Rahm Emanuel on How the Dems Lost Their Way and Trump's Immigration Successes, Plus, Mark Halperin, Link Lauren and Dan Turrentine | Ep. 1112

20:05Rahm Emanuel:We worked on what our job was. We didn't. That wasn't the focus. I respected what you made a choice. and also they're an adult, you're talking about kids, slightly very different. Very, very different. And a parent has a right to speak up at the school about this. My point, though, on this whole subject, though, Megan, we are talking about, let me give you an example. We're spending now, I don't know, eight minutes on this. There's 50 million kids. That's only because you won't give me a straight answer. We can move on if you give me a straight answer. I'm giving you a straight answer. Let me give you a rapid fire.

20:34Rahm Emanuel:50 million kids go to public schools, to schools in elementary education in America. We're talking about 0.01%. Okay. I get it. But I know people who have been hurt by the boys who are participating in the sports and so on. And they matter. As a father of both a son and two girls, they are fundamentally physically different. And we have to, that's just biology. You get that. Okay. And as it relates to sports. So let me just ask you a couple of things quickly. So do you believe boys should be able to play in girls sports? Do you believe that? Is this the round robin? Yeah, we'll do a quick rapid fire.

21:10And then we can move past this. Do you believe that kids under the age of 18 should be able to be put on puberty blockers and then cross-sex hormones?

21:18Rahm Emanuel:I think parents have to make that decision themselves. I think that a child is too young at 18 to make that decision. It has to be made with a family and that choice. I think before somebody makes a life decision, they have to think twice about that. So you disagree then with the Tim Walz policy in Minnesota, where a child who doesn't get affirmed by his parents can go into Minnesota and get jurisdiction there and get the parental decision overruled? Yeah, look, I think these are life decisions, and I'm also slightly both. I have two minds, not two minds, but two strains that influence an opinion.

21:54One, there's a life decision, and a child can't make that decision.

21:59Rahm Emanuel:You have to have some moral development and character and judgment and foundation for that. Two, parents have to be involved in that, and I think that's for them to make. I don't think the public should be in that space. What if, I mean, there are some parents out there who are completely whacked in the head. There really are. They're not all. Well, that's not news, is it? But it's not just on, no. No, it's not news. But to me, it's terrifying because. Look, I left this out, but I want to repeat it is. I have a son and two daughters and they are physically different. And that's why when it comes to sports.

22:34Why did all the Democrats bail off of that point? The couple came out right after the election and they said what you just said. And then they got browbeaten. And then you got the answers in the question.

22:43Rahm Emanuel:I mean, that's not ever scared me. And, you know, I used to say this to President Clinton and President Obama. Sound is not always fury. Sometimes it's just sound. And don't assume just because somebody's screaming at you, they represent more than the wrong voice. Ken, should we be putting men in female prisons? Men claiming they're women. No. And all right, here's my last one for you. Can a man become a woman? Can a man become a woman? Not, no. Thank you. No. That's so easy. Why don't more people in your party just say that? Because I'm now going to go into a witness protection plan. My money's on you.

23:23Rahm Emanuel:I think you'll be fine. No, it's just so nice to hear the truth said. Okay, we spent too much time on this. Without qualifications. Yeah, well, it just can't happen. Let's talk about... I'm not saying medically. I'm just saying it can't happen. I got it. Right. Let's talk about our cities. Okay. and NAFTA, because I know you had a role in NAFTA. And NAFTA has become so controversial now, this North American Free Trade Agreement that had the net result of shipping a bunch of American manufacturing jobs overseas or down to Mexico. And it's become super controversial with both parties. You can look back and find in-depth articles in the New York Times and, of course, over on National Review and the Wall Street Journal about what this has done to American manufacturing.

24:05My friend Tucker and many others have made this like a central plank that they want in discussions, which is how bad American cities have become. You know, how you step out of the train station, Union Station in Washington, and you're stepping over homeless people. You know, I went out for a premiere of a TV show in L.A., literally stepping over homeless encampments just to get to the building, like open air drug markets in some cities in California and further north in the Pacific Northwest. Here in New York City, you know, you've got human excrement on the street. You've got trash cans constantly overflowing.

24:40Rahm Emanuel:That's why New York needs allies like Chicago. Chicago, don't even get started. Listen, Chicago had a heyday. I lived there. I was there for five years under Mayor Daley. Those days are behind it. But this is my principal question to you, okay, because Tucker and many others will use that as an opening to say, and therefore, why are we giving money to Ukraine? And I get that point. But I think, you know, there's another question to be asked, which is, does it have to do with federal money at all? Is this condition of our cities really to blame on the feds or is it to blame on Democrat mayors in those cities and decisions like NAFTA that outshipped all the jobs that kept them driving?

25:17So let's go.

25:17Rahm Emanuel:You got like seven questions there. So let me try to peel through all eight answers. OK. One. First, let me give a shout out that's being lost in the national debate to cities. We're on course right now. And I talked to the mayor of Baltimore, Birmingham, Little Rock and Cleveland in the rest of the day. Probably the lowest homicide rate in recorded history. Baltimore's experienced the lowest homicide rate right now since 1968. So while they're Chicago doing Chicago's also reduction also. But come on. No, wait. Look, I'm I'm with you on homeless. I get the open drug market. Nobody's been more spoken about that.

25:56Rahm Emanuel:And you can go through my tenure. But that doesn't obscure or brush out. And I disagree with you on this one point that crime is on both homicide rates, violent and also property crimes on historic lows. It's a fact that's happening. They said that last year and it was debunked by the FBI. No, the FBI numbers. Just anyway, you can look at that. We're going to you and I are going to disagree to disagree on this one. It is on course for historic low levels. Now, as it relates to homeless encampments, I think municipalities, mayors have been way too permissive in a culture as it relates also to drug markets.

26:39Rahm Emanuel:Way too permissive in a culture, not just for businesses, but most importantly for families and for children. Giving out needles. And I think that the example of mayor in San Francisco, at least what I've read, the mayor in San Francisco, I think has got now the right approach to how to handle both of these issues. And it's also pretty clear. I can say this is I was ambassador. Japan came back for the Asia Pacific Conference in San Francisco. When a city wants to clear out homelessness, all of a sudden it happens when you have a bunch of foreign dignitaries. So when when their own residents want it, you should actually be as vigilant as you were when foreign dignitaries come.

27:13Well, you tell me Japan doesn't have this problem.

27:16Rahm Emanuel:That's a they also have a different type of social system and a different that's a longer conversation than when this show permits. Second piece, and I would just not have a permissive culture in that, and Portland has now realized the wrongs of their ways, parts of Seattle. You cannot allow a zone for open, quote unquote, drug markets. It then becomes a permission slip to a whole host of other type of social and criminal aspects. So that's a massive don't go there. Now, two things that I think are really important. One is, I think there was, as the president himself kept basically the structures of NAFTA, and by the end of President Clinton's term, just a fact, there were 300 ,000 more manufacturing jobs than when he came in.

28:05Rahm Emanuel:Now, I think there was a mistake made, and no doubt about it. You can't leave Peoria, Battle Creek, Racine, Kenosha to confront on their own. There was not enough support, not enough investment. America has always succeed, always succeed when you invest both in America and Americans. That's why I'm big about education, big about the investments in technology and in our strengths. The bigger challenge, I would say, is not so much NAFTA, but is what happened with China. That's where you really had a fundamental and big swaths of America were left basically to fend for themselves against the PRC, the Chinese Communist Party and their strategy.

28:49Rahm Emanuel:And that's where you've seen the devastation. Now, do I think everything should be cleaned up? You've learned certain things after a certain point vis-a-vis NAFTA, et cetera. I do. Both parties have kept it in place, the basic structure, because it's better to have, as Ronald Reagan said, two neighbors that are allies working with you because that's a large economy and also brings up the capacity to focus on other parts of the world. Second, though, China coming into the WTO without with all of us hoping they would stay as strategic competitors, not realizing that President Xi in 2012 decided that China was going to become a strategic adversary.

29:28Rahm Emanuel:And that unchecked, as you can see right now, both with the United States and the European Union dealing with China, that is where we've had a major devastation to the United States. So what what what would you say to, you know, men in those cities like Detroit wondering where their manufacturing job went. What's the Rahm Emanuel plan to bring it back? Well, one is build baby build. And my basic point is when we are short right now, not tomorrow, not looking to the future, which we are also short, massive amount of investment in car, in carpenters, electricians, plumbers, operating engineers, the whole building trade.

