Trump Has Catastrophic Thursday as Bluffs Get Called

30 Jul 2026 · 22 min · 6 chapters

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In short

Political and geopolitical roundup focused on Trump’s AG nomination fight, alleged “slush fund”/IRS immunity, economic slowdown, Middle East strikes, and MAGA criticism of Fauci plus conspiracy claims about FIFA and a misprinted Africa map.

Guests

None mentioned in the transcript; it’s a solo host segment (Midas Touch/“editor in chief Ron Filipkowski” referenced).

Key claims

Trump says Senate GOP leaders Cornyn and Tillis won’t confirm Todd Blanche unless Trump’s January 6 “slush fund” and settlement/IRS immunity are formally revoked; host alleges Blanche’s confirmation testimony was a lie and calls the situation “lawless organized crime.” Host also claims GDP growth is weak (1.5% vs 2.1% expected) and blames Trump for global chaos.

Notable examples

Saudi strikes on Sanaa; Iran claims destroying multiple U.S. F-35s in Jordan and hitting bases in Kuwait; Houthis vow retaliation; Qatar LNG shipment via Iran-linked corridor; UEFA boycott threat over FIFA stake sale; State Department map error at a global AIDS summit.

Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.

Chapters

Tap a time to open that second in VO

Trump's Catastrophic Thursday

2:01 to 5:32

Discussion on Trump's AG pick Todd Blanche and his legal troubles.

“His bluff was called regarding his AG pick, Todd Blanche.”

Tax Evasion and Criminality

5:33 to 7:48

Exploration of Trump's past dealings and the implications for his taxes.

“we explain this makes the Epstein files, Trump slush fund for insurrectionists, and tax fraud immunity, major topics heading into the midterms.”

Global Conflict and Economic Impact

7:50 to 14:03

Analysis of international conflicts and their effects on the economy.

“GDP growth slowed to an annualized rate of just 1.5 % in the second quarter, coming in well below expectations.”

Regional Tensions and Iranian Strikes

14:03 to 15:34

Learn about the recent military actions and developments involving Iran, Iraq, and nearby nations.

“The Houthis surely will be attacking more refineries in Saudi Arabia and other infrastructure.”

World Cup Controversy and UEFA Boycott

15:37 to 18:18

Discover the controversy surrounding FIFA's potential sale of World Cup stakes and UEFA's reaction.

“The Jordanian army says Iran launched several missiles toward its territory.”

Inaccurate Map at Global Health Summit

18:19 to 19:08

Discuss the blunder made by the State Department at a global AIDS conference regarding a map of Africa.

“Let's destroy that because that's what these Epstein class oligarchs do all of the time.”
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Transcript

Automatic transcript. May contain errors.

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1:06See terms. Pop quiz. What's in your kid's lunchbox? At Whole Foods Market, they've already done the studying. Over 300 food ingredients are banned from their shelves. No hydronated fats in the peanut butter. And no high fructose corn syrup in the cookies. And for sandwiches, there are no synthetic nitrates or nitrites in any of their deli meat. So you can pack lunchboxes with peace of mind. Get back to school ready at Whole Foods Market. Pop quiz. What's in your kid's lunchbox? At Whole Foods Market, they've already done the studying. Over 300 food ingredients are banned from their shelves. No hydronated fats in the peanut butter.

1:46And no high fructose corn syrup in the cookies. And for sandwiches, there are no synthetic nitrates or nitrites in any of their deli meat. So you can pack lunchboxes with peace of mind. Get back to school ready at Whole Foods Market. Donald Trump is having a catastrophic Thursday morning. His bluff was called regarding his AG pick, Todd Blanche. Now Donald Trump says that he may pull Todd Blanche's nomination because Senator Cornyn and Senator Tillis are not willing to confirm Blanche as the attorney general unless and until there is a written document formally revoking the January 6 slush fund that Donald Trump entered into in his personal capacity with the federal government in his frivolous lawsuit and where Donald Trump provided himself with a super pardon to have no more tax audits for himself and his family and his companies, essentially for the rest of his life.

2:48And Donald Trump now showing that the plan all along, get Blanche confirmed as the attorney general, and then try to enforce the settlement agreement between Trump and the federal government where he gave himself that super pardon. Also this morning, you have Saudi Arabia striking the Sanaa Airport in western Yemen. The Houthis vowing retaliation. The Middle East is on fire right now. And you had Iran claim that they destroyed multiple U.S. fighter jets, F-35s in Jordan, multiple strikes in Kuwait. Iran is claiming that they caused massive devastation in their response to the U.S. strikes. And we know Iran responded during the evening hours and during the morning.

