Trump Shuts Down House and Rages in Oval

Summary

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The MeidasTouch Podcast

Episode: Trump Shuts Down House and Rages in Oval

Date: June 25, 2026

Hosts: Ben, Brett, and Jordy Meiselas

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Episode Overview

In this episode, the Meiselas brothers break down Donald Trump’s chaotic day: a disastrous Oval Office press conference, his order to shut down the House of Representatives pending the Senate’s passage of a controversial voting suppression act, and a multi-pronged blame campaign that stretches from housing legislation to foreign policy blunders. They analyze Trump’s characteristic refusal to accept accountability, his attacks on bipartisan measures, and a laundry list of scapegoats for his administration’s failures, all with their trademark mix of sharp political insight and lively banter.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Trump Shuts Down the House (03:03 – 04:49)

• Context: Trump orders his supporters in the House to halt legislative progress until the Senate passes his voting suppression act.
• Mechanism: The “rule” needed for votes on any new legislation is blocked under Trump’s direction, causing a legislative freeze.
• Analysis: The hosts frame this as yet another denial of democratic norms for political leverage.

2. Housing Bill Veto Threat & Press Conference Soundbites

• Bipartisan Housing Bill: Recently passed to make housing more affordable and accessible, especially for first-time home buyers.

• Trump’s Stance (03:53):

  "I said I'm not signing the housing bill. I want to see what happens... I made billions of dollars with housing. I know housing better than anybody, maybe anywhere... Lower the interest rates. You can have all the housing you want. But you have to understand, I don't want to hurt people who own houses too..."
  — Donald Trump [03:53]

• Host’s Commentary: Even with bipartisan support and the likelihood the bill becomes law anyway, Trump resists, citing vague concerns about interest rates and market effects.

3. The Blame Game and Deflections

• Interest Rates & The Fed: Trump attacks former Fed Chair Jerome Powell:

  "We have this numbskull that was the head of the Fed before and he's a stupid person and we call him too late because he was too late with the interest rates all the time."
  — Donald Trump [03:53]

• Bipartisan Bill Dismissed:

  "Affordability. We're doing great. The Democrats gave us a tremendous affordability problem and we're reducing prices a lot."
  — Donald Trump [05:21]

• Notable Quote (On Blame Cycle):
  “This is what Donald Trump does. He blames everyone and everything for what he does. This is his plan. This is the Trump blame cycle.”
  — Political Commentator [06:17]

4. Reflecting Pool & Washington DC Comments

• Vandalism Claims: Trump alleges that his improvements to D.C.'s reflecting pool were sabotaged.

  "But think of that. You work so hard, you get it open way ahead of July 4th... and then somebody is in there with a knife cutting it and ripping the floor out. It’s terrible."
  — Donald Trump [07:41]

• Blames ‘Acid Grass’:

  "They poured acid on the grass... acid kills grass quickly. So that's being fixed. But the reflecting pool is great."
  — Donald Trump [09:23]

• Host’s Recap: The hosts mock the ever-growing list of bizarre scapegoats Trump mentions.

5. Foreign Policy: The Iran MOU and War Powers Resolution

• Trump on Iran Deal Failures:

  "We're doing great in our negotiations with Iran... We have breaking news. The Senate has voted that they’d like Trump to stop the war. So Iran sees that and they go, what's that all about now?"
  — Donald Trump [06:47]

• Host’s Fact-Check: The hosts clarify that Trump’s timeline is misleading and that he covers failures with rhetorical misdirection.

• Iranian Foreign Ministry’s Statement (15:00+): The hosts read a pointed statement channeling Iranian skepticism about US intent and warning that mixed signals threaten any diplomatic progress.

6. Dodging Accountability: The Manad School War Crime

• Reporter Asks About US Bombing of An Iranian School:

  "I have not seen [the report], no... I don't know that they're ever going to solve that problem... There were missiles flying all over the place..."
  — Donald Trump [11:12]

• Hosts: Express outrage at Trump's evasiveness and the lack of transparency regarding a significant war crime with civilian casualties.

7. Economics: Gas Prices, Oil Companies, & Friends

• Trump on Oil Prices:

  "We should be, in my opinion, at $2.25 right now at the pump, and we're higher than that, and we are doing a big investigation on it."
  — Donald Trump [12:53]

• MeidasTouch Critique: The hosts point out Trump’s cozy relationship with oil executives, suggesting his complaints about price gouging ring hollow given his alliances.

8. No Accountability: The Ken Paxton Episode

• Texas AG Releases Child Sex Predator: MeidasTouch exposes the lack of answers and accountability from MAGA officials.