30:05Rahm Emanuel:You can't AI that away and you can't get it to China. How do we do that? Like, yeah, I'm going to tell you one thing. High school level. Well, yeah, I'm going to tell you one thing we did in Chicago that I think should be a national program. And you have to hire career counselors, et cetera. You could not get, we made it a requirement, starting your freshman year, we gave you support. You could not get your high school diploma without showing a letter of acceptance from either a college, community college, a branch of the armed forces, or a vocational school. You had not just the Kelly children and Emanuel children, but every child had to have a post high school plan.

30:41Rahm Emanuel:We changed the high school from a diploma driven to a career college driven. And what comes next? There you ensure that every child invest. And let me say one side note. If you look at the American history, there are three great periods of economic growth, all underpinned by one thing. There's land grant colleges under Lincoln. there are the uh universal high school education turn of century and the gi bill you could also add probably a fourth nasa in the science and engineering and basically stem as a challenge to sputnik when you invest in americans america succeeds just to be clear just to be clear because there's a lot of my audience understandably has questions about whether the modern day college education is a worthwhile i didn't say college i said college community college i know branch armed forces let me finish the question so i wanted to pick up on the last thing you said which is vocational education.

31:33So what would that look like? An additional, like how to fix cars, how to go to beauty school.

31:37Rahm Emanuel:Everything from carpentry, electrician, operating engineer, bricklaying, painting. Can you do it in high school? Like in my high school in upstate New York, we had the BOCES program and you could actually do that in your ninth through 12th grade education. We created a high school in Chicago for exactly that. And you also, one of the things we did in our community colleges, we had dual credit, dual enrollment. So we brought community college classes into high schools and kids went from high school back to the community college. A lot of the community colleges had carpentry. They had electrical.

32:09Rahm Emanuel:That would be amazing because we need it. But it's a requirement to get your own high school diploma. Your kids are going to know because they grew up in your home. High school is just one step. They're going to know where you ask your children, where are you going to be in four years or whatever? They have a plan. I just got to be honest, in the city of Chicago, which is true across the country, not just Chicago, some kids, four weeks is their plan, not four years. And making them think past high school, making it a requirement, stepping in where it's not happening at home, socializing this idea starting your freshman year is essential.

32:44Rahm Emanuel:That's number one. Number two, I happen to think investing dramatically in the most promising technologies of tomorrow ensures that America stays competitive. That and so that's part of not only you got to build these data centers, you got to build the submarines that we need to confront China. And we don't have that capacity. We're not even really thinking about it. No, we're not thinking about it. We're not investing in it. And the truth is the mistake of the last decade. The best thing I can say about President Xi is he woke us up about a decade ahead of time. Now, are we making the most use of the time?

33:17Rahm Emanuel:Absolutely not. We have to start investing quantum computing, AI, biomedical, take alternative energy, take all the promising technologies of tomorrow, massive investment in the research side, what I call that the brains part, and massive invest in the broad side so we have the capacity to make the most of this. And if you start with AI education in school, every child, every student will have the basics and fundamentals to succeed as you look around the corner. Unless the AI has already eaten us all by the time the children get this program. Let's talk about immigration, because this is another issue in schools and elsewhere that kids are doing it.

33:55I mean, in New York right now, it's crazy the number of translators they have to have in the public schools, what the kids who are American born are having to deal with. Why do you think Joe Biden let between 10, 20 million illegals into the country?

34:07Rahm Emanuel:Yeah. So there's one is let me start with what I think the challenge is. and I'm not sure why Biden did that or the Biden White House. You're also, and I want to preface, because it's not your audience knows this, my father is an immigrant, my grandfather on my mother's side, 1914, comes to America. We're a nation of laws and a nation of immigrants. That's who we are. And we're clear about the law. You break the law, the law is going to follow you. That should be simple. and we're also nation immigrants we want people from around the world who want a better tomorrow people like from asia from latin and so america and africa who want to come here and start a better future legally yeah legally now the that's number one number two and i just note is recent gallup data all about how the numbers on immigration have flipped on trump the people reacted to the chaos on the border.

35:07Rahm Emanuel:Now, President Trump went from basically being the voice of order to the inspiration behind disorder. They do not like what he's doing in Los Angeles and around the country. They see him now the inspiration behind disorder. And I think if I was in for the Democrats, we have no disagreement on confronting illegal immigration. We should be for let's have a discussion about legal immigration, because there is a break. You didn't answer my question. Why did Biden let 10 to 20 million illegal immigrants? They were not focused on what they should have been focused on. The border should never allow to be out of control.

35:41Rahm Emanuel:Now, you opened it. You're also talking to the person that for President Clinton was responsible for Operation Gatekeeper in San Diego, Operation Safeguard in Nogales, Arizona. The border should be secure. So you disagree with what Joe Biden did? I disagree with allowing chaos at the border that where people can flaunt the laws. As again, my North stars on immigration. We're a nation of laws and we're a nation of immigrants. You have to honor both. You can't allow disorder at the border and assume that it's going to be any respect for the rest of the process. Do you think would you change any of President Trump's border enforcement mechanisms if you were elected president?

36:21the border enforcement no i do think it's mistake to call out you know i say this five years

36:29Rahm Emanuel:president trump's room you know first term the first six months of his the only place he's ever called out u.s troops is on an american city and i think that's absolutely wrong i do know i you have a prisoner who's illegal pick them up if they're in the orange jumpsuit take them we'd love to but the sanctuary cities don't allow it no no but here's my point that's a lot of states All the states basically participate in making sure if you have a criminal element who is illegal, fine. No, the sanctuary cities don't allow that. You know that's true. Megan, let me then go farther. You have people going to Home Depot to get a job.

37:03That's not the problem here.

37:05Rahm Emanuel:You have people trying to go to a place of worship at the Catholic Church. That's not the problem here. Border stuff, I said it. Problem is, and this is why President Trump's also numbers have flipped on this in the country, not only Republicans and immigrants. I've seen the numbers. The latest Gallup poll shows a shift in support on President Trump for his deportation program. And that's what we're talking about now. Yes, right. You've endorsed the border policies, but not the deportation policies. And I'm also, to then get back to where I was, there is a split in the Republican Party on legal immigration.

37:37Yes, there is. Chamber of Commerce Republicans still want more.

37:39Rahm Emanuel:And if Democrats were smart, said, we're good with you on illegal as it relates to the border. Now, let's talk about legal, because that's where the wedge is in the Republican Party. They haven't, though. You know, they haven't. Well, I'm aware of that. That's what makes you a little different. And some would say, therefore, not electable by Democrats. Like I can see Rahm Emanuel, if he gets past the primary, appealing to some more centrist, independent types. But that, you know, I had Mark Halpern on the program recently. He's coming on next. And he was saying, you know, your biggest problem is going to be getting past the primary because with the Democrats who have moved to the left, who are endorsing Democratic socialists like Mondami and this guy in Minnesota.

38:19Rahm Emanuel:Well, look, that's what primaries. President Clinton wasn't who we know him to be, President Obama. Primaries will prove something and will prove something. As I like to say, given the fields, we're all stuck at that big number, 3%. OK, that's where we are. I'll have to prove something. But, you know, sometimes when you say, let's just say, quote unquote, the progressive left. Who, as you noted, or as Mark has noted, have a problem. Was it the free community college if you earn a B average in high school that you have a problem with? Was it the pre-K? It was the Laquan McDonald tape, right? So was it the minimum wage?

38:52Rahm Emanuel:Yeah. And the inspector general said that and did a report on it. And look. Just the audience. Let me just tell the audience what that is. So when Rahm was mayor of Chicago, there was an officer involved shooting of a black man named Laquan McDonald. And there was a tape of the incident that was kept quiet, kept not accessible by the public by a decision by you. for a year and then ultimately you can correct me when i'm done yeah and then ultimately you released it and it did show that the officer was to blame and that he should he shot when he shouldn't have and then there was an immediate drop in polling for in support of you by especially the black and hispanic communities in chicago and some have never forgiven you for not releasing releasing the tape earlier you can correct me as your lawyer you know what the rules are as it relates in the middle of an investigation so one let me go all the way to the back Laquan's uncle who's a pastor on the West Side, big supporter of mine.

39:45Rahm Emanuel:And there's not a day or a week that goes by that I don't rethink what ifs. And you don't get a do over in politics. You only get lessons learned applied forward. And I thought I had fixed the system beforehand. And clearly the problems are much deeper. And I own that. That's why. And I take responsibility for that. and responsibility not only to fix it, but to also get the place of the city in a better place. There were seven attempts at police reform before I got there. This one is finally sticking. And the other thing is, you know, Joe Ferguson, the inspector general went through it, said I followed.

40:25The problem was I did follow the procedures. That's the problem is they were put in

40:30Rahm Emanuel:place and you have kind of two tensions on one side. If you, you got the FBI, the U S attorney investigating cities, investigating state is investigating. If you unilaterally make a decision, you hamper a criminal investigation. That officer when served three years, if you don't do it, you only drive the wedge between the police and the community even further. And so you're caught between this Solomon like choice, either one, one, you break the law, the other one. What I hear you saying is you think it's explainable. You think you think this is not a deal breaker for Democrat primary voters. Look, I have the responsibilities I did when I got Senate confirmed for for Ambassador Japan.

