2453 - Trump’s McKinley Fixation; Free Mahmoud Khalil w/ David McWilliams, Lily Greenberg-Call

Summary

The Majority Report with Sam Seder: Episode 2453 Summary

Title: Trump’s McKinley Fixation; Free Mahmoud Khalil
Host: Sam Seder
Release Date: March 13, 2025
Guests: David McWilliams, Lily Greenberg-Call

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Introduction

In Episode 2453 of The Majority Report with Sam Seder, host Sam Seder delves into two pressing issues: Donald Trump's apparent fixation on President William McKinley and the controversial detention of Mahmoud Khalil. The episode features insightful discussions with economist David McWilliams and activist Lily Greenberg-Call, highlighting historical parallels and current political dynamics.

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Trump’s Obsession with William McKinley

Guest: David McWilliams
Timestamp: [28:20] – [55:38]

David McWilliams, an esteemed economist and podcast host, explores the intriguing parallels between Donald Trump's presidency and that of William McKinley from the late 19th century.

Key Points:

1. Historical Context of McKinley’s Presidency:

   • William McKinley, a Republican from Ohio, became president during a transformative era characterized by economic growth, immigration, and territorial expansion.
   • McKinley’s tenure marked the rise of big business influence and the advent of lobbying in American politics, mirroring modern oligarchic influences.

2. Parallels Between McKinley and Trump:

   • Tariff Policies: McKinley was known as the "Napoleon of tariffs," believing tariffs were essential for American economic growth. Similarly, Trump has aggressively employed tariffs, particularly targeting European alcohol, likened to a "regressive sales tax." McWilliams notes, “a tariff is a tax and it’s passed on to consumers” ([13:00]).
   • Oligarchic Influence: Just as McKinley was backed by industrial titans like Rockefeller and JP Morgan, Trump’s administration is influenced by contemporary oligarchs such as Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos.
   • Territorial Expansion and Imperialism: McKinley initiated small territorial acquisitions post-Spanish-American War, akin to Trump’s initiatives like Greenland and his stance on the Panama Canal.
   • Isolationism and Anti-European Sentiment: Both presidents exhibited isolationist tendencies and a strong anti-European stance, reinforcing nationalistic ideologies.

3. Economic and Social Implications:

   • McKinley’s policies led to significant wealth inequalities and set the stage for future economic reforms like the New Deal.
   • Trump’s unilateral tariff policies are criticized for fostering economic uncertainty and potential stagflation, as businesses grapple with unpredictable trade wars.

4. Cultural Reflections:

   • McWilliams draws a fascinating connection between McKinley and the Wizard of Oz, suggesting the film serves as an allegory for the class struggles and cultural wars of McKinley’s era, much like contemporary America’s divisions.

Notable Quotes:

• “A tariff is a tax and it’s passed on to consumers” – David McWilliams ([13:00]).
• “Trump is saying like we can go around that I can do this unilaterally and make it so that everyday people bear this burden” – David McWilliams ([18:45]).

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Analysis of Tariffs and Economic Policies

Discussion Between Hosts and Guest

McWilliams and co-host Matt Binder dissect the ramifications of Trump's broad and punitive tariff implementations. They argue that unlike targeted tariffs aimed at fostering specific industries (e.g., the CHIPS Act for semiconductor manufacturing), Trump’s sweeping tariffs on European goods like alcohol serve as a regressive economic burden on American consumers, exacerbating income inequality.

Key Points:

• Impact on Consumers and Businesses:

  • Broad tariffs lead to increased costs for everyday goods, disproportionately affecting middle and lower-income families.
  • Businesses face uncertainty, hindering investment and economic stability.

• Historical vs. Modern Tariffs:

  • While McKinley’s tariffs aimed at protecting burgeoning American industries, Trump’s tariffs appear more punitive and less strategic, lacking the nuanced implementation required for economic growth.

• Potential for Economic Conflict:

  • Tariff wars between the U.S., Canada, and Europe may escalate into broader economic or even military conflicts, reminiscent of historical economic rivalries.

Notable Quotes:

• “If you want to incentivize onshore manufacturing of X product, you slap a tariff on the import of that particular product” – David McWilliams ([17:08]).
• “Tariffs, very, very blunt, very regressive” – David McWilliams ([17:08]).

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The Historical Parallels and Implications

Further Discussion with David McWilliams

McWilliams elaborates on the long-term effects of McKinley’s policies, drawing direct lines to potential future outcomes under Trump’s administration.

Key Points:

• Wealth Inequality:

  • McKinley’s era saw a significant rise in wealth disparities, a trend McWilliams warns could intensify under Trump’s policies.

• Introduction of Lobbying:

  • The 1896 election marked the genesis of modern lobbying, heavily influencing policy in favor of big business, a practice further entrenched in today’s political landscape.

• Cyclical Economic Policies:

  • McWilliams suggests that the repeating cycle of economic booms and busts, influenced by protectionist policies, could lead to prolonged economic instability.

Notable Quotes:

• “Tariffs are really gone to the back of the American public” – David McWilliams ([16:54]).
• “This is a regressive sales tax, basically, in terms of how it functions” – David McWilliams ([17:08]).
• “This is their effort to like. It's a very far right libertarian vision” – David McWilliams ([19:13]).

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Detention of Mahmoud Khalil

Guests: Lily Greenberg-Call, Ramzi Kassim
Timestamp: [57:49] – [74:53]

The episode shifts focus to the alarming detention of Mahmoud Khalil, an immigrant and Palestinian activist at Columbia University. Former Democratic administration staffer Lily Greenberg-Call and activist Ramzi Kassim address the unconstitutionality and political motivations behind his detention.

Key Points:

1. Circumstances of Detention:

   • Khalil, a recent Columbia graduate, was detained without criminal charges for his activism opposing Israel’s military actions in Gaza.
   • His detention involved a mysterious abduction by Trump officials, who relocated him from New Jersey to Louisiana without notifying his family or legal counsel.

2. Violation of First Amendment Rights:

   • Khalil’s detention is a blatant breach of free speech rights, as he was targeted solely for his political views and activism.

3. Political Reactions and Antisemitism:

   • Democratic leaders like Chuck Schumer condemned Khalil by associating him with anti-Semitic actions, while others like Chris Murphy offered more robust support.
   • The Trump administration has been criticized for using antisemitic rhetoric to justify political repression, exacerbating tensions within Jewish communities.

4. Historical Context and Legislative Abuse:

   • The statute used to detain Khalil was historically intended to target Soviet agents, not for suppressing political speech, highlighting its misuse.
   • This mirrors past authoritarian practices where legislation is weaponized to silence dissenters under the guise of national security.

5. Call to Action:

   • Guests urge listeners to mobilize, advocate for Khalil’s release, and resist authoritarian measures threatening democratic freedoms.

Notable Quotes:

• “Khalil is a recent graduate of Columbia University... there is no evidence he has broken any law.” – Emma Vigeland ([59:46]).
• “It requires the Secretary of State to notify Congress with supporting evidence for why they're making this move.” – Emma Vigeland ([69:21]).
• “This is going to breed resentment of Jews to take away people's rights in our name.” – Ramzi Kassim ([72:48]).

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Reactions from Political Figures and Communities

Discussion with Ramzi Kassim and Lily Greenberg-Call

Ramzi Kassim articulates the broader implications of Khalil’s detention, linking it to historical patterns of antisemitism and authoritarianism.

Key Points:

• Community Impact:

  • Khalil’s abduction not only threatens individual rights but also aims to instill fear within activist communities, signaling a crackdown on dissent.
  • American Jewish organizations and leaders are mobilizing to condemn the administration’s actions and protect civil liberties.

• Historical Echoes:

  • The use of antisemitic language and tactics recalls McCarthy-era persecution, highlighting a cyclical trend of using bigotry to justify repressive policies.

• Strategies for Resistance:

  • Emphasis on grassroots activism, public demonstrations, and unified community responses to counteract authoritarian measures.
  • Encouragement for Jewish and allied communities to lead in defending democratic values and opposing fascist agendas.

