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- [00:00]
David Rothkopf
The United States is asleep at the switch and people who listen to your podcast are like, no, I'm angry, I'm doing something. You're not doing enough. I don't care what you're doing, you're not doing enough because we're going to lose this country.
- [00:28]
Lee McGowan
Hello and welcome to the Politics Girl Podcast. I'm your host, Lee McGowan. Let's get into it. So when things are this crazy, when the news is this never ending onslaught of shocking and unprecedented chaos, when everything you know about how things work seems to be up for debate, it's difficult to know what to do honestly. It's hard to even know what's going on. So today I thought we would take a step back and look at what's going on from a 30,000 foot view. So we're all on the same page. To do this with me, I've asked my friend David Rothkop to join us as he is not only a foreign and domestic policy expert, but a man who's really excellent at seeing the big picture and asking the hard questions in full transparency. This podcast was recorded on Friday, March 28. For those of you who don't know David, he is the CEO of the Rothkop Group, best selling author and journalist and host of the Deep State Radio podcast. He is also someone who truly understands government, having served as Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce and International Trade Policy in the Clinton Administration, as well as working at as a professor in International affairs at Columbia University, Georgetown and Johns Hopkins. He is a contributing columnist to the Daily Beast, a member of the Board of Contributors of USA Today, and has authored hundreds of articles for multiple publications. I'm hoping we can just go through some of the top lines of what is happening in America so that you are prepared with the information you need to go forward. Knowledge really is power and I want you to feel powerful right now. So without further ado, please welcome best selling author, international expert and brilliant thinker. Not afraid to face the truth. David Rothkop. Welcome back my friend.
- [02:00]
David Rothkopf
It is good to be back.
- [02:01]
Lee McGowan
Well, thank you for coming. I wish it was under better circumstances. Donald Trump has been president for two months and our country is quantifiably worse in every single way. We are weaker, we are less safe, we are poorer, we are abandoning our allies and embracing our enemies. The economy is tanking, our human rights are being abandoned and we are seemingly being run by wholly incompetent, cruel, greedy self dealers. So what is your initial take on where we sit here two months into the second Trump administration?
- [02:34]
David Rothkopf
Well, you've got me pretty close to tears there with your intro. I mean, you know, I think you've put your finger on it. I mean, that's where we are. And I think one of the most important things we can do is recognize how extraordinary the moment is, how different this is from anything we've ever been through, from. From anything we've ever experienced as a country. This is not going from some Democrats to some Republicans or having a debate over whether we should have Obamacare. This is an administration that is actively seeking to destroy the institutions of our government, fundamental freedoms, the structure of the international community, to redo who we are allied with, what we stand for as a country. And every day it gets worse. And, you know, other administrations move a little more slowly than this one has because they stop to obey the law. These guys don't care about the law.
- [03:38]
Lee McGowan
That's one of the biggest things for me is that we're watching the dismantling of so many institutions. But to watch the destruction of the rule of law, it makes the ground shake under you. We could have a discussion about if the Department of Education is bloated, but we can't have a discussion about if you can just pick people up off the street and send them away to foreign prisons without trial. To me, that's two completely different extremes. And let me ask you about what's happening with these arrests. And I use that term loosely because many of these people are being taken off the street without a warrant, without just cause, in many cases by plainclothes, masked assailants claiming to represent our government. Do you think this is a test? Like, a test to see how Americans respond to public kidnappings, to see what we do if we don't do anything that we're teaching them what they can get away with so they can expand their list of who gets taken from immigrants and visa holders to green card holders, to citizens, to anyone who they consider an enemy of the state. You're someone who thinks about these big questions. Where does this go from here?
- [04:52]
David Rothkopf
Well, I don't think it goes anywhere good. I do think it's a test. I. I think it's an effort to redefine the way the government works. And I'm not 100% sure how much they care about how people react to what they're doing. I think they care about, you know, whether impediments arise from the courts, perhaps whether the Supreme Court ultimately lets them do what they're doing, and perhaps some political impediments that may threaten the rest of their agenda. Honestly, even in those cases, when you have a president who has immunity and essentially unlimited pardon, power to grant to all the people that works for him, we're in a new place. He is acting like a king. And these people. This woman who got picked up at Tufts University apparently got picked up because she wrote an op ed with two other people that was pro Palestinian, you know, shit, was not pro Hamas, and they stopped using the terrorism language. You know, yesterday, when referring to this all, Marco Rubio said, well, if people come here and cause a ruckus, we're going to get rid of them. Cause a ruckus.
- [06:04]
Lee McGowan
That's me, babe.
