The News Roundup For July 10, 2026

25:54There's a long trail of evidence, litigation suits, counter suits. And it looks like legally it has reached the end of the road. Politically, most American voters have moved on. It is very baked in the cake. You're either you support the president, you're against the president. You're not pinning your decisions about your happiness of the country on this. Well, I don't know how to answer it either. I ask it because I think it's important to not forget to ask it because we've come quite a distance in a few years from a place where a ruling and a decision like this would have been a showstopper in America.

26:34Meanwhile, some other big news, this time from the Department of Justice and from Donald Trump's ongoing and multi-front campaign to interfere in the midterm elections. The Department of Justice sent a letter to all 50 states and the District of Columbia threatening to arrest and criminally prosecute state election officials if any votes are cast in their states by non-citizens. FEMA has also threatened to withhold a portion of anti-terrorism preparedness money if states don't comply with the administration's election demands. Margaret, threatening criminal prosecution and jail for how state officials do their jobs within their states under their laws.

27:16What is the Trump administration trying to do here? Yeah. And so you're right that these letters went out to every 50 state. But I think elections officials who happen to be Democrats feel that it is certainly more targeted toward them. It's already illegal, of course, to try to vote if you're a non-citizen. There's already laws about that. Election law is controlled by states. The Trump administration wants to impose more federal control over elections. This is another major step to do that. It also implies the threat of prosecution of elections officials. And again, that is elections officials who happen to be from the Democratic Party feel that is more a target on their backs.

27:56It also could have the effect of dampening enthusiasm for voting, even if you are a legitimate citizen with rights to vote. And finally, it does build some groundwork for the president or his administration to argue after the fact election fraud if they don't like the results in certain states. Analysis after analysis has shown non-citizen voting is extremely rare. Essentially, this is a red herring, essentially a non-issue in terms of tilting elections. And yet the president, his allies in Congress, including the Speaker of the House, continue to harp on it. We're going to take a deep dive into these latest moves to undermine elections by the Trump administration and what they mean for a free and fair process.

28:37That's on Monday on If You Can Keep It, our weekly series all about politics and democracy. Make sure you join us then. Meanwhile, more signs of determination to take control of the midterms. On Thursday, the president fired the last members of the Independent Federal Election Commission that assists election administration officials across the country. Megan Scully, this happens just months before the midterms. What are the consequences here? What could this lead to in elections? What's the president up to? Absolutely. Well, I think, as Margaret just said, it's all part of this building the case ahead of this midterm elections, which could be absolutely decisive in terms of who controls at least two of the levers of power in Washington.

29:22And building the case in order to challenge the election results. Trump is still harping about the 2020 election results without any evidence that that was anything other than a free and fair election. So this is just sort of adding to his arsenal as we move closer to the midterms. Big thing, this Election Assistance Commission sets the standards for voting machine certifications. You've got chaos coming for anybody moving into voting machines nationally. That's the bottom line. And Trump has fired the remaining members of that commission. We're going to take a break. But before we go, this message from one of you.

30:01Where is Mitch McConnell? So it seems pretty shady that he can speak for 20 minutes to two different congressional members, yet not be bothered to release a statement to the public concerning his health. That's just ahead. We'll be right back.

30:19Every story from shortwave NPR science podcast starts with a question. Like, why do we have nightmares? How does AI affect my energy bill? At NPR, we are here for your right to be curious. about the world around you. Follow Shortwave wherever you get your podcasts because the more you ask, the more interesting the world gets. You know that moment in an interview when someone says something that just blows you away? On NPR's Wildcard podcast, we've got a deck of questions that offers a shortcut to those moments. What do you admire about your teenage self? What's a lesson you keep learning again and again?

31:00When has selfishness served you well? I'm Rachel Martin. Listen to the Wild Card Podcast, only from NPR. Let's get back into the conversation now. We had a question before the break. Where is Mitch McConnell? Part of the answer is that GOP Senator, seven-term GOP Senator Mitch McConnell, has been in the hospital for three weeks now. His family and congressional staff have been extremely tight-lipped about the reason for that. Emergency dispatch audio suggests that someone at McConnell's residence in Washington, D.C., may have suffered a cardiac arrest and been given CPR last month. And this extended mysterious hospital stays raising questions, to say the least, about Mitch McConnell's seat in the Senate and whether or not he'll be returning to it.

31:46He has announced he's retiring at the end of this term. Margaret Taleb, what complications has McConnell's hospitalization created for Republicans now? I mean, this is an incredible story, not to state the obvious. But in a best case scenario, Senator McConnell's recovery is going quite slowly and he's not ready to, you know, make public statements. In a worst case scenario, it's much worse than that. He's 84. But what is interesting from a political perspective is that it's not just Democrats raising questions. And of course, Kentucky's governor is a Democrat, Andy Beshear is like, what's going on?

32:21I need to know what's going on. But it's also sort of the MAGA wing of the Republican Party who have been increasingly critical of McConnell for being a bulwark against Trump at some times who are saying, what's going on? Even had a Republican member this week saying, I don't know if Mitch McConnell's alive. Then you've got friends of McConnell, allies and former staff of McConnell, staff of McConnell saying, this is ridiculous, enough of the conspiracy theories. He's OK. So we're all going to find out soon. But why does it matter? Part of the reason why it matters is because Republicans in Kentucky keep changing the law about what happens if there's an opening in a Senate seat.

32:58And part of the reason why is there's a Democratic governor. So they have taken away the Democratic governor's ability to appoint a replacement that had already happened. But then the law keeps changing again. And if I have this right and someone check me if I don't, I think that the latest twist involves a date in early August. It's August the 3rd, because if McConnell's seat were to become vacant before that date, you would have a situation where I think where there could be a special election. But if it's after that date, it just sits vacant. And boy, the Senate is in a bare, bare, bare margin.

33:39What could that do to the president? Mitch McConnell is an appropriator. He may be very elderly, but Mitch McConnell is powerful, Megan Scully. He's former majority leader. He sits right near, maybe doesn't have the gavel, but let's face it, he's at the top of the Appropriations Committee. He's on defense appropriations. He is a say-so guy when it comes for things like$83,$7, whatever it was, billion dollars supplemental for the war in Iran. There's one other element to this. If that seat were to become open before August 3rd, there is a ticked-off Kentucky Republican, Thomas Massey, who would like to run for that Senate seat.

34:17And I'm sure they would run another. That would split the Republicans. So either way, you can argue whether a vacancy is worse or a filling it is worse for the president. And absolutely. On the defense front, you know, there's a lot of business before Mitch McConnell holds the gavel of the Defense Appropriations Committee in the Senate. And at the top of that agenda is war funding and a separate$300 billion partisan piece of legislation for the Defense Department. And while Trump and McConnell have certainly had a contemptuous relationship over the years, McConnell is very much on board or has been very much on board with Trump's push to increase defense spending to some$1.5 trillion.

