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Deadline: White House - Season Episode 131 -Episode 131 engsub watchfull❌🍿🍿 Secret Engagement
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00:02I'm a big crypto. I've become a big crypto guy. I wasn't initially. I didn't know much about it.
00:07But for some of my first term, I wasn't really I wasn't much involved, but I'd watch and I watched
00:13it grow.
00:14And it's a huge industry. And I got involved in a little bit for politics, you know, because I realized
00:20a lot of people love crypto.
00:21And even me as a businessman, I'd see a lot of money starting to come in with Bitcoin and, you
00:26know, the different forms.
00:28And I said, this thing's got a lot of life.
00:33Hi again, everyone. It's five o'clock in New York. I'm Antonia Hilton in for my friend Nicole Wallace today.
00:39Once upon a time, you know, presidents would try very hard to avoid any conflicts of interest while in office
00:44or even just the appearance of one,
00:46which is why Donald Trump's foray into cryptocurrency during his second term is so unnerving.
00:52Trump only recently got interested in crypto thanks to his sons.
00:55And yet he has already made a staggering amount of money from it.
00:59The New York Times details a stunning new report that shows how Trump has profited mightily from the digital currency,
01:05all while his supporters have lost big time from that new report.
01:10Nearly one million people who bought President Trump's meme coin have lost money through the end of June,
01:15according to a report by the cryptocurrency analytics firm Nansen.
01:19Their losses total three point eight one billion dollars.
01:25The analytics firm's assessment was calculated this week after Mr.
01:28Trump signed an annual financial disclosure showing that he walked away with a six hundred and thirty six million dollar
01:35payout on the same crypto bet,
01:37part of a haul of at least two point two billion from all of his business ventures in twenty twenty
01:43five.
01:43The Times writes how this was a fail safe investment for Trump that essentially took advantage of those who bought
01:49his coin.
01:50The odds were always in his favor.
01:53Mr.
01:53Trump profited whether the price of his meme coin went up or down.
01:57He collected returns whenever anyone traded the tokens as he repeatedly pushed his followers to do using his truth social
02:04account to promote the coin.
02:05Trump, while in office, has deregulated the crypto market.
02:09He signed an executive order his first week in office to help the crypto industry.
02:14He had the Justice Department disband its cryptocurrency enforcement team,
02:18and he has put people in regulatory positions that are friendly to crypto.
02:23Meanwhile, those who follow him and support him in this, they're losing.
02:27The Times spoke with a man named Nicholas Pinto, a frequent crypto trader who voted for Mr.
02:32Trump in twenty twenty four.
02:33Mr.
02:34Pinto said he invested a total of roughly five hundred thousand dollars in the Trump coin and has now lost
02:40about half that investment.
02:42He is leveraging the power of being president to launch currencies when he seems trustworthy in the public's eye.
02:49Mr.
02:49Pinto said it is kind of incredible.
02:51It is almost a legal scam.
02:54The White House responded to the Times reporting, saying,
02:57All actions by President Trump and his administration are taken in the best interest of the American people.
03:03I have heard that exact statement from this administration before.
03:06And that is going to be where we begin this hour with business analyst and author of The Message of
03:11the Markets on Substack, Ron Insana.
03:14Also joining us, MSNOW political analyst and Bloomberg Opinion senior executive editor Tim O'Brien.
03:19And with me here at the table, executive editor and New York bureau chief of The Economist, Charlotte Howard.
03:25It's great to have all of you.
03:27But, Ron, I'm going to start with you.
03:28So break down this, quote, legal scam for me, how Trump was able to make money while so many people
03:36who care about him, who like him lost so much.
03:41As you stated, Antonio, you know, it doesn't really matter what the coin does.
03:44The president gets money that comes into his wallet.
03:47And if there is trading activity that takes place in the mean coin that is named after him, he profits
03:53from that, whether the price goes up or down.
03:55It has gone down more than 90 percent since it was first introduced.
03:59So those who have purchased the coin effectively at its peak when it first came out are down substantially, as
04:05you mentioned, $3.8 billion lost among a million different investors.
04:08But in the crypto world, if you launch a mean coin, there are a variety of different ways to profit
04:13from it.
04:14Now, listen, if there were any of us in the real world, something like this would be, I think, by
04:20regulators in another administration, be considered something akin to a pump and dump scam, where you profit and the investors
04:28lose, and would probably be investigated by regulators if, indeed, they were inclined to do so.
04:34So this is a tricky one.
04:36Since they deregulated crypto, since there's very little oversight from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which oversees the crypto industry,
04:44there'll be no investigation.
04:46There'll be no discussion of this.
04:47It'll just be a massive loss for investors.
04:50And typically, too, you would also see civil lawsuits alleging some sort of investment fraud if it were anyone other
04:57than the president of the United States.
04:59You know, Charlotte, everything Ron just said there is incredibly distressing and depressing to me.
05:05I mean, you would think that there's a bit of a higher ethical obligation here, actually, because this is the
05:10president.