- [06:05]
David Rothkopf
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, exactly. But the point is we have freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, and it's written right there, right there into the First Amendment to the. To the Constitution. These are founding principles. This is how the country got started. And they're, as you say, and I think you're very right to point this out. And a lot of people aren't pointing it out. You know, if it's Palestinian, pro Palestinians today, what is it tomorrow? Another woman got arrested this week or stopped at Logan Airport. A Russian doctor at Harvard Medical School and is likely to be sent back to Russia right now. And she's been a Putin critic. So are we now going to be rounding up people for totalitarian dictators around the world and sending people back? I mean, isn't this the opposite of the idea that actually led to us getting the Statue of Liberty, the concept behind the Statue of Liberty, that we would embrace people from elsewhere in the world who were subject to tyranny, subject to the kind of abuse that's happening here now? And I just think it'll go further and further, you know, will they? I mean, there's a pattern. It's not just those people, right? Look at what's happening with dei. Look at what's happening with scientific research. Look at the things that have been taken down off of websites. This is a systematic effort to wage a war against knowledge, to wage a war against facts, which is what fascists do, totalitarians do. They say, I'm going to set the narrative, I'm going to lie to you, and I want to get rid of anything that might get in the way of people buying my lies. I'm worried where that goes. There was another woman, a French person, coming here for a conference, and she was denied entrance into the country because on her phone she had statements that were critical of the Trump administration. Meanwhile, there are other people in the Trump administration who are looking at ideas like denaturalization, taking people's citizenship away so they can be kicked out of the country. Well, combine those two ideas and combine them with the police state tactics that they're using and people getting tossed, not just tossed out of the country without due process, tossed out of the country and put in an El Salvadoran prison, a hellhole from which they may never escape without any due process. That's. This is, you know, you know, when people go to me and they go, well, we really need, you know, I have a lot of centrist friends. And they're like, well, we got to find common ground.
- [08:56]
Lee McGowan
Common ground with people sending you to an El Salvadorian prison and it's known for human rights violations? There's no common ground there.
- [09:02]
David Rothkopf
There is no comm ground. It's like, what are you going to do? Compromise on a bigger cell? I mean, you know, this is. This is ridiculous. You know, what are you. Common. Common ground with a tyrant. I'd like slightly less tyranny, please. This is ridiculous. And by the way, you know, I think there's. There's some Democratic leaders who deserve criticism because they're. They're taking a kind of soft attitude to this because they think they're still in 1985 or something, while these guys are dismantling our government, imposing police state tactics, make it illegal to have ideas they don't approve of. I mean, what did you think last night? Trump put out an executive order saying we have to get rid of the bad ideas, the political indoctrination at the Smithsonian Institution and, wait for it, the National Zoo. I mean, what's the problem there? The pandas are black and white. They just want all white pandas.
- [10:02]
Lee McGowan
You know, I mean, the pandas are also Asian. They're black and white and Asian. So it's all dei. That is a DEI animal that.
- [10:10]
David Rothkopf
Exactly. We got to get rid of those DEI animals. I guess we get polar bears or something like that.
- [10:15]
Lee McGowan
I was reading about the Smithsonian thing, and I thought, does this man actually do any work? Does he know what the president's job is? Because it's not to go into the Smithsonian and start taking out exhibits. Like, that's not the president's job at all. You know what I mean?
- [10:28]
David Rothkopf
Like, well, he actually doesn't have any authority to do what he's saying. But this gets back to my point about the law. He doesn't care. Garrett Graff, who's a good writer about these kind of things, wrote a social media post this morning in which he said Trump realizes now that executive orders are like, he didn't use this term, but it's like supercharged truth social posts because they get so much attention. And the fact that what he is suggesting or saying he's going to do or ordering, he doesn't have the power to do. He doesn't care. He doesn't have the power to change how states conduct elections. He doesn't care. He doesn't have the power over the Smithsonian. He doesn't care. He's just, you know, going in because he wants to create the illusion of action, even if he doesn't actually get some of it done.
- [11:18]
Lee McGowan
Well, the thing is, is that I think the problem is, is that, yes, no, you can't just rule by executive fiat in a constitutional republic that we have. That's not how the Constitution is set up. It's not how it's supposed to be. The legislative branch is in of our laws. And yet if he is surrounded by people who tell him yes to everything, he does that say, yes, of course we'll do that. Yes, of course we'll do that. Like I keep thinking about the courts holding the line for us right now. Like the Republican controlled legislative branch has clearly abandoned their responsibilities to the Constitution and they're letting the executive Branch and Trump's EOs just run roughshod over them, you know, making the hundreds of laws by executive order, which is not at all how it's done. So the courts are upholding the law and putting stays on some of these and saying people don't have to comply and saying, turn around that plane where you have these people deported. And in many cases, the Trump administration is just seems to be ignoring the court rulings, which puts us into a constitutional crisis world. Right. But even more frightening to me is the recent sort of stance of speaker of the House Mike Johnson, who's now saying that Congress might just have to defund the courts that don't comply with Trump's orders. He might just have to shut down entire circuit courts if those judges don' uphold the President's wishes. And that's completely outrageous. Like, yes, Congress is a check on the courts, but the idea of Congress just shutting down the courts or firing judges or changing things so that Trump just gets everything he wants is a massive overstep on the Speaker's part and it should be setting off major alarm bells for everybody in this country.
- [12:58]
David Rothkopf
Yeah, it's, it's tyranny.
- [13:01]
Lee McGowan
Yes.