35:06dollars. So McConnell, his absence will be felt in the Senate when these important issues come before Republicans. We don't have to get into the details of the Appropriations Committee, but without McConnell, that committee is tied. And that means gridlock, folks. I can tell you, I can tell you that. All right, let's leave the Senate aside because I want to go to Houston, Texas, and more on ICE's continuing campaign immigration crackdown on behalf of the president and another person fatally shot by ICE on the streets of America, Lorenzo Salgado Arojo. He's a Mexican immigrant in Houston, three U.S.

35:44citizen children during a traffic stop on Tuesday, shot and killed by ICE agents. He's the latest high-profile person killed by ICE officers since the Trump administration's crackdown began. Here's his son, Rinaldo Salgado, at a press conference on Wednesday. I saw a video posted on Facebook that he had been shot. I recognize him immediately. Not from his appearance, but from his voice, crying for help as he lay on the street bleeding out. Salgado said that his father had been in the United States for 35 years and was in the process of obtaining legal status. We don't have all of the details yet.

36:26Ice says Salgado Araujo, quote, refused to follow multiple verbal commands and weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run over ICE law enforcement officers. The Department of Homeland Security is investigating the shooting. Margaret, what do we actually know about this incident so far? Well, we do know, and it was the local congresswoman who's a Democrat who came out with this information on Thursday that apparently this man was not actually the target. It is not who they were going after. It was a different person in a different car. And so if that information, as that information plays out, I think it's obviously extremely concerning because it just shows that there's a real human cost to these operations and that, you know, precision and less violence, you know, are really important.

37:24This is a human life and this is someone who was on the path to legal status and had been playing by the rules. At least 26 people have been shot by federal immigration agents since the start of the immigration crackdown. That's according to The Trace. They're a nonprofit newsroom that follows guns in America. The government says that this man used his car as a weapon, Steve Clemens. That sounds familiar because it's the same charge they leveled at Renee Good in Minneapolis, despite video evidence that everyone saw that she was attempting to run over an ICE agent before she was shot. Well, this is the new template that people are pointing to and saying that, and we don't have a camera in this case, but I think people are saying, hey, this is given an opportunity to ICE officers to take more forceful action because of the so-called weaponization of a vehicle against them, the threat of their life.

38:15And I have to tell you just personally having watched what happened in Minneapolis, hearing this go on, and just hearing it, I think it's what's – I mean, to be honest, I think what Secretary Mark Wayne Mullen at DHS is actually trying to deal with, which is the quick draw of guns on people who are unarmed. And that has been an issue that's out there. I think he's trying to deal with it. He said he's trying to deal with that. But the tone and norm of ICE enforcement is one that disregards life pretty quickly. Megan? I think it's important to note that just several months ago, there was a push in Washington to put additional constraints on ICE.

38:53There was a government shutdown over it. Absolutely. And what resulted essentially was continued, you know, these safeguards essentially falling by the wayside. And that effort has since essentially dissipated. Well, it was also, this is a good time to note a statistic in America from this past July 4th weekend. It's always one of the most violent weekends of the year. People are outside, explosions are going off, and the weather is warm. There were 139 shootings that left 35 people dead and 187 injured across the country on July 4th on the 250th anniversary of this country. That number's actually slightly down from last year.

39:40Steve Clemens, that feels like a uniquely American data point. Yeah, I mean, there's just a lot of guns. There's a lot of violence. And it is a part of – when the world looks at us and says, what's the biggest difference between the United States and, say, a European country or Japan or Australia, it is our proclivity for violence. And it's just something that I think we continually internally struggle with. As you mentioned, we have a constitutional amendment that protects the right to bear arms. But even Antonin Scalia, when he was alive and on the court, did not believe that that meant that you could have just unrestained arms of all kinds.

40:17And that is a challenge at this moment as we're celebrating our 250th anniversary. Well, we leave that unique piece of Americana to the side for the moment. But we talk about July 4th. I mean, one of the stars of July 4th celebrations, at least here in D.C., a lot of military flyovers, a lot of jets. They're impressive. They're very loud and intimidating. B-1 bombers, B-2 bombers, F-35 jets. Also, a gift from the government of Qatar for the president of the United States. He was clearly delighted when he unveiled that new plane,$400 million gifted to him by the Qatari government. It debuted after extensive upgrades cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars more to make it fit for presidential security.

41:02But the Air Force said the plane was, quote, a secure, modified executive platform. But this week, when Trump left the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, he didn't fly on that shiny new plane that he loves to show off. Here's what he said when he was asked why. It's flying to Europe to one of the big bases, two or three of the big bases, where we can show it to the people. And we'll be going home by normal methods. But we have it going to Europe to a couple of bases, actually one in particular, but it's going to go to a couple of bases stop so the soldiers can see it because it's truly magnificent.

41:41Turns out that was not true. That was not the reason the plane was stopping in England. According to The New York Times, the Secret Service advised the White House not to use the new Air Force One citing potential threat from Iran given renewed hostilities in the Persian Gulf. Instead, the president flew out of Turkey on the older Air Force One. He switched to the new plane in England for the leg back to the States. New reporting, Margaret Tollett from The New York Times, saying that the new plane does not have counter missile measures and security measures that it needed, confirming to The New York Times that indeed it does not have full security upgrades and it wasn't safe to fly.

42:20Yeah, that's right. I think you've really done a good job of summing up the like, where's the ball? Because the storyline has changed several times. One of the challenges in reporting around Air Force One is that while a lot of information is available about the Air Force One fleet, some of that information is, you know, it's classified or highly protected because it involves security systems. But it is it has been reported again and again that what the planes that we have thought of as Air Force One, they have like systems that can scramble and block if there were to be like an incoming missile, like an anti-aircraft missile coming.

42:55And so the question then became, was the Qatar gift tricked up with enough stuff? Like the president was trying to make it happen really fast. Let's get it out there. And this reporting, the Times' very good reporting, suggests that to really add all those add-ons to make it as safe as the other Air Force one, it could cost anywhere from$400 million to a billion more dollars on top of it. And by the way, it could take a couple years to get it like totally ready the way the other... So why fly now? Is this because of the president's eagerness to show it off and fly in a... Show it off, put it in a parking lot.

43:31And then it goes to the museum at the end of it. So, like, this plane is not going to be the plane that... You've flown on Air Force One many times. Not this one. No, not this one. The president said to a reporter, if I go down, you go down with me. Quite true. By the way, that's true every time you're in a motorcade with the president or on a helicopter. That's not as good as the president's helicopter. Like, that's the price you pay for flying in the most secure aircraft with Secret Service protection. Frankly, it's true on any airplane. But I think like it's traveling with the president as someone who has done had did it for many years is basically the safest way you can travel.

