In short
Trump’s attempted National Guard “invasion” of Portland, Oregon and Chicago, Illinois is blocked by restraining orders; the episode argues this is authoritarian dehumanization and a pretext for violence, while also criticizing a government shutdown and threats to health-care subsidies.
Guest backgrounds
No guests are identified in the transcript.
Key claims
A Trump-appointed judge repeatedly issues restraining orders preventing National Guard deployment; Trump allegedly tries to bypass the Oregon order by using California National Guard, and similarly uses Texas National Guard for Chicago. The episode claims Portland is peaceful and Chicago is being staged with pepper spray/tear gas near schools to justify federal occupation. It also alleges Trump’s Navy speech uses dehumanizing “gnats” language toward Democrats, likening it to historical atrocities. It criticizes Republicans for not extending Affordable Care Act subsidies during a shutdown.
Notable examples
Portland images (Oct 3–5) showing markets/marathon; Chicago chemical-agent tactics near elementary schools; Stephen Miller calling the ruling “legal insurrection”; House Speaker Mike Johnson sending lawmakers home; a South Carolina judge’s home burning after death threats.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Chapters
Tap a time to open that second in VOTrump's Military Invasion Plans Unraveled
0:04 to 0:56
Discussion on Trump's failed attempts to deploy National Guard troops against Portland and Chicago.
“Their products are trusted in Michelin-starred restaurants worldwide and designed to perform just as well in your kitchen.”
Trump's Military Invasion Plans Unraveled
1:53 to 6:05
Discussion on Trump's failed attempts to deploy National Guard troops against Portland and Chicago.
“Donald Trump got a rude awakening late Sunday night as his military invasion of Portland, Oregon and Chicago, Illinois hit a major roadblock.”
The Reaction of Local Officials
6:05 to 9:19
Exploration of local officials’ responses to Trump's military actions and the implications for democracy.
“I just want to show you some of these images of Portland, Oregon from October 3rd, October 4th, October 5th, just so you can see like the farmer's market and people running a marathon and you'll see peaceful protests.”
Trump's Authoritarian Rhetoric
9:19 to 14:00
Analysis of Trump's speeches and their authoritarian implications, including health care policies.
“That's the dehumanization language that justifies genocide, that justifies atrocities that we've seen across the world over and over again.”
Universal Health Care Discussion
14:00 to 14:37
Exploring the need for universal health care and critiques of current policies.
“I have a better plan called universal health care.”
Government Shutdown and Mike Johnson's Remarks
14:38 to 15:23
Analyzing House Speaker Mike Johnson's comments on government operations amidst a shutdown.
“In the meantime, extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies so people can live.”
Trump's Military Deployment Controversy
15:24 to 16:46
Discussing Governor Pritzker's statements on Trump's deployment of National Guard.
“It has been for the last several days and it's very unfortunate because as we're talking real people are being adversely affected around the country and some in very substantial ways.”
Judicial Independence and Threats
16:47 to 19:09
Examining threats against judges and the implications for democracy and judicial integrity.
“Well, let's back up and remember this judge is a Trump-appointed judge.”
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00This podcast is sponsored by Made In Cookware. Made In partners with multi-generational artisans and some of the world's best chefs to create professional quality cookware, knives and kitchen tools. Their products are trusted in Michelin-starred restaurants worldwide and designed to perform just as well in your kitchen. From five-ply stainless clad to carbon steel, every piece is built to last and made to actually make you a better cook. Discover award-winning cookware at madeincookware.com.
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1:52See terms. Donald Trump got a rude awakening late Sunday night as his military invasion of Portland, Oregon and Chicago, Illinois hit a major roadblock. The Trump appointed judge who ruled against him the previous day on Saturday when he tried to activate the Oregon National Guard troops to invade Portland ruled against Donald Trump again when it was uncovered that Donald Trump after getting a restraining order against him and his regime on Saturday from using Oregon National Guard troops. Donald Trump called up the California National Guard to use California National Guard troops to now invade Portland, Oregon.
2:34And that was something that Donald Trump was also doing in Chicago, Illinois, also using Texas National Guard troops to invade Chicago, Illinois. Governor J.B. Pritzker called that out earlier in the day. Now, this Trump-appointed judge in Portland, Oregon, late Sunday night issued yet another restraining order against Donald Trump. She let Donald Trump's DOJ lawyer, who had to be at this late night court appearance, she let him have it and say, you're an officer of the court. How could you possibly construe the order that I issued on Saturday, blocking the National Guard from invading Portland to
3:13Ben Meiselas:not cover other states national guard other than the oregon national guard to which donald trump's doj lawyer said i don't know i don't do policy that's above my pay grade and the judge says i'm issuing an order right away and i'm making it very clear you are not to invade this city with the united states military do you understand you are not to federalize the national guard in this city from any state. Do you understand? Make sure the regime understands. And this was a Trump appointed judge from 2019. Now, Governor J.B. Pritzker is likely going to be bringing a similar lawsuit. And we see what happened in Portland, Oregon.