9. Bashing America’s Allies

• Trump Generalizes Disappointment:

  "I was disappointed with Italy. I was disappointed with the UK... Germany and France. We’re disappointed with most of them. Spain is a horror show. Spain is terrible, even from your standpoint..."
  — Donald Trump [14:12]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Blame Cycle:
  "The Trump playbook: fail miserably, then find a scapegoat… Over and over again.”
  — Political Commentator [08:12]

• On Housing Veto:
  "I made billions of dollars with housing. I know housing better than anybody, maybe anywhere."
  — Donald Trump [03:53]

• On US-Iran Relations:
  “Contradictory statements by U.S. officials regarding the MOU to end the imposed war will do nothing to reduce the accumulated distrust of Iranians and will merely serve as a reminder of past breaches of faith.”
  — Iranian FM statement (read by Political Commentator) [15:00+]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Trump Orders House Shutdown: 03:03 – 04:49
• Housing Bill Veto Rant: 03:53, 05:21
• Fed Bashing & Blame Game: 03:53 – 05:31
• Iran Blame & Foreign Policy Misstatements: 06:47
• Reflecting Pool and "Acid Grass": 07:41, 09:23
• Manad School Bombing Report Evasion: 11:12 – 12:05
• Oil Prices and Executive Friends: 12:53
• Trump on Allies: 14:12

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Tone & Style

The episode blends serious political analysis with humor and sharp, accessible commentary. The brothers’ banter keeps the discussion lively, but they don’t pull punches on issues of democracy, corruption, and accountability—highlighting Trump’s signature tactics of deflection, blame, and evasion with a combination of sarcasm, fact-checking, and deep concern for democratic norms.

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Conclusion

The episode is a thorough deconstruction of Trump’s most recent political plays and rhetorical strategies, exposing patterns of denial, scapegoating, and undermining democratic institutions. For someone who hasn’t listened, this is an incisive, at times darkly funny, survey of Trump-era dysfunction, bringing together news clips, host insights, and a running record of MAGA world’s “never accountable” ethos.

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Transcript

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[Political Commentator]

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[Political Commentator]

had a disastrous press conference in the Oval Office. At the same time he has ordered his MAGA stooges to effectively shut down the House of Representatives yet again. He has ordered his MAGA stooges not to advance what's called the rule in the House of Representatives to allow voting on additional legislation. He says until the United States Senate agrees to pass his voting suppression Act. He wants wants Congress to be shut down. Let me show you what was going on though during this disastrous Oval Office press conference where Donald Trump said that he would not be signing the housing bill that was just passed on a bipartisan basis to try to make housing more affordable and accessible to Americans and especially for first time homeowners. Watch what Donald Trump says.

[Podcast Host]

Let's play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

I said I'm not signing the housing bill. I want to see what happens. We said, look, the housing bill is housing. I made billions of dollars with housing. I know housing better than anybody, maybe anywhere. It's all about the interest rate. Lower the interest rates. You can have all the housing you want. But you have to understand, I don't want to, I don't want to hurt people that own houses too. These people, for the first time in their lives, they have valuable houses, they become rich. I don't want to hurt them either. What you want to do is what good for everyone, get the interest rates down. We have this numbskull that was the head of the Fed before and he's a stupid person and we call him too late because he was too late with the interest rates all the time. We need low interest rates. Low interest rates will solve everything. We'll solve that now. Despite that, we're doing well with housing now.

[Political Commentator]

Fortunately, the housing bill was passed by a veto proof majority in both the House and the Senate. If Donald Trump doesn't take any action, it automatically will become law in 10 days. If Donald Trump vetoes it, then the veto has to be overridden by the House and the Senate. So we'll see where that goes. But at the same time, Donald Trump is attacking this bipartisan affordability housing bill. He says we're doing great on affordability.

[Podcast Host]

Here, play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

Affordability. We're doing great. The Democrats gave us a tremendous affordability problem and we're reducing prices a lot.

[Political Commentator]

He then says that he finds Mamdani to be very attractive. He's attracted to Mamdani and Mamdani is charming. Here's what he says.

[Podcast Host]

Let's play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

Mandavi was here, as you know, twice. And he's a very nice guy. He's a charming guy, good looking guy. Talk, we talk. But you can't raise taxes on people when you force them to leave your state or your city. And they're leaving and they're going to Florida.