44:04You have the most protections available to anyone. But this plane was not protected as well as. But it also shows something else. They worry about Iran. They are worried about what Iran might do next. There's a sense not only the protections there, but we're engaged in an active kinetic conflict. The president of the United States is worried about it. Secret Service doesn't care about headlines. They care about real threats, and it's indicated there. All right, before we go, we do have to say goodbye this week to Team USA, who went out of the World Cup 4-1 to Belgium. Listen. I was really happy because the energy was really high this much.

44:41Because in the previous matches, I think the energy was really low. It was not like a winning spirit, and this match was really good. I think we have given an answer on sports, so it's not nice that politics can between us, but okay. If they play like today, I think they can go further and beat Spain also. Steve Clemens, the American team did not step up, but the Belgians really thought that Trump interfered in this whole thing. Well, people all over Europe are doing the YMCA dance, thanking Donald Trump for giving the Belgians that extra oomph. to take it home. The Belgian team was doing it on the field and in the dressing room.

45:21Were they mocking the president? I think they were saluting the president. Same. That's Steve Clemens, editor-at-large for the National Interest. Across the table from me, Megan Scully has been here, Congress editor for Bloomberg News and Margaret Tollev, senior contributor for Axios, director of Syracuse University's Institute for Democracy, Journalism, and Citizenship and host of the brand-new podcast That's 250 American firsts. We're just getting started with this week's headlines. When we come back after a break, we'll have a new panel and all of the news from around the globe. Stay with us.

46:01So you've decided you want to be more active. Exercise scientist Keith Diaz says put away the smartwatch. Start by noticing your body's natural cues. For us to build a habit to check back in with our bodies, that behavior is much more likely to stick. Tracking what the body needs. That's on the TED Radio Hour podcast. Listen on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back to the 1A podcast. I'm Todd Zwillick. It's the international half of our weekly news roundup. The United States and Iran restart hostilities around the Strait of Hormuz. President Trump gets hostile with NATO, and Ukraine gets a new boost in fending off Putin's missiles.

46:44All that, plus a Trump-like politician in the UK who's making moves while a watchdog investigates his finances. In the WAMU studio with me, Elizabeth Hagedorn, diplomatic correspondent for All Monitor. Hi again, Elizabeth. Hi, Todd. Good to be here. Great to have you. Joining us from Istanbul in Turkey, where he was covering the NATO summit in Ankara, Jack Detch is a defense reporter at Politico. Hi, Jack. Hi, Ted. Sounding great all the way from Turkey. And in London, David Rennie, geopolitics editor at The Economist, where he writes the Telegram column. Great to have you back, David. Hello. Well, as I mentioned, the president is back from NATO in Ankara, Turkey.

47:24But let's start in the Persian Gulf. Today, the president says the United States is headed back into talks with Iran for the third or fourth time now. The president had some choice words for Iranian leadership while he was at the NATO summit and declared the memorandum of understanding between Washington and Tehran to be over. I don't want to deal with them anymore. They're scum. You know what scum is? They're scum. They're sick people. They're led by sick people. and they're vicious, violent people. And if they had a nuclear weapon, they'd use it. As far as I'm concerned, it's over. I'll speak to our negotiators.

48:03They want to negotiate. They're good people. Steve Woodcoff, Jared Kushner. But they have to come back to me. As far as I'm concerned, it's just a waste of time dealing with them. So, of course, the United States and Iran reached a preliminary peace deal last month to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to shipping traffic while they continued talks over major issues like nuclear enrichment and missiles and frozen Iranian assets. The United States launched strikes, Jack Detch, that hit several cities in Iran. Iran fired back at Gulf neighbors, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Qatar. Also said that it hit U.S. military assets in the region.

48:40Again, the president says we're headed back into talks. There was a a lull in the fighting in the last few hours. What's the latest? Yeah, so it's a split between the two of them. I mean, we've seen the U.S. not carry out any fresh strikes overnight after three straight days of hitting Iranian targets, as you mentioned, and that was kind of a stair step from the United States. You saw the first night on Tuesday, the U.S. hitting boats, then begin to hit air defense systems and coastal defenses on Wednesday, and then by Thursday, Iranian officials said they were even hearing explosions near the Boucher nuclear power plant complex.

49:14So a serious tit for tat between the United States and the Iranians this week. The Iranians also firing back. Now we're in a stage that sort of seems like a limbo, Todd. Negotiators are being dispatched. The Qataris are sending mediators to Tehran, which indicates that technical talks could be back on. That would help resolve the issues in the Strait of Hormuz, nuclear nonproliferation, and potentially sanctions issues. But these are deep technical talks. And at the same time, you have bullets flying back and forth across the Persian Gulf. So not a good sign for where we're headed. David Rennie, does the president have a better option than talks right now?

49:56No. And I thought that clip was so revealing that you just played of him in Ankara, where he was kind of trying to sort of set up a good cop, bad cop dynamic. You know, yeah, my negotiators will talk to you, but then they have to come back to me. It's like he's the tough guy which gives him leverage. President Trump has told us many times he believes in leverage. He believes in cards. Who has the cards? But, you know, this original negotiation, this original memorandum of understanding was not him doing Iran a favor. It was clear that Iran feels it has all the cards because actually the pain that it can inflict on the global economy and via the global economy on the American economy and via high gas prices in the US on Donald Trump's approval rating, they feel that that gives them extraordinary leverage.

50:36And so they got this memorandum of understanding that really did not tackle America's original wish list going into the war at all, which suggests that the Iranians still feel that they have the cards. And if you look at the reporting out of the region, why is the fighting sort of restarting? It's partly fears that there are very, very hardline elements in Iran trying to undermine the very idea of talks with America, but also that there's a fundamental disagreement between the two sides about what they'd even agreed in that very sketchy opening ceasefire deal. Did Iran agree to let the Americans try and usher ships through the Gulf without Iran say so?

51:13Or does Iran, which I think is the line out of Tehran, Iran feels that it has to be consulted on every ship that goes through. And so this fundamental misunderstanding, I think the fact that Iran is back to closing the straits, suggests that in Donald Trump's universe of who has the cards, Iran feels that it has the cards and that the pain inflicted by American bombs is not actually as useful as Donald Trump likes to make out. Elizabeth Hagedorn, your take on leverage and Iran's decision, at least in this iteration, to restart hostilities. What are they trying to show in the Gulf and what do they get out of it if we're headed back into talks, as the president says?