Notable Quotes:

• “There is no evidence that Mahmoud said anything that would... it's still an illegal detention.” – David McWilliams ([63:40]).
• “We need to be fighting for Mahmoud as if he is one of our own, because he is one of our own.” – Ramzi Kassim ([72:47]).
• “If we don't fight back, then we're not going to have much to fight for.” – Ramzi Kassim ([72:47]).

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Call to Action

Throughout the episode, hosts emphasize the importance of listener engagement in combating the administration’s policies. They urge the audience to:

• Contact Senators: Listeners are encouraged to call their senators at 202-224-3121 to express opposition to the continuing resolution that permits budget cuts affecting various sectors.

Notable Quotes:

• “Call your senators. 202-224-3121 is the number.” – David McWilliams ([04:22]).
• “The number is 646-257-3920. We'll open up the phone lines on the other side of this.” – David McWilliams ([77:28]).

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Conclusion

Episode 2453 of The Majority Report with Sam Seder offers a deep dive into the historical underpinnings of current political strategies under Donald Trump, drawing chilling similarities to William McKinley’s presidency. Coupled with a critical examination of the authoritarian detention of Mahmoud Khalil, the episode serves as a potent reminder of the fragility of democratic freedoms and the enduring struggle against oligarchic and authoritarian influences.

Listeners are left with a sense of urgency to mobilize and defend democratic principles, ensuring that historical lessons inform present and future actions.

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Recommended Listening:

• David McWilliams Podcast: For an in-depth exploration of the historical parallels discussed.
• Ramzi Kassim’s Interview on Democracy Now: Featuring comprehensive insights into Mahmoud Khalil’s case.

For more information and to support The Majority Report, visit Majority.FM.

Transcript

[Sam Cedar]

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[Emma Vigeland]

Majority Report with Sam Cedar.

[David McWilliams]

It is Thursday, March 13, 2025. My name is Emma Vigeland in for Sam Cedar and this is the five time award winning Majority Report. We are broadcasting live steps from the industrially ravaged Gowanus Canal in the heartland of America, downtown Brooklyn, USA. On the program today, David McWilliams will be with us to talk about William McKinley and why Trump is so obsessed with him. And later in the show, Lilly Greenberg call former Biden administration staffer who resigned over his Gaza policy joins us to talk about the wildly unconstitutional detention of Mahmoud Khalil. Also on the program, keep calling your senators. Chuck Schumer publicly says Democrats will reject the continuing resolution that allows Elon to keep illegally cutting the funding that they're supposed to be appropriating.

[Matt Binder]

Usurping their power.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah, signing off on their own death warrant. You can't even get Democrats to fully agree not to do that. But many are skeptical that this may be a stunt by Schumer, that he might be doing a head fake. So don't let up. 202-224-3121. Call your senators. It's in their hands now. Today is the deadline for agencies to submit mass layoff plans to Doge. This comes as Trump doubles down on his desire to end the Department of education. But 21 Democratic attorneys general sue in response after the EU announced a 50% tariff on US whiskey retaliating against Trump. Trump's retaliating with more percentage 200% tariff he proposes on European alcohol. You think that like rich people are going to be thrilled when their French wines are four times the price?

[Matt Binder]

Remember when the wall was going to get higher every time?

[David McWilliams]

Yeah. Mexico said something and Mexico was supposed to pay for it. The stock market keeps falling after Trump's tariff threats. But Republicans argue no pain, no gain. Meaning pain for you, gain for them. Trump withdraws his nomination for RFK's buddy. Anti vax sir. Don't have his name down actually. But he was going to be CDC director. Looks like he didn't have the votes. The mayor of Miami threatens to close a local movie theater for screening the Oscar winning Israeli Palestinian documentary no Other Land hysteria. Zionists are 21st century McCarthyites, folks. Tim Walls announces that he will go around the country to red districts speaking to Trump voters about progressive policy. He is that guy. A UN Independent inquiry finds that Israel has committed genocidal acts against Palestinians by systemically targeting women's health facilities and using sexual violence. Trump's envoy arrives in Moscow to discuss the 30 day ceasefire that Ukraine has agreed to. And lastly, Trump replaces the chief IRS counsel with a Doge sycophant. All this and more on today's Majority Report, also known as a majority report. And it is just myself and Matt today. Bradley is out. So forgive us if, you know, we have a little lag time between clips. Matt has to kind of roll around in his rolly chair from computer to computer. Say hello now if you can. Hello. But honestly, this is like this is really key right now. Continue to call your senators. I'm going to say the number again. 202-224-3121 is the number. Chuck Schumer may be doing this just as a bit of theater and AOC on, on social media just this morning was kind of indicating that that could be the case, saying that there's the potential for a head fake for a failed proposal for a 30 day continuing resolution, which is what the Democrats are saying. So that they can say, well, we tried. We'll vote to invoke closure on the GOP spending bill. That basically leaves a bunch of blank space for Elon Musk to fill it in with his Doge cuts. It says nothing about addressing the fact than an unelected billionaire is illegally cutting the funds that are supposed to be appropriated that they're discussing in this bill. How can you not put that into place? And, and how could Democrats vote for it in that instance? John Fetterman's already said he's going to do it. But the point is, is like the House Democrats, they stood together. Chuck Schumer, get your caucus in order, make sure they don't get to 60 votes. So again, call your senators, 202-42-43121. Matt, go ahead.

[Matt Binder]

I'd just like to say the founding fathers in their infinite wisdom, which I've never sort of problematizing or contradicting, actually created the Department of Governmental Efficiency at the start. It's supposed to be called Congress.

[David McWilliams]

Right.

[Matt Binder]

If you look up like what Harry Truman was doing as a senator before he was president, it's called the Truman Committee, which would go around like contractors during World War II and be like, hey, those are bad engines or we're getting a bad deal. It wasn't led by a contractor like Elon Musk, it was into contractors, where that's where the fraud goes, whether it is in the military or in health services or stuff like that. And we have the foxes looking into the hen house for fraud right now.

[David McWilliams]

Yep.

[Matt Binder]

And any, and the way that any sort of Democrat could say, well, we just need to be the responsible one. You're being responsible by giving a budget to the foxes.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah. And the Fetterman, whatever, he's a lost cause. Just completely out to lunch. But there are 10 senators who are being cited here as undecided. Gallego of Arizona, Angus King, independent, but caucuses with the Democrats. Mark Kelly of Arizona, who's trying to do the centrist thing. Ben Ray Luan, Brian Schatz, Tammy Baldwin, Lisa Br. What does that stand for? Senator? Oh, Blunt Rochester. Okay. Who is the, the senator from Delaware, which is insane. Brian Schatz, Tammy Baldwin, Andy Kim from my old old home state of New Jersey. What the hell are you doing? Jon Ossoff is assessing the situation. And then Tina Smith. So Those are the 10 Democrats that need to be targeted right now. And that is Haley Talbot of cnn who has that tracker going on right now.

[Matt Binder]

And once again, that is 202, 224, 3121.

[David McWilliams]

Thank you, Matt. With that, this was a pretty startling admission on CNN last night. Kaitlan Collins had Senator Mark Wayne Mullen on, you know, the guy that tried to have a fist fight with Sean O'Brien in the Senate and Bernie had to break it up.

[Matt Binder]

Kind of won O'Brien's respect a little bit.

[David McWilliams]

Right.

[Matt Binder]

We'll get into that right now.

[David McWilliams]

I mean, well, then and now Sean O'Brien's All Like Loving the Republicans, so I guess that's water under the bridge. But he's here on CNN and Kaitlan Collins asks him about Donald Trump's tariffs. And no problem, he makes an admission here that I just don't think any other Republicans have said so far, but it's absolutely the case. So he let slip what the real function of Trump's in insane tariff war is.

[Emma Vigeland]

It's promises made and promises kept by the president.

[David McWilliams]

Well, but the businesses seem confused. I mean, Wall street, we're watching. I mean, you're seeing the numbers. What's a business leader left to think?