- [13:02]
David Rothkopf
You know, it's despotism. They're acting like dictators. They're doing what Putin did what Orban did, what Erdogan has done in Turkey, what Netanyahu is attempting to do in Israel. And there is a group of these countries, and we are now part of that group, that are ethno nationalist. In other words, they're playing a nationalist card. And it's often racism underlying it and anti democratic. And it is trying to push the world away from international institutions and away from international law to a world of strong men, of autocrats who get to do whatever they want, however they want, who resolve their big disputes with either corrupt deals or with wars. And that's where they want to head everything. And you're right to bring this up because too much of the stuff I read in the press is like, Mike Johnson has made the following statement in the fight, and it's like, oh, this is the same old, same old. And it's not. You know, Donald Trump said this week, I mean, every week there's stuff, right? He said this week, I would like to pay reparations to the January 6th rioters. He wants to pay the people who attempted a coup against the United States government. Well, why does he want to do that? Because he wants them to be his private army to do his bidding, to make elections harder for people. And we can think of 100 examples of this. And by the way, go back to your point about the test. Let's just start very early on. The Congress passed a law. I didn't particularly agree with the law, but the Congress passed the law. The law was that TikTok had to divest from the Chinese, be divested or shut down. And Donald Trump, in his first 24 hours in office, said, no, we're not going to enforce that law. I'm going to go cut my own deal. And nobody challenged him. Right? Then within 24 hours, we were saying, oh, the laws don't matter. And the Congress, as you say, they appropriate funds. That's the law. They write the laws, they appropriate funds. They are the only ones who could create or end the Department of Education. But Trump puts out EOs saying we're going to get rid of it, and then uses all sorts of kind of nefarious techniques to get rid of it in everything but name only. We're going to stop directing the funds. We're going to fire people. We are going to block these kinds of things. And they're doing that across the government. I mean, you know, today there's a story Elon Musk wants to change the computer system at Social Security. Well, what's that going to do it's going to keep people from getting their Social Security money they depend on for a couple of months now. I think it's politically insane, right? But the point is they're using tactics to achieve what they want outside the law, regardless of the law, in spite of what the laws are. Just every place they can do it, they're doing it.
- [16:06]
Lee McGowan
It's pretty sickening. I'm having a really hard time with it because like I was saying earlier, you know, it's very difficult to function in a, in a time where there is no rule of law. Like Steve Schmidt wrote on Substack that one of the things that makes Trump so deadly is that he's surrounded by imbeciles and extremists and yes men and people that are mostly incompetent, that these are the people telling him yes, these are the people giving him advice. These are the people who hear what he has to say and don't question him. This is not a group having debates or analyzing issues. They have no grand plan aside from usurping power and never giving it back. And that's the thing. It's like we talk about, like, you get rid of Social Security, that is politically toxic to do something like that. And yet it feels like they don't care. The whole idea is to dismantle the government, make it not work, then privatize whatever they can to make money, to pull in more money, to make us all desperate and poor and like, we'll just depend on our strongman leader to give us whatever we he can take. But like, when I think about this government not giving power back, because often when people talk about, look, oh, the 26 election or oh, the 28 election, I'm like, oh, that seems like 100 miles away because there's so much that could happen before that. But I think about Trump's recent executive order saying that anyone who votes needs to have proof of US Citizenship. Or the next EO that was talking about getting rid of voting by mail, because this is basically the SAFE act, but in executive order form, because the Republicans are never going to get that bill passed through Congress. And it's really a bill specifically designed to disenfranchise voters, but Trump has signed it as an executive order and if the courts don't stop it, then it really will affect how people can vote. And I feel like, okay, A, there might be something positive there, cuz they are still concerned about people voting, that they want to suppress our votes, but B, this is what they're doing. They're trying to not only disrupt the entire government, but also make sure we can't vote. Like the SAFE act is terrible, and it was terrible when it was a bill in Congress, and it is terrible now that it is in EO form. But basically the idea around it is that you have to prove citizenship. Right? That this idea that it reads like a voter protection bill, like the government is just trying to make sure that only American citizens vote. Which, to be clear to people who are listening, is something we already have thanks to the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility act of 1996. That bill itself prohibits noncitizens from voting, and it comes with punishment of prison or a fine or deportation. But, like, we don't actually have a lot of noncitizens voting. I think the Brennan center said it's something like 0.0001% of people who try to vote who aren't citizens. So it's like a negligible amount. It's never been a problem. And the Republicans have always said it's a problem. They try to pass bills to make it harder and harder for people they don't like to vote. And in this case, if you have to prove citizenship, you're going to need a passport to vote. And only 51% of this country has a passport. And a lot of those people are children of passport holders. They're now voters. Right. So let' number 40%. Ish. We're not solving a problem. They're making a problem that they can then keep people from voting. And in, in this case, the citizenship thing, it's people that can't afford passports, people that can't go and get passports, people that can't show two forms of ID that match if they don't have a passport. Because most women who got married, it doesn't match. Right. So like my birth certificate is not going to be the same as my married name. So then they don't match. So then I don't qualify to vote. This is the kind of thing that they're trying to do right now. And I, I find it interesting on top acting like dictators. They're trying to work within our system still to stop us from getting them out of power. Does any of that make sense to you? Are you one of those people that needs complete darkness to sleep, but your blinds allow light around the edges and it's never quite dark enough. Do you find yourself in 2025 with blinds from 1995? Well, there is a better way to buy blinds. Shades, shutters and drapery. And it's called three Day Blinds. 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The world is crazy. They're trying to work within our system still to stop us from getting them out of power. Does any of that make sense to you?