51:51Well, Iran is certainly using pressure around the Strait of Hormuz to show that it can impose real costs on global shipping, which in theory gives it leverage in these negotiations. The negotiators didn't exactly secure an ironclad agreement in their rush to secure an exit from this war. And if you read parts of the MOU, much of which is quite vague, including the section on the Strait of Hormuz, you see that Iran commits to safe passage in the strait, toll-free for 60 days. But the ambiguous wording has let Iran argue that it can control traffic, that it can demand ships follow its routes, not those under U.S.

52:32Navy protection. And so I do think that it's likely that while the two sides may return to talks, we could continue to see these sort of skirmishes that stop short of full-blown war for the foreseeable future until the two sides fully resolve their core disputes, not just on Hormuz, but also on Lebanon. David Renny, you mentioned the tension inside Iran, elements in the Iranian power structure such as it is that don't want talks with the United States. And we got this question from Brett, who says, decentralized control of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard was attributed as part of Iran's resilience during the early parts of the war.

53:07Could this lead to the possibility of a commander controlling the state of Hormuz, conducting actions that are counter to the intent of the central command in Iran? Brett is asking if Iran is still centralized around a central axis of power or if some powerful commander could take matters into his own hands in the strait. It's a really good question. I mean, one of the reasons that the strait closed as quickly as it did is I was in Israel for some reporting recently. Their senior figures were saying that they were taken by surprise by how fast the Iranians closed the strait. And that was precisely because actually surprisingly junior commanders were able to take initiative under that structure that they defused power down in the event that there was going to be a decapitation of their top leadership.

53:50I think actually the stuff that diplomats are watching very closely right now is not necessarily kind of rogue commanders on the water in the Strait of Hormuz. It's things like, you know, very hardline figures in the administration in Tehran complaining about the very idea of talking to the Americans. You actually saw quite interesting kind of footage, you know, these enormous crowds that I'm sure we'll talk about in this kind of multi-multi-day procession of the funeral coffins of the former Supreme Leader. You saw crowds chanting at some points against the very idea of people negotiating with the Americans.

54:25So there is a real concern that there are people who think that it's not just about the tolls that Elizabeth talked about, it's about sovereignty, that Iran shouldn't even discuss who gets to control, who goes through the strait. Well, there were seas of mourners gathered to honor the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah al-Khamenei. As David Rennie mentioned, the Ayatollah's flag-draped coffin in the coffins of several family members, also killed on February 28th at the start of the war, crept through the streets of Tehran, hundreds of thousands of people looked on. Earlier in the week, we spoke to Negar Murtazavi.

54:58She's a journalist and host of the Iran podcast at the Center for International Policy about the funeral and the mood of mourners there. His family was killed alongside him, and they're all being buried. So there's a lot of symbolism as far as that. They're being portrayed as victims, as martyrs who stood up to these big enemies, these two powerful armies who launched the war in Iran. And there's also defiance, a message of defiance, strength, resilience, continuity of the Islamic Republic because we know one of the big goals of the war was regime change and the regime did not change. I mean, the leaders changed because of assassinations, but nevertheless, they were able to put the house together and create some continuity.

55:41So there's multiple layers of messaging for multiple audiences. So Jack Detch, what about the message that the leadership in Tehran wants the West and the United States to get from that showing and that mourning? Well, they really tried to make this a referendum validating the leadership in Tehran, the idea that all those people coming out into the streets were just essentially giving a rubber stamp to the regime that's in place to the Islamic regime. It does seem like there are some problems with that. There's some independent reporting indicating that perhaps some of the observers who came out, some of the mourners for the Supreme Leader were indeed paid in some way, shape, or form or subsidized.

56:27So that would take away from this sort of spectacle. And of course, we didn't see some of the former presidents of Iran that are still living, Hassan Rouhani, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad not making appearances. So you still have, simultaneously, despite this massive display, certainly signs that there are some cracks in the foundation. Meanwhile, interestingly, Elizabeth, there were funeral possessions that spread to Iraq, to Shiite parts of Iraq, Najaf and Karbala, places people Americans remember from the Iraq war. What is the IRGC and the Iranian leadership trying to broadcast there? It underscores Iran's regional reach.

57:06It's a reminder that neighboring Iraq is home to militias that are armed and funded by Iran as part of its axis of resistance, despite U.S. efforts to curb Iranian influence there. And as the NATO summit got underway in Turkey, a Danish reporter pulls no punches with the NATO secretary general in Ankara. You sit next to Donald Trump in moments where he talks about conquering Greenland, talks about lashing out at allies like Spain, starting trade wars. Things that it doesn't seem like the old Mark Rode would approve of. Does this have any effect on your self-respect when you sit next to him like that and say nothing?

57:42Donald Trump also played some familiar hits, ones that don't play well at all in Europe. Of course, there was Greenland. That should be controlled by the United States, not by Denmark. There was NATO spending. With all the money we spend to help them with Russia. And we don't have to spend any money. We could remove all of our soldiers out of Europe. And on Europe itself. They better be careful with immigration and energy. If they're not careful with those two things, you're not going to have a Europe anymore. Jack Detch, you were in Ankara this week. Give us your readout of the NATO summit, given the greatest hits we just played from the president there.

58:22Yeah, I mean, it was pretty head-snapping to see Donald Trump land in Ankara, bash Europe in the way that he did, and then to see his mood really improve by Wednesday. I mean, certainly the president seemed a bit tired. He took fewer questions in his press conference than I think we've ever seen at a summit or a gathering like the NATO summit. But when you look at just sort of the rap sheet of what the Europeans got, it's probably the most successful they could have been. They got critical comments on Russia. They got support for Ukraine. They got$250 billion in weapons deals signed. And Donald Trump is apparently prepared to give the Germans Tomahawk long-range missiles and potentially even license Volodymyr Zelensky in Ukraine to build U.S.-designed air defenses, which they desperately need.

59:09I think there are two things that are part of this. I mean, certainly Trump's threats on the Europeans have lost some of their power. When I was talking to NATO officials, they said it was priced in at this point. Everyone sort of expects these critical comments and then for Donald Trump to kind of turn around. And Europeans also just not hanging on every word anymore. So I think part of this is certainly the Europeans getting adapted to Trump's style of speaking, his bluntness, his anger with Europe. But also the U.S. is losing some leverage when it messages around the world that it's pulling up sticks from Europe, drawing down its troop presence.

59:43And you see the Europeans doubling down on defense spending or at least rhetorically doubling down on defense spending in the way that they're saying they will. David Rennie, what did you see when you watched NATO? Look, I think that Jack's absolutely right. And I think the other thing that Europeans are learning about, I mean, so it was interesting, you played that clip of the Danish reporter, lots and lots of people very cross with the Dutch Secretary General Mark Rutte saying, you know, how come you're so soft on him? How come you flatter him? And, you know, at one point, Mark Rutte compared Donald Trump this week to Dwight Eisenhower.