[Emma Vigeland]

It's, it's tough right now. And I understand that. I'm a business owner. We all make decisions based on two things. The way we were raised in our life experience before politics, all I ever did was business. You need certainty, which is why we need, you know, tax policy that's permanent, not that's able to fade in and out. I'm not trying to get off on that subject, but I'm just saying that we need certainty in the business world. Tariffs is a tax and it will be passed on consumers. But it also allows us to have open markets. So if you want to have open markets and access to other markets. So let's go past Canada and let's go past Mexico and start talking about the rest of the countries we allow to come in here that the president says we want to have reciprocal taxes on you if you're going to or tariffs on you if you're going to charge us 36%, we're going to charge you 30 for 6%. If you want to charge us zero, will charge you zero. Every one of these countries want access to the strongest and greatest economy in the world. That's the United States. We don't necessarily have to have their market, but if they're going to have access to us, we want access to their market.

[David McWilliams]

What you just said is important, that a tariff is a tax and it passed on to consumers.

[Emma Vigeland]

Of course it is. Everybody else does not acknowledge that is something that the president who is a business person understands that completely. No one understands the economy better in this president. There hasn't been a president that understands this economy better than this.

[David McWilliams]

And I'm sorry, just for a quick second and go back to when she says you just revealed that because the White House is not revealing it. And you see he gets nervous and just starts to compliment Donald Trump over the top. Right. You know, he admitted what he's not supposed to admit, that the tariffs are a compounding regressive tax on the American people. Instead of raising taxes on the wealthy to justify further tax cuts on the.

[Emma Vigeland]

Wealthy and greatest economy in the world, that's the United States. We don't necessarily have to have their market, but if they're going to have access to us, we want access to their market.

[David McWilliams]

You just said is important that a tariff is a tax. And of course passed on to consumers.

[Emma Vigeland]

Of course it is.

[David McWilliams]

Everybody the White House does not acknowledge.

[Emma Vigeland]

That is something that the president who is a business person understands that completely. No one understands the economy better in this president. There hasn't been a president that understands this economy better than this person.

[David McWilliams]

And I think you'd agree that in part of why he won reelection was because of his promises on the economy. There's a new CNN poll today out that says Americans are not that impressed with how he's handled it so far. It's 56% majority of the public disapproves. That's actually lower disapproval than it ever was during his first term in office.

[Emma Vigeland]

It's still higher than it ever was with Biden, though.

[David McWilliams]

Well, but you're already Judging him just on Biden's.

[Emma Vigeland]

No, I'm just saying that if you're going to. If you're going to use numbers, you're using his high number. In his first four years, we had inflation at 1.4%.

[David McWilliams]

It's worse than it ever was during his first.

[Emma Vigeland]

But he.

[David McWilliams]

Of how they're viewing it.

[Emma Vigeland]

But he's got to recover from four years of Biden. Keep in mind, we had a very. We were in a recession over Biden, but no one talked about it. Sorry. I'm sorry.

[David McWilliams]

They were asked how Trump is handling the economy over Biden. They were asked about the tariffs specifically and they said they disapprove of that. Even by a wider margin. 61 to 39%.

[Emma Vigeland]

President Trump will get this economy where it needs to go. He said that he was going to do what he's doing with the tariffs. Moving on. He said he's going to keep people from taking advantage of us. These countries have been taking advantage of us.

[David McWilliams]

Ok. Ok. This is what happens when you elect a guy that basically operates as a glorified mafia boss to be the president of this country because he has no fundamental understanding of how our trade relationships work with our partners in North America or in Europe and how it is mutually beneficial in this. Like more like broad capitalist sense. Right. If we want to talk about cutting into globalization and on shoring a lot of our manufacturing, I'm on board with that. But you know what? Sort of addressed that through a very kind of xenophobic lens. But still the CHIPS Act. The CHIPS act was about domestically manufacturing, a lot of what we import from China and abroad so that we have a more resilient economy. And Donald Trump the other day says he wants to take a hammer to the CHIPS Act.

[Matt Binder]

The point of tariffs, why we use them a lot when we were a developing economy hundreds of years ago and why developing economies use them now is to protect local industry so you can build it up there. I mean, Sam's. I think Samsung in South Korea. I mean South Korea is a big example. Not sure particularly if Samsung is. But these companies are basically state protected.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah.

[Matt Binder]

And there is use. And again, like look at China. Like it's very clear why Americans and why it's sort of bipartisan that we wanted to help the chip industry here in America because a lot of them are being made in Taiwan and look at a map, for instance, if war broke out. So. But this is. They're not. Tariffs are not done to raise money from other countries.

[David McWilliams]

Well, when they are done in that way. And when it's being applied in this way, it really, all it does is put that on the back of the American public.

[Matt Binder]

Right. They have to be targeted toward a certain industry that you want to develop.

[David McWilliams]

If you want to incentivize onshore manufacturing of X product, you slap a tariff on the import of that particular product so that the price is higher and so the US based company can compete. But broad tariffs, 25%, 50% now he's saying 200% for European booze. That is just going to function as a regressive tax. The sales tax, as I've said a few times on the show, is already a regressive tax because it's a flat tax on those goods. And then if you are somebody who is a working family or a middle income family, the proportion of your disposable income that is spent with that sales tax percentage is higher than somebody who is wealthier. And so when you increase the price of goods to raise revenue, as opposed to taxing, taxing the rich instead, that is a compounding regressive tax. That's how tariffs are going to function. What they don't want to address is that since the Reagan era when he slashed the top marginal tax rate for people, what from like 70% to around 50% and then they kept cutting and cutting and cutting since that period. Is that the reason that say our budget isn't in order or we have some of these deficits is because we completely cut off the most effective fundraising mechanism for the federal government government, which is taxes and taxing the rich. So they don't want to do that. And a lot of Democrats frankly don't want to sign off on a bill that raises taxes on people who are also their donors.

[Matt Binder]

Yeah, they're both of the same people. So it's the representatives of rich people say, and we don't know where money is.

[David McWilliams]

Right. So Trump is saying like we can go around that I can do this unilaterally and make it so that everyday people bear this burden. And we're going to be talking about, you know, the historical parallels with William McKinley with our next guest in just a second. But, you know, I do think that that is a startling admission there where a little disturbance. Little disturbance.

[Sam Cedar]

But we're okay with that. It won't be much.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah, I'm sure you are okay with that. I'm sure you are okay with that. To make tariffs a major source of federal revenue is to immiserate the average family. Period. Period. And I do think at the end of the day. This is their effort to like. It's a very far right libertarian vision of like we've already cut the income tax and slashed it since under Reagan in the ways that I just described. How about we get rid of income tax altogether like, like in Florida, because.

[Matt Binder]

You know, would actually really help. Manufacturing is massive infrastructure spending. It would, you know, things like that. You know, we could do all this tariff stuff or whatever, but you could just make it so like our trains weren't derailing and spilling stuff all over the place. Maybe make that more efficient. But whatever. What do I know?

[David McWilliams]

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[Lilly Greenberg]

David, it is coming out in September in the United States. Not for quite some time in the United States in September.

[David McWilliams]

All right, well, we'll have to have you back to discuss your book when it comes out here.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Love it. That'd be great. Thanks for the invite and lovely to see you. And I hope all things are all going over well over there in New York. And so, greetings from Dublin.

[David McWilliams]

Well, greetings from New York, unfortunately, here in the United States, where Donald Trump is the president. And this is where I was just thrilled to have you on, because people should really check out your podcast and listen to this full episode on Trump and his obsession with William McKinley and how many parallels there are with him and what he's borrowing from. But I guess let's just start with the presidency of William McKinley. What is he known for? And what was the historical context of the time when he came to power?