- [23:01]
David Rothkopf
Yeah, it's exactly what's happening here. I would add to it that they're gonna be challenged in the courts. But even if they're challenged in the courts in the first instance, by promulgating an executive order like this, they're intimidating people saying, you know, don't show up. And a lot of people will be like, oh, my God, I'm not going to be able to vote. And they just won't go. But secondly, if it gets tied up in the courts, we've seen how Trump plays the courts, right, which is delay, delay, delay, delay. And so you'll get to 2026, you'll get to 2028, and there will be all sorts of grounds, specious, but nonetheless grounds based on all of these conflicts, for them to say, oh, we can't count this, there are people here we're challenging and we're going to. All the election results caught up in this. And then on top of that, of course, who issues passports? U.S. government, State Department. Who runs the State Department? Marco Rubio. He's already demonstrated he'll do whatever Trump wants. And you can have already seen the slowdown in the issuing of passports anyway. Now, I'm not 100% sure that this passport thing is actually a genius idea because I got kind of a feeling that more Democrats own passports than Republicans for a variety of reasons. But, you know, as you say, it's illegal for non citizens to vote already. It's entirely unnecessary. And it's part of a broader effort to say we're going to make this difficult. We're not going to have mail voting, we're not going to allow you to count votes after the day that they're of the election, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. All of this is trying to entrench the minority that has elected Trump into power for as long as possible. When I say minority I mean, even though he got more votes than Kamala Harris, he got fewer votes than half of the total number cast, and much fewer when you consider that half people didn't vote anyway. One of the problems we've got is they're trying to dismantle voting rights while they are dismantling our international alliances, while they are getting rid of science and health care in the US While they are squeezing universities and shutting down the Department of Education, while they are rounding up people in the streets. And it's just very hard for the average person to know which direction to look. Now we've got J.D. vance in Greenland because we're gonna take over Greenland. I mean, insanity, right? But, yeah, but that's where we are. And I just think it's real important for people to stay focused and to say, look, this is. None of us have ever lived through this before. It's happened in lots of other countries, but none of us have lived through this before. And what we have to do is we have to wake up every morning and figure out how are we going to fight it, not just at the polls, but organizing, getting our voice out at the grassroots level. Because I think the story of the Trump administration at the grassroots level is terrible. And in any town in which you live, there are neighbors who have been fired, there are veterans who aren't going to get their operations that they need. There are Social Security recipients who are not going to be getting their money. There are people who are suffering because of these policies. And if we can put them in front of the school board, put them in front of the town council, put them in front of the county supervisors, town hall, put them in front of people at the local level, then we could actually produce the kind of results that will ultimately force these guys from office. And by the way, we're making some progress, right? Pulling Elise Stefanik's nomination to be UN Ambassador is because they think she could lose in a district that was 60, 40, and because they think that in the Mike Waltz district in Florida, which was also a very red district, they could lose. So they re Their tiny three person margin in the House is hanging by a thread.
- [27:19]
Lee McGowan
Well, let's pull that thread. Listen, here's the thing. You, you mentioned universities, right? So you're wearing your Columbia sweatshirt today. For people who are just listening, David has a very long history with Columbia University. And talk to me about these universities capitulating to this regime because it seems like your alma mater has decided to roll over for this administration to cut their Middle Eastern study programs to Suspend students to ban masks, to basically do anything the administration asks them to do to stay in his good graces. And I understand that Columbia gets funding from the federal government, but they're also a private institution and the oldest in America with. With a huge endowment. Right. So they're not desperate for his money. And watching their behavior play out just feels like despicable cowardice to me. But this is your. This is your, like, educational home. Tell me how you feel about this and where you stand on this.
- [28:15]
David Rothkopf
You know, the reason I like coming on this podcast is because basically all I have to do is agree with you. And, you know, I mean, it doesn't really require a lot of thinking. We think the same way. And I just like. Not. But. But, yeah. I mean, I'm wearing a Columbia sweatshirt today because, you know, I went to Columbia. I taught at Columbia. My grandfather went to Columbia. My great grandfather went to Columbia. My parents went to Columbia. My kids went to Columbia. And so I have a lot of Columbia sweatshirts. In fact, all the blue sweatshirts I own are Columbia. And so this morning, when I wanted to put on a blue sweatshirt, that's what I got. Okay. But I could not be more embarrassed by the leadership at Colombia or the lack of leadership of Colombia. Their capitulation, you know, they do have a very big endowment, and they could easily just say, go away. We're gonna. We're. We're gonna handle this on our own. They're feeling some pressure from trustees in New York who may be supportive of Trump. There's residual bad feeling over some of the aspects of the protest that had to do with the Israeli Gaza conflict. But, you know, I think it's a broader issue. And, you know, when the president of University of Pennsylvania was forced out, the president of Harvard was forced out at the time of the protests regarding Gaza, I said, be careful. This is not about that. They're using it as an excuse. They want to pressure universities to teach what they want taught. And in the Columbia case, they've said, like, you know, this is a department that needs to be shut down. We've already seen them stop funding for all sorts of medical research. We're, you know, months away from RFK Jr. At HHS saying vaccines are bad. And we're going to start seeing that translated into things. The whole DEI campaign, you know, across the country, all sorts of federal contractors have stopped referring to these things that in the federal government, it's reached the point of ridiculousness that they took down references on the Department of Defense website to the plane that dropped the bomb on Hiroshima because it was called the Enola Gay and they didn't want the word gay to appear anywhere. They took down references to, to Jackie Robinson, who broke the color barrier and is a great American hero because they thought it was DEI related. And so take dei, take anti science, take the predicate of things around antisemitism. Take all of these things together and what do you have? You've got suppression of free speech. And university presidents should have gotten together and stood up and said, no way. So should law firms.