1:00:12Now, I think that there are Eisenhower fans who have issues with that. But actually, I wrote a column saying, you know, frankly, we should give him a medal if that means he doesn't throw Ukraine under the bus and, you know, doesn't leave NATO. Let's be realistic. The other thing that the Europeans have got very smart about is they've worked out that Donald Trump thinks that people who are losers, it's like kind of cooties in a kind of elementary school playground. Indeed. You can catch it from someone. And so they've tried to say, you know, Vladimir Putin, he's a loser. He's got cooties. You don't want to play with him.

1:00:41You want to play with Zelensky. And I think actually the remarkable scenes at the end of the summit where you saw Zelensky and Trump together, and it was one of the friendlier meetings we've seen, Zelensky very confident, cracking jokes. Donald Trump says, are you willing to go to Moscow to negotiate with Putin? And Zelensky, showing his kind of background as a comic, he goes, actually, it's a dangerous place. There's lots of Ukrainian drones flying around there. And so Trump and everyone laughs. And so for the Europeans, I think they are slowly learning to play Trump kind of in the way that you need to play the guy.

1:01:10We're going to talk more about Zelensky, Ukraine, and Russia in a moment. Elizabeth Hagedorn, we heard that Danish reporter saying to Mark Rutte, essentially, where's your self-respect in the way you suck up to Donald Trump? I'm paraphrasing. Has Ruta, has he cracked the code understanding that Donald Trump appreciates praise, gifts, and adulation, and so that's just what he's going to do? That certainly seems to be his approach. But as you mentioned, the criticism is, you know, has this flattery delivered any benefits to the alliance? And I think as David and Jack mentioned, you know, the approach taken by some of the other NATO leaders at the summit is one of getting used to these Trump theatrics, less panic, more pragmatism, keep the summit moving, keep it on track and kind of absorb the criticism from him.

1:02:02So we talk about the rhetoric of deliverables from NATO, Jack Deitch, but also the reality. Last year, Donald Trump was placated somewhat. Allies committed to spend 5 % of their GDP annually on defense by 2035. What did we learn this year about how the alliance plans to manage European security with this new spending if it materializes? realizes, okay, the money we were told is coming. What changes on the ground for NATO in Europe? Well, we know what they want to invest in, right? We know they want to invest in long-range weapons. We know they want to invest in air defense. The politically sticky part is going to be getting all of these investments to stick and to do it in a climate where you see far-right leaders on the rise in Germany, in Britain, you see them on the rise, you see them on the rise in France potentially going into the next election.

1:02:56And that's something, of course, we'll talk about in the next segment. But you just see sort of, I think a political expiration date on this whole project of building up NATO and building up a European pillar of NATO. So I think you see a bit more resolve within Europe to continue building these things. But building air defense is incredibly difficult. Building long range missiles is incredibly difficult. They do have some time, it seems like, when it comes to the Russian buildup, which has been slow. The Russians, of course, have been slowed down in Ukraine as well. But the politics may not abide by this NATO buildup.

1:03:30Well, one of Donald Trump's demands that it absolutely enrages European allies is his insistence that the United States will take Greenland. You heard a moment ago that Trump brought it up again. But then NATO Secretary Mark Ruda got people's attention when he said this. We should praise Donald Trump for the fact that NATO is so much stronger. Of course, it has to do with the Russian threat. It has to do with the war in Ukraine. but it very much also has to do with President Trump delivering now what since Eisenhower, the United States tried to achieve equalizing spending between the US and Europe.

1:04:02And it makes Europe stronger. It makes Europe more relevant for the United States as a partner. So, David Rennie, there's the Eisenhower comparison that you mentioned just a moment ago. I mean, Denmark dispatched hundreds of troops to Greenland earlier this year because of President Trump's threats. What are the Danes and the Europeans and Greenlanders saying now after he re-upped this threat? Look, the Danes are not relaxed. They think it's a serious threat. Actually, Donald Trump, you know, you said it was his greatest hits, but he added a new kind of riff this week that he was saying, you know, if you don't give me Greenland, maybe I'll just pull all the troops out of Europe.

1:04:35That's a new threat. I think what I'm willing to give Mark Rudd a kind of a pass on is I think he is taking one for the team. He's very smart at giving Donald Trump these kind of flattery reality sandwiches. And so you've got all the ludicrous flattery about Eisenhower. But he will then say, you know, one of Donald Trump's big things in Ankara is he's got it into his head that the reason that Iran is not going well, the Strait of Hormuz is proving tricky, is that the Europeans didn't join him in the war. Now, that's basically nonsense. The message from Rutter and some of the other Europeans this week was, actually, you know, how do American planes fly sorties over the Middle East?

1:05:08They'd leave bases in Europe. And that is a massive power projection platform. And, you know, I'm sure there are listeners saying, hang on, why shouldn't Europe pay for its own defense? Why should America pay for, you know, deterring Russia? Europeans increasingly, European governments get that. There is real spending going on. The problem is that it's going to be a 10-year project to replace all of the really, really advanced stuff that America has always taken the lead on providing in NATO. And so that's the tricky bit is, you know, Europeans get it, that they are now going to have to be more and more responsible for their own defense.

1:05:40But if America was to walk out tomorrow, it's very hard to deter an attack by Vladimir Putin. That's the timing question. Well, we have to remember that NATO isn't just Europe. It also includes Turkey. And Elizabeth Hagedorn, Turkish President Recep Erdogan, came away with a big win at NATO. What did he get? You know, it's interesting because for years, Turkey was treated with suspicion within the NATO alliance for a host of reasons, including stalling Sweden's bid to join, its attacks on Kurdish forces in Syria and, of course, the buying of the Russian defense system that prompted sanctions in the U.S.

1:06:18But Erdogan really came out looking like a winner this week because of Trump's treating him as a favored partner. He said before he went that he was there mostly because his friend Erdogan was hosting it. And so not only did this summit boost Turkey and Erdogan's profile inside NATO, but it gave Turkey something it's wanted for years, and that is a warmer reset with Washington, a bigger stage inside NATO. And of course, not only did you have Trump's praise, but you had talk of lifting sanctions tied to these S-400 purchase, and also Trump saying he's considering reopening the path to Turkey. What about jet fighters for Turkey?