[Lilly Greenberg]

So, William McKinley, the story starts in a little small village in Antrim, which is the north of Ireland, Scots Ulster village, where William McKinley's father, Davy McKinley, was born and emigrated to the United States. McKinley fights in the Civil War, is a lawyer, is a Republican, tries to get on the Republican ticket. He's from Ohio, he's a Methodist, he's very religious. And up until around the 1870s, not really doing very much. Not really doing very much, but he becomes the president. And we'll talk about this in 1896 in one of the most celebrated, contentious, and frankly, very modern elections. This is the interesting very modern election. It's the first election where you see, for example, big business, you see lobbying. It's the first election where you see a populist, a real deep populist against a classic conservative McKinley. There's a culture war going on, and there's a massive economic war going on between the establishment elite and the working man. The working man in the United States having expanded dramatically in the previous two decades as first the Irish arrived, then the Italians arrived, then the Jews arrived, all come at the same time as the Germans and Scandinavians were coming. So you get this huge sort of cultural demographic maelstrom in the United States, and of course, the country is pushing out to the West. Now, the reason I found this fascinating was two things. One is the course of writing this book. Although I'd known it beforehand, but I haven't researched it properly, I alighted upon the fact that the wizard of Oz may be the most fated movie in American history, in the sense that American families sit around Sing over the Rainbow, Judy Garland, all that sort of stuff. I thought when I was a young fellow that it was just a kid story, but in actual fact, the wizard of Oz is an allegory about William McKinley. Now, this is the fascinating thing, and William McKinley is the man that Donald Trump bases his presidency on. He has been asked, if there is somebody in history that you mirror yourself and you imagine yourself to be, it is William McKinley. That is why I decided to do a wee bit of digging about McKinley, see what sort of character he was. So McKinley, his presidency is characterized by four similarities to Trump's. The first one is tariffs. He was called the Napoleon of tariffs. McKinley believes that tariffs are the way in which the United States would grow dramatically and muscularly. Number one. Number two, it's the first election where you get the oligarchs against the people. So at the time, you had Rockefeller and JP Morgan supporting McKinley. This time around, you've got, you know, Bezos, Elon Musk, all those sort of characters.

[David McWilliams]

Right, our 21st century robber barons now.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Exactly, exactly. So it's exactly the same thing. Now and then, of course, you have McKinley starts a number of small territorial wars of acquisition. Kind of smells like Greenland. One in Panama, one in Cuba, one in Philippines, one in Guam and one in Hawaii. By the end of McKinley's reign, he has acquired these small territories and small wars, which is the first time since the American War of Independence that America has projected its power outside America. And then finally, his overall, despite these four small wars, which you would regard in the American hinterland or the sphere of influence, he is isolationist, which is exactly what Trump wants to be. And he is basically very anti European, which is precisely what Donald Trump is. So these sort of similarities are kind of knocking around in the back of my head. And then when you start to investigate, what you see are uncanny parallels between the potential operation of Trump Mark 2 and the operation of McKinley Mark 1 and then Mark 2. And then the final similarity, or at least possible predictive power of McKinley is the following. McKinley wins a second term. He gets assassinated in 1901. His Vice President, his J.D. vance, ironically, who everybody thought was going to go down the same oligarch route. His vice president is a man known to Americans as Teddy Roosevelt. Teddy Roosevelt gets into the White House and what he does is he completely does a 180 degree turn, goes against the robber barons, goes against all the large, large steel companies, the railways, the electricity companies, breaks them all up and turns America into a much more vibrant democracy. In a way, what you have there is the conflict between MAGA and the Tech Bros playing out 100 odd years ago. Maga, the Steve Bannon Maga and I suspect advanced MAGA is much more anti big business but the Trump version of which has been in a co opted by big business because Donald Trump is impressed by big business, he's impressed by money guys. So very interesting period of eight or nine years of American history and all. And this is the fascinating things all played out in the wizard of Oz where all the main characters. The wizard of oz is William McKinley. This is the amazing thing. And the wizard of Oz was an allegory written about this class struggle, this culture war, the struggle for money. A very, very tedious subject for most people. For me, fascinating. Whether or not America should be on the gold standard or silver standard sounds very esoteric but actually at the time it was fascinating. So there, there are amazing Emma, similarities.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah. I mean the one part where the JD Vance thing I think can't, can't be the complete parallel is that Peter Thiel and the tech oligarchs financed his whole political career. I mean I really do think that his. There was an article that came out in Politico about how Elon Musk was the one pushing one of the many pushing Donald Trump to pick J.D. vance. But perhaps we can have a Democrat populace come in afterwards and do what you describe. One can only hope. Yeah.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Roosevelt was.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I want you to talk more about the gold standard and silver standard fight because that's a, that's a fascinating piece of this history that you know, we can learn from.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Yeah. So I think Emma, the gold and silver standard, you've got to go back to Alexander Hamilton who set up the dollar in 1792 and that was a silver dollar. And that silver dollar remained the currency of the United States until 1872. So nearly 100 odd years. And then in 1872 the United States Congress took this really momentous decision to abandon silver and go for gold. Now the reason it did that, there's many reasons, one of which is that America wanted to be taken seriously by Europeans and they were all on the gold standard. So America thought, well, you know, we need to be a proper country and deal with gold like the rest of them. But the problem with gold is the following. Gold is more valuable than silver. So if you go on a gold standard, what you do in effect is you tie all your dollars to gold. That means because it's more valuable than silver, you reduce the supply of dollars in the system. And what that does is two things. One it leads to deflation, which is falling prices, number one. But number two, it profoundly enriches the people who hold gold. Surprise, surprise. Who holds gold. The richer, the poor. The rich. So what you get is you get a system which is entirely based on creating a financial architecture that rewards very wealthy people.

[David McWilliams]

This is crypto.

[Lilly Greenberg]

There you go. Crypto is even worse because crypto is nothing more than a lobby group that has effectively taken over the Treasury. But that's terrifying for us, and we're not even Americans, so I can tell you about that stuff in a minute. But. So the gold and silver standard is a wee bit like the crypto discussion. But the vast majority of Americans at the time are farmers. And the farmers income comes from the land. And the land's income comes from the yields largely of wheat and corn in the Midwest. Okay. And of cotton in the South. And the south is an interesting example, because the south was, before the Civil War, the richest part of the United States. So much so that the currency that was issued by the bank of Louisiana, coming from New Orleans, which was one of the most wealthy cities in the United States, was called the Dees. Okay, Dixon. And it was a $10 note. But the problem is that Louisiana was half French speaking, half English speaking at the time. The French speakers could pronounce X as this, but the English speakers pronounced it as dix. And that's where Dixieland comes from. And the Dixie Chicks and the Dixie Democrats. So it's all about this currency. But that currency was a paper currency that was defaulted on after the Confederacy lost. So there was a huge drop in Southern wealth after the Confederacy lost the Civil War. And they were seething, and they didn't have any gold.

[Emma Vigeland]

Why?

[Lilly Greenberg]

Because they'd spent all their gold trying to fight the war. And when they lost the war, nobody gave the money back to them. Whereas the Union side, who had also spent gold, the Union government gave them money back. So straight away, you see a flow of money to the north east of the United States after the Civil War. Second issue is, as the railroads started to expand out into the Midwest, what happened? The farmers didn't realize this at the time, was that every single time a railroad went out, like 100 miles, hundreds of thousands of hectares of arable land around the railroads came into production. Now, what does that do? It reduces dramatically the price of wheat. And what's the farmer's only income? It's wheat. So suddenly, farmers who are always in debt, because if you're a farmer, you earn money when you harvest, but you lose money when you sow so you need money all the time, they end up in a weird situation where the price of the corn and the wheat, which is their income, is falling against gold all the time. So the more indebted they get, the more indebted they become. And you have this emerges this amazing party called the populist party in the Midwest in the 1880s that merges with the Democratic Party under a charismatic leader called William Jennings Bryan, and he fights against McKinley. And the politics of the 1896 election were the populists and the Democrats wanted to come off gold and go on to silver and thereby allow more dollars be printed and thereby relieve the suffering of the farmers in the Midwest and the South. Whereas the more industrial north, the financiers, the bankers, the oligarchs, wanted to stay with gold. And as a result, they backed their man, Mr. McKinley, to the hilt. So the politics of money is always never, of course, it's. America is never far away from the. The underlying politics of the country.