[Political Commentator]

Then Donald Trump said that his deal with Iran, the MoU, was going to be so perfect that he was about to do the strongest and most powerful deal ever. However, he says the United States Senate then passed a War Powers resolution, concurrent resolution with the House of Representatives and that destroyed his ability to negotiate because Iran said, wait, the United States Senate just did a concurrent War Powers resolution? So that's why Donald Trump is saying there may be problems with his MoU. By the way, the MoU was done before the War Powers Resolution. This is what Donald Trump does. He blames everyone and everything for what he does. This is his plan. This is the Trump blame cycle.

[Podcast Host]

Here, play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

So we're doing great in our negotiations with Iran right in the middle of one of the key things which we're going to get anyway. We got, we have breaking news. The Senate has voted that they'd like Trump to stop the war. So Iran sees that and they go, what's that all about now? You know, it's meaningless, right?

[Political Commentator]

But I now speaking of the Trump blame cycle, he then says, you know, look, the reflecting pool, it was about to be so beautiful for July 4th. It was going to be amazing. But then he said the vandal started gashing it. The MoU was going to be perfect. The reflecting pool was going to be beautiful. But then all these people interfered.

[Barbecue Enthusiast]

It's rigged.

[Political Commentator]

Everything's unfair. Do you see the pattern here?

[Podcast Host]

Let's play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

But think of that. You work so hard, you get it open way ahead of July 4th. July 4th was the key. And then somebody is in there with a knife cutting it and ripping the floor out. It's terrible. But the 350 foot gash in the side, it's a terrible thing. Ready? I'm going to end on this. I'm so proud of Washington D.C. it's become one of the hottest cities in the world. But what is the hottest in the world is the United States of America.

[Political Commentator]

By the way, as we say, as we said on the Midas Touch network, the Trump playbook fail miserably then find a scapegoat. Algae bloom in the reflecting pool caused by his renovations. Vandals did it. Gas prices spiked due to his war. Oil company price gouging. Interest rates remain high due to inflation caused by his tariffs against the world and war. Jerome Powell's fault. Bungle the COVID response. Oh yeah, that's Dr. Fauci. Incited interaction. It was the deep state, it was the FBI, it was antifa. It was Black Lives Matter. Immigration enforcement failures. Radical activist left wing judges did it. Economy slowing or recession fears. It's Biden's economy coming soon. Lose the midterms due to historic unpopularity. It's the rhino's fault for not passing the SAVE Act. You negotiate this MOU that's weaker than Obama's jcpoa, the War Powers Resolution did it. Do you see the theme here? Over and over again? Then Donald Trump says around the reflecting pool, the grass is messed up now. And that's because they poured acid on the grass. It's, it's acid grass.

[Podcast Host]

Here, play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

But we fix those. You know, grass has a life just like people have a life. And we fixed a lawn and it will be fixed. One of the other things, they did a job around the reflecting pool. We have a huge field of grass. They poured acid on the grass. The same people, I guess they poured acid. So that's in the process it killed, you know, acid kills grass quickly. So that's being fixed. But the reflecting pool is great.

[Political Commentator]

Then Donald Trump also says, you know, it's the fake news's fault for reporting on all of this.

[Podcast Host]

Let's play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

And then the fake news tries to say, oh, well, it didn't work. Of course it worked. Everything I does work. What I do works. What I do best is build. And we fixed. I think it's 52. All over the city they're talking about it. But you know, the biggest thing is we have one of the safest cities. If you would have come here two years ago, you had a good chance of being mugged, although you're a very big guy. They would have mugged him up. They would have beat the hell out of him. He would have said, I'm never going back.

[Political Commentator]

And then in terms of the ducking and dodging accountability, a reporter says and asks, so have you seen any report on the Manob School where The United States military. He slaughtered over 168 little girls in Iran at the beginning of the war, which undisputedly the United States did a sick and disgusting war crime for which anyone involved in the chain of command deserves to be tried in the Hague. That's what I feel objectively. What does Donald Trump say? Ah, we're never really going to get to the bottom of it. It's war. We're never going to find the answers. Lack of accountability. War criminal, liar.

[Podcast Host]

Here, play this clip.

[Reporter]

Can I ask you one other question?

[Political Commentator]

Have you seen the report into the Minad School attack, sir? Could you tell us?

[Donald Trump]

I have not seen it, no.

[Reporter]

Why not?

[Donald Trump]

At some point, Well, I have to wait for it to be complete. I don't know that they're ever going to solve that problem. I mean, you could ask Pete, but I don't know that they're ever, they're going to say it was one of our missiles, Pete. I don't know that they're ever going to solve that problem. In terms of whose fault was it? Because there were missiles flying all over the place and it's horrible what happened, but there were missiles flying all over the place and somebody said it was our missile. Well, maybe it wasn't our missile, but I've seen nothing to lead me to believe it was. There were plenty of missiles being flown by other people. What do you think, Pete? Well, Mr. President, we've taken the investigation very seriously and when the appropriate time is right, whatever that outcome is, that'll be the time to divulge. I mean, if you come up with the right answer. I don't think it's going to be us. I don't think it was us. There were a lot of missiles being fired at that time. Yeah, please.