1:07:01F-35s. I'm sorry. Yeah, talk about the F-35s and how important that is to Turkey. It's very important to Turkey. These are state-of-the-art, cutting-edge, 6th-gen, 5th-gen. Jack, are they F-35s? You know this stuff. 5th-gen. 5th-gen fighters that Turkey now gets access to. Possibly. But of course, this sets off alarm bells in Israel, which has long held concerns about Ankara's closer ties with Washington. It's increased regional clout. So while this was a big win for Erdogan, definitely Prime Minister Netanyahu was watching this week's developments with concern. That's Elizabeth Hagedorn from All Monitor, Jack Dech from Politico is here, and David Rennie from The Economist.

1:07:45Well, we've already mentioned Volodymyr Zelensky, president of Ukraine, his appearance at NATO, but not a member of NATO. Zelensky said he shouldn't just be a guest at NATO, that the next time he wants to come back as a member. Do you really believe it would be right to live outside NATO, a country and a people with this level of defensive capability? Tom writes to us, Trump asked Zelensky if he would go to Russia to meet Putin. His reply was priceless, David Rennie, but he should have gone further and asked Trump if he's willing to go to Tehran. They're writing jokes for the president of Ukraine now.

1:08:24But David Rennie, what about Zelensky's argument for why Ukraine should join? Is he any closer to that dream in year five of Russia's war against his country now? No, I think it's pretty clear that Ukraine isn't going to get into NATO. And, you know, there's a short-term reason, which is it has Russian troops on a lot of its territory. and you can't let a country into a defense alliance like NATO when it's at war, doesn't control its own territory, is being attacked by Russia. Because, you know, the core of NATO is basically the promise that other members of NATO will come to your aid if you're attacked.

1:08:58If you've currently got Russian troops fighting a war on your soil, it's just a nightmare to let that country in. The problem that Ukraine faces is that it knows it's not going to get into NATO anytime soon, and also because that would provoke the Russians and that worries other Europeans. So it's trying to get into the European Union instead, but actually it's a really bad fit with the European Union. There's a lot of really tough reforms on things like, you know, corruption and having clean judiciary and courts and stuff that Ukraine isn't ready for. The argument that you heard Zelensky make there is really interesting, that actually it's not a charity case.

1:09:30It's not a request or a favor to be allowed in, which is true is that Ukraine is now the world's champion in building defensive drones against the Russians. It's developed some amazing kind of 21st century warfare kind of techniques. in real time that other Western allies, including all over Europe, are desperate to get their hands on. And so he's right that Ukraine is no longer a charity case. It's actually a partner in rearming against Russia. But the idea of letting in a country that doesn't have its own full control of its own territory, unfortunately, is a complete nonstarter. So Jack Teich, you mentioned some new warmth for this iteration of NATO between Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky.

1:10:09And some of it was practical. Donald Trump said on Wednesday, the United States would grant Ukraine a license to manufacture its own Patriot missile interceptors. This is why while the United States is running low thanks to the war in Iran. And John asks this, Trump gave Ukraine permission to develop and manufacture their own Patriot style missiles. Is this really any big benefit to Ukraine, given that it will take months and maybe more than a year for Ukraine to actually have the first usable missile? It seems like just another pretense of standing up to Putin without actually doing much, says John.

1:10:45Jack Dech, what about the new license for Ukraine to build its own missiles? The decision to have been made years ago, but they have it now and it will help them in the future. I mean, these Patriot interceptors are notoriously difficult to build. It just takes a very long time to get the systems together to get them into Ukraine. I think this raises a lot of questions, too, because this announcement really surprised a lot of people. The logistics of it would be quite difficult. Would they set this up on Ukrainian territory, perhaps in far Western Ukraine, further from the reach of Russian missiles?

1:11:15Russian missiles can still hit those areas, but it would be more of a challenge. Or would they offshore this and do what they're currently doing? So you'd basically ramp up the production for more Patriot interceptors in countries like Germany, which are already licensed to build them. So I think it's raising more. We know very, very little about what's going to happen. There are a lot of questions about what this would be going forward. But, you know, for Zelensky, who's always looking for more pledges of Western weapons, first it was the artillery, then it was the long-range Atakum's missiles.

1:11:47Now he's talking about co-production with the West. I mean, this is a huge win for him. David Rennie, what's the state of this war now from where you stand? It's probably not fair to say Ukraine has completely turned the tide and is winning. And yet Ukrainian attacks deep inside Russian territory in Siberia, 1 ,700 miles from the Russian border with Ukraine, increasingly aggressive tactics by Ukraine to bring the war home for Putin. What's the state of the war now? Look, it's a really, really interesting political moment. You are seeing, as you say. It's not just kind of the ability to strike deep into Russia.

1:12:25It's also the ability to really pound away at Crimea that used to be part of Ukraine that is now claimed as part of Russian territory. That is now, you know, you're seeing fuel shortages, you know, constant attacks on anything trying to get fuel into Crimea. That's a real blow to Vladimir Putin's pride because taking Crimea was so important to him back in 2014. You're seeing attacks in Moscow, those amazing videos of oil refineries. You know, there's clouds of black smoke rising in Moscow, people queuing for gas, long, long queues, people having fistfights in gas stations over kind of shortages of gas in Moscow, in the heart of Russia.

1:13:01That is politically very, very difficult. We have a cover story this week in The Economist, hurry, hurry, go and buy it, with one of the richest men in Russia, a top oligarch, speaking out about how this is now not sustainable. That's an astonishing intervention that we haven't seen to date. It's a really big deal. But why are we all talking about things like Patriot Interceptors? If they're having a more successful summer, there are real fears about the winter to come. Russia does have a massive edge in the longest range missiles, the ballistic missiles. There's only one thing that can really knock those missiles down, protect you.

1:13:33That's Patriots. They are in desperately short supply. If you're Ukrainian, you are heartbroken by the number of Patriots that have been basically fired away by Gulf Arabs against Iranian drones over the Gulf War. This is a really, it's a dramatic moment. Russia is looking very vulnerable and very, very unhappy right now. But, you know, the fear is that this goes into a winter and then the winter is going to be really tough. And Elizabeth Hagedorn, we're going to go to a break. But for the first time this week, you also notice, yes, images of long gas lines in Russia, bombings deep inside Russia, oligarchs speaking out.

1:14:05And for the first time, nods to the idea that Vladimir Putin may be politically vulnerable. If he loses this war, the narrative goes, he's finished. Yeah. And I think the announcement about the Patriot interceptors, Trump's comments about long-range strikes from Ukraine helping push Russia to the negotiating table really reflect this administration strategy of help Ukraine defend itself, but keep U.S. costs limited and maybe bring Russia into a deal. Well, there are some big developments in other parts of the Middle East to talk about. Let's start in Gaza, where the political wing of Hamas says it's dissolved its government in the Gaza Strip.