[David McWilliams]

Right. And just the fact that, I mean, you said this in that podcast episode that I really Recommend is that McKinley's election in this way really realigned the political map because the Northerners went towards the Republican in the election because it was protecting their wealth. And there's another figure that is a parallel to one of the robber barons, but maybe the closest, Mark Hanna, McKinley's financial backer, who was very intimately involved in policy. And basically that's why in the wizard of Oz, as you describe, the depiction of Oz is like an amalgamation of both Hannah and McKinley. So who is this bag man pulling the strings behind the scenes?

[Lilly Greenberg]

So basically what you have is Hannah comes in. Mark Hannah. So McKinley is a Methodist, Northern Irish, Scots, Irish, as we, as you guys call them. So too is Mark Hannah. They're both from Ohio. Hannah is an ultimate man behind the scenes. He is the operator, he's the Svengali. He's pulling all the strings. And that's why exactly, the wizard of Oz, when Dorothy eventually finds the wizard, is nothing more than this little guy behind a pulling strings who stands for very, very little. Mark Hanna comes into McKinley's life in the 1880s. He finances him, he turns him around, he turns him from a loser. Because McKinley had constantly been losing, you know, local elections against a guy called lynch in Ohio. But his fortunes change when he meets Hannah. Hannah, of course, is exactly the sort of guy you want behind you. A bag man. If you decide that what you're going to do is you're going to become the agent of big business. So Hannah is an extraordinary character and like all these characters, long forgotten, but he offers the blueprint for lobbying in the United States. So there's no lobbying before 1896. This is the amazing thing, right? The election of 1896 creates lobbying, which is something that Hannah understands completely because he understands McKinley isn't half as good a speaker as Jennings Bryan, so he can't beat him out on the hustings. But if he can get all big business to come to McKinley, then big business will change the facts on the ground in their place, and they'll do it through money. So it's also the beginning of lobbying. And as you know, as Americans, lobbying has certainly made sure that your democracy is one of the finest democracies that money can buy.

[David McWilliams]

Right, right. And that, I mean, the ushering in of that level of like, almost like brazen, moneyed interests behind a president, I mean, they just did a Tesla basically ad outside of the White House.

[Lilly Greenberg]

We saw it.

[David McWilliams]

It's so eerie. And the way that he continually invokes McKinley means I think he's just like, obsessed with him, really trying to kind of emulate him in a variety of different ways. And we'll get to the tariffs in a sec, because that's the most obvious. But the imperialism that McKinley also engaged in is really important to understand. The taking of Hawaii, the occupation of Cuba after the Spanish American War. The Philippines also conquered during that time and basically colonized by the United States. This echoes what he's trying. The Panama Canal under McKinley. That's why he's fixated on this. Greenland you can see being kind of an extension of this. Or Canada can be the Hawaii of what Trump is envisioning. He's so lost his mind at this point that I really think this is what he thinks is his calling, is to be McKinley 2.0.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Well, I think you're absolutely right. I mean, it's kind of bizarre, the similarities. McKinley understood one thing that all subsequent presidents have understood in the United States, which is that a small war galvanizes the population and you can create all sorts of chaos. You can create and mask all sorts of kleptocracy with a little war. And so in the late 1890s, America goes to war against Spain over Cuba. This is a colonial war. In the aftermath of that war, the Americans realized, look, we had a Pacific fleet and an Atlantic fleet. We were fighting a war against Spain and Florida. In effect, we need to bash a hole through this continent to make sure that our Navy on the west coast and the east coast can talk to each other. So they pick. They should have picked Nicaragua, by the way, which is the closest bit, but they picked Panama because there was a nice bit of corruption and money changed hands and all the good stuff. So when I look at Trump now and again, I look from afar as an Irish citizen, but somebody's been to America many, many times. What I see are not only uncanny parallels, but also, In a way, McKinley has given Trump the permission to behave as he does because all he's got to say is, look, I'm only doing what the other guy did 100 years ago. And isolationism is part of that. The kind of vehement and visceral anti European angle. And all this is part of that, too. And again, as we said, the tariffs are what McKinley decided. The great thing about tariffs is you reduce income tax, but you actually tax your people through consumption.

[David McWilliams]

That's the bizarre thing. It's a regressive sales tax, basically, in terms of how it functions. Right. Especially in the broad way that he's applying. Applying them. Did McKinley apply tariffs in this Broadway as well?

[Lilly Greenberg]

Yeah. So McKinley probably ended up having tariffs at around 50%. But remember, the United States was not half as integrated into the world economy then as it is now. The United States, basically, there was a battle between, if you really go back to American economic history, it's a massive battle between the Federalists under Alexander Hamilton and the Republicans. And this was. Goes back to a row at the core of the Founding Fathers, what sort of society should America be? And some of them, as we know, like Jefferson, wanted America to be this sort of rural idol which is cut off from the rest of the world. And Hamilton wanted it to be a muscular power to compete with the Europeans. So that's always been at the backdrop of American political philosophy. Trump is introducing tariffs. As, you know, the problem with introducing tariffs, if you introduce tariffs in a world of protectionism, you're kind of doing the same as everyone else. Right. Which is what McKinley was doing. But what Donald Trump is doing is introducing tariffs to his best friends, the Canadians, the Europeans. And we're frankly kind of shocked by the whole thing. It's kind of like, really, you're going to put tariffs on us as opposed to people who might have been America's enemies. But, yes, but tariffs, very, very blunt, very regressive. And of course, Emma, the key thing about tariffs is countercyclical reactions to tariffs. So, you know, countries are not without their own sense of themselves. Institutions are not without their own sense of themselves. And what you're finding now is that we have a tariff war between Canada and America, a tariff war between Europe and America, and tariff wars, trade wars, usually lead to capital wars and they're usually a forerunner to other wars. So I think we're in very, very dangerous, dangerous times. The One thing about McKinley is he didn't last long enough for this to happen.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah, he was assassinated. Perhaps that's another thing that there was an attempt on Trump. So he maybe sees him as a, as a compatriot in that regard.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Yeah, maybe.

[David McWilliams]

I mean, then, then I guess the globalization piece that Trump seems to be missing, just the fact that our economy is so interconnected means that you can't necessarily do tariffs. I mean, not that they were. Not that, you know, I could defend the policy back in, you know, 1897, but the idea that you could apply this now when we. I'm in favor of onshoring a lot of our manufacturing to make our economy more resilient, but the way that he's applying this, it's just nonsensical. And I can't see an end to this that doesn't lead to just price increases that will be so crippling that it's going to decimate millions of Americans.

[Lilly Greenberg]

This is obviously the first time the majority report on Wall street have been on the same side.

[David McWilliams]

Right.

[Lilly Greenberg]

You know what you're finding is the guys down in Wall street, down the road from you, agree with you. They're basically saying, hold on a second. We are looking now at a vista of stagflation. So where the economy is slowing quite quickly as a result of the chaos coming out of White House. Because, you know, business, you know, for example, Trump is interesting for our business, the media business, the commentary business.

[Emma Vigeland]

Right.

[Lilly Greenberg]

It creates churn, excitement, etc. But for fundamental businesses, non service businesses, you need what they call transparency, visibility. You need to be able to forecast with some degree of certainty that is not happening. It's very clear that American business is hoarding now. It's hoarding its own assets, turning its own money. It's not recycling because it doesn't know, will I invest in Ireland? Well, maybe not the Irish. Taoiseach was in Wall Star was in Washington yesterday. What was the outcome? We're not that sure. Will I invest in Europe, will I invest in Canada or will I invest back here? But you know what? Back here, I'd like the economy to be growing. I'd like to be a sense of security, all that sort of stuff. So it Seems to me that this idea of smashing up everything, breaking it and then trying to rebuild it, which can be the only intellectual framework you look at this about, is a highly, highly speculative approach to the society. Forget the economy, the society. But maybe speculation is what Donald Trump has been doing all his life.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah, that's exactly right. And I guess, lastly, before I let you go, David, can you speak, can you speak a little bit about McKinley's role in exacerbating incoming wealth inequality prior to the Great Depression, and if there's a parallel here for, for Trump as well.

