Former National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Trump's First 100 Chaotic Days

Summary

The MeidasTouch Podcast Summary

Episode: Former National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan on Trump's First 100 Chaotic Days
Release Date: April 21, 2025
Host: MeidasTouch Network (Ben, Brett, and Jordy Meiselas)

In this compelling episode of The MeidasTouch Podcast, the Meiselas brothers engage in an in-depth conversation with Jake Sullivan, former National Security Advisor to President Biden. The discussion critically examines the tumultuous first 100 days of the Trump administration from a national security standpoint. Through insightful dialogue, the episode sheds light on key policy missteps, the erosion of U.S. alliances, and broader geopolitical ramifications.

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1. Assessing Trump's First 100 Days: A National Security Disaster

Jake Sullivan opens the conversation by providing a stark evaluation of President Trump's initial 100 days in office. He categorizes the period as an "unadulterated disaster," emphasizing the systematic dismantling of core American advantages on the global stage.

Jake Sullivan [01:53]: “This is an unadulterated disaster. … President Trump's effort essentially to knock them [American advantages] out.”

Sullivan highlights how Trump's actions undermined U.S. economic strength, soft power, and the nation’s reputation as a magnet for global talent in science and innovation. He underscores the long-term implications of these policies, which jeopardize America's standing and influence worldwide.

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2. Chaotic Leadership: The Pete Hegseth Controversy

The discussion shifts to recent scandals involving Pete Hegseth, who allegedly used private text messaging apps for official communications. Sullivan expresses grave concerns about leadership instability and mismanagement within the Trump administration.

Jake Sullivan [03:55]: “Secretary Hegseth should never have been nominated and should never have been confirmed in the first place.”

Sullivan criticizes Hegseth’s inability to manage the Pentagon effectively, citing the resignation of top-ranking officials and the ensuing operational chaos. This turmoil is depicted as a symptomatic reflection of broader administrative dysfunction.

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3. Erosion of U.S. Alliances: Opening Doors for Adversaries

A significant portion of the conversation delves into how Trump's rhetoric and policies have strained U.S. alliances, inadvertently benefiting geopolitical rivals like China. Sullivan explains that Trump's dismissive stance towards allies has emboldened China to forge stronger ties with traditional U.S. partners.

Jake Sullivan [05:29]: “China is working for it. He is single-handedly taking away this huge asset.”

Sullivan warns that weakening alliances diminishes the U.S.’s ability to effectively compete with China, particularly in economic and military arenas. The erosion of these relationships compromises collective security and undermines efforts to counterbalance Chinese influence globally.

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4. The Ukraine Crisis: Mismanaged Diplomacy and Blame Shifting

The podcast addresses Trump's handling of the Ukraine conflict, highlighting his unrealistic promises and flawed negotiation strategies. A clip of Trump’s remarks on swiftly ending the war is dissected to illustrate his administration’s flawed approach.

Donald Trump [08:48]: “I'll end that war between those two countries in 24 hours. It won't even take that long.”

Sullivan vehemently criticizes Trump’s strategy, arguing that the president inaccurately placed responsibility on Ukraine rather than addressing Russia's aggression. He asserts that effective peace requires holding Putin accountable, a stance not reflected in Trump’s policies.

Jake Sullivan [09:42]: “This war is Russia's fault, and it's ultimately President Putin's to end.”

Sullivan emphasizes the necessity of sustained pressure on Russia and criticizes the administration for failing to leverage diplomatic and economic tools to foster a just and durable resolution.

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5. Flawed Negotiation Tactics: Setting Unrealistic Deadlines

The conversation continues with an analysis of Trump's negotiation style, particularly his use of arbitrary deadlines and premature concessions, which Sullivan deems counterproductive.

Jake Sullivan [12:13]: “It reminds me of this famous scene in Blazing Saddles where the sheriff holds a gun to his own head and says, you know, don't or I'll shoot.”