05:11Many of these people who have bought these coins, you know, they're not necessarily people who believe or know a
05:16whole lot about the blockchain, but they do believe in Donald Trump.
05:19Yeah, I think this is a fascinating political test for the president, because core to his appeal to his base
05:24since 2016 has been that the Democrats are taking advantage of you.
05:30They're treating you for suckers.
05:31They don't understand your plight.
05:33And this is, I think, the clearest case we've had yet, where there's a possibility for Trump supporters to feel
05:38like they have been taken advantage of by the president whom they've been supporting so faithfully.
05:44So if you look at issue after issue, there are all kinds of constituencies within Trump's base who have been
05:50remarkably loyal.
05:51You know, farmers haven't really complained about the effects of tariffs.
05:54They've really stuck with the president as one example.
05:56But I think this is so stark.
05:58You know, I wonder whether there'll be a political impact within his base.
06:01I think more likely you'll have a political impact beyond his base where Americans look at this president and think
06:06this is not how it's supposed to be.
06:08Do you think some of that is there's an element of sort of shame, like a fool me once, shame
06:14on you, but fool me twice or three times or four times or five times, I'm embarrassed now?
06:20You know, I think there will be some indignation.
06:23And you've started to see, you know, a few fractures within his party.
06:26But generally, people who've rebelled against this president have suffered and been punished.
06:30You know, you look at Marjorie Taylor Greene.
06:32You look at the candidates within different Republican primaries who've tried to push back against the president.
06:36And the Trump endorsed candidate has defeated those who tried to push back against the president.
06:41So one of the things that has been so fascinating about his time so far is that he has resisted,
06:46I think, all conventional political logic where you think that voters will act in their own self-interest most of
06:52the time.
06:52He has this real magnetism.
06:54And I think that this is the one issue that I'm very curious, does this break that pattern?
06:58Tim, is there any sort of modern precedent for this in a Western democracy?
07:05Absolutely not.
07:06And it goes well beyond a conflict of interest.
07:09You know, the questions that have been rolling up each time from the media to Trump when he talks about
07:15this is, is there a conflict of interest?
07:16And either he or his proxies of the White House say, no, no, no, of course there isn't.
07:20Well, of course there is.
07:22And the larger issue is what's the impact of having a president who is using every lever of government and
07:30has access to regulation, relationships domestically and internationally, to simply pad his wallet on a daily basis, along with the
07:40wallets of his two eldest sons.
07:42And it's worth putting this in context.
07:45You know, when Trump left the White House after his first term in 2020, involuntarily left the White House, most
07:54of his wealth was tied up in a handful of urban office buildings in New York and Los Angeles.
08:00And they were all getting pounded by COVID.
08:03They had very high, very low occupancy rates and a lot of debt.
08:09And I think when he came into his second term, making a ton of money wasn't just a byproduct of
08:16his campaign.
08:17It was one of the purposes for it.
08:19And he went since, you know, and as soon as he got into office, he went about trying to harvest
08:24money off of crypto.
08:26And the amounts of money are so massive.
08:29You know, on crypto alone, he earned $1.4 billion last year.
08:33That is well above anything he ever earned in any single year in the 60 or so years he's been
08:41a businessman in other fields.
08:43And he knows it.
08:44And he didn't earn this money because he was working hard.
08:47He did not earn this money because he's talented.
08:50Two conventional ways we honor people getting rich in the United States.
08:53He earned it because he's sitting in the Oval Office.
08:56And he makes the regulations that govern this industry.
08:59And the very fact that he went about deregulating a poker chip, essentially, because there's no demonstrated yet widespread commercial
09:10or consumer use for crypto.
09:13Right now, it is an incredibly speculative endeavor.
09:16And the fact that he went about harvesting that much money off of it and no one is standing his
09:22way, not the regulatory agencies, not his own party, and to date, not voters, only emboldens him to do more
09:28of it.
09:29Charlotte, I want to read a little bit from your latest piece for The Economist.
09:33He could do well to recall that history remembers Jefferson, not for his debts, but for writing the Declaration of
09:40Independence.
09:41And Grant, not for being a lousy businessman, but for winning the Civil War and helping America recover from its
09:47wounds.
09:48History honors Truman for being scrupulous about his personal gain, as well as for ending the most devastating war the
09:55world has ever known and rebuilding it after.
09:57Mr. Trump's legacy is still taking shape.
10:00In the end, he may be best known for reaping riches from the office only 45 men have had the
10:07honor to hold.
10:08Where do you think his legacy is heading?
10:11I think that each day, with the type of behavior that we saw articulated in this devastating, almost 1,000
10:18-page report, he is himself writing that legacy.
10:21You know, he is in not just crypto.
10:24You know, you look at a few other areas of investment, particularly in mining, which he has identified as a
10:30strategic interest for the United States,
10:32and also, as disclosed in his finances, a strategic interest for the Trump Organization,
10:37that he is, in multiple areas of American life, really blurring the line between public interest and personal financial gain.