[Lilly Greenberg]

So basically, McKinley, his victory in 1896, like all political victories, rewarded his mates. So first of all, he kept the gold standard in intact, which was not reversed until Teddy Roosevelt's nephew, FDR Roosevelt, in 1936, ironically, the year, the year afterwards, they started making the wizard of Oz. And of course, the wizard of Oz, the yellow brick road, is the gold standard. It's the yellow bricks going up to Oz. And Oz is the chemical symbol for gold. So it's all ties in together. And what you get in the United States in the period 1870 to 1914, which is the period that 1917, which is the period that Trump fetishizes, you get massive, massive movement of people and capital, number one. But number two, you get a profound exacerbation of wealth inequalities. You'll know that's when another famous Irish American, Scott Fitzgerald, wrote the Great Gatsby. It's called the Gilded Age for a reason. And the reason is the following, that you had this hyper speculative aristocracy or oligarchy in the Northeast who were speculating with credit based on gold which they had acquired. And you have an economy that's growing very, very rapidly. You have a huge amount of recently arrived immigrants in the northeastern cities who are in effect, working for no minimum wage, just for the lowest possible denominator because they're ethnic, they're different, they don't speak the language. It's taken them a generation or two to actually find their feet in the United States. So they are in no position to actually rise up or in any way to come together as a political party. But in Europe, you have the emergence of the labor movement, the Fabian movement. This, of course, is percolating down to America. And what you get by the beginning of the 1920s and well into the 1920s is a labor movement that is saying to its leaders, hold on a second. We would like some of the pieces, please. And that leads, of course, as we know, to the emergence of the New Deal in the early 1930s, which in itself was, I think, propelled by the Great Depression. But would it come anyway? It would have come anyway. I don't think it came out of nowhere. I think it's a long cyclical process where it's this idea of the Overton Window where ideas which seem radical, they become mainstream and the ideas that were mainstream yesterday become redundant. And that's what I see happening all over the world. But as you said, McKinley, because he reframed the map of America where the Northeast ironically became Republican and the rest of the place Democrat, quite different to what we are at the moment. He. For a 40 year period, this is the worrying thing. If you really want to take the parallel for about a 40 year period in 1896 and let's say 1936, McKinley ism dominated the United States. And that was in effect an oligarchy which ruled through a culture war, through money, through position, through power, et cetera. And that I presume is the fear if you're an American citizen. Right now.

[David McWilliams]

The parallels are very eerie. And again, there's a podcast episode on the David McWilliams podcast which goes into this even more in depth. All of the parallels with wizard with the wizard of Oz. People should check that out. Also check out David's book Money A Story of Humanity. It's out in the UK but coming out later this year in the United States. David McWilliams, thanks so much for your time today.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Really appreciate it, Emma, it was an absolute pleasure. We'll do it again.

[David McWilliams]

We should. All right, quick break. Yep. See you soon. Quick break. And when we come back, we're gonna be going to be speaking to Lily Greenberg. Call it. We are back and we are joined now by Lily Greenberg. Call former special assistant to the chief of staff at the Department of the Interior under the Biden administration. Lilly resigned over Biden's support for the genocide in Gaza. Lilly, thanks so much for coming on the show today.

[Ramzi Kassim]

Thanks for having me.

[David McWilliams]

So of course I wanted to have you on today to talk about the, you know, and we can update the audience on the one of the gravest crimes against our First Amendment by perpetrated by our government. I don't know that we've seen this century the detention of Mahmoud Khalil over his activism opposing the genocide in Gaza at Colombia. And I wanted to first begin by getting your reaction as somebody who worked under a Democratic administration to two separate statements by Senate Democrats. The first is Chuck Schumer's statement which begins by basically condemning, condemning Khalil do we have that, Matt? I sent that to you over dm, but I can start reading it here from my computer. So Chuck Schumer's statement begins, I abhor many of the opinions and policies that Mahmoud Khalil holds and supports and have made my criticism of the anti Semitic actions at Columbia loudly known. Mr. Khalil's. But. Mr. And so this is how he begins his statement, essentially by falsely linking him to anti Semitic actions without fully saying it and abhorring his opinions as if this is what's important here and as if he's saying anything controversial. And now let's compare this to Chris Murphy's statement, the senator from Connecticut who I think is really stepping up to the plate in many ways here. We might not be aligned on every policy, but this is why Chris Murphy is my pick, really, for the next leader for the Senate Democrats. That's, I'm throwing that out there here, because this is somebody who understands how to fight Republicans in this era, and this is a much more appropriate way to react to this grave First Amendment violation.

[Emma Vigeland]

A young man by the name of Mahmoud Khalil, an immigrant and a legal permanent resident of the United States, is being held right now in prison, even though no criminal charges have been filed against him. Now, I want to tell you why that should matter to every single American. Khalil is a recent graduate of Columbia University. He opposed Israel's military operation in Gaza. He has deep animus toward Israel's policies and the US Support for those policies. He helped organize the protests over Gaza at his university last year. You can disagree with his views or his politics, but there is no evidence he has broken any law. But last weekend, Trump officials entered his apartment and took him into custody. They brought him to a detention facility in New Jersey at first, but when his family went to visit him, he wasn't there for a while. His family and his lawyer had no idea where he was. They eventually found out that he was being held in a detention facility in Louisiana, and that's where he still is today. In dictatorships, they call this practice being disappeared, no charges, no claims of criminal behavior. The White House doesn't claim he did anything criminal. He's in jail because of his political speech. And here's why everybody should care. In America, your political speech is protected whether or not the president likes what you say. But today, if you're loyal to Donald Trump, your speech is going to be protected, even if it's hate speech. You can be Marco Ellis, an employee of Dogecoin who said he quote was racist before it was cool. And, quote, normalize Indian hate. And the Vice President of the United States will tweet in your defense. But if you are disloyal to Trump or you're organizing against Trump's political agenda, your speech could be criminalized. You could find yourself in jail. Now, Trump chose to begin by disappearing a Palestinian immigrant, hoping that his place of birth and his immigrant status would just cause people to look the other way. But we cannot, because there's.

[David McWilliams]

There's more to that statement. But I think that's a great piece of it. What a contrast. And, Lilly, just your reaction to seeing the different ways that powerful Democrats in our government are reacting.

[Ramzi Kassim]

I think Murphy's statement is excellent, and I think it is what Democrats need to be doing right now.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Right.

[Ramzi Kassim]

They need to be unequivocal in calling this out for what it is, which is a politically motivated abduction of an activist for his speech.

[David McWilliams]

Right.

[Ramzi Kassim]

They should be pressing the Trump administration to release Mahmoud immediately to halt this crackdown. And we need more Dems to be speaking out like Chris Murphy. It's a problem that people like Schumer and Jeffries are spending more time throat clearing about how they abhor Mahmoud's positions before saying that they believe in the First Amendment and how that applies to every single person in this country, regardless of if they like what they're saying or not.

[David McWilliams]

And there is no evidence that Mahmoud said anything that would. I mean, not that it even would matter. He can say whatever he wants. He could have said deeply anti Semitic things, and this would still be an illegal detention. But the reality is, is that we know that the Trump administration engages in anti Semitism all the time. Just yesterday, Trump said that Chuck Schumer is no longer a Jew. He's Palestinian, which is something he's repeatedly said. But he hadn't gone the extra step to do what he's basically was more explicit about this time, which is saying that he's a bad Jew. As if Donald Trump, who said there were both, many people, good people, on both sides of the Charlottesville Nazi rally, as if he has any leg to stand on about anti Semitism. Just your reaction. And I should say, Lilly, you were the first, I think, I believe, Jewish staffer in the Biden administration to resign over his Gaza policy.

[Ramzi Kassim]

Yeah. I mean, first, just to address what you said before, too, like, there really. There is no evidence that Mahmoud Khalil has espoused support for Hamas. And I think it's so upsetting that any support for Palestinian human rights is equated to support for terrorism.

[David McWilliams]

Right.