- [31:09]
Lee McGowan
Yeah, that's what I was going to say. It's like, where's the unity? If all the universities stood together, they would be unstoppable. And it's the same thing with these law firms obeying in advance. I can't get my head around it. Like, if academia stood united against this and law firms stood united against this, they could actually make a difference. But they're all rolling over.
- [31:27]
David Rothkopf
Well, not quite all of them. There was a law firm in the past 24 hours that said they would challenge them further. And the dean of Georgetown University Law School wrote a very good, strong letter and he pushed back on this. But it's still disgusting that the vast majority of some of the most powerful institutions in the United States are obeying in advance. They're capitulating, they're bending the knee. And every time they do that, they send a message to Trump, which is, this works. Do more of it. It's appalling. And I got to tell you, by the way, another one of these things that really gets me, and I know you and I both, despite the career twists that have brought us to where we are, both of us started off doing theater. I'm really disgusted with the lack of response from the arts and cultural community. Where are the protests? Where are the shows? Where are the demonstrations? They have a platform. Why aren't they using the platform? They're just going along to get along. And I think that's, you know, the Kennedy Center. Why are they shutting down? You know, why do they take over the Kennedy Center? And, you know, Lord knows who's going to be Kennedy center honoree next year. Mel Gibson and, you know, Kid Rock. Kid Rock and Sly Stallone and right wing politician, right wing actors, you know, Lin Manuel Miranda said, okay, we're not going to do Hamilton at the Kennedy Center.
- [33:01]
Lee McGowan
Issa Rae, too, canceled her whole situation.
- [33:03]
David Rothkopf
Issa Rae and Rhiannon Giddens did also. But, you know, where is the rest of the power of that community? The power of why Aren't students, why aren't students demonstrating on campuses? Every time I'm frustrated about this and I say on one of my podcasts or I say at a TV show, where are the protesters? They'll go, oh no, there were 35 of us outside a Tesla dealer. Come on, folks. In Belgrade, in Serbia a couple weeks ago, there were a million people protesting that government, which by the way, the Trump administration supports that government and has a project there with that government. And Don Junior's over there a lot, but a million people. There are only 7 million Serbians, right? For 40 weeks, there were a quarter of a million people in the streets of television. There are protests in Georgia, there are protests in Hungary. And the United States is asleep at the switch. And people who listen to your podcast are like, no, I'm angry, I'm doing something. You're not doing enough. I don't care what you're doing, you're not doing enough. Because we're going to lose this country that we are at the point of no return. If they get one election cycle where they're not challenged or we lose the right to vote, they get another couple of years of this. This is going to be, you know, from the point of view of our foundational institutions, they're all going to be rubble. And if you don't think it can happen here, happens everywhere, happens all around the world. That's human history and it's time we wake go.
- [34:51]
Lee McGowan
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- [38:21]
David Rothkopf
And it's time we wake up.
- [38:23]
Lee McGowan
Yeah, no, I mean, listen, I think people are afraid. I think you, like you said, it's happened all over the world, but it's never happened here before. But I think people need to be aware that we're already at. We're 60 days in and we're already at State sanctioned kidnapping. Right. Like, we're using the Alien enemies Act from 1798 to, you know, send people, as we were saying earlier, to prisons in El Salvador where they're known for their human rights violations. That is basically American gulags. That's what we're doing. We're already there.
- [38:53]
David Rothkopf
And people are saying they're afraid. And I'm saying, get over it.
- [38:57]
Lee McGowan
Yeah.
- [38:58]
David Rothkopf
Fear is what they use in order to get what they want done. And does that mean you're gonna have to sacrifice? Does that mean you might expose yourself? Does that mean you might lose some kind of business? Does that mean that they might come after. Yeah, yeah. But unless we flick the switch in our brains and say, okay, I'm willing to take that, you know, I. I say to people, you know, you shouldn't own a Tesla. And they're like, well, I own a Tesla, and it's a pain in the ass to have to go and sell it and whatever. And it's like, so do you understand what you're supporting? Do you understand what you're backing here? Do you understand that you actually have leverage? That when you, you don't support those businesses, when you make them hurt, you send a strong message that it's possible that grassroots solidarity is ultimately going to carry the day. And, you know, one of the things I love about you and your show is, you know, you're always talking about the base truths of American democracy. And the base truth in American democracy is that they're not just three branches of government. Government, there's an executive and there's a judiciary and there's a legislative branch. And all of those are compromised right now. But this is not like England was when we broke away from it, where the sovereign was the king. And it's not like Trump thinks it is, where he thinks he's the sovereign. The sovereign in our system is usually. It's the people. Trump works for us. The government works for us. And so it's up to us to accept our role in governance and fight for that. And that's where we are right now.
- [40:42]
Lee McGowan
Yeah, there's going to be a mass protest around the country on April 5 being organized by the indivisible people and a bunch of other groups who have gotten involved. And I hope to see a lot of people on the street on that day. I think that the country's size works against us in this way because I think, like, in. If we lived in a country the size of France, we could all get to Paris, you know, within three hours, if we lived. There were.