41:09Rahm Emanuel:I will explain it. I own it. And if you're looking for 100 percent, nobody is. But I learned my lessons going forward. And that's going to be true for anybody who's a chief executive. Tying together the possibility of you as the Democrat nominee with our previous discussion on illegal immigration, you may be aware that Hunter Biden has some thoughts on you. Shared with a podcaster I do not know and have never heard of. Hold on a second. I'll tell you who he is. His name is Andrew Callahan. OK. It's a three hour long interview. This guy's a comedian and journalist and YouTuber. And Hunter had some thoughts on you, among other issues.

41:51including illegal immigration. Here he is. And he's somehow convinced all of us that these people are the fucking criminals. White men in America are 45 more times likely to commit a fucking violent crime than an immigrant. And the media says, well, you got David Axelrod and, you know, Rahm fucking Emanuel. So fucking smart Rahm Emanuel. And so we got to understand that these people are really mad. And we got to appeal to these white voters. Rahm, the only people that fucking appealed to those fucking white voters was Joe Biden, 81 years old, and he got 81 million votes. And he did because not because he appeased their fucking Trumpian sense, but because he challenged it.

42:31And he said, you can be an 81-year-old Catholic from fucking Scranton that doesn't understand it, but still has empathy for transgender people and immigrants. And nobody said, oh, Joe Biden's going to turn us into a socialist state, no matter how much they said it. But these guys think that we need to run away from all values in order for us to lead. I say, fuck you. How are we getting those people back from fucking El Salvador? He's got a potty mouth. Neither you nor I have failed to utter that word in our past. I know this.

43:02Rahm Emanuel:But we went 50 minutes here clean. He's a big fan of it. I don't know. I kind of like Rahm fucking Emmanuel. I could see that on a sign, like a lawn sign for you. Your thoughts on his thoughts about you? I'm kind of feeling for Axelrod right now. He got thrown down in the gutter with me. I've got an empathy. But I don't I think we're giving this more time than it's due. That's my own view. Yeah. Yeah. A little empathetic. You have a son who's blinded by his own love for an effect and loyalty for his father. And I get that, but not the first phone call I'm going to make for a strategery. Good to hear.

43:40He's he's also been out there and said it there in part that saying the only reason that the Dems lost last presidential election is because they weren't loyal to his father. Yeah.

43:48Rahm Emanuel:Megan, as you probably know, there's a lot of stories about Dems have to now start swearing to look like they're normal or something like that. I was 30 years ahead of my time. I'm like a good bottle of wine. Still not normal? I mean, I don't I just it's not we spent two minutes way too much time. I'm not this isn't about Hunter, but I know your brother, Ari, according to the Jake Tapper book, was very outspoken about getting Biden off the ticket, saying he cannot do it. We need a plan. Come up with a real plan. You're not your brother's keeper, but you're Joe Biden's ambassador to Japan. Did you share those feelings?

44:26Rahm Emanuel:I was appointed by Joe. I was America's ambassador to Japan. So and that's how I took the role. But I was honored that President Biden selected me. Um, so here's my thing is look, one that everybody said, Oh, it was a coverup or whatever. 83 % of the American people issued a judgment. If it was a coverup, the American people were in on it because they had their own opinion. Number two, does this look like subtle, quiet, reserved? No. Okay. So, um, number three, I have a general rule. I mean, just look, oval offices are very seductive. been in and out of them with two presidents for eight years.

45:08Rahm Emanuel:White House is one of the challenges they have is not to be as insular as they become. It's pretty clear that that both of those qualities played a role here. Now, I slightly disagree with other Democrats. I actually think this was a winnable race. And it's pretty clear if you look at the data, it was a winnable race. And the real challenge, in my view, is why Democrats failed. It was not going to be a blowout race, but you could, the data was there and the capacity was there to win, and the Democrats fumbled it. You think it was winnable with Joe Biden? No, but it was a winnable race. Okay. If there had been some sort of a reset.

45:50Rahm Emanuel:Look, 70 % of the country thought it was heading in the wrong direction. That's kind of architecturally built in for a challenger. But the day Kamala Harris takes over, the Democrats are down, Biden-Harris are down eight. By the time you get to her debate with Donald Trump, she's up three. That's not a statistical error. She was running on the economy, running on what I think is the most important issue, that the American dream is unaffordable. It's inaccessible to the American people, and that is unacceptable to us. This shouldn't be that hard. Owning a home has become a struggle. The system is stacked against people.

46:28Rahm Emanuel:It used to be. You're not wrong. OK, that's the fun. And we went off on all these other tangents. They're telling you what the core thing is. And when Kamala Harris spoke to it, she goes up plus three after the debate. She wanders off into this democracy thing. So in a weird way, when she makes a break with Joe Biden and says. she does i'm going to be the future i'm going to be change she but all the answers of i don't distinguish my agenda at all then basically debate or from the view uh performance she basically i'm going to be continuity she goes down so to me it tells you that no disrespect to hunter buttons hunter biden's analysis that this was winnable now i do think there are below that surface forget 2024 for one second.

47:21I think the Iraq war, the financial meltdown of 08,

47:28Rahm Emanuel:China into the WTO unchecked and COVID have fundamentally not only upended our politics, upended our economics, upended our schools, and we haven't yet recovered from all of that. Totally agree with that. And every word one, Iraq was built on a lie and a deception and people responsible for it have never been held accountable. As somebody who in the Obama administration argued for Old Testament justice, the bankers should have been slapped silly on the South lawn, line them up and just beat the living crap out of them. And they weren't. They were arguing for their bonuses and people lost their homes.

48:07Rahm Emanuel:Yeah. Number three. what we talked about China earlier still applies in this conversation, which is they were cleaning our clocks and we left America basically unilaterally disarmed to face off against China by themselves. And COVID also, and this is where I think Democrats have made a mistake, we donned the jacket of the establishment, follow the science, follow the science, when it's pretty clear, like take schools. COVID as it relates to young kids wasn't what it was related to people that were either both ill or much older. And now we have an absentee rate of 20%. We look at our shoes and we don't want to talk about it.

48:42Rahm Emanuel:So when you look at those four things, that is to me the biggest structural challenges of our society, our economy, and our democracy. Here's the thing I have to ask you. Is it possible for a cisgender heteronormative male who happens to be Jewish to get the Democrat nominee for president in 2025 America? Well, that's going to be up to the Democratic force, but I'm going to make the best case. Yeah, I get that number. Don't worry about that. Look, let's just take Jewish. Yes, I do. Because I will say one thing. When I ran for Congress, my predecessors were Dan Rosankowski, Roman Pachinsky, Frank Annunzio, Rob McCoy, and Flanagan.

49:22Rahm Emanuel:And along comes Rahm Israel Emanuel. Same thing. There was only 2 % Jewish in the district. But the Dem Party has changed on Israel. I'm going to get right there. I want to saying, I've had Nazi insignia sprayed on a fence. I've seen it. And I've seen, I still don't know, somebody go clean it up. So I've seen the best of people. I've seen people look past, not past faith, or more importantly, not past my faith, because it is who I am. My name is Rahm Israel Emanuel, not according to Hunter Biden, but it is who I am. Okay? So I look at that, and my faith and my Jewish education is what led me to public service.

50:00Rahm Emanuel:And I'm very proud of it. Now, by way, I am the only person who's ever gone toe-to-toe with Bibi Netanyahu. He called me a self-hiding Jew publicly. So I support the state of Israel. I support its existence. I support it as a Jewish democratic nation, a sovereign nation. But I am willing, when I disagree, speak about that. And I've said that, but do I think so? I do because in the end of the day, our party believes in both economic kind of equality and also equality in a political system. And this country, this idea, and I say this, I want you to hear. My grandfather came here from Ukraine with nothing.

50:45that his grandson, that he used to call a schmuck, could be both a chief of staff to a president,

50:51Rahm Emanuel:a senior advisor, elected to Congress, the mayor of the city that we called home, and then represent America over. This is the greatest country in the world, not because of my success, but because of the story and the permission that has allowed somebody whose own grandfather didn't have a bucket to spit in and a window to throw it out of, could provide that opportunity. And I'll close on this because we didn't get to this about family. My parents in our family room had my grandmother's purse with her and my two great aunts passports. And on either side of that purse were the black and white photos of my aunts, uncles, cousins, a mom and dad's side who never made it to this country.