1:14:42After nearly two decades in power, Hamas says it will hand civilian administration to a United Nations-backed committee, backed as part of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire deal. Israel's foreign minister, meanwhile, Gideon Saar, dismissed the move, saying, and this is a quote, as long as Hamas retains its weapons, any civilian government will, of course operate as Hamas dictates. Well, Elizabeth Hagedorn, we talked for months about stagnation in the U.S.-brokered peace plan for Gaza, stuck in phase one, phase two nowhere in sight. We've covered it week after week after week. Hamas is not committed to disarmament, one of the tenets and major points of that plan, and the one Israel says is a deal-breaker for them at this phase.

1:15:26There are a lot of other deal-breakers too. What's the read on how significant this civil administration move really is. I mean, it's significant in that Hamas has run Gaza with an iron fist since 2007. But as you referenced, this is something that Hamas, in theory, has already agreed to as part of the 20-point plan that it and Israel agreed to in October. So this is them doing things they've already said they would. Yes. And it's unclear, therefore, if this means anything meaningful on the ground when Hamas is still dragging its feet on this bigger issue of disarmament because until Hamas disarms, Israeli troops won't leave Gaza.

1:16:04International peacekeepers are unlikely to deploy. And, you know, it's kind of a chicken and egg situation because Hamas says it won't disarm as long as Israel continues to violate the ceasefire. And so meanwhile, you have this group of Palestinian technocrats who are currently based outside of Gaza that are supposed to govern as part of this Trump plan from October. This is the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza. Tell us about it. Also known as the NCHAG. And in theory, this Hamas announcement would clear the way for these Palestinian technocrats to come into Gaza and begin their work.

1:16:39But in reality, that governance won't begin while Israeli bombs continue to fall and while Hamas remains heavily armed. Is this strategic on the part of Hamas? Does it put any additional pressure on Israel to say, hey, look, we're making moves. We're abiding by phase one. I think that's certainly part of their calculation. I mean, Hamas frequently uses Israel's expanding presence in Gaza, the fact that violations of the ceasefire are continuing daily as part of their justification not to disarm. So I would see it in line with that. All right. Let's talk about the ceasefire and the violations that Elizabeth just mentioned.

1:17:17And nine months after that deal was signed, Israel attacks in Gaza continue. Israel says it's striking fighters in city centers. But this week, those strikes killed at least eight people in the territory, including two children, according to the health ministry in Gaza. One of those strikes hit a tent in a displaced persons camp. Israeli forces have also been expanding the line of military control known as the yellow line, David Rennie, beyond the boundaries established in the October 2025 peace plan that we're talking about. What's happening around that yellow line now? There's been some good investigations by media organizations using things like satellite photos doing, you know, geolocation to see that basically that line.

1:18:01The short version is that instead of controlling about a half of the original Gaza Strip. You know, they're pushing somewhere in some places to kind of nearly two-thirds. And we shouldn't be surprised. The Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has said in public that his aim is to control 70%, if needs be, of the Gaza Strip, initially as a buffer zone. Now, if you listen to people like Jared Kushner and others in the Trump administration, they'll say the glorious future that awaits Gaza is that there will be an area of the Gaza Strip which is not under Hamas control, where we can start having vetted Palestinian families arriving and we'll build them beautiful new homes and a beautiful new life.

1:18:36And so there'll be a kind of a good Gaza, which will be a massive incentive for everyone to align with the international plan versus bad Gaza, the kind of the rubble where Hamas is still fighting. But for now, there is no sign of the good Gaza and the vetted Palestinians arriving. That's a very, very long way away if it ever happens. In the meantime, it just looks like a land grab. And all of that made still more painful by the fact that Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to be an election announced as soon as next week. We're expecting maybe next Thursday, the dissolution of the Knesset, the Israeli parliament.

1:19:08That starts the fighting gun, fires the starting gun on an election, say, in October. And in that sort of mood, when Netanyahu is already on the back foot of what's happened in Iran, there's every incentive for him to be super tough in Gaza. Well, always in the background when we talk about Israel and Hamas and Lebanon and Hezbollah is the question of Syria. And the president of France, Emmanuel Macron, he landed in Damascus on Tuesday. And while Macron was on the ground meeting with Syrian President Ahmad al-Shara, a bomb exploded near the French president's hotel. At least 18 people were wounded in that attack.

1:19:46Even so, Macron and al-Shara announced they'd reestablished diplomatic ties. They signed more than a dozen new economic agreements. Jack Jetch, what do you make of these events happening simultaneously so close to each other? New warmth between France and Syria, but also kinetic explosions near where the president is staying. Well, it's clear that Syria's near-term future is going to be characterized by some violence, some infighting, but Emmanuel Macron, among other Western leaders, seems to be concluding here that Ahmad al-Shara is the person to lead the country forward, and he doesn't want to see sort of a failed state emerge in the Middle East and, you know, potentially become another canker sore for the Islamic state and other terrorist groups to emerge and perhaps refugees as well.

1:20:36So I don't think he fully trusts al-Shara. I think he sees leverage and he sees an ability to to get French companies in there. This was also an agreement that Macron was inking with al-Shara to get French shipping giants into the country, help out with Syrian logistics. So there's a business play as well for the French as Syria looks towards its economic reconstruction. Well, if Donald Trump sees the French making a business play in Syria, maybe he wants a part of that too, or at least he wants the United States to be a part of that. Al-Shara also met with the president on Wednesday on the sidelines of the NATO summit.

1:21:13Here's some of what he had to say. Do you have any questions? Mr. President, are you going to remove Syria from the state sponsor of terrorism list? I think I will, yeah. I think I will. Why wouldn't I? He's done a great job. Elizabeth Hagedorn, Syria has been on the state sponsors of terrorism list in the United States since 1979. And the Secretary of State has now officially notified Congress of their new status the same day. What's the calculus here for the Americans? Well, consider that more than a year ago in Trump's first meeting with Shara, he said he would lift all sanctions tied to the former Assad regime.

1:21:50And in that time since, his administration has rolled back several layers of sanctions, eased export controls, worked with Congress to repeal the Caesar Act, which was the toughest of the sanctions. And yet Syria remained on this terror list alongside just Cuba, Iran and North Korea, even though the new government was cooperating with the U.S. military on counterterrorism in Syria on dismantling ISIS and Hezbollah cells. And, you know, why this designation matters is it carries extra regulatory hurdles for foreign companies looking to invest in Syria. It also had a big chilling effect on banks and technology firms that were frankly just wary of doing business in a country.

1:22:33This seems like a mini rush into Syria. Jack Detch just told us that Emmanuel Macron has a business case for French companies. You're telling me that Donald Trump has a business case for American companies. Is Syria that big of a market that everybody's rushing in? or? This is a country that needs to rebuild after 14, nearly 14 years of war. The World Bank has put the price tag at doing so at more than 200 billion. A lot of opportunity there. The Trump administration wants a stable Syria. We're removing this designation. In theory, opens the door to more commercial investment. Well, this week, the president brought up an idea that he's mentioned before David Rennie, that Syria could be enlisted to fight Hezbollah in Lebanon.

