Speaker 1: Live from the heart of the nation's capital, this is
Speaker 1: a Jim Acosta Show special report.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 3: Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Jim Acosta Show.
Speaker 1: It's another day that ends in Y and Donald Trump
Speaker 1: turning our world upside down. Just 60 days, folks, until
Speaker 1: the midterm elections in this country. Of course, voting is
Speaker 1: going to start much sooner than that. And as we've
Speaker 1: been saying on the show, Donald Trump is already working
Speaker 1: hard to deprive you of your right to.
Speaker 3: Vote in this country.
Speaker 1: We'll talk about that and more during this hour. Our
Speaker 1: big guest is Hunter Biden. He's back on the show.
Speaker 1: We're very happy to have him with us. And I
Speaker 1: just want to say, Hunter, before we get started, I've
Speaker 1: got to give a shout out to our friends over
Speaker 1: at Ground News. There's a new tool I'm using more
Speaker 1: and more these days to check out the news.
Speaker 3: It's called Ground News.
Speaker 1: Not only do they have all of the day's news,
Speaker 1: they also provide ownership information about the media outlets reporting
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Speaker 3: Take a look.
Speaker 1: Go to groundnews.com slash Acosta to get 40 percent off
Speaker 1: the unlimited access vantage plan and unlock worldwide perspectives on
Speaker 1: the stories shaping our world. Hunter Biden, great to see you, man.
Speaker 2: Hey, great to see you. I'm a ground news person myself, too.
Speaker 2: There you go.
Speaker 3: Well, we've got to get those plugs in. We'll get
Speaker 3: your plugs in, too.
Speaker 4: How you been?
Speaker 2: I'm doing great. I'm doing great. I'm having fun out there.
Speaker 3: I know you are. You're everywhere.
Speaker 1: And, you know, I guess the first thing that always
Speaker 1: comes to mind whenever we get on is just how
Speaker 1: your father's doing. I know his health has been an
Speaker 1: issue as of late. I did see that he's going
Speaker 1: to be going to the 9-11 ceremony in New York.
Speaker 1: That's the one that Trump, I guess, is skipping because
Speaker 1: they won't let him speak there and, I guess, ruin
Speaker 1: the festivities. But it's good to see that your dad's
Speaker 1: going to be there for that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he is.
Speaker 4: And, you know, he's so tough. It's just like impossible.
Speaker 4: to keep him down. I mean, everyone that loves him
Speaker 4: and keeps telling him, please, like, you know, just can
Speaker 4: we rest for a little bit?
Speaker 2: But, um, so, you know, he's going to have to
Speaker 2: live with this for the rest of his life. It's painful.
Speaker 4: And the, and the, uh, the process is, um, you know, I, I,
Speaker 4: as I always say, it's, it's, uh, something I think
Speaker 4: almost every single person can relate to had, uh, someone
Speaker 4: that they love that has, uh, has cancer or has
Speaker 4: battled with cancer. And so, He's, but today he's doing,
Speaker 4: he's doing, he's doing great. Prognosis has been good. The
Speaker 4: treatment has been working and, but it's something he's going
Speaker 4: to have to live with for the rest of his life. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And it does say something, does it not, that the
Speaker 1: folks in New York would like to see Joe Biden
Speaker 1: at the 9-11 festivities, but not Donald Trump. I mean,
Speaker 1: it seems to me that that's probably a good move
Speaker 1: on their part, not having Donald Trump there, given his
Speaker 1: track record. Yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean, What is that even all about? I mean,
Speaker 4: talk about the level of narcissism that you have to
Speaker 4: have is to demand to speak, to be the only
Speaker 4: the first person to ever speak that, you know, with.
Speaker 2: I just don't get it.
Speaker 4: It just he takes every beautiful thing about us coming
Speaker 4: together and figures out a way to divide us even
Speaker 4: further and make something make it all about him.
Speaker 1: It's so true. There are so many different places where
Speaker 1: we can go. I want to talk about your Substack
Speaker 1: and anything else that you might have coming up. The
Speaker 1: other thing that has been pissing me off lately, and
Speaker 1: maybe it's because I spent almost eight years there covering
Speaker 1: the White House on a daily basis, is the fact
Speaker 1: that the Supreme Court says it's okay for Trump to
Speaker 1: knock down part of the White House and build this
Speaker 1: ridiculous ballroom.
Speaker 3: I guess what the.
Speaker 1: Supreme Court is now saying is that You know, any
Speaker 1: president can come in. I guess they can knock down
Speaker 1: the whole thing. They can put in an office building.
Speaker 1: They can put in an amusement park.
Speaker 3: It's insane. Have you had any thoughts on this?
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, one of the things that I think is
Speaker 4: the most troubling about that decision is that they is
Speaker 4: outside of just the context of the actual East Wing
Speaker 4: and that project is the way that they got to
Speaker 4: the decision is by denying standing.
Speaker 2: Um, to the, uh, to, to the, uh.
Speaker 3: To the plantation folks, right?
Speaker 2: Yeah. Preservation folks.
Speaker 4: So if, if they don't have standing, what, uh, and
Speaker 4: so many other things, not basically on whether he wants to,
Speaker 4: you know, tear down the Kennedy center, whether he wants to,
Speaker 4: you know, whatever he wants to do. And I always
Speaker 4: say about this, just so everybody understands this, this is,
Speaker 4: this is not just abnormal.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 4: This is a, um, uh, and it's beyond just the
Speaker 4: idea of like, he likes to build things or, or
Speaker 4: turn everything into gold. What it is, is him taking
Speaker 4: ownership of something that belongs to all of us. He
Speaker 4: is saying to us, I can do with this, whatever
Speaker 4: I want, because I own it. I am, I own
Speaker 4: the white house. I own, you know, the Kennedy center.
Speaker 4: I own the, the reflecting pool. And, you know, It's
Speaker 4: literally what autocrats do.
Speaker 2: And it's what dictators do.
Speaker 4: And for him, it's about the symbolism of that, is
Speaker 4: that he can bring in literally a wrecking ball and
Speaker 4: take down a third of the entire square footage of
Speaker 4: the East Wing and build it in his likeness. And
Speaker 4: that's the thing that's the most disturbing about it. You know,
Speaker 4: I think that the Supreme Court is, you know, maybe
Speaker 4: too late for us, but it's going to rue the
Speaker 4: day when they gave so much latitude to this guy
Speaker 4: that clearly has the intention of never leaving.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, and Hunter, you and I are around
Speaker 3: the same age.
Speaker 1: And I mean, I don't know about you, but I
Speaker 1: grew up with like reverence for the Supreme Court.
Speaker 3: I mean, I thought, you know, the.
Speaker 1: Office of the presidency, obviously very political and Congress, very political.
Speaker 1: The Supreme Court, I grew up with this, and maybe
Speaker 1: I was stupid and naive, but I had this notion
Speaker 1: that the Supreme Court was sort of above all of that.
Speaker 1: Now I get the sense that people just feel like, ah,
Speaker 1: it's just the MAGA guys on one side, the liberals
Speaker 1: on the other side, and that's the way it goes.
Speaker 1: And what a depressing thing to have happened to our country. Because,
Speaker 1: I mean, are you telling me that if Joe Biden
Speaker 1: had knocked down part of the White House, that the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court would be like, okay, sure, that's fine?
Speaker 2: I just think that's nuts.
Speaker 3: No, I know.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's astounding. I mean, and it's every day.
Speaker 4: There's a new example of it in which he's given
Speaker 4: a free pass by the other institutions and the Supreme Court, Congress,
Speaker 4: the other separate parts of the executive that in the past,
Speaker 4: whether it's by just the norms, the Justice Department being
Speaker 4: one of them, That it just every day he gets
Speaker 4: a pass. And and the more that he does, the
Speaker 4: more the precedent is set.
Speaker 2: And I and when I say rue the day.
Speaker 4: What happens when the quote-unquote kind of anti-Donald Trump comes in,
Speaker 4: which will not be any better for this country, regardless
Speaker 4: of where you stand as it relates to Donald Trump,
Speaker 4: is that no one, this is the entire idea behind
Speaker 4: our constitutional republic.
Speaker 2: He's attacking the fundamental.