51:36Rahm Emanuel:There's nothing subtle in a Jewish home. you are given a gift it's called the united states of america you respect that gift and you honor that gift and that is what i look with and i think the country as a father with two kids in the armed forces will respect that thank you so much i think your children are wrong you should talk about your dad and your grandpa your kids you nailed it i gotta thank god it was only a minute because i was i was close to tears there and i see the cleanucks right there thank you thanks for coming back will you yeah all the best to you and we'll be right back with mark.

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54:26Okay, we've got some friends of the show joining me now to recap what we just saw and talk about all the latest headlines as well. Let's get to it with two of the hosts on the MK Media Podcast Network. Mark Halperin, host of Next Up with Mark Halperin. And Link Lauren's here, too. He's host of Spot On with Link Lauren, along with former Democratic strategist Dan Turntine, a co-host of The Morning Meeting on the two-way YouTube channel with Mark. Guys, welcome. Great to have you. Thanks for having us. So fun. I didn't know which hour to look forward to more, but I'm psyched this once here. It's like game post-game.

54:56All right. So let's start. Let's pretend we didn't talk about the Rahm Emanuel interview during break and give me your fresh impressions. Dan, you go first. I thought he did great. I mean, I think considering this is like early in the game, no one's going to be perfect at this point. He had good answers. I thought when you asked him about the workforce and the economy, I thought even on immigration, right? You heard the echoes of Bill Clinton followed where a nation of laws, a nation of immigrants. He kept coming back to that. He, you know, when you tried to talk to him about the border and everyone coming in, he said, I don't know why they didn't do it, but they shouldn't have.

55:29I thought he did well. I thought the one issue where he was a little bit was the transgender. That's obviously a touchy issue in the party. But I thought that he did very well. And when I think about people who understand what you need to do to win, that is somebody who understands what it takes. Yep. I think for me, maybe it's a generational difference, but half the electorate is going to be Gen Z and millennials by 2028. And when you think of Rahm Emanuel and you Google him, Every picture is him cavorting with the Clintons, the Obamas, the Bidens. He looks like politics as usual, and he looks like the embodiment of the swamp.

56:03And even in the interview, I felt he came across a little smarmy trying to control the interview. He was wishy-washy on some of the trans stuff. And it's like, you're a 65-year-old man. You've been in politics for decades, the upper echelons of politics. And you can't give straight answers on these questions that we want. And you kept asking about men in women's restrooms and in girls' bathrooms. He said, oh, it's not a dominant issue. Let's move on. It's not a dominant issue. But then Kamala Harris, part of the reason she lost were those swing state ads on taxpayer-funded transgender surgeries for inmates.

56:29These might not be the dominant issues to you, and you might think they're culture war issues, but they're still going to galvanize voters. So I just didn't find him that likable. Okay, so he did not get Link's vote, Mark. No, and they're both right. I've known Rahm since your senior year in college, so I've known him a long time. Dan is right that Rahm graded on a curve against some of these other people who were talked about. his level of sophistication, his level of confidence, his level of understanding the intersection of politics, politics and the press. It's light years ahead of almost any other Democrat, not just thinking of running for president, but almost any Democrat active on the national stage.

57:05Link's right, too. There's so many issues related to Rahm that make it almost impossible to imagine him actually being the nominee, not only because he's, as your questions teased out, he's crosswise with the base. But he's yesterday. He's a longtime political figure, made millions in investment banking. He's not on paper what the party is currently looking for. So I think he showed his best and his worst with you. And I think you asked him about all the right issues that teased that out and put it in sharp. It was fascinating. So from my perspective, but I'll say one thing about yesterday before I get to my perspective.

57:40So was Joe Biden. He was yesterday and he won. I'm talking about the first time around. So there is the possibility that even though you've got baggage and you've got party affiliations and you've got all the connections for 50 years, you could be the man. Walter Mondale was the nominee too, but we're in a different time, I think. And even from four years ago. Yeah, we've got Mom Donnie now, like they are next mayor here. So they're really going. Let's hope not. But my own impression was, so I thought we had a very cordial first 48 minutes together and that's good i mean and we kind of laughed about it after the fact that we're sure meeting number two will be a little bit more contentious yeah yeah it was my first time interviewing him uh no people like rahm emmanuel did not come on fox news we did not have access yeah so but i liked it you know we touched on some hot button issues but we kept it cordial and i think that's good i really wanted the audience to get to know him and i wanted to see if he would say normal things to me without me like beating him over the head or him beating me over that.

58:37And I was amazed at some of his direct answers. Like, yes, he wiggled on the trans thing for quite a while. But in the end, when we did our little lightning round, he did give me a couple of points of like the men in prison. We have it cut. Here's here. Watch.

58:51Rahm Emanuel:I have a son and two daughters and they are physically different. And that's why when it comes to sports, why did all the Democrats bail off of that point? The couple came out right after the election and they said what you just said, and then they got browbeaten and then you got The answer's in the question. I mean, that's not ever scared me. And, you know, I used to say this to President Clinton and President Obama. Sound is not always fury. Sometimes it's just sound. And don't assume just because somebody's screaming at you, they represent more than their own voice. Ken, should we be putting men in female prisons?

59:22Men claiming they're women. No. And, all right, here's my last one for you. Can a man become a woman?

59:30Rahm Emanuel:Can a man become a woman? Not. No. Thank you. No. That's so easy. Why don't more people in your party just say that? Because I'm now going to go into a witness protection plan. Is he? I mean, listen, you guys know, I realize that wasn't like hugely like a huge breakthrough. We all talk about what's true and what's real every day. But for a guy who wants to be the Democratic nominee, that was pretty bold. Well, I think the overarching thesis and takeaway from the interview is just how broken the Democrat brand is, that a guy goes, men and women are different. And we're like, hooray! Yay! He's like, oh, wait a minute.

1:00:06Men and women have biological differences. We're going, yes, amazing. This is groundbreaking for a Democrat. Like, that's how broken the identity is. But he's going to have a hard time in the primary because the Democrat Party has been co-opted by this, like, loud, progressive, vocal minority, and they just keep capitulating to them. So I don't really think he has a prayer. He might have some good ideas and he seems strong on some issues, but I don't think he has a prayer in a primary. Does that come back to haunt him? No. I mean, I think, look, the interesting thing— No, it does not come back to haunt him?

1:00:32No. And I'll tell you why. Even hanging out with you might come back to haunt him. That's right. There's two things going on. The first is the party after the election said, we know we need to make change. Now, anytime anyone's attempted to do it, as he said, the base has yelled. Rahm's issue is going to be both two things. He's going to have to do these sister soldier moments. The party needs to do sister soldier moments. Where you break with your party. And he's got that right. I don't worry about that. Rahm's other challenges. He's going to have to throw some bones to the base and where he chooses to do that, because the problem for Rahm is the energy is in the base and the base can't stand him.

1:01:05You asked him about it. You asked about a very sensitive issue that he has with the black community. He's going to have to figure out, and I have no doubt he's thinking about this, where am I going to lock arms with them and unapologetically charge against Donald Trump and J.D. Vance and everybody else? Other candidates, it's the complete opposite. They're inching up to that sister soldier moment. Gavin Newsom on the podcast with Charlie Curran flirted with it, took so much heat. He then, you know, and was really kind of struggling until the immigration thing propelled him forward within our party, maybe not the general electorate.

1:01:38But so, I mean, Rahm's got two things. But again, he thinks about that stuff. He'll be smart about it. He'll be strategic. And I have no doubt when he does, he'll move forward aggressively. Let me be honest about Rahm. Rahm likes to be honest. Rahm's talented, right? He's one of the most talented Pauls. He's not Bill Clinton. He's not Barack Obama. He's not George Bush. And he's not Donald Trump. He's not in their league. He's a super talented staffer, which he once was. He was a super talented candidate for mayor. super talented DCCC head. He's talented, but he's not their category of talented.

1:02:15So can someone less talented than those four guys, all of whom stood up to their party and appealed to the base, right? Simultaneous, make people in the base feel good and stand up to people in the base. That's really hard. I just don't know that Rahm is talented enough to do that, except he's running against a bunch of people who are less talented. So he might be talented enough to do it, but he's not in their league but i will say the people he's running against let's say it's like aoc gavin newsome they have some star quality and charisma that's what i was missing maybe if i watched it i would get a different feel but listening to it it was kind of like low energy jeb bush kind of like that sort of slow i don't think he's low energy but it's just like the answer yeah where's the other gear though i guess in this interview it just felt kind of like low to me and he's kind of like yeah i'm thinking about that so i don't know if he has the star power and charisma to tap into the sort of like populism on the left that the right has had for so long and then to go to what you mentioned, the reason President Trump caught fire in 2015 and 16 is because he was willing to call out the elites and the establishment in his own party, these neocons and who'd been running the party for 15, 20 years.