- [41:05]
David Rothkopf
There were a million people in Washington two days after Trump was inaugurated the last time for the Million Woman March. You know, we've done it before, we.
- [41:15]
Lee McGowan
Can do it again. I was. I was at the LA protest after Trump was inaugurated in the women's March, and there were 750,000 of us just in LA alone. I think the thing is, is that that was, if I may say, it was women who organized that. And women have been kicked in the te twice watching their candidate lose to the worst man in the universe. And I think we're looking for leadership. You were talking earlier about Democrats not standing up and not being in the right place and not being the leaders we need in this moment as an opposition. I think there has been this very slow addressing of where we actually are. I watched from the election to inauguration thinking that the Democratic president and their administration would be doing something to protect us from what was coming. And I kept thinking they must have a bigger plan. They're not just going to let this monster just come in. And it seemed like, okay, no. Then we had the inauguration. You're like, okay, well, the Democrats have to be prepared to be, you know, the, like, very vocal opposition to this. They have to act the way Mitch McConnell would. They have to get in the way and obstruct and be in everyone's face and cameras saying, this is outrageous and we can't do this and this is against the Constitution. Nothing. Right. We get one opportunity to. To stand up with the continued resolution and say, we're not voting for any of this. You're trying to ruin the American people. You're firing half of America. You got this unelected billionaire with his doge doing the dumbest stuff with big balls over here. We're not doing it. And we see Chuck Schumer flip. And I think a lot of people who are seeking leadership are like, what do we do? You know, I am panicking and I don't know what to do, and I know I should do something. And I'm watching people be picked up off the street. I think we are slow on the uptake.
- [42:50]
David Rothkopf
Without a doubt, I agree with you 100%. We are slow in the uptake. And it's time to, you know, recognize that Chuck Schumer's past his sell by date. And it's time to recognize the leaders that have emerged, whether it's AOC or frankly, Bernie Sanders or Jasmine Crockett or Governor Pritzker or some of the other people who are able to speak clearly about it. Boston Mayor Wu or Jamie Raskin on a regular basis.
- [43:15]
Lee McGowan
Yeah, Chris Murphy's doing great work.
- [43:17]
David Rothkopf
Like, yeah, there are people out there, but a lot of people still. The switch hasn't gone off in their head.
- [43:24]
Lee McGowan
I know.
- [43:24]
David Rothkopf
And said, I could lose it all. It's like, you know, the house is on fire. Chuck Schumer and John Fetterman, and there are five Democrats who voted for 10 of Trump's nominees. They're like, oh, the house is on fire. Let's make some mores. The rest of us have got to say, the house is on fire. And it's not, what should I do? It's do everything. Use the platform. You've got to change opinions and to share the truth. Get out and protest where you can protest. Donate whatever funds you've got to candidates that matter. Go to your town council, go to your board of education, go to participate in an active way in local politics. Write leaders, email leaders, organize boycotts, participate in boycotts. Do it all because time's running out. Totally share your frustration with this because the Dems have been asleep at the switch for the most part. Some of the core leaders, it's, you know, the scene in the Godfather, you know, too often quoted, Michael Corleone turns to Robert Duvall's character and says, you're not a wartime consigliere. We, we need wartime consiglieres. We need people who are ready to be the opposition to a fascist government and not the people who want to be the minority party in a functioning democracy, because that's not what we've got. We're not there. That's the past. Podcasts, like your podcast, play a really important role. You've got a big following, and every single one of those people could make a big difference because you've got a following of tens of thousands of people. And each one of those people has a following, too, of hundreds or of thousands. And if you take the multifier effect, that's millions of people. And if they become active people, millions of people active, will make the difference in this election and this country. And sending a message to the government that, no, we're just not going where you want to go.
- [45:37]
Lee McGowan
Yeah, no, I just keep thinking. The Politics Girl podcast is produced, as people know, by my husband Sean, and he owns a production company called Happy Warrior Entertainment, just produced a piece with Timothy Snyder's words from On Tyranny. And you go through all of it and we're going to release it coming out because it's such an important moment that people aren't getting. And the first lesson in On Tyranny is do not obey in advance, which most people know. But right after that, it says most power that authoritarian governments get is freely given. The people make an assessment of what they think they're going to be asked for, and they give it in advance. They say, like, that's what the universities are doing. That's what these law firms are doing. That's what the people in many ways are doing. They're like, what are they going to need me to do? I'll do it so that I'm not in trouble. But the thing is, is that if you think that what's happening to the people who are, say, green card holders or visa holders or wear a hijab, and that's not you, so why would that happen to you? This kind of thing, if you think what's happening to these people around America right now, now can't happen to you because you're a citizen and they're not, you're mistaken. Once you start snatching people off the street for having the wrong opinion, for writing an op ed, for being a national security threat, you are opening the door to something you can't close, something terrible you can't close. And I think about Timothy Snyder and his work and how he. And you know, he's just come out with. He and two of his Yale colleagues have decided to leave Yale and go to toront work at the University of Toronto instead because of what's happening in this country. And he said, if you accept that non citizens have no right to due process, then you are accepting that citizens have no right to due process because all the government has to do is claim you're not a citizen and without due process, you have no chance to prove the contrary. Like, I keep thinking of people being like, well, they'll be like, are you a citizen? And I'm like, yeah, here's my id and they're like, whoops, I dropped it. Prove you're a citizen. And you're like, but you have my id. And they're like, stop resisting. You know, like, this is how quickly it can happen. Right. I think we have a real lack of imagination in this country because it's never happened to us, because we've lived in, like, the hot tub, warm water of, like, safe democracy for so long that we can't imagine things going badly for us, but things are already going badly. We need to have a far bigger imagination for how authoritarianism works and understand that this whole concept of saying, but that's not legal is meaningless in the face of people who don't care about legality, who don't care about the rule.