10:46And it's demeaning to the office.
10:48It's demeaning to the presidency.
10:49And I think the American people look at this as just patently not what the founders intended this role to
10:57be.
10:58Ron, what do you think, big picture, are the consequences for our social fabric, our democracy, also our economy,
11:05if you have political families like Trump and his sons operating like investment groups, basically?
11:12Well, I mean, I think what it really calls into question is what the future looks like,
11:17if it's okay for the president and his family to profit from a wide variety of business endeavors,
11:23some of which, as Tim pointed out, and I agree with him on crypto, it has no commercial or consumer
11:28use in most cases,
11:30particularly since there are about 13 million meme coins floating out there right now.
11:34On top of that, his stock trading, which has been, at least through whoever his representatives are,
11:41has been taking place on a minute-by-minute basis throughout his presidency,
11:46it means that, effectively, it's okay for anyone to behave this way.
11:49If the president can do it, I mean, going back to what President Nixon said errantly,
11:53if the president does it, it can't be illegal or, in this case, maybe unethical.
11:58It raises a lot of questions about the future behavior of presidents.
12:01If you go back to at least his four predecessors, if not farther back,
12:06none of them traded stocks while they were in office.
12:09They had blind trust.
12:10They didn't know, effectively, what their investment advisors were buying and selling,
12:15if they were doing any of that at all.
12:17And it's really raised a lot of ethical questions as to how a president should behave in office
12:23when the precedent has already been established,
12:26that this type of behavior has been, and arguably, and I think, should be unacceptable.
12:33Tim, even if every transaction is technically legal, technically above board,
12:40do you think we're now in territory where it's going to be impossible to separate
12:44the president's personal financial interests and goals from public policy,
12:50national security, and everything else?
12:54Only if Congress sits on its hands,
12:57and only if laws aren't passed in the wake of Trump's exit from the White House,
13:03whenever that happens,
13:04to simply make it unacceptable for a president to be engaged
13:09in the kind of business activities and conflicts of interest and grift
13:14that Donald Trump and his children are engaging in right now.
13:17That can be put on the books legally.
13:20You can make it a requirement that presidents cannot run for the presidency
13:25and then occupy the White House unless they've separated themselves from those assets.
13:31There's wishful thinking in the Constitution around this
13:34and in certain federal ethical guidelines,
13:36but they simply aren't enforceable,
13:38and no one's really taken Trump to pass for that.
13:42And what you're left with now,
13:43and you know, I share Charlotte's sentiment and admire her writing.
13:47It is important that Trump be cognizant of his legacy.
13:51The anomaly here is that he is a profoundly damaged person
13:56who doesn't care about what the history books think of him.
14:00Donald Trump sees a bag of money on the desk in front of him,
14:04and that motivates him in the minute and in the instance
14:07far longer than anything like thinking about his legacy does.
14:10And to prevent ourselves from getting harmed
14:13by other presidents who come into the office and lean in that same direction,
14:17we have to get laws in the books that prevent it.
14:19Because right now, it's not only an issue
14:21that the president can enrich himself or herself in that office,
14:25it's that they're vulnerable to bribes.
14:27And it damages the national interest,
14:29and it damages domestic policymaking.
14:32Yeah, and it's not just Trump who sees that bag of money on the table.
14:35His whole family, his kids do.
14:37Ron, I want you to take a listen to some...
14:39Yeah, yes.
14:40I want you to take a listen, Ron,
14:42to some sound from Trump's interview with your former colleague
14:45at CNBC, Joe Kernan, last week,
14:47where he talks about his sons and their businesses.
14:52I feel badly in a way for my kids
14:53because every time my kids do,
14:55if they invest in a stock or if they go and do a bill,
14:58anything they do,
15:00because the presidency is so powerful, so big,
15:04everything, if they buy a cupcake company,
15:07well, the energy to make the cupcakes is,
15:10you know, sort of like,
15:13how's my energy policy?
15:15So therefore, you have a conflict.
15:17Almost anything they do,
15:19if they want to buy a truck,
15:20if they want to buy, you know,
15:21if they buy an energy-efficient truck,
15:24they have inside information.
15:28So it's pretty tough in that sense.
15:30I tell my kids,
15:32stay away from as much as you can stay away from,
15:35but they also have a life, you know.
15:38Ron, was any of that compelling to you
15:40around cupcakes and energy?
15:42Do you get the sense that Trump's sons
15:43are doing their best to stay away
15:45from what they can stay away from?
15:47No, not in the least.
15:48I mean, one, they're involved in a mining project
15:50in which the United States now has an interest in,
15:52one of the former Soviet republics.