3:40I want to break this all down for you. What's taking place this morning? Here's what Donald Trump posted moments ago. Todd Blanche is a star and he capitalizes star and everyone knows it. He has the potential to go down as one of the greatest attorney generals of all time. However, John Cornyn of Texas and Tom Tillis of North Carolina, both of whom I refuse to endorse and whose political careers have been ended by my action, are refusing to vote for this great nominee who will remain in any event as acting. In other words, Trump wants to keep Blanche as acting AG forever and not get him actually confirmed by the Senate.

4:22Remember, both Cornyn and Tillis voted for Merrick Garland and others, too numerous to mention. I have no objection to temporarily withdrawing Todd's name if they do not do the right thing and putting him back after Cornyn and Tillis are out of office. Donald J. Trump, to which Cornyn and Tillis responded, there are many more people here on the Senate than just us who want to see a written document revoking that January 6th slush fund and the settlement agreement between Trump and the government, waiving all tax audits and criminal investigations into Trump's tax evasion. Now, as our editor in chief, Ron Filipkowski says, it sounds like Todd Blanche actually wanted to sign off on the language that the senators requested to kill Trump's IRS immunity and slush fund so he can get the gig as attorney general.

5:17But his client, Donald Trump, won't let him. Not really how any of this is supposed to work, but this is a lawless organized crime operation. Indeed, it is a lawless organized crime operation. On the Midas Touch account, we explain this makes the Epstein files, Trump slush fund for insurrectionists, and tax fraud immunity, major topics heading into the midterms. And so it seems just abundantly clear the following. The fact that Blanche refused to terminate the slush fund in writing for Trump's criminal cronies, as well as his IRS immunity deal, proves that his testimony at his confirmation hearing that these things were dead was always a lie.

6:03Everything with Trump is always a lie. They They were dead until he got confirmed. And then Cornyn said, just put it in writing. We'll make it very simple that the January 6 fund and the super pardon is terminated. Put it in writing and then we'll confirm you as the AG. They're refusing to do that. As I've always said, this was all about Donald Trump waiving his tax liability as he's always done his whole life with tax evasion and all of the criming and scamming and fraud that Trump committed his whole damn life while he ripped people off, while he screwed people over. And they also wanted you to be outraged, as we all should be, about the January 6th insurrection fund.

6:47But it was about Trump who made billions and billions of dollars, and I believe far more than has been reported thus far. What was it? $4 billion in the first year alone he made in all of his quid pro quo deals using the White House as his personal piggy bank and screwing over the

7:03Ben Meiselas:American people. I think the number is closer to$10 billion. But even if you accept$4 billion, that means the taxes on that would probably be a billion, a billion and a half, two and a half billion dollars, maybe, depending on the way these deals were structured. He wanted to waive all of that and, of course, waive all of the past tax liability. That's what this was always about. And now he's saying, I'm going to pull the nomination of Blanche temporarily and then hope that we have control over the Senate after the midterms because it's so important to Donald Trump that he has this tax evasion immunity.

7:43Ben Meiselas:What a crook, what a scoundrel, what a criminal he is, in my opinion. We got other bad news this morning. U.S. GDP growth slowed to an annualized rate of just 1.5 % in the second quarter, coming in well below expectations. Expectations were 2.1%. Remember when Trump and Lutnik and Hassett and Bessett, it's going to rip. It's going to rip. I expect 4 % GDP, 5 % year-over-year GDP. right now it is heading in the wrong direction very slow growth here's how they reported it on state regime media fox let's play it in line with estimates let's get to gdp this is the first look we're getting at second quarter gdp maria the first read is 1.5 percent one and a half percent the estimate was a gain of 2.1 percent so we're coming in a little bit light on this first look at second quarter GDP.

8:43And here's how they reported it on CNN. Let's play this clip. And working through it, Matt, what does this new data tell you? Well, Kate, it tells us that the economy slowed down during the spring, U.S. GDP coming in at one and a half percent. That was softer than expected, right? The forecast was for 2.1 percent. And this is a slowdown from the first quarter when growth was at 2.1 percent. So this is soft. It's not terrible, but it's certainly not blockbuster growth by any stretch.