Sullivan likens Trump’s deadlines to a high-stakes bluff that undermines serious negotiations. He points out that such tactics erode trust with international partners and embolden adversaries like Putin to exploit the administration’s weaknesses.

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6. Disrespecting Public Service: Arbitrary Firings and Moral Decay

A critical segment addresses the Trump administration’s treatment of public servants. Sullivan condemns the arbitrary and capricious firings within government agencies, highlighting the detrimental impact on morale and institutional integrity.

Jake Sullivan [14:48]: “There are serious, distinguished, dedicated public servants who wake up every day and just try to serve this country. … I find this absolutely unacceptable, cruel.”

Sullivan underscores the importance of respect and stability within the civil service, arguing that the administration’s dismissive actions are not only unethical but also harmful to national security efforts.

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7. Overlooked Threats: The Unaddressed Risks of Artificial Intelligence

In a forward-looking discussion, Sullivan raises concerns about the administration’s lax approach to artificial intelligence (AI). He warns of the potential dangers, including job displacement, security vulnerabilities, and the spread of misinformation.

Jake Sullivan [16:37]: “I am very worried that this administration, in its alliance with certain people in the technology industry, is not taking seriously the risks associated with artificial intelligence.”

Sullivan advocates for robust regulatory frameworks and strategic oversight to harness AI’s benefits while mitigating its risks, stressing that neglecting these measures could have profound societal and security repercussions.

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Conclusion: A Call for Strategic Leadership

Throughout the episode, Jake Sullivan provides a comprehensive critique of the Trump administration’s national security policies, emphasizing the need for strategic, principled leadership. His insights underscore the critical importance of maintaining strong alliances, responsible diplomacy, and proactive governance to safeguard American interests and uphold democratic values.

The Meiselas brothers adeptly facilitate a dialogue that not only highlights the administration’s shortcomings but also emphasizes the broader implications for U.S. national security and global standing. This episode serves as a vital resource for listeners seeking a nuanced understanding of contemporary political dynamics and their impact on international relations.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps:

• Jake Sullivan [01:53]: “This is an unadulterated disaster. … President Trump's effort essentially to knock them [American advantages] out.”

• Jake Sullivan [03:55]: “Secretary Hegseth should never have been nominated and should never have been confirmed in the first place.”

• Jake Sullivan [05:29]: “China is working for it. He is single-handedly taking away this huge asset.”

• Jake Sullivan [09:42]: “This war is Russia's fault, and it's ultimately President Putin's to end.”

• Jake Sullivan [12:13]: “It reminds me of this famous scene in Blazing Saddles where the sheriff holds a gun to his own head and says, you know, don't or I'll shoot.”

• Jake Sullivan [14:48]: “There are serious, distinguished, dedicated public servants who wake up every day and just try to serve this country. … I find this absolutely unacceptable, cruel.”

• Jake Sullivan [16:37]: “I am very worried that this administration, in its alliance with certain people in the technology industry, is not taking seriously the risks associated with artificial intelligence.”

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This detailed summary encapsulates the critical discussions and insights from the episode, providing a comprehensive overview for those who have yet to listen.

Transcript

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[Host]

I'm joined by Jake Sullivan, former National Security Adviser to former President Biden. I'm sure you have a lot to say, Jake, about the past 100 days in the Trump administration. The first question I want to just ask you is how would you rate the first 100 days of the Trump administration from a national security perspective, given of course your background?

[Jake Sullivan]

Well, normally when you look at a first hundred days, you look at policy decisions and you stack them up. Some good, some bad. It's a mixed bag. This is an unadulterated disaster. And it's because it's not just about the policy. It's that President Trump and his team have gone at the core American advantages in the world and systematically tried to dismantle them. Our allies, they've trashed them. Our basic confidence in investing in the United States is the strongest economy in the world. They've cast that into question. Our soft power, the United States is a beacon of light in the world. They've taken that away. The idea that the United States is the place that attracts the best talent from all over the World for science and innovation. They've cast doubt on whether if you're an immigrant who wants to come to the United States to study or research, you won't just get thrown in jail. So across all of the major dimensions of the things that have been America's major advantages, in less than 100 days, President Trump has put them all at risk. And that's not even speaking about Ukraine or China or Gaza or the other issues that we could get into. This is about the core foundations of American power and purpose in the world and President Trump's effort essentially to knock them out.