15:55Number two, I think that if you go back
15:58and look at history,
15:59Billy Carter, who embarrassed President Jimmy Carter
16:01by launching Billy Beer,
16:03or Roger Clinton,
16:04who had some questionable behavior activities
16:07when President Clinton was in office,
16:08relatives of the president
16:10are at least have been constrained
16:13to a certain degree
16:14in their own activities
16:15because they are so close to the presidency,
16:17because they are so close to information,
16:19if indeed they're close to the president himself.
16:22And so, no, they should be constrained.
16:24And particularly when they're on the boards
16:26of companies that are being regulated
16:27or deregulated by the federal government,
16:29when they're involved with companies
16:31that do business with the federal government,
16:33as is the case with the president's sons,
16:35all three of them for that matter.
16:37There is no justification,
16:40and this is incredibly tortured logic,
16:43to suggest that they have lives
16:45and they should be able to do what they want,
16:46when in fact they still appear to be,
16:49at least from my vantage point,
16:51deeply involved with this presidency,
16:53and this would include Jared Kushner as well,
16:55and foreign business dealings.
16:57All right, entire panel is sticking around with me.
17:00When we return,
17:01Donald Trump getting rich off crypto
17:03is just one example of how his economy
17:05is benefiting a select few,
17:07while the vast majority of Americans struggle.
17:10The real state of the Trump economy
17:11after a short break,
17:13also ahead, chilling scenes this weekend in Washington,
17:16where groups of white nationalists
17:18descended upon the American July 4th celebrations,
17:21while Donald Trump is criticized
17:23for yet another racist post about the Obamas.
17:26That conversation later in the hour.
17:28Deadline White House continues
17:29after a very quick break.
17:35Three times in five months.
17:38That's how many times Dell stockholder Donald Trump
17:40has told the American public to buy a Dell computer,
17:43the most recent of which was this morning
17:45in the Oval Office,
17:46when Trump remotely rang the opening bell
17:48for the New York Stock Exchange and the NASDAQ.
17:51He did so to mark the start of Trump investment accounts
17:53for children born during his second term,
17:56which Dell CEO Michael Dell and his wife are contributing to.
18:00Dell stock then rose after Trump's remarks.
18:02Yahoo notes that according to Trump's financial disclosures,
18:06the president bought at least one million in Dell stock
18:09during the first quarter of 2026.
18:11But it does point out that Trump says his assets
18:13are managed through blind and semi-blind trusts.
18:16We're back with Ron, Tim and Charlotte.
18:20So, Charlotte, I guess just like as was the case
18:24with the crypto business,
18:26it doesn't seem like Trump really even wants to try to hide
18:29or maintain any sort of sense of discretion here
18:35to try to convince the American public
18:37there's nothing shady going on.
18:38It's almost like he's thrown all this stuff out of the window.
18:41And he believes that by being so brazen about it,
18:44that the rest of us will just sort of forget.
18:47And maybe he's right.
18:48Yeah, I mean, it's a play that's worked for him pretty well, right,
18:51in the past.
18:52If you look at other activities, you know, he's pretty,
18:54he doesn't pretend to be someone who was always faithful
18:57to one woman as an example,
18:59which would have been a test for politicians in the past.
19:03He has this pitch, which is that, you know,
19:06everyone else has been lying to you, basically.
19:07I'm going to tell you the truth.
19:09And yes, that means that I'm playing to a more open set of rules
19:14than you might have been accustomed to hearing from politicians,
19:17but I'm actually the one who's being honest with you.
19:19And I think in this instance, you're really, again, you know,
19:22really pushing the boundaries of that logic
19:24because I think to most ordinary Americans,
19:26there's something about this that just doesn't smell right.
19:29I mean, you can look at example after example
19:32within those financial disclosures.
19:34Ron, in the earlier segment, referred to the government taking a stake,
19:40or it was actually one of his sons having a venture firm
19:42that invested in a mining company
19:44that then received a government loan.
19:45You know, the president disclosed in that report last week
19:50that there was a company in which the government took a stake.
19:53And then after that, the president sold his shares
19:56in the company for financial gain.
19:57So, I mean, there's just many, many examples of this.
20:00And I think Trump is betting, one, that Americans have always assumed
20:03their politicians are corrupt.
20:04And so he's just being more open about the gains
20:07that he can reap from the presidency.
20:09And two, that voters have a short memory and they love him.
20:12You know, going back to the earliest stages of his campaign,
20:15he said, I could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and get away with it.
20:17I mean, he's really, I think he believes that.
20:20You know, he thinks he can get away with a lot.
20:21And so far he has.
20:22Yeah.
20:22And we have colleagues who go out on the road every week.
20:25And in fact, they do essentially hear that sentiment from people.
20:28Tim, you know, I want to get your sort of big picture thoughts
20:32on that image earlier today of the president talking about everything
20:37from crypto to what's going on with FIFA,
20:40with Dell and other key figures standing behind him.
20:44This isn't the first time where Trump has sort of rambled
20:46about his own personal interests and political goals,
20:49with sort of titans of industry standing behind him.
