Sullivan Theater there in New York. We look a little younger there, Matt, just a smidge younger in this photo. How time flies. But it is, I mean, you know, government was weaponized. The FCC, as part of the government was weaponized to go after Stephen Colbert. And so maybe, I don't know, maybe Stephen Colbert will announce tonight that he too is applying to the anti weaponization fund. I'm doing it a bit tongue in cheek to point out how preposterous this is that we have an anti weaponization fund when Donald Trump is the king of government weaponization. But, you know, he does a lot of nutty things these days. Earlier today, he couldn't commit to whether he was going to go to his, his son's wedding this weekend. He was talking about that. And it, and you know, this has been a running theme on this show. I've been, you know, raising the question about Donald Trump's cognitive state. He raised the issue, he made it an issue when he went after Joe Biden when Joe Biden was office and called him Sleepy Joe and everything else. And so, you know, listen, there are legitimate questions about Donald Trump's cognitive health. He goes out there on a regular basis and brags about how he aces all of these cognitive tests. Of course, we don't see them in person. We don't know for a fact, Donald Trump, whether or not you ace these cognitive tests. We don't know if you even took these cognitive tests. But he claims that he's taken these and he talks about them as if they're IQ tests, when they're not their cognitive test. How do I know this? How do I know some of these things? Well, as it turns out, we here on the Jim Acosta show, there, there are no lengths that, that we will not go to. It's a double negative to, to get to the bottom of these things. And so, yes, I did a cognitive test. I did the, it's the moca. I think it's called the MOCA Cognitive Exam. Here it is right here. I did it. And we have a clip. We recorded this at a nearby studio with, with Dr. Rob Davidson of Paging America, a great guy. He helped administer the test. We have a little clip to tease this. We're going to be playing the full thing tomorrow on the show. So if you thought my big reveal today was my application for the Anti Weaponization Fund, no, it's that I took the cognitive exam. And here's a clip. You are going to help me take one of these cognitive tests, the cognitive test that we think Donald Trump claims he's been taking.
- [59:55]
F
Yeah. Well, I'm not going to help you.
- [59:56]
A
You're not going to help.
- [59:56]
F
My job here is to administer the test.
- [59:58]
A
That's good. Yeah.
- [59:59]
F
And I think at least once, I believe last year they did report this specific test. It's called Montreal Cognitive Assessment. Okay. So it's MOCA is how people refer to. It's probably the most common cognitive test that physicians or other providers administer to patients when there's a concern about their cognition. You know, there's a concern they may be slipping.
- [60:20]
A
So, yeah, we're doing this to drive home a point that this is not something that a president should be bragging about, that he aces these tests. And also just to see what it's like, I mean, I've been wondering, what is this? What is it like? How does it work? So I guess we should, should we do it?
- [60:36]
F
I think let's go at it. So, yeah, let's do it.
- [60:38]
C
Okay.
- [60:38]
F
And I can, I can hold up. It's called the MOCA. This is version 8.1.
- [60:41]
A
I believe there's three of them.
- [60:42]
F
I mean, people can search this out online. You can find them everywhere, particular, particularly nowadays. The first part is going to be you doing a few things. And I can explain what the task is.
- [60:53]
A
First part here, that looks pretty good there. I think that looks all right. In my personal opinion, it could have been neater, but that was while I'm
- [61:05]
F
doing this and while I'm doing this, like, how, actually.
- [61:11]
A
So there you go. There's the cognitive test. And just a short teaser there just to let everybody know, this is going to be happening tomorrow at 4 o' clock Eastern. You're going to be able to see it live here on the Jim Acosta Show. Did I pass? Did I fail? I guess if I failed the cognitive test, there would be some serious problems right now and I probably would not be able to host this show. So that probably gives you a sense as to how I did on the cognitive test. I will say, well, I don't want to reveal it. I will say that, that it is not like, like a done deal, that as you sit down you're just going to nail the whole thing. But, but I, I will say that if I had failed it, I probably wouldn't be here right now. So I think I did okay. I, I will let the count out of the bag that I think I did okay. But I did take the test because we wanted to see what the hell is Donald Trump talking about when he talks about taking these cognitive tests. Watch it tomorrow. It'll be here on the Jim Acosta Show. Of course, we always like to have lots of fun here on the program. And this is one of those examples again. And as I say, heading into the test, there should be no wagering. This better not be on Polymarket or Calshi or whatever the hell they call that stuff. There better not be any betting as to whether or not I pass the cognitive test. Please, please don't do that. Please. No wagering. But I want to thank great show today. Sharon McMahon, America's government teacher. She was terrific today as well as Judd Leggum at Popular Information and lawyer Oyer, Liz Oyer. Always appreciate her having on the program. Appreciate all of you tuning in each and every day. For those of you who subscribe to the show, become paid subscribers of this show, you are funding an independent media project that is free of government interference and free of corporate influence. You know, Donald Trump can kick us off of cable networks, but he can't really do anything about what we're doing here. Thank goodness. And because we have the freedom to do what we do here on independent media, we can bring you the news and the information that you need in a way that isn't, that isn't really being determined by a corporate overlords or ass wipes like Brendan Carr. We just don't do those kinds of things here. So appreciate everybody who helps out. It means the world to me. So thank you. Every time we have a paid subscriber, it definitely helps. Not just on substack, but on YouTube, folks who become subscribers on YouTube, that makes a huge difference as well. So, like, share the program however you can help us. It means so much, but in the meantime, still reporting from Washington, I'm Jim Acosta with my test right here. We'll explain more tomorrow, so stay tuned for that. I'll see you next time.