[Political Commentator]

And then Donald Trump says, ah, you know, it's the oil price gouging. That's why the prices, the prices should be 225. But I'm being screwed by the oil companies now. Let me just say I actually believe we are being screwed by the oil companies as well. I do think that there's price gouging. I think though that existed before the war as well. I think we're being price gouged by a lot of collusive behavior by corporations that Donald Trump supports. But I do want to mention this. Donald Trump had all of those oil executives sitting around him right as he was invading Venezuela and he said, these are my friends, these who I, I consult them about everything. Right? And so these are your buddies, Donald. These are the people who are getting richer and richer while Americans are suffering. This is your crew. This is your. These are your buds.

[Podcast Host]

Here. Play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

The gasoline or the oil prices have come down so much, and we are not seeing anything at the pump by comparison to what it should be. We should be, in my opinion, at $2.25 right now at the pump, and we're higher than that, and we are doing a big investigation on it. Yeah.

[Political Commentator]

And it just reminds me, as I think about this, like, this is who MAGA is. Ken Paxton, maga, Republican AG in Texas releases a child sex predator. I mean, one of the most sick, disgusting child sex predators without anything. Midas touch. Tried to ask him, why did you do that? No accountability. Watch what happened.

[Barbecue Enthusiast]

Just.

[Political Commentator]

I'm just trying to show you this is who they are.

[Ryan Reynolds]

Here.

[Podcast Host]

Play this club.

[Reporter]

Excuse me, Mr. Paxton, what do you think about Adam Hoffman? Why'd you get a plea deal for a sex tile tax predator? Do you have anything to say about that? Should it be registered as a pedophile in the state of Texas? A sex offender?

[Donald Trump]

Step back. Step back.

[Reporter]

What do you have to say to Adam Hoffman, the victim of Adam Hoffman? Mr. Paxton. Mr. Paxton, what do you have to say?

[Political Commentator]

And then Donald Trump says, I'm disappointed in Italy, uk, Germany, Spain, France. Every country, every. Everyone's screwing me over here.

[Podcast Host]

Play this clip.

[Donald Trump]

Help if we need it. I feel, you know, would have been a little bit different, but I was disappointed. I was disappointed with Italy. I was disappointed with the uk he's now gone and, you know, he had a lot of problems, but we were disappointed with the uk we were disappointed with Germany and France. We're disappointed with most of them. Spain is a horror show. Spain is terrible, even from your standpoint. I mean, they don't want to pay anything. They think they're in for a free ride. Spain is not a good group, not a good group at all. But I have great respect for this man. And so we're going to be discussing what took place, and we'll see what happens. Thank you.

[Political Commentator]

And while Donald Trump engages in this behavior, and while you have Trump and Rubio, you know, saying all of these lies about the mou, you know, one of the big problems that it creates is this ambiguity that could lead to war restarting again very soon. Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesperson said the following. The US Ruling establishment has never shown any sincerity in its behavior toward the Iranian nation. Iran, while having ample reason for this suspicion, entered the diplomatic process in good faith and signed the MoU to end the imposed war. Iranians know that the enemy's animosity will not end with the signing of a single agreement, and they will take every step. Vigilance Bearing in mind the experience of the past five decades, especially the developments of the last year and a half, the contradictory statements by U.S. officials regarding the MOU to end the imposed war will do nothing to reduce the accumulated distrust of Iranians and will merely serve as a reminder of past breaches of faith. The US Ruling establishment must bear in mind that the principle of commitment for commitment requires the fulfillment of reciprocal obligations and the avoidance of interpretations that are entirely at odds with the explicit wording of the Memorandum of Understanding text. And so let's stick to what's in the text. You know, all of this lying and all of this, you know, these deranged press conferences and statements, they don't help anybody. They don't help anything. It makes you look like a clown. It makes the United States look foolish, and you're just going to lead to war again. And we saw where that happened last time. That's where we're at.

[Donald Trump]

Anyway.

[Political Commentator]

Hit subscribe let's get to 7 million subscribers. Thanks for watching, everybody. Want to stay plugged in? Become a subscriber to our [e-mail] you'll get daily recaps from Ron Filipowski, ad free episodes of our podcast, and more exclusive content only [e-mail].