20:53And it seems, not that those relationships are new
20:57between the White House and these key figures,
20:59but the way in which they sometimes end up standing there,
21:02nodding along and backing him up in his sort of explicitly
21:06partisan goals and rants.
21:08That part does feel new to me.
21:12Well, I mean, I think they know, Antonia,
21:14that in order to get Trump's blessing regulatorily or otherwise,
21:19they need to bend the knee.
21:21And they need to show up at the White House.
21:23I think foreign diplomats have learned the same lesson.
21:27I think there was a variety of European leaders who were doing it
21:30until it didn't work out for them anymore.
21:32And despite everything they did, Trump said he was going to invade Greenland.
21:36And I think particularly the tech community in the United States
21:39adopted the same strategy, which was go to Washington,
21:45bring him trinkets, praise him,
21:49and then hope that he changes policy to benefit them.
21:53And you can see in his stock trades that there certainly is a pattern
21:57of apparent quid pro quos.
21:59In Dell's stock, in NVIDIA's stock, in Palantir's stock,
22:04in all of those, you can either trace Trump making an investment in the stock
22:08and policy changes within a short time period,
22:11or he goes on social media and touts the stock.
22:14The same thing happened with crypto, by the way.
22:17The UAE's spymaster invests $500 million in Trump's crypto business,
22:22and a few months later, Trump lifts chip exports to the UAE.
22:27In all of these cases, it's not just Donald Trump praising the American economy
22:32and saying the stock market's good.
22:33It's Donald Trump browbeating members of the elite business class in the United States
22:39to sing his praises, and in return,
22:42he makes money off of that relationship, and they get lighter regulation.
22:46And at the end of the day, where does that leave average Americans
22:49in a time when they're struggling with affordability issues?
22:52And the middle class, which has always been the bulwark of the American economy,
22:56is fraying.
22:58Yeah, I mean, all of America, all across the country,
23:02people are struggling financially, Ron.
23:04We also saw those less-than-expected jobs numbers last week.
23:08And just consumer sentiment is at historic lows.
23:11And then even as you listen to the president talk about how good the stock market is doing,
23:15he was talking to a reporter the other day, you know, basically saying,
23:17well, how's your 401k when they were trying to ask the president questions?
23:21You have to remember, correct me if I'm wrong,
23:23but something like almost half of Americans do not even have a 401k.
23:27Those gains kind of mean nothing for them.
23:30Well, let me flip that just a little bit, Antonia,
23:32because we now have household ownership of equities at an all-time high,
23:36exceeding that of the year 2000 at the height of the internet bubble,
23:39which sometimes can be a sign of a late-stage market development.
23:43Now, having said that, the concentration of ownership in the stock market
23:47is also at an all-time high among the top 1% of the wealthiest Americans.
23:54And so there is this enormous disparity between who holds the wealth
23:57versus how much exposure there is,
23:59and how Americans feel is the widest gap we've seen between the stock market,
24:04the Dow across 53,000 for the first time ever today,
24:08and consumer sentiment, which is hovering near the lowest level since the 1950s.
24:12People feel worse about the economy than they did after the pandemic,
24:16the great financial crisis, even after 9-11.
24:18And so there's this enormous disparity between the lived experience
24:21of middle and lower income individuals,
24:23and those at the very top who own a great chunk of this stock market wealth
24:28that has accumulated over time, not just in the Trump administration,
24:31but over the last several years as well.
24:33Ron and Sana, Tim O'Brien, Charlotte Howard, so good to see all of you.
24:37Thank you so much for joining me today.
24:39And when we return, it was a weekend celebrating America's 250th birthday,
24:43but the white nationalist patriot front tried to make it something very different.
24:48And Trump administration officials had a very hard time condemning all of it.
24:51We're going to bring you that story after a short break.
24:57As America celebrated its 250th birthday,
25:00the centuries-old fight over who we are and who this country is for
25:04was on full display as neo-Nazis with the group Patriot Front
25:08marched through the streets of Washington, D.C.
25:10The members, always hiding their identities behind matching masks, hats, and polos,
25:15walked through the nation's Capitol chanting,
25:17Reclaim America, leading to indelible images of terrified residents,
25:22what was supposed to be a day of national celebration,
25:25including this image captured by Reuters,
25:27that will no doubt end up in our history textbooks one day,
25:31of a black woman on the train surrounded by white nationalists,
25:35and a black man forced to stand next to masked men
25:38donning the traitorous Confederate flag.
25:41The group was founded in the aftermath of 2017
25:44Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.
25:47According to the Southern Poverty Law Center,
25:49the founder, Thomas Rousseau, quote,
25:52led Vanguard America members,
25:54a neo-Nazi group that participated in the rally during Unite the Right,
25:58including James Alex Fields Jr.,
26:00the young man accused of murdering anti-racist protester Heather Heyer that day
26:05after fatally driving his vehicle into a crowd of protesters.
26:09The rally where Donald Trump said there were, quote,
26:12very fine people on both sides.