1:03:15I don't know if Rahm is going to be able to do that because the left likes. He is one. Yeah, he is one. And the left likes to cast purity tests way more than the right. You said one thing we disagree with or we don't like this one little thing. So I think he's going to have a tough time. He doesn't sound woke. I'm not sure whether any Democrat who's not woke is going to get nominated next time around. The party just does, they're captured by it. It's, it's a cancer. It's metastasized. There's no excising it. I know normies like you, Dan, would like it to be, but I just don't think it can happen.

1:03:44The only thing is our party's history, we flirt with these very progressive candidates, Howard Dean, you know, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, Sanders in 16 and, and both of them in, in 2020. Our history is we back off and go with the safe candidate. Now, our party is more left than we were in the past. And at some point that may come to an end, that pattern. But as a party, we tend to value victory and who we think has the best chance way more than people I think kind of give us credit for. Here's what's cautionary for me. What was the most obvious question you were going to ask him? What was the thing he should be prepared for more than any other?

1:04:24About how he's going to win over his... Well, trans, trans, right? Oh, you mean for me, Megan? Yeah, yeah, for Megan. Yes, for sure. So he basically tried to avoid answering until you wouldn't let him, right? Yes. That to me, I mean, how he could have been relative, maybe he thinks that was the right way to do it. But to me, that seems unprepared, not just mechanically unprepared, but if he's not ready to confront that issue with you, what's he waiting for? Yeah, you know for sure I'm going to be asking about that. He also, he did, for the record, endorse minors getting puberty blockers into cross-sex hormones, meaning they get sterilized for life.

1:04:58They lose sexual function as long as their parents agree, which is not what the side of reason believes at all. And his bathroom answer wasn't great either. No, because he'd already allowed it. Well, but he could say on reflection, I think it was a bad idea. And he didn't abandon it. Without Trump. I did. He did not abandon that. But he did not say that a man could become a woman. and he said men should be in women's prisons and he seemed to say men should be in women's sports he's kidding himself if he thinks i i believe he can say that's not the focus the focus is on the that's that's never gonna fly with me or anybody else like i'm sorry whether it's hubris we'll decide what the focus is like that's the one advantage of having this job the base will decide too yeah but i mean i'm saying look literally having done all these presidential debates I'm sorry.

1:05:43I will decide. It is up to me. I will be the one to put this issue. We're trying to win back the working class voters for whom that was a bigger issue than we thought it was. It's the cultural, do you understand us? We started losing them culturally in the 90s. We then lost them economically in the last 10 years. We got to win them back on both fronts. And I don't want to just be negative about him. Because again, I think he's more talented than almost anybody else who might run. What he gave you was a bunch of tactical replies. Megan's going to ask this. I'm going to say this. I'm going to try to change the subject.

1:06:14She didn't change the subject. Now I got to answer. Did you feel as hard on any of those issues? I liked the last answer about America. I'm saying on the top of her shoes. The American stuff's easy. He can do hard on that. There was no, you know, again, to go back to the question of authenticity. It was all tactics. I think the education thing is legit to him. Yeah. I mean, that's sellable. That's an easy one. It's a real issue. Exactly. Yeah. On the easy ones, he's great. Yeah. On the hard ones, I thought it was all just tactical. The one place I disagree with you, though, Mark, is on the vocational training stuff.

1:06:42I do think he believes in it, which it's easy. No one's against vocational training. Well, but we fumbled over what we want to do on the economy like to no end. Sure. But but he just to me, he's he's not trying to show his heart on those things. He's just trying to get through it. I wonder whether he'll have it improved to the point that he can sell it. Because, look, Gavin Newsom suffers from a different problem. And he was saying we're all at three percent. That's not exactly true. Kamala Harris is at 12. My God. Good luck, Dan. Let's go back to Rome. Right after Kamala is Gavin, who's up there, I think single, like maybe nine.

1:07:17And then everybody else is down lower. AOC is up there, but it's not going to happen. So he's right that there's no real front runner, and we don't think Kamala Harris is actually going to run for president again. So it's really him and Gavin maybe looming up there. And Gavin Newsom, I don't know. He may be formidable. To me, he's just such an obvious snake oil salesman who will say anything depending on who's across from him. I just think people will be able to see through that from a mile away. And they might like the steady Eddie with a couple sharp elbows. Rahm fucking Emanuel. Rahm Deadfish.

1:07:52Whatever it is. Well, my thing with Gavin Newsom is he can't even call his wife his wife. She's like his partner. And she's given the man multiple kids. And then he was against men and women sports for a minute in the Charlie Kirk interview. He's gone back. Now he's fighting with the DOJ. Gavin Newsom stands for nothing. So if Rahm Emanuel can have black and white straight up answers for things, just be straight with the American people. And to go to your point, Dan, the left and the mainstream media constantly like to tell Americans what issues are important to them. Oh, trans is a culture war issue.

1:08:19It's not a big deal. Well, these millions of moms turned out for President Trump because it was a big deal. Oh, we don't care about seed oils. This food isn't going to decide this election. Those Maha moms came and turned out. So every issue matters now, especially with social media. I think Rahm's got to fine tune some of these answers. The other thing is, can I tell you, I was thinking about this last week, you know, right before the fall of the Roman Empire, the culture completely imploded with debauchery and no connection to faith or something bigger than oneself and all these, you know, not caring for the weak or, you know, for unborn babies at all.

1:08:50And that's why the culture wars do matter. Like we're, we're back there in some ways with like throuples and people trying to normalize pedophilia with the minor attracted person label and the cutting off of children's genitals in the name of like equity and inclusion, dividing us by race, trying to make little girls boys when they're not like all this stuff. You can dismiss it as culture wars, but I actually think it's the degradation of a cohesive society. It's what happens when you remove faith as a guiding principle of any society. And it really is the road to end times. Like, it's fine to just dismiss it as like, oh, your sweet little culture.

1:09:30No, it's the road to end times. So, like, if we don't fight back against it, we're going to completely lose everything that's dear to us. I don't know if he knows that or if he's just too much of a Democrat to really see that. He travels in circles where these things are not as big a deal. He just does. What do you make of Gavin Newsom, though, against him? Those two on a stage. Picture that. I still think Newsom's not going to run. I'm the only one who does. You really do. Why? Because in the interview I did with him on the MK Media Network, he talked about his daughter being upset that she had to be followed around by one security person when she went out.

1:10:04And when are you going to leave? She said, he said, his daughter said, when are you going to leave office so I can stop this? If he runs for president and wins. He's not. He doesn't even know the daughter's damn name. Who the hell is this daughter? Oh, please. I also don't think his wife wants him to run. You don't? Oh, Jennifer Schiphol-Nusome. Jennifer. First partner does not want him to run. I may be wrong. Maybe he'll do it, but I don't. If he does run and it's him against Rom, then I think you will see an elevated debate. I don't, I don't, I think those two guys will have a serious conversation about the party.

1:10:37With all due respect, this is a guy who sleeps with his campaign manager's wife. He's an alcoholic who kind of lied about going to rehab and we're suddenly like he's father of the year. His daughter really doesn't want him to run for president. Oh, please. He's going to run if he wants to. And they'll still make his daughter play against a boy. Even though he gives lip service that he won't when he's interviewing. I mean, I don't know how he can't be thinking seriously about it and leaning towards it, given the last month and a half that he's had. I mean, we can all debate whether what he advocated for with the L.A.

1:11:04riots was smart or not. But he's had a moment in the party. I don't think anyone's had a better last month as a Democratic candidate for 2028 than Gavin Newsom. Well, because the bar is low. Agreed. 100 percent. Seventh ring of hell. But the party now, like if you read articles when he went to South Carolina, you look at focus groups. What does everyone say? He's fighting. Oh, my God, he fights. He stood up to Trump. He now has this communications team where he's trolling J.D. Vance. He's doing better on social media. He's employing a lot of the tactics. He's not speaking our language, but you have to acknowledge that he's out there swinging.

1:11:37Well, he is speaking the language of Donald Trump, which is nonstop front foot in your face. I'm going to troll you. I'm going to hit you. I'm going to mock you. I'm going to do everything. And our base, just as the Republican base craved it in 15 of like, oh, my God, he's not apologizing on immigration or any of this stuff. We can again, we can debate good general election strategy. But I don't know how you go to South Carolina and Jim Clyburn says, I like this guy. He's got a bright future, I think. And go home and say, well, hon, I'm hanging. Yeah, all right. That was nice. I would have won.

1:12:07There's four factors that I think get lost in the conversation about running for president that I don't know that he'll do as well in. And I'm very bullish, more bullish than you two are on his skills. One is, what are the early states they're going to vote? We don't know. But if the early states include Iowa and South Carolina, let's see how he does. Gavin, we're talking about. Gavin. Number two, raising money. He should be able to raise a ton of money as governor of California. He's got the best digital list to raise money. I want to see if he can raise serious money. OK, number three is effort.