Speaker 4: uh, reason for why we are a nation and why
Speaker 4: I always believe that regardless of all our warts and, and, uh, and, uh,
Speaker 4: troubled history is that we were always seeking to, uh,
Speaker 4: build a better union. And, and, and he made it
Speaker 4: clear that that is not the intent we're, we're, what we're,
Speaker 4: we're in now is, um, you know, the, uh, implementing, uh,
Speaker 4: the Trumpism, uh, and not the constitution.
Speaker 3: Exactly.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And Trumpism, by the way, includes falling asleep all the
Speaker 1: time in the Oval Office.
Speaker 3: He did it yet again. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know we brought this up the last time.
Speaker 1: He called your dad Sleepy Joe all the time. He
Speaker 1: falls asleep every time they do one of these photo
Speaker 1: opportunities in the Oval Office. He's falling asleep.
Speaker 3: We can show some of the video right there. And
Speaker 3: he's just out cold with people behind him talking.
Speaker 1: I mean, I fall asleep in movies or in front
Speaker 1: of the TV and stuff. But people like standing around me,
Speaker 1: I would never fall asleep.
Speaker 3: I don't get this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I get it. He clearly has something wrong.
Speaker 4: There's nothing even remotely normal about this. And it's really
Speaker 4: the hypocrisy. This is where I would love to hear
Speaker 4: your take on it. is I don't get what the
Speaker 4: press is doing. I read an article today about Steve
Speaker 4: Witkoff meeting with what's his name from the UAE, the, the,
Speaker 4: the Amir's brother who runs all of the intelligence services
Speaker 4: for the UAE and is, you know, and runs the
Speaker 4: sovereign wealth fund. And it had this whole article about
Speaker 4: how Steve Witkoff had this major sit down with him
Speaker 4: as it related to the Iran war for the strategy.
Speaker 4: And not one mention in there about how Steve Witkoff's
Speaker 4: family is partners in business with this person in World
Speaker 4: Liberty Financial to the tune of almost a half a
Speaker 4: billion dollar investment in a scam, a cryptocurrency scam. And
Speaker 4: it's amazing to me is how they let this stuff
Speaker 4: just slide.
Speaker 2: It is absolutely. I mean, I remember this, OK, for years.
Speaker 4: I don't know how long and how many millions of
Speaker 4: dollars I had to defend myself. And one of the
Speaker 4: issues was, is that I when my dad was neither
Speaker 4: president nor vice president, met with individuals that I was
Speaker 4: doing business with. He never met with them, but he
Speaker 4: literally did like a photo op walking out of a restaurant,
Speaker 4: not even a photo op.
Speaker 2: The guy took a picture of himself, a selfie.
Speaker 4: And yeah and and that was it that's the entirety
Speaker 4: of any evidence that they had similarly now these guys
Speaker 4: are literally making billions of dollars with these people and
Speaker 4: they are and they are um uh uh setting policy
Speaker 4: for the United States of America, which has increased gas
Speaker 4: prices by what, 40% since the start of the war
Speaker 4: of the rent? The straightforward solution is still closed. And
Speaker 4: they're making money off of it by front trading, insider trading,
Speaker 4: letting them know when he's going to go make a
Speaker 4: statement and making billions of dollars in trades on the
Speaker 4: world's futures.
Speaker 1: I would love for somebody to ask that question, how
Speaker 1: he could give these people advanced access to his Truth
Speaker 1: Social feed so they can place the right bets on
Speaker 1: the stock market or the calci market or prediction market
Speaker 1: whatever it's so totally corrupt and insane and not in
Speaker 1: keeping with the american tradition at all of the office
Speaker 1: of the presidency i mean i also think that jared
Speaker 1: kushner doing business with the saudis you know that.
Speaker 4: He makes annually a hundred million dollars in fees from
Speaker 4: the saudis they're literally paying him And not only that,
Speaker 4: he's got, I think, up to $ 6.
Speaker 2: 4 billion invested in his fund now. $ 6.
Speaker 4: 4 billion, all from Gulf state countries.
Speaker 1: And they want to give the Saudis nuclear power, which
Speaker 1: obviously could lead to a.
Speaker 2: They do.
Speaker 4: And by the way, I know, for instance, that the
Speaker 4: Secretary of Energy's nephew is in bed with some of
Speaker 4: the people that have gotten pardons from Donald Trump. And
Speaker 4: they're supposedly the point people for any of the technology
Speaker 4: that's going to be transferred to the.
Speaker 4: To the Saudis as it relates to a nuclear program
Speaker 4: of which we were so hell bent on stopping.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I mean, it just doesn't end. And I just,
Speaker 1: you know, to me, the press needs to be asking
Speaker 1: harder questions.
Speaker 3: I mean, and part of it is.
Speaker 1: Because he throws out all of this goofy, crazy shit
Speaker 1: on a regular basis. You know, he says things like,
Speaker 1: you know, did you realize that dumb has the letter
Speaker 1: B on the end of it?
Speaker 3: And he just says silly, kooky stuff.
Speaker 1: And I'm thinking to myself, you know, I guess we
Speaker 1: could cover, I mean, I guess we could.
Speaker 3: Play this, but it's like, you know.
Speaker 2: And that's when I.
Speaker 5: Came up with the name Democrat because it's the dumbest
Speaker 5: stuff I've ever seen. Like the transgender, like the men
Speaker 5: and women's sports, like the open borders, like hundreds of
Speaker 5: other things that are so bad. And then I said, well,
Speaker 5: if you replace the E with a U instead of Democrat,
Speaker 5: you have Democrat. And most people don't know that dumb
Speaker 5: has a B at the end. You know, they think
Speaker 5: it's D-U-M and that's okay.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Hunter, nobody thinks that. And I don't, is his
Speaker 3: brain broken?
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, your father said one thing in
Speaker 1: a debate, had to end his campaign, and Trump says
Speaker 1: this shit almost every day.
Speaker 2: Every day. Every day.
Speaker 4: It's almost, you know, and then here's the thing, Jim,
Speaker 4: is this is why I think that from your experience.
Speaker 2: As being.
Speaker 4: A part of the White House press pool and White
Speaker 4: House correspondent, is I just don't get how they let
Speaker 4: this stuff pass. I don't get it anymore. And, and I, and, and,
Speaker 4: and so we get caught in this thing. Well, yeah,
Speaker 4: dad had a bad, one bad debate performance. And, and
Speaker 4: sometimes he mixed up the word ran with the rack
Speaker 4: or things like that. This, this literally happens on a
Speaker 4: daily basis. And I almost wonder, is it, if it's
Speaker 4: like the, You know, you say, well, it's just all
Speaker 4: of these things that he does as a distraction, like
Speaker 4: naming Lake Ontario, renaming Lake Ontario.
Speaker 3: Yeah, what did you think of that? Well, I mean,
Speaker 3: I can't.
Speaker 4: Think of it literally more, a dumber with a B
Speaker 4: thing in history, except for the thing that he did,
Speaker 4: you know, three days before that. I mean, talk about dumb.
Speaker 4: It is just, like, and offensive and childish.
Speaker 1: And then Google goes along with it. Apple goes along
Speaker 1: with it. That's disgraceful, too.
Speaker 2: Yeah. By the way, go get your MapQuest. Everybody go
Speaker 2: to the Apple Store right now and download MapQuest. I'm
Speaker 2: with you.
Speaker 4: The heroes of the internet right now who refuse to
Speaker 4: name a lake, by the way, which has been named
Speaker 4: that for over, what, 500 years. Something like that. I
Speaker 4: think 400 years, literally, before colonization. And so it's just
Speaker 4: dumb with the B.
Speaker 3: It is all dumb with a B.
Speaker 2: There's no question about it. You know what it is?
Speaker 2: It's a dumb with a Donald Trump at the end.
Speaker 2: That's what it is. Yeah.
Speaker 3: With a capital D.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1: No, you know, and I did see one of your
Speaker 1: interviews the other day where you were talking about Vice
Speaker 1: President Kamala Harris. And I mean, I will say that,
Speaker 1: you know, this from the from the get go looked
Speaker 1: like a really good pairing to me when your your
Speaker 1: dad picked Kamala Harris as vice president.
Speaker 3: I thought they worked together pretty, pretty well.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess, you know, any relationship between the
Speaker 1: president and vice president might have its hiccups from time
Speaker 1: to time.