[Host]

And let's talk about just the breaking news. Pete Hegseth allegedly having additional communications on private text message apps that are not supposed to be used, you know, in that format. You know, he's out there today saying fake news, apparently sending it to his wife and brother and personal lawyer that was brother and lawyer apparently work at the Department of Defense. Also, you know, as I think we've also learned that three of the top ranking people quit there. It just seems like a total mess. I think the former press secretary who worked for Hegseth says it's a total meltdown. That's their own words. I mean, these are the people who work for them. What do you make of that all?

[Jake Sullivan]

Well, it's really amazing when someone who describes themselves as your friend, as your supporter, as someone who actually came in to work for you, leaves and writes within 100 days of you taking office an op ed in which he describes, as you said, a total meltdown, utter chaos, and frankly, basically says President Trump should fire you. Now, I'm one who believed, as I think you are, that Secretary Hegseth should never have been nominated and should never have been confirmed in the first place. So all of this, in a way, wasn't just predictable. It was predicted by a lot of people who said that putting a person like this into this role would result in disastrous leadership at the Pentagon. And that's exactly what we've seen across the board. And we've seen other extraordinary statements from his former senior aides, basically saying we were fired for no good reason. We don't get what's going on. And if Secretary Hegseth can't even run his front office, how can he possibly run the entire Pentagon?

[Host]

You know, in your answer to my first question, you listed a bunch of things and you started off by talking about the damage being done with our allies from a national security perspective, when Donald Trump has talked about annexing Canada or taking it over when he attacks our Allies in Europe or Australia or elsewhere. From a national security perspective, what's the, what are the additional dangers that, you know, may not be that obvious? Obviously we shouldn't be attacking our allies. But from a security perspective, what are you worried about?

[Jake Sullivan]

You know, I think the easiest way to answer that question is to put yourselves in the shoes of the leaders in Beijing, China's leadership, they've spent years, even decades trying to drive wedges among and undermine the United States relationship with its alliances because they recognize it's an asset they don't have. Only the United States of America has this network of strong, capable democratic allies. And now what President Trump is doing is China's work for it. He is single handedly taking away this huge asset. And I would say there are a number of costs to that. But one of the biggest ones is that for us to compete effectively with China in the future, we need to be flanked by strong allies, capable allies. And going it alone in this trade war and the broader competition with China is a weaker way to approach things than with the strength of having a lot of people standing with us, with us.

[Host]

From your perspective and what you can share, are you seeing things that are worrisome in terms of China reaching out, driving wedges in the tpp, reaching out to Southeast Asian countries? And you see Xi Jinping having those types of meetings, reaching out to Europe to sell vehicles there and reaching out to Australia to build alliance. Are you seeing things like that form that you go, wow, we spent so much time, whether it was with Biden or Obama, building certain things, only for it to crumble in under 100 days.

[Jake Sullivan]

Well, here's a split screen for you. In the summer of 2023, President Biden brought the leaders of Japan and South Korea, who had historically been adversaries, together for a trilateral summit at Camp David, really stitching an alliance for the INDO PACIFIC among three great democracies, the U.S. south Korea and Japan. A few weeks ago, China brought together Japan and South Korea at a very senior level, the foreign minister level, and they issued a joint statement, those three countries. And in it they said, we're going to work together on issues of trade. And it was anticipating that President Trump wouldn't just have a trade war or trade competition with China, but that he was going to pick fights with their allies too. So that's a great example, which we see replicated in China's outreach to Europe, China's outreach to Southeast Asia, even China's outreach to Canada and Mexico. That shows you that they see a real opportunity Based on the fact that President Trump is casting aside our alliances to make gains at our expense.