9:13Ben Meiselas:With all of this chaos going around in the world caused by Donald Trump, with the pain, misery and suffering of the American people caused by Donald Trump, with all of his fraud, his lies being exposed with the never ending war still never ending. and seems that there's just going to be more and more escalation in all-out war and all-out hell. By the way, not to mention, you had Russia's ballistic missiles yesterday. I did a video on this earlier. The targets were Lviv in Ukraine, but apparently they hit Eastern Poland, even though the targets were Western Ukraine and there were some areas in Eastern Poland and Lublin that were actually hit.

10:01Ben Meiselas:And I wasn't sure when I was doing the video, but we have confirmation now, by the way, from Poland's prime minister, who's kind of downplaying it. It seems like a little bit the way we hear these Arab nations say, oh, the drones never struck. It was just the debris. That's what the prime minister of Poland saying right now. It was just debris. It was, I don't know. I don't know. Because you're also saying the prime minister of Poland, these next 100 days will be the most critical days to determine who wins the war, Russia or Ukraine. And this is what the prime minister of Poland is saying. A lot depends on Donald Trump and Elon Musk to help Zelensky.

10:42Ben Meiselas:I've been warning about this. I said, there are lots of people who are saying, oh, Donald Trump seems to be more supportive of Zelensky now. And he's saying, I said, no, no, no, no, no. Trump is a scammer. He'll lure you in. It's just another tactic. He's on the phone with Putin still. And he's probably, Trump's probably just trying to get more information out of Zelensky right now about formations and what Zelensky's planning. So in my opinion, so he can tell Putin, let's not, let's not lose sight of what's really happening here. or to make these promises to Zelensky, make Zelensky more dependent on Trump because Zelensky was becoming pretty independent of Trump.

11:20Ben Meiselas:So Trump can pull him back into his orbit, fear the feel that he's controlling Zelensky right now, and then promise things. Okay, I'll get you the interceptors. I'll give you the license. Zelensky then changes his strategy depending on Trump and then Trump doesn't deliver. That's how Trump operates. I just want everybody to know that anyway. So with all of this going on in the world, with the world at a war, in war right now with each other, what's MAGA doing? Again, this morning still attacking Dr. Fauci. I mean, you've got MAGA Republican Senator Ron Johnson from Wisconsin saying, look, Dr. Fauci wasn't just wrong on COVID.

11:56Ben Meiselas:He was wrong about AIDS. He tried to act like AIDS and HIV was a big thing he fear-mongered aids and hiv here play this clip the injection injuries the economic devastation it never should have happened but it all happened because the saint fauci fear-mongering scare-mongering just like he did with aids remember that he's you know aids it could be you know you know household transmission no that's not it but he did that same way because he wanted to get a vaccine he's a vaccinologist he admitted in october 2019 in milking institute panel. These people are the craziest people. What do you mean he fear-mongered AIDS and HIV is a big deal.

12:38Ben Meiselas:The COVID deaths were a big deal. You want to look at where more deaths took place and say, aha, maybe they were in red states and areas that voted Trump overwhelmingly. Like, do these people not care about like dying? I mean, they just live, I guess they live in a death cult. I guess they don't. Then they bring on MAGA Republican Congress member John McGuire. And he's like, Have you heard about the BLT sandwich using the human fetus baby parts and vaccine sandwiches? Dude, what are you all talking about? The American people just want health care. We don't want to be in never ending wars. People want to be able to be paid with dignity.

13:15Ben Meiselas:They want a fair wage. They want to be able to afford their own. What are you talking about? BLT fetus sandwiches. These people are freaking crazy. Here, play this clip. It's just it's crazy. I don't know if you heard about the BLT sandwich using human fetus baby parts in the vaccine when they could have used ivermectin, but maybe they're helping the big pharma get rich. If he were to be convicted of contempt, it'd be a hundred thousand dollar fine up to a year in jail. But that's not enough. And Senator Scott said he's hiding behind a fake auto pen pardon. So I'm hoping that he gets accountability and justice.

13:53Ben Meiselas:Now, as I noted earlier, you had Saudi Arabia just launched multiple strikes on the Sanaa, the capital of Yemen. The Houthi leader, Abdul Malik al-Houthi, warned that there were indications this would take place. Watch what's going to happen. The Houthis surely will be attacking more refineries in Saudi Arabia and other infrastructure. Wait for that. I'm sure I'll be reporting on that this morning. Notable development as well. Qatar sent its first shipment of liquefied natural gas through the Strait of Hormuz in weeks using Iran's designated shipping corridor. No longer the Oman route that the U.S.

14:37Ben Meiselas:tried to open, Pakistan worked with Iran to broker this Qatari LNG tanker to pass. And again, this follows Iran striking LNG tankers of the United States in Egypt, which the U.S. and CENCOM and corporate news here in the United States basically tried to cover up. And any of the tankers that were using that U.S. route by Oman were getting hit tanker after tanker by Iran. Strait of Hormuz is closed other than the Iranian route. And we see it right here with this Qatari ship working with Pakistan to get permission from the IRGC. OK, CENTCOM, you claim you control the Strait of Hormuz. Then why did this Qatar?

15:19Ben Meiselas:You're close with Qatar. Qatar gave Trump a jet. So if you control the Strait of Hormuz, why did Qatar need to reach out to Pakistan to broker its tanker to go through the Iranian IRGC-backed route? If you control the Strait of Hormuz, Senkham, it's so ridiculous. So just some basic developments that have happened over the past 12 hours. The Jordanian army says Iran launched several missiles toward its territory. The Kuwaiti army said Iran launched a heavy attack on its territory and struck a building belonging to a Chinese company, but failed to admit other losses. Lots of red flags. They're a Chinese company.

15:57Ben Meiselas:Doesn't make sense. Iran is allied with China and Kuwait, just putting that information out. They've been lying about all of these drops. So I don't fully believe that it's a Chinese company. I believe they had a building. the qatari lng ship passes and irgc announced successful strikes for example in the muwafik al-salty airbase according to irgc the strike damaged and destroyed six f-35 fighter aircraft it claimed also the irgc claims it hit the al-salam airbase in kuwait setting fire on two drone hangers and one fuel depot for military aircraft and helicopters. Iran also claims there were casualties of U.S.

16:42Ben Meiselas:service members. We know that the United States covers all this stuff up. So I just I don't know if the IRGC is telling the truth there about the casualties. It does seem that they definitely hit these bases hard, but there's basically been a blackout where the U.S. refuses to acknowledge what's actually happening in the region. Final points I want to bring up as well before we go. We've been covering this World Cup debacle right now where the Kushners and Trump want Gianni Infantino and Gianni Infantino is leading this to basically turn FIFA into a hold co that would sell off FIFA World Cup to private equity.

17:28Ben Meiselas:They would sell a 20 % stake in the World Cup to a Kushner-led company, to Josh Kushner, but this is all in the family, to a Kushner-led company. And UEFA, the European Soccer Football Federation, they came out. All 55 of the UEFA countries unanimously came out and supported a boycott of the World Cup if FIFA plans to sell the stakes. And you think about it. I mean, the UEFA, the European Federation, that's the most powerful part of FIFA. So when they all came together and they said, we're boycotting the World Cup, Donald Trump and Gianni Infantito and their greed and their disgusting behavior may have now just fully destroyed the World Cup.

18:17Ben Meiselas:They took the World Cup and they said, hey, you know what? Seen people brought people together. People were bringing joy. Let's destroy that because that's what these Epstein class oligarchs do all of the time. I'll just I'll just note this also. There was a global health summit that just took place in Africa. So the State Department did a presentation at a global AIDS conference in Brazil. and they displayed a fully inaccurate map of Africa at this global health summit. A State Department presentation at a global AIDS conference in Brazil featured a map mislabeling every African nation as officials blamed hasty edits and AI tools for the blunder like literally every country they put in the wrong place on the map right there.

19:08Ben Meiselas:There you have it, everybody. will keep you posted each step of the way. Wanted to give you the full roundup of the morning, okay? Hit subscribe. Oh, by the way, if you can pre-order WTF America and put in the comments that you did the pre-order, the publisher tells us that there's a good amount of momentum, but they really want these pre-orders before September so we can know where we do our book tour. So if you're planning on buying it, If you can get it now, it helps us coordinate how we're going to spend our time, where we're going to go to and all of that. So it helps a lot to do it now versus waiting until October.

19:52Ben Meiselas:Thanks everybody for watching. We appreciate you. Hit subscribe. Let's get to 7 million subscribers. Thank you, everybody. Before you go, our book, WTF America, is available for pre-order now. It's the story of how we got here and how we fight our way back. To pre-order, scan the QR code or click the link in the description. Let's do this.

From the publisher

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on Donald Trump’s catastrophic Thursday as all his bluffs, domestic and foreign, get called.

Pre-order the new book from MeidasTouch, WTF America?!: The Way Out of This Hell and Back to Democracy, today: https://bit.ly/wtfamericayoutube

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