1:23:13It has a lot of analysts completely baffled. Greg Karlstrom, your colleague at The Economist and friend of the show here on 1A, he called this idea, quote, one of the craziest and dumbest things the Trump administration has ever proposed. So why does it keep coming up, David Rennie? Greg thinks to get off the fence on that one, doesn't he? Say what he thinks. Yeah, look, it's someone has put it in his head that this would be a neat and smart thing to do. He's always up for some sort of hard man to take on a sort of tough problem. He, you know, back in the day, I remember the first Trump administration, his brilliant idea was that the Russians should be allowed to kind of have their will in Syria because they were tough guys who didn't care about, you know, killing a few civilians here and there to sort out Assad.

1:23:54So he's always up for someone tough to go and do the dirty work. The problem is that you speak to anyone who understands the dynamics in Lebanon, that the idea of Syrians being welcome as in any way a kind of helpful player to take on Hezbollah is just an absolute red flag to everyone in that country. And so it is just one of the weirder things he says, and we can add it to the list of weird and unhelpful things that he says. But generally, the fact that America wants Syria to be not a failed state is a good thing, and that France does, because you have others, and there's suspicions that Israel maybe doesn't want Syria to be a completely successful state, that it quite likes a broken Syria.

1:24:32So actually, if it involves a bit of weirdness and maybe a few business deals for his friends, I think probably on balance, we should take a Donald Trump that wants Syria to succeed. Well, we're talking about Emmanuel Macron of France. Let's make a stop in France briefly before we get to the end of the hour. We got to go to the UK too. Boy, do we have to go to the UK. You're going to love this one. Marine Le Pen, she's the longtime leader of France's far-right national rally party. She has a new lease on life, politically anyway. On Wednesday, a French appeals court shortened the sentence that she got in a 2025 ruling, which found that she embezzled EU funds to her party in fake job schemes.

1:25:09That means she likely can run for president in 2027, although she might have to wear an ankle monitor while campaigning. Jack Detch, what does this all mean? Is Marine Le Pen going to show off her ankle monitor and show that she's defying the state and run on that? Yeah, we'll see how the whistle-stop house arrest campaign goes for Marine Le Pen. But on paper, this does actually make the race more competitive. Le Pen pulls much higher than Jordan Bardella, her protege, who was considered to be national rally's candidate in waiting and would be running to succeed Emmanuel Macron. So, I mean, this does potentially avoid for national rally this ugly succession battle between Le Pen and Bardella, but it puts the onus on centrist parties to succeed Emmanuel Macron, to find somebody to do it, to the traditional right, to figure out what to do.

1:26:02It's interesting to see Marine Le Pen, though, in sort of this addition. She's not, I guess, as strident as she's been on some of her anti-European positions. She's not campaigning to leave NATO or the EU. She's trying to reform for a Europe of nations. So, I mean, you'd see a France that's less interventionist, of course, very anti-immigrant under this type of administration and perhaps more pro-Russia and anti-Ukraine, but perhaps not sort of the Marine Le Pen that we're used to seeing, which, you know, might lead to a breakup of France's position in NATO as some expected. Well, Marine Le Pen has a cousin, a political cousin anyway, in the UK, and his name is Nigel Farage.

1:26:51He leads the UK Reform Party. And he was instrumental in convincing British voters to leave the European Union in 2016, otherwise known as Brexit. He announced on Wednesday he was resigning his seat in Parliament and will run for the very same seat again. David Rennie, Nigel Farage loves stunts. Why is he doing this? So this is a really important story. He's not just a populist leader. He's currently in the lead. His party reform has 30 % of the vote. He is the biggest party. He could become a prime minister in some circumstances. He's under pressure on things like unexplained donations from murky friends.

1:27:26So he had this pompous whole thing. I'm going to resign from parliament. I'm going to run again in a special election in my own seat. And I'll let the will of the people decide rather than the mainstream media and the establishment. And that looked like a smart move for five minutes. And then all of the other mainstream parties, the conservatives, Labour, the Lib Dems said, we're not going to run against him. So now the only main party running against him is a gadfly comedian who runs as a satirical character called Count Binface. Count Binface is an alien from Sector Sigma-9, as I understand it.

1:27:57Let's let him speak for himself. I was on my way back home to Sigma-9, bit of R &R, and then old Nigel throws his toys out of the pram, has a hissy fit, calls an unnecessary by-election. I got wind of that. I've turned around the starship pronto. How about that? Lovely. Count, Binface is a cross between Red Dwarf and Monty Python, David Rennie. Joke candidates like this are common in Britain because you have easy ballot access laws. Binface is going to do better than your average goofball candidate. Yeah, we've had a big Labour Party donor saying he's going to give him, I believe, four million pounds or something.

1:28:37But look, it is a really interesting example that over the years, when Britain has been faced by particularly far-right candidates, one of the ways we've got around it is kind of just is laughing at them. That great British tradition, kind of Monty Python or whatever, that satirical kind of the guy kind of mocking you from the back, who do you think you are? That used to keep us safe. That didn't seem to work so well, but maybe Count Binface is going to revive the great British tradition of not getting angry with extremists, but mocking them. I was mistaken earlier in the week. I thought he was Lord Binface.

1:29:10I was corrected by a former British national that were he a Lord Binface would not be able to stand for parliament. But then he had an issue with a copyright. There's an American cult movie in which the character Lord Buckethead exists. And so he had to change to Count Binface. So he's had an upgrade on his title. All right, gang, we're going to go for the hour. I want to thank all of you for being here. It's been a fantastic hour. We appreciate your analysis. We appreciate Appreciate a really straightforward look at Count Binface in the UK elections in Nigel Farage's race with David Rennie, geopolitics editor at The Economist.

1:29:46He writes The Telegram. Check it out. Jack Detch is defense reporter at Politico. Thanks, Jack. And Elizabeth Hagedorn here in the studio with me, diplomatic correspondent for All Monitor. Elizabeth, thanks for being here. Thanks. Mike Kidd is our sound designer and engineer. Chris Castano is our digital editor. Maya Garg is our senior managing producer. Alexander Bouttee is our senior supervising producer. Aileen Humphreys is our senior producer and editor of 1A On Demand. And Thomas Liu produces our podcast. Special thanks to Matthew Simonson for additional On Demand support this week. This program comes to you from WAMU, part of American University in Washington, distributed by NPR.

1:30:27I'm Todd Zwilich. This is 1A.

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