- [48:16]
David Rothkopf
Of law, or who are willing to twist legality. Right. So if you, the Attorney General, say that protesting outside a Tesla dealership is domestic terrorism, that's bad. Right? But if it. She then says, I can use my special powers to fight terrorism against you because you're a protester, that's worse. And if they can say to somebody, oh, we have these special wartime powers that allow us to throw people out of the country. There's no war.
- [48:47]
Lee McGowan
We're not at war with Venezuela. What are you talking about?
- [48:49]
David Rothkopf
Yeah, but, you know, it's like, there's no invasion on the southern border. That's bullshit. But what they're trying to do is to find a predicate in order to enable them, them to use power in an undemocratic, outside the rule of law way. And if they can use it against them, they can use it against you. And if you're listening to this podcast, if you're spending an hour of your week listening to this podcast every week, you've got a target on your back. Doesn't mean you shouldn't listen to the podcast. It means you should understand your role in this society, because they will find an excuse. They will. You know, this is the president who wanted to use live fire against BLM protesters in 2020.
- [49:43]
Lee McGowan
Yeah. The whole goal is to keep us afraid because that keeps us controlled. And then they chip away at our rights until they're gone, and we can't allow it. If anything, you should embrace your annoying, mouthy American spirit at this moment. That thing that makes people around the world go, oh, Americans, they're so loud. Loud and annoying. Do that, but in service of your country right now, you know, do that in service of the Constitution. Do that in service of the rule of law. Because like you said, it's only going to get worse if we don't be more likely. I'm in my insufferable bitch era. This is where we're at.
- [50:22]
David Rothkopf
May we all get there.
- [50:24]
Lee McGowan
Listen, before you go, I just have to ask you about the drama that Trump administration is trying to bury right now, but we have to keep attention on, and it's what people are calling signal gate, Right? And if you don't mind, I just want your thoughts on it, because it's so ridiculous. And if people don't know what I'm talking about when I say signal gate. This is the story right now where top US Officials, we're talking the Vice President, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State, the National Security Advisor, the Director of National Intelligence, the CIA director, the Treasury Secretary, the White House Chief of staff, the Deputy Chief of Staff, and a special envoy to the Middle East. Middle east were all kind of yucking it up on a messaging service called Signal, which is not a secured line, discussing sensitive military plans, including times and locations of Air Force attacks in Yemen. Right. And they accidentally added a. An Atlantic journalist to the chain who was like, am I on a private chain talking about war plans? And he waited, and then he was like, oh, I should remove myself. I'm probably, like, breaking some law being here. And then he realized that this should never have been done, and all of these people who should know way better shouldn't be doing this. And it has come out to the forefront now, and now we are all aware that this happened, and we go, okay, well, if they're doing this for the Yemen attack, what else are they on a signal chat for? What else of our national secrets are going are out there in the ether. You know, these people are completely incompetent. Why are they in charge? And the Trump administration is trying to say, this isn't a big deal. Who cares? Democrats are so ridiculous. Why are you trying to make this such a big deal? And I think the thing is, is that this actually is a giant big deal, and it is not a partisan big deal. This is a. Like, these people cannot run our government because everyone is in danger. Big deal. And I would really love to know your thoughts on where that is before I have you go.
- [52:13]
David Rothkopf
I mean, my thoughts are, again, roughly where yours are. You know, this is a big deal. It represents an incredible breach of security. It represents unbelievable recklessness and irresponsibility. I'm part of the top officials in the Trump national security Cabinet. You know, particularly egregious are the United National Security Advisor for inviting Jeff Goldberg onto the chat. But especially Secretary of Defense Hegseth for posting the information that had it leaked out, could have led to the deaths of American pilots or intelligence operatives or others. Because they were telling in advance where we were going and what we were doing and how we were getting there and what kind of weapons we were using. The administration had, you know, and by the way, the Director of National Intelligence and the Director of CIA were on this thread and at no point did they say, hey guys, stop, don't do this. At no point either this information was classified, which by every definition, DoD definition, broader US government definitions, it should have been, or by not classifying it, they were making an even more egregious mistake in terms of security. And there's a lot of talk about attack plans. But there was a lot of other stuff on this discussion thread that is also the kind of thing that is typically classified. First of all, high level discussions like this are always classified because they give you a sense of where administration policies may go. But you had the Vice President saying, I'd like to squeeze the Europeans. The Secretary of Defense going, yeah, I join you in your loathing of European freeload. Loading. That would be classified because that's incredibly inflammatory kind of perspectives on these things. You have people on this chat celebrating when apparently a bomb blew up and killed a lot of civilians. That is pretty horrible, but would also have been classified for a variety of other reasons. So you have incompetent people, or you have reckless people. You have people who don't care what gets out there to our enemies. Enemies. Or you have people saying, maybe it's okay if the enemies get this stuff. And atop this whole pyramid, you have Donald Trump who gave classified information to the Russians in May of 2017 in the Oval Office. You have Donald Trump who stole classified documents, hid them in his house, lied to the FBI about those documents, mishandled. You have Donald Trump who is trying to suppress fire people from the government, anybody who said he had ties to the Russians, they're being fired. Any initiative that protected us from that kind of compromising tie is being eliminated. It's all part of a pattern which should make you actually think the worst. You should make them think, why would Donald Trump hire such incompetent people. People. Maybe he. Maybe it was intentional. Maybe this is the kind of thing that they think weakens us and that plays well with his autocrat friends elsewhere. I don't know about the last part, but it's worth considering. But this is not something that should go away in any other time in any Other government waltz would be fired, Hagseth would be fired, and Ratcliffe and Gabbard should be worried about their jobs.