[Host]

You know, when I spoke to former ambassador of Japan Rahm Emanuel, he said he thought the key moment in Asia was when they saw what went down in the Oval Office with Zelensky. And they said that moment he said he thought showed, oh, that was utter weakness. And then everybody. The moment thereafter, they started running military drills, and they always do. But, you know, they really picked up the pace thereafter. We compiled this short clip of what Donald Trump promised about Ukraine and what the reality is. I want to show it to you then I want to get your thoughts of how the Trump administration's handled Ukraine. Let's. Let's play this clip and the war.

[Donald Trump]

In Ukraine in 24 hours. Yes. How would you do that? I know Zelinsky very well. I'll end that war between those two countries in 24 hours. It won't even take that long.

[Unnamed Commentator]

No one's saying it's going to be done in 12 hours, but we want to see how far apart it is and whether those differences are, can even be narrow. So we came here yesterday to sort of begin to talk about more specific outlines of what it might take to end the war, to try to figure out very soon. And I'm talking about a matter of days, not a matter of weeks, whether or not this is the war that can be ended.

[Donald Trump]

If for some reason one of the two parties makes it very difficult. We're just going to say, you're foolish, you're fools, you're horrible people, and we're going to just take a pass.

[Host]

When you watch that, Jake, what goes through your mind, and how do you feel generally about the way this administration's handled Ukraine?

[Jake Sullivan]

Well, what goes through my mind is that President Trump thought, when he made those ridiculous statements about ending the war in 24 hours, that this entire war is Ukraine's fault and it's Ukraine's to end. And that is such a catastrophic misread of the situation, I don't even know where to start. This war is Russia's fault, and it's ultimately President Putin's to end. But instead of putting pressure on Putin, Trump is putting pressure on Zelensky. And I do not believe that that is going to lead to a just and durable peace. The only way we will get a just and durable peace is if President Trump does something he has not done yet in this term or at any point, I think, in his adult life, and that is get serious about holding Putin and Russia to account, putting pressure on them, building on the leverage that we handed off to them when we left office. And that's what I'd like to see. Unfortunately, we haven't seen real signs of that from this administration. They find a way to constantly excuse Russia and constantly pressure and squeeze Ukraine. And I think that that has it. I think the technical term is ass backward.

[Host]

Jake, you've had the rare vantage point of actually being in the rooms with these foreign leaders, being involved at the literal highest level of negotiations with them. In my past career, I did negotiations for endorsement deals and things like that. But even in my negotiations, you would know. You never set arbitrary deadlines against yourself that you can't meet. Because if you can't meet it and you miss it once and then you show that you're not going to stand by those deadlines, your adversary in the negotiation starts to look at you and go, oh, got it. This is a clown I'm playing with, someone who's just doing this as a game and they're not very serious. At the highest level with geopolitical security implications, this seems to be, doesn't seem to be like this is his shtick. 30 days, two weeks, you know, 90 days, I'm going to do all of these deals. And I think even what we're seeing with this most recent 90 day, you know, we're going to do 90 deals in 90 days. Countries are like, okay, I'm going to show up, I'm going to leave and I'm going to make him sweat it out because he set these fake deadlines. Just what do you think about that? The way he's even handling these things, just from a strategic sense, based on how you would handle these types of negotiations and others in the administration you work for.