1:12:35Is he willing to get up every day with his young kids and living on the West Coast and do the 10 things that's necessary to do to run? And then the last thing is, how do you handle a crisis? How do you handle a political crisis when they come at you? I don't think we've seen him handle political crisis particularly well. Or real crises. There's nothing rebuilt in L.A. whatsoever. Not a single home is rebuilt. But look at when he's been like, remember that thing where he was on the cell phone and a lady was trying to talk to him like, yeah, like that's, you know, look at it. Look at how Bill Clinton, look at how Donald Trump handled Access Hollywood.

1:13:06Look at how Bill Clinton handled Jennifer Flowers in the draft. Look at how Barack Obama handled Reverend Wright. Like, I just don't see in him someone who digs deep when that stuff happens. So in those four areas, he's not as great as he's been in some of these other things, as Dan pointed out. And I just think there's reason to be skeptical that he's going to play at that level. I'll tell you something about Rahm that we didn't get into today. he's as vicious on Trump as Gavin Newsom is. Like we didn't get into Trump today. He won't be running against Trump, notwithstanding what Steve Bannon says.

1:13:37And so, but every Democrat is still going to run on Trump, right? Like whoever it is, whether it's JD or Marco or could be Tulsi, who knows? It's going to be all about Trump. So I think he'll, he'll also appear as a fighter because he'll be out there saying the nastiest things possible about Donald Trump. And I do wonder, though, like, how's that going to go? Because I don't think Rahm Emanuel or Gavin Newsom or anybody else I've heard of on Team Blue has the oratory skills of J.D. Vance or Marco Rubio, who are, I just think, going to eat their opponents alive. And either one of those guys will kill them unless they increase their game by the time they get out there.

1:14:17Well, even Gavin Newsom, they thought he was going to do great in that debate with DeSantis. They're like, DeSantis, they're going to wipe the floor with him. Newsom's this snake oil salesman, greasy guy, talker. And he goes out there. Ron DeSantis holds up like a poop map. He just wipes the floor with Newsom. I forgot about that. Yeah. I don't think people were expecting. And Newsom kind of floundered and flailed. And I think that's what happens when you press Newsom. And we saw that in the Sean Ryan interview. He was pressed very delicately about eight-year-olds transitioning and cross-sex hormones for kids.

1:14:44Couldn't give a straight answer. It was a lot of this sort of air traffic control. Bob Fosse jazz hands. And he couldn't give an answer. And so Gavin Newsom, I don't even think it's a guarantee. Gavin Newsom makes it out of a primary. Could you put him on a debate stage? He crumbles so quickly. Like he seems unwell. Like something's off with him. Like he's going to crumble really fast. I know what you mean. Like why does he gesticulate so violently? More than Tim Walz. It makes me distrust him, really, because I've said this before, but my CIA guy, Phil Houston, invented the deception detection program there.

1:15:15They still use all over the world. Hands above the midline is a tell, if coupled with another sign of deception, that you're lying. It has to be two signs of deception within five seconds of asking the question. This is not voodoo. This is real. He's a human lie detector. He's outed bad guy terrorists who we thought were working for us. He's found double agents within the CIA who we thought we were using against another country, but really they'd been turned against us. Phil Houston is the man. And he's ready to arrest Gavin Newsom. He hasn't weighed in on Gavin. but just FYI, hands above the midline can be a tell if it's coupled with another sign of perception.

1:15:51I've literally never done that by the way. Like this. I do it all the time but I'm not a real blonde. Watch out. I'm deceiving you. I'll do it when I'm like making a point. It has to be coupled with something else like a verbal attack. Like how could you ask me that kind of a question? That's, I'm lying. Like Nathan Thurm on Saturday Night Live. Who's he? He's a character who would say stuff like maybe someone should interview you. Maybe someone should investigate you. Are you asking me all the questions? All right. So that's enough about Rahm Emanuel and Gavin Newsom. This is a long way off, although kind of it's not.

1:16:20It always starts early. I don't know. It's too soon. OK, President Trump has been in there for six months. Can I say one more thing about the very first question you asked him? Why are you here? I thought his answer was abysmal. He just kind of joked about it. You didn't like it. He should have said, I want to reach every American. You have a huge audience of people who have been trending Republican and I want to win him back. Not I had nothing better to do. I don't know. I just thought I just thought that was it set a it set a tone. If he's serious about reaching your audience, I just thought that was kind of disrespectful.

1:16:50Come on bended knee with a bouquet of flowers. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good point. And say and say we had to fight for every vote. We can't let people who voted for Donald Trump vote Republican in four years. And again, I'm not I'm not against joking. I just think the reason that George Bush and Donald Trump and Bill Clinton and Barack Obama all won is because they ran simultaneously appealing both to their party and to a general election electorate. And he just seemed to me just missed the opportunity to do that. He told me before the interview, and I don't think he would mind if I repeated that because he seemed to suggest he might tell the story himself, that he was here in part because his sister-in-law listens to the show and heard me say something nice about him.

1:17:36He should have said that. Blended family could have done a answer like that. Yeah, so he was like, well, maybe she'll give me a fair shot and I'll go over there. And I did. And so, listen, when he comes back, we'll see if he does better, if he takes these pieces of advice to heart. But I want to talk about Trump because there's been a very interesting development now on the within the intel community around Trump. Tulsi Gabbard late on Friday. And I just want to say, as on all things, I am a truly honest broker on this. I'm still trying to figure out what's real. I don't know. Like who she is accusing of what, for instance.

1:18:08No, whether she's right and Matt Taibbi, who I love, is right, that this is a bombshell and it's terrible and people really could go to jail, or whether Andy McCarthy at National Review, who I love and respect and who's a totally honest broker too, is correct, that this is a complete nothing burger and she's totally off and apparently hasn't read her own CIA director's release of last week. and that he would suggest she hasn't really been following the Russiagate scandal because everything she just told us is old. And so I'm really trying to figure out, but just to set it up for the audience, this is very complex.

1:18:47On Friday night, Tulsa Gabbard went on Fox News and said that she'd found documents that she was releasing that show in some substance that one day the intelligence community under Barack Obama was ready to come out and say that the Russians did not interfere in the 2016 election and really had no part in it. And that whole thing was kind of bullshit. Then Barack Obama pulled them all into the White House. They had a big meeting. And then literally the next day, they were like, Russia interfered to help Trump and leaked it to all the reporters Washington Post. And the suggestion is that Obama turned to them and said, I'm not having a report coming out of you guys saying that they didn't interfere.

1:19:37Our whole narrative is that Hillary would have won had it not been for the Russians. Now, give me a report that says that. That's the implication. And that then the intel community did it and the subservient Washington Press Corps ran with it. And that's how the narrative really took off that the Russians had gotten Trump elected. Okay. So Andy McCarthy's point in response is, okay, you're talking apples and oranges. What they said prior to the Obama meeting was we've seen nothing to suggest the Russians hacked election machines, even though they tried in a couple of places, but that they didn't, they were not able to do anything technologically that would have altered the outcome in election with raw vote.

1:20:24Then they have the Obama meeting and then they come out. And it's true that their report that they issued then was all about the ways Russia did interfere, like fake articles about Hillary, bots that circulated negative news about her. And they hacked the DNC mail, which is how we have a lot of the admissions we have from her and her terrible family. Anyway, he's saying it's apples to oranges. And while she is producing now emails that do show they were ready to say no interference when it comes to election machines prior, that we kind of knew everything that she's saying already. I'm going to show you her announcement.

1:21:04I think we have it, guys, don't we, on Friday night. Yeah, sat nine. Let's play it. Spells out in great detail exactly what happens when you have some of the most powerful people in our country directly leading at the helm, President Obama and his senior most national security cabinet, James Comey, John Brennan, James Clapper and Susan Rice and others, essentially making a very intentional decision to create this manufactured, politicized piece of intelligence with the objective of subverting the will of the American people. The list goes on and on about the consequences of President Obama and his senior cabinet members politicizing intelligence once again, and I say these words very clearly to enact what was essentially a years long coup subverting the will of the American people.

1:22:04One of the other points Andy made was that he's not a fan of Tulsi. He wasn't behind her confirmation. But he's also saying it's not a surprise to him that Tulsi Gabbard would try to exonerate Russia entirely and instead blame America. Right. Like sort of say Russia didn't do anything whatsoever. And he's his point is she's overstating it. Russia did do some things, But it didn't cost Hillary the election. He and he doesn't contend that. But that we're we're now sort of manufacturing something for press clicks or and possibly indictments that may not be there. Anybody want to take this? I mean, look, I'll say this.