3:53I think we'll see a federal judge shortly do the same thing in Illinois. And Governor Pritzker said, look, Donald Trump just called up the Texas National Guard to invade Chicago, Illinois. Now, Governor Abbott of Texas, He was giddy. He said, we can't wait to invade Chicago. We're standing by for those orders. We've activated the Texas National Guard and we are going into blue states and blue cities at your direction. No one's stronger than the Texas National Guard. Hey, Governor Abbott, how about you deal with your own state, like your failing electric grid? Maybe you want to deal with that. Maybe the fact that Texas is a state that takes far more than it gives the federal government.
4:35You see, California gives the federal government$85 billion more than it takes. But Texas, like most red states, is a taker state. It takes$75 billion from the federal government in services and grants and all of these things more than it actually gives to the federal government. Doesn't that just sum up red states and red cities for you right there? Just so utterly hypocritical. And by the way, there are still dead children missing from the flash floods that happened a few months back that the red cities and red counties completely botched. that FEMA led by Kristi Noem and some random guy that Kristi Noem's side guy, Corey Lewandowski, brought in.
5:24We don't even know who this guy is who doesn't have any federal emergency management history at all. Who is this guy? Remember, they shut down the urban search and rescue and they didn't activate it on time. They shut down the call centers. They're literally still missing dead children right now in the state of Texas. And they're focused on sending the National Guard troops into Chicago, Illinois. How utterly pathetic is that? So yeah, the Trump appointed judge issued that scathing order late Sunday night, another restraining order against the Trump regime. You are to allow no National Guard troops from any state to invade Portland, Oregon.
6:03Do you understand? She issued a written order shortly thereafter. I just want to show you
6:07Ben Meiselas:some of these images of Portland, Oregon from October 3rd, October 4th, October 5th, just so you can see like the farmer's market and people running a marathon and you'll see peaceful protests. You'll see some views of Mount Hood. The city, as Senator Wyden says, is vibrant. It's peaceful. It's resilient. We don't need federal occupations or military invasions. What the hell is going on in the United States of America. And you've got people like Donald Trump's right hand, Stephen Miller, just involved in daily incitement. Miller and Kristi Noem and Pete Hegseth and all of these fascists inciting, inciting, trying to provoke.
6:53We've showed you images in Chicago where literally they're inflicting chemical warfare on the people of Chicago. Pepper spray, gas canisters. The Chicago police themselves choking. They're doing this chemical warfare near elementary schools. Children are getting sick. They're going out of their unmarked ICE vehicles, waving guns around, indiscriminately beating people on the street. They're shooting pepper bullets at people indiscriminately because they're trying
7:24Ben Meiselas:to provoke a reaction so they can go, see, it is a war zone. Look what it looks like. So they can shoot on social media. The smoke from their gas canisters and say, you see what's going on? We We need to invade. That is their tactic. That is the tactic of authoritarians. Create a pretext for this invasion. By the way, could you even believe? I mean, we can now under the Trump regime. But if you think about what I've just been talking about for five minutes, military invasions of using National Guard from red states like in Texas or then trying to co-opt the California National Guard, Democratic states still.
7:59but to invade Portland, Oregon, other National Guards to invade states, other states, occupy states. And we've heard what Donald Trump's been saying all week. He spoke in front of our military generals and admirals early last week and said the biggest enemy is the enemy from within. The main mission that you're going to have is invading American cities. That's what he talked to the stone faced generals and admirals about. Donald Trump gave a speech to the Navy on Sunday. Did you see that? The 250th anniversary Navy speech in Norfolk. Did you see that? And he said, the Democrats are the enemy. He called them gnats.
8:37He goes, we got to deal with these gnats, the Democrats. That's what he told to the United States Navy, telling the Navy to go after and attack the political opposition party. That's just full-fledged authoritarianism. That's why I say we're not in a constitutional crisis. We are in a weak and pathetic dictatorship right now, a la a Viktor Orban, a Bukele. This was never something we'd ever thought we'd see in the United States. But here was Donald Trump on Sunday telling the Navy that we have to deal with the gnats, he calls them, the dirty gnats, the Democrats. And to be clear, that's the language of dehumanization used by people like Adolf Hitler.