[Ramzi Kassim]

I mean, and if we even want to go there, like there's a quote that's being spread around the Jewish community right now, actually of Mahmoud saying, I think last spring that, you know, Palestinian and Jewish liberation are connected and that he deeply believes that. And I think that's, you know, that it's just indicative of how. Right. You're right. I mean, it doesn't quite matter. These people are not actually interested in protecting Jews. None of this is about protecting Jews. If anything, it's another way that they're weaponizing anti Semitism to justify fascism. And it's placing our community as the face of Trump's fascist crackdown on speech that he doesn't like. The White House tweeting out Shalom Mahmoud over a picture of him does nothing to solve anti Semitism. And if anything, it makes Jews less safe. It's going to breed resentment of Jews to take away people's rights in our name. It's a crackdown on free speech. And it's not about fighting anti Semitism. And turning Palestinian into a slur like Trump has done is, is just, you know, another clear attack on Palestinians and their, and the movement for Palestinian human rights and freedom and on any Jewish people or non Jewish people who, who support that.

[David McWilliams]

Can you react even more to what you just said about that tweet calling, saying Shalom Mahmoud? You know, I find the idea that this administration is invoking Judaism as they use, frankly. There was an article in Wired, by the way, that said that explained what they're using the statute. They're using this ina piece of legislation. I'm trying to find the non abbreviated version. I will in a second. But it was sponsored during the height of the McCarthy era by McCarthyites in the 50s, and it was also targeted against Jews, as we know, you know, the Red Scare was also deeply anti Semitic. So the fact that they're saying Shalom that way and using Zionist state repression to equivocate that with Judaism, that's one of the most anti Semitic things I've seen a government official openly engage in. And it was from the White House account.

[Ramzi Kassim]

Yeah, I mean, the whole story of Mahmoud is, was. So it's the stuff of nightmares, right?

[Lilly Greenberg]

It's. It's to.

[Ramzi Kassim]

To be disappeared with no warrant, without access to lawyers, not telling his wife or lawyers where he is. And, and those are the stories that I grew up hearing as a young Jewish person from my ancestors and people in my community about what it was like for us as Jewish people to live under authoritarian regimes in the old country, right? People picked up at night, stolen from their families, their whereabouts unknown. So then to see that happen and then to see something so abhorrent like that tweet, I mean, it was, it's, it's disgusting. You know, it's so personally offending. And honestly, I think it's like a deep miscalculation in some ways by Trump and his Christian nationalist buddies, because a broad swath of American Jews are furious about this abduction, and they're furious about the way Trump is blaming this abduction on Jews. Of course, we're seeing progressive Jewish organizations speak out, but we're also seeing organizations like the Jewish center for Public affairs and mainstream rabbis at synagogues across the country, Jewish politicians, Jewish Federation in Michigan, you know, calling this out for what it is, which is a fascist crackdown on freedom of expression. And I think it's so. This has crossed such a line for so many people, and it's such a, it's just so clear that it's so anti Semitic to, to blame, to, to justify the disappearance of a person and a complete violation of their First Amendment rights by saying, you know, this is, this is because we care about Jews and anti Semitism and again, taking away people's rights and taking away people's jobs and livelihoods, right, with this crackdown on the education system and everything that they're doing and blaming it on Jews or claiming to do it on behalf of Jews is going to create resentment towards Jews, which is intentional, which is also what they want, because they would rather people blame Jews than blame them.

[David McWilliams]

Right. Or question U.S. foreign policy. And so they're much more willing to drum up anti Semitism for that purpose. Here is one of Mahmoud's lawyers who is on Democracy now this morning. His. His name is Ramzi Kassim. And Amy Goodman has a great question for him about that statute that's being used very flimsily by the Trump administration to detain Mahmoud. And he explains, you know, the history of this piece of legislation and how it has previously been used even for explicitly anti Semitic purposes.

[Emma Vigeland]

Parody with the Palestinian people.

[David McWilliams]

The government is trying to deport Mahmoud based on a rarely used provision effect federal immigration law that allows the Secretary.

[Emma Vigeland]

Of State to remove individuals whose presence.

[David McWilliams]

It believes has potentially serious adverse foreign.

[Emma Vigeland]

Policy consequences for the United States, unquote.

[David McWilliams]

Can you explain this extremely rare provision?

[Emma Vigeland]

The only previous time it was used.

[David McWilliams]

Before was in 1995, according to recent press reports. According to the New York Times, that was an attempt to deploy support.

[Emma Vigeland]

A former Mexican Government official.

[David McWilliams]

Ironically, the judge who struck it down as unconstitutional in 1996 was Marianne Trump.

[Emma Vigeland]

Barry, President Trump's sister, who was a.

[David McWilliams]

Federal judge in New Jersey. Can you talk about this?

[Lilly Greenberg]

Yeah.

[Emma Vigeland]

So that provision has, you know, an interesting history, to say the least. It's a provision that is now understood, took to have been enacted primarily to target Eastern European Jewish Holocaust survivors who came to the United States and were suspected, often wrongly suspected, of being Soviet agents. So that's the origin story of this particular piece of federal legislation. And that origin story is the reason why Congress came back in and amended it, saying, well, you can't use this law to punish people for their views and their speech. And if you want to do that, then it requires a personal certification by the Secretary of State for why that person's presence and their speech poses a compelling risk to US Foreign policy interests. And it also requires the Secretary of State to notify Congress with supporting evidence for why they're making this move. So it is an exceedingly rarely used provision and it certainly does not trump the Constitution and Mr. Khalil's First Amendment rights.

[David McWilliams]

So just a fascinating piece of context. And you see how. Well, first of all, Donald Trump being a student of Roy Cohn, who was somebody who pushed for the execution of the Rosenbergs in the Red Scare, which was also anti Semitic. Cohen was, you know, trying to, I guess he was very anti Semitic, despite his background. I'm very anti gay, despite being gay anyway. But you can see how the targeting of specific groups under the guise of cracking down on communists or leftists, or in this instance, I mean, the modern Zionist crackdown is a McCarthyite one. History is really rhyming here. And it's. They're using antisemitism to justify it in this instance, while also drumming up antisemitism.

[Ramzi Kassim]

Exactly. Which is actually a real manifestation of how antisemitism happens historically. It is usually a part of this cycle of both using it and blaming Jews, but also drumming up using Jews as kind of a cover for the ruling classes actions. And I think this is really why American Jews need to be making sure that our synagogues and our federations and our Hillels and all of our Jewish institutions are speaking out unequivocally against this. We need to be fighting for Mahmoud as if he is one of our own, because he is one of our own. And we as Jews know where this kind of thing leads. And we cannot allow that to happen here in the United States because this is a test case. Right. This is. This is. They're they're testing how much they can get away with this.

[Emma Vigeland]

Right.

[Ramzi Kassim]

As Chris Murphy said, and as I said before, they. They abducted someone who they think politicians and the public will not have a lot of sympathy for and will look away. But they're not going to stop there, Right. They're going to go after anyone who advocates for anything that the MAGA regime is against, for reproductive justice, for climate action, for migrant justice. We need to make sure that the regime loses. And American Jews, I believe my community needs to be on the forefront of that, of fighting that.

[David McWilliams]

And lastly, Lilly, how would you recommend folks get involved here in terms of just what are the paths for activists who not don't just want to free Mahmoud, but want to kind of be a bulwark against the very authoritarian actions that this administration is going to engage in, the ones that you describe.

[Ramzi Kassim]

I mean, people need to be in the streets, right? I think there's been some really wonderful actions right now and, you know, clear like people taking you to the streets in New York and D.C. and I know in Louisiana, outside of the detention center where Mahun is being held, but both people in power and, you know, regular everyday Americans need to be. Need to be showing up. This isn't a time to think, oh, someone else is going to go, right? It needs to be you. And you need to bring your community and your kids and your neighbors and particularly right within, you know, I was saying, within the American Jewish community, we need to make sure that our institutions are speaking out against this. But I think that applies to other people and other communities as well. And this is really clear, right? Like, you don't have to agree with what someone is saying to understand that, that such an explicit violation of our First Amendment rights is an attack on all of us. And if we don't fight back, then we're not going to have much to fight for.