1:22:38I am with you. I'm not sure what she's doing, because I think what she's trying to argue is it wasn't determinative to the outcome. But there is no debate. Russia tried to influence the election. As you say, they bought ads on YouTube. They bought ads on Facebook. They had chat bots. They hacked email. They wanted Donald Trump to win. Now, the question was, did the Trump campaign collude? Robert Mueller ruled there was no definitive proof that they colluded. But I'm not sure what I almost get the sense that what she's saying is like they didn't try to interfere in the election. And what's also fact is the Obama administration the last month of the campaign was aware of what was going on and struggled.

1:23:16Do they go public with this? Do they put it out? If we do, it's going to look like we're trying to tip the scales. After the election, they huddled and said, we need to get out both as like a PSA. Hey, Russia, you tried to do this and we're aware of it. And then they said, was there collusion? Was there perhaps something more there? I think that latter part they wanted to put out into the kind of, you know, mainstream to be like someone needs to go look at this. Right. And obviously that enraged Trump. And he didn't want, you know, he wanted and he wanted everyone to know that he he did this. But I'm not sure what she's implying.

1:23:47If there's real signs of crime or now, then by, you know, goodness, put it out and let the public see it. But I'm very skeptical. Mm hmm. I don't know. Have you looked at this? It's very smart people who I normally trust are in diametric disagreement on it. If she sees a crime, she's got to say who and what law they broke. It's just too vague. I pick up on a point Dan made, which I know because I did a lot of reporting on this. They really did struggle with what to say. They didn't want to let the Russians go on called out in public. But they also didn't want to be accused of trying to make it seem like the Russians were doing something.

1:24:23They were pretending the Russians were doing something to help Hillary. I actually think there's 19 things you could list that, say, caused Hillary Clinton the election. And this is one of them. It was very close. You don't know what would have happened otherwise. But I think Russia helped Trump win substantially, not through collusion, but because they wanted Trump to win. And that is something she's playing down. What she's playing up is that they somehow broke the law in trying to protect Hillary Clinton. And again, she's suggesting they manufactured it. she's basically suggesting this is the same thing as COVID, where the scientists went from, this looks like it came from a lab.

1:24:55We've never seen such a virus from an animal. And then after Fauci and Collins browbeated them, they came out and they were like, it's definitely not from a lab. It's from a pangolin. They're people associated with Barack Obama who leaned into collusion without a doubt. And that wrong. I don't know if it's against the law. It was dirty pool. But mostly what they said was the Russians interfered with the election and they did. I think this is a little bit of cosmic karma. Everything comes full circle because Tulsi was accused by Hillary Clinton and the Obamas, I believe, of being like a Russian asset.

1:25:27And she went on The View and said she's owned by Russia. She's a Russian puppet. And Tulsi was coming out saying, I'm nobody's puppet. I've served this country. You know, I'm a woman in uniform as she is. And she's a rock star. But yeah, no, I think this is a little bit of cosmic karma. She gets to now come out and say, ha, look at what we've just uncovered in these files. But I think it's Monday. Maybe by the end of the day, we'll have more information. because I read on the way over here, she's now given something to the DOJ. She said it's going to come out this week. We're going to see leak, leak, leak.

1:25:52I think it was weird Friday night to make the announcement with everything going on. Yes, I know. Why? Why? They put out news that's bad for them heading into a weekend after a holiday. They put out news that's good for them a Friday night. Hannity will be here Monday, so I don't know if I have to go on tonight. That might have been an Epstein circuit. I was just going to say. Maybe. I'm not sure that's going to work either. We'll talk about that when we come back. Let's take a break, and then we will discuss where we are in Epsteinpalooza. Stand by. Okay. Do you want to know about something positive and upbeat?

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1:30:02So you were saying before the break it's fancy here isn't it? It's something I can steal like an ashtray You know what's funny? I don't think anybody does anymore The same guy has been driving me and my family since I started at Fox Super nice man And he was dropping me off today and he said, you know, Megan, you've been coming to this same location because the series is right across from Fox and right across from NBC. He's like for like almost 20 years now. As long as you can spit a watermelon seed far enough to hit the other building, that's good for you. You know, it's like this is media central and it does bring back a lot of memories.

1:30:39Anyway, so we were saying before the break that possibly the Tulsi Gabbard thing was a head fake to change the topic of conversation from Epstein. Did it work? Well, it's hard to know, right? Because what the two intervening things that seem bigger around Epstein, one is the Wall Street Journal story, which rallied MAGA back towards the president. And the other is the announcement of the filing to release, ask the grand jury transcripts to be released. I think those two things did the most to take the steam out of it for the media, even though the New York Times now seems obsessed with reviving it.

1:31:12So I want to say two things. I don't think we're going to learn much from the grand jury files at all. And I think the Trump administration knows that. So, you know, he says, oh, nothing I do will ever satisfy them, which is true. But this definitely won't like this won't even come close. It's not a good faith effort to say it's definitely not a good faith effort. But secondly, on the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal hit piece, it was so lame. It was the best thing Trump could have asked for. And I realize he came back swinging. But even if he had it, like there's nothing we on the right hate more than the left's fake news hit pieces on Donald Trump.

1:31:46We've seen so many of them. The guy literally took a bullet. He's been put through hell. Like we have all had it up to here with the with the false attacks on Donald Trump. And so the best thing that the left, and I include the journals for reporting that, could have done was just be quiet and let it stay a Trump slash influencer problem. Don't help because that only makes people on the right want to drop it and defend him. And that's kind of where I am. Like, it was such a lame. I'm very interested in what the truth about Epstein is. Very interested. You try to tell me the whole scandals about Donald Trump.

1:32:18Fuck off. I'm out. Like, that's that's a lie. We know that we would know that by now if it were true. I will not be your truth warrior on that because I know it's not right. But I do want real answers in the underlying scandal. Go ahead, Link. You know, I just feel like the left really wants to tie Trump to Epstein more closely. And I think that's what The Wall Street Journal really was about. I mean, I just have a hard time believing he's sitting there drawing and doing this. The whole thing sounded really silly to me. And then there's also still this narrative online that, you know, maybe Trump visited the island.

1:32:44I'm like, the guy doesn't even stay in hotels that don't have his name on it. I certainly don't think he visited the island, but they want to keep tying Trump to Epstein. I think J.D. Vance is still looking like a winner because he doesn't seem as mired down in the Epstein stuff. J.D. Vance, I don't think he's spoken about it as much. He's now rallying around the president with the Wall Street Journal story, as he should. So I think going into 2028, I don't see this Epstein stuff having really any bearing on the election. He brokered the peace between the FBI guys, Kash Patel and Dan Bongino and Trump.

1:33:10Right. And because Trump was mad at them after the like she goes or I go thing with Dan. And that reportedly J.D. Vance stepped in. Want me to take an opposing view? Yeah, go for it. Do it. Okay. Trump is making these decisions about what the country learns about something people are really interested in. Yes. And he's got a conflict. He was close friends with the person at the center of this. How close? I think the Wall Street Journal story, if true, speaks to that. You say he stays in his own hotels. I've never heard of Donald Trump flying on anyone else's plane, ever. Flies on his plane. He flew on Epstein's plane.

1:33:41That suggests something. Again, I'm not assuming facts, not in evidence. I'm not saying the president broke any laws. I'm not saying he did anything improper. But he was close friends with the guy. For 15 years. Yeah. And so he should really be recused from this in terms of the public interest and confidence in decision making. So any story that illustrates or claims to illustrate their closeness, I think, just speaks to that. You think about it. He shouldn't be the one deciding these things because they're about his good friends. That's a pipe. But let me tell you something. My own feeling is not that Trump has something to hide in these files.

1:34:11I really don't believe that. But I do believe Trump probably has some powerful donors and or friends. Which is why he shouldn't be deciding. But I think that's the question. is that the question, it dies down if there's nothing, if there's no more new oxygen. But I think we've all probably heard there are more stories in the works. Now, they may not ever see the light of day. There may not be anything there. But I think to Mark's point, they were close friends. New York and Palm Beach are small worlds. We're sitting in, one of them right now. If there's another story and it starts to get closer to them, then I think this continues to have more oxygen and people start, it brings it back in front of the public.

1:34:47People demand stuff. And to Mark's point, people started thinking, is Trump hiding something about his friends or about him or what is it? Trump brought that piece of it on himself. If Trump had just stayed consistent with the base and this had never been Trump's issue, he really hadn't been touting Epstein on the campaign trail, though his son touted it many, many times. And so did his top deputies and his emissaries out on the campaign trail. But if Trump hadn't done that weird answer at that cabinet meeting and then gone on the attack against the MAGA base, nobody would be thinking this is like a Trump scandal.