26:15Trump's secretary of the interior was asked for comment on the appearance of the white nationalists
26:19marching in broad daylight just hours before Trump's speech.
26:23Here's how he responded.
26:26Certainly what they stand for is nothing that I could possibly agree with,
26:30but one of the foundational principles of the United States,
26:32which makes democracy messy, is free speech.
26:35Do you, as interior secretary,
26:37will you recommend to the president that he condemn this group
26:41and what they were trying to message,
26:44what they did try to message here in Washington?
26:46Well, there have been,
26:48Dana, part of my response to that is that there are protests on the mall
26:54that people say things that I think are irreprehensible about President Trump,
26:58and yet they're allowed to go on because of free speech in our country.
27:05I want to bring in two great friends,
27:07NYU law professor and legal analyst, Melissa Murray,
27:09and also with me, Princeton University professor and political analyst, Eddie Glaude.
27:14He is the author of the fitting book, America, USA,
27:17How Race Shadows the Nation's Anniversaries.
27:21Eddie, I want your reaction to Burgum there, the secretary.
27:25I mean, you know, basically saying democracy is messy,
27:29equating people protesting in D.C.
27:32who've said some mean words about Donald Trump
27:34to Nazis marching in the streets.
27:37Well, first of all, it's great to see you, Ed, Melissa.
27:40First of all, he's lying on two fronts.
27:42He's lying.
27:42One, he's lying about the administration's commitment to free speech.
27:47We know what just happened with protesters against ICE in Texas 30 to 100 years.
27:53We know their position with regards to BLM and others.
27:55There's a way in which they're lumping everybody into Antifa,
27:59domestic terrorist organization and the like.
28:01So we know he's lying in terms of the consistency in his application of free speech.
28:06The second thing, he's lying principally about what he could not condone.
28:10What is the substantive difference between the Patriot Front
28:13and the policies of the Trump administration?
28:15The Patriot Front says it wants a white ethno-state.
28:18Sounds like Stephen Miller to me.
28:20It says that multiculturalism, immigration, and diversity
28:22pose an existential threat to the country.
28:25Sounds like Trump's immigration policies to me.
28:27Sounds like his attack on DEI to me.
28:29So I want us to name the devil that has us by the throat.
28:33There's a reason why the Interior Secretary will not condemn the Patriot Front,
28:37because in so many ways, at the level of substance, they're easily aligned.
28:43You know, Melissa, I've been thinking a lot about what Eddie has spelled out so well there.
28:49The way in which, too, since the Unite the Right rally back in 2017,
28:52that these concepts, these phrases, these movements,
28:56they've gone from being on the fringe, genuinely, I think, shocking many Americans that day,
29:02to sort of being something that's just in the dialogue, in our political fabric, on a day-to-day basis.
29:07And one of the words that I think sort of connects the threads here is the word re-migration.
29:13This is something that not only have we heard members of this administration use,
29:18but in fact, Trump's DHS posted this on social media back in November.
29:23The stakes have never been higher, and the goal has never been more clear.
29:27Re-migration now.
29:30Re-migration, I know you two know this, but for anyone listening or watching right now,
29:35re-migration has its roots in neo-Nazi rhetoric and strategizing in the United States.
29:41It is about the forced expulsion of all non-white immigrants from this country.
29:47Melissa, when you see DHS posting language like that,
29:51and then you see Patriot Front feeling comfortable coming out in public in this way,
29:56when Trump has made so much of America 250 in our Capitol about himself,
30:00what does that tell you?
30:02I think Eddie said it best, Antonia.
30:05This is a mission that's aligned with much of the work of this administration.
30:09And it's not just what has been happening with regard to this anniversary.
30:13And anniversaries are always fraught with nations reflecting on who they are and who they want to be.
30:19And our nation, I think, is having a real sort of inflection point where we're looking back,
30:23we're looking ahead, and we are becoming a different kind of country.
30:28And I think this is part of the anxiety that a group like Patriot Front is trying to harness.
30:33We are becoming more multi-ethnic, more multi-racial, and that, for many, is frightening.
30:38It's part of the anxiety around this new migration.
30:41Making America great again is also about returning America to a particular demographic character
30:46that hasn't existed, at least since the 1970s and 1980s,
30:51and will not exist if current patterns continue in the way that they have.
30:56I think it's also behind some of the more quotidian policies around this administration
31:00that we're not talking about, the efforts to roll back DEI in schools and in the workplace and employment.
31:06These are the places where most Americans come into contact with people who are not like them.
31:12For the most part, we live relatively segregated lives in terms of our homes, our neighborhoods,
31:16our churches, where we worship.
31:18It's when we go to college.
31:19It's when we go to work that we see people who are not like us.
31:22We've had different experiences, and that is what this administration is trying to break down
31:28at the most fundamental level, making sure that we can remain cloistered in our silos
31:33and never reach out to the other, never have empathy for the other.
31:37And that is what allows them to fracture and break us and return America to what they want it to
31:42be.