[David McWilliams]

Well, I really appreciate your time today. Lilly Greenberg, call. Lilly resigned from the Department of the Interior under Biden over his support for, for the genocide in Gaza. Thanks so much for coming on today. Really appreciate it.

[Ramzi Kassim]

Thanks, Emma. Take care.

[David McWilliams]

Take care. All right. With that, folks, we are going to wrap up the free part of this program and head into the fun half which you can access if you become a member when you go to join the majorityreport.com it helps us stay afloat. We don't know what the future looks like with the big tech overlords and the platforms that we rely on to finance our program. So any way that you can do to make us a Little bit more resilient and becoming a member where you can IM the show and we'll read your IM on air, you know, most likely at one point. We will once we get to it. It's really helpful. So join themjorityreport.com Matt, what's happening on Left Reckoning?

[Matt Binder]

Yeah, Left Reckoning tonight also. Hey, Brandon, just to give you a heads up, bringing you on screen there. You're muted also, by the way. I'm not sure why. Yeah, Brandon, how about you let us know what's on. On the discourse.

[David McWilliams]

Yes. Yeah, you go first.

[Emma Vigeland]

You guys saw this, but there's a.

[Lilly Greenberg]

New episode of this show online called Surrounded. It's produced by this channel called Jubilee. And on Monday, we watched their latest video where some guy, Sam Sader, the conservative. Right, yeah, the conservative commentator.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah. Who owns out of Boston. Social justice warriors, Right?

[Emma Vigeland]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He put on a real clinic with those SJWs.

[Lilly Greenberg]

So we watched a lot of that. You can't watch it on my YouTube, but you can watch it on my Twitch, which has the exact same name as my YouTube channel. I'm diversified like that.

[Emma Vigeland]

And then yesterday we caught up on.

[Lilly Greenberg]

The whole tariff situation.

[Emma Vigeland]

I don't know if you saw, but.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Howard Lutnick was on CBS News with Nancy Cortez. And he did his best to sell.

[Emma Vigeland]

The upcoming recession to his, you know, fan of, I mean, I was gonna.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Say his fandom of like, not too smart conservatives, but I don't think he.

[Emma Vigeland]

Did too great of a job. But yeah, like, check it out on the YouTube channel.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Check it out on the Twitch. And that's what we're up to.

[David McWilliams]

All right, check it out there. Matt, what's happening on Left Reckoning?

[Matt Binder]

Yeah, Left Reckoning. This week we had Karl Bear on and Terrence Ray, Kyle Bear talking about the Mahmoud Khalil stuff because I couldn't really talk about anything else. And, and also Ukraine and also Terence Ray. We talked about the invention of red and blue states and sort of how people think about that being flawed. So check that out. Patreon.com reckoning all right, guys, we'll head.

[David McWilliams]

Into the fun half now. And the number is 646-257-3920. We'll open up the phone lines on the other side of this. See you there.

[Emma Vigeland]

Okay, Emma, please.

[David McWilliams]

Well, I just, I feel that my voice is sorely lacking on the Majority Report.

[Emma Vigeland]

Wait, look, look. Sam is unpopular.

[Sam Cedar]

I do deserve a vacation at Disney World. So, ladies and gentlemen, it is my pleasure to welcome Emma to the show.

[David McWilliams]

It Is Thursday.

[Matt Binder]

I think you need to take over for Sam.

[Emma Vigeland]

Yes, please.

[David McWilliams]

No, no, I'm gonna.

[Emma Vigeland]

I'm gonna.

[David McWilliams]

I'm gonna pause you right there.

[Emma Vigeland]

Wait.

[David McWilliams]

What?

[Sam Cedar]

You can't encourage Emma to live like this.

[Lilly Greenberg]

And I'll tell you why.

[Emma Vigeland]

She was offered a tour.

[David McWilliams]

Sushi and poker with the boys. Twerk, sushi and poker with the boys.

[Emma Vigeland]

Who was offered a tour.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Sushi and poker with the boys.

[David McWilliams]

Sushi and poker. Tim's upset. Twerk, sushi and poker with big boys.

[Emma Vigeland]

Was offered twerk, sushi and that's what.

[Sam Cedar]

We call the biz.

[Emma Vigeland]

Twerk, sushi and poker with big boys.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Right.

[Emma Vigeland]

Twerk, sushi and po.

[David McWilliams]

We're going to get demonetized.

[Sam Cedar]

I just think that what you did to Tim pool was mean.

[David McWilliams]

Free speech.

[Sam Cedar]

That's not what we're about here. Look at how sad he's become now. You shouldn't even talk about it. I think you're responsible.

[David McWilliams]

I probably am in a certain way. But let's get to the meltdown here. Sushi and poker with the boys.

[Emma Vigeland]

Oh, my God. Wow.

[David McWilliams]

Sushi.

[Sam Cedar]

I'm sorry. I'm listening.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Losing my mind.

[Emma Vigeland]

Someone's offered twerk.

[David McWilliams]

Yeah. Sushi and poker with the boys.

[Emma Vigeland]

Logic.

[David McWilliams]

Twerk, sushi and poker with the boys.

[Emma Vigeland]

I think I'm like a little kid.

[David McWilliams]

Think I'm like a little kid.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Had this debate 7,000 times. A little kid.

[Emma Vigeland]

Think I'm like a little kid. Think I'm like a kid.

[Lilly Greenberg]

I'm losing my mind.

[Matt Binder]

Some people just don't understand.

[David McWilliams]

So I'm not trying to be a.

[Sam Cedar]

Dick right now, but, like, I absolutely.

[David McWilliams]

Think the US should be providing me with a wife and kids. That's not what we're talking about here, all right?

[Emma Vigeland]

It's not a fun job. That's a real thing. That's real thing. Willy Wonka. That's a real thing. That's real. That's a real thing. That's a real thing. Real thing. That's a real thing. That's real thing.

[Sam Cedar]

Ladies and gentlemen, Joe Will Logan has done it again.

[Emma Vigeland]

That's a real thing. That's got poker with the boy.

[Lilly Greenberg]

I think he might be blowing it out of proportion.

[Emma Vigeland]

Real thing. That's poker with the boys. Offered twerk. That's a real thing. That's poker.

[David McWilliams]

Let's go. Sushi and poker with the boy.

[Emma Vigeland]

Take it easy.

[David McWilliams]

Twerk, sushi and poker.

[Sam Cedar]

Things have really gotten out of hand.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Sushi and poker with the boys.

[Emma Vigeland]

Delusional, deluded.

[David McWilliams]

Sushi.

[Sam Cedar]

You don't have a clue. As to what's going going on.

[David McWilliams]

Sam has the weight of the world on his shoulders. Sam doesn't want to do this show anymore. It was so much easier when the majority report was just you. Let's change the subject for it.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Rangers and Nick's doom, right?

[David McWilliams]

No. Shut up. You don't want people saying reckless things on your program.

[Lilly Greenberg]

That's one of the most difficult parts about this show.

[David McWilliams]

This is a pro killing podcast.

[Sam Cedar]

I'm thinking maybe it's time we bury the hat.

[David McWilliams]

Left his best.

[Emma Vigeland]

Don't be foolish and don't tweet at me. And don't the way Emma has c. All of these people love it.

[David McWilliams]

That's where my heart is. So I wrote my honors thesis about it.

[Emma Vigeland]

Oh, sorry.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Wrote an honest thesis.

[Emma Vigeland]

I guess I should hand the main.

[Lilly Greenberg]

Mic to you now.

[Emma Vigeland]

You are to the right of me on foreign policy.

[David McWilliams]

We already formed Israel, dude. Are you against us?

[Emma Vigeland]

That's a tougher question.

[David McWilliams]

I'm an.

[Emma Vigeland]

Incredible theme song.

[David McWilliams]

Hi, bumbler.

[Emma Vigeland]

Emma Viglin. Absolutely one of my favorite people, actually.

[David McWilliams]

Not just in the game, like, period.