1:35:24He's making it. He's so defensive on it. It's making people be like, whoa, there's the target right there. Is there a simpler explanation here? When I look at President Trump, I think, is he bored? Sometimes I look at him and go, is he bored by something? That's sometimes an explanation. And I think President Trump, because he doesn't live on X, because he has Fox rolling 24-7, that's what he watches. They're not really covering Epstein that much. And I don't think he really gets everything that's happening on X in the podcast space with the discussion around Epstein. I think President Trump is also frustrated because he had weeks of just consistent winning, right, when it came to the border, the Iranian nuclear facilities, going down to Texas with the grieving families.

1:35:58I know because I was there. But President Trump had weeks and weeks of winning. And then now he's like, you guys want to talk about Epstein, this loser scumbag? Because the attorney general should not put out that memo. Right. But he is going to stand by. She is not going any freaking where. Even what's so funny to me is at that FIFA soccer game, Pam Bondi was in the box. So was Rupert Murdoch. And now he's doing Rupert Murdoch five days later. But yeah, I think Pam Bondi is not going anywhere. She's Florida. Susie Wiles likes her. And she's good on cable. And so I don't see her going anywhere anytime soon.

1:36:26I don't know if I agree with that. I really don't. Because I believe Trump likes her and doesn't want to switch out his AG. And Susie Wiles likes her. But the base has turned on her. They will forgive the big man. They're not going to forgive her. Mark my words. I think it'll take some time, like with the Mike Waltz situation. I don't think he's going to give a dog a bone right now and give you the body and the head that you want. Could I see her going and being moved and shifted down the road? Sure, I don't see it happening now in the dog days of summer. And my information is that she's miserable anyway.

1:36:53I don't think she's happy anyway. Yeah, I mean, it's - Comfortable with the status quo. Yeah. It's so remarkable, too, because he's so culturally deft. He so has his finger on the pulse of his base, of what's being talked about around the country. This is the first time in 10 years that I've just seen him on the wrong side of this repeatedly. To your point, he's dug in about it. And that is surprising, right? You would just think he's so smart and so clever that he would see this, he'd shift other than, you know, throwing out something like the Russia with Tulsi Gabbard. When does he make that move?

1:37:24Right. And how does he do it? Because as a Democrat, I just am like, Like, whoa, you're so on your back foot, you can't get off it. I know this is a weird place to go with it, but in a way, it kind of reminds me of what happened at Fox with the Gretchen Carlson investigations. She filed this lawsuit. Nobody liked Gretchen. No one really wanted to deal with her. We all knew she got fired because she had terrible ratings and she wasn't popular. But then she dug up this Me Too allegation, which we were all like, oh, sure, whatever. Even I was like, there's no way that's why she got fired. And even though I knew what Roger had done with me, to me, not with me, years earlier.

1:38:00But what was happening in that case was Roger had managed to limit the investigation into Gretchen's allegations to only the team that worked with her on her show, which would mean he would never get – the investigators, Lachlan and Rupert and their lawyers would never get to the women who actually had stories. and this grand jury thing has that feel to me like i don't think we're going to hear anything from those grand jury files regarding any trump friends any super rich new yorker or floridian who because you know julie k brown as annoying as she is was on um was it ross do thoughts whatever his last name is douthat's podcast over the weekend and she was once again reminding us all that there, he is believed Jeffrey to have trafficked girls to third parties, to other rich men.

1:38:54And she was naming some very rich men. I'm not going to name them here. You can listen to the podcast if you want to as like having made Jeffrey super rich, super fast, other than just less Lex Wexner, the Victoria's Secret guy, other than him. And it just really got me thinking again about the fact that there, there really are reports. There are women out there who can point the finger at a third man or fourth man or fifth man. And I got dollars to donuts that those names probably aren't in the grand jury. But the point of it was to just say, we're doing something for disclosure and see where the story goes.

1:39:26And from their point of view, I hope it goes away, which it could. Yeah. I'm also never really into file dumps. Like people said, we want JFK, we want RFK, we want all these files. And then they made noise for like six hours online and we didn't really learn that much. There was no big bombshell. The earth didn't come to an end, nothing shattering happened. So I don't really lose sleep over it. Like if we learn something new. We learned something new, but I don't find it all that interesting. Well, let me ask you this, what's the net effect of all of this? Because, you know, my own feeling is I didn't like how Trump handled this, especially last week, but it didn't change my feelings about Trump.

1:39:55You know, I still support him. I still think he's incredibly good for the country. He's, he is chalking up so many wins. So like you look at the fact that Trump is getting boys out of girls sports. He is stopping the mutilation of children. He is closing down the border. He is deporting dangerous illegals. Oh, that matters way more to me than about Epstein. But there are people in Cormaga for whom, you know, this is a very big issue and it speaks not to just like their conspiratorial nature, but like the system that protects corrupt rich guys and shits on the little people. And that could be an ongoing problem.

1:40:29I think it's huge because, look, the last three elections have been games of inches, two, three percent, right? Trump barely wins in 16, barely loses in 20, barely wins in 24. As you just said, for the first time in 10 years, Trump and his movement have been defending the status quo, defending institutions, right? You had Charlie Kirk saying, I trust the government. Like, we haven't heard that in a decade. And for these younger people, and I give Trump tons of credit to get all these young people to buy into him, to buy into MAGA, to believe in him. They're saying, wait a second, this is no different than what we kind of heard during COVID.

1:41:08You know, some people go back to the Iraq war and, and, and Rom kind of touched on all these different things. That's where I say he's tone deaf a little. How does he fix that? Not that they're rushing to us Democrats yet, because we have a huge trust problem with them. But for the first time, we've been about change. We've been about transparency. And the Republicans are just - That's where you fell off the left, Dan. But also, Dan - You gotta start somewhere. Maybe Elon Musk and his America party, maybe they'll get a couple. But they're not going Democrat. Here's my thing. If I'm President Trump, right, he's looking at these polls that even CNN is running that he's gone up the last week or two, even with all the Epstein stuff.

1:41:42And I think one of the takeaways is, even if they're really loud voices on X and in the podcast space, they might not have as much effect on these polls and in the broader electorate. I think for President Trump, because he's not living in those online spaces, He's like, I'm winning. I'm killing it. We've got the most secure border. Why aren't you talking about this? I'm bored with Epstein. I think it's really that for me. I don't think it's so much the friends or there's some secret thing he's hiding. I think he's like, I'm bored. Why are we talking about this guy? He's dead. He's gone. Some piece of Trump genuinely believes this is a Democrat conspiracy, that like this was this is like a long trap that's been laid by Democrats somehow.

1:42:14I haven't totally figured it out, but I think he there is a piece of him that does genuinely believe this is like some sort of a thing that's been laid for him. And I reported this earlier. I was told by a few people that there is a belief. This is not confirmed that there's a belief that there were some like poison pills put in the files by the Biden team before leaving office. that that would make it such that Trump wouldn't want to release the files. I have no idea whether that's true. But now I've heard it from a couple of people. And even the Trump, even President Trump intimated it. Credible.

1:42:43I want them to put out the credible documents is what President Trump keeps saying now when he's gaggling. She can put out anything that's credible. And so I think he's just worried there could be some stuff in there that's supposed to paint him in a negative light. And he's like, I'm winning so much. My polling is great. Why are we talking about this guy? Why don't you just love me the way I deserve to be loved? I think he's bored with it. I think he's so bored. And the news that he's watching isn't covering Epstein at all. and his aides might be coming to him saying, this is really big online, this is big online.

1:43:07And I think he's like, I'm sick of this. Yeah, I don't like online. So Mark Halpern, does it affect him in any way, shape or form or no? I don't think so. I think it's the 485th lesson that we all should be humble and remember that Donald Trump understands MAGA better than we do. Yeah. And politics in general. The guy's instincts for it have been spot on. Spot on. Spot on, pun intended. Trademark copyright. And he can do stuff and say stuff that other people can't. Yeah. I think it's also July. I was talking about this with someone yesterday. Like, it's the middle of summer. It's July. I think a lot of people are at home.

1:43:39I think by, you know, a couple weeks we won't even be discussing this. Well, maybe that's why they released it when they did, you know, because it's summer. But I was just amazed that they released it during such a slow news time when the media is always looking for something to chew on. And this has been such a juicy story. If they're super sophisticated, maybe they figured out it can burn out over the summer. Same way BBB is going to burn out by the time we actually get to the midterm. It's happening. All right, guys. a pleasure. Thank you all for being here. We never get to be in the same room.

1:44:06Yeah, it's wonderful. Okay. Tomorrow we've got another MK media star. One of the EJs, Emily Jashinsky will be here for the full show. Don't miss that. Thanks for listening to the Megan Kelly show. No BS, no agenda and no fear.

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