Speaker 3: I mean, Trump and J.D. Vance, that's a whole other story.
Speaker 1: But I guess you were doing an interview the other
Speaker 1: day where you were talking about Kamala Harris and loyalty.
Speaker 3: Did you want to.
Speaker 4: Well, you know, here's the thing is this is like
Speaker 4: I truly love the vice president.
Speaker 2: And I certainly don't.
Speaker 4: I can't speak for my dad on this is that
Speaker 4: he loved working with the with Vice President Harris. And
Speaker 4: she was an incredibly loyal and effective member of the administration.
Speaker 4: And on a personal level, I'd love Doug and Kamala.
Speaker 4: I'm an overly sensitive boy sometimes. You know, I think
Speaker 4: I think I made that statement. in response to like,
Speaker 4: I saw a thing where she was talking about like
Speaker 4: who her favorite presidents and, you know, and, and I
Speaker 4: guess what the point was is that she wasn't going
Speaker 4: to name, you know, her, you know, her ticket, but, um, uh, but, and, and, and,
Speaker 4: and the fact of the matter is, is that I
Speaker 4: think the, what we should be talking about now is
Speaker 4: the incredible women, particularly black women that are, that are
Speaker 4: running for that, that are actually in races right now. Um, uh, like, uh,
Speaker 4: like Stratton, like, um, uh, Keisha Lance Bottoms. I mean,
Speaker 4: talk about an incredible candidate down in Georgia.
Speaker 2: And my own senator from the state of Delaware, Lisa
Speaker 2: Blount Rochester, who is a superstar.
Speaker 4: And I know that the, so here's me apologizing for
Speaker 4: being a little bratty on the.
Speaker 2: National tv but you know that's me so.
Speaker 1: That's okay it's all right to get a little sensitive
Speaker 1: about your dad he's your dad that's.
Speaker 2: The way yeah yeah um.
Speaker 1: You know but i i do wonder though it does
Speaker 1: raise the issue of like what is the future of
Speaker 1: the democratic party i know you and i talked about
Speaker 1: this before and i knew you told me that you
Speaker 1: weren't going to run for anything so i'm not.
Speaker 3: Going to ask about yourself but um Is it John Ossoff?
Speaker 1: He brought up the Natalie Harp thing, and then that
Speaker 1: went viral and I think created a real problem and
Speaker 1: a headache for the current White House. I mean, I
Speaker 1: thought that was kind of a master stroke on his part.
Speaker 1: I don't know whether it was somebody who gave him
Speaker 1: that idea or what, but is there a candidate out
Speaker 1: there that you'd like? I guess we should talk about
Speaker 1: the Natalie Harp thing, too.
Speaker 3: We should get to that, too.
Speaker 4: Okay, so we'll get to the Natalie Harp thing, which
Speaker 4: I think is totally relevant and fair. And I don't
Speaker 4: think this whole thing like, oh my God, you're attacking
Speaker 4: like this poor, you know, shit, number one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, fuck it, let's talk about Natalie Harp first. What
Speaker 3: do you think about that?
Speaker 2: Okay, Natalie Harp first is this.
Speaker 4: Is anybody that walks that close to the football, to
Speaker 4: the nuclear codes, along with the president, that is in
Speaker 4: his presence on a 24, clearly 24-7, that acts this
Speaker 4: weird and seemingly inappropriate in the workplace? is someone that
Speaker 4: we have an absolute right to focus on and to
Speaker 4: focus on why she didn't get a national security clearance
Speaker 4: for over a year when she entered into the into
Speaker 4: the employ of Donald Trump.
Speaker 2: There is nothing normal about this.
Speaker 4: And if this was not if this was Joe Biden,
Speaker 4: if this was Barack Obama, it would be wall to
Speaker 4: wall coverage on Fox News 24 seven.
Speaker 2: There is no way that this is not an appropriate issue.
Speaker 4: And it is the hypocrisy of them saying, oh, well,
Speaker 4: this young woman, you're trying to ruin her life. No
Speaker 4: one's trying to ruin anybody's life. We're trying to get
Speaker 4: to the answers of why it is this relationship exists
Speaker 4: the way that it does.
Speaker 2: It is strange.
Speaker 4: It is inappropriate in many senses. And it should be answered.
Speaker 4: And it's a legitimate question.
Speaker 2: But every single time what they do is they act
Speaker 2: like as if, oh, my, you know.
Speaker 4: Like the way that you're talking about a woman. Look at, like, Jesus,
Speaker 4: God Almighty, look in the mirror, people. Look in the mirror.
Speaker 4: Look in the mirror.
Speaker 1: Donald Trump has insulted women more than any human being
Speaker 1: in the history of mankind.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And, again, like, go back to the White House
Speaker 2: Press Corps.
Speaker 4: On Air Force One, he turns to an experienced, seasoned,
Speaker 4: incredibly well-liked journalist on the plane who's asking him tough questions,
Speaker 4: and he turns there and says, quiet, Biggie. And none
Speaker 4: of these people like Scott Jennings on CNN had any
Speaker 4: problem with that.
Speaker 2: They don't find any problem with that.
Speaker 1: And by the way, Scott Jennings, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: is Scott Jennings a really reliable person?
Speaker 4: I mean, you know, like, Oh my God, he's the
Speaker 4: biggest jackass on ever. I mean, I have to admit,
Speaker 4: it's like literally there's no one that gets under my
Speaker 4: skin more than Scott Jennings, because it's just like, it's.
Speaker 2: Lie after lie after lie after obfuscation.
Speaker 3: He claims he talked to Mitch McConnell.
Speaker 1: He says, I talked to Mitch McConnell.
Speaker 3: Where's Mitch McConnell?
Speaker 2: By the way, it would be really easy. I don't
Speaker 2: understand why they don't do this. It'd be really easy.
Speaker 2: Show me the phone log. We all have it. All
Speaker 2: you have to do is go.
Speaker 4: Into your phone, you go to the number you know,
Speaker 4: when it was dialed and it shows you how long
Speaker 4: the how long the call was.
Speaker 2: Show me the phone log. Show me the number. He
Speaker 2: could end it. He could end the debate about whether
Speaker 2: he did it. But he's full of shit. We all
Speaker 2: know it. Now, as it relates to.
Speaker 4: The future of the Democratic Party, I have to say
Speaker 4: this is all of this hand wringing is so typical
Speaker 4: of we Democrats.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 4: There are people look at the candidates that are out
Speaker 4: there that are being talked about.
Speaker 2: I don't know of anybody that generates more excitement of
Speaker 2: the base.
Speaker 4: And by the way, more press and coverage than AOC.
Speaker 3: Forget about- You'd like to see AOC.
Speaker 2: No, look at AOC. Look at John Ossoff.
Speaker 4: Look what John Ossoff has been, the excitement that he's
Speaker 4: been able to create in Georgia, in a purple state
Speaker 4: at best, in which he- has been able to break
Speaker 4: out of the wall-to-wall Donald Trump press and be able
Speaker 4: to create his own. And by the way, look at
Speaker 4: somebody like James Tallarico. Now, they may steal that election
Speaker 4: from him by closing polling stations.
Speaker 2: Did you see that? They closed down 95 polling stations.
Speaker 2: They're going to do everything they can do to steal it.
Speaker 2: But what an.
Speaker 4: Amazing candidate for Texas in particular. And by the way,
Speaker 4: Abdul Al-Sayed is going to win. I'll tell you here
Speaker 4: right now. Abdul Al-Sayed is going to win in Michigan.
Speaker 4: And oh, I'll tell you about somebody who I think
Speaker 4: is a rising star in the face of the Democratic
Speaker 4: Party that I'd like to see is Dan Coe in
Speaker 4: Massachusetts 6th, who just won the primary there. He's amazing.
Speaker 4: Watch him on TV. Watch how he goes on Fox
Speaker 4: News and takes it back to them. That's the future
Speaker 4: of the Democratic Party. Look at Keisha Lance Bottoms in Georgia.
Speaker 4: Look at Lisa Blount Rochester in Delaware. Look at Julie
Speaker 4: Stratton in, and just, we have these amazing candidates. By
Speaker 4: the way, Gavin Newsom, I don't care what you say
Speaker 4: about Gavin Newsom, if anybody's ready for prime time, you
Speaker 4: know what I mean? Like he is, and as a communicator,
Speaker 4: And not only a communicator in the.