31:43Eddie, why do you think they dress like that?
31:45We just showed everyone on their screen a moment ago the way that Patriot Front presents itself.
31:50I mean, they're always cowardly.
31:52They always want to hide their identities.
31:54But they also dress in this very particular, well-studied, uniform manner.
31:59What message are they trying to send?
32:01Well, I mean, it's an echo of the brown shirts, of course, and the like,
32:04but it's also a sense that they are worried about some form of social sanction.
32:08Even though the permission structure has allowed them to come out in public to do what they're doing,
32:13they're still worried that they will somehow bear a cost for this.
32:18And this is very important for us to understand.
32:19Again, there's no substantive difference between, say, the KKK and White Citizens Council,
32:24except for class, perhaps, right?
32:26I mean, we tend to think of the KKK as being a working-class institution, as it were.
32:32But it was filled with people who were on chambers of commerce,
32:36people who were sheriffs, people who were firefighters and the like.
32:40So what would be revealed if those masks were taken down
32:43is that it wasn't just simply the folks on the margins.
32:46It could be folk in our own community.
32:48And I want to say this, too, really quickly, Atonia.
32:50This is an echo.
32:51August 8, 1925, over 30,000 Klansmen and women marched down the street of Pennsylvania Avenue.
32:59They claimed that Calvin Coolidge would not have been elected if it wasn't for the KKK in 1924.
33:05At the Democratic National Convention, they claimed that their seminal piece of legislation
33:10was the Johnson-Reed Immigration Act of 1924.
33:14There has been a synergy between these forces before.
33:17And here we are in the 250th year of the country seeing that synergy once again.
33:22Melissa, I want to quote for you at the Southern Poverty Law Center.
33:26They have this quote from the Patriot Front Manifesto.
33:30The American identity was something uniquely forged in the struggle
33:33that our ancestors waged to survive in this new continent.
33:37To be an American is to realize this identity and take up the national struggle upon one's shoulders.
33:42Not simply by birth is one granted this title,
33:44but by the degree to which he works and fulfills the potential of his birth.
33:49Talk to us about the parallels between this kind of hateful and exclusionary rhetoric
33:55and the way that the Trump administration has tried to change
33:58and limit who gets to be legally an American.
34:04This is an administration that has just been very upfront about its America first attitude.
34:11And America first is for quote unquote heritage Americans.
34:14Like if you are someone from somewhere else, if you're an immigrant,
34:17I'm not even sure if African Americans who are the descendants of those who were brought here in chains
34:22would be considered truly American for purposes of this.
34:26I mean, we've seen this the way the president talks about those who hate America
34:30and their efforts to rebrand patriotism as something that's all about allegiance to their vision of America.
34:37But all of this is deeply coded.
34:40All of this is about exclusion and ensuring that we are separate from one another.
34:44Because I think the thing that they feared most,
34:46the thing that they saw in 2020 in the aftermath of George Floyd,
34:50is students and young people of all stripes, all colors coming together
34:55in support of this movement against state violence.
34:59And I think it was deeply threatening, the idea that everyone would be coming together
35:03and against the use of force in this way.
35:06This one man, George Floyd, had united all of these people.
35:09I think it's something they have not gotten over, that they're deeply shaken by.
35:14And they're working overtime to try and counteract that.
35:18And to Eddie's point, why does the patriot front look like this?
35:22Why do they dress like this?
35:23They're dressed in quotidian gear.
35:25They look like the geek squad, like the guy who could fix your computer.
35:29That is by design.
35:30This could be anyone.
35:32And the masks just amplify that.
35:34You don't know who they are, but they are in your community.
35:36You don't know who you can trust, if you are a person of color,
35:39if you are an immigrant, because they are hiding in plain sight.
35:42That is the point.
35:44That is the fear they are stoking.
35:46Melissa and Eddie, you're both staying with me.
35:49Because when we return just last week,
35:51former President Barack Obama marveled about how he lives rent-free in Donald Trump's head.
35:56Trump proved it once again with yet another racist post about the Obamas.
36:01That story after a short break.
36:07You've got to ask him what it is.
36:09The obsession?
36:12The obsession.
36:13I know what it is.
36:13Yeah, I obviously, you know, have a room in his head.
36:17Rent-free.
36:18You do everything with grace.
36:19A suite in his head.
36:22But the thing about it is that was always clear to me.
36:26Look, first of all, when I was president,
36:29the last thing I had time to do was worry about what somebody said or what my predecessor did.
36:36They're gone.
36:38I've got work to do.
36:41That was former President Barack Obama last month on Donald Trump's continuing obsession with him.
36:46Donald Trump over the weekend doing nothing to dispel the notion that President Obama lives in his head rent-free.
36:53The AP reports that Trump, quote, posted a falsified image of former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama,
37:00waving before boarding an Air Force One that had been spray-painted with graffiti.