- [55:47]
Lee McGowan
Yeah. No, this is not how any of this works. It's shady as hell, honestly. If anyone else did this, a soldier, someone who works in security, someone who works in an embassy, they wouldn't just be fired, they would probably be court martialed and quite probably jailed, honestly. But the idea that these top guys are top security guys, including the Vice President of the United States, are trying to pretend this is no big deal is nauseating and it should really make people very, very concerned for our safety and the safety of our national security.
- [56:16]
David Rothkopf
Yeah. And by the way, you know, Pam Bondi said, oh, we're not going to investigate this and that.
- [56:20]
Lee McGowan
Terrific.
- [56:21]
David Rothkopf
That is. But it's another problem. Right. The Attorney General isn't doing her job. The Department of Justice isn't doing its job in ensuring that our laws are enforced because she views herself as the personal attorney of the President. So take the immunity, take the pardon power, take a Congress that's supine and add to it people senior places in the administration who are enabling the law breaking as opposed to upholding their oath of the Constitution. And that's how you get in the situation we've been talking about for the past hour.
- [56:55]
Lee McGowan
Yeah. And exactly why the Senate should never have approved any of these people to be in his Cabinet. That's exactly why the Senate is supposed to consider carefully who the President is surrounding himself with. And they didn't. They just rubber stamped everyone who is incompetent and compromised. And I think it's just given people like China and Russia and Iran and North Korea just like butterflies in their stomach with joy. There's no way they can't be just absolutely thrilled with what we're doing. I was, honestly, I'm going to go back to Steve Schmidt. He said that like everyone in the American government right now is just a comic book villain brought to life. Like he calls them a poisonous pack of fools, a real life Team America, world police and a disgusting, ugly spectacle. And I thought, yep, that sounds exactly right to me.
- [57:42]
David Rothkopf
It is exactly right.
- [57:44]
Lee McGowan
Well, I want to thank you so much for joining us today, David. I love talking to you. Clearly we are in a crisis, but every autocrat in history has attempted to do this, to consolidate power by weakening the courts, to suppress votes, to silence their opposition. But they only succeed when the public is complacent. And that's what you're talking about. Right. So the, these people can only win if we give up. So we really have to stay focused and engaged and continue to fight back every. Every single day.
- [58:13]
David Rothkopf
Totally agree. Always love to come here to visit you. It hasn't left me upbeat, but I. But it has left me energized.
- [58:22]
Lee McGowan
Oh, good. That's what we need. We need a little energy, if not happiness.
- [58:26]
David Rothkopf
Yes.
- [58:27]
Lee McGowan
So that was David Rothkop reminding us that this administration is actively seeking to destroy everything we know, and we can't allow it. That we are a nation built on causing a ruckus. So the good citizens of America have to do that now. We cannot check out. We have to recommit to the principles of truth and justice and freedom and stand up and fight for them. That the Trump administration, like fascist nations before it, is waging a systemic war against facts and intelligence, against the rule of law and elections, against our very sense of agency and power within a nation we thought we knew. But I want to remind you that these people are not untouchable. If Signalgate taught us anything, it's that these people are incompetent. They are stupid and greedy and vicious. And while they will clearly do anything to hold on to power, we have to be willing to do anything to hold them off. It is a heartbreaking and scary moment in our country's history, but it is a truth we must acknowledge if we want to see our way through it. I want to thank David for joining us today and you for caring enough about democracy to be here. Now. Go out and fight back. Give them no reason to believe their takeover will be easy because we are coming for them. Until next week. Peachy. Out. Before you go, I just want to thank the premium members of this podcast and encourage those who aren't members to consider supporting this work. Independent voices are the ones really bringing you the truth right now. And in today's political landscape, we do it in danger. So if you aren't a member of Politics Girl Premium, Please go to politicsgirl.com and consider signing up. You will get this podcast ad free, along with my rants and bonus content sent directly to your inbox. So even if my work is silenced on social media, you will still get access to the truth and information you need. There is a link to sign up in the bio of this episode, but also@politicsgirl.com and as always, please like and share this podcast so we can grow the audience. Audience. The more people who have access to real information, the more effective we will be at defeating these people who would destroy our country. As always, thank you for your time and support Politics Girl Podcast is written and performed by me, Lee McGowan, in partnership with the Midas Media Network and produced and edited by Happy Warrior Entertainment. All rights reserved.