Speaker 2: New media, he's got a team, man. He is ready
Speaker 2: to go. So I think we have an enormous, incredibly
Speaker 2: deep bench.
Speaker 4: And the question is not whether or not we have
Speaker 4: the people to bring us over the finish line. The
Speaker 4: question is whether or not they will allow us to
Speaker 4: get to the finish line.
Speaker 2: Meaning the way in which they're trying to suppress the
Speaker 2: vote is real.
Speaker 4: And they are they they will do everything in the
Speaker 4: power from mailing voting to shutting down the Postal Service
Speaker 4: in order to be able to suppress the vote. Those
Speaker 4: are the things that we need to be focused on
Speaker 4: as part.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And they're also I mean, there was just a story
Speaker 1: in The New York Times. DHS agents apparently are rummaging
Speaker 1: through state voter rolls trying to find candidates. These mythical,
Speaker 1: you know, illegal voters, undocumented voters out there. They try
Speaker 1: this every four years. They talk about voter fraud and
Speaker 1: they never prove it. It's just a kind of shit.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 1: What do we do as a country, though, if they
Speaker 1: do try to steal it?
Speaker 3: If they do.
Speaker 1: I've been worried that Trump is just trying to cause
Speaker 1: so much chaos that it results in this giant 52
Speaker 1: car pile up in the midterms. And they say, well,
Speaker 1: we can't really sort it out right away. So let's
Speaker 1: go to the Supreme Court and see if we can
Speaker 1: delay the seating of a new Congress until we sort
Speaker 1: this out. These are the scenarios that I worry about.
Speaker 1: What do we do as a country?
Speaker 3: Does it mean.
Speaker 1: People have to take to the streets and surround the
Speaker 1: White House?
Speaker 3: I mean, what do you think?
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's what I think.
Speaker 4: I mean, look, make no mistake, this is what they're planning.
Speaker 4: Whether they can pull it off or not, I don't know.
Speaker 4: But that is what they're planning. This is what they're
Speaker 4: going to do. And it will take mass civil disobedience
Speaker 4: in order for us to be able to reverse this.
Speaker 4: I keep saying to people, this is not about saving
Speaker 4: our democracy. This is about getting it back.
Speaker 2: They have already blown through the rule of law in
Speaker 2: so many ways.
Speaker 4: They have already done things to make it clear that
Speaker 4: they do not believe in free and fair elections. Every
Speaker 4: single thing they say about these elections is a complete lie,
Speaker 4: verifiable by just just checking your facts, people. And so
Speaker 4: what we know is this. They're going to try to
Speaker 4: steal it and like everything with them. Everything is projection
Speaker 4: or confessions. They claimed that election was stolen so they
Speaker 4: could create enough chaos to be able to try to
Speaker 4: change the rules in their favor. That's what all of
Speaker 4: this is about. That's what every single piece of this about.
Speaker 1: And so I yeah, maybe it'll take a general strike.
Speaker 1: Maybe people should, you know, in blue states just not
Speaker 1: go to work and just say, listen, if you.
Speaker 4: By the way, I've been thinking that we should have
Speaker 4: done that a long time ago. I mean, I even
Speaker 4: think about this in the context of what he's doing
Speaker 4: to Canada and our relationship to Canada. And I watch
Speaker 4: what Doug Ford is doing out in what he's in
Speaker 4: Ontario province.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: Or I forget.
Speaker 4: And he he has been much more strident even than
Speaker 4: the prime minister and saying, like, you know what? We're
Speaker 4: not going to do any more trade. We're going to
Speaker 4: we're going to target blue states. We are going to
Speaker 4: cancel the Starlink contract. We are, you know, 10 billion
Speaker 4: dollars worth of contracts with the Canadian government are going
Speaker 4: to be canceled. I people have to respond in kind.
Speaker 4: We as Democrats have to respond in time. So a
Speaker 4: general strike, 100 percent. Civil disobedience, 100 percent. Mass mobilization,
Speaker 4: 100 percent.
Speaker 2: All of those things.
Speaker 1: And it's enough with us being destabilized and being the
Speaker 1: victims of the chaos.
Speaker 3: Why not, you know, put some heat on them?
Speaker 1: That's to me that that's that sounds like what you
Speaker 1: got to do to get their attention, to get his attention, to.
Speaker 2: Wake him up. Couldn't agree more. And by the way,
Speaker 2: here's another thing. You know, people are talking that way
Speaker 2: and are like J.B. Pritzker in Illinois.
Speaker 4: That's true. Governor Newsom, Wes Moore. We got some really,
Speaker 4: really good people. I think that, you know, unfortunately, I
Speaker 4: say in every interview is people ask me about Democratic Party.
Speaker 2: I say the Will Rogers line. I'm not a member
Speaker 2: of any organized party. I'm a Democrat. And but but
Speaker 2: this is not it. By the way, here's the other thing.
Speaker 2: this isn't about Democrats. This isn't about Republicans. This is about,
Speaker 2: this is about the country. It's about saving the country.
Speaker 4: And just everybody, people remember this wake up, wake up
Speaker 4: to the fact that Donald Trump has a 31% favorability
Speaker 4: rating is that the, the number of people that still
Speaker 4: consider themselves MAGA is less than the actual, in terms
Speaker 4: of population, probably less than 10 to 15% of this country.
Speaker 4: And so, All of us, all of us have to
Speaker 4: find common ground, which is one of the reasons why
Speaker 4: I'm willing to go talk to people like Tucker Carlson
Speaker 4: or Candace Owen. Because at least in one thing they've
Speaker 4: found is that they have woke up to the fact
Speaker 4: that Donald Trump is a complete and utter fraud and
Speaker 4: charlatan and is ruining the country.
Speaker 1: I'm glad you mentioned that because I noticed you did
Speaker 1: these interviews. And I understand the philosophy behind it, sort
Speaker 1: of like Pete Buttigieg going on Fox and that sort
Speaker 1: of thing, which I always think that's great. Do you
Speaker 1: get the sense, though, when they tell you, I've had it,
Speaker 1: that's it, I'm done with Trump, that they're just reading
Speaker 1: their audience and they're just, again, being charlatans and putting
Speaker 1: their finger in the wind?
Speaker 3: Or do you think it's genuine?
Speaker 1: I think in the part of Tucker.
Speaker 2: And Candace, it's genuine. Interesting.
Speaker 3: And because Tucker's really full of shit. I know. I'll
Speaker 3: just say that, you know, he has been.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, I hope so because some of the things
Speaker 2: that he said about me in the past, I know exactly.
Speaker 4: I mean, he was, I got a lot of heat from,
Speaker 4: from people that I really respect and that I, um,
Speaker 4: I love that when I did that and, and they
Speaker 4: said to me at the time, uh, right after, and
Speaker 4: I mean, it may have cost him a friendship in
Speaker 4: one instance is that Hunter, what they, these people did
Speaker 4: to me, is unforgivable. And this is somebody that they
Speaker 4: actually did ruin their life. And I can't believe that
Speaker 4: you would go and, quote unquote, kind of bury the
Speaker 4: hatchet or try to do a kumbaya. And number one,
Speaker 4: in each instance, it's nothing about kumbaya for me. I
Speaker 4: think that everyone should be held accountable. But the idea
Speaker 4: that I don't have standing, so to speak, in terms
Speaker 4: of somebody that has been completely dehumanized, defamed, and had
Speaker 4: their lives not turned inside out, upside down, and had
Speaker 4: the shit beat out of me for seven years by
Speaker 4: those people. So I feel if anybody has the right
Speaker 4: to go and make their own decision about who they
Speaker 4: talk to, it would be me.
Speaker 2: And I know this.
Speaker 4: This is just my strategy. My strategy is that we
Speaker 4: have to do first things first. First thing first is
Speaker 4: getting rid of Donald Trump. And I will go anywhere
Speaker 4: in which I can find common ground and people that
Speaker 4: are in agreement with me that Donald Trump is a
Speaker 4: cancer on the soul of this country. And so that's
Speaker 4: that's my strategy. I may be wrong, but but that's.
Speaker 3: No, I think it's good.
Speaker 1: I think it's good to try to penetrate these bubbles
Speaker 1: that people are in. And sometimes you have to do it.
Speaker 1: You have to go into the lion's den. I totally
Speaker 1: agree with you. And Hunter, tell us a little bit
Speaker 1: about your Substack and what you're doing these days, because
Speaker 1: it really is, I think, a valuable resource for people
Speaker 1: who have dealt with addiction, people who have tried to
Speaker 1: get their life together in the way that you have.
Speaker 3: And it's a process.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So, you know, I love Substack because it's because the
Speaker 4: whole model of it and you get to write in
Speaker 4: long form and you get to actually really flesh out
Speaker 4: some of the ideas that you've had. And I wrote
Speaker 4: two books in rough draft. And so what I do
Speaker 4: with my subscribers is I'm releasing the book kind of episodically,
Speaker 4: the first one. And the second book that I wrote
Speaker 4: is kind of not from the internal perspective, but from
Speaker 4: an external perspective. The operation that was run against me
Speaker 4: by people like Rudy Giuliani and and Steve Bannon and
Speaker 4: many others. And so, but also to, you know, you
Speaker 4: don't have to be a paid subscriber to go read
Speaker 4: my sub stack in which I write essays about the things.
Speaker 2: And what I try to do is I try to.
Speaker 4: Relate my own experience in recovery to what the country's
Speaker 4: going through. And so I write on there and I
Speaker 4: write a lot about, you know, addiction and a lot
Speaker 4: of other things in my art.
Speaker 2: And it's really cool, but go subscribe. You can subscribe
Speaker 2: for free.
Speaker 4: You don't have to, you know, do the paid, to
Speaker 4: do the paid one now if you want to do
Speaker 4: the paid one jim i'm okay.
Speaker 3: That's okay i'll become one i'll do it.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah um but it's um it's pretty cool and
Speaker 4: um and uh and i'm actually having a lot of
Speaker 4: fun with that it um it is fun i i
Speaker 4: i i'm i have uh i fancy myself to be
Speaker 4: a writer since i was a kid and um i'm
Speaker 4: maybe maybe not that great at it but it uh
Speaker 4: it's uh along with my art this keeps me sane.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's all you can do is, is try
Speaker 1: to pour your heart into stuff. I mean, that's, that's
Speaker 1: what life is all about. But, and I think a
Speaker 1: lot of people respect what you've been doing lately, Hunter. They,
Speaker 1: they really liked the fact that you're trying to take
Speaker 1: ownership of your life and people say the narrative, it's
Speaker 1: kind of like a jargony word, but you've taken control
Speaker 1: of your story, who you are.
Speaker 3: And I think that's fantastic. And I really think it is.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, I, I got, I got some more tricks
Speaker 2: up my sleeve too.
Speaker 1: So you got some other stuff coming and should we,
Speaker 1: I got.
Speaker 2: Some other tricks coming up my sleeve and it'll be fun.
Speaker 2: It'll be fun.
Speaker 3: All right. There's a tease there. Very good.
Speaker 2: All right. We'll get you back.
Speaker 1: Maybe we can talk about it when it comes out,
Speaker 1: but Hunter, thanks a lot.
Speaker 3: Really appreciate it. Good to see you.
Speaker 2: Always good to see you, Jim. Thanks for having me on.
Speaker 2: See you.
Speaker 3: Take care.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was Hunter Biden there. Terrific interview with Hunter
Speaker 1: Biden on the state of our democracy. And I thought,
Speaker 1: you know, his words there towards the end of the
Speaker 1: end of the interview when he said it might take
Speaker 1: people taking to the streets after these midterms happen. If
Speaker 1: Donald Trump tries to steal these elections coming up this fall,
Speaker 1: that it might take something like that in this country
Speaker 1: to stay on this front of our democracy and the
Speaker 1: state of it and how fragile it is right now.
Speaker 1: Let's bring in Ruth Ben-Ghiat. She is the author of
Speaker 1: the wonderful Lucid Substack. Always a must read. Ruth, always
Speaker 1: great to see you. Thanks for coming back.
Speaker 6: It's so nice to be speaking with you.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 3: And we've got a lot of ground to cover, too.
Speaker 1: One of the things that we should get into is,
Speaker 1: I mean, just today, a federal judge was looking at,
Speaker 1: you know, what this latest thing from the Trump administration,
Speaker 1: the way they're trying to rig the midterms. He wants
Speaker 1: to restrict mail-in ballots ahead of the November elections. And
Speaker 1: this federal judge sounded very dubious about the whole thing,
Speaker 1: saying it could cause major disenfranchisement. There was a hearing
Speaker 1: on this today. She raised a lot of questions. We
Speaker 1: don't have a ruling on this just yet, but she
Speaker 1: may act fairly quickly on this. What do you make
Speaker 1: of this, Ruth, what Trump has been trying to do
Speaker 1: with mail-in balloting on the eve of a midterm election cycle?
Speaker 3: It's extraordinary.
Speaker 7: It's extraordinary, but it's completely in keeping with– what a
Speaker 7: desperate person does. Somebody who knows that he has led
Speaker 7: the GOP, they have led themselves into situation where they're
Speaker 7: going to do very badly. And so what autocrats have
Speaker 7: always done, if they keep elections going, as happens in
Speaker 7: the 21st century, is so you try and rig the
Speaker 7: system and you use intimidation to get people not to
Speaker 7: feel unsafe coming out to vote. You strip people from
Speaker 7: the rolls. Orban in Hungary used gerrymandering as well. So
Speaker 7: he was defeated and he conceded. But these are old
Speaker 7: tricks that desperate people do to keep themselves in power
Speaker 7: when they know that the way they've been acting has
Speaker 7: caused mass discontent. And so if they were to let
Speaker 7: a free and fair election proceed, they would lose.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 1: And that's what he's up against right now. That's what
Speaker 1: has the Republican Party freaked out right now. Many of
Speaker 1: them are reluctant to go to his Trumpapalooza convention that
Speaker 1: they want to have next week in Dallas. I guess
Speaker 1: MSNOW and some other folks have been interviewing Republican lawmakers,
Speaker 1: and they're acting as though this is like going to one.
Speaker 3: Of RFK Jr. 's measles sites.
Speaker 1: They don't want to go anywhere near that convention. And
Speaker 1: I know you wrote recently, in your lucid sub stack,
Speaker 1: we should also mention your amazing book, strong men, but
Speaker 1: in your lucid sub stack, um, about how Trump has
Speaker 1: kind of broken the Republican party. I mean, he has
Speaker 1: really devastated the Republican party right now and they're paying
Speaker 1: for it dearly.
Speaker 6: They're paying for it.
Speaker 7: And there's also, um, so he's broken the party and,
Speaker 7: you know, as a reminder, and I need to remind
Speaker 7: everybody that we have only two major parties.
Speaker 6: So, um, in other countries that have multi-party.
Speaker 7: Systems, if a leader kind of corrupts and starts to,
Speaker 7: you know, engineers the decline of a main party, the
Speaker 7: defectors who want to save their skins have somewhere else
Speaker 7: to go. They can go to other parties. But here,
Speaker 7: there's nowhere else for people to go. Now, maybe Tucker
Speaker 7: Carlson will run for president one day. Who knows what
Speaker 7: could happen? But The other thing I wanted to say
Speaker 7: is really interesting. We're living through this global renaissance of
Speaker 7: resistance in the world.
Speaker 6: And there's a.
Speaker 7: Whole subcategory of Gen Z protests and resistances. And we
Speaker 7: are rapidly approaching having the three main conditions that around
Speaker 7: the world are sparking resistance. One is economic hardship. Two
Speaker 7: is when people see blatant corruption happening. by not just
Speaker 7: the leader and his family, but, you know, entrenched elites,
Speaker 7: so blatant corruption. And third is when the government is
Speaker 7: both brutal, but also, and this is really important, uncaring.
Speaker 7: So if there's a natural disaster, the government doesn't care.
Speaker 7: They're too busy, you know, taking care of themselves. And
Speaker 7: so this mix of economic hardship, blatant corruption, and a
Speaker 7: government that either is, you know, going after you with
Speaker 7: violence or doesn't care about you, it's usually both.
Speaker 6: So we have all this.
Speaker 7: And the GOP and Trump, they know they're in a
Speaker 7: very precarious situation and certainly explains the way that Trump
Speaker 7: is acting also with his ballroom and his bunker. All
Speaker 7: the things that are happening can be filed under desperation
Speaker 7: because of the way they've behaved.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: They wouldn't be trying to rig the midterms if they
Speaker 1: thought they were going to do really well. And on
Speaker 1: the corruption thing, you're absolutely right. I mean, a couple
Speaker 1: of things you mentioned there. I do want to get
Speaker 1: into the ballroom and the vanity projects. I've been calling
Speaker 1: them insanity projects. But on the corruption, I just saw
Speaker 1: this poll from Gallup, and I think we can put
Speaker 1: this up on screen that talks about how people feel
Speaker 1: about corruption these days.
Speaker 3: This is according to Gallup.
Speaker 1: A record 89% in the United States say government corruption
Speaker 1: is widespread. Substantial majorities, Republicans, Democrats, and independents agree. I suspect, Ruth,
Speaker 1: if this poll were taken back when Joe Biden was president.
Speaker 3: Barack Obama, the number would not be that high.
Speaker 1: This is a reaction to what has been a corruption
Speaker 1: bonanza under Donald Trump in this second administration. I don't
Speaker 1: think we've ever seen anything like this in America before.
Speaker 1: Maybe even in, like, I don't know, North America or
Speaker 1: the Western Hemisphere. I mean, among Western democracies where a
Speaker 1: president of the United States or president of a country
Speaker 1: has enriched himself to this degree. I mean, you really
Speaker 1: have to look for other examples besides Donald Trump.
Speaker 7: Yeah, the parallels are from autocracies. And it's really a
Speaker 7: totally different mentality. And I actually added a corruption chapter
Speaker 7: to strongmen because, and Trump is in it, because he
Speaker 7: was starting all of these things. And the whole purpose
Speaker 7: of why autocrats are in office is completely different than
Speaker 7: Democrats with a small d. And one of the main
Speaker 7: reasons they want to get to office is to make money.
Speaker 7: So you make private income off of public office. And
Speaker 7: it's not just you, it's also your family. It's your clan.
Speaker 7: And that's why like sons-in-law often are there to make
Speaker 7: dirty deals and they're given special tasks. And then it
Speaker 7: becomes like what eventually is called a mafia state where
Speaker 7: you have the families and clans of the officials like
Speaker 7: Howard Lutnick. So this is starting and they make money.
Speaker 7: And so, you know, when it's very well developed, like
Speaker 7: in Putin's or in Erdogan, you know, established autocracies, corruption
Speaker 7: is actually the way, it's like the fuel that lubricates
Speaker 7: the system. And so we're starting this, and it's actually,
Speaker 7: like everything else that's happened here, it's happened at top speed.
Speaker 7: And last thing I'll say is it's not just about
Speaker 7: making money. It's also about rolling back any kind of oversight, right?
Speaker 7: So the Biden administration had passed a lot of laws,
Speaker 7: including the corporate transparent act that marco rubio was so
Speaker 7: proud of um to make sure that bagged out bad
Speaker 7: actors couldn't be anonymous if they formed shell companies well
Speaker 7: that's all been repealed and so they've been rolling back
Speaker 7: stuff that prevents um corruption, including from foreign sources, Russian sources, etc.
Speaker 7: And they've been having a free-for-all, and now we have
Speaker 7: crypto and other ways of making money that have no regulation.
Speaker 7: So it is unprecedented in American history, and I would
Speaker 7: say in the history of democracies.
Speaker 3: It really is. It's incredible.
Speaker 1: And getting back to the not vanity, but insanity projects,
Speaker 1: I guess Doug Burgum, the Interior Secretary, he just tweeted
Speaker 1: this a short while ago. Apparently, they're going to try
Speaker 1: to get started.
Speaker 3: On this arch.
Speaker 1: He says, we are pleased to announce that after a
Speaker 1: very long wait, we are preparing to start over the
Speaker 1: next two-week period the excavation work necessary for the Great
Speaker 1: Triumphal Arch and Military Observation Deck at Memorial Circle on
Speaker 1: Columbia Island between the Lincoln Memorial and so on. And
Speaker 1: for folks who may not understand the geography of this,
Speaker 1: if you look through the arch there, you're looking at
Speaker 1: Arlington National Cemetery. And a lot of veterans are upset
Speaker 1: about this because this is going to spoil the view
Speaker 1: of Arlington National Cemetery as you're coming across the Memorial
Speaker 1: Bridge from the Lincoln Memorial. And they call it the
Speaker 1: Great Triumphal Arch. But, Ruth, I mean, this is code
Speaker 1: for the Great Trump Arch. I mean, this is obviously
Speaker 1: a monument to himself, just like the White House ballroom is.
Speaker 1: And it is also another telltale sign of autocrats and
Speaker 1: wannabe autocrats.
Speaker 6: It's interesting. I didn't know it was supposed to.
Speaker 7: I saw there that for the first time it's a
Speaker 7: military observation deck.
Speaker 3: I saw that.
Speaker 7: And that is significant because there will also likely be
Speaker 7: military posted there at a nice height to observe and
Speaker 7: do whatever they need to do if there's unrest. So
Speaker 7: the way I've been seeing this ballroom slash bunker for
Speaker 7: a long time is through the lens of autocrat psychology.
Speaker 7: So the ballroom was never the main point. It was
Speaker 7: always what was beneath it. But the ballroom is his ego.
Speaker 7: And it's the way he has a mechanism to have
Speaker 7: parties so that donors can give him money and get
Speaker 7: their wishes, right?
Speaker 2: All of that.
Speaker 6: That's a form of corruption, right? You pay to play.
Speaker 6: So the ballroom is about that. So it's his ego.
Speaker 7: But the bunker has always been about his deepest fears.
Speaker 7: And in fact, the Washington Post did like a data-driven
Speaker 7: investigation over a few months of what Trump talks about
Speaker 7: the most.
Speaker 6: And guess what?
Speaker 7: It's his ballroom slash bunker because it's his fears. And
Speaker 7: the way he talks about it is super interesting. He
Speaker 7: talks about it having anti-sniper capabilities, He talks about being
Speaker 7: in a hospital. And now we hear it's going to
Speaker 7: have a data center. It's going to be like a
Speaker 7: little world unto itself in which he feels safe.
Speaker 1: And a drone port on top.
Speaker 3: He's talked about this.
Speaker 6: A drone port.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 6: So this is all to protect him.
Speaker 7: So he has a place to go because that's what
Speaker 7: he most cares about. And it's really incredible, Jim, because
Speaker 7: in Strongman, my book, I have an endings chapter. And
Speaker 7: all of them, have these palaces and with bunkers underneath
Speaker 7: and they retreat there when they feel threatened or they
Speaker 7: retreat into their palaces and they're arming themselves like Lukashenko
Speaker 7: during the protest, you know, peaceful, peaceful protesters were marching
Speaker 7: toward the palace and he, you know, gotten a helicopter
Speaker 7: on the grounds of his palace and he had like a,
Speaker 7: a assault rifle in hand and he goes up to
Speaker 7: look at them. These people are, living in fear. And
Speaker 7: so Trump, again, this is the desperation. He's totally focused
Speaker 7: on having somewhere to hide where he will be protected.
Speaker 3: No, that makes perfect sense.
Speaker 1: And I tell people all the time, I mean, it
Speaker 1: was a miracle that he left office willingly the last
Speaker 1: time around. I mean, he was just about dragged out
Speaker 1: kicking and screaming. They had to set up a whole
Speaker 1: departure ceremony for him. I was at that departure ceremony
Speaker 1: at Joint Base Andrews because he was such a crybaby
Speaker 1: that he would not go to the inauguration of Joe
Speaker 1: Biden like Jimmy Carter did with Ronald Reagan and George H.W.
Speaker 1: Bush did with Bill Clinton. And that I mean, that
Speaker 1: is an extraordinary thing that people need to keep in mind.
Speaker 1: And I totally agree with you. This bunker thing, this
Speaker 1: bunker mentality that he may he may find himself in,
Speaker 1: especially if there's a massive shellacking in the midterms. He's
Speaker 1: a lame duck. There's gridlock in Washington. He can't get
Speaker 1: anything done. And then he and Stephen Miller and those
Speaker 1: types get more and more desperate.
Speaker 3: And there's no.
Speaker 1: Guarantee that he leaves willingly the next time. I remember
Speaker 1: last time Nancy Pelosi was talking about, well, we might
Speaker 1: have to run the White House out of another building
Speaker 1: if he doesn't want to leave. I think those are
Speaker 1: real scenarios that we need to grapple with.
Speaker 7: Oh, yeah, because, you know, many people, not us, have
Speaker 7: amnesia about January 6th.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 6: And they've rewritten that history.
Speaker 7: But this was a direct, you know, a direct flow
Speaker 7: out of him trying not to leave and trying to
Speaker 7: overturn the election. And I agree with you, you know,
Speaker 7: not showing up to Biden's inauguration, actually, from a propaganda standpoint,
Speaker 7: was very smart of him because he actually pulled off
Speaker 7: this very unusual feat where he kept his personality cult
Speaker 7: going and while he was out of office for four years.
Speaker 7: And he kept indoctrinating people so they actually thought that
Speaker 7: he was the rightful president and that Biden was illegitimate,
Speaker 7: an imposter. And so he's played this all so that
Speaker 7: he keeps his legitimacy.
Speaker 6: The problem is now he's losing his legitimacy.
Speaker 7: That's how in political science they often talk about When
Speaker 7: autocrats start to go down and you can have elite
Speaker 7: defections of people from the party and stuff, when they
Speaker 7: lose their legitimacy because they're having economic difficulty, they're being
Speaker 7: too corrupt or too openly corrupt. Like Trump, he doesn't care.
Speaker 6: If people know.
Speaker 3: He doesn't care now.
Speaker 6: He's boasting about it. And that's why you have that
Speaker 6: high polling rate.
Speaker 7: Where, you know, people are like, hey, he's not supposed,
Speaker 7: even his backers are like, he's not supposed to boast
Speaker 7: about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: You know, it makes me wonder what would happen if
Speaker 1: he just flat out refuses to leave the next time.
Speaker 1: You know, I mean, and I really think he could
Speaker 1: try to game out a scenario where he runs for
Speaker 1: a third term. I mean, I know he's, I mean,
Speaker 1: I saw the video of him last night.
Speaker 3: He looked really sweaty. He does not look good. He
Speaker 3: does not look like he's in good health.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean he doesn't try to just cobble
Speaker 1: something together and try to just run again and not leave.
Speaker 1: What do we do as a country, Ruth?
Speaker 7: I'm not sure what would happen, but it's entirely consistent
Speaker 7: with autocratic psychology that they never back down. I wrote
Speaker 7: a New York Times op-ed. It came out February 1st,
Speaker 7: and it was about what I call autocratic backfire. Because
Speaker 7: when they make mistakes... they don't course correct like other
Speaker 7: types of politicians. They double down. They never admit mistakes.
Speaker 7: And so he is never going to do what Orban did.
Speaker 7: And it was a miracle that Orban conceded. And he
Speaker 7: conceded within two hours. He didn't have to concede within
Speaker 7: two hours, but he did. But Trump's not going to
Speaker 7: do that. There's too much at stake. And he's been
Speaker 7: through too many, you know, impeachment processes, and he's terrified
Speaker 7: of being held accountable. Um, and so we, we should
Speaker 7: be prepared, uh, for him to try and run again.
Speaker 7: That's why Steve Bannon and so many people are putting
Speaker 7: it as their role to put out these extreme ideas
Speaker 7: that he's the exception.
Speaker 6: He doesn't have to obey the rules.
Speaker 7: Um, And we should all also be prepared that if
Speaker 7: he lost, he wouldn't leave because that would be consistent
Speaker 7: with the behavior of many autocrats.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: And getting to the here and now, the upcoming midterms,
Speaker 1: I mean, I really think that he is, you know,
Speaker 1: going after mail-in ballots, the possibility of ICE. going to
Speaker 1: the polls, maybe even the National Guard and so on
Speaker 1: in certain Republican states where you might have a MAGA
Speaker 1: governor who says, OK, sure, send the National Guard out.
Speaker 1: I think in Texas, they're talking about restricting the number
Speaker 1: of polls this next time around. And I mean, a
Speaker 1: lot of this could get tied up in court. And
Speaker 1: I just wonder if part of his thinking, part of
Speaker 1: what they're gaming out is sort of what they did
Speaker 1: after the 2020 election, where they tried to throw everything
Speaker 1: into so much chaos, get it so tangled up in
Speaker 1: the courts that it made it. sort of uncertain as
Speaker 1: to what was actually the result of the election when,
Speaker 1: of course, Joe Biden.
Speaker 3: Won the election.
Speaker 1: And maybe they're trying to do that in advance of
Speaker 1: the midterms this time around, throw so much chaos at
Speaker 1: the courts, get things tangled up in knots. This race
Speaker 1: over here, we can't really concede that race. That Senate
Speaker 1: seat over there, we can't concede that. And they try
Speaker 1: to delay the seating of a new Congress. They try
Speaker 1: to take it to the Supreme Court and just cause
Speaker 1: this 52-car pileup in our democracy. I don't think that's
Speaker 1: a No.
Speaker 7: Because what autocrats do is that they interfere with the
Speaker 7: entire chain of election. So they make it more intimidating
Speaker 7: and difficult to vote in the first place. Also, they've
Speaker 7: already delegitimized.
Speaker 6: Elections in the minds of many people. Oh, it's all corrupt.
Speaker 6: I'm not going to vote. So they've done that.
Speaker 7: Then they try and threaten people. During the Biden years,
Speaker 7: I followed all these Republican state proposals for what they
Speaker 7: wanted to do with poll watchers.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 6: Some of them were insane.
Speaker 7: There was one that didn't pass in Texas where an
Speaker 7: armed poll watcher was going to be able to come
Speaker 7: in somebody's car if you were disabled or you were
Speaker 7: going to vote.
Speaker 6: I kid you not.
Speaker 3: Unbelievable.
Speaker 6: Stuff like that.
Speaker 7: So we have to, you know, all these things. So
Speaker 7: those are all the tricks before the voting, during the voting.
Speaker 7: And then there's calling fraud, losing, between air quotes, ballots.
Speaker 7: There's the, remember, never rule out the Chinese, you know,
Speaker 7: the Chinese narrative that there's like, you know, so.
Speaker 6: There's that stuff.
Speaker 7: And then what autocrats do is they refuse to seat
Speaker 7: the victors from the opposition. Or if you're further down
Speaker 7: the autocrat road, you actually remove people who are already elected.
Speaker 7: Erdogan does that all the time. He just removes people.
Speaker 7: He removes Kurdish politicians, he strips them of their seats.
Speaker 7: And Bukele has been.
Speaker 6: Doing that too. So the whole chain of voting.
Speaker 7: is tampered with when you have a government in which
Speaker 7: corruption is institutionalized. Because election denial, I actually see it
Speaker 7: as a form of corruption. It's really important to know
Speaker 7: this when you see politicians who are still saying that
Speaker 7: Trump won the 2020 election. The reason I call it
Speaker 7: corruption is that it means that people have colluded and
Speaker 7: decided together, in this case as a whole party, to
Speaker 7: tell a lie to the American people. It's a form
Speaker 7: of collusion. It's a form of deception and they're lying
Speaker 7: to the American people. And that's become the party line.
Speaker 7: In fact, you can't, you can't even get a government
Speaker 7: job now if you don't answer the question properly.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 6: We've had all that too.
Speaker 3: Even judicial nominees.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's right.
Speaker 2: People.
Speaker 1: And I mean, not just like, you know, somebody who's
Speaker 1: going to be in charge of the fish and wildlife service,
Speaker 1: no big deal. But I mean, like, judicial nominees, cabinet secretaries.
Speaker 1: It's terrifying stuff. And when I was talking to Hunter
Speaker 1: Biden about this and hearing your comments earlier about resistance
Speaker 1: and how we have all the elements falling into place
Speaker 1: for a resistance movement in this country, which by the way,
Speaker 1: is not a dirty word. I wonder if it will take,
Speaker 1: if he does try to steal the midterms and they
Speaker 1: do try to deny the vote, deny the will of
Speaker 1: the American people, will it take people taking to the streets.
Speaker 1: And I don't mean like rioting or what they did
Speaker 1: on January 6th. I'm talking about what they've done in
Speaker 1: places like Hungary and other places where people seeking freedom
Speaker 1: just mobilize, take to the streets peacefully, respectfully, and say,
Speaker 1: we're not leaving. Or they just don't go to work
Speaker 1: in blue states and just have a general strike. And
Speaker 1: I just wonder if it's going to take something like
Speaker 1: that in this country to get the message across. You're
Speaker 1: not going to tear this country apart. You're just not
Speaker 1: going to do it.
Speaker 7: Yes, it could indeed take that. And certainly this might
Speaker 7: be an occasion. And it's very important that civil resistance
Speaker 7: remains nonviolent. There's a ton of studies that show why
Speaker 7: you need to remain nonviolent because you alienate allies. Also,
Speaker 7: there's the question of violence in itself, not good. So
Speaker 7: it's strategic, it's moral. And most of the resistance around
Speaker 7: the world that we hear about, including the big mobilizations
Speaker 7: before elections, like in Hungary and Poland, 2023, they are nonviolent.
Speaker 7: And they have been the biggest mass demonstrations that those
Speaker 7: countries have seen in decades.
Speaker 6: And so.
Speaker 7: We're a very decentralized, very large country. So we may
Speaker 7: not see one mobilization on the Capitol, but it's decentralized today, resistance,
Speaker 7: especially here. But we may see that and also forms
Speaker 7: of labor, work stoppages and strikes. Those are time-tested tools
Speaker 7: in the resistance kit to protest.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think it's something that folks need to keep
Speaker 1: in mind and absolutely do it peacefully, respectfully. You know,
Speaker 1: we are all Americans, but if they're not going to
Speaker 1: respect the process, I think it could come to that.
Speaker 1: But Ruth, always great to catch up. We had such
Speaker 1: a wonderful conversation. We covered so much ground. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much for doing it. It's always a treat to
Speaker 1: have you on. And I know you're so busy, but
Speaker 1: thank you so much.
Speaker 6: Oh, it's a delight to talk to you, Jim.
Speaker 3: Good to be with you. All right.
Speaker 1: Check out Ruth's Substack Lucid, her book, Strong Men. which
Speaker 1: as she mentioned during the interview has been updated, of course,
Speaker 1: to include lots of stuff on Trump.
Speaker 3: Of course he would be in that book.
Speaker 1: But before we go, I do want to say just
Speaker 1: very quickly, you know, and I do think we need
Speaker 1: to start having this conversation as a people in this country.
Speaker 3: What are we going to do?
Speaker 1: First of all, what we're going to do is we're
Speaker 1: going to mobilize and organize and register and get ourselves
Speaker 1: in a position to where we are going to vote
Speaker 1: in mass in this country. And we're going to have
Speaker 1: a plan to vote. We're going to have a plan
Speaker 1: going into this.
Speaker 3: Fall to vote. If you typically vote with.
Speaker 1: A mail-in ballot and your state is run by a
Speaker 1: kooky governor who may work in cahoots with Donald Trump
Speaker 1: to stop that from taking place, you and your friends
Speaker 1: are going to have to come up with an alternative plan.
Speaker 1: You're going to have to find out when the early
Speaker 1: voting starts. You're going to have to make a decision
Speaker 1: as to whether you get out in the parking lot
Speaker 1: at six in the morning. And It just may be
Speaker 1: uncomfortable for the two weeks around the election where we're
Speaker 1: early voting in mass and we're voting in person in
Speaker 1: mass to make sure they cannot stop the vote. They
Speaker 1: cannot stop this democracy. They cannot stop accountability. They cannot
Speaker 1: stop the American people speaking with all of our voices
Speaker 1: that this nonsense is not going to stand. 89% of
Speaker 1: the American people believe that there is corruption on a
Speaker 1: widespread scale inside the U.S.
Speaker 3: Government.
Speaker 1: I mean, that poll number alone, I just want to
Speaker 1: show it again one more time.
Speaker 3: This is Gallup, folks.
Speaker 1: This is not some fly-by-night polling thing. Record high, 89%
Speaker 1: in the United States say government corruption is widespread. Substantial
Speaker 1: majorities of Republicans, Democrats, and independents agree. 89% of the
Speaker 1: American people They barely agree on anything. We 89% love
Speaker 1: Dolly Parton, and I think that's it. But we also
Speaker 1: believe that government corruption is widespread in the United States.
Speaker 1: Think about that. Absorb that information for a moment. That
Speaker 1: we now live in a corruption bonanza. We're swimming in
Speaker 1: an ocean of corruption, courtesy of Donald Trump. And I
Speaker 1: think that's going to drive a lot of people to
Speaker 1: the polls this fall. I think it's part of the
Speaker 1: reason why Jared Kushner reached out to Hakeem Jeffries. I
Speaker 1: think we're going to see more of these kinds of
Speaker 1: episodes between now and then because the Republicans know what's coming.
Speaker 1: They know that Hakeem Jeffries is likely going to be
Speaker 1: the Speaker of the House come next year. And they
Speaker 1: know that there are going to be investigations. And that
Speaker 1: is why the Republicans, you're not going to see any
Speaker 1: endangered Republicans at this Trumpapalooza down in Texas next week.
Speaker 1: They're going to stay away from that like it's one
Speaker 1: of R.K.
Speaker 7: Jr.
Speaker 1: 's measles outbreaks. That's how they're going to avoid that.
Speaker 1: They're going to avoid that like the plague. And so
Speaker 1: they know what's coming. That is why it is so
Speaker 1: vitally important that you just reassure yourself. And I've talked
Speaker 1: about this on the show. I'm going to talk about
Speaker 1: it again. You can reassure yourself that we can outlast this,
Speaker 1: that we can outlast this moment, that this moment will pass.
Speaker 1: But it's going to pass if all of us do
Speaker 1: our job and vote and make it stick. And make
Speaker 1: it stick. Make sure that the people in power understand.
Speaker 1: Mike Johnson, you are not going to steal this election.
Speaker 1: John Thune, you are not going to steal this election.
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, J.D. Vance, you are not going to steal
Speaker 1: this election. Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, you are not going
Speaker 1: to steal this election. It's not happening. You're going to try.
Speaker 1: We know you're going to try. You're going to keep
Speaker 1: screwing with the mail-in ballots. And Donald Trump's going to
Speaker 1: keep hyperventilating, getting all sweaty. And with that, whatever that
Speaker 1: shit is he puts on his face, he's going to
Speaker 1: get real sweaty between now and November. He's going to
Speaker 1: be sweating. He's going to be sweating big time. But
Speaker 1: we're going to make him sweat. Remember the old commercial?
Speaker 1: Never let him see you sweat. If he had nothing
Speaker 1: to worry about, he wouldn't be so sweaty. He wouldn't
Speaker 1: be so sleepy during the middle of the day. He
Speaker 1: can't sleep at night. He can't sleep.
Speaker 3: Can't sleep. That's why he's.
Speaker 1: Napping in the Oval Office on a regular basis because
Speaker 1: he can't sleep. at night because he knows what's coming.
Speaker 1: Accountability is coming. Democracy is coming. The voters are coming.
Speaker 1: The ballots are coming.
Speaker 3: The truth is coming. And they can't handle it. They
Speaker 3: cannot handle it.
Speaker 1: And if it means taking it to the streets peacefully, nonviolently,
Speaker 1: not like the criminals and thugs on January 6th, but
Speaker 1: real American resistance, then that's what's going to take place.
Speaker 3: Because you're not going to avoid what's coming. Accountability. Accountability
Speaker 3: is coming.
Speaker 1: I want to thank Hunter Biden for coming on the
Speaker 1: show today. Ruth Van Giet, terrific show today. Everybody, make
Speaker 1: sure you subscribe to our new daily newsletter. You can
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Speaker 1: And anytime you become a subscriber, you support, you like,
Speaker 1: you share, you're supporting independent media. Remember, look what they're doing.
Speaker 1: Look at all the monkey business over at CBS and
Speaker 1: 60 Minutes. Look at all that crazy, crazy shit. And
Speaker 1: those people want to take over CNN. Look what's happening
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Speaker 1: these kinds of stories and interviews coming to you each
Speaker 1: and every day. But in the meantime, still reporting from Washington,
Speaker 1: I'm Jim McCostell.
Speaker 3: See you next time.