[Jake Sullivan]

Well, it reminds me of this famous scene in Blazing Saddles where the sheriff holds a gun to his own head and says, you know, don't or I'll shoot. That is the effective equivalent of what setting these deadlines is all about. I couldn't agree with you more that setting that deadline, that 90 day deadline on the trade deal is just upping the ante on the United States, not upping the ante on our trade partners. And similarly, the way that President Trump has approached the Ukraine negotiations, I think has basically taught Putin that he can continue to play this out. Now, I think we could see Putin also play Trump in a different way, which has come to some kind of agreement around a very short term ceasefire that gives him a lot of freedom of maneuver to keep squeezing Ukraine. So we'll have to watch what happens in the days ahead. But President Trump has made two cardinal errors, I think, in negotiations. One is what you said, the setting of the arbitrary deadlines. The second is giving away concessions, massive concessions, before the negotiation has even begun, which he did when he sent Secretary Hegseth to Europe to say, we're not going to let Ukraine and NATO, one of Russia's huge asks, and getting nothing in return for that. And there, too, I think President Trump has shown that his capacity to negotiate effectively with someone like Vladimir Putin simply hasn't borne out.

[Host]

Do you think it's inexperience, the eagerness to get a deal, the fact that they set a fake deadline, so they think, wow, if we give this concession, of course the other side's going to immediately agree. And the other side's like, nope, maybe you should have learned the history about how Putin negotiates. And he'll know if you give an inch, he'll take your life. What do you think it even is about it?

[Jake Sullivan]

Look, I don't think that there's a real logic to this. I don't think that there's some deep strategy. I think what there is, is every day you have somebody waking up in the morning and thinking that they can command the news cycle with very bold assertions. 24 hours, 90 days, 30 days. That is about projecting strength for the minute, not delivering strength for the long term. And I just think that's a mode of operating that President Trump brings to geopolitics the same way he brings it to regular politics. And in geopolitics, it just doesn't hunt.

[Host]

What do you make of Doge Elon Musk going in with the wrecking ball to these agencies? I'm sure you know really fine workers who have either lost their jobs, who are fearful right now. What do you make of everything That's.

[Jake Sullivan]

Yeah. Look, I have kind of two basic reactions. The first is when I heard about an effort at government efficiency. I thought, in principle, that makes sense. I could support that. You don't need to look any further than the Pentagon to see that there are needs for dramatic changes in the way that we procure weapons, that we field our military. And that's something that I was working on in the closing months as national security advisor. But the way they've gone about it is, first, totally arbitrary and capricious. They're just sending young guys who know nothing into various agencies and slashing and burning in ways that they then have to go fix, like firing the folks responsible for our nuclear program. But the second thing, and it kind of gets to your question, is just the casual cruelty of it all. These are serious, distinguished, dedicated public servants who wake up every day and just try to serve this country. And they serve Democratic and Republican presidents alike. In fact, many of them served in President Trump's administration and did so with distinction. And there's almost a gleeful kind of ethos among doge to send these people packing, to fire them, and to belittle them on the way out the door. I find this absolutely unacceptable, cruel, and the kind of thing that that should shock the conscience of Americans who, yes, want to see more efficiency, but also want to see decent public servants treated the way they deserve to be treated.

[Host]

While I have you on the program, you know, with your wealth of information about everything that's going on, just. Do you think that there's something that's not getting enough attention that either worries you, concerns you, that is just on your mind that you think our audience should know about?

[Jake Sullivan]

One thing that does concern me, it's not a today or tomorrow thing, but it's coming soon. J.D. vance went to Paris and gave a speech on artificial intelligence a few weeks into the administration. What he basically said was, we need to let it rip. No guardrails, just let the technology be the technology. And I get the need for us to compete vigorously with China to make sure that we control the commanding heights of artificial intelligence and not our peer competitor. But I am very worried that this administration, in its alliance with certain people in the technology industry, is not taking seriously the risks associated with artificial intelligence. The potential job loss, the potential security risks, the potential for just an avalanche of misinformation and disinformation. In fact, on that, they probably like it. And so I think this is an area that is going to become increasingly front of mind for Americans as AI touches their lives. And they deserve a government, an administration that is taking those risks seriously. And I fear that that is not happening right now.

[Host]

Jake Sullivan, former National Security Advisor in the Biden administration, We appreciate you. We hope you come back.

[Jake Sullivan]

Thanks for having me, everybody.

[Host]

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