9:18Let's just go out and call it what it is. That's the dehumanization language that justifies genocide, that justifies atrocities that we've seen across the world over and over again. So here's Donald Trump saying that to the United States Navy.
9:33Ben Meiselas:Play this clip. But we have to take care of this little gnat that's on our shoulder called the Democrats. They want to give all of our money to illegal aliens that pour into the country. And, you know, I have a bigger heart than they do. But the problem is when you do that, they come in by the millions. Everybody wants that, so you can't do it. But I've also pledged the largest ever investment in our military's history. We're spending over one trillion dollars. We've never had anything like that before. One trillion dollars on our military. And that includes, along with your Secretary of the Navy and Pete Hexeth, we're going to be building lots of ships and doing a lot of things that you haven't seen happen for 35 years.
10:14And then before Donald Trump went and spoke to the Navy, he was speaking about, again, just utter lies about Portland.
10:23Ben Meiselas:Portland's burning to the ground, insurrections all over the place. You know what this is very akin to when Vladimir Putin was out there saying this is about denazification. That's why we're going after Ukraine. It's about denazifying them. And Zelensky, who's actually Jewish, he's a Nazi and that's what we got to do. This is about Dina. It's the same sick and demented mind, sick, twisted, demented mind of these fascists, the Trumps and the Putins. Here's what Donald Trump said. Portland burning to the ground. You saw the images I've been playing of Portland, Oregon, not burning to the ground.
11:01Beautiful, lovely city. Some small protests, mostly all peaceful in front of the ICE facility there that at times when ICE is shooting people with pepper spray It could get a little rowdy, but for short periods of time and nowhere recently was it ever all that rowdy at all.
11:20Ben Meiselas:But it's not a military invasion situation. But here's what Donald Trump says. Here play this clip.
11:30We're going to look at that. It was amazing. Portland is burning to the ground. It's insurrectionists all over the place. It's Antifa. And yet the politicians who are petrified. Look, the politicians are afraid for their lives. That's the only reason that they say like there's nothing happening. And you've seen it. The place is burning down and they pretend like there's nothing happening. So we'll take a look at the order. We haven't seen the order yet. And while all of this is going down, the government is shut down. Maga Mike Johnson and Donald Trump have ordered all of the Republicans to not show up on Capitol Hill.
12:07Republicans on a paid vacation must be nice. Paid vacation for all of them. And they have the Cadillac health care plan while Donald Trump is taking away people's Medicaid, gutting and harming people's Medicare.
12:20Ben Meiselas:And if you're on an Affordable Care Act plan, you're usually either on one of those three. your subsidies for your monthly premiums is about to expire. So if you were paying about$300, $400 a month, you'll soon be paying about$1 ,500 to$2 ,000 a month. So good luck trying to pay $24 ,000 to$30 ,000 a year in health insurance premiums without the subsidies. Americans realize what's going on. Well, Donald Trump was asked though this weekend at the White House as he was heading to that Navy speech to give that fascist, disgusting speech in front of the Navy. And he was asked, so are you open to extending Affordable Care Act subsidies?
13:00Millions of people rely on the Affordable Care Act subsidies in order to get their health care.
13:05Ben Meiselas:What do you say, Donald? Here, play this clip. President, are you open to extending the Affordable Care Act subsidies? We want to fix it so it works. It's not working. Obamacare has been a disaster for the people, so we want to have it fixed so it works. And it's the same damn, damn answer he gave during his first administration and now during this authoritarian regime, right? He goes, we want to fix it. We don't like Obamacare. We want to change it. We want to, we, but you remember in the first administration, when John McCain put his thumb down and save the program while there's no more John McCain's, it's all MAGA Republicans.
13:43Now no more thumbs down. These Republicans have not just sold it. They've sold out everybody.
13:49Ben Meiselas:They've sold out their own constituents. Damn right, their own constituents are either on Medicaid, Medicare, or likely an Affordable Care Act plan. And they depend on those subsidies. So if y 'all wanted to come up with a better plan, come up with one. I have a better plan called universal health care. It should all be free. We shouldn't be paying monthly premiums. If you live in the United States, you should be able to live. And then you should be able to go get health care for free. Disagree with me? debate me all good that's what i think but the affordable care act's what we got it's way better than it was before obamacare or the affordable care act where 20 plus million americans were uninsured would just die because they didn't have health insurance so we've come a long way i don't think we've come where i think we should be but it's not like trump and these magas are coming up with an alternative plan they just destroy they don't know how to build come up with your own damn plan.
14:42Ben Meiselas:In the meantime, extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies so people can live. That's what we should do. Instead, you're running away on vacation. You're not even having discussions with Democrats, yet alone negotiating when Democrats are just saying, give Americans health care. I mean, seriously, what the hell are we even doing here? And here's a MAGA Mike Johnson during one of his interviews yesterday where he's like, oh, it's quieter. He was in the Capitol Hill. He was in Capitol Hill. He was like, it's kind of quiet around here. It's been for the last very several days. It's very unfortunate.
15:13Ben Meiselas:And the host is like, but yeah, you sent everybody home. It's quiet because you told people to go on vacation next week because y 'all want this government shutdown. Here, play this clip. House Speaker Mike Johnson joins us from Capitol Hill. Good morning to you, Speaker. Anyone up there to negotiate with? There's not, Margaret. Good morning. Good to hear your voice. It's kind of quiet around here. It has been for the last several days and it's very unfortunate because as we're talking real people are being adversely affected around the country and some in very substantial ways. I pray that more Democrats in the Senate will come to their senses and do the right thing and when they have the next opportunity on Monday to vote to open the government I surely hope that they will.
15:54Well you did send your lawmakers home to their districts which suggests we've got probably another week ahead of us of this shutdown.
16:03Ben Meiselas:And finally, let me show you this. This is what Governor J.B. Pritzker had to say yesterday morning. And this was before the news broke more in the afternoon that Donald Trump and Abbott would be sending Texas troops to invade Chicago, Illinois. Here's what Pritzker had to say here. Play this clip. Trump is also trying to deploy the National Guard to Portland, Oregon, after a federal judge there appointed by Trump, I should note, temporarily block that effort, top White House advisor Stephen Miller blasted that ruling as, quote, legal insurrection and said, quote, the deployment of troops is an absolute necessity to defend our personnel, our laws, our government, public order, and the republic itself, unquote.
16:45What did you think when you saw that statement from Stephen Miller? Well, let's back up and remember this judge is a Trump-appointed judge. This judge actually said what I think should be said about all of what Donald Trump is doing, which is it's untethered from the facts. That's what the judge said, that what the government is doing, what Trump is doing is untethered from the facts. That's the case. He was claiming that, you know, it's mayhem on the grounds of, on the streets of Portland. He's saying that, you know, Chicago is a war zone. None of that is true. They're just making this up. And then what do they do?
17:23They fire tear gas and smoke grenades, and they make it look like it's a war zone and they, you know, get people on the ground are, frankly, incited to want to do something about it appropriately. I mean, if you are on the ground and you're being having tear gas pellets fired at you, as they have been doing in Broadview, Illinois, you know, you want to you want to react. You want something to happen. And unfortunately, they're using every lever at their disposal to keep us from maintaining order.
17:54Ben Meiselas:And I'll leave you with this one image as well, which is this right here is the house of a South Carolina judge, Diane Goodstein. You'll see her home burning to the ground after an explosion. Now, she was a judge who temporarily blocked South Carolina from giving millions of voters data to DOJ. Lots of Trump regime people and right wing MAGA influencers were attacking this judge. She received countless death threats. We don't know. We don't know the cause. I want to be clear of this fire. If this was a MAGA host, he would be saying right away or she would be saying right away, just look at what they did.
18:38Ben Meiselas:This was a Democrat. I don't know the cause of it, so I'm not going to jump to conclusions. But what I will say is that this was a judge who was commonly and frequently under attack from Trump regime officials and MAGA people. And not a day goes by where Stephen Miller is not basically referring to judges as terrorists. He goes, the Democrat Party has filled our legal and judicial system with radicals who protect the left wing terrorists. This is a very real and dire crisis for our Republican form of government. Again, what a pathetic weasel this guy is. And by the way, in Portland, Oregon, that federal judge was a Trump-appointed judge.
19:20Ben Meiselas:In Washington, D.C., we've seen Reagan-appointed judges, Trump-appointed judges, George W. Bush-appointed judges, rule against Donald Trump. We've seen that across the country as well. That's all I got for you this morning. Hit subscribe. Let's get to 6 million. Thanks for watching. Thanks for watching. Be sure to add the Midas Touch podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts for new updates every single day.
From the publisher
MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on Donald Trump’s military invasion failing as his conduct rapidly spirals out of control.
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