37:05The latest image shows the Obamas smiling and waving at the top of stairs alongside a baby blue and white
37:12presidential plane
37:13with graffiti painted on it that included the Democrats' campaign slogan,
37:17Yes, We Can, Obama, and BLM, short, of course, for Black Lives Matter.
37:22The post also shows graffiti in Arabic on the plane that says the phrase,
37:27which means praise be to God or thank God.
37:30It comes just months after Trump posted another racist image of the Obamas as apes in a jungle.
37:36We're back with Melissa and Eddie.
37:38Eddie, I see you shaking your head, so I'm just going to let you, you tell me what's going on
37:43up there.
37:44Well, obviously, he lives rent-free in Trump's head.
37:47There's nothing inherently racist about graffiti.
37:49It's a vernacular art form that's powerful in so many ways.
37:53But what he's trying to do is to conjure up images of the ghetto, of how Black folk will depreciate
37:59the value of whatever,
38:01wherever place they occupy.
38:02But, you know, we can talk about him being in the head of Barack Obama's being in his head.
38:08But, you know, I'm thinking, Antonio, I'm thinking about Nolan Wells,
38:12an 18-year-old kid who goes out on a boating trip with a group of white kids on the
38:17coast of Mississippi,
38:17and he doesn't return.
38:18They come back.
38:20And now there's all of this question, what happened to him?
38:22I'm thinking about all of the violence that follows from this stuff.
38:26See, the thing is, is that we can talk about it at a certain level of abstraction,
38:29but we have to raise our babies in this mess.
38:32And this man gives a permission structure where downstream, the violence that follows from what he triggers,
38:40we have to endure.
38:41So, yes, Obama lives rent-free, but we have to deal with the consequences.
38:46We have to pay the costs downstream.
38:49And so I'm grieving for Nolan Wells' parents, who's now trying to ask some questions or answer some questions
38:54why their baby didn't return home and all his white friends did with his telephone.
38:59Thank you, Eddie, for shouting out that story that I don't think has gotten enough national attention,
39:04Nolan Wells and his disappearance.
39:06Melissa, I want your reaction to this image, too, and what you think it represents about where we are.
39:12But I also want to take the opportunity to show this poll that I know that the president must hate
39:16right now
39:17because 57 percent of Americans view Obama positively, making him the most popular living president.
39:25And right now, only 34 percent view Donald Trump positively.
39:29I mean, despite the rhetoric, the environment that he puts out there.
39:34I mean, the Obamas, and I would say the Obamas sort of as an avatar for actually all black people
39:40still moving forward
39:41and doing their thing in spite of what so many have tried to do to us in this moment.
39:46Here they are still at 57 percent.
39:50I mean, it's got to hurt a little, Antonia.
39:53Not only do you think about this man 24-7, when you have to look at him, he is younger
39:57than you.
39:57He's smarter than you, more attractive than you.
40:00And 57 percent of Americans think they'd rather have him as president right now than you.
40:05That's got to hurt.
40:06And I don't know what else to say about it, but Eddie is exactly right.
40:10I think very few people have actually covered the story of this tweet in large part because it's become so
40:16commonplace.
40:17I mean, it's almost not even newsworthy.
40:19Like, the president of the United States said something racist about his predecessor.
40:24Like, you know, not really a news story anymore because it happens so often.
40:28But Eddie is right.
40:30We've become anesthetized to this in some respects.
40:33But everyday people have to live their lives in the climate that is cultivated by this kind of nonsense.
40:41They have to raise their children.
40:42They have to lead dignified lives because the president has this obsession with his predecessor, who happens to be a
40:50black man.
40:51I mean, I don't know what else to say about this.
40:54You know, we're here.
40:56It's 250 years into the United States.
40:58Black people have been here for the whole time.
41:00And we've helped build this country.
41:03We're a part of this country.
41:04And I don't know who needs to hear this, but we are Americans, too.
41:10Black people have been here for the whole time and for hundreds of years before it.
41:14We're in that one.
41:15Look at that.
41:16Not by name, but we're there.
41:19Melissa, look at Eddie's promoting your book.
41:22You've got to have a copy of Eddie's next time.
41:25I do have a copy of Eddie's on the way.
41:27I have a Kindle copy, but I do have a hard copy that I need to get signed.
41:31I love it.
41:32We're going to work on that.
41:33Melissa Murray, Eddie Glaude, it's always so fun to talk to the two of you.
41:36Thank you both so much.
41:38A quick break for us, and we're going to be right back.
41:42As we reflect on the country's 250th birthday, Nicole's conversation with Georgia Senator
41:47Raphael Warnock on this week's episode of the Best People podcast is very instructive.
41:52You can listen to that conversation by scanning the QR code on your screen or download the Best
41:57People wherever you get your podcasts.
41:58You can also find Nicole's exclusive conversation with former special counsel
42:03Jack Smith, his first news interview.
42:05Just scan that QR code.
42:07Another break for us.
42:08We're going to be right back.
42:12